Exodus Magazine - October 2021

#228 | October 2021 • Cheshvan 5782

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October 2021 • Cheshvan 5782

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5 | JEWISH SOUL

The Sabbatical Year

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10

8 | JEWISH THOUGHT

Uncommon Wisdom

This year’s Rosh Hashanah ushered in a Shemittah Year. Since Rosh Hashanah is the “head” (Rosh) of the year, this added dimension, too, must assert itself in each and all the days of the current year.

In a work released shortly before his death, Rabbi Adin Even-Israel Steinsaltz z”l rearticulates many of the ideas that animated him throughout his life.

— From the Rebbe's letters

— by Marina Zilbergerts

6 | MADE YOU THINK

10 | JEWISH THOUGHT

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editorial jewish soul made you think first person jewish thought ask the rabbi our community simchas

Heal the Planet or Help My Community?

Answering the Call

Would anyone imagine that by abandoning our families and communities for the sake of “more universal issues,” we would actually end up with a better planet?

Abraham was not a conventional leader. He did not rule a nation. There was as yet no nation for him to lead. But he was the role model of leadership as Judaism understands it. He took responsibility.

— by Tzvi Freeman

— by Jonathan Sacks

7 | FIRST PERSON

18 | PERSPECTIVES

Once, at 11:00 o’clock at night, a woman visited us. After looking around to make sure no stranger was present, she addressed my husband in hushed tones.

The story of the destruction of the wicked cities, Sodom and Gomorrah, is simple enough: The classical story of corruption and its consequences But is this the entire story?

— from the diary of Rebbetzin Chana Schneerson

— by Simon Jacobson

The Midnight Wedding

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

perspectives marketplace memorials

4 5 6 7 8 12 13 17 18 21 25

Moshiach in Sodom?

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I look around and see a world at war with itself.

It is a war between the body and the soul — not just the body and soul within the individual, but the body and soul of all things, of every experience, of every opportunity, of every art, or every movement, of every aspect of life. The body is the selfish and materialistic aspect. The soul is the altruistic and spiritual aspect. Every thing and every moment has both of these aspects, and for some reason they always seem to be in conflict.

And so the war rages on: In the parliaments, in the boardrooms, in the bedrooms, and in the minds of those who dream of something better.

But though it seems ubiquitous, it didn’t have to be this way.

The peace treaty was delivered over three millennia ago on a little mountain the desert.

Still, the fight continues unabated. The path was revealed and a royal decree issued to tear down the wall between body and soul, but the call was generally ignored. The absolute clarity that could have been is overshadowed by the fogginess that is, like mud in clear water kicked up by centuries of the unnecessary handwringing and mudslinging of the small-minded, the bloodthirsty, and the ignorant. And so this barrier continues to haunt us, and remains the flashpoint from which all conflict emerges and hatred burns. The propagators, the promoters, and all those who benefit by receiving their cut lost sight of the big picture long ago. A world of abundant goodness and wealth is bled dry by the shortsighted greed of those who, if they would only open their minds, would see that they themselves would benefit more from giving.

But we cannot place blame, nor find fault, since they have been effectively trained for their vocations and they’re just doing their jobs. Even they have mostly grown tired of it, but they have gotten used to playing this game and have found effective methods to alleviate the guilt.

At the same time, I see alternative realities

around every corner, waiting for the right moment so they can emerge, waiting for an optimistic soul to be open to the promise, to allow them to brush aside the oppression and injustice. It’s like we’re teetering on the precipice of revolutionary change, yet shrouded in clouds that obscure it.

Why does such obvious potential for immediate goodness and peace coexist alongside such blatant violence and ugliness? Or, perhaps more practically, what am I going to do about it?

Today, more than ever, it is up to each individual to be a revolutionary. Not the flag-waving, guntoting, manifesto-spewing revolutionaries of old (though we can certainly still use a few of those on occasion), but personal revolutionaries who embody transformation in a real way in their own private lives — in their thoughts, in their relationships, in how they live their lives.

The rules of the game seem to dictate that we have to play along or risk getting written out of the script altogether. (Imagine the horror!) So we play it safe by playing along. But the supposedly safe course is no longer guaranteed to provide even the most minimal return on investment.

There is no pot of gold at the end of that road.

Each person has their portion of the world to illuminate. I can’t do this by sitting on the sidelines observing, playing by fake rules written for an extinct and irrelevant reality.

Is the world beautiful or ugly? Is it blessed or damned? Will I tap into the power of the soul, or succumb to the world of the body? Ultimately, that war is over, though it rages on as if it had just begun. The only battle left is the one I create in my own mind, so the revolution begins within my mind as well. I choose which reality is allowed to persist. I no longer need to fight for the beauty that is the harmony of body and soul to persist. I just need to allow the inherent goodness and balance in the world to just be, right there in front of my face, right there where it was all along.

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jewish soul

The Sabbatical Year From the Rebbe's Letters

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his year’s Rosh Hashanah ushered in a Shemitah (Sabbatical) Year. Since Rosh Hashanah is the “head” (Rosh) of the year, as mentioned in the previous letter, this added dimension, too, must assert itself in each and all the days of the current year, including such days which have no direct bearing on the observance of the Shemitah laws (because no agricultural work is then done in any case).

The Shemitah Year is known as the “Shabbos” of the seven-year cycle (or the so-called “Sabbatical Year”). Insofar as work, in particular, is concerned, what Shabbos is in relation to the other days of the week in terms of cessation from work and sanctified rest, the Shemitah year is in relation to the other years, with this difference; On Shabbos all work is prohibited, whereas in the Shemitah year only agricultural work is prohibited, as the Torah declares: “The land shall rest a Shabbos unto G‑d...thy field thou shalt not plant, and thy orchard thou shalt not prune.”

Although the lessons we learn from the Seventh Day and from the Seventh Year are similar in many respects, there is a difference in the main concepts which they stress: Shabbos emphasizes mainly that G‑d is the Creator of the world (“For in six days G‑d made the heaven and the earth” ); the Shemitah Year accentuates mainly the fact that G‑d is the Master of the world, now as at all times. Man must attest by his actions that he “Owns* nothing; but that everything is in the possession of the Master of all.”

In the Seventh Year the owner of a field or orchard renounces his ownership to these properties, in fulfillment of the Torah injunction: “And the (spontaneous produce of the) resting of the land shall be for food unto you (alike with) thy servant and thy maid,” etc. Commenting on this verse, Rashi explains: “G‑d says I have not excluded these from your use or food, rather that you should not act as their proprietor, but everyone shall have equal right to them.

In other words: The Shemitah year emphasizes the concept that although the Creator has given the earth to man, for food and use, he must remember that the real and permanent proprietor is G‑d. The concept that G‑d is the Master of the world with all

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

that is in it, is an idea which a Jew espouses every day of the year and expresses it in actual fact by making a blessing over everything which he uses for “food and use” (to quote Rashi), thereby declaring that G‑d is King of the Universe, Creator of everything, etc.

However, in the year of Shemitah this concept is accentuated with the utmost emphasis, as mentioned above.

And this is one of the most edifying instructions of this year’s Rosh Hashanah: It is not enough to acknowledge that the Supreme Being is the Creator of the universe; it behooves us to remember also what logically follows from this acknowledgment, namely that the Supreme Being is also, and at all times, the Master of the world; and the constant awareness of it must be expressed in terms of the daily conduct throughout the year.

And although the laws of the Seventh Year do not apply outside of the land of Israel, its spiritual content and instruction are applicable everywhere.

The concept that the Supreme Being is the permanent Master of the world with all that is in it, as this concept is expressed during the Seventh Year, finds a most conspicuous

practical application in the matter of Tzedakah, an all-embracing Mitzvah, which requires of every Jew to give away part of his hard-earned money to a poor man who did not toil for it, and to a Torah institution or other institution which cares for the needs of the needy. Comes the Seventh Year and teaches a special concept in the matter of giving Tzedakah: a) A person does not give away his own, but only that which G‑d has temporarily entrusted him as His agent to the poor; b) Through sharing his possessions with others, a person justifies that which he keeps for himself.

Needless to say, the practice of Tzedakah is not limited to money, but includes “money, body and soul,” spiritual Tzedakah, which obligates every Jew to help another Jew who is “poor” in Torah and Mitzvoth. However much a person values his time and efforts to use them for his own Torah edification and the practice of the Mitzvoth, he is told that he must not consider himself as the exclusive proprietor, but must devote of his time and efforts to the dissemination of the Torah and Mitzvoth among those who are “poor and needy” in these matters.

This is also one of the major aspects and resolutions of Yom Kippur, characterized by teshuvah (repentance), prayer and tzedakah (charity), as is also emphasized in the prophetic reading of the day: “This is the fast I choose... share thy bread with the hungry...when you see a naked person, clothe him,” etc. Our Sages explain that in addition to the plain sense of these words, they also mean spiritual Tzedakah: To feed the “hungry” person who is starving for spiritual sustenance, namely Torah, and bedeck with Mitzvahs the one who is “naked” of Mitzvahs.

