Parashat Naso: What Can You Live Without?

Theologian Margaret Miles writes that moderns would do well to see the value of asceticism, the religious ideal that one should refrain from worldly pleasures in pursuit of loftier spiritual goals.   In fact, in an age of overwhelming wealth and privilege, alongside an ever-present danger of crass materialism, Miles argues that we may need a “new asceticism” now more than ever.  She writes:

“...Scriptural language...sets the human being either in the perspective of connection to the source of life and being, or in that of the disorientation caused by clutching at objects of immediate pleasure and enjoyment.  Such objects, good in themselves, become “too dear” in that the person becomes attached to them instead of to the source of life and being.  They become addictive.  Because they are created thing that owe their being to the generosity of the Creator, they cannot provide the infinite life and satisfaction for which human beings long.   We are addicted when we refuse to recognize that we demand of these objects what they cannot provide.   We need to recognize that forcing them beyond their capacity to give devalues them, and that we must continually be frustrated by their inability to give us greater life” (Margaret R. Miles, Fullness of Life: Historical Foundations of a New Asceticism, 157-158).

According to MIles, the things about which the average human being obsesses, namely material possessions, wealth, and status, are the things that we actually need the least, and, according to Miles, most take away the individual from the pursuit of God.  In contrast, a life of controlling one’s desires, a life where abstention is considered a virtue, is a life Miles is says is most worthy living today.   

Parashat Naso describes the Torah’s model of an ascetic, the nazir.  According to our parasha, the nazir, “shall abstain from wine and strong drink: he shall drink no vinegar of wine, or vinegar of strong drink, neither shall he drink any liquor of grapes, nor eat fresh grapes or dried” (Bemidbar 6:3).   While Jews are no longer able to take a vow of nezirut today, our commentators sought to understand what universal messages we might draw from the specific prohibitions observed by the nazir.  Attempting to draw a distinction between what the Nazir must do and not do in order to demonstrate their devotion to God, Obadiah Seforno argues that the Torah wants to make clear that the Nazir devotes his life to God by way of abstaining from certain worldly pleasures, as opposed to physically harming himself.  Seforno states:

“...he is not to flagellate himself, or practice fasting, but only to abstain from wine and intoxicating liquids.  The former methods of self-denial would result in a diminished ability to serve the Lord with all one’s faculties.   Flagellation, a common practice among certain types of monks and “holy men,” is not allowed, but becoming a teetotaler does reduce the urge to let oneself go and engage in demeaning activities due to drunkenness” (Seforno on Bemidbar 6:3).

According to Seforno, it is foolish and dangerous to assume that one can show devotion to God by making their body unable to function.   Instead, Seforno argues that one can show devotion to God by demonstrating that one does not need all worldly pleasures to achieve satisfaction in this world, and abstaining from these behaviors will ultimately lead to rewards in the next world.

Taking a similar approach to Seforno, while emphasizing the lesson that non-Nazirites can learn from the laws of the Nazir, Abraham Ibn Ezra argues that the Torah tells us that the laws of the Nazi place so much emphasis on the head to symbolize the spiritual kingship of one who chooses to take on these obligations.   Ibn Ezra states:

“Hair set apart for his God is upon his head”: Some say that “nazirite” is related to nezer, “headdress,” and since our phrase literally says, “the nezer of his God is upon his head,” that is not at all implausible.  Know that all human beings are slaves to worldly appetites.  But the truth king, who wears the kingly crown of nezer upon his head, is he who is free of appetite” (Ibn Ezra on Bemidbar 6:7).

Ibn Ezra argues that the abstentions observed by the nazir reflect an ideal state of living for all human beings, where every person is able to restrict his or her appetites, putting aside trivial things in pursuit of godly devotion.   As a result, the nazir is not only an individual who made a choice to pursue the true path of divine devotion, but a paradigm for how all of humanity can serve God.

Finally, in the modern day, Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, one of the leading thinkers in Modern Orthodox Judaism in the twentieth-century, writes that the entire goal of religious observance is reflected in the life chosen by the nazir, a life where one attains highest levels of sanctity by way of asceticism and abstinence.   Rav Soloveitchik writes:

“The aspiration to achieve a state of ecstatic transcendentalism, the negation of life and this mortal world, the annihilation of existence and reality, the reaching out of the religious personality to the ethereal world that stretches beyond the confines of tangible existence is embodied in many of the systems of conduct involving asceticism, vows of abstinence and withdrawal from society.   The religious personality sometimes imagines that afflictions, suffering, fasts and solitude constitute the media bringing immortal happiness to man...According to his outlook, the man who withdraws from the world and forgoes earthly and ephemeral pleasures is rewarded with eternal life and a sublime, spiritual existence” (Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, “The Halakhic Personality,” WZO Department for Torah Education, Jerusalem, 5739).

