Gentlemen, an amazing observation about human nature in today’s learning.  We are on the topic of ritual impurity, which is quite involved.

When a man is ritually impure he needs to immerse in a pool of rainwater (mikvah) or spring to become pure before eating sacred foods or entering the Temple. The procedure after touching a corpse is more complex.

Our sages made a decree that someone should not take a shower just after immersion. The reason was because sometimes the mikvah was old rain water standing in a cave, and people felt dirty after immersion and then had drawn water poured over them.  The problem was some people got confused, thinking that the immersion in the mikvah was just preparation and the shower was the main step to make them pure.  After all, they felt dirty after the immersion and felt clean after the shower.  Our sages saw that some uneducated people would come to skip the immersion altogether and just shower, and remain ritually contaminated. So to keep people from following their feelings instead of the law of mikvah, they instituted no more shower just after immersion.

 

Naturally you understand that our sages 2000 years ago enjoyed a deep understanding of human nature.  People follow their feelings.  Especially when the people may not be fully educated.  There may be areas of your own life where you go with your emotional response and this causes problems.  Think about this and become aware when you fall into this trap.  Then use your intellectual abilities to set a reminder or boundary to prevent your feelings from causing issues.
A simple example of this is never go shopping for food while hungry, this leads to impulse buying caused by your feelings.  You can generalize this concept to approach life with a feeling of plenty so you won’t give your time and energy to things are not worthwhile.  Our patriarch Jacob stated: “I have everything” (Genesis 33:11).  This is the attitude of abundance, knowing you already have what you need.  This helps you to avoid pitfalls in relationships and greed in business.

 

 

There is a historical note in today’s learning that shines light on today’s corrupt approach to marriage and divorce.  Our sages list various decrees on ritual purity made by prior generations, noting Shimon ben Shatach established marriage contracts for women and made a decree on metal.  Actually the marriage contract, Ketuvah, existed before this decree (there is hint in Ex 22:15), but before Shimon ben Shatach, a man could write that a wife’s Ketuvah is only from a certain field.  If he got angry, he could just say take the field and go.  The new mechanism was to lien the husband’s entire estate to the Ketuvah, so a court would need to appraise his fields or property first to pay to correct amount.  This was to slow down the process and make the husband think twice about divorce.  This is especially important for Cohanim (priests) who cannot remarry their wives.

 

We are learning about the Sabbath, we don’t have time now to discuss Jewish divorce in detail.  Modern men may hear this decree and think that Shimon ben Shatach was a great feminist to put a lien on the entire estate for her.  However, as we will learn God willing when we study divorce, a woman who was divorced was entitled only to one year of food.  It was more difficult for women to be financially independent in ancient societies, but it was assumed that she could learn to manage herself after a year.  This was not an open ended commitment with endless support payments, it was a fixed amount.  In addition, women could not unilaterally divorce their husbands.  Because of this, divorce was very rare.

In modern America, women file the vast majority of divorces, and the system is rigged to give them financial incentive to do so.  Today’s divorce industry is designed to enrich lawyers and women at the expense of men, and structured in a way to encourage women to divorce for money and prizes.  In conventional Judaism divorce was discouraged and financial commitments are limited to a reasonable sum.  This resulted in a more stable society with healthier families.

 

This week we study the portion “Vayakhel”, Exodus 35-38:20.  We also read the portion of “Pekudei” this year, in leap years they are separate.  Our learning focuses on the construction of the Mishkan, the Tabernacle, a portable Sanctuary complex.

We explored the reasons building the Tabernacle was necessary, and the importance of the donations being voluntary.  This week the Bible describes how the people brought the materials for the Tabernacle and wove or constructed the materials to create the Tabernacle and the items used within such as the Holy Ark, Table, and Menorah.

At the outset, Moses reminds the people that doing work on the Sabbath is forbidden, Ex 35:2.  We already know about the centrality of Shabbat in conventional Judaism:

Conventional Jews for millennia have refrained from constructive work in the Sabbath, from dusk on Friday through Saturday night.  God commands us to observe the Sabbath as a remembrance to Creation, which occurred over six days.  It also serves as a time of freedom after a period of work, making it a reminder of our Exodus from slavery in Egypt.  The Jewish Sabbath is the origin of the nearly universal concept of a weekend, so the Sabbath is also a gift to every person in the world…

Jews who fully observe the Sabbath are assumed to keep conventional Jewish law in all areas, since it takes a great commitment and dedication to properly keep the Sabbath.

The Sabbath is a Divine command, but also has practical social effects.  It gives Jews a chance to get together once a week, as a family and as a community.  We pray and learn together and enjoy deluxe meals (cooked before Shabbat).  It is an opportunity to meet people, invite friends over, and socialize.  Customarily it was also a time to set up young men and women on dates (as we have learned, this not to arrange marriage, but to help the younger generation focus their prospects).

Moses was reminding the Jewish nation about the Sabbath for a particular reason.  God had just commanded the people to begin work on the Tabernacle.  They may have thought that a Divine command to accomplish something, such as construction, would trump a command to avoid doing something, such as working on the Sabbath.

We have a general concept that a positive command “get up and do” overrides a negative command.  The restrictions of the Sabbath, as a key facet of Jewish observance and identity, were not overridden by building the Tabernacle.

The “get up and do” concept works in your own life, in any area.  There is much more value in doing something now than waiting around for something to be happen for you.  Choosing not to take action is itself a choice, and not always the correct one.  If you feel lethargic, just going outside or exercising can snap you out of that.

Certainly developing your own wisdom, learning new approaches to life, working on your business or body will override whatever negativity you are feeling.  Use “get up and do” as a motto whenever you are not accomplishing on the level you could.

