Gratitude – A Hereditary Trait?

Parshas Ki Seitzei

Posted on September 9, 2024 (5784) By Rabbi Mordechai Kamenetzky | Series: Drasha | Level: Beginner

 

Marriage: The tie that binds. It is the building-block of any nation and the foundation for its growth. Yet Jewish law restricts whom the children of Abraham may marry – even among those who share their own faith. The Torah tells us that neither an Ammonite nor Moabite male may marry into the direct descendants of Abraham.

 

True they may marry other converts, but they can never enter a direct union with descendants of Klal Yisrael.

 

The Torah tells us the reason for this restriction. “On the fact that they (Ammon) did not greet you with bread and water as you left Egypt and for employing (Moab) Bilaam the son of Pe’or to curse you” (Deuteronomy 23:4-5)

 

One must truly wonder: according to the Torah, anyone is allowed to become a Jew. It requires acceptance of the mitzvos and the responsibilities that Judaism entails. Yet the Torah it seems, has great reason to disallow males who descend from the nation of Ammon and Moab from marrying direct descendants of Abraham. Surely it is solely not the refusal of bread and water or the employing of a sorcerer to curse the Jews. After all, the Egyptians enslaved the descendants of Jacob, nevertheless, Egyptian converts may marry Jews – albeit after three generations of waiting. Even converted descendants of our enemy Esau may marry the children of his nemesis brother Yaakov. What then is the inherent evil trait of Ammon and Moab that disallows their union with Abraham?

 

A brilliant young student entered the portals of Yeshiva Torah Voda’ath in the 1940s. Hailing from a distinguished rabbinic family which instilled within him a creative mind, he questioned some of the arcane dormitory rules and restrictions that were imposed with boys of less character in mind.

 

But rules, said the dormitory counselor, are rules and he wanted to have the young student temporarily expelled until he would agree to conform. An expulsion of that sort would have left the young man (who lived out of town) no alternative but to leave the Yeshiva.

 

They brought the matter before the Rosh Yeshiva, Rabbi Yaakov Kamenetzky. “True,” he said, “rules are rules, but I owe this young man something.” The dorm counselor looked stunned.

 

“In the 1800s this boy’s great-grandfather helped establish the kollel (fellowship program for married Torah scholars) at which I would study some decades later. I owe his family a debt of gratitude. If the rules disallow his stay in the dormitory, then he will sleep in my home.”

 

An essential trait of the Jewish people is gratitude. The children of Avraham are instilled with it, whether it be gratitude to Hashem or his mortal messengers. However, it seems that Ammon and Moab have no sense of gratitude. Their forebear was Lot, Avraham’s nephew who raised Lot and was saved by him during a vicious war. Avraham taught Lot the spirit of hospitality and helped establish him in life. Yet Lot’s children, Ammon, and Moab, showed no gratitude. In fact, they were eager to destroy Avraham’s children – both physically and spiritually. There can be no fusion of those two traits.

 

We can handle enemies. When an Edomite or Egyptian accepts the faith, he can become a true partner in every aspect that bonds Jews – even marriage. But in the harmony of the Jewish family, in the building the future of our nation, there is no room for ingrates.

 

Moabite women however, are exempt from the ban. It seems that they had no control over the decisions. How interesting it is to note that the Moabite convert, Ruth, the woman who showed tremendous gratitude toward her mother-in-law was the precedent-setting example that lifted the ban on Moabite-women converts.

 

Those actions of gratitude and understanding ultimately led to the birth of King David the forebear of Moshiach.

 

Life Between the Cracks

Parshas Ki Seitzei

Posted on August 24, 2018 (5778) By Torah.org | Series: Lifeline | Level: Beginner

 

I was about 15 years old when I lost a Siddur (prayer book) on a backpacking trip near the summit of New Hampshire’s Mt. Washington, the highest peak in the Northeastern United States. It must have fallen out of my pocket at a pit-stop along the hike. After my return to New York, I had no dreams of seeing that Siddur again. Besides, it didn’t have much sentimental value to me, so it wasn’t a great loss.

