Shabbat Shalom Weekly
Torah Portion: Shimini
Kosher Ideas
by Rabbi Yehuda Appel
Many people find dieting to be quite a challenge. Indeed, Jewish tradition found the entire enterprise of eating to be filled with obstacles and opportunities. Meal time is termed in Jewish literature as “the hour of war”; the Hebrew word for war — milchama –– has the same root as lechem – bread. Eating is supposed to be an act of elevating oneself through the medium of thought, speech and action. In the realm of thought, we should view eating as an act of fulfilling the Almighty’s will. In the realm of speech, we say a blessing over the food. And in the realm of action, we eat the food with care and appreciation of the Almighty’s beneficence.
In this week’s Torah portion, Shmini, the delineation is made between kosher and non-kosher animals. The Torah states that for an animal to be kosher it must chew its cud and have split hooves. Chewing the cud (“rumination”) involves the regurgitation and then redigestion of food. Jewish tradition sees this as an allusion for the need to review and reexamine one’s actions, a procedure that is at the very heart of righteousness. The split hoof, coming as it does at the foot, emphasizes the need for a person to be complete from head to toe.
In contradistinction to the wholeness of a kosher animal, there are four animals — the camel, pig, shafan and arnevet (the last two animals’ identities are not known today) – who are singled out in this week’s Parsha because they possessed only one of two kosher signs.The camel represents pride, the pig – hypocrisy, the shafan – idolatry, and the arnevet – narrowness.
On the other hand, fish are seen as the most holy of species. Unlike other species who, even in their kosher manifestations need some tikkun (rectification), the fish needs none. Fish do not need to be ritually slaughtered or have its blood removed as its land cousins did. Moreover, the fish were unaffected by Noah’s flood. While the land animals had been involved in bestiality before the deluge, the fish maintained their purity and were thus saved.
This symbol of the fish as representing purity can also be found in the kabalistic literature where it is used to symbolize the tzaddik, the righteous person. Many people are guilty of misusing their gift of sight and viewing scenes they would be better off avoiding. In kabalistic understanding, the anatomical feature of the eyelid is an allusion to this need to at times shut our eyes and avoid seeing improper things. The tzaddik, however guards his behavior, intuitively avoiding such situations, and actually needs no such safeguard. He is thus symbolized by a fish, a species which has no eyelid.
The Torah also makes distinctions between kosher and non-kosher fish. To be kosher, a fish has to possess both fins and scales. The sources explain that these elements can be likened to crowns atop the fish, attesting to the kosher fish’s higher spiritual status. Furthermore, such fish tend to swim in the upper expanses of the ocean where the water is more pure.
It is clear that Jewish tradition sees the act of eating as an opportunity to elevate one’s behavior to a higher level.
Why not make dining — and dieting — a truly holy act?!
Mistaken Anger
by Rabbi Dr. Mordechai Schiffman
On the Eighth Day of the inauguration of the Mishkan, the Tabernacle, a celebration is in order as God’s Glory appears and a fire descends, symbolizing the successful acceptance of the sacrifices. Yet the elation turns quickly to tragedy, when another fire descends, but this time, to consume Aharon’s sons, Nadav and Avihu, after they offer a foreign fire on the altar.
Aharon is silent. The ceremony must proceed as planned. The usual regulations of mourning are suspended. Moshe informs Aharon and his remaining children to eat from the Meal and Peace offerings as intended but does not mention anything specifically about the Sin offering. When he discovers that they burned the whole animal and didn’t eat it, Moshe expresses anger.
Aharon defends the decision, arguing that after all he has experienced on that day, God wouldn’t want them to eat that sacrifice. Moshe hears Aharon’s argument and is pleased. The Sages explain that Moshe knew the law that they shouldn’t have eaten the Sin offering, but forgot. The Midrash (Vayikra Rabba 13) identifies this as one of the three times Moshe became angry and consequently, forgot a law.
