Shlomo's "The Worst Jew in the World"

& Reb Leibeleh's "Urgings of the Heart"

 

By Daniel Nakonechny

19 Sh'vat 5766

בס"ד

 

Let's start with a story of Shlomo Carlebach from a visit in Vienna (I believe in the '70s).

 

[Shlomo speaking] I just want to tell you something. I was just in Vienna and basically I gave ten concerts. One concert was for the Yidden [Yiddish: Jews] in the synagogue in Vienna but the rest was all over the country for non-Jews. You know what it is? Do you know how many thousands and thousands of young people are still hiding the fact that they are Jews because their parents told them, "don't ever say you're Jewish, it will just cause problems."

 

I just want to share with you one story. I gave a concert near Vienna and you could see one lady in the audience who was mamash crying her eyes out. I walked up to her and asked her, "who are you, what's going on?" and this is what she told me. Her grandparents converted from Judaism to something else. Nevertheless her parents went to Auschwitz, because by the Germans there were no 'chochmas' [literally: 'wisdoms' but here meaning 'trickery']. If your father or mother are Jewish you go. She said to me, "My father came from Auschwitz alive but he is a dead person. He says that he is not Jewish, he is not Goyish. He says that he has no place in the world. My father put it so much into me that I don't have a place in the world either."

 

Nebech. This girl was with us every concert, gave a lot of koach [energy]...she has to go to Israel...there is no other place. But you know...if it [going to Vienna] was just for this young lady it was worth it to come.

 

Can you imagine how deep Avraham, Yitzchak and Ya'akov's connections to G-d were, that three thousand years later.....look what's happening?!

 

Everybody thinks, "who is the greatest Jew I ever met?"  But I had the privilege of meeting the worse Jew in the world. I gave a concert in Heidelberg and after the concert the chevre - some Jewish and some not Jewish - we were all walking around the city. And you know that in Heidelberg you don't see people walking around with yarmulke's and tzitzis [i.e. visibly Jews]. So a person comes out from a bar and he looks at me and he can't believe it. He looks at me a few times......he was so drunk......and then he says to me. "Have you ever seen the worse Jew in the world?"

 

What a question?! Reb Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev should have been there!

 

He says to me, "Have you ever seen the worse Jew in the world? … You are looking at the worse Jew in the world!  I want you to know that when I was four years old my parents gave me to non-Jewish neighbors and they never came back. I know I'm Jewish, but I don't do anything about it. I am the worse Jew in the world." He lifted up his arms and he screamed, "I AM STILL A JEW!"

 

I can't forget this Yiddeleh [Yiddish diminutive for 'Jew']. You know, it says in all the seforim [religious books] that when Ya'akov Aveinu blessed all his children he mamash thought of every Yid until Mashiach is coming. All the blessings which we have and which G-d should give us they are all from Ya'akov Aveinu. He mamash blessed every tribe and thought of every Yid. [Shlomo]

 

Shlomo's story seems such a far cry from this week's parsha, parshat Yithro, where we do the opposite and with all our being embrace ourselves as Jews and receive the Torah.

 

Curiously, immediately before our receiving the Torah, we're told a story about a non-Jew who wants to be Jew. This is the story of Yithro, and it is one of the deepest mysteries of the Torah. Why does this story about a non-Jew who comes to be a Jew appear in the Torah exactly just before we are about to receive the Torah? It's a question that absorbs Chazal, yet without even knowing what Chazal think the most obvious answer is that because the entire essence of the Torah is teaching us what it means to be a Jew apparently Yithro, too, has something to teach us about being a Jew.

 

Still, in some ways it's incongruous that we should learn from a non-Jew what it means to be a Jew. After all, we all know that in general Jewish tradition and history and practice is not too often enamored of non-Jews, at least not in overt, public ways. There are many valid and legitimate reasons for this, and there are also many invalid and illegitimate reasons for it. Shlomo understood them all, and such was Shlomo's greatness that against so much of the negativity of Jews against non-Jews, Shlomo could embrace and champion non-Jews.

 

About Yithro, Shlomo said that Yithro "was the only person Moshe Rabbainu ever made a feast for." Moshe didn't make a simple congratulations party. Moshe made a feast that included Aaron and the elders, a feast that included sacrifices and took place in God's presence, with all of the accompanying Heavenly awe and rejoicing. No other person was ever given such honor by Moshe, and because Moshe did it and because it was Moshe who did it it's a deep measure of Yithro and what he comes to teach us.

