Parshas Ki Sisa Purim (5785) - Moshe Rabbeinu and Mordechai HaYehudi sweeten the bitterness of the Jewish people

00:00 On Purim 5663, the Rebbe Rashab, Rabbi Sholom Dovber, was in Vienna, Austria. He was staying there for medical treatment and had spent several months there over the winter. After three months, Purim arrived. That year, Purim fell on a Friday, and several guests arrived that day—chassidim from Russia, as well as chassidim from Poland and Hungary. A pleasant farbrengen began on Purim afternoon, at around two o’clock. They farbrenged until Friday night. Then they made Kiddush and continued the farbrengen until after midnight on Shabbos. It was a rich and very enjoyable farbrengen. The next day, on Motzaei Shabbos, at the close of Shushan Purim, the chassidim wanted to continue farbrenging. They went to ask the Rebbe Rashab, Rabbi Sholom Dovber, to continue the farbrengen in honor of Shushan Purim, but the Rebbe Rashab said he could not. The chassidim went into a side room and sat down to farbreng. During the night, the attendant there, whose name was Chaim Meir, came in with the mail. The Frierdiker Rebbe was there and received a bundle of letters. He saw that among them was a letter from the administration of the Tomchei Temimim yeshiva in Lubavitch, containing a report on the state of the yeshiva and its students, on each one individually and on all of them together: who was studying,

02:01 what they were studying and how they were studying, how things were progressing, and how the students conducted themselves. When the Frierdiker Rebbe looked at the letter, he realized it contained good news that would certainly give the Rebbe much satisfaction. He went straight over, knocked on the door, and handed the envelope—the letter—to the Rebbe Rashab. The Rebbe Rashab opened the letter and read it, while the Frierdiker Rebbe returned to farbreng with the chassidim. Some time later, Reb Chaim Meir, the attendant, called the Frierdiker Rebbe and told him that his father, the Rebbe Rashab, was looking for him. He went in to the Rebbe Rashab and saw his face shining with joy and a great uplift of spirit. He understood that the letter had certainly had its effect and brought him satisfaction. Indeed, Rabbi Sholom Dovber, the Rebbe Rashab, told him that the letter had given him great satisfaction: he could see how the students were flourishing, growing, and advancing in Torah study and avodah. He wished that the mashpi’im would be good mashpi’im and those receiving their guidance would receive it well, and so on. The Frierdiker Rebbe understood that this was an auspicious moment and said, “Well, perhaps after this letter, after the satisfaction it brought, this is the time for us to merit having the Rebbe farbreng with us.” The Rebbe Rashab agreed at once. The chassidim gathered there in the room,

03:39 sat down around him, and the Rebbe Rashab came to farbreng with them. It was a rich and very enjoyable farbrengen that Motzaei Shabbos. The Frierdiker Rebbe relates that one of the chassidim there—chassidim who had already said a little l’chaim on Purim—suddenly burst into intense tears and said, “Rebbe, how does one become more elevated?” In other words, how does one reach a higher level? The Rebbe Rashab answered that chossid: “To become more elevated, get into my wagon. Get into my wagon. My wagon is adorned,” as it says there, “with the sweat and tears of the work of the heart and the work of the mind. Get into my wagon, and you will become more elevated.” Then another chossid turned to him and said, “Rebbe, where are the steps? How does one climb into the Rebbe’s wagon?” The Rebbe Rashab answered that there were four steps. He said, I believe, four steps, and in any event he mentioned two of them. The first is that with every physical thing, one must consider how to derive spiritual benefit from it. That is, we should use the physical thing we have before us not merely for its own sake, but look for the spiritual benefit it can bring in serving Hashem. And regarding another step, he

05:16 said that a chossid must study Chassidus for fifteen minutes every day. This was on Purim 5663. We find that when Purim falls in this pattern, close to Shabbos, we read Parshas Ki Sisa. When we consider the connection between Purim and the parsha, we find something interesting. The Gemara asks, “Where is Mordechai alluded to in the Torah?” And it says we learn it from a verse in the weekly parsha: “Take for yourself the finest spices, pure myrrh,” in the passage dealing with the anointing oil. Hakadosh Boruch Hu told Moshe Rabbeinu, “Take for yourself the finest spices, pure myrrh.” The Gemara says that “pure myrrh,” mar deror, is translated as “mira dachya.” In other words, this is the spice used to prepare the anointing oil. The translation calls mar deror “mira dachya,” and from this comes Mordechai’s name. That is where we see Mordechai alluded to in the Torah. But this is not clear: What is the significance of the name? What is the allusion? What are we meant to learn from “mira dachya,” from its connection to Mordechai and to the parsha? In the parsha we also find the whole account of the sin of the Golden Calf, and in general, the parsha is closely connected to the story of the Megillah.

