I recently saw an ad that got me thinking. I believe it was an advertisement for someone who was organizing a girls’ choir. I just saw it in passing. It wasn’t much more than a glance, and I even forgot where I saw it, so I haven’t been able to look it up. Either way, I think it is interesting to note how it was marketed.
If I am not mistaken, the advertisement spoke about how being part of a choir brings out confidence in girls and shows them how to shine and work together as a team. Wonderful! We are all for kids being confident, and we are definitely proponents of teamwork, of learning how to work together rather than having individuals swallow up all of the air in the room. Right?
Then I remembered another line in the ad, a promise made by the organizers. It said something like, “The songs and productions will not appear on Instagram or other similar kinds of platforms… The only place where it will be uploaded is to 24Six…”
It was that line that reverberated in my brain and got me thinking. First of all, the very fact that the organizers were reassuring the public that the recordings would not appear on Instagram, etc., made me understand that there is such a thing as a choir performance by frum girls who attend mainstream Bais Yaakov elementary schools being uploaded to Instagram!
Yes, it means that there are people who have no problem publicizing the performances of pure bnos Yisroel, showing them off to the world as if they were mannequins on display in a department store. In this case, however, it is even worse, because the department store is the entire world. (Yes, I know that they write the perfunctory disclaimer, “For women and girls only.”)
Am I Missing Something?
Now, the second part of the ad, the assurance that it will only be uploaded to 24Six, warrants an entirely separate article, but that is not the subject of our discussion now.
I was thinking: What is going on? Parents are supposed to be the greatest protectors of their children. They have been entrusted with these precious pikdonos by Hashem so that they can watch them, guard them, and preserve the “neshomah shenosata bee tehorah hee — the pure neshomah that was entrusted to them.” Why would a parent even have the desire to publicize his daughter’s singing, and why would someone leading a choir have the audacity to take recordings and videos of pure Jewish frum girls singing and put them out there for Charlie, Peter, Chris, Jack and Jill, and anyone in the world to watch?
Am I missing something?
“Venaaseh Lonu Sheim!”
That very day, I happened to be learning Parshas Noach, this week’s parsha, and I noticed the wording of a posuk that, interestingly enough, during all the previous decades that I have learned this posuk, never hit me the way it did now.
The posuk, which appears during the story of the Dor Haflagah, says, “Hava nivneh lonu ihr umigdal verosho bashomayim venaaseh lonu sheim — Come, let us build a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves.”
I never fully paid attention to that part of the posuk.
It never hit me that they wanted to “make a name for themselves.” What does that mean? Even more, what did it mean back then?
In those days, they didn’t have mass communication like we have. There were no podcasts, no Instagram channels, no social media. There wasn’t even a simple video or radio. How was a person supposed to “get his name out there”?
The only way was to build a tower that could be seen from everywhere in civilization.
They wanted the entire world to know that they were the ultimate. They were the strongest. They would build the most towering skyscraper. They would conquer the very heavens. The entire world would recognize them and be in awe of them. “Venaaseh lonu sheim — We will make a name for ourselves.”
My dear friends, I know that the Yated readers are the public that perhaps least needs to be told and warned about the dangers of naaseh lonu sheim—getting your name out there—but there are two reasons why I would nevertheless like to utilize the Yated to talk about this.
Firstly, because this is my shofar; this is the place where I write and where I want to write. Secondly, the very fact that Yated readers may be less exposed to these mediums means that perhaps they are not yet lost and can still protect themselves and understand what they and their children will be dealing with.
The “Who” Who Are Getting “Their Names Out There”
We are living in a society that screams, “Venaaseh lonu sheim.” If you don’t have your own podcast, your own YouTube channel, your own Twitter feed or Instagram feed, then you don’t really exist.
Now, who do you think is getting their name out there?
The role model who is sitting and horuving in one of the botei medrash of Bais Medrash Govoah? The rebbetzin or mechaneches who is being moser nefesh to help bnos Yisroel be happy, confident servants of Hashem?
