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Addition by Subtraction

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Vayishlach 5774-An installment in the series From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School For series introduction CLICK By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz-Mara D’Asra Cong Sfard of Midwood   Yaakov remained alone, and a man wrestled with him until just before daybreak.

-Bereshis 32:25

He had forgotten small flasks and [unwilling to squander them] returned [unaccompanied] for them. 

-Rashi Ibid

But Esav said, “I have plenty, my brother; let what is yours remain yours.”, “Please no!” Yaakov said “If indeed I have gained favor with you, then please accept my gift.  After all, seeing your face is like seeing the face of the Divine, you have received me so favorably. Please accept my welcoming gift as it has been brought to you.  Elokim has favored me [with it], and I have all [I need].” Yaakov thus prevailed upon him, and [at last] Esav took [it].

-Bereshis 33:9-11

Yaakov was among those Tzadikim who “value their property more than their bodies”(Chulin 91A).   So much so that he found it unconscionable to let a few small flasks go to waste.  Rav Leibeleh Eiger points out that his imploring Esav to accept his substantial gifts seems totally incompatible with his earlier behavior and attitude.  Even had he been less frugal, the fact that the recipient was the wicked Esav should have curbed his generosity and apparent urgency to part with his own property.

“But of the Tree of the Knowledge Joining Together of Good and Evil, do not eat of it; for on the day that you eat of it you will definitely die.’

– Bereshis 2: 17

The word Da’as means joining together and becoming as one. We’ve learned that the Original Sin, ingesting of the fruit of the Tree of the Joining Together of Good and Evil resulted in the Yetzer HaRa became internalized and integrated into mans very being. When Adam and Chava became what they ate this had a universal cataclysmic effect as the mish-mash of good and evil spread throughout the macrocosm as well. The catastrophic result of the Original Sin is that on both a human and a cosmic level there is no longer any unadulterated good or any unmitigated evil.

To resolve Yaakov’s inconsistencies Rav Leibeleh applies and expands this concept. He maintains that the physical manifestation of mans intrinsic evil is the foreskin. The bris milah-covenant of circumcision is intended to separate this congenital admixture of evil.  No one considers circumcision an act of maiming nor circumcised people to be amputees. On the contrary; the preamble to this covenant is “Walk before me and become perfect!” (Bereshis 17:1). One achieves perfection through excision of the superfluous. Circumcision is addition through subtraction.

Milah serves as the template for free-will endowed human beings to continue exercising their will in making birurim-refinements that sift the evil away from the good and expunge it. When HaShem bestows munificence and kedushah-holiness on deserving individuals that kedushah contains traces of evil as well.  It is the recipients’ mission and challenge to sift away and remove these smatterings of evil.  The Divine Wisdom determines the quality and quantity of evil that is in the mix, customizing the “compound” that requires refining so that it is appropriate to the soul tasked with the refining.

In our patriarch’s case, the vast stream of benevolence and kedushah overflowing from HaShem to Yaakov was adulterated by the pollutants of Esav’s evil. But until Yaakov isolated and detached the portions belonging to Esav that he’d received, he himself was as imperfect and spiritually maimed as one who is uncircumcised.  While Yaakov was, indeed, very parsimonious and possessive of that which belonged to him, he was eager to divest himself of all that belonged to Esav. This explains why he literally begged Esav to accept his gift. Yaakov was not giving away, he was giving back.

This helps explain the odd grammatical construct of pasuk 11; “Please accept my welcoming gift as it has been brought to you” is in the past tense. The pasuk would have been less stilted had it read: “Please accept my welcoming gift that I bring to you/ that I am giving you”. Subtextually Yaakov is telling Esav “Don’t imagine for a moment that I’m giving up anything (good/holy) that is actually mine. I’m merely transferring something that belonged to you from long ago. It had been brought to you in the past as an extraneous, superfluous add-on of evil at the time that HaShem’s shefa-overflow of benevolence came to me (כי חנני אלוקים). The welcoming gift that I present to you now was always meant to be yours.   On the contrary, you must take back what was always your portion from me so that what remains with me will be refined, unadulterated holiness. I must add to myself, perfect myself through this subtraction. Giving you this gift is another iteration of cutting away my foreskin.”

The very act of urging, pleading, nagging, almost harassing, Esav to accept the gift, was out of character for Yaakov.  While non-violent, it resonated of the type of compulsion and intimidation we normally associate with Esav, he to whom “the arms” belong, who lives by his sword and who engages in tyrannical imperialism. The technique of this gift-giving, actually divestiture, was itself, a part of the birur. “Prevailing-upon” his brother, Yaakov used his persistence as body language to tell Esav “Take your own haftzarah-your compelling, prevailing-upon away from me. ויפצר בו…ויקח

On that day Esav returned on his way to Seir. Yaakov journeyed to Sukkoth.  There, he built himself a house, and made shelters for his livestock. He therefore named the place Sukkoth. [Shelters]

– Bereshis 33: 16-17

The Torah’s narrative progresses from the episode of the “gift” to Esav to the final separation of the two brothers from one another. Rav Leibeleh concludes that this segue is as seamless and reasonable as the irreversible separation of the foreskin from the perfected body.

Adapted from Imrei Emes Vayishlach D”H Kach page 37  

The “Absolute Value” of Middos

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VaYetzai 5774-An addendum in the series

From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School

For series introduction CLICK

By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz-Mara D’Asra Cong Sfard of Midwood

Conventional wisdom dictates that when taking inventory of ourselves, that we should use a bookkeepers ledger sheet as a model. We divide our strengths and weaknesses along the lines of credits and debits but, generally speaking, we never insert the same item into both columns. We catalogue anger, stinginess and haughtiness as our bad middos – character traits on the negative side of the ledger and patience, humility and generosity as our good middos on the positive side. Never shall the twain meet.

But earlier this week, when probing Rachels middah of jealousy we learned that the Izhbitzer disabuses us of this notion and, basically, invalidates this bifurcated model of our kochos hanefesh-faculties of our souls.  He taught that (I paraphrase, remember, these are interpretive adaptations, not verbatim translations): “HaShem provides every individual soul with a unique makeup and an incomparable defining middah– characteristic, a leitmotif that colors all their perceptions, impacts all their decisions, tests them at every juncture and motivates all of their thoughts, words and deeds. The Divine Will desires that one’s leitmotif  be both their greatest strength, their supreme source of good and their worst weakness, their most horrible enabler for evil. “

A good way to understand the Izhbitzer is by drawing on the mathematical concept of “absolute value”. The absolute value of a number is its distance from zero on the number line and it makes no difference if it is a positive or a negative number.

The absolute value of x, denoted “| x |” is the distance of x from zero. This is why absolute value is never negative; absolute value only addresses “how far?” not “in which direction?” This means not only that | 3 | = 3, because 3 is three units to the right of zero, but also that | –3 | = 3, because –3 is also three units to the left of zero.  It is the same for middos and kochos hanefesh, the absolute value of the negative/ evil ones and their positive/ good counterparts are equal. E.g. the | zealousness| (which is read as “the absolute value of zealousness) = passion.  But the | anger AKA – negative zealousness | = passion as well. Understanding that they share the same root “value” illustrates why sublimating the negative into the positive is eminently doable.

The Izhbitzers disciple, Rav Tzadok, the Lubliner Kohen, develops this concept making it a source of encouragement and a beacon of hope.

Each of us has a visceral awareness that our yetzer haras obsession should be our own. Those tendencies that the yetzer hara presses us most incessantly about are the precise ones that we could utilize to excel at with pristine goodness free of even a trace admixture of evil or ulterior motives.   The faculties that we’ve abused to sin most egregiously with are precisely the ones that we may use to maximize our capacity for goodness and holiness with.

This is why the Midrash teaches that we ought to do Mitzvahs with the same limbs that we’ve used to sin with. (VaYikra Rabbah 21).  This is much more than a mere means to repair the damage done by the sin midah k’neged midah -quid pro quo.  It is a mending of the sinners soul as well.

Every individual was created to be mesaken-repair and sanctify one particular thing.  Each of us is a super-specialist with a unique and inimitable mission of tikun. No two faces are clonishly alike because the face is the portal through which ones tzelem Elokim-image of G-d, may be perceived. Our faces are reflective of our Divine singularity for HaShem is not only אחד=one but יחיד ומיוחד=singular. Thus the subtext of the famous Talmudic query (Shabbos 118B) “Which matter was your father most careful about?” is; what was your fathers uniqueness? What was his understanding of his soul’s peerless mission that expressed itself in his placing the emphasis of his Avodah-Divine service, in a particular area?

The Gemara that teaches that “One does not stand on Torah matters until and unless he’s been tripped up by those (particular) Torah matters” (Gittin 43A) can be understood in the same vein. One doesn’t trip on generic, fungible Divrei Torah. The particular Divrei Torah that served as his customized stumbling blocks attune him to those selfsame Divrei Torah’s potential for being his personalized stairway to heaven.

Tzidkas haTzadik Inyan 49

 

Opposites Attract…AND Repel

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If I say to the girl “Tip your jug over and let me drink” and she responds, “Drink, and I will water your camels as well” she is the one whom You have verified [as the mate] for Your servant Yitzchak. [If I find such a girl] I will know that You have done lovingkindness to my master.

-Bereshis 24:14

She [Rivkah] is fitting for him [Yitzchak]for she will perform deeds of lovingkindness and is worthy of coming into the house of Avraham.

-Rashi Ibid

She is worthy of him, for she will perform acts of kindness, and she is fit to enter the house of Abraham;She is worthy of him, for she will perform acts of kindness, and she is fit to enter the house of Abraham;

At first glance the litmus test for Rivkah’s compatibility with Yitzchak seems ill-advised.  While it’s true that Avraham Avinu is identified with Chesed-lovingkindness, Yitzchak Avinu is identified with Gevurah-might and self-control. So, while extending favors and lovingkindness might demonstrate that Rivkah was worthy of entering the house of Avraham, Eliezer had been dispatched to choose a bride for Yitzchak, not for Yitzchaks father. As such, perhaps Eliezer should have prayed for HaShem to arrange for circumstances that would test Rivkahs self-restraint, courage and strength rather than her lovingkindness.

HaShem said “It is not good for man to be alone.   I will make him a helpmate opposite him

-Bereshis 2:18

Rashi famously explains this Pasuk as an either / or proposition; “If one is worthy (his wife) will be his helpmate, if he is unworthy then she becomes his opponent to wage war”.  However, the Izhbitzer writes that a straightforward reading of the Pasuk tells us that Hashem’s Will is that one’s help arises from a challenging opponent rather than from an ostensibly sympathetic ally.

