Category: Excerpts

Excerpted from Rabbi Norman Lamm’s Festivals of Faith: Reflections on the Jewish Holidays

The distinguishing feature of every Jewish holiday is simhah, joy or happiness. The Torah commands us: Ve-hayita akh sameah, “And thou shalt be altogether joyful” (Deut. 16:15).

Now, while this particular commandment is included in the Torah’s legislation of the festival of Sukkot, there is no reason to restrict it to that holiday. Indeed, the mitzvah of simhah applies to every holiday. It is somewhat astonishing, therefore, to discover that the Talmud finds it necessary to apply the requirement of simhah specifically to the present holiday, Shemini Atzeret. Thus, the Talmud says (Sukkah 48a), “le-rabbot leilei yom tov ha-aharon le-simhah,”— that the commandment to be happy on the holiday includes not only the first days of Sukkot, but the last days—which means Shemini Atzeret—as well. (What makes this talmudic statement even more surprising is the fact that the word akh, as in ve-hayita akh sameah, is usually understood le-ma‘et, “to exclude.” That is, the word akh, or “only,” usually means to restrict what follows. In this case, however, the Talmud understands it in the reverse, le-rabbot: You must be happy not only on the first day of the holiday, but le-rabbot, it must be inclusive and extend to the last holiday as well.)

Why the necessity for emphasizing simhah even on Shemini Atzeret?

Perhaps we can understand it from a story that the Talmud elsewhere tells (Yoma 21b) of a popular custom that used to take place as soon as the entire Sukkot holiday, including Shemini Atzeret, was over and done with. People would gather about the Temple, and ha-kol tzafin le-ashan ha-ma‘arakhah— everyone would peer intently at the column of smoke that would rise from the altar, where the logs were burning so as to provide a source of fire for the sacrificial service. As the column of smoke rose, all eyes would be glued to it, to see which way the wind would blow it. If the column would blow to the north, then the poor were happy and the well-to-do farmers were sad, for a north wind indicated that there would be early rain that season, and their produce was in danger of rotting, and they would therefore have to sell their harvest at a low price. If the column tended to the south, the poor were sad and the farmers were happy, because a south wind indicated late rain, and therefore the fruit and wheat could be kept until the prices rose steeply. If it was an east wind, everyone would be happy, for nature would balance perfectly for everyone. If there was a west wind, everyone was sad, for it indicated probable drought and famine.

Now we may understand the need for the emphasis on being happy even on Shemini Atzeret. For as soon as the holiday was over, people would rush to find out which way the wind was blowing. And so, quite naturally, even during the holiday itself, in anticipation of this event, the peace of mind, the quiet and serene joy that are so essential for the holiday, would already begin to vanish. During the holiday itself, the mind of the Jew and his heart would begin to concentrate not on ve-hayita akh sameah, “be altogether joyful” before God, but on, which way does the wind blow? The Rabbis of the Talmud, therefore, took special caution and went to special pains to remind us that we must banish such anticipation of worry from our hearts, and as long as we are in the midst of the festival, we ought to retain a full and complete sense of simhah.

The same teaching applies with no less force and relevance to us in the mid-twentieth century than it did to our ancestors during the Second Commonwealth, for we, too, are constantly concerned about which way the wind blows. Here we are, toward the end of a marvelous and joyous holiday. Yet, can anyone doubt that in the minds of so many of us, during our services this morning, and during the rest of the afternoon to come, the major concern is not the meaning of our prayers or the attainment of true joy, but worry about tomorrow and the day after? We are still in the midst of Shemini Atzeret, and already we are worrying: will it be an economy of boom or bust, will the stock market be bullish or bearish, will the economy go up or down, will we experience recovery or recession? Everyone has his theory, and everyone anxiously awaits some sign of which way the wind blows.

But under such conditions, even if the ultimate result is favorable, the worry and the tenseness, the anxiety and the concern in anticipation, frequently vitiate whatever benefits may obtain later on. In addition, such worry in advance destroys the sanctity of yom tov, it empties the holy day of its content of holiness. The Rabbis therefore remind us, Ve-hayita akh sameah, le-rabbot leilei yom tov ha-aharon le-simhah. Hold off your worries, postpone your problems, delay your anxieties. It is still yom tov, and we must be observant of the commandment to experience joy even on the eve of the day when we return to office and marketplace and start wondering about what the future will bring, about which way the wind will blow that column of smoke in its many modern guises.

This is more than just good advice or a wise recommendation. To experience simhah on the holiday is nothing less than a mitzvah, a commandment. To declare happiness a commandment presupposes a major psychological principle: that joy is the result not only of external circumstances, but of an inner orientation. Whether I am happy or not depends not only upon whether my needs are fulfilled by the world, but also upon whether I know what to want and how to react to the world. In other words, my personal disposition can be controlled by an act of my will. My state of mind is not an infinitely plastic piece of clay molded by outside events; it is something that I can create if I exercise enough control.

That is a hard doctrine to accept. Most of us would prefer to believe that our happiness or unhappiness is the result of what life brings us, and that if we lack happiness, it is exclusively the result of our miserable fate and we are the unwilling victims of cruel circumstances. Now there is no doubt that simhah is to a very large extent decided by the conditions of the world in which I find myself, but not totally and exclusively so. There is a story that Hasidim tell of one of their great teachers, and that the Mitnaggedim tell of one of their great rabbis—and this in itself is evidence of the authentic Jewishness of the story, whether or not it literally occurred. The great rabbi and sage about whom the story is told was in the midst of dancing on Simhat Torah, filled with heavenly and rhapsodic simhah. Suddenly a student came into the singing and dancing crowd and furtively handed the rabbi a telegram. The rabbi glanced at it, blanched, and returned forthwith to the dancing and singing. The messenger was stunned, for the telegram had informed the rabbi that his only daughter had been killed in a distant city. The rabbi continued in his state of joy and happiness until the day was done and the Havdalah recited; after which he burst out in uncontrollable weeping and mourning. What a superb illustration of self-control: mourning is forbidden on the holiday, and therefore the rabbi was able to will himself into a state of simhah, holding off his deeply felt grief until the yom tov had passed.

