Chasidut su Deuteronomio 32:18
צ֥וּר יְלָדְךָ֖ תֶּ֑שִׁי וַתִּשְׁכַּ֖ח אֵ֥ל מְחֹלְלֶֽךָ׃
Della Roccia che ti ha generato sei stato indifferente, e hai dimenticato Dio che ti annoiava. .
Bnei Machshava Tova
The verse in Deut. 32:18 chastises Israel, saying "you forgot the G-d who bore you." This is the fundamental reason for one's distance from G-d. R' Elimelech of Lizhensk wrote in his pre-prayer meditation, "May our thoughts be refined, lucid, clear, and strong." Everyone knows that if they were to actually understand how they stand in G-d's presence, there would be no evil inclination; on the contrary, one would express their entire spiritual nature in holy words until they completely sublimated their physicality into the divine. Furthermore, even if one just held fast to G-d mentally, they would feel the nullification of the evil inclination and all of its poison suffusing the physical senses would vanish before G-d. Hasn't every Jew felt -- for example on Yom Kippur, particularly during the Kol Nidrei and Ne'ilah services -- the disappearance of all one's sinful desires and thoughts due to their strong mental contemplation of the divine? The entire source of human degradation is due to this "forgetting of the G-d Who bore you," when one's thoughts diminish and are no longer as refined, clear, and strong as they were on Yom Kippur or similar occasions. Even if one wanted to strengthen their knowledge and thoughts, they would not be able to sustain their concentration for very long. Because this is the case, all of our efforts must be put towards strengthening our thinking: to expand it, strengthen it, and perfect it, so that it may attach to the Blessed G-d -- not only during select times such as during the shofar blasts of Rosh Hashanah or on Yom Kippur, but that it is constantly clear, strong, and connected to holiness.
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Kedushat Levi
When the psalmist, in psalms 111,4 says of G’d: זכר עשה לנפלאותיו, “He has made a memory for His wonders,” the question arises why ”wonders” need to be commemorated by a special זכר? We would have thought that their very having occurred is their memorial! The psalmist answers this unspoken question in the latter half of the same verse when he says: חנון ורחום ה', “Hashem is gracious and compassionate.” At the sea of reeds G’d demonstrated that in spite of His being compassionate He deliberately suppressed this attribute by drowning the Egyptians in order to “save” the Israelites. This “canceling” of one of His major attributes on account of the interests of the Jewish people is what are referred to both by the psalmist, and by Moses in the shirat hayam, the song of thanksgiving, as נפלאותיו or פלא, “wonderful, amazing.”
The second type of ישועה, “rescue” is when G’d garbs Himself in the “clothing” worn by nature, i.e. makes use of natural law without disturbing its normal function. A well known example of such an event is the “miracle” of Purim, which according to all that we know about it did not contain any elements that could be described as interference with the natural course of events.
Achashverosh married Esther, and due to his jealousy of Haman who he thought had tried to rape his wife Esther, he hanged Haman. A similar “miracle” resulted in the festival of Chanukah, the king or chief general of the Seleucids lusting after Yehudit and trying to rape her, resulting instead in his being killed by her, and his army becoming demoralized. In both the examples mentioned, many thousands of gentiles, antisemites, were killed in due course.
The subject becomes easier to understand by means of a parable. A King built a palace for his son; originally, he had meant for his son to live in that house. After a while, some wicked people expelled the son from this house. It would be appropriate for the house that had served as the protector of its inhabitants to not only protest this action but to take counter measures. However the house, i.e. the stones, are immobile, as pointed put by Chabakuk 2,11. Seeing that the stones of the house are immobile, they are powerless. The world was created for the sake of the Jewish people, i.e. the world is our “house,” as G’d has told Pharaoh that the Jewish people are His firstborn son when viewed in terms of the parable. (Exodus 4,22) When the gentile nations dispossess us or kill us, the “world” ought by rights to rise up in our defense. As this is not possible, the owner of the world, G’d, will do this instead. This is why the numerical value of the word טבע, nature loosely translated as “world,” is the same as the numerical value of the word אלה-ים, G’d, i.e. 86. When “nature” smites the gentile nations, it is the same as G’d smiting them. The world is the sum total of the Creator’s creative activity. G’d may be perceived as its father. The expression מעשה בראשית, a simile for the 6 days of G’d’s creative activity, contains the word ראשית, “beginning,” i.e. that the final product of G’d’s creative activity had been planned from the very beginning, i.e. as a home for the Jewish people, who are the whole purpose of G’d’s beginning the creation of the universe. At the conclusion of this process, אחרית, the Creator garbed Himself in what we are fond of calling טבע, “nature,” and all that this term entails. When Moses said in Deuteronomy 32,18 צור ילדך תשי, “you (his people) neglected the Rock that begot you,” his words expressed similar sentiments.
