The Four Parshas in Light of Chassidus - 4 Necessary Stages in Every Jew's Service of Hashem

00:00 Today we’ll talk about the four special readings we read during the month of Adar. We all know that in Adar, in addition to the regular weekly parsha, we read four more passages. The question is: What exactly connects these four readings? What is their deeper meaning, their message? Why are these four readings added specifically at this time of year? Of course, there is a straightforward halachic explanation for each one. But as with everything, we believe and know that nothing in the Torah, and nothing in the world, is a coincidence. The Baal Shem Tov teaches us about Divine providence in every detail of creation. Nothing that happens to the inanimate, the plant, the animal, or the human being happens by chance. How much more so when it comes to things the Torah tells us. So the fact that these four readings have been brought together must hold a message for us. Today, we’ll first explain what each of the four readings is about on a simple level. Then we’ll look at their deeper meaning: the chain that links them, their connection, their inner dimension. We’ll see that, deep down, their content forms a very interesting sequence. It’s a process connected with the time we’re in now—the month of Adar, the days before and after Purim, and the days when we prepare for Pesach. The four readings are connected to this period in a profound, inward way. And above all, we’ll look at their message for daily life: what they teach us and the strength and depth they give us in our everyday service of Hashem. So first, from a halachic perspective, let’s start with the straightforward explanation.

02:19 Why do we read these passages? In brief, there are two explanations for Parshas Shekalim. The halachic explanation is that we read it before the month of Adar, on the Shabbos when we bless the month of Adar, or sometimes on Shabbos Rosh Chodesh Adar. That is the time, as the Mishnah in tractate Shekalim says, when “on the first of Adar, announcements are made concerning the shekalim.” When Rosh Chodesh Adar arrives, announcements begin that every Jew must bring a half-shekel to the Beis Hamikdash. Why? Because in the time of the Beis Hamikdash, the Torah required that, beginning on Rosh Chodesh Nissan, the communal offerings be brought from the new funds. They had to be brought from the newly collected money. Throughout the month of Adar, every Jew was meant to bring a half-shekel, which was used to purchase the communal offerings for the entire year. Although we no longer have the Beis Hamikdash, we still observe the custom connected with the half-shekel. As is well known and brought in halachah, before Purim, on the Fast of Esther and around that time, we continue to give a half-shekel contribution. That is the simple explanation. The Midrash offers another interesting explanation. When Haman came with the ten thousand talents of silver with which he persuaded Achashverosh to agree to the terrible decree—to destroy, kill, and annihilate all the Jews—he offered ten thousand talents of silver. That is the account in the Megillah. The Midrash, cited in the Gemara, says that Hakadosh Boruch Hu declared, and a heavenly voice proclaimed: “Wicked one, their shekalim have already preceded your shekalim. You think you’re going to accomplish something with those ten thousand talents of silver? Know that the half-shekels the Jewish people brought came first. They have already had their effect, and that

04:27 already tells us that, with Hashem’s help, everything will be turned around.” Of course, we need to understand this more deeply. What is the connection between the half-shekel and Haman’s money? What exactly was this exchange, this argument, between Hakadosh Boruch Hu and, lehavdil, Haman? What did Haman hope to accomplish with the money, and what did Hakadosh Boruch Hu mean when He said that the half-shekels had preceded it and had already brought about the annulment of the decree? With Hashem’s help, we’ll explain that later as well. The second reading is Parshas Zachor. On the face of it, the simple reason we read it, as explained in halachah and in the Gemara, is that remembrance must come before action. On Purim, we relive the story of the wiping out of Amalek, whom we are commanded to remember. Haman son of Hamedasa the Agagite was descended from Amalek. As is also written, the seventy-five thousand killed throughout the king’s provinces, as well as the five hundred and the three hundred, were all descended from Amalek. The story of the Megillah is, in essence, the story of wiping out Amalek. That is why we first fulfill the Torah’s commandment to remember Amalek—“Remember”—by reading Parshas Zachor on the Shabbos before Purim. Then comes Parshas Parah, which is connected with preparations for Pesach. We must begin preparing for Pesach thirty days before the festival. In the time of the Beis Hamikdash, Jews would go up for the festival and had to bring offerings, especially the Pesach offering. For that, they had to be ritually pure. They could not bring the offering in a state of impurity or go up for the festival in that state. They therefore needed to be purified before offering the Pesach sacrifice. Purification from impurity contracted through contact with the dead was accomplished through the sprinkling of the waters of the red heifer, as we know from halachah. That is why we read Parshas Parah Adumah even today. Then comes the Shabbos before the month of

