March 11th, 2015
Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai had five disciples: Rabbi Eliezer ben Horkenos, Rabbi Joshua ben Chananyah, Rabbi Yossei the Kohen, Rabbi Shimon ben Netanel and Rabbi Elazar ben Arach…. He [Rabban Yochanan] used to say: If all the sages of Israel were to be in one side of a balance-scale and Eliezer ben Horkenos were in the other, he would outweigh them all. Abba Shaul said in his name: If all the sages of Israel were to be in one side of a balance-scale, Eliezer ben Horkenos included, and Elazar ben Arach were in the other, he would outweigh them all.
Ethics of the Fathers 2:9
The word torah means “instruction,” for nothing in Torah is merely anecdotal; every “incident” is a lesson, each “parenthetical” observation a law of life. If the Ethics of the Fathers devotes the better part of a mishnah to the discussion of the relative virtues of Rabbi Yochanan’s disciples, it is to teach us something about ourselves and how we are to view the potential of man.
The mishnah cites two opinions as to which disciple was the superior. Rabbi Yochanan is quoted as saying that Rabbi Eliezer was greater than all the other sages of Israel put together. But another opinion, also attributed to Rabbi Yochanan (cited in his name by Abba Shaul) is that Rabbi Elazar outweighed them all. The commentaries[1] explain that there is no contradiction between the two versions. Rabbi Eliezer possessed a quality (a mind like “a cemented cistern that loses not a drop”[2]) in which he surpassed all others, while there was something about Rabbi Elazar (his capacity to generate new ideas “like an ever-increasing wellspring”[3]) in which he outweighed all the sages, including Rabbi Eliezer.[4]
Therein lies the eternal lesson for each and every one of us. Every human being was created to fill a certain role in G-d’s creation—a role that cannot be filled by anyone else. So not only is he unique, not only is he indispensable, but there is a point of reference from which he is the greatest human being in the world—greater than all other human beings combined. It is our challenge and duty to discover this specialty in ourselves and develop that area in which one is truly “the greatest man who ever lived.”
Based on the Rebbe’s talks, Tammuz 28, 5743 (July 9, 1983); Av 4, 5742 (July 24, 1982)[5]
———————–
[1]. See Bartenura, Tosefot Yom Tov and Midrash Shmuel on our mishnah.
[2]. Ethics of the Fathers 2:9.
[4]. The Talmud (Horiot 14a) records a debate over which quality should take precedence in the choosing of a leader: the retention of past wisdom or the generation of new. The conclusion is that the former should take precedence over the latter, since leadership requires, first and foremost, a thorough knowledge of the law. This explains why the view that Rabbi Eliezer was the greatest disciple is attributed to Rabbi Yochanan himself, while the view stressing Rabbi Elazar’s overriding quality is quoted in his name by Abba Shaul. Rabbi Yochanan speaking as “Rabbi Yochanan”—the leader of his generation—emphasized the virtue of retention; but Rabbi Yochanan is also the source of the view—expressed in private, and publicly stated by another sage—that there is a point of reference from which the quality of “an ever-increasing wellspring” is the ultimate measure of greatness.
[5]. Biurim L’Pirkei Avot (Kehot, 1996), pp. 108-109; 110-111.
Tags: purpose of life, leadership, personal growth, Mishnah
Posted in Chapter Two, Months & Holidays, Pirkei Avos, Ethics of Our Fathers, Torah, Nisan | 2 Comments »
March 11th, 2015
Rabban Gamliel the son of Rabbi Judah HaNassi would say… Be careful of the government, for they befriend a person only for their own needs. They appear to be friends when it is beneficial to them, but they do not stand by a person at the time of his distress.
Ethics of the Fathers 2:3
Good advice for anyone lobbying for a cause among the wielders and brokers of power, and as pertinent today as when offered eighteen centuries ago. But Rabban Gamliel is not only speaking to community leaders and political activists, but to each and every one of us, including those fortunate enough never to have had any dealings with the government. What is his message to those of us whose involvement in politics is confined to the governance of the “miniature city”[1] that is man?
Indeed, the individual human being is a virtual “city” of thoughts, feelings and deeds, each with its own momentum and trajectory, converging, interacting and clashing with one another. What gives it all coherence and unity is the government of the city—the intellect and instincts which are the authorities in a person’s life.[2] As is the case with all governments, this internal authority is crucial, indeed indispensable: without it the city of man would be reduced to a chaotic mob. But as is also the case with all governments, it is profoundly selfish, its every act motivated solely by self-interest and geared solely toward self-perpetuation.
