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God Waits in the Desert

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The Talmud also writes there that the mouth of a fetus is compared to a strand of hair. This teaches that one’s spiritual level depends on what he says. In Tehillim we find, “I believed as I speak” — words of emunah build one’s emunah and bitachon and draws him near to God. But speaking profane words distances one from the purpose of creation. How much more so do words of slander and falsehood! The verse commands, ‘‫ — מדבר שקר תרחק‬ Distance yourself from falsehood.’” Rav Zusia of Anapoli, zy”a, interpreted this phrase in a novel way: “If you speak falsehood, you will be distanced from God!”

Daf Yomi Digest
Stories Off the Daf
“The Eyes, the Nose and the Mouth”
Niddah 25

“They went down to the pit alive” (Bamidbar 16:30) – even in the grave they think they are alive. There is a blessing contained in “They went down to the pit alive,” as with “the sons of Korach did not die,” (Ibid. 26:11.) – “a place was established for them (In Gehinom “the pit,” Megilla 14a.) and they repented.” For teshuva, repentance, is effective only while one is still alive. This, then, is the blessing – that even in the pit they will live, and they will be able to effect teshuva.

“Today’s Day”
Tuesday, Sivan 26, 5703
Torah lessons: Chumash: Korach, Shlishi with Rashi
Tehillim: 119, 97 to end.
Compiled and arranged by the Lubavitcher Rebbe
Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, of righteous memory, in 5703 (1943)
from the talks and letters of the sixth Chabad Rebbe
Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, of righteous memory
Translated by Yitschak Meir Kagan

I sometimes get kind of cranky about a life of faith. I sometimes forget about what I’ve already learned about faith and trust. I’ve recently been reminded of something I first read on Derek Leman’s blog, but the reminder didn’t come from Derek:

The call of faith is hard, the task seems impossible, the place we are called to seems desolate, the day of regeneration seems far in the future, but this faith is its own reward during the long delay.

I’m reminded that we’re to have faith in the desert. But while it’s easy to declare that the desert represents the faithless world we live in, in fact, the desert is inside of us each time we doubt.

Each time I doubt.

Ironically, the desert is a good place to be when I’m in doubt. There are few distractions. I imagine a sandstorm. The wind is hot. I have coverings over most of my body including around my eyes so I’m not blinded by the sand. The sun is obscured from my vision as a hazy, blurry ball of yellow and white but the power of its heat is oppressive.

And there is only me and the wind and the sand and the heat and somewhere beyond, the vast reaches of the desert, all but lifeless.

And there is God.

He’s not actually apparent. I talk to Him, though. I complain to Him. I wonder where He is. I imagine that He’s contracted Himself; He’s withdrawn from the part of the universe where I live, He’s left me to swing in the breeze or in this case, the wind and sand.

Not really, of course. The reality of His existence is that He’s always “standing at my shoulder” so to speak, never far away at all, no matter how transparent He seems to be to my failing perceptions. But it’s as if He has withdrawn, like a silent lover who has backed away in order to give me time to process some sort of quarrel between us.

Not that He’s ever argued with me. I do all the arguing. That is, until I realize He has left me and I am utterly alone and abandoned in the desert of my soul.

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning?
O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer,
and by night, but I find no rest. –Psalm 22:1-2 (ESV)

The wonderful thing about being alone is that you have time to think. There are no distractions, not even the presence of God (though He is still present). The desert is comforting, even the heat is welcome; the sweat, the smell of dry things. There is still rock beneath my feet so my footing is sound.

The quote from Derek’s blog says in part, “but this faith is its own reward during the long delay.” Faith is a companion in the desolation, a faint voice I can just barely hear over the banshee winds. Though I feel as if the God in whom I have faith is “far off and the road to reach him is long” and arduous, I am also reminded that my desert can be watered and flourish, but only when I’m ready to return. Only when I want to begin the journey again (or is this part of the journey?).

He leads me beside still waters.
He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths of righteousness
for his name’s sake.
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me. –Psalm 23:2-3 (ESV)

But that’s only a mirage which has yet to arrive; an oasis that will only come when the Messiah does, or when my faith in the Messiah returns.

This week’s Torah portion records the failure of the Children of Israel to realize the promise and the dream. They lack faith and do not take possession of the land of Canaan. They are condemned to wander the vast wilderness for forty years, dying one by one along the way. Miriam, Aaron, and even finally Moses all perish. Only Joshua and Caleb from that generation survive and only because of steadfast faith and trust.

The very last verses of the Parashah say this:

The Lord said to Moses as follows: Speak to the Israelite people and instruct them to make for themselves fringes on the corners of their garments throughout the ages; let them attach a cord of blue to the fringe at each corner. That shall be your fringe; look at it and recall all the commandments of the Lord and observe them, so that you do not follow your heart and eyes in your lustful urge. Thus you shall be reminded to observe all My commandments and to be holy to your God. I the Lord am your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to be your God: I, the Lord your God. –Numbers 15:37-41 (JPS Tanakh)

The commandment of tzitzit is directly connected back to failure because man needs tangible reminders of an intangible God. Faith and trust are shadows in the mist as well, but the tzitzit are real enough. They are not faith, but for the Children of Israel, they serve as a visible reminder that God is as near as the four corners of their garments.

Christians don’t wear tzitzit since, among other things, the failure to possess the land and the subsequent possession of Israel by the Jewish people are commandments for the Jews, not for us. However, our need for faith and trust is the same. Our need to be reminded of God is the same. Where is God when we need Him? He’s standing apart, giving us time to realize we need to return to Him; letting us stew in our graves while we decide to repent and live.

A life of faith isn’t all that easy. It’s not even so much that the world around me thinks I’m a superstitious fool for believing in the providence of a God that I cannot see and touch and who allows horror and tragedy to abound on his earth while we believers declare His undying love for humanity. It’s the desert inside where the battle is fought. It’s where I fight with God. It’s where I fight with myself. It’s where I have one lover’s quarrel after another with the One who is the lover of my soul.

