Chasidut su Salmi 91:15
יִקְרָאֵ֨נִי ׀ וְֽאֶעֱנֵ֗הוּ עִמּֽוֹ־אָנֹכִ֥י בְצָרָ֑ה אֲ֝חַלְּצֵ֗הוּ וַֽאֲכַבְּדֵֽהוּ׃
Mi chiamerà e io gli risponderò; Sarò con lui nei guai; Lo salverò e lo porterò in onore.
Kedushat Levi
The words: וילך חרנה, according to this method of interpretation allude to the future when G’d would become angry with His people. The words: ויצא יעקב, would contrast this with his leaving the domain from which G’d dispenses all His goodness for His creatures, especially the Jewish people. All this caused him great anguish and when the Torah describes his ויפגע במקום וילן שם כי בא השמש, “that he met hamakom and had to spend the night there as the sun had set,” this is a simile for Yaakov foreseeing how the fortunes of the Jewish people would turn from having enjoyed G’d’s bounty to not only becoming persecuted but also causing G’d to share the pain that He had been forced to inflict upon His people. The darkness alluded to in this verse describes that his vision became so clouded worrying about how G’d must suffer when His favorite people stray so far from the path of Torah that they must undergo harsh punishments in order to bring them back to the right path.
When the Torah describes Yaakov as ויקח מאבני המקום, “he took from the stones of hamakom,” this describes Yaakov’s sharing G’d’s pain and wishing to be able to compensate G’d for this in same way. (Alluded to by the word ויפגע). The words מאבני המקום וישם מראשותיו, “from the stones of hamakom and he placed them under his head,” suggest how Yaakov tried to share G’d’s “pain” at what both He and His people would have to endure in exile. His whole thinking was preoccupied with how he could somehow if not forestall these happenings at least ensure that his descendants would survive these experiences. This is the key to his dream of the ladder that follows. It portrays that Yaakov had found a means to deal with the physical implications of exile and persecutions because of Whom He saw on the top of the ladder. This helped him console himself that all of these harsh experiences would be confined to Israel’s existence in the “lower” regions of the universe. The words: וראשו מגיע השמימה, “the ladder’s top reached into heaven,” reminds Yaakov that exile also touches the celestial spheres, so much so that its impact affects those regions negatively. Its most direct impact on the celestial regions is that it interferes with the dispensation of G’d’s largesse to mankind, and the forces of nature upon which man depends.
The line: והנה מלאכי אלוקים עולים ויורדים בו, “and behold G’d’s angels were ascending and descending on that ladder,” is the message that even exile has its positive aspects, as it enables numerous “sparks” that had previously “fallen” from the tree that we perceive as the Shechinah, to find their way back to their holy origin. At the same time, regretfully, the descent of the Jewish people into exile brings with it a parallel descent of some other “sparks” from the Shechinah into the ritually contaminated part of the universe. In our verse these “sparks” are referred to as מלאכי אלוקים, “Angels of the Divine.” Presiding over all these happenings is G’d, והנה ה' נצב עליו, “and behold the Lord is standing above it;” this line also reassures Yaakov that wherever he may find himself he will not be alone, as G’d Himself accompanies him even in exile. Moses confirms this in psalms 91,15 when he says (quoting G’d) “I will be with him in distress.” Seeing that the Lord is with us, our real “pain” or sorrow is really G’d’s pain and sorrow.
As soon as G’d saw that Yaakov’s concern was with His pain and sorrow, and how all this would impact on the foundation of the Jewish people and its development, He reassured him that he was the same G’d Who had looked after Avraham and Yitzchok, his respective grandfather and father. He assured him that this same piece of earth on which he was lying at this time, i.e. that he is so worried about, He, the Lord will give to him and to his descendants and that his descendants will spread out to all the corners of the earth. He continues to reassure Yaakov that during all the vicissitudes of history that his descendants would endure, He would always keep a benevolent eye on them. They will, in due course, return from exile to a brighter future.
