Summer News !

Posted on May 17, 2012 | Comments Off on Summer News !
Many of you have inquired about my summer travel plans. After a year off from leading tours, I am happy to announce that my wife and I will be leading a tour of Spain and Gibraltar beginning on Monday, July 9, and returning on Thursday, July 19. The tour will be under the auspices of Kesher Tours – my fourth tour with them.
We will begin in Barcelona, and travel to Granada, Seville, Gibraltar (for Shabbat), Cordoba, Toledo, Madrid and other towns. We will immerse ourselves in the Jewish history of Spain, the cradle of the Sephardic Jewry, and visit places that played a formative role in the lives of the Rambam, Ramban, Ritva and many other great rishonim.
Those interested can find details at www.keshertours.com or contact Yossie at Kesher Tours, at 1-212-481-3721.
I hope you can join.
-RSP

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The Disease of “Me”

Posted on May 17, 2012 | Comments Off on The Disease of “Me”

A recent juxtaposition of statements made by each of the last two presidents at defining moments of their presidencies is revealing but not surprising. It highlights the death of humility in public life, and perhaps more.

On December 14, 2003, George W. Bush announced to the nation the capture of the brutal Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein. He said, in pertinent part (and note the language in bold): “The success of yesterday’s mission is a tribute to our men and women now serving in Iraq. The operation was based on the superb work of intelligence analysts who found the Dictator’s footprints in a vast country. The operation was carried out with skill and precision by a brave fighting force. Our servicemen and women and our coalition allies have faced many dangers in the hunt for members of the fallen regime, and in their effort to bring hope and freedom to the Iraqi people. Their work continues, and so do the risks. Today, on behalf of the nation, I thank the members of our Armed Forces and I congratulate them.”

Now contrast that with Barack Obama’s statement upon the killing of Osama bin Laden, announced on May 1, 2011: “And so shortly after taking office, I directed Leon Panetta, the director of the CIA, to make the killing or capture of bin Laden the top priority of our war against al Qaeda, even as I continued our broader efforts to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat his network. Then, last August, after years of painstaking work by my intelligence community, I was briefed on a possible lead to bin Laden. It was far from certain, and it took many months to run this thread to ground. Imet repeatedly with my national security team as we developed more information about the possibility that we had located bin Laden hiding within a compound deep inside of Pakistan. And finally, last week, I determined that I had enough intelligence to take action, and authorized an operation to get Osama bin Laden and bring him to justice. Today, at my direction, the United States launched a targeted operation against that compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan.”
If writing two autobiographies before actually accomplishing anything doesn’t do it, Obama here crosses the line that separates puffery from pathology. He did everything but claim to have personally hunted down bin Laden and killed him with his own hands, while simultaneously piloting the helicopter, smoking a cigarette and draining a three-point jump shot.

Certainly, some will speculate as to the mindset of a braggart who is clearly oblivious to how he sounds, assuming he doesn’t himself believe his own hype. Perhaps it stems from his disrupted childhood, growing up with a permanently-absent father and a frequently-absent mother that necessitates this self-flattery. Perhaps it is an unconscious recognition of the dearth of his personal resume, notwithstanding (or maybe the proximate cause of) his election to the presidency. One of my colleagues long ago pointed out Obama’s stubborn resistance to using a railing while descending steps, as if he is immune from mishaps – as if he can’t possibly fall. (Apparently he did stumble once, video suppressed.)

And there’s this, President Obama’s statement last week endorsing homosexual marriage: “At a certain point I’ve just concluded that for me, personally, it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same-sex couples should be able to get married.” Forget the fact that he’s changed his position several times – pro-same sex marriage in the 1990’s, anti- in the 2000’s, pro- again in the 2010’s – without being seriously questioned about his changes (why was he against it? Why was he for it? What moral compass guides him? Is it crass politics – one wag called it less “evolution” on Obama’s part and more “intelligent design,” an attempt to revive his flagging base. What is it?) Forget the fact that he should have to explain why he would be opposed to two adult brothers marrying, two sisters, a brother and sister, a parent and a child, or why he would oppose polygamy or polyandry – assuming, of course, that the people were all in love and wanted to build a strong family. Forget all that, and ponder this: how is it possible to squeeze four first-person pronouns in one sentence, even conceding his lack of eloquence without a teleprompter?!

