Vezot Ha'bracha - Mattot 75 Zeal = Ze'ri'zut and Context

In Parsashat Ha'azinu Devarim 32: 48-50 God commands Moses' to ascend Mount Nevo and see the land of Canaan and then you will die on the mountain'. In our  Parasha Ha'azinu, Devarim 34:1,  Moses ascended Mount Nebo with  one giant leap  displaying tremendous  ' ze'ri'zut' , zeal  and energy  in fulfilling  God's commandment.  Moses acted in a similar way Numbers 31 when he was commanded to 'go to war against the Midianities, take revenge for the Children of Israel and afterward you will be gathered unto your people'. Even though he would be bringing closer his death, he did not delay and sent the army   into battle with Pinchas as  its commander.  Abraham in Bereishit 22:3, expressed the same ze'ri'zut, zeal and passion, when he got up early in the morning in order to carry out God's command to sacrifice his son, Isaac. He would be thus hastening Isaac's death.   In these cases, the question is asked, what's  the  rush ? – life  is so precious, there are so many opportunities to do so many mitzvoth. Every moment, minute and certainly hours are extremely precious. One can do so much learning and many more mitzvoth in this short  time. The question is even stronger on Moses'   ascent  of  Mount Nevo. 

Rabbi Katz from the Telse Yeshivah asks - If Moses would have walked up the mountain in a respectable way, he could have done a lot of learning, which meant a lot of mitzvoth in the hours before his death.  Why did Moses give up so much for the sake of a  hi'dur Mitzvah, doing the mitzvah in an extraordinary way with ze'ri'zut, zeal and energy. The answer is that doing mitzvoth with ze'ri'zut, passion and zeal is not considered as something extra, but part of the mitzvah itself. It is the expression of one's intrinsic motivation and deepest feelings. For Moses, carrying out God's explicit commandments was more valuable than his   life,  despite the many opportunities to do mitzvoth. And he did it with great happiness, zeal and ze'ri'zut, even if it brought closer his death.

But it seems that Moses was not so precise when he carried out God's commandments. In the case of the war against Midian, Moses was commanded to take revenge .He  himself does not go to war but sends Pinchas as the commander. In our Parasha Moses does not immediately ascend Mount Nevo. He  first  gives his final blessings to the tribes  and then leaves them to ascend the mountain. God's commandments   have to be seen in terms of their context and other Torah values. Moses sent Pinchas to do battle, because Moses had taken refuge in Midian after feeing Egypt. It would be throwing stones into the well, from which he drank and that would not be showing ' gratitude ' and ha'ka'rat ha'tov. It was an act of ' de'rech eretz ',common decency and ethical behavior  for Moses to first address his people and bless them before he left them.  Implicit in God's command was to send Pinchas and not go to battle  himself and first to address and bless the nation before he ascended Mount Nevo.

Parents and educators tend to focus on just getting kids to do the actions of the mitzvoth and will use any extrinsic motivators such as prizes, grades and competition to motivate kids to do the mitzvoth. This is based on a false belief that kids cannot appreciate the beauty or value of mitzvoth and that ultimately in an automatic way, kids will come to do things for the right reasons and with intrinsic motivation. The truth is that it is much easier to bribe kids to do something than to ' inspire' them to do something.  Intrinsic motivation, ze'rizut, passion and energy are not 'hidur mitzvah ' but the mitzvah itself. The motivation  for the prize not only gets in the way of kids ' connecting' with the mitzvah itself.We also convert  the spiritual =mitzvoth into money or other prizes. Prizes just motivate kids to get more prizes.  When the focus is on the action and not making meaning of the action we miss out on helping kids see the actions and mitzvoth in their context.Extrinsic motivation tends to narrow focus and helps for manual tasks or tasks that require little thinking. God's mitzvoth require us to broaden our focus and see what we are doing in their context and in terms of other Torah values God does not want blind obedience. He wants us to do mitzvoth with commitment and understanding and love . Moses taught us that ze'ri'zut, zeal and energy  are intrinsic to  the mitzvah and not hidur mitzvah-  something extra. Moses taught how God's commandments must be seen in a context, so values such as gratitude =' ha'ka'rat ha'tov ', ethical behavior and  common decency = 'derech eretz' are given expression when we do our mitzvoth and interact with others. 