For Rav Soloveitchik, Judaism is a spiritual discipline, an opportunity for everyday actions of abstention to pursue a sanctified spiritual existencce.  Furthermore, Soloveitchik argues that when religious people make the choice to give up something pleasurable to them, those individuals are defining what “pleasure” means in a radically different way, for pleasure, to the religious mind, is found in moments of divine connection, rather than earthly desire.

While Judaism always places emphasis on the importance of expressing gratitude for good fortune, our parasha reminds us that there is value in resisting the temptation to only want and take more, and that the nazir develops a unique connection to God by way of learning what they can live without.   This week, ask yourselves how you are teaching your children the value of holding back from their desires, and seeing the immense personal value that can come from resisting their urges.   If we can teach our children to ask what they can live without, we will take one small towards a life of genuine abundance, pleasure and holiness.

Shabbat Shalom!

Parashat Bemidbar: A Person’s a Person

Don't give up! I believe in you all.

A person's a person, no matter how small!

And you very small persons will not have to die

If you make yourselves heard! So come on, now, and TRY!

• Dr. Seuss, Horton Hears a Who (1954)

Regardless of whether or not we view the Torah as historical truth or a divinely-inspired text, the Torah-text focuses almost exclusively on the lives of the Israelites elites, the people who are directly receiving God’s messages and commands for the people.    While we learn a great deal about Moses, Miriam, and Aaron, we learn very little about the everyday lives of ordinary Israelites, which might lead one to conclude that the Torah is simply not concerned about individuals, and sees the Israelites as a single corporate entity.   However, in Parashat Bemidbar, where Moses is commanded to take another census of the Israelites, our commentators’ understanding our parasha’s message will teach us, like Dr. Seuss writes, that a person’s a person, and that counts a great deal.

Parashat Bemidbar opens the fourth book of the Torah with God commanding Moses to, “Take a census of the whole Israelite community by the clans of its ancestral houses, listing the names, every male, head by head” (Bemidbar 1:1-3).  On the one hand, almost all our commentators who take a peshat (contextual) approach to reading our parasha argue that the census in our parasha was given solely for the purpose of identifying those males fit for military conscription.   However, the question remains as to why God would command a census at all, for surely God would be able to count the Israelites without the aid of Moses and the Israelite leadership.

In a medieval commentary, the Ramban argues that the taking on census is more a theological statement than a practical one, because God wanted to the Israelites and the world to see how much God’s chosen people grew in size from the time when Jacob and his family went down to Egypt, seventy in number, until the time when the Israelites were ready to journey to Canaan.  The Ramban states (emphasis mine):

“It was necessary for the Torah to record the total number after giving the details because Moses and Aaron had been commanded to ascertain the number of the people and the number of each tribe, for this was the manner of kings to number the people.  But I have not understood the reason for this commandment, why God ordered it (i.e. to record the general total).  It was necessary to know the number of each tribe separately for the purpose of the arrangement of the camp according to standards, but why was it necessary to know the general number?   Perhaps the idea was to make known God’s loving kindness unto them, that when their fathers went down to Egypt they numbered only seventy souls and now they were as the sand of the sea.  And after every pestilence and plague God numbered them in order to make known that although he wounds, he also makes whole again, in accordance with what our Sages said, “out of an abundance of love for them God numbers them frequently.”” (Ramban on Bemidbar 1:45).

In this commentary, the Ramban points out that commanding Moses to go through a human-driven process of counting the Israelites will allow the Israelites to discover themselves how much they have grown in number.  By extension, by allowing the Israelites to realize for themselves how much they’ve grown as a people, they will also come to realize that God’s promise that Abraham’s descendants would be as numerous as the “sands in the sea” had finally come to pass.

While the Ramban that asking Moses to take a census at all reveals an important theological message, the Torah commentary of Rabbi Yosef Karo, known as the Toldot Yitzhak, argues that how Moses and Aaron took the census itself also reveals a message about the connection between God and the Israelites.   Karo states:

“The Israelites were not counted by their heads, nor were they counted by giving the half-shekel.  Each person wrote down his name on a slip of paper and gave it to Moses our Teacher, Aaron and the heads of the Tribes.  Then the slips of paper were counted.  This form of census portrayed a great level for the Israelites, since each one was counted separately.   In this way God would remember each and everyone for a blessing” (Toldot Yitzhak on Bemidbar 1:2).

