Rabbi Jonathan Sacks teaches that one of the reasons that Isadore Rabi, a Nobel Prize winning physicist, entered the field of physics is that each day when he returned home from school as a child, instead of asking him what he had learned in class as his friends’ parents did, Professor Rabi’s Jewish mother inquired instead, “Izzy, did you ask a good question today?”
Judaism is a tradition that values good questions almost above all else. As young children we ask four questions during the Passover Seder, the festive meal that we share on the first two evenings of the holiday. As teenagers and adults we answer (seemingly) unlimited questions from our Jewish parents. There is a cultural stereotype that the Jewish default is even to answer questions with other questions. (Why do people think that?)
And therein lies the secret to our engagement with the world, our engagement with each other and even our engagement with God. Declarative statements end conversations, bound relationships and bring investigation and thought to a stop. Questions invite deeper communication, more profound mutual understanding and novel insights.
This is the lesson that is inherent in so many of our sacred texts. In the very first verse of the Book of Genesis, the text of the Torah reads, “In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth.” (Genesis 1:1) And no sooner do we learn that famous verse than do we encounter the commentary of the preeminent 11th Century Torah scholar, Rashi, who comments, “this verse says nothing other than ‘explain me.’” In Rashi’s reading, the text literally begs us not to take the Torah at face value and to ask questions instead.
As we continue through the Book of Genesis, our patriarch, Abraham is not afraid to question even God. God tells Abraham about the divine plan to destroy the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah in order to root out the evil of their inhabitants and Abraham responds by asking God, “Will you sweep the innocent away with the guilty? . . . Shall not the Judge of all the earth deal justly?” (Genesis 18:23-25)
When we encounter challenges, when we face disappointments, when the world just isn’t the way we would like it to be it’s only human nature to contract, to pull away, to come to the conclusion that it’s just too difficult to move forward. Turning to a stance of curiosity prevents us from closing off our options and enables us open us to new possibilities instead. When we think that we’ve hit a wall, inquiry help us to find a door.
As the Jewish world prepares to begin a new year on the Hebrew calendar and as the children in our community prepare to begin a new school year, I will be inviting my community to replace the ambition to know more with a resolution to ask more. The rabbis in the Mishna teach us that the wise person spurns arrogance and has the humility not to interrupt a friend’s words, not to reply in haste and to ask what is relevant. (Mishna Avot 5:9)
It is my prayer that we will have the wisdom and the humility to formulate good questions over the year to come and that these questions will help us to understand each other better, help us to meet the challenges in front of us and help us to bring the world just a bit closer to reaching its sacred potential.
About Rabbi Eric M. Rosin
Rabbi Eric Rosin began his professional career as an attorney in Los Angeles serving the entertainment industry, but discovered he needed to be doing something he was passionate about. He left the practice of law and began studying for ordination at the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies in Los Angeles. After ordination, Rabbi Rosin served for two years as the assistant rabbi of Temple Beth-El in Richmond, Va., then assumed the pulpit at Kesher Israel Congregation in West Chester, Pa. in 2004.
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