Sukkot and the Quality of Life

Never-ending ambitions keep the world spinning hysterically. We live and strive for attainments in the future, while the achievements and successes of the past go by the wayside, forgotten.

Have you ever noticed how difficult it is to enjoy a college diploma, a friend, a business success, your spouse or even your child?

Try it. Try spending some time just enjoying what you have. Instead of looking for things to do, just sit and appreciate.

You tried it? Good! How long did it last – five minutes, 15 maybe?

It’s difficult. And the more we strive for future goals, the harder it gets to appreciate past successes. Of course, goals are great and we should always strive higher. But do we sufficiently appreciate what we’ve already achieved?

We attain one goal, and then we want more and more. It doesn’t stop even when we’ve achieved our biggest dream. It only stops … when we say “stop!”

Sukkot is the holiday when we say “stop.” Sukkot is the “happiness” holiday – which is really the “appreciation” holiday. It is the essence of everything we are striving for: meaning, fulfillment, purpose, happiness.

Status Simple

"Pinchas… son of Aaron, the Kohen" (25:11)

The Guardian newspaper in England has just run a preview of a bio-pic of the life of Princess Diana. With all its razzle-dazzle, Hollywood could not have outglitzed this movie.

I remember well the outpouring of grief when she died. That people should mourn a life cut off in its prime is understandable. What was remarkable, however, was the spectacle of a world rending its clothes and beating its breast at the demise of a self-confessed adulteress. Youth, beauty and royalty apparently gilds marital treachery and turns it into the stuff of true life romance.

This singular flood of tears, however, was not a mere aberration of public sense and sensibility. From time immemorial there has existed such a double standard in society. Throughout history, kings have exercised what the French in their exquisitely delicate manner call the droit de seigneur – "the right of the master."This was the accepted custom of the ruler to claim the first night of a girl’s marriage.

In this week’s Torah portion, Pinchas puts an end to a plague which has killed 24,000. The cause of this plague was an orgy of immorality with the women of Midian and Moav. Instead of applauding his action, however, the people accused him of murder. It’s interesting that the accusation leveled at him is that ‘this grandson of someone who fattened calves to be calves to be sacrificed to idols’ had the gall to kill a prince of Israel. If you think about it, what does the social status of Pinchas have to do with whether his actions were justified or not?

Adultery amongst the hoi-poloi is as gilded as romance amongst the glitterati. Status makes everything permissible.

Street Heater

"Miriam and Aharon spoke against Moshe regarding the Cushite woman that he had married." (12:1)

Imagine a Native American who has spent all his life on the reserve in Canyon de Chelly, Arizona, finding himself on the East Side of New York City around 29th and Lex. He walks down the street and stops. His attention is riveted on a nearby window. Straddling the window is a rectangular metal box about three feet long by eighteen inches high. It blasts out hot air, chugging away in a relentless mechanical symphony. He lifts his eyes. Brownstone apartments rear upwards to the sky. And in each and every window he sees the same metal boxes. Hundreds of them. All are belching out hot air into the humid Manhattan sky.

He thinks to himself, "These white men must sure love the heat. It must be 102° and they still put these contraptions in their windows to heat the street!"

Sometimes an air conditioner can look like a street heater.

When Miriam found out that Moshe had separated from his wife, she thought that he had become conceited. She thought that Moshe viewed himself as being so close to G-d that he had risen beyond a normal marital relationship. She thought that this self-imposed monasticism was a product of an inflated ego. Of course, what would be considered conceit in Moshe would to us appear humility beyond anything we have ever seen or experienced. We have no parameters to equate our concepts of conceit and humility to Moshe. But, on that exalted level, Miriam thought that Moshe had succumbed to pride.

But how could Miriam have thought that Moshe was acting out of pride? The Torah itself calls Moshe the "humblest of all men." Surely Miriam knew the Torah’s evaluation of Moshe. How could Miriam have even suspected his motives?

Moshe may have been the humblest of all men, but he wasn’t a shlepper. Being humble doesn’t mean walking around with a hunched back and a miserable look on your face. Moshe knew that he was the king. But he also knew that compared to G-d, he was nothing. His humility lay in understanding, like no man before or since, exactly how small he was compared to G-d. It was because Moshe worked on himself to this point that G-d concretized his awareness by speaking to him ‘face to face.’ Then Moshe’s humility became visceral. He could ‘see’ how small he was.

Humility is not something you can judge from the outside. Sometimes someone may seem very humble, but inside they are watching everyone watching them being humble. They are starring in their own mental movie called: "A Life of Total Humility." On the other hand, a king may appear to behave in a rather grand fashion, whereas inside he genuinely sees himself as totally unworthy.

