Torat HaTikvah

Gimel: The Menorah

Journey to the Orchard: The Third Way of Understanding Torah

In our first foray into the worlds of Torah, I introduced the concept of the Pardes (PaRDeS) - the orchard of meanings, the four levels of understanding of the Torah.  As I hope you recall, the Peh - the first letter of the word Pardes - stands for P’shat - the simple meaning. In our first shiur, we understood perhaps that the simple meaning is not simple at all…

In the second shiur - lesson - I described the second level of understanding: Remez.  This word means “hinted meaning.” It represents a deeper level of understanding of the Torah - where text speaks to text, each illuminating the other, each casting the other into relief, each calling forth meaning from the other.

Now it is time to go deeper yet, to the third level of Torah study.  In the world Pardes - Orchard, the third letter is Daled.  It stands for the word Drash - the delved-into meaning.  Unlike the simple and hinted meanings, we are called upon, when studying Drash, to insert our own lives, experiences and insights into our understanding of the text.

When studying the P’shat, the simple meaning, we are guided by a simple question:  What is the Torah saying?

When studying the Remez, the hinted meaning, we are guided by a deeper question: How does juxtaposing two Torah texts together help us understand them in a deeper way?   In simpler terms, what is the Torah saying in reference to itself?

But the Drash asks something more: What is the Torah saying to me, right now?

If the Torah is an eternal document, speaking to all of humanity all of the time, we need to be able to demand that it speaks to us - right here, right now where we are.

In order to hear this message, we need to use the tools of P’shat and Remez, but also not be afraid to react to the text from our hearts. The message of the Drash is a deeply personal one; for God is speaking to you right now.

The Menorah: The Simple Meaning

In this week’s Parsha (Torah portion), God is carefully instructing Moshe how to construct the Mishkan, the Tabernacle, the traveling wilderness sanctuary.   The Mishkan is a cultic structure that focuses God’s presence in the heart of the community: it makes the revelation on Sinai a permanent part of Jewish life, for it is in the Ohel Moed, the Tent of Meeting, where God is revealed and teaches Israel during their forty year sojourn to the Promised Land what it is to be a Goy Kadosh, a nation set apart, a holy people.

Physically, the Mishkan consists of a linen tent - the Tent of Meeting- containing two chambers: an outer and an inner.  In the inner tent is the Aron HaEdut- the Ark of the Covenant, a box of acacia wood covered in gold containing the Tablets of the Covenant. The outer tent contains several other furnishings. Most prominent of these is the Menorah - made of solid gold.

Our Parsha begins with God telling Moshe to bring pure hand beaten olive oil to light the Ner Tamid - the Eternal Light - and to keep it burning MiErev ad Boker - from evening to morning.

This is the Menorah of the Chanukah miracle. According to the Torah, the flame of the Menorah was kindled by God’s presence.

When Beit HaMikdash, the Temple in Jerusalem, was destroyed by the Roman Empire in 70 CE, the Menorah was carried off by the conquerors.  A frieze of this catastrophe stands to this day in Rome.   The Talmud says that when  a Jew sees this reminder of perhaps the greatest tragedy of our history - the destruction of our national home and the beginning of our 2,000 year old exile - he should spit before it!

The Drash

Our Rabbis’ Understanding of the Oil of the Menorah:

From the crucible of Jewish history, witnessing the destruction of the Temple and the exile of Israel, the early Rabbis (1st and 2nd centuries CE) had no problem understanding the meaning of the Menorah and its oil to their generation. Hear their words now:

Why was Moshe commanded to fill the Menorah with only pure, beaten Shemen Zayit - olive oil?

Just as an olives must be bound with ropes, boiled, beaten and left exposed before they yield a drop of oil and provide illumination, so must Israel be bound and oppressed before they yield a drop of Teshuvah - repentance - and Merit redemption. (Shmot Rabbah 36).

This is how the Rabbis of the Midrash understood the Torah’s message in their time.  The sight of the Menorah, symbol of peace, hope and God’s presence, being carried off  by the brutal Romans as a spoil of war must have been one of profound agony.

Rather than give in to despair, they delved into the text and arrived at an understanding that even this catastrophe concealed an opportunity for elevation, for adding to the Light and not extinguishing it.

It is not being a Pollyanna - distorting reality to find a supposed blessing in everything that life throws at us.  Rather it is the mark of integrity, of faith and of commitment to seek to wrest meaning from life, from all of life.

In his seminal work, Night, Eli Wiesel, seeing his fellow prisoners praying on Rosh Hashanah in Auschwitz, said to himself, “See how much greater man is than God? Even now they pray to You!”

Lighting the Flame

To the Midrash, a ladder to heaven can be built even out of life’s shards - but it requires an act of will to accomplish.  It begins when we make the time in our lives to reflect, to engage with ourselves deeply and profoundly.

We begin to ascend when we simply open ourselves to experience miracles.  The words of the Shema, lighting Shabbat candles, giving Tzedaka, studying Torah, engaging in acts of love and compassion- they all have the power to bring God’s presence into our lives when we intend for them to do so.

There is a very strange story in the Talmud (Ta’anit 25a) about an impoverished sage, Rabbi Haninah ben Dosa, so poor that he cannot afford oil for the Shabbat lights. He instructs his daughter, Beruriah, to fill the lamp with vinegar instead.  She is confused until he tells her, “Cannot the One who commanded the oil to burn command the vinegar to burn?” The lamp remained burning throughout Shabbat until they used it to light the Havdalah candle.

To Rabbi Haninah, flame coming forth from oil is a miracle.  In fact, the entire world, existence, consciousness, being- is an act of love, an outpouring of energy from a source that is beyond imagining.

In the Tanach, the Bible, in the book of Mishlei, Proverbs (20:21) it is written:

Nephesh Adam Ner HaElohim - The soul of man is God’s candle. We are the Shemen Zayit, the pure, beaten olive oil, from which God’s illumination can come forth.

The Menorah’s likeness exists only on the accursed Arch of Titus, a testament to unspeakable oppression and cruelty. But we can create a Menorah in our heart, a Menorah that cannot be destroyed, or exiled, or lost.  On Shabbat, meditate on the candles flames, look at them for a few moments, then close your eyes and see them within you. Let them form shapes, letters, forms. Let their gentle hissing become sounds and voices.

The lesson of Drash, the third level of Torah, is that the there is a Voice that is speaking, still speaking, only to you, to you alone. May you merit to hear it in your life and in your love - Shema Yisrael.

May our exploration of Drash lead you to places of power and joy in your own heart…

And Yeshar Ko’ach - may you grow from strength to strength.

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