Our Elderly
When Moses descends Mount Sinai carrying the Ten Commandments and observes the Israelites worshipping the Golden Calf, he throws down the tablets in anger, shattering them. Later, the fragments of those broken tablets are collected and put into the Ark alongside the new Ten Commandments.
In a stunning analogy, the Talmud teaches “Show respect to an old man who has forgotten his learning through no fault of his own, for we have learned that the fragments of the old tablets (the Ten Commandments) were kept alongside the new tablets in the Ark of the Covenant (Babylonian Talmud, Berachot 8b).
The Talmud teaches that just as the broken tablets were holy and treated with respect, the elderly who become intellectually or emotionally broken are also holy and should be treated with respect.
At this time, when our elderly are deeply at risk and susceptible, the message of the Torah and the Talmud is indispensable.
Shabbat Shalom.
— Rabbi David Woznica