For the Toldot Yitzhak, each individual (male) Israelite had the opportunity to be counted as a distinct individual in the census taken in Parashat Bemidbar.   By allowing each person to be counted, individual Israelites were transformed from nameless faces in the proverbial crowd to individuals whose existence matters and is known.

Finally, taking a similar theme to the Toldot Yitzhak, but emphasizing the census’ impact on Moses himself, Rabbi Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev writes in his Kedushat Levi that taking the census was intimately connected to Moses learning the Torah.   Rabbi Levi Yitzhak states:

“The verse would have made more sense in the reverse order: Moses counted them, as God had commanded him.  But this appear to be the meaning: God gave the Torah to Israel, and the souls of Israel form the body of the Torah.  There are six hundred thousand Jewish souls, parallel to the number of letters in the Torah.  Israel, in others, are the Torah.  Each one of us constitutes one of the Torah’s letters.   By counting Israel, therefore, Moses was learning the Torah” (Kedushat Levi on Bemidbar 1:19).

In this final commentary, the taking of a census is akin to learning Torah, the rabbinic ideal of how we engage with God’s message for humanity in our daily lives.  If God created human beings in his image, then counting each human being in a census is a reminder that everything we do for humanity imbues our life with God’s worldview for how human beings should treat one another, a world where every person counts.

In each commentary, the ability to recognize and identify the presence of each individual in a community makes an important statement about the spiritual aspirations for the community itself.  When a community ensures that no individual is lost in the crowd, and no one’s presence is considered expendable, the community makes a statement about what it means to emphasize dignity, justice and fairness.    At Schechter, we pride ourselves on making sure that each child is taught in a way that meets their unique needs, a vision echoed in our parasha, one that we must ensure continues to thrive in our school community and the entire Jewish world.   

Shabbat Shalom!

Parashat Behukotai: Find Your Element

Sir Ken Robinson wants to transform education by shifting our traditional modes of learning to a process where each individual can discover his or her “element,” the subject that this student loves to learn, something that is essential to that student’s “identity, purpose, and well-being.”   Robinson writes:

“The Element is the meeting point between natural aptitude and personal passion. What you’ll find in common among the people you’ve met in this chapter and the vast majority of the people you will meet in the coming pages is that they are doing the thing they love, and in doing it they feel like their most authentic selves. They find that time passes differently and that they are more alive, more centered, and more vibrant than at any other times” (Ken Robinson, The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything, 21).  

Jewish tradition takes embraces wholeheartedly the approach outlined by Robinson, for Judaism is not content for someone to simply “study” Torah.   Our tradition uses word like cleave, immerse, and embrace Torah, sending the message that only when a person considers Torah their “element” will he or she actualize God’s vision for the Jewish people.   

This approach is echoed in how rabbis analyze the first verse in Parashat Behukotai, which states that  “If you walk in My statutes, keeping and performing My commandments, I will grant your rains [gishmeykhem] in their times” (Vayikra 26:3-4).   While a first-reading of the parasha might lead us to conclude that the Torah uses the words “laws” and “commandments” for rhetorical effect, our traditional commentators reject the idea that any literary device is only used by the Torah for rhetorical effect. Taking a familiar approach, Rashi argues that the purpose of this verse is to make Torah study the central value of the Jewish people.  Rashi states:

“If you follow My laws and faithfully observe my commandments”: “Follow My laws” would seem to mean “observe my commandments.”  But if that is stated explicitly, what is meant by “follow My laws”?  That one should labor in the study of Torah, and one should do so in order to “observe my commandments.”   As Deuteronomy 5:1 says, “Hear, O Israel, the laws and rules that I proclaim to you this day!  Study and observe them faithfully”” (Rashi on Vayikra 26:3).

On the one hand, Rashi’s commentary identifies that the seeming redundancy in the Torah-text between the words “laws” and “commandments” actually draws a distinction between the study of Torah specifically and pursuit of mitzvot generally.   However, Rashi’s commentary also expands upon the contextual meaning of our parasha, asserting that we do not follow Gody only through the observance of mitzvot, but also through engaging in the passionate pursuit of a divine connection through Torah study.

