From: Netvort@aol.com
Sent: Friday, January 21, 2005 2:35 AM
To: JoshHoff@aol.com
Subject: Netvort : parshas Beshalach, 5765





                                             A Jarring Experience

                By Rabbi Joshua (preservedly known as The Hoffer) Hoffman


  ~~~~~~~   With thanks to the Almighty, beginning our eighth year   ~~~~~~~


In memory of my mother, Yoninah bas Tzvi Hirsch, whose yohrzeit will be this coming Sunday, the thirteenth of Shevat. May her memory be a blessing.


 The Torah tells us that the Israelites arrived at the wilderness of Sin on the fifteenth day of the second month after their departure from Egypt. There, the people complained to Moshe and Aharon that they felt they would die of hunger. In response, God told Moshe that He would bring down, for them, bread from heaven, which they would collect each day, except for Shabbos, when it would not fall. Instead, on Friday, a double portion would fall, and suffice for the next two days. Later in the parsha, the Torah describes this bread, which the people called manna, and how it tasted. Then, Moshe tells Aharon that God commanded to take a jar and place one day's measure of manna in it, and place it before God as a keepsake for the generations (Shemos 16:33). Rashi notes that 'before God' means, before the ark, and that this verse was not said until the Tent of Meeting was built, sometime later than the events described in the immediately preceding verses. Still, it was written here in the section dealing with manna. The next verses relate that Aharon did as Moshe told him, and that the nation ate the manna for forty years, until they came to the edge of the land of Cana'an. Rabbi Shmuel Dovid Luzzatto, or Shadal, the nineteenth century Italian Bible commentator, writes that this last verse was also written later, by Moshe, at the end of the forty years in the wilderness. Neither Rashi nor Shadal, however, directly discuss why the ark was chosen as the place to put the jar of manna that was to serve as reminder to the nation of what occurred in the wilderness, although comments they, as well as others, make about the manna, can, indirectly, provide us with some answers to this question.


Rashi brings the Mechilta which says that when the prophet Yirmiyahu would later rebuke the people for not engaging in Torah study, they would ask, how could they leave aside their work and engage in Torah? How would they be able to earn a livelihood? Yirmiyahu would then bring out the jar of manna, show it to them, and tell them that their ancestors sustained themselves with that manna. God, he added, had many ways by which to provide people with the provisions they need. Based on this midrash, we can understand why the manna was placed next to the ark. The idea of keeping the manna as a keepsake was, then, according to the midrash, in order to have it on hand to use as a lesson for future generations, to engage in Torah study and not worry about the loss of livelihood involved. The ark, which contains the tablets of the Torah given at Mt. Sinai, as well as a Torah scroll, was therefore the appropriate place to put the jar of manna, to serve as a permanent reminder of the connection between the two.

Actually, this approach of the Mechilta is reflected in the words of God Himself, which He said when He first delivered the manna to the people from heaven. He told Moshe, " Behold I shall rain down for you food from heaven ; let the people go out and pick each day's matter on its day, so that I may test him, whether they will follow My Torah or not" (Shemos 16:4). Rashi himself says that the test God meant was, whether the people would keep the laws regarding the collection of the manna, namely, not to leave over from it on any given day, and not to go out on Shabbos to gather it. This explanation looks at the verse in a circumscribed way, and explains the text within the limited context of the verse itself. However, Rambam, in his Guide for the Perplexed (3:24), offers a broader interpretation. He says that the term used in regard to God's tests, 'to know,' does not mean, for God to know, but, rather, for people to know. In regard to the manna, he notes, the Torah says elsewhere (Devorim 8:2), " That He might afflict you, to test you, to know what is in you heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not." The meaning there, says the Rambam, is, for religious communities, and people throughout the world, to know that those who totally devote themselves to God's service are provided by Him with food in  unthought-of ways. The verse in our parsha, Rambam continues, also means that people in general should consider it and see whether being devoted to God's service is useful and sufficient or not sufficient. Torah study is, certainly, an important part of one's service to God, and actually the guiding force behind that service. Thus, by placing the jar of manna next to the ark which contains the Torah, the people are reminded of the lesson of the manna, that those who devote themselves to studying and observing the Torah will not suffer deprivation as a result.


