Hasidut untuk Mazmur 119:12

The text does not say “Ani,” for if it had done so, it would have suggested that the Holy One Blessed Be He revealed all of His light to Israel, in its fullness, and that thereafter they would not have been able to go deeper in His words, for He had already revealed everything. Thus the kaf [separating ani from anochi – ed.] teaches that it was not in its fullness, but rather an image, a likeness, of the light that God will reveal in the future. And all that a man will grasp in going deeper in the words of Torah will show that, until this point, he was in darkness. Day and night suggest this reality. The day is when God opens the gates of wisdom to people. The night is so that the person will not think that he has grasped everything in its entirety. For all that he has grasped is like the nighttime, when compared to the daytime that will come afterwards. And so it always is. Thus everything is nighttime in comparison to the light that God will open up in the future. This is what is suggested by the conjunction of the verse “Do not make an idol (pesel).” The Zohar teaches that “this verse is taught on account of the [later verse], ‘Make for yourself (p’sol l’cha) [two tablets],’--therefore, do not make an idol, and do not make yourself a servant of another Torah.” The idea here is that the word pesel means something which is cut, delimited, finished and without anything missing. But this is only found in the Torah of Moses. In human thought, nothing can be finished and made completely whole. As the Midrash (Ruth Rabbah 3:2) tells: Caesar said to Rabbi Joshua ben Hanania, “I am also able to make a Torah like Moses.” And he decreed that no one light a fire for three days. But in those three days he saw smoke coming from a certain house. The Caesar was told that one of his ministers was ill, and he decided to allow [the minister to make the fire in his house]. Of course, in our holy Torah we have this same rule, that saving a life outweighs Shabbat. But the difference is that one who desecrates Shabbat to save a life does not transgress the holy Torah, because the commandment to do so is part of the Torah. Likewise, in every place in which we invoke “When it is time to do for God,” we have a hint of “abrogate your law” (Ps. 119:12). Thus the Torah contains within it all of its own future abrogations, and its light encompasses all contingencies and all circumstances that could possibly come to be. No man has the power to do this. This is how the Zohar interprets “Do not make a pesel” – this refers to the positive commandments. “Or image” – this refers to the negative commandments. For nothing is revealed to any person in its entirety.