Parshas Bo - With What Do We Prepare for the Geulah?

00:02 I heard this from Reb Yoel Kahn, a"h, the Rebbe’s chozer. He related that he arrived in 5711, soon after the passing of the Frierdiker Rebbe on Yud Shvat 5710. In time, he became the Rebbe’s chozer, repeating the Rebbe’s teachings, maamarim, and sichos. He was a mashpia and a Torah scholar in America, at 770. He said that in those days, immediately after the Frierdiker Rebbe’s passing, as is well known, during that first year between Yud Shvat 5710 and Yud Shvat 5711, the Rebbe did not want to hear at all about accepting the leadership. Chassidim asked and urged the Rebbe to accept the leadership and become Rebbe, but he would not agree under any circumstances. Yet at that time, even though he did not want to accept the leadership, he performed miracles. There were great miracles that the Rebbe performed during that period, revealing his greatness. This was in addition to his greatness in Torah, which was evident in the farbrengens and sichos he gave then. One incident took place around Tishrei 5711, when the Rebbe still did not want to hear at all about accepting the leadership. After Tishrei, a Jewish man came. He was a wealthy man, far from observing Torah and mitzvos. But he faced a terrible crisis:

01:52 His daughter had become gravely ill. The doctors said it was only a matter of time and that they could do nothing to help. They said there was nothing to be done: either she would recover by a miracle or, G-d forbid, a very different fate would be decreed for her, and she would not survive. They were talking about just a few days. Her condition kept worsening, becoming more and more dire. The man went to every doctor, and they all threw up their hands and said there was nothing they could do. Though he was far from observing Torah and mitzvos, he began going to various tzaddikim and rabbis in America at the time. He promised a large sum of money—several thousand dollars, a large amount in those days—to anyone who would promise him that his daughter would recover. That was how he came to Lubavitch, to 770. He had already approached a number of people, and they could not help him. He heard that the Frierdiker Rebbe had passed away, but he also heard about the Rebbe’s son-in-law, the young son-in-law, who, people told him, could perform miracles. He came and asked to go in, because

03:19 he wanted to go in and ask the Rebbe for a blessing. They directed him to the secretary, Rabbi Hodakov, a"h, to request an audience with the Rebbe. Rabbi Hodakov said he would ask after prayers. The Rebbe was about to daven; that year, he was leading the prayers. The man waited until after Maariv. Rabbi Hodakov went in to the Rebbe, and the Rebbe said he was busy and that the man should come tomorrow. The man was very angry. What did that mean? A man like him had come, a wealthy man who wanted to give a great deal of money, while his daughter’s condition was so grave and so precarious, and she was deteriorating. Every minute mattered; no one knew what might happen. The doctors had said that during the night, G-d forbid, the worst could happen. And here the Rebbe was saying, “Let him come tomorrow.” But there was no point in pressing the matter. Rabbi Hodakov conveyed the Rebbe’s answer to him: “Tomorrow means tomorrow.” The man saw there was no one to argue with, and although he was terribly shaken, he left and returned the next day. Remarkably, the doctors told him that throughout the night the daughter’s condition, the little girl’s condition, had not

04:42 changed—it had neither worsened nor improved. Until then, her condition had been steadily deteriorating, growing worse and worse. But that night she was stable, as they say, and her condition remained as it had been. After the morning prayers, he went in to the Rebbe and described the entire situation, the whole matter. He told the Rebbe that he had already been to all the doctors and had already been to all the rabbis and tzaddikim. He was prepared to give a certain sum—I think he said ten thousand dollars, which in those days, in 5711, was an enormous amount—if the Rebbe would promise him that his daughter would recover. The Rebbe told him that even now it was not just a question of money: if he wanted his daughter to recover, he had to undertake to observe several mitzvos. The Rebbe told him to undertake the mitzvah of putting on tefillin, keeping kosher, and observing Shabbos—those three mitzvos. The man was not at all pleased. He immediately said that under no circumstances was he prepared to take on additional mitzvos and that it was out of the question. He would rather give the tzedakah. The Rebbe told him again that it was out of the question, and the man said, “I

