A Second Branch
Now, while we're on the job of וְהִצְדִּיקוּ אֶת הַצַּדִּיק we have to consider that there’s a second chapter in this program and that is to praise tzedek. We should praise Torah and mitzvos too; we should praise all forms of tzedek, of avodas Hashem. וְהִצְדִּיקוּ אֶת הַצַּדִּיק means that you have to open your mouth and speak highly of all the good things in this world.
It’s a separate chapter but it’s the same idea. Absolutely it’s included; it’s the will of Hakadosh Baruch Hu and a perfection of character to talk to people about how good it is to keep Yiddishkeit. Or how good it is to eat kosher food. Or how good it is when a couple lives b’kedusha v’teharah. There’s nothing like it in the world!
Talk to your friends, your family, and tell them how good it is that we are part of a nation that keeps all the issurei d’Rabanan that protect us from the pitfalls of the outside world! How good it is to follow the dinim of yichud! So many people – even decent people – have ruined their lives because of entanglements but the frummeh, we are saved from that because of the laws of the Sages.
Sweet Torah, Geshmakeh Davenen
How good it is to do mitzvos! How good learning Torah is! A line of Gemara! Ah, to learn a piece of Gemara, the shakla v’tarya and to know it, to be able to say it outside, there’s nothing better in the world, nothing sweeter.
Speak about how good it is to daven with kavanah. Say, “Last night I davened such a good Ma’ariv! Ah! A mechayeh, a pleasure to daven with kavanah!” People will hear that and remember it forever.
When I was eleven years old I was once walking in the street with two European Jews, old-time European Jews. So one of them said to me as follows. He said, “When I was in Europe when they came out of the shul after Maariv, so they used to say, “Ahh, ich hub gedavent ah geshmaken Maariv.” He rubbed his hands together. “Ahh, it was a pleasure, that Maariv.”
I can't forget that; it was more than sixty years ago; at least sixty-five years ago and I remember it like today. He said, “Ah, a geshmake Maariv I davened.” That man raised up in my mind the ideal of davening. Davening? A pleasure? Yes. It’s a pleasure to daven Maariv.
Righting the Upside Down World
It’s our function in the world to speak up about what’s right, what’s tzedek, that it’s right, that it’s good. Especially today when הוֹי הָאֹמְרִים לָרַע טוֹב וְלַטוֹב רָע – Alas for those who speak about good things as if they are not good, and the things that are not good, they say that they are good (Yeshaya 4:20). It’s an upside-down world! So who’s going to speak up for tzedek? Mayor Koch? Mayor Koch speaks up only for the opposite of tzedek.
And so this mitzvah comes and tells us that it’s up to us. We’re obligated to speak good words about Torah living. That’s what it means tzedek; doing mitzvos, learning Torah, yiras Hashem, ahavas Hashem, middos tovos. Jewish homes! Yeshivahs, Beis Yaakovs! That’s the biggest tzedek there is and we have to let the world know. We are the ones chosen to be propagandists for the Torah.