Some will say that this is incredibly inhuman; I will agree only that it is far greater than what is normal. Certainly, few of us could hope ever to attain such a degree of mastery over our own instincts—may the Lord spare us from such tragedy! But the same principle is available and accessible to each and every one of us in modified form. We can, indeed, exercise some form of control over our state of mind. We may indeed will to be happy, to be joyous, to experience simhah. We can, if we want to strongly enough, emerge from the doldrums of self-pity and achieve a state of tranquility or serenity.

Business worries, professional concerns, even family problems should never be allowed to gain the upper hand over our inner equilibrium. That they often do does not mean that they always must. Ve-hayita akh sameah—we must remain happy and joyous even at a critical period when the future is unknown and mysterious and we do not yet know which way the wind will blow. No wonder that today we recited the special prayers for geshem, for rain, which is a symbol of prosperity. One would imagine that if the prayers were answered affirmatively by God, there would be no cause for any further concern by us. Yet as soon as the cantor will announce with a flourish that it is God who is mashiv ha-ruah u-morid ha-geshem, who makes the wind blow in the right direction and gives us abundant geshem, we will all call out: “li-berakhah ve-lo likelalah”— may it be for blessing and not, Heaven forbid, for a curse. Why is this necessary? Because even prosperity can be a curse if, in the course of achieving it, we worry ourselves to distraction. It is a truism that not everyone who is rich is happy. It is not often appreciated that in the very process of amassing wealth, one often sacrifices his personal simhah on the altar of affluence. Our prayer, therefore, is that we be the recipients of God’s gift of wind blowing in the right direction, that of geshem, but li-verakhah ve-lo li-kelalah—may we achieve it in a blessed way, not in an accursed way. May we attain our heart’s desire for prosperity, but not at the cost of personal simhah. May we each achieve our professional goals, whether of fame or fortune, without at the same time ignoring a wife, neglecting children, abdicating character and principles, and forgetting about the spiritual dimension of life.

I expect that there are some who will take exception to what I have been saying. It is an altogether expected reaction of the sophisticated intellectual of today to dismiss with contempt any concern by religion for the peace of mind and serenity of ordinary folk, and to consider such concern contaminated by the dubious doctrines of Norman Vincent Peale. However, such reactions notwithstanding, the Torah is interested that we experience simhah, that the tempest within the heart be stilled, that during Shabbat and yom tov we enjoy a quiet and sacred serenity. There is, after all, a certain limited validity to the irenic, or pacifying, quality of religious faith. A calm mind is no less desirable for one’s spiritual welfare than a healthy body.

Nevertheless, we must confess that if this were the end of the story, our critics would be justified. If religion is meant only to give us happiness and peace of mind and tranquility, then it is not religion; it is nothing more than a sublimated tranquilizer. Even in the course of counseling us to will ourselves into a state of simhah and postpone our worrying about which way the wind will blow, the Torah inculcates us with a spiritual and ethical principle of the greatest significance.

For how, indeed, shall we go about developing this state of mind called simhah at a time when we are consciously enmeshed in worrying about the future?

The answer that Judaism offers is of the utmost importance: it tells us that the more concerned you are with your own happiness, the less likely you are to achieve it. For the constant pursuit of one’s own happiness means that simhah is defined in a purely egoistical fashion: How can I be happy? But “If I am for myself, who am I?” (Avot 1:14). This way leads only to frustration and bitterness. True simhah is attained only when I forget about myself, only when I lose myself, only when my concern is with making others happy. That is why the commandment to experience simhah on yom tov is coupled, in the Torah, with the commandment to provide for the joy and happiness of the poor and the widow, of the orphan and the stranger and the Levite.

Perhaps the best example is the joyous last day of the festival which we shall observe tomorrow, Simhat Torah. What does that mean, to be happy with the Torah? Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi explained that Simhat Torah means not only to be happy with the Torah, but, even more, le-sammeah et ha-Torah—to make the Torah happy, to provide the opportunity for simhah to the One who gave the Torah! Thus, on this day we determine to live our lives so that we give God the occasion for nahas, that we make Him happy: yismah Hashem bema‘ asav (Ps. 104:31). Then we shall be the prime recipients of this divine gift of simhah.

For indeed, when we forget about the satisfaction of our own desires and concentrate instead upon making the Torah happy, upon affording nahas to the Almighty, then we shall find that our lives are fulfilled—no matter which way the wind blows! A life of service is the way to a life of serenity. Living according to Torah will lead to a life of tranquility. Devotion to Judaism brings you unexpected joys. In the striving for holiness we will discover the possibilities of happiness.

Tomorrow’s worries will, eventually, become yesterday’s forgotten trivia. No matter which way the wind blows, it will soon dissipate itself and vanish. But true simhah, as we have defined it, lasts forever; for if it is achieved by means of le-sammeah et ha-Torah, of making the Torah happy, and the Torah is eternal, then our simhah is eternal too.

If we are concerned about receiving nahas from our own children, let us attempt, in our own lives, to grant that same blessing of nahas retroactively to our parents and grandparents whom we shall shortly memorialize in our Yizkor prayers. If we want God to make us happy, it is we who must first make Him happy.

Let us, on this great and wonderful day, cease worrying about tomorrow and commence being grateful for today and yesterday; for herein lies the secret of simhah.

Excerpted from Dr. Mandell Ganchow Coming of Age: An Anthology of Divrei Torah for Bar and Bat Mitzvah 

Parashat Ekev

by Rabbi Cary A. Friedman

In Parashat Naso, the third verse of the Birkat Kohanim reads, “May Hashem lift (yisa) His face (panav) toward you and give you peace” (Bemidbar 6:26). The Hebrew phrase nesi’ut panim, according to one view in Chazal, means that God grants special favor to Israel.

The idea that Hashem demonstrates favoritism, however, appears to directly contradict another verse in the Torah, a verse in Parashat Ekev (Devarim 10:17): “For Hashem your God is the God of all powers, and Lord of all lords, the great, mighty and awesome God who shows no favoritism (lo yisa panim) and takes no bribes.”

