Hidden Messages

Hidden Messages The other day I was having a conversation with a friend of mine and the topic turned to "charity collectors." These are people who are down on their luck and have to resort to leaving their homes (in our communities these folks are more often than not coming from Israel) and suffering the indignity of traveling around to various Jewish communities, going door-to-door, and asking for a handout. My friend was telling me about an aunt of his who graciously opens her home in NY to all sorts of Jews who need a place to stay while in town raising funds. One particular guest approached her, explained his story, and asked if he could stay for a period of time. Turns out he was not as honest as he portrayed himself to be, and the woman of the house wanted to ask him to leave. She approached him and confronted him with her complaints and, to her utter shock and disbelief, he just ignored her. Instead of even having the decency to engage in conversation or even to deny her claim he simply turned around and started walking away from her and around the house. She followed after him and continued talking to his back, but he just went about his business. She followed him into the kitchen (her kitchen, mind you) where he calmly opened up the cabinets and began taking out a frying pan and spatula and a carton of eggs from the fridge. While she tried to get his attention he silently went about making himself an omelet, cracking open the eggs, putting them in the pan, turning on the flame and frying his egg. Talk about good old fashioned chutzpah! This woman, who was so kind and generous to him (and so many others) by opening her home to perfect strangers simply could not believe how brazen this impudent fellow was. I am not sure how the story ended (I would hope she eventually got him to leave the house, although I highly doubt he cleaned the frying pan or put away the eggs before he did) but a thought occurred to me while listening to this bizarre tale. We human beings, and particularly in our role as G-d’s Chosen People, are also strangers in a foreign place. We are born into this world and inhabit it for the decades that we are blessed to live for. During this time we are really “guests” in a home that belongs to G-d. As Creator of the world, G-d is the de facto owner of the world as well. In fact, in our Amidah prayer we refer to G-d as the Owner of everything by virtue of the fact that He created it all. We are put into this world with specific roles, leadership and missions as well as directives (the mitzvot) which serve as the “house rules” by which to live. Too often we are derelict in our duties, don't follow the “rules,” and G-d wishes to talk to us about it. True, we may not have the benefit of direct communication from G-d, but He “speaks” to us through other channels. Torah literature teaches us that when calamities befall a person, or the world at large, they are to be understood as messages from G-d that He wants us to improve our behavior and our loyalty to Him. Since the end of the first Temple era, G-d removed the gift of prophecy from our world, and there are no longer people who can receive direct communication from Him. In the absence of such a phenomenon we can never truly point to a specific message or ideal that G-d wants us to improve upon. But one thing we can know for certain. He wants something. He wants us to take the events that we see happening around us and use it as inspiration to make some sort of improvement in our spiritual lives. It may be one thing for one person, another thing for some else and yet a third thing for the next fellow. The common denominator is that everyone should take some step towards self improvement. So when events happen, be they Covid, catastrophes in Meron, rocket attacks in Israel, hate crimes rooted in anti-Semitism or any other troubling event, let us all remember that these are G-d’s way of getting our attention as guests in His House. Let us put down the frying pan, put the eggs on hold and stop for a minute to have the respect of a conversation with our gracious Homeowner. In that merit may we be blessed with a very long stay as guests in this home of ours, complete with eggs and everything else to enjoy! Shabbat Shalom, Rabbi Yosef Koval