So He periodically leaves me alone in the desert with the wind and the sand and the heat. But he provides me with solid rock to walk on so I won’t lose my footing or my way.

The desert is a good place for me to ponder my lot and my fate. Occasionally the wind dies down a bit and I’m temporarily given a small sheep to tend, so I have something else to care for. This is God reminder that He cares for me in the same way.

And God waits at a distance, but always watching me, ready to return to my side in an instant should I but say the word.

And He waits.

Torah Portion

Shlach: The Miraculous Messenger

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The Torah portion of Shlach relates how the men sent to spy out Eretz Yisrael returned and reported that the country was unconquerable. The Jewish people, they said, would be unable to enter the land, since “The inhabitants of the land are mighty.” (Bamidbar 13:28.)

Furthermore, say our Sages, (Sotah 35a.) the spies went so far as to say that even G-d would not be able to wrest the land from its inhabitants. Their words caused great consternation among the Jews, who feared that they would be unable to enter Eretz Yisrael.

How was it possible for the spies to mislead the Jewish people and convince them that even G-d could not help them, when the Jews themselves had constantly witnessed the miracles performed on their behalf, e.g., G-d provided their daily food and drink in a miraculous manner — manna from heaven and water from Miriam’s well.

Commentary on Torah Portion Shlach
from “The Chassidic Dimension” series
Based on Likkutei Sichos Vol. XVIII, pp. 171-174
and the teachings of the Lubavitcher Rebbe
Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson
Chabad.org

Like the logic applied in our initial conundrum, the spies argued that after God created the laws of nature, He ruled that even He Himself would not be able to change those laws. God bound His own hands, as it were, by means of the laws that He Himself instituted. Until now, God’s leadership in the wilderness had been one of supernatural miracles that defied the laws of nature again and again. It was clear though that entering thelandofIsrael, for all its holiness, meant entering the confines of nature and living by its laws. This was why the ten spies thought that the Jewish people could not overcome the giants who lived in the land. They believed that God had indeed created a rock that could not be lifted. Moses himself used this argument in his prayer asking for God’s forgiveness, saying that destroying the Jewish people, God forbid, for their sin, would be proof for the surrounding nations of the erroneous claim that “God lacked the ability to bring this nation to the land which He swore to them…” (Numbers 16:14-15).

Joshua and Caleb, the remaining two spies, also saw that conquering the land was a supernatural task, but they said, “Yes, God can create such a rock that He cannot lift, but He can still decide to pick it up if He wants to.” They realized that on entering theHoly Land, God could paradoxically empower the Jewish people themselves with supernatural powers and this would become their very nature.

-Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh
“The Rock that God Can Carry”
Commentary on Torah Portion Shlach
Wonders from Your Torah

I hadn’t heard this particular perspective on the “sin of the ten spies” before and that they believed that there was “a rock that God Himself couldn’t lift,” so to speak. I did however, realize that anyone who is “sent out” for a particular purpose is called “shlach,” including us.

I know it doesn’t sound like these two things are connected, but I can explain.

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” –Matthew 28:19-20 (ESV)

WalkingThat command was originally given by the Master to the “eleven disciples (who) went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them.” (v16) However, it has been inherited by every disciple who is called by his name, Jew and Gentile alike, and we have carried that mission upon us for nearly 2,000 years.

How are we doing so far?

Actually, not that bad. But we could be better, especially in the present age. It’s not so much that the Good News of Jesus Christ isn’t being spread to the four corners of the earth and that the vast, vast majority of the human race hasn’t heard of God, the Bible, and Jesus. They certainly have heard the Good News, however many of those people; perhaps most of those people, don’t see it as “good news” at all. Many people experience Christianity as “bad news.” They see us as superstitious, as old fashioned, as out of touch, as bigots, sexist, racist, anti-gay, anti-political correctness, anti-progressive.

Some of that is true, whether we intend it to be or not. Where have we gone wrong?

In the days of Moses, the ten spies gave an “evil report,” not because they were dumb or evil or cowards, but because they believed that the supernatural power of God would not go with them when they entered the land of Canaan. They believed that without the power of God, in terms of mere human strength, they would have no chance at defeating the mighty giants of the land. They felt abandoned and afraid.

Every time I read the words of “the great commission” as recorded in Matthew 28:19-20, I always puzzled over Christ’s final statement:

“And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Now I realize what he was trying to say. He was trying to say that his disciples would not be alone in the enormous mission of taking the word of the Jewish Messiah to the nations of the world. Remember, nothing like that had even been dreamed of before let alone attempted. In a world full of false gods and polytheistic idol worshipers, how would the Word of the One God of Israel and the Messiah King of the Jews be received by the Gentiles? Would they listen to the Gospel message at all, or listen and then merely incorporate God into their panthenon of other gods, worshiping the God of Heaven as if he were just another idol of stone, wood, or bronze?

The Bible didn’t record the reaction of Christ’s “great commission” but it would be another fifteen years or so before any one of them would attempt to respond. Even then, Peter needed the prompting of not only a vision on a rooftop (Acts 10:9-16), but that of a messengers sent by the God-fearing Roman Cornelius with an unusual request. (Acts 10:17-23). The rest of this chapter in Acts tells the tale of God showing just how possible it was to carry the message of the Messiah to the Gentiles and how indeed, many Gentiles were eager to hear it.

Receiving the SpiritAnd in seeing that the Gentiles could receive the Holy Spirit, even as the Jews had already done (Acts 10:44-48), it was confirmed that the supernatural power of the Spirit of Messiah was with them “always, to the end of the age.”

