Dvar Torah Vaetchanan 5773
My wife Jenna and I are approaching our 10th wedding
anniversary. It sometimes feels like yesterday that we were
married, except when I try to fit into my wedding suit.
One of my favorite memories from the wedding day is my
parents-in-law, Jim & Linda, singing to us "Do you Love
Me?" from Fiddler on the Roof,
Some of you may be able to picture that memorable scene,
where Tevye the Milkman asks his wife Golde this very
simple question: “do you love me?” To which she very
romantically answers, “do I what!?”
Now that I think about it, perhaps they should have
chosen the Beatle’s “All you need is love.”
All kidding aside, what Jenna’s parents did was beautiful
and very touching. Still, at least to me, this song is beyond
comprehension, to think that after 25 years of living and
struggling together and raising five daughters that Tevye
asks this basic question for the first time and that Golde, his
wife, dismisses it as foolish.
Fiddler, however, is a reminder, writes Salomon
Gruenwald, that it wasn’t too long ago that arranged
marriages were common in many Jewish communities as
well as in other traditional cultures. Yet, the notion that love
is an individual decision that stems from romantic feelings
was not completely foreign to our ancestors. In fact, they
set aside a day for celebrating romantic love.
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Thousands of years before anyone heard of Saint
Valentine, Sadie Hawkins (or Woodstock), the Jewish
people created a Jerusalem-centered love festival for
couples. This custom is quite in keeping with the sensuous
poetry of Shir ha’Shirim, the Song of Songs, canonized
in the Hebrew Bible.
According to the Mishna (Taanit Ch. 4), during the time of the
2nd Temple, the 15th Day of Av (Tu B’Av) was a day set
aside for romance. Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel recounts
that on Tu B’Av, under the warm glow of a full summer
moon, the young women of Israel would go out of the
Jerusalem city walls dressed in white and dance in the
vineyards calling to the young men to choose their bride.
In recent decades this day has been revived in
modern Israel as the Jewish day of romance (kind of like
Valentine’s Day). Even Google has felt the love. As the
Times of Israel reported, Google Israel, in keeping with
the company’s policy of changing its logo for festivals and
special occasions, went all lovey-dovey for Tu B’Av 2012
modifying its’ logo by entwining “o”s, with a little heart
flying above them.
It’s interesting that this joyous day comes right after
the saddest day of the Jewish year – Tisha B’Av. On the
9th of Av we mark the destruction of the 1st and 2nd
Temples and a number of calamities that have befallen
our people over the centuries; but just 6 days later we
have a celebration of love.
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With this knowledge, it is perhaps beshert that Tu B’Av –
the day of love – falls during the week we read Parashat
Va’Etchanan. Love figures in very centrally to this week’s
Torah portion. In addition to the recounting of how we
witnessed God at the foot of Mount Sinai (called Horev in
the Book of Deuteronomy) and how we received the 10
Commandments, this parasha also contains one of the
most famous passages in Torah – recognized by almost
any Jew. Shema Yisrael, Adonai Eloheinu, Adonai Ehad
- Hear, O Israel! The Eternal is our God, the Eternal is One.
And continuing, V’A’havta—You shall love the Eternal
your God with all your heart and with all your soul and
with all your might.”
The notion– to Love God – is one of the most
enigmatic. Is this a commandment? If it is indeed a
commandment, then how do we know if we’ve fulfilled it?
After all, love is not quantifiable. Isn’t it impossible to
generate an emotion on command? And how can God
command us to love God – aren’t our relationships with
God more complex than that?
In addition to its internal ambiguity, perhaps one of
the reasons this idea seems so strange to us is that we’ve
been raised in a culture in which love is thought of more
as a passive emotion or sentiment that one feels rather
than a verb—love as something you do. Shmuel David
Luzzato, (an Italian 19th century scholar) wrote the
following:
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The [emotion of] love itself cannot be the subject of a
command …[a person who] is exclusively concerned
with doing God’s pleasure and observing God’s
commandments will be called the lover of God…the
love of God is not a separate commandment, but an
underlying principle of all the commandments.
In other words, according to Luzzato, the passage is
teaching an attitude that motivates action. This
interpretation parallels with the beliefs of our biblical and
early rabbinic ancestors. They believed that the heart
was the seat of the intellect and will. Therefore when
we are commanded V’a’havta et Adonai Elochekha
b’chol leva’vcha – “You shall love the Eternal your God
with all your heart” it means to love with intention to act.
A Midrash, in fact, makes this explicit: The Holy One
said to Israel: My children, do I ask that you suffer
material loss on My account? What do I ask of you? Only
that you show your love of Me by loving one another, by
honoring one another, by respecting one another; that
there be found among you no transgression, no dishonest
dealing, no unseemly conduct… as it is said: It has been
told to you, O man, what is good, and what God requires
of you: only to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk
humbly with your God (Micah 6:8). Do not read “walk humbly
with your God”, but rather read, “walk humbly, and Your
God will be with you.” As long as you walk humbly
performing, without display, the good deeds God
commands, God will descend and humbly walk with you.
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According to the Midrash, V’a’havta, is about action – but
not action toward God, but through active love of others.
In other words, loving other people cannot simply be a
sentiment we hold in our hearts. The verb 'V'a’havta'
(And you shall love) appears only two other times in the
whole Bible, where we are admonished to love others: our
neighbor (Lev. 19:18) and the stranger (Lev. 19:34).
We also know from the most intimate of relationships
that the romantic impulse that initially draws two people
together will not be enough to sustain the relationship
over time if their love is not treated as an art that is
cultivated and practiced—enduring love is hard.
Despite the challenge, I find myself in agreement with
the Jewish-American Psychoanalyst Erich Fromm, “Love
is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of
human existence.” Or as another Jewish-American, Burt
Bacharach, wrote in his song, "What the world needs
now"
What the world needs now is love, sweet love. It's the
only thing that there's just too little of.
He continues,
Lord, we don't need another mountain. There are
mountains and hillsides enough to climb. There are
oceans and rivers enough to cross, enough to last till
the end of time.
What the world needs now is love, sweet love, no,
not just for some but for everyone.
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As the Shema teaches—love is verb. So this Sunday
night and Monday on Tu b’Av, consider doing something
loving for someone you love, or for someone in need of
some loving-kindness.
Shabbat Shalom
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