Re'eh (Haftarot)

“Afflicted and Storm Tossed”

The haftarah for Re’eh, the third in the series of seven, is quite brief, encompassing a mere dozen verses (Isa 54:11-55:5). In contrast with its anguished and storm-tossed state, here Zion is promised a glorious future—its city streets inlayed with precious stones, its gates gleaming with agate. But more important, it will be blessed with justice and righteousness, it will be kept far from oppression and corruption, while all those who are hungry and thirsty for the word of the Lord will come to her. The Creator of the universe Himself will guarantee that no vessel fashioned to harm them will succeed.

This haftarah contains one particular verse which is familiar from a Rabbinic dictum quoted in our daily prayers, which begs for deeper and closer attention. “And all your children shall be taught by the Lord, and great shall be the peace of your children” (54:13). What is meant by “limudei ha-Shem,” translated here as “taught by the Lord.” Is it simply intellectual, cognitive learning, say of a sacred text, or is it something else? Judging from the immediate sequel (“you shall be established with righteousness… you shall be far from oppression…”), one may infer that the “teaching” spoken of here is closer to ethical training, to cultivation of character—perhaps like the internalization of the “knowing and understanding Me” spoken of in, e.g., Jer 9:24 (see HY II: Tisha b’Av).

A Thought for Elul: “Whoever does one good deed acquires a defending angel; whoever does one sin acquires an accusing angel.” (Avot 4.13)

I was reminded of these words of Rabbi Eliezer ben Yaakov some weeks ago, when I was walking along a Jerusalem street and came upon a poster announcing the death of a certain person. I had only met the deceased briefly, some twenty years before, but immediately memories of our encounter came flooding back to me. An author and thinker, he had approached me at that time to translate a short paper he had written. I was then a young man, just starting out in the translator’s profession. When the time came for him to collect the material, he made the following proposal: rather than paying me for the translation I had done, he would consider it as a sample of my work; if he liked it, he might give me the job of translating a much larger work he had written. I rejected the offer out of hand: it was not what we had agreed upon; I was a family man, with two small children to support, and had devoted time and effort in preparing the translation. But beyond that, there was something petty, dishonest, stingy, not to say insulting, in his approach. The incident also rankled, in light of the lofty and world-embracing ideas which he addressed in his writing.

All these thoughts crossed my mind when I saw the announcement that he had gone to His Maker. I then thought of the above passage in Pirkei Avot. We often read this passage in a quasi-mystical sense, as if referring to the “good” and “bad” angels created by our deeds, which are somehow summoned up in the heavenly courtroom each year on Rosh Hashana when all of us are judged, as well as at the end of life, when the dead person’s soul is called upon to render a final reckoning to its Creator.

But it occurred to me that there is a much simpler, more naturalistic reading of this dictum of Hazal. Try as I might to think charitable and forgiving thoughts towards this man (who no doubt thought of himself as a highly spiritual and ethical individual: after all, his entire life was devoted to the exploration of significant spiritual and ethical issues!), I cannot respect him. Should I chance upon a review of one of his books, or perhaps a eulogy in one of the papers, or see an announcement of the inevitable memorial lecture or academic mini-conference in his memory, I shall no doubt think: “If they only knew what he was like in real life! What a cheap, slimey hypocrite!”

I only met him once in his life. That one act, revealing his personality and character as it did, indelibly shaped my impression of the man. I shall no doubt carry the above-described memory of Mr. X to my own grave, because that is all I really know about him. His own behavior has will-nilly made me into an “accusing angel.”

That, I believe, is the lesson of this mishnah: that we must bear in mind the importance, which we often never anticipate, of every single act in our lives, because everything we does shapes how others judge us, and may turn them into a “prosecutor” or a “defender.” The message is not “What a creep Mr. X was,” but to extrapolate from it: If I remember X because of this one petty, nasty deed, so should I learn to be careful in life, and to know that I am constantly encountering others who may judge me, in the future, both before and after 120, on the basis of those small actions that betray my character.