The intense introspection of Elul is far behind us. The royal crowning of Hashem on Rosh Hashannah is but a distant memory. The pressure of Asseret Ymei Tshuvah has come and gone and the books of Yom Kippur have officially been closed. The sukkot have been dismantled for another long year, and our feet have healed from the joyous dancing of Simchat Torah. Yet as sad as we are to pack away our various machzorim and see the Days of Awe fade away, the change of seasons brings with it a sigh of relief. We couldn't possibly handle another barrage of huge meals, impose on another family for a place to stay, or afford to miss a single extra class. We couldn't possibly pick out another outfit, afford another trip home or stand for another moment in shul pretending we know where we are in the machzor. And it is official, as a thunderstorm rages outside, answering the tefillot of Jews all around the world, that the cold front has brought with it someone we've both been dreading and secretly anticipating: The month of Cheshvan. Mar-cheshvan. Mr. Bitter Cheshvan.
As the only month of the Jewish calendar without a holiday, the mark of the dismal beginning of winter, and a sudden return to the mundane after a period of spiritual bounty, Cheshvan doesn't have the best reputation among the other months. He represents a fall from grace – spiritually, emotionally, and physically. The flood in the days of Noah that destroyed the world happened in Cheshvan. Rachel Immenu passed away in Cheshvan. So why does our tradition say that the Third Temple in the days of Mashiach will be built in this bitter, cold and empty month?
The challenge of Cheshvan is to ground the unbelievable spiritual energy of the chaggim in our seemingly mundane physical world. The word עולם, 'world', literally means 'concealment'. In order to grant His creations the gift of free will and allow for the illusion of the existence of anything other than His All Encompassing Oneness, Hashem creates worlds of concealment. He masks Himself behind the mundane and allows for a world in which His very own creations can flatly deny His existence. And that is Cheshvan.
"בראשית ברא אלקים את השמים ואת הארץ. והארץ..."
The Torah opens by telling us that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. He created the spiritual realities of the universe, the happenings of the heavens, the secrets of existence, the holy, the transcendental, the beyond. And He created the earth. He created the physical world, the mundane, the imminent, the simple, the here and now. The second verse begins with the words 'והארץ'. Don't worry about the spiritual secrets, God hints to us, I'll worry about that. Your life, your existence, your Torah that I am about to reveal to you, all takes place in the physical world. Know that השמים exists, He demands, but live in הארץ.
The chaggim are over. We may remain connected, but our time of basking in perpetual inspiration has dissolved into university, work, and the challenges of every day living. There is a danger of descending into this Cheshvan-like existence and dropping all of the spiritual enlightenment we have been granted out of a fear that there is no place for it in this bitter world of gashmiut. The challenge is instead to both bring the light down and raise the world up by revealing that behind the dark, heavy rain clouds of this world of concealment exists a Light and a Truth so bright that it is only through the chessed of concealment that we can exist. Perhaps if we manage to use this month of Cheshvan properly, as a way to scratch away at the surface and reveal the hidden spirituality surrounding us, we will merit to see the Bet Hamikdash rebuilt, revealing that Mr. Bitter Cheshvan is really the bearer of the greatest spiritual gifts we could ever dream of. His storm clouds may bring darkness, but his rains bring unprecedented potential for growth.
אני ואתה נשנה את העולם,
אני ואתה ויבואו כבר כולם,
אמרו את זה קודם לפני,
לא משנה – אני ואתה נשנה את העולם.
Anyone with a solid Zionist education has, no doubt, sang this feel-good Israeli song in Hebrew class, yet as I learned it in Ulpan I began to question its legitimacy. “Me and you will change the world”, it claims. That's a pretty hefty statement, in my opinion. It assumes two axioms that need to be further developed. The first, that the world is indeed changeable. That we are not destined to live in the same world tomorrow that we live in today. And the second, that it is we who have the power to change it. That the entire world can be affected by small things – by individuals, by ideas. We, in a modern day North American culture, are certainly familiar with these empowering and optimistic ideals, but I sometimes wonder how deeply we truly understand them. More often than not, they remain cliché statements repeated during “Awareness Week” at school and “Yom Chessed” at camp, instead of becoming integrated values that we understand, never mind truths that we actually live by.
On the commentary on this week's parsha, Parshat Re'eh, we find a small-scale example to better demonstrate this concept. We are introduced to “The Wayward City”- a city so spiritually corrupt that the majority of its citizens are persuaded to worship idols. We are commanded to first investigate the situation, and if it is indeed as bad as it seems, to slaughter all the idol worshipers and to destroy along with them, all of their animals, possessions and property.
"הכה תכה את ישבי העיר ההוא...” (יג:טו) - “You shall surely smite the inhabitants of that city”
Ralbag finds an issue in the diction of the Torah – why does it say “that city” instead of “the city”? In his answer, he reveals something revolutionary. Rambam explains that after the court has established the city as a Wayward City, two Torah scholars are sent there to try and bring the people back to Hashem. Ralbag suggests that in the event that the people repent, the city need not be destroyed, because it is no longer “that city”. He comes to teach us that there are ideas in this world so powerful that they can literally change the status of an entire city. Whether a city follows in the ways of Hashem or strays after other gods is the defining question, one that identifies and characterizes the city.
