From your own lot...

B”H

The second posuk in this weeks Torah portion tells us exactly what kind of sacrifices we were able to bring to the Hashem. To be more specific, of all of the kosher animals, we’re allowed to bring just three: the ox, the goat and the sheep.

Recently I went through a little personal challenge that really resonated with me when I learned about the deeper meaning of this posuk. Without going into too many details, which are not so important, G-d handed me a challenge to help me appreciate myself more, where I am and where am I going … but I had to go a little bit out of the way to learn this lesson.

I always wonder why it is that people, myself included, crave that what we can’t have…

A common and silly example is girls with curly hair yearning for straight hair and girls with straight hair hoping for curly hair... Or in more complicated situations... people saying if only I was born to this and this family... if only I grew up there... if only I had this thing or that opportunity... THEN life would be perfect...

Just like the above examples, I myself wasn’t completely content with where I was. I was yearning for something else, something a little bit different. An opportunity presented itself that seemed to fill what I was looking for… and I perused it…

As soon as I arrived, I realized that something was off... Something wasn’t right... It just didn’t sit well with me being in the place that I thought was good for me... or at least that I thought would be a better fit for where I was in life. I kept trying to make it work however, and the harder I tried the more I saw that I just needed to go back “home.”

It’s funny, now that I’ve had time to reflect on the situation. Sometimes you really have to go outside of yourself to know who you are and where you belong. But the more I think about it, the more I realize that everything in life is for a reason. You can’t be where you are, and not appreciate it fully, so sometimes stepping outside of the situation that is best for you is what brings you back to the place you belong.

Who knows us better then G-d? After all, He created us; He put us into the world at this specific time and in a specific place… He made sure that everything around us the way it was supposed to be for us to reach our greatest potential and our greatest heights. And then He gave us the challenges to let us get there, because in order to be a part of the project, we have to put in some work as well.

Yet in the middle of the challenge, it’s often times hard to see how this challenge is exactly what you NEED at that point and time… It’s also hard to see that you have the tools to overcome it and its even harder to not blame it on the circumstances around you. If only this was different... if only I was in a different place... if only… then everything would be okay.

There is a story in the Gemura about a man named Eliezer ben Jordaya. He was a great rasha, a very wicket person. One of his biggest weaknesses was women, and he visited every prostitute in the land. One day as he was leaving the chambers of one of the prostitutes, she said that, “there would not be any teshuvah (repentance) for him.”

Her statement really struck a cord with Eliezer and he didn’t want her statement to be true. So he ran to the wilderness where he sat on a hill and asked the sun and the moon for help in his repentance, but the sun and the moon answered that they could not help him... then Eliezer turned to the hills and the valleys, and asked them for help, but they also could not help him... this went on until Eliezer realized that there was no where to turn but to himself. So he put his head in-between his legs and cried deeply from within for forgiveness…

At that point and time his soul expired. The greatest sage of the time commented on Eliezer’s repentance stating that Eliezer was able to achieve in one hour, that which the great sage has been trying to achieve his whole life.

Commentaries on this story point out that Eliezer wasn’t doing real teshuvah at first. By pointing to the sun and the moon, he was actually saying: if my environment and the place where I grew up were different then I could have been better… Similarly the hills and valleys represented his parents; if only I had a different family Eliezer said, then I would have been a better person. However, this also didn’t work. It was only when he looked deep inside and took ownership of his situation, agreeing that he could have made different choices given his circumstances that he was forgiven.

I sometimes get this image of the Jewish people as a whole… We are one body yet every single one of us has a specific task that we have to accomplish. Imagine a body, made up of million and millions of cells. Each cell has within the DNA, the code to do the work of every other cell, but for some reason each was placed in a certain location that maximized its work there.. The liver cells making up the liver cleansing the body, the brain cells making up the brain and the skin cells holding it all together. Yet one day, the liver cells decided that the brain had a much more important job, a cooler task. So they left the liver and went to try to be a brain… They had the DNA after all, they were able to do it… but they were fashioned to be the liver, so they weren’t as productive as before when they were doing the actual task at hand, and the body began to deteriorate.

As time went on, the liver cells say how much they were going outside of their nature, outside of them selves to do the work of the brain, and they understood that something was out of place… yes it may seen cooler to be a brain, but without a liver the brain can’t go very far itself..

Similarly each Jew is put into his specific situation and given a specific task to complete. And G-d, knowing this about us, when we can’t always see it clearly, gave us hints to act on it… By seeing where we come from, who we are, what are our talents and what are our challenges we get a much better picture of what we are needed for in this world… We can analyze and ask ourselves, am I the liver or am I the brain.

But this often times seems like a lot of work. And its often times hard… So we want to run away, go somewhere else, where it looks easier… and this is why it’s called a sacrifice. The ox, the goat and the sheep represent the domestic animals, the animals we already have in our backyard… People often times want to serve G-d from exotic places, extreme places, to far outside of themselves. But that’s not what G-d wants. G-d wants you to serve Him with what he gave you. To make sacrifices from your own lot.. To be the best you that you can be and overcome the challenges He gave you, not run out looking for your own.

