The Torah and the Self

Ten Commandment Jews

2012-02-12T23:26:00.000-08:00

Have you ever heard of the expression "Ten Commandment Jew"? Perhaps today its less in usage. Years ago when I would speak to people about their level of observance often one would tell me "I am a Ten Commandment Jew". What they meant was that yes, s/he identified with the moral principles of the faith but s/he did not keep the rituals. Of course his/her concept of The Ten Commandments did not include the laws of Shabbat observance. The Ten Commandment Jew made clear that s/he loved his/her faith. It was just that the burden of taking on all the mitzvot was more than they felt they could carry. We might call it "Judaism light".

This week in the parsha of Mishpatim, a reading that immediately follows last weeks reading of the giving of the Decalogue at Sinai, we separate the men from the boys, as it were, at least in terms of living the Jewish life in its fullness. The Ten Commandments, of last week, were only the lead-in. This week the laws begin to be fleshed out. The portion of Mishpatim contains 53 mitzvot. And while many of the laws are civil laws for the ejudication of disputes according to the truth of Torah, the message is clear. The Torah is all encompassing.It addresses every asepct of life with no exception. There is no way to separate the moral from the ritual, nor the religious from the secular. To be a Jew is to embrace a lifestyle.

That very wholistic imperative is what frightened the Ten Commandment Jews. The sacrifice it called for was too extensive and consequential. They chose to limit their observance and make it more bearable.

The truth is the attitude of the Ten Commandment Jew is not so far off from each of our attitudes. We all, even those of us who embrace the full 613 commandments of Judaism and accept our Judaism as our way of life, nonetheless have depths of observance and practice of faith that we say are beyond us. We do not deny they are worthwhile practices or that they are religious expectations. We simply say that to keep them requires too great a sacrifice. And so we give ourselves a pass.

I don't think I need to find examples here for you. Each of us on his/her own level can think of things that s/he knows and believes to be part of what it means to be a good Jew in the best sense, yet s/he does not maintain in practice. For some it may be about the laws of kosher in the home or when travelling, for another it may be about the Torah he studies, for a third it may be about the spirit of the Shabbat in the home or perhaps the level of materialism s/he embraces, or the amount of tzedaka s/he gives. We all have places where in one way or another we say "the sacrifice is just too much. Up to here I can go in my committment to observ,e but no further".

Yet there is a paradox here that we must confront. Let me frame it in the context of a vignette. I once knew a young man name Jeremy. He moved from London of the UK to live in the community I did which was London, Canada. He had a post at the University. Jeremy, at one time, was involved in a secular movement for Jews on campus at the University of London (in the UK) called the "Non Jewish Jews Society". He was a classic case of one who embraced the notion of The Ten Commandment Jew.
And then something changed for Jeremy. He found himself being drawn to traditional observance. He tried the Shabbat and found he liked it. He discovered, to his amazement, that what he saw as a burden and something to be discarded was actually a gift to his life and not a burden at all. The Shabbat he once saw as representative of Judaism's oppressiveness he came to value as a great blessing to his life and indeed no sacrifice at all to maintain.

Rav Aharon Kotler, the founder of the great yeshiva in Lakewood, New Jersey and the acknowledged 'gadol hador', the leading Torah authority of a generation ago, pointed out that all sacrifice for the doing of the good is illusory. Until we have committed ourselves to the mitzva it appears to us that much will be required of us to get it done. We become intimidated and struggle to make the sacrifice. Yet the irony is that, just like in our vignette with Jeremy, once we make the committment and take on the practice, we find it does not feel like a sacrifice at all. What we now do and embrace as our practice feels right and good and even pleasurable.

Whenever we think of breaking through a barrier we have created to do that which we know to be right, despite the sacrifice, we need to know the sacrifice we imagine we will have to make is not real. Yes, it feels real. Indeed at times it feels too much to ask of ourselves, but in reality, once we cross over, we will not feel like we are sacrificing at all. What we do will bring its own rewards that will engender a sense of wellbeing and joy. Sacrifice? What sacrifice!

I suspect each of us has known the truth Rav Aharon Kotler spoke of in his/her own life. We each have had some place where we expected the sacrifice would be great, and nonetheless resolved to the task. Once on the other side,to our amazement, we discovered their was only blessing with no price paid.

What we need to do is trust that precedent and build on it. Again and again, we need to break through the fears and anxieties of the new for us and the intimidating and confirm that, in the face of doing the good, sacrifice is an illusion.

The consequeunce of moving to the next spiritual level in our lives is not a price to be paid but a blessing to be gained !

Shabbat Shalom

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Thanks very much.
Yisrael

Winters of the Soul

2012-02-09T03:37:00.000-08:00

It has been a cold winter here in Israel and in much of the world. When our physical condition is compromised by the cold we know what to do. We dress warmly for the outside. We up the heat for the insides of our home. And if we get fortunate we escape the cold altogether for a time and travel to a place with a warmer climate.
But what about the spiritual cold? What about the inevitable times when our soul seems constricted and depleted of its warmth. How do we create a 'varmkeit' when our innards feel frigid and o
spirit is hibernating?

I understood the early section of this week's parsha of Yitro to be talking to me and to just such a time. Let me quote the relevant passages here. Its somewhat lengthy but relevant for our discussion.

"And Yitro, the priest of Midian, the father-in-law of Moshe heard
all that G-d did for Moshe and all Israel His People, that Hashem
brought the Israelites out of Egypt....And Yitro, the father-in-law
of Moshe and his children and wife came to Moshe to the wilderness
where they camped to the Mountain of G-d....And Moshe went out to
greet his father-in-law and he kissed him and they exchanged
salutations and Moshe brought him to his tent. And there Moshe told
him the story of all that happened, what Hashem did to the Pharaoh
and Egypt, about the Israelite's experience, and of all their challenges
of the journey and how G-d saved them. And Yitro became excited for
all the good Hashem did for Israel that He saved them from the
Egyptians. And Yitro said 'Blessed be Hashem who saved you from the
Egyptians and from the Pharaoh, who saved you the People from
clutches of Egypt. Now I know that Hashem is is greater than any
other God because he saved you from their evil intentions towards
you.'"

There are many questions that emerge from this passage. But let me raise this one for now. The Torah tells us that Yitro, while still in Midian heard all of what Hashem did for the Israelites. He knew of the events even before he came to the camp.
So then why is it that on hearing the story told to him by Moshe did he become so moved. He aready knew the facts. He came because of them. What did Moshe add that made Yitro so emotionally responsive and prompt his spontaneous blessing.

We each may have our own idea here. Let me share the way I understand the story.
Yitro was a priest of Midian, even as the Torah makes clear and then repeats in the narrative. He was invested in matters of the spirit. He wanted a faith he could believe in. His pagan practice seemingly did little to sate his quest for the primal truths. When he heard about the miracles G-d performed in Egypt and in the Exodus he came to the wilderness. He left the comforts of home (as Rashi tells us) to discover the truth he needed to know.

He did not hear from Moshe anything he did not already know. It was not new facts that impressed him. What Yitro heard was the story, not a story of G-d's grandeur, but a story of relationship. He heard the personal account of how G-d saved His People. He heard a story of relationship between the Deity and a human entity, a story filled with Divine care and compassion. It was not G-d's power or feats that impressed Yitro. Many Gods claim that. No, rather it was G-d's humility and His availability to His People in a spiritual intimacy that moved Yitro to belief.
When Yitro comes to accept our G-d he said "Now I know that Hashem is greater than any other God, because He saved you from the evil intentions of others towards you." Yitro is saying, "It is because G-d's goal is not to impress but to save, even in the quiet, when no one knows, he saves us from other's bad intentions, in that I know He is truly G-d."

Yitro knew there was a G-d before he came. He heard of the miracles. What he did not know was of G-d's greatness. Miracles are fact. They don't tell a story. He did not know G-d's essential greatness until he heard the story first hand from his son-in-law, a survivor. What he heard was not a story of G-d making miracles but a story of G-d saving His sufferring children through miracles. Miracles were not the end but the means. It was when he heard of G-d, not qua G-d but rather G-d in relationship with us that he was moved to embrace the faith of Israel. It was the story of the personal G-d that was so compelling as to lift the doubts from this life-long searcher for spiritual truth and to convince him of the veracity of the G-d of Israel.

What do we do when we find our souls feeling the cold and lacking enthusiasm. We all experience such times. We may say our prayers but they lack the feeling. We may say grace after meals, but our thanks feel empty.We study, we do kindnesses, we parent our children saying all the right things and yet we are not fully present.
How do we get back the vitality of faith and relationship to both G-d and others that is the fire of ths soul?

From the remedy I think we can also discern the cause of our malaise of the spirit.
I think when our souls go cold we are missing story in our life. Our figid spirit eminates from a religious practice that, while full of devotion and belief, lacks the personal dimension. Our faith has no face to it. We do, we perform, we commit, we may even sacrifice, but without a story in mind. Our service lacks the color commentary to feed it and give it juice. We stop listening and telling tales. We become so focused on the content that we lose the context.

I will tell you. A Shabbat table needs more than words of Torah to make it a spiritual haven. It needs stories, hassidic stories, stories of the sages, or our stories of faith and deliverance. Faith needs to be grounded in the human experience to come alive. Children forever seem to be full of enthusiasm why?, because they are constantly being excited by stories. Yitro found G-d because of Moshe's story. It was only on hearing the facts as a story that his soul became excited.

If we find ourselves in a spiritual winter I suggest the reason is that our faith has become dry. We have not given sufficient attention to the color commentary that is vital to make any experience alive. We have stopped telling and listening to stories. We need to put names and faces on the values we invest in. We need to find our G-d not in isolation but in the context of the human drama.

After all isn't the Torah itself a book of stories. Even the laws are presented to us in the form of a story " And Hashem spoke to Moshe saying...."
Let us find the stories to warm us and give fire to our souls!

Shabbat Shalom

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Optimist and Pessimist

2012-01-31T22:52:00.000-08:00

There is a wonderful story told of two children with polar personalities. One was an an optimist in the extreme. No matter what the circumstances, even when things went wrong, she always had a smile. She was sure things would only get better. The other was an extreme pessimist. Nothing made her happy. She always assumed, even in the good times, that bad was sure to follow. Their parents decided to put their dispositions to the test. The pessimist was put in a room full of the most wonderous toys, everything a child could dream of having. The optimist was put up to her neck in a room full of manure. Each had the door locked on them.

In two hours the parents returned. To their amazement when they opened the door on their child the pessimist in the room full of toys, she was sitting in the corner crying. She explained, "All these toys are great. But soon the batteries will wear out and the springs on the wind up toys are sure to break. Its only a matter of time and I will not be able to play with them anymore." And her sibling the optimist, up to her neck in manure, when they opened the door on her she was giggling and splashing in the filth. She said, "I know with all this manure there has to be a horse in here somewhere!"

This Shabbat is Shabbat Shira. We read of the great miracle that occurred at the Sea as Israel was, once and for all, saved from their Egyptian taskmasters. On their deliverance they sang the "Oz Yashir" the song of praise and thanksgiving, a song so filled with holy inspiration that it is included in the Torah and recited each day in our morning prayers.

The sages are clear, Israel, even the most common among them, had an inspired vision at the Sea greater than the prophet Yechezkail. The Torah gives context to the Song with the prelude "And they believed in Hashem and in Moshe His servant".
Their intense belief gave rise to expression in the Song of the Sea.

But the story is puzzling. Those of us who learn Daf Yomi, the daily page of Talmud, only this week studied the text in Tractate Areechin that tells us that of the ten testings of the Divine in the wilderness, two occurred at the Sea, and one of those was after the Sea split and they crossed on dry land! The Talmud tell us "Israel lacked faith". After the miraculous crossing they feared "Just as we crossed perhaps so too did the Egyptian army and they are yet coming after us but from another place on the shore."

How can the Talmud teach that the people lacked faith, even after the crossing, until they saw the dead bodies of the Egyptians wash up onto the shore when the Torah tells us they "believed in Hashem and in Moshe His servant". The Torah is clear that the song was triggerred by the power of their belief. Yet the Talmud takes them to task for precisely that, a shortfall in belief.

Moreover we might wonder. If they indeed had the strong belief as the Torah affirms how is it that only a few days later, when they lacked water, they complained bitterly and inappropriately. And, only a few weeks after that, again they complained, this time about their diet. They had the audacity to question whether they would not have been better off had they never been redeemed.

How do we make sense of all these contradictory dimensions of the psychic and spiritual health of our ancestors?

I think the answer may be something we alluded to in the story with which we began.
When the Torah tells us "And they believed in Hashem..." they did! The People had faith at the sea, an uprecedented faith. But faith is one thing and trust is another. In Hebrew we distinguish between 'emuna' and bitachon'. Undoubtedly the Israelites knew G-d in an intimate way. They had the vision of the prophets at the Sea. But trust is another matter altogether. Trust or bitachon requires us to believe not only in the goodness of the Other, but in the worthiness of ourselves.
To trust we need to not only know G-d exists and to feel His presence. We need to know that G-d will do good for us because we indeed are worthy of His love.

The Israelites of the Exodus indeed believed in G-d. They had emuna. What they lacked was bitachon. And not because they thought G-d was not good. But because they felt undeserving. They did not trust that the good they received today would be there tomorrow. They were pessimists. And like all pessimists they lacked trust, not in the love of Hashem but in the worthiness of themselves to continue to know the blessing.

When the Talmud taught that the People were lacking in belief, I suggest the shortcoming the Talmud is inferring was a belief in themselves and in a G-d who will love them with their flaws. True the sea was parted for them. Yet they still were not sure the Egyptians didn't cross as well. After all, according to the Medrash, even the angels said at the sea "They are idol worshippers and so are they. Why save the Israelites?". We might assume our ancestors wondered the same thing. They had no doubts about the power of G-d. They simply lacked the trust in their own worthiness to be sure G-d would save them at the expense of the Egyptians.

Over and over through the wilderness journey when Israel sins the root of the sin is not a lack of belief in G-d. Rather the root of the sin is a lack of bitachon caused by a feeling of inadequacy and a fear that G-d will not rescue them from their predicament because they are undeserving. Israel's sin was a prevailing pessimism.
It is not that we were in fact deserving. On the contrary, relative to our own merits we indeed had reason to be pessimists. But G-d loves us, with our lacks. He does only good for us no matter our inadequacies. His love is unconditional.

I dare say, the struggle of our ancestors with bitachon is not theres alone. Who of us has not fought the feelings of pessimism from time to time. Perhaps we have been hurt in a relationship and struggle to trust again. Or pehaps we have failed in projects we have undertaken and now we are hesitant to try yet again. The root of our doubts, like those of our parents of the Exodus, is a lack of self worth. If we believe we are deserving we will be optimistic even when things did not turn out as we hoped. When we expect the worst it is typically because we feel we don't deserve success.

What we need to realize is that our success and belief in it is not really about us.
We may well be more right than the optimist. We are undeserving. On our own we have no right to assume things will get better. But trust is about G-d and our relationship to Him. Trust in the good is our conviction that He will always do what is best for us. In the words of Rabbi Akiva, even when that which seems bad happens to us, it is to say "Gam Zu l'tova", "This too is for the good".
We don't invest in the future with optimism because we are confident in ourselves.
We invest because we know G-d loves us and whatever the results it will be for the good.

To be an optimist, to trust again in the face failure, is a spiritual challenge.
We are called upon to believe in G-d's unconditional love for us. There is no room for a prevailing sadness in life. To live as a person of the spirit is to be ready to invest and invest again.

Shabbat Shalom

A Peace of the Whole

2012-01-25T22:58:00.000-08:00

It is now eleven months since the horrific murder of the Fogel family in Itamar. You recall Ruti, Hudi and there three young children were brutally stabbed to death by Arab terrorists on Friday night as they slept in their beds. Last night in my neighborhood shule, where Ruti's father, Rav Ben Yishai most often davens the afternoon and evening prayers, the Rav of the shule asked him to say a few words between Mincha and Maariv. You see, with the end of the eleven months, Rav Ben Yishai, who has been saying the kaddish for his family, will stop reciting the mourner's prayer. He, Rav ben Yishai, will no longer take his place with the others who grieve the loss of a loved one to chant the traditional kaddish.

Rav Ben Yishai is a modest and unassuming man. While I do not know him personally, his dignity is evident in the way he carries himself. He is defferential to others, even though in many cases he is both older and more learned than they.He speaks in a quiet yet firm voice. What he says comes from a place deep within. It does not need to be shouted or repeated to be heard. He had but a few words to convey to the small community of men he has davened with now for near a year each evening. But what he said was compelling. In essence he said that his children died 'al kiddush Hashem', sanctifying the great name of G-d. Their place in heaven could not be higher. He said that he draws comfort in knowing that there sacrifice is an inspiration for all of us in our committment to the love of the land of Israel and the Torah of Israel. Their death while hugely tragic was not empty. It served to make the ideals in which we believe, ideals which are often abstact, real and alive for us. Through them and their sacrifice our Judaism is renewed and deepened and given much more veracity.

Have you ever wondered why it is that when we pray, even our most intimate prayers, like the 'amidah', the silent sh'moneh esrai, we frame our talk to G-d in the plural form rather than the singular. We almost never use "I". Instead every request, blessing and praise is put in the form of "we". Even when we perform a very personal mitzvah, like putting on tefilin or lighting Shabbat candles, we say "blessed are you L-rd our G-d etc..who has commanded us". We do not say "who commanded me" ! Why? Why does tradition insist that we use the plural and disdains the more personal singular form.

I will tell you another story...also one that happened yesterday. I live across the street from the Yeshiva Mercaz Ha'Torah. One of the outstanding Rebbes of the Yesiva, Rav Aryeh Greenwald makes it a personal priority to reach out and learn with men and boys in the community and to offer the marginalized Shabbat hospitality.
He has been learning daily with one elderly and compromised man for some two years. Yesterday they made a siyum on completing an order of the Mishna. If this man, had made a party, say to celebrate a significant birthday, I am not sure he would have ten people to invite. Here, with Rav Greenwald, he made a siyum in the Yeshiva and 40 young men were present. They knew him a bit since he came to daven on occasion when he ate with the Greenwalds. On this day, these young Yeshiva boys were his community.They sang and danced with him. They celebrated his joy. They gave him a sense of belonging and helped him to feel the worthiness of his achievement in his Torah study.

We live in a time that emphasizes the development of the individual. Western society has long put the focus on the "I" over the "we". Just note what I wrote. "I" is capitalized always; "we" never. Self actualization is the priority. Success is measured in personal success. But is that a Jewish perspective. Does our tradition support emphasizing the "I" above the "we"?

I think not! I think we are misguided in taking on the prevailing values of the culture that sorrounds us. In Torah perspective the "we" needs to be given precedence.
Who we are as individuals matters. But not as much as the whole to which we belong.
The Sages taught us that by dint of the way we express ourselves to G-d. No matter how noble our act of devotion or heatfelt our prayer, we can only speak to G-d as part of the community of our People. No "I", no matter how significant, learned or holy, can supplant the "we". It is only in the context of community that an individual has enduring meaning and stature.

That lesson was clear at the siyum where a man with no friends, isolated and alone, had a sense of belonging and meaning through the "we" of the unlikely community of Yeshiva boys 50 years his junior. And it is true for Rav Ben Yishai and his family who grieve. The only solace to be found in the brutal murder of his children and grandchildren is to see the Fogels not as a private family brought to a tragic and untimely end. But rather to see the Fogels as a part of the Jewish People living our nation's story in which their sacrifice, horrific though it was, enhances the character of the whole to which they belonged.

The truth evident in the stories above is equally true for you and me. No peace can be had for the indvidual as an individual in this world. Life is tragic. We all fail, and even when we accomplish, our accomplishments when standing alone, hardly matter. We all die and barely leave a trace for having been. No, the only peace to be found for the individual is as part of the whole. As part of the whole we transcend. As part of the whole we prevail. As part of the whole we contribute to a perfection that is impossible to us as individuals.

My sense is that in our practice of our faith we miss the mark. We are so busy worrying about our personal devotion and its level of excellence that we fail to see ourselves as part of the community. Our emphasis so often is on "how am I doing" relative to the expectations we and tradtion puts on us. Rarely do we consider how we are performing as part of the ensemble that is the Jewish People and if we are contributing our limitted yet important part to the whole.

This Shabbat we read of the Exodus. So many of the commandments we are given both this week and throughout the Torah are "to remember the exodus from Egypt".
What are we meant to remember when we perform mitzvot? What is recalling the Exodus
supposed to invoke. Surely we might answer "gratitude to G-d over our redemption".
But may I humbly suggest that perhaps we are meant to recall that even when we perform the most personal mitzvah we are part of a people. We do not do mitzvot as indiviudals isolated and alone, no matter how holy we may be. In keeping a mitzvah even as an individual, even in the privacy of our home, we need to see our act as belonging to the story of our People and connected to the Exodus that was a national not an individual event.

Peace for the individual is impossible. We can only know peace as part of the whole. Perhaps we need to alter our perspective and worry less about the individual we are and more about the body we are a part of and how we are doing our share for its wellbeing. Perhaps our focus should not be on becoming a spiritual hero but rather on becoming a good team player!

Shabbat Shalom

Do We Owe G-d?

2012-01-17T23:43:00.000-08:00

For several months now I have been troubled by a theological question with practical implications. In so many of the sifrai musar, the traditional works of the great rabbis of the past on issues of ethics and personality development, we find that the core ingredient necessary to being a true servant of Hashem is 'hakarat hatov', gratitude for the good G-d has done for us. So much of all we do, from blessings before eating to public expressions of thanksgiving on personal deliverence from illness or danger is based on this fundemental sense of gratitude. When asked how we are, the traditonal response is "Baruch Hashem, Praised be G-d, good". We bless and, in essence, thank G-d for everything from our being able to wake in the morning to a bowel movement.

But I ask you why the great debt of gratitude? I understand that if someone does me a kindness I owe them thankfullness. After all they put themselves out in some way, no matter how small, for me. True G-d does us the greatest of kindnesses. He gives us life renewed each day. And indeed G-d performs for each of many great acts of deliverance. But do I really owe G-d for what He does for me? It takes no effort for G-d to do even the greatest thing. It costs G-d nothing to be kind to me. He expends no energy, no time, no resources. G-d's gifts are what the Talmud calls
"ze nehene v'ze lo chasair", "this one benifits without any cost to the other who provides the benifit". In the case where one can be gifted with no cost to the benifactor it is considered a great evil not to give! All G-d gives us is at no cost to Him. If He would not give us He, by His own ethic, He would be doing evil. Why then do we owe Him gratitude? Why am I considered wayward and held culpabable if I don't keep His Torah. I don't owe G-d any more than I owe rent to a landlord whose house I live in when he could not rent it anyways. And according to the Talmud indeed I do not owe rent to the landlord in that case!

After struggling with this issue for some time I am going to tell you a truth I came to know that at first blush is surprising. Neither you nor I owe G-d for kindnesses received. He didn't put out from His self to give to us. It cost G-d nothing. Hakarat hatov, the foundation of our relationship to G-d, is not paying back a debt owed. Rather hakarat hatov is a personal character trait that feels gratitude for that which is received regardless of the expense of the giver. Hakarat hatov is our appreciation for blessings we are given. It is a feeling engendered not by the sacrifice of the donor who provided us our gifts, but by the gift itself we receive and the relationship it infers between us and our benefactor.

This week my wife and I were sitting together and I mentioned how much I thought I owed her for all she has done for me over the time of our marriage. Lindy said to me, "You don't owe me anything" and she went on to explain that she did not like the idea that my commitment to her was based on debts owed. If I was grateful to her for the love she showed me and felt a desire to show love in return that was great. But she did not warm to the idea of giving out of indebtedness. In the course of our conversation it became clear that yes, I owed her. After all she made effort and sacrifice for me. But in the ideal my response to her would not emerge from the bottom line, that of debts owed. Rather in the ideal my response to Lindy would come instead from a love and gratitude felt in response to her love.

In human relations we indeed owe debts for kindnesses done. Our obligations to honor and care for our parents certainly emerges from our indebtedness to them. Even if we do not love them we are debt bound to show them respect. After all they made effort to put us in the world and raise us. With G-d however it is different. G-d made no effort. Our service to Him cannot come from a debt.

Truth is if our obligation to keep Torah and tradition would eminate from a debt we owe G-d, then Non-Jews should also owe a similar obligation. How can they repay such a huge kindness with a keeping of the minimal seven Noachide laws. And if keeping those laws would be enough to repay our debt to G-d for his kindness then why are we be held liable for 613 commandments?

The answer is that ultimately we are obligated to keep the Torah because of a covenant we accepted at Sinai. The Covenant binds us. We committed ourselves at Sinai to G-d and His Torah and for all generations.
Neither we nor the non-Jews of the world are called to pay a debt to G-d.
Yet, we do have a higher calling. We are challenged to love G-d and to experience His gifts to us as personal kindnesses and invitations to relationship. We are called to gratitude for our blessings so that we may serve Hashem not due to contractual committments but out of love. The feeling of hakarat hatov raises the character of the act of devotion to G-d from obligation to an act of love and relationship. We are not punished for a lack of hakarat hatov. It's not the basis of our requirements to obey the Torah. The feeling of hakarat hatov when serving Hashem offers us an opportunity. When we perform mitzvot out of the feeling of hakarat hatov we are transformed. In the process we become holy. Through the sense of appreciation for our gifts received our service to G-d binds us in love to him, even as it binds husband and wife and all of us in relationships where giving comes out of appreciation rather than indebtedness.

In the portion this week of Va'aira and in the succeeding two weeks we read the story of the Exodus. So many of the mitzvot of the Torah are meant to be
performed "zecher lee'tzeeyat Mitzrayim", "in remembrance of the Exodus from Egypt".
That G-d redeemed us from Egypt does not mean we owe him. The ten plagues, the drowning of the Egyptian army at the Sea and the rest were no effort for G-d. Bringing the Exodus about meant no more challenge to Hashem then leaving the status quo. Yet we were redeemed, and by G-d. That was an awesome gift for us. While we owe no debt we are called upon to remember and be grateful, to let the Exodus be an instrument to bring us to a love of G-d and a desire to be close to Him through keeping His commandments.

In actuality though we do not owe G-d for the kindnesses he bestows on us, His gifts to us are manifestations of his love for us. After all G-d does not have any personal need to get met in granting us His blessings. He could just as well withold as grant. If not for His love for us He could ignore our circumstances entirely. For His love for us we are grateful, and in hakarat hatov, we respond in kind with an expression of love for G-d.

You say to me...Okay so what...What's the point here?

As we mature we are called to have our faith mature with us. We need to be thinking about G-d and the nature of our relationship. I cannot love my wife, nor she me unless she and I are thinking about our dynamics and on a regular basis. That is true for you and your spouse as well. All relationhip, to be alive, requires reflection and intentionality. So too, our relationship with G-d needs to occupy our thoughts.

If our relationship with Hashem is to be alive we need to be thinking about its fibre and impact and with regularity. I will tell you this on a personal level.
Once I realized that I don't really owe G-d and my love for Him emerges from a sense of appreciation for the blessings I am given, a whole new world opened up for me.
While it may not change what I do,my new perspective changes the meaning and intentions of my devotion. In the world of the spirit, meaning and intention is everything.

Shabbat Shalom

From Zusha to Moshe

2012-01-12T00:19:00.000-08:00

There is a well known Hassidic story of the Rebbe Reb Zusha. He was known for the simplicity of his lifestyle and his inspiring humility. He once told his disciples, "When I die and face my judgement I do not fear the angels will ask me why I was not as spiritual as Moshe.I will simply tell them Moshe was a soul so much greater than my own. Nor do I fear they will ask me why I was not as kind as Avraham. If they do I will tell them Avraham was unique in his capacity to do hesed. How can you expect so much of me. Nor do I fear they will ask me why I did not compose songs to G-d as David. If they do I will say how can you compare me to the "sweet singer of Israel". But what I do fear if that they will ask me "Zusha, why were you not Zusha?" and for this I will have no answer!."

I thought of that story as I reflected on the opening parsha of Sh'mot in this the second book of the Torah which we begin this week. In the course of the reading we are told of the selection of Moshe to be the instrument G-d will use to bring an end to our servitude in Egypt and to our great national suffering. Moshe is told by G-d at the burning bush that he is to bring about the Exodus. He is charged with perhaps the greatest role in the history of humanity. Yet Moshe's response is to graciously yet persistantly decline the mission. Over and over he refuses his call. Only when he is partnered with his older brother Aharon does Moshe relent and take on the charge.

So I thought, isn't this odd. Here in the famous tale of Reb Zusha Zusha only worries that he will get to heaven and his failing will be that he was not Zusha, that he did not realize his full potential in his lifetime or worse that he took a wrong turn and became someone other than he was meant to be. Yet Moshe, of whom Reb Zusha spoke in his self reflection, given his preference, is ready to opt-out of being Moshe. Though G-d himeself tells him he is meant to be the one to facilitate the Exodus Moshe says " please send someone else". Why wasn't Moshe worried that when he got to heaven they would say to him "Moshe why were you not Moshe"? How could he have declined his mission and failed to realize his personal destiny?

For all of us who have mused over our life's choices and questioned whether we became who we were meant to be I think the answer to our riddle can be most instructive. What was Zusha really worried about in not being Zusha? And, in contrast, why was Moshe so unconcerned that he might fail his destiny.

The answer is that Zusha never was worried that he might have failed his destiny in choosing the wrong life role, occupation or interest. He was not worried that maybe he should have been a doctor instead of a carpenter or a shoemaker instead of a teacher. What made Zusha anxious was not that he made the wrong choices in the details of his life, no matter how important they may appear. What bothered Zusha was that perhaps he had failed to realize the self he was meant to become. Perhaps
he was meant to become more open to difference and more loving to those who wronged him. Or perhaps the opposite, the Zusha he was meant to become was to be more able to set boundaries and assert expectations. Zusha was worried that while his fame and reputation was for being humble and unassuming maybe the Zusha he was meant to become was assertive and bold. He could not be sure he had become the Zusha he was meant to be. The externals did not matter. It didn't concern him the form his life took. It was the self that troubled him. Zusha was not sure he had become Zusha.

Moshe knew who he was. He was the man willing to stand alone in the face of injustice and at great personal risk. He killed the Egyptian who was beating the Jew at great danger to himself as the story showed. As a consequence he had to flee the wrath of Pharaoh. A refugee, and a stranger in a foreign land, again in the face of injustice he risks to save those in distress. We read just after the story of Moshe slaying the Egyptian that he came to Midian and immediately rose to the defence of the daughters Yitro to save them from the harrassment of the local sheppards. It's clear, Moshe was Moshe. In fact it is because he was Moshe that G-d chose him to redeem his People. When Moshe declined the mission G-d called him to he was not compromising his ability to be true to the self he was meant to be. No matter his life circumstances Moshe was going to realize his personal greatness. Indeed he already had. What Moshe did not want was the role. He begged G-d to send someone else. Whether Moshe would have been the redeemer or remained a sheppard, he would have been true to the realization of his self.

Most of us make the error of spending the bulk of our energy trying to decide on the externals of our life. We worry over carreer choices and where we should invest our energy. We fear we will miss our call, make a mistake that compromises our self and destiny. And when we feel we made an error, sometimes not til years later, we rue our decision and lament our life. Whether we chose the wrong life mate, husband or wife, or whether we chose the wrong carrer path, we become morose over what we feel was a wasted life, that we did not live the life meant for us.

The message I glean from Moshe and the story of his willingness to reject his call is that our focus on the form of our life is misguided. True we may be disappointed. Perhaps we squandered wonderful opportunities that would have been far better for us.
But they are not telling as to the quality of our life. In the end what matters is not what happenned to us or even what we made happen, but rather who we have become.
Is the me I am now the me I was meant to realize? Have I become myself? And if not what need I do to realize the Zusha that is me.

Each of us has a life journey that is unique. To take the journey we need a map. Moshe and Reb Zusha teach us that the map we need is not the map of the world without. The circumstances of our life while important are not defining. The map we need is an inner map, a map of our self. Our life's journey is to come home to our self. For that journey we are not prisoners of our past and it is never too late!

Shabbat Shalom

Cheap Grace

2012-01-04T22:06:00.000-08:00

Last week at kiddush I asked someone about a mutual friend I had not heard from in some time, ever since he moved up from Jerusalem to the North of Israel. I was shocked to learn that my friend, one I had felt particularly close to, was no longer in the country. In fact, where he was was in Jail in the United States. And that was not all. It turned out that so much of what I knew about my friend was untrue. Even his name was a lie. He was a fugitive from justice and came to Israel six years ago on a false passport. He created a false identity, as a single man, though he was married and with children. His ruse was so successful he even managed to get Israeli citizenship, under his assumed name.
So, you might ask, if he had managed so well for six years to escape justice, how did he wind up back home and in prison? Was he extradited? Did he get caught? No
not at all.

What's just as surprising as the story of my friend's charade is that my friend, of his own accord, went back to the US and turned himself in. He could have lived his lie forever. Yet, saying no goodbyes to all who knew and loved him here in Israel, he simply went home to face his accusers. The question I ask is why? Having successfully eluded serving time, and no small amount of time, why go back?
Indeed we might ask why do so many fugitives from justice seem compelled at some point, perhaps years and years later,to turn themselves in?

To understand this phenomena we might well look at an intriguing passage in the portion of this week, that of Vayechi. After Yaakov died and the brothers and Yosef returned to Egypt we find an fascinating development, a kind of post-script to the story of Yosef and his brothers. The brothers, now all these years after the reconcilliation, became fearful. The Torah reads " And the brothers realized that their father died and they said 'Perhaps now Yosef will hate us and he will pay us back for all the evil we did to him.'" They go on to create a lie telling Yosef that Yaacov, their father, before his death requested of Yosef that he hold no grudge, and that he forgive his siblings and not cause them harm. Yosef, one last time, tells his brothers not to worry. All that happened was the will of G-d.

When the Torah records the fear of the brothers it uses the term in Hebrew "Lu".
Rashi points out that 'lu' usually means 'hopefully'. But it would be odd that the brothers were saying "'Hopefully' Yosef will hate us etc ". Therefor Rashi tells us that here in this singular case in the Torah the word 'lu' means 'perhaps'. So the verse then reads "Perhaps Yosef will hate us..." And 'lu' here is synonomous with the term 'ulaiy' or 'maybe'.

Yet,Freudian that I am, I still might wonder. Why did the brothers then
not say "ulaiy", which always means 'maybe'. Why did they (or the Torah) record their fear with the use of the term "lu" which in every other case means "hopefully". Is there perhaps a double meaning intended here?

I suspect the answer is a resounding "yes"! The brothers, perhaps unconsciously, did indeed want Yosef's wrath at them for the harm they caused him. Else how could they ever come to closure with their past. It would remain hanging over them. They knew they did wrong. They knew that all actions have consequence. True Yosef gifted them with his forgiveness but unless they paid for their wrongdoing they could never feel clean with him. He was magnanamous, but the relationship would be amongst unequals.
They would forever feel shame in his presence. They needed his vengance. They needed to face justice.

The story of my friend, the story of all who escape justice, the story of all of us who wronged another, be it spouse, parent, child, or friend, is that until we pay for our wrong-doing even the generosity of the other will not free us. It does not matter that there is no Javere pursuing us. The book won't feel closed for us. We will struggle to feel an equality with the one we wronged. The relationship will suffer. Could it be that the historical struggle between Judah and the ten Tribes of Israel, dominated by the tribes Menashe and Ephraim that emanate from Yosef, has its roots in the unfinished issues from the sale of Yosef centuries earlier, a sale that never was never adequately healed.
Until and unless we face our misdeeds and atone for them we will feel shame and a relentless anxiety. Yes we need forgiveness...but not forgiveness granted by our victim as an act of grace and generosity. We need a forgiveness earned. Only in earning our atonement can we be healed.

My friend, the one we spoke of at the outset, at one time read this blog. He remains dear to me. I want to be in touch.
If you are reading this now...please let me know how to support you. I hope I will hear from you. I care deeply.

I pray that you and I, unlike the brothers of Yosef, will have opportunity to right our wrongs and to know true healing from shame. Cheap grace is no real gift. Healing and wholeness in the face of wrong-doing needs to be earned.

Please feel encouraged to buy "The Torah and the Self" as a book. It is available at Pomeranz Books in Yerushalayim and online at Barnes and Noble and at Amazon.
I am most appreciative.

Shabbat Shalom

Getting Past Resentment

2011-12-29T02:09:00.000-08:00

A self story...Many mornings at the minyan I attend a certain elderly gentleman shows up. He's not there every day. When he comes he will usually show up for a few days in succession. Each day he attends he expects to be given the opportunity to daven for the amud, to lead the prayers. And when there is a Torah reading, he claims that honor too. I know most of the men at minyan think nothing of this fellow's expectations and give him a hearty 'yasher koach', congratulations after each effort of his. I, on the other hand, find his claim for the limelight arrogant and egocentric. It annoys me, though I never let on.

I know my attitude is not right. It's not that I am wrong about the man. I think he is blind to his own yearning for kavod...But so what? Why should it bother me? Why should I carry resentment. And more importantly, how can I get over it to feel a love for this fellow Jew and member of my minyan the way I need to.

As I reflected on my issue I thought about the readings of the last few weeks in the Torah, the story of Yosef and the brothers. I wondered how was it that Yosef was able to overcome all of his feelings of resentment towards his brothers and be so ready to forgive them. I mean, we know the brothers redeemed themselves in the end. This week's parsha of Vayigash tell us how when put to the test, in a situation not too disimilar to the sale of Yosef, twenty two years earlier, the brothers rally to protect the new favorite Binyamin. But that takes care of the brother's feeling of shame. They showed remorse. But as for Yosef, he suffered terribly because of what they did to him. He spent years in prison, separated from family, alone and abandoned. How did he find the wherewithall to forgive them and let go of his resentments.

I believe the Torah itself gives us a clue. And it is found in last week's reading.
When the brother's came back to Egypt with Binyamin, as Yosef, the ruler had insisted, we are told that Yosef made an elaborate dinner for them. The dinner was in Yosef's private residence. Every effort was made to meet the brother's dietary requirements. Moreover the Torah tells us that Yosef himself gave out the individual portions to the brothers. He fed them, and, Rashi tells us, he did so in a splendid way. Why? What was the purpose of this great feast. And why does the Torah see fit to include it in the narrative as relevant?

Rabbi Yisrael Salanter, the founder of the Musar movement in the 19th century in Europe made the observation that if we find ourselves disliking someone and struggling to overcome the feelings the remedy is to extend kindness to that person.
Through our kindness we foster a sense of responsibility towards the other. And through the sense of being responsible to them we come to care for them.

That's at the core of the story of Yosef and how he was enabled to feel compassion towards his brothers. Indeed Yosef held resentments. How could he not. He was a tzadik but not an angel. The way he got passed the ill feelings was to make a big meal for his brothers and to personally extend himself to them even so much as to dispense to each his individual portion. In providing for his brothers, in feeding them, in honoring them and tending to their needs, even though he did not much like them, Yosef came to care for them. And by dint of his care he felt a sense of responsibility towards them...and from that emerged a sense of connection.

