By Rabbi Abraham Unger, Ph.D.
Executive Director
This Week’s Torah Portion
The Choices We Make
I always wondered why Judaism never exploded in terms of number of adherents. Why hasn’t this great intellectual and spiritual tradition ever attracted more than a handful of subscribers? On the other hand, Judaism has also inspired great loyalty over the course of an epic history. It’s the only faith in all of Western civilization that has survived from antiquity. All other peoples from the Biblical period have disappeared from the world stage. For example, are there still any Nabateans or Phoenicians? They faded millennia ago. Only the Children of Israel remain.
Judaism is not a clear and simple tradition to unpack. But one unequivocal dimension of it explains the quandary outlined above – that Judaism maintains a small population yet remains ever historically present. Rather than focus on doctrine, the Torah’s path is to look at nuance and context, sustaining an ever-flowing Halakhah, body of law, around which one can exercise their uniquely individual talents to infuse with meaning according to their own propensity. For example, one person may observe Shabbat with great song, and another with deep analytical study, but there is no uniform creedal approach. All of a person’s being is brought to the Sabbath table. It was the master Rabbinic theologian Rabbi Dr. Joseph Soloveitchik who articulated that ultimately Judaism is a humanistic religion, because it centers on how to realize each of our potentials. G-d is omniscient; He knows all and is known to us as the Creator. The purpose of His Torah is to inspire our own creativity.
This week’s parsha emphasizes how we choose to elicit our best selves. Rabbi Herschel Schachter, one of Yeshiva University’s two major contemporary Poskim (judges of Jewish law), states that ultimately, the most important aspect of our freedom of choice indicated by the opening verse of this Shabbat’s Biblical reading is a sense of yirah, awe. We need to dive into our own souls to draw out wonder at the universe, and turn that awe into a life that realizes each of our dreams.
This is not an easy message to convey to billions of people. It is hard work to live a life of Mitzvot, commandedness, and it is an hour by hour exercise in self-improvement. But, once accepted as a way of being, it is just as hard to give up as it may be to accept. Once involved, how could anyone ever let go of such a deeply enriching approach to the daily revelation of being alive? The Torah is a tree of life to those who cling to her, just as the prayer states on Shabbat morning after we finish reading the parsha. And so the Jewish people too cling to her, not because we have to, but because it is unimaginable to experience the sacred without her.
Weekly Parenting Message from the Parsha
Following the Rules
The title of this week’s parenting message conjures up drudgery. In the realm of parenting, though we must have rules in our homes, does being an obedient servant of policies and procedures really represent our strongest hopes for our children? Of course not. Learning to live within structure is just a prerequisite for functioning in the world, but it is not the ultimate goal.
Judaism has a unique take on this aspect of child rearing. This Shabbat’s Torah reading voices a fascinating question. Does a person gain more reward for observing a Mitzvah, a command, that they are obligated by, or for doing a Mitzvah, in the sense of a good deed, that they volunteer to do? It turns out that the required act earns more reward than the one performed voluntarily. How could this be? Aren’t we supposed to teach our children to go the extra mile?
Of course we want our daughters and sons to go above and beyond the letter of the law in contributing to our world. But, in training them, it is vital to teach that before we each do as we see fit, even towards the good, we must share in a common practice to sustain civility and respect.
Without that foundation in a reciprocally-based society of basic standards of conduct, it is hard to move toward a more refined sense of how to make a personal, voluntary contribution. Yes, rules really matter, not as the ceiling, but as the floor in making a better world.