That age hasn’t expired yet and neither has our calling. Not all of us enter what the church calls “the mission field” in a formal sense, but in truth, we are all “missionaries” or “sent ones.” We are shlach in the way we live our lives. Every word we speak and every action we take tells the tale of our Lord and Master, for good or for ill. Every deed of honor and praise glorifies the Name of God, and every mistake and mean-spirited act we commit drags that Name through the mud.

Joshua and Caleb understood that God would enable the Israelites to take the land, not by a series of supernatural miracles, but by making the people of Israel the miracle. We see in the book of Joshua and beyond how true this was. They didn’t have to believe in the miracles. They just needed faith in God. That first generation out of Egypt couldn’t overcome their “slave mentality” and when faced with such challenges, they balked. They didn’t have faith in themselves, let alone a God they felt would cease to provide protection from Heaven (I know, I’m applying midrash here, but I think it fits).

As believers and disciples of the Jewish Messiah, our teacher, our Master, and our King, what have we learned, not only from his lessons but from the lesson of the Shlach among the Israelites? Jesus already said that he would continue to be with us for the amount of time it takes to fulfill the directive to spread the Word of hope. He asks us to have faith. Faith in our Master, faith in the One Holy God of Israel…and faith in ourselves.

We see from the Biblical record that the taking of Canaan and the forging of Israel was no easy task, even though God was with the Children of Jacob. We see from the record of Paul’s letters that even though he was personally comissioned by the Messiah to be the “shlach to the Gentiles,” his task was at times brutally difficult. Our tasks are not easy, either. Living a life of faith and swimming against the tide or a world determined to deny God never is. We are reviled, called foul names, laughed at, ridiculed, and that’s only in the western nations. In other parts of the world, Christians are raped, beaten, tortured, and murdered for the sake of Jesus Christ. Under such terrific pressure, our sin is never in doing our best and failing, but only in failing to try.

“In fact, the spies’ sin, in fact any sin, can be understood using the same principles just applied. Sin is like a rock that by nature cannot be “lifted,” that is forgiven…But we know that even after sin, God remains open to teshuvah (repentance and return to God).”

-Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh

“You do not always succeed, but you always have to try.”

-Gutman Locks
“Tefillin After 72 Years”
Stories of the Holocaust series
Chabad.org

A life of faith and miracles isn’t begun by waiting for God to make the first move. He’s waiting for us. So is everyone else. You can be the answer to someone’s prayer. All you have to do is try.

Good Shabbos.

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Considering Life and Randomness

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Despair is a cheap excuse for avoiding one’s purpose in life. And a sense of purpose is the best way to avoid despair.

-Rabbi Tzvi Freeman from his book
Bringing Heaven Down to Earth
quoted from sichosinenglish.org

A rabbi was once called to a hospital to see a Jewish teenager who was suicidal. Feeling that he was a good-for-nothing who could not get anything right, the boy had attempted to take his own life. But even his suicide attempt failed. Seeing that he was Jewish, the hospital staff called the rabbi to come and try to lift the boy’s dejected spirits.

The rabbi arrived at the hospital not knowing what to expect. He found the boy lying in bed watching TV, a picture of utter misery, black clouds of despair hanging over his head. The boy hardly looked up at the rabbi, and before he could even say hello, the boy said, “If you are here to tell me what the priest just told me, you can leave now.”

Slightly taken aback, the rabbi asked, “What did the priest say?”

“He told me that G‑d loves me. That is a load of garbage. Why would G‑d love me?”

It was a good point. This kid could see nothing about himself that was worthy of love. He had achieved nothing in his life; he had no redeeming features, nothing that was beautiful or respectable or lovable. So why would G‑d love him?

The rabbi needed to touch this boy without patronizing him. He had to say something real. But what do you say to someone who sees himself as worthless?

“You may be right,” said the rabbi. “Maybe G‑d doesn’t love you.”

This got the boy’s attention. He wasn’t expecting that from a rabbi.

“Maybe G‑d doesn’t love you. But one thing’s for sure. He needs you.”

This surprised the boy. He hadn’t heard that before.

-Rabbi Aron Moss
“The Rabbi and the Suicidal Teenager”
Chabad.org

I’ve heard this before and on the surface, it sound pretty good. It sounds like you would never have been born and wouldn’t have continued to live if you didn’t have some important part to play in God’s plan. It also sounds like if you took yourself out of God’s plan (by suicide for instance) there would be a big hole punched into the middle of that plan.

Seems like a really fragile and vulnerable plan. Since human beings have free will, we can commit a thousand different actions that would be contrary to God’s master plan for Creation. If one human being were to kill himself before fulfilling his or her part in the plan, what would God do? Is there a “plan B?”

I want to finish with the Rabbi Moss commentary before continuing:

The very fact that you were born means that G‑d needs you. He had plenty of people before you, but He added you to the world’s population because there is something you can do that no one else can. And if you haven’t done it yet, that makes it even more crucial that you continue to live, so that you are able to fulfill your mission and give your unique gift to the world.

If I can look at all my achievements and be proud, I can believe G‑d loves me. But what if I haven’t achieved anything? What if I don’t have any accomplishments under my belt to be proud of?

Well, stop looking at yourself and look around you. Stop thinking about yourself, and start thinking of others. You are here because G‑d needs you — He needs you to do something.

My friend, you and I know that happiness does not come from earning a big salary. Happiness comes from serving others, from living life with meaning. I am convinced that all you need to do is focus outward, not inward. Don’t think about what you need, but what you are needed for. And in finding what you can do for others, you will find yourself.

Let’s get the easy stuff out of the way first. Does fulfilling your part in God’s plan for your life automatically mean you’re going to be happy about it?  Look at the Apostle Paul’s life. After being commissioned by Jesus to be the emissary to the Gentiles and to spread the Good News of Christ to the nations (Acts 9), was his life happy? It may have been fulfilling and rewarding in the sense that Paul knew he was doing what God was asking, but it was hardly happy or even comfortable. Paul was beaten, left for dead, had to run for his life, was shipwrecked, and bitten by a poisonous snake. He was finally executed in Rome after a lengthy stay as a prisoner. That doesn’t sound like “happy” to me.

