masei

This weeks parsha thought is dedicated לזכר נשמת ר' אליעזר בן שבתי

The posuk says ויכתוב משה את מוצאיהם למסעיהם על פי ה' ואלה מסעיהם למוצאיהם Moshe recorded the stops for their journeys that were by Hashems command; these were their journeys according to their stops. Why the change in the order? First it says מוצאיהם למסעיהם stops for their journeys, & then it says מסעיהם למוצאיהם these were their journeys according to their stops.
The בעל הפלאה explains the posuk of רצון יראיו יעשה ואת שועתם ישמע ויושיעם - the will of those that fear him he does, and their cry he will hear and save them.
That even though 'ה knows that the will of the ones who fear him isn't for their benefit, still he does their will. Once they will realize that it wasn't beneficial for them & cry out to Him, then he will save them.
The וידבר משה says that after Moshe said למה הרעות לעם הזה; why are you doing bad to this nation, 'ה had to fulfill his request & take them right out even though it was too early for them to go into Eretz Yisroel. That's why it says they needed מוצאיהם למסעיהם; that they went out because of the journeys, when in reality it was מסעיהם למוצאיהם these journeys were only necessary because they went out ahead of time.
Now if we only needed the journeys to make up the time until we could go into the land, why the need for all the stops along the way?
The way the Machazeh Avraham explains the changing of the wording helps us understand the need for the stops along the way. He says that it's teaching us how to view our lives. We tend to think that events happen to us because we're in a certain place at a certain time, & since one was put into this situation a certain outcome occurs. While that might be our natural thought process, nothing could be further from the truth. In reality, we travel to a certain place because 'ה wants us to. He wants something to happen to us there, & not vice versa. At almost every stop they made, something significant happened. It wasn't by chance that 'ה brought them to each place, for He wanted them to experience each trial. The stops were not because of the journey, but rather the journey was to get to the stops. We needed these stops to teach us that even though throughout the generations we won't have Moshe to lead us and tell us what each stop along the way means, we have to know that wherever we end up, including all the stops along the way, is exactly where we're suppose to be, because if 'ה put us there then that's where we belong!

mattos

This weeks Parsha Thought is dedicated
לזכר נשמת בלימה בת רב חיים

After the war with Midyan, when the Jews returned home with the spoils of war, Elazar told them that they would have to be purified before they were able to use them. Depending on the way they were used, that's how they were purified.
The Torah precedes this command by saying, זאת חקת התורה; this is the decree of the Torah, then goes on to tell us the laws of kashering vessels.
The Chafetz Chaim asks, why would that be considered a חוק, which is a mitzvah we don't understand? This actually makes sense. We need to purify the vessels, & it's logical that the way they became impure would be the way to make them pure. If they were used with fire, it's understandable that they'd need to be cleansed with fire. ר 'משה פיינשטיין takes the question a step further, and asks, how is kashering a mitzvah that has to do with the whole Torah? It should have just said זאת חקת הגעלה. How are the laws of הגעלה a decree for the whole torah?
R' Moshe says we can learn a vital lesson from here that pertains to the whole torah. Just like vessels can go from being impure to being pure, so too a person who is full of sin can be turned around & become totally pure by doing teshuva. The decree of the torah is that a person should never feel that he sinned too much to come back, & just like when you purify, if it was used with fire it needs to be purified with fire. If it was used with a lesser degree of heat, it's sufficient with less. So too when a person does teshuva. If he sinned with a fiery passion then the teshuva has to be fiery, & if not, a lesser teshuva is enough.
The Chafetz Chaim says that the Torah is sometimes compared to fire, & other times it's compared to water. It's compared to water teaching us that just like when one goes in the mikve it immediately purifies him, so too when one immerses himself in Torah it also purifies. It's also compared to fire for one shouldn't think that the Torah can only purify the surface avairos that are compared to water, but even the ones that are deep inside you. The Torah can burn them out like fire.
So what the Torah is teaching us here is that there's always hope, & that as long as we turn away from sin & go on the right path there is the opportunity for us to be forgiven, & one should never think he can't come back. That, says the Chafetz Chaim, is the חוק that 'ה put in the Torah; the power to purify a person from sin, from a simple sinner that only needs the purity of water, to the habitual sinner who needs the purity of fire. Whatever the need, by clinging to the Torah you can be purified !

