Parshas Ki Savo: We Jews Are All Connected
Growing up in North America there was always one regular feature of summertime life: block parties. A block party is when all the neighbors on a street gather together to share food, music, fun, and even fireworks. The kids run amok and the parents talked and got to know each other. It was a great community builder. But it no longer seems to exist.
Since moving to Adelaide, no neighbors have come knocking to greet us. If not for the Jewish community, how would people in the suburbs meet each other anymore! When I recently walked past a next-door neighbor parking her car and stopped to chat, I asked why this is. “I guess we’re all just scared,” came the reply. “Everybody keeps to themselves these days!”
This might be all well and good in the secular world, but it won’t work in the Jewish world. As Jews, we are all intimately connected. In this week’s parsha we are reminded of the blessings and the curses G-d will give us if we obey (or disobey) His commandments. We are blessed if we do G-d’s will and cursed if we do not.
Yet how many times do we see great rabbis and tzaddikim living in poverty? Many times, we see that those who are most righteous seem to lead a life with fewer blessings. And those of us who fail each day in our mission to do G-d’s will seem to be far more blessed than they are. It doesn’t seem to make any sense!
The fact is that we are all interconnected. When one does a mitzvah, it’s not just the individual doing it for himself – he’s doing it for the entire community, for all the Jews. There are many stories of entire communities being saved from divine punishments just because one person who lived there did such a mitzvah it saved the whole group. Those who are truly righteous people often “give up” their spiritual reward so that we, who are not so holy, can instead have the benefits.
We cannot live isolated like so many people in the Western world do today. We cannot hide in our homes watching TV with no idea who lives around us. We are Jews. And we are all connected.
Shabbat Shalom!
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