The Hidden Light of Purim (Adapted from the Torah of Rav Yitzchok Hutner, zt”l, Pachad Yitzchok, Purim Maamar 34)

 The Hidden Light of Purim (Adapted from the Torah of Rav Yitzchok Hutner, zt”l, Pachad Yitzchok, Purim Maamar 34)

By Eliakim Willner

Eliakim Willner is author of an English volume of Pachad Yitzchok Maamorim, and of “Nesivos Olam – Nesiv HaTorah: An Appreciation of Torah Study”, a translation with commentary of a work by the Maharal of Prague, both published by Artscroll/Mesorah. A translation of the Maharal’s Nesiv HaAvodah awaits publication, along with many additional Maamorim.

 Long Term Benefits of a Short Term Solution

 “…and these days of Purim shall not be revoked from amidst the Jews, and their memory shall not cease from their descendants” (Esther 9:28). The Medrash explains that “even at a time when all the other holidays will be annulled, Purim will not be annulled, as the verse assures us: ‘…and their memory shall not cease from their descendants’”.

We can best understand this Medrash by way of a parable. Two individuals are ordered to recognize people in the darkness of night. One of them lit a candle and examined the faces of the people in its light in order to recognize them. The second individual had no candle, but since he was nonetheless obligated to recognize the people, he trained himself to recognize them by the differences in their voices.

Insofar as clarity and accuracy are concerned, the first individual had an advantage over the second since visual recognition is more certain than auditory recognition. On the other hand, the second individual had an advantage over the first in that he fine-tuned his sense of hearing with respect to distinguishing human voices. The individual who used a candle lacks the ability to accurately distinguish people using his sense of hearing. Thus, once morning dawns the first individual will extinguish his candle since it is useless in the light of day. The candle-driven recognition abilities that he strove to achieve at night are now redundant. As for the second individual, true, he too is now able to visually recognize people, but the fine-tuned auditory recognition abilities that he strove to achieve at night will remain with him forever.

The “Sixth Sense” of Purim 

In a leap year we read the Megilla in the second Adar month, in order to juxtapose the redemption that took place on Purim with the Egyptian redemption, which took place in Nissan. The deliberate juxtaposition of Purim with Pesach teaches us that there is a comparison to be made between the two redemptions. 

It is important for us to realize that just as the Egyptian redemption is marked by a divine declaration of Anochi, “I”, as in “I am Hashem, your G-d, Who took you out of the land of Egypt”, so too is the Purim redemption marked with its own Anochi declaration: “And I will surely hide, hastair astair…”. (The Gemara points to this phrase as an oblique reference to Purim: “Where is there a reference to Esther in the Torah? It is in the verse, ‘And I will surely hide, hastair, astair’” Devarim 31:18). The Anochi in both cases signals Hashem’s active involvement in both redemptions, albeit, as we will explain, in different ways

The significance of this fact is that there are two ways for the Jewish nation to recognize the Anochi, the “I”; the presence of Hashem as mastermind of events – either the Egyptian redemption way, or the Purim redemption way. Referring back to our earlier parable, the Jewish nation recognizing the Anochi in the Egyptian redemption way is comparable to the individual who recognizes others with the aid of a candle, a tool that provides light. The open miracles of the Egyptian redemption “illuminate” Hashem’s active involvement, as it were.

The Jewish nation recognizing the Anochi via a hidden and oblique redemption – the Purim way – on the other hand, is akin to the individual who recognizes people using a self-developed means of perception which enables him to bypass the sense of sight. There were no open miracles during the Purim redemption. Hashem’s involvement could only be discerned by “reading between the lines” of what appeared to be ordinary, natural events.

Let us expand our parable. When the day dawns brightly, and the sun rises in all its glory; that is to say – switching to the nimshal  – when, at the time of our final redemption, the light of Hashem’s glory will be orders of magnitude greater than the brightness of the sun, the earlier open miracles – the “tools” that the Jewish nation had to rely on previously in order to perceive the Anochi, the presence of Hashem as mastermind of events – will automatically become superfluous.

