The Shulchan Aruch (Y.D. 81) rules that a Jewish baby should not nurse from a non-Jewish woman if a Jewish woman is available because the milk of a gentile will cause his heart to become impure (מטמטם את הלב). The Vilna Gaon zt”l says in the name of the Rashba that this halachah is learned out from Moshe Rabbeinu, who refused to nurse from an Egyptian woman because in the future he would speak with the Shechinah!
R’ Yaakov Kamenetzky zt”l asks: How can this halachah apply to all Jewish children if the reason it is forbidden is that Moshe Rabbeinu was a holy child who would later speak face to face with Hashem? Wasn’t Moshe different? He answers that from here we learn out a tremendous lesson in chinuch. Indeed, EVERY Jewish child has the potential to talk to the Shechinah! Every aspect of his upbringing and education should be with the mindset that he can and will one day speak to the Shechinah! Who knows, maybe it will be YOUR child who will be the Moshiach! If we always carry this thought in the back of our minds, we will raise our children differently. If we believe that our children are special and holy, we will make every effort to ensure they are sheltered from even the slightest exposure to impurity.
We are living in a world of טומאה. We are surrounded by immorality, indecency, and impropriety. In a split second, with the click of a button, one can fall to the lowest level of impurity. It is a scary world, and the most frightening part is that our children know more than we do! We can hardly attempt to shelter them from dangers that we ourselves are unaware of. We need to see our children as holy, and we need to instill in them a desire to remain pure.
We can do this only if we ourselves truly believe in them. Only if we project to them our belief in their potential for greatness will they wish to achieve it. We MUST do whatever we can to protect the purity of our children because they just might be the ones chosen to speak to the Shechinah!
TORAH TAVLIN
