Boulder Jewish News Arts, Culture, Events, Lifestyles, Holidays, Synagogues, Education
Well, we have come to the end of the 53 (gematria of the word GAN – meaning garden) portions of the Torah. This week we start all over again. I once asked some first graders why we keep reading the Torah over and over, unlike other books where we finish one book and move on to another. One bright student commented, ‘The Torah is the same but each year we get smarter and understand more.’ I can’t think of a more succinct reason for this re-run especially if you realize that the last letter in the Torah is a LAMED and the first letter of the Torah is a BEIT. When you put the two letters together, they spell LEV which means heart, hinting to us that the Torah is the heart of Jewish life!
One of the opening verses in this parasha, before Moshe’s blessings to the twelve tribes begins, ‘G-d came from Sinai.’ There is also a reference to Sinai at the very end of the Torah, which alludes to the incident of the breaking of the first set of tablets of the Ten Commandments.
What was the Jewish state of mind when they first received the Torah and why the stress on being at Sinai? This mountain seems to be so important that we also begin the source text of Jewish ethics, Pirkei Avot, with the quote: ‘Moshe received the Torah from Sinai and transmitted it to Yehoshua!’ If the Torah is meant for all places and times, what’s the relevance of its ‘first appearance’ to the Jewish people? The latter point about G-d speaking to all the people seems like the most important point- no other religion even claims to originate with a revelation to an entire nation.
The Lubavitcher Rebbe pointed out that, as is true about the Torah in general, it’s not just about geography. On one hand, a mountain is a source of importance. It ‘stands out’ from the lowly earth. On the other hand, the sages say that G-d picked Sinai just because it was the lowest mountain. Therefore an important lesson is that we need to be as low and humble as Sinai, but at the same time we must recognize the importance of our unique role and purpose in the world.
How do we hold the two traits of humility and pride together? Because we are striving to serve a G-d who is non-binary, in the sense of transcending paradox and contradiction. But if that combo is so Divine, how can we expect on a day to day level to negotiate such opposite attitudes successfully? I think one essential trait to develop is Gratitude. In terms of pride, we can be more humble the more blessings we can experience. When there is an overemphasis on ‘who am I’ to be so responsible for such heavy issues, then we need the pride of having a clear sense of mission, as designated from a Divine source. As the Code of Jewish law begins, ‘Don’t be embarrassed in front of the scoffers,’ but rather rise with alacrity to fulfill your purpose in the world.
So now we can better understand the importance of ‘Torah from Sinai’ as reflecting the strength of a mountain and the humility of being close to the earth. The end of the Torah shows us a similar principle. The very last words of the Torah are ‘ASHER SHIBARTA-‘which you broke.’ Referring to the breaking of the first set of Ten Commandments. This is a very strange ending not just for the parasha but also for the whole Torah! The Lubavitcher Rebbe has an important take on this break.
The sages say that one of the reasons Moshe broke the tablets was to interfere with the completion of the wedding process of transferring a wedding gift from G-d to Israel. In other words, if the Jews were to actually receive the tablets, it would be like a bride being officially married. Then if they were to be involved in the Golden Calf, they would be considered unfaithful and G-d forbid deserving of annihilation. Moshe chose to risk his personal existence by destroying those priceless sapphire tablets to save the people.
Also this act was to kind of join himself with the Jewish people in the transgression of the Golden Calf itself. If you recall from the book of Exodus, G-d was so angry with the people that He said to Moshe: ‘Leave me alone and I will finish them off,’ whereupon Moshe responded, ‘If so, erase me too from your book,’ and thus he committed an act that might justify his removal from the world. How could he even think about committing such a defiant act? The Rebbe says because he was trying to show and if you could say so, remind G-d that even in His initial desire to create life, and even if the Torah was the blueprint of creation, the people came first. As the Midrash puts it, ‘The Torah is called first, and Israel is called first; which is the actual first? The thought of the Jewish people came first.’ In other words, the Torah is the vehicle to enable Israel to manifest Divine goodness and sanctity into an otherwise mundane, materialistic, spiritually lifeless world.