Chazal spoke quite harshly about arrogance, in every person but certainly in a leader for whom it invariably leads to failures. “A haughty heart is an abomination of G-d” (Mishlei 16:5). Self-aggrandizement is a sign of weakness and insecurity, not strength. It is unbecoming, and, as is well known, “pride precedes destruction and arrogance comes before failure” (Mishlei 16:18). Rav Hirsch explains that haughty people become overconfident; perhaps they genuinely believe they can control the tides and cool the planet. How will Obama react to defeat – further tear apart the country? Complain bitterly about race and bias? Tie up the country in litigation? He has been remarkably lacking in class, almost unheard of in presidential politics.

The haughty are compared to idolaters and sexual predators (Sotah 4b) and find it difficult to praise others (Zohar). “One coin in a bottle rattles; the bottle filled with coins makes no sound” (Bava Metzia 85b). One whose true virtues are minimal cannot but speak of them at length; a person of genuine greatness sees no need to refer to himself or his achievements. They speak for themselves.
It was Pat Riley who characterized arrogance as “the disease of me,” marked by chronic feelings of under-appreciation and a concomitant focus on the self, and a resentment of the competence and success of others. Bad midot are worse than bad policies, and although only a fool looks to any politician to provide examples of good midot, politicians can have an extraordinary effect on the public culture, for good and for bad. Man’s finest virtue, Rav Moshe ibn Ezra stated, is that of which he is unaware.

Leadership often carries with its feelings of superiority, especially when the leader makes decisions that affect millions of people. It is an occupational hazard. The better ones conceal it under a veneer of humility and graciousness. It makes them personally tolerable, even if their policies are repugnant and risible. Someone should inform the President of this basic truth.

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Posted in Contemporary Life, Current Events, Machshava/Jewish Thought, Philosophy

The Holy Life

Posted on May 7, 2012 | 2 comments

    The Torah’s sublime challenge to the Jewish people – Kedoshim tihiyu, “be holy,” – is a remarkable demand, compounded by the fact that the Torah does not give us any overt guidelines as to how a person becomes holy. We have some clues; Rashi comments that holiness is a byproduct of abstention from immorality and sin. But that is still not a definition. It is certainly possible for a person to abstain from immorality and sin and not be holy. So what is it that we are being asked – and clearly something at the very essence of Jewish life?

      The injunction “Be holy,” for all its inscrutability, demands one thing of us that is in very short supply today, and at the heart of the moral malaise in society, the meanderings of our youth and to some extent all of us, and much of the discontent we feel: the obligation to create and nurture an inner world, an Olam Hapenimi, where the soul is really expressed and our values are located – the point of connection between the human being and G-d. For much of society today, Jewish and non-Jewish, the inner world is dormant, or worse, dead, and we have to revive it.

     What does it mean to lack an inner world? Take the Secret Service scandal, for instance. The problem was not their desire to expand the definition of “Service,” but their lack of understanding of “Secret,” the first word of their agency. This, and the rest of the shenanigans across the country, is a product of what Dan Henninger (WSJ) labeled our “Age of Indiscretion.” People are indiscreet not only in the sense that they don’t cover their tracks well, but rather that many people today choose to live their lives on public display. Many feel no need to cover their tracks, because their self-esteem is dependent on their public lives – on people reading about them and hearing about them, and knowing their every inconsequential thought and action.

    This refers not only to celebrities but to all of us and our children. It is easy to blame the technology, and undoubtedly technology has enabled greater access to private places than ever before. But technology is a tool – it’s morally neutral – and the limits and effects of the technology are choices that we make. Personally, I think that Facebook and its offshoots are some of the most harmful phenomena in our world today, not that my disapproval will cause them to lose a nickel off their impending IPO. Facebook and friends breed indiscretion, induces bad behavior, propagates superficial and artificial relationships – and, worst of all, they rob people of their inner world, their inner sanctum of thoughts, feelings, emotions – of the capacity to think, to be private, to look before you leap, to be a real person, and especially to connect to G-d.