Then there is the Divine Promise: Asser t’asser, as explained by our Sages of blessed memory, that through giving tithes and Tzedakah, a person will not only not reduce that which he has, but, on the contrary, it will he greatly increased, to the degree of riches. And although the Mitzvoth* in general (including Tzedakah ) must be fulfilled not for the sake of the reward, but because G‑d, the Creator and Master of the world, commanded them, nevertheless G‑d has given the assurance of a generous reward (Asser t’asser), both materially and spiritually. EM

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made you think

Heal

the

Planet

or

Help My Community?

Tzvi Freeman

W

hy is there a conflict? What other way is there to save the planet other than by thinking globally and acting locally? Would anyone imagine that by abandoning our families and communities for the sake of “more universal issues,” we would actually end up with a better planet?

The Torah tells us that G‑d created all His creatures en masse—in flocks, herds, packs, or as numerous scattered individuals. Only man was created singular, one of a kind. The sages of the Talmud find a lesson in this: that every person is an entire world. One person lost is an entire world lost. One person saved is an entire world saved.

Nothing has had a more destructive effect on our world than the reduction of human beings to accumulative numbers. Once a person is a number, a family is an arbitrary set, a community is a superset, and the world becomes a mess of meaningless digits. Once we learn to value one another, to value life, to value living together, only then can we learn to value the planet as a whole.

Almost 450 years ago Rabbi Isaac Luria, “the Ari,” added a whole new depth to the idea of tikkun olam—fixing the world. The idea itself is as old as Adam and Eve, who were placed in the garden “to guard it and to work it”—meaning to take care of it, to be the stewards of planet Earth. The Ari went into detail, explaining how each Torah practice is meant to heal another aspect of the world.

Our souls, he said, did not descend to this world for their own sake—they were perfect to begin with. Rather, they came here to heal a broken world, to put back together the fragments by using each thing for the purpose for which it was created.

And the Torah provides the instructions for completing that puzzle.

This means that every act of kindness, of wisdom and of beauty that you perform has not only a local, but a global effect. As the Baal Shem Tov taught, “All the wars and violence in the world are because there is strife between a husband and wife.” Similarly, Rabbi Chanina taught that studying Torah brings peace to the world.

The cosmos is wired, and we are sitting inside the motherboard. There’s no way to

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estimate how great an impact one random Torah deed can have. Maimonides put it this way: “Every person must see him- or herself as though the entire world is held in the balance, and with one small act the scales can be tipped one way or the other.”

That’s called a sense of responsibility—a global responsibility. But one that starts at home, with what’s best for you and your family. EM

Rabbi Tzvi Freeman, a senior editor at Chabad.org, is the author of Bringing Heaven Down to Earth and more recently Wisdom to Heal the Earth. To subscribe to regular updates of Rabbi Freeman's writing or purchase his books, visit Chabad.org. Follow him on FaceBook @RabbiTzviFreeman.

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

first person

The Midnight Wedding from the diary of Rebbetzin Chana Schneerson

I

recall the following episode of my husband’s life, which happened in 1935.

Once, at 11:00 o’clock at night, a woman visited us. After looking around to make sure no stranger was present, she addressed my husband in hushed tones: “Rabbi, I have come to you from a distant city—its name I won’t tell you. In about an hour, at midnight, my daughter will be coming with a young man. They both hold such important positions that their coming here places them in true danger. After my entreaties and tears, they promised me to agree to a Jewish wedding ceremony, but only if you will officiate; under no circumstances will they do it with anyone else.”

At 12:00 o’clock, the two arrived, the daughter having covered her face so she would not be visible. I immediately led them both into my husband’s office so that no one should notice them.

It was at this point that my husband began his preparations. First, he insisted on having a minyan, without which he would not perform the wedding. Besides my husband and the groom, we needed eight more men who “would see but not be seen,” and trusted, one hundred percent, that they would not later inform on anyone.

Within half an hour, this was accomplished, except for a tenth man, who, as usual, was missing. My husband sent for the building supervisor, who was Jewish and belonged to the young generation. His official duties required him to watch our home to observe whether we had many visitors and whether the Rav was performing religious ceremonies!

As soon as he walked in, my husband said to him, “You need to be the tenth man; otherwise I can’t perform the wedding ceremony.”

Startled, the supervisor gave my husband an astonished look. “Me?!” he asked incredulously. But he immediately went to the window and closed the shutters firmly, locked the door and took a seat.

The final preparations began. I brought out a dark-colored plush tablecloth that was similar to the cover of a chuppah [wedding canopy]. The four tallest men in the minyan acted as poles to hold it up.

After my husband wrote out the ketubah,

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

the groom and bride were called out of their darkened room. They were still fearful of being seen by others, so they didn’t allow candles to be lit.

The bride entered with her face covered, just as when she had first come, and no one saw her face. She was led seven times around the groom. The latter, a tall young man in a leather coat, who looked like a Russian commissar—and perhaps he was of that ilk—did everything he was told, and recited the words “Harei at mekudeshet…” [“You are hereby consecrated…”].

At 1:30 a.m. the groom and bride hurried out of our home.

Among the wedding “guests”—the minyan—were two men who carried Communist party membership cards. They sat down and threw them down on the table.

With unusually warm feeling they declared, “Now, Rabbi, we’re Jews together with you.

We feel that we don’t want to leave you.”

Pointing to their membership cards they said, “When we’re in your presence, these are worthless…!”

I observed such reactions to my husband’s presence from many people.

That same week, a Communist, the chief manager of shipping at the Petrovsky metal factory, arranged a circumcision for his son.

He sent a message to my husband that he was leaving that evening on a business trip, and requested that the bris be held in his absence.

Everything, of course, was taken care of.

The day after the bris, he returned from his trip. He was very wary of some of his neighbors, and upon arriving immediately yelled and berated his wife for allowing such a thing. He shouted at his mother too— making sure his neighbors could hear—that he would bring charges against her, too, in court!

There was a sequel to this: Later, when my husband was exiled, he needed a set of pots, but I couldn’t obtain them for any price.

This Communist ordered them to be cast at his factory, saying they were needed for the factory’s director. When he gave them to me, he told me that when I send them off to my husband, the Rav, I should write that he will never forget my husband, especially the fact that he had rendered his son fully Jewish. EM

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jewish thought

Uncommon Wisdom Marina Zilbergerts

T

his past summer marked the first yahrzeit of Rabbi Adin Even-Israel Steinsaltz z”l (17th of Av, July 26).

Rabbi Steinsaltz was admired throughout the Jewish world on account of his great achievement in democratizing the experience of learning Talmud, bringing it to those who had neither knowledge of Aramaic nor teachers able to initiate them. In providing unprecedented access to Jewish study for anyone who wanted to come and learn, his life’s work represents a revolution whose importance cannot be overstated.

His mission was to make Jewish knowledge accessible to the widest audience and thereby inspire authentic Jewish engagement through learning. By drawing on his wide-ranging fields of knowledge and interest – from academic Jewish studies to fields as variegated as botany, aerospace engineering, archeology, psychology, art, and music – his commentaries connect Torah, broadly speaking, to all the possible facets of life.

In a work released shortly before his death, a new Hebrew commentary on The Ethics of the Fathers (Pirkei Avot), Rabbi Steinsaltz rearticulates many of the ideas that animated him throughout his life. His wide-ranging glosses on the nature of wisdom, intellectual achievement, human relationships, virtue, and government, among other topics, show how Avot explores the problems faced by the individual as a moral agent in a world where knowledge is readily available but wisdom is hard to come by. For Rabbi Steinsaltz, Avot articulates the Sages’ skepticism about intellectual achievement as the path to ethical action, cutting against the grain of contemporary culture. This commentary on Avot is a fitting capstone to his overall oeuvre.

Like Rabbi Steinsaltz’s other works, this volume is both rigorous and simple. The writing is concise and inviting, avoiding jargon in favor of accessibility. This transparency of style is a matter of principle; in The Sociology of Ignorance, a 1987 Hebrew book Rabbi Steinsaltz co-wrote with his childhood friend, the historian Amos Funkenstein (1937-1995), the authors describe how knowledge has been monopolized by institutions from the church to the academy. The book presents an argument for the ideal of “open knowledge,” a value essential to Judaism, which Rabbi Steinsaltz

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traces back to Ezra, Hillel, and the rabbinic democratization of Jewish learning in Yavneh.

Rabbi Steinsaltz’s commentary on Avot is written in the same spirit of opening the gates of Jewish knowledge to contemporary readers. He takes the terse statements of the Mishna and provides context, often from other contemporaneous cultures. He also provides historical and thematic character profiles of the rabbinic sages, relating their Mishnaic statements to the circumstance of their lives and personalities. The commentary contains an overview of key Jewish interpreters across the generations, as well as translations and etymologies of Greek and Persian terms, manuscript variants, textual differences from Avot de-Rabbi Natan, and a full bibliography.

