Torah Portion: Tzav

Finding Passion
by Rabbi Stephen Baars

We all need a sense that what we are doing makes a real difference.

When Rose Blumkin left Belarus to came to America in the 1920’s, she did not speak a word of English and had no formal education. But with the $500 she borrowed from her brother, she started a very modest furniture store in Omaha Nebraska. Very modest.

However, by the time Mrs. B (as she was affectionately named) sold the Nebraska Furniture Mart to Warren Buffet, it was the largest furniture store in America.

Buffet said about Mrs. B., “Put her up against the top graduates of the top business schools or chief executives of the Fortune 500 and, assuming an even start with the same resources, she’d run rings around them.”

How do you get to be so successful?

In this week’s parsha God commands the Kohanim (priests) to remove the ashes every morning from the Temple. At first glance, that doesn’t sound like the kind of task one would give to such a holy and important person. In fact, it doesn’t sound like the kind of thing that needs mentioning at all.

Interestingly, the Talmud reports that the Kohanim were so eager to take out the ashes, that they instituted a lottery system to stop them arguing about who would get the job! In contrast, every four years there is an election in America. Many important roles and positions are on the ballot. But not the garbage men!

Rav Yaacov Weinberg zt”l tells of a social science experiment in which minimum wage workers were hired to work along a conveyor belt, simply screwing nuts onto bolts. After a while however, the conveyor belt was reversed and these same workers had to take these same nuts off those same bolts.

They found that no matter what they were paid, people wouldn’t do it.

We all need a sense that what we are doing makes a real difference. In other words, it’s not the money. We need to feel we are doing something important. Double or triple your salary, and nevertheless if all you did was move papers from one side of your desk to the other, you would soon quit. When Apple turned against Steve Jobs they wanted to fire him, but couldn’t. What did they do? They gave him an office with no responsibilities. All he had to do was show up and he would get paid – and they didn’t even care if he showed up!

Jobs couldn’t do it, and he quit.

I have been told that the time of greatest productivity in America was World War Two. Anyone who was putting a nut on a bolt or sweeping a factory floor, or driving a bus felt they were making a real difference.

This concept can be seen in every person you work with. If the goal is important to them, then they are willing to take out the garbage, and if it isn’t, then you can’t pay them enough to do it. When you do it for the money, then you need the prestige as well.

I grew up in London, and while I was in school a friend of mine was chosen to serve in Buckingham Palace for the Queen of England. It was a different time and a different place — but you could not put a lid on how proud he felt doing that job, a job in any other place or any other time would make him feel belittled.

When you view your job like that, you will be a Mrs. B.

Find a career or job for which you are willing to take out the garbage, and you have found your passion.

This is not as difficult as it might seem. I remember growing up while NASA was trying to put a man on the moon. There was not a single kid I knew that wouldn’t give everything to take out the garbage in mission control.

Now we can understand the removing of the ashes. This was quite simply, taking out God’s garbage.

So, our lesson?

Passion comes from the goal NOT the role. Don’t worry about the title, worry about the results.

If in what you choose, you are willing to do whatever needs to be done, then you can have passion.

If you aren’t doing something that you would feel honored taking out the garbage, then being the CEO is no honor either.

By the way, what do we call people who are willing to do whatever needs to be done, where the title is as irrelevant as the compensation?

We call them parents.

                                                                                                  * * *

BRAINSTORMING QUESTIONS TO PONDER

Question 1: Think of a time when you were so focused on a goal that eating and maybe even sleeping had no place in your mind. The goal was so important that no task was too menial for you. What was that goal and how did you feel about completing it?

Question 2: What are the top three most important goals that a human being can have?

Question 3: What can you do every day to help achieve those goals?

Matzah and Chometz
by Rabbi Ari Kahn

If bread is associated with negative attributes, why do we eat it all year round?

The concepts of leavened and unleavened bread are familiar to us from the holiday of Passover, but we tend to focus on the physical or technical aspects that differentiate them from one another. However, Jewish tradition goes far beyond the physics of the dough itself, and seeks out the deeper symbolism of chametz and matzah.

Talmudic teachings regarding Passover associate leavened bread with the evil inclination:(1) The difference between leavened bread, chametz, and matzah, the unleavened “bread of poverty,” is that bread is puffed up, indicating haughtiness or pride. And yet, this teaching leads to some unavoidable questions: If bread is associated with negative attributes, why should it ever be allowed? Why not require that we eat only unleavened bread all year round? Alternatively, we may ask, why is Passover specifically the time to prohibit leavened bread? While we can easily understand the obligation to eat matzah to commemorate our hasty departure from Egypt, we should have no difficulty imagining that this symbolic food might co-exist with leavened bread. In other words, why prohibit bread simply because we are obligated to eat matzah?