The Gemara (Berachot 20b) notes this apparent contradiction and records the following dialogue:

The ministering angels said before the Holy One, Blessed be He,
“Master of the Universe! It is written in your Torah, ‘[He] shows no favoritism and takes no bribes,’ yet, behold, You favor Israel, as it is written, ‘May Hashem lift His face toward you!’” He answered them, “Should I not favor Israel, for whom I wrote in the Torah, ‘You shall
eat and be satisfied and bless Hashem your God,’ yet they are careful about themselves for a kezayit and a kebeitzah [i.e., they bless even after eating less than is necessary to be satiated]?!”

The Gemara’s explanation seems to be that God’s ability to demonstrate favoritism and go beyond the demands of strict justice is built into the legal system. God certainly does favor the Jewish people, but only because they deserve it—through their willingness to do more than the law demands. The verse that states that God does not show favoritism is speaking about a normal case of a person who acts according to the letter of the law.

But what is the nature of this “going beyond” the letter of the law? In what way do the Jewish people do this? What does the case of Birkat Ha-Mazon represent?

The Vilna Gaon describes the case of a man who has an amount of food sufficient for one hearty meal. If he eats the entire amount of food himself, he will certainly have eaten enough to reach the biblical level of “satisfaction,” and be required to recite Birkat Ha-Mazon on a Torah level. However, if he finds two other people and shares his food with them, each will have eaten a kebeitzah, enough to attain the rabbinic threshold of “satisfaction” and, together, all three will be able to recite the Birkat Ha-Mazon together as a zimmun, enabling them to praise God in an enhanced way.

Further, if the owner of the food identifies nine other people with whom to share his food, and divides it equally among them, each will receive a kezayit, enough to satisfy the smallest rabbinic parameter for “satisfaction” and, together, all ten will form a minyan and recite Birkat Ha-Mazon with even greater praise for God.

Thus, a Jew’s willingness to bless over a kezayit represents his desire to share his meal with nine others and to praise God at the highest level. Barring that, he would settle for a kebeitzah—sharing his meal with two others in order to offer up an enhanced blessing. The Gemara describes one who is willing to eat as little of his food as possible in pursuit of greater degrees of praising God. Surely this desire to forgo one’s personal comfort and enjoyment in exchange for this opportunity merits special consideration from God.

Rav Chayyim of Volozhin understands the case of Birkat Ha-Mazon to represent another type of extraordinary service of God that earns the Jewish people special consideration. He explains that the case reveals a special kind of inconsistency of which the Jewish people is “guilty.” Most of the time when people act inconsistently, they do so to their own advantage. The Jewish people, however, are inconsistent to their own disadvantage—specifically, Rav Chayyim points out, through their interpretation of the word sevi’ah: satisfaction.

When the Torah commands tithing so that the poor will be “satisfied” (Devarim 26:12) the Jewish people err on the side of generosity and interpret the term to mean a large quantity. But when they consider the definition of “satisfaction” as it relates to their own eating and subsequent requirement to recite Birkat Ha-Mazon, they adopt the much smaller measures of kebeitzah and kezayit. This selfless decision to forgo personal comfort and enjoyment in exchange for the opportunity to care for the poor merits special consideration from God.

As a newly-minted adult, take these interpretations to heart, and apply them to your observance of the Torah. Forgo fleeting physical comfort in order to enhance your praise of God (bein adam la-Makom) and err in the disbursement of your resources on the side of providing generously for the poor (bein adam la-chavero), and you will surely merit, God willing, His special consideration and care. “May Hashem lift His face toward you and give you peace.”

Rabbi Cary A. Friedman is the author of six books, including the newly published ‘Beautiful Days, Holy Days’.

Excerpted from Erica Brown’s ‘In the Narrow Places: Daily Inspiration for the Three Weeks‘, co-published by OU Press and Maggid Books

Redeeming the Ruins – Tenth of Av

How do we behave in exile, especially when we do not feel as though we are in exile? We turn to Jeremiah, the prophet who foretold of the first exile to Babylon, for advice. He preempted what the ancient Israelites may have thought was the appropriate religious response by writing a letter to his followers. The gloom and doom that we would naturally expect the prophet to suggest – and that fills page after page of his prophetic testimony – is curiously absent from his letter. Instead, he presents a formula that strikes us with its contemporary resonances.

In chapter 29, we read of the letter that Jeremiah wrote to a group of exiles in Babylon, which he dispatched from the land of Israel with Elasah, the man whom King Zedekiah sent to Babylon to see King Nebuchadnezzar. In addition to Elasah’s diplomatic mission, he was also to present this letter as guidance for the small but growing community of exiles. The chapter begins with the letter’s intended audience:

This is the text of the letter which the prophet Jeremiah sent from Jerusalem to the priests, the prophets, the rest of the elders of the exile community, and to all the people whom Nebuchadnezzar has exiled from Jerusalem to Babylon…( Jeremiah 29:1)

The condition of exile changes personal and communal identity. You are in one place but your heart and mind are in another. To quote Rabbi Judah HaLevi, “I am in the west, but my heart is in the east.” To be an exile is never to reconcile yourself with where you are, but to live in a persistent hope of where you want to be. In the book of Esther, Mordekhai is the only person introduced as an exile, as someone who knows that he is not where he should ultimately be at a time of immense assimilation. Imagine the immigrant who, when asked who he is, always mentions the place he comes from and not the place where he currently resides. He lives in perpetual dislocation.

Jeremiah, perhaps realizing the crippling impact of dislocation on the soul of a people, advised against this kind of thinking:

This said the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, to the whole community which I exiled from Jerusalem to Babylon: Build houses and live in them, plant gardens and eat their fruit. Take wives and beget sons and daughters; and take wives for your sons, and give your daughters to husbands, that they may bear sons and daughters. Multiply there, do not decrease. And seek the welfare of the city to which I have exiled you and pray to the Lord in its behalf; for in its prosperity you shall prosper. (Ibid. 29:4–7)

In line after line, Jeremiah adds to his demands across generations, not only in the immediacy of the day but with the foreknowledge that exile can become more than a momentary condition but a way of life, for decades if not centuries.

