The Contaminated Grain

 

 

 

The Contaminated Grain
 

 

 

Shalom,

 

We wish all of those who have been affected by the outbreak of the coronavirus to come back to a normal, healthy life very soon.

 

All of us at Ulpan-Or are now trying to help with supporting online Hebrew learning for schools, communities, and individuals around the world to fight isolation by sharing FOR FREE our resources during these difficult times!

 

We also assist in group webinars, lessons, and interactive online learning in general.

 

 

 

Let us know if you are interested in learning more by responding to this email. 

 

 

Following our last week’s post ‘King’s Paradox Reward’
(found at https://www.ulpanor.com/2020/03/27/kings-paradox-reward/),
many of you expressed interest in getting to know more of Rabbi Nachman’s stories.

 

So, this time we will share another story of his –‘The Contaminated Grain‘, which, we feel, can bring everyone to ponder upon, under the current circumstances. 

 

First, here is a short background about Rabbi Nachman from Braslav.

 

Born in Medzhibozh, Ukraine to a distinguished Chasidic family descending from the Baal Shem Tov, Rabbi Nachman earned a reputation as an independent thinker and outspoken teacher and soon attracted his own substantial following.

 

 

Throughout his life, Rabbi Nachman faced a great deal of opposition to his unconventional ideas from many of the leading rabbis in the Chasidic world.

 

He was accused of arrogance, messianic pretensions, and propagating semi-heretical doctrines, and he and his Chasidim were even persecuted for their views.

 

In 1802, Rabbi Nachman moved to the city of Bratslav, where he suffered several personal catastrophes, including the death of his wife and several of his children, and produced the major part of his work.

 

He was a prolific writer, but little of his writing remains.

 

The most influential work attributed to him – Likutei Moharan – a compilation of his sermons on the Bible, Talmud, and Zohar – became the primary source text and spiritual guide for the Bratslav Chasidim.

 

However, his “Tales” may be considered the peak of his creative life, both for the originality of their form and content and for the profundity of their underlying ideas.

 

Many of his tales at the beginning remind us of folk stories about kings, princes, and princesses, but this usually diverse from the “original route” and end with a paradoxical conclusion… 

 

These tales inspired many other writers and thinkers such as: Franz Kafka, Martin Buber, Yitzhak Sade Eli Wiesel and more.

 

Rabbi Nachman was born on the New moon of the month of Nissan (celebrated yesterday).

 

He contracted tuberculosis in 1810 and passed away before his fortieth birthday.

 

Here is another one of his short (less known tales): 

 

The Contaminated Grain

 

 

This is the story of a king who discovered that his entire supply of grain had been contaminated by a strange fungus (maybe a novel type of virus).

 

 

 

The king said to his viceroy, “I can see in the stars that every person in my kingdom who eats grain from this year’s harvest is going to go mad! The grain looked the same and tasted the same as normal grain.

 

 

There was no way of knowing anything was different except for one thing.

 

Anyone who ate this grain, he or she became deranged – in other words, insane.

 

The king and his advisor were the only ones who knew about this problem. They discussed their options.

 

They were rapidly running out of uncontaminated grain. They would be out of regular grain very soon, and they would have to open the contaminated grain supply…

 

There were no alternatives to feed the entire nation.

 

At first, they thought that they would give the grain to the people but would not eat it themselves so that at least two people in the kingdom would maintain their sanity. This way, they would be able to rule the kingdom.

 

Then the king realized that he would not be able to govern the people if he did not understand those.

So he suggested that he should eat the contaminated grain, but his advisor should stay sane.

 

However, the advisor realized that it would be impossible to give advice to the king if he was seeing true reality, but the king was not.

 

 

They understood that in order to rule people who had a different reality, they both had to eat the contaminated grain so that they could experience the same reality as everyone else.

 

The only hope for the future of the people was the possibility to find a way that the king and his governor would be able to realize that the reality they were experiencing was not the real, true reality.

 

This would prepare them for better (normal) times to come.

 

So the king said:

 

This is what we’ll do:

 

“We’ll put a sign on each of our foreheads. I will look at your forehead, and you will look at my forehead. 

 

And when we see the sign, then we will remember that we are mad.”

 

 

 

Have any clue? 

 

As opposed to his teachings in “Likutey Moharan”, Rabbi Nachman encouraged people to interpret his tales freely. 

 

So, we do encourage you to please respond to this email with your own thoughts and interpretations. 

 

We also wanted to share with you a very recent song composed by Hanan Ben Ari “Longing for Humans”, in reflection of the current situation.

 

Here is a free translation of it to English.

 

 

You are welcome to join our GDL – Guided Distance Learning courses to be able to understand this and many other Israeli songs in Hebrew.

 

See more below:

 

https://www.ulpanor.com/course/gdl-individual/

 

Watch the song here:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9m54DdWgoo

 

 

 

Wishing all of you a peaceful and healthy weekend.

 

Shabbat Shalom,

 

 

 

 

 

 

Many ask us for permission to redistribute our newsletters. By all means, please do feel free to forward this newsletter to anyone you wish! 

 

Access the archive of our previous posts at:

 

https://www.ulpanor.com/category/blog/

 

 

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