And?
Leviticus 19:1-20:27
Summary: This parsha contains a number of verses that contain two different-seeming mitzvot, and though it is interesting to see how they connect, it is also interesting to see them as simply two different ways to connect. You can do this. And you can do this.
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In one episode of a short-lived but very funny comedy sketch show called The State, a certain man was about to make a coffee run for his co-workers, As he was collected the orders, one of his office mates said, “I’d like a medium coffee and a muffin”. The man turns around and says, with confusion on his face, “And?” You see, he had never heard the word “and” before.
Imagine life without the word - or concept - of “and.” Honey, where are you going? I am going to the store. I will buy pickles. I will buy bananas. I will buy ice cream. Of course, on the surface level, this is not much more than a linguistic inconvenience, making for longer-than-seemingly-necessary conversations about shopping excursions. But, assuming that the omission of our favorite conjunction also serves as a description of experience, this shopping trip becomes a series of smaller adventures. I will drive to the store. One thing I will do is buy bananas. Buying bananas is fun for all sorts of reasons! Another thing I will do is buy pickles. Buying pickles offers all sorts of opportunities and possibilities! I will buy ice cream! I love buying ice cream! Suddenly, a trip to the supermarket contains multitudes.
“Honey! You were supposed to buy ice cream! You didn’t buy ice cream!” Now consider these two possibilities. “I bought pickles but I didn’t buy ice cream.” “I bought pickles and I didn’t buy ice cream.”
In the first response, the purchase of pickles is somehow supposed to change the way the lack of ice cream is seen. Yes, I did not buy ice cream. But look! I bought pickles! Gherkins! And pickles are good! In the second response, they are two separate adventures. One adventure resulted in the purchase of pickles. Another adventure did not result in the purchase of ice cream. Each of them is its own story. They are decoupled from one another, each worthy of its own telling, rather the entire shopping trip fused into one whole story featuring one success and one failure, averaging out to zero.
This tricky word “and” - and its Hebrew equivalent represented by the letter vav - can have a variety of implications, some of which feel incredibly heavy and burdensome, and some of which feel quite liberating. Consider this week’s Torah reading that includes fifty-one commandments, placing it 5th among readings with the most “action items.” Many of these fifty one mitzvot are coupled together, with two seemingly-unrelated action items included in one verse. For example, “let each person have appropriate awe of their mother and father, and keep Shabbat.” And, “Do not defraud… do not commit robbery… and do not retain the wages of a worker until morning.”
In each of these, and with the whole reading taken all together, it can feel like a very demanding list of things to do. You must do this, and this, and this, and this, and also this, and this, and this.” Oy. It makes me want to take a long nap. But what if they are seen as a series of distinct opportunities to express the holiness that this parsha, as a whole, wants us to express? Here’s one way to do this. Here’s another way to do this. And here’s yet another. Not to say that any of them are optional per se, but that even if a person neglects one of them, the other ones still stand as accomplishments and successes. Lest a person think, God forbid, that if I don’t do all of them, it is as if I have done none of them. This is simply not true.
Such an approach has become more and more important to me of late. Going through a little bit of a rough patch of late, (don’t worry; everything’s really fine and manageable,) I have come face to face with my own misuses of “and”. Unable (or unwilling) to tease out different strands from days that feel like knots, all manner of moments and experiences, successes and failures tangled up together and making the whole thing look like the one thing that jumps out at me most blatantly (which is usually the most shameful or disappointing thing). It has been hard to stand at the end of the day and separate this class from that, this conversation from that, this reaction from that, to the point where I can say, “I got angry at that person. And I love that person.”
It’s not that important - or accurate - to glom my frustration with that person’s behavior and my unwavering respect and love for them. To mitigate the “I got angry at that person” with “BUT I love them” does a disservice to both sentiments. My anger is my anger. My love is my love. I’d like permission to feel this AND that. And, yes. I failed in this one major area of my life this week, AND I see myself as a good person who is worthy of love and all that. Being a good person doesn’t (and shouldn’t) mitigate my failures, and my failures shouldn’t mitigate my love of myself. They are separate adventures.