Build houses, he tells them. Plant gardens. Seek the welfare of the city. Building a house is a statement of permanence. This is Jeremiah’s starting point. Yet as he moves on, we, the readers, realize that building a house is perhaps the least permanent act on Jeremiah’s list of recommendations for exile. After all, no matter where you are, you need some form of shelter even if, as an exile, you build something temporary in keeping with your desire to leave.

Jeremiah moves from building houses to planting gardens. The Malbim (1809–1879) observes that planting a garden implies a longer stay than building a house since the process of sowing and cultivation requires time. He cites a verse from Isaiah that seems to imply the exact opposite of Jeremiah’s thinking:

They shall not build for others to dwell in, or plant for others to enjoy. For the days of My people shall be as long as the days of a tree; My chosen ones shall outlive the work of their hands. They shall not toil to no purpose. They shall not bear children for terror. (Isaiah 65:22–23)

Whereas Isaiah does not want others to benefit from the planting of gardens, Jeremiah wants the gardeners to take advantage of what good can be found while on foreign soil; to invest in their lives.

In a midrash on the famous psalm, “By the Waters of Babylon” (Psalm 137), the rabbis of old say that the question “How can we sing a new song on strange land?” was not rhetorical, but literal. The Levites, in their desperation, cut off their thumbs so that they would not be able to play their instruments for the enemy King Nebuchadnezzar (see Rashi on Kiddushin 69a). They sat, instead, on the banks of the river and bemoaned their loss. But the midrash alludes to something darker: by cutting off their thumbs, they made themselves ritually unsuitable for serving God in the Temple precincts after their exile (see Leviticus 21:17). Signs of mourning that are permanent can show profound loss but may also reveal a lack of faith in the future.

We have met Jeremiah on many pages here, and might not expect him to offer us a positive prescription for exile. Yet he does. He tells us to become good people, raise good children and be good citizens, no matter where. He also offers us the belief that a stronger people will make a stronger nation when the exile is over and redemption is on the horizon.

Isaiah, too, offers his guidance on rebuilding:

And they shall build the old wastes, they shall raise up the former desolations, and they shall renew the waste cities, the desolations of many generations. (Isaiah 61:4)

We are the people who rebuild ruins. And when, as the Talmud teaches, we get to heaven and God asks each of us, “Did you work for redemption?” we can each say, “Yes, I did” with a full heart.

Excerpted from the Koren Mesorat HaRav Kinot: Lookstein Edition. Edited by Rabbi Simon Posner, Kinot translated by Rabbi Dr. Tzvi Hersh Weinreb.

Kina 10, Eikha Yashva Havatzelet HaSharon

Why is it that the stringency of our observance of mourning decreases in the afternoon of Tisha B’Av, at precisely the time that the flames of destruction began to engulf the Beit HaMikdash?

כי כליה חיבתי כדור המבול For we deserved extinction no less than the generation of the Flood. This passage sounds the recurring theme found in the kinot that the Beit HaMikdash served as a substitute, as collateral, for the Jewish people, and the physical structure of the Beit HaMikdash suffered the destruction that rightfully should have been visited upon the entire nation. The kina says that the Jewish people are responsible and are deserving of punishment; we are guilty, and we should have been destroyed as was the generation of the Flood. God, however, in His mercy and grace, subjected His throne, the Beit HaMikdash, rather than the Jewish people, to disgrace, abuse and destruction. It is for this reason that Tisha B’Av contains an element of mo’ed, a festival – God rendered His decision on Tisha B’Av that Knesset Yisrael is an eternal people and will continue to exist. The Beit HaMikdash was humiliated, profaned and destroyed in order to save the people.

This concept is expressed halakhically in the character of Tisha B’Av afternoon. The second half of the day has a contradictory nature in halakha. On the one hand, the avelut, the mourning, is intensified because the actual burning of the Beit HaMikdash commenced in the late afternoon of the ninth day of Av, and the flames continued throughout the tenth (Ta’anit 29a). On the other hand, Nahem, the prayer of consolation, is recited in the Amida for Minha in the afternoon, and not in Shaharit of Tisha B’Av morning or Ma’ariv of the preceding evening (Shulhan Arukh, Orah Hayyim, Rama 557:1). Similarly, tefillin are put on in the afternoon, not the morning (Shulhan Arukh, Orah Hayyim 555:1), and sitting on chairs rather than on the ground is permitted in the afternoon, not the morning (Shulhan Arukh, Orah Hayyim 559:3).

In Minha, one re-inserts in Kaddish the phrase תתקבל צלותהון ובעותהון”, accept our prayers and entreaties” (see Beit Yosef, Tur Orah Hayyim 559 s.v. ve’omer kaddish belo titkabal, with respect to the recitation of Titkabal in Shaharit). This phrase is removed from Kaddish earlier on Tisha B’Av because the assertion that “satam tefillati, my prayer is rejected” (Lamentations 3:8), which prevails on Tisha B’Av, comes to an end at midday. Paradoxically, the moment the Beit HaMikdash was set ablaze was a moment of relief. At that moment, it became clear that God decided to take the collateral, the Beit HaMikdash, instead of pursuing the real debtor, the Jewish people. Paradoxically, once He took away the Beit HaMikdash in the afternoon of Tisha B’Av, the nehama, the consolation, could begin. Tisha B’Av is a day of limitless despair and boundless hope and faith.

Excerpted from Erica Brown’s ‘In the Narrow Places: Daily Inspiration for the Three Weeks’ co-published with Maggid Books

One of the most beautiful expressions in Eikha is “Let us lift up our hearts with our hands to God in the heavens.” (Lam. 3:41). When we visualize this verse, we can imagine pieces of a broken heart held high in our hands, a gift to God of our innermost feelings. “Look, God, see our pain. See these fragments, these emotional shards, pieces of our heart. We show them to You. Have pity and compassion upon us.”

