Yeshiva Students and the Army

One of the difficult issues I faced when making aliyah some thirty years ago was accepting the fact that I would be drafted into the army. I grew up in the States during the Vietnam War era and had a kind of reflex reaction against anything military. At the same time, I understood that Israel's situation was one of being under constant military threat from its neighbors and, as such, came to accept that living here entailed personal responsibility to help defend against that threat.

I came to this conclusion in part by consideration of halachic sources. Despite the decision by numerous charedi (ultra-Orthodox) leaders to not allow their followers to join the army, I felt strongly that this was a misguided decision based on what I had learned.

However, knowing that my grasp of halachic sources was (and is) greatly limited, I approached Rav Mordechai Savitsky z”l, whom I have mentioned previously in this blog, to ask his opinion. Rav Savitsky was well known in the charedi world and, in fact, had been asked to be the head of the rabbinic court for the EdahHachareidis back in the 1970s, a highly prestigious position which he turned down (and I intend to speak about that decision in a future post). I had the privilege to study with and ask numerous halachic questions from Rav Savitsky during the time I lived in Boston and even after my aliyah considered him to be my rav.

I asked Rav Savitsky simply if halacha dictated that I must accept going into the army. Rav Savitsky's initial reply was a deflection: he stated that I should not worry and that he had connections who could get me an exemption.

I persisted, though, and presented my argument. I put it to him that if, chas v'chalilah, the Israeli army would cease to exist, the entire Jewish population of Israel would be in mortal danger. Therefore, one should see that being in the Israeli army is, in fact, an act of saving lives (פיקוח נפש – pikuach nefesh). I then pointed out to the rav the gemara which states in a b'raita:

תלמוד בבלי מסכת יומא דף פד עמוד ב ואין עושין דברים הללו לא על ידי נכרים ולא על ידי כותיים, אלא על ידי גדולי ישראל.

Babylonian Talmud Yoma 84b: ...and we do not do these things (to violate the Shabbat for a person whose life is in danger) by way of non-Jews or by way of Cuthites, rather by way of the great of Israel (gedolei Yisrael).

This gemara is brought down in the most prominent halachic works including the Mishneh Torah of the Rambam (Hilchot Shabbat 2:3) and the Shulchan Aruch (Orach Chaim 328:12).

Thus, I argued, it is davka the talmidei chachamim (the learned sages) and their students who should be the first to volunteer for the army.

Rav Savitsky smiled and replied simply, “You're right.”

I left it at that and, when I was drafted, went to the army. As it happened, I was never actually called for active duty, but that's another story.

Let me point out here that many charedim do serve in the army, although as of yet they are still a minority. Why the charedi leaders do not adopt the position that there is an actual obligation to join the army is another question.

The connection to this week's parsha and my story comes by way of a book called אם הבנים שמחה (Em Habanim S'mecha-The Mother of the Children is Happy) by RavYissacher Shlomo Teichtal. I will elucidate in my next posting.

Zealotry for Whom, May I Ask?

About a dozen or so years ago I was approached by a woman asking to have a pair of tefillin checked. As it happened, I met her in her brother's home which was in a charedi section of Jerusalem. Upon concluding that the tefillin were not kosher she ordered a new pair as well as a used pair for her husband. She did not tell me who the new pair were for.

Her brother walked me outside afterward and told me not to sell her the tefillin as he knew they would be given to her niece for her bat mitzvah. When I pointed out that halacha, while discouraging women from putting on tefillin, does not forbid them from doing so, either (Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim 38:3, see the RaMa's comment). He became very heated, going on about how terrible things were happening in the States with women's minyans where they put on tallitot and tefillin.

I exited but received a call from him the next day. He told me that he had tracked down my original sofrut teacher (who by then was living in the US) and claimed that my teacher told him that if I sold tefillin for a woman's use he would have no choice but to publicize the matter and see to it that others didn't buy from me. I actually checked with my teacher and while he assured me he didn't say those things I understood that this brother was essentially blackmailing me with the threat of smearing my name in the Orthodox world.

After a bit of rage and bit of shock, I decided to speak with Rav Chaim Pinchas Scheinberg, a world renown posek and one whose opinion I greatly respected not only for his halachic mastery but also for what I knew was a sensitivity to the people he rendered halachic decisions for.

I explained the situation to Rav Scheinberg and then asked him two questions:

1. Was I allowed to sell the tefillin to this woman?
2. Was this brother in violation of the prohibition against lashon hara for having spoken about me and this matter to my teacher?

