| Dear Yeshiva Family:
This week's parshah begins with the laws of the treatment of one's slaves. Though to our sensitive American ears, the concept of slavery is fundamentally unjust, the Torah does allow for such an institution. Unlike our modern understanding of slavery, the Torah's laws governing slavery require care and compassion (see Rambam Avadim 9:8). In fact, one of the purposes of slavery, where the slave is Jewish, is rehabilitating the slave to become a better person, something only possible in an environment of mutual respect and compassion, where the master is a paradigm of a good human being.
In ancient times, one situation where someone might acquire a Jewish slave was if a person stole and was unable to pay back the theft. Instead of sending the thief to languish in a debtor's prison, which does not accomplish much, the law is that this offender is to be sold into servitude to work off his debt. The maximum sale time for such an offense is six years. During those six years, the slave would be housed, fed, and clothed by his new master. He would also potentially be provided with a wife from one of the maidservants belonging to this master. If, after the allotted time has passed, the slave decides that he would like to stay in his current situation where all his needs are met and perhaps the workload is not so hard, then he must have an unusual procedure performed upon him. He must stand next to a doorpost and have his ear pierced into the doorpost with a drill. The Meforshim explain "What is the reason that the ear had to be pierced rather than any other limb of the servant's body? Rabban Yochanan ben Zackai said: That ear which heard on Har Sinai "Do not steal" and yet its owner went and stole and was therefore sold as a slave should be pierced!" (Rashi 21:6).
Since the drilling is coming in response to his act of stealing, why should we wait for the extension of his term as a slave and not immediately pierce his ear when he was initially sold? This would seem to be a more appropriate time to send this message; when he was being sold for the crime and beginning to pay off the debt created by his sins, rather than when he extended his sentence.
Rabbi Leib Bakst, zt"l (a son-in-law of Rabbi Mordechai Rogow zt"l, one of the former Roshei Yeshiva of our Yeshiva) explains that for the initial act of stealing the Torah would not mandate getting branded. This is because everyone can have ups and downs in their lives, for that is part of the human experience. We are here in this world to grow, and growth naturally is achieved through dips and lessons learned "the hard way." It is understood that some people will occasionally fail, even to the point that they steal and have to be sold as slaves to pay back their mistakes. "To err is human," and does not automatically require so drastic a measure as to imprint a physical sign on the person. The purpose of selling him is mainly to have him earn sufficient funds to repay the people he now owes and to be part of a family that has good ideals and morals so he can learn from example of what it means to be an upstanding citizen and not have to resort to thievery. Therefore, at the initial selling we do not mark him as having an ear that does not listen, but rather, it's possible that he does listen, and simply failed, as humans do.
However, while we understand and even forgive failure, we do not accept it if a person remains in the place of failure. If you fall, you must get up. Get up, brush yourself off, and continue the fight for success. It is the complacency of wanting to stay in his new station as a slave, and the lack of will to grow, to rejoin society as a "regular" person and to learn from his mistakes that shows us this fellow requires a special branding. By choosing to remain a slave he demonstrates that the thievery he practiced six years earlier was not a one-time mistake, but rather shows that he stooped to a low level and remained there despite being around a family modeling proper behavior, ethics, and etiquette. Someone who did not change his status for six years, shows us that he is not growth-oriented, and he is a person who requires that special, timely branding.
In truth, this man has more of an opportunity to grow. Someone sold as a slave has to look at himself and see where his poor choices landed him. He has to recognize where he is holding and ask himself how he ended up there, and that itself should spur future growth. Someone in the upper crust of society may have an excuse for not being growth-bound, for he found himself a comfortable niche in society. However, this slave is now in a situation that screams that there is a need for growth, for it reminds him daily that he was a thief; yet he did not internalize the message, and therefore requires this unusual sign specifically at the end of his term.
The Torah teaches us the important concept of self-correction. Even as we grow older, we still need to self-teach. A person always has to be growing, never just resting in the grooves he has created for himself, but always looking internally to see what screws need tightening and what can be improved upon. A person should continually be asking himself, now that I am 30, 40, 50, 60 years old, am I doing everything I can to improve myself and be a better person and a better servant of Hashem?? Do I practice a growth mentality? Perhaps there is another step I could be taking. We must always be correcting ourselves as we continue to grow towards Hashem.
May Hashem grant us the wisdom to know how to do self-check-ins, to want to strive to be better, and to be part of the growth that authentic Judaism demands of us all at all times!
Rabbi Moshe Revah Rosh HaYeshiva, HTC - Beis HaMidrash LaTorah moshe.revah@htc.edu | 
No comments:
Post a Comment