{"id":81182,"date":"2020-10-08T14:32:37","date_gmt":"2020-10-08T11:32:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=81182"},"modified":"2020-10-08T14:32:37","modified_gmt":"2020-10-08T11:32:37","slug":"what-my-high-school-math-teacher-forgot-to-tell-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/what-my-high-school-math-teacher-forgot-to-tell-me\/","title":{"rendered":"What My High-School Math Teacher Forgot To Tell Me"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[],"acf":{"old_id":"81182","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":46656,"related_cahpter":"586","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"Parallel lines can create a synergy that really do meet at a common purpose\r\n\r\n","content":"

As I read this chapter of Psalms, I remembered the difficulty I had as a high-school student, wrapping my head around the idea of parallel lines meeting at infinity. No matter how hard my math teacher tried to explain elliptic geometry, it was incongruous to my teenage brain that I could ever, even hypothetically, follow two parallel lines and come to the same endpoint.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

David is promoting two parallel but intersecting paths to God in these verses. One is the appreciation of nature and the other is the study of Torah. To walk down one path, viewing the vastness of the heavens and the reliability of the cycles of day and night, brings us to a recognition of the awesomeness of God. The other path, the study of Torah and the laws within it, develops our relationship with God. As the sun brings light into our world, the Torah \u201cmakes our eyes light up (19:9).\u201d The two paths should both be traveled.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch comments on this chapter that there is a fundamental difference between humans and the rest of nature, and that is free will. While the movement of the sun and the passage of day and night continues in the pattern in which it was created, we can choose to rise in the morning or not, to shine our light on the world or not. In a sense God took a step back when He gave us free will and filled that gap with Torah.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What is remarkable, is that God gave us the gift of being able to choose to walk either or both of these pathways. At some moments in our lives, those moments perhaps when we\u2019re witnessing a beautiful sunrise or gazing at a vista of mountains or ocean, we reflexively, even if unconsciously, internalize the knowledge of the greatness of God. Though it is our duty to pay attention to and appreciate God\u2019s creation, it behooves us to know how to translate that into the greatness of humanity. For that, we have the Torah to teach us how to use our free will to elevate our relationship with the physical world, each other and God.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, it turns out that parallel lines that create a synergy really do meet at a common purpose. It\u2019s not mathematical, but spiritually it\u2019s pretty neat.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

image: Unfulfilled Meeting,<\/em> by Erik Pevernagie, (80 x100 cm), oil on canvas \/ wikipedia<\/span><\/p>\n","image":false,"embedded_video":"","video_duration":"","show_fb_comments":true,"credit_media":""},"tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"What My High-School Math Teacher Forgot To Tell Me","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"Parallel lines can create a synergy that really do meet at a common purpose","preview_embedded":"","preview_image":false,"preview_video":"","external_link":"","link_for_pay":false,"tile_gallery_items":false,"credits":""},"alternate_tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"","hide_media":false},"tile_group":{"preview_image_url":false,"main_caption":"","sub_caption":"","":null,"popup_package_extra_content":"","read_time":""},"home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo":{"seo_title":"","seo_description":"","seo_default_title":"","seo_default_description":""},"links":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81182"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=81182"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81182\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":81183,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81182\/revisions\/81183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=81182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=81182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}