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October 4, 2002/Tishri 28 5763, Vol. 55, No. 6
Learn from past mistakes
Torah study
RABBI DAVID KOMEROFSKY
B'reisheet, Genesis 1:1-6:8
Focal Point
- And to Adam God said, "Cursed be the ground because of you ... By the sweat of your brow shall you get bread to eat until you return to the ground. ... For dust you are, and to dust you shall return." (Genesis 3:17-19)
- Adonai said to Cain ... "What have you done? Hark, your brother's blood cries out to Me from the ground! Therefore, you shall be more cursed than the ground, which opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. ... You shall become a ceaseless wanderer on earth." (Genesis 4:9-12)
By the way...
- You shall not pollute the land in which you live; for blood pollutes the land, and the land can have no expiation for blood that is shed on it, except by the blood of him who shed it. (Numbers 35:33)
Your Guide
- The selection from Numbers reiterates the lesson about the connection between humans and the land. In our time, we think of pollution as something that humans create as by products of our actions. How does our blood pollute the earth today?
- How are the experiences of farmers and ranchers (like Cain and Abel) different from those of city dwellers who rarely see the "land" in its natural state?
D'var Torah
As we reflect upon the past High Holy Days, are we able to step back from the last year and start fresh? The truth is, we carry our mistakes with us as potential lessons.
With B'reisheet, we can take a lesson from the first family of humanity. Just four chapters into the creation of the world, we read an account of fratricidal violence.
It is worth noting that in the Hebrew of Genesis 4:10, God tells Cain, "Hark, your brother's bloods cry out to Me from the ground!" Why is blood written in the plural? From this verse the Rabbis expounded: "It is written: 'The bloods of your brother cry out to Me,' that is, his blood and the blood of his potential descendants. ... Therefore was the first human, Adam, created alone, to teach us that whosoever destroys a single life, the Bible considers it as if she or he destroyed an entire world. And whosoever saves a single life, the Bible considers it as if she or he saved an entire world." (Mishnah, Sanhedrin 4:5)
It is important for us to learn from the fact that the beginnings of humanity are marred by errors of judgment. Imperfection is part of being human: It is what we learn from our mistakes that make us more like God.
Two distinct errors of judgment are apparent in B'reisheet: Adam's and Eve's disobedience of God in eating the forbidden fruit and Cain's murder of his brother, Abel. And two distinct punishments are meted out by God.
The link between these two punishments is the connection between human beings and the land. The words adam, "human being," and adamah, "land or earth," share a common root in Hebrew and are interwoven. What B'reisheet teaches is that our actions directly impact our home, and our home suffers when we err in judgment.
Learning from our mistakes, from those of our family members, and from those who came before us makes us human, b'nei Adam, "children of Adam and Eve."
Rabbi David Komerofsky is the dean of students and the director of the rabbinical school at HUC-JIR, Cincinnati, Ohio.
Torat Hayim, produced by the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, is on the Internet at www.uahc.org/growth.
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