The donkey is saying, "Yours, G-d, is the greatness, and the might,
and the splendor, and the victory, and the glory, for everything in the Heavens
and earth [is Yours]; Yours, G-d, is the kingship, and the exaltation over
all." (Chronicles I, 29:11)
Rabbi Yochanan the son of Berokah would say: Whoever desecrates the Divine Name covertly, is
punished in public. Regarding the desecration of the Name, the malicious and
the merely negligent are one and the same.
Hod shebeHod (glory and gratefulness within the context of glory and gratefulness)
We now arrive at week thirty-three of
the Jewish calendar, the week of Pesach
Sheini and Lag Ba’Omer. As
explained earlier, Lag Ba’Omer is a
day of great celebration, because it was then that the students of Rabbi Akiva
stopped perishing. On Lag Ba’Omer, we
also celebrate the yahrzeit of the
great tzadik, Yesod ha'Olam (foundation of the world), Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai.
It is customary to light a bonfire in his honor, representing the great light
that he brought to the world through his teachings of Kabbalah.
This week, in Perek Shirah, the donkey proclaims: “Yours, O Lord, are the
greatness, and the might, and the glory, and the victory, and the majesty, for
all that is in the heavens and on the earth [is Yours]; Yours is the kingdom
and [You are He] Who is exalted over everything as the Leader.” (1 Chronicles
29:11) King David recited this verse when he was at the height of his glory,
reiterating that everything is from Hashem:
glory and kingship, the Heavens and the earth.
This is the week of hod (acknowledgement) in the Counting of
the Omer, and therefore it is quite
appropriate that the song of the donkey so gracefully acknowledge that
everything comes from G-d. The song of the donkey contains all seven emotional sefirot: gedulah is a reference to chesed;
then comes gevurah, tiferet, netzach, and hod; hakol is a reference to yesod; and mamlachah, a reference to malchut.
Pesach Sheni
is the yahrzeit of Rabbi Meir, one of
the greatest Torah scholars of all time. This week also includes the yahrzeit of the great Rabbi Yehuda Bar
Ilai. All three men, Rabbi Shimon, Rabbi Meir and Rabbi Yehudah, were disciples
of Rabbi Akiva. The Zohar (the main text of Kabbalah, written by Rabbi Shimon
Bar Yochai) tells us that during this week the Gates of Heaven are wide open.
Rabbi Chanan Morrison, based on the
teachings of the Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak Kook, helps us better understand the
importance of the donkey. Donkeys are considered extremely impure. They have
both signs of not being kosher – they do not chew their cud and do not have
uncloven hooves. The Zohar teaches that the donkey is so impure that is
considered an avi avot hatumah, a
great source of impurity (as mentioned previously in Week 12, Kabbalah and
Chassidism have the power to elevate even the most impure animals).
Despite being extremely impure, the
donkey has a mitzvah that no other
non-kosher animal has: "Every firstborn donkey must be redeemed with a
lamb."[1] The Talmud, in the tractate of Bechorot
(5B), explains that the reason why the donkey has this special mitzvah is because it was instrumental
in helping the Jews transport the treasures they had received in Egypt.
However, there is also a deeper meaning here: the donkey represents the
treasure to be found within each one of us.
The word for donkey in Hebrew, chamor, comes from the word chomer, matter, physicality. In the
messianic age, physicality will be merged with spirituality.[2]
According to the prophecy of Zachariah, Moshiach will arrive on a donkey!
According to Rav Kook, the Messiah's
donkey represents the period of Ikveta
d’Mashicha, the time when the “steps” (ikvot)
of messianic redemption begins to be heard. Ikvot
also comes from the word ekev, which
means heel or sole of the foot¸ the roughest and most insensitive part of the
body. The era of Ikveta d’Mashicha is
one of great spiritual decline, full of chutzpah,
deceit, immorality and corruption. However, the Zohar writes that despite their
external faults, the generation of this time will be good on the inside. This
inner good will be reflected in the special souls of the pre-messianic era.
Despite the gloom weighing on their behaviors and beliefs, they will be blessed
with an innate holiness, as expressed in their great love for the Jewish people
and for the Land of Israel.
The Ikveta d’Mashicha is to be a difficult period, and not all Torah
scholars were eager to go through the experience. However, Rav Yosef showed
great spiritual strength in saying: "May the Messiah come, and may I have
the merit to sit in the shadow of his donkey’s dung."[3]
Rav Yosef was accustomed to look at the inner essence of things. He recognized
the holiness hidden in this special generation, symbolized by the Messiah’s
donkey. Perhaps the above is also the deeper
meaning for the statement: "If the earlier generations were like angels,
we are like humans. But if they were like humans, we are like donkeys."[4]
Rabbi Moshe Wolfsohn explains that
recognizing inner holiness was also the power of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai
himself. It is no coincidence that hundreds of thousands of Jews of all
backgrounds and levels of religiosity flock to his grave on Lag Ba’Omer. Rabbi Shimon was not only
able to understand the deep meaning of the mystical side of the Torah, but he
also knew of the enormous value hidden inside every Jew. Just as each of the
600,000 letters of the Torah are special, and essential to a scroll’s validity,
so too is each of the 600,000 souls of the Jewish people holy and an essential
part of the Jewish people as a whole. If only one letter in a Torah is missing,
even if it seems to be the most insignificant one, that Torah is considered
invalid and cannot be read in the synagogue. The same goes for the Jewish
people and every soul that is part of it. Without even a single soul, even the
lowest of the low, we are not complete.
