Shame-less (Shabbat Re-eh)
One of my earliest childhood memories is being taught the story that a rabbi was studying with his students and had an outburst saying, “Whoever ate garlic should leave the room right now.” In response, I was taught that one of the student rabbis left the room. He hadn’t eaten garlic, but he wanted to prevent the person who had from shame.
What do we learn from this story?
I learned as a young child that a teacher is never supposed to embarrass a student, no matter how irritating that student’s habits or behavior may be, which is sometimes easier to say than do. As an educator, having my students know that I love them even though my classroom often smells like the inside of a sneaker is important. And I tell all of the teens I teach to shower and put on deodorant when they are coming to my class… I don’t discriminate or single anyone out. Deodorant for everyone is welcome!
This story became the metaphor for Jews teaching us not to embarrass another human being, especially if there is an inequity in status.
We are the people of the Jewish star, which for most of our existence was donned as an imposed badge of shame, yellow or otherwise. As a people, individually and collectively, we were shamed time and again by governments and individuals, for who we were and for what we believed.
The book of Deuteronomy, including this week’s Torah portion, is constantly reminding us not to neglect the stranger, the fatherless, the widow, and this week, the Levite. We are taught this week to forgive debts and make sure that the needy are cared for:
Dt. 15:11 “For there will never cease to be needy ones in your land, which is why I command you: open your hand to the poor and the needy kinsman in your land.”
A light bulb went off for me! We do not care for others in order to “do a mitzvah” and to step in for God who is not directly feeding them. We are commanded to do this so that no one will ever be shamed by living in poverty, deprivation, or hunger. It is our responsibility to give every ‘child of God’ dignity. We are supposed to live Shame free/shame-less lives and it is our Jewish value and obligation to make sure that everyone we come in contact with does not suffer the curse and degradation of Booshah –Shame.
We read Psalm 15 all of the time:
Lord, who may abide in Your house? Who may dwell in Your holy mountain?
Those who are upright; who do justly; who speak the truth within their hearts.
Who do not slander others, or wrong them, or bring shame upon them.
We are Jews. We are the people of the Book and that book, be it Torah or Talmud, or the host of other Jewish books, teaches us that our lives should be Shame-Less… free of shaming others.
Everything I read and study these days seems to be viewed through our new adult education, L.I.F.E. topic, “Living a Values-Driven Life.” Rabbi Rappaport and I will spend the next year partnering with you to identify, study, and live the Jewish values that should guide our lives. So, when an article came across my computer about a ruling from an Orthodox rabbi last month about not embarrassing Bar/Bat Mitzvah students, I started to think about this Jewish value of not bringing shame on others.
Rabbi Jonathan Raziel of Ma’ale Adumim wrote about his ruling in the prestigious halakhic journal Techumim, that it is forbidden to correct mistakes, large or small, made by the Torah reader, because that is a rabbinic ruling, and the command banning shaming another human being is a prohibition from the Torah itself. Anything in the Torah trumps the rabbis every time, or is supposed to.
He wrote the ruling in response to a real situation, where a fifteen year old Bar Mitzvah boy left the bimah crying, never to return to finish his Bar Mitzvah, because of the aggressively rude corrections being made by the congregation, which shamed the boy.
One person, a gabbai, was appointed centuries ago when Jews became less learned, to make soft spoken corrections to help the reader and insure accuracy. What has become common in more traditional settings is that readers are publicly embarrassed, not by Jews who want to make sure the Torah is read correctly, but really by Jews who have a “one upsmanship” arrogance that they know better and can show up the reader. I grew up in such a setting and that is why we don’t embarrass our readers. We offer help only when necessary and then in the softest way. It is also the obligation of the reader to be as prepared as possible. That goes without saying.
Interestingly enough, the stream of comments after the article berated the rabbi for not caring about the Torah, Jewish law, or fulfilling the mitzvah of hearing the Torah accurately. They also further shamed the 15 year old boy by questioning whether he was worthy to read Torah publicly.