There is a Hasidic reading of this verse that offers us a different image. It aids us in constructing a positive way to handle human hardship. When we are in pain, personally or collectively, we may turn to others for guidance or cry to heaven for divine assistance, but we still have to struggle profoundly with how to manage with the pain and how to feel about it. Rabbi Soloveitchik once made a distinction between pain and suffering: Pain in the physical universe is what we experience when we get hurt. Suffering is an emotional, existential state that can exist long after the physical pain is gone. It can be wrenching, seem intractable. In the face of immense loss, we feel our smallness and vulnerability. Rabbi Naĥman of Bratslav, Hasidic rebbe and master story-teller, used the narrative form to give advice about this difficult human problem.

As a thinker, Rabbi Naĥman rejected despair and believed that humanity needs to cling to faith, joy, melody, and movement, authoring the famous statement of optimism: “Mitzva gedola lihiyot besimĥa tamid – It is a great mitzva to always be happy.” He believed that communication with a tzaddik, a righteous man, is critical for the soul, and that every person yearns for God. With that spirit in mind, we turn to one of his stories.

A Tale of Suffering:

A king once sent his son to distant places to study. When the son returned home, he was well versed in all branches of wisdom. The king then told his son to take a boulder the size of a millstone, and bring it up to the palace attic. The son looked at the huge, heavy boulder and realized that he would not be able to lift it. He felt very bad because he would not be
able to fulfill his father’s request.

The king then explained his true intention to his son: “Did you really think that I wanted you to carry this huge boulder? Even with all your wisdom, you could not do it. My intention is that you take a hammer and break the boulder into small pieces. You will then be able to bring it up into the attic.”

Many Hasidic tales center around a king and his son. The king obviously represents God, the ultimate King, imagined in human form, and the son represents the children of Israel. The king is both the stern, authoritative figure and the sympathetic father, playing on the tension that exists when these two roles are embodied in one person, much like our prayer “Avinu Malkenu, Our Father, Our King,” beseeches God through the prism of two different relationships melded into a difficult whole.

In this story, the king, as is often the case, tasks his son with an assignment that on the surface seems impossible. No one can shoulder such a large rock and carry it up to an attic. The king is, in essence, testing his son’s ingenuity. How will the son interpret the task? Will he have the originality of thought to find a way through, or will he give up in hopelessness because a solution is not immediately apparent? Although the prince has been sent to learn the world’s wisdom, he must pass this test that requires more than book knowledge in order to be worthy of becoming king. Indeed, in most such stories the king tests his children or his charges in order to check their worthiness, and to prepare thenext generation for the tribulations of leadership.

The son in this study does not measure up. He could not see beyond the size of the boulder to find a way through the challenge that his father posed. The stone was too big and heavy. And the father understood at that moment that his son’s wisdom was severely limited.
Academic learning is not the only, or predominant, requisite for sitting on the throne. The prince lacked a creative problem-solving instinct; he saw only one dimension in the father’s request, and that led to paralysis rather than innovation.

This story also has a wider application. Suffering is at the core of the human experience. Religions like Buddhism aim at helping people grow through suffering rather than shrinking in the face of it. Much of Hasidic thought, based as it is on an eternal sense of optimism, also aims at managing suffering by breaking it up into incremental pieces, each of which can be carried up to God – placed in the divine attic, so to speak. The way to manage suffering, the king wanted his son to know, is not to shoulder all of it at once, but rather to chisel away at it bit by bit, and only then lift it. That way it can be borne, and carried to a high place – given meaning and redeemed before God. Rabbi Naĥman implies that God wants us to “lift up our hearts with our hands to God in the heavens.” But our hearts may be like heavy stones, which we cannot possibly lift. What we then must do is take a hammer of words and break our hearts of stone. Then we can lift them up to God.

We have another biblical verse that has been interpreted in a similar way. In Jeremiah we read, “Is not My word like fire? says the Lord; and like a hammer that shatters a rock?” ( Jeremiah 23:29). In one Talmudic interpretation, Jeremiah is saying that just as a hammer can shatter a rock, so too can the words of Torah combat the evil inclination, breaking it apart so that it has little power to rule over us. This is a wonderful approach to managing temptation. Instead of looking at desire as a solid, immovable rock that obstructs our way, we need to view ourselves as the holders of a hammer, who can break the rock into manageable pieces that will then present little challenge.

So often in our lives we stand in front of a mountain of despair or temptation, before an immovable stone. At the bottom of such an incline, our capacity to scale the heights seems questionable. We can’t move mountains. But we can wear down the mountain, piece by piece, day by day, crumbling the rock, lifting it high to God, asking for compassion, realizing that we are far stronger than we’ll ever know.

Kavana for the Day

Recall a situation in the past that seemed beyond your ability to manage: it may be a family problem, an educational challenge or a professional struggle. Or perhaps there’s a mountain in front of you at this very moment, or a stone too heavy to lift. Write down what made or makes it seem so overwhelming and frightening. Now list ten small ways that you can chisel into this rock, and some reasons why you should offer up to God each piece that you’ve broken off. Think how this will make a difference.

Tackle the first on your list. Don’t leave it until tomorrow. You begin healing your suffering now. Believe that the King has faith in your creativity.

Excerpted from the Koren Mesorat HaRav Kinot: Lookstein Edition. Edited by Rabbi Simon Posner, Kinot translated by Rabbi Dr. Tzvi Hersh Weinreb.

Kina 22

The Rav discusses what we mourn for on Tisha B’Av. It is not only the Hurban Beit HaMikdash in the material sense, but also the Hurban Beit HaMikdash in the spiritual sense, the destruction of centers of Torah and the thousands of towns and villages over the ages where Jews lived a sacred life.

After shifting from kinot for the Hurban Beit HaMikdash to a kina for the Ten Martyrs, there is now a further shift in the subject matter of the kinot. This kina (Hacharishu Mimeni Va’adabera) is the first of several commemorating the massacres in Speyer, Mainz and Worms, and other related tragedies during the Crusades in Germany at the end of the eleventh century. These kinot recount the Hurban Batei Mikdash of the Hakhmei Ashkenaz, the slaughter of the Torah scholars and the destruction of the Jewish communities.

