Torah & more… תורה ועוד

Shul can be a very relaxing, even soporific experience and so it happened, once upon a time, that Joe-Shmo was a little sleepy during the Torah reading. He woke up just to hear the reader chant the words: “And you shall take fine flour and bake twelve cakes thereof… and you shall place them in two rows, six in a row, upon the pure table before G-d” (Leviticus 24:5-6). Inspired, he felt as if G-d himself spoke to him. The next day, he baked 12 loaves of challah, and brought them to shul. Quietly, making sure no one sees him, he placed the loaves in the ark, asking G-d to accept his gift as if this was the Temple.
No sooner did he leave, the shul’s janitor walked in to do his daily duties. Whipping his sweat, he approached the ark. He looked up, making sure no one sees him, and sat down for a moment. “Dear G-d,” he said, “thank you for giving me even this job, but please, my wife and children are still hungry at home. I need your help. Please, send me something.” He then opened the ark to clean it as usual, and you can imagine his surprise to see twelve freshly baked breads. Who could this bread be for?? G-d doesn’t eat bread, and he himself has a hungry family at home! Surely, this is for him! He took the loaves and went happily on his way.
The next morning, Joe-shmo came back for minyan a little early. He wanted to check up on his offer and see if it was accepted. He opened the ark, and was amazed and happy to see that is gift was accepted! He rushed home to bake another set of loaves and take them back to shul.
This went on for a while.
But one day, as life – and stories – go, the two happened to run into each other. Disappointed they looked at each other: ‘You?? I thought it was G-d Himself who accepted my gift!’ ‘You?? I thought G-d Himself was feeding my family!’ The rabbi who also happened to be there, listened to both, then said – -d: Your hands are the hands of G-d doing what needs to be done in the world.
I’ve heard this story many years ago from Reb Zalman Schachter Shalomi, and every year when Parashat Emor rolls around, where this verse appears, I love to remember and retell it; I hear Reb Zalman’s rusty, deep voice in this: Your hands are the hands of G-d doing what needs to be done in the world. I hear in it the same message of “flow” modern psychologists speak of; the “satvic” energy of Yoga teachings and the Torah. Yet as I write the story again, I can’t help but wonder: Everybody’s hands? Everything we do? Only our very best or that too??
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At the end of this week’s reading we’re told about a fight between two Israelites. It’s a strange incident because of the details told: One is described as a son of an Israelite woman – whose name is given – and an Egyptian father and the other, an Israelite. The former ends up – possibly – cursing the other, using G-d’s name in some way: either cursing G-d Himself or aiming to hurt his fellow by invoking a curse. Initially the community does not know what to do with him but then they are told to stone him to death. There are a number of ways to try and understand this, but a question still remains: when we punish someone, what and who drive our action? School is a place to consider this question often, and wonder: is it the well-being of the child? The well-being of the community? The well-being of the teacher or leader? In the end, the result might be the same, but I believe the motivation will have an impact.
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If you need one chapter to find all Biblical holidays, you’ve come to the right parasha: Leviticus 23 has them all, including Shabbat, and the count of the Omer is mentioned in this week’s reading too. As it’s been said, we count each day, because each day counts. That one too.
Shabbat Shalom.

We tend to think of “love your neighbor as yourself” as a Biblical commandment that “makes sense”, while, for example, that of “sha’atnez”, the prohibition to mix wool and linen in the same garment, as a “chok”, a law which has no obvious reason. But, seriously, what exactly makes sense about love??

