{"id":51861,"date":"2021-09-20T13:35:08","date_gmt":"2021-09-20T13:35:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/holidays\/?p=51861"},"modified":"2021-09-20T13:35:08","modified_gmt":"2021-09-20T13:35:08","slug":"to-kiss-to-dance-to-be-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ou.org\/holidays\/to-kiss-to-dance-to-be-one\/","title":{"rendered":"To Kiss,\u00a0To Dance,\u00a0To Be One"},"content":{"rendered":"

To kiss is to express intimacy; to dance is to fill space with movement, with passion and joy.\u00a0 In small and large ways, to kiss and to dance are ways to express love and devotion, two sentiments at the heart of the Simchat Torah <\/em>celebration.<\/p>\n

Torah is our most precious possession, our gift.\u00a0 To our mortal sensibilities, Torah allows us to know God.\u00a0 God is Torah and Torah is God.\u00a0\u00a0 For the Jew, to know God is to study His Torah; to love God is to love Torah.<\/p>\n

Love is often expressed with a kiss.\u00a0 During hakafos <\/em>on Simchat Torah<\/em>, we press our lips directly to the Torah, showing our full love and devotion \u2026\u00a0 for what is a kiss but a physical expression of the deepest feelings we hold?\u00a0 Sociologists have categorized as many as fifty-two types of kisses but to kiss the Torah is to exist in a category beyond.<\/p>\n

Recently, I watched a Hachnasat Sefer<\/em> Torah<\/em> celebration on YouTube in which a non-Jewish reporter observing the celebration seemed enthralled by what he was witnessing.\u00a0 Turning to the Jew who accompanied him, he exclaimed, \u201c\u2026 I can actually feel the ecstasy in the air, but tell me just one thing, what is the significance of everyone kissing and hugging this Torah?\u201d<\/p>\n

See the celebration through his eyes!\u00a0 Jews on their feet for hours as fellow Jews embrace the Sifrei <\/em>Torah and circle the shul seven times, dancing and singing throughout!\u00a0 Jews kissing Torah after Torah, over and over, with the true passion of a beloved.\u00a0 Hugs.\u00a0 Kisses.\u00a0 Dancing.\u00a0 Again, and again.\u00a0 No wedding reception more boisterous or joyous.\u00a0 Hugs.\u00a0 Kisses.\u00a0 Dancing.<\/p>\n

And when the singing and dancing ends?\u00a0 There is more love of Torah as the actual reading of the Torah is completed!\u00a0 It is Simchat Torah<\/em> and we have yet again completed the entirety of Torah, from Bereshit <\/em>to the last word of V\u2019zot HaBracha<\/em>!<\/p>\n

But wait\u2026 we are not <\/em>done.\u00a0 It is not a completion we celebrate but rather a declaration of an unending devotion and love.\u00a0 We no sooner complete the last of V\u2019zot HaBracha than<\/em> we begin anew with Bereshit<\/em>!\u00a0 But why?\u00a0 Why return to the start right away<\/em>?\u00a0 Why not take a moment to savor our accomplishment?\u00a0 The p\u2019shat <\/em>is that we are never finished with Torah.\u00a0 God\u2019s gift is Ein Sof<\/em>, like God.\u00a0 It is only our human limitations that needs and perceives an \u201cend\u201d.\u00a0 This is why, at every siyum <\/em>celebration as we rejoice at the completion of this sefer <\/em>or this masechet<\/em>, we cry out, \u201chadran halach<\/em>!\u201d \u2013 we shall return to you.\u00a0 There is always more, and we are eager to begin anew, to return, to learn more.<\/p>\n

There is another reason we do not take a break; we do not want the Satan to be able to falsely accuse Klal Yisrael<\/em> of believing that they are finished and done, as a graduate tossing his cap into the air and bidding farewell to his college studies.<\/p>\n

Could the Satan really claim such a thing of our Simchat Torah <\/em>celebration?\u00a0 In \u201cMessages from Rav Pam\u201d by Rabbi Sholom Smith, Rav Avraham Pam ZT\u2019L, notes that the Satan can see and hear all the singing and dancing, not to mention all those kisses and loving hugs of those Sifrei Torah<\/em>.\u00a0 Who could witness this and suggest that we are like graduates, bidding farewell to our studies?<\/p>\n

If Hollywood has taught us anything it has taught us that a kiss can mean different things\u2026<\/p>\n