Like all things in Torah, this concept manifests itself also on a personal level. When I think back to the beginning of my ba'al teshuavah process, I remember realizing that both my conception of and relationship with God were the only things that could literally effect every aspect of my life. Whether or not God exists, what type of God exists, and what, if anything, He expects from us, are questions whose answers have the power to completely change a person. My friend recently shared with me an idea she heard in a shiur from Rabbi Akiva Tatz that illustrates the same point. Rambam explains complete teshuvah, repentance, as when a person is placed in the same situation where he previously sinned, and now he chooses not to. When we are in vulnerable situations and forced to make difficult decisions, our yetzer harah and the evil forces in the world jump at the opportunity to persuade us to do wrong. After we have done teshuvah and find ourselves in the same situation again, these evil forces cannot succeed in persuading us to do evil. Rabbi Tatz explains that the reason these evil forces cannot succeed is because they cannot find us! After a complete, deep, teshuvah process, we literally become new people. The evil forces cannot find the person who sinned, because that person no longer exists – he has connected to an idea so powerful that it has effected his whole being, and he is now a new person.
As we head into the month of Elul, we are reminded that we have the power to reinvent ourselves completely. Through our honest self-introspection, our deep repentance, and our sincere desire to perfect ourselves, we can begin to see our existence in a God-context, thus leaving behind the parts of ourselves that do not fit into that picture. We see that when we attach ourselves to Hashem, as individuals, as a people, and, dare I say, as a modern state of Israel, we have the power to change ourselves, and with us, the entire world.
On my flight back to Toronto after my Year in Israel, I was writing furiously in my journal, trying to make sense of all that I'd seen, felt, learned and experienced, when a fellow passenger came up to me and struck up a conversation. We spoke about the power of Eretz Yisrael, and our mixed feelings about leaving. It was Parshat Shelach that week, and he explained to me Rebbe Nachman's interpretation of the spies' evil report of the land, specifically the phrase “the land...is a land that devours its inhabitants”(Bamidbar 13:32). Unfortunately I don't remember his exact understanding, but it implied that this statement was both true and potentially positive, if read correctly. “Perhaps it's true,” he suggested with a smile, “no one can deny that you become a part of this place. Whether you like it or not, your soul gets stuck here. Eretz Yisrael absolutely swallows you up.”
Those words echoed in my ears as my aliyah flight took off from Toronto just over a month ago. Exactly a year had passed, and as I learned Parshat Shelach on the plane, I thought about the deep, enigmatic connection between Am Yisrel and Eretz Yisrael. Over the past month as I've gone through the technical motions that will officially make this place my permanent home, I have been trying to better understand the meaning of this phrase. As I go from office to office, line to line, bus to bus, mountain to mountain, maayan to maayan, tiyul to tiyul, and Shabbat to Shabbat, this questions comes with me. What is it about Israel, about this physical mass of land in the Middle East, that completely consumes the Jewish people?
At first, I felt nothing. I felt like I was just here for the year. Perhaps it was all just so natural, so right - - the fulfillment of 3000 years of waiting. And then I began to panic. Am I in denial? Do I not understand the magnitude of my decisions? And then, suddenly, I felt everything. I felt everything, all the time. The most aggravating annoyance as I went through (and continue to go through!) the infamous Israeli bureaucracy. The most incredible frustration as I struggled (and continue to struggle!) in Ulpan, realizing my personal handicap in the language in which I will soon be studying. The most painful longing for friends and family members so far away, on so many levels. The most frantic helplessness as I heard the news of a terrorist on a mad rampage, bulldozing innocent people, smashing into the 13 bus I take to my Katamon apartment. The deepest sorrow upon feeling the effects of our captured soldiers tragic return to their home, to our home. And then the most all encompassing relief as I lit the candles and brought in my first Shabbat in the holiest city in the world. The most refreshing peace as I returned to Sfat for the first time. The indescribable feeling of touching the Kotel and realizing how close it will always be. The subtle comfort of being home. And the final clarity I have as I develop these thoughts at a maayan in the Judean Mountains at sunset (not to be too much of a cliché, or anything).
The greatest challenge, I have found, has been allowing myself to feel all that is constantly coming my way. Israel is a place so intense, so loaded, so powerful, that it is virtually impossible for my Western mind to categorize, analyze, and understand it, intellectually. My roommate gave me the wise advice of her mother, “Your emotions are a part of you. You need to embrace them, experience them, let them wash over you, and only then can you let them go.” But how could I feel something that didn't make sense? How could I understand what I was going through, when it was so much larger than my limited perspective? Moreover, how could I be frustrated, annoyed and negative when I knew it was all part of something so Good? I tried so hard to remind myself at the peak of my frustrations, that each time I was being sent from office to office to office, I was spending more time exploring the streets of Yerushalayim, Ir Hakodesh. “It doesn't matter how time consuming it is to get your medical insurance sorted out, or that every single person has given you completely contradictory directions,” I rationalized, “at the end of the day you are receiving free health care from an independent Jewish state in Eretz Yisrael that you have had the opportunity to make your home after thousands of years.” But it didn't work. All of my efforts were futile, and this type of thinking only increased my frustration.
