October 2, 2021
Author(s): Rabbi Wes Gardenswartz,
Parshat Bereishit
October 2, 2021 — 26 Tishrei 5782
The Catch With the Torah’s Most Important But Hardest Teaching
by Rabbi Wes Gardenswartz
Temple Emanuel, Newton, MA
For years now, every few months I receive a failing grade as a good citizen. Every quarter it comes in the mail: the dreaded and terrifying, triggering and retraumatizing Home Energy Report from National Grid. It compares our energy usage to that of Efficient Neighbors and Average Neighbors. It is never pretty. There are three possible grades: Great, represented by a big smiling face; good, represented by a small smiling face; and the dreaded “Using more than average,” which is represented by a sad, frowning face.
Shira and I try. We really do. But every quarter, we get the sad, frowning face. Not only do we use more energy than Efficient Neighbors, we use more energy than Average Neighbors.
That is every quarter since forever. It came then as a total shocker when, in the most recent report, for the first time ever, we did better–much better–than even our most Efficient Neighbors. We got a big, smiling yellow face with the notation that we used “42% less gas” than efficient neighbors.
I was so proud, I could not wait to bring this National Grid report to share it with you.
There is only one problem. I took one more look at this happy National Grid report and noticed that it covered a period during the heart of the summer when we were not living at home; we were living in the Berkshires on an extended Air B and B. We did not use less energy. We used no energy, which is why our report was so good.
In other words, there was a lovely report, but there was a catch that undoes the lovely report. Beware of the catch that undoes.
I bring up my sad National Grid story because, in a similar way, when our Torah starts off this morning, we get not only a lovely teaching. We get the Torah’s single most important teaching. Every human life contains infinite dignity because we are all created in God’s image, b’tzelem Elohim.
It does not get more compelling than that. The Mishnah in Sanhedrin draws out the centrality of this lesson: Nobody can say I have more yichus than you; nobody can say my blood is redder than yours; nobody can say I am entitled to more of life’s blessings than you are—because all human beings possess equal and infinite dignity, since we are all created by God in the image of God.
This teaching is wonderful, but like my report from National Grid, there is a catch.
While the Torah lays out this inspiring vision of equal and infinite human dignity, and while the Talmud duly notes its centrality, the Torah itself goes on to violate this teaching.
What about Exodus 21:2: “When you acquire a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years; in the seventh he shall go free, without payment.” If human dignity is real, why does the Torah permit slavery.
What about Deuteronomy 7, when Moses demands that the Israelites destroy the holy sites of the seven Canaanite nations: “you shall tear down their altars, smash their pillars, cut down their sacred posts, and consign their images to the fire.” If human dignity is real, why does the Torah mandate destruction of another faith’s holiest sites in God’s name?
How can it be that the Torah says both all people are created in God’s image–and also that slavery is permissible and religious holy war is mandatory? What is the catch here?
We can identify the catch when we consider the verse that Rabbi Akiva famously opined was klal barzel ba’Torah, the basic principle of the Torah: va’ahavta l’reacha kamocha, you shall love your re’ah as yourself. What is a re’ah? If you consult a biblical concordance, a re’ah is used in two related senses. One is a neighbor, somebody you share a zip code with, a fellow citizen. The other is a friend or companion, somebody you really like and have a lot in common with. The most famous and emotional use of the term is reim ahuvim, beloved companions that we use for a couple that just got married, part of the language of the sheva berakhot.
Add this together, and we are commanded to like people who are like us. But somebody who is not like you, somebody who lives in a different zip code, somebody you do not have a lot in common with, somebody you do not like, is not covered by the Torah’s command va’ahvta lere’acha kamocha. That’s the catch. Strangers not included. Enemies not included.
That same catch also obtains with the Torah’s teaching about human dignity. Yes, we all have equal dignity, if we are all in the same community, if we are beloved companions. But the Hebrew slave? Different socioeconomic class. We don’t see him. The seven Canaanite nations? That is our enemy. We don’t see them.
The Torah’s catch should sound deeply familiar to us as Americans. In the Declaration of Independence, our founders offer up words that seem sublime:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal
It’s beautiful. It’s inspiring. But there’s a catch. All men are created equal did not include women. All men are created equal did not include enslaved people. All men are created equal meant men like the founders who wrote it: white Christian land-owning men. The American project has been to expand from this constricted reading to a more expansive reading that includes all fellow citizens.
That is also our Jewish project: to make manifest the Torah’s teaching that all people are created by God and that every human life possesses infinite dignity. How do we do it?
It is not automatic. It is not default. The default is that we like people who are like us. The default is that we have natural connection with people who live in our zip code, or who are our beloved companions. It takes an intentional, conscious effort to transcend tribalism and to be compelled by human dignity. It takes work.
Let me share a vision of what this might look like. Arthur Brooks, an eminent writer and thinker and professor at the Kennedy School of Government, wrote a book called Love Your Enemies. He offers the reader a thought exercise.
I am going to give you a list of one-sentence demographic identities of four people. As you read them, knowing nothing else, form a mental picture, and ask yourself what you feel about each person.
- A Spanish-speaking immigrant woman, raised in poverty in a dictatorship, who comes to America as a young adult and works a minimum-wage job.
- A politically conservative young man from an upper middle-class family, who studies at an Ivy League university.
- A farmhand in rural Idaho, who spends his days driving a combine and his free time hunting and fishing.
- A girl, orphaned at birth in a small village in China, who later winds up against all odds living in the United States.
The reader at first blush might think that I will be most able to picture the demographic most like me; and I will have a harder time relating to the demographic not like me. But he then offers his happy catch.
It turns out that was a trick question. Those four people are my wife of twenty-seven years and our three children. Admittedly, we are way out on the tail in intrafamily diversity… What we do have in common? Intense love for one another, which is the one thing that ultimately matters.
Arthur Brooks married the woman who was orphaned at birth in a small village in China and who against all odds ending up living in the United States. Their three children are the Spanish-speaking immigrant woman, the politically conservative Ivy League grad, and the rural Idaho farmhand. They are not like each other. But they love each other.
Can we do our own version of the same? If we can, that is the Torah’s most important idea living in the real world. If we can, that is religion on its best day. Shabbat shalom.