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Tales
for the Shabbos Table
It is written in the Talmud (Shabbat 88b)
that with each Divine utterance
G-d spoke to the Jews at Mount Sinai they all died and G-d had
to repeatedly
revive them.
The Torah even tells us (Deut. 5:22-24)
that the experience was so traumatic
that after the first two commandments they begged Moses to make
it stop and
go receive the rest of the Torah on his own.
At first glance this makes absolutely no
sense.
The Torah is just a book, why did they
have to die? What killed them?
There are a lot of religions that have religious books and no
one had to die
to get them. Not only that, but the Torah is called Torat CHIAM.
the Torah
of LIFE, and the tree of Life!! So why did they die?!
Here is a story to help us understand.
In the city of Annipoli lived a devoted
Chassid (follower) of the Holy Rabbi
Zusia of Annipoli who was a rich businessman specializing in precious
stones
and almost anything else of major value.
His biggest business was done in the one
month of the year that he would
travel to the massive fair in Leipzig.
First he would go to Rebbe Zusia for a
blessing, then travel to the fair and
finally return with big profits. He always gave a big percentage
to charity
and the rest of the year he sat and learned Torah while preparing
for the
next year's fair.
But one year the Rebbe told him. NOT to
travel!
At first Yaakov couldn't believe his ears.
He just stared, shocked and
speechless for several seconds then timidly repeated the Rebbe's
words,
"Not. not to travel? Not to go.. to the fair?"
The Rebbe just nodded slightly and poor
Yaakov, realizing he had nothing
more to do there, confusedly backed out of the room.
But when he got home his wife didn't take
the news so benignly. "What?!"
She screamed "Not to travel!? What are you going to do..close
the business?
Sweep the streets? Sell diamonds in Annipoli? Did you ask the
Rebbe what you
should do instead?! Are you sure the Rebbe understood the question?"
She<
even suggested that he go back . but that was out of the question!
A Rebbe
doesn't make mistakes!
But she didn't let up and soon his in-laws,
brothers, partners, investors
and even a few friends heard the news and joined in until Yaakov
thought he
was going mad. Suddenly his wife had a brainstorm idea:
"You know, Rebbe Elimelech of Lezinsk
is Rabbi Zusia's brother and he is
also a holy famous Tzadik. ... Maybe go see what he has to say!"
At first Yaakov tried to resist. after
all he already had a clear answer
from Rebbe Zusia, but when everyone started putting on the pressure
he began to think differently. Certainly Rebbe Elimelech would say the
same thing as
Rebbe Zusia and then everyone would finally leave him alone.
He traveled to Lezinsk, easily got an audience
with the Holy Tzadik and told
him what had happened with Rav Zusia his family.
Rabbi Elimelech answered,
"Tell me. you are a Mohel (one who
knows how to circumcise babies) correct?"
Yaakov, just shook his head yes. In fact he was an expert Mohel
and it was
treasured hobby of his to gladly offer his services whenever a
Jewish father
had a baby to circumcise. How Rab Elimelech knew he had no idea...
but what
did it have to do with this?
"Well" continued the Rebbe, "I
want to teach you a special formula that will
stop bleeding when nothing else works." Only after he was
sure Yaakov had
learned it by heart did he continue.
"Now then, you ask about going to
Leipzig? You say my brother said no?!" he
asked rhetorically, "And you come to me!!?" he continued
in an almost angry
tone.
Yaakov began to regret coming.
"Well..." Rabbe Elimelech paused
. "I say YES. YES you SHOULD go to
Leipzig!!
Rab Yaakov's jaw dropped in astonishment
and the Rebbe continued,
"In this case my brother Zusia saw
only until the river. but I see AFTER the
river!"
Yaakov had no idea what the Rebbe was talking
about and he didn't really
care. He returned home with wings on his feet and a joyous song
on his lips
and in two days he was on his way; bags packed and pockets filled
with
precious gems and large sums of money.