And then it hit me. I was at a friend's going away party and met a woman who'd made aliyah close to two years ago. We spoke about the process, the challenges, the highs and lows, and she helped me to understand the inherent purpose of all that I had been going through. “This land will absolutely flatten you and rebuild you,” she warned, “any personal hang-ups? Ego-trips? Character flaws? Forget them!” And that is when I looked back over the past month, and realized that the entire experience has been picking at the very aspects of myself that need the most work. Whether it is learning how to ask for help, validating my own emotions, letting go of my ego, or relinquishing my desire to control my own fate (among many others!), my very environment is refusing to allow me to get away with my flaws. Every day, the things that frustrate me so completely, only do so because, in His abundant love and kindness, God has designed a reality where we are so intrinsically connected to this land that our experiences here reflect that which is happening internally. We are forced to address these issues head on, and the more we attempt to avoid them, the harder they will chase us. We need to become completely devoured by this land in order to realize our true potential and become the greatest versions of ourselves possible.
I know that I am currently living the dream of so many of Tzipiyah's readers, and I feel a responsibility to be as honest as possible to those who look here for inspiration as I make my own personal report on the land. It is not necessarily easy. It is not necessarily fun. Perhaps this land really does devour its inhabitants. But it is real, it is worth it, and I truly believe that any time spent here, no matter in what capacity, has the power to bring us deeper and deeper into the reality of the world, into the heart of the people, and into the individual potential of ourselves. Please God, we should all get here soon.
It is with great pride and joy that Tzipiyah.com would like to announce that one of our writers, Debbie, is making Aliyah today!
Yes, Debbie is today becoming an active participant in the most incredible movement of the world's history. She is making her own destiny tied into the destiny of the Jewish People. Wow! Mazal Tov!
Debbie, I would like to wish you on behalf of Tzipiyah.com and all of our readers the warmest Mazal Tov. May you keep being an inspiration for all of us, not only with your powerful writing but also with your inspirational actions through which you show us Torah is not just theoretical but rather, torah is Torat Chayim - a living Torah.
May this Aliyah be the start of many new aliyot for your as you keep going higher and higher in both your physical and spiritual accomplishments.
Mazal Tov! Bekarov Etzel Kulanu! Soon by all of us!
A short thought from my dad:
"The problem with today is that many people forget that although Israel is 'independent', it is completely dependent on God. When Israel celebrates its dependence on God, then we will be truly free!"
מֵאֵת יְהוָה, הָיְתָה זֹּאת; הִיא נִפְלָאת בְּעֵינֵינו
This is Hasmem's doing, it is wonderous in our eyes
זֶה-הַיּוֹם, עָשָׂה יְהוָה; נָגִילָה וְנִשְׂמְחָה בוֹ
This is the day which Hashem has made; we will rejoice and be glad in it/Him (?)
-Tehillim 118
Part of The Yom Haatzmaut Project
1. Organizations to Help Victims of Terror
2. Operation Solomon
3. Education
4. Worst Human Rights Violater (according to UNHRC)
Organizations to Help Victims of Terror
In response to the violence and terror thrown upon the people of Israel since it's conception, countless organizations have been founded to aid the victims and their families. Whether these organizations provide financial, technical, medical, emotional or psychological support, they show a level of resilience, strength and love among Am Yisrael that promises a bright future...no matter what is thrown (or shot?) our way! It is by continuing to transform pain into love, despair into hope and tragedy into triumph that we will ultimately turn exile into redemption.
Operation Solomon
In 36 hours, 34 non-stop flights of Israeli aircraft transported 14 500 Ethiopian Jews to Israel. On May 24, 1991, the operation set a world record for 'single-flight passenger load' when an El Al 747 carried 1 122 passengers to Israel (1 087 passengers were registered, but dozens of children hid in their mothers' robes). Two babies were born during the flight(wikipedia.com).
Bringing geulah - kibutz galiyut at its finest..!
Education
There are challenges and problems galore - student strikes, teachers strikes, insufficient funding, low teachers' wages, strikes, strikes, strikes, but at the end of the day, Israel's commitment to education can be seen through the following facts:
Israel has the highest ratio of university degrees to the population in the world.
Twenty-four per cent of Israel's workforce holds university degrees, ranking third in the industrialized world.
Four Israeli universities are included in the European Top 100.
Worst Human Rights Violater According to the UNHRC
I would be extremely worried and ashamed if Israel was meeting the United Nation's Human Rights Council's standard of human rights. Since its inception, the Council has passed twenty resolutions - 19 of them have been anti-Israel. The 2009 UN anti-racism conference, Durban II, is being planned by a committee that boasts Libya as its Chairman and Iran, Cuba and Pakistan as its members. Richard Falk, who draws a moral equivelency between the actions of the Nazis and those of the Israelis, was just appointed special rapporteur on the Palestinian territories. Need I continue?
Considering the council's definition of Human Rights proves to be completely backward, I consider this title to be a great compliment to Israel's commitment to human rights. Despite the fact that she has been faced with difficult challenges every step of the way, Israel offers religious and political freedom, protects minority rights, champions womens' rights, and protects the holy sites of other religions in the only liberal democracy in the Middle East. Perhaps we arent exactly where we would ultimately like to be, but we're most definitely on the way...
