A Letter to Elijah

Passover 2020/5780

Dear Elijah,

Our tradition has so much to say about you. We call you at the end of each Shabbat to bring about a time that is all Shabbat, when we will be one with each other and with the environment. We call to you at each bris and baby naming, to speedily arrive so that our newborns will know a world of peace – where gun violence and poverty are unknown. We call to you now on Passover, as we have done throughout our lives, opening the door and praying you will walk through and tell us that redemption is on its way – redemption from hate, from scarcity, from illness.

Elijah, this pandemic has pushed everyone to the edge – economically, physically, emotionally. If ever we understood our oneness and global connectedness it is today.

We know that bringing about a messianic time requires our readiness to receive you. Our Rabbis taught that you could be garbed as any homeless and hungry stranger on the street or as any patient in a hospital bed. That could be any one of us today. We see you in each other. We see you in ourselves.

This year, may you enter our doors and our hearts. For if we see our common humanity and set global healing as our collective goal toward which we daily work, then indeed you will come.

We hope to see you soon.

[Featured image by Kate Macate.]