Taking an approach that combines philosophy and mysticism, Bahya ben Joseph ibn Pakuda, otherwise known as Rabbeinu Bahya, writes in his Hovat Ha-Levavot (The Book of Direction to the Duties of the Heart) that the verse in our parasha connects rainfall with the observance of mitzvot because the observance of mitzvot is connected to the sustenance to humanity and the entire world.   He states:

“You must know that God in His Holy Book has entrusted the world and everything in it to your service, for your welfare, on condition that you obey Him.   If you disobey Him, everything will disobey you too, as is made clear in the Scriptures: “If you walk in My statutes, keeping and performing My commandments, I will grant your rains in their season, and the land shall yield her produce, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit” (Vayikra 26:3)” (Bahya ben Joseph Ibn Pakuda, The Book of Direction to the Duties of the Heart, “On Self-Reckoning for God’s Sake,” Translation by Menahem Mansoor, 360).

For Rabbeinu Bahya, the foundation of the world depends upon the observance of the mitzvot, because God entrusted us to live our lives in a way that reflects God’s Torah.   While taking a different approach than Rashi, Rabbeinu Bahya’s commentary reminds us mitzvot are meant to be an all-consuming approach to life, and not merely a secret of discrete acts.

Finally, the Or Torah writes in his Hasidic commentary that this verse from our parasha shows that one cannot truly embrace Torah unless they perform mitzvot with passion and devotion.    He states:

“...This verse may also be applied to fulfilling the commandments.  A person who understands the meaning of a commandment and its origin will do it with incomparably more fervor and desire than one who does not, who follow it as a statute for which no reason is given in the Torah.  Even if the latter person does it to fulfill God’s decree, it just cannot bear the same enthusiasm.  Thus: If you walk in My statutes.  Even when you don’t know the reason, you walk with devotion and fervor.   This will be even more true of My commandments, where you know the reasons.   Then I will grant your rains, [purifying your bodily selves: gishmeykhem].”   (Or Torah on Leviticus 26:3-4, in Arthur Green ed., Around the Maggid’s Table, 310).

In this final commentary, it is not enough to observe the mitzvot; the mitzvot must be observed in a particular way, and with a particular mindset.   Whether we call it passion or devotion, our parasha challenges us to see a full embrace of God’s Torah as the only way to truly show that we are following his words.

While our students at Schechter primarily learn about Judaism by sitting and studying in a classroom, ultimately our vision for Jewish education is that each child find their pathway to make Judaism something essential to their purpose, and a passion they wholeheartedly embrace.   By extension, if we wish to make sure that our children are in their element when studying Torah, then it follows that we must take that challenge in our own lives.  This Shabbat, ask yourself, “What do I need to do make Torah my element?,” and then go out and do it.  It will be the best choice you’ll ever make.

Shabbat Shalom!

Parashat Behar: A World of Opportunity

In 1751, the colony of Pennsylvania ordered the creation of a bell that would celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of William Penn’s Charter of Privileges, the colony’s original constitution that granted unprecedented religious freedom and government participation for the colony’s citizens.  Because this “Liberty Bell,” as it became known, would be constructed for the colony’s jubilee celebration, the makers of the bell chose to inscribe a famous verse from Parashat Behari, “Proclaim liberty (dror) throughout the land to all its inhabitants” (Vayikra 25:10).   In making the choice to describe this biblical verse on the bell, the colonists were making the statement that their colony should be a place with freedom of a unique and special quality.

Jewish tradition ascribes equal importance to the verse chosen by the colonists of Pennsylvania, as our parasha includes this verse in the description on how the Israelites should observe the yovel (Jubilee Year), a time when all slaves should be freed, and all debts should be cancelled.  When examining the language chosen by our Torah, our commentators asked why the Torah uses the word dror for “freedom” or “liberty,” as opposed to hofesh, the more commonly used word for freedom.   While attempting to explain this linguistic, our commentators will help us discover that not all freedom is created equal. Rashi argues that the term dror connotes a finality and complete freedom of movement for the formerly enslaved person.   He states:

“You shall proclaim dror”: For release.  The slave is released even if his six years of service are not up, and even if his ear has been pierced with an awl, making him a slave “for life” (Shemot 21:6).  Said R. Judah: “What is the meaning of this word dror?   He lives on his own and conducts business anywhere in the country.”  That is, he may dar, reside, anywhere he likes-he is under no one else’s authority.  That is what “release” means” (Rashi on Vayikra 25:10).   

