Parshat Ha’azinu is Moses’ great song — lofty, poetic, and weighty. And after the High Holidays, with all their intensity, I think we could use a lighter song of our own.
So let me share with you one of the Bible’s lesser-known gifts: baseball. You didn’t know baseball was in the Torah? It’s right there in the opening words of B’reishit: “In the (beginning) big inning.” And which inning is the big inning? The 7th, of course — because on the 7th day, God took a 7th inning stretch.
Now, before anyone groans — yes, this is one of my “regular” jokes. I’ve told it in the past, and I’ve even preached a version of the rest of this sermon a few times over the years. But like the best family stories told around the holiday table, we tell them again not because we’ve forgotten them, but because they still taste sweet every time.
So let’s pick it up from here — because according to midrash, right after that 7th inning stretch, God saw that creation was not yet complete. And God said: “Let the cocoa tree put forth its fruit, each seed after its kind.” And it was so. And the tree brought forth seeds — some for dark chocolate and some for milk chocolate. And God tasted the chocolate, and behold, it was very good. And God blessed the chocolate. And there was evening, and there was morning, the eighth day.
Some say that when Adam and Eve were expelled from Eden, God gave them chocolate — dark to remind them of loss, milk to give them hope. And perhaps that is why the scientific name of the cacao tree is Theobroma Cacao — “food of the gods.” (Though some have called it the food of the devil — but the theological basis for that is a little shaky.)
Over the generations, our scholars discovered that chocolate is more than food. It is a symbol of hope. It is the gift of lovers, the comfort of soldiers, the sweetness given to a child who has little else. Chocolate has a language all its own, a word understood in every tongue — even, they say, at the Tower of Babel.
And some have taught that chocolate is a metaphor for the Jewish people. Wrapped in gold at a fancy bar mitzvah, or tucked into a simple shiva basket, the taste is always the same. Just as the essence of Jewish faith remains the same, no matter how we wrap it. Chocolate melts and takes on many forms — gelt, kisses, hearts — just as we Jews have taken many shapes: Ashkenazi, Sephardi, Mizrachi; Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, secular. The forms may differ, but the essence is unchanged.
So as you savor chocolate chunk ice cream, or a piece of fudge on your plate, remember that chocolate carries something divine. Slip a piece into a pocket — M&Ms are safest there — and let it remind you of Shabbat, this weekly taste of the world to come. Give it to your children and grandchildren, watch their faces light up, and remember those children for whom one square of chocolate may be the only sweetness they know.
In times of sorrow, bring chocolate to console the mourner. In times of joy, share it with the bride and groom. For as it is written: God tasted the chocolate, and it was good.