We're at the Threshold of Geulah! What Spiritual Preparation Is Required Now?

00:00 Have you noticed that precisely in the weekly parshas read during the Three Weeks, when we mourn the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash, we read about the conquest of Eretz Yisroel, its division, and its territories? Parshas Pinchas, Matos, Masei, and Devarim. The Torah tells us how the Jewish people prepared to enter and conquer Eretz Yisroel, with many very important details. That itself carries a very important message. As the Shelah Hakadosh writes, the weekly parshas are connected to the times when we read them. It is no coincidence. Precisely during these Three Weeks, when we mourn the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash, we read about entering Eretz Yisroel, conquering it, and its territories. That gives us the greatest strength, encouragement, and comfort, because a Jew knows that the destruction is only temporary. Very soon, with Hashem’s help, we will return and take possession of all the territories of Eretz Yisroel in their entirety. And not only that: as the verse says, “When Hashem your G-d expands your borders,” we will merit to take possession of the territories Hakadosh Boruch Hu promised Avraham Avinu but that we have not yet received. As we know, at the Covenant Between the Parts, Hakadosh Boruch Hu promised Avraham Avinu ten lands, but in practice we received only seven. The Midrash says that Hakadosh Boruch Hu did not give us three of those lands, and with Hashem’s help we will receive them with the coming of Moshiach Tzidkeinu. So it is very interesting that in these parshas we also learn about these three lands east of the Jordan, which did not become part of Eretz Yisroel at the time. And it is precisely about them that we read in Parshas Matos, Parshas Masei, and Parshas Devarim—the parshas read during the Three Weeks. So that is what we will discuss today. We will try to understand exactly what the story is with these three lands that Hakadosh Boruch Hu promised

02:25 Avraham Avinu at the Covenant Between the Parts. In Parshas Lech Lecha, the three lands are called the lands of the Keini, Kenizi, and Kadmoni, and these lands will not come into our possession until the days of Moshiach. On the other hand, when we come to Parshas Matos, Masei, and Devarim, the Torah does explicitly speak about these lands. Some of their territories are connected to the land east of the Jordan, where the tribes of Gad and Reuven settled. So in the weekly parsha we learn that the tribes of Gad and Reuven come and ask for an inheritance east of the Jordan, and there is a whole debate between Moshe Rabbeinu and the tribes of Gad and Reuven. At first Moshe is angry with them and says: What is this, that you do not want to enter Eretz Yisroel? He compares them to the spies, who also did not want to enter Eretz Yisroel: You are weakening the people, making them afraid to enter the land, fight, and conquer it, and so on. Then, after discussion and dialogue, Moshe understands that their intentions are actually good. He tells them: Yes, provided you go as the advance guard. They accepted that they would go at the front in the war, ahead of their brothers, and would not return east of the Jordan until the fourteen years of conquering and dividing the land were over. Only then would they return home. But their portion would be east of the Jordan. It is known that at least part of the land east of the Jordan is connected to those three lands that the Jewish people did not receive at the time and will receive only in the future. What are these three lands? Ammon, Moav, and Edom. These are three lands that we know Hakadosh Boruch Hu told us at the time not to conquer. The Torah tells us in Parshas Chukas, and repeats in Parshas Devarim, where Moshe Rabbeinu recounts the details: the Jewish people wanted to pass through the land of Edom, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu told them not to conquer Edom. And afterward there was

