Friends - does anyone out there have any oxen? Well, if you do, read this week's parasha for very important instructions as to oxen care and maintenance, possible future legal tangles, etc. If not, well, skip this one and go to next week's parasha. Choose your own adventure.
OK. Here we go. Oxen care principle number one: Never ever run a joke too long. But never cut it too short.
No, seriously. Obviously this week's parasha matters to all the ox-less as well. Especially because the Lubovitcher Rebbe says the parashiyot only go up in kedusha (holiness). How could this week's list of practical laws, most of which are entirely impractical, be on a higher level than last week's firework: the giving of the Torah, G-d speaking to all of us directly, seeing sounds, dying several times over and being resurrected? Noble eternal principles of relationship, etc. etc.?
It is holier because we get to see the lofty ideas of last week's parasha manifested in daily life. Deep down within the laws of goring oxen and neglected pits, layer below layer is the principle "Anochi" ("I am"), the first commandment: "I am Hashem your G-d." Every commandment might read, "I am Hashem your G-d, so if your ox gores your friend's ox, then…" But there is a deeper level of relationship between these laws and the great Principles: these laws lead us to a much deeper understanding of those Principles than we would have had without them. These laws give those Principles life, body, and imagery. Especially given what we discussed last week, specifically that the point of Torah is not to be the figurehead of Truth, but to be the context for relationship - with G-d and with each other. When we constantly remind ourselves of that rule, that Hashem wants a world, and we don't know the reason exactly, but He wanted a world, and He made space within His infinite Light to make a world that was, so to speak, outside of Himself, and created for Himself a relationship, and if He wanted a world which would simply dissolve back into Him, then He wouldn't have given us laws about oxen. He would have said, "Thou shall not have oxen, so that Thou might contemplate Me and dissolve into Me ASAP." But we have these laws, and it seems that Hashem wants us to have human lives, to have oxen and pits. And He wants them to be infused with "Anochi" - consciousness.
There's a beauty one feels at the end of the day when justice has been served - even if one lost the court case and had to pay money. Real justice can give one hope for humanity, can remind a person that there is more to people than their own desires and small lives, that hovering over the community at large is a sense of Right-ness that connects us to principles that are eternal and go beyond us.
It is said that "Anochi" is the root of all positive commandments, and that "Thou shall have no other gods but me" is the root of all negative commandments. It is exciting to attach each law to its root and see how the process plays out. For example, the first law mentioned in the parasha is about slavery. If a Jew becomes a slave, then he works for six years and goes free on the seventh. We see here a clear underlying principle: slavery is bad, and therefore must be impermanent. Also, as R' Leibele Eiger points out, the master may easily lose consciousness of this fact that slavery is bad, and he cannot be trusted to free slaves on his own. Therefore the Torah must mandate a limited time for slavery.
So, if slavery is bad, why not just outlaw slavery? Certainly, many answers have been provided to that question. It seems to me that Hashem does not want to limit how far we can go with His principles. If a person can descend into slavery and still maintain dignity and G-d-consciousness, then why limit it? Again, the two axes are genuine humanity and G-d consciousness. With only G-d consciousness, we dissolve into Him. With only genuine humanity, chaos will eventually take over. With the two together, I believe, G-d does not need to limit us so much. Only at the outer limits, like incest, does there need to be the prohibition of certain kinds of relationships. Within the bounds of Justice and good taste, we are allowed to take humanity to all necessary ends, bringing G-d-consciousness to bear in all corners of the globe.
So, everyone who is for G-d, quick, to the ox store. We have work to do.
Rav Gavriel Goldfeder
|
Rav Gavriel Goldfeder is one of the first semicha recipients of the yeshiva. A graduate of Drew University in Religious Studies, he came to Bat Ayin after stints in other yeshivot and found a spiritual and intellectual home. Here he met his wife, Ketriellah, who was a student in our short-lived Women's Yeshiva. Upon graduation, Gavriel took the position of rabbi of the Aish Kodesh Congregation in Boulder, Colorado and together with Ketriellah and their growing family, they are busy creating (in Gavriel's words), "a community infused with Torah values, passion for learning and prayer, consideration of one another, and action, as well as deep celebration of the joys of life." |