RABBI YAAKOV ASHER SINCLAIR (Ohr.edu)
“When you kindle the lamps...” (8:2)
It is the late 1800’s.
We're a stiff-necked people. It says so in the Torah. When I think back over many of the non-observant Jews I have met in my life, I see how their youthful questioning was often met by a “Shut up and just do it” attitude that turned them into unwilling atheists. I’ve often thought that the highest paid teachers in the Jewish educational system should be the first grade rebbes. A child’s entire future spirituality may rest in their sometimes-incapable hands. Who cares if the Rosh Yeshiva novel idea gets shot down five minutes into his mind-twisting hermeneutical exegesis? But if a young child’s question, “How we know that there is Hashem?” is met by red-faced lathering and a scream of “Apikorus,” that response may lead the child to believe that there is no answer.
How many super-talented Jews are so over-represented in the arts and the sciences! And how many of them might have used those talents to sanctify the name of Heaven had they been given the right answer and the right encouragement at the right time.
Jerry Wexler (January 10, 1917 – August 15, 2008) was a major player in the music business from the fifties to the eighties. Think Ray Charles, the Allman Brothers, Chris Connor, Aretha Franklin, Led Zeppelin, Wilson Pickett, Dire Straits, Dusty Springfield and Bob Dylan. He coined the term "Rhythm and Blues," changing the title from “Race Music.”
In 1979, Wexler agreed to produce an album by Bob Dylan. He was unaware of the nature of the material that awaited him. "Naturally, I wanted to do the album in Muscle Shoals, as Bob did, but we decided to ‘prep’ it in L.A. where Bob lived," recalled Wexler. "That's when I learned what the songs were about: born-again Christians in the old corral. ... I like the irony of Bob coming to me, the Wandering Jew, to get the Jesus feel ... But I had no idea he was on this born-again Christian trip until he started to evangelize me. I said, 'Bob, you're dealing with a sixty-two-year-old confirmed Jewish atheist. I'm hopeless. Let's just make an album.'"
“When you kindle the lamps...” The word ‘to kindle’ here is ‘Behaalotecha,’ which comes from the root l’a’lot, which means to go up. The Menorah represents the spirituality of the Jewish soul. It’s not enough to just wave a match in the general direction of a child’s spirituality, you have to hold that match there long enough and carefully enough until the flame can ascend by itself.
