Three Shakespearean Questions

Table Talk from the desk of Rabbi Alexander Seinfeld

July 12-13, 2024 • 7 Tamuz 5784 • Chukas (Num 18-23).

The goal of this email is a life-changing Shabbat table ... please share.

Here are three Shakespearean questions for your table:

1. Hamlet Act III, Scene 1 ("To be or not to be") is possibly the most famous poem in history. How much of it can you recite by heart?

2. What is the correct punctuation of the phrase, "To be or not to be"?

3. In a nutshell, what's the theme of the poem?

The answer to Question #2 is: a comma after the first "to be" and a colon after the second one. As in:

To be, or not to be: that is the question:

Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer

The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,

Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,

And by opposing end them?

The answer to Question 3 is that it's a meditation on death, and he decides that the only thing that prevents a troubled person like himself from committing suicide is fear of death.

But try asking this: What's so fearsome about death?

Our tradition teaches that the only thing to fear about death itself is the two movies that they're going to show you. 

The first movie is the film of your life.

Imagine viewing a movie of your entire life - every great thing that you did and every dumb thing you did, including the dumbest one of all - wasting time.

The second movie is the film of what your life could have been had you made different choices. Especially if you had wasted less time.

What you could have achieved — intellectually, creatively, in your relationships, in your legacy.

For some, the pain of confronting those squandered opportunities will be great.

Others won't have such a hard time, because they read this email, shared it with everyone they knew, and started living every day to the fullest, every day until...

Good night sweet prince:  

  And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!

Shabbat Shalom 

(Yes, the pic is clic-able, as always...)

This week's Table Talk also appears on my Times of Israel blog.

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