Reading With A Good Eye

Before we get to today’s essay, I’d like to take a minute and ask you to help us do a mitzvah. A maggid is a wandering Jewish storyteller. Devorah Spilman (a storyteller for 30 years) & her husband, me, Jacob Spilman (her manager & techie) will hit the road Aug 1–23 with our 2 kids (helping as roadies) to tell traditional & original Jewish tales. Storytelling is a small, intimate performance art. It’s also a great way to spread the type of information we provide in this blog in a fun, relaxed and accessible manner. But, we want to reach a wider audience for my wife’s stories through the Internet. Maggidal Mystery tour will 1) produce a CD of 5 Jewish Folktales & Stories told by Devorah 2) provide live performances in Boise, Salt Lake City, Boulder, & Topeka 3) publish podcasts of each performance, plus blog a video diary of our journey to each venue & podcast stories in the van. Funding pays for tour expenses, equipment needed to podcast the diary, stories in the van & live performances. The time we have to meet our financial goal is extremely limited now. Our funding platform is Kickstarter. Please click on the following link to Kickstarter to go there now and donate: http://kck.st/p8ZutC. If you love Traditional Jewish Stories, you’ll love the rewards you find for donating. Please help out. Thanks.

———————————————————-

There is a tradition that Elijah the Prophet, or Eliyahu, wanders the world often disguised as a beggar. In his wanderings, only those who merit seeing Eliyahu will see him for who he truly is. Unfortunately, most of us, me included, would probably turn Eliyahu away seeing only an anonymous, forlorn, sometimes ragged, even disgusting beggar. I learned from Rabbi Shlomo Carelebach that the reason why this occurs is that when we look at Eliyahu, he reflects back to us who we are.

This is why Chazal teaches us to see with an “ayin tov” (Hebrew lit. a good eye). That means that whoever we encounter, we should not only give them the “benefit of a doubt’, but we should go one step further and see the spark of divinity that is trapped in their forms. Once we see their spark of divinity we are required to make an additional effort and treat them as God’s child. When we are able to do this, we merit seeing Eliyahu.

When I approach a holy text, I have to remind myself constantly to read the text with an ayin tov. It’s too easy to read a text from my own perspective. All too often, statements we read from our greatest teachers sound nonsensical to us, quaint, unscientific, antiquated, racist, preachy, obtuse, ambiguous, superstitious, or misogynistic. Too late in life, I have come to understand that it is precisely these statements that serve to turn us away from level of sod (the hidden, deepest meaning of the text) addressed in the text. Like Eliyahu, the text mirrors the reader. It is only until you see the spark of divinity in the author; it’s only when you give up the limitations of your own thinking, that the level of sod reveals itself.

In the western academic tradition, we value the democracy of the debate. Everyone has an equal voice. And, in the common educational and political discourse of humanity, this is appropriate. As human beings, we are all equal in God’s eyes. However, when we view our individual selves, we need to recognize that there are others who are more accomplished than we are. Unfortunately, as Chazal says, a person can’t let himself out of his own jail. (Barachot) It’s difficult to tell who is wiser since I judge them by my own standards.

And so, when I approach a text these days, if I come across a passage that creates a negative feeling inside of me, I try to stop myself and ask: “This text has lasted longer than I have been alive. Why has this author’s words endured this long? From the author’s perspective, from his time and place, what is valuable? What would this mean in the author’s time and place? How is he pushing me away from the sod? Is he getting me angry? Bored? Inviting me to be too lazy to follow his sources? Is he being literal or metaphorical? How do the metaphors operate to give the reader a context for understanding the meta-message?

Albert Einstein once wrote: “Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods.” If this is the case, I must provide HaShem with a great deal of mirth. However, when HaShem chooses to reveal the level of Sod to me, the pleasure of that spark of light being revealed is indescribable.