Havdalah Introduction (part 1): Farewell My Beloved
“If the Jews won’t make Kiddush, the non-Jews will make Havdalah.”
Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin
n the same way that Shabbat begins with Kiddush, so too Shabbat ends with a form of “Kiddush” called Havdalah. Why was it given a different name? As we have discovered together, one of the meanings of the word Kiddush is separation. The word Havdalah also means separation, but it is rooted in a different Hebrew word – lehavdil. However, in Lashon HaKodesh there are no synonyms. No two words can mean exactly the same thing. It is true that when very similar meaning words in Lashon HaKodesh are translated, the nuances are often lost. Nevertheless, there are no two words that convey exactly the same meaning. If so, what is the difference between the words Kiddush and Havdalah? One of the subtle differences between them is that the word Kiddush implies voluntary separation whereas Havdalah depicts involuntary separation.
On Friday evening we welcome the beauty of Shabbat into our lives. We are commanded to sanctify and honor the most awesome of days by making Kiddush. By declaring to all that Hashem created the world in seven days and that we belong to Him. As Shabbat draws to a close, we reluctantly acknowledge that we must once again return to the mundane. To our regular weekday existence. And to do so we must take leave of the grandeur and the sanctity of Shabbat. It is not something we want to do. We have no alternative but to do so. Our reluctance to part from the Shabbat Queen is reflected in the word Havdalah. The word expresses our wish to stay in a state of Shabbat from one Shabbat to the next. Yet, because this it not a possibility, we bid farewell to our beloved Shabbat, not by reciting Kiddush but by reciting Havdalah instead.
This distinction between voluntary and involuntary separation can help explain an extremely sharp and even caustic comment made by Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin, some two hundred years ago. He said, “If the Jews will not make Kiddush, the non-Jews will make Havdalah.” This means that the Jewish nation has been put into this world to sanctify themselves and be a “light unto the nations.” We are here to reveal Hashem’s glorious radiance upon the world. If we do not recognize this fact ourselves, if we do not live according to Hashem’s Will, but, rather, allow ourselves to sink into the abyss of assimilation and intermarriage, the non-Jewish nations will “remind” us that we do not belong with them. They will forcibly prove to us that we are different, even if we do not want to be reminded of that fact. The non-Jewish nations will make Havdalah, so to speak.
I once read an article written by a Reform clergyman from Miami. The topic was assimilation. He wrote, “We think that intermarriage leads to assimilation, but it is the other way around. We marry people like ourselves. The average middle-class Jew is as different from the average middle-class Gentile as your average Hutu is different from your average Tutsi. I know Rabbis aren’t supposed to say things like this. We are supposed to fight assimilation, tooth and nail. But, to be honest, I am about as assimilated as you can get. Put me in a lineup of the average middle-class non-Jew, and the only way you could tell us apart is to play a Jackie Mason tape and see who laughs. The truth is our kids don’t intermarry. They marry people just like themselves.”
Perhaps, inadvertently, the author was right. We are supposed to marry people just like ourselves. Jews are supposed to marry Jews. And Jews are supposed to behave like Jews. What could be sadder or more tragic than our having our Jewish identity forced upon us by non-Jews. To have the non-Jewish nations of the world make Havdalah when we could so easily be making Kiddush instead.
To be continued…