Sometimes things aren’t quite the way they seem. Sometimes a cool air conditioner can look like a street heater blasting out its own hot air.

Hidden Miracles

“If you walk in My laws…” (26:3)

The purpose of this world is to be a factory to produce a product called Olam Haba – the World-to-Come.

That is our only target, and the mitzvot our only passport.

However, you can read the Torah from cover to cover and you won’t find one specific promise about the reward for keeping the mitzvot in the next world. Promises of reward in this world abound. We are promised the rains in their time. The land will give its produce and the trees will bear fruit. There will be an abundance of food that we will eat to satiety. We will dwell securely in our land. No one will walk down a dark street and be frightened. No one will worry about sending his children off on the bus in the morning. There will be abundance and peace.

Why is it that the Torah makes no open promises about the reward for keeping the mitzvot in the next world, but is replete with details of their reward in this existence?

All reward and punishment in this world is through hidden miracles. When a person eats bacon or a cheeseburger and dies prematurely, nobody knows that he died because he ate bacon or a cheeseburger. People die at his age even when they don’t eat bacon or cheeseburgers. They die younger.

A person gives tzedaka and becomes rich. You don’t see that he became rich because he gavetzedaka. There are plenty of rich people who don’t give tzedaka – they inherited it or they won the sweepstake. The hidden miracle is that this person wasn’t destined to become rich or wasn’t supposed to die young, but because he gave tzedaka or because he ate the bacon or cheeseburger, G-d changed this person’s destiny. It’s miraculous, but it’s hidden. It looks like nature, but if it were actually the work of nature, then nothing that a person did in this world could have any effect on him. For a person is born under a certain mazal, a certain "destiny", and without the intervention of an outside force – the hidden miracle – nothing that a person did, whether for good or bad, would have any repercussions in this world.

That’s why the Torah speaks at great length about the outcome of the performance or non-performance of the mitzvot in this world. For it is truly miraculous that our actions should affect anything in this world, a world that, aside from these hidden miracles, is run by a system of mazaland nature.

However, as far as the next world is concerned, it’s obvious that our actions will have repercussions there. The Torah doesn’t need to stress the reward and punishment in that existence because it’s obvious that people who engage in spiritual pursuits and serve G-d faithfully should receive spiritual rewards. But it is certainly not natural that people who are immersed in the work of the spirit, the study of Torah and the performance of mitzvot should receive their reward in this world as well. Thus the Torah stresses the reward for keeping the mitzvot in this world because that is something that no one could surmise without being told of its existence.

Hidden Miracles

“If you walk in My laws…” (26:3)

The purpose of this world is to be a factory to produce a product called Olam Haba – the World-to-Come.

That is our only target, and the mitzvot our only passport.

However, you can read the Torah from cover to cover and you won’t find one specific promise about the reward for keeping the mitzvot in the next world. Promises of reward in this world abound. We are promised the rains in their time. The land will give its produce and the trees will bear fruit. There will be an abundance of food that we will eat to satiety. We will dwell securely in our land. No one will walk down a dark street and be frightened. No one will worry about sending his children off on the bus in the morning. There will be abundance and peace.

Why is it that the Torah makes no open promises about the reward for keeping the mitzvot in the next world, but is replete with details of their reward in this existence?

All reward and punishment in this world is through hidden miracles. When a person eats bacon or a cheeseburger and dies prematurely, nobody knows that he died because he ate bacon or a cheeseburger. People die at his age even when they don’t eat bacon or cheeseburgers. They die younger.

A person gives tzedaka and becomes rich. You don’t see that he became rich because he gavetzedaka. There are plenty of rich people who don’t give tzedaka – they inherited it or they won the sweepstake. The hidden miracle is that this person wasn’t destined to become rich or wasn’t supposed to die young, but because he gave tzedaka or because he ate the bacon or cheeseburger, G-d changed this person’s destiny. It’s miraculous, but it’s hidden. It looks like nature, but if it were actually the work of nature, then nothing that a person did in this world could have any effect on him. For a person is born under a certain mazal, a certain "destiny", and without the intervention of an outside force – the hidden miracle – nothing that a person did, whether for good or bad, would have any repercussions in this world.

That’s why the Torah speaks at great length about the outcome of the performance or non-performance of the mitzvot in this world. For it is truly miraculous that our actions should affect anything in this world, a world that, aside from these hidden miracles, is run by a system of mazaland nature.