To illustrate this concept he cites the Gemara (Bava Metzia 84A) that relates that after the death of Reish Lakish, Rebee Yochonon became despondent. Rebee Yochonon had been the deceased’s adversary in numerous Halachic disputes, At first Rebee Elazar ben Pedas was sent to him as a new disciple to “replace” Reish Lakish. But Rebee Elazar turned out to be a “yes-man” ally, buttressing each of Rebee Yochonon’s Halachic opinions with corroborating braisos. Rather than drawing comfort from his new student Rebee Yochonon grew even more grief-stricken and cried out “You are nothing like the son of Lakish! When I offered an opinion the son of Lakish would pose twenty four questions and I’d supply twenty four answers. In this way the topic would be illuminated and clarified.”

Hashem’s stated goal in the creation of the first woman; adversarial assistance, was to become the template for all subsequent women. The antithetical natures of man and woman are reflected on the biological, psychological and spiritual levels. Human males and females perceive reality in distinctive masculine and feminine ways. They are two genders divided by a common language. A contemporary author aptly titled his bestselling book about relationships using a metaphor indicating that men and women come from different planets and are as extra-terrestrial aliens to one another.

Chazal tell us that since the time of Creation, HaShem is a Matchmaker who “sits and pairs up couples.” (Bereshis Rabbah 68:4). Based on how He designed the first human couple to function as a unit this means that besides the two genders being diametrically opposed to one another in the broadly generic sense the Divine “Maker of pairs” customizes opposing forces in every specific couple according to each partner’s unique make-up.

The Izhbitzers great disciple Rav Tzadok, the Lubliner Kohen, carries the concept further:  The attraction and pairing of opposites is based on more than the dynamic tension of opposing forces strengthening and sharpening one another. It is also because each individual is incomplete unto themselves. To use the Talmudic imagery, a single person is merely half a body.  So when antithetical males and females are paired they complement one another and fill in that which their partner lacks.

This explains the prayer of Avraham’s servant, Eliezer. It is precisely because Yitzchak is defined by Gevurah that Eliezer sought a mate for him imbued with Chesed. To have paired Yitzchak with a woman of Gevurah would have been redundant, so to speak,  as Yitzchak would already have provided the marriage with that half of the equation. Such a match would work against the Divine template for matchmaking; “a helpmate…. opposite him” davkah.

There are two ways in which a Midah B’Kedusha-A characteristic rooted in holiness can be linked to another characteristic;  either by uniting with its opposing Midah B’Kedusha or by being conflated with its sympathetic, mirror-image Midah B’Sitra Achra-a characteristic rooted in evil.  When two antithetical Midos B’Kedusha join forces their relationship is symbiotic. They complement one another like nesting concave and convex figures with each Midah B’Kedusha rounding out the other to form the whole.  So, while a tension exists between them, sensing that it is their “adversary” that will make them complete, they are attracted to one another as well.

On the other hand when a Midah B’Kedusha connects to its mirror-image Midah B’Sitra Achra nothing beneficial accrues to the Midah B’Kedusha . It is stuck with and to the evil Midah B’Sitra Achra as part of the inescapable fallout of the cosmic mish-mash of good and evil resulting from the Original Sin *1. But there is no reason, hence no way, for a Midah B’Kedusha to unite with an antithetical Midah B’Sitra Achra. When confronted with an antithetical Midah B’Sitra Achra the Midah B’Kedusha senses all of the tension and the antagonism but none of the opportunity for fulfillment. In such instances, the Midah B’Kedusha is utterly repelled by the adversarial nature of the Midah B’Sitra Achra.

This helps us better understand the family dynamics of our earliest patriarchs and matriarchs. Avraham Avinu was defined by his midah of Chesed– loving-kindness, giving to, and pouring out upon, others. His mate, Sara, complemented and completed Avraham through her opposing midah of Gevurah. In the next generation the roles of the male and female marriage partners were reversed. Yitzchak Avinu was defined by his midah of Gevurah-forceful self-restraint.   Informed by Hashems awe-inspiring Infinity, Gevurah is the trait of conquering, and impeding the expansion of, oneself.  His mate, Rivkah, complemented and completed Yitzchak through her opposing midah of Chesed.

The evil parallel midah of Chesed is Znus-debauchery which bears some superficial similarities to acts of “giving to and pouring out upon others” but which is informed at its core by selfishness and egotism rather than by selflessness and altruism. The evil parallel midah of Gevurah is Shfichas Damim-homicide which bears some superficial similarities to acts of “forcefulness, conquering, and impeding expansion” but which seeks to dominate others rather than oneself and that is informed at its core by self-indulgence and paranoia rather than by self-abnegation and the awe of G-d.  Yishmael is the embodiment of Znus while Esav is the personification of Shfichas Damim [The arms are Esavs arms…You shall live by your sword].

Although Yishmels midah was evil it had some affinity to the holy midah of Chesed and so Avrahams Chesed allowed him to tolerate Yishamel.  But Sara, who possessed holy Gevurah, the trait intrinsically hostile to Chesed, was completely repulsed by Yishmaels unholy, evil “Chesed” and so she drove him away. In precisely this manner while Esavs midah was evil it had some affinity to the holy midah of Gevurah and so Yitzchaks Gevurah moved him to affection for Esav.  Yitzchak loved Esav (Bereshis 25:28).  But Rivkah who possessed holy Chesed, the trait intrinsically hostile to Gevurah, was completely revolted by Esav’s unholy, evil “Gevurah” and so she orchestrated events to disinherit him.

Adapted from Mei HaShiloach Bereshis D”H E’Eseh Lo                                                                                                                                                      and Kometz HaMincha Inyan 50 (page 46–47)

1* This fundamental concept received a fuller treatment in an earlier installment in this series.  To learn about it CLICK HERE

Of Angels and Men

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VaYera 5774-An installment in the series

From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School

-For series introduction CLICK

 By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz-Mara D’Asra Cong Sfard of Midwood

 And he [Avraham] lifted his eyes and saw, three strange men standing near him

-Bereshis 18:2

The three “men” were angels

-Rashi ibid

When a man’s ways please HaShem, He causes even mans enemies to be at peace with him.

– Mishlei 16: 7

Two ministering angels , one good the other bad , escort a person home from the synagogue Friday evening.  When he comes home to find the lamps lit, the table set and his bed made the good angel says ‘May it be HaShems will that next Shabbos we find things the same way ’ and the bad angel is compelled to respond ‘Amen’ against his will

-Tractate Shabbos 119B

And Elokim said “Let Me Us make man”. Alternatively: “Man has [already] been made.”

-Bereshis 1:26

Chaza”l teach us that Malochim-Angels are fundamentally opposed to the creation and ongoing existence of human beings:  Rebee Seemon said: When HaShem, came to create Adam, the ministering angels formed groups and parties, some saying, ‘Let him be created,’ while others urged, ‘let him not be created.’ As it is written, “Loving-kindness and truth met up, justice and peace kissed.” (Tehillim 85:11): The Angel Loving-kindness said, ‘Create man, because he will dispense loving-kindness’; the Angel Truth said, ‘Let him not be created, because he full of lies’; the Angel Charity said, ‘Create man , because he will perform acts of altruism’; the Angel Peace said, ‘Let him not be created, because he is full of strife.”’ What did God do? God took Truth and cast it to the earth, as it is written, “and truth will be sent to the earth.” (Doniel 8:12)The Malochim said before the Holy One, “Master of the Universe! Why do you despise Your seal? Let Truth arise from the earth!” Hence it is written, “Let truth sprout from the earth.” (Psalms 85:12) …Me’od –‘Very ’) is [in reference to] Adam; [the letters מאד–very are a word jumble for אדם–man i.e. Adam=man is good] as it is written, “And God saw everything that God had made, and, behold, it was very good.” (Genesis 1:31), i.e. and behold Adam was good. Rav Huna the Elder of Tziporen, said: While the Malochim were arguing with each other and disputing with each other, HaShem created the first human. God said to them, “Why are you arguing. Man has already been made!” (Bereshis Rabbah 8:5).

This  Midrash implies that the creation of Man took place “under protest”. Even when temporarily suppressed many protests are ultimately successful. So it is not out of the question that the Angelic naysayers were complicit in the undoing of humanity through the first sin and the subsequent degradation of humanity by the generations of the Flood and the Dispersion.

The human predilection for lies and strife are a product of mans constrained G-d consciousness. An angel has but to lift its eyes to attain a limitless, incomparable awareness of HaShem and how His glory fills the universe. In marked contrast, even after years of intense exertion, mans G-d consciousness is meager. The light that man beholds is relatively dim and is known as “the Diminutive Face”.  Angels are illuminati bathed in HaShems infinite light. The angelic sense of superiority in terms of their G-d consciousness underlies the various “no-votes” protesting the very creation of man. Regarding uncircumcised man there was no adequate argument to refute the angel’s dismissiveness. There was no debating with them.  HaShem Kivayachol-so to speak had to ignore their protests and present His creation of Man as a fait accompli.

Many Mechabrim-Torah authors, in particular the Ramcha”l , explain that the very Raison d’être of Klal Yisrael- the Jewish People is to rectify the sin of the first man and to bring humanity back to the pre-sin state. As such it would stand to reason that our founding patriarch, Avraham, would earn the angelic seal of approval.

The second Izhbitzer, The Bais Ya’akov takes this approach in explaining the Angels post-circumcision visit with Avraham.

The new edition of Man, Avraham Avinu after the covenant of circumcision, could do something that angels could not.  As dim and meager as his light may have been he was capable of transforming darkness into light and able to draw new light into the gloom of our murky, materialistic world.  In marked contrast angels see things as they are without recognizing any potential for qualitative change. To an angel what’s light is light and what’s dark is dark. For the angels heaven is heavenly and the earth is, well, hopelessly earthy.

As long as the foreskin adheres to man all of mans internal light and potential for illumination are trapped and imprisoned within his being. But when man, Avraham, removes the foreskin his internal and external transformative powers are unleashed. Avraham spread G-d consciousness to the four corners of the earth and, in so doing, made something heavenly out of the earth.

The Tikunei Zohar reveals two remarkable, complementary acronyms in the phrase   מִי יַעֲלֶה לָּנוּ הַשָּׁמַיְמָה–Who (mee) will ascend (ya’aleh) for us (lahnu) to heaven (HaShamaymah) [Devarim30 :12].  The first letters of each word form an acronym for Milah-circumcision. The last letters of each word form an acronym for the tetragrammaton-HaShems proper four letter Name. The encoded allusion being that the circumcised one, Avraham, can in fact ascend to Heaven for us and bring HaShem to the earth.