In a sense, however, this kina is a continuation of the kina “ארזי הלבנון.” In both kinot, the deaths that are described represent a double catastrophe. Thousands of Jews were killed during the Crusades. But the tragedy was not just the murder of ten people during the Roman times or the myriads during the Crusades. The tragedy was also the fact that the greatest scholars of the Jewish people were killed. In this kina, the mourning that is expressed is not just for the inhuman act of the massacre. Rather, the principal emphasis is on the destruction of the Torah centers in Germany.

The dates of these massacres are known to us. The Crusaders generally started out on their journey in the spring, and the massacres took place in the months of Iyar and Sivan, around the time of Shavuot. Even though these events did not occur on Tisha B’Av, they are included in the kinot and are commemorated on Tisha B’Av because of the principle, already noted in connection with other kinot, that the death of the righteous is equivalent to the burning of the Beit HaMikdash. If the Beit HaMikdash was sacred, how much more sacred were entire Jewish communities which consisted of thousands of scholars. These communities were also, collectively, a Beit HaMikdash in the spiritual sense. If the kinot speak about the Hurban Beit HaMikdash in the material sense, they also mourn the Hurban Beit HaMikdash in the spiritual sense, the destruction of centers of Torah and the killing of great Torah scholars.
In fact, sometimes the death of the righteous is even a greater catastrophe than the destruction of the physical Beit HaMikdash.

There is an additional reason for including these kinot dealing with the massacres in Germany in the Tisha B’Av service. Hurban Beit HaMikdash is an all-inclusive concept. All disasters, tragedies and sufferings that befell the Jewish people should be mentioned on Tisha B’Av. Rashi says (II Chronicles 35:25, s.v. vayitnum lehok) that when one has to mourn for an event, it should be done on Tisha B’Av. When these kinot relating to the Crusades are recited, one should remember that the tragedies being described happened not only in 1096 but in the 1940s as well. These kinot are not only a eulogy for those murdered in Mainz, Speyer and Worms, but also for those murdered in Warsaw and Vilna and in the hundreds and thousands of towns and villages where Jews lived a sacred and committed life. The kinot are a eulogy not only for the Ten Martyrs and those killed in the Crusades, but for the martyrdom of millions of Jews throughout Jewish history.

Excerpted from Erica Brown’s ‘In the Narrow Places: Daily Inspiration for the Three Weeks’ Click here to buy the book

Ours is an age which has forgotten how to cry.” Rabbi Norman Lamm, chancellor of Yeshiva University, offered this observation in a sermon he gave on Rosh HaShana called “Three Who Cried.” Rosh HaShana is a time when many of us cry over ourselves and our wrongs, and sometimes over the state of the world. Rabbi Lamm speaks of three types of tears: the tears that come when our myths of absolute security and certainty are shattered; the tears of those who resign themselves to hopelessness; and the tears of those who cry over reality, not from frustration or resignation, but from a determination to change and renew that reality. Jewish crying fits the last of these categories: the act of crying, according to Rabbi Lamm, is the beginning of transformation – the tears are those of protest and resolute purpose.

But Rosh HaShana is not the only crying time of the year where we have perhaps forgotten the meaning and the power of tears. Eikha returns to the motif of crying again and again. We can visualize Jeremiah, its attributed author, weeping ceaselessly as he writes. He tells us as much:

My eyes are spent with tears, my heart is in tumult; my being melts away over the ruin of my poor people. (Lam. 2:11)

When I cry and plead, He shuts out my prayer. (Ibid. 3:8)

My eyes shed streams of water over the ruin of my poor people. (Ibid. 3:48)

My eyes shall flow without cease, without respite until the Lord looks down and beholds from heaven. (Ibid. 3:49)

Do not shut your ear to my groan, my cry. (Ibid. 3:56)

We hear a familiar refrain in Jeremiah’s words: God is ignoring our tears. We sense multiple levels of pain in these verses. There is the anguish of destruction which prompts tears and then there is the additional weeping that occurs when God ignores the tears. Perhaps there is no pain greater than ignored pain. Just watch a child fall in a playground. The child in pain looks up to see if a parent is watching. With no parent to watch, he holds back the tears and continues to play. But when he sees that his mother is indeed watching, he bursts into tears, waiting for a nurturing embrace and someone to brush them away. Tears are one of the most powerful, wordless ways we communicate our feelings to others. To know that someone hears those tears and ignores them adds an additional element of suffering: “Do not shut your ear to my groan, my cry.”

But what about God’s tears? Does God ever cry about us? Do we ever ignore His cries? In the opening to Eikha Raba, an ancient rabbinic commentary on the book of Lamentations, there is an interpretation of the verse, “And God, the Lord of Hosts, called the day for crying and eulogizing” (Proem/Petiĥta 24). When our enemies broke into the Mikdash and conquered it, God said, “I no longer have a place in this world and will remove My Presence from it, back to its original resting place.” And at that same time, God cried and said, “What have I done? I placed My Divine Presence in the lower world for the sake of Israel and now that they have sinned, I have returned to My original dwelling.” In the midrash, God then goes with the ministering angels to see the destruction of the Mikdash from up close, and He cries again, “Woe is Me over My House. My children, where are you? My priests, where are you? My loved ones, where are you?”

At this point, God speaks to Jeremiah of what He is experiencing. “Today I am like a man who made his only son a wedding canopy, and he died in the middle of the ceremony.” God then tells Jeremiah to go and call upon his ancestors Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Moses at their burial places since “they know how to cry.” Jeremiah says that he does not know where Moses is buried (since we are told in Deuteronomy 34:6 that no one knows the location of Moses’ grave). God tells him to go to the edge of the Jordan River and call out “Son of Amram, son of Amram.” Jeremiah does this and asks Moses to petition God on behalf of Israel.

Moses asks Jeremiah why, but Jeremiah does not know (this midrash positions Jeremiah before the destruction. Here, the prophet has been denied the power to see the future). Moses then asks one of the ministering angels whom he knew from the time of Sinai to explain Jeremiah’s request and is told of the upcoming destruction: “The Temple has been destroyed and Israel has been exiled.” At that moment Moses begins to cry and petition so that his tears wake the patriarchs, and the angels rend their garments, put their hands on their heads, and scream and cry so that their tears reach the gates of the Temple. When God sees this spectacle, He declares a day of mourning.