The trip was pleasant as never before and
the weather was beautiful. He had
a good feeling; a feeling that this trip would be something special.
A BIG
success.
But, as the sun was setting and they were
just hours before Leipzig,
tragedy struck.
The barge that they were crossing the river
on struck something under the
water and with a sickening crunch suddenly reeled over and before
they knew
it the ship was gone and everyone was up to their necks in the
cold, black
river, fighting for their lives against the strong current, .
Yaakov grabbed on to some piece of flotsam
and after what seemed like hours
washed up on the shore. It was dark, freezing cold, all his outer
garments
had been swept away by the current; he had lost everything! And
now he was
almost naked, penniless, alone and freezing to death. a stranger
in a
strange empty frightening land.
In the distance he saw a large house and,
shivering uncontrollably, he ran
in that direction. When he got to the front door he began pounding
and
screaming for help. "Help! Let me in.. I'm freezing!! Throw
me a blanket!! Please!" The door opened, a Jewish man peeked out, undid
the latch and
said.. "Come in! Come in quickly!" The last thing Yaakov
noticed as he fell
unconscious into the man's arms was the Mezuza on the door.
He awoke several minutes later, wrapped
in warm blankets near the stove. "Ahh! Thank G-d!" Said his host, "you're all right".
We were really
worried. What happened?"
As Yaakov came to himself he told his sad
story. True it was a miracle he
was alive, but he had lost his entire fortune. Everything!! Now
he
understood why Rabbi Zusia didn't want him to come... Probably
Rebbe
Elimelech wanted to teach him humility.
Suddenly his host asked. "Tell me,
You're from Annipoli maybe you know of
someone over there in Annipoli or Lezinsk that is an expert Mohel?"
"What? Why," Yaakov replied "I
myself am a Mohel, and an expert Mohel as
well. at least that's what the Rabbis say." He was still
shivering a bit.
"Ahhh!" exclaimed his host "Maybe
you can help me! I have a heartbreaking
problem and for almost ten years now I can't find the solution."
Yaakov was all ears.
"My wife has given birth five times
and all boys!"
"Mazal Tov! What is the problem?"
asked Yaakov
"The problem is that the first two
children passed away."
"Oh, I'm sorry."
"They bled to death. When they were
circumcised the Mohel could not stop the
bleeding may HaShem have mercy! And now the law is that it is
forbidden to
circumcise the other three. For years I have looking for a Mohel
that knows
of a way to stop the bleeding.. Perhaps you .."
Suddenly Reb Yaakov remembered what Rebbe
Elimelech taught him and told his
host about it.
His host observed Rab Yaakov for several
days and when he was sure he was
normal and could be trusted, the Brit (circumcision) was set for
that day
and .. The potion worked! It stopped the bleeding!!!
The next day Rab Yaakov circumcised the
other two children and his host,
beside himself with joy, rewarded him royally. It seems this fellow
was a
multi-millionaire, one of the richest men in Leipzig!! Yaakov
was suddenly
worth over ten times what he lost!!
Suddenly he understood what Rebbe Elimelech
meant about the 'Other side of
the river."
This answers our question.
Just as Rab Yaakov had to lose everything
in order to gain untold riches so
the Jews had to die at Sinai.
The Torah is not just a religion book.
Religions and their various Bibles
only claim to teach how to invest one's time and energy in the
lower physial
aspect of creation in order to move up to the spiritual afterlife.
But this
requires no more transformation than, say, any course in self-improvement.
But at Mount Sinai the Jews became transformed
into new TYPES of beings! A
GOY KADOSH (here 19:6) A Holy race that can connect the ENTIRE
CREATION
(through the physical commandments) to the INFINITE ALLMIGHTY!!
Therefore they had to die.
Death usually means departure of the soul
from the boundaries of the
physical . but in this case it meant leaving the boundaries of
all
creation!!! And getting the power to reveal the ESSENCE of G-d
IN THIS
WORLD! (Like it was in the Holy of Holies).
