שִׂים שָׁלוֹם טוֹבָה וּבְרָכָה חַיִים חֵן וָחֶסֶד וְרַחֲמִים עָלֵינוּ וְעַל כָּל־יִשְׂרָאֵל עַמֶּךָ, בָּרְכֵנוּ אָבִינוּ כֻּלָּנוּ כְּאֶחָד בְּאוֹר פָּנֶיךָ כִּי בְאוֹר פָּנֶיךָ נָתַתָּ לָּנוּ ה’ אֱלֹקינוּ תּוֹרַת חַיִּים וְאַהֲבַת חֶסֶד וּצְדָקָה וּבְרָכָה וְרַחֲמִים וְחַיִּים וְשָׁלוֹם, וְטוֹב יִהְיֶה בְּעֵינֶיךָ לְבָרְכֵנוּ וּלְבָרֵךְ אֶת־כָּל־עַמְּךָ יִשְׂרָאֵל בְּכָל־עֵת וּבְכָל־שָׁעָה בִּשְׁלוֹמֶךָ בְּרוֹב עוֹז וְשָׁלוֹם. בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה ה’ הַמְבָרֵךְ אֶת־עַמּוֹ יִשְׂרָאֵל בַּשָּׁלוֹם –
Grant peace, goodness, and blessing, life favor, kindness and compassion upon us and upon all Israel, Your people.
Bless us, our Father, all of us as one with the light of Your countenance. For by the light of Your countenance You gave us Adonoy our God, a Torah of life and the love of kindliness, righteousness, blessing, compassion, life, and peace.
And may it be good in Your sight to bless us and to bless Your people Israel, at all times and at every moment with Your peace (with much strength and peace). Blessed are You, Adonoy, Who blesses His people Israel with peace.
Peace is important
Our sages teach that peace is the ultimate container for blessing; without peace, there’s nothing. It’s something we ask for every day, the conclusion of the Amida, every prayer, and even how we greet people – Shalom!
But isn’t that also true of wisdom? Or health?
שִׂים שָׁלוֹם
We ask God to place or grant peace on us, not to make peace for us or give it. The language of placing or granting suggests something done gently – sama bamizbeach
placed by Hashem – bnachas shelo yifaseh.
Sometimes, the absence of conflict is the least difficult option, but that’s hardly peace.
Peace doesn’t mean a lack of conflict; it doesn’t mean turning the other cheek and suffering in silence. Your non-response to conflict contributes to a lack of overt hostility that is superficial and only a negative peace at best. Sure, there is no external conflict, but everyone recognizes that conflict is there, even if it’s unspoken and even if it’s only internal. It’s a position of discomfort and resentment – possibly only unilateral – and it may genuinely be too tricky or not worth the headache to attempt to resolve. Be that as it may, that is not what peace is; it’s not a state of blessing at all. It’s the fragile status quo that lasts only as long as it is sufficiently tolerable, but it’s a lingering poison that slowly suffocates; it’s only a ceasefire or stalemate; it’s certainly not peace.
Peace isn’t the lack of conflict that stems from being weak and harmless. It’s not good morality if you don’t fight when you’re meek and harmless. You haven’t made that choice; you simply have no alternatives. Pirkei Avos is dismissive and disdainful of people who don’t stand up for themselves – אִם אֵין אֲנִי לִי, מִי לִי. In a world of pacifists, a bully with a stick would rule the world. There’s nothing moral about being harmless.
We pray for God to bring peace, yet an imposed peace is not peace at all. There is a straight line from the peace imposed on Germany after World War One to the causes that directly to the sparks that lit World War Two, scarred our history, and burned continents. Peace can’t be forced; peace must be gentle – שִׂים שָׁלוֹם
When Jewish People are threatened, they gather and unite, but that isn’t peace or unity; that’s also forced and simply an alliance of political necessity. After the Exodus and as the Jewish People approached the Land of Israel, bordering nation-states were alarmed, and the tribal chiefs of Moav and Midyan struck an alliance to stop the Jewish People’s so far unstoppable march toward their lands. Moav and Midyan were sworn enemies, but a common thread brought them together; we’d expect that if they had been successful, they’d have resumed hostilities soon after. That’s not peace; that’s just a temporary partnership of convenience.