04:48 the same thing with Ammon and Moav: “Do not harass Moav.” In other words, we were not to conquer these countries, these lands, whose peoples lived outside Eretz Yisroel—Ammon, Moav, and Edom. And the Midrash says, as we mentioned, that Hakadosh Boruch Hu told Moshe Rabbeinu that He was keeping these lands for a future time. That time will come with the arrival of Moshiach Tzidkeinu: “When Hashem your G-d expands your borders,” as it says in Parshas Shoftim. Then, with Hashem’s help, we will receive these lands too. But for now, we must not touch them. These were lands belonging to peoples closely related to the Jewish people. We all know that Ammon and Moav were the sons of Lot, Avraham Avinu’s nephew, and Edom is Eisav, Yaakov Avinu’s brother. So these were nations related to the family, and it was precisely these nations that Hakadosh Boruch Hu said not to touch. But the land east of the Jordan—the parts the Jewish people conquered from Sichon and Og—had, as Rashi already explained in Parshas Chukas, actually been parts of Ammon and Moav. What happened? These territories had first been “purified” through Sichon, as Rashi explains from the Gemara. That is, once Sichon, king of the Emori, and Og had conquered these territories, they no longer bore the name of Ammon and Moav. That is how the Jewish people were able to conquer them. But this means that, in essence, these areas belong to those three lands. This opens a window for us to understand the real story much more deeply, on an inner level. What happened there with the tribes of Gad and Reuven? First, though, I want to raise a simple question about the plain meaning of the Torah text, a question many commentators ask and answer in different ways. Have you noticed that Moshe Rabbeinu

06:57 speaks very harshly to the tribes of Gad and Reuven, explaining why their request is wrong? They come and say that they have a great deal of livestock, many animals, and that because of this they want to remain east of the Jordan, which is suitable for livestock. Moshe rebukes them for it: How could they have such a desire and make such a request? Nevertheless, in the end they manage to convince Moshe Rabbeinu, and he says: All right, you want it? You will have it. When we look at the Midrashim, we see that it is not so clear whether, in the end, this is considered something positive or negative. The Midrashim go back and forth, presenting different sides of the whole story of the tribes of Gad and Reuven. But here comes something truly remarkable. Suddenly we find that when Moshe Rabbeinu gives the land east of the Jordan to the tribes of Gad and Reuven, he adds half the tribe of Menashe as well. Wait—what happened here? How did half the tribe of Menashe enter the story? They were not in the picture; they had not asked for anything. How did they become involved? And more than that: without their asking, Moshe Rabbeinu decides not only to grant Gad and Reuven what they requested, but to add another half-tribe. What is going on here? The Ramban, among the commentators, suggests that perhaps some members of the tribe of Menashe requested it, or that they were a very large tribe. There are various explanations, but when we look at the plain meaning of the Torah text, it appears that Moshe Rabbeinu himself decides to send another half-tribe, Menashe, to live east of the Jordan. What is going on here? And what is this idea of dividing a tribe in half? Half would remain in the Land, and half he sent east of the Jordan. Why was it specifically Menashe who were the ones

08:53 Why did Moshe Rabbeinu choose them to divide into two? Of course, on the plain level, it was a large tribe. But there were other large tribes; the tribe of Yehudah was large too, and so on. No—he specifically divided Menashe in two, leaving half in the Land and sending half across the Jordan, even though, according to the plain meaning of the text, they had not asked for that. What is the story here? So there are several things we’re trying to understand, and today we’re trying to explain the deeper meaning. When we look at what was really behind the entire request of the tribes of Gad and Reuven, we’ll also be able to understand the deeper story of the tribe of Menashe: why half the tribe of Menashe remained in the Land and half was across the Jordan. Why did he divide them that way, and why was it specifically the tribe of Menashe that merited all this? The explanation, the Rebbe says, is a wonderful one. As we said, the land across the Jordan actually belongs to the territories the Jewish people are meant to receive in the future. Moshe Rabbeinu knew this. He certainly knew that Eretz Yisroel was meant to be the land of ten nations. He knew from the Covenant Between the Parts that Hakadosh Boruch Hu had promised the Jewish people, in addition to the land of the seven nations, that of the Keini, the Kenizi, and the Kadmoni. And he knew that these three nations corresponded to the lands of Edom, Ammon, and Moav. But the time had not yet come. True, the time had not yet come, but Moshe Rabbeinu already wanted to lay the groundwork—not just for entering the Land at that time, but for entering the Land with the coming of Moshiach Tzidkeinu. One of the wonderful things we see in the Midrashim—and it can be understood from the verses in the weekly parshas, throughout the parshas in which Moshe Rabbeinu prepares the Jewish people to enter Eretz Yisroel—is that he is preparing them not only for the first entry. In fact,

