Shir ha-Shirim VIII: Part Five: Cord to Rope
Rabbi Chaninah said: Imagine a deep well full of water, cold, sweet, and wholesome water, but no one was able to get a drink of it, until one man came in joining rope to rope and chord to chord, jewels from it and drank, and then all began to draw and drink. So too, proceeding from one thing to another, from one parable to another, Solomon penetrated to the innermost meaning of the Torah, revealing unsuspected beauties, as it is written, “The Proverbs of Solomon son of David, King of Israel; to know wisdom and instruction,” through the Proverbs of Solomon he mastered the words of the Torah. (Shir ha-Shirim Rabba 1:1.8, part five)
How different is Rabbi Chaninah’s approach from that of Rabbi Shelah! The latter described the Torah as a boiling pot of water that none could approach for fear of being burned. Rabbi Chaninah describes the Torah as a deep well full of cold, suite, and wholesome water, that we could not access until Solomon Kane and Did one thing to another, one part of life to another, life experiences to Torah, until we had a rope long enough to lower a bucket the deep well and drink from its fabulous waters.
Rabbi Chaninah does not speak of our theater of Torah, but of our inability to fully access its sweetness, it’s refreshing and wholesome waters that could energize our lives. We could not do this until we could connect cord to court, rope to rope, to different types of string, to tell us that we had to connect the different parts of our lives to the death print parts of total, and only then were we able to access the full benefit of this sweet waters of Torah and seeing its Song.
It is only when we examine all the details of the Pesach story and understand how a person suffering because he was working the wrong type of job, or a family so devastated by its servitude that when a child is murdered by the King they weep, not because of the death of the child but because of their work, that a man and woman are too exhausted to even consider bringing more children into the world, how Jacob feared going down into Egypt, how the brothers refused to follow Joseph’s instructions as to how to address Pharaoh, and more, and more, all play a role in the Pesach story, our story, that we can begin ourselves to connect cord to cord, rope to rope, and access the sweet waters of Torah; its Song.
The Pesach Seder is our opportunity to understand that all connects; every part of Torah and everything we experience. It is our opportunity to connect cord to cord, rope to rope, and experience the refreshing sweetness of Torah. We can then begin to seeing its Song; the Song of Songs.