Age of understanding

RABBI ILAN ACOCA

In my youth, I remember people talking about turning 40. Many said it was the time when all our aches and pains begin to appear, a time of mid-life crises, the age when we begin to realize that we are getting old. Consequently, it always seemed to me an age that I should approach with trepidation. However, turning 40 recently, I started to think about the significance of this number – and my feelings about turning 40 began to change.

Columbia University professor Dr. Walter Plitkin, considering the age-old question of whether or not life really does begin at 40, emphatically says “yes” in his famous and oft-quoted 1932 bestseller Life Begins at 40. Interestingly, the Torah agrees that life does begin at 40, though not in the same way that Plitkin maintains it does. It turns out, 40 is a richly symbolic number in the Torah, as we shall see.

The number 40 is ubiquitous in the Torah, where it consistently underscores themes of transformation and renewal. Yom Kippur, for instance, is the 40th day of the repentance period. The Torah tells us that Moses ascends Mount Sinai to commune with G-d for 40 days and to receive the life- and world-transforming Torah. Moses, having returned to a people worshipping a golden calf, smashes the tablets and returns on Rosh Chodesh Elul to climb the mountain again to convene with G-d for yet another 40 days. We observe the day of Moses’ second descent as Yom Kippur, the 10th day of Tishrei. He returns this day with a second set of tablets, signifying G-d’s forgiveness of His people, His acceptance of their repentance and His people’s new lease on life.

In Deuteronomy (29:3-4), Moses, after leading the Jewish people for 40 years in the wilderness, tells them, “G-d has not given you a heart to know, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, until this day.” Here we see that it took the Jewish people 40 years in the desert before they could internalize, mentally and spiritually, the events that took place.

Furthermore, the mishnah, in Ethics of Our Fathers (5:24), tells us, “A person of 40 attains understanding.” Rashi’s comment on this mishnah is that a person who turns 40 has the maturity to understand the essence of the issues and challenges confronting him throughout his life.

Elsewhere, the Torah states that, when a person becomes ritually impure, he must immerse himself completely in a mikvah, a ritual bath, which the Talmud (Yoma 4b) tells us must be filled with 40 measures of water. After this immersion, he leaves the mikvah ritually pure, just as the world emerged pure after it rained for 40 days and 40 nights, as we learn in the story of Noah.

When I ponder these ideas at some length, I feel reassured that 40 is indeed a positive, even hopeful, number. We see that 40 is truly a recurring and powerful symbol of birth, rebirth and change. Just as Rabbi Akiva started his Torah life at the age of 40, I suspect that all of us, upon review and inspection, may well find that the number 40 features significantly in each of our lives.

I understand now that, in many ways, life really does begin at 40!

Rabbi Ilan Acoca is spiritual leader of Congregation Beth Hamidrash. A version of this article appeared in the Canadian Jewish News.

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