Every day the world seems more mixed-up, rudderless, disordered.
If only it could be restored to order as readily as… a speedcube. If only our problems could be solved as swiftly as avid cubers shift discordant squares into place, revealing solid sides of color and, in mere seconds, a geometric thing of beauty.
A strange analogy, perhaps – but one of the thoughts that went through my mind as I spent a full day sitting in a sports arena in Rechovot hosting the 2024 Israel Speedcubing Championship, in which my son was participating for the first time last week.
He’s 17 and has been a cubing enthusiast for years now, a pursuit perfectly suited to his mathematical brain and dexterous, constantly moving fingers. The overwhelming majority of the 308 participants in this competition were young and male. Like the multifarious cubes they were solving – more on that in a moment – they (and their parents) represented a cross-section of Israeli society: dati leumi, secular, even a few charedim. There were quite a few boys with long hair, some of those sporting a kippah too.
If your knowledge of cubing begins and ends with the classic 3-square x 3-square Rubik’s cube, you’d be amazed to discover the array of cube types on the market: versions of varying dimensions, from 2×2 through 7×7 (as well as even larger ones not used in competition), plus a plethora of other shapes and designs – from pyramids, known as Pyraminx, to the 12-pentagon-sided Megaminx to the curiously named Sqewb, which resembles a diamond within a square, and more. There are also myriad manufacturers; among serious competitors, Rubik’s is actually not the most favored.
It was a Hungarian professor of architecture, Erno Rubik, who invented the Rubik’s cube back in 1974, which is why speedcubes are known in Hebrew as kubiot Hungariot (Hungarian cubes). Wildly popular when I was a kid, the cube faded into near oblivion for a couple of decades until the advent of the Internet spurred the proliferation of websites devoted to cubing – including fresh iterations of the original – and the craze exploded anew.
The championship we attended included 16 events (including, for super-maestros, blindfolded and one-handed solving). My son performed respectably, advancing in three of his four events, and did his part serving as a “judge” – the person at each table supervising the timed rounds. Speedcubing is a fine-toothed sport, no less intense than a track sprint: Winning comes down to the hundredth or even thousandth of a second. Competitors take a moment to examine the scrambled cubes – uncovered just a moment beforehand – and then the timer starts and their instincts take over. As insensibly as breathing, their mindful fingers as graceful as musicians’, they restore polychrome harmony – and hit the clock.
A cheer broke out in the arena when Ben Baron, a top Israeli cuber, set a new national record – an average time of 5.88 seconds in the 3×3 event. (The world record stands at 4.86 seconds, and 3.13 for a single solve, both held by American Max Park.) Baron is one of the team behind Speedcubing Israel, the Jewish State’s chapter of the World Cubing Association (WCA). Founded in 2010, Speedcubing Israel has since held 50 competitions around the country. In addition to the annual championship – which we first learned about through a newspaper write-up last summer (unfortunately, it was too late to register for that one) – the group holds several different competitions in Israel throughout the year. Its organizers, including Baron, regularly compete around the globe.
Last week’s championship was dedicated to one of the Israeli hostages being held in Gaza – hometown son of Rechovot Nimrod Cohen, a 19-year-old soldier who was kidnapped by Hamas on October 7. His mother addressed the room, and in between events, some of the young cubers created a mosaic made from tiny cubes depicting Nimrod’s face with a prayer for his return.
In typical Israeli form, the vibe in the arena was relaxed, which is to say things moved along less swiftly and smoothly than they could have. But the organizers used tech very well – results and rankings were being posted online as fast as they could input them, and the competition was being Livestreamed for, I suppose, the sabas and savtas sitting at home fiddling with their computers.
I learned some new things about speedcubing – for example, that participants’ ranking in most events is based on their average time from a set number of rounds (usually five), which is considered a better reflection of their true abilities than one raw score. Their best and worst times are discarded but can still establish a personal record.
More meaningful than mastering the fine points, however, was watching my son interact with new people over a shared discipline. He’s not into athletics, but speedcubing bills itself as a sport – and that’s fine by me. Any parent whose kids tend to “do their own thing” knows how gratifying it is to see them in their element, opening up, relating. It’s truly not about winning but about the experience of taking part.
In a broader vein, during the hours spent watching and waiting in the bleachers, I reflected, as I inevitably do these days, on the enveloping comfort of living in our own Jewish microcosm. While violent antisemitic mobs were unleashing their bile on the streets of Chicago, and Jews across the world are considering their futures, my family and I attended a public event – a competitive one, no less – that anywhere else would have filled us with trepidation. No trying to hide or blend in here, no swapping out head-coverings or tucking in tzitzit. No delicate dance between holding court and holding back. Just being our Jewish selves, and feeling exceedingly blessed despite Israel’s unceasing mortal challenges.
Our world is infinitely more complex than any speedcube – and while there’s no quick solve at our fingertips, there is a master design and the pieces are shifting into place. When G-d finally stops the clock, we can all rejoice.
