5770 פרשת ואתחנן

 Included in this week’s Parsha is the first Parsha of Krias Shema which is the first Pasuk of Shema and the Parsha of V’ahavta. The first Pasuk of the Parsha of V’ahavta says “and you should love God with all your heart, all of your soul and all of your money.”

 This is one of the 613 Mitzvos that every person is required to do. Many commentaries try to explain what the requirement to love God is.

 The Sipurno gives a very interesting interpretation of this Pasuk. He says that it means “a person should be happy to do what God wants of him once he understands that there is no more honorable thing to do.”

 The question is what does doing the Mitzvos with joy have to do with loving God? If anything this would be the reason to bring a person to do the Mitzvos but how should it bring a person to love God.

 In order to understand this Sipurno, let us try to examine what factors can bring about feelings of love. One of those factors could be the fact that if someone is constantly giving us great things we will naturally feel love for them.

 In our lives many times it is very difficult in the material sense to see that everything we really have is coming from God. Not that it isn’t the case, but since there are so many intermediaries involved (a person’s employer for parnasa, doctor for health, etc), it can blur the truth which is that everything truly only comes from God.

 However, there is one thing that unmistakably can only be from God and that is the Torah and the Mitzvos. This is what the Sipurno is teaching us. If a person feels happiness in doing Mitzvos because he appreciates that there is nothing more special in the world as doing Mitzvos, he will naturally begin to love God since God gave him this wonderful gift.

 The question then becomes, how we can get ourselves to appreciate the fact that Torah and Mitzvos is the most special thing we have. This is even more difficult when we live in a world where such a tremendous focus is put on materialism and acquiring money and other material objects.

 One idea might be to focus on certain aspects of Tefilah from where we can glean the importance of Torah and Mitzvos. For example when a person says Birchas Hatorah and he says “God chose us from all the nations and gave us his Torah” to realize that it is only the Torah that makes us special. When we say in Uva Lzion “… God gave us the Torah… so we should not live empty lives” we should focus on what our lives would be like without Torah and Mitzvos. Through concentrating on these and other ideas we will come to realize how special a gift Torah and Mitzvos are and then we will naturally do the Mitzvos with more joy and come to have a greater love and appreciation of God.

5769 פרשת ואתחנן

In this week’s Parsha the Torah continues to describe the rebuke of Moshe Rabbeinu to Bnei Yisroel. One of the things that Moshe Rabbeinu rebuked Bnei Yisroel about was their actions concerning the immorality and the worship of Peor with the Midianites. The Torah then describes two different groups of people. The first one was the people who were punished for their idol worship and the second group were those who attached themselves to God who were not punished.  When the Torah contrasted the two groups it used the word “and” as if to say that the two groups were actually from one group that split into two.

 The Ohr Hachayim asked how the Torah would compare the people who worshipped idols to those who attached themselves to God.

 The Ohr Hachayim explained that the group who the Torah describes as being attached to God should also have been punished for their sins; however since they repented they were not punished.

 If we analyze this Ohr Hachayim a little more closely we can ask the following question. The entire episode including the idol worship and the illicit relations with the daughters of Midyan took place over a very short period of time. The punishment was immediate. When the rest of Bnei Yisroel saw their fellow members dying due to their sins, they repented. They were also decreed to die due to their sins and their repentance was apparently enough to remove the decree. What kind of repentance could this have been if it came about due to their fear of punishment?

 If we look at the language of the Ohr Hachayim a little bit more closely we can glean an additional understanding of repentance.  He interpreted the word in the Pasuk of “devaykim” to mean they came close to God through repentance and attached themselves to God. Even though the repentance process probably began with the fear of seeing the people around them dying that was just the impetus for them to realize the magnitude of their sin and to use that to actually build a very close relationship to God.  This is why the decree was cancelled. True repentance works even if it is only brought about by fear of punishment. This is actually considered to be a very high level of repentance as Bnei Yisroel reached a level of “dvaykus” to God which we know is a very difficult level to reach.

 We are now finishing the period of the three weeks which will culminate with Tisha Beav and will be continuing on our way towards Elul and Rosh Hashanah. Bnei Yisroel, both in Eretz Yisroel and around the world have been experiencing tragedies from all sides. We must view the tragedies effecting others as a wake up call to look more closely at our own actions and to see how we can repent from anything we might be doing wrong and use that repentance to grow closer to God in all aspects of our lives.

