If you haven’t read Monday’s Kavanah, please check your inbox and do so before reading this reflection.

“Hadestown” is a tragedy. At the end, the lovers are separated, the sun still burns the land dry in summer, and the rains of winter are too short to provide relief. The workers toil endlessly and poverty endures. In short, very little has changed. And yet, the last number suggests we raise a glass to Orpheus. In this song we hear phrases like:

Some birds sing when the sun shines bright
Our praise is not for them
But the ones who sing in the dead of night
We raise our cups to them

And

Some flowers bloom
Where the green grass grows
Our praise is not for them
But the ones who bloom in the bitter snow
We raise our cups to them

In a performance filled with meaning, these last words provided the culmination to the story and capture what is most Jewish about this musical masterpiece. We are a people that waited 2,000 years to return to the land of our birth. Two thousand years is 50 generations, during which we endured exile, persecution, despair, and poverty, and yet, we endured and hoped. We prayed facing Jerusalem and we said: “If I forget you O Jerusalem…” in Psalm 137. Like the complex substance of “Hadestown,” this compelling Psalm is both a song of hope and a song of tragedy. The juxtaposition of these two motifs reminds us that hope is possible even in the midst of despair.

The problems facing our world can overwhelm us. Even this past weekend, the words of hate plastered on a rented truck in West Hollywood alarm us.  We could be forgiven our despondency, and yet, our praise is for the “ones who sing in the dead of night,” who remember Jerusalem in exile. Despite the enduring and endemic challenges of our world, we refuse to give up on ourselves and others. Lord Rabbi Jonathan Sacks said it powerfully: “We are what we choose to be. Society is what we choose to make it. The future is open. There is nothing inevitable in the affairs of humankind.” (read the full essay here)

How can we be agents of hope in a world that is so often dark? That is the essential Jewish question.

—Rabbi Ron Stern