By Rabbi Naomi Goldman

What calls you this year? As the season shifts and the days get lighter or warmer, what do you feel drawn to? Is it family and the pull of the season? Is it work?  Going out into nature? Or perhaps the deeper work of the soul, or silence? This week we begin reading Vayikra, the central book of the Torah, when the narrative stops and we start to dig in to what our relationship with our Judaism is really all about. At the heart of this book is the injunction to love your neighbour as yourself, so love is in there somewhere. But it begins with a call – Vayikra means “and God called”.  And if someone or something is calling, we need to be able to listen.

Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi used to say that hearing God was like tuning a radio station – the voice is everywhere all the time, but unless we are tuned in, we won’t hear anything; it’ll just be white noise. We need to stop and take time to adjust the wavelength.  Sometimes the voice comes from inside us and then we need to listen to what our hearts are really saying in a deep way.

The idea of a vocation – that you might be called to do something specific that only you can do – comes from the Hebrew Bible, where God calls to Moses to reveal these laws and ritual practices to the people. It’s not the only place this happens. God calls to Abraham to leave his home and family and God calls to the Prophets to speak truth to power.

Listening to the call is about being present in this current moment. Given the times in which I live, what is going on, what am I being called upon to do right now? We all have different skills and abilities so the answer is likely to be unique to each one of us. You probably know, deep down, what you are being called to do. Perhaps you are already doing it. But if you have yet to work it out, then listen hard, and tune out the static. You might hear a voice calling.

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