Week of Tragedy - Boston Bombing

The tragic events of the Boston Marathon are quite unnerving and shake us to the core.  How should one respond to such news and how do we deal with such calamity? The horrible cruelty perpetrated as innocent lives are taken, maimed and changed forever is hard to imagine. Members of the Newtown massacre who were at the marathon, how do they cope?  If that wasn’t enough, another major calamity happened this week when the Fertilizer factory exploded killing up to 60 people and injuring 200.

How do we respond? What are the answers? There are no simple answers, and in fact to any of these events, no answer given will suffice. To Paraphrase our Rabbis in Pirkei Avos – silence is the best medicine. Like Aharon Hakohen’s response ,  Vayidom Aharon,  and Aharon was silent, when his sons died from the fire of heaven, the only response we have is silence.

Silence can mean many things. It may mean holding back anger and pain and it may mean accepting G-D’s judgement. It also means that that which makes me human, the power of speech, is put on hold, because to be able to respond is almost not possible. It is beyond our ability, it’s superhuman.

In an article about another devastating story this week,  Shoshana Stern, a 12 year old girl, daughter of Rabbi Mike & Denise Stern, was killed when she was hit by a car while skateboarding home. Denise Stern is quoted as asking the detective how the driver was doing and that she hoped the driver’s life was not ruined. “We are people of faith”, she told the detective. That faith is the faith of silence.  It’s the understanding that there’s more we don’t understand than we do understand.

We must continue to find strength in each other during these difficult times. May we strengthen our faith with Hashem, and continue to push forward, using the character trait of Netzach, Endurance (the Sefirah of the week), to do what’s right, with faithfulness.

Flying Bagged Passenger

This is NOT a TOY!

Most of us have seen the warning labels on plastic bags, especially the ones that are wrapped around toys. They say, "This is not a Toy!"  I've wondered often, what prompted such a stern warning. It seems that every warning label has a story (read: lawsuit) attached to it. Yes, I understand if the warning said “May cause suffocation, keep out of reach of children”, but a Toy? My theory, (snope it if you’d like) is that someone came home one day with a  gift. “Kid’s look, what I got you…”, “Wow daddy, what is it?” says the excited little ones.  “Well kids,” says daddy, “It’s a little race car! Oh and what’s this it comes with a bonus toy plastic bag! What a bargain.”

This week, the news got a shot of an airline passenger in a plastic bag. The photo itself is fascinating, with the potential of so many captions. Many have wondered how he’s able to breathe, and others were wondering what he was actually doing! Could it be that he was so concerned about airborne disease, or perhaps he’s just someone else’s carry-on luggage?

After doing some research, I found the reason for the passenger’s bagginess. The man was a scrupulous kohen who was concerned and knew that the plane would be flying over Jewish cemeteries. The Talmud in Eruvin 30b-31a (daf yomi this week), discusses the concept of an Ohel Zaruk, a moveable (enclosed) tent. The scenario that is posed is whether a kohen can enter a cemetery in a box in order to pick up food for an eruv. The Rambam, (Maimonides), follows the view that a moveable enclosure does not protect a person who is above something that can make him impure. With regards to the impurity of a cemetery, the impurity rises to the heaven.   It is for this reason that El-Al has modified its flight paths many times in order to accommodate kohanim. Although the airplane does not constitute a separation, the bag that surrounds the kohen would create the separation from the unwanted Tumah (impurity).

The concept of a sealed bag is used in other areas of halacha as well. For example, with regards to geniza, or the burial of sacred objects, one is required to put a Sefer Torah and Tefillin in a sealed klei cheres, earthenware jug, in order to slow the decomposition process. Nowadays, we put them in a plastic bag.

How does he breathe? The same scenario in the Talmud, on Eruvin 31a, explains that the kohen can grab the food with a stick as long as the hole, from where the stick is held, is less than one tefach wide (approximately 3.5 inches). Based on this, the airline passenger would be able to have many small holes in the bag, which were at least 10 inches apart from each other and with the size of each hole less than 3.5 inches.

The big question really is what was your reaction when you saw that picture? Confused, embarrassed, proud, inquisitive or angry? What would you have felt had you been on that plane? Would you have felt that he was making a Chilul Hashem (descration of G-D’s name), a Kiddush Hashem (Sanctification of G-D’s name), or would you have simply leaned over to the man and shown him the warning sign on the bag?

Comedian Avi Lieberman has a great line, “if someone is more religious than us, he’s meshugah, and if they are less religious than us, they’re a goy. “  The first half usually happens when we see something that’s out of our comfort zone of religion and just goes too far. It’s important to stop and think for a moment as to why we live and why we do the things we do. It may go against our nature, but it is important to see someone else’s meshugenah tendencies as another approach to doing things right, for the right reasons.   Before we judge and mock others’ religious practices, just imagine what the ‘goy’ below you thinks of you!

Ps. I found the picture to my original theory. Taken in a Wal-Mart: