|
Tales
for the Shabbos Table
This week's section tells us of the
final exodus of the Jews from Egypt; the crossing of the "Yam
Suf" (Red Sea) and the destruction therein of the entire
Egyptian army.
We learn that after this happeded,
G-d rained Manna for them from heaven and made them rich from
the wealth that was washed up on the shores of the Sea (in
addition to the gold and silver that they took out of Egypt).
But later we will learn that the Jews
rebelled because of these very things. They complained bitterly
about the Manna and made an idol, the golden calf, from the
gold!
What went wrong?
To understand this, here is a story
about the previous (sixth) Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef
Yitzchak Shneerson, who passed away onthe Tenth (Yud) of Shvat
fifty-two years ago (this past Wednesday was Yud Shevat).
When Yosef Yitzchak was just a lad
of eleven he already had a "free-loan fund". The
money came from rewards his father, the holy Fifth Lubavitcher
Rebbe, Shalom Dov-Ber, who gave him a for each section of
Jewish oral law (Mishna) he learned by heart. He had amassed
about sixty rubles, which he loaned without interest to Jews
in need, especially shopkeepers in the marketplace.
Once a week, every market day, he would
be found in the marketplace collecting or extending his loans
and making new ones. But what he especially loved was to be
near the simple shopkeepers and learn from their wholehearted
belief in the Creator.
One Jew that he especially liked was
the almost totally illiterate "Dovid the Butcher".
Dovid was about fifty years old, but was strong and healthy,
and would do any sort of honest work no matter how menial
or difficult to earn a few pennies to feed his wife and four
children. He always had a blessing on his lips and a smile
revealing a set of white shining teeth in contrast to his
dirty-blacked face (earning him the nickname "Baal HaSheniem",
"Mister Teeth").
One market day young Yosef Yitzcak
saw Dovid walking happily through the street carrying a young
calf on his shoulders, a sheep under his arm, and a basket
of chickens hanging around his neck.
"Hello!" Shouted Dovid with
a smile, "I hope to G-d I'll make a nice profit off these!".
Suddenly one of the local policemen appeared from nowhere,
ran up to Dovid and punched him full force in the face! The
bewildered Jew staggered backward blood running from his nose
as the policeman prepared to give him another blow.
Now this was no simple matter. The
local police were cruel drunkards that took their frustration
out on everyone, especially Jews. But they were the ultimate
power in the area and everyone was petrified of them. In fact,
if a Jew saw a policeman he would always move to the other
side of the street from sheer trepidation.
But Yosef Yitzchak removed these thoughts
from his mind and fearlessly yelled, "Drunkard! Disgusting
Pig!" as he ran toward the officer, pushed him with all
his might and almost knocked him over.
The startled policeman, who was four
times as big as the boy, forgot temporarily about beating
poor Dovid, caught his balance and turned his wrath on the
lad. "Grab him! Take him to the jail!" He screamed
to one of his colleagues that appeared on the scene. "Look!
He tore my prize medal from my jacket." (Which was a
lie).
His collegue grabbed the boy by the
neck and rushed him through the crowd to the jailhouse. There
he was greeted with curses and shouting by the jailer on duty
who slapped him in the face, grabbed his ear, led him down
a corridor to a series of doors that opened to pitch black
rooms, pushed him into one and slammed the door shut behind
him.
Later Yosef Yitzchak related: "At
first I was shaking with fear. What would become of me, a
young boy sitting in a black dungeon in the midst of seasoned
criminals?
But then suddenly I became filled with
pride. I was sitting in prison because I helped a Jew. I risked
my life just like my predecessors and my forefathers up to
the first Jew Abraham!
Suddenly a muffled moaning and thrashing
from a side of the room disturbed my pleasant thoughts. Fear
again entered my heart. I had no idea what it was, (perhaps
a dying man?) because the room was without light. I called
out, but there was no answer. So I sat in the dark and thought
to myself that I should do something positive.
I decided to recite the Mishnas I had
learned by heart. I thanked G-d that my father encouraged
me to learn so much, and after an hour I finished all Seder
Zeroim. My trust was completely in G-d that everything would
turn out for the best and I felt calm enough that I stood
and prayed the afternoon prayer with great happiness.
When I sat back down to continue reciting
(I knew all of the Moed section as well) I heard that moaning
again, and it was then I remembered that I had a box of matches
in my pocket. I was supposed to deliver them to someone in
the market, but because of what happened I wasn't able to.
I took out the box, struck a match, and in the flickering
yellow light I saw what was making the noise. It was a calf
tied up and gagged lying in the corner, but it wasn't the
same one that Dovid was carrying when I met him in the market.
It was a different one.