An angel can take light and multiply the light, take the tiniest blade of grass and exhort it to grow tall, thick and lush (Bereshis Rabbah 10:6). But these are, after all, quantitative expansions not qualitative transformations. Angels are incapable of making the inert-mineral botanic or metamorphosing the botanic into animal or the animal into the human. Omnivorous man ingests the mineral, the botanic and the animal and, through digestion, integrates them into his speech-endowed being.  When man uses this nutrition to serve HaShem through speech AKA prayer he has not merely grown the grass tall…he has altered the grass into something human, speaking and prayerful.  The angels were forced to recognize their relative inferiority and could no longer argue the uselessness of man in HaShems creation.  Impressed and even awestruck they too wanted to partake of the circumcised mans meal.

 Adapted from Bais Ya’akov-Vayera Inyan 16 (page 72A ) 

Don’t Just Choose Good. Sift the Evil Away From the Good

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An installment in the series

From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School

-For series introduction CLICK

By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz-Mara D’Asra Cong Sfard of Midwood

 “But of the Tree of the Knowledge Joining Together of Good and Evil, do not eat of it; for on the day that you eat of it you will definitely die.’

– Bereshis 2: 17

 “Avram came to her [Hagar], and she conceived; and when she realized that she was pregnant, she looked at her mistress with contempt. Sarai said unto Avram …Now that she sees herself pregnant she regards me with condescension.  Let Elokim judge between me and you.’”.

– Bereshis 16: 4, 5

Every other  בֶּינֶיך – between me and you, in Scripture is spelled lacking the second yud, but this one is spelled plene. As such it may also be read וּבֵינַיִךְ (second person feminine, as though Sarai is threatening Hagar rather than Avram), for Sarai cast an Ayin Hara-evil eye on Hagar’s pregnancy, and she miscarried her fetus. 

– Rashi Ibid

Many Mechabrim-Torah authors, in particular the Ramcha”l , explain that the very Raison d’être of Klal Yisrael- the Jewish People is to rectify the sin of the first man and to bring humanity back to the pre-sin state. This is why comprehending the workings of the original sin is a prerequisite to better understanding the family dynamics of our patriarchs and matriarchs.

In   Nefesh HaChaim the Magiha –author of the glosses, explains that prior to eating of the forbidden fruit Adams Yetzer HaRa-inclination to evil was clarified and external to his being (personified in the Nachash HaKadmoni-the primordial snake). The qualitative paradigm shift resulting from the first sin was that the Yetzer HaRa became internalized and integrated into mans very being. The word Da’as means joining together and becoming as one. He and Chava became what they ate, entities in which good and evil are joined together. This had a universal cataclysmic effect as the mish-mash of good and evil spread throughout the macrocosm as well. The catastrophic result of the original sin is that on both a human and a cosmic level there is no longer any unadulterated good, even in the soul of the most saintly, nor any unmitigated evil, even in the deeds of the wickedest.

The Pasuk (Koheles 7:14) “In the day of Good…in the day of Evil…; Elokim made one corresponding to the other,..” teaches that everything in Kedusha-holiness and good has its parallel in impurity and evil. After Adams original sin these parallel entities become linked and blended together.

Avraham Avinu was defined by his midah of Chesed– loving-kindness, the trait of giving to, and pouring out upon, others. The evil parallel midah of Chesed is Znus-debauchery which bears some superficial similarities to acts of “giving to and pouring out upon others” but which is informed at its core by selfishness and egotism rather than by selflessness and altruism.  As a patriarch of Klal Yisrael and a rectifier of Adam’s sin Avraham Avinu’s life’s-work was not merely to choose to actualize Chesed and avoid stinginess and callousness at every opportunity but to clarify and purify his Chesed, to thresh away its Znus dark underside.

Avraham Avinu’s progeny prior to Yitzchok were the incarnations of the dark underside of his midah. He needed to get them out of his system, as it were, before being able to reproduce a soul as free of evil admixtures as Yitzchaks.  Whereas Avraham Avinu was defined by his midah of Chesed his son Yishmael would be defined by his midah of Znus. When HaShem Kivayachol-so to speak, shopped the Torah to other nations of the world our sages recount the following exchange:  “‘He shined forth from mount Paran’ (Devarim 33:2) HaShem asked the Ishmaelites ‘Would you like my Torah?’ they replied ‘What is written within it?’ HaShem said ‘You shall not commit adultery ‘‘If so’ they responded ‘we do not want it’.”  In a similar vein the Talmud (Kidushin 49B) tells us that “ten measures of infidelity/licentiousness descended to the world. Arabia took nine measures and the remaining measure was divided among the balance of the nations”.

Progressing from these principles Rav Tzadok, the Lubliner Kohen, offers insight into the apparent “domestic squabbles” in Avrahams home.

During Hagar’s first pregnancy the refinement process of Avrahams Midah began. The embryo then being formed embodied a blend of good and evil that was being filtered out. Yet in the mix that was being filtered out there was still a greater relative amount of Chesed vs. Znus. Feeling the gravity of the good growing within her Hagar “lightly esteemed” i.e. grew self-important and became condescending towards her mistress. By the second pregnancy unadulterated Znus was distilled from Avrahams Chesed in the person of Yishmael.

Just as Chava, Adams mate, was the one who induced him to internalize evil and to comingle evil with good it would be Sara, Avraham Avinus wife, who would prompt him to extract and externalize his evil. Just as Chava began her work of ruination-through-adulteration with her eyes “The woman (Chava) saw that the tree was good to eat, and that it was desirable to the eyes” (Bereshis 3:6), Sara would begin her work of repairing- through-sifting-out with her eyes, casting an Ayin Hara-evil eye. Just as Chavas work of ruination-through-adulteration would conclude with the conflicted, ambivalent  humans, whose goodness had been contaminated with evil, being driven out of Eden (Bereshis 3:23,24), Sara would complete her work of repairing- through-sifting-out by banishing the unambiguous human, whose soul completely extracted and distilled the evil midah of Znus, from the house of Avraham. (Bereshis 21:10-14),

 Adapted from Kometz HaMincha Inyan 38 (pages 39–40)

and Nefesh HaChaim chapter 5 Hagaha D”H v’zeh, v’hainyan (pages 22-25)  

 

 

Youthful Indiscretions and Deferment of Gratification

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An installment in the series

From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School

-For series introduction CLICK

By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz-Mara D’Asra Cong Sfard of Midwood

In general children and adolescents have a hard time deferring gratification.  They want what they want, all of it, now… not later and if there are doubles and triples available they’ll grab those with gusto as well.  Impulse control, patience and rainy-day/retirement planning ripen with age and are the hallmarks of a mature sensibility. The inability to just wait or to ration pleasure has been the absolute ruin of many a young man. In spite of near-universal juvenile unrestrained self-indulgence most of us were still lucky enough to avoid the long arm of the law, or at least the disapprobation of authority figures, in our youth.  Even so in middle age we intermittently look back appalled at how we could have been so totally rampant, uninhibited and out of control.

…and HaShem said to Himself “never again will I curse the soil on account of man, for the inclination of man’s heart is evil from his youth”.

– Bereshis 8: 21

The second Izhbitzer, The Bais Ya’akov raises questions about the reason that the pasuk provides for the Divine decision to never destroy the earth again.   To begin with a superficial reading of the verse would beg the question of liability for mans evil inclination and seems to point the finger at HaShem. Also, if having an evil  inclination from ones earliest youth is reason enough to save post-diluvian generations from utter destruction, why was it not enough to save the Dor HaMabul-the Generation of the Great Deluge?  Presumably, in terms of having a proclivity for evil from their earliest youth, individuals who comprised the Dor HaMabul did not differ from individuals who comprised generations after the Great Deluge.

What is true for the microcosm that is each individual human is equally true for the macro-man that is humanity as a whole. Individual human beings have an infancy, childhood, adolescence, young adulthood, height-of-powers, middle-age, old-age and dotage. So does humankind. The sins of the Dor HaMabul as expounded by the Written and Oral Torahs are characteristic of youthful indiscretions on a global scale. Ironically, though the individuals involved may have been living well into their 7th, 8th or 9th centuries, their utter lack of respect for boundaries, their insatiable self-indulgent sensuality and inevitable dissipation were the indiscretions, crimes and sins of out-of-control children, not of scheming, calculating adults. As a generation the ten generations from Adam to Noach, the Dor HaMabul, embodied humankind’s childhood and early adolescence.

The Gemara in Kidushin 30 B teaches that the single antidote for the Yetzer Hara-Inclination to evil is the Torah. But lacking the maturing, impulse-controlling Torah, humanities earliest generations grew expansive in pursuing their passions and hearts desires to the hilt. They had neither the aspiration nor the capacity for self-contraction or for damming up the cascading, white-water urgency of their hungry spirits. They attained instant gratification all at once.

Chazal tell us that the pasuk “What is Shahkai, that we should serve Him? (Iyov 21:15) was the mantra of the Dor HaMabul.  The Divine name of Shahkai is deconstructed to mean “He who said to His creation ‘ENOUGH!’”.  It is the Name of tzimtzumim– constriction and the setting of boundaries. It is precisely such a limitation enforcing Deity that the infantile, unrestrained Dor HaMabul rejected. The Divine name of Shahkai is the one that informs the p’sukim:  “At Your snarl the primordial waters fled, at the voice of Your thunder they hurried away… You set a boundary which they should not cross over, that they might not return to cover the earth.” (Tehilim 104:7, 9 )

But when all that satisfies comes in a flash it cannot endure and must disappear just as suddenly. The Mabul destroyed the sources of instantaneous immoderate gratification in an instant. We are not punished for our sins but by them. As the Dor HaMabul rejected the Shahkai aspect of Divinity It withdrew to the supernal spheres and with It the constraining Force holding the primordial waters back from “returning to cover the earth.”

We find a parallel to the Dor HaMabuls self-destruction in the Torahs laws of Shmitta-the Sabbatical year. Each year’s agricultural produce is the sum total of HaShems benevolence to the farmer. The concept underpinning Shmitta is that the farmer should exercise the impulse control and rainy-day planning not to consume his entire crop, this Divine bounty, immediately. That instead he set aside a portion of the crops each of the first six years and defer part of the gratification to enjoy during the seventh when his fields will lie unplanted. By not grabbing all of the bounty that HaShem gave on him all at once the farmer could ensure that the goodness and bounty would last and that he would endure on his land, his earth, forever. Instead, when the Bnei Yisrael sowed during Shmitta they reaped the whirlwind of the seventy year Babylonian exile (see V’Yikra 26:34). This was not so much a punishment as the logical, inevitable conclusion of snatching all the goodness at once. The Shmitta years were supposed to have been spaced and intermittent, constrained and bounded, not expansive and uninterrupted…but so was the gratification from the agricultural bounty.  The seventy years of agricultural desolation of the Babylonian exile were more than poetic, quid pro quo justice for seventy desecrated Shmitta years. In fact this desolation was a dehydrated Mabul.