Another Midrash (Sifra) reports a fascinating dispute between two sages as to the sequencing of the problem. Did Moshe’s anger cause him to make a mistake or did his mistake cause him to get angry? Chanania ben Yehuda argues that Moshe’s anger led to his mistake. However, Rabbi Yehuda questions this analysis because if it wasn’t for the mistake, he never would have become angry in the first place. The mistake led to the anger, not the other way around.1
It is unclear which sage is correct with regards to Moshe. Yet, for the psychological message, we don’t have to pick a winner. They are both true. Anger both causes mistakes and is rooted in mistakes. The fact that anger causes mistakes is quite obvious. When we are angry, we tend to speak or act in ways that we later regret. Mistakes caused by anger destroy careers, damage relationships, and devastate families.
Less apparent, yet perhaps more important, anger is also rooted in mistakes. Some argue that we cannot control the way we feel. Emotions, they argue, just happen to us without any conscious control. Yet, mounting evidence indicates otherwise. Our thoughts, beliefs, expectations, perceptions and attitudes impact the way we feel. A core principle of Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) is that by working on identifying, challenging, and changing our thought processes, we can change our emotional experiences to be healthier.2
The thoughts that lead to an unhealthy anger are almost always mistaken. They are what are referred to as cognitive distortions or irrational beliefs. While we should always be hesitant of critiquing Moses, following the lead of the two Midrashim above, at the very least we can try to glean a lesson for our own self-improvement. In Moshe’s case, it seems his mistake was that he didn’t remember all the facts of the case and then jumped to the conclusion that the others were wrong.
Are we prone to jumping to conclusions, to making judgments before we have all the facts? Do we yell at our kids, siblings, parents, friends, coworkers, or employees, before clarifying the whole story? If yes, it may be worth our while to work on training our brains to slow down, examine the situation from all sides and ask clarifying questions of others.
By changing our mistaken thinking, we can change our emotions and help avoid the consequences that unhealthy emotions have on our relationships.
- See Ohr HaChaim for a fuller analysis of the Midrash. See also Rabbi Dr. Abraham’s Twerski’s, “Twerski on Chumash.”
- For more on the interaction between thought and emotion, see “Cognition and Emotion: From Order to Disorder” by Mick Power Tim Dalgleish.
Speak with Respect
by Nesanel Yoel Safran
From this week’s Torah Portion
It is an important value to treat and speak to others with respect and not with rudeness or chutzpah. This is especially true when speaking to those older than we are. After Passover we enter a semi-mourning period called Sefirat Ha-Omer, in which we commemorate a great catastrophe that once took place at this time of year because the students of Rebbe Akiva didn’t treat each other with enough respect. A person who avoids the negative trait of chutzpah and treats others respectfully brings peace to the world and also shows that he respects himself.
In our story, a girl discovers the value of respect.
“What, do you think — I’m your slave or something?” Dana shouted into the phone.
Greg, her married older brother, had called to ask her to baby-sit for him and his wife that evening.
“Pay me? You bet you’ll pay me. It’s going to cost you, and cost you big!” she went on. “Okay, I’ll be there in 20 minutes — if you’re lucky.”
Dana banged down the phone with a smile on her face. It always gave her a buzz to tell off her big brother or any other adult for that matter.
“Thanks for coming over, Dana,” smiled Ellen, Greg’s wife. “We’ll be back by 10 PM. The kids just need to eat supper — I have it ready in the microwave — and then to bed. Is that okay?”
“I guess so, if I have to. And don’t be a minute late!” Dana snapped.
“Dana, could you please speak a little more respectfully to Ellen?” Greg said. “She’s an adult, you know,” he added.
But Dana just shrugged. She didn’t buy any of this ‘respect your elders’ stuff and instead made it a point to make sure they respected her.
Greg and Ellen left and Dana got ready to make some easy money. She figured the little kids would be fed and in bed within half an hour and she could spend the rest of the night raiding the refrigerator and catching up on her chatty phone calls.
“Okay kids, come sit down. It’s time to eat,” she said pleasantly, expecting them to come running to the table she had set. Instead, the three kids ran the other way.
“Hey, I said come here!” she repeated.
“Who’s gonna make us?” one of them burst out laughing, joined by his two siblings.
‘This is ridiculous,’ Dana thought. ‘How could they just talk back to a baby-sitter like that?’ She was sure she’d get them under control soon enough, but after chasing them around the house a couple of times, Dana gave up on supper and decided to skip right to bedtime.