However, as far as the next world is concerned, it’s obvious that our actions will have repercussions there. The Torah doesn’t need to stress the reward and punishment in that existence because it’s obvious that people who engage in spiritual pursuits and serve G-d faithfully should receive spiritual rewards. But it is certainly not natural that people who are immersed in the work of the spirit, the study of Torah and the performance of mitzvot should receive their reward in this world as well. Thus the Torah stresses the reward for keeping the mitzvot in this world because that is something that no one could surmise without being told of its existence.

The Right Man For The Job

"Moshe said to Aharon, ‘Come near to the Altar’…" (9:7)

Bungee-jumping, hang-gliding, free-fall parachuting, and riding over Niagara Fallsin a beer barrel all share one thing in common. You have to be absolutely meshuga to do them.

There’s a big difference between being fearless and being foolhardy.

However, there are times when even being afraid is an advantage. The Chafetz Chaim once decided that a particular talmid should take a vacant post as the Rabbi in distant community. Thetalmid was reluctant to go. He told the Chafetz Chaim he was afraid of the responsibility of being the only halachic authority for an entire community. The Chafetz Chaim replied to him, "Should I send someone who’s not afraid?"

Sometimes being afraid doesn’t disqualify someone from being the right man or woman for the job. Sometimes it’s the essential quality.

Moshe had to tell Aharon to "Come near to the altar". Rashi says that Aaron was embarrassed and afraid to approach the altar. Moshe told him not to be afraid, for it was precisely Aaron’s quality of awe which qualified him to be the Kohen Gadol.

When we want to become closer to G‑d and serve Him with more conviction and faithfulness, we could be embarrassed by our inadequacies. We might feel afraid, incapable of such a task. "Who am I to serve G-d?" we can think to ourselves. It is precisely that quality of self-effacement, of fear, which is the pre-requisite to be ‘the right man for the job".

The Biggest Bar-B-Q In The World

"When a man among you brings an offering…" (1:2)

Imagine you’re an alien traveler flying over Jerusalem some two and a half thousand years ago.

Your intergalactic GPS detects a beautiful building coming up on the horizon. Opening your "Earth on five dollars-a-day", you read about what you’re seeing. "The Beit Hamikdash is the most spiritual place on earth." Something doesn’t seem quite accurate about this description because everywhere you aim your scanner all you can see are very physical things.

For a start, animals are being slaughtered, dissected and burned on what looks like the world’s biggest bar-b-q. Wine is being poured down two holes on top of a square monolith on which the meat is being burned. Nearby, bread is being baked. Oil is being mixed with flour and fried in open pans. There are animals in pens, along with birds. Everywhere there are all kinds of cooking utensils. Men are washing their hands and feet. There is a column of black smoke rising perpendicularly into the sky.

This is spirituality?

You make a mental note to write to the editors of "Earth on five-dollars-a-day" that their description of this tourist spot is way off the mark.

Our intergalactic traveler could be forgiven for mistaking what he saw, for indeed the Beit Hamikdash ostensibly was a very physical place. Our fearless voyager, however, failed to notice a key item in the Beit Hamikdash – the Aron, the Holy Ark. Inside the Ark was the Torah. It was only through the Holy Torah that the Divine Presence rested on the Beit Hamikdash and turned the most physical of places into the most spiritual.

The Beit Hamikdash is a microcosm of the Universe, and a macrocosm of the body of a human. If you look at a person he seems to be a very physical thing. He consists of sinew and flesh, fluids and membrane. And yet, he is so much more.

Just as the Torah caused the Divine Presence to rest on the Beit Hamikdash and the Mishkan, so similarly the Torah turns flesh and blood into a dwelling place for the Most High.

The Ultimate Labor Saver

"Six days shall labor be done, and the seventh day will be for you holy…" (35:2)

For as long as I can remember, one of society’s most cherished dreams has been a robot that gets all your work done for you.

In the late fifties we were regaled with fanciful concoctions of tin cans that looked like Tin-Man-rejects from "The Wizard of Oz", complete with the apron and a happy mechanical smile. In the sixties, wacky inventors produced little motorized "home-puppies" that scooted around cleaning the carpet and swept the floors. Nowadays robotics has reached amazing levels. Watching a car being assembled today is an eerie experience with nary a human in sight. (Except of course to execute the mandatory strike for shorter hours and better working conditions.)

I want to let you into a secret. The "Ultimate Labor Savor" has been in existence for over three thousand years. The trouble is that many people don’t know how to operate it.

"Six days shall labor be done, and the seventh day will be for you holy…"

The grammar of this verse is unusual. The Torah doesn’t say you can do labor for six days, rather it expresses itself in the passive, "labor shall be done."

