A Time to Seek

by Rabbi Steven Pruzansky

(First published in CBY's "Kehilatenu")

Are you hungry? Are you thirsty? Not for hamburger, fries and a Diet Coke or even a salad and mineral water. And not even thirsty for water, although that is closer to the point. “All who are thirsty should go to the water (Yeshayahu 55:1) on which our Sages expounded “water refers only to Torah” (Masechet Bava Kama 82a). We are a hungry and thirsty people, especially when Elul comes and the New Year is about to begin.

The Gemara (Masechet Shabbat 138b) teaches that there will come a time in the future when the Torah will be forgotten from the Jewish people, as the verse says (Amos 8:12): “Behold the days are coming, G-d says, and I will send a famine to the land. Not a famine for bread and not thirst for water but to hear the word of G-d. And people will wander from sea to sea and north to east to seek G-d’s word – and will not find it.” It sounds like a truly desperate state of affairs; people will not even know what is a divine thought or value or what is considered godly behavior. No scholar will be able to answer definitively questions of Halacha. Can that really happen?

That same Gemara concludes with the statement of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai: “Heaven forbid that the Torah should ever be forgotten from the people of Israel, as the Torah itself promises “for it shall not be forgotten out of the mouths of their descendants” (Devarim 31:21). What then do the Sages mean when they said that ‘people will wander…to seek G-d’s word and not find it?’ It means that they will not find the practical Halacha and the theoretical teaching in one place.”

If so, doesn’t that also mean that the Torah will be forgotten? How and why does Rabbi Shimon disagree with his colleagues?

Rav Yaakov Shapiro, current Rosh Yeshiva of Mercaz Harav, quoted Rav Kook as saying that Rabbi Shimon is correct. It is inconceivable that the Torah will be forgotten from the Jewish people. That is for the simple reason that as long as there are people who “wander about…to seek G-d’s word” then by definition the Torah is not forgotten. We need to be seekers and searchers. That is the purpose of the month of Elul and the Yamim Noraim. Indeed, the very word “Elul” is drawn from the Aramaic root for searching (see Targum, Bamidbar 13:2). We need to overcome our normal complacency, our sense that we have seen it all, heard it all, and know it all, and become hungry and thirsty – for the word of G-d.

On Rosh Chodesh Elul, Moshe was told “carve for yourself” new tablets of the Law – for yourself. The essence of the second set of tablets, the ones that survived, is that they were produced by Moshe’s own hand. They resulted from an inner yearning that he had to come closer to G-d and heal the breach between G-d and the Jewish people. So too, the repentance of this season is always the result of inner arousal – of the sense that something is amiss and needs to be repaired in our relationship with G-d and even with our friends and loved ones. It is the season of seeking. We are all mevakshim.

Thus we say twice daily in Tehillim 27 there is “one thing I ask of G-d, that is what I seek (that I might dwell in the house of G-d).” And we say “I seek your presence, G-d.” I seek Your closeness and Your favor, I seek Your warmth and forgiveness, I seek new opportunities and new challenges, I seek to satisfy my hunger and to slake my thirst – for You.

And isn’t it true that when we sincerely seek G-d then that is when we are most likely to find ourselves – our real personalities and talents, our real commitment, and our real purpose in life? What a blessing to be afforded this opportunity year after year.

“’Seek G-d when He might be found’ – these are the ten days from Rosh Hashana to Yom Kippurim (Masechet Rosh Hashana 18a).” May our quest begin and we find what we seek, and merit Hashem’s blessings for a year of life and good health, prosperity and peace, friendship and holiness, and complete redemption, for us and all Israel.