Beyond the Rule of Passion: Naso

Beyond the Rule of Passion:  Naso

D’var Torah by Rabbi Boaz D. Heilman

This week’s Torah portion, Naso (Num. 4:21—7:89), bursts the bubble of perfection that last week’s portion, B’midbar, envisioned for us.

It may be unfair and we can protest all we want, but it’s an inescapable fact that, despite all the beautiful visions and prophecies in the Bible, life just isn’t perfect.

Nature’s whims and caprices, even the earth’s instability, are only the setting for the real drama that takes place on life’s stage.  We are the players, and it is human emotions that transport us and which evoke both laughter and tears. 

Unpredictable and volatile, our emotions bind us one to another, but just as quickly they can turn into dangerous and divisive passions. 

The Midrash teaches that “love and hate disrupt the natural order.”  The presumption behind this teaching is that were it not for these emotions, life would follow some “natural order.”  Perhaps so, but we will never know.  Human beings, arguably more than any other living creature, are ruled by our passions.  That is our natural order.  Perhaps what the rabbis meant is that all too often we allow our emotions to get out of hand, causing needless chaos and destruction.

The story of this week’s portion, Naso, begins where B’midbar leaves off.  The Israelites are encamped around the Tabernacle, each with his and her own place, each with his and her own unique function and role in the upkeep and maintenance of the community.

But almost immediately, we see the cracks of imperfection.  Petty offenses occur, incursions into one another’s property, intentional or unintentional misdemeanors, take place.

Then worse things happen, as feelings intensify and passions erupt.

Love’s fresh bloom has the potential to sour and turn into jealousy.  And faith, unshakeable source of strength for some, can easily become excessive and turn into dangerous zealotry.

These passions, it seems, have bedeviled us since time immemorial, even to our own day.  Stories of jealousy and domestic violence are the stuff of local news, while religious fanaticism underlies brutal global wars and even many of our own internal, social and legal battles.

Recognizing the volatile nature of human emotions and passions, the Torah admonishes us to keep them in check through formal rituals.

One of the most revolting of these rituals is known as the Ordeal of Bitter Waters.  Disgusting, degrading, and even misogynistic, this ritual is theoretically meant to prove the innocence of a woman accused of infidelity by her husband.  In this test, the woman is forced to drink a vile mixture of water, dirt and ashes.  If she is guilty, she will display mysterious—and impossible—physical symptoms.  If, on the other hand, nothing of the sort happens, she is cleared of all charges and is restored to her former place and role.

It may be sickening, but the Ordeal of the Bitter Waters serves to save the woman’s life.  Literally and figuratively, she is taken out of the jealous husband’s hands. The ritual, administered by a dispassionate priest, allows dangerous passions to cool and violent urges to dissipate. 

Religious zealotry—excessive devotion to God—is likewise disruptive to normative social order.  Yet, as we know all too well, it too is a common phenomenon.  Religious wars, crusades and jihads are but some of the examples of unbridled faith. 

Once again, the Torah prescribes rituals intended to keep this human peculiarity under control.  Strict rules are proposed whose purpose is not only to give direction to religious passion, but also to restrain it, to keep it from turning into violence.  Among these, alcohol is forbidden to the Nazirite (the term used to describe this excessively devout individual); so is coming in contact with—and, by extension, causing—death.

The rituals that Naso prescribes are, thankfully, obsolete.  Their role has been replaced by the rule of civil law.  But both ritual and law are only concepts, ideas invented as a counterbalance to violent emotional outbursts.  Once in the throes of our passions, we find it difficult if not impossible to control ourselves.  That’s why the Torah requires external supervision.  The jealous husband is replaced by the court.  So, too, is the Nazirite’s devotion kept in check by the surrounding community, whose critical role it is to maintain a watchful eye on the individual and keep his passion under control.

Love and hate may indeed raise us above the ordinary.  Certainly they define our humanity as distinct from all other forms of life.  However, our easy susceptibility to excessive passions can cause us to disrupt the natural order of things, to wreak mayhem and destruction within our homes and upon our society.  It is only when we recognize the powers that exist above us, beyond our own skins and egos, that we can maintain stability within and around us.

Only when we accomplish this difficult task can the Priestly Blessing, the pinnacle of this portion, become our blessed lot:  “May God bless you and watch over you; may God cause light to shine upon you and be gracious to you; may God’s countenance be lifted up unto you and grant you peace” (Num. 6:24-27). 

Kein y’hi ratzon, may this indeed, be our blessing.

