Unauthorized Use Constitutes Theft
From Rabbi Avraham Twersky, sort of
A few weeks ago we prempted (as it were) this week’s Parshat [Nasso] (asn). This week we learn from Torah that: “And they shall confess their sins which they have perpetrated, and he shall make restitution for his sin”. Before we discuss this one little bit of learning, let’s go back to what we talked about before:
Theft, The Evil of
Last week we read in Parshat Kedoshim, “Do not steal…”
The Gemara says that, “One may not steal from another even if one only wants to annoy him (!), and really intends to return the stolen item”. If the victim has even one moment of aggravation it is not permitted. One who steals will ultimately lie, swear falsely and desecrate the Divine Name. It concludes with the comment that one chet (sin) leads to another.
And yet there is another sin which – if possible – is worse. That is: when you steal from yourself. Think of it in this manner; you are in business and there is a convention of your industry chiefs. It is a prime opportunity for you to “network” and to present a paper which will contribute to both the benefit of mankind and yourself. Instead, you sit at the bar for one last bit of “Dutch Courage” and miss several minutes of opportunity which will never again occur. You have stolen from yourself. And further- you arise early each morning, have your breakfast and take your coffee in the other room and turn on the TV instead of picking up your copy of the Chumash and learning this week’s Parshat. You have stolen from yourself again and this time you have stolen an opportunity to improve yourself (literally) ‘body-and-soul’!
Well, now I need to tell you about the amazing “pps” that I recently received entitled “Hubble”. This presented pictures from Deep Space taken by the remarkable bit of space-age hardware, the Hubble telescope. And as I sat in my garden this morning; temperature in the low 70’s, the sky a cerulean blue, the trees in bud, the birds singing… I thought back to those pictures that are from ‘places’ in space millions of light-years away… pictures of history, if you will and I thought: “HaShem, what wonders you have wrought, things beyond mankind’s wildest imagination.” And then I thought about our fleeting lifespan on this spacecraft ‘earth’. Why, do we steal from ourselves? Why don’t we learn when we study Torah? And R. Twersky relates what Chazal have told us: “A person does not ‘sin’ unless he is overtaken by a spirit of folly.” So: Are we just all a bunch of ‘nut cases’? And even if we are, we are accountable for our actions. We don’t have the liberty to live our lives hedonistically – according to the sundry whims that capture our mind. Our souls [and are we not a soul first and a person – a body – secondarily?] are on loan from HaShem and we have a (some) specific purpose and that is firstly to do His will and follow his commandments.
Take, for example, Kashrut. People have long tried to “justify” Kashrut as a set of laws given to us to protect us from ills (to protect our health), as the prohibition of eating pork. To avoid trichinosis, et. al. – and so, these people tell us that with modern health codes we don’t need to be concerned with following these ‘out-of-date’ rules or laws. This is an example of the “laws of ignorant opinions authoritatively stated,” [in politics and religion: the less a person know the more authoritatively s/he speaks…] but the truth is simply that these laws (kashrut) are filled with moral meanings; they are a code of ethics! We are told not to eat a limb torn from a living animal, not to drink the blood of the animal for the blood is “LIFE” itself, we are told that “I am Ad-nai, your G_d. Sanctify yourselves and be holy, for I am the L*rd that brought you out of Mitzraim to be your G_d.” So to follow kashrut is to follow the ethical teachings given us to know and understand that all of life is holy and when we sit down to a meal of meat or a meal of vegetables, we need to “discover” the hand of G_d, and learn anew the reverence of life. We have not stolen the life of the cow or chicken, we have (in at least one sense, given it gilgul – but we won’t go into that in this discussion) sacrificed it to expiate our sins and help us to grow. And perhaps to Sanctify yourselves and be holy.
As on Jew responded, when asked why he only ordered only salads when he ate “out” (in non-kosher) restaurants, “I’m Jewish, and each time that I eat a salad (and not something treif), I am reminded of who I am and what being Jewish means to me.”
Perhaps star-gazing too much has led me in a very round-about way of trying to say that we need to see HaShem everywhere and hear His voice in the bird song, and to try not to be a “nut case” for a few minutes; at least. Eh?
Shabbat Shalom
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