I-Sight

You shall not hate your brother in your heart. (19:17)

One of the most difficult emotions to deal with is resentment.

Resentment can come from many different sources. It can result from someone genuinely wronging us. Or we may feel wronged by someone even though an objective third party would say that we were being over-sensitive. Resentment can come from plain old jealousy – someone is brighter than us, or seems to have an easier life, or is more successful. Or resentment can come for no good reason at all. It may result from the way that someone speaks or dresses or expresses himself. As they say in the North of England, "It’s the way he hangs his face".

The spiritual masters teach that this is the worst kind of hatred. In Hebrew it is called Sinat Chinam, literally Free Hate. Hate that has comes from no injustice, real or perceived, but just the way someone is.

"You shall not hate your brother in your heart."

In this weeks Torah portion the Torah categorically prohibits that gnawing worm called resentment.

Fine.

The Torah says that we mustn’t feel resentment. But isn’t that more easily said than done? How are we supposed to put this into action?

First of all, we cannot work on our feelings until we understand them. This requires objectivity and the help of someone who is impartial to help us objectivize our emotions. Only when we can delineate our feelings will we have a chance of changing them.

If this analysis shows that we have been genuinely wronged, the proper mode of conduct will depend on the circumstances. It may involve a direct confrontation, or a rebuke from a third party, or legal recourse in Beit Din religious court. When we act to deal positively with our resentment in one of these ways, the poison of the resentment is very often vitiated or extinguished.

However, there may be circumstances where a genuine grievance has no outside recourse and we may just have to forgive and forget. In this last scenario (and in the others too), we should remember that it is G-d who runs the world and we should analyze why G-d has put us in our present situation.

As far as jealousy is concerned, we should remember that each of us is on our own separate monorail in life. The fact that someone else has something that I don’t have, be it brains or money or looks, in no way means that they are taking away from me. The root of jealousy is a lack of trust in G-d’s Providence. Each of us is born with unique capabilities with which to fulfill our potential in this world. If G-d hasn’t given me something, it’s because I don’t need it to complete my mission on this earth.

And as far as Sinat Chinam is concerned, we should remind ourselves that we are all created in G-d’s image. If there is something that I hate about my fellow for no objective reason whatever but just because it’s “the way he hangs his face” it means that I am despising the image of G-d Himself.

However, if we look carefully with a positive eye at those whom we resent, and try and divorce our egos from our emotions, we might begin to see all kinds of positive traits that they possess.

It all depends on our I-sight.

I-Sight

You shall not hate your brother in your heart. (19:17)

One of the most difficult emotions to deal with is resentment.

Resentment can come from many different sources. It can result from someone genuinely wronging us. Or we may feel wronged by someone even though an objective third party would say that we were being over-sensitive. Resentment can come from plain old jealousy – someone is brighter than us, or seems to have an easier life, or is more successful. Or resentment can come for no good reason at all. It may result from the way that someone speaks or dresses or expresses himself. As they say in the North of England, "It’s the way he hangs his face".

The spiritual masters teach that this is the worst kind of hatred. In Hebrew it is called Sinat Chinam, literally Free Hate. Hate that has comes from no injustice, real or perceived, but just the way someone is.

"You shall not hate your brother in your heart."

In this weeks Torah portion the Torah categorically prohibits that gnawing worm called resentment.

Fine.

The Torah says that we mustn’t feel resentment. But isn’t that more easily said than done? How are we supposed to put this into action?

First of all, we cannot work on our feelings until we understand them. This requires objectivity and the help of someone who is impartial to help us objectivize our emotions. Only when we can delineate our feelings will we have a chance of changing them.

If this analysis shows that we have been genuinely wronged, the proper mode of conduct will depend on the circumstances. It may involve a direct confrontation, or a rebuke from a third party, or legal recourse in Beit Din religious court. When we act to deal positively with our resentment in one of these ways, the poison of the resentment is very often vitiated or extinguished.

However, there may be circumstances where a genuine grievance has no outside recourse and we may just have to forgive and forget. In this last scenario (and in the others too), we should remember that it is G-d who runs the world and we should analyze why G-d has put us in our present situation.

