פרשת יתרו
In this week’s parsha, we get the Torah. The moment that the Torah was received, is uncontestably the most defining moment in all of Jewish history. This is the moment that we became more than just the descendants of Avraham, Yitzhak, and Yaakov. We became G-d’s people. In this week’s parsha, we learn that before the receiving of the Torah, Hashem commanded Moshe to inspire the people and impress them with the incredible zechus it is to receive the Torah. Hashem wanted the Jewish nation to know that the Torah would make them into a “kingdom of priests and a holy people.” However, by this time, it was clear to the entire Jewish people that the only reason they were taken out of Egypt in the first place was to receive the Torah. The Torah was the basis of their very existence. Why did Hashem feel that the Jewish people were in need of further convincing? Was there any way they could possibly decline?
Rav Yerucham Brodiansky shares a startling idea. It’s not enough to just want Torah. One needs to love Torah. One can even learn Torah leshem shamayim and miss the entire point! [ER1] If one merely learns Torah with intent to practice what he learns and become a person of truth, he is overlooking the most fundamental element of Torah learning—a loving relationship with Hashem. Torah, in its essence, is Hashem’s love letter to the Jewish people. A person should cherish every word he learns and grow closer to Hashem because of it. This is what Hashem wants. This is why Hashem commanded Moshe Rabbeinu to impress the people with the Torah’s loftiness. Hashem wanted us to know that He was giving a very special gift. The Torah would make us into exalted and angelic beings, above the mundane existence of a corporal world. Torah changes us and makes us beautiful. How could one not fall in love with Hashem and the incredible present He has given us? However, it is very easy to forget this eternal message. Therefore, one must always continue to deepen his love for Torah. This love, in Hashem’s eyes, is more precious than anything else.
So how do we develop a love for Torah? The first thing to do is just learn. The more a person advances in his learning, the more one can appreciate the Torah’s beauty. Rav Ben Tzion Abba Shaul teaches on a deeper level, that if a person thinks about what it means to learn Torah, it is impossible for him to not fall in love with it. A person must appreciate that when he learns Torah, he’s not just learning interesting information or even deep lessons about life – he is beginning to grasp the very thoughts of HaKadosh Baruch Hu! Through this intimate interaction with the Divine, a person can ultimately connect to Hashem. No other experience offers such intimacy. As incredible and inspirational as other things may be, everything pales in comparison to learning Torah. Besides this, Torah is our only shot at perfecting ourselves in this world. The gemara in Kiddushin 30b says that the only antidote for the yetzer hara is the Torah. In other words, without the Torah we don’t have a chance. The Mesillas Yesharim fervently warns us not to fool ourselves into believing that we can overcome the yetzer hara by any other means, explaining that the yetzer hara is so strong and cunning it can destroy a person even without his knowing. The only hope we have is the Torah. We should realize what a tremendous blessing it is that we were given the Torah. Torah completes us and brings us closer to Hashem. By reflecting on how fortunate we are to have the Torah, we can come to a much more profound love.
The gemara in Pesachim 68b tells how Rav Yosef used to encourage himself in learning. Rav Yosef, impressing on to himself the great effect the Torah would have on his being, used to say to himself “Rejoice my soul! Rejoice my soul!” Amazingly, the gemara actually asks a difficulty on Rav Yosef, believing Rav Yosef’s method of self-encouragement to be flawed. “Doesn’t the entire universe rely on Torah learning?” challenges the gemara. Why did Rav Yosef only find the Torah inspiring as a means of uplifting himself when really the Torah is the very thing that uplifts and sustains all of creation? The gemara answers that a person thinks about himself first. I believe that the gemara is telling us that it’s obvious that a person can appreciate the Torah for its loftiness and its greatness. The Torah is the blueprint of the universe! However, the most effective way to come to a love for Torah is to appreciate what the Torah does for him personally. A person has to think about how the Torah has given him the strength to completely transform himself. When we remember how far we have come over the years, it is truly remarkable. Hashem’s Torah has and is helping us become the very people we want to be.
When I think of ahavas haTorah, one of the great figures that immediately comes to mind is Rav Moshe Mendel. I believe that we can all learn from his example to deepen our own ahavas HaTorah. Rav Moshe would get up at chatzos every night and learn until Shachris. Even though he knew Shas and Poskim cold from the time he was a very young man, his abnormal and rigorous schedule of learning was fueled by his overflowing love of Hashem’s Torah. All who saw him learn were touched by the beauty of his inspired avoda and he sang the gemara with such a sweet tune, one could almost cry. He especially loved to delve into the depths of the Torah and was greatly pained when he was forced to refrain from such intense learning in his later years due to his health. However, even when he couldn’t learn iyun, he pushed himself to grow in his love for Torah and learned with the same enthusiasm despite being limited to just gemara/Rashi/Tosfos. Rav Moshe Mendel was such a strong believer in the importance of ahavas haTorah that he claimed that any problem a bucher could possibly have while in yeshiva stemmed from a lack of ahavas haTorah. Indeed, according to Rav Moshe Mendel, insufficient ahavas haTorah was the biggest problem any person could ever have.
May we all be zoche to plant a true love of Torah in our hearts!
[ER1]Do you want to leave out this sentence? I think the definition of lshem shamayim is that you’re doing it for the sake of Heaven – if that’s not the definition of a loving relationship, what is?