Rav Scheinberg answered that in principle halacha would not bar me from selling the woman the tefillin. However, he told me that in this instance I would not be allowed as doing so would risk my livelihood given the threat from this man.

Regarding the question of lashon hara on the brother's part he paskened clearly that, yes, he violated the law of speaking lashon hara.

Lashon hara is not simply gossip; rather, it is specifically speaking ill of someone even though what it is said is true.

I sat back after this conversation in amazement. This brother violated what Chazal considered to be the most severe prohibition of the Torah (see Tosefta Peah 1:1) in order to prevent his niece from fulfilling a mitzvah!

While women are exempt from the mitzvah of tefillin, and in fact the RaMa specifically discourages them, they are allowed to fulfill it if they wish. According to Ashkenazi custom, in fact, they are allowed to say the blessing and include the words 'Who has commanded us to lay tefillin.”

I was reminded of this incident recently with the brouhaha over The Women of the Wall. I have heard various accusations against them including that what they are doing is for their own liberal minded agenda and not l'shem shamayim (for the sake of heaven). I have heard people challenge them about wearing tallit and tefillin and make the claim that they only wear them at the wall in order to incite and provoke and don't wear them every day.

I am puzzled by the uproar, the criticism and especially the attacks, both vocal and physical, against this group of women for a number of reasons.

The one I want to emphasize here is simply this: If the point of the Torah is to become closer to God through his commandments and women voluntarily decide that they want to adopt wearing tallit and tefillin and praying together, why is that so bad? Shouldn't the Orthodox world be encouraging this type of behavior?

After all, I didn't hear the brother go on about how terrible it is that parents in the US (and even here in Israel) spend lavishly for bar and bat mitzvah celebrations, many of which are devoid of any spirituality and often violate shabbat and kashrut laws.

I am puzzled because these Orthodox people who object so loudly and crudely feel that their priorities dictate ignoring specific prohibitions of the Torah in order to prevent women from taking upon themselves mitzvot.

I see a bit of a parallel in this week's parsha. In Numbers 11, after Moshe complains to God that it is too much for him to bear the full responsibility of caring for the children of Israel, God sees fit to transfer some of Moshe's spirit to seventy elders in order to spread that responsibility around.

As it happens, a couple of the newly formed prophets, Eldad and Meidad, under the influence of this Holy Spirit they had just received, continued to prophesy in the camp publicly even as the others had stopped. This was reported back to Moshe and Yehoshua whereupon Yehoshua said to Moshe his master:

במדבר פרק יא : (כח) ויען יהושע בן נון משרת משה מבחריו ויאמר אדני משה כלאם:

(כט) ויאמר לו משה המקנא אתה לי ומי יתן כל עם יקוק נביאים כי יתן יקוק את רוחו עליהם:

Numbers 11 : (28) And Yehoshua the son of Nun, an attendant of Moshe from his youth, replied and said, “My master Moshe, imprison them!” (29) And Moshe said to him, “Are you zealous on my account? And would it be that the Lord would make all of the nation prophets when the Lord would give His spirit upon them!”

Yehoshua saw Eldad and Meidad taking up the mantle of prophecy as a threat to his master Moshe and wanted to suppress that threat. Moshe, about whom we'll learn a bit later that he was the most of humble of men, not only did not perceive a threat but welcomed the spreading of the Lord's spirit however the Lord saw fit.

This word that Moshe uses, המקנא, which I have translated as “are you zealous,” is the same root word used later to describe Pinchas (Numbers 25; 11, 13). In the case of Pinchas, such zealotry was de facto sanctioned by God Himself. However, we see from this story that zealotry is not always a welcome thing.

What is the nature of the zealotry here? Perhaps it is simply that Yehoshua's zealotry in this case was not לשם שמים (for the sake of Heaven), but rather was serving the more narrow purpose of maintaining Moshe's exclusive position as a prophet.

While readers may be quick to point out myriad differences between this story and the current events regarding the Women of the Wall, consider this: Why are the Women of the Wall in particular and women who choose to wear tallit and tefillin in general seen as such a threat by parts of the Orthodox establishment? The halachic argument against their practices is weak at best. Moreover, what provokes some to violate clear halachot in their protests?