On Purim we are meant to reach a state of consciousness where it is impossible to discern between “Blessed is Mordechai” and “Cursed is Haman”. This concept appears to be completely absurd. Mordechai is pure goodness; a representative of God on this earth; a symbol of courage, faith and wisdom. Haman, on the other hand, is the antithesis of these ideas. Haman is Amalek – an arrogant coward committed to the annihilation of any Godliness or goodness in the world. As a people who tend to erect concrete walls between good and evil, this blurring of lines begs further investigation.
Perhaps we should first examine the nature of opposites as seen through Torah eyes. Afterall, Purim is all about opposites – “Nahafokh hu!” Everything in the Purim story turned out the exact opposite way of how it seemed it would at the beginning. We know that in the physical world, every action has an equal and opposite reaction. For example, how far back we pull the slingshot determines how far forward the pebble will fly. We also know that everything that exists in this physical world is merely a physical manifestation of a deeper truth in the spiritual world. By observing the physical world around us we are able to understand not only scientific concepts, but also mystical realities.
This concept can be applied to all energies in the world, not only those that we are able to experience on a physical level. For example, there is a general rule in Judaism that in any situation where there is a potential for holiness, there is an identically powerful potential for impurity. All things that make the world go round – sex, power, money – can be used to either create, build and elevate our beautiful world, or absolutely corrupt and destroy it. There is also an idea that as we grow, so does our yetzer harah. As we strengthen our connection to Hashem and are lead more and more by our souls than our bodies, our evil desires kick it into overdrive, putting us into even more tempting situations than we've previously endured. It is almost like a spiritual thermostat, except with the opposite purpose of ensuring that we never get too comfortable!
All of these complicated ideas appear in my brain visually on an xy-axis. Picture a grid where for each point on the positive side, there is a mirror image of an equal and opposite point on the negative side, leaving us with a perfectly symmetrical graph of opposites. Well hold on a second – if points War, Hate and Disease can be obliterated by simply erasing Peace, Love and Health, is that perhaps a theoretical option to consider? Can we annihilate Evil by giving up Good?
When we erase all the points from the grid we are not left with nothing – we are left with an empty axis. The axis is the structure of the universe, the paradigm through which the world exists. Removing the points leaves us with a tremendous void. Happiness is not merely the absence of sadness. A cease-fire is not true peace. These energies are real – they all have tangible identities, powers far greater than we can begin to understand, and without them life would simply not be world living.
An empty axis is a world of unfulfilled potential. On one end, we have Hashem - hidden behind this checkered screen, dying to communicate with us, to send us messages, to teach us about the workings of the world, to actualize the purpose of creation. And on the other side you have us – begging to communicate with our creator, to understand the hidden mysteries of life here on earth, to see the world develop in the way in which we wish it would. But then there is a breakdown. Without the points, God has no way of speaking to us, and we have no data to interpret.
This understanding, however, only brings up more problems. It suggests that points Cancer, Global Warming, Depression and Poverty are all drawn by our Benevolent Artist. To explain this anomaly, we must return to our discussion of how our evil inclination grows along with our goodness. Previously, I wrote that because our yetzer harah and yetzer tov are of equal force, whenever our yetzer tov ‘wins’, our yester harah needs to become stronger as well. But if they are truly equal, how can our yetzer tov ever be triumphant in the first place? How can we ever graduate to a higher level of goodness if we are always pitted up against a twin evil? Wouldn't we be trapped in a perpetual scrappling match? A spiritual stale-mate? By recognizing that the evil isn’t really Evil, and instead using it for Good, we take from the Evil in order to feed the Good. We need to learn to stare the evil of the world straight in the eyes and say, “You do not exist. Ein od mivaldo – there is nothing in this world except for God”. When we are able to see our hardships and pain as challenges sent to us by our loving Father in heaven to help us actualize our potential, we will learn to bless the Evil, thus making it Good.
When we observe our situation in the world right now, covered with Points of Pain, it is difficult to say that all of the trials and tribulations in our personal and national lives are worthy of blessing, but Mordechai wasn’t exactly living in Gan Eden, either! At a time when the Jews were condemned to total annihilation and the world was being ruled by Evil and Corruption, Mordechai was able to see the real King and thus, he changed fate.
If you believe that you live in a chaotic world run by Chance and Evil, then you will. But if you believe that all of the perceived chaos, chance and evil are really just gifts from God to help us grow into better people and stronger Jews, then so it will be -“Nahafokh hu!”. You have the power to live in a world where the beauty and mastery of an entirely good and loving God runs the show. By seizing the evil and manipulating it for God’s will, we elevate it to a point where it forces our yetzer tov to strive to a higher level, thus evil actually creates good and darkness gives way to light. So “Cursed is Mordechai” – down with the goodness that tricks us into thinking we have reached our potential, and “Blessed is Haman” – may we rise to the challenges of the day!
Wishing all of Am Yisrael a truly happy Purim, where we can look back on our lives and say, Ein Od Mivaldo!