One must avail oneself of this government. But one must also deeply mistrust it, being aware of its self-bias. One must repeatedly challenge oneself: am I doing this because it is the right thing to do, or because it serves my selfish interests?
Based on an address by the Rebbe, Iyar 1, 5739 (April 28, 1979)[3]
——————–
[1]. Ecclesiastes 9:14, as per Talmud, Nedarim 32b; Tanya, ch. 9.
[2]. Cf. Zohar, part II, 153a: “There are three governors [within man]: the mind, the heart and the liver.”
[3]. Biurim L’Pirkei Avot (Kehot, 1996), p. 95.
Tags: skepticism, leadership, self-government, self awareness, government, politics
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March 11th, 2015
What is the greatest quality for a person to cleave to? …Rabbi Shimon said, one who sees that which is born…
Ethics Of The Fathers 2:10
Rabbi Israel Baal Shem Tov, founder of the Chassidic movement, taught the doctrine of “Perpetual Creation.” G-d’s creation of the universe, commonly perceived as a one-time event, is a continual act on His part. In each and every fraction of time the world is born anew out of a state of absolute nothingness as the Creator again imparts life and being to every existence.
This is the deeper meaning implicit in Rabbi Shimon’s praise of “one who sees that which is born.” On the most basic level, this refers to need for a person to consider the consequences of his actions, to look beyond the here and now to what his present choices will give birth to. On a deeper level, Rabbi Shimon is saying: Behold the world’s perpetual birth out of utter nothingness. Do not perceive the universe as an existence in its own right – understand that in essence it is nothing, that this seemingly formidable reality of a moment ago is now not and must again be brought into being by the Creator. What is “real” is only the Divine will to create.
The implications of this view of reality are manifold. Often, the “reality” of our world may appear to preclude one’s fulfillment of G-d’s will: “realistically” one may see no way of earning a living unless one works on Shabbat; “realistically” one’s efforts to positively influence one’s fellow stand no chance of success. But one who sees the world born anew every fraction of time by an act of Divine creation, understands, in the most vivid and absolute manner possible, that “reality” can never be inconsistent with the Divine will. It is not even a question of the Divine will being more “powerful” than reality – reality is nothing but the fact of G-d’s will to create it, as it is, in the present micro-moment.
From an address by the Rebbe
This is an excerpt from “Beyond the Letter of the Law” by Yanki Tauber published by The Meaningful Life Center.
Tags: existence, rebirth, Divine energy, reality, creation
Posted in Months & Holidays, Chapter Two, Pirkei Avos, Ethics of Our Fathers, Torah, Nisan | 1 Comment »
March 11th, 2015
I shall find you outside
Song of Songs 8:1
In the weeks preceding the festival of Shavuot, it is customary to study the 39th tractate of the Mishnah, Ethics of the Fathers. The Ethics deals with the moral, rather than legal, dimension of Torah: while the other tractates outline the permissible and the forbidden under Torah law, the Ethics describes the spirit in which the Torah is to be approached, studied, and implemented, and the character and mindset that the Torah should inspire. Every year, as we approach the day on which we received the Torah from G-d at Mount Sinai, we study the Ethics in preparation for our annual re-experience of that event.
There are six Shabbatot between Passover and Shavuot, and on each of these Shabbat afternoons we study another of the Ethics’ six chapters.[1] Actually, as it originally appears in the Mishnah, the Ethics contains only five chapters; a sixth chapter, The Acquisition of Torah, is taken from the Baraita (“external” talmudic literature) and appended to the Ethics for study on the Shabbat before Shavuot. As a result, this chapter has come to be regarded as the “sixth chapter” of the Ethics.
On the surface, this seems one of those accidents of history that determine the prominence or obscurity of a work: a gap in the calendar, the search for the appropriate “filler,” and the Ethics gains a chapter. But as our sages repeatedly point out, nothing in Torah is by chance or fluke. In the words of the famed Gaon of Rogachov,[2] “Everything, even a thing that seems determined by force of circumstance, is purposefully directed and dictated by G-d.”[3] Indeed, the story of the sixth chapter of the Ethics expresses a truth that is fundamental to the Torah, and to the significance of Shavuot in particular.