Before someone opens his mouth to say something, a person considers if the words he is about to utter are the ones appropriate for expressing his wish. If he wishes to make a request, he thinks about how best to phrase such a request in order that it may be granted. By changing his mode of speech, he becomes a totally new person. When G’d issued directives to create the universe, He created the whole world with these oral directives. (Compare psalms 33,6 בדבר ה' שמים נעשו, “the heavens came into existence by a single word of the Lord”.) When it comes to “saving” this world from impending destruction, using the טבע, “nature,” as His instrument, He deals with something that is established, and therefore employs a different means than the one He had employed when bringing something into existence. According to our author the word טבע is closely related to the word חנוכה, completing a training program, consecration, i.e. establishing a kind of order, norms, imprinting a form on something, as in מטבע, coin. G’d no longer needs to resort to something brand new, i.e. miracles.
When Esther is described as אילה, a strong animal, (feminine of איל, ram) i.e. fully mature, our sages referred to the period of overt miracles in Jewish history having come to an end in her time, so that the salvation of the Jewish people in which she was instrumental did not require G’d’s intervention by upsetting the rules of nature through a miracle.
[If G’d were forever to have to resort to miracles to achieve His purpose in the universe, this would reflect a basic flaw in that universe. When at the end of the Purim story the Jews are described as voluntarily accepting what they had accepted at Sinai under tremendous pressure, this too is a compliment to G’d, whose children had matured. Ed.]
The sages (at the beginning of 40,10) are quoted as seeing in one of the branches which the cup bearer saw in his dream, the young priests, the ones who would perform the sacrificial service in the Temple in due course. If we revert to the allegorical approach that the author has adopted, the פרחי כהונה that the Talmud spoke about are the sacrifices offered in the Temple, which are symbolic of how miracles become converted into norms, טבע, seeing that most communal offerings are closely tied to certain days, weeks, months, or years, and these in turn symbolise how what had come into existence as an overt miracle at the creation, had been transformed into what we call natural phenomena, i.e. manifestations in nature that are not only predictable but can be calculated thousands of years in advance.
[The author tries again to bring the subject of Chanukah into this portion, as the portion is always read around that time of year, draws on the Talmud Shabbat 21 where the subject is Chanukah. Ed.] The Talmud there stipulates that the best time for lighting the Chanukah candles is the period immediately following sunset until it has become so dark that no more pedestrians are about. (There was no street lighting in those days) Our author sees in this a symbol of the gradual switchover from G’d performing overt miracles to working through letting טבע perform most of His intervention in the affairs of man. The expression for complete darkness, used by the Talmud is עד שכלתה רגל מן השוק, usually translated as “until the pedestrians have ceased walking in the public domain.” Seeing that the word רגל does not only mean “foot, but is also directly related to רגילות, something habitual, he understands the Talmud as hinting at this “getting used to seeing no more brilliant miracles,” as the period following “sunset.” The expression used by the Talmud for sunset is שקיעת החמה, the word חמה, “sun,” referring to something overt, highly visible.
The second type of ישועה, “rescue” is when G’d garbs Himself in the “clothing” worn by nature, i.e. makes use of natural law without disturbing its normal function. A well known example of such an event is the “miracle” of Purim, which according to all that we know about it did not contain any elements that could be described as interference with the natural course of events.
Achashverosh married Esther, and due to his jealousy of Haman who he thought had tried to rape his wife Esther, he hanged Haman. A similar “miracle” resulted in the festival of Chanukah, the king or chief general of the Seleucids lusting after Yehudit and trying to rape her, resulting instead in his being killed by her, and his army becoming demoralized. In both the examples mentioned, many thousands of gentiles, antisemites, were killed in due course.
The subject becomes easier to understand by means of a parable. A King built a palace for his son; originally, he had meant for his son to live in that house. After a while, some wicked people expelled the son from this house. It would be appropriate for the house that had served as the protector of its inhabitants to not only protest this action but to take counter measures. However the house, i.e. the stones, are immobile, as pointed put by Chabakuk 2,11. Seeing that the stones of the house are immobile, they are powerless. The world was created for the sake of the Jewish people, i.e. the world is our “house,” as G’d has told Pharaoh that the Jewish people are His firstborn son when viewed in terms of the parable. (Exodus 4,22) When the gentile nations dispossess us or kill us, the “world” ought by rights to rise up in our defense. As this is not possible, the owner of the world, G’d, will do this instead. This is why the numerical value of the word טבע, nature loosely translated as “world,” is the same as the numerical value of the word אלה-ים, G’d, i.e. 86. When “nature” smites the gentile nations, it is the same as G’d smiting them. The world is the sum total of the Creator’s creative activity. G’d may be perceived as its father. The expression מעשה בראשית, a simile for the 6 days of G’d’s creative activity, contains the word ראשית, “beginning,” i.e. that the final product of G’d’s creative activity had been planned from the very beginning, i.e. as a home for the Jewish people, who are the whole purpose of G’d’s beginning the creation of the universe. At the conclusion of this process, אחרית, the Creator garbed Himself in what we are fond of calling טבע, “nature,” and all that this term entails. When Moses said in Deuteronomy 32,18 צור ילדך תשי, “you (his people) neglected the Rock that begot you,” his words expressed similar sentiments.