10:59 Moshe Rabbeinu is laying the groundwork for the conquest of Eretz Yisroel through the end of all generations, with the coming of Moshiach Tzidkeinu. The Midrashim say that one reason Moshe Rabbeinu himself wanted to enter the Land was that, had he entered, the complete Geulah would have come right then. Many Midrashim say that if Moshe had entered Eretz Yisroel, the first Beis Hamikdash would already have been the final Beis Hamikdash. And many other wonderful Midrashim tell us that there was, in fact, an auspicious moment right at the Exodus from Egypt. When the Jewish people crossed the sea at the Splitting of the Sea and said, “Hashem will reign forever and ever,” they were already preparing for the final Geulah. But because of the sin of the spies, the sin of the Golden Calf, and various other things that happened along the way, there were setbacks, so to speak. Things dragged on and on and on and became complicated. At the same time, although Moshe Rabbeinu did not merit to enter Eretz Yisroel, Hakadosh Boruch Hu told him, “I want you to see the Land.” This is said in Parshas Pinchas, repeated in Parshas Va’eschanan, and said again at the end of the Torah, when Moshe Rabbeinu’s last day arrives and Hashem tells him once more to go up the mountain and see the entire Land. He shows him the whole Land in all its detail. Rashi tells us there at the end of Parshas Vezos Haberachah that Hakadosh Boruch Hu says to him, “As far as the western sea”—“as far as the last day.” And Rashi says in the name of the Midrash that Hakadosh Boruch Hu showed Moshe Rabbeinu all the events that would happen to the Jewish people until the resurrection of the dead. Moshe Rabbeinu sees with his own eyes the entire history of the Jewish people, down to our own day, to the coming of Moshiach Tzidkeinu, to the resurrection of the dead. Moshe’s seeing is not mere seeing. Hakadosh Boruch Hu is not simply showing him a film of what will happen. Rather, Moshe’s seeing—

12:58 Moshe’s seeing has an effect; it accomplishes something. As explained in a number of works of halachah and homiletics, Moshe Rabbeinu’s sight, his gaze—the gaze of a tzaddik—has an effect on a place. Moshe’s seeing laid the groundwork and gave the Jewish people strength for every era and every generation. It also brought holiness, along with other effects explained in the Midrashim and sacred texts. What did Moshe Rabbeinu’s seeing accomplish for Eretz Yisroel and for the Jewish people throughout the generations? Moshe Rabbeinu sees, he knows, and he lays the groundwork for the great conquest of Eretz Yisroel that will take place in the future, with the coming of Moshiach Tzidkeinu. So although Hakadosh Boruch Hu told him that the Jewish people were now going to conquer only the land of seven nations—the Torah lists them several times: the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, Jebusites, and Girgashites, seven nations—the time had not yet come to conquer the other three. “Do not harass Moav.” Even so, something of that future conquest had to begin now. But when the tribes of Gad and Reuven came to ask for land across the Jordan, in territories that had belonged to Ammon and Moav and had become permissible through Sichon, Moshe Rabbeinu initially saw that they were not asking for it with the right purpose in mind. They were asking for other reasons. They had abundant livestock—animals and herds. They needed the fields; they needed pasture for their livestock. So he did not see in their request the right desire or the right purpose, and that is why there was a dialogue between Moshe and the tribes of Gad and Reuven. But after Moshe Rabbeinu decided that this really was the right thing to do, he understood that they truly were prepared to go with self-sacrifice, to go as the vanguard, and so on, and that they had the right intentions. For some reason, though, they felt that their place in the world was specifically across the Jordan. There are various explanations for this, which we cannot go into here. So Moshe Rabbeinu