The book is neither a traditional religious tome nor an academic edition of a Jewish text, yet it offers much to both the religious scholar and learner as well as to the academic, or any person eager to absorb Jewish knowledge “on one foot.” In so doing, it reveals an essential component to the genre he pioneered that comes into full relief in this last book, namely, the humanist valence that is a crucial part of the Jewish view of learning and understanding.

In the introduction Rabbi Steinsaltz comments on Avot’s overall goal: “This book helps us to become acquainted with the Jewish nation from the inside, to understand its inner thought, the means by which it aspires to perfection” (xii).

Like the Mishna and Talmud, geared towards engaging with the process rather than the outcome, Avot does not describe perfection itself but the processes by which one might aspire to an ideal that is in itself unattainable.

Contrasting with the Greek wisdom tradition,

Rabbi Steinsaltz explains that although the rabbinic sages are primarily concerned with philosophical questions, “they do not engage in abstract philosophical discourse.” Rather, they offer “short statements delivered by the sage to his students, which represent a grain of an idea” (xii).

The form chosen for the articulation of Jewish wisdom, which Rabbi Steinsaltz compares to Confucianism, rebels against the hubris of Greek-inspired enlightenment rationalism. “This is not a book for reading,” he continues, referring to direct, rational, means of knowledge acquisition. It is, rather “a bundle of medicines that a person does not swallow all at once, but takes one at a time and internalizes until it begins to enact its intended remedy” (xiii). Neither apparent nor guaranteed, Rabbi Steinsaltz likens the wisdom offered by Avot to a type of medicine for the soul, whose remedial effects can only transform the person over time, if ever at all.

Indeed, running through the commentary is skepticism about the very value of intellectual achievement and the difficulty of translating it into meaningful action. On Shimon ben Gamliel’s dictum “All my days I grew up among sages and found nothing better for the body than silence. Not study, but action is primary” (1:16), Rabbi Steinsaltz comments: While words of wisdom have a definite value and intellectual benefits, in terms of their outcome […] they are likely, in fact, to cause people harm […]. Action alone determines a person’s path in the final analysis; it, rather than the articulation of new principles and interpretations, however beautiful they may be, is the test for the individual and society (67).

This skepticism about intellectual achievement might seem like a performative contradiction.

Rabbi Steinsaltz was awarded the Israel Prize and many other honors and described as a “once in a millennium scholar” (a title his students say he disparaged). Rabbi Steinsaltz was clearly a paragon of intellectual achievement. What then explains this apparent disenchantment about the intellectual edifices constructed by the human mind? Is this a restatement of the old Hasidic critique of the cult of intellectual achievement targeted at contemporary culture?

Rabbi Steinsaltz later clarifies that “intellectual achievement, even great wisdom,

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

jewish thought

cannot save a person from a situation of a breakdown, whether the result of internal or external factors” (187). As attractive as brilliance may be, the silent, basic actions of individuals – tending, listening, being present – are the things Jewish wisdom says we can count on.

Rabbi Steinsaltz could not have chosen a better work to revise our reliance on contemporary intellectual culture for moral guidance than Pirkei Avot, a work deeply concerned with the meaning of piety. The idea of piety seems outdated, to be sure, to many people living today in a culture that has outsourced the need for ethical guidance to social movements.

An interesting feature of Rabbi Steinsaltz’s commentary is that it reads Tannaitic piety in a modern light without eliding its essentially rabbinic character, as recent commentators have done. His commentary is a masterful demonstration of how to avoid grafting modern principles of social justice onto a venerable tradition.

Even when commenting on Avot’s more troubling dicta, such as “do not frequent conversation with women” (1:5), Rabbi Steinsaltz does not feel compelled to either dismiss or apologize for the text in light of modern sentiment, but rather offers a novel interpretation which both keeps true to rabbinic ethics while holding an important lesson for modern life: When a person has an open home […] it is obvious that among those guests are also women. It is thus the place to warn one against becoming too friendly with all the women who come to his house because the conversation […] is likely to devolve into a conversation about intimate matters.

A casual conversation between a man and a woman – it is difficult for such a conversation to be entirely removed from a deeper system, conscious or unconscious, of erotic tension.

(26).

The world in which Rabbi Steinsaltz considers this dictum is not a sexually segregated one, but one in which men and women casually mingle at events, parties, people’s houses, and where the problem of “erotic tension,” which Rabbi Steinsaltz bluntly names, is an inherent potential in all human interactions. Operating with a psychologically complex view of human

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

desire rather than an idealized post-gender age ruled by reason, Rabbi Steinsaltz describes a familiar scenario: A man becomes close to one of his female guests. Readers of Chaim Grade’s novel The Yeshiva or viewers of Shtisel know that even in a gender-segregated society no dramatic illicit act needs to take place for passions to run high. A causal conversation can become intimate, and, with modern devices, can easily turn, for instance, into a situation of sexual or emotional infidelity.

Pirkei Avot mistrusts the rationalizations and confidence of intellectually gifted people. In Hillel’s central and pious injunction, “Do not trust yourself until the day you die” (2:4), he warns us that even the most well-intentioned individuals can be blinded by the feel-good hubris of viewing themselves as aligned with the “correct” principles.

For Rabbi Steinsaltz, the path of wisdom is an individualist pursuit that sometimes requires being at odds with the powers that be. In his commentary to Avot’s exhortation to “despise the rabbanut” Rabbi Steinsaltz explains that the term “rabbanut” denotes every type of institutional power [srara]; whether we are talking about communal leadership or religious leadership. This statement is especially sharp because it does not only imply that a person should try to avoid involvement with institutional power but more specifically, that one should despise the very condition of institutionalization.

When a person becomes a part of an institutional system (whether large or small), it causes him to change his relationship to people. This is not an accidental outcome of exploitation or corruption but a problem inherent in institutional power itself (43).

Just as he was suspicious of intellectual and moral overconfidence, Rabbi Steinsaltz was suspicious of power. Rabbi Steinsaltz observes that the occasional anti-government sentiment found in Avot can be linked to political tensions during the Herodian period, but the insight remains no less relevant today (44). The fundamental problem with institutions is that they cause those embedded in them to lose sight of the needs and interests of ordinary individuals who become their subjects.

This is an idea Rabbi Steinsaltz has articulated in other contexts, for example, in order to rebuke

Jewish communal and religious establishments.

In the case of the latter, Rabbi Steinsaltz has also described how conformity and routine hinder authentic religious connection. He knew this on a personal level; as an outsider facing opposition, Rabbi Steinsaltz was obliged not only to create his own vision for Jewish knowledge and the texts which would realize it, but also all the frameworks which would house it, which included his Israel Institute for Talmudic Publications, schools, yeshivot, and various other educational and outreach initiatives in Israel and the Former Soviet Union.

While on research leave shortly before the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, I visited Rabbi Steinsaltz’s Jerusalem minyan during the last months of his life. The minyan was located, appropriately it seemed, in the Museum of Natural History in Jerusalem’s old German Colony neighborhood, in a little house in the museum’s yard surrounded by thick vegetation.

Located right next to it was a whimsical enclosure which housed a tortoise. It is a small but dedicated community of minds which included Jews of all shapes and colors, across the religious spectrum and walks of life, who were there to partake in Rabbi Steinsaltz’s unique vision of the Jewish religious experience.

Rabbi Steinsaltz’s commentary takes the Jewish tradition seriously on its own terms, neither historicizing its dictums nor making them conform to today’s sentiments. It reminds us that wisdom and the prospect of growth is sometimes a bitter pill to swallow, requiring the re-examination of ourselves and our principles.

The commentary on Pirkei Avot offers a grounding read for today’s perplexed, inviting intellectual and ethical humility in a world turned upside-down, calling for a return to simple basic action. EM Marina Zilbergerts is a professor of Jewish literature and thought at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the author of a forthcoming book entitled The Yeshiva and the Rise of Modern Hebrew Literature (Indiana University Press, 2022). She and her family are members of JRCC East Thornhill.

This article previously appeared in the journal Tradition.

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jewish thought

Answering the Call Jonathan Sacks

T

he early history of humanity is set out in the Torah as a series of disappointments. G‑d gave human beings freedom, which they then misused.

Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit. Cain murdered Abel. Within a relatively short time, the world before the Flood became dominated by violence. All flesh perverted its way on the earth. G‑d created order, but humans created chaos. Even after the Flood, humanity, in the form of the builders of Babel, were guilty of hubris, thinking that people could build a tower that “reaches heaven” (Gen. 11:4).

Humans failed to respond to G‑d, which is where Abraham enters the picture. We are not quite sure, at the beginning, what it is that Abraham is summoned to do. We know he is commanded to leave his land, birthplace and father’s house and travel “to the land I will show you,” (Gen. 12:1) but what he is to do when he gets there, we do not know. On this the Torah is silent. What is Abraham’s mission? What makes him special? What makes him more than a good man in a bad age, as was Noah? What makes him a leader and the father of a nation of leaders?