Relieved, I sat back down in the dark
and resumed my recitation, and about an hour later, the door
opened and the jailer appeared but this time he was a different
man." "Forgive me!" he said, almost whining,
"I
didn't know that you were the nephew of Rabbi Zalman Aharon
(My father's brother who was respected by even the highest
officials because of his wisdom and talents). "And please
forgive that slap I gave you. After all I didn't break any
of your teeth or anything. I'm just used to hardened criminals
etc."
"I was led out of the room to
the courtroom where an informal trial was in place. Dovid,
his nose and face all swollen, was standing before the captain
of the station. The policeman that punched and arrested him
was also there trying to accuse Dovid of stealing the calf
he carried in the market, and two witnesses were testifying
that they saw Dovid buy the calf from someone else.
I was released and met outside by one
of my uncle's helpers, and when I told him of what happened
and of the gagged calf that shared my prison room, he returned
to the station and ordered an investigation. A few minutes
later the truth was revealed; the policeman had stolen that
calf earlier in the day from someone else and hid it in the
prison room (thinking that no one would reveal it) hoping
to sell it that evening. When he saw Dovid carrying another
calf he thought he could pin the one he stole on him and maybe
get Dovid's calf as well.
It was a foolish plan. The policeman
was fired and had to sit in jail. The police apologized to
Dovid and my father gave me a reward for being so devoted
to giving charity and risking my life to help others.
And that was the first time I sat in
prison."
This answers our question. True the
Jews had everything in the desert; riches, food, security.
But they were missing something very important; they didn't
have the chance to give charity!
And because they didn't help each other,
which is the essence of Judaism (Rabbi Akiva said, "Brotherly
love is the entirety of the Torah") they became selfish
and were never satisfied with what they had, until it even
brought them to idolatry.
If so, we can ask a question. Mimonedies
says in the end of his Masterwork "Mishna Torah"
that all Judaism is aimed at bringing the Moshiach who will
bring utopia in this world. There will be no hunger, war etc.
and there will be such plenty that nothing will be lacking.
Perhaps this is undesirable? Won't it bring to the same selfishness
as it did to the Jews in the desert?
The answer however is simple: The reason
G-d gave the Jews plenty in the desert was so they would turn
their COMPLETE attention to Him. As it says about the Manna
(Deut. 8:3) "G-d made you hungry by giving you Manna."
Namely when they saw how G-d miraculously and mysteriously
provided all their needs they were supposed to have become
"hungry" for the Infinite; not to be concerned with
the Manna or the wealth but rather with the source of the
Manna and the wealth..
So it will be in the days of Moshiach
when the entire world will hunger only for G-dliness. Then,
as the Mimonedies says the only occupation of the world will
be only to know G-d.
But it all depends on our good deeds
and acts of charity and kindness now.
Moshiach NOW!
Rabbi Tuvia Bolton
Yeshiva Ohr Tmimim
Kfar Chabad Israel
Torah Online Site: http://www.ohrtmimim.org/torah
Tales
for the Shabbos Table
This week we read about the spectacular
escape of the Jews through … the
‘Red’ Sea.
[Off the subject, Yam Suf does not
mean Red Sea! Moshiach will have to fix
that along with all the non-Jewish Ten-Commandment Tablets
(they really were
square) and rounded branched Menorahs (really were diagonal)]
In the prophet Micha (7:15) it tells
us that the Exodus was only a
preparation for (and a mild example of) the redemption through
Moshiach that
we are all impatiently expecting. So what can we learn from
the following:
It says in this week’s portion
(14:31) that after the Jews crossed the sea:
“They believed in G-d and Moshe His servant”.
Why does the Torah tell us this? That
although HaShem miraculously destroyed
Egypt with ten plagues, brought manna from heaven, water from
a rock, clouds
of glory, and split the sea … the Jews only began believing
in Him when
they came out of the sea?!
Also what does it mean to ‘believe’
in Moshe?
And finally; how can the belief in
Moshe be equated with the belief in
HaShem? Why are they written together??
I would like to explain with a story.
The story begins with a ‘Farbringen’
(Chassidic gathering) of the Chassidim
of the previous Lubavitch Rebbe in France shortly before WWII.
The Rebbe’s
son-in-law (who in another ten years would become the next
Lubavitch Rebbe)
was also present and he was the main speaker, but some of
the other
Chassidim also spoke.
One of them told of a miraculous experience
that he had two years earlier.
After escaping death in Russia the Rebbe had to move his headquarters
to
Poland and many Chassidim moved there to be with him. But
in the course of
his stay the Rebbe told many of them to leave Poland and settle
in other
countries, for instance the one telling the story was one
of a group of five
that the Rebbe told to go to France.
