Rabbi's Message

What does God want from me?  This is a question that I often find myself asking when confronted with difficult situations.  When there is no clear "right" answer, how do we still act like a mensch?  In our Torah reading this week, Ekev asks the same question:  "And now, O Israel, what does the Lord your God ask of you?"  Thankfully, it also gives us an answer:  "Only this:  revere the Lord your God, to walk only in His paths, to love Him, and to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and soul, keeping the Lord's mitzvot and laws...for your good."  One striking piece about this passage is that it commands emotions - reverence and love.  Emotions cannot be produced on demand.  The Talmud recognizes this when it teaches, "Everything is in the hands of Heaven except for reverence of God."  Rabbi Harold Kushner, in his commentary in our Etz Hayyim Humash, explains:  "Reverence and obedience are perhaps the only virtues we cannot learn by imitating God, because God has no one to revere or obey.  One of the fundamental teachings of Judaism is that people are free to choose between good and evil, between following God's ways and rejecting them.  We cannot be compelled to be good.  The decision whether to love God and to follow the Torah's teachings is totally under our control." 

The Torah provides us with a road map to goodness and fulfillment.  It helps us make decisions by imploring us to take the moral and ethical path.  The decision of how we make Torah a part of our lives, however, is up to us.  Torah can point us in the right direction, but we choose to take the first step.  But we don't take this step alone.  It is a well-worn path.  When we choose to walk this path, we connect ourselves to our ancestors, our family and community, and future generations.  Let's take that step together.        

Shabbat Shalom