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Thoughts on the Parsha ~
Parshas
Kedoshim
Approaching Understanding
By:
Daniel Listhaus
לֹא תִקֹּם וְלֹא תִטֹּר אֶת בְּנֵי עַמֶּךָ וְאָהַבְתָּ
לְרֵעֲךָ כָּמוֹךָ אֲנִי ה'
“You
shall not take revenge and you shall not bear a grudge against the members of
your people; you shall love your fellow as yourself – I am Hashem.”
-Kedoshim 19:18
The
concept of v’ahavta l’ray’acha ka’mocha is one that is taught to
children already at a young age and is one which is universally accepted as
fundamental to Torah life, in fact, Rabbi Akiva famously taught, “v’ahavta
l’rayacha ka’mocha zeh k’lal gadol ba’torah”.[1]
As
important and fundamental, and arguably conceptually obvious as this mitzvah
is, there are two big issues with such a commandment which the Ramban points
out. First, the Ramban[2] writes,
how could the Torah command a person to love others as much as one loves
himself? It is impossible! A person’s heart could love someone a lot, but not
as much as oneself. If so how could the Torah command of us something which is
impossible?
Second,
the Gemara[3]
discusses a case where two people are traveling and are both dying of dehydration
and there is only one bottle of water between them. The Gemara brings
from no other than Rabbi Akiva himself that “chayecha kodmin l’chayei
chaveirecha” – that your life must take priority over your friend’s;
thereby ruling that you should drink the water yourself and save your own life
as your friend dies. We see from this Gemara, that it is actually
forbidden to “love a friend as much as yourself” and you would have to drink
the water yourself and watch your friend dehydrate. If so, the Ramban asks,
how can we reconcile this with the commandment the Torah states clearly that we
are commanded to love a friend like ourselves?
The Ramban
answers that if one reads the Torah carefully one will realize that the
Torah does not say to love one’s friend as oneself; that is a misconception. The
Torah does not say “v’ahavta es ray’acha ka’mocha”
which would indeed mean to love one’s friend like oneself, but rather the Torah
says “v’ahavta l’ray’acha ka’mocha” which actually means to love
for a friend as one would for oneself. The Torah commands that we be pleasant
to others and wish upon them everything we would wish for ourselves without a
feeling of jealousness that they would have something we do not. However, the
Torah certainly is not commanding one to actually love another human as much as
oneself because that is impossible, and certainly not to give up one’s life to
save another’s which would be improper.
This Ramban
is a clear example of how important it is to pay attention to the details. The
wording of “l’rayacha” instead of “es rayacha” makes such a difference
in terms of what the Torah expects of us.
However,
along the lines of “paying attention to the details”, let us revisit the Ramban’s
premise and his questions. The Ramban bases his first question on
the fact that the Torah could not be commanding us to love a friend as much as
ourselves because it is not possible. Now, it is true that the maskana (conclusion)
of the Ramban is that indeed the words do not even mean that, so the
Torah is definitely not demanding that of us. However, is the premise true? Is
it really impossible to love someone as much as oneself? How would the Ramban
explain people who go out of their way to do things for others? If a person
could spend money or time on oneself but instead chooses to spend that same
amount on someone else, does he not love that person as much as himself? Where
would the Ramban draw the line between random acts of selflessness and ahava?
If you do not like someone you probably are not going to do nice things for
them voluntarily, so if you are doing something nice it is probably a good
indicator that you like them enough to be spending your energy on them instead
of relaxing for yourself. Certainly in this sense people could love others as
much as themselves, we experience it quite often. So, what does the Ramban mean
that it isn’t possible for a person to love another as much as himself? What type
of ahava is he referring to that he is so sure is impossible to feel
equally for another? It cannot mean giving oneself over in physical exertion,
wisdom, or money because those areas of chesed are widespread.
Furthermore,
even if one would argue that the ahava that the Ramban refers to
is specifically ultimate ahava when a person would actually be willing
to die for another; that cannot be true either as can be proved, ironically,
from the Ramban’s second question. The Ramban asked that it
cannot be that the Torah demands one to love a friend like himself because the Gemara
tells us that one must prioritize one’s own life before his friend’s. It is
true that the Gemara says this, but let us think for a moment why the
Gemara was compelled to point it out. According to the Ramban’s
premise of his first question it is unequivocally impossible for one to love
someone else as much as himself. If that is true, why would the Gemara
have to rule “prioritize your life before your friend’s”? Well, actually, the
reason is that that was needed to refute the Gemara’s hava amina.
