Extracting Sparks from Stones

Elul, Nitzavim »

Is Your Love for G-d Actionable?

Minutes of formal meetings always end with a list of actionable items. Committees love to talk and to hear themselves talk, but if the discussions don’t produce actionable items, they are not useful.

The same is true about love. Loving someone in theory or loving the idea of someone is not the same as loving in real life. If our love is romantic, we love being in love. If our love is actionable, we love a real person and our love is real. If our love doesn’t find expression in actions we take for our beloved, our love is abstract. It not concrete. It is not real.

In this week’s Torah reading, G-d declares that it is very easy for us to love G-d. “For this is very close to you, in your mouth, and in your heart, to do it” (Deuteronomy 30:14). It is not distant or difficult to speak of loving G-d. It is not even distant or difficult to love G-d in our hearts. And it is certainly not difficult to love G-d in an actionable way. To do loving things for the G-d we love.

Rabbi Manis Friedman told a story about a girl who wrote to the Lubavitcher Rebbe that she was inclined to being mean for no reason at all. She had been to many therapists, and no one had been able to help her. The Rebbe offered simple (but not simplistic) advice: When someone asks for salt, pass the salt.

The therapists came at the problem from the inside out. First figure out why you are inclined to being mean, then inspire kindness, then act on it. The Rebbe suggested the opposite approach. Practice kindness until it takes root in your habit and then your heart. Begin with the action. It is easier and faster.

If we wait until we are aflame with romantic love for G-d, it might take forever to reach actionable love. But if we begin with actionable love—doing things that we might not want for ourselves, but doing them because the one we love wants them—we will eventually be aflame with love for G-d. It requires diligence and persistence, but it begins easily enough.

How Much Is my Soul Worth?
A poor man once came to Rabbi Avraham Yehoshua Heschel of Apt and complained that he was short a thousand rubels to marry off his daughter. The Rebbe told him to return home and accept the first business offer that came his way. On his way, he stopped at an inn where several diamond merchants were comparing their merchandise over dinner.

He approached in case there was some business to be done, and the merchants asked him if he was interested in a diamond. He applied in the affirmative, and they asked how much he was looking to spend. He pulled the lone rubel from his pocket and announced it was all he had. They all broke into laughter. Then one merchant decided to have some fun and said, he had something worth a rubel he was willing to sell: His share in the world to come. The poor man agreed, and they wrote up a contract.

The merchants continued to laugh about it until the merchant’s wife arrived and heard what her husband had sold. She declared that she did not want to be married to a man with no share in the world to come. As it turned out, the husband was a pauper. The money came from his wife’s family. This was a problem, and he tried to console her that it was just a joke. She told him if it was just a joke, he should buy it back.

However, the poor fellow refused to sell it back for a rubel or even twenty or two hundred. He insisted on a thousand rubels. The wife forced her husband to pay the full price and repurchase his share in the world to come. When he did, the poor man told him the backstory. When she heard about the Rebbe of Apt, she asked the poor fellow to bring her to him. He complied and arranged an audience for her with the Rebbe.

She told the Rebbe that she had no regrets. The money was well earned and would go to a good cause. She had only one question: was her husband’s soul worth a thousand rubels or had she overpaid? The Rebbe replied, “When he sold it, it wasn’t even worth a rubel. When he repurchased it, it was worth more than a thousand rubels.

From The Outside In
If you think about it, this man had no interest in his share in the world to come. He sold it, never thought to buy it back, and did it only under duress. Moreover, even then he balked at the price and paid it only because his wife left him little choice. How and why was his soul worth so much just for buying it back?

The answer is that he might have been lacking in intent, but there was nothing lacking about his actions. He paid the full thousand rubels even if his heart wasn’t in it. What is the value of action without intent and heart? Our sages taught that we must never undervalue action without intent because we have to start somewhere. If we wait around until intent and passion are ignited, we might wait forever. But if we begin with acts of love, we will eventually kindle the love. (Talmud, Nazir 23b.)

We can do the same. With Rosh Hashanah shortly upon us, we can each resolve to increase our Jewish practice. Resolve to give a nickel to tzedakah every morning, resolve to put on tefillin every day, resolve to light candles before every Shabbat. Even if your heart isn’t in it, it is a good beginning.

Stop and think about it, the path from doing to loving is long, but has no barriers. The path from loving to doing is not as long, but there are big barriers to overcome: laziness and selfishness. Resolving to do can lead to love, resolving to love, may never lead to doing. Plus, love isn’t built in a day. Actions are.

A Million Dollars
This reminds me of another story. A donor offered a venerable rabbi in Israel a half million dollars for his rabbinical academy if he could be assured a place beside the rabbi in the world to come. The rabbi replied that the price for a place near him in the world to come is a million dollars. The man said that was too much and left without giving anything.

One of the students asked the rabbi why he didn’t accept the half million. It was a lot of money. The rabbi replied that to earn a share in the world to come, one must go out of one’s comfort zone. This man was prepared to give a half million that means it was in his comfort zone. He needed to give more if he wanted a share in the world to come.

The student asked what the rabbi would do if the man had agreed to give a million? The rabbi replied, “In that case, I would ask him to arrange a place for me next to him in the world to come.”

We just learned an important lesson. No matter how much you practice now, it is not enough for the coming year because if you are doing it now, it is in your comfort zone. Take on a new resolution. How large? How often? I can’t answer that. Only you can. If it still feels comfortable, it is not large enough. The moment your resolution makes you uncomfortable, you are right where you need to be.