Goodness strengthens the bonds connecting the physical world to the spiritual, causing the spiritual light of G-d's Presence to be more evident in this world. Conversely, evil disrupts the bonds between the spiritual and physical, quite literally making the world a more evil place. (We will discuss this concept more fully G-d willing in a future class (5:1; www.torah.org/learning/pirkei-avos/chapter5-1a.html).)

Goodness strengthens the bonds connecting the physical world to the spiritual, causing the spiritual light of G-d's Presence to be more evident in this world. Conversely, evil disrupts the bonds between the spiritual and physical, quite literally making the world a more evil place. (We will discuss this concept more fully G-d willing in a future class (5:1; www.torah.org/learning/pirkei-avos/chapter5-1a.html).)










Spiritual Global Warming, Part I

Chapter 5, Mishna 1(a)



By Rabbi Dovid Rosenfeld

"The world was created in ten utterances. What does this come to teach us? Could not the world have been created in a single utterance? It was in order to exact punishment from the wicked who destroy the world which was created in ten utterances and to grant reward to the righteous who sustain the world which was created in ten utterances."



As an introductory note, we'll find Chapter 5 to be of a somewhat different style than previous chapters. Much of this chapter is factual. The first 18 mishnas provide us with lists and totals -- lists of miracles, types of punishments, different classes of people, etc. It is fascinating in its own right, but it is perhaps a little less "straight" ethics. We will try, all the same, to approach the wise words of the Sages with the same reverence -- and will hopefully reveal in them the same profound messages and life lessons we have always discovered.

The ten utterances through which the world was created appear in the story of Creation, primarily in the first chapter of Genesis. They correspond to the expression "and the L-rd said" which appears throughout the story. (E.g., "And the L-rd said: 'Let there be light,' and there was light" (v. 3).) The Talmud (Rosh Hashanah 32a) explains that although "and the L-rd said" appears only nine times in the story of Genesis, the first verse of Genesis itself -- "In the beginning G-d created the heaven and the earth" -- is also considered a statement. It too refers to an act of creation. And, continues the Talmud, all acts of creation were achieved via Divine utterance, as the verse states, "By the *word* of G-d were the heavens made" (Psalms 33:6).



An interesting aside to our mishna is the concept that the world was created through G-d's utterances alone. When G-d stated "Let there be light," we might have thought this was simply a statement of intent -- G-d was merely talking to Himself, so to speak, that He would then go ahead and create light. The verse, however, implies a far more immediate result: "And the L-rd said: 'Let there be light,' and there was light." The light resulted directly from G-d's utterance.



Kabbalistically speaking, the idea of this is that G-d's utterances are not merely "plans". His words themselves *were* acts of creation. G-d's "statements" are a creative force. At Genesis they were actual projections of His will -- and began a long process of concretizing spiritual intent into physical reality and the universe we know.

(This concept also reveals a bit about the wisdom and sanctity of the Hebrew language. G-d "spoke" in Hebrew when He created the world. In Kabbalistic thought, Hebrew words do not just "mean" something by convention. The words themselves contain the spiritual essences of their physical counterparts. Each letter corresponds to a spiritual force; each word the combination of such forces. Actually, Hebrew words *really* mean their interpretations.)



This concept -- of ten Divine utterances -- is a Kabbalistic one (as you may have guessed by now...). We are taught that there are ten "sefiros" or levels of emanation from G-d to the world. The concept, loosely speaking, is that G-d's infinite reality filters down to the physical world via ten gradations. The world is a reflection of G-d, but ten steps removed -- the higher emanations being entirely beyond man's ability to comprehend. (Kabbalists generally deal with at most the lower seven -- and more often the lower six.) The physical world we know is inextricably bound to the spiritual, infinite realm of the Almighty, but it requires ten degrees of dissipation to span this infinite gap. From a Kabbalistic sense, our mission is to span that distance, bringing the physical world in harmony with the spiritual and making the world a reflection of the Perfect Being from which it emanated.




This concept is meaningful to non-mystics as well, among whom I number myself. And that is the simple, profound message of our mishna. (Pirkei Avos, to be sure, is not a work on Kabbalah. However, we will find the more literal approach to life and reality here taken by the Sages to be entirely consistent with the depth of their understanding of the metaphysical world.) What practically is our mishna teaching us with this concept that the righteous/wicked sustain/destroy a world of Ten Utterances?