The people were later told to stop bringing materials for the Tabernacle, since they had enough (36:6), and because bringing items from the public domain to the camp of the Levites, where the construction was taking place, was forbidden on the Sabbath.

We see from here that despite the donations being voluntary (except for the one small coin used as a census), everyone pitched in and there was more than enough material.  The people who had already given wanted to bring more and more and Moses had to tell them to stop.

There is a deep concept here:  when you are in a giving more, putting your personal energy and ideas out into the world, you will always have something to give.  If you are focused instead on taking and getting from others, you will not have enough to give.

There are people who are “takers” in life, often in the form of taking time from other people for their own emotional needs.  They tell you all their problems and troubles and you feel drained and they are not better for it.

Friends, don’t let them take your time and energy.  There are other people, who even when you give them from your time, you are also recharged and invigorated after.  That is what you want to find.

Cherubim

The Bible describes the construction of the famous Cherubim (37:7).  Commonly these are understood as having the shape of angels or angelic children.  God told us at Sinai not to make any idols (Ex 20:4) and also “don’t make the image of anything you saw with me” (Exodus 20:20).  Rashi on this verse notes this includes a prohibition on making other Cherubim for synagogues like they had in the Tabernacle and Temple.

However, we again see the concept that a positive command “get up and do” to build Cherubim overrides a negative command.  Since we were commanded to make these Cherubim, that overrides the command to not make images (not that they were idols, but even making a statute for non idol purpose is forbidden).

Naturally we need to clarify, angelic topics can be a source of confusion.  We don’t pray to angels.  They have no independent power or existence, they are messengers and agents only.

Angels are often misunderstood.  Christian theology depicts an evil angel or Satan opposing God, with the ability to choose to fight against God.  If you believe in an omnipotent Creator, then believing his angels can fall and rebel is farcical.  Judaism understands that Satan is a tool of God just as much as the other angels, having no independent will and no abilities other than what God allows.

The best comparison for modern men to understand the function of angels is to imagine a programmer making scripts, apps, or robots to do exactly what he wants.  They can’t examine or change their own code, they have no awareness of the entire system, only what their specific programmed purpose is.

In this way, Men are superior to angels, we can, within limits, make free will decisions while angels are locked into their programming.  “Satan” means impediment, the role of this angel is to impede our spiritual progress so we put in the effort needed to overcome it, and in so doing strengthen or personal powers.

Deuteronomy 4:15 seems to refer to God Himself having no form, implying there was some kind of angelic forms visible.  We assume there were angels appearing with God at Sinai, and that is why the command was given.  Our sages stated these were actually forms of children, but with wings.  Hence the popular artistic depiction of “angels” as winged children.  The actual angels who visited Abraham appeared as nomads or Bedouins.

The cherubim had their wings spread out above, shielding the cover with their wings. They faced each other; the faces of the cherubim were turned toward the cover, 37:9.  This was a sign of Divine favor to the Jewish people.  However, if they turned away from each other, this was a bad sign.

Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the sexiest one of all?

Exodus 38:8 teaches that the women come to donate their copper mirrors to the Tabernacle.  We mentioned this briefly in Exodus.  This episode is one of the greatest proofs of the steadfast loyalty of Jewish women to their husbands and families. 

Our ancient sources, passed down generation to generation from the people who were there, explain the back story to these mirrors.  The Bible calls them The women who “gathered” (38:8) וַיַּ֗עַשׂ אֵ֚ת הַכִּיּ֣וֹר נְחֹ֔שֶׁת וְאֵ֖ת כַּנּ֣וֹ נְחֹ֑שֶׁת בְּמַרְאֹת֙ הַצֹּ֣בְאֹ֔ת אֲשֶׁ֣ר צָֽבְא֔וּ פֶּ֖תַח אֹ֥הֶל מוֹעֵֽד׃

It is obvious that they gathered to donate the mirrors. The Bible is using this peculiar word to allude to another gathering, during the harsh slavery in Egypt, when these women “gathered” meaning birthed many children.  Rashi, a famous Biblical commenter describes based on earlier Medrashim, how righteous women saved our nation with sexuality:

The Jewish women owned mirrors of copper, which they used when they adorned themselves.  Even these did they not hesitate to bring as a contribution for the Tabernacle.

Moses was about to reject them since they were made to increase vanity and sexual desire, but the Holy One, blessed be He, said to him, “Accept them; these are dearer to Me than all the other contributions, because through them the women reared vast hosts in Egypt!”

When their husbands were exhausted through the crushing slave labor, their wives used to bring out to them food and drink and feed them.  Then the wives would take the mirrors, and each gazed at herself in her mirror together with her husband, and seduce him by saying, “See, I am more attractive than you!”

Thus they awakened their husbands’ desire and subsequently became the mothers of many children, at it is said, (Song 8:5) “I awakened thy love under the apple-tree”, (referring to the fields where the men worked). This is what the Bible means when it states, מראות הצבאת “the mirrors of the women who reared the hosts (צבאות)” (Midrash Tanchuma, Pekudei 9).

Another account of this event is also in the Talmud, Sotah 11b, and begins:

As the reward for the righteous women who lived in that generation the Israelites were delivered from Egypt. When they went to draw water, the Holy One, blessed be He, arranged that small fishes should enter their pitchers, which they drew up half full of water and half full of fishes. They then set two pots on the fire, one for hot water and the other for the fish, which they carried to their husbands in the field, and washed, anointed, fed, gave the men to drink…

When the Egyptians enslaved the Jews and were working us to death, often literally, the men gave up hope and lost their libido.  They knew if they had more children they could not protect them from the Egyptian brutality.  So why bother?

