PURELY COMMENTARY

8 | SEPTEMBER 29 • 2022 

column 

Dust and Stars for the Days of Awe
S

urfing the expanses 
of space and time 
in distances that 
challenge understanding and 
imagination, the James Webb 
Space Telescope has become a 
mild personal obsession since 
it was launched 
in December 
2021. The Space 
Telescope is 
approximately 
the size of a 
large truck. 
Orbiting the 
sun — nearly 1 
million miles from Earth — it 
is exploring, documenting 
and transmitting images of 
space across 13.6 million 
light years. The enormity of 
the distances means that the 
Webb Space Telescope is not 
only seeing across space, but 
it is looking back in time. 
Because all traveling 
objects take time to pass 
from departure point to 
arrival, their travel can be 
measured in relation between 
speed and time. Because of 
the distances involved, the 
images transmitted back to 
NASA by the Space Telescope 
record portraits of stars and 
systems not as they are in 
2022 on this planet, but as 
they were approximately 13.1 
billion years ago. 
As the Space Telescope 
continues its mission, it will 
challenge the basic ways that 
we understand the birth and 
growth of the universe, and 
our place in it. 
I am no scientist and have 
never had any scientific 
training. However, something 
about the skill and the 
ingenuity of the scientists 

behind the project, the 
magnificent beauty of the 
far-flung places and times 
captured in the transmitted 
images, and the ability to 
reach out and touch the 
enormity of the universe 
ignites in me a glimpse of the 
spirit. 
As we enter the orbital 
path of the Days of Awe, 
the Jewish ritual rhythm 
propels toward a period of 
soul searching. Who are we? 
What is worthwhile? What 
trajectory do I want to set 
for my own life? And where I 
have fumbled and fallen, how 
do I pick myself up to keep 
moving ahead? Like a high-
powered telescope, we are 
encouraged to refocus and 
look deep into our past, our 
location and our direction. 
The Days of Awe push us 
to diminish personal ego 
as a prerequisite in moving 
from self-examination to 
change. These 10 days are not 
only about the creation of 
the world but also about an 
opportunity for self-creation. 
Between perusing articles 

and images about the prog-
ress of the Space Telescope 
and the approach of Yom 
Kippur, I hear Van Morrison 
whispering in my ear, “Didn’t 
I come to bring you a sense 
of wonder? Didn’t I come to 
lift your fiery vision bright? 
Didn’t I come to bring you 
a sense of wonder in the 
flame?” 
What comes to my mind 
considering the ramblings 
above? 
 
A LESSON IN HUMILITY 
The Days of Awe are a lesson 
in humility. We are mortal. 
We live as members of 
families. We exist in circles 
of community. We are part 
of a path of memory. While 
so much of contemporary 
culture is about the 
individual, the sovereign 
“I,” the Days of Awe and 
maybe also the path of the 
Space Telescope reminds 
that we are small, and not 
particularly significant in the 
broader contexts of galaxy 
upon galaxy, light year after 
light year. 

Both for us as individuals 
but also for “The Chosen 
People,” our relative 
insignificance is a big pill 
to swallow. Carl Sagan, 
a scientist and public 
intellectual whose science 
included a profound sense of 
wonder offered the following 
reflection on a famous 1994 
photo showing the pinpoint 
Planet Earth from space:
“Our posturings, our 
imagined self-importance, 
the delusion that we have 
some privileged position in 
the universe, are challenged 
by this point of pale light. 
Our planet is a lonely speck 
in the great enveloping 
cosmic dark. In our obscurity, 
in all this vastness, there is 
no hint that help will come 
from elsewhere to save us 
from ourselves.” (Carl Sagan, 
The Pale Blue Dot. 1994) 
The sentiment that Sagan 
shares above seems to echo 
those of Abraham in his 
recognition that we are all 
but “dust and ashes.” (Genesis 
18:27). 
There is another face 
to the coin. Sagan hints 
above that the relative 
inconsequentiality of human 
existence in the context of 
the expanse of the universe 
does not absolve us from 
responsibility for our own 
lives and for the places where 
we live. Likewise, Abraham’s 
recognition of the inescapable 
confinements of human 
existence are not a call to 
surrender responsibility. 
In the same sentence where 
he admits our base material 
composition, he also stands 
straight facing the God of 

Scott 
Copeland

NASA, ESA, CSA, STSCI, WEBB TEAM

A Cosmic Tarantula caught by NASA’s Webb

