The Rebbe Whose Staff Continues to Blossom

A Jewish man is shipwrecked on a desert island. After 10 years he’s finally rescued by a passing ship. When the rescuers embark on the island, they are surprised to find the man has built himself an entire civilization: golf course, restaurant, and two synagogues. “But since you’re here all alone on the island,” they asked, “why do you have TWO synagogues?” “Because,” replied the man, pointing to the buildings, “that’s the one I go to, and that’s the one I don’t!”

The truth behind an old Russian joke

An old Russian joke tells the story of a peasant with one cow who hates his neighbor because he has two. A sorcerer offers to grant the envious farmer a single wish. “Kill one of my neighbor’s cows!” he demands.

I recently read a paper by two British economists, Daniel Zizzo of Oxford University and Andrew Oswald of Warwick University, suggesting that there is a good bit of truth behind that joke. In fact, truth be told, this discovery predated the world’s existence by two thousand years and was even published some 3,318 years ago in the all-time bestselling manual for life authored by G-d – The Torah.

The Torah’s perspective on envy is clearly defined in it’s narration of Korach’s mutiny against Moses over the position of High Priest which Moses had announced that G-d had designated his brother Aaron to serve [1].

Korach is seen as the father of all quarrelers. His very name is tantamount with cacophony, rebellion and conflict. His infamous mutiny resulted in the death of 14,700, besides for the 250 men who were swallowed by the earth for joining in his rebellion.

What was so severe about his crime that he was deserving of such drastic punishment with such severe outcome of death and destruction?

Jealousy vs. envy

The Torah acknowledges that life is not black and white. There are good persons who can occasionally fall into evil actions just as there are evil persons who are caught red-handed committing a nice heartfelt good deed every once in a while. Of course, between those two there are many different levels (with the Mafia bosses situated somewhere in between them). Because of this acknowledgment, the Torah therefore does speak of concepts such as reward, punishment and repentance as opportunies enabling one to rectify past improper and unbefitting thoughts, speech and actions in one’s life.

One of the unholy and undesirable actions the Torah speaks about is the feelings of jealousy. It is of such utmost importance that one learns to control it that it is listed in the Ten Commandments not too far away from the commandments not to murder, rob, or commit adultery [2].

Jealousy is so hard to control and it can happen so often. For some it is so often that they cannot recall the last day they did not experience it. Yet, the Torah does mention it. It understands that it can happen. It isn’t so far fetched and evil to desire the best, the grandest of luxuries and riches available for yourself and your family. The problem only begins when you covet that which your friend or neighbor has and experience feelings of jealousy towards them for having what they possess as their own, and you don’t.

This is jealousy. It is a common issue which the Torah is willing to acknowledge as a possible sin you might commit and seek repentance for. However, the same Torah acknowledgement cannot be said of envy. Envy is what Korach experienced and what resulted in the earth opening up and devouring Korach and his cohorts alive, a most unnatural and horrific death.

What is the difference between jealousy and envy that the Torah draws such a dramatic line between them by serving such a drastic punishment to a rebellious group guilty of envy?

A person envies someone towards whom he has ill will because of that person’s success, achievements, and the like. He envies something that belongs to someone else and to which he has no right or claim.

The difference

However, jealousy is the feeling of intrusion onto something that belongs to him or upon which he maintains a claim.

An envious attitude is always negative. A jealous outlook is usually negative but it can be positive, depending on its object and inclination. For example, a man may be jealous when another man talks to his wife (negative); however, a free people must jealously guard their liberties if they want to keep them (positive).

The blossoming staff

G-d instructed Moses to conduct a test to prove that Aaron was the chosen High Priest. Each one of the twelve tribal heads placed their staff in the Sanctuary; Aaron, as the head of the tribe of Levi, placed his staff in the ground as well. Each tribal head wrote his name on his staff. The Torah recounts [3]:

“And it shall come to pass that the man’s staff, whom I shall choose, shall blossom; and I will put to rest the murmuring of the children of Israel, whereby they murmur against you.”

Sure enough, the next morning Moses went into the sanctuary and saw that the staff of Aaron for the house of Levi had blossomed, produced budding fruits and bore ripe almonds.