From Yosef I can glean a message I need to take to heart as I think about how to overcome my resentment towards the little man who needs to claim a big role at daily minyan. Truth is I may never like the part of him that runs for the kavod. Yet if I want to come to care for him as a person rather than harbor resentment I need to extend myself to him and do him some favors. Maybe I can give him a ride home or bring him a siddur before davening. It need not be a big thing. I don't yet have to invite him for a Shabbat meal. If I just show some care I will feel a sense of responsibility towards him. And in that I will find the gateway to honest caring for him even with the parts of his personality i dislike.

I suspect I am not the only one who finds him/herself feeling disdain for another, and for many reasons. Some of our reasons can be the result of real harm caused, as in the story of Yosef and his brothers. Some of our reasons, like mine, are more obscure, yet nonetheless block a natural compassion. Each of us can learn the lesson from Yosef and overcome our emotional distance by doing a kindness for that other. It is through kindness that love and care is cultivated. And kindness can grow care even in a wilderness.

Shabbat Shalom

Re-thinking the Joseph Story

2011-12-22T03:38:00.000-08:00

Getting to know oneself is no easy task. We can think we are self aware only to be deceived. One tool that can help in this work is to reflect on a book we read or a film we saw and to ask ourselves "which character do I most identify with?". Often what we discover will surprise us. Once we have identified the character with whom we most connect we can begin to explore the similarities between us and them and uncover components in our character that were earlier buried in the unconscious and emerge only when our guard is down.

The story of Yosef and his brothers begs for just such a reflection. If I asked with whom in the compelling drama do you most identify I suspect you would answer that you identify most with Yosef, the innocent victim and the later hero of the saga. Or perhaps, if you are in a more advanced stage of life, you might tell me that you identify with Yaacov, the old father, who feels the unending grief for a son lost and a family broken. Few of you I imagine would say that you idenitfy with the brothers. No matter how our commentaries explain their actions or attempt to make them understood, the brother's unconscionable deed of selling their own flesh and blood into slavery just doesn't feel like a response to family strife we can relate to or identify with.

But I invite you to step back a moment. The purpose of the blog "The Torah and the Self" is to learn about ourselves by finding points in common with characters in the Torah, even in the more obscure cases. The premiss we begin with is that we share, at least in some measure, a point in common with all people. And if the Torah is telling us about personalities, no matter how nefarious or extreme, they are meant for us to find in them a personal connection so we can learn from them about ourselves. Over the years, in the pages of the blog, we have found ourselves in the Pharaoh and in Esav, and from the deed of our parents both good and bad.

So let me ask again about our point of identification in the Yosef story. Can we find ourselves in Yosef's brothers, at least in some measure? What do they have to teach us about ourselves?

The Talmud tells us that one of its great sages, Rav, had the habit of visiting the graveyard, there to learn from the dead. One of the things he discovered was that 99% of people die as a result of the evil eye. Of course its not the evil eye that is the immediate cause of death. It would not be found on a death certificate. Nonetheless, whether the cause of death was cancer or heart failure, that which made the person mortal was the evil eye put on them by another.

The evil eye is another term for jealousy that one person feels towards another, a jealousy that prompts resentment, a jealousy that kills. So let's consider again. The brothers were jealous. Their jealousy caused them to hate their brother and resent his success. They sold him into slavery assuming he would die. We struggle to relate to such criminal behavior. Yet, as Rav discovered, its quite common to harbor ill will towards others, to feel resentment over their life's successes. We seem to all carry jealousy, so much so that nearly all people are made mortal by another's jealous feelings. In the end, while we might say we would never do the other harm or even wish him/her harm, that is but on a conscious level, what we are aware of. At a deeper level our jealousy too causes us to want to posess that which belongs to another and finds that which the other does have to be undeserved and more rightfully ours.

To the extent that Rav found truth in the graveyard conversations with the dead, we all cause harm by our jealousy and resentment, in ways not that much less significant than the brothers of Yosef. And while its true we are often blind to our resentments and jealousies, the brothers were equally blind to theirs. They had little conscious idea that their motivation to sell Yosef was rooted in self interest. We, like the brothers, will not recognize our jealousy and envy of others unless we admit that these unflattering character flaws live in us. Only when we stop pretending we are beyond such pettiness can it become possible for us to mitigate the jealous feelings and stop the effects of jealousy and the evil eye.

Now you may say to me "You have got to be kidding. Do you really believe in the evil eye?" Whether I do or don't is not so much relevant here. What is relevant is that resentment of others and their successes is legion. Jealousy does not belong to Yosef's brothers alone. It inheres in all of us. You say where?

Let's look at our lives. Honestly, how hard is it to be truly happy with someone's good news, especially someone we are close to and especially when we are deprived of the same gift. Of course we express happiness, and some of it is felt. But who in the secret of their own heart does not have a corner of resentment thinking "it should have happened to me". Which sibling is truly never jealous of his/her peer over success or nachas? Who has not looked upon the blessings of another and thought "I am more deserving than they". And I dare say every time we argue with another and get locked into an intractable struggle is it really a battle of ideas or rather of egos, with each of us afraid to let the other win.

I want to make clear here a distinction between envy and jealousy. I may envy another person's blessings, say that they have nachas from their children or study much Torah. That does not reflect a character flaw. I simply wish that I too could know similar blessing in my life. In envy I don't question whether the other deserves their gifts or want to take it from them for myself. On the contrary envy will often lead me to improve myself so I may be like the other and know the same gifts in my life. (To be an envious person is not a good thing but envy as a feeling can motivate me to improve and grow).

Jealousy is something else from envy. In jealousy I want what the other has. Still more, I feel I am more deserving of it than them. Envy leads me to admiration. Jealousy leads me to resentment of the other. Rav was on to something profound. It is impossible to be jealous and not have feelings of resentment to the other. And it is impossible to resent someone and not at the same time, at least in part, wish them harm, if not consciously than unconsciously.

No, I suggest we need to look to the brothers of Yosef and be not too quick to discount the points we share with our distinguished ancestors. It's not flattering to claim jealousy as operational in our life but I suspect if we had the courage to explore our behaviors honestly we would would find many many of our responses are rooted in jealousy and resenment. I will leave the work for each of us to do to unpack where that jealousy shows its ugly head. But I guarentee, if we are willing to look at ourselves and our resenments with curiosity rather than recrimination, we will find its expression everywhere.

The hidden gift of the story of Yosef and the brothers is that if these great men, fathers of the Tribes of Israel could have been victims of jealousy, we need not be ashamed to claim it is operational in our lives too. That does not make our jealousy or resentment go away. It does however make it okay to acknowledge.
And in our honest acknowldgement we have already made significant strides to self healing.

I am delighted to inform you that the best of the blogs over the past three years has just been released as a book "The Torah and the Self" by Yisrael Kestenbaum.
It can be ordered from Barnes and Noble and through Amazon amongst online book stores.
Thanks for all your support!

Shabbat Shalom

When Heroes Fall

2011-12-15T04:57:00.001-08:00

In the life of each of us we face moments where our heroes disappoint. Sometimes its a teacher, mentor, or boss, someone we admired and thought of as better than they turned out to be. Sometimes its our parent, our mother or father, who we adored growing up yet who, we realized as we matured, was flawed, not only in general, but even in the way they raised us. There are few more painful moments in life than those moments when we realize our heroes had clay feet.It becomes still harder to accept when we realize those we thought loved and cared for us in the absolute were comrpomised themselves and indeed so too was the love and care extended to us.

What do we do with our new insights into our former heroes. Therapists have made a career out of treating men and women like us with just that problem. Some ouf us, unable to reconcile our current perception with our former, break off all connection with the hero of yesterday. We bury the relationship and all it contained claiming it was all a sad mistake. Others of us, difficult though it be, try to find a way to salvage what can be saved from the relationship. We work to not let our disappointment and shattered ideal poison what blessing remains possible in the relationship. True, we say, the other may not be who we thought they were, but that does not mean they have no redeeming virtues. We attempt to reset the connection under perhaps a lower callibration.

In many ways the later is the work of adult children. Unlike in our youth where we idealized our parents, as we mature we must find the courage to see our parents for who they really are, with their flaws. Seeing them in their nakedness is not easy.
Yet only then can we ever have a real relationship with them. Are we disappointed? Of course, inevitably. But with time and support we can turn that disappointment into an opportunity, a chance to have an adult to adult relationship with our parent, to know them, so that while they are no longer our hero they become something more precious, our friend.

I share this insight this week, as we read the parsha of Vayeshev, because their is a passage in the reading that speaks pointedly to this theme.
When Yosef finds himself in the house of Potiphar, the butcher of the Pharaoh, he is seduced by the master's wife who begs him to sleep with her. Though tempted, Yosef responds to her saying "Behold my master has complete trust in me, and has placed everything under my control. And there is no servant in the household more important than me, and he has held nothing back from me except you because you are his wife. How then can I think to commit such a great evil and thereby sin to G-d."

Yosef's ability to rise above his temptation earns him the title "Yosef Ha'Tzadik", "Joseph the Righteous". He is praised throughout the literature of our tradition for his self discipline in a most challenging time. Yet what I find surprising is the language of Yoesf's argument to Potiphars wife where he explains why he will not sin with her. He recounts all that her husband has done for him, stating how ungrateful he would be should he commit adultery with Potiphar's wife. Yet in the end Yosef said that if he were to commit the act he would "sin to G-d". Wait a minute. If he owed so much to his master for all he had done, he should have said "I will sin to your husband, my master". Why does Yosef recount all he owes to Potiphar yet claim the sin he would commit would be against G-d.

I suggest the answer here is relevant to our earlier discussion. Yosef was talking to Potiphar's wife. She obviously felt it was okay to sin against her husband in an illicit relationship. Yosef knew that while he felt he owed a debt of gratitude to Potiphar, if he would have claimed the sin would have been against him, Potiphar, the wife might have said "You don't know my husband. He is abusive and a tormentor. He has committed horrible atrocities. He deserves to suffer. He has it coming for all he has done to me and others. He may be a hero to you but he is no hero. On the contrary he is a villain. He has had this coming for a long time."

Yosef silenced such a justification by claiming from the outset that the husband did wonderful things for him and while it may be also be true that Potiphar has no rewards coming to him because he is an evil man, yet he, Yosef, cannot wrong him.
Yosef in saying that his sin with would be against G-d, argued that his responsibility is to show gratitude to those who have been good to him, no matter who they are in other aspects of their life or in their personal nature. 'Hakarat hatov', showing appreciation for kindnesses done to us is a personal responsibility devolving on we who receive. We must show gratitude or else we sin to G-d. Our gratitude has not to do with the goodness or general worthiness of our benifactor.

For many of us, thinking about persons who have failed to live up to our expectations causes us to reconsider how we are with them. We withdraw and withold. Any debt of gratitude we may have had gets wiped clean. We simply say they are not deserving any longer of our appreciation.

Yet the story of Yosef tells us just the opposite. Yosef argued that he owed Potiphar. It didn't matter who he was or what he did. Yosef's debt was due for kindnesses received. We too have those we owe, parents, teachers, mentors, friends.
True they may have lost value in our eyes for wrongs committed or flaws in their personalities. We may now realize that they may even have caused us some harm.
Yet we cannot thereby excuse ourselves from our responsibility before G-d to be persons who show gratitude for the good received. Its not about them but about us.

To be a mensch is to be thankful, even when that thanksfullness is not easy to show, even when we feel ambivalent about the person to whom we need be grateful.

Shabbat Shalom

To Win or Not to Fight ?

2011-12-07T23:58:00.000-08:00

When I was a boy the Shabbat table was a place for my father to assert himself. From the singing of zemirot to the topic of conversation, he ran the show. When I matured and marked the occassional Shabbat at home with family I noticed that my father's role at the table had changed. While he sat at the head of the table as before, he no longer controlled the table dynamics. He let others, in particular his now older children take the lead. And while he may well have wished for more zemirot or less casual banter, he held his peace. It appeared sometimes as if he was a guest at his own table.

In the parsha of this week, Vayishlach, we seem to witness a similar change in our father Yaacov. At the outset Yaakov is a man to be reckoned with. He wrestles an angel to a draw, holding the angel hostage until he receives from him a blessing.
Earlier, at the close of last week's reading, Yaacov had engaged his father-in-law, Lavan in a heated confrontation. This week we read where Yaakov meets Esav, his intimidating brother, entirely prepared for every eventuality, be it a peaceful rendezvous or war.

And then, rather abruptly, Yaacov begins to fade as a dominant personality. When Dina, his daughter is raped and then held by the prince of Sh'chem the Torah tells us that on hearing the news Yaacov "held his silence" waiting for his sons to deal with the atrocity. Later when he challenges Shimom and Levi for having wiped out the town, telling them that their actions had put him and the family in mortal danger, he lets his two sons have the last word.

And so Yaacov's personal eclipse continues. The Torah tells us that Reuvan did something seriously wrong in regards to his father's marital bed after Rachel died.
Did Yaacov react? According the text we are told "Yisrael (Yaacov's new name) heard", and seemingly did nothing. And next week when we read of the enmity the brother's had for Yosef because of his grandiose dreams the Torah tells "the brothers were envious and Yaakov observed the matter". Yaacov did not try to make peace between the brothers and Yosef. On the contrary he let the process unfold without his intervention. How different the story might have been if Yaacov had tried to bring peace between them.

How do we understand this change in Yaacov? What happened? And I might well ask the same question regarding the change in my father. What made him become to retiring?

I think the key to understanding the change in the character of Yaacov can be gleaned from what the Torah tells us about our father at the point where we noticed he was no longer the same. It happened directly following the confrontation with Esav. Yaacov comes to the city of Sh'chem 'shalem' meaning complete and whole in every way. There he erects an alter to G-d in thanksgiving. He called the alter for "G-d the G-d of Yisrael".

What's interesting here is that Yaacov calls himself "Yisrael". G-d did not give him that name untill later in the story as we read in following chapters. It was only the angel who blessed him who gave Yaacov that name, yet that's sufficient for Yaacov to claim the name as his own. Here he is, Yaacov coming home, and he is no longer the son who stole his brother's blessing, the weak link in the family. He wrestled an angel and received a blessing in an open strugggle rather than by deception as earlier in his life. That represents the final stage of Yaacov's emergence into the light and redemption of self. He feels complete, 'shalem'. He has reached the place in his life where he no longer needs to prove anything. He is whole and sated with who he is. Even before G-d calls him "Yisrael" Yaacov claims the name. It belongs to him by dint of who he has become.

Once Yaacov feels the peace of self, he no longer needs to take the lead in fighting the battles of life. He is now ready to let others assume the limelight. He can watch the process unfold and wait with no need to assert himself and control the dynamics. And so Yaacov "holds his silence", and he lets others have the last word, and he "hears" but does not react, and he "observes" letting the process unfold in the way it needs to. Yaacov, the most passionate of the Avot, the one who showed anger on several occasions when he felt wronged, can now, as he reaches the place of inner quiet and fulfillment, sit tight and assume a place in the background. He no longer has the impulse to react.

I believe my father reached that place in his own life, a place of inner satisfaction, where one knows who s/he is and has nothing more to prove. It is a blessed place. And when one gets there one no longer has the urge to combat the wrongs of the world, though sometimes one must. In that place one has patience and even when responding responds with a deliberateness and thoughtfullness, not in a frenzy.

The truth we are being taught through the unfolding story of our father Yaacov is that not all our passion, even for the good things, is a sign of our inner well-being.
When we are reactive to things, even though the cause be just, it is likely because we are unsettled ourselves and have not yet come to a place of inner peace. Strong emotional responses only arise in the person in a state of inner unrest. True the cause of the emotional reaction maybe something external.I may be reacting to the wrongdoing of my child or my husband's insensitivity or some inexcusable injustice of life. Yet I would not react to the situation the way I do unless I was already in flux within. The strength of my response says more about me than about the circumstances to which I am reacting.

I hope in my life and yours we will come to that place where we no longer need to fight every battle, react to every hurt. I pray we will know the settledness within that will give us the wherewithall to have patience and be thoughtfull even in times of duress. I know that kind of 'shalem' only comes through a life's journey. Most of all it requires that we be truly happy with our self as we are.

Yet in the end, the goal of a blessed life is not to win every battle but rather to reach a place where we do not feel the urgency so strong to make them our fight.

Shabbat Shalom

To Avoid or Confront ?

2011-12-01T02:37:00.000-08:00

Many years ago Paul Simon sang a popular song titled "Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover". In essence the song's message was that we seem to find many varied ways to bring endings to relationships, all of them meant to avoid having to say a meaningful and honest goodbye.

The Parsha of this week gives evidence to the truth of Simon's insight. In the parsha of Vayetze, near the end, Yaacov decides to return from the home of his father-in-law, Lavan, after twenty years and return to his family and birthplace.
Yaacov is a much changed man over those twenty years. He came poor and leaves wealthy. Moreover he came a bachelor and leaves with four wives and 12 children.
Yaacov has every reason to say goodbye to his father-in-law. His leaving would certainly leave a vacuum. Yaacov and his entourage mattered. Yet Yaacov chooses to flee, not telling Lavan or his wive's family that he was departing.

Its clear Yaacov prefers to avoid the farewells. And why? Well just look at the earlier sections of the same reading of this week.

After fourteen years with Lavan and after Yosef is born the Torah tells us that Yaakov thinks to move-on. This time, unlike later, Yaacov begs leave from his father-in-law explaining that its time to go. In response Lavan pleads with Yaacov to stay, and offers him a chance to make real money. Seeing an opportunity for himself and his family, Yaacov decides to stay another six years.
So why this time when preparing to leave does Yaacov do as the Paul Simon song suggests and "slips out the back Jack".

The Torah itself alludes to the answer. When Yaacov first thought to leave the relationship with Lavan was on cordial, if not warm, terms. Yaacov had little and would leave with little. Saying goodbye was unlikely to cause discomfort. Six years later the Torah tells us that Yaacov was painfully aware of Lavan's resentment toward him. He was embittered that Yaacov was no longer the dependent sheppard but rather a wealthy man of means. Lavan found Yaacov's metamorphosis disturbing. It made him envious. Yaacov knew that saying goodbye now would inevitably bring on recriminations and ill will. In Yaacov's mind it was better to avoid than confront.

We know all too well the preferance to avoid rather than confront. In our own lives over and over we avoid the painful goodbyes preferring instead to find a way to "slip out the back..." And its not only the goodbyes we avoid because we fear confrontation. Often we choose not to say hello to people we fear will be reactive to us. We pretend we don't recognize someone, or cross the street so we don't have to acknowkledge them and deal with the complexities of our connection to them. Moreover so often we hide our feelings from others, even those closest to us. We choose, at times, to lie so as to create the pretense of shalom, when in reality its not real peace we have gained but rather avoidance of an honest expression of self and a chance for healing and conflict resolution.

Unless we risk confrontation with its unpleasantness we stand no chance of resolving our conflicts and finding our way to the peace that may be there for us on the other side.

Yaacov discovered that very lesson in his attempt to avoid confrontation with Lavan.
What happened after Yaacov fled? The Torah tells us that Lavan chased after him. A strong and forceful confrontation ensued, the very thing Yaacov wanted to avoid. Harsh and heated words were exchanged.
Only after each, Yaacov and Lavan, had expressed the fullness of their feelings was a reconcilliation possible, one that indeed occurrs at the reading's end.
At the close of the story Lavan and Yaacov come to an understanding. They sit down to a feast. No, they are not friends. But they are reconciled. Each comes to closure with the other and with a sense of personal integrity. Isn't that what peace is all about?

Not surprisingly when Yaacov has another confrontation looming, this one with his brother Esav who has sworn to take vengence on him, Yaacov does not avoid. Rather than flee, Yaacov send messengers to Esav and sets up the rendezvous even as we will read in next week's portion. Yaacov learned his lesson. Avoidance is understandable but a poor substitute for honest confrontation.

The challenge for we who walk in Yaacov's footsteps is will we too summon up the courage to risk confronting the persons and issues that hang over us. Will we find a way to stop avoiding and speak our truth? To flee offers a momentary relief but no potential for resolution. Only in the honest encounter is there opportunity for healing and peace.

Shabbat Shalom

On the Power of Parental Love

2011-11-24T02:37:00.000-08:00

This week in our Torah reading we leave the house of Avraham and enter the house of Yitzchak. We begin the story of a new generation. It is tempting to compare the family lives of each to the other to discern both similarity and contrast. What's clear is that while both generations, that of Avraham and Sara and that of Yitzchak and Rivka are our Fathers and Mothers, and represent a continuum of values and traditions, in terms of personality and domestic lifestyle they vary widely.

One key similarity is that in both households their was a good son and a bad son.
Avraham and Sara have their Yitzchak and Yishmael. Yitzchak and Rivka have their Yaakov and Esav. In the end, each bad son was excluded from the line of tradition. Only the good son remained attached.

But here we come to an important difference. Whereas, even as we mentioned, the bad sons in each home were cast out, the stories were not the same. Esav, the son of the second generation of whom we read this week, remained a bad boy. Not only is he a villain in the story of his parents and sibling, he and his decendants represent the historical antagonists of the Jewish people. Esav, while of the same genetic makeup as Avraham and Yitzchak rejects his roots. Still more, he disdains his roots. His personal life and legacy leave no room for redemption.

With the bad boy in Avraham's household this is not the case. True Yishmael is cast out, and according to the tradition, for unacceptable behaviors. Yet in the end Yishmael does teshuva. He repents. The Torah told us last week that he participated with his younger brother Yitzchak in their father's funeral. The Sages point out that Yishmael even honored Yitzchak above himself at the rites, though he was the elder.
They explain that the "ripe old age" the Torah tells us that Avraham enjoyed was due to he peace he had knowing that his son Yishmael was back in the fold.
Proof that in the end Yishmael was a tzaddik is the fact that one great sage of the Talmud carries his name, Rabbi Yishmael, a contemporary of Rabbi Akiva. In contrast no Jew has ever been named Esav.

We might well wonder why? Why was it the case that Yishmael, though a bad boy for much of his life ultimately returns to the faith and values of his upbringing and Esav remain unrepentant ? What made teshuva possible for Yishmael and not so for Esav?

Let's begin by taking a look at the story of Yishmael, the son who did return. What made that possible?

The answer is plain and compelling. Yishmael all his life, even when he was cast out, always had the love of his father Avraham. Even in the time of his sinning, he was never rejected by his father. We see this from many sources. Let it suffice to point out two. The first, the Medrash, that explains why G-d had to tell Avraham at the time of the 'akaida', the Binding of Yitzchak, "take your son, your only son, the son you love, Yitzchak..." Rashi on that verse bring the explanation of the Sages, that when G-d told Avraham to take his son, Avraham said " I have two sons".
So G-d said to him "your only son", to which Avraham responded "each is only to his mother (Yishmael came from Hagar)". To make Himself more explicit G-d said "the one you love" to which Avraham replied "I love them both". Finally Hashem had to identify the chosen sacrifice by name "Yitzchak".

It is clear from the above Medrash that even after having to expel Yishmael from his home at the demand of Sara, Avraham considered him a son in the truest sense, and that indeed he loved him, even as he loved Yitzchak. Moreover when Avraham and Yitzchak go to the Mount Moriah for the sacrafice, the Torah tells us they were accompanied by two lads. The Sages inform us that one was Eliezer, Avraham's faithful servant. And the second, none other than Yishmael, the one time wayward son, who seemed indeed to forever have been a part of his father's life.

It is this undying love that Avraham had for Yishmael, through all of Yishmael's life, that made it possible for him to return in later years to the values and practices of his youth. When a parent continues to love his/her child, and when they show that love, even when the child strays, s/he makes possible the correction in that child's life, the correction they most hope for.

Ah but you ask, what about Esav. We know Yitzchak loved Esav, even more than he loved Yaakov. The Torah told us so in no uncertain terms and in the reading of this very week. Why didn't Yitzchak's love serve to bring about Esav's return?

I shared this question with my son Moshe, who is a very popular Rebbe in the Yeshiva in Waterbury Connecticut and author of his own beautiful
book on character issues titled "Olam Hamidos". He suggested brilliantly, that there is an important difference between Avraham's love for Yishmael and Yitzchak's love for Esav. Avraham knew who Yishmael was. Sara had told him about his sinfulness. He had no illusions. Yet he loved Yishmael anyways. That kind of parental love, where we know our children with their flaws and continue to love them, is redemptive and offers hope for change.

Yitzchak, on the other hand was deceived by Esav. Esav forever hid his misdeeds from his father. Yes, Yitzchak had love for Esav, great love, but it was not for the Esav as he really was. It was for an imaginary Esav. Esav always felt that if his father ever truly knew him he would reject him, so he lied and pretended. In hiding himself, Esav was precluded from ever knowing the love of his father. In the end, Yitzchak's love was a false love and was therefore renderred impotent and unable to bring about Esav's potential return.

The lessons here for us as both parents and children are oh so cogent and compelling.
First, it behooves us to realize the power of love and, in particular, parental love.
While the impact of Avraham's love for Yishmael, with his issues, did not bear fruit in the immediate, it ultimately proved critical to the redemption of Yishmael's life.
It may take time, but a parent's love, true love, matters and indeed matters absolutely.

Second, we as parents need to do all that we can to make our children feel safe and secure enough with us so that they don't have to hide and pretend. If we are intimidating or our children so fearful of our rejection that they won't let themselves be known we will never know them and hence never be able to love them for who they really are. As parents we need to help our children realize that our love for them is not tied to their behaviors but rather is absolute. We may disaprove strongly of what they do but we affirm unconditionally the goodness of who they are.

Third, as chidren we need to take risks in letting ourselves be known to our parents and trust they will find the ability to love us. The price of hiding apects of ourselves is not worth the benifits the deception my provide.
We need our parent's love. Some times and some parents are not able to give that love. Yet we need still to try them and see to what extent real love of us, love that is based on self revelation is possible. It is not all or nothing. Parents may not be able to get past their own limitations to embrace all of our truth. Yet what we make known and gets affirmed is healing. Moreover loving and being loved is a process. Both parent and child grow in a transactional relationship as each becomes more able to be loving and authentic with the other.

And finally, as Yogi Berra once said "It ain't over til its over." The love between parent and child may not ripen until both have reached siginificant levels of maturity. Our challenge as both parents and children is to be open to the gift moments when they come and to believe we are capable and worthy of love in its purest and most potent form.

Shabbat Shalom

The Touchdown Dance

2011-11-16T23:57:00.000-08:00

In American football, if a player is fortunate enough to score a touchdown for his team he will typically do a spontaneous little dance in celebration often referred to as "The Touchdown Dance". In a wonderful old movie titled "Parenthood", the late Jason Robards, playing an old parent with a wayward son, who while mature in years, continues to get himself into juvenile trouble, makes the observation that the work of parenting is never over. One never can do the 'touchdown dance', celebrating a culminating triumph.

The story of Avraham confirms Jason Robard's observation, not only about parenting, but about life in general. There is no touchdown dance.

This week we read the portion of Chayai Sarah. It begins with the death of our matriarch Sarah, telling us of Avraham's grief and then of his search for a worthy place for her burial. In tradition, its no accident that the Torah tells us of Sarah's death following the story we read last week of the 'akaida', the 'binding of Yitzchak'. Avraham has no opportunity to celebrate the gift G-d gave him of getting his son back, that is, not having to kill him as a sacrifice as he first thought, none at all. As soon as Avraham gets home rather than make a celebration on his and Yitzchak's salvation he learns of his beloved wife Sarah's death. He goes from elation to grief. And then he has to go seek help from strangers to secure a place to bury Sarah. And later still he worries that Yitzchak is getting older and remains unmarried. Avraham proceeds to send his servant a great distance, back to Avraham's birthplace, to hopefully there secure the appropriate wife for his son.

Again and again Avraham passes through crisis, times of worry, only to need G-d's help once more to negotiate the next issue. The crisis/issues never end. And with it neither does Avraham's need for G-d's deliverance. There is no final triumph, no touchdown dance.

I have always found it compelling that in Hallel, the psalms of praise we recite on holidays and days of deliverance in our liturgy, we exalt in G-d's response to our crisis. Near the Hallel's close we chant the verses "This is the day Hashem has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it." And just prior we say, "I will give thanks to Hashem because He answered me and did not let my enemies rejoice over me." These verses are typically sung in the synagogue with great enthusiasm and abundant joy.
And why not. The Hallel is recited on days memorable for their glad tidings. In joy we sing and praise G-d.

What's surprising is what follows in the Psalm. Immediately after those triumphal verses we recite in a very different and plaintive mode, "Please G-d save me".
Question is how do we go from the triumph to the desperation in such a seamless flow?
If we are so jubilant in our victory how in the next moment do we experience such a need for salvation?

Rebbe Nachman of Breslov noted the continuous flow of ups and downs in Avraham's life. In each case Avraham would experience the 'y'shua', the salvation of the Divine, only to need it again, almost immediately, in a pursuant crisis. He understood the dynamics by first pointing out that each 'y'shua' manifests a nearness of G-d to the person in crisis. In fact the essence of the salvation is not the relief from the threat but rather the presence of G-d in one's life as evidenced in one's relief.

The Title of Your Life

2011-11-03T00:00:00.000-07:00

Over dinner last week my seventeen year old daughter, Bess, made an interesting observation. She said, "All people have stories but only few have a story." What she meant to say is that while all of us have lives full of incidents and experiences its rare to find persons whose life tells a single tale with a common underlying theme.
Is it true? Do most people not have a single story in which the variety of the stories of their life is contained?

In the parsha this week we begin the story of Avraham. To tell it will take us through much of the next three weeks. The readings share with us many episodes in Avraham's life from the early years and unto his death. How do we experience what we are being given? Is it indeed a story, singular with many chapters or are we being given a multiplicity of vignettes about the same person but otherwise distinct and unrelated?

Even more significantly when we speak of the Jewish people and our story, is it indeed a single story, expressed through many passages? Or is it in reality not one story but many, millions of stories, belonging to the same people but otherwise independent and unrelated?

In posing the later question whose answer is clear, when we speak of Israel's journey we are speaking of the oddessy of a nation where each episode is part of a singular story now transpiring over some four thousand years, we can also answer the earlier question, about our father Avraham. Yes Avraham had many experiences. Yes, Avraham lived large and invested in life so that he had a wide varierty of encounters and challenges. But the stories are not isolated and self contained. They make up a larger whole, the story of Avraham! We who have the gift or hindsight, may see that all the stories have in common the 'testing of Avraham'. His stories contain ten trials, each meant to bring out Avraham's personal excellence as a human being and man of faith. While superficially the stories seem isolated, with perspective we can see they are all aspects of a single tale.

Ok so we know the Jewish People have a single story and so too with Avraham. But what about us? Is my daughter right? Is it so that for most of us our lives are fragmented and while we have many stories their is no singular over-arching story that binds them?

I think not. I believe that not only do our people have a single story and greats like our father Avraham, but each of us has a meta-story made up of the various chapters of our lives. If we reflect on our experience we will see that their is a unifying thread to our lives. The problem is that we tend to be so busy living in the moments of our lives that we can't get the distance to see how our life is like a musical work composed of theme and variation, always coming back to the same core elements of meaning.

When facing old age and the end of life, mental health professionals talk about the importance of doing life review. Life review is a process of looking back on the journey one has had and finding the story within the stories. Life review creates an opportunity to claim one's journey as an integrated whole, with its good and bad, ups and downs, and ultimately to bless ones own life so one can let go and die with peace. In doing life review most people are surprised at how the life they lived and thought was disjoint and disconnected actually can be spoken of and seen as a single tale.

I can tell you for my own experience of having performed hundreds of funerals and having delivered an equal number of eulogies that one can find red threads to even the most fragmented of lives. If one listens to the stories one can find the story that unites them.

Ah but you say what difference does it make whether you have a vision of your life as a single story or not? Let me tell you a beautiful story I heard of the Piezeczna Rebbe.
A man came to the Piezezcna knowing he was going to be transported to a Concentration Camp. He knew he would have little opportunity their to perform mitzvot, to learn, to do hesed. He asked the rebbe what could he do to give his life meaning in the Camps. What mitzva could he perform? The Rebbe told him, "When you are in the Camp go over to every person you can, as many as possible, and ask them to tell you their story."
The Rebbe did not tell the man to ask for their 'stories'. No stories won't do. Telling stories without an underlying them will not help . But telling the story will.Telling the key story that is manifest in the particulars of life enables us, even in the darkest of times, to feel alive.We may lose everything but in having our story we retain ourselves. If we lose our story we have lost it all. Our story is core to who we are. To lose the story is to lose our self.

We, each of us, have a story. In the end, our lives with all its complexity, is a single tale. The work for us is to come to recognize that story. We need to try and put all the particulars of our experience into a single framework so as to reveal its underlying meaning and purpose.

The question we might ask ourselves is "If our life was a book what would the title be?" Knowing that title gives direction to our lives and makes each experience,no matter how difficult, bearable, since it is not a random confrontation with adversity but part of the book of us and integral to who we are.

Shabbat Shalom

What's It All About ?

2011-10-27T04:34:00.000-07:00

Many many years ago, probably before most of the readers of the blog were born, there was a popular movie of the 60's called "Alfie". The movie told the story of an aimless young man who goes about flitting from one woman to another, with little care and no committment.He lives life from one moment to the next, with no purpose nor direction save to follow his pleasures. He is not a bad sort of person. In fact he is very nice. He just seems to see the world as a place to get his needs met and pursue desires as they become available. There was a song by the same name as the movie which was equally popular in its day. The opening lyrics went "What's it all about Alfie? Is it just for the moment we live...and are we meant to take more than we give?"

This week we read the parsha of Noach which predictably tells the story of the deluge and G-d's destruction of His world. After, the world begins again with Noach and his children, a new start with new hope. Why did G-d need to bring His first effort to a close? The Torah is clear that the people and the world they inhabitted became corrupt. The Talmudic sages taught us that people were steeped in idolatry, promiscuity and theivery. The implication is that humanity as a whole was invested in a life of sin. The deluge was then a punishment to a wayward civilization and a condemnation of their lifestyle.

The problem with that approach is how can the generation of the flood be taken to task and punished when they were never given commandmants regarding acceptable behavior?
The Noachide Laws, the seven commandments given to non-Jews to observe, including the prohibition of idolatry, thievery and sexual promiscuity, was given to the descendants of Noach, and not prior generations. How then could Noach's generation, while admittedly guilty of extreme moral lapses be punished without first being commanded and warned of the consequences of the partiucular sins ?

The Torah tells us that G-d informed Noach of the impending devestation. He did so in the following words " ....the end of all flesh has come before me, because the world is full of violence, therefore I will destroy them and all the land". Nowhere does G-d say that the flood was to be a punishment. Rather G-d said "the end of all flesh has come before me". The implication here is that the world reached its own end. Moreover the word used by the Torah over and over in these verses is in Hebrew "hashchata" or corruption. Earlier it said "G-d saw the land and behold is was 'nishchata' corrupt". G-d does not say here the world was evil, though it was. Its condemnations was because it was corrupt. By corrupt we mean to say that its purposes were compromised. It could not become what it was meant to be.

The upshot of all we have been pointing out is that indeed the world of Noach was not destroyed as a punishment for sin. It was not really destroyed. Rather the purpose of life is growth and becoming. When that no longer became possible because of the wayward behaviors of humanity the end of the world was inevitable. The world's corruption brought about its termination. It could not exist devoid of its 'tachlis', purpose. G-d needed to be 'mashchit', meaning perform an act of corruption to rectify the corrupted, inorder to restore the possibility of a world where growth and spiritual becoming is possible.

Every person, according to our sages, is a miniature world. The message here for us is compelling. We, like the world itself, exist inorder to grow and become. Stagnation occurrs in life. We all go through periods where we get stuck. But our overall ambition needs to be centered on growing and becoming. Else we have no claim to exist in this world. Its not enough to be good. We must be forever striving to be better. Its not enough to be without sin. We need to be driven to become holy.
Unless we are working on ourselves and all the time our life has no purpose. Just as Noach's world, when it lost its purpose lost its claim on existence, our life too needs its purpose to continue. And the purpose of our life and indeed the world as a whole is spiritual growth and becoming.

Any person who says "I have reached a place in life where I am satisfied with myself", or who lives with that attitude whether they actually say it or not, no matter how good they are, puts their existance in jeopardy. Its not that they are bad. On the contrary, they may have a great place instore for themselves in the world to come. But if you've stopped growing and becoming you can't claim a ticket to a seat in this world. The ride for you is over.

"What's it all about Alfie, or Yankey or Sruley or Rachel or whomever? It is about becoming and growing. Each day, each experience, each encounter offers us a chance to grow. All we need is to be open and meet the moment mindful of our agenda.
The new year has begun. Lets get to it!

Shabbat Shalom

Between Men and Women

2011-10-17T04:31:00.000-07:00

This Shabbat we begin the Torah anew and with it we tell the story of the first couple and their early days on this planet. Even then men and women had their struggles. We read of the forbidden fruit and that Chava, the first woman, ate and then gave her husband, Adam to eat in defiance of G-d's command. When G-d challenges them to explain their sinful behavior, Adam immediately blames Chava saying "the woman you gave to be with me, she gave me of the fruit and I ate". Even then male-female relationships were complex, oscillating between love and hate, acceptance and disdain. And why not, in creating Chava G-d said "I will make for him an 'ezer knegdo', a helpmate opposite him." Yes men and women help each other. And yes, they are in many ways opposites. It is only in knowing both, that our spouse is indeed our partner, and that s/he is very much unlike us, that their can be any hope for a good union.

Lets explore this fascinating story of the sin of the forbidden fruit a bit further to see just how different male and female can be. When the serpent tries to entice Chava to eat the fruit,Chava tells him that the fruit is forbidden. She says to him, "Even though G-d told us that we may eat the fruit of all the trees of the garden, He forbade us to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil or even to touch it". The Sages of the Talmud point out that Chava added a restriction G-d never spoke. She added a prohibition to touch the tree. Nowhere do we find G-d forbade touching the tree. That added restriction, the rabbis point out, served to cause her downfall. The serpent seized the moment and pushed her into the tree. She saw that nothing happened as a consequence. She then concluded, if touching engendered no harm why should eating, since both were equally forbidden. The Sages discern from here that " all who add (meaning they embellish a prohibition) only serve in actuality to lesson its impact.

The question that leaps out at us is how is it that Chava added what G-d did not say? And if she did of her own, then how could she be deceived into believing that touching should have the same consequence as eating?

Many a commentary points out that Chava never heard directly from G-d the prohibition of eating from the fruit of the tree. She got her information from Adam.
It may well be that in telling her of G-d's rule he added the injunction, that G-d forbade touch as well. He did not trust his wife not to sin. He thought if he added a safeguard, prohibiting touch, it would serve to protect her from the real sin of eating from the tree.