06:35 Nissan—the Shabbos when we bless the month of Nissan, or sometimes Shabbos Rosh Chodesh, depending on how the calendar falls. Then we read the fourth passage, Parshas Hachodesh: “This month shall be for you the first of months; it shall be for you the first of the months of the year”—the month of Nissan and the laws of Pesach. That is the simple explanation. But as we said, everything has deeper and still deeper meaning. The Baal Shem Tov teaches us about Divine providence, so we must understand that there is Divine providence in the fact that these four readings come together in the same month, in the same period. Surely there is a message that unites all four and connects them to this time, the month of Adar. So what is their spiritual message, their deeper meaning? If we look more deeply, we’ll discover a chain, a sequence, a common thread connecting all four readings, and a very special process. We also need to understand why two are read before Purim, while the other two are read after Purim as part of our preparations for Pesach. If we had to express the point in one word, these four readings teach us the path to Geulah—the path to an inner Geulah, the redemption of the person and the soul. After all, the time we are in now is a time of Geulah. Adar is a month of Geulah: the Jewish people’s deliverance in the days of Achashverosh, on Purim. And Nissan is the month of the Geulah from Egypt. So we are speaking about a period of Geulah, but there are two kinds. The Geulah of Purim was a deliverance during exile. As the Gemara says, “We are still servants of Achashverosh.” The Jewish people were not redeemed completely; they were still in exile. After the miracle of Purim, they remained

08:53 Also under Achashverosh. The Beis Hamikdash had still not been built, but in the midst of exile and darkness, the wondrous light of Purim shone. It gave us hope: everything was turned around, and suddenly people saw how Hakadosh Boruch Hu protects the Jewish people—one sheep among seventy wolves—guarded by the great Shepherd who watches over us even in moments of exile. That is the Geulah of Purim. On the other hand, Pesach is the redemption from Egypt, the beginning of all redemptions. From there comes “As in the days of your exodus from the land of Egypt, I will show you wonders.” It was the first redemption, the source of all the others. The redemption from Egypt was total. At that moment, the entire Jewish people were redeemed completely; they all left in the blink of an eye, and so on. That was when the Jewish people were born as a nation and began the process of preparing to receive the Torah—which is, in essence, the Geulah. So this period we are in is a time of Geulah. This also teaches us what our Sages say. The Gemara says at the end of Tractate Taanis, “When Adar begins, we increase in joy.” And Rashi tells us why: “They are days of redemption for Israel—Purim and Pesach.” In other words, the reason we increase in joy as soon as Adar begins is that we are already in the process leading toward the Geulah. The Geulah includes both Purim and Pesach. So as soon as Adar begins—we are in a month of Geulah, preparing for the redemption that begins in Adar with Purim and continues through Pesach. Pesach, the time of our freedom, is a time of complete Geulah. Now, when we speak of Geulah, as we said, there is the redemption and liberation of the body, and there is the redemption and liberation of the soul. Of course, both on Pesach and on Purim, there was liberation of the body. On Pesach, the bodies of the Jewish people were subjected to backbreaking labor and everything the Torah

11:10 tells us about—all the suffering and what the Midrashim describe, and so on—that the Jewish people endured in Egypt, the iron furnace. And there was liberation of the body. The same is true of Purim: the bodies of the Jewish people faced a decree “to destroy, kill, and annihilate” them. Every Jew, in every land, was in mortal danger, and then everything was turned around. There was a great miracle. But at the same time, when we speak of Geulah, there is certainly its spiritual dimension: the redemption of the inner self, the redemption of the soul as it is freed from darkness, evil, and impurity. That is the deeper meaning of Geulah. A Jewish soul descends into the world and lives in it, surrounded by the yetzer hara, the body, the animal soul, and a world full of kelipos and sitra achra, as the Alter Rebbe says in Tanya. Geulah is, in essence, an inner, spiritual redemption in our service of Hashem: the soul’s liberation from the hold of the physical and the body. Of course, that does not mean we need to run away from the body. As the Baal Shem Tov taught us, a Jew’s true liberation, the redemption of the soul, does not mean fleeing from the body or breaking it. There was once an approach to serving Hashem that involved breaking the body. The path the Baal Shem Tov taught us is the opposite. A Jew needs a healthy, sound body. As the Rambam says, we must care for the body; it is precisely with a healthy body that we can serve Hashem. You cannot serve Hashem with a sick body, with a body in a state of weakness. So certainly, serving Hashem calls for a healthy soul in a healthy body. But what is the redemption of the inner self? It begins when a Jew connects to his source, when the soul can emerge and free itself from materialism, selfishness, self-importance, and the sense of “me,” and begin to feel a connection to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. As the Alter Rebbe explains in Tanya, “The second soul in a Jew is truly a part of G-d above.” The soul is

