By Rabbi Michael Leo Samuel
CHULA VISTA, California — There is a famous legend about Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai (135-170 C.E.) who once expressed a disparaging opinion about the Roman Empire and its cultural depravity. Afterwards, the Roman authorities decided to have him arrested for disrespecting the Empire. Rabbi Shimon and his son soon hid in a cave from the Romans after the Bar Kochba rebellion was crushed in the second century CE. For 12 years, Rabbi Shimon and his son Rabbi Elazar lived off the fruit of a carob tree while studying Torah together away from civilization. After the danger of Roman retribution had passed, both of the men emerged from their cave to find a world of men engaged in plowing, planting and reaping.
Feeling disgusted, they quipped, “How can men thus forsake eternal life to indulge themselves in a transient one?” Rabbi Shimon got upset his fellow citizens did not occupy themselves the study of their ancestral heritage—the Torah.
A Heavenly voice answered: “Have you come out to destroy my world? Return to your cave!”
Another year passed, and soon, the two once again emerged from the cave. This time, however, Rabbi Shimon was ready to accept the ways of men, but his son, Rabbi Elazar, still felt defiant. “It is sufficient for the world,” Rabbi Shimon pleaded, “that the two of us study Torah without interruption.”
One Friday afternoon, shortly before sunset, both of the scholars saw an old man running home, his arms clutching two bunches of myrtle blossoms.
Curiously, they asked him, “What are these for?”
He replied, “Why, they’re in honor of the Shabbat!”
The Sages asked further, “But wouldn’t one myrtle branch be sufficient?”
The old man replied, “One of them is for the Heavenly command of Zachor, ‘remember’ the Sabbath to keep it holy; the other is for the second command, Shamor,’ observe’ the Sabbath by ceasing from all creative labor.”
Rabbi Shimon exclaimed, “See how much love the Jews have for their commandments!” At last his son was reconciled.[1]
The story illustrates an important truth. Judaism is not interested in making a hermetic society where we forget or withdraw ourselves from the problems of the world. Jewish values have great relevance in the world when it comes to business ethics, personal values, and the way we add sanctity to our most mundane activities. Work is necessary for the world to survive. Perhaps more importantly, the Talmudic legend teaches us that being a part of a community is what really makes us stronger. When we add our talents along with others, we create something synergistic–contrary to Euclid, the sum is always greater than all of its parts when it comes to improving our communities.
After I thought about the Talmudic story, Rabbi Shimon’s experience as a troglodyte reminded of another famous cave story of ancient literature– Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. In this famous tale, Plato describes a deep subterranean cave where people have remained imprisoned since childhood. Enchained from the neck down to their legs, all they could see was the back of the cave and the shadows that were cast upon it from people walking outside. These prisoners could not even see the source of the shadows that were on the wall, much less believe, that there was an outside reality—a radically different world that did not resemble anything they had ever known. However, what if the cave-dweller were given the capacity to see beyond the cave? Plato (through the voice of Socrates) explains that his self-understanding of the world would change in an instant. Socrates says to his friend Glaucon:
- Consider, then, what would be the manner of the release and healing from these bonds and this folly if in the course of nature something of this should happen to them. When one was freed from his fetters and compelled to stand up suddenly and turn his head around and walk and to lift up his eyes to the light, and in doing all this felt pain and, because of the dazzle and glitter of the light, was unable to discern the objects whose shadows he formerly saw, what do you suppose would be his answer if someone told him that what he had seen before was all a cheat and an illusion, but that now, being nearer to reality and turned toward more real things, he saw more truly? And if also one should point out to him each of the passing objects and constrain him by questions to say what it is, do you think that he would be at a loss and that he would regard what he formerly saw as more real than the things now pointed out to him? . . .
Yet, one prisoner managed to get free and went out to see the outside world for the first time. The sun’s light blinded and irritated the prisoner’s eyes, for he could not bear to look at it. Finally, he realized that everything that he had seen in the cavern had been only shadows on a wall—and nothing more. By gradually training his eyes to recognize the shadows and the reflections, eventually he will grow accustomed to the sight of the upper world. At first, he will see the shadows best; next the reflections of men and other objects in the water; and then the objects themselves; then he will gaze upon the light of the moon and the stars and the spangled heaven; and then he will see the sky and the stars by night better than the sun or the light of the sun by day. Lastly, he will be able to see the sun, and not mere reflections of him in the water, but he will see him in his own proper place, and not in another; and he will contemplate him as he is. He will then proceed to argue that this is he who gives the season and to endure anything, rather than think as they do and live after their manner?[2]
The next question Socrates poses to Glaucon is especially important: What if the emancipated man returned to the cave community. What would he experience? How would he be received? How would the man’s life change?
- Wouldn’t he remember his first home, what passed for wisdom there, and his fellow prisoners, and consider himself happy and them pitiable? And wouldn’t he disdain whatever honors, praises, and prizes were awarded there to the ones who guessed best which shadows followed which? Moreover, were he to return there, wouldn’t he be rather bad at their game, no longer being accustomed to the darkness? Wouldn’t it be said of him that he went up and came back with his eyes corrupted, and that it’s not even worth trying to go up? And if they were somehow able to get their hands on and kill the man who attempts to release and lead them up, wouldn’t they kill him? (517a)
Undoubtedly, the man’s fellow prisoners would deride the freed man’s experiences. However, their derision really derives from fear that the man might be right! People tend to remain rigid in their opinions because change is threatening. While “the truth will set you free,” there is a flip side to this statement. Friedrich Nietzsche cautions, “Sometimes people don’t want to hear the truth because they don’t want their illusions destroyed.” As spiritual leaders, sometimes our goal requires that we shatter the illusions that bind and gag the human spirit and short-circuit our its capacity to actualize one’s potential.
In both stories, the cave represents a place where the potential for realizing one’s human and spiritual potential is stifled. It is only by leaving the comfort zone of the cave, one can arrive at a realization of enlightenment. There can be no true mystical, ethical, or philosophical wisdom when one lives in isolation from others. This seems to be the message of both Plato and the Talmudic sages.
Ignorance and spiritual arrogance may be the greatest prison of all.
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Rabbi Samuel is spiritual leader of Temple Beth Shalom. He may be contacted at michael.samuel@sdjewishworld.com