The Outsiders
The Mishnah was edited by Rabbi Judah HaNassi (circa 200 CE), who sifted through thousands of teachings by dozens of sages over seven generations to compile a concise codex of Torah law. All subsequent discussion of Torah law is predicated upon the Mishnah; it forms the heart of the Talmud (which records three hundred years of exposition on the Mishnah) and is its ultimate point of reference. The teachings that Rabbi Judah did not include in the Mishnah are called Baraitot, from the word bara, “outside.” The Baraitot are widely cited by the Talmud to aid in the interpretation of the Mishnah or to support or refute a point of view, yet they are considered of a lesser status and authority than the Mishnah proper. Thus, the fact that a chapter of Baraita is “brought indoors” and elevated to inclusion in the Mishnah constitutes a quantum leap in its stature and significance.
Shavuot, as we said, is the day on which we “received” the Torah. But when our ancestors gathered at the foot of Mount Sinai on the sixth day of Sivan in the year 2448 from creation (1313 BCE), the Torah had already been in their possession for many generations. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph all studied the Torah, as did the tribe of Levi in Egypt.[4] Sinai marks not the disclosure of a hitherto unknown document, but the granting of a mandate that radically transformed the nature and import of this document. The Midrash offers the following parable to explain what happened on that first Shavuot:
Once there was a king who decreed: “The people of Rome are forbidden to journey to Syria, and the people of Syria are forbidden to journey to Rome.” Likewise, when G-d created the world He decreed and said: “The heavens belong to G-d, and the earth is given to man.”[5] But when He wished to give the Torah to Israel, He rescinded His original decree, and declared: “The lower realms may ascend to the higher realms, and the higher realms may descend to the lower realms. And I, Myself, will begin”—as it is written, “And G-d descended on Mount Sinai,” [6] and then it says, “And[7] to Moses He said: Go up to G-d.” [8]
Before Sinai, there existed a “decree” [9] that split reality into two wholly self-contained realms: the spiritual and the material, the G-dly and the mundane. Torah, the divine wisdom and will, could have no real effect upon the physical world. It was a wholly spiritual manifesto, pertaining to the soul of man and to the spiritual reality of the “heavens.” While its concepts could, and were, applied to physical life, physical life could not be elevated—it could be improved and perfected to the limits of its potential, but it could not transcend its inherent limitations and subjectivity. Nor could the spiritual be truly brought down to earth—its very nature defied actualization.
Then G-d dissolved the dichotomy He decreed at creation. A fissure was opened in the inviolable wall, a window from the inner world of the spirit to the external world of the material. The Torah could now sanctify physical life. The G-dly could now be made real, and the tactile made spiritual.
No longer did the old rules apply, where what was inside was locked in and what was outside shut out. Torah was empowered to extend beyond its spiritual parameters to embrace the dark, cold world of matter and imbue it with warmth and light.
Based on an address by the Rebbe, Shabbat Parshat Bamidbar 5749 (May 19, 1989)[10]
———————–
[1]. Many communities observe the custom of repeating the study of the Ethics after Shavuot, in the Shabbat afternoons of the summer months (until Rosh Hashanah).
[2]. Rabbi Joseph Rosen, 1858-1936.
[3]. Tzafnat Paane’ach on Numbers 33. According to the doctrine of hashgachah pratit (“specific divine providence”) taught by Rabbi Israel Baal Shem Tov, this is true of every event and phenomenon in G-d’s world; but it is even more emphatically so in everything that pertains to the Torah, which is G-d’s revelation of His wisdom to man.
[4]. Rashi on Genesis 26:5 and 46:28; Pirkei d’Rabbi Eliezer 8:1; Talmud, Yoma 28b and Kiddushin 82a; Chizkuni on Exodus 5:4.
[8]. Midrash Tanchuma, Va’eira 15.
[9]. In Hebrew, the word gezeirah means both “decree” and “split.”
[10]. Sefer Hasichot 5749, pp. 480-486.
Tags: Mt. Sinai, spiritual and material, Mishnah, divine providence, Talmud, Jewish law
Posted in Months & Holidays, Pirkei Avos, Ethics of Our Fathers, Chapter Six, Torah, Nisan | No Comments »
March 11th, 2015
Judge every man to the side of merit
Ethics of the Fathers, 1:6
On the most elementary level, this means that if you discern a negative trait in your fellow or you see him commit a negative act, do not judge him guilty in your heart. “Do not judge your fellow until you are in his place,” warns another of the Ethics’ sayings, and his place is one place where you will never be. You have no way of truly appreciating the manner in which his inborn nature, his background and/or the circumstances that hold sway over his life have influenced his character and behavior.
