Part II. Weapons Training
Spirit of The Law
I’ll mention one example just as an illustration. In the Torah there’s a requirement that on the doorways in a Jewish house there must be a mezuzah – a Jewish homeowner is obligated min hatorah to inscribe on a piece of parchment two parshiyos of the Torah and place it on his doorpost.
Now, it’s true that when a person puts up a mezuzah and then forgets all about it, he’s fulfilled the requirement of the Torah – he has discharged his obligation and the beis din cannot step in and chastise him or even criticize him. The Torah was given to a multitude, to all types of Jews, and not everybody has the intelligence; not everybody is capable of more than the basic requirement and so as long as someone is willing to keep the laws of the Torah, we can’t demand much more of him.
But the truth is that putting up the mezuzah is a very minor achievement in comparison to what the mezuzah actually must do. And if a man sinks to the lowest level and is satisfied with a mechanical observance, then even though he might be fulfilling the mitzvah, he is certainly transgressing the purpose of the Torah. He’s forgetting that the purpose of the mitzvah is to be a testimony – to make us think of the contents of the mezuzah.
Mezuzah Meanings
Because the Torah says, you should put these words of Mine, upon your hearts, and upon your souls ... and you should write them on the doorposts of your homes (Devarim 11:20). It means that’s why we put mezuzahs on our doorways – in order to put these principles on our hearts and on our souls. So we see that the mezuzah is given for a purpose – what Hakodosh Boruch Hu wants is that we should put these ideas into our minds.
The mezuzah reminds us at all times, every time we go in and out, that we should never forget who we are. As a Jew walks into his house, he’s not walking into an Irish house. He’s walking into a holy house and his behavior has to be different than an Irishman. And when he walks out, the mezuzah is reminding him, “On the street you’re still a Jew. You’re carrying the Torah of Hashem in your heart wherever you go.”
Spouses Armed for Battle
Here's a man coming back from work; he’s walking up to the door of his home and his nerves are ragged. Inside the house his wife has been dealing with little children all day long and her nerves are more jangled than his. And in one minute they're going to have an encounter. And so he stops at the mezuzah for a moment and thinks, “Hashem echad.” Oh! That’s a man who knows how to use a mitzvah! He walks inside with the mezuzah in his mind and he saves the evening.
His wife too; as she is going to open the door for him she passes by the mezuzah – there's a mezuzah in the kitchen and she looks at it and reminds herself of its purpose. And so both of them are armed now. They have weapons for this great battle, the milchamah chazakah, of remembering their function in the world at all times.
Isn’t it a remarkable thing that people can live their entire lives without realizing what the mezuzah is saying? Isn’t it a waste when we go in and out, in and out all day long and we ignore that great expedient? Even if you’re sitting in your house, you can make use of that weapon. From time to time, look at the mezuzah and arm yourself. When you’re eating, look at the mezuzah for a minute. You’re sitting on the couch, take a look at the mezuzah. The mezuzah is not for the doorpost – it’s for you! And the more you take it from the door and put it into your head, the more successful you are.
Testimonies of Shabbos
We’ll take another example – it’s not our subject yet, but it will illustrate more clearly what the purpose of the mitzvos eiduyos are and how they’re expected to be used.
Shabbos! Ahh! Shabbos is full of testimonies. Every melacha you can’t do, that’s a testimony. Every time you pass a light switch and you don’t turn it on, you’re reminding yourself that on Shabbos, Hashem rested from Creation. Bigdei Shabbos is a testimony. The neiros, the kos shel kiddush, it’s all testimonies. Isn't it a pity that they’re not being used?
As you come to the Shabbos table and you see the two challos – there's a white cloth on top of the challos and a white tablecloth underneath the challos, exactly like the mann which rested between two layers of pure white dew. Don't do it mitzvas anashim melumadah, out of habit. They’re there for a purpose; so you should think about the mann.
Don't just go into the table without thinking of this symbolism. Remind yourself, it’s two challos; lechem mishneh, the double portion that fell down on erev shabbos. There are so many great lessons that the mann teaches us – we’ll talk about them one day – and that’s why we make sure that every meal we eat on Shabbos has double bread. You sit down to the seudah with two breads because it’s supposed to be putting lessons into your head always.
Tefillin Testimonies
Now, we’re just beginning the subject because the testimonies of the Torah are endless. I’ll take out a minute to add a few more to give you a hint of what’s in store for those who are able to look and discover.
