Stand Tall? – Parshiot Behar/Bechukotai

Printable PDF available here. Prior pieces on Behar/Bechukotai are available here, here and here.

**Rav Kook (Based on Ein Ayah, Gemara Berachot 43b)**

I am the Lord your G-d who brought you out from the land of the Egyptians to be their slaves no more, who broke the bars of your yoke and made you walk erect (lit. קוממיות). (Vayikra 26:13)

One may not walk with an upright posture (lit. קומה זקופה), for one who walks with an upright posture, even only four amot, it is as if he pushes away the Divine Presence, as it is written (Isaiah 6:3) “The entire world is full of His glory.” (Gemara Berachot 43b)

In Gemara Berachot, our Sages teach that it is prohibited to walk with an upright posture. One who does so arrogantly “pushes” – so to speak – the Divine Presence away from the world. While we can all agree that arrogance is a bad character trait, this teaching seems to contradict an explicit verse in Parshat Bechukotai. G-d declares that He freed us from Egyptian slavery, so that we could walk ‘קוממיות’ – upright! How are we to make sense of this apparent paradox?

To answer this question, we must understand that our Sages are speaking (as they often do) on multiple levels. After all, your posture is more than just a matter of how your vertebrae are aligned. It is a function of how you see yourself and your inner world. It is the latter that our Sages are primarily concerned with.

Every person is created with various abilities and talents, both physical and spiritual. By actualizing our potential, we can attain completeness, contentedness, and the ultimate blessing of Divine closeness. We were all created with a yearning to elevate ourselves, to express our talents on the highest dimensions and to continually erase the border between the potential and the actual. But this process is not one we undertake out of a sense of raw ambition or self-centered desire. It is a religious task, one that must be undertaken with consciousness of the Divine taskmaster who has given us the abilities that we seek to develop and express.

One who views his talents through a spiritual lens will always be conscious of a guiding Divine hand. He will exert himself to the best of his abilities, but also retreat and place a limit to his ambition when G-d or His Torah demand it. Although he realizes that he was put in the world to achieve and accomplish, he knows that the yardstick for his accomplishments comes from Above – and not from his family, friends, or society around him.

In other words, this person “walks” upright – but not to the fullest extent possible. His “posture” is somewhat bowed, because he knows that no matter how much he achieves or accomplishes, there are certain places he could take his talents that G-d has put off limits.

This is the resolution to the contradiction we started with. The Torah indeed declares that G-d wishes us to walk erect (lit. קוממיות) – but this is not the same thing as the ‘upright posture’ (lit. קומה זקופה) condemned by our Sages in Gemara Berachot. The latter refer to someone who walks entirely upright, who acknowledges no limits to his powers or talents. In this way, he “pushes away the Divine Presence” and leaves no room for Divine influence to guide or impact the actualization of his potential.

It’s a Cover-Up – Parshiot Achrei Mot/Kedoshim

**Rav Kook (Based on Ein Ayah, Gemara Shabbat 22a)**

And if any Israelite or any stranger who resides among them hunts down a wild animal or a bird that may be eaten, he shall pour out its blood and cover it with earth. (Vayikra 17:13)

“He shall spill its blood and cover it with dust”. This means that with what one spills, he shall cover. [Just as a person spills the blood of a slaughtered animal with his hand, so too, he is obligated to cover the blood with this hand and not cover it with his foot.] The reason is so that mitzvot will not be contemptible to him. (Gemara Shabbat 22a)

There is a mitzvah to cover the blood of a shechted bird or non-domesticated animal. Various explanations have been offered for this mitzvah, known as kisui ha’dam. Some explain that the mitzvah is intended to distance us from the prohibited consumption of blood. Others explain it as a protective measure against ancient pagan practices involving blood.

But these explanations seem simplistic. Can it be that this G-dly mitzvah is nothing more than a guardrail against lowly paganism or consumption of blood, both practices that most of humanity has evolved beyond? These kind of flimsy, contingent explanations cannot possibly exhaust the depths of this – or any – G-dly mitzvah. The mitzvah must be relevant to every stage of humanity’s development.

We should note that although humanity has made great strides in its ethical and moral development, there are still many rungs to climb. We still have not reached the highest levels of holiness and elevation that are our destiny. Granted, we cannot speak in detail about the moral code or ideals that will govern at the end of history, in the Messianic era and subsequent to the revival of the dead (lit. תחיית המתים). These matters are simply beyond our ability to comprehend. But we can point to aspects of humanity’s current state of being – things that we take for granted as normal – and identify them as flawed practices that will be discarded when humanity eventually rises to a perfected state. The spilling of animal blood is one such practice. It cannot possibly be reconciled with man’s ultimate state of ethical and spiritual perfection. It is not a mere coincidence that according to the Torah, humanity was originally prohibited to consume meat and only the vegetable world was permitted.

Although we will eventually return to this lofty state, it is improper for humanity to leap impulsively to levels of extreme piety and forgo the consumption of meat. That would be neither suitable nor sustainable for our current state of being. Such inappropriate piety would breach the boundaries of what the Torah permits, and its end will be catastrophic failure. Much work remains to be done in the interpersonal and social domains of existence before man can rightfully extend a loving hand to the denizens of the animal world. How can we, in good conscience, divert our spiritual energies and resources to the animal kingdom as long as our fellow human beings are afflicted with poverty, disease, war, persecution and suffering?

This places humanity’s moral development into a difficult paradox. On one hand, consumption of meat is permitted to us in our current state, and it is both rash and impudent for us to leap to Messianic levels of piety by forgoing meat. But on the other hand, we cannot become so habituated to our imperfect state that we become struck in it, that we forget that there are more rungs to climb, that we stop becoming and content ourselves with being.

The mitzvah of kisui ha’dam is G-d’s divinely legislated means of navigating this paradox. The animal world is permitted to man for his needs, and he is allowed to spill animal blood. But G-d demands that this be done with hesitation, with a certain sense of shame. Man may spill blood, but he must cover it up. He thus reminds himself that in the light of the ultimate and most perfect truth, spilling animal blood is cause for contrition and a measure of shame.

This also explains why the mitzvah of kisui ha’dam is limited to birds and non-domesticated animals, a question that has bothered many commentators. Based on our analysis, we can explain that slaughtering birds and wild animals is particularly shameful because they are generally self-sufficient and do not rely on people to provide their needs. By contrast, humans provide for and take care of domesticated animals, and their slaughter thus has a semblance of a fair exchange. In this way, the Divine lawgiver ensures a proper balance between humanity’s current moral state and the ultimate heights to which it is destined to ascend.

For this reason, our Sages teach that kisui ha’dam should not be performed with one’s feet as it would be disrespectful to the mitzvah (lit. ביזוי מצוה). The feet are the lowest part of the body, and using them for this mitzvah would express that it is oriented towards the lowest stages of humanity’s moral development (like weaning us from consuming blood or paganism). For this mitzvah is Divinely engineered to bring about nothing less than the highest and brightest future, and it should thus be performed with the hands. The hands can be raised higher than any part of the body, higher than even the head, which is the seat of the intellect. The message is that kisui ha’dam connects us to a level of spiritual reality that is beyond our current comprehension, to levels of holiness that await us at the end of history.

In this regard, kisui ha’dam serves as a paradigm for all of the Torah’s mitzvot. No mitzvah is consigned to a distant past or to the inferior stages of humanity’s development. Every mitzvah advances humanity and history to its ultimate conclusion, to the light of G-d and His splendor, to the day when G-d will pour out his spirit upon all flesh and remove the spirit of impurity for the earth. On that day, animals will become human-like in their spiritual capabilities and humanity will attain levels that we cannot even comprehend. Humanity will revert to its Edenic diet and animal slaughter for food will be a vestige of the past.

And on the 8th Day, Everything Was Good – Parshat Tazria/Metzora

Printable PDF available here. Previous piece on this parshah is available here.

Rav Kook (Based on Shemonah Kevatzim, 1:497)

“And G-d spoke to Moses, saying… “If a woman conceives and gives birth to a boy…on the eighth day, the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised.” (Vayikra 12:1-3)

The classical explanation for the mitzvah of milah[1] is that it tempers sexual desire. This explanation encompasses within it broad and fundamental principles regarding man’s place in the world and his role as a servant of G-d. We must note that the term “milah” is not fully accurate, as the correct term is brit milah – literally the “covenant of circumcision.” This mitzvah was given to Avraham as the foundation of a unique Divine covenant, part of which was G-d’s promise to him “to be a G-d to you and your descendants.”[2] By engraving the sign of this covenant into our flesh, we express that this covenant is not an peripheral, superficial part of our existence, but intrinsic to and inseparable from our very being. As Iyov (19:26) declared, מבשרי אחזה אלוק – “From my flesh, I perceive G-d.”

