פרשת ויצא
There is a very strange series of verses recorded in this week’s Parsha. Toward the end of the Parsha, Hashem appears to Yaakov after he has married his four wives and begun the building of Klal Yisroel, and tells Yaakov that the time has come to part ways with the wicked Lavan and to travel deeper into Eretz Yisroel. Yaakov at this point calls his wives in for in important meeting and the Torah then spends ten whole verses recording how Yaakov attempted to convince Rachel and Leah how bad it would be for them to remain in Charun with Lavan, and how inappropriately Lavan had acted. He concludes by mentioning that God had also told him to leave. The Torah then records a verbose response by Rachel and Leah in which they agree to go with him because their father was no longer being friendly to them and there was nothing left for them in Charun. This loquacious account of Yaakov and his wives’ response requires explanation. If Hashem told them to leave, is there any other justification which is required? Was Hashem’s command not enough to motivate them to travel that they needed to search for other good reasons? Furthermore, had they not found these good reasons to depart from Charun, were they insinuating that they would have stayed in spite of Hashem’s command to leave?
R’ Eliya Lopiyan explains that certainly the forefathers and mothers would have listened to Hashem’s command regardless of the rationale behind it. But the Torah is coming to teach us a fundamental rule in the service of God. The Torah is teaching us that one is required to look for happiness in his service of God and to always see the beauty in the Torah. In other words, it would not be appropriate for a person to serve God out of misery and grouchiness, consoling himself with the thought that at least when he gets to the next world things will be good, rather one must seek out and foster the positive emotions that the Torah is supposed to generate in a person. For example, one shouldn’t think that if he were not learning in Yeshiva, but rather pursuing a life of wealth and physical amenities that he would be happier and he is just suffering through his life in Yeshiva to acquire a large portion in the next world. In fact the opposite is true. The Mishnah says that jealousy, desire, and honor, which are all the things that people in ‘that’ world are striving for, remove a person from the world, and the “Ben Torah” enjoys a more tranquil life even in this world.
There is a verse in Psalms which illustrates this principle beautifully. The verse says “When one enjoys God one receives all of his heart’s desires.” This verse means to say that when one realizes the enjoyment in serving God, he will feel that all of his desires have been met. Even though this person may have in fact received less than another person, he nevertheless feels quite content because he feels satisfied by virtue of his service of God, this makes him more fortunate.
With this principle, we can understand Yaakov’s explanation which he gives to his wives and their response back to him. Certainly Yaakov and his wives would have complied with Hashem’s direct command regardless of their comprehension of it. But they felt that it was their duty to attempt to draw out the sense of justness in Hashem’s command and to speak out how dramatically it would improve their lives. Perhaps it would be appropriate at this time to relay the famous incident which happened with R’ Moshe Feinstein. They once asked R’ Moshe, why is it that we see many people in the community who have sacrificed tremendously in order to keep the Shabbos and given up almost everything they had, being forced to look for a new job every Sunday, and in spite of all this, their children gingerly desecrate the Shabbos every week? R’ Moshe responded that while it is true that these people showed genuine self-sacrifice in order to keep the Shabbos, they weren’t happy about it and their kids perceptively picked up on that bitterness that they had. On the other hand, had they been joyful in their Shabbos observance, their children would have certainly kept the Shabbos.
How does one acquire this fundamental feeling of bliss which is required for one’s proper Mitzvah observance? The Mesilas Yesharim in Chapter 19 offers one possibility. He quotes a Midrash in which R’ Ibo says that when one prays, one should contemplate the grandness of the Creator which he is standing in front of, and this will generate in him a sublime ecstasy. We could employ this principle of R’ Ibo in all of our Mitzvah observance. Every time we perform a Mitzvah, if we are aware of the stature of the God whom we are serving this will certainly generate in us strong feelings of pleasure for our work. The Chazon Ish used to say that when one dons his Tzitzis in the morning, he could feel an abundance of happiness if he merely thinks about the fact that he is connecting to his creator in a deep way by this simple action.
R’ Pincus, Z”l, used to take this concept and express it in a very extreme way. He would explain that if one does not find himself feeling pleasure in his Mitzvah observance, this is a clear sign that his Mitzvah observance is not real. He would illustrate this with a parable. Imagine a person finds a bag full of money on the street and he shows no outward sign of emotion at his find. This is a clear indication that he is not aware at all of the precious contents that are located in his bag, because were he to be aware, and he is a normal human being, he would surely show some joy. Similarly, if one shows no emotion when he performs an act which connects him with the creator of the world, either he is insane, or he is completely unaware of what he is doing.
I would just like to conclude by pointing out that not only is joy an integral part of one’s Mitzvah performance, but it completely transforms a person into a different human being and raises him to a different plane. The Ohr Hachayim at the beginning of Parshas “Vayechi” points out that sometimes the Torah refers to Yaakov as “Yaakov” and other times as “Yisroel”. He explains that when Yaakov was in a state of complete joy, he was referred to as “Yisroel” and other times as just “Yaakov”. From here we see that a person who has joy in his Mitzvah observance even develops a different name! The Ari Z”l, claimed that all of his wondrous achievements where due to the delight he found in his Torah observance!
May we merit to serve God faithfully out of true bliss!