To decode the mystery we have to recall what the Torah has been signalling prior to this point. A key theme – perhaps the key theme – is a failure of responsibility. Adam and Eve lack personal responsibility. Adam says, “It wasn’t me; it was the woman.” Eve says, “It wasn’t me, it was the serpent.” It is as if they deny being the authors of their own stories – as if they do not understand either freedom or the responsibility it entails.

Cain does not deny personal responsibility.

He does not say, “It wasn’t me. It was Abel’s fault for provoking me.” Instead he denies moral responsibility: “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

Noah fails the test of collective responsibility. He is a man of virtue in an age of vice, but he makes no impact on his contemporaries. He saves his family (and the animals) but no one else. According to the plain reading of the text, he does not even try.

If we understand this, we understand Abraham.

He exercises personal responsibility. A quarrel breaks out between

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Abraham’s herdsmen and those of his nephew Lot. Seeing that this was no random occurrence but the result of their having too many cattle to be able to graze together, Abraham immediately proposes a solution: Abram said to Lot, “Let there not be a quarrel between you and me, or between your herders and mine, for we are brothers.

Is not the whole land before you? Let’s part company. If you go to the left, I will go to the right; if you go to the right, I’ll go to the left.” (Gen. 13:8-9) Note that Abraham passes no judgment.

He does not ask whose fault the argument was. He does not ask who will gain from any particular outcome. He gives Lot the choice.

He sees the problem and acts.

In the next chapter we are told about a local war, as a result of which Lot is among the people taken captive. Immediately Abraham gathers a force, pursues the invaders, rescues Lot and with him, all the other captives.

He returns these captives safely to their homes, refusing to take any of the spoils of victory that he is offered by the grateful king

of Sodom.

This is a strange passage – it depicts Abraham very differently from the nomadic shepherd we see elsewhere. The passage is best understood in the context of the story of Cain. Abraham shows he is his brother’s (or brother’s son’s) keeper. He immediately understands the nature of moral responsibility. Despite the fact that Lot chose to live where he did with its attendant risks, Abraham does not say, “His safety is his responsibility, not mine.”

Then comes the great moment: a human being challenges G‑d Himself for the very first time. G‑d is about to pass judgment on Sodom. Abraham, fearing that this will mean that the city will be destroyed, says: “Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked? What if there are fifty righteous people in the city? Will you really sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous people in it? Far be it from you to do such a thing—to kill the righteous with the wicked, treating the righteous and the wicked alike. Far be it from you! Will not

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

Abraham was not a conventional leader.

He did not rule a nation. There was as yet no nation for him to lead. But he was the role model of leadership as Judaism understands it. He took responsibility. the Judge of all the earth do justice?” (Gen. 18:23–25) This is a remarkable speech. By what right does a mere mortal challenge G‑d Himself?

The short answer is that G‑d Himself signalled that he should. Listen carefully to the text: Then the Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do? Abraham will surely become a great and powerful nation, and all nations on earth will be blessed through him” … Then the Lord said, “The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin so grievous that I will go down and see if what they have done is as bad as the outcry that has reached Me.” (Gen. 18:17–21) Those words, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?” are a clear hint that G‑d wants Abraham to respond; otherwise why would He have said them?

The story of Abraham can only be understood against the backdrop of the story of Noah. There too, G‑d told Noah in advance that he was about to bring punishment to the world.

So G‑d said to Noah, “I am going to put

an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth” (Gen. 6:13).

Noah did not protest. To the contrary, we are told three times that Noah “did as G‑d commanded him” (Gen. 6:22; 7:5; 7:9). Noah accepted the verdict. Abraham challenged it. Abraham understood the third principle: collective responsibility.

The people of Sodom were not Abraham’s brothers and sisters, so he was going beyond even what he did in rescuing Lot. He prayed on their behalf because he understood the idea of human solidarity, immortally expressed by John Donne: No man is an island, Entire of itself …

Any man’s death diminishes me, For I am involved in mankind.

But a question remains. Why did G‑d call on Abraham to challenge Him? Was there anything Abraham knew that G‑d didn’t know? That idea is absurd. The answer is surely this: Abraham was to become the role model and initiator of a new faith, one that would not defend the human status quo but challenge it.

Abraham had to have the courage to challenge G‑d if his descendants were to challenge human rulers, as Moses and the Prophets did. Jews do not accept the world that is. They challenge it in the name of the world that ought to be. This is a critical turning point in human history: the birth of the world’s first religion of protest – the emergence of a faith that challenges the world instead of accepting it.

Abraham was not a conventional leader.

He did not rule a nation. There was as yet no nation for him to lead. But he was the role model of leadership as Judaism understands it. He took responsibility. He acted; he didn’t wait for others to act. Of Noah, the Torah says, “he walked with G‑d” (Gen. 6:9).

But to Abraham, G‑d says, “Walk before Me,” (Gen. 17:1), meaning: be a leader.

Walk ahead. Take personal responsibility.

Take moral responsibility. Take collective responsibility. EM

future tense

MOSHIACH MUSINGS

One thing to realize about redemption is that it is not an all-or-nothing proposition. Bringing Moshiach is not the sole responsibility of any one generation; it is the culmination of a collective effort, goodness accumulated throughout the ages. And goodness doesn't disappear.

Also, there is a specific benefit to being in this generation. The Chassidic masters teach that the purpose of creation is to make this world into a dwelling place for G‑d. Not the worlds of the angels, not some heavenly realm of souls and spiritual beings—but this earthy, palpable, mundane physical world. In order to bring Moshiach, this is what we need to work on—we've got to bring G‑d down to earth.

Let me ask you: Is there any generation that better qualifies as being "down on earth” than ours? For Moshiach to come, the G‑dly needs to be revealed in us. In what the Kabbalists call "the lower realms." In fact, the generation before the coming of Moshiach is called the "heel of Moshiach" because the world is at its lowest point since Sinai.

Each and every one of us has a crucial role in drawing the divine picture and bringing Moshiach; if you didn't, you would not have been created. Telling ourselves that we have no power, are insignificant, unimportant, and don't matter is simply a product of laziness.

On the contrary, the very fact that we are such ordinary people, struggling with the most earthly, mundane matters—that's exactly what qualifies us more than any other generation to bring G‑d down to earth. You can't invite Him in unless you live there yourself!

Remember, G‑d put us in this position because He believes in us. And if He does, so should we.

ask the rabbi

The Logic of Loans Rabbi Yoseph Y. Zaltzman

Q

I have a couple of questions about loans. A friend of mine who is known to burn money and not repay loans is continuously

asking me for a loan. I have heard that one should always give a loan when asked. Should I be giving him a loan? And why is it forbidden in Judaism to charge interest on a loan? This seems strange to me since financing is a healthy economic engine in society.

In Judaism, it is considered a great deed to give a loan, even to a rich person. It is considered to be greater than giving charity, for it does not make the person receiving feel needy and worthless, as if begging for survival. Not giving a loan to a poor person when one has the available funds to do so is frowned upon in Jewish law. The Rebbe encouraged every community to establish at least one free loan organization.

Just like there is strong language when it comes to giving loans, Jewish law also uses strong words for those who take loans without the means or the intention to repay them. Maimonides writes: “It is forbidden for a borrower to take a loan and use it when it is unnecessary, and lose it, leaving the creditor without a source to collect the debt. This applies even if the creditor is very wealthy. A person who acts this way is wicked, as Psalms says (37:21), “A wicked man borrows and does not pay.” Our sages commanded (Ethics of our Fathers 2:12), “Treat money belonging to your friend as dearly as your own.”

The Code of Jewish Law adds, “If one is known to be such a person, it is best not to give a loan at all.” You should try your best to avoid him and not to lie to him by saying that you don’t have any money for him. If he continues to nudge you, you should say that at this time you have no money available. Being sensitive with ones words is very important when dealing with someone in need, no matter how crooked his or her dealings are.

The prohibition of charging is indeed a strange one. there’s nothing unfair or underhanded about charging or paying interest on a loan, since both parties knowingly consent to the transaction. Neither is it inherently deleterious to society. On the contrary, loans and interest

12

are the two poles of the turbine that drives a healthy economy. When loans are available, merchants can make greater profits, builders can build bigger buildings, entrepreneurs can bring new ideas and inventions to the market, and families can live in better homes. That translates as more class mobility, more jobs, more food, more clothing, more leisure time and more choices of how you want to live. So Why Is It Forbidden?

The reason Torah prohibits charging interest between Jews is simply because your fellow Jew is family. It’s just not appropriate for family members to help each other out on terms of interest. The Jewish nation is meant to behave as a cohesive unit, like a single organism, each one concerned for the other’s benefit as much as with his own. It is an expression of Jewish unity, a central component of our collective strength and what brings about our redemption. The Torah gives the prohibition of interest as one of the reasons G‑d took us out of Egypt. The Maharal of Prague (Rabbi Yehuda Loewe), explains that G‑d desires the unity of the Jewish nation, and it is for this purpose that He redeemed us from Egypt and gave us the land of Israel.