It was only the loyal dedication of the Jewish women towards their husbands that saved the Jewish people.  The women believed that God would redeem us, so they knew there was still a point in having children in difficult circumstances.  I was overjoyed when I saw that Rabbi Eliezer Melamed, a genius and prominent teacher in Israel, makes this same point in his guide to marital intimacy.

The women would use their mirrors to beatify themselves, that is obvious.  The use of the mirrors to tease their husbands requires contemplation and explanation.  The women were using their sexual appeal to refuel the libido of their husbands.

By teasing “I am more attractive than you”, these women hinted to their husbands that since the men were enslaved and debased, the women had a higher level of attractiveness.  There would be an unspoken undertone that, had they not been loyal, the Jewish wives could have attracted Egyptian men and gone over to their powerful captors.

The Jewish men would get interested, partly due to their wives feeding them after hard labor, combined with her looking good and being affectionate.  The men also needed to show their wives that they still had their mojo.  The Jewish men did their part and gave the women a good time.  Jealousy of a potential rival can do amazing things for the testosterone and libido.

The mirror was used not only for women to adorn and make themselves up, but also to arouse a bit of jealousy.  While jealousy is usually a bad trait, here it was used for holy ends, to get the husbands back in the race as competitors.  In this way the loyal women maintained procreation even during the years of slavery.

War Brides

The implied threat of Jewish women being taken by the Egyptians was a real danger.  Typically when one group overpowers another, the women go over to the winners, as we discussed in Exodus: Women and assimilation:

Historically, when a dominant conquering nation comes in, the local subjugated women are tempted to be with those victorious higher status men.  This happened in Nazi occupied Europe, and throughout the ages.

Rollo has an excellent essay about the War Brides dynamic and we mentioned this concept in context of The abduction of Dinah.  However, even living under the absolute rule of the Egyptians, who enslaved them and subjugated the men, the Jewish women did not stray.  The Jewish women in Egypt stayed loyal to their husbands, even when their men had lost their will to procreate.

Now these copper mirrors that had incited holy jealousy were used, by Divine command, to build the laver, a water container used in the Tabernacle for purity.  This shows that items these women used to increase physical beauty and sexual passion belonged in a holy place.  Not only that, they were appropriate material to fashion a vessel used to purify the Priests before they engaged in sacrificial service.

This may be why God tells Moses that this donation was more dear to Him than anything else. These women were giving the mirrors back to God, after using them to enhance their physical beauty and seduce their husbands in order to save God’s nation.

The lesson for us is that our natural human urges, which some faiths consider to be merely animalistic and carnal, are truly holy when used appropriately.  After all, God Himself made us with our biological desires.  It is up to us to use them in a creative and giving way, in the appropriate context.  For Jewish readers check out Rabbi Melamed’s halachic work “The Joy and Blessing of the Home”.

Women stigmatizing women 

The other use of this copper water vessel made from these holy mirrors was to prepare the special potion given to a wife suspected of infidelity (a Sotah).  Rashi explains, based on the Talmud: “it was for this reason that the laver was made of the mirrors, because it served the purpose of promoting peace between man and wife.”

Through giving of its waters to be drunk by a woman whose husband had warned her and who nevertheless had been alone with another man (Numbers ch. 5) thus affording her an opportunity to prove her innocence (Sotah 15b).”

If a suspected adulteress had betrayed her husband, the potion made with the water from the copper laver would cause her to die painfully and publicly.

Gentlemen, this is truly interesting.  The water container made from the mirrors of the loyal women was used in the loyalty test of a suspected adulteress (Sotah).  You can imagine how a wife suspected of straying felt drinking this Sotah potion.  She knew the water came from the copper vessel which was made from the mirrors of thousands of wives who had chosen their own downtrodden and enslaved husbands over the dominant, powerful Egyptians.

If the accused wife had truly been loyal, she would join generations of upstanding Jewish wives who had channeled their bodily desires into holiness.  If she had really strayed and betrayed, she would have felt as if millions of female eyes were on her, judging her…  Countless loyal Jewish women through the ages condemning her to death.

When a suspected adulteress perished in this test, the other women would use her name as a curse and warning to their daughters “don’t flirt and drink with men and end up like her…”

Naturally, this leads us to a critical sociological observation:
When a society judges infidelity as a very evil thing, that society will get less infidelity.  This is especially true when women are the ones doing the judging and stigmatizing.  They are experts at it, and can create the most effective social buffers against it.

(See also https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=OMMGDQXRie8)

In modern mainstream ‘culture’, the stigma against all manner of things like infidelity, divorce, abortion, and out of wedlock births has been annihilated.  There is no negative judgment on people in indulge in all forms of things that 75 years ago were utterly anathema.  And we see the results.

The next things on the ‘social justice’ agenda seem to be normalizing transgender identity, transgender competition against normal athletes, euthanasia and pedophilia.  Society has stopped shaming insane, perverse and destructive behaviors.  And so we get more of them.  Simple social economics.

We also observe that when a group wants to promote destructive behaviors, the first thing they do is demand an exemption from any criticism and stigma.  We have talked about this concept, asking who gets to define normal for you?

The more vehement and aggressive a group is in attacking anyone who questions their behavior, the more they demand exemption from criticism, then the more they know deep down that their behavior set is wrong.

Some groups and lifestyles demand zero criticism, and try to ruin the lives of people who speak out or do not accept them, they cannot tolerate any critique.  This is because their ideology has no real moral truth and their behavior is immoral.  Recall that in totalitarian societies, the first thing the regime thugs do is to violently stamp out public criticism of the regime.

