When you live in an apartment building, your actions have consequences. And the apartment below us often reminds us of this reality: they seemingly have a broom or pole in each room to instantaneously alert us of our infractions. Understanding this, my three year old daughter tenses up every time she hears a loud noise, fearing that the neighbors are banging at her. (She\u2019s often right.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Chazal capture the affect neighbors have on each other with the adage \u201cOy l\u2019rasha oy l\u2019shcheino- woe is to the wicked, and woe is to his neighbor.\u201d Of course, they teach the inverse as well \u201cAshrei l\u2019tzaddik v\u2019ashrei l\u2019shcheino\u201d praiseworthy is the righteous and praiseworthy is his neighbor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Medrash highlights this effect in the discussion of the encampments of our parsha. Bnei Kehat and the tribe of Reuven were placed next to each other in the formation delinieated in our parsha. Unfortunately for Reuven, the tribe of Kehat would infamously produce the rebellious Korach. Oy l\u2019rasha oy l\u2019shcheinav; the tribe of Reuven would ultimately be drawn into Korach\u2019s rebellion. In just a few weeks we will read of the demise of some of these Reubenites who were attracted to Korach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We know that our friends and neighbors can impact us. When that impact is negative, we can usually look back to pin the situation on a bad decision on our part, or sometimes bad luck.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But Revuen\u2019s tribe did not choose their location, and it was not the result of a roll of the dice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
G-d commanded each tribe to dwell in a specific location! Reuven has no choice but to neighbor up to Kehat, and ultimately members of the tribe die on account of this placement! How could G-d (seemingly) unfairly place the tribe of Reuven in harm\u2019s way?!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In his Sichos L\u2019Sefer Bamidbar, Rav Avigdor Nebenzahl answers this question with a harsh reality. G-d places each of us in difficult situations. We do not always understand why we are placed in the situations we find ourselves, but we believe that G-d\u2019s placements are deliberate. A wicked neighbor adversely affects us, but that is no excuse for laxity; we must be aware of our environment and fight off any negative forces that we encounter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are two ways one could go with this message. We can take note any adverse effects of our neighbors, become conscious of them, and make sure we resist negative influence. But I would like to steer another direction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What type of neighbors are we?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Do those who live near us see us as a source of good?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Do people see the seat next to us in shul as a conducive place for davening?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Do people wish us a good Shabbos knowing that we will greet them warmly?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Shavuot is a time for us to show the types of people we are, to ourselves, to our families, and to our neighbors. When we show up to Shavuot programming and participate in the tikkun leil Shavuot, we create an atmosphere of involvement in our shul. We may not get to choose our neighbors, but we can choose the behavior of our neighbor\u2019s neighbors, and be the conduit of the bracha<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ashrei l\u2019Tzaddik v\u2019ashrei l\u2019shcheinav.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When you live in an apartment building, your actions have consequences. And the apartment below us often reminds us of this reality: they seemingly have a broom or pole in each room to instantaneously alert us of our infractions. Understanding this, my three year old daughter tenses up every time she hears a loud noise, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"saved_in_kubio":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[51,72,10,39],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/remoteshul.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/remoteshul.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/remoteshul.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/remoteshul.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/remoteshul.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=341"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/remoteshul.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":342,"href":"https:\/\/remoteshul.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341\/revisions\/342"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/remoteshul.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/remoteshul.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/remoteshul.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}