Everyone knows
that Tisha B’Av (the 9th of Av) is the lowest point
of the Jewish calendar. HaShem’s protective
aura thins, and we grow vulnerable to error and to harm. The
downward tug of this time is ancient, and nearly impossible to
resist. It started when Essav’s guardian angel attacked Yaakov
on this day and dislocated his hip.1 Since the hip
area includes the generative triad (comprised of the three sefirot: netzach, hod, yesod)
kabbala interprets this as an impurifying of the generations
to come. The angel could not penetrate Yaakov’s protective
aura, says R. Tsadok, but it was able to
contaminate the seed-stock of the Jewish people with a smudge
of its narcissistic filth.2,3
In the Torah’s
lexicon of symbols, Essav is the forbear of Amalek,
Israel’s
archenemy—the fearsome embodiment of unrepentant
evil.4 Every other creature has at least a sliver
of soul, a ray of God that dwells within and sustains its
life. Yet these progeny of Essav are hollow men, who absorb
their life juice through their skin.5
They
feed off the sparks that fly from the clashing of matter and
psyches in conflict. They are chronic provocateurs, for their
survival requires exactly this. If conflict would cease, so
would they, for they have no inner wellspring from which to
draw life. These empty creatures with a void at their core are
the spiritual offspring of Amalek. Like viral spores they
float through history, invisible, until they find a host who
is susceptible to their hate-filled contagion.6
Hitler and his
Nazi thugs are textbook specimens of the Amalekian profile
which features the following traits:
-
extreme narcissism
and grandiosity (7.אני
אמלוך.8
כחי ועוצם ידי)
-
causeless hatred
(9אל אחר שאין לו דעת
אסתרס...)
- capacity
for unconscionable cruelty (מי
שיש בו ואכזריות... חוששין לו
ביותר...10)
-
aspiration to
supplant G-d, and rule the world in His stead.
(12ולית דיין.)
The Jewish
I-center views Amalek as the polar opposite other—the one who
possesses all the traits that we, as a people, revile. Yet it
is equally true (from the teaching above) that we also carry a
smidgen of Amalekian stain as descendents of Yaakov’s
(otherwise) holy seed.
Perhaps this is
why our conflicts in this country often deteriorate into
name-calling, with the N-word at the top of the list. We can’t
seem to quarrel about matters close to heart without reducing
the other to an
irredeemable louse. It is most telling that these nazi
accusations go both ways. You are a nazi because
you dare to impose secular values above God’s law. And you are a nazi because
of your racism which amounts to causeless hatred toward people
of different descent.
You are a
nazi because you follow orders like a robot without
questioning their ethics and relevance to the modern world.
And you are nazi for betraying the Jewish people by providing
ammunition to their detractors. And you are a nazi for
creating an apartheid Jewish state. And so it goes, on and on
and on.
If it is true that
causeless hatred prompted the Temple’s demise and only its
opposite can save us…then we have got to find another way to
disagree among ourselves. Wherever we stand on the political
spectrum, the most nazi-like behavior is to reduce our
adversary to his most disagreeable feature, fixate on that
point alone, and then brand him a loathsome nazi with a clear
conscience, for in our narrow vision he shrinks to only that.
And this is what
distinguishes a political frame from a spiritual one. In
politics the power of one’s position comes from proving that
there is not one shred of truth on the other side—you
are completely wrong, and I am completely right. This
has its pros and cons. On the pro side, its (illusion of)
certainty fires passion and reduces anxiety. On the con side,
it is just not true, for it is the nature of our complex world
that real truth is never purely black and white. There is
always a sliver of legitimacy to the other side.
And that is
Judaism’s chidush to the world. Centuries before the
word, “paradox” appeared in the English language, the Talmud
asserted the (higher) truth of paradox as the rectified model
for approaching dispute.13 “These and
these [which totally contradict them], are both words of the
living G-d…Yet in practical matters we follow the ruling of
X.”14
This is the
Talmud’s simple approach to conflict: (1) Identify the truth
of both sides. (2)
After exploring the full range of perspectives and finding the
merit in each—only then is it time to pick the best one to
guide the action at hand. The Talmud’s approach honors truth,
promotes peace and stretches the mind. But it also produces
anxiety—decisions are harder when options are perceived as
shades of gray instead of clearly demarcated blacks and
whites.
