When Yonason was a young boy, there was a very tall pillar in his city, and all of the children would try to see who could successfully reach the top of the pillar. Everyone tried to get up, but the pillar was so tall and difficult to climb, that midway they would stop and come down.
Only Yonason was able to successfully scale the pole to the top. One of his friends asked how he was able to do that when everyone else couldn’t even get a quarter or a third of the way up!
Yonason responded that he never looked up to see how much more he had to climb up and achieve, as that would have been too daunting. He only looked down to see how much he had already succeeded in climbing up and every time he saw that he had accomplished and climbed a little more, it encouraged him to keep going.
This is how the boy grew up to become the great Rav Yonason Eibeshitz[i].
Shavuot is the birthday of King David; what was his stock?
It all started at Sodom. A city which has come to epitomize moral depravity and cruelty. A city that would make Las Vegas look like Jerusalem and a city Lot and his two daughter escaped from. His two daughters think that they are only the three people left in the world and think they need to re-populate the world and they both have child from their father. One child is called Mo’av (from my father) and Amon (from within a nation)
Around a thousand year later, Ruth the Moabite, the nation descending from Mo’av, converts to Judaism and married Boaz.
Her great grandson was King David.
You couldn’t imagine worse circumstances in a family’s origin story.
What does that teach us?
Rabbi Nachman of Breslov says the only way you can elevate and inspire someone is if you believe that deep down there is an element of good to be brought forth. Everyone, deep down is intrinsically good.
This voice comes out very thinly, it’s a sublime consciousness, and it’s a general feeling of wanting to be good. It doesn’t come over as vivid. It is important that we understand that this little voice is our inner yearning for spiritual growth.
Yes it can be good to look back on the past. There is a lot to learn from our past. But we have to be careful not to let our past bog us down so much that we're afraid to look a better future.
Realise that greatness and growth is there waiting to be unlocked. Keep looking forward.
*Based on a class of Rav Becher.
[i] He became known as "an acknowledged genius" in at least three separate areas of Jewish religious creativity: Talmud and Jewish law; homiletic and popular preaching; and Kabbalah.
