Making our way through Pirke Avot, we’re nearly done with the fourteenth verse of the first chapter, meaning we’re nearly through the first chapter altogether, and if not now, when?
He used to say, If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?
There isn’t anything special about the Hebrew in this one. If not now, when? And if we go by the most common interpretation, it follows very closely: If you do not make your own way, don’t expect anybody else to help you, but at the same time, don’t concentrate so hard on your own desires that you ignore other people, and don’t procrastinate. Straightforward, good advice.
The other common interpretation is spiritual. Don’t feel that you can rely on the virtues of your ancestors; the spiritual reward or punishment you earn is your own. The way to spiritual merit is to eschew your own self-centeredness and work for others. And don’t put off your spiritual enlightenment, because you could die at any moment, you foolish mortal, you. All good advice, nothing wrong with it, very powerful and motivating stuff, actually.
So if I’m wandering around inside the verse, looking at it upside-down and backwards and through polarized filters to get the 3-D effect, and shaking it around to hear it rattle, it’s not out of any dissatisfaction with the straightforward stuff. Nor do I have any illusion that I’m getting some sort of deeper, truer meaning this way. I do feel that it all adds up, that the meanings layer, one and another and another, or rather weave more than layer, to make a stronger fabric. And I think it’s helpful to me, as I read and re-read the avot, to examine them backwards and sideways and upside-down, and to lick the beaters, too. There’s always more, even if more and better aren’t synonyms.
So, I looked at the first part of the verse by setting it next to the Song of Songs. And for the second part, I chewed on the root, and found other meanings for it. Now the urgency of this third part doesn’t seem to follow from those. After all, one of the things about dodi li is that it’s for the long haul. And the temptation to be mighty is not going away, either. So how can we work our way into if not now, when from where the last two have taken us?
Er. Still thinking.
The Rambam says, you know, in his commentary, that failing to acquire good habits in youth, it is difficult to acquire them later. I think that’s not only true, but I think that force of habit is one of the strongest motivations people have. When we say that youth is wasted on the young, it’s not just that us middle-aged folks lack the vigor to do things things that never came into our horizon when we were young, vigorous and ignorant. It’s also that the discipline we could train ourselves into when we were young seemed at the time not to be worth it. My Gracious Host asked a couple of weeks ago What would your younger self think of you?, and I in response imagined a brunch attended my me at the age of 20, me at the age of 40 and me at the age of 60. Later, continuing to think about that brunch, I was thinking that 20me would be asking all kinds of questions, and 60me would be saying You’re not really going to eat that, are you? You’re killing me, here. And I am not going to tell you anything unless you get up from the table right now and go floss. Now! Go! Little pisher.
What Maimonides is saying, of course, is that if you say when you are young that first you’ll make money and then, when you retire, you will study Torah, that not only is it possible you will never make enough to retire, not only is it possible you will die before that time comes, but if you do make money, and you do retire, and you find yourself a teacher, you may well find that it’s too late to develop the mental discipline and habits that will allow you to succeed in your studies. If not now, when? Then? Good luck to you.
Don’t wait to be your own Beloved until you are out of the habit. Don’t wait to be the Beloved of the Devine. Don’t wait to be the Beloved of your Beloved. Love, too, is a habit you can get into and out of.
Don’t wait to be vulnerable, to be a who rather than a what, to be flesh together with bone, ani and li together. That’s a habit, too.
Today, it’s possible for me to follow Hillel, to be fully human by being fully myself, by being mine. Today, it’s possible. Tomorrow, probably. Next week, I would think very likely, although I have a dentist’s appointment, and I have to take the car in. There’s March, but I’m very busy in March, with the show and all, and then in April it’s Passover. May, though. Maybe May.
Tolerabimus quod tolerare debemus,
-Vardibidian.