Welcome to Emotional Wellness Daily, a project of SIMHA, the Sephardic Initiative for Mental Health Awareness. Yesterday, Dr. Katzenstein introduced the concept of pleasure versus happiness. Pleasure was depicted as physical, whereas he said that happiness is something more internal. Pleasure is fleeting, for the moment, while happiness is something that's more long lasting and eternal. I would like to comment on that, through a Torah lens. And while I’m not disagreeing with what he's saying in a psychological sense, we'll see soon where differences come up.
There are two words that we're going to be discussing today. One is Hana’ah, which means pleasure, and the other is Simcha, which means happiness. In the secular world or the psychological world, when we use the word pleasure, it usually connotes something physical. In our religion, the Gemara in Berachot 17A says thatOlam Haba is all about Sadikim sitting and enjoying the shine of God's presence. Rav Yehezchiel Levenstein, in his sefer Or Yehezkiel on Emuna, where he talks about reward and punishment, says that the true pleasure or pain is when it comes to spiritual pleasure or plain, and that's what Olam Haba is all about. He says that Mesiilat Yesharim (chapter one) says the true delicacy (pleasure or delight) is Deveykut in/cleaving to Hashem Yitbarach.
So while Dr Katzenstein talked about pleasure versus happiness, I would like to tweak that a bit. With the Torah lens, it’s physical pleasures and happiness versus spiritual pleasures and happiness. Physical pleasures and happiness are short-lived. You can have a happiness about something physical, but it's short-lived. You're happy about your new car, you're happy about your new marriage, you're happy about a lot of things, but they don't necessarily last. Spiritual happiness is forever, because it's real.
And while we can talk about spiritual happiness or spiritual pleasure, it’s really something that's removed from most of us, to truly perceive what that means. The Hovot Halevavot (Shaar Bitachon, Chapter 5) discusses at length why it is that the Torah doesn't talk about Olam Haba. He explains that since we're physical beings, it's not something that we can fully appreciate orunderstand. So we talk about worldly pleasures versus spiritual pleasures, but the real pleasure and the real pain is spiritual. The Rambam, in his Perush Mishnayot, at the beginning of perek Helek in Sanhedrin, proves this, with the following: He says, there’s nothing more pleasurable than honor. People spend a lot of money to put their names on a building. They'll spend a lot of money to be the guest of honor. People pay for honor. That means honor is worth more than something physical.
Honor is something spiritual.
Similarly, there's nothing that hurts more than jealousy, and there's nothing that's sweeter than revenge. These are all emotional or spiritual pains and pleasures, so we simple people don't fully understand them.
Rav Chatzkel says that there was a certain Gadol that said that the greatest pleasure for him was being able to sit at night with the Gemara, and have enough light from the candle to be able to enjoy that.
So therefore, going back to Dr. Katzenstein’s point, I would like to tweak it a little bit with a Torah lens and say, our focus in life has to really be on spiritual pleasures, spiritual joy, and spiritual accomplishments. And we do that. When a person goes to sleep at night, does he look back at his day, and think, “How much did I eat? How much did I drink? How much did I party?” Or does he say, “How many good deeds did I do? How much kindness did I do? How much character perfection did I do? How much introspection did I do?” These are the accomplishments that bring a person true pleasure and joy, because you know it's real. You know it's lasting. You can feel it. Yom Kippur is a spiritual event. Shabbat is a spiritual event. In order for us to really have happiness, we have to work on developing an appreciation for spiritual accomplishments.
Have a wonderful day.