This midrash explains the etiology of Tisha B’Av in an imaginative rendering of how tears prompted God to declare a day of mourning – and also describes how Jeremiah had to learn how to cry. He needed to take lessons from a master, Moses. And Moses needed the angels to cry with him so that the tears would reach the Temple. Finally, looking at all of this emotional unraveling, God Himself was also moved to tears.

Tisha B’Av is Jewish crying-time. It is a day when we look back at persecution and shed tears over the mess. Once a year we have to revisit a painful past where persecutions meld and merge into a continuous timeline of tragedy. We fast. We pray. We think. We cry.

What if we have forgotten how to cry? Though we may feel like crying, we so often hold back tears. Rabbi Lamm reflects on this in relation to Rosh HaShana, but his words are easily transferable to Tisha B’Av:

Once upon a time the Maĥzor [High Holy Day prayer-book] was stained with tears; today it is so white and clean – and cold. Not, unfortunately, that there is nothing to cry about…It is rather that we have embarrassed ourselves into silence…And so the unwept tears and unexpressed emotions and the unarticulated cries well up within us and seek release. What insight the Kotzker Rebbe had when he said that when a man needs to cry, and wants to cry, but cannot cry – that is the most heart-rending cry of all.

For us to feel the impact of the Three Weeks deeply, we have to allow ourselves the full range of sadness: grief, loss, remorse, guilt and confusion. We don’t have to teach ourselves to cry. We just have to give ourselves permission.

Kavana for the Day

Has there ever been a time when you cried over the Jewish people? Think of that moment and what prompted it. What was the trigger that pushed you over the invisible emotional boundary line? Open up the book of Eikha and skim its verses. Identify the one that pains you the most. On Tisha B’Av, go back to that verse and read it several times until you feel that you have taken it in fully.

If you cannot cry over it, but want to learn how to cry, think of someone you could turn to in order to learn how to cry. What prompted that choice of person? What makes some people “good criers” and others less able to express emotion fully? When we give ourselves permission to cry and to experience the full range of pain that Jeremiah expresses, we also learn how to experience the intensity of joy.

Excerpted from Erica Brown’s In the Narrow Places: Daily Inspiration for the Three Weeks, co-published by OU Press and Maggid Books 

Growth through Discomfort

We grow only through discomfort. When we are comfortable, there’s no reason to change. The book of Proverbs helps us appreciate the voices of those who make us feel uncomfortable with ourselves: “He who criticizes a man will in the end find more favor than he who flatters him” (Proverbs 28:23). We all love compliments. They make us feel special and connected to the person who offers them. But Proverbs tells us to be wary of the flatterer, the person who gives us too many compliments. We will do better with the person who offers us solid criticism that can help us grow and change in the future, than with one who offers us the fleeting luxury of a feel-good moment. How well do you take criticism? How well do you give it?

The book of Proverbs contains many descriptions of the wise man and the foolish one, comparing and contrasting them, praising one and criticizing the other. One of the most meaningful differences between the wise person and the fool is how they each take criticism. “Do not criticize the fool for he will hate you. Correct the wise man, and he will love you” (ibid. 9:8).

To understand why wisdom requires criticism, we have to think about the nature of rebuke. To do so, we turn to the very first verses of Deuteronomy, to the parasha of Devarim, the Torah portion that is always read during the Three Weeks. The Hebrew word “devarim” means “words” or “things.” In fact, words are things, giving the translation double weight. Many will shrug off an abuse of language with the simple dismissal, “It’s just words,” but Jewish tradition, from its semantic roots, treats words as having the concreteness of objects. They are our intellectual and emotional currency; they exist in the world. They are not wind or air that circulates lightly among us. They have weight and measure. Selecting the right words, the right context in which to use those words, and the right people to whom to say them is the better part of wisdom, especially when it comes to giving criticism.

When it comes to the things that we have to say, but don’t always want to say, we look to Moses for advice. We open the book of Words/Things and read the following verses: “These are the words that Moses addressed to all Israel on the other side of the Jordan. Through the wilderness, in the Arabah, near Suph, between Paran and Tophel, Laban, Hazeroth, and Di-Zahab, it is eleven days from Horeb to Kadesh-Barnea by the Mount Seir route. It was in the fortieth year, on the first day of the eleventh month, that Moses addressed the Israelites…” (Deuteronomy 1:1–3). Rashi adds layers of nuance to what seems like a typical biblical introduction, merely offering us the place and time of events. Moses, he contends, gathered everyone together so that there was no one absent who could later say that Moses spoke and no one contended with him. In other words, when everyone is present at a speech and hears the same words, there can be argument over interpretation but no refutation. Everyone knows who spoke up in debate. Rashi cites this ancient midrashic reading because the verse says “to all Israel,” an expression which is surprisingly rare in describing Moses’ audience. The actual words, “See, you are all here; he who has anything to say in reply, let him reply,” is a remarkably democratic position. If Moses is going to chastise the Israelites for a difficult past, let all be present to hear it so that anyone can counter, if anyone dares.

All of the complicated place names that may mean little to later readers are locations where the Israelites sinned. Rashi surmises that the audience would have well understood the significance – and implicit shame – in the mention of these specific stops along the way; the text does so subtly, Rashi observes, to protect the honor of the Israelites. While we may not be able to recall the import of these places, we can understand the significance that names embody. Consider how we can immediately conjure images of freedom just by naming a few cities: Gettysburg, Selma, Philadelphia, Boston, Jamestown.

Why does Moses gather everyone together in the last year of this wearying journey? Any number of possibilities come to mind. He could be preparing them for life in the Promised Land, giving over laws that they have not had to keep thus far, but that would be critical as they neared the land – such as laws related to war, to agriculture and to the formation of a government – all matters that are discussed in this last of the five books. He could review history and offer his perspective on the past, which is certainly one way that this farewell speech is understood. He could be preparing final words of inspiration, since he knows that he will not be making the last leg of the journey.

