Thursday, May 29, 2014

Parshas Nasso (5774) - You Can Run But You Can't Hide

Thoughts on The Parsha
Parshas Nasso



You Can Run But You Can't Hide
By: Daniel Listhaus
וַיְדַבֵּר ה' אֶל משֶׁה לֵּאמֹר: דַּבֵּר אֶל בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל וְאָמַרְתָּ אֲלֵהֶם אִישׁ אִישׁ כִּי תִשְׂטֶה אִשְׁתּוֹ וּמָעֲלָה בוֹ מָעַל: וְשָׁכַב אִישׁ אֹתָהּ שִׁכְבַת זֶרַע וְנֶעְלַם מֵעֵינֵי אִישָׁהּ וְנִסְתְּרָה וְהִיא נִטְמָאָה וְעֵד אֵין בָּהּ וְהִוא לֹא נִתְפָּשָׂה

“Hashem spoke to Moshe, saying, “Speak to the B'nei Yisroel and say to them: Any man, if his wife will go astray and commit a trespass against him; and a man will have lain with her carnally, but it was hidden from the eyes of her husband, and she became secluded and she was defiled – but there was no witness against her – and she had not been seized...”
-Nasso 5:11-13

Our parsha deals with the topic of sotah – the women suspected of meeting another man, who is then warned and then later caught again being secluded with him. Despite the usual stance of “innocent until proven guilty”, the Torah demands that this woman go through a difficult process which first tries to get her to admit if in fact she is guilty and if that does not work she is given the bitter waters to drink from. The sotah waters only have a fatal affect if in fact the woman is guilty, if she is innocent then not only will the waters not harm her, but she is actually given a beracha (blessing) to have children.

Amongst the various details of the sotah, Rashi1 comments that a sotah's lying with another man renders her unfit to her husband, whereas a man who lays with another woman, even his wife's sister, is still permitted to his wife. Rashi then continues and writes, “Like the incident of two sisters who resembled each other...”

According to many m'forshim (commentaries), this last line of Rashi was an editorial mistake and placed there by accident, as it has nothing to do with the first part of the Rashi. However, regardless, the incident being referred to is one worthwhile to reflect on.

The Medrash2 relates that there was once two sisters who looked very much alike. One was married to a certain person in one town, and the other was married to a certain fellow in a different town. One of the sister's husbands suspected her (his wife) of being with another man, so he warned her and wanted to take her to the Beis Hamikdash in Yerushalayim to make her drink the sotah-water. However, before he had a chance to do so she ran away to her sister's house . Her sister asked her why she came so suddenly and she explained to her that her husband wanted her to drink the sotah water but that she did not want to. Her sister understood that if she was so worried about drinking the sotah water, she must be guilty so she offered that since they looked extremely similar, they swap places, and that she will drink the sotah water instead of her. Indeed, they went through with their plan and the sister dressed in her clothes and went to drink from the sotah water, which of course had no affect because she was in fact innocent. They were so happy that their plan had worked that they got together and hugged and kissed each other on the mouth. When they kissed, the guilty sister smelled the sotah water and died instantly. The medrash then continues and states that this fulfills that which Shlomo HaMelech wrote in Koheles3, “Man is not in control of the wind, to be able to confine the wind, and he has no authority on the day of death. There is no substitution in war, nor does evil escape him to whom it belongs.”

Oftentimes we find ourselves doing things with the thought, “I hope I do not get caught”. Sometimes it is mere hope, and other times sophisticated schemes are devised to cover up any evidence. However, when it comes to doing things we should not be doing we must take a moment to consider who it is we are trying to fool. The plan of the two sisters sounded perfect to them – identical twins switching places in order for the innocent one to be the one who drinks the sotah water, thereby saving her sister's life. However, the one thing they forgot to take into account was who it was they were trying to outsmart. They may have pulled the wool over the guilty sister's husband's eyes, but they failed to remember that one cannot outsmart G-d.

