Serving G-d With Joy
Serving G-d With Joy

In Tehillim, Psalms, King David exhorts us to serve Hashem with joy. In this week's Torah portion, not only are we told that we will be terribly cursed if we do not follow the commandments of the Torah, but we are then further warned that these catastrophes will befall us “because you did not serve the Lord your God amid gladness and goodness, when everything was abundant.”

Several related questions arise.

First, which is the real reason Hashem will bring these calamities upon our nation, that we do not observe His commandments, or that we do observe His commandments but fail to have the proper emotion in this observance.

Further, it seems that this is a very high standard for the average person, to feel elation in our observance of mitzvoth. Would Hashem really hold us to that standard?

The simplest answer to our questions is from Rav Schlesinger, the Rav of Gilo, whose response follows the approach of the Mishnah in Pirkei Avot that states that all who keep the Torah in poverty will merit keeping the Torah in wealth, and conversely, those who fail to keep the Torah in abundance will then suffer poverty and keep the Torah in this diminished state.

This response still leaves us with the question of feeling joy in following the Torah. Rabbi Frand tackles this question by focusing on the two last words of the verse, “Meirov kol,” when everything was abundant. By using these two words together after speaking of gladness and goodness of heart, the Torah is reminding us that gladness comes from within and is not a product of what one has.

The two words here echo the words of the evil Esau and our patriarch Jacob upon their reunion. Esau, with his overflowing riches, proclaimed, “Yesh li rov, I have plenty,” implying that there is always room to have more. Therefore, Jacob was able to convince him to take the extremely generous gift he had sent his brother, for Jacob’s response was, “Yesh li kol, I have everything.”

When viewed from this perspective, one can understand that Hashem urges us to be happy knowing that we ourselves determine our level of happiness, that happiness is the result of choosing to focus on the good and the blessings in our lives rather than on what we lack. When we can transform our perspective from rov into kol, we can nullify the punishments.

Taking this reasoning to another level leads us to discuss the dual nature of man. He is both a physical and a spiritual being and, as Rav Elya Lopian points out, he therefore has roots that reach up toward heaven and roots that dig down into the earth. Where the individual focuses will determine which aspect will grow. Even if one keeps all the mitzvoth but is nevertheless focusing on the joys of the physical aspects of his life for their own sake, rather than as a means to spiritual ends, he risks losing those material blessings that keep him anchored to the physical and prevent his soul from soaring upward.

Rabbi Lopian continues: How can one know the direction in which he is growing? The barometer that measures his connection is the amount of pleasure and joy he experiences in each of these pursuits. For those who focus on the physical, this area of pleasure will be taken away, for this is not where the true joy of a human being should be realized.

When Hashem created Man, He envisioned him as a spiritual bring, a portion of God Himself, merely clothed in a physical body. As Rabbi Walkin explains in The World Within, man’s soul intrinsically desires to reconnect with its Maker, for therein lies its greatest joy.

We need to recognize this reality, that as God is the King, we, His children, are princes and princesses. As such, it is beneath our dignity to wallow in lowly physical pleasures; rather we must learn how we can use our physical and material gifts to help us reconnect to the upward root and the essence of our being. If we contemplate our holy soul, we will gain direction in our lives, thereby achieving true happiness, for spirituality is the natural state of man.

God constantly sends us messages to achieve this end. If we fail to achieve it through what we perceive as blessings, He will send us “curses” until our souls begin to reconnect.

Where does one begin losing his true path and begin sliding onto the wrong road? Rabbi Reiss cites Reb Moshe Leib of Tesov in identifying that point. The marker, he says, is simcha, the joy one feels in doing mitzvoth. As long as one feels joyous with Torah and mitzvoth, he will not go astray. As soon as he loses that sense of joy and begins observing mitzvoth only through a sense of obligation he begins losing his way.

Even more important, if we hope our children follow the path of Torah, we must imbue them with a sense of joy in our way of life, not just a sense of obligation. We must replace the Yiddish expression, “Es iz shver tzu zein a Yid, it is difficult to be a Jew” with, “Es iz a glick tzu zein a Yid, es iz a kovod tzu zein a Yid, it is a joy, an honor and privilege to be a Jew.” We must show our children that we keep the Torah more because we want to than because we have to.

Our Rosh Hashanah liturgy helps us understand from whence this joy should arise. The liturgy presents us with two possible relationships between ourselves and God: are we like children [of God] or are we like servants [of God]. If we are like Your children, have mercy upon us as a father has mercy on his children; and if we are like servants, our eyes are uplifted to you hoping for compassion.

Each of these relationships is unique and will generate the reciprocal relationship, explains Rabbi Walkin. When a father asks his son to do something for him, the son doesn’t merely acquiesce. He is happy to fulfill his father’s wish and goes beyond the very minimum actually verbalized. On the other hand, when a master (or a boss) asks his servant to do something, The servant may rush to do so for fear of losing his job, but he does not do so joyously and seldom goes beyond the request, unless he’s looking for a promotion.

When we ask Hashem for whatever we feel we need, especially before or on Rosh Hashanah, Hashem reciprocates with the approach we had in fulfilling His request to do mitzvoth. If we acted as sons toward their father, Hashem happily gives us what we request, going above and beyond the original request. On the other hand, if we grudgingly fulfilled our obligations not as a son but as a servant, Hashem is not obligated to further give us anything, for He has already given us so much.

If we are convicted of a crime, a father will do all within his power to mitigate the crime and ease the punishment. Not so an employer who will extend himself only if he himself will derive some benefit from the freedom of his employee. In the same vein, when we err or transgress, Hashem will minimize our transgression and lessen the punishment or forgive us completely if we have created the father/son relationship. But if we have only grudgingly fulfilled our duties, Hashem will judge us as a mere servant or employee.

It is the month of Elul. We have the choice to behave toward our God as our personal Father, with love and joy, appreciating our opportunities to thank Hashem for all He does for us, or we can behave as a servant doing His bidding, frustrated and angry that we cannot do as we please at any given moment.

We can now take this idea one step further. Hashem is not only our intimate Father but also our Sovereign King. We are in His presence. He has not erected high castle walls to keep us from him, not does He maintain a scheduling secretary or a security contingent to block our access.  No president, no earthly royalty, no company CEO, not even most busy rabbis have unlimited hours with no appointment necessary when any subject can meet with them.

How wondrous, how special, how honored are we to have such unlimited access to our Father our King! What greater reason is there for joy! All we have to do is make our presence known by performing a mitzvah or speaking to Him through prayer, for He is truly interested in every aspect of our lives. He is interested in me!

And so, as true royalty, on Rosh Hashanah we eat rich food and drink fine wine as befits our status, elevating the food and drink to spiritual pursuits.

True wealth and joy lies in Torah and in the Torah way of life, not in material values, for our souls yearn for this connection, As Rabbi Schorr points out in Halekach Vehalebuv, if we do not find our joy in this spiritual realm, we will seek joy to fill the void in inappropriate places. We will experience a high which will soon subside and lead to a crash. Thus will begin our slide into the abyss.

On the other hand, if our high comes from doing good, the high stays with us and can be recalled even years later to raise our spirits again and bring continued joy to our souls (and a smile to our lips).

Our challenge in the month of Elul is to maintain our connection to Hashem through simcha, through the joyous performance of mitzvoth that we can bequeath to our children. When we tap into our Godly soul, we feel true joy, and act as befits our status as a child of Royalty. Our service is the service of a loving child to his Father, and our joy reflects this relationship.