Men and women often struggle to trust each other. They note the differences between themselves and their partner in temperament, personality, and life priorities. In not trusting its not uncommon for one to take added precaution with the other, to share truths in a less open way, for fear real honesty will cause a problem. Husbands and wives often hold back from each other or embellish to minimize what they fear will be the other's reaction or follow-up behavior.
From the story of Adam and Chava the Sages warned us, "Sometimes adding can turn out to be be subtracting". Though different than us, we need to risk in trusting our partner. There is no other option!

But there is more here than that. One great Bible commentary argues that Chava, in only hearing G-d's command from Adam, misinterpreted what G-d was actually saying.
She thought the ban on eating from the tree was not because of the impact eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil would have on them. Oh no, she thought the basis for the mitzvah not to eat of the tree was to protect the tree! Thinking that the prohibition was given to protect the tree, it was perfectly logical for her to infer that touching could be as consequential to the tree as eating the fruit. After-all it was not eating the fruit that mattered. To protect the tree, meant not taking from it. Touching then should have a similar deleterious consequence. And hence when the serpent pushed her into the tree and nothing bad happened to the tree she figured it was all okay.

Adam and Chava heard the same charge. Yet each heard in it something different. Adam heard in it a call to protect himself from eating that which G-d deemed detrimental to him. Chava heard a call to care for others, in this case the tree. Women and men hear things differently, even when the same words are used. Carl Jung wrote of masculine and feminine energy and how different they are. Masculine energy, typically dominant in men, is more linear, rational, valuing form, and practical, more focused on 'truth', and the right. Feminine energy, more often dominant in women is more metaphorical, spiritual, non-linear, relational, about persons rather than objective truth. It prioritizes peace and harmony over doing the right!

In marriages we see these differences between men and women all the time. Often they struggle to understand each other. A woman lives closer to her feelings. Whats true for her might seem factually incorrect to her husband. He might become angry at what he perceives as her failures. Yet the woman's priorities may be totally different and through those priorities she both sees the world and fixes her behaviors. In the context of her life's priorities and values she is not a failure at all and she resents her husbands insensitivities to what she perceives as her response to her call and life's work.

It is not surprising that marriage is a work and to have a successful marriages men and women need to understand that they are substantially different. They need to stop expecting the other to behave and think like themselves. Most importantly they need to cease being disparaging of the other's priorities or condescending. Adam and Chava in the Garden could easily do teshuva and repair their relationship with G-d.
It would take more to heal the tension between the genders and their respective ways of thinking, doing, and prioritizing. Those struggles, long after our banishment from Gan Eden, we continue to carry.

The beginning of the Torah and the beginning of the year impels us to make the work of understanding gender differences and showing respect for attitudes and behaviors other than our own a priority in our lives. If not we, like Adam early in the Garden, will remain alone.

Shabbat Shalom

From Resignation to Acceptance

2011-09-25T08:12:00.000-07:00

Elisabeth Kubler-Ross in her classic “On Death and Dying” wrote of the stages people go through in the process of dying. In the final stage of Kubler-Ross’s model, the dying, if they are successful, move from resignation to acceptance of the impending end of their life. Resignation means that one recognizes that his/her death is inevitable. S/he is no longer fighting the reality or denying it. But nonetheless the death feels like a betrayal, like something that should not be. Often in a state of resignation the dying become depressed and withdrawn. Acceptance is a step further in the process and the final stage, if one is able to achieve it. To accept one’s dying is not to want it, nor is it to welcome death. Rather acceptance is the embracing of the reality as part of the story of one’s life. While undesirable, it can no more be changed than can one’s height or parentage. To accept one’s death is no different than to accept the limitations of one’s life. It is part of who one is. In the stage of acceptance one dies at peace and in touch with both family and community

At the close of this week’s parsha we read that G-d tells Moshe to climb the mountain of Nebo in order that there he may die. We know Moshe did not want to die. He fought for the right to enter the Promised Land. He begged G-d over and over to forgive him his one sin and allow him to cross the Jordan with his people. Over and over G-d said “no” to Moshe, culminating in this, G-d’s last instructions to our beloved teacher. Did Moshe reach the stage of acceptance before he died? Did he come to terms and embrace the reality before him or did he simply resign himself to the inevitable.

The answer is right here before us in the text. What does Moshe do before he dies, indeed on the very last day of his life? He sings the song of Ha’azeenu. Moshe gathers all the people and engages them. One does not sing if one is resigned to death. Nor does one gather the community if one has merely surrendered. Moshe, fought. He fought valiantly. In the end he accepted. And in that acceptance he made his dying something that proved a blessing for all Israel.
Truth is when it comes time to accept our reality and we do, rather than continue to deny it or resist it, we have the possibility of new blessings, one previously unrecognized.

Look at the story of Moshe. In one way he was defeated. G-d did not acquiesce to his petition. According to tradition, Moshe was prepared to enter in any way possible. He was willing to surrender the leadership to Yehoshua and enter as a member of the Community of Israel. He was willing to strike any bargain. In all cases the answer was “no’. Yet when Moshe finally comes to accept, as evidenced in this week’s parsha, he finds that the “no” does not mean exactly “no”. It just means “no” to the way he was asking.

What do I mean? Well take a look at the verses. G-d tells Moshe “Go up to this Mount of Avarim, the Mountain of Nebo that is in the land of Moab…and gaze upon the land of Canaan that I am giving to the Children of Israel for an inheritance….” And then look at the verse at the end of next week’s reading of Zot Habracha. There, even as Moshe is told he must die in the wilderness, he is also granted a form of entry into the land. Hashem invites him to see the land in its entirety, the hills and the valleys, the rivers and the streams, from one end to the other. While its true Moshe may not enter the land bodily, his eyes are permitted to enter. After granting Moshe the eyes to see the land in all its grandeur G-d says to Moshe, “You have seen it now with your eyes even though enter you shall not.” Through his eyes Moshe becomes one with the land of his yearning. Yet that form of entry was not possible for Moshe to experience until he accepted his death on the other side of the Jordan. Only once he stopped resisting and moved past his resignation could Moshe know the blessing that was there for him to claim.

In our lives too, so many times things happen to us that we struggle to accept. We simply refuse to embrace that which feels unwelcome. And then, when we can no longer deny or combat the reality, we resign ourselves to our fate with a shrug. We feel our circumstances are unwelcome but “what can I do”. The problem with that attitude is that as long as we feel resigned to our fate rather than embracing of it we will not be able to extract the blessing the story has in it for us. We will not reap the gift that even that which we did not want to happen has to give us, often a blessing and a gift that is precious and sweet. We will not even know there is a gift or blessing that we can claim in the situation until we move from resignation to
acceptance.

If there is a more powerful truth to enhance the quality of our life I cannot imagine what it may be. The lesson from Moshe, is that in acceptance we get answers that neither denial, nor bargaining, nor anger, nor resignation, the prior stages of Kubler-Ross’s model, will yield. In acceptance of our fate we not only know the peace and belonging we forgo in our prior stages, we also receive a gift, that while
perhaps not what we wanted, is satisfying in its own way.

May we all be inscribed and sealed for a wonderful new year!
Shabbat Shalom

Our Most Costly Fear

2011-09-21T22:26:00.000-07:00

To be human is to have fears. Some of us fear the big things like financial collapse and illness for the ones we love. Others of us fear the small, like did I make enough food for Shabbat and will I pass my driving test. Sometimes we have irrational fears, like the fear of heights and of a mouse. The person who is brave enough to scale Mt Everest may have stage fright or be afraid to speak in public. We don't invite our fears. We wish we didn't have them. Often we are ashamed of our fears. But alas, they are as much ours as the color of our eyes.

What fear, do you suppose, has the most consequence for the quality of our lives?
I think you may be surprised when I tell you that for my part, it is a little fear, much overlooked that most compromises the quality of our life. It is the fear of committment.

The fear of commitment is most common, virtually everyone has it to some degree, and it is omnipresent in our lives. Its hard to commit! And yet without commitment everything we do is lacking in depth and intensity. We do so much good in our life. Yet lacking commitment to the work that brings about the good, we are robbed of the gift our good deeds have to offer us.

There are three reasons we most often struggle to make a commitment. The first, and acceptable one, is because we fear we will make a wrong decision and then struggle to extricate ourselves. If we don't commit because we are unsure if what we may be commiting to is worthy of our investment we are being prudent and wise. But the problem with our failure to commit is when it is motivated by the two other fears. The first, if we commit now we are afraid we may miss something important that will come along later. We fear not having our options open. We won't accept today in order not to miss the 'good thing' we may later have available. That fear of commitment is pernicious and compromising. The second invalid reason we fear commitment is related to another fear, our fear of failure. We won't commit because we are afraid that if we do we may fail, and better not to commit than to commit and fail. How much of life's opportunities do we miss because of that fear of commitment/ fear of failure syndrome.

Where do we see that type of fear of commitment in action? The young man or woman who cannot seem to find the right shidduch. No matter who they date it never seems right for them. They may give all kinds of reasons why nothing has worked and lament their circumstances. They may even say its fear of making a mistake, the good kind of fear of commitment, that is holding them back. In most cases, if the truth were revealed, it might be a surprise even to them. What's in the way is not something outside themselves but inside. Their fear is of commitment, the wrong kind. They are not ready to close their options, no matter who the other was. They are afraid, in their minds, to be 'trapped'.

It happens over and over in ordinary life that our fear of commitment prevents us from investing fully, even in the good we do. Someone asks us to do a hesed, maybe to visit a homebound and infirmed elderly man or woman on a weekly basis; Or we are asked to commit to a learning seder with someone or a group; or we are inspired enough to want to take on a new healthy behavior, say regular excercise or to quit smoking. In all the above cases while we typically will be glad to do a 'one time' act, we decline to commit. Our fear of commitment and of the failure causes us to either decline invitations to growth and change or to perform without commitment. Life lived lacking commitments is a shell of a life that's lived out of commitments.
The committed are not enslaved, on the contrary, they are actually liberated. What they do is not an addendum to their life. It is their life. The more committed we are to our life's work the more alive we are. Those who live a life comprised of free moments live on the surface, they wait, and rarely experience the gift of being alive that comes with investment of self.

We stand on the eve of Rosh Hashanna. The parsha we read this week is Neetzavim-Vayelech. At the outset of the portion Moshe tells the Israelites "You are standing this day before the L-rd your G-d.....". He is about to enter them into sacred covenant with the Divine. The Zohar tells us that when the verse says "this day" it is referring to Rosh Hashanna. What's interesting to me is the terminology in the pasuk. Moshe tells them "You are 'standing'..." The term for the word 'standing' he uses is 'neetzavim'. Neetzavim has the same root as the word in Hebrew for monument, 'matzaiva'. Many of those who interpret the Torah text point out that 'neetzavim' like 'matzaiva' infers a rootedness, a standing in such a way as to be firm and planted like a monument. Yet the very next word Moshe uses is 'hayom','today'. Hayom implies temporalness, that which is transitory, only for today. How do we reconcile the use of the contradictory terms that is, standing in perpetuity as if always and yet for today? What does that say to us about Rosh Hashanna?

I believe the answer is very much in line with our discussion. True ,Moshe was telling the Israelites, you can only live day to day. You don't know what the future will bring. You don't know what capacities you will have. You don't even know what you will desire. But nonetheless you must enter this day as if it will be forever. You must give your self fully to it like a monument, 'neetzavim', rooted, committed entirelyand yes unafraid!
You cannot allow the temporality of your existence or the frailty of your will to stop you from saying "yes" when committing to the 'brit'.

This is Rosh Hashanna. All of us stand with our future in doubt. We have no future.
Its all awaiting judgement. How can we commit? How can we say "yes".
It is to that we are being challenged, "Let go of the fear and commit. True you only have today but live today with commitment to tomorrow should it come, else you will not know life at all, even today."

Life without commitment is no life. Better to commit and fail or even to miss something you may have preferred than to live in waiting.

May you and all whom you love be blessed with a new year of health, meaning, and happiness. May it be rich in commitment!

Shabbat Shalom
Shana Tova

"Ashamed Forever"

2011-09-14T22:18:00.001-07:00

Elie Weisel in his classic "Night", an autobiographical work describing his experiences in a slave labor camp during the Holocaust, shared a powerful moment that changed his life. He was sent to the Camp as a teen together with his father, a man he loved deeply and admired. He cared for his father in those times of great deprivation and looked out for him. Yet, he found that love and admiration, in those trying times, were not the only feelings he had for his father. Once after a long march, he could not find his father. He found himself feeling surprising and unbidden feelings within.

"Don't let me find him. If only I could get rid of this dead weight so that I could use all my strength to struggle for my own survival and only worry about myself. Immediately I felt ashamed of myself, ashamed forever."

In the Parsha of this week we encounter passages that predict the very reactions of Weisel in his story. The Torah tell us, in the verses that describe the horrific ordeals that will befall us if we fail to keep the faith and Torah, that we will suffer an extreme hunger,a hunger so severe we will eat our own dead children so as to stay alive.

"The man amongst you that is tender and very delicate will look with hostility towards his brother and towards the wife he loves and towards his remaining children..so that he will give them nothing of the flesh of his dead children ...because he has nothing left him due to the seige and oppression."

And the Torah goes on to say the woman/mother, one whose life had always been priveleged, will now feel the same resentment and hostility towards her husband and family that her husband felt towards her, with each focused on their own survival because of the awful circumstances.

What is the tragedy here? What curse is the Torah revealing to us, that in the severity of our hunger we will eat our dead children? The Torah aleady informed us of that in the earlier verse when it said "And you will eat the fruit of your own body, the flesh of your sons and daughters..." What is the new curse implied here?

The answer is,here there is a curse more subtle but equally painful. Here the curse is, not only will you need to resort to cannibalism to survive but the hunger and quest for survival will bring out the worst elements of your self. In pursuit of your needs, you will be resentful of the people you most love in the world. Not only will you not feel compassion towards them, you will come to despise them.Your own wife, your own children you will hate. And in that you will find shame, a shame of your self deep and awful, a shame that is a curse as profound as the lack of food and maybe worse. You who were so delicate, so much above petty resentments, a person of culture, will become as an animal with your feelings emerging more out of instinct rather than love.

Elie Weisel knew that curse. He knew the power of that shame of self. He knew that no matter how learned I may be, how cultured and civilized, how gentle and gracious, that underneath the surface lives a bare and ugly self, one who in the face of hardship has no more dignity than an animal. In the context of prolonged deprivation and staring at a threat to our very survival we will not only take what we can, we will hate the others who compete with us, even be they the people we loved most in the world. True we will often rise above the circumstances and be gracious towards the other, yet at a feelings level we know we carry a mean spirit and an envious heart.

The shame we are talking about is an existential shame. Its not a shame because of something we did. Its a shame because of who we are, because, when push come to shove, we are frail beings, not much more generous of spirit than animals. This is the shame we speak in our prayers during selichot and in the service of Yom Kippur. Its the shame we recite before G-d in the words "I am before you as a vessel full of shame and disgrace". Existentially we are compromised. It just takes the severe circumstances to bring it to the surface.

How vital this message is for me and I suspect for you as we stand less than two weeks before Rosh Hashanna. Most of us have puffed up images of ourselves. We demand our 'kavod', that others respect our dignity. We get insluted easily in as much as we perceive ourselves as worthy of courtesy and deference. We look at all we have accomplished and all we continue to do and we say to the other "how could you treat me as you did?". We demand an apology or harbor resentment. Families become divided, husbands and wives carry grudges, brothers and sisters don't speak, all because of felt slights that never get healed.

The Torah text of this week reveals to us that not only will our sinninng cause us hurt. The Torah teaches us something about who we are. Its tells us to forget about how important we consider ourselves, how learned, how sophisticated. Underneath it all we are not much better than an animal. Once compromised all the toppings will vanish and we will become focused exclusively on our own survival and resent any and all who jeapodize that survival. How dare we become huffy when we feel insulted. We are, in our own words "a vessel full of shame and disgrace". How can anyone then insult us?

There is no truth more important for us to know than the truth of our existential smallness. Moments where we face the extreme show us, like they did for Weisel, what frail creatures we are. Those are the moments of shame and hurt. But they also are moments oh so enlightening. In those moments we see ourselves without the ego's delusions. In those moments we become able let go of the slights, perceived insults, and disregard of others, not because they did no wrong, but because we realize we are not so important after all, that we need to not take ourselves so seriously.

How beautiful life would be if only we were aware of our existential shame and took it to heart. I pray we won't need to see our shame in order to feel it !

Shabbat Shalom

Dealing with the Devil

2011-09-06T23:14:00.000-07:00

Years ago, whilst I still lived in the States I frequently counselled Orthodox young men who were gay. They sought help as they wrestled with the conflict between the urgency of their sexual orientation and the laws of the Torah. Many, like the ones whom I met, had already left the fold of the Observant. They could not bear the strain of the contradiction between their personal life needs and the condemnation of tradition. It was too difficult for them to keep all the mizvot in the context of a hetero-sexual community and secretly yearn for the forbidden same sex intimacy.
Those who came to me were determined to persevere, despite the challenges, living an Orthodox lifestyle while acknowledging there sexual orientation, albeit in secret.What they sought from me was some validation that they remained good even while living a compromised faith.

I never failed to be moved by their stories, and their were many, each unique and compelling. The first thing I told each young man was that he was a hero in my eyes. His challenges were not my challenges.His temptations were not my temptations. His observance of mitzvot was not the same as mine. Everything he did in keeping the Torah was so much more powerful and significant inasmuch as he lived with his struggle, that he overcame his inner conflictedness and continued to maintain tradition. I would tell him that true, the Torah condemns homosexual practices, but the Torah was written for all Jewish men. For most, like me, keeping that mitzva is hardly a great act of devotion. I have no desire for intimate relations with those of the same sex. But he has such desires and they are his only sexual desires. If he is to have romantic love, sex and intimacy in his life it will only be with a man. Rather than focus on the times he surrendered to his desires, I encouraged him to look at the times he fought them, the moments he held back, and the regret he felt that he could not lead life as the typical hetero-sexual. I told him in those moments he evidenced an unparalled expression of love of G-d and Torah. And in those moments, private as they may be, he was a hero of the faith. I encouraged him to look at the positives of his behaviors, that he too could so easily have surrendered the commitment to Torah, as did so many others like him. Yet he did not. I told him his reward was far greater than his culpability for his moments of compromise. I said to him that I was envious of his share in the World-to-Come. And I meant it.

This week in the Parsha of Kee Taytzay, we find the Torah, to my understanding, teaching the same truth. In the opening verses it give us the laws of the 'Y'fat To'ar', the beautiful woman taken captive in war. The Torah permits something most surprising. It allows the Jewish soldier to take a non-Jewish woman,and have relations with her (whilst she is still not Jewish).Only later, if he wishes to marry her, does she need to convert. The Sages of the Talmud understood this law as a special consideration of the soldier's wartime psyche. Knowing in wartime it would not be realistic to forbid the Y'fat To'ar the Torah permitted her to the soldier with certan provisos. Even whilst the Torah allows for the initial intimacy it demands the captive woman be treated respectfully. She must be allowed time to grieve her family of origen before marriage, if the soldier rejects her she must be set free. She may not be sold into slavery etc. The words the Talmud uses to explain this surprising allowance to the soldier is that here "the Torah addressed the 'yetzer hara', the evil inclination within the person."

Later Rabbis, after the period of the Talmud, wrestled with the laws of the Y'fat To'ar. They struggled to understand the principle at work here and what can be gleaned from it about Torah values in general. In concert with the concept of this blog "The Torah and the Self", I like to keep things simple. What can I understand from the laws of the Y'fat To'ar that pertain to me and my observance? How is it relevant to my life and self?

The story of my experiences with the gay Orthodox younge men calls out to the relevance of the Torah narative here. When we are in a situation where it is near impossible to expect that we will be able to overcome our temptations the Torah makes room for us. I am not meaning here to condone homosexual practice. The laws of the Y'fat To'ar are the exception rather than the rule. I am simply saying we need to make room for men and women with a homosexual orientation to be included rather than excluded of our community. We need to recognize that their are those for whom the traditonal way will not fit. For them we need to create models that recognize the reality of their situations and, acknowledging that even though homosexuality is not in keeping with the Torah, it is for those of that orientation, a reality that will not disappear. To pretend that we can rule it out and make it disappear is to align ourselves with the 'yetzer hara'. In doing so we make it impossible for men and women with a homosexual orientation to find a place in our communuty. We exclude them and drop-out from all Torah observance is the inevitable outcome.

The newspapers here and abroad have featured the story of Rav Harel, an Israeli rabbi living in the Gush who has started a match making service bringing together Orthodox gay men and women who desparately want a home and children. The idea is the couple agree to marry and together have and raise children.True they will not be romantically attached, and they may have their separate liasons outside their marriage with a same sex partner. But the model will allow them the joys so much a part of tradition, family, home and children. While some have criticized the Rav's plan, it is the very idea the Torah gave us this week and explaind in the Talmud as the Torah addressing the yetzer hara. While wrong, we cant change the homosexual behavior, nor can the homosexual. Lets work with it so that the yetzer hara's victory is limitted, indeed, it might well be argued, no victory at all, since no one chooses their orientation. To me Rav Harel's efforts are inspiring.

But we don't need to go so far as those with a homosexual orientation to find meaning in the laws of the Y'fat To'ar. How many women know that putting on make-up on Shabbat is forbidden yet can't resist putting it on when they go to shule on Shabbat? I mean frume women, observant in every other way. Yet no matter how exacting they are in keeping all the mitzvot, this they cannot do. How many of us go to shule to minyan each morning, often early, often when its not convenient, expressing wonderful devotion to G-d, yet come home down from our efforts because we felt bad that we did not daven with 'kavana' concentration.

We each have our places where we get stuck in our observance and can't seem to overcome. We fail and fail again. And while our inability to overcome does not contain near the obstacles as the person with a gay orientation dealing with his/her homosexuality, it is for us a sin we can't get past. If we follow the 'yetzer hara' in us we will beat ourselves up over our failing. We will forget about all the good we did, in our examples, all the care the woman took to make Shabbat for her fsmily and to keep all the other aspects of Shabbat observance so meticulously, in the case of the prayers, the effort we make to get up early, go to shule , daven with a minyan, answer kedusha, kadish etc,.
Instead we only see where we were compromised. Rather than affirm ourselves, while taking note of our shortcoming, we condemn ourselves. In the process we rob ourselves of the joy of keeping mitzvot. Our all or nothing mentality makes keeping mitzvot depressing. This is the work of the evil inclination. And only feeds our temptation to distance ourselves from the holy.

Look at the story the Torah gives us of the soldier driven by desire to take the beautiful captive woman. Recognizing his passion, the Torah does not say "no". Instead it puts curbs on it. It gives the soldier mitzvot to perform with regards to the woman, mitzvot of kindness and respect. He is mandated to curb his passion and keep it within bounds. In the end, rather than feel badly about his earthiness, the soldier is left with a positive feeling.He did mitzvot even as he succumbed to the desires he could not control.

You and I need to learn that while each of us has our place of failing, and we each need to continue to make efforts to improve, we must not let the little bit of ugliness in our life destroy all the beauty we create. Beating ourselves up over our failures gives victory to the devil. It make us feel unworthy and despondent. Our G-d wants our happiness.
In truth, the sense of unworthiness leads to stuckness. Its the realization of our goodness that makes change possible.

Shabbat Shalom

Waiting on Anxiety

2011-08-31T22:13:00.000-07:00

The Torah in the first words of this week's parsha tells us "Judges and officers you must make in all your gates which Hashem your G-d gives to you". Rashi points out that the terms 'gates' here refers to the cities Israel will inhabit. Other commentaries interpret the text similarly. But then why does the Torah use the word 'gates' when it might better have used the term "cities". What is the hidden message the Torah is trying to teach.

The holy Shaloh understood the use of the term 'gates' by taking the Torah imperative and personalizing it. He notes the Torah does not say "you must make..." employing the 'you' in the plural form. On the contrary the 'you' in the text is in the singular form as if the Torah is giving the imperative to each individual Jew, that each individual must set up "judges and officers" in his/her gates. He goes on to interpret the verse in a creative way saying that the 'gates' of the text intimate the 'gates' within the individual. Each person has seven gateways to the body, two eyes, two ears, two nostrils, and a mouth. These are vulnerable places. We can do much damage to ourselves and to others if we don't guard what comes out of them and what goes in carefully. It is about these gates that the Torah calls on us to protect. We must put in there proximity inner judges and officers lest we misuse them and cause harm.

In the context of this blog in which we personalize the Torah text to reveal things we need to know for our spiritual and emotional well-being, I would like to adapt the idea of the Shaloh to make it personally relevant. I would suggest that the 'gates' of the Torah text not only be thought of as parts of the body, in keeping with the view of the Shaloh. We need to see the 'gates' in the context of our experiences. 'Gates' then would mean places of transitions in our lives, places that mean change, new ends and new beginnings. It is precisely in these times where our world is in transition that we may well regress and make mistakes of judgement we normally would not make. It is in these time that might well do something that will compromise both ourselves and other and later severely regret.

And why would be more vulnerable to make serious errors in times of transition? Why are these 'gates' so important to protect? The answer is that transitions bring with them anxiety. We become afraid of what will happen to us when we have left the past and have not yet a secure future. In transitions we don't yet know what's expected, we don't yet know whether we will succeed or fail, we don't yet know what will be the implications of our going and coming. Most transitions only happen because we either have no choice or feel we have no choice. Otherwise, even to our own dis-ease, we will choose to stay put, rather than leave and risk the change and the anxiety it brings.

It is hard to hold tight in this situation of anxiety. We want to escape it as soon as possible. Ideally we will contain the anxiety and find the ability to wait.Difficult as it is, we will bear the feelings of instability. We will trust G-d and our own abilities to let time bring us to the other side and the new beginnings it affords. But occasionally the anxiety feels too much and along comes a quick rescue.In our healthy and settled mindset we would reject the 'rescue' as inappropriate for us and damaging. But in our hurting state we see the option before us as a potential great relief. We don't have the stomach to wait any longer. We are too ill at ease to wait for peace and settledness to come naturally and bring with it the opportunities we sought when we made the transition in the first place.
So much effort goes down the drain, all because we are too anxious to wait.

Waiting on anxiety is a huge challenge. So many lives are ruined by the inability to wait. Think about it. Men and women after one failed marriage so typically marry early and make the same mistake again. The reason, they could not wait for the anxiety of the transition to pass. They chose to relieve it prematurely and rather than make their life better they wound up back in the same place or worse. Psychologists tell us one should not remarry for at least two years after a divorce or being widowed.

After losing a job its so tempting to take the first job offered us, even when, somewhere inside, we know that job will not make us happy and is not what we are meant to do. The anxiety of living in the state of transition is too much for us and we choose any means possible to escape it rather than wait for the healing to happen.
I am sure you can think of many more cases where we are tempted to cut the short the healthy process of change in our lives. And the price we pay is that we surrender the gifts the process of change was meant to realize and sometimes the new becomes worse even than the old

It is to the difficulties of living in these gateway times in our lives that the Torah at the outset of the parsha demands that we have "judges and officers". The Torah wants for our well-being. It wants us to be able to grow. In order to support our process and help us wait on anxiety the Torah calls on us to have friends who will remind us of our situation and disciplines that will keep us grounded, our 'judges' and 'officers'.

May we find through our faith in Hashem and in our belief in ourselves the courage to wait.

Shabbat Shalom

The Limits of Love

2011-08-24T04:17:00.000-07:00

The Vilna Gaon is reputed to have remarked that the most difficult mitzvah for him to observe was the Torah's call that on the Chag of Sukkot we be "only happy" and for seven days! For me the most difficult mitzvah is found in this weeks parsha of Re'eh. Let me share the passage in the Torah.

"If your brother the son of your mother or your son or your daughter or the wife you love or your friend who is like your own soul entices you in secret saying.
'let us go and serve other gods' which neither you nor your fathers have known of the gods of the peoples around you whether near you or far off from you, even from the one end of the earth or the other. You should not consent to him, nor listen to him, nor should you have compassion on him, nor should you spare him or conceal him. Rather you should kill him, your hand being the first to put him to death and after the hands of all the people.You should stone him to death because he made effort to draw you away from the L-rd your G-d who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage."

There are several mitzvot that devolve from these verses in the Torah. But in essence they amount to the same call. If someone tries to get us to commit idolatry, even in secret, no matter how close we are to them, no matter how much we love them, even if they are our own children, even if they beg us for mercy, we must turn them in and even participate in the death they receive for their crime, throwing the first stone.

I must admit I cannot imagine turning my child in for the crime of being a 'mayseet', the term in Hebrew for someone who attempts to seduce us into idolatry. Of course its a grievous crime, but for me to bring about the death of my own child! S/he spoke to me in secret. It would be so easy to let it slide especially if s/he begs for mercy and forgiveness. I find the Torah's challenge to me almost impossible to keep.

Yet I think we need to explore the mitzvah for the messages it imparts. First its important to note that the Torah insists that we turn in the 'mayseet' not because of his/her perversion. Rather the Torah demands we turn him/her in because of the harm s/he attempted to cause us. Its because G-d loves and wants our wellbeing even more than we do that He demands the we care for ourselves and get the influences that threaten us out of our lives. One needs to hear in the core challenge of the mitzvah how much our G-d wants for our spiritual health and that we not do anything to jeapordize our rightful place with Him.

Still more I hear the message to me in a very personal way. In telling us that no matter how much we care about the seducer and love him/her we must not show them any mercy even to the point of participating in their death, G-d is teaching us the limits of love. We can love another, indeed we must love another. Yet that love of the other can never be at the expense of the love of ourselves. If loving another compromises our self-love then its not only not noble. It's wrong!
The Sages state it very simply "if one needs to choose, either your life or your friends life, your life takes preference." It is simply not okay to love someone else if that love brings about harm for us.

I can think of any number of real life situations that relate to the above. The woman who is married to the abusive husband who keeps doing violence to her in either words or deeds and then begging her for forgiveness, she stays with him excusing her behavior as love for her husband. In keeping with the values learned from the laws of the 'mayseet', taking back her husband is misplaced love. He is harming her. He does not warrant her love or compassion. Her love for herself must take precedence. Taking him back is not only not a noble self sacrifice, its wrongful and dare I say a sin!

But their are so many cases where we might apply the values the Torah imparts. The older son who comes home and in his callousness violates the spirit of our Shabbat. Yes, we need to love our son, but not at the expense of giving up the Shabbat spirit that is so vital to us. We need to keep him close and show our love. He can come and should come any other day or agree not to publicaly desecrate the Shabbat in our home. We must put love for ourselves and our needs first, the exception being young and dependent children whose needs come before our own.

And what about the parent who wants us to pursue a certain career path,one that would make them happy but would compromise our sense of what we are meant to do and what would make us happy. Its not heroic to fullfil the dreams of our parents at the cost of our happiness and fulfillment. We need to put ourselves first. Not because we want to but because this is what G-d wants us to do.

The situations are endless. The principle is the same. G-d wants us to put the love of ourselves above the love for any other save our love of Him. At times that's not as easy as it seems. Yet that it can be difficult doesn't make it less important. On the contrary it underscores its importance for the quality of the life G-d wants for us.

Shabbat Shalom

Learning from Mistakes

2011-08-17T02:07:00.000-07:00

What is the key ingredient of success? What characteristic does every successful person share? Interviews with highly successful people have shown that the one quality all had in common was that they were dedicated to learning from their mistakes. It wasn't that they didn't make mistakes. Many had their lives littered with them. Rather is was that they were determined that the mistakes they made would serve as lessons from which they would learn and grow.

In the parsha of Eikev that we read this coming Shabbat it seems the Torah is revealing to us this great truth. In the course of Moshe's words of challenge to the Israelites before his death Moshe tells them that they need be wary lest they come to think that the land they are about to inherit was given to then due to their own merit. Moshe is emphatic in stating that they need to recognize that they the People were essentially undeserving of this great gift and only the wickedness of the Peoples who lived there prior and the promise G-d made to their parents were reasons Hashem gave them the land to inherit.
The warning concludes "And you should know that not due to your own merit does Hashem your G-d give you this good land to inherit because you are a stiff necked nation". Moshes then reviews the recent history of Israel's wilderness journey where they committed one sin after another beginning with the worship of the Golden Calf and ending with the story of the spies.

The lesson Moshe is teaching his nation is easily understood. They need to recognize their flaws and not take accomplishment in inheriting the land as a sign of virtue.
But the question we might well ask is why does Moshe tell the people that the reason they are undeserving is because of their "stiff-neckedness". Surely that flaw pales in comparison to the flaws of a lack of faith in G-d, a lack of gratitude, a national cowardice, all flaws that Moshe seems to remind them of in the stories he recounts to prove to the People their essential unworthiness. Why does Moshe say it is the nation's stubbornness that makes them unworthy to the gift of the land on their own merit?

I believe the answer to our question has very much to do with the opening idea of the blog. Yes, for sure the Israelites made mistakes. They sinned time after time.
But it is not the individual sin, no matter how grave, that makes them unworthy in their own merit to inherit Israel. On the contrary, they likely did t'shuva and repented after each sin. Surely they did after the sin of the Golden Calf. Moshe brought down the Second Tablets with the Decalogue on them on Yom Kippur. And after the debacle with the Spies immediately the nation asks for forgiveness and to enter the land. No, its not the sin itself that made inheriting the land of Israel beyond their grasp. It was the fact that the nation refused to learn from its mistakes. They were stubborn. They repented but it did not prevent them from making the same essential mistakes time and time again. They refused to learn their lesson.

It is for this reason Moshe recounts the stories of the nations failures, one upon another. Not to show they are a sinful people but rather to show their stiff- neckedness. One failure did not serve to prevent another. They would not learn from experience. And if to succeed is to learn from our mistakes no failure can be greater than to resist that learning. To refuse to use ones failures to make correction and grow means to be condemned to repeat the failures. A nation doomed to repeat its sinful pattern of behavior is not one worthy of being master of the land of Israel.

The lesson the Torah is teaching us is critical to the quality of our lives. Most of us have the same resistance to learning from our failures that our stiff necked ancestors had. The question is why? We often feel guilty. We even repent with tears and regrets. Why then do we not learn from our mistakes and so often repeat them in one form or another again and again? Why do we resist the learning?

The answer is that to learn from our mistakes we have to do more than acknowledge our sin or self destructive behavior. We need to analyze it, investigate it, explore our motivations. To learn from our mistakes we need to understand why we made them in all their nuances. We need see what in us got hooked into this error and why. To do that work is painful. It means we have to sit in our failure and swim around in it. To do the work of learning our lesson from failures confessing regrets, no matter how sincere, is not enough. We need to learn from our mistakes about what tempts us and to what we are vulnerable. It would be so much easier if we could express our guilt and resolve to not err again and move on. That avoids the shame and embarrassment we feel in having to mull over our wrong and live for awhile mired in the muck.

Yet not unpacking the fullness of the story of our failures including why we made them serves to keep us stuck in a pattern where we are doomed to make ths same mistake or one similar to it again and again. Only a full self and circumstance evaluation affords the chance to learn the precise lesson we need to learn so we don't repeat the mistake and so we indeed can grow from our experience.

Stiff-neckedness is a trait that belongs to most of us in the face of mistakes whether they be in sinful behavior, in personal relationships, or in matters of money. Over and over we err in a similar fashion. Each time we pledge it will be better next time, but to no avail. We simply struggle to tolerate sitting with our failure so we can see the precise causes of it, discern what we need to learn, and how we need to grow.

To inherit the promised land meant for us as persons we need to learn the lesson taught our foreparents in the wilderness. We can make mistakes in life, indeed many mistakes, and still reach the promised land. Only our refusal to learn from our mistakes bars our entry. Only our refusal to explore our errors and discern the precise nature of our vulnerability limits our potential.

Shabbat Shalom

The Right Lesson

2011-08-03T06:39:00.001-07:00

In the haftorah of the second week of the period known as 'Bain Ham'tzarim', Between the Afflictions, the mourning period between the fast of the Seventeenth of Tamuz and the fast of Tisha B'av, we read from the early chapters of the prophet Yirmeyahu. There, in the name of G-d, the prophet rails against the wrong-doings of Israel, wrong-doings that threaten to bring about the destruction of Judea. Yirmeyahu does not spare the leadership of the Jewish people. On the contrary, he condemns the establishment in no uncertain terms. We read "The Kohanim do not say where is Hashem, and those who sustain the Torah do not know me, and the leaders rebel against me, and the prophets prophesy to the Baal and go after that which will be to no avail."

Priests, Torah sages, leaders, prophets, they all are found wanting, and in the worst terms. On this the Shabbat that falls on the eve of Tisha B'av, Shabbat Chazon, the words of the prophet feel haunting and true.

It has been a terribly difficult time for our people in the last few weeks and days, and in particular for the religious community. First we were shocked and deeply saddened by the murder of Leiby Kletzky and in a most gruesome manner. And the murderer was not an outsider, but one of our own, a Jew and indeed a religious Jew.
Then the end of last week Rav Elazar Abu'hatzaira, a tzaddik and mystic, spiritual mentor to so many, was stabbed to death. There too the perpetrator of the unconscionable act was a frum Jew.
And if that were not enough, this week the newspapers in Israel are reporting the story of a Breslover Hasid, who was married to 7 women and over the past 15 year is accused of the worst kind of abuse and sexual wrong-doing. If the crimes in each case were not awful enough, we are left with the newspaper images of those who committed them. All the would-be criminals wearing kipot, some in full hassidic garb.

The tragedies are fresh. The tears are still wet. We are still reeling from the events. Its too soon to draw the lessons we need to learn from these horrific episodes or to now know how we need to use them to make social improvements.
But if the true lesson is still elusive I know wrong lessons when I hear them. I am told soon after Leiby Kletzky's murder there were rabbanim in the States who already put out the blame and a collective call to teshuva. Problem is they went in the wrong direction. They said the murder of Leiby Kletzky is meant to show us the harmful consequences of the internet and of the media in general. They put forth the call to clean-up the negative influences that invade our home and family.

Problem with that approach is that the murderer of Leiby Kletzky was in no way influenced by the media. It was not a sexually based crime. And how would that lesson fit the other crimes experienced by the Jewish community.
Too often leaders take the easy way out and speak of t'shuva for sins unrelated to the horrors we have experienced. Some may call for us to stop speaking 'lashon hara' or to be more careful in Shabbat observance.I can see it coming even if not yet. Those kinds of lessons while wonderful in themselves have nothing to do with what we experienced. I think it is to leaders who take the wrong lesson and are afraid to see the hard challenges put before us by our painful conditions that Yirmeyahu, the Prophet is criticizing so sharply.

What do the murder of Leiby Kletzky, the murder of Rav Elazar Abu-hatzaira and the horrific acts of family abuse have in common?

