Everyday students would walk past the house of their teacher, a holy rabbi, and see him carefully tending to a garden. He pulled weeds, loosened soil and watered the plants, while all the time quietly saying something.
“Rabbi, sorry to bother you” began one of the students. “Would you let us care for the garden? We feel it’s not proper for you a great teacher and holy rabbi to be doing such work.”
The rabbi looked up from the garden towards his students and explained, “man’s dignity is not greater than G-d’s. If the Holy One, blessed be He can cause the winds to blow, clouds to rise, rain to descend, the earth to produce, and tables to be set, certainly a rabbi can do simple things. (Kiddushin 32b) Besides I prefer to care for the garden myself.”
Some days later the students again saw the rabbi on his knees carefully tending the garden. One of the students thought out loud, “What can be so important about tending a few plants? Our teacher is spending so much time on it.”
“Perhaps working the garden helps him to relax” another student offered.
“That can not be” answered another student. “There must be a worthy reason for the holy rabbi to devote so much time to such a simple task.”
The students decided to find out, and one of them approached their beloved teacher with their question.
“I was once walking with one of my teachers, a true light to the generation, through fields and then in a forest,” the rabbi explained. “We were discussing various Torah (Scriptural) topics, and I wasn’t paying too much attention to the surrounding trees and bushes. I concentrated on each and every word my teacher spoke.”
“Suddenly, my holy teacher stopped the lesson and pointed to a plant we were passing by. ‘In plants, as in sleeping bodies, there is life.’ (ibn Daud, Emuna Rama 15 (1168)) Listen well and remember the things I tell you this day. My teacher pointed at a small green plant and said, ‘This one can be eaten’, He pointed to another plant. ‘This one is poisonous.’ “
“We walked some more and he continued the lessons from the Torah (Scripture). Several times throughout the lesson, my teacher stopped and pointed out many plants that could be eaten. He then said something that left me a bit confused, ‘You shall eat the fruit of the labor of your hands; you shall be happy, and it shall go well with you.’ (Psalm 128:2).
“I was a bit puzzled by my teacher’s interruptions, but I didn’t question him because he was my teacher, a true light to the generation. I made sure to remember what he had told me that day, for I was certain that he had some reason for telling me this.
“Shortly after that, we were forced to leave the village as anger, hatred and violence made it unsafe for Jewish people to remain. The hordes with their battle cry ‘Hierosylma Est Perdita’ (Hip Hip, Jerusalem is Lost). I hid in the forest, and I had almost no food with me. The hunger was almost unbearable. One day, I happened to glance down at the forest floor, and I recognized one of the plants that my holy teacher had pointed out to me, many months earlier. I lived almost entirely on those plants during that terrible time, and they saved my life.”
“I feel its necessary to show my appreciation to the plants that saved my life, and therefore, I care for them personally. I ask you to remember, ‘Just as water makes plants grow, so the words of the Torah (Scripture) nurture everyone who labours over them as they require’. (Song of Songs Rabbah 1:19)”
May all your tales end with Shalom (peace)
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