When I dropped math in high school and spent my grade twelve year mocking all of the number crunching nerds around me, I never imagined that years later I’d be wiping the dust off my old textbooks and starting from square one. Now, as I study for my SATs in order to get into university in Israel, it looks like the joke is on me. I was complaining to my family about the tediousness of my new favorite subject when my sister asked jokingly, “What if 1+1 doesn’t really equal 2? Then everything else you’re doing is useless!” From there, erupted a dinnertime conversation about the essence of Oneness. My father, the token Breslover, argued that 1+1=1 because the nature of oneness is a completion so whole that it leaves no room for separate parts.
My brother, the 17-year-old hooligan, argued that he was being ridiculous because 1+1 clearly equals 2.
I, the mathematician, argued that 1+1=window.
My sister, the normal one, marveled at how her joke turned into a philosophical debate.
My mom ate her Chinese food.
The question may seem silly, but the power of oneness is something that has mystified us since Day 1. Pardon the pun. And the rhyming.
This week’s parsha, Vayakhel, opens with Moshe gathering B’nei Yisrael together to give them the commandment of Shabbat.
“And Moses gathered (vayakhel) the entire assembly of the children of Israel and said to them: These are (eleh) the things that Hashem commanded…” (35:1)
The commentators ask many questions about this verse: Why is the commandment of Shabbat repeated so many times throughout the Torah? And why now, specifically? Why did Moshe gather the people in such a way as seen in very few other places in the Torah? Furthermore, the Netivot Shalom points out that Shabbat is the epitome of the experience of closeness to God. How is it possible that right after the grievous Sin of the Golden Calf, the Jewish people can be expected to climb to such lofty heights? Are we not tainted and unworthy? By comparing the language used in this week’s parsha with last week’s parsha, we learn an important lesson:
“…and the people gathered (vayikahel) around Aaron and said to him, “Rise up, make for us gods that will go before us…” (32:1)
“And upon the completion of the golden calf: “They said: ‘This is (eleh) your god, O Israel…” (32:4)
Through carefully examining the language, we are told to pay close attention to the connection between these two events. But what could possibly be further away from Shabbat, man’s acknowledgement of God as the Creator of the universe, than idolatry? Whereas in last week’s parsha the people gathered together in order to proclaim an idol as their god, this week, the peopled are gathered together by Moshe in order for him to proclaim the word of God unto them. The Netivot Shalom goes on to say that there is an element of Teshuvah contained in Shabbat that can bring a Jew up from the depths of any situation imaginable, even that of the Golden Calf. What is this element? None other than the Power of One, of course. He interprets Pasuk 35:1 in such a way that the word “eleh” is referring to “vayakhel” – Moshe gathered the entire assembly of the children of Israel to tell them not only the ‘Dos and Donts’ of Shabbat, but also the message of unity, captured in the word “vayakhel”
If man never sinned, perhaps as an individual he would be able to achieve oneness with God. However, after sinning, in order to man to reach such lofty heights, we need to be lifted along with those around us. The only antidote to the most grievous of sins is unity. For example, the generation that built the Tower of Babel in efforts to wage war against God was spared the punishment of being wiped in the merit of their unity. Furthermore, when B’nei Yisrael were in Egypt, we had sunk to the 49th of 50 gates of impurity. We were on the cusp of total spiritual annihilation. In order to become an Am worthy of receiving the Torah and experiencing the revelation of God at Har Sinai, we needed to bypass all of these gates. It is for this reason that Hashem gave B’nei Yisrael the mitzvah of the korban pesach. This is a communal mitzvah – not only must the offering be eaten with the entire household, but “kol kehal haedat yisral” – “the entire congregation of the assembly of Israel” must slaughter it together (12:6). It was only through this type of behaviour that B’nei Yisrael finally achieved the level of encamping “k’ish echad b’lev echad” – “like one man with one heart” – at Har Sinai.
I learned this Netivot Shalom on Monday morning before going to the rally organized by the Jewish community in support of the residents of Sderot, who have been barraged by Qassam rockets on a daily basis for the last eight years. The rally was deemed ‘a huge success’, and the community of Toronto was praised for being the leaders of North American Jewry for finally taking action. The overarching theme of the speakers (including Alan Dershowitz!) was that of the solidarity between the Jews of Toronto and those of Sderot. “Your future is our future,” emphasized David Koschitzky, chair of the UJA Federation of Toronto, speaking to a tired group of Sderot citizens gathered together on a live video feed at 3am. As I looked around the spacious hall, full to capacity with 2 000 Jews of all ages and religious background, waving Israeli and Canadian flags, I wasn’t sure if I should be proud or ashamed. The speakers all seemed to be very impressed by the message of strength and unity expressed by such a turn-out, but I couldn’t help but wonder: “in a city of more than 200 000 Jews, where are the other 99%?!”
And then I thought back to the Netivot Shalom. What is so powerful about unity, anyway? When we are gathered together, the individual is nullified, he teaches. We do not disappear in a creepy communist way, but rather when God sees Jews gathered together in love and support of one another, our individual sins fall away. They are completely overshadowed by the power of our coming together. As my token-Breslov-father was sure to remind me, surely all of the Toronto Jews that missed the rally were busy learning Torah and visiting the sick, but for the few that did not know about it and instead watched the Raptors game, perhaps the unity among those gathered together in Toronto and Sderot is enough to bring us all one step closer to Peace in the Middle East.
