How can I go up to my father if the (Naar) boy is not with me?… (Breishis 44:34)
Sometimes a verse in the Torah can be learned as a freestanding
statement abstract from the context of the narrative. Here Yehuda is
desperately pleading to rescue his youngest brother Benyamin and he
utters a few words that have deep significance to each and every one of
us, “How can I go up to my father and the NAAR- the youth is not with
me!?”
We are all children of HASHEM, literally, as the verse explicitly
states, “Banim Atem L’HASHEM Elocheichem” – You are children of HASHEM
your G-d!” (Devarim 14:1) We are gifted with an inherent and unbreakable
bond with HASHEM. A parent -child relationship is forever. The love is
unconditional. It can be developed and enhanced but it is not an
artificially crafted or abstract construct. It’s natural! We come into
this world installed with this program. It’s part of our spiritual DNA.
We have this natural attraction and yearning to come close to HASHEM,
like a child’s desire to be near his father, or like a smaller magnet is
drawn to a larger magnet.
With all this, it is still possible for barriers to be erected that
weaken that magnetic pull. It is relatively easy to put a child’s
picture or a test on the fridge with a magnet. Only a slim piece of
paper stands between the magnet and the metal but if layers and layers
of papers are added, it becomes increasingly difficult and even
impossible for the magnet and the fridge to detect the attraction.
Certainly, if one attempts to place the entire Sunday Times on the
fridge, no magnetism can be felt through that thick impediment. The
attraction is still there. It always was, and always will be, but there
is a blockage.
More than once I have had people tell me, “Rabbi, please talk to my
niece. She’s an atheist!” My answer is always the same. “Tell your niece
there’s a guy named Label Lam who does not believe that she is really
an atheist!” When I do meet a person who feels this way, it is usually
based on some deep emotional component, and they feel anger towards G-d!
It’s not that they don’t believe. They are busy being angry at a G-d
they claim does not exist.
If just some layers of antipathy can be melted, healed or peeled away then a powerful pull will immediately be felt again.
Now let’s go back to Yehuda’s expression, “How can I go up to my
father and the youth is not with me?!” Although Shakespeare had said it,
“You can’t take it with you”, and Lord knows the Pharaoh’s tried with
all their might but were unsuccessful, there is something that we can
and we must take with us. How can we go up to our Father in Heaven
without that sweet, innocent, playful, and wholesome child!? How did we
allow that essential part of our being to become buried in negativity
and cynicism!?
What is the nature of this “youth”? The Baal Shem Tov said that we
can learn three important things from little children. Number one, that
they are constantly curious; their heads are always turning; they’re
exploring, and they’re testing the limits of everything, including their
parent’s patience. Number two, they’re happy with the smallest things.
We think they need sophisticated toys, but they’re often content to play
with the box or the wrapper the toy came in, or to paint the highchair,
and their little brother with chocolate yogurt. And number three, when
they want something badly enough, they cry out to their father.
And so even we, in our advanced age, we can learn to be curious about
the mysteries of HASHEM’s universe and His Torah; to be content, and
excited, and appreciate even the smallest things; and when we want
something badly enough, to cry out to our Father is Heaven, Avinu
Sh’B’Shemayim.
Yehuda’s rhetorical question reverberates through the cosmos even
still. How can we go up to our father and the youth is not with us?!
Curiosity and idealism are the signs of youthfulness along with a
child’s natural love for his father. It’s something that carries us
happily through life and we take it with us when we go up to our Father
in Heaven. King Dovid wrote, “NAAR Hayisi Gam Zakanti” – “I was youthful
– I am also old”. It’s not a contradiction at all. It may be required,
even while old, to be forever youthful.
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