January 13, 2022
I love to read. My 13 year old self …even my 18 year old self… would be shocked at that statement. I started reading in college, not necessarily for my classes, and have been reading ever since.
I love reading many different genres….History. Psychology. Leadership and Management. Biographies. And of course, divrei Torah.
Among the challenges of these past two years is the diminished time we spend together. One of my deep professional goals is to create a Yavneh community, to feel we know another, to share life goals and ambitions and exchange thoughts with one another on topics of interest. With less time together, that goal becomes more elusive.
Hence this idea to share, on occasion, excerpts from books I am reading (confession-I tend to read multiple books at the same time-one waiting in each room I frequent). I invite you to share feedback with me, continue the conversation and even trade book suggestions with one another.
This past Shabbat, parshat Bo, I read a drasha from Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm. The drasha appears in Derashot Ledorot and was delivered in the Manhattan Jewish Center in 1959. The messages are as relevant and contemporary today as they were sixty plus years ago. With all of our talk about quieting the mind and the impact of technology on our children, and ourselves, I thought I would share a few paragraphs with you. I hope you enjoy.
"Modern life, with its perpetual telephone calls and never-ending blare of television, with its round of constant appointments and business and social duties, represents an intrusion of upon the privacy of each of us, a deliberate attack upon the citadel of one's personal privacy...
I have never known a really creative person who did not precede the creative act with at least a moment of profound, thoughtful solitude. No really great speech or beautiful musical composition is rolled off extemporaneously. It is forged in the silence of the mind when the outside world is shut out by a Godly darkness. No brilliant idea, whether in the sciences or art or business, is born out of the brawl of life - it is hatched out of the stillness of a creative personality. What is inspiration? It is nothing but the product of positive and constructive silence in the innermost, inviolable chambers of a man's heart."
Rabbi Jonathan Knapp
