Parshas Korach: Materialism?

Modern society places a strong emphasis on material goods.  We judge one another all too often by the car we drive, the house we live in, or the clothes we wear.  Some people cannot afford food, yet wear a Prada purse.

Many religions in the world repudiate materialism.  Many religions are ascetic in nature and exalt those individuals who can give up the most materialism.  Perhaps this is why Korach’s possessions are swallowed up when he sins? Perhaps Korach was too much of a materialist.

This cannot be the full explanation, however, because Judaism is not a religion that tells us to give up our material pleasures.  Instead, we are meant to uplift them and raise that which is “base” and physical to a higher, spiritual level.

The answer to the question lies in what Korach and his followers choose to offer up to G-d: incense.  Incense is an offering that is purely spiritual.  Unlike meat or other food offerings, where ultimately much of the offering is eaten, incense leaves nothing behind.  Korach and his followers were upset because they wanted to be priests so that, like the incense, they could live an almost completely spiritual life and be close to G-d at all times.  Yet, G-d rejected their offering. And then swallowed up Korach’s possessions.  It seems like a contradiction: I don’t want the spiritual and I don’t want the physical, either!

In part perhaps G-d was highlighting Korach’s hypocrisy.  He wanted to live in the spiritual world but he just couldn’t let go of the physical.

But much more than that, it seems likely that G-d was just trying to teach a lesson about the nature of materialism.  Material goods must be used in the right way.  They are neither to be adulated nor eliminated, but rather elevated.  By making an incense offering, Korach was advocating the elimination of the physical goods he was privately adulating, when in reality he should have been elevating those selfsame physical goods to a higher spiritual level.

This is what we, too, can do in our own lives.  We can elevate our physical possessions by using them in the right way.  Use candles for lighting on Friday nights. Use tables for Shabbat dinners.  Use spare beds for hosting guests.  Use cars for visiting the sick or elderly.  Every physical possession we have can be elevated in some way.

Shabbat shalom!

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Parshas Naso: Purifying Our Thoughts

We understand why some groups of ultra-orthodox Jews segregate themselves from the rest of the world.  The modern world is full of non-Jewish influences.  You turn on the radio and hear immodest music.  You turn on the television and see people dressed immodestly.  You walk in the street and you smell non-kosher food.

Most of us think we are strong enough to resist temptation. “I can quit smoking any time I want,” says the smoker.  And yet, those who really have quit smoking know it is not that easy.   But how did he start smoking in the first place?  He was probably surrounded by friends who smoked.  He started just by trying a bit, then a bit more, and eventually he was addicted.  And more than simple addiction – smoking became part of his world, his routine, his social scene.

It is the same with non-Jewish influences.  If we surround ourselves with people who we regularly see eating bacon, it is hard to resist the temptation to try it.  And this applies with things that go far beyond the laws of kashrut or modesty.  It includes our entire values system.  And it starts in our minds.

This is the meaning of the sotah, the wayward woman, in this week’s parsha.  In the Temple times, a woman who had been warned not to be alone with a certain man was seen secluding herself with him and was accused of adultery.  She proved her innocence – or her guilt was revealed – when she drank a potion of water and the dissolved ink from a parchment with this passage of the Torah on it.  Today, we do not follow this literally, but we can gain from its meaning.

The sotah is like our mind.  Rabbi Nachman of Breslov teaches that, like a married woman who should not be alone with a man other than her husband, our minds should not be alone with non-Jewish thoughts.  In Judaism, there are three levels of mitzvah and aveira: thought, speech, and action.  By secluding ourselves with our thoughts, we think we are safe and will not be found out.  But the influences will eventually come out in our speech and our actions.

This week, as we prepare ourselves to relive the giving of the Torah, is a perfect time to work on purifying our thoughts.

Shabbat shalom!

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Parshas Achrei Mot: Improving Every Day

 We are in the home stretch now of our Passover preparations.  The house is nearly ready and we are working on switching our kitchen over even as we write this.  If you need somewhere to go for a meal over Pesach, whether for a seder or for a daytime meal during the Yom Tov, please call the Shul office.

