RABBI ARTHUR SEGAL:JEWISH SPIRITUAL RENEWAL:JEWISH RENEWAL:CHANINA:YOSI:ETHICS

 RABBI ARTHUR SEGAL:JEWISH SPIRITUAL RENEWAL:JEWISH RENEWAL:CHANINA:YOSI:ETHICS

 

 

Jewish Spiritual Renewal:Shabbat 1/17/09:Hebrew College,MA:Torah,Talmud,TaNaK

 

Shalom Chaverim v' Talmidim:

Shavuah Tov!!

 

Three points before we get into this coming Shabbat's Parasha with some TaNaK and Talmud study.

 

1) Mozel Tov to our fellow, newly ordained Rabbi Sue M, and all of our other Renewal Rabbis!!! May you all go forth and arise like lions in the morning to do the will of G!D.

 

2) I was incorrect when I stated that Dylan's song ''Neighborhood Bully'' was not recorded. It was on his Infidel album. This was sent to me by Brian in Canada, along with this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ENZZrYe_rg . Note, that we rabbis always need a gabbai, always learn from our fellows, and never ever must stop learning. I have learned more from those I teach, than from my teachers. And I am echoing words of our Talmudic sages.

 

3) We always have new members joining the class,Baruch ha Shem. We just finished Beresheit, Genesis. You can access every class, by going to the archives at the website at the very bottom of this class. If you have difficulty, then email me at RabbiASegal@aol.com and I will copy and paste every past class to you.

 

OK. We are now into Exodus.

 

As a Spiritual Renewal Rabbi who has been blessed to have traveled, I understand that Yiddish, is not the only Creole language that our people developed in Galut. Ladino, spoken by the Jews of Spain and other Sephardim, is one that immediately comes to mind. But my grandparents, of blessed memory, spoke Yiddish and I remember many phrases they said to me in their moma loshen, mother tongue.

 

'Vosder mentsh tun zihk aleyn volten in kayn tzen sonim nit vintsehn'' and "Got shrtroft, der mentsch is sikh noyken''. The first translates into: ''What a person does to himself, ten enemies wouldn't wish on him'' (the same applies to nations, as history shows few fail from external enemies but usually from internal policies), and the second translates as: '' God punishes, but people take revenge.''

 

Because many in our class at Hebrew College are those getting their Masters degrees in Jewish Education, and because we have many Jewish Educators in this class, the d'var Torah below addresses Jewish Education in the USA today, especially for our children. Tell me how your kids would do on the little quiz I have made part of the D'var...or how you do.

 

While the yetzer ha ra will always be with us, the antidote the Talmud teaches is Torah and Talmud study. [Talmud Bavli Tractate Kiddushin 30b]. (The word antidote is a mistranslation of tahvlin. Torah is actually a spice, or better still, a condiment, to the yetzer ha ra. Judaism knows we cannot kill our evil inclination, and God made us this way. Instead we align it with God's will.)

 

Some Talmud: Yerushalmi Tractate Beracoth 9.5 "Our forefather Abraham made his yetzer ha ra good.''

 

When we learn how to behave, and learn how others dealt with real life situations and still managed to stay ethical, we do not get swayed so easily by our evil inclination to take the soft and easy way and to be unjust and unkind in our dealings with others.

 

When one treats us with their yetzer ha ra, e.g. rebuffs our greetings, or doesn't answer an email,  or is jealous of us (covets), we have to respond to these spiritually ill folk with love and kindness. They are separated from God. Rabbi Abraham the son of the Rambam says: ''The Yetzer ha Tov is the intellect. The yetzer ha ra is one's animal desires.'' Just as we do not hate a puppy who doesn't know any better and urinates on the rug, we cannot let ourselves get angry with folks whose ego, their yetzer ha ra, has them marking their territory, as well.

 

So what part of Jewish religious school did Bernie Madoff miss? At what point did Mr. Madoff let his yetzer ha ra make-off with his ethical compass and stop treating his fellows the way he would wish to be treated?

 

Some Torah: Gen 6:11: "The earth was corrupt before God, and the earth became full of robbery." We are discussing  Noah's time, before the flood.

 

Some Talmud: Talmud Bavli Tractate Sanhedrin 108a : ''Their sentence was not sealed except for theft.'' In other words, of all the evil things men and women were doing, from kinky sex with themselves and animals, God flooded them because of stealing.

 

Some Midrash: Midrash Rabbah Genesis 38:6: Even when the folks built the Tower of Babel to be like God, God didn't kill them. He just sent them away in different directions speaking different languages. Why? They worked in harmony to build the Tower! "The Generation of the Flood who were robbers and there was strife between them, and therefore they were destroyed." But not those building the Tower.

 

Some more Torah (ah, it won't hurt you): Genesis 13:7: ''And there was strife between the herdsmen of Abram's livestock and the herdsmen of Lot's livestock.'' So what were they fighting about?