Siblings that spend time in close proximity bicker and fight; as they grow older and move out of the parental home, they fight less. That’s also not peace. They fight less because there is more distance now.
When you shut out someone you were once close with and don’t fight with them, that’s also not peace; that, too, is distance.
Peace is something specific; as the Ohr HaChaim notes, the word for peace is cognate to wholesomeness and perfection, a holistic and symbiotic harmony of constituent parts – שָּׁלוֹם / שלימות.
Fighting is rooted in falling short of that ideal, fractured and insecure individuals fighting for control, dominance, and superiority.
To what ends
As the Rambam explains in detail, one of the core functions of Mashiach is bringing peace to the world. Not for conquest or subjugation, and not for prosperity, but for freedom for the world to be busy with Torah and spiritual pursuits.
In fact, it is quite possible that peace and liberty from oppression might be the only difference between the world we know and a world that has been redeemed.
How does God do something without doing it?
If I want burgers for dinner and you want pizza, we disagree. If we go to the store and they’re all out of pizza, we might agree to have burgers, but that’s not peace. If we pick up pizza and burgers, that’s also not peace; everyone getting what they want doesn’t get to the heart of the issue.
Peace means working through the issues peacefully; God can grant us the environment to create peace. Maybe we can agree that this time I get to choose and next time you choose!
When two kids fight over something, like who gets to sit next to dad, the family might devise a system, taking turns or paper rock scissors. But in reality, the argument isn’t about sitting next to dad; it’s that the kid who loses out feels unloved. If dad pulls the kid aside and gives them some tender love, care, and proper attention, they wouldn’t feel unloved or jealous; they wouldn’t care about sitting next to dad one particular time. If no one feels badly pushed away anymore, each one allows the other to occupy as much space as they need; you can give the other person all they need to resolve the issue.
Think about a conflict you’re involved in or aware of, personally, in the family, in the community, and what the causes are.
When Dayan Fischer was the rav in Zichron Moshe, an unwell man walked to the front of the shul and sat in the rabbi’s seat at the beginning of services. People asked him to move, and he refused. Then they tried to remove him physically, but he got agitated and was too strong for them, and he fought them off. Bemused at this, Rav Fischer walked up to the man, whispered something in his ear, and stepped back; the man promptly stood up and sat in the shul’s back corner. When asked what he had said, Rav Fischer said he’d told the man that the rabbi sits in the back corner on the right; the man just wanted to feel like the rabbi.
People want things, and they’ll fight for what they want. To make peace, you need to find a way to solve problems creatively and let them get what they want and for you to get what you want.
It’s no different from the general approach and orientation to prayer suggested here; it is disingenuous to raise your eyes and heart to heaven and pour your heart out for God to figure it all out for you. A child says give me, give me, give me! Mature adults understand the need to put in the effort to work for the things we want; mature prayers emerge from experienced efforts.
Peace is not simply the absence of conflict; it is the absence of conflict through resolving the issue at the heart of conflict and addressing the deficiency or lack, which results in wholesome perfection – sim shalom – giving inner wholeness and inner peace.
Perfection – שלימות
This blessing is also a prayer for perfection. Regarding character traits, our sages speak of measurements, middos – MIDDOS CITE. Much like ingredients in a recipe, there isn’t one you want in zero or unlimited amounts; you need the right measure of salt, pepper, chili, and garlic, or the recipe is a disaster.
There is such a thing as being too kind; our sages say that when someone is kind to the cruel, they end up being cruel to the kind. In that instance, the kindness isn’t kindness at all but a misguided distortion of morality. Children require a balance of kindness and discipline; children who only get sweets and toys end up spoiled.
There is a place for anger; what if you never got angry, even in the face of the worst crimes imaginable? If an adult beats up a child in front of you, is it something to be proud of that you’ve worked on yourself not to get angry? You absolutely should get angry!
The model of wholesomeness and perfection requires balance – shleimus. When a person is miserable, they are off balance.
It’s important to understand that everyone has their own balance, their recipe with different ingredients and measurements.
One of the great adventures in the story of our life is to figure out how to express those traits in the right way; a person with a natural predisposition towards kindness isn’t supposed to find a way to minimize that kindness; they are supposed to figure out how to channel in the highest and best way.
People with a propensity towards severity don’t serve themselves well by stifling themselves and finding ways to maximize kindness; they’re supposed to exercise balance in a way that requires judgment and discernment.