     Do we wonder why davening is so difficult – for all of us, but especially for young people? Because we have no inner worlds. Kavana (concentration, focus, intention) is all about an inner world, and without cultivating an inner world, Kavana is impossible. Without an inner world, davening becomes all about “saying words,” and “saying words” will have a diminishing impact on people over time, especially saying the same words again and again. That is why people get easily distracted in prayer, seek comfort in inane conversation, and simply congregate in the halls. There are no “actions” in prayer, nothing to post about or tweet about; it is function of our inner world, and so it is rapidly being lost. Too often, our outside shakes, while our inside is inert.

      In another realm, what is tzniut, in a modern term, but discretion – judgment, reticence, the yearning to keep private what is private. Tzniut recognizes the dignity of every person; it is the veneer that shields our inner world, our holy of holies, from the prying world. So tzniut can nurture a real relationship of real people – i.e., people who relate and interact appropriately, not through texts and emails, but through actual conversation, not with flamboyance or braggadocio, but with humility. The extent to which people choose to communicate indirectly, through technology, and thereby avoid human contact, is astonishing, and debilitating to the nurturing of real human relationships.

      And what a disease is a lack of tzniut – indiscretion – whether it is found in adults who act like children and broadcast it, or in young people who know no limits and bare their deepest secrets (and more) to a world of strangers, or, for that matter, in a president who can’t stop using the word “I” in boasting about his accomplishments but never in acknowledging his failures. President Obama in that sense is quite representative of his generation. President Bush the First had an aversion to using the first-person pronoun, having been whacked at his home dinner table as a child every time he started a sentence with “I.” President Reagan recognized that there is no limit to what can be accomplished as long as no attention is paid to who gets the credit. And perhaps the best example of the ethos of a prior generation was President Kennedy who, after accepting full responsibility for the Bay of Pigs fiasco, stated that “success has many fathers, and failure is an orphan.” These days, success has only one author, and failure is a team effort, of just the previous guy’s fault.

      It is the presidency as reality TV, where only appearances count.

      Rashi continues that “wherever you find boundaries against indecency, you find holiness.” I.e., wherever you find boundaries, period, you will find holiness, maturity, and responsibility. And wherever there are no boundaries, human beings can descend to great depths.

     The Rambam wrote (Shoresh 4, Sefer HaMitzvot) that “Be holy” is not one of the 613 commandments, because we don’t count the “commandments that subsume the entire Torah.”  “Be holy” is not something to do, but something to be. It is that something that defines our lives as individuals, separates us from the nations, and is the hallmark of our people – to build an inner world that can connect directly to G-d. It is that uniqueness that can fortify our lives and give it depth and substance, as assuredly as it will render us worthy of the rebuilt Holy Temple, speedily and in our days.

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Posted in Chumash, Contemporary Life, Current Events, Machshava/Jewish Thought

Dating Myths

Posted on May 1, 2012 | 2 comments

      Recently, one of the popular Shabbat publications that is distributed in Israel depicted a number of myths that hinder and impair many young people’s quest for their life’s partners. The article appeared in Zomet, was written by Rav Yoni Lavi, and pulls no punches in an effort to highlight areas in which a change in philosophy – and a discrediting of some of the myths – can go a long way in promoting marriage and resolving part of the singles’ “crisis.” The myths follow (translation mine) and one can agree or disagree with some or all but the issues raised are all important:

 1)      Every person has one special someone.  Actually, everyone has many more than just one person with whom he/she can marry and establish a loving, happy and enduring relationship. The mentality that in a world of more than seven billion people there is only one person wandering about that is meant for me – my twin, my soul mate – who, if found, will provide me eternal happiness and who, if not found, will doom me to despair and misfortune for the rest of my life, is a dangerous illusion. There is a gigantic field of hundreds, and maybe even more, of appropriate and worthwhile mates. A successful marriage depends less on the identity of the person chosen and more on one’s ability to conduct himself/herself in that marriage on a daily basis. Therefore, the task before you is not to decide “is this the one?” but rather to choose a person with whom you feel you can build a home together that is filled with love. This transforms the quest of choosing a spouse into something that is much more logical and attainable.

2)      When it is the right time, it will happen. This statement is somewhat true but also conditional – the condition being that you don’t interfere with what should happen. From G-d’s perspective, He has long desired to see many of his sons and daughters standing joyously under the chupa. He is even prepared to assist in this process. But the problem is that there are those who with their own hands sabotage the process. How? Through their patterns of analysis, their manner of searching for a spouse and their conduct while dating. The central question becomes: is what stands between you and the chupa receiving more and more advice, and more and more recommendations – or is a change in approach and a removal of [self-imposed] obstacles most desirable? If the latter, then a proper match is already available and waiting.