Before someone opens his mouth to say something, a person considers if the words he is about to utter are the ones appropriate for expressing his wish. If he wishes to make a request, he thinks about how best to phrase such a request in order that it may be granted. By changing his mode of speech, he becomes a totally new person. When G’d issued directives to create the universe, He created the whole world with these oral directives. (Compare psalms 33,6 בדבר ה' שמים נעשו, “the heavens came into existence by a single word of the Lord”.) When it comes to “saving” this world from impending destruction, using the טבע, “nature,” as His instrument, He deals with something that is established, and therefore employs a different means than the one He had employed when bringing something into existence. According to our author the word טבע is closely related to the word חנוכה, completing a training program, consecration, i.e. establishing a kind of order, norms, imprinting a form on something, as in מטבע, coin. G’d no longer needs to resort to something brand new, i.e. miracles.
When Esther is described as אילה, a strong animal, (feminine of איל, ram) i.e. fully mature, our sages referred to the period of overt miracles in Jewish history having come to an end in her time, so that the salvation of the Jewish people in which she was instrumental did not require G’d’s intervention by upsetting the rules of nature through a miracle.
[If G’d were forever to have to resort to miracles to achieve His purpose in the universe, this would reflect a basic flaw in that universe. When at the end of the Purim story the Jews are described as voluntarily accepting what they had accepted at Sinai under tremendous pressure, this too is a compliment to G’d, whose children had matured. Ed.]
The sages (at the beginning of 40,10) are quoted as seeing in one of the branches which the cup bearer saw in his dream, the young priests, the ones who would perform the sacrificial service in the Temple in due course. If we revert to the allegorical approach that the author has adopted, the פרחי כהונה that the Talmud spoke about are the sacrifices offered in the Temple, which are symbolic of how miracles become converted into norms, טבע, seeing that most communal offerings are closely tied to certain days, weeks, months, or years, and these in turn symbolise how what had come into existence as an overt miracle at the creation, had been transformed into what we call natural phenomena, i.e. manifestations in nature that are not only predictable but can be calculated thousands of years in advance.
[The author tries again to bring the subject of Chanukah into this portion, as the portion is always read around that time of year, draws on the Talmud Shabbat 21 where the subject is Chanukah. Ed.] The Talmud there stipulates that the best time for lighting the Chanukah candles is the period immediately following sunset until it has become so dark that no more pedestrians are about. (There was no street lighting in those days) Our author sees in this a symbol of the gradual switchover from G’d performing overt miracles to working through letting טבע perform most of His intervention in the affairs of man. The expression for complete darkness, used by the Talmud is עד שכלתה רגל מן השוק, usually translated as “until the pedestrians have ceased walking in the public domain.” Seeing that the word רגל does not only mean “foot, but is also directly related to רגילות, something habitual, he understands the Talmud as hinting at this “getting used to seeing no more brilliant miracles,” as the period following “sunset.” The expression used by the Talmud for sunset is שקיעת החמה, the word חמה, “sun,” referring to something overt, highly visible.
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Sha'ar HaEmunah VeYesod HaChasidut
This hints at what is written in the Midrash Rabbah (Nasso, 9), “Rabbi Abbahu told a parable about a painter who was painting the image of a king.159When he was at the point of finishing the painting, they told him that the king had died, and another king was ruling in his place. When the painter heard this, he became despondent and said, “What shall I do with these drawings? Should I finish the painting in the form of the first king or of the second? In this way he was he uncertain. Thus it is when a man has marital relations with his wife, the Holy One, blessed be He, fashions the embryo in the visage of his father. But when the adulterer comes upon her, all the fluids are mixed. This is as it is written (Hosea 4:2), ‘There is swearing, and lying, and killing, and stealing, and committing adultery, they break all bounds, and blood leads to blood.’ What did the Holy One, blessed be He, do? He went back, so to speak, and changed the form of the embryo from the father to the adulterer. This was to fulfill what is written (Iyov 24:15), “(the adulterer) hides his face.” (That is, God “hides” the face of the adulterer in the embryo.) This is as we have said (Devarim 32:18), ‘you were unmindful of the Rock that bore you, and you forgot God who gave birth to you.’ “ The passage of the Zohar that we are dealing with finishes: If it is because of the Torah (that is, he is giving inauthentic interpretations to the Torah), it is taught that the entire Torah is a name of the Holy One, blessed be He. There is not a word in the Torah that is not included in the Holy Name. For this reason it is imperative to exercise extreme caution so as to not err with regards to the Holy Name … Rabbi Abba said, it is written, “do not make a carved image (pesel - idol).” In another place it is written, “p’sol - carve for yourself two tablets of stone.” “Do not make a carved image” means do not transmit another Torah that you did not know, and that your Rav did not tell you. What is the reason? “I am Hashem your God, a jealous God,” I am the One who will exact punishment from you in the world-to-come, at the time when the soul desires to go up before Me, there are some souls that are destined to deceive, and be cast into hell.”
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