The Bible shows us that it used to be the case that society as a whole, especially the women, would openly judge people and hold them accountable for indecent and immoral behavior.

This use of stigma obviously shamed individual women who did not heed their sisters, but certainly benefitted the society and families in general.  The positive use of shame and stigma is almost completely lost in modern secular society, and we see the results.

In today’s learning our sages ask if a wife can sleep in bed with her husband if both are wearing clothes.  Right, so this needs explanation.  The woman in question is menstruating, so she and her husband are forbidden by the Torah from cohabitating during flow week (see Leviticus 15:19-30, 18:19, 20:18).  We should be very concerned that if they sleep in the same bed they will come to sin.  So of course not, what’s the question?!

You see gentlemen, if they have their clothes on that is very different than normal, so they will be reminded not to get busy.  You see, they normally slept without clothing entirely.  This was the expectation.  In fact, if a man insists they wear clothing to bed, the wife can demand a divorce (Gemara Ketuvot 48a).  The ideal situation was no barriers between husband and wife.  Not even a holy sheet.

This wisdom applies both literally and on a deeper level:  If you are interesting in a woman who is putting barriers between you and her, that is not a “mixed message” about her interest.  That IS the message.  She is not interested, move on.

When you are with your woman there should not be barriers.  If either of you are distracted of somewhere else, this is a psychological barrier.  Learn to give her all of your attention.  A wise man (?) once said we are looking for 90% enthusiasm and 10% technique.  Clothing may be a barrier or may be an enhancement to closeness, depending on the situation and the woman.  Sometimes women want to hide their bodies due to low self esteem, or perhaps she is using modesty to increase you desire.

Amazing cultural insight in our learning today that gives us perspective about how we dress.

The Mishnah teaches we don’t check our clothing with a lamp on Shabbat, in case the person comes to to tilt the lamp to brighten the flame.  Changing a flame is a forbidden labor on the Sabbath (Ex 35:3).  Lamps were not very bright, and inspecting clothing needs significant light, so someone may come to a transgression.

Shmuel taught that even to use a lamp to check in dim light if this is your own clothing or your wife’s is forbidden.  Rava explains that this was only relevant in the rich city of Mechoza. Residents of Mechoza were wealthy and avoided labor, so men wore loose fitting clothing similar to women. 2000 years ago it was more common to wear robes and the like; the Roman toga is a prime example.  However, this safeguard is not relevant in other places where men and women wore very different clothing.  It seems that men who needed to work in fields or perform manual labor wore tighter more practical clothing, and so the clothing of men and women were very different and readily distinguished.

The Gemara explains even in Mechoza this problem is only for older women who would wear a robe similar to a man’s robe.  This was the closest it got to gender neutral fashion.  However, the younger women would wear a robe that was wider, apparently like a skirt or with longer sleeves, something more feminine.  Even in Mechoza, the concern is only regarding using dim light to distinguish clothing off the body.  Once the clothing was on the person, you could readily tell this was an older woman or a man.

This sociological data preserved by out sages gives us a massive insight into present day life.

In our time, mainstream culture pushes on girls to be “strong and independent” TM and behave and look like men.  This includes dressing like men.  In practically every (successful) culture throughout human history, women dressed like women and men like men.  That’s the natural thing to do.

Gentlemen, when you see a young woman dressing and acting like a man, you know she has been influenced by the messaging of popular, mainstream, feminist culture.  This is a tip off to you.  You can also judge women by how much skin they are showing.  Some women who don’t look so great will compensate by showing more skin, to distract you from their faces.  There is something special about a young woman who looks great even in more modest, traditionally feminine clothes.

 

More wisdom:

You can’t arrange a match for your daughter on the Sabbath, according to the school of Shammai. Matchmaking involved negotiation of which family would pay for which items in the wedding and what each would provide as dowry for the new couple. This is like doing business, which is forbidden on Shabbat. However, Beit Hillel allows matchmaking: You can’t take care on Shabbat of your needs, but you can take care of others. Therefore, Beit Hillel allows matchmaking your son – this is not your need but of others.

Step back.  So many parents use their children to live vicariously, and exert subtle and less subtle pressure on then, especially regarding their relationships. Our ancient sages remind us that each person’s match is their own need. This was true even when parents, family, and rabbis were more involved in helping young people find a spouse. In conventional Judaism, we don’t use our kids as vehicles to act out our unrealized desires. They are their own people, and we help them to find the right person to marry, but we don’t control them.

 

An exciting message for our time:  Our sages only reluctantly allowed visited the sick on Shabbat since this is depressing and the Sabbath is a time of joy (they were not concerned with transmitting infections).  We learn that we do not pray for their healing on Shabbat, but we do say “It is Shabbat from crying out, but the cure is soon coming”.  We recite this for the sick on Shabbat in our Synagogue.

As you know, this is relevant now that the nation is gripped with pandemic panic and some think the solution is shutting down our social and economic life.  I will note that our sages point out that a panic can be much worse than the actual danger (Gemara Shabat 60 – only 48 days from now).  This is especially true when the panic is being flamed to serve political and economic goals at the expense of our nation’s overall wellbeing.

 

We have a concept in conventional Judaism that God creates the ‘cure’ before the ‘disease’.  We are fortunate that God created a ‘cure’ for the social distancing panic in the form of digital connections and a well developed online shopping and delivery infrastructure.  Imagine this situation without the ability to order food and supplies to come to your house.

This is not just for literal diseases, but any difficult situation in life.  If you feel stuck, the solution already exists, you just need to get the motivation to find it.  Sometimes knowing that there is a way out to freedom is enough for you to get the impetus to change your life.
Listen friend, God took over 600,000 men, plus their women and children and converts, out of Egypt with wondrous miracles. But they had to walk into the sea to escape. God can take you, one man, out of whatever problems you face. But you have to take the first step.

