A Jew for G-d

We find in Torah that the first one to call Jews a nation was the Pharaoh: “Behold, the people of the children of Israel are more numerous and stronger than we are” (Shmois 1:9). G-d is the second to call Jews a nation, while talking to Moshe Rabbeinu, and later, in the context of giving Jews Torah.


On the night of shvi’i shel Peisach, I heard someone explaining the origins of the famous Russian saying: Byut po litzu, a ne po passportu — “One gets hit in one’s face, not in one’s passport.” There were Jews in Russia, who, tired of antisemitism, would change their nationality in the passport from “Jew” to “Russian” or “Ukrainian”. One such man even changed his last name to a more Russian-sounding one. One time he met a friend and complained about antisemitism despite all these changes. “But, in your passport you’re a Russian!” protested his friend. The Jew responded: “Yes, but they hit my face, not my passport.” (Meaning, despite the changes in the passport, the man’s face still looked Jewish and provoked antisemitism.)

Oftentimes, I hear from people things like: “Even though my mother is Russian and my father is Jewish, I was still attacked by antisemites” or “Nazis [y"sh] treated everyone equally: Orthodox, Conservative and Reform Jews; those whose mothers were Jewish, or those whose only fathers were Jewish”. To this I respond with the above statement about Pharaoh and, lehavdil, G-d.

We have to decide according to whose terms we are going to be Jewish: according to the Pharaoh’s or according to G-d’s. And this goes deeper than the questions of identity. We need to ask ourselves: are we Jews for the goyim, for the outside, or for Hashem? If one wears a kippa, a hat, a beard, peyos, a kappote on Shabbos, all the world sees that he is a Jew. And that’s the way it’s supposed to be. But on this level he is still a Jew for the goyim. To be also a Jew for Hashem, his needs to be a Jew on the inside.

And the biggest goy in our life is not our neighbor, but the goy within us: our nefesh ha’bahamis (the animal soul). It’s very easy to make this goy satisfied. Eat nice food on Shabbos and Yom Tov, live in a nice house, in a nice community, have a good time being a Jew, learn things that are easy for you and are interesting for your mind, and the goy is satisfied.

And all these things should exist! But in order to be a Jew for Hashem, an oived Elokim, one has to push against himself. Never be complacent with one’s level. Never be comfortable in one’s avoida, in one’s middos, in one’s davening, in one’s learning. If some level is achieved, it’s time to work on achieving a new level. If something is difficult, if you’re struggling, emotionally, intellectually, with your willpower, it means you’re likely doing the right thing.

Otherwise, says Rebbe Rashab in one of ma’amorim of hemshech Samech Vov:

One who does not serve G-d with kabbolos ol malchus Shomayim, to guard his soul against his nature [...], even though he performs the mitzvos, studies Torah and prays every day, [he is not an oiven Elokim at all; his observance] is superficial, by rote. He does not devote himself nor his natural faculties to G-d at all.

Such service is described in the verse: For this people has approached Me ... with its mouth and its lips it honors me with prayer, but its heart has drawn away from Me. This refers to one to pays lip service, provoked only by habit, since this has been his habit from childhood. And the verse continues: And their fear of Me became the command of men, which has been taught, by habit and second nature, literally.

It is all merely what their parents have accustomed them to doing from childhood, and it does not possess any element of serving G-d with ol malchus Shomayim from their own initiative: to do what goes contrary to their nature, even though it requires acting against their own will, etc. Such service is not considered oived Elokim at all.