As humans, we are limited to our own intelligence. Therefore, by definition, everything we think is only through our own brains. For example, sometimes your brain registers others' body language or behavior and interprets it based on what it knows would cause you to act in such a way. Even the most emotionally intelligent people are biased with their own life experiences, habits, and behaviors. As the gemara4 says, “One who declares others unfit, is himself unfit.” However a bigger mistake than failing to recognize this is to actually go so far as to limit G-d to our own intelligence and subconsciously assume to ourselves: “I could outsmart Hashem because if I were G-d I would fall for this trick.” This was the mistake of identical sisters. Their plan seemed fool-proof and would have worked had it not been Hashem – the controller of the entire world – that they were ultimately trying to fool. When it comes to trying to fool Hashem, you could try to run but you certainly cannot hide. If one is meant to die, he will. If one is meant to end up in a certain circumstance, he will. The one Hashem wants to reward will be rewarded, and the one Hashem wants to punish will be punished no matter what. As it says in Mishlei5, and we recite every morning in davening: Rabos machshavos b'leiv ish, va'atzas Hashem hee sakum – There are many designs in the heart of man, but it is only the counsel of Hashem which prevails.

The mishna6 states, “Consider three things and you will not come to sin: Know what is above you – an observant eye, and an attentive ear, and all your deeds are recorded in a book.” Upon reading this mishna, a question immediately comes to mind. Why does the mishna have to list the three items? Just write, “Know what is above you”, and people reading the mishna will understand that it refers to Hashem who knows the past, present, and future, and will reward and punish accordingly?
The mishna7, continuing its discussion of the laws and details of the ben soreir u'moreh (wayward and rebellious son) – the child who gets used to overindulging in meat and wine. Describes certain situations where despite the child doing everything that would make him a ben soreir u'moreh, he will not become one due to the type of meal he was partaking in. The gemara8 which follows comments that one could only be deemed a ben soreir u'moreh if he is in company of bums. If however, there would be even one proper person of standards present, then the child's actions will not be perceived as habitual and the halacha would not categorize him as a ben soreir u'moreh. Being in the company of people with higher standards and morals has an incredible impact on the way one acts because it causes one to be much more conscious of what he is doing.

Similar to this idea, Rabbeinu Yonah offers the following answer to the question on the mishna in Pirkei Avos. He writes that things lose meaning once you begin to drop a description for a title or category instead. Certainly the mishna could have said, “Remember Hashem is above you”, but unfortunately that just does not send the chill down our spines. We say to ourselves, “Okay, I'll remember that”, and then go right ahead and rationalize how we would be able to explain our various actions to Hashem because after all – if we were G-d and we had to rationalize to ourselves, we would accept such arguments and let ourselves off the hook. Therefore, explains Rabbinu Yonah, the mishna chose to provide details: Hashem is omnipresent and is watching and listening to everything we do, say, and think. Not only that, but He never forgets – as if written down.

There is no doubt that this is a fundamental belief and must be the foundation of our every day lives. It is no wonder that the Rama inserts into the first halacha of Shulchan Aruch9 what Dovid HaMelech writes in Tehillim10, which captures this idea: “Shivisi Hashem l'negdi samid...” (“I have set Hashem before me always...”)

May Hashem help us not fall so often into the trap of assuming Hashem is limited, chas v'shalom, to our own level of intelligence and then thinking we could outsmart G-d just because we could outsmart ourselves.
1Rashi Bamidbar 5:13
2Medrash Tanchuma 6 as well as Yalkut Shimoni Koheles 8
3Koheles 8:8
4Kiddushin 70a
5Mishlei 19:21
6Pirkei Avos 2:1
7Sanhedrin 70a
8Ibid. 70b
9Orach Chaim 1:1

10Tehillim 16:8

Photo Credit: Edited picture based on sherimackey.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Slide11-e1393091354133.jpg

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