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| Parshas Emor - Of Mice and Men: Divide and Conquer |
Tuesday, April 29, 2014
From the Archives...Parshas Emor - A Meal Unfit for a King
Parshas
Emor
A
Meal Unfit for a King
By: Daniel Listhaus
“To
be an appeasement for you: unblemished.... Any [animal] in which
there is a blemish you shall not offer, for it will not be an
appeasement for you”
-Emor
22:19-20
The
privilege and opportunity that we are given to be able to offer
karbanos (animal
sacrifices) is tremendous. Each and every karbon
has its own power to aid an individual or tzibbur (the
public) in seeking
mercy, forgiveness, or offering thanks to Hashem. However, there is
an underlying question when it comes to karbanos which
begs to be asked. Why is it forbidden to bring an offering with a
blemish? Take the Karban
Olah, for example.
This is a sacrifice which gets completely burned in the fire on the
mizbe'ach (alter) for
only Hashem. Hashem certainly does not eat the karbon.
In fact, to think so would be heretical. The Rambam1
writes that Hashem has no body. Furthermore, we declare this in Ani
Ma'amin2
and in the prayer of Yigdal3.
Even merely ascribing physical
characteristics to Hashem, such as Him having a mouth and needing to
eat, is forbidden. So why is it that when offering a karbon
to the One who created it, has no need for it, will not eat it nor
sell it for money, it is forbidden to do so if the animal has a
blemish?
Let
us now take this idea a step further. Earlier in the parsha,
a very similar negative commandment is instructed: “Hashem spoke to
Moshe, saying: Speak to Aharon, saying: Any man of your offspring
throughout their generations in whom there will be a blemish – the
bread of his G-d he shall not approach to offer.” The Torah then
continues, “...he [the blemished kohen]
should not come to the paroches (curtain),
and he shall not approach the mizbe'ach,
for he has a blemish...”4
Again, we could ask the same question as before. Hashem created man
and even created this specific kohen with
the blemish he has! How could Hashem give a stamp of disapproval to
something which He Himself created? Is a blemished man somehow
second-tiered in the eyes of Hashem?
Regarding
the kohen who has a
blemish, Rashi5
succinctly explains the issue of him being the one doing the service
of Hashem. Rashi
writes, “It is not proper that he should approach.” Then, Rashi
quotes part of a passuk (verse)
in Malachi, “it is
like [the concept depicted in the verse of] 'Go offer it to your
ruler!'. Let us examine this verse in Malachi
more closely. The complete passuk
reads, “ 'When you present a blind animal for sacrifice is nothing
wrong? And when you present a lame or sick [animal] is nothing wrong?
Present it, if you please, to your leader! Would he be pleased with
you or show you favor?' Said Hashem, master of legions.”6
This passuk in
Malachi is a little
difficult to understand. What does our giving something to Hashem
have to do with how pleased a human king would be if he were
demanding the same thing. Chazal (our
sages) have taught us many times how different Hashem is from a human
king in terms of expectations, “personality”, and virtually every
area – for anything a human could do imperfectly, Hashem could do
perfectly. If so, why does Hashem seem to be as particular as a human
king in the passuk?
It
must be that Rashi is
quoting this passuk to
teach us the following. Certainly Hashem has no need for our animals
at all, let alone the best of them; however, we cannot give to Hashem
something which in our own eyes is not appeasing because, in reality,
giving something not appeasing by our standards to Hashem shows that
we do not really acknowledge the importance and greatness of Hashem,
nor the necessary respect due to Him.
The
Mesilas Yesharim7
writes the following, “...One must beautify one's mitzvos...get
a nice pair of tzitzis,
nice tefillin, nice
sefer Torah,
nice lulav, etc....
for it is not enough to do the mitzvah
alone, rather one must show respect and beautify it. And one who
says, 'Respect [through beautifying and spending extra money on
objects] is a materialistic nonsense which exists only to man, but
Hashem does not care what the condition or state of beauty something
is in; Hashem is above all that and as long as I do the mitzvos
with the right intentions, it is enough', is a sinner.” The Mesilas
Yesharim continues to
explain, “Such a person is called a sinner because Hashem indeed is
called 'The G-d of Honor' and we are obligated to give Him this
respect even though He certainly does not need it.”
But
why is this so? Why is it that Hashem demands of us a respect which
He does not need nor get benefit from?