13:40 a part of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. When the part can connect to the whole, when that part of G-d above can return and connect with its source, with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, that is the beginning of the process of Geulah. This idea begins with the mitzvah of the half-shekel. If we go back in history, the half-shekel is a mitzvah Hakadosh Boruch Hu gave the Jewish people after the sin of the Golden Calf, as atonement for that sin. What happened with the Golden Calf? It was an extremely grave situation. The Jews had only just received the Torah. Only forty days had passed, and they stumbled into the gravest sin, idol worship: the Golden Calf. They bowed to gold, bowed to the calf, and thought, G-d forbid, that it was divine. Then came the atonement. What does the Torah say? Atonement would come through “When you take a census of the children of Israel.” When the Jews bring the half-shekel, it will be an atonement—“to atone for your souls.” And the well-known question is: How can half a shekel atone for such a grave sin, one that touches the very essence of a Jew’s relationship with Hakadosh Boruch Hu? The answer is that the half-shekel symbolizes this very idea: a Jew knows he is only a half, and together with Hakadosh Boruch Hu he becomes whole. When am I whole? When I unite with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. That is the repair for the sin of the Golden Calf. That sin was, G-d forbid, a severing of the connection, a separation: the Jew thought he could manage on his own, that he did not need Hakadosh Boruch Hu. We’ll bow to the Golden Calf, bow to gold, make an idol out of gold, and live well that way. Why do we need to devote ourselves, to set aside our own will? Then came the atonement. The moment a Jew grasps the truth—that I am only a half, a part of G-d—and seeks to connect with the whole, with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, together we become one whole shekel.

16:02 This is also what our Sages tell us: Hakadosh Boruch Hu showed Moshe Rabbeinu a coin of fire. It says, “This they shall give”—something like this they shall give, a coin of fire. Hakadosh Boruch Hu showed Moshe Rabbeinu a coin of fire and told him, “This they shall give.” And everyone asks: What did Moshe Rabbeinu find difficult, that Hakadosh Boruch Hu needed to show him a coin of fire from beneath the Throne of Glory? Could he not understand what a half-shekel was? Why did Hashem need to show it to him? As Tosafos explain in Tractate Chullin, Moshe Rabbeinu’s difficulty was really this: How could a half-shekel atone for the terrible sin of idol worship, the sin of the Golden Calf? And the answer was a coin of fire. When a Jew gives the half-shekel, he is not merely giving half a shekel. Within that half-shekel he brings the fire, his soul—“The soul of man is the lamp of Hashem.” There is “A mitzvah is a lamp and Torah is light,” and there is “The soul of man is the lamp of Hashem.” When a Jew brings an offering, when a Jew brings a half-shekel, within that half-shekel is the fire of the part of G-d above that is his soul. It is a small, simple act, but within that small, simple act of giving a half-shekel lies the deepest essence of a Jew. That is why Chassidus explains the rule for the half-shekel: “The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less.” This is not like ordinary tzedakah, where, on the contrary, each person should give according to the generosity of his heart. For the half-shekel, we say, “The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less.” Because at this point of fire, this point of connection, we are speaking about what a Jew essentially is. There is no more and no less. There is no rich person and no poor person. Everyone is the same. In the essential quality of being a Jew, Moshe Rabbeinu is no more a Jew than the simplest Jew,

18:08 And the simplest Jew is no less a Jew than Moshe Rabbeinu. The Jewish people express this point through the half-shekel, and that is really the first point. The path to Geulah, the path to our liberation—the soul’s liberation from the idolatry of Egypt, from the idolatry of the sin of the Golden Calf, from the materialism and selfishness of the world—begins with the half-shekel. The moment a Jew gives a half-shekel of his own, and that half-shekel contains the coin of fire, the spark of his soul is kindled, and he has already begun his journey toward Geulah. Of course, another point must be added here, as explained in many places: the half-shekel symbolizes not only that a Jew is one half and Hakadosh Boruch Hu is the other, but also that one Jew is one half and another Jew is the other. This is the idea of Jewish unity. There is the unity of a Jew with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, and there is the unity of one Jew with another. A Jew knows, “I am only half. I need another Jew to be a whole Jew.” Because this, too, is a vessel; this, too, is preparation for leaving, for freeing ourselves from our inner exile. We know that exile means division between hearts. The Beis Hamikdash was destroyed only because of baseless hatred. This whole division between hearts is what causes division within the soul. So when there is connection and unity, we are on the way to Geulah. That is the first mitzvah, the first passage. After a Jew has kindled the fire of his soul, given his half, and devoted himself to Hakadosh Boruch Hu, the second stage arrives: blotting out Amalek, remembering Amalek. Amalek represents the exact opposite of everything we have discussed. Amalek symbolizes the opposite of fire: “who cooled you off on the way.” Amalek symbolizes coldness—“who cooled you off on the way.” The Jews leave Egypt, and Amalek arrives. What

