Shabbat HaGadol: Asking Questions

Asking Questions

Thoughts on Shabbat HaGadol 2019

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And so, should your son ask you, “What is this service to you?” You shall say, “A Pesah sacrifice to God, who passed over the house of Bnei Yisrael in Egypt when He scourged Egypt and our households He rescued.” (Shemot 12:26-7)

And so, should your son ask you tomorrow, saying, “What is this?” You shall say to him, “By strength of hand God brought us out of Egypt, from the house of slaves…” (Shemot 13:14)

The missvah of telling the story of our exodus from Egypt, sippur yessiat Misrayim, lays focus on questions. Beginning with the four queries of mah nisthanah, the structure of leil seder takes form as one of “question and answer” (she-elah u-teshuvah). The heads of the household are furthermore encouraged to pique the children’s curiosity by encouraging them to engage in the central activity of the night – asking questions.[1]

Why do questions play such an important role in our national recollection of yessiat Misrayim?

Seeking the appropriate questions and framing them properly often provides the necessary segue to insight. Albert Einstein was reportedly once asked: “If you had an hour to save the world, how would you spend that hour?” He responded: “I would spend 55 minutes defining the problem and then five minutes solving it.”[2] Elon Musk, the founder of Tesla and SpaceX similarly remarked: “A lot of times the question is harder than the answer. And if you can properly phrase the question, then the answer is the easy part.”[3]

Following my graduation from high school, I entered an elite yeshiva for Talmud study in Israel. Although I was confident in my general ability to understand rabbinic texts, I hoped to grow my skills in plumbing the depths of Talmudic discourse. I was confused by my rabbi’s opening sentence to the first shiur, when he told us simply, “My goal in this yeshiva is to teach you how to ask the right questions.” It was, however, over the course of my two years of carefully listening to his classes that I came to appreciate his statement. I discovered that the seeds to blossoming novel insights and interpretations are thoughtful questions.

R. Shemuel Yaakov Borenstein z”l suggested that the “question and answer” format of sippur yessiat Misrayim is in fact rooted in the exodus from Egypt itself. He explained that it was, perhaps, the “dark” and incomprehensible centuries of servitude in Egypt that laid the groundwork for the “lit-up” depth of perception of God and His ways that was experienced by Am Yisrael upon their departure.[4] We, too, relive the exodus by leading our seders along the similar route of mystifying questions that lead to revelation.

Indeed, the great kabbalist R. Moshe Cordevero z”l noted the ironic reality of how the concealment of a powerful light  is necessary for its revelation. “Though concealed, the light is actually revealed, for were it not concealed, it could not be revealed,” he wrote. The dazzle of the sun serves to conceals its overwhelming brilliance, as you cannot gaze at the it with the naked eye. “Yet when you conceal it – looking at it through screens – you can see and not be harmed.”[5]

Inspired by his own realization of this reality, the well-known British psychotherapist Wilfred Bion fashioned an approach that “casted a beam of intense darkness” into psychological analysis. He would first shroud the client’s issues in the darkness of obscurity and misunderstanding before endeavoring an insight of solution, which could then “glitter in the darkness.”[6]

In the word question there is a beautiful word – quest. I love that word.

(Elie Wiesel)[7]

The integral role of questions to sippur Yessiat Misrayim must serve as a paradigm for our approach to life in general. Living in constant anticipation of the “Eureka!” moment of insight or inspiration is futile. Courageously asking the questions that may precipitate discovery is ennobling.

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[1] See Rambam’s Mishneh Torah, Hil. Hamess UMassah 7:3.

[2] Quoted by J, Daniel Couger, Creative Problem Solving and Opportunity (Danvers, MA, 1995), pg. 178.

[3] “Transcript of Elon Musk Interview: Iron Man, Growing Up in South Africa,” Fresh Dialogues, Feb, 7, 2013. <www.freshdialogues.com/2013/02/07/transcript-of-elon-musk-interview-with-alison-van-diggelen-iron-man-growing-up-in-south-africa>. Cited by Hal Gregersen, Questions are the Answer (New York, NY, 2018), pg. 17.

