This weeks portion includes the famous dictum, love they neighbor as thyself—ve-ahavta le-reiakha ka-mokha. (Leviticus 19:18) What is the secret to love?

Rabbi Eliyahu Dessler in his Mikhtav M’Eliyahu (Strive for Truth), points out that the cornerstone of love is the capacity to give to one’s beloved. And he adds, it’s not necessarily the case that one first loves and from the loving comes the giving. The reverse is equally true, and even more powerful. One gives and from the giving, comes loving. The more one gives, the more one loves.

Years ago, there was an extraordinarily successful program known as Marriage Encounter. One of its basic teachings was that love is not a feeling, it’s a decision. After all, feelings change. One morning I may wake up feeling like loving my spouse, child, parent, siblings or friends, and the next morning, I may not. But if I’ve decided to love you—that is, if love is a decision—from the decision, from the action, the feeling may come. In fact, the real test of love is not only what I feel towards you, but what I’m prepared to do for you.

The idea that love is predicated on action, is crucial to understanding prayer, and for that matter all of Jewish ritual. If prayer is an expression of one’s love of God, why should we be mandated to pray? Why not pray only when we feel like it?

It is often the case, however, that we may not feel like praying for long periods of time. But if we’re obligated to pray, if we make a decision to pray, by placing ourselves in a prayerful mode, feelings of prayer may surface. This in fact is the basic idea of ritual, religious observance, which connects us to God. Perform the ritual and from the act the feeling may come. Hence, Jews at Sinai first proclaimed “we will do,” only afterwards did they say “we will listen.” (Exodus 24:7)

What is true in personal relationships in regard to love of others and of God is also true about our love for the community. Ahavat Yisrael is not only the emotion of loving other Jews, but is translating that love into action, into actually doing something for Am Yisrael.

From this perspective, I have more respect for someone who disagrees with me and therefore, doesn’t act, than for someone who agrees but for a variety of reasons, doesn’t act. Indifference is a greater sin than taking the wrong position.

No wonder the root of ahavah, love, is the two letter Aramaic word hav, to give— giving is the pathway to love.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Avi Weiss