But Rabbi Moss isn’t talking about happiness, he’s talking about serving others as part of God’s plan and in doing so, finding yourself. If you had a chance to fulfill a great purpose in life and to serve God in bringing many otherwise lost people to Him, wouldn’t you do it, even if it meant personal hardship?

Actually, that’s a tough question, especially for many Christians in western nations who aren’t typically called upon to make such great sacrifices and to suffer such hardships. In theory, our answer should be “yes,” but in practicality, I’m not so sure we’d all jump up and down enthusiastically and yell out, “Pick me!”

Now let’s dig a little deeper. Paul’s purpose in life was unmistakable. Jesus appeared to him in a vision and told him what he wanted. A few days later, he sent a human messenger to him to tell Paul his next steps. We see in other parts of the Bible how Paul seemingly had other supernatural experiences which no doubt re-enforced his life’s purpose.

But all that stuff doesn’t happen to most of us. Even if it did and we saw visions and heard voices telling us to do such and thus, most Christians around us would think we were nuts and recommend us to the nearest psychiatrist.

But as far as I can tell, most of us don’t have supernatural experiences to tell us what our life’s purpose happens to be. Most of us have to figure it out, seemingly on our own.

Rabbi Moss suggests to his (possibly fictional) suicidal teenager that as a young person, he has most likely not yet had the opportunity to fulfill his life’s purpose. God needs him to do that, so he has to stay alive until that purpose if completed. But what is that purpose? How do you know what it is? How do you know when you’ve done it? Do you just wait around and hope you can figure out what it is and then perform it when opportunity strikes?

Tough questions. Here’s another one. If you do figure out what your purpose in life is and you have already completed it, what’s the purpose in continuing to go on?

Running out of timeOK, that’s somewhat unfair, because the question assumes that your purpose in life is to commit one act that is easily defined and can be performed in a relatively quick manner, like changing a tire, or helping an older person across the street. But what if that’s it? You’ve done what God created you to do. You may have years or even decades of life still left in you. What now?

Of course, your purpose might be long-lasting and multi-dimensional. You could have been created to be a parent and a grandparent and to influence and support your family across your entire lifetime. In that case, you can never fulfill your purpose until God dictates that it is time for you to die.

Reflecting back on everything I’ve just written, it would seem that, if we accept the premise Rabbi Moss provides, we know we haven’t fulfilled our purpose in life because we’re alive. We assume that when we die, we’ve completed what we were created to do.

But what about “suicide” and “plan B?” If free will allows a certain number of people to kill themselves, what happens to God’s plan? Is it irreparably thwarted? That hardly seems likely since God is God. Being human, we tend to think of the progression of time, fate, and the universe relative to God’s plan as rather linear. Step 1 leads to step 2 and then to step 3 and so on. But if we accept that, we’re saying that no sort of randomness is possible in a created universe. But if we have free will, that can’t be true.

If God’s plan includes the possibility of randomness and further, the possibility that not all people born will fulfill their plan (so far, I’ve only included the single reason of suicide, but people may fail to fulfill their plan for a variety of other reasons tied in to their free will and the free will of people in their environment), then God must have a “plan B” (and I’m sure it’s much more complicated than this) to compensate. If one person who is to fulfill some aspect of God’s plan dies, then there must be a method (that is totally outside of human awareness) of shifting people and events around to accomplish God’s goals in this instance.

That means in an absolute sense, as individuals, we are not indispensible to God. We can be replaced. God doesn’t have an ultimate need for our individual lives.

Rabbi Moss’ story may seem compelling and we can even see how it might have turned around this depressed and suicidal boy, but it’s also not too hard to work our way around his argument, either. When Rabbi Freeman says, “Despair is a cheap excuse for avoiding one’s purpose in life. And a sense of purpose is the best way to avoid despair,” it sounds like he is being too dismissive of someone else’s despair. If Rabbi Moss (or whoever was the Rabbi in the story of the suicidal teenager) had walked into the room, dropped Rabbi Freeman’s two sentence “bomb,” and walked out, do you think it would have done any good?

People have better days and worse days. Having a purpose in life is usually pretty important, but most of the time, it gets lost in the day-to-day shuffle of going to work, interacting with our families, paying the bills, and whatever other tasks we’re expected to perform just because of the roles we play in the various areas of our lives. Most of the time, we don’t give our overarching purpose much thought. It only comes up when you read blog posts such as this one or encounter a personal life crisis.

The raw fact is that many of us may never become aware of some higher and nobel purpose of our life, let alone one that is assigned to us by Heaven. Most of us, if we have an awareness of God at all, will live our day-to-day existence, try to love, strive not to hate, read our holy book, pray, and by the time we die, we can only hope that we did whatever we were supposed to do.

That’s not a particularly satisfying thought and Rabbi Moss tells a better tale than I do, but who’s to say if life works out this way or that?

I can’t.

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Mourning for the Great Mountain

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There is an interesting, but somewhat misunderstood, halachah. It has to do with not filling one’s mouth with laughter now while we do not have a Beis HaMikdash. In the words of the Orchos Tzaddikim: “One should only feel joyous in that which brings to enhanced service of God. He should never feel joy from that which causes another pain. For example, one who has wheat should not feel happy if there is a famine and he will make a large profit, since this is bad for others. One should also never take joy in another person’s death, even if he was left a legacy and will profit handsomely from this. Regarding such situations, one who shows proper decency and does not feel joy fulfills the mitzvah of ואהבת ’לרעך כמוך. One should accustom his heart to feel joy at his friend’s success. Most especially one should feel great happiness when he see others doing God’s mitzvos, since this is God’s will.