A person will never feel balance until they understand their personal characteristics, tendencies and predispositions – their middos.
While the post-war era of Jewish education is among the most prolific in terms of output and reach, one severe limitation has been the rigidity of formulaic cookie-cutter systems that take a one-size-fits-all approach. If you fit, you’re great and belong, but if you’re a round peg in a square hole, many individuals have been squeezed out, left behind, or had to fight hard for their piece of wholesomeness – שִׂים שָׁלוֹם
The school might try to say it’s a shortcoming in the student, but it may just as well be a shortcoming in the school. Some schools try to stamp out people with learning differences, and sometimes, these aren’t disabilities; they can be superpowers with negative externalities. There seems to be a movement towards giving these extraordinary people the resources they need to express themselves and giving them space and freedom to grow – שִׂים שָׁלוֹם
But it’s so much easier and better when it’s not forced. We want it granted and placed. Maneuavered, manipulated, gently influeced – שִׂים שָׁלוֹם.
In the form of books, influences, teachers, friends, and people we need to meet when we need them.
שִׂים שָׁלוֹם טוֹבָה
We don’t just wish for peace; we need peace that is good because not all peace is.
As the proverb teaches, there is a time to make a peace and a time for battle – eis shalom eish milchama. Sometimes, a compromise betrays a fundamental value, leaving a lingering sense of loss and regret; those are the battles that must be fought, and conceding is never worthwhile. In the leadup to World War Two, the Allied leaders misguidedly tried to appease Hitler by allowing Nazi Germany to annex the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia without the Czechoslovak government’s participation in the talks and effectively sacrificing Czechoslovakia’s sovereignty in the hopes of securing peace. The Munich Agreement was easy; it wasn’t good and didn’t last. It has since become synonymous with the dangers of appeasement when it involves the sacrifice of core principles and the rights of others, highlighting that peace at any price can ultimately lead to far greater costs.
We need peace that is good – שִׂים שָׁלוֹם טוֹבָה
וּבְרָכָה
Blessing is a way is saying abundance, growth, more – ribui CITE. Rashi teaches that Genesis starts with the letter Bet because it starts with the same letter that the word blessing does – bracha / bereishis. The Ibn Ezra questions this teaching, noting that all sorts of plain and ordinary words start with different letters, like the word for animal – beheima CITE.
The Maharal explains that Rashi’s teaching isn’t that the letter Bet starts the word for blessing; the letter Bet is the definition of blessing; it cuts to the heart of how blessing works, the nature of the thing itself. The numerological value of the letters that spell the word for blessing all start with – beis reish caf, 2 20 200 CITE. The numerological quality of the number two is that it signifies multiple, more, and many, amplifying what is present.
There is a legendary story about the prophet Elisha, who stayed in a poor widow’s house while traveling. A creditor was pressuring her, but all she had was a little flask of oil; Elisha told her to collect as many pots and pans and bottles and containers as possible and borrow as many as she could from her neighbors, and he told her to pour the flask of oil into the containers – it didn’t empty until every container was full. She had enough to pay her debt and provide for her family’s needs.
When Yakov blesses his sons on his deathbed, he identifies a quality and identifying characteristic in each child and blesses them with expansiveness, with enlargement and extension of the gifts they already possess.
(like idea of tzemach
like idea of samuch min haayin
like not counting klal yisrael)
חַיִים
We pray for life.
But not just breath and a heartbeat, but a life that goes beyond a lifetime, a life of eternity, through connection to the Torah, a life that goes on.
Beyond that, we want a life of meaning, a life that matters, a life that makes us feel alive, with liveliness and vitality – chiyus CITE. Sometimes, we feel fired up, inspired, motivated, and connected to the universe and everything; other times, we feel alienated and disconnected.
We pray for life – חַיִים.
חֵן
We pray for grace and charm, finding favor in the eyes of God and man.
Far more subtle than physical attractiveness, grace and charm are invisible qualities that are distinct but often overlap, enhancing how an individual is perceived and how they influence the world around them.
Grace embodies elegance, poise, and kindness in behavior or manner, reflecting an inner harmony and balance associated with a certain serenity and thoughtfulness, a gentle strength that enables individuals to navigate complex situations with ease and compassion, an inherent beauty or soul radiance.