Genesis 28,16. “Yaakov awakened from his dream, etc;” the word משנתו, here is a reference to the mental state of depression under which Yaakov had laboured when contemplating the exile his descendants would experience in the future. When he says: אכן יש ה' במקום הזה ואנכי לא ידעתי, “indeed the Lord is even in this place and I did not know it,” is an acknowledgment that he had unnecessarily despaired of the future of his people thinking that G’d would forsake them in exile. Having realized now that he had been wrong, filled him with such gratitude that he determined to build a Temple on the site where this insight had been revealed to him. The words: בית אלוקים, as something already in place, allegorically speaking, refers to his realization that once there is a Jewish people G’d will never again withdraw from the lower regions of the universe as He had done previously when man’s conduct had become too offensive.[I believe the principal lesson Yaakov learned in this dream (as portrayed by the author) was that even when Moses speaks clearly in the Torah about G’d “hiding His face,” (Deut. 31,18) this does not refer to His withdrawing from our part of the world; it only means that we will be under the impression that He has done so as we see no evidence of His Presence overtly or covertly. Ed.] If this is the lesson of exile, exile itself becomes a truly positive experience.
At this stage Yaakov reverts to his original intention of taking the “stones” or “stone” i.e. the foundation stone of the Jewish people and converts it from a potential tool into an actual by consecrating it with oil. [The Jewish people no less than the Temple are perceived as “Temples,” the former as a living entity, the latter as an inert structure always on a sacred site. Ed.] [The significance of oil for consecration, and the miracle of Chanukah being the miracle of the cruse of holy oil as having been foreshadowed in Yaakov’s dream signaling the end of desecration of the Holy Temple, has thus been established. Although some of the words are mine, I trust that I have conveyed our author’s meaning. Ed.]
This is the first time in the Torah that “oil” is portrayed as possessing spiritually elevating potential. Normally, we are familiar with this only from when the priests who were anointed with oil, or when a King, first in a dynasty, was consecrated with it. Yaakov understood the mystical properties contained in such oil (holy oil) and used it here for the first time as such.
[One wonders at the fact that although Yaakov appears to have been stripped of all valuables prior to this night, he still had some such oil on his person; this makes the connection the author establishes between Chanukah and Yaakov’s dream of the ladder a great deal more plausible. Ed.]
Reshit Chochma, shaar ahavah section 5,39, שמן, oil, i.e. the resin found in trees, is a euphemism for wisdom originating in the celestial regions. By means of this wisdom G’d used a combination of this wisdom and sanctity to produce a unique product, the foundation stone of the Jewish people preparing from this an entire building containing many “rooms” one of which was reserved for G’d to manifest Himself therein to His people exclusively. When speaking of “His people,” we refer to the spiritualized concept of the Jewish people, described by our sages as כנסת ישראל, “the collective soul of the Jewish people.” This is what the Torah had in mind when it reports Yaakov as saying: ויקרא את שם המקום ההוא ביתאל, “he called the name of this site Betel;” the Torah adds that ואולם לוז שם העיר לראשונה, “originally the name of the town had been Looz.” (Verse 20) By mentioning this detail, the Torah wishes to inform the reader that even before Yaakov spent a night at this location all the basic ingredients for the site to be elevated to one of sanctity had already existed as a potential. This was so because the concept of a Jewish nation, as mentioned previously, was not new, in fact it had been in G’ds mind before He even began to create the universe. This concept did not only include the formation of a Jewish nation, but envisaged its history right to the point when the Messiah would redeem this people from its last exile. According to tradition (Bereshit Rabbah 69, discussed at length) the human body contains a bone known as לוז, which is indestructible, the angel of death having no power over it, and conversely, it is also the bone from which all other parts of the human body develop. [Not necessarily a “bone” as we understand it, but possibly what we call a stem cell in our time. Ed.] The “stem cell” לוז, is for man what the expression היולי is meant to convey when we speak of the origin of the universe, the primordial raw material. Yaakov’s contribution was to make out of a potential Jewish nation one that had materialized.
When the Torah describes Yaakov as ויקח מאבני המקום, “he took from the stones of hamakom,” this describes Yaakov’s sharing G’d’s pain and wishing to be able to compensate G’d for this in same way. (Alluded to by the word ויפגע). The words מאבני המקום וישם מראשותיו, “from the stones of hamakom and he placed them under his head,” suggest how Yaakov tried to share G’d’s “pain” at what both He and His people would have to endure in exile. His whole thinking was preoccupied with how he could somehow if not forestall these happenings at least ensure that his descendants would survive these experiences. This is the key to his dream of the ladder that follows. It portrays that Yaakov had found a means to deal with the physical implications of exile and persecutions because of Whom He saw on the top of the ladder. This helped him console himself that all of these harsh experiences would be confined to Israel’s existence in the “lower” regions of the universe. The words: וראשו מגיע השמימה, “the ladder’s top reached into heaven,” reminds Yaakov that exile also touches the celestial spheres, so much so that its impact affects those regions negatively. Its most direct impact on the celestial regions is that it interferes with the dispensation of G’d’s largesse to mankind, and the forces of nature upon which man depends.