06:04 can give a larger amount,” and tried to double and triple the sum, offering more and more. The Rebbe told him, as related by Reb Yechiel [unclear]: “You want to know what they’re saying Above, what they’re saying in Heaven? In Heaven, they’re waiting for you, too, to undertake these three things. If you’re prepared to undertake these three things, then we have something to discuss; if not, there’s nothing to discuss.” When the man heard this, he began to tremble. He asked for time to think it over. He went out, returned a while later, and said that he would undertake them. And indeed, he undertook to put on tefillin, observe Shabbos, and keep kosher. It was very difficult for him, because he was not at all accustomed to these things. Nevertheless, he undertook all three. Then his daughter’s condition began to improve—a complete turnaround. She continued improving, until all the doctors said unanimously that they could not understand it at all. She came out of her condition entirely and recovered completely. The man came to the Rebbe and wanted to make a kiddush. The Rebbe said he was not ready for that yet. He wanted to see that

07:26 the man would indeed keep his resolutions and remain firm in them—that this would not be just some [unclear] thing, where he would make a kiddush now and that would be the end of it. The Rebbe said he wanted to wait a while. A few months passed, and on Shabbos Parshas Vayigash, 9 Teves—at that time, the Rebbe did not usually hold a farbrengen on a Shabbos that was not Shabbos Mevarchim—the man came to the Rebbe and made a kiddush. That Shabbos, the Rebbe did hold a farbrengen, a full and very pleasant farbrengen, which was also published in 5711—sorry, Shabbos Parshas Vayigash, 9 Teves 5711. At that farbrengen, the Rebbe spoke about the miracle that had happened to the daughter and explained the saying of our Sages, “A daughter first is a good sign for sons.” He explained what a daughter represents: a daughter is on the level of a recipient. He connected the idea of receiving with accepting the yoke of Heaven. This is the meaning of “A daughter first is a good sign for sons”: when the daughter—the level of a recipient and of accepting the yoke of Heaven—comes first, it is a good sign for the sons, for all that follows: love of Hashem, fear of

08:50 Hashem, which are called “sons” in Tanya. What does that mean? This is the foundation on which the entire structure of serving Hashem stands. The Rebbe spoke about this and said that we must accept the yoke of the mitzvos and the yoke of Heaven in the manner of a servant, with kabbolas ol. This then brings all the blessings, the spiritual downflows, and the influence of kindness that Hakadosh Boruch Hu bestows upon Jews, materially and spiritually. In the weekly parsha, Parshas Bo, the Torah relates that when the time came to leave Egypt, among the instructions given in the passage beginning “This month shall be for you,” Hakadosh Boruch Hu says to Moshe Rabbeinu, “Draw out and take sheep for yourselves”—that the Jewish people should take the Pesach offering. The Torah says, “On the tenth of this month”: the Pesach offering had to be taken on the tenth of the month, the tenth day of Nissan. It then says, “And it shall be kept by you”—the sheep, the Pesach offering, had to be kept for four days from the tenth. Rashi brings a question raised in the Midrash: Why were the Jewish people commanded to take it on the tenth of the month, four days in advance, for the Pesach offering in Egypt? There is no such requirement for the Pesach offerings of later generations. For the Pesach offering of later generations, there is an inspection requirement: one must check that the offering has no blemish, and there is a four-day inspection period,