The answer is that in each case the one who committed the terrible sins lived within the community and yet was disconnected from it. Think about it. I am in no way excusing the murderer of Leiby Kletzky, but he was clearly mentally ill, troubled, alone. He took Leiby to his house because he was so lonely, not because he was a child molester. If he had had friends and community I really doubt whether this could or would have happened. Likely he went to shule each Shabbat and yet no one knew him, no one knew his angst. The man who killed the great rav was troubled over an impending divorce. Who knew his heart? Who did he confide in? What friends did he have? From every indication he was alone and his upset and anger unknown. I am in no way excusing him. Yet as a community we need to ask did we provide the care that would make sharing burdens possible or did we each mind our own business. And the Breslover Hasid who abused 7 wives and many more children over 15 years, how can it be that no one knew the story of his domestic circumstances. Where were the friends? Where the community? for him? for his wives? for his children? Its unimagineable that such could go on and no one should know. And in truth, one way or another, that the abuse went unrecognized or unmentioned is a strong condemnation of our community.

We know from the Torah that if a corpse is found murdered in the fields and we do not know the murderer the closest community to where the murder happened must seek atonement. The Torah describes a whole ritual in which the elders of the nearby city need to confess and gain forgiveness for their lapse in allowing someone to be murdered in their midst. The question we need to ask ourselves is what do we have to seek atonement for in the aftermath of these tragedies. For what do we have to atone.
And when I say we I mean as much the rabbanim as the ordinary Jew, as much the Rosh Yeshiva as the am ha'aretz. Saying we need to teshuva for some unrelated sin is taking the easy way out.

I think the answer here is clear and compelling. In the wake of all the horrors we have witnessed we need to claim some culpability. The ones who committed the crimes lived amongst us yet we never reached out to them in such a way that they might have felt cared for and the crimes might have been avoided. Or in the case of the abused women we never took enough interest to learn what was going on in this awful domestic environment and over fifteen years. We don't need abstract lessons here. The challenge for us as community and individuals lays right before our eyes.

Tradition tells us that the Second Temple was destroyed because of social sins. We did not care sufficiently for one another. One would have to be blind not see the striking parallel to the conditions we live in today as evidenced in the debacle of the incidents we discussed. Sad as each story is in itself still more each story reflects the weakness of our communities and our failure to provide real care for the marginalized. We need to be less concerned with excluding the suspected unsafe and more concerned with including the ones left adrift. Our tendency to seek homogenaity in our environment in order to feel safe has the exact opposite result.
By failing to extend ourselves to those who are different and alone for whatever reason we not only harm them. We compromise the very safety we yearn for.

So as we come to Tisha B'av now nineteen hundred and forty one years after the destruction of the Temple and the onset of the exile what lesson should we take?
May I humbly suggest that we use the tragedies we are currently experiencing to motivate us to extend ourselves to the compromised and alone. I mean each of us looking around us to notice at least one person who seems isolated, without friends, different, alienated. And that we make it our business to talk to him/her, befriend him/her, ask about his/her circumstances, make his/her life and needs whether they be emotional or physical matter to us. What greater response could there be to both our historic loss and the current tragedies. Real caring makes all the difference in the world.

May this year be the one in which we the find comfort that is our destiny. May there be no more strangers in our midst!

Shabbat Shalom

Meaning in Loss

2011-07-27T00:09:00.000-07:00

I have a riddle for you. There is only one yahrzeit mentioned in the Torah. Only once does the Torah provide us with the date of someone’s death. In fact, there is only one time the Torah gives us a date relative to any event in someone’s life. Who is this person and what is the date?

The answer is found in the reading of Massai and the person is Aharon. The Torah tells us, in the middle of the listing of the encampments of Israel during their 40 years in the wilderness that when they got to Hor Hahor, Aharon went up to the mountain there to die. It goes on to say that his death occurred on the first day of the fifth month (Av) in the 40th year from the Exodus. We might well wonder why? Why is Aharon’s death significant enough that we are given its exact date. Why only him, not Moshe or Avraham, Yaakov or Noach? And why does the Torah interrupt the names of the encampments to tell us this event that occurred when they reached Hor Hahor. Until this point the list was given with no mention of events that occurred in the places the Israelites camped. We were told a list of names, without reference to their historical relevance. When we are told about the encampment at Sinai there is no mention of the giving of the Torah. Nor is their mention of the story of the spies when we are told of the encampment at Kadesh. Why is the episode of Aharon’s death recorded here with the place of the encampment. It is not given to us to tell us the story . We already know the story of his death from the parsha of Chukat we read a few weeks ago. Why then interrupt the series of names with the telling, albeit briefly of Aharon’s death ?

I must say that the questions posed caused me considerable challenge. I could not make any sense of the Torah’s message when I thought of why Aharon might be special so as to have his yahrzeit marked. I then thought not about Aharon but about the people, the Israelites and their experience in the wilderness and with loss. And I thought about the message we may be being given here in the context of my own life and the losses I have sustained.

Truth is I have found that people can be divided into two groups; those that have gone through a significant loss, like the death of a parent, and those who have not. Persons who have sustained the loss of a loved one or of something profound that can never be retrieved have a sobriety about life that is absent in the one who has not yet lost. They never again have the full smile, the innocent belief in life’s fairness, the care-free way that at times the one who has not yet sustained loss can experience. For those who have lost, life is no longer a game. They evidence a seriousness, a certain heaviness absent in the one who has been spared. It’s not a bad thing . It’s simply different. The one’s who have lost see the world and life very much out of a different lense. Some might call it maturity.

And I thought that in that truth, in the realization that loss changes us in some profound way, we may find the secret to unravel the mystery of why the Torah this one time tells us a date, the date of Aharon’s yahrzeit. After all, what we are being given in the text is the sequence of Israel’s travels, encampment after encampment. We are told of forty two places of camp over the forty years in the wilderness. The Torah may be interrupting the list with the record of Aharon’s passing to mark a distinction. True many more significant events happened in various places, like the giving of the Torah. Yet those events represent what happened to the Israelites. The death of Aharon is not a story of what happened to the People . Nor, in this context, is it a story about Aharon. Rather it is a story about the transformation of the nation from a people who have not known national loss to a nation which has. Israel is not the same nation after Aharon died that it was prior. Yes, there were many many personal losses in the wilderness. A whole generation died. But here we are talking of something different. Here we are talking of the nation’s loss. Miriam died earlier, but she had not the prominence in every-day life Aharon had. Aharon was the kohain gadol, the high priest. His death was to the nation as the death of a parent is to an individual. While Moshe died later, the people had already known the loss of a spiritual parent in Aharon. In Aharon’s death the nation gained a new sobriety and sense of life’s temporality. They were changed and forever.

It is for this reason, I suggest, the Torah tells us of Aharon’s death, and only of Aharon’s death in the list of encampments. The nation’s character was altered through the experience of his passing. The People that arrived at Hor Hahor were not the same People that left. It is because Israel was different before and after and because we are speaking in some profound way of a new national reality, that the Torah must record the passing of Aharon even as it lists the travels themselves. Who is travelling changed at Hor Hahor.

What of the date? Why does the Torah in this case provide the yahrzeit ? Here we come to another important and related idea. When we mark the anniversary of the passing of a parent whose occasion is it, ours or theirs ? Typically we assume that the yahrzeit marks a day of significance for the departed, the culmination of their life. I suggest that the yahrzeit marks a day of equal or perhaps even greater significancance for us, we who survive. The yahrzeit marks a day that changed our lives. We are not the same after our parent passes. We mature. We become more conscious of life’s fragility. We know the finiteness of existence in a way we never knew before. And while the transformation for us happens most dramatically on the passing of the first parent, each loss deepens our insights and makes us more wise and aware.

I suggest that it is for this reason the date of Aharon’s yahrzeit is made known to us. If it were a personal loss, or the loss that occurred in the context of a family the date would not be made known to us in the Torah. The Torah does not give us data in the life of individuals no matter how great. But Aharon’s yahrzeit was a date of national consequence. We, the People of Israel, were changed forever through the event. Aharon was to the nation what a parent is to the family. He was a spiritual mentor and protector. He was a healer. If Moshe was the teacher of the nation Aharon was its care-giver. His death marked an important occasion in Israel’s story. It signified the nations struggle with mortality, even as does the death of an individual does for a family. It is in the context of its meaning for the nation that Aharon’s yahrzeit becomes worthy of being known. No other yahrzeit or day in the life of an individual was as consequential to the formation of the People.

So what’s the message for us. We each sustain losses in our lives, losses that can never be retrieved. Sometimes it’s the death of someone near and dear to us. Or it may be the death of a marriage, or the permanent loss of certain capacities through the aging process or disease. These losses mark points of demarcation in our lives. We become different on the other side of the loss. We have the dynamics of survivors. It is important that we honor those date and times, not only for the person or potency lost, but for the power the loss has to shape and form us, we who grieve, and to help us mature. Loss typically engenders tears and grief. Yet in the aftermath of those tears and the grieving process we become more real and more beautiful. We become more authentic. Is it any wonder then that a yahrzeit gives us occasion to share a l’chayim and a tasty delight with the minyan after davening. We would not be who we are without it!

Shabbat Shalom

Mixed Messages

2011-07-20T04:31:00.000-07:00

Many years ago the famed British anthropologist Gregory Bateson proposed that schizophrenia was caused by children living in a home where they received from their parents 'double bind' messages. By 'double bind' messages he meant that the content of the message conflicted with the context. In example, the mother of the child who grows up to become schizophrenic may tell him/her often that she loves him/her. The problem is that she says the words while displaying an angry or impatient face, a face that speaks anything but love. Bateson felt that the ever present conflict between what the child heard, content, and what the child saw, context, created double bind messages that were crazy making and ultimately contributed greatly to the mental illness that would show-up in later life.
And while Bateson's theory of schizophrenia has been debunked, the concept that double bind messages or what we commonly call 'mixed messages' can have a deliterious effect remains true and compelling.

I was remembering that when I read the early parts of this week's parsha of Matot.
There Moshe tell the heads of the Tribes the laws of vows. He speaks powerfully of the importance of the spoken word and its power to bind someone except in certain and specific exceptional cases. The Torah tell us that Moshe opened his instructions to them with "These are the words that Hashem commanded." Our Sages taught that Moshe was unique amongst the prophets in his clarity of prophesy. Only he could use the words "these" or in Hebrew 'zeh'. All other prophets could only say "So spoke Hashem", in Hebrew 'ko', a less exact term. They could not say "These words spoke Hashem" with certainty. Their vision was inexact and required interpretation. Not so Moshe, whose prophesy was precise and direct.

Question we might ask is why does the Torah tell us of the unique nature of Moshe's vision, in contrast to all other prophets, here. Why does the Torah reveal this truth about Moshe's experience at this time and with these laws of vows. It was always true to Moshe's prophesy. Why here are we told of it with the Torah telling us that Moshe used the word 'ze', "these", and not 'ko' "so".

I believe the answer may be very much in keeping with the ideas with which we began.
Moshe was instructing the Israelites about the importance of being true to one's words. It was the laws of vows they were being given. One cannot give laws which speak to the importance of the word using "'ko'" or "so spoke Hashem". Here, where the very content is about being true to what one pledges with words, Moshe needed to be able to say "'ze'" or "these are the precise words G-d told me to command you".
One cannot give a message that says words matter in such a form that implies words can be used inexactly. Doing so would be to deliver a double bind message, the content and context would be in conflict. Rather than be effective, delivering messages in that way produces confusion and ambiguity.

I can remember once going to hear a talk by the famed cancer doctor Bernie Siegel. He argued that one must be honest with how one feels and not deny one's experience even when one is trying to be strong. He said "If someone, say a friend you meet on the street asks you "how are you"? If you are not feeling great don't lie. Don't say "fine" when its not. Its never good to deny your experience to your own body and self. If you know the other person does not want to hear a true account of your circumstances just say "6 out of 10". Thats enough to own your truth and yet allow your friend to say "I hope it gets better for you" and move on." Siegel, similar to Bateson, argues that one needs to keep the content of ones messages consistent with the context of one's experience. To do otherwise is harmful.

I would like to suggest that the message we need to take to heart here, both from the Torah text of this week and from the wisdom of the world, is that we need to be consistent even when it comes to reconciling our personal experience and our faith.
So often when we are asked how we are doing we say "Baruch Hashem", or "Thank G-d". We reply that way no matter how we in fact feel, whether sick or healthy, suffering or at ease. Its as if baruch Hashem covers all cases. And why not. Don't we believe all G-d does is for our good. In that case we can and must bless G-d no matter what our circumstances and indeed its all good.

Yet in doing so we miss an important point. When we are asked "how we are doing?" we are not being asked for some objective assessment. Of course to the person of faith all is good. The question we are being asked is a personal one. "How are 'we' doing?"
How are we coping with the 'good' we are receiving, which in some cases can feel pretty awful. To answer honestly and in consistancy with our experience we need to say more than "baruch Hashem". We need to say "Baruch Hashem good" or Baruch Hashem not so good". We need to claim our experience. Our content needs to match our context. We need to own our personal truth as much as we need to affirm the truth that all that Hashem does is for the good. Unless we do both we will never allow for a real reconciliation of the internal struggle between what we believe and what we feel. Unless we are willing to claim the totality of our experience real acceptance of our fate, in more than cliches, will never be possible.

It is important for our own wellbeing, as much as for others, that we minimize the inconsistancies in our life between the content and the context, between what we say and what we show, between our words and our feelings. I do not believe that lying about our truth, even when attempting to be faithful, is in our best interest or is in keeping with the will of the Divine.

Shabbat Shalom

Life as Lottery

2011-07-13T05:17:00.000-07:00

Have you ever had the experience of just having bought something new, and then passing another store selling the same thing and going in to ask the shopkeeper his/her price? for something you already bought! Why? Why do we do that? We have no intentions of returning the item we just purchased. We are not about to buy another.
Yet we go in to compare the price we paid with what the same item is selling for somewhere else. And why? What compels us to make the comparison?

This week in the parsha of Pinchas we are told of the 'chalukat haaretz', the dividing of the land of Israel, soon to be inherited by the People, into portions, portions for the Tribes and smaller portions for each family within the tribe.
The Torah tells us that the division and allotment of portions was not done by a selection process in which each tribe and family participated and made their preference known. Nor was the allotment done by Israel's leadership through logical consideration of each tribe and family, their needs and numbers. No the allotment and assignation of portions in the land was done by a lottery. "Al pee ha'goral taichaleik et ha'aretz, bain rav lim'at". After the Torah tells us that the allocation will be in accord with the numbers within each family and tribe it goes on, not once but twice, to insist that the lottery will be the means of assignation.

Question is why? Why is the Torah so insistent that the land cannot be aportionned except through lottery. One other time the Torah requires a lottery and that for the assignation of the two goats of Yom Kippur, one to be a sacrifice and the other the scapegoat, to be sent to the wilderness, their to be thrown down into the gulley carrying with it the sins of the Nation of Israel. Those goats needed to be identical in appearance, in stature, in value. Each could equally lay claim to be the sacrifice whose blood was brought into the Holy of Holies. Yet only one got such an honor. The other was relegated to be shunned, ignominiously killed, with the sins of the People. It was only by dint of lottery that the assignation was made.
Is there a correlation between the two circumstances in the Torah where lottery becomes the decision making process. Can we make a comparison between the lottery of the aportionnment of the land and the lottery of the assignation of the goats of Yom Kippur?

Rebbe Nachman of Breslav understood the 'gorol', the lottery of Moshe in the division of the land in a way quite compelling. He explained that the land simply could not be divided by preference or a human decisor on the basis of logic, no matter how well reasoned. The land, he argued, was not given to the tribes and families at the end of the wilderness journey. The land was already theirs. It belonged to them intrinsically and from the time they left Egypt. Each tribe and each family within that tribe had a piece of land that was as much theirs as was their name and story. The land and the family it belonged to were one, inseparable, indivisable. It is for this reason the land could never be sold in perpetutity and returned to its original owner at the Jubilee year. It was one with its owner, part of his self. That being true, the land could not be divided on the basis of preference or human logic. To do that one would have to assume the land had no owner and now we were deciding who gets what. The land however already belonged to its owners. It was only that we did not know who indeed was the rightful partner to this piece of the land of Israel. What was needed was not a decision but a revelation. What was needed was the awareness of who was the owner of each section of property. Revelation can only be gleaned by means of lottery. The lottery did not decide.The lottery was Divinely inspired. The lottery revealed who belonged to what?

If I understand Rebbe Nachman right, then the lottery of the goats of Yom Kippur is very different from the lottery of the 'chlaukat ha'aretz'. Though both use the same process for decision making they do so for polar opposite reasons. The lottery to decide the fate of the goats of Yom Kippur is used because there simply was no other way to decide. They were identical goats. One had no more merit to be chosen for his role than his peer. Reason could not help us. Sometimes, when we have no other means by which to make a decision, when reasoning will not help us, we use a lottery, or in our times we may flip a coin. Not so the lottery of the assignation of the portions for the land of Israel. There the lottery was necessary because we needed something beyond reason. Reason could help us but it would not do. Through reason we can discern what we should do, what is logical. Reason cannot reveal what the reality is. Only lottery, Divinely inspired, can show us what is existentially true.
Only a holy lottery can show us the real.

So now that we have the two models of 'gorol' I want to ask you, which one feels most true to the story of your life? When you think of all the things that have happened to you, the important decisions you have made, like who you married and your choice for career and business decisions, do you feel that it really could have been otherwise? Is the way your life turned out essentially similar to the lottery of the Yom Kippur goats, it could have gone either way? Or do you see your life as predestined? I mean the important things in your life story, like who you were going to marry, whether you would be rich or poor, healthy or sickly, the kind of work you would do and whether you would have success, were they random or like the lottery of the land already written in Heaven only to be revealed in the flesh through the years of your life?

From the wisdom of our tradition it seems clear. The story of our life is more similar to the lottery of the Land than the lottery of the Yom Kippur goats. Our Sages already told us long ago, "All is decided in Heaven except for fear of Heaven". They taught us that before a person is born all the details of his/her life are decided, whether s/he will be rich or poor, weak or strong, sickly or healthy etc. Our life is a unpacking of what was already decided. Yes, we have freedom of choice and whether we will be good or bad remains in our hands. But the rest belongs to fate and destiny.

I share this understanding because it seems to me the core of having a happy life is not about having been given a 'happy' portion in heaven or even about good decision making here on earth. Rather happiness comes when we accept that the story we are living is the story we are meant for and that it could not be otherwise. We find happiness when we believe our life is a revelation, and like the lottery of the Land something that had to be and is as much a part of us as is our name and our existential reality. What happens to us in our life is no more an accident than who we are as persons. To say "me" is to say my story as much as it is to say my form.

I suspect that this idea is very much behind the teaching in Ethics of the Fathers, "Who is rich? He who is happy with his portion". When we feel our life is our portion even as the land was the portion for each tribe and family, something that was theirs inherently and not a matter of choice, no matter how well argued, then we no longer compare our story to others, we no longer see our lives in relative terms. Our life then can not be otherwise. Comparisons make no sense. We are living the one and only destiny that belongs to us.

And so we return to where we began, our visit to shops selling items just like the one we just bought to see if we could have gotten it cheaper or on the positive side ,to see if we got a bargain. We asked what's the point in this? What motivates us?
The answer is that we see our decision making as the lottery of the Yom Kippur goats.
We are not sure we made the right choice. It felt arbitrary or perhaps we suspect we did not reason as well as we should have when we decided to buy. Sadly, too often we do the same thing with the man or woman we decide to marry. After the fact we start making comparisons. It's not whether we are happy. It's whether we got maximum value in our spouse. Whether we could have done better. Comparative shopping may save some money, but as a way of life it kills the joy. We never know the peace that comes with accepting our story as the destiny meant for us. We never really inherit the land that is ours and know the feeling of belonging and ownership.

No matter where we are in our life, no matter where we have been, no matter our story it is part and parcel of who we are. It could not have been otherwise. That is not to say we can not do better. We must always strive to be better persons within our story and more faithful to Hashem and our peers. We remain challenged to be good and grow. But what happens to us, and even what we decide, outside of the arena of morals and right and wrong, is our destiny and meant for us.

Our life is our lottery. Its the portion in the land of the living meant for us even as the lottery of the land of Israel was for meant for our ancestors.
To be happy is to enjoy what is ours!

Shabbat Shalom

Eyes to See

2011-07-07T02:54:00.000-07:00

The Talmud, when it reviews the writers of the works of the Holy Scriptures tells us that Moshe wrote three books, the five books of the Torah, of course, the Book of Job, and the book of Bilaam. Rashi there explains the need for the Gemara to tell us that Moshe wrote the book of Bilaam. Surely its part of the Torah, of course Moshe wrote it. He explains that since the story of Bilaam, that which is the parsha of this week, Balak, is not in its essence a story of the Children of Israel, nor does it include laws relevant for us, we might think Moshe would have no business or reason to write it. The Talmud therefore tells us that indeed while Bilaam's story is one that happens in the background, and one that Moshe did not participate in, nonetheless he is the one who wrote it.

The presence in the Torah of this weeks Parsha is puzzling and for the very reasons Rashi felt the Talmud needed to tell us it was written by Moshe.It seems so uncharacteristic of the text.Its not really our story. But I want to raise with you a follow-up question and not about the context of the story but about the content.How is it that Bilaam when he goes to curse the Nation of Israel is unable to find a flaw. How is it that each time he aspires to rain down a curse he is overwhelmed with the People's goodness.
This is the Israelites we are talking about, a nation whose sins fill the book of Bamidbar, the current book we are reading, and much of the Torah in its entirety.
These are the people who, shortly after Bilaam gives up on his efforts,at the end of the reading, engage in lascivious behavior with Moabite women, in concert with idolatry, in a calamity that brought about the death of 25,000.

How is it that Bilaam can only find the good in this People? What does he see that we are missing? The story in the context of the Book of Bamidbar seems incongruous.

I think to comprehend what is going on here we need to make a critical distinction.
There are two words in the English language that seem synonomous but in fact are not. The words are 'guilt' and 'shame'. On the surface to say "I feel guilty" after doing something wrong seems the same as saying "I feel ashamed of doing something wrong". Maybe shame is a stronger word, but its essentially appears just a stronger expression of the same feeling. But in fact guilt and shame are different in kind not in degree. When I feel guilty I feel I have done something bad. When I feel shame I feel I am bad. The difference between the two sentiments is enormous.
In feeling guilt I acknowledge wrong-doing but retain my inner sense that I am a good person. That makes change possible. I am good and can correct my behavior.
When I feel shame I feel I am inadequate. The problem is not with what I have done but with who I am. I feel flawed of my essence. In the feeling of shame we are stuck . We could change behavior, especially if we believe we are made of good.
We cannot change our essence. In shame we are left to despair and resignation.

The difference between people who make ammends for wrongful behavior and who improve in life and those who do not may not be so much about their respective wills or motivations. The difference may boil down to how they view themselves, as either guilty or shame-full. People who feel themselves good will feel guilty and improve.
People who feel themselves bad will see their plight as hopeless and while feeling shame it will not move them to change or improve, on the contrary, it will cause them to stagnate.

In this backdrop we can perhaps understand the story of Bilaam. True the Israelites were guilty of serious sins. The Torah recounts story after story, both before the episode of Bilaam and after, of our waywardness. Bilaam knew that. Perhaps thats why he felt a curse could be placed on us. What he saw, to his chagrin, was that what we did as a people, our sinfulness, no matter how grave, did not reflect who we were. It had no bearing on our essence.
Israel, the people, were without blemish. Israel, the people, were good through and through. The transgressions reflected poor judgement, not poor character.

The Torah, in its wisdom, needs to give us this story. With all we read of our shortcomings in the recent readings, and week after week, we are liable to believe we are unredeemable, that we are damaged goods and despair of improvement. There is a danger we would see the problem is not with what we did but with who we are. Guilt would become shame and we would be doomed to mediocrity. It is for this reason the Torah gives us the perspective of Bilaam. His eyes on us tell us that what we did is no reflection of who we are. Bilaam provides us with the ultimate blessing. Through him we are given the gift of belief in ourselves despite our litany of wrongs. In that change becomes possible. We can grow and improve...and we do!

The lesson Bilaam provides us with is as vital to our lives as to those of our ancestors. We each need to believe in our intrinsic goodness to have any chance to grow and become. Guilt, yes, shame, never!. Neither for us nor for our children. Nor should we let anyone else place shameful messages on us or our children. There is no room for shaming messages...not even from those who say they love us. Shame kills our possibilities. It keeps men and women stuck in bad marriages. It keeps people from advancing in their careers. It keeps us from realizing our potential in relationship to Hashem. Shame is a poison that keeps us from our sh'laimut waiting to be realized.

We are good! Would that we would see ourselves as Bilaam saw us. We don't need to feel more guilty. We need to feel less shame!

Shabbat Shalom

The Time to Grieve

2011-06-29T02:11:00.000-07:00

"To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven....a time to weep...." (Kohelet 3:1,4). In this weeks parsha of Chukat we are told of two times that warranted weeping. Yet, from what we can discern, only on one of those occassions did our ancestors in fact weep. Why?

Aharon dies in this weeks reading. In the aftermath of his death we read, "And when all the congregation saw that Aharon was dead, they wept for Aharon thirty days, even all the house of Israel." Yet earlier in the very same reading we are told Miriam died. On her death all we are told is that she was buried in the place of her death. There is no mention of mourning or of grief. What follows Miriam's death is the story of the drying up of the nation's water supply and their complaints to Moshe and Aharon. That leads to the sin of Moshe and Aharon at the "waters of quarrel" which caused them to have to die in the wilderness and not enter the Promised Land.

Why did the Israelites not cry and mourn Miriam? She too, like Aharon and Moshe was a communal leader. In fact, the miraculous well that gave the nation water all the years in the wilderness was in her honor. Our sages taught that the lack of water that followed Miriam's death was due to the fact that in her absence the well dried up. She was the one who led the women in song by the sea. It is for her, we read several weeks ago, that the nation waited before travelling when she was stricken with 'tzaraas' and left outside the camp. Why then no tears? Why no national mourning?

There is one commentary that says the reason the water supply dried up after Miriam's death was as a punishment for the People's failure to grieve her. He explained that G-d said to the Israelites, "Measure for measure. You failed to tear for Miriam. The well then will not tear and produce moisture for you."

What the commentary struggles to answer is why did the People not cry for Miriam. Why did they cry for Aharon and not her? While he offers an answer it does not seem satisfying.

I would like to suggest a different approach, one that emerges out of my years of providing care for those who go through loss. We know in our tradition its a mitzvah to cry for our dead. We are mandated to sit shiva and mourn. Its also a mitzvah for the community to support the mourners in their time of loss. We are called upon to see to their needs, that they have food and attention. We are charged to make sure that that their world is safe enough for them to let go, that they need not fear to be vulnerable enough to cry and lament their loss. I suggest that the people did not cry at Miriam's passing because immediately on her death they were thrust into a crisis. They had no water. It is not possible to grieve when one is in the midst of a battle for one's life, when one's world feels unsafe, when one is overwhelmed with fears. When Aharon died the nation also lost a great gift. Tradition tells us the Clouds of Glory ceased to hover over the camp. That too was a loss,but a loss not near as immediately felt as the absence of water felt on the passing of Miriam.
For Aharon the nation could feel safe enough to grieve. Not so for Miriam.

My understanding of the story is in concert with the Rambam's understanding of Moshe's sin at the well. He explained that Moshe's sin was in becoming angry with the People and inappropriately saying to them "Listen you rebels....." Rambam noted that we do not find that G-d had expressed anger at the People for their complaint. Moshe had no reason to chastise them. Yet we might understand Moshe's anger in the context of the story. Here his beloved sister died and he and Aharon are the only ones mourning. The People not only do not grieve, they come disturb his grief period with boisterous complaints. Its fascinating that the word Moshe used when he put down the nation is "rebel" in Hebrew "morim". The four letters of the word, mem resh yud mem are the same as the letters of his sister's name Miriam. Indeed from the Torah text itself the word rebel could be read Miriam. It seems clear that Moshe was troubled by the failure of his People to pay proper respect to his sister on her passing and why not?

Yet G-d did not hold the nation at fault here. He understood, as Kohelet taught us, "there is a time to grieve..." When we are overwhelmed by fear and anxiety we cannot be expected to cry. It does not mean the loss was not significant nor that our sadness is not real. It simply means now is not the time!

This is a most important concept to take to heart when we consider our own reactions to loss and the reactions of others. My daughter lost her mother to cancer when she was thirteen. Her tears were few. I struggled to understand her limitted reaction. I knew she loved her mother. Many young people don't grieve as we expect, whether it be a death or the break-up of the family through divorce. We often are surprised by their lack of emotionality. Yet we need know that the lack of tears and anger does not mean a lack of feeling or care. What is means is that their world feels too unsafe for them to allow themselves to be vulenrable. Often they fear their feelings if expressed will overwhelm them. They sense a need to wait for the time when they feel they can let go. It maybe months, it maybe years, or maybe never.(Of course these dynamics are not something the young person is conscious of. One cannot simply ask the young adult or child what they are feeling and why and expect a response).

And we too, as adults, are not different. The woman who after years of abuse breaks away from the offending husband, taking her children with her, will not likely feel the anger or sadness the dissolution of the family warrants. Its not that she does not have the feelings inside, nor is it that they don't need expression. But now she is fighting the battle of her life. She is seeking to secure a new future, provide for the family's needs. Its not a safe moment to take time-out and mourn for what was and is no longer. She will need to do it at another juncture in her life when the world feels safe and life has come to a place of repose.

We need to learn from the story of Miriam's passing to be gentler with ourselves and others in the aftermath of loss. We need to know that each of us has our own time to grieve, and our own time to hold-back tears. The lack of tears does not mean a lack of care. It simply means the time for us is not yet!

Shabbat Shalom

What Do I Really Want?

2011-06-23T03:55:00.000-07:00

Have you ever found yourself humming a song and you don't know why? Maybe its a popular tune from long ago or some jingle from a television commercial you thought you hardly noticed. You wonder, why is this melody playing for me today? Why does this song I have not thought of in many a year come up in my head right now?
There is a folk wisdom that says that what you find yourself humming spontaneously will reveal what matters to you now in this moment of your life. Through the song's title, its lyrics, its message, your unconscious is revealing the current drama of your life and what you really want.

That folk wisdom,while intriguing, has been debunked by many and found to be untrue.
But the question it prompts remains. How do we know what we really want? How do we know our heart? There was an article this week in the Maariv about a young chatan, groom, from a charaidi background, who left his kallah, bride right after the chuppah and all the wedding guests. He fled and was not found for a month. A 'get' quickly followed. But what prompted the chatan to marry and then so quickly opt out? Did he not know his own heart?

And while the above example may be extreme how many of us have felt ambivalent about what we want in terms of career, family, level of Observance, community. Who has not felt certain of what they want only to feel very much unsure shortly after? We make choices and then choose again. Some of us remain so paralyzed by our ambivalence that we don't choose at all. How indeed do we know what is our true desire? Would that we could so easily look at the song of the day and find a solution.

From this week's parsha of Korach perhaps we can get some insight. You recall Korach, a man of stature, from the same tribe as Moshe, the tribe of Levi, stirred up a mutiny against Moshe. He questioned whether Moshe and Aharon had not taken too much of the responsibility for communal leadership unto themselves. His motivation was jealousy and self-agrandizement. He couched his challenge as a call to equality.
He said "For the whole nation, all of it is holy.And why have you raised yourselves above the congregation of Hashem".

The results of the mutiny of Korach are legendary. After a test by means of the firepans of incense in which only the firepan of Aharon was chosen, the earth opened up and swallowed Korach and all his mutineers died with him.

What is interesting to note is that Moshe called for the test of the true by means of the firepans of incense not on the day of the mutiny but rather the next morning.
Moshe said "Tomorrow morning G-d will reveal who is truly his and who is holy that He wants him near, and who He has chosen to be near to Him."

The commentaries wonder why the delay? Why does Moshe wait a day to bring the mutiny to closure? Why did he not immediately call for the test and validation of his leadership?

The answers are many, including several in the Medrash. In keeping with the concept of the blog, that is, understanding the Torah through the window of our self, I think Moshe was telling Korach and his followers something profound. Moshe was telling them, "Look I know you think you are motivated by holy desires and that you believe you are really only interested in the welfare of the People. Wait then. Wait til the morning, til the next day, after the heat of the moment of challenge has past. Tell me then, when you are calm and serene and all the passion has cooled, in the morning when you wake, do you still want this revolt? Are you still committed to it? Is it your ego compelling you in which case you will find less enthusiasm for your agenda come next day, or is it really a matter of conscience that you cannot desist from, something you truly feel called to, no matter the consequences."

Many years ago I had a teacher who was taken by my ability to get very excited about a particular issue, express strong feelings, only later to quickly forget about it and move on to something else. He said to me, "Israel, you are a mile wide and an inch deep." Indeed not all passion reflects depth. We can feel something very strongly and with emotion and yet it will not leave a trace a few minutes later.
To feel deeply, for something to really matter to us and at the core of our being, it needs to leave a residue. It needs to effect us in some significant way and for more than the passing moment.

If I want to know what really matters to me, what I really want, the lesson Moshe is teaching me is that I need to wait. If what I want continues to hold importance in the light of the new day, when I am calm and serene, then I know what I want is core to my real self. If the passion and yearning passes, now matter how strong it seemed in the individual moment, it is driven by forces external and maybe even impure. No matter how many times the passion may return, if it does not hold force in the 'morning' of my life when all is calm and quiet, it does not warrant a place of importance and in many cases it should command no place at all.

So many questions lie before us. So many decisions. What do we do about our marriage or our work? In what do we invest our self? Where do we put our energies? To answer those questions and so many more, we need to know what we really want, what matters to us. And to know that we will have to get past the emotional moments, the moments of passion and look towards the morning, the moments of serenity, when our heart speaks to us and we have the capacity to listen.

Then, in the morning, we will know our truth. Then, in the calm,when the passions have quieted, we will know what we need do.

Shabbat Shalom

"Where Am I ?"

2011-06-15T03:27:00.000-07:00

A short time before my father died I asked him where he saw himself in the context of his life. I said, "Dad, if you drew a line and the starting point of the line represented your birth and the line's end symbolized your passing, where are you now?" My father's response was somewhat startling. He said "Now, I see myself as a little past the middle."

My father's sense of self in the context of his life's journey at the age of 84 contrasts markedly with the wisdom we find expressed by one of our great sages who taught us to view every day as if its our last,no matter how old we may be, so that we will always be in a state of 'teshuva', repentance.

"Location, location, location!" In the world of real estate, all that matters is location. The emphasis on location can be equally compelling in our spiritual journey. Nowhere does that become more clear than in the parsha this week of Shlach Lecha. Our ancestors were in the wilderness, on the threshold of the Promised Land. Moshe sent the spies, all men of distinction, to explore the land and bring back a report in anticipation of the invasion. Ten of the twelve men brng back a disheartening report. They speak of the difficulty of the conquest and of the harshness of the country. In response, the People lose heart. They cry and lament their situation. They despair of enterring Israel. And with that the fate of the Generation of the Wilderness is sealed. They are condemned by G-d to wander and ultimately die in the wilderness, never to enter the Promised Land they rejected in their cowardice.

The core error made by the spies and the people who believed them was that the wilderness offerred an alternative home, and a safe one at that. True, they were a nation in transition, but they had so many comforts. They had the manna to eat and waters to drink. They were protected by G-d's pillar of fire by night and Cloud of Glory by day. They had Moshe and Aharon to lead them and the Mishkan as a house of worship. Why risk enterring the Land of Israel? Why compromise a good thing for something that seemed risky at best?

Israel's mistake was a mistake in location. They did not realize where they were. They thought they were in a spiritual haven in the wilderness. They thought "what we have is plenty good." They did not understand that as good as the 'midbar' seemed it was never meant to be their dwelling place. Israel the people need Israel the land. Just as their could be no nation without the Torah, their could be no nation without its homeland of Israel.

The Torah, in the first part of the book of Bamidbar focused on forming the People's identity. All the emphasis on the counting, according to family and tribe, the travels by position and flag, the order of society including the Levites and their tasks, were meant to help the Israelite define in clear and certain terms "who am I?"
"Who am I?" is a question of deep and abiding importance for a nation and its constituents. One needs to have an unequivical sense of one's own identity to fulfill ones purpose in the world.

But "who am I?" is only one of two compelling questions vital to our People's health and wholeness. The other, equally significant, is "where am I?". Unless a nation and its members know where they are in the context of their life and history they will be equally compromised in fulfilling their call. Israel knew who they were. But the sin of the spies indicates they did not know where they were!

In the sections of the Torah that follow the story of the sin of the spies and its horrific consequences we have several laws given to us. All involve knowing our location. The first two deal with the laws of donating wine and oil for libations for individuals who bring a sacrifice, and the taking of challa from the dough to give to the kohain. Both laws only apply once the people are in Israel. In the wilderness, where this generation was to die, the laws were irrelevant. Knowing where one is is central to the mitzvah's observance.

After those laws we are told of the requirement to bring special sin offerings if we violated a Torah law unintenionally. In each of those cases, the sin typically occurs when a person does not know where s/he is. S/he is missing some vital information on their situation that causes the unintentional sin. And then we have a story of the man who violated the Shabbat in the wilderness and who, in the end, was stoned to death for his sin. Here too, the man did not recognize his location, in this case, his location in time. He failed to accept that he was living in the Sabbath.

And finally the reading ends with the portion of Tzizit, which we say twice a day in the sh'ma. Tzizit are not like tefilin. Tefilin are holy, they contain the name of G-d on parchments. We wear them on our head and opposite our hearts. They are meant to remind us who we are. Tzizit are not holy. Our Sages taught the blue dye, the 'techailet' of the tzizit is meant to remind us of the blue of the sea, and the sea of the sky, and the sky of our call to fulfill G-d's laws. Tzizit are meant to remind us as to where we are, our fragility in life and our calling. They answer the question "where am I?"

Where am I? is a question we need to constantly be asking ourselves throughout our life. We need to ask it in terms of our physical space and in terms of our space in time.

In terms of our physical space how tragic that those who live outside Israel build a home and life without even feeling the absence of Eretz Yisrael. The comparison to the Generation of the Wilderness and their willingness to forgo settling the land with its challenges for the spiritual and physical comforts of foreign soil is too compelling to dismiss.

And even those of us who live here in the Holy Land, do we realize its kedusha. I see litter everywhere. Garbage on the street. Yes, people desecrating Yerushalayim with schmutz. How can that be? How can we live here and be so mindless. We too fail to comprehend where we are!

And just as important we need to ask "where am I?" in the context of our lives.My father's optimism about life as he neared death is inspiring, but it won't serve us well if we delay doing what we need to do in our lives because we feel we have time.
Life moves on, years pass. We have work to get done, growth to accomplish. We cannot postpone the changes we need to make, our improvements forever. The time for most of us is here and now. For most of us the excuses of youth are past. We need to know our location and respond with the urgency it warrants.

