[dropcap]THE[/dropcap] Hebrew month before Rosh Hashanah — “Elul.” A time for introspection. Into what?

A clue: See the Torah portion read the week before Elul — “Re’eh.”

By some quirk this year, “Re’eh” is read this Shabbos, the first day of Elul itself, not before.

Either way, what Rosh Hashanah messages does this Torah portion hint at? Why does it always coincide with Elul?

Start with this:

Sharply, idolatry in “Re’eh” is termed an “abomination.”

Is it really necessary to tell Jews this?

Are there any Jews today who believe in idols?

Which Jew does not know “Shma Yisrael . . . G-d is one”?

Perhaps the point is this:

Idolatry in the Torah is associated with murder. In condemning idolatry, the Torah also condemns murder. The Torah rejects murder not just as an ethical principle but as a corollary of idolatry, of pagan religion.

To which one may again ask: Is this really necessary? Which Jew justifies murder as part of the practice of Judaism? Yet, we read (Deut. 12:31):

“ . . . everything that is an abomination of the L-rd, that He hates, have they [the pagans of antiquity] done to their gods; for even their sons and their daughters have they burned in the fire for the gods.”

Perhaps the point today is this:

If you wear away at basic ethical sensibilities long enough, they weaken. It doesn’t matter what it is, even murder. Radical Islamic terrorists wear away at the stigma of murder if associated with religion.

To say that this will never have a major impact on Judaism is, I fervently hope, true. Yet, other tenets of the Jewish faith have broken down over the force of centuries of assimilation, and while I doubt this will happen to the stigma that Judaism attaches to murder, still, observe:

Murders of Arabs by Jews, understood as a religious imperative, have taken place in Israel.

Not widely, thank G-d.

Not without near universal Jewish condemnation.

But who would ever have thought that even a single instance of such a murder would ever take place?

Idolatry leads to, and takes the form of, not only ethical abomination but spiritual corruption.

The Torah in “Re’eh” warns: In the extreme, shun idolatry.

[dropcap]Next[/dropcap] Rosh Hashanah messages in “Re’ah”: laws of kashrut, of charity, and of the three major holidays, Passover, Shavuot, Sukkot.

Perhaps the Rosh Hashanah message here is this:

It is not enough to be a Jew ritually, and not enough to be a Jew ethically. Kashrut? Not enough. Charity? Not enough. Judaism is a holistic enterprise, coloring our reason and our spirituality.

The three major holidays embrace both messages: of reason, such as freedom on Passover; and of ritual, such as matzah on Passover.

This double theme stretches through other teachings in “Re’eh.”

For example, “ . . . you shall not harden your heart or close your hand against your destitute brother. Rather, you shall open your hand to him; you shall lend his requirement . . . ” (Deut. 15:8).

Tzedakah, perfectly clear. It’s the ethical.

But why isn’t it — “opening your hand” — enough? Why the further reference to lending?

Because some people are too proud to accept tzedakah. So, you shall lend him. Here we reach the spiritual: A person who cannot live without tzedakah has a unique spiritual challenge. He must work on himself until he can say: “I will not refuse charity, since I acknowledge that it is G-d Who has brought me to this low point.

“I cannot endanger my family due to my pride.”

But until a person can climb this spiritual mountain, the Torah offers a workaround: Lend him. Don’t give him, lend him.

It is a temporary workaround. A person with no means can only get so far with a loan. He has a tall, spiritual, unenviable task ahead of him: learning to bite one’s lip, to accept help, to see it as coming from G-d, until he can work himself out of his pit.

[dropcap]Another[/dropcap] example of the double, ethical and spiritual theme of “Re’eh” and Elul: the holiday of Shavuot.

It is the pinnacle of spirituality, commemorating the revelation of the Torah by G-d Himself to hundreds of thousands of people. Equally, Shavuot, through the Torah, lays down all of the great ethical teachings of Judaism, encapsulated in the last five of the Ten Commandments.

I get the ethical.

I get the spiritual.

That’s the double demand for Elul.

Introspection, by definition, asks us to go beyond self-congratulation.

“I’m a good Jew because . . . ”

That is not the introspection Elul asks for. That is not the call of the hour.

“I could be a better Jew by . . . ” That is the challenge of Elul.

May it be productive for all of us.

May we approach the “L’shana tova” greeting four weeks from now with a month of spiritual preparation and confidence-building behind us.

Copyright © 2016 by the Intermountain Jewish News