Chasidut do Liczb 6:23
דַּבֵּ֤ר אֶֽל־אַהֲרֹן֙ וְאֶל־בָּנָ֣יו לֵאמֹ֔ר כֹּ֥ה תְבָרֲכ֖וּ אֶת־בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֑ל אָמ֖וֹר לָהֶֽם׃ (ס)
"Powiedz Ahronowi i synom jego w te słowa: Tak błogosławić macie synom Israela; powiecie do nich:
Kedushat Levi
Numbers 6,23. “the Lord spoke to Moses, saying speak to Aaron and his sons saying: thus you shall bless the Children of Israel saying to them.”
The Baal Shem Tov used the above verse repeatedly to tell his listeners that psalms 121,5 in which the psalmist describes the Lord as being our protective angel and likening Him to a shadow, i.e. ה' צלך על יד ימינך, “Hashem your shadow on your right side.” A shadow always follows precisely what the owner of the shadow is doing. Similarly, what G’d does reflects exactly what man had done before. Seeing that this is so, it is imperative that man donates to charity, displays compassion with the ones less fortunate than he by performing kind deeds for them, as G’d, seeing this will reciprocate in kind with people who do this. The attribute of G’d that we described as “shadow,” and which David called צל, is known as כה, usually translated as “thus.”
It is well known that the Creator, blessed be His name, is most concerned with doing “good” for His people Israel, as our sages said: “the mother cow is more concerned with giving milk to feed her calf than the calf is desirous of suckling at her teats.”
When man stands in prayer he must recite 18 benedictions, not because otherwise G’d would not grant him his requests, but we must do so in order for G’d to experience joy and satisfaction from us, His creatures.
We must always remember what the sages taught in Avot 2,8 that even if we think that we have studied a great amount of Torah we should not compliment ourselves for this, for all we did was what we have been created to do. Man’s deeds have one purpose and one purpose only, to provide satisfaction for the Creator who gave him life. When man prays (utters requests), he thereby turns himself into a “recipient.” When someone wishes to receive something he extends his hand heavenwards and the back of his hand earthward. When he prays intending to provide his Creator with satisfaction, instead of being a petitioner he turns himself into a “donor.”
The major symbol of the priestly blessings consists of their raising their hands with the backs of their hands facing their faces like someone about to dispense gifts, heavenwards, and the palms of their hands open, pointed earthwards, suggesting that they are about to dispense largesse.
The real interpretation of the verse: כה תברכו את בני ישראל, is: “thus you shall bless the Children of Israel in order that the Creator shall have pleasure from them and in order that thereby you will become dispenser of pleasure instead of remaining petitioners waiting for a Divine handout.” As a consequence of this, the Creator will feel encouraged to dispense all manner of blessings on Israel. This is the meaning of the attribute described here as כה, i.e. just as Israel does something for the pleasure of G’d, so He, in turn, will reciprocate by doing things for Israel, His people.
The Baal Shem Tov used the above verse repeatedly to tell his listeners that psalms 121,5 in which the psalmist describes the Lord as being our protective angel and likening Him to a shadow, i.e. ה' צלך על יד ימינך, “Hashem your shadow on your right side.” A shadow always follows precisely what the owner of the shadow is doing. Similarly, what G’d does reflects exactly what man had done before. Seeing that this is so, it is imperative that man donates to charity, displays compassion with the ones less fortunate than he by performing kind deeds for them, as G’d, seeing this will reciprocate in kind with people who do this. The attribute of G’d that we described as “shadow,” and which David called צל, is known as כה, usually translated as “thus.”
It is well known that the Creator, blessed be His name, is most concerned with doing “good” for His people Israel, as our sages said: “the mother cow is more concerned with giving milk to feed her calf than the calf is desirous of suckling at her teats.”
When man stands in prayer he must recite 18 benedictions, not because otherwise G’d would not grant him his requests, but we must do so in order for G’d to experience joy and satisfaction from us, His creatures.
We must always remember what the sages taught in Avot 2,8 that even if we think that we have studied a great amount of Torah we should not compliment ourselves for this, for all we did was what we have been created to do. Man’s deeds have one purpose and one purpose only, to provide satisfaction for the Creator who gave him life. When man prays (utters requests), he thereby turns himself into a “recipient.” When someone wishes to receive something he extends his hand heavenwards and the back of his hand earthward. When he prays intending to provide his Creator with satisfaction, instead of being a petitioner he turns himself into a “donor.”
The major symbol of the priestly blessings consists of their raising their hands with the backs of their hands facing their faces like someone about to dispense gifts, heavenwards, and the palms of their hands open, pointed earthwards, suggesting that they are about to dispense largesse.
The real interpretation of the verse: כה תברכו את בני ישראל, is: “thus you shall bless the Children of Israel in order that the Creator shall have pleasure from them and in order that thereby you will become dispenser of pleasure instead of remaining petitioners waiting for a Divine handout.” As a consequence of this, the Creator will feel encouraged to dispense all manner of blessings on Israel. This is the meaning of the attribute described here as כה, i.e. just as Israel does something for the pleasure of G’d, so He, in turn, will reciprocate by doing things for Israel, His people.