 

Sometime later, maybe a few months, I received a manila envelope in the mail addressed to me, and inside I was shocked to find my Siddur. The short handwritten note inside explained that the finder was hiking along the Mt. Washington trail and found this little book between the rocks with my address in it, and they thought I would want it back. This random kindness from a complete stranger left a strong impression on my 15-year-old mind, and of course I wrote back a grateful reply.

 

The return of another’s property, even the smallest thing, can bring them so much joy.

 

It’s a Mitzva to return lost items, as detailed in this week’s Torah portion (Deut 22:1-3). From a careful reading of the verse — “VaHaSheivosa Lo” – “and you should return it to him” — the Talmud (Sanhedrin 63a) extends this commandment to healing others, returning their health and ability to live.

 

If this Mitzva applies to physical objects and physical wellbeing, then it surely applies to restoring a spiritual loss. As much as we value the things we own and our health, our greatest value is our spiritual life. We derive so much meaning from our relationships with others, and our relationship with G-d. Just like my prayer book, so many souls have fallen between the rocks. How many have become lost in the endless pursuit of the perfect house, the perfect job, the perfect car, and the perfect restaurant? People may not be in touch with the reality, but there is so much joy to be found in a spiritual experience, and a spiritual relationship with the source of all life and meaning, our Al-mighty Creator. (Based on Tiferes Shimshon)

 

“Lo Suchal L’Hisalem” – “We can’t hide and ignore (Deut 22:3)” what’s being lost in our culture of indulgence and diversion. True love to our friends and family, and even complete strangers, is expressed when we introduce them to a prayer, a Mitzva, and an inspiring or novel Torah thought.

 

 

Doctors and Pilots

Parshas Shoftim

Posted on August 9, 2026 (5786) By Rabbi Naftali Reich | Series: Legacy | Level: Beginner

 

Seeing is believing. Most of us are natural skeptics, and it is difficult to convince us of something we have not seen with our own eyes. And even then, we are apt to have lingering doubts.

 

Indeed, we take pride in our skepticism, because we know it protects us from all sorts of fraud and deception. We are nobody’s fools.

 

In this week’s portion, however, the Torah goes directly against this tendency. The Torah exhorts us not to deviate one whit from the words of our Sages, neither to the right nor to the left. What does this mean? The Talmud explains that even if they tell us that our right hand is our left and our left is our right we are to follow them with implicit faith. Of course, our Sages would obviously never tell us something that is patently ridiculous. Rather, the left and rights hands are a metaphor for something that is seemingly erroneous according to our perceptions.

 

Nonetheless, we are required to follow their lead rather than our own judgment. The Torah demands that we have faith.

 

How do we understand this requirement to have faith? Why does the Torah demand of us to go against our natural instincts? Why should we follow blindly rather than take a stand as independent thinkers and demand explanations?

 

If we pause to consider, however, we will discover that faith forms an integral part of our everyday lives. In fact, without faith we would be practically immobilized. When we get into our cars, we do not worry that our brakes may be defective and will suddenly fail when we are traveling at high speeds. Why? Because we have faith in the manufacturers. When we get on a plane, we do not worry that the pilot is incompetent or drunk. Why? Because we have faith in the pilot. When we go to doctors, we generally accept what they tell us. Why? Because we have faith in our doctors.

 

Without faith, we would be afraid to switch on the lights or put food into our mouths or believe a word anyone tells us. Clearly, Hashem created us with the innate ability to have faith. Why then, if we so easily have faith in our doctors and pilots, do we find it so difficult to have faith in Hashem even when we believe in His existence? Why do we find it so hard to accept all His deeds and commands without question?

 

The answer lies in our egotism. Doctors and pilots are there to serve us. Accepting them in good faith may result in physical restrictions, but it does not require us to surrender our personal independence in any way. We are still in control of our destinies. They advise. We make the decisions. Such faith comes easily.

Faith in Hashem is an altogether different matter. If we forfeit the right to question His deeds and commands, we acknowledge that we are subservient to Him. We surrender our independence, and that is a very difficult thing to do. But still, we must. For if we believe in Hashem yet refuse to give Him our faith and trust, we would be living a lie.