The idea, simply, is that if G-d created the world in ten utterances or emanations, the layers of the universe are inextricably bound together. And so, if I do good or evil, I do not only harm myself or even the physical world about. I damage all levels of existence -- from the lowest to the highest. And thus, the acts of the righteous or wicked sustain or destroy the world in ways infinitely above and beyond what we are able to comprehend

For better or worse, however, this idea is far too broad and far-reaching to be dealt in the remainder of this class. (And we didn't even decipher this week's corny title...) ;-) G-d willing, we will build on this further next week.

Gestapo Agrees to Release Jews from Camps; 1,200 Reach Switzerland; More Due Today

http://archive.jta.org/article/1945/02/09/2866478/gestapo-agrees-to-release-jews-from-camps-1200-reach-switzerland-more-due-today
February 9, 1945


Gestapo Agrees to Release Jews from Camps; 1,200 Reach Switzerland; More Due Today

Geneva, Feb. 8 (JTA) –

One of the most fantastic feats of rescue of Jewish internees from German concentration camps has been accomplished by a group of twenty orthodox Swiss Jews who sent Jean M. Musy, a former member of the Swiss Federal Council, to Gestapo chief Heinrich Himmler in order to negotiate with him concerning the fate of Jews remaining in Germany.



As a result of the negotiations, a group of 1,200 Jews released from the concentration camp in Theresienstadt arrived in Switzerland last night from Germany, and 540 more are expected to arrive here tomorrow. The release of these internees is considered a very important achievement.



Addressing a press conference today, Swiss Minister of Justice, Eduard von Steiger, said that it is hoped that henceforth regular transports of Jews from Germany will arrive in Switzerland. All the arrivals, he declared, will be placed in refugee camps in Switzerland and will be obliged to leave the country at the earliest possible date.



About one-half of the 1,200 Jews from Theresienstadt are natives of Holland who were deported by the Germans from Amsterdam and other Dutch cities. There are also 58 children under the age of 12 in the group. The remainder are Jews from Germany and Czechoslovakia. The 540 Jews who are expected to reach Switzerland tomorrow are deportees from France. The refugees from Theresienstadt were given food to last for the three-day trip from the camp to the Swiss frontier.



Citation - Click to see see this article's citation



"Gestapo Agrees to Release Jews from Camps; 1,200 Reach Switzerland; More Due Today." Jewish Telegraphic Agency 9 Feb 1945.

Further Reports of Liquidation of Polish Ghettos Reach London; Poles Praised

http://archive.jta.org/article/1943/12/10/2862488/further-reports-of-liquidation-of-polish-ghettos-reach-london-poles-praised
December 10, 1943


Further Reports of Liquidation of Polish Ghettos Reach London; Poles Praised

London, Dec. 9 (JTA) –

A detailed report of the liquidation of the smaller Jewish ghettos in Poland by the Nazis during last May and June was received here today by Dr. Ignacy Schwarzbart, a deputy in the Polish National Council. The report says that the ghettos in Piaski, Komskowole, Siedlice, Lukow and Radzyn were wiped out.



In the town of Wlodawa 4,000 Jews - 1,000 of whom had been sent there from Lwow since May - were divided into two contingents of 3,000 and 1,000. The 3,000 were sent to the Sobibor concentration camp, and most of the 1,000 were executed on the spot. Some of the latter, however, succeeded in fleeing to safety in the neighboring woods. Several hundred Jews were killed at Siedlice. In Wengrow 400 of the 700 Jews in the city were executed in the ghetto and the other 300 were gassed in the Treblinka "death camp," the report discloses.



Several hundred Dutch Jews recently arrived at the Trawniki camp, it is also revealed in the underground report. Children, women and aged men were sent to the Sobibor camp, while able-bodied men were placed in workshops manufacturing clothes for the German army. The report pays tribute to several Polish individuals and families who have been executed by the Germans for the "crime" of either sheltering Jews or feeding them.



Citation - Click to see see this article's citation



"Further Reports of Liquidation of Polish Ghettos Reach London; Poles Praised." Jewish Telegraphic Agency 10 Dec 1943.

Czech Peoples Court Acquits Jew Who Was “elder” of Theresienstadt Ghetto

http://archive.jta.org/article/1947/01/02/3008103/czech-peoples-court-acquits-jew-who-was-elder-of-theresienstadt-ghetto
January 2, 1947


Czech Peoples Court Acquits Jew Who Was “elder” of Theresienstadt Ghetto

PRAGUE, Jan. 1 (JTA) –

Benjamin Murmelstein, one of the Jewish "olders" of the Theresienstadt ghetto, who were appointed by the Nazis to act as administrative officers and carry out their instructions, was acquitted yesterday by a Czech Peoples Tribunal which was trying him as a war criminal.



