- According to Pirkei Avos, which person is a complete opposite of Bila’am?
- Why did Moav tell about their fear to specifically to the nation of Midian?
- Since Balak was ready to pay to Bila’am an enormous sum of money to help him push Am Yisroel away from his land, why didn’t he just simply hire many armies to get it done?
- Since a malach does his mission with the utterance of his mouth, why did the malach that came to stop Bila’am have a sword in his hand?
- From where in parshas Balak do we learn the following rule? Hashem helps a person to go on a path that he wants to take.
- On Rosh Hashana we blow the תרועה “teruah” sound on the shofar. Find a word in parshas Balak with that root but a completely different meaning.
Ask Around Your Shabbos Table
In this week’s parsha, we see the incredible love that Hashem has for Klal Yisroel by turning Bila’am’s curse into a blessing.
Ask Around Your Table:
Why in the bracha before Shema (of Shacharis) do we say: הבוחר בעמו ישראל באהבה (Who chooses His nation Am Yisroel with love), and not simply: הבוחר בעמו ישראל?
Answer:Rav Yisroel of Rizhin quotes his father saying in the name of the Baal Shem Tov who answered this question with the following mashal:
One person goes to the market to buy fruits. When he looks at the fruits, he finds some defect in every fruit: “this one is missing a bit, this one is a bit rotten, etc.” Another person, however, goes to the same market and right away buys the fruits, even though they are not perfect, because he says about each fruit: “But on the other side it is perfect. How beautiful is this fruit...”
And that mashal explains “הבוחר בעמו ישראל באהבה” - Hashem chooses Am Yisroel with love even though Am Yisroel is not perfect, because Hashem looks only at the positive attributes of Am Yisroel. [ספר עירין קדישין, ליקותים, נושא תפילה ד‘“ה הבוחר]
