10. The Sfas Emes (Vayishlach 5640) writes, "With a person's hislahavus for Torah and avodah, he sends arrows of fire to the enemies of Bnei Yisrael." The Gemara (Brachos 32b) states, "From when the Beis HaMikdash was destroyed, a partition made of iron separates Bnei Yisrael from their father in heaven." We have to tear down this wall, but how? Reb Chaim Alter Panet, zt'l, in his sefer חיים אשישות answers that Chazal teach us that fire can breach strong iron. So, with the fire of hislahavus, we can remove the barrier that separates us from our Father in heaven.
The Kedushas Levi writes that when a person sins, chas v'shalom, he makes a pgam, blemish, above, and it gives strength to the Sitra Achara. This is the meaning of the pasuk (Vayikra 21:9) לִזְנוֹת תֵחֵל כִּי כֹּהֵן אִישׁ וּבַת, if a person begins performing aveiros, chalilah, ַלֶּלֶתמְח הִיא אָבִיהָ אֶת, she brings disgrace to her father in heaven. The solution is ֵףת ִּשָּׂר ׁבָּאֵש. "Through the hislahavus that one has afterwards while serving Hashem, all the kelipos will burn up."
11. The Gemara (Yoma 29a) says, מעבירה קשים עבירה הרהורי, "Thinking about an aveirah is worse than performing the aveirah itself." Sfas Emes (Ha'azinu 5634) makes a kal v'chomer. If thinking about an aveirah is worse than performing an aveirah, we can deduce that thinking and yearning to perform a mitzvah is greater than performing the mitzvah itself!
12. Tzaddikim taught that in these generations, we have become weak and are unable to fast too much. But we don't have to worry. Hashem arranges other tikunim and rectifications to purify us from all our aveiros.
that surround him melt like wax. It will be as it states (Ovadyah 1:18) יוֹסֵף וּב ֵית ׁאֵש יַע ֲקֹב בֵית וְה ָיָה ׁלְקַש עֵשָׂו וּב ֵית לֶהָבָה, "The house of Yaakov shall be fire and the house of Yosef a flame, and the house of Esav shall become stubble, and they shall ignite them and consume them..."
As we wrote, the nation had to purify the cooking and food utensils they took from Midyan. Three forms of purification are mentioned in this section in the Torah (see 31:21-24). They are (1) mikvah, (2) הגעלה, purging in boiling water, and (3) ליבון, purifying and sterilizing with fire. The Or HaChaim Hakadosh zy'a (Rishon l'Tzion on Mishlei 2:7) writes that these three forms of purifications correspond to the teshuvah we need for the three categories of aveiros. Some aveiros need mikvah, some need a concept similar to הגעלה, and some need the concept of ליבון, fire.
For example, the Or HaChaim HaKadosh writes, "Tevilah in a mikvah of forty sa'ah will help for bad thoughts, which one shouldn't have thought about. He must immerse himself in forty sa'ah, and that will remove the thought." For non-kosher foods, he says that the cure and teshuvah is הגעלה, which he explains means to fast. "Because with the fast, his entire body becomes hot, he sweats, and that pushes out the issur (the forbidden foods that he ate)..."
We will now discuss ליבון, which generally means to purify with fire. The Or HaChaim writes, "Anger, and not believing in the words of Chazal, are among the aveiros that are performed with fire... The cure is ליבון, which means to study Torah constantly, with toil, because Torah is fire. With the fire of Torah, he will remove the forbidden aveirah that became soaked up into his body, due to his aveirah."
It states in Shemonah Esrei, in the tefillah of נחם that we say on Tisha b'Av: באש 'ה אתה כי לבנותה עתיד אתה ובאש הצתה. This means the Beis HaMikdash will be rebuilt with fire. We can explain that the Beis HaMikdash will be rebuilt with the fire of yearning for Hashem that is in the hearts of all Yidden.
Zera Kodesh (Vayeitzei ויצא ה"ד) writes, "(Tehillim 147:2) 'ה ָׁל ִַםיְרוּש בּוֹנֵה "Hashem is the builder of Yerushalayim." It is written in the present tense because Hakadosh Baruch Hu is constantly building the Beis HaMikdash with the good deeds we do. As it states ובנה בימינו בקרוב אותה, that with ימינו, our days, the Beis HaMikdash is being built, every day. With the mitzvos we perform daily, the Beis HaMikdash is being built up, every day, a little more, until it is entirely built, through our noble deeds in galus."
Building and Destroying the Beis HaMikdash
13. Just as mitzvos build the Beis HaMikdash, we understand that aveiros, chalilah, prevent and disrupt the building of the Beis HaMikdash, chalilah. The Yerushalmi (Yoma 1:1) states, בימיו המקדש בית נבנה שלא דור כל בימיו נחרב כאילו, "Every generation, that the Beis HaMikdash wasn't built in their days, it is as though it was destroyed in their days." We can explain this in the manner that the Ropshitzer Rav explained the words, בימינו בקרוב אותה ובנה, that the Beis HaMikdash is built בימינו, with our days. Similarly, we say that if the Beis HaMikdash wasn't built בימיו, with the mitzvos he performed in his lifetime, נחרב כאילו, it is like it was destroyed, בימיו, due to what he did with his days.
The Wisdom of the Chachamim
14. In a drashah, someone described how foolish people are when they think they are wiser than the chachamim. He said: "Imagine someone enters a beis medresh and sees on the wall a large sign, a קורא קול, declaring that from now on, it is forbidden to eat chicken with milk, as a safeguard to protect people from eating cattle meat with milk, which is a Torah prohibition. The person reading the announcement says in a loud voice and a mocking tone, 'Did you see what they wrote here? I don't know what the rav knows and what the rav doesn't know, but one thing I do know.
