A sauce of much anxiety by Rabbi Y R Rubin

A sauce of much anxiety

By Harav Y. R. Rubin Shlita

Well, for me, it was tomato ketchup; it always was and still is. When we were youngsters and going off to yeshiva in Eretz Yisroel for the first time, we “Americana bochurim” were warned that in the Holy Land food was not all that plentiful. We were told that we should take with us ample supplies of our favourite staples because ‘you just won’t be able to nip out to the local grocery for things.’

Hence some schlepped with them bottles of coffee, others enough tissues to paper the whole of Jerusalem, while Master Rubin took bottles of ketchup, without which life would seem unbearable. This anecdote is to show that every Yid, no matter how isolated he may think he is, carries a little “home-town golus” with him. Americans have their shtick, as do Jews from every other land. We schlep our little golus with us, wondering how others get by without those little things that seem so vital to us.

“Yidden have been sought after by many a power, only to be despised when their use was no longer needed”

Unfortunately, golus isn’t always confined to a bottle of ketchup.  For most of our existence we carry some of the golus attitudes as well. This isn’t always a bad thing. Americans have a “can-do” attitude that allows them to undertake projects that seem otherwise impossible. The English are reserved, masters of good manners. The list can go on; suffice it to say that part of us is where we come from. The problem is that there are negative aspects that also seep into our outlook in life and sometimes the golus in which we live can threaten to engulf us.

The Kotzker Rebbe was wont to say: “It took one moment to take the Yidden out of Egypt, and forty years to take the Egypt out of the Yidden.” Egypt, and all temporal powers, gain control over others by means that are not always obvious; rather, what they do is done below the radar, beneath our range of view. Those who take the time to learn the vital parshios at the beginning of Shemos, will see the incremental steps the wicked Pharaoh took to capture our forefathers, and then proceeded to treat them with barbaric disregard.

In this week’s parsha we read the phrase “Mitachas sivlos Mitzrayim“. Hashem says, “I shall redeem you from their (Egypt’s) service… The Sfas Emes interprets this as: I will take you out of your tolerance and complacency towards Egypt. You cannot expect to be redeemed from Egypt if you are tolerant of your situation. This is the first step towards leaving Egypt.

Likewise, if we truly want to have our bitter “golus Edom” to come to an end, it cannot happen if we have become tolerant, complacent, and even comfortable with our golus.

So how do we accomplish this? Where do we get the ability to take the ketchup without the rest of the baggage?  The Sfas Emes gives us an insight whilst explaining a passage about Yaakov Ovinu.  He says that there is something special in the Torah’s choice of the words Vayechi Yaakov be’eretz Mitzrayim, “Yaakov lived in Egypt.”  The word vayechi comes from the same Hebrew root as the words chiyus and chaim. These words call forth a special importance; they signify true living, that is living connected to one’s roots to Hashem.

The greatest question here is: how was Yaakov able to experience spiritual chiyus, life, vibrancy in Egypt, which was a country well known to be a swamp of impurity? This, says the Sfas Emes, was possible because Yaakov’s greatest quality was emess, truthfulness. By clinging to truth, despite the mire surrounding him, he was able to find spiritual chaim, life.

The strategy seems to be that when living in golus one must decipher what is truth and what is just worldly vapour. The acts of our forefathers are a sign for their children, and Yaakov’s ability to stay focused no matter where in golus he was placed, is the lesson that we, his children, must absorb if we are going to survive. We can choose to flounder in the murky waters of a golus attitude or we can choose to focus on what is emess.

The choice is there for us to consider. It is easy to fool oneself, but the truth will still be true. We can accept the lies of those seeking to corrupt our values, or become attached to Hashem’s will. The golus will end, and the Yiddishe nation will be vindicated. The question that remains is: where will we as individuals be?

The Voideslover Rav, zt”l once told me, “A Yid should never be tied down to one place emotionally. I still have my Polishe passport; who knows what Hashem wants with us?” His words ring truer even more so today: today’s friend is tomorrow’s enemy.

Yidden have been sought after by many a power, only to be despised when their use was no longer needed. I live in England, a land that threw its Jews out in the 13^th Century only to allow them back in some four hundred years later. In the time when no Jews were in this fair land, a well-known writer penned the play called The Merchant of Venice about an evil Jew who sought to kill someone who owed him money. This writer never even saw a Jew, yet he wrote this calumny about our people. The play remains popular, even today.

Yes, I will worry about my ketchup and others will be concerned over their favourite aspect of golus, but hopefully, like Yaakov, we will accept the truth of what and where we are, and in this way remain alive spiritually.