15:06 wants this to serve as preparation for the great conquest. When Eretz Yisroel expands—“Enlarge the place of your tent”—it will spread outward to much broader territories, encompassing all the surrounding lands: Ammon, Moav, and Edom. That is the expanse of Eretz Yisroel, the complete Eretz Yisroel that will exist with the coming of Moshiach Tzidkeinu. “And if Hashem your G-d expands your borders, as He swore to your forefathers.” Moshe therefore wants to begin preparing for this already. And so Moshe Rabbeinu says: Let’s bring that purpose into this. If so, I need to bring in the tribe of Menashe. Why the tribe of Menashe? Precisely because they did not ask for this, and they did not make any personal requests. But who is the tribe of Menashe? First of all, Menashe is the son of Yosef. Yosef Hatzaddik, as Rashi himself said in the previous weekly parsha—and it comes up again in this parsha—cherished the Land. The daughters of Tzelafchad: we learn about them in these parshas. Tzelafchad was the son of Chefer, son of Menashe, son of Yosef. And Rashi says Yosef cherished the Land, for he asked the tribes, “You shall bring my bones up from here with you.” Yosef had a special connection to Eretz Yisroel, and so his daughters—that is, his granddaughters, the daughters of Tzelafchad—cherished the Land too. In other words, among the tribes, Yosef and his descendants, Menashe and Ephraim, had a special connection to the Land. Moshe Rabbeinu sees that Menashe has this special connection to the Land, so he sees that they have the special merit to receive land—not only the part of Eretz Yisroel connected with the present time, but also the part of Eretz Yisroel connected with the time to come, in the future. And therefore he says

17:19 We will divide the two tribes—we will divide the tribe of Menashe in two, so that this one tribe is split. Some will receive a portion in the Land of Israel as it is now, and some will receive a portion in the Land of Israel of the future, in the days of Moshiach. And that, specifically, will connect the Jewish people to the complete Geulah, to the conquest of the entire Land of Israel, “when Hashem your G-d expands your borders.” And why specifically Menashe, the son of Yosef? After all, there is Menashe and there is Ephraim. What is special about Menashe? The Torah explains that Yosef had an intention when he gave Menashe and Ephraim their names. What did each name mean? The Torah tells us in Parshas Mikeitz that the name Menashe comes from “For G-d has made me forget all my hardship and all my father’s house.” In other words, Yosef HaTzaddik named his first son Menashe so that he would remember, so that he would never forget what exile can do to a person. “For G-d has made me forget all my hardship.” That is why Moshe Rabbeinu chose the tribe of Menashe: because Menashe’s name, “G-d has made me forget,” means that wherever a Jew finds himself, he always remembers that exile is not his place. He does not want to remain in exile; he waits every moment to leave it. He knows that exile is a place that makes him forget G-d, his hardship, and his father’s house—and that very awareness reminds him to return and to yearn for home. And when half of Menashe are in the Land of Israel and half of Menashe are across the Jordan, they know that this is only temporary, because soon we will come together, and we will merit to see the Land of Israel expand to include all those lands. That also keeps the tribes of Gad and Reuven from drifting away. It helps them always remember where our true place is and why we are there: that we are here across the Jordan not only because it is good land for livestock and we have grass and pasture for the flocks, but actually

