Pirke Avot 1:3

Antignos of Socho received [the tradition] from Shimon the Righteous. He
used to say: Do not be as servants who serve the Master to receive reward.
Rather, be as servants who serve the Master not to receive reward. And let the
fear of heaven be upon you.

The famous Israel philosopher and theologian Yeshayahu Leibowitz argued in support of Antignus of Socho that the only valid reason for performing the mitzvot is because it is G-d's command. Any other reason, as our mishna suggests, would fall to the status of expecting a reward. No motivation except the fear of heaven, by which we mean acceptance of the commandments, is sufficient reason to compell us to act according to Halacha.

For most of us, it would seem that both Leibowitz and Antignos of Socho are asking of us that we perform the impossible. Even when our motives are pure, our actions are always with an eye of the effect. It is certainly simple enough to eschew the more crass and materialistic rewards that we might think accrue to those who follow G-d's ways. Most of us understand that there is no quid pro quo that attends to those who follow the mitzvot. By the time we have reached adulthood, we no longer think that simply because we are good people that only good things must result.

But putting aside material rewards such as riches or even more spiritual requests such as good health, each of acts with the idea that some good will accrue to us because of our actions. We give tzedakah not because it puts a point on our scoreboard when we stand before G-d, but because doing so gives us the sense of satisfaction that we have done the right thing. We eat according to Jewish law for many reasons: it allows us to participate in the Jewish community; it adds a sense of kedusha (holiness) to the mundane act of eating; it may be healthier. All of these reasons cary with it some sense of reward or compensation for having chosen to follow the laws of Kashrut. In keeping Shabbat we are compensated by the sense of peace and tranquility that setting aside this day brings to us. Indeed, for many with hectic lives, the thought of setting aside a day increases stress, not the opposite and thus they do not observe Shabbat.

Yet, it is possible to understand how we can follow this Mishna if we separate the notion of serving one's master in general from specific deeds that our Master may require of us. The general notion is summed up in the beginning of the Sh'ma when we are told, "You shall love the Lord your G-d with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might." The basic thought that should guide us in doing G-d's commands is that we are commanded to love G-d. But the very notion that we can be commanded to love G-d is a paradox. (See Chapter 11 of Louis Jacobs A Jewish Theology for a detailed discussion of this issue). How can we be commanded to love anyone; love is an emotion over which we have no control. Thus, when we truly love, whether it is our parents, our spouse or our children, our family or our friends, we do so without thought of reward. We love and from that love we are motivated to do things that demonstrate our love.

In the same way, if we truly love G-d, then we are motivated to follow G-d's commandments not in the hopes of receiving a reward but because this is how we demonstrate our love for G-d. We run to perform to mitzvot out of our deep feeling of love for G-d. This is how we can be like the servant who serves the Master without thought of reward.

Pirkei Avot 1:2

Shimon the Righteous (HaTzadik) was of the remnants of the Great Assembly. He
used to say: "The world stands on three things - on Torah, on Avodah and on Gemilut Hasidim"

Shimon HaTzadik chose three categories on which he claims that the world stands. Putting Torah aside for a moment, we can look at what he means by Avodah and by Gemilut Hasidim. Avodah specifically refers to the sacrifices in the Temple. Shimon lived at a time when the Temple still stood and was the center of Jewish worship. The daily sacrifices as well as the sacrifices for specific reasons and times were the center of Israelite worship of G-d. But even during Shimon's time, there was more to the worship of G-d than sacrifices in the temple. The synagogue had emerged by this time and there were more local and more transcendant methods of worshipping G-d, including prayer and study of sacred text. We can see that Avodah refers not to a specific method of worshipping and serving G-d, but to a category of service that we refer to as Mitzvot ben Adam L'Makom, mitzvot between a person a G-d. All of our ritual actions, such as prayer, Shabbat, Kashrut, tefillin, and tzitzit fall into this category of worship.

The other category that Shimon identifies is Gemilut Hasidim. This category covers all of the mitzvot that are Ben Adam V'Adam, those that are between a person and another person. Commandments to care for the poor, visit the sick, welcome the guest, celebrate with the bride, and others fall into this category. Between Avodah and Gemilut Hasidim, we cover all of the commandments that G-d has given to us.

What, then, is Torah in Shimon's tri-archy? If we understand his three pillars to represent three different categories that stand apart from each other while linked through their role of sustaining the world and in their ultimate source as coming from G-d, then we need to derive a category for which Torah is the archetype or representative. One clue is in recognizing that Torah is different from Avodah or Gemilut Hasidim in that the latter categories are actions that we, humans, must take. People are responsible for performing the sacrfices, offering prayer, wearing tzitzit, leaving corners of the field for the poor, doing tzedakah and all of the other mitzvot. By contract, Torah is something is G-d's revelation to His people. Torah is G-d's action, G-d's responsibility to us.