The Chief Rabbi of England, Dr Jonathan Sacks, once posed the following question: Why of all miracles that would serve as proof of to whom the position of High Priest belongs to, did G-d choose the miracle of having a staff blossom? Why not cause the staff to transform into a snake like it did for Aaron previously in the court of Egypt’s Pharaoh? Perhaps a miracle not associated with a staff at all? Why not have his turban change color or perhaps a miracle of a different nature altogether?

And the chief rabbi answered the question as follows: A staff is a dry stick, having long-ago disconnected with the tree that sustained it with life. The miracle was for a dead and desiccated staff to blossom with life, to show what an authentic High Priest is: a man who can look at death or destruction and see it as a catalyst and opportunity for the restoration of life and energy, to be reborn and rebuilt [4].

Herein lays the difference between jealousy and envy. Jealousy is a negative emotion which can be turned into a platform for growth, achievement and personal attainment of happiness and self-satisfaction. Envy, on the other hand, only has the negative element to it. The flaming storm of enviousness will not be doused until its cause is destroyed. There is no positive element to enviousness; it leaves no opportunity for a catalyst of rebirth. Korach didn’t see his jealousy as a reason to work on becoming a greater man like Moses, rather as envy which would not rest until he ousted Moses and replaced his position with himself.

Envy is destructive. It prevents a person from enjoying life. If one’s focus is on other’s success and possessions, it will cause pain and lead to highly counterproductive behavior. The sages listed envy as one of three things which destroy a person (the other two are lust and desire for honor) [5]. To overcome envy, focus on what you have and what you can accomplish in this world. The ultimate that anyone can have in this world is happiness. The secret to happiness is focusing on what you have. And if you are happy, you won’t envy others!

Tribute to a master and teacher of the highest caliber

This upcoming Thursday, June 28-29 (3 Tammuz on the Jewish calendar) marks twelve long and difficult years since the passing of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson.

Like millions of his generation, the Rebbe was personally touched by the Holocaust. His younger brother, DovBer, was shot to death and thrown into a mass grave, as were tens of thousands of other Jews in a series of massacres conducted by the Germans shortly after their occupation of Dnepropetrovsk in fall of 1941. A beloved grandmother and other family members were also killed. The Rebbe’s wife lost her younger sister Sheina, who perished in Treblinka together with her husband and their adoptive son [6].

The most important thing about the Holocaust to the Rebbe was not how we do or do not understand it, nor, even, how we memorialize its victims, but what we do about it. If we allow the pain and despair to dishearten us from raising a new generation of Jews with a strong commitment to their Jewishness, then Hitler’s “final solution” will be realized, G-d forbid. But if we rebuild, if we raise a generation proud and secure in their Jewishness, we will have triumphed.

This is exactly what the Rebbe proceeded to do. Appointed by his father-in-law to head the educational and social arms of Chabad, he set in motion the programs which, over the next half-century, would herald the renaissance of Jewish life in the post-holocaust world, truly setting a catalyst for rebirth and rebuilding spanning all four corners of the globe.

From the Rebbe’s very own writings to a Holocaust survivor:

“…To remember is indeed an imperative and a duty – particularly in light of the growing campaign to forget and to make forgotten. And yet, remembering is only one part of the task that rests upon us. The other, and far more crucial, part is to actively counteract Hitler’s so-called “final solution”…

Your first duty is to live: to assume an ordered life, a married life, to establish a Jewish home and a Jewish family. This will most definitively underscore Hitler’s defeat: that not only did he not succeed in eliminating a certain Vishnitzer Chassid, but that this Vishnitzer Chassid will raise up children and grandchildren, generations upon generations of Vishnitzer Chassidim. And I don’t mean this as figure of speech – though it is less important if he be a Vishnitzer, or a Lubavitcher, or simply a Jew who lives his life in accordance with the Torah and its precepts…”

The Rebbe epitomized the essential leader and High Priest of the Jewish People. In every incident of death or destruction he discovered a way to exploit from it every possibility to rebuild, reconstruct and continue to be alive with purpose and achievement.

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Footnotes:

[1] Numbers 16:1-34.
[2] Exodus 20:14.
[3] Numbers 17:16-24.
[4] I wish to thank Rabbi Yosef Y. Jacobson for sharing the Chief Rabbi’s most inspiring words with me.
[5] Ethics of the Fathers 4:28.
[6] Much thanks to Chabad.org for the information presented here of the Rebbe’s connection to the holocaust.