 

I want to share a Torah from several years ago, and I want to close with Torah from the Heilige Rebbe Leibeleh Eiger. Hopefully we'll gain some insight into Yithro's teaching us how precious and sweet it is to be a Jew. In Sefer Tehilim (Psalms) [146:9], David HaMelech teaches us that God "shomer (protects) Gerim (converts)". The Hebrew verb 'shomer' means to watch, guard, protect, and it also means 'to save' - in the manner of 'I

guard my money cautiously' and 'I am saving it for when it will be needed.' In this light, according to the first meaning we understand that God protects Gerim, but according to the second understanding what is God saving them for?!

 

The Ger (convert to Judaism) presents Judaism with a tremendously perplexing problem that Chazal grapple with at great lengths. This problem can be stated in one sentence. How can someone outside of Judaism - i.e. someone not born a Jew - come to embrace the Torah?

 

On the surface, this doesn't seem like such an overwhelming dilemma. If a person, through rational, logical thinking, comes to the conclusion that Torah is true and that it is the only valid value system in existence, then surely it is expected that he or she would accept it and that he or she would be accepted. When explained this way, there is no obvious counter argument.

 

However, in understanding that the Torah is 'n'tah b'tocheinu' - 'planted within us' (as found in the blessings of the Torah), we discover some of the problem. With these two words, 'n'tah b'tocheinu', we are told that Torah is in our genes, literally. It is genetic. How, then, are we going to explain the existence of the Ger?

 

Furthermore, Chazal are divided in determining when exactly did Yithro, the paradigmatic convert, join Am Yisrael? Was it before Har Sinai and the giving of the Torah, as his story's location in the Torah would seem to suggest? Or is it after the receiving of the Torah, as much internal evidence seems to suggest?

 

Beyond the seemingly scholarly need to clarify Torah ambiguities lies an extremely fundamental question: Did Yithro come to the Torah after Am Yisrael received it and brought it into this world and, thus, made it available to the world? Or did Yithro acquire the Torah before Am Yisrael brought it into the world and, therefore, he would be on the level of, say, the Avot (our Forefathers)?

 

The Torah itself intensifies the problem because it is very clear to the Torah that the Ger, even after he or she converts, still has some aspect that causes him or her to remain distinct within Am Yisrael. The word Ger is written in the Torah numerous times. We interpret these numerous references, rightfully, on God's insistence that Am Yisrael treat the Ger with exceptional care and understanding, nevertheless the emphasis, itself, indicates separate identity.

 

The most obvious example of the Ger having individual status and not being included or absorbed within Am Yisrael is found in Sefer D'varim in Parshat N'tzavim (29:9,10). The parsha opens by delineating the ten categories or hierarchies of Am Yisrael. One is the Ger! In a word, just as the Torah has mystery in this world, so too does the Ger have mystery in the Torah.

 

Chazal are not at peace with this dilemma, and their interpretations and reactions pursue the extremes. From genuine praise to genuine denunciation, they wrestle and grapple with the Ger in all his complexity as an entity, in all that his existence means for Am Yisrael, and how, practically, he affects and influences Am Yisrael and is affected and influenced by Am Yisrael.

 

What is undeniable, however, is that the juxtaposition of Parshat Yithro to Matan Torah (the Giving and Receiving of the Torah) means that the Ger is essential to the Torah and its existence - regardless of whether Yithro came before or after.

 

To understand the Ger, the Torah demands that we read between the lines. Significantly, the Torah, as much as it is a contractual document, is even more a relationship - a love relationship between God and existence in general and between God and Am Yisrael in particular. Within the expression of that sanctity stands the Ger, much in the same way that a child (or any outsider) can physically and emotionally stand within the embrace or proximity of two who love each other very deeply. He is outside yet included; he is affected, usually profoundly so.

 

We learn about Yithro as Ger in Parshat Yithro. There the Torah introduces him saying, "Yithro heard what God did for Moshe and [Am] Yisrael, His people, because He took them out of Egypt." Yithro's response was to go to where Moshe and Am Yisrael were encamped, which the Torah describes, "Yithro came to Moshe to the Midbar (wilderness, of which desert is one kind) where he [Moshe] was camped".

 

Since Moshe (and Am Yisrael) were obviously in the Midbar, writing the word 'Midbar' creates a redundancy, which Rashi points out and clarifies. "'To the Midbar': [Didn't] we also know that he [Moshe] was in the Midbar? Instead it [the word 'Midbar'] is coming to teach us Yithro's praise. [What is that?] He [Yithro] had been living in and at the epitome of honor and exclaim in the world, yet his heart urged him to go to the Midbar - an unformed desolation - to hear words of Torah."