As far as jealousy is concerned, we should remember that each of us is on our own separate monorail in life. The fact that someone else has something that I don’t have, be it brains or money or looks, in no way means that they are taking away from me. The root of jealousy is a lack of trust in G-d’s Providence. Each of us is born with unique capabilities with which to fulfill our potential in this world. If G-d hasn’t given me something, it’s because I don’t need it to complete my mission on this earth.

And as far as Sinat Chinam is concerned, we should remind ourselves that we are all created in G-d’s image. If there is something that I hate about my fellow for no objective reason whatever but just because it’s “the way he hangs his face” it means that I am despising the image of G-d Himself.

However, if we look carefully with a positive eye at those whom we resent, and try and divorce our egos from our emotions, we might begin to see all kinds of positive traits that they possess.

It all depends on our I-sight.

The Prose and The Passion

"…a strange fire" (10:1)

Everything in this world is a physical parable of a spiritual reality.

Take the computer for example. The entire "miracle" of the computer is based on the numbers ‘1’ and ‘0’ placed in ever more complicated and elaborate sequences. If there’s a ‘0’ where there should be a ‘1’ or vice versa, even the simplest program will just not run. It will probably send one of those delightful error messages like, “Would you like to debug now?” No thank you, I’d like to finish this article which is already late!

It’s not immediately apparent but serving G-d is somewhat like a computer program.

In this week’s Torah portion the joyous event of the dedication of the Mishkan (a joy that Chazalcompare to the creation of Heaven and Earth) is marred by the tragic death of two of Aaron’s sons, Nadav and Avihu.

Nadav and Avihu are consumed by fire when they enter unbidden into the sanctuary of G-d to offer incense. The Torah refers to this as a "strange fire". "Strange" because they were not commanded to do so.

Rabbi Yehuda HaLevi in "Kuzari" explains that this fire represents their passion. They were passionate to come close to G-d, but they didn’t respect the boundaries that He had set for them.

The halacha is our boundary, and even when one has great passion to seek G-d, one must respect those boundaries. Rabbi Soleveitchik once said that if G-d had not given us explicit permission we would not even be able to pray to Him. What arrogance would it be for us to approach G-d? However, G-d not only allows, but even desires our prayers. Still, we must respect the distance that exists between us and G-d.

The desire for spirituality is often impatient with details, rules, regulations and procedures. In looking at the big picture one might feel that paying attention to the small details is just not very important and even distracting. What difference does it make if I recite "Shema" five minutes after the latest time? What is the problem if I flick a light switch on Shabbat?

Isn’t "passionate feeling" the most important element of spirituality?

The tragedy of Nadav and Avihu reminds us that wonderful as fiery passion is, when not grounded in submission to the Will of G-d, when it represents the exercise of ego instead of surrender, it cannot connect and ultimately will be destructive.

• Sources: thanks to Rabbi Yitzchak Breitowitz

A “Betzalel Production”

It always amazes me how many people it takes to make a movie. The end credits of a major production read like the telephone directory of a small town with hundreds of people all involved in bringing us a couple of hours of fantasy. And yet at the beginning of the film there is always one name by itself. “A Francis Ford Copolla Film” or “A “Martin Scorsese Film” or “A Steven Spielberg Production.” In spite of the myriad of workers on a film, the film is still called after its director, for it is his vision that makes the film.

Everything in this world is a marriage of form and matter. Take a spoon for example. The matter of the spoon is the metal. Its form is its shape. The form of something always reveals its purpose. The form of a spoon is that it has a handle at one end to grasp it and a receptacle at the other to contain soup, sugar and the like. The form of something always reveals its purpose, and the purpose of something ultimately reveals its spiritual dimension. Even a spoon has a spiritual side! Everything in this world reveals a marriage of the physical and the spiritual, of matter and shape, of potential and purpose.

Just as the lowest physical object unifies these two entities, so too do the highest of physical existences. The Mishkan, the Tabernacle, was one of the most spiritual physical objects that existed. It was the house in which the Shechina, the Divine Presence, would dwell.

The Mishkan was constructed by many people. Moshe called upon every G-d-fearing man and woman to assist by spinning and weaving tapestries and constructing the components of the walls of the Mishkan with their own hands. The special skill of the women was spinning goat hair for the tapestries. The hair was both fine and stiff which made it difficult to work with.

