Shabbos was truly a day of rest, and a welcome one at that. There were some thirty men at davenning. There was some debate concerning the prayer for the state – some suggested that we pray for the welfare of Moi, president of Kenya!
At lunch there was a lot of singing; not only zemiros , but also Mashiach, Mashiach, Mashiach, and other such songs. During the meal I delivered the following lecture (in Ivrit):
“Shalom to everyone, my name is Natan Slifkin and during my vacation I am a maggid shiur at a most unusual yeshivah: Yeshivat Gan HaChayot HaTenachi . Actually, it’s the department of Biblical education at the zoo. We try to educate the public about Torah perspectives on animals. This topic would also seem to be relevant to us – after all, we came to Africa mainly in order to see the wildlife. So I think that it would be pertinent to examine some Torah views on animals.
“In parashas Bereishis , Hashem says, ‘Let us make man in our image.’ As the commentators note, this is an extremely difficult passage to understand. Let us make man? Hashem is One – who is He working with?
“Why did Hashem create animals? What role do they play in the world? Each animal is the physical manifestation of a spiritual quality. When the Mishnah in Pirkei Avot tells us to be as mighty as the lion, it does not mean that the lion is a parable for might. It means that the lion is might incarnate . The various spiritual qualities, middot , all have their physical incarnation in terms of different animals.
“So when Hashem said, ‘Let us make man,’ He was referring to all of the animals. He took the spiritual dimensions of each animal and combined them to create man. He took the might of the lion, the brazenness of the leopard, and the alacrity of the gazelle. Let us make man – you will provide all of the different qualities and I will form them into a human being.
“This concept helps us understand many difficult sections of the Torah. For example, we are told that in the generation of Noach, the animals had corrupted their ways and were sentenced to destruction in the flood. Initially, this is very difficult to understand. Animals don’t possess free will – they have no good and evil inclination to choose between. How can they sin?
“But now we can understand it. It was the people who had sinned. And since man is linked to the animals from which he was created, then if he misuses his spiritual qualities, the animals that are the physical manifestations of those qualities also corrupt their ways.
“Some of the animals, however, were spared from the flood. Rav Gedaliyah Schorr explains that these were the animals that were linked to Noach’s spiritual qualities. Since he had not sinned, they had not corrupted their ways, either. It was these animals, Noach’s animals, which were saved in Noach’s ark.
“The Midrash tells us that one day Noach was late in bringing the lion its food and it mauled him. Perhaps we can now understand this episode a little more clearly. Noach, in being late, was lacking in the quality of gevurah , might. It is might that is required to overcome the inertia of laziness. The Shulchan Aruch tells us that a man should ‘Be as mighty as the lion to rise in the morning to serve his Creator.’ The lion is the physical incarnation of this might that is used in prompt action. Since Noach malfunctioned in this quality, its physical incarnation of the lion also malfunctioned and attacked him.
“Tomorrow we are heading out on safari to Tsavo West. When we see the animals, we should try and learn what we can from them. Thank you, and Shabbat Shalom.”
The drashah went down very well. People began to sing Shir HaMaalos to the tune of Jambo Jambo .
After lunch I took a walk along the beach together with Manny Samuels from Pisgat Ze’ev. “Are you doing much shopping here?” he asked me.
“I should do,” I replied. “My Rosh Yeshivah gave me some money to buy souvenirs for him. But I can’t think of anything that would be small enough to fit in my luggage.”
Just at that moment a creepy-looking African approached me.
“ Jambo ,” he muttered. “Do you want some marijuana?”
“That would be small enough to fit in your luggage,” Manny pointed out. Nevertheless, I decided against buying it. Anyway, it was Shabbos.
Shabbos afternoon was pleasantly relaxing. The monkeys returned to the hotel and scampered around the patio, in the trees, and on the roof of the hotel. As the sun set, I could just make out the outline of a monkey on the roof, silhouetted against the dark blue sky.
The attraction on Motzai Shabbos was a reptile show at the hotel. This was no display of cages, but a hands-on demonstration. The Africans handed out green bush snakes, house snakes, and an African Rock Python. Needless to say, I was the first to take each of them, although I did not dangle them from my mouth as did the Africans. Meanwhile, one of the Africans was opening a large sack. He spilled out its contents on the floor: a four-foot monitor lizard, the stuff that dreams are made of (or at least my dreams). I strutted around with the lizard clinging onto my head and its tail hanging down my back. “What, is he crazy?” someone gasped. “No, he works for the zoo,” explained someone else. I was proud of my status: The Lizard King.
Pride cometh before a fall. Holding the lizard in front of my face, I asked my father to photograph me. While I was speaking, the lizard flicked out its long forked tongue and licked my own tongue. The taste of the tongue of a lizard that lives off carrion has to be experienced in order to be fully appreciated. Gagging and spluttering, I went off to retch into the bushes.
For the grand finale of the show, one of the men placed a large box on the floor. Using a long metal pole with a hook on the end, he opened the lid and pulled out its contents: a large gaboon viper. He placed the deadly snake on the floor in front of us. It wriggled straight towards a group of people, who screamed and backed off. The African pulled it back towards him with the hook, and then kicked at it. The viper responded by lashing out at his boot, to the collective gasp of the one hundred or so spectators. It probably wasn’t as dangerous as it looked, but they’d never allow it in England. After sparring with the viper for a few more minutes, it was replaced in its box, and with that, the show was over. We returned to our room.
My father found that one of his shirts was ripped, so he threw it in the garbage. The significance of this was not apparent to us until some days later.
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