Parashat Re’eih 5770

What A Sight!

In the teaser to get us to watch the reruns of Grey’s Anatomy, we hear Meredith Grey pleading to her former lover, “So pick me, choose me, love me.”  All that she desires is for someone to recognize her for who she is, a woman worthy of being embraced and cherished for the blessings that she can offer to another.  This week’s Torah portion coincides with the announcement of the new, and final month, of the year, Elul, which the sages teach us is an acronym for the phrase, “Ani L’dodi Vi’dodi Li”: “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine.”  It is a phrase that comes to us from the Song of Songs, which is a love poem in humanized form that is a metaphor of the love between God and Israel.  They are the words that a bride often speaks to her groom underneath the chuppah as her vow of love.  In regard to God, Elul is considered by many to be a time of heightened awareness and spirituality in which God is closer to us, and more approachable than at other times of the year.  God sees that we are working on mending our relationships in preparation for the High Holidays.

Re’eih speaks to us about the value of “seeing” in our tradition.  Three times a year we are instructed to appear before God (Deuteronomy 16:16).  When someone says to me, “It is good to see you!” I often respond with the words, “Glad to be seen!”  “To be seen,” from my own experiences, makes the interaction between people something that goes beyond the personal, private, and introspective.  I have often wondered how personable it is to tweet and to text, or even e-mail another and call it a communication.  Information may be conveyed, but the emotional element needs to be inferred.

When God commands us to come to Jerusalem for the three pilgrimage festivals, it is because this is what God sees as beneficial to the Divine relationship that exists between the Spirit and the human world.  Being seen by others reminds them and us that we are a part of a community that shares in a certain destiny.  It reminds us that we are indeed responsible not only for our own behavior and actions, but also we are responsible for more than just ourselves.  Doing gemilut chesed is an integral part of our commitment to this world.  Opening our hands to the needy when we see that it is necessary to do so is just one way in which we fulfill the mitzvah, the obligation of feeding the hungry and clothing the naked.  What we overlook by our absence when we do not show up at the synagogue for the holidays, outside of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, is that God needs to see us as much as we need to see God as a spiritual community.

Another value that is of similar importance was introduced to us a couple of weeks ago, “Sh’ma – listen, pay attention.”  Is “seeing” the same as “hearing”?  If not, what is the difference between them?  Is one greater than the other?  At times we are commanded to “hear” and at other times we are told to “see” – “Open up your eyes”!  Just as the people who live in Swampscott and Marblehead swear that it is a greater distance to cross the bridge connecting Salem to Beverly, we in Beverly know in reality that it is a far shorter distance to cross that same bridge going from Beverly to Salem.  According to Rabbi Salanter, the founder of the mussar movement of Judaism that focuses on a person’s ethics, “the distance between the mind and the heart is greater than the distance between the sun and the Earth.”  When we think about this statement, what affects us more, an event that we heard about, or an event that we witnessed?

The eyes are the windows to the soul, because they allow the heart to be exposed to the world.  The mind closes us off with our thoughts that often try to hide us from the truth.  When we learn something, it stays in our minds and is useless – until we can move it into our hearts and then act upon it.  I recently read a Talmudic adage that claims that a wise man is one who can foresee the outcome of his actions.  During the Torah reading for this week we are asked by Moses, and by God, to individually “see” what a different world this planet can become when we follow the teachings of the covenant with God.  For example, we are told in Deuteronomy 15:7-19 that “if there is a poor person among you, you should not harden your heart to that person.”  Rather you should give him what he needs based upon what he was accustomed to having, so that he should not suffer an embarrassment of living on less than what he was used to.  More specifically, “you should surely give to him, and you shall not harden your heart when you give to him.”

Why does the Bible say “to him” twice?  According to Rabbi Segal, there are two parts to giving tzedakah – the donor and the recipient.  Many times the one does not know the other.  A prime example was when I was called by the Gift of Life foundation about my willingness to donate my marrow to an individual – if I was considered to be their “best fit.”  After going through a thorough investigation that took two months to receive the needed results, I was told that the recipient was considering another individual for the actual transplant, but was wondering if I would consider remaining in line if my marrow was needed by him.  According to their guidelines, neither the donor nor the recipient knows one another for at least three years.  After that time, the recipient then has the privilege of deciding whether or not to reveal him/herself to the donor.  I find this exercise that had me on edge for several months to be a most humbling experience in regard to “seeing” versus “hearing” and the difference in intensity between them.  While being detached may protect both parties, putting someone at a distance does have its emotional implications.

Another important lesson that I wish to share with you comes from an analysis of the first two words of today’s Torah reading:  “Re-eih ani notein lifneichem…  See (singular) I place before you (plural) blessing and curse.”  According to the sages of the Talmud in Tractate Kedoshim 40a, each person should see the world as if it is half good and half bad, half meritorious and half lacking.  In this way an individual is much more receptive to seeing that he or she can make a difference by doing tzedakah and tilting the entire world toward good.  Even though Moses speaks to us as individuals, and the choice of blessing and curse is up to us as individuals to choose, the fate of the world rests on us as a whole.  Whenever we perform an individual act in which we repair our world – we see the injustice, we feel it in our hearts, and we act upon it – we discover how much we are truly connected in life.

It has been suggested that the single flitter of a butterfly’s wings has a rippling effect on our environment.  When one butterfly is paired with millions of butterflies, the effect on the weather in a different part of the world can be felt most remarkably.  How we choose to act, whether it be a blessing or a curse that is released, can have major consequences for the rest of us.  One selfless act can have a great impact on a person.  It doesn’t have to be something big.  Jewish law says that if you have $100 to give as tzedakkah, it is better to give one dollar to one hundred individuals than to give all of it to one person.  By learning how to give to so many will help an individual to open their heart more easily in the future.

One sage observed that the word for “heart” came before the word for “hand” in the commandment to give to those who are less fortunate than ourselves.  He asked, “Do the poor not benefit from our hands rather than from what is in our hearts?”  The response that is offered to us is that “one should give charity with a smile, so that even if you have nothing to give, you should at least give kind words to the poor.”

As we open our eyes to the world that we inhabit, may we be fortunate to realize the many choices that we face.  Let us not turn from the blessings that await us in this month of Elul, as we prepare ourselves for a new year of health, happiness, and prosperity, seeing others as well as being seen!