A glimpse at Chai Elul
Reb Eliezer, father of the Baal Shem Tov zy”a, was especially meticulous in keeping one particular mitzvah: Hachnasas Orchim. He was legendary for it, known across the village and the fields beyond as the person who would station paid lookouts at the edge of town to make sure no wayward traveler went un-collected, un-scooped into his home where hot meals and a warm bed awaited them. His eagerness in the mitzvah greatly pleased Hashem. But, as these stories always seem to go, the greater the joy with which a mitzvah is performed, the more it apparently triggers Heavenly litigation: the Satan pointing an accusatory finger and murmuring, “Too good, too perfect; he must be tested.”
The Satan was ready to test the limits of Reb Eliezer, but Eliyahu HaNavi insisted that he would be the one to test him. Eliyahu arrived in Walachia (in modern-day Romania) as a poor traveller on a Shabbos afternoon, knocking on Reb Eliezer’s door, backpack and staff in hand. The Baal Shem’s father opened the door and warmly welcomed his guest, offering him a comfy bed and hearty Shabbos seudah; he paid no attention at all to the chilul Shabbos his guest displayed by arriving on Shabbos.
Before leaving, the navi revealed his true self to his host, offering a precious reward for the genuine ahavas Yisrael that he had displayed: a son would be born to the elderly Reb Eliezer and his wife; a son who would make the eyes of the people see light, to find the best in others, just like Reb Eliezer had. A little while later, on the 18th day of the month of Elul, Yisroel was born, who later became known as the Baal Shem Tov, and went on to truly light up the world.
In the Chassidic tradition, Chai Elul – the 18th day of the month of Elul – is so much more than just the Baal Shem Tov’s birthday, the day that Eliyahu HaNavi’s promise came true. Elul can sometimes lean toward dread: we audit our sins, imagine the scales, the decrees, the cold dread of the Yomim Norayim. All of us have, at one point or another, “shut the door” on the part of us we feel is a “mechalel Shabbos”, harshly judging ourselves by our worst moments.
But on this day, “Chai”, life, sneaks into the month by virtue of this birth, this origin story. We can echo Reb Eliezer’s outlook even towards ourselves. The Baal Shem Tov’s whole legacy is an argument that Elul can be approached, not only with trembling but with vitality, with a readiness to love, with Chai, a language of life that the Baal Shem Tov was raised to live with by his holy parents.
The Chassidic mission, the legacy of the Baal Shem Tov and his movement, is, fundamentally, to “call the bluff” of the world, to look at someone who presents his or herself as a “mechalel Shabbos” – in whatever way that might be – and see instead a Yid who needs a home. In Elul, we have the opportunity to see the same thing for ourselves. Elul is not only about judging ourselves, but about learning to recognize the good that still flickers beneath the failures, and then granting ourselves the hospitality of self-acceptance, the hachnasas orchim of self-forgiveness.
The brachah we draw down on Chai Elul is really the same brachah Reb Eliezer and his wife earned: to see light where others see darkness, to find the best in others, and, by doing so, to uncover the best in ourselves.
This article was found in Nekuda Tova Issue 52.
