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as humanity is presently con-
stituted. The reaction, when 
it came, was fierce and disas-
trous. The 19th century saw 
the return of the repressed. 
Identity came back with a 
vengeance, this time based not 
on religion but on one of three 
substitutes for it: the nation 
state, the (Aryan) race and the 
(working) class. In the 20th 
century, the nation state led to 
two world wars. Race led to 
the Holocaust. The class strug-
gle led to Stalin, the Gulag and 
the KGB. A hundred million 
people were killed in the name 
of three false gods.

WORSHIPING THE ‘SELF’
For the past 50 years, the 
West has embarked on a 
second attempt to abolish 
identity, this time in the 
opposite direction. What the 
secular West now worships 
is not the universal but the 
individual: the self, the “Me,” 
the “I.” Morality — the thick 
code of shared values binding 
society together for the sake 
of the common good — has 
been dissolved into the right 
of each individual to do or be 
anything he or she chooses, 
so long as they do not direct-
ly harm others.

Identities have become mere 
masks we wear temporarily 
and without commitment. For 
large sections of society, mar-
riage is an anachronism, par-
enthood delayed or declined, 
and community a faceless 
crowd. We still have stories, 
from Harry Potter to Lord of 
the Rings to Star Wars, but 
they are films, fictions, fanta-
sies — a mode not of engage-
ment but of escapism. 
Such a world is supremely 
tolerant, until it meets views 
not to its liking, when it 
quickly becomes brutishly 
intolerant, and eventually 
degenerates into the politics of 

the mob. This is populism, the 
prelude to tyranny.
Today’s hyper-individu-
alism will not last. We are 
social animals. We cannot live 
without identities, families, 
communities and collective 
responsibility. Which means 
we cannot live without the sto-
ries that connect us to a past, 
a future and a larger group 
whose history and destiny we 
share. The biblical insight still 
stands. To create and sustain a 
free society, you have to teach 
your children the story of 
how we achieved freedom and 
what its absence tastes like: the 
unleavened bread of affliction 
and the bitter herbs of slavery. 
Lose the story and eventually 
you lose your freedom. That is 
what happens when you forget 
who you are and why.
The greatest gift we can give 
our children is not money or 
possessions but a story — a 
real story, not a fantasy, one 
that connects them to us 
and to a rich heritage of high 
ideals. We are not particles of 
dust blown this way or that 
by the passing winds of fad 
and fashion. We are heirs to a 
story that inspired a hundred 
generations of our ancestors 
and eventually transformed 
the Western world. What you 
forget, you lose. The West is 
forgetting its story. We must 
never forget ours.
With the hindsight of 33 
centuries, we can see how 
right Moses was. A story told 
across the generations is the 
gift of an identity, and when 
you know who you are and 
why, you can navigate the 
wilderness of time with cour-
age and confidence. That is a 
life-changing idea. 

The late Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks 

served as the chief rabbi of the 

United Hebrew Congregations of the 

Commonwealth, 1991-2013. His teach-

ings are available at rabbisacks.org. 

Prideful Humility
A 

discussion is raised 
in the Talmud about 
how we, as Jews, are 
supposed to walk. I mean that 
quite literally. Our rabbis of 
blessed memory argue about 
how we are to physi-
cally take steps in our 
daily lives. 
This shouldn’t real-
ly be too surprising. 
After all, our sages talk 
about everything from 
how to tie our shoes 
to how to eat to best 
digest our food. Even 
bathroom etiquette 
is discussed in the 
Talmud. But this walk-
ing piece is especially 
interesting because it 
comes with serious 
pushback from later sages. 
The Talmud puts forward 
that one should walk with a 
bend, arguing that walking 
upright displays arrogance 
and minimizes the glory 
of God’s Divine Presence 
(Berachot 43b). So, for prac-
tical purposes, the rabbis 
are suggesting that when we 
walk, we should do so slightly 
bent over to show respect to 
our Creator. 
But the sages of the Middle 
Ages have a different interpre-
tation, one that comes from 
our parshah this week. Citing 
the opening lines of Metzora, 
these rabbis notice that when 
a leper is found to be healed 
of their affliction, they are 
asked to make an offering 
composed of two birds, cedar 
wood, crimson and hyssop. 
The birds they understand. 
Animals are a recurring 
and central element of the 
sacrificial system. But cedar 
and hyssop strike these com-

mentators as being surprising 
additions to this offering; and 
when something in the text 
seems out of the ordinary, the 
rabbis often find symbolic 
significance to its inclusion. 
In this case, that 
symbolism stands as a 
beautiful rebuke to the 
proposed humility of 
the Talmud. Cedar and 
hyssop, these later rab-
bis argue, demonstrate 
how a Jew is to carry 
herself in the world: 
strong and upright, 
approaching life with 
confidence and a sense 
of responsibility like a 
cedar. Simultaneously, 
without paradox, gentle 
and bending, approach-
ing life with awe, wonder and 
humility like hyssop swaying 
in a breeze. 
How do we walk, these rab-
bis ask? With the complexity 
intrinsic to human existence. 
Not with a humility so great it 
cripples us from confronting 
the daunting task of putting a 
broken world back together, 
but also not with a hubris 
that prevents us from under-
standing life’s fragility and the 
necessity for compassion. 
As we approach Passover 
and zman cheiruteinu, the 
recognition of our liberation, 
may we walk forward with 
purpose and conviction, with 
confidence and hope, but also 
with flexibility and kindness. 
And through it all may we 
walk together with awe and 
wonder. Shabbat shalom and 
chag kasher v’sameach. 

Rabbi Yonatan Dahlen is a rabbi 

at Congregation Shaarey Zedek in 

Southfield.

SPIRIT
TORAH PORTION

Rabbi Yoni 
Dahlen

Parshat 

Metzora: 

Leviticus 

14:1-15:33; 

Malachi 

3:4-24.

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