Rebbetzin Heshelis, the
author of The Moon's Lost Light ,offers this exploration of the fact that the
Torah does not completely prohibit slavery, although it has laws regarding the
proper treatment of Jewish and non-Jewish slaves. I cannot say her explanation
will satisfy everyone, but it is a brave effort to tackle a subject which is
difficult especially to modern people. This is a continuation of a series she started here.
Rebbetzin Devorah Heshelis
A
continuation of "on slavery"…
Our
next encounter with slavery in the Torah, is the slavery of the entire Jewish
People. Here we see the evil, cruelty and injustice that we generally ascribe
to slavery. We know that this slavery was basic to Hashem's plan for the
development of the Jewish People because Hashem informed Avraham Avinu in the
bris
bein habsorim (covenant between the parts) that his children would be
enslaved and afflicted in a land which was not theirs. From the context of that
prophecy, it seems that the enslavement of the Jewish People was a necessary
prerequisite to inheriting the
land
of Israel. But why would
Hashem, who is only good, make suffering a prerequisite to inheriting the land?
Before
answering this, let us look at the introductory passage to Pirkei Avos. This
passage states: "All of Israel have a share in the world to come, as it
says, "And your nation are all tsaddikim, forever they will inherit the
land, the branch of My orchard, the work of my hands, to be proud of."
This
is certainly very comforting, but are all of the Jewish People really tsadikim?
And if this is assured, then where is free will? And why is the assurance that they will
forever inherit the land (of Israel)
proof that they all have a share in the world to come? Is there an intrinsic connection
between being tsaddikim, inheriting the land of Israel,
and having a place in the world to come?
The
answer, of course, is yes. Chazal tell us that three great presents were given
to the Jewish People, which are acquired only through suffering. They are: the
world to come, the Torah, and the land
of Israel. These three
gifts are all connected and are actually different aspects of the same thing; our
connection with the Shchina.
Chazal
say that olam habo – the world to come - is the place where "tsadikkim sit
with crowns on their heads and enjoy the the shine of the Shchina". Chassidus says that in olam habo we actually
unite with the Shchina. This is the greatest pleasure that exists and is the
ultimate purpose of our creation.
(The
term olam habo as used here, is not referring to the soul's temporary enjoyment
of Gan Eden which takes place after a person's death. It is referring to the
ultimate olam habo which the entire Jewish People experience after the revival
of the dead, and the great Day of Judgment.)
And
there is an intrinsic connection between olam habo and Eretz Yisrael, because
Eretz Yisrael is the Shchina's place in this world. Because of this connection,
Chazal said that "Anyone who lives in Eretz Yisrael it is as if he has a
G-d, and anyone who lives outside of Eretz Yisrael it is as if he has no G-d",
for living in Eretz Yisrael means being directly attached to the Shchina. Furthermore
the nefesh (lower soul) of every Jew comes from Eretz Yisrael, even if that Jew
was never physically present in Eretz Yisrael. This is because the lower
Shchina is the essence of Eretz Yisrael and every Jew's nefesh comes from the
lower Shchina. If we forever inherit the land of Israel
this means that we forever have a connection with the Shchina, which means that
we are assured a place in olam habo.
(The
fact that we do not always feel the presence of the Shchina in Eretz Yisrael is
because there are klipos - impure, hard barriers - both surrounding our hearts
and covering up the inherent holiness of Eretz Yisrael. Nevertheless, even now,
despite the presence of the klipos, we see Hashem's clear hashgacha in a way
which is rarely seen outside of Eretz Yisrael. Outside of Eretz Yisrael is it
very rare for people who are not tsaddikim (according to our terms) to
experience miracles. In Eretz Yisrael the entire country has again and again
experienced miracles, especially during the wars, may Hashem continue to
protect us and show us His presence.)
And
there is also an intrinsic connection with the Torah, because the Torah is the
means through which we become tsaddikim, so that we can be attached to the
Shchina. Hashem told us very clearly and very strongly that our presence in
Eretz Yisrael is dependent upon our keeping the Torah.
But
what happens if the Jews do not keep the Torah? How, then, will they have an
eternal connection with Eretz Yisrael? This was Avraham Avinu's question when
he asked, "ba'meh eidah ki irashena" – with what will I know that I
will inherit it? The answer Hashem gave him was: exile. If the Jewish people
sin they will go into exile, but they will never lose their intrinsic
connection with Eretz Yisrael, and when the sins are atoned for, they will
return.
But
why are all of am Yisrael tsaddikim, even though they sometimes don't keep the
Torah? And if they are, then where is free will?