 

Some more Midrash: Midrash (Rabbah Genesis 41:5): '' Lot's herdsmen pastured their animals in fields belonging to others, Abraham's herdsmen kept their cattle muzzled, and rebuked their counterparts for committing robbery...''

 

Four out of the Ten Commandments deal with honesty: Stealing, lying under oath, coveting, and adultery.

 

Some Talmud:Bavli Tractate Pirkei Avot 4:2: Rabbi Ben Azzai said, "One mitzvah leads to another and  one transgression induces another transgression." Can you think if your Synagogue ignores a basic precept, and then expects people to follow other precepts?

 

Some TaNaK: Psalms 24:3-4, "Who will ascend upon God's mountain and who will stand in His holy place?  He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who has not taken My name in vain and has not sworn deceitfully." If we as Jews stuck by this rule today, would our bimahs [pulpits] be empty?

 

Some more TaNaK :(Isaiah 58:2-11): "Daily they pretend to seek Me, desiring knowledge of My ways . . . 'Why have we fasted and You did not see?' they ask. 'We have afflicted our soul and You do not know?' Behold, on the day of your fast you pursue your affairs, and from all your debtors you forcibly exact payment. Behold, for quarrel and strife you fast, and to strike with a fist of wickedness..."

 "Loosen the fetters of wickedness, untie the bands of perverseness, send the oppressed free, and break every oppressive yoke. Offer your bread to the hungry, bring the wandering poor into your home. When you see someone naked, clothe him . . . Then you shall call and God shall answer, you shall cry and He shall say, 'Here I am.' . . . God will always guide you and satiate your soul with radiance..."

 

Now would not that be great if this is how we all spent Yom Kippur day?

 

Some more Talmud: Bavli Tractate Pirkei Avot 2:12: ''Rabbi Yosi  said 'The money of your fellow should be as precious to you as your own; prepare yourself to study Torah…'" If we truly understand what he is teaching one has to learn to respect and love his fellow, before he can truly approach God and Torah.

 

Some more Talmud: Bavli Tractate  Avodah Zarah 18a: Circa 135 CE Rome forbid the study of any of our texts. 300 years before the Greeks forbid the study of the Chumash, so Jews studied the books of Prophets which is how the Haftarah developed (Those teaching that it developed in Roman times are incorrect.).

 

Rabbi Chanina is going to teach anyway, and  is captured in the middle of a Torah lecture and burned alive. He was wrapped in a wet Torah to prolong his death and he said joyously he could see the letters ''dance of the scroll to heaven.''

 

But a few days before, he asked Rabbi Yosi : "Will I be deserving of a portion in the World to Come?"

 

Now listen carefully to  what this brilliant sage listed as an answer when Yosi asked him if he had done anything of special merit in his life.

 

Chanina said  he once had two bags  of money—one for charity, and the other for his obligations. He  accidentally gave his money bag to the charity. He could have reimbursed himself from the other bag. But rather than put his hand into the bag of money for the needy, he gave the second bag for charity too.

"In that case," answers Rabbi Yosi, "may my portion be like your portion; my lot like your lot."  Of all the deeds Chanina did: Talmud scholar and teacher, putting his life at stake for Judaism, his honesty with public charity funds was the deed to guarantee him entrance to Olam Ha Ba.

 

Some more Talmud: Bavli Tractate Talmud, Shabbat 31a: Rabbah says that when a soul goes to heaven, the very first question he is asked is: "Did you conduct your business honestly?"

 

Some Talmud: Bavli Beracoth Tractate 17a-b: "May you see your world in your life, and may your end be for the world to come and your hope for many generations. May your heart deliberate over understanding, may your mouth speak wisdoms and may your tongue bring forth song. May your eyelids make you look straight before you, may your eyes be enlightened with the light of Torah and may your face glow like the brightness of the sky. May your lips express knowledge and your insides rejoice in uprightness, and may your steps hasten to hear the words of the Ancient of Days, the Almighty."

 

This prayer was said for millennia to Jewish students as they left Hebrew school. May we again see Jewish Religious Schools go from two hours a week to  a minimum of six. May we teach the joy of being Jewish. May we teach the joy of the gift of Shabbat. May we take our children with us to Shabbat day services and make clear that we find it unacceptable and unJewish to have doors locked and bolted on our Sabbath at our Temples. We do not demand that others worship on Shabbat.  But we can no long tolerate others dictating to those of us who wish to worship on Shabbat and telling us that we and our children cannot.   May we teach Jewish ethics to our children. And may our children learn well, and teach their parents what they are taught. Amen.

 

As usual a D'var Torah for the Parasha for Shabbat 1/17/09 follows.

Many blessings, Shalom, and Shavuah Tov!!

Rabbi Arthur Segal
Hebrew College, Newton Centre, MA, USA
Via Shamash Org on-line class service
Jewish Renewal
Jewish Spiritual Renewal
Hilton Head Island, SC;Bluffton, SC, Savannah, GA

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