Sacks 6/7:6 or 7 Insights by Rabbi Sacks in the Coming Parshiyot

Yitro, Mishpatim, Terumah

Every week or so, depending on the Parsha, I will share 6 or 7 insights from Rabbi Sacks that stuck out to me and will inspire us in the coming week or weeks.

Wishing everyone meaningful and sweet Shabbatot–Shabbat Shalom!

Insight #1 - יִתְרוֹ-The Original Barukh Hashem  (Ex:18:10 p. 517)

‎בָּרוּךְ יְ-ה Blessed be the LORD – The quintessential Jewish expression of thanks, gratitude, and acknowledgment is barukh Hashem, meaning “thank God” or “praise be to the LORD.”

Ḥasidim say of the Baal Shem Tov that he would travel around the little towns and villages of Eastern Europe, asking Jews how they were. However poor or troubled they were, invariably they would reply, “Barukh Hashem.” It was an instinctive expression of faith, and every Jew knew it. They might have lacked the learning of the great talmudic scholar, or the wealth of the successful, but they believed they had much to thank God for, and they did so. 

When asked what he was doing and why, the Baal Shem Tov would reply by quoting the verse “But You are the Holy One, enthroned on Israel’s praises” (Ps. 22:4). Every time a Jew says Barukh Hashem, he or she is helping to make a throne for the Shekhina, the Divine Presence.

Insight #2 - יִתְרוֹ-Shabbat-Live it to Understand It. (Ex. 20:11 p 532)

The Sabbath is the time when humans cease, for a day, to be creators and become conscious of themselves as creations. Just as God had to make space for the finite, so human beings have to make space for the infinite. One way to understand the holy, then, is that it is a time or space that in itself testifies to the existence of something beyond itself. The Sabbath points to a time beyond time: to creation.

The Sabbath is one of those phenomena which you have to live in order to understand. For countless generations of Jews, it was the moment at which we renew our attachment to family and community, during which we live the truth that the world is not wholly ours to bend to our will but something given to us in trust to conserve for future generations.

Insight #3 - יִתְרוֹ-How Can a Feeling be Forbidden? Envy as a Key Danger in our Lives (Ex. 20:14 p 534)

לֹא תַחְמֹד Do not crave – Envy, desiring what someone else has, is an emotion, not a thought, a word, or a deed. Surely, one would think, we cannot help our emotions…So how can envy be forbidden at all? Surely it only makes sense to command or forbid matters that are within our control. In any case, why should the occasional spasm of envy matter if it does not lead to anything harmful to other people?

It matters because envy is one of the prime drivers of violence in society. It is what led Kayin to murder Hevel. Most poignantly, envy lay at the heart of the hatred of the brothers for Yosef. They resented his special treatment at the hands of their father, the richly embroidered cloak he wore, and his dreams of becoming the ruler of them all. That is what led them to contemplate killing him and eventually to sell him as a slave.

The antidote to envy is gratitude. “Who is rich?” asked Ben Zoma, and replied, “One who rejoices in what he has” (Mishna Avot 4:1). 

Through gratitude we learn to celebrate what we have instead of thinking about what other people have, and to be what we are instead of wanting to be what we are not.

Insight #4 - מִּשְׁפָּטִים -Why Should We Help our Enemy? (Ex. 23:4 p 561)

שׁוֹר אֹיְבָךְ Your enemy’s ox — There are two principles at stake in these laws. One is concern for the animal. Jewish law forbids tzaar baalei ḥayim, the needless infliction of pain on animals. It is as if the Torah is saying: A conflict between two human beings should not lead either of them to ignore the fact that the donkey is laboring under its load. It is innocent. Why should it suffer?

The second principle is stronger still. It says, in effect: Your enemy is also a human being. Hostility may divide you, but there is something deeper that connects you: the covenant of human solidarity. Distress, difficulty — these things transcend the language of difference. A decent society will be one in which enemies do not allow their rancor or animosity to prevent them from coming to one another’s assistance when they need help. If someone is in trouble, help. 

There is something distinctive about the Torah’s approach to hatred and enemies. It is realistic rather than utopian. It does not say, “Love your enemy.” It says to help him. Saints apart, we cannot love our enemies..,When your enemy is in trouble, come to his assistance. That way, part of the hatred will be dissipated. …At the heart of the law of the overladen donkey is one of Judaism’s most beautiful axioms: “Who is a hero? One who turns an enemy into a friend” (Avot DeRabbi Natan 23).

Insight #5 - מִּשְׁפָּטִים -Experience in Order to Understand–Opposite of our Logic Leads to Success. (Ex. 24:7 p 568)

The modern Western mind tends to put things in the opposite order. We seek to understand what we are committing ourselves to before making the commitment. That is fine when what is at stake is signing a contract, buying a new mobile phone, or purchasing a subscription, but not when making a deep existential commitment. 

The only way to understand marriage is to get married. The only way to understand whether a certain career path is right for you is to actually try it for an extended period. Those who hover on the edge of a commitment, reluctant to make a decision until all the facts are in, will eventually find that life has passed them by. The only way to understand a way of life is to take the risk of living it. So, naaseh venishma – we shall do, and eventually, through extended practice and long exposure, we shall understand.

Insight #6 - תְּרוּמָה -The Importance of the Giving Muscle (Ex. 25:2 p 576)

The Torah therefore tells us something simple and practical. Give, and you will come to see life as a gift. You don’t need to be able to prove God exists. All you need is to be thankful that you exist – and the rest will follow. That is how God came to be close to the Israelites through the building of the Sanctuary. Where people give voluntarily to one another and to holy causes, that is where the Divine Presence rests.

Insight #7 - תְּרוּמָה -The Role of Sacrifice in our Everyday Relationships (Ex. 27:1 p 595)

Now, however, after several centuries, the idea of love‑as‑sacrifice has grown thin in many areas of life. We see this specifically in relationships. Lose the concept of sacrifice within a society, and sooner or later marriage falters, parenthood declines, and the society slowly ages and dies. 

My predecessor, Lord Jakobovits, had a lovely way of putting this. The Talmud says that when a man divorces his first wife, “the altar sheds tears” (Gittin 90b). What is the connection between the altar and a marriage? Both, he said, are about sacrifices. Marriages fail when the partners are unwilling to make sacrifices for one another.

…Jews and Judaism survived despite the many sacrifices people had to make for it. Equally possible, though, is that Judaism survived because of those sacrifices. Where people make sacrifices for their ideals, the ideals stay strong. Not all sacrifice is holy. But the principle of sacrifice remains. It is the gift we bring to what and whom we love.