G-d trusts the Jews so much that whatever their slip ups, He has faith that they will recover. As the Rebbe also commented to someone who denigrated Jews who show up to services only on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur saying they’re ‘fake,’ the Rebbe’s take was that the ones who don’t come the rest of the year are the ‘fakes;’ the ones who come on the High Holidays are the ‘real’ Jews.
One primary condition for the success of this mission is unity. Another curious phrase in the opening verses of this parasha express the unity necessary to accomplish this purpose: ‘they (the people at Sinai) placed themselves ‘under Your feet.’ One of the many meanings of this phrase is that all the Jews, even the souls yet to be born, gathered together ‘under the mountain.’ The mountain was like a Chupah, a Divine canopy, a holy force field that united all the souls, with their vast differences, into a sacred union with G-d. Without humility each soul could not feel its connection to its fellow. The holistic sense of togetherness which binds the nation into one organism would be deficient, and even the commandments between the people and G-d would be faulty.
I once asked a little boy about the saying in the Hagadah, ‘If G-d would have brought us to Sinai and not given us the Torah, Dayenu, (it would have been enough)’ But how is that possible? Wasn’t the whole purpose of getting to Sinai in order to receive the Torah? He answered, ‘If each soul has a special piece of Torah, and they all gathered together around the mountain, that means they already had the Torah!’
The Jew of October 8th is the Jew of Sinai, of Warsaw, of Jerusalem — the same soul, awakened again. Every time history tries to erase us, we write a new chapter. There is an old poem that goes something like this: I LOOKED FOR WISDOM AND IT ALLUDED ME. I SOUGHT FOR G-D BUT COULD NOT SEE. I SEARCHED FOR MY BROTHER/SISTER AND FOUND ALL THREE.
The first chapter of Genesis expresses the themes of the last section of the Torah. G-d also reflects both humility and pride. Pride when declaring ‘It was good’ after each day of creation (except the second whose work was unfinished). Humility when He writes, ‘Let US make man.’ Who is the ‘us’? The sages say that G-d consulted the angels before creating humans. Even though this might convey a sense of more than one G-d, He was willing to risk that mistake, in order to teach people to be humble enough to consult with ‘lesser beings.’ How much more should we seek advice from others?
Moshe exhibited the abovementioned traits of both pride and humility. He was both a man of G-d and a man of the earth and could straddle both because he was connected to a realm beyond the tension of both realms. So too we are told we all have a spark of the generous spirit of Moshe which floats beyond time and space. He has a special connection to Shabbos. The three prayers of Shabbos span past, present, and future. The first is the Shabbos of creation, the third, the Shabbos of the future, and the second, the Shabbos of the present. Thus the prayer begins, ‘May Moshe rejoice with the gift of his portion.’ This refers to his choosing Shabbos even in Egypt as a day of rest for the weary Hebrew slaves. In fact, the Gerer Rebbe states that the commandment of remembering Shabbos still remained etched on the first tablets, because keeping Shabbos is like keeping the entire Torah!
When in the creation story we read about Friday, the Torah does not just say, ‘day two, three, etc. but says THE sixth day, referring as the rabbis say, to the sixth day of Sivan, when Israel stood at Sinai and their acceptance of the Torah insured that existence on earth would be permanent and holy. Even when Adam and Chava sinned, the spirit of Shabbos would not let them leave the light of the Garden for 36 hours!
We read story after story about how some of the hostages not only kept their faith under the most horrendous circumstances, but even tried to keep Shabbos the best way that they could. As the saying goes, ‘More than the Jews have kept Shabbos, Shabbos has kept the Jews!’ So as I complete my series of essays about Shabbos and the weekly parasha, I would like to bless the readers FOR both human and divine help to keep connected to Torah study and implementation on the ground level of Torah values, especially to hold on to the gift of Shabbos, in deeds, words, and even thoughts. SHANA TOVA U’METUKAH!