In fact Matan Torah was similar to what
will be at the Raising of the Dead
(See Tanya end of Chapt 36) and if the Jews hadn't sinned with
the Golden
Calf they would have lived eternally IN THEIR BODIES!!
But all this, as fantastic as it seems,
is NOT in the past G-d forbid.
We all have this power till this very day!
And the Raising of the Dead is
the real goal and hope of the Jewish people NOW!
Through our, faith, joy, love and work
in the LIVING Torah . we too will
experience the revelation of HaShem in the entire world and everything
will
return to eternal life with..
Moshiach NOW!!
Rabbi Tuvia Bolton
Yeshiva Ohr Tmimim
Kfar Chabad, Israel
Tales
for the Shabbos Table
This weeks Torah portion tells
us about the giving of the Torah; a story
which has no comparison in history, and which defies even human
imagination.
But what does it mean today?
To understand, here is a story.
In New York there is a special daily Torah
learning program for elderly
men. It is run by a Chabad Chassid, and it is very successful.
Every day
hundreds of retired Jews are bussed in from throughout the New
York area
to attend the classes.
Because the majority of participants are
not Chabad Chassidim, the
Chassid never mentioned Chabad Philosophy or even spoke much about
the
Lubavitcher Rebbe. But one Chabad holiday, perhaps it was the
Rebbe's
Birthday, the 11th of Nisan, he made a small speech praising him.
But it was a mistake. Only seconds after
he began one of the old men
stood up, pounded on the table and yelled,
"LIES! All LIES!" Your Rebbe
doesn't do any miracles! He doesn't even
know what he's saying!"
The other men turned to listen, and when
he saw that the Chassid wasn't
stopping him he continued;
"That's right! I know the truth! The
whole Rebbe business is a bluff, a
big bluff! You wanna know why?! I'll tell you why! About ten years
ago
my daughter told me she's marrying a gentile. Get it? A gentile!
A
catastrophe! Maybe I'm not so religious...but a non-Jew? That's
too
much! She tells me that he's not going to convert or nothing!
I started
running around, talking to her friends, to Rabbis. Nothing helped.
Then
someone suggested that I go to the Lubavitcher Rebbe and he would
make a
miracle. So I went by him and I told him the problem. You know
what he
did? He gave me a dollar to give to charity and said there was
ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to worry about! So I took his advice and stopped
worrying.
You know what happened? Two months later
they got married and now they
got three children!
So there is your great prophet. A big BLUFFER,
that's what he is!!!"
Everyone in the room was silent. The Chabad
Rabbi was completely
stunned. He had never heard such a story in his life. What could
he say?
But the angry man didn't stop there; he
was "on a roll".
"Not just him! Not just him! ALL the
orthodox Rabbis are a bunch of
crooks. All of 'em! Each and every one. A bunch of fakers and
lazy
bums!"
"Nu!" Said the Chabad Rabbi,
"I understand why you don't like the
Lubavitcher Rebbe, but what have you got against all the other
Rabbis?
What did they do?!"
"What did they do!?" He screamed,
"I'll tell you! Those creeps wouldn't
give me a divorce from my wife. That's right! When I wanted to
divorce
my wife a few years later they made me run around from Rabbi to
Rabbi
like a chicken with no head, and they still refused!"
The director was really confused now. He'd
heard about rabbis refusing
to marry people, but why would they refuse giving a divorce?
"They said some garbage about my wife's
conversion not being good or
something. The fact is they are just a bunch of lazy bums!"
"Hey!" one of the other retirees
called out. "Hey! If your wife wasn't
converted, so your daughter isn't Jewish.. So the Lubavitcher
Rebbe was
right, there WAS nothing to worry about! She married a gentile
like
herself!
What is different about the Jews? Why do
even non-religious Jews care
about their Jewish identity?
The answer is hidden in this week's section.