 

Therefore, the Torah exhorts us again and again to have faith in Hashem, to overcome the stiff, illogical resistance of egotism and submit to His higher intelligence. Certainly, He is at least as deserving of our good faith as our doctors and pilots.

 

After attending the yeshivah of a great sage for several years, a young student suddenly declared himself an atheist and announced that he was leaving. Naturally, this came as great shock to the other students and the faculty, and they begged him to consult the sage before he left.

 

The sage nodded gravely as he listened to the young man.

 

“I agree that if you are an atheist this is not the place for you,” he said. “But tell me, what made you become an atheist?”

 

“It is because I have lost my faith,” the young man replied.

 

“Indeed? And why did you lose your faith?”

 

“Because I have questions.”

 

The sage smiled sadly. “No, my young friend, you do not have questions. You have answers. You have decided that you want to live a certain lifestyle, and in order to do so you have to be an atheist. Now that you’ve come up with this answer, you have found questions to support your foregone conclusion.”

 

In our own lives, we experience the egotistical resistance to faith in our children, who find it hard to admit that their parents may be right but would willingly accept the same statements from others. The difference is simple. When we acknowledge the wisdom of parents, we pay a high price for personal independence. Similarly, we pay a high price when we acknowledge the awesome might and wisdom of the Master of the Universe. But if we overcome our stubborn egotism and acknowledge the obvious truth, we will find that the rewards of faith are well worth the price we pay for them.

 

Text Copyright © 2010 by Rabbi Naftali Reich and Torah.org.

Rabbi Reich is on the faculty of the Ohr Somayach Tanenbaum Education Center.

 

 

 

Needs and Desires

Parshas Reeh

Posted on August 27, 2024 (5784) By Rabbi Mordechai Kamenetzky | Series: Drasha | Level: Beginner

 

When I stand in line in a pizza shop or bagel store, I anticipate the counter fellow asking me, “So what do you need?” That’s because I often answer, “bread and water.” Then I smile and add, “that’s what I need. Now I’ll tell you what I want.” Of course I go on to order a potpourri of unneeded calories, that are comfortably arranged on a staple of Western man dough. To some of us those toppings are the deep insight to the verse in this week’s portion, “Man does not live by bread alone” (Deuteronomy 8:3). Of course, as thinking Jews, we know the verse does not refer to bread or pizza garnishing. The suffix of the verse contains the important message “rather by everything that emanates from the mouth of G-d does man live” (ibid).

 

By all means, this week’s portion tells us to keep life in perspective what we want, what we need and an attitude we must ingest and ultimately exude in the way we live our lives.

 

But the truth is the Torah seems a bit contradictory. It tells us, “He afflicted you and let you hunger, then He fed you the manna that you did not know, nor did your forefathers know, in order to make you know that not by bread alone does man live, rather by everything that emanates from the mouth of G-d does man live.”

 

Did Hashem not sustain us with a physical form of sustenance? Hashem did not say, ” Do not worry; survive without bread;” rather he sent us a form, albeit a miraculous form, of bread. So, if eventually we need bread, and it does sustain us, how is He telling us that man does not live by bread alone?

 

A well-known therapist in the New York Metropolitan area received a phone call late one night.

 

“Doctor.’ the frantic voice on the other end of the phone pleaded. “I must make an appointment for my six-year-old son. He is in desperate need of a therapist.”

 

“And what makes you think he needs a psychologist?”

 

“Well, his mother and I are separated. During the week, our son stays by his mother. On the weekends he is with me.” The man continued. “Well, we just began this arrangement. Tonight as his mother was about to put him to bed, he began to wail. ‘I want to go back to Daddy!'”

 

“She tried unsuccessfully to convince him to go to bed and finally gave up. She got him dressed and drove him across town to my place.

 

“How did that work out?” asked the doctor.

 

“Well,” continued the father, he came to my place. Everything was fine until he was about to go to bed. Then my son began to cry incessantly. ‘I want to go back to Mommy!’ This time I had to drive him, and then…” The doctor listened a few more moments and then he interjected, “I don’t know if your son needs a therapist, but he definitely needs parents!”

