If you go in My edicts. (Vayikra 26:3)
Perhaps this means mitzvah observance? When it says, “And you will keep My mitzvos,” we see that mitzvah observance is already stated. So what does “If you go in My edicts” mean? That you should toil in Torah study. (Rashi)
Keep Learning
The mitzvah of Torah learning is different from all other mitzvos in regards to its obligation. Each mitzvah has a certain time allotted to it, in which we are to fulfill that mitzvah. Tefillin is at daytime, lulav is during Sukkos, tzitzis is on a daytime garment, and so forth. The time for Torah study, however, is whenever a person is able to learn, as the Rambam writes:
Every Jewish man is obligated to study Torah, whether he is poor or rich, healthy or in pain.... Among the great sages of the Jewish people were those who chopped wood or drew water for a living, and among them were blind people, and they still occupied themselves with Torah study day and night.... Until when is a person obligated to study Torah? Until the day of his death....
A couple of chapters later the Rambam describes in detail the great obligation to learn Torah and the great virtue of one who learns regularly, and the extent to which a person needs to minimize involvement with worldly business and pleasures in order to merit the crown of Torah:
Someone whose heart moves him to fulfill this mitzvah properly and to merit the crown of Torah should not divert his mind to other matters... rather you should make your Torah to be your regular pursuit and your work secondary. You should not say, “When I have free time, I will learn,” maybe you won’t have free time.... Chazal exhorted, “Minimize your business activities and engage in Torah learning.” Words of Torah are compared to water, as it says... similarly, words of Torah are not found in those of haughty heart.... A person should work every day a little, as much as he needs to live, if he doesn’t have food to eat, and the rest of the day and night he should occupy himself with Torah study....
The Mishnah emphasizes how important it is not to interrupt one’s learning, even when traveling :
Someone who is walking on the road and reviewing the teachings he has learned, and interrupts his learning to say, “What a beautiful tree this is, what a beautiful field this is,” Scripture considers it as if he is liable for the death penalty.
Anyone who looks at what Chazal and later sources wrote will see how greatly they emphasized the obligation to learn Torah and not to interrupt the learning.
The Torah was originally given to the Dor De’ah, the sublime generation that stood at Sinai and attained the level of prophecy. It was Yehoshua bin Nun who was commanded, והגית בו יומם ולילה – “You shall study it day and night,” and was exhorted, רק חזק ואמץ – “Only be strong and fortify yourself.”
Chazal taught that just as the reward for Torah study is equal to the reward for all the mitzvos put together, so the punishment for neglect of Torah study is equal to the punishment for all the mitzvos put together. This means that neglecting Torah study for one moment is worse that all the aveiros in the Torah. One who smokes on Shabbos or eats all the forbidden foods is better off than one who neglects Torah learning.
Amazingly enough, even though all this was written thousands of years ago and was addressed to the Dor De’ah, we in this lowly generation are expected to fulfill the same command. It is the same Torah. It’s hard to understand this, but it’s a fact. We are responsible for all this, like they were.
This brings us to the big question: how in the world can I manage to do this? How can fulfill my obligation to toil in Torah learning?
Make It Sweet
The answer to this question is to be found in Birkas Hatorah, the blessing recited over Torah learning. Let’s look at this blessing. The first part says אשר קדשנו במצותיו וצונו לעסוק בדברי תורה – “He sanctified us with His commandments and commanded us to engage in Torah study.”
This is where all the questions arise. What, me, I am commanded to do this? Learn diligently day and night without interruption?? How can I possibly fulfill this command, practically speaking?
The answer is in the very next line of the blessing : והערב נא ה’ אלוקינו – “Please, Hashem our G-d, make it sweet!” This is in fact a prayer, but it is also the answer to the question.
“Please, Hashem our G-d, make it sweet!” is a special prayer that Torah learning should be sweet and pleasant in our mouths. It is a request to be granted the capability to learn Torah. It is written: ושמחת בכל הטוב אשר נתן לך ה’ אלקיך – You shall be happy with all the good that Hashem, your G-d gave you.
On this verse the Ohr Hachayim wrote his famous words:
If people would sense the sweetness and pleasantness of the Torah’s goodness, they would run after it like crazy and would not consider a whole world full of silver and gold to be worth anything.
