Dear Community,
BringThemHomeNOW – Day 342
In these precious days of Elul leading up to Rosh Hashanah, we know and we are told how important it is to focus on spiritual self-reflection, self-appraisal, and self-correction.
But the process requires time and patience and a concerted, determined effort.
And it’s September, and our minds are anywhere but here.
One word jumped out at me this year (as they often do), and I wanted to share it with you from this week’s parasha, because I believe it is what might be called a Freudian slip of the most majestic, Divine intention. In other words: not a slip at all:
כִּ֤י תִבְנֶה֙ בַּ֣יִת חָדָ֔שׁ וְעָשִׂ֥יתָ מַעֲקֶ֖ה לְגַגֶּ֑ךָ וְלֹֽא־תָשִׂ֤ים דָּמִים֙ בְּבֵיתֶ֔ךָ כִּֽי־יִפֹּ֥ל הַנֹּפֵ֖ל מִמֶּֽנּוּ׃
When you build a new house, you shall make a parapet for your roof, so that you do not bring bloodguilt on your house if anyone should fall from it. (Deut. 22:8)
Firstly, this idea is standalone. Appearing as a one-verse paragraph, along with several other one-verse paragraphs in this week’s parasha, it stands on its own merit.
But the verse has several grammatical and logical issues.
Firstly, the word “Ki” (meaning “when” rather than “if”) appears twice; translated as: “when you build a house” and then “if anyone should fall from it”.
But what if the understanding was reversed: “If you build a house” and “when anyone should fall from it” (God forbid!).
Why are these words – “when” and “if” – used in this way, and is there a correct understanding of which one is conditional and which one is inevitable – or are they perfectly interchangeable?
The Abarbanel (Rabbi (Don) Isaac ben Judah Abarbanel; 1437 Lisbon – 1508 Venice) has an extraordinary eye for detail and he focuses on the true translation of the verse.
The last four words of the verse are: כִּֽי־יִפֹּ֥ל הַנֹּפֵ֖ל מִמֶּֽנּוּ׃ – which actually mean “when the faller falls from it [the roof]”. Not “if anyone should”, but “because the faller [a person already prone to falling] WILL fall”.
What the Torah is telling us is that there are people who are vulnerable. They are “prone to falling” in life; finding things difficult, becoming overwhelmed, doing things that are self-sabotaging.
It is not just for the careful that we should build these parapets around our houses, but because there are people who find life challenging, or are facing temporary challenges and need additional resources and help to get them through.
They are not, by habit, people who fall. But if they find themselves in a precarious situation – on a proverbial or metaphorical roof – even if it wasn’t their fault. It is not their time for life to come to an end, although it may happen, but it won’t be because we have not built our structures with the protections needed to just care for them.
This is Abarbanel’s message, and my message to our community.
We are in a time where we are all on a precarious roof. We feel uneasy and not fully secure as a people, as we grapple with the challenges we face as a Nation.
But the Torah is saying that – built-in to the process of building and aiming upwards – is the understanding that we need to prepare ourselves in the planning process, so we have our own, pre-fabricated safety net, that will catch us if we should slip.
Sending all of us strength and reassurance that community is the parapet around the house we have built.
May we have the strength to stand firm, because we have already built it to hold us together.
Shabbat shalom uMevorach