This blessing begins in a most interesting fashion: “Let Your tender mercies be stirred for the righteous, the pious, for the leaders of the House of Israel, for devoted teachers and faithful converts, and for us.”
These beneficiaries of G-d are hoped for “tender mercies” are obviously categorized. But what do these categories actually mean? What’s the difference between righteous and pious? Between leaders and teachers? Between “converts” and “us?”
Abudarham, writing in Spain in the 1300’s, suggests that the first category, the righteous, is in reality a “null set”—that is, a group that theoretically could exist but doesn’t actually have any members. After all, no one is completely righteous. As human beings, sin is unavoidable. The best we could hope to be in practical terms is “pious”—people who sin but sincerely repent. Under optimal circumstances, those who have achieved piety will, at the very least though their example, come to serve the community of Israel as leaders or as teachers of Torah. And the members of the community from two sources—those who convert and those who are homegrown. Concerning those that convert, what we hope for more than anything else is that they will be “righteous” converts, sincere converts.
And then, there’s “us.” By adding “us” the text implies that we don’t really fit any of the above mentioned categories. And this teaches us two very important things.
First, we’re all just schleppers. All egotistical illusions aside, we aren’t perfectly righteous, or perfectly pious, or truly learned, or even on the spiritual level of someone who converted to Judaism out of conviction, rather than simply being born into it and taking it for granted. And it’s good to know exactly where we stand.
There is an hysterically funny video clip of a long line at an airport, where a flight had been cancelled and everyone had to rebook. One arrogant man pushes his way to the front of the line and declares that they have to get him on the next flight, and first class only. The person at the counter politely explains that she’ll do the best she can, but he’ll have to wait because there are many people in the line ahead of him. At that point he angrily declares, “Do you have any idea who I am?” At which point the woman at the counter picks up the microphone and announces to the airport, “There’s a man at counter 14 who has no idea who he is. If anyone can help, please come to counter 14.” At which point the crowd erupts in laughter. The rest of the clip is too obscene to mention, but the point is that this guy did not know that he was simply one of “us,” like virtually everyone else.
Second, and crucially, even if we are merely “us,” we nevertheless hope to also be recipients of G-d’s “tender mercies.” We don’t have to win Nobel Prizes in morality or theology to be beloved by G-d. We just need to be human.