In this week’s parsha, we read about how the kohen gadol (high priest) has to immerse himself in a mikveh when he changes into his special white garments for Yom Kippur and again when he changes back into his regular priestly clothing.  But there is something unusual about this: We usually only immerse in the mikveh when we are ascending to a higher spiritual level.  It makes sense for the kohen gadol to immerse before putting on his special Yom Kippur clothes.  On the other hand, it seems odd for him to immerse in a mikvah when he is putting on his regular clothes.  It seems like he is going down a spiritual level, not going up!

From this we learn that we must always work to improve ourselves.  The reason the kohen gadol immerses before putting on his normal workaday clothing is that he will now be doing an even better job than he did before.  His priestly service on Yom Kippur raised him to such a high spiritual level that he is now going to be on an even higher spiritual plane even for his normal daily activities.

So, too, we learn that we can always grow and improve.  We must always be working to climb to a higher spiritual level, to keep a bit more of the Torah than we did in the past.

Pesach is the perfect time to implement this.  We can always keep it a little more strictly, a little bit better than we did last year.  If last year you did not eat bread during Pesach but you still had pasta or crackers, try this year to eat nothing leavened.  If last year you had nothing leavened on Pesach, try this year to eat all your foods certified kosher for Passover only.  If last year you attended or hosted one seder, this year attend two.  There is always some room for improvement.  One easy first step is to attend this week’s shiur on the Hagaddah!

We wish you all a Shabbat shalom and a happy and kosher Pesach!

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Parsha Metzora: Time to Clean Up!

To the tune of “Santa Claus is Coming to Town”:

I’m making my list, checking it twice
Wish I was Sephardi so I could have rice!
Pesach time is coming to town…

It haunts you when you’re sleeping
You clean while you’re awake.
Who knows if it’ll be bad or good
But it’ll be clean for goodness sake!

So you’d better not shout. You’d better not cry.
You’d better just clean, I’m telling you why:
Pesach time is coming to town!

Yes, that’s right, Passover (Pesach) is right around the corner.  With two babies under two, we’ve had to start our preparations extra early this year.  It really helps to have a good song or two to sing while you work, which is how Rachel came up with the one above.

But Pesach isn’t only about cleaning up your house.  All that cleaning to get rid of chometz in the physical sense leaves lots of time for reflection and it is an ideal time to focus on cleaning up our spiritual selves.  It is often said that chometz is a metaphor for the ego.  All the hot air that puffs up bread is like the ego that puffs up a person.  Pesach is the time to get rid of it, to empty oneself so one can be a more humble receptacle for G-d and His Torah.

But this week’s parsha reminds us that ego isn’t the only thing we have to clean out of our lives.  Miriam, Moshe’s sister, speaks lashon hara and develops tzaaras, a spiritual malady with a physical manifestation, often mistranslated as leprosy.   We don’t have a real translation for tzaaras because it doesn’t exist today.  Most people would, perhaps, see this as fortunate. Phew, I don’t have to have an ugly skin disease just because I spread some gossip about my neighbor!  But in reality, it is sad.  The fact is that gossip is so accepted and so rampant in our society that if tzaaras existed we would probably all be afflicted!  So G-d has removed the malady from us.

As we clean our homes for Pesach it is the perfect time to clean ourselves of old, bad habits.  As we brush aside our ego, one of the first things we should do is to brush aside our inclination to gossip.  We can choose not to speak it, choose not to read it, and choose not to listen to it.  We have the power to decide, and in that power comes freedom.  The freedom of Pesach.

Shabbat shalom!

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Parshas Shemini: Mourning a Loss

Sadly, our congregation has suffered two losses this week.  Our hearts and prayers are with the mourners; they should be consoled amongst the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.

How fitting, then, that this week’s parsha also features two sad deaths.  Two of Aaron’s four sons, Nadav and Avihu, bring an unbidden incense offering to G-d in the Tabernacle.  G-d sends down a fire to consume the offerings, but that fire consumes the men also, and they die.