This is because the Anochi – the presence of Hashem as mastermind of all events – will permeate every aspect of existence after the final redemption, causing the miracles of the Egyptian exodus, in comparison, to pale into relative insignificance, just as the lesser light of a candle pales into insignificance in comparison to the light of the sun.

The miracles of the Egyptian exodus are akin to the candle of the parable. Just as a candle illuminates only its immediate vicinity, so do the Egyptian exodus miracles expose the hand of Hashem only in the events of the miracles themselves. The light of the much brighter sun is akin to the miracles of the final redemption, but in both cases our perception of Hashem’s active involvement does not extend beyond what the light illuminates; it does not extend to what appears to be “natural” everyday events. Both lights remain external tools for perceiving the involvement of Hashem.

All this is true about the holidays that are centered around the Egyptian redemption. It does not apply to the Purim redemption, in the context of which the Jewish nation taught itself to recognize Anochi – the presence of Hashem as mastermind of events – even during darkness; during hiddenness. This “sixth sense” of perception persists in the soul of the nation whether it is light or dark, just as, in the parable, the individual who taught himself to distinguish people by the sounds of their voices had no need for an illuminating tool at all in order to identify people. With our “Purim sense” we do not need to rely on the extraordinary light of the ultimate redemption to recognize Hashem as the mastermind of all events. No external “tools” in the form of open miracles are necessary.

That is why “even at a time when all the other holidays will be annulled, Purim will not be annulled, as the verse assures us: ‘…and their memory shall not cease from their descendants’”.

Supercharging the Mind with Ad D’lo’Yada 

In summary, there are two ways in which a person can be divinely enlightened. The first – the Egyptian redemption way –  can be expressed using the verse-phrase, “Hashem enlightens me” (Micha 7:8). The second first – the Purim redemption way –  can be expressed using the more expanded verse-phrase, “…although I will sit in darkness, Hashem enlightens me”.

Purim’s distinction is the enlightenment that “glows” even in the darkness. And just as the energy that guides a person even in the midst of darkness is more potent than ordinary light, so too are the intuitive insights that emerge in the below-the-level of consciousness glow of Purim especially cherished.

 

The Misoninim Mysteries: An Understanding Based on the Torah of the Maharal and the Ketzos HaChoshen

 

The Misoninim Mysteries: An Understanding Based on the Torah of the Maharal and the Ketzos HaChoshen

The Mysteries

The parsha of the Misoninim (Bamidbar 11) may superficially seem straightforward but on reflection, there are a number of puzzling aspects that beg for explanation. First of all, what was their primary complaint? Did they want meat? If so, what was the point of mentioning the vegetables that they ate in Egypt? Were they tired of the mon? Then why mention meat, any “real” food should have served their purpose? And why (posuk 7) did they seemingly speak in complimentary terms about the mon?

Why does the Torah tell us (posuk 4) that they “had a lust”; what does that add to the stated complaint of “we want meat!”? Why (posuk 10) do they add their resentment of the newly forbidden marital relationships to their litany of complaints; what does that have to do with either a hankering for meat or the “monotony” of the mon? One might say that they were complaining for complaining’s own sake, so there is no relationship between the complaints, but that seems superficial.

Finally, the quail that they were provided was immediately fatal; the moment they sunk their teeth into it, they died. How, then, did so many people die from eating it? Didn’t people watching the first quail-eaters die realize that they might be better off avoiding it?

Surely there is depth to be mined beneath the surface here.

The Benefits of a Coercive Matan Torah

To solve these mysteries – and to understand this parsha – we turn to the introduction to Sefer Shev Shmaitso, by the Ketzos, who has a unique and unifying understanding of the parsha of the Misoninim based on the Torah of the Maharal.

It all begins at Sinai. Recall that, per the Medrash (Tanchuma, Noach 3) before the Torah was given to Yisroel, Hashem lifted the mountain over their heads like a barrel, har k’gigis, and told them that if they did not accept the Torah, “this will be your burial place”. Of course the question is, since the nation had already willingly accepted the Torah (naaseh v’nishma; we will observe and we will understand) why was this coercive measure necessary?

