The Cutting Room Floor

by Susan Weinberg

The period from Pesach to Shavuot is a time of reflection and study. This period lasts 49 days and traditionally is a time to study the Pirkei Avot, Ethics of the Fathers. These are the sayings of the rabbis, many of which we know well. Perhaps one of the best known is Hillel's statement "If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And when I am for myself, what am 'I'? And if not now, when?" (Avot 1:14).

The section that we turned our attention to is called the Kinyan Torah which deals with the acquisition or receiving of Torah. It is from the time of the Mishnah, but was not included in the Mishnah. These are the clippings that ended up on the cutting room floor, but found a new home in the Pirkei Avot and form the last chapter of this section.

The Beraita introduces the passage by asserting that the Torah is greater than the priesthood or the kingship; for the kingship is acquired by 30 qualities and the priesthood by 24, but the Torah tops them all with 48 requirements (handout-Kinyan Torah). Not only do these differ in numeric count, but the nature of the requirements also differs. The priesthood and kingship are hereditary and are methods of political or religious control governing a finite period. The Torah has an infinite time frame, is subject to individual interpretation and represents collective knowledge and values. The priesthood and kingship requirements are relational in nature. The priesthood addresses what the people are required to give. The kingship speaks to the privileges of his office. The Torah by contrast addresses the things we must do to receive Torah.

With that introduction we began to explore this list of 48 criteria and identified some that we found particularly intriguing. We broke the group into two circles, one inside the other and facing each other paired off to discuss a selection of criteria through modern day eyes. Every time the rabbi shook a tambourine we changed partners.


It was only later that I took at look at what the Sages said relative to our understanding and I've included it below. Sometimes we focused on the same concept and sometimes our more contemporary perspective took us in another direction.


Ordering of the Lips - We saw ordering of the lips as choosing one's words with care, diplomatically and not in anger while the rabbis saw it more as practicing one's lessons until they came effortlessly.


Joy - We associated this with an openness and receptive state, one of listening. The rabbis spoke of enjoying one's studies as an incentive to continuing and saw joy as broadening the mind, sharpening the intellect and unlocking the memory. I rather liked the idea that joy precedes learning.


Long-suffering - we saw this as dealing with challenges without complaint and saw challenge and attitude as important attributes of learning with much of our learning coming from discomfort. The Sages saw this as avoiding anger.


One who recognizes his place - We added a caveat to this that it was true if the place was one of choice. Much of life is about finding one's place in the world, recognizing it and choosing it. We are all restricted to some extent, born into a particular body and in a particular country and we can choose to honor our body and seek to encourage wisdom in our country. We felt that recognizing one's place had to do with authenticity. The sages spoke of assessing one's own worth, knowing one's qualities as well as shortcomings.


Makes a fence around his words - We weren't quite sure where to go with this one, but the rabbis spoke of expressing oneself with caution. We felt that words need to be part of a dialogue so our fence required a gate. Turns out that wasn't their interpretation at all.


Our final attribute was shunning honor which we saw as not being too full of oneself, not too dissimilar from the Sages who added that we should be studying Torah for love of Torah, not for our own reputation.


Rabbi Davis concluded by noting that there are many pathways to the Torah. The Pirkei Avot speaks of three crowns, the crown of the Torah, the crown of priesthood and the crown of kingship, but the crown of a good name excels them all. Hmm, three crowns, but the fourth is better? What are we supposed to do with that? It goes on to state that the crown of a good name flows from the Torah, thus wrapping it all together. Rabbi Davis summed it up with the statement that Menschkeit is the foundation for Yiddishkeit. Being a good person, a mensch, is at the core.

The second part of our session was led by Carolyn Light Bell and Leah Golberstein who began their session by distributing chocolate to encourage joy which we understand is a precursor for learning. They began by leading us in some poetic thoughts from the Kohelet and other sources (Poetry-Haiku Instructions handout).


We were particularly intrigued with a quote they provided from Rav Avraham Isaac Kook (1865-1935) who wrote: "Literature, painting and sculpture give material expression to all the spiritual concepts implanted in the depths of the human soul and as long as even one single line hidden in the depth of the soul has not been given outward expression, it is the task of art to bring it out."


We explored a number of poetic expressions leading us into haiku and were given some time to explore our own creative talents at haiku. We spent a lot of time counting out the 5-7-5 syllables on our fingers to arrive at our creations. As I looked around the room, many hands were raised as fingers moved in rhythm.




