Ki Teitzei: 5784 - "The mother shall not be taken over her young": A wonderful explanation of the mitzvah of shiluach hakein (sending away the bird's nest), its fascinating connection to one who says 'I will sin and repent,' and also relevance for our times. Presented by…

00:01 Speaker 1 One of the mitzvos in the weekly parsha is the mitzvah of sending away the mother bird. “If a bird’s nest happens to be before you on the way, in a tree, and the mother is sitting on the fledglings or on the eggs, you shall surely send away the mother, and take the young for yourself, so that it will be good for you and you will live long.” This mitzvah is a decree of the Torah. Still, a rabbi from Jerusalem offered a beautiful explanation for it. He explained it this way: Usually, when you approach a bird, it flies away. You can’t catch it; it immediately spreads its wings and escapes. But when it is sitting on its young or on its eggs, it does not fly away, because it has compassion for its offspring. If you come along while it is sitting there and take advantage of the vulnerability that Hakadosh Boruch Hu instilled in the bird, that is cruel. You are exploiting the bird’s vulnerability in order to catch it. That is why the Torah said you may not take the fledglings or the eggs. And there is proof of this: the Rambam rules that if someone sends away the mother and takes the fledglings or the eggs, he may then catch the mother. There is nothing wrong with that; it is not forbidden. The Rambam says explicitly that when you take her while she is sitting on the fledglings or the eggs, she cannot fly away, and you are exploiting her vulnerability. That is a cruel thing, which the Torah forbids in order to teach a person a moral lesson. You cannot exploit the vulnerability that Hakadosh Boruch Hu instilled in that creature in order to catch it. We see the same idea in the Mishnah in Tractate Yoma: “One who says, ‘I will sin and repent, I will sin and repent,’ is not given the opportunity to repent.” Similarly, it says, “I will sin and Yom Kippur will atone—

02:08 Speaker 1 Yom Kippur does not atone.” Why? The Rambam explains this point. Why is he not given the opportunity to repent, and why does Yom Kippur not atone? The Yerushalmi relates that Wisdom was asked, “What should a person who has sinned do?” Wisdom answered, “Evil pursues sinners.” Then Hakadosh Boruch Hu was asked, and He said, “Let him repent.” In other words, the whole concept of repentance is a kindness that Hakadosh Boruch Hu has done for a person: even though he sinned and transgressed what is written in the Torah, Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives him the possibility and the opportunity to make it right. That is repentance. But a person takes repentance—that kindness Hakadosh Boruch Hu has shown him—and exploits it in order to sin: “I will sin and repent, I will sin and repent.” He is not given the opportunity. On Yom Kippur, Hakadosh Boruch Hu said, “I have forgiven, as you have spoken.” You exploit Yom Kippur in order to sin? Then Yom Kippur does not atone. So this is the same idea as sending away the mother bird. Exploiting a vulnerability, or exploiting a kindness that Hakadosh Boruch Hu has shown, is forbidden. We can also connect this to current events. In Israel’s wars, there have been a number of cases in which soldiers pursued terrorists who were hiding in a cave. There were such cases during the War of Independence and later as well. Soldiers pursued terrorists who hid in a cave. When the soldiers got there, an Arab woman was sitting there nursing her son. They saw a woman nursing her child and asked, “Are there terrorists here?” She said, “What are you talking about? There’s nothing here.” As soon as the soldiers left, the terrorists came out and shot and killed them. Something similar happened with the Lamed-Heh convoy, when thirty-five men were killed. There was an elderly Arab shepherd who saw them. He seemed harmless, as though nothing was going on.

04:05 Speaker 1 But he immediately went and reported that there was a group of soldiers there. They came and killed them all. In other words, our enemies have this cruelty: they exploit the vulnerability of a Jew. Because Jews are compassionate, they exploit that compassion and do what they do. So too with the bird’s nest: you cannot exploit the compassion that Hakadosh Boruch Hu instilled in the bird in order to take the fledglings. May we have a peaceful Shabbos and hear good news.

04:40 Speaker 2 Amen.