When I was growing up it was not uncommon to hear the expression, shver zol sein a Yid which, for the uninitiated, means it’s difficult to be a Jew, as if it were some kind of a burden. A few years ago I heard a much respected rabbi declaim against that proposition stating that it was a shtick apikorsis to even say such a thing.
Those who talk of burdens are am haratzim who haven’t the slightest concept of what it means to be a Jew. If we replace the word responsibility for burden then maybe there’s what to talk about.
In Parshas Bechukosai we’re given the Torah’s version of a heads up, otherwise known as the Tochacha. And for those of us who are a little dense or were perhaps talking during Krias HaTorah that week, Hashem tops the first heads up by standing our hair on end in a second Tochacha in Pashas Ki Savo.
One ignores these admonitions at our collective peril.
In the Tochacha of Bechukosai the Torah says: 2)You shall keep My Sabbaths and fear My Sanctuary. I am the Lord. 3) If you follow My statutes and observe My commandments and perform them…
Everything that follows is predicated on these two verses. If you keep the Torah Hashem will give you big time. If you don’t, you’ll get whacked…big time!
The Torah continues: 4) I will give your rains in their time, the Land will yield its produce, and the tree of the field will give forth its fruit. 5) Your threshing will last until the vintage, and the vintage will last until the sowing; you will eat your food to satiety,…
In current vernacular it means that if you keep the Torah there won’t be any economic problems. There won’t be any need for a VAT tax. There won’t be any water shortages. No one will even give a thought to how high the Kinneret is because the rain will simply fall from Shomayim as needed. Everyone will eat to satiety so there will be no need for a welfare budget.
Again the Torah continues: …and you will live in security in your land. 6) And I will grant peace in the Land, and you will lie down with no one to frighten [you]; I will remove wild beasts from the Land, and no army will pass through your land; 7) You will pursue your enemies, and they will fall by the sword before you; 8)Five of you will pursue a hundred, and a hundred of you will pursue ten thousand, and your enemies will fall by the sword before you.
With peace in the Land, Peace Now and the rest of the “peace loving” Leftists who incessantly babble about land for peace and the like will be out of work. And with no prospects of gainful employment in sight it’s doubtful that they will be in a position to share any of the national burdens.
Hezbollah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Iran
And to punctuate all of this good news the Torah goes on to tell us that: 12) I will walk among you and be your God, and you will be My people.
Now how’s that for a Divine bit of political incorrectness?
As we said above, this is all going to happen if You shall keep My Sabbaths and fear My Sanctuary…..and If you follow My statutes and observe My commandments and perform them…
But as we all know, the Torah ends off the Tochacha by relating to us the flip side of being good boys and girls with:
14)…if you do not listen to Me and do not perform all these commandments,
15) and if you despise My statutes and reject My ordinances, not performing any of My commandments, thereby breaking My covenant
16) then I too, will do the same to you; I will order upon you shock…
Anyone reading this knows how the Tochacha ends and it’s not good.
Hashem, in His Torah, has very clearly laid out what our responsibilities are. We are all individually and collectively responsible for doing His Will. Those that do so are sharing the collective (or national) responsibility.
But those that don’t share this responsibility or burden as they see it are, at the very best, shirkers while a less benign take on their status would view them as traitors, for by separating themselves from the public good they will, chas v’shalom, bring us all to disaster just as their ideological progenitors did some 2,000 years ago.