A deeper reading of the pasuk reveals that it is not HaShem that caused the Great Deluge by implanting the evil inclination into humans but that it was humanities collective immaturity, the indiscretions and instantaneous gratification of an infantile humankind that made the Great Deluge inevitable. Once this period of immaturity was outgrown HaShem could, Kivayachol-so to speak, declare that this kind of maximal instantaneous destruction would never need to be repeated: and HaShem said to Himself “the inclination of humankinds heart is evil from its youth. But… having dissipated and destroyed itself the period of youth is now over. As humanity develops into a more Torah-informed being, one that exercises self-control and defers gratification never again will the need exist for Me to curse the soil on account of man.”

 Adapted from Bais Ya’akov-Noach Inyan 35 (pages74–75) 

Updated 1:15 PM

 

Seven Ushpizin…then Shmini Atzeres

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From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School

For series introduction CLICK

By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz-

 Every day [of Sukkos] they would go around the Mizbayach-altar once. But on that day [the seventh day AKA  Hoshannah Rabbah] they did so seven times.

– Tractate Sukkah 52A

 Rabi Avira extrapolated [some say that it was Rabi Yehoshua ben Levi] the Yetzer Hara– the inclination to Evil has seven names: HaShem called it “Evil”…Moshe called it “uncircumcised”…[King] david called it “impure”…[King] Shlomo called it “hater”… Yeshaya called it “obstacle”…Yechezkel called it “stone” Yoel called it “the concealed one”…

– Tractate Sukkah 43B

 The exodus from Egypt was incomplete until the parting of the Sea of Reeds seven days after the Slaying of the Firstborn and so we can easily understand why the Moed-holiday of Pesach lasts for seven days (in Israel/ on a Torah level). But whether the Sukkos that we dwell in are meant to recall actual booths or clouds of glory  it seems odd that the Moed-holiday of Sukkos should last for seven days plus an eighth day of Shmini Atzeres when the Moed of the Giving of the Torah, Shavuos, is a mere one day festival(in Israel/ on a Torah level.)

The Biskovitzer explains that each of the daily circuits (Hakafos) of the festival of Sukkos is meant to vanquish another aspect, another “name”, of the Yetzer Hara. This can be accomplished by properly welcoming the individual Ushpizin– ethereal guest for each day of the festival.  The placement of this teaching regarding the Yetzer Hara in tractate Sukkah informs us that HaShem empowered the seven Ushpizin as adversaries to the various aspects of the Yetzer Hara.  Each of the individual Ushpizin ‘s  specialized holiness undoes a different aspect of the Yetzer Hara . If an individual’s attitude is that he will not rest until that days characteristic of the Yetzer Hara is completely subdued and ameliorated, until he achieves a scintilla of Yaakov’s conquest of the angel who was not released from Yaakov’s grip until he agreed to bless him as Yisrael-the metaphysical equivalent of “crying uncle” (Bereshis 32:27), then he will have properly welcomed that days Ushpiz and will be aided by the Ushpiz in achieving his goal.

To illustrate the principle here are a few of the examples that the Biskovitzer provides:

When we say that the Yetzer Hara is uncircumcised we refer to the Yetzer Hara’s power to create barriers and blockages that obstruct the Torahs’s  message from ever entering a person’s heart. Yitzchak Avinu, the first one to be circumcised on the eighth day is the Ushpiz who negates this aspect of the Yetzer Hara.

When we say that the Yetzer Hara is an obstacle or a stumbling block we refer to the Yetzer Hara’s power to use smoke and mirrors to deceive people and trip them up on dangers unknown to them until after it is too late. Yaakov Avinu, the one who prevented the greatest of all cosmic errors, the near miss of Yitzchok conferring the blessings on Esav, is the Ushpiz who negates this aspect of the Yetzer Hara. Far from deceiving his father, it was Yaakov who saved his literally and figuratively blind father from falling into a trap that he was incapable of seeing himself. Long before it became one of the 613 Mitzvahs Yaakov fulfilled the pasuk of “You shall not set stumbling blocks before the blind” (V’Yikra 19:14)

When we say that the Yetzer Hara is a stone we refer to the Yetzer Hara’s being the irresistible force and the immovable object simultaneously.  There are times when we “hear” the Torahs message, truly want to do and be good and know full well that what we are doing is wrong but the Yetzer Hara is just too heavy and forceful to resist or turn aside and we in turn are too weighed down to flee. There was never anyone so oppressed by a dense, weighty temptation as Yoseph HaTzadik. The Yalkut Shimoni relates that his temptress, Potiphar’s wife even had him fitted with a weighted steel choker to try to get him to lower his head and eyes to compel him to gaze at her. Yet Yoseph HaTzadik resisted the irresistible temptation, rolled aside the immovable stone that would have immobilized a lesser man and “fled and got outdoors” (Bereshis 39:12-13).

Vanquishing the Yetzer Hara allows room, to draw HaShem K’vyachol-so to speak from His heavenly abode so that his Divine Indwelling inhabits the lower spheres of our material world. These seven days, seven circuits, seven Ushpizin and seven aspects are all preparatory to Shmini Atzeres, a day that alludes to the ultimate unity of HaShem and Israel and the utter eradication of the Yetzer Hara. This world is of seven days-six days of creation and the seventh day, Shabbos, that completes, complements, blesses and fulfills all the others. Anything characterized by eight is otherworldly. Shmini Atzeres is the sneak preview, the trailers of the time about which the Torah declares: “Hashem alone did lead him, and there was no strange god with Him.” (Devarim 32:12)

 Adapted from Neos Deshe;  Hoshana Rabbah D”H B’chol and Shmini Atzeres D’H Chag. (pages 168-170, 210-212 in new edition) 

 

To Feast or to Fast… THAT is the Question!

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An installment in the series

From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School

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 By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz-Mara D’Asra Cong Sfard of Midwood

 It (Yom HaKipurim) is a Sabbath of Sabbaths to you and a day when you must afflict your souls. You must keep this Sabbath from the ninth of the month until the next night.  

-VaYikra 23:32

Chiya bar Rav of Difti taught: “and …you must afflict your souls…[on the] ninth of the month” Do we begin fasting on the ninth?  [In truth] we don’t fast until the tenth! Here, the Torah is teaching us that all who eat and drink on the ninth are considered to have fasted on both the ninth and the tenth.

-Yoma 81B

On the tenth day of the seventh month you must afflict your souls and not do any melacha…This is because on this day you shall have all your sins atoned to purify you. Before Hashem you will be purified of all your sins.

-VaYikra 16:29, 30

There is a lot of conflicting data on the subject of the Torahs attitude towards asceticism.  On the one hand, Shabbos the basis of sanctified time, is identified with pleasure “And call Sabbath pleasure” (Yeshaya 58:13 ) and the entire chapter of Yeshaya 58 takes a rather dim view of fasting unless it is coupled with social justice. On the other hand, the very holiest time, the Sabbath of Sabbaths is a fast day.  The Nazir, who abstains from the fruit of the vine, is called both holy (BeMidbar 6:8) and sinful (Nedarim 10A) as is one who engages in voluntary fasts (Ta’anis 11A). The place of eternal rewards is called “the Garden of Delights”, but the delights there are of a decidedly non-physical variety; “the righteous sit with their heads crowned and bask in the radiance of the Shechina-the Divine indwelling”

In practical terms this quandary is most pronounced on the 9th and 10th days of Tishrei when the day of feasting that precedes the Day of Atonement and self-denial is reckoned as a day of fasting as well.

The often irresistible lure of this-worldly pleasures is, arguably, the major contributing factor to sin and its concomitant impurities. As such, there is a compelling logic to how abstaining from of this-worldly pleasures would help us attain the contrary outcome of decontamination.  As the Pesukim (VaYikra 16:29, 30) state: “afflict your souls …to purify you! “  However, as Rav Leibeleh Eiger explains, HaShem desires to sublimate everything (in his parlance to “sweeten” everything). Eating and drinking are the general categories under which all the temporal desires and delights fall.  HaShem wants all of these to be sanctified as well.  Holy self-gratification may sound like an oxymoron. But since our only will is to fulfill His will and “we cast that which weighs us down upon Him” He then “sustains us” with spiritual nourishment. (Tehilim 55:23). When we eat on Erev Yom Kippur in order to fulfill HaShems Mitzvah, eating becomes a catalyst for purity identical to the mortifications of Yom Kippur itself.

The Mohn-Manna Bread provides an intriguing precedent for this counterintuitive concept. The Torah states that the Mohn was like a “honey doughnut” (Shemos 16:31). Per Chaza”l diners tasted every flavor that they could imagine emanating from the Mohn (Yoma 75A). Moreover, the clouds that showered down the Mohn sprinkled pearls and jewels as well (ibid). The impression one gets is that the Mohn delighted all the senses. Yet the Torah describes the Mohn experience as one of mortification and affliction (Devarim 8:2, 3). Cognizant of the one-day-only supply of Mohn we can well imagine the anxious longing with which the Jews in the wilderness anticipated its daily arrival. The take away lesson for all generations of Jews from this Hedonistic-Ascetic hodgepodge is that we should yearn for HaShems salvation and be totally reliant on Him for both the eating and the abstention from eating. The feasting and the fasting are both only done to fulfill His will.

The verse: “Before Hashem you will purified of all your sins” implicitly alludes to Erev Yom Kippur. “Before HaShem” meaning feasting on the day before HaShem’s great and awesome day, Yom Kippur, will purify and decontaminate of your souls just as the fasting on Yom Kippur itself does.

