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Orchard of Delights
In one of his profoundest teachings, the Arizal describes the
cataclysmic event known as “the breaking of the vessels.” During
the creation process the immature vessels were not strong enough to
contain the primordial light, so they shattered. Our world is called
Olam Hatikkun (the World of Rectification) for it is composed of
a previous world’s broken vessels. Humanity’s mission is to repair
and redeem each of the shattered vessels, which enclothes a trapped
spark of light in need of repair and redemption.
Upon deeper reflection we see that garments simultaneously conceal
and reveal. The Hebrew root word for the word “olam” (world) means
“to hide.” Paradoxically, just like garments, the world both reveals
and conceals God. The world and the laws of nature hide God so well
that His presence is not at all obvious, yet to a spiritually attuned
soul, the beauty and awesome precision of nature and its laws reveal
the handiwork of the Divine.
Significantly, the holiday of Purim usually falls in close proximity
to the annual Shabbat reading of Tetzaveh. Many commentators have
pointed out that God’s name does not appear in the Scroll of Esther,
which is read on Purim. They take this to symbolize the fact that
God’s Providence was hidden in the historical narrative. Only after
the miraculous salvation had come to pass did the people realize how
involved God had been behind the scenes, leaving nothing to chance.
In fact, when delving deeply into the text and the commentaries,
one realizes that God’s hand was behind every detail of the unfolding
story.
Parenthetically, this dynamic of God being hidden and yet revealed
in the Purim story is reflected by the custom of dressing in costumes
and masks on Purim. On the one hand, masks or costumes hide their
wearers, yet, on the other hand, wearing costumes allows people to
reveal certain aspects of themselves that they would either never have
the opportunity to reveal or would, under ordinary circumstances,
be afraid to express. This custom is also connected to Queen Esther
concealing her nationality when she was chosen as queen, only to
reveal it later when it would elicit the greatest effect.
In the portion of Terumah, we discussed how the cherubim
on the ark allude to the cherubim guarding the Garden of Eden.
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Mishpatim
This interplay between the physical and the spiritual is expressed
very clearly by Shabbat. According to the Zohar, Shabbat is called
“a day of the soul,” a time to feel and experience reality in a more
spiritual manner than is typically possible during the hectic six
workdays. We might naturally assume initially that Shabbat’s all
encompassing sense of spirituality would demand a de-emphasis of
the physical in order to allow the spiritual to take precedence. Yet
we dress in our finest clothes, set the table with our best dinnerware,
adorn the house with flowers, eat three festive meals where we linger
around the table, and enjoy a longer nighttime sleep and often an
afternoon nap. Furthermore, the Kabbalah teaches that the most
appropriate time for intimate marital relations is Shabbat evening.
From this we can see that far from being a hindrance to spirituality,
the physical activities of Shabbat are the very material used to
engender spirituality. When performed with the proper mindset, they
are raised and infused with their enclothed spiritual essences. Yet as
the Slonimer Rebbe explained, this can only be truly successful if we
first purify ourselves of our baser attractions to the physical.
This notion of Shabbat and of the interplay between the physical
and the spiritual is also reflected in Yom Kippur. The Torah refers to
Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year, as “Shabbat Shabbaton”
(the Shabbat of Shabbats; Leviticus 16:31). On this day we refrain
from any connection to the physical world by not eating, drinking,
bathing, anointing ourselves with oils, wearing comfortable leather
shoes, or engaging in marital relations. This represents the first
stage of clarifying our relation to the physical. When this has been
accomplished, we are elevated to the higher level of employing the
physical on an ongoing basis to reach great spiritual heights.
Having deepened our understanding of the interplay between
the physical and the spiritual, we can now return to the incident
under discussion. Whether or not the leaders’ eating and drinking
was deemed appropriate by the commentators depends greatly
on whether those involved had in fact reached the second level as
described by the Slonimer Rebbe. Onkelos and Ramban apparently
concur that their motivations were indeed pure. Rashi and Midrash
Tanchuma were obviously not convinced that this was the case
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