5768 פרשת ואתחנן

 In this week’s Parsha the Torah tells us that in the future Bnei Yisroel would leave the ways of the Torah.  The Torah continues and describes to us the punishment that will come about due to the actions of Bnei Yisroel. It is for this reason that we read this portion on Tisha Beav.

 However, we also know that the Shabbos of Parshas V’eschanan is also called Shabbos Nachamu, meaning the Shabbos of comfort. This is the first of the weeks of comfort which last until three weeks before Rosh Hashanah at which point begins the three weeks of Teshuva.

 Why do we read this particular Parsha on Tisha Beav, there are other portions in the Torah that describe the punishment of Bnei Yisroel when they leave the path of the Torah in much greater detail; for example the portions of the Tochachah (rebuke) found in Parsha Bechukosai and Parshas Ki Tavoh? What is special about this particular portion that even though the description of the punishment is only three Pasukim long we read it on Tisha Beav?

 In order to answer this question we need to understand the purpose of the mourning of Tisha Beav. The Michtav Ma’eliyahu written by Rav Dessler gives us a very interesting explanation behind this mourning. He says the following:

  Tragedies – destruction and mourning has the purpose to bring out in the heart of a person a feeling of hopelessness regarding this world. This is the lowest (first) level in the quest for cancellation of our view of reality as we see it. Through this a person can reveal and grow the inner spark of true spirituality which is inherently the comfort a person is seeking since it brings him to repentance.

 From this Michtav Ma’eliyahu we see that the whole purpose of mourning isn’t for us just to recall the awful punishments that Bnei Yisroel received when they strayed from the path of God, but rather it has a purpose which is to get a person to repent. Furthermore, repentance according to the Michtav Ma’eliyahu is the only true comfort. The Michtav Ma’eliyahu explains how mourning leads to repentance by saying that when a person thinks about the tremendous destruction it makes him realize that the purpose of this world can’t be for the physical pleasures only.

 This is why on Tisha Beav we read this particular portion and not the Tochachah. Since the purpose of the mourning on Tisha Beav is to bring us to repentance not just to recall the suffering we read the portion that brings the two ideas together, that when we have suffering it should lead us to repent.

 With this idea we might be able to understand the following quote of the Gemara:

  Anyone who mourns over Yerushalayim will merit and see its comfort (rebuilding).

 The obvious question is how many great Tzadikim over the generations mourned for Yerushalayim but did not merit seeing its comfort (i.e. its rebuilding)?

 A possible answer is that its comfort does not refer to the actual rebuilding but rather to the process of having the Beis Hamikdash rebuilt. We have the potential by repenting and correcting our deeds to bring Mashiach and the rebuilding of the Beis Hamikdash. If a person mourns over Yerushalayim properly and takes from that mourning the necessity to repent and he truly changes his ways this is the comfort since he feels that he is doing his part in rebuilding Yerushalayim.

 If we can use the mourning we experienced on Tisha Beav to help us get back on track we should all merit to see the actual rebuilding of the Beis Hamikdash in our days.

5767 ואתחנן

 This week’s Parsha is read every year on the Shabbos after Tisha Be’av.Within the Parsha are also the Pesukim that we read on Tisha Be’av.

 The Shabbos after TIsha Be’av is also called Shabbos Nachamu– the Shabbos of consolation.

 The following question can be asked: We can understand why we read a portion of Parshas Veschanan on Tisha Be’av since it deals with what the punishment would be in the future when Bnei Yisroel does not keep the Torah, however Parshas Veschanan does not seem to have anywhere in it words of consolation that would be apropos for Shabbos Nachamu?

 Sometimes from what seems to be a description of tragedy is really the source of the consolation.

 One of the Pesukim that we read on Tisha Be’av is the following Pasuk beginning with the words Batzar Lecha:

 When you are in pain, you will find these words and you will return to God.

 There is a Gemara in the Yerushalmi in Sanhedrin which describes some of the sins of Menashe Hamelech. The Gemara describes how he put an idol in the Beis Hamikdash and he killed Yeshayahu Hanavi and because of his sins he was captured and tortured and when he was suffering the Gemara describes his reaction the following way:

 After Menashe cried out to all the different idols in the world and they did not help him ease his suffering at all, he said I remember that my father used to read the Pasuk in the shul that said “Batzar Lecha”and he repented.

 When Menashe did Teshuva, it was a true and complete Teshuva. However, the angels complained to God, how can you accept his Teshuva after all the terrible sins he did. God answered that if he did not accept the Teshuva of Menashe the doors of Teshuva would be closed in from of all Balei Teshuva.