Jewish circles are displeased with the verdict, charging that Murmelstein conducted himself in "an unworthy manner" while in the Nazi-appointed post. It is understood that as a result of the strong feelings in the Jewish community, Murmelstein plans to emigrate to Switzerland.



Citation - Click to see see this article's citation



"Czech Peoples Court Acquits Jew Who Was “elder” of Theresienstadt Ghetto." Jewish Telegraphic Agency 2 Jan 1947.

Nazi Youth Leader Charged at Nuremberg Trial with Deporting 50,000 Jews to Death Camps

http://archive.jta.org/article/1946/05/28/2745244/nazi-youth-leader-charged-at-nuremberg-trial-with-deporting-50000-jews-to-death-camps
May 28, 1946


Nazi Youth Leader Charged at Nuremberg Trial with Deporting 50,000 Jews to Death Camps

Nuremberg, May. 27 (JTA) –

U.S. Prosecutor Thomas Dodd today confronted Baldur von Schirach, former gauleiter of Vienna and one-time Nazi youth leader, with documents proving that he had arranged for the deportation of 50,000 Jews to extermination camps in Poland. Dodd submitted to the International Military Tribunal the minutes of a meeting of Hitler, Hane Frank, then gauleiter of Poland, and Schirach, at which Schirach asked Frank to accept 50,000 Viennese Jews.



Schirach denied that he knew what had happened to the deportees, stating that he believed the older people were sent to Theresienstadt, while the younger ones were sent to Poland. Dodd interrupted, declaring: "You know that the Jews were taken to Riga and Minsk and annihilated."



Dodd quoted from 55 reports submitted to Schirach in 1942 by Reinhard Heydrich, who was at the time deputy chief of the Gestapo, giving full details of the massacre of he deported Jews. The prosecutor remarked that "your memory is very bad today," when the former youth leader said that he could not remember having seen the reports.



The Russian prosecutor following Dodd, submitted excerpts from an affidavit by Ida Wassotom, a Jewish resident of Lemberg, relating how members of the Hitler youth groups, which Schirach directed, had participated in the murder of hundreds of Jews in that city. Uniformed youths, armed with knives and pistols, she said, reamed the streets, breaking into homes to search for hidden Jews and killing Jewish men and women on the streets.



Citation - Click to see see this article's citation



"Nazi Youth Leader Charged at Nuremberg Trial with Deporting 50,000 Jews to Death Camps." Jewish Telegraphic Agency 28 May 1946.

Spiritual Cause and Effect

Spiritual Cause and Effect






Chapter 2, Mishna 7



"He [Hillel] further saw a skull floating on the water. He said to it: 'Because you drowned you were drowned, and in the end those who drowned you will be drowned.'"



Hillel was the author of the previous two mishnas, as well as 1:12-14.



The basic theme of this mishna is that justice is always meted out to evildoers. Hillel saw a skull -- severed from a body, implying the victim had met a violent death (R. S. R. Hirsch) -- and immediately saw beyond it to the vicious cycle of violence and death which brought such tragedy into existence. The Mishna states, "With the measuring stick that a person measures he is measured himself" (Sotah 1:7). A person whose life revolves around violence and murder is likely to become a victim himself. He who lives by the sword dies by the sword.



There are, however, some obvious difficulties with such a principle. As we all know, innocent people are victims of homicides all the time. Conversely, murderers often go unpunished and die natural deaths. At the very least, the world's first murder victim (namely Hevel (Abel), son of Adam, see Genesis 4:8 -- the world didn't go very long without...) by definition could not have been a murderer!



The commentators therefore do not understand Hillel's statement to be definitive or even all that literal. In fact, this mishna was stated in Aramaic, the spoken tongue of that period, rather than in Hebrew, the "official" language of the Mishna. It is also not stated in the typical format - "He said...", but rather, "He saw this and said..." -- implying Hillel was merely responding to the situation before him, speaking to himself in his own language.