So as we enter into this Shabbat, I hope that we all have a heightened understanding of the essence of unity on Shabbat and the totality of the Oneness of Hashem. May we all spend quality time with those we love and remain united in thought, action and prayer with all of Am Yisrael around the world.
“I have a great story for you,” announced my friend excitedly.
“Tell, tell,” I begged, playing into her intention of suspense.
“Hm, I dunno, it’s gonna cost ya,” she added, jokingly.
“Well, uh, my soul’s for sale?”
“Ah, please! No one wants a soul these days!”
We laughed. She told me the ‘great story’.
I have no recollection of the ‘great story’, but, since that day, the meaningless preamble has popped into my head time and time again. We may have joked casually, but the truth behind our banter is certainly not a laughing matter. We live in a world where many people spend their lives chasing after things that will ultimately prove to be futile and empty. They deny that the very source of their existence exists. Religion is a burden, God, an inconvenience, and Truth, an illusion.
With this reality as my backdrop, I began to learn this week’s parsha, Ki Tisa. I, like all of the commentators, was baffled by the story of the Sin of the Golden Calf. How is it possible, they ask, that a mere forty days after the greatest revelation in the history of the world the people sinned so grievously? What were they thinking? Perhaps they were trying to replace Moshe, not God? Yes, this makes more sense! Or maybe it was the Egyptian multitudes that joined B’nei Yisrael when they left Egypt? My confusion, however, lies somewhere else.
“Aaron said to them, ‘Remove the rings of gold that are in the ears of your wives, sons, and daughters, and bring them to me.’ The entire people removed the gold rings that were in their ears, and brought them to Aaron.” (32:2-3)
Unfortunately, it is not hard for me to imagine Am Yisrael rebelling against, or flat out denying the existence of, God. I do not have to delve so deeply into my imagination to conjure the image of people who would rather follow their own personal desires than that of an Eternal being. What is difficult to grasp, however, is how Aaron convinced ‘the entire people’ to give up their jewelry, wealth and riches. It appears that Rashi, too, is bothered by this part of the plot. He explains that Aaron knew that the people were misguided, yet out of fear for his own life, he went along with their plan. He was sure that the women would not easily give up their jewelry (which many say they didn’t), and thus he could buy enough time for Moshe to return and the whole episode to be forgotten. Aaron could never have anticipated how enthusiastic the people would be with the idea of a molten god. When we learn this story, we tend to give B’nei Yisrael a very hard time about their actions, yet there is actually something impressive going on here. In a world where many have given up God for money without a second thought, it is humbling to think of a people that would give up all of their most valuable possessions for God, even if in a misguided manner.
Nevertheless, it is considered a great sin, arguably an archetypal-root-of-all-sins-kind-of-sin. The parsha opens up with Hashem demanding that Moshe take a census of B’nei Yisrael by collecting half a shekel from each person.
“Everyone who passes through the census, from twenty years of age and up, shall give the portion of Hashem. The wealthy shall not increase and the destitute shall not decrease from half a shekel – to give the portion of Hashem to atone for your souls.” (30:14-15)
The Torah goes to great lengths to emphasize the value of the half-shekel and the importance of it being atonement for sins. It is said that through the contribution of half a shekel, B’nei Yisrael would achieve forgiveness from the Sin of the Golden Calf. Well, pardon my saying so, but that’s a pretty good deal. If atonement only costs fifty cents, it certainly pays to sin!
It is clear that there must be a deeper more symbolic significance to the contribution of the half-shekel for it to atone for a sin as great as idolatry. In Jewish tradition, the half-shekel has been linked to the three master relationships of a human being: the relationships between fellow man, a man and himself, and man and God.
On a national level, through each man giving an equal contribution, we learn the concept of our individual responsibility to both Am Yisrael and humanity as a whole. In order for the world to rise to a higher level, it is imperative that each of us does our part. Depending on our stature, our purpose appears to be a greater or lesser sacrifice, yet at the end of the day, none of us can be complete without the other.
On a personal level, within each man exists a dichotomy. Human beings are a pardoxal half-physical, half-spiritual being, and by taking our animalistic desires for materialism and directing them to something greater than ourselves, we are able to become a more complete being. Weare not giving away half a shekel, but rather gaining control of half of ourselves, thus becoming whole.
Lastly, we see how the contribution of the half-shekel connects to our relationship with God. We were married to God at Mount Sinai with the two tablets as our marriage contract. When Moshe came down from Har Sinai with the freshly engraved tablets and saw B’nei Yisrael dancing and celebrating around a Golden Calf, he smashed the tablets. The sin was adultery just as much as it was idolatry! The Sin of the Golden Calf is the ultimate separation from our Creator. We are nothing without God, and He has chosen to be nothing in this world without us. In order for us to actualize our potential and become whole beings, we must first recognize that there is no self out of a Divine context. If there is no God, there is no me. Furthermore, it is perhaps more important for us to recognize that God cannot move the world to its intended purpose without us doing our part as well.
We live in a broken world of fractures, schisms, and half-shekels. War is rampant, relationships are failing, God is hidden and people are depressed. In order for us to gain true atonement for the sins of our time, whether they are personal or national, we need to create connections and bring unity into the world. We need to focus on healing, stitching and bringing things back together by improving our relationships with our fellow man, ourselves, and our God. The first step in doing so is recognizing that we are but a half-shekel, and that, alone, is worthless. We may only be half of the story, yet its ending is entirely dependent on us.
