On The Way
We moderns tend to reduce faith to a set of ideas and attitudes that fit our prevailing pragmatic outlook. Religion becomes just another social group, culture or tradition - something we enjoy for its benefits and pleasures but not anything that truly transforms us.
Rabbi Yosher Ber Soloveitchik wrote a famous essay entitled The Lonely Man of Faith. In it, he explores the two portrayals of Adam in Bereishis as an analogy for the life of faith. Adam I, the Adam of ambition and worldly achievement, represents the part of us that wishes to make our mark on civilisation's unfolding story. This side of our nature drives us to shape our surroundings through technology and enterprise. And yet, within us resides an Adam II, a restless, stirring being who seeks intimate union with its Eternal creator. We yearn for a purpose beyond material goals: communion with the Divine. This tension between our earthly tasks and spiritual longings lies at the core of our experiences. The origins of this paradox reach back to the dawn of mankind.
Of course, one ignores either Adam's at his peril. As Jews, we strive to live according to our belief system, and all want to believe that a strong Adam II remains inside us. Yet Rav Soloveitchik is quite clear; it is possible to maintain a behaviourally religious identity and still be ignorant of the spiritual. By treating religion as a lifestyle, we’ve imprisoned the transcendent between our narrow walls of space and time. But this can't be all Judaism is. If that were the case, the spiritual realm would be neither distinct nor independent, just another 'life hack' amongst many. It's as if we were gazing at the heavens through a straw, surrounded by beauty yet only viewing a fraction of it.
What have we lost? And how do we get it back? Rav Kook sees these questions hinted at in this week's parsha. The verse states:
"The Israelites were in the desert and found a man collecting wood on Shabbos." {Bamidbar 15:32}
Moshe is unsure how to deal with the transgressor and turns to God to establish the appropriate punishment. So an unidentified wood-gatherer desecrated Shabbos, but who was he?
We find the answer in Parshas Pinchas. When God commanded Moshe to divide the land of Canaan among the tribes of Israel, the daughters of a man named Tzelofchad feared his share would be lost since he had no sons to claim his portion. They decided to approach Moshe and request their father's land inheritance:
“Our father died in the desert... because of his own sin, and he had no sons.” {Bamidbar 27:3}
In both verses, we encounter an anonymous man and the seemingly superfluous information that events occurred 'in the desert'. The Talmud records Rabbi Akiva drawing a connection between the unknown sinner and the transgressor who committed a sin of equal obscurity. The individual who disregarded Shabbos by gathering wood was none other than Tzelofchad, and it was this very violation that resulted in his demise.
Yet still, some questions remain. Was Tzelofchad's desecration of Shabbos tied to his death without sons, risking his inheritance of Israel? And what's the Torah's strange reminder that his sin occurred 'in the wilderness'? We will expound on our original inquiry as we continue pursuing Rav Kook's line of thought.
The desert represents transience. Wilderness is no place to establish roots and nurture growth. Even the nomads who live amongst the dunes are constantly on the move, never setting a permanent home. We only encounter deserts on a journey to an ultimate destination. In reality, even kedushah in the desert contained the seeds of impermanence. Mount Sinai, sanctified for Matan Torah's revelation, returned to being just another mountain. Only Eretz Yisrael and Yerushalayim possess holiness without limit, the place selected for God's eternal presence.
Famously Rav Tzadok identifies Shabbos as corresponding to time in the same way the Temple corresponds to space. Hence, holiness manifested in time may also exhibit varying levels of permanence. The eternal Shabbos expresses the most lasting form of sanctity in time, representing a foretaste of the world to come. All other holidays depend upon the calendar, as set by the Sanhedrin. Yet Shabbos beats to a different rhythm, for it recalls not what happened but Who made it happen. Festivals commemorate God's deeds performed for our ancestors; Shabbos whispers of the silent mystery of Being itself. The Festivals proclaim God in history; Shabbos alludes to God before history - that breathless, timeless, eternal moment in which God spoke the world into being.
Tzelofchad violated Shabbos in the desert, and in the desert, he perished. When he ignored Shabbos's transcendent holiness, he rendered his desert journey an impasse, a cul-de-sac, a dead end. He became disconnected from higher reality, both through time and space. He lost permanence in the dimension of time - Shabbos day - and place - his inheritance in the Land of Israel. Tzelofchad's demise serves as a reminder and warning:
life can only be lived with an awareness of eternity
Our technological and science-based society has many advantages. But it has also bred a utilitarian and pragmatic mindset that focuses only on what we can see, measure and manipulate. As a result, we have lost sight of higher truths, unseen dimensions of meaning and purpose. This narrowing of our horizons has impoverished our souls and made us perceive our lives and possessions as permanent.
But the truth is that nothing lasts forever. Pleasure passes, fortune fades, wellness wanes, and all we grasp so tightly will one day slip away. We clutch at shadows, forgetting the Light which casts them, acting as if this brief span of years is all there is. We must recapture a sense of the transcendent, of something beyond time that gives meaning and perspective to every day. Only then can we live wisely, with open hands, not clinging too tightly to what we have but using it well. But to do so requires us to cultivate an inner detachment, an ability to see through the illusion of permanence to the reality of constant change. Certainly no easy feat, but one we must pursue never the less. Adam II still burns within us. Our fleeting time should be utilized for purposes that will last beyond our petty desires of the moment. We are all on the way.
Good Shabbos, and Keep Pondering!
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