Tefillin! The pessukim tell us clearly that tefillin are intended to remind us that Hashem took us out of Mitzrayim and that we are His from now on. From that day onwards, we have to keep the words of His Torah in our mouths constantly out of gratitude to Him. At least the moment that you put it on, think of this lesson. Of course, there’s no harm in thinking of the tefillin later on too, especially when you are saying kriyas shema.
But it’s not limited to those few minutes a day. Whenever you see a pair of tefillin, a tefillin bag, you will always be reminded of what the tefillin is supposed to tell you. Not only men – women too. You see your husband or your son taking his tefillin and rushing out to shul, remind yourself what it’s all about.
Pesach and Sukkos
The matzah, the marror, the pesachdige dishes – there’s so much to think about. The matzah has to be utilized. Very good, that the matzah is baked with such carefulness, with hashgocha, with such dikdukei mitzvah. Wonderful! But now that it's all done, what's the matzah all about? The matzah is lying on the table, as an eidus, to remind us to think about certain principles.
When you go in the sukkah, it’s reminding you of something. Aaah, what a beautiful sukkah! You put a lot of work into the sukkah and you asked shailos of your local rov; is this schach kosher? Is that wall kosher? Everything was good and now you and your family are sitting around the table in the sukkah and you even have beautiful ornaments hanging. It’s beautiful! But what’s it all about? What's the sukkah all about? It says it straight out in the Torah – the sukkah is to remind us of the nissim that Hakodosh Boruch Hu did for us in the midbar. You never thought about that? Ooh, that's a pity. Make sure next Sukkos you think about that. Every time you go into the sukkah your mind is becoming a different mind altogether. That’s the purpose of the mitzvah; that’s how the mitzvah becomes a weapon in the hands of a Jew – by changing your personality, by transforming your mind.
The Hidden Torah
We’re talking now about a specific chelek of the Torah – we are going to call it the pnimiyus haTorah, the inside of the Torah. I know there are others elsewhere who would say that something else is pnimiyus haTorah but that’s not going to be a subject of discussion here; for our purposes we’re going to speak about the inner realm of the Torah as expressed in the mitzvos eiduyos.
There was once a big tendency in our nation to ponder the reasons for the mitzvos. Of course the ones whose reasons are apparent or seem easy to surmise were studied at length but even other mitzvos which we call chukim because they seem to be cryptic commandments with no purpose behind them, even they were studied. Just to cite one instance, if you study the Rambam’s seforim you’ll see that he made plenty of attempts to take the mystery out of the chukim – he tried to understand their significance in a most practical way.
But when it comes to the mitzvos eiduyos, there’s no question they were studied for their significance – throughout our history there were always people in our nation who wanted to benefit not only by doing the mitzvos, but they wanted to get the inner lessons of the Torah, the hidden realm. “It’s not enough to do the mitzvos superficially,” they said. And therefore, they spent time studying all of these lessons.
Overdoing It
And make no mistake about it – it’s a very very important subject; it’s what Hakodosh Boruch Hu wants most from the mitzvos. Only what happened? Some people overdid it. There were philosophers, thinkers, who were so intent in preaching this lesson to the multitude that sometimes because of their enthusiasm, they overstressed the pnimiyus, the inside of the mitzvah, and some of their listeners began to think that if the purpose of the mitzvah was to teach a certain attitude, a certain ideal, then we could dispense with the outward acts of the commandment. Some people began to say, “Why should we buy parchment and hire a scribe to write the parshiyos – it can be quite expensive after all – the main thing is the pnimiyus.”
It was an argument that some people made, and therefore, there were those who began to neglect the mitzvah – there arose a certain tendency among a small number of people that the act is not so important and that we could dispense with the mitzvah itself.
Neglecting the Hidden Torah
Let’s say mezuzah for example. They said that if the purpose is stated openly in the Torah, to remember Hashem, so as long as we give every day a half hour of thinking about the lesson that Hashem echad and that He’s watching, that’s better than having a mezuzah and never once thinking about Hashem. Why suffice with the shell, the outer layer, when the real purpose is the fruit? That was their argument.
The truth is, it’s a very big error. It’s an error for many reasons but one of the most important ones is that it’s the system of the Torah to provide certain physical objects to act as reminders; to testify to certain great principles. And Hakodosh Boruch Hu wants us to utilize those objects because when you train yourself to attach certain ideals to an object, He knows that’s how you best inscribe the principles into your personality – like I said earlier, the one who made the battle knows best how to be victorious.
