פרשת כי תשא
In this week’s Parsha, God bequeaths to Moshe Rabenu the Ten Commandments. The Midrash says that while Moshe was in Heaven receiving the Torah from God, the Satan projected an image of Moshe’s dead body to the Jewish people. After which, the verse relates that after Moshe received the first set of Tablets he came down from the mountain to find the Jews sinning with the Golden Calf. At this point the verse continues to say that he threw down the Tablets, irreparably smashing them. I would like to attempt to explain why Moshe felt that he had to take such a drastic action with the first set of Tablets.
My great uncle, the Meshech Chochma, explains that in order to answer this question, we must first understand how it is that the entire Jewish nation were able to commit such a grave sin on the very mountain that they were to receive the Torah, especially in light of the fact that they were on such a high spiritual level. He says that although the Eruv Rav, (the Mixed Multitude) of Jews actually transgressed the commandment not to worship idols, it seems clear that the vast majority of the Jews wouldn’t stoop so low. So what indeed was their sin?
We know that Moshe Rabenu was the spiritual leader of the Jewish people. As such, he was endowed with many abilities that no one else possessed. The mistake of the Jewish people was to believe that these abilities were inherently unique to Moshe as opposed to mere gifts from God. However being that they did erroneously believe that Moshe had abilities independent of God, when the Satan projected in image of Moshe’s coffin, the Jews immediately panicked and attempted to have Moshe replaced with another spiritual entity. For this purpose they chose the calf for, the Kaballah Seforim bring down that directly underneath God’s throne, there is an image of a calf.
With this in mind, perhaps we can answer our original question. When Moshe came down from the mountain to find the Jews sinning, and he understood that this sin stemmed from a fundamental misunderstanding of the source of spiritual power, he decided that he had to show them that even the most powerful thing on earth – the Tablets – could be broken through the following reasoning: Moshe drew a Kal V’chomer argument by saying to himself that if the Jews believe that I, a mere being of flesh and blood, possess independent spiritual powers, they will certainly come to worship these Tablets which are written by God’s finger. Based on this argument, Moshe came to the conclusion that these Tablets were too much of a liability to keep around and he destroyed them. This would perhaps explain why the verse states that the shards of the broken tablets were stored together with the Second Tablets in order to portray to all future generation this lesson: that whatever power the Second Tablets possess is solely from God and without Him, can be broken at any time.
The conclusion that we must draw from these events is that a fundamental belief, that a Jew must foster, is that no force in this world possesses any independent power divorced of God. Rav Dov Shteinholtz, the Mashgiach of Kol Torah, illustrates this by quoting the Gemorah which says that finding a person a mate and providing a man with sustenance are as difficult for God to do as splitting the Reed Sea. The Rashbam explains that for these two events to go smoothly in a Jew’s life require a great amount of prayer. The Mashgiach explains that certainly no one thing in life is any more difficult for God to perform then any other thing, however we must view these two episodes in our lives as if it were difficult for God to give them to us. What do these two events have in common? It is easy to look at both of these miraculous deeds and belittle them by saying that certainly a young man with a great reputation is likely to find “a real catch”. Or if one opens up a large store with attractive merchandise, surely he will do well. To prevent this from happening, the Gemorah warns us that these feats are as difficult for God to perform as Krias Yam Suf – meaning to say that the Gemorah is warning us to be aware of how miraculous it is that God is able to do these seemingly predictable acts of benevolence for us.
The Mashgiach concludes by explaining why it is that these two acts are on par with the Splitting of the Sea. The Ramban adds that although every miracle was wondrous in nature, the Splitting of the Sea was particularly miraculous in that no Egyptian in his right mind would enter the dry land of the sea after all the miracles God had performed for the Jewish people. They should have been sure that entering there would mean certain death. But nonetheless they went into the sea. From here we can conclude that even common sense actions and seemingly predictable events are not a foregone conclusion and can only be affected if it is the will of God. This will hopefully lead us to accept the reality that although it appears when we put out more attractive merchandise we earn more money, or the better girl gets the better Shiduch, in reality, this is not true and only by the hand of God can any of these events take place!
I would like to finish with a story that the Brisker Rav was heard to say over about R’ Chaim Velozhiner. He said that a man once heard R’ Chaim giving over this word and challenged him by asking, “What would be if I would take this cup in my hand and try to smash it? If God doesn’t want it to happen, will the cup not break?” R’ Chaim answered that indeed, if God doesn’t desire it, the cup will remain unscathed while being abused. The Brisker Rav went on to relate that this man proceeded to take the cup and slam it against the table. Nothing happened. He then smashed it on the floor. Nothing. In despair and with fear of being humiliated the man repeatedly attempted to smash this fragile cup with no result. From here, concluded the Brisker Rav, we see clearly that nothing in this world can occur without the direct assistance of God.
May we be Zoche to truly recognize that every aspect of our existence is dependant solely on our Creator!