How can we ensure Jewish continuity?
Table for Five: Re’eh
In partnership with the Jewish Journal of Los Angeles
Edited by Salvador Litvak, the Accidental Talmudist
Keep and hearken to all these words that I command you, that it may benefit you and your children after you, forever, when you do what is good and proper in the eyes of the Lord, your God.
– Deut. 12:28
Rebbetzin Miriam Yerushalmi, CEO SANE; Author, Reaching New Heights
The letters of the Hebrew word notzer (“keeping”) may be rearranged to form the word ratzon (“Divine Favor” or “Will”). A meritorious deed results in Hashem’s bringing reward into the world for many years, even for a thousand generations after the original deed, because it is in keeping with the Divine Will.
During Elul, we recite the Selichos prayers, which include the verses listing Hashem’s Thirteen Attributes of Mercy. We are reminded that Hashem is full of compassion and the source of all mercies. Additionally, these verses encourage us to emulate these holy attributes in our own lives, thereby decreasing our negative qualities while strengthening the expression of our inner spiritual beauty. Integrating Hashem’s Thirteen Attributes into our hearts and minds will help us relate to ourselves and to others in our lives with compassion. We pray that we be able to respond to others whose behavior or words are hurtful in ways that help them while protecting our own well-being.
Feeling hurt, we often may feel tempted to act unkindly (may G-d protect us). But regardless of what kind of treatment we think the other person may deserve, we emulate Hashem and act kindly, graciously and even generously towards everyone. Even one moment of dignified behavior, of controlling negative reactions, of acting generously, can profoundly affect our life and the lives of our offspring for generations. As a result of our kindness, good comes into the world and lasts in this world and in the world of truth, forever.
Rabbi Jonathan Leener, Prospect Heights Shul
As the verse indicates, children play a central role in the covenantal mission of the Jewish people. Jews think not in days, weeks, months, or years, but in centuries. When we view time in this expansive way, education and children become highly significant. The Talmud (Shabbat 119b) even refers to schoolchildren in messianic terms as “anointed ones.” Recognizing that the path to redemption is long, we understand the need to invest in generations of Jews to ensure we ultimately get there. In the words of my teacher, Rabbi Yitz Greenberg, “The perfect world can be reached only by an endless chain of human effort. The actions of any one person or any single generation are not enough.”
This long-term investment begins with Jewish education, where the focus is on the individual child. As King Solomon taught, “Train a child according to his way” (Proverbs 22:6). For the Torah to endure within a child, the teacher must engage the child’s entire being, not just their mind. Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira, one of the great Jewish educators, emphasized this holistic approach, stating, “We are not now seeking the mind of the student alone, but rather, we seek the entire student: the soul, spirit, and neshama of the Jewish child.” As we approach the new year and begin to set new goals and spiritual commitments, let this verse remind us to start with the children.
Rabbi Tal Sessler, Temple Beth Zion
One of the chief religious challenges of our time, indeed of all time, is “How to be religious without betraying humankind?” In other words, how do we lead a religious life endowed with both fervour and authenticity on the one hand, and a humanitarian universalism of basic human decency on the other hand?
This is a formidable challenge. We live in a time in which crimes against humanity are perpetrated in the name of piety and righteousness. This is not exclusive to radical Islam. To give but one example, Prime Minister Rabin was also murdered by a religious zealot, and under the pretext of so-called religious law. In the words of Rabbi Sacks, there are those who “kill in the name of the God of life, wage war in the name of the God of peace, hate in the name of the God of love, and practice cruelty in the name of the God of compassion.” In other words, there are those who constantly violate the divine instruction to strictly do “what is good and proper” in the eyes of God.
Nachmanides cautioned us not to be villains under the pretext of Torah. The late rabbi Yehudah Amital, a Holocaust survivor and seminal Modern Orthodox figure, preached time and again that human decency is primary, and therefore also precedes the minutiae of religious law. What is at stake in this battle is not only intricate theological disputations but also, in many ways, the very fate of the human story.
Rabbi Michael Barclay, Spiritual Leader of Temple Ner Simcha
The directions of this verse are clear: do God’s commandments, specifically the ones preceding this verse, and things will go well for us and our children. And only a few verses earlier is an important Jewish law: we are forbidden from ingesting blood.
This was important for non-Jews to realize in the Middle Ages, when in 1144 in Norwich, England the Jews were accused of killing Christian children for their blood. Called the “blood libel” and defined as blaming Christian deaths on Jews, this fallacy has caused thousands of Jews to be persecuted; and most educated people thought this crazy accusation disappeared centuries ago. But with the prevalent Jew-hatred since October 7, this blood libel accusation, clearly forbidden in the Torah (Deut. 12:23), has resurfaced with some of the largest social influencers: Nick Fuentes, Jake Shields, and Candace Owens to name a few. Owens recently even used this blood libel to attack the origins of the ADL, after previously also asserting that “Hollywood is controlled by a Jewish gang of thugs like the Crips.”
When we see anyone making these types of accusations, we must all stand up and stop them. The text in this week’s parsha is clear: blood is forbidden for Jews. The extensions of the blood libel must be confronted directly and stopped. These social influencers must be exposed as the Jew-haters they are. We must correct all anti-Semitic falsehoods the moment they happen. Each of us has an obligation to expose Jew-hatred based in blood libels, and in so doing, may we receive the promise found in this verse: that we and our children benefit forever.
Lori Schneide Shapiro, Rabbi/ Open Temple
How do you feel about blood? The living waters of the body contain within them all of the imprints of our ancestry. Chapter 12 commands not once but TWICE that “you may not partake of it; you must pour it on the ground like water.” Ibn Ezra’s commentary identifies “Keep and hearken…” to the prohibition against the drinking of the blood, moving us into an obeisance connecting Judaism to our DNA. Did the ancestors know of epigenetics? Not in so many words, but in metaphor. The actions of our ancestors are imprint on our blood; our behaviors nurture patterns that move our lives and the lives of who will follow us into a path of intimacy with the Divine; or exile. Life is an ancestral journey, unknotting the transgressions of those who came before us. Our pasuk reminds us that each and every choice – from the molecular to the magnanimous – matter, and within that meaning we deepen the infinite intimacy with the Divine. As we move into so many milestones this year marking the yamim no’raim, we must ask ourselves how we turn blood into a path to holiness. From the blood spilt from human evils to the more prevalent spilt bloodthirstily in venal pursuits; and, in doing so, may our guardianship of Judaism pulse through our every vein.
With thanks to Rebbetzin Miriam Yerushalmi, Rabbi Jonathan Leener, Rabbi Tal Sessler, Rabbi Michael Barclay and Rabbi Lori Schneide Shapiro
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