Yemei Tashlumin for Mattan Torah 5783 - Torah Study With Yegiah

00:00 We are in the days following Shavuos during which the festival offerings could still be brought, and today we’ll talk about learning Torah and why Torah must be learned with effort. Surely, each of us came to the giving of the Torah and accepted the Torah anew. And we know that Torah study requires effort. Learning itself is not enough. As our Sages say: “If someone says, ‘I worked hard but did not succeed,’ do not believe him; ‘I did not work hard but succeeded,’ do not believe him; ‘I worked hard and succeeded,’ believe him.” Torah study must involve effort and work. Today we’ll talk a little about effort in Torah study and where we find the strength for it: Where do we get the strength to succeed in learning Torah? Sometimes a person wants to learn Torah, yet finds learning very difficult. People sometimes say, “I keep working and working, and it gets very hard; I don’t always feel like it.” Where do we get the strength to succeed in learning Torah, despite all the difficulties, from within and without? First, I’ll tell a well-known story that the Rebbe related several times in the name of his father-in-law, the Frierdiker Rebbe, about something that happened with the Tzemach Tzedek. Once, a chossid came,

01:47 a young married man, to the Tzemach Tzedek and complained: “What should I do? I have no desire to learn. I don’t feel like it.” The Tzemach Tzedek replied, “Is that so? That’s good. When you don’t feel like learning and you learn anyway, that’s good. But what am I to do? I do feel like learning!” In other words, the Tzemach Tzedek helped him understand that, on the contrary, the very fact that he faced a challenge, that learning was difficult for him, made his learning all the more precious. If he nevertheless learned and worked hard at it, it had special value and a special power, because his learning came through effort and work: he didn’t feel like it, yet he overcame that and learned. The Tzemach Tzedek himself, by contrast, already found pleasure and delight in learning, and he felt that he lacked that quality—the preciousness of effort in Torah study. In this connection, the Rebbe once related another story he had heard from the Frierdiker Rebbe: The Tzemach Tzedek insisted that his son, the Rebbe Maharash, learn with effort. He related that the Rebbe Maharash was naturally gifted with remarkable abilities. Even as a child, he had exceptional talent and an excellent

03:16 memory, and he immediately grasped the point of a sugya. So he did not have to work all that hard. He used to learn a great deal, but without exerting himself. Once, the Tzemach Tzedek instructed him to learn a tractate, Tractate Menachos. After finishing it, he came to be tested. The Tzemach Tzedek tested him, and he knew it very well. The Tzemach Tzedek asked him about one of the sugyos: where had he exerted himself over it? He answered, “I didn’t have to exert myself. I understood it.” The Tzemach Tzedek sighed and said, “You must exert yourself.” That was what the Rebbe Maharash had been lacking, and he began to learn Torah with such great effort that sores appeared on his forehead—sores that bled—and his health suffered as a result. That intense effort harmed his physical health. There is something special here: Torah study must specifically involve effort. To discuss this, let’s take one teaching of our Sages. The Gemara in Tractate Shabbos, on page 88, cites the well-known teaching on “They stood at the foot of the mountain”—a teaching that raises a difficulty, as we’ll see. On the verse “They stood at the foot of the mountain,” it says in the name of Rav Avdimi bar Chama bar Chasa: “This teaches that Hakadosh Boruch Hu held it over them.”

05:00 “He held the mountain over them like a barrel.” When they came to receive the Torah, Hakadosh Boruch Hu took the mountain and held it over them like a barrel. He held the mountain over the Jewish people and said to them, “If you accept the Torah, well and good; if not, there will be your burial place.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu told them: If you accept the Torah, good; if not, “there will be your burial place.” The Gemara continues: “From here comes a strong objection to the binding force of the Torah.” In other words, because Hakadosh Boruch Hu held the mountain over the Jewish people and compelled them to accept the Torah, there was a strong objection to its binding force. Rashi explains that the Jewish people could have claimed they were under duress: they had not truly wanted to accept the Torah; they were forced to. They therefore had an excuse. But later, “they accepted it again in the days of Achashverosh.” At that later time, the great miracles the Jewish people saw, as Rashi says, moved them to accept the Torah. This is a difficult Gemara; it’s hard to understand what happened there. At first glance, it makes no sense. As Tosafos ask: The day before, on the eve of Shavuos, the Jewish people had already accepted upon themselves the

