Rabbi Michael Strassfeld "The Challenge of Modernity"

There is a statement in the Talmud Yerushalmi that describes the Torah as being black fire written on white fire. Over the centuries this phrase has been explained in a variety of ways. They all begin with an image of the fire you can see (the black fire) and the fire you can't see (the white fire). One interpretation is that the black fire is the letters of the written Torah and the white is the Oral Torah. For Jewish mystics, the white fire is the hidden meanings of the Torah that lie beneath the written text.

I want to suggest a new interpretation for our time. The white fire is the larger world around us. Without the white spaces the Torah can not be read. Without the white fire the Torah would be lacking a larger context.

. . .

I want to suggest that modernity is the opportunity and the challenge to be touched by both the black fire and the white fire. It is also to understand that the real truth is we always have read the white letters. We always interacted with the world around us even when hindered by the walls of the ghetto. Now the walls are down. We are free of the limitations of so many centuries. Reading only the black letters is an inadequate response to the world we live in.

. . .

It will not be easy but without reading both the black fire and the white fire we are misunderstanding the nature of Torah. The Midrash says that God looked into the Torah and created the world. It doesn't say God looked into the Torah and created the Jewish people or just the land of Israel. The whole world is Torah's context. After all, the Torah begins not with the Exodus or even with Abraham and Sarah. It begins with creation and Adam and Eve.

.

. . . at least in America, we have the possibility of exploring Torah as it was meant to be-in the fullness of God's intention---black fire on white fire.