פרשת קרח
In this week’s parsha, Korach leads a popular revolt against Moshe Rabbeinu and Aharon. Chazal teach us that Korach was a very distinguished member of the nation and as such, desired honor for himself, choosing to dispute Moshe’s leadership and Aharon’s right to the Cehuna. Korach envisioned himself as the true leader of the Jewish people and argued that Moshe had hijacked the mantle of leadership, using his position unfairly for his own personal gain. Korach, until this day, remains a primary example of how dangerous jealousy and the pursuit of honor can be. As Chazal say in Pirkei Avos 4:21, “Jealousy, lust, and honor take a person out of the world.” However, Chazal also teach us that Korach was a tremendously righteous individual of colossal spiritual greatness. He was an enormous talmid chacham and was one of the few holy enough to carry the aron, a job that could be lethal for those not on the appropriate spiritual level. Furthermore, Chazal tell us that Korach was so great that he had ruach hakodesh! The Ramban writes that even Aharon himself believed that Korach was greater than him! So how could Korach, such a spiritual giant, fall to such base behavior and be jealous of others? Moreover, if Korach was so great, how could he have been so blinded by his pursuit of honor as to challenge Moshe Rabbeinu, the undisputed leader of the Jewish people?
Rav Aharon Kotler explains that it was precisely Korach’s greatness that paved the way for his incredible downfall. As a person grows in his avodas Hashem, he begins to access and activate the greatest things of which human beings are capable. When a person begins to appreciate his personal evolution, he begins aspiring to greater heights and increases his desire to come close to Hashem. However, the more one yearns for spiritual greatness, the more vulnerableone is to forgetting why he yearns for such exaltedness. Does he want to become great for Hashem’s glory or for his own? If a person loses perspective and forgets why he yearns for his own greatness he can become prone to committing even the most disgusting and unintelligible acts. This is what happened to Korach. Korach didn’t always lust for power for his own glory. Korach, in truth, initially only lusted to sanctify Hashem’s Name, and as a leader of the Jewish people, he would have the ability to affect others in ways that he otherwise could not. However, at a certain point, Korach’s intentions became tainted with his own self-interests. After Elitzaphan ben Uziel was appointed as Nasi over the tribe, Korach’s jealousy overtook him and Korach became enraged at what he viewed as an unforgivable insult to his own capabilities. In the end, Korach’s conduct revealed an ugliness that ended up devolving into near stupidity. Those of us who are climbing the ladder of spiritual greatness should be aware of what is driving us to strive for that to which we aspire. Any moment, we too, has v’shalom, can miss the point and forget that we aren’t serving ourselves; we are serving Hashem. We must remember that as great as we are becoming, it means nothing if we are not doing so for Hashem’s sake. In truth, one should check oneself every day to make sure that one is still pure-intentioned. We have to really make sure that we are completely leshem shamayim.
Other than examining our intentions, what can we do to purify our ambition, to ensure that we act more and more purely for the sake of Heaven? I’ve observed over the years in the yeshiva that often, when chevrusas don’t get along, it is because they just don’t listen to each other. They don’t value each other’s ideas. They just state their own opinion and attach no importance to investigating the other side’s perspective on the issue, which could actually possibly be the truth. The gemara in Eruvin 13b says the reason Beis Hillel’s halachic opinion was accepted instead of Beis Shammai’s was because they stated their opponent’s opinion before their own. They valued understanding the other position, and that is why the Mishna in Pirkei Avos 5:17 declares the dispute between Beis Hillel and Beis Shammai to be a dispute that was truly for the sake of Heaven. They didn’t care who was right – they just wanted the truth. If we honestly exert ourselves to listen to and appreciate our chaverim’s ideas, we can train ourselves to sincerely act for the sake of heaven. If we stop caring about what we think and start caring about what G-d thinks, our lives can change completely. All the unhealthy ambitions and feelings we may have had in the past will disappear. We just need to learn to become people who constantly strive to magnify Hashem’s honor while minimizing our own.
There is a story of a young bucher who was presenting an in-depth gemara shiur to a group of fellow talmidim. The shiur had a very exciting chiddush at the end that left the entire group amazed. However, there was a very sharp bucher in the group who found an irreconcilable contradiction in the shiur. Understanding that pointing out the difficulty could devastate his friend, the sharp bucher hesitated to speak. However, he soon found himself presenting the difficulty to the group just a few moments later, and they were shaken by it. The young bucher himself didn’t know how to answer and stepped down from the podium, stating that he would have to rethink his thoughts. Feeling sad for his friend, the sharp bucher came over and began apologizing for destroying his incredible chiddush. “No, no,” said the young bucher, “I can’t thank you enough for getting rid of my pshat. I really could have reached the wrong conclusion and thought I had the emes!” May we all be like this young bucher – so leshem shamayim!
May we all be zoche to be motivated by our love of Hashem and not our love of our selves!!!