And Hashem brought us forth out of Egypt with a mighty hand, and with an outstretched arm, and with great terror, and with signs, and with wonders.
Hashem helps us fight the Yetzer Hara with the Torah.
In the past, we quoted the first half of the Ohr Hachaim for this week’s parsha. He explains the person bringing bikurim to Hashem as a mashal for a person at the time of his departure from this world. When a person dies, his soul ascends, giving Hashem a detailed report of how he lived in this world, with its trials and tribulations. He tells Hashem that the Mitzrim – referring to the Yetzer Hara, made us suffer. They place pressures on our lives that prevent us from focusing on our true purpose and distract us from our goals. The yetzer hara also brings us false reports and convinces us to see things from a warped perspective. The solution to this problem is davening to Hashem to protect us from the snares and wiles of the evil inclination, and He provides the solution.
וַיּוֹצִאֵנוּ ה' מִמִצְרַיִם בְיָד חֲזָקָה - Hashem then brought us forth out of Mitzrayim with a mighty hand. The Ohr Hachaim explains this to be teaching us Hashem’s ways and methods of saving us from the terrible fight the yetzer hara puts up. The Gemara (Sukkah 52b) writes that a person’s evil inclination constantly adds strength and fights us. We become weaker, and it would be impossible for us to fight this evil inclination without Hashem’s assistance.
צוֹפֶה רָשָע לַצַדִיק וּמְבַקֵש לַהֲמִיתוֹ – the wicked watch out for the righteous one, attempting to slay him. The Gemara says that this refers to the evil inclination, who is constantly attempting to ensnare the righteous people into the death trap of an aveira. Nobody would be able to withstand this onslaught without divine assistance.
The first tool He gave us to fight the yetzer hara is the יָד חֲזָקָה – the mighty hand. This refers to the Torah. The Gemara (Kidushin 30b) tells us that Hashem tells Klal Yisroel, “I have created the evil inclination, but the Torah is a spice that ameliorates its effect.” Without Torah, nobody can fight his evil inclination. When a person is devoted to the study of Torah, his life is in his hands. Hashem is constantly with him, assisting him when the yetzer hara attacks him. When the yetzer hara has an aveira for him to do, his devotion to Torah will elevate him above the base desires that are awakened in him.
This seems to be true on a psychological level too, although the Ohr Hachaim does not make this point. When a person spends time each day focusing on his obligations to Hashem, delving into the minutiae of Halacha and the seemingly slight differences in nuance between similar matters, he internalizes the importance of Torah and its laws. Even after he has closed his Gemara, his personality has changed, and he is more likely to take each Halacha seriously and ignore the wiles of the yetzer hara. Additionally, many of the tricks of the yetzer hara are based on seriously warped ideas. The yetzer hara attempts to convince a person of many distorted concepts and strange ideas to cause him to do an aveira. After a person has spent some time working his brain, focused on the sevaros and concepts of Shas, his mind is straightened out. Many of the tricks in the arsenal of the yetzer hara have been rendered useless through the straight logic of the one who toils in Torah.