I cannot speak on behalf of either side in this controversy. But what it feels like, and what I felt in my own story above, is that these protesters confuse the Torah with their particular lifestyle. What these women choose to do does not fit into a traditional Orthodox narrative as they see it. These women's actions threaten to change norms within the Orthodox world which include changing leadership roles and decision making, just as Yehoshua saw a threat from Eldad and Meidad.

Perhaps Yehoshua thought that maintaining Moshe's position as the exclusive prophet to the people was a pursuit for the sake of Heaven and perhaps those who oppose the Women of the Wall feel themselves to be acting on behalf of Heaven, as well. Perhaps Yehoshua felt that Eldad and Meidad were acting out of self interest just as those who oppose women laying tefillin may feel that they are acting out of self interest.

What we learn from Moshe, though, is that when we see others who are fulfilling mitzvot we should not stop them based on our assumptions. At the very least, until we know otherwise for certain, we should let them be.

Who knows? Maybe their desire to fulfill these commandments, for whatever reason, may bring renewed interest and spirit to the Torah in our day just as Eldad and Meidad must have electrified the crowd around them.

Very Serious Nonsense! or More About Drash

"Come, come,” said the King impatiently. “Sir Alaric, what do you make of all this nonsense?”

"Very serious nonsense, Your Majesty,” answered Sir Alaric.

            The Five Hundred Hats of Bartholemew Cubbins by Dr. Seuss

A friend of mine who attended many of my classes in Talmud and Tanach was fond of dismissing any number of drashot of Chazal by tossing off a favorite Yiddish description of his, namely: naarishkeit! Roughly translated, it means 'nonsense.' It seemed to him that many of the midrashim which seemed to deviate from the simple meaning of the text were not worthy of scrutiny or understanding since they were simply nonsense.

But why should nonsense not be worthy of attention?

Nonsense by definition is something doesn't seem to make sense. Sometimes, we may miss important understandings by glossing over that which seems to not compute.

To bring an example from another master of nonsense, Lewis Carroll wrote the following riddle:

Dreaming of apples on a wall,
And dreaming often dear,
I dreamed, that if I counted all,
How many would appear?

So what's the answer? He told you the answer in no uncertain terms but you likely weren't paying attention. Ten apples would, of course, appear as he was dreaming of-ten!

Ha ha, you say, very funny. And perhaps Alice's creator meant nothing more than to trick you. But you might also say he was trying to get you to read everything he wrote with great care.

Essentially, this is how Chazal looked at Tanach and the Torah in particular. They would strive to understand the 'simple' meaning of the words but then would dig deeper and find more levels. In a number of instances, they also broke up words in order to discover hidden meanings. After all, if mere mortal writers had such meanings in their work, why not find them in the Torah, as well?

A salient example is:

בראשית פרק ב (ד) אֵלֶּה תוֹלְדוֹת הַשָּׁמַיִם וְהָאָרֶץ בְּהִבָּרְאָם בְּיוֹם עֲשׂוֹת יְקֹוָק אֱלֹהִים אֶרֶץ וְשָׁמָיִם:

Genesis Chapter 2 (4) These are the generations of the heavens and the earth in their creation on the day the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.

Now if you look closely at the letter ה in the word בהבראם you will see it is smaller than the other letters. This is how it appears in a Torah scroll. Chazal understood that was a tipoff that the letter should be read independently of the rest of the word.

The word בהבראם means “in their creation” but if we split off the ה (with the letter ב preceding it) then we get a new reading: ב-ה בראם He created them (the heavens and the earth) with (the letter) hei!

From here it is learned that this world we occupy was created with the letter hei. This notion fits into a much wider concept of the nature of creation and comports well with other sources. Check out my blog here for some of the wider concept.

Sometimes, that which is hidden at first sight because it seems so outlandish brings the greatest meaning.

There But For Fortune...

This week's parsha describes in great detail the special service done in the Tabernacle (and later in the Temple) by the High Priest for Yom Kippur. The service is long (it took all day!) but I want to focus in particular on the part which was brought especially to achieve atonement for the nation as a whole.

First, though, I will point out that the High Priest had to bring sacrifices for him and his family, which included all of the other priests. Specifically, he had to bring a bullock as a חטאת chataat, a sin offering, and a ram as an olah, on offering which was completely burnt on the altar. The idea was that in order to be fit to represent the children of Israel, the High Priest himself had to be in a state of purity and atonement.

The children of Israel, for their part, had to offer two goats as a sin offering and a ram for an olah.

