Interpretation!

  In Torah study,

  Perhaps you can,

Interpret this way,

 Or interpret that way.

Just please don’t

 Interpret it away!

  ---O---

Envision !

The other evening, at “Moshiach Seudah”, I had the pleasure of hearing words from Rabbi Shalom Mordechai Rubashkin. He was reluctant to offer a public delivery.  Only after his esteemed brother in law, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Rosenfeld, spoke followed by melodies and L'Chaims did he finally open up and closed the holiday with some of the most meaningful words I heard all holiday.

He explained that there are three dimensions in space. There's a line, which is one dimensional. Then there's a plane, which is two dimensional. Finally, there’s a cube, which is three dimensional.

Part of the condition of the “divine state of exile”, and its attendant darkness, is that human minds are also in exile. They experience difficulty seeing beyond their  conditioned limits. This could be compared  a one dimensional being groping to imagine what it's like to live in two dimensions. All he knows is movement along a line, variations on a repetitive back and forth. Imagining side to side movement is very challenging; perhaps a paradigm shift best groped for in academic abstractions. But, it doesn't end there. Then same can be said for a two dimensional being groping to grasp three-dimensional reality. It's just the next level of the exact same struggle.

Then Rabbi Shalom Rubashkin continued his address by recounting some of the conditions under which he observed Passover in prison. He explained that he had matzah, wine and no shortage of bitter herbs. Besides a child to ask the questions, everything technically necessary to properly observe the holiday was present. Yet for all his freedom to celebrate the holiday of freedom, he cannot compare a Passover in prison to one with family and community in Borough Park. The stark contrast can be compared to a one dimensional being going suddenly going two dimensional!

Someone who only had the experience of Passover in prison cannot even begin to imagine what it's like to have it in Borough Park. Similarly, people today are challenged imagining what Passover in Jerusalem will be like after the Messiah arrives. We're like that two dimensional being groping to grasp at the third dimension.

We imagine that what we already have is utterly fantastic, a wow! But, that's only because of how the limitations of exile have conditioned our thinking. However, if we accept that our mental scope of vision has been narrowed by the darkness, then we can begin to open ourselves to seek and yearn for more. Then our capacities to envision will expand, expanding the scope our holy yearnings as well.

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He Seeks, She Seeks, I Seek, You Seek

I was once taught that all the universes, spiritual and earthly, emerge into being because some ultimate cosmic male seeks out his missing cosmic female; that all the universes, with their happenings, are designed to bridge these longing lovers.

But this story is not just about the universes. It is also about me and you.

Deep down, in some intangible space of self, we all seek one ultimate spiritual connection.  Most of us don't even know what it is. It could be too deeply lodged to see. Yet, the whole drama of our lives emerges from this singular seeking.

   

------------------- O -----------------

Pour Out Thy...

At the Passover Seder there’s a traditional prayer which begins with the words, “Pour out Thy wrath upon the nations who do not know You and upon the regimes which do not call out to Your name. For they have consumed [the descendants of] Jacob...”

In recent times there are people who express feelings that this prayer is anachronistic and not properly aligned with progressive humanistic values. However, I think they innocently misunderstand.

The prayer is not talking about “people” at all. A proper reading of the Hebrew demonstrates that it's strictly addressing "political entities". Nations and regimes are “political entities” in the way modern corporations are “legal entities”. Yes, people play roles in corporations, but, they aren't the corporations themselves. The same can be said for nations and regimes.

I don't think that there's a single progressive liberal who would not want to see “political entities”, with terrifying human rights records, dissolve away instantly; hopefully in peace.

         ----------------O-----------------

What Does it Mean to Bless God’s Name?

“There's a divine name for every detail of divine providence. The name is actually the essence of that detail of divine providence. During prayer we bless that name, in order that it should be blessed from the Source - the Infinite One. We direct all of our prayers solely to the Infinite One, [asking] that He should do everything according to His simple will. For its known, [that we pray to Him alone] and not to His divine emanations.”

~ Tal Orot (section 1, chapter 3)

His Hands

Psalm 145 declares, “You open Your hands and willingly satiate all living beings!”

Does God literally have “hands”?

The Medieval Jewish philosophers would say that the Psalmist is expressing himself allegorically; that God behaves with His creatures “as if” He has hands.  

The Kabbalists would say that God “having hands” is not meant as a description of God. Rather, it’s intended in a possessive sense, such as when we say, “His world”. In other words, as God possesses the world, so He possesses a spiritual level called, “Hands”. They are not hands in the sense that we know of (even if they are the spiritual source of our own hands). When God opens His “hands”, humanity bathed in blessings.

These two views do not contradict. In fact, they are entirely complementary.

The philosophers were referring to the essence of God. Regarding this level, nothing descriptive can be said about whom He is. Every possible description of this sort is merely an allegorical “as if”.  

On the other hand, the Kabbalists are not describing God Himself. In fact, they never do. In their coded system of metaphor they are offering a description of a spiritual level, which can as rightfully be considered a “possession” of God.

An interesting surprise emerges. Usually, one would expect the Kabbalists, who are mystics, to be the ones discussing the higher levels of reality.  It turns out that in this case it was the philosophers were talking on a higher level; as the Kabbalists were referring to a spiritual level, while the philosophers were referring to God’s core essence.

---------------------O---------------------

Appetites

Discover your appetites,

  They are your spiritual lights.

Some are already holy,

  Some need dusting to glisten.

Acknowledge your duties,

  They are your earthly vessels.

Thread your appetites,

  Into the sweat of your duties.

You will have inserted,

  Souls into lifeless bodies;

Animating them,

  Each with a spirit of life!  

-------🔥O🔥-------