Donald Trump in the Torah

Pirkei Avot (5:22) says of the Torah, "Turn it over and turn it over, for all is in it." As an American living in Canada, who is regularly asked [or mocked, or harangued] about Donald Trump, I have been wondering: Is Pirkei Avot serious? Is Donald Trump to be found in the Torah?

And I think the answer is Yes; Donald Trump's ancestor was named Avimelech. This is not the Avimelech of Bereishit; rather, it is Avimelech of the book of Shoftim (Chapter 9).

In the period when the Jews were led by Judges, between the death of Joshua and the start of Jewish monarchy, Avimelech rose to power in the region of Mount Ephraim as an anti-government outsider. He rabble-roused against the leaders in power. (9:1-3) He spent a fortune to attract supporters who are biblically described as "empty and senseless", who helped him overthrow those in power. (9:4-5) And, yes, he appeared misogynist - he died after a woman dropped a millstone on his head, and his dying request was for a youth to kill him, "lest they say of me that a woman killed him." (9:53-54)

Of course, the analogy to Avimelech is imperfect - for starters, Avimelech actually succeeded in gaining public office - but I mention it because of an important lesson within Avimelech's story. After Avimelech's rise, his half-brother Yotam ascended Mount Gerizim and proclaimed a scathing rebuke against those who had selected Avimelech.

Yotam described the trees trying to anoint a leader from among themselves.
First they approached the olive, but the olive refused, lest the job diminish its important oil.
Then they approached the fig, but the fig refused, lest the job diminish its sweet fruit.
Then they approached the grape, but the grape refused, lest the job diminish its joy-inducing wine.
Finally, they approached the thorn, which produces nothing useful. The thorn agreed to take on the role. (9:7-15)

Society runs a grave risk when those who are qualified shy away from leadership, for then only thorns are left to lead. May we not be stuck with the thorns; may those who are qualified - our olives, figs, and grapes - always step up, to guide our community and world forward.

The Death of King Uziahu

One of the features in the weekly Toronto Torah produced by our Beit Midrash is a column on the haftorah. We begin with a description of the featured prophet or the author of the book from which the haftorah is drawn, and then we explain the haftorah's message, and its relationship with the parshah. Then, if there is more space, we discuss some unique aspect of the haftorah.

I wrote this week's column, and for the "unique aspect" I noted the death of King Uziahu, and its message for us:

The message in our haftorah dates itself to "the year of the death of King Uziahu." (Yeshayah 6:1)  What was the significance of the death of this king, in relation to Yeshayah's vision?

Divrei haYamim II 26 describes Uziahu as a righteous king of Yehudah, the southern Jewish kingdom. He sought out G-d, battled the foes of the Jews, and built up the city of Yerushalayim. However, Divrei haYamim continues to describe him as becoming arrogant in his success, to the point that he sought to bring incense upon the altar himself, despite the fact that he was not a kohen. Tzaraat broke out upon his forehead, and he left the Beit haMikdash in shame.

Amos 1:1 and Zecharyah 14:5 make reference to an earthquake which occurred in the time of King Uziahu. Bringing in midrashic passages (see Seder Olam Rabbah 20, Radak Amos 1:1 and Rashi Yeshayah 6:1, for example), the earthquake, the tzaraat, and the death of King Uziahu are all referenced at the start of our haftorah.

At this time, when one of our greatest kings overreached in his arrogance, violated the sacred space of the Beit haMikdash, and was punished, Hashem showed the prophet Yeshayah a vision of His throne room. Gd then warned Yeshayah, and through him the Jewish nation, of the impending devastation at the hands of the Babylonian Empire. The link between Uziahu's death and Yeshayah's message is clear: Without proper leadership, our chances for repentance and growth are slim indeed.

Kitniyos

A few years ago, I posted an article on-line about the gezeirah/minhag called "kitniyos", under which Ashkenazi Jews of the past 700-800 years have refrained from eating legumes, rice and assorted other non-chametz produce during the week of Pesach.

The practice originated out of concern for grain being mixed in with other products during harvesting or processing, as well as concern that permitting kitniyos products might lead to accidental permission of the chametz products they resemble.

My position in that post was that the kitniyos decree is founded upon solid logic (even if some of its modern extensions are not), and that it doesn't create great hardship (how many of us need to eat rice or beans every week?). [Where it does create great hardship, such as for those with extreme food allergies or for babies who need soy formula, kitniyos are approved.] So I argued against the popular resentment of this practice.

I didn't think my position was that radical, but others disagreed.

I re-visit this subject now in order to add a point: It seems to me that some of the resentment for kitniyos stems not from any hunger for rice, but from a basic lack of trust for rabbis, leading to automatic rejection of their statements and rulings.

Example: The other day I heard a rabbi cite a classic midrash regarding Sarah's biblical prepartion of "cakes" for guests; the midrash, basing itself on textual evidence, says that this event occurred on Pesach. Despite the textual evidence, I noticed someone nearby groan reflexively. Why? I think it was not because the midrash was particularly questionable, but because it was a rabbinic teaching.

There are several factors here.

The populism which dominates government,
the democratization of information,
the rise of critical thinking,
the revelation of scandal among religious and political leaders,
the proliferation of independent philosophical paths,

lead to rejection of leadership, religious and otherwise, Jewish and general. I don't view any of these factors as automatically negative, but the result is a thoughtless, knee-jerk rejection of leaders.

Add in external pressure from those who reject religion altogether and highlight its foibles at every opportunity, and the result is that religious dicta are challenged and rejected not on their merits, but because of their source.

I find this sad. There is much to debate in the arena of kitniyos, and much to be learned from the general challenging of rabbinic teaching. Rabbis who are expected to explain and defend their teachings will produce stronger Torah. But when the rejection comes from reflex rather than reflection, well – that which is poorly conceived is poorly received.

Let my leaders fail!

I did the weekly three-minute parshah video for the kollel this week; hope my cold isn't too obvious:



Here is the quote from Rav Zalman Sorotzkin, Oznayim laTorah for Vayyikra:

יש להליט בדברי חז״ל אלה רעיון מאלף: הנשיא או המנהיג, אם הוא בעל מרץ ומעוף, מחפש תמיד דרכים איך להיטב את מצב עמו או עדתו, ומרוב מעשים יש שהוא טועה ועושה דבר אשר מוטב היה שלא לעשותו; הוא חטא ב״קום זיעשה״, עשה מה שלא היה צריך לעשות, או אם נתבטא בלשון חז״ל — עבר ״על לא תעשה״. חטא כזה מתכפר אם זדונו כרת ע״י קרבן חטאת, שהרי שוגג הוא. לעומת זה יש נשיא או מנהיג, שהוא תמיד מסתפק, אם כדאי לעשות דבר זה או אחר לטובת עמו ועדתו ופן יצא מזה דבר שאינו לטובת העם, ומרוב הזהירות אינו עושה כלום ומזניח את עניני הכלל. ואח״כ כשהוא רואה, ששגג בזה ״שלא עשה״, שלא הקדים את פני הרעה — הרי הוא דומה לעובר על ״מצות עשה״, שקרבנו עולה... ויש, איפוא, למצוא רמז בדרשת חז״ל הנ״ל, שאשרי הדור, שהנשיא שלו, אם שגג באיזה דבר, הרי הוא ״מחייבי ׳חטאות״, היינו שמרוב מרצו ועבודתו לטובת הכלל נכשל פעם ועבר על ״לא תעשה״ על דבר שלא הי׳ ראוי לעשות, ויתרון לנשיא כזה על נשיא ״מלא ספקות״ ומפניהם הוא מזניח את עבודת הציבור, על נשיא ״ממחייבי עולות״

We can unveil in these words of the Sages an instructive ideal: The nasi or leader, if he is a person of energy and alacrity, continually seeks ways to improve the standing of his nation or group. As a result of his many deeds, sometimes he errs and does something when it would have been better had he not acted. He sins with an action, doing what he should not have done. To use the language of the Sages - he violated a 'Lo Taaseh'. for such a sin one atones with a chatat offering, granted that for intentional violation there would be a punishment of kareit, since this is not intentional.

Opposite this is a nasi or leader who is perpetually in doubt whether to do this or something else for the benefit of his nation or group, lest something emerge which does not benefit the nation. Due to his great care, he does nothing and he abandons the needs of the community. Then, when he sees that he erred through inaction, and did not act to prevent bad develops, he is like one who sins by failing to perform an ‘Aseh’, and who brings a korban olah.