06:40 yoke of the Kingdom of Heaven when they placed “we will do” before “we will hear.” As Rashi says in Parshas Mishpatim, they placed “we will do” before “we will hear” on the eve of Shavuos. All the Jewish people together—“All the people answered together”—said, “We will do and we will hear,” placing “we will do” before “we will hear.” In other words, they committed themselves to Hakadosh Boruch Hu and accepted the Torah willingly. If so, why was it necessary for something else to happen the next day, at the giving of the Torah, when “they stood at the foot of the mountain” and He held the mountain over them like a barrel? Tosafos ask this question. Tosafos answer that Hakadosh Boruch Hu was concerned that when the Jewish people saw the great, overwhelming fire—and, as our Sages say, “With every utterance, their souls flew out”—they would become frightened and change their minds. That is why He held the mountain over them like a barrel. But we need to understand this answer of Tosafos: What was Hakadosh Boruch Hu concerned about—that they would not accept the Torah? Why wasn’t their acceptance when they said “We will do and we will hear” enough? What was happening there that made it necessary to compel the Jewish people to accept Torah and mitzvos? What is the meaning of all this? What exactly happened? There are a number of explanations. What we’ll discuss here is, first and foremost, an explanation according to the straightforward meaning, understood more deeply. As the Rebbe writes in one of his letters, he explains this based

08:11 on the explanations of [unclear]. And within this, as the Rebbe cites, there is an explanation from the teachings of the holy Baal Shem Tov, as well as one from the teachings of the Alter Rebbe. So the explanation of the Gemara’s straightforward meaning, understood more deeply—what happened here, and what does it mean that “He held the mountain over them like a barrel”?—is as follows: When the Jewish people left Egypt, they openly witnessed the greatest miracles that took place there: the plagues that Hakadosh Boruch Hu brought upon the Egyptians, the Exodus from Egypt with a mighty hand, the wondrous revelations of the Exodus, the splitting of the sea, and afterward the war with Amalek—all of these events. And when the moment of the giving of the Torah arrived, they felt and grasped something else: the Jewish people then grasped the truth. They understood, at the deepest level and in the innermost part of their souls, the truth of the Torah. They felt that the Torah touched their very souls, and that observing Torah and mitzvos was life itself; and, G-d forbid, not observing Torah and mitzvos was the opposite of life. In other words, “This teaches that He held the mountain over them like a barrel” does not mean what people might simply imagine—that Hakadosh Boruch Hu took the mountain

09:52 and said, “Either you learn Torah, or you throw your coat over your head and go home.” That is not what it means. It means that at that moment, when the Jewish people stood at Mount Sinai, face to face [unclear], they felt and understood in the depths of their souls just how true Torah and mitzvos are, and how Torah and mitzvos are the very life of their souls. Without Torah and mitzvos, it is as though “your life is not life.” In other words, in everyday life, a person often knows—even in physical matters—that a certain way of behaving is wrong when it comes to his health or habits. He has heard, and he knows, that doctors say a certain thing is unhealthy, that it is bad for the body, that he should not do it or eat it. Nevertheless, he does not [unclear]. He doesn’t say it; he doesn’t say the [unclear]. Meanwhile, he enjoys it; he can eat, he can drink. The same is true of a person’s habits and conduct in everyday life: he does not feel that something is harming his health or affecting him in other ways. But sometimes there is

11:22 Moments when the truth shines through. Sometimes a person has a moment when he feels, when he grasps deep within himself, just how true something is. At that moment, his way of behaving becomes utterly unthinkable to him. He feels that it goes completely against his nature and that he must not do it. Take, for example, someone who has fallen into stealing. He thinks nothing has happened—once, twice, three times—and that there was nothing wrong with it. But when he sees that he is losing his life, and sees all the troubles and everything he has gone through, an inner realization takes shape. He feels that “your life is no life.” This is something we see in everyday life. The same is true in spiritual matters: often a person does not grasp, again, [unclear] of a transgression, and does not grasp the significance of a mitzvah. After all, it says, “For they are our life and the length of our days”; and, by contrast, the verse says, “I have set before you life and good, death and evil; choose life.” That is true and certain and right; that is how it is. Yet he himself does not feel it in everyday life. He does not grasp that Torah and mitzvos are life for a person, and that evil and transgressions are a matter of death, G-d forbid. He does not grasp it. And here they tell a story about the Tzemach Tzedek.