In point of fact, one of my all time favorite commentators, The Tur, a late 13th century/ early 14th century brilliant commentator, in Orech Chaim 142, shares the opinion of the Manhig (Abraham ben Nathan Ha-Yarhi’s seminal work of the second half of the 12th century) that if a Torah reader makes a mistake – even one such as pronouncing Aaron as Haran – we do not correct him and make him go back in order not to publicly embarrass him. Maimonides, of course, disagrees, and makes him go back even for a small mistake, as Maimonides cared much more about laws than people. The Manhig and Tur’s caring ruling is not the traditional view, as there was a constant fear that errors in the Torah reading would lead people astray and could create confusion about the laws and mitzvot we must follow. I have always been a Tur fan and followed him.
Another story a bit closer to home:
Rabbi Koenig (Sheilot V’Teshuvot Chukei Chaim, 28) discusses the issue of berating an individual who talks during the services. He asserts that while it is true that this might result in the embarrassment of the individual, the desecration of God’s name takes precedence… so ushers, we don’t berate, but we are permitted to call behavior to someone’s attention and to remove those who disrupt our service, always in a way that no one feels shame. Ironically, we usually do an exemplary job of that, but sometimes those who are insensitive to the service bring shame to themselves and the ushers by berating those whose only intent is to maintain the sanctity of the service.
In the Jerusalem Talmud, the less authoritative one, (Chagigah 2:1 and Midrash Genesis Rabbah 1:5) it states: “One who gains honor through the degradation of his fellow human has no share in the World to Come.”
Rabbi Judah he-Chasid(Sefer Chassidim, 358) says that one should not humiliate a gentile who observes the seven Noahide laws; rather he should be honored even more than a Jew who does not engage in the study of Torah.
It is virtually impossible to lead a shame-less life. You know how awful it feels to be humiliated and so often in our media-crazed world people are embarrassed or accused with great media attention and fanfare, but no one pays attention when the charges or claims are found to be baseless and a retraction is printed that takes an inch or a fraction of a second, rather than the streams and columns and hours of the story that brought shame to the individual in the constant media loop that bombards our computers and television.
Our tradition is very much a legal one and long before we had today’s legal system, you paid damages for causing someone undeserved shame.
The Talmud (Babylonian, Baba Kama, 83b) in discussing the amount one must pay in damages for causing someone embarrassment (boshet), states that damages depend on the status of the humiliator and the humiliated. Some felt that the higher one’s status the more damages needed to be paid, but three pages later, one opinion (86a) makes it clear that “all are the children of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” That all have status.
There are rabbis who even go so far as to remind us that even the dignity of the wicked needs to be protected, for you never know the consequences of humiliation, as described in the research of Dr. Hershey Friedman of Brooklyn College, in his paper on Human Dignity in Jewish Law*:
“Bar Kamtza suffered great humiliation when he was ejected from a party to which his enemy inadvertently invited him. His embarrassment turned into anger and he decided to make trouble for the Jewish people with the Roman emperor. God did not prevent Bar Kamtza from achieving his goal and the Temple was destroyed and a large number of Jews were killed because of the mortification of one individual. (Babylonian Talmud, Gittin 57a)
Pirke Avot 2:10 “Let your fellowman’s honor be as dear to you as your own.
Consider the story of a man who met Rabbi Shimon b. Elazar as he was riding on the beach on his donkey after a fulfilling Torah study. The man, who was exceptionally ugly, said “Peace on you, Rabbi.” To which the rabbi responded not with a greeting of Shalom but with words of shame, “Empty One, how ugly you are. Are all people in your town as ugly as you are?” The simple man responded to the rabbi on his “high horse” (donkey): “I do not know, ask the Craftsman who made me, as you tell Him how ugly is the vessel He created.”
