Audio Shiur: Parshat Ki Tisa - How Could Moshe Break the Luchot?

Audio Shiur:
Parshat Ki Tisa - How Could Moshe Break the Luchot?

Generally, we don't commend people for smashing things in anger. Why then do we seem to laud Moshe for smashing the luchot habrit?

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Audio Shiur: Parshat Ki Tisa: The Impossible Luchot

Audio Shiur:
Parshat Ki Tisa: The Impossible Luchot

Before we can ask why Moshe broke the luchot (which we ask), we need to ask a better question: why did God give Moshe the luchot at all? Once we tackle that question, we can take a stab at why Moshe broke them.

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Parshat Ki Tisa - The Sin of the Eigel, and Our Anxiety

Audio Shiur:
Parshat Ki Tisa - The Sin of the Eigel, and Our Anxiety

How could the Jewish people commit such a terrible sin so soon after the heights of Matan Torah? And, more relevant to us, what does their sinfulness tell us about ourselves? Why did they fail, and why do we?

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Buying Furniture, the Israeli Way

When Simcha's bed broke (the fifteen-year-old high riser frame finally gave out a while back) we knew that we'd have to buy furniture here. I'd been putting it off both for lack of time (there's no Sunday here), and also because I dread making significant purchases here, for a very simple reason: I always feel like I've been ripped off.

And, just as I expected, when we got to the store, there were no prices on anything. You just kind of have to rely on what the sales guy tells you. We found a bed we liked. He wanted 1,700 shekel. Couldn't he go down? Sorry, that's the sale price. We asked for a moment, and I expressed my frustration to Rena. She said, "Offer him 1,500 - take it or leave it."

I did just that. He took it, and rang up the sale. Mind you, I have no idea whether it was a decent price on a bed or not. Seems about right, but who knows?

Then, we had to wait for a few minutes while the storage guy came back (special for us) to load the bed onto the roof of our car. (Pay 250 shekel for delivery? Are you kidding?) The salesman - David (or Dudi, as his friends call him), did something I really didn't expect.

He told me a d'var Torah from the parshah.

To better explain my surprise, I need to paint the scene. Dudi is about forty-five, with a shaved head. Very professional looking, nice shirt and jeans. Gun in a holster at his hip. He struck me as a typical secular Israeli; nice guy, but not very religious.

And then he asks me: Why, in Parshat Ki Tisa, when the Torah tells us about the Tablets - the לוחות הברית, does the Torah spell the word לוחות without the letter "vav" - לוחת?

I checked, and he was right. The Torah tells us, (Shemot 32:16),

וְהַלֻּחֹת--מַעֲשֵׂה אֱלֹהִים, הֵמָּה; וְהַמִּכְתָּב, מִכְתַּב אֱלֹהִים הוּא--חָרוּת, עַל-הַלֻּחֹת

And the tables were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, graven upon the tables.

He took out a siddur and turned to Pirkei Avot - the sixth chapter, where the Mishnah reads:

אומר: "והלחת מעשה אלהים המה והמכתב מכתב אלהים הוא חרות על הלחת".

אל תקרא "חרות" אלא "חירות", שאין לך בן חורין אלא מי שעוסק בתלמוד תורה.

and it says, "And the tables were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, graven upon the tables." Do not read [the word} as (charut) - "graven" - rather read the word as (cheirut) - freedom. For there is no free person like the one who immerses himself in the study of Torah

Dudi asked: Why is this in the sixth chapter of Avot? For the same reason that the letter vav (meaning 6) is missing: Because the Torah was teaching us that true freedom for the Jewish people would only come in the sixth millennium, which is now.

I don't know if I paid a good price for the bed. But the d'var Torah, which was clever, really lifted my spirits, not just for its own value, but because it reminded me that you can't judge a book - or a furniture salesman - by how he looks on the outside.

Audio Shiur: Parshat Ki Tisa - Shabbat's Protective Nature

Audio Shiur:
Parshat Ki Tisa - Shabbat's Protective Nature
Before the tragic narrative of the Sin of the Golden Calf, we find the story interrupted by a short description of the Shabbat. What are these pesukim doing here? How do they relate to the chet ha'egel? What can they teach us about how we should relate to Shabbat today?

