The Year’s Labors Before Us: Nitzavim

The Year’s Labors Before Us

D’var Torah for Parashat Nitzavim

By Rabbi Boaz D. Heilman

It’s Labor Day weekend, and it’s also Shabbat Nitzavim.  This combination can only signify one thing—the end of summer and the oncoming of the High Holy Days.  Parashat Nitzavim (Deut. 29:9—31:30) always comes around at this season, and indeed, in less than a week, we will be congregating for our Rosh HaShanah services, welcoming in the New Year with prayer, but also with apprehension. 

For who knows what the New Year will bring?

Unlike Rosh HaShanah, one of the oldest of all our holidays, Labor Day was established much more recently, in 1894.  And yet, for such a recent holiday, it has lost a good part of its original purpose.  Created in recognition of the contributions of workers to our society, Labor Day has become a calendar holiday, a de-facto declaration that summer is over.  Rather than celebrating and honoring workers, it’s a day for families to gather for one last barbecue, one last outing to our favorite vacation spot, whether it be the beach, a lake, mountainside or just the backyard.

And so it is good on this Labor Day to remember some of the original purpose for which it was created.  Today, there are still workers who are paid little more than minimum pay and yet are expected to survive and even get ahead in this society.  I wonder where health care is on their budget, and wholesome food (not the kind that they are hired to fry and serve), not to mention the clothes their children need for that all-important first day back at school.  As we speak, this weekend, fast-food workers throughout the country are staging a protest, demanding “living wage.”  Think about that as you get your Coke-burger-and-a-fry midnight snack at you local Burger King or McDonald’s drive-thru window tonight. 

How timely is the Torah’s reminder this week, that, in a few days time we will all be facing God’s scrutinizing judgment.  For with parashat  Nitzavim we find ourselves standing together, rich and poor alike, for the swearing-in ceremony.  We are gathered, at Moses’s command, to stand before God as we once stood at the foot of Mt. Sinai.  We, our ancestors as well as our descendants, from the most powerful down to the lowliest of menial workers, each of us on this day stands ready to enter into the Covenant between God and Israel.  It is to be an everlasting bond that will join us all, regardless of color, size or Klout score, and shape us into one community.  The Covenant will make of us one nation, one people, each of us responsible not only to his or her own task, but also to the fellow human beings standing before us, behind us, and to our sides. 

All equal before God’s presence.

The equality of all human beings and the communal responsibilities we owe one another are perhaps the two most important lessons of the Torah.

So on this Labor Day, as we gather with our families, yes, by all means, let us all enjoy this last fling with summer.  But let us keep in mind also that so much work, so much labor, yet remains ahead of us.  Facing the future, attentive to the command to be holy to our God, let’s pledge anew our purpose and mission as God’s People—to make this world a better place for all its inhabitants.  Not only for us, mind you, but for all its inhabitants. 

One and all, alike.

© 2013 by Boaz D. Heilman