Hallelujah Hineni–I Am Here
This morning I am going to talk about two words.
The first is Hallelujah—Praise the Lord.
You might have seen a link that I posted on Facebook this past week showing the opening skit from last week’s Saturday Night Live in which Kate McKinnon, in her spot-on Hillary Clinton impersonation, sits at the piano and sings Leonard Cohen’s haunting ballad, “Hallelujah.”
I did my best, it wasn’t much
I couldn’t feel, so I tried to touch
I’ve told the truth, I didn’t come to fool you
And even though It all went wrong
I’ll stand before the Lord of Song
With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah
She does not employ humor or satire, only raw emotion. And at the end she says, “I’m not giving up and neither should you.”
This segment touched my soul in ways that I cannot describe—but I know from the reaction of so many of my friends and acquaintances that I am not alone in this experience.
The juxtaposition of Cohen’s death and the perplexing election added to the poignancy of this moment, but I would like to suggest that such a performance would have been powerful even if the world had not lost the prolific poet last week.
Leonard Cohen may be best known for “Hallelujah,” which has been recorded by over 300 artists, but his songbook offers countless lyrical expressions and reflections. For me, what is most attractive about Cohen’s work is that it often references Jewish texts. Seen through the lens of Hallelujah, Cohen expertly weaves stories of the flawed King David into the text, returning to the refrain of Hallelujah, thus extending the tradition of the psalms which are attributed to David, and also often return to the refrain Hallelujah.
Cohen’s friend Leon Wieseltier recounted the following anecdote in a story earlier this week: His young son had asked what inspired Hallelujah, and Cohen offered in response, “I wanted to stand with those who clearly see God’s holy broken world for what it is and still find the courage or the heart to change it.
Hallelujah—Praise God—not because the world is perfect or your life is ideal. Rather, Hallelujah, because the world is broken, yet we have the ability to repair it.
Before I turn to the second word, let’s sit for a moment with this week’s parsha. While it is not part of our triennial reading this year, the harrowing story of the binding of Isaac—akedat Yitzhak– is found in parshat vayera. Our text presents Abraham bringing his son atop Mount Moriah in order to offer him as a sacrifice to God. At the last minute a ram appears and God tells Abraham to offer it instead. This text has been explored from every angle and has been the subject of countless works of poetry, art and music. Each year as we approach Parshat Vayera I revisit Cohen’s intense, “Story of Isaac:”
The door it opened slowly,
My father he came in,
I was nine years old
And he stood so tall above me,
His blue eyes they were shining
And his voice was very cold.
He said, “I’ve had a vision
And you know I’m strong and holy,
I must do what I’ve been told…”
Well, the trees they got much smaller,
The lake a lady’s mirror,
We stopped to drink some wine.
Then he threw the bottle over.
Broke a minute later
And he put his hand on mine.
Thought I saw an eagle
But it might have been a vulture,
I never could decide.
In a few short lines we encounter vices in the form of fundamentalism and alcoholism. The parent child relationship, is presented as tense if not wholly fractured. The unique story of our patriarchs’ family becomes the story of all, and an ancient seemingly inaccessible narrative jumps into our contemporary era. Cohen was a master of midrash. Indeed he even addresses one of the oft discussed matters of the incident—that is, how old was Isaac at the time? While the experience would have been traumatic at any age, we can likely agree that the trauma would have manifested differently at different ages. Our text does not name Isaac’s age, and our commentators have offered suggestions ranging from as young as 4 to as old as 40. For Cohen, he was 9.
The text of the Akedah includes three instances of the second word I’d like to discuss, “hineni.”
There is no adequate English equivalent for Hineni—it is most often translated as “I am here” or “Here I am.” The commentary in our Lev Shalem Mahzor explains that “the term indicates readiness, attentiveness, receptivity and responsiveness to instructions. It serves as a kind of refrain throughout the Akedah.” First, prior to the instructions for the offering of Isaac, God calls to Abraham and he replies, “hineni.” Later, as Isaac is perhaps beginning to sense what is going on atop Moriah, he calls out “Avi—Father,” and again Abraham responds “Hineni” Finally, as Abraham is holding the knife to offer his son in sacrifice an angel of the Lord calls to him, and again, he responds “Hineni.”
This week, the repetition of Hineni triggered for me a connection to Cohen’s final masterpiece. Hineni became the central theme of the song “You Want it Darker,” found on Cohen’s final album released days before Rosh Hashanah this year. It has been suggested that this was Cohen’s “Last Lecture,” a culminating piece of wisdom to prepare himself and his audience for his impending death. Those fluent in the language of our liturgy picked up this theme immediately. Magnified, sanctified, be thy holy name—Friends, if you know any Aramaic, it is this phrase—Yitgadal v’yitkadish shmei rabbah.
He goes on, “hineni, hineni, I am ready Lord.” Throughout the song, this repeats, and in the background you can hear what sounds like a hazzan chanting Hineni as well.
Hineni—I am ready Lord.
Hineni and Hallelujah are two untranslatable terms, yet Cohen brings both to life. Hineni is a statement of presence and preparedness.
Hallelujah is not an expression of blind praise for the Divine. Rather “hallelujah” offers an opportunity to recognize our potential in conjunction with the fractured world we inhabit. And, to bring us full circle—
Hallelujah…Hineni, two sides of the same coin—
I’m not giving up and neither should you.
Shabbat Shalom