The Gemora (Bovo Kama 52a) asks: "What is a
mashkuchis? It is a goat that goes at the head of the
flock." Rashi explains: "The owner of the flock has a wise
goat that walks at the front and the entire flock goes after
it."
A young boy studying in yeshiva ketanoh strikes a
match so he can smoke the second cigarette of his life. A
concerned friend goes over and asks him: "What's wrong with
you? Why are you smoking another cigarette? Don't you
remember that yesterday you hardly managed to finish smoking
half a cigarette? Later you even admitted that not only you
did not enjoy it but you suffered unpleasant side effects,
and almost choked."
The boy's honest and immediate answer is: "But I want to be
`like everybody else.' "
All old-hand smokers confess that they eventually regret the
madness that overtook them when young. The desire to be like
everybody blinded them, and they were even prepared to suffer
until they could finally be "real smokers." Now it is
difficult for them to wean themselves from this addiction.
One bright morning, a Bais Yaakov Seminary student mincingly
paraded into her class wearing glasses with a bizarre frame
made in China. The lenses were tiny and elliptical, the size
of a medium olive. The girl was noticeably proud of them . .
. and herself. She was not at all startled by her friends'
laughter when they saw this spectacle. She condescendingly
looked down at them and announced with inflated self-
confidence: "You are simply not up-to-date! This is the
latest fashion. My optician, who quoted experts in the field,
told me that these frames are the nicest in the world!"
Within a week, another fifteen girls paraded into the
seminary with the same type of frames. Dozens of other girls
nagged their parents, demanding the latest craze in glasses.
One astonished father asked: "Only four months ago you
yourself chose the glasses you are wearing, and they are
perfectly good. What is the reason for this big and needless
expense?"
His question was not left hanging; he received an unequivocal
response: "My glasses are ugly. I want to be like
everybody!"
Not long afterward, "everybody" — men, women, and
children — were wearing this new sort of glasses. You
could hardly find any person walking in the street, any self-
respecting human being, wearing large glasses. "[The goat]
that walks at the front and the entire flock goes after it,"
as Rashi writes, is what made the latest "glasses
revolution," until, of course, the next "glasses revolution"
. . . and naturally the same with hats, shoes, and all the
rest.
"To be like everybody" is a like sickness caused by jealousy
and an abundant dosage of feelings of inferiority, well
blended with laziness. The fact that a person nods his head,
that he cancels his own opinion because of what others think,
mostly has nothing to do with the middoh of humility.
Such behavior generally stems from being too lazy to think
for oneself and possessing a definite feeling of inferiority.
A person lacks the needed courage to weigh each decision with
his own intellect and to do what he himself understands to be
proper. Because he is lazy, he relies on his friends to do
his thinking for him. Those who do not think for themselves
sometimes enlist in their aid Chazal's statement: "A person's
opinion should always be intermingled with [that of] others",
but they are mistaken — see the Rambam in Hilchos
Dei'os.
The Gemora (Kesuvos 8b) teaches us: "Initially,
burying a corpse disturbed the relatives more than the man's
death (since it became socially necessary to bury him with
expensive clothing, such as garments made of silk —
Rashi). The family would abandon him and run away, until
Rabban Gamliel degraded himself and instructed that he be
buried in (inexpensive) linen clothing. The nation later
acted like [Rabban Gamliel] and buried their relatives in
linen clothing."
What time period does the Gemora refer to when it
writes that "initially" Jews acted in such a revolting way
and deserted their dead relatives and ran away? The word
"initially" appears several times in the Mishnah and
Gemora and each time refers to a different era.
For instance: "Initially [the dayanim on a beis
din] would accept testimony about the new month from each
person." The mishnah, by writing "initially," is
referring to a time period that started with Matan
Torah. Another example is: "Initially, they would put up
torches," which means, as seen in the context of the
mishnah, ever since bnei Yisroel came to Eretz
Yisroel. A third case is: "Initially, there was no difference
of opinion in Yisroel and a Sanhedrin of seventy-one members
would sit in the Lishkas Hagozis . . . but when
talmidim lacking sufficient practical expertise
increased, the number of differences of opinion rose."
Obviously, the time referred to by this "initially" is from
the time the Sanhedrin sat in the Lishkas Hagozis,
which was approximately a hundred years before the second
Churban.
The question remains: How long was the period of the
"initially" when Jews would forsake their deceased relatives?