However, brit milah is far more than a symbolic declaration. One who understands the message of this mitzvah, who defines his essential identify by his relationship with the Divine, will exert himself to unify all of his drives and desires. He will use them to further the enlightened and righteous goals established by the Creator of those very drives and desires, who implanted them in His creations for the ultimate goodness of the world that He created. Such an individual will experience a sense of unity in his own inner world, and as a result, he will acutely perceive the inner Divine unity of the world around him.

However, not everyone reaches this lofty level. For many people, their various drives and desires pull them in different directions. Their inner world is ruptured and unharmonious, and they cannot fathom the notion of directing their desires toward a higher, overarching purpose. They gaze at the world through the lenses of their fractured and divided inner world, and thus conclude that the world itself lacks any unity or greater purpose.

Sexual desire – and the various branches of physical, imaginative, and spiritual yearnings that are encompassed within it – is the most basic and foundational of all human desires. And even this stormy, turbulent drive is one that an upright person can encompass with a spirit of nobility (lit. רוח אצילי) and harness, alongside other layers of his spiritual and physical persona, to supernal and elevated ethical purposes.

The opposite is also true. Through an obsession with the impure, unrefined dimensions of sexual desire, humanity can fall – and has fallen – into the lowest levels of iniquity. In this lowly state, one’s ability to perceive any ethical, idealistic or purposeful dimension of reality is blocked and clogged up (lit. אטום). In this sad and pathological state, humanity is savagely pessimistic and blinded to the Divine goodness that permeates existence. The notion that procreation, that bringing children into this sad and fallen world, could serve any higher ideal is not merely foreign, but seen as irrational and senseless. If existence itself is not good, how can it be ideal to bring (through procreation) additional creations into such a miserable state of being? Humanity’s sexual desires, thus estranged from any higher purpose, are left unchecked and uninhibited, resulting in devastating and brutal consequences.

But this pessimistic vision is a false one. Our Torah declares that “G-d saw all that He had created, and behold, it was exceedingly good.”[3] This perspective extends to all levels of reality, including sexual desire. This is the deeper lesson of brit milah, the removal of the foreskin, which embodies the false vision of unrestrained sexual desire. The excision of the foreskin in physical reality, through the mitzvah of brit milah, is meant to reverberate in a corresponding excision of the impure spiritual reality of unrestrained sexuality.

Tempering sexual desire through brit milah is thus neither a sign of asceticism nor an intrinsic value of its own. It is rather a Divinely prescribed corrective, so that those party to this covenant can broaden the noble dimensions of life and allow G-dly light to shine forth not only in the highest heavens, but even the ‘lowly’ fleshly levels of reality.

“From my flesh, I perceive G-d….”

[1] This explanation appears in Moreh Nevuchim of the Rambam.

[2] Bereishit 17:7.

[3] Bereishit 1:31.

Food For Thought

Rav Soloveitchik (And From There You Shall Seek, pg. 115-116): Neither Greek philosophy nor Christianity grasped the moral and metaphysical aspects of sexual intercourse. Only the Halakhah gives this act a solid basis in religious life; the commandment to “be fruitful and multiply” (Gen. 1:28) is the ﬁrst one in the Torah. Marital life is pure and blessed. The life of a bachelor, even if he has never sinned, runs contrary to the View of the Halakhah. One who is not married has no joy, no blessing, and no Torah (Yevamot 62b). The Holy One, Blessed Be He, Himself engages in matchmaking (Gen. Rabbah 68:3—4). The joy of the bride and groom is very important, and anyone who participates in it receives a great reward. A husband is required to have relations with his wife at regular intervals, according to his physical ability and the conditions of his work… The Halakhah’s laws of sexual intercourse, which are based on psychological principles and sexual hygiene, are marvelous for their clear-headedness and “modernity.” How much concern, along with delicate and intimate understanding, is found in these laws! The same iron-clad Halakhah that forbids sexual intercourse when the wife is menstruating and establishes preventive measures around this restriction, also imposes an absolute duty upon man to have intercourse with his wife periodically out of love and affection…

Man worships his Creator with his body, his eating, and his sexual activity, and this worship is preferable to worship through prayer. Look and see how much is written in the Torah and the Talmud about the laws of forbidden sexual relations and forbidden foods, and how little is written about the laws of prayer. Many people who gorge themselves on food like a predatory animal in its lair and deﬁle their sexual love life are able to pray to G-d on bent knee, but not many can eat in the presence of G-d and sanctify themselves while under attack by the sexual drive. Wherever there is a possibility of sexual activity, the Torah enjoins sanctity.

Maimonides calls his compilation of the laws of forbidden sexual relations and forbidden foods by the name “The Book of Holiness.” Sexual relations reﬂect the image of the human being as differentiating himself from the beasts and (while still in his body) soaring to the heights. Socratic/Platonic metaphysics, which has had such a great inﬂuence on Christianity, insists that the spirit rises upward while the body goes downward, that man is crowned with a garland of reason and has the power to soar up to the world of the Logos by devoting himself to a spiritual and intellectual calling that does not involve his real animal existence. Judaism declares [in contrast] that man earns eternal life by transforming his purposeless, animalistic, temporal existence into the holy life of the man of G-d. The former speaks about the continuing existence of the general [collective] soul, while the latter insists on individual immortality and the reawakening of the dead. The body will emerge from its grave in all its glory. Physiological drives are sanctiﬁed through the moral commandments, which are not intended to subdue this world, but rather to place upon it the crown of royalty. The Halakhah allows the creature of nature to break through to pellucid radiant expanses and new skies. It is not only the spirit but also the beast in man that worships the Creator. The Shechinah hovers over the abyss of lust and man’s animalistic, instinctual essence, and sanctifies them.

Circumcision (Neil Menussi): Western civilization, it seems, has always been trapped in the movement of an intense emotional pendulum. It travels back and forth between a worship of material nature, on the one hand, and a longing for a purely spiritual world, on the other. On the one end, Nature is depicted as a kind of incarnated divinity, a perfect, harmonious, self-balancing whole. Our purpose, according to this image, is merely to incorporate ourselves into the natural order. On the opposite end of the pendulum, Nature is depicted as an evil and threatening element, man’s purpose being to subjugate it to the rule of the rational mind, and eventually release himself from its hold and join the world of pure souls. The history of the Occident is largely a chronicle of the periodic motion, back and forth, between these two poles.

The pendulum movement is clearly evident in the history of sexuality. The West seems to be veering sharply between hedonist worldviews that sanctify the sexual impulse, and ascetic worldviews that demand a complete abnegation of sex. It was against the Greek aristocracy’s hedonism that Plato and his followers arose, claiming that the soul is trapped in the body “as in a tomb” (to this day, physically unconsummated love is named for Plato); Rome countered with its uninhibited, orgiastic lifestyle; the barbarian tribes, after the ecstasy of destroying the empire, suddenly accepted Christianity and were hurled headlong into the opposite extreme, the Catholic torment of self-flagellation; when the Catholic church sank into corruption and debauchery, the even more puritan Protestantism emerged; and when Christianity altogether lost its vitality, there arose from within her, with equal and opposite force, modern secularism, which introduced the sexual revolution of the 20th century. The West is characterized neither by total hedonism nor total asceticism; totality itself is the true leitmotif. Between one revolution and the next, in spite of all changes of shade, it appears that – inasmuch as the corporeal and the spiritual are concerned – the West is unable to break free of its either-or paradigm. Hither and thither swings the pendulum; the somber smile that it draws in the air forever remains.

Questions for Discussion

Rav Kook finds a basis for his insights on brit milah in a verse in Iyov – “From my flesh, I perceive G-d.” What else might this verse mean?
Why is brit milah such an important mitzvah?
Do Jews perform brit milah because of the commandment to Avraham or because of the verse in this week’s parshah cited at the top of the previous page?
In light of Rav Kook’s insights, why is the effort by radical secularists to abolish brit milah misguided?
Rav Kook writes about “Sexual desire – and the various branches of physical, imaginative, and spiritual yearnings that are encompassed within it…” What do you think he means by other yearnings being encompassed with it?

