November 2006 Why Did Rabbi Akiba Smile? By Rabbi Alvin Kass Thousands of years ago, the Romans decreed that the Jews could no longer study the Torah. Rabbi Akiba, recognizing that the future of the Jewish way of life depended on the exposition of the Law, took the risk and lost. Caught in the "treasonous" activity of teaching, he was condemned to death. As Rabbi Akiba was being tortured, his agonized disciples discerned a grin of satisfaction on his countenance. They asked: "Master, how can you smile at a time like this?" Rabbi Akiba answered: "All my life I have recited the prayer 'And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might!' This means that your love of God must be so great that you are willing to give up your very life if necessary. Never before have I had that opportunity. Now that I have it, shall I not rejoice?" With those words Rabbi Akiba breathed his last. Rabbi Akiba's act of martyrdom for the sake of Torah has been repeated many times throughout Jewish history. It reveals the unalterable and inexorable fact that Torah study lies at the very heart of our faith. We are a people who believe that "the ignorant man cannot be truly pious." Authentic observance and genuine religiosity can come about only through a thorough knowledge and a complete mastery of the Torah. People often marvel at the phenomenon of a learned longshoreman such as Eric Hoffer but throughout our history, Jews have always possessed an intellectual proletariat. We are a nation where Eric Hoffers are not the exception but the rule. Torah study has constituted the catalyst which injected a love of democracy into the Jewish people. In contrast to the aristocracy of royalty and priesthood into which one entered through an accident of birth, the aristocracy of scholarship was open to every Jew, no matter how humble his beginnings. The sole requirement was a continuing and unremitting dedication to the study of Judaic civilization. The whole structure of our faith is built around Torah study. It is the foundation of Jewish morality. It is the source of that unique pageantry that we call the Jewish way of life. It is the cement that has held the Jewish people together throughout millennia of dispersion. It has instilled them with a sense of common ancestry and a common destiny. Perhaps the worst calumny ever circulated about Torah study is that it is a pediatric undertaking which ends at the age of Bar and Bat Mitzvah. In truth, Torah study must be a lifelong process in which our knowledge is constantly growing and receiving reinforcement. The Sages understood very well what happens when people cease to learn: "He who does not increase his knowledge, decreases it." Any educated psychologist will affirm that the rate of forgetting is much more rapid than the rate of learning. The death of the human spirit which results from a cessation of Torah scholarship is formulated in the rabbinic dictum: "He who does not study deserves to die." The Sages also knew how easy it is for the noblest resolutions to get lost in the hustle and bustle of our daily routine. Hence, they admonished: "Say not, 'when I have leisure I shall study;' perhaps you will never have leisure." What we sometimes forget, is that Torah is fun. Instead of getting lost in the "wasteland" of TV viewing every night, stimulate your mind through Torah study. I guarantee that anyone who studies Torah will never again know the meaning of the word "boredom." It is with good reason that our tradition envisioned the bliss of eternal life as an endless immersion in the study of the Law. The pursuit of Torah affords us an avocation that will provide a meaningful and inspirational way to fill the sacred hours, days, and years of life with which we have been blessed by Almighty God.