Shadal, in his comments to the last verse in the section of manna, which tells us how long the Israelites ate the manna, cites the comments of Rabbeinu Saadia Gaon in his introduction to his work The Book of Beliefs and Opinions (Emunos VeDeos). He writes there that, to his mind, the miracle of the manna is the most amazing miracle recorded in the Torah, because it endured for forty years. He writes that it is hard to conceive of a scheme through which a nation of about two million people could be nourished for forty years only by food produced for them by God. Had there been such a scheme, he continues, the early philosophers would have used it to sustain their students and teach them wisdom without having to work for a living. It is also not conceivable that the ancestors would have fabricated this story and passed it on to their children without being challenged. Shadal adds that because the manna continued to be provided for forty years, the people had ample time to investigate whether Moshe produced it through some kind of deceit or trickery. The manna is, therefore, concludes Shadal, the foundation of our belief in the fundamental principle of the divine origin of the Torah. Based on this comment, we can further understand why the jar of manna was placed next to the holy ark containing the Torah, since the manna is our best proof that the Torah was given to us by God. The manna, given to us by God, reflected on the Torah which it was next to, which was also given to us by God  (We may add parenthetically that the Rambam, in his Mishneh Torah, Laws of the Foundations of the Torah, 8:1, writes that belief based on miracles is imperfect and subject to refutation. Our real proof for the divine origin of the Torah, he continues, is the revelation that the entire nation experienced at Mt. Sinai, through which it had a prophetic experience and witnessed Moshe receiving the Torah through prophecy. Some scholars have posited that the Rambam sometimes presents a certain theory in refutation of one propounded by Rav Saddia Gaon. Perhaps this is an example of that practice.).


On a related but somewhat different note, Rabbi Hillel Lieberman, Hy"d, in his Ahavas Torah, offers another explanation of why the jar of manna was placed next to the aron, without mentioning the comments of Rashi, Rambam or Shadal. He cites the Talmud as saying that the aron took up more space than was provided for it in the Holy of Holies, and, thus, was beyond the realm of space and time. As such, it was not subject to any form of decay. Thus, it was the appropriate place to put the manna, to assure that it would last for generations, without spoiling. Perhaps this explanation can be seen as an adjunct to the first two we have presented. Since the Torah is of divine origin, as demonstrated by its recording of the continued granting of the manna over a forty-year period, as Shadal explains, it is not subject to the limitations that mundane objects are given over to. Moreover, adherence to and study of it will not cause one a loss of sustenance as a result, even though studying the Torah and following its commandments demands that one compromise the amount of time and effort he can devote to the pursuit of his personal needs. Just as the manna provided a person with exactly the amount of sustenance he needed to maintain a healthy life style, so, too, will one who lives by the Torah be able to provide for his personal needs, as Rashi and the Rambam taught.


I would like to add a further explanation for the placement of the jar of manna next to the aron. The Mishneh in Menachos (12:4), records a dispute between Rabbi Shimon and the Sages concerning the amount of flour that can be mixed properly with a log of oil to use as a meal offering brought in the Temple. He says that sixty tenths of an eipha measure of flour can be placed in one utensil and mixed properly with one log of oil, but sixty-one tenths cannot, and the sixty first tenth must therefore be placed in a separate vessel. In response to the question of the Sages, how it could be that a small amount of flour above can make such a difference, Rabbi Shimon says that all of the measures of the rabbis are given exactly. With sixty tenths a meal offering can be mixed and with sixty-one tenths it cannot be mixed, just as a mikveh of forty seah is kasher, or halachically fit, for one to immerse himself in to become purified, while a mikveh which has a small amount of rain water below the required forty seah is not kasher. When Rabbi Shimon says that the measures given by the rabbis are exact, he really means the measures given by the Torah, because the Talmud tells us that measures used in mitzvos are 'halacha l'Moshe mi-Sinai,' meaning that they are of Sinaitic origin. Rabbi Shimon's statement is reminiscent of what the Torah tells us about the manna. Moshe told the people to gather an omer measure of manna per person. Everyone went out to gather the manna, the Torah records, "… he who took much and he who took little. They measured in an omer and whoever took more had nothing extra and whoever took less was not lacking" (Shemos 16:17-18).  God provided each person with an omer portion of the manna. No matter how much a person would gather, he would be left, in the end, with that amount per person in his household, and the rest would spoil. On one level, then, placing the manna next to the ark containing the Torah serves as an indication that the precepts of the Torah are given in an exact way, just as the manna provided for each person was given in an exact way.

On another level, with Rabbi Shimon's statement in the background, the placement of the manna next to the aron teaches us a further important lesson. Rav Dovid Feinstein has often remarked that whatever money a person makes by pursuing an activity that is in violation of the precepts of the Torah will be lost in some way, and whatever he feels he loses by following the dictates of the Torah will be made up in some way. This, it seems, is the lesson of the manna, which was given to each person in exact accordance to his needs. Placing the manna next to the aron highlighted this lesson, and was meant to act as a spur to Torah commitment.

The basic message behind all of these explanations of the reason for placing the jar of the manna next to the aron is the need to trust in God and believe that His Torah, whose origin is beyond time and space, is true in an absolute sense. This being so, the Torah can help us, also, transcend the limitations of time and space, and guide us to a path in life that will provide us with exactly what we need to serve God in this world while still enjoying the legitimate pleasures that life has to offer.



Please address all correspondence to the author (Rabbi Hoffman) with the following address - JoshHoff @ AOL.com.

To subscribe to Netvort, send a message with subject line subscribe, to Netvort@aol.com. To unsubscribe, send message with subject line unsubscribe, to the same address.