Charm is the ability to attract or delight others through one’s personality, involving a magnetic appeal, charisma, energy, or warmth that draws people in, creating connections and fostering relationships.
Esther is described as graceful and charming; there was something about her that was captivating, a twinkle in her eye that captured hearts and minds – חֵן
At Sinai, the Torah describes how the Jewish People camped at the foot of the mountain, waiting for the hallowed moment they would receive the Torah – vayichan shem – camped. Our sages note that the Torah describes the verb for camping in the singular, teaching that the people camped as one person, with one heart and one mind. In a complementary teaching, our sages reread the word with different vowels; they loved each other and saw grace in each other eyes – vyichan vayichein CITE.
Sharing hopes and dreams, people’s hearts can beat together, and they can truly love one another. Without closing my eyes to your flaws and knowing my imperfections, I can recognize that there is something truly beautiful about you. If I can see your quality and you can see mine, we will have peace; if I recognize and see my own, I will know peace.
Grace and charm get you further than you might expect. We pray for grace and charm, finding favor in the eyes of God and man.
וָחֶסֶד וְרַחֲמִים
On its face, kindness and compassion are mutually exclusive sentiments; you can express one or the other, but they can’t coexist. When a wealthy individual expresses distress over what we might consider first-world problems, a common reaction might be dismissal or lack of empathy, perceiving these complaints as unworthy of genuine compassion given their relative prosperity. Yet, from a divine perspective, God can show compassion for their distress, understanding it within the broader context of human experience and extending kindness irrespective of their material wealth. Every individual’s feelings and struggles are valid and deserving of acknowledgment and compassion, regardless of their external circumstances – וָחֶסֶד וְרַחֲמִים.
Conversely, when someone is visibly suffering or in need, human beings are quick to feel compassion, recognizing the immediate need to alleviate their pain. However, this individual might yearn not just for compassion but for genuine human kindness that acknowledges them as a person beyond their current state of need, for interactions that bring love and warmth without the shadow of pity. True support encompasses seeing and treating individuals with dignity and care that transcends their immediate circumstances – וָחֶסֶד וְרַחֲמִים
The divine combination of compassion and kindness transcends human limitations because God’s desire to give is not based on human need or worthiness; it is a fundamental expression of divine love at the root of all existence – Olam Chesed Yibaneh CITE”.
Predating Creation, self-generating and infinite, we ask God to share these with us in peace, and also with those who don’t deserve our peace: the hurtful people in the world who will never learn, will never change, and who will never be the one to make peace. We pray for the kindness of being able to have peace with those people as well – וָחֶסֶד.
Sometimes, kindness isn’t enough to get to a place where we can make peace; other times, a person has done something so awful they don’t deserve kindness. Faced with someone whose actions make them seem undeserving of kindness, the challenge lies in finding the strength to extend compassion. Seeing past the conflict and recognizing the inherent brokenness, emotional fractures, or the depth of another’s flaws can awaken a sense of compassion within us. How bad they must feel, how unhappy they will always be, how they will alienate every bit of goodness out of their life; and if they don’t feel bad at all, how sad that is, how terrible it is to be so irreparable broken and damaged – וְרַחֲמִים.
The coexistence of kindness and compassion challenges us to embody these divine attributes, extending compassion and kindness even in the most challenging circumstances, bringing peace into our lives – וָחֶסֶד וְרַחֲמִים.
עָלֵינוּ וְעַל כָּל־יִשְׂרָאֵל עַמֶּךָ
For most of history, the utopian ideal that most cultures and societies strived for has been domination, subjugation, and victory; the pages of history are written in the blood and tears of conflict. In stark contrast, Judaism’s religious texts overwhelmingly endorse compassion and peace; love and the pursuit of peace is one of Judaism’s fundamental ideals and is a near-universal characteristic in our pantheon of heroes – בקש שלום ורדפהו. R’ Jonathan Sacks notes that the utopian ideal of peace is one of Judaism’s significant original revolutionary contributions.
But this blessing doesn’t fantasize about a dream of world peace, a world where the nation beat swords to plowshares; it doesn’t talk in abstract platitudes.
It is a prayer for peace for ourselves and the entire Jewish People.
