Beraishis

The Torah begins by telling us that Hashem created the world with all that is in it. The earth was initially dark, so one of the first things Hashem created was light. וירא אלקים את האור כי טוב ויבדל אלקים בין האור ובין החשך, and Hashem saw the light, that it was good & He separated between the light & dark.  

Rashi explains that Hashem saw that the light was good & that it wouldn't be good for the light & dark to operate simultaneously, so He separated them. One’s time He made during the day & the other’s time during the night. Sifsey Chachamim explains that it can't really mean simultaneously, because that would be impossible, rather it means either that in one town it would be light & in another dark, or it means that it would be day for an hour or two & then night for an hour or two & then switch back. So, Hashem made it uniform that we have the daytime of light & the night of darkness. 

The Chofetz Chaim, however, says the posuk is trying to teach us about separation when things are intermingled: how we have to separate between the profane & the sanctified. In Eastern Europe, traveling peddlers would come to town selling tzitzis, siddurim,‎ mezuzos & other holy articles. They would set up a table in the back of the shul near the furnace; when prayers ended, the people would come & buy what they needed. 

Once, at a shul in Poland, the Rav, Reb Chaim Leib Mishkovsky, approached the table ‎to buy something & was shocked to see that, among the holy items were books of heresy, haskala literature. Without hesitation, he took the books & threw them into the furnace. The peddler complained; “rabbi, not only did you just cause me the loss of the cost of the books; you don't let me make a living; those books were my biggest profit.” 

The rabbi replied, “I will pay you the full retail price for the books I burned. Now that you say you won't be able to support your family, I will help you find another job.” The next day, the peddler went to the rabbi to ask him if he found him a job.  The rabbi answered, “yes, he was working on something & with the help of the local priest, he might have something for him.”  

“How can the priest help?” asked the peddler. “Well, last week I met the priest & he told me that the man who used to ring the church bells every morning, died. I will ask him to offer you the job. It's a respectable & decent paying position.” The peddler was shocked & insulted! “Rabbi, do you think I would sell my soul to be an assistant to the priest?” 

The rabbi replied, “listen to yourself. To ring bells to wake up non-Jews to go to church is unthinkable in your eyes, but to sell heretical books that will entice young Jewish children to idolatry is permissible?!”

How often do we do this in our own life? We put custom on a pedestal while transgressing real Torah laws without a thought? This is why, says the gemara, that we have havdala - the bracha of separation. Additionally, the bracha of chonain hadaas contains the word wisdom, for if there is no wisdom, there is no separation. We have to realize that just as, between day & night, the difference is obvious, so, too, the difference between the holy & the mundane, the Jew & the Gentile, must never be blurred. 

Let's take this new beginning, a fresh start to the year, to focus on what's important in our lives, to be able to make the differentiation between right & wrong, holy & profane & not have them intermingle, so we will merit the eternal light!  

V'zos Habracha / simchas Torah

Before Moshe is to take leave ‎of this world, he blesses each of the tribes. Then he tells each tribe the key to its physical & spiritual success. Two of them are combined in one posuk, שמח זבולן בצאתך ויששכר באהליך, rejoice , Zevulun in your excursions, and Yissachar in your tents. 

This partnership between Yissachar & Zevulun is the classic formula for the relationship between the supporters of Torah and the ones that engage in Torah study full time. Zevulun engaged in commerce to allow Yissachar to devote all his time to Torah study.  

Why is Zevulun mentioned first in the posuk? Shouldn't it be Yissachar, who studied Torah full time, be mentioned first? The Yesod HaAvodah answers that the Torah gives preference to challenge; spending one’s life in the beis medrash does not put one’s spiritual mettle to the test in the same way that a business life does. Moshe therefore blessed Zevulun first that he should be able to keep the proper perspective: his financial success should be looked at as a means rather than a goal. 