The line: והנה מלאכי אלוקים עולים ויורדים בו, “and behold G’d’s angels were ascending and descending on that ladder,” is the message that even exile has its positive aspects, as it enables numerous “sparks” that had previously “fallen” from the tree that we perceive as the Shechinah, to find their way back to their holy origin. At the same time, regretfully, the descent of the Jewish people into exile brings with it a parallel descent of some other “sparks” from the Shechinah into the ritually contaminated part of the universe. In our verse these “sparks” are referred to as מלאכי אלוקים, “Angels of the Divine.” Presiding over all these happenings is G’d, והנה ה' נצב עליו, “and behold the Lord is standing above it;” this line also reassures Yaakov that wherever he may find himself he will not be alone, as G’d Himself accompanies him even in exile. Moses confirms this in psalms 91,15 when he says (quoting G’d) “I will be with him in distress.” Seeing that the Lord is with us, our real “pain” or sorrow is really G’d’s pain and sorrow.
As soon as G’d saw that Yaakov’s concern was with His pain and sorrow, and how all this would impact on the foundation of the Jewish people and its development, He reassured him that he was the same G’d Who had looked after Avraham and Yitzchok, his respective grandfather and father. He assured him that this same piece of earth on which he was lying at this time, i.e. that he is so worried about, He, the Lord will give to him and to his descendants and that his descendants will spread out to all the corners of the earth. He continues to reassure Yaakov that during all the vicissitudes of history that his descendants would endure, He would always keep a benevolent eye on them. They will, in due course, return from exile to a brighter future.
Genesis 28,16. “Yaakov awakened from his dream, etc;” the word משנתו, here is a reference to the mental state of depression under which Yaakov had laboured when contemplating the exile his descendants would experience in the future. When he says: אכן יש ה' במקום הזה ואנכי לא ידעתי, “indeed the Lord is even in this place and I did not know it,” is an acknowledgment that he had unnecessarily despaired of the future of his people thinking that G’d would forsake them in exile. Having realized now that he had been wrong, filled him with such gratitude that he determined to build a Temple on the site where this insight had been revealed to him. The words: בית אלוקים, as something already in place, allegorically speaking, refers to his realization that once there is a Jewish people G’d will never again withdraw from the lower regions of the universe as He had done previously when man’s conduct had become too offensive.[I believe the principal lesson Yaakov learned in this dream (as portrayed by the author) was that even when Moses speaks clearly in the Torah about G’d “hiding His face,” (Deut. 31,18) this does not refer to His withdrawing from our part of the world; it only means that we will be under the impression that He has done so as we see no evidence of His Presence overtly or covertly. Ed.] If this is the lesson of exile, exile itself becomes a truly positive experience.
At this stage Yaakov reverts to his original intention of taking the “stones” or “stone” i.e. the foundation stone of the Jewish people and converts it from a potential tool into an actual by consecrating it with oil. [The Jewish people no less than the Temple are perceived as “Temples,” the former as a living entity, the latter as an inert structure always on a sacred site. Ed.] [The significance of oil for consecration, and the miracle of Chanukah being the miracle of the cruse of holy oil as having been foreshadowed in Yaakov’s dream signaling the end of desecration of the Holy Temple, has thus been established. Although some of the words are mine, I trust that I have conveyed our author’s meaning. Ed.]
This is the first time in the Torah that “oil” is portrayed as possessing spiritually elevating potential. Normally, we are familiar with this only from when the priests who were anointed with oil, or when a King, first in a dynasty, was consecrated with it. Yaakov understood the mystical properties contained in such oil (holy oil) and used it here for the first time as such.
[One wonders at the fact that although Yaakov appears to have been stripped of all valuables prior to this night, he still had some such oil on his person; this makes the connection the author establishes between Chanukah and Yaakov’s dream of the ladder a great deal more plausible. Ed.]
