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I’d like to ask you a question: Why is the world falling apart?
People will come up with many creative answers: They
will blame everyone from the Chinese to the Iranians; from the capitalists to
the socialists. It’s the Democrats’ fault, it’s the Republicans’
fault. It’s the price of oil, it’s the
price of eggs….
My friends, I have the answer and I won’t even charge
you for it. The reason the world is falling apart is because we are ignoring
the word of G-d, His Torah. Our Torah is the blueprint of the universe. Before
G-d created the world, He created the Torah. Therefore, the Torah is the DNA of
all reality. So, if the world looks like one big mutant cancer gene, it’s
because we have scrambled the DNA and tried to create the world according to
our own “architectural design.” That ambition has failed man, time and time again:
Adam sinned, he was thrown out of Eden and brought
death to the world. The generation of the flood sinned and G-d brought the
mighty flood; the people built a Tower of Babel and G-d punished them. Sodom and Gomorrah well, their fate wasn’t too
pretty either.
You see, G-d is the master coder, and when we try to
overwrite the program, we find ourselves faced with catastrophic glitches and
disasters.
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So why is the world broken? Because we ignore G-d’s
will.
And there is one sin that I want to speak about that
is at the root of it all – calloused hearts!
When someone came to Hillel and asked him to summarize
the entire Torah on one foot, he said: “‘That which is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the entire
Torah and the rest is commentary. Go and
study it.’”
You see, my friends, all
of Judaism depends on the ability to view another person’s life as just as real
and significant as one views one’s own. If we don’t see the human being in the
other person, then we certainly don’t see the G-d in them. When our egos are
too big, we leave no breathing room for
the existence of others. It may very well be that we are the lucky one, the
rich one, the pretty one, the healthy one, the employed one, but that doesn’t
cancel out the fact that everyone’s life matters. If others are not as lucky as
we are, it doesn’t give us the right to disqualify their existence or emotions.
We should have empathy, compassion and an opened hand and heart. And conversely
for those who are less lucky, we have no right to dismiss the woes of the more
fortunate with contemptuous comments such as, “Ah they are rich what do they
know of suffering.” Pain, suffering, heartache, sickness and troubles have no
tax bracket.
But we’ve become so
callous and numb to the ordeals and dignity of others, that our feelings of
superiority or inferiority and our massive egos dehumanize our brothers, our
friends, our neighbors and our fellow citizens. We spurn and trample on the
one principle which Hillel highlights as encompassing the entire Torah.
The Torah commands us,
“Love your neighbor as yourself.” In fact, the rabbis teach that you should
pray for another before you pray for your own needs. The reward: You will
benefit first.
G-d tells us to circumcise
our hearts. The Rambam explains this as behaving fairly, justly, not only to
people who are rich, powerful or popular but toward everyone. Have a heart for
people who need your heart; have a dollar for people who need your dollar; Have
a smile, a hug and kindness for people who need it, not just for people who can
do something for you. Because that is
just serving your own ends and using people as little props in your deceitful game
of life.
Truly, we live in such an egotistical, self-absorbed
world that it is no wonder that it is falling apart. It’s fractured by the pull
of each man for himself. From selfies to the social media platforms which
broadcast them, the obsession with self is nothing less than suicidal.
We
deem others along with their ambitions and successes as threats to our own
survival, and as such, everyone feels like an enemy and no one like a friend, a
neighbor or a brother.
In
this week's Parshah, Bo, we read about Pharaoh’s persistent refusal to
let the Israelites go. Pharaoh deemed himself a god. He believed that he
created the Nile and that he created himself. He rejected G-d. While the most
devasting plague was yet to hit his country, the death of the firstborns of
Egypt, he slept in his bed. While his country was being destroyed plague after
plague, he was still able to sleep because he had a heart only for himself. It’s
repeated many times that Pharaoh hardened his heart. That hardened heart ruined
him and his country. Ego has only false gains, but its collateral damage will
always bring justice in the end.
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G-d did not command us to love our parents in the Torah, just to respect them. But He did command us to love Him and to love our neighbor. Rabbi Akiva said that doing so is a fundamental principle of the Torah. “A soul enters this world for seventy or eighty years just to do a favor for another,” says the Baal Shem Tov.
Friends the very last letter of the Torah is a lamed and the first is a beit, combined they spell the world Lev, which means heart. We must have a heart! We put conditioner on our hair and skin to make it soft, more importantly we must condition our heart. Circumcise it, soften it, open it. If G-d gave us a heart, it’s because He wants us to use it!
Shabbat Shalom
