Good Moed Al Jaffee
11:23 PM - Just got home from Yom Tov/Shabbos is Spring Valley. Intense in a good way. Heard a nice Torah from the Chernobyl Maggid. Zman usually is translated as time, it also means to prepare. The various zmanim in the Jewish year prepare us to have that theme carried through the year. Thus, freedom is initiated at Pesach, Torah at Shavuot and Happiness at Sukkot. It reminds me of the idea of ma'ase avot siman lebanim - that the avot allowed certain energies to be taken and run with by their descendants. May we be blessed to have happiness opened up for us now for the year.
On a related note, rreconnecting to G-d from a place of love (teshuva mei'ahava) accomplishes what can not be done through a fear based repentance (teshuva miyirah).When you do teshuva mei'ahava your aveirot - negative actions become zechuyot - merits. Up to and including Yom Kippur is a time when most people focus on fear of G-d. Sukkot is referred to as yom rishon lecheshbon avonot - usually translated as - the opening day for the reckoning of sins.
Sukkot is zman simchateinu. Rav Nachman MiBreslov explains that on Sukkot we re-focus our teshuva and do it mei'ahava. The true meaning of yom rishon lecheshbon avonot, may be that in the post Yom Kippur days we want to re-count our avonot and work on recycling the avonot as zechuyot - to switch things around through teshuva mei'ahava.
On Rosh HaShana, at Tashlich, we throw our sins into the water. On Sukkot we gather in the water with joy - u'she'avtem mayim besason - we collect back those aveirot with great joy!
"11:59 PM" - It's later than that, but it's still Motzei Shabbos, Saturday Night, and not yet Sunday morning.
The head of my school's English department, Tikvah Weiner, made my day recently when she told me that she quotes me all the time. She's presently teaching The Things They Carried and when asked if it's a true story she used my line that it's true although it may not have happened. That just came into my mind. I'm thinking a lot about one of my favorite stories. I think it will need to be a post of its own. Maybe soon.
On erev Yom Tov I wrote about the new book on Al Jaffee. Over Yom Tov I did some asking and thinking about the head shaving issue raised in that post. I once heard that this was a custom done by one Chassidic group. I was just informed by a very reliable source that this has nothing to do with sect but is contingent upon geography. The prevalent custom in Galicia was for women to shave their heads when they got married. Jaffee's mother was from Lithuania, which explains why she did not keep that custom.
This book is written so well. It is a brillian collaboration. One critique that I have is that it contains a small amount of crude words and images. As I enjoyed the book and bumped into these pieces I was reminded of something I recently read in another excellent book. Christine Lavin worked many years ago with Robert Klein. She helped him out by taking notes offstage as to what new bits were working or not. Afterwards he said that instead of paying her money (she would have liked the money) he would give her advice (she cherishes the advice to this day, even though she would have liked the money). He told her to never go crude in her performances. He said that you immediately knock away a percentage of your audience, and why would you want to do that? I think that Jaffee and Weisman will lose some readers that would have been ripe for this book due to the bits of crudeness that they included. Sigh.
Here's a sample of Weisman's writing, from the very start of the work (to the right of the drawing above):
"The plausible impossible" is a term of art unique to cartooning. It is what holds Bugs Bunny up when he runs off a cliff, traverses a yawning chasm, and continues running on the other side, completely ignorant of the terrible fate that, except for a magical, momentary suspension of the laws of gravity, should have been his. It is the guiding comic principle - at once thrilling and ridiculous - that lies at the heart of cartooning. This willing suspension of disbelief has a logic all its own. What keeps Bugs aloft, what makes the impossible plausible, is not looking down. It is a talent that eighty-nine year old Al Jaffee has displayed in his life as well as his art."
She writes masterfully here, and throughout the book. She returns to this theme repeatedly emphasizing how throughout his travails Al keeps his balance by not looking down but rather looking ahead, and moving on.
It's interesting to note that Al has issues with traditional Judaism. Perhaps more interesting is that he has offered his services for many years, and continues to do so (as did his colleague Dave Berg) to Chabad's Moshiach Times. About this Al says, "I have a warm relationship with my editor, Dovid Shalom Pape. Even though I abandoned all of religious zealotry years ago in Lithuania. I like the kind and gentle souls of the people of Orthodoxy. Or maybe I'm doing penance for my mother. I keep asking Dovid, 'Where was our G-d while they were roasting our people?' I know it's an elementary question, but I still haven't gotten an elementary answer." (Al Jaffee's Mad Life pg. 93)
posted by rabbi neil fleischmann @ 11:59 PM
7 Comments:
Hi Neil,
Moadim L'Simcha!
I've always wanted to understand this and really don't understand how it is/what the conceptual mechanism is that G-d established in the universe, that through teshuva mei'ahava, aveirot become zechuyot. When you have time, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this.
Sharon
Sharon,
I'll try to put some thoughts in writing here, though this is a mysterious topic, really. Just let me know if you want to hear more:
It's hard to put into words, but I think the only way we can really come to understand anything that has to do with G-d is to start with the gap between man and G-d - to realize how questions in this realm are G-d things that are like the gap between genders but with a huge exponent next to it. It's a G-d thing, we wouldn't understand. I think of this as the opposite of a cop out, although people sometimes hear it as one. It’s a paradox and yet true that the more we understand how G-d is beyond us the more we can tap into our being created by G-d, “in His image,” and grow closer to G-d.