However, this only explains why you should not judge your fellow guilty. Yet our mishnah goes further than this, enjoining us to “judge every man to the side of merit.” This implies that we should see our fellow’s deficiencies in a positive light. But what positive element is implied by a person’s shortcomings and misdeeds?
Differently Equal
An explanation may be found in another talmudic saying: “Whoever is greater than his fellow, his inclination (for evil) is also greater”[1]—a rule crucial to our understanding of a fundamental principle of Torah, that man possesses “free choice” regarding his actions.
Indeed, how can we consider a person’s choices to be free and uncoerced, when there is so much inequality in life? Can we compare the moral performance of an individual whose character was shaped by a loving family, a stable environment and a top-notch education with that of one who has experienced only rootlessness, violence and despair? Can we compare a person who has naturally and effortlessly been blessed with a superior mind and a compassionate heart to one who has not been so privileged? Are their choices equally “free”? Are they equally accountable for their actions?
The answer to the last two questions is “Yes.” Certainly, no two human beings are alike. Each has been given a life that is unique to him alone, with his own individual array of challenges and tests on the one hand, and potentials and opportunities on the other. Free choice means that the Creator, who has created each individual and the circumstances of his life, has also fortified him with whatever resources are required for him to face his every moral challenge.
“Whoever is greater than his fellow, his inclination for evil is also greater.” One who has been advantaged with superior talents and qualities must struggle against an inclination towards corruption and evil far more powerful than that which faces the more “average” individual. Conversely, one who has been subjected to a greater measure of setbacks and trials in his life, has been granted an equally greater measure of fortitude and achievement potential.
So if your fellow has committed a crime so despicable that you are incapable of even contemplating such a deed; if he is plagued by demons so horrendous that you can hardly envision such evil—know that he is undoubtedly in possession of a potential for good that far exceeds your own. Understand that while he has succumbed to forces far more powerful than anything which you will ever face, he is an invaluable human being, one whose inner resources, if cultivated, could translate into attainments unimaginable by one less inclined to evil.
In other words, look not to what he is but to what he can be. Dwell not on the way in which he has negatively expressed his potential, but on what this potential truly consists of.
A Single Exception
So judge every man to the side of merit—every man, that is, except yourself. For the attitude detailed above, while appropriate to adopt towards other human beings, would be nothing less than disastrous if applied to oneself.
“True, I have done nothing with my life,” the potential-looking individual will argue. “But look at what I am capable of! Look at the quality of my mind, the sensitivity of my feelings, the tremendous talents I possess. It’s all there within me, regardless of the fact that I have never bothered to realize any of it. This is the real me. The extent to which I actualize it is only of secondary importance.”
In our judgment of human life and achievement, we must adapt a double standard. Our assessment of a fellow human being must always look beyond the actual to the potential reality within. On the other hand, we must measure our own worth in terms of our real and concrete achievements, and view the potential in ourselves as merely the means to this end.
This is an excerpt from “Beyond the Letter of the Law” by Yanki Tauber published by The Meaningful Life Center.
Tags: potential, self awareness, Mishnah, Talmud, love your neighbor, judgement
Posted in Chapter One, Months & Holidays, Pirkei Avos, Ethics of Our Fathers, Torah, Nisan | No Comments »
March 11th, 2015
Today is seven days, which are one week, to the omer
Counting of the Omer for the 8th day of Passover
There was once a people who lived in a deep valley ringed by high mountains. A perpetual mist, trapped by the mountain walls, hung over the valley, allowing only a dim light to penetrate. Generation after generation were born, lived and died in this gray world.
The old men of the valley told stories of a brighter, warmer world beyond the mountains, a world made joyous and beautiful by a thing called “the sun.” At times, a listener of these stories would be inspired to set out for this sunlit world. But the mountains were steep, the trails treacherous, the maps uncertain, and the goal but a fanciful idea. They all came back empty-handed.
One day, a mighty wind forced a breach in the cloud-cover and, for a fleeting minute, the valley was flooded with light and warmth. For the first time in their lives, the people of the valley beheld the face of the sun. Then the wind receded, the breach was closed, and once again they were in their familiar, sunless world.