Idolatry and Intoxication – Parshat Shemini

Printable PDF available here. Previous piece on Shemini available here.

**Rav Kook (Based on Ein Ayah, Gemara Berachot 32a)**

Do not drink intoxicating wine, neither you nor your sons with you, when you go into the Tent of Meeting, so that you shall not die. [This is] an eternal statute for your generations, to distinguish between holy and profane and between unclean and clean… (Vayikra 10:8-10)

Now Hannah was praying in her heart; only her lips moved, but her voice could not be heard. So Eli thought she was drunk. Eli said to her, “How long will you make a drunken spectacle of yourself? Sober up!” And Hannah replied, “Oh no, my lord! I am a very unhappy woman. I have drunk no wine or other strong drink, but I have been pouring out my heart to the Lord. Do not take your maidservant for a wicked woman (lit. בת בליעל); I have only been speaking all this time out of my great anguish and distress.” (Shmuel Aleph, 1:13-16)

[Hannah told Eli that she was not a wicked woman (lit. בת בליעל). Rabbi Elazar said we derive from here that when a drunk person prays, it is as if he engaged in idol worship. For the word בליעל also appears with regard to a city that has been instigated to engage in idol worship: “Benei beliya’al have gone out from your midst and have lured the inhabitants of their city, saying let us go and serve other gods which we have not known” (Deuteronomy 13:14). Just like that context deals with idolatry, so too Hanna referring to one who prays drunk as a בליעל indicates idol worship. (Gemara Berachot 31b)

All forms of idolatry share two essential characteristics. The first is an emphasis on man’s emotional and imaginative faculties, untethered from the intellect. Indeed, the idolatrous impulse is based on a superficial, unthinking perspective on reality. Idolatry deifies the powerful and inescapable forces of nature, but fails to see their underlying Divine unity.

Intoxication also enfeebles one’s intellect and ability to perceive clearly. This is what our Sages had in mind when they compared one who prays while drunk to an idolater, based on a verse in Sefer Shmuel. This is more than just exaggeration or a homiletical flight of fancy. Our Sages are identifying the very essence of idolatry, and teaching us that intoxicated prayer shares the same essential characteristic.

This is not to imply that moderate drinking has no role to play in religious life. Indeed, there are times when we are allowed (or perhaps even encouraged) to transcend the world of rationality and tread in the realm of holy emotion and sentiment. But prayer is not such a time. Jewish prayer demands a clear mind, and a razor-sharp focus on the Divine ideals expressed in the world of tefilah. And thus intoxication and prayer are a contemptible combination, barred by the inner truth of aggadah and the world of halacha as well.

A second – and related – characteristic of idolatry is a fissure between the realms of action and thought/ideals. Paganism sees the world as fragmented and divided among warring gods. Some of these gods are (or can be bribed into being) favorably disposed to humanity, and others are full of wrath and vengeance. There is no underlying Divine unity to all of reality. Idolatry’s fragmented perspective on reality results in a similarly fragmented religious personality. There is no need to harmonize what one believes with how one behaves. Paganism’s religious ideas provide no guidance to the individual on how to act, and no guidance to the collective on how to construct a just society. On the contrary, the world of action is abandoned to the stormy and unreliable influence of imagination and raw emotion – which, as we have seen, are the dominant characteristics of idolatry. For this reason, idolatry always results in degenerate and horrible ethical failures – such as child sacrifice, ritual murder, and sexual deviance.

This is what our Sages have in mind when they associate idolatry with the world beliya’al, which has a connotation of ‘bli ol’, without a yoke. Idolatry is untethered from the ‘yoke’ of true ideals and clear thinking. This yoke can only be found in the perfected and holy Divine Torah, which teaches us how to harmonize the world of action with the highest G-dly ideals.

Food For Thought

Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch (Chorev, pg. 7-8): Nor is this idolatry merely an error, a mistaking of falsehood for truth. In that case, it would be simply an intellectual mistake, a delusion, deplorable indeed, but, even at the worst, not the worst that might happen. For there would still be left human dignity and the purity and uprightness of human action. But this is not the case. As soon as you set anything else beside G-d as G-d, and still more as your G-d, forthwith human dignity, purity and uprightness fall to the ground, the fabric of your life goes to pieces.

If a man follows after any being as G-d except G-d, he necessarily sinks to a lower level. As soon as a man thinks of any being as independent and as belonging only to itself, it must appear to him as tyrannical, intent only on self-aggrandizement and producing only for self gratification. Hence the man who reveres such beings as gods must of necessity regard unbridled violence and self-indulgence not as something bestial and so beneath man but as something Divine and so above man, and pursue them as such. Nay, more; when the law of Unity has vanished from his conception of the world and the universe breaks apart for him into isolated deities which serve only themselves, he will soon count himself among the gods, and, recognizing no law in his own life either, he will break out into all kinds of excesses and abandon himself to arrogance and dissoluteness.

Dr. Hylton I. Lightman (Ou.org): Judaism has a not uncomplicated relationship with alcohol. We Jews start drinking young, real young. There is the wine at the Bris when the baby is only eight days old. Then there is wine at the Pidyon HaBen. The two sips at the Chuppah. The focal point of our week is the Friday night Shabbos meal when typically Abba or another post-Bar Mitzvah male will sanctify the wine. Havdallah. Yom Tov Kiddush. The famous Four Cups at the Seder. Is there a Jewish simcha that is without the raising a glass of schnapps and proclaiming, “L’Chaim”?

No shul or yeshiva would want its members or students to become alcoholics. But let’s be honest. Many shuls and others create a social life around alcohol and to be cool and in (are those words current?), you have to partake. Think Kiddush Club when men, typically at some point during the layning and definitely before the rabbi’s speech, exit the sanctuary and call to order their own private gathering of booze and food.

Our Torah is filled with references to wine so clearly wine is important and plays a major role in Judaism. Sefer Shoftim describes wine as “bringing joy to G-d and man.” Every sacrifice brought to the Mikdash was accompanied by a wine libation. Likewise, there are times in our Torah when wine has been mishandled – actually, let’s call it accurately – abused. Our Torah does not sanitize those times and their consequences. Noach was disgraced by excessive wine consumption. Ahron’s sons’ faux pas stemmed in part from intoxication. And these are only two examples. Then there’s Purim. This day suffers such a bad name because of the drinking. Let’s not forget Simchas Torah. A nurse on staff in an area emergency room once told me that she and her colleagues call it “The Other Jewish Halloween.”

Like anything else in life, balance is a good thing. Alcohol, when imbibed appropriately, can enhance our Ruchniyus. By the same token, when treated inappropriately, it can make for a Chillul HaShem, G-d forbid. Kohanim were not allowed to serve in the Beis HaMikdash while drunk. We are forbidden to daven while drunk. A kohen is not allowed to “duchen” after having even a single glass of wine. The Tree of Knowledge in Gan Eden, according to one opinion, is both “good and bad.” When utilized properly, its potential for good is infinite. By the same token, if not used for good, the negative consequences are of equal proportion. It is up to each of us to choose how it should be used. Hopefully, we will choose to choose to make a Kiddush HaShem.

Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch: (Collected Writings Vol. II, pg. 143-144): Not “belief’’ but “knowledge,” not “sentiment” but “determination and accomplishment;” these are the energies through which the “Jewish religion” becomes manifest. And for that very reason Judaism is not a “religion.” It has no part with any of the facets that other “religions” emphasize as the “essence of religion.” He who would drag Judaism down to the level of “belief’’ divorced from knowledge, who would place also at the head of the “Jewish faith” all the nebulous subjectivism which indulges in “devout impulses” and have these notions constitute the basic requirements of the Jewish “religion,” cannot be one of the “priests of the Lord.” He is in reality one of the priestlings of paganism who exploit vague sentiment and sensibilities for the worship of their own delusions, whose harvest, therefore, has mostly been grief and mourning, misery and distress…. This is probably the reason why [non-Jewish clergy] are called כמרים, “hierophants of sentimentalism” or, more accurately, “fishermen of sentimentalism” (In Tanach, the root כמר denotes both stirrings of sentiment and the fisherman’s net.) They prey upon the “feelings” of the people and catch their fish in the muddied waters of sentimentalism. By contrast, G-d requires of His priests that “the lips of the priest shall preserve knowledge and they should seek instruction from his mouth, for he is the messenger of G-d” (Malachi 2:7). And similarly, “Our G-d did not speak from amidst mystical murkiness, “not in the darkness of night. I did not say to the sons of Jacob: Seek Me in the waste places. I am G-d, speaking of right; proclaiming that which is straightforward and clear” (Isaiah 45:19).

