Isn’t Humbleness Just Low Self-Esteem?
“Moses was a very humble man, more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth.” (Numbers 12:3)
Was Moses, indeed, humble? The man who courageously challenged the mighty Pharaoh the King of Egypt, who led an entire people out of slavery, the man who after seeing the golden calf smashed the very tablets written by the finger of G-d.
Judaism teaches that no character trait is absolutely negative, everything has a role. All we have to do is look at each trait with an open mind and determine its pluses and the minuses. When it comes to pride there is an aspect of it that comes from the godly grandeur of our soul and is therefore, truly humbleness and the source of powerful sacred self esteem. But there is an aspect of pride that comes from our ego which is haughtiness and self destructive; alienating us from our true inner self. This type of pride focuses...
Take a drive up the south side of the Golan Heights, and you will see one of the most incredible vistas in Israel. As the road winds up the side of the Golan cliffs, the panoramic view deep into Syria is overshadowed by the Russian made Syrian Bunkers that bear silent testimony to the near suicidal challenge that faced the Israeli troops who made their way up the mountain under murderous fire in 1967, breaking the stranglehold Syrian guns held over the Israeli towns and villages below.
Up on top of the Heights, as one drives across the open plains, one notices the occasional odd collection of trees that seem to grow in clusters above most of the Syrian positions that controlled the Heights. These trees are no accident; they are part of one of the most incredible stories in modern Israeli history, and bear witness to the fact that one man, in the right place, at the right time, can...
A Love Letter from the Divine
After the miraculous Exodus from Egypt, the Jewish people traveled in the desert for 49 days until they reached Mount Sinai on the 6th day of the Hebrew month of Sivan. There they experienced the ultimate revelation and communion with G-d. They encountered G-d face to face, heard the voice of G-d and received the Torah and its commandments—the mitzvoth.
Whereas, Passover is the birthday of the Jewish people, this holiday, which is referred to as the holiday of Shavuot, can be likened to the Bar Mitzvah of the Jewish people. It is a time to celebrate the Mitzvot—the responsibilities implicit to the loving relationship we enjoy with G-d.
Recently a friend asked me if I would meet with his son, Sam, and help him prepare his Bar Mitzvah speech. I generally don’t teach thirteen-year-olds, but for a friend I made an exception. So I got together with Sam and I began to share with him some...
This week we celebrate the festival of Shavuot, commemorating a moment, some thirty-three hundred years ago, when we all stood together, beneath a wind-swept mountain, deep in the Sinai desert. The power of that moment was that, more than at any other time in our history as a people, we truly became one; one people, experiencing a desire to receive and to share, together.
There is a legend about Moses Mendelssohn, the grandfather of the well-known German composer, who was far from being handsome. Along with a rather short stature, he had a grotesque hunchback.
One day he visited a merchant in Hamburg who had a lovely daughter named Frumtje. Moses fell helplessly in love with her. But Frumtje was repulsed by his misshapen appearance.
When it came time for him to leave, Moses gathered his courage and climbed the stairs to her room to take one last opportunity to speak with her. She was a vision...
Prophecy 101:
Ego is a Non-Prophet Venture
This week we begin to read from the fourth of the five books of Moses. Although this book is referred to in English as the Book of Numbers, in Hebrew it is referred to as Bamidbar because of the opening verse; "And the Lord spoke to Moses in the wilderness (Bamidbar) of Sinai ..."
The Midrash, Jewish Oral Tradition, derives a somewhat puzzling insight from the fact that G-d spoke to Moses in the wilderness :
Unless one makes himself hefker (open and ownerless) like a wilderness he cannot acquire wisdom and Torah. (Bamidbar Rabbah 1:7)
In other words, to be receptive to the revelatory word of G-d you must be like the wilderness completely open and ownerless – in a state of humility and surrender. Moses heard the word of G-d not only in the physical location of the wilderness but also because was he was in a “wilderness” state of mind.
Edging G-d Out
The creative experience...
‘Kakash’: Tank Officer’s course; known as one of the most difficult courses in the Israeli army. Four and a half grueling months of misery deep in the desert, with little or no sleep, at best on or in the tanks, with no showers all week long; just an endless misery of dust, grease, scorching desert sun, and endless tank maneuvers.
The pinnacle of this course, which came all the way at the end, was the ‘Ringo’ maneuver.
After four months of training, each cadet was given a platoon of tanks to command, in deep desert and mountain terrain, with a host of unexpected dilemmas and targets thrown at him one after another.
Designed to test his ability to react and make difficult decisions under intense pressure, it was the tank officer’s ultimate nightmare, and we all knew it was waiting for us at the end of the course. Failing this test meant failing Officer’s course. For me, repeating the entire course...
Bonding or Bondage
Why Serve the Divine?
“For unto Me the children of Israel are servants; they are My servants who I took out of the land of Egypt; I am the Lord G- d.” ~~ Leviticus 25:55
There is an Eastern teaching that proclaims, “Be here and now.” Torah however would say, “Serve G-d here and now.” Indeed, this is the fullest experience of life.
The Kabbalah teaches that G-d wants to be present in the here and now, and our job is to serve G-d in that desire. Therefore, to serve G-d means to infuse each moment with the presence of G-d. In other words, I must always ask myself, “How can I serve G- d right now?”
If right now I am with my friend, spouse or child, I should see this moment as an opportunity to show him/her love and thus serve G-d, who is the source of all love. It’s not my love. I didn’t invent love. I didn’t...
I once met a fellow who was born in Germany, but managed to get out in 1938 in the nick of time. Some people don't think of such a person as a survivor in the same way as someone who survived the death camps, but Shmuel (not his real name) lost his entire family; he was the only one who managed to get out. And after three years in Nazi Germany, he lived on the run for two more years before finally escaping to Cuba. It is a mitzvah to hear such people's stories in order to remember, and I asked him what made him realize it was time to get out, when the rest of his family could not see the writing on the wall.
It was a standard German-Jewish Holocaust story: 'it can't happen here' or 'the Jews have been through this before; we'll get through this as well'.... And to be honest, he wasn't overly concerned when...
“These are the appointed holidays of G-d, holy convocations, which you are to proclaim in their appointed times.” — Lev. 23.4
Henny Youngman, the comedian, once said, "I tried being an atheist, but I gave it up. There were no holidays."
What is a holiday really about? Is it the same as a vacation?
A vacation is a time to vacate, but a holiday is a time to celebrate.
To vacate means to take off, get away from the everyday and clear yourself out from the tensions and challenges of the daily grind. Perhaps you'll suntan on a beach, play golf or catch a good concert.
A holiday, however, is a holy day. It is not an escape from everyday life to paradise. Rather, it is a time to infuse paradise into the everyday. This is the power of celebration. My guess is that the word celebrate connects to the word celestial. And from a Jewish perspective that would make sense, because a Jewish holiday...
Many years ago, when I was in High School, my mother arranged for me to get a ride up to school once a week with one of the teachers who taught there. We lived in Manhattan, and as the Mesivta High School I attended was in Riverdale, having a ride that morning saved me a good hour I would have spent on public transportation. It also meant leaving our apartment at 7:30am instead of 6:30 for which I was understandably grateful.
In retrospect, I am not entirely certain the arrangement was purely practical, as the teacher would regularly engage me in a variety of Torah topics and philosophical and existential questions …
One morning as we were driving up the West Side Highway, a car barreled down an entrance ramp and slammed into the front of our car. After being thrown across the highway, the rebbe managed to get control of the car as the engine puttered off, and we...
