Archive for the ‘00. Yom Kippur’ Category

Aramaic with a Kittel

We begin the story telling aspect of the Seder, Magid, with a short prayer, הא לחמא עניא – This is poor man’s bread… But next year, may we have liberty in Jerusalem.

The prayer is not in the usual Hebrew, but in Aramaic, and this presents a thorny issue. Prayers are usually carried to heaven by angels, but angels do not understand Aramaic, and so cannot present prayers in Aramaic; as such, prayers are not meant to be said in Aramaic. Why then, is this portion in Aramaic?

Perhaps there is a way around this issue. There are times when an emissary is not required. There is a Gemara that teaches that Hashem’s presence is manifest in the room of an ill person. Prayers are more effective – there are no angels required; Hashem is right there.

The Shaagas Aryeh points out how the same is true on Yom Kippur – the Kohel Gadol goes into the Kodesh HaKadashim, and utters a prayer in Aramaic. How is that the prayer can pray in Aramaic? It is because he is in the Kodesh HaKadashim, in front of the Ark, where Hashem is manifest. No angels necessary.

Most of the year round, we are under the influence of the Satan. But not all year – השטן has a value of 364, a year, less one day – that is one day per year that the Satan does not influence us – Seder night; it is a Leil Shimurim. When we are enjoined to keep Pesach, we are told that וְשָׁמַרְתָּ אֶת הַחֻקָּה הַזֹּאת לְמוֹעֲדָהּ מִיָּמִים יָמִימָה – the word ימימה is very odd; this is it’s only appearance in the Torah. It has the same initial letters as the second part of Tehillim 93:3 – כִּי הוּא יַצִּילְךָ מִפַּח יָקוּשׁ מִדֶּבֶר הַוּוֹת – Hashem Himself will save us, ימימה. This is why there is no Satan on Seder night. Hashem is there.

Just like on Yom Kippur. Which is one reason for a kittel. But it goes deeper – the animal used for the korban Pesach is set aside on the tenth of the month, the tenth of the month that Yom Kippur is. ימימה is a 24 hour day, but it is not the same day.

It is Leil HaSeder and Yom Kippur that Hashem is in front of us, and therefore we wear a kittel and pray in Aramaic.

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Lord–I need a miracle!

אֵשׁ תָּמִיד תּוּקַד עַל הַמִּזְבֵּחַ לֹא תִכְבֶּה – A continuous fire shall burn upon the altar; it shall not go out. (Vayikra 6:6)

עשרה ניסים נעשו בבית המקדש (…) ולא כבו הגשמים את עצי המערכה – Ten miracles occurred in the Temple: (…), and the rains did not extinguish the logs on the fire (of the Mizbeach). (Avos 5:5)

It seems odd that the miracle that occurs here is supernatural. Miracles are meant to seem as natural as possible, and it would have been simpler to manipulate nature, so that rain wouldn’t fall on the Mizbeach at all, rather than have rain fall on the fire but not extinguish it. What is the purpose of the miracle being deliberately more complicated than need be?

R’ Chaim Volozhin suggests that there is a very powerful message we can learn from this.

Sometimes we wish that the circumstances around us would just change, that our “rain” would just stop. But it is evident from the Mishna that the circumstances won’t just change to suit our individual needs; just as אֵשׁ תָּמִיד תּוּקַד עַל הַמִּזְבֵּחַ – the fire burnt on the Mizbeach cotinuously– even in the pouring rain, it would not go out.

We can have all the excuses in the world to stop and falter from what is required of us as Jews. But we have a clear role model in how to conduct ourselves in the Mizbeach. Instead of shying away from our responsibilities, we need to persevere. People pray for miracles, when they don’t see that they need to their hishtadlus – their part. This hishtadlus is the part we play in solving our problems, and thus our problem’s solution is in our own hands. If we keep at what we’re meant to, we will be our own miracles. Our miracles won’t come on their own.

The fire on the Mizbeach was not allowed to be in a state of not being lit – if this was done through a miracle, what is the need for an instruction to not extinguish it? Perhaps we can explain in a similar vein that the fire wasn’t “magic”. It didn’t burn on it’s own with nothing there. It required constant replacement of logs of wood, and over hundreds of years, did not go out.  The pasuk says as much: אֵשׁ תָּמִיד תּוּקַד – it never stopped. This is a further indication we need do our part to see G-d’s hand. It won’t play itself.