Questions for Discussion

Rav Kook writes that idolatry inevitably results in ethical failures because it severs the world of action from the intellect. Do you agree? Could there be other explanations for the ethical failures of paganism?
What distinguishes an appropriate level of drinking from the kind of intoxication that Torah Judaism dispproves of or prohibits?
See the excerpts from Rav Hirsch above in “Food for Thought.” Is he saying the same thing as Rav Kook? If not, how is his analysis of idolatry different?
What are some events on the Jewish calendar or life-cycle events where alcohol plays a role? Why is it given a role?
Were Nadav and Avihu drunk when they brought their offering to the Mishkan?
Why do people leave davening to go to kiddush club?

Freedom for the Past, Freedom for the Future – Parshat Behar/Bechukotai

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Rav Kook (Shabbat Ha’aretz, Introduction)

And you shall sanctify the fiftieth year, and proclaim freedom [for slaves] throughout the land for all who live on it. It shall be a Yovel for you, and you shall return, each man to his property, and you shall return, each man to his family. (Vayikra 25:10)

From Rosh HaShana until Yom Kippur of the Yovel Year,[1]Jewish slaves were not released to their homes, until the shofar was sounded on Yom Kippur. But they were also not enslaved to their masters, as the Yovel Year had already begun. Rather, they would eat, drink, and rejoice, and wear crowns on their heads like free people. Once Yom Kippur arrived, the court would sound the shofar, slaves would be released to their houses, and fields that were sold would be returned to their original owners. (Gemara Rosh haShanah 8b)

Every fifty years, in the Yovel year, all Hebrew slaves would be emancipated and fields would return to their ancestral owners. We would expect this to be a disruptive and chaotic experience. Yovel overturned the ordered patterns of the economic and social order. Put yourself in the shoes of a Jewish master used to owning his slaves, or a wealthy landowner habituated to reaping profit from his substantial holdings. Yovel would have felt like a bomb going off, leveling everything in sight.

But this is not the picture painted by our Sages in the gemara. The Yovel was a cause for celebration, and was regarded by all not as a source of joy, not dread. This is because Yovel draws from the highest source of holiness, which is itself an integral part of Israel’s essence. It comes not as a demand foreign to Israel’s being, but an expression of its true self and its all-encompassing spiritual vision. For any other nation, Yovel would be utterly foreign to their aspirations, and would be experienced as a terrible burden. But not so is the Jewish People.

We must ask, however, what the difference is between the spiritual aspiration furthered by Yovel and that of shemitah? Do the two represent the same, different, or mutually complementary ideals?

The answer is that the vision of Yovel is more ambitious than the shemitah cycles that proceed it. Shemitah is future oriented. It comes to correct the spiritual development of Israel prospectively. Unhindered and unrestricted, man’s economic activity leads to jealousy, spiteful competition and lust for wealth. It dullens man’s spiritual grandeur, and causes him to forgot G-d. Shemitah, the “Sabbath of the land,” comes to elevate man’s aspirations beyond his physical sustenance and remind him that “Not by bread alone does man live.”

This is an awesome, supernal process that plays out every seven years, but it is very much future-focused. The people, like the land, gather spiritual strength for the earthly labor of the next six years of the shemitah cycle. But the pollution of society’s past shortcomings, failures, and injustices remains. Yovel comes to uplift this domain as well. Let us explain.

Most slaves would go free after seven years of labor. The slaves who had to wait until Yovel were those who refused to leave when given the opportunity, who choose a position of feeble dependence and spurned G-d’s declaration that “Israel shall serve Me – but no other.” These were individuals who had lost their dignity and become estranged from the supernal holiness that gives Israel its life force. These lost souls could not be uplifted by shemitah – but Yovel comes to emancipate even them, to restore their splendor and holiness, and revive their pride in holy life. As our Sages tell us, “They would eat, drink, and rejoice, and wear crowns on their heads like free people.” Yovel was a time of equanimity and brotherhood. Absent was the grievance, the violence and the vengeance that usually occur in connection with slaves being freed.

The same dynamic expresses itself in Yovel’s restoration of ancestral lands. While the concept may be foreign to the modern mind, which regards land as just another commodity, in Biblical times selling one’s ancestral land was an unimaginable tragedy. It was a step that only the desperately poor would take, and even then only out of total desperation.[2]With land representing the major source of wealth, a person who sold their ancestral land in Biblical times usually condemned themselves to a life of destitute poverty. Yovel doesn’t only restore these individuals physically to their land. It straightens out the inequalities of the past, and repairs the apparent injustice that results when certain people are condemned to abject poverty while others prosper and grow wealthy. This is not a prospective vision, like that of shemitah, but one that seeks to rectify the past as well.

Although the spiritual vision of Yovel is more ambitious than the shemitah cycles that proceed it, the two have a symbiotic relationship. One cannot leap to higher levels of holiness without laying a foundation and attaining the necessary intermediate stages. Israel can only come to Yovel by going through the transformative spiritual process of shemitah beforehand. Year after year, cycle after cycle, the shemitah process transforms Israel, restores it to its holy Source and the deepens its Divine character. Until eventually, the holy nation seeks not only to correct its path going forward, but even to rectify even past shortcomings, failures, and injustices.

“And you shall count for yourself seven shemitah years, seven years seven times. And the days of these seven shemitah years shall amount to forty-nine years for you. And you shall sanctify the fiftieth year, and proclaim freedom [for slaves] throughout the land for all who live on it. It shall be a Yovel for you, and you shall return, each man to his property, and you shall return, each man to his family.”

[1]This may be a Torah source for the aseret yemei teshuva.

[2]See Melachim Aleph, 21, where Navot declares “G-d forbid that I would give the inheritance of my forefathers to you!”

Food for Thought

Rav Hirsch (Commentary on the Torah): The Yovel year…. [is] to bring the social and political rebirth of the nation with all its healing and restoring effect on the internal and external relations of the nation, as a miraculous gift from G-d’s Almighty Grace. All the wrongs and the whole diversity of different classes with its resulting contrasts of opulence and wretchedness, of independence and dependence, which the unequal distribution of wealth have brought to the internal social life of the nation, all the precarious situations unto which the nation has fallen in its political relations to other states, all this, Yovel is to wipe out and clear up. The nation is again to be established by the Grace of G-d, socially healthy, and politically free, even as it was on the first day its national life was started on the basis of G-d’s laws. It is to progress in this fresh internal and external freedom and independence granted afresh by G-d, from Yovel to Yovel, until it reaches the goal where its national life shines forth so brightly amongst the other peoples of the world, that it invites all the nations to throng to it, to learn from it the institutions of G-d, which alone guarantee justice and freedom and eternal peace on earth. But this great national rebirth of the nation, to be obtained from G-d, must be met on the other side by the two great acts of restitution and regeneration which are in human hands: restoration of ancestral lands and freeing slaves, and both not as human-political measures, but proclaimed by shofar blasts in the Name of G-d, as the effect of the justice of His Rule and of His fundamental right of possession.

Questions for Discussion/Further Thought

Does Yovel indicate the Torah’s opposition to economic inequality? Why or why not?
The Torah refers to Yovel as ‘Shabbat.’ How does Rav Kook understand this comparison?
How does a person who is growing spiritually relate to their future? To their past?
The Torah says that in Yovel, we are to “Proclaim freedom throughout the land to all its inhabitants.” What famous American artifact bears this verse? Do you think Rav Kook would agree with its use?
Does Yovel teach us anything about how we should observe Shabbat?
Does Rav Kook’s analysis of Yovel and shemitah remind you about any concepts related to teshuva?

The Midst of the Community – Parshat Emor

Number of Jews in Israel and worldwide on the rise - reports - The ...

Printable PDF available here.