G-d gave all those who worked on the Mishkan a measure of special know-how. This supernal wisdom was not limited only to humans. Even the animals that transported the beams of the Mishkan knew which route to take and did not require guidance.

The two people in charge of building the Mishkan were Betzalel and Oholiav. G-d gave them a special degree of insight to help them fulfill their task of fashioning the vessels of the Mishkan and to form even the most delicate of patterns, all of which were necessary for the vessels to perform their allotted spiritual functions.

However, in the Torah the only one who seems to receive credit for the building of the Mishkan is Betzalel. The verses in the Torah repeat over and over “and he made it.“

The reason is that Betzalel not only exerted himself in the physical construction of the Mishkan, but he labored more than anyone else to understand the spiritual depths in each of the mystical vessels of the Mishkan. Because of this effort G-d rewarded him with the highest level of spiritual insight into the Mishkan and its implements.

Betzalel endowed the vessels of the Mishkan with lofty and holy thoughts. He was the spiritual maker of all that it contained and thus the Torah attributes the construction to Betzalel alone.

It was a “Betzalel Production.”

Taking Off Your Gloves

You hurry down the platform. You have to take the next train out of town. The train whistles. It’s about to leave. To open the door of the carriage you need to remove your glove. As you do so, the glove slips from your grasp, floats neatly between the bottom of the train and the platform, and lands on the track. There’s nothing you can do. Either you lose the train and save the glove, or lose the glove and catch the train.

What would you do? Miss the train and save the glove? Or save the glove and miss the train? Well, this is what one of the great figures of the Mussar movement did:

He took off his other glove and threw it under the track.

If you look in the written Torah you’ll be hard pressed to find a single mention of the word ‘rights’. Obligations – of these, the Torah is full. Obligations of a master to a slave; the obligations of a child to its parents; of a pupil to his teacher and vice versa; of a community to the poor; of the individual to the community; obligations to the orphaned, to the sick, to the convert; the obligations of man to G-d. ‘Rights’, however, are something that the Torah hardly mentions. Why?

You can construct a legal system that spells out people’s rights ("…all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights…" ) or you can write a code, like the written Torah, that spells out their obligations. You’ll get to the same place. The end result will be the same because to the extent that you have obligations you don’t need rights, and vice versa. The end result will be the same.

With one big difference.

If you base a system of law on rights you turn people into takers; if you base it on obligations you turn them into givers.

The Torah wants to create a nation of givers, a nation who will throw the other glove under the train so the person who finds it will have another to complete the pair.

The Dust of Greatness

"Come, blessed of G-d" (24:31)

About three hundred years ago, in the 1960’s there was a TV hairspray commercial whose slogan was, "The closer you get, the better she looks!" Judging by the model’s hairdo, this particular hairspray made motorcycle crash-helmets redundant. (Could be they were pitching their sales at Hell’s Angels?)

It always struck me that the closer you got to the rich and the beautiful, the less and less better they looked.

Unlike the denizens of Hollywood, to whom proximity usually reveals nothing but larger and larger flaws, the privilege of spending time with a true Torah Sage demonstrates the closer you get – the better they look.

Recently we experienced the passing of one of the greatest Rabbis of our age, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef,zatzal. Listening to the eulogies of this extraordinary man reminded me of the time I met Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach, zatzal. The meeting cannot have lasted more than five minutes. My grasp of Hebrew at the time was negligible. However, when I left the room I felt like a different person. It was nothing he had said. He had barely looked at me. It came from merely being in his presence. I left his room with the dust of greatness on me.

The four species of Succot – the palm frond, the etrog, the willow and the myrtle – represent four kinds of Jewish people. The etrog has a beautiful aroma and it tastes good. The etrog symbolizes a Jew who has both Torah and mitzvot. The palm tree yields dates, which taste good, but the tree has no aroma. This symbolizes the Jew who has Torah but no mitzvot. The myrtle has a beautiful aroma, but it has no taste. This is the Jew who has mitzvot but no Torah. And finally, the willow, which has neither taste nor aroma. This is the Jew who has neither Torah nor mitzvot. Without this willow, however, one cannot perform the mitzvah of the four species – and without the "willow-Jew" the Jewish People is not the Jewish People. It is not Klal Yisrael.