There is a hint to this in the lesson of the sages (Horiyyos 10b), “Fortunate is the generation whose nasi, if he has sinned, is among those who are obligated to bring a chatat offering,” meaning that because of his great energy and work for the good of the community he stumbled on occasion and violated a ‘Lo Taaseh’, erring in doing something he ought not to have done. This nasi is greater than a nasi who is full of doubt, such that he abandons the work of the community, a nasi who must bring a korban olah.

The theme is important, beyond the material I could fit into two minutes and thirty seconds. For rabbis in shuls, for teachers and administration in schools, for boards of community institutions like UJA/UJC, Jewish Family and Children Services, JCCs and so on - we need leaders who have the latitude to act on educated instinct, and that latitude can only be granted by communities which are supportive.

In memory of Aharon

[The following post was my contribution to this week's Toronto Torah, which is downloadable here; enjoy!]

Am I doomed to play out my family’s traits in my own life? Aharon haKohen, whose yahrtzeit is observed this coming Sunday night and Monday, Rosh Chodesh Av, is proof that I am not.

We are familiar with the stories of peace and goodwill associated with Aharon. Avot d’Rabbi Natan 12 describes how Aharon involved himself in mediating people’s personal quarrels. Midrashic sources demonstrate Aharon’s conciliatory nature in dealing with the creators of the Golden Calf. Rashi (Bamidbar 20:29) states that every Jew mourned Aharon’s death because of his peace-pursuing traits. The purveyor of Peace and Torah described in Malachi 2:5-6 is said to be Aharon haKohen, who brought peace between individuals and between G-d and the Jewish people. And so on.

What we often miss, though, is that Aharon’s pursuit of peace broke from his family’s dominant trend toward קנאות , zealotry. Aharon’s great-grandfather, Levi, responded with violent outrage to Dinah’s kidnapping and to Yosef’s presumption. Aharon’s elder sister Miriam expressed indignation toward her parents and toward Moshe, and Aharon’s younger brother Moshe displayed outrage numerous times in his career. Aharon’s nephew Chur stood against the Golden Calf to the point of sacrificing his life; Aharon’s family rallied to Moshe’s call, executing the ringleaders of the Calf’s idolatry. Aharon’s grandson Pinchas crowned himself judge and executioner for Zimri; Aharon’s descendants, the Chashmonaim, did likewise against the Hellenists in the era of Chanukah. Eliyahu haNavi, who proclaimed, “I have been zealous for G-d,” was a descendant of Aharon.

Talmudic sources (such as Bava Batra 160b) identify a demanding nature – קפדנות - as an eternal hallmark of kohen conduct, such that the sages needed to create obstacles to prevent them from hasty divorce. The gemara (Sanhedrin 82b) depicts Aharon’s grandson Pinchas challenging Divine justice, and then HaShem justifying this hubris because it was the result of family influence.

Aharon’s family was known for their fiery commitment to proper religious and social conduct, and for putting their lives on the line to defend those principles. Aharon held those same values, but he acted peacefully rather than with anger. Indeed, Ramban (Bamidbar 20:8) asserts, “אהרן לא כעס מימיו, Aharon was never angered.”

Certainly, defying so thoroughly an engrained family trait requires great strength and independence, but how did Aharon even know he was right in shattering this family mold? Where did Aharon find the courage to support his iconoclasm?

Perhaps the answer lies in a brief comment by Ibn Ezra (Shemot 6:13). The Torah describes HaShem’s initial charge to Moshe and Aharon, “ויצום אל בני ישראל,He instructed them regarding the Jewish people.” Ibn Ezra explained, “יש אומרים שצוה שלא יכעסו על ישראל כי רוחם קצרה, Some say that He instructed them not to be angry at the Jewish people, for the people’s spirits were limited.” In other words, HaShem warned Moshe and Aharon to recognize the shortcomings of their generation, and to govern with patience and understanding.

Aharon accepted that the people for whom he was responsible were limited, tortured into smallness by their Egyptian masters and the suffering of exile. He resolved that despite the gene-fueled cauldron burning inside him, he would direct his energy away from the flames of outrage and toward finding creative ways to lead the nation positively, peacefully, and prosperously.

This is the Aharon haKohen who was Miriam and Moshe’s complement in government for forty years, and whose passing we commemorate in the coming week. This is the Aharon haKohen for whom the Torah records (Bamidbar 20:29), “They cried for Aharon for thirty days – the entire house of Israel.” This is the Aharon haKohen who offered korbanot to atone for a nation, and who kindled the lights of the menorah. תהיה נשמתו צרורה בצרור החיים, may his soul be bound in the bond of life.

Certainly, we need leaders of fire and strength, but in our own days of limited spirits may we also merit to be led by the students of Aharon.

Rabbi Motti Elon, Rabbi Leib Tropper, and our Yosef Mistake

[This week’s Haveil Havalim is here]

The more I think about the scandals of Rabbi Elon this past week, and Rabbi Tropper a short while ago, the more I believe that the Jewish world makes two mistakes:

1. We have a very low bar for entering leadership

Many people have desires which go unfulfilled because they lack opportunity. Admired leaders, whether overseers of conversion processes or heads of yeshivot and seminaries, have that opportunity on a daily basis. We should be doing more to vet people before putting them in those positions of opportunity.

I’ve actually believed this for a long time, ever since I was put in charge of various things at a pretty young age. A leader, a Gadol, someone we will trust with our institutions as well as our hopes, cannot be a work in progress other than in his own humble mind.

Part of the problem, as I see it, is that we hunger for leaders. We look at generations past and see their great figures, we look at the recent ones, like Rav Moshe Feinstein, and we long for their kind. And so we look to people who have yet to prove themselves, and we make them leaders. But Rav Moshe, to use him as an example, was a long time in the making, decades before he was recognized as a leader.

A leader should spend decades proving himself before the nation turns to him with that level of respect and trust. In learning, in chesed, in publishing, in apprenticing, a potential leader must prove himself before we place the Jewish world, and our trust, in his hands a la וגם בך יאמינו לעולם (Shemot 19:9).


2. On adultery, we overstate Yosef’s greatness

The Torah portrays Yosef passing the test of Potiphar’s wife (Bereishit 39) with little hyperbole. Yosef went to work, she approached him, Yosef ran away. Gittin 57a also notes that Yosef's deed was a one-time event; righteous, certainly, but not truly heroic.

We, on the other hand, play it up as an incredible deed, this refusal to commit adultery with the wife of his employer.

I wonder whether this hyperbole doesn’t provide a subtle heter (permission) for adulterers: “Well, Yosef was a great tzaddik, and that’s why he didn’t stumble; I’m not Yosef, it’s not the greatest problem if I stumble once or twice.”

I know you could (and perhaps should) argue the point, but I’m just wondering about it.

Why the Tropper Scandal Scares Me

I have not the slightest inclination to listen to the infamous audios floating around on the Internet, for a few reasons.

One, because we are trained (Pirkei Avot 4:18) not to look at others בשעת קלקלתן, at the time of their corruption. We have nothing to gain, and much sensitivity to lose, by such voyeurism.

Another reason is that I saw this coming years ago. I didn't predict his specific downfall, but I attended an EJF conference in Boston several years ago, where it was obvious that the people in charge were taking advantage of the benevolence of their major donor, Tom Kaplan.

Mr. Kaplan spoke at a dinner during the event and outlined his vision of an organization which would help intermarried couples return to Judaism. From what I could see, this was not the agenda of the people running the conference, and it was not what was being implemented on the ground. The man with the dream was being used by the people charged with carrying it out.

I turned to the person next to me – turned out to be the Executive Director – and I commented, “He reminds me of Peter Pan.” After that comment I didn’t get invited back, which was neither a surprise nor a disappointment; it was clear that agenda had already trumped ethos.

But the major reason I don’t want to hear those conversations is the thought of how many others could end up doing what he did.

The profile for leaders who fall into this trap is straightforward:
People whose great ambition overwhelms their personalities;
People who abandon tzniut as they put themselves into the spotlight;
People who think they are the smartest ones in the room.

Taken with their ambitions, they overstep lines in pursuit of their goals, until the act of breaking rules becomes meaningless;
Abandoning tzniut, they stand front-and-center, eating up the accolades and thinking themselves unbounded heroes whose foibles are nothing to their successes;
Believing themselves the smartest in the room, they ignore the concerns of others and they imagine that any danger they don’t perceive must not be real.

And so they feed their egos, and so they break rules, and so they fall, thinking all the while that they are in pursuit of the greatest good.

There are lots of ambitious, talented, charismatic leaders in the Jewish world. They are many leaders who are quite capable of ignoring red lines on issues that are dear to them. I am very concerned, worrying who will be next.