 The question that can be asked on this Gemara is, why would not accepting the Teshuva of Menashe cause the door to be closed in front of Balei Teshuva, all the other people will say that only if you would do such stringent sins like Menashe would your Teshuva not be accepted, but our Teshuva would be accepted?

 The answer could be based on an idea brought down by Rav Yitzchak Blazer in his sefer Kochvei Ohr. Unfortunately, I don’t have the Kochvei Ohr accessible so I am bringing it down as best as I can remember.

 The Navi inYechezkal says the following:

Say to the house of Israel, so you have said our sins are upon us, how can we live? 

 On this Pasuk  Rashi says the following:

 Therefore you Bnei Yisroel do not want to do Teshuva because you think that Teshuva will not help.

 The Kochvei Ohr explains that the reason Bnei Yisroel did not think that their Teshuva would be accepted was that they understood how much of an act of rebellion doing any small sin was and they couldn’t fathom that there could be anyway they could be forgiven for that.

 This could be the understanding of the Yerushalmi that said that if God didn’t forgive Menashe for his sins it would close the door in front of all people who want to do Teshuva since every sin is such a rebellion against God.

 However, God gave us a tremendous gift called Teshuva. No matter what sins a person does there is nothing that stands in front of Teshuva.

 This is the comfort of Parshas Veschanan. Even when Bnei Yisroel reaches the lowest level of sins where God punishes Bnei Yisroel with awful suffering where the Torah describes them as being in tremendous pain, nevertheless the end of the Pasuk says  you will do Teshuva and the result will be that God will accept the Teshuva and remove the suffering from Bnei Yisroel.

Chazal tell us that the period from after Tisha Be’av until Yom Kippur is the period that we should work on ourselves to  repent. When we read this Pasuk of “Batzar Lecha” we should think about the precious opportunity we have to totally wipe the slate clean through repentenance. If we can really appreciate the wonderful gift that teshuva is and take advantage of it to really change, we should all merit that next year we should be celebrating Tisha Be’av as a Yom Tov with the coming of Mashiach.

5766 פרשת ואתחנן

 Now that we are entering the period after the three weeks,  we should begin preparing ourselves for Elul and the Yamim Noraim. When we discuss our preparation for the Yamim Noraim we learn from Chazal that we must do three things to remove any bad decrees that are hanging over our heads due to our sins. These three things are Teshuva, Tefilla and Tzedaka.  Over the next few weeks we will try to discuss each of these items in depth.

 In this week’s Parsha we see some very interesting ideas regarding Tefilla.

 The Parsha begins with Moshe Rabbeinu praying to God for the right to be able to go into Eretz Yisroel .The Pasuk says

Moshe prayed to God at that time saying

 The Midrahs asks what the  Torah was teaching us by adding the word “saying”, it would have been enough to say that Moshe  davened and what his prayer was, why add the word “saying”?

 The Midrash answers by quoting the saying of Rabbi Azarya which says

To tell the generations that at a time of great distress to daven since  Moshe was told already that he would not be allowed into Israel and yet he still davened with the knowledge that he could very well be answered in the affirmative.

 We can learn from this Midrash a very important idea about  tefilla, which is that even in the most dire situations, where there looks to be no hope, we should still pray to God. As long as we can still daven there is always hope.

 The Targum Unkelos a few Pasukim later reinforces this idea. The Pasuk says the following:

“Who is a great nation to whom God is so close like the closeness God has to Bnei Yisroel when they call out to him.”

On this the Targum Unkelos explains that the interpretation of this Pasuk is “how great are the Jews that God is so close to them to accept their prayers when they pray to him like God who answers us when ever we pray to him”. What the Targum Unkelos is saying is that unlike all the other nations of the world who can pray to G-d and not necessarily have their prayers accepted, the prayers of Bnei Yisroel are always received by God.  

 We see from these two commentaries how special the relationship is betweenGod and Bnei Yisroel. We are endowed with a special relationship, that for us the doors are never closed to our prayers. There is a tremendous unique one of a kind bond between God and Bnei Yisroel.

 During this very trying time for Bnei Yisroel  in Eretz Yisroel and the world over,  one thing we should involve ourselves  in is improving our Tefilla. God is waiting for us to cry out to him to ask him for help and he is there to answer. The door is always open and no prayer goes unheard. Now especially following on the footsteps of  Tisha Be’av we should work on davening with more Kavana and hopefully we will merit the redemption soon.