10:24 But there is no need to buy the Pesach offering four days in advance. You can buy it whenever you want. By contrast, for the Pesach offering in Egypt there was a special command to take it “on the tenth of this month, and you shall keep it in safekeeping”—it had to be kept. Rashi asks: Why, specifically for the Pesach offering in Egypt, did the Jews have to keep it for four days beforehand? Rashi brings a very beautiful Midrash on this: “Rabbi Masya ben Charash would say.” Rabbi Masya ben Charash quotes a verse: “I passed by you and saw you, and behold, your time was a time of love.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu came—this is a verse in Yechezkel. As is known, in chapter 16 of the book of Yechezkel, the prophet describes the entire Geulah from Egypt through pregnancy and birth, the birth of the Jewish people: “On the day you were born.” He portrays it as a child emerging from its mother’s womb. And there it says, “I passed by you and saw you, and behold, your time was a time of love”—the time for the Geulah had arrived. He says there, “The time had come for the oath I swore to Avraham, that I would redeem his children.” The time had come for Hakadosh Boruch Hu to fulfill the oath He had sworn to Avraham, to bring the Jews out of Egypt. But “they had no mitzvos in their hands”; they were completely bare, without mitzvos. “And you were naked and bare,” as the verse says there—the Jews were in a state of being “naked and bare,” without a single mitzvah to occupy themselves with. “They had no mitzvos to occupy themselves with so that they could be redeemed.” “And He gave them two mitzvos.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu gave them two mitzvos: the blood of the Pesach offering and the blood of circumcision. He gave them these two mitzvos, the blood of the Pesach offering and the blood of circumcision, “for they were circumcised that night”—they were to be circumcised that night. Rashi continues: “Because they were steeped in idol worship.” The Jews then were not only without mitzvos; they were also steeped in idol worship. Therefore, “He told them, ‘Draw away and take for yourselves’”—“Draw your hands away from idol worship and take for yourselves a sheep for a mitzvah.” In other words, withdraw, distance yourselves and separate yourselves from idol worship, and take a mitzvah upon yourselves. That is Rashi. A beautiful Rashi, a beautiful Midrash, but all the commentators ask, seemingly: Where is the answer to the question? The Midrash of Rabbi Masya ben Charash does not answer the question. Rashi opens with a difficulty: Why, for the Pesach offering in Egypt, did the Jews need four days, “on the tenth of the month”? Where is the answer? The Midrash is beautiful: They were “naked and bare,” “they had no mitzvos in their hands,” and they needed to be surrounded with mitzvos, so He gave them the blood of the Pesach offering and the blood of circumcision. Very nice, but where is the answer to why it had to be specifically four days beforehand? All the commentators ask this about Rashi’s plain meaning. Indeed, several commentators give answers here. The commentators answer—Rabbi [unclear], author of the Tashbetz, and Rabbi Y. [unclear]—that the meaning is

11:59 [unclear]

13:37 that it is indeed connected to circumcision, because the blood of the Pesach offering and the blood of circumcision were together then. And we know that after a circumcision, three days pass before one recovers. On the third day after circumcision, as it says, “And it was on the third day, when they were in pain,” as we learned in the previous parsha, Parshas Vayishlach. After circumcision, the pain lasts three days. So, naturally, they could not leave Egypt immediately after being circumcised. They had to perform the circumcision and wait three days. That is why the command to circumcise was given on the tenth of the month, and the circumcision took place at night, as he says—on the night of 11 Nissan. Indeed, several Midrashim say that the circumcision took place on 11 Nissan, the same date as the circumcision when they entered Eretz Yisroel with Yehoshua bin Nun. They entered Eretz Yisroel on the tenth of Nissan. It says there that this happened at Gilgal, when they had to circumcise everyone who had not been circumcised in the wilderness, and that took place on that very day, 11 Nissan. So the Midrashim do indeed say: It was the same date on which the circumcision took place in Egypt. Afterward, they had to wait three days, because after circumcision they needed to wait. That is why they took the Pesach offering together with the circumcision, so that the two mitzvos would be together. This is an answer given by the commentators. But that is not what Rashi seems to mean. In Rashi, in Rashi’s plain meaning,

15:03 it seems that “that night” is not the night of 11 Nissan, but the night of Erev Pesach. Right? After all, Rashi says the blood of the Pesach offering and the blood of circumcision. The blood of the Pesach offering means slaughtering it, not taking it. They did take the Pesach offering on the tenth, but there was no blood then. The blood of the Pesach offering was always on Erev Pesach, and that was when the circumcision took place. And indeed, several Midrashim say this—in Midrash Rabbah and other Midrashim, in Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer—that the circumcision took place specifically on Erev Pesach. So, as also seems clear from Rashi’s plain meaning, the question returns, at least according to Rashi: What is the point here? Where is the answer? Rashi raises a question: Why did they take the Pesach offering in Egypt four days beforehand? Where is Rabbi Masya ben Charash’s answer? And there are several other questions here. To discuss Rashi, we would need to farbreng about all the details. We will go straight to the point: This is an explanation the Rebbe gave at a farbrengen on Shabbos Parshas Bo, Yud Shvat 5717. This is the yahrzeit of the Frierdiker Rebbe, the day of his histalkus and of our Rebbe’s ascent to the leadership. The Rebbe went into this Rashi in a very rich sicha and explained its plain meaning. He added another question—we will come to several questions, but at least one interesting question.

