Oblivious

We read in this week’s parsha that Balak, king of Moav, was fearful of the Jews as they advanced to enter the Promised Land, so he hired Bilaam to curse the Jews and undermine their power. However, as Bilaam set out, the donkey he was riding saw an angel on the road with his sword drawn. The donkey turned off the road, but Bilaam beat the animal to get it back on the road. Then, the angel stood in the path of the vineyards, with a fence on either side. When the donkey saw the angel, she pressed against the wall to squeeze past the angel, and crushed Bilaam’s leg. Bilaam beat her again. Then the angel stood in a narrow place, where there was no room to pass. The donkey just crouched beneath Bilaam, who beat her again.

Yet, the bizarreness of what he was experiencing did not give Bilaam pause, as he was obstinately set on achieving his mission. So much so, that when the donkey spoke to Bilaam, he responded in kind as though a talking donkey was a natural occurrence.

The Sefer Matamim points out that, in a similar vein, Moshe Rabbeinu went personally to Datan and Aviram, because he desperately wanted to save them from suffering the terrible fate of Korach and his cohorts. As the messenger of Hashem, Moshe Rabbeinu had been instrumental in bringing the Ten Plagues upon Mitzrayim, he had split the Red Sea, brought water in the desert. Anything he had said in the Name of Hashem had come true. Now Moshe Rabbeinu was warning Datan and Aviram that anyone who rebelled against Hashem would have a bitter end. All they had to do was admit that they had erred. Yet, the pasuk tells us (Bamidbar 16:27), “… Datan and Aviram went out haughtily at the entrance of their tents, with their wives, children and infants.” Rashi expounds they were intractable and came to curse and blaspheme Moshe.

After the destruction of Yericho, Yehoshua declared (Yehoshua 6:26) that anyone who rebuilt the city of Yericho would be cursed, and his children would die one by one, beginning when he lay the foundation and ending when he set up its gates. Centuries later Yechiel, the associate of Achav, buried all his children as he continued to build Yericho. The Talmud (Sanhedrin 113a) amplifies that as Yechiel gradually buried all his sons, he should have suspected that the curse of Yehoshua caused their deaths, yet he paid no heed and was unshakable in his determination to build up Yericho.

The Talmud (Eruvin 19a) defines such examples of such willfulness as, “The wicked do not repent even at the entrance of Gehennom,” and cites the pasuk (Yeshaya 66:24), “And they will go out and see the corpses of the men who rebel against Me….” It is noted that the rebellion is in present tense, meaning that the wicked people continue to rebel forever, and they are judged in Gehennom for generations and generations. Likewise, the Talmud (Bava Basra 74a) describes the scene where Korach is continuously judged in Gehennom and calls out “Moshe and his Torah are true, and they are liars.”

The great tzaddik R’ Yisroel of Ruzhin observed that in that context Korach should be saying “we are liars.” In truth, though, says R’ Yisroel, Korach and his cohorts are only saying those words in order to get out of Gehennom. The sages are the ones who added the words “they are liars,” because Korach’s group do not believe what they are saying. They continue to be evil even in Gehennom.

The Torah includes all the illustrations above – Korach and his congregation, Datan and Aviraim, Yechiel – to teach us that when the attribute of justice is present in the world, when events and situation seem amiss, we are obligated to heighten our awareness. We must increase our tefillah, our learning, our chesed, and submit to the supremacy of Hashem, so that He will then have mercy.

Not only is our disposition and attitude critical in disquieting circumstances, but every word we utter during challenging times is significant. When one says the right thing it could literally create a difference in the blessing he brings upon himself. If one, G-d forbid, says the wrong thing, or attributes various developments and incidents to happenstance or some rational explanation, it could result in the protraction of his pain. Every word is critical.

The great R’ Emanuel Chai Riki (1688-1743) was born in Italy. Orphaned at a young age, he was raised by an uncle who ensured that he received a very strong Torah education and was imbued with a tremendous love for Hashem. At the age of nineteen it became necessary for R’ Emanuel to earn a living, and he became a rebbi of young children. Yet he spent every spare moment continuing to delve into the depths of the revealed and esoteric dimensions of the Torah. He merited to have Eliyahu HaNavi learn together with him certain explanation of the Zohar.

At the age of thirty, R’ Emanuel settled in Eretz Yisrael with his family, where he finished his comprehensive commentary on the Mishnayos, which he named Dikdukei Aniyus (Analyses of Poverty). Great sages tried to convince him to change the name of the sefer, but he refused. Then after being forced to leave Eretz Yisrael, and a miraculous escape from pirates who stole all his belongings, except for his manuscripts, R’ Emanuel realized that he was actually very wealthy for he had his Torah, which was more precious than gold or silver. He renamed his sefer Hon Ashir, A Treasure of Wealth.

With that his mazel changed. He was appointed the Chief Rabbi of Florence, Italy, where he wrote his famous work Mishnah Chassidim. He invested in business and merited great spiritual and material riches.

Our words have a major impact on every aspect of our personal life.