Mevarchim Hachodesh - Blessing the New Month (Part 3)
“The greatest darkness comes just before dawn –
but most people give up one minute before the light.”
Ba’al Shem Tov
The opening Tefillah for Mevarchim HaChodesh continues: …A life of goodness, a life of blessing, a life of sustenance, a life of physical health, a life in which there is fear of Heaven and fear of sin, a life in which there is no shame or humiliation, a life of wealth and honor, a life in which we will have love of Torah and fear of Heaven…
Strangely, in our beautiful Tefillah, the request for Yirat Shamayim – fear of Heaven – is repeated. True, the Siddur Otzar HaTefillot – one of the definitive sources for the accuracy of variant texts within Tefillah – cites an opinion that earlier versions did not include the first request for Yirat Shamayim; the accepted text, however, reads “…A life in which there is fear of Heaven and fear of sin, a life in which there is no shame or humiliation, a life of wealth and honor, a life in which we will have love of Torah and fear of Heaven…”
Many commentaries point out that after asking for Yirat Shamayim, we then ask for “a life of wealth and honor.” They explain that very often, wealth and honor blind people to the true source of their blessings; that the more successful they become, the more they believe in their own business acumen. And sadly, even though one would expect the opposite, they lose sight of the “Senior Partner” in all of their business ventures. Too often, paradoxically, the more successful a person gets the less they think they need Hashem. They sometimes stop thinking about Hashem altogether.
And that, say the commentaries, is why we ask Hashem a second time - after asking for wealth and honor - for an additional portion of Yirat Shamayim to help us counterbalance our wealth and success; to remind us that without Hashem there is no possible way that we can succeed at anything.
Rabbi Elchonan Wasserman (1874-1941), one of the closest disciples of the saintly Chofetz Chaim, was one of the most prominent leaders of the Ashkenazic Torah world before and during the Holocaust. A childhood friend once came to visit him. Over the years, this friend had become a very successful lawyer and a very wealthy man. When he saw the poverty that Rabbi Wasserman lived in, he was appalled.
“Elchonon!” he said. “You are far brighter than I am. If you would have gone into law like me, you would have been tremendously wealthy today!”
Rabbi Wasserman didn’t respond and they spent a pleasant few hours together. When it was time to leave, Rabbi Wasserman escorted his guest to the railway station. When they arrived, there were two trains waiting to leave, one in one direction and the other in the other direction. One of them was a sleek modern locomotive with luxurious first-class carriages and the other was old and dilapidated. The guest made his way to the platform where the shabby, rundown train was standing.
Rabbi Wasserman told his guest that he was a little surprised. “After all,” he said, “Someone as successful as you should really be travelling in the lap of luxury. Shouldn’t you get on the other train?”
His guest was taken aback. “Elchonon!” he exclaimed. “Of what possible use is a luxurious train if it is going in the wrong direction?!”
“Listen to yourself!” said Rabbi Wasserman with a smile. “You are quite right! When you need to arrive at a particular destination, it doesn’t make much difference how you get there; the important thing is that you arrived! Why didn’t I become a lawyer? Because it would have taken me, in the lap of luxury, in the totally wrong direction!”
Our Tefillah is teaching us one of the most basic tenets in Judaism. That, like with almost everything here in this physical world that we inhabit, the pursuit of material success is neither good nor bad. Material wealth is simply a vehicle that can be used for spiritual growth. There is nothing wrong whatsoever with material success so long as we never lose sight of Who gives it to us…and how we are supposed to use it.
Rabbi Avigdor Miller (1908-2001) was one of the most multifaceted American-born spiritual leaders in his generation. He was a prolific author, the communal Rabbi of Congregation Beis Yisrael of Rugby in Brooklyn, the Mashgiach of Yeshivas Chaim Berlin, and later served as the Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivas Beis Yisrael; his legendary speeches and classes until today are eagerly awaited by a loyal readership. According to the official website - TorasAvigdor.org - 80,000(!) booklets are printed each week with his lessons and thoughts on the Torah. When he was asked why the request for Yirat Shamayim is repeated, Rabbi Miller gave an answer that he heard from a very good friend of his, Aharon Birzem - later murdered by the Nazis - when they were students in the legendary “Knesset Yisrael” Yeshivah in Slabodka.
Aharon Birzem pointed out to Rabbi Miller that there is a slight difference in the phrasing used each time we ask for Yirat Shamayim: The first time, we ask for “A life in which there is
fear of Heaven…”. The second time we ask for “A life in which we will have… fear of Heaven.”
The difference is this: we first request a life where “there is” fear of Heaven, that we may live in an environment of Yirat Shamayim, where we can gain an awareness of Hashem and feel the Yirat Shamayim around us. In effect, we are asking Hashem: “Give us a religious environment.” The second time is a personal request for ourselves, that “we will have” fear of Heaven, that we should merit to absorb Yirat Shamayim so that it becomes a part of our very being.
Living in a community established on Yirat Shamayim, Rabbi Miller writes, is a tremendous thing; many of us are able to live fully committed religious lives because of our environment. Better still is when, in addition to our surroundings, we work to reach a level of inner Yirat Shamayim.
Thus we ask twice for Yirat Shamayim: First, that our month should be spent among Jews who live lives of Yirat Shamayim; second, that it be a month where we achieve Yirat Shamayim ourselves.
To be continued…