Right after “love your neighbor” it says “you shall keep (guard, maintain) my laws” (Leviticus 19:19). Rabbi Hirsch (19th century) takes us back to the first time we see the verb “to keep”, lishmor, which is when G-d placed the first human in His Garden (Genesis 2:15). What did Adam need to “guard” or “maintain”? For that, we go just a little earlier, to the 3rd day of creation, when G-d says: “’Let the earth put forth grass, herb yielding seed, and fruit-tree bearing fruit after its kind, wherein is the seed thereof, upon the earth.’ And it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, herb yielding seed after its kind, and tree bearing fruit, wherein is the seed thereof, after its kind; and God saw that it was good” (Genesis 1:11-12).
Like a chorus, the repeated statement is “after its kind”: each was created to be who and what it is, and to grow within its realm to the fullest potential. Certain mixes interrupt with this process, with this purpose of creation, and we have to guard against that.
When I was very young, wondering about strange laws in the Torah, I was told that it’s not good to mix wool and linen because they shrink differently in hot laundry. Well, maybe that too. But maybe the Torah tells us that “wool” and “linen” are two very different “kinds” beyond the thread in a garment; that one represents the animal kingdom, and the other – the plant. This is symbolic of not mixing certain things.

Interestingly, the same verse (in this week’s reading) also instructs us “not to let (your) cattle gender with a diverse kind; you shall not sow your field with two kinds of seed” (still 19:19). We gain some insight from a unique word used here: “kil’ayim”, which means not any mixing but – “materials that are mutually exclusive”. Rabbi Hirsch again, in his poignant dig into Hebrew roots, teaches that “kil’ayim” shares its roots with “ke’le”, jail, prison, and so literally can mean – “two jails”. Accordingly, mixing things that don’t fit with each other, “imprisons” both of them in a place they should not be. Some mixtures help us grow but some others – don’t.

Which brings us back to “love your neighbor”. Because of the unusual Hebrew grammar in the verse, Rabbi Hirsch concludes that we are not asked to “love” all people in the romantic sense of the word, which would be impossible and unreasonable, but, we are asked to see the other as we’d like to be seen ourselves, namely, as equal and yes, separate, special human beings created in G-d’s image, and give them the space to be just that, each unique for who he or she is. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Shabbat Shalom.

The middle letter in the Torah is in this week’s reading, and is a Vav. It appears in the word gachon (belly) in Leviticus 11:42.
A Torah scroll writer is called a sofer”, which literally means ‘someone who counts’. I think of mother duck who “counts” her eggs. Anything we really care about, we treat with utmost attention. Counting the Torah letters was no different. A Torah scroll contains 304,805 letters, so this Vav should be the 152,403rd letter (with 152,403 letters on either side). However, a careful count (which I admit, I didn’t do but accept the findings of those who did), shows that this Vav is actually the 157,237th letter. The middle letter accordingly would be in Leviticus 8:28, and is an Alef of the word הוא, hu (pronounced like who), which stands for He, and that’s another long story.
But most still teach that it’s the Vav. There are ways to rearrange the count; say we’re counting “long” letters, “unusual” letters, with or without spaces; how are we counting “double words” (“Abraham, Abraham” in Genesis 25:19) and others. One way or another, we teach that it’s the Vav.
Vav, the sixth letter of the Hebrew alphabet, literally means a “hook” and is used as “and” in the Hebrew language. For example Abraham and Sarah is “Avraham veSarah”. Extra meaning is added by the fact that “and” in Hebrew is not a separate word but only one letter that “hooks” to the next word and becomes one with it.
I often say that the commentary teaches more about the commentator than about the issue. I believe this is a critical rule in learning. In this case, even though we count the letter carefully over and over again, the message is stronger than the objective count. Vav, the sixth letter of the Hebrew alphabet, literally means a “hook” and is used as “and” in the Hebrew language. For example Abraham and Sarah is “Avraham veSarah”. Extra meaningful is added by the fact that “and” in Hebrew is not a separate word but only one letter that “hooks” to the next word and becomes one with it.
We want to be mindful that this whole book is all about making a meaningful connection, between people, and between us and G-d.
And while we’re on letters:
The three most frequently occurring letters in Hebrew are yod, heh and vav. These are also the letters that make G-d’s name. According to some, these are the hints for G-d’s presence in the world; according to others, this is how the world was made – it was all one “G-d block”, which was broken into smaller chunks that we can comprehend and that will be meaningful to us.
Shabbat Shalom.