Click here for the audio link, or listen in the handy audio player supplied below.

Crime and Punishment - A Drashah for Ki Tisa 5769

This past Thursday night, I got my first Israeli traffic ticket. Did I get a ticket for I speeding down the 6 at near sonic speed? Do that all the time, but that wasn’t it. No, I got a ticket for stopping to pick up a hitchhiker. One minute my neighbor from down the block is trying to get into my car, and then next minute he’s slamming the door shut, and I hear a knock on my passenger window. See what happens when you try and do a mitzvah?

Actually, it wasn’t so cut and dry. Yes, I did stop to pick up a tremp – a wonderful act. But I also did so smack in the middle of the road. Apparently, that’s not only illegal. It’s also dangerous.
I begged. I pleaded. I tried the עולה tactic. I spoke in English. Nothing worked. The policewoman was adamant. You’re going to have to pay. לא נורא she kept saying. Just pay the fine and move on.
The sad part is that I’m not sure that I disagree with her. After all, I did stop in the middle of traffic – even for a good reason. I did something rather dangerous; I was lucky someone wasn’t directly behind me. And as much as I wanted her to let me off with a warning, for the past 24 hours, I’ve been a more careful driver. I won’t do that again. I’ll be sure to pull over to the side of the road. And I wonder to myself, had she let me off with a warning, would I be as careful next time? In essence what I’m asking is: was she right? Did she really have to punish me?

This theme of Crime and Punishment occupies my mind precisely as we read about חטא העגל. When the Jewish people build the עגל, we know what they really deserve:

וְעַתָּה הַנִּיחָה לִּי, וְיִחַר-אַפִּי בָהֶם וַאֲכַלֵּם; וְאֶעֱשֶׂה אוֹתְךָ, לְגוֹי גָּדוֹל.

And now leave me and I my anger will grow, and I will destroy them, and I will make you into a great nation.

The punishment the people deserve is total annihilation. It’s over. Yet Moshe, with his quick thinking and passionate pleas saves the people from certain death. He descends down the mountain, deals with the Golden calf, and then returns to God to plead for mercy.

וַיָּשָׁב מֹשֶׁה אֶל-ה', וַיֹּאמַר: אָנָּא, חָטָא הָעָם הַזֶּה חֲטָאָה גְדֹלָה, וַיַּעֲשׂוּ לָהֶם, אֱלֹהֵי זָהָב. וְעַתָּה, אִם-תִּשָּׂא חַטָּאתָם; וְאִם-אַיִן--מְחֵנִי נָא, מִסִּפְרְךָ אֲשֶׁר כָּתָבְתָּ.

Moshe returned to God and he said, Please - this nation has committed a grave sin and they made an god of gold. And now, if you carry their sin -- and if not, erase from the book which You have written.

“Look God,” he tells him. “While they might deserve to be destroyed, I can’t let you do it. In fact, I insist that you forgive them. Because if you don’t, I don’t want to have any part of this entire endeavor. If you cut them out, you cut me out too.”

God’s answer is more subtle and circumspect:

וַיֹּאמֶר ה' אֶל-מֹשֶׁה: מִי אֲשֶׁר חָטָא-לִי, אֶמְחֶנּוּ מִסִּפְרִי..

And God said to Moshe: He who sinned against me I will erase him from My book.

And we then immediately read:

וַיִּגֹּף יְהוָה, אֶת-הָעָם, עַל אֲשֶׁר עָשׂוּ אֶת-הָעֵגֶל, אֲשֶׁר עָשָׂה אַהֲרֹן

And God smote the nation on the fact that they made a calf that Aharon made.

What was the plague? Rashi says that it was מיתה בידי שמים – the divine death penalty. Ramban points out that we don’t even know how many were killed. I think I know why we don’t know who they are: because, as part of their punishment God erased them from the Torah. They no longer exist, not even as a number to be counted. That’s some punishment.