Today (continued from yesterday) the Talmud advises living in a younger, more recently settled city.  The Talmud illustrates this by noting that Lot wanted to flee from Sodom to the town of Tzoar (Genesis 19:20).  Because it was established more recently, Tzoar was less steeped in sin than Sodom and the other cities, and was temporarily saved while Lot was there.  He later fled to a cave when he realized Tzoar would also be caught up in the destruction.

You can often find an advantage in seeking something new, there is a certain idealism and willingness to change in a younger city or institution.  For example, an older established university has long set policies and traditions, while a newer school may be more willing to accommodate innovations or your individual goals.  The wise man will grow wiser from understanding how this applies in many areas of life.

 

Today the Gemara includes a famous statement: And Rava bar Meḥasseya said that Rav Ḥama bar Gurya said that Rav said: It is preferable to suffer from any extended illness than from an intestinal illness. Similarly, it is preferable to suffer any other pain, and not heart pain; any slight ache and not a headache; any evil and not an evil wife.

Gentlemen, 2000 years ago our sages already understood that your relationship with women is a critical part of your wellbeing.  They taught that your wife has a profound effect on your life and has the capacity to inflict tremendous damage.  If you have a bad woman or problems with a wife, this can cause more evil to you than anything else.  This fact is often obscured in modern society, which tends to blame all relationship troubles on the man.  In fact, there is a major push to absolve women of any responsibility for problems in their relationships.  This is a modern fallacy and our ancient sages were well aware of the reality of interpersonal relationships.  We have talked about this before in Responsibility to brothers

 

Even small issues with your wife or LTR can gradually wear you down as a man, and eventually change your attitudes and outlook on life.  Our sages explain that since your woman has a profound influence on your daily life and emotional state, you have to exercise the utmost care in choosing her.  You have to make a tremendous effort with help from heaven to get the right match.

Our sages similarly explain Proverbs 18:22: “For this, let every pious man pray to You in the time of finding, that the overflowing waters may not reach him” (Psalms 32:6). With regard to the phrase, the time of finding, Rabbi Ḥanina said: The time of finding refers to the time one must find a wife, that one should pray to find a suitable woman to marry. As it is said: “He who finds [matza] a wife finds [matza] good and obtains favor from the Lord” (Proverbs 18:22).

In Eretz Yisrael, the custom was that when a man married a woman, they would ask him: Matza or motzeh? In other words, they would ask the groom whether the appropriate passage for his wife is the above verse from Proverbs that begins with the word matza, as it is written: “He who finds a wife finds good and obtains favor from the Lord” or whether the more appropriate verse is the one beginning with the word motzeh, as it is written: “And I find [motzeh] the woman more bitter than death” (Ecclesiastes 7:26).

Friends, your woman can bring you the ultimate good, or a situation more bitter than death.

 

In today’s learning we see Rava criticize Rav Hamnuna for praying at length.  That may sound strange, prayer is a key concept and daily practice of our people, and all spiritual people.  Rava said you abandon eternal life earned through the study of Torah and wisdom, and engage in temporary life, as prayer includes requests for mundane physical needs.

The Gemara explains: And Rav Hamnuna held that the time for prayer is distinct and the time for Torah is distinct, meaning that the time that one devotes to prayer is not at the expense of the time devoted to Torah study.

Gentlemen, I’ll break this down for you.  Learning wisdom and developing your own methods to succeed in this world brings you long term growth and status.  Wisdom helps you cope with the world and keep your equilibrium.  Torah is Eternal Wisdom, but this concept applies to any self development you are engaged in.

Prayer is a practical necessity for religious men, for modern men who might not pray, think about the daily things you do just to keep your head above water.  You need to work, eat, exercise, do laundry, whatever it is.  The daily grind.  Don’t let the daily tasks take up most of your time, focus on the long term goal that will eventually raise your personal level and status.  This is Rava’s message.

Rav Hamnuna for his part held that the time you devote to prayer is separate from the time you give to wisdom.  His lesson is devote the time you need to each separate area of life, don’t try to do separate things at the same time.  Multitasking often gives the illusion of accomplishing more but actually reduces your efficiency.

We have another interesting teaching, based on Ecclesiastes 10:16-17 “Alas for you, O land whose king is a lackey and whose ministers dine in the morning!  Happy are you, O land whose king is a master and whose ministers dine at the proper time—with restraint, not with guzzling!”

Our sages launch into a discussion of when people eat their main meal of the day, noting that scholars wait to dine until the 6th hour, midday.  Eating a breakfast snack when needed for strength is mentioned and praised in the Talmud.  However, it seems that it was also common to skip breakfast, especially for sages who were not doing physical labor.

Naturally, modern men will find it interesting that waiting until the 6th hour of the day to eat means that this man has fasted for about 16 hours.  This aligns with the practice of intermittent fasting, or the 16/8 – 16 hours of fasting and 8 hours of eating.

Our sages also state that a man should eat only 1/3 of his fill, drink 1/3, and leave 1/3 empty.  This is usually understood as being advice for one meal.  It also aligns with only eating solid food for 8 hours of the day.  This has massive metabolic benefits.

Also, the Gemara states when you give a gift, you should inform the recipient that you gave it. However, we also have a concept in Judaism that charity should be given anonymously.

So what gives, can’t Jews make up their mind?  It’s simple, really, we don’t want a charity case to feel like a charity case so we give them what they need anonymously.  We don’t want them to feel shame of that they are beholden.  By contrast, a gift by definition is not what the recipient needs, but what they would appreciate.   They recipient feels loved, and wants to know who loves them.