Citing a midrash in Ruth Rabbah (2:21), Rav Pam focuses on a dramatic and emotional moment, \u201cAnd Oprah kissed her mother-in-law farewell.\u201d (1:14)\u00a0 \u00a0The midrash teaches that every kiss is frivolous except for three types:\u00a0 The first, kisses of greatness (gedulah<\/em>), as when Navi Shmuel took a flask of oil and poured some on Shaul\u2019s head and kissed him. (Shmuel 10:1) When Shmuel kissed the newly anointed King Shaul, their two souls were joined, enabling Shmuel to transfer a spirit of holiness to Shaul.\u00a0 The second, the kiss of meeting (perakim<\/em>), reuniting those who have been separated, as when Aaron encounters Moshe, \u201cHe went and met him at the mountain of God, and he kissed him.\u201d (Shemot 4:27)\u00a0 \u00a0The third is the kiss of separation (perishut<\/em>).\u00a0 This is Oprah\u2019s kiss, a kiss that creates the continuing bond and connection when two people must part from one another other.<\/p>\n

No question our kisses on Simchat <\/em>Torah are real, so why do we fear the Satan\u2019s false accusation?\u00a0 Rav Pam responds that the Satan could have made the case that they are kisses of perishut<\/em> \u2013 of separation.\u00a0 Goodbye kisses.\u00a0 I\u2019m leaving you now, kisses.\u00a0 Farewell kisses.<\/p>\n

But our kisses are not <\/em>farewell kisses!\u00a0 So, to guarantee that there can be no such mistake, as soon as we finish the final words of Sefer Devarim <\/em>we immediately read the first words of Sefer Bereshit<\/em>.\u00a0 No goodbyes here!\u00a0 Our kisses are kisses of gedulah<\/em>, of greatness.\u00a0 Our kisses create a spiritual connection to the soul of Torah itself.<\/p>\n

Such a connection cannot be maintained by love and devotion alone.\u00a0 Connecting so powerfully to Torah also demands strength and fortitude.\u00a0 It is strength which enables us to focus on gedulah<\/em> rather than perishut<\/em>.\u00a0 \u00a0Where do we get this strength?\u00a0 Where do we get the fortitude to return to Torah over and over again, with no mid-winter or summer breaks?<\/p>\n

Our strength comes from our unity.\u00a0 We are One People.\u00a0 Torah study and learning is not a \u201cone-man band\u201d.\u00a0 We are in this together.\u00a0 At Sinai when Torah was revealed, we stood together as one. k\u2019ish echad b\u2019lev echad<\/em>, as one to receive it.<\/p>\n

As one.\u00a0 Consider, is there a more indelible image than of Jews dancing?\u00a0 And how do Jews dance?\u00a0 Not individually but in a line with hands clasped or in a circle \u2013 a gathering, a community, a unity.\u00a0 Together.<\/p>\n

It is our oneness that is our strength on Simchat Torah<\/em>.\u00a0 It is for this reason the celebration focuses not on the learning of<\/em> Torah but on dancing with<\/em> Torah.\u00a0 The Lubavitcher Rebbe (shared with me by Rabbi Mordechai Dinerman) insightfully noted that the Torah we dance with on Simchat Torah <\/em>is not opened to the text but closed and clothed.\u00a0 Simchas Torah<\/em>, he explained, is the day when the inherent connection of the Jew with Torah is revealed.\u00a0 The inherent connection is the idea of morasha kehilas Yaakov, <\/em>an inheritance.\u00a0 Whether a child taps into it or not, he owns the inheritance. It is his. Similarly, every Jew has a connection to Torah, and we underscore this not by reading, learning, and expounding the Torah on Simchas Torah<\/em>, (which some can do and others less so), but by covering the Torah, keeping it closed and dancing with it, which underscores the inherently-equal connection we all<\/u> share with the Torah.<\/p>\n

There are many levels of understanding when studying and learning Torah but when it comes to dancing with the Torah, we are all equal.\u00a0 Dancing unites all Jews into a single, great Chosen People.\u00a0 Perhaps more to the point, the Rebbe continues that, in learning Torah, it is impossible to learn it all at once; one needs to learn one inyan<\/em> and another inyan<\/em>, one parasha<\/em>, one masechet<\/em> and so on.\u00a0 But when dancing with a closed, covered Torah, we dance and hold the complete<\/u> Torah, from beginning to end, in its entirety.<\/p>\n

The Lubavitcher Rebbe makes clear that what unites us on Simchat Torah<\/em> is the dancing.\u00a0 In study, we are differentiated by our heads.\u00a0 When we dance, we dance with our feet, our unity is clear.\u00a0 When we dance, we are equal!\u00a0 On Simchat Torah<\/em> we don\u2019t study, we dance.\u00a0 In doing so, we understand that we are all capable of gedulah<\/em>, not perishut<\/em>.\u00a0 Yes, each of us must continue to grow deeper in our Torah learning and study but particularly on Simchat Torah<\/em> it is our unity in Torah we must embrace.\u00a0 And to do that, we need only keep dancing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To kiss is to express intimacy; to dance is to fill space with movement, with passion and joy.\u00a0 In small and large ways, to kiss and to dance are ways to express love and devotion, two sentiments at the heart of the Simchat Torah celebration. 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