Parshat Vayeira: The Ugly Duckling - Rabbi Yaakov Asher Sinclair

about 20 years ago a little lonely character sat on my keyboard nobody took much notice a bit it wasn't very useful wasn't the spacebar it wasn't even caps it wasn't even caps lock almost the only people who ever pressed this little key for store keepers and ledger writers who needed a mathematical abbreviation to turn two letters into one its name the ad size it was the loneliest character on my keyboard typographies ugly duckling who would have thought that a few short years later the @ sign would be a megastar of worldwide proportions now it's on everyone's lips countless millions of email addresses span the world and everyone has to use that little ugly duckling the outside and all because of Ray Tomlinson in 1972 Ray Tomlinson sent the first email using the @ symbol to indicate the location of the email recipient now Tomlinson using a model 33 teletype device understood that he needed to use a symbol that would not appear in anyone's name so there'd be no confusion the logical choice the @ sign both because it was unlikely to appear in anyone's name and also because it represented the word artists in a particular person sitting at a particular computer the ugly duckling of the world of typography had become a swan Abraham Rama V nu is called ha every now incidentally every is the root of the word meaning Hebrew Hebrew every high every means the one who crossed over Abraham crossed over from his world and his background he rejected idolatry and proclaimed the unity of God at a time when idolatry and polytheism were as self-evident to his world as the laws of physics are two hours Abraham stepped outside conventional wisdom to the extent that he became a social pariah derided as a mule espousing aberrant philosophy that would had no where to the minds of his generation monotheism would die along with Abraham they couldn't have been more wrong despite being alone in his beliefs Abraham's gift to the world monotheism became the world's most widespread belief the Mishnah in a vote says do not despise any man and consider nothing impossible because there is no man that does not have his hour and nothing that does not have its place even the humble outside [Music] you [Applause]