[This week's Haveil Havalim is here.]

Chanukah: Aristocracy and Meritocracy (Derashah: Chanukah 5770)

[Note: This is a quasi-derashah, quasi-shiur, as I am guest-speaking at a Shabbaton this Shabbos.]

It’s safe to assume that 98% of the people here have heard the old joke about Yankel, who comes to the rabbi and begs to be made a kohen. Beside himself as the rabbi refuses to make him a kohen, Yankel pledges successively larger sums of money, he offers to perform greater and greater deeds of righteousness, to come to minyan, to learn torah, to help others, until, finally, the rabbi asks, “Why do you want to be a kohen so badly?” And Yankel replies, “My father was a kohen, my grandfather was a kohen…”

We laugh at the absurdity of Yankel’s request; doesn’t everyone know that kehunah is inherited?! Is he truly unaware that membership in this oldest of Jewish aristocracies is determined not by good deeds but by accident of birth?

But we shouldn’t laugh at Yankel – because Yankel knows a great deal about Judaism’s egalitarian instincts:

• Yankel knows that all human beings are created equal – that Ben Azzai taught that the most important pasuk in the Torah is זה ספר תולדות אדם ביום ברא אלקים אדם בדמות אלקים עשה אותו, that all human beings are placed on earth with an identical claim to affinity with their Maker.

• Yankel knows the mishnah that says Gd assigned all of us the same pedigree from Adam and Chavah in order to highlight the ridiculous character of a human who would dare allege, “אבא גדול מאביך, My ancestor is greater than yours.”

• Yankel knows the lessons of Sefer Bereishit and Sefer Shmot, that Avraham and Sarah of Aram, that Rivkah and Rachel of the house of Lavan, that Yosef the imprisoned felon, that an entire generation of slaves, can lay claim to the status of בני בכרי ישראל, firstborn children of Gd, and can establish the nation that the Shechinah would recognize as her own.

So why do we laugh at Yankel? We should agree with him!

Why do we accept the aristocracy of kehunah, as well as its twin nobility of מלכות, the monarchy?

Why is our government an inherited authority?

Why do we tolerate the idea that the honor of serving in the Beit haMikdash should go to an individual of no special merit beyond a genetic helix stamped Scion-of-Aaron, or that the right to sit upon King David’s throne should go to an individual who is simply descended from Ruth?


It’s because monarchy and kehunah are not really about honoring descendants, assigning privilege to people who don’t deserve it. A Jew who is born to a king, or to a kohen might never sit on the throne or serve in the Beit haMikdash. He has potential, as a Divine favor to his forebear, a reward for that ancestor’s labor.


Ramban said as much regarding the monarchy.

Ramban discussed the way that the Chashmonaim took over the Jewish monarchy after the events of Chanukah, and he claimed that they ultimately fell in battle as punishment for usurping the throne that belonged to King David’s heirs. And Ramban argued, citing the Yerushalmi, that the monarchy was assigned to that tribe not because those heirs were wonderful, but in honor of the deeds of their patriarch, Yehudah:

• Monarchy belonged to Yehudah’s line, according to a Tosefta, because Yehudah demonstrated selfless leadership in admitting his own guilt with Tamar publicly, because he saved Yosef’s life from his murderous brothers, and because he stared down the Viceroy of Egypt to save Binyamin.

• Monarchy belonged to Yehudah’s line, because Nachshon ben Aminadav, the prince of Yehudah’s tribe, trusted Gd and marched into Yam Suf before it split.

• And Monarchy belonged to Yehudah’s line because Ruth acted to save her former mother-in-law, Naami.

In other words: Monarchy was appropriate for King David and his children not because of King David, but because of the great deeds of the founders of his line.


The same principle applies to Yankel’s coveted kehunah; the right of kehunah belongs to Yankel because of the merit of his distant ancestors:

• Yankel’s great-great-grandmother, Yocheved, heroically saved Jewish baby boys in Egypt;

• Yankel’s great-great-grandparents, after Cheit ha’Eigel, rallied to Moshe’s cry of מי לה' אלי, Whoever is for Gd, come with me!

• Yankel’s great-great-grandfather, Aharon, led the Jewish people with selfless love.

In their merit, Gd gives their heirs a shot at serving in the Beit haMikdash.


But that’s all it is – a shot at being king, a shot at being a kohen, a shot at government of the Jewish people. One who is born into those lines can lose his position.

• An ignorant kohen is forced to take a back seat to a Torah scholar, even if the Torah scholar’s lineage is illegitimate;

• Families of kohanim lost their status because of their poor conduct;

• Offspring of Yehudah lost their thrones when they sinned.

• Jewish history is littered with the stories of regal families, heirs of the royal line, who fell from their perches.


We laugh at Yankel because he failed to understand that his great-grandfather’s merit remains for him. But Yankel understood our meritocratic ideal, that the offspring must still earn their status; authority must still be earned.


And Yankel was right about one more point related to the way we govern ourselves. When Yankel pledged tzedakah and Torah and chesed, he made the point that anyone, regardless of background, can start a new line or merit, can earn positions of greatness for himself and his heirs.

This message was expressed clearly every time the Jews dedicated or re-dedicated a house to Gd:

• When the Jews wished to construct a mishkan in which to gather and commune with their Creator, Gd assigned the task to Betzalel, from the royal tribe of Yehudah, and Ahaliav, from the tribe of Dan. Dan, descendant of Rachel’s maid Bilhah, was the tribe that moved last when the Jews traveled through the wilderness. He was the מאסף, the Desert Zamboni, sweeping up anything lost by the rest of the nation. The leader and the laggard were paired to construct the mishkan – and any Jew who wished, כל נדיב לב, could contribute goods or services to that Mishkan.

• When the Jews set out to build the first Beit haMikdash, Shlomo haMelech hired a man named Hirom – not Hiram King of Tzur, but Hirom whose mother was from the tribe of Dan, and whose father was from the city of Tyre up north. According to Abarbanel, Hirom’s father may not have been a Jew at all. Shlomo, from the tribe of Yehudah, and Hirom, from the tribe of Dan, and eventually Hirom’s son, who shared his name, built the Beit haMikdash.

• We find the same message of inclusion in the second Beit haMikdash, which was erected by a ragtag group of Jews who left Bavel more for lack of Babylonian opportunity than from any special Jewish piety. Despite their lowly beginnings, their poverty and their ignorance, this generation served as leaders and built the second Beit haMikdash.

• And then we move on to Chanukah and find the Chashmonaim, family of the Kohen Gadol, joining with any Jew who will answer their call of “מי לה' אלי, Whoever is for Gd, come with me!” to rebel against the Greeks. We find a woman named Chanah, daughter of Matityahu Kohen Gadol, rallying the Jews to revolt – and then we find another woman named Yehudit, with no particular lineage, executing the general Holofernes.

• This same principle has empowered Jewish leadership through the generations, no matter what culture or continent we have inhabited. Despite the absence of a Divine decree a la לא יסור שבט מיהודה, הכרת הטוב drove us to reward our leaders with opportunities for their descendants. From Tannaim and Amoraim in Israel and Bavel, to Gaonim and Rashei Galuta in Bavel and North Africa, to Negidim and Chachamim and Parnasim and Roshei Yeshiva in Europe, to the leaders of the first Jewish communities in the Western Hemisphere, leaders of great merit have created lines, have been honored as their children were offered the opportunity to be ממלא מקום אבותיהם, to fill the seats of their parents – and when those children proved worthy, they established great dynasties, the well-known names of Jewish leadership: Klonymuses and Abarbanels, Rothschilds and Touros.

The mishkan, the first Beit haMikdash, the second Beit haMikdash, the rededication of Chanukah – all of them teach us that anyone can achieve greatness, that even as we honor descendants of great people, a non-kohen, a non-melech, any Yankel, can create a meritorious line of his own and bring honor to his own offspring.


This balance of honoring great people through their descendants, while demanding merit from those kin themselves, is of practical relevance for our theme this Shabbos. In governing our institutions, whether on the large scale of a country or the smaller scale of a community shul, we balance between those two imperatives.

The Jewish State of Israel is obligated to honor the contributions of its founders, be they the ancient, pious חלוקה communities, or the ideological BILU movement of the 1880s and 1890s, or the refugees of the Pale of Settlement at the end of the 19th century, or the kibbutznik chalutzim of the first half of the 20th century. These men and women, religious and secular, earned a place of honor for their in the new land by dint of their sweat and the lives they risked and gave for its creation. As Rav Kook recognized and actively promoted, as Rav Yissachar Techtel argued in his אם הבנים שמחה, Jewish government which seeks to honor the principles of Torah must recognize that these people are the melachim and kohanim of our time, and determine policy in a way that honors, rather than disenfranchises, their progeny.