When people assist each other, they are uniting through their act of kindness. One who takes interest acts in the opposite manner, taking advantage of his fellow Jew’s misfortune in order to enrich himself. It is for this reason that throughout the generations Jews have scrupulously kept the prohibition of interest, and Jewish communities generally set up interest-free loan organizations.

In the merit of Jewish unity, not only were we redeemed from Egypt, but we will merit the final redemption. EM

Интересный вопрос задает одна женщина: «Если еврей женится на нееврейке, то по закону его дети не будут евреями. В случае, когда еврейка выйдет замуж за нееврея, их дети будут евреями. Означает ли это, что брак еврейки с представителем любой другой национальности не представ-ляет опасности для сохранения еврейского народа?» Каково мнение Торы по этому вопросу? Тора запрещает браки с неевреями и говорит, что еврейские мужчина и женщина должны создавать семью в своем народе. И это не просто закон, - это постановление, обладающее глубо-ким смыслом. Дело в том, что каждый человек в этом мире имеет свое предназначение: миссия еврея заклю-чается в одном, а миссия нееврея – в другом, у них разные задачи. И поэтому смешаный брак – это не просто запрещение Б-га, это идет против потенциала каждого из супругов. Кстати, не только евреям запрещено жениться или выходить замуж за неевреев, но и представителям других национальностей тоже запрещено вступать в брак с евреями. Коротко говоря, миссия еврейского народа заключается в привнесении святости, Б-жествен-ности в этот мир. Задача всех остальных народов – привести людей к норме мирной и красивой жизни: чтобы все относились друг к другу с уваже-нием, чтобы исчезли трущобы и криминал... Это задача для всего восьмимиллиардного человече-ства исходит из 7 заповедей, данных Вс-вышним всем народам на горе Синай. Еврейскому народу на той же горе Вс-вышний дал 613 заповедей...

The article above is excerpted from the Russian edition of Exodus Magazine. To subscribe, please visit exodusmagazine.org or call 416.222.7105.

Rabbi Yoseph Y. Zaltzman is the Senior Rabbi of the Jewish Russian Community Centre of Ontario. You can Ask the Rabbi at jrcc.org or fax to 416.222.7812. To meet with Rabbi Zaltzman in person, feel free to call 416.222.7105 to book an appointment.

Appointments are generally available on Wednesday evenings after 7pm.

Rebbitzin Chiena Zaltzman is also available for private consultations by appointment on Wednesday evenings from 9 to 10pm by calling 416.222.7105.

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

‫ב”ה‬ ‫ב''ה‬

OCTOBER 2021 | CHESHVAN 5782 COMMUNITY CALENDAR

OCTOBER2021 THU

07

MIKVAH 101 BEGINS

Our

Community

НОЯБРЬ 2020

KISLEV 5781

T H E M O N T H I N R E V I E W. U P C O M I N G E V E N T S & P R O G R A M S .

18 ELUL FARBRENGEN

The 18th of the month of Elul is the birthday of two great luminaries — the Baal Shem Tov (R. Yisrael ben R. Eliezer, born 1698), founder of the Chassidic move¬ment, and the Alter Rebbe (R. Shneur Zalman of Liadi, born 1745), founder of Chabad.

Together, they formed the foundation of the Chassidic revolution of Jewish life, one that continues unabated to this day. It is no wonder that this day infuses the month of Elul with life – 18 being the numerical value of the Hebrew word “chai,” which means life.

There is no better time, since this day also marks 12 days before Rosh Hashana, one day to reflect upon and repair one month of the previous year. The day was marked with an uplifting community farbrengen gathering hosted by the JRCC West Thornhill, led by Rabbi Levi Jacobson and famed speaker Rabbi Y. Y. Jacobson and attended by dozens of community members.

PRE-ROSH HASHANAH CHALLAH BAKE After over a year of limiting most community events to virtual gatherings, it was nice to get together in person for the annual pre-Rosh Hashanah Challah bake. Over 200 women gathered simultaneously on Thursday, September 2 at all JRCC branches to bake Challah together in advance of Rosh Hashana. According to Jewish tradition, when a group of women gathers to partake in this sacred tradition as one, it opens up the heavenly gates to their prayers, and draws blessing for the entire community – and it was a moving and powerful experience for all those who participated.

CANDLE LIGHTING TIMES Friday, Oct 1, 2021

6:40 PM

Friday, Oct 8, 2021

6:28 PM

Friday, Oct 15, 2021

6:16 PM

Friday, Oct 22, 2021

6:04 PM

Friday, Oct 29, 2021

5:54 PM

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

PRE-HIGH HOLIDAYS PROGRAMS FOR KIDS In the days and weeks leading up to the High Holidays and the Jewish New Year, the JRCC branch in East Thornhill hosted a unique event to engage community children in preparation for this important time of year.

The program featured a variety of interactive activities and workshops designed to both entertain and educate, including educational games, tastings of traditional foods, holiday-themed crafts, and more.

HIGH HOLIDAY GIFT PACKAGES Dozens of volunteers of all ages, from 5 to 80 years of age, heeded the call for people to come help organize, package and distribute High Holidays packages for the community. Thanks to their amazing devotion and hard work, packages were distributed to thousands of homes throughout the GTA. Each package contained the traditional Rosh Hashana foods of apple, honey and pomegranate, a card wishing a Happy New Year from the community, a High Holidays Guide, a tzedaka charity box, sweets for children, and a magnet featuring a photo of the Rebbe holding a Torah scroll. The packages were received with great joy and huge smiles when delivered to homes. We would like to express our special gratitude to our volunteers who made this whole giant project possible, and to the Yummy Market management for their generous donation of beautiful red and gold New Year's apples. The devotion of such time and energy and the entire process, from the packaging of the gift packages to the distribution to homes throughout the community, was a beautiful expression of the unity of the Jewish people, which is the central theme of the High Holidays.

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Photo of the Month

Jewish Russian Community Centre

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 21 7:00 pm For Men & Women A Hachnasat Sefer Totah (Torah Completion Ceremony) dedicated by Edward Kholodenko in memory of Ella bat Avrohom Yitzchak took place at the Questrade office in attendance with hundreds of community members and Chassidic singer Benny Friedman.

Weekly

ZOOM ID: 824 6764 6203

Register online at www.JRCC.org/revival

Mikvah 101

6 week course with Mikvah.org certified instructor Mrs. Chanie Zaltzman

Thursdays, Oct. 7 – Nov. 11

JrccEastThornhill.org/FamilyPurity

Birth Kit

PROGRAM Join our group of Jewish women to socialize and learn some Torah.

These classes are geared to any level of prior knowledge.

East Thornhill Sunday 8pm (in-person), Mondays 8 p.m. (virtual) Willowdale Bi-Weekly on Wednesdays at 7 p.m.

Rockford Tuesdays (in English), Wednesdays (in Russian) Details at www.jrcc.org/TorahAndTea For other women’s classes visit: www.jrcc.org/WomensCircle

14

For all the newborn Russian Jews

Did you just give birth?

Did you become a grandparent?

Do you know any of your friends who just gave birth?

JRCC is ready to deliver a baby package right to the house. It includes: baby diapers, body suits, napkins, baby cream, kids cup, baby powder, shower gel, Jewish soft toy, blessing for a child and a mother, Jewish educational book, baby blanket.

Contact JRCC office for more info

416.222.7105 ext.245

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

get fun in on the

Еврейский Центр Русскоязычной Общины Онтарио 1 Jewish Russian Community Center of Ontario

Bat Mitzvah Club A delightful and deep journey in Jewish pride and self-growth

Sundays 5:30 - 7:30 Girls 11- 12

] ] ] ]

awesome adventures and trips cool crafts, mitzvah projects sleepover Shabbaton gala Bat Mitzvah celebration and more!

Get more info and register at

jrcc.org/Bat Bat Mitzvah Club

batmitzvah@jrcc.org ● 416-222-7105 x212

Morning & Evening

KOLLEL

ROCKFORD - 18 ROCKFORD RD. WEST THORNHILL - 1136 CENTRE ST., UNIT 2 EAST THORNHILL - 7608 YONGE ST., UNIT 3 More information at www.jrcc.org/Kollel

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

Faces of the Community Raphael Chernin Engineer Thornhill Tell us a little about your career.

I am a toolmaker engineer by profession. I worked at several factories in Kharkov, Ukraine. When I came to Canada in 2002, I had to start all over again, and I decided go into machining. I worked for almost ten years as a turner machinist and a milling machine operator. Imagine a large factories that experience all kids of breakdowns that require urgent on the spot repair during the course of their operations. That's what I was doing.

Why did you choose to live in Thornhill?

This area was not chosen by me, but by my daughter. But I like it first and foremost because a large number of Jews live here. I feel like a member of a large Jewish family in this area.

