After more than six weeks locked down in our homes, with businesses shut, it is natural that we are feeling restless and anxious to get on with our lives.
This is the fourth week of the counting of the Omer. We count seven weeks from Passover to Shavuot. These 49 days link the two holidays together. We ascend over the seven weeks from becoming a free people during the Exodus to becoming God’s servants through receiving the Torah.
In Kabbalah — Jewish Mysticism — each week in the counting of the Omer corresponds to a different sefirah (one of the ten aspects of the Divine through which God’s light is channeled as it flows through our world and our souls). By meditating on the week’s sefirah , we draw that dimension of God’s spirit into our soul and are nurtured by it.
This week’s sefirah is Netzach. The word is often translated as “victory” or “eternity,” but a better translation might be “endurance.” It is the power to overcome all obstacles, the persistence and focus we need in order to succeed.
Netzach is not about rising above the moment. It is not the strength of the sprinter. It is the strength of the marathon runner who pushes on relentlessly over the long term, determined to meet his/her goal. When we draw down God’s Netzach into our soul, God graces us with the fortitude to surmount the long-term challenges we face.
Rabbi Min Kantrowitz writes: ” Netzach is like spiritual fuel… Helping us get through difficult times with grace, Netzach is available during the bumpy events of ordinary times and the dramatic and unavoidable traumas of life.”
We could surely use some Netzach now, as we face the long road that lies ahead of us in dealing with this pandemic. After more than six weeks locked down in our homes, with businesses shut, it is natural that we are feeling restless and anxious to get on with our lives. It also makes sense that we worry about the impact of this crisis on the economy, the stock market and our own finances. But if we rush back too fast, we jeopardize both ourselves and others. It would be wise of us to pray that God imbues us with Netzach, so that we stay focused not on this moment, but on the long road that lies ahead.
In Kabbalah, Netzach is also about the ability to overcome obstacles that stand in the way of our being instruments for bringing God’s Chesed -Kindness into the world. As our anxiety over our challenges rises, there is a temptation to turn our focus only on ourselves. Just looking after our own needs is hard enough and sufficiently tiring that we lack the energy and will to attend to the concerns and needs of others. Under the weight of stress, we can become less patient, less giving, less accepting. In this sense too, we need Netzach now, enabling us to be stubbornly persistent in always showing patience and kindness to one another in word and deed.