We can further say that the Kohen Gadol went into the Kodesh Kadashim once per year, on Yom Kippur. He performed the service, and said one prayer. The sole prayer that as ever said in the Kodesh Kadashim was this. The most holy prayer of the year was that Hashem should not listen to the travellers and tourists that it shouldn’t rain, and that it should rain as much as possible. Through rain we see the hand of G-d, and this further shows the importance of “letting it rain” and working around it, rather than having it not rain at all.

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Reverence and the Ten Martyrs

Every year, in the Yom Kippur Mussaf, we recall  the death of the Ten Martyrs in the prayer of  ”אלה אזכרה” – ‘These I shall recall’.

One of the reasons revealed to us about their death is expounded on by the prayer itself, quoting the Midrash, that the Ten Martyrs died as an atonement for what the brothers did to Yosef. It’s a beautiful prayeriyut, but the problem is that there were Ten Martyrs and only nine brothers around at the selling of Yosef. This was because Rueven left at that very moment to do T’shuva, Binyamin was a small child, and Yosef probably didn’t want to sell himself. So why do we focus so much on ten when in truth there should only have been nine deaths?
The Nizuztei Shimshon (see Forgiveness – Big Deal) in Parshas Baholoscha answers by saying that after the brothers sold Yosef they made a חירם (excommunication decree) to be applied on anyone who revealed the truth about what happened to their brother to Yaakov Avinu.

But, as mentioned above, there were only nine brothers present and for the חירם to come into effect there would need to be ten male Jews present – a מנין. Thus says the מדרש that Hakodesh Baruch Hu joined together with the nine brothers to be the tenth and to create the official חירם.
Nine Martyrs gave up their lives as a קבלה from the heavens to be an atonement for the nine brothers. One of the Martyrs gave up his life כנגד ה who joined the minyan to complete the חירם as mentioned above. The Nizutzei Shimshon tells us that R’ Akiva was merited to give up his life כנגד ה. Why Hashem joined with the brothers to sell Yosef is a story in its own, but why was R’ Akiva merited to be killed כנגד ה?
In גמרה Bava Kama 41b it discusses how there were two Tanaaim who expounded on all instances of the word ”את” appearing in the torah. “את”, according to these Tanaaim, was always including another rule that was very well hidden in the Torah. Everything was going well until these Tanaaim reached the pasuk of “את ה תראה”  – ‘Hashem your G-d you shall fear’. They couldn’t learn anything from this “את” because what could it be adding? What should man be fearing more than G-d himself? Therefore they were unable to complete  their entire ‘project’ from lack of being able to expound upon this one “את”.

Generations later Rabbi Akiva figured out that final explanation. He said the “את” was including Talmidei Chachamim, that one must fear the Talmidei Chachamim just as much as he fears G-d. Now we have a basic explanation for why Rabbi Akiva was chosen כנגד ה . Rabbi Akiva brought Hashem and the Talmidei Chachamim to the same level. Not חלילה that they have the same power, but to say that a Talmid Chacham must be revered just as we revere Hashem. With this power that Rabbi Akiva had, to bring the world to recognize the trepidation one must have for his Rav, he merited to be taken כנגד ה.

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Day vs Night

The pasuk says regarding Yom Kippur:
שַׁבַּת שַׁבָּתוֹן הוּא לָכֶם וְעִנִּיתֶם אֶת נַפְשֹׁתֵיכֶם בְּתִשְׁעָה לַחֹדֶשׁ בָּעֶרֶב מֵעֶרֶב עַד עֶרֶב תִּשְׁבְּתוּ שַׁבַּתְּכֶם -      It is a complete day of rest for you, and you shall afflict yourselves. On the ninth of the month in the evening, from evening to evening, you shall observe your rest day (23:32).
The Gemara in Pesachim 68b wonders since when do we fast on the 9th; we only fast on the 10th? The Gemara answers that it’s a mitzva to eat on the 9th. The Torah views someone who eats on the 9th as if he fasted on the ninth and the tenth.
There is a famous question asked by many: what is the Gemara’s diyuk (problem and solution)? We have this style of date in the Torah previously (i.e.בָּרִאשֹׁן בְּאַרְבָּעָה עָשָׂר יוֹם לַחֹדֶשׁ בָּעֶרֶב תֹּאכְלוּ מַצֹּת עַד יוֹם הָאֶחָד וְעֶשְׂרִים לַחֹדֶשׁ בָּעָרֶב – In the first [month], on the fourteenth day of the month in the evening, you shall eat matzos, until the twenty first day of the month in the evening. (Exodus 12:18) ), and the Gemara did not see fit to question why it says that we should eat matzos on the 14th if we really eat them from the 15th. So why only by Yom Kippur?