I once read a daily dose from Rabbi Tzvi Freeman that said that which you are good at, you owe to the world, but that which you are challenged by, you owe to yourself… And I’m very lucky to have been given an opportunity to see this. I was experiencing a personal challenge and my first reaction was to run away from it… but when I really looked at what was going on, I realized that all I need to do was come back and put in a bit of work to really appreciate who I am, where I am and where I’m going… In the end, your own personal challenges are only there to help you grow…

A Chiar Can’t Stand on One Leg…

What does it mean to be a true leader? Does it mean to be better then everyone else around you at the task at hand? Maybe it means to be exceptionally intellectual, understanding the intricacies and details of the project in front of you? Or maybe it just requires that one is bigger and stronger then everyone around him and can push his way to the top?

In this weeks Torah portion, we learn that being a leader doesn’t involve any of the above qualifications at all. After being taken out of Egypt by the hand of Hashem, with Moshe as their righteous leader, the Jews none the less decided to build a golden calf. In a way, their intentions were some what understandable. Moshe told them that he would be back in forty days, and due to miscalculations they were slightly off. They didn’t want to replace Hashem, rather they wanted a new Moshe, a new leader that would connect them closer to Hashem, and idols was what they were most familiar with. A golden calf sounded like a logistically acceptable option.

So as Moshe is getting the tablets from Hashem on mount Sinai, the Jewish people are in the camp building and dancing with, rejoicing at their new god the golden calf. Hashem tells Moshe that you’re people aren’t doing so well down there, go and see what’s happening. When Moshe comes down, he see’s what the Jewish people have gotten themselves into and he walks into the middle of the camp, and breaks the tablets right in front of the people. The Gemara shows that Moshe was highly praised by Hashem for this act. “From where do we know that the Holy One, Blessed is He, agreed with him? And Reish Lakish goes on to explain that Hashem tells Moshe “ishar koach sheshebarta” Your strength shall be true, because you broke the Tablets!”

But one second, why is Hashem praising Moshe? These are the tablets made by G-d Himself. G-d’s marriage contract to the Jewish people, and Moshe has the hutzpah to take it into his own hands and break them? Even more so, to break them right in front of the people, couldn’t this set a bad example for the people? After all, G-d was Moshe’s Boss, and if Moshe defies the Holy One in such a way, does it mean that everyone else could do the same also?

One of the answers given is that when G-d made the tablets, they were so much of Himself that they only contained in the written Torah, the message directly from Hashem. But Hashem didn’t really want the Jewish people to only get the written Torah, rather He wanted them to get the oral Torah as well. If we only received the written Torah, then we would just be doing things because we were told to, in a makif surrounding type of way, but it wouldn’t penetrate us inside and we wouldn’t do things by choice. The oral Torah on the other hand, which came with the second set of tablets which Moshe carved out, gives us an opportunity to really get close to the commandments, to intellectually and emotionally internalize them. To struggle over trying to figure out what they mean to every individual. The Torah then becomes personal and meaningful to each and every Jew. Therefore Moshe acted on G-d’s accord and for this he is rewarded.

But this still doesn’t make so much sense. The Rebbe points out that if G-d really wanted to give us a way to internally connect to the Torah, then He could have done it with the first set. So is there a deeper reason? After breaking the Tablets Moshe went back to mount Sinai to plead for Hashem’s mercy on behalf of the Jewish people. At this point Hashem is pretty upset. Hashem tells Moshe, look at these people… they’re no good, let me just start over, I’ll wipe them out and I’ll start from you Moshe. After all, Moshe was on the mountain the whole time the people were making the calf; he had no part at all in this sin. He was completely in the clear. But Moshe was not so okay with this idea. And he replied to Hashem by stating, that if a chair on three legs is shaky, how much more so would a chair on one leg fall over? In other words the Jewish people came from three forefathers, Abraham, Isaac and Yakov and they made the calf, and if you rebuild the nation from just me, of coarse it would not be as strong. And with this statement, Hashem agreed.

This example, show’s much more so, why Moshe was praised by Hashem for breaking the tablets. When Moshe came down from the mountain, he really was holding the words of Hashem. Similarly, he was in the clear, being on the mountain and having no participation what so ever in the sin. Yet as he came down, he saw what the Jewish people were doing. And He knew that the contract he was holding in his hands between the Jewish people and Hashem would make the act of the Jews much more liable to punishment. Yet if he could walk into the middle of the camp, acknowledge that what the people were doing was wrong and then startle them, shake them up, show them their unjust path. But also to join them.

Moshe had no clue what would happened to him if he broke the tablets. They were made by G-d and he was sent to deliver them. Yet he chose to decrease the severity of the punishment on the people, allowing for himself to be open to G-d’s wrath. And this is what G-d was proud of Moshe for. G-d was proud that Moshe was a true leader. One that was willing to stand up for his people, to make himself vulnerable to protect his people. Moshe had immense self sacrifice on behalf of his people. When the Rebbe told this over at a farbrengen in crown height, tears rolled down his face. Being a leader doesn’t mean being the best, the brightest or the strongest, but rather it means being there for the people you are leading. Being a leader means being willing to sacrifice your own status and your own needs to help the people around you. For this you don’t even have to be in charge of a big operation or company, rather you can apply this to every aspect of your life, how you treat your family, your friends and others around you, because after all, you are the leader of your life.