Perhaps
the answer to this question is exactly within what the Mesilas
Yesharim, the passuk
in Malachi, and Rashi
are trying to describe. We as humans have a certain “currency” we
use when it comes to giving honor to those who deserve respect, which
is to present things beautifully and nicely even if it means to spend
some extra money or go the extra mile. Sending the handsomest
individual with the largest lexicon and most oral capabilities, is
what a community would certainly do if it wanted to appease a
government, board, or influential group. Similarly, if one was to
host an event for a wealthy family, certainly everything would be
perfect, and only the best-of-the-best meat and wine would be
prepared and served to the royal guests. It is through these methods
which we know of to give respect and honor to humans, and therefore
we must use these same means when serving and sending messengers to
Hashem. If we send a impaired kohen representative
or an animal with a blemish to Hashem, when we would not do so to our
own leader of flesh-and-blood, then we may fool ourselves into
thinking that the reason we are doing so is because we think to
ourselves, “Hashem is above all these materialistic things anyway”.
However, in reality, the rationalization of this argument is present
because it is being powered by a lack of emunah
(faith) and bitachon (trust)
in Hashem, which causes us to feel that it is not worth spend the
extra money or go the extra mile. Offering something to Hashem which
would not appease man is the litmus test which illustrates that we do
not really care enough to give Hashem the minimum amount of respect
we could; for if we did care to give the utmost honor and respect,
the only way to do so would be to use the currency we are familiar
with and use when offering honor and respect to worthy human leaders.
1Rambam
Hilchos Yesodei HaTorah 1:8
2Third
of the thirteen Ani Ma'amins, commonly
known as the thirteen principles of faith.
3Third
line of Yigdal, Morning
Prayer Service. (The thirteen lines of Yigdal follow
the thirteen principles of faith.)
4Vayikra
21:18
5Rashi
Vayikra 21:18
6Malachi
1:8
7Mesilas
Yesharim, R' Moshe Chaim
Lazzato, Chapter 19
Cover Picture Credit: Edited picture from http://www.founditemclothing.com/itgoesto11/i-scream-you-scream-we-all-scream-for-ice-cream-a-gallery-of-5-cool-shirts/
Happy 3rd Birthday Thoughts on the Parsha ! ! !
Believe it or not, Thoughts On The Parsha is now beginning its 4th Cycle It has been an incredible experience and looking back it is amazing to see how many changes have been made.
Three years ago Thoughts on the Parsha began with a D'var Torah on Parshas Emor - A Meal Unfit for a King with about 30 readers via email:
From here we moved on to the blog:
Soon after a new tab appeared:
Which was linked to the new Parsha Stumpers Blog:
Then, as the email list grew larger a new format was sent out:
Baruch Hashem though we were able to move past that eye-sore for the new and improved email:
We graduated past this too with the addition of exciting cover pictures to fit (sometimes :-) ) the D'var Torah's content:
Then, after numerous requests to distribute the D'var Torah via social media, the Thoughts on Parsha Google+ Page was created with a beautiful stream of everything posted from the Dvar Torah Blog, Parsha Stumpers, and more recently: Shaar Hazechira (from Orchos Tzadikim) and Pirkei Avos, complete with pictures and the ability to share and +1 ...... #Awesome!
Okay, So I admit, I have not been able to post the Sha'ar Hazechira and Pirkei Avos as often as I would like, but am trying.
Now, Baruch Hashem, Thoughts on the Parsha has expanded and directly reaches hundreds and hundreds of people each week and shared with many many more! There are readers of all ages and across the spectrum of Judaism, from around the world including the United States, Canada, Israel, Russia, Central and South America, England, France, and Australia!
I am looking forward to another year of learning the parshiyos and sharing my thoughts with you.
Thank you again.
Daniel
Thursday, April 24, 2014
From the Archives...Parshas Kedoshim
Parshas Kedoshim
Caught
in a Lie
By:
Daniel Listhaus
לֹא
תִּגְנֹבוּ וְלֹא תְכַחֲשׁוּ וְלֹא
תְשַׁקְּרוּ אִישׁ בַּעֲמִיתוֹ:
וְלֹא
תִשָּׁבְעוּ בִשְׁמִי לַשָּׁקֶר
וְחִלַּלְתָּ אֶת שֵׁם אֱלֹקיךָ
אֲנִי ה'ה
“You
shall not steal, and you shall not deny falsely, and you shall not
lie to one another. And you shall not swear falsely by My Name,
thereby desecrating the Name of your G-d – I am Hashem.”
