Parashat Vaethanan
July 31, 2015

This week's Torah portion opens with Moses pleading before God for the one thing he really desires: to enter the Promised Land. God answers curtly, "Enough, don't speak to me of this matter again." God uses the same words with which Moses answered the rebellious Korah, "Rav lach," "You have arrogated too much to yourself." Moses pleads from his heart, and God, with whom Moses enjoys the best of relationships, turns him down so coldly that God appears annoyed at Moses' arrogance.
Moses immediately turns to the task at hand: reviewing the story of the sojourn from Egypt, through Sinai, and to the Israel.
What had Moses done wrong? He had made it about himself. He asked for fulfillment, a very human desire that we expect to have answered humanely if we have done well. What would it cost God, after all, to be kind?
Rashi understands Moses' passion and God's refusal in his comment on Dt. 3:23, "And I pleaded..." The word 'pleading' always refers to a freewill gift. Even though the righteous can and should rely on their good deeds, one does not pray to God for anything other than a freewill gift, as God said to Moses in Exodus 33:19 "I shall give grace to whomever I want." In other words, God chooses according to God's own criteria, which we cannot fathom.
The midrash turns the passage into a question of waiting between prayers: how long between worship services or parts of the service should someone take before starting up again? Here's the answer:
R. Simlai expounded :
A man should always recount the praise of the Holy One, blessed be He, and thereafter pray [for his needs].
Whence have we this? From Moses; for it is written, "And I besought the Lord at that time, saying" (Deut. iii. 23).
Then it is written, "O Lord God, Thou hast begun to show Thy servant Thy greatness, and Thy strong hand; for what god is there in heaven or on earth, that can do according to Thy works, and according to Thy mighty acts ?" (ibid. v. 24). And after that it is written, "Let me go over, I pray Thee, and see the good land" etc. (ibid. v. 25). (from sefaria.org)

In other words: take time first to think of God's merits, and then ask for what we need. The logical conclusion of this discussion we find in the Mishnah, Pirkei Avot 2:4, which opens:
Make His [G-d's] will your will, so that He will make your will His will. Make your will insignificant relative to His will, so that He will make the will of others insignificant relative to your will.

We, all of us, have those desires of our hearts that we truly wish to see fulfilled. Moses gave his life for a cause, and asked for a major favor at the end, with which God took umbrage and declined. Moses immediately returned to his task of leading the people. What, then, is the purpose of prayer, Rashi asks, if not to bend God's will to our own? Rashi answers brilliantly, "Take time before worship to remember God's manifold wonderful qualities, and only then should you pray." Then what do we pray for? The answer comes in Pirkei Avot, "That our will will become God's will and our desires match." That is the purpose of prayer.

Mr. Prime Minister: You Legacy is on the Line
July 7, 2015

To The Prime Minister of the State of Israel, Mr. Benjamin Netanyahu

Dear Mr. Prime Minister:

When you were a guest of the United States Congress in March, you insisted that the American Congress listen and respond to the words of Iranian leaders that threaten the State of Israel. You were adamant that we take words seriously.
In part you said on March 3, "For those who believe that Iran threatens the Jewish state, but not the Jewish people, listen to Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, Iran’s chief terrorist proxy. He said: If all the Jews gather in Israel, it will save us the trouble of chasing them down around the world."
You have said in the past that the nations of the world should have taken the words of Nazi leaders seriously, but failed to react to what was being said.
Mr. Prime Minister, clearly you understand the importance of words and the deeds that follow.
Today your Religious Affairs Minister said that Reform Jews are not part of the Jewish people and cannot be counted as Jews. We heard him very clearly. Now we will listen to your response.
Since the First Zionist Congress 118 years ago Jews of all streams and ideologies have worked together to bring the House of Israel under Israel's tent. Whether living in Israel or creating ties to Israel, we, lovers of Zion, have included ourselves in the destiny of the Jewish State. Now, your Minister, a member of your government, states those days are behind us. We are not members of the Jewish people.
Mr. Prime Minister, your legacy as the Prime Minister hangs in the balance. Will you continue to unite the Jewish people behind Israel, wherever the lovers of Israel live around the world? Or will you, through your actions, declare that your Minister of Religious Affairs is correct: liberal Jews are not members of the Jewish people any longer? Mr. Prime Minister: now is the time to choose your legacy. What will it be?
Your people are listening to take your words seriously. Are we, Mr. Prime Minister, or are we not part of the Jewish people? Shall we continue to support Israel in the American Congress? Shall we, Mr. Prime Minister, continue to support Israel in the Democratic and Republican Parties? Shall we, Mr. Prime Minister, continue to preach to the American Jewish community that the fate of American Jewry depends upon the fate of the household of Israel living in the Land of Israel? Shall continue to organize groups to visit Israel, send our children on Birthright (Taglit) and to camps in Israel, encouraging constant exchanges between the People of Israel wherever they may be found?
Or shall we, Mr. Prime Minister, conclude from your actions that we were mistaken: that Israel is the State of a small minority of the Jewish people that excludes all liberal Jews?
Mr. Prime Minister, the time for petty coalition politics has come to an end. After an entire century of convincing the Jewish people that we are one people, Am Echad im Lev Echad, one people with a single heart, now is the time to decide: Is that or is that not true?
If Mr. Azoulay continues in your cabinet, Mr. Prime Minister, we know that you have taken his words seriously and you have responded.
The choice is yours. We await your words and your actions.
Ahad HaAm -- One of the People of Israel
Rabbi Mark H. Levin

What Do We Really Want?
Parashat Balak
July 4, 2015

Evil confounds us. Why do we engage in evil? In Genesis 8:21 God proclaims, " 'I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth." Is that it? Are we naturally evil?

In this week's parashah, God first prohibits Balaam from working on behalf of the wicked Balak, and then allows Balaam to go. Does God change his mind?
In Numbers 22:20 God commands, "Rise and go with them," to which Talmud Makkot 10b responds, "Rava bar Rav Huna said, 'A man is led in the way he wishes to follow.'" In other words, our powers of rationalization to do what we really want, facilitate our sins.

Rashi contends in vs. 18 that Balaam's motive is greed, "'A house full of silver and gold": This shows us that he was greedy and coveted other people’s money. He said, “He ought to give me all his silver and gold, since he has to hire many armies, and even then, it is questionable whether he will be victorious or not, whereas I will certainly succeed.'”- [Mid. Tanchuma Balak; Num. Rabbah 20:10, trans. from Chabad.org]

To which Torah Temima says, "Everything is in the hands of heaven except for the fear of heaven," (Rabbi Hanina, Berachot 33b) "The Holy One, Blessed be God, saw the direction he wanted to go and permitted him to go there." Even though our fates may be determined for us, our moral qualities are our own determination.

It appears then that we sin because of an inner predilection to head in a particular direction, even when we avow something different. But we can choose.
Torah Temimah continues, "... Balak did not offer Balaam that he would enrich him with silver for his actions, he only promised him that he would honor him, as it says, 'for I will give you very great honor, and whatsoever thou say to me I will do; come therefore, curse for me this people.' (vs. 17) So why does Balaam answer him with money? Because it is known that "the desires of a man are frequent on his tongue to recall them." In other words, our words betray our real interests.

What do we learn? To look inside of ourselves before we respond to determine what our true interests and motives are. What do we really want? What is our real goal and predilection, and is that moral? Balaam's problem, the human dilemma? We are too willing to ask again and again to get what we really wanted to begin with, and then we rationalize that the others agreed with us because they went along with our desires. God followed Balaam's inner drive. Balaam didn't want to curse the Jewish people. He wanted the gold and silver he felt he could earn from Balak, and that colored his moral judgment and even made him betray the source of his power. May we not succumb to the same. Torah enables us to compare our internal desires to a morally unambiguous path, and decide for the good from the outset.