A thought on פרשת בהר
"...ki gerim v'toshavim atem Imadi...""...for you are strangers and dwellers with Me..." (25:23)
HaShem reminds His people that we must not deal carelessly with the Holy Land. The verse seems to explain that we must always be aware of our fluid status in this world, in our land. We may dwell there yet we may also go into exile, estranged from our homeland like strangers who sojourn here and there but are forced to wander.
The Recanati endorses that interpretation, but adds another angle. We note that HaShem does more than pronounce us "strangers and residents." He adds that we have that versatile status "Imo," with Him. This means more than the reality that in His Presence we may be transformed from dwellers to wanderers. The verse also means that HaShem's 'status', as perceived within a mystical light, is symbiotic with our status.
When we are rooted to our land and our conduct merits the right to feel like residents and dwellers, then the Divine Presence is sensed with a similar permanence. However, when we stray and must flow past our borders, afoot and afield in the Diaspora, the Presence seems distant, alienated, even estranged from us and from the rest of the world. As the Talmud declares, "wherever Israel is exiled, the Shechina is with them" (Megilla 29a.)
The Recanati's novel addition here is that not only is the Presence with us in exile, but the Presence is exiled in the ways in which we are exiled. The verse states, thus, that "you are dwellers along with Me, yet you can become estranged, as can I."
One of our challenges in exile is that of developing a constant sense that HaShem is to remain a presence in our minds and lives. Attaining that sense is possible, for the Presence "follows us" into exile. However, the other aspect of that challenge is accepting that the more we roam and stray in our wanderings, the harder it is to remember how to look for Him.
When I was a little boy, my mother used to sing me a song from her childhood in Scotland. It was about a person who had not followed directions nor paid attention to their path. One of the final verses went, "...lost my way and don't know where to roam..." The tragedy which we all face in the Diaspora is not only that we have become displaced and lost, but that we no longer seem to know where to roam. We end up making faulty decisions, wrong turns, hit dead ends, or go in smaller and smaller concentric circles.
Can you find your way home?Good Shabbos. D Fox
HaShem reminds His people that we must not deal carelessly with the Holy Land. The verse seems to explain that we must always be aware of our fluid status in this world, in our land. We may dwell there yet we may also go into exile, estranged from our homeland like strangers who sojourn here and there but are forced to wander.
The Recanati endorses that interpretation, but adds another angle. We note that HaShem does more than pronounce us "strangers and residents." He adds that we have that versatile status "Imo," with Him. This means more than the reality that in His Presence we may be transformed from dwellers to wanderers. The verse also means that HaShem's 'status', as perceived within a mystical light, is symbiotic with our status.
When we are rooted to our land and our conduct merits the right to feel like residents and dwellers, then the Divine Presence is sensed with a similar permanence. However, when we stray and must flow past our borders, afoot and afield in the Diaspora, the Presence seems distant, alienated, even estranged from us and from the rest of the world. As the Talmud declares, "wherever Israel is exiled, the Shechina is with them" (Megilla 29a.)
The Recanati's novel addition here is that not only is the Presence with us in exile, but the Presence is exiled in the ways in which we are exiled. The verse states, thus, that "you are dwellers along with Me, yet you can become estranged, as can I."
One of our challenges in exile is that of developing a constant sense that HaShem is to remain a presence in our minds and lives. Attaining that sense is possible, for the Presence "follows us" into exile. However, the other aspect of that challenge is accepting that the more we roam and stray in our wanderings, the harder it is to remember how to look for Him.
When I was a little boy, my mother used to sing me a song from her childhood in Scotland. It was about a person who had not followed directions nor paid attention to their path. One of the final verses went, "...lost my way and don't know where to roam..." The tragedy which we all face in the Diaspora is not only that we have become displaced and lost, but that we no longer seem to know where to roam. We end up making faulty decisions, wrong turns, hit dead ends, or go in smaller and smaller concentric circles.
Can you find your way home?Good Shabbos. D Fox
posted by Rabbi Dr. Fox at 1:58 AM
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