When God is distant
In the wake of October 7th, I found myself repeatedly quoting a powerful idea of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik on one of the passages we recite in the Haggadah (The Seder Night: An Exalted Evening, p. 45).
Right before we read the passage of the Four Children, we praise God. In and of itself, this wouldn’t be remarkable – were it not for the choice of name used for God.
Barukh ha-Makom, Barukh Hu! “Blessed is the Makom, Blessed is He.”
The Haggadah abandons all of our typical names for God in favor of a more obscure one, refering to God as the Makom. And while English Haggadot offer a variety of different translations here, R. Soloveitchik favors its literal translation.
Ha-Makom literally means “the Place,” an incredibly abstract way of characterizing God. We’re most familiar with it from kedushah, in which we quote the prophet Yeḥezkel. After experiencing a vision in which God instructs him to speak to the exiled Jewish people, Yeḥezkel hears kol ra‘ash gadol, “a great roaring sound,” that declares barukh kevod Hashem mi-mekomo, “Blessed is the Glory of God in its place” (Ezek. 3:12).
For R. Soloveitchik, the fact that God as the Makom was experienced specifically by Yeḥezkel, of all the prophets, is key – because Yeḥezkel was a prophet of exile. In contrast to other prophets, who lived during Temple times, Yeḥezkel lived after the Temple had been destroyed.
Yeḥezkel was thus confronted by the loss of God’s presence – by the vast chasm between humans and the divine. Following the Temple’s destruction, God was no longer perceived as a close, intimate companion but a distant Deity, “hidden,” in the words of R. Soloveitchik, “by many veils of transcendence.”
We perceive God as the Makom at specific moments when He feels distant. When we relate to Him as our God who is somewhere far away, over there – still hearing our prayers, still attentive to our needs – but far less close than we’d like.
And that’s why, says R. Soloveitchik, we invoke this term when consoling mourners. Ha-Makom yenaḥem etkhem, “May the Place comfort you,” because we acknowledge and validate the fact that, at this moment of mourning and loss, their sense of intimacy with God may feel weaker: when mourning, God may seem a distant Deity.
And, as R. Soloveitchik stresses, this also explains the Haggadah’s curious choice of language here. At this point in the Seder, we’re supposed to see ourselves as slaves trapped in Egypt. We’re supposed to see ourselves as the Jewish people before God came to them and redeemed them. And thus, we speak of God the way an oppressed slave may relate to Him: as a distant Makom. God still watches over and protects us – but the sense of intimacy is missing.
I’ve found myself leaning into this idea more and more since October 7th – because I think it’s important for people to realize that, not only is their theological pain valid at a time like this, but that Judaism legitimizes such beliefs. We aren’t forced to be happy-clappy at all times.
And the power of this understanding is amplified by the fact that we also refer to God as ha-Makom when saying Aḥeinu, the prayer in which we ask Him to save those being held hostage. Here, too, our prayers validate our dissonance: we beg God to act and free the hostages but do so from a place of pain – the very fact that Jews are being held in captivity weakens our sense of intimacy with God.
Nonetheless, despite all I have just said, the past few months have made me realize that I need an additional understanding of why we refer to God as ha-Makom here. R. Soloveitchik’s understanding has been my default for so long – I’ve always found it so powerful that I’ve never really looked for any other interpretation.
But, personally, as validating as R. Soloveitchik’s interpretation is, I’ve found myself needing a new perspective – one that helps me reframe ha-Makom. My pain is validated, my shock and trauma legitimized, but now I need something different to help me translate my grief into a different energy.
Which led me to a beautiful interpretation of Rabbi Meir Goldwicht, one of the roshei yeshiva at Yeshiva University, in his Haggadah entitled Meir Panim. For R. Goldwicht, God as ha-Makom signifies an entirely different relationship between us and Him.
Because the idea that God is in a specific place need not imply a forced distance between Him and us, but an intentional act in which God leaves us space to be His partner. He is the Place – He has His own control over the world – but He leaves us our own space to cultivate.
God as ha-Makom validates our grief, pain, and trauma when understood as R. Soloveitchik does, but the understanding of R. Goldwicht gives us another way to process those emotions: to work towards improving the space God has left for us, doing whatever (little) we can to make the world a little brighter – no matter how dark it may seem.