Table Talk from the desk of Rabbi Alexander Seinfeld
December 15-16, 2023 • 4 Teves 5784 • Mikeitz (Gen 41-44).
The purpose of this blog is to beautify Shabbat table conversation ... please print & share.
Here's a three-pete of the theme of "learning from everyone"...
(We began two weeks ago with Christopher Hitchens and last week added the presidents of Harvard, MIT and Penn.)
This week: the dastardly Greeks!
First question for your table, What can we learn from the Greeks?
Today is of course the climactic eighth day of Chanukah - "Zos Chanukah" - when we can lock in the potentiality of Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Sukkot which are all "sevens" at the level of Simchas Torah which is an "eight"....
What in the world does that mean, you ask?
There is a big myth about Chanukah that it's about our triumph over Hellenism.
Judaism good, Hellenism bad. We won, they lost, let's eat latkes.
Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong....
Hellenism is not only good, it's necessary.
Here's a good Jewish vocab term to share with your table: hidur - pronounced "hee-dure".
It means beautification.
There is a mitzvah to do every mitzvah with a hidur. That is, to do it in a beautiful way. When you light Menorah, use the nicest menorah you can afford. When you give tzedakah, give it with a smile and kind word. When you build a guest room, make it handicap accessible.
Get the picture? This is the way Jews incorporates the seven into our eightness.
Don't shun the seven, let it shine - but don't let the seven (the physical beauty) be your end, it's an agent to achieve the eight (the spiritual purpose of every mitzvah).
Challenge question for your table: Name one mitzvah that you do every day that you could do with more hidur?
There is a mitzvah to do every mitzvah with a hidur. That is, to do it in a beautiful way. When you light Menorah, use the nicest menorah you can afford. When you give tzedakah, give it with a smile and kind word. When you build a guest room, make it handicap accessible.
Get the picture? This is the way Jews incorporates the seven into our eightness.
Don't shun the seven, let it shine - but don't let the seven (the physical beauty) be your end, it's an agent to achieve the eight (the spiritual purpose of every mitzvah).
Challenge question for your table: Name one mitzvah that you do every day that you could do with more hidur?
Happy Zos Chanukah and
Shabbat Shalom,
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