It is all
riveting. And according to Prof. Mary McNaughton-Cassill (UT-San Antonio), who
studies the nexus of media and stress, we’re in for far more stress as news
becomes a 24/7 aspect of our lives, reaching us through conventional print and
broadcast media, cable, and social media. Many of us even receive real-time
alerts on our cell phones, which serve to ring alarm bells day and night. Life
appears darker and more foreboding, the world increasingly dangerous and threatening,
in the shadow of a non-stop newsfeed that itself feeds on calamity and
catastrophe. New media outlets compete fiercely for our attention, favoring
sensationalistic, emotionally-wrenching, violence-soaked images and stories to
keep us transfixed. Not a day goes by that I don’t hear or read the words “the world
is imploding” or “the world is going to hell in a
hand-basket” or “things are getting worse and worse” multiple times.
This week’s Torah
portion, Ki Tavo, could lead us to the same sense of doom and gloom, but
the S’fat Emet
(Rabbi Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter of Ger, 1847–1905) finds hope and inspiration in
just two words in parshat Ki Tavo. Moses’ discourse
to the Israelites promises the Israelites fame and fortune if they obey God’s
covenant. On Mt. Ebal, Moses erects an altar and stone monuments coated with
plaster and inscribed with words of Torah to reinforce his point. Then Moses
directs that after the people cross the Jordan River, they are to assemble on
the slopes of Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal to hear the curses that will befall
those who violate the covenant, and the blessings that will come to those who
obey it. And if that’s
not enough, this is followed by the Tokhechah (lit. “rebuke”), a long
list of curses—threats,
really—far longer
than the list of blessings and promises: drought and famine, plague and
pestilence, insanity, servitude, war and decimation. So abysmally negative and frightening are the
images invoked by the words that the Tokhechah is unnerving to read or
hear. Therefore it is traditionally read in synagogue in a hasty undertone. The
Tokhechah sounds this summer’s news. Where in this can we find
hope and inspiration?
Moses
opens the discourse:
הַיּוֹם הַזֶּה, יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ מְצַוְּךָ לַעֲשׂוֹת אֶת-הַחֻקִּים הָאֵלֶּה--וְאֶת-הַמִּשְׁפָּטִים;
וְשָׁמַרְתָּ
וְעָשִׂיתָ אוֹתָם, בְּכָל-לְבָבְךָ
וּבְכָל-נַפְשֶׁךָ.
The
Lord your God commands you this day to observe these laws and rules;
observe them faithfully with all your heart and soul.
The S’fat Emet
focuses on Moses’ emphasis
on “this day.” He reminds us that both midrash and
Rashi explain Torah to be teaching us that, “Each day these [words of Torah]
should be like new in your eyes.” But
why is the sense of newness conditioned by “like”? Why should Torah be “like new,” the S’fat Emet wonders?
Is
something out there trying to fool the person giving him something that isn’t
really new, but is “like new’? God forbid!
It is really within human power to renew each thing. The renewal is there
within everything since God “renews each day, constantly, the work of
Creation.”
“Constantly” means
in each moment. Nothing exists without the divine life-force, and the point in
each thing that comes from God never grows old, since God’s
words are constantly alive and flowing.
It is
precisely because everything comes from God (the divine life-force), which is
continuously “alive and
flowing,” that newness (that, is, possibility) inheres
in every moment and every situation—today and every day. That which is,
is a given, but it does not define
what will always be. The S’fat
Emet is talking about hope and optimism, which many people find so difficult to
hold onto lately.
The world of the S’fat Emet was as fraught as ours, and he well understood the difficulty of maintaining a high level of optimism in the face of overwhelming reality. This he readily acknowledges but hastens to remind us that nonetheless, behind, beneath, and beyond everything is God, the life-force, and therefore the possibility for change is always present. Here is how he expressed it:
The world of the S’fat Emet was as fraught as ours, and he well understood the difficulty of maintaining a high level of optimism in the face of overwhelming reality. This he readily acknowledges but hastens to remind us that nonetheless, behind, beneath, and beyond everything is God, the life-force, and therefore the possibility for change is always present. Here is how he expressed it:
However,
darkness covers the earth (Isaiah 60:2). The outward “shell” hides
that flowing point. Thus Scripture says: There is nothing new under the sun (Ecclesiastes
1:9). That is the natural world that hides the renewal.
This is a
beautiful religious metaphysical ideal. Yet at the same time we cannot fail to
recognize that much of the violence perpetrated around the globe is connected
with religion or a direct outcome of religious beliefs and claims. Voltaire (1694–1778) said, “Those who
can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.” Harvard professor
of psychology Steven Pinker would agree. Raised in a Jewish family, Pinker “converted” to atheism as an adolescent. He is
highly critical of religion and scripture, and argues that religion is not a
force for peace. In his recent treatise, Better Angels of Our Nature: Why
Violence Has Declined, he writes:
The
scriptures present a God who delights in genocide, rape, slavery, and the
execution of nonconformists, and for millennia those writings were used to
rationalize the massacre of infidels, the ownership of women, the beating of
children, dominion over animals, and the persecution of heretics and
homosexuals. Humanitarian reforms such as the elimination of cruel punishment,
the dissemination of empathy-inducing novels, and the abolition of slavery were
met with fierce opposition in their time by ecclesiastical authorities and
their apologists. The elevation of parochial values to the realm of the sacred is
a license to dismiss other people’s
interests, and an imperative to reject the possibility of compromise.
Pinker
argues for optimism and hope. He tells us that our era is less cruel and
violent, and endowed with great peace and cooperation—on the
scale of families, neighborhoods, tribes, and nations—than in
any period in human history. Drawing on academic research from the arenas of
cognitive science, psychology, history, economics, sociology, and archaeology,
Pinker painstakingly argues that our lives are safer and better than any
previous generation, and the trend is continuing thanks to state monopolies on
force, international commercial trade, the expansion of human rights (include
the empowerment of women), and the cultural proliferation of scientific reason—but not
thanks to religion. His optimism renews a sense of hope for a better future,
but his seemingly categorical castigation of religion is troubling.
The S’fat Emet
shows us that Pinker is not necessarily correct. His commentary on “this day” continues:
While the
S’fat Emet
doesn’t point it
out, Torah confirms his view that it is in mitzvot that find the power to
transform possibility into reality, also from this week’s parashah.
הַסְכֵּת וּשְׁמַע,
יִשְׂרָאֵל,
הַיּוֹם הַזֶּה נִהְיֵיתָ לְעָם,
לַיהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ. י וְשָׁמַעְתָּ, בְּקוֹל יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ; וְעָשִׂיתָ אֶת-מִצְוֹתָו וְאֶת-חֻקָּיו, אֲשֶׁר אָנֹכִי
מְצַוְּךָ הַיּוֹם.
Silence!
Hear, O Israel! This day (i.e., today) you have become the people of the
Lord your God: Heed the Lord your God and observe God’s
mitzvot and laws, which I enjoy upon you today. (Deuteronomy 27:9-10)
We are in the month of Elul, a time when we recite Psalm 27, the psalm of repentance, daily through Hoshana Rabbah. Psalm 27 closes with these words:
Yet I have faith that I shall surely see
Adonai’s goodness in the land of the living.
Hope in Adonai.Be strong, take courage, and hope in Adonai.
© Rabbi
Amy Scheinerman
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