At this level of thinking, one can
understand that no one is above anyone else. This understanding is exactly what
was lacking to the 24,000 (12,000 pairs) of students of Rabbi Akiva who died
during the Counting of the Omer. In a pair, one of the partners
might think he is superior to the other in understanding, and come to think
that he need not show respect to the other. On the contrary, his partner should
show him respect. Rabbi Shimon Bar
Yochai came into the world to fix this way of thinking.
When one looks at others while
focusing on their inner essence, their soul, whose source is the same for all –
G-d – there is no room for difference. On this level, we all truly equal, all
siblings, children of one Father. This is the primary lesson taught by the
Alter Rebbe in chapter 32 (lev,
heart) of the Tanya; the Alter Rebbe explains that that this is the secret of
how to love your neighbor as yourself. It was Rabbi Akiva who stated that to
love your neighbor as yourself is the great general principle of the Torah.
It is also worth noting that while
Rabbi Akiva’s deep love for his fellow might have always existed in potential,
in the beginning of his life however, he expressed the exact opposite emotion.
The Talmud quotes Rabbi Akiva, who states that before became learned, he hated
the sages so much that he wanted to bite them like a donkey. His students ask
why he did not want to bite them like a dog. Unlike a dog, Rabbi Akiva says, a
donkey’s bite can break the bone. The Hebrew word for bone is etzem, which also means essence. Perhaps
herein lies the secret to Rabbi Akiva’s teachings, which is connected to Rabbi
Shimon Bar Yochai’s path mentioned above: Rabbi Akiva was able to transform
tremendous hatred into the greatest love by focusing on people’s essence.[5]
The number thirty-three is the number
associated with Lag Ba’Omer and Rabbi
Shimon Bar Yochai. The combination of the Hebrew letters lamed and gimmel spell Lag, but also form the word gal, which means to reveal. One of the
Rebbe’s best known ma’amarim on Lag Ba'Omer is entitled “Gal Einai v'Abita Niflaot miToratecha,”
a verse in Psalm 119.
The lesson of this week’s Pirkei Avot is the teaching of Rabbi
Yochanan the son of Berokah, who states: one who profanes the Name of Heaven in
secret, will be punished in public. Either inadvertently or intentionally, it
is all the same when it comes to the desecration of the Name (IV:4). This
teaching appears related to Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, who sanctified the name of
Hashem in secret and then publicly
revealed his greatness. Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai spent twelve years in a cave
studying Torah with his son. After this long period, he left the cave and
spread his teachings to the rest of the Jewish world. (Rabbi Shimon’s
additional teaching in Week 43 found along with that of Rabbi Yehudah Bar Ilai,
in which Rabbi Shimon praises the importance of the “crown of a good name:”
Having a “good name” means being a good example and thereby publicly
sanctifying the name of G-d.)
This week’s sefirot combination is hod
shebehod, just as Lag Ba’Omer
itself. It is a week of tremendous revelation of divine glory. In the yearly
count, Lag Ba’Omer is hod shebehod shebehod.
A lesson in self-improvement that we
can learn from the song of the donkey is that everything comes from G-d, both
what we perceive as bad and also what we perceive as good. Thus, as explained
in the previous week, we must not only direct ourselves to Him when we are in
trouble, but also thank Him in moments of glory.
[1]Exodus 13:13
[2] One of the Baal Shem
Tov's teachings: "When you see chamor,
a donkey" (Sh'mot 23:5) - when you carefully examine your chomer
("materiality"), your body, you will see... ..."your enemy" - meaning,
that your chomer hates your Divine soul that longs for G-dliness and the
spiritual, and furthermore, you will see that it is......"lying under its burden" placed upon it - (the body)
by G-d, namely, that it should become refined through Torah and mitzvot; but
the body is lazy to fulfill them. It may then occur to you that......"you will refrain from helping
it" - to enable it to fulfill its mission, and instead you will
follow the path of mortification of the flesh to break down the body's crass
materiality. However, not in this approach will the light of Torah reside.
Rather... ..."you must aid
it" - purify the body, refine it, but do not break it by
mortification.
There
was indeed a method of subordinating the body through afflicting it with
ascetic practices, but the Baal Shem Tov rejected this path. He saw the body
not as an obstacle to the spirit, something intrinsically evil and unG-dly,
but as a potential vehicle for the spiritual, a means for the soul to attain
heights otherwise inaccessible. The "enemy" is to be transformed into
an ally, an instrument. In great measure the Mitzvot employ gross physical
matter to fulfill G-d's will, e.g. leather for tefillin thongs, wool
for tzitzit, etc.
|
[3] Sanhedrin 98b
[4] Talmud, Shabbat 112b
[5] Talmud, Pesachim 49b
No comments:
Post a Comment