Why is Jewish Law so Petty Minded?

Question:

Why does the Jewish religion seem to obsess over insignificant details? How much matza do we have to eat, which spoon did I use for milk and which for meat, what is the right way to tie my shoelaces? It seems to me that this misses the bigger picture by focusing on minutiae. Is this nitpicking what Jews call spirituality?

(I actually already sent you this question over a week ago and didn't receive a reply. Could it be that you have finally been asked a question that you can't answer?!)

Answer:

I never claimed to have all the answers. There are many questions that are beyond me. But it happens to be that I did answer your question, and you did get the answer. I sent a reply immediately. The fact that you didn't receive it is itself the answer to your question.

You see, I sent you a reply, but I wrote your email address leaving out the "dot" before the "com." I figured that you should still receive the email, because after all, it is only one little dot missing. I mean come on, it's not as if I wrote the wrong name or something drastic like that! Would anyone be so nitpicky as to differentiate between "yahoocom" and "yahoo.com"? Isn't it a bit ridiculous that you didn't get my email just because of a little dot?

No, it's not ridiculous. Because the dot is not just a dot. It represents something. That dot has meaning far beyond the pixels on the screen that form it. To me it may seem insignificant, but that is simply due to my ignorance of the ways of the internet. All I know is that with the dot, the message gets to the right destination; without it, the message is lost to oblivion.

Jewish practices have infinite depth. Each nuance and detail contains a world of symbolism. And every dot counts. When they are performed with precision, a spiritual vibration is emailed throughout the universe, all the way to G-d's inbox.

If you want to understand the symbolism of the dot, study I.T.

If you want to understand the symbolism of Judaism, study it.

By Aron Moss

Rabbi Aron Moss teaches Kabbalah, Talmud and practical Judaism in Sydney, Australia, and is a frequent contributor to Chabad.org.

About the artist: Sarah Kranz has been illustrating magazines, webzines and books (including five children’s books) since graduating from the Istituto Europeo di Design, Milan, in 1996. Her clients have included The New York Times and Money Marketing Magazine of London.

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February 11, 2013

By the way, the import is not anti-lefty.

Consider the tefillin, one of the most sacred signs/actions of a Jewish man's day. He wears one tefillin on his left arm, nearest to his heart, in obedience to a Torah text. He wears the other on his forehead, nearest to his brain.

The brain governs the upper third of his body; the heart governs the central third of his body. This mitzvah thus would seem to "honor" the left arm, hand, and fingers.

Disributing "shoe-typing" between right & left sides honors both, and, more to the point, acts as a pole star for a Jewish life. A "Jewish" way to tie our shoes--a "Jewish" act to take with the arm, hand, fingers & forehead--a "Jewish" way to eat--literally and figuratively this "ties" our bodies to a Jewish outlook, to serve Gd with our hands, our heads, and our hearts, not only in these "trivial" "tiny" ways but in loving our neighbor & rejoicing throughout Shabbos. Visit an observant home on Friday night to see the resulting children.

Jonas
Columbus, Ohio

February 10, 2013

Thank you Yehudit for an excellent example of how a "dot" does make a real difference in real life.

Hymie
London

February 10, 2013

Tying shoes is indeed a meaningful dot

It is a physical action. What we do with our bodies impacts our hearts, minds, and souls. When we incorporate an idea into a physical action of any kind, it makes an impact on us far beyond words or theories.

Please refrain from imagining that imperfection ought to make us feel guilty. Maybe it will for those of us today, who live in a Christian culture and tend to assimilate Christian ideas. But the Jewish model is that we are all on our personal ladder and that what matters is how much we grow and contribute during this lifetime, rather than on perfection. Nobody can be perfect except GD. What GD loves is our GROWTH rather than our perfection. We start at a given place, and we grow from there.

It is customary for Jews to recall someone on the anniversary of his/her death, rather than on his/her birthday. We recall Washington's birthday, but we recall the Yahrzeit (death anniversary) of Maimonides. We recall how much s/he had grown by the time his/her life was complete.

