Chanukah – Education for Mesirat Nefesh

CHANUKAH – EDUCATION FOR MESIRAS NEFESH (2021)

The Bach’s Insight Into Chanukah

The Bach explains that galus Yavan stemmed from hisrashlas b’avodah — Am Yisrael’s avodas Hashem lacked complete dedication.  Middah-k’neged-middah, reshayaim imposed gezeiros (e.g., the Tamid and the Menorah) that disturbed the avodah in a very definitive way.

As a result, Am Yisrael’s teshuvah called for mesiras nefesh.  Specifically, they went to war and risked their lives in order to restore that very avodah.  The neis of Chanukah is a by-product of that mesiras nefesh.  

Defining מסירות נפש

In order to understand mesiras nefesh – like every sugya – we start from the extreme case.  This is the way the Gemara works.  Whether it is Bava Kamma or Gittin, Chazal routinely present very extreme cases from which we discern the overarching concept. 

With regards to mesiras nefesh, the extreme case is (as the name suggests) involves one actually giving his life.  Now, picture someone moments away from giving his life al kiddush Hashem — the biggest zchus imaginable.  He prepares to make a bracha to be mekdaish shem shamayim b’rabim.  Now, imagine telling that person “you know, your life is really nonsense.”  This is clearly not true.  

We see from the extreme case, that mesiras nefesh is about “giving over” something of real import to that which is even of greater importance — the Borei Olam.

Not so long ago, Rav Chatzkel zt’l was crying in Shanghai. Why?  Because he was not able to give his life for kiddush Hashem.  We, by contrast, would be so happy that we survived.  Rav Chatzkel was crying why the others were zocheh and yet he wasn’t.  

When we think about people who, chas v’shalom, go off-the-derech, we often ask ourselves, why would someone do that?  Why not just be frum and also have everything in the world?

This line of thinking stems from a view of k’lal y’srael without any mesiras nefesh.  We imagine one could enjoy everything in world and remain charedi.  Be shomer Shabbos and have a good time in the sukkah.  This outlook, though, would not be sustainable because Yiddishkeit  presupposes that one is living with mesiras nefesh.  Part and parcel of the life of an observant Jew is the reality of seeing something you want and not going after that thing. 

Our View of מסירות נפש

Mesiras nefesh is the biggest madreigah one could reach and yet we are not even reaching in the beginning.  Our whole approach to mesiras nefesh is off-kilter.  When we speak of mesiras nefesh we invariably end up denigrating the underlying desire that one seeks to give up.  Whatever the activity or habit or object may be, we simply dismiss it as pure nonsense.  It’s pointless.  Just ignore it.

However, the extreme case (of giving one’s life) taught us that what one is willing to give over is important – very important – and not just some pesky disturbance. 

Educating about מסירות נפש Does Not Belong To רבים

Given this backdrop, we must understand that educating about mesiras nefesh is always a personal question.  The consequences of giving something up are always going to be felt by the individual in his personal life.  Mesiras nefesh presupposes that your own nefesh – which is composed of entirely different ingredients than mine – is given over in an entirely different way.  

When we approach mesiras nefesh from the vantage point of the rabbim we often miss this point.  Preaching mesiras nefesh to an entire yeshiva or congregation will not be effective.

Let’s use sports as an example of this phenomenon.  Since it’s practically asur to say that sports are important, our default position is to allow it once or twice just to vent that energy.  We don’t try to understand why someone would actually enjoy basketball or football, rather we just imagine that if one gets it “out of your system” that’ll quench his desire.  

This simplistic approach is entirely wrong.  When one does something they enjoy, that doesn’t diminish the desire.  Rather, you want more of that.  You just reinforce the attraction of the thing.  

Rather than hoping the desire will peter out, we have to bother ourselves with understanding the desire to play.  We have to consider what relevant kochos emerge from playing ball.  We have to think, when one wants to play ball, what kochos could be given up or given over or channeled towards avodas Hashem.  When we reckon with these insightful questions we can build a student or broaden his personality or help him understand that that particular outlet.  

This approach all presupposes, though that we realize the student’s desire is something that is important for him. Once that recognition is in place, we can have a meaningful discussion as to what is so important for you and why that is so important for you and what do you want out of that whole thing and what is so glamorous about that thing.  Then we can think pro-actively about what can one give up regarding that desire or how we can go further on or what can we channeled towards avodas Hashem.

There are No Hobbies.