Even as we sought to stay within the required pattern, Ann reminded us with a haiku that it was only a structure.

Forget this structure
It is only a construct
we keep for order


The very interesting expressions that we received can be found on the handouts page at Haiku, but let me close with:

Chocolate brings joy
We rejoice in our portion
And are enlightened

A Heart of Wisdom

 October 13, 2015  by Susan Weinberg

We joined together today in a new beginning in the Artists' Lab. For some of us it is the fourth year  of a growing community of artists.  We fondly greeted familiar faces and were introduced to new ones.  We had a much larger group as we brought the two labs together and added new members.

We gathered with our facilitators in an introduction to our topic of Echoes: Voices of Wisdom, a rich topic with much to explore.  Meryll began our exploration by introducing the Pirkei Avot, Ethics of the Fathers, a section of the Midrash written around the Common Era.

 It states Who is wise? The one who learns from every person…(Talmud - Avot 4:1)   She noted that the word for teacher and student comes from the same root, for hopefully we are both.

Rabbi Davis then introduced a parable from a book titled The Hasidic Parable by Aryeh Wineman.  The parable entitled Or HaEmet  tells the tale of a king who created a challenge with incentives to test the diligence of his servants.  Three groups of servants attempt three strategies with only the final one achieving the goal. Take a minute to read it before you proceed.

We had an energetic discussion about the need to seek wisdom by coming in unencumbered by emotional or physical coverings, without artificial light and in concert with other souls.  It was noted that the parable rewarded those who exhibited both planning and forethought as well as being willing to respond to circumstances creatively and in the moment.   Others noted traits of resourcefulness and faith.  We also assumed that the later servants learned from the failures of the earlier servants.  As this was a metaphor we looked to the meaning of different elements.  We concluded that illumination through precious stones represented seeking deeper knowledge.  Illumination was only found by being willing to destroy what we know.

Many were uncomfortable with the role of the king, particularly the element of judgment and condemnation of failure.  When asked how we would apply this to our experience in the lab we spoke of the need to be vulnerable, but also to create an environment of trust, rather than competition.  We felt it important to be able to risk failure in a nonjudgmental environment.  The king had no place at our table.

Some spoke of their experience as a parent or as an immigrant to a new country as a time when they had to be vulnerable to achieve a greater level of wisdom.

The second part of our session was both an introduction of members and a sharing of something we associated with creativity. We hadn't much time to consider this question and several of us confessed to groaning at the receipt of this last minute assignment.   It proved; however, to be a very intriguing project with thoughtful responses from all.  Lab members offered up music, poetry, readings, Jewish parables and quotes.

Some of the offerings included the poems Remember Me by Hal Sirowitz and Otherwise by Jane Kenyon and the wonderful quote "Seek the company of those who search for truth; run from those who have found it." (André Gide).  In the realm of great minds think alike we had more than one person who brought their Tibetan singing bowl or a seashell.  The Tibetan bowls "spoke" for themselves.  The seashells were symbolic of wisdom with the hardness on the outside that represented the accumulation of experience with the inside luminous and if fortunate containing a pearl.

Some of us offered linkages to the past, a cookbook offered as a tender gift from a father and for me, a folder of notes on books read from my mother.  While some in our group sought ideas from the Internet, for me wisdom has always been associated with my mother who recently passed away. In her files I found a wonderful folder of excerpts from books that spoke to her and reminded me of our many conversations about books and life.  When Meryll had spoken of the Pirkei Avot, I had flipped through my mother's file sure I had read of it in there.  Sure enough she had a page devoted to it.  I shared some of the quotes in her folder such as "Don't try to make life a mathematics problem with yourself in the center and everything coming out equal" or "we are our injuries, as much as we are our successes." (The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver).  Or the rather biblical sounding quote from Nicole Mones in Lost in Translation, "A brave man bows to circumstances as grass does before the wind". She also wrote of a book by Jerome Groopman titled The Measure of Our Days: A Spiritual Exploration of Illness.  Within it he had referenced the Biblical Psalm 90, a psalm of life and death which presents a perspective on wisdom.

The stream of human life is like a dream,
In the morning, it is as grass, sprouting fresh,
In the morning it blossoms and flourishes,
but by evening it is cut down and withers
Our years come to an end like a fleeting whisper.
The days of our years may total seventy,
if we are exceptionally strong, perhaps eighty;
but all their pride and glory is toil and falsehood
and, severed quickly, we fly away...
So teach us to number our days that
we may attain a heart of wisdom.