Insights and Inspiration
from the
Holy Land
from
Rabbi Ephraim Schwartz
"Your friend in Karmiel"
October 23rd 2020 -Volume
11 Issue 2 5th Cheshvan 5781
Parshat Noach
I'm Not a Hamburger
Ne' ila was over.
The service we were attending that year (about 15 years ago) in Atlanta Georgia
where we were going to be staying for Sukkos, was inspiring. Rabbi Feldman gave
inspiring sermons. The chazzan davened beautifully. But now it was over. The
shofar blasted. We were forgiven. Let's daven Mariv and eat. As the chazzan got
up to start the evening prayer, Rabbi Feldman approached the pulpit and announced
that nobody was to leave the shul after Mariv until he did. The chazzan then
began barchu es hashem ha'mevorach and maariv began.
Now usually Mariv after 25
hours of fasting with the smell of the fresh bagels, coffee- did I need a coffee-and
fresh cakes, is hard to concentrate for. But now with the Rabbi's mysterious
announcement fuggedaboutit. The final kaddish was over. We said amen and
silence reigned. All eyes were on the Rabbi and he very very slowly walked up
to the pulpit and once again merely said "No one should leave the shul,
until I leave". Our stomachs were rumbling, the tension and hunger
were overwhelming. The Rabbi then walked down the steps from the podium and
made his way step-pause-step-pause, you know like how they teach you to walk
down by your graduation, or chuppa, and stopped by every pew and said one
sentence.
"I am not an
animal- I am a human being".
He repeated it pew by pew as everyone got in
line behind him calmly exiting the shul slowly and patiently repeating after
the Rabbi.
"I am not an
animal- I am a human being".
There was none of the
traditional pushing and shoving by the break-fast. We all got our bagels, our
orange juice, our cake and even our coffee, graciously allowing other people to
pass us in line. It was very goyish…J. But it was one of the
greatest exercises I have ever experienced. Animals push and shove. Animals are
dominated by their urges. We humans with the spirit of Hashem are not like
them.
I don't know if that lesson would've taken
hold any other time of the year. Food-particularly free food, Kiddush, Bris-es,
and wedding smorgasbord bring out the animal in us. We are trained from a young
age when they throw pekelach at the chasan in shul by an aufruf
that we need to do whatever it takes to get the most candy. The polite, shy kid
will only get wrappers. The last one in the yeshiva dining room will only get
the end pieces of the kokosh cake and the bottom of the chulent pot.
We'll miss the clearance sales items in the supermarket and we'll lose the
parking space. It's a dog eat dog world out there we're told and the assumption
is only the pit-bulls will survive.
Now we out-of towners
always knew that about New Yahkers, and we Americans always knew that about
Israelis. We understood that they were living in pressure cookers and are in
survival mode all the time. But we were different. It doesn't seem that way so
much anymore. Everyone seems to be losing their patience more often. People are
saying things and talking in ways that have never been acceptable. I hear lots
of animals barking, screeching, pushing, bullying, silencing. It feels like the
world is becoming more and more like a zoo. Everybody wants whatever they want,
no one can tell me no. We have rights, and don't try to take away my dog-food.
I'm not sure Rabbi Feldman's sentence long lecture would've worked today. But
right after Yom Kippur when we really truly understood and appreciated how holy
we all are, when we all felt that divine spark shining brightly within us, at
that moment we all knew we were not animals. We were humans created in the
image of Hashem. And we knew it as did Noach right after the flood.
Welcome to Parshas Noach,
every animal lovers favorite parsha. Not only those of you that have pets or
want one, or those of you that like going to the zoo or feed cats or pigeons in
the park- can you stop feeding the ones on my block. But even those good carnivores like myself
that like their animals between two pieces of rye with pickles, onions, guldens
mustard, preferably corned or smoked. See one of the main problems of the original
world Hashem put into motion is that until after the flood nobody ever had a
real flayshig chulent. Mankind was vegetarian. In fact, strangely enough, it
was the first thing Hashem said to Adam and Chava after he blessed them that
they should be fruitful and multiply. Take a look.
Bereishis (1:28-29) Hashem said, “See, I give you every
seed-bearing plant that is upon all the earth, and every tree that has
seed-bearing fruit; they shall be yours for food. And to all the animals on
land, to all the birds of the sky, and to everything that creeps on earth, in
which there is the breath of life, [I give] all the green plants for food.” And
it was so.
Rashi notes that this is a commandment-one that
even precedes not eating from the Tree of knowledge!- that equates man and
animal.
And to every beast of the
earth — The Torah places cattle and beasts on an equal level with them with
regard to food, and did not permit Adam to kill any creature and eat its flesh,
but all alike were to eat herbs. But when the era of the “Sons of Noach” began
He permitted them to eat meat…
There is something
troubling and jarring about these verses once you come to think about it. Here
we have Adam and Chava who are the pinnacle of creation and who Hashem has just
told should be fruitful and multiply and rule over all of the animals of the
earth and conquer it, and the next statement is and here's what's for dinner.