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Kedushat Levi
Our sages (on Numbers 6,23 where the priests are commanded to bless the people), used this parable when commenting on the word להם, “to them,” i.e. that the priests are not to include the gentiles in their blessings. [Having already said that they should bless the Children of Israel, the extra words אמור להם would otherwise appear to have been superfluous. Ed.] When G’d tells Moses in our verse here: אל הארץ אשר נשאתי את ידי לתת להם לאברהם וגו', “to the land that I have sworn to give to Avraham, etc.;” He had to explain that although up to now this land had enjoyed G’d’s generosity as the people on it had found it a good land to dwell in, from now on, this land would be “good” only for the Jewish people. The term: “Jewish people,” presupposes that these Jews keep the commandments they will undertake to observe at Mount Sinai, less than a year later.
A different way of understanding G’d’s oath to give the land of the Canaanites to His people, the Jewish people: The author again turns to a parable to illustrate his point. We must analyze the expression נשאתי את ידי, “I raised My hand (in an oath).” A prince was engaged in a war against the enemies of his father, the King’s kingdom. When the prince was victorious there was great joy in the King’s palace. As a result of the great joy, the King, who was normally not overly generous, now displayed great generosity to everyone who turned to him with a request. Suddenly, while all these festivities were in progress, an enemy of the king’s son shows up with a request to his father, the king. The king is now faced with a dilemma. If the king ignores the root cause of the joy and the festivities he may G’d forbid also fulfill a request of his son’s arch enemy; on the other hand, if the king keeps the source of all the festivities in mind, i.e. his son’s victory in a life and death struggle, i.e. that his son had just vanquished this arch enemy of his, he will most certainly not pay any heed to the request made by his son’s enemy.It is written in Song of Songs 6,3 אני לדודי ודודי לי, “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine;” in other words: “my beloved yearns for me.” According to Bereshit Rabbah 1,4 one of the 6 things that G’d contemplated before beginning to create the universe was the concept of a Jewish people and all that this entails. When the Jewish people perform His wishes He takes great delight in this. The joy G’d experiences when the Jewish people live up to His expectations results in His feeling justified in having created the universe, i.e. all the various universes. He therefore dispenses some of His largesse to all other parts of the universe also. In order to dispense some of His largesse to the gentile nations He limits the outpourings of His largesse to the Jewish people. When the sinful creatures in the universe take note of G’d’s being so generous, they line up, so that they too will become beneficiaries of G’d’s “good mood.” At such a time G’d reminds Himself that originally He had only created the universe on account of wishing to see His “dream” of a Jewish nation performing all its tasks being realized. As soon as He reminds Himself of this, He will turn off the “taps” i.e. the attribute of largesse that had been allowed to flow to the gentile nations also, and will concentrate all of His largesse on the Jewish people.
The “attribute” dispensing this “largesse” is known as יד, “hand;” the reason for this is that in our terrestrial world largesse is “handed” out. This explains why G’d used the expression ידי, “My hand,” when referring to His oath to “hand over” the land of Canaan to Avraham’s descendants.
A different way of understanding G’d’s oath to give the land of the Canaanites to His people, the Jewish people: The author again turns to a parable to illustrate his point. We must analyze the expression נשאתי את ידי, “I raised My hand (in an oath).” A prince was engaged in a war against the enemies of his father, the King’s kingdom. When the prince was victorious there was great joy in the King’s palace. As a result of the great joy, the King, who was normally not overly generous, now displayed great generosity to everyone who turned to him with a request. Suddenly, while all these festivities were in progress, an enemy of the king’s son shows up with a request to his father, the king. The king is now faced with a dilemma. If the king ignores the root cause of the joy and the festivities he may G’d forbid also fulfill a request of his son’s arch enemy; on the other hand, if the king keeps the source of all the festivities in mind, i.e. his son’s victory in a life and death struggle, i.e. that his son had just vanquished this arch enemy of his, he will most certainly not pay any heed to the request made by his son’s enemy.It is written in Song of Songs 6,3 אני לדודי ודודי לי, “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine;” in other words: “my beloved yearns for me.” According to Bereshit Rabbah 1,4 one of the 6 things that G’d contemplated before beginning to create the universe was the concept of a Jewish people and all that this entails. When the Jewish people perform His wishes He takes great delight in this. The joy G’d experiences when the Jewish people live up to His expectations results in His feeling justified in having created the universe, i.e. all the various universes. He therefore dispenses some of His largesse to all other parts of the universe also. In order to dispense some of His largesse to the gentile nations He limits the outpourings of His largesse to the Jewish people. When the sinful creatures in the universe take note of G’d’s being so generous, they line up, so that they too will become beneficiaries of G’d’s “good mood.” At such a time G’d reminds Himself that originally He had only created the universe on account of wishing to see His “dream” of a Jewish nation performing all its tasks being realized. As soon as He reminds Himself of this, He will turn off the “taps” i.e. the attribute of largesse that had been allowed to flow to the gentile nations also, and will concentrate all of His largesse on the Jewish people.
The “attribute” dispensing this “largesse” is known as יד, “hand;” the reason for this is that in our terrestrial world largesse is “handed” out. This explains why G’d used the expression ידי, “My hand,” when referring to His oath to “hand over” the land of Canaan to Avraham’s descendants.
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