Weekly Torah Portion: The flame of enthusiasm

After the sin of the golden calf, which we wrote about extensively last week, Moses goes up to Mount Sinai to plead with God to forgive the people. He is persistent, and indeed, a few months later, on Yom Kippur, Moses comes down from the mountain with a new version of the Ten Commandments, to replace those that he broke in anger.

But he has an additional message for the people: We must build a Tabernacle. He gathers the people and tells them of God’s command to build this Tabernacle, with each person contributing as they see fit.

The Bible does not mince words in describing the people’s enthusiasm as well the great spirit of generosity that inspired the people to come and contribute their services. Eventually, professional artists working on the Tabernacle came and told Moses, “The people bring much more than enough,” meaning there was just too much. Thus the people were commanded to stop donating.

The verse then goes on to say, “So the people were restrained from bringing.” The wording seems a bit strange because the word for restrained is the same as that for imprisoned in Hebrew. It could have been written, for instance, that they were just asked or told to stop bringing. But the Bible wanted to drive home the point, as if people needed to be imprisoned in order to stop them from making donations. Their desire to give both their property and their talents for the tabernacle was so strong they had to be restrained to stop.

It is hard not to admire this spirit of generosity, but our sages read these verses and did not get excited by them. They remembered what we read last week about the Golden Calf. Almost everyone contributed to its construction as well, with great enthusiasm.

They said, “You cannot judge the character of the nation - Charged with the calf, they give; charged with the Tabernacle, they give (Jerusalem Talmud, Shekalim 2).”

Many have wondered about the nature and character of the Jewish people. After all, they gave donations to totally opposed causes. A modern example would be a person who donates to Gush Emunim and to Peace Now. How can one judge the character of this special nation-

It turns out, however, that there is at least one characteristic we can glean from the story: the trait of enthusiasm.

Within the Jewish people, and perhaps in humankind as a whole, there is a special phenomenon of enthusiasm. You can see it in the masses that descend on brand-name stores from abroad, or the crowds that throng the jogging trails. This enthusiasm focuses on a certain brand one day and then goes somewhere else entirely.

It is not by chance that we find Jews as active participants in the world’s most revolutionary movements, even in the most bizarre places. Because when Jews get enthusiastic, they go all the way.

The Talmud tells a story about a Jew passing by a statue one day just as idol worshippers were performing their rituals, which involved defecating on or near the statue. The Jew came along and wiped his butt on the statue. The priest in charge of the idol worship apparently said, “never has a person worshiped our god in such a fine manner as this Jew.” This seems to show that no matter what Jews are doing, they go all the way.

This trait has many virtues, as it can motivate a person to reach places that lacking such energy, they would never reach. Theodor Herzl and the Zionist movement, as well as many other Jewish initiatives, are examples of this.

But there is also a great danger in the trait of enthusiasm: it declines at the same speed with which it was generated. Someone who gets excited, without really thinking through all the reasons for his or her excitement, can easily switch objects of admiration. Perhaps tomorrow, he or she will be excited by the exact opposite of what awed him or her today.

We must not let ourselves or our leaders get swept away by the enthusiasms of the masses; because in a single moment, this enthusiasm can expire and refocus on another idol.

Last week, we were all thrilled at the sight of the Iron Dome system. Its high interception rate made us all walk taller. Indeed, there are good reasons for this. But it is the nature of enthusiasm to pass. Just one failure could make previous enthusiasts speak out against the system and loudly proclaim its weaknesses, and regret the decision not to attack.

Our leaders must not allow enthusiastic voices of the public to influence their jusdgement; they must act according to logic. Good luck to us all.

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