The Maharal in Tiferes Yisroel 32 answers by pointing out that things that are imperative are permanent. This is why, for example, a me’anes is bound to his victim, the anusa, for life; he forced himself upon her (imperative) and therefore the relationship becomes permanent. The Maharal cites a Medrash that explains that the coercion at Sinai metaphorically creates an unbreakable me’anes-anusa-type relationship between Hashem and Yisroel; the Sinai covenant is permanent and, come what may, neither party can back out of it. Naaseh v’nishma was a discretionary acceptance of the Torah and therefore, despite its merits, it would not have been permanently binding.

The Ketzos notes that this bond extends to the relationship between Yisroel and the Torah as well. We must study Torah; it is imperative and not optional; permanent and not transitory. He cites Yalkut Re’uveini (Vayishlach) that the Sar of the Torah, the angel in charge of the Torah, was tasked with mon production. What does the mon have to do with the Torah? The Sefer HaMagid of the Bais Yosef states that the mon had the effect of nullifying free choice and making it impossible for those eating it to occupy themselves with anything other than the Torah. Their physical appetites disappeared; their only passion was for Torah study.

Appetites for Appetites

This, then, was behind the primary complaint of the Misoninim. They wanted their physical appetites back; they “had a lust’ for their dormant physical lusts! This business of mandatory Torah-study-only wasn’t for them. They yearned for the ability to enjoy a steak again; they remembered that in Egypt they were even able to enjoy vegetables!

In short, they wanted the discretionary Torah of naaseh v’nishma only, the imperative nature of the har k’gigis coercion wasn’t letting them enjoy the physical pleasures of life. However, they sugar-coated their complaints by arguing that it was more meritorious to operate on a free choice basis than to be boxed in to Torah. We would eat the mon without being forced to, they argued; after all, it’s appealing and tasty. We would study Torah too – when we wanted to. But we want our physical appetites back!

They were way out of line. The role of that generation was to immerse themselves totally in Torah study. Har k’gigis was supposed to have a dramatic effect on their way of life during their desert sojourn and the mon was an integral part of creating that way of life.

Their punishment, writes the Ketzos, was that they got their physical cravings back with a vengeance. They knew, after the first few moments, that eating the quail was a death sentence. Yet their appetites were so strong that they were compelled to gorge themselves nonetheless!

Forbidden Marital Relationships and Har K’Gigis

This approach solves most of the Misoninim mysteries we mentioned. How, though, does their resentment of the newly forbidden marital relationships fit into this picture? The Ketzos answers this by referencing a question of the Maharal in Gur Aryeh (Vayigash). The Maharal notes that when the Torah was given, the entire nation had the status of converts to Judaism. If so, the Maharal asks, why is it that the forbidden marital relationships affected this generation? We know that a convert has the status of a newborn and his previous familial relationships are cancelled. A convert may even marry his birth-sister since the conversion nullifies the brother-sister relationship. So why were the Misoninim complaining about these forbidden relationships in the first place?

The answer, says the Maharal, is that a convert only has the status of a newborn when the conversion was done willingly. However, the conversion of the nation at Sinai was transformed into a coerced conversion when the mountain was held over their heads. Therefore their previous familial relationships were not nullified and the prohibitions applied.

If the Torah had been given on the basis of naaseh v’nishma only there would have been no practical application of the Torah laws prohibiting certain marital relationships for that generation. The “culprit” preventing that from happening was the coercive nature of their conversion brought about by the threat of har k’gigis. We now understand how this particular complaint fits into the Misoninim’s broader picture. They were bothered by all the ramifications of har k’gigis versus naaseh v’nishma, and this was one of them.

The Implications for Us, Today

Our generation does not have mon and our therefore our physical appetites are restored. We can choose to favor them, but the mon remains in our genes forever and we retain the ability to attenuate our physical desires and to choose to single-mindedly devote ourselves to the pursuit of Torah and mitzvos, just as our ancestors did in the desert.

The Ketzos adds a sobering thought. Our physical and spiritual components were implanted in us as separate entities and were “designed” to stay that way. When we leave this world our soul should be heading upwards, unimpeded and unsullied by the body, while the body reposes in the earth, disconnected from the soul.

