All The King’ Soldiers. Parsha essay for Torah Reading: Ki Tisa (Exodus 30:11 – 34:35)

Our Parshah recounts the famous story of the Golden Calf. One of the highpoints (or low points) of that account is the fact that the Tablets containing the Ten Commandments, which Moses had received directly from G-d, had a very short life. Immediately upon returning from Sinai, Moses saw the Jewish people worshipping the Golden Calf and he shattered the Tablets.

We know that G-d had subsequently given Moses a second set of the tablets, but what ever happened to the broken Tablets?

The Talmud discusses their whereabouts and states that they are kept together with the second set of whole Tablets in the Ark. (And according to Maimonides, the Ark is still around today hidden in a subterranean chamber beneath the Temple mount.)

Of what import is the knowledge that the shattered Tablets are housed together with the whole Tablets?

The Talmud addresses this matter by stating, “Be careful to honor a scholar who forgot his learning because of infirmity, because the whole Tablets and the shattered Tablets are both in the Ark.” In other words, since we honor the broken Tablets by putting them in the Ark, though they apparently have no use now since they can’t be read, so too must we respect a scholar who might not have his knowledge with him now in his old age, since he used to have his learning.

This statement appears in the Talmud together with two other teachings of apparently totally unrelated themes that the Sage Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi imparted to his sons:

“Complete the parsha together with the congregation reading the Hebrew text twice and the Targum (Aramaic translation) once.

“And be careful with the veridim (jugular vein or carotid arteries). [Make sure to sever them while slaughtering a chicken so the blood will drain.]”

“And be careful to honor a scholar who forgot his learning because of infirmity, because the whole Tablets and the shattered Tablets are both in the Ark.”

These three teachings appear to be totally disjointed.

Let us try to understand the significance of these teachings and their connection to one another.

We read the weekly Torah portion (known as the parsha or sidra) with its translation on a weekly basis because, as Jews, we must “live with the times.” This means we must allow the timely teachings of the Torah to inform our lives on a weekly basis. Although all of the Torah is relevant to us every day of our lives, there is a need to focus on the weekly parsha for its guidance during the specific week the congregation reads it.

But, it is not enough to read the parsha once. One must read it twice. One way of explaining this is based on the fact that we tend to read things through the prism of our own minds and hearts. We sometimes color what we read by the preconceived notions we have and thereby distort the true import of the Torah. By doing so, we deny ourselves the benefit of reading the Torah portion for direction in our lives. Instead of hearing what G-d’s message to us is, we may hear how the Torah confirms what we think the message ought to be. The Sages therefore admonished us to read it again to instructed us that although the first time we read it the way it appears to us, the second time we must read it from the perspective of the Author of the Torah.

After reading it twice to ensure that we do not distort or color the message, we must then read the translation. This requirement addresses the opposite concern that necessitated reading the Torah portion twice. Whereas reading it twice was intended to preserve the integrity of the message, reading the translation is intended to make the teachings of the Torah resonate with each and every one of us in our state of mind and being.

Now that we see the words of Torah in its pure and unadulterated Divine form we might discover that the Torah teachings are too lofty and distant from the realities of our lives. We cannot glean any practical and relevant insights that can impact our lives because we are inhabitants of a universe that is “light years” away from the Torah’s source. Particularly in the times of exile, we will feel the existence of a serious dichotomy between our world and the world of Torah.

It is therefore crucial that we have a mechanism to take the pure teachings of the Torah and translate them into the realities of our physical existence. This is what the Aramaic translation (known as Targum Onkelus) as well as Rashi and other classical Jewish commentaries provide for. While they remain faithful to the original, they have the capacity to bring the message into our universe and consciousness.

Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi was instructing his children to maintain this delicate balance; to maintain the integrity of Torah even as it could be made relevant to those who are “in the real world.”

This teaching is followed by a second one that admonishes the shochet to make sure that the veins or arteries that contain large volumes of forbidden blood be drained after the bird is slaughtered.

To understand this process on a spiritual level, we must preface how the entire process of shechitah (ritual slaughter of animals and birds) is more than just killing these creatures for their consumption. It is about elevating the world in which we reside.

While Torah—especially through its official translation, Onkelus —is G-d given energy that flows downward to us and enters into our consciousness to make us more spiritual and Divine, the human being has to then take the world around him or her and elevate it. If Torah is bringing G-dly knowledge down into our experiences, the Mitzvot we do involve taking the physical world and our experiences and bringing them to closer to G-d. This we do, among others Mitzvot, by the process of shechitah. The word shechitah—while referring technically to the act of kosher slaughter—actually derives from a root that means to pull or draw, as in moving something to a higher place.

So Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi tells his sons that in the process of elevating the physical world and making it more spiritual one must drain the blood from it. Figuratively speaking, this means we should divest ourselves of the life and passion we invest into our physical and material pursuits. We cannot rise upward if we are tied down.

And at this point, Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi imparts the third and final message to his sons:

Even if you live your life in accordance with these principles—of effectively translating the untainted and lofty teachings of Torah into our daily lives, and successfully elevating our physical existence by divesting ourselves of passion in the pursuit of materialism—we may nevertheless experience periods in which our Tablets become shattered.

Frequently, we can reach a high and then fall down thinking that we are no longer in the game. And even if we don’t degenerate into shameful behavior akin to worshipping the golden calf, we nevertheless feel that much of our energy has been spent; we become a shadow of who we were, and now we feel we are left with nothing or very little.

This leads to the depressing thought: What good is it that we’ve achieved such progress when it all reverts to nothing? And while it is undeniably true that a person can always turn a new leaf; it is precisely the thought of having to start anew that is so daunting and demoralizing. If only we could recapture our original youthful achievements; if only we can put the shattered Tablets back together and make them whole again.

The answer to this unsettling thought is that even if our Tablets our broken, they do not lose any of their holiness.

Similarly, when we lose some of our spiritual attainments and the energy that we invested in our early achievements in life, they did not go to waste. This is so because the Divine writ has been etched into our souls by G-d Himself. Nothing can destroy that which is an integral part of us just as no one or nothing—even the shattering of the Tablets—could diminish their holiness.

As we stand on the threshold of the Era of Redemption we discover that these three challenges assume even greater significance:

Challenge number one is to balance the reading of the Torah with its translation. Since we are still in exile—and before the dawn of Redemption we are told the darkness can be greater- we must double our efforts at seeing the Torah from G-d’s perspective. And indeed, because we are on the cusp of the Messianic Age we are provided with even greater potential to see the Torah from G-d’s perspective. Simultaneously, we have the challenge of having to translate the Torah and apply it to the dark exile conditions that exist in these times.

Challenge number two is to drain the passion from the “other side.” Because we are so close to the age concerning which it is written there will be no more impurity and evil, the forces of evil can be far greater and more potent than ever before. It behooves us now to learn how to drain the “blood” (read: passion) for all that is incompatible with Torah.

Challenge number three is to realize that as broken as we may think we are because of the painful protracted exile we have endured, we have never lost our inherent holiness. On the contrary, every Mitzvah we have done, notwithstanding the pressures of society, have etched into our souls and bodies G-dly energy and light that can never be erased.

In the Messianic Age, all of us—those of us whose Tablets were never shattered because they lived in the days of old when the Holy Temple stood and spirituality was rampant, as well as the righteous people of all times, together with the majority of us who have had set backs and whose Tablets have been shattered to one extent or another, will be united together with our righteous Moshiach.