Purim, Redemption and Transcendence

PURIM, REDEMPTION AND

TRANSCENDENCE

The Supremacy of Study

Judaism is all about knowledge. We are enjoined to know G-d, to study Torah, to ask questions and to find answers. In no other culture does learning occupy as exalted a position as it does in Judaism.

This focus on knowledge is echoed in all of the Jewish Holidays:

The Passover Seder revolves around the children whom we encourage to ask questions and a father who is prepared to give answers.

Shavuos is when we celebrate the giving of the Torah – the source of Jewish knowledge.

The night before we relive the experience at Sinai we stay awake learning.

Dwelling in the Sukkah during the Holiday of Sukkos, the Torah tells us, is in order that we know that we were housed in Sukkos. The focus of so many Mitzvos is to remember, probe, learn and know.

Purim and Moshiach the Exceptions

Purim, surprisingly, by contrast, is when we are told that we should drink to the point that we no longer know the difference between cursed is Haman and blessed is Mordechai! No matter how we interpret this controversial requirement – literally, figuratively or both – it is clear that our objective on Purim is not knowledge, but the need to transcend knowledge.

There is a parallel between the transcendence of knowledge associated with Purim and the transcendence of knowledge associated with the future Redemption. The Talmud (Sanhedrin 97a) states that Moshiach is one of three things which come when one’s mind is distracted from it.

Simply put this means that certain things happen when we do not expect them to happen — such as the discovery of a lost object. Similarly, Moshiach’s coming, no matter how much we prepare for it and anticipate it, will be a surprise.

On a deeper level, the Talmud has revealed to us that there is something about Moshiach that goes beyond knowledge. There is something about Moshiach and the future Redemption that does not fit the conventional mold, just as Purim does not fit into the mold of the conventional Holidays we celebrate throughout the year.

Reconciliation

What does it mean to transcend knowledge? And how do we reconcile this idea with Judaism’s obsession with learning and the acquisition of knowledge?

The truth of the matter is that, on the contrary, this exhortation to transcend knowledge does not negate understanding and study, it deepens it.

To go beyond something, one must first reach that something and then overtake it. To go beyond knowledge means to understand as much as is possible to grasp of a subject and then to recognize that there is something about it that cannot be fathomed with conventional tools. At that point we are “compelled” to bring forth new resources from within our soul to access the unknowable. This new resource is the inner faith we all possess that enables us to connect to those spiritual elements of Judaism that are beyond knowledge.

Purim does not negate the conventional values of Judaism. It demands that we should not be satisfied with blessing or embracing Mordechai-good and cursing or repudiating Haman-evil, based on conventional knowledge. We must embrace good and reject evil on a more profound and super-rational dimension as well.

In the present day and age, with all of the hype about the level of knowledge we have achieved in all spheres of life, we do not realize even a fraction of our intellectual potential. To say that in the Messianic Age we will transcend knowledge is to say that we will, first of all, realize all that we can in terms of understanding and then some more. Transcending knowledge in Judaism thus means two things.

First, it demands that we learn, probe and reach the heights of knowledge.

Second, that we then recognize that there is something about G-d and His Torah that is beyond us that can only be grasped with pure faith.

From the book Light from the Future: Purim by Rabbi Heschel Greenberg, published by the Jewish Discovery Center.