This concept will help you decide when to give anonymously and when to let people know you are the source.

More juicy wisdom

The Gemara brings a statement of Rav “a woolen garment is precious to it’s wearer”.  This means even something used and worn is valuable to you.  You are used to it and know how it works.  This is the root of sentimental value.

This concept can apply to relationships as well, you know what to expect so you have a certain value and investment in this person.  However, this needs to be balanced against the danger of remaining in a situation because it is comfortable.

Today the Mishna brings various activities we do not begin just before prayers, so we do not get involved and miss our most important appointment – with God.

The Gemara explains we don’t even start a small meal, since a person can come to extend the meal and indulge himself, and miss prayers. When you start indulging the body, with food, rest, sleep, it is easy to get carried away, and lose hours, days, and your life.

 

When something needs to get done in life, do it now. If you don’t it can stay on the to do list, since other things keeps coming up.

Today the Gemara examines if using a small surface or space only with difficulty is not a usage for Jewish law to make that small area part of the larger domain it is in.  The ramification would be that a cubby or crevice opening to the public domain would be part of that domain, and throwing an object into that crevice could be a legal transfer.  The Gemara concludes that a “usage” with difficulty is not a legal usage.

An interesting point is that Hebrew, the ancient Jewish language, is the Holy Language, and does not have what we call “bad words”.  In fact, conventional Jews are very averse to using foul and explicit language.  Hebrew uses euphemisms for bodily functions.  The same word for “use” “tashmish” is used as euphemism for intimate relations, usually phrased as “using the bed – tashmish hamitah”.  Therefore, our Gemara is hinting that if “using” your love life is only with difficulty, that is not a real love life.

As we have seen, in conventional Jewish culture, sex is normal and healthy, see
Daily dose of wisdom, Brakhot 62: the Rabbi under the bed

Judaism is not merely a spiritual system but accounts for man’s physical needs.  Our holy men do not sit alone meditating on a mountain or praying in a monastery.  They get married, have kids, hold day jobs.  Sure, we are spiritual beings inside physical vessels; since God put us in this physical world, any system of life needs to account for the physical.

Daily dose of wisdom, Brakhot 24. Intimacy is normal

God gave us intimacy as a gift and tool for connection, when it is used properly there is nothing to be ashamed of.  Judaism is a faith that teaches that while our spiritual life is the main focus, the physical body is also from God, and our physical drives can be used properly and channeled for constructive purposes.

Daily dose of wisdom, Brakhot 22. The power and danger of intimacy

Fulfilling intimate relations is a central need for both men and women and a healthy sex life is absolutely necessary for a healthy relationship.  But as the Talmud states, men should not act like roosters, there is a time and place that is appropriate to express your intimate powers.

Today our sages hint that if your “tashmish”, your intimate life, is difficult, then there is something wrong.  That is not how it is supposed to be.  If it isn’t happening regularly, and with enthusiasm and fun, it needs to be fixed.

The Gemara brings case of sticking a long pole in the ground then throwing something onto the top of this tall pole in the private domain.  Interestingly, our sages say the pole is 100 amot tall.  This would be about 180 modern feet.  The use of this number seems strange, the same rules would apply to a pole 10 amot tall.  Also, the Gemara says he himself stuck the pole in the ground.  It makes no difference legally if someone else put the pole there, the airspace of the private domain extends upwards forever.

Our sages are hinting that we need to set our sights very high to achieve great things.  Thus the same man who put this long pole into the ground is the same man to throw something atop the pole.  He set a great goal and met it.  We are created with immense power, and so many of our failures are due to setting our aim too low, not too high.  We need to set high goals and throw ourselves at our goals with the power to reach our targets.

 

This week we read the portion “Ki Tisa” (Exodus 30:11 – 34:35).  It starts with taking a census of the Jewish people by counting small silver coins they donated, which would be used for the sockets holding the walls of the Tabernacle.  Later, the annual half shekel coin was given by every Jew each year to pay for the daily offerings brought on behalf of the entire nation.

The simple message is that every individual matters.  Religion is considered a group endeavor, and rightfully so.  But your personal level of faith, of belief, your dedication to growth, these are all your own.  In Trumah, we discussed how

Judaism is in a real sense a decentralized religion that emphasizes individual authority, exercised within proper limits.  The Jews began as just one man, Abraham, standing steadfast against the establishment culture of idolatrous polytheism and subjective immorality.

Every person counts, not just as a number, but as a part of the foundation of the Holy Tabernacle.  We learned that each person brought whatever gold and materials they wanted to donate, but this small coin brought with the census was the same for everyone.  Each person, whether rich or poor, had an identical share in the sockets holding up the walls.  Each person could fairly say: If not for me, the Tabernacle walls could not stand.

We have a slogan in Judaism “Fortunate is the man who toils in Wisdom, and thereby brings satisfaction to his Creator”.  The language is precise.  Not “the Creator or our Creator”, when a man works on himself, this is noticed by HIS Creator.

The world was made for this one man who realizes that he can grow in Wisdom if he works on himself, and then puts in the effort to better himself.  God has a special attachment to each and every one of us.  When we use the world He made properly by learning, growing in Wisdom, and perfecting ourselves, then each personal choice and act brings Divine satisfaction.

As we explained in Trumah:

You are an entire world.  There is no one exactly like you in existence.  There never was before and there never will be again.

You have unique talents and hold tremendous potential:  You are a world unto yourself, and you can create worlds, or destroy them.  You have been given a mission to make yourself into whatever you choose to be and you are infused with the power to accomplish anything.  Your choices matter.