But that was even worse. Each time she would catch one and put him into bed, the other two would dart out. “Catch us if you can!” they would taunt and jump around like monkeys.
By now Dana was getting really upset. “Listen, you guys, you have to do what I say!”
“Why?” squealed little Billy with a mischievous grin.
“Because I’m the baby-sitter and I’m more than twice as old as you, that’s why!” But this only evoked more laughter and Dana finally just let them run around until they fell asleep on their own and then carried them to bed.
Dana heard the key turning in the door. Finally! Boy was she going to give those two a piece of her mind! Greg and Ellen had hardly gotten in the door when she let them have it.
“Boy did you sucker me. You must be the world’s worst parents to have kids like that!”
“What happened? “asked Ellen, looking upset.
“I’ll tell you what happened. Those brats of yours — they spent the whole night talking back to me and not paying attention to anything I said. What’s wrong with them? Don’t they have any respect for people old…”
“Respect for people older than they are?” Greg finished her sentence with a wry smile.
Dana was about to answer back her brother sarcastically, but then stopped herself short. Wouldn’t mouthing off to them be doing just what she accused the little kids of doing to her? Respecting elders never seemed important to her before, but now after seeing how ugly and wrong it was the way the younger kids treated her, she realized it really was important and right to speak respectfully to older people — just because they’re older — and wiser.
“Well, yeah. I mean, I guess it’s not so easy to be respectful and,” she looked at Ellen, “I’m sorry if that is how I’ve been treating both of you.”
Dana took her pay and silently went home. She had had a tough night but had come out of it with a big lesson.
Discussion Questions
Ages 3-5
Q. How did Dana feel about speaking respectfully to people older than her at first?
A. She felt like it didn’t matter.
Q. How did she feel in the end?
A. She saw how wrong it was to mouth off to somebody older and decided she wouldn’t do it anymore.
Ages 6-9
Q. What lesson did Dana learn from the experience?
A. Up until then, Dana felt like she didn’t have to speak respectfully to people who were older than she was and even made it a point not to. But when she was on the other end and saw that there was something very wrong about how the little kids were treating her, she realized that when she spoke to older people disrespectfully, it was coming off just as ugly.
Q. Why do you think Dana was drawn to speak disrespectfully to her adult brother and sister-in-law?
A. She probably felt that it somehow made her ‘bigger’ or ‘cooler’ to be able to mouth off at someone older — especially an adult. But really it is the opposite. A person who restrains his impulse to mouth off and is able to speak respectfully proves that he is more mature than he looks and vice versa.
Spiritual exercise: The next time you speak to someone older than yourself, make an extra effort to speak respectfully.
Ages 10 and Up
Q. Do you think it is a legitimate value to give special respect to someone on the sole basis of his being older than we are? Why or why not?
A. We should certainly speak respectfully to everybody, regardless of their age, but especially so to those older than we. God set up the world and our lives in a way that we go through different life-stages, from infancy to old age and everything in between. As he reaches each stage, a person gains more maturity, understanding and life experience and therefore becomes legitimately worthy of extra respect from those who haven’t yet reached that level.
Q. How do you think our ability to show respect to our elders reflects on our ability to spiritually connect to God?
A. To truly connect spiritually to God, we must first properly respect His infinite greatness. This is a huge step, so to help train us to make this connection, God puts people in our lives, who for various reasons – including age – are worthy of our respect. When we pass the test and show them the respect we should, we become ready to make that ultimate God connection.
Spiritual exercise: The next time you speak to someone older than yourself, make an extra effort to speak respectfully.
Quote of the Week
“Be among the disciples of Aaron, loving peace and pursuing peace, loving people and bringing them closer to the Torah. (Hillel, Pirkei Avot 1:12)
Joke of the Week
Avi, a devout Israeli farmer, lost his favorite Chumash that his grandfather passed down to him; Avi was distraught at this carelessness.
Three weeks later, a cow walked up carrying the Chumash in its mouth.
Avi the farmer couldn’t believe his eyes.
He took the book out of the cow’s mouth, raised his eyes heavenward and exclaimed, “It’s a miracle from Hashem!”
“Not really,” said the cow.
“Your grandfather’s name was written inside the cover.”
Shabbat Shalom!!
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