Decalogue, Take Two!

So, in my last entry, I was talking about how I was the lay leader for Friday night services at Congregation Adas Emuno two weeks in a row, on August 8th and 15th, and gave you a run-down on what I did on the 8th. Well, as luck would have it, the parsha or Torah portion for the 15th, the second from the Book of Words, aka Devarim or Deutoronomy, is the portion that contains the second appearance of the Decalogue, aka the Ten Commandments. And as luck would really have it, I was lay leader for one Friday night last year in July when this was the exact same Torah portion. And in case you're wondering about the July/August disparity, the cycle of Torah readings follows the Hebrew calendar, which is a lunar calendar, which is why Jewish holidays sometimes come earlier or later relative to the secular calendar, or why secular holidays come earlier or later relative to the Jewish calendar, as do most Christian holidays, Easter being a notable exception.

So, anyway, the point being that I didn't have to do a whole lot of new preparation for the service, and as luck would have it (seems to be a lot of that going around), I also blogged about it. In fact, I did three blogs last year, starting by discussing the Ten Commandments, and ending with a summary of the service I led. So, for your convenience, here are the links in their correct chronological order:

The Ten Commandments

Va'etchanan

And I Prayed

There were just a couple of changes that I should note. First, this time I did read the section from Chapter 4 of Deutoronomy (in And I Prayed I explained that I had wanted to do it but decided not to because it would take too long; this time I wanted to make the point about how much repeated emphasis there is on the ban against graven images).

This time, I also added a reading before the Mourner's Kaddish, lyrics from a song by Leonard Cohen, If It Be Your Will:

If it be your will
That I speak no more
And my voice be still
As it was before
I will speak no more
I shall abide until
I am spoken for
If it be your will

If it be your will
That a voice be true
From this broken hill
I will sing to you
From this broken hill
All your praises
they shall ring
If it be your will
To let me sing
From this broken hill
All your praises
they shall ring
If it be your will
To let me sing

If it be your will
If there is a choice
Let the rivers fill
Let the hills rejoice
Let your mercy spill
On all these burning
hearts in hell
If it be your will
To make us well

And draw us near
And bind us tight
All your children here
In their rags of light
In our rags of light
All dressed to kill
And end this night
If it be your will

If it be your will.

Now of course I had heard of Leonard Cohen growing up, who back in those days didn't know the song Suzanne? But it wasn't until I started hanging with the poets on MySpace that I learned that he also has produced an extensive body of poetry, in addition to a large library of recorded music. He's kind of Canada's answer to Bob Dylan, and like Dylan, his work often draws on Jewish liturgy, themes, and sensibilities. That's certainly apparent in this song.

But what really got me hooked was the Leonard Cohen concert documentary, I'm Your Man, which features a variety of artists performing his songs, along with interviews and biographical material. And there was an amazing rendition of If It Be Your Will by a singer named Antony, reminiscent in his nonverbal kinesics of Joe Cocker, that was probably the highlight of the film, certainly of its most memorable moments. And through the miracle of YouTube, I can share this with you now:



Of course, there was no way to reproduce this kind of performance when all I did was a simple reading. But I was very pleased to learn, after services at the Oneg Shabbat (where we have wine, hallah, cake, and fruit), that two of my friends from Adas Emuno who were there that night, Michael and Fanny Fishbein, were also familiar with the documentary, and were also thinking of Antony singing this song. It was a fitting end to my two week run with the Book of Words, I think (and Michael did an excellent job of leading services this past Friday night, I should add).