Freedom To Complain?

Several years ago, I attended a bat mitzvah reception in Washington D.C.

During the cocktail hour, the hosts served a variety of hors d’oeuvres, including the most delicious lamb chops I had ever had.

They were slightly spicy, succulent, scrumptious; every bite melted into a small taste of heaven. This dish was transformative and clearly unforgettable. Almost two years later, the celebrant’s younger brother had a bar mitzvah and the party was being held in the same hotel.

All I could think about, no, obsess about, was sampling again those amazing grilled morsels. At the appointed hour, I arrived and quickly scanned the rows of delicious hot plates. To my utter shock and chagrin, no lamb chops.

I was grief stricken, devastated and in a down mood for the rest of the evening. My night of joy was ruined because all I could think about was missing.

I was reminded of this reaction recently, when reviewing sections of the Book of Numbers, where the still wandering Israelites were getting ever closer to the Promised Land.

We are told in Numbers 11:4 the Hebrews felt a deep craving and cried to Moses and said, “Mee Yacheelaynu Basar,” which means, “We want to eat meat!” After eating only manna, the descendants of the 12 tribes of Jacob wanted lamb chops!

The complainers go on: “In Egypt we remember eating fish, cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic.” Isn’t it astonishing that these newly freed people believed their slave rationed diet consisted of tilapia, pickles, and cantaloupe?

What was even more important to the Jewish sages was the observation the Torah spoke about human nature honestly.

People obsess and complain about what they don’t have and rarely spend equal energy counting the blessings they do have. The sacred texts detail miracle after miracle that occurred on behalf of these fi ckle followers of Abraham. Some examples are the 10 plagues, the splitting of the Red Sea, the Ten Commandments, manna from heaven in thewilderness, and water wells in the Middle Eastern desert.

Even setting aside constant protection from a “pillar of cloud” and heat and warmth from a “pillar of fi re,” these people forgot to focus on their first and most fantastic blessing, namely freedom.

Did the newly liberated multitude from Egypt forget the cruelty they suff ered since the death of Joseph, their prince and protector? Perhaps, the rabbis postulated, they mistakenly believed freedom meant the freedom to complain.

As the great American Jewish commentator Rabbi A. J. Heschel noted, freedom, as envisioned and embraced in Judaism, does not mean the freedom to do what one wants whenever one wants.

Instead, the Torah’s defi nition of liberty is that if you are gifted with the ability to do what you want, you ought to choose to do the right thing - a good deed, something positive for someone else.

Emancipation creates the moral obligation to make the world a better place. The Israelites that left Egypt never made it to the Promised Land because they could not experience this level of freedom. They wandered for 40 years so a new generation could be born and raised in the wilderness in total freedom from material things. Thus, they would have a better chance to grasp this concept of freedom and help make it universal.

As we approach the Fourth of July and we think about the range of freedoms Independence Day represents, let’s remember that we need not only be forever grateful for liberty and lamb chops, but to use our blessings to bless others as well.

RABBI JACK ZANERHAFT IS THE SPIRITUAL LEADER OF CONGREGATION ETZ CHAIM (TREE OF LIFE) IN BENTONVILLE.

CONTACT HIM AT ZANEY4JAZ@ AOL.COM.