For me, and I suspect for many people, the most moving moment in the Jewish circumcision ritual, the Brit Milah (or more commonly in the Yiddish pronunciation, the Bris) is the moment when the rabbi or the mohel after the circumcision itself says the phrase ze ha-katon, gadol yihiyeh— “may this little one become big.” Perhaps the power of this sentence is in its simplicity—four easy Hebrew words. As they are written in the text, the word “may” does not even appear. Legitimately, “may” is understood and it’s found in most translations (After all, this formula appears toward the end of a prayer and is addressed to God. In the liturgy of Edot ha-Mizrah—Sephardic Jews mostly of the Mediterranean world—the four Hebrew words translate as “May God cause this little one to grow big,” clearly showing the formula as a prayer.)
Yet taking the words literally they have a different feel: “this little one will become big.” As if “will” is in italics! Baldly stated like that, we may be reminded at the same time of the exact opposite—not every little one does make it to being big. Fortunately, in our time, at least in first-world nations, the infant mortality rate has declined dramatically over time, but for most of Jewish history, those four Hebrew words must have resonated with particular emotion. (And not even that long ago: my grandmothers on both sides lost children before the age of five.) Doesn’t it suggest that saying it so strongly, so definitively, one is trying to make it happen—this child will grow to adulthood?
I am reminded of something that I heard my late JTS colleague the theologian Neil Gillman say. He was talking about the experience of going to a Bris in which the person performing the circumcision, the mohel, was a veritable Catskills comedian. He had a quick one-liner for every moment in the ceremony. And the crowd was heartily entertained. Neil was actually offended by that “performance.” He thought that it was completely wrong. The Bris, he asserted, was a joyful moment but not a joking moment. At the Bris, this infant was being initiated into the Jewish people, through a ritual as old as the Torah. Could anything be more monumental? And I would add, it was a fraught moment because no one can foretell any 8-day old child’s future, even in our world.
I have Brit Milah a bit on my mind these days because just six weeks ago I participated in the Bris of our first grandchild, Ezra Misha Locke-Holtz. I had the honor of being the sandek, the godfather (but not in a Marlon Brando kind of way), and I was given the role of reading aloud the passage in which the infant’s name is first said and the phrase ze ha-katon, gadol yihiyeh is spoken a few moments later.
And that brings me to Elul. Being at your grandson’s Bris, it turns out, is a pretty good way to lead one into Elul. And in turn into the Days of Awe. One of the great themes of the High Holidays is the recognition that there are things beyond our control, that as much as we have to live our lives with a sense of agency, with a belief that our actions are able to affect our destiny—our liturgy reminds us that a fundamental humility is also what our tradition asks of us. Our ancestors saw all this as being within God’s purview and although free will is given to us, we are like small boats on a large sea. That recognition is brought home every year as we recite the Netanah Tokef: “Who shall live and who shall die; who will rise up and who will be brought down. . . .” Even we, even now wherever we are in our life’s journey, are like the baby at his Bris, little as we are, we pray that we too will grow bigger.