Were there no nevi'im, zekeinim, or Anshei Knesses
HaGedolah, the zugos, and afterwards the
tanoim, who did nothing to thwart such a disgraceful
state of affairs? Did this offense to humanity need to remain
until Rabban Gamliel did something about it?
Let us try to explain this matter according to a
moshol from everyday life, from the rise of banquet
halls in Eretz Yisroel during the last few decades.
"Initially, there were no banquet halls in Eretz Yisroel." I
have been living in Israel for more than seventy years and
can testify that the whole concept of banquet halls, i.e.,
halls intended only for simchas, like for a wedding, a
bar mitzvah celebration, an engagement party, a bris,
a pidyon haben, and a sheva brochos, was a
recent innovation. Before, although there were some large
hotels that occasionally catered, in general those of the
middle class and even many of the more affluent would
celebrate their weddings at home or in buildings belonging to
public institutions, such as cheders or Bais Yaakov
schools.
Not too long ago, weddings in Yerushalayim were scheduled for
late erev Shabbos. People would set up the
chuppah in the shul's yard or on the paved area
above the local water cistern. The mechutonim would
eat the wedding meal — a regular Shabbos meal —
in the house of the chosson's father. Even more
prosperous Jews would hold the wedding meal in their own
spacious apartment and invite relatives according to how much
space they had in their house. Some relatives would arrive
after the meal and just eat a kezayis so they could be
part of a minyan for bircas hamozone and
sheva brochos. The rest of the guests would come after
the meal to celebrate with the chosson and dance with
him.
The main simchah, the nitshadah (Arabic for
"evening"), took place on Motzei Shabbos. All the relatives
and friends of the chosson would come and rejoice with
the chosson until after midnight. They would dance
accompanied by the lively music played on drums. (Other
musical instruments are forbidden in Yerushalayim because of
a cherem kadmonim and aveilus for the
Churban of Yerushalayim). Yeshiva talmidim
preferred to postpone their weddings until bein
hazmanim so that the chuppah could be in the
yeshiva's yard and the meal could be in the yeshiva's dining
room. Only the "modern" rich Jews, who had the means, would
permit themselves to make weddings in a hotel.
Incidentally, the rich too would only invite relatives and a
small number of acquaintances to the wedding, since the hotel
halls at that time were usually small and could not hold too
many people either.
Even the rich would make Bar Mitzvah celebrations in their
own homes. They made the seudas mitzvah for only the
closest family, on the night when the boy became thirteen. To
make up a minyan, if necessary, they would request
somewhat more distant relatives to attend. The next day,
during the whole day, all other relatives and friends would
come to the home of the family to wish mazel tov and
would be treated — each family according to its means
— with fruit, cake, and glasses of wine and liquor to
make a lechaim. The guests would sit for a quarter of
an hour, more or less, and afterwards would leave to allow
others to sit down. No one ever thought of providing a
gigantic meal for a bar mitzvah; surely not in a hotel.
Surely no one thought of giving an engagement party or
bris, pidyon haben, sheva brochos, in a hotel, as is
common lately. Many would make the bris and
pidyon in a shul and afterwards the meal would
be at their home. The meal was intended for the immediate
family, with some neighbors or relatives to make up a
minyan.
This was all true until the time when the "goat that goes at
the head of the flock" arrived. A poor person who was
marrying off his only daughter went and, elated with
simchah, sold all he had and went into debt to make
the wedding in a hotel like the rich do. Many heard about
this wedding and made a kal vochomer for themselves:
If such a penniless person can make a wedding in a hotel,
surely we who have more means can do so, and are obliged to
do so. In a short while "everybody' was making weddings in
hotels, including those who do not quite have the financial
means to do so. Everyone wanted to be like "everybody," and
in that way it became the custom that a wedding was made in a
hotel.
But hotels were not built for this purpose, and only in a few
of them was it at all possible to make weddings. Since the
demand was overwhelming and people wanted "to be like
everybody," special wedding halls sprouted one after the
other. In this way the whole concept of wedding halls was
born.
During this period there were still normal wedding halls,
since even the really prosperous did not make a wedding for
an enormous crowd, the way today even an ordinary
avreich does. What happened was that the hall owners
started to compete with each other. One of them with a sharp
business sense built a gigantic hall and announced in the
newspapers that his new hall has room for 250 guests! At that
time, of course, only the rich allowed themselves to invite
250 people for their children's wedding meal. It did not take
long, though, before "the goat that goes at the head of the
flock," who has a meager livelihood, also made a magnificent
wedding for 250 people. After that, of course, everyone else
made a kal vochomer, and so it went. Soon everyone was
making such a wedding, since everyone wanted to be like
everybody.