Human relationships form in concentric circles. I am at the center, then perhaps my spouse and children, then parents and siblings, then friends and extended family, then community and acquaintances, then my city, my country, continent, species, and planet.
This blessing acknowledges a more localized version of the Jewish People – ourselves; this brings an abstract ideal of loving an idea into something tangible and practical, the humans around you. World peace is a lovely idea, but in the real world, it starts with individuals, human to human. A full half of the Ten Commandments are grounded in interpersonal regulations – בין אדם לחברו. It’s not enough to love humanity in the abstract; you have to love people in particular – your annoying neighbor and the guy who never stops talking – עָלֵינוּ.
The Torah and this blessing expect us to expand our consciousness so that the circles around us matter enough to impact our well-being – עָלֵינוּ.
Every time there is some kind of local, national, or global crisis, leaders inevitably get up and speak about the need to make peace between our community and their community, our people and their people, our ways and their ways, as if peace already existed between the people sitting in the same room! Peace is complex, and it doesn’t happen by itself; it’s not something you do with others; it’s something we need to do with and among ourselves, here and now – עָלֵינוּ.
בָּרְכֵנוּ אָבִינוּ כֻּלָּנוּ כְּאֶחָד
We pray for many things: happiness, health, children, wealth, and spirituality. But we want those blessings to be rooted in unity, not division – בָּרְכֵנוּ אָבִינוּ כֻּלָּנוּ כְּאֶחָד
While it’s good to try to be a better human than you used to be, it’s never good to act better than your friends; we don’t want our blessings to come between us. When someone becomes successful and wealthy, if they become snobby and stop hanging out with their old friends, their success isn’t a blessing.
It doesn’t have to be contentious or divisive when someone becomes more observant or religious. There are ways of being with and around people in your life who want different things and respect each other’s differences; blessings rooted in unity, not division – בָּרְכֵנוּ אָבִינוּ כֻּלָּנוּ כְּאֶחָד
I am blessed; I don’t want people to be threatened by my personal, professional, or spiritual attainments. I don’t want them to be insecure or jealous of what I have; I don’t want my parents, friends, or siblings to feel like they’re not good enough. I also want to celebrate and be happy for the blessings other people receive – בָּרְכֵנוּ אָבִינוּ כֻּלָּנוּ כְּאֶחָד
Zooming out beyond the Jewish People as part of ourselves is ourselves as part of the Jewish People.
The Kol Nidrei Prayer on Yom Kippur includes a line that grants the congregation permission to pray with sinners and wrongdoers together as one people. God asks us to be one people; we ask God to pray as one people. There are things we can’t get on our own, things we don’t deserve on our own; we ask God for a blessing as part of the Jewish People – בָּרְכֵנוּ אָבִינוּ כֻּלָּנוּ כְּאֶחָד.
But when we can live together and respect each other as one, we can call God “Father” – בָּרְכֵנוּ אָבִינוּ כֻּלָּנוּ כְּאֶחָד.
בְּאוֹר פָּנֶיךָ כִּי בְאוֹר פָּנֶיךָ
This prayer asks for blessing with the light on God’s face.
When we speak of light, it’s a way of describing an effect; light feels warm and good; it’s something nice that we associate with smiling and feeling happy.
Asking for blessings with the light on God’s face is the metaphor we use for the mechanism of things that are nice and good.
As we’ve frequently encountered, this is a complex metaphor. God doesn’t have a face, and faces don’t generate light. But when we talk about parts of God, it’s in ways the human imagination can relate to, so God’s arm is a way of speaking about power. In this instance, the face is seen as the mirror of the soul, a space that reveals the inner world; we may conceal our true thoughts and feelings by hiding our natural expressions, but
sometimes, we distort our face so it doesn’t, but its natural state is to display our inner feelings.
Our sages teach that this blessing is an extension of the Priestly Blessing, which this blessing follows in the public repetition. That blessing speaks of God’s face shining us with grace – yaer hashem panav eilecha vichuneka.
When we speak of a blessing with God’s face lit up, it’s a request for blessing from a place of happiness and joy, where the outer and inner worlds align with light and joy.
Our sages teach that God created the universe with no cause other than the quality of kindness – olam chesed yibaneh CITE.