Before giving the Torah G-d
tells Moses (18:8,9) "If (the Jews) listen to me and keep
(the Torah)
then they will be special and precious...A nation of priests and
a holy
race" etc.
The Torah is the foundation of two other
massive religions and has been
a source of guidance and comfort for billions of people for thousands
of
years. Why does it cause only the Jews to be called "special"
and "holy
priests"? They don't seem any different from anyone else.
Here is another story to help us understand.
Some ten years ago I was present at a Chabad
Shabbat Seminar at a fancy
hotel. The main speaker was Rabbi Yechezkel Sofer, and I was helping
out. After the first evening session I announced that the next
morning
the schedule was that we would learn Chassidut at 8:00 a.m. and
at 9:00
we would begin to pray.
Among the participants were a group of
"Misnagdim" (religious Jews, that
oppose the Chassidic way in general and Chabad particularly) who
came
not so much for the lectures as for the reduced hotel rates, and
as soon
as they heard the announcement about learning Chassidut they protested
for three reasons:
1) They argued that prayer must be done
first thing in the morning.
2) What was the point in learning these
mystical Chassidic ideas about
G-d that no one understands anyway.
3) For over three thousand years Jews did
without Chassidut, their
fathers didn't learn Chassidut and they wouldn't either.
Rabbi Sofer listened and calmly replied
that if they could answer one
simple question he would excuse them wholeheartedly. They, being
Torah
scholars, agreed.
The question was: "What is the meaning
of the word "BORUCH"?" (Jews are
supposed to say one hundred blessings every day and every blessing
begins with this same word which literally means "blessed"
namely;
Blessed are you G-d etc.)
They immediately answered, "Well its
like saying thanks to G-d". "No
no" Answered Rabbi Sofer, "Then it would be a different
word, then it
would be "Modeh" ".
"Alright, then its like praising him
and saying that He's holy" they
tried again."No! The word for that is "Kadosh"
" He answered.
"Well" they tried once more....
"It just means that G-d is blessed"
"What?! We bless G-d!? He needs to be blessed?"
They tried a few more but finally realized
that they really never gave
the subject much thought, and they gave up and asked him what
it means.
"You want to know what it means?"
Rav Sofer asked rhetorically as he
looked each of them in the eye.
"Come to Chassidut - Tomorrow morning
eight o'clock!"
Needless to say they all arrived. And he
explained:
"The word "Boruch" means
to "draw down". G-d purposely created this
physical world differently from the "upper" spiritual
worlds. Up there,
G-d is revealed, while down here the Creator, although He creates
everything constantly, is concealed. And it is our job to reveal
him, as
He was revealed at Mount Sinai or later in the Holy Temple.
Every time we make a blessing, especially
on a commandment, we draw down
G-dliness from the upper worlds so that this world also feels
a little
bit like the angles do; that G-d is Creator of all being and He
is the
King of the Universe."
The Misnagdim were satisfied.
This is what happened at Mount Sinai that
made us different. The Jews
received the Commandments, began making BLESSINGS and started
changing
the world.
Or in more simple terms, when they got
the Torah they became chosen by
G-d to be His SERVANTS. So that even today, whether they know
it or not,
they, and only they (each and every one of them) can make this
world
into a blessed and meaningful place. That is what G-d chose us
for and
that is the service that He wants from us.
As G-d said to Moses at the burning bush
(3:12) "You will SERVE me on
this mountain." And as He told Moses so many times to relay
to Pharaoh
"Send my people so they will SERVE me."
Of course this ultimately will be accomplished
by Moshiach (Maimonides,
Melachim 12:5) and that is why we so impatiently await his arrival.
(As it says in the beginning of the book "Sefer Mitzvot Katan":
The first of
the Ten Commandments, "I am G-d that took you out of Egypt"
implies the
arrival of Moshiach who will bring the redemption, just as Moses
redeemed the Jews from Egypt).
