Rabbi Breit's Blog

Sometimes we wait too long to address our discomfort. We can’t pinpoint what’s bothering us, or we decide to let little things go until those little things seem to stack into a pile, or maybe we’re nervous to speak up. The result is usually problematic.

Imagine: maybe you’re hurrying somewhere, someone else made you late, you’re hot in the humidity (no imagination required here), you’re carrying something a little too heavy you probably should have left home, you need the restroom, and there’s something stuck jabbing you in your eye. Then someone shouts your name. It’s a loved one. They are frustrated you’re walking too slowly.

Can you imagine?! Why, that’s it! The final straw! Now not only are you now telling them off for this interaction, but also everything else they ever did wrong that got you into this position in the first place. The complaints tumble out one after the other.

It’s normal, but it’s not great.

The Israelites do it in our parsha. They’ve really had it with the desert at this point. And, after Miriam’s death, they can’t find water. But they don’t just come to Moses to say 'help, we're thirsty'. No, too easy. They begin here: “If only we had perished when our brothers perished at the instance of the LORD!” And then add, “Why have you brought the LORD’s congregation into this wilderness for us and our beasts to die there? Why did you make us leave Egypt to bring us to this wretched place, a place with no grain or figs or vines or pomegranates? There is not even water to drink!”

Now that’s a stack of complaints. And it pushes Moses to the brink. He falls on his face before God, who tells him how to get water. Moses hears the instruction but then goes and hits a rock with a stick twice, shouting “Listen, you rebels, shall we get water for you out of this rock?!” The water flows. But God is angry. For this God forbids Moses and Aaron from ever entering the land of Israel.

What can we learn from this Torah? Everything went downhill. Maybe it can draw our attention to the dangers of choosing complaint when we are piling up internal grief. The Israelites are grieving the past — yes even the past where they were slaves in Egypt. They miss the few creature comforts they had. They grieve the easy blessed future they imagined when Moses first led them into Sinai. They need a good lament. Like our imagined initial scenario, there’s a lot of discomfort. And they haven’t accepted it because they don’t think it -ought- to be this way. Moses screwed it up! Without Moses, everything would have been great! They don’t lament their reality, they complain, because they think they’re entitled to better. They don't grieve, they grumble. The complaint stack is good indication you're not grieving, you're kvetching.

So the next time you’re schlepping, you’re cranky, you’re feeling done. Remind yourself this is the cost of the life you chose. Maybe let out a good bit of grief. But don’t build up complaints to stack and hand to the first person who dares approach you.