And yet, we don’t live in a world of rainbows and butterflies, lollipops and unicorns. We live in a world of pain and suffering, too. Pleasure can theoretically be reduced to two chemicals in the brain, dopamine, and serotonin; if God truly wanted to show kindness, couldn’t God have made a universe of creatures swimming in pleasure chemicals? Psychology teaches that we only feel good if we earn that reward by accomplishing a goal, but the question remains: why couldn’t God give us the feeling of satisfaction of achieving a goal?
The Ramchal explains that any manner of these variant forms of Creation falls short because they would fail to create the mutual relationship God desires. God’s greatest gift isn’t pleasure or happiness; it’s a connection and relationship with the Creator; that’s what the World to Come us, and that’s why free will exists and is at the heart of humanity, Judaism, and spirituality.
Although God shapes the universe out of kindness, our sages teach that God shrouds kindness in judgment; it must be so for humans to earn their keep. Embedded in this teaching is an inner and outer desire, an inner desire of abundant kindness and an outer wrapping of judgment, pain, and problems. What we subjectively experience as real and painful can be something else entirely at the root of existence.
When there’s a disconnect, that’s never a good thing. No one ever wants to hear their suffering is redemptive or glorious. So we ask for blessings from the light on God’s face, where the outer and inner worlds align with light and joy.
Not bor panecha
Some blessings are missing some light.
Our sages understand the Exodus story as an emergency measure; it wasn’t yet time, and the people were unworthy, and much of the Exodus story happens in darkness. But God had made a promise to Avraham and was going to keep His word – Baruch shomer havtochaso CITE.
We want our blessings to come with light, clarity, and illumination. We want to see and understand how all the parts of the puzzle come together.
נָתַתָּ לָּנוּ יְהֹוָה אֱלֹהֵינוּ תּוֹרַת חַיִּים
In giving the Jewish People the Torah, the blueprint of existence, God shared an instruction manual for proper living him, the way to manifest and participate in some small way in God’s qualities and bring light into Creation – נָתַתָּ לָּנוּ יְהֹוָה אֱלֹהֵינוּ תּוֹרַת חַיִּים
But more than giving us those things, once upon a time, God gave us Himself – נָתַתָּ לָּנוּ יְהֹוָה אֱלֹהֵינוּ.
When a young couple gets married, the groom gives the bride a ring, and the bride might give the groom a watch, but the greatest gift they can give is themselves to each other.
Many marriage laws and customs are derived from the encounter at Sinai; God gave Himself to the Jewish People through the Living Torah and a love of kindness. Spirituality is not an esoteric thing, not an arcane search, not a boring compendium of information and rules. Spirituality is the gift of learning how to be divine, the secret to unlocking the immortal soul, and how to be fragments of God that never dies; loving and obsessing over kindness is one way.
(gmach stories needed)
תּוֹרַת חַיִּים – The Torah is alive
The Torah is a spark of the Divine; it follows that it possesses some powerful, although sometimes paradoxical, properties. The Maariv prayer eloquently refers to the Torah as the essence of our existence—”ki heim chayeinu.” However, this intrinsic vitality contrasts starkly with the moment at Sinai, where the Jewish People died upon hearing God’s voice, only to be revived by the words themselves, which are restorative to the soul – “toras hashem temima meshivas nafesh”.
Our bodies possess a similar property; when cancer cells develop that can threaten survival, the immune system will send T cells to meticulously identify and hopefully eliminate the cancerous cells – a destruction for healing. Chemotherapy works similarly, poisoning the body in a calculated intervention to heal the body by destroying harmful elements.
The Torah targets parts of the human personality that are less than ideal, breaking them down only to rebuild us in a more refined form. It is through enduring and embracing this process, challenging as it may be, that we find a deeper, more vital existence. Just as our bodies can emerge stronger from the battle against illness, so too can our spirits find rejuvenation and life through the transformative power of the Torah if we commit to its teachings and allow them to guide our renewal.
Torah that comes alive
There are things that are boring, sad, and annoying, and there are things that make us come alive, things that are exciting and fill us with life.
We pray for the Torah to be one of those things.
What kind of person would you be if kindness was one of the things that made you feel most alive?
The bad things in life would be much easier to avoid if they felt like death.
Some people love to help others. They are born to volunteers to visit the sick and the old, feed the poor, and teach the unaffiliated, but it doesn’t come naturally to some people.
