Rabbi Daniel Greyber, Beth El Synagogue - "The Exile of Sadness"
Rabbi Daniel Greyber serves at Beth El Synagogue in Durham, NC. This contribution is a sermon that he recently shared with his faith community. "The Exile of Sadness" A sickness afflicts modernity; we exile sadness. Time after time, people sit in my office or stand with me at the cemetery and, when they start to cry, they apologize, as if tears are a turpitude and sadness a sin. These apologies are a symptom of an emotional illness that plagues our society. Emotional health is the ability to rejoice in happy times, like a wedding or or when a baby is born and it is to feel sadness when someone dies or is sick or when our marriage is ending or we are estranged from those we love. But we apologize for our tears. Jewish tradition tells a story. When the Temple was destroyed in 70 CE, God cried. An angel, Metatron, plead with God, “Let me cry instead.” God responds, “If you do not leave me to cry, I will enter somewhere you cannot enter and I will cry.” Metatron is ashamed of Go