26 Tammuz

What is the Source of Living Water?

In this week’s Haftarah portion, we read: “My people have committed two sins: They have abandoned me, the Source of Living Water, and they have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that hold no water.” (Jeremiah 2:13)  I learned this lesson firsthand when I was about 14 years old, in the 1990s. We were in the camp, in a mountainous region of our country called Chalatenango in La Palma. One of our activities was to dig a cistern next to the San Ignacio River where clean and abundant water flowed. In the heat of the sun, they instructed us to dig a cistern a few meters from the river to store water. After about 3 hours of hard labor, we managed to dig a hole about 1.5 meters deep and about 80 centimeters in diameter which we filled with stones and white earth. When the cistern was completed, we were instructed to fill it with water.

In my innocence and naiveté and I must say, a bit of arrogance thinking that what I had built was correctly designed by me. I thought that by carrying buckets of water from the river and depositing them in my “cistern”, I would generate a jacuzzi. To my surprise, despite the fact that I had carried at least 20 buckets of water, I never even managed to keep 50 cm of retained water in my cistern, because everything was absorbed into the earth. No matter how much I tried, sweated and declared in faith, nothing worked, because I had no sealants or concrete to reinforce the cistern. To me, the most shocking part as I think back,  was that I blindly followed instructions and never asked myself, did I really need to build a cistern next to this beautiful river from which I could drink water, in which I could bathe and enjoy? The fruit of my work was: effort in vain, mud, and exhaustion, as psychologists say a “burn-out”.

When reading our portion, this is exactly how I understand and connect with the commandments that instruct us: “You shall have no other gods before me” in Ex. 20:3 and the commandment that plants our feet firmly on the ground: “You shall not commit adultery” Ex. 20:14.

What does all this really mean? We are replacing the truth with the false and loving the false.

In this portion, Israel had been given very clear instructions concerning Midian. They were told to destroy everyone, without mercy, as the Eternal’s very specific revenge on this tribe, because they had caused the death of so many Israelites through their Sinat Chinam, senseless and gratuitous hatred out of the simple desire to harm.

However, what did Israel do? They replaced the Words of the Eternal for their convenience. In the end, they decided to be wiser than the Bore Olam, and executed just the men, leaving the women and children alive, thus provoking Moshe’s anger. Although they ultimately did carry out the order in reaction to his anger, it’s clear that they thought they were justified in keeping the captives for themselves as booty.

Next, we read about how Reuben and Gad approached Moshe with a request to dwell outside of what, one day, would be Israel, since the land on this side of the Jordan, that they had already taken was in their eyes, good for cattle (32:5), thus expressing their love for economic well-being (32:16): “Then they approached him and said: We will build corrals here for our cattle (their obvious priority) and cities for our children (a secondary concern),” clearly demonstrating where their interests lay. Priorities…the corrals were above their children, something that Moshe corrected them in 32:24, when he says: “Build yourselves then cities for your families and corrals for your flocks and do what you have promised.”

Here again, we see how economic and physical possessions, things that we will not take with us into eternity, become a “substitute” for what is real, for what is lasting in our lives.

Today, society measures prosperity in terms of assets and vanity. Worst of all, what seemed to be the right decision for the princes of those tribes at that time, did not turn out as expected; in fact, living outside the Promised Land would make them vulnerable, and they would be the first tribes to be taken into captivity by the Assyrians, and ultimately lost as tribes of Israel to this day, as we read in 1 Chronicles 5:26.

We read in the next chapter 33:55 “And if you do not drive out those who dwell on the land from before you, it will come to pass that those whom you leave behind will be like needles in your eyes and like thorns in your sides; and they will harass you in the land where you will dwell.” Once again, we fall into the humanism and relativism of today, where everything is not entirely good or bad, we are “lukewarm” in our thoughts and actions, influenced especially by humanist, socialist ideas.

Israel did not want to banish all its inhabitants after entering the Promised Land, and we read how needles were really in their eyes during the time of the judges until today. Once again, other “substitutes” for the Eternal’s orders arise; we are going from banishing to “acceptance, toleration of diversity, of equality, respect, assertiveness, and empathy.” Banishing is not equivalent to murder, it is equivalent to the fact that the Promised Land is a land that is won, not with money, but with a way of life. We see examples of this substitution in various personalities in the Bible, such as King Saul, Achar (in 1 Chronicles 2:7), Lot or Esau. They all ended badly.

Unfortunately, today our society teaches us to dig cisterns, which may seem beautiful, and which make sense in the short term, but we are replacing the Eternal’s wisdom with the wisdom created by man; we are replacing the family with fleeting pleasures (perhaps, this is why there are so many divorces and broken homes); we are learning not to banish what harms us as individuals, rather we live in the continuous presence of humanism, tolerating those practices that ultimately affect us as individuals. I speak of corruption, sexual immorality, and making promises that we do not keep thus making our word worthless, along with greed, and many other evils. An addict does not become addicted overnight; it begins by slowly tolerating the substance, accepting practices that we could never imagine and ideas that go in direct opposition to the Torah.

Are we digging ourselves into holes in which there is no common sense? There is a Source of Living Water continually available, as Isaiah 55:1 says “All of you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and those of you who have no money, come, buy and eat. Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost.” How do we buy these? With effort and the merits that come out of living the commandments and not substituting the true for the false.

What is the Source of Living Water? It is the Torah, inspired by the Eternal’s desire to communicate His will to the human race. We can either choose to dig our own wells or immerse ourselves in the waters of the Eternal which brings life and is freely available to each and every one of us.

Chazak, Chazak, V’nitchazek.

Be strong, be strong, be strengthened

Shabbat Shalom

Mauricio Quintero