To the extent that we humor our physical component by indulging ourselves in physical pleasures, we pollute our spiritual component by intermingling it with our bodies. The separation at death is more difficult and more painful and our souls actually retain the pollution of the physical desires we indulged in during our lives.

The Torah tells us (verse 34) “He named that place Kivros Hata'avah (Graves of Craving), for there they buried the people who crave.” Note the present tense: “who crave”. They were dead and buried, surely it would have been more accurate to say, in the past tense, “the people who craved”? But the Ketzos quotes the Akeida who writes that even after their death, their souls continue to crave since they were polluted by the body’s craving when they were connected. Sobering indeed!

May we all merit to take full advantage of the permanence Hashem blessed us with when he imposed har k’gigis, by focusing our lives around Torah and by minimizing physical world indulgences.

We Are Malochim (Adapted from the Torah of Rav Yitzchok Hutner, zt”l, Pachad Yitzchok, Shavuous, Maamar 4)

 We Are Malochim (Adapted from the Torah of Rav Yitzchok Hutner, zt”l, Pachad Yitzchok, Shavuous, Maamar 4)

By Eliakim Willner

Eliakim Willner is author of a volume of select Pachad Yitzchok Maamorim, in English with commentary, and of “Nesivos Olam – Nesiv HaTorah: An Appreciation of Torah Study”, a translation with commentary of a work by the Maharal of Prague, both published by Artscroll/Mesorah. A continuation of the Nesivos Olam series, “Nesivos Olam – Nesiv HaAvodah: The Philosophy and Practice of Prayer” awaits publication.

 The Paradox of True Servants of Hashem 

In life, our possessions can generally be classified as either luxuries or necessities. But what of wisdom? Is wisdom a luxury or a necessity? Intuitively we might say that wisdom is a necessity. How can we get along without wisdom?

That is one perspective on wisdom. But from another perspective, wisdom, and in particular Torah wisdom, partakes heavily of the character of the most lavish of luxuries. We explain this apparent paradox.

In general, necessity surpasses luxury from the standpoint of the degree of pain suffered in its absence, while on the other hand, luxury surpasses necessity from the standpoint of the degree of pleasure enjoyed in its presence. For example, the pleasure obtained from a royal audience – certainly a luxury - is infinitely greater than the pain suffered from not having a royal audience. Not having something that most people never have anyway is not a terribly great source of pain. Conversely, the pain of lacking food to eat or clothing to wear is infinitely greater than the pleasure of having those necessities. Having necessities is a state that people take for granted and do not especially experience great joy from.

The general rule is that the more an experience makes inroads onto the turf of “luxury”, the more the pleasure of having it exceeds the pain of not having it. On the other hand, the more an experience makes inroads onto the turf of “necessity”, the more the pain of not having it exceeds the pleasure of having it.

However, anyone who has been fortunate enough to observe the inner life of true servants of Hashem, knows with certainty that their relationship to their Torah study and to their service of Hashem partakes of the characteristics of both necessity and luxury, interwoven. For people such as these, when either Torah or service are lacking, the pain is akin to the lack of the most vital necessity. However, the joy and the spiritual pleasure when they are present, is akin to that of the presence of the most lavish of luxuries, and the most enjoyable of pleasures, as we have said.

What is the spiritual source that energizes this remarkable phenomenon?

A Personal Naaseh V’Nishma 

This is what Rabbeinu Yonah taught in Shaarei Teshuva 2:3:

“… For one who accepts upon himself to do whatever the masters of Torah instruct him, from that day onward… And from the time that he accepted this in his heart, he acquired merit and reward for his soul for all of the commandments and ethical acts. And happy is he for justifying his soul in a short time…

“And it is said in Avos D’Rav Nosson 22, ‘Anyone whose actions are greater than his wisdom - his wisdom will endure, as the posuk states (Shmos 24:7), “We will do and we will take in”, Naaseh V’Nishma’. [The implication of the sequence is that we are prepared “to do” whatever it is we are told to do regardless of what the command that “we will take in” will be. The taking in is only necessary to define the command and enable us to set the action in motion.]