The Torah says to love God and your neighbor, but those aren’t laws legislating emotion; they command action. Do what you would have done if you felt that way as if you felt that way and had that emotion. Sticking to a task without motivation often winds up generating motivation later. Once you’re invested in an activity, person, or thing, you care more about it. When you’re paying for a dinner you’re not especially hungry for, you’ll force yourself to eat a bit more; if you’re at a friend’s wedding, you would never because it’s not your problem.
(Joey Rosenfeld as if)
We don’t want to be cruel; we must be invested in kindness. Loving kindness has nothing to do with its visibility or glamour but with loving it for itself, including the kindness no one cares about. It means loving washing the dishes so someone else won’t have to, picking up the tissue on the floor, and taking the trash out. It includes the popular things everyone has a soft spot for, like caring for special needs children, but the point is it doesn’t end there; what about someone not young or old, not poor, sick, or dying? What about someone middle-aged and just a little uncomfortable? Someone who loves kindness is excited to help that person from their innermost being.
Torah isn’t enough.
We pray for a Torah that’s alive, pulsating with life.
The Zohar teaches that at Sinai, all souls were gathered and present, and each soul perceived the Torah to its utmost depth to the absolute capacity each soul is capable of. There are Torah teachings and classes that fill us with life. If the Torah were truly alive to us, loving kindness would follow naturally.
In a vibrant world with so many things vying for our attention, corporate psychologists have determined that marketing campaigns have a maximum of eight minutes to occupy the human attention span. Marketers have optimized what colors catch the eye and which emotions to stir to provoke the desired behaviors.
The Gateshead Rav said that we have to give our children what the world will provide them in a kosher way, or they will go out and get it in the most nonkosher way.
If you had the best teacher or teachings, but they weren’t relatable, who would want to learn? The method matters, the medium matters, and the truth isn’t enough – toras emes CITE.
We pray for a Torah that’s alive – toras chaim.
One time, Shlomo was on his way to teach a class, and he was running late when an Israeli collector stopped him and asked for a minute. He told Shlomo his story, which was a tale of woe and pain, but ten minutes long or more, and Shlomo felt terrible for him, gave him money, and moved on.
We don’t want kindness that is reluctant, begrudging, or unwilling. We don’t want the watered-down version; we want the real thing.
When Yitzchak prepares to die, he asks Esau to bring the food he loves so he can bless Esau with all his heart and soul, his entire being and essence – lmaan avarchecha nafshi
We pray for Torah and kindness that we are comfortable doing and love to do.
וּצְדָקָה וּבְרָכָה וְרַחֲמִים וְחַיִּים
We translate Tzedaka as charity and righteousness, which seem mutually exclusive; is someone owed something, in which case it is righteous to return, or are they not owed anything, in which case it would be charitable?
The Ibn Ezra translates it as something more like the act of equity; when the rich share with the poor, it equalizes inequity – צְדָקָה.
The Rokeach suggests that these requests aren’t separate; they’re all one. If we could discover a life of Torah and a Torah that is alive, we’d find kindness, charity, blessings, compassion, life, and all the rest; if Torah excited us and felt alive, everything else would follow: kindness, compassion, and charity would be natural.
Charity isn’t just giving money; it’s any leveling of the playing field. If someone lacks anything at all and you can help, that’s charity. Beyond financial means, remember that your time and expertise must be spent charitably as well, whether it’s homework, introductions, business contacts, or tips.
When someone is floundering spiritually, helping them is charity, including someone you perceive as superior, be it a teacher, mentor, or parent. Charity doesn’t make you better than another; there is no hierarchy or verticality in helping – it just means you have some more stability. Not even more objective stability in life; only a little more than they have right now, which is what you can share, and that’s enough. You know who they are, and you can share the place you see them from.
וְרַחֲמִים
Although we have already prayed for grace and mercy, the first was the kind everybody needs; this is another kind, the kind that comes from the light of God’s face – כִּי בְאוֹר פָּנֶיךָ.
Our sages teach that in moments we are stuck, we have a key; God gives us opportunities, and the qualities with which we navigate our challenges feed back into our lives as problems or solutions – nasan lecha rachmim vrichamecha
(Peterson)
Our sages teach that there is a kind of reflexive mirroring to helping others, that when you help someone with their problem, it somehow helps solve yours. If you help someone get married, it enables you to get married or makes your marriage smoother. When you pray for someone else, your prayers get answered as well.
