וְזֶה הַדָּבָר אֲשֶׁר תַּעֲשֶׂה לָהֶם לְקַדֵּשׁ אֹתָם לְכַהֵן לִי וגו' (כט, א)
And this is the thing that you shall do for them to sanctify them to serve Me as kohanim... (29:1)
The Power of Words of Prayer:
Sefer Bais Aharon says that the words “this is the thing” is reference to speech (the word “davar” can mean either “word” or “thing”). Accordingly, the verse is teaching us that when one’s words are used for good purposes, such as tefillah, they become holy and can have great effects in this world and in the Upper Realms, and the one who utters them becomes sanctified as well.
A Story About the Baal Shem Tov:
We can learn a lesson about the power of tefillah from the following story (related in Sefer Devarim Areivim, Ois 20):
During the times of the Baal Shem Tov zy”a there lived a Jewish man who resided in a small town and made his living from a little tavern that sold whiskey to the non-Jewish residents of the surrounding area and those passing through. Unfortunately, very few travelers passed by this remote area and he did not have many customers. Since he had little income, his children were often hungry. However, this Jew was full of emunah and temimus, and he never complained or expressed disappointment.
One day, the Besh”t called over several of his students and took them with him on a trip. They traveled until they came to the outskirts of this village, which was situated between numerous forests and empty fields. The Besh”t pointed the village out to them and said that they would spend the night there and receive a lot of money for tzedakah.
They headed straight to this Jew’s house, and found it bare and run-down. The students asked the man’s wife to prepare something for her guests, but all she had in the house was a small amount of bread that she was saving for her children. She took that bread and gave it to them.
When the man returned home and saw his guests, he didn’t know what to do. The Besh”t then turned to him and requested 18 gold coins for charity. He said, “I will not leave this house until you donate that sum.” The man said that he didn’t have a penny, so the Besh”t told him to pawn his pillows and blankets. Left with no other choice, the man did as he was told. He pawned all his possessions and gave the money to the Besh”t, who then departed along with his students.
The man and his family accompanied the group as they left, hoping that they would return the money, but the Besh”t rode away quickly. When the group of men was out of sight, the tavern owner and his family returned home hungry and bereft. The small children asked for bread, but there was none to give them. So they went to sleep hungry. The man got up to daven Minchah and Maariv, and he cried many tears as he begged Hashem to improve his situation. He then went to sleep as well.
In the middle of the night, a gentile banged on the window and screamed, “Moishke, give me some whiskey! I’m thirsty!” Not only did the tavernkeeper have no money, he also had no whiskey left. So he filled the barrel with water and poured some for the non-Jew. The customer began to highly praise the “whiskey”, exclaiming that he had never tasted anything so good in his life. The tavernkeeper laughed to himself but was happy that he had at least earned a bit of money and he would be able to buy bread for his children. However, to his dismay, the gentile said that he had no money and he would have to pay him later.
The tavern owner went back to sleep but the same thing occurred twice more that night. The same gentile knocked on his window and asked for whiskey, saying that he had no money now but he would pay him later.
After the third time of doing this, the non-Jew said, “I see that you are a good, honest man. I woke you up three times and didn’t pay you but you served me nicely anyway. Since I like you, I want to give you a coin that I found. I don’t know what it’s worth but you can take it to the moneychanger and see if it is enough to cover my bill. If it isn’t enough, you’ll let me know and I’ll pay the rest later.”
The tavernkeeper knew that the coin was worth quite a bit. He told the man that it would more than cover his bill and he could have some more whiskey to make up the difference. The man thanked the Jew for being so honest and said, “I have a lot of coins like this one in my house. I will give you them all if you give me whiskey whenever I come by.”
The tavernkeeper made a lot of money for this deal. He was able to build himself a mansion, and purchase fields, orchards, cows and chickens.
A Year later, the Besh”t returned with his students, who were amazed to see how well the tavernkeeper was living. The man came out to greet them with much honor and the Bech”t said to him, “You should know that all the wealth you have now was ready for you for several years. You only had to daven one Tefillas Minchah with a broken heart and it would have been given to you. But you never thought to do it until I came here and caused your heart to break. You then davened the tefillah that was answered.”
