.011911•111•111¢1 " • . .,4:;:n4irr,44ia=SWIL1 14Z+41P1114014621.141 . . , • THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS '■ •3o1V:1i10 INSIGHT Putting your trust in God - • p r • .10 PP% BY MICHAEL ROSENAK Special to The Jewish News Parashat Shoftim seems God is not so stringent or particularly pre-occupied remote as to demand that with public order. It deals His people be only rational, with justice and courts, immune to anxiety, never royal law and priestly gifts, wishing to peek behind the cities of refuge and mobili- veil of destiny. But He does zation for war. And it takes demand: Be wholehearted into account how what even then. Stay with Me! Peter Berger calls the Yet the self-contained "plausibility structure" of terseness the verse, five society may be threatened Hebrew of words without by ambiguity: where the "ands" and "buts," suggests jurisdictions of particular that there is more to it than courts is nebulous and re- that. Standing there by it- sponsibility may be shirked self between two references (hence the law of the be- to the idolatrous abomina- headed heifer — eglah tion, it reads like a sum- arufah); or- where personal ming up of what the indi- aspirations or fears may make a citizen unfit for battle. Parashat Appropriately, the parashat is called Shoftim Shoftim: ("judges") for it is concerned with magistrates and Deuteronomy policemen, with maintain- 16:18-21:9. ing the "sane" world which the Torah envisions for the Isaiah achievement of its vision: a 51:12-52:12. holy people, covenanted to God. Most threatening to this sane world is fear of the fu- vidual is to learn from all ture, uncertainty. This fear the "law and order" that the may easily destroy order. It Torah imposes. First of all, there is what invites celebrations of the weird, ritualized intima- we may call the halachic tions of chaos, recourse to principle. Life is a whole sorcerers, soothsayers, and all of it should be ghosts and "familiar "wholehearted with God"; spirits." And flirtation with in all things one should cosmic chaos leads readily "know" Him, and not make to moral lawlessness; sooth- matters easy for oneself by saying and ghostliness to separating life into sacred child-sacrifice — dreadful and secular domains. That parents making sons and very unhalachic Jew, Mar- daughters "to pass through tin Buber, once expressed the fire." These, of course, the Torah condemns as abomi- nations. And to those temp- ted to seek guidance beyond the horizons of order, reas beyond the realm of Providence, the Torah commands sternly: You shall be. wholehearted —tamim with the Lord thy Washington — Congress Go . The pshat (plain mean- is having second thoughts ing) of this verse is clearly about a proposed interna- indicated by the context. tional Islamic art and cul- Rashi says it: "Trust in God, ture center that would be do not try to penetrate the part of the $75 million future, accept wholehear- museum complex Currently tedly what He has in store being built underneath the for you." Or, don't restrict Mall. A House Appropiations your loyalty to fair weather, don't have recourse to dark Committee hai blocked a $5 powers even in black mo- million contribution for the ments of life. You can't both center from Saudi Arabia serve God and be served by until hearings can be held to divinations. Rambam, determine whether the Sforno and Rashbam point Saudi gift has any strings out that one may ask attached, Newsweek maga- prophets about the future, zine reported this week. or inquire of the mysterious Congressmen are also con- priestly Urim V'T urnim, or, cerned with potential secu- we might "go to the rebbe." rity threats to the center, The Torah provides even for the magazine said. The center, which was the extra-normative. proposed by S. Dillon Rip- ley, retiring head of the Smithsonian Institute, Michael Rosenak is a would stand adjacent to the professor of Jewish museums for African, Near Education at the Hebrew Eastern and Asian art. Rip- University of Jerusalem, ley has had differences with where he also, serves on the Congress over the Smithso- staff of the Melton Centre nian's management and key .for Jewish Education in the Capitol Hill figures, includ- Diaspora.: - . Friday, August 31, 1964 the halachic principle well when he pointed out that the Hebrew language has no word for "religion" be- cause God will not let him- self be "bought off" with one aspect of life. He wants the whole human being. So, not all is fair in love and war and "business is not busi- ness" when it is theft. And then, we are bidden not only to serve God in all things, but -we are also commanded to serve only God, not powers of nature and not instruments of cul- ture and not needs or achievements or even ideals. Being wholehearted with God, paradoxically, must mean that you can't trust your insights and visions absolutely because only God is absolute. Or, if you must be single-minded — and when it comes to serving God you must be un- less you want merely "reli- gious" social convention — be naive, innocent. Be a dweller in tents like that ish tam, Jacob, who studied Torah in the tents of Shem and Eber while Esau was out hunting, killing, mak- ing friends and influencing people. For you can't study Torah, which is perfect (t'mima) and thus embraces all wisdom, and think you know • it all. There, in that confining tent, the un- limited search is the way of wholeness. , IMO =M. •.• 11 11 • •.1. I Elmilab I •• ■ • p pr• vt If you think you're out of space... Think again. • Inner Space makes space. More space...Better space...by designing and installing custom closet / storage systems that work. And we design each one...one at a time. So you end up with a closet / storage system that fits you. Your lifestyle. Your personality...And your budget. Let Kathie Park at Inner Space show you how it's done. Just call. (313) 559-6363 1339 W. Square Lake Road Bloomfield Hills, MI. 48013 Swim in our outdoor and indoor pools. Play Tennis, Jog, enjoy Free Aerobics, exercise on Nautilus and Universal equipment, dine in our Restaurant or Lounge, you name it It's Southfields most luxurious Athletic and Social Club. Hurryl Last chance for 75% OFF initiation. , Copyright 1984, National Hauurah Committee O NEWS co - Proposed DC Islamic center subject of; dispute ' , f,e .( CE! WIC ing Rep. Sidney Yates of Il- linois, are demanding a more precise description of the Islamic center's func- tions before any money is released, according to Newsweek. Also, some Smithsonian curators are , concerned that representa- tives of other faiths will now demand equal treatment. - WJC approves Lutheran view of Martin Luther . Budapest — A senior offi- cial of the World Jewish Congress, Dr. Gerhart M. Riegner, told the World As- sembly of the Lutheran World Federation here ear- lier this month that world Jewry received with satis- faction the forceful rejection by Lutheran theologians of Martin Luther's anti- Jewish 'teachings and re- marks. Riegner's statement marked the first• time a non-Christian had ever ad- dressed the Assembly. • HAMILTON PLACE Athletic & Social Club 30333 Southfield Rd. (between 12 & 13 Mile Rds.) Presented by: HALL REAL ESTATE GROUP - CALL NOW 646-8990 OFFER EXTENDED ONE WEEK 33