16:28 The question is: Why does Rashi specifically mention his name? Rashi does not give the names of Tannaim and Amoraim unless there is a particular lesson or reason to do so. So the question arises: Why does he write, “Rabbi Masya ben Charash would say,” rather than simply quote Rabbi Masya ben Charash’s words? He introduces him with a particular expression: “Rabbi Masya ben Charash would say.” Perhaps he means to tell us something by that, by immediately attributing the words to him. We will not dwell on all the names. Our question is this: When we look at the Midrash, we see that half of it is not Rabbi Masya ben Charash’s words at all. The second half of the Midrash that Rashi quotes comes from Rabbi Eliezer HaKappar, yet Rashi does not mention Rabbi Eliezer HaKappar. He mentions only Rabbi Masya ben Charash and then quotes the continuation, which contains Rabbi Eliezer HaKappar’s words, without saying that Rabbi Eliezer HaKappar said them. This, too, calls for an explanation. And here we come to the central point of the explanation of all this—a very rich subject concerning the Exodus from Egypt. When the Jewish people were about to leave Egypt, Hakadosh Boruch Hu commanded Moshe Rabbeinu that they should bring a Pesach offering. What is the Pesach offering all about? The Torah does not make the whole matter clear. Why were the Jewish people commanded, before leaving Egypt, to bring a [unclear]

17:47 Pesach offering? The word “Pesach” comes from “Hashem will pass over the entrance.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu told them to put the blood there so that He would see the homes of the Jewish people. But seemingly, that is a particular detail, connected to the blood they placed on the entrances of their homes on Pesach. What is the overall reason for the entire Pesach offering? To answer that, Rashi quotes Rabbi Masya ben Charash. Rabbi Masya ben Charash says that this is not merely about a particular detail; it is about the larger picture: When the Jewish people were about to leave Egypt, the time for their Geulah had arrived. The Geulah from Egypt was a comprehensive Geulah. And as the verse says, “You shall serve G-d on this mountain”: The entire purpose of the Exodus from Egypt was for the Jewish people to become the people of Yisroel, a people who “shall serve,” a people who serve Hakadosh Boruch Hu. And for them to be ready to receive the Torah “on this mountain,” he says, the Jewish people were in a state of being “naked and bare.” They lacked what they needed in order to be ready to receive the Torah. What did the Jewish people lack? Two things: one connected to turning away from evil, and the other to doing good. As for turning away from evil, the Jewish people were in Egypt, and they

19:10 They were in a state of impurity. In Rashi’s words, quoting Rabbi Matya ben Charash, they were “steeped in idol worship.” The Jewish people experienced “the Egyptians made us evil.” They were surrounded by the Egyptians, and the Egyptians “made us evil”: they instilled evil in them. As the Frierdiker Rebbe explains that phrase, the evil of Egypt clung to the Jewish people. That was what was lacking: the Jewish people were “steeped in idol worship.” Not merely involved in idol worship, but steeped in it. In other words, in everything they did, in all their affairs, they had become bound up with idol worship. It had become something that swept them along; that was how they approached everything—steeped in idol worship. This was something that still had to be addressed. There was also the matter of doing good: they had to be ready to receive the Torah. They needed some connection that would enable them to receive the Torah at the Giving of the Torah; that is the movement of “do good.” So, he says, there are two matters, two mitzvos, and both are all-encompassing mitzvos. One is “turn away from evil” for the Jewish people. They were steeped in idol worship—not merely involved in it, but steeped in it. On the other hand, the Jewish people had to be prepared for the Giving of the Torah. That is precisely why Rabbi Matya ben Charash says, “He gave them two mitzvos.” And further,