Immediately, the Rabbi realized he had sinned and got off his donkey and prostrated himself begging for forgiveness. The man replied that he would not forgive him until he apologized to God the Craftsman, his Creator. When they got to the town, the Rabbi was still begging for forgiveness. The man was told to forgive him by the villagers, but he had one condition: the rabbi could never speak to anyone and shame them again. After that Rabbi Shimon is said to have taught: “ A person should always be as gentle as a reed and not tough as a cedar tree.” This is the reason given why Torahs, tefillin, and mezuzah paper are all written by scribes with reeds and quills. (BT Taanit 20ab, Avot D’Rabbi Natan 41)
The internet is such an amazing resource. Consider a question that came in from an Orthodox Jew to an internet Orthodox rabbi, Rabbi Yirmiyahu Ullman from S. in Israel. (www.rabbiullman.com)
“I volunteer in a used clothing center (gemach) open in the mornings. There is one woman who comes in every week with a very strong smell of garlic. Since we are in a basement and don’t have adequate ventilation, it is very disturbing to all present. We sometimes spray aerosol but it is only effective for a short while, and she stays longer. Can we ask her outright to eat her daily garlic for lunch? Will she be insulted? What is the right thing to do?
Dear S.,
I empathize with your problem. Still, even though it might be permitted to say something to the person, I do not think that it would be the correct thing to do.
The Talmud (Sanhedrin 11a) relates that once Rabbi was giving a lecture and there was a very strong smell of garlic in the room. He stopped the lecture and asked for whoever had eaten the garlic to leave the room. Rabbi Chiya got up and walked out. When the others saw someone as important as Rabbi Chiya leave, everyone else left out of deference to him. In the morning, Rabbi’s son sought out Rabbi Chiya and asked him how he could have been so inconsiderate as to disturb the class like that by eating garlic. Rabbi Chiya replied that he would never have been guilty of garlic breath in a lecture. Rather, knowing that if he left, everyone would follow, he decided to get up in order to spare the “culprit” embarrassment by enabling him to leave with everyone else.
I know that your scenario is not completely analogous, but I think that the underlying message of the Talmud is as applicable. It is difficult to imagine any way of telling the woman that her odor leaves something to be desired without her being terribly embarrassed. This is not only regarding the time that she is being told, but every time she comes into the gemach. And besides, you never know, she may have to ingest garlic to treat some health condition. If so, complaining will just make her feel bad about something she has no control over. Subsequently, in my humble opinion, however hard it is for you and your “co-chesedniks” to put up with the discomfort, the rewards for not saying anything are far greater than the immediate reward of saying something. While saying something now might bring a breath of fresh air into your lives in this world, not saying something will bring you eternal “fresh air” in the World to Come.”
Many of us do not live our lives for any kind of payoff in the World to Come, although the “fresh air” Rabbi Ullman suggests sounds very appealing to me. We want to live our lives with Jewish values so that we can be the best people we can be, the best Jews we can be, the best children of God and Torah we can be. Those of other faiths have the exact same aspirations and seek wisdom from their sacred texts and leaders in the same way.”
Our portion this week begins, “Re’eh” – “See.” Our tradition teaches us that we must never cause another’s face to become red. When we see the other person as an extension of ourselves and our values, it makes it so much harder to inflict unkindness and shame upon them. When we see “the other” through God’s lens, we are less likely to bring shame upon him or to dishonor her. Let us not close our eyes to the host of circumstances that cause another to suffer shame. One action, one person at a time, may we learn that the smell of garlic is not so bad if it preserves another’s dignity…it is fantastic in a good tomato sauce or when roasted on a pizza, in a restaurant where no one complains of the smell of garlic!
Shabbat Shalom.
Sources:
Human Dignity in Jewish Law, Hershey H. Friedman PhD, Professor of Business and Marketing, Brooklyn College, 2005 – I am so grateful to Dr. Friedman’s extensive work on selecting wonderful sources from our rabbinic literature.