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Jewish World Review
Dec. 29, 2006
/ 8 Teves, 5767
Don't forget your playful inner child
By
Rabbi David Aaron
“For I made myself responsible for the naar youth — to my father, saying, If I do not give him safely back to you, let mine be the sin for ever……..
For how shall I go up to my father, if the youth be not with me?”
— Genesis 44:32-34
Although these words were spoken by Judah expressing his commitment to return the youth to his father Jacob hinted here is also our own responsibility to bring our — naar — the inner child within us — back to our Heavenly Father. Otherwise there is no way we can ascend to our Father and lovingly bond with Him in every moment of our life journey.
The Zohar, the magnus corpus of the Kabbalah, teaches us that within us all is a naar - youthful child - and also an old foolish king. What does this mean?
Well, consider the difference between the youthful child and the old foolish king. In Hebrew, naar, the word for child, comes from the word meaning "to shake up." And that is very appropriate, because the child is always agitating, moving, growing. A child loves playful adventure.
You might live five minutes away from the school and your kid comes home an hour-and-a-half after school has let out.
"Where were you?"
"I was just walking home."
"But we live five minutes away."
"I don't know ... I was just walking home."
"Well how long can it take you to get here? What did you do?"
"Ahh ... ahhh ... you know that backyard that says `BEWARE OF VICIOUS DOG'? We thought it would really interesting if we climbed over the fence and we'd kind of move across the yard .... `Hi poochie, hi poochie ... hi poochie ...' and then you know that antenna next door, well, we climbed up that antenna and jumped over to the other roof ..."
A child loves adventure, his excitement isn't just getting there, his excitement is in the getting to there.
Contrast this with the old foolish king. He thinks that he is already there. Where is there to go if you are already king? He'd rather sit on his throne than take a walk into the unknown. The unknown to him is not an adventure but a risk — he could fall off his high horse, he could lose his crown, you never know.
But a child loves adventure, it loves to grow, it loves challenge. A child thinks why eat spaghetti with a fork if I can do it with a straw? Now that would be interesting — to just suck each one of them up. A child loves challenge, enjoys the journey and knows how to be playful.
I once watched my kids take hundreds of pieces of a puzzle and spend long hard hours putting it together. I had planned to frame it once it was finished, but they had a different idea. They celebrated its completion by destroying it. Why? Because they were not interested in the puzzle being completed! They were interested in the excitement of doing the puzzle, the challenge and adventure of making it. That's what they enjoyed about it. They understood what we should all understand. There's so much life and value in the process, so much growth and awareness in the journey, as difficult as it may be.
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Life is a challenge, and if you are ready to acknowledge that and see it as the challenge of any good game — where the challenge itself is what makes it fun — then life for you will not be a burden, but an playful adventure.
There is a story about a guy who set out to climb Mt. Everest and just before he got to the top he died. And people said "How tragic, he almost made it ... How tragic he was so close to reaching his goal."
In the Kabbalistic view of life, it was not tragic at all. Because in the Kabbalistic view of life, the climb is just as good whether or not you make it to the top. In fact, the reality of life is such that you never do get to the top. The climb is the goal. The top of the mountain is only the direction, but it is not the destination. The Talmud teaches that no one will live this world with half of his desires fulfilled. Even Moses never reached the promised land he died on the way. But the truth is we all die on the way. Is that tragic? Not if you lived your life knowing that the way is the goal and be sure to take along your inner child and enjoy the journey.
For more information on this topic, please see Rabbi David Aaron's "The Secret Life of G-d: Discovering the Divine within You"
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JWR contributor
Rabbi David Aaron is the founder and dean of Isralight, an international organization with programming in Israel, New York South Florida, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and Toronto. He has taught and inspired thousands of Jews who are seeking meaning in their lives and a positive connection to their Jewish roots.
He is the author of the newly released, Inviting G-d In, The Secret Life of G-d, and Endless Light: The Ancient Path of Kabbalah to Love, Spiritual Growth and Personal Power , Seeing G-d and Love is my religion. (Click on links to purchase books. Sales help fund JWR.) He lives in the old City of Jerusalem with his wife and their seven children.
© 2006, Rabbi David Aaron
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