20:33 The obvious question is: What is the significance of two mitzvos? How do they fit in here? If the issue is a single condition, “and you were naked and bare,” then the person needs to be clothed. When someone is naked, you clothe him with a garment—“clothe the naked.” You put one garment on him. Why are two garments needed here? If one is enough to clothe him, why two? After all, we are apparently speaking about garments. The Maharal of Prague, in Gur Aryeh, his commentary on the Torah, explains Rashi’s words as referring to two matters: first, that the Jewish people should become servants of Hashem, and second, that they should serve Hashem. A person becomes a servant of Hashem through bris milah. Bris milah engraves upon the person himself, stamps upon him, that he is a servant of Hashem. That concerns the person himself. Then there must be the act of serving Hashem, expressed in “Draw away and take for yourselves”: take a Pesach offering and draw away from idol worship. These are the two matters—being servants of Hashem and serving Hashem—as the Maharal of Prague explains. But following what we discussed earlier in explaining Rashi’s words, we can add a much fuller explanation: these were two fundamental, all-encompassing matters needed to bring the Jewish people out of the Egyptian exile and prepare them to receive the Torah. What were they? The first was the Pesach offering. According to this, the Pesach offering addressed “turn away from evil”—their being “steeped in idol worship.” The Pesach offering was taken from sheep or goats, which were the idols of Egypt. The Egyptians were steeped in it; this was

22:07 the idol worship centered on the flock, which the Jewish people brought in four days beforehand. The flock was what the Egyptians revered, their idol. And the Jews were steeped in idol worship—that was their condition. They had to be detached from the idol worship of Egypt. That was one side of it. On the other side, something positive was also needed: bris milah. Bris milah is entering into a covenant with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, forming a bond with Him, and through it one can receive the Torah. And, of course, bris milah is fundamental, because it is the covenant and bond between the Jews and Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Let us return to the Pesach offering. This also explains the reason Rashi cites here in the name of Rabbi Matya ben Charash: Why was it taken four days in advance? Why, specifically for the Pesach offering in Egypt, did they have to take it four days beforehand, on the tenth of the month, keep it in the house, and only four days later prepare it as the Pesach offering? The explanation is this: the entire purpose of the Exodus from Egypt and of the Pesach offering was to bring the Jews out of Egypt—“Draw your hands away from idol worship”—to detach them from idol worship, from the condition in which they were steeped in it. To bring them out of that condition, it was not enough to take the Pesach offering once, on a single day, and slaughter it immediately—even if only minutes were involved. We can see plainly that—

23:36 when a person takes something on and does it once, all at once, that does not yet prove that he is truly committed to it. The Gemara says regarding Chananiah, Mishael, and Azariah: “Had they flogged Chananiah, Mishael, and Azariah,” we do not know what would have happened to them. In other words, if their suffering had continued over time, they might not necessarily have been able to withstand it. Similarly, a person makes a good resolution for a moment. They could have been told to take the Pesach offering and slaughter it immediately. Had they done so, it would not have proved that the matter was truly engraved within them, that it had become internalized, that the whole thing was etched into them. It might have happened only once. That is why it had to continue for four days. This is the meaning of “Why was it taken four days in advance?”: to spend four days with the Pesach offering, and during those four days to reflect on what was happening, on what Hakadosh Boruch Hu wanted of them, and on their firm decision to detach themselves from the idol worship of Egypt. Rashi has already taught us this. He does not need to introduce it on his own here; he said it earlier. Rashi said earlier, concerning the Binding of Yitzchak, that when Hakadosh Boruch Hu commanded Avraham Avinu to go to the binding, and he set out for it early the very next morning—“Avraham rose early in the morning”—he had to wait three days. Only “on the third day” did he see the mountain.