 

The Torah is telling us a very special message. Of course, we need bread to sustain us. We must use the world’s physical resources to aid in our sustenance. But there is a message sent when in the evening we have nothing and the next morning we have manna. The message is that the physical sustenance we need be it agricultural nutrition, medicinal remedies, or a boost in business is all Heavenly ordained.

 

Hashem afflicted us and starved us. Then he gave us food that was totally measured, meted, and doled by His Divine hand. That daily ritual became a metaphor for eternity. Physical amenities are the very source of physical existence. But the source of that sustenance may never be overlooked. Man needs bread. That is the way of the world. But just don’t forget our G-d who sends it. We may need therapists. But don’t forget the parents!

 

Good Shabbos!

 

 

The Love Test

Parshas Reeh

Posted on August 7, 2023 (5783) By Rabbi Naftali Reich | Series: Legacy | Level: Beginner

 

He is everything you would expect a prophet to be. He has a flowing white beard and eyes that glitter with fire. He is wise and learned, and he seems to have supernatural powers. And he claims to be the bearer of an important prophetic message. But there is one problem. His message runs contrary to the dictates of the Torah.

 

How are we supposed to deal with such a person? The answer appears in this week’s Torah portion. “If there should arise in your midst a prophet or a dreamer of dreams who will show you a sign or an omen, and if the sign or the omen should materialize as he spoke to you, saying, ‘Let us follow other gods whom you do not know, and let us worship them,’ you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer of dreams, for G-d your Lord is testing you to determine if you still love G-d your Lord with all your heart and all your soul.”

 

Why did Hashem allow this false prophet to display “signs and omens”? In order, the Torah explains, “to test us, to determine if we still love Him with all our hearts and souls.”

 

Two questions immediately come to mind: If anything, such a scenario would seem to be a test of our faith or our fear of Heaven. Why does the Torah consider it a test of our love, of all things? Furthermore, what is the purpose of testing our love? Surely, the Creator knows whether or not we love Him. A test of faith would present us with a choice, an exercise of our free will, just like any other commandment in the Torah, but a test of love only determines a fact – which is already known to Him.

 

The solution to this puzzle can be found earlier in the Torah when Bilaam attempts to curse the Jewish people. “But G-d, your Lord, did not want to listen to Bilaam,” the Torah tells us. “And G-d your Lord transformed the curse into a blessing, because G-d your Lord loves you.” Why did He find it necessary to transform the curse into a blessing? Why wasn’t it sufficient to nullify the curse and render it impotent and harmless?

 

The answer, explain the commentators, lies in the next phrase, “Because G-d your Lord loves you.” Such is the power of love! A person who loves cannot bear to hear anything negative about the object of his love. His beloved is pure and good and beautiful, a paragon of virtue and grace. Because of His love for the Jewish people, Hashem found the very sound of Bilaam’s curse abhorrent, even if defanged and rendered harmless. Only by transforming the curse into a blessing was His love fulfilled and satisfied.

 

Similarly, when we are confronted with a false prophet who attempts to tear us away from our beloved Creator, the Torah tells us, “You shall not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer of dreams.” We must turn a deaf ear to him. It is not enough to ignore, reject or disdain his words. That only shows good intellectual judgment, not passionate love. We must place our hands over our ears and blot out those terrible words from our earshot, from our very consciousness. We must show that the love burning in our hearts makes us wince and cringe at each blasphemous syllable, that we cannot bear to listen.

 

“I am having serious problems with my wife,” a man told a great sage. “We bicker. That wonderful feeling we had when we first married is gone.”

 

“Indeed?” said the sage. “I’m not surprised. You see, I’ve heard she was unfaithful to you.”

 

“What!” screamed the man. “That cannot be! She is a fine, loyal woman. My wife would never do such a thing. Take those words back right now! How can you say such a terrible thing about my wife? I can’t even begin to tell you what a wonderful person she is.”

 

“Fine, I take them back,” said the sage. “But if she is such a wonderful person, perhaps your problems are not serious after all. Eh?”

 

Sometimes, when the pristine love in our hearts is buried under the rubble of everyday life, the shock of hearing our beloved maligned will reawaken the dormant love and fan its embers into a flame once again.

