Interconnected

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When Moshe recounts to the people in his repetition of the Torah, he tells them how each Jew is important:

וְהָיָה עֵקֶב תִּשְׁמְעוּן אֵת הַמִּשְׁפָּטִים הָאֵלֶּה וּשְׁמַרְתֶּם וַעֲשִׂיתֶם אֹתָם וְשָׁמַר ה’ אֱלֹ-ךָ לְךָ אֶת הַבְּרִית וְאֶת הַחֶסֶד אֲשֶׁר נִשְׁבַּע לַאֲבֹתֶיךָ – It will be because you heed these ordinances, keep and perform them, that the Lord your God will keep for you the covenant and the kindness that He swore to your forefathers. (7:12)

Moshe addresses the audience but changes from תִּשְׁמְעוּן, the plural, to לְךָ, the singular. Why?

There is a famous story in Gemara Shabbos. A non-Jew approached Shamai and offered to convert if Shamai would teach him all of Torah while he was standing on one leg. Interpreting the gentile’s words as mockery, Shamai threw a piece of rubble from a building at him. He approached Hillel and put forward the same request. Hillel said, “Love your neighbor as yourself. The rest is commentary, go study.”

What was the premise of the man’s request? Clearly, the request to learn Torah on one leg is absurd, let alone to ask it of the greatest rabbis of the era. Hillel’s response is curious too. How does his answer incorporate mitzvos such as Shabbos, tefillin, bris mila, mezuzah etc.?

It is said in the name of the Arizal that every Jew must perform every single one of the 613 mitzvos, or their soul returns in another form, a gilgul, to complete what is missing. But it is impossible to accomplish all 613 mitzvos; many are mutually exclusive. Some are specific to gender, age, caste eg Kohanim and Leviim, kings, during the time of the Temple etc. Does this mean that everyone comes back as a gilgul many, many times so that they could fulfill each and every mitzva in the Torah?

This was precisely what the gentile was asking – teach me Torah on one רגל – in one lifetime, with no gilgul. רגל can mean “time” as seen when Bilam strikes his donkey: וַיִּפְתַּח ה’ אֶת פִּי הָאָתוֹן וַתֹּאמֶר לְבִלְעָם מֶה עָשִׂיתִי לְךָ כִּי הִכִּיתַנִי זֶה שָׁלֹשׁ רְגָלִים: The Lord opened the mouth of the donkey, and it said to Bilam, “What have I done to you that you have struck me these three times?” (22:28) Alternatively, Kabbalistic interpretation aside, he simply wanted to perform all mitzvos, resulting in the same difficulty that an individual cannot possibly do so. Shamai beat him with construction material. This alludes to a building, that has many floors. Without multiple components, it’s not a building. Torah has many levels, and many mitzvos. Without them all, the soul is incomplete.

Shamai was telling the gentile that the Torah cannot be actualised in a single lifetime; it is paradoxically impossible to fulfill each and every mitzva.Hillel proposed an answer through unity. His directive of וְאָהַבְתָּ לְרֵעֲךָ כָּמוֹךָ meant that once unity was achieved, the rest of the Torah would follow. The benchmark of unity is כאיש אחד בלב אחד – one man with one heart. It is not a man’s that have shoes, but the man. Similarly, of one Jew performs a mitzva, the entire nation tap into the mitzva. With three simple words, Hillel explained to the gentile how to perform Torah directives.

Back to Moshe’s speech, he says וּשְׁמַרְתֶּם וַעֲשִׂיתֶם – keep and perform them in the plural form, which is said to the entire nation. But nonetheless, in spite of the inability of being able to actually do them all, וְשָׁמַר ה’ אֱלֹ-ךָ, Hashem will protect you – the individual. That is, each person should keep what they are able, and will be rewarded as such. This explains why it was necessary to be united at Sinai; without unity, there would be no point in receiving a Torah that could not be fulfilled. R Yitzchak Lande points out that the Torah switches from plural to singular many times, because although there is a communal responsibility, this doesn’t assuage the individual’s duty to pitch in – even if the job is done!

Everyone has to pull their weight – Jewish unity will ensure each individual gets included in what they can’t manage.

Benefiting from Miracles

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R’ Chaim Brisker wonders how the jug of oil the Hasmoneans found in the Chanukah story was suitable for use beyond the first day. It wasn’t natural olive oil after the first day – it was the product of miracle, and therefore not organic – and the commandment to light the Menorah was with natural olive oil specifically. It might have had the physical and chemical properties of olive oil, but the substance had not come from an olive!

What was the point of using it after the first day?

Secondly, the Gemara in Taanis 24 states that one ought not benefit from a miracle.

Examples of this may be found in the stories of rabbis of old in Europe who didn’t have food, and when circumstance or luck provided something for them to eat, the Rabbi would refuse it on the grounds that it would detract from his Olam Habah.

At the construction of the Mishkan, in Shemos 35:27, the Torah describes how the princes, הַנְּשִׂאִם, brought oil and spices after the nation donated resources, but הַנְּשִׂאִם is spelled without the letter י. Rashi explains the oversight to mean that their intentions were good, but their actions were deficient, in that they underestimated the will of the Jewish people to donate materials for the construction of the Mishkan, and so their name was shortened here to teach us to act wholeheartedly.

R’ Yonasan ben Uziel explains differently, reading Nesi’im as Neshaim, Aramaic for clouds. It was not the Nesi’im who provided the materials, but rather, clouds came to the princes with stones, oil and spices – from the sky!

R’ Chaim Zevin asks R’ Chaim Brisker’s question; how could the princes use these for the Mishkan? They might have physically been olive oil/stones/spices, but again, they were unnatural. And then there is the prohibition of benefiting from miracles.

This can be answered by understanding how Noach left the Ark.

וַתָּבֹא אֵלָיו הַיּוֹנָה לְעֵת עֶרֶב, וְהִנֵּה עֲלֵה-זַיִת טָרָף בְּפִיהָ – the bird came back in the evening with an olive branch in its mouth. (8:11)

The Ramban explains that the olive branch was from Gan Eden – clearly, it is an actual place with actual things within it.

Knowing this, R’ Tzvi Pesach Franck concludes that we can differentiate between certain kinds of miracles. The cases under discussion were not Yesh Me’ayin – something from nothing. These were Yesh MeYesh, manipulations of something that was somewhere else – specifically, in Heaven! They were then moved to Earth. They were thus completely permissible, much like the Manna, which was not a new “thing”, rather, it is what the angels grind to make their bread according to the Gemara in Yoma. Nothing new was created, which was what the prohibition in Taanis was referring to. That is to say that the miracle was not their creation, which one would be forbidden to benefit from according to Taanis 24, but rather, their miraculous manipulation to be somewhere else at the appropriate time.

This can be proven from when Yakov brings a feast to his father, Yitzchak:

“וַיֹּאמֶר, הַגִּשָׁה לִּי וְאֹכְלָה מִצֵּיד בְּנִי–לְמַעַן תְּבָרֶכְךָ, נַפְשִׁי; וַיַּגֶּשׁ-לוֹ, וַיֹּאכַל, וַיָּבֵא לוֹ יַיִן, וַיֵּשְׁתְּ” – “And he said: ‘Bring it near to me, and I will eat of my son’s venison, that my soul may bless thee.’ And he brought it near to him, and he did eat; and he brought him wine, and he drank.”

At no point did his mother prepare wine, and R’ Yonason ben Uziel again points out the previous idea of things existing in Heaven and says that an angel brought wine made from grapes that were in heaven since Creation.

There is a saying; “To bake an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the Universe,” – this is the same idea. The objects under discussion were not from scratch at all.