Balak: 5784 - The weekly sharpening: "And Hashem put a word in Balaam's mouth." A wondrous Midrash: some say He placed a hook in his mouth, others say a bridle. What is the dispute about? | Rabbi Shimon Zonnenfeld, at the conclusion of…

00:03 The weekly parsha. Bilam says to Balak: “I cannot transgress the word of Hashem my G-d, to do anything small or great.” At first glance, the order seems backward. Why say “small or great”? If he cannot do something small, he certainly cannot do something great. So what does “small or great” mean? We need to understand this. Another point: It says, “Hashem placed a word in Bilam’s mouth.” He put something in his mouth. What did He put there? There is a puzzling Midrash. One opinion says He put a fishhook in his mouth, and another says He put a bridle there. What do a fishhook and a bridle have to do with what He put in his mouth? What are they disagreeing about? And each brings a proof from a verse. The one who says He put in a fishhook cites, “How can I curse whom E-l has not cursed?” And the one who says He put in a bridle cites, “How can I denounce when Hashem has not denounced?” But what is the difference between a fishhook and a bridle, and what does it mean that Hakadosh Boruch Hu put one in Bilam’s mouth? A fishhook is a bent needle that a fisherman uses to catch fish. It catches the fish by its tongue and mouth, so it cannot stick out its tongue. That is a fishhook. What is a bridle? A bridle is something external that presses against an animal’s lips, pressing so hard that it has to stick out its tongue. So they are not disagreeing; both are saying the same thing. Hakadosh Boruch Hu put both a fishhook and a bridle in Bilam’s mouth, because both were needed. Why? Here is the explanation. Bilam hated the Jewish people much more than Balak did. Balak asked him to “drive them out of the land”—he did not want them here; he wanted them to go somewhere else. Bilam did not say “out of the land.” He wanted to drive them out of the world altogether, because Bilam

02:35 hated the Jewish people more than Balak did, and he was constantly trying to curse them and wipe them out of the world. How did he try to do it? He knew when Hakadosh Boruch Hu was angry, and he wanted to invoke a name of Hakadosh Boruch Hu associated with judgment, bringing judgment upon them and thereby wiping them out of the world. For example, we know that Elokim is a name associated with judgment. But the beginning of the name Elokim, “E-l,” is associated with kindness: “The kindness of E-l is all day long.” So its beginning, “E-l,” is associated with kindness. Similarly, the name Havayah, Yud-Hei-Vav-Hei, expresses mercy, but its first part, “Yud-Hei,” is associated with judgment: “Fortunate is the man whom You chastise, Yud-Hei.” Yud-Hei is associated with judgment. Bilam was constantly looking for a way to invoke a name associated with judgment against them so he could curse them. What did Hakadosh Boruch Hu do? When Bilam wanted to curse them using the name Elokim, which is associated with judgment, as soon as he said its first part, “E-l,” He put a fishhook in his mouth. Bilam could not continue. It remained “E-l,” which is associated with kindness. When Bilam wanted to curse them with the name Yud-Hei, which is also associated with judgment, Hakadosh Boruch Hu put a bridle in his mouth, forcing him to complete the word. The bridle made him stick out his tongue and complete the name Havayah, which expresses mercy. So Hakadosh Boruch Hu used both the fishhook and the bridle. This first of all explains the Midrash: what are the fishhook and bridle doing here? Hakadosh Boruch Hu put both

04:47 things in Bilam’s mouth, each time so that he would not invoke a name associated with judgment, but rather a name associated with mercy. This also answers our original question: Why did he say, “I cannot transgress the word of Hashem, to do anything small or great”? Later, Bilam says that he cannot change what Hashem his G-d commanded him. First he says “Hashem,” and then “G-d.” With the name Havayah, “small” came first, because he wanted to use just Yud-Hei to bring judgment upon them. So first he said, “I cannot transgress the word of Hashem to do anything small”: he wanted to shorten the name Havayah and invoke a name associated with judgment. And what does “great” mean? When he wanted to curse them using Elokim, a name associated with judgment, he said only “E-l” and wanted to continue, to make it longer and bring judgment upon them. Then Hakadosh Boruch Hu put a bridle in his mouth, and he had to continue and say the name associated with mercy, leaving it as an expression of mercy. So this explains both points: why he said “small” before “great,” and what the two mean. Since today is 13 Tammuz, the festival of Geulah, commemorating the previous Rebbe’s release from prison, this is a Geulah for the entire Jewish people, for everyone called by the name of Israel. May it be Hashem’s will that we soon merit the true and complete Geulah. Amen, amen.