Does a King Need Servants?

You bet He does!

Rashi on the last and final parsha of the Torah says that a king without servants is not a king. Which is why God needs us. 

Then Hashem became King in Jeshurun,
When the heads of the people assembled,
The tribes of Israel together.

But more poignantly, Rashi adds that Hashem can't be King of the Universe if the Jewish people are not united. 

In Hebrew, yachad shivtei Yisrael; if the Jewish people are fraught by conflict and unrest, and cannot come together, then Hashem ceases to rule over his world through the aegis of the Jewish people. 

This is a very sad reality. One where the stature of the Jewish people declines, when we are not impervious to attack but rather susceptible to it, where the Jewish people are not looked up to but rather defamed and denigrated. 

With Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur behind us - when Hashem was coronated over our people and the whole world - and Sukkot likewise receding into the past, may we remember the message of these holy holidays, that having coronated Hashem, and Him, after choosing us as his people, may we strive to embed Hashem's hand in the natural world by leaving our comfort zone and bringing our fellow brothers and sisters closer to Him. May we live a life where the real world is the one not confined strictly to the Beit Midrash, or halls of prayer, but rather one where we engage our fellow Jews and build not only a temporary home but a permanent one vested by and with the values of changing the world and implementing the values of kindness for our fellow man, seeing in God's plenty Hashem's hand so that we can share it with others. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

No More Mr. Nice Guy

Parshat Kdoshim makes us think twice about how we treat people who are mean to us. "You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against members of your people. Love your fellow man as yourself: I am Hashem." The sages teach that taking a revenge takes the following pattern. One man asks his fellow man to lend him a sickle because his has broken and he needs to harvest his wheat and trim the weeds that threaten his wheat. His friend says no. A month later the same scenario plays out, just this time, the one who refused needs one himself. His friend says no. Why, he asks himself, would he lend his friend a sickle if his friend didn't lend him one? The rationale even makes sense. In the business world, there's a new term, "coopetition," companies usually do compete but sometimes cooperate for their mutual benefit. The thinking makes sense when it comes to the nitty gritty of human relations; Nobel Prize winner, Professor Israel Aumann talks about w...
Read more

Can Moshe Have Misheard God?

Sometimes we hear something, but we don't really hear what has been said. Or, we understand a message differently from how it was intended. That was what happened in this past week's parsha, Shemini, when Moshe's wrath flared against Aharon's sons, Elazar and Itamar for not eating the he-goat of their sin offering. He chastised them. "Hashem gave it to you to procure forgiveness for the community's sin and to atone on their behalf before Hashem. Its blood was not brought into the sanctuary within; it should have been eaten in the holy domain as I had commanded." For a little bit of background, for Aharon HaCohen, it had been a fraught day to say the least; Elazar and Itamar's older brothers, Nadav and Avihu, had been eaten alive in a heavenly flame that took their lives but left their bodies intact. Moshe commanded Mishael and Elzaphan, their cousins, to then remove them by their tunics and place them outside of the camp. The day, in essence, ha...
Read more

What if God Was One of Us

The answer is, it would be pretty darn bad.  This week's parsha speaks to four different situations where one accidentally sins, and the consequent atonement process.  On Shabbat, a friend asked me, "Why does the verse  say, ' When a chieftain (i.e. leader) sins, unwittingly bearing guilt by performing an act Hashem has commanded him not to do (Vayikra 4:22)..?' Why doesn't the Torah say " If " like it says for all of the other transgressors, 'If the annointed priest sins...If the high assembly sins...If a layman sins..?' What distinguishes between the Nasi or tribal chief, or head of Israel, and every other potential sinner'"? I told him, "You see, it's like the expression, ' She'elat Chacham, Chatzi Teshuva ' (the question of a wise person, is already half the answer). A person who has to lead others, will inevitably get his hands dirty." You can't lead without making mistakes, you can't be human withou...
Read more