"Where am I?" is a question each of us has to ask ourselves and grapple with on a regular basis. To live well and meaningfully we need to know our location, both in space and time. Its the way to the Promised Land, both for us as individuals and for us as a People.

Shabbat Shalom

It's Unfair !

2011-06-06T06:02:00.000-07:00

Last week my wife and I were all set to see Aida, the Verdi opera that is being produced at Massada. It is a huge spectacle that has drawn attendees from around the world. Knowing the opera would end very late and that it would be a long ride home, we decided to take advantage of special bus transportation from Jerusalem organized for the event. The tickets were expensive. The anticipation high. We talked about how special this would be for weeks. This was to be an experience!
We got to the designated pick-up spot 45 minute early. We were eager and excited.
And we waited..and waited..and waited. We saw no others who looked like they were going to the opera, and no trace of the bus. Finally, exasparated, we tried calling others who might know. No one could be reached. And then, then we took a second look at the tickets, and we realized. We had made a mistake, a terrible mistake, a two hour mistake. We misread the times. The bus left two hours before the time we anticipated!

Missing events is a theme this week.It is one we find in the parsha of B'haalotcha. There the Torah tells us of the Passover that was celebrated the second year after the Exodus, the only one marked by our ancestors in the wilderness. The Torah tells us that their were those who had a problem with the Passover. They were ritually impure and prohibitted from bringing the Paschal lamb. They came to Moshe and complained, "why should we be held back from bringing the sacrafice of Hashem in its proper time together with the People of Israel."

Moshe brought their complaint to G-d and indeed we received the laws of Pesach Sheni, the Second Passover, a month after the first. Pesach Sheni was designated specifically for those who, for good reason, could not bring the Passover at the
time of the initial holiday. They are given a make-up date, to bring the offering and celebrate a dimension of the chag.

The Talmud in tractate Succah tell us that those who came and complained about being left-out of the Passover experience were,in fact, ritually impure because they were caring for a 'met mitzvah' a dead person who had no one to bury him/her. Their ritual impurity was not a matter of choice but rather an obligation, as the Torah insists we defile ourselves to care for the dead who have no one to bury them.
Moreover the Talmud tells us that they had completed the purification process prior to the time of the Passover. They were simply waiting for nightfall to be able to enter the sacred space and partake of the holy.

Question we might ask is, from where does the Gemara know those who were insistant that they not be excluded were defiled through a 'met mitzvah'? How do they see it in the verses? The Talmud derives from the language of the 'pasuk' that those who wanted to partake of the ritual already had completed their purification. But what's the source for the idea that they were involved in doing another mitzvah?

I think to understand the intent of the Gemara we need to take a second look at the story of the Pesach Sheni. At first glance it appears that the complainants got what they wanted. They wanted to be included in the Passover rites, despite their ritual impurity and they we given the opportunity, albeit a month later. But on keener reflection the truth is the complainants did not in fact get what they wanted. In the verse we quoted above we read that those ritually impure wanted to mark the Pesach "...together with the People of Israel". They did not want to be excluded. They felt it unfair that they miss this time to join with their brothers and sister in partaking of the special rites. When Hashem gives them the make-up date its some solace but only partial. They remain unable to bring and eat the Paschal lamb with the nation marking its first anniversary of the Exodus. They remain excluded in the celebration of the People. Pesach Sheni indeed gives the ritually impure a chance to fulfill the mitzvah of the 'korban pesach', the paschal lamb, but now its a private celebration, without the joy of solidarity with all Israel.

Whats the message here for you and me? What was Hashem telling our forebearers in the wilderness and, by extension, us? For me the message here is that all life, even religious life, has rules. When rules are in place even though they may feel unfair, they nonetheless are operable and the consquences are in force. The laws of ritual purity and impurity are Torah principles that effect our relationship to the holy.Yes, it may be true that to be excluded from a national celebration because of such rules seems unfair, is unfair. Yet thats the way it is!

The Talmud in Succah was stressing this crucial point. They told us that those who came wanting to be included in the Passover rite with their brothers and sisters might well have become impure because they were doing G-d's will in caring for a 'met mitzvah' and might even have virtually completed their purification process. Still, while they were given a chance later to bring the offering, they remain on the sidelines as the rest of Israel brought the Passover on the 15th of Nisan. Was it unfair, as they argued? Very much so! But life, and yes, even Torah law in particular situations can be unfair. Our task is to accept the reality, bitter as it may sometimes feel, as the will of the Divine. Sometimes loving G-d, loving the life He has given us, and loving His Torah, when it feels unfair, is the greatest expression of devotion.

A hasid once came to his rebbe and in tears shared what he felt was a terrible problem. He said," Rebbe help me! Whenever I daven to Hashem I have unbidden thoughts that enter my mind. No matter how much I try I can't seem to keep my 'kavana', my intentions, focused on the holy." The Rebbe told him in response, "Who said G-d wants your intentions. Maybe G-d wants your struggle!"

Life is unfair. We missed Aida and our tickets were wasted (though it could well be argued we had only ourselves to blame). Those ritually impure, no matter how noble the reason for their being in that state, cannot celebrate the Passover meal with their People. Over and over, day after day, we experience the unfairness of life, and yes, even in matters of faith and Torah law.

The challenge for us is not to waste useless energy cursing our fate or invested in anger over our circumstances. Rather we are called upon to see the unfair that befalls us as part of the Divine plan and to use it as an opportunity to love G-d even when our experience feels unjust. Who knows if that is not the very reason that which feels unfair befalls us.

Unfair, yes. Now let's love our G-d in the unfairness!

Chag Samayach
Shabbat Shalom

"I'll Get Smaller"

2011-05-24T22:28:00.000-07:00

When Audi Murphy, the most decorated American soldier of the Second World War, was asked what prompted him to take on so many acts of bravery in the face of death, he is reputed to have answered, "I was young. I never imagined I could die."
No wonder then that those targeted to be drafted or recruited for the army are the young, between 18 and 26. Its not that they are wiser at that age than those older. Its simply that they may be more willing to express courage in battle, since they feel a sense of invincibility.

Its interesting to contrast the make-up of a nation's fighting force with the make-up of the spiritual army of the People of Israel, in this context, the Levites. This week, in the Parsha of Bamidbar, we are told that the Leveyim, Levites, were to replace the First-born as the designees of G-d to work in the Temple and assist the Kohanim, the Priests in the service. The Torah tells us that their were three Levitic families. Each was assigned a different task. What they had in common was that, unlike the army dedicated to a nation's physical struggles, where soldiers were recruited at the age of twenty, the Levites served from the age of thirty and then only til they reached the age of fifty.

Rashi, in his commentary on the requirement that the Levites be thirty, as first told to us with reference to the recruits from the family of Kehat, explains that
the Levitic family of Kehat had to carry the holy components of the Mishkan, the portable sanctuary the Israelites carried with them in the wilderness, on their shoulders. They had to be strong. Strength maximizes for a person once they reach thirty.

While far be it from me to challenge Rashi's rationale, I do find it difficult as a total explanation as to why the Levites could not serve until they were thirty. What about the other two Levitic families. They used wagons to transport the items for which they were responsible. Why were they unable to serve until reaching thirty? And moreover the requirement to be thirty did not only apply in the wilderness and with the Mishkan. It was the rule in the permanent Temple , the one erected once the Israelites settled in the Land. Then the Levites had no longer the responsibilty to carry. Why was the limitation that under thirty was excluded from service still in force.

And still further, the Rama in the Shulcah Aruch, the code of Jewish Law, tells us that a chazan for the High Holidays should not be less than thirty years of age. The commentaries there explain, since our prayers are in place of the Temple service and the Levites, who represent us, could not do the worship if under thirty, so too a Cantor representing the community in prayer should be at least that age. Problem is, if the only reason the Levites were ruled out if less than thirty is because of a lack of physical strength, what has that got to do with a Cantor leading a community in prayer?

In keeping with the context of this blog, that is, looking at the Torah through the window of our self, I want to share a story that helps me understand the Torah's age requirement. I once heard Rabbi Eliezer Kaminetzky, the now retired Rav in Highland Park, NJ, tell of his interview weekend for the post of rabbi of his synagogue.
Then a young man, he noticed that while everyone seemed impressed with him, there was one old-timer who appeared to have his doubts. Rabbi Kaminetzky approached him at the close of Shabbat and told him, "I see you have some reservations about me for your Rav. Perhaps it is because you feel I am too young and a bit too sure of myself." He went on,"While I respect your concerns, let me tell you this. My father owned a Jewish book store in which he sold all types of ritual objects. Once a man came in to the store and was looking at the array of havdalah candles. He came over to my father and said ' I really like this one. But its a bit bigger than I wanted'. To which my father replied,'Don't worry. It will get smaller'." The Rabbi went on to tell the old man,"Me too, you don't need to worry about my smugness. You can give me the position.For sure I will get smaller."

Life has a way of humbling us. We start out so confident of our talents so sure of our beliefs, brimming with self assuredness. The older we get, the less sure we become, the less confident, the more introspective. Life knocks us off our pedestal.The challenges and yes, the failures teach us how little we know, how little we really are.

It is for this reason the Levites may well have been told they cannot serve in the Temple before the age of thirty. Until thirty most of us are still too large to have the humility necessary to stand before G-d. We have not yet had the failures and disappointments sufficient to show us who we really are. Like the High Holidays chazan, we need to get smaller before we are worthy to enter the sacred spaces representing the community. We need to know that we do not know. We need to have the self-doubts that make truth possible for us. We need to have the inner uncertainty that leaves room for the spiritual to find presence within us.

Often times I will have a conversation with the young. Now, myself a man mature of years, I stand in wonder before the cockyness and self assuredness I experience in them. They have no doubt about the correctness of their positions. They carry little doubt about their calling. At times I feel like the old-timer in Rabbi Kaminetzky's story in dealing with them. And then I remember, this is the way its supposed to be. They are young. I too was once like them. With time, like with me, life will teach them. They will become smaller.

And for you and me who, like the havdala candle, have burned down some in traversing through life, its good to know that our journey has made us smaller. The problem for most of us is not that we are not big enough for the tasks we most need to do, but rather we are not small enough!

Shabbat Shalom

Live Relationship or Dead Marriage ?

2011-05-19T05:32:00.001-07:00

Have you ever wondered, what makes marriages go cold? Men and women typically start off so much in love, so much excited by one another. Yet all too often, in a few years, they are virtually strangers living as one. Couples who at the outset were full of conversation, sit across the table from each other with nothing to say except as it concerns the children they share or matters of the home, like bills that need paying or repairs that must be made. No one shares matters of the heart.
What happened?

I think that a verse in this week's parsha of B'chukotai may give us some insights.
The Torah at the outset tells us of the reward and punishments that will devolve upon the People of Israel for adherence to or disobedience of the mitzvot. After a long list of wonderful blessings that G-d tells us that He will bestow on us, including victories over our enemies, bounty of the field, peace and security, etc, the verse reads, "And I will place my sanctuary in your midst and I will not detest you." It continues "And I will be for you for a G-d and you shall be My people etc."
Now what's surprising here is that in the midst of a wonderful litany of gifts all of a sudden we read, "and I will not detest you".
Why should G-d detest us? We are keeping the Torah? We are doing His will? And what kind of blessing is not being detested? Being detested would indeed be a terrible, curse but that doesn't make its opposite a blessing. Why should we expect to be detested?

I think the answer here tells us something profound about relationships and intimacy.
When we marry someone we are attracted to the wonderful qualities they posess. We also may love many of their ways, the way they smile, the way they express themselves, the way they dress. We find them beautiful both inside and out, both the spiritual and the physical.
As we get to know someone we discover parts of them we do not like. Sometimes we are turned off by what we perceive as a character flaw. Most often we find ourselve not liking personal mannerisms, maybe they laugh too loud, or maybe they are a bit sloppy, or maybe they are forgetful etc.

Most of the mannerisms of our partner that we discover we don't like we knew when we married them. They are not really surprises. What we didn't know is how much those behaviors would bother us. When we were dating or even in the early stages of marriage we over-looked the pieces of our partners behavior that displeased us. Only after we married and lived in an intense intimacy of husband and wife did we find that the very things that we found cute, or at least non-offensive, now become hard to take.

Why is that? The answer is that intimacy places a focused lense on every aspect of our significant other. It magnifies both the good and the bad, the desired and that which we don't like. As we grow together, over time we find that increasingly we have difficulty tolerating certain dynamics of our spouse, dynamics that we thought would not bother us, at least not to this extent. So what happens? In some instances the mannerisms of our spouse become to us so abhorent that we say we cannot live with them any longer. We then go on to get a divorce with all the heartache that entails.

More commonly, in order to mitigate the effect of the behaviors of our spouse that we don't like, we reverse the process. We become less intimate, less connected. Bit by bit we detach. Once we are emotionally detached the behaviors of our spouse are no longer under the microscope. We no longer react to them with a heightened sensor. But at the same time in our detachment we lose that which gave life to the marriage, the intimacy between us and our husband or wife. The cost of preserving the marriage is the death of the relationship. It's a pretty steep price to pay.

This is what the Torah is telling us in the 'bracha' that "I will place my sanctuary in your midst and I will not detest you." Israel, G-d's beloved, may keep the Torah and perform the mitzvot, but they will inevitably have their flaws. No one is without unattractive aspects of their personality. Thats why Hashem gave us the Torah in the first place, to help us with our defects. G-d is telling us that even though He will live in our midst and we will have a profound intimacy, yet He will not be negatively affected by our character lackings. Yes, we will have shortcomings but they will not compromise the intensity of G-d's relationship with us. Unlike the husband and wife in our vignette, Hashem will maintain the closeness and not be turned off. Our intimacy with the Divine will remain fresh and alive.

Would that it were so easy for us to make a similar pledge to our life's partner.
If only we could tell our husband or wife that no matter what we find we don't like in them, we will never experience their behavior intolerable and never grow distant to preserve the marriage.

No, for us to make such a pledge it would require more from us than a good will. We would have to confront our own attitudes as much as those of our spouse. We would have to talk about things we don't like about them and listen to what they have to say about us. We would have to reflect together on the mannerisms and nuances that seem so small at the outset and yet, like a cancer, grow and ultimately rob a marriage of its life energy.

People always say communication is the key to a good relationship. But the question is communication about what. The Torah this week teaches us that what we need talk about is the hard stuff, the stuff that gets in the way between us and our spouse.
The very things we are afraid to talk about is the stuff we need to discuss to preserve our marriage. And that kind of talk, while scary, is a matter of life and death for the relationship.

Do we want intimacy? Of course, both with Hashem and with the one we love. Hashem is perfect. There is no flaw in Him to distance us. And He promised to remain intimate with us even with our shotcomings. To maintain intimacy with our love, will require us to recognize that its natural to find aspects of the one we are married to intolerable. Our choice is whether to grow distant in silence so as to preserve the marriage or risk openning up so as to assure the relationship has life.

I, for one, would prefer a live relationship to a dead marriage and I am willing to do the work, uneven and scarey as it may be. What about you? Its never too late!

Shabbat Shalom

"You Only Hurt the One You Love"

2011-05-12T03:03:00.000-07:00

Do you remember growing up when we commonly used the refrain "sticks and stones can break my bones but names will never harm me". Of course it wasn't true. Too often most of us felt the woundedness caused by harsh and critical words. And they left marks more deleterious and longer lasting than any physical blow we might have sufferred.

The Torah this week in the parsha of B'har makes clear that abuse through words is unacceptable and a sin. The Torah teaches "'v'lo tonu ish et amito'" " and do not wrong one another". The Sages in the Talmud point out that here the text is referring to verbal advantage/abuse. It cannot be addressing financial wrong, as in cheating or deception, since the Torah, in an earlier verse, already taught us that we may not take financial advantage of a fellow Jew by deceiving or cheating him/her. This commandment then is teaching us that we must watch how we speak to another, that we not cause him/her emotional hurt by putting him/her down, by teasing, or by knowingly giving him/her bad advice.

The Torah edict makes perfect sense. We know that we can be hurt and hurt another worse with words than with money. What is surprising is what the Talmud goes on to say about the parameters of the prohibition. The Talmud wants to understand the word 'amito',literally, "his peer" as it is used in the verse above where we are forbidden to cause hurt. 'Amito' is an uncommon term to use when referring to another. Typically the text will use the word 'ish' meaning,
a person, or 'acheve', meaning, his brother, as occurrs often in the reading of B'har. What does 'amito' mean here?
They go on to say that the word 'amito' is an abridgement of several longer words. It stands for "'am she'itcha b'torah umitzvot'", "persons who are similar to you in that they keep the Torah and the commandments".

Yet can that be? Can it be that we are only forbidden from verbally abusing Jews who are Observant, Jews who are faithful to the law? Can it really be that we are permitted to be cruel to a non-religious Jew or a non-Jew, to put him/her down, to be verbally abusive? That hardly makes sense. The Torah is clear, we are forbidden to cause physical harm to all Jews. And stealing is unacceptable even from a non-Jew. We are commanded to be sensitive to the pain of animals. How can we be granted license to cause emotional pain to others, even be they other than us in Torah adherence?

The question that troubles me is one that troubled Rabbi Baruch Epstein and he sought to makes sense of it in his commentary "Torah Temimah". In the end, his response seems unsatisfying even to him. In keeping with the concept of this blog, that is, personalizing the Torah text to see what it has to say to us in the context of our lives, I shared this vexing problem with my wife. And she, out of the context of her life, came up with an explanation for the Talmudic understanding of 'amito' that felt true and compelling.

Lindy said that perhaps the Rabbis were not using "'amito'", "persons who are akin to us in keeping the Torah and mitzvot" to limit the prohibition of verbal abuse and cruelty and to give license to hurt those outside of ourselves. What they were doing was simply noting a fact. The persons most likely to get hurt by our words are the people we are closest to, those in our family and our community. What they meant to say was that cruel words for the most part don't really cause hurt to strangers. For them it is true the adage "sticks and stones...but names can never harm me".We have little power in their lives. What we say or feel matters little to them. But thats not true for those we are closest to. For them, as the refrain in the song goes, "You only hurt the one you love". Indeed the ones we love can be more severely hurt by our words than by our actions. Yet the oddity here is that the ones we are closest to we are typically least careful not to hurt with our words. We take license with our spouses, our children, our friends in ways we would never do with a stranger. We assume they won't take offence or worse, if offended, they won't complain.

It is to us the Torah is speaking. "Don't hurt with words he who is 'amito', the one you are so comfortable with you fail to respect." Yes, its true,its never right to be cruel in speech and with anyone. But the ones you have to worry about are the ones more similar to you, Observant like yourself, in your community, part of your family. It is them who we can most hurt. It is in addressing them that we need be most attentive to what we say and how we say it.

"You only hurt the one you love". Its a good thing to remember! Its a much more useful refrain then "sticks and stones may break my bones....".
Our task is to never minimize our capacity to hurt the ones we love with our words, so that we never cause them to suffer!

Shabbat Shalom

When is a Holiday Not a Holiday?

2011-05-05T03:35:00.000-07:00

A friend recently wrote me from the US. He reflected on the just concluded holiday of Pesach. He noted that many of his friends in the community where he lives, were quite eager for Passover to end. They had had enough of the matzah and enough of the Yom Tov meals and enough of the long days spent in shule. They were ready to get back to life as normal. He, my friend, wondered why men who were observant of the mitzvot, commandments, and invested in them would be looking forward to moving on.
He remembered when he was a boy and living in Brooklyn amongst hassidim, how when the Passover holiday drew near its close the men shared in a communal 'oneg yom tov', a joyous holiday gathering at the shteible. They sang together and danced, trying to draw every last gift the holiday had to offer. They were sad to see the sun set on the chag.

He wondered what changed. Why do so many of his friends today feel so different from the way the men he looked up to as a boy felt as Yom Tov ebbed.

After reflection, my friend concluded that many of the modern Observant Jews of today keep mitzvot out of a sense of obligation. They hold on to the tradition but see it as a sacrifice, albeit a worthwhile one. They are committed to Torah, but out of duty.
The Hassidim he knew growing up kept the mitzvot out of love more than duty. They cherished the opportunity to fulfill G-d's commandments. For them no holiday was ever long enough, no call to observance too difficult.

I would like to embelish the insight of my friend. And I do so from the vantage point of the Torah reading of this week, the parsha of Emor. In Emor we are given the most detailed call to the observance of the holidays of our year. Not only is each holiday enumerated, but the mitzvot associated with the holiday are detailed and defined.

As the holiday section opens we read "These are the festivals of Hashem, holy convocations, that you are to proclaim at their appointed times." The verse, while well known is mystifying. In the beginning it refers to the festivals as G-d's. If that be true, then why do we need call them anything. They are G-d's holidays, they don't belong to us.
The Rabbis of the Talmud understood the enigmatic verse by changing the way we read the word "otam" meaning "them" and to read it instead as "atem" meaning "you". The verse then would be interpreted "...which you alone will call at their appointed times". They explain that even though the holidays were indeed Divinely ordained, they do not come to life except through the calendar as decided by the Beth Din, the Jewish court. It decides on the length of the lunar month and when to add a month for a leap year. The Sages point out that even if the court erred in its decision, in example, it made a leap year, adding a month, when it was uncalled for, the decision is effecacious. The chag, G-d's chag, will occurr based on our calendar dates be they right or wrong in reality. While the holidays are G-d's, they are given to us to actualize.

I compared the attitude of my friends friends in the galut with what I experienced as Pesach concluded here in Eretz Yisrael. Here there was a genuine sadness when the Passover holiday was slipping away. At the synagogue I attended we sang and danced before saying goodbye. And this was not a shule of hassidim. Why? Why is here different?

The answer I believe is that here in Israel the holiday is not G-d's holiday alone. It feels like it belongs to us. The chag is part of the fabric of our life. Even secular Jews mark Passover as a time of vacation, trips and outings. There is no mail, no bus service during the days of chag. We look forward a whole winter to this season of family and community gathering. There is no Sunday here. There is no Presidents Day weekend. This is it! Pesach is not an addendum to our life, something extra. Pesach and all the Jewish events are integral to our life and calendar.
When holidays are "atem", belonging to us, meaning they are intrinsic to our lifestyle their can only be sadness when they depart. Indeed the hassidim of my friends youth lived Jewish life, even in the galut, like we live it today in Eretz Yisrael. For them there was no Sunday, no 4th of July, and Succot was an eight day h Thanksgiving, minus the turkey. No wonder they were loathe to see the holidays leave.

And the same could be said for Yom Hashoa, The Day of Holocaust Remembrance. In America in order to feel connected to this important day of identification with our brothers and sisters who perished at the hands of the murderous Nazis, we have to go to a special service of remembrance. Otherwise the day will feel just like any other. Here in Israel, no service is necessary. Sirens go off all over country for two minutes at exactly the same time. Everyone stops what they are doing. Even those in cars on the highway, pull-over. Everyone stands, wherever they are in a common time of silence and sadness. The same will be true this coming week with the day of remembrance for the soldiers who fell in defence of our country, and later in the joyous celebration of Yom Ha'atzmaut, Israel Independence day. Here these event are part of the tapestry of our lives. They are not obligations. They are consistent with who we are , expressions of our national self.

The Jerusalem Talmud teaches that the day a person brings a sacrifice to the Temple is for him/her a holiday, a personal holiday. And because its a holiday for him/her s/he is forbidden from work. Note the sequence of events. Its not the prohibition from work that makes it a holiday. On the contrary, because it's for him/her a holiday that no work should be done.

There lies the key. If the holiday or feeling of a special occasion precedes the call to the observances sorrounding it the event will forever feel fresh and desired.
If the observances are the base for the holidays existence in our life it will likely,at some point, lose its flavor.

The truth is really simple here. Jewish life is meant to be lived in a Jewish state.
Nowhere is that truth more compelling that on a Yom Tov, Jewish Festival, or a day of reigious and national meaning.

Shabbat Shalom

From Hatred to Love

2011-04-26T00:04:00.000-07:00

Have you ever found yourself feeling a distinct dislike for someone, not because of anything s/he did to you, but simply for who s/he is? Are their people in your life that you simply can't stand? Most of us have such feelings towards others, and for most the feelings bring on a sense of guilt. I mean these feelings seem to eptiomize 'sinat chinam', hatred for no cause, a sin that was so severe as to cause the destruction of the Temple and bring about our People's exile of near 2,000 years. Yet try as we might to use the force of our will to get over our disdain for others, we seem helpless in the face of feelings of enmity beyond our control.

This week lets explore our negative feelings towards others. Perhaps if we hold them up to scrutiny, shameful as they are to us, we can move from being prisoners of our unbidden feelings to masters of them, and find a way to overcome.

I charge us to this task now because our parsha is that of Kedoshim, a reading that over and over again calls on us to care for and extend ourselves to others. In the reading we find mitzvot of hesed, kindness, ranging from the law prohibiting us from taking revenge to the law which forbids us to hate, and from the injunction against slandererous talk to the commandment to leave portions of the field for the poor.The theme of the reading is summed up in one pithy yet compelling phrase "'v'ahavta l'rayacha kamocha'", "and you shall love your neighbor as your self."

Aye but there's the rub! I can understand my responsibility vis a vis others when the challenge involves a call to either act or desist from acting. But how can I be charged with the responsibility to love? Love is a feeling. Feelings resist mental commands. And you and I both know their are many people we would be grateful not to disdain, nevermind love!

And we are not the only ones who are troubled by the call to 'love'. The Rambam felt it impossible for a person to love others as much as s/he loves himself. Tosfot too found the imperative difficult to comprehend and so wrote that the law had a limitted context where it could be applied. Commentator after commentator took the passage and reframed it so that its charge could be made relevant.

Yet as I refelect on the passage and on the challenge I find so difficult, to feel loving towards those for whom I have an almost instinctual dislike, I have come to interpret the verse somewhat differently than the standard. The challenge of loving my neighbor as "myself" is not about the depth or intensity of the love. On that score the Rambam is right. I cannot love everyone to the degree I love myeslf. Rather here the Torah is teaching me a method to loving others. And to understand the Torah's call I first must understand what gets in the way of my love for others.

Let's reflect. Who are those we find we struggle to tolerate. Maybe we can't stand the boastful person, or the narcissist.Perhaps its someone who is lazy or who is ungrateful that causes our disdain. Perhaps its someone who is pushy or slovenly in dress. In all cases we have to wonder why is it that they are unacceptable to us. What does it matter to us how they dress, how they behave, that they are conceited or fail to say thank you. We may say, "They have issues or behaviors I simply find unacceptable". O'kay, but why hate them. They are not hurting you, or anyone else, certainly not directly. You dont approve of the behavior but why despise the person.Typically we hate those who threaten us, those of whom we are afraid. S/he is no threat! They engender no fear. Why hate him/her. Why is it so hard to simply let the other be and love them, or at least not hate them, with their shortcomings.

Most who study the human psyche say that the reason we hate others even when their behaviors have no real relevance to us is because we can't separate their behaviors from our own. And its our own behavior, now seen in them, that we find intolerable.
When we witness in the other person a way of conduct, that at some level we know we too share, a behavior in ourselves we find unacceptable yet present inside us, albiet repressed, we feel threatened. In the other we see reflected a behavior we have fought to repress in ourselves. Seeing the behavior feel threatening, almost as if it would be contagious and our carefully contained no-no would rear its head, a no-no we have striven mightally to push down.

Ah you say, "that sounds ridiculous, I hate in the other things I have totally overcome in myself." Yes you have overcome them. But they are not gone. They are only pushed into a deeper level of consciousness. They remain present but in hiding as it were. When we see another manifesting traits that once were ours, now hidden, we feel afraid and react to the fear by generating the reaction always generated by fear, hatred! We come to hate or at least disdain the other.

So what's the antidote? How can I get past the fear and the concomittant hatred?

It is to this that the Torah taught us, "Love your neighbor as your self". The key necessary to loving another is loving your self. If you love your self, all of who you are, with the parts of you that are not so wonderful, parts you are glad to have put in eclipse, then you will be able to love the other, any other, no matter his/her behaviors and not feel threatened by them. The work of loving another commences with loving who I am. The more fully I can love myself and yes, indeed master my darker side but not repress even the bad parts of me as unacceptable, the more I will be able to extend myself to loving others.

It is only when I can meet my shadow side, without fear, knowing it's there, accepting it's there, and trust myself to make the right choices that I love myself, and thereby, in loving myself, make loving the other possible.

So when we find ourselves feeling disdain or even hatred for another person we need to ask ourselves what is it about them we feel threatened by. When we know what it is we dislike so strongly in the other, we need to then ask ourselves "where is that feeling, attitude, or behavior in me". If I can't find it (as will likely be the case) we need to ask "where has it gone?" and then yes, invite the feeling up from the cellar of our psyche, so we can acknowledge it without fear.Only then, when we acknowledge our own character flaws without fear, will we be free to get past the prison of intolerance and hatred towards others.

Tough work indeed. But we were given a lifetime to get it done!

Shabbat Shalom!

We Are Necessary!

2011-04-13T03:40:00.000-07:00

"I am special and unique." No belief is more important to the quality of our lives than the belief in our specialness and uniqueness. To the extent that we believe that we bring an uncommon gift to the world we are able to withstand even the harshest of storms. To the extent we see ourselves as commonplace and ordinary we are vulnerable, and life's challenges can easily drive us to despair.

No person was more unique in the life of our people than the Kohain Gadol, the High Priest. At any time there was only one, and none other. As we read in the parsha of this week of Acharai Mot, only he could enter the Holy of Holies of the sacred Temple. Only he could perform the rites associated with Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year. Only he could secure atonement for Israel's sins through properly performing the rituals required of him on that day. He had title. He had privelege. He had licence. Indeed the Kohain Gadol held an unparaleled place in Israeli society.

Yet if our sense of being special and unique is vital to our well-being it's surprising that while the Torah confers the above priveleges on the Kohain Gadol it does not do so in a very affirming way. On the contrary, the Torah begins the section in which Aharon is told of his unique entitlement by telling him "...You may not enter the Holy at any time, within the 'parochet', (the curtain separating the Holy from the rest of the Temple) and unto the 'kaporet'(the special cover) that is on the Ark, lest you die....". Only then, after telling Aharon that all year long he is forbidden from enterring the most sacred sites, with a potential punishment of death, is Aharon told that on Yom Kippur he may enter. And even their the Torah does not grant Aharon personal privelege. It simply instructs him to perform rituals, some of which will require of him to enter the place no one else is granted permission to enter. G-d does not confer the license on Aharon as due him because of his lofty personal status. It merely provides him with the means to do his job, hardly an affirmation of him as a 'great' person!

What is the Torah teaching us about the belief in our specialness and uniqueness, a belief we already claimed as necessary to sustain us when we find life difficult.

The answer is that yes, it's true, we need always to believe their is no one else exactly like us and that we bring a unique gift to the world. We are indeed special.
But that specialness is not about who we are, but rather about what we are meant to do. We each have a unique 'tafkid', task to perform, a task no one else can do, or at least no one else can do exactly as we can. Like Aharon, we too have an 'avoda', a holy rite to perform, if not on Yom Kippur then at some time equally significant not only to our personal journey, but to the completion of the destiny of our People.
The fulfillment of Israel's destiny requires us and our special contribution even as it requires the yearly service of the Kohain Gadol for its atonement. We matter, we matter absolutely. When life is hard and the challenges of our life feel overwhelming its so important that we remember that we are necessary, that we are special and unique, that we must persevere, if not for our own sake then for the sake of our People who depend on us. No one can do our job. No one can fill our place. We alone, with our unique personal make-up, are the only ones who can redeem the destiny of our People by taking on the task meant for us.

But that specialness and uniqueness, while forever giving our life meaning, must not serve to make us feel better than others or separate us from our peers. Our individual talents, gifts, and blessings, help define our personal role within our community. It would be wrong in the worst way to see those talents, gifts, and blessings as reasons to look down on others or separate us from the community and its memebers. That is why Aharon's priveleges were announced to him in a way that mitigated his sense of personal entitlement. First he was told that all year long he could no more enter the holy than any other Jew. And even the once a year he could enter, indeed because of his uniqueness and special status, should not be seen by him or the High Priests after him as making him/them somehow better than the rest of Israel. Their privelege only reflected the work of their lives, even as our privelege, be it smarts or beauty, wealth or position, is not about us qua us, but rather about our work and life's purpose.

If you think about it, many extremely talented people, and some of the most beautiful, and wealthiest suffer from depression, take drugs, compromise their lives and even commit suicide. Hollywood stories like those are the stuff of everyday news.
We often wonder how can people so blessed and so gifted feel so bad about themselves and their lives, be so self-destructive.

The secret here is that while our gifts and talents make us feel unique, they don't necessarily make us feel good. Our talents and our gifts for the most part are not earned. They are given to us. The athlete had to be born with the ability to be a basketball star, else no amount of practice would make him a professional. And the actress had to be born beautiful. Plastic surgery would not have been enough, and even then her beauty would be owed to others. The surgeon had to have the requisite IQ to succeed in his/her studies. Without the G-d given intelligence s/he would not know the career success. If one thinks about it, the gifts of ones life, and his/her talents are no reason to gloat. Only a small part is earned. If our neighbor had the same make-up as us their is no real reason to believe s/he would not do equally as well.
Indeed we often feel we fail the talents and gifts we were blessed with. It is not then surprising that we have all the tragic stories of the downfall of the rich and famous.

No, our specialness and uniqueness needs to give our life meaning not entitlement. The gifts bestowed on us provide us with a never ending source of personal purpose. They do not grant us privelege and status. After all, they are not earned.
Yet in having a unique call and challenge to our life we can forever claim a place at the table. We never have to feel we are a burden. We have a right to exist. We are necessary! There is no greater blessing than to know we are necessary!
Today, every day, no matter our circumstances, we are necessary to our People and to our world!

Shabbat Shalom
Chag Kasher V'samayach

The Work of Change

2011-04-07T05:23:00.000-07:00

One of the great suprises of life, for most of us anyways, is how little we actually change in the course of years. I mean yes, we grow. We mature and we age. But all that means is that we became who we already were in potential. We simply added years and life experience to the existing base person. Change is something altogether different. In change we become someone we were not prior. We actually alter our base personality. Change is a kind of remaking of the self in new ways. Its revolutionary.

So why do I say most of us change so little. Well, think about it. The same issues, the same weaknesses, the same character flaws most of us had in our youth remain with us. They may have become more subtle or more pernicious, more hidden from others or more pronounced, but they remain our issues. Whether it be anger or lust, stinginess or impatience, laziness or insensitivity, whatever our issues have been, it seems to matter little how much the externals of our life change or how much we age, the issues of our life live on.

Why? What keeps us stuck? Why is change, real change, so hard to realize?

I think we may have a clue from the portion in the Torah of this week, that of Metzora. In this weeks parsha we continue to discuss the laws of the person struck with spiritual leprosy, even as we began last week. Our sages taught that the word 'metzora', used for the leper, is derived from two Hebrew words, 'motzi ra', one who brings out evil. They teach that this 'metzora' is not your typical leper, the one we encounter in the anals of human history. These lepers are different. They are experiencing their maladiction as a punishment for being a 'metzora' 'bringing out evil', that is, for speaking what we refer to as "lashon hara", evil talk about another. It is for talking bad about another, even though what one says is true, that one is struck with this spiritual leprosy and all its consequences.

Question we might ask is why is leprosy the appropriate punishment for 'lashon hara'?
What's the correlation between speaking badly about another, though true, that engenders this particular affliction. There are many possibilities of punishment. Why leprosy?

If we reflect, we might ask why does someone talk badly about another person? Why is speaking 'lashon hara' so commonplace and so difficult to resist? I think the answer is that most of us are pained in the awareness, even if not always conscious, of our own ongoing limitations. We know we are flawed. What's more, we know it is so difficult to change. In that context, when we find and speak evil of another we thereby excuse ourselves, at least to ourselves. We say, as-it-were, I am not soo intolerable, look at him! In speaking evil of another, indeed even in our desire to listen to evil spoken of another, we excuse ourselves for our shortcomings. We give ourselves a pass on our own failure to change. Change is hard, very hard. We find solace with our own mediocrity by revelling in the evil-doing of others.

The Rabbis taught us that the one who speaks evil of another murders three people; the one spoken of, whose reputation is ruined, the one who speaks and the one who listens to the evil talk. We can understand that the one spoken evil of is as if s/he was murdered. But why the speaker and the listener. That they sinned is a given, but why as if they were murdered?

The answer is that when one speaks badly of another or even listens to that kind of talk, one is putting a bandaid over their own issues so as not to feel them. Rather than face their need to change they are making themselves okay with being as they are, with their shortcomings. To live a life and not change is to have missed the point of life itself! It is indeed as if to have murdered ones own soul!

The damage we do in speakng or listening to evil about another, or even in revelling in it when we see it in newspapers or on television is very much to ourselve. We put a salve on our sense of inadequacy rather than change. Resisting 'lashon hara' forces us to face our truths and the hard work of becoming who we are not yet. It challenges us to look at ourslves, not relative to another, but for who we are and who we are charged to become.

The metzora, the lepor, the one who speaks evil of others, is forced through his leprosy to see that the flaw is in him! He cannot blame others or judge himself on a relative scale. In accepting that I am the one with problem and I am the one who needs healing, the lepor shifts his focus, and thereby change, real change, becomes possible. Leprosy is not so much a punsishment for the metzora, but a remedy. It is the way for him to stop excusing his shortcomings by talking evil of others and instead right himself.

Today we don't have the rites of the leper. There is no one to say to us, "Hey, stop focusing on the wrongfulness of others when you should be worrying about yourself".
We need to remind ourselves that life would be tragic if we lived without change.
In the end, it matters not what others have done, whether it be good or bad. We are responsible for ourselves. We need to do the hard work of change!

Shabbat Shalom
.

Born Again

2011-03-31T21:37:00.000-07:00

If you were offered the opportunity to live forever would you take it? If given the chance to never die, to live on in perpetual good health and vitality would you say "yes"? Of course the reality is we will never be given that chance. And yet how we would respond to such a proposal says much about us, about who we are.

The Parsha of this week, Tazreea, opens with the laws of ritual purity and impurity as they apply to the woman who gives birth. She, while obviously blessed with a baby is nonetheless rendered impure in the act of childbirth and must both wait a period of days and bring a sacrifice before she is permitted to enter the Temple.

Question we may well ask is what is the nature of this 'tumah', ritual impurity? Typically 'tumah' is associated with death. The corpse is the ultimate 'tumah'. Dead animals are 'tamay'. Even the menstruating woman is 'tamay',while to a lesser degree, because her period represents the death of the opportunity for child with the passing of the ovum. But why the woman who gives birth? Why is she 'tamay'? She has born life, new life. She should represent the ultimate in 'tahara', ritual purity.