Pinchas 73 - The power and Pitfalls of consistency

After Moses asks God to appoint a leader to succeed him and lead the people, God tells Moses to give the Israelites a spiritual inheritance in the form of the Temple service.  The first in a long list of sacrifices and offerings is the ' Korban Tamid ' the continual daily offering that was brought twice a day , morning and afternoon , on every day of the year without exception.

The biblical text, in a strange way  interrupts the description of the laws  pertaining to the Daily offering , and tells us that this offering was identical to the one that offered in the wilderness of Sinai during the inauguration of the tabernacle.

This Tuesday ,is the fast of  the 17^th of the month of Tamuz .

On this day 5 tragedies took place. Moses broke the 2 tablets on which the 10 commandments were written, The Continual daily offering – the Korban Tamid -was stopped and annulled, the walls of Jerusalem were breached ,  Opastamus burned the Torah scroll and placed an idol in the temple.

It would appear that stopping the bringing of the daily sacrifice seems the most minor of the tragedies especially that today we seem   get along without a temple and its sacrifices. Also the daily sacrifices are not considered the high lights of the year, like those of the Festivals or special occasions like   Yom Kippur when the people used to come to visit the temple , so why is the stopping of the Daily sacrifice so significant.?

The continual daily sacrifice  takes priority  over all other sacrifices – it is the first sacrifice to be brought and if one has to choose between a more holier sacrifice like the additional sacrifice brought on the Sabbath and the daily sacrifice , the daily sacrifice is brought.

The answer is that the daily continual offering is symbolic of consistency and routine. What defines a person is his 'daily routine ' and  how he lives his life on a day to day basis. It is his continual daily connection with his creator , with learning, and with his physical body = a healthy life style – exercise, healthy eating , spiritual food etc . It is about consistency and process, loving what you do,  rather than focusing on loving what you achieve .

Consistency, good habits, routine, and structure are very important for people to flourish and succeed.  But routine and consistency have a major  pitfall. It so easy that our actions become stale, automatic, robotic with no thought . They become rote –' mitzvat anashim me'lumada '

The Bible interrupts the description of the laws   pertaining to the Daily sacrifice , and tells us that this sacrifice was identical to the one that offered in the wilderness of Sinai during the inauguration of the tabernacle. This is also to remind ourselves  that the daily sacrifice should be brought with the same feelings of  excitement, newness  and enthusiasm that accompanied the first daily offering .

 In fact our actions should be like musicians whose performance has the richness of a thousand performances and the excitement of a first performance.

 King David in Psalms 27:4 says  - "I asked one thing from G-d, that is my request; to dwell in the House of G-d all the days of my life, and to visit His Palace."

 King David wants to dwell in God's house all the days of his life , yet wants still to experience the newness and the excitement that a visitor experiences in the house of G-d.

As parents , educators and people who are interested in self growth and empowerment how do we help ourselves and our children to be consistent with our daily routines and yet maintain the newness and the excitement of a first time performance and avoid the pit fall of consistency  - automated action.?

With kids we confuse the need to give 'structure and routine'  with control and compliance. 'Reasonable structures should be  imposed only when necessary , in a flexible manner , without undue restrictiveness, and when possible , with the participation of the child.' –AK  Healthy structures can be defined  as the provision of  healthy guidelines and information that children need to be ' self –determining . ' -Grolick

The ' imposed ' routine or structure is usually enforced by using rewards and punishment and not by ' teaching and refection.' This further impairs any internalization and commitment to the values underlying the actions , and makes for 'rote ' behavior.

The motivation driving a routine or structure is usually extrinsic so for example, learning is driven by grades and tests or making the honor's roll instead of the love of learning expressed by a continuous learning on a daily basis.

Dieting and exercise is driven by the goals of losing weight and good results on blood tests rather than trying to adopt a healthy life style which you enjoy and believe in .

 We forget the lesson of the daily offering that it is the everyday activities and not the highlights of life that are important and define us. We focus primarily on 'achievement and not on the 'process'.

We make the mistake by overrating and calling for more ' self discipline , grit and resilience ' in order to achieve the goals of consistency and hard work. Proverbs 5:19 in the context of learning says – be'ahavata tisgeh tamid – by the love for her ( torah learning ) you will be captivated for- ever , always and continuously. It is the love for what we do that makes for self discipline, grit and resilience possible in healthy ways.

The way we can promote the love of what we do is try to support the autonomy of kids, that they feel self directed as we should as well when we pursue our goals  , we all should feel a sense of purpose , relevance and connection, be competent, feel a sense of belonging, support and relatedness to the people around us.