Let us, for a moment,
Play by the rules
& regulations:
We eat nightmarishly and sleep
Dreamlessly; we laugh out loud
And cry silently; we climb upward
And sometimes fall down; we work
For the future and, at times say, in the
Future we will work; we go through the
Routines and the routines go through us;
We make different changes, changes make us
Different, and differences are seen either as a
Uniqueness to be embraced or a weirdness to
Be embarrassed
There are many laws and bylaws (some inevitable,
Built into the DNA structure that is nature; others
Adopted by man, either as a fad, fashion or statement –
Or even a triangulation: a faddy fashion statement) and
With these does the physical world, the world we see with
Our eyes and know with our bodies, revolve and evolve.
No body lives beyond these rules – either we walk, run, or
Fly, either we jump, skip, or fall, either we believe, understand
Or deny…but no matter what our persuasion, we all live by
(At least some of) the rules.
We, as creatures with the necessity of invention, have always
Tried reaching beyond the rules, beyond the norm, beyond the
Ordinary into the
Extraordinary
And these are the ordinances
That you shall place before them
Following the revelation at Mount Sinai
When the holiness of above reached for
The mediocrity of below, when the
Brilliance of heaven embraced the dullness
Of earth, when the simplicities of every
Day life were infused with the profundities
Of the eternal, everlasting pulse that is the
Divine
The question arises: it is one thing for heaven
To reach below and make everything profound –
After all, heaven can pretty much do anything;
But how can we, human beings of flesh and blood,
Ever take the profound and make it simple, take
Heaven and make it a part of our earthy, breathy,
Downtown existence…
And these are the ordinances
As the pen waxed poetic above, the body lives
By rules; the body does what it wants, yes, but
Within the gilded framework of life and living.
But the soul, how does the soul live, what does
The soul want – if the body wishes to eat, drink
And be merry does the soul wish it any less?
And now, post Sinai, when the gaps are bridged,
G-d says, here, these are the laws that will allow
You to reach beyond any limitation – the rules &
Regulations of the body make you ordinary but
The rules & regulations of the soul, now those
Allow for something extra…
That you shall place before them
How, you ask? Because these mitzvahs are not
Imposed upon us but a part of us, placed before
Us, within us, our essence one with the acts, our
Acts one with the essence…
One can follow a law, play by the rules
Without actually becoming them; one can
Do a mitzvah with the hand and not with the
Heart, one can light a candle with the fingers
And not with the mind – but the ultimate is when
The profound, the mitzvah, is integrated not only
In the minimum necessary but throughout the whole
Being, when the most profound becomes one with the
Most simple.
It is then that the ordinary truly does become extra-
Ordinary
Mendel Jacobson is a writer, poet and journalist living in Brooklyn. His weekly poetry can be seen at jakeyology.blogspot.com
The words of this author reflect his/her own opinions and do not necessarily represent the official position of the Orthodox Union.