The same applies to the exorbitant menus of the gigantic
meals and the huge abundance of side dishes and various types
of salads. Lately something else has been added in Eretz
Yisroel: a "bar" at the entrance to the hall for those who do
not take part in the meal. The tables of the bar are weighed
down by an abundance of mouth-watering foods and snacks. A
baal simchah who does not add a bar to the meal is
considered insane. Also, from 250 guests for the meal, the
standard has gone up to 400 for an average simchah.
This is not the end. Things will continue to get out of
control. In short, everything that the rich allow themselves
to do immediately becomes adopted by the masses, since
everyone wants to be like everybody.
Once the cities had been filled with wedding halls, one rich
person decided to hold his son's bar mitzvah in a
wedding hall. Some other rich people followed his step, and
then "the goat that goes at the head of the flock" also made
a bar mitzvah celebration in a wedding hall. In this
way it has become the custom for many to make bar
mitzvah celebrations in wedding halls.
The next step has been that people have begun making
engagement parties in halls, and as long as it is being done
in a hall, they are making it with a real seudas
mitzvah with all the abundance of side dishes and salads,
just like a wedding meal.
Lately people have begun making brisos, pidyonei haben,
sheva brochos, and even kiddushim in halls. Why
not? Because of the great demand, these halls have been
opening one after the other. Now their name has been changed
from wedding halls to banquet halls for all types of
simchas.
Try asking a kollel student, to whom a firstborn boy
has been born and who is about to book a hall for the
bris and later the pidyon haben, how he is
going to manage to pay for all this. Explain to him that out
of the meager stipend he receives from the kollel he is going
to have to pay a great part each month for these
simchas. Nor should he forget that he has a mortgage
to pay, and that the mortgage payment increases each month
according to the cost-of-living index. If you dare to suggest
to him that he should make the simchah with ten men
from his close family and that he can easily make it in his
apartment, and in this way too he can make a real seudas
mitzvah, he will look at you with anger and say: "But I
have to be like everybody!"
Until now we have presented the moshol. The
nimshal, how this applies to our case in question, is
as follows. We asked when was the period when "initially,
burying a corpse disturbed the relatives more than his death,
and the relatives would abandon him and run away, until
Rabban Gamliel came." How was it possible that during that
whole time no one could stop that appalling behavior? It
seems to me that what happened was as follows:
Initially, each person would bury his relative according to
his means, as we find in the bringing of bikkurim:
"The rich would bring bikkurim in golden baskets and
the poor in baskets made of shoots of willow trees." Probably
some poor person later came, some "goat that goes at the head
of the flock," and sold all that he had to bury his relative
with silk tachrichim just as the rich do. The custom
later became that even the poorest person could not refrain
from buying the expensive tachrichim, and the silk
industry suddenly began to blossom.
The rich people made a kal vochomer: If the poor are
prepared to give all their possessions for the honor of their
deceased relative we are, at the very least, obligated to
give a significant part of the inheritance that our relative
has left us for his own tachrichim. They started
ordering the most expensive tachrichim from Chutz
La'Aretz. The import business for expensive
tachrichim started flourishing. At that point "the
goat that goes at the head of the flock" arrived "with the
whole flock after him," until the minhag had become
that everybody buries their departed relatives with imported
tachrichim of precious silk and there was no
difference between the rich and the poor.
The rich saw what was happening and it bothered them. One of
them clothed his departed relative with tachrichim
that cost a real fortune and hung jewelry around him. The
poor could not possibly copy that, and therefore they "would
abandon their departed relatives and run away." Rabban
Gamliel realized that something must be done, and he
therefore prepared plain linen tachrichim for himself
and let it be known that when he died he wanted to be buried
with these inexpensive tachrichim, that are worth only
one zuz.
*
There is an opportunity to be the "Rabban Gamliels" of our
generation. If people will "degrade themselves" and not make
any more weddings for their children according to the way
that their status would demand, but be satisfied with
weddings like those made some forty years ago.
They can set an example, so that others, who with difficulty
bring a livelihood for their families, will not have borrow
money to make fancy weddings that they cannot afford.
How great will be their reward!