My rabbi taught us an amazing thing.  He said take every man seriously.  This man in front of you could cure cancer.  He could start a nuclear war.  Most of all, take yourself seriously.

This is perhaps the most important message a modern man can internalize in order to get his life on track.

 

Now, it’s going to get ugly.  

How could the betrayal of the golden calf even happen?
How could it be that the ancient Jews, just after hearing the Ten Commandments, including the command to not make idols (Ex 20:4), could construct an idol?  Our sages (Gemara Shabbat 88b) illustrate the sheer brazenness:

Ulla said about the Golden Calf: How insolent is the bride who is promiscuous under her wedding canopy.  R. Mari, son of the daughter of Shmuel, said: What verse shows this? “While the king was still at his table, my nard (a spice) gave off its perfume.”  (Song of Songs 1:12.  Others interpret the verse as a positive, see Shir HaShirim Rabba 1:12).

The image here is a bride, literally just married, who is intimate with another man during the wedding.  The idea of it is so brazen and repulsive that anyone immediately understands the message of the metaphor.  In addition, our sages in the Medrash (Bamidbar Rabbah 9:54) explain dozens of parallels between the laws of the unfaithful wife (Sotah) and golden calf.

So, how could such a heinous thing have happened?  The Torah does not pull any punches or cover over unpleasant truths.  Not everyone lives happily ever after in Bible stories.  This is because God intended the truth of the Torah to teach us how to avoid problems in our life.  So there must be a valuable explanation…

Remember, the Jews left Egypt with a “mixed multitude” (Eruv Rav) of non Jews who wanted to tag along and join the victors (Ex 12:38).  Before the Exodus, Egypt was famous as being a brutally strong nation from which no slave escaped.  Egypt, as the superpower of the ancient world, had slaves from many other countries, not just Jews.  During the Exodus, many idolatrous slaves seized the opportunity to escape with the Jews.  There is considerable discussion as to whether it was a major mistake for Moses to allow them to come along with the actual descendants of Jacob and join the Jewish people.  But they did come along, and at Sinai they did commit to becoming Jews.

We know from Jacob’s time the profound influence a person’s upbringing continues to play throughout their life.   The “mixed multitude” had been idolaters until just 7 weeks prior, in the polytheistic and debauched ancient Egypt.  They were tempted to return to that lifestyle, which allowed promiscuity, indulgence, and bacon that was just now forbidden to them.

However, they did not at first suggest making an idol, but merely having a leader to replace Moses.  The impetus for the golden calf was a mistake in counting.  Moses said he was going up Sinai to get the Torah from God, be back in 40 days.  The people thought 40 days included that same day, but it did not.  When Moses did not show up on day 40, they thought he had died from exposure to Divine glory (Ex 20:16), and that therefore they had no leader.  The “mixed multitude” of former pagans started spreading the rumor Moses was dead, arguing that they needed to appoint a leader to bring them back to Egypt (Ex 32:1).

Now, the original concept of an idol was to be an intermediary between man and the unfathomable Creator.  It’s hard to relate directly to an Eternal, Omniscient deity who has no physical form or shape whatsoever.  Early men, even though they knew about God from Adam, soon started worshipping things God made, like the sun, moon, stars as intermediaries (Rambam).  This was to make worship more accessible and easy.  Later they made their own idols, and even treated mortal men as idols, continuing the theme that men needed something tangible to connect to the intangible.

For the “mixed multitude”, Moses was their intermediary.  They did not see themselves as worthy to forge a direct personal connection to God, even though God clearly stated this at Sinai.  Due to their idolatrous upbringing, they felt a need for something between them and God, and Moses was this focus for them.  He had allowed them to escape Egypt.  After they witnesses the overwhelming revelation at Sinai, they felt that being personally connected to God could be a death sentence. When he didn’t return, they suspected that Moses too was not worthy.  Therefore, without Moses to link them to spiritual life, they felt the urge to return to idols and Egypt.

Their need for an intermediary is so strong that it reduces them to the ridiculous, they say “This is your god, O Israel, who brought you out of the land of Egypt!” (Ex 32:4).  Obviously, everyone knew that it was God with a capital G and his messenger Moses that had brought these people out.  They had all just experienced that miracle seven weeks before!  But since they did not feel like they could access God without Moses, they needed something to grasp on to emotionally, however silly.  Believe in something or fall for anything.

Now, the problem is that Jews who descended from Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and the 12 tribes did not take these men to task and rebuke them. The mixed multitude was claiming an idol was their deity and no one said anything?

Our sages reveal that Miriam’s son Hur stood up against their wicked plan, and he was immediately murdered by the Eruv Rav.  This prompted Aaron to pretend to go along with them to try to stall their idolatry until Moses’ return (Ex 32:5).  But no prominent Jews formed a group to oppose the spreading idea of idolatry.

This was a massive failure of the original Jewish people to exercise leadership and enforce boundaries.  They should have taught the newcomers that in truth every man, woman, and child can enjoy a direct link to God.  Every person has a Divine spark, their soul, which is crying out to connect to the greater Divine.

Now, I am sure they had good reasons, among them that the idolatrous faction had just murdered Hur for standing up to them.  I also suspect that just after the Divine revelation at Sinai, they were on a spiritual high and did not take seriously the idea that some men among them would stoop to idolatry.  After all, they had just heard from God himself the command to believe only in God and have no other gods (Ex 20:3).  Who could be so low as to commit idolatry after that?  They simply did not appreciate how depraved their fellow men could become.

Another possibility is that with the Sinaitic revelation, the old guard Jews were now aware of how little they knew and how much work they would have to do to achieve closeness to God.  They were humbled by the glorious revelation and felt that they had not yet internalized the message.  In this state, their misplaced humility preventing them from acting strongly against the mixed multitude.  