Rav Tzadok, the Lubliner Kohen,  taught that whenever a Jew consumes food as a Mitzvah the food contains the flavor of Mohn which is the bread of the ministering angels and, as such, it is the flavor of other-worldly pleasure, the taste  of the radiance of the Shechina.  The topic of Mohn appears in the chapter entitled Yom HaKipurim in tractate Yoma because Mohn consumption is exactly like fasting on Yom Kippur the point of both activities being to experience spiritual gratification by absconding from the temporal pleasures of the physical world. When the Gemara says “all who eat and drink on the ninth are considered to have fasted on both the ninth and the tenth“  it is not because eating on the 9th  is like fasting but rather because fasting on the 10th is a different kind of eating, a spiritual angelic ingestion.  On Yom Kippur we dress, stand, go barefoot and wear white like angels.  We fast and are at peace with one another like angels. On Erev Yom Kippur we eat like the nullivore angels dining on “the grain of heaven and the bread of the mighty” (Tehilim78: 24, 25).

 Adapted from Toras Emes Erev Yom Kippur 5625-1865 A.C.E. (page 57)

and Machshevos Chorutz 12 (page 95)

Don’t be Bailed Out. Be Vindicated!

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An installment in the series

From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School

-For series introduction CLICK

 By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz-Mara D’Asra Cong Sfard of Midwood

G-d’s angel called to him from heaven and said “Avraham, Avraham’!  Do not put forth your hand towards the youth (i.e. do not harm him) for now I know that you fear G-d as you have not withheld your only son from Me.   

-Bereshis 22:11,12

And today, recall with mercy the binding of Yitzchok on behalf of his offspring. Blessed are you Hashem who recollects the covenant.

-Conclusion of the Zichronos blessing- Rosh Hashanah Musaf Service

On the second day of Rosh Hashanah the Torah reading is the Akeda– The binding of Yitzchok. The Meforshim explain that this in order to evoke the merit stockpiled by the Patriarchs at this seminal event in Jewish History. The legacy of this merit will help us, their offspring, be more likely to be adjudicated favorably on this Holy Day of Judgment. Per the Talmud and Rav Saadiya Gaon the Akeda is among the reasons underpinning the Mitzvah of Shofar and, in particular, the use of a ram’s horn to fulfill the Mitzvah as Avaraham ultimately sacrificed a ram in a burnt-offering as a surrogate for Yitzchok.

Conventional wisdom maintains that of the two patriarchs involved it was Avraham who played the pivotal role in earning the incalculable merit of the Akeda by withstanding daunting, superhuman challenges to his faith in a kind Creator, his life’s work in disseminating a theology predicated on that faith, his defining characteristic of Chesed-lovingkindness in general and, in particular, his unprecedented and peerless love for Yitzchok.

Rav Gershon Henoch, the Radzyner Rebbe takes a decidedly different approach maintaining that while Yitzchok may have been relatively passive his was the predominant role in shaping the everlasting impact of the Akeda.

HaShem is omniscient and exists above and beyond time.  As such when His spokesbeing the angel stayed Avrahams slaughtering knife at the last moment categorically admonishing him “Do not put forth your hand towards the youth” HaShem was doing far more than providing the individual person Yitzchok with a stay of execution and a new lease on life. He was giving his Divine seal of approval on the life of Yitzchok AND on the lives of all the souls that would issue from Yitzchok.  The life and lifework of each and every Jew, each and every human being who can be described as the offspring of Yitzchok, received HaShems imprimatur when the Divine voice reverberated through the angel and decreed “Do not put forth your hand towards the youth” . When HaShem issued this decree the Divine Mind was perfectly and infallibly aware of all the future generations about whom He’d assured Avraham “It is (only) through Yitzchok that you will gain posterity”(Bereshis21:12). The conception, birth and ongoing existence of every single Jew who was ever born or who will ever be born, down to the last generation, are thus firmly rooted in the Divine will.

Consider, says the Radzyner, the enormity of what this implies. Sin, ruin, hazards and stumbling blocks are inconsistent with the Divine will. So with the words “Do not put forth your hand towards the youth” HaShem affirmed that no sin, ruin, hazards or stumbling blocks can stem from any Jew. Otherwise a strong claim of injustice, K’vyachol, could be lodged against HaShem. After all, Avraham had already given Yitzchok up.  Yitzchok  had been elevated as a sacrifice. He was no longer of this world.  He was as good as dead.  Yet HaShem, in effect, resurrected a corpse that had not yet fathered children. Had it been possible for any sin etc. to result from this future offspring why would an omniscient transcendent G-d have reinstated Yitzchoks existence?

Accordingly the concept of invoking the merit of the Akeda is about much more than a wayward child who’s run afoul of the law drawing on the deep pockets of his mega-rich and politically well-connected father to bail him out for the umpteenth time. The merit of the Akeda inheres in it demonstrating, against all apparent evidence to the contrary, that the wayward child never ran afoul of the law in the first place.  Thundering across time and space the Akeda admonishes one and all “Do not put forth your hand towards the youth”! It is the quintessence of exoneration through merciful justice that overturns the sentence of nonexistence and validates the life of all of Yitzchok’s offspring on this Holy Day of Judgment.

The Rosh Hashanah liturgy (or any other) that superficially asks HaShem to remember, recall or recollect is troubling. For the transcendent Creator memory cannot possibly mean the cognitive bridge connecting the no-longer-existent with the present as it does for His temporal creatures. Instead concludes the Radzyner, “recalling with mercy the binding of Yitzchok on behalf of his offspring” means that through the Akeda it is within the grasp and recollection of every Jew to gaze into the depths of his heart and the inner recesses of his memory to behold how he is rooted in, and bound up with, the Divine Will.

Adapted from Sod Yesharim Rosh HaShanah Chapter 77 (page 84)

Is Torah Everything…or is Everything Torah???

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An installment in the series

From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School

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By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz

You shall take of the first of every fruit of the ground, produced by the land that HaShem your L-rd is giving you. You must place it in a basket and go to site place that HaShem will choose as the place associated with His name.  There you shall go to the Kohen-priest officiating at the time, and say to him: ‘Today I am telling HaShem your L-rd that I have come to the land which HaShem swore to our fathers to give us.’  

-Devarim 26:2-3

When referencing a Thesaurus it is imperative for the writer or speaker to discern the precise shade of meaning that he wishes to convey and to have a nuanced understanding of the differences between near synonymous words. Loping, jogging, sprinting, fleeing, chasing, scurrying, dashing, trotting and galloping are all forms of running.  Yet each verb retains a distinct and specific meaning and using the appropriate word paints a more accurate word picture.

In Lashon Kodesh there are many verbs for speech; amirah, dibur, sipur, hagadah and kriah to name a few. Each of these has a specific meaning and these words cannot be used interchangeably. Commenting on one of the preamble pesukim-verses to the Aseres HaDibros-the Decalogue; “This is what you must say (somahr) to the house of Jacob, and tell (v’sahgayd) the children of Israel” (Shemos 19:3) Rashi famously delineates the different meanings of the terms; amirah and hagadah: “to the house of Jacob: These are the women. Say it to them in a gentle language. — [from Mechilta] and tell the children of Israel: The punishments and the details [of the laws] tell the males, things that are as harsh / tough as tendons.” -[Mechilta, Tractate Shabbos 87A] (Rashi Ibid). So, in Lashon Kodesh, when the style and/or the content of the spoken message are harsh the correct verb to use is a conjugation of Hagadah.

With this in mind it seems odd that the Mikrah Bikurim declaration accompanying the bringing of the first fruits is described as a “telling”; “Today I am telling HaShem your L-rd that I have come to the land which HaShem swore etc.” Superficially there does not seem to be anything particularly tough or acerbic about either the style or substance of this declaration. The Mikrah Bikurim declaration is, by turns, grateful, joyous, melancholy (when speaking of the crucible of the Egyptian exile), reverent and exultant. But nowhere in Mikrah Bikurim do we find anything overtly harsh.

The Izhbitzer maintains that this “telling” is indeed harsh and he reveals the hidden subtextual tough talk of Mikrah Bikurim .

By Torah design the Kohanim and Levi’im were not part of the homesteading act  in ancient agrarian Israel.  The Torah constructed a society in which eleven of the tribes would till the soil, ranch or sail the seas to earn a living while one tribe, the tribe of Levi (including the Kohanim) would be totally dedicated 7/24/365 to Torah study, Mitzvah performance and Avodas HaShem. With no significant land of their own to farm this tribe could not possibly be self-sufficient. So a system of societal largess through Matnos Kehuna and leviya is mandated by the Torah to sustain the Levi’im and Kohanim. This system unburdened them of the earthy, materialistic concerns of  cultivating the soil and enabled them to dedicate themselves completely to the rarefied activities of advanced Torah study, additional Mitzvahs and sacrificial service in the Mishkan and Bais HaMikdash sanctuaries.  This kind of tribal apartheid led to them feeling a sense of spiritual superiority over the balance of the Jewish People. For the Kohanim and Levi’im Torah was everything.

But when the lowly Jewish farmer from one of the other tribes brought his first fruits to the Bais HaMikdash, gifted them to the Kohen and declared Mikrah Bikurim he was telling a tale that the Kohen did not want to hear. Back bent from too many rough rows to hoe, fingernails cracked from plow and sickle repair, hands callused from demanding physical labor, perhaps even vaguely redolent of the dung he spread to fertilize his fields, the farmers persona and  lifestyle implicitly passes judgment on the kohens. He is “telling” the Kohen (off) “Even though you toil in the Bais HaMikdash while I toil in the fields with every furrow that I plow, with every weed that I pull and with every branch that I prune I perform the Mitzvahs bound to the Land, and actualize the Torah that you study. In hindsight, now that I’ve brought my Bikurim,  it has become so clarified that everything that I did to bring forth these fruits from the Holy Land and every earthy, muddy even dung-covered place that I interacted with were suffused with the holiness of the Bais HaMikdash.  For me everything is Torah!”

When the Kohen who practices the lifestyle of “Torah is everything” is forced to hear that, in fact, “Everything is Torah”  that’s tough, really tough for him to hear.

Adapted from Mei HaShiloach 6:17 (D”H higad’tee) 

Metamorphosis: From Cubic Zirconia to Hope Diamonds

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An installment in the series

From the Waters of the Shiloah:Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School

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 By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz

When you wage war against your enemies, HaShem will grant you victory over them so that you will capture his captives. If you see a beautiful woman among the prisoners and yearn for her you may take her as a wife.                                                                                                     -Devarim 21:10-11

The Torah spoke only against the evil inclination…                                                                                      -Rashi Ibid

”Various commentaries explain that when a Jew/ Israelite warrior becomes enamored of a beautiful captive woman that his desire for her stems from something more profound than the womans skin-deep beauty. The apparent redundancy of the phrase “V’Shaveesah Shivyo” literally, “and you will capture his (the enemies) captive” indicates that there was something inherently holy that the enemy had imprisoned and that the Israelite warrior is merely recapturing. He is, in fact, liberating that which had already been held captive. Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder and the eyes of the sanctified Israelite warrior behold the beauty of the scattered sparks of holiness within the captive woman. It is this intrinsic holiness that makes her attractive to him. (Cp. Ohr HaChaim Ibid)

As the messages of the Torah transcend specific locations and historical eras the Biskivitzer contemplates how the law of the Yefas Toar– the beautiful captive and the lesson of “the Torah speaking only against the evil inclination” might be applied in present-day Judaism.

