Dear Friends,
This past week I have been sitting with words from Degel Mahaneh Efraim, a Hasidic collection of teachings written by Reb Moshe Chayim Efraim of Sudilkov (1748–1800), the grandson of the Ba’al Shem Tov. He teaches, “A stranger has no one to connect with and be close to. They have no one to whom they can tell all that happens to them and all that is in their heart, no friend, neither Jew nor gentile. But as soon as they see another stranger, a friend, they tell each other everything… It is known that the Holy Blessed One is like a stranger in the world.”
It’s a piercing description of loneliness and displacement. To be a ger – a stranger, an immigrant, a newcomer – is to be without an anchor, without people, without safety. And yet, the Degel suggests that that is exactly where God is. The Shechinah, God’s presence, drifts through the world like a mother bird in search of a nest, waiting to land in places where people will make space for her.
This kind of theological thought hits differently here in DC right now, where so many immigrants and asylum seekers are terrified and suffering. But our tradition does not stop at naming the loneliness. It insists that God dwells with the stranger. “You are but strangers residing with Me,” says God in Leviticus. To make space for the stranger is to make space for God. To welcome the immigrant is to create a landing place for the Shechinah.
This week’s parsha, Ki Teitzei, gives us the mitzvah of the mother bird: if you come upon a bird’s nest with the mother sitting over her young, you may not take them both. You must first send the mother away, so that “it may go well with you and you may live long.” (Deuteronomy 22:7) The Torah places compassion at the center of this mitzvah: we are asked to notice the vulnerability of a mother bird protecting her young, and to act with loving kindness.
The Zohar, and later the Degel Mahaneh Efraim, use this same image of the mother bird to describe the Shechinah, God’s presence, wandering and unsettled, searching for a place to rest. When we welcome the stranger, when we care for the displaced, we create a place for that mother bird to land.
Here in DC, families who have crossed deserts and oceans now find themselves in shelters, in tents, or waiting endlessly for court dates that will decide their fate. Parents hover protectively over their children, just like the mother bird — but in precarious, often unsafe conditions. Folks are swept up by ICE as they go about their daily work.
Rabbi Ebn Leader, who initially showed me this text from the Degel Machaneh Efraim, noted that the Zohar emphasizes that mitzvah (commandment) shares a root with tzavta (connection). It’s not just an obligation; it’s an invitation to relationship. When we make space for the ger, the stranger, the vulnerable in our city, we are making space for God’s own presence. The Degel lifts up a line from Psalm 121, “God is your shadow.” The movements we make toward compassion are mirrored by God above. If God is wandering with the stranger, I hope we can find ourselves volunteering, empathizing, and in community right there with them.
Shabbat shalom,
Rabbi Hannah