The Odds in Favor of Blessings

May 23, 2008
Rabbi Seymour Rossel

I was visiting the library a few days ago and I happened to overhear a conversation. Two teenagers were standing in the reference section and one asked the other, "What are all those books with the same color cover?" The other one answered, "That's the encyclopedia." The first one scratched his head and said, "Wow! Someone printed out the whole thing?"

All of us probably have some experience with this. Every once in a while, you click the print button with your mouse, and suddenly a flurry of pages starts coming from your printer and you frantically try to find the stop button, which, of course, doesn't exist. The only really fast way to stop it is to turn off or unplug the printer, which can result in a printer jam. All that trouble from clicking with a mouse.

Which reminds me of the story of a mouse: There was this city mouse who invited his country cousin to stay for a while. It happened that they were dining in the kitchen when a mean-looking cat entered the room. "Don't panic," said the city mouse, "Leave this to me." He marched up to the cat and said, "Woof! Woof!" The cat hissed and ran away.

The country mouse asked his cousin, "How did you do that?" and he answered, "Cousin, I don't know how it is where you come from, but here in the city it always pays to learn a second language."

The point of both these stories is that things are not always what they seem to be. An encyclopedia is not a computer print-out of Wickipedia and "Woof! Woof!" is not a second language. Both jokes rely on the fact that people tend to take things too literally.

In our covenant with God, described in this week's portion, the terms of the contract seem pretty cut and dry. God says, "These are my laws." Here are the blessings that will come if you keep them: "You will have sunshine in the summer, rain in the rainy season, crops that will grow so quickly that you will barely plant them before you are ready to harvest, all the good things in life: health and happiness and freedom from your enemies." Here are the curses that will come if you disobey: "Illness and hunger, strife with your enemies, crops that do not grow and when they grow they will feed the mouths of raiders who steal them from you, floods instead of rain, and drought instead of sunshine."

Placing this covenant review at the end of Leviticus was purposeful. Leviticus is like the Overstock.com of Jewish regulations. Leviticus puts everything out there in detail: from the command to love your neighbor right down to the proper underwear priests should wear in the Temple (and, believe me, they don't stock anything like those loin cloths at Victoria's Secret). Did the priests of ancient times really believe that if you keep all these commandments God will do everything that God promised and if you don't you will be cursed seven-fold for disobeying?

Modern preachers sometimes try to use the Bible this way. Some evangelist or other will make the claim that global warming is God's punishment for gay marriage or hurricanes are God's punishment for X-rated films. This is an excellent technique for placing power and judgment in the hands of priests, but it is clearly not very good theology. And let's not let ourselves off the hook, either. Pronouncements like these not only come from Christian evangelists, ultra-Orthodox and Chasidic rabbis are often quoted as knowing exactly why God is punishing you and they are glad to tell you, even if they are not asked.

On the other hand, when there is a sunny day, a good crop, happiness in the home, celebration in the community, these voices tend to fall silent. Blessings from God do not give priests and evangelists the power that comes with guilt and struggle, so they are hardly worthwhile to preach about. Even in newspapers and in the media, there is only a story here and there about something good, as compared with the massive amounts of tragedy and terror.

Our sages of the Talmud and Midrash were serious folk, but they were not dour. They were anxious to see God's laws followed, but they were not prone to using guilt and threats to make them effective. To their way of thinking, and to mine, people should do what is right because living is a sacred task, a task that allows us to be holy, to feel holy, to behave in holy ways, without becoming self-righteous and sanctimonious. But, if this is so, where can we lay the blame when things go wrong in the world?

That's the whole point here. We only need to lay blame when we take things too literally. There is a vast difference between laying the blame for things and understanding the workings of cause and effect. The rabbis pointed this out when they commented that enmity and warfare result from the perversion of justice. When we allow those who govern us to pervert justice, to oppress the poor, and to suppress minorities, it is not God who punishes us, but we who bring punishment upon ourselves. If we smoke and drink and take drugs that pollute our minds and bodies, it is not the drug dealers and pharmacists and prescribing doctors who are to blame, it is our own responsibility that causes the ill effects that result. Hurricanes and earthquakes and volcanoes are blind, but we are very aware of where we are living and we can judge the odds for ourselves. Indeed, we have whole industries like the insurance business that depend on nothing else than helping us judge the odds, statistically and monetarily.

Some religions call on you to give yourself over to a higher power, to stop thinking so much for yourself and allow the priests to think for you. Traditional Judaism does not do this. Do you want blessing? Choose what is responsible and what is holy. If you cannot tell what it is, you can even ask for advice. You can listen to your doctor, your lawyer, your builder, your dentist, and your rabbi, but your decision always remains just that: your decision. God tells us, "You have good and evil staring at you all the time, you have choices to make that determine whether you will live and live well or you will die emotionally, spiritually, and physically. Choose good and choose life, for these two go hand in hand." That's the real meaning of the covenant with God for me and I think that it has always been the real intention of our covenant.

I learned to honor the covenant by making one mistake after another, one misstep after another, and I recommend the same path to you. Our chore in this life is not to be perfect, but to strive for perfection. The covenant just shows us the way, tells us to be responsible for our own behavior, and gives us a glimpse of what lies ahead. The odds are in your favor if you live a consecrated life, the odds are seven to one against you if you do not. But it is all up to you. And let us say: Amen.