When we keep Shabbat, G-d’s blessings rest on all our workday efforts. If you’re a creative writer for an ad agency, suddenly you’ll find a brilliant new concept that just wafts into your consciousness from out of nowhere on Tuesday morning. If you’re a cabinetmaker, all the mortises that you cut are a perfect fit. If you’re a pilot, you’ll find that there’s a break in the weather allowing you a landing-window at your destination, avoiding a three-hour delay and a few hundred irate passengers. The list is as endless as the activities of man. When we keep Shabbat properly, even if you don’t overly exert ourselves, we will find that things just seem to get done, that little bit quicker and better.

Shabbat is the Ultimate Labor Saver.

The Lair Of The Lion

A while ago, a well-know Israeli daily newspaper, not known for its sympathy to religion, published a cartoon. In the cartoon, a man was having a dream. Out of his head, came the statutory "think-bubbles". The bubbles got larger and larger until the following scene unraveled. The man saw himself ‘Upstairs’ being questioned by angels with wings wearing what looked suspiciously like black hats: "But why didn’t you keep Shabbat?" they asked. "You knew there was a thing called Shabbat, didn’t you? What about Kashrut? You knew there was something called Kashrut?"

In the following bubble, the man wakes up in a cold sweat. Then a close-up on his face."Maybe they’re right!" He says.

Some time ago, a baby-food company recalled tens of thousands of its products because some lunatic had put glass in some of them. Was there anyone who thought "Well, the chances of getting the one with the glass is so minuscule – thousands and thousands to one. I’ll just go right ahead and feed this apple puree to my little six-month old baby?!"

If there were five hundred bottles of cola on a table in front of you and you knew one of them was poisoned, would you drink any of them? Is there anyone in the world who would pause, way up the statistical probabilities, and say ‘Well, it’s such a small chance…"

When faced with even the smallest possibility of an enormous danger, not even the longest odds in the world encourage us to take a chance.

So why isn’t everyone religious?

Why don’t people think like this: "What if those religious fanatics are right? After all, even if they’re wrong, so at least I’ll have had a wonderfully rich and fulfilling life, a faithful wife and a lovely family, etc. etc. But what if they’re right and I’m wrong? I’m going to lose out on something eternal. I’m going to get to the next world and I won’t have the price of admission. I won’t be able to get even a cheap seat! I’ll be out in the middle of a cosmic ocean with no direction home. Maybe they’re right! Maybe it’s all true. Maybe there is a World-to-Come. Maybe I will have to give an account in front of the real ‘Supreme Court’. So you know what? I’ll be religious just in case! Better safe than sorry!"

Why don’t people think like this? What’s the difference between a bottle of baby food and Judaism?

In this week’s Torah portion, the Torah starts a lengthy description of the Mishkan. The sheer volume of this account outweighs almost every subject in the Torah. What was the Mishkan and why was it so special that it merits such voluminous expanse in the Book where nothing is merely descriptive and there is no place for sheer literary embellishment?

The word Mishkancomes from the word ‘to dwell’. It was the place that G-d ‘dwelled’ in this lower world. But if G-d is the place of the world – the world is within Him – how can a mere building house He whose glory fills the universe? How can the Omnipresent have a ‘house’?

There is a difference between existence and presence. G-d exists equally everywhere. He is no more in one place than another, because there can be no place where He is not. He is the place of the world. Anywhere where He is not cannot exist, by definition. Rather, the Mishkan and the Beit Hamikdash (HolyTemple) were places where the presence of G-d was palpable. You could see He was there.

Imagine sitting at a computer. You are typing away, lost in the great American/British/Israeli novel. Unbeknownst to you, a lion enters your room. It’s a very quiet, well-behaved lion, and you carry on typing in blissful ignorance.

The existence of the lion is unaltered by whether you carry on typing or you turn around and give yourself a bit of a surprise. However, the presence of the lion has everything to do with whether you turn around or not.

The Mishkan allowed one to see and fear the lion, as it were. G-d’s presence there was palpable.

The word for ‘sight’ in Hebrew is from the same root as ‘fear’ – yirah. What is the connection between seeing and fearing? A person only fears what he can see. Intellectual concepts don’t frighten us. The biggest proof is that we don’t fear G-d. Even if we’re religious and we know that there is a World-to-Come, a cosmic day of reckoning, even though we know these things clearly, we can’t see them, and so we don’t really fear. Fear comes only from seeing the Lion. Going into the Mishkan was like going into the lion’s lair.