But I’d like to ask the question a different way: why did God need to punish the nation? After all, if He’s really the ה' ה' אל רחום וחנון, do we think for a moment that He gets any pleasure out of punishing the Jewish people? You know that phrase, “This hurts me more than it hurts you”? With God, it’s really true. It does hurt Him more than it hurts us. And yet punish us He does.
In fact, we mention the specter of punishment each and every day. Where? In the קריאת שמע. After we declare our faith in God and accept the yoke of Mitzvot upon ourselves, we turn in the second chapter to the theme of reward and punishment. והיה אם שמוע תשמעו אל מצוותי – if you listen to God’s commandments – then ונתתי מטר ארצכם בעתו – you get rain, and food and plenty and prosperity. But, השמרו לכם פן יפתה לבבכם – don’t slip up and slide down that terrible path towards idolatry, because if you do – ועצר את השמים ולא יהיה מטר – no rain, no food, much death and loss of ארץ ישראל. We say it twice a day, morning and night.
No one wants punishment. I am often struck on Yom Kippur by the very end of the וידוי, when we ask God for compassion and forgiveness. We say,

יהי רצון מלפניך ה' אלקי ואלקי אבותי, שלא אחטא עוד. ומה שחטאתי לפניך מרק ברחמיך הרבים, אבל לא על ידי יסורים וחלים רעים.

Let it be your will, my God and the God of my fathers, that I will not sin any more. And that which I have sinned before You cleanse in Your great compassion, but not through affliction or difficult sickness.

Who wants יסורים? No one. But sometime, perversely, we need them, because while we all like positive reinforcement, somehow punishment is so much stronger and more pronounced, that it serves as a more effective method of education and reinforcement.

This is actually a topic of great debate is today’s current political and economic crisis, especially regarding the financial bailout not only of banks, but also of homeowners who bit off bigger mortgages than they could handle, often recklessly. Commentators call this moral hazard, which Wikipedia defines as,

The prospect that a party insulated from risk may behave differently from the way it would behave if it were fully exposed to the risk. Moral hazard arises because an individual or institution does not bear the full consequences of its actions, and therefore has a tendency to act less carefully than it otherwise would, leaving another party to bear some responsibility for the consequences of those actions.

Put simply, if you don’t suffer from mistakes – or sins – the chances increase that you’ll simply repeat the same mistake (or sin) again.
Reward an punishment become especially important when we tackle the job of parenting. Let’s be honest: no parent likes punishing their children. It’s almost always easier to capitulate, forgive and forget, and hope that the behavior doesn’t happen again. But without the punishment, it always, always does happen again, usually in a more pronounced and severe manner.
No parent likes denying their children the things that they want. Who needs it? They’ll only whine, complain, and make our lives miserable. “Why can’t I have that ipod, cellphone, dboard, wii”? It doesn’t matter what it is. It often feels cruel to say “No, you can’t have it.” If you can’t afford it, that’s one matter. But many of us can, and we still say no. Why do we fight and argue and refuse when the path of least resistance a simple “yes”?
We say no because of a Rashi in the parshah. When Moshe climbs up הר סיני and tells God that, , חָטָא הָעָם הַזֶּה חֲטָאָה גְדֹלָה, וַיַּעֲשׂוּ לָהֶם, אֱלֹהֵי זָהָב, Rashi says that he actually said much, much more.

אתה הוא שגרמת להם, שהשפעת להם זהב וכל חפצם, מה יעשו שלא יחטאו. משל למלך שהיה מאכיל ומשקה את בנו ומקשטו ותולה לו כיס בצוארו ומעמידו בפתח בית זונות, מה יעשה הבן שלא יחטא

It is You who caused them [to sin], that you gave them as much gold as they wished; what should they do so as not to sin? This can be compared to a king that fed and gave drink to his son, adorned him, hung a wallet full of money around his neck and stood him before a house of harlots. What should he do so as not to sin?

When our children hear a “no,” as much as they don’t like it and don’t want it, often it’s the very thing they need the most.

