Weekly Dvar Torah: Love Your Fellow as Yourself

When the pagan came to Hillel asking to convert on the condition that he teach him the entire Torah while standing on one foot, Hillel responded; “What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. This is the entire Torah; the rest is commentary.”

On the verse in Torah which says; ואהבת לרעך כמוך = Love your fellow like yourself, Rabbi Akiva says this is a fundamental principle of our Holy Torah.

Basically, in different words, both sages tell us how fundamental loving your fellow is to the Torah.

This idea of commanding a person to love someone is fascinating, how can you command someone to love anything, isn’t love an emotional expression of how you feel about someone? So how can there be such a commandment, is it possible to force someone to love Kugel, when he can’t stand to eat potatoes, or noodles for that matter?

Let’s explore the idea of Ahavas Yisroel = Love of your fellow Jew.

Chassidus teaches that when you meditate on the idea that my body is just that, my body, and my body is just my egocentric selfish me, but the real me is my Neshama, my soul, my spirit, then I can see how every Jew has an identical Neshama, we come from the same place, we have the same father, and therefore we are actually brothers, then it is very easy to come to love every single Jew.

I once knew a kid who hated spinach, those were the days when the government dumped tons of spinach onto every school kitchen, Popeye the sailor man got those muscles from eating spinach.

This kid hated the smell of spinach, and when spinach was served he stayed out of the lunchroom.

Until a mother’s helper met him outside, boychikel why aren’t you at lunch? The kid said, I hate spinach!

Lovingly the woman took him in and created some concoction that was made of spinach, but not noticeable, the boy gulped it down to the last drop.

The caring lady asked the boy, so how did you like this dish? He said I really loved it, I never had such good food here in school.

Finally, she revealed to him that this was a spinach dish.

Really, why did you trick me into eating spinach when I told you that I hate spinach?

Because spinach is very healthy, and if you would realize how healthy it was, the smell wouldn’t bother you, and you would enjoy it every time just like you enjoyed it now.

Ever since, spinach became this boy’s favorite food.

I know that it’s a silly analogy, but the message is clear, when you think about it, and you dig deeper, then you get to the source, all the externalities disappear, the looks don’t matter, the smell isn’t noticed, you realize that at its core every soul comes from the same place, Hashem is our father, and we are all brothers and sisters, so of course I love my siblings.

And the commandment is to meditate on this point.

Hillel went to the source, he saw every soul where it comes from, and he taught that the Torah is all about revealing that essence, therefore loving your fellow is what it’s all about, the rest of the Torah is there to help implement this love, to reveal this essence of the soul.

Rabbi Akiva took it down to the next level, because you love yourself, and you love your fellow because he is like you, then you want him to live a good life just like you, this is a fundamental principle of the Torah, because with love you will bring him closer to the sweet ways of Torah, and then also externally he will be like you and there will be no separations or divisions.

That’s why the Rebbe taught us that the three loves, love of Hashem, love of Torah and love of your fellow Jew, are inseparable, and this motto is at the heart of the Rebbe’s Chassidim and Shluchim.

And they are there in fire and in water, in the heat and the cold, in war and in peace, always there to stretch out a helping hand to every Jew, whoever he is, wherever he is, and whatever his needs.

Pass that spinach bourekas please,
Gut Shabbos

Rabbi Yosef Katzman