The Lazy Entomologist
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The Lazy Entomologist*
By Rabbi Elchanan Schulgasser
Mishlei Chapter 6, Verse 6
לֵךְ-אֶל-נְמָלָה עָצֵל; רְאֵה דְרָכֶיהָ וַחֲכָם.
Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise.
This particular verse has been bugging me. King Solomon’s advice is presumably intended to make the lazy person more industrious. Somehow, watching ants walk around, collect food, and do all manners of ant- activities will have an energizing effect on the lethargic individual.
My difficulty with this prescription is that it seems ineffective. Most of us have at some point stopped to watch a busy ant hill. Yet many of us are still lazy. I have even swept my shoe over the top of an anthill and stared mesmerized at the resulting bustle of activity, as the ants frantically seek deeper cover for themselves and their food. In fact, I admit that I have done this more than once. Despite this, I cannot say I have conquered laziness. Worse, I am not aware of any increased energy that this has brought me. It would seem that the medicine was a dud.
Now, it could be that I didn’t watch the ants long enough, or perhaps not as regularly as required to combat laziness. Maybe I haven’t studied them in enough detail—there’s lots left for me to learn about their habits, their feeding schedules, and their behavior in different seasons and climates. But am I to believe that, if I study them more avidly I will eventually overcome laziness? Are there no lazy entomologists?
Maybe I’m a fluke, though, and most people might indeed respond to “ant-therapy”. Perhaps corporate managers should be advised to put ant-hills on their workers’ desks, or to do away with the weekly pep talk in favor of a large ant-colony prominently displayed in the front lobby. But even if these far-fetched proposals were true, a more fundamental question would be: How are we to understand why the observation of ants leads to reduced laziness? What is the mechanism?
A friend proposed that watching ants might have a subconscious effect on the observer. For example, seeing industrious ants could make one feel guilty. After all, if the ants are working so hard and humbly, shouldn’t we be working hard too? Perhaps King Solomon is suggesting the lazy man spend time gazing at industrious productivity, which will cause the looker to adapt this trait himself.
I had a hard time with this explanation. After all, ants don’t choose to bustle. They are programmed that way. They have no choice. Why would the behavior of an ant—which lacks free choice—affect my behavior? Why should watching them make me, a creature possessed of choice and tempted by laziness, feel more animated? Indeed, I am quite confident I could enjoy a nap in a room lined floor-to-ceiling with ant farms (properly sealed, of course).
I believe King Solomon is telling us something else. Maybe there is nothing magical about watching ants after all. Staring at them won’t make you less lazy. You can study ants your whole life and still be lazy.
Rather than providing a talisman or a potion, Solomon is providing a path. He speaks to the lazy person who wants to become wise and is willing to do something about it. The only way to get wise, says Solomon, is to get busy. Lazy person, do you wish to be wise? This—ant-like industry—is what it will take. Go to the ant, says Solomon. Not because watching it will do anything for you at all. “See its ways” means more than gazing passively. In order to become wise, one mustadapt its ways.
To gaining wisdom, says the wisest of all men, there are no shortcuts. Therefore, to overcoming laziness, the solution is not to see the ant. It is to become the ant.
A Midrash (Vayikra Rabbah 19:4) tells of a foolish, unlearned person who gaped disbelievingly at the vastness of the Torah. Who can possibly study all this? he asked. Surely its mastery is beyond human achievement. The wise man viewed the Torah differently. If I study two verses today and two more tomorrow…in time I will know the Torah in its entirety.
*Technically, an entomologist studies insects, while a “myrmecologist” studies ants