Rashi believes that Moses, following in the footsteps of Jacob, Joshua, Samuel and David, gathered everyone together to rebuke them before he took leave of this world. There is something harsh and grating in this idea, that the last words of a beloved and beleaguered leader to his followers are words of chastisement. The Sifrei, the midrashic compilation on Deuteronomy, presents four reasons why people offer rebuke on their deathbeds: in order to criticize once rather than repeatedly; the shame of the person criticized is mitigated by the fact that this is a final meeting; to prevent the person who is rebuked from harboring a grudge against the rebuker; in order that they may part in peace.

Each of these reasons aims at clearing a path so the relationship can move forward. The last words someone utters are profoundly impactful, and stay embedded in the receiver’s mind, precisely because they are the last ones. If you were to hear criticism again and again it would wash over you without really making a soulful mark. Sincere and thoughtful feedback not only fulfills the biblical command, “You shall not hate your brother in your heart; you shall surely rebuke your friend” (Leviticus 19:7), it also helps clear the barriers that stand in the way of a relationship. Rather than a final parting with the mystery of words unsaid, a last-ditch effort at advice and guidance can be its own meaningful legacy, a gift from the person who is leaving us forever.

Although Maimonides tells us how best to give difficult feedback – softly, in private and for the good of the person and not for our own good (Laws of Character 6:7) – we all still struggle with hearing it well and not putting up our defenses. Rabbeinu Baĥya ben Asher, the thirteenth-century Spanish scholar, writes in his introduction to Deuteronomy that Moses gathered everyone together to leave his ethical last will and testament, even though not all in the group were willing to listen:

It is well known that most rebukes [sic] are directed at the average person, the masses; the masses have different views, are not homogeneous…Seeing that all these people do not have minds of their own, they do not easily accept rebukes [sic] seeing that what one person likes another dislikes. What is pleasing to one person is unacceptable to others.

When in the presence of many people, it is always easy to believe that the rabbi offering up a heated sermon, or an angry boss at a staff meeting, is talking to or about someone else.

Rabbeinu Baĥya quotes two Talmudic passages to validate his reading. One states that younger scholars are preferred over older ones because the younger scholars are less critical. It’s easier to be popular if you make people feel good than if you make people feel challenged. The other reflects the words of Rabbi Tarfon: “I wonder if there exists in this generation anyone who knows how to accept rebuke.”

The way that we give and receive criticism is often shaped by culture, community expectations and societal norms. When we are defensive, we lose a whole avenue to introspection that can help us develop and grow in our sensitivity and thoughtfulness to others. Think of the helpful words of a mentor, a supervisor, or someone who took your last performance review seriously and gave you feedback that might not have been comfortable to hear but helped you become a better professional. Or the friend who you thought insulted you, but actually helped you become a better parent. There’s the word your wife said that offended you, but that made you see that you weren’t treating one of your children with the proper respect. Every day we receive messages about ourselves. Every once in a while, someone cares enough to tell us what they see. Correct the wise person and he will love you…

Kavana for the Day

Part one: Ask someone who is close to you either professionally or personally for feedback about something very specific. Listen carefully and prompt with questions. Think afterwards about what they said, how it made you feel, and what you’re going to do about it.

Part two: Think of a relationship that has suffered because you have not been telling someone what you really think. Find a way to give respectful feedback that shows love and concern. How did you do?

Excerpted from Rabbi Shmuel Goldin’s ‘Unlocking The Torah Text: An In-Depth Journey Into The Weekly Parsha- Bamidbar’, co-published by OU Press and Gefen Publishers 

Context

Following Bilam’s failed attempts at cursing the nation, the Israelites are seduced by the “daughters of Moab” and fall prey to the licentious idolatry of Ba’al Peor. God responds with a devastating plague that tragically claims twenty-four thousand victims from among the people.

Although no clear connection is immediately drawn in the text between the main story of Parshat Balak and the devastating episode of Ba’al Peor, a brief reference found later in the book of Bamidbar lays blame for this tragic event squarely at the feet of the sorcerer Bilam: “Behold! It was they [the Midianite women] who caused the children of Israel, by the word of Bilam, to commit a betrayal against the Lord regarding the matter of Peor; and the plague occurred in the assembly of the Lord.”

Questions

If the episode of Ba’al Peor can be directly traced to the scheming designs of Bilam, why doesn’t the Torah immediately say so?

Why record this tragic episode as an apparent epilogue to the Balak/Bilam narrative, omit any connection between the two stories, and then subsequently affirm such a connection, in a textual aside, much later in the text?

Approaches

A

A solution to these puzzles can be found if we recognize the tragic episode of Ba’al Peor not only as the textual epilogue to the Balak/Bilam narrative, but as the event that drives the message of that entire story home.

As we have noted before, the Talmud maintains that God’s transformation of Bilam’s curses into blessings ultimately has very limited practical effect. Due to the sins of the Israelites, the majority of these blessings revert back to their original curses. From this rabbinic perspective the Balak/Bilam story conveys a powerful, counterintuitive lesson: Bilam’s words, and other similar phenomena, do not matter at all. Ultimately our fate is determined by our own merit or guilt.

B

Suddenly, the strategically placed episode of Ba’al Peor is invested with new, devastating significance. As the Israelites emerge unscathed from Bilam’s external threat, only to fall prey to their own shortcomings, the flow of events mirrors in practice what the Balak/Bilam narrative preaches in theory: We can blame no one else for our failures; our destiny is in our hands.

The Torah’s immediate omission of Bilam’s pivotal role in the episode of Ba’al Peor now becomes completely understandable. Any mention of the sorcerer’s involvement would have diminished the Torah’s consistent message of personal responsibility. Through its silence, the Torah effectively robs us of the ability to blame anyone else for our people’s descent into idolatry. We are forced to realize the uncomfortable truth: Bilam’s machinations would never have succeeded had he not found the Israelites willing, easy prey.

Any mention of connection between Bilam and his successful plot against the nation will wait for another time and place. For now, the Torah is intent on bringing Parshat Balak to a cohesive close. From start to finish, this parsha is designed to sensitize us to the role that we play in determining our own fate.