In order to address these questions, we would do well to broaden our scope to include another festival that is intrinsically linked to Passover: Shavuot, the Festival of Weeks. While the Exodus from Egypt serves as the catalyst for the prohibition of bread, we are commanded to count seven weeks, and on the fiftieth day to celebrate Shavuot, thus creating an unbreakable chronological link between the two holidays. While we may say that the primary link between Passover and Shavuot lies in their agricultural aspects, the theological, historical and symbolic aspects of these festivals are no less intertwined: Specifically on Shavuot, as opposed to every other day of the year, bread is included in the service and celebratory sacrifice in the Beit Hamikdash. Seen from this perspective, the link between Passover and Shavuot creates a continuum, shedding light on the questions we have raised regarding chametz and matzah, as it leads us from the prohibition of bread to the occasion on which leavened bread is brought into the Temple service. In fact, the Torah laws that govern the sacrifices brought throughout the year in the Beit HaMikdash bring our questions into even sharper focus: As a rule, other than the Shtei haLechem, the two loaves that are an integral part of the service on Shavuot, bread was not allowed in the Temple or Temple service at all. This week’s parashah contains a clear statement of this prohibition:   “Aharon and his descendants shall then eat the rest [of the offering]. It must be eaten as unleavened bread in a holy place. They must therefore eat it in the enclosure of the Tent of Meeting. It shall not be baked as leavened bread. I have given this to them as their portion in My fire offerings, and it is holy of holies, like the sin offering and the guilt offering… (Vayikra 6:9-10)

Other than the two loaves offered on Shavuot, there is only one other exception to the ban on leavened bread in the Temple, and it, too, is found in this week’s parashah:  At thanksgiving offering, then it must be presented along with unleavened loaves mixed with oil, flat matzahs saturated with oil, and loaves made of a boiled mixture of flour and oil. The sacrifice shall also be presented along with loaves of leavened bread; all these shall be brought with one’s thanksgiving peace offering. (Vayikra 7:11-13)

This unique combination of breads is offered in thanksgiving: When an individual feels that his or her life has been spared through Divine intervention, when a personal catastrophe is averted and a person experiences personal salvation, they may bring this offering of gratitude to celebrate the peace they have been granted. It is specifically this thanksgiving “peace offering” that includes both leavened and unleavened bread.

We have learned two apparently independent laws, one regarding the unique service on Shavuot and one regarding the thanksgiving sacrifice; when we overlay these two laws, a fascinating observation emerges: The Passover experience, encompassing the paschal sacrifice, the matzah, even the seder itself, may be akin to a “thanksgiving” offering. If this is the case, we cannot help but notice that something is missing, and the thanksgiving is not complete: The leavened bread that is an integral part of the thanksgiving offering is not included in the celebration of Passover. Quite the opposite: Leavened bread is strictly prohibited throughout the entire festival, leading us to the conclusion that despite our feelings of thanksgiving and joy, we are really not quite completely free. The national and personal freedom that Passover celebrates is somehow lacking, hence the inclusion of leavened bread is inappropriate.

What is missing from the Passover story? Why is our celebration, and our offering, less than perfect? When the Jews left Egypt, they were politically free, yet they were spiritually limited. They were wrested from the depths of depraved Egyptian society, extricated from the world of idolatry and superstition, yet no other belief system had taken the place of the idolatry they left behind.

The prohibition of bread on Passover reminds us that leaving Egypt was not enough. Physical, political freedom is simply a means to an end; we are not truly free until we are given our mandate, until we accept our mission, until we appreciate the raison d’etre for our liberation from Egypt. Only when we stood at Sinai and accepted the Torah was our liberation complete. As we celebrate Passover, we mark a time when we were still a humble nation of emancipated slaves who had not yet achieved true freedom. Only after accepting the Torah, after accepting our new marching orders, after accepting the loftiest mission given to humankind, was there place for pride.

Only on Shavuot can we celebrate and give thanks for our complete freedom and take pride in our partnership with God, a partnership designed to elevate and transform the world. On Shavuot, we complete our thanksgiving, adding the two loaves of leavened bread that were missing on Passover. This sort of celebration, in which we complete our offering of thanksgiving, is reserved for those who enjoy true freedom. Celebrating anything less is a shallow celebration of mediocrity.

