Thought for the Day: A Haircut Is a Commitment and the Torah Cares How You Look

Before you start to wonder if I was abducted by aliens... No, I am still the guy who gets a haircut when his wife lets him know that he is not welcome in the house until he gets his haircut. It turns out, though, that committing to getting a haircut has serious halachic ramifications.

The mishna (Shabbos 9b) starts with: A person may not sit down in front of the barber close to mincha until he davens. Rashi explains that "sit down in front of the barber" means "to get a haircut." 

Let's think about that. Rashi did not get paid by the word. Rashi is everyone's rebbi in how to most succinctly explain a topic. We all marvel at how Rashi is able to open up and explain a topic with so few words. Rashi always is either pointing out an essential feature you may have missed or stopping you from heading down the wrong path. I racked my brain trying to figure out what else I could have thought the mishna meant by "sitting down in front of the barber" other than "to get a haircut".

I went searching. Chazal tell us that if you search sincerely, you will find. (I need to find that Chazal again sometime....) I found such a cool comment in a sefer called שבת של מי (it was in a collection; I have no idea who it is). He says:

I have not found in any of the commentaries on the mishna an explanation to a question wehad in his beis medrash: Why does the mishna say, " A person may not sit down in front of the barber close to mincha until he davens", instead of the more succinct and to the point: One is not allowed to get a haircut until he davens mincha. I am unwilling to just write down something just to write down something; I'll just be satisfied with noting this irregularity.

That is so cool. And it also encouraged me to look further. I found a R' Akiva Eiger who addressed a point I really had missed. The mishna continues and says, "you may not enter a bathhouse, tannery, nor eat a meal, nor sit in judgement <on a beis din>. If he started, he need not stop <to daven>". R' Akiva Eiger wonders why getting a haircut was written completely separately from the other activities in the mishna. Of course he also answers: Because all those other activities can be interrupted in the middle if you see it is getting late and you need to daven. But you can't stop a haircut in the middle because of כבוד הבריות/human dignity.

First, I think it is beautiful that the Torah takes כבוד הבריות/human dignity so seriously. We sometimes are expected to give our lives for the Torah. But the Torah itself doesn't want you to feel embarrassed by walking into davening before your hair looks nice.

I think that is what Rashi wants to tell us. You are not just "sitting in front of a barber", you are making a serious commitment of time that must be dedicated to this activity. Think about that and plan accordingly.