**Rav Kook (Ein Ayah, Gemara Berachot 21b)**

[Translation based on Rabbi Chanan Morrison’s “Gold From the Land of Israel”]

You shall not desecrate My Holy Name. I shall be sanctified amidst the children of Israel. I am the Lord Who sanctifies you. (Vayikra 22:32)

In Judaism, an individual can pray in solitude, but the highest form of prayer takes place in a minyan. Certain special tefilot regarded as a sanctification of G-d’s name (such as kedushah and kaddish) may only be said when ten men are present. Otherwise, these parts of the liturgy must be omitted. The gemara (Berachot 21b) derives the requirement for a minyan from G-d’s declaration in this week’s parshah that “I will be sanctified in the midst (lit. תוך) of Israel.” The gemara notes that this word appears again when G-d warns against Korach’s rebellious band, declaring to the rest of Israel “Separate yourselves from the midst of this eidah (community)” (Bamidbar 16:20). From here, we learn that G-d is sanctified within an eidah, which itself is defined by reference to the ten spies who brought a negative report of the Land of Israel. The Torah refers to that group of ten people as an “eidah ra’ah,” an evil community (Bamidbar. 14:26). Thus, we see that G-d is sanctified in a community of at least ten members.

This is extremely puzzling. First of all, why is the requirement for a minyan, a positive spiritual encounter with the Divine, derived precisely from two classic examples of infamous rebellion against G-d — the spies and Korach? And why is a minyan needed for anything in the first place? Why isn’t prayer an exclusively private matter between a person as his Maker?

To resolve these difficulties, we need to understand the nature of holiness. Holiness can come from our natural aspirations for spiritual growth and perfection. However, the desire to perfect ourselves — even spiritually — is not true holiness. Our goal should not be the fulfillment of our own personal needs, no matter how lofty, but rather to honor and sanctify our Maker. Genuine holiness is an altruistic striving for good for its own sake, not out of self-interest.

Now, the essence of Divine service is to advance G-d’s will, which is to advance the welfare of His creations and to bestow kindness upon them. One who does not join with the community, who does contribute to and uplift its welfare, cannot lay claim to holiness. Therefore, kedushah, kaddish, and certain other prayers may not be said in private. Without a community to benefit and elevate, the individual cannot attain true holiness.

This special connection between the individual and society is signified by the number ten. Ten is the first number that is also a group, a collection of units forming a new unit. Therefore, the minimum number of members for a quorum is ten.

As for why we learn this lesson from the wicked, it is precisely the punishment of the wicked that sheds light on the reward of the righteous. If the only result of evil was that the wicked corrupt themselves, it would be unnecessary for the law to be so severe with one who is only hurting himself. However, it is part of human nature that we influence others and are influenced by our surroundings. Unfortunately, evil people have a negative influence on the entire community, and it is for this reason that they are punished so severely.

Understanding why the wicked are punished clarifies why the righteous are rewarded. Just as the former are punished principally due to their negative influence on the community, so too, the reward of the righteous is due primarily to their positive influence. Now it becomes clear that true holiness is in the context of the organic whole. And certain prayers sanctifying G-d’s Name may only be recited in a minyan, with a representative community of ten members.

Food for Thought

Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch (Commentary on Pirkei Avot): It is not through the individual, but through the community and through the congregation which represent that community on a smaller scale, that Judaism lives on forever. Besides, it was not the Jewish individual but the Kehilath Ya’akov, the Jewish community that God appointed as the bearer of His sacred cause. Therefore the Jewish individual can fulfill his true purpose only in communion with the congregation, and accordingly he is earnestly admonished not to separate himself from the congregation, but to cleave to it in both joy and sorrow, to share its burdens and to help it discharge its tasks.

Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch (Commentary on the Siddur): Thus it is only from the hands of the community that any individual at any time is given his task, and it is only within the framework of his community that he can fulfill it. For the mission reaches far beyond the limited physical, moral and intellectual capacity of the short-lived individual. But a community cannot die; a community can do all things. It is only within the framework of a community that all limitations can be compensated for, that wants can be supplied, and therefore the individual can discharge his task only as part of that community. It is for this reason that only a very few of our prayers were written specifically for individuals; most of them are phrased in the plural form…

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks (Community of Faith:

Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch (Nineteen Letters): It was not with just one word, one summons of creation, that the Almighty brought this world into being [based on Pirkei Avot 5:1], the whole of it and every detail; for if it had been created in this manner, everything would be directly dependent upon G-d’s Word for its existence, life, and functioning. Instead, He called forth His world into existence in ten stages; He created an abundance of forces, intermingled and functioning closely together, according to His Word – and then He separated them, so that each had to sustain the other: none was henceforth able to exist and function by itself, but had to be sustained by its fellow creatures and, in turn, had to help them exist and function. In this way everything contributes according to its strength, however much or little, to the existence of the whole; and if it destroys a fellow creature, it robs itself of what it needs for its own existence.

Questions for Discussion/Further Thought

What other reasons might there be for the concept of a minyan?
Where else in Torah does the centrality of the community express itself?
How can we stay connected to the Jewish community when we are unable to assemble and daven together?
How do we strike the right balance in Jewish life between serving the community and focusing on one’s self?
Can you think of a time that you felt particularly connected to the Jewish community?

To Love is to Live – Acharei Mot/Kedoshim

It’s good to be back!

Printable PDF available here.

Rav Kook (Based on Midot haRe’iah, Ahavah 1, 3 and 5)

You shall love your fellow as yourself, I am the Lord. (Vayikra 19:18)

Love for all of G-d’s creations must precede love for every member of humanity, and only after that can one ascend to love of Israel (“ahavat Yisrael”). One must understand that ahavat Yisrael does not stand in contradiction to love of humanity, which is encompassed and subsumed within it. For Israel’s Divinely-appointed destiny is to rectify and repair all of existence, and thus true ahavat Yisrael requires a universal love. Thus, we must strive to advance the physical and spiritual welfare of all nations. Without an inner love of humanity that pervades its entire being, Israel will never advance towards its ultimate calling – “Give praise to G-d, call out in His name, make His greatness known amongst all nations” (Tehillim 105:1).

Our love for all of humanity also draws on the constant outpouring of Divine light that rests upon every created being. As King David declared in Psalms (33:5), “G-d’s kindness fills the earth.” That is, everything exists through G-d’s kindness and contributes to His splendor. To despise, to hate means to deny the Divine kindness that sustains the object of one’s hatred.

We have hatred only for the wickedness and spiritual pollution from which the world has not yet been cleansed. Anywhere in our tradition that we find expressions of hatred and contempt for the nations of the world, we must know that such sentiments are directed only at the points wickedness therein. But sparks of life, of light and holiness, have always been present in the tzelem Elokim possessed by all of humanity, by every nation in accordance with its measure. All of this, Israel knows, with deep confidence, purity of faith and holy resolve.

Food for Thought

Tanya (Likutei Amarim, Chapter 32): Even with regard to those who are close to him, and whom he has rebuked, yet they had not repented of their sins, in which case he is enjoined to hate them, there still remains the duty to love them also, and both are right: hatred, because of the wickedness in them; and love on account of the aspect of the hidden good in them, which is the Divine spark in them, which animates their Divine soul. He should also awaken pity in his heart for her [the Divine soul], for she is held captive, as it were, in the evil of the sitra achra that triumphs over her in wicked people. Compassion destroys hatred and awakens love, as is known from the [interpretation of the] text, “To Jacob who redeemed Abraham.”

A Story About Rav Kook (from R. Aryeh Levine): I recall the early days, after 1905, when G-d granted me the privilege to ascend to the Holy Land; and I arrived at Jaffa. There I first merited meeting our great master, Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook (of blessed memory), who greeted me with good cheer, as was his sacred custom to receive all people. We chatted together on various Torah topics. After an early minchah, he went out, as was his custom, to stroll a bit in the fields and collect his thoughts. I accompanied him. During the walk, I plucked a twig or a flower. Our great master was taken aback when he saw this. He told me gently: “Believe me — in all my days, I have been careful never to pluck a blade of grass or flower needlessly, when it had the ability to grow or blossom… Every sprout and leaf of grass says something, conveys some meaning. Every stone whispers its inner message in its silence. Every creature utters its song [of praise for the Creator].” Those words, spoken from a pure and holy heart, engraved themselves deeply on my heart. From then on, I began to feel a strong sense of compassion for all things.

