Dress for Success, & Don’t Forget to Shine Those Shoes
Jul 25th, 2010 | By admin | Category: 2007-8, Archivesby Rabbi Yisrael Rutman
You may think that getting an MBA is all about learning how to negotiate a generous compensation package for yourself, so that when your company’s gone down the tubes along with the stockholders’ life savings, you can retire in serenity to your Malibu domain. Actually, there’s much more to it than that. Before your name is tacked up on the door of the CEO’s suite, you’ve got to run some hurdles, and they’re not easy. The aspiring multi-billionaire has to face job interviews, like any ordinary plebian. There are certain things he must know, and thanks to a recent article in The Wall Street Journal, now the rest of us are in on it too.
WSJ reports that in this era of designer sports shoes, business schools train their graduates to shine their shoes before an interview (unless, that is, the corporate culture you’re applying for is sneaker friendly). They warn against “untucked or wrinkled shirts or wearing beeping sports watches to staid business events. Sagging socks, dangling earrings and obvious designer logos all send messages that register with the people on the other side of the table…Men should wear no more than three accessories (e.g., belt, wedding band, watch). The higher a woman climbs on the social ladder, the more light-colored suits she should wear (to look less intimidating).”
Not that a snappy outfit is all that counts, of course. Incompetence will soon be found out, no matter how expert the crease in your pants. But the absent-minded professor in sneakers routine will only wash if you’re an Einstein, or at least a Bill Gates.
In Judaism, clothing also counts. It comes as a surprise to many people. They think that a truly religious person should be concerned strictly with matters of God-awareness and moral conscience. Clashing stripes and checks may crash your chances for a good job, but what’s it got to do with serving God? Doesn’t He see past all that?
True, He “knows the heart,” as the Torah says; but that doesn’t mean He overlooks the externals. For example, the Torah requires that we (both men and women) dress modestly. Not that God would be embarrassed. But that we should reveal and focus on the parts of our bodies—the head, face and hands—which represent our humanity, rather than the limbs we have in common with animals. (Yes, they also have heads, faces and, well, paws, but not the mind or ability to express emotion of a person.)
The Shulchan Aruch rules that a Jew should not imitate the fashions of the gentile society. Whether those fashions are associated with idolatry, promiscuity, or other obnoxious ideas, they are proscribed. Color is a part of the scheme too. Red, which is traditionally evocative of violence (think of the flag of communist Russia, red with the blood of the proletariat), is a color to be shunned.
The Rambam states that we should dress in a dignified way; neither lavishly nor slovenly. Ostentatious attire arouses jealousy. Going about in torn or dirty togs is not befitting a member of the Jewish people.
Shined shoes would seem to fit the picture, as well. But, as in corporate America, much depends on the job description and the corporate culture. In the ancient Temple, the kohanim (the priests), went about barefoot. The Torah does not say why, but we can speculate. Since in Judaism the shoe symbolizes one’s connection to the earth and the physical environment generally, and the Temple was the place where spirituality reigned, the kohamim removed their shoes as a sign of their divorcement from the mundane.
The kohanim wore four garments: a robe, pants, hat and belt. But again, it depended on the assignment. Temple maintenance required that the ashes on the altar be removed every day (trumas hadeshen). This was a commandment like any other in the Torah, and the kohanim drew lots for the job. As prestigious as it was, it was a sooty business, and the kohen chosen had to change his garments before performing the task. For, as Rashi explains, one should not wear the same thing to cook the king’s food as to serve it.
The laws of the Temple are remote from our experience, but the Sages learn many things from them. From the story of trumas hadeshen the Talmud in tractate Shabbos derives the principle that one should not dress the same way on Shabbos as one dresses the rest of the week. The seventh day is special, a day in which we bear witness that God created the world in seven days, and it calls for someting better than one’s everyday clothing.
And don’t forget to shine your shoes.
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