Where does your family come from?

My father is from Austria-Hungary – most likely from the Czech Republic. In 1905, he and his family came to Vitebsk, in Belarus, which was then the center of Jewish life. My father went through the war, became a communist, and nevertheless continued to secretly adhere to Jewish traditions. He kept a prayerbook under his pillow and always read before bed. My mother is from Kryvyi Rih, Ukraine.

Her father, who came from a Polish Jewish family, lived and studied in France and became a mining engineer. In the 1900s, the French mastered the extraction of iron ore in Kryvyi Rih, and my grandfather came there with a French company to construct the mines. These mines have survived there to this day. In his family, Judaism was strictly observed according to all the laws of traditions; everything was kosher, and they celebrated Shabbat and all the holidays. My grandfather died of altitude sickness. While working in the mines, coal or metal dust settled in his lungs. My mother was the fourth child of nine children in this family. She managed to observe Jewish holidays in the Soviet Union, but keeping kosher was a challenge. My mother scrupulously observed the fast on Yom Kippur, and this was very important to her. How did we know about the coming of the Jewish holidays? There were 120,000 Jews in the million-strong Kharkov population – more than 10% (even in the 1990s). Some with connections in Israel would receive a Jewish calendar from Israel and make copies. At my mother's place I saw the thinnest piece of tissue paper, which was the 8th or 9th carbon copy of a calendar typed on a typewriter. This is how we learned about Jewish holidays.

If you had the opportunity to meet anyone in history, who would you choose and why?

I have met more than once with the famous military photojournalist Yakov Ryumkin and would gladly do so gain. Yakov Ryumkin was born in 1913 near Kiev, began his professional career in Kharkov and continued it in Moscow, becoming a photojournalist for the Pravda Newspaper and the Ogoniok Magazine. He was a member of the pool (working group) of Khrushchev's journalists. He had no formal education, but became a famous journalist, beginning with articles that were published in local Kharkov newspapers with wonderful photographs that he took himself. He was self-taught and incredibly well-read, an excellent storyteller.

He covered the entire war from beginning to end, reaching Berlin and constantly creating a photographic chronicle of the war. The famous writer Konstantin Simonov described the story when Yakov was sent to film the hostilities during the Battle of Stalingrad. There was no free space on the plane, except for the gunner’s position, so Yakov sat there. Somehow, without stopping photographing, he managed to shoot down a German plane. Yakov Ryumkin was a heroic man who could do anything in the name of shooting. Once he was assigned by one of the Kharkov editorial offices to take a series of photographs of Kharkov. Ryumkin conceived something unusual: he decided to make aerial photography from an airplane. To achieve this with the technology available at the time, they tied him to the plane with a rope to the plane, opened the door, and took pictures while leaning out, practically falling out of the door. The pictures were amazing.

Nobody did that at the time.

He was friends with the composer Matvey Blanter, author of the famous song Katyusha. To the words of Konstantin Simonov (with whom Yakov was also friends), Blanter wrote the "Song of Correspondents" dedicated to Ryumkin. Yakov was also friends with the writers Boris Polev and Mikhail Sholokhov. He spent three months living in the North Pole research station, drifting on a giant ice floe, and during this time he created numerous pictures of life in the far north.

What are your plans for the future?

I have grandchildren to whom I devote all my time. I want to live happily ever after with them.

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JRCC Directory

JRCC Program Spotlight

416-222-7105 | www.jrcc.org Jewish Russian Community Centre of Ontario

LEARN AND LIVE The survival and thriving of the Jewish people over two millennia of wanderings and persecutions around the world is one of the great mysterious phenomena of history. The secret of Jewish survival has always been our people’s c o n s i s t e n t attachment to the Torah. the principal occupation of Jewish people was always learning Torah. Everything else flows from there.

The eternal, Divine wisdom of the Torah gives expression to the essential connection between the soul and its Creator, while also providing practical guidance for living a meaningful life within an often harsh, materialistic and even hostile world. Just as the Torah enabled our people to survive and thrive for centuries in a variety of situations, so too the Torah can empower us as individuals to find direction and guidance to live our personal lives to the fullest.

In addition to featured courses

and lectures during every season, the JRCC’s Institute of Jewish Studies organizes dozens of ongoing weekly classes and study programs that enable us to make

the Torah a regular, consistent part of our everyday lives. By perusing the weekly schedule you can find classes on a variety of topics, including Jewish law, Talmud, Chassidic thought, in both English and Russian. You can also join the popular evening Chavrusa (study partner) programs. The peace and quiet of early mornings are also an opportunity to set aside time for study and reflections by joining one of the Morning Kolel programs, where we can start our

day with a dose of Jewish studies, followed by morning serves and another class afterwards.

Especially during times of stress or uncertainty, having set times for Torah study helps to center us and empower us to focus on our higher priorities.

The word Torah means “instruction” and “light” – it shines a light and gives practical guidance that we can apple to our daily lives.

Wherever your interests or needs lie, you are sure to find something that suits your study goals and schedule to help you learn and live. Get the latest schedule at jrcc.org/ijs. And if you don’t find what you’re looking for, you can contact your local JRCC branch rabbi or the JRCC office about creating it together.

Due to the unpredictable and rapidly evolving COVID situation, please check online for the latest updates regarding times and locations for in-person classes and virtual classes.

5987 Bathurst Stre­et, #3 To­ron­to, ON M2R 1Z3 Canada Office Hours: Sun: 12 — 5 Mon to Thurs: 9 — 6 • Fri: 9 — 3hrs before Shabbat

JRCC BRANCHES JRCC of Ontario: 5987 Bathurst St., #3 Rabbi Yoseph Y. Zaltzman x278 Roi Aftabi, COO x257 JRCC Woodbridge: 25 Sandwell St. Rabbi Avrohom Yusewitz x261 JRCC S. Richmond Hill & Maple: 9699 Bathurst St. Rabbi Avrohom Zaltzman x247 JRCC Concord: 411 Confederation Parkway, #14 Rabbi Avraham Weinstein x 249 JRCC Affiliate CRC of Thornhill Woods: 8808 Bathurst St. Rabbi Chaim Hildeshaim x224 JRCC West Thornhill: 1136 Centre St., #2 Rabbi Levi Jacobson x240 JRCC East Thornhill: 7608 Yonge St., #3 Rabbi Mendel Zaltzman x227 JRCC South Thornhill: 1 Cordoba Dr., Party Room Rabbi Levi Blau x288 JRCC Rockford: 18 Rockford Rd. Rabbi Shmuel Neft x235 JRCC Affiliate Jewish Gorsky Assn.: 465 Patricia Ave. Rabbi Dovid Davidov x255 Downstairs JRCC Willowdale and the City: 5700 Yonge St. Rabbi Yisroel Zaltzman x231 JRCC Sheppard & Bathurst Senior’s Building 4455 Bathurst St., Party Room / Mr. Roman Goldstein x221 JRCC Lawrence & Bathurst Senior’s Building 3174 Bathurst St., Party Room x221

JRCC AFFILIATES Danforth Beaches Rabbi Shalom Lezell (416) 809-1365

Durham Region Rabbi Tzali Borensein (905) 493-9007 Georgina, Ontario Rabbi Yossi Vorovitch (905) 909-8818 Hamilton Region Rabbi Chanoch Rosenfeld (905) 529-7458 London, Ontario Rabbi Lazer Gurkow (519) 438-3333 Niagara Region Rabbi Zalman Zaltzman (905) 356-7200 Ottawa, Ontario Rabbi Chaim Mendelsohn (613) 218-8505 Waterloo Region Rabbi Moshe Goldman (519) 725-4289

EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMS L&M Gelfand Daycare JRCC Daycare and Preschool x501

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SUPPORTED IN MEMORY OF

ANNE & ED MIRVISH

with us

DONATE YOUR FURNITURE TO THOSE IN NEED! Call us @ 416-222-7105 ext. 248 to get a quote for pick-up

Shanah Tova!

Partly funded by The Regional Municipality of York

16

JRCC Hebrew School Sunday and after-school program x225 Institute of Jewish Studies Classes & Lectures for Adults x221 Exodus Magazine Monthly Publications in Rus & Eng x222 JRCC Bookstore & Library jrcc.org/bookstore x221

SOCIAL PROGRAMS Furniture Depot: 1416 Centre St. #6 x500 jrccfurnituredepot.org Hospital & Jail Visitations x221 Family Counselling & Legal Advice Holiday Programs x234 Events, Parties & Holiday Awareness

Call us at

416-222-7105 x 248 or visit us online at jrcc.help

Jewish Identity Verification x237 Mazal Makalski jewishidentity@jrcc.org

nah a h S a!

Tov

Simcha Gemach x234 Chanie Zaltzman chanie.zaltzman@jrcc.org Volunteering x254 Get involved in your community!

