This is the d’var Torah I delivered on Friday, May 8, 2026, at Congregation Neveh Shalom.
There are people who come and go from our lives, having just a momentary impact. And there are those who, over time, quietly but steadily shape who we become. If you’re lucky, you can name them because you never forgot them. A teacher who saw something in you before you saw it in yourself. A mentor who nurtured, but also challenged. And if you’re really lucky, that same person is still walking alongside you decades later, bearing witness to the chapters of your story as they unfold.
This week, as we read Parshiyot Behar and Bechukotai, the Torah turns our attention to time that stretches beyond a single lifetime. In Behar, we learn about Shemittah and Yovel, the sabbatical and jubilee years, built-in rhythms that force us to think generationally. The land rests, debts are released, and we are reminded that what we “own” is never fully ours. In Bechukotai, we encounter blessings and consequences tied not just to individual behavior, but to the collective path of a people across time. Together, these portions ask us to consider: what does it mean to live a life that echoes beyond us?
The Torah’s answer is both grounding and demanding. You don’t build a legacy through grand gestures alone. You build it through consistency, through values lived over time, through relationships that endure. “If you walk in My laws… Im bechukotai teleichu” is not about a single moment of faithfulness, but a way of being that accumulates meaning across years and generations.
And that kind of legacy doesn’t happen in isolation. It is shaped through the people who guide us, challenge us, and believe in us.
This Shabbat, we have the extraordinary privilege of welcoming Rabbi Danny Nevins as our Scholar in Residence. For me, this is not just a professional honor; it is deeply personal. Rabbi Nevins has known me since I was 11 years old. He was my rabbi and teacher, the one who stood with me at my bat mitzvah, who guided my family through the grief of my father’s funeral, and who officiated at my wedding. He has been a constant presence across the most sacred thresholds of my life.
This is what leaving a mark on someone’s life looks like. This is what we mean by “legacy.”
It’s not abstract; it’s lived in relationships that span decades. It’s in the investment in another person’s growth. It’s in showing up, again and again, at the moments that matter most. Rabbi Nevins didn’t just teach Torah, he modeled what it means to live it. And whether he knew it or not, he was planting the seeds for my future, and for who I would eventually be here, at Neveh Shalom, in this community.
Has anyone seen the 2016 movie Arrival? Where Amy Adams plays a linguist whose job is to decipher an alien language? What she discovers – spoiler alert, even though it was 10 years ago – is that humans, just like the aliens, are capable of seeing time as one big picture rather than as linear. They just have to learn the language.
In a sense, that is the invitation of Behar and Bechukotai: to see our lives not as isolated stories, but as part of a much larger unfolding. To ask ourselves: what are we planting, and for whom? What rhythms are we creating that will outlast us? Who are we investing in, not just for today, but for the generations we may never meet?
Here’s the part that might challenge you a bit: legacy isn’t something you leave behind at the end of your life. It’s something you’re building right now, whether intentionally or not.
So be intentional.
Show up for someone consistently enough that they can count on you years from now. Teach something worth remembering. Model the values you hope will endure. Be the person whose presence shapes another person’s story in a way that lasts.
Because one day, someone will stand where you stand and tell the story of who helped them become who they are.
Make sure that story is worth telling.
Rabbi Eve Posen 