For a criminal in North Carolina, January 5th 2019, was a really bad day. A day that he made a terrible mistake. You see, this criminal had tried abducting a woman on the street, and, when she resisted and started running away, the would-be abductor inadvertently chased her right into a karate dojo. Which was not empty. Present were a few kids who were still being picked up by their parents, and some adult students. But worst of all for the criminal was the fact that Randall Ephraim, head instructor of the Bushiken Karate dojo, was tidying up as the
odd twosome entered. Ephraim calmly asked the large-sized man how he could be of assistance, and the man, incredibly, stated what – or rather who – he wanted! Of course, he didn’t say that he wanted to kidnap anyone, but he made it abundantly clear which individual he was after, the latter emphatically insisting that she doesn’t know the man and feels extremely threatened by him.
Hearing that, dojo master Ephraim expeditiously forced the man out. Then the criminal committed his near-fatal error: he started attacking Ephraim. Bad move. Really bad move. By the time Ephraim was done with him, the man had to be wheeled away on a stretcher before being taken to jail and charged with attempted abduction.
Talk about a faux pas.
It reminded me of a story I read in HaRav Yaakov Galinsky’s Vihagedeta, about the time a group of Karaites tried to convince the king of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth that they represent original Judaism, and the “Rabbinic Jews” – as the Karaites referred to them – should be given an ultimatum: either revert to Karaite “authentic” Judaism or undergo baptism. The Karaites’ argument was based on a law that mandated every citizen of the Commonwealth to ascribe to some religion. Since, argued the Karaites, “Rabbinic Judaism” is an aberration from the “true Jewish religion”, it should be considered that they are not ascribing to any religion!
The Vilna Gaon appointed an esteemed talmid chacham, Rabbi Aryeh Leib Meites of Pinsk, to be the Jewish representative in the debate that the monarch ordered in the wake of the Karaites inflammatory claim. As Rabbi Meites entered the chamber alongside the three Karaite scholars who came to debate with him on that fateful day, the king – who was to serve as judge in presidium over the debate – was astonished to see the Jews’ representative carrying his shoes under his arms instead of wearing them on his feet. “What is the meaning of this?!,” the king demanded.
“Your majesty,” Rabbi Meites humbly responded, “when Moses was bade to approach the burning bush for an intimate encounter with the Divine Presence, he was ordered by the Heavenly voice to remove his shoes. By Jewish law, to enter the holy Temple one had to remove his shoes. And on our holiest day of the year, the Day of Atonement, we do not wear shoes. You see, your majesty, for us Jews, removing one’s shoes is a sign of deep respect and honor.”
Greatly flattered, the king nevertheless persisted, “But why do you carry your shoes under your arms? Why did you not leave them in the outer room?”
To that, Rabbi Meites responded, “Oh, that, your majesty, is a lesson that we also learned from our prophet, Moses. You see, when Moses finished speaking with the Almighty at the burning bush, and turned around to put his shoes back on, he discovered that his shoes had been stolen by the Karaites! So, from Moses, we Jews have learned that if one ever removes one’s shoes in the presence of Karaites, one must make sure to hold on to them so that the Karaites not be given an opportunity to steal them.”
Incensed and insulted to the core, the Karaite scholars screamed, “Why, you slanderer, you! What a base and unjustified smear! How could you even dare to claim such a thing when you know very well that the Karaites did not even exist in the time of Moses! Why, everyone knows that the Karaite sect began with Anan only 1,000 years ago!”
As the “mouth of the wicked tripped them up”, Rabbi Meites broke out into a great smile of relief, realizing that he had, with Hashem’s help, succeeded in winning the debate before it even began. The king, as well, could not contain his smile. And the Karaite scholars, suddenly realizing their faux pas, wallowed in their deep shame.
In all likelihood, both those Karaite scholars as well as the would-be North Carolina kidnapper blamed their downfall on those that apparently thwarted their plans. Being able to look at it objectively, though, we know that such thoughts are nothing but foolishness and utter folly.
They have only themselves to blame.
Of course, none of us are kidnappers or heretics bent on destroying the Jewish People, but we still may have what to learn from them. Inevitably in life, we come up against situations – whether it be in the personal, financial, or social realm – where we may feel thwarted and tripped up. Sometimes we are not to blame.
But sometimes we are.
And it never hurts, when things seem to be backfiring badly, to take a step back and ask ourselves: are we the ones tripping ourselves up? Might we benefit from a change in course? After all, when we one day read the story of our lives, we don’t want to find ourselves laughing in bitter irony, do we?