Personal Parshah for Ki Tisa 5769: The Terrible Sin of the Golden Calf

This week's shiur:
Parshat Ki Tisa: The Sin of the Golden Calf
Reading the sin of chet ha'egel - the sin of the golden calf, one question comes to our mind: how? How could a nation at the height of spirituality and closeness to God fall so far so fast? We'll discuss this critical question using the language of the chumash, and hopefully learn something about ourselves as well.
You can click on the player to play the file, or right click here to download the file and play it on your mp3 player.

Wisdom - The More You Have, the More You Get - Table Talk for Ki Tisa 5768

We've all seen that experiment where you first fill a jar with big rocks, and then when you can't put any more in, you put in smaller rocks -- and they miraculously fit into the seemingly full jar. The point is, even when you think something is full -- there's always room for more, when what you add is finer than what's already in the container.
This image is a wonderful metaphor for the assimilation of knowledge.
The Torah tells us that when God chooses people to construct the Mishkan, in addition to selecting Bezalel and Oholiav by name the Torah tells us that, ובלב כל חכם לב נתתי חכמה -- "and in the hearts of every wise person I have placed wisdom." (31:6). Why would God need to place wisdom in the heart of someone who is already wise? The Gemara in Brachos (54a) provides the answer:

Said Rabbi Yochanan: The Holy One Blessed be He only gives wisdom to one who already has wisdom, as it is written, "He who gives wisdom to the wise and understanding to those who have intelligence (Daniel 2:21). Rabbi Tachlifa of the West heard this idea and repeated it before Rabbi Abahu, who said to him: You learn [this rule] from that verse. We learn it from this verse, as it is written, "And in the hearts of every wise person I have placed wisdom."

Yet, this only begs the question: why give wisdom to the wise? Why not spread the wealth? The answer lies in our bottle of rocks. As wisdom and knowledge increases, the information becomes finer and more specific. In every discipline, the greater your understanding of the matter, the finer the information becomes. More importantly, one cannot possibly comprehend the fine, specific information before he acquires the general principles.
This rule especially applies to Torah. To become great in Torah, one first needs to be grounded in the basics. You cannot comprehend the depths of gemara before you learn mishnah, and you can't learn kaballah (hidden mysticism) before you have a deep knowledge of Torah.
But the beauty is, the more you know, the more you realize that there is to learn.

Table Talk - Ki Tisa 5767

I'd like to share some thoughts that we discussed during the week at the womens' parshah shiurim -- Tuesday at 1:30pm at YIOP and Wednesday at 8:45am at Akiva. And no, I never miss an opportunity to plug a shiur.
The world recognizes the Two Tablets as perhaps one (or two) of the most famous Jewish symbols ever. In airports and other public places around the world, they represent a Jewish house of worship. Jewish chaplains in the US Armed Forces wear a pin of the tablets to signify their faith. And, you can find some reprsentation of the tablets in pretty much every shul in the world. (In our shul, we have a set from the old Young Israel of Oak Woods building above the aron in the Beis Medrash.)
This recognition comes for good reason: these are no ordinary Tablets. The Torah tells us that these tablets are מַעֲשֵׂה אֱלֹקִים, הֵמָּה -- "the work of God," and their writings was also "the work of God." כְּתֻבִים מִשְּׁנֵי עֶבְרֵיהֶם--מִזֶּה וּמִזֶּה, הֵם כְּתֻבִים -- "written from both sides, from each side they were written." (34:15-16) The Midrash explains that while God hewed the writing in the Tablets all the way to the other side, if you then looked at the Tablets from the back, instead of seeing the writing backwards, you would see the writing forward again. In Rashi's words, they were מעשה נסים -- "a product of miracles." They could not really exist in the natural world, but they did.
What do they Jewish people do with the Tablets? We know that they place them in the Aron -- the ark, which they then place in the Mishkan -- the Tabernacle -- in the קדש הקדשים -- the Holy of Holies. Only the High Priest entered the Holy of Holies on Yom Kippur, and even then, he certainly never opened the Aron to look at the Tablets. (If you've ever seen "Raiders of the Lost Ark" you'd know why.)
If so -- if no one were to ever see them, ever -- why does God even give these Tablets to the Jewish people?
Discuss amongst yourselves.