Rabbi Weinberg's Elul Thought for the Day

Friday September 25
The unique coupling of the terms Avinu and Malkenu by Rabbi Akiva (Gemara Taanit 25b) which is the basis of the prayer known by that name which we have been reciting twice a day since Rosh Hashanna is genius, but raises some serious questions. How could Rabbi Akiva have paired these two terms when they are paradoxical and connote opposite kinds of relationships which are normally mutually exclusive? Father conjures a sense of love, affinity, and casualness whereas King conjures strict adherence to a hierarchical relationship that engenders fear and danger. Rabbi Dr. Jonathan Sacks in his commentary to the Rosh Hashana Machzor captures the difficulty of this paradox in a quote from Nobel Prize-winning physicist Neils Bohr.  Bohr once explained how the idea of his Complementary Theory of quantum physics came to be.  Bohr’s son had once confessed to having stolen an item from a local shop. In that very difficult moment that no parent ever wants to face, Bohr found himself pulled in two different emotional directions.  On the one hand, he could think of his son with love as a father.  On the other hand, he could think of his son with justice as a judge.  However, he concluded that he could not feel both emotions and play both roles at the same time.  The juxtaposition of God as King, who is detached and judgmental, and Father, who is loving and forgiving is difficult for us as human beings to understand and something that, perhaps, only Hashem can achieve.  Do you ever feel like Hashem is your King?  Your Father?  Do you ever feel both at the same time?  For me, these terms represent moments of closeness and moments of distance from Hashem and the natural oscillation between them that I feel at various moments of life.  Spend time this Shabbat thinking about what emotions each image conjures up for you and how you reconcile the paradox. 
Shabbat Shalom!