Acharei Mot(Leviticus 16-18)

It's not so bad!

Let's start by asking an uncomfortable question: "What is the worst thing you can say to your children?"

Why ask such a question? Because if you understand this, you will understand what is the best thing to say to your children.

Things like "you are stupid" might pop up into your head. But worse than telling your children they are stupid, is telling them you don't love them.

What's worse than that? Think about it...

That you hate them.

Why is it so bad?

Because if you tell your children that you hate them, then why should they try to please you? And if everything you do for them is perceived as bad for them, then it's tantamount to telling them to give up trying.

So ... what's the best thing you can tell your children? Obviously, that you love them. Parents intuitively know this, and must constantly reinforce this message. Your children must understand that everything you do for them is only for their good, even if it's painful.

Yet what complicates this dynamic is that children may subconsciously want to believe that you hate them -- as a way to justify their own disobedience.

THE ABSOLUTE BEST

Now let's go one step further.

What is worse than telling your children that you hate them?

That God hates them!

Can you imagine such a thing!? To tell your children that the Creator and Ruler of this universe hates them, that their lives are an oversight, that God sets forth every day with the express desire only to make their lives impossible. Is there any greater torture a parent can inflict on a child?!

So now you understand how important it is to teach children that God loves them. Can there be any more meaningful concept?!

"LIVE BY THEM"

This week's Torah portion teaches one of the most meaningful instructions: "Carry out the commandments and live by them" (Leviticus 18:5). Maimonides explains that this means when a Jew is threatened with his life to forsake a Mitzvah, he is obligated to break the Mitzvah to save his life. This is true with every Mitzvah except three: murder, illicit relations and idol worship. In other words, you can eat pork in order to save your life, but you may not murder to save your life.

This idea is rather obvious, especially when it comes to murder and illicit relations. But many are confused about the requirement to die rather than bow down to an idol -- "After all, I don't believe it. I'm just bowing to it!"

In truth, if all you were doing was simply bowing down to the idol, then the Torah would not say that for every other important mitzvah you should be willing to break, but not this. In other words, you are not just bowing down.

What is idol worship? It is the belief that rather than One Supreme Being directing the world for my good, it is a multitude of forces which are playing against me, with absolutely no regard for my well-being.

We said before that if God hates me, then everything that happens is bad for me. With the idea that God hates me, He constantly sends things to make my life impossible.

Similarly, with idol worship, competing and contradictory forces run the world, with no thought to anyone's betterment. If whatever happens is a product of random irrelevant forces, then everything that happens is -- with all probability -- going to be bad for me!

Now we understand why idol worship is so terrible. It is almost equivalent to the worst thing you could possibly tell your children!

GOD LOVES YOU

"Okay, rabbi. So why die instead of worshipping idols? Just believe in your heart that God runs the world -- and save your life by bowing down to the idol?"

Think about it. You said that on one hand you believe that God runs the world in your heart, but on the other hand you are bowing down to the guy with the gun so he won't kill you! But if you really believe that God runs the world, then no harm should come to you for doing the right thing! So why bow down?!

You can't tell your children that you love them, when you don't. You can say the words, but they don't mean anything. Similarly, you can't tell your children that God loves them, when you don't believe that He loves you!

Belief in God means that what happens to you is not the result of some random act, or even a malicious or uncaring person, but is directed by God Himself. You may not like it. But realize that it is even more meaningful than when you do something for your child that they don't like!

It's not easy to live with this idea -- that all "bad" things that happen to you are really "good." But it's a lot easier than believing that all bad things are really bad!

BRAINSTORMING QUESTIONS TO PONDER

Question 1: How could parents better communicate love to their children?

Question 2: In what ways do we act as though random forces run the world? How does this affect us emotionally?

Question 3: Think of an experience in your life when some "bad" thing happened, but ultimately turned out for the good. How did this affect your sense that God loves you?