Several years ago, while sharing a long drive with a business colleague named Jim Robinson, we proceeded to engage in a seemingly mundane conversation, though one that I often reflect upon. While Jim isn’t Jewish, he is a serious and deep thinker. We were discussing our daily schedules when Jim took note of a comment I made about waking up very early in the morning to participate in a study group (Daf Yomi or other chaburas) and morning prayers.
While I kept trying to change the subject, Jim kept asking me what could be that meaningful to draw a person out of bed that early in the morning. When I realized the sincerity of Jim’s question, I proceeded to explain. I asked Jim what we do for the first 13 or so years of our lives. The answer is that we work extremely hard to get good grades in order to be accepted into a good high school. Why do we want to get accepted into a good high school? To give us the opportunity to work hard for four years to get into a good college. Why do we want to get into a good college? For the privilege of experiencing tremendous pressure and hard work while hoping to secure a good job. Why do we need to secure a good job? So that we could spend a lifetime working as hard as possible to earn enough money so that we could send our kids to school and start the circle all over again.
When you really think about it, I shared with Jim, life has to have more meaning, and we must live for a higher purpose. Otherwise the circle of life is nothing but madness.
What is the higher purpose of life for which we were created?
In his foundational work, Derech Hashem, the Ramchal explains that the purpose of creation was for Hashem to bestow his good on others. The Ramchal, in Mesillas Yesharim, quotes Chazal in explaining that man was created to bask in Hashem’s presence, which is the truest delight and pleasure that can possibly exist. The true place of this delight is in Olam Haba, the World to Come, but the path to reach that world is through this world, which was prepared for this purpose.
Hashem gave us the opportunity to earn our place in Olam Haba through the vehicle of living a life of Torah, mitzvos and devaikus, clinging, to Hashem. A necessary component to a system where we truly have the opportunity to earn our place in Olam Haba is having free will. Without free will we would not truly be earning anything on our own. Maintaining our free will necessitates that we constantly have an equal chance to choose right or wrong. Additionally, Hashem must conceal himself in this world at all times or the choice to choose the right path would become so obvious, negating our free will.
The unfortunate reality for many of us, however, is that the allure and temptations of this physical world are plentiful, often pulling us towards wrong choices and misguided priorities.
I once heard Rav Moshe Weinberger tell a life-changing mashal, parable, from Rav Hillel Paritcher, one of the original Chassidim of Chabad.
A few hundred years ago, a person living in an Eastern European shtetl heard the most beautiful niggun, song, that he ever heard. This niggun was so inspirational that it lifted him to a place that he had never been to before, enabling him to briefly forget all of his worries. Shortly after hearing this niggun, he returned to his daily routine and he “lost” the niggun. While it left an everlasting imprint on his neshama, soul, he could never quite recall it and he developed a lifelong yearning to hear that niggun again.
This insatiable thirst to rediscover the niggun led this person to travel far and wide in search of ba’alai neginah, professional musicians, who might be able to help him remember the song that he once heard.
Being a wealthy man of means, he traveled all over the world, spending countless hours over the course of many years with musician after musician as they played one tune after another, while our friend intently listened to each one trying to rediscover the elusive niggun.
On a few such occasions he would briefly hear a tune or a chord that sounded familiar, before quickly realizing that it was not the niggun. The more he listened to each melody, the more certain he was that it was definitely not the niggun. He knew that if he would ever be lucky enough to hear the niggun one more time, he would certainly recognize it.
The nimshal, lesson, is that we learn from Chazal that an angel comes and teaches each child all of Torah while the baby is still in the mother’s womb. The angel then gives the baby a tap above the lip and the baby forgets all that it learned. As Rav Hillel Paritcher and Rav Weinberger explain, the neshama then enters the body and descends into a life immersed in this physical world. Throughout the years of a life, the physical body leads the person to chase after every physical pleasure and runs from one ba’al menagain to another trying to rediscover the niggun that the neshama once heard back in the womb. The ba’alai neginah that we chase might be a sports team, an exotic vacation, a fancy car, a wild
concert or so many other things. Yet deep
inside the neshama knows that these fleeting pleasures simply are not the right niggun and will never bring a person the true pleasure that they are longing to rediscover.
May our soul searching during these auspicious days of Elul enable us to be zoche, privileged, to rediscover the lost niggun, and return us to the path Hashem lovingly prepared for us.
Daniel Gibber is a longtime resident of Teaneck and is a VP of Sales at Deb El Food Products. In addition to learning as much Torah as he can, he is also privileged to speak periodically on the topic of Emunah and be involved in Jewish outreach through Olami Manhattan. He can be reached at: [email protected]