Samson Raphael Hirsch (Chorev, Pg. 53): I, the Lord, the personification of love, am Father of all beings around you, have called them all, like you, to life and well-being. If you love Me, and because you Love me, love My children; rejoice in their well-being, see in each My work, My child, in his welfare the prospering of My work and My child, in his woe the decay of My work, the suffering of My child. Love therefore the master in the work, the father in the child… How do you raise yourself above the stone and the plant and the animal? Is it not through devoting yourself of your own free will to the welfare of the world around you? And this is just what love effects. Your whole activity belongs to G-d’s world… Carry love in your heart; it is this which makes you a man and an Israelite. This love in you, if it is genuine, expresses itself in deeds with which, to the best of your ability, you promote the progress of the world around you to that state of welfare in which your love requires that you should desire to behold it.

Lubavitcher Rebbe: When there is love of G‑d but not love of Torah and love of Israel, this means that the love of G‑d is also lacking. On the other hand, when there is love of a fellow Jew, this will eventually bring also a love of Torah and a love of G‑d… So if you see a person who has a love of G‑d but lacks a love of Torah and a love of his fellow, you must tell him that his love of G‑d is incomplete. And if you see a person who has only a love for his fellow, you must strive to bring him to a love of Torah and a love of G‑d — that his love toward his fellows should not only be expressed in providing bread for the hungry and water for the thirsty, but also to bring them close to Torah and to G‑d.

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks (Covenant and Conversation 5778): The opening chapter of Kedoshim contains two of the most powerful of all commands: to love your neighbour and to love the stranger. “Love your neighbour as yourself: I am the Lord” goes the first. “When a stranger comes to live in your land, do not mistreat him,” goes the second, and continues, “Treat the stranger the way you treat your native-born. Love him as yourself, for you were strangers in Egypt. I am the Lord your G-d. The first is often called the “golden rule” and held to be universal to all cultures. This is a mistake. The golden rule is different. In its positive formulation it states, “Act toward others as you would wish them to act toward you,” or in its negative formulation, given by Hillel, “What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbour.” These rules are not about love. They are about justice, or more precisely, what evolutionary psychologists call reciprocal altruism. The Torah does not say, “Be nice or kind to your neighbour, because you would wish him to be nice or kind to you.” It says, “Love your neighbour.” That is something different and far stronger.

The second command is more radical still. Most people in most societies in most ages have feared, hated and often harmed the stranger. There is a word for this: xenophobia. How often have you heard the opposite word: xenophilia? My guess is, never. People don’t usually love strangers. That is why, almost always when the Torah states this command – which it does, according to the sages, 36 times – it adds an explanation: “because you were strangers in Egypt.” I know of no other nation that was born as a nation in slavery and exile. We know what it feels like to be a vulnerable minority. That is why love of the stranger is so central to Judaism and so marginal to most other systems of ethics. But here too, the Torah does not use the word “justice.” There is a command of justice toward strangers, but that is a different law: “You shall not wrong a stranger or oppress him” (Ex. 22:20). Here the Torah speaks not of justice but of love. These two commands define Judaism as a religion of love – not just of G-d (“with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your might”), but of humanity also. That was and is a world-changing idea.

Samson Raphael Hirsch (Chorev, Pg. 25, 159): “To love” means to feel one’s own being only through and in the being of another. “To love G-d,” therefore, means to feel that one’s own existence and activity are rendered possible and obtain value and significance only through G-d and in G-d. You exist and are something only to strive to reach G-d—that is, to perform His will. To love G-d only through G-d; and therefore in all that you are and do, you have and to love His Torah is the same thing; for to love G-d means nothing until you begin to love His Torah.

Questions for Discussion

See Rav Hirsch in Food For Thought, above. Is he expressing the exact same point as Rav Kook? If not, how are their views different?
What does it mean to have a tzelem Elokim?
How does Rav Kook address the problem of loving all of humanity in a world still filled with evil and wickedness?
Rav Kook writes that no person or nation can never lose their tzelem Elokim. Do you agree? Why or why not?
What are different ways to express ahavat Yisrael? To express love for humanity?
Does our generation have an easier or harder time than our ancestors in cultivating ahavat Yisrael? In cultivating love for humanity? Why or why not?
Does the term “fellow” in “Love your fellow as yourself” include non-Jews as well? Or only Jews?

Lost in Thought – Parshat Vayikra

Printable PDF available here.

This is re-posted from last year. A new post will follow shortlyl

Translation (Orot haTeshuva, Perek 14): [1]

Sometimes a person’s spirit falls into a state of smallness, and he does not find any satisfaction within himself. This feeling is due to the paucity of his good deeds, the quantity of his sins, insufficient diligence in Torah study.

Such a person must exert himself in the realm of thought. He must bear in the mind the teaching of the Zohar that “the thought of a person who understands one matter [via inference] from another is more valued by the Holy One, blessed be He, than all sacrifices and burnt offerings.” [2] This means that a person’s holy thought and supernal, mental visualizations possess all of the qualities of the sacrifices and all of the qualities of the physical acts of worship associated with them…

It is possible that many aspects of his descents come about because he has not properly appreciated the foundation of his thought. Therefore, [a person] should exert greater effort to understand with an inner understanding. [This is] because the rectification of the entire world and the healing of all people depend upon the foundation of thought. He should elevate his thought as much as he can and rise to teshuva out of out of inner love.

“Fortunate are the people who know the shofar blast (lit. teruah); G-d, they will walk in the light of Your countenance.” (Tehillim 89:161)

Commentary

A person realizes that he has not lived up to his dreams and expectations. He has performed few good deeds, learned little Torah, prayed inadequately, and failed to improve his personality traits. To the contrary, he has committed sins. Seeing no evidence of growth and improvement, he feels inadequate and believes that he has failed.

At first, he may hold onto his dreams — but that only makes him miserable, and sometimes those around him as well. Eventually, the discrepancy between his ideals and his reality grows so painful that he prefers to leave the world of deep thoughts and sink into the realm of smallness. He shrivels up and slips into a superficial way of thinking that he believes is appropriate for a person of few accomplishments. But that is just the opposite of what he should do — which is to maintain his great thoughts and aspirations.

A person must not allow himself to become small-minded. Rather, he must redouble his efforts to remain in the world of deep thought. There, he is free and can accomplish a tremendous amount. Even if he is not living properly, as long as he maintains his spiritual ambitions and insights into the nature of mitzvot and good deeds, he has the opportunity to improve. As the Zohar teaches, the thoughts of a Jew who does not settle for smallness, but rather lives in a realm of greatness, are more precious to G-d than all sacrifices and burnt offerings.

Now, we understand that holy thoughts are valuable, but what is the logic of comparing them with sacrifices? The two categories seem to lack any overlap that would allow us to place them on a spectrum and give the gold medal to holy thoughts. [3] The answer is that sacrifices are not an end of themselves, but a tool, a sacred technology for uplifting our consciousness and bringing us closer to G-d. Indeed, the very word קרבן derives from the root ק.ר.ב., literally ‘coming close.’ Sometimes, a person brings a sacrifice out of a voluntary desire to come close to G-d, [4] and sometimes he must bring it to repair the damage from some transgression or other spiritual failure. But the mere act of sacrificing an animal has no value unless it catalyzes an inner transformation. This is why many of the Nevi’im reacted furiously when ascribes were brought by their religiously and ethically corrupt contemporaries. In the words of Isaiah (1:11, 16-17), “Of what use are your many sacrifices to Me? says the Lord. I am sated with the burnt-offerings of rams and the fat of fattened cattle; and the blood of bulls and sheep and he-goats I do not want… Wash, cleanse yourselves, remove the evil of your deeds from before My eyes, cease to do evil. Learn to do good, seek justice, strengthen the robbed, perform justice for the orphan, plead the case of the widow.”

Although a superficial reading might suggest otherwise, the prophets are notmerely accusing the people of being hypocrites. [5] Nowhere in Nevi’im do we find the suggestion that keeping kosher, observing holidays or any other mitzvah is worthless if one is guilty of ethical failings! Evidently, korbanot generate a particularly pernicious type of religious hypocrisy. Someone who brings a korban despite leading a profane and unethical life has confused mistaken the means for the end. To quote another one of the prophets (Hoshea 6:6), “For I desire loving-kindness, and not sacrifices, and knowledge of G-d rather than burnt offerings.

Sometimes when a person has great and holy thoughts, various things prevent him from carrying them out. The source of that constraint may be external – his neighborhood, spouse, children, and the like – or internal. But even then G-d accepts his holy thoughts as offerings.…. even if a Jew’s practical life is in shambles, as long as he possesses holy thoughts, he can maintain himself in a place of greatness until miracles will yet occur.