The difference between Torah and the other two categories is that the latter categories, mitzvot that we must perform, represent finite actions. Either we perform the mitzvah or we don't. Once we have performed it, it is done and we move to the next mitzvah. The peformance of a mitzvah stands at a point in time. By contrast, Torah is an eternal revelation. According to the Midrash, Torah was created before the world was created and will exist in the World to Come.

Torah is how we know what G-d expects of us. It is the revelation of G-d's will that informs us how to perform the mitzvot that makes up the other two pillars. It is G-d's part in sustaining the world. G-d has one part in making the world exist; we have two. G-d has told us what we must do to sustain our world. It is up to us to do it.

Chancellor Eisen holds a Town Meeting in Livingston

The new JTS Chancellor held a Town Meeting, what is apparently one of many that he has been holding around the country. After he presented his views, he entertained questions from the audience and then asked a question of his own, what can JTS be doing to improve Conservative Judaism for the congregation? (I have paraphrased it as I remember the question). Here is my written answer to Dr. Eisen:

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Dr. Eisen -

Thank you very much for holding the Town Hall meeting last night at Beth Shalom. It was good to be able to hear what you had to say.

You asked for suggestions of what problems JTS could help to solve in our communities. To answer that question, I think that one needs to start by looking at where JTS has failed the Conservative communities over the past several decades. If JTS, under your leadership, can start to address those failures, then there will be real success. I see those failures in two areas.

First, JTS has failed to provide the Conservative Jewish community with an answer to why we should believe. Religion is inherently a system of belief in tenets that are not subject to academic or scientific proof. As a scholarly institution that prides itself on academic rigor, JTS has excelled at tearing down the pre-modern edifice on which belief rested. Fields like archaeology, anthropology, sociology and literary and textual criticism have given us wonderful and important insights into our history. As Conservative Jews, we have marvelled in and taken pride in these discoveries and insights. But, as spiritual beings, we have been stripped of the underpinning of belief.

Like you, Heschel is my intellectual, and even more, my spiritual hero. Heschel painted a picture for us of belief that rests first and foremost on a love of G-d. As you said last night, the ideal is that we enter into mitzvot out of a love for G-d and community. When we commit ourselves to observance because it is an expression of our gratitude for G-d's gifts to us and our way of touching the divine, we are achieving our highest spiritual level as Jews. I believe in the Torah as G-d's revelation for Jews not because there is scientific proof that it is G-d's word, but because that is how I, as a Jew, know how to serve G-d. How the Torah came into being is interesting as an academic exercise; why it came into being and what it means to me is the spiritual journey that I travel.

We need Jewish leaders who believe, deeply and passionately, in G-d, Torah and Israel and who can articulate why they believe in ways that are compelling to other Jews. They need to be more than role models; they need to be leaders. We are far too smug about what we know to be false and far too timid to talk about what might be true.

The second area in which I think that JTS has failed the Conservative movement is in creating faith communities. We have many synagogues and congregations, but woefully few true communities. A community is one that comes together to pray, to learn, to socialize, to support, to act, and to live together. How many congregations view their synagogue or center as their second home? How many congregations have a large percentage of their members in the synagogue building on a weekly basis? A congregation is a board, a building, a staff, and dues-paying members. A community is much, much more than that. Are we training our leaders to understand the difference and to work for the latter rather than the former?

One test of a community is how it treats the stranger, the visitor. I used to travel extensively for work and on those occasions when I need to stay over Shabbat, I invariably ended up at Chabad instead of the Conservative shul, because the Conservative shul had no concept of, much less ability to provide, Shabbat accommodations. A community that observes Shabbat together naturally comes to have the ability to provide such facilities for those who happen to find themselves in the community.

The failure of our congregations can be seen by examining the success stories. Every successful Conservative congregation of which I am aware, with my congregation of Agudath Israel as the notable exception, is based in a community with an Orthodox population. If I take congregations such as Beth Ahm in LA or the Conservative Center and Temple in Highland Park, the East Brunswick Jewish Center, the Conservative congregation in Rockville, or a number of other successful Conservative congregations, they all have thriving Orthodox communities as well. It is the Orthodox communities that make it possible for committed Conservative Jews to live in those communities. It is the Orthodox that create and supporet the Kosher marketplaces, build the Eruv, build the Mikvah, and create a public Jewish face that is not ashamed to be seen as religious. The committed Conservative Jew is largely a free-rider on these benefits.

When that Orthodox community does not exist, the Conservative congregation is much weaker. It has a hard time attracting the committed Conservative Jew because for that Jew the needed services that stretch beyond the doors of the synagogue don't exist. This, more than anything, I think is why young people raised in Schechter schools, Ramah camp, and USY find themselves drawn to Orthodox communities. I don't think that it is simply that they have come to believe something different from what they were taught, but because they have been taught that living the life of a committed Jew is important, they have no choice but to find an Orthodox community that can provide the essential services.

In your talk last night, you touched on these themes and for that I am hopeful that your leadership will address these issues. Having read your books, I know that you understand the forces that are at work and that you have spent much time thinking on how to harness them for positive results. I am cautiously optimistic for the future of our movement because you are at the helm.

I wish you the best of luck.