But, simultaneously, those descendants must earn their titles. Being an Israeli by accident of birth is like being a Kohen by accident of birth; it entitles you to a seat at the table, but the future of that seat depends upon your own virtue.

And the same is true regarding our communities. A few months ago I was privileged to attend Rabbi Strauchler’s Installation here at Shaarei Shomayim, and I heard a great deal about the founders of this shul. I watched video interviews with them and their relatives, and I listened to tributes for families who have maintained this proud institution over the decades. These are the melachim and kohanim of Shaarei Shomayim, an aristocracy which earned a place of pride for its future generations. The einiklach of those heroes occupy that place of pride, but their challenge is to achieve greatness of their own, to earn their titles of today.

And the same applies regarding ourselves. I am part of a special line, descendants of Avraham and Sarah and of those who joined them over the millenia. I am part of a brit, a covenant – and I am in danger of taking it for granted. I want to be like Yankel – I want to come to Gd and say, “Gd, make me a Jew! I’ll do anything – chesed, torah, davening – just make me a Jew!” And when Gd says, “Why? Why do you want to be a Jew?” My answer will include the words, “Because my parents were Jews, and my grandparents were Jews…”


This morning’s haftarah described the role of aristocracies with the image of a Menorah whose oil is provided by two anointed sources, the monarchy and the kehunah. Next Shabbat, the second Shabbat of Chanukah, we will read about the role of Chirom, the man whose mother came from Dan and whose father may not have been Jewish.

The union of the two, the ancient aristocracy on one side and the rank-and-file creating its new aristocracy on the other, will continue the chain of the Mishkan, the first Beit haMikdash, the second Beit haMikdash and Chanukah, to construct the third Beit haMikdash, a בנין עדי עד, a construction everlasting.

-
Notes:
1. Ben Azzai's quote is in Yerushalmi Nedarim 9:4, the line about Adam's pedigree is in Mishnah Sanhedrin 4:5.

2. Ramban is on Bereishis 49:10, and his source is Yerushalmi Horiyyot 3:2

3. Yehudah's monarchy is identified as his and Nachshon's honor in Tosefta Berachot 4:18; Ruth's credit appears in the midrash to Ruth.

4. See http://www.torah.org/learning/ravfrand/5762/kisisa.html for an interesting story regarding the Chafetz Chaim and the honor of being a Kohen.

5. The mishnah in Horiyyot 3:8 talks about prizing the ממזר תלמיד חכם over the כהן גדול עם הארץ.Yoma 38a and Succah 56a talk about the dishonored families of Kohanim.

6. Regarding the construction of the mishkan, the rank and file contributed so much that the נשיאים, the leaders of the tribes, were pushed to the end, to donate follow-up gifts to what we could term The Building Fund – but each leader is mentioned personally in the Torah, despite their identical gifts, in order to show that each individual was significant.

7. The midrash of Chanah is found in Otzar Midrashim of Eisenstein.

8. The historic honor for the families of leaders is enshrined in halachah; many responsa deal with the problem of passing leadership positions to unworthy descendants, and of those who tried to wrest leadership positions from worthies.

Olive, Fig and Grape: Don't say No! (Derashah)

[For the record: I have a poppy on my coat today.]

[Note: This week's "Toronto Torah" is now available here.]

I spoke at a UJA meeting earlier this week, and presented an idea I really like; it would be a good skeleton for a derashah if I were still in the darshaning business.

Here’s a digest:

Avimelech, son of Gideon, uses the aid of the population of Shechem to murder his half-siblings and gain the throne. Yotam, the sole remaining sibling, delivers a public rebuke before disappearing into hiding. (Shoftim 9)

As JPS translates the relevant part of Yotam’s speech:
He went and stood in the top of mount Gerizim, and lifted up his voice, and cried, and said unto them: 'Hearken unto me, ye men of Shechem, that Gd may hearken unto you.
The trees went forth on a time to anoint a king over them; and they said unto the olive-tree: Reign thou over us.
But the olive-tree said unto them: Should I leave my fatness, seeing that by me they honour G-d and man, and go to hold sway over the trees?
And the trees said to the fig-tree: Come thou, and reign over us.
But the fig-tree said unto them: Should I leave my sweetness, and my good fruitage, and go to hold sway over the trees?
And the trees said unto the vine: Come thou, and reign over us.
And the vine said unto them: Should I leave my wine, which cheereth G-d and man, and go to hold sway over the trees?
Then said all the trees unto the bramble: Come thou, and reign over us.
And the bramble said unto the trees: If in truth ye anoint me king over you, then come and take refuge in my shadow...

Clearly, the main villain whom Yotam targets is his half-brother, the thorn, Avimelech. This is a completely unworthy, unproductive man, and he has accepted the throne.

It is also evident that Yotam blames the population itself for asking the thorn to lead.

But there is another set of villains: The olive, fig and grape, which decline to lead because they wish to preserve their unique attributes, which they fear they would lose if they were to take the throne. The olive is afraid it might lose its dignified position; the fig is afraid it might no longer be seen as the one that produces sweet, satisfying fruit; the grape fears that it will no longer be seen as the source of joy.

I see this all the time, in community work; it’s especially relevant for tzedakah solicitation. People are afraid that they will lose their respected positions if they run around asking for funds. People are afraid that they will be known as takers, rather than givers. People are afraid that they will spend their time talking about war and poverty and social services, and cease to be the life of the party.

But those are the people we need, for their talents! We need people who make community enterprises an honor. We need sweet people who make others feel good. And we need people who bring joy to these serious matters. These are the people who make good on the Torah’s עשר בשביל שתתעשר (“tithe so that you will become wealthy”) pledge – the people who enrich those who give, in many diverse ways that transcend finances. We need the olive, the fig and the grape.

All leaders bring talents to the table. None of us are thorns – but what sort of fruit are we?

And I closed with one more thought: The olive, fig and grape are reticent because they fear losing their dignity, they fear becoming known as takers, they fear being known for dull sobriety. But the truth, and I have seen it many times, is that those who lead end up with greater honor, end up known for the satisfaction they provide rather than the money they take, and end up increasing spiritual joy for themselves and for all they meet.

Of Nesiim and Parents and Flexible Authority (Derashah: Matot-Masei 5769)

Kalev ben Yefuneh, now 80 years old, nasi of Yehudah, a legend for his righteous stand against the meraglim some forty years earlier, strode into Moshe’s tent. He was accompanied by Shmuel ben Amihud, a newly appointed nasi replacing the deceased criminal Zimri. With them came 10 more leaders – Elidad ben Kislon, Buki ben Yagli, Chaniel ben Efod, each the leader of an entire shevet/tribe.

These twelve governors had been summoned by Moshe Rabbeinu, their great leader. Moshe had just announced his imminent death and appointed Yehoshua to succeed him, and now he gathered his governors… but for what? What would he tell them?


“וידבר משה אל ראשי המטות לבני ישראל לאמר זה הדבר אשר צוה ה' – And Moshe spoke to the heads of the tribes of the Jewish people, saying, ‘This is what Gd has commanded.’”

The leaders waited with bated breath.

“איש כי ידור נדר לה' ... לא יחל דברו – When someone makes a vow to Gd, he shall not make his word mundane. He must fulfill everything that comes from his mouth.”

At this point, perhaps, Achihud ben Shlomi turns to Paltiel ben Azan with a quizzical look: For laws of purity and shemitah and kashrut and inheritance Moshe didn’t summon us, but he gathered us from our important business to say, “People must keep their word?”


But then Moshe continued with laws about nullifying vows, about recognizing that commitments made in all sincerity might be in error, and might not be worth upholding.

And with this addition, perhaps, the reason for gathering the leaders of bnei yisrael became much more clear. This was a message that they, of all people, needed to hear – the message of nullifying one’s word.


Certainly, the laws of vows do apply to the entire nation – but Moshe first presented this message to the leaders, as a message targeted toward them. There is no דבר אל בני ישראל here – Moshe doesn’t say, “Tell this to the nation.” It’s a message which educates the leaders, first and foremost, in how to do their jobs.

These leaders would be crucial for the post-Moshe era. Moshe had just appointed Yehoshua as the federal leader of the Jewish people, but the nesiim, the tribal governors, would still be needed.
• There would be land to distribute.
• There would be disputes to resolve.
• The Jewish people in Israel would live tribally, doing almost nothing as a coherent whole.
• Even war would be handled by individual tribes, not by the nation.