A great rabbi once visited London and took some meetings, and Shlomo spent the night translating for him. People poured out their hearts the entire night and received blessings, but the sob stories shook Shlomo.
A person can experience pain that isn’t directly his; they have still endured pain. When you give someone whose child is sick some money for their care, you are invested in their recovery. When you help a young couple get married, you have bought into the success of their marriage.
Although we carry so much of our lives on our own, there are little fragments that others can share indirectly; we ask for opportunities to be merciful, where we can help someone with a problem. We ask for a heart big enough to include someone else’s problem so I can deserve more, so I can change my nature to be more naturally kind and good, and help more people – וְרַחֲמִים.
וְחַיִּים וְשָׁלוֹם
We take life for granted; there is no prayer or blessing for life.
There is a blessing for healing, but this blessing may be the first mention of life; the life we want is peaceful – וְחַיִּים וְשָׁלוֹם
Quite arguably, life is the opposite of peace. Life is a war! Do we choose what’s easy or what’s right? Spiritual or mundane? Body or soul?
We pray for a life where we don’t feel torn apart, an extension of a life of Torah, with harmony and serenity, not plagued by doubt and confusion – וְחַיִּים וְשָׁלוֹם
וְטוֹב יִהְיֶה בְּעֵינֶיךָ לְבָרְכֵנוּ וּלְבָרֵךְ אֶת־כָּל־עַמְּךָ יִשְׂרָאֵל בְּכָל־עֵת וּבְכָל־שָׁעָה בִּשְׁלוֹמֶךָ
A puzzle piece on its own will never be complete; the Jewish People are incomplete without each other, and the soul is incomplete without it’s connection the Creator.
One of the functions of the existence of deficiency and lack in our lives is as a prompt to reach out to the Creator and ask, so we ask the Creator – we know that peace is good in God’s eyes – וְטוֹב יִהְיֶה בְּעֵינֶיךָ.
The Rosh Hashana prayers affirm the utopian vision of the world coming together to acknowledge the Creator and do what is right and good in the world – vyeiasu kulam agudah achas laasos retzoncha.
Following the prompt, we ask God to help bring us together – vtov yihye beinecha
בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְהֹוָה הַמְבָרֵךְ אֶת־עַמּוֹ יִשְׂרָאֵל בַּשָּׁלוֹם: –
The Song of Songs refers to the female figure as Shulamis, which our sages understand to be an allegory to the Jewish People. Shulamis is the feminine variant of Solomon or Shlomo, themselves variants of Shalom, peace, or peaceful.
The Jewish People are born as Yakov, clutching at Esau’s heel; he fights with angels and becomes Yisrael. To be Jewish is to be a fighter, to fight for what is right and good. Judaism stands up against selfishness and fights for the sake of peace.
Fighting for peace isn’t contradictory doublespeak; the responsibility to work towards a better world and the ultimate goal of peace sometimes requires a confrontation with ugliness in the world. In a flawed world, the achievement of peace might require using force to defend against aggression or injustice; as one of the great early modern military strategists put it, the aggressor is always peace-loving; he would prefer to take over our country unopposed.
Peace isn’t something that happens by itself. It is not a default or natural state. It almost always requires giving something up, compromising, sacrificing, or investing in lasting peace. It requires fighting yourself; God blesses fighters with peace.
Identify an area in your life that you need peace in; an area between yourself and others; yourself and God; and you and yourself. Ask yourself how you’re willing to fight for peace, and do those things; then you can ask for help.
(shlomo
god promises avraham a son
he and his wife are old, it’s an outlandish claim, Sarah laughs
vayachsehva lo tzedaka
brisker rav – Avraham knew that to believe that was charity god had given him
tzedaka is making things fair
hashem tells avraham after all he’s done he beleives in avrhaam and will give him miracle child
carry banner of God
and avraham believed in hashem vayachsehva lo tzedaka
rokeach says whole sentence is one
toras chaim leads to res
with that we have ahavas chess etc
we forget this
sefardics on rosh hashana say song of gates
gate of chayim amen gates of parnassa amen
people shout loudest for parnassa
not loudest for chaim
take for granted
not thtat we dont appreciate them
we assume they are there)