© 2015 by Boaz D. Heilman

To Be Counted Among Them: B'midbar

To Be Counted Among Them

D’var Torah for Parashat B’midbar

It had been a field of green dotted with grey stones, but overnight it turned into a sea of waving red-white-and-blue. 

It’s a tradition now, one that even has a name: “Flags In.”  Right before Memorial Day, hundreds of thousands of American flags are placed at cemeteries where American service men and women are buried.  Since its inception at Arlington National Cemetery in 1948, the tradition has spread throughout the country, lending poignancy to a day that has otherwise become an opportunity for family barbecues and store sales.

I have to admit that these small flags have a powerful effect on me today.  They are silent witness to carnage and destruction, to loss and bereavement.  They mark where the infinite potential of life ended, leaving behind only emptiness and silence.

In response to the countless losses of war and violence, the Hebrew Revival poet Shaul Tchernichovsky wrote, “See O Earth! we have been so wasteful.” Nothing but numbers and ageing memories remain where once life was teeming, where children played and couples embraced, where old men and women sat and reminisced about the past.

Numbers.

Our lives are defined by numbers:  Social Security, bank accounts, passports, drivers’ licenses and so many more.  Full, unbound lives are reduced to something we can put a handle on and define, with a clear beginning, middle and an end.

But is there no more? Are we reduced to numbers, like so many distant stars that reflect completed journeys through the void of space?

The Torah thinks not.

By one of those coincidences that occur every few years, this week’s Torah reading, the first portion in the book of Numbers—known by its Hebrew title B’midbar (“In the Wilderness,” Numbers 1:1—4:20)—falls on the Shabbat of Memorial Day Weekend as well as on the Jewish holiday of Shavuot.  As befitting the English title of this, the fourth book of the Torah, B’midbar contains many lists and numbers.  At God’s command, Moses takes a census of the Israelites, tribe by tribe, faction by faction.  As the lists compound, we see an orderliness that reminds us of the rows and rows of graves of the fallen heroes.

And yet B’midbar is anything but about death.  It’s about life and survival.  It’s about fulfilling duties and responsibilities to community and nation.  For all its seemingly repetitive lists, B’midbar elevates concepts into ideals, reminding us that these long-gone men and women were nothing short of giants, heroes who fought not only against oppression but also against the nothingness, the lack of meaning and purpose that life would be were it not for them.  Their values are reflected in their names, their lives were dedicated to concepts that Judaism sanctifies:  faith, loyalty, generosity, brotherhood. 

The values we pursue and uphold give us our names and elevate us from the minuscule speck that we would otherwise be.

The holiday of Shavuot has several layers of meaning.  In ancient days—before Judaism—it represented the rebirth of springtime.  The wise sages of our people, some 2000 years ago, determined that Shavuot also celebrates the giving of the Torah to the Israelites.  In modern Israel, nothing says summertime to children more than the holiday of Shavuot.  But as the school year draws to its end, celebrations are held at which first grade children receive their own copies of the Torah.  It’s a moment fraught with symbolism.  Even if the children don’t know it yet, they have just participated in the ongoing enactment of receiving Torah, a process begun thousands of years ago in the Wilderness of Sinai, b’midbar Sinai.  Their school year may be ending, but these children have just begun their own journey in the wilderness, Torahs in hand.

The common saying has it that “it’s a jungle out there.”  The metaphor the Torah uses is slightly different.  Rather than a jungle, it’s a wilderness, a desert, out there.  The similarities are obvious, but so are the differences.  The wilderness has no water, little vegetation and only sporadic life.  Yet what the Torah sees in it is its potential.  All it needs is a little rain, a bit of attention and care, and even the desert can bloom.  Overnight, the wilderness can come alive.

To the ancient Rabbis, the Torah is a guidebook to taming the wilderness.  Torah adds meaning and purpose to life, elevating our otherwise futile and even sorrowful existence to something akin to Godliness.  Like the wilderness, embedded deep within each of us is the potential not only of a meaningful life, but also of greatness.

Unlike silent tombstones, the lists enumerated in B’midbar speak not of a dark and silent past, but rather of a bright future teeming with life. This transformation, B’midbar tells us, is not impossible.  It’s possible for each of us to rise, to be more than a mere number, to be counted among the heroes, the remarkable and the extraordinary.

Similarly, the wasteland doesn’t have to remain that.  The hatred, the violence, the endless wars and wastefulness don’t have to be the legacy we leave behind us.  The Torah—God’s gift to humanity—is more than an enumeration of the dead.  One of the terms by which we call the Torah is Eitz Chayim—a tree of life.  The alignment of holidays this weekend serves to remind us that life is not only precarious and short, it is also much too precious.  It contains possibilities that must not be wasted, a promise we can fulfill for ourselves and for our children.

