If it ain't broken, why hold a tikkun for it?

[readwhine]

That time of year again...

Once again, I'm hosting and leading large parts of a Tikkun Leil Shavu`ot this Tuesday evening, and as always happens two days before I'm wishing I wasn't. I've been through this cycle often enough to know that (assuming that with God's help it goes reasonably well) I'll get over this feeling and be longing to do another

Comments

[boroparkpyro]

very cool!

i just got drafted last night to give a שיעור as part of a TLŠ. i'm also using Eiliyahu and the Still Small Voice (or Soft Murmuring Sound), but i'm talking about Eiliyahu and Elisha‘, how Eiliyahu gets fired and then transformed.

[readwhine]

I'm not sure in what sense you're using the word "fired" here...

[boroparkpyro]

fired. downsized.

At Hhoreiv, God asks him, "what the heck are you doing here?" and Eiliyahu gives a whiny answer about being a failure. God shows him a pyrotechnic display meant to teach him that God is *not* in the wind, fire, earthquake - i.e. not in the violent, showy methods that Eiliyahu has been using - but instead in the soft sound. God then asks Eiliyahu again "what the heck are you doing here?" and Eiliyahu gives the same exact wrong answer, word for word, letter for letter, trop for trop. So then God says, "fine; go back and make Hhaza’eil king of Aram, Yeihu’ king of Israel... and Elisha‘ a new prophet instead of you."

If you then go and read what kind of prophet Elisha‘ was, you see that he didn't go around throwing fireballs at soldiers, slaughtering idol-worshippers, and casting the country into a drought. Instead he resuscitated dead/dying children, floated axes out of rivers, cured poisoned food, etc. (except for that weird incident with the bears).

God was saying, "dude, you're too harsh. i need a nice,

[readwhine]

That's interesting (especially about the same exact wrong answer), but I'm not sure that the text really bears it out. Elijah did his own share of miracles for poor people and resuscitating dying children earlier in his career, and what are you going to do with verse 17? "Anyone who gets away from Haza`el will get it in the neck from Jehu, and anyone who gets away from Jehu will get it in the neck from Elisha".

On the other hand the idea of Elijah being too much of a qanai and spending the rest of eternity making up for it is already in Pirkei deRabbi Eliezer (end of chapter 28, or chapter 29 in some editions): "אמר לו מה לך פה אליהו קנא קנאתי אמ' לו לעולם אתה מקנא קנאת בשטים על גלוי עריות שנ' פנחס בן אלעזר בן אהרן הכהן וכאן קנאת חייך שאין עושין ברית מילה עד שאתה רואה בעיניך" -- God said to him "Who do you think you are saying that you are the only left who is true to me? Just to show you, you are going to attend every brit from now on.", and I think this is implicit in the text: after Elijah says "I'm the only one left", God points