But it is up to us to hasten his arrival
by increasing good deeds,
making blessings and waiting impatiently for....
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 are reading the most important
section in the entire Torah; the
very foundation of existence; G-d gave the Torah to the Jews.
There was no event even vaguely comparable
to it in the history of mankind;
several million people, (an entire nation!) actually saw and heard
the
Creator of the Universe say what He wants.
In fact no other religion or nation (including
those who claim to replace
the Jews) even claims that such a thing happened to them.
The experience was so powerful that with
each word of G-d, everyone actually
died and had to be miraculously revived (Shabbos 88b) just like
the raising
of the dead! (See Tanya, end of chap. 36)
If so we can ask a question:
Why does the name of the parsha have nothing
to do with all this?
It’s true that Yisro was a very important
convert, but certainly not as
important as the giving of the Torah! Why is the entire section
named after
him?
I would like to answer this with a story
I heard over fifteen years ago.
Ofer (The name has been changed) was an
embodiment of the Israeli dream. He
was young, handsome, intelligent, athletic, uninhibited and …
a successful
stuntman in Hollywood. He ‘made it’ in California!
Money! Fun! Action! Excitement! The world
was his for the taking, and he
took as much as he could.
But most of all he loved riding his Motorcycle.
Speeding down a desert
highway over 100 Mph was what made him really happy. That’s
where he
wanted to be forever; on the cutting edge of life.
Of course in the true Israeli tradition
he kept as far from G-d, and
certainly from Judaism, as possible. “In fact” he often
quipped, “If I
thought that religion was like Marx said, the Opiate of the masses,
I might
have tried some.” But it was even more meaningless to him
than that.
Until his accident.
One beautiful summer day on a lonely highway
somewhere in Nevada he hit
about 130 when suddenly, from nowhere, a huge semi-trailer truck
appeared in
front of him. It took him a second to realize that it wasn’t
a mirage and
then it was too late. He smashed into the front of it and flew
into
oblivion. When the police arrived they had to search for a while
till they found his broken body several hundred feet from the
scene of the accident. He was still
alive, but they had seen a lot of accidents and they were sure
he wasn’t
going to last.
“This one is for sure a goner”
was the last thing he heard as they pushed
him into the ambulance and closed the doors. He thought to himself,
“ I don’t
want to die; I’ll do what You want. PLEASE, G-d, Save me!!!”
And everything went black.
When he woke up it was dark. He couldn’t
move. Was he dead? No, he was
alive. Why couldn’t he see or move? Then suddenly he realized
what
happened; “My G-d - I’m buried alive!! They buried me!!”
He was sweating; it was getting hard to
breathe. He tried to get up but he
couldn’t, he couldn’t move. He started to scream, “Please
G-d - Please,
HELP ME!! I’M SORRY!! G-D, HELP ME!!!
Suddenly he was blinded; it was so bright!
The florescent light flickered
on. He was in a hospital.
“Doctor!! Doctor!! Come fast!!! He’s conscious!!”
He had been in a coma for over a month.
He couldn’t move because he was in
a body cast from head to toe; almost all his bones had been broken.
Even
the policemen that were at the accident had never had seen anything
like it,
it was clearly a miracle that he was still alive. But the miracles
didn’t
stop.
It took a lot of physical therapy and a
lot of prayer but in one year he was
actually back on his feet, completely recovered! He even went
back to work
as a stuntman, bought a new bike. And completely forgot his vow.
Although it sounds a bit hard to believe,
a year later the same thing
happened again!
Speeding like the wind through the desert,
he lost control on a curve,
destroyed his bike, broke his neck and skull and on the way to
the hospital
made another vow to G-d before losing consciousness.
A year and a half later after another miraculous
recovery, he was back on
his feet and back to his old lifestyle like nothing had happened.