For a more in-depth analysis see: http://arikahn.blogspot.co.il/2015/03/audio-and-essays-parashat-tzav.html

NOTE    1. Talmud Bavli Brachot 17a, and commentary of Rashi.

Follow Instructions
by Nesanel Yoel Safran

From This Week’s Torah Portion

Carefully following instructions can help us accomplish things we wouldn’t be able to do otherwise. In this week’s Torah portion we learn of the instructions that the people carefully followed to properly bring the special offerings to the Tabernacle, which helped them feel closer to God. We, too, achieve a lot by carefully following instructions.

In our story, a boy sees the value following instructions — in living color.

“Whatcha doin’?” Cal asked his big sister, Jenny, who had just sat down at the playroom table and was looking very busy — Cal’s favorite time to ask her lots of questions.

“I’m about to make a painting,” Jenny said, as she laid out a flat white panel and rows of little containers; each a different color and with a number on its cover.

“Yeah? A painting of what?”

“If you must know — this.” Jenny held up a cardboard box top that had a beautiful picture of running horses on it.

“Come on,” the boy chuckled, “You’re not an artist or anything. You could never make something that looked like that.”

“That’s what you think,” Jenny sniffed as she opened the cap of one of the paint cups. Then, after staring for a while at the while panel, she took her paintbrush and painted a small brown spot in one of the corners.

“Why’d you do that?” Cal asked, poking his finger at the newly painted spot.

“Don’t touch! Hey, don’t you have somewhere to go?”

“Me? No. Why? And what are all those little squiggly boxes on what you’re painting?”

Jenny, who by now had filled in several more patches in various corners of the panel, reluctantly raised her head.

“Those ‘squiggly boxes’ are the paint-by-number instructions. They say where to put which color…”

“Instructions? I hate instructions!”

“Oh, really? I would never have guessed. But, sometimes people need them, you know. Like now. See, all the boxes that have the number ‘one’ on it, I have to paint with this kind of brown. And all the…”

“That’s how you think you’re going to make a good painting? Are you nuts?”

“Not last I checked. Hey, isn’t that Dad calling you from downstairs?”

“Dad’s out shopping in case you want to know. Like I said, why bother with dumb instructions? Just paint however you want.”

“I do make paintings that way sometimes, but this time I want to make it just like in the picture…”

“You can even paint with your fingers like we do in school – here, want me to show you how?” He reached for the paints.

“No!! Will you just let me…”

“Cal … bath time…”

“Hah! This time Mom is calling you. Too-da-loo!”

The boy stomped down the stairs and Jenny, finally free from playing ’20 questions,’ was able to buckle down and concentrate. She carefully followed the instructions one by one…

A while later:

“Hey, Jenny, why does it happen that every time I stay in the bath a long time my skin wrinkles up like I’m eighty gazillion years old?” Cal asked as he burst into the playroom.

“I give up.”

The kid, now in his pajamas and smelling like bubble bath, jumped up onto her lap and stuck his face inches from her now nearly completed painting.

“Wow! That really looks just like those horses in the picture!”

“Thanks. But be careful, it’s still a little wet and you don’t want to have to go back in the bath for another eighty gazillion years, do you?”

“No way! Hey! What happened to all the little boxes?”

“I filled them all in – like I told you I would.”

The boy shook his head. “Wow, do you think I could make a nice picture like that?”

“Sure. As long as you follow the instructions.”

Discussion Questions

Ages 3-5

Q. How did Cal feel when he first saw Jenny painting?
A. He felt like there was no reason to have to follow the instructions.

Q. How did he feel in the end?
A. When he saw how nice the picture came out, he realized following instructions could be a good thing.

Ages 6-9

Q. Why do you think people sometimes don’t like following instructions?
A. It can be hard and it’s also human nature to like to do things our own way – which is fine – but sometimes by following instructions we can accomplish things we wouldn’t be able to do otherwise.

Q. Do we always have to follow the instructions we are given?
A. It depends. If the instructions are to do something dangerous or against our values, then certainly not. However, if they will help us learn or accomplish something – why not?

Ages 10 and Up

Q. Who do you think will be better at learning from others by following instructions – a conceited person or a humble one? Why?
A. To follow instructions requires a measure of humility, as we must admit that we don’t ‘know it all.’

Q. The Torah has been describes as ‘instructions for living’. What do you think this means?
A. Life and all of its many inner and outer facets is a hugely complex undertaking. The Creator wouldn’t just pop us down on the planet without an instruction book on how to live the most pleasurable and successful life. That instruction book is the Written and Oral Torah.

 

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