Reb Akiva Eiker shows us how to view our service to Hashem. The Torah begins with the letter ב   & ends with the letter ל which spells לב, heart. If one looks at the letters before & after ‎these letters in the alphabet, he will find כ before the ל and א before the ב spelling אך. Looking at the letters after those, we find after the ל the letter מ and after the ב we find ג spelling גם. There is a rule in the gemara that the word אך excludes something; the word גם includes something. The Torah is teaching us that, by putting the word לב to start & end the Torah, no matter how little one can accomplish in his Torah learning, like the אך or how much one can accomplish in his Torah learning like the גם ‎all that matters is that it's done with the לב, as long as whatever one does is done with the whole heart trying to get close to Hashem. 

‎During Simchas Torah in the year 1948 in the Ponevitch Yeshiva, the elderly Shamash was very moved by the dancing of the boys & the excitement they had for Torah. He started thinking "if only my children were still alive, they would surely be among these boys dancing so feverishly but alas they are buried under some patch of ground somewhere in Europe".

As he was t‎hinking about his children that were brutally taken from him and about how much Torah they could have learned had they still been here, his heart felt like it was going to burst from the pain and he started crying hot tears. He ran to where the Rosh Yeshiva, Rav Kahaneman was sitting & cried "Rebbe, where are my children? Why were they taken from me? They could have grown & been giants in Torah & yiras shomaim. Why were they taken?

His cries tore the hearts off those who heard him & especially the Rav who also lost his family in the war. The Rav turned to him crying & said that, for them, we don't have to cry; they sacrificed their lives for Hashem.  ‎They are in a world now full of only good where they are learning in the bais medrash upstairs with all the holy people. Do you know why we need to cry?

We need to cry about ourselves! Where are we in the world?  We are here and how much could we accomplish with every second that we are here? Every second we learn, we are getting life for eternity, reward that we can't fathom, and what are we really doing? Are we taking advantage? It’s our job to sanctify Hashem with life, to live a life of Torah & take advantage of every second. 

As we finish this cycle of the Torah & prepare to start anew, what are our goals? How do we make this ‎year better? Perhaps, if we realize that even though most of our time is spent out in the world, and most of our spiritual challenges consist of showing how a Jew is supposed to live & deal with people,    

Nevertheless, if we could make the commitment to utilize the time we do have for learning & doing mitzvos, to take advantage of the time we are given here, that no matter how much or how little it is, if we do it with all our heart, it will be considered as if we lived a complete Torah life!

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Haazinu

‎The song of Haazinu‎ is the song of the history of a nation, for just as a musical composition has decrescendos & crescendos, so, too, the history of the Jewish people has its diminished times, periods of calamity, that will be followed by the joyous crescendo of the great finale, the ultimate redemption. (Otzros Hatorah)

One of the stanzas in our parsha states: ויאמר אסתירה פני מהם , and He will say I shall hide my face from them, אראה מה אחריתם, and see what is their end, כי דור תהפכת המה, for they are a generation of reversals. Rashi explains that they reverse Hashem's good will to anger. 

However, Reb Zusia of Anipoli saw the end of the verse in a good light. He translated the posuk as follows: "I shall hide my face from them" - let them act carelessly for a while. "I see what their end will be" - I'm not so worried about how they are acting now, for ‎"they are a nation of reversals" who have the potential to reverse in an instant from sinfulness to repentance. 

We just completed the fast and contrition of Yom Kippur. Ask anyone how it was & they will answer, “it was a great, inspiring, beautiful davening”.  However, looking around the day after doesn't seem much different; for the most part, we still look the same, act the same & dress the same. So what changed? 

What did we accomplish? ‎What could we still accomplish?

The Chafetz Chaim tells us a story about a wealthy man, who had many different businesses & ‎many employees. One day, his newly married nephew needed to go to work & came to him looking for a job. The wealthy man was very happy & told his nephew, “this is perfect; I need someone I can trust to oversee all the different businesses & workers to make sure everything runs smoothly.” 

The nephew was delighted for it was an easy job; he didn't need to get his hands dirty & the uncle was going to pay him a nice salary at the end of each month. The wealthy man took a piece of paper, wrote on it all the daily activities of the workers, gave it to his nephew and said, “come to me at the end of the month & we will go over the list;  then I will pay you”. 

