By: Rabbi Shlomo Ezagui
Are you searching for,” the truth?” What is, the truth? People innately and instinctively search for truth. Most people never discover truth for many reasons, all the while craving and yearning for it.
The signature of G-d, is truth. G-d characterizes Himself, as truth. Does that help?
Here’s another hint. In Hebrew the word for truth is EMET, made of three letters, Aleph, Mem, and Tof. The first, middle, and last letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Does that help?
A couple is celebrating their fiftieth wedding anniversary. A great big party is made and the husband presents his wife with a gorgeous diamond ring. One hour after the party the ring evaporates.
Did he dupe her? The ring was real, during the party. It did disintegrate after all the guests and friends went home, but it was real when it was presented, or was it not?
Let’s say it didn’t evaporate after the party but instead of lasting a lifetime, “a diamond is forever”, it was discovered to be, not the material it was characterized to be.
According to Jewish law, “living waters” which have the power to purify, must come from a body of water that is always existent. If the waters should dry up even once in seven years the water is not living, even at the very beginning of the seven year cycle. At the very beginning of seven years the time clock is already ticking to its demise, so death and termination is its inherent reality, rather than life. Living is only what this water appears to be when in truth death is its fate.
The Bible says, “We are made from earth and to earth we shall return.” That would mean that while we are alive our inherent path and direction is death. Rabbi Abarbanel says, “The minute a child is born he already begins to die.”
Does that mean we are investing our lives in transience and impermanence? Could this be why we search for truth. Somehow to attach ourselves to more than where our bodies can reach?
The Torah says, “This world is a world of falsehood.” When you look at the world it proudly claims, “Here I am, I have always been here, I am real and I am forever.”
However if you met me at “ my address”, a mansion overlooking the ocean with expensive cars parked in the driveway, only to find out I rented this location for ten minutes, you would be right to accuse me of being “untruthful” since I allowed you or I even fed you with a deceptive and misleading image of myself.
Because we are inherently spiritual beings in a physical body we seek the qualities not of relative truth but real truth. A reality and actuality which lasts forever. Why waste time and investment on something that will not be around tomorrow when I can invest in permanence.
Truth is a reality that is permanent. Truth is the way it is, all the time. “G-d our G-d is EMET-Truth – He is the G-d of (real i.e. eternal) life.”
If you are unhappy with all the lies and untruths around you, you are searching truth to satisfy the yearnings of your true self, the soul that desires eternal qualities, you will find it only in G-dly practices as spelled out in G-ds Bible. The more a person invests his energies and attaches himself to G-dly practices, the more he will satisfy the constant feeling for meaning and purpose in life. Everything else is shallow and fleeting, hence not deep reaching and not the truth.
Pursuing a G-dly life is the only path to true happiness.
To read more articles from Rabbi Ezagui visit him at http://koshercaffeine.blogspot.com/
