Timeless Torah

Binding straps of leather around one’s arm and head is distinctively Jewish. True, other cultures like the American Indian also made a big tzimmes using elaborate headdresses, but that was traditionally reserved for a tribal chief, and only on certain occasions. But tefillin are central. It, more than any other mitzvah, initiates our boys into Jewish manhood. Its role is not decorative or even sentimental; it is the defining commandment that separates the child from the adult. But why specifically tefillin?
It is worthy to note that the first direct quotation from Moses in the Bible is, “Why do you strike your fellow?” With these words Moses is introduced as a protester of violence, a threat that today is not rhetorical, but increasing in both frequency and intensity.
What do the tefillin teach us? Each morning, as we wrap the leather straps, our arm loses its range of movement. This is to remind us that man is not free to do as he wishes. He should only act in ways that are in consonance with the spirit of the tefillin and of the Sh’ma. Some acts, such as harming another human being, or taking that which does not belong to you are evil. Hands should heal and build, and not be used for other purposes. Every day the tefillin practically pinches us in the arm, announcing, “All your actions must conform to these principles.”
The first box is placed near the heart, symbolically the seat of our emotions. Certain emotions are prohibited by the Torah, such as “Do not hate your brother in your heart,” and “Do not harbor a grudge.” Other feelings are mandated. These include, “You shall (even) love the stranger,” and who can forget the famous, “You shall love your fellow as yourself.” The tefillin give us a glimpse of our amazing potential, not only to do what is right, but also to remain in control of our emotions.
This concept, brought to us via the tefillin, is revolutionary. It flies in the face of both classical psychology and contemporary social engineering. Thus the common but feeble excuse, “I couldn’t help myself,” is not acceptable to anyone sensitive to the message of the tefillin. Our emotions are not beyond our control. We are their masters, not their pawn. A heart touched by tefillin will surely reject such flimsy rationalizations. The second box of the tefillin is placed upon the head, the seat of the mind. Man’s intellect is his finest attribute, but it has also proved to be civilization’s greatest threat. When man uses his mind properly, he can create a paradise; when he does not, he can cause total destruction.
One hundred years ago, philosophers honestly believed that society was on the verge of a breakthrough of epic proportions. Illiterate men, they preached, relied on force to make their point of view heard. But with industrial, technological, and educational advances provided by free public schooling, moral enlightenment would be the order of a new world. Sadly, this hope has proven vain. Modern man looking down from his skyscraper penthouse is no more moral than his ancestor who lived in a cave.
The second box is placed above the mind, to declare that the mind does not reign supreme. There is something higher than human intelligence, originating in a realm of absolutes, delivering unadulterated and non-relativistic direction. Lacking such ethical vision, a brain alone, regardless of how cultured, can lead man to his ruin.
The Biblical commandment orders us to place the tefillin “between the eyes.” That too is of great significance, for how we use our eyes shows who we are. When the sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe, was still a little boy, he asked his father why G-d gave man two eyes. Would not one eye have been quite sufficient? “The right eye is for seeing the good, and the left eye is for seeing faults,” his father replied. “Use your right eye to look at others, and your left eye to look at yourself.”
Tefillin are a bond and a “sign”, binding the American Jew, the Russian Jew, the Ethiopian Jew, and the Israeli Jew together into one inseparable whole. The tenacious tefillin strap spans oceans and continents, past and present, gathering together our scattered people into one indivisible unit. Indeed, the heroic story of the tefillin echoes the history of our people. Remember Auschwitz, where Jews lined up hurriedly to put on a secret pair of tefillin and take them off without reciting the Sh’ma, because the Germans could come in at any moment. Picture a group of Jewish university students at a Chabad House strapping on tefillin, unhurried, and without fear.
Powerful, inspirational tefillin: It introduces the young and reminds the old, that our hand, heart, and mind must be bound to G-d and Torah, to ideal and principle, to those who wear their tefillin daily and to those who as of yet have not experienced the strength of its embrace.