“The reason is that when a man accepts upon himself with a faithful heart to keep and do according to the ‘Torah that he was taught, and about the judgement that was told to him’ (Devarim 17:11), from that day, he has the reward for all of the commandments that his ear heard and that he understood, as well as for all of the things which his ear has still not heard about…

“And it emerges that the actions of this man are greater than his wisdom, since he did not know the thing, but the reward for it is in his possession. And it is of the same nature as the declaration of the nation Yisroel at Mount Sinai, ‘We will do and we will take in– they accepted the actions upon themselves before hearing what was required of them. And in no other way it is possible for the actions of a man to be greater than what he knows.”

These are the words of Rabbeinu Yonah.

The Sinai Baseline 

The lesson of Rabbeinu Yonah’s words is this: The Mishna that teaches (Avos 3:9) that the only wisdom that endures, is the wisdom of a person whose actions are greater than what he knows, is built on the same principle as Yisroel’s declaration of “We will do and we will take in”, when the Torah was given.

The implications are earth-shattering. The Mishna is actually teaching that the heights that Yisroel achieved at Sinai with that statement, subsequently became the standard against which the wisdom of every Jew is measured – to the extent that if his wisdom does not measure up to that standard, it will not endure!

That statement, which, at Sinai, shook all the worlds in wonderment, and at which an amazed heavenly voice cried out, “Who revealed to My children this secret formulation used by the malachai hashares, per the posuk (Tehillim 103:20), ‘Those mighty in strength, who perform His word, to take in the voice of His word’ (‘perform’ precedes ‘take in)” – that same statement is now the universal baseline. The only way for any Jew to achieve the wisdom-enduring level of “actions greater than knowledge” is for him to precede “we will take in” with “we will do” in his personal service to Hashem.

How are we to understand this?

The Malochim and Us 

The explanation is as follows. The precedence of “we will do” to “we will take in” on the part of the malachai hashares means that the taking in is not the cause of their fulfilling the will of Hashem. The taking in merely enables the fulfillment by defining the required act, but the fulfillment itself is independent of any particular cause, since the malachai hashares exist only to fulfill the will of their Creator. Their very name defines their essence; the word for “angel” is malach and that word means “delegate” or “agent”. Heavenly beings are referred to in this way because their mission is their existence. The rule is that a single malach cannot have multiple missions because a malach’s mission is synonymous with its existence and a single entity cannot have more than one existence.

Chazal teach us (Chagigah 14a) that there are malochim that sing a single song of praise to Hashem, and then expire. But can malochim “die”? Death was decreed when Odom ate from the Aitz HaDaas, but malochim were not included in that decree. Rather, the malochim expire simply because they have no existence independent of their mission. The moment their mission is done, they are themselves, by definition, done. Thus, if a maloch’s mission was a one-time declaration of Hashem’s sanctity, it will cease to exist once it has made that declaration.

To put it another way, it is the maloch’s “we will do” that defines their existence since it establishes their status as agents of Hashem and therefore it must precede their “we will take in”. Being an agent of Hashem gives them the capacity to fulfill Hashem’s missions. “We will take in” enables the mission specifics to be transmitted to them. Once the mission is complete there is nothing further for that maloch to “do” so it ceases to exist.

However, the specific maloch-like behavior of “will do” before “take in”, meaning, no justification for existence without the “do”, was transplanted into mankind when the Torah was given. From that point onward, there exists in the physical world an entity such that the justification for its existence, and the fact of its existence, is to fulfill the will of its Creator. The identity of that entity? The Jewish nation.

The defining feature of the events surrounding the giving of the Torah was not that the heavens descended upon the earth; not the spectacular miracles resulting from that event. It was, rather, the introduction of the concept of chad hu, “overlapping identities” – the unity of Hashem, the Jewish nation and the Torah. The implication of introducing the concept of chad hu is that from that moment onwards it is not the “take in” that triggers the “will do” but rather, that the “will do” is a natural outcome of the unity; the “take in”  is no more than a means of actualizing the “will do”. In that model it is inevitable that the “will do” precede the “take in” just as it does with respect to angels. We are one with the Torah, our mission, and it defines our identity, just as a maloch’s identity is defined by its mission. In that way, we, denizens of the lower worlds, partook of the secret of the denizens of the upper worlds.

