My favorite scene from the original Star Wars movie is not the light saber fight between Obi Wan Kenobi and Darth Vader or the proton torpedo shot that destroys the Death Star, but instead the near-death experience that the four central heroes – Luke, Hans, Leia and Chewy – have in a garbage chute. With the walls caving in on them, and the slimy worm like creature called the dianoga pulling Luke under the refuse, the situation looks grim. At the last second, R2D2 with the help of C3PO manages to stop the mechanism, saving his friends from their horrific fate.
In almost every story, there is always a moment when all could be lost, and, somehow, miraculously it isn’t. These Near-Death Experiences (NDEs) are what give the central characters of any story the strength and the faith to persevere. The famous Crossing of the Sea we read about in this week’s Torah portion, Beshalach is just such a moment. Pressed between their own version of a trash compactor, with the Pharaoh and the Egyptian Army forming one of the walls and the Dead Sea the other, our ancestors’ situation is dire. Just like in Star Wars: A New Hope, we can feel the walls caving in with nothing to stop them, until Moses raises his staff and the waters finally part. It doesn’t take the magic of Cecil B. DeMille to truly feel the tension of that moment in history.
We have all had moments where we looked disaster in the face and somehow prevailed. They need not be Near-Death Experiences to be an existential crisis. Now that the Buffalo Bills season is over, we can all take a deep breath for all the times this past season they should have failed, but somehow pulled victory out of the grasp of defeat, and, of course, the one time, they were not able to do so. This is why the last game hurts so much more, but also why the season was so spectacular, nonetheless. One day, God willing, it will go our way, and we will find a way our way to the football Promised Land. In the meantime, always remember what the characters in Star Wars taught us, sometimes we must go through the muck to make our way to glory. May it be so, may it be so!
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Alex