07:01 In general, we find in the parsha what we find in the story of the Megillah. In the parsha there was the sin of the Golden Calf: the Jews had only just received the Torah, and forty days later this terrible sin took place. It had consequences expressed in the words, “On the day I make an accounting, I will call them to account”; that is the full severity of the sin of the Golden Calf. It involved idol worship. It was something terrible, to the point that Hakadosh Boruch Hu said that, G-d forbid, He wanted, may Hashem spare us, to impose the most severe punishment on the Jews. But Moshe Rabbeinu stood firm and said to Hakadosh Boruch Hu: Stand by the Jews. “Remember Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yisroel, Your servants.” “And Moshe pleaded”—he prayed, and succeeded in turning around the Jews’ difficult situation. That was the story of the sin of the Golden Calf. We find something similar on Purim. On Purim there was a similar sin, and the Gemara asks: What was the sin on Purim? The Gemara says that they enjoyed the feast of that wicked man. What is more, the Gemara says, “They bowed to an image.” This matter of bowing to an image is also similar to the sin of the Golden Calf, even in its details.

08:36 The Rebbe says that bowing to the image was not outright idol worship. It was an image of Nevuchadnezzar and so on; there was no outright idol worship here, but rather an element of associating another power with Hashem, of assigning importance to Nevuchadnezzar. Because of this, a great punishment came upon the Jews, leading later to the terrible decree, may Hashem spare us, “to destroy, kill, and annihilate all the Jews.” Similarly, the sin of the Golden Calf was not idol worship in the simple sense. The Jews were not looking, G-d forbid, for another G-d. But the verse says they were looking for someone to take Moshe Rabbeinu’s place: “For this man Moshe, we do not know what has become of him.” They were looking for an intermediary; they thought the calf would be that intermediary. In other words, in both cases it was a form of idol worship, but not outright idol worship. And what was the situation? In both cases, the punishment was destruction. As the Midrash says—the Midrash connects the two stories—when Haman sought “to destroy, kill, and annihilate all the Jews,” Hakadosh Boruch Hu said to him, “I said I would destroy them, and I could not.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself says—and the Midrash cites the verse connected to the parsha—“Were it not for Moshe,” because Hakadosh Boruch Hu...

10:04 wanted, may Hashem spare us—“I said I would destroy them, were it not for Moshe, His chosen one, who stood in the breach before Him to turn back His wrath from destroying them.” But Moshe turned the situation around. In the merit of Moshe Rabbeinu, Hakadosh Boruch Hu could not carry it out. Hakadosh Boruch Hu says to Haman: You should know that even I, the Master of the Universe Himself, “said,” may Hashem spare us, “I would destroy them, and I could not.” So you think you can? On the contrary, watch out for yourself: the Jews will keep growing and rising higher and higher, and you, Haman, will be hanged. That is what the Midrash says. It follows that the accounts in Parshas Ki Sisa are very similar to the Purim story. And in both cases, through whom was the situation turned around? Through the nasi, the tzaddik of the generation. In Moshe Rabbeinu’s case, “Were it not for Moshe, His chosen one, who stood in the breach before Him to turn back His wrath from destroying them”—Moshe Rabbeinu was the one who turned the situation around. And so it was with Mordechai: through him, too, came the turning back of the wrath from destruction. Mordechai gathered the Jews and stood firm in “he would not kneel or bow” and “Gather all the Jews.” He acted with such self-sacrifice that he turned the entire situation around and brought about “The Jews had light and joy.” Where do we see this point? What is the essential quality we find in both Moshe Rabbeinu and Mordechai? It is found in the name “Mordechai.” The power of a tzaddik lies in the fact that—

