Musar su Isaia 45:18

The purpose of the above commandment is to populate the world, since G–d wishes for it to be populated, as we know from Isaiah 45,18: "for He did not create it a waste; for habitation did He form it; I am the Lord, there is none else." This is a very important commandment around which revolves the fulfillment of all the commandments. Torah was given to man and not to the ministering angels. It is incumbent upon man therefore to leave behind him those who can preserve Torah and fulfil its commandments, who can recognize the existence of a Creator who not only supervises what goes on in the universe but is able to direct history. This opportunity must not be denied to Israel [through failure to procreate Ed.] This is the meaning of Rashi on Genesis 6,9 that עיקר תולדותיהם של צדיקים מעשים טובים, "the most important contribution (descendants) that the righteous make are good deeds." The meaning is that it is incumbent upon someone who wants to deserve the title צדיק to see to it that he begets creatures who keep the commandments and perform good deeds.

I believe that I can add another dimension to the understanding of this מדרש, and to relate it to the commandment of פריה ורביה, the duty to procreate. I also mean to explain why the Talmud (Megillah 27) says that the only reason one is allowed to sell a Torah scroll is to enable one to fulfill the commandment to get married and to beget children. The Talmud there simply says that the reason for this is the verse in Isaiah 45,18: "He did not create it to be a waste, but formed it for habitation." why does the Talmud not quote the commandment from the Torah which is very specific, and is content to quote an indirect reference from the prophets? The same question can be raised against a statement in Chagigah 2b, where the Talmud also denies a person who is partially a slave and partially free the right not to marry by citing the above verse in Isaiah as its reason. Tosaphot, in addressing themselves to that problem, come to the conclusion that the statement in Isaiah is more compelling than the commandment פרו ורבו. No explanation is offered why this should be so.

We had raised the question in the introduction to Parshat Bereshit, why the Talmud in Chagigah 2 did not quote the commandment of פרו ורבו in Genesis when it wanted to tell us about the severity of neglecting to fulfill the commandment of procreation, and chose the line from Isaiah about G–d not having created the universe in order for it to remain תהו, in an elementary state. We can now understand this when we consider that the message the Talmud wanted to convey was that someone who fails to heed that commandment is as if he arrested the whole process of creation and its purpose by allowing the universe to remain static, in the state of Tohu, its very beginning.