And so Moshe follows up his appointment of Yehoshua by telling the nesiim: You still have a leadership role to play – and this is how I want you to play it:

לא יחל דברו – In your capacity as leaders, you may not make your words mundane political tools, saying one thing and meaning another, playing politics with carefully crafted remarks, saying what people want to hear in order to keep them happy. Your words are not חול, they are קודש - not mundane, but sacred.

But, at the same time, Moshe warns that a true leader recognizes the limitations of his קודש words. Chazal warned us, “ואל תשתחווה לדבריך, Do not bow to your words” – do not view your words as a sacrosanct idol, to be preserved and honored at all costs.


Perhaps better than any other Jewish leader, Moshe knows this balance.

• Moshe grew up at the knee of Paroh, a man who never learned how to back down, who pretended to retreat in the face of each מכה only to revert to his stubbornness in the end. Moshe saw what happens to a leader who cannot change course.

• But then, on the other hand, Moshe himself was sent on a mission in which he could not back down, in which he was to stand face-to-face with Pharoah over a period of months repeating variations on the same words , שלח את עמי, Send out my nation, no fewer than seven times.

• Which is not to say that even Moshe had the balance between backbone and flexibility quite right.
When Moshe charged Yehoshua with his mission, he said, כי אתה תבוא את העם הזה, Yehoshua, you will come into Israel with the nation – leading with the people, not forcing them to obey your words.
But HaShem corrected Moshe, saying, כי אתה תביא את העם הזה, You will bring this nation into Israel yourself – as the gemara elaborates, טול מקל והך על קדקדם, If they don’t listen then take a stick and hit them over the head!

And so Moshe warns the leaders: You will need to get this balance right.


One might argue that this lesson is obvious; do you really need Moshe Rabbeinu to tell you to be flexible? Does it really take the greatest leader of all time to remind you that Paroh is a bad role model?

Probably not – but the challenge for a Nasi is more complex, because a Nasi speaks with Divinely-invested authority; Gd warned the nation, ונשיא בעמך לא תאור, Do not attack the nasi; Gd required that we honor these people, and follow them, and so their words carry great weight. Further, the nasi speaks on behalf of government, on behalf of law and order, on behalf of the best interests of their shevatim and of the nation as a whole.

Seen in that light, a Nasi faces a great challenge: He must honor his words as Divinely-authorized edicts, but he must simultaneously override the temptation of claiming infalliblity.


Historically, there were times when the nesiim backed down on their Divinely inspired commands.

For example: A few decades after our parshah the tribe of Binyamin descended into lawlessness, and those nesiim, acting on Gd’s instructions to wage war against Binyamin, declared a religious ban against marrying anyone from that tribe. But when they saw the decline of Binyamin, they reversed themselves, recognizing that one cannot bow to his words, even words uttered in the name of Gd.


This is an important lesson for religious leaders, but it is also important for parents, because parents, too, are religious leaders, speaking with Divine authority.

When the Torah instructs, כבד את אביך ואת אמך, Honor your father and mother –
When the Torah warns, איש אמו ואביו תיראו, Have awe of your mother and father –
HaShem invests parents with religious authority like that of the nesiim, such that when parents speak to their children, Gd endorses their words.

Add to this the fact that we instruct our children for their own good, their own physical and spiritual well-being - telling them to get ready for school, to do their homework, to eat their vegetables, to wear a yarmulka or to come to shul or to give tzedakah – and it’s easy for us, like the nesiim, to view our words as inflexibly קודש.

So Moshe warns the nesiim, and he warns all of us: לא יחל דברו, don’t make your words mundane, but, on the other hand, know when to give in.

[I closed with a message for parents who are celebrating the birth of their children this week.]

-
Notes:

1. The opening thought - the perplexity of the nesiim and the appropriateness of Moshe's message for them - is built around a thought from Rav Baruch Yashar in בין השיטין של תורה.

2. "Do not bow to your words" is from Kallah Rabti 4:17. Moshe's charge to Yehoshua is in Sanhedrin 8a. The battle with Binyamin is in Shoftim 20-21.

3. We had celebrations for three babies this week. If not for that, I might have used Berachot 34a as the closer. HaShem vows to destroy the nation after the Eigel, and Moshe nullifies the neder. HaShem is omniscient, He knows He won't carry it out - so why make the neder in the first place? Perhaps to teach Moshe about the possibility of hafarat nedarim, of backing down.

Iran's Trust Revolution and the Meraglim (Derashah Shelach 5769)

According to the analysts, Iran’s upheaval is not a 21st century version of Eastern Europe’s liberation. Mir-Hossein Moussavi and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are both conservatives, ideological brothers.

This is also not a “power to the people” rebellion; Iran’s poorer classes support Ahmadinejad, not Moussavi.

Millions of Iranians are endangering their own lives not out of political philosophy or abject poverty, but in outrage over a government that has betrayed their trust.

Government has always been empowered by social contract, but in this age of free and speedy access to information government is also held accountable to social contract. Violating that contract, betraying that trust, in Iran’s case ignoring votes in a democracy, leads to revolt.


The need for maintaining popular trust is not a new idea. In fact, a midrash suggests that Gd's decision to send the meraglim/spies was motivated by that need, to maintain popular trust regarding Canaan, to head off doubt by letting the Jews themselves see what the land offered.

Elaborating on this point, the midrash compares the desert Jews to a man who wishes to purchase a donkey. He asks, 'Would you give it to me for a test run?' The owner agrees. 'Can I take it on mountains and through hills?' 'Sure.' Once the buyer sees that the owner is hiding nothing, he hands over the money without even doing the test.

Of course, our relationship with HaShem is supposed to be about Emunah/faith, but Gd understood that not every Jew would reach such a high level, that some might need to know everything upfront – and so HaShem allowed them to send spies, in order to build trust.


Moshe also practiced this trust-building transparency, regarding the money he raised for the mishkan. After the collection was complete, Moshe gave the nation a full accounting of all of the items presented; it’s listed in the beginning of the parshah of Pekudei.

One midrash suggests that this was a response to people's explicit allegations about what Moshe was doing with the money; Moshe swore he would provide a full accounting in order to earn their trust, and he did.

Moshe's practice with the Mishkan collection became the recommended ‘best practice’ for tzedakah in general; the Shulchan Aruch says that elected tzedakah distributors need not provide a full explanation of their spending, but the Rama adds that they should do so anyway, כדי שיהיו נקיים מה' ומישראל, to maintain innocence before Gd and Israel.

And this transcends the realm of tzedakah; the Torah’s instruction of maintaining innocence in the eyes of Gd and Israel, of earning popular trust, is all-encompassing.


This is certainly true for our communal institutions.

One of the RCA's resolutions at this year's convention was on exactly this topic – the need for Jewish institutions to function with the greatest transparency, in order to build trust.

The wording of the resolution includes the message, “Let it be resolved that all Jewish communal institutions strive to attain levels of transparency regarding financial affairs, regarding the mechanism of leadership succession, and regarding the planning and execution of general business. Vehicles for attaining transparency include annual open meetings, featuring complete reports of their activities and financial condition, as well as periodic newsletters detailing current news and goals.”

Iran or Meraglim or Tzedakah funds or communal instituions, it’s all about earning and maintaining trust.


And there’s one more area where transparency and trust-building are critically important: On talking to our children and grandchildren about our religious beliefs.

As parents and grandparents, we wrestle with the question of what to tell our children about illness, about family issues, about finances; we wonder when it's appropriate to include them in the knowledge that a parent lost a job, or that a relative has received a terminal diagnosis.

This question is all the more applicable for our personal spiritual struggles, our issues of faith and doubt, and I believe that pre-teen and teen children need to know their parents’ beliefs, as well as their parents’ skepticism, in an age-appropriate way.

As children near their teenage years, some younger, some older, they experience normal skepticism about all of the things they learn in school, and particularly the Jewish lessons which are contradicted by so much of society's input. How do I know the Torah is true? Where is Gd now, and where was Gd during the Holocaust? Is there really a Mashiach? What happens when people die?

When parents discuss these issues, and their own views, with their children, that open conversation can establish a trusting relationship that will last far into the future:
• It can prove to children that their parents are people of depth, and not rote observers of ritual;
• It can send the message that wondering and doubting are normal and healthy;
• It can provide answers for children’s questions, and it can provide lessons in how to deal with doubt;
• And it can establish a line of communication that children will, hopefully, exploit as they grow older.

