Rejoicing in theTorah
You’re probably reading this as we are in Israel to celebrate Sukkot. So although the newsletter was written a few weeks beforehand, I thought that during this rest from more intense study would be a good time to present a short exhortation on this special time of rejoicing in the Torah. While we celebrate with decorated sukkot, special meals, dancing, singing, midrash, waving the lulav, and visiting friends and family, we celebrate the One Who IS our Song:
- The LORD is my strength and song, and He has become my salvation;
- This is my God, and I will praise Him; my father’s God, and I will exalt Him. (Ex 15:2)
Where the text says, “I will praise Him,” there is deeper meaning than can be seen in most English translations. The word for “praise” is navah:
נָוָה
Navah, which is translated in the NASB as “praise,” has an essential meaning of making a place of rest, particularly beautifying it:
[H5115] to rest (as at home); causatively (through the implied idea of beauty), to celebrate (with praises):—keep at home, prepare an habitation.
Here's how it is used in Scripture:
- to beautify (Hiphil) to beautify, adorn
- to dwell (Qal) to dwell, abide, keep at home (Hophal) rest
Especially on weekly Shabbats and the high sabbaths of our moedim, we have an opportunity to beautify the mitzvot we keep. We don’t just check off a mitzvah box; instead, we create a place of “rest” for the Presence of Adonai to dwell in our little temples. When Adonai is at home with us in a mitzvah we keep, it radiates His beauty. The beauty of the mitzvah is from His glory, not ours. To remind ourselves of the beauty of the Mishkan and Mikdash (Tabernacle and Temple), we can find ways to physically beautify a mitzvah. It might be special things for the Shabbat table, like fine challah covers, silver matchbook covers, embroidered tablecloths, or an ornate kiddush cup.
In the synagogue, Torah scrolls are adorned with silver ornamentation, even a “breastplate” and a “crown” of ornaments in the shape of pomegranates. The pointer used to keep one’s place in Torah reading is usually beautiful silver. Such extravagance may be a little off-putting to the average newcomer to Torah. It feels ostentatious, somehow contrary to the simplicity of the truth contained within the Scripture.
How we feel about these things personally means nothing. What it means to those who beautify the mitzvot means everything. If the point is to show off the wealth of the congregation, then the decorations are nothing. If the point is to provide a proper resting place for the King of Kings by honoring His commandments, then the decorations are everything they should be.
Some may point to Yeshua’s rebuke of extra-long tzitziyot or extra-wide tefillin, yet these are not rebukes of beautifying the observance of the commandments, but of drawing attention to one’s self. Honoring the Source of the mitzvah is not the same as honoring the observer of the mitzvah! If we were unsure about it, history tells us that the First Century Notzrim (Jewish followers of Yeshua) were known for wearing tefillin decorated with beautiful silver cases. These early believers beautified the observance of the commandment, making it sweeter both for the observer and the recipient of its glory, the Holy One.
This is where our “Book of the Week” comes in. There is a small population of Jews left in Iran, the remnants of the first two beast kingdoms of Babylon and Persia, the lion and the bear. Because the Jewish history of the Roman exile is heavily weighted toward the Ashkenazi (European) experience, many have no idea of the Mizrachi (Middle Eastern) Jewish experience from the Babylonian exile until today.
When Israel became a nation in 1948, the long sufferings of Middle Eastern Jews reached critical mass, and almost entire Jewish populations, such as Iraqi Jews, were stripped of their possessions and deported. Many made their way to Israel, but many also dispersed to other nations.
Iranian (Persian) Jews also began trickling out of Iran, and the trickle became a flood when the Shah was deposed in 1979. As was the custom, the Jews’ property was often confiscated, coerced, or swindled by the new government officials, institutions, and even friends and neighbors who capitalized on the Persian Jews’ loss of protection under the ayatollah. Many arrived in their host countries with only a suitcase. Those who remained in Iran were under constant suspicion as Israeli spies, and many were hanged.
The Jews of Iran is a photographic chronicle of the Jews left in Iran. They are somewhat protected under the current Iranian government, but not from the government's sincere benevolence and tolerance of the Jewish population. Instead, they are “token” Jews used for propaganda purposes. This is a sick attempt to deceive the world that the ayatollahs are just fine with Jews who stay in their place as dhimmis, or non-Muslim residents subject to extra taxes and loss of rights, but that the free nation of Israel is evil.
In truth, the beast systems of the world can never tolerate Jews or those who identify with them in covenant obedience residing in their own land Israel and exercising freedom from the Beast’s control. The Beast must be “worshiped,” obeyed first, then those who obey the Creator of the Universe may be rewarded with limited rights to worship another. The Beast rule is always characterized by seizing ultimate power and authority over human souls.
In our Footsteps of Messiah series, we’ve been anticipating the time that those principalities and powers in high places are shaken out of the way, and their human puppets on earth lose the power derived from them. I found The Jews of Iran a bit sad, especially since I am half Persian, but what fascinated me in the photographs was how the synagogues and feast celebrations of Persian Jews are decorated in spite of oppression. In particular, there is a photo of an elaborately decorated set of tefillin. For Queen Esther's children to beautify the mitzvah in the face of beast-evil is particularly poignant.
And so we must do. As we keep the mitzvot in the face of the rising flood of evil around us, may we beautify them as much as possible. Not only with outward beauty, but to emphasize the beauty-rest we experience within when we glorify obedience to the Creator of all things.
At the conclusion of the Babylonian exile, the lion-beast had fallen. Purified from idol-worship even in Babylon, a remnant received permission to return to the Promised Land. Under the new Persian bear-beast, more and more returned to rebuild the Temple. This is why the Jews simply cannot be stamped out by any beast empire. Those empires all have a shelf-life, an appointed period to rule, then they will be brought down. The Kingdom of Heaven will never end, and the observant Jews, representing all Israel, serve that King, not a human shah, king, or emperor.
When we are subjects of a Kingdom that never ends, then the end of empires may be troublesome and troubling, yet it brings Israel one step closer to the reign of Messiah Yeshua and the One Whom we’ve enthroned on our praises, beautifying a resting place for Him through observing the commandments even in the places of our exile. If we will beautify the commandments in exile, then we can join the remnant that returns to rebuild Jerusalem and prepare her to unite with Jerusalem above.
Why do the Persian Jews still beautify the commandments, yet they haven’t escaped the beast? Good question. With such questions, it’s helpful to turn the question inward. How well are we beautifying the commandments we observe? Why haven’t we escaped the beast? Is there yet any ugliness inside or outside the mitzvot that diminishes the glory due the One Who commanded it?
If it is in your heart to beautify a commandment with something as simple as devotion and love, then do it with all your heart. If it is in your heart to rejoice in the Torah by spending money (but not on a Shabbat!) to do so, then by all means, for no one is to appear before Adonai in His Holy City “empty-handed.”
If you like to splurge on lavish enjoyment of the sabbaths and feast days, let no person judge you! Judge yourself. If this is an expression of your intense desire to release the glory of the Father into the world, then don't hold back! Rejoice in the Torah, and give Yah a habitation of rest in your little sanctuary...even in the exile. Every day in exile is a day closer to home.
**
Although like most photography books The Jews of Iran is expensive ($29.95), if you're not looking for a "coffee table book," you can likely borrow it through your local library's interlibrary loan service.
