Modern technology has created dimensions of environmental
pollution that our forebears did not know. We have heavy
metals in our air and our drinking water, and particles of
foreign material all around us.
What do we do to counteract these pollutants? We use filters.
We use charcoal to strain our water, various types of mesh to
clean our air and cylindrical metal screens to filter out the
impurities in our motor oil. People who are foolish enough to
smoke use filters on the ends of their cigarettes to remove
tar from the smoke. When the filter is full of the foreign
matter that we are trapping, we change to a fresh filter.
We live in a world that is polluted by foreign influences
that run counter to our Torah values. However, in order to
insure our survival, our loving Father gave us a filter to
screen out these elements. This wonderful filter is the forty
day period between Rosh Chodesh Elul and Yom Kippur. During
this time, we add the 27th chapter in Tehillim, in which
Dovid Hamelech states his desire: to dwell in the House of
Hashem.
Can we even imagine sitting in Hashem's House with all of the
ridiculous baggage of the gentile world that we have carried
around all year? Of course not. We have to use this time to
jettison our personal environmental pollution, to throw it
out and leave it far behind us.
At the height of the intifada, an article appeared in
a prestigious magazine published in the U.S. for the Torah
community. The writer commented that he was attending a
dinner when news of a terror attack here in Jerusalem was
announced.
He reported that the people at the dinner were initially
shocked and saddened, and said a few chapters of Tehillim.
However, within a few minutes, they went back to eating what
he called their "filet mignon."
The point of the article was that world Jewry had become
somewhat insensitive to the horrors that were being
perpetrated against their brothers here in Israel. Of course,
I was greatly bothered by that sad commentary.
But I was equally disturbed by the name he used to describe
the meat that was being served at a banquet being held within
the Torah community. Filet mignon is a cut of beef that comes
from the hind part of the animal, and because of the
difficulty in removing the forbidden part which incorporates
the sciatic nerve and its surrounding fats, people who
observe kashrus do not eat filet mignon even from a kosher,
properly slaughtered animal.
I realize that what they serve at kosher banquets in the
States is not actual filet mignon. It is a boneless cut of
meat from the front part of the animal. My concern is, why on
earth do they use a treife term to describe their
roast? Only to be like the goyim!
We pick up a magazine for the Torah world and read an ad for
clothes. How are the new garments described? "Latest European
styles." Translation: you can dress like the goyim.
Finally, we buy our children music cassette tapes that are
supposed to be educational because the lyrics are verses from
our holy sources. But, and this is a big `but,' why do they
set these very verses to tunes and rhythms derived from the
`music' of the slums of America?
We eat like the goyim, dress like them and now we can
fill our homes with the sounds of goyish music. And
why? because we have allowed non-Torah influences to creep
into our lives and distort our vision.
Let's get back to the words of Dovid Hamelech. After he tells
us that what he desires is to sit in Hashem's house, he goes
on to say that he wants to visit His Sanctuary. Dovid
Hamelech is not content to dwell in Hashem's Presence, as
lofty a goal as that is. He goes further. He wants to get
glimpses, however brief, of the deepest Holiness of
Hashem.
Dovid Hamelech's aspirations are truly noble and that is why
Chazal instituted that we recite these words during this
important time of the year, when we are busy putting our
spiritual houses in order. Each of us has to make every
effort to counteract our outside influences. We have to
realize that we have developed a mindset that runs counter to
the verse in Tehillim, and we have to uproot that way of
thinking.
Instead of yearning to sit in Hashem's House etc., our
generation has over time developed a version that goes more
like this: We have a desire; to sit in Hashem's House, and
also to visit the `sanctuaries' of the goyim, be they
Paris, Rome or Beijing.
There is an old American Jewish joke that goes like this: How
do you know you are in a Jewish neighborhood? Answer: When
you see a pizza shop and a Chinese restaurant on the same
block.
When we take a sip of water and it has a chemical taste, or
we turn on the air conditioner and very little air comes out,
or we pull into a gas station to check the level of our motor
oil and a sticky mess appears on the dipstick, we know it is
time to change the filter.
Awareness of the infiltration of all of the gentile
influences that I have mentioned, and others that you can
easily think of yourselves, should surely be an indication
that it is time to use the rest of Elul and the Asseres Yemei
Tshuva to pull out our ineffective clogged spiritual filters
and replace them with new ones.
We know that we were redeemed from Egypt in the merit of our
ancestors' refusal to adopt gentile names, speech and
clothing. Yes, I know, we do part of that. We name our
children Chanale and Yossi. Great. But we have fallen short
in the other departments.
We have role models from just a few decades ago of people
whose filters worked particularly well. Rebbetzin Ruchoma
Shain wrote about her father, R' Yaakov Yosef Herman
zt'l, whose self-imposed filter against twentieth-
century America where assimilation was running rampant, was,
"What does the Boss want from me?"
When we fill a glass with properly filtered water, we can
truly appreciate its sparkling beauty. Just think. By
filtering out all of our non-Torah influences, we can
daven during the approaching Days of Awe with far
greater clarity and look forward to a bright and beautiful
new year.