Oh and by the way you're sitting on the same table as the goats, pigs, cows and
hyena. Are we humans or are we animals? Why are they sitting on my table? This
is obviously very very important, as this is literally the first thing Hashem
tells us. We need to know this. What does this mean and why did it change?
In case you think that the
what's-on-the-menu-for-mankind thing is just a hungry Rabbi's musings reading
and projecting into the text his rumbling stomach, we find the same exact
conversation with Noach right after he comes out of the Ark and brings his
sacrifices. Hashem blesses Noach that he should be fruitful and multiply and
rule over the animal kingdom, as he did to Adam.He then continues right after
and tells him the new improved flayshig menu he will be permitted to have.
Bereishis (9:1-3) Hashem blessed Noah and his
sons, and said to them, “Be fertile and increase, and fill the earth. The
fear and the dread of you shall be upon all the beasts of the earth and upon
all the birds of the sky—everything with which the earth is astir—and upon all
the fish of the sea; they are given into your hand. Every creature that lives
shall be yours to eat; as with the green grasses, I give you all these.
Don’t get me wrong here, I'm a big fan of food and
of knowing what's on the menu, but yet it seems that this has supreme
significance to Hashem, for once again what we will be eating precedes even the
commandment to not murder, and the command to be have children and populate the
world which comes after this. {It's only the blessing to be fruitful that
precedes this, while the command is three verses after the above pesukim.}
Why is what we eat and who we eat it with so essential that is told to us right
at the get-go of our coming into the world?
The answer, suggests the
Lubavitcher Rebbi in a fascinating sicha, is to teach us precisely the
lesson of Rabbi Feldman, for it is the essence of what we are and the purpose
of our creation. Hashem created us on the same day as he created the animals
and like them we were formed from earth. We are connected to the earth at our
core and it is on this earth that we are meant to fulfill our role, just as
they are. They are fruitful and multiply as do we. They eat from the foliage of
creation and elevate it in doing so just like we do. Yet we are given a holy
soul, a neshoma, that spark of godliness that is the free will that is the
image of Hashem that they don't have. That free will gives us the ability to
rule over them and elevate the animals of creation as well. We direct creation
as does Hashem. Yet, that power and that unique elevated soul comes with the danger
of us forgetting that we are not the ones that run or create the world. We are
creations. We are not Gods. It is for this reason that right at the start
Hashem defines us as such. We are created with a spiritual role and holy
mission to direct and reveal godliness in all of the world. But we sit at the
same table as the animal kingdom because we are created just like them. We are
human beings with souls, but yet we sit and eat with the animals to remind us
that we are not God.
As I said in my parsha
youtube video last week (my newest feature-see below how to signup) that was
the same function of the tree of knowledge. According to the midrash it was a
tree like any other tree. It was merely symbolic. The plan was that there would
be one tree that Man would not eat from merely to remind him that he wasn't the
baalabus- Master of this world. That we answer to a Higher power that
created us. The snake, of course lied and made it out to be something special.
But it was in fact just a regular fruit tree. Something to remind us that just
as the animal kingdom was created by Hashem and follows his will, we by using
our free choice could overcome our earthy animal-keit and uplift the
world, and never fool ourselves into thinking that we are in charge.
After the failure of that
world of Adam, with the deterioration of mankind to the degree that it even spread
to the animal kingdom, the world and plan expired. Hashem pulled the plug and
let out all the water. The bath was empty and it was time to start again. In
this world though the danger that our spiritual nature and of the soul we
possess fooling us into thinking we were gods was not as dangerous as us
believing that we were merely evolved gorillas. The world knew there was a Higher
power that just destroyed it all. We knew we were playing in Someone else's
sandbox. So maybe we were just mere animals? Maybe we just need to follow our
instincts. Maybe we are "creatures of habit". Maybe we don't have a
soul. No free-will. No purpose. Thus in this new world Hashem changes the
rules. We no longer sit with animals at the table. They are food. We are human
beings. We are not hamburgers.
Why are we not hamburgers?
Because we have a holy soul. Because Hashem created us with a spiritual
mission. Because there is so much we have to do in this world, with this world;
there is so much we have to reveal. We were imprinted with that holy image of Hashem.
The steak and chicken cutlet never were. In fact the animal kingdom is looking
to us to elevate them when we make a bracha on them, when we eat them at our
Shabbos table. When we put them in our chulent.
This past year has been
one long lesson that we are not in control of the world. If a little micro
particle can cripple all of our most
"advanced" civilization for close to a year now, than we really
aren't that advanced and we are clearly not gods. So for many this feeling
brings out the animal. We are seeing that more and more as society deteriorates
before our face. It's happening in the world, but it should never happen to us.
We eat chulent every Shabbos; Flayshig chulent-(an oxymoron). We eat it to
remind us of Rabbi Feldman's message, the Rebbis' teaching, Noach's Adam's and
Hashem's. We are human beings we are not animals. So stop pushing so much to
get another piece of kugel.
Have an awesome Shabbos,
Rabbi Ephraim
Schwartz
RABBI SCHWARTZ’S FAVORITE YIDDISH PROVERB OF THE WEEK
" Ven
di licht iz krum, iz der shoten krum."
When the light is crooked, the shadow is crooked."