-Kedoshim
19:11-12
The
first passuk
(verse)
of parshas
Kedoshim
begins, “Hashem spoke to Moshe, saying: Speak to the entire
assembly of B'nei
Yisroel and
say to them: You shall be holy, for I, Hashem your G-d, am Holy.”1
Rashi2
comments
that this passuk
teaches
us that this part of the Torah was said b'hakhel
–
at a gathering of the entire B'nei
Yisroel
– because the majority of the essentials of the Torah depend on
it.3
There is no doubt that this parsha
indeed
contains the most basic and fundamental parts of the Torah. After
all, the Aseres
Hadibros are
present throughout the parsha
in
some way or another–
some explicitly and some hinted to. Additionally, the parsha
contains
the mitzva
of
v'ahavta
l'rayacha ka'mocha (love
your fellow as yourself)4
which
is, as Hillel called it, “zeh
klal gadol batorah – this
is a tremendous fundamental in the Torah”.5
Interestingly,
a large part of the mitzvos
in
this vital list of “kedoshim
tehiyu
(you shall be Holy)” are mitzvos
having
to do with being honest and staying away from sheker
(falsehood).
In the aforementioned passuk,
the Torah lists a series of warnings: “You shall not steal, and you
shall not deny falsely, and you shall not lie to one another. And you
shall not swear falsely by My Name, thereby desecrating the Name of
your G-d – I am Hashem.” Rashi6
comments that this juxtaposed series is no coincidence. In fact, the
Torah is teaching us a lesson in human behavior. Rashi
writes as follows, “If you have stolen, your end will be to deny
falsely; and then your end will be to lie; and then your end will be
to swear falsely.”
There
are two questions one could ask on this Rashi.
First, what is the difference between denying falsely and lying? If
one stole something and then denies doing so, that is itself a lie.
So according to this succession of aveiros
(sins)
which
Rashi
is
setting up, how is lying any different from denying falsely?
The
second question one could ask on Rashi
is
that he seems to be taking this whole theory too far. The mishna
in
Bava
Metzia7
discusses a case where two people walk into Beis
Din (Jewish
court), each holding half of a tallis
and
are each claiming that it is entirely his own. The halacha
(law)
that
the Mishna
states
is that they split the tallis
equally
and then each swear that they do not own less than half.8
The Gemara9
then
explains that the sh'vuah
(oath)
was instituted to address an issue which would arise without it.
Imagine if the law would be that whatever two people come into court
holding is automatically split in half between them. With such a law
in place, what would stop people from approaching others and grabbing
a part of whatever they please, dragging them to court, and then
getting to keep half of it? In order to stop such a thing from
possibly happening, this oath was instituted to essentially scare off
dishonest people from taking advantage of the halacha.
We
see from this Gemara
that
swearing falsely in Beis
Din was
no laughing matter. Taking a sh'vuah
in
Beis
Din
was something that even the biggest thief would think twice about. If
so, how could our Rashi
make
such a confident inference from the passuk
that
one who steals will ultimately end up swearing falsely?
Perhaps
we could come to understand the lesson that Rashi
is
teaching us by first understanding an area of human behavior. There
are three phases which a person goes during the process of performing
any action: before, during, and after. The “before stage” is when
we anticipate what to expect with the experience we are about to
undergo. The “during stage” is the stage of the experience
itself, while the last stage is the “after stage”, which consists
of our memories of the experience we had. These three stages are
obvious and known to all, however their relationships with each other
are things which are often not payed much attention to.
Imagine
for a moment that you have decided to take the day off to go to an
amusement park with a couple of friends. You arrive at the park at
10am and spend the day playing different games, going on various
rides, and having a terrific time. Finally, at about 3pm, with only
one hour left to spend at the park, you and your friends decide to
take a break amongst the excitement. So, you sit down together for a
late, but wonderful, picnic lunch. After lunch, you decide to go on
the new super-duper-upside-down-roller-coaster. This starts off as a
great ride until you realize that your lunch is there as well, is not
too happy with you at the moment, and will be waiting to take revenge
the moment you get off the ride. Then, as you begin to get sicker and
sicker, your strong-prescription glasses go flying off without any
warning, and will just as much never be seen again as you will not be
able to see for the rest of the day. You get off the roller-coaster
and are forced to watch your friends go off and continue enjoying
themselves as you stay behind for the remaining hour of your time at
the amusement park sitting at a bench sick to you stomach, and barely
able to see.
