Getting Dirty: Building a Better World

I’m always incredibly envious of those of you who possess a “Green Thumb!”  Personally, I love plants, flowers, and shrubs!  I love the dirt, the watering, the tending of the plants.  Yet, no matter how hard I try, my plants always seem to shrivel up, lose their leaves, or die!  My tomato plants never make it to the tomato stage!  My mums become wilted!  My orchids lose their flowers!  I’m completely and utterly perplexed by gardening and I’m in awe of all of you who bring seed to flower.

This week, we begin once again “In the Beginning.”  Beresehit Bara Elohim et HaShamyim v’et HaAretz.  “In the Beginning, God Created Heaven and Earth!”  According to tradition, Gan Eden, the Garden of Eden was a place of perfection!  It was a self-sustaining garden, filled with beautiful plants; it was utterly magnificent.  Picture Adam and Eve lying on their hammocks, grabbing fruits by the fistful, and sleeping the day away. 

Yet, the Garden of Eden was just “the picture of perfection.”  It wasn’t genuine perfection.  Adam and Eve, the first human beings, lived in a world of naiveté.  They were like children, cloistered in their room, pretending that everything was fine.  Their world was Disney Clean: no crime, no challenges, no worries.  Yet, was this reality?  In their dreamy, vacation filled extravaganza, Adam and Eve recognized that something was missing!  In a moment of true courage and chutzpah, Eve grabbed an apple from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and everything changed.  After sharing the fruit with Adam, these first human beings were awakened to the world around them.  They recognized clearly, their responsibility to create, build, and truly bring our world closer to perfection.

The Chasidic Rebbe Levi Yitzkhah of Berditchev teaches that the word Beresheit, literally “In the Beginning,” can be separated into two words: Bet Resheit, “Two Beginnings.”  He passes on this piece of wisdom: Our world possesses two Creation Stories, two beginnings.  First, is the story of the Holy One who bestowed bounty upon us.  Second, is our story, the tale of human beings who through our own abilities, shape this bounty, into a world of hope, compassion, and peace.

It was difficult to leave the dreamy world, the picture of perfection!  But, when Adam and Eve, took a bite out of the apple, they recognized their role to make our world a better place.  Our world can be messy and distraught.  It sometimes can feel much easier to retreat to our compounds, our Garden of Eden.  We can control what happens in our homes, in our bubble.  Yet, this picture of perfection, isn’t reality.  When we reside solely in our own world, we ignore the plight of hardship that surrounds us: hunger, homelessness, addiction, economic challenges, fear, mistrust, and anger.  The most important lesson from this week’s Torah portion: break out of our bubble!  Smash down the gates!  Leave the oasis of our Garden of Eden!

Adam and Eve, left Gan Eden, with a rake, a hoe, and a shovel.  Outside the Garden, with sweat on their brow, muscles that ached, they tended and tilled their gardens, becoming stewards of the world.  Adam and Eve were the first human beings.  They weren’t the first Jews.  That story of Abraham and Sarah will begin in a couple of weeks!  The lesson of this week’s Torah portion is for all of us, all of humanity! 

As I’ve shared already, I’m a very bad gardener.  I possess no green thumb.  My plants are destined to die!  Yet, that doesn’t get me off the hook.  Our role as human beings is to get dirty, to plant the seeds for an improved life.  We are to be tillers and tenders, working together to make our world a better place.  It’s through our stewardship that we can shape the world into God’s Vision of the Garden of Eden.  May this year, be the year, that together, our hard work blossoms into a world of perfection and a world beauty.