“Nevertheless, one should not fill his mouth with laughter in this world, as we find in Berachos 31. Since the Beis HaMikdash was destroyed, all joy has been mixed with sorrow. We also find in Niddah 23 that Rabbi Yirmiyahu tried to make Rabbi Zeira laugh but did not succeed.

When someone learned that the halachah not to fill one’s mouth with simcha is actually in the Shulchan Aruch, he was shocked and wondered how this could be prohibited.

He decided to ask the Sdei Chemed, zt”l, who was certainly a true scholar and fulfilled in every detail of halachah without compromise. “The halachah not to fill one’s mouth with laughter due to the destruction of the Beis HaMikdash is a middas chassidus. But this should not be confused with mockery. One who mocks is in one of the four groups that will not receive the Shechinah, as we find in Sotah 42!”

Daf Yomi Digest
Stories Off the Daf
“Rejoicing in the Right Way”
Niddah 23

This isn’t going to resonate well with most Christians because Christianity isn’t focused on the Temple as the point of connection between man and God. We focus on the life and spirit of Jesus Christ for that connection and, for most Christians, the Temple is superfluous. For most Christians, the Temple is a cosmic “so what?”

That’s kind of a shame because we may have to try to relate to it at some point, especially if traditional Jewish thought is correct and the Messiah, that is Jesus Christ, actually rebuilds the Temple.

The mashiach will bring about the political and spiritual redemption of the Jewish people by bringing us back to Israel and restoring Jerusalem (Isaiah 11:11-12; Jeremiah 23:8; 30:3; Hosea 3:4-5). He will establish a government in Israel that will be the center of all world government, both for Jews and gentiles (Isaiah 2:2-4; 11:10; 42:1). He will rebuild the Temple and re-establish its worship (Jeremiah 33:18). He will restore the religious court system of Israel and establish Jewish law as the law of the land (Jeremiah 33:15).

–Judaism 101

However even if you have a tough time with that perspective, our story off the Daf can tell us a few other things, such as not rejoicing under circumstances when we win but someone else loses. We have a tendency to do that as human beings, but when we lose, when we’re hurt, when we’re afraid, we certainly don’t want others to feel happy about it. Most of the time, when we’re under duress, we don’t want people around us to feel happy about anything. We want them to feel upset, compassionate, and then try to help us.

What if a Christian sees a Jew under duress over the destruction of the Temple? I know it happened almost 2,000 years ago and Christians tend to think the Jews should “get over it” but that’s because we don’t understand the significance of the Temple in Judaism. We want Jews to realize that Jesus Christ is their temple and that it’s going to be all right because Jesus loves them. But most Jews aren’t going to relate to oto ha’ish that way, at least not right now (and I consider it a miracle any time a Jewish person does recognize the Jewish Messiah through the Gentile disguise that we have put on Christ).

I found the following footnotes for Chapter 11 of the Rambam’s The Laws and Basic Principles of the Torah at history.hanover.edu:

The whole of the following passage was deleted from most of the editions published since the Venice edition of 1574.

“If he did not succeed to this degree or he was killed, he surely is not [the redeemer] promised by the Torah. [Rather,] he should be considered as all the other proper and legitimate kings of the Davidic dynasty who died. G-d only caused him to arise in order to test the multitude. As it is written [Daniel 11:35], “Some of the wise men will stumble, to purge, to refine, and to clarify, until the appointed time, for it is yet to come.”

“Jesus of Nazareth who aspired to be the Mashiach and was executed by the court was also spoken of in Daniel’s prophecies [Daniel 11:14], “The renegades among your people shall exalt themselves in an attempt to fulfill the vision, but they shall stumble.”

The rest of the text is equally uncomplimentary toward Christianity, but that’s less to do with Jesus as Messiah and more to do with the subsequent “development” of the Christian/Jewish relationship over the past 20 centuries or so. However the beginning of Chapter 11 also says the following:

In future time, the King Mashiach[1] will arise and renew the Davidic dynasty, restoring it to its initial sovereignty. He will rebuild the [Beis Ha]Mikdash and gather in the dispersed remnant of Israel. Then, in his days, all the statutes will be reinstituted as in former times. We will offer sacrifices and observe the Sabbatical and Jubilee years according to all their particulars set forth in the Torah.

Whoever does not believe in him, or does not await his coming, denies not only [the statements of] the other prophets, but also [those of] the Torah and of Moshe, our teacher, for the Torah attests to his coming, stating: [Devarim 30:3-5]

This is similar to something the Master said 1,200 years earlier:

Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father. There is one who accuses you: Moses, on whom you have set your hope. For if you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote of me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?” –John 5:45-47 (ESV)

Perhaps we Christians shouldn’t rejoice too much, not because we’re mourning the Temple and lament its loss, but because our human lives and failures made it necessary for Christ to suffer and die. True, he was resurrected again, just as the Temple will be remade by him (my opinion), but that doesn’t absolve us of our crimes, nor does it repair our present broken and suffering world. To those Christians who rejoice over Jewish suffering, you are missing the point, not only of the lesson of the Sages but of God’s own teachings. If the Jewish people mourn the Temple, they will also mourn Messiah.

“And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and pleas for mercy, so that, when they look on me, on him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over him, as one weeps over a firstborn. –Zechariah 12:10 (ESV)

While the prophet is most likely speaking directly to Israel, Christ was pierced for us as well, so we should also mourn and not overly rejoice at our Salvation. True, we thank God for our redemption from death and our adoption as sons and daughters of the Most High, but there is still a lot of work to be done and if we are only happy for ourselves, how can we strive to reach out toward others in their suffering?

For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh. They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises. To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever. Amen. –Romans 9:3-5 (ESV)

As Maimonides said, “Whoever does not believe in him, (the Messiah) or does not await his coming, denies not only [the statements of] the other prophets, but also [those of] the Torah and of Moshe, our teacher, for the Torah attests to his coming.”