All
the Jewish souls, including those who were as yet unborn, agreed to accept the
Torah of their own free will. This was especially great because the Jewish People
signed an unread contract, not knowing what Hashem would require of them. They
did this simply out of their love and belief in Him, their desire to do His
wishes, and to be His people. Their acceptance of the Torah made them
tsaddikim, and assured them of a share in olam habo. This applies to true
converts as well, who agree to keep the Torah, come what may.
(Most
commentaries add that one's share in olam habo can be lost through especially
severe breaches of the Torah, but Chassidus says that if a Jew loses his share
in olam habo in one lifetime, Hashem will bring him back again and again until
he regains it. The merit of sincerely accepting the Torah lasts forever. By
accepting the Torah we received a Jewish soul which is a "chelek Elokah
mima'al, a part of Hashem above, and as so, is never lost. This is true of a
sincere convert as well.)
So
now we see the connection between Torah, Eretz Yisrael and olam habo. Through
accepting the Torah we acquired an eternal connection to the Shchina which is
the essence of both Eretz Yisrael and olam habo.
But
why must these three great presents be acquired only through suffering?
Hashem's
plan for creation was to give goodness and pleasure to His creatures. But He
wanted them to do something to deserve this awesome goodness, for in the world
of truth, if one receives great gifts without earning them one can never fully
enjoy them. Chazal explain that one who receives free bread is embarrassed to
look at the face of his benefactor.
Furthermore,
Hashem wants to give us the ultimate gift of being His equal, His partner, so
to speak. This is what Shir HaShirim is about, and is also referred to by the
prophets who call the Jewish People Hashem's wife. The reward of olam habo is
not like a material reward which is outside of oneself, but rather it is a
rewards of being, of who you, yourself, are. And what you are, is what you made
yourself into. We have to create ourselves spiritually, by withstanding tests
of evil, and so become Hashem's beloved partner in creation. Originally we were given a chance to acquire
all three great presents without suffering, through passing great tests. The
problem was, that we failed.
The
first test was the prohibition of eating from the Etz Tov Vi'ra (tree of
knowledge, good and bad) in Gan Eden. What took place there was much, much
deeper than one would imagine, and was truly an awesome test. Adam and Chava
had in them all the souls of all mankind. Had they withstood this test, the
first Shabbas would have been olam habo. But they did not pass this test, and neither
did we, whose souls were in them and all took part in this sin. Therefore, the six days of creation turned
into six thousand years of world history, and the all inclusive souls of Adam
and Chava separated into many, many separate souls, each with it's own mission
in this world. Since that time, to achieve the purpose of creation and bring ourselves
to the level of olam habo, it is necessary to first correct the sin of eating
from the Etz HaDa'at tov vira.
And
that is why the Jewish People had to go through the Egyptian Exile. The purpose
of the Egyptian exile was to cleanse us of sin of eating from the Etz HaDa'at,
which now could only be accomplished through suffering.
Nevertheless,
the level of suffering was still able to be determined by our own behavior. The
prophecy was that the Jewish People would be in a foreign land, enslaved and
afflicted for four hundred years. (Four hundred is the number of negative
klipot – impure barriers – that spiritually attack a person and separate them
from Hashem. Apparently, each year in exile was to remove one level of klipah.)
But
not all of those four hundred years were passed with great suffering. Hashem
began counting the four hundred years from the birth of Isaac, who was expelled
by the Plishtim and had his wells stuffed up by them. This was considered as
part of the necessary suffering of those four hundred years. Ya'akov's lifetime
was also included in the four hundred years, with his suffering included as
well. The suffering of the Jewish People as a whole started in Egypt with the death of Ya'akov, as Rashi wrote,
after the death of Yaakov Avinu, "the eyes and hearts of Israel were clogged from the
enslavement". But at that time the Jewish People were not literally slaves.
Yosef was still alive and ruling. Even so, because the Jews were not free to go
and come as they wished, and perhaps had to pay special taxes, or had special
limitations placed upon them, this was considered being enslaved, i.e. being
subjected to the control of others. Yet at this time, when they were still
tsaddikim, the subjugation was nowhere near what came later.
Had
the Jewish People continued as they were then, and remained completely faithful
to their own laws and traditions, the truly harsh part of the exile never would
have materialized. However, many of the people stopped making bris milah. The
Sfas Ems on Parshas Shmos says that if the Jews would have not stopped making
bris milah the Egyptians could never have enslaved them. Rashi, based on
Chazal, tells us that many of the people went out of the perimeters of their
own area, the land
of Goshen, and began to
take part in the Egyptian social life, going to their theatres and circuses,
till "the land became full of them". Had they stayed quietly unseen in Goshen, rather than filling up the rest of Egypt, the
Egyptians would not have felt threatened and would not have enslaved them. This
is a very important lesson for us to remember. When in exile, don't assimilate,
don't adopt the cultural pastimes of the host country, and don't act as if the
country belongs to you. Stay quietly on the sidelines, leading your own Jewish
life. Don't give anyone room to suspect that you are taking over their country.
