5. When people try to recite kidush levanah, but clouds cover the moon, often they will come back out to check the sky a half-hour later. Perhaps the clouds parted. The Magid, Reb Moshe Weinbach Shlita, said that this is a hint to how we should understand a Yid. Sometimes, he seems to be covered over with clouds due to his aveiros, and we don't see his shine. But look at him a half-hour later. Maybe something has changed. Maybe now you will see his nekudah tovah, and the good that's within him will shine forth. There is definitely an incredible holy shine in every Yid, only sometimes we must look for it, and sometimes we have to wait until it shines forth.
The same can be said about how each person thinks about himself. He shouldn't think that he is distant from kedushah. He must recognize that there is a lot of kedushah within him. When he removes the "clouds" and seeks the shine of the neshamah, it will burst forth.
A story is told about Baron Rotchild. He once advertised that he was looking to hire an accountant. During the job interview, the Baron asked the first candidate, "How much is ten plus ten?" He replied twenty. The Baron doubled the numbers: "How much is twenty plus twenty?" "Forty," the man replied. "How much is forty plus forty?" "Eighty," the applicant replied. The Baron informed him that this job wasn’t for him. Several other candidates applied for the position, and the same scene repeated itself. The Baron asked the same questions, received the same answers, and rejected the candidates.
One person came for the interview. But before going to the Baron, he asked some of the Baron’s employees what had happened at the interviews of the others who came before him. He heard that the applicants were asked simple arithmetic questions. They answered correctly, but for some reason, the Baron didn't hire them.
When it was his turn for the interview, the Baron asked him, "How much is ten plus another ten?" The man placed his finger to his mouth to imply that he didn’t want to speak in a loud voice. He stood up and shut the windows. Then he returned to his seat, bent over, and whispered to the Baron, "How much do you want it to be?" The Baron hired him.
This is because the Baron wasn't looking for someone who knows math. He wouldn't need an accountant for that. He was looking for someone to help him grow his wealth, to be creative and innovative, to know how to achieve the desired results even when the reality was less than optimal.
There is a nimshal that we can learn from this story: It states (Mishlei 24:16) ָםוָק ַדִּיקצ ּוֹליִפ ַעֶבׁש כִּי. This means that a tzaddik will fall seven times, but in the end, he will pick himself up again.
Mathematically, this isn't a great record at all. He fell seven times more times than he picked himself up. However, one must know how to do the math. It isn't easy for a person to pick himself up again, after falling so many times. When he does, that one time is extremely valuable.
In other words, not everything is quantified with numbers. Quality and value are added to the equation. Therefore, a person should value himself, despite his faults, because the good he has may immensely outweigh his faults. Reb A. M. Rutner zt'l said that the pasuk cannot mean that the tzaddik fell seven times in a row because after he fell once and he is on the ground, how can he fall again? It must be that he fell and picked himself up. Then he fell again, and he picked himself up. After every time he fell, he raised himself up again, and this is why he deserves the title of "Tzaddik."
In parashas Shemos (ch.4), Hashem told Moshe to throw his staff, the אלקים מטה, to the ground, and it turned into a snake. Then Hashem told him to pick it up. It returned into a staff. Hashem said that he should perform the miracles, the ten makos, with this staff. I heard from a tzaddik of our generation that we see the greatness of a person who fell, and then rose again. We see it from the fact that initially the staff was called אלקים מטה, but after it fell and was raised, it became a staff with which miracles occurred.