So right away we want to know why their sin offering was of a different animal, goat as opposed to bullock. But further: Why two?

Once the bullock of the High Priest was offered and atonement achieved, then the two goats were brought to the High Priest. He would lay on them גורלות goralot, lots. One would indicate לה' lashem, for the Lord, and the other לעזאזל laazazel.

The word azazel is only used in this context. There are various ideas about its meaning. One is that it is a fusion of two words עז and אזל. Together they mean 'a goat goes.'

The verses tell us that the one upon which the lot lashem fell would be brought as a sin offering and the other would be sent to azazel in the wilderness.

Chazal understand from the specifics of the verses that ideally the goats would be purchased at the same time and would look as similar as possible.

So what's the deal with the lots?

We find elsewhere in the Tanach that lots were used to determine Divine will. What seems like a chance operation was actually, literally a Divining method. Other examples are lots that were cast to determine how the land of Canaan would be divided between the tribes. In the book of Joshua lots were used to determine who had violated the ban on taking spoils from the conquering of Jericho.

But still, why two, why goats and why choose them by lots? 

One approach taken to understand why goats is offered by the Ramban and expanded on by the Abravanel. In Hebrew they are called שעירי עזים s'irei izim, he-goats. The word sair, though, can also be translated as 'hairy.' It is used to describe Esav. It is also similar to the word tzair, which means 'a youth' or someone who is relatively pure and untouched. Yaakov is referred to as 'ish tam' a 'whole' or 'complete' person. 

At the beginning, Yaakov and Esav had the same potential, but they each chose different paths. They were both the sons of Yitzchak and Rivkah but they each determined their fortunes. They also, of course, both remained the sons of Yitzchak and Rivkah for their entire existence.

The s'irei izim of Yom Kippur end up in some way representing both of those paths which our ancestors chose.  

Also, to begin with, both goats are taken as a chaat, a sin offering. They are only differentiated after the casting of the lots.

These goats were used to achieve atonement for the children of Israel at large. The one ends up being brought like a regular sin offering while the other is cast off of a cliff into a stony ravine.

It seems to me that essentially, the two goats are viewed as one but they represent different aspects of the nation. The one that is sacrificed to Hashem in the regular way which sacrifices were brought, represents that which is open to all. The entire congregation witnesses that sacrifice. And it is in line with all that is open and known.

The goat for azazel, by contrast, is cast off by a single man who himself may not witness its death. This goat seems to represent something of the dark side of the nation, those things which are hidden and which are not spoken of, perhaps. 

 

Maybe only by acknowledging our whole selves, our open ideal side as well as our hidden, dark side, can we achieve true atonement and ultimate purity.

Shabbat shalom!

Dead Man Walking

Yes, yes, I know it's been a while and here it's almost Shabbos and, well, okay, I am going to dash something off. Actually, I wrote out a lot of stuff but it's getting complicated and I want to make a simple observation, as it were.

Most of last week's and much of this week's parsha deals with the concept of צרעת tzaraat. This is often translated as leprosy and since it probably refers to something else, I will just use the term tzaraat for now.

Many of you know that Chazal linked the affliction of tzaraat with speaking ill of others, even if what is said is true (לשון הרע lashon hara).

What I want to point out is that this affliction carried with it signs that the person afflicted, the מצורע m'tzora,  was like a dead man (or woman).

I'll mention two points in this regard: One is that he or she was sent out from the entire encampment of the children of Israel in the wilderness (v. Leviticus 13:46 from last week's parsha and Numbers 5:2).

The significance of that was that the person was no longer part of the community for the duration of the affliction and experienced a kind of social and spiritual death.

What is more, Chazal also learn that if the m'tzora walks into a house, all of the vessels in that house become ritually impure even if he or she does not come into contact with them. Remind you of something? This is also the result of a dead body being in a house or under an enclosure (Numbers 19:14).

Why was the m'tzora punished in this manner?

Consider that the center of the encampment was the Tabernacle and the central focus of the Tabernacle was the Ark which held the Tablets and beside it was the Torah.

The height of man's existence is experienced through learning and speaking about the Torah, our connection to the Divine.

The very opposite of that is using our capacity as speaking, thinking beings to speak ill of others. Thus, the m'tzora is removed as far as possible from the Torah and from human companionship until the affliction passes.

Just sayin'....

shabbat shalom!