“Hold on, so let me get this straight,” I demanded in a voice choked by disbelief, “you’re saying that there is absolutely no way that I can start at York University this coming semester?”
“No, I’m sorry,” responded the bored voice on the other end of the phone, as if my future wasn’t hinged on the outcome of this conversation. “Your application has been forwarded on to the following semester. Have a great day.” Click.
And that was it. I hung up the phone and heard a nervous chuckle escape from my tightened chest, a chuckle that soon developed into full-blown laughter. I had accidentally sent in my transcripts three weeks late, and as a result of this minor oversight, “the Faculty of Arts at York University was full”. My ‘plan’ had been to start at York in January 2008 - until this happened. Well, that’s not really true. My ‘plan’ had actually been to start at McGill in September 2007 - until Shanah Bet happened. Well, that’s not exactly true either. My ‘plan’ had originally been to start at Western in September 2007, until ‘my year in Israel’ happened. And that’s not completely true either, but for Sanity’s sake, I’ll stop here and allow your imaginations to wander.
In this pivotal moment, instead of berating myself for my stupidity or panicking in the face of the Unknown, I threw my head back, stared heavenward and laughed. In this timeless moment, I saw past, present and future bound together as one. I suddenly understood that all of the confusion, challenges and choices of the last few years of my life had lead me to this fateful moment – so I called my mom and told her I was making aliyah. I’m not joking.
On top of this story being simply great, it is also completely relevant to this week’s parshah. Parshat Beshalach contains one of the most miraculous events in Jewish History. More amazing to me than the splitting of the sea, is the moment directly following it: “…And the nation feared Hashem, and they had faith in Hashem and in Moshe, His servant.” The Jewish people have a long and well-documented history, yet proclamations of national faith as pure and definitive as this are few and far between, thus begging further investigation.
There is a midrash claiming that from the time of creation until the splitting of the sea, no man had never before sang a song in praise of God - not Adam, nor any of our avot. What is it about this event that brought Am Yisrael to an unprecedented level of Emunah and immediately inspired in us song that has since than been immortalized in our prayers every morning? The Slonimer Rebbe suggests that, at this moment, Am Yisrael understood on a deep and profound level that all of the suffering, pain, and tears of the last 210 years of slavery were ultimately for the good. God’s love of Am Yisrael was so clear that the drowning of babies and the backbreaking labor were immediately forgiven, and B’nai Yisrael burst into a song; a song about the past, the future and the present all rolled into one.
“The Song at the Sea” contains within in traces of the cyclical nature of Jewish history and our relationship with Hashem. It hints to the future geulah and reminds us of a time where, despite national tragedy and a seemingly upside down world, we had a pure and perfect faith that it was all for the good. So too, there will come a time when the challenges and horrors of the last three thousand years of Jewish History make sense and reveal themselves to be Hashem’s disguised mercy. Just as I have no idea how my own life plans will turn out, I would never be so arrogant to claim that I have any inkling of how God’s Plan will turn out. I cannot begin to speculate on how our knotted past will untangle itself and emerge as a beautiful bow on our present (and future), yet all that we can (and must!) do is strengthen our emunah that even if we don’t understand it right now, one day we will.
So here I am. Staring blankly out of my bedroom window at the gray screen that covers the world here in chutz l’aretz. God exists within every bit of physicality in this world. Or so I’ve been told. Somewhere hidden deep beneath the gray, slushy snow banks, along with the McDonalds cup and the Coca-Cola can from before the first snowfall is a Divine source. It exists only because a benevolent creator willed it to be. In some deep spiritual reality, in order for the world to develop according to Plan and for the Divine potential to be actualized, this snow bank needs to be exactly here, exactly now. That all, of course, is obvious. But then how come it doesn’t awaken my soul?
With a dream-like smile on my face, a longing gaze in my eyes, a physical pain in my heart and a yearning in my soul, the borders of the screen get fuzzy and a series of dramatic bells take me back to a moment in my not-so-distant past.
So here I am. Sitting on a rooftop in Sfat with a cup of Chai tea in hand, Yosef Karduner serenading me with his Godly praises on my iPod, and the mountains of Northern Israel rolling on before me eternally. And it is here, with, with the sun and the breeze as my witnesses that I will attempt to transfer the status of my soul at exactly this moment onto a one-page-double-sided paper ripped clandestinely out of some poor innocent’s notebook. In just over a month, I’ll be on a plane back to Toronto, to a place formerly known as ‘home’, when the world meant something entirely different. When I look out at these mountains, my heart physically aches and my soul threatens to jump out of my body and sail directly up to it’s Creator. I see the struggles of three thousand years of Jewish history reflected in the heaven-kissed peaks and deep, dark valleys. I see the dichotomy of the finite and the infinite attempting to coexist and make space for each other within themselves. I see the big picture, the master plan, stained by individual trees and interrupted by lone cars on a highway in the distance. And where do I fit in to all of this?
