Tips from the Talmud: What is the one thing everybody needs?

 

“Not good” – an expression that will always haunt me. In school, we were “forced” to compose poetry. In short, let’s just say I wasn’t very good at it. One of my more exquisite pieces ended with the phrase “and that was not good” describing some desperate and irretrievable situation. My more creative and imaginative friend, Marshall, thought this phrase very funny. After all, we were supposed to use words that were descriptive and powerful, conjuring up the picture in the mind of the reader. I didn’t show him my work too much after that.

Then comes along the parsha we just read today, in which Yitro says to Moshe “the thing you are doing is not good” (shemot 18,17). What is not good? The next pasuk answers “the task (of judging the people all day) is too heavy for you; you cannot do it alone”. The only other place in the Torah where the phrase “not good” is mentioned is describing Adam’s situation before Eve came along – “it is not good for man to be alone” (Bereishit 2,18). So we could categorize the “not good” descriptions in the Torah as situations where a single person cannot possibly come to any good. To me it seems that the expression used -  לא טוב (not good) is telling us not just that it is bad but that no good can possibly come out if it unless the situation is changed.

We see that both the sources mentioned are areas where the Torah is describing how to build a society whether in terms of the family unit or in terms of bringing order and structure between members of the society. In other words, we cannot create a good society alone. We need others.

And now we come to the next gemara for analysis:

“There cannot be a world without perfumers and tanners - fortunate is a person whose trade is perfumery, but woe (אוי) to the person whose trade is tanning”. (the materials used in tanning have a bad smell). (Pesachim 65a)

In an earlier post, we saw several trades the gemara warned would receive no blessing. This time the gemara describes a trade in terms of: woe (אוי) to the person who deals in it. This is an interesting description that conjures up Rashi’s description of Korach’s rebels as “woe to the wicked and woe to his neighbour”.

This “Korach” usage of woe leads us to believe that it refers to an extremely negative opinion of a person. But in our gemara, the person just smells bad. As long as he and his wife and children had no sense of smell, all would be well, wouldn’t it? He is not a bad person.

Perhaps this gemara is referring to something more. Something which is particularly relevant at the moment. The gemara in masechet chagigah 4a also discusses a tanner. It quotes an opinion that says that a tanner is exempt from the mitzvah of Aliyah leRegel (appearing in the Bet Mikdash 3 times a year). And why is this? Because this person is not included in the description of “all your males” as it excludes those who are not suitable to be with “all your males” as nobody wants to be near them. In other words, this is a person who is excluded from society.

So what could it mean when the gemara says “woe” to a tanner. Woe to him because nobody is willing to share company with him. Social distancing to the extreme?

So what is the worst fate that can befall a person, one that is on the level of Korach’s rebels in its negativity? As we have seen with our own eyes in the last year and from the gemara and the two Torah sources above, it is the lack of a social network that prevents a society from “goodness”. This has been a major issue for many people who live alone, for our children and for ourselves.

Let us again raise our sensitivity to this issue. Let’s reach out to those in need of a call, a kind word or a smile. Bring more good to the world and remove the woe/אוי from those around us.