In 'tumat hayoledet', the impurity of the woman in childbirth, the Torah is teaching us something most vital. Life is not born in a vacuum. Life is always preceded by death. For something to be born, that which was prior needs to come to an end. True, the birthing mother has the great gift of a new baby. Life has come into the world. But that could not happen without the death inside herself of the being that was growing within. For nine months she was alive in a different way. One was two, two hearts, two minds. Now even as her baby has a life of its own, she, the mother, has a loss. She is now but one again, as she was prior to pregnancy.
The 'tumah' is within her, for the death of the second self that lived within.

Over and over we can see this truth revealed in the reality of our finite world. The umbilical cord is the source of life for the fetus. To have the cord severed when the fetus is within the mother means death for the unborn. Yet once the child is born we need to cut the cord, an act that causes separation and a momentary death. Yet it is necessary for the new baby to have life. Even a seed that becomes the starting point for a tree, needs to corrupt and decay in the soil to release it potential to root and bring forth new life.

Death and life, while opposites, are continuous with each other. One cannot have the life without their being a death.This is the message we read this week in the Torah in anticipation of Pesach in the portion we call "Parshat Hachodesh". The Torah reading challenges Israel, the new nation to its first mitzvah, one that is quite surprising. The first mitzvah given to our People is "hachodesh hazeh lachem rosh chadashim", "this month is to be for you the first of the cycle of months". The sages understood the mitzvah as that which calls on us to sanctify the months, the core time frame for our calendar, on the basis of the monthly renewal of the moon. When the new moon is born, after it has totally disappeared the night prior from the sky, sanctify the time and declare the month holy.

What's the message in this and why is this mitzvah so vital as a precursor to the redemption?

The Sfat Emet explained the concept here in a way consistent with what we have been sharing. Sanctifying the new moon is meant to teach us that our holiness as a people or for that matter as persons is not about simply adding on to what we already are. Holiness is about renewal, about being reborn, what in hassidut is referred to as 'hischadshut'. The moon has to entirely disappear, to die , as it were, and then be reborn, in order for kedusha to be possible. Like the moon we as a People and each Jew individually is challenged to die many times, so that we, s/he can be reborn and claim the kedusha meant for us. All real growth requires both a death and a rebirth. We cannot simply remain as we were and expect to add. To become we need radical change.

Perhaps you in your life, I know for certain me in mine,I had to go though the renewal of the moon to reach the place meant for me.I had to die and be reborn. There was no other way. Only by ending one life could another begin. To hold on to the remnants of a outlived past only delays the inevitable and necessary. In hassidut the teaching is that only through a 'hitbatlut', a self nullification, can we come to a 'hitchadshut', a true renewal.

And so to return from whence we began, if we were offered life unending would we choose to take the 'gift'? If life is about growth and becoming then I think not. If we lived forever we would not change, we would not die. A life without death means no 'hitchadshut', no renewal, no real growth. That would be too high a price to pay, even for a life unending.

Our tradition challenges us to do more than observe mitzvot and learn Torah. It asks more of us than to do kindness and be a good person. G-d asks us to remake ourselves in new and improved forms, to die and be reborn over and over in our lives. Sometime the death and rebirth is small, and sometimes we need a whole make-over. The key is to find the courage to die to ourselves so that we can know the gift waiting for us on the other side.

Shabbat Shalom

Setting Precedence

2011-03-23T05:49:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, especially in Israel, when we least expect it, we have experiences that move us to the depth of our soul. That happened to me last Shabbat at mincha services in my neighborhood shule. There I and about 150 men got to honor Rav Ben-Yishai, the father of the Fogel family brutally murdered in Itamar. The shiva was over just Shabbat morning. Rav Ben-Yishai came to shule and received an aliya.
During shiva the mourner is not allowed to receive an aliya. This represented his first opportunity since the tragic murder of his children and grandchildren.

When his name was called he proceeded to the shulchan to receive his aliya. The whole community of men rose as one, spontaneously, to pay him homage. And they remained standing until his honor was complete. The silence in the synagogue was deafening. Each man was transfixed in heartfelt solidarity with Rav Ben-Yishai and his family.

Most of those present, indeed most in Israel, knew of Rav Ben-Yishai's eloquent eulogy at the funeral of his daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren.Many had travelled North for the service. Others read his remarks in the papers or heard it on radio. Rav Ben-Yishai, in the face of this unspeakable tragedy, evidenced great courage. He insisted on praising his G-d and recommitting himself to his faith and his People, the core values of his murdered family.
He, like so many men and women before him, accepted G-d's will even at a time of so great a loss.

Indeed this is essentially our mandate as Jews. We are all of us called upon, in times most dark and painful, to accept the will of the Divine. Mourners in their moment of greatest pain recite a bracha validating the decision of our G-d as just and rightful. At the graveside the grief stricken assembled recite "Zadok Hadin", a prayer in which we proclaim all G-d's deeds as good. While the circumstances of Rav Ben-Yishai's family were more horrific and the tragedy more difficult to accept, he was essentially following the precedent of the heroic men and women of our people who submit their will to the will of their G-d no matter the circumstances.

In this context it becomes difficult to comprehend this week's parsha of Sh'mini, in particular,the story of the tragic deaths of Aharon's two sons, Nadav and Avihu. Nadav and Avihu died during the celebration of the inauguration of the Mishkan, the house of G-d built by the Israelites in the wilderness. The Torah tells us their sin was "bringing into the sanctuary and strange fire". The consequence, they died a sudden death. As we might expect, Aharon, their father, was devastated. Yet after Moshe, his brother, offers him brief words of comfort, we are told "Aharon kept silent". In the face of an overwhelming personal tragedy Aharon accepted G-d's will and contained any anger or negative emotion he might have had.
He continued to perform the rituals of the day as he was required.

Tradition teaches that Aharon was greatly praised for his self-control and devotion in the face of his great loss. He received unique blessings from G-d for his faithfulness. His action is lauded as heroic. Yet we might wonder why? What did Aharon do so much more than that which every Jew is required when confronting a personal tragedy. Moreover while Aharon silently accepted G-d's will, men and women throughout our history made blessings and publicly proclaimed G-d's righteousness, a seemingly harder thing to do. If we place Rav Ben-Yishai's response to his huge tragedy next to Aharon's response it would seem Rav Ben-Yishai's was the more noteworthy. On what basis does Aharaon earn all the acclaim for his silence?

And a similar question can be asked about Avraham and the story of the binding of Yitzchak. Anyone familiar with our liturgy knows that over and over we beseech G-d that He have compassion on us in merit of Avraham's great commitment,being willing to sacrifice Yitzchak. Why is Avraham's act so significant. Our history is sadly replete with men and women who not only gave their lives 'al kiddush Hashem',sanctifying G-d name, but surrendered their children to death rather than see them forced to embrace a foreign faith.

The answer to both questions I think is the same. And it leads us to a great truth. Let me couch the answer with this vignette. In my life I have had many non-Jewish friends. Sometimes they ask me about Jewish practices. When I tell them about fasting on Yom Kippur they are astounded. "You mean you fast 25 hours and you don't die?" they ask. They continue "You must be drinking during the fast". They cannot imagine the self-control that even the most minimally observant Jew undertakes. And the same feeling they express with regards to abstaining from eating in non-kosher restaurants. How do you do it? they ask. "How do you pass up opportunities to eat when you are hungry?"

What they do not understand is that we are inculcated into a certain way of life with certain behaviors from the time we are young. What's near impossible for them to imagine,is for the Observant Jew second nature. What we have learned to practice is so much easier than it would be for someone not oriented into that way of life.

Its true what Aharon did in remaining silent to the tragic death of his two eldest sons would not stand out in light of the heroic embracing of the will of the Divine expressed by parents through the generations. Nor even would Avraham's sacrifice of Yitzchak be so unique an expression of devotion in the context of the history of Jewish martyrdom. But Aharon and Avraham were the first. No one prior had ever demonstrated the faithfulness they displayed. True we have done equally great things. But we had their precedent. They set the example and from them we embraced a set of expectations that made accepting G-d judgement and even martyrdom, if not easy, at least doable. Aharon and Avraham had no models. They had to do the unprecedented. We who are schooled from the time of our youth in their stories and the stories of other heroes through our history have not nearly the same challenge.

And whats in this for you and me? Well it seems to me that any strengths we have in terms of personal character traits or in terms of religious practice was made more plausible because we had family members or teachers who set an example and paved the way for our excellence. We did not have to invent our good behavior or conduct, our courage or uncommon devotion.We did not have to be original in caring or compassion, in patience and acceptance. We had orientation, or, at least, we had role models.

It is for us to create the precedence for our children and community.
When we find the wherewith all to be happy in the face of adversity or to maintain faith when things seem bad, when we show kindness even to people different from us or extend ourselves even when its uncomfortable, we make it that much easier for others to do similarly. Our behavior sets the mode. Those who matter to us need only to follow, a much easier path, and one now much more likely to be chosen with us having taken the lead.

We all have virtues learned and integrated because of those who came before us. What have we given those who will follow?

Shabbat Shalom

Breaking Form

2011-03-18T05:38:00.000-07:00

I spent last Shabbat with the new family my step-daughter married into. It was Shabbat Chatan, the first Sabbath after the wedding, and we were together in a hotel in Netanya. The chatan and his family are Sefardim, originally from Tunis. The whole of the Shabbat experience, from davening to food was couched in a tradition I did not know. The experience in synagogue, in particular, felt very alien. For me it might almost have been another religion.
Yet on reflection, after the weekend, I realized that the differences between my Ashkenaz service and that of the Sefardim is not very much in the content of the prayers. The prayer are for the most part similar. What is different is the way the prayers are recited. Sefardim do alot of communal chanting, whereas Askenazim tend to say prayers to themselves. The melodies of Sefardim are middle-eastern, in the minor key. Ashkenazim use melodies of the West, in the major mode.

So while the experience in prayer felt so foreign it was not, in fact, that much other than what I have known. The differences were of the form, not the substance. Yet, it seems, form alone can make a difference so vital that it can feel totally other.

I was thinking how this thought rings true for that which we see in the parsha of this week, that of Tzav. Here in the Torah portion there is emphasis on the clothes worn by the 'kohen', priest and the 'kohen gadol', high priest. When the instructions are given for consecrating the priests they are told they are to be wearing their special clothes during the special sprinkling. Indeed even the clothes are to be made holy. The clothes are so important that a kohen who serves in the Temple without being fully clothed in the priestly garments has a severe penalty and his service is invalid. Without his clothes he is called a 'zar', a non-kohen.

We see from all of the above that what we wear has profound significance. Indeed all of the trappings of our life are relevant for defining us. As tradition taught "'chitzoniyot m'orair p'neemiyot'", "the outside influences the inside of a person". Whether it be the way people daven or the clothes the kohen wears, or for that matter the way we dress or the style of our lives, style has substance! The form of our lives shapes the substance of who we are! In essence, we become how we live, how we look, how we act!

Its no wonder the davening of the Sefaradim felt so different despite a similarity of content. The form of the prayers is like the clothes for the words. Clothes, form, matter, and makes things different of essence!

And yet here we are on the eve of Purim. Already the streets have been full of children in costume. Even adults often dress in disguise on Purim. And the custom seems to have a basis in halacha. There are rabbinic opinions that allow men to dress as women on Purim, something forbidden all year long by Torah injunction. Yet we might wonder why. Did we not just talk about the importance of the externals, that they influence and shape who we are. How is it on Purim we are not only permitted, we are encouraged to dress in ways not true to ourselves and often as characters whose behavior we would never want to emulate?

I believe the answer is that on Purim we mark a holiday that goes counter the norm. The Jews of Persia lived in an environment where all the externals said a renewal of Judaism was impossible. They were in exile, the first exile, the Temple destroyed. They lived amongst a hedonistic people with a hedonistic king, as the Megilla describes. Everything around them mitigated against a revival of the Jewish spirit. Yet despite it all the Jews of the diaspora, facing extermination, experience a total renewal of faith. The Sages describe the events of Purim as a second acceptance of Torah, the first being at Sinai. Only they point out, this acceptance, the one that happened at the time of Purim was greater. Here the Jews accepted the Torah from love of G-d. At Sinai, yes, they accepted, but they were, as tradition teaches,in fact coerced.

Purim is the holiday of Jewish renewal that takes place when the context in which our People lived said it would be impossible. Purim is the one time where the 'pneemiyut' broke through the 'chitzoniyut', where who we were at our core broke through the constraints of the form in which we were living.

Every day can't be Purim. But on Purim, in dressing in costume, we say that true though it normally is that the clothes make the man or woman, on this day we are more than the clothes we wear. We can dress as whomever, yet we will remain ourselves. No externals will compromise the integrity of our true being.

The message of both the Parsha and of Purim is that while we need to be careful to create an environment for ourselves that is in synch with our purpose and nature, after all the clothes of our lives indeed matter, yet if we find ourselves ensnared by a context foreign and antithetical to who we are we can still overcome and rise above it.
Purim teaches us that the though the form shapes us it does not condemn us. No matter the circumstances we find ourselves in we can yet find spiritual renewal and rebirth.

Shabbat Shalom
Chag Purim Samaiach

Knowing Our Place

2011-03-10T09:40:00.000-08:00

When I was a boy I davened in a synagogue each Shabbat with some 300 grown men. While all the regulars wore similar taleisim, white with black stripes, their was one noticeable difference amongst a select few of the men. Nearly everyone, including my father, recited the prayers with their talis on their shoulders. A few however, davened with their talis over their head. It was clear to me that these men were different from the rest. They were the learned of the community, talmidai chachamim, even if not officially in the rabbinate. I said to myself "when I grow up I want to be one of the special ones, the talmidai chachamim. I too want to be worthy of davening with my talis over my head."

The years have past. I no longer am that boy of eight. I am a man mature and beginning to age. I look around me in the shule wherever I daven and I see in many cases more than half the men daven with the talis over their head. What's changed? Have so many become learned? I don't think that's the change. I see men who don't fully observe Shabbat, yet they daven with the talis over their head. I see boys not yet married, with only a minimum of Jewish education davening with a talis over their head. It seems wearing the talis over the head has become the right of everyone. It symbolizes nothing more than that the person doing it wants to show he is serious in prayer. I wonder what the boy of eight can observe in today's synagogue, that might inspire him to want to excel and become worthy.

This week we begin the third book of the Torah, Vayikra. Much of the early parshiyot deal with the laws of sacrifices in the Mishkan.
As we enter the subject the Torah reads "'Adam',(a man) who decides he wishes to bring a sacrifice to Hashem...." Its worth noting that the Torah refers to the one who wants to bring the sacrifice not in the common term for man, 'ish', nor in the gender neutral term the Torah uses through most of the parsha 'nefesh', a soul. Here at the outset the Torah when the text refers to a man it uses the term 'adam', a term of distinction, typically reserved for a person of character.

A number of our sages have commented on this. In particular they point out the oddity that here we are talking of bringing a sacrifice, most commonly in response to seeking forgiveness for committing a sin, and yet we use the noble term 'adam' to refer to the one bringing it. They wonder about the incongruity. In a situation in which one sinned it would seem 'ish' or 'nefesh' would be more appropriate.

Yet it seems to me not a problem at all. The context in which the Torah is using the term 'adam' to refer to man is with regards to the 'korban olah', the sacrifice that was a voluntary offering, totally consumed on the alter. That sacrifice is not typically brought for a sin. It is the ultimate gift offering in which no part is reserved for the person who brought it.

But if that's the context in which the Torah chooses the term 'adam' to refer to man, we might ask, what is the Torah trying then to teach us calling the one who brings it 'adam'?

In light of the self-story I wrote about to open this blog, I think we might understand the Torah to be telling us something profoundly relevant. I suggest the Torah is telling us that if you are going to bring the 'olah', the offering entirely voluntary and a total gift to G-d, you had better be an 'adam'. Only a person of spiritual character has business making a public display of bringing an 'olah' to the Temple. Bringing an offering was very much a public event. The person mired in mediocrity should not assume a public posture of spiritual excellence, as exemplified in bringing an 'olah', no matter how much he wants for the religious experience. An 'olah' belongs to an 'adam'.The Torah is teaching first become an 'adam', a man of character, then you can bring the 'olah'. To do otherwise, no matter how sincere in the moment, smacks of pomposity, and is inappropriate.

The Torah teaches us that while we may all want the most intense religious experience, we need to know our place. Everyone, as the Torah refers to in the term 'nefesh', needs to bring a sin offering. Only an 'adam' should consider himself worthy to publicly bring the 'olah'.

We live in a time where even persons who are on the level of 'nefesh' (like me) want to express their public Judaism as if they are an 'adam'. They want to 'max out' on the Jewish experience. They argue, why not experience the intensity of form that was once reserved for those who achieved a spiritual excellence. It is to them that the Torah is speaking in telling us that you have to earn the right to express yourself as devout in public. Otherwise public expressions of religiosity, that go beyond the halachic mandate, are bordering on pomposity and actually are antithetical to the humility true faith requires.

Talis over the head and other public displays of religiosity, formerly reserved for those devout, should remain in their domain.
We who are mediocre in our Jewish lifestyle have no business pretending, especially in the public arena. That is not to say we should not aspire to reach the level of the one's for whom taking on practices of devotion is rightful. On the contrary, they should motivate us to be worthy of joining their ranks and engaging ourselves in the practices reserved for the 'adam'.

Shabbat Shalom

Closed Out

2011-03-03T08:07:00.000-08:00

This week we come to the end of the second book of the Torah with the reading of the Parsha of Pekudai. The reading also marks the culmination of the story of the building of the Mishkan, the temporary sanctuary to house the spirit of the Divine, the Israelites built in the wilderness. There is one verse in the reading that struck me as most compelling. After we read of how Moshe, in accord with G-d's command, erected the Mishkan and placed all the objects he fashioned, in accord with the commands of G-d discussed in the earlier week's readings, we are told something startling. The verse reads "And Moshe could not enter the Tent of Meeting because the 'Anan' (Cloud of the Divine) rested upon it and the glory of Hashem filled the Mishkan".

How could that be? How could it be that Moshe, who toiled with such devotion to build the Mishkan and adhered to the will of G-d so precisely, could be closed out from entry on the day the Mishkan was first erected. This is the Moshe who had privileges to enter the Holy of Holies, where even the High Priest could not go but once a year, any time he desired. This is the Moshe who visited G-d on Mt Sinai and dwelt with the angels. Yet he was locked out on the day the Mishkan was first born.

Moreover everything Moshe made was within, there to welcome the presence of G-d into His home on earth, from the alters to the menorah, from the golden vessels to the sink, yet Moshe who created them was outside and could not enter.

And its not the only time Moshe was left outside while that which he forged was privileged to enter. Do we not find the story replayed when Moshe at the end of his life is, to his great dismay, unable to enter the land of Israel, the Promised Land, while the People he made into a nation are charged to cross-over the Jordan and inherit the land. How can it be that the People he molded could go where he could not?

I thought about this as this week my daughter, Bat Sheva, became an 'olah', a full fledged citizen of Israel. I grew up a strong Zionist, the child of strong Zionists. My father was president of Poal Hamizrachi of New York in the late 40's just as the State was coming into existence. He travelled to Israel in 1947 and tried to set-up a family business here that unfortunately did not take root.
While forever dreaming of making aliya, life circumstances prevented the realization of his dream. I too, all my life dreamed of living in Israel, fulfilling the great mitzvah of Yishuv Ha'aretz, settling the land. Now, for me too, because of circumstances, becoming an 'oleh' is not feasible. Yet where neither my father nor I could go, and where we remain closed out, she who we fashioned, our daughter and granddaughter, is privileged to enter.

And herein lies the great truth.
Sometimes the ones who pave the way never make it to the Promised Land. Yet their energy and guidance give what they bring to life the power to enter.

And truth be told its not the only case in my life where this rings true. I spent many years learning in yeshiva. Yet as much as I loved learning, I did not have the temperament to sit in the bais medrash (study hall) and devote my life to Talmud study. My restlessness caused me to have to leave the world of Torah and invest in other worthy Jewish activities. But I always felt that, willy nilly, I was closed out, even if due to my own temperament, from a life I would have relished. Yet, thanks to G-d, while my journey took me away from intense Torah study, I have two grown sons, who have rooted themselves in the bais medrash, one a rebbe in a prominent yeshiva and the other in an excellent kollel. They have entered and made a home in a place I could not settle. Yet here too, I sense that the love of Torah that inhered in me was passed on and it made their life in that world possible.

I suspect that each of us can find places where we know the experience of Moshe, places where, while we were closed out, our children or our students, or someone we loved or influenced, was privileged to enter. We may have mourned that we did not merit to enter that place that was so important to us. Yet, on reflection, we can, like Moshe, derive joy in knowing that that which is within, that which is basking in the special gift of that environ, is there, at least in part, because of our influence and investment.
And in that we can derive both nachas and a sense of fulfillment.

Shabbat Shalom

The Black Hat

2011-02-10T01:25:00.000-08:00

Since Sukkot I have been learning morning seder at the Mir Yeshiva.
In order to not stand out I had to change my style of dress. Formerly I might have worn khaki colored slacks and a blue shirt with a kippa seruga (knitted). Currently each day I dress wearing a white shirt and black slacks and with a black velvet yarmulke. I am not one who likes to conform. More to my nature would be that if everyone wore black I would wear grey. But as I have grown older I feel less need to assert my anti-establishment sentiments. And while the black and white dress would not be me, I wear it out of respect for the Yeshiva and the men I learn with. I had become so 'yeshiveshe' that I even took my haircut with the Yeshiva barbers.

But I had remained resistant to one change, donning the black felt hat. I had given up black hats more than 30 years ago, some years after I left Yeshiva. To put on a black hat felt like surrender. I hesitated to give up the last vestige of my independent self and accept the black hat and with it the label of hareidi, which I don't feel I am. For several months I wrestled with what is the right thing for me to do. I davened Mincha each day in the Beit Midrash with 400 others all in black hats while I remained the lone hold-out in my black. albeit velvet, kipa.

The struggle with the black hat was not so much about conforming to the norms of the Yeshiva but rather about surrendering the spontaneity that I experience when I can express myself in a style that feels true to me. I will confess something here. Since I came to Mir and with it changed my dress, I noticed that while my learning grew in quality and quantity, my davening got weaker. I used to have daily conversations with G-d that all of a sudden disappeared from my routine. Under the influence of the Yeshiva I became so focused on doing what is right that I lost some of the joy in Divine service, 'avodat Hashem'. I know its important to be 'good' and that the Yeshiva environment encouraged, but how about being 'happy' and in love with G-d. Isn't that just as important. As I became 'frumer' I seemed to lose the joy. Fear of G-d dominated over love of G-d.

Would wearing the black hat be the final straw. Yes I would look and feel hareidi. But 'hareid' in ivrit means fearful. Do I want to be 'hareid', so much protected from doing wrong that I lose the 'joie de vivre'.

Ah, but then I saw the parsha of this week, that of T'zaveh. In it the Torah details the clothes to be worn by both the Kohain Gadol, the High Priest, and the regular kohanim. One article of clothing intrigued me. The Torah requires the Kohain Gadol to wear a 'm'eel' a long beautiful robe. The Torah describes the robe in detail. As part of its design it is to contain bells. Why bells? The Torah tells us that the bells were on the robe so that "his sound will be heard when he goes into the Holy and when he leaves so that he will not die".

The Medrash tells us that the bells were on his robe to teach us an important lesson in 'derech eretz', proper conduct. When one enters a place, even his/her, home, s/he should always knock, and let anyone present in the home know s/he is enterring lest s/he enter and take the other by surprise and cause them upset. The Kohain Gadol was told to make himself heard as he entered, even G-d's place, so as to teach us that we always need to announce our coming.

Okay, that's a powerful directive. But that only explains why the Kohain Gadol's sound should be heard on entering the Holy. Why does the Torah say that his sound needs to be heard both on his entering and his leaving? Why does he need to make noise when he exits the Holy too?

I reflected on this in the context of my dilemma with the black hat.
The Kohain Gadol was called by G-d to do specific tasks in the Bait Hamikdash, the Temple. His work was clearly defined. He had no room for self-expression in his service. He did precisely as the ritual in tradition required. Not only his service as circumscribed. Even his dress allowed no choice of his own. The clothes, while beautiful, were in accord with the Torah mandate. The Kohain Gadol had no room to express his personal style or taste. In that context we might wonder if the 'self' of the Kohain Gadol my not get lost in the process. I mean, he had to conform entirely to dictums from without. There was no room on the surface for self-expression. Would he feel like me in the Mir, and his fear of Hashem be so dominant that it compromised his love of Hashem?

It is to this issue that the Torah speaks when it calls on him to put bells on his robe. The Torah tells us that the bells were so 'his voice' will be heard when he enter and when he leaves. The noise of the robe is 'his' sound in the Holy. The Torah wants to make clear that while so much of the ritual and dress is determined from without, the Kohain Gadol must not lose himself. He must find a way to bring his uniqueness, his self into the service in the Holy. And what's more, even on his way out, as impressive and over-powering as the sacredness of the Holy may be, the Kohain Gadol must make himself heard, that he should remain true to the uniqueness of his individual soul and personal gifts.

With that thought in mind I decided yes, I could wear the black hat.
Wearing it would be respectful of the world of the Yeshiva I learn in. Would I lose my self and my uniqueness in the process? Not if I take the lesson from the Kohain Gadol and its imperative. True, on the outside I conform. But I must be insistent that my voice be heard, even while wearing the black hat. Conformity to ritual and custom provides only the shell, a shell that may protect one from danger if one relied entirely on one's self for direction.

Indeed it helps to belong to a group. But that does not free one from the responsibility to be true to one's genuine self in service to Hashem. On the contrary, the trappings to which one conforms make it safe to make one's voice heard and know it is in the service of the Divine! No, It makes is mandatory to make one's unique self heard in avodat Hashem.

Wearing the black hat, conforming to the group, does not free me from self-expression. The Kohain Gadol, in the designated clothes and doing the prescribed service was mandated to make 'his' noise.
I may look indistinguishable from everyone else in the Mir but that only makes it more imperative for me to be me!

Shabbat Shalom

The Little Things

2011-02-02T21:05:00.001-08:00

This week we begin a series of parshiyot, Torah portions, focused on the Mishkan, the sanctuary built by the Israelites in the wilderness to house the spirit of the Divine. The Torah details the components of the Mishkan, the materials of which they were to be made, and their exact design. The two alters for sacrifices, the ark to contain the Tablets of the Law etc. are all enumerated and detailed.

The various furnishings of the Sanctuary are all used in keeping with the Mishkan's purpose, to offer devotion to Hashem. That is all except one! The one component of the Mishkan which seems out of place is the 'shulchan', the table of gold, used to place upon it the shew bread, the lechem hapanim'. Why, we might wonder, is their a need for a table in the sanctuary? A table seems to reflect earthy needs. This is the house of G-d, devoted to the spiritual.

Many of our great Torah commentaries have responded to explain the place of this surprising feature in the Mishkan. In keeping with the focus of this blog, The Torah and the Self, which is to personalize the Torah content so as to extract a message germane to us where we are today I would like to share the following possibility.

The Kohanim, the priests, were charged with the loftiest of missions.They we mandated to be the conduits between Israel and G-d and offer the rites in the Temple. Little doubt they saw their work as essential and gave it priority over other aspects of their lives.
They were Israel's ambassadors to Hashem. What greater task could there be?

It was the Kohanim who actually were in the company of the Golden Table, not the ordinary Israelite. The shulchan was in the inner part of the Mishkan, a place non-priests could not go. For me, the message of the Table was meant as a vital reminder for the Kohanim.
In its presence, the shulchan said "Though you Kohanim, have the holiest of jobs, do not let yourself forget who you serve! See this table and remember, you are here to bring the needs of the ordinary Jew and his ordinary worries, over parnasa, income (represented by the table) etc. before G-d. Never let the holiness of your mission cause you to lord over those who sent you. You must empathize with the common Jew though his life is so mediocre in comparison to yours and give priority to his needs, earthy as they may be."

Each morning of late I am picked up by a special bus taking men to the Mir Yeshiva to learn. The bus originates in a different 'shchuna', neighborhood, than mine, one much more hareidi.
By the time it gets to me it is near full. When I climb on-board their are maybe two or three seats still available. Yet invariably their is a hat or a sefer on the seat, usually belonging to the person in the adjacent seat. Also in most cases unless I stand by the unoccupied seat and ask for place to be made for me no effort is made to clear room. I ask myself why? Could be the person in the adjacent seat doesn't paid me no mind, was too busy learning to notice me. Could be he didn't feel an urgency since I am not really a like him. I don't have on a black hat, I am older, and I live in a mixed neighborhood. But in any case the person who fails to extend himself without being asked misses on a hesed of 'hachnasat orchim', hospitality, a great mitzvah. And he feels he did no wrong.

How does that happen? How does a devout man, one who learns Torah all day, forget the Jew in front of him in need of a seat on the bus? The question should not be such a surprise. We make similar errors all the time. In our resolve to do the 'big' thing we deem important, we ride over the 'little' things that lay in front of us.
We become so busy with our goals, worthy as they may be, that we push and shove and trod over everything in our path.

The Kohain in doing his holy work was daily confronted with the 'shulchan', the Golden Table to remind him that his work, important as it is, only has meaning in the context of his relationship to the People and their needs. If he loses sight of that his holiness becomes a selfish endeavour, and he misses the whole point of his service.

Would that we never lose sight of the purpose behind all the important work we do, and that we be forever mindful that the things that seem to get in the way may be the things we need to give our attention and respect.

Shabbat Shalom

The Measure of Holiness

2011-01-27T04:57:00.000-08:00

My father, of blessed memory, was born in Leipzig. He and his large family emigrated to the United States just prior to the outbreak of World War Two. He would often tell me how he could not comprehend the anti-semitism that sprouted in Germany. He would say "Our neighbors were the finest people. And so gracious to us. How could they have turned into haters. How could they who were friends become people of whom we needed to be afraid?"

Indeed, how did Hitler and the Nazi machine turn the whole populace of Germany into anti-semites and collaborators with the evil regime?
Germany was the most civilized of countries. Its people were cultured and, up until the rise of Nazism, tolerant.

If one studies the process the answer is clear. It happened in stages. First the Nazis used propaganda to turn the Jews into 'others', to dehumanize us, to make us radically different in the eyes of the average German. Once we were seen as no longer like them, it was easy for the German to hate us and even collaborate in our demise.

The nature of human beings is that in order to cultivate hate we make the 'other' a "stranger". We focus on how they are less than us, on how their manners and ways are different. Have you ever noticed how when we who are Caucasian hear of a tragedy in Europe, say a flood or plane crash, we will feel a sense of sadness and solidarity with the mourning survivors. Yet a tragedy of much greater proportion can occur in Africa amongst Blacks and it causes little emotional impact. Just look at the Western societies limited reaction to the horrific situation in Darfur. Even when we do react it tends to be a response to the crisis, like an earthquake, rather than to the people and their story.

All hate and detachment begins with a focus on difference. All love commences with a recognition of how we are one and the same.

The Torah in this weeks parsha makes clear that being G-d's Holy People does not give us license to separate from others and their plight. Yes, last week we read of our receiving the Torah and of our uniqueness in destiny and purpose. But that inspiration must not serve to cause us intolerance and hate of those not like us.

We begin the reading with of this week with the Jew who sells himself into slavery. We are not permitted to mistreat him. On the contrary he has rights and privilges. He is not to be seen as 'other'. Even the non-Jewish slave is talked about. He too has rights protected by the Torah. Should the owner abuse him their are consequences. The Torah goes on to talk about our responsibility not to cause hurt, emotional or otherwise to the convert. Indeed we are charged to love the 'ger'. The Talmud teaches that more than 40 times in the Torah there is reference to our need to care for the welfare of the convert.

And if that was not enough the Torah tells us this week "Do not cook the goat in it mother's milk." From this we derive all the laws of separation of milk from meat. Many of the commentaries understood the law as teaching us sensitivity even to animals. They too have feelings. While we are permitted to eat meat it would be insensitive to cook the meat we killed for our pleasure in the milk its mother produced to give it life. And their are other laws that seem to promote the same sensitivity to animals. The law that requires us to cover the blood from fowl or non-domesticated animals we kill to eat may well have been designed to engender in us a sense of shame that in order for us to have our needs met we took a life, even of an animal. Moreover we are forbidden from eating the 'chailev', the best fats from domesticated animals we prepare to eat. Perhaps this is meant to teach us a similar lesson. Yes you are permitted to eat meat, but you must never become so callous as to think of the animal as a plant, totally for your use, and lose sympathy for it as a live being.

In all this the Torah is teaching that the measure of our holiness is our capacity to care for that which is different from us and to treat the 'other' with respect and consideration. To be holy is to find G-d in everything and everyone.

Our holiness may separate us and make us unique in character and soul. But that same holiness, to the extent we live and feel it will give us reason to find a common love and identity with all G-d's creation.

Shabbat Shalom

Telling Our Story

2011-01-20T04:51:00.000-08:00

I have often asked those whose life journey included discovering and embracing Judaism what was the key influence that brought them to the Faith.I write here in particular of those we call "Baalai Teshuva". More often than not what they answer is that it was no inspired sermon or text that influenced them, nothing they read in a book or found in promotional material. What triggered their new interest in Jewish observance was connection to a person and that person's story of faith.

I was struck by how much that parallels something we find in the parsha of this week. Early in the reading of Yitro we are told "And Yitro, the priest of Midian and the father-in-law of Moshe, heard all that Hashem did for Moshe and for Israel His people that He liberated them from Egypt" Clearly then Yitro knew of the exploits of Israel and that prompted his decision to come greet Moshe in the wilderness.

Yet shortly after the Torah tells us that when Yitro came Moshe went out to greet him and brought him into his tent. He then shared with Yitro all that happened to the Israelites and how G-d saved them. The Torah tells us that on hearing Moshe's account "And Yitro greatly rejoiced on all the good G-d did for Israel that he saved them from the Egyptians". He then went on to bless G-d the redeemer concluding "And now I now that Hashem is greater than any other god..."

Clearly Yitro was inspired by the story Moshe told him of G-d's intervention on their behalf. He became overwhelmed with joy. He was moved to bless G-d. Yet he knew the story before he came to visit Moshe. We were already informed of that at the beginning of the reading. So what new information did Yitro get that produced such a visceral response? Why such a strong reaction to information he already had?

You may have your own ideas here. And I welcome you to share them in a comment. But for me the message is clear. Before Yitro heard the story, but as a news report. It was factual yes, and compelling. It motivated Yitro to come and check it out. But the inspiration did not come until Yitro experienced the story first hand from those who lived it. Only when Moshe told him the story did it become alive and touch his soul.

We often see that in our own lives. We may know the story of the holocaust, read many books about it, even see the films. Yet nothing will move us like the first hand account of someone who is a survivor. Their story, even if its but a piece of the total picture, touches our soul and makes an impression that lives with us.People inspire people. That's the sum truth. Information, knowledge, truth, we may get from many sources. But inspiration comes ones soul to another.

That is why the Baal teshuva is more typically affected by a special person in their life than by inspired writing or powerful argument. And even those of us not technically Baalai teshuva will often look back on our lives and find who we are is the product of the relationships we had with 'beautiful' people, people we admired and wanted to be like, be it parents, teachers, mentors and friends.

What does that mean for us proscriptively? I suggest that one lesson we might take from the story of Yitro and from the realities of our own lives is that we need to let ourselves be known to our children and grandchildren. Its not enough that we teach them right from wrong and provide them with a Jewish education. We need to let them experience us as persons, with our story and with our challenges. We need to have real relationships with our children and real conversations. They need to feel they know us!

People often quote the cliche for parents "Its not what you say but what you do that matters." I would add, "Its not only what you do but who you are in relationship to your children that matters".
Yitro was inspired not by the story of the Exodus, but by the impact he saw it had on Moshe and Israel. Our children and grandchildren need to see the impact of what matters to us has on our life. To make that happen we need to share with them our story and self.

This blog marks the one hundredth written for The Torah and the Self. I hope some of you have found meaning in the weekly reflections. It has been a joy to write. I thank Hashem for the opportunity to reflect on the truth of his Torah and its impact of our personhood.

Shabbat Shalom

The Gift of Failure

2011-01-13T05:02:00.000-08:00

Have you ever thought to put your child to a test that you knew they could not pass? Most of us think that a test is only meaningful if we can pass it. Perhaps thats part of the reason people often say "G-d doesn't give us more than we can handle".
The idea being that a test challenges us to bring out our best and grow. But if we were sure to fail what would be the point.

And yet I think in this week's Parsha we see otherwise. The Torah tells us this week of the final stages of our deliverance from Egypt when our ancestors saw their Egyptian pursuers drowned in the parting of the sea.
We call the Shabbat, Shabbat Shira, the Sabbath of Song in commemoration of the beautiful and profound song of praise to G-d sung by the Israelites on their miraculous salvation.

But lets step back a minute. The Parsha of B'shalach opens telling us that G-d took the Israelites by a longer route to the Promised Land. And why? because He was afraid if the people were to immediately have to deal with the conquest of Canaan they might become fearful and in the face of a great battle, because of that fear, decide it better to return to Egypt.

Obviously from the opening verses we can deduce that G-d did not put much trust in the courage and faith of this fledgling nation to withstand tests of character.

With that in mind we might well wonder why G-d tests the people in this weeks reading and on at least two occasions. In both instances the people ran out of water. They complained, in one case bitterly, to G-d over their circumstances. Now we may well ask why did they find themselves without water? G-d could have provided water before the situation reached a point of crisis. Why did they need to go through all the anxiety?
It seems that G-d had them confront their drought as a test, to see how they would respond in crisis. Would they come to Moshe with respect and appreciation, beseeching G-d's mercy or would they lament and complain with a sense of entitlement, which in fact they did?

Yet if the purpose of putting the people in a position of crisis was in order to test them we might wonder why. Why test them? G-d already knew they lacked character and faith, that's why he took them the long way round to Eretz Yisrael. He knew they would not behave with appropriate respect and appreciation. So why give them a test they were certain to fail?

I think maybe we need to reexamine the premise with which we opened the blog. Is it really true that a test we are certain to fail makes no sense to give? I think not!

Remember the Israelites had just crossed the sea. They had experienced a great spiritual high, so much so that it led them to song, a song worthy of the Torah, a song worthy of being recited each day in prayers, a song we stand for in Shule as it is read, a song for which, generations later, we still give this Shabbat its name. The People might well have believed that after such an inspired moment they had achieved their spiritual call. They might well have thought "we made it". We are G-d's people and we are complete in our work to perfect our faith.

Sadly, as much as the People may have thought that true, it was very much the opposite. The People were raw and immature of faith. As it turned out they needed to journey 40 years in the desert and experience all kinds of travail to finally become the Nation G-d could bring into the Land.

How could Hashem show the people that they had much work to do, and what the work was about? The answer is what we see. G-d gave them a test he knew they would fail. And why? because though He knew they would fail, they didn't. They were sure of themselves. The test and the failures showed them how much was left for them to do to grow sufficiently to be worthy of being the Chosen People.

