“A Day That Burns Like A Furnace”: The Warning of Shabbat HaGadol
By the Prophet Malachi, Rabbi Arthur Waskow, Rabbi Nathan Martin, and Atara Saunders*
We are approaching Pesach, and Jewish tradition marks the approach with a special Haftarah to be chanted on the last Shabbat before the holyday begins. That Shabbat is known as Shabbat HaGadol, named after one word in the Haftarah, “the great.” Tonight and tomorrow are Shabbat HaGadol.
But especially in our own generation, we feel the whole Haftarah and because of it, the whole Shabbat, is indeed “Great.” Why? Here are the last words of the Prophet Malachi, the last of the ancient Hebrew Prophets. His words seem almost uncanny, spoken 2500 years ago in language that pierces our ears and hearts with astonishing precision and profundity:
“Here! The day is coming
That will flame like a furnace,“
Says the Infinite YHWH / Yahhhh,
The InterBreath of Life —
“When all the arrogant, all evil-doers,
root and branch,
will like straw be burnt to ashes.
“Yet for those of you who revere My Name,
Yes! My Name, Yahhhh, the Interbreath of Life!
a solar sun of justice will arise
with healing in its wings, its winds, its rays.
“Here! Before the coming
of the great [HaGadol] and awesome day
of YHWH/ the InterBreath of Life,
I will send you the Prophet Eli-Yah [Elijah]
[Whose name means “My God is the Breath of Life”]
to turn the hearts of elders to the youth
and the hearts of youth to elders,
lest I come and smite the earth
with utter destruction.
(Malachi 3:19-24)
We ourselves live in the day of Earth’s getting hotter and hotter, bringing on us plagues of fire, flood, famine, and in targeted neighborhoods of color and low-income, epidemics of asthma and cancer. All of us are suffering as in the days of Pharaoh, when the plagues ruined lives and livelihoods of all.
Our ancient forebears had to choose between “normal” — Pharaoh’s Army, slavery with meat and pickles — or the Unknown — the Sea and the Wilderness. They chose Freedom, which always tastes of the Unknown.
Today, as in Malachi’s prophetic words, Earth’s burning heat comes from the burning of fossil fuels. Those who survived in the ancient story were Yisrael (the people of Israel) who revered and wrestled with God. Today it will be villages, cities, whole countries whose people will be brave enough, who love the Breath of Life enough, to swiftly turn to solar and wind energy as remedy.
Today let us pause on Shabbat HaGadol, heed the words of the Prophet Malachi, and invite ourselves to shoulder the task of Elijah by taking active roles in the world for healing Earth, not devastating the next generation.
Perhaps we can even ask ourselves to find a support partner for climate action and share what single action we each will take to uphold the Elijah Covenant to turn toward each other, young and old, to heal the earth. The youth are already speaking out – the Jewish Youth Climate Movement, the Sunrise movement, Extinction Rebellion. Will we, the Elders, turn our hearts to them, our own grandchildren?
Were we to write a response to Malachi, it would sound like this:
“Here! we ourselves are coming
Before the terrible day
of smiting Earth —
For we ourselves shall turn the hearts
Of elders and youth to each other
So that this day of smiting
Does not fall upon us.”
*We three represent three generations of Jewish climate activists that the Prophet Malachi calls to turn their hearts to each other: Rabbi Arthur Waskow, founder and director of The Shalom Center, is 90 years old; Rabbi Nathan Martin, associate rabbi of Congregation Beth Israel in Media PA and former Board chair of Pennsylvania Interfaith Power and Light is 58 years old; and Atara Saunders, a student at Drexel University, is 21 years old.