The Long and Winding Road to P'shat-Part Three

Language is at once one of the greatest forms of human expression and one of its most limited. We humans experience and think stuff all the time and often we are quite anxious to let others know of our experience and thoughts. We search for the right words to express those thoughts. Sometimes we are successful in conveying those thoughts, other times less so. We like to read good authors be they masters of prose or poetry in large part because they are able to convey their thoughts in words so well.

But words are by nature limiting and limited. Those who write or speak publicly choose their words carefully in order to, at the very least, convey their basic intentions. Often, writers will attempt to convey a multiplicity of meaning using words sparingly.

This is especially true of poetry.

In Dylan Thomas' villanelle:  Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night (one of my favorite poems) we read the first stanza:

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rage at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

When we read the first line, do we think that Thomas is giving us advice about going out after dark? Would we think that's the plain meaning of this text?

Hopefully not.

The term 'that good night' here, as we understand from the rest of the poem, is referring to death. So why didn't Thomas just say: Put up a fight when it's your time to die?

Because it's a poem and the way he put it is more poetic—DUH!

Well, to be more precise, his particular use of language here evokes much more than even the 'plain meaning' would tell us. Night has its own associations and imagery. It is a common word laden with meaning being used here in an uncommon way.

In other words, it is a metaphor.

The reader will quickly understand that the 'plain meaning,' the author's intended meaning, is not at all the same as the literal meaning. Yet the literal understanding of the phrase 'that good night' is always lurking in the background of consciousness of the reader—it sets a mood and allows for the reader to make his/her own associations.

This use of language allows the writer to transcend certain limitations of particular words. By placing words in a certain context, the words are 'value added.'

Looking back at our explication of the word B'reishit (continued here) we understand that the word in question, b'reishit, has a certain literal meaning, namely 'in the beginning (of).' But what was the author's intent in using that particular word? Was it simply to give an indication of a time in history?

Maybe not.

Maybe the Torah's intent in choosing that particular word was to evoke myriad relationships and connections with that word as is used elsewhere.

If poets do this, why would we think that the Torah doesn't do it?

The Long and Winding Road to P'shat -- Part Two

Any thoughtful student of the Torah is confronted with myriad problems. Even if we can get through some sort of cursory reading of, say, the first chapter of B'reishit, we are then confronted with blatant contradictions to that narrative in the second chapter! One moment you think that male and female were created simultaneously into a world with a whole ecosystem and the next (chapter) you see that a male is created before any female or any trees, for that matter.

This is one screwy story, you might say.

Further perusal of the Torah will yield numerous anomalies including contradictions in the particulars of various commandments, many obscure passages and quite a bit of repetition.

In short, a rather messy book.

If you take the critical approach you'll say that these discrepancies reflect a multiplicity of authors whose stories and versions are stitched together over time. This basic approach leads to the Documentary Hypothesis—and a very fancy hypothesis it is!

Also, to my mind, somewhat dull.

But more than that, it doesn't do a very good job of explaining how we end up with this variegated text. It's all well and good to say that various texts got edited together but then why would anyone put together a text that is so full of problems sometimes even within the same paragraph?

This hypothesis seems to assume that if God had written a book it wouldn't be so messy.

This begs the question: If God wrote a book, what would it look like?

Let's step back a moment. Let's say that God created the Universe. I am not going to try to prove that – but accept if you will that premise for the moment.

Now let's look at the Universe. Is everything neat and tidy? Not quite. In fact, just as an example, physicists are still looking for a Theory for Everything because, in fact, lots of observable and theoretical phenomena don't really line up so well. Quantum physics doesn't abide by Newton's rules, for example (I say this as a physics layperson but relying on books like Dancing Wu-Li Masters, recommended by my late Uncle Bob who was a fully fledged and well recognized nuclear physicist).

When humans make stuff we like to think we can make everything 'perfect.' But does that really reflect the way God works? Of course, we can't know that for sure (She still ain't tellin'!) but my senses tell me that this universe is full of contradiction and inconsistency.

Back to the Flatlander's point of view. Recall that the toughest part of understanding the cube might be that the two lines which are farthest apart in the two dimensional representation are actually the same line in the three dimensional cube.

Maybe it is precisely those parts of the Torah which seemingly contradict or don't fit in with each other very well that point to deeper meanings on other planes?

This is essentially the rabbinic approach.

When one puts his or her mind to it, and struggles with the text, one can actually, albeit usually briefly, hold the contradictory passages simultaneously and see something beyond.

Next up: P'shat and D'rash