פרשת בלק
In this week’s Parsha, Balak, after hearing of the miraculous victories of the Jewish people, and their imminent arrival and takeover of his land, hires Bilam to curse the Jewish people as a last, desperate measure to try and halt the Jewish advance. This attempt turned out to be futile because Hashem protected the Jewish people and did not allow Bilam’s formidable aptitude in sorcery to be effective during the time he wanted to curse them. So instead, he resorted to causing the Jews to sin by enticing them with the Midianite women, thereby hoping to cause the Jews to lose spiritual status in the eyes of Hashem and make them more vulnerable to a military assault. This second strategy met with some success, and many Jews died in a plague as a result, but earned Bilam a death sentence, when he was killed by the Jewish army shortly afterward. However, the Torah testifies that Bilam possessed some very unique talents. We know that Moshe was unparalleled as a Jewish prophet, but in the non-Jewish prophets, Bilam was indeed Moshe’s equal. That means that incredible level of intimacy of the knowledge of Hashem which Moshe was able to achieve, was present in the wicked Bilam as well! If that is true, how could he possibly fall to the depths he fell to in which he attempted to completely annihilate Hashem’s chosen nation. Imagine the viceroy and beloved confidant of the king attempting to murder the king’s son for no good reason! Furthermore, the verses indicate that although Bilam knew Hashem didn’t want him going with Balak’s emissaries, he went anyway hoping to find a time in which Hashem’s vigil over the Jewish people was relaxed slightly, and he could successfully curse them. How could somebody so knowledgeable in Hashem’s ways have made such a fundamental error as to honestly believe that he could “trick” Hashem, who by definition is flawless and not susceptible to trickery? What was he thinking?
The famous Mashgiach, R’ Yerucham explains that Bilam should serve as an incredible lesson in human nature. We humans have the bizarre capacity to know something is true on an intellectual level, beyond any doubt, and yet not accept it on an emotional or practical level. We can act in a way which is not consistent with what we believe to be true. The only way to ensure that our actions are commensurate with our beliefs is to constantly repeat to ourselves and reiterate our ideas until our conviction in them is solidified. In the verse in Psalms, David says, “As I murmur my faith inside of myself, I begin to delight in your words”. Only by doing this frequently and regularly can we hope to bring our actions to the level of our thoughts, otherwise, our passions will take over and will always pull us downward.
The Gemorah in Shabbos quotes the verse which says that every Jew must repent one day before he dies. R’ Elazar expounded on this verse and said that it is referring to the fact that since every Jew doesn’t know when he may die, he must repent every day. R’ Yerucham was puzzled by this Gemorah as it seems obvious. Was there any thought that a person knows when he is going to die? Of course not. Therefore the verse is obviously teaching us that we must repent every day, and R’ Elazar’s teaching seems inane. R’ Yerucham explains that this Gemorah is referring to the need for a person to relentlessly remind himself that he will die. As R’ Green always said about the life insurance salesmen correcting a person who began a sentence “If I die…” with the words “It’s not if, it’s when”! But even though we know this intellectually, we do not really act in a way which reflects that knowledge. How often do we see a person who is a hundred years old and yet he still hordes his money as if he is going to need it for something, and tries to amass wealth like a young man. These actions seem preposterous to us, but to the person seem totally normal. Such is the human condition, and R’ Elazar was teaching his students that if a person does not constantly remind himself that he will die, he will certainly act as one who doesn’t believe it is going to happen.
When the great Tzadik, R’ Nachman from Breslov was a young man, he used to sit in Shul next to his grandfather, who sat in the important section of the Shul. One day, little Nachman noticed that one of the elderly men who normally sat next to his grandfather hadn’t come to Shul for a couple of days. So little Nachman asked his Zayde where this man was. His grandfather replied that the gentleman had passed away. But little Nachman didn’t understand what those words meant, as he had never encountered death before. His Zayde explained to him, “Nachman, you see the temporary nature of this world. You see how ephemeral it is, and how things are here one day and gone the next. Clearly this world is only to gather all that we can, and to leave with as much merchandise in hand as possible.” R’ Nachman wrote in his later writings that that moment was a major turning point in his life. That stark realization of how real death was, was driven deep within him, and at that moment he began a life dedicated solely to growing in spirituality, paying no heed to any other pursuit. Such is the power that a genuine realization can have on a person in that it fueled the rest of his astonishing life, and allowed him to become who he became. R’ Gamliel Rabinovich once commented to me, “You know its funny that in the old days, they would only announce on the loud speakers when a great leader passed away, but now, every day we here these kind of announcements. I guess it is because in the olden times, Jews were always thinking about the day of reckoning, so they didn’t need constant reminders, but now that people have stopped thinking so much about their own demise, they need daily reminders”.
On a practical level, most Jews today believe in Hashem. I recently have had the opportunity to visit my mother in a non-religious hospital in Israel, and although very few patients are observant, they all seem to have a great deal of faith. What are some exercises we can do to close the gap between what we believe and how we act. The Beis Halevi used to have the words, “שויתי ה’ לנגדי תמיד” written on his snuff box so that every time he would take a sniff of tobacco, he would be reminded of Hashem at least six times a day. R’ Avigdor Miller used to stroll frequently in areas where he could view nature, and would concentrate intently on the intricacy of every tree and flower he would find, and would graphically draw attention to their beauty and unfathomable wisdom, using this a constant tool to extol the virtues of the Creator to himself and to others. Every day when we recite the Shema, we remind ourselves of the exodus from Egypt, and of Hashem’s ability to manipulate nature at any given time, regardless of the circumstances. This steady reminder is deemed necessary by the Torah itself, and it is not sufficient to recite the Shema once a month or once a week. We are meant to use the Shema as a tool to infuse ourselves with a daily dose of faith in Hashem which is absolutely necessary. In summary, this work is not easy, but through taking advantage of the constant reminders that are built into our religion by actively contemplating their significance, and supplementing this with extracurricular exercises, each and every Jew can succeed in allowing his actions to be consistent with his beliefs.
May we all merit to shrink the space between our actions and our beliefs!