[4] R. Shemuel Yaakov Borenstein, Haggadah shel Pesah Zot LeYaakov (Bnei Brak, IS, 2019), pg. 243.

[5] R. Moshe Cordevero, Pardes Rimonim 5:4. Translated into English by Daniel C. Matt, in The Essential Kabbalah: The Heart of Jewish Mysticism (New York, NY, 1995), pg. 91.

[6] See James Grotstein, A Beam of Intense Darkness: Wilfred Bion’s Legacy to Psychoanalysis (New York, NY, 2007).

[7] Quoted in Questions are the Answer, pg. 1.

Shabbat HaGadol: Freedom

Freedom

A Message for Shabbat HaGadol 2018

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Watch my brief discussion of this issue, at SCA's Yom Iyun at Bet Torah this past Monday night, here.

Am Yisrael was instructed the elaborate laws and processes of korban Pesah immediately prior to their redemption from Egypt (Shemot 12:21-9). The timing of this missvah appears significant. It was performed during the critical moments of Am Yisrael’s anticipated freedom, as God murdered the firstborn sons of the Egyptians and spared their own. Although the specific rationale that underlay the details related to this sacrifice have long been debated, I believe that the basic concept of commandments at the time of liberation is instructive. It lends a necessary depth to our understanding of freedom.

R. Yehoshua ben Levi taught: “No one is truly free, except if he engages in Torah study”.[1] Although the strict laws and methodology of talmud Torah and the performance of its missvot seem antithetical to the standard conception of freedom, R. Yehoshua ben Levi inexplicably pointed to them as its paradigmatic expressions. R. Joseph B. Soloveitchik z”l similarly noted that the full expression of “retelling the exodus from Egypt” (sipur yessiat Misrayim) takes place through the intense study of the laws and strictures of korban Pesah.[2] How do the study of Torah and performance of its missvot relate to a proper expression of freedom? 

The well-known social psychologist Erich Fromm articulated a fundamental distinction regarding the ideal nature of freedom. He paid careful attention to Adam and Hava’s acquired “freedom” after they ate from the ess ha-da’at, and realized that although they certainly did achieve a “freedom from the sweet bondage of paradise,” they were nonetheless devoid of a “freedom to self-governance and individual realization.”[3] Without a guiding light of a “freedom to,” our “freedom from” can leave us more constricted than any prior state of slavery. 

Consider, for example, that an art professor at Sacramento State College observed that students often panic when confronted by an empty canvas. In contrast to former times, when painters had patrons who ordered portraits or painted commemorations of important events, contemporary artists are confronted by a vacuum in which no style is required and no task is demanded of them. The “freedom” of an empty canvas freezes the students. The professor realized that his students often react to the situation by “self-enslaving themselves,” and turning back to old masterpieces in search of form and meaning.[4] 

Dr. Moshe Koppel provided an excellent analogy for a similar concept: the rules of grammar. Though an outsider may believe that language would allow most expressiveness if there were no rules, the exact opposite is true. The grammar of language provides the necessary structure within which expression can flourish.[5] 

Studying Torah at the “seder of liberation” serves as our yearly reminder that “no one is truly free, except if he engages in Torah study.” Torah and missvot provide the necessary structure for our lives of “freedom to,” allowing us to circumvent the uncertainty and chaos of a life stuck in a constant state of “freedom from.” 

The paradoxical experience of attaining freedom by submitting to a context of law stretches back to an earlier time than the first seder. The elaborate rules that accompanied Am Yisrael’s performance of korban Pesah were performed by the people of Am Yisrael at the same time that they experienced a “freedom from” the Egyptians. The nation’s ability to follow the instructions provided them with the necessary medium for their transition into “freedom to” Torah and missvot. 

Shabbat shalom! 

Rabbi Avi Harari 

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[1] Masekhet Avot 6:2.