According to Rashi, the essence of the word dror is that when the yovel year comes, the previously enslaved person is now “under no one else’s authority.”   However, Rashi’s commentary also implies that merely being granted physical freedom does not warrant the use of the word dror, for this word denotes an additional kind of freedom, one that requires deeper exploration.

Rabbi Avraham Bedersi writes in Hotam Tokhnit, a late twentieth-century book analyzing the usage of synonyms and antonyms in Jewish texts, that a subtle, but essential difference, exists between the words dror and hofesh.   According to Bedersi, “Both terms are antonyms to bondage, but dror surpasses the other in that is denotes charity and purity, i.e., anything free of dross and corruption,” making the word dror not merely a word connoting personal freedom, but that word signifies a certain kind of world. Bedersi writes:

“This meaning of dror stands out in, “And you shall proclaim liberty (dror) throughout the land to all its inhabitants” (Vayikra 25:10), not only to the servants but also to the sold fields, to be returned to their original owners in the yovel year, and to the farmers who interrupt their work on the land.  Thus, “And you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants...and you shall return every man to his possession, and you shall return every man to his family.   A yovel shall shall that fiftieth year be to you, you shall not sow...For it is the yovel, it shall be holy to you…” (Ibid. 10-12).   Deror implies an absence of fear and impediment” (Rabbi Avraham Bedersi, Hotam Tokhnit, translation taken from Nehama Leibowitz, New Studies in Vayikra, Vol. 2, 533).

The Torah uses the word hofesh to describe an individual person’s freedom, yet when Torah single use of the word dror implies what Bedersi considers to be the “unqualified freedom” that can only come in the yovel, where debts are released, slaves freed, and society returns to an original state where people have an equality of opportunity that did not exist previously.    

When we place our parasha in a larger historical context, Bedersi’s reading makes a great deal of sense. In the JPS Torah Commentary, Baruch Levine writes that the term dror reflects an ancient Babylonian practice of new kings releasing those people previously enslaved under prior regimes.  Levine writes:

““You shall proclaim release throughout the land…”: The Hebrew term deror has conventionally been rendered “freedom, liberty.”   More has been learned about it in recent years, however.   Hebrew deror is cognate with Akkadian anduraru, which designates an edict of release issued by the Old Babylonian kings and some of their successors.  This edict was often issued by a king upon ascending the throne and was a feature of a more extensive legal institution known as mesharum, a moratorium declared on debts and indenture” (Baruch A. Levine, The JPS Torah Commentary: Leviticus, 171).

In this commentary, Levine notes that the word dror reflect a state of affairs where a new regime wants to wipe the societal slate clean, and allow ordinary citizens to not be encumbered by previous policies that deprived them of freedom of movement an opportunity.    By extension, when the Torah states that we should proclaim dror throughout the land, our text proclaims that the yovel is a chance for a fresh start and a new world.

In each of these commentaries, we are reminded that mere physical freedom, hofesh, does not matter unless a world of opportunity is open to the newly freed person, the state of affairs our parashah attempts to capture when saying that we shall declare dror during the yovel year.   Like the motivation of those who carved this verse on the Liberty Bell, not all freedom is created equal, for dror (liberty) is a moment when a person feels a new world is open to them.   The message from our parasha and the Liberty Bell is one that must give us pause as we educate our children to be independent thinkers, for one day, each of them will walk out into the world a “free” person, yet if we do not help them see the world as one of immense opportunity, then the freedom is not the quality of which we should expect for them.   As a Schechter Community, may we heed the message of our parasha, and help shape a world where freedom is proclaimed, so that our children all people might see the possibilities a pure and holy freedom will bring.

Shabbat Shalom!

Parashat Emor: Excellence Through Torah

In The Smartest Kids in the World, journalist Amanda Ripley writes that when American education officials tried to understand why our students performed so poorly on the PISA (Program for International Student Assessment), a test given to compare the educational achievement of students around the world, these officials founds that while the the United States does provide superior educational resources to many countries, we continue to struggle in terms of knowing how to execute education in a way that leads to excellence.  Ripley writes:

“In essence, PISA revealed what should have been obvious but was not: that spending on education did not make kids smarter. Everything—everything—depended on what teachers, parents, and students did with those investments . As in all other large organizations , from GE to the Marines, excellence depended on execution, the hardest thing to get right” (Amanda Ripley, The Smartest Kids in the World: And How They Got That Way, 17-18).