Israel awaits his coming but they do not know who he is. We who do know his name must not rejoice that we hold that knowledge and others do not. We must not be bitter that others refuse to accept his name as Messiah. We must live our lives with caring and compassion for everyone, shunning no man whether Jew or Gentile, but welcoming everyone in peace to our Temple and our Great Mountain of God.

But there is another way of understanding it. With the help of verses such as “I will lift up my eyes to the hills – From whence comes my help?” (Psalm 121:1), where the psalmist lifts up his eyes to the “mountains” (as the Hebrew has it), the following explanation is given: “You shall become a plain – this is Messiah Son of David. And why is his name called Great Mountain? Because he is greater than the fathers, as it says, ‘Behold, My Servant shall deal prudently; He shall be exalted and extolled and be very high’ (Isaiah 52:13). He shall be higher than Abraham, more exalted than Jacob and higher than Jacob. … more exalted than Moses … and higher than the angels. This is why it says, ‘Who are you, O great mountain?'” (Midrash Tanchuma W, Toledot 14).

-Tsvi Sadan
“Great Mountain” (har hagadol) pg 58
The Concealed Light: Names of the Messiah in Jewish Sources

 

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The Pious Fraud

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In a reply to a yechidus query in the winter of 5635 (1874-75), my grandfather said to my father: The yetzer hara, (the evil impulse), is called “animal soul,” not because it is necessarily a brute animal. At times it may be a fox, the most cunning of beasts, and great wisdom is needed to perceive its machinations. At other times it may clothe itself in the garb of an earnest, straightforward, humble tzadik, possessing fine traits of character.

The animal soul manifests itself in each person according to his individual character. One person may suddenly experience a powerful longing to study Chassidus or to meditate deeply on some chassidic concept. The truth is, however, that this is nothing more than the yetzer hara’s counsel and the animal soul’s machinations to prevent him from engaging in the avoda of davening or a similar activity.

Take this as a general principle and remember it always: Any matter that is effective towards or actually leads to active avoda, and is confronted with opposition of any sort, even the most noble, that opposition is the scheming of the animal soul. My father concluded: Until then I had not known that there can be a “pious” animal soul, let alone a “chassidic” animal soul.

“Today’s Day”
Shabbat * Sivan 23, 5703
Compiled and arranged by the Lubavitcher Rebbe
Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, of righteous memory, in 5703 (1943)
from the talks and letters of the sixth Chabad Rebbe
Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, of righteous memory
Translated by Yitschak Meir Kagan

The nature of good vs. evil and the nature of the human soul is somewhat more complicated in Judaism than it is in Christianity. I’m not going to spend any time trying to delve into these explanations, since there are people much more knowledgable and wiser than I am who have already made those distinctions. I do want to talk about how as human beings, we tend to fool ourselves, though. I know a lot about that.

It’s interesting to consider that even a very righteous person who desires to study Chassidus (If you’re Christian, think of it as studying the Bible, though that is a woefully inadequate comparison) could actually be caving into his “evil impulse.” I mean, what’s wrong with studying the Bible, folks? Or, what’s wrong with praying, or going to your local house of worship?

According to the commentary, even the desire to do something praiseworthy may be masking something else we’re trying to avoid, including our own awareness that we’re not being forthright in our motivations.

Really?

Think about this.

I want to read and study the Bible or some online commentary on the Torah. Being who I am, I’ll probably start writing a blog about it just because it’s in my nature to turn Bible study into blogs. But the floor needs to be vacuumed. Or my daughter needs a ride to work. Or my grandson is visiting and wants me to play with him. Or something is bothering my wife and she wants to talk with me about it. Or…

Well, you get the idea.

There’s nothing wrong with studying. There’s nothing wrong with blogging about Biblical or faith-based topics…unless they get in the way of “the weightier matters of the Torah,” which almost always involves actually doing some sort of good deed for another human being.

Imagine an extreme case where a person studied the Torah to the exclusion of all other considerations, including earning a living and supporting his family.

For even when we were with you, we would give you this command: If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat. –2 Thessalonians 3:10 (ESV)

But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever. –1 Timothy 5:8 (ESV)

But most of us aren’t that extreme. We do however, know how to appear pious and holy to the outside world and still have defective motives though.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness. So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. –Matthew 23:27-28 (ESV)

Jesus was addressing people who knew they were being hypocrites and they didn’t mind behaving that way. What about those of us who truly believe we’re doing the right thing, but are really serving our own interests? We may really tell ourselves that studying Torah is more important than getting a job or getting a better job so we can support our families. We may tell ourselves that studying the Bible is more important than doing the vacuuming, washing the dishes, making dinner for the kids, or helping our neighbor with her yard work. I suppose, on a certain level, we can make a convincing case for it, too. After all, what’s wrong with studying the Word of God? What’s wrong with being immersed in the Bible? What’s wrong with being consumed and even obsessed with a life of faith?

What? But doesn’t a life of faith involve actually doing something about it? Doesn’t mowing your neighbor’s yard override praying, at least sometimes? Should we always ignore people for the sake of something we consider a higher ideal?

It’s probably not clear-cut in every single situation, but often we are so clever, we convince ourselves to do what we want to do, something that is indeed praiseworthy, so we can get out of doing something we don’t want to do that is equally praiseworthy.

The ego of man is cannibalistic in essence. At worst, it destroys everyone and everything in its path in order to attain its selfish goals. At best, as in the case of a civilized, refined and tolerant individual, it acknowledges its status as one among many, avows its support of the “human rights” of its fellows and concedes the legitimacy of pursuits other than its own. But even the most liberal-minded of men cannot escape the trappings of the ego: he will always see his fellow through the prism of self. His (seemingly) objective mind will point out that he shares the planet with billions of others, that there exist countless perspectives and callings in addition to his own. Deep down, however, the self will remain the gravitational center of reality, its ultimate point of reference. He will see others as necessary, perhaps crucial, but always secondary cogs to the kingpin of self.