You might argue
that I am taking the Talmud’s teaching out of context—that it
only accorded the status of “G-d’s truth” to the words of a
Torah scholar. You might argue that it never intended to
extend this principle to the simple, heretical (and ignorant)
masses. And you might be technically
correct.
Yet, along with
the Torah of ink on parchment there is also the Torah of
souls. Just as there are 600,000 letters of the written Torah,
so are there 600,000 root souls in the spiritual community of
Israel.15 Each individual that comes into the world
embodies some unique piece of one of these sixty myriad
letters. And so, says R. Tsadok,16 just as there is
a scroll of ink on parchment, so is there a scroll of souls
that includes the entire unfolding of generations. The
sum-total of the soul-sparks of Israel comprise a single and
complete Torah…the real Torah…the one that HaShem
studies on His side of the heavenly mechitza.17
And just as “there is no truth that is not
Torah,”18 so there is no Torah that is not holding
some deep and eternal truth. That applies to the Torah on
parchment as well as the Torah of souls, which means there is
always some truth, perhaps very hidden, in the perspective of
every Jew. That
doesn’t mean you have to accept it as your own guiding
light. But it
does mean (if the Talmud be our guide) that you must search it
out, appreciate its point, and then you can decide against it,
if it doesn’t accord with the priorities of your view of the
world.
Let us draw from
the tools of our tradition and apply the Talmud’s model to the
interpersonal challenges of our time. Let us take our
teachings out of the books and into the streets, households
and (batei)
kenesset. If we want to remove the smidgen of
Amalek from our souls, we must learn to
respectfully disagree. HaShem should grant us the ears to hear
the “words of the living G-d” as they radiate from each letter
of His precious Torah of souls. And let the peace that is born
from this practice mach’zik the
brocha19 of mashiach, our fasting
should turn to feasting and we should celebrate redemption,
NOW.
-------------------------
Zohar 1:170b; R.
Tsadok Hokohen, Kometz
Mincha, (Yahadut, Bnei Brak,
5735 / 1975), p. 71-78 (*74); R. Natan Sternholz of Beslov,
Likutey Halachoth, Orach Chaim, Hilchoth Hodayah
6:25.
2 R. Tsadok Hokohen,
ibid.
3 Gen. 36:1
identifies Essav with Edom, and Gen. 36:31-39
describes the “kings that ruled in Edom before there was a king to
the children of Israel.” R. Isaac
Luria (Ari) reads
this passage as hinting to the seven primordial universes
created and destroyed before our own, or eighth in the
sequence. These first seven kings (or primordial worlds) were
riddled with narcissism and shared a lust to rule the world
(“ani emlokh”).
Consequently, in kabbala, Edom becomes
synonymous with power-lust and
narcissism.
4 Gen.
36:12.
5 Leshem, HDOH,
chelek 2, drush 4, anaf 18, siman 7.
6 R. Tsadok HaKohen,
Yisrael Kedoshim, chapter 8 (p. 97, first
edition).
7 Deut.
8:17.
8 Kings 1:1:5. The
sefira of daat is the place where empathy
originates, and Kabbala explains that “the other god, is
castrated, and has no daat (ie no capacity for true
empathy).
9 Zohar 2:103a; Ari,
Eytz Chayim, shaar 48, perek 2; Gra, Sifra d’Tsniuta, perek
3,4.
10
שו"ע אבן העזר סימן
ב, TB Yevamot
78b-79a.
11 BR
26:6.
12 BR 26:6.
13 The word, paradoxus is
of Greek origin, but its original meaning was “something
surprising and unexpected.”
14 TB Eruvin
13b
15 Zohar Chadash 74d, Megalla
Amukoth 186. This
count includes the subletters (for example, that letter alef is built from
two yuds and a vav.
Otherwise, there are 304, 805 letters in the
Torah.
16 ר' צדק
הכהן, צדקת הצדיק אות קצ"ו (סוף).
17 ר, שלמה עליאשאוו, ספר הכללים, כלל ח"י ענף י' סימן ג'
אות י"ב.
18 TY RH
3:8.
19 Mishna, Uktzin 3:12.
“R. Simeon b.
Halafta said: the Blessed Holy One found no vessel that could
grasp and contain blessing for Israel save that of
peace, as it is written: the Lord will give strength unto his
people; the Lord will bless his people with
peace.”
)