By Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal
SAN DIEGO –On Wednesday evening I returned from attending this year’s Rabbinical Assembly International Convention. For the first time, this annual gathering of Conservative-Masorti rabbis took place in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Although the convention was held in the suburb of Summerlin in a quiet hotel far from the famed Las Vegas Strip, some hardier souls ventured out to experience the glamour and glitz.
One rabbi who had never been to Las Vegas came back from exploring the casinos and told us that he was glad he went. He said that this week’s Torah portion, Tazria, and next week’s portion, Metzorah, speak about tumah and taharah, ritual purity and impurity. He said that roaming the casinos sensitized him to these two categories which are difficult for moderns to understand.
Ritual purity and impurity have nothing to do with physical cleanliness. Rather, they are spiritual states associated with death, mold, mildew, and bodily secretions on one hand; and washing in a mikvah, “washing away” the impurities, on the other
My colleague said that standing in the casino with the smoke, flashing lights, nonstop noise, and intense bleary-eyed gamblers with stacks of money before them gave him a real sense of what it means to be ritually impure!
He was, of course, making a spiritual rather than a literal point. Nothing that goes on in a casino (at least overtly) contravenes Jewish law (including smoking and gambling). Yet, it well may be asked if spending hours in front of a slot machine is the most productive use of one’s time. Are cigarettes a form of relaxation and blessing, or an addiction and source of illness and death? Is gambling a form of entertainment, or a way to waste time and monetary resources that could be put to better use? Or is the truth somewhere in between?
I suppose the answer to these questions depends on how disruptive any hobby, habit, or avocation is to one’s life. Any activity, even a seemingly
positive one, can drain your resources, ruin your relationships, and take over your life.
Even hobbies as benign as collecting coins and stamps can be destructive if the totality of one’s being is obsessively dedicated to them.
A happy life is a balanced life in which employment, family, hobbies, free time, and fun balance and work in concert with one another. Whether time spent in a casino, makes one “pure” or “impure” depends on how it affects not only your life, but the lives of those around you.
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Rabbi Rosenthal is spiritual leader of Tifereth Israel Synagogue in San Diego. He may be contacted at leonard.rosenthal@sdjewishworld.com