CHOCHMAS NASHIM: RE’EH: GODLINESS
By: Suri Davis
What is it like to be Godlike?
G-d created the world with perfection and goodness, man repays that kindness with sin. This parshah/torah portion and its connection with the haftorah. Fascinating!!!
The very first verse peaks our interest. See I, G-d, give before you today blessing and curse. G-d doesn’t give us, G-d sets before us blessing and curses. But there seems to be a superfluous word, “today.” I’ve been pondering this sentence. See is not merely with vision, when one says that he sees, it means also that he perceives or understands, which can be beyond the five senses.
The parshah goes on to say, if you observe the torah commandments, G-d will provide blessings, and if man sins, man will be cursed. It’s all in our hands, and our actions. But that very first verse, packs a lot of thoughts in and of itself, before one continues reading on. It appears to me that the use of the word today, means that everyday, all the todays, G-d provides us with blessings and curses.
We are not G-d, we know what we like and want today, not knowing whether it will be good or bad for us. We want steak and mashed potatoes and coconut cream pie. That feels good, until man’s blood work comes back which states his sugar and cholesterol are dangerously high. Man can see when looking at the steak that it is a brachah, but can also see the future consequences of his action and forego the steak. It is both a brachah/blessing and a klalah/curse.
So too with those occurrences which happen to man. G-d knows the thought processes of man. When something happens to man, if man perceives it as a curse, and he wants to get closer to G-d, he will review his actions to determine if he needs to change and improve himself. That is good. Alternatively, he can challenge himself to see that what happened it ultimately good for him, and use it as a challenge of trust in G-d that what appears to be a curse, is actually a blessing. Either way, it is win/win. Each occurrence is a glass that his half empty/full, how will man consider it, and how does bitachon/trust in G-d influence how man sees it.
What fascinates me is that G-d warns the Jews to do good for we are servants of G-d since He redeemed us from 210 years of slavery in Egypt with direct grand miracles, so man cannot say that an army of men came and fought the Egyptians to free the Jews, it was pure miracles directly from G-d.
To show gratitude to G-d, the parshah informs us that we are to bring the first of fruit and cattle to the holy temple as a sacrifice to G-d and that a tithe of all produce and cattle are to be brought to the holy temple as well. A less on in gratitude for our wealth and success. For G-d gives us so that we can provide to the poor in the form of tithes/gifts and loans to the poor. Loans in the context of the bible reveals the ultimate truth, which is that most loans to the poor end up as gifts, and man should not shy away from these loans, because truly it is best to give than to have to receive.
G-d wants to see us at least three times a year in the holy temple, for Passover, Shavuoth and Sukkoth. We are His beloved children, and we bring with our bounty to thank G-d for His beneficence. And then, once again, we are warned not to stray after the indigenous idol worshippers, we should not permit one to convince an entire city to worship idols, and yet Moshe via G-d knows what our future brings.
And so it is that our haftorah is one of seven haftorahs where G-d comforts His nation after destroying the temple, and this is what it means to be G-d. That we sin daily against G-d, that His angered was stirred over and over such that He had to destroy His own home and drive His children out of their country for two thousand years, and whereas G-d should be indignant for what we have to do Him and continue to do, it is HE/G-D who comforts us for His having to drive us away from Him. A parent who wants to retain ties to His children by saying “this hurts Me more than it hurts you.” We parents know how painful it is sometimes to take away a privilege from a child which he enjoys, because we have to teach him so kind of lesson. We would rather enjoy life together, than to punish a child, and see him sad. G-d wants to retain that connection with us even as we sin.
AND SO IT IS that this Shabbos is Shabbos mevorchim Elul, when G-d comes out of his palace and into the fields to give closer access and connection with His subjects. “I am here, I come out to be with you before you coronate Me as king on Rosh Hashanah. I stretch out my hand to you, open my palace doors to you wanting you to come and connect. Just ask for forgiveness and/or change your ways to reveal that you want to get close to Me, as I want to get closer to you.”
G-d knew before the Jews entered the land, what their end would be, as did Moshe and King David when he wrote Psalms. Every day is a new opportunity to do mitzvoth/good deeds. As the Lubavitch Rebbe said that the word Mitzvoth has its root to Tzavta/bond, every good deed we do between man and G-d and man and his fellow man, creates bonds with G-d.
Have a good Shabbos.
-Suri