Parashat Re’eh 5786
Rabbi Shmuel Rabinowitz, Rabbi of the Western Wall and Holy Sites
In the Jewish yearly cycle, Parashat Re’eh is generally read at the beginning of the month of mercy and forgiveness – the month of Elul. This month serves as a time for introspection and accounting for the year that has passed, as well as a time to set goals and objectives for the coming year.
The understanding that we need to pause from time to time and examine our actions is sharpened by reading the opening verses of the parasha:
“See, I set before you today a blessing and a curse: the blessing, if you heed the commandments of the Lord your God… and the curse, if you do not heed the commandments of the Lord your God.”
(Deuteronomy 11:26-28)
In these words, the Torah distills all of life’s struggles and temptations into one simple principle – making the right choice. In the language of the thinkers, this is known as the “point of choice.”
The Torah similarly summarizes the theme of repentance, in the passage read around the time of Rosh Hashanah:
“I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day… I have put before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live.”
(Deuteronomy 30:19)
What is the truth? What constitutes a proper life? And how does one choose correctly? These are weighty questions with which humanity has grappled for many years. The temptations and desires of the world, painted in dazzling colors, do not make the right choice any easier. They can even distort clarity of thought, drawing a person into them without realizing that they are choosing curse and death.
Every person has areas they have already conquered – places where the likelihood of stumbling is virtually nonexistent. Rabbi Eliyahu Dessler, in his essay on free choice (Michtav MeEliyahu, Vol. I), notes that for most people who observe the Torah and its commandments, there is no temptation to desecrate Shabbat or to eat something that is clearly not kosher. Even those who observe Jewish tradition have areas of choice that they have already conquered, while their struggles lie elsewhere, each person according to their own level and circumstances.
A person has an obligation to identify where their own “point of choice” lies – the place where the weight of their personal struggle is greatest – and to choose correctly there. One must be courageous enough to examine, through the lens of truth, whether one’s actions belong to life or to death.
The writings of the early sages offer a simple explanation for human behavior that leads people to make mistaken choices: the assumption that the choice has already been made for them. A person who does not believe may reason that their choices have no real significance, since once their life comes to an end, their role is over and their actions have no lasting impact. Even a person who considers themselves a believer may tell themselves that their fate has already been predetermined and that the path they are walking cannot be changed. This mistaken way of thinking removes responsibility from the individual and causes them to miss the greatest human gift with which humanity has been endowed – the ability to choose.
The Rambam, Maimonides, wrote about this error:
“If God had decreed that a person would be righteous or wicked, or if there were something in a person’s very nature that compelled them toward a particular belief or action, as fools imagine, how could He have commanded us through the prophets, ‘Do this’ and ‘Do not do this’? … What place would there be for the entire Torah? … Know that everything is done according to His will, and yet our actions are entrusted to us. Just as the Creator desired that fire and wind rise upward and water and earth descend downward, so too He desired that human beings have free will, with all their actions entrusted to them, without anyone forcing or compelling them. Rather, a person acts according to their own understanding and the knowledge that God has given them. Therefore, they are judged according to their actions…”
(Mishneh Torah, Laws of Repentance 5:4)
A human being is created in the image of God and has been granted immense power to influence the world through their actions. What happens in their life is, to a significant extent, shaped by their choices. The power of choice granted to a person is so great that one can even choose against the truth.
As we approach the end of a year in which we have made many choices – some better and some less so – we must recognize that the coming year will depend, to a great extent, on the choices we make.
God has given us the framework of observing the commandments and a path for how to live, but He has left it to us to decide what our Shabbat table will look like. How we approach prayer is our choice. What kind of education we give our children and what values we embrace in our homes are our choices.
Perhaps along the way we will sometimes resort to the convenient excuse that everything has already been chosen for us. But anyone who truly desires life will take the power of choice into their own hands – and choose to choose a life of genuine eternal meaning.
