At its core Judaism is a religion of, it celebrates life and helps live a good life. We see this repeated throughout our sacred texts, like here, “I have put before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life,” (Deuteronomy 30:19) or here, “You shall keep My laws and My rules, by the pursuit of which human beings shall live: I am Adonai.” (Leviticus 18:5) This last verse is made even more explicit in the Talmud, “Rav Yehuda said that Shmuel said: … ‘You shall keep My statutes and My ordinances, which a person shall do and live by them” (Leviticus 18:5), and not that he should die by them.’”
But the Jewish vision of what it means to live is very specific, life only has meaning with purpose. The entire system of Jewish law is designed to help us live lives of meaning and value. We all know the phrase, “man does not live by bread alone.” It comes from this week’s Torah portion. The entire verse is, “[God] subjected you to the hardship of hunger and then gave you manna to eat, which neither you nor your ancestors had ever known, in order to teach you that a human being does not live on bread alone, but that one may live on anything that Adonai decrees.” (Deuteronomy 8:3) With this verse Moses is reminding the Jewish people that God has sustained them in their wanderings in the desert with physical sustenance (manna) and spiritual sustenance (Torah).
If we just focus on our physical needs we are materialists and spiritually stunted; our lives are limited. If we just focus on our spiritual needs we cannot survive in the world. A well balanced person must pay attention to both, as it says in Pirkei Avot 3:17) “Where there is no bread, there is no Torah; where there is no Torah, there is no bread.” Or, as Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel put it, “A body without a soul is a corpse. A soul without a body is a ghost.” As we begin the countdown to the High Holy Days perhaps we can pay attention to our physical and our spiritual selves.
Eikev, Deuteronomy 7:12-11:25; Parashat HaShavua for Shabbat, August 24, 2024
August 22, 2024 by tbhrich • Drashot
At its core Judaism is a religion of, it celebrates life and helps live a good life. We see this repeated throughout our sacred texts, like here, “I have put before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life,” (Deuteronomy 30:19) or here, “You shall keep My laws and My rules, by the pursuit of which human beings shall live: I am Adonai.” (Leviticus 18:5) This last verse is made even more explicit in the Talmud, “Rav Yehuda said that Shmuel said: … ‘You shall keep My statutes and My ordinances, which a person shall do and live by them” (Leviticus 18:5), and not that he should die by them.’”
But the Jewish vision of what it means to live is very specific, life only has meaning with purpose. The entire system of Jewish law is designed to help us live lives of meaning and value. We all know the phrase, “man does not live by bread alone.” It comes from this week’s Torah portion. The entire verse is, “[God] subjected you to the hardship of hunger and then gave you manna to eat, which neither you nor your ancestors had ever known, in order to teach you that a human being does not live on bread alone, but that one may live on anything that Adonai decrees.” (Deuteronomy 8:3) With this verse Moses is reminding the Jewish people that God has sustained them in their wanderings in the desert with physical sustenance (manna) and spiritual sustenance (Torah).
If we just focus on our physical needs we are materialists and spiritually stunted; our lives are limited. If we just focus on our spiritual needs we cannot survive in the world. A well balanced person must pay attention to both, as it says in Pirkei Avot 3:17) “Where there is no bread, there is no Torah; where there is no Torah, there is no bread.” Or, as Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel put it, “A body without a soul is a corpse. A soul without a body is a ghost.” As we begin the countdown to the High Holy Days perhaps we can pay attention to our physical and our spiritual selves.