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Friday February 8, 2008

Amid the rat race, we need to just ‘be’ with HaShem

by rabbi judah dardik

Terumah

Exodus 25:1-27:19

I Kings 5:26-6:13

When Harrison Ford went hunting in “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” he wasn’t looking for the decorated cabinet in which we store our Torahs in

synagogue. He was looking for the original, made of gold with two keruvim on top as described in this week’s Torah portion.

You may be wondering what exactly a keruv (cherub) is. They are little metal figures with wings that have the faces of children (one boy and one girl). The Talmud (Chagigah 13B) offers the etymology as “k’ravya”— Aramaic for “like a child.”

The passage goes on to ask how we are then to understand Ezekiel’s vision of the chariot. In Chapter 10 of that book, the prophet describes seeing four different faces on the heavenly chariot: one of a cherub, one of a man, one of a lion and one of an eagle. If keruvim have the face of a child, then there are only three different kinds of faces, because the cherub and the man have the same face! The talmudic answer: “One is big, and one is small.”

What? Saying that one is big and one is small doesn’t distinguish them! If the only difference is scale, then they in fact have the same face. (Had my infant son had any hair, he would have looked just like my wife.)

Another talmudic passage, found in Bava Batra 99A, may point us in the right direction. It teaches that the keruvim that Moshe made faced one another. Yet Chronicles II 3:13 records that when King Solomon dedicated the Temple in Jerusalem, the keruvim were “peneihem la’bayit”— facing outward toward the walls of the Temple. So did they face in or out? The Talmud answers that when the Jewish people are “doing the will of HaShem” they face in toward each other, when that is not the case they miraculously face outward.

This too is difficult, because it implies that on the day of the Temple dedication that we weren’t doing the will of HaShem. But that was one of the high points in Jewish spiritual history!

The Netziv explains that the phrase “doing the will of HaShem” means something other than what we might assume. It isn’t a question of behaving properly or not. Rather, the term is a specific reference to one’s mode of relating to HaShem. There is one mode in which one contemplates HaShem and the Torah (HaShem’s “will”) and looks up in awe. This is what the Jewish people did in the desert; all our needs were provided for, and we spent our time engaged in learning and contemplation.

There is another more familiar mode as well, namely: partnership. In much of our Jewish lives, we serve as partners with HaShem in trying to make a better world. We are empowered and take action in our Jewish lives to do acts of tikkun olam, ritual mitzvahs and kindness to others. In that mode, we are the principal actors.

We were working as partners to build the Temple as a special place where the Divine Presence would be readily perceived. HaShem gave the directions and we did the work, together all the way.

This also helps explain the issue of the different faces on the chariot. Working with another adult, we meet as equals and partners. We look into the face of a peer. But when we work with a child, we do most of the work and the child is there to spend time with us. They look to us not as equals, but look up to us and want to be in our presence. These are indeed two different faces representing the experience of HaShem’s presence — one of working as partners and one of communing together.

Too often, our experience of HaShem is limited to being partners. Our spiritual lives follow the lead of the material “rat race,” and become one Jewish project after another. Reading about the keruvim reminds us to take that quiet moment once in a while, to just “be” with HaShem. To study Torah, meditate and reflect. To spend time not only working together with HaShem, but also experiencing the awe of the Divine Presence in our beautiful world.

Rabbi Judah Dardik is the spiritual leader at Orthodox Beth Jacob in Oakland. He can be reached at Rabbi@BethJacobOakland.org.

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