But
why did the suffering the Jewish People had to endure specifically take the
form of slavery?
Perhaps
part of the answer is that Adam and Chava - who included within them all our
souls - did not recognize the necessity to submit to Hashem's will in all
circumstances. One of the lessons of the Egyptian exile was that if you do not
subject yourself to Hashem's will, you will be subjected to the will of
tyrants. It is not always easy to obey Hashem's laws, but if we realize that we
must always do Hashem's will, as if we were a slave to Hashem (who only wishes
good for us, and will greatly reward us) than we will be saved from slavery
under evil people. The Torah says that after the redemption, "Hashem will
circumcise your heart to love Hashem your G-d with all your heart and all your
soul for the sake of your life" (Dvarim 30:6). At that time we will no
longer need to feel that we are "slaves" to Hashem's will for the
yetzer will be removed. That is why the
navi Hoshe'a prophecied that after the redemption we will serve Hashem
with love rather than fear. Now, however, in the world of tests, when the
yetzer hara is still strong, we must remember that we are subject always to
Hashem's will. We must make the yetzer hara a slave to the yetzer tov, and if
not, cholila, we ourselves will become slaves.
There
were also deep rooted personality benefits that were gained from the Egyptian
experience. The Torah tells us to be considerate of geirim (aliens or
converts) and to love them "for you were geirim (aliens) in the land of Egypt. In the aseret hadibrot (ten
commandments) we are told that the slave must rest on the Shabbos, remembering that "you were a slave in
the land of Egypt". This lesson remained deeply ingrained in the
Jewish character. It is part of Jewish nature to prevent the perpetration of cruelty
and injustice to the weak and downtrodden.
Furthermore,
the Jewish People will eventually rule over the entire world. This will happen
with the coming of the full redemption. It would have happened shortly after
the Egyptian redemption if it hadn't been for the sin of the golden calf. The
Egyptian experience was a preparation for a position of rulership. Anyone who
becomes a ruler, must first feel what it means to be subject to others in order
to assure that they will only help raise others and not hurt them.
So
now we know why the Jewish People needed to go through the suffering and
slavery of the Egyptian exile, yet the intensity of the suffering is still incomprehensible.
Innocent baby boys were thrown into the Nile. If
a man didn't finish his work load, his baby was put into the walls to
suffocate. When Pharoh was stricken with leprosy he bathed in the blood of
slaughtered Jewish children. Why did Hashem allow all this terrible cruelty?
Moshe
Rabbeinu asked the same question. The Ari z"l gives us a glimpse into the
answer, which is more amazing than we could possibly have imagined.
The
generation of the flood had very high souls, but they had a very great yetzer
hara, as well. They sinned and sinned terribly until Hashem brought the flood
upon them and they were drowned. However, they were given another chance, being
reincarnated in the generation of the
tower of Babel.
Once again, they sinned, the
tower
of Babel was destroyed,
and they were dispersed. Then they were reincarnated in the people of Sdom, who
were even worse. Avraham prayed for the people of Sdom to be saved. His prayer
did not go unanswered. Although Sdom was destroyed for its evil, the people
Avraham prayed for were brought back again as Avraham's own descendents, this
time, in
Egypt!
The suffering that these children went through was to totally expiate them from
their previous sins, in the flood, in the
tower of Babel,
and in Sdom, so that they could come back again as pure souls of the Jewish
People!
There
is yet another reason why the Jewish People needed to go through the Egyptian
exile and enslavement. They needed it to receive the Torah.
The
Torah is the goal and purpose of our lives; indeed it is the purpose of all
creation, but it was not a simple thing to be given a chance to acquire the
Torah. The Torah is the Etz HaChaim, the Tree of (Eternal) Life that was in Gan
Eden, but after sinning, Adam was sent out of Gan Eden and Hashem set up
fearsome guards to make sure he would not return to partake of the Etz HaChaim.
After eating from the Etz HaDa'as eternal life would only be harmful, because if
people would not die, the evil which they absorbed from the Etz Hada'as tov
v'ira (Tree of Knowledge [of] good and bad) would remain in them forever. The
Torah gives eternal life, and indeed, says the Medrash, had the Jewish People
not sinned with the golden calf, their acceptance of the Torah would have caused
them to live forever.
And
so Hashem would not allow mankind to eat of the Etz HaChaim