The fleeting vision shattered the valley’s rigid routines. Those whose lives had been strictly confined to mundane trades or nighttime diversions—from tavern wagers to evaluating platforms advertised as the best crypto casinos—suddenly found their earthly preoccupations eclipsed by a celestial awakening. A restless energy rippled through the shadowed settlements, upending everything they had previously considered normal.
“So this is the sun!” exclaimed the people of the valley. “This is sunlight! This is what it is like to live a life of light, beauty and joy! We must leave this dark, cold place. We must set out for the sun-blessed world beyond the mountains.”
So the people began climbing out of the valley. The mountains were as steep as ever, the trails as fraught with hardship and uncertainty. But whenever they faltered in their path, whenever they began to doubt the attainability of their goal, they would remember that moment of sunlight and it would drive them to press on. Inspired and prodded by that vision, they climbed out of the clouds to the world of the sun.
The Climb to Sinai
For two hundred and ten years, our ancestors lived in darkness. Enslaved by the Egyptians, the most debased society to ever dwell upon the face of the earth, the Jews inhabited a spiritual fog which shut off every vestige of manifest G-dliness.
Their elders spoke of an age-old promise, made by the G-d of their fathers, that they would one day leave this sunless world. They spoke of a mountain top upon which G-d would show Himself to them, take them to Him as His chosen people, and grant them His Torah, the revelation of His wisdom and will. They spoke of a land, basking in the light of divine providence, in which they would fulfill their destiny as “a light unto the nations.”[1]
But this was little more than a fantasy. The darkness of their world seemed impregnable. They had no idea what this place in the sun was like, much less how to get there.
Then, at the stroke of midnight on Nissan 15, 2448 (1313 bce), a breach opened up in the clouds of their exile and they beheld the face of their Creator. On that night, “the Holy One, Blessed be He, revealed His very self to them and redeemed them.”[2]
G-d, of course, could have simply lifted them out of Egypt and brought them to Mount Sinai that very night. But He wanted it to be their journey, their achievement. So after that momentary vision, the face of G-d receded.
Then began the arduous climb to Sinai. The Jews were out of Egypt, but Egypt was still deeply imbedded within them. For seven weeks they struggled to refine the seven traits of their souls, to cleanse it of the profanity of Egypt and make themselves worthy candidates for the divine choice.
This was something that they had to achieve on their own, in the darkness of their deficiencies and the coldness of their alienation. But it was that initial vision of the divine light that inspired, encouraged and drove them in their journey.
Each year, on the first night of Passover, we commemorate the events of the night of the Exodus. Through the seder observances, we reexperience the liberating vision that impels our annual emergence from our personal “Egypt” and drives our internal liberation “from slavery to freedom, from darkness to a great light.”[3]
But the revelation of the Exodus is but a brief, momentary flash. On the following day we begin our 49-day trek to Sinai, reenacted every year with the “Counting of the Omer.”[4] Beginning with the second night of Passover, we count the days traversed from the Exodus, chronicling the milestones and stations of our journey of self-refinement.
The 50th day is the festival of Shavuot, when we once again stand at Sinai to receive G-d’s Torah and be chosen as His very own “kingdom of priests and holy nation.”[5]
Days and Weeks
In commanding us to count the days from Passover to Shavuot, the Torah instructs:
You shall count for yourselves from the morrow of the Shabbat, from the day on which you bring the omer offering, seven complete weeks they shall be; until the morrow of the seventh week, you shall count fifty days… And you shall proclaim that very day a holy festival…[6]
In other words, not only the days, but also the weeks are to be counted. Thus, on the seventh day of the count we say, “Today is seven days, which are one week, to the omer”; on the 25th day we say, “Today is twenty-five days, which are two weeks and three days, to the omer”; and so on to the last night of the count, when we say, “Today is forty-nine days, which are seven weeks, to the omer.” Indeed, the very name of the festival that culminates the count, Shavuot, means “weeks,” emphasizing that it is the product of the seven- etc.) making a total of week count from the second day of Passover.[7]
Kabbalistic teaching explains that there are seven basic impulses in the heart of man: chessed (love, benevolence); gevurah (restraint, awe, fear); tiferet (compassion, harmony); netzach (ambition, competitiveness); hod (humility, devotion); yesod (communicativity, connectedness) and malchut (regality, receptiveness). Each of these traits includes nuances of all seven (e.g., chessed of chessed, gevurah of chessed, tiferet of chessed, forty-nine aspects to the human character.
