Ahavat Olam. Eternal love. This, our prayer book teaches, is God's gift to the Jewish people. But then we read just a little further in the prayer and we discover that the way that that eternal love is expressed is through torah u'mitzvot, chukim u'mishpatim -- laws, rules, and guidelines for life. And we wonder: isn't this counterintuitive? How is can the creation of boundaries -- the limiting of what types of behaviors are in bounds -- possibly be an expression of love?
As kids, we might have thought that love was expressed by the taking away of all rules -- that we would know we were loved if we were allowed to stay up past midnight or eat cake for every meal of the day. But as we got older, we realized that rules and boundaries are in fact a sign of love. They help us to know that our actions have consequences, that someone cares about what we do.
In the words of a Jewish Zen koan: "How do you give a cow its freedom? Build a fence for it."
Baruch Atah Adonai oheiv amo Yisrael.
As kids, we might have thought that love was expressed by the taking away of all rules -- that we would know we were loved if we were allowed to stay up past midnight or eat cake for every meal of the day. But as we got older, we realized that rules and boundaries are in fact a sign of love. They help us to know that our actions have consequences, that someone cares about what we do.
In the words of a Jewish Zen koan: "How do you give a cow its freedom? Build a fence for it."
Baruch Atah Adonai oheiv amo Yisrael.
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