The Ohr HaChayim begins his commentary on the first sentence of the book of Shemot (Names) Exodus, with an explanation of why the verse begins “And these are the names….” “To teach you,” he writes, “that they were all tsaddikim, like their fathers. And they added to Avraham, Yitzhak, and Yaakov, great tsaddikim, for like the actions of the fathers the descendents did.” He then wonders why the Torah must publish the list of the names of the tribes, seeing as the same list was published at the end of the book of Bereishit. He writes, “To count who came to accept the decree of the King to bear the yoke of exile…and those who did not come (implying future generations, since all of Yaakov’s house came at that time?) wanted to come.” We see here a willingness on the part of the children of Yaakov to enthusiastically undertake what their father began by his uprooting himself and going down to Egypt. They also demonstrated a confidence in their abilities and the abilities of their descendents to do the work that needed to be done in exile.
And what is the work that needs to be done in exile?
SHABBOS TABLE WARNING: One will almost inevitably either hear or unintentionally utter the following words at least eight times this shabbos: Elevate sparks. The source of this crazy and oft-misconceived phrase may be traced to the fact that Hashem promised Avraham that his children would leave Egypt with great wealth, as in fact they did. But what is this wealth? According to Hassidus, the wealth is the “sparks” of holiness which have fallen into “impure shells,” meaning that the holiness is less apparent or covered over by an apparently unholy exterior. One’s task is to break the shell, meaning the illusion of unholiness, to find that this thing/person/place/idea is actually a functionary in Hashem’s plan. Contrary to popular opinion, one (apparently) cannot elevate the sparks of, say, Ben Yehuda Street simply by moving his exceptionally holy body down those hallowed cobblestones and be a spark-magnet. Nay, it is work. Hard work. One must actually find wealth there. What is this wealth? We see when the Jews left Egypt they left with “vessels of silver, vessels of gold, and garments.” Our sages tell us gold and silver represent yir’ah (awe-fear) and ahava (love) respectively. If one can walk down Ben Yehuda Street and be truly inspired to love and/or fear Hashem because of what he sees/hears/feels there, if he can understand how Ben Yehuda Street fits into Hashem’s plan and that its appearance of ________ (fill in your own critique) is only a shell of the real holiness that is there, the desire hidden deep in the eyes of the passers-by to find fulfillment and meaning in Hashem, then one can say he has “elevated sparks.”
The Ohr HaChayim implies that the brothers were willing and enthusiastic to do this work. We are not necessarily given that option – which is probably for our benefit. We are each born into a personal exile that is beyond our control. We do not know the nature of the sparks we seek to elevate. We do not even know the nature of the sparks that are within us that we need to elevate, aspects of our being that we might reject as negative, superficial, or ungodly that must actually be used in the service of Hashem. This exile, as we saw with Reuven, are often determined by the circumstances of our births and the nature of the relationship between our parents, which are well beyond our control. But this is good – we do not stand outside of exile and choose what we shall strive to elevate. Our lives are the playing-out of an exile-redemption cycle. We don’t call it “doing Hashem’s will” or “raising sparks” or “accepting the yoke of exile” – we call it survival. We must find meaning and happiness in what we do and what we are surrounded by, lest the waters meaninglessness overtake us and drown us. The willingness, then, is to accept ourselves as the reparation that must be made, to accept the task of not wavering in the quest for integrity, to accept the ideal of the pursuit of true happiness at all times, to accept the walls Hashem has birthed us with and turn them into windows through which the Divine light might shine…. (Inspired by R. Nachman Torah 36 and friends)
A Torah by the Yat”TziV may he live long and be blessed – Shemot means “names.” What is the importance of a name? It is a word, which is made up of letters. It is written in the Sefer Yetzirah (1:1) that Hashem created the universe with 32 paths of wisdom. These are the 22 letters, which are quality, and 10 digits, which are quantity. In Genesis, Hashem asks Adam to look into the animals and name them. In other words, look into the letters with which each animal was created and, in those letters, see the essence of the animal.
We have a tradition that prophecy has ceased, with the exception of infants and lunatics. But we also have a tradition that parents, when they name their children, have a moment of prophecy. The name they give is composed of the letters that are the essence of that baby’s soul.
Let us detour for a moment to our parsha, Shemos, (2: 11-12). “It happened in those days that Moshe grew and went out to his brothers and observed their burdens. And he saw an Egyptian man striking a Hebrew man of his brethren. He turned this way and that and saw there was no man, so he struck down the Egyptian and buried him in the sand.” With an explanation from one Rav Zeev, (and the authors own humble insights) let us look deeper into these verses. “It happened in those days that Moshe grew..” He had been raised as an Egyptian prince from the beginning, his education including reading, writing, arithmetic, governing, and culture, in hopes that one day he would be a nobleman among his people. “And observed their burdens….” What was Moshe’s burden? Though he was raised Egyptian, he knew he was an Israelite, and knew that the Israelite woman who nursed him in infancy was actually his mother. This burdened him – was he Israelite or Egyptian?