11:47 He can turn darkness into light and bitterness into sweetness. He can take something bitter and make it sweet; take darkness and turn it into light. What is the significance of “Mor Dechai”? The Alter Rebbe explains in the Purim maamarim that mor is a kind of fragrance. It comes from blood, as the early authorities write: mor is a kind of blood taken from an animal. There is a certain animal from which fragrances are produced. According to most halachic authorities, it is a non-kosher animal. They take the fragrance from it and produce mor, which was one of the ingredients of the ketores. The ketores contained mor. In fact, one reason our Sages call the Beis Hamikdash “Moriah” is the mor in the ketores. In other words, mor has a central place in the ketores and in the Beis Hamikdash. What makes mor different from everything else? It is taken specifically from the three completely impure kelipos: they take something from the deepest darkness and make it into ketores for Hashem. All the offerings come from kelipas nogah, from permitted things. But here, in the ketores, there is something even greater: they take mor from a certain animal, which most early authorities consider non-kosher, and make it into ketores for Hashem in the holiest place in the Beis Hamikdash. This is the great idea of turning darkness into light—transforming the deepest darkness into the greatest light. And that is really the story of the sin of the Golden Calf,

13:38 Later in the parsha, there was a time of terrible darkness because of the state of the Jewish people and the sin they had committed. Yet from there the Jews reached an even higher level, as we see later in the parsha: from the sin came “I have forgiven, as you said,” and afterward came the great day, the holy Yom Kippur. That was a tremendous transformation of darkness into light: “I have forgiven, as you said”—Hakadosh Boruch Hu pardoned and forgave the Jewish people because Moshe Rabbeinu turned the darkness into light. On the words “And Moshe pleaded,” the Midrash says that one interpretation of the word vayechal is connected with sweetness. The Midrash says that chilui means sweet; honey is called chilui in the language of the Gemara. “Vayechal”—he made it sweet. Moshe Rabbeinu turned bitterness into sweetness. The Midrash adds that this was the story at Marah: when the water there was bitter, Moshe Rabbeinu asked, “What do we do with the bitter water?” And Hakadosh Boruch Hu—“Hashem showed him a tree”—showed him what to do. The word for “tree,” eitz, is related to eitzah, “advice.” That is what happened at Marah: through “He showed him a tree,” he turned the bitter water sweet. Hakadosh Boruch Hu told Moshe, “A time will come when you will see that bitterness can be turned into sweetness, and you will know what to do.” That time came with the sin of the Golden Calf. “Vayechal”—Moshe Rabbeinu took what he had seen at Marah, that bitterness could be turned into sweetness, and by standing up and arousing mercy for the Jewish people, he turned darkness into light. Not only did Hakadosh Boruch Hu pardon and forgive the Jewish people, but the days of forgiveness and Yom Kippur followed—the Yom Tov that comes once a year, and everything connected with it. And so it was with Mordechai. Mordechai did the same thing. It was a time of darkness, doubled and redoubled,

15:47 The Jews were in exile, and they were caught up in matters that, as the Gemara relates, went so far, G-d forbid, as bowing to an idol. Then came the matter of “they enjoyed the feast of that wicked man.” As explained, we see that all of these things gave importance to King Achashverosh, importance to a non-Jew, importance to non-Jewish ways—something connected with idol worship, G-d forbid. By standing firm in his refusal to “bow or prostrate himself,” Mordechai turned the darkness into light. The greatest transformation in the Purim story is that “the mouth that forbade was the mouth that permitted.” The very Achashverosh who issued the decree and gave his house to Memuchan, to the wicked Haman, bringing about the harshest decrees against the Jews, may Hashem save us—that same Achashverosh ordered Mordechai brought before the king and said, “Thus shall it be done,” and gave Haman’s house to Esther and Mordechai. That is the greatest transformation from darkness into light. Mordechai brought this about, just as Moshe Rabbeinu brought about a transformation among the Jews. Moshe Rabbeinu revealed that the Jews’ sin with the Golden Calf was not inward; it was only outward. Through his self-sacrifice for the Jews and his prayers for them, Moshe Rabbeinu brought about something—by breaking the Tablets, he revealed—that the Jews, in truth, all the [unclear] in the parsha, was not [unclear]. All of this was the [unclear]; there was still [unclear] suspicion against the Jews. They had sinned. But by breaking the Tablets, Moshe Rabbeinu brought the truth to light: Jews do not want to sin. Even while sinning, a Jew is truly with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Jews always stand together with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and any sin is only something external, a spirit of folly that has entered; at their core, Jews stand together with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. And through this, Moshe