The Biskivitzers insight is based upon a innovative reading of the verse in Koheles 7:10 “Do not say: ‘How was it that the earlier days were better than these?’ for it is not out of wisdom (lo miChochma) that you ask this (shoaltah zos).” by the Rebbe Reb Binim of Przysucha (P’shischa)

Imagine, says the Rebbe Reb Binim, if a father wanted to present a diamond pendant to his young daughter but was concerned that she may still be too immature to care for the diamond in a responsible manner. So the father gives her an ersatz cubic zirconia instead.  Afterwards, he monitors her behavior and, if and when she proves her maturity and responsibility, he then gives her the genuine diamond.

HaShem treats us much the same way.  When we are young, or at least young in our Judaism, we characteristically pursue spirituality with zeal, ardor and passion. Torah and Mitzvahs seem dazzling to us and exert a come-hither attraction over us. We pine for Mitzvahs and yearn for Torah and want nothing more than to unite with the Torah and Mitzvahs. At the same time, the temporal pleasures of the here-and-now world lose all of their attraction and often even become repulsive to us. And while such yearnings seem to be priceless diamonds of spirituality they are, in fact, fakes. In metaphysical terms they are mere cubic zirconia. These yearnings were not the products of our own guile or efforts in Avodas HaShem– serving G-d, but freebie gifts bestowed on us by a “hopeful” Divine Grace to see if, when and how we would deal with the genuine article. The precocious and wise “daughter” will carefully guard and polish her cubic zirconia. In other words “she” will do everything within her power to preserve and increase the Cheshek-the passion and yearning for Torah and Mitzvahs, consistently breaking new ground in Torah and Mitzvahs, purifying her motivations for Torah and Mitzvahs and avoiding any over indulgence in earthly pleasures and diversions. Through these wise efforts she will then have earned a genuine diamond, i.e. a lifetime of authentic and immutable passion for Torah and Mitzvahs. On the other hand if she is careless and irresponsible with the cubic zirconia then, as all counterfeits eventually do, it will lose its appeal and cease to be attractive. The passion for Torah and Mitzvahs will wither and die.

So… do not say: “How was it that the earlier days were better than these?”  It is pointless to wax nostalgic over the good old days of our youth when our souls were on fire for Torah and Mitzvahs. For that yearning and passion was lo miChochma – NOT the result of our own guile, wisdom, awe of Heaven and exertions. Rather it was shoaltah zos- you borrowed it…it was a “loan” by the grace of G-d.

The Biskivitzer concludes that this is the contemporary application of the law of the Yefas Toar. When we first “go out” to wage war against the evil inclination in our youth HaShem grants us victories by gracing us with a passion for Torah and Mitzvahs. The Torah and Mitzvahs are, themselves the Yefas Toar. Comely, attractive and dazzling the Yefas Toar of Torah and Mitzvahs wield an overwhelming attraction that captures our hearts and that ignites our passions. Why does HaShem grace us with this gift? “Only against the evil inclination” to enable us to repel the evil inclination while we are young and, if we properly appreciate, guard and treasure this ersatz diamond while young, to obtain the actual diamond that stands the test of time. “Only against the evil inclination” helps us maintain and increase our passion for Torah and Mitzvahs throughout our lives to sustain a string of victories against the evil inclination until we breathe our last.

The Biskivitzer adds an intriguing wrinkle. He opines that in order to properly relate to our youthful passion, our zirconia, we need to internalize it. If you’ve got it don’t flaunt it. Don’t wear your holy yearnings on your sleeve. To carry the allegory a step further; think about tucking the diamond pendant under your blouse when riding the subways or walking through a high crime district. In his words “Divrei Torah do not require a hubbub or a flamboyant display. One who fails to hide his passion will dissipate it.”

Adapted from Kol Simcha  (D”H Od PP 68–69)

and Neos Desheh (D”H Kee Saytazay LaMilchmah Ahl Oyvecha P. 101, 128 in the new edition

A Foolish Consistency is the Hobgoblin of Little Minds

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An installment in the series
From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School
For series introduction CLICK

By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz

Do not erect a sacred Monolith for this is something that HaShem your L-rd hates                                                                                                                                -Devarim 16:22

Although HaShem commanded us to make Altars of soil and multiple stones He hates the (single stone) monolith… even though the monolith was beloved by Him during the era of the patriarchs He hates it presently…                                                                                                                        -Rashi Ibid

Good habits become second nature. As we grow and mature we develop attitudes and approaches that are translated into specific behavioral patterns. Once well established these attitudes and behavioral patterns become very difficult to break. On the rare occasions of inconsistency we are often described as “acting out of character” and most people consider consistency an unquestionable virtue.  We associate immutable consistency with being principled, sincere, dependable and serious.

However the Izhbitzer cautions against being too obstinate to ever alter ones attitudes or behaviors. In contemporary post-sacrificial terms this is what the prohibition of “erecting a monolith” means.  A monolith is a single pillar or slab of hard inflexible stone. While soil is soft and malleable and the variegated stones of a multiple stone altar are of different shapes, sizes and colors, a monolith is a model of, well, monolithic, monochromatic, monotonous consistency.    Even sacred monoliths are hated by HaShem.  Even regarding ones manner of relating to and worshiping HaShem the Torah prohibits monolithic, heels-dug-in inflexibility.

In the bygone era of the patriarchs, when HaShems sovereignty was not yet acknowledged by the vast majority of the mankind this kind of obstinacy was beloved by Hashem. At that time the call of the hour was for the Avos and Imahos to dig in their heels, draw lines in the sand and to be moser nefesh-to lay down their lives, for every minute detail of worship of the One True G-d. Whereas for us there are only three cardinal sins for which the Halacha demands death before transgression in all circumstances. It goes without saying that if in given situations we must steer clear of obstinacy and be flexible enough to actually sin then, depending on a variety of variables, we must certainly be responsive and flexible enough to adjust our ways and means of fulfilling Mitzvos and worshiping HaShem.

Understanding that the capacity for inconsistency is required of us in our relationship with Hashem has a tremendously positive impact on our interpersonal relationships as well. If we had the luxury of monolithic inflexibility we’d find it much easier to be dismissive of other people, their Hashkofos and approaches to Avodas HaShem –serving G-d. But since we ourselves must eschew a monolithic style in Avodas Hashem, if we ourselves serve HaShem in a less-than-absolutely-consistent range of ways then we are much better able to tolerate the diverse approaches of our fellow Jews.

While uniform standards govern the actual implementation of the 613 Mitzvahs that are equally binding on each and every Jewish Soul, the Ta’amei HaMitzvos– the rationale and motivation underpinning the Mitzvahs are “tasted” (Ta’am) and experienced by each soul in a unique and inimitable way.  This is why the  Pasuk (Devarim 6:17) says: “You (plural) should be very careful (Shamor Tish’merun) to keep the commandments of Hashem your L-rd as well as the Edos.. that He commanded you (singular- Tzivcha) . The Edos refer to the Ta’amei HaMitzvos which differ from individual to individual.  Hence the second person singular conjugation of the verb “command”.   It is imperative for each of us to understand that, in fact, it is impossible for our fellow Jews to observe the Mitzvahs using our unique and inimitable approach and attitude and that to expect their approach to be consistent with ours is not merely being judgmental and dismissive, but completely irrational and foolish.

 

Adapted from Mei HaShiloach to Devarim 16:22 (D”H Lo Sakum )

and 6:17 (D”H Shamor)

 

Sacred Carpe Diem (Seize the Day)….

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An installment in the series

From the Waters of the Shiloah:

Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School

For the series introduction click

By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz

Behold I have set the Blessing before you TODAY

First Pasuk in Parshas Re’eh -Devarim 11:26

There is an inverse relationship between our age and the quantity and the intensity of our regrets.

When we are young we tend to be more self-righteous and are less aware of our own shortcomings.  Even when a young person regrets something the future seems bright and fresh opportunities abound. Few irreversible forks in the lifes road have been taken yet. Most of all, the supply of time seems inexhaustible.  Even if mistakes have been made or opportunities squandered there is plenty of time readily available to set things right.

But as we age, our hearts fairly break with regret and remorse. More and more of the open doors of opportunity slam shut. Yesterdays sins engender new ones and, far from learning from our mistakes, we tend to habitually repeat the old ones while continuing to break fresh ground with new ones. Once we reach lifes halfway point we tend to obsess over “woulda, shoulda, coulda”. Worst of all, as the sands in our personal hourglasses dwindle to a precious few we become convinced that even if we could stop messing things up and somehow come up with a plan to rectify the past that the time we have left is insufficient to implement our plan…so why bother?

The coming month of Elul is a season for Teshuva. Yet for many of us, as regret and guilt are the very foundation of Teshuva, Elul has ceased to be a time of optimism and renewal. On the contrary, during Elul the spirit crushing thoughts of “woulda, shoulda, coulda” just intensify.

Rav Laibeleh Eiger explains that the Pasuk emphasized the word HaYom–Today to challenge these depressing thoughts. The Torah is eternal and its message is equally relevant and binding for all times and places.  HaShem is assuring the Jews of here and now, of Elul 5773, that he has set THE blessing before us today…this very day. HaYom im Bekolo Tishmoun –“this very day if you were to just hearken to His voice”(Tehilim 95:7). Among the seven Shabbosos of Nechama perhaps the greatest solace of all inheres in the word “HaYom”=Today. It teaches us that huge tracts of time are not required in order to set things right. On any given day and at any given moment that one begins to regret their sins, salvation is nigh. On that very day and at that very moment HaShem sets the blessing before him.

This is why Parshas Re’eh is always read the Shabbos before Elul begins. It sensitizes us to the fact that HaShem recognizes our regret, remorse and general awakening to Teshuva and immediately responds by setting the blessings before us TODAY.

The most famous allusion to the upcoming month Ahnee L’Dodee, V’Dodee lee-“I am for my Beloved and my Beloved is for me” (Shir HaShirim 6:3) imparts the same message.  HaShem is neither k’vyachol –so to speak emotionally stingy nor slow to respond. Spiritual gratification is instantaneous. The moment that “I am for my Beloved” my Beloved reciprocates and “is for me”.

