Torah Goes Hollywood Goes to the Olympics
TGH takes a special trip today — to Beijing for the Winter Olympics. How did we get in, you say, with all these covid restrictions? Such is the power of Torah Going Hollywood. Check us out here, and you’ll see what the Chinese health authorities saw and be similarly enchanted.
Now for some Torah wisdom that will make your rock curl.
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Like the Valentine’s Day flowers really meant for your neighbor, the beginning of this week’s Torah portion is a giant awkward misunderstanding. The text begins “v'atah ti'tzaveh et b’nei Yisrael… l’ha’alot ner tamid" — “and you should command the Israelites [to take for you pure beaten olive oil] to raise a ner tamid." And of course the question is what is a ner tamid and for what cause exactly should it be taken?
King James gonna King James, so it translates this as "for the lamp to burn always," giving rise to the common English phrase "an eternal flame" and the widespread belief that the flame in the Tabernacle was a light that never went out.
But "tamid" likely doesn’t mean always — it probably means consistently. In other words, this was a light that was regularly lit at night (and extinguished in the morning), not always burning.
(It’s odd that this mistranslation persists, since a few verses later Aaron and his sons are instructed to arrange the burning "from evening to morning," pretty much clinching the fact that it’s a part-time deal. A later story in Samuel confirms this is how it went down — it was a nighttime light.)
Rashi himself considers both possibilities, asking if the “tamid” is like that for a certain sacrifice (consistent) or the Tabernacle Sabbath bread (ongoing). Many modern translators go with a “persistent light” or something to that effect.
Alright, so why am I going on about lights and the duration thereof? Well, the idea of a light that burns for 12 hours instead of 24 isn’t just a question of energy conservation. In fact, I’d suggest there’s a pretty big philosophical difference between a light whose purpose is to never to go out and a light whose purpose is to be kindled regularly. Put simply? it’s the difference between a symbol of constancy and the act of being consistent.
A flame that never goes out has symbolic value — “there is a divine presence that is always here,” it says. But when we need to light it every night, it shifts the burden to us; it says that it’s on the humans to recall these lofty messages and undertake creativity on a regular basis. Translate it like King LeBron and you’re saying that the flame is being lit for us to observe. Translate it like its more probable meaning and it’s something even more powerful — we must create the light.
It would have been very easy to let the flame burn all the time. But that would defeat the purpose. The priests needed to find a way, every night, to illuminate the darkness. And the next morning they had to put out the fire, trusting they’d be able to light it again that night.
The idea of a light rekindled at regular intervals brings us — where else? — right here to the Olympics. The tradition of lighting the Olympic torch and then relaying it to the host city has a rich history, dating back to the 1936 Summer Games. (It’s a little more modified now, but that’s another story.) For decades the flame would go from place to place before ultimately lighting a cauldron in the host city at the Games’ opening.
The flame at the Olympics, I’d suggest, has a similar purpose to the flame in the Tabernacle: to underscore humans’ role in authoring this world. Over the years the Olympic flame has been transported in some truly remarkable ways: by camel, by canoe, by Concorde. Once it even went by radio signal. (It triggered a laser.) Not for nothing is the relay route itself designed to follow a path of human achievement, passing through cities known for exactly that.
Stolen from the gods by Prometheus in Greek mythology, the very idea of the flame is to highlight what humans can do, our ingenuity. The power to be creative, lofty, transcendent, is quite literally in our hands — just like the nightly flame at the Tabernacle.
And then at the end of the Games, the light is extinguished. Also like the Tabernacle. For something that burns all the time may as well not burn at all.
That idea is encapsulated by one of the great writers of holy texts, Morrissey of The Smiths. In “There Is a Light That Never Goes Out” Morrissey sings, with his trademark black wit, of humans’ power to create its strongest emotion, love, and uses the consistent-flame metaphor to make the point.
As the character sings of his desire to be with someone on a magical night: “And if a double-decker bus/Crashes into us/To die by your side/Is such a heavenly way to die.” As long as he’s on this earth — even if it’s just for a few more hours — the character in the song says he’ll make sure to create love, will make sure the light won’t go out.
And in a way, he suggests, that love is stronger and brighter precisely because it does go out — because it lasts only for the night and is out by morning. Just like — you see where this is going by now — the Tabernacle light.
[Also related, in a rather different musical vein: The Bangles 1980’s Top 40 hit “Eternal Flame,” used for a similar purpose of love. “Close your eyes, give me your hand, darling. Do you feel my heart beating? Do you understand? Do you feel the same? Am I only dreaming? Is this burning an eternal flame?” The regular beat, the consistent return, is what makes love love and humans who they are. Oh and the song notes, “I watch you when you are sleeping.” It, too, is a nighttime thing.”]
I thought of this idea of a light being more meaningful when it’s put out and rekindled while watching Shaun White at the Games this week. The most exciting and decorated snowboarder of all time, as you may have been following, was back for one last shot at a medal before retiring. He almost didn’t qualify for the halfpipe finals but eked it out on his last run.
As he was being interviewed leaving the mountain, White was asked about getting a day off between then and the finals. Wouldn’t it be better, White was asked, to just compete again the next day and keep the momentum going?
He actually didn’t mind, he said. Being away for a day would make him come back stronger, would make the finals more meaningful. The light, in other words, had to go out. And that would make him rekindle it that much more brightly.
Thank you for reading.