24:56 Yes, and Rashi asks: Why did it happen that way? Why were so many days needed? So that he would have time to reflect on the matter. That was, in fact, the test of the binding. If Hakadosh Boruch Hu had told him, “Take your son to the binding,” and had him take his son immediately, without thinking, and only the next day Avraham had grasped what he had done—who knows what regret might have followed. Hakadosh Boruch Hu told him, and only the next morning did he rise early, “in the morning,” after which he traveled for three days. That makes four days. Four days are needed for a person to reflect on something fully—that is what we learn from Rashi concerning the Binding of Yitzchak. From there we can understand this case as well. This is what Rashi means when he asks, “Why was it taken four days in advance?” specifically for the Pesach offering in Egypt. Rabbi Matya ben Charash explains that they lacked two mitzvos to prepare the Jews, so that they would not be “naked and bare,” G-d forbid. They had to distance themselves from the impurity of Egypt through the Pesach offering, and they had to prepare to receive the Torah through bris milah, so that they would be ready to receive it. This had to extend over four days—“taken four days in advance”—during which the preparation took place. Only afterward did they slaughter the offering. And why specifically Rabbi Matya ben Charash? Because the Gemara says that his yeshiva was in Rome. Rabbi Matya ben Charash was

26:24 one of the Tannaim who lived in the time of Rabbi Akiva. As the Gemara says in Bava Basra, there was a yeshiva in Lod, and there were yeshivos in Eretz Yisroel. Where did Rabbi Matya ben Charash establish his yeshiva? Specifically in Rome. His yeshiva was the greatest beis midrash, as the Gemara says in Sanhedrin regarding the verse “Justice, justice shall you pursue”: “Follow Rabbi Matya ben Charash to Rome.” It was the greatest beis midrash of its day. Where was it? In Rome. Being in Rome, where Jews were, Heaven forbid, in exile among non-Jews, “Rabbi Matya ben Charash would say”—he would say this again and again. That is the meaning of “would” here: it was something he repeated many times, because it concerned him deeply. When we are in the Roman exile—which is the present exile—and Jews are in a state of being “naked and bare,” and we encounter Jews, may Heaven have mercy, in that condition of exile in Rome, we must know that we have to see to it that a Jew does not remain, may Heaven have mercy, “naked and bare.” We have to find two mitzvos. When we meet a Jew on the street, we must prepare him for the Geulah and see to it that he has a mitzvah of “turn away from evil” and a mitzvah of “do good,” connecting him to Hakadosh Boruch Hu through a mitzvah. And from that mitzvah—“one mitzvah leads to another”—he will go on to fulfill another mitzvah and yet another, and in this way emerge from his inner exile.

27:42 And this is the lesson from Rashi, who teaches Jews how they should conduct themselves, based on the words of Rabbi Masya ben Charash: what happened at the time of the Exodus from Egypt. From this we also learn how Jews should conduct themselves in our exile, which began with the Roman exile. As the Rebbe spoke about then, at the [unclear] of Yud Shvat, this is connected to the day of the Frierdiker Rebbe’s passing, for he too had a yeshiva in Rome. Where was the Frierdiker Rebbe? He was in Russia, then left and went to Poland, and later traveled to America. America in those days was a harsh and bitter exile spiritually, with all that meant for the Jews there. And while he was there, he established a yeshiva in Rome. There he laid the foundation for spreading Yiddishkeit throughout the world, with mesirus nefesh. Chassidim must go out into the street and seek out more Jews, help them put on tefillin, [unclear] mitzvos, and study Torah with them. Through even one mitzvah, or two mitzvos, they bring a Jew to the point where he is ready to move from one garment to the next, and from one mitzvah to another, and leave his inner exile. In this way, we will ensure that we leave this exile and see to it that not a single Jew remains in exile.

28:59 That is our purpose, which we learn from these days, from [unclear]: not to think only of ourselves, but to think of more and more Jews. That another Jew should put on tefillin, another Jew should affix a mezuzah, another Jew should eat kosher, and another Jew should keep Shabbos. Through all these things, “You, children of Israel, will be gathered one by one” will be fulfilled, along with [unclear] what is written in our parsha: to leave Egypt, to leave exile, and enter the true and complete Geulah through our righteous Moshiach.