No More Victims
Torah helps us look for the good in everyone and everything. Even adversity is seen as hidden good. The Messianic Age will change our focus to see all the hidden good fully revealed. BECHUKOSAI BECHUKOSAI
Tough Love
One of the least “popular” readings of Torah is this week’s selection, which describes the harsh suffering that would befall the Jewish people in the event that they stray from the teachings of the Torah. It goes without saying that despite the way it sounds to us, all the words of the Torah are equally holy and positive. Even when the words sound harsh, since they are in the Torah, which is described by King Solomon as, “Its ways are pleasant and all of its paths are peace,” we are compelled to conclude that beneath the harsh exterior lays a hidden positive meaning.
One approach to understanding the positive nature of this selection known as the “tochacha-words of rebuke” is that when G-d transforms all of the curses into blessings, the blessings will be so incredible, precisely BECHUKOSAI because they came from the most horrific curses. While we would settle for fewer blessings if we knew that that would eliminate the curses, G-d, in His infinite and unfathomable wisdom chooses otherwise. So we are left with the request to G-d, “Please transform the curses of the past into the most exquisite blessings.”
There is another approach to the understanding of the “curses” based on the fact that the Hebrew text allows us to translate and interpret each and every curse as a blessing.
Baseless Anxiety
In today’s message we will discuss one such verse; first with the standard translation and then with a more creative and positive one.
…and you shall flee when no one will pursue you.
The simple meaning of the text is clear. One of the greatest curses is when a person is filled with anxiety and there is no reason for it. It is worse when it causes the person to flee and can never find rest.
BECHUKOSAI
A Chassidic master translated the same phrase in a positive fashion, but first a brief introduction is in order:
Don’t Wallow in Victimhood
King Solomon in Ecclesiastes states: “G-d looks out for the one who is pursued.” One interpretation of this verse is that G-d looks out for the downtrodden and victimized individuals.
There are some people who take this verse to undesirable extremes and developed a cult of victimization. They wallow in their own suffering and their sole claim to G-d’s relationship with them is their status as one who is being pursued and threatened by others.
Indeed, the Jewish people have been the perennial victims and for that alone we are entitled to G-d’s protection and love. But there is danger in relying on being a victim for our connection to G-d. There is great danger in putting inordinate emphasis on taking up for the victim because in some cases we forget about who is right and who is BECHUKOSAI wrong, and instead look at the one who is weaker and assume that he or she is right just because they are the underdog.
When Israel was yet a fledgling entity and its very existence was in peril, the Western world seemed to have supported Israel. But when Israel won the Six Day War and subsequent military victories, the tables were turned. Many people and countries began to look at the losing side as the one’s that had to be supported. Israel was vilified only because they had the chutzpah to win!
There is a story told of a prominent European personality who supported Israel before the Six Day War. After the Israeli victory he complained: “I was convinced they would lose; that’s why I supported them.”
While being a victim does entitle you to more compassion and support, even from G-d, it is far better to earn G-d’s protection when we are not victims. It is preferable to earn G-d’s love when we do what is good, defend our ourselves, and focus on our purpose in this world to be a force that influences it for the good. In this positive way we earn G-d’s love on a much higher level than if we simply lay BECHUKOSAI claim to G-d’s beneficence because we are the victim.
Let’s Not Define Ourselves by our Suffering
But Judaism is anything but cynicism and pessimism. No matter what, we have never forgotten, and we dare not forget, the promises the Torah has made to us that G-d will take us out of exile and bring about the Redemption.
All of our suffering in the past has turned many of us into cynics and pessimists. Understandably, we have focused much of our attention on the Holocaust and the untold misery it has brought. But, as important as it is to never forget the past, we must not allow our existence to be defined by our suffering.
When we raise children thinking that the defining feature of their Jewish heritage is anti-Semitism and suffering, they will be deprived of the much more desirable role of the Jewish people as a “Nation of priests and a holy people,” and a “Light to the Nations.”
BECHUKOSAI
“You shall be Elevated; Not, You shall Flee”
Now let us return to the foregoing Biblical “curse” and see how it has been retranslated in light of the above:
Instead of translating the Hebrew word “v’nastem” as “you shall flee,” the word can be translated as “and you shall be elevated.” So now the verse reads: “And you shall be elevated when no one shall pursue you.”
This verse takes on a completely new and refreshing meaning: Even when you will not be pursued and you are no longer a victim, you will be elevated. Your relationship with G-d will not depend on your status as a victim. You will no longer have to quote Ecclesiastes to enjoy G-d looking out for you.
Living in Galus has so conditioned us to expect adversity and to look for theological explanations for it.
Now, as we stand on the threshold of the Messianic Era, we have to recondition ourselves to expect positive experiences and to touch G-d’s infinite kindness in the most revealed fashion.
BECHUKOSAI
May we see the complete realization of this imminently with the coming of Moshiach.
BECHUKOSAI
BECHUKOSAI
From the book Light from the Future: Parshas Behar-Bechukosai by Rabbi Heschel Greenberg, published by the Jewish Discovery Center.
