There is a double entendre here. A double life. A double portion maybe.
In Hebrew each letter has a numerical equivalent. So aleph is one, bet is two, gimmel is three. Chai (chet, yud)=18. So life is 18. That is why many Jews give gifts or donations in multiples of 18. 36 is therefore double life.
36 times in Torah we are told to champion the cause of the widow, the orphan, the stranger because we were strangers in the land of Egypt.
36 is the number of “concealed ones”, the hidden righteous, the “lamed vavniks”. An idea from the Talmud that at all times there are 36 special people in the world that are so important that even if one of them were missing, the world would come to an end. In every generation these hidden souls are the 36 righteous that “greet the Shechinah,” the Divine Presence. (Tractate Sanhedrin 97b; Tractate Sukkah 45b) Each individual does not know he (or she?) is a lamed vuvnik–nor the identities of the other ones.
These thirty six are hidden. Concealed. We often say of secret agents that they have a double life. Something that is hidden that we don’t know about. Maybe the lamedvavniks are secret agents of G-d, making this world a better place.
After the Holocaust, people began to wonder if the 36 exist at all or maybe, just maybe one of them is missing.
Andre Schwarz-Bart in his novel, Last of the Just has another way of looking at them: “Rivers of blood have flowed, columns of smoke have obscured the sky, but surviving all these dooms, the tradition has remained inviolate down to our own time. According to it, the world reposes upon thirty-six Just Men, the Lamed-Vov, indistinguishable from simple mortals; often they are unaware of their station. But if just one of them were lacking, the sufferings of mankind would poison even the souls of the newborn, and humanity would suffocate with a single cry. For the Lamed-Vov are the hearts of the world multiplied, and into them, as into one receptacle, pour all our griefs.”
This week we begin reading the book of Numbers. It begins by taking a census. With people standing up and being counted. It is what G-d wants. It is what G-d orders. “And the LORD spoke to Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, in the tent of meeting, on the first day of the second month, in the second year after they came out of the land of Egypt, saying: Count all the congregation of the children of Israel, by their families, by their fathers’ houses, according to the number of names, every male, by their polls; from twenty years old and upward, all that are able to go forth to war in Israel: you shall number them by their hosts, even you and Aaron.”
It seems almost the opposite of the hidden 36. However, maybe they are related. This weekend we will honor two families. The Zimmermans have been long time synagogue members. He has served as president. She has been active in Sisterhood, Hadassah, ran the Hebrew School for a time. He is an attorney. She a social worker. They have done so many things behind the scenes it would be impossible to count. The Robinsons are a newer family. They too stepped up and have been counted. She has served on the school committee and really manages to rally the Torah School families to participate. She has been on the executive committee of the synagogue board in her role as secretary. Her children have been active members of the Torah School and we as a community swelled with pride when AJ celebrated his Bar Mitzvah and has read Torah for Simchat Torah. Again, they do so many things behind the scenes it would be hard to count. One example–watching AJ at a PJ Library Shabbat or a Sunday morning pre-school. He loves being with the little kids and he can calm them down by reading them a story. He can allow a little kid to find the afikomen at Passover. He is becoming a mensch. Quietly, behind the scenes. It would seem to be a double life in the life of a typical teenager.
Lamedvavniks? Who knows–but the possibility is there. The possibility is there for any of us. Woody ALlen famously said that 80% of life is showing up. In order to be a hidden lamedvavnik, and I don’t really want to know who you are, first you need to stand up and be counted and then continue to do things behind the scenes. That too is a double life.