The Gemara brings the case of two people travelling along the way and
one of them has in his possession a flask of water. If both drink from it then
they will both die because there is not enough water to sustain both of them
until they could reach more water. However,
if only one drinks it then he will be able to survive. In this case Ben
Petura said that better both should drink and die than for one to drink and
watch the death of his friend. Clearly the idea of an “ahava ka’mocha”
exists. People are willing to do things for others – even willing to die for
others. How could the Ramban say with such surety that it is impossible
for one to love someone else as much as oneself? Which area could he possibly
be thinking of which makes that statement so true that it is not only the Ramban’s
premise, but remains true in his answer as well?
There is
no doubt that as multifaceted as emotions and middos are, ahava is
one of the most complex. Even if one were to categorize the areas where ahava
applies, there are so many categories each of which has subcategories and
interrelate with the others. The Orchos Tzadikkim[4] splits
basic ahava into six areas. Love of parents to children, money, opposite
gender, relatives (parents, siblings, extended family and friends), long life,
and honor. Of course the feeling that one gets when a child accomplishes
something is a different feeling than one gets when spending a nice day out
with one’s spouse; and the calming feeling of being healthy and living a long
life is different than the feeling of being recognized or earning a lot of
money. The same word of ahava or love could be used in all these
circumstances to describe a positive connection to very different facets of
life. Of course ahava could be misused – both underappreciated and
overused – which is why it is a middah and requires introspection and
analysis like every other middah. However, perhaps more of an underlying
root of ahava which must be identified is the concept of understanding.
Understanding is key to loving things because without understanding the ahava
will not be used properly. The Orchos Tzadikkim goes through
each of the categories explaining that if one just uses the emotion of ahava
without stopping to understand how it should be applied, it could result in consequences
not good for the receiver of the ahava.
Everyday
in Shema we say “Shema Yisroel Hashem Elokeinu Hashem echad” and
follow that by reciting “v’ahavta eis Hashem Elokecha…”
it is the willingness to stop, listen and understand our place in the world and
our relationship with Hashem (Shema) which allows us to love Him (V’ahavta).
Ahava comes from understanding. When one understands and accepts
oneself, one can begin to love oneself; and when one understands and accepts
other, one can begin to love them. The heart can act through its own emotions,
but a meaningful expression of feeling only occurs when the heart’s brain is
being used along with it. In fact it is this very aspect that we thank Hashem
for every morning in the leading b’racha of “asher nasan l’sechvi
vinah” – “the One Who gave the sechvi understanding. Sechvi
literally means rooster, referring to the fact that rooster knows when to crow.
However, as the Mishna Berurah[5]
points out, sechvi also means a heart. We praise and thank Hashem
for giving our hearts the ability to understand and differentiate between
things as obvious as night and day, for without the ability for the brain to work
together with the heart day could easily become confused with night.
Perhaps it
is this deep, but basic, underlying factor of ahava which the Ramban
is referring to. It is true that in order to have proper ahava it is
vital to approach understanding of the person or thing that the ahava is
being felt for. However, it is impossible to know another person one hundred
percent. One could approach understanding and work on it but it is just as
important to admit to oneself that it is impossible to fully comprehend another
person. This is known as the illusion of asymmetric insight – a cognitive bias
which refers to people’s perception of thinking that their knowledge of others
surpasses others knowledge of themselves. However the truth is that just as you
know that others will never fully understand you, so too it is impossible for
you to fully understand someone else. You might get to know them extremely
well. You may be able to synchronize your thoughts and come to the same exact
conclusions most of the time, but you could never understand completely. The
reason is simple. We were all created with unique mixtures of middos,
tendencies, and situations which all affect us and help shape who we are. In
order to have ahava for oneself one has to understand oneself. The more
one accepts and understands about oneself the more ahava he could have;
and the same is true with one’s relationship with others. However, it is not
possible for one to know someone else like himself.
Perhaps
this is what was bothering the Ramban. The Torah commands “v’ahavta
l’ray’acha ka’mocha”. Of course it is possible for a person to love another
even beyond the point of selflessness where one would be willing to spend loads
of time and money and even willing to give up one’s life for another to the
point that that was the ruling in the Gemara until Rabbi Akiva himself,
the advocate of v’ahavta l’ray’acha ka’mocha, came and ruled “chayecha
kodmin…” However if the Torah would in fact command that we love a
friend as much as ourselves, that would be impossible because in order to love
one needs to understand and one cannot understand another human as well as
oneself. Therefore, as the Ramban explains, the passuk is not
commanding such an impossible task, but rather just expecting that we wish upon
our peers the same good things that we would for ourselves.
Although
it is true that the Torah does not expect us to love others at the same level
that we love ourselves because that would not be possible, the Torah does expect
that we try our hardest to understand others in order that we could maximize
the genuine ahava that we can express.
May Hashem
help us during the time of sefiras ha’omeir, a time specifically meant
to be utilized working on our interpersonal relationships, to better understand
ourselves so we could love ourselves, as well as approach understanding others
so that our ahavas yisroel toward them could be as genuine as
possible.
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