13:01 Once, when the Tzemach Tzedek took part in the rabbinical conference in Petersburg, the government sought to make changes to Jewish life. It was a major conference that involved great danger. The government wanted to change the way Jews educated their children, and the Tzemach Tzedek stood against it with tremendous mesirus nefesh. One of the well-known stories from that time is that someone asked the Tzemach Tzedek how he could stand up to the government that way. One of the prominent people at the conference, a man well versed in Torah law, asked him: After all, it says that someone who rebels against the government is liable to death. The way the Tzemach Tzedek stood against the government amounted to rebellion against it. Twenty-two times during the conference, he faced grave danger. The man asked how he could do such a thing, contrary to the halachah that one who rebels against the government is liable to death. The Tzemach Tzedek replied: It says that one who rebels against the government is liable to death of the body, but one who rebels against the Kingdom of Heaven is liable to death of the soul. Which is worse? The Tzemach Tzedek felt and understood with his whole being that rebellion against the Kingdom of Heaven means spiritual death, and spiritual death is worse than physical death. But people like us, ordinary people, do not grasp this. And this was what was new at the Giving of the Torah: among all the Jews, without exception, there was

14:46 The moment Hakadosh Boruch Hu came to Mount Sinai and held the mountain over them like a barrel, every Jew felt the truth in his soul: If you accept the Torah, well and good. When you study Torah and observe the mitzvos, that is life, and it is good; things are good both spiritually and materially. But if not, if there is no life of Torah and mitzvos, that is not life; there will be your burial place. It is a matter of death, of burial. That was what they felt at that moment. But once the Giving of the Torah had passed, that feeling left them. It was there only in the moment when Hakadosh Boruch Hu allowed them to feel it. When the Giving of the Torah passed, that moment passed too: “When the ram’s horn sounds a long blast, they may ascend the mountain”—the Shechinah departed. So that feeling departed as well. The day after the Giving of the Torah, the Jews no longer felt that way. And so there arose the strong grounds for a claim of coercion: they no longer had that feeling. Now that I do not have that feeling, why should I take Torah and mitzvos upon myself under all circumstances, even when it becomes difficult, when I take no pleasure in it and when it is not easy? I do not have that feeling now. This explains why there are strong grounds for a claim of coercion.

16:17 But our Sages say, “They accepted it again in the days of Achashverosh,” with the Kohanim and the events of Purim [unclear]. Then they saw the truth. On Purim, “The Jews fulfilled and accepted.” At the Giving of the Torah, “He held the mountain over them like a barrel”; that was a revelation of supreme love. When there is such a revelation, you see the truth. [unclear] an entire period, from the Exodus from Egypt through the Splitting of the Sea and the war with Amalek, and then at Mount Sinai—all of it was a revelation of supreme love. Hakadosh Boruch Hu showed us His love. That love was revealed, and “As water reflects a face back to a face, so one person’s heart reflects another’s.” When you see someone showing love, you show love back. That is natural. “As water reflects a face back to a face”: when I look in a mirror and smile, the figure in the mirror smiles back at me. So too, “one person’s heart reflects another’s”: love is reflected back. When Hakadosh Boruch Hu reveals His love to us, we too feel love for Him. And so this was what was new at the Giving of the Torah: Hakadosh Boruch Hu showed us His great love through miracles and revelations [unclear].

18:06 At the Giving of the Torah, Hakadosh Boruch Hu revealed His love, beginning with the Exodus from Egypt. And so, “As water reflects a face back to a face,” the Jews felt an extraordinary love. It stirred in them a desire to come still closer to Hakadosh Boruch Hu, with great love. [unclear] This is what the Gemara means by “He held the mountain over them like a barrel”: it was not coercion born of fear; it was the compelling force of love. In those moments, from the Exodus from Egypt until the Giving of the Torah, Hakadosh Boruch Hu showed us such great love, through miracles and wonders and the revelation of G-dliness. [unclear] When it comes to Torah and mitzvos, it is not something you can evade. [unclear] Hakadosh Boruch Hu, “I am Hashem your G-d,” gave Himself over completely in love. That came from the revelation, from the revelation of supreme love. But when that supreme love departed, it could be forgotten. Amid the trappings of the natural world, it could be forgotten. Love that comes from the person himself, on the other hand—that is not forgotten. You do not forget it the way you forget something that comes from a revelation of light, from supreme love; it comes from the person himself. That is the difference.

