The sheer weight and volume of the music filled up the room and all of the space between the dancers, wrapping each of us in a big warm blanket of sound and sweat.

Thank you to everyone who joined us for the Jewish Voices on Rock blog series. The series is now done and available as an archive.

When one of my dearest friends invited me just a few years ago to attend an AC/DC show, I couldn’t resist. I felt a little strange having to tell the synagogue that I had to miss a board meeting to attend an AC/DC concert.

We cannot escape our history; as a people, faces and names may change but the stories do not. For this reason, and because art imitates life, lyrics heard in today’s secular songs are informed by ancient sacred texts. In fact, I can't listen to Spotify without hearing the Torah singing back at me.

Here Comes the Sun came on. My tummy sank with the tractor-beam sound of the descending Moog at the beginning, giving birth to George’s serene voice and guitar. It’s still with me right now, and will be when I die.

If we’re praying for peace, let’s find our fervent desire for a better day somewhere in our souls. If we’re praying for healing, let us channel our terror of mortality and the grief of loss into the hope of a long, healthy life with those we love.

Our hands, our fingers, can be used for battle. But this battle needs to come from art. It needs to come from music. It needs to come from writing. So long as it’s honest, it’s good. It needs to be hard, fast, intelligent, a vessel for the Divine.

We want to believe that we are nearly immortal. We make plans days and weeks and years ahead despite never knowing if we’ll be alive to see them fulfilled. We have almost no control over our destinies and that is enough to terrify anyone.