Truth is that sometimes we need to have tests, even those we are going to fail. They teach us that often we are not near as good as we think we are. When we fail tests they show us what we need to work on, sometimes to our great surprise. Its amazing how often just when we believe we have gotten past a certain character flaw or growing edge a situation comes up which tests us and we find ourselves acting in ways that show us not quite there at all. We believed we had outgrown the issue. The test showed us we still need to work on ourselves.

Failing the life tests we think we should have past is a great gift. It helps us get over the self-deception that we have made it. It shows us that even where we feel good about ourselves we often still have much work to do!

Shabbat Shalom

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Who Am I? Part Two

2011-01-06T05:34:00.001-08:00

If you follow this blog then you know my focus is to respond to the primal question of "Who am I?". For me that is the central question we need to address. All our life gets lived out, one way or another, based on our response.

In this week's parsha of 'Bo' we read the story of the Exodus from Egypt. Surely, here, if anywhere, we would expect to find clues to help us discover our core sense of self. And indeed I do think we can find here some meaningful content to help us with our process.

Prior to leaving Egypt the Israelites were given a number of mitzvot to perform. They were also given some information about their destiny. In fact, the questions that we read at the seder of two of the four sons is found here, given to the Israelites even before they began their national journey. That the Israelites would have both wicked sons and simple sons is reflected in the reading.

The Torah tells us "And it will be when your children say to you "what is the meaning of all this effort?" And you should say to them "it is a sacrifice of the Passover to Hashem who passed over the homes of the Israelites when he smote the Egyptians..." And the Torah goes on to say that when the People heard this they bowed deeply.

The Sages tell us that the Israelites bowed out of gratitude. They experienced the message G-d gave them as a gift. They heard in it that they would have children,that there would be future generations.
They chose not to focus on the fact that the children promised here would be wicked and would reject the 'effort' that they were putting into the preparation for the Pasech.

Yet is that not somewhat surprising? I mean if someone told us that they saw our future and that in it we were destined to have children or grandchildren but that those children and grandchildren would be delinquent and sinful, would we consider the vision a gift?
How do we understand the reaction of our ancestors? They did more than smile and say thanks at this news. They actually bowed deeply in gratitude. Yet we would expect ambivalent feelings at best?

This week we marked Rosh Chodesh. The day prior to Rosh Chodesh we call in tradition Yom Kippur Katan, the mini Yom Kippur. Some holy Jews fast on Yom Kippur Kattan. The end of the month, like the end of the year, or any end, calls to us to Teshuva and self-reflection.
I attended mincha, the afternoon service on Yom Kippur Kattan at the Mir Yeshiva where I learn. Some 2000 others davened with me.
The Mincha of Yom Kippur Kattan is very reminiscent of Neila on the real Yom Kippur. It lasted better than an hour and was full of prayers of confession and remorse. Part of the liturgy of Yom Kippur Kattan calls for reciting a 'vidui', a confession, in this case one written by Rabbainu Nissim, perhaps 700 years ago.

The confession was powerful and humbling. But what struck me most in reciting it was that in the content each person unequivocally refers to himself as a 'rasha', a wicked person. I mean really, here I was with 2000 men who learn Torah all day, whose life is devoted to serving G-d and to doing the right, who sacrifice all the material gifts the world can offer to pursue the sacred, and they call themselves "wicked"? And Rabbainu Nissim himself, who wrote the confession, did he believe himself a rasha. He was of the greatest of sages. Did all the Jews through the centuries who fasted on Yom Kippur Kattan and prayed with feeling and fervor and expressed this vidui consider themselves 'reshaeem'?

Maybe what our parents in Egypt heard, that they would have children who met the classification of the 'rasha', the evil son, is not so bad if in 'rasha' we include children like Rabbainu Nissim and the 2000 men who prayed with me that afternoon!

Who am I? According to the liturgy I am a 'rasha', a wicked person. I said so and before G-d,together with all my fellow Jews seeking to do teshuva at that powerful mincha service.

Of course the meaning of calling myself a wicked person has not to do with any tabulation of merits and demerits. If being good or bad was simply a matter of adding up ones deeds and seeing which side had more, Rabbainu Nissim and, I am certain, virtually all the 2000 men I davened with would come out on the side of the good, 'tzaddik' not 'rasha'. But that's not the measure we need to use. Rabbainu Nissim knew that we are called to excellence in our devotion to Hashem. Anything less than excellence is evil.In our context, if one commits a single act of murder s/he is guilty and evil, no matter how much good s/he did in his/her life. In committing even one sin before G-d, our creator and king, we commit a crime of unimaginable consequence. No matter how much good we do, without teshuva, we become a 'rasha'.

By that measure we are all indeed 'reshaeem'. And if we are, how dare we judge others or reject them? Our parents in Egypt heard the message, they would have children who were wicked. But so what? They knew themselves. They knew they were wicked. We all are!
They didn't flinch at the news or recoil. They rejoiced. They bowed in gratitude. They knew that the 'rasha' is in each of us. And the very rejection, implicit in the question of the 'rasha', each of us has posed in one form or another at some time. That's no reason to dim the glad tidings that there would be future generations.

Who Am I? This week I learned I am a 'rasha'. Indeed I am one of the wicked children referred to as part of the tidings my ancestors received in Egypt. It's not that I became aware of some evil within that I did not know about. It's just that the measure by which I gauge myself has changed. I learned I am a 'rasha', but a 'rasha' in very good company.
That doesn't excuse me. But it does make improvement both more necessary and possible.

Shabbat Shalom

Offering Hope

2010-12-29T06:11:00.000-08:00

Everyone needs hope. We cannot survive without it. At times our hope may be simple,just getting home and seeing our family after a hard day at work. At other times, more stressful and depleting, our hope may be more esoteric. We hope soon all our suffering will come to an end or perhaps that their will be a better future for us, if not in this world then in the next, or if we can't escape our suffering at least their will be a brighter future for our children. But no matter where or when, human beings have a need for hope and one way or another,be it fanciful or real we will find it.

I was made conscious of the struggle for hope when I looked over the early verses of this weeks Parsha of Va'eira. You may recall the Parsha opens with Hashem rebuking Moshe for his challenge to the way things were going. At the end of last week's reading Moshe complained to G-d that since being sent to redeem the Israelites things had only gotten worse for them. Hashem tells Moshe at the outset of Va'eira that he needs to have the faith of the Patriarchs who never questioned Hashem's ways even when they seemed inscrutable.

At the end of Hashem's rebuke He once again sent Moshe on his mission and demanded that he tell the Israelites that indeed they will be redeemed. No, more, much more, Moshe is commanded to tell them not only will they be redeemed, they will become G-d's special people, they will have a special providence, and that they will be brought into the land of Israel, the land of their ancestors to inherit it for themselves.

After charging Moshe with the responsibility to to share this glorious passage of promise with the children of Israel the Torah continues "And Moshe spoke so to the Children of Israel but they did not listen to Moshe due to their exhaustion and the hard work imposed on them".

I found it fascinating that here Moshe has a wondrous message of hope and redemption for the Israelites, a nation so burdened and oppressed, a message full of promise and inspiration. Yet they could not hang their hope on it. They were too beaten to listen. Didn't they need hope? If everyone needs hope, surely the oppressed need it. I know our ancestors were suffering and fatigued but you would think that would have made them more attune to the glorious message of the Divine promise.

The answer to the question teaches us much about hope both for ourselves and when offering it to others. Remember the Isaac Leib Peretz story Bantsche Shveig (Banstche the Silent). Briefly, it tells the tale of a simple minded Jew in the shtetle who was abused constantly for his limited intelligence, poverty, and for being a social misfit. For all the abuse heaped on him Bantsche remained silent, never uttering a harsh word in return nor uttering a complaint. When Bantsche died he was treated in heaven far differently than on earth. If here he was social reject totally maligned, in heaven he was seen as the purest and holiest of men, mostly because of his compelling self-control remaining silent to his tormentors and in the face of a life of abuse and adversity.

Peretz writes that in the Heavenly Court Bantsche was found deserving of great reward. After-all he was a true Tzaddik. Even Satan could not deny his saintliness. When the time came, the Heavenly Judges asked Bantsche what he might want for his prize in the World Eternal. Any request would be granted since it was indeed earned. Bantsche thought for a moment, Peretz writes, and then answered "Maybe I could have a hot roll and butter each day for breakfast". And with that Satan roared a great laugh for indeed he had won!

In many ways the story of Bantsche Shveig is a story about hope. Bantsche could have had anything. He was worthy of the best heaven could offer. But Bantsche's life had been so rough and so impoverished that he could not even hope for a true piece of heavenly bliss. In light of his life's struggle the most he could aspire to was the warm roll and butter. Hope for Bantsche was limited by his circumstances and its effect on his psyche.

The same was true for the Israelites in Egypt. Moshe brought to them the wondrous message from G-d, a message that included becoming a G-d's chosen nation, and inheriting a new land of their own. Beautiful words, but words that spoke to more than the People could hear. The People in their time of persecution and abject slavery could only hope for an end to their suffering. They could not even imagine the larger vision offered them. It was beyond their horizon.
It is no wonder that the next time Hashem sends Moshe back to the People to again deliver the message of hope, a few verses later, he is commanded to simply redeem the people from Egypt, no more and no less. That they could hear!

Often we see people who are struggling. Life is hard for them. Perhaps they are dealing with a terminal illness, or a terminal marriage.Perhaps they are feeling overwhelmed with financial burdens or a lack of success in their endeavours. We want to offer hope. We know they need hope. The message we take from the Parsha of this week is that any hope we might offer can only be received and held on to if it is within the mindset of the sufferer.

To offer someone who is dealing with paralysis after a stroke the hope that they might yet run a marathon and go on to cite some athlete who did so, may be beyond the ability of the paralyzed one to hang on to. It might well be better to keep the hope closer to where the person is now. Perhaps a hope the other could hear would be the hope that they will yet walk again and cite some neighbor we know of similar age and circumstances who made such progress. Pancreatic cancer is fatal. No one has been cured of it. Offerring hope to one sufferring a fatal cancer might better be found in the hope of making the most of the time left, than a hope based on miraculous recovery (though some patients may prefer to pin their hope on a miracle as unrealistic as that is).

The key is, while hope is vital for everyone, the hope we offer the other needs to be consistant with where they are and with what they find possible in light of the circumstances they are living. Yes, offerring another hope is a gift, but the angels, no matter how they may have wished, could not offer Bantsche a hope more than he could imagine, and even Hashem's promise so glorious fell on deaf ears to our ancestors who were slaves in Egypt and had not the mindset to hear.

Shabbat Shalom

Perspectives

2010-12-23T21:54:00.000-08:00

When I was growing up I heard many a Rosh Yeshiva reflect wistfully on Jewish life in Europe and how it was so much more spiritually authentic than life in America. Some of those Roshai Yeshiva came from Europe, others just knew it from their own teachers.I accepted their perspective as true. We are living in an inferior spiritual world. What once was is lost and irretrievable.

But as I grew I came to wonder. Was it true? Was Jewish life in Europe pre-Holocaust spiritually superior to Jewish life in modern America. Were those the 'good old days' spiritually speaking, never to return?

I am not sure how many of you have read the Yiddish writer Chaim Grad and his classic novels like "The Aguna" or others like him.
They wrote of life in the shtetles and cities of Eastern Europe they knew both well and personally. These were not the anti-religious Yiddish writers who had an axe to grind. Nor were they writers who over-romanticized the life of the Jew of the period. They wrote what of what they experienced in both the good and bad.
What is clear from reading Chaim Grad and others is that, contrary to what I heard in Yeshiva, my ancestors in Eastern Europe were no paragons of virtue. True there were many holy men and women of distinction. But society as a whole could be as corrupt and mean spirited as anything we see in our days and worse. Cruelty was commonplace. Many a Jew, both religious and otherwise acted in ways that are inexcusable. And even religious leaders, rabbis and others were not so uncommonly morally corrupt. Over-all, the impression one gets on reading first hand accounts is that Eastern European Jewry and its social systems was no better than what we have today and in many ways far worse.

And truth be told the idealization of Eastern European Jewry, in contrast to the facts is not a one time phenomena. In the context of tradition, we always seem to glorify earlier generations. The sages of the Talmud said of themselves that they are pale imitations in comparison to the sages of the period prior. The Vilna Gaon said that we have no capacity to even imagine the excellence of our ancestors of the time of the Second Temple and to hold ourselves in comparison.

Yet the facts often point otherwise. The Jews of Bayit Sheni were the Jews of Kamtza and bar Kamtza and guilty of huge and grievous sins against each other. The zealots of the Second Temple period were often ruthless; the priests often corrupt. After-all we are talking of the generation that warranted the destruction of the Bait Hamikdash and galut for their sins!

How do we reconcile the seemingly contradictory perspectives. On the one hand within tradition we venerate earlier generations. On the other, we know factually that the past was no better and at times worse than the current climate in which we live?

The answer I think can be found in the Parsha of this week, that of Shmot. It is clear, no matter how we may want to glorify the generations of the past that our ancestors in Egypt were lacking. Just look at the stories we are given. An Egyptian task-master is beating a Jew and none but Moshe comes to his aid. One Jew is beating another and again that seems commonplace. When Moshe attempts to intervene he in turn is threatened. And later, in response to Moshe's message of redemption, he suffers scorn from his own people. From the glimpses we have of the society its not surprising the Sages tell us that Israel was very nearly too far gone to be redeemed.

Yet the Parsha also tells us of heroes. It speaks of the mid-wives Shifra and Puah who at great self-sacrifice refused to obey the Pharoah and kill the Jewish babies on birth.It tells of us Batya, the daughter of the Pharoah and of her effort to save baby Moshe. In tradition she became a convert to our faith, giving up her prestige and position in Egypt. It tells us of Moshe and his heroism in defence of his people. In fact, the very Jewish society that we read of as mediocre at best, produced heroes that can never be duplicated. No one, no matter how spiritually excellent, will ever be like Moshe.

And in this lies the great truth. Yes there is something to be said of an excellence of earlier generations that we can not aspire to attain. Not however in the society as a whole. On the contrary, the societies past, whether in Second Temple times or Eastern Europe had flaws as profound as our own. But what cannot be duplicated is the excellence in individual people, rabbis, leaders, men and women of unique stature, the holiness they attained, their character and spirituality is beyond our capacity and even, at times, our ability to imagine

So what can we take from all this.For one thing, I don't believe their is any benefit in putting down the social context in which we live. Over-all we are progressing as a people, not regressing! We get better with each generation and we need to affirm that. We are moving closer to Mashiach, not further away. More Jews study Torah today than at any time in Jewish history. Yes, many Jews are not religious, but where have we ever seen so much religious practice in an environment where not coerced to be frume! After all in earlier generations Jews had no choice but to comply with the religious rules of the kehilla. And where have we ever seen in the past such a profound movement of t'shuva, return to the faith. Its glorious!

No, there is no point in putting ourselves down. We need to affirm our People's growth and spiritual progress...and build on it.
Yet we do need to be mindful that we lack the individual excellence that existed in the Greats of yesteryear. Today we have no Rambam, Vilna Gaon or even Chafaitz Chayim. We affirm that so as to keep us personally humble and reverential to the teachings of the past, teachings and guidance we need so much in-order to continue our journey to the redemption.

Shabbat Shalom

Channuka Then and Now !

2010-12-01T02:40:00.000-08:00

Tonight will be Channuka.With darkness, we will gather as family and light the menorah (or here in Israel more commonly called, 'chanukiya'). Brachot will be made, songs sung, not to forget the tasty treats. We will usher in the 8 days of celebration.

There is a beautiful composition recited after lighting the candle called "hanairot halallu". The passage reminds us of why we light the candles, "to mark the miracles and wonders... done for our Fathers in those days at this time". It goes on to tell us "... these candles are holy. And we have no right to make use of them (not for light nor for warmth etc)... They are only for us to gaze
on, so that we may thereby give praise to Your Great Name for all Your miracles and wonders and salvation".

The odd thing about Channuka is that it is of the most spiritual of Jewish holidays. The Rabbis taught that Channuka is different from Purim. Purim marks a time where our physical survival was threatened. We celebrate G-d's redemption with food and drink and indulgences of our body. Channuka was not a time where the physical existences of our people was at risk. It was the Jewish spirit that was persecuted and as much by the Hellinistic Jews as by the Greco-syrio rulers. The spirit of Hellinism was sweeping the world. Jews who believed in the values of Torah were out of step. The edicts that caused us anguish in the period of Channuka were not those of Haman, focused on our destruction. The edicts were those focused on compromising our observance of Shabbat, kashrut, and the study of Torah. The heroes of Channuka were martyrs for the faith like Channa and her 7 sons, all of whom perished rather than submit to the Greco-Syrian authority .
Indeed Channuka was the first time in Jewish history where martyrdom for the faith, something we would sadly see as commonplace in the times of the Crusades, was invoked and called for, a new kind of Jewish heroism.

It is for that reason,since Channuka as essentially a triumph of the Jewish spirit, that there are no mitzvot associated with Channuka that focus on the physical. It may be nice to eat sufganiyot and latkes, but no mitzvah! The one mitzvah is to light the menorah. And even there we are not meant to make use of the light as mentioned above, but rather just to gaze on it and give thanks.

Whats odd about all this is that Channuka has become the most materialistic of Jewish holidays, especially in the States. Its a holiday where no one feels guilty, even the least affiliated Jew, because there is so little to observe. Light candles? give gifts? eat latkes? Why not? One can live a totally assimilated life and embrace that!

I remember many years ago when living in a small Jewish community in moderately sized Southern city, that the newspapers, as was their custom, did a feature on a Jewish family at the season of the holiday, in this case Channuka. They showed pictures of the family readying for lighting candles and interviewed the mother. The mother, trying to be informational, told the reporter of how Channuka marked a miracle that happened to the oil in the Temple and that therefore we have a custom to eat foods made with oil. She then went on to give a recipe for Channuka of a food cooked in oil. Latkes? no! Sufganiyot? no! Crab cakes!! She actually gave a Channuka recipe for crab cakes!

It is sad when one thinks about it, that this holiday that speaks to the heroes, both men and women, who gave their lives for observance and Torah, so that Judaism should persevere,those who said "we are different from you and we refuse to surrender our uniqueness," would be celebrated by their children as the holiday of assimilation. What so much of the Jewish world is essentially saying in the current secular theme of Channuka is "We are just like everyone else. We eat the same. Live the same lifestyle. Being a Jew is just a matter of culture and history, but with little real consequence. We want to be like you!"

So when we come to make our blessings tonight and light our candles
what are we celebrating? What should we see when we gaze on the lights?

What we celebrates is the survival of our faith! What we see in the candles is that pure light, with G-d's help, triumphs. Despite the woman and her Channuka crab cake recipe and many like her, who sadly have gotten lost along the way, Torah Judaism thrives and prospers. Despite all the efforts throughout Jewish history to compromise our commitment to our faith, we remain strong and determined. I go to Mir Yeshiva every day to learn. Would you believe five and a half thousand young men and some older, like me, do the same. And that's just one Yeshiva amongst thousands around the world! That's what one sees in the candle! The power of the pure to triumph, even if few, even if weak. Would that the martyrs of Channuka and all our history could see the vibrancy of Torah today...all resultant from their devotion.

Indeed there is much to celebrate and for which to thank Hashem.

Chag Urim Samaiach
Shabbat Shalom

Going Home

2010-11-18T05:56:00.000-08:00

Many years ago Thomas Wolfe wrote a novel "You Can't Go Home Again".
In it he told the story of a man, himself a novelist who becomes an instant success for his first book. However that very book is seen by the people of his hometown as describing them in unflattering ways. He becomes a hero in society. Yet, because of the anger he causes in the town of his roots, he can't go home again!

"You can't go home again" has become much more famous as an individual maxim than as a novel. Its core concept expresses the idea that once one grows up and grows out of the limited family environs, s/he can never really go back home, at least not as the person/child they once were.

This week, in the parsha of Vayishlach, we read of Yaakov, our father, finally coming home. In truth it seems a much delayed homecoming, and one Yaakov did not seem very keen on. You recall, several weeks ago we read how Yaakov was sent away by his mother Rivka, after he stole the blessings from Esav, his brother. Rivka and Yitzchak envisioned Yaakov being away as short time, just long enough to marry and for his brother's anger to abate.

In the end Yaakov stays away all of 36 years. Twenty of them he spends in the home of his father-in-law, Lavan. By the time he returns his mother already died. He had opportunity to return home after being with Lavan 14 years. Instead he chose to stay-on and make money growing his flock. Even when he finally decided to return to Canaan, it only came after he no longer felt welcome in the house of Lavan. He expressed to his wives the need to leave, not so as to return to his parents, they are not mentioned. Rather he claimed the need to redeem the pledge he made to G-d at Bet El,before he began his long and difficult journey.

Still more, after his encounter with Esav, of which we read this week, we would expect Yaakov to finally go home. But no, he moved his family to Succot, there setting up a home for a year and a half.
And even after that, Yaakov moves to Sh'chem where the terrible story of the rape of his daughter Deena takes place, and in consequence the whole town is massacred. Who knows how long he might have stayed there if he were not compelled to leave because of the circumstances.

Only after Rachel died did Yaakov finally come home. Why? Why does Yaakov seem to resist going home? Why does he disappoint both parents desire to see him, and keep away so long? How can we explain this? And if he truly avoided home for so long, how is it that he finally does indeed go home again?

We call this blog The Torah and the Self. Its intent is to make the Torah personal so as to grow from what the stories and laws have to teach us about ourselves. None of us can be sure why Yaakov stayed away so long, why he avoided going home. But knowing ourselves, and knowing his story we can speculate. It would not be surprising if in Yaakov's time away and in his maturation he got in touch with some conflicted feelings towards one or both of his parents. After-all, his father Yitzchak preferred his older brother Esav to him, as the Torah told us. Yaakov was the Tzaddik yet his father loved more his older sibling who was not. That hurts!

As for Rivka, Yaakov might well have wondered about the way she loved him. Why did she send him in to lie before his father in the deception of the blessings, rather than confront his father herself. Why did he have to carry the burden of the wrath of Esav, when it was his mother's agenda he was following? Questions that while when young and living at home one might put aside, as one matures and moves away, cause one a sense of conflictedness towards a parent and perhaps even some anger.

Many of us who were 'perfect' children, as we grew became conscious of issues we had about our upbringing. Often we brought them to therapy. If we were fortunate we got to raise the issues with our parents, express our feelings and achieve a special reconciliation, one only possible adult to adult. That's hard work. Many a child, now adult, resists going home if their feelings never get worked through.

Yaakov had reason to avoid going home.It was uncomfortable for him at best. He had feelings about his childhood and upbringing. How could he not? So how is it that he finally goes home? What makes the homecoming possible?

I believe the Torah tells us exactly what made Yaakov able to go home. He needed to! When does Yaakov go home, after the debacle with Deena, when he cannot protect his only daughter from harm and fails as a father. When does Yaakov go home, after he is ashamed of Shimon and Levi his older sons for there act of mass murder, and for making the family vulnerable to attack.When does Yaakov go home, after his beloved Rachel dies on the road, in giving birth to his child! and, in tradition, as a consequence of an oath he swore to Lavan! Indeed he goes home after he has failed as a husband too!

Yaakov goes home because he needs to. Yes, he felt conflicted towards his mother and father. But he needed the love and affirmation only a parent could bring. The angel he wrestled with, in the beginning of this week's reading, wounded him a wound time and attention could heal. These wounds were different. They affected his core sense of self and person and required much more to heal. These wounds needed the warmth of home and nurturing. Yes, Yaakov the adult,the one accomplished and mature, needed the love and caring available to children in their time of vulnerability. That kind of caring can only be gained at home and from one's family of origin.

Seen in this light the story of Yaakov's homecoming is both profound and personal. In it we can very much find pieces of ourselves and of those we know. Can we go home again? We can when we need to! Who was it that said "necessity is the mother of invention!".

Yaakov's story is indeed our own...

Shabbat Shalom

PS I want to thank my wonderful wife Lindy for her thoughts on this that much inspired me.

Who Am I?

2010-11-10T00:06:00.000-08:00

When we first meet someone and attempt to get to know them one of the first questions we ask is "What do you do?". In asking the question we reveal an assumption; who we are can be gleaned from what we do!

But is that really true? I want to explore with you this week's parsha and in particular the lives of our matriarchs, Rachel and Leah, to test our assumption.

On Rosh Chodesh, after our early morning daf yomi, the Rav left the shule.Before he left he asked me if he should bring my regards to "Mama Rachel". You see, he was leaving to recite early morning prayers at Kever Rachel in Bethlehem, on the outskirts of Yerushalayim. His question led me to wonder. What is it about Rachel, our mother, that makes her the mother-ideal in the eyes of our people and throughout the generations? After-all she only gave birth to two of the twelve tribes. Moreover nearly none of the Jews who survive today can be said to be her descendants. For most of us, and here I mean most as in likely some 90%, Leah is our mother. Rachel is our aunt.Moreover Rachel died young, in childbirth. She was only a mother to one of her children, Yosef, and was not there for much of his life either. How does she become the mother in death when she spent so few years being the mother in life!

If we were to name the ultimate 'mother' of our people it would be likely to choose Leah. She is our true mother. She gave birth and raised most of the people of Israel and most of the Jews alive today. Yet in the long-run, while Leah was the mother, based on her life and deeds, she is better noted for being Yaakov's wife than for being the mother. She is buried with Yaakov in Hebron. Rachel, the wife Yaakov loved is buried in a grave of her own in Bethlehem.
When we name the couples buried in the M'aarat Hamachpaila we name Yaakov and Leah.

Yet the oddity here is that Yaakov never seemed to really love Leah. She bore his children but never became the 'wife' to him that Rachel was. Yet after her death, in the context of history,she seems recognized in tradition, not as the mother, but as the wife!
How can that be?

The answer to the riddle teaches us something profound. It surely is true that Rachel in her lifetime was much more the 'wife' than the 'mother'. But what we do does not so much define who we are as what we yearn for. The story of Rachel's short and tragic life is the story of the yearning for children. Yaakov's love mattered less to her than being a mother, so much so that she told him "Give me children else I will die!". When Reuvan, Leah's eldest, brings home the wondrous flowers from the field for his mother, as we are told in this week's reading, Rachel is willing to give up a night of intimacy with Yaakov to know the gift of as child's love, even vicariously. Rachel dies in childbirth. No woman more yearned for children. She is the mother-ideal, and not just for the two children she bore. She is our mother. Her life was all about the yearning to be a mother, even if so little of it was actually spent raising children.

On the other hand, yes, Leah was the mother in the story of her life. Her work was very much the raising of children. But the Torah is clear, what Leah yearned for was the love of her husband. She wanted more than anything to be the 'wife' to Yaakov.She named each of her children for the impact she hoped that child would bring to win her the love of Yaakov. She gave up her son Reuvain's gift of the wondrous flowers for the night of intimacy with the husband who loved her less. Leah's life was raising children. Yet her yearning was to finally be the wife! It is as the wife of Yaakov she is remembered, buried by his side for all eternity, not as the mother, for this was her yearning. We are what we yearn for, not what we do!

When I say "yearn", it is not the same thing as wish! A yearning is something deep within us. It becomes our source of hope and joy. A yearning gives us reason for living, it motivates our existence.
Let me give an example. A young woman had a severe accident as a child and is left without the use of her legs. She cannot walk, never mind dance. Yet she yearns to dance. She watches ballet with an uncommon intentionality. She follows every motion. She identifies with the ballerina, feeling herself move with the dancer's turn and jumps. In her mind, she is one with the ballerina. She dances each dance she watches. She loves ballet. She loves to dance. It gives her life meaning. Who is this paralyzed young woman. Her yearning defines her! Though she cannot move her legs, she is a dancer!

Do you and I have yearnings? Do we have deep seated hopes and dreams that give our life its energy. For the one most spiritual the yearnings that define him/her is the intimacy with G-d. For others the yearning may be for something far less noble, money, prestige, position etc.

Who we are is revealed by what we yearn for not by what we do!
Re-adjusting our yearnings,though difficult, may be the most important work we can invest in!

Shabbat Shalom

Truth or Consequence

2010-11-05T04:49:00.000-07:00

There is no more confounding story in the Torah than that of Yaakov and Esav. In this week's parsha of Toldot we read how our father, Yaakov, at his mother's behest, steals the blessing his father Yitzchak intended to bestow on Esav. Yaakov clearly engaged in act of deception. Yet nowhere does the Torah indicate that it was a sin. On the contrary,Yaakov was the one deserving of the blessing, the son with moral values and the one faithful to the tradition of Avraham. Moreover he was obedient to his mother. In this case we might well argue, the ends justified the means.

We all know times in our lives where we might well argue that the ends justify the means. Lets say we are applying for a job, one we need desperately to provide food for our family and a roof to live under.Yet we also know that unless we lie on the application about something in our past or some personal detail, like our age, we will never get the post. In a case like this we might well argue that our lie is not only justified but mandated by our circumstances. We might say the wrong in this case is in fact a right and ought to be done!

Yet if we follow the story of Yaakov, the deception he engaged in came back to haunt him and confound his life. In the parsha of the week coming, that of Vayetze, Yaakov is deceived by his father-in-law, Lavan, and his intended bride, Rachel, as he wedded her sister Leah in error. And in the following weeks in the parsha of Vayeshev, Yaakov's sons deceive him regarding the sale of Yosef, bringing him Yosef's coat dipped in blood and leading him to believe Yosef was killed by a wild animal. The impact of both deceptions was huge on Yak's life. That they follow the story of the stolen blessings seems meant for us to conclude that the former led to the latter and as a consequence.

If Yaakov's act of stealing the blessings intended to Esav was justified and correct then we might wonder why does he seem to pay such a heavy price in his life with the deceptions played on him?

In coming to terms with this difficult question I want to share with you a story in the Talmud. The Gemara in Sanhedrin (87a) tells of Rav Tuvis who had the excellence of never telling a lie. He shared that once he travelled to a town called Kushta (which in Aramaic means truth). There no one told a falsehood. There also no one died prematurely. Rav Tuvis settled in the town and married a woman from the community.They were blessed to have two sons. One day, he related, a neighbor woman knocked on the door while his wife was washing her hair. In order to protect his wife's privacy he told the neighbor that his wife was not home. Shortly thereafter both sons died. The people of the town came to Rav Tuvis and asked how could this have happened, after all no one died prematurely in their town. He told them the story of his lie. They in turn asked him to leave the town lest he bring tragedy on all of them.

What's amazing about the story is that while Rav Tuvis indeed told a lie, it was a lie justified in halacha and appropriate to protect the modesty of his wife. He did no wrong. Nonetheless his untruth had huge repercussions for him and his family. Why?

The Maharal, in explicating the story makes clear that even when a lie is told for good reason and is the correct thing to say, it does not go without consequence. It leaves its mark. The lie was spoken, that it was the right thing to say does not make it less a lie. And for every act we do, even one that is warranted, if it contains a deception it has an effect.

Yaakov and Rav Tuvis both had good cause to engage in the deception. It was the right thing to do. Yet because it was a lie in fact, while they received no punishment for their act, it nevertheless had impact on their lives. All our actions, even when the ends justify the means, have consequence, even if no punishment.

This week marks the yahrzeit of Rabbi Baruch Ber Leibowitz, one of the Torah giants of a generation ago. During World War One he was compelled to flee Poland where he had his Yeshiva for Russia. After the war he wanted to return to Poland. The guards at the border would only let Polish citizens return. They asked him if he was a citizen. Reb Baruch Ber would not tell a lie even where it was warranted to escape the upheaval in Bolshevik Russia. He told them "I am not a citizen but many of my students are citizens of Poland". The border guards were so impressed with Reb Baruch Ber's honesty that they let him pass.

Clearly Reb Baruch Ber had justification to deceive the border guards. If he had lied it could not have been called a sin. Yet he insisted on telling the truth. He knew that an untruth even justified in speaking leaves both an impression and a consequence.

What does all this mean for you and me? We are not the Tzaddik of Reb Baruch Ber, and we need at times to lie. Indeed at times halacha may want us to lie to protect another or to avoid hurting another. Yet we need to be conscious that all our actions have consequences. And if even those times where we do the right leave an impression, if not a punishment, how much more so the wrong we do and the unjustified leaves a mark in the world and on ourselves and family.

Everything we do has consequence. We need to be aware and intentional!

Shabbat Shalom

The Stranger

2010-10-21T06:54:00.000-07:00

The Medrash taught "Great is 'hesed' (acts of loving kindness)that the Torah begins with hesed and ends with hesed." The Medrash goes on to point out that the Torah begins with the story of Adam and Chava in Gan Eden,where after their calamitous sin G-d Himself clothes them. At the Torah's end we read of G-d's hesed in seeing to the burial of Moshe.

If the Torah is replete with a message of hesed much of the call to hesed is found in the early portions of the Torah we are currently reading . And that call is not given to us directly in the form of commandments but rather we learn from stories, stories of G-d's kindness, stories of G-d's loving ways, stories that teach us behaviors we are meant to emulate in our challenge to follow in G-d's ways.

And so from this week's reading of Vayeira we are called to the hesed of visiting the sick even as Hashem visited our father Avraham after his brit mila. And from the reading of next week, where we read of Hashem's blessing to Yitzchak after his mother, Sarah's death, we learn to comfort the mourner etc.

What is interesting however is that one of the most important mitzvot of hesed we don't learn from Hashem's ways at all, but rather we learn from the acts of human-kindness, in fact the kindness of Avraham and his actions in this week's parsha.
What mitzva is that? The mitzvah of'hachnasat orchim, inviting guests into one's home, hospitality.

The mitzva of hospitality, 'hachnasat orchim' is learned from the outset of this week's reading where Avraham rushed from his tent to meet the angels, he believed were travellers, walking down the road. It mattered not to Avraham that he has no idea who they were. He invited them into his home, washed them, fed them and served their needs as a valet. More, Avraham sets-out a lavish feast for them as if they were royalty honoring him with their presence. His hospitality knows no bounds. It models for us our call to the hesed of 'hachnasat orchim'.

But the question we might ask is why of all the calls to hesed is this hesed of hospitality learned from a human example and not one Divine? The call to 'hachnasat orchim' unlike 'bikur cholim','malbish arumim' and 'nichum availim' emerges not from 'Imitatio Dei' but from the inspiring example of our Patriarch.
Why? Why is their no Divine example here?

Many of us know the story of the birth of the Baal Shem Tov. He was the only child to his parents and born in their old age. Tradition has it that it was the 'zechut', merit of the mitzva of 'hachnasat orchim' that gained Reb Eliezer, the father of the Besht, this unusual gift from Heaven. Indeed the story goes that Satan challenged Heaven's intent to reward Reb Eliezer for the 'hachnasat orchim' he and his wife performed in such an exemplary way. And so Reb Eliezer and his wife were put to a test. The prophet Eliyahu came to them on Shabbat dressed in weekday clothes and appearing to have desecrated the Shabbat in his behavior. He even said "Gut Shabbos" to Reb Eliezer so there could be no excuse that he was confused or unaware of the holy day. Reb Eliezer might have good reason to resist inviting this 'sinner' into his home especially on the Shabbat itself. Yet Reb Eliezer and his wife extended themselves to this seeming Shabbat violator. They hosted him, providing him with wonderful meals and lodging. They never mentioned his wayward behavior. In fact, when it was time to part, Reb Eliezer and his wife invited the Jew to please return to them again and soon so they might host him once more.

The story of Reb Eliezer and that of our father Avraham have one important thing in common. They teach us that the mitzva of 'hachnasat orchim' is essentially intended to host the stranger, s/he who is other than us. Its no great deal to invite our family, our neighbor, a community member or a 'landsman', a friend into our home. What we are challenged to do in this mitzva of hesed is to invite someone whose ways and behaviors are different than our own. Avraham invited those he thought non-believers, men whose purpose and values were totally alien to his own. Reb Eliezer invited the 'sinner' and on Shabbat. We, in their image, are called to reach out to the ones living on the margins, those whose ways may not conform to ours at all. Yet we extend our lives and our homes to them.

Think about it. We may argue that its a sin to invite such persons into our homes, our sacred and protected space. We may well argue that allowing the one estranged into our personal sanctuary will pollute the place we most treasure and safeguard from the 'bad' influences that exist in the world without.

Yet from the story of Reb Eliezer and from the model behavior of Avraham we learn that 'hachnasat orchim' calls us to invite into the place most private to us and protected s/he who is in need of hospitality. It calls on us to risk exposing ourselves to those foreign, even those holding beliefs and values antithetical to our own, into the core of our existence.

It is for this reason that the mitzva of 'hachnasat orchim' is learned from the behaviors of a human, Avraham, rather than through imitation of the ways of G-d. Its true G-d extends himself and makes a home for the the one in need and estranged. But we cannot learn the extent of the mitzva of 'hachnasat orchim' from Hashem because no one is a 'stranger' to Hashem. Even the greatest of sinners is still His child. We all are to Him 'bnai bayit', members of the home. For the mitzvot of ' bikur cholim' and 'nichum availim' it matters not whether the person is family or stranger to the essence of the mitzva. In all cases the hesed essentially remains the same. But 'hachnasat orchim' has meaning to the extent that we reach-out to the person different from us and welcome him/her into our home. For that we can only learn from another human dealing with an 'other' not from Hashem for whom all are part of His family.

Few mitzvot earn for a person the blessing in this world that does the hesed of 'hachnasat orchim'. But we must not fool ourselves. The essence of the mitzva calls for us to invite into our home and life the one who is not us, the one different and other, no small challenge for sure!

The opportunities for fulfilling the mitzva of 'hachnasat orchim' are many. And we can do so in ways that require less effort than preparing and serving a meal or giving lodging. Simply saying "Shabbat Shalom" can be a form of hachnasat orchim, or perhaps engaging another in the language they know when its a language in which we are not fluent. The main ingredient of this hesed is found not in the 'what' we do, but to whom! "Shabbat Shalom" to the stranger, trying to communicate with the one different from us in culture and background, that is what matters!

Do you want to have a part of this great mitzva? Do you want to be called a 'machnis orach'? Look around you, find the stranger, and extend yourself! How much more beautiful our world would be if we indeed took this hesed in its truest form to heart.

Shabbat Shalom !

Following Our Destiny

2010-10-15T03:00:00.000-07:00

Some years ago Paul Cohelo wrote an interesting book titled "The Alchemist". In it he told a fable of a boy, a poor shepard, who had a vision that a great treasure lay waiting for him in a very distant land, far far from his home. The story is of the boys journey towards the realization of his dream, a journey that is replete with obstacles, distractions, and dangers, a journey of many years and even more encumbrances.

The end of last week's Parsha of Noach and the outset of the portion of this week of Lech Lecha gave mind to that compelling story. You may recall, at the end of last week's reading we first meet our father Avraham. We are told that he was born into the family of Terach, his father, in the land of Ur Casdim. Further we are told that Terach uprooted the family from Ur Casdim with the intention of migrating to Canaan. On the way he stopped in Charan and wound-up settling there. Eventually he died there, never making it to Canaan.