19:55 Therefore, the days of Achashverosh were a time without revelation. [unclear] On the contrary: it was the time of Haman’s decree “to destroy, kill and annihilate” all the Jews, may G-d protect us. Precisely in those days of Haman and Esther, when there was no revelation, the Jews’ mesirus nefesh emerged from within themselves, through their own strength. It became clear how strong a Jew’s bond is: he does not want to be cut off from G-dliness. That mesirus nefesh came to light then, on Purim. And it led the Jews to accept the Torah: they accepted it not only because of what they had been shown from Above, but from within themselves and through their own strength, because of the essential bond between the very essence of the Jewish people and G-dliness. That is why it was a true acceptance, an eternal acceptance. And here comes the Baal Shem Tov’s interpretation. The Baal Shem Tov adds another point, which brings us back to what we were discussing. [unclear] It concerns Jews in every generation: it is not enough that the Jews took it upon themselves and said, “We will do and we will listen,” specifically when there was the revelation from Above of “He held the mountain over them like a barrel.” The Baal Shem Tov says that even a person who has no desire—here the Baal Shem Tov says that he must study even when he has no desire for Torah

21:43 and serving Hashem. There are times when a person has no desire for Torah and serving Hashem. Nevertheless, I am not free to desist. Am I free? I cannot desist. Rather, he should do it against his will, and recognize that it is as though he is being compelled to do it against his will. He does it against his will, as though someone is forcing him, even when he has no desire. On the face of it, what is the Baal Shem Tov saying here? What is the deeper meaning of his words? [unclear] The Rebbe explains their deeper meaning in an entirely different way. The Baal Shem Tov is saying this: there are two forms of servitude. The matter of kabbolas ol [unclear]—they put “We will do” before “We will listen.” The servant’s commitment, too, has two sides. There is a servant who gave himself over to become a servant. He gave himself over. He [unclear] that he wants to be his master’s servant, and he accepts the yoke of his authority. He accepts his master’s yoke and commits himself, and whatever he does, he will do with dedication, day and night, with complete devotion. But it comes from his own decision. And there is a second kind of servitude: the master chose the servant and made you a servant. This is like what we find in halachah, in the Gemara in Kiddushin, that there are two kinds of Hebrew servants: a Hebrew servant who sells himself, and a Hebrew servant whom the court sells.

23:21 One who sells himself, as the Gemara says, is one kind of [unclear], one kind of servitude: the self-commitment of a servant who sells himself. And there is a second kind of servitude: a Jewish servant sold by beis din. As the Gemara says, a person has no money, and beis din sells him. There is a major practical difference in halachah between them. As the Gemara says, if he sells himself, his master may not give him a Canaanite maidservant; but if beis din sells him, his master may give him a Canaanite maidservant. In other words, when he sells himself, his servitude is still not absolute; he is not completely bound, and therefore his master cannot give him a Canaanite maidservant. But when beis din sells him, the servitude is greater, and his master can even give him a Canaanite maidservant, as the Gemara explains there in the details of this halachah. What does this mean? It is a different kind of servitude. The first kind has an advantage—there is an advantage to it: I committed myself. Of my own choice, through my own strength, I decided that I want to be a servant. Seemingly, that is the greatest thing possible: I committed myself to being a servant. But there is a drawback. The drawback is that because the servitude is my decision, my choice, and comes from who I am, it has limits. Yes, sometimes it gets hard. What gets hard here?

24:47 I feel I don’t have the strength. I don’t have the desire. At first, I committed myself because of [unclear], because I was in a state of inspiration. But now the inspiration has passed, I don’t feel like it, it has become hard, and it has turned out to be more than I thought. I can no longer commit myself like that; I don’t have the strength. But when the servitude comes from the fact that you were made a servant from Above, it comes from Above; it is planted within you, planted within a person. And because it is planted within a person, the strength for it is not limited. In the application of this idea, at least, to the relationship between Jews and Hakadosh Boruch Hu: if the bond, the commitment, the servitude, is only my decision—that I committed myself to being a servant—then it has limits, according to a person’s strength and limitations. A person has limitations, and he committed himself according to his strength. Sometimes it really is hard; sometimes there are difficulties at home and outside. He doesn’t feel like it; he has difficulties and the like. A person studies Torah, and all sorts of things interfere, and he says: This isn’t what I had in mind. I took this upon myself in a certain way, but I never imagined difficulties like these. And I don’t have...

