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Vayeishev 5758 Volume V Number 12 Naso 5776 Volume XXIII Number 40 Toras Aish Thoughts From Across the Torah Spectrum They were so fragile that it took three years to RABBI LORD JONATHAN SACKS work out a way of unrolling them without causing them Covenant & Conversation to disintegrate. Eventually the scrolls turned out to be t 176 verses, Naso is the longest of the parshiyot. kemayot, amulets, containing, among other texts, the Yet one of its most moving passages, and the one priestly blessings. Scientifically dated to the sixth Athat has had the greatest impact over the course century BCE, the age of Jeremiah and the last days of of history, is very short indeed and is known by almost the First Temple, they are four centuries older than the every Jew, namely the priestly blessings: most ancient of biblical texts known hitherto, the Dead "The Lord said to Moses: Tell Aaron and his Sea Scrolls. Today the amulets can be seen in the sons, 'Thus shall you bless the Israelites. Say to them: Israel Museum, testimony to the ancient connection of May Lord bless you and protect you; / May the Lord Jews to the land and the continuity of Jewish faith itself. make His face shine on you and be gracious to you; / What gives them their power is their simplicity May the Lord turn His face toward you and give you and beauty. They have a strong rhythmic structure. The peace.' Let them set My name on the Israelites, and I lines contain three, five, and seven words respectively. will bless them." (Num. 6:23-27) In each, the second word is "the Lord". In all three This is among the oldest of all prayer texts. It verses the first part refers to an activity on the part of was used by the priests in the Temple. It is said today G-d -- "bless", "make His face shine", and "turn His face by the cohanim in the reader's repetition of the Amidah, toward". The second part describes the effect of the in Israel every day, in most of the Diaspora only on blessing on us, giving us protection, grace and peace. festivals. It is used by parents as they bless their They also travel inward, as it were. The first children on Friday night. It is often said to the bride and verse "May Lord bless you and protect you," refers, as groom under the chuppah. It is the simplest and most the commentators note, to material blessings: beautiful of all blessings. sustenance, physical health and so on. The second, It also appears in the oldest of all biblical texts "May the Lord make His face shine on you and be that have physically survived to today. In 1979 the gracious to you," refers to moral blessing. Chen, grace, archeologist Gabriel Barkay was examining ancient is what we show to other people and they to us. It is burial caves at Ketef Hinnom, outside the walls of interpersonal. Here we are asking G-d to give some of Jerusalem in the area now occupied by the Menachem His grace to us and others so that we can live together Begin Heritage Center. A thirteen-year-old boy who without the strife and envy that can so easily poison was assisting Barkay discovered that beneath the floor relationships. of one of the caves was a hidden chamber. There the The third is the most inward of all. There is a group discovered almost one thousand ancient lovely story about a crowd of people who have artefacts including two tiny silver scrolls no more than gathered on a hill by the sea to watch a great ship pass by. A young child is waving vigorously. One of the men This issue of Toras Aish is dedicated by in the crowd asks him why. He says, "I am waving so Mr. & Mrs. Itzy Weisberg the captain of the ship can see me and wave back." But," said the man, "the ship is far away, and there is a" לעלוי נשמת crowd of us here. What makes you think that the ע'ה Mrs. Ida Weisberg captain can see you?" "Because," said the boy, "the חיה פייגא בת יעקב יוסף ז'ל on her 21st yartzeit captain of the ship is my father. He will be looking for נפטרת יז סיון תשנ'ד לעלוי נשמת ע'ה Mr. David I. Rosenberg ר'דוד יצחק ב'ר רפאל ז' ל נפתר כה אייר תשכ'ב ת נ צ ב 'ה an inch long. 2 Toras Aish testify not to faith but to a profound failure of faith. TORAS AISH IS A WEEK LY PARSHA Faith means that I believe that G-d cares about NEWSLETTER DISTRIBUTED VIA EMAIL me. I am here because He wanted me to be. The soul AND THE WEB AT AISHDAS.ORG/TA. He gave me is pure. Even though I am like the child on FOR MORE INFO EMAIL [email protected] the hill watching the ship pass by, I know that G-d is The material presented in this publication was collected from looking for me, waving to me as I wave to Him. That is email subscriptions, computer archives and various websites. It is being presented with the permission of the respective the most profound inner source of peace. We do not authors. Toras Aish is an independent publication and is need to prove ourselves in order to receive a blessing unaffiliated with any synagogue or organization. from G-d. All we need to know is that His face is turned TO DEDICATE THIS NEWSLETTER PLEASE CALL toward us. When we are at peace with ourselves, we (973) 277-9062 OR EMAIL [email protected] can begin to make peace with the world. So the blessings become longer and deeper: me among the crowd." from the external blessing of material goods to the That is roughly what we mean when we say, interpersonal blessing of grace between ourselves and "May the Lord turn His face toward you." There are others, to the most inward of them all, the peace of seven billion people now living on this earth. What mind that comes when we feel that G-d sees us, hears makes us any of us more than a face in the crowd, a us, holds us in His everlasting arms. wave in the ocean, a grain of sand on the sea shore? One further detail of the priestly blessings is The fact that we are G-d's children. He is our parent. unique, namely the blessing that the sages instituted to He turns His face toward us. He cares. be said by the cohanim over the mitzvah: "Blessed are The G-d of Abraham is not a mere force of you... who has made us holy with the holiness of Aaron nature or even all the forces of nature combined. A and has commanded us to bless His people Israel with tsunami does not pause to ask who its victims will be. love." There is nothing personal about an earthquake or a It is the last word, be-ahavah, that is unusual. It tornado. The word Elokim means something like "the appears in no other blessing over the performance of a force of forces, cause of causes, the totality of all command. It seems to make no sense. Ideally we scientifically discoverable laws." It refers to those should fulfill all the commands with love. But an aspects of G-d that are impersonal. It also refers to G-d absence of love does not invalidate any other in His attribute of justice, since justice is essentially command. In any case, the blessing over the impersonal. performance of as command is a way of showing that But the name we call Hashem -- the name used we are acting intentionally. There was an argument in the priestly blessings, and in almost all the priestly between the sages as to whether mitzvoth in general texts -- is G-d as He relates to us as persons, require intention (kavanah) or not. But whether they do individuals, each with our unique configuration of hopes or not, making a blessing beforehand shows that we do and fears, gifts and possibilities. Hashem is the aspect have the intention to fulfill the command. But intention of G-d that allows us to use the word "You". He is the is one thing, emotion is another. Surely what matters is G-d who speaks to us and who listens when we speak that the cohanim recite the blessing and G-d will do the to Him. How this happens, we do not know, but that it rest. What difference does it make whether they do so happens is central to Jewish faith. in love or not? That we call G-d Hashem is the transcendental The commentators wrestle with this question. confirmation of our significance in the scheme of things. Some say that the fact that the cohanim are facing the We matter as individuals because G-d cares for us as a people when they bless means that they are like the parent for a child. That, incidentally, is one reason why cherubim in the Tabernacle, whose faces "were turned the priestly blessings are all in the singular, to to one another" as a sign of love. Others change the emphasise that G-d blesses us not only collectively but word order. They say that the blessing really means, also individually. One life, said the sages, is like a "who has made us holy with the holiness of Aaron and universe.
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