Chana
Cleveland

February 8, 2013

amazing and deep discussion

that asks many questions. The first question from the rabbi's article is-what is out relationship to our Creator? What I glean from this discussion is that the more relevant one's relationship with G-d is, the more one pays attention to detail in one's everyday life. Here is an example. Recently, I had to reconstitute some medicine to give to patient. I followed the instructions. However, it was noticed that the medicine wasn't reconstituting in the normal way. Another drop of fluid was added. Still it did not reconstitute properly. Then another, until finally the 3rd drop caused the medicine to fully reconstitute. These amounts are extremely small, but entirely relevant to proper administration of the medicine. One stray cancer cell left behind can be relevant. What is, exactly, our relationship to our Creator? That is for each of us to decide in our own personally relevant way. The Shema states that ALL is G-d, there is nothing that is not G-d. HOW we relate to Gd then is highly relevant.

Yehudit
Olam Hazeh

November 25, 2012

This explanation is straining gnats

Rabbi, not tying your laces the proper way won’t block your email. This answer is not comparing apples with apples. Omitting a dot in printing a bank note is in a different realm to omitting it, for example in saying etc… Whether I omit a dot in the second case is of no bearing. It is the context that gives it its importance. Tying my shoe the wrong way has absolutely no bearing on my salvation. The right gives the left withholds must surely rank as arbitrary, logically, since is possible, as the proverb says, to give with both hands. Your answer has not explained why it makes a jot of difference to tie the right shoe first.

Joseph Wilson
South Africa

August 29, 2012

Sarah, thank you so much for explaining.

I hope that all these little, teeny, tiny nuances of rules don't stress anyone out. I can see where "Jewish guilt" comes from. It is probably almost impossible to follow every little rule to the letter without breaking them sometimes. Thus, guilt. Smile!

Karen Joyce Chaya Fradle Kleinman Bell
Riverside, CA, USA
jewishriverside.com

August 28, 2012

Hi Karen

No, she isn't joking. We start with the right and end with the right. So put on the right shoe, put on the left and fasten it, then fasten the right one. Before there were buckles on sandals, there were ties.
I understand how Chana's main point about the right giving and the left withholding sounds like a return to the days when lefties were considered cursed, and children were beaten into using the right hand for all tasks. That, of course, is not what she advocated. It means that righties and lefties have tendencies to give or withhold, respectively, and they need to be aware of this. Neither aspect is better or worse than the other, both are needed, in the proper amount, you can be stingy or over generous, neither is healthy. But this is for us to use as self knowledge, not a basis for judgement.

Sarah Masha
W Bloomfield, MI/USA

August 28, 2012

Karen Joyce etc

I should have explained that it's not necessarily "right"--it's whatever the dominant foot happens to be. (In my case, for example, my dominant hand is the right, but my dominant eye is the left. I finally realized why cameras were designed to poke me in the right eye--it's because they are assuming the right eye is looking through the lens, and I always use my left eye to look through the lens. So I agree that there is an automatic oppressive tendency in all cultures to assign negativity to the left. Sinister is one. Gauche is another. I ought to have said "dominant" rather than "right". Thank you for your comment.

The dominant hand gives.
The other hand restricts.
We are told to avoid interlacing our fingers so as to avoid confounding these two basic principles.

In Kabbalah, chesed ( lovingkindness) on one side & gevurah (power and restriction) on the other. BOTH are needed, but we prefer to be judged with Chesed.

But Swirl ice cream is restricted to give it shape.

Chana
Indianapolis

August 28, 2012

Diss

And when someone says that Jewish law is petty, that is disrespectful of Jewish law.

There is every reason to respect Jewish law.

If you do not consider yourself subject to Jewish law, it is disrespectful of those who are subject to it to say it is petty.

Why don't you say English law is petty, or the American constitution is petty?

Those who choose to be part of a given culture or a given system of law have every right to do so without having their culture or their law being dissed by those who choose to be outside of that community or outside that culture or outside that system of law.

So why are some people failing to mind their own business and attacking others who are happy with their own culture, their own system of law, and their own community, and are not bothering anybody else?

St. Cyr
San Francisco

August 24, 2012

Chana, I didn't know about the tying of shoes.

You are not joking, right? Saying that about the right and the left perpetuates prejudice and discrimination, along with superstitions, about right and left handedness. Did you know the word "sinister" has origins in being left handed? We really have a law about tying shoes? How can that even be, since shoes didn't have shoe ties in biblical days. They were sandals.

Karen Joyce Chaya Fradle Kleinman Bell
Riverside, CA, USA
jewishriverside.com

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