If a person with a strong inclination to live in the realm of thought sees that he has not improved over the years, he may view his thoughts, ideals, dreams, and plans as feeble and insignificant. Not valuing them, he judges himself to be a small person with small deeds. He thus abandons his deep thoughts – and because his nature is to think, now he thinks deeply about foolish things. But this is the wrong approach. He must rather exert himself and receive counsel in order to continue giving credence to his large thoughts. It is true that he is having a hard time realizing them – nevertheless, they are authentic. As long as his deep thoughts remain important to him, he will be able to work them into his life and become a bigger person.

As a result of holding onto his good, true, and deep thoughts, a person is able to stay connected to holiness. Those thoughts bring about healing, salvation, and other rectifications. This is so even if this person does not always carry out his thoughts. Now, a person who is living a small life has a natural tendency to abandon his great thoughts, because of the gap between the two. But to the contrary, he should elevate the thoughts inner life until he attains a deep, powerful teshuvah from inner love.

Rav Kook concludes with a verse from Tehillim – “Fortunate are the people who know the shofar blast (lit. teruah); G-d, they will walk in the light of Your countenance.” How does this verse connect to the previous teaching? It seems that Rav Kook is picking up on the notion of “knowing” the shofar blast. The verse is referring to someone who at least knows and understands the depths associated with the teruah, even if at present he cannot actualize them by doing teshuvah. Such a person should not despair or abandon his lofty thoughts– on the contrary, he is “fortunate” and will “eventually walk in the light of G-d’s countenance.”

Questions for Reflection and Discussion

How exactly are korbanot supposed to lead to G-d-consciousness?
Rav Moshe Weinberger writes that “A person who is living a small life has a natural tendency to abandon his great thoughts, because of the gap between the two.” Could this (paradoxically) explain any of the ‘off the derech’ phenomenon?
Does the written Torah present any laws about the korbanot that indicate the importance of thought in the process?[6]
Are there any behaviors or characteristics that you think characterize someone who leads a small-minded life?
Rav Kook writes that “the rectification of the entire world and the healing of all people depend upon the foundation of thought.” How exactly does this work? Is it a mystical/metaphysical process, or something that operates in a way we can comprehend?
What should you do to promote or hold onto thoughts of greatness?
Rav Kook draws a connection between holy thoughts, teshuva and the shofar, but doesn’t elaborate on how they relate together. What do you think he is getting at?

[1]The translation and commentary are largely excepted from R. Moshe Weinberger’s Song of Teshuva.

[2]Zohar, Nasso 121b.

[3]To use more formal terminology, these seem like nominal concepts instead of ordinal ones.

[4]R. Menachem Leibtag notes that Sefer Vayikra starts off with voluntary korbanot, as if to emphasize that sin and atonement is not the primary motif of sacrifices.

[5]A widespread misconception (outside the Torah world) is that the Prophets opposed the legalism of the Torah, and emphasized the value ethical conduct to the exclusion of mitzvah observance.

[6]Ok, so you had to cheat and look at the footnote. See Vayikra 5:5 and 7:18.

Rustling Leaves – Parshat Bechukotai

Printable PDF available here.

“And those of you who survive, I will bring fear in their hearts in the lands of their enemies, and the sound of a rustling leaf will pursue them. They will flee as one flees the sword, and they will fall, but there will be no pursuer.” (Vayikra 26:36)

Ma’amarei haRe’iah (Pg. 504)

The most terrible curse of the Exile is the weak-heartedness described in this verse, which affects not just the physical affairs of the Jewish people but its spirit as well. The fear of the slightest ‘copper button’ [on the uniforms of non-Jewish officials and soldiers] gave rise to sickly neshamot, afflicted, broken and unable to receive the light and vibrant lifeforce of the future redemption. An incessant sense of fear degraded the spirit of the Jewish People, leaving us deprived us the vitality needed for our national rebirth in the Land of the Avot.

The arbitrary cruelty of our non-Jewish overseers habituated us to a sense of lowliness, to accepting the way things were as the way they had to be. This sense of resignation borders of blasphemy.[1]As a result of the weak-heartedness of Exile, many Jews regard it as strange and un-Jewish that there be a Jewish police force [or a Jewish army]. ‘Those matters are for non-Jews to attend to!’ they proclaim. And thus we continue our exilic mentality that for rescue or general well-being we must turn to non-Jews, but never to ourselves.

The same sense of dependency applies to the spiritual realm as well. We lack confidence in our spiritual heritage, in our wealth of Torah literature. We know that we possess law, aggadah, ma’aseh bereishit and ma’aseh merkavah [i.e. mysticism], ethics, logic and Jewish philosophy, but we think that these deal only with timeless and eternal matters, not the pressing issues of the day. As soon as one tries to apply the Torah to such issues, he is dismissed by those of false piety as a planter of kilayim and polluter of the Jewish spirit. All such notions are bitter fruits of the Exile and its spiritual impurity. The Jewish People have carried this poison since we were exiled from the Holy Land and ceased to live a full, vibrant life in our own land….

This does not mean to idealize excision and isolation from contact with the outside world. On the contrary, Judaism welcomes insights and sparks of wisdom from other cultures – but only if they can (i) be integrated into the Torah’s higher architecture of Divine truth, and (ii) bear the unique imprint of Am Yisrael…

The time has come for the Jewish people to take heed of worldly reality, to expand our boundaries. We are neither able nor permitted to remain as we have in Exile, totally reliant on the goodwill of non-Jewish potentates for political security and totally dependent on non-Jewish wisdom for solutions to practical issues of the day. Not in Eretz Yisrael. Here, we are free to shape our communal affairs and our collective spiritual consciousness, and we must attend to them diligently. Here, the Jewish People returns to full, holy engagement with life.

Food for Thought

Prof. Aviezer Ravitzky – Hadash Min ha-Torah? (Engaging Modernity pg. 47-49): “The traditionalist ideologist criticizes his modernist counterpart for ambivalent, hyphenated approaches… According to him, all of these approaches, by virtue of their synthetic nature, upset the wholeness of Torah and its unity. A whole Torah does not require completion; it is sufficient unto itself. All of the above “additions” to the pure Torah… necessarily lead to an amputation of the full, complete… The Torah is required, as it were, to contract itself and to leave room for other values alongside itself. Similarly, these combinations would inevitably create a divided and split religious personality, torn between different sources, values, and authorities.

Secondly, the traditionalist critic argues, this dualistic approach, just as. it truncates the wholeness of the Torah source, also affects its inner purity. In order to foster a mixture of two disparate elements, in order to bring about any synthesis or integration, one must bring about an organic change in the nature of each of the original components: “Torah” combined with “labor” is no longer the same pure Torah. A yeshiva that is combined with a university or with military service is no longer a “sacred yeshiva.” The holy realm, in order to be united with the secular, must lose its own inner integrity…

[There is, however] a very different concept of wholeness… From its point of view, a whole Torah is not one that ab initio includes everything, but one which touches upon everything or can be applied towards anything. It does not exist as an abstract norm, dwelling in the bosom of the eternal alone, but as a dynamic demand, realizing its power and manifesting its vitality precisely in face of transformations. within historical time. If the world expands and widens, if man builds and destroys, and yet only the Torah contracts and is sufficient unto itself, it is not preserved, but rather withdraws and shrinks.

According to this model, the Torah is not understood as a pure idea… such that every organic relation affects its inner integrity. On the contrary, by its very nature the Torah is constantly engaged in relations of inclusion and enrichment. Indeed, for many modern religious thinkers, there exist truth and goodness and beauty which do not come into contact with the Torah, then the Torah would be displaced from its primacy. The same holds true with regard to the religious personality. In the present condition, where new realities surround man in all dimensions of life, choosing spiritual and intellectual isolation would require him to devote most of his energy to sealing off all openings. It would demand that he know less and less about human creatures and nature, about science and art, and it would thereby stifle many channels of creativity. Lacking such isolation, the preservation of a one dimension man who is never threatened by the external and novel would not be assured. Even here, therefore, preservation requires contraction and truncation, rather than wholeness and completion…”

Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch, The Nineteen Letters: “[The Jewish People] was to be a people in the midst of the people; as people it was to show the [other] people that God is the Source, and the Giver, of all blessing that to dedicate oneself to the fulfillment of His will means the attainment of all happiness that man can desire; that this sacred resolve is sufficient to give stability and security to human existence. It received, therefore, the blessings of a land and state power, not, however, as end, but as means of carrying out the Torah, its possession and retention dependent, therefore, upon fulfillment thereof as [the] only condition…There came the time when… [i]t became necessary to take away the abundance of earthly good, the wealth and the land, which had led it away from its mission; it was obliged to leave the happy soil which had seduced it from its allegiance to the Most High; nothing could be saved except the soul of its existence, the Torah; no other bond of unity should henceforth exist except “God and its mission,” which are indestructible, because they are spiritual. Through the annihilation of Israel’s state-life its mission did not cease, for that had been intended only as a means to an end. On the contrary, this destruction itself was part of its fate; so strangely commingled of divine and human elements, in exile and dispersion its mission was to be resumed in a different manner…The nation was scattered into the four quarters of the earth, unto all peoples and all zones, in order that in the dispersion it might better fulfill its mission.”

