We begin Shabbat morning on the inspiring note Ma Tovu: “How wonderful are your tents, Jacob, your abodes, Israel.” In response to this collective complement, we individually express our feelings about having entered the synagogue, the House of G-d. “I, by Your great love, enter Your home, and bow down in reverence before Your holy shrine.”
“Love” we understand (or at least we think we do—more on that later). But “reverence” (literally, “fear”) is harder for us to wrap our heads around. “Fearing G-d” just isn’t our strong suit. But that’s because we rarely face reality squarely. If you aren’t in fear of the Master of Life and Death, you aren’t paying attention.
Here’s a visual aid. Google J.M.W. Turner’s Snow Storm: Hannibal Crossing the Alps, one of the greatest early modern paintings. As the title indicates, it depicts Hannibal and his elephants crossing the Alps to attack Rome. But in the process, and far more dominantly, it depicts the unthinking power of the natural world. Massive mountains, avalanches, swirling maelstroms of black and white. The painting is rather large (about 71/2 feet wide by 5 feet tall). But Hannibal and his elephants—the legendary army facing the might of Rome– are only about 4 inches high, almost invisible until you get up close to the painting. In Turner’s vision, they are dwarfed by the power of the natural world.
And so to is it for us. Whatever power we imagine ourselves to have, “Mann tracht un G-tt lacht,” (“People plan, and G-d laughs”). When we face the power of the universe square on, in particular when we face our own mortality, and that of those we love, when we stand humbled and powerless in “G-d’s holy abode,” fear seems like the only reasonable response.
At the same time, though, when we truly face the realities that evoke fear, it enhances our ability to truly feel love. All that makes us feel “at home”—whether our own home or G-d’s home—becomes so much more precious. Yes, the universe displays awesome power—but so does the laughter of children, the smell of honeysuckle, the wag of your dog’s tail, the touch of a loved one.
My teacher Rabbi Yochanan Muffs z”l has demonstrated that “to love and fear G-d” come together in Jewish thought as a metaphor for heightened consciousness and complete concentration. Ma tovu reminds us that prayer is like a magnifying glass. It allows us to see reality—all of reality–in heightened detail. Whether we are beloved guests in G-d’s home, or trembling visitors in G-d’s holy palace, the point of the exercise is to become fully alive.