Overview
of the Weekly Reading
To be read on Shabbat Naso - 12 Sivan 5775 /May
3
Torah: Numbers 4:21-7:89
Haftorah: Judges 13:2-25 (the birth of Shimshon,
connecting to the section about nazir)
Pirkei Avot:
Chapter 1
Naso is the 2nd Reading out of 10 in Numbers
and it contains 8632 letters, in 2264 words, in
176 verses
Overview: Naso opens with tallying the
three Levite families and defining their specific services in
the dismantling, carrying, and assembly of the Tabernacle throughout
the Jews' desert journeys. Next, Jews with various types of impurities
are forbidden to enter different sections of the camp. Then, G-d
commands the Jews about the restitution for sinning against a
fellow Jew. Also discussed is the command to bring 'trumah'-crop-gifts
to the priests. Next, the Torah speaks about the suspected adulteress,
the test of her fidelity, and the consequences of her guilt or
innocence. The parsha continues to discuss the vows, laws and
scarifices of Nazirites. The following verses are the priestly
blessing to the Jews (which are recited daily). The parsha concludes
by listing the donations and sacrifices that each tribal prince
brought to the Tabernacle.
 An
essay from
Rabbi Shaul Yosef Leiter, director of Ascent
(for a free weekly email subscription, click
here)
This week's Torah portion speaks about the commandment of
confession and teshuvah (repenting). The verse says, "When
a man or woman sin…they should confess the sins that they did"
(5/7).
Rabbi Moshe Chagiz explains why the above verse about confession
starts in the singular – "a man or a woman sin",
but ends in the plural. "they should confess". This teaches
that when each us confesses our sins, we have to also confess, and
feel contrite and responsible for the sins of our fellow man. This
is the inner meaning of the Jewish people acting as guarantors for
one another. We are all connected. We really are all one.
In analogy: a group of people were in a boat in the middle of the
sea. One of the passengers started knocking a hole in the floor
of his cabin. All his friends screamed at him, but he shouted back,
"What do you care? Can’t you see that I am knocking the
hole in MY own cabin?"
Rabbi Chagiz concludes how all the Jewish people are guarantors
for each other. Even when one person sins, it obligates and affects
us all. The Jewish people are like one person. (Tzohar L’taiva)
Maimonides explains this verse in a way that seems difficult to
defend. He says that the main requirement of teshuvah is
the verbal confession alone and deems this confession as the fulfillment
of the commandment for repentance. Yet how can confession be the
main element of teshuva? We all know how easy it is to say
“sorry” while not feeling real regret or any sincere commitment
for true inner change. A few answers are suggested. Here is the
Lubavicther Rebbe's:
The Talmud (Makos 23/72) teaches that the 248 positive commandments
are related to the 248 organs of the human body. The Zohar (volume
A/170/b) teaches that the 365 prohibiting commandments are connected
to the 365 veins and sinews in the body. Chassidut explains that
the organs of the body, the veins and sinews, the positive and prohibitive
commandments and our souls are all connected. The soul also has
613 (248+365) powers (Tanya ch. 51). When a person is complete in
his observance of the commandments, his soul is also complete. Similarly,
if he is missing a commandment, or damaged in some way his observance,
the aspect of the soul that relates to that physical organs is also
missing or damaged (Likutei Torah, Netzavim).
Amazingly, teshuvah can repair this damage! A contrite heart
and a complete soul are connected. Teshuva's source is from
an even higher place than all the commandments. It is from the most
inner depths of a person’s heart that is connected in the most
supernal element of his soul—an element that is beyond the
world and its influences, the part of our soul that only wants truth
and to be connected to the infinite Divine. This level of the soul
is the source of all the 613 soul powers, and from this place a
new force repairs any existing damage, and completes the person.
For this reason Maimonides defines confession as the commandment
and not the actual act of repenting—of feeling regret and committing
to change. He counted as commandments only those actions that are
connected to one of the 613 soul powers. Since teshuvah is
from a higher place—so high that it can actually repair damage
within the other powers—therefore only confession, an act of
speech, is counted within the 613.
