Shavuot greets us next week. (erev is May 28). We celebrate the 10 Commandments, Confirmation in many congregations and for this final Pirke Avot passage, we turn to a line from Chapter 2 of the collection (either paragraph 5 or 6 depending on translation you use). It is a small line with a huge impact: “In a place where no one acts as a man/person/human being (b’makom sh’ain anashim) strive to be a man/person/human being (hishtadel l’hiyot ish).
In tradional translations, the words anashim, ish are rendered as “man”. In many more contemporary translations, we see an expanded sense of the word. Let me suggest, as you study this passage, that it is one of the most important in Avot. It speaks to so much of our modern world. We see now people who see the world only through their own eyes, their own experience, rather than how their actions may impact the larger community. This passage includes the values of compassion and mercy, lovingkindess and dignity: in truth, this one line carries with it the very essence of what is means to be and act as tzelem elohim.
What does it mean to act like a human being? That really is the task before us. This season beetween Passover and Shavuot helps focus our souls on this very question. Likewise, the 10 days between Rosh Hoshonnah and Yom Kippur mirror, in a different way, this call to assess our own life and soul. What does it mean to act like a tzelem? Let that be our charge for this holiday. The Commandments serve as a symbolic guide to creating a society that brings order out of chaos, reflecting the Creation stories in Genesis. Once again, we face choices. Once again, our tradition calls on us to “strive to act like a human being”
Stay safe and healthy
Rabbi Rchard F Address
Rabbi Richard F. Address, D.Min, is the Founder and Director of www.jewishsacredaging.com. Rabbi Address served for over three decades on staff of the Union for Reform Judaism; first as a Regional Director and then, beginning in 1997, as Founder and Director of the URJ’s Department of Jewish Family Concerns and served as a specialist and consultant for the North American Reform Movement in the areas of family related programming. Rabbi Address was ordained from Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in 1972 and began his rabbinic career in Los Angeles congregations. He also served as a part time rabbi for Beth Hillel in Carmel, NJ while regional director and, after his URJ tenure, served as senior rabbi of Congregation M’kor Shalom in Cherry Hill, NJ from 2011-2014.
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