Over the years, I have asked tons of people: “what is their hobby?” Most people, I found simply cannot answer.  “Hobby?  What hobby?  I learn.”  Now, when I first began to hear these answers, I was so impressed that people simply don’t enjoy anything else besides learning.  But once I heard the same line fifty times, I began to realize that there are not fifty Vilna Gaons walking around.  Why not?  

Because this “no-hobby” phenomenon has nothing really to do with learning. Rather it is because people are not aware of their nefesh.  People are so primitive in their thinking that they fail to realize the presence of any nefesh.  And clearly, without any nefesh to speak of, you can forget the whole notion of mesiras nefesh.  

Let’s give an example.  The yeshiva tells the talmidim, “you have to learn” and the importance of learning davka on Chanuka and davka on Shabbos Chanukah, but … you really want to go to your relative’s mesibah.  What is our response?  “Just ignore that” and “Just forget about that.”  Why?  Because it’s much more important to learn.

This response is not educating anyone in mesiras nefesh.  We may think that we are approaching this in a personal way because for this talmid it’s about visiting his aunt and for that talmid it’s about attending a shalom zochor – but we are essentially always communicating that everything on the other side of the ledger is just nonsense.

Similarly, we cannot hope to successfully educate kids about a kosher phone if all we seek to do is to “close the door” on the whole topic.  By way of contrast, we have to understand that these kids want to feel connected and then work with that ratzon – is it a good ratzon or not?  Why do you want to be so connected?  Then you have to respond to the boy and explain to the boy and work with the boy.  

What’s the alternative?  You dismiss that desire as totally unimportant – and once that’s the case, you simply cannot work on mesiras nefesh.  You never allowed your nefesh into the equation.  Rather, you have to take that nefesh – your nefesh – and that experience that you enjoyed and that experience that you want … and you have to contemplate that yes that is something to reckon with; yet I am willing to give that up for something else.  Or I am willing to move that koach towards something that will bring be closer to the Borei Olam.  

So long as the matter is not personal, one simply cannot educate about mesiras nefesh.  I must first recognize that for him, there is something alluring and enticing about an I-phone.  He wants that phone.  And he wants to feel connected.  And he wants to have 100,000 people that hold of him.  Fine.  Let’s accept that premise and work with it.  What could we give up?  Where is my nefesh and how and where can I be mosser it?  

The whole approach of pretending that one has no ratzonos, stems from a fear to recognize the existence of such ratzonos.  In so doing, we pretend to be on some advanced level of avodas Hashem when, in reality, we essentially prevent any avodah from even beginning.  

The work of mesiras nefesh presuppose a recognition of one’s ratzonos and this is one of the reasons that the chinuch of mesiras nefesh is always personal.  This being the case, if we persist with an impersonal notion of mesiras nefesh and simply “do what we need to do” and ignore any and all pressure “not to do what we need to do,” we have cut ourselves off from any real mesiras nefesh.  We didn’t “give anything away,” but rather we just “pressured ourselves” into en masse conformity.  

Conclusion: The New Avodah of Chanukah

To the extent we truly wish to work on Chanukah¸ this approach opens up a new and sensible avodah at this time.  We have a tremendous amount of work to do within our own nefesh.  Within our own nefesh are ratzonos that could go in directions absolutely incompatible with our charedi lifestyle.  If we would actually go according to those kochos, who knows where we would end up.  

Nevertheless, ignoring them altogether accomplishes nothing.  The avodah requires us to be moseir nefesh.  To take that piece of nefesh in that koach – within that ratzon – and work with it, and modify it, and make it softer, and render it less of a pull on my persona, of finding a way to make it a little more shayach to avodas Hashem in some other manifestation.  When we work with that nefesh and moser this nefesh that is where the work begins  Where we ignore any opposing forces, however we forfeit the opportunity to educate about mesiras nefesh.  

This provides an ample place for us to work in a personal way over Chanukah.  We should look for  something that you enjoy, something that you want should be and look for ways to give that over.  But let us remain mindful that this chinuch can only work on a personal-level and not via an institution-wide, macro-level.  Adrenaline and hype will only go so far. Mesiras nefesh cannot be built from pressure.   

With this histones from the Bach we can chart for ourselves a very rich place of avodah throughout Chanukah. The starting point is (1) recognizing that mesiras nefesh lies at the very heart of avodas Hashem and yet (2) it cannot be educated properly within a genera, macro-framework.  Rather, the work of mesiras nefesh will only be successful when undertaken in a personal way.  If we engage that work, we will find that mesiras nefesh does not demand that one give up their life but rather that our ratzonos – which are important ratzonos -should be given over to avodah.  When we face that reality, we can identify something in our lives that is important to us and give up a bit for avodas Hashem.