Parshas Vayishlach always reminds me of something that once happened to me when I was sitting in a car, stuck in traffic with one of my talmidim. He told me that he was once in a similar situation with a rebbe that made a certain waving motion with his hand and few moments later the traffic dissipated. I said, ‘Let’s try it. It can’t hurt’ and so we waved our hands all over the place and, low and behold, it worked! The traffic dispersed.
I don’t know the source for this hand-waving but what I do know is the idea of Kfitzas Haderech. This is mentioned in our holy books and mainly works with permutations of letters based on verses in the Torah. For example, let’s take the letters of the first 4 words Es Hashamayim V’es Haaretz. When a person meditates on them with the proper intent and kedusha it can help him reach his destination much quicker. Why is this significant today when most of us reply on the help of Waze to get us to wherever we want to go?
The answer is that the very act of meditating on the letters of the Torah helps us to reach even a small appreciation of the entire Torah, the precious gift that we received 3330 years ago. As the Or Hachayim writes in Parshas Bechukosai, only when Mashiach comes will we really understand how incredible the Torah is. In his words, we will go meshugah over the Torah.
Another example of the power hidden in the Torah is expressed by the Chafetz Chayim z”l who explains the logic behind the concept of ain mukdam in the Torah. It seems very strange that scattered throughout the holy Torah there are paragraphs that are out of chronological order. The Chafetz Chaim explains this based on the Yalkut Shimoni where it is written writes that the Torah is so powerful that when a person learns it he can have the potential of techiyat hametim. This is, of course, a dangerous power for just anyone to possess and therefore Hashem mixed up the order somewhat so when someone is learning, he/she can’t easily access this force.
Additionally, there are several verses in Mishlei that express the idea of how the Torah can provide healing to one’s flesh since its spiritual power has a direct effect on our physical existence- both our body and the world at large. It is worth seeking out these passages.
by Rabbi Daniel Coren
