Part II. Love the Individual
One at a Time
Now, it’s a very big achievement if you’ll acquire that attitude of loving the Am Yisroel. If you love the Jews in Bnei Brak, you’re living for a purpose. You love the Jews in Brooklyn and Williamsburg and Lakewood? Excellent! All the frum Jews in Chicago, in Los Angeles, wherever they are. And you love them because you’re trying to love those that Hashem loves. A tremendous achievement!
And yet that’s only the beginning; there’s more to this mitzvah. Because included in קְדֹשִים תִּהְיוּ is to love the individual Jew too. Hakadosh Baruch Hu loves, not only the nation, He loves Reuven on his own, and Yosef on his own, and Berel and Sarah and Chana and Ettel; every single Yisroel is beloved by Him. One at a time He loves them! And so that’s the ideal we have to aim for – that’s what we’re ambitious to achieve.
Now, that ideal is given to us in the form of a command in this week’s sedrah: וְאָהַבְתָּ לְרֵעֲךָ כָּמוֹךָ – And you should love your fellow Jew, each individual, like you love yourself (Vayikra 19:18). It means you have to love that plain Jew over there. You see him sometimes on the street. You have no business with him. He doesn’t even greet you. You have to learn how to love him.
He’s Not My Type
Now, that’s a little more difficult maybe because when you begin to think of the individual so it could be he gets on your nerves. Maybe you don’t like his nose so much. Some people are like that; they have a predilection, a taste, for straight noses. They cannot stand a nose that stands out like a cliff.
Even if you like his nose, maybe he doesn’t think like you do; he follows a different set of political objectives than you do. He wears a yarmulke like this; it’s one material and you wear a different kind of material. Maybe he’s a Satmerer and you have different ideas. You have a different rebbe. And he tells you his opinion about things; you didn’t ask for it but he tells you. It’s not so easy to love everyone.
One Nation Under G-d
So along comes our possuk, וְאָהַבְתָּ לְרֵעֲךָ כָּמוֹךָ, and it says to us, no matter! As long as he’s רֵעֲךָ בְּמִצְווֹת, he keeps the mitzvos, so he qualifies for your love. Just because let’s say you're a Bobover chossid and he’s a Belzer chossid or a Lubavitcher chossid makes no difference; these names don’t make any dichotomy between us. Hashem loves him, that’s the only thing that matters.
Now, it’s easy to say this but fulfilling it, that’s not so simple. You have to train yourself; it has to be done with a program, a system. Otherwise, you're mekayem כָּמוֹךָ, that’s all. You love yourself. This Jew over here (the Rov pointed at himself) you love very much all your life. But כָּמוֹךָ רֵעֲךָ, your fellow like yourself? No, it doesn't even begin.