Commentary on Ethics of Our Fathers
“The Contemporary Cannibal”
Sivan 23, 5772 * June 13, 2012
Chabad.org

This is part of a direct commentary on the following:

Rabbi Chaninah, deputy to the kohanim, would say: Pray for the integrity of the sovereignty, for were it not for the fear of its authority a man would swallow his neighbor alive. Rabbi Chaninah son of Tradyon would say: … Two who sit and exchange words of Torah, the Divine Presence rests amongst them…

-Ethics of the Fathers, 3:2

On the surface, it doesn’t seem as if there’s a connection between our need for a sovereign in order to curb man’s aggressive nature and studying words of Torah, but with just a little thought, the link becomes apparent.

So anyone who views the universe as an ownerless, arbitrary existence will never transcend the moral and intellectual cannibalism of the ego. For without a supreme authority that creates, defines and gives direction to all of creation, the self and its perceptions are the sole judge of right and wrong; inevitably, one’s vision of others will be tinted with the color of self.

It is only through the fear of G-d, only through the acceptance of the sovereignty of the King Of All Kings, that man can grow beyond the prejudice and anarchy of the ego. It is only by sensing an Absolute Truth before which all are equally insignificant, but which grants significance to the countless individual roles that fulfill the Divine purpose in creation, that an individual can genuinely see his fellow as his equal.

And because the naturally self-centered consciousness of man is, by definition, incapable of truly seeing beyond itself, this truth it is not something that one can understand and feel with the contemporary tools of his mind and heart. One must therefore “pray for the integrity of the sovereignty” in his life. One must concede that the transcendence of self is beyond his humanly natural capabilities, and humbly request that he be granted a higher, ego-free vision of his fellow.

It is only by acknowledging the absolute sovereign of the universe and submitting to His will that we can stop, look at what we’re doing, and realize what is really important in our lives and in the lives of those around us. Studying the Bible is important. Praying is important. Playing with your three-year old grandson is more important. God’s Bible is always there and is vital in helping us understand the importance of our roles, but once a moment in a child’s life has passed, you never get it back again.

You need to decide what you are. If you believe yourself to be angel, be prepared for some disappointment. If you think of yourself as a beast, you may well become depressed.

Best to know you are human. Stay away from situations you can’t handle, and face up to the mess when you fall down. That’s even higher than the angels.

-Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
“Identity”
Based on letters and talks of the Rebbe
Rabbi M. M. Schneerson
Chabad.org

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God as a Teacher

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Talmud StudyThe metaphor of God as teacher and human beings as His pupils, a metaphor that gains prominence in the rabbinic period, is also an apt means of describing the covenantal relationship. God as teacher encourages His pupils to think for themselves and assume intellectual responsibility for the way Torah is to be understood and practiced. The fact that the rabbis not only declared that the age of prophecy had ended, but insisted also that the talmudic sage ranked higher than the prophet, seems to suggest that the community has a higher appreciation of its covenantal relationship to God when it sees Him as its teacher than when it sees Him as an authoritarian voice dictating His will through the prophets.

God as a loving husband and the devoted teacher do not require reward and punishment to play a significant role in the covenantal relationship. They are not frameworks of absolute power of one covenantal partner over the other, but frameworks in which the integrity of both partners is recognized and the human partner is enabled to feel personal dignity and to develop the capabilities of responsibility.

-Rabbi David Hartman
from the Introduction of his book
A Living Covenant: The Innovative Spirit in Traditional Judaism

Are you a God-fearing man, Senator? That is such a strange phrase. I’ve always thought of God as a teacher; a bringer of light, wisdom, and understanding.

-Erik Lehnsheer/Magneto (played by Ian McKellen)
X-Men (2000)

I just did two strange and different things, at least from a Christian point of view. I used Rabbi Hartman’s quote to describe God as primarily a teacher, and I quoted a comic book movie to do the same thing. Strange. Interestingly enough, the character of Eric (Magneto) Lehnsheer is portrayed as a Jewish Holocaust survivor, so his perspectives may have a place in today’s “meditation.”

It’s not as if Judaism doesn’t see God as a Judge, but He is not only a Judge (and I need to be careful here, since I’ve mischaracterized aspects of Judaism before). The Bible is replete with “marriage metaphors” in which God is portrayed as a loving husband to a sometimes faithless Israel. While this metaphor is occasionally used by Christianity to justify the supersessionist view that the church (the loyal wife) has replaced Israel (the faithless wife), in fact, God has also said that He will take back Israel when she turns back to Him and that He will never permanently abandon her.

However, I’m less interested in discussing the topic of supersessionism and more interested in exploring God as our teacher. As Rabbi Hartman seems to say, this casts God in a completely different light than the one by which we are accustomed to viewing Him. It also nicely fits into how Judaism sees the role of human authority within the realm of faith. I continue now with Hartman as he speaks in his book’s Introduction.

When Christian ministers ask me at what age or on what occasion I received my calling as a rabbi, I often find myself hesitating over how to respond. If I answer it began when I entered yeshivah at age five to study Bible and Talmud, they might believe that I am likening myself to Jeremiah, who received his prophetic calling as a child. If I tell them that I never received a calling but was ordained after my teachers concluded that I was intellectually capable of rendering competent decisions regarding what is prohibited and permitted by Jewish law, they might be shocked at meeting a modern version of a Pharisee. They could perhaps find confirmation for the allegation that legalism had replaced the living guidance of God.

…Yet, as a traditional halakhic Jew, I know that a rabbi is a teacher whose spiritual role is premised on possession of an intellectual understanding of the Jewish tradition and commitment to the Jewish people. A direct call from God is not required to legitimize activity as a rabbi in Israel.