The trust this establishes can be the difference between a child who rejects his parents’ path, and a child who chooses to follow it.


In his essay, “My Father’s Bourgeois Judaism,” Franz Kafka described being dragged to shul for Rosh haShanah and Yom Kippur. He wrote to his father, “Four days a year you went to the synagogue, where you were, to say the least, closer to the indifferent than to those who took it seriously, patiently went through the prayers as a formality, sometimes amazed me by being able to show me in the prayer book the passage that was being said at the moment, and for the rest, so long as I was present in the synagogue (and this was the main thing) I was allowed to hang around wherever I liked. And so I yawned and dozed through the many hours (I don't think I was ever again so bored, except later at dancing lessons) and did my best to enjoy the few little bits of variety there were…”

Kafka felt that his father never discussed the spiritual with him, and the result was a son who did not trust, and who rebelled and walked away.

Let’s model our parenting on HaShem’s act of sending the Meraglim, rather than the silence of Kafka’s father. When our children know that their vote counts, when they see that we permit them to take the donkey for a spin before buying it, then we will have earned their trust.

-
Notes:

1. The midrash comparing sending the meraglim with selling a donkey is Sifri Devarim 21; the midrash on Moshe earning trust by making a full accounting is Tanchuma Pekudei 4. The Rama's comment is in Shulchan Aruch Yoreh Deah 257:2.

2. Note that the meraglim trumped Gd in the drive for the nation's trust, by claiming that Gd really had been hiding information all along - the land is filled with giants, it's a harsh land, we've been duped, etc. It isn't until the beginning of Devarim that Gd, through Moshe, acknowledges to the people the residents of the land are mighty, etc.

3. Perhaps this desire for national trust is one reason why a nasi (leader of the Jewish people) is required to bring a unique korban if he sins. Bringing a normal sin-offering, hiding his transgression among the regular citizens, will not suffice; leaders must be honest with their citizenry.

Who needs rabbinic leadership?

The other day I quoted a 2007 survey performed by YU’s Center for the Jewish Future (in its Community Growth Initiative) on the way that young couples choose a community.

According to the CJF's published report, they surveyed 100 “young families” from Riverdale, Washington Heights, Teaneck, University of Pennsylvania, Einstein, Kew Gardens Hills and Holliswood.

The participants were from early 20s to early 30s, from newlyweds to families with 2-3 children under the age of 5. The great majority of the participants had grown up on Long Island (16.4%) or in Queens (14.4%); the highest-ranking non-NY/NJ hometowns were Chicago, LA and Philadelpha, each with 3.4% of the participants. There was no small community with 2% or more of the results.

As I explained in that previous post, these families ranked the importance of 12 factors for choosing a community. The overall result was:

1. Hashkafa
2. Choice of Day Schools
3. Affordable Housing
4. Job / Higher Education
5. Young Couples
6. Eruv
7. Values
8. Mikvah
9. Convenience
10. Proximity to Family
11. Rabbinic Leadership
12. Kosher Restaurants

Which led one commenter to note how low rabbinic leadership ranks in the survey results. To me, though, this makes perfect sense, for several reasons:

• As the study authors noted, younger families usually have not experienced a need for real pastoral involvement, as in helping people through severe illness or marshaling community resources in a crisis;

• As the study authors also noted, the families interviewed still had strong connections to their rebbeim from yeshiva and may not have seen the need for a communal posek or pastoral authority;

• The study authors also noted that a great percentage of the young families surveyed lived in apartment communities, without any substantive rabbinic presence. [Similarly, many of them ranked eruv and walking-distance mikvah low on the list; presumably they felt they could always build one easily enough, with or without rabbinic leadership?]

• I would also add that the young families surveyed likely had little awareness of what a rabbi does in a community, particularly a small community. Coming from Long Island, Brooklyn, Queens and Teaneck, their experience with community organization and growth would be entirely theoretical. Speaking for myself, I had no clue about the role of a rabbi in a non-New York community.

• And, finally but perhaps most crucially, good rabbinic leadership generally takes place behind the scenes, so that these families, and most families, would likely not be sensitive to it. If a rabbi does his job well – organizes help for people in need discreetly, works well with committees, arranges for shul and community decisions to flow properly – then no one knows what he has done.

So, no, I’m not that surprised by the result. I’m curious, though, as to what those same couples will say if they are re-surveyed five and ten years down the line.

Hallel for Yom ha’Atzmaut without a berachah (Rav Tzvi Yehuda Kook)

Yeshivat Hesder Ramat Gan published “Go’el Yisrael גואל ישראל,” several years ago. The book collects considerable quality material on Yom ha’Atzmaut and Yom Yerushalayim, from Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook, his son Rav Tzvi Yehudah Kook, their students, and other giant of Religious Zionism. It also offers a complete seder tefillah for Yom haAtzmaut and Yom Yerushalayim.

On page 300-301, Rav Tzvi Yehuda Kook is quoted regarding the Chief Rabbinate’s recommendation of saying Hallel without a berachah on Yom ha’Atzmaut, Israel’s Independence Day:

On the Erev Shabbat preceding Yom ha’Atzmaut, a certain important man came to me and asked why our rabbis do not permit us to recite a berachah upon Hallel for Yom ha’Atzmaut. I replied to him that the ruling of the Chief Rabbinate is balanced and correct.

The enactments of the Chief Rabbinate apply to the entire community. Since, to our pain and shame, a great portion of our community does not believe in the great act of Gd which is revealed to us in the establishment of the government of Israel, and since, due to its lack of faith, it lacks joy, it is not possible to obligate them to recite Hallel with a berachah. It is like someone who sees a friend and is glad to see him, who is obligated to recite a berachah; if he is joyous, he recites a beracah. If he is not joyous, he does not recite a berachah.

Rav Maimon, whose entire being was dedicated to building Gd’s nation and portion, was filled with the joy of faith, and so he established in his synagogue to recite Hallel with a berachah. The same is true in other, similar places – the IDF and religious kibbutzim. However, the Chief, all-inclusive Rabbinate cannot enact a berachah as an all-inclusive ruling for the entire community, when the community is not ready for it.

In our central Yeshiva we had followed the ruling of the Rabbinate, for we are not a kloiz of a specific sect. We are associated with the general Jewish population centered in Yerushalayim, and since that population includes, for now, to our pain and our embarrassment, obstacles to complete faith and joy, and therefore to the obligation to recite a berachah, it is appropriate that we also act according to the ruling of the Rabbinate for the general population.

I find this explanation fascinating for many reasons, including the following:

• I’m not sure which group he means, when he speaks of those who don’t believe in the great act of Gd – does he mean those who do not believe in Divine intervention? Or those who do not believe that the State is an act of Gd?

• I wonder how many people who do not believe in Divine intervention, or who do not believe that the State is an act of Gd, daven in Mercaz haRav – and on Yom ha’Atzmaut in particular?

• I believe that his insistence on keeping the yeshiva – the bastion of his father’s Torah! – as an institution open to all, and serving all, and avoiding divisive practices even on matters we hold most dear, should be a model for all of us. This is true leadership.

I don’t need to have an opinion on the National Cathedral saga

[First: This week's Haveil Havalim and this month's Kosher Cooking Carnival are out!]

If I had a dime for every time someone has asked me, since Wednesday, what I think about Rabbi Haskel Lookstein’s participation in the worship service at the National Cathedral last week, and the Rabbinical Council of America’s semi-public disapproval…

First: I am נוגע בדבר (I have a conflict of interest), because I am a big fan of Rabbi Lookstein. In my smichah days he volunteered his valuable time every week – on an erev Shabbos, no less! – to teach much-needed Homiletics classes for the guys. I have used his CDs teaching proper chazanus for Yamim Noraim. I have seen him to be a sincere baal chesed, someone who will move שמים וארץ (heaven and earth) for Torah and for Am Yisrael. And that’s even before we get into his distinguished career in rabbanus and at Ramaz.

Second: I am נוגע בדבר (I have a conflict of interest) because renowed poskim, who are my halachic mentors, have already issued rulings on the matter. I am familiar with their read of both the facts on the ground and the relevant halachic sources and precedents, and I see nothing I can add to their expressed perspectives.

Third: My opinion doesn't change anything here; there is no practical purpose to voicing an opinion on this.

But beyond all of that, I think that onlookers like myself need a dose of humility here.

I taught an adult education class the other day (on the issue of Lying for Peace, משנים מפני השלום), and we came to the gemara in Bava Metzia (23b-24a) which says, “A Torah scholar may lie about three topics: (1) Whether he knows a tractate, (2) Intimate details of his marriage, and (3) His host’s hospitality.”