YEDinstitute – Entrepreneurial Mentorship x221 yedinstitute.org

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

SHARE THE JOY! the ex odus ma g azine s im cha sectio n

IT’S A BOY!

Mazel Tov to

IT’S A GIRL!

Rabbi Mendel Zaltzman

Itai Egron Liron Grimberg Arie Yehuda Yavorsky Gabriel Delicato Michael Cristea Chana Franki Vortsman Rachel Yakubov

on his birthday!

BAR-MITZVAH!

Asher Rudik Yohash Kotliarov Shmuel Leib Lakher Idan Itschak Boltianski

MARRIAGE!

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Moshiach

in

Sodom?

Simon Jacobson

T

he story of the destruction of the wicked cities, Sodom and Gomorrah, is simple enough: These two cities were destroyed due to the exceptional cruelty of their citizens. The classical story of corruption and its consequences.

But is this the entire story?

Upon reading the elaborate details of the narrative – the way G‑d debates whether to reveal His plans to Abraham; the Divine “descent” to confirm the wickedness of Sodom; dispatching an angel to destroy the city; the extensive efforts exerted to save Lot, in the merit of his uncle Abraham; Abraham’s intervention, pleading to save Sodom – it is quite apparent that there is much more going on than just the demise of another corrupt city.

And what exactly was Sodom’s terrible crime, causing an “outcry…so great, and their sin so very grave,” that led to them being singled out for such unprecedented destruction? Was there no other corrupt city in history that deserved punishment?

There is an inexplicable Midrash that only accentuates the mystery of Sodom: “It is written I found my servant David.

Where did G‑d find him? In Sodom”!!

(Bereishit Rabbah 41:4; 50:10).

True, the Midrash explains that Lot and his daughters are the ancestors of David: Ruth the Moabite and Na’amah the Amonite, whose progenitors were Lot’s two daughters, which means in effect that David originated from forbearers who lived for a while in Sodom.

But, what is the point of emphasizing this seemingly irrelevant, and even demeaning, detail?! David was not born in Sodom and never lived in Sodom (which was destroyed long before he was born). What is the Midrash trying to tell us, and why is it important to know that G‑d found David, of all places in… Sodom?!

Finally, and above all: Every detail in Torah is meant to be a relevant guide for our lives. What lesson do we learn from Sodom’s destruction today? Why is it important for us to know all the fine particulars of the story?

Looking closer at the Torah’s account we find that the Sodom story actually begins earlier. There we learn about Abraham’s long trek to Canaan – what would become the

18

Promised Land of Israel – together with his wife Sarah (still named Sarai at the time), his nephew Lot, all their belongings and “all the souls that they had made” [brought closer to G‑d]. The verse then tells us how a feud broke out between the herdsmen of Abraham’s and Lot’s flocks. Abraham suggests to his nephew, “Let us not feud… for we are brothers after all. If you [go to] the left, I will go to the right; if to the right, I will take the left. Lot looked up and saw that the entire Jordan Plain, all the way to Tzoar had plenty of water. (This was before G‑d destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.) It was like G‑d’s own garden.” Lot thus chose to go East and settle in the Plain and he “migrated as far as Sodom.”

The Torah then adds “But the people of Sodom were very wicked, and they sinned against G‑d.” – Here is the first time Sodom is mentioned.

The story continues: War broke out between the “four kings against the five,” the five including Sodom and Gomorrah, in the Siddim Valley (now the Dead Sea). The four kings were victorious and seized all the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah, as well as

capturing Abraham’s nephew Lot, who was living in Sodom.

When Abraham hears that his nephew was taken captive, he pursues the four kings and successfully attacks and recovers all the goods, as well as Lot and the people. The story concludes with the King of Sodom asking Abraham: “Give me the souls. You can take the goods.” And Abraham replied that he does not want the goods: “Not a thread nor a shoelace! I will not take anything that is yours! You should not be able to say, ‘It was I who made Abram rich.’”

The Torah, above all, is not a story or history book; it is the Divine blueprint of existence and a spiritual guide for our lives.

What part of the cosmic order is mapped out by this intricate story Lot’s capture and release, the war with Sodom and Abraham’s involvement?

In a masterful and eloquent fashion, the great 16th century scholar and mystic, Rabbi Isaiah Horowitz, known as the Shaloh (15651630), explains the inside story beginning with a fundamental question: Abraham’s journey to Israel was essentially

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

perspectives

a spiritual ascent to new Divine heights. Why then did he associate himself and took along the wicked Lot in this journey?! [As we see above, that Lot could not coexist peacefully with Abraham, and the Torah emphasizes more than once how he “separated” from Abraham and only then did G‑d reveal Himself and spoke to Abraham about the Promised Land].

The Shaloh cites the answer of the Zohar (I 79a): What did Abraham see that caused him to bond with Lot? He foresaw with Divine inspiration that Lot would merit to be the forbearer of David” (Lot’s daughter would give birth to Moab, the ancestor of Ruth, grandmother of David).

But this, says the Shaloh, requires explanation: What connection does David have to our present story?

Quoting the Ramban (Nachmanides), the Shaloh explains that “Know this fundamental principle: All the journeys and events that happened with the Patriarchs [Abraham, Isaac and Jacob] come to teach us about the future… they were shown what would happen to their descendants. For this reason the Torah documents in detail the experiences that transpired with the Patriarchs. No one should think that these are superfluous details; they actually pave the way and map out all the future events that would transpire with their children throughout history. There is nothing that happened to Abraham that would later not occur with his children (Ramban Lech Lecho 12:6).

The same is true with Abraham’s battling the four kings to free Lot and the goods they captured: “This story happened with Abraham to foretell and show us that there would rise four major empires – Babylonian, Persian, Greek and Roman (represented by the four kings) – that would dominate history. But the end would be that his [Abraham’s] children would prevail over the empires. They would all fall and the children would end up redeeming all the possessions and hostages they had taken captive.

As we see, a bit further in the story, how G‑d makes His covenant with Abraham, telling him:

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

“Know for sure that your descendants will foreigners in a land that is not theirs for 400 years. They will be enslaved and oppressed.

But I will finally bring judgment against the nation who enslaves them, and they will then leave with great wealth.” And this transpires “as the sun was setting, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and a deep dark dread fell upon him.”

The “deep dark dread” that befell Abraham resulted from the vision shown to Abraham of the future powerful empires that would control and terrorize the world, each in their own way: the Babylonian, Persian, Greek and Roman (and Ishmaelite) empires.

The great 15th century Kabbalist, Rabbi Isaac Luria (known as the holy Arizal) explains that these empires – that extend over the entire span of history – represent the different stages of refinement (birur) that we achieve throughout the generations.

Everything in our material existence contains Divine ‘sparks,’ i.e. spiritual energy, and we are charged with the mission to redeem and elevate these sparks, and thereby refine the material universe and transform it into its true purpose: a vehicle for spiritual expression.

Beginning with the enslavement by the Egyptian empire – the archetype and root (‘head’) of all the exiles and empires – each subsequent empire symbolizes another stage of refinement in integrating G‑dliness into the material world. The process concludes with the refinement of the last two powers, Edom (Esau) and Ishmael, which leads to the Messianic age – a world where there will be no more destruction and terror and all children of Abraham serve the One G‑d of Abraham in peace and harmony (see Abraham’s Vision).

This, the Shaloh explains, is the meaning of the Zohar’s brief words that Abraham bonded with Lot because he foresaw “that Lot would merit to be the forbearer of David:” Lot and his descent into wicked Sodom – and his being captured by the four kings – represents the captivity that each of us experiences as we are taken hostage (physically and/or, even worse, psychologically) by the “empires” around us and the powerful tentacles of material existence, which want to

crush our hope in building a better world and bringing spiritual redemption to the world.

But the purpose of this captivity is for us to prevail over the dominant forces of existence and redeem the “great wealth,” the powerful Divine sparks that lay trapped and embedded in the material universe, with the ultimate redemption led by Moshiach son of David, descendant of Lot. Abraham knew that the stakes were high: Through freeing Lot from the hands of the kings, and then again when he was saved by the angel from Sodom’s destruction, Abraham’s children were empowered through the ages to free the different shapes of “Lot” trapped in the various manifestations of “Sodom” that would crop up in each generation. And by doing so, we give birth to the redemption (David).

Abraham knew that in the throes and abyss of “Sodom” laid great power, and when redeemed, “Sodom” would yield an enormous spiritual bounty. Thus, Abraham immediately laid everything on the line to free Lot from captivity. Abraham also attempted to save the entire city. At the time that was not meant to be; the city was simply too corrupt. But in the end of days, Ezekiel (16:55) tells us “Sodom with her daughters will return to their former state,” meaning the spiritual energy redeemed from Sodom – Moshiach ben Dovid.

This is the meaning of the Midrash cited above, “where did G‑d find him [David]?

In Sodom,” referring to Moshiach son of David. When the angels come to save Lot and his family from Sodom, they used a strange expression: “Take your wife and two daughters who are found here.” The word “found” (nimzoas) is superfluous and cryptic.