How could they speak against their fellows when they were so low?  When you feel low, you cannot stand up to others.  Our sages explain that this same mistake destroyed the Temple: it was the “humility” of Rav Zecharia ben Avkulas that destroyed our home, burned our courtyard and exiled us from our land (see Talmud Gittin 56a).

Naturally, it was a combination of factors that lead to the debacle of the golden calf.  We should not be surprised when our fellow men misbehave or transgress what we assumed were strict boundaries.  Humans are capable of wonderful loyalty and insidious treachery.  Don’t be a person who can be surprised by human nature.  People change, they don’t always live up to your high expectations.  This is especially true when their upbringing inculcated certain values.  Under stress, people will return to those values they grew up with.

In addition, don’t be too humble.  You need to raise your own status and work to fix yourself.  If you feel like nothing, you cannot influence anything. 

Yes, humility is absolutely necessary.  Know your limitations (and plan to overcome them).  But also know your boundaries and do not let other people take a single step over then.  You will be tested in life, and if you fold, you will suffer tremendously.

So…why a calf anyway?

We have a Divine commandment “do not boil a kid in mother’s milk”, which is repeated to emphasize the force of this law against mixing of milk and meat together (Exodus 23:19 and 34:26, Deut 14:21).  Milk and meat products cooked together are not Kosher for Jewish consumption or use.  It cannot even be fed to animals.  Ancient sages note that this prohibition is not only the mother’s milk, but any milk, and explain that the Torah writes mother because it was typical for people to have the mother animal’s milk available when they were eating the calf.  Some sources explain that there was an idolatrous practice to purposefully use the mother’s milk to cook the offspring, possibly a Canaanite fertility ritual.

The golden calf idol represents an inversion of Jewish law.  The sinners brought adult animals as offerings to the calf, the offspring.  The older adult animal was dying, not the child.  This shows that the idolaters wished to turn over the traditional order of authority. 

They wanted the younger generation, the new ideas, to overcome the traditional ways.  They wanted the “new” Jewish converts from the mixed multitude to overcome the stuffy old fashioned Jews actually descended from Abraham.  Thus, mature adult animals were slaughtered before the calf idol, showing the new was more valuable than the old.

We see this today in mainstream society.  It is common for members of the younger generations to deride their elders as old fashioned, or “boomers” out of touch with the modern world.  The disrespect to prior generations is popularized by the media and consumer culture.  If you condition people to associate the new as exciting and the old as out of fashion, you can sell them new things and make money.

By contrast, in conventional Jewish culture, we understand that every prior generation was one step closer than we are to the Divine revelation at Sinai, a little closer to the time of the Temple.  We assume they had valuable life wisdom.  We try to understand how our ancestors lived so we can live better ourselves.  There is a lot of wisdom out there, if you are not too proud to seek it and make it your own.

Last week, we talked about this in the context of getting advice on dates and mates:

This is something missing in modern secular society.  We don’t ask our elders for practical advice based on their life experience.  There is also, as far as I know, no concept of telling a young woman to rely on what wiser men say about her potential mate.  Would she even listen?  Yes, a woman will see if a man is respected and accepted by other men.  That does increase her interest.  But we have lost the concept of relying the knowledge and expertise of others for critical life decisions.

This week we find the outcome of not valuing tradition and the wisdom of elders.  The new Jews from the mixed multitude wanted to replace the old ways of staunch monotheism with a new, hip, updated Judaism that could appeal to the masses.  To visualize this change in values, they sacrificed the adult animals to the young calf.  They wanted to flip the natural order upside down.

We see this in modern mainstream society: it is not enough for activists to ignore the ways our culture used to work.  Instead, the goal is to shove the new ways down everyone’s throat and force society to adopt new moral and sexual values.  Thus, in the past decade it was no longer good enough for activists to demand that we tolerate practices that for all of human history were considered by practically every human society to be sexual deviancy.  Instead, we have mandated indoctrination in (public) schools promoting their deviancy, and transgender story time for children, with propaganda read by sex offenders.

We mentioned in our discussion of same sex education:

Listen, they will grow up, the boys will meet girls and the girls will meet boys.  It will happen.  There will come a time when boys and girls need to invest ample time and energy into attracting the other sex and forming relationships.  Wanting children to rush into that inevitable milieu is misguided and dangerous, it undermines their development. 

This is especially true when some interest groups want to “educate” children into accepting abnormal behaviors and identities.  You should be extremely suspicious of any agenda or person that wants to expose children to romantic or sexual content.  That is child abuse.

Just like the golden calf followers, today we see the same push for the new values to totally supplant the conventional, traditional social norms.  If you dare to question these people, you can get attacked as ignorant, old fashioned, “ok boomer”.  These attacks are part of the struggle over who gets to define normal for you:

The more vehement and aggressive a group is in attacking anyone who questions their behavior, the more they demand exemption from criticism, then the more they know deep down that their behavior set is wrong.  Some groups and lifestyles demand zero criticism, and try to ruin the lives of people who speak out or do not accept them, they cannot tolerate any critique.  This is because their ideology has no real moral truth and their behavior is immoral.  Recall that in totalitarian societies, the first thing the regime thugs do is to violently stamp out public criticism of the regime.

Here, the mixed multitude pushing idolatry was willing to stoop to murder to intimidate other Jews into tolerating their spiritual deviancy.  The other Jews, with incredulity or misplaced humility, failed to organize a stand against this corruption, and the outcome was disaster.  Modern men need to draw the parallels and be willing to call a spade a spade, despite all the propaganda pushing you to change your definitions of normal.