Rabbi Shlomo Gantzfried (author of the Kitzur Shulchan Aruch, biography here) answers with another famous question: how could the Patriarchs keep the whole Torah if they were still technically non-Jews, and there is a halacha that a non-Jew may not keep Shabbos?

One of the more accepted answers is by R’ Pinchas Halevi Horowitz (biography here) in Kiddushin 37b. He explains that there are two types of time spans: the Jewish calendar, where the night precedes the day, and the secular calendar, where the day precedes the night. The issur for a non-Jew to keep Shabbos, as explained in Sanhedrin 56b, is keeping Shabbos for a full 24 hours (not even necessarily on Saturday; it may even be a Monday). However, the pasuk in which this issur is mentioned is from Genesis 8:22 וְיוֹם וָלַיְלָה לֹא יִשְׁבֹּתוּ - “day and night shall not recede”. We see that their calendar starts from the morning. Therefore, the Patriarchs kept Shabbos as we Jews keep it-Friday night and Saturday day. However, on Motzaei Shabbos, they did a melocho, when it is still considered Shabbos for a non-Jew, as his Shabbos would only start in the morning. Thus, they never fully kept a Shabbos of a non-Jew.
With this wonderful concept, R’ Gantzfried explains how we can understand why the Gemara is specifically bothered with Yom Kippur and not with Pesach.  Pesach was mentioned before Matan Torah (the pesukim about Pesach are whilst the Jews were still in Egypt); therefore, 14th at night means the night that actually comes after the day. However, when the Torah commands us about Yom Kippur, we are already in the Jewish calendar mode, thus 9th at night really means a full 24 hours before Yom Kippur.

Therefore, the question from the Gemara is entirely legitimate!

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Work or Food?

דַּבֵּר אֶל בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל וְאָמַרְתָּ אֲלֵהֶם מוֹעֲדֵי ה’ אֲשֶׁר תִּקְרְאוּ אֹתָם מִקְרָאֵי קֹדֶשׁ אֵלֶּה הֵם מוֹעֲדָי – Speak to the Children of Israel and tell them these are the Festivals that they shall keep holy (23:2)

שֵׁשֶׁת יָמִים תֵּעָשֶׂה מְלָאכָה וּבַיּוֹם הַשְּׁבִיעִי שַׁבַּת שַׁבָּתוֹן מִקְרָא קֹדֶשׁ כָּל מְלָאכָה לֹא תַעֲשׂוּ שַׁבָּת הִוא ה’ בְּכֹל מוֹשְׁבֹתֵיכֶם - [For] six days, work may be performed, but on the seventh day, it is a complete rest day, a holy occasion; you shall not perform any work. It is a Sabbath to the Lord in all your dwelling places. (23:3)

Rashi wonders why Shabbos is inserted into the middle of the parsha of the Festivals (moadim).

The Vilna Gaon comes up with a fascinating explanation that explains the pasuk in a different vein. On all the Festivals certain types of melachos are permitted (‘ochel nefesh‘), whereas on Shabbos all melachos are forbidden. However on one yom tov no melacha is permitted – Yom Kippur  - which is also known as שַׁבַּת שַׁבָּתוֹן – the same terminology that the Torah uses for a regular Shabbos. Thus the Vilna Gaon explains the pasuk like this;

דַּבֵּר אֶל בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל וְאָמַרְתָּ אֲלֵהֶם מוֹעֲדֵי ה’ אֲשֶׁר תִּקְרְאוּ אֹתָם מִקְרָאֵי קֹדֶשׁ אֵלֶּה הֵם מוֹעֲדָי – Speak to the Children of Israel and tell them these are the Festivals that they shall keep holy (23:2)

שֵׁשֶׁת יָמִים תֵּעָשֶׂה מְלָאכָה וּבַיּוֹם הַשְּׁבִיעִי שַׁבַּת שַׁבָּתוֹן מִקְרָא קֹדֶשׁ כָּל מְלָאכָה לֹא תַעֲשׂוּ -  six days “of these” a melacha is permitted ( “these” are first and last days of Pesach(2), one day Shavuos (3), one day Rosh Hashana (4), one day Succos (5), one day Shmini Atzeres (6) [these are the days that are Yom Tov 'mideoraisa' which are still observed today in Israel]) however the seventh is the holy of holiest – no melacha is permitted (yom kippur [not even ochel nefesh])!

Geshmack :)

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