20:23 What does Amalek do? He cools things off. As the Midrash says, all the nations of the world were alarmed and shaken. As we say in the Song at the Sea, dread and fear of the Jewish people would fall upon all the nations. Amalek came without any reason. The Children of Israel had not set out to—no, they had not conquered his country, his land. There was no... But his aim was to cool the excitement, both among the nations of the world and among the Jewish people themselves. Suddenly, it seemed possible to fight against Hakadosh Boruch Hu, to fight against the Jewish people. That coldness symbolizes evil; it symbolizes kelipah; it symbolizes the opposite of the coin of fire. So when a Jew kindles the spark of his soul—that is the idea of the half-shekel—the second stage comes: blotting out Amalek. We have to know that Amalek exists. “Amalek is the first of the nations, but his end is utter destruction,” says the verse in Parshas Balak. Amalek is the first of the nations. There are many bad character traits. Chassidus explains that each of the nations mentioned in the Torah represents various bad traits, bad behaviors, things a person needs to correct. But Amalek is called “the first of the nations.” He is the root, the cause, the beginning, the source. That is where it all starts. Where does it start? With the deepest point of this coldness: “It doesn’t interest me; I don’t care,” and with casting doubts. It is written that Amalek has the same numerical value as safek, “doubt.” How does Amalek cool a person off? He does not tell him, “Don’t do mitzvos; go commit sins; go do wrong.” No, that is not how Amalek speaks. He cools things off. He throws out some doubt: “Who says you have to do this? Who says it’s so important? Who says your mitzvos are needed? Does Hakadosh Boruch Hu need you? What does He need you for? Is it really that important? All right, it has to be done, but you can do it

22:30 later.” This coldness is the complete opposite, the absolute antithesis of the coin of fire. So after you bring the half-shekel comes the matter of remembering Amalek: blotting out the Amalek within the soul that wants to cool us off from everything good and holy. Once we have these two foundations, we are ready for Purim. What happens on Purim? What is the essence of the festival of Purim? On Purim, the Jew within a Jew awakens. As explained in Chassidus, what is the inner essence of Purim? “A Jewish man.” “And Mordechai would not kneel or bow down.” The strength of a Jew who does not yield or bow down to Haman. Haman symbolizes Amalek, and the Jew symbolizes steadfastness: “I am a Jew through and through.” That is the point that shines in every Jew on Purim. As explained in the sefarim, and at length in Chassidus, Purim is a day even higher than Yom Kippur. Yom Kippur is “like Purim.” Purim is on an even higher level than Yom Kippur. On Yom Kippur, too, every Jew’s spark awakens—the Jewish core, the soul, the power of teshuvah. But on Yom Kippur we need to fast, to practice self-denial, to spend the whole day in shul. We need to prepare for forty days before Yom Kippur: the month of Elul, Rosh Hashanah, and the Ten Days of Teshuvah. On Purim, amid the food and the festive meal, the feasting and rejoicing and wine, and everything we do on Purim—with all the, in the midst of ordinary life—that is where a Jew connects, and his soul shines in the most wonderful way. On Purim, a Jew’s essential bond awakens, and that is why it is a Geulah. That is why “everything was turned around.” “On that night, the king’s sleep was disturbed.” The moment a Jew awakens the Jewish core within himself, an awakening takes place Above, so to speak. Yes: “On that night, the king’s sleep was disturbed”—the sleep of the King of the Universe—and Geulah comes about. That is the Geulah of Purim. But Purim, as we said, is a moment; it is Geulah, but