3)      I simply haven’t met the right one. How do you know? Maybe you have and you told her/him “no!” Maybe the right one is in your vicinity – even a meter away – but you ignore her because you are focused – obsessed – on some fashion model who is unattainable [or on an ideal that is a fantasy] and therefore you are uncertain if the person you are with is the right one. Maybe you are looking in one direction, and he/she is standing in the complete opposite direction?

4)      Without you, I am half a person; without you, I am nothing. A single is not a “half-person.” A single person is not a broken vessel or a worthless wretch. A single is a complete personality, productive and generous. Sometimes people forget that singles have lives outside of dating, and that they have other objectives in life aside from finding a spouse. Thus, aside from the questions that sound general and interesting but actually imply something else, like “Nu, what’s new with you?” and the encouraging but ultimately tormenting words “soon, by you,” it is permissible to ask a single “how’s work?”or “how do you like your new car?” or “how about meeting for coffee tomorrow night?” or say “that new blouse is stunning!”

Before you are a “single,” you are a human being. If everything in life hinges on dating, then perhaps it is time for some soul-searching. There are other substantive things in life – study, work, family, service of Hashem, hobbies, etc. And G-d-willing a relationship will also be part of that life.

5)      Men disqualify women based on superficialities like appearance. But this is true not only of men but also of women. It doesn’t happen all the time but it does occur too frequently. What does this say about us – the culture of the “pose” and the “show” in which we live? What does it say about us that visions of fashion models dance in our heads, drawn from the mass media, movies and advertisements, which clutter our heads and complicate our choices and the process of choosing? These are good questions for which each person must find an individualized answer. (Note: be careful what pictures you post on Facebook. You have no idea how many potential dates are lost because of this.)

6)      When it is “the one,” then you will know. It is clear that you have watched too many romantic dramas, but… real life does not work like that. Most couples arrive at this most momentous decision in their lives when something in their heart trembles, when everything does not seem perfect. Moreover, if everything seems perfect, check again. Maybe you have been blinded and are overlooking something important. In relation to other significant choices in life (where to attend school, where to work, etc.) the matters are complicated and there are pros and cons for each side. One has to have confidence and faith in the person with whom you wish to take the next step – but one who expects to hear a “divine echo,” or to feel butterflies in the stomach, or the sensation of burning love in his/her fingertips, will keep waiting and waiting.

7)      Meeting on the Internet is for the pathetic and the desperate. Friend, you are passé. Even if there might have been something to this in the past, those days are long gone. Today, it is possible to find on the relationship web sites many pious and exceptional individuals who understand that it is mistaken to categorically reject any option that Hashem has afforded us in order to achieve our destiny. Of course, one has to exercise caution before an actual meeting takes place, but it would be a shame to discount any avenue to the sacred goal.

Those are the myths. Perhaps the most provocative aspect of the above is Rav Lavi’s apparent rejection of the concept of “bashert” – the idea that Hashem has designated a particular person for us to marry and our task is merely to identify that person. But that does make the task any simpler? I think not. If anything, it complicates it, adding to the difficulties of getting to know a complete stranger and deeming them “marriageable” the esoteric question of “is this the one Hashem has ordained for me?” That type of pressure is liable to discomfit too many people and invalidate too many otherwise fine relationships.

Many years ago, I heard Rav Ahron Soloveichik zt”l explain that bashert (in the Talmud’s language, bat ploni l’ploni) guarantees only one thing: Hashem arranges that you encounter that person. Bashert does not guarantee that you will marry that person, or that the marriage will be a happy and fulfilling one; those depend on our free choice and good midot. And even what we do after that initial encounter – pursue that person or ignore him/her; look for the good or obsess over flaws – also depends on our bechira. As such, it is probably best to remove the bashert issue from our calculations, as it obfuscates instead of clarifies. It should remain in the realm of divine secrets to which we have no access, and which plays no role in our deliberations.

A debunking of many, if not all, of the aforementioned myths will lead to a healthier dating process and more satisfying marriages – and create Jewish homes that bring glory to the Torah and our Creator.

 

 

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Posted in Contemporary Life, Current Events, Machshava/Jewish Thought