“And he saw an Egyptian man striking an Israelite man….He turned this way and that and saw there wasn’t a man….” In self-reflection, he saw that the Egyptian part of him was smiting the Israelite part of him. So he looked deeper, “turned this way and that…” inside, beneath his Egytpian robes and upbringing “and saw that there was no man,” saw the illusion of his Egyptian side. “So he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.” Sand in Hebrew is chol, which also means profane, as opposed to holy. Moshe hid his Egyptian side in the mundane and sought to make himself a vessel for holiness, thinking this would be achieved by hiding parts of himself in the sand. Hiding something in sand is not permanent – treasures hidden there may be dug up later and appreciated. “And he saw two Isarelites fighting” – an internal struggle between the Jewish self who thinks he can or must hide parts of himself and the Jewish self that knows that all parts of his being can be used to serve Hashem.
We see that Moshe looked into his inner-most being. What is the pathway to one’s inner-most being? It is one’s name, the letters of which are the elements which constitute one’s existence. On a simple level, Moshe saw that his name did not mean “Drawn from the water” but rather “he will draw others from the water” (Sforno 2:10). On a deeper level we might examine the letters that constitute our names for some insight into the center of our beings.
The author’s name means “To rejoice” “Antelope” son of “Beloved” and “To Lift Up”. When he rejoices he dances like an antelope and everyone is beloved to him and he is raised up. If you can figure out who it is you win the opportunity to talk to him. You also win the opportunity to try to understand why he interprets his name to mean what he thinks it means!
“I have compared you to my horse among those pulling Pharoah’s chariot, my beloved” (Song of Songs 1:9). The great commentator the Malbim writes that the various forces at play in one’s life are the “horses pulling Pha’s chariot.” The forces in one’s life might pull him toward lust, haughtiness, jealousy, and desire for honor and wealth. But the Divine soul, programmed with love and awe of Hashem and the desire to do His Will is also among the forces pulling the chariot. It is “My (Hashem’s) horse.” This horse-force wants to pull the individual toward being a chariot for the Divine Presence. The chariot-driver seeks to put that force among all the other forces and direct them all by his desires. The force of the Divine soul quietly but persistently pulls us toward holiness. For it to succeed, it must be recognized not as a force among forces but the force that should be given the helm.
A davening insight – we should be conscious during psukei d’zimrah, the 8-or-so Psalms and other passages read in the beginning of the morning prayer, that the same Hashem of whose praises we sing, the Creator of heaven and earth and the sea and all that is in it, the guardian of truth, Who gave names to all the stars and brings rain and sustenance for all, to Whom all praise is due, to Whom we sing a new song, Who wants us to be in awe of Him, Who split the sea, Who assures us that all souls can praise Him, we will be facing this same G-d not fifteen minutes later in the personal amidah. And we create the reality of the way we will stand before Him. As it says “Hashem sits upon the praises of Israel” – we build the throne on which we seat our King. Whether we are moved to awe or not is very much in our hands.
It says of Re’u’el’s daughters that they “approached and lowered their buckets and filled the troughs to give water to their father’s sheep.” These words “approached (va’ta’voana) and lowered their buckets (va’tid’lena) and they filled (va’timalena)” are indicative of the process of drawing inspiration from another. We might tend to skip the second step; that is, we hope to approach and fill up. In the parable of a well, this would be equivalent to approaching the well and finding the waters rising to greet us, practically leaping into our troughs. But only a select few have been worthy of such grace – for example Rivkah, as the midrash says the waters rose to greet her; Ya’akov and Moshe were also worthy. They could approach someone and immediately be on the level of truth, from where genuine inspiration is drawn. But we must have an intermediate act. Seeing as surfaces are often misleading, and people have anxieties about opening up and have amazingly high walls in front of their inspirational innards, we must lower our buckets down – we must draw from a deeper place than the surface. If we try to fight our way down, the defenses go up, the stone is rolled back on. Perhaps a better way is to ask questions, to strive to ascertain what forces are operating under the surface. If the desire to know is genuine, we might hope to find the level of true connection that is inherent in all Yisrael from where inspiration might be drawn by both sides.
From Private Bochur – Who knows? Who knows a righteous act from a wicked one? Do we know the whole context? Seems simple – lets look inside. Moshe slew one man and almost another. Was he right? Wrong? But he fled anyway, because the world looked upon his deed as punishable. His running away brought him to the mountain of G-d, speaking directly to G-d. He ran away, yet found that he really came toward the Creator. Interesting reward? Curious punishment? Moshe didn’t believe in the possibility of the task G-d gave him, and certainly not in his ability to fulfill the task he was given. So we all are - but hopeful. We can repair the struggle we experience when trying to accept new realities. Open ourselves to new roles. With faith in the Almighty to change us from stumbling to fluid (in tongue and action…. And someday in thought and consciousness). How can we take on this struggle and open ourselves to playing new roles with ourselves, friends, and teachers? One insight, from Moshe: asking questions, expressing doubts…..even in front of the Master of the World!! A parsha of communication. Is it not He that made the mouth and allows us to speak? A note for all you warriors fighting the battle of the ego - out there, if you “don’t know,” so know that He gives knowledge.
Rav Gavriel Goldfeder
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Rav Gavriel Goldfeder is one of the first semicha recipients of the yeshiva. A graduate of Drew University in Religious Studies, he came to Bat Ayin after stints in other yeshivot and found a spiritual and intellectual home. Here he met his wife, Ketriellah, who was a student in our short-lived Women's Yeshiva. Upon graduation, Gavriel took the position of rabbi of the Aish Kodesh Congregation in Boulder, Colorado and together with Ketriellah and their growing family, they are busy creating (in Gavriel's words), "a community infused with Torah values, passion for learning and prayer, consideration of one another, and action, as well as deep celebration of the joys of life." |