The question is a hard one and my take on it is of course limited. The idea of Teshuvah in the first place is a gift from G-d. The medrash describes – at creation time - G-d asking the attribute of justice what to do to a man/woman who sins and the answer is to take away the life they were entrusted with. G-d allows for teshuva and gives us chance after chance – that in itself is way beyond human. Then there’s the idea that (at least regarding certain sins) we can erase them. And then there’s more – in some cases at least – we can turn the sins into positive.
Maybe the idea is that if we learn from our mistakes and use them then they truly become something positive. Or maybe it’s just G-d’s mercy. I like the idea and feel it to be true that we can use our mistakes and build them into something positive if we do proper teshuva (regret for the past, a new future plan, putting the plan into action by truly leaving the sin behind, and confessing to G-d) (also when it comes to people we need forgiveness from the person, which can be granted with or without being asked). I think the best answers are usually combinations of factors. I think it’s a combination of us taking in the lessons and the kindness of G-d.
a friend just told me a nice vort (hafla'ah quoted by first lisker rebbe) - that the point of the shofar in ellul is to wake us up to do teshuva. after we do complete tshuva our sins are turned into mitzvot. this may be the true meaning of the idea that we blow the shofar and then don't blow it right before RH to confuse the satan - what confuses him is that our sins have become mitzvot!
Thank you so much for your thoughtful response that contains so many interesting ideas. I had the thought over Rosh Hashanah/Yom Kippur time that G-d has so much love, so much more than we can even imagine, and He wants, really wants so much to forgive us. I'm not sure how this ties in with my question, but I felt it really strongly. I feel like there's a truth, a secret truth, that is a dynamic embedded in the universe, planted by G-d, that somehow allows for the nature of aveirot to be transformed into zechuyot. But I can barely wrap my brain around the idea. When I try to pin it down it eludes me. For sure learning from mistakes can, when judiciously considered, catapault us to behave otherwise, and be a catalyst in the refinement of our character. It feels like there is in tandem with this psychological reality a "mysterious" (as you say) cosmology to the transformation of misdeeds into merits. That is what I'm longing to understand; it's an exploration that feels exciting. I think it best to just keep working on improving, refining, growing . . . to keep this question that I hear in my head and feel in my heart and my stomach dangling in the background, and know that in time, if G-d decides, I will come to understand on the level He decides is appropriate for me to know, and that is useful in creating and furthering goodness.
Thank you again for bringing me to further consider this.
Sharon
Thanks Sharon,
When I first learned in Israel after high school, in 1980, I heard an idea on the other end of the spectrum. My morning shiur rebbe at the time - if I remember correctly (Rabbi Yitchak Mirsky who has since become somewhat know for his Hegyonei Halacha seforim and hagadah) said that teshuavah is like taking thumbtacks out of the bulletin board. The thing is that - he said - even though the pins are out, the hole remains, and that's just reality that even after teshuah the ramifications of your actions can't be undone in the world.
Just a couple of years ago I heard Rabbi Uri Orlian tell a story at Shaloshudes at roughly this time of year. As the story goes there was a boy who misbehaved a lot in school (and all over). His father decided that every time that the kid acted out his father would represent it by putting a nail in the ceiling over the boy's bed - so that he'd see a mark reminding him of what he did (reminds me of a study that compared people who ate chicken wings with people who ate boneless chicken poppers to see if the bones would make the people more aware of how much they ate).
The boy got in so much trouble that in time his entire ceiling was filled with nails. At that point he started to feel uncomfortable about the nails and asked his father to take them out. They made a deal, every time he behaved well another nail was taken out of the ceiling. Eventually it was empty, and the boy was happy.
Now, I'm not sure if the way that Uri Orlian told the story included this next part. I'm pretty sure it didn't. I think it's my addition/edition. The boy started to be uncomfortable again. Despite his being super well behaved when he looked up at night he saw an uncountable amount of holes. He raised the issue to his father. His father said that he would repaint and refinish the ceiling; his boy had earned it. And the child was thrilled, not only had the marks been removed but as a result of the entirety of his actions the ceiling now was better than it had ever been.
Teshuva works differently in different cases, but there is definitely an idea that applies at least sometimes that things become better than ever.
Cool that you thought about this on Rosh HaShanah/Yom Kippur. I had posted about Al Jaffeee and and and. Then I went back to past posts to see what I'd heard, read, and then put on the blog over the years. After re-reading it I pasted the piece about teshuva mei'ahavah and it's power. Your comment got me to really consider it.
It is indeed something profound.
'Where was our G-d while they were roasting our people?' I know it's an elementary question, but I still haven't gotten an elementary answer."
That's his problem right there. He wants an elementary answer to the world's hardest question. Let him study a little (or a lot), serve God a little, have some faith, and then we'll talk.
Thanks, Kishke.
I'd be happy to meet Al for lunch and talk to him (even not over lunch).
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