In the beginning of Lech Lecha, Hashem commands Avraham (then Avram) to travel to a land that he will be shown. Avram is promised that if he travels as G-d commands, even though he does not yet know the destination, he will be rewarded with great blessings, blessing that would never be possible for him if he remained in Charan.

In keeping with G-d's command Avraham takes his family and migrates. Where does he go? We would expect the verses to tell us that G-d, somewhere along the line, informed Avraham of where he is to go. But no, nowhere does it say that Avraham received instructions as to his destination. Rather the 'pasuk' tells us "And Avram took his wife Sarai and Lot, his nephew, and all their property and the souls he made in Charan and they left to go to the land of Canaan, and they came to the land of Canaan." Only once he was there do we find Hashem appeared to him and told Avram that indeed this is the land that was destined to belong to his descendants.

The question is how did Avraham know where to go? How did he decide on his direction, his course? On the basis of what did he journey to Canaan?

I believe the answer is that even though Avram did not know what Hashem had in store for him as a final destination, he knew that if he was meant to travel it had to be to Cannan. Cannan was after-all the place his father was meant to make home. Life's issues got in the way and he settled in Charan. Yet Cannan was always the family's destiny.If Avram was going to travel at all, if he was to realize the blessings Hashem intended for him, he knew he had to get to Cannan. From there he might have to go to other places Hashem had in mind. But once given the command to travel it was obvious that Cannan was the direction. In the end,as it turned out, Canaan was not only the immediate destination but the ultimate destiny and home G-d had intended for Avram,for his family, and indeed for us.

What's the message here? My sense is that we are being shown an important truth for all of our lives. Each of us at one time or another has had a sense of a journey we were meant to make, a destiny or as we say in the holy language, a 'tachlis', a calling that was ours, our personal journey we were meant to make, one we may have long forgotten.What happened to our call. It may have gotten buried in the exigencies of life or neglected in favor of other more accessible goals. The price we may have had to pay to realize the call may have made our destiny feel unattainable. Or we simply may have given up in frustration and chosen another path.

In the end, not pursuing our personal call has had its consequences. It compromises our spirit and robs us of our 'joi de vivre'. Most importantly the blessings that were meant for us can never be gained. Our life lacks the gifts intended for us.

The story of Avraham's journey tells us that it need not be too late. Though Terach died and missed his call, Avram could yet realize it, and he was already 75! We need to go back and remember. What remains unfinished for us? What calling did we know way back when that we can yet reclaim. True it may have to take a slightly different shape, and it may not be the full measure possible for us in an earlier time in our life, but yet the call may well be redeemable, if only we give it the attention and priority it deserves.

What "lech lecha" is there for us in fulfilling a destiny yet unrealized? What blessing remains for us to claim?
Things to think about this Shabbat, things to excite the memory and imagination.
We are never too old to pursue our journey!

Shabbat Shalom!

When Thanks is No Thanks

2010-10-07T01:02:00.000-07:00

"Thank you". I am not sure there are any two words more often spoken in our society than those. We say thanks to everyone, from the waiter who brings our food in the restaurant to the person who cuts our hair. We thank when someone does us a favor and we thank when we pay for what we receive. We say thanks to strangers, people we don't actually know, and we say thanks to members of our own family for kindnesses both great and small.

The importance of "thank you" should not be minimized. Our Sages long taught that our relationship to G-d is founded on 'hakarat hatov', gratitude for the good we receive from Him.To the extent we lack gratitude is to the very extent our devotion to Hashem is compromised. Ramchal in his classic Mesilat Yesharim makes clear that the key to being faithful to G-d is feeling appreciation for all the blessings He bestows on us.

Yet I think it is important to realize that being thankful is much more than saying "Thank you". We can say "Thank you" a thousand times a day and remain essentially ungrateful. When the Sages called us to "hakarat hatov", they were focusing on our internalization of the indebtedness we owe for the goodness we receive. In short, gratitude is seen, not so much by what we say, but by what we do!

Let me give an illustration. The other night an old friend from the States called and said she was in Yerushalayim and wanted to visit, in a few hours! She realized she had not given any notice and since it was my daughter she most wanted to see, she said "I will take her out for Pizza". Wanting to be a good host I said "Why go out? Come and we will make supper here".

It was nice of me to offer. But the task of making the supper fell on my wife, who had just gotten home from working all day when I go the call. To Lindy's credit, in the spirit of our Matriarch Sarah, she was happy to prepare the meal, and on the spot! She was a great host and the food was delicious.

Now after Lindy's effort, of course, I said "Thank you". In fact I repeated several times that night how much I appreciated what Lindy did, and for someone who was not her friend, nor the friend of her daughter, but mine and the friend of my daughter!.

Yet, and here's the rub, the next day there was a confusion about the time of a meeting we were supposed to attend together and Lindy came home late . I was upset and angry.I blamed her. I expressed annoyance with her.
Where had all the thankfullness of the day before gone? I mean, if I was truly grateful for her great kindness of the day prior how could I become so upset now. Sure I said "thank you". But unless I feel thankful, and not only in the moment but in the context of our life together, the thanks is empty.

In the Parsha of Noach, which we read this week, one of Noach's sons, Ham, and his grandson, Canaan, see Noach in a vulnerable moment. They comrpomise him in his time of shame. And in the end, for their lack of respect for their father, they are cursed by him.
We might imagine that Ham, and all the family , had expressed thankfulness to Noach and many times. After all, because of him they were spared when the whole world was destroyed in the flood. Yet when it came time to show thanks, in Noach's moment of weakness, they ridiculed him or worse. The thanks they may have spoken was empty, no matter how sincerely expressed, if it did not translate into grateful behavior.

It is not enough that we say "thank you" or even feel "thank you" in the moment. Our relationship to G-d and to our spouses and community is based on our feeling a continuing sense of indebtedness, one that effects our behaviors towards the other even when we don't quite feel the "love". Gratitude needs to be more than a sentiment. It needs to be an operating dynamic in our lives, and in relationship.

In this case as in so many others in our lives, the call to us when we say "thank you" is "show, don't tell!". We need to show the gratefulness to make it matter. Talking the words without the concommitant behaviors is vacuuous.

Shabbat Shalom

The Secret

2010-09-21T02:43:00.000-07:00

I have a secret to reveal. And its a secret I am sure you know even before my telling you. Yet its a secret we hide mostly from ourselves. The secret is a simple truth, "that which we most need is often that which we are most afraid of!"

What do I mean? Well think about it in its most obvious context. The alcoholic most fears being without access to his beloved addiction.
He imagines being without that which he has become dependent on will surely kill him. Yet truth is just the opposite. The very alcohol he assumes he needs, is that which endangers him. And the very abstinence he imagines will kill him, is his salvation.

The truth so plain in the life of the addict is true for most of us and often. We fear taking the very steps in our lives that, if we were to find the courage to take, would free us and enrich us. Another example, many are loathe to get rid of stuff they no longer have use for. They just can't throw things out. They fear taking the step of tossing things away as they would an operation. Yet if/when they actually found the inner courage to clear their clutter they find themselves free in away they never felt before.
Not only did getting rid of the 'junk' not cause them harm, it actually was the liberation they needed.

And the same is true, though more subtle, of those who fear intimacy, and hesitate to marry. They say they want to commit, its just they have not yet met the right one. Yet in their hearts they know they dread commitment and even were the perfect match to come along they would struggle to say "yes". In fact, for those who fear intimacy its almost a relief when they discover the person they date is not really right for them. It relieves them of having to make a decision they are too overwhelmed by to make.

Yet if and when they finally find the gumption to indeed say "yes" they find themselves free as they never were before. Wonderful new possibilities arise out of the gift of true intimacy, the very intimacy they feared. They discover to their amazement a happiness they never thought possible.

So you say, what does this have to do with Sukkot, the holiday at which we stand. Well I find something interesting here that relates to our secret. Sukkot is the holiday of 'simcha', joy, so much so that we refer to the holiday in our prayers as the 'zman simchatainu'. We can understand the joy as being connected to the season of harvest.During Sukkot, in the land of Israel, our forefathers and mothers celebrated the bounty of the in-gathering.

But one thing is troubling.When people have prosperity they typically like to show it off. The person with the most money usually has the fanciest car, the largest home, the most expensive clothes. It seems a big part of enjoying our prosperity is showing it to others. Yet Sukkot, the season which marks our bounty and largess gives us little opportunity to flaunt our riches. On the contrary, even the family with the largest home, leaves that home to sit in the same basic Sukkah as the poor person who lives on the other side of town.
The sukkah is our home for a whole week. Not only do we eat there, we sleep and live our life there. On Sukkot their is little opportunity to tell who is rich and who is poor. Class distinctions dissolve.

Many of us imagine that without our status symbols we would amount to nothing. Without that which distinguishes us from others we would be 'ordinary' and in that easily invisible. Our whole lives we fear being invisible and so we work and toil to be distinguished and to have status. We want a title to be called by, be it Doctor, Rabbi, or even Mrs. We seek wealth and position so as to be somebody. Our fear is that without the accoutrements we would be nobody and for all intense and purposes disappear.

Yet Sukkot teaches us the secret we have been discussing. That which we most need is often than we most fear. When we let go of our status symbols, the home being a primary one, not only do we not disappear and feel a prevailing gloom. On the contrary, we know a sublime happiness. In our ordinariness, the very thing we fear, we discover a source of joy. In being like every one else we are freed of the driveness to be special, and we find a profound joy that is oh so liberating, being part of the whole.

Truth be told, those who have developed a sense of humility haven't really made a sacrifice at all. It just appears they have to us who live in the world which says "you are nobody unless you have status, positions, wealth, and power". To them, humility is a gift, not a sacrifice. They are happier in humility than we are with all our distinctions. And we would be too if we dared get past the fear, drop the focus on being special and accept ourselves as one of community.

Sukkot tells us the secret of happiness is giving up the need to be unique. The bounty, the harvest, having G-d's wonderful material blessings is a necessary condition.After all, its hard to be happy on an empty stomach. But unless, with our wealth, we can live in the Sukka, and be part of the community of Jews everywhere and of all stations, we are prisoners of the very bounty that is G-d's blessing, and robbed of the real happiness available to us.

"That which we most need is often that which we are most afraid of."
All of us need to be happy. Most of us fear the very thing that will serve to get us there,that is, letting go of our prized status, position, wealth and influence.

In the very ordinariness we fear is our liberation and joy!

Chag Samayach
Shabbat Shalom

Sorry for What?

2010-09-15T05:19:00.000-07:00

I remember as a yeshiva bachur the frenetic energy of the High Holy Day period.Long prayers,frequent musar shmoozen,the commonly taken taanit dibur (fast from speech)all gave the Yeshiva an other-wordly feeling.Everyone carried a seriousness about them. The spirit of teshuva (repentance) was palpable.

And then came the eve of Yom Kippur. The yearning for atonement approached its zenith.Prior to Kol Nidre boys might go bench to bench, row after row, seat after seat, beseeching forgiveness from anyone they may have offended during the year. Often they asked forgiveness from other boys whose names they didn't know, and to whom they likely never said a word. It didn't matter. Everyone knew the adage that for sins between one person and another, even Yom Kippur cannot atone without gaining forgiveness from the offended other."Forgive me", "Be mochail me", over and over the request was made, and forgiveness granted....But for what?

I once saw in a sefer where a certain Rav, when asked by others for forgiveness on the eve of Yom Kippur in the manner we just described, declined. He said to the one asking forgiveness, "Tell me how did you offend me? If I don't know what you did how can I, in good faith, say I forgive you.If what you may have done truly hurt me I may need time to accept your apology."

We might ask even more, how can one be sorry if s/he does not know what s/he did wrong?

Yom Kippur is filled with prayers of remorse. We make confessions over and over, indeed 10 times during the holy day.The confessions consists essentially of two types, the first a shorter form, with a listing of general failings according to the alef bet we often refer to as the 'Ashamnu', from the first word of the recitation. The second is a longer listing of particular sins, also according to the alef bet but with much greater detail of wrong-doing and that we call 'Al Chet'.

Question we might ask is why two forms? Why do we need both Ashamnu and Al Chet? If you asked most people which of the two they found most meaningful and relevant to the task of saying "I am sorry" to G-d, I think they would answer, Al Chet. The sins we confess in Al Chet are quite specific ranging from talking 'lashon hara' to using profanity and from disrespecting parents to sexual immorality. In the last section of the Al Chet we confess sins based on the severity of the punishment for the violation, including sins for which we incur the death sentence like violation of the Shabbat.
The saying of the Al Chet in all its specificity evokes in us a feeling of remorse. Frequently we are overwhelmed with a sense of guilt and wrong-doing.

So why do we need the Ashamnu.In the Ashamnu confession we talk about our sinfulness in more general terms. We say "We have become guilty, we have betrayed, we have robbed,... we have provoked, we have turned away, we have been perverse etc." Lacking in detail, the confession rarely elicits the emotional response in us of the Al Chet.

Yet interestingly if we asked which is the more important of the two confessions, it seems clear the Ashamnu takes precedence. The Al Chet is only recited on Yom Kippur. The Ashamnu is confessed each day at selichot during the High Holy Day period and 3 times each day at that.Moreover the Ashamnu is recited as an everyday confession all year long according to those davening nusach sefard, indeed twice a day. And even on Yom Kippur, by the time we reach the climactic confession of Ne'ela, as Yom Kippur draws to a close, only the Ashamnu confession is recited, not the Al Chet.

Are we missing something here? What makes the Ashamnu more important? What insight are we lacking to make the confession of the Ashamnu more compelling?

I think the insight we lack is the awareness that in the confession of the Al Chet, for all its specificity, we are giving voice to the symptoms of our spiritual malaise, but not its source!
True, we are detailing our wrong-full behaviors, and they need to be expressed. But speaking lashon hara or showing disrespect for a parent etc are individual sins that reflect a core spiritual shortcoming. Why are we callous about what we say? about what we eat? about what we do? Why do our behaviors show a disregard for our spouse, our neighbor, the poor etc? Why are we lax in our observance?

For the answer we need to go past the individual sinful acts and look at who we are, our charactalogical flaws. What are they?
The Ashamnu lists them all. "We betray, we spurn, we are ungrateful, we feel entitled, etc." Just look at the words of the Ashamnu in this light and I think you will see that each speaks to our weakness of spirit and our lacking in love and fear of our G-d.

I think the reason we can more easily relate to the Al Chet is because its less threatening to us. Yes, we sinned, yes, we did wrong, but we remain good. In confessing the Al Chet we can cry for deeds done wrong without having to question the integrity of our character. The confession of Ashamnu demands that we acknowledge our flawed self. Sinners that we are, we nonetheless like ourselves. We are prepared to confess and maybe even change our behaviors. But we don't want to change ourselves!

Yet the reality is that only in the sincere recognition that the sins of the Al Chet did not happen in a vacuum. They are no accident. They emerge from a diseased soul. And truth be told, no change of behavior will really be possible until we claim our soul's flaws and change who we are. Al Chet only has meaning as a sequel to the Ashamnu. Only in confessing with heart the weaknesses in our character and our lacking in spiritual shlaimut (wholeness) can we really atone and do the teshuva to which we are called.

We need to be sorry not only for what we did but for who we are! We need to confront our limitations of character, both in relationship to G-d and in relationship to the community of people who make up our world.

This year I ask you to look with me at the Ashamnu again. Open your self to the honesty it invites.See if it does not speak to you both in terms of who you are and in terms of who you want to be.

As Ramchal wrote in his classic "Mesilat Yesharim", our purpose in this world is to achieve 'shlaimut' so we can enjoy the great pleasure of nearness to G-d in the World to Come. Mitzvot are the means to the 'shlaimut'. In the confession of the Ashamnu,rather than focus on the particular sin, we claim our regret for our lack of 'shlaimut' and by implication we share our yearning to reach new levels of shlaimut in our future.

G'mar Chatima Tova! May this year bring us to new and higher levels of personal sh'laimut!

Shabbat Shalom

"It Was a Very Good Year"

2010-09-01T03:30:00.000-07:00

"Rebbe Eliezer taught,'Repent one day before you die'." His students asked him "But how can we know when we will die?". He responded "Indeed treat every day as it might be your last. That way your whole life will be focused on right living and repentance".

Rebbe Eliezer's teaching, while making much sense to me, is not the way everyone sees things. I remember when I was a teenager the late Frank Sinatra released a song called "It Was a Very Good Year". The lyrics were of a man reminiscing on his life beginning from when he was 17. The entire focus of the man's life, through all the different passages was pursuit of pleasure.
Now I could understand that looking back at his younger years and his youthful indulgences he might claim "it was a very good year". But I remember, even as a teen, I was shocked that when Sinatra, in the song, is already an old man, reflecting on his later years, as his life is ebbing away,there too, rather than repent or refocus, he remains equally committed to the pursuit of pleasure, just of a more refined type. There too, near his end, he proudly claims the pleasures he pursued and pronounces them "a very good year".

Knowing he has but little time left, he feels no impulse to to 'tshuva', repent, and devote his remaining time to worthy endeavours. Living his 'last days' does not impel him to the mandate of Rebbe Eliezer quoted above. Instead he remain committed to his agenda, drawing from life every last pleasure it has to offer.To the end, he affirms and blesses his self-indulgent focus.

And thats not the only time I found myself surprised that life's end did not lead to change. For many years I worked as a hospital chaplain. I visited the frail and dying and spent hours upon hours at their bedside. Rare indeed was the case where a person, knowing his/her end was near used their last days and months to make ammends, repent, express remorse, make the kind of changes that Rebbe Eliezer envisioned for those who know time is short.

I came to realize that there are two kinds of people in the world. If told they had but a month to live, the first kind would go out and live it up, pursue all the pleasures available to them, take advantage of every opportunity to enjoy life before it was gone. Knowing they were dying would not motivate them to repent. On the contrary it would inspire them to intensify their pleasure seeking agenda.The second kind of person would use their last month to make a difference. They would seek to improve themselves though intensive prayer and sudy. Or they might invest their last days trying to improve the life of others through acts of hesed and voluntarism.

It is to this last group and only to the last group, that Rebbe Eliezer's teaching has relevance. Sadly, I suspect, this group represents the minority.

We stand now only a few days before Rosh Hashanna. It is almost always the case that the last Shabbat of the year we read the parsha of Nitzavim. Prominent in Nitzavim is Moshe's challenge to the People of Israel to the mitzvah of Teshuva, Repentance.
The end of the year, the time of judgement, and the mitzvah of Teshuva, for some of us, the contiguity of the mitzvah and season is propitious.Knowing we are coming to an end, knowing we face a judgement, knowing that our future is at stake, moves us to introspection and return. This is the season of return.

Question is, into which group do we fall? Are we of the Frank Sinatra variety, who, while we may not live a life as hedonistic as his, nonetheless share with him the attitude that when faced with our end, we refuse to change and instead insist til the last, that all of our life and behaviors reflect "a very good year".
Are we, like so many I visited, determined to remain true to the way we have always been, unwilling to adapt, change, or alter our values, and practices.

Or are we students of Rebbe Eliezer. Will we seize the moment and remake ourselves. Will we have the courage and the smarts to change for the better and move ourselves along the road to real 'shlaimut', wholeness, a shlaimut that inevitably requires change and acknowledgement of wrong-doing.

Two kinds of people... Which are we? How we respond to knowing an 'end' is at hand makes all the difference in determining whether we are essentially persons of the spirit or of the earth.
We can bless the past and cleave to it saying "it was a very good year" or we can say "the year past may have had many good things about it, but it cannot be my model for the future. I need to change!"

As another one of those immortal crooners sang "Its now or never".
Lets make it now!

Ktiva V'chatima Tova!
May you and all those you love and all Israel be inscribed and sealed for a life of blessing, meaning and growth.

Shabbat Shalom

Happiness in Marriage

2010-08-18T05:18:00.000-07:00

"If a man should marry a new wife he is exempt from serving in the army and from all manner of compulsory service. For one year he is free to engage solely in domestic matters and to make his new bride happy" (Devarim 24:5).
So we read in the Parsha of Ke Taitzay, the portion of this week.
But here's the rub, how indeed does one make one's wife, or for that matter husband, happy?

Husbands and wives will tell you that they have been trying to make each other happy for years without real success. Divorce rates continue to soar. Unhappy marriages are the norm. Yet so many a man and woman will tell you that all they wanted was to make their spouse happy. In the end, the failures outnumber the stories of success. What goes wrong?

Their is a well known passage in the Talmud that implies even G-d struggles to find the key to a happy home. In the Gemara Sota a difficult pasuk in the Psalms is interpreted to teach that making successful shiduchin is as difficult for Hakadosh Baruch Hu as was parting the Red Sea at the time of the Exodus.

Question is, while we can understand the message here underlying the complexity of making successful matches, the connection between parting the sea and forging a marital union seems strange. In the one case, G-d needs to make a miraculous separation, dividing the waters so the Israelites could cross. In the other, G-d needs to bring already separate entities together, in making a marriage. How are they related? One is dividing, the other uniting.

Through coming to understand this passage in the Talmud we may discover some great truths about marriage and intimacy. I suggest that the Rabbis of the Gemara already knew that finding love was no great feat. Falling in-love is easy and natural. It happens to nearly everyone sometime or other.And for many of us it happens over and over.

But that love, the love based on the sense of identity with another is the easy part of real love. We discover someone we feel much in common with and our hearts sing.The hard part of a loving relationship is the the part in which we recognize how our partner is not like us, how we and they are different. That part of relationship is grounded in respect. It's focus is on the appreciation of another with their differences from us. Unlike the loving part based on similarity, here we celebrate them for who they are in their 'otherness' from us.

Scott Peck in his classic self-help book "The Road Less Travelled" precedes the section on love with a section on respect. He argues that no real love can happen without the foundation of respect. Respect is always based on the recognition that my partner is different from me with unique interests, tastes, likes and dislikes and opinions. Only when we accept and validate the other for who they are, and not try to change them to be like us, can intimacy blossom. Intimacy is always the dance between nearness and distance, between love and respect, between seeing the other as a reflection of us and seeing them as unique and individual.

In truth most marriages fail and most relationships lose their joy, not because their was not enough nearness and love. Rather what kills relationship is the lack of respect and the appreciation of the other for their distinctness from us. Too often we spend a lifetime in relationship either trying to change our partner to be like us or lamenting how hopeless they are because they refuse to accept our way of thinking and doing.

In this backdrop the Talmudic passage cited above makes sense. Forging a successful union is very much like parting the sea. In parting the sea G-d divided the sea which was essentially one body of water into two distinct parts, and kept them that way. They remained all the Yam Suf, yet they were two individual components and unique. On reflection, that is quite a task. A marriage union requires the same effort to be successful and joyous. The man and woman need to indeed be one. Yet at the same time they need to be divisible and distinct with each having their own uniqueness celebrated and affirmed by the other. Intimacy is the miracle of a oneness consisting of two affirming and loving each other in their respective differences as well as similarities.

And so we return to where we began. How do we make our partner happy? Staying home from war and burdensome obligations gives us the means but not the method.

If we take what our Sages taught seriously than we will know that happiness in marriage is not lacking because we don't sufficiently love or feel enough in common with our spouse. That's not the problem. The problem in our relationships is that we do not sufficiently celebrate our spouses uniqueness from us. We don't respect him/her enough. And worse still, we try to change him/her to be the way we think s/he should be.

I am fortunate enough to be a new chatan, and not for the first time. Last Friday I married. It devolves on me the mitzvah to make my wife happy. Its our first year. But in truth the mitzvah applies to every married man and every married woman. Our work is to make our partner happy.

I know and hope you know that the happiness we aspire to will not be gained by bringing some new gift to your husband or wife.Rather it will be gained in showing them respect for who they are and encouraging them to be most truly themselves. Their is no greater gift one can give another than saying and showing "You are different from me. And with those differences I love you as you are!"

Shabbat Shalom

Living as an Innocent

2010-08-12T03:40:00.000-07:00

I recently read a news item where it was reported that the noted basketball super-star Lebron James paid a rabbi, reputed to have mystical abilities, a 6 figure fee so he would advise him on business decisions. According to the article, the rabbi, who heralds from Israel, and speaks no English, sat-in on investment proposals made to James and counselled him on where to place his money.

Making use of religious personalities,symbols,and amulets as a means to discern the future and influence the course of our lives is not new. But is it kosher? Just because we make use of items within the tradition rather than say tarot cards and rabbis instead of fortune tellers, does that in itself make it okay?

The Talmud teaches that one is not permitted to use 'psukim', verses in the Torah,repeated over and over, as a kind of religious device to, by dint of the 'magic' in the verses, bring about healing and prosperity.

This week the Torah is explicit in forbidding us from making use of soothsayers and fortune tellers to predict our future. But the Torah goes one step further. It tells us "Tamim t'hiyeh eem Hashem Elokecha", freely translated that means "You shall be innocent with the L-rd your G-d". The Haamek Davar explains the Torah's call to be 'tamim' by saying that even where we feel the need to know, we should remain innocent and trusting. And G-d will do as He sees fit for us.

The implication of the Hamek Davar's understanding of the verse is that its not enough that we do not make use of secular powers to know and direct the future. Even utilizing sources within the faith towards that end compromises our challenge to be 'tamim' and trusting in G-d and His direction.

So many who embrace the outer clothes of religion do so with the idea that religion will serve as some kind of magical potion to ward off evil and protect.They use prayer, study, rabbis, as if they are simply charms to guarantee against unwanted things. Sometimes they even become passionate in observance and most meticulous. Yet their practice feels almost primitive in its expectation that somehow if one does this or that one can be certain of his/her future.In their minds, Judaism provides the ingredients, which if rightly combined, can control the course of events.

Now its true that the Torah itself encourages us to pray for our needs. But prayer is not meant to manipulate the heavenly forces but rather to put ourselves in a new place with G-d, so that his mercy will devolve on us. Prayer is never meant to force the hand of G-d. And so too when we seek the counsel and prayers of great Rabbis. We do not expect them to be witch-doctors, with the powers of demi-gods. We simply ask for their prayers to be added to our own in beseeching G-d's, in whose hand our future rests, help.

Neither of the above practices compromises Hashem's call to us to be 'tamim'. We remain innocent and trusting in Hashem's will and decision. We simply are doing what He told us to do, appealing to Him so that he may give us the 'good' He intends for us.

Lebron James's Rabbi seems a far stretch from the 'tamim' of which we speak. The rabbi is not giving a 'bracha' to this Black basketball super-star. He is using his mystical powers to tell him what he otherwise would not know. And not about his moral conduct, but about investments that will make him money.It seems to me, he is using religion as a magical tool rather than as away to enhance one's spiritual self and draw near to Hashem. It is using religion against itself and its purpose.

It is not easy to be a 'tamim'. It is not easy to surrender ones natural instinct to want to both know and predict the future. The Torah tells us that in the ideal we will be given a 'Navi', a prophet so Hashem can tell us what we need to know. But for the rest, for all those personal matters of consequence not on the national agenda, we need to find the courage and faith to let go and let G-d be G-d.

Religion practiced as a means to manipulate the forces out of our control that they be good to us is a tainted religion.In the ideal, the goal of the religion we practice should be to give us the strength to live with all the unpredictability of life as an innocent, as a 'tamim', and be happy with our G-d.

Shabbat Shalom

Are the Religious Happy?

2010-08-04T03:37:00.001-07:00

Gene Simmons, a lead vocalist with the rock band Kiss, and one who in both lifestyle and music gave expression to the joys of hedonism, was born in Israel. He emigrated to the United States while still a boy. Nearly all of his mother's family perished in the Holocaust. Once when interviewed, he acknowledged that growing up he had considerable contact with the Orthodox Jewish community in Israel. Yet he rejected religious life entirely in favor of the totally secular which he came to represent with his gaudy costumes and shameless antics. When asked why, he responded by noting that for all the certainty and fervor in the Orthodox Jewish world there was a noticeable lack of joy! How could he believe in Torah values and be part of a Torah community absent of joy!

Is he right? Do the religious experience less joy than the secular?
Do those who follow worldly pleasures, like they use to say about blonds, indeed have more fun?

Some years ago I attended a Siyum Hashas, a celebration of the completion of learning through the entire Talmud, together with near 20,000 men who completed the 7 year cycle of Daf Yomi study.
It was held in the largest indoor venue in New York, the fabled Madison Square Garden. It was an awesome spectacle. All these men, and many more who could not attend or could not get tickets, studied a page of Talmud a day. They were not rabbis or scholars. They were accountants and plumbers, diamond merchants and teachers. In short they were every-day people. Yet they were devoted to studying Torah, so much so that they gave at least an hour a day to learn Talmud and the daily page. Here they were in the home of the New York Knicks, and concert venue for the Grateful Dead, and they filled it, not to cheer or smoke pot,but to celebrate the gift of Torah study.

The evening was punctuated by addresses from the leading Roshai Yeshiva in America, scholars all and most revered. Yet as I sat and listened to address after address it was not the profundity of the remarks that struck me. Rather I was struck by how little spontaneous joy seemed evident in each speech. Encouragement? Yes! Challenge? Yes! Admonishment not to forget the learning? Yes! There was lots of those themes in the addresses. But where was the joy? I thought the Roshai Yeshiva should be dancing with glee. What a Kiddush Hashem, a sanctification of G-d. Committed Jews filled the Garden, the bastion of the secular! A cycle of learning was completed by more Jews than ever before in Jewish history. Why were there so few smiles on the faces of the spiritual leaders? Why did the ambiance feel more serious than happy!

I repeat my earlier question. Are those who take the Torah lifestyle seriously less happy than those who reject it? Does observance compromise our joy?

Its worth noting that in this weeks parsha, that of Re'eh, whilst we are charged in no uncertain terms to a total commitment to keeping the commandments and embracing the life of Torah, we are also mandated to be joyous. No less than 7 times in this week's portion we are charged with the call to be happy.

But lets be honest here. All the expectations that we keep the mitzvot, and they are many and intricate, and that we dare not sin gives us reason to be serious and hesitant to rejoice. If we take the Torah and our G-d given obligations to heart we are more likely to forever be concerned if we are getting it right! We are likely to be more anxious than happy, more sober than exuberant. With all the details of proper observance from the complexities of the laws of Shabbat and making the right bracha to having true 'kavana' when we daven we are forever likely to be self-doubting. Self-doubt rarely leads to joy.

And the confessions we make in our own prayers seem to mitigate against us feeling happy. If one davens nusach Sefarad, twice a day one recites the 'ashamnu' list of sins. And even if one does not, over and over we recite that we are essentially unworthy of the kindnesses we receive from G-d. All that we get and all that we ask for we do acknowledging we are undeserving.If one believes that even the blessings in his/her life come to him/her undeservedly, its hard to be happy. Grateful, yes! But happy, no! In the end, no one can be truly happy with gifts that come to him/her if s/he feels s/he is not really deserving of them.

And yet the Torah commands us to be happy. How can that be?

There is a brilliant and pithy model that someone once used to describe levels of spiritual maturity. They divided the process into 4 components. When one has a totally undeveloped spiritual sense they live life for their own sake. When they get early spiritual yearnings, in the second stage, they pursue G-d centered ends but for their own sake and benefit, meaning because of the rewards G-d promises for keeping and/or the punishment for neglect. At the third level, one pursues a G-d-centered agenda, that means the focus of one's life is on the spiritual, and for G-d's sake. At this level, one's desire to do mitzvot is so as to bring nachas to G-d. And mitzvot are indeed the center of one's life's work. I would think this is the highest level. But there is one stage yet beyond.
And that is to pursue one's own life's agenda, not G-ds, but not out of selfish motives. On the contrary, if you were choosing you would pursue the spiritual agenda entirely. Rather you choose what is good for you, even though you prefer to focus on G-d, because Hashem wants you to, that is Hashem wants your pleasure and joy!
The highest level is choosing to do what is for you but for G-d's sake!

It is in this context that even the most religious person can know,and indeed must know,total simcha. Rebbe Nachamn taught "mitzvah gedola l'hyot b'simcha", "its a great mitzvah to be happy always". What did he mean its a "mitzvah"? Mitzvah is a commandment! Rebbe Nachman should simply challenge us to be happy.
The answer is that Rebbe Nachman knew that for the truly spiritual person its so hard to be happy. S/he knows how lacking s/he is and how undeserving. If one simply is seeking to serve G-d for G-d's sake one is more likely to be serious than joyous, and self-doubt will reign. But simcha is a mitzvah. G-d wants us to be happy! We need to be happy not for our sake but to do G-d's will for us.
That kind of happiness can happen even for the one most skeptical of his/her worth, because that happiness is not about them but about Hashem's desire for them.

Gene Simmons was right. Religious people, those who take their obligation to Hashem most seriously tend not to be as naturally happy as their counterparts who are secular. How can we be truly happy when we feel ourselves so lacking.

But we are called upon to be happy. Its a mitzvah oft repeated in the Torah. It takes a level of great spiritual maturity to forgo our own self critique and be happy because Hashem wants it for us.
Yet that is our mandate. To be candid,I think even great Roshai Yeshiva miss this call. They remind us of our limitations. They talk to us at stage 2 and 3 of our spiritual continuum. But they do not challenge us to attain stage 4 nor do most in themselves reflect the joy it should auger. Too bad!

You and I will have to get it on our own....To be spiritual and full of joy is not only not inconsistent. They go hand in hand. To the extent we lack the joy is to the extent we have not yet matured sufficiently in our spiritual process.
True we have no right to be happy. All we are given is a gift undeserved. But G-d wants us to be happy...And even if I feel unworthy I need be happy because He wants me to know joy!
"Mitzvah gedola lhyot b'simcha tamid!

Shabbat Shalom

Paying the Price

2010-07-29T04:59:00.000-07:00

What does it mean to be an adult? In what way is the grown-up different from the child? How do we recognize emotional maturity?

We may have many answers to those questions but surely any will include the idea that to be grown-up, to attain maturity means to recognize that all our actions have consequences. In the life of the child mistakes are made and forgiven with a simple "I am sorry".
S/he realizes that at times s/he has done the wrong. But nothing is so consequential that it is beyond redemption with an apology and, perhaps, a parental punishment. What s/he does not realize is that his/her actions have enduring consequences. S/he,as a child, does not yet know that one's actions can never be undone no matter how many apologies. We pay for what we take in life. Nothing is really free !

Truth be told, many of us, as would be adults, have yet to fully accept the same lesson. We go through life often realizing we are making mistakes, but we are unwilling to pay the price for them.Like children, we assume we can just say we are sorry or that we try our best and that will be enough. If you doubt the truth of what I say, just ask the smoker who is surprised to get lung cancer as if s/he didn't think s/he would ever pay the price for his/her choices. Or ask the person who does not exercise and over-eats and too early in life has a heart attack. Or the parent who fails to discipline his/her child when they are young and then finds him/herself with an unruly teen. Its not that the choices we make guarantee the consequences but they make them both predictable and likely.

The Torah this week in the parsha of Eikev makes clear that our choices have consequences. From the portion's beginning where Moshe tells the Israelites that if they keep the Torah and do the commandments they will be blessed with prosperity and peace to the end of the reading and the second paragraph of 'shma', the theme of action and consequence is repeated over and over. Indeed this is the recurring theme of the entire book of Devarim.

But we might ask, if G-d loves us why isn't it enough that He reward us for our commitment to Torah. Why does He need to punish us if we fail to observe? The Rabbis taught "The Holy One Blessed be He wanted to merit Israel therefore He gave us Torah and Mitzvot." We can understand that we are given the many many mitzvot so we can earn reward. But why punish us if we fail. True there are many opportunities to earn blessings, but one might wonder if its worth it with all the waiting reproof when we fail and, with all the commandments, there is so much opportunity for failure!

I was thinking about this when I went to visit an elderly and infirm man whom I learn with each week. You may recall him from an earlier blog. Well, I had called his wife earlier in the week and advised that I needed to reschedule our learning time. She said the new time was perfect for him and they would be delighted to see me.
When I got to the apartment I discovered, to my surprise, that he was not home. He had an eye doctors appointment and they had forgotten about our learning appointment. She apologized to me several times for the error and repeated over and over how meaningful the learning time was for her husband!

Now why did the wife of my weekly chavruta need to repeat over and over that the learning time her husband and I shared was so important to him and her? She could have just explained the mistake, as she did, and moved on?

The answer is that she knew what we all know. We don't forget things that have consequences for us. When my chavruta, even at 91 years, has a physicians appointment, he writes it down in his little book. He will neither forget it nor miss it. But our learning does not have that kind of 'chashivut', importance to him. It does not get noted in the book. And do you know why? Because it does not have immediate consequence in his mind. I do not get paid to learn with him. Our learning is a gift! When anything is a gift, with no apparent cost, no matter how precious, in the end it goes unappreciated and typically it gets neglected.

Please don't misunderstand.I am not meaning to be critical of my chavruta. On the contrary, my chavruta taught me something about me, and you, a lesson perhaps more valuable than the hour we would have spent learning. He helped me understand why it is that Hashem had to not only attach reward to keeping the mitzvot, but also attach punishment for failing to keep. If mitzvot only engendered reward with no negative consequence they would go under-valued and neglected. We simply would prioritize our lives so that other things, things that have negative consequences, would dominate our routine. We would miss our purpose in life!

I suspect that its for this reason the father makes the blessing of 'baruch she'ptarani', blessed is He who freed me from the consequences of the punishment for my son's 'avairot', sins, at his son's Bar Mitzvah. The blessing seems most peculiar for a happy time and one filled with hope for the future. Yet, in accord with what we have come to see, the blessing makes sense. To become a Jewish adult is to take responsibility for the consequences of one's actions, to be what is called in tradition a "bar onshin", someone who will be punished for his/her failures. No acceptance of mitzvot can be real and meaningful without knowing that it does not come free! The bar mitzvah, the boy, now man, son of commandments must accept that reality lest all the promise be lost in neglect.

The father makes the blessing so the son can hear! He makes the blessing so his son can fully comprehend that from now on he, the boy, is liable for his own deeds. If all Bar Mitzvah meant was reward and blessing then mitzvot would become cheap and observance a nicety, rather than a commitment. In this backdrop, is it any wonder that for so much of the Jewish world bar,bat Mitzvah makes so little impact on a boy's or girl's life. No matter how big the splash of how lavish the gifts if the young adult does not accept consequences for being a Jew the rite of bar/bat mitzvah will be empty of impact.

Whether in our own lives or in the lives of the children we are raising we must come to terms with the reality that our actions have enduring consequences. Its not enough to just claim the blessing in doing the right. We must acknowledge and accept that failure is more than sad, warranting an apology. Failure is tragic!

Whether in saying the hurtful word to another or failing to keep Shabbat as we need to, we must know that its not enough to mean well.
Meaning well does not help if you drive under the influence and harm someone. Meaning well does not undo the wrongful spiritual act either, whether to another or to Hashem. Knowing that, for sure does not make life easier. But it does make it more likely that we will toe the line and indeed live a life that will be called blessed rather than tragic!

Shabbat Shalom