Ha’azinu – Youth Takeover Shabbat

PARENT AND TEACHER

The Times reported this week that more than 700,000 people have fled Russia, to avoid the military draft. This calls to my mind an earlier era of refuseniks – Jews who were denied permission to leave the Soviet Union for Israel. Under communism, it was forbidden to teach Torah. An underground network was set up in Moscow to teach Torah at all levels. It was managed from London by Dayan Ehrentreu and a man from Hendon called Ernie Hirsch. Together, they have the merit of bringing hundreds of young Russians closer to their Jewish roots. I was privileged to travel to Moscow for a week to teach Talmud. I went with a friend. We knew what we were doing was illegal and we knew we ran the risk of being arrested.

The group we met in Moscow was led by Eliyau Essas, one of the most remarkable people I have ever met.

Essas became interested in Judaism while studying at Vilnius University. He applied to make Aliya but was denied permission. This resulted in him losing his job. He set about organising a network of Torah study at all levels. The visiting rabbis supported the most advanced group with shiurim (lectures) in Talmud.

When I met Essas, he presented as a learned and observant Jew. He told me he was self-taught. He had found books and had studied them. Then he heard about a Jew in Riga who kept Shabbat and had managed to do so throughout soviet domination. Essas told me: “I travelled to Riga to spend Shabbat with him. From then on, I was able to keep Shabbat myself and teach others what to do.”

In this week’s parasha we read of two avenues to approach Jewish life: “Ask your father (avicha) and he will tell you, your elders (zekenecha) and they will say it to you.” (Devarim 32:7)

The zaken or elder stands for the sage or scholar, the teacher of Torah. The av or father represents the unique example of Jewish living in practice, a model to which one can personally relate.

Both these roles are necessary.

The zaken provides the head. The av provides the heart.

The zaken innovates rules and ideas. The av offers applications and values.

Sometimes, one person occupies both of these roles. But that does not have to be the case.

The zaken need not be of this generation. A person may be inspired by the writings of Maimonides of the 12th century or Rav Kook of the 20th century.

But the av or ‘parent-figure’ has to be of our times. He or she must be someone in whom we can see the Torah ideal and role-models for us authentic Jewish spirituality relevant to our lives today.

The explosion of Jewish knowledge in our generation combined with the resources of the internet make so many more ‘elders’ and ‘fathers’ accessible to us. We are so fortunate that we don’t have to travel from Moscow to Riga to find the answer.

Let us make the most of our opportunities