 

Unfortunately, the same can happen to our love for the Creator. Therefore, in order to revive our love, He sends false prophets who speak dreadful, blasphemous words. And if there is still some love in our hearts, we clap our hands over our ears, unable to listen.

 

In our own lives as well, the ubiquitous blandishments of contemporary society whisper in our ears and lure us away from a faithful Jewish life. But if we allow ourselves to be scandalized, if we to turn a deaf ear to the modern false prophets and embrace our own ideals and values, we will undoubtedly feel a new surge of love for our Creator, a love that will blossom forth and suffuse “all our hearts and all our souls.”

 

Text Copyright © 2006 by Rabbi Naftali Reich and Torah.org.

Rabbi Reich is on the faculty of the Ohr Somayach Tanebaum Education Center.

 

 

 

Important Life Decisions

Parshas Eikev

Posted on August 23, 2024 (5784) By Rabbi Label Lam | Series: Dvar Torah | Level: Beginner

 

(V’Haya) And it will be, if you hearken to My commandments that I command you this day to love HASHEM, your G-d, and to serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul… (Devarim 11:13)

 

The Talmud tells us that the expression “V’Haya” introduces a matter of SIMCHA, something to rejoice about, anticipation of good news. On the reverse side the Talmud posits the notion that, “VaYehi” is a foreboding, a warning that storm clouds are on the horizon, trouble is coming.

 

The Vilna Gaon explains why grammatically this makes sense. “Yehi” – “will be” is future tense.

 

The letter VUV at the beginning reverses the tense from future to past, “and it was”. The explanation is that there are some matters in life that are on the calendar, sitting there in the future like a dentist appointment, a court date, any invasive medical procedure and we wish it was over. The anticipation of it and the experience itself is so distressing that we would like it to be history. So, there it is, in the future tense, hauntingly present and we are looking forward to the time when it will have passed already.

 

“Haya” – “it was” is past tense and with a VUV in the beginning it is converted to the future, “and it will be”. There are other types of experiences in life that are so pleasant and dear to us that long after they are over, we wish we could carry them forever into the future. That is why people hire photographers and videographers to a wedding or a Bar Mitzvah or any other happy occasion, so that we can bottle and hold on to some part of that delightful experience. That is why we don’t hire a photographer to memorialize a root canal. We wish we could forget the extreme discomfort of one while the other we desire to cherish in perpetuity.

 

Now, these are not just two ways of describing the situations and circumstances of our lives.

 

They are really two choices and two distinct ways of living our lives. Stephen Covey explains something in his classic time management model that I have found this to be helpful and wonderfully true. It is possible to put everything we do into one of four categories.

 

1) Matters that are Important and Urgent: This can include all predicaments that suddenly rush to the head of the priority line, like medical emergencies, crises in personal relationships, notification of utilities being shut off, and anything else that must be taken care of immediately.

 

2) Matters that are Important but not Urgent: This involves studying Torah, exercising, paying bills, spending quality time with those near and dear and anything that, even though it is not pressing and necessary to be done right now, remains a positive and productive habit of doing, and builds and creates a life of accomplishment.

 

3) Matters Not important but Urgent: This is perhaps more common than we think. It may be prompted by getting a phone call in the middle of dinner, only to find out it’s a telemarketer.

 

Life is filled with and a day is often punctuated by untimely interruptions from people and things that add little import or value to our lives.

 

4) Matters not Important and not Urgent: How much time is spent or lost on silly games and mindless videos and in incessant prattle that only leave us feeling empty in the end, like eating a giant glob of cotton candy or drinking zero soda.

 

In which of these four is it most worthwhile to invest the time of our lives? I think every healthy minded individual can agree that number two is the place to be. The more time that is spent in three and four on matters not important, the more one is inviting the experience of number one where suddenly the important things become emergencies – “Vayehi”.

 

How does one decide what is important? Begin with the end in mind, The last act is the first thought! That is how HASHEM made the world and that is how we shape our priorities. We imagine how we would like to be ultimately thought of and then that informs the values and actions we engage in when living our life.

 

It’s been said, “Some people make things happen, some watch things happen, and some ask “What happened?”” “V’Haya” is the happier way of making important life decisions.