It appears that Hillel was not making an "official" statement of policy: We certainly cannot state unequivocally that all victims of homicides were murderers themselves or that all murderers will be murdered. Rather, Hillel was reacting to the gruesome sight before him. He took in the experience and began to reflect: There is certainly some degree of G-d's justice behind such an event -- even one so clearly the result of human vice and capriciousness. As I noted above, R. Samson Raphael Hirsch explains that Hillel came across a human skull severed from a body and reasoned that the person must have been the victim of violent crime. (The Aramaic expression "you were drowned" doesn't necessarily mean killed by asphyxiation. More literally, it translates "you were caused to float." The victim was most probably murdered first, and then his body tossed in the water.)




Hillel thus saw in this harrowing encounter G-d's justice in this world. People are not killed randomly; G-d must have allowed it to occur. Although generally G-d permits free will in this world, with few exceptions He would never allow a person to be murdered unless that person had some degree of guilt on the Divine scales. G-d may not have struck the person down Himself: He is "slow to anger" (Exodus 34:6), giving man many opportunities to repent. Yet it was He who allowed the other's murderous designs to be fulfilled. The victim must have in some way been deserving of his fate. The victim certainly might have been a murderer himself -- this is the "textbook version" of the justice we would hope to see in this world and which Hillel conjectured might have been the case. Yet regardless, the victim must have had some degree of guilt -- however indiscernible -- and for that alone did G-d allow such serious crime to go unchecked.

Of course, we are touching upon a difficult theological issue. Why each victim "deserves" his fate is clearly beyond our comprehension. We will learn later, "It is not within our power to explain neither the tranquility of the wicked nor the suffering of the righteous" (4:19; www.torah.org/learning/pirkei-avos/chapter4-19.html). But again, Hillel was not making an "official" statement. We can never truly say we "know" that all that occurs in this world is correct and an execution of G-d's justice. All the same, Hillel, perhaps the greatest scholar of a great generation, used this certainly unnerving incident to reaffirm his own pure and simple faith in G-d's justice -- beyond even his comprehension.




And our Sages felt it worthwhile to record Hillel's reflections. Let all future generations know that even the greatest among us could not really explain the injustices he saw around him. In the most general way, yes, but no one can truly fathom G-d's inscrutable ways. Nevertheless, Hillel accepted. He recognized his own limitations, took in the lesson, reaffirmed his faith, and most importantly, he moved on.



There is an even deeper truth behind Hillel's statement, as noted by the commentators. Hillel saw reward and punishment as not just some Divine act of retribution but as a cause-and-effect cycle. There is an interconnection between people and deeds in this world. One who commits a good or a bad deed not only deserves reward or punishment but brings about a change in this world. This is true firstly in the most literal sense. Do a favor for your fellow or give him a cheerful greeting, and you will spread good cheer in this world -- which your fellow will in turn spread to others. Conversely, introduce violence to your environs -- kill another human being, start a gang war -- and rage and callousness will be introduced. Respect for human life will decrease -- and you yourself may become victim of the very forces you have unleashed.

But there is a much deeper aspect to this -- on the level of the metaphysical. The physical and spiritual planes of reality are interconnected in ways we cannot possibly know or understand. A person's good deeds affect both the spiritual and physical environment around him. Goodness strengthens the bonds connecting the physical world to the spiritual, causing the spiritual light of G-d's Presence to be more evident in this world. Conversely, evil disrupts the bonds between the spiritual and physical, quite literally making the world a more evil place. (We will discuss this concept more fully G-d willing in a future class (5:1; www.torah.org/learning/pirkei-avos/chapter5-1a.html).) Thus, if a man murders, he creates a very real spiritual force of evil in this world. That force unleashed destroys both the spiritual and physical layers of reality about. And it will attack those most susceptible to its i nfluences.



And no one is more vulnerable than the creator of the evil himself.

The victim was quite likely a murderer himself -- and his murderers will meet the same fate themselves -- for this is the direct result and byproduct of evil unrestrained. Perpetrate evil in this world, make this world just a little bit less holy, and it may just come back to haunt you.



On this level, punishment is not simply some Divine decree -- some magical promise of retribution for your sins. It is the very literal result of the evil you have perpetrated. There are spiritual laws of nature in this world every bit as much as there are physical. And this is what Hillel truly comes to teach us. He saw in this chance encounter the spiritual forces beyond which both initiated and were perpetuating this vicious cycle of violence. Violence begets violence, making the world an ever more violent place. Therefore, let none of us say his own behavior is his own personal business and should be of no concern to others. The Talmud writes, "All of Israel is responsible for one another" (Shavuos 39a). We all share this world together, and we all influence and are influenced by one another. Let us all strive together to make it a place of peace, godliness and the Divine Presence.