Thursday, July 12, 2012
Tapping into previous generation
9:22 PM | 
Posted by
Rabbi Chaim Coffman |
By Rav Moshe Sternbuch
Educational advice
Have
them take for you a perfectly red unblemished cow, upon which no yoke was laid (19:2)
A
perfectly red unblemished cow is very difficult to come by, and can only be
located after much effort. Clearly, obtaining tahara (purification) from
tumas mes (the impurity of a dead body) was not meant to be an easy
task. Similarly, anyone seeking to purify himself from his evil ways must
realize that his goal can only be achieved after expending a lot of effort.
A cow,
which had a yoke laid on it, was not qualified to serve as a poro adumo.
(the red heifer) This teaches us that if the holy is intermingled with the
secular this diminishes from the potency of the tahara, which is inherent in the holy component.
From the outset all the objects and the actions surrounding the poro adumo
had to be infused with complete kedusho.
If we want
our children to grow up dedicated to serving Hashem and His Torah, we have to
make a point of inculcating unadulterated Torah and yiras shomayim (fear
of heaven) from the outset, without any secular components at all. That way our
efforts to ensure that they acquire a love of Torah and mitzvos are
likely to be crowned with success.
Why we wear yarmulkes
Any
open vessel which has no seal fastened around it becomes unclean (19:15)
This possuk
may be taken as a general instruction to "fasten" our openings. We
must endeavor to maintain control over our mouths and thoughts, and make sure
that we do not speak or even think things contrary to the Will of Hashem. In
the absence of such control tumah will become embedded in our neshomos.
It is
clear from the gemoro (Masseches Shabbos 156b) that the purpose of
covering our heads is to increase yiras shomayim. Rav Shimon Sofer zt”l¸ the Rav of Krakow adds that head
coverings on a Jewish boy or man teach him the lesson that he has to rein in
his thoughts and control his imagination.
Interestingly,
one of the first actions undertaken by the first generations of anti-religious maskilim,
who rebelled against their religious upbringing, was to take off their
yarmulkes. By doing so they demonstrated that their thoughts were no longer
subjugated to any higher purpose, and certainly not to daas Torah and chazal.
Jewish mother
The
congregation had no water (20:2) Rashi: From here we learn that all the
forty years they had the well in Miriam’s merit.
The mon
came down in the merit of Moshe Rabbeinu¸ and the anonei
hakovod hovered above them in the merit of Aharon. Why did they require the
merit of Miriam specifically for water, the most basic commodity of human
existence?
The ideal
Jewish mother is an akeres bayis, a housewife, the mainstay of the whole
household, who is always next to her children, and raises them from the very
first day. She lays the foundations for the continued existence of the Jewish
home, be it in matters of tznius, kashrus, chesed¸
hospitality, and so on. It is within her power to maintain the purity of the
home and to prevent foreign influences from infiltrating into it.
This is the lesson of Miriam’s well. The righteous women of each
generation are the cornerstones of the nation, and they preserve the kedusha and tahara
of their households. Miriam was the role model for Jewish women from her day to
our own times, and the water which the whole nation enjoyed in her merit
symbolized the basic and essential role of the Jewish mother.
Significance of each individual
The
Canaanite king of Arad
They were obligated to wage war for the sake of saving even one
maidservant from the danger of assimilation. Every individual is indispensable,
because all the upper worlds derive their sustenance from the avoda of each and every one of us in
this world, and we cannot imagine the importance and preciousness of each yiddishe neshomo. This should inspire
us not only to improve our own avodas Hashem,
but also to do more to draw even one person closer to his Maker. Anyone who
succeeds in doing so is to be envied.
Wells of TOrah and Yiroh
A well
dug by princes, carved out by nobles of the people (21:18)
Targum Yonoson
writes: “the well which was dug by the forefathers
Avrohom, Yitzchok and Yaakov… was dug by the heads of the nation Moshe and
Aharon”. In other words, the leadership and avodo of Moshe and Aharon
was based on the avodo of our holy forefathers, and without their
preparation and efforts, the Jewish nation would not have merited what they did
in the generation of Moshe and Aharon.
We mentioned above that that is not easy for a person to purify himself from his
evil ways. On the other hand, we must it that if we
persevere we can easily reach extremely high levels, since the generations
preceding us have already dug wells consisting of water filled with Torah and yiras
shomayim from which we can
benefit. All we have to do is to tap into those potential treasure
troves by means of our own avodo.
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