I explained the first case, in which a scholar is asked, “Do you know a certain volume of gemara,” and he denies knowing it well. The scholar does know the subject, but, as a matter of humility, he claims ignorance. (Presumably this is not where he is asked a question by someone wishing to learn Torah or needing a halachic decision, but that’s a topic for another discussion.)

A large segment of the class – an adult class! – could not fathom the logic here. I explained that this is a matter of humility, but they still didn’t get it. These are very good people, strong members of society, but the idea that one would humbly deny his strengths was entirely foreign to them.

I think this is a function of society itself. We are taught, encouraged, demanded to promote ourselves, lest we be overlooked, or lest we look down upon ourselves. Humility is just not valued; if anything, it’s considered a character flaw, some function of a lack of self-esteem.

Rabbis are especially expected to have opinions. If a rabbi answers a question on a proba interview - "Do you feel that the State of Israel embodies Mashiach" or "What do you think is the single greatest threat to Judaism today" - with anything less than 100% certainty, he is assumed to be waffling in order to hide offensive opinions. Certainly, it cannot be that he is simply... uncertain. And if he is uncertain, well, then, he would not be a good leader.

It seems that people believe "leadership" has less to do with leading and more to do with talking.

This is what I see in the constant insistence upon having a comment on any and every issue, National Cathedral services and otherwise. There really is nothing wrong with saying “I don’t know.”

And especially when that’s the truth.

Moshe, Obama and the Cult of Personality (Derashah: Vaera 5769)

As I watched the crowd shots at the Inauguration this past week, and I listened to people describing their expectations for the Obama presidency, I was forcefully reminded of Rav Shimshon Raphael Hirsch's comments on our parshah.


The parshah begins with Moshe's frustration and his outburst at Gd - "Why did You send me to Paroh?" Moshe demands to know. "From the moment I came to Paroh, he made things worse for this nation - and You, Gd, You have not saved Your nation!" To which Gd responds by telling Moshe to return to Paroh - but then the Torah interposes a genealogy of Moshe and Aharon:

Levi had three sons, Gershon, Kehat and Merari.
Gershon's kids were Livni and Shimi.
Kehat's children were Amram, Yitzhar, Chevron and Uziel.
Merari's sons were Machli and Mushi.
Amram married Yocheved, and she gave birth to Miriam, Aharon and Moshe.

Why does the Torah include this genealogy; what are we meant to learn here?

Rav Shimshon Raphael Hirsch explained, in a fascinating polemic, that the Torah presents this record of the ancestry of Moshe and Aharon in order to vaccinate the Jew against a theological disease which would ultimately infect Christianity: "So that, for all time, their absolutely human origin, and the absolutely ordinary human nature of their beings, should be firmly established. We know well enough how, in later times, a Jew whose genealogical table was not available... came to be considered by nations as begotten of Gd, and to doubt his divinity became a capital crime."

In other words: The Torah presents Moshe's pedigree lest we come to believe, through the miracles he would engineer and the charismatic personality he would bring to bear, that he was somehow a deity.

The Jews of that day wanted a deity for a leader. When Moshe disappears to receive the Torah, the Jews approach Aharon, seeking a new leader. They say to Aharon, "קום עשה לנו אלהים אשר ילכו לפנינו כי זה משה האיש אשר העלנו מארץ מצרים לא ידענו מה היה לו, Make a god to go before us, because we do not know what happened to Moshe the man who brought us up from Egypt." The Jewish people are dissatisfied with this all-too-mortal leader; they would be led by a god. And so HaShem stresses, at the outset, that their leader is but a human being, born of human parents.


But there is more here. I believe that beyond concern for deifying Moshe, HaShem is also concerned that this nascent nation will act in the manner of children everywhere, shirking responsibility with the expectation that their parent, Moshe, will take care of matters on their behalf, achieving feats of righteousness in their name, protecting them from the consequences of their actions, leading them along the spiritual equivalent of the Bunny slope toward a land flowing with milk and honey.

Moshe does play a parental role; as he says forthrightly, he is a nursemaid carrying a nurseling. That's why Moshe was selected in the first place, per one midrash; Moshe was chosen because of the way he cared, as a shepherd, about every sheep in his flock. This type of parental leader was necessary at this stage, to introduce a nation of slaves to their spiritual and national potential as a parent will nurture a child through adolescence and into realization of his strengths and powers.

But with that positive parental role comes the negative, adjunct possibility that the Jewish nation will become dependent upon their leader, viewing him as the solution for all of their problems. And, in truth, that did happen. This man who had said, "They will never believe me, they will never trust that Gd spoke with me," would become the parent for every national need, from food to water to military leadership, as well as the righteous protector, religious proxy for a sinful edah.

And so the Torah, at this early stage, takes pains to inform the Jew: Moshe is no superhuman individual, capable of shouldering the burdens of a nation. The Jewish people, in that generation and for all time, will need to take responsibility for their own actions, will need to grow into their role as a special nation and meet the challenges themselves.


This same concern - the possibility of relying on a leader to too great an extent - was, in fact, a problem which appeared repeatedly in Jewish history.

* Jews flocked to numerous false messiahs down through the ages, from Bar Kochba to Shabbtai Tzvi to many lesser figures in between. It is not that we are feeble-minded or beset with an unthinking gullibility. Rather, the offer of a man who bears our sins is attractive for people who are tired of bearing their own.

* Even short of Mashiach, various Jewish sects have long embraced leaders and accepted, without question, the notion that their leader's righteousness could somehow serve as a substitute for their own, extending mystical philosophies of leadership well beyond their authors' intent. Whether the chassid who goes too far with his Rebbe, or the Sephardi Jew who does the same with his Chacham, some Jews have adopted personal paths which their leaders would never have recommended, placing their leaders' portraits in their homes and businesses but failing to emulate the lifestyles of those much-admired icons.

This is a grave risk. Humility is certainly appropriate. Subordination of our will to the guidance of someone who knows us and who knows Torah is certainly appropriate. But the abdication of responsibility, with the expectation that another's righteousness will stand in our stead, that another will act in our place - this is anathema to the personal responsibility which permeates every nook and cranny of the Torah's moral mandate.


This morning's listing of Moshe's genealogy is only the beginning of the Torah's response to that abdication of responsibility:

* We noted last year, on Parshat Shoftim, that the Torah presents us with many models of leadership - Melech and Kohen, Shofet and Navi. But we also noted that all of these positions are presented as בדיעבד, concessions to a human need for intermediaries, and not an ideal. In the ideal world, all of us are leaders in our own right.

* The gemara was particularly concerned with the embrace of false messiahs, and declared, תיפח עצמותן של מחשבי קיצין, Cursed be those who formulate calculations of when Mashiach will arrive! Rather than play games of mathematics in a daydream of future irresponsibility, better to expend our energy in action!


We, in our own lives, are expected to steer clear of the mistake anticipated in this morning's parshah, to understand that we cannot look to leaders, living or deceased, past or present or future, to act on our behalf.

Our organizations - shul, school, any of them - dare not depend on a single person's inspiration and perspiration; all of us bear the responsibility of working for the betterment of the community. And the same is true for our Judaism; rather than wait for others to burden us with guilt or bodily drag us to righteousness, we must recognize that Moshe was as human as the rest of us, and that neither he nor any of his spiritual heirs will be able to do for us that which we will not do for ourselves.


President Obama may turn out to be as good as his backers claim, but as he has said himself, he will never be a nation's savior; a nation must be motivated to save itself. The same is true for the Jewish people under Moshe, and today.

Our redemptions, Messianic and otherwise, will come when we recognize that no human being can bring it one single second nearer for us. As the gemara says, redemption will come when we recognize אין לנו על מי להשען אלא על אבינו שבשמים, that rather than depend on Moshes or Messiahs or Presidents to act on our behalf, the only One upon whom we can depend is HaShem - and HaShem has already handed us the keys to our own redemption, and is waiting for us to put them to use.

-
Notes:

1. The gemara on אין לנו על מי להשען is at the end of Sotah, as I recall. Rav Shimshon Raphael Hirsch's note is in his commentary to Chumash. He also discusses why the Torah brings the genealogy of Shevet Reuven and Shevet Shimon, but I didn't want to get sidetracked here.

2. Of course, the Torah also provides the genealogy of Aharon here, and for the same reason, but adding Aharon and his own conflicts as a "parent" to the nation to this derashah would have made it overly complicated, albeit more interesting to me.