(When I first heard the story I also didn’t
believe it, until I remembered
that the exact same thing happened with the Israelis after the
six-day war,
and again after the Yom Kippur war (and yet again afterwards after
the Gulf
war); everyone forgot the miracles and secular life continued
as usual.)
He even set his sights on a promotion.
He had caught the attention of a
very influential manager in Hollywood and was on his way to getting
some
really big-time jobs with opportunities to do some serious acting.
If it
worked out he could be earning more than a million dollars a year!
Things
were looking up.
There was only one drawback; the manager
was a missionary.
Now, really the fact was that Ofer could
have cared less. Religion meant
nothing to him. He read the books the manager kept giving him
because he
wanted to keep on good terms. He even went to a couple of meetings
with him.
Everyone there was friendly, the lectures were nice, but he was
interested
in having a good time.
And it would have remained that way if
his manager would have left him
alone, but he didn’t. He kept shaking up Ofer’s indifference
with strange
interpretations of the Torah and ideas about sin and salvation
that he had
never thought about.
He didn’t know what to do. On one
hand he wanted the big bucks and really
couldn’t find anything wrong with the Manager’s line
of thought. But on the
other hand, maybe it was just his Israeli egotism or Jewish stiffneckedness.
For the first time in his life Ofer felt that he was a Jew and
someone was
trying to take it away from him.
The only problem is that he didn’t
know enough about the Torah to argue
back.
This continued for several months until
one Friday morning he happened to be
walking downtown thinking about some of the things his manager
said when
someone called out to him, “Excuse me sir, are you Jewish?”
“What?” he
replied as he turned around and saw a young Chabadnick standing
behind a
small folding table filled with literature and holding a pair
of Tefillin.
“Are you Jewish? Come put on Tefillin, it will only take
a minute. Have you
got a minute?”
It wasn’t long before Ofer was sitting
in the Chabad house pouring his heart
out to the ‘Shliach’ (the Rabbi in charge) about his
missionary friend.
Now he was ready. The next time the manager
brought up the subject, Ofer
wrote down all the quotations, thinking he would defeat them.
But the more
he read from the Torah and the prophets afterwards to prepare
his rebuttals,
the more he realized that he himself knew nothing about Judaism.
“My advice to you” said the Shaliach
a few days later, “is to write to the
Lubavitch Rebbe for advice and a blessing."
“A blessing?” Asked Ofer incredulously,
but he wrote anyway and in two weeks
he received a reply. The Rebbe told him to concentrate only on
strengthening his own Judaism through learning the Torah and doing
the
commandments and forget the debates.
Today Ofer is a Chabad Chasid and lives
near Sefad with his wife and seven
children.
That is why the portion is called Yisro.
When G-d makes miracles, even reveals Himself
amidst lightning and thunder,
gives the Torah and enlivens the dead something essential is still
missing;
The joy of free will. And Yisro added that missing ingredient.
Rashi explains that the events that convinced
Yisro to convert were the
splitting of Yam Suf and the subsequent attack of Amelek. In other
words
Yisro realized that the human ego can be so strong that it is
possible for
one to see the miracles and the power of G-d, and still remain
as cold as
Amelek, like the stuntman in our story.
But Yisro, also like our stuntman, eventually
ignored his own impulses, and
from his own volition rejected idolatry and devoted himself totally
and
joyously (18:9) to serving the G-d of Israel.
Something like what happened on the Holiday
of Purim. The Talmud says that
only then, (over 800 years after Matan Torah) did the Jews really
fulfill
the Torah for the first time! Because then they served G-d from
their own
free will in Joy despite the obstacles.
Yisro got his joy by leaving everything
and connecting to Moshe. In the
days of Purim the people connected to Mordechi and in our generation
it is
the Lubavitcher Rebbe that is the source of Joy and self-sacrifice
to the
G-d
of Israel that will bring
Moshiach NOW!
Rabbi Tuvia Bolton
Yeshiva Ohr Tmimim
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PARSHA
MOSHIACH
IN THE PARSHA