On the other hand, one can no longer deny that he is getting older. Sadly, some who we celebrated with last year are no longer around to celebrate with us this year.<\/p>\n
Birthdays bring back memories of the past. The memories themselves are sometimes wonderful, but sometimes remind us of tragic experiences that we would rather forget.<\/p>\n
My own birthday is coming up soon, and one of the ways I know it is approaching is with the upcoming weekly Torah portion. You see, my Bar Mitzvah parsha<\/em> was Parshat<\/em> Ki Tisa<\/em> (Exodus<\/em> 30:11-34:35), which we read this coming Shabbat. Each year, this Torah portion is an occasion for reflection for me, and this year is no exception.<\/p>\nMy memories center about the people who were there. My parents, of course, are among them, and three of my grandparents, all long gone. A great-uncle, already old then, who went on to live until he was a hundred and ten years old, and who was one of the few people then who actually taught me something about my parsha<\/em>. My sisters were there, although one was barely a year old.<\/p>\nI also remember fondly, and with great respect, the man who taught me to read the Torah. His name was Mr. Sender Kolatch, and he was a world class baal<\/em> koreh<\/em>, or Torah reader, himself. I would walk to his home every Friday night for lessons, each of which was followed by tea and cookies. I still keep in touch with one of his children. He too is long gone.<\/p>\nBut what I reflect on most is the discrepancy between what I knew about my parsha<\/em> then, and what I have learned about it in the many decades since my bar mitzvah. I did learn to read it from the Torah scroll, and I\u2019m told I did it well, but I had only a very superficial knowledge about this profound parsha<\/em> and its very diverse contents.<\/p>\nI knew, for example, that it opened with the mitzvah<\/em> of machatzit<\/em> hashekel<\/em> that every Jew was to contribute a half shekel to a central fund, out of which the costs of the Tabernacle services would be paid.<\/p>\nI knew that the opening two sections of the parsha<\/em> were among the longest, if not the longest, in the entire Torah. This was one of the biggest obstacles I had to mastering the Torah reading. But I hadn\u2019t a clue as to the details of those two sections: about the special oils and fragrances which were an essential part of the Temple service. It was much later that the Talmud tractate which discusses these details and their significance, Masechet<\/em> Kritut<\/em>, became one of my favorite Talmud tractates.<\/p>\nI knew about the reference to Shabbat in the opening sections of the parsha<\/em>, but it was not until much later that I began to appreciate the connection between sacred space\u2014the Temple precincts, and sacred time\u2014the Shabbat day.<\/p>\nI knew the story of the Golden Calf, but only as a story. I did not appreciate its contemporary relevance and rich symbolism until much later. I have since, for example, become enamored of Rabbi Yehudah HaLevi\u2019s explanation of the attractiveness of a Golden Calf for the people. He maintains that the demand to worship an invisible god was just too much for the Children of Israel, so that they chose a tangible object through which to worship a God Who could not be seen. How tempting it is to this very day to try to find tangible physical or ideological substitutes for the transcendent Almighty, a temptation which leads us to modes of worship which is more \u201csophisticated\u201d than dancing around a Golden Calf, but no less idolatrous.<\/p>\n
The courageous confrontation of Moses with God, as he intercedes for the sinful people and begs forgiveness for them, was \u201cover my head.\u201d It made no impression upon me. And yet, now, these verses have come to exemplify what for me is the essence of true leadershSip: \u201cMoses went back to the Lord and said: \u2018Alas. This nation is guilty of a great sin in making for themselves a god of gold. Now, if You will forgive their sin [well and good]; but if not, erase me from the record which You have written\u2019\u201d (Exodus<\/em> 32: 31-32).<\/p>\nNor did I in any way understand Moses\u2019 plea: \u201cNow, if I have truly gained Your favor, pray let me know Your ways.\u201d What ways? What exactly was Moses asking for?<\/p>\n
I now have learned that Moses was asking to understand God\u2019s inscrutable will. He needed to understand so much that we find difficult in our daily lives as we struggle to make sense of \u201cwhy the righteous suffer.\u201d But for a 13-year-old, blessed with a relatively problem-free life, I was protected from such a \u201cneed to know.\u201d<\/p>\n
Our Torah portion contains so much else that was not part of the agenda of a 13-year-old boy, brought up in the United States in those years. It was not that the period of history in which I was born and raised did not have its immense trials and tribulations. After all, I was born months after World War II began. When I was safe and secure in my baby bunting, my cousins in Poland were being shot and buried alive. My childhood years were concurrent with the State of Israel\u2019s struggle for independence. My Bar Mitzvah took place during a time when our neighbors\u2019 sons were off in the distant land of Korea, from which one of them did not return.<\/p>\n
Yet, there is much in the parsha<\/em> that was relevant then: God\u2019s response to Moses\u2019 request that he know His ways: \u201dYou cannot see My face, for man may not see Me and live;\u201d the mysterious \u201ccleft in the rock\u201d in which Moses hid; the symbolism of the Second Tablets which Moses was instructed to carve of stone; the Thirteen Attributes of God\u2019s mercy; the radiance which graced Moses face, so that \u201cthe people shrank from coming near him;\u201d and the mask, or veil, which Moses wore so as to frighten the people no longer.<\/p>\nAll this rich content, and more, was not taught to me, and had it been taught to me, it wouldn\u2019t have meant very much.<\/p>\n
There is a lesson in the ignorance of this particular Bar Mitzvah boy and all that he has subsequently learned about the Torah and about this parsha<\/em>. It is lesson by which I have tried, albeit neither constantly nor consistently, to live by. The lesson is this: One cannot be complacently satisfied with the understanding of Torah that he attained as a schoolchild. As we mature, so must our knowledge of Torah mature. The Torah of a 13-year-old cannot slake the intellectual thirst of a 30-year-old, nor can the Torah we learned when we were 30 satisfy our spiritual needs when we turn 60.<\/p>\nOur Torah must be renewed as we grow older. Torah study must be a lifelong endeavor. Then, and only then, can it continue to inspire and instruct us as we struggle with the challenges of living, with the challenges that change as we age.<\/p>\n
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