I’ll save you the soul bearing that followed, and zoom in on something so totally bizarre and absolutely illogical that I was experiencing. Through looking at a physical land mass, a geographical collection of mountains, I experienced a moment of intense self-knowledge and complete clarity in my relationship to an infinite Being. Apart from the shocking aesthetic differences, what is really so incredibly different about a dirty snow bank on a polluted side street in Toronto and a majestic mountain top in the hills of the Upper Galilee? Rationally – very little, but realistically - everything.
In Orot Hatechiyah, Rav Kook attempts to explain the constant struggle and tension that exist in Eretz Yisrael today. There are three forces battling within Am Yisrael in the development of the state of Israel – the religious, the nationalist, and the humanist. These forces battle in the Diaspora as well, he explains, yet they manifest themselves in an intensified manner in Eretz Yisrael. And why is that? The most important things in life are ‘good for nothing’, meaning they are ends in themselves, not means to something greater. Torah is one example of this, Eretz Yisrael is another. Eretz Yisrael is not an external means to an end for Am Yisrael, although through being a unified nation functioning according to Torah in our land, we do have the potential to bring about unprecedented change in the world. Primarily, however, our connection as a people to the land of Israel is something inherent, intrinsic and internal. When we are in our land, we experience the spiritual reality that means being completely connected to the essence of who we are, both as individuals and as a nation.
Then how come all the fighting? Why all the tension? After all, I’ve never seen a fanatic observant Jew in Toronto throw a stone at his reform brother driving down Bathurst Street to temple on Shabbat! Nor have I ever seen an unaffiliated Jew in Toronto beat up his brother because he has a strange hairdo and wears a funny hat all the time! When Am Yisrael is disconnected from its essence, when the spiritual umbilical cord is cut, the nation begins to fade away. As a man in Chevron told me on Parshat Chaya Sarah last year, "this is your first time breathing fresh air - you had no idea you were surviving through an oxygen mask all these years". At the time, I thought he was crazy. Now with a lot of learning, experience, growth and perspective, I know he just understood the reality of the world in a way I had never seen it. People are asleep and apathetic, merely existing in a perpetual state of drowsiness, unaware of the spiritual realities that the soul of the nation is experiencing at any given moment. Sure, returning to the land brings problems, but when you see a sick child lying quiet and calm in his bed, wouldn’t you do anything to bring him back to his mischievous, trouble-making, vase-breaking self? The tension in Israel may at times seem unbearable, but at least it lets us know we are alive.
And this is what it means to be a Jew in Eretz Yisrael. Because of nothing more than God’s infinite mercy, I have had the blessing of spending the last year and a half learning Torah in Eretz Yisrael, strengthening my relationships to my self, my people, my Torah, my God and my land. I am attempting to unify these relationships in a way that they cannot ever be lost because they will define who I am and the eyes through which I see the world. If one aspect is ever missing, I should feel a lack and an identity crisis so large that it should shake me up and drive me to teshuvah. To be a Jew in Eretz Yisrael is to be so aware of your essence, so connected to your true self, that even when you feel confused, lost and scared, you have total clarity about these feelings and you have the ability to feel them completely. You are alive.
Display Name : Debbie
Gender: Female
Birthday: July 20, 1988
HomeTown: Toronto, Ontario
Current City of Residence: Toronto, Ontario...for the next 6 months until I make aliyah.
Favorite City outside of Jerusalem: Sfat - but I haven't gotten around to the whole world...yet.
Yeshiva/Seminary Attended: Machon Maayan (Shanah Alef), Nishmat (Shanah Bet)
Occupation: When I finally start, student - majoring in Jewish History looking toward Holocaust Education.
Interests or Hobbies: Meeting people, travelling, music, reading, learning, babies, sarcasm, paradoxes, balance, laughing, crying, thinking, wine, life.
Favorite Music: Grateful Dead, CSNY, Paul Simon, Yosef Karduner, Eric Clapton, The Tragically Hip, BB King and I was just introduced to something that may soon become a favourite - The John Butler Trio.
Favorite Book: Exodus (Leon Uris), Netivot Shalom (Slonimer Rebbe), Bereshit (God), To Heal A Fractured World (Rabbi Jonathan Sacks), Worldmask (Rabbi Akiva Tatz), Man's Search for Meaning (Viktor Frankel), 1984 (George Orwell), The Life You Were Born To Live (Dan Millman), Harry Potter, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, The Kite Runner etc...
Freestyle description: I love people, life, God, the world and myself. In no particular order. I just came back from a year and a half of transformative Torah learning and self discovery in Israel and plan to make aliyah this summer. But I also have learnt not to take my own plans too seriously. I'm a free spirit that loves making lists. I don't like to box myself or others in. I try temper ideals with reality. It's really hard. I really dislike freestyle desciptions of myself. Makes me nervous.
Random Questions: When you hesitate before hitting snooze on your alarm clock, are you being lazy?
No, by taking the time to hesitate you're being responsible and excercising your free will.
For your birthday, your aunt gave you a maple syrup dispenser shaped like a rooster. Please write her a thank-you note.
Dear Aunt, It's the thought that counts. Next time...think harder. And include a gift receit. Or at least a maple syrup refill. Can't wait to see you next year.
Have you ever drank your soda from a straw?
I don't drink carbonated beverages, they make my nose feel funny. Except beer, which makes my nose feel great...but not from a straw.
Whats your favorite planet and why?
Earth. That's a rediculous question.
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