Who can ever contemplate the pain suffered by a parent upon the loss of a child?  This is suffering none of us wants even to imagine.  Just the thought of losing a loved one causes us to catch our breath in our throats. Our hearts skip a beat.  And the feeling of utter devastation when we do actually experience a loss defies words.  The loss is total and complete.

This is why we sit shiva.  Judaism in all its beauty and wisdom acknowledges that pain.  We are permitted for seven days after the funeral (excepting Shabbos) to mourn as deeply as we need to.  Friends, acquaintances, and even caring strangers may come to visit the shiva house because pain is easier to bear when the house is full than when it is empty.  And at the end of that week, we rise from our shiva but we do not resume our normal life.  We continue an abridged mourning ritual for the first month, and a lighter form still during the first year.  In this way, mourning follows a natural progression.

But poor Aaron who lost his sons! He was not permitted to sit shiva.  They were the only priests in the entire Jewish nation.  There was nobody to take over from them while they mourned, so they had to set aside their mourning and continue in their duties.

Moses tries to comfort Aaron, telling him that G-d has brought Nadav and Avihu close to him as sacrifices out of His great love for them.  Perhaps Aaron thought his sons were killed as a punishment for bringing the unbidden sacrifice.  ‘No,’ Moses tells him, ‘they were killed because they were on a higher level than the two of us put together!’  But Aaron is silent in the face of his brother’s attempt to comfort him.

Perhaps this is a lesson for all of us when we visit someone in mourning.  Trite words and platitudes cannot help someone who is hurting so much.  To say, “he’s in a better place now” or, “G-d loved her so much He called her back to Him” do not really make a person feel better when they are deep in their mourning.  Sometimes fond memories of the lost beloved one help remind the mourner of the lives he or she touched. Yet, sometimes words, even well-intended, cannot do a thing to make someone feel better.  Sometimes all the mourner really needs is a hug, a shoulder to cry on, and an ear to listen.

Baruch dayan ha’emes; blessed is the True Judge, for we cannot understand His ways.  May the mourners be comforted among all the Jews of Zion and Jerusalem.

Shabbat shalom!

Parsha Pekudei: We Are All Important

This week a letter was published from a woman who wrote to Rabbi Chalkowski, the rosh yeshiva of Neve Yerushalayim, where I studied.  She married and moved away from her community, making a new life with her husband far from home.  However, she maintained contact with her best friend who remained behind.  She watched as her friend remained popular in the community and met with great success in her career. Yet, she was in a new community where she had a hard time making friends and her career – in the same field as her friend – remained stagnant. She wrote to the rabbi because she felt disappointed with her life, especially in comparison to her friend.

Haven’t we all felt this way at some point or another?    It is so easy to look at another person and think their life is better, that it is the one you want.  He got a promotion. She got rich. He is popular. She is famous. Why him? Why her? Why not me?

Such comparisons might leave us feeling down at times.  There is always the temptation to think we have not achieved as much, even if we have tried our hardest.

In this week’s parsha, the precious metals and gemstones donated for the mishkan (tabernacle) are accounted and then assembled.  As to be expected, gold is the most precious.  There is more silver and much more copper than gold.  It seems like the gold must be the most important and the one G-d likes the best.  If metals had feelings, how would the silver and copper feel?

The gold is used to cover the ark, which means it is pretty important. However, the gold could not do its job covering the ark if the silver and copper were not part of the surrounding mishkan that protected the ark.  Although it seems like the gold is the most important, the mishkan could not have been built without all the metals contributed.  If only gold was given, there would be no mishkan.

It is the same with people.  Although it may seem that someone else has more success, we are each equally important.  Sure, the boss is important in the company, but the company would not function without the lower workers. The boss alone could not make the company run.

The world would not function without each and every one of us to make our contributions.  We may feel that our jobs are unimportant or our success is less than others’ but the truth is that we are all equally important, just in different ways.  Just as the silver and copper had essential roles in the building of the mishkan, so too do we each have an essential role in this world we live in.

Shabbat shalom!

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