Dear Friends:
As we all know, the Torah begins with the Creation of the world. The story leads us through the few brief moments of perfection in Gan Eden, the expulsion of our first parents, the events of the Great Flood to the advent of the Children of Israel. And we are introduced to this unique family: Avraham and Sarah, Yitzchok and Rivka, Yaakov, Rachel and Leah and their children. We have been living with this family for months, sharing their troubles, their Exile in Egypt, their liberation from slavery, their journey to Har Sinai….
Suddenly, the story comes to a halt!
We are face to face with … MITZVOS!
Is it hard for you? I must confess: it is hard for me. It was so HAIMISH up to now! I feel like a bar mitzvah boy. All of a sudden I have to grow up! I have to leave home! My parents are sending me off to yeshiva! Suddenly, that beautiful, warm, instructive, loving, fascinating, engrossing, real, familiar world comes to an end …. and the work begins!
It’s a shock!
The moment we arrive at Har Sinai, the focus of the Written Torah changes dramatically. According to Sefer ha Chinuch, Parshas Mishpatim contains 53 mitzvos (23 positive and 30 negative)! Learning the weekly Sedra becomes an entirely new and seemingly much more difficult experience.
Yes, my friends, it’s time to grow up!
It’s a big world out there, and we have to face reality.
It is now time for us, who follow the weekly cycle of Torah readings, to go on to the next stage. We have finished cheder and now we must learn in a more adult manner. Many young men do in fact leave their home to study out of town. In Europe, before the War, it was certainly common. And why? “Ki haim chayainu v’orech yaumainu… because [Torah and mitzvos] are our life and the length of our days.”
At the end of Parshas Mishpatim, Moshe Rabbeinu ascends Har Sinai. He is preparing to spend forty days and forty nights in this endeavor. He is not going because he desires to enjoy the scenery; he is going to work hard, very hard, maybe the hardest anyone ever worked in history. He is going to exert incredible hishtadlus in order to try to comprehend what Hashem is giving him, and then transmit it in such a way that the chain will extend until the end of history. “La’asok bedivrai Torah” involves unlimited effort, effort that goes beyond time clocks, beyond endurance, beyond what logic may say are normal human abilities. We are not a 9-to-5 nation! Perhaps that is why, directly after we say the Blessings on the Torah in the morning, we thank G-d for “girding Israel with strength” and “giving strength to the weary.”
Some people have already put in hours of hard work even before they daven Shacharis. There is a man who gives a shiur starting at about four a.m. at a bais medrash near where I live. His booming voice can be heard clearly throughout this entire large room. Several years ago, in a shocking accident, this man lost a brilliant son who himself had traveled literally around the world to teach Torah. And yet, he never stopped teaching his four a.m shiur! His voice booms out just as loud as it did before the tragedy! The fire of Torah is not diminished; in fact I imagine it is even more intense! I cannot tell you how much I admire this man!
Do you hear this?
“Oter Yisroel b’sifara… [He] crowns Israel with splendor!”
Why? Because we are mesiras nefesh to learn Torah with unlimited devotion!
Is it an accident that we have survived against all odds these thousands of years? “Ki haim chayainu v’orech yaumainu… they are our life and the length of our days.” Our Torah is a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire at night!
And how will we survive the challenges that lie ahead? We need nothing new, nothing innovative, nothing eccentric. We do not look for new, improved methods. We are not like the surrounding culture, which is constantly in motion, restlessly seeking new emptiness to replace old emptiness. Thank G-d, we do not have emptiness! Our life is full, because we are occupied “yom v’layla” with Torah and Mitzvos.
We desire nothing else!
We need nothing else!
We have everything!
Because Torah is real to us and our life is consumed with it, we become part of the eternity of Torah, and we are able to survive the shocks of the world.
This week we learn the mitzvah of “mahtzis ha shekel.”
Why half a shekel? What good is a half?
Moshe Rabbeinu went up on Har Sinai and the Al-mighty came down!
We enter the Bais Medrash and apply our full neshomas to learning Torah, with all our hearts, and with all our souls and with all our resources. How do we accomplish it? How do we comprehend it! Because Hashem, in His mercy, comes down and enlightens us, elevates us, brings us toward Him!
“Hashem desired, for the sake of [Israel’s] righteousness, that the Torah be made great and glorious.” (Isaiah 42:21)
Our half shekel is met by a flame from Heaven!
Thus we ask every morning, “Please, Hashem our G-d, sweeten the words of Your Torah in our mouth and in the mouth of Your People, the family of Israel! May we and our offspring and the offspring of Your people, the House of Israel – all of us – know Your Name and study Your Torah for its own sake.”
As we contemplate the upheavals that surround us in these days of “chevlei Moshiach,” we are reminded that the old days are gone. We are not kids any more. Once perhaps we could fool ourselves into thinking that we had time. But, as the Mishna says in Avos, “The day is short; the task is abundant.” By grasping Torah and mitzvos with “all our heart and all our soul and all our resources,” we can hope to pass through all the tests and enter the world of Moshiach and Bais ha Mikdosh. And then, in the days after Techias ha Maisim, when we greet our Teacher Moshe Rabbeinu, we will be able to give him nachas, and say to him, “The chain you forged was unbroken throughout the millennia. We have labored over the Torah as you taught us, and our labor was not in vain!”
May we see it soon in our days!