3. A question: Is the Torah really addressing the Jew in the wilderness, of that generation, with this concern? Or is it addressing us? I suspect the latter.

The End of Leadership: An Elul thought (Derashah, Shoftim 5768)

I am not thrilled with this derashah; I feel like the key idea (the Intimacy point expressed below) requires more thought and discussion. This is part of the oversimplification to which derashot are vulnerable, due to both their natural format and the timeframe afforded for developing them.

Last week, drawing on Parshat Reeh, I proclaimed the Torah’s support for big government. We talked about a pro-active Fed, regulation of lending, commerce and employment, government price-fixing and restraint of trade, all sanctioned by the Torah in the name of society’s health.

Today we’ll have to throw much of that out the window, though, because Parshat Shoftim argues that government is a necessary evil, that political and religious leadership are not a blessing but rather a reaction to human frailty.

Parshat Shoftim introduces us to four classes of leader - Shofet, Melech, Kohen, Navi - and all of them are what we call in Aramaic בדיעבד, “after the fact,” a necessity but not a happy one.


First, Shoftim introduces us to the role of Shofet, of Judge.

The judicial system is a cornerstone of Torah civilization, and is prescribed for all humanity. One of the seven Noachide laws requires all human beings to create laws and enforce them. Shoftim, judges, ruled over Jewish society after the death of Yehoshua’s generation, governing us for four centuries until the coronation of King Shaul.

The Shofet’s power is taken very seriously in the Torah: The judge must be honored; as our Torah says, “If the judge tells you that something is the law, even if he says right is left and left is right, you are required to listen.”

But the Torah seems to view judicial leadership as a sad reality rather than an ideal. As the Torah states it, “כי יהיה ריב בין אנשים, ונגשו אל המשפט ושפטום,” “When people fight, then go to the court for justice.” כי יפלא ממך דבר למשפט, when you are not capable of handling disputes, then go up the ladder of the courts until you reach the Supreme Court at the Beit haMikdash. We do have a hierarchy of courts - but the entire basis for the system is this: When you have a conflict, you need a judge. If there were no conflicts, there would be no need for judges.


The Torah then introduces us to another leader - the Melech, the king.

Society often needs strong government, leaders who will protect society’s least privileged members. Some of our kings were, indeed, sensitive to that responsibility. Pirkei Avot notes that even if our monarchs are corrupt, הוי מתפלל בשלומה של מלכות, we should pray for the welfare of the king, because if not for the monarchy, each person would swallow up the next.

The king, like the shofet, can expect full allegiance; one who is מורד במלכות, rebelling against the throne, earns capital punishment!

But the Torah appears ambivalent about this federal authority, too. The Torah does not provide us with a clear instruction, “Create a federal government.” Instead, ואמרת אשימה עלי מלך ככל הגויים אשר סביבותי, When you say, “We will place a king upon ourselves, like all of the nations around us,” then you can have a king. It’s a concession to our desire.


The third leader we meet is the Kohen, the priest responsible to coordinate operations in the Mishkan and Beit haMikdash.

Those Kohanim, as well as their first-cousins the Leviyyim, played a critical role in Jewish society, bringing offerings and overseeing and maintaining the Beit haMikdash. Some of them were our greatest religious figures; Aharon was a Kohen, Moshe was a Levi, and their descendants guided the nation.

Like the Shofet and the Melech, the Kohen’s domain is sacrosanct; no one may enter the kohen’s territory. Usurping the role of a kohen earns lashes, at least.

But the whole concept of Kehunah and Leviyyah was really a correction for a problem; at first, as Rashi explains, we were not supposed to have a Beit haMikdash at all, let alone a class of religious officials. HaShem wished to dwell among us, in our homes and in our lives, and we were going to relate to HaShem directly. It was only after we created the עגל, the Golden Calf, that HaShem declared ועשו לי מקדש, that we would need a central site for worship, with dedicated workers who would staff that central site.


And, finally, we meet the Navi, the prophet who conveys messages from HaShem to the nation.

I would think that if any leader would be ideal, it would be the Navi - he talks directly to HaShem, and conveys guidance to the nation. Yeshayah, Yirmiyah, Eliyahu, Elisha, neviim are the giants of Tanach, earning praise far surpassing that of all but the best of our kings. So, what could be better than having a navi?

The Navi, too, is protected; those who refuse to follow a navi are harshly punished. And regarding a Jew who pretends to be a navi, Gd says אנכי אדרוש מעמו, I will deal justice to him.

But our parshah describes the Navi as a בדיעבד institution as well. Moshe tells the Jews that HaShem had really wanted to speak to each of them individually. It was only after the Jews retreated from Sinai and said, “We cannot hear from Gd directly, the closeness is too much,” that Gd said, “Fine, I see this is what you need right now, so I will appoint intermediaries to communicate with you.”


So why do we need these leaders and their laws? If Gd didn’t want these functionaries, if Gd wanted us to be able to function without shofeit or kohen, then why did He create us this way?

One answer, I think, is that all of the problems which led us to need judge and king, kohen and navi, stemmed from one fundamental element of our design: Ever since Adam, we have been created as proud individuals, our souls and bodies separated from all others, with the strength of independence and all of the positives it brings. We recognize ourselves as islands, our primary interest is to look after our own well-being, and every relationship, every interaction, is judged based upon how it will affect our independent strength.

The downside of all of this independence is that it comes with an inability to handle immediacy, intimacy:
*Intimacy with other people: We need a shofeit because we have a natural selfishness which traumatizes our relationships; we need a melech because we cannot unite ourselves.
*And intimacy with Gd: We need a kohen because we aren’t ready to be close to Gd; we need a navi for the same reason.

Of course, we do seek community, and we do act selflessly at times, to fill our pragmatic needs - to provide comfort or protection or resources, or to fill some other psychological or practical gap. We seek HaShem, too, generally because of some need within ourselves. But these practical needs tend to be more utilitarian than idealistic.

We erect barriers against too close an intimacy with others, lest we make ourselves vulnerable to harm. Emotions are concealed, apologies are scarce, rights are fiercely protected, and only the power of the law and the lawsuit can wrestle concessions from our tight grasp.

We shy away from too intense a sharing of our with Gd, lest we become drawn into a religion which will eliminate our individuality. It’s the old phenomenon of vicarious Judaism - having the rabbi be the professional Jew, doing “all the right things,” so to speak, so that other people won’t have to.


Enter these leaders, as mediators - kings and judges to mediate our relationships with other people, priests and prophets to mediate our relationship with HaShem.

But these roles, I am convinced by our parshah and by the predictions of the neviim, are not meant to last forever. As the neviim themselves predict, there will come a day when we will all be neviim, כי מלאה הארץ דעה את ה', the earth will be filled with knowledge of HaShem. We will all be a nation of kohanim, and we will not need special kohanim. No longer will we seek physical gain at the expense of others, and so the שופט’s role will be reduced to handling misunderstandings. And our final king will be a mashiach who will lead us as a nation to reach this ultimate state.

Our task is to evolve, to understand that embracing other people does not eliminate our sovereignty as individuals, to accept that an intense embrace of HaShem does not mean the end of our personalities and identities, to render these leadership models obsolete. Through acts of generosity - political generosity, financial generosity, emotional generosity - we can draw closer to others, step by step, until we are one. And through acts of piety - davening, learning, observing the mitzvot - we can draw closer to HaShem.


There is one day during the year when we achieve this intimacy with our neighbors and with HaShem: Yom Kippur.

*We discard all distractions of food and physical pleasures, to spend the day focussing on Gd.
*Right at the outset we announce that we have come to pray as one, ignoring barriers for 25 hours until we embrace each other with the shofar blast in our ears and ה' הוא האלקים on our lips, at the close.

In this month of Elul, let’s set the stage for that evolution, apologizing to others for our wrongs and then apologizing to HaShem as well, breaking down barriers of self-consciousness as well as denial, and so come to HaShem and to society on Yom Kippur prepared not to rely on a king or judge, priest or prophet, but to commune with Man, and with HaShem, ourselves.

-
Notes:
1. On the "Lo Tasur" protection for a Shofet, see the difference between Sanhedrin 89, which I cited here, and the Sifri to the same pasuk.

2. I adopted Rashi's view on the origin of the Mishkan/Beit haMikdash, as a make-up for the Golden Calf. However, even with Ramban's view that there was always to be a central site, the firstborn were originally to do that work, so that a greater cross-section of the nation would have been represented, and that changed with the Eigel.

3. I am going out on a limb with my description, at the end, of the messianic period as a time when intentional sin will be more or less eliminated. This is actually not clear at all.