Over the past few months, we have discussed three fundamental questions:
1) What is the purpose of life?
2) What is my role in accomplishing that goal?
3) What guides me in accomplishing that goal?
We answered, based on maaseh Bereishis, matan Torah and building the Mishkan:
1) The purpose of life is to take our place as the “conductors of the symphony,” that is maaseh Bereishis, using everything available to us to accomplish our dual task of “l’ovdah u’l’shomrah”—”to work it and guard it.” We participate in the circle of life by giving meaning to the rest of Creation.
2) Every individual is meant to identify their unique talents, resources and abilities gifted to them by Hashem and voluntarily use them to serve the broader klal, learning from those whose hearts “lifted them up” to build the Mishkan. As indicated by the commandment to donate a half-shekel to the Mishkan, no individual can accomplish this broader goal alone; the efforts of every individual are completed by the contributions of the rest of the nation.
3) The Torah we received at Sinai is the guidebook that Hashem gave the Jewish People to enable them to model for the rest of the world how to live the God-centered life described above. Halachic practice and the values each mitzvah concretizes allow us to navigate the challenges of daily life, on both the individual and communal level, in the way that Hashem wants from us.
Before bringing this idea from theory to practice over the next few weeks, I want to point out one source which stitches together these exact three events. A Midrash Tanchuma in Parshas Naso (16), commenting on the completion of the Mishkan and popularized by the Tanya (ch. 36), describes Hashem’s desire when He created the world, what went wrong, and how that desire was ultimately fulfilled:
Rabbi Shmuel bar Nachman said, At the time that Hashem created the world, He desired that He would have a dirah b’tachtonim — a place to reside down here, the way He has in the upper world. He created Adam and commanded him, saying: You may eat from all the trees of the garden, but do not eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Adam transgressed His command. Hashem said to him, I desired to have a place to reside down here the way I have in the upper world, and you transgressed the one command I gave you. Immediately, He removed himself to the first layer of the rakia… when Kayin killed Hevel, He immediately removed himself to the second layer of the rakia… along came Avraham and excelled in good deeds, and Hashem descended from the seventh layer to the sixth. When Yitzchak stretched out his neck on the altar, Hashem descended from the sixth to the fifth… Moshe came and brought the Shechina [back] to the earth, as it says: “And Hashem came down on Har Sinai.” And the verse says, “Basi l’gani achosi kallah — I came to My garden, my sister bride.” When was that? When the Mishkan was erected.
This Midrash identifies the ultimate goal Hashem had for the world: to establish a place down here in which He would be “comfortable,” similar to what He had up there (of course, this is all in the form of analogy). The way to accomplish that is by demonstrating fidelity to His commandments. Adam’s sin was the first push away from this world, while Bnei Yisrael receiving the Torah on Sinai was what finally brought Hashem back to it. Finally, the Mishkan symbolizes a space dedicated to Hashem in this world, a concrete representation of the theoretical dira b’tachtonim.
Thus, this Midrash powerfully reinforces our thesis: Hashem’s goal in creation was for all humankind to dedicate themselves to Hashem’s service. When that failed, Hashem appointed the Jewish People to model that perspective for the rest of the world, using the Torah from Sinai and the symbolic creation of and service in the Mishkan as their guides.
It is important to note that while this Midrash is most closely associated with the worldview of Chabad, it is highlighted by both Rav Hirsch and Rav Soloveitchik in their respective sefarim. While Chabad understands it in a mystical way, such that this goal is accomplished by finding ways to add Divine “light” to this world to overcome its natural “darkness,” Rav Hirsch and Rav Soloveitchik use it to mean developing a fully functional Jewish society that reflects the values Hashem wants to see in the world, as communicated through Torah and halacha.
What enables a soldier in the Great Battalion to devote his energies to the right projects? What can he look to for guidance in navigating the challenges posed by confusing and complex situations or value propositions? Torah, given to us as a “moreh —guide or instructor,” provides that guidance. By concretizing and objectifying our responses to different situations, across all areas of life, Hashem ensured that we would always have a lens through which to view whatever is happening in the world. With this perspective, our soldier adopts the words of David Hamelech as his tefillah: “Horeini Hashem darkecha, ahalech ba’amitecha — Show me your way, Hashem; I will walk in Your truth.”1 Torah allows us to develop into the people who can navigate the world according to Hashem’s values, no matter what the prevailing culture says.
While I’ve been quoting Rav Hirsch and Rav Soloveitchik extensively, I have not engaged with one question that is strongly associated with the worldviews of both: secular studies, “the wisdom of the nations of the world.” Over the next few weeks, I hope to develop the role that such study is meant to play in the worldview we have been developing here. How does a member of the Great Battalion engage in secular wisdom?
Tzvi Goldstein graduated from Yeshiva University with semicha and a degree in Psychology. After making aliyah, he taught in Yeshivat Hakotel for five years and now edits sefarim for a number of publishers. He recently published a sefer with Mosaica Press called Halachic Worldviews, exploring Rav Soloveitchik’s approach to developing hashkafa from halacha, and writes at tgb613.substack.com. You can reach him at [email protected].