pinchas

This weeks Parsha Thought is dedicated
לזכר נשמת יהודה בן ר' נחמן

The parsha starts off with 'ה telling Moshe the reward that Pinchas gets for avenging His honor, and while doing so tells us the names of the people who sinned. ושם איש ישראל.... זמרי בן סלוא...... לשמעני
The name of the slain Israelite man who was slain with the Midianite woman was Zimri, son of Salu, leader of a Shimonite patriarchy.
The Ohr Hachaim asks, if the Torah wanted to reveal the names of the sinners, it doesn't make sense to do it over here where we are talking about Pinchas's reward. It should have said it where the act actually took place. Instead, there it just refers to him as the איש ישראל.
When the Torah mentions Zimri's lineage, Rashi says, just like when we list the lineage of Pinchas, a tzadik, to praise him, we list the lineage of Zimri, a rasha, to denigrate him. Rav Lieff asks, it's understandable how listing the lineage of Zimri, the grandson of great people, makes his act even more despicable.
Whereas Pinchas, being a tzadik the son of a tzadik, a noble act is what is expected of him. How can you compare the two?
After Shimon & Levi killed out sh'chem, they said "are we gonna let him make our sister into a harlot?!". This was what the shevet of Shimon stood for; they were totally against promiscuity. And what was Aaron's motto? Love & peace. He was always running after peace, trying to make peace between man & his friend, husband & wife. His essence was peace.
Now, says Rav Lieff, we could understand what Rashi meant by comparing them. They both went against the grain of how they were brought up & what they stood for. Zimri, whose family was against promiscuity went & committed this act that went against everything he stood for, & Pinchas too, went against his upbringing of peace & love to pick up a sword & kill, which went totally against his core.
The חיד"א says in the name of ר' אליעזר נחמן פואה, that when you talk bad about רשעים they have tza'ar & that could give them a כפרה. The חיד"א says that's what chazal mean when they say ושם רשעים ירקב; that means don't mention them by name, for then they can get a כפרה that they don't deserve.
According to that we can understand why it didn't say Zimri's name when he committed the act, for that would have degraded him, possibly giving him a כפרה. Therefore it just says an איש ישראל. But here, where it's discussing Pinchas & that a great kiddush Hashem came out of his act, the mentioning of the rasha's name doesn't give a כפרה, so it can be mentioned.
We see from this Posuk two things. First, that one can go against his nature for either good or bad, & second, that even after a disaster one has to make a kiddush Hashem.
This week we saw both of these things. First we saw how a person can go totally against the nature of a human and do the unimaginable, and then we saw how we could make a kiddush Hashem by all coming together to try to help. It didn't matter what you looked like or what kind of hat you wore; everyone was in it together. We have to learn from this to keep that sense of unity through good times too. We have to go against our nature of thinking that one type of jew is better than the other, and love each other just because we're jews, and not need any more tragedies to bring us all together. In that zchus may we merit the coming of moshiach now!

balak

The posuk says that when בלעם was riding his donkey with the elders from Moav to go curse the jews, his donkey stopped & wouldn't move. He hit it 3 times to get it to move, & 3 times the donkey wouldn't move.
Unbeknownst to him, there was a מלאך with his sword drawn, blocking the path. Then the donkey starts talking to him, saying,what did I do to you that you are hitting me? Did I ever do such a thing to you before? בלעם had to answer, no, you never did. The posuk goes on to say that 'ה opened the eyes of בלעם & he saw the מלאך who chastised him saying, why did you hit your donkey these three times? It was me who was blocking your path. The רמב"ם in מורה נבוכים says that from the reprimand of the מלאך who said למה הכית את אתונך why are you hitting the donkey, we learn that the דין of צער בעלי חיים is דאורייתא.
Then the מלאך says to בלעם, had the donkey not turned away, I would have killed you & let her live.
Rashi says that we learn from ואותה החייתי, and I would have let her live ,that being that he didn't kill בלעם, he killed the donkey. Why did he kill the donkey? Because says Rashi, of כבוד הבריות. Hashem takes pity on peoples' dignity. He didn't want people to be able to point to the donkey and say, that's the donkey that bested בלעם.
We just said that צער בעלי חיים is דאורייתא, so how could the מלאך go & kill the donkey? Especially for the kovod of בלעם who was a rasha & was on his way to try & curse the jewish people to obliterate them. Is this whose kavod we're worried about? ר' אברהם גרודזינסקי says, the Torah is teaching us a powerful lesson. One can't begin to comprehend the honor that's due every person if for the kovod of a mushchis & a rasha we're willing to transgress the torah & kill an animal for no other reason than to protect his dignity. How much more so for our friends, who are called בנים למקום, do we have to be so careful to treat them with the ultimate respect!

chukas

Right after the Torah tells us the laws of the פרה אדומה, it says ותמת שם מרים; Miriam died there.
Rashi asks, why did the Torah put these next to each other? He answers that it's to teach us that just like קרבנות are מכפר, the death of צדיקים is also מכפר.
Right after the death of Miriam comes the episode of Moshe hitting the rock instead of talking to it. רבינו בחיי says, the reason it's right after is because that was the cause of Moshe & Aaron dying in the midbar, & not being able to enter the land of Israel.
The gemara in chulin tells us the story of R' Pinchas ben Yair whose donkey wouldn't eat from grain that didn't have maaser taken off. It says, if even the animals of צדיקים are protected from causing their owner to sin,all the more so no bad will come because of the tzadik himself.
Based on that, how could it be that miriam could be the cause of her brothers' death & them not being able to enter the land?
The navi in yeshaya says, הצדיק אבד ואין איש שם על לב the righteous one perishes and no man takes it to heart. ואנשי חסד נאספים באין מבין כי מפני הרע נאסף הצדיק; men of kindness are gathered in with no one understanding that because of the impending evil the righteous one was gathered in. There are two explanations given for the words "that because of the impending evil the righteous one was gathered in." One is that we learn from our Posuk that the death of צדיקים is מכפר, and two, that the צדיק goes before the bad comes so he doesn't have to see it. As the gemara says, when a צדיק leaves the world, bad comes.
We need to understand how the two reasons can coexist since once the death of the צדיקים was מכפר, why should bad befall us? Says the נודע ביהודה that צדיקים die because of the sins of the generation, but if after the death of the צדיק the people take it to heart & repent, 'ה will forgive them & no more evil will befall them. In this case the death will be a kapara. However, if we don't take it to heart, then the punishment will come & 'ה will take more צדיקים so that they don't see the evil that can befall us for not taking it to heart and repenting.
Right after the death of miriam what did the jews do? They went to moshe complaining, we have no water, why did you bring us here to die? We should have stayed in Egypt.
They didn't learn anything from the death of miriam; just the opposite. They started complaining again, so her death couldn't be a kapara for them. And it was the sinfulness of the nation that caused Moshe & Aaron to die & not be able to go into the land, not Miriam.
We have to learn from here not to take the death of צדיקים lightly, and to learn from their ways how to better ourselves. 'ה shouldn't have to take any more tzadikim away from us, but instead grant them long life so we can emulate them & get the kapara that we so desperately need!