RABBI SCHWARTZ'S TOUR GUIDE EXAM QUESTION OF THE WEEK
answer below at end of Email
50)
The train station in Jerusalem is named after:
A. Haim Weizman
B. Yitzhak Ben-Zvi
C. Zalman Shazar
D. Yitzhak Navon
RABBI SCHWARTZ’S COOL VIDEO OF THE WEEK
https://youtu.be/hjIIMZJDVYE - Ashkenazim eating Sefardic Food
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh1BChVM9D4 – I love this Rabbi K new song, just so
amazing to see him singing with his son… beautiful song!
https://youtu.be/bputeFGXEjA – Can't Go through Parshas Noach
without the (not so great) Bill Cosby's funniest skit! From the good old days
https://youtu.be/GYlAjw8sR8o – Ben Shapiro interviews my Buddy
Nissim Black!
https://youtu.be/uk5AzrN3Uz8
– The
Razel Brothers Hoshana Rabba Achas Shoalti by the Kotel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9u2Fia0-oMc
– I confess I never was that into Joey Newcomb- besides the thank you
Hashem thing was getting on my nerves already. But Sruli B has officially
gotten me into him. I love his new album and then got his first one and I'm
really liking this song… Go Joey! Sruli you sold me.
RABBI SCHWARTZ'S PARSHA/ ERETZ YISRAEL CONNECTION OF THE WEEK
Noach– The end of this week's parsha introduces us to Avram (he's still didn't get his extra letter in his name yet-side story- when I made Aliya the guy that gave me my Israeli citizenship papers asked me how I spelled my last name- I told him it was shin vav vav (like a w) alef reish tzadik. He told me that there's no reason for an alef in my last name and took it out. So unlike Avraham that got an extra letter when he came here I lost one…). The Mishna in Avot tells us there were 10 generations from Noach until Avraham and they all angered Hashem and then Avraham came and received reward for all of them. The question obviously asked by many of the commentaries that if all of the generations were bad what reward did they deserve that Avraham getting and why would he get it?
Let's start first with the story of the "Tower of Bavel" the Torah introduces the story with an interesting description
Bereishis (11:2) And as they migrated from the east, they came upon a valley in the land of Shinar and settled there.
Dovid, Naval and
Avigayil- 877 BC-
After the death of Shmuel, Dovid still does
not take over the Kingship. Although he had been anointed by Shmuel to be the
king he understood that his kingship will not begin until Shaul's ends. So
Dovid heads back down to the wilderness of Paran to the southern
Chevron hills and him and his group of jolly men offer protection for the
local shepherds from Carmel . The sheep they were protecting belonged to
a non-gentleman named Naval. A name that translates as disgusting or obnoxious,
which is kind of who he was.
How many vegetarians does it take to eat a cow? A: One if nobody's looking
What did one vegetarian say to the other vegetarian? A: We have to stop meating like this
.Why did the tofu cross the road? A: To prove he wasn't chicken.
A vegetarian has a carrot sticking out of one ear, celery out of the other, and a mushroom up his nose. He goes to the doctor and asks him what's wrong. The doctor tells him, "Well, for one thing, you're not eating right."
I like making jokes about vegetarians...but never about tofu, that's just tasteless.
One day two accountants, who were best friends, were walking together down the street. One was a vegetarian and constantly berated the other for eating meat! After stopping for a hot dog, the vegetarian erupted "Why do you eat meat?, Do you even know what's in that hot dog? You know, you are what you eat!"
The carnivore replied "I am what I
eat, an uncontrollable vicious animal (beating his chest)"
As they stepped off the curb a speeding car
came around the corner and ran the vegetarian over. The carnivore called 911 and
helped his injured friend as best he was able. The injured vegetarian was taken
to emergency at the hospital and rushed into surgery. After a long and
agonizing wait, the doctor finally appeared. He told the uninjured carnivore,
"I have good news, and I have bad news. The good news is that your
friend is going to pull through." "The bad news is that he's going to
be a vegetable for the rest of his life."… As I said terrible jokes…
*********************************
Answer is D – Last question for this exam. It's
an easy one. Everyone who's lives in Yerushalayim knows the name of the station
is named after Yitzchak Navon. The question is do they know who Navon was? OK
so I'll tell you. He was the 5th president of Israel, the first to
be born in Israel and Yerushalayim and the first sefardic one. He died in 2015
when the train project was being worked upon and thus got the name.
So I got the
last question correct and the final tally for this Summer of 2019 is Schwartz
37 correct and 13 wrong giving me a passing score of 74%. However since I have to only answer 45 out
of the 50 question, I can take off five that I got wrong (for arguments sake
let's assume that I would'vve skipped the 5 questions I had no clue about) and
thus it would have 37 right and 8 wrong giving me a score of 82%.
Now this is only the first part of the exam that in fact only counts for 30
points of the total exam. Which would give me 24 points on the Part A of the
exam. The part of the exam which writing a 2 day itinerary for a group
selected, part B, and then choosing one place from the itinerary you have
written and writing a full page describing it is worth 70 points. So technically
if I got that part correct entirely I would've gotten a 94% final grade.
