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.
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