As a result, every fresh insight that enters the mind of every Jew – that is, every “take in” – is guaranteed to have been preceded by a “will do”, thus maintaining, for every Jew, the constant equilibrium of the actions of a man being greater than what he knows.

The Ever-Present Mission 

Moreover, since, from the moment the Torah was given and onwards, every Jew’s advancement in Torah knowledge and in service to Hashem is attained on the basis of chad hu, we must view these advancements not as new acquisitions obtained from outside his current sphere, but rather as self-vitalizations, based on a preexisting foundation. Such a person is, in a manner of speaking, pulling himself up by his own bootstraps. Since he is one with Hashem and the Torah, his accomplishment is tantamount to uncovering and activating a novel Torah thought, or a laudable practice, that was already there as his previously accepted “mission”, albeit in latent form. Thus, however much he grows, he will always be “greater than what he knows”.

Torah is Life 

We are now prepared to identify the spiritual origin of the two-sided relationship that true servants of Hashem have with their Torah and their service. We said that it is a relationship comprising both necessity and luxury, for, to a true servant of Hashem, the pain of absence with respect to Torah and service, is as acute as the pain of someone lacking a vital necessity, while the pleasure of possessing Torah and service is as intense as the pleasure of enjoying the most extravagant of luxuries.

This paradox becomes plausible when we realize that the distinction we drew earlier between luxuries and necessities applies only to the trappings of life and to the process of seeking them out. When it comes to life itself, however, this distinction dissolves. The drive to survive fundamentally outweighs even the combined desires for necessities and luxuries. A person saved from drowning in a river does not gauge his reaction to that experience using the same pain versus pleasure yardstick that he would use to gauge his reaction to necessities or luxuries.

A person facing the prospect of his imminent demise is struck with a stark realization of what it means to live. All the pleasures of the world pale into insignificance when measured against the possibility of a second chance at life itself. Thus, when it comes to a life-or-death situation, the pain of absence and the pleasure of presence are equal partners. They are both at their height.

As we stated earlier, all advancements in Torah and service to Hashem that are worthy of the name take place as self-vitalizations, based on a pre-existing foundation. They are not new acquisitions obtained from outside the person’s current sphere, but are newly-vitalized chunks of potential which themselves derive from his already-integrated oneness with Hashem and with the Torah. They are above and beyond the plane in which necessities and luxuries fall into different categories. These advancements are, in other words, acts which bring life, and distance death, and as such they both bring joy in their presence and despair in their absence, akin to the feelings of someone plucked from a raging river.

Only an outside observer, who pigeonholes the experiences of servants of Hashem into one or the other of necessity or luxury categories, will be perplexed at the apparent duality of how they relate to their experiences – as if they were both necessity and luxury at the same time. But the reality is that there is no duality. In fact, they are seeing the outcome of unity. Yisroel and the Torah are one.

It All Started at Sinai 

We say in birchas kriyas shma, “We will rejoice in the words of Your Torah and in Your commandments… For they are our life…”.

The stated reason for the rejoicing seems to be beside the point. Are there not things that people rejoice about other than the fact that they are alive? The reference, however, is not to ordinary joy but to the joy experienced by a person saved from drowning in a river, who rejoices in life itself. When a person is spared after staring death in the face, he becomes acutely conscious of the fact of his existence, and there is no joy more intense than the joy experienced at that moment.

Similarly the Torah and mitzvos continually awaken us to the very fact of our existence and for that reason “we will rejoice in the words of Your Torah and in Your commandments, for they are our life”. Thus this is not merely a statement about one particular thing that we find joyful, it is an explanation of why we are continually in a state of joy. The Torah and its commandments are unique in their ability to keep us in a continual state of joy because they are the raison d'etre for our very existence.

May the yom tov of Shavuous renew our joy in the Torah, and may that joy last throughout the year!