Explains the Midrash that “found” implies something lost. The expression “found” is also used regarding David, “I found David my servant,” referring to Moshiach (from the House of David), who will be “found” in a strange place, as if he came out of nowhere. According to the Midrash, the verse “take your wife and two daughters who are found here” is referring to two important discoveries: Ruth the Moabite and Na’amah the Amonite, whose ancestors were Lot’s two daughters. These two daughters would be the

19

perspectives

progenitors of David and Moshiach. Thus, “the two daughters who are found here” is telling us that in the darkness of Sodom there is to be “found” – unexpectedly – Moshiach from the House of David (see also Talmud Yevamot 63a. 77a. Zohar I 110b).

How is this to be translated into our own lives?

Sodom’s grave sin was their perverted philosophy of life. The various crimes of Sodom are documented: The very name Sodom carries multiple connotations of a culture of inhospitality and moral indifference that degenerated into social oppression. Cruelty to each other and to strangers. Obsession not to help one another. Sexual depravity.

But these are all symptoms. Beneath it all lay a fundamental offense – which is the root of all crimes and which underscores Sodom’s unique form of corruption that causes them to be singled out in the Torah.

In various places in the Talmud we find the expression “coerce them [not to behave] with the characteristic of Sodom.” That cruel characteristic is depriving someone of benefit even when you have nothing to lose. “Zeh nehneh v’zeh lo chosor.”

In Ethics of Our Fathers, the Mishne (Avot 5:13) brings two opinions: One who says ‘what is mine is mine, what is yours is yours’ – is an average quality. The second opinion states that this is “midas (the quality of) Sodom.”

The Tzemach Tzedek explains the two opinions: Opinion one holds that a Sodom characteristic is only when you deny another a benefit though you lose nothing (as the Talmud states). But if you have something to lose, even just a bit, it is not optimal behavior, but neither can we characterize you as Sodom. Thus, one who declares ‘what is mine is mine, what is yours is yours’ (in order not to incur a loss) is merely an average quality (not good not bad).

The second opinion, however, maintains that even if you have something to lose, the mere statement ‘what is mine is mine, what is yours is yours’ undermines the basic infrastructure of existence – a symbiotic relationship between a countless amount of diverse forces and systems.

If every aspect of nature and ecosystem,

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or every cell and faculty in our own bodies, would take on the attitude of ‘what is mine is mine, what is yours is yours’ – we would be left, G‑d forbid, with utter annihilation. This is the psychological manifestation of Sodom – which led to its total demise.

Similarly, the lifeline of every community, state or country, and every economy or other system – especially in the increasingly shrinking global village of our world today – is dependent on the “give and take” of different strengths and contributions, all complementing each other in a mosaic-like symmetry. The antithesis of ‘what is mine is mine, what is yours is yours.’

Sodom-like isolationism lies at the heart and root of all other Sodom’s sins. The destruction of Sodom is, in a way, more a result from the ‘what is mine is mine, what is yours is yours’ attitude than from their outright criminal behavior.

Abraham represents ultimate unity – harmony of diverse forces. Sodom – and the hostages it took (represented by Lot) – symbolizes utter compartmentalization.

Yet within the darkness of Sodom “David” can be found. And that is what Abraham

was after.

We too, today, live in a world where he have both options. The spiritually displaced state called “exile” is a result of divisiveness (baseless hatred, sinas chinam).

The divisiveness manifests in interpersonal relationships, but it always begins with an intrapersonal (an inner) dissonance.

Abraham’s encounter with Sodom teaches and empowers us to access the pioneering spirit “Abraham” within each of us and fight the urge of ‘what is mine is mine, what is yours is yours,’ and definitely the one that refuses to allow another to gain even when we have nothing to lose.

The “Abraham” within also gives us the power to “find” the “David-like” gems embedded in “Lot” within ourselves and within others.

And finally, prepare the way to discover personal and global redemption in, of all places, Sodom. EM Rabbi Simon Jacobson is the author of Toward a Meaningful Life: The Wisdom of the Rebbe and the director of the Meaningful Life Center (meaningfullife.com).

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

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26

wars, becoming a part of prohibition law in the 80s, the company is now an important economic player in a region, producing more than 20 million bottles of alcoholic beverages per year.

Although the distillery's roster includes an assortment of wines, gins, and vodkas, by far the most famous of its products are its award-winning brandies. Like all top-notch spirits, the high quality of this liquor begins with the region's grapes. Occupying the land east of the River Dniester, Transnistria is in the heart of the ancient Bessarabian wine region, a gem of viniculture perched above the Black Sea that has also survived the many ups and downs of centuries of Russian rule.

Plucked from the Bessarabian vine, the grapes fortunate enough to make their way to Tiraspol are transformed into brandy using a process identical to that used to make Cognac in France—double distilled in copper pots, aged in oak barrels, and then carefully blended with water and sugar. The grapes are of a typical Cognac variety, an assortment that includes Colombard, Riesling, and Ugni Blanc. Despite the company's rigid adherence to the French production methods, Kvint is not located in Cognac, France and therefore cannot formally call their products "Cognacs." Instead they use the Moldovan word divin, hence Kvint's name, which is an acronym for the Russian phrase "divins, wines, and beverages of Tiraspol." But in a land where international laws don't seem to really apply, most local people still refer to Kvint's products as Cognacs, and it is called Brandy everywhere else in the world.

Also Kvint is focusing their efforts on making a wide assortment of wines. Along with ordinary table dry, semi-sweet and dessert wines, the KVINT’s portfolio can boast of some excellent varietal and blended wines matured in oak barriques, according to traditional production process from 9 months to 3 years.

Shop for the best selection of Kvint Wine : KVINT CABERNET SAUVIGNON KOSHER 2015, LCBO #455138 This wine is made under control of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of New York (USA), OU, it has the status of Kosher for PASSOVER, Mevushal (approved for Passover, pasteurized). This wine is made from the selected grapes grown in own vineyards of KVINT. It features pleasant astringency and harmonious acidity. Its bouquet is complex with aroma of nightshade berries enriched with hints of morocco leather.

KVINT MERLOT KOSHER 2015, LCBO # 455112 Bright berry aromas: hints of cassis, and delicate nuances of prunes and cherry.

It is velvety on the palate, with barely perceptible astringency and freshness.

BRANDY KVINT KOSHER and DIVIN KVINT KOSHER FOR PASSOVER are now available at LCBO stores, Vintage # 577817 and # 540039.

It is made under control of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of New York (USA), OU, it has the status of Kosher for Passover (approved for Passover).

It is made by special production process with eauxde-vie and wine-distilled spirits aged in oak barrels not less than a year. It features fine golden color, harmonious taste and bright floral aroma with light tones of maturity.

October 2021 / Cheshvan 5782

FIERA FOODS COMPANY IS HIRING! As one of North America’s largest, privately-owned large-scale bakeries, Fiera Foods Company and affiliated companies has an incredible history of expansion, innovation and quality over the past 30 years.

We’re looking for outstanding people to join our outstanding team.

• Production (Mixers, Scalers, Oven Operators, Production Line Operators,

General Production Staff, Forklift Operators, Shipper/Receivers); • Skilled Trades (Electricians, Mechanics, Refrigeration Mechanics, PLC Technicians) • Sales (Canada and US); • Management (Lead hand, Supervisory, Management, Project Engineers)

Our commitment to quality, excellence, and responsiveness are critical to our team and our success. Superior communication, teamwork and attention to detail are expected of everyone.

Please submit your resume and your compensation expectations to jobs@fierafoods.com or call (416) 746 1010 (ext. 258).

We thank all in advance for their interest, however only those selected for interviews will be contacted.

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Jewish Russian Community Centre of Ontario Еврейский Центр Русскоязычной Oбщины

S MCHAT

TORAH

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TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 28

Join the JRCC branch near you for all-night dancing with the Torah on this most joyous holiday.

JRCC OF WOODBRIDGE Rabbi Avrohom Yusewitz 12 Muscadel Rd.

THORNHILL WOODS Rabbi Chaim Hildeshaim 8808 Bathurst St.

EAST THORNHILL Rabbi Mendel Zaltzman 7608 Yonge St., Unit 3

NORTH YORK Rabbi Shmuel Neft 18 Rockford Rd.

RICHMOND HILL/MAPLE Rabbi Avrohom Zaltzman 9699 Bathurst St.

WEST THORNHILL Rabbi Levi Jacobson 1136 Centre St., Unit 2

SOUTH THORNHILL Rabbi Levi Blau 1 Cordoba Dr. (Party Room)

GORSKY COMMUNITY Rabbi David Davidov 465 Patricia Ave. (Downstairs)

CONCORD 411 Confederation Pkwy., Unit 14

WILLOWDALE Rabbi Yisroel Zaltman 5430 Yonge St. (Party Room)

More information: 416.222.7105 Address correction requested

PM 40062996

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