Shabbat Shalom, Shaul
(for a free weekly email subscription,
click
here)
For last year's essay by Rabbi Leiter on this
week's Reading, see the archive.
____________________________________________
This
week's story from Yerachmiel Tilles, managing editor of ascentofsafed.com
and kabbalaonline.org
From
the Kabbalah Commentaries on the Chumash ("5
Books of Moses")
13th
century - "RambaN"
- Rabbi Moshe ben Nachman
14th
century - "Bachya"
- Rabbi Bachya ben Asher
16th
century - "Alsheich"
- Rabbi Moshe Alshech of Tsfat
17th
century - "Shelah"
- Rabbi Yeshaiya Horowitz
18th
century - "Ohr
HaChayim" - Rabbi Chaim Ben Attar
a sample for this week:
Alsheich
"If someone makes a vow of abstinence"
[6:2]
The Torah has described degrees of sanctity among the Jewish
people, such as the High Priest and the Levites, all of
which were attained through birth. It would be easy for
the ordinary Israelite to assume that he could not aspire
to a higher degree of sanctity than what he had been born
with. The Torah therefore describes that by making a vow
and assuming additional obligations, every Jew can raise
the level of his sanctity. In fact, he can attain a measure
of sanctity comparable to that of the High Priest, in that
he may not defile himself by participating in the burial
rites of his closest relatives. Whereas the High Priest
attains such sanctity only through appointment by others,
i.e., the High Court selecting him, the Nazir can
achieve this by his own efforts, independent of anyone else's
input. To this end, the highest placed persons among the
Israelites are urged to add to their sanctity by denying
themselves items which are permitted per se.
The reason the Torah has not forbidden wine or alcohol,
but, on the contrary, has arranged for many commandments
to be performed by means of drinking wine, using it to sanctify
the mitzvah, is to teach us the proper use of wine.
The Torah, at the end of our passage, actually exhorts the
erstwhile Nazirite to drink wine upon completion of the
period of his vow (verse 20).
Objectively speaking, wine is a blessing, a successful grape
harvest is a sign of G-d's blessing (Deut.7:13). However,
the Torah addresses a person who wishes to counter the urge
he has to indulge in drink to the point of drunkenness.
This is the person whom the Torah describes as ish ki
yafli, the man who wants to distinguish himself by denying
himself pleasure inducing indulgences. Certainly, the Torah
does not approve of people, who make a vow of abstinence
because of anger, or to show off their self control. The
reason the Talmud cited seeing a sotah woman in disgrace
as the catalyst that prompted a person to make a vow of
abstinence, is to show that only when a person's motivation
is the avoidance of becoming involved in sin, infidelity
etc. does the Torah approve, or even counsel temporary abstention
from wine and alcoholic drink.
(Adapted from
Torat Moshe - the 16th commentary of Rabbi Moshe Alshech,
the "Preacher of Zefat" on the Torah, as translated
and condensed in the English version of Eliyahu Munk)
For the rest of "The Masters of Kabbala
and Chumash" on this
Weekly Reading; and on all
the other Readings.
|
FROM
THE SAGES OF TSFAT AND GALILEE ON KabbalaOnline.org
Specifically,
for an overview of the recommended articles in the columns:
Holy Zohar, Holy Ari, Mystic Classics, Chasidic Masters, Contemporary
Kabbalists, and more,
click to Naso
one sample:
Chasidic Masters
 Kabbalistic
Hair Styles
By Yosef Y. Jacobson
A nazirite is prohibited to cut his hair. The Chasidic masters teach
that hairs act as "straws" transmitting profound and inaccessible
energy. Each strand of hair, shaped like a straw, communicates a
level of soul-energy that due to its intensity cannot be communicated
directly, only through the "straw" of hair, through the
contracted, and curtailed medium of hair, which dilutes the intense
energy.
To continue,
click
here.
For
a free email subscription to our weekly anthology, click
here.
For another taste of recommended Kabbalah articles on a variety
of subjects,
click on the icon to go to our weekly Kabbalah magazine.
|
.jpg)