Archive for the ‘Otzros Hatorah’ Category

Man: pinnacle of Creation or anticlimax?

The Parsha begins with elaborations on laws pertaining to human purity:

דַּבֵּר אֶל בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל לֵאמֹר אִשָּׁה כִּי תַזְרִיעַ - Speak to the children of Israel, saying: If a woman conceives…. (12:2)

Rashi comments:

אשה כי תזריע : אמר ר’ שמלאי כשם שיצירתו של אדם אחר כל בהמה חיה ועוף במעשה בראשית, כך תורתו נתפרשה אחר תורת בהמה חיה ועוף – If a woman conceives: Rabbi Simlai said: “Just as in the Creation, man was created after all domestic animals, wild beasts, and birds, so too, the law [concerning the cleanness] of man is stated after the law [concerning the cleanness] of domestic animals, wild beasts, and birds.”- [Vayikra Rabbah 14:1]

The Gemara (Sanhedrin 38a) explores why the creation of man followed the creation of birds and beasts. It concludes that “אחור קודם צרתני – you were formed first and last” (Tehillim 139:5). What does this mean? If a man is worthy, we say he preceded Creation, but if he is a sinner, we say that even a mosquito was created before him, so he has nothing to be arrogant about, given that even minuscule entities such as the mosquito were created before him.

However, this is difficult to comprehend – “If a man is worthy, we say he preceded Creation” – if we examine the reality, man was created last, on the 6th day of Creation, so how are we to understand the Gemara?
(more…)

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United We Stand

The Pasuk says ” וַיִּיקַץ יַעֲקֹב, מִשְּׁנָתוֹ, וַיֹּאמֶר, אָכֵן יֵשׁ יְהוָה בַּמָּקוֹם הַזֶּה; וְאָנֹכִי, לֹא יָדָעְתִּי – And Yakov awakened from his sleep, and he said, “I now know the Lord is in this place, and I did not know before.” (28:16)

Clearly this means something else, and R’ Shamshon Ostropolier obliges us. He explains that we know from Sefer Yechezkel there are 4 images on the Kisei HaKavod(G-d’s Holy Throne), a lion, an eagle, a cherub and a man.

He then explains that אָכֵן is Roshei Teivos Aryeh (lion), Cruv (cherub, the angel that appeared on the Aron) and Nesher (eagle), and אָנֹכִי is Roshei Teivos Aryeh, Nesher, Cruv, and Yakov. This is what he was really saying; “”אָכֵן” I already knew were on the Kisei HaKavod, but after I saw the Kisei Hakavod in my dream, I saw “אָנֹכִי” with the additional yud, for Yakov ie that my face was the fourth, fitting enough to be on the Kisei HaKavod, לֹא יָדָעְתִּי“.

I heard a very interesting explanation on how he saw himself as fitting from when he woke up and not before. There is machlokes how many stones Yakov took as the pasuk does not say how many. Pirkei D’Rebi Eliezer says that Yakov took 12 stones to put around his head. Before, all the stones were seperate and individual, and Yakov/Yisroel was not fit to be on the Kisei HaKavod. But once he woke up and saw they had combined to make 1 stone, then he was fitting to be on the Kisei Hakavod, and that’s why he didn’t know before. We can apply this to ourselves by saying that the 12 stones is a metaphor for the 12 Tribes, and clearly from this we can see that divided we are not fit to be on the Kisei HaKavod, but united, we are.

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Why did G-d “relent” to Isaac and Rivka’s prayers?

When it was clear that they would be unable to have children, Isaac and Rivka prayed, and the Pasuk (21:25) says:

“וַיֶּעְתַּר יִצְחָק לַיהוָה לְנֹכַח אִשְׁתּוֹ, כִּי עֲקָרָה הִו וַיֵּעָתֶר לוֹ ה – And Isaac entreated the Lord for his wife, because she was barren; and He relented to him”.

A gentleman once told R’ Yosef Chaim Sonnenfeld a short Dvar Torah on this. Why does the Pasuk say “and He relented to him”? Does this not seem an odd way of saying that G-d heard and heeded his prayer?

The gentleman explained that there is a tradition that all the Patriarchs were meant to live until the age of 180. Yet Avraham died aged 175 (25:2). We can work this out: Avraham was 99 when he circumcised himself, 100 at Isaac’s birth, 137 at the Akeida, at which point Isaac was obviously 37. Isaac was 40 at his marriage, and 60 at the birth of Yaakov and Esau (25:26), making Avraham 160 at their birth. Esau first murdered aged 15, making Avraham 175. There is a Rashi that Avraham would live to see Yishmael repent (25:9), but die before Esau killed someone for the first time (25:30). If he died aged 175, where are the missing 5 years?