Reshit Chochma, shaar ahavah section 5,39, שמן, oil, i.e. the resin found in trees, is a euphemism for wisdom originating in the celestial regions. By means of this wisdom G’d used a combination of this wisdom and sanctity to produce a unique product, the foundation stone of the Jewish people preparing from this an entire building containing many “rooms” one of which was reserved for G’d to manifest Himself therein to His people exclusively. When speaking of “His people,” we refer to the spiritualized concept of the Jewish people, described by our sages as כנסת ישראל, “the collective soul of the Jewish people.” This is what the Torah had in mind when it reports Yaakov as saying: ויקרא את שם המקום ההוא ביתאל, “he called the name of this site Betel;” the Torah adds that ואולם לוז שם העיר לראשונה, “originally the name of the town had been Looz.” (Verse 20) By mentioning this detail, the Torah wishes to inform the reader that even before Yaakov spent a night at this location all the basic ingredients for the site to be elevated to one of sanctity had already existed as a potential. This was so because the concept of a Jewish nation, as mentioned previously, was not new, in fact it had been in G’ds mind before He even began to create the universe. This concept did not only include the formation of a Jewish nation, but envisaged its history right to the point when the Messiah would redeem this people from its last exile. According to tradition (Bereshit Rabbah 69, discussed at length) the human body contains a bone known as לוז, which is indestructible, the angel of death having no power over it, and conversely, it is also the bone from which all other parts of the human body develop. [Not necessarily a “bone” as we understand it, but possibly what we call a stem cell in our time. Ed.] The “stem cell” לוז, is for man what the expression היולי is meant to convey when we speak of the origin of the universe, the primordial raw material. Yaakov’s contribution was to make out of a potential Jewish nation one that had materialized.
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Kedushat Levi
Exodus 34,6. “Hashem passed before him and proclaimed:” A look at Rashi’s commentary on these words shows us that G’d wrapped Himself in a tallit, prayer shawl, just like the reader in the synagogue. [This is not taken from Rashi’s commentary on the Torah, but from the Talmud’s allegorical interpretation of this verse in Rosh Hashanah 17. Ed.]
Concerning the above, my late and revered teacher Rabbi Dov Baer said that the 13 attributes the Torah mentions here are the spiritual equivalent of the 13 principles of Rabbi Yishmael that are considered as legitimate tools of exegesis of the written Torah. For instance, the principle known as קל וחומר, using logical conclusions, is the counterpart of the attribute א-ל, whereas the principle known as גזרה שוה, replicas of the same word used for apparently divergent subjects, is the equivalent of the Divine attribute רחום.
When a wealthy person takes pity on a poor, destitute person, he automatically begins to understand the pain and near despair experienced by the poor so that he lowers himself mentally to that level. He experiences the pain endured by the poor and his feelings of being hemmed in from all sides. When this happens, the wealthy person, -parallel to G’d-, extends pity and mercy to the poor so that the poor and the rich have reached the same level. A similar process occurs when G’d looks with mercy on the Jewish people in distress. This is what Moses referred to when he said in psalms 91,15: עמו אנכי בצרה, “I am with him in distress;” this is what is meant by “equating” the Divine attribute of mercy to the exegetical tool known as גזרה שוה, “establishing common ground based on identical words used in texts speaking of different subjects.”
Concerning the above, my late and revered teacher Rabbi Dov Baer said that the 13 attributes the Torah mentions here are the spiritual equivalent of the 13 principles of Rabbi Yishmael that are considered as legitimate tools of exegesis of the written Torah. For instance, the principle known as קל וחומר, using logical conclusions, is the counterpart of the attribute א-ל, whereas the principle known as גזרה שוה, replicas of the same word used for apparently divergent subjects, is the equivalent of the Divine attribute רחום.
When a wealthy person takes pity on a poor, destitute person, he automatically begins to understand the pain and near despair experienced by the poor so that he lowers himself mentally to that level. He experiences the pain endured by the poor and his feelings of being hemmed in from all sides. When this happens, the wealthy person, -parallel to G’d-, extends pity and mercy to the poor so that the poor and the rich have reached the same level. A similar process occurs when G’d looks with mercy on the Jewish people in distress. This is what Moses referred to when he said in psalms 91,15: עמו אנכי בצרה, “I am with him in distress;” this is what is meant by “equating” the Divine attribute of mercy to the exegetical tool known as גזרה שוה, “establishing common ground based on identical words used in texts speaking of different subjects.”
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