Rav Yosef Dov Soloveitchik, Days of Deliverance (pg. 135-137): “Political inferiority does not go hand-in-hand with spiritual inferiority and submissiveness. The best example of this sort of paradoxical bravery is the bravery of the traditional Jew… For centuries, Jews lodged during a long, dark Diaspora night in all sorts of ghettos, unprotected, helpless, without rights, abandoned, despised and alone… But when Esau wanted a gift of Jacob’s sacred objects – the holiness of family life, the Sabbath, kashrut, accepted beliefs and traditions – or when Esav demanded that Jacob compromise his Torah and his way of living – then a remarkable transformation occurred within Jacob. Suddenly the coward, the quiet and unassuming Jew, became a hero, full of strength and stubbornness. Suddenly the crooked back straightened, the pitiful eyes began to spit fire, and he, the coward, refused Esav’s request with chutzpah and determination… And when Esav persisted and demanded things that were sacred, then the passive man, the coward, the man who said three times a day ‘And to such as curse me let my soul be dumb, and let my soul be unto all as the dust,’ became a fighter who resisted Esav with great stubbornness.”

Questions for Reflection and Discussion

What can you do to make the Torah more relevant to your practical, day-to-day concerns, instead of something that only deals with abstract matters of the spirit?
From Rav Kook, it sounds like Exile has been entirely bad for the Jewish people. Do you agree? If so, what are positive things that the Jewish people have attained or accomplished by virtue of being in Exile? (See Rav Soloveitchik and Rav Hirsch above for some possibilities.)
Rav Kook writes that the Exile caused the Jewish people to see their spiritual heritage as irrelevant to worldly, practical matters. Do you think he’s talking about people who are Torah observant or those who have abandoned Orthodoxy for other belief systems? Or both?
Read the excerpt above from Professor Aviezer Ravitzky. Professor Ravitsky is a leading scholar of Rav Kook, but the passage above is not intended as a commentary on Rav Kook’s weltanschauung. Do you think Rav Kook would agree with it? If not, why?
What can you do to contribute to the revival of Jewish life and vitality and the Land of Israel?

[1] Rav Kook makes reference to the Talmud in Bava Kamma (38a), which recounts that Babylonians used to console mourners by asking (rhetorically) “What can possibly be done?” The Talmud describes this as blasphemous, presumably because it seems to question G-d’s judgment. Rav Kook is taking a more provocative interpretation (perhaps only as an allusion) – passivity and resignation is itself blasphemous, and such is the attitude of the “Babylonians,” i.e. those outside of Eretz Yisrael.

To Put Away Childish Things – Parshat Behar

Printable PDF available here.

You shall not make idols for yourselves, nor shall you set up a statue (lit. פסל) or a monument for yourselves… (Vayikra 26:1)

Shemonah Kevatzim (Vol. 1, Pg. 179)

On a simple level, this verse prohibits forming a physical representation of the Divine. The truth is that this prohibition represents a much broader category, against whose poisonous influence we must be exceedingly vigilant. The danger of a פסל, a physical idol, is that it repudiates G-d’s transcendent and infinite nature. By definition, an idol is a counterfeit, an impossible attempt to ensnare the Infinite within the frail and limited capacity of the human imagination.

And yet humanity can engage in this same delusion without creating any physical idols. An immature and limited conception of G-d [1] is just as much of a פסל. When a shallow conception of G-d takes hold ahold among humanity, by virtue of habit and an undeveloped manner of thinking, and humanity later advances to a higher stage of consciousness, tremendous anguish results. The consequence is kefirah, denial – not of G-d, whose true essence is unknowable and who, a priori, can never be defined, but of the pre-conceived and immature notions of G-d which have polluted humanity.

The purpose of kefirah’s existence is to uproot the shallow and limited conceptions of Divinity from life and thought. He who recognizes the root of disbelief will extract its honey and return it to the source of its holiness. Gazing upon it, he beholds not unrequited evil, but the majesty of the terrible ice – the heavenly kefirah (lit. כפור שמים, a provocative allusion to Iyov 38:29, where the phrase literally means “heavenly frost”).

Commentary

Rav Kook’s provocative thesis is that a non-believer can never really reject G-d, since by definition a created human mind can neither define nor accurately perceive G-d’s essence. The most a non-believer can do is to deny a form of G-d which he has developed in his own mind. After all, in order to negate a concept, one must first delineate that which he denies, prior to declaring that it does not exist. And once a person paints a static picture of G-d, it is that static (and therefore shallow) picture that he rejects and refuses to accept.[2]

Rav Kook thus assigns metaphysical (or metahistorical) value to kefirah, whose ultimate purpose is to purify humanity from immature conceptions of G-d. A sensitive soul can “extract the honey” from disbelief and “return it to the source of its holiness.”

But do we still have a theory that allows us to see a value in atheism? Professor Alan Brill[3]claims that Rav Kook was happy to see late nineteenth century atheism wake up the Jewish world and spur the masses to a more purified and refined conception of G-d. But what about the ‘new atheists’ of the twenty-first century, “whose methodology consists in criticizing religion without understanding it, quoting texts without contexts, taking exceptions as the rule, confusing folk belief with reflective theology, abusing, mocking, ridiculing, caricaturing and demonizing religious faith and holding it responsible for the great crimes against humanity.”[4]In Professor Brill’s world “Rav Kook assumes that there would be an advancement in perception[5]….He did not assume that they would remain un-evolved.” What about the people who smashed their idols and simply walked away?

Questions for Reflection and Discussion

Rav Kook does not explain why humanity fell into an immature and limited conception of G-d in the first place. What do you think he has in mind? Could it have anything to do with Christianity?
In last week’s parshah, we learned that someone who blasphemes G-d is subject to the death penalty. How do we understand this in light of Rav Kook’s analysis? Shouldn’t we say that it’s impossible to blaspheme G-d, and the most one can do is curse one’s limited conception of G-d?
What kind of person is qualified to “extract the honey” from disbelief and “return it to the source of its holiness”? What kind of dangers are involved?
The Torah is full of descriptions of G-d speaking, acting and (apparently) expressing emotion. How do we reconcile that with the idea that G-d is transcendent and unknowable?[6]
Are you convinced by Rav Kook’s analysis of where kefira comes from? Why or why not?

[1]Lit. קבוצה בצורה מיוחדת וידועה

[2]Based on https://www.etzion.org.il/en/kefira-our-day.

[3]https://kavvanah.wordpress.com/2011/12/17/hitchens-atheism-and-rav-kook

[4]The Great Partnership (pg. 11), Rabbi Jonathan Sacks.

[5]Rav Kook writes elsewhere that “Disbelief must come out in the form of civilization to uproot the memory of G-d and all the institutions of divine worship … and upon the desolate ruins wrought by disbelief, will the exalted G-d-knowledge build its palace.”

[6]See the end of the first chapter of Rambam’s Yesodei haTorah – “[A]ll such [descriptions] and the like which are related in the Torah and the words of the Prophets – all these are metaphors and imagery. [For example,] “He who sits in the heavens shall laugh” [Psalms 2:4], “They angered Me with their emptiness” [Deuteronomy 32:21], and “As G-d rejoiced” [ibid. 28:63]. With regard to all such statements, our Sages said: “The Torah speaks in the language of man.” This is [borne out by the rhetorical question (Jeremiah 7:19):] “Are they enraging Me?” Behold, [Malachi 3:6] states: “I, G-d, have not changed.” Now were He to at times be enraged and at times be happy, He would change. Rather, all these matters are found only with regard to the dark and low bodies, those who dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is dust. In contrast, He, blessed be He, is elevated and exalted above all this.”