The gentleman said to R’ Yosef Chaim Sonnenfeld that “וַיֵּעָתֶר לוֹ ה” is the answer. There was never any doubt that Isaac would have children; his father had been promised “nations”. Certainly then Isaac would have children, and Rivka would certainly be their mother as she was the one deemed worthy, as evidenced by the miracles Eliezer witnessed. “וַיֵּעָתֶר לוֹ ה” can be interpreted to mean that G-d did not want to give them children just yet, but simply wanted them to wait a bit longer so Avraham would not live to see his grandson become a murderer.

When R’ Yosef Chaim heard this, he jumped up and exclaimed that this was certainly true, because the numerical value of “וַיֵּעָתֶר לוֹ ה” is 748 (686+36+26), the same Gematria as חמש שנים – five years – 748, which represents G-d relenting to their prayers to have children – at the expense of חמש שנים from Avraham Avinu’s life.

R’ Yosef Chaim also said that we say “רְצוֹן-יְרֵאָיו יַעֲשֶׂה; וְאֶת-שַׁוְעָתָם יִשְׁמַע, וְיוֹשִׁיעֵם – He will fulfill the desire of them that fear Him; He also will hear their cry, and will save them”. Isn’t this in the wrong order? Doesn’t Hashem fulfill their desires to placate their cries? R’ Yosef Chaim explains that the prayers of a devout person are able to change what is meant to happen to people, which explains fulfilling their desires. But people don’t know what’s best for them, and sometimes suffer as a consequence of getting what they desire. The pasuk teaches that Hashem will even repair this later cry of suffering that is of their own doing.

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Out of Context

וַיַּעַן אַבְרָהָם וַיֹּאמַר הִנֵּה נָא הוֹאַלְתִּי לְדַבֵּר אֶל אֲדֹנָי וְאָנֹכִי עָפָר וָאֵפֶר – And Abraham answered and said, “Behold now I have commenced to speak to the Lord, although I am dust and ashes.”

The Gemara in Chulin 88b says that the reward for saying this was that his children would earn the Mitzvah of the ashes of the Para Adumah (Red Heifer) and dust of the Sotah (a woman brought to the Temple accused of adultery was forced to drink a concoction which had dust from the foot of the Altar in it).

Beyond the obvious yet superficial connection of dust/dust, ash/ash, how are Sotah and Para Adumah a relevant reward to Afar v’Efer?

The Dubner Maggid tells a story of an upstanding member of society who made a wedding for his son, and all the people and rabbis were invited. There was the top table for the family, and next to it, another for the rabbis. The greatest rabbi invited showed up, wished Mazal Tov, but felt unworthy of sitting in the prescence of the other rabbis, and quietly sat in the corner elsewhere. The host felt that the rabbi had not been accorded due respect, and he requested that the whole table of rabbis move to the table in the corner to join this great rabbi. He manipulated the context to make the supposedly unworthy corner into one worthy of having the great rabbi sit there.

The Dubner Maggid explains that this is precisely what Hashem did; He took what Avraham said, and changed the context from dust and ash with all their negative connotations, to dust and ash as Mitzvos, the essence of the Torah, the absolute opposite of dust and ash.

Another explanation was suggested by the Beis HaLevi: Dust of the earth has no past, but immense potential for the future; it can grow plant life, which itself is alive, can then sustain other life etc, whereas ash has no future whatsoever, but in the past was part of a living thing. Avraham meant he had no past, like earth, and and no future, like ash.

Says the Beis HaLevi, Hashem inverted this, by giving the Mitzvah of Sotah, which cleans the woman’s past, and Para Adumah which purifies the persons future.

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How we have a Yetzer Hara

Before man ate from the tree, we find that וַיִּהְיוּ שְׁנֵיהֶם עֲרוּמִּים, הָאָדָם וְאִשְׁתּוֹ וְלֹא יִתְבֹּשָׁשׁוּ - They were both naked, the man and his wife, and they weren’t embarrassed. (2:25)

Rashi remarks that they were not ashamed because they did not know the concept of modesty. They could not distinguish between good and evil and although a degree of knowledge was initially granted to man, enabling Adam to name all the animals, nonetheless they were not imbued with the evil inclination until they ate of the tree, after which he knew the difference between good and evil.

The purpose of creation is to grow close to Hashem by battling the natural tendencies and inclinations that prevent us from fulfilling our duties and overcoming them. This being the case, what function would creation have served if there were no inclination for evil?

R’ Chaim Volozhin explains that Adam had all the faculties, notably free will, instilled within him before the original sin, to enable to him to do as he saw fit. What he didn’t have, was an internal urge to sin or do evil. The snake/Satan figure, the personification and embodiment of evil, was an external being to Adam, and had to physically manifest itself as the snake to ensnare Adam and Eve - unlike today, where this battle is an internal battle, choice, decision.

The original quote from Rashi implies this: that the Evil Inclination only became an innate thing in man once he consumed the fruit and it became part of him.

The Pardes Yosef adds that the Gemara concludes that the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil was an Esrog tree – a פרי עץ הדר – the final letters of the words are י – צ – ר – יצר! When the פרי עץ הדר entered their bodies, the יצר did too!

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