Parashat Metzorah

Plaut p. 752

Source Sheet by Yair Robinson

April 17, 2026

There’s a Hasidic story that once Rabbi Elimelekh, “the Tzadik” had his friend Rabbi Mendel as a guest for dinner. As it happened, that night, Rabbi Elimelekh’s servant forgot to set out a spoon at Rabbi Mendel’s place. Everyone was eating except Rabbi Mendel, who sat looking at his soup. The Tzaddik observed this and asked: Why aren’t you eating? Well, said Rabbi Mendel, I don’t have a spoon. Look, said Rabbi Elimelekh, one must know enough to ask for a spoon, and a plate too, if need be!

Now, we could be critical of R’ Elimelekh, and that he could have been a more gracious host. What kind of Tzadik doesn’t put out a spoon? Quite rude and unwelcoming. But there is another way of looking at this story, which is that Rabbi Elimelekh has a point.  Rabbi Mendel should have asked for help. Not wait for someone to notice, not sit there passively, or worse, passive aggressively. If we’re in distress, we have to ask for help, we have to point out the problem.

And here’s the thing; we aren’t any good at asking for help. We’re great at offering help to others, to be sure. We’re happy to be the one who supports; we’re less thrilled to be on the receiving end. And sometimes, it’s like we’re paralyzed, trapped in our own version of “Waiting for Godot”, hoping that someone will do something, but never actually voicing our own needs.

Our tradition teaches us that, to be sure, we need to be prepared to offer help and support, but we also need to be prepared to ask for it, and that no one is keeping score. We see that in our Torah portion, which talks about a person with Tzaraat; sometimes called leprosy but really some kind of spiritual skin disease. We are told right at the beginning that as soon as a priest hears about the person suffering from tzaraat, he must go to that person outside the camp to address his needs. This means that someone had to tell the priest, and that the priest must go to that person as soon as he hears of their suffering. I know that sounds self-evident, but too often I find that we’d rather suffer in silence or hope someone notices that we don’t have the proverbial spoon than admit our own frailty or advocate for our needs. And when we close ourselves off like that, in a way, we push our friends away, we tell them that we don’t trust them to be there for us. And we tell ourselves that we aren’t worthy of love and support.

Rabbi Mendel deserves a spoon. The metzorah—the person with tzaraat—deserves to be seen by the priest, to have his illness attended to so he can reenter the camp. And we deserve love and support. But sometimes, folks, it’s our job to ask. Let’s be brave enough, trusting enough, to do so. Amen.