The willow is essential to the wholeness of the Jewish People. By itself, however, it has little or nothing to recommend it. Why then is the lowly willow accorded a special day of its own during Succot on Hoshana Rabba? Why does the willow, the least auspicious of the four species, have its own day? There is no â€˜Etrog Day’ or â€˜Lulav Day’ during Succot. What is so special about the willow that it merits its own special day?

Everything in this world recognizes itself by its opposite. A pigmy can never understand what small is until he meets a Watussi giant. And someone on a low spiritual level can only recognize where he is when he meets someone great.

When Lavan saw Eliezer he mistook him for Avraham Avinu. Eliezer was no Avraham Avinu, but to Lavan he was a spiritual giant. Through his encounter with Eliezer, Lavan recognized his own lowliness, and in doing so he was elevated to a point where his words had the power to change reality. For when Lavan said, "Come, blessed of G-d," Eliezer emerged from the curse of being a descendent of Canaan, and became in truth a baruch, "blessed."

The same is true of the willow. By being bound together with the other species and recognizing its lowliness, it is elevated to the point that it has a power of its own, distinct from its role of completing the four species. The discovery of true self that comes through self-effacement and humility makes the willow worthy to have its own day in the festival.

Few things can be more depressing than realizing exactly how low we are spiritually, how far we are from where G-d wants us to be, how far we are from where we ourselves want to be.

And, yet, that "willow moment" can unlock the key to true spiritual power.

• Sources: based on the Kotzker Rebbe quoted by the Shem MiShmuel in his essays on Hoshana Rabba

We Have The Technology

"They said to one another, ‘Come, let us make bricks and burn them in fire.’ And the brick served them as stone, and the lime served them as mortar." (11:3)

Technology is the conceit of the modern world.

The GPS system in our car allows us to receive satellite signals locating our position to within six feet anywhere on the planet. Behind the helm of our trusty gleaming V-8, we are the kings of the road. Previous generations pale into technological primitives.

We have the technology.

With a cellular phone we can call from the desert, from the top of a mountain, from the middle of nowhere, and communicate to anywhere in the world. And what are those deathless words that we wish to communicate across the tens of thousands of miles?

"Hi! Guess where I am!"

Now that’s what I call progress.

We may know where our car is better than ever before, but when it comes to knowing where weourselves are, that’s a different story.

If we had developed in any real sense over the last couple of thousand years, would we still find anything of value in Shakespeare? If the human spirit had undergone a comparable degree of progress to technology, the poetry and art of those who died hundreds of years ago should seem impossibly quaint to the modern eye. If we were really more advanced, no one should be in the slightest bit interested in John Donne, Cervantes, Sophocles, Pascal, Mozart or Boticelli – except for historians. And yet, we recognize that our generation is hard put to come anywhere close to these artists.

Technology is an apology for our feelings of inferiority when we compare ourselves to our forebears. Our axiom is, "We may have less to say, but we can say it from the middle of nowhere." Cold comfort is better than none.

At the end of this week’s Torah portion there is a description of the attempt of the Generation of Dispersion (Dor Hapalaga) to build a tower that reached into the sky.

“They said to one another, ‘Come, let us make bricks and burn them in fire.’ And the brick served them as stone, and the lime served them as mortar.”

Rashi comments: “In Babylon there were no stones…”

Because there were no stones in Babylon, they were forced to apply technology and invent the brick. Immediately following this verse they say, "Come, let’s build a city and a tower with its top in the heavens." They wanted to make a tower to challenge G-d.

This is a seeming non-sequitur. What does the lack of stones in Babylon have to do with building a city and a tower to challenge G-d? Why is making bricks a harbinger of incipient rebellion?

The Dor Hapalaga was intoxicated with technology. Bricks were the Babylonian equivalent of a Saturn V rocket. Take some mud, bake it and voila! Genius. If Man can take mud and turn it into towers and spires and palaces, what can he not do? Is there a limit to his powers?

From this kind of thinking there is a very small step for Mankind to think that they can dispense with G-d completely.

"Let us build and make for us a name.”

We have the technology.

• Sources: Rabbi Yosef Chaim Sonnenfeld, Rabbi Yissochar Frand