26:05 the strength for it; they really did reach that point through their own strength, and beyond that they cannot go. As explained in Chassidus, they did not only become servants—this is “He held the mountain over them like a barrel.” In other words, Hakadosh Boruch Hu made us servants. The servitude of the Jews is not only what came about through “they said ‘We will do’ before ‘We will hear’”—a wonderful and important thing, the service achieved through one’s own strength, with which the Jews accepted the Torah. But on the other hand, Hakadosh Boruch Hu did not settle for what the Jews had attained; He made them servants from Above. He bound them to Him. “He held the mountain over them like a barrel”—Hakadosh Boruch Hu brought about that the Jews’ servitude would not be only according to the limitations of a created being, of a person relying on his own strength, but according to the strength of the Creator. And because the Jews’ servitude rests on the strength of the Creator, it has no limits. Therefore, nothing can separate Jews from Hakadosh Boruch Hu. And that is why the Baal Shem Tov says that even when one does not feel like it, [unclear]. That wording, too, expresses the question of desire: I don’t feel like it, and sometimes I really can’t; it’s hard for me. I feel that this is too difficult a subject, too difficult a matter. I have too many difficulties, too many worries and preoccupations.

27:15 And so on—all these things. The Baal Shem Tov comes and says: Even when one does not feel like it, one is given limitless strength from Above. With that strength, a Jew can overcome all these things and all the obstacles, study Torah, and serve Hakadosh Boruch Hu in every circumstance. And this is the true meaning of “He held the mountain over them like a barrel”: the great new element added at the Giving of the Torah was that limitless strength was given. As the Rebbe explains in the sicha, this helps us understand Rashi’s explanation of the verse, “I am Hashem your G-d, Who brought you out of the land of Egypt.” The Ten Commandments open with this verse: “I am Hashem your G-d, Who brought you out of the land of Egypt.” Rashi focuses on these words and asks: What does “Who brought you out of the land of Egypt” mean? “It was on this condition that I brought you out: that you would accept My decrees.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu says: I brought you out of Egypt on the condition that you would be bound to Me. What is he telling us here? Seemingly, it is self-evident; it was already said earlier. “You have seen”—the earlier verses already say that Hakadosh Boruch Hu said in [unclear], “For I spoke with you from heaven,” and “You shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” What does “I am Hashem your G-d, Who brought you out of the land of Egypt” add here? Rashi says: Hakadosh Boruch Hu is saying, I know that you said, “We will do and we will hear.” You took it upon yourselves and committed yourselves to being servants of Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and you “said ‘We will do’ before ‘We will hear’”—absolute kabbolas ol. But that was your decision, your choice.

28:47 And because it came from your choice, it is possible that when things become difficult, you will want to [unclear]: “The Torah exempts one who is prevented by circumstances beyond his control,” as the Gemara says. To this Hakadosh Boruch Hu said: “I am Hashem your G-d, Who brought you out of the land of Egypt”—I brought you out on this condition, that you would be bound to Me. Hakadosh Boruch Hu brought about within Jews a servitude that comes, so to speak, from His side, and that servitude is absolute. This commitment has no limits, and no concealment can stop it. That is why, throughout every era and in every circumstance—even in the hardest times, amid the most severe concealment, and even when there was the greatest confusion and the greatest difficulties—Jews always stood firm with mesirus nefesh and studied Torah with mesirus nefesh. So from “He held the mountain over them like a barrel,” on the Jews’ part there is [unclear], from Above, from Hakadosh Boruch Hu’s side, a servitude imposed from Above; Hakadosh Boruch Hu binds the Jews to Him. And this is what the Tzemach Tzedek told the chossid: On the contrary, the fact that I don’t feel like studying and nevertheless study Torah comes from a much deeper place—from the fact that Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives us strength. And the strength Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives is limitless. Therefore, a Jew has limitless strength to devote himself to Torah and avodah, to serve Hakadosh Boruch Hu in every circumstance, and to bring about, through toil, “you will find.” Now, during the days following Shavuos when its offerings can still be made—

30:15 we must indeed accept the yoke upon ourselves: “Whoever accepts upon himself the yoke of Torah is relieved of the yoke of government and the yoke of worldly concerns.” Despite all the difficulties and all the confusion—may we already be able to study Torah. “Whoever upholds the Torah in poverty will ultimately uphold it in wealth.” May we merit to study Torah in true freedom. And very, very soon, in our own days, may we merit to truly study Torah in true freedom, for “the sages and prophets longed for the days of Moshiach only so that they would be free to engage in Torah and its wisdom,” and “the earth will be filled with the knowledge of Hashem as the waters cover the sea.”