24:57 there is still darkness all around. As we said, Purim is a moment of Geulah in a time when Hashem’s presence is still hidden. Achashverosh still rules over the entire realm, and Mordechai has to come before him. He is second to King Achashverosh, and the Beis Hamikdash has still not been built. In other words, it is a moment of Geulah. And if we apply this to the soul, there is a moment when a Jew’s soul awakens. As our Sages say, “Open for Me an opening the size of a needle’s eye.” Purim is a kind of opening: a Jew opens up the Jewish spark within himself the size of a needle’s eye, “and I will open for you an opening as wide as the entrance to a hall.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives us something, and on Purim there is a certain Divine revelation in the soul. But that is the point. After Purim, we must begin preparing for Pesach, to reach true Geulah and freedom. What happened on Purim is not enough. Now we must begin inner work, deep work, work that reaches further into the soul, to purify ourselves of every impurity. On Purim, a Jew may have an awakening of teshuvah: he said l’chaim, drank wine, rejoiced until he could no longer distinguish, and the Jewish core within him awakened. He cried out, “I am a Jew, a Jewish man!” with complete conviction. But a moment after Purim, it fades. Then comes Parshas Parah. The red heifer brings purification from the impurity of death. The red heifer means that there are things we need to purify. A person needs to examine himself, to see what needs correction and where there is the impurity of death. Chassidus explains that here, in essence, we return to the same idea. You come to recognize that death exists—not only physical death, but spiritual death. Spiritual death is when we lose our vitality, lose the energy and warmth in our service of Hashem. Then we need to be purified from the impurity of death. This purification from death to life is a wondrous power that Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives us: even if you have reached a state of the impurity of death, there is a power through the mitzvah of

27:19 Parshas Parah Adumah: through it, a Jew reconnects with his roots and purifies himself of every impurity, clearing away everything that drains the vitality from our service of Hashem. So Parshas Parah Adumah is a more detailed kind of work: going into the depths of the soul and seeing how I can purify myself. And here we are told that we need the ashes of the red heifer. We take the animal, the animal soul. The red heifer represents the heifer within us, the animal soul we have. It has to be burned. Burning means removing all the materialism of the animal soul, until only ashes remain. The ashes are the essential energy of the animal soul, which we can redirect from love of this world to love of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Burning the red heifer means burning away all material desires and making ashes: taking the animal soul’s love, which was directed toward material things, and directing that love solely toward Torah and mitzvos. That is the idea of water—“there is no water but Torah”—and that, essentially, is the work of Parshas Parah Adumah. Then we come to the fourth parsha, the parsha of Geulah. What is the fourth parsha called? Parshas HaChodesh. HaChodesh means renewal. What is Geulah? Geulah is when a Jew is renewed. He has fresh vitality. He lives anew; he is born anew. I am a completely different person. Renewal is the opposite of growing stale. Sometimes a person goes through his daily life and does everything. He gets up in the morning, davens, has a Torah class, goes to work, and goes through his whole daily routine. But it has grown stale. There is no enthusiasm. He just does and does and does, without living it in a fresh, renewed way. That is called exile. Geulah means

29:36 HaChodesh—renewal. For a Jew, every day should be “new in your eyes.” A Jew who lives with Geulah, who is truly connected to his soul, experiences every day as a new reality, because each day brings a new connection. Each day, he experiences creation anew. Hakadosh Boruch Hu has created me anew and given me a soul with fresh strength. He looks at the world knowing that Hakadosh Boruch Hu brings it into being and gives it life at every moment. So he lives in a state of constant renewal. Every moment, every day: “In His goodness, He renews the work of creation each day, continually.” That is a life of Geulah. So that, essentially, is the progression of the four parshiyos. First comes Parshas Shekalim. This is what we explained earlier, what the Midrash says Hakadosh Boruch Hu told Haman: “Their shekels preceded your shekels.” You think you will bring ten thousand talents of silver, as though you are a generous person who is all about giving, and give so much money to show that you are somehow better than the Jewish people? No, no, no, no, no. When a Jew gives the half-shekel, he gives his fire, his essence, his very self, his deepest point. That is where the process of Geulah begins. A Jew starts to free himself from the very first moment, beginning with the half-shekel. Then we have the strength to erase Amalek within our souls. Then Purim arrives, and everything is turned around. Then the inner work of drawing closer to Geulah begins—to complete and perfect freedom—as we purify ourselves of the impurity of contact with the dead and begin to live anew. Then we reach the renewal of “This month shall be for you.” That is the progression of the four parshiyos. And with that, we go from one Geulah to another, toward the complete Geulah of the month of Nissan. As the Gemara says, “In Nissan they are destined to be redeemed.” May we merit to see the complete Geulah through Moshiach Tzidkeinu

31:38 even before the month of Nissan, so that by Nissan we will already be living in the true and complete Geulah for which we are all waiting.