Of course not. Those are the people who are running away from naaseh lonu sheim. They want to do so much for Klal Yisroel while trying their hardest to make sure that they themselves are not part of the story.
Today’s culture, which unfortunately has not just seeped into our collective communities but has saturated them, is to get your name out there and take credit for everything, even things that you have not done.
The main objective is for you to be part of the story. The podcaster thinks that he or she is the story rather than the person telling the story.
The talmid chochom in Bais Medrash Govoah, Yeshivas Rabbeinu Chaim Berlin, or any of the other myriad yeshivos and kollelim who has just been mechadesh a new mehalech in a difficult sugya is not the one who wants to get his name out there.
What Sells Today? Appealing to the Basest Instincts of Kinah, Taavah and Kavod
Now, let us think: What sells today? Who gets the most traffic on their social media feeds?
My understanding is that those who get the most traffic are the people who appeal to the basest instincts of kinah, taavah and kavod. Look at Hasan Piker, one of the most influential people in politics today, who is a rabid antisemite who wants to see Hitler come again and kill everyone. He believes that America deserved 9/11. He literally cannot complete a sentence without a whole bunch of ugly curse words streaming from his mouth…and he has more people watching and listening to him than almost anyone else. He is less than a nothing! But because he is brash, angry, evil, and knows how to harness grievance, he is popular.
Now, I am not comparing any frum person who wants to get their name out there to him. Chas veshalom to even think of doing that!
What I am, however, doing is saying that most of those “Let’s get our names out there” people are appealing to the baser instincts of their followers and viewers. It may just be curiosity, and it may be a lot of kinah, taavah and kavod mixed in, but one thing is for sure: The person who is getting their name out there is not the person you are going to consult when you need a brocha for your child. You know that, and he or she knows that too.
Why Did Hashem Destroy the Dor Haflagah?
So why did Hashem destroy the Dor Haflagah? Why did He hate what they were doing?
Simple. Hashem hates gaavah. He simply despises it. Hashem is, kevayachol, allergic to it. He can’t be together with it, as the Gemara teaches us that when it comes to the baal gaavah, Hashem says, “I cannot live in the same world [as the baal gaavah].”
Perhaps it was the terrible middah of arrogance that the Dor Haflagah possessed that sealed their fate.
We must realize that as good and talented and powerful as we think we are, we are really nothing.
Remember how, less than a month ago, on Yom Kippur, we said, “Mah anu — What are we? What is our life? What is our kindness? What is our righteousness? What is our salvation? What is our strength? What is our might? What can we say before You, Hashem?”
Hashem controls everything, and the second we think that we are in control, the second we think it is us, our prowess, and our “name” that will be famous, Hashem does not want to be near us. We live in a world just like the Dor Haflagah, where everyone is fighting for publicity and everyone wants to “get their name out there.”
It is important for us to understand that world even as we despise it, because that is the world in which our kids live.
Your child will walk into a shul, and if he sees a famous (or even not-so-famous) singer or entertainer davening there, he will notice him before he notices the rov of the shul. Don’t think I am making this up. I have seen it with my own eyes.
When Small Is Big and Less Is More
We learn that at the time of the Dor Haflagah, there were two brothers, the children of Eiver. One was named Peleg and the other was named Yokton. Peleg was named Peleg because it was in his days that the world split into many different groups — “niflega ha’olam.”
Yokton’s name comes from the root of the word “koton,” small. Chazal teach us that Yokton was given that name because he was an anav; he was humble and would always make himself small. Chazal teach us that the s’char for his humility was that he merited to have many, many children.
(By the way, we see from here that a segulah for children—and many children—is conducting oneself with humility.)
Yokton received such a great reward because he went against the tide. While everyone in his generation was behaving with such arrogance, thinking that they could take over the world and even overcome Hashem, Yokton remained humble and small and didn’t let himself get swept up in what “everyone” was doing.
Let’s remember that we Yidden are different. The more we make ourselves small, the more we take the spotlight off ourselves, and the fewer people know about us and what we do, the better it is.
Yes, Yokton teaches us that small is really big and less is really more.
A “small” thought to think about…in a “big” way.