The Chazon Ish wrote something similar:
The marriage match between the wisdom and the person cannot be made without longing and appetite. The words of Torah are beloved. The power of affection opens the brain and the heart to swallow wisdom, understanding and knowledge. “It was said about R. Yochanan, ‘If a person would give all the wealth of his household for the love’ that R. Yochanan loved the Torah, ‘he would be scorned.’”
When a person loves Torah, this will bring him to learn constantly, and it will also cause him to properly absorb what he learns. It is written: ךֶרָבְּח דַּכְׁשֶא אֹע לָׁשֲעַּתְׁשֶיךָ אֶתֹּקֻחְּב — I will take pleasure in Your laws; I will not forget Your words.
The Radak interprets as follows:
When I think about words of Torah, I take pleasure in them. Therefore I will not forget them, because they bring me happiness and joy.
Enjoying learning causes us to remember what we learned. And the Radak says also the opposite is true: if a person feels that learning is a burden, in the end he won’t be able to learn.
The Vilna Gaon was able to learn with tremendous constancy for hours upon hours. We get tired after learning a daf Gemara for half an hour. Why? Because learning is not sweet to us like it was to him. That’s why we experience it to be hard and tiring. The only solution is to get to a place where learning Torah is sweet and pleasant.
It’s easy to pick up a newspaper or a book with stories about tzaddikim and start to read and get absorbed in something interesting and not even notice the time passing by. Similarly, it’s easy to go through hours with a candy in one’s mouth and not get tired of sucking on it. But the Torah is different. It is bitter in the beginning and sweet in the end.
Emunah in Hashem, and truly recognizing that Torah learning attaches a person to Hakadosh Baruch Hu, brought the Gedolei Torah throughout the generations to have a zest for Torah and to taste tremendous sweetness in every word they learned. This sweetness enabled them to learn with such great hasmadah.
How to Make It Sweet?
It says in Mishlei: רַל מָּה כָבֵעְ רׁשֶפֶנְת וֶפֹס נּבוָּה תָעֵבְׂ שׁשֶפֶ נ קֹתוָמ — A satiated soul will trample on honey, and for a hungry soul, everything bitter will be sweet.
The Vilna Gaon interprets as follows:
When a person has no desire for Torah learning, he doesn’t taste its sweetness, and then he will “trample on honey.” But when his soul is hungry, when it desires and longs for Torah study, even “everything bitter will be sweet” because he toiled greatly over it and exerted himself for it.
Here we see that putting sweat and effort into Torah learning brings a person to feel tremendous longing for Torah, to the point that even the bitter becomes sweet. Then the pleasantness he experiences becomes a wondrous tool to increase his hasmadah.
A wise person once told me about a relative of his who, after the Shabbos evening meal, sits down and learns with great hasmadah until morning. When asked how he manages to do this, he answered that at first, it’s hard, but afterward the difficulty goes away and the learning becomes enjoyable and sweet.
The hasmadah makes it pleasant, and the pleasantness increases the hasmadah, and it just keeps growing and growing. It says in the Gemara:
R. Zeira said, and some say it was R. Chinena bar Papa: Come and see how the way of Hakadosh Baruch Hu is not like the way of human beings. The way of human beings is that you can put something into an empty receptacle, and you can’t put something into a full receptacle. But Hakadosh Baruch Hu is not like that. For Him, you can put something into a full receptacle, and you can’t put something into an empty receptacle, as it says, אם והיה תשמע שמוע – “If you heard [i.e., learned] you will hear [i.e., learn more] and if not, you won’t hear.”
Rashi explains as follows:
If you learned once, in the end you will lend your ear another time. If you learned something old, i.e., you reviewed again and again what you learned last year, you will learn something new. And if you turn your heart away, you will not learn anymore.
Learning with constancy makes the learning enjoyable, and makes a person want to learn more and more, with more and more constancy.
I was fortunate to know R. Nachum Lassman, who was a tzaddik and a great talmid chacham. Once he needed to stay with a certain Jew in order to attend to an urgent matter. He traveled to the Jew’s house but did not find him at home. So what did he do? He went to the beis midrash and learned there until morning.
There are people who sit and learn until morning, but it’s not like the story about R. Nachum. Other people, when they stay up all night to learn, they planned it out in advance. But he originally had no intention of learning all night. For him it was the natural and obvious thing to do in such a situation.
Staying up all night to learn like that might be a very lofty level, but it’s all a matter of habit. You simply need to get used to being absorbed in learning, thinking in learning, not spending time idly. Eventually you will feel a most amazing pleasure and love of Torah.