Thus, the basic journey is one of seven weeks, each devoted to perfecting another of our seven primary attributes. The days are details and aspects of the weeks, a count within a count, a journey within a journey.
The Contradiction
The Torah’s emphasis on the weeks of the omer count gives rise to a seeming contradiction in its instructions as to how the count is to be conducted. The Talmud devotes a lengthy discussion to resolving this inconsistency and arriving at a decisive interpretation of the Torah’s words.
For the Torah not only instructs us to count seven weeks from the second day of Passover—it says that these should be “seven complete weeks.” This seems to imply that the count should include seven full calendar weeks, each running from Sunday to Shabbat. This would mean that the festival of Shavuot will always fall on a Sunday—the day after the seventh “complete” week has been concluded.[8]
The Talmud, however, rejects this hypothesis. For the Torah explicitly instructs, “You shall count fifty days.” Obviously, then, the “complete weeks” of the omer count are not the Sunday-to-Shabbat weeks that populate our calendar, but “man-made” weeks—seven-day units created by our count. Otherwise, the count would, in most years, total more than fifty days. (For example, if the 1st of Passover occurs on a Tuesday, and we were to insist on seven “complete” Sunday-to-Shabbat weeks, Shavuot will occur on the 54th day of the count.)
But there are certain years, concludes the Talmud, in which the configuration of the calendar is such that there is no inconsistency, and all Torah’s words are implemented in their most literal sense. When the first day of Passover falls on a Shabbat (as it does this year), the seven weeks of the omer are “complete” in every sense: they are fully personal weeks, each containing seven days of our individual count; and they are complete calendar weeks, corresponding to the seven-day cycle which G-d instituted at the very beginning of creation, and which continues to define our experience of time.[9]
The Man-Made Week
But why are the Torah’s instructions expressed so ambiguously, fraught with inconsistency and open to misinterpretation? And why is the counting of the omer so structured that in certain years the count is more “complete” than in others?
As explained above, the entire point of the omer count is that our journey to Sinai be a personal one, the product of our own efforts. Of course, no human achievement can equal the perfection of the divine. But that which is granted us from Above, however perfect and infinite, is never as deeply appreciated or as intensely identified with as that which we attain with our own finite capabilities. In the words of the Talmud, “A person would rather have a kav of his own [grain] than nine kavim of his fellow’s.”[10]
The only truly “complete weeks” are G-d’s weeks—the weeks that are the product of His original work of creation. Man-made weeks are forever bound by the limitations and deficiencies of their mortal creator. Yet it is man-made weeks that connect Passover and the Exodus with Shavuot and Sinai. “You shall count for yourselves,” instructs the Torah. This is your climb, your journey.
Hence the contradiction—an inconsistency built in to the very nature of the omer count. On the one hand we are striving towards Sinai, toward our election as G-d’s chosen people. The goal is perfection: the refinement of all seven dimensions of the heart and all their 49 subdimensions. On the other hand, it is we who are conducting the count; we who are struggling up the steep slopes of our valley, we who compose and define the weeks of the omer.
The inherent paradox in these two objectives is reflected in the contrary implications in the Torah’s instructions. On the one hand, the Torah insists on seven “complete”—apparently G-d-made—weeks; on the other hand, it emphasizes that these are to be personal weeks, the product of our count rather than of divine creation.
In truth, however, the omer count is a place where the finite and the infinite converge, where divine revelation and human effort combine to move a people toward their encounter with G-d. For though the actual count begins “on the morrow of the Shabbat”—on the day after the first of Passover—it is driven by the revelation of the Exodus. Though the actual count is conducted in the valley of human subjectivity, it is that original, momentary flash of light that penetrates the darkness of our valley, impels us on our journey, and empowers us to forge upwards and attain the summit.
When Passover Falls on Shabbat
So there are two elements in our every journey: that which we receive and that which we achieve. As we traverse the quests and climbs of life, at times one, at times the other, of these elements dominates while the other recedes to the background.
At times, the divine influence in our lives dominates. We sense a higher power carrying us along, granting us the understanding and vision with which to meet life’s challenges and the courage and fortitude to surmount them. At such times, we appreciate that we are part of something greater than ourselves; that our achievements are the outgrowth of a perfection that transcends the human, reflecting the divine source of all our gifts.
