Humankind has reached some extraordinary advances in technology. I just read about a new kind of hearing aid that connects to a person’s smart phone, where settings can be changed depending on the kind of a room in which a person finds themselves. Settings in a library would be different from those in a crowded restaurant, and if one was speaking to someone to the left, one could direct the hearing aid to pick up the sounds of only that person. One could even focus on that person too quietly speaking to you from across the large table. The author of the article stated that hearing with these aids was significantly superior to perfectly normal hearing.
I am even more amazed, however, that while we can come up with life-changing technologies to improve the lives of some, we still cannot conquer more fundamentally basic issues like poverty. A study just released by Advocates for Children of New Jersey states that almost one-third of all New Jersey children— 646,000—are considered low-income. Though we advance at exponential rates in science, we seem to be only inching along when it comes to social welfare.
We’re currently reading from the book of Leviticus, and believe it or not, this book has more than recipes for sacrifice. A good amount of the book is devoted to what is called the Holiness Code: the section that teaches us how to be holy, and Godly.
What is it to be holy? What is so revolutionary that the Torah needed chapters and chapters to present to us a vivid picture? Hillel taught that the whole Torah could be summed up in the verse, “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18). The rest, he says, is commentary. Indeed, what distinguishes “holy” from “decent” is going beyond simply “living and let live,” and instead intervening whenever we see others in need. Being decent is being polite, staying out of another person’s way lending a hand when asked. Being holy is to help before being asked, to anticipate problems before they become too big to handle.
To be holy, according to our tradition, is to make the community’s needs as important as one’s own. To be holy, we are taught, is to help pay off the debt of a person in deep financial trouble. To be holy is to provide a homeless person with a roof and work. To be holy is to extend oneself beyond one’s zone of comfort to seriously help those around us.
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We are in the period of the counting of the Omer— the 49 days between Pesaḥ and Shavuot, between receiving the gift of freedom from Egyptian servitude and the revelation of learning what to do with our freedom at Sinai through the receiving of Torah. Often, these 49 days are devoted to spiritual introspection.
I challenge us, instead, to use these days for looking outward. Every day, as we prepare for Shavuot, with your family and friends, see if you can come up with a different project that (a) is reasonable for a single person or family to do, and (b) can make a difference in the communities in which we live. And, if you’re up for sharing, please share your daily idea on our Emanu-El facebook page, or on twitter with the hashtag #OmerJustice.
May this time of preparation for receiving Torah once again be a time for bringing more holiness into our lives through our bringing more comfort to others.
Published in Temple Emanu-El’s Kolaynu. May 2014.
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