17:53 Rabbeinu transformed it. He revealed the Jewish spark, revealed this strength within the Jews, and that changed the situation created by the sin of the Golden Calf. Turning darkness into light—that is what this parsha is about; that is its story. And we find the same with Mordechai. The Gemara asks what caused the harsh decree and gives two reasons: “They enjoyed the feast of that wicked man,” and “they bowed to an idol.” The Gemara asks: “Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai’s students asked him: Why did the enemies of Israel in that generation become liable to destruction?” And what does the Gemara answer? “They only did it outwardly,” and therefore the entire decree was only outward as well. In other words, Mordechai revealed that all the sin was only outward, something external. Mordechai revealed that a Jew is a Jew. “A Jewish man”—that is how the whole story of the Megillah begins. The fact that Mordechai “would neither bow nor prostrate himself,” and that he expressed this openly, does not apply only to Mordechai; that is who Mordechai is. Even Haman understood it: “He disdained laying hands on Mordechai alone, for they had told him of Mordechai’s people,” as the Megillah itself says. Haman immediately understood that it was not enough to go after Mordechai alone. That is Mordechai. And through the power of that point, the entire Jewish people are like Mordechai. For Moshe, a Jew is someone who “will neither bow nor prostrate himself.” A Jew stands with Hakadosh Boruch Hu; he does not want to be cut off from G-dliness. And Mordechai revealed that point, the “Jewish man.” He was the Jewish man, the one who took charge and brought out within the Jews,

19:47 the Jew in practice, the power of faith, [unclear], “acknowledges the entire Torah”—that is what Mordechai revealed. Through this came the entire “it was turned around.” He revealed it—and that is the greatest miracle, the great Yom Tov of Purim. And this is the Rebbe’s role. As we see in this pattern: Moshe Rabbeinu stood proudly, and thus Moshe Rabbeinu—the intermediary who connects Hakadosh Boruch Hu and the Jews—stood proudly and took responsibility for the Jews. He revealed the innermost essence of a Jew, and through this turned darkness into light. This is what the parsha tells us. Mordechai brought about the transformation from darkness into light by revealing the “Jewish man,” the inner essence of every Jew: that a Jew does not want to be separated from Hakadosh Boruch Hu under any circumstances. Through this, he broke through the darkness and brought about the “it was turned around.” This is what is said about Purim: “These days of Purim shall not pass from among the Jews, and their memory shall not cease from their descendants.” Why is Purim such a great Yom Tov? How can it be said that “all the festivals are destined to be nullified,” but Purim will not be nullified? Because Purim reveals the essence of a Jew. Purim reveals the transformation—the greatest transformation from darkness into light—which will come only in the future. This quality is found in no other Yom Tov. “All the festivals are destined to be nullified.” And this is the point: the darkness within the—

21:17 The darkest situation will turn to light. And that was the greatest G-dly miracle of Purim. Who brought it about? Mordechai, by awakening the Jews—Moshe of his generation, as the Midrash says, “Mordechai in his generation was equal to Moshe in his generation”—and revealing in the Jews a readiness for mesirus nefesh. As the Alter Rebbe says in Likkutei Torah, throughout the entire year of Haman’s decree, the Jews stood firm with mesirus nefesh, and “no thought of anything else entered their minds.” What’s more, he gathered people together publicly to study Torah with mesirus nefesh. This broke through every obstacle and brought about the greatest miracles: “For the Jews there was light and joy, gladness and honor.” And the same is true of the Geulah in our generation. This is what it means when we say that the Rebbe connects us to Moshe Rabbeinu: “Choose men for us”—Moshe’s men—as it says in the passage we read on Purim, “And Amalek came.” Through our connection to Moshe Rabbeinu, yes, we are given the strength to turn darkness into light, to turn bitterness into sweetness, and to make the world a dwelling place for Him, to reveal the light of the Geulah. Yes, may we truly see “For the Jews there was light” in 5785. When Jews stand firm on Purim, stand with their full pride, with the stubborn resolve of “he would neither bow nor prostrate himself,” and reveal the pintele Yid—as we have seen clearly lately, with the pintele Yid emerging in more and more Jews.

22:47 And Jews stand proudly with their Judaism. “The fear of the Jews fell upon them,” as it says [unclear]. “The fear of the Jews”—the fact that a Jew fears Hakadosh Boruch Hu, a Jew’s fear of Heaven—“fell upon them,” upon the nations of the world, “and they will fear you.” And through this, may we merit the true miracles we are all waiting for, the miracles of the true and complete Geulah. And may it be Hashem’s will that in 5785 we merit the greatest miracles and the greatest wonders we are all waiting for, this true transformation with the complete Geulah through our righteous Moshiach. Amen, may it be His will.