At other times, our selfhood and individuality dominate. The divine influence recedes, heightening our sense of our own strengths and weaknesses, of our responsibility for our failures and successes. We experience difficulty and disappointment, alienation and despair; but also fulfillment, pride, and true identification with our achievements.
Finally, there are those moments, rare and exquisite, when the received and the achieved coalesce in our journey: when our vision of the sun is fully integrated into our struggle up the mountainside. Times when we sense the enormity of what has been revealed and granted to us and, at the same time, fully identify with them. Times when we are not only aware of what is divine and infinite in our lives, but when our experience of them is an intensely personal experience, for we have incorporated them into our self and personality.
The seven weeks of the omer count are always “complete weeks”—complete in that they represent the optimum of our personal efforts at self-perfection, and complete in that they are driven by a vision that has the perfection of the divine. Usually, however, these two aspects of “completeness” are in conflict with each other: an overt emphasis on the divinely granted vision will detract from our sense of fulfillment and identification with our achievements. So the divine input into our lives retreats to the realm of “memory,” “intuition” and “spiritual experience” to allow for our construction of wholly man-made weeks to bridge Passover and Shavuot.
But there are certain years in which these man-made weeks coincide with the divinely-ordained weeks of the calendar. When the first day of Passover falls on Shabbat, each of “our” weeks is also a Sunday-to-Shabbat week, alluding to a special window of opportunity. In these years we are particularly empowered to integrate our divine endowments with our personal achievements.
In these years, our journey from Exodus to Sinai is comprised of “seven complete weeks” in every sense: weeks that combine the perfection of the divinely granted with the intensity of the personally achieved.
Based on the Rebbe’s talks, Passover 5751 (1991)[11]
Adapted from the teachings of the Lubavitcher Rebbe by Yanki Tauber
[4]. On the second day of Passover, the day on which the count begins, an omer (approx. 43 oz.) of barley was offered at the Holy Temple in Jerusalem, representing the refinement of the “animal soul” of man (barley being an animal food—cf. I Kings 5:8; Talmud, Sotah 14a) which is the objective of the count.
[7]. Shavuot is thus the only festival that does not have a fixed calendar date, but is defined as the 50th day of the omer count.
(Today we follow a fixed calendar in which the month of Nissan always has 30 days and the month of Iyar, 29 days. Thus, the 50th day of the count, which begins on Nissan 16 (the 2nd night of Passover) always coincides with the 6th of Sivan. However, this is only because today we do not have a functioning Sanhedrin (supreme court of Torah law). In essence, the Jewish calendar is fixed by eyewitness sightings of the new moon, based on which the Sanhedrin would proclaim the new month. By this process, which will recommence with the coming of Moshiach and the reestablishment of the Sanhedrin, any month may consist of either 29 or 30 days; Shavuot might thus occur on the 5th, 6th or 7th of Sivan.
For this reason, there exists a halachic dilemma in the case of a traveler who crosses the International Date Line during the period between Passover and Shavuot, thereby “gaining” or “losing” a day. Regarding all other festivals, whose dates are determined by the calendar, an individual’s loss or gain of a day is obviously irrelevant. But since Shavuot is defined solely as the 50th day from the second day of Passover, the question arises: is this traveler to observe Shavuot on his 50th day, or is he to defer to the 50th day as counted by the community with whom he is observing the festival?)
[8]. Indeed, the Baitusim (a breakaway Jewish sect that rejected the “oral Torah”—the traditional interpretation of Torah handed down through the generations) contended that this is how the count is to be conducted. The Baitusim based their interpretation on the Torah’s instruction to begin the count “on the morrow of the Shabbat,” which they understood as a reference to the weekly Shabbat. The traditional interpretation, however, is that the “Shabbat” to which the Torah is referring is the first day of Passover (a festival day is also referred to in the Torah as “shabbat,” for on these days we cease from our workday labors).
[9]. Talmud, Menachot 65b; Rashi, ibid.; Midrash Rabbah, Kohelet 1:3; Mattenot Kehunah, ibid. In these years, the verse instructing us to begin the count “on the morrow of the Shabbat” is likewise fulfilled in its most literal sense.
[10]. Talmud, Bava Metzia 38a.
[11]. Sefer HaSichot 5751, vol. II, pp. 437-440.
Tags: self-development, Counting the Omer, seder, emotions, light and darkness, darkness, Chassidic stories, Mt. Sinai
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