Now back in those days this was no
small task; they had several borders to
cross, among them dreaded Germany, and to make matters worse
one of them had
an non-valid passport and no time to get a new one; the Rebbe
told them to
leave immediately.
On the trains, one of them would lie
on the bench and the other four would
sit on him, covering him with their long winter coats to avoid
the passport
checks. And they even managed somehow to pass all the other
borders. But
the check post at the German border was notoriously dangerous,
especially
for Jews, and for Jews with no passports it was almost suicide.
They decided on some sort of plan,
but as they neared the front of the line
they heard shouting and screaming from inside the inspection
center, then a
pistol shot followed by a moan and silence. They tried to
look as confident
as possible but were really trembling inside, if it wasn’t
for the Rebbe’s
blessing they would all have turned back and returned to Poland
on the spot.
But to their amazement when the first
Chassid got to the window, the
official snatched his passport from his hand and stamped it
without asking
questions! And so he did to the second. Then he began talking
on the phone
and stamped the remaining three passports without even looking
at them!
But their problems were far from over; the place was full
of cruel
robot-eyed policemen and soldiers checking and rechecking
everything and
everyone that moved (probably that is where the shots came
from) but
strangely the police paid no attention to them! They walked
through the
station unnoticed, as though they were invisible, hailed a
taxi, and left.
One half hour later they were in a telegraph office sending
a message back
to the Rebbe … they were free! It was a miracle!!
The Rebbe’s son-in-law listened
attentively to the story. When it finished
he asked for the exact date and time of the miracle and when
he heard the
answer he smiled and said, “Now I understand something
that was a mystery to
me these last two years.
“The Rebbe, my father-in-law,
had to have a nurse come in every day and
give him an injection because of his health. (After his imprisonment
and
torture in Stalin's prisons he became increasingly paralized).
" One day the nurse came in and
saw a frightening sight: the Rebbe was
sitting rigidly in his chair, eyes slightly open and completely
unresponsive. She was sure that he was having a catatonic
attack of some
sort, and immediately called the Rebbe’s wife. When the
Rebbitzen entered
she began weeping frantically, but before they called a doctor
they called
for me.
“When I entered I also was shocked
at first, but then I noticed something
that made me realize that there was noting to worry about;
it was almost
imperceptible but the Rebbe’s lips were moving, he was
saying or reciting
something!
“I bent down and listened and
then straightened up and announced that there
was, in fact, no cause for alarm …the Rebbe was saying
“Az Yashir Moshe”
(The song that the Jews sang after crossing Yam Suf. (Shmot
15:1 –19)!!
“After ten minutes the Rebbe opened his eyes and returned
to normal.
“I never asked the Rebbe for an
explanation but now I have it. It was the
exact same time that your miracle was occurring. The Rebbe
was passing you
all through the German inspection like Moshe passed the Jews
through the
sea!
That is the Job of a Rebbe; to help
free Jews.
Now we can answer the above questions.
There was something unique about the
miracle of Yam Suf. In all the
previous miracles the Jewish people did not have any spiritual
uplifting.
They had been freed from physical bondage but spiritually
they were not yet
really G-d’s people; G-d seemed to them to be a separate
entity and they
believed in Him from ‘afar’.
But at Yam Suf it all changed. The
Lubavitch Rebbe explains that when Moshe
split the sea, ‘all the water in the world’ (Rashi
14:21) even the highest
spiritual levels ‘split’. The heavens no longer
concealed the Creator and
the natural soul no longer concealed the G-dly soul. The Jews
saw not just
the spiritual but also the source of the spiritual (Rashi
15:2 ‘zeh’) and
their consciousness became united with the Infinite One for
the first time
in history.
But equally important, they saw that
it all was because of Moshe; without
Moshe they could never have achieved it on their own.
That is why the Torah equates Moshe
with G-d.
This is the Torah’s message here
for us:
In every generation, just as Moshe lifted the people and prepared
them for
the giving of the Torah, there are Tzadikim like the Lubavitch
Rebbe,
preparing the Jewish nation for Moshiach and the coming redemption.
That is the purpose of the teachings of the Baal Shem Tov
called ‘Chassidut’
(especially that of Chabad called ‘Torat Ha Moshiach’)
to change the
consciousness of the Jewish people and awaken their unique
Jewish souls.
To make everyone realize, as the Rebbe
said, ‘Moshiach is here; we must only
open our eyes!!
We have to devote just a bit more time
each day to the learning of Chassidut
so we will all be expecting....
Moshiach NOW!!
Rabbi Tuvia Bolton
Yeshiva Ohr Tmimim
Kfar Chabad Israel
back to top
|
PARSHA
MOSHIACH
IN THE PARSHA
WEEKLY
MESSAGE