To Heal a Broken Heart

Parshat Tzav

by Rabbi Avi Billet 

 The tragic story of a fire in Brooklyn coming on the ten year anniversary of a similar story in Teaneck has left the greater Jewish community reeling. We mourn with these families, and wish for a recovery for those still in medical care.

 Having seen and experienced devastating loss, the only thing I know to be experientially true is that love and the passage of time are the most important ingredients to being able to continue with life and to find happiness once again – if that becomes a goal in life. Having faith in God is also helpful, because it can help a person find a sense of purpose in living beyond tragedy.

 Towards the beginning of its commentary on our parsha, the Midrash Rabba aims to explain how those who suffer through devastating ordeals can get closer to God, utilizing the experience of King David, who said in Tehillim (Psalms 51:19): “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; O God, You will not despise a broken and crushed heart.”

 How true this statement is, and how true do we hope for it to always be.

 Of course, the Midrash does not raise this sentence in a vacuum. The parsha does focus heavily on sacrifices. And the Midrash paints King David’s statement as one of hope for how he could get closer to God despite having suffered terrible calamities.

 One utilization of the verse asserts King David’s Teshuva (repentance) process, in the aftermath of the Batsheva incident of Samuel II 12 as, “God, I have overcome my evil inclination, and I have repented before You. If You accept my repentance, I know that my son Shlomo will build the Beit Hamikdash, and build the Mizbeach, and burn the sacrifices on it.” This is how “a broken spirit” can turn into the fulfillment of “the sacrifices of God,” when the dream of what future generations can hopefully accomplish can be articulated and hopefully actualized.

 Another view utilizes the same verse as the answer to a question – not about King David and his son Shlomo, but about any person looking to find God: How do we know that a person who repents is given the credit for having gone up to Jerusalem, having built the Temple, having built the Mizbeach, and for sacrificing all of the offerings? Because this is how “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit.” The broken heart that accompanies repentance can bring about the highest level of serving God.

 But closeness to God is not only achieved through repentance, as is demonstrated through the concluding teaching of the Midrash, in the name of Rabbi Alexandri. If a human being is served with broken vessels, it is assumed to be an insult. But God is the opposite – He knows that the most powerful and the most poignant service comes from the brokenhearted. “The Lord is near to the broken-hearted, and He saves those of crushed spirit.” (Tehillim 34:19) God is the One “Who heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.” (Tehillim 147:3). The prophet Isaiah (57:15) quotes God Himself, who said, “With the lofty and the holy ones I dwell, and with the crushed and humble in spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble and to revive the heart of the crushed…”

 What, therefore, is the meaning of “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit?” That through a broken heart one has the ability to come closest to God.

 The broken heart can be demonstrated in one of two ways. Either a person sins and breaks one’s heart through repentance. Or tragedy breaks one’s heart, and the person turns to God through serving him.

 When a nation can collectively have a broken heart, this Midrash is suggesting that we are experiencing the closest chance we have to seek out God’s presence, and to feel His comforting hand. When King David wrote Tehillim 51 in the aftermath of the Batsheva tale, he had two experiences which weighed heavily on his conscience.

 The first was that his conduct in that story was sinful and he needed to return to God. His deed was public, his exhortation from the prophet was spelled out to him, and he was also made aware through prophesy of what was expected of him.

 The second was that he had suffered the ultimate loss of several of his children – the first child born from his union with Batsheva (Shlomo was the 2nd child of that union), the deaths of his sons Avshalom and Amnon in his lifetime, as well as his daughter Tamar’s defilement at the hands of her half-brother Amnon. (Adoniyahu, another son, was killed shortly after King David’s death.)

 In our local story, there is no sin. There is no prophet. And there are no answers. There is only tragedy, suffering, and loss, for a family and for a community.

 There is no healing from losses of this kind. There is always an emptiness in the lives of surviving family members, as well as in the greater community.

 Hopefully, with the outpouring of love and with time, everyone will be able to find some kind of comfort from the ultimate Comforter because He will see that what brings us closest to Him is the broken heart.