He took the paper & was so excited that he would be making so much money‎. As soon as the month was up, he came to his uncle to get paid. The money was waiting for him, but first his uncle wanted to review with him all that was going on in the companies. He asked his nephew to report & the nephew rattled off the entire paper by heart, every worker and what they were supposed to be doing. The uncle was impressed that he knew the ‎schedule by heart but he wanted to hear how the workers were doing. Were the businesses performing properly? However, the nephew just kept repeating the chart; he knew nothing else. The uncle asked, “did you think I was paying you so much money just to memorize the chart? The chart was only a guide for you to know what to do, not just to say!”

At Ne’ila, the high point of Yom Kippur we all shout out the יג מידות, the thirteen attributes of mercy.  When we say these to Hashem, we should be forgiven & He will answer our prayers.  However, it doesn't seem like that is always the case. The Chafetz Chaim explains that we are like that nephew, just saying the list. The יג מידות are not just a prayer; it is the manual for what we have to do, not just say. We need to emulate the attributes of Hashem, be‎ compassionate, merciful, kind, etc. If we emulate Hashem & go in His ways by being nicer to people, looking out for each other's benefit, 

trying to emulate Him, then we will merit change, forgiveness & the answering of our prayers!

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Vayelech

 The Midrash writes that the first word of our parsha, וילך, connotes  ‎reproof. What reproof was Moshe giving? The sefer Minchas Ani explains that Moshe's reproof is contained in the next posuk where he says " I am one hundred & twenty years old today today my days & years are filled.”  The Zohar writes that even Moshe didn't know until that day that this was to be the day of his death. His reproof was that no one knows when his time is up & one should have his purpose for being in this world in front of him always, as it says, repent one day before your death. Since no one knows when that day is, there has to be a constant state of awareness as to what we are doing with our time.

As the parsha states: ולמדו ליראה את ה אלקיכם כל הימים אשר אתם חיים על האדמה, and they shall learn to fear Hashem all the days that you live on the land. Why does it say that you should fear Hashem all the days? Isn't it a given that as long as one is here, he has to fear Hashem?
Reb Simcha Zissel of Kelm says that the words "all the days" does not refer to the phrase to fear Hashem, rather it refers to the words "they shall learn"‎ - developing a reverence for Hashem Himself is a life-long learning process & something that has to be cultivated each & every day. We need to develop a consistency in our level of commitment to Hashem.

The Chafetz Chaim compared this to a sick man who met his friend. “How are you”, asked the friend. The sick man replied, “I'm seriously ill & running a high fever.” The friend said well, tell you the truth you don't look so bad. The sick man replied, actually today I'm not doing too bad; my fever is down & I'm feeling OK. So, asked the friend, why did you tell me you’re sick? The sick man replied, that's the nature of this sickness; one day I'm delirious with high fever & the next day it's gone but 2 days later it's right back; so trust me I'm sick.

This, says the Chafetz‎ Chaim, is how we approach the mitzvos. Some days we are perfectly healthy serving Hashem fully & then other days we slip into sin.  Our ultimate goal has to be to serve Hashem & revere Him all of our days. The first time the Satmar Rebbe saw a neon sign on a butcher shop that had the words בשר כשר , kosher meat ,flashing on & off he said, that's America; sometimes kosher, sometimes not.

Another interpretation of what Moshe meant when he said "I am a hundred and twenty years old today" is that we should make sure our days are not wasted; he was saying that his hundred & twenty years were complete to that very day, not lacking. The של"ה הקדוש explains that every day that we do something good, that day is internalized for us forever; that day belongs to us.  However, days that we use for bad are considered like dead days; they are wasted.

‎As we approach Yom Kippur, let's take this lesson to heart & commit ourselves to have a greater awareness of Hashem in our lives, to constantly develop our awe & reverence for Hashem. Rabbi Shlomo Gissinger once told me that one way to gain reverence for Hashem especially on these days from Rosh Hashana through Yom Kippur is by concentrating on the word מלך every time we make a bracha. That will be a constant reminder that Hashem is our king. If we can do this on a constant basis, we will ensure that we don't let any of our days go to waste & all our days will be good for eternity!