There
is no doubt that this day will be remembered as one of the worst in
your life. However, if you would stop to think about it, that would
not be such an accurate analysis. After all, for five out of the six
hours spent at the park, you had a great time. Nonetheless, many of
those pleasures and fun moments will not be able to be recalled later
because the memory of you being sick will kill your memory of
experiencing the great time you had. In other words, peoples'
experiences are tremendously effected on both sides of the actual
event. The attitude which one has when anticipating an experience
will have a tremendous impact on the experience itself; however, to
even a greater degree, the way we choose to remember an experience,
will effect the way we remember it forever.
Our
memory has an incredible influence over our experiences. Some times
this could be good. As a matter of fact, the Orchos
Tzadikkim10
writes
about how great it is to forget and forgive people who have done bad
things to you in the past. However, the power of memory is
simultaneously extremely dangerous. The reason it is dangerous is
because it is easy to manipulate.
The
Orchos
Tzadikkim11
describes
that when someone tells a lie, it generally falls into one of nine
categories. One of these categories is when someone hears a story but
when he says it over to others, he conveniently leaves some parts
out, and adds other parts in to make the story more thrilling. People
are wiling to do this even though there is no inherit benefit to be
gained by either party. Yet, the Orchos
Tzadikkim writes,
one who accustoms himself to saying such lies will result in
testifying falsely. If one becomes someone who allows sheker
to
take control of him, and allows his memories to be manipulated, he
has breached the geder
shel emes – the
fence protecting his truths. This leads to actually believing one's
own lies; and unless he does something to protect himself, he may
easily become someone who testifies falsely about people – not
necessarily because he means to do so, but because he is a person who
is not careful with emes
and therefore such outcomes enter the realm of possibility.
Rashi
writes
that one who steals will eventually come to deny falsely, then will
come to lie, and will ultimately end up swearing falsely. The Maskil
L'Dovid12
writes that the sequence goes as follows. Someone goes ahead and
steals an item from someone else. Then, when asked if he took it, he
will deny it defensively with a definite “no”. The next part of
the time-line is coming up with lies. The thief starts thinking up a
whole story about where he was at the time, what he was doing, and
who else was there. He throws so many vivid details into his story
that he himself starts confusing them with the real details of what
happened. This person who is not careful with protecting his memory
ultimately becomes worse than just a regular thief. He ends up as a
denier and a liar who will get so caught up in his lies to the point
that he will start believing it himself. Once he starts believing the
lies that come out of his mouth, he will have no problem with
swearing falsely. He will believe his own story to the extent that he
will not be scared off by swearing – after all, he is swearing the
truth.
We
must make sure that we take control of our memories and keep them as
accurate as we can in accordance with the experience we experienced.
A memory is extremely important because it has the potential to
recall the facts that we remember experiencing in the past. However,
we must keep in mind the manipulative power that our memory is
capable of, and be careful not to force information into our
memories. Doing so opens up to disaster. Once we let our guard down
and allow ourselves to manipulate our own memories, there is no end
to the aveiros
in
sheker
it
could lead to.
1Vayikra
19:1
2Ibid.
3The
Sifsei Chochomim asks: What
is Rashi saying? The
entire Torah was taught to the entire B'nei Yisroel
from Moshe! He answers with two possible answers. Either that this
parsha was said even
in front of all the women and children (which was not necessarily
the case by the entire Torah), or that this parsha was
said in front of everyone at the same time as opposed to them
learning it from Moshe in groups, as they did for other parts of the
Torah.
4Vayikra
19:18
5Rashi
Vayikra 19:18 brings this from
the Toras Kohanim 19:45.
The Sifsei Chochomim here
adds that in fact Hillel said,
“This mitzva encompasses
the entire Torah. The rest is just its explanation.”
6Vayikra
19:11
7Bava
Metzia 2a
8Bava
Metzia 5b describes exactly why
the sh'vuah (oath)
must be made in this specific way.
9Bava
Metzia 3a
10Sha'ar
HaShich'cha
11Sha'ar
HaSheker
12Vayikra
19:11-12
Friday, April 11, 2014
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