[2] See, e.g. R. Soloveitchik’s Festival of Freedom: Essays on Pesah and the Haggadah (New York, NY, 2006), pg. 26-7, 99, and Haggadat Siah HaGrid (Jerusalem, IS, 1995), pg. 30-33.

[3] Erich Fromm, Escape from Freedom (New York, NY, 1969), pg. 33-34.

[4] Related by Joseph B. Fabry, in The Pursuit of Meaning: Viktor Frankl, Logotherapy and Life (Charlottesville, VA, 2013), pg. 101.

[5] Moshe Koppel, Meta-Halakhah: Logic, Intuition, and the Unfolding of Jewish Law (Lanham, MD, 1997), pg. 116-17.

Shabbat HaGadol: Competent Followers

Competent Followers

A Message for Shabbat HaGadol 2017

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Most of us are conditioned to primarily evaluate the “leadership” of an initiative or institution when assessing its success. Our general theory is that the greatness of an operation is mostly dependent upon the strength and competency of its leaders. A recent opinion column in The New York Times accordingly noted that many leading universities excessively boast their association with leadership: Princeton’s website lists “leadership activities” as the first on a list of characteristics for would-be students to showcase, Harvard’s application informs that its mission is “to educate our students to be citizens and citizen-leaders for society,” and Yale’s website informs applicants that it seeks “the leaders of their generation.”[1]

In the days and hours leading up to the exodus from Egypt and the historic establishment of Am Yisrael, we might then expect the emergence of a new crop of leadership. And yet, the Torah does not emphasize the “leaders” of that time, but rather the “followers”:

And Moshe called all the elders of Yisrael and said to them, “Draw out and take yourselves sheep according to your clans and slaughter the Pesah offering” … And Bnei Yisrael went and did as God had charged Moshe and Aharon, thus they did do. (Shemot 12:21,28) 

And Bnei Yisrael had done according to Moshe’s word, and they had asked of the Egyptians ornaments of silver and ornaments of god and cloaks. (35) 

And God said to Moshe and Aharon, “This is the statute of the Pesah offering: no foreigner shall eat of it” … And all Bnei Yisrael did as God had charged Moshe and Aharon, thus did they do. (43, 50) 

In a 1988 Harvard Business Review article, Robert Kelley defined a discipline in organizational psychology termed “followership.” He listed the qualities of a good follower as one committed to “a purpose, principle or person outside of themselves,” and being “courageous, honest and credible.” Kelly explained that “companies will not succeed without the kind of people who take pride and satisfaction in the role of supporting player, doing the less glorious work without fanfare.” He wrote that the best bet for true success is to be found in a healthy culture of “followership.”[2]

The importance of a strong “followership” is sorely missing from our current societal landscape. Unfortunately, “leadership” reigns as the single qualification in the contemporary vision of a path to success. David Brooks suggested that our society’s misconception stems from its collective cynicism, as people believe that they are better than everything else around them. Steering his readers to the proper path, Brooks cited from Dwight D. Eisenhower’s memoir “At Ease”:

Always try to associate yourself with and learn as much as you can from those who know more than you do, who do better than you, who see more clearly than you. 

It is a statement that is perhaps better known to us from Ben Zoma:

Who is wise? He who learns from all people.[3]

Brooks further explained that good leaders need good followers. The followers must possess the ability to "recognize just authority, admire it, be grateful for it and emulate it."[4] A positive partnership is the core ingredient for all successful operations.

The Torah’s repeated mention of the nation’s obedience during the critical moments of its formation teaches the invaluable lesson of “followership.” Learning from the success of Am Yisrael at that time, the model of a strong “followership” must serve as our compass for success in all walks of life. 

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[1] Susan Cain, “Not Leadership Material? Good. The World Needs Followers,” The New York Times, March 24, 2017.

[2] Robert Kelley, “In Praise of Followers,” Harvard Business Review, November 1988.

[3] Avot 4:1.

[4] David Brooks, “The Follower Problem,” The New York Times, June 11, 2012. See, as well, Brooks’ The Road to Character (New York, 2015), pg. 63.