Two more Pesukim in Re’eh reemphasize the instantaneousness, the “Today” of Divine reciprocation, rapprochement and blessing:

L’shichno Tidreshu… U’vahsah Shamah– “Search for His closeness… and you will come there.” (Devarim 12:5).  The moment that a person rouses himself and rededicates his heart to Hashem i.e. when we seek out His Shechina and “search for His closeness” we are immediately repositioned “you will come there” I.e. that HaShem becomes revealed to the recipient and accepts him.

Ish K’matnas Yadoh– “every man according to his capacity to give” (Devarim 16:17).   i.e. immediately after the preparation has been made to receive and the hand has been outstretched comes…. K’virkas haShem Elokecha asher nosan loch  “(as) The blessing of HaShem your L-rd that he gave to you” (Ibid)

Adapted from Toras Emes-Devarim 11:26 (4th D”H Re’eh on page 208)

 

The Joy of Understanding….

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An installment in the series
From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School
For series introduction click here.
By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz

You will therefore observe the commandments (Mitzvos), and the irrational statutes (Chukim), and the rational ordinances (Mishpatim), which I command you this day, to fulfill them.
Last Pasuk of Parshas VeEschanan

And it will come to pass that in the end, you will listen to these rational ordinances (Mishpatim), and observe and fulfill these, then HaShem your L-rd shall keep with you the covenant and the compassion, which He swore to your fathers.
First Pasuk in Parshas Ekev

Devarim 7:11-12

The jarring contrast between these two adjacent Pesukim is readily apparent. The first includes the generic catchall term, Mitzvos and the two sub-categories of Chukim and Mishpatim while the latter pasuk lists only Mishpatim.

The Izhbitzer is troubled by this contrast and by the opening word of the Parsha; VeHaya, which Chazal teaches us, is indicative of joy and happiness.

The classically defined difference Mishpatim and Chukim is that the ta’amim, the reasons for the former are readily apparent “had the Torah never been revealed, some human legislator would have instituted these as laws”. Their justness is manifest. Whereas whichever taamim are provided by Chazal and great Torah thinkers for Chukim are of a symbolic or homiletic nature. As brilliant and even compelling as many of these taamim are, they call to mind the parable of the boy who drew the bulls-eyes around the arrows only after they were stuck in the wall. No human legislator would ever have promulgated such laws.

As rational beings we often find Chukim inherently less gishmak= satisfying than Mishpatim. Often, our rational minds question and recoil from Chukim. We fulfill them as religious duties and as expressions of our deep-seated belief that, in the Divine Mind, logical reasons for them do in fact exist. Yet to a lesser or greater degree, when compared to Mishpatim we find them burdensome and onerous.

Just as reading a good music review cannot replicate the experience of seeing and hearing the symphony orchestra play the music, believing that apparently irrational Mitzvos are logical and good for us is no substitute for hearing and understanding that they are, indeed, logical and good for us. Currently unable to actually grasp the reasonableness, goodness and compassion that inhere in the Chukim we bear them as a burden.

The sensibility of the here-and-now world bifurcates the Mitzvos into rational and irrational categories. But in the End of Days HaShem will grant us a new consciousness, more perceptive and nimble minds.

The Izhbitzer reads these two Pesukim not as contradictory but as complimentary. Pasuk 11 speaks of K’lal Yisrael observing and fulfilling all categories of Mitzvos. Pasuk 12 is a yiud= a good tiding of joyous things to come. On “That Day” the plugs in our ears that allowed for bifurcated Mitzvos will be removed. We will hear and understand that Chukim are an illusion, figments of our constrained consciousness, and that ALL the Mitzvos of the Torah are Mishpatim. We will then grasp that the Mishpat, the fairness and justice that informs the Torah in its entirety was to provide the wherewithal for HaShem to bestow favor and goodness upon Israel. On “That Day” when this new “hearing”, this expanded consciousness, dawns upon us “then will our mouths be filled with joyous laughter.”

It is precisely because pasuk 12 mentions only Mishpatim that it begins with the word VeHaya.

Adapted from Mei HaShiloach Volume I Devarim 7:12 page 117and page 118

Reassess O Reassess My Nation….

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An installment in the series
From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School
For series introduction click.
By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz

Invariably, when a toddler takes his first tentative steps he stumbles and falls. Understanding that the child’s staggering and falling are indispensable developmental prerequisites to becoming a full-fledged walker, the wise parent will delight in both the unsure steps and in the awkward falls. On the other hand the toddler himself is apt to howl in pain, humiliation and frustration every time he hits the floor. Once the child outgrows this stage he usually forgets about it entirely until, several decades later, he becomes a toddler’s parent himself. But if, say, at age nine the child were to reconsider it, he too would understand that the early stumbles and missteps were no cause for humiliation or pain at all. In retrospect, the unsteady steps and the stumbling were ALL good.

The Lashon Kodesh word Nechama is often mistranslated as “consolation” or “solace” when, in truth,  the cognate of the concept of Nechama is best expressed in English by words such as “reassessment” or “reconsideration.” When applied to something in our past formerly thought of as sweet, good or beneficial we describe our change-of-mind as remorse or regret. Thus the Pasuk that serves as the prelude to the Great Flood (Bereshis 6:7 ) states “Kee Nechamtee kee assesseem” = “For I regret having made him (man)”. Based on context “For I take comfort in having made man” would be a gross mistranslation of the text.

Rav Tzadok, the Kohen of Lublin teaches that, conversely, when applied to something in our past formerly thought of as bitter, bad or detrimental we can still describe our change-of-mind as Nechama, but there is no parallel word or phrase in English that neatly captures the flavor of this sort of reassessment.

The current Zeitgeist urges people to “move-on” from tragedy and personal setbacks. Time may heal all wounds but it does so by blunting the pain and by dimming the memory, not by affording the one who sustained the wound the wisdom to understand that the wound was not an injury but the indispensable cause of the healing, development and growth, that the operation was not one of amputation or dismemberment but of reconstructive surgery.

We are not punished for our sins but by them. The Divine promise of Nechama will be delivered by Hashem bringing us to the realization that all of our sins and their punishments were necessary components in His original plan for the potential emerging into the actual. This is why the “seven haftoros of consolation”, beginning this week, lead into Shabbos Teshuva. Teshuva, predicated on human regret and remorse -“thinking better of it” lies at the root of the transformative power of Nechama. Our reassessment of our sins, our awakening from below- “return to me”, evokes a sympathetic vibration and awakening from Above- “and I will return to you” i.e. the Divine reassessment of the wages of our sins. Our sins and suffering will no longer be assessed as aberrant departures from His will but recast as indispensable steps in His original plan.

Our People long for the Nechama for a history that has seen countless white-water rivers of blood all surging into stormy oceans of tears. But this aching, longing yearning is for something much loftier than some palliative that will dull the unbearable pain and eclipse the nightmarish memory. We ache for the heightened consciousness of reassessment. The paradigm shifts that will make us “regret” ever thinking that the Golus was painful. The highest consolation and comfort inheres in understanding that all of the stumbles, pain and humiliation were nothing of the kind, that they were all good. When HaShem heightens and expands our consciousness to reassess our Golus then and only then will our Nation have been comforted and consoled. We dare not settle for anything less.

Adapted from Resisei Layla end of Chapter 45, on Page 91

The Tree of Life Heals the Tongue

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An installment in the series
From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School
For series introduction click here.
By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz

All of the historical tragedies associated with the 9th of Av are rooted in the sin of the Spies, a sin of Lashon Hara. Anyone wanting to be “part of the solution” that will transform the 9th of Av into a Moed should use all available ways and means to be metaken Lashon Hara i.e. to heal and repair their damaged faculty for speech.

The Midrash Rabbah at the beginning of our Parsha states: HaKadosh Baruch hu declared “Come see how treasured the power of the Torahs tongue is; in that it cures the human tongue….Rebbe Levy said the proof is from our own Parsha. Before Moshe acquired Torah he acknowledged ‘I am not a man of words…rather, I am heavy of mouth and heavy of tongue’ (Shemos 4:10) but once he acquired Torah, his “heavy tongue” was cured and he began to speak. As our pasuk says ‘These are the words which Moshe spoke to all Israel in Transjordan’

Rav Leibeleh Eiger sheds light on this Midrash based on the Gemara in Sanhedrin 99B.

There, the Gemara explains the Psukim in Iyov 5:6 “For Man is born to labor” and in Mishlei 16:26 “The laboring mans soul exerts itself for him; for his mouth compels him.” as follows: Rebee Elazar said: the pasuk in Iyov is ambiguous as to whether man was born to labor physically or verbally. The second pasuk ‘for his mouth compels him’ proves that man was born for verbal labor. Yet, there is still some vagueness as to whether man was born to labor verbally in Torah or in everyday conversation. We gain clarity from the Pasuk in Yehoshua 1:8 “This Sefer Torah shall not budge from your mouth; you should put it into words day and night.”

The upshot of this Gemara is that the human faculty for speech was created exclusively for Divrei Torah. When one wants to utilize their power of speech for words devoid of Torah but catches himself and reflects “Why should I speak? My mouth was not created for this kind of speech! “and when, as a result of this rumination, he changes the subject matter of the conversation to Torah topics, he edifies and “heals” his mouth through Divrei Torah.

This provides us with a deeper insight into Moshe Rabenus assessment that “I am not a man of words…” It is not that he was not being self-deprecatory. Instead he was expressing his profound awareness of the true raison d’etre of human speech. In essence he was acknowledging that, absent Torah, why should a human labor verbally? Why should one speak at all? Of all speech-endowed human beings Moshe Rabenu deserved to receive the Torah and speak its word because of his unique awareness that any speech is impossible without HaShems consent and assistance. But once he did receive the Torah then “These are the words which Moshe spoke to all Israel!” That is to say that only these (i.e.)Torah words which Moshe spoke are capable of being spoken.

We too can achieve the Torahs therapeutic effect on our speech if we come to comprehend, as Moshe Rabenu did, that unless it is in harmony with HaShems will and unless He facilitates it, that no human verbal communication is even possible.

In order to avoid Lashon Hara it’s essential to master the Halachos of Shmiras HaLashon. But to actually cure our sickly tongues, to achieve spiritual oral health and to be metaken the sin of the spies we need to follow Rav Leibeleh Eigers advice and comprehend that; absent Torah, why bother laboring verbally?

As his Rebbes Rebbe , the Kotzker, might have put it “ I don’t want Chasidim who are too frum to speak Lashon Hara. I want Chasidim so engrossed in speaking Divrei Torah that they are too busy to speak Lashon Hara!”