When we compare American students with students around the world, what we discover is that all the fancy gadgets and high-profile commissions are meaningless unless we can create an educational culture of rigor, excellence, and sweat.   Day-after-day, we have a choice learn in a culture of excellence, a vision echoed in this week’s parasha’s description of Sefirat Ha-Omer.

When describing the process for counting the omer, Parashat Emor states that, “Seven complete (temimot) sabbaths shall there be” (Vayikra 23:15), leading our commentators to ask why the Torah uses the term temimot for “complete,” when one could argue that counting an entire week implies that the one counted the entire week, and it might make more linguistic sense to use the term sheleimut for “complete.” The Ramban argues that the essence of Sefirat Ha-Omer is that one should perform the mitzvah exactly as God proscribes; no more, no less.   He writes:

“They must be complete”: They must be counted precisely, neither less nor more--each week must be “without blemish,” as the same Hebrew phrase is translated elsewhere (e.g. 22:21).  Too much is as much of a blemish as too little” (Ramban on Vayikra 23:15).   

On the one hand, this passage from the Ramban is decidedly simple; a person should simply perform the mitzvah exactly as God commands it.  At the same time, an implicit message of the Ramban’s commentary is that even something as simple as counting a measure of grain must be done with care and commitment, for even small acts are opportunities to demonstrate a Jew’s devotion to Torah.

Taking a spiritual approach, an early midrash connects counting the omer with the larger task of fulfilling all of God’s mitzvot.   The midrash states:  “R. Hiyya taught: Seven complete sabbaths shall there be--when are they complete?  When Israel fulfills God’s will” (Vayikra Rabbah 27:3).   Expanding upon this midrash, Rabbi Yaakov Tzvi of Mecklenburg writes in his Ha-Ketev V’Ha-Kabbalah that the counting of the omer is not merely a mimetic collection of grain, but a process of spiritual fulfillment:

“R. Hiyya taught: Seven temimot complete sabbaths shall there be--when are they temimot complete?  When Israel fulfills God’s will.  This homiletic interpretation is based on the use of temimot instead of sheleimut in the text.  Whereas the latter implies quantity, the former signifies quality.  Our Sages carefully analyzed the text...Thus the quality as well as the number of the days is important in the counting of the omer” (Ha-Ketev V’Ha-Kabbalah on Vayikra 23:15).

In this commentary, the omer must be counted in weeks that are temimot because the process of counting the omer is one small step in living a life of mitzvot.   By extension, the way that a Jew lives a life of Torah is through a daily commitment to caring passionately that mitzvot are performed diligently and lovingly.

Finally, Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch, the German-rabbi generally identified as the founder of Modern Orthodox Judaism, writes in Horeb that Sefirat Ha-Omer is a public statement of the Israelites’ liberation, an acknowledgment that freedom from slavery requires communal ritual if the Israelites are to show gratitude for the blessings God bestowed upon them.   Hirsch writes:

“You have celebrated the Fear of your Liberation and remembered before your God your independence, living in your land and eating its produce.  You have therefore reached your freedom and the benefits of independence, the very goals all nations aspire to.  You, however, are but on the threshold of your calling as a nation, and have started counting the days to the attainment of another goal.  The Torah expresses the command of the omer counting in the following terms: “From such time as thou begins to put the sickle to the corn, shall you commence to count seven weeks” (Devarim 16:9).   When others cease to count, you begin your counting” (SR Hirsch, Horeb, in Leibowitz: Vayikra, Vol. 2, 431).   

According to Rabbi Hirsch, the danger of the Exodus from Egypt was that the Israelites might see the Exodus as the end of their journey, when, in reality, the Exodus was just the beginning of a lifelong journey to serve God.   The moment the Israelites begin the counting of the omer, they are working towards an individual goal that is a piece of a much larger goal, to live a life of excellence through Torah.

No person’s personal, educational, spiritual or professional success is guaranteed, and it should go without saying that achievement is only the result of hard work and commitment to excellence.  At the same time, Parashat Emor reminds us that the mitzvah of Sefirat Ha-Omer symbolizes how daily commitment to precision and excellence is the process by which the Israelites will come to embody Torah, and provides a model for how we might pursue a similar excellent in our spiritual and personal lives.    As we continue the period of Sefirat Ha-Omer, may we continue to encourage our children and Schechter Community to strive for the high standard presented in our parasha, ensuring that each day is step on a larger journey towards a life of excellence.   

Shabbat Shalom!