It is so strange to think that in one week's parashah we can describe the experience of the giving of the Torah. It's almost like I want to be just in that moment of the first aleph, of the first word of the first commandment for a while. How can we describe the moment, and then move on? Shlomo Hamelech describes this moment: "He kissed me with the kisses of his mouth." Who wants to leave a kiss, to leave the deepest expression of love? And when we do what is left? A memory, an impression, a way we describe to ourselves how the moment was.
Even the Torah itself is but a gateway, a description in words of a pathway to the infinite. A translation, if you will. The Mei Hashiloach, the Ishbitzer Rebbe, tells us that the reason that the Ten Commandments were started by the word "anochi ("I"), as opposed to "ani" ("I"), was to add the letter caph, which means "similar to, but not quite." In other words, even this Torah that we have is but a limited translation of what it is describing. And yet without the Torah we would have no translation.
We tend to think of translation work as technical. Take something in one language and give it over in another. But the truth is we are always translating. We have a thought we must turn into words. We have love that is meaningless unless somehow it can be manifested. Two people interact, yet even if they speak the same tongue, they must find a way to convey their feelings truly. How often do we say, "I love you" though we know the words cannot begin to touch the meaning of it?
And so we all translate, and sometimes we give over some or all or more. And sometimes we totally mistranslate, doing or saying things which describe something that we did not mean at all. And so the Torah, the Teaching, has two aspects. The drug of life, or the drug of death, as the Rabbis teach us. It can imply, and then lead us into, the experience of G-d it was meant to be, and beyond. And yet if it is translated wrong it can kill our spirit, our life energy. We have a tradition to read the Torah twice in Hebrew, and once in translation. There is more than one way to read the Torah, but only one way is the true translation for each person.
The gemara tells us that when G-d spoke the Ten Commandments, they were spoken in the voice of Moshe. And yet the Torah tells us that "Moshe speaks and G-d answers him in voice." The gemara learns here that the person speaking and the person translating should speak at the same level. Here the Mei Hashiloach tells us the most unbelievable thing: Moshe spoke and G-d did the translating. The words came through Moshe's mouth, but G-d translated it into each person's heart. And G-d continues to this day, giving us each a unique new understanding of what those precious words mean
A true translation needs to combine giving over the meaning and the spirit. But how is this possible? How can I constrict my whole awareness, my feelings, my experience into words and actions without losing the essence of what I am to convey? We have only clues. The Rabbis tell us: "Words that come out of the heart go into the heart." The Torah that we learn must be received in the heart, and then the words we speak must come from there. And of course we must be true to the Source. Always to make sure we have not deviated from whatever has been translated to us of the true meaning.
And when we speak or interact with others, we must do so from the heart with truth. And when we can do this, and we trust G-d to be the translator, the Torah can come in and remind us all: " I am Hashem, your G-d, who has taken you out of the house of slavery." And we can answer, echoing Yitro, each in our own language: "Now I know that G-d, You are greater than all the powers", "for your love is better than wine."
Rav Raz Hartman
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Rav Raz Hartman, born to Israeli parents, grew up in Southern California. He was attending U.S.C., majoring in Music Peformance, when he met Rav Natan Greenberg. That meeting eventually result in Raz's coming to the Bat Ayin Yeshiva, where he studied for six years and was given Semichah in 2003. He is married to Leah, and they live, with their three children, in Nachla'ot, Jerusalem. Raz serves as Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivat Simchat Shlomo, and founder of the v'Ani Tefillah minyan. He has produced several albums of Jewish music. |