COMMENTARY
November 2020
Federation Star
29
The gift Rabbi Howard S. Herman DD
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hink back to when you were a kid. At various points in your year, someone would give you a gift. It could be for your birthday, or maybe Chanukah, or perhaps a member of your family went on a trip and brought something back for you. When you received the gift, if you didn’t acknowledge it, your parents would instruct, “Say thank you.” When you were very young, one of the first words your parents taught you, other than “please,” was “thank you.” If someone gave you something, the gift giver was entitled to politeness and acknowledgement. After a while, you caught on and you would utter this phrase habitually,
without needing the verbal cue or even thinking about it first. “Thanks” comes up quite a bit this season of the year. I have always found it curious that all of us, not just Jews, are so focused on “thanks” in November. Yet it doesn’t seem to be much of a priority the rest of the year. In fact, not only is it not a priority, we seem to walk around with an attitude of expectation, where everything we receive is simply coming to us as a matter of course. The prevailing attitude seems to be “I’m a good person, I work hard, I play by the rules, so why shouldn’t everything come my way?” It almost seems there is a “yin and yang” philosophy operating. I do this, so I get that. But where is the gratitude? Judaism has always taken a very strong stand on being gracious and thankful for the blessings and bounty that come our way. The Hebrew word for gratitude, “hakarat hatov,” literally means recognizing the good. Practicing gratitude as a
Jewish value means recognizing the good that is already yours. Gratitude, as a Jewish value from the Torah’s point of view, is an integral part of one’s spiritual life. We say Birchat Hamazon (grace after meals) and the motzi before we eat as a way of daily expressing our gratitude for the food we have. In traditional Judaism, we are to say a minimum of 100 blessings every day. We are to stop and say blessings over a myriad of things we encounter daily. Why? Because saying a blessing means you have to physically stop and notice what is there. Our days shouldn’t just be a blur of objects and activities that we simply pass through without noticing. We have real gifts in our lives. Take something simple like eyesight or breathing. My guess is that most of us never give them a second thought until something goes wrong with them. Then we start praying to be able to go back to when they were working properly.
We rarely ever think about the food we buy. But what happens if it is not readily available to us? It is only then, that we begin to see what a blessing it really was. The ideal of gratitude comes from our very name, “Jew.” The word Jew comes from the tribe of Judah, or in Hebrew, “Yehudah,” which means “thanksgiving.” Leah, Judah’s mother, gave him that name since she wanted to express her thanks to God. The very first words of the very first morning prayer “modeh ani” mean “I thank you.” In “Pirke Avot, Ethics of our Ancestors,” the question, “Who is rich?” is asked. The answer: those who rejoice in their own portion. Please don’t relegate being thankful to one day in November. Open your eyes and heart to the abundant blessings that are yours each and every day, with every breath you take. May you be inspired to embrace gratitude every day of your life. Shalom Uvracha Rabbi Howard Herman serves at Naples Jewish Congregation.
Looking for Eden in a pandemic Rabbi Fishel Zaklos
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ell over half a year has passed since our world turned topsyturvy. The question that I wish to pose to us all is, can we find space for gratitude amongst everything we are experiencing? This year has created opportunities for many emotions. And yet, along with the sadness, there is much to be grateful for. Don't you agree? I often think of Adam and Eve — the two people who had everything. They lived in paradise, literally! The world was theirs for the taking. But there was just one tree among millions of others that G-d told them to avoid. They had the whole world, minus one tree, and all they could think about was that one tree. Focusing on the singular forbidden item in their lives was their downfall. Gratitude demands the exact opposite — focus on the beauty, the sweet, the blessings. You might have seen the following anecdote on social media. After a 93-yearold man in Italy recovered from COVID19 in the hospital, he was asked to pay the cost of the ventilator for one day. Upon hearing this, the man began to cry. The doctor comforted him that a bill was not worth crying over. The man's reply made all the doctors tear up. "I don't cry because of the money I have to pay," he said. "I can pay all the
money. I cry because I have been breathing G-d’s air for 93 years, but I never paid for it. It takes €500 to use a ventilator in a hospital for one day. Do you know how much I owe G-d? Why did I take it for granted until now?" I can’t verify the truth of this anecdote, but I choose to share it because of its poignant message. Every day, we can find gratitude for the gift of life itself. The gift of sunshine. The gifts of smell and taste. The gifts of family and friends. We all have many things in our lives that are truly miraculous. There is a wise saying from the Jewish sages, that when it comes to matters of spirituality, we must look at people greater than we are and aspire to uplift ourselves. Yet, when it comes to matters of the physical, we must look at people who have less than us and feel gratitude for what we have. Yes, there is deep pain in our world today. The heart aches for all the suffering in the lives of so many. And yet, in spite of the pain and that which we lack, we can also choose to adopt the attitude that there is still so much light in our world. To focus on what is beautiful and not take the goodness in our lives for granted, for that would weaken our character and the example we wish to present to our children. The focus on what we have is so much better for our health and the quality of our relationships. It brings out a version of ourselves that allows us to live a higher quality of life. Gratitude brings so many benefits. Can we find space for it in our lives? As we awaken each morning, before we do anything, the traditional Modeh Ani
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prayer falls from our lips. With it, we offer thanks to G-d, the living and eternal King for mercifully restoring our souls. Let us concentrate on the commitment we make to G-d as we thank Him for the responsibility He bestows upon us, allowing us
to carry the breath of life in our bodies. Gratitude is an attitude over which we have complete control, and it’s up to us to find our own Eden in the everyday. Rabbi Fishel serves at Chabad Jewish Center.
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