May our deeds transform the wilderness we all too often see around us into a living, fruitful orchard.  May green fields never again be stained with shed drops of red blood.  May peace, gratitude and dignity be the banner we raise high above all our homes, on this Memorial Day, Shabbat and Shavuot, and on all days to the end of time.

Kein y’hi ratzon. May this be God’s will.

© 2015 by Boaz D. Heilman

Holy Math: B'har-B'chukotai

Holy Math:  D’var Torah for Parashat B’har-B’chukotai

By Rabbi Boaz D. Heilman

The Torah loves math.

I’m not only speaking of the Ten Commandments—a number that’s handy and easy to remember.  There are countless instances where the Torah measures and re-measures taxes, people, animals, dry goods, liquids, and even time.

The Torah has a strict unit of measurement, which it calls the “sanctuary weight.”  That’s the standard by which our contributions to the Temple are measured.  You can’t whittle away an inch or an ounce, solid or liquid.  Your contribution is considered holy and so it must be measured by a sacred standard, “sanctuary weight.”

But human beings are only human, and sometimes we try to get away with substandard measures.  Sometimes we give just a bit less than what is expected of us; sometimes we renege on promises.  There are Ponzi schemes and pyramid schemes, cheating on tests, even grade inflation. The most recent addition to our ever-expanding vocabulary of fraudulent behavior is deflategate, also known as “Ballghazi.”

It doesn’t matter that the “sanctuary weight” of game-time footballs is somewhat variable to begin with, a range of anywhere between 12.5 and 13.5 pounds per square inch, or PSI’s.  And it doesn’t matter that the Patriots’ 45-7 win against the Baltimore Colts was so decisive that it’s hard to imagine that underinflating the balls by a couple of PSI’s made any difference at all.  The point is that somewhere there, whether with Tom Brady’s knowledge or not, someone probably tampered with the balls.   Just in case, you know, just to make sure.  Just to stack the odds a tiny bit.  Practically unnoticeably.

Deflategate happened because, unfortunately, in our culture winning is everything.  We tell our children that the real value of the sport is in how you play the game, but reality, we know—and our children soon learn from us—is different.

In our culture, winning is everything.  You win if you have the right car; the largest house; the thickest portfolio of successful stocks; the largest number of followers in the various social media.

That’s why this week’s Torah portion is so perfectly on target.  B’har-B’chukotai (Lev. 25:1—27:34, actually a double portion) restates the rules for us.

By these rules, as it turns out, these common standards by which we measure success do not constitute a valid measurement of our value.  Not before God, at any rate.  As Moses sees it from the top of Mt. Sinai, holiness—by the Sanctuary system of weights and measurements—is not found in the final tally of our possessions.  Holiness is not measured by the number of oxen you bring to the sacrifice; a pinch of salt will suffice if that’s all you can afford, as long as if you bring it with true kavvanah, with true intention and humility.

In the Courts of Heaven, a person’s worth is evaluated by what he or she does, not by who they are or how much they own.

וְכִי יָמוּךְ אָחִיךָ--“And should your brother be bent low,” the text tells us (Lev. 25:25, 39)—we must reach out and help him rise again.  Not merely as an impersonal act of charity, but rather because we recognize in that fallen person a brother, a kinsman, a fellow human being who needs our help.

Dignity toward one another in our varying needs, dignity towards the Earth and its various needs—these constitute the true yardstick by which God measures us.  Dignity is the outer cloak of holiness.

When we look at the countryside from high ontop a mountain, we see it as we cannot when we find ourselves far below the summit.  From his perspective on the top of Mt. Sinai, Moses sees an ideal world that mundane matters often hinder us from seeing.  He sees not a wilderness, but a rich earth giving its food, fruit and wine in such plenty that no one needs to go hungry—not the poor, not the stranger, not even the stray animal. 

At the foot of the mountain, Moses sees a folk made up not of downtrodden refugees from slavery and abuse, but rather a worthy people risen to a state of holiness.

It isn’t an impossible dream.  But achieving it does mean that we must learn to measure ourselves by a different yardstick, by a standard that cannot be inflated or deflated.  Our worth is determined by the Sanctuary Weight—by how much we do for one another, by the respect we show our neighbor, by the dignity with which we treat life and the earth around us.

In the end, we are remembered not by how much money we made in our lifetime, but rather by the amount of kindness we spread around us.  That’s our true worth, both here and in the life hereafter.

That’s the kind of counting the Torah loves best.

© 2015 by Boaz D. Heilman