19:38 we are here, as we discussed, because this is the beginning of the conquest of the Land of Israel in the days of Moshiach. And here we come to a most wonderful point that Chassidus reveals to us: What exactly is the message for us? What is the avodas Hashem we need to understand in connection with these three lands—the Keini, Kenizi, and Kadmoni—that we will receive with the coming of Moshiach Tzidkeinu? One of the things the Alter Rebbe teaches us in Tanya is that all the revelations, everything we will receive in the future—in the words of Tanya, all the revelations of the days of Moshiach and the Resurrection of the Dead—depend on our deeds and our service during exile. In other words, the work we do and the deeds we perform today are the preparation for the days of Moshiach. So when we speak about conquering the Land of Israel, there is the physical conquest of the Land of Israel even now, and there is also the spiritual conquest of the Land of Israel—our spiritual work. Conquering the Land of Israel within the soul is the introduction and preparation for the conquest of the Land of Israel in the future, in the days of Moshiach. Now, there is a wonderful maamar of Chassidus that the Mitteler Rebbe delivered when he visited Rabbi Akiva Eiger. Rabbi Akiva Eiger was one of the great Torah sages, one of the great geniuses who lived at that time, about 200 years ago. This story happened exactly 200 years ago, in 5585, 1825. At that time the Mitteler Rebbe traveled to the region of Germany, around where Rabbi Akiva Eiger lived, in the city of Posen, something like that, and they met. At that meeting the Mitteler Rebbe discussed Chassidus with him, and they also discussed halachah together. There was a very interesting exchange. He writes about Rabbi Akiva Eiger with great respect and appreciation for his greatness. Among other things, what did they discuss in Chassidus? They discussed this very subject: What is its spiritual meaning? What is the root, in avodas Hashem, in the work of the

22:02 soul, of conquering the Land of Israel? What do the seven nations represent, and what do the three nations that we will receive in the future represent? And why have we received only the seven nations now, while the three nations—the Keini, Kenizi, and Kadmoni—will be received only in the future, in the days of Moshiach? He explains that, as we know from Kabbalah and Chassidus, Tanya explains that the soul has ten faculties. There are the three higher faculties, called mochin, the intellectual faculties—Chochmah, Binah, and Daas, Chabad—and there are the seven middos: Chesed, Gevurah, Tiferes, Netzach, Hod, Yesod, and Malchus. Seven middos. Just as, so to speak, above there are ten sefiros in the world of Atzilus, the G-dly soul, which is literally a part of G-d above, is also made up of ten faculties. These are divided into two groups: the three intellectual faculties and the seven middos. Avodas Hashem must encompass all of them. A person needs to work on both his mind and his feelings. But at this time, the main work is with the seven middos. In our time, the main work of a person is refining his middos. The soul descended into the world during this period of exile, at this time, in order to conquer and correct our seven negative middos and turn them into good ones. Chesed should become holy kindness: love for Hashem, love for another Jew, and so on. The same applies to Gevurah: it should become holy Gevurah, fear of Hashem, and so on. That is where the main work lies now. But refining the mind, refining the intellect, is much harder. Of course, a person still needs to work on it. We are people of intellect, and we need to work on our minds too. But fully refining the intellectual faculties is much harder. There are many fine distinctions and subtleties involved, things that are far more difficult to correct. Sometimes, specifically in intellectual matters, a person does not really notice what is bad and what is good, and it is harder to tell the difference. And about this

24:10 they say that in the future it will be the main focus: refining the intellectual faculties—Chochmah, Binah, and Daas—the Keini, Kenizi, and Kadmoni. And this is what the Rebbe teaches us about our own time: we are already approaching the Geulah, and in just a moment we will enter it. We are already very, very close, at the threshold of the coming of Moshiach Tzidkeinu. So this time calls on us not only to work on our middos, but also to begin preparing for the Keini, Kenizi, and Kadmoni. That means work with the intellectual faculties: studying Torah and the inner dimension of Torah, the secrets of Torah. We see that specifically in the last generation there has been a great revelation of light in Chassidus. The deepest teachings are being revealed and explained in such a wonderful way that anyone can become a vessel for them. That is what we need to make known to ourselves today and share with others: we are already at the threshold of the complete conquest of the Land of Israel. Not only the seven middos—I mean, the seven nations—but also the three nations of the Keini, Kenizi, and Kadmoni: Ammon, Moav, and Edom. So we already need to prepare for this, and the preparation must also be an inner one. As we said, it means refining not only our seven middos but also the three intellectual faculties, Chochmah, Binah, and Daas. By strengthening our study of Chassidus, the inner dimension of Torah, and the teachings of Chabad, with understanding, comprehension, and depth, we will merit to see these days transformed into joy, gladness, and festive occasions with the true and complete Geulah. Amen, may it be His will.