You did not ask for this burden, but in time you will understand that it is primarily a privilege
On the surface it was just an ordinary morning Shacharis, but this time it was quite extraordinary because you, our great-grandson, joined me in the minyan. This was the first time in your life you were donning tefillin, in preparation for your forthcoming bar mitzvah.
In cosmic terms, you are continuing the chain that began with Moshe Rabbeinu 3,500 years ago: “l’os al yadcha ul’totafos bein einecha — a sign on your hand, and totafos [frontlets] between your eyes.” Jews have worn tefillin since then, the tefillin containing the Shema Yisrael and other key sections of the Torah. Moshe Rabbeinu wore tefillin, and now you, my great-grandson in the year 5780, are wearing them.
Is there any other people on earth that has maintained its major religious practices intact for 3,000 unbroken years, despite vicious pogroms and murder? And here standing before me is this shy but proud young fellow, the latest in that unbroken, majestic line.
In personal terms, as one who still remembers his own first day with tefillin, it is beyond rational belief. To witness a son donning tefillin is stirring enough. To have a grandson do the same, approaches a feeling of awe. But a great-grandson, the son of the son of my son, and to be able to stand with him and to witness it? It is beyond awe and wondrous. As Yaakov said, “katonti mikol hachasadim… ki b’makli…” (Bereishis 32:11).
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