Adapted from Imrei Emes Devarim D.H. B’Midrash Rabbah

Holy-Anger Havens for Anger Mismanagement Refugees

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From the Waters of the Shiloah: Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School

For series introduction click.

By Rabbi Dovid Schwartz

The Mitzvah of earmarking Refuge Cities is introduced in Parshas Ma’asei: (B’Midbar 35:6) Along with the cities that you shall give to the Levi’im, shall be the six refuge cities, places to which a murderer can flee.  Beside these you shall give (the Levi’im) forty two more cities.

Why must Refuge Cities be manned and operated by Levi’im and not by any of the other tribes of Yisrael?   Based on the Izhbitzers teachings Rav Tzadok,  the Kohen of Lublin,  offers this fascinating approach:

A.  The Mishna in Avos  4:21 teaches that there are three primary roots of sin: “ Kina-Fury-infused-jealousy, Ta’avah-lust and Kavod-respect-chasing”.  Each of these sin-roots find their Tikun-amelioration through various drastic and meaningful changes. Shiniu Makom-a change of location, Shinui Ma’aseh-a change in behavioral patterns or Shinui HaShem-a change in name/ identity.

B.  For everything that exists in the sphere of Kedusha there exists something corresponding to it in the adversarial sphere of impurity/ entropy. As the Pasuk in Koheles (7:14) states: “In the day of goodness be of good spirit and in the day of evil calamity reflect; for Elokim has reciprocally patterned these opposite those… “

Allowed free reign and taken to its logical conclusion fury-infused-jealousy (Kina) results in homicide, the irreversible removal of the target of the jealous fury. The Tikun for this particular sin-root is “change of location”. This is why the Torah imposed exile to be metaken the sin of manslaughter. And yet, the Torah does not demand a nomadic life of perpetual, rootless wandering to accomplish this tikun*. Instead, it provides for a refuge city.  This is because fury-infused-jealousy has an “upside” that can find expression in the sphere of Kedusha.  Holy Kina is rooted in Yitzchok Avinus trait of Gevura.  Among other things it manifests itself in, “[When] a Talmid Chacham gets incensed it is the heat of the Torah within him boiling over” (Ta’anis  4A).  This is why Torah dictates that these cities be inhabited by Levi’im, as they are one of the tribes whom Yaakov Avinu had branded as furious*.

It is well known that the commandments of “Do not kill” and “Do not commit adultery” are polar opposites. When emanating from the sphere of Kedusha, fury-infused-jealousy is antithetical to sins of lust *. No doubt Yosef HaTzadik, who embodies the definitive sacred suppression of lust, employed “holy” fury to withstand the greatest of lustful temptations in history. Holy fury is a spiritual legacy that Yosef bequeathed to all of Israel, but most of all to his own tribal descendants *. Ramot-Gilead and Shechem were both cities located within tribal homelands of Yosef and where, per Chaza”l, there was a lopsided number of murderers (Malkos 9B-10A).

It is no coincidence that both became refuge cities.  By dint of spiritual genetics there was a disproportionate degree of “the boiling-over heat of the Torah” in the tribal homelands of Yosef that concentrated most of all in and around the cities of Ramot-Gilead and Shechem. But when fury expands beyond the boundaries of holiness into the sphere of impurity/ entropy it can result in manslaughter, the ultimate expression of fury-infused-jealousy. As “HaShem does not make unreasonable demands on His creatures” (Avodah Zarah 3A) Ramot-Gilead and Shechem became refuge cities to better accommodate the “hereditary” spike in manslaughter cases to be expected in those regions.

Rav Tzadok continues: “I heard an insight on the Pasuk (Shir HaShirim 6:5) ‘Your hair is as a flock of goats, cascading down from Gilead’ from my Master, the holy Izhbitzer. It is well-known, hair symbolizes Gevura-strength and Dinim–strict, pitiless justice*. These derive their holiness from Mt. Gilead.”

Space constraints do not allow for an explanation of how a change in behavioral patterns ameliorates lust or how a change in name/ identity ameliorates respect-chasing. For a full and fascinating treatment of these refer to the source.

Adapted from Tzidkas HaTzadik 80

______________________________________________________

Notes:

to accomplish this tikun . As was demanded of Kayin, histories first murderer. Strikingly, Kayins fratricide was motivated by fury-infused-jealousy. See Bereshis 4:8-12

branded as furious.  See Bereshis 49:5-7

 antithetical to sins of lust.  In explaining why the Nazir must grow his hair long The Mei HaShiloach (Beha’aloscha D.H. V’He’eviru) states: The Talmud (Kidushin 40A) teaches that if a person feels that he may succumb to the evil inclination for lust that he “should cloak himself in black”. This means he that he should force  Marah Shechora– melancholy upon himself, depression being nothing more than an inward-directed anger. The Zohar teaches that hair is indicative of anger. The Nazir, attempting to address a tendency for ta’avah-lust must arouse himself to anger to defeat and suppress this tendency. Thus, he must grow out his hair.

 his own tribal descendants. Compare Takanat HaShavin page 47 D.H. U’V’hiyos

 strength and Dinim – strict, pitiless justice. See the above note on “antithetical to sins of lust”

 

 

Be Like Pinchos. Don’t Reinvent Yourself… Reincarnate Yourself!

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From the Waters of the Shiloah-Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School

Imagine if you could live your life over again with total recall of all of your mistakes and missed opportunities AND with the accumulated wisdom, experiences and skills to seize all the missed opportunities and to avoid all the mistakes! Such a life would be truly deathless. RavTzadok – The Kohen of Lublin tells us how to live this dream:

When a person resolves to be Moser Nefesh-to die a martyrs death to sanctify HaShems Name with absolute sincerity and unconditional decisiveness (i.e. that if is G-d’s will that it is better for him to die than to live, heaven forfend, then he is gladly willing to die) he is, paradoxically, saved from a decree of death. G-d considers his thoughts and kabolos= resolutions that he takes upon himself as though they’ve already been done.. As such, someone sincerely resolved to die, has died! Afterwards, it is as though he were reincarnated and reentered this temporal world a second time cognizant of what he ruined (was mekalkel) in his first incarnation and capable of repairing (being metaken) all of the damage in his new incarnation. Every imaginable sin can be repaired this way as death atones for all.

Pinchos is identified by our sages as the literally immortal Eliyahu Ha Navee. The formula described above was the one employed by Pinchos. He was fully prepared to die when attacking Zimri, who would’ve had the law on his side had he overwhelmed Pinchos. As the Tamud in Sanhedrin82A teaches:“Had Zimri turned around and slain Pinchos he’d be exempted from the death penalty on the grounds of self-defense. ”So while Pinchos did, in fact, survive he was fully prepared to die Ahl Kidush HaShem= to sanctify HaShem’s Name. Thus, he merited the Covenant of Peace and, as Eliyahu, lived forever.

Adapted from Tzidkas HaTzadik 158

From the Waters of the Shiloah – Plumbing the Depths of the Izhbitzer School

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Many veteran Chozrim B’Tshuva grapple with the problem of “plateauing”. The epiphanies and ecstasies of our journeys beginnings become ever-fading memories nearly lost in the mists of time. We yearn for those tempestuous days when every Torah thought was revolutionary and every insight was likely to generate a paradigm shift wherein one conceptual world view is replaced by another. Such insights fast-tracked our spiritual growth, empowered us to make major lifestyle changes and fueled our passion for Torah, Jewish community and our integration into K’lalYisrael. As months turned into years and decades we found ourselves confronted with the same sort of enthusiasm killing rote-Mitzvah-performance and been-there-done-that Torah study that dogged our FFB brethren. Now as we gray about the temples we’ve “arrived” as solid/stolid, well-established members of the Torah middle class. Yet in quiet desperation we ache for some miraculous elixir that will jump-start our growth and ascent.

The Izhbitzer Rebbe, HaGaon Rav Mordechai Yoseph Lainer OBM was the scion of a great Rabbinic dynasty and a leading disciple of the Chasidic schools of Przysucha (P’shischa) and Kotzk. In time he formed his own school. As a Rebbe-Chasidic Master in his own right he groomed and mentored such towering intellects and soaring spirits as Rav Leibeleh Eiger, Rav Tzadok-the Kohen of Lublin, his sons the Bais Yaakov and Rav Shmuel Dov Asher-the Biskovitzer and his grandson the Radzyner-Rav Gershon Henoch, the Ba’al HaT’cheles zecher kulom l’vracha.

Chasidic folklore has it that when Rav Mordechai Yoseph first visited Przysucha the Rebbe Reb Binim challenged him to…“see who’s taller”. Standing back to back, the strapping Rebbe towered over his diminutive neophyte disciple. Still, the Rebbe Reb Binim graciously conceded “Now I’m the taller one. But you’re still young. With the passage of time you shall grow” clearly implying that, ultimately, Rav Mordechai Yosephs level would exceed his own. That the student would grow taller than the mentor.

It was the Rebbe Reb Binim who first nicknamed Rav Mordechai Yoseph the Mei HaShiloach – “The Waters of the Shiloah”. This refers to the Silwan Brook that, by tradition, flowed slowly and deliberately through the Bais HaMikdash Courtyard. This flattering moniker is the Hebrew cognate of “still waters run deep”. The Rebbe Reb Binim said of Rav Mordechai Yoseph “He is like the waters of the Shiloah which flow unhurriedly and reach the deepest depths.”

The Rebbe Reb Binims assessment of the Izhbitzer was both apt and prescient. His Torah insights, and those of the school that he formed, eschew superficiality. While firmly anchored in Torah and Chasidic tradition the Torah of the Izhbitzer school is ground-breaking and, often, radical. An Izhbitzer insight turns everything we knew, all of our conventional Torah wisdom, on its ear. Not by overturning the apple cart but by digging more deeply and, as in the game of Boggleâ„¢, by shifting our vantage point. By turns genuine, profound, authentic and revolutionary the Divrei Torah of the Izhbitzer school have the power to help those of us who have flat-lined spiritually rediscover our red-blooded beating hearts and those of us on autopilot along the broad, well-traveled Torah information super-highway blaze new trails and ascend the roads less traveled.

This series, concentrating on the Parsha or the Jewish calendar, will attempt to draw still waters that run deep from Rav Mordechai Yosephs wellsprings for imbibing by the English speaking public. It is hoped that the refreshing Mei HaShiloach will serve (Mishlei 25:25) “As cold waters to a faint soul, so is good news from a far country” to recapture our youthful ardor to ascend for life.