The way of the world is that when two people have a difference of opinion, then their difference of opinion also affects their relationship until sometimes it causes them to separate from one another, even if initially they loved one another. Their difference of opinion caused their separation, and they can no longer stand to be in the same vicinity with one another. But the way of the Torah is not like this. Aside from what our holy Torah teaches us to stay away from argument as we see in the previous parsha of Korach, the Torah teaches us the way of life, how we must conduct ourselves even if there is a difference of opinion.
We learn in Avos (5:17) ‘Any dispute that is for the sake of Heaven will endure, but one that is not for the sake of Heaven will not endure. What is a dispute that is for the sake of Heaven? The dispute between Hillel and Shamai. And what is a dispute that is not for the sake of Heaven? The dispute of Korach and his entire company.’ The Tanna teaches us that there is such a thing as a dispute for the sake of Heaven, but we must know how we must conduct ourselves in a dispute for the sake of Heaven.
The Gemara (Kiddushin 30b) expounds on the posuk (Tehillim 127:5), 'אשרי הגבר אשר מלא את אשפתו מהם לא יבושו כי ידברו את אויבים בשער' – ‘praiseworthy is the man who fills his quiver with them, they shall not be shamed, when they speak with enemies in the gate’. ‘What is the meaning of enemies in the gate? R’ Chiya bar Abba said, “Even a father and his son or a teacher and his student, who are studying Torah in one gate, at first become enemies with one another, but they do not move from there until they become devoted friends of one another, as it states (Bamidbar 21:14) 'את והב בסופה' – ‘that which was given at Yam Suf’. Do not read it ‘on the Red Sea’, but rather, ‘in the end’.’ Rashi there explains, ‘Become enemies – Neither one can accept the words of the other, and each tries to disprove the other.’
True, there are differences of opinions, and ‘one does not accept the words of the other’, and many times the dispute causes tension between them. But we must remember the words of the Gemara, ‘but they do not move from there until they become devoted friends of one another’. And if the Gemara says this about a dispute in learning Torah when we are allowed to disagree with one another, and still, at the end of the argument we are obligated to be devoted friends with one another. How much more so when we are not talking about a Torah dispute, and there is a difference of opinion, for ‘just as their appearances are different, so are their opinions different’ (Berachos 58a), but we must always remember the principle in the Gemara ‘they do not move from there until they become devoted friends of one another’.
-Tiv HaTorah - Chukas