 

In this one word Rashi opens up the whole understanding of what Yithro did and what Yithro is. With the inclusion of this one single word - 'Midbar' - the Torah speaks volumes.

 

Oblivious to the argument (that has already started) about when Yithro came and at what prompting, the Torah juxtaposes two words, 'Yithro' and 'Midbar'. Yithro, explains Rashi, is the embodiment of all the acclaim, accomplishments, fulfillment, success, honor, and glory that are achievable in this world. Nothing was beyond his grasp and nothing was denied him.

 

With full awareness of this, the parsha begins, "Yithro heard what God did…", to which Rashi interprets that 'his heart urged' him. What does it mean that 'his heart urged' him? It means either that Yithro had already 'internalized' what he'd heard, or that Yithro had been 'listening with his heart'. Yithro, the embodiment of worldly striving, leaves the epicenter of civilization for a place of 'unformed desolation'. He literally went from one pole to its opposite.

 

How many people heard what Yithro heard?

 

It wasn't like the splitting of the Reed Sea or the destruction of the Egyptian armed forces was unknown to the world at large. It wasn't exactly a secret that well over a million plus people had departed unimpeded the crushing grip of Pharaoh's regime. It wasn't exactly unknown that these same million plus people were surviving, succeeding, and progressing in the Midbar - an 'unformed desolation'. Like everyone else, surely Yithro heard all the media coverage. Surely Yithro's stature allowed him to hear all of the upper echelon government, military, and political analysis and to hear all the evaluations of the leading minds and intellects of what had occurred.

 

Who heard?!

 

God teaches us that Yithro heard.

 

What did Yithro hear? Yithro heard beyond what the ear and the mind hear; Yithro heard the 'urgings of his heart'. Yithro heard that which only the heart can hear. Yithro heard love. Yithro heard the love of God moving in this world; the love of God coming to act and to rest on His people. Yithro, the embodiment of civilization, left the epitome of civilization to go to the Midbar - an 'unformed desolation'.

 

Why did he follow his heart? Because he wanted to hear words of Torah, because he wanted to hear God's love for His people, because he wanted to hear God's love letter.

 

Perhaps we'll never really know whether Yithro came before or after the giving of the Torah. Perhaps we'll never really know whether it was before Har Sinai that Yithro's heart heard God's love that fills all creation.....Or if it only was after Har Sinai that Yithro's heart heard God's love pouring out for His people.

 

Does it matter? Does it really matter why Yithro gave up everything? Isn't it sufficient to know that when it came to Torah, Yithro followed his heart?!

 

Although Avraham is the forefather of Am Yisrael, in the Torah Avraham is not known as a Jew but as an "E'vri". E'vri (from the root: 'ayin' 'beit' 'resh') is that which passes over, that which goes beyond. Avraham went from the constraints of this world - as man knows it - to the world as God knows it. Avraham went beyond. So, too, the Ger - as Yithro epitomized - goes beyond.

 

So, to return to our original question, "for what does God save the Gerim?"

 

He saves them to prove that it's still possible; that it's all very real. He saves them to show that not only is it possible, but to show that all that God is waiting for is for all of us to be E'vrim - for all us to go beyond.

 

The Heilige Rebbe Leibeleh Eiger explains that the opening pasuk (sentence) of this week's parsha, "vayishma Yithro" - "and Yithro heard", is the intentional and necessary introduction to the Giving and Receiving of the Torah. Says Reb Leibeleh, "to receive Torah you have to hear with your heart." "And," he teaches, "specifically it is Yithro we need to learn from, because there never was anyone further away from God and Torah than Yithro."

 

As we all know, there was not a single form of religious worship - from the most primitive paganism up to the highest Sikhism - that Yithro hadn't learned and mastered. He knew them all intimately. Against all this background, Yithro's heart was still able to and was still 'urging him to hear': to hear God's love and to hear God's love calling.

 

Says the Heilige Reb Leibeleh, "Not only was Yithro so immersed in every conceivable kind of religious practice, but his whole existence, from conception to growing up, was not from and of the essence of Sanctity. Yet, despite all the various and genuinely highest spiritual awareness that Yithro had achieved, Yithro knew that he was not truly connected to God. Yithro, who so very truly was so very far removed from it all, 'heard with his heart', and he followed his heart to bring himself to God and Torah and Am Yisrael."

 

Continues the Rebbe, "If this is true of Yithro, the non-Jew and master of 'spiritual awareness', then how much more so is it true of a Jew, who in being born a Jew, is born with and into the essence of Sanctity. The truth and reality is that no matter how far away he or she is right this minute that just by listening to their hearts they are already so very close to the Holy One, Blessed be He."