I can only imagine that the confusion Rabbi Hartman expects of the Christian ministers he references is reflected in the minds and hearts of any Christians reading this missive. Indeed, Judaism is often seen as a legalistic, works-based, and spiritually “dead” faith for exactly the reasons Rabbi Hartman states. And yet he also says that a “rabbi is a teacher whose spiritual role is premised on possession of an intellect understanding of the Jewish tradition,” presupposing that rabbis actually have spiritual roles in Judaism. So where is the spirituality?

What is spirituality?

According to Wikipedia, spirituality “refers to an ultimate or an alleged immaterial reality; an inner path enabling a person to discover the essence of his/her being; or the “deepest values and meanings by which people live.” That’s probably not a very helpful definition, but spirituality is difficult to define, largely because the spirit cannot be conclusively demonstrated in a material world.

In some branches of Christianity, spirituality is considered synonymous with emotion, or more specifically, an emotional experience that is inspired by a spiritual encounter with God (or one that bypasses God and focuses specifically on Jesus Christ). We tend to think of spirituality as a “feeling.” Most Christians don’t tend to relate to spirituality as a thought or as something that happens when we study and learn from a teacher or rabbi.

And yet, Rabbi Hartman seems to be saying that learning Torah and Talmud is a spiritual experience. I don’t know if that’s what he’s actually saying, but I think I can make a case for it. I think that in Judaism (this is just my opinion, of course), the sense of a Jew’s identity is inexorably tied to Jewish history, traditional Jewish thought, Talmudic study, midrash, halachah, and understanding. You might even think of the passionate debates that occur in yeshivah as a metaphor for a Jew “wrestling with God.” (Genesis 32:22-32)

The concept of wrestling or debating with God may seem alien and even sacrilegious to a Christian, even though we have ample examples from the Bible. Look at Abraham boldly debating with God over the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 18:16-33) and Moses pleading with God to spare the Children of Israel after the sin of the Golden Calf. (Exodus 32:9-14). Can a Christian even understand this the way a Jew can?

That said, Rabbi Hartman doesn’t see a complete dissonance between Jews and Christians.

…those early experiences were given profound intellectual and philosophical support in the years of my graduate study at Fordham University. Living with the Jesuits, sensing the intellectual and spiritual integrity of my teachers, observing how our different faiths were reciprocally enriched through our encounters – these were experiences that I could not ignore in developing my own appreciation of what it is to stand as a covenantal Jew before God.

I can’t say that all Jews will agree with Rabbi Hartman’s statements and I’m sure not all Christians will either. We see, based on everything I’ve written and quoted up to this point, that Christianity and Judaism conceptualize themselves and their relationship with God on a spiritual level in fundamentally different ways. We see God and how we are supposed to connect to Him from two totally different directions. And yet there are the occasional glimmers when, if we try hard enough, we just might be able to understand that we have a few things in common, as Rabbi Hartman pointed out in his description of his time among the Jesuits.

But God is One. He is the God of the Jews and the nations. He makes the rains descend on not only Jews and Christians, but on the righteous and unrighteous alike. He sent His “only begotten son” “not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.” (2 Peter 3:0 ESV)

If God is our teacher, is He providing two wholly dissimilar lessons, one for the Jews and the other for everyone else? Christianity doesn’t think so, but their (our) solution is to replace the original lesson God taught at Sinai with the one taught by Jesus at Calvary. Traditional Jews believe that God teaches a larger lesson (the Torah) to the Jews and a subset of that lesson (the Noahide laws) to the nations.

I don’t agree with either viewpoint and believe that it is God’s intention to ultimately reconcile Israel with the nations as co-existing covenant members, Sinai and Messianic, standing side-by-side in front of the throne of God. I don’t know how to completely articulate this relationship yet, especially in terms of our mutually dependent roles being described in scripture, but I believe it is well worth pursuing.

We see that at the end of all things, the ” throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it (the city), and his servants will worship him.” (Revelation 22:3 ESV) I believe those servants are both Israel and we from among the nations who have demonstrated an enduring faith, who have “fought the good fight,” and “have finished the race.” (2 Timothy 4:7)

If God is speaking to both the Jew and the Christian (and indeed, to the entire world), we must discover what the lesson is and what our teacher wants us to learn. Jesus was rightly called “teacher” and “rabbi” and he taught as did the other rabbis during the late Second Temple period in Israel. This was an experience that his disciples found to be completely consistent with how other disciples learned from their rabbis. From what we see in the Bible, it was also consistent with how we Christians experience spirituality, love, compassion, and truth.

Some Jewish thinkers believe that the Second Temple was destroyed, not because of general faithlessness among the Jews, but because of the sin of baseless hatred between one Jew and another. The counterpoint to this sin, and what some believe will aid in the coming of the Messiah, is for Jews to show unrestrained love by…

reaching out to another person – any other person – and showing him care, consideration, and concern. Do a favor for someone else, not because there is a reason to do so, but because you care for him.

“Keeping In Touch: The Three Weeks”
Based on the teachings of the Lubavitcher Rebbe
Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson
Adapted by Rabbi Eli Touger
Chabad.org

If we are trying to hear the lessons being taught by our rabbi and Master, perhaps reaching out to everyone, Jew and Gentile alike, with care, consideration, and concern, might be a good place to start.

A river of life flows through the inner worlds, emerging from there into your own, carrying with it all your needs.

You need to know about that river, for it carries upstream as well.

When you celebrate that river with a blessing for your food, out loud and with joy, then your voice echoes back with even greater force, replenishing all the higher worlds through which the river passes on its way. The channels of life are widened and their currents grow strong.

Take care of your river. Invest in it and reap the dividends.

-Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
“The Echo Upstream”
Based on letters and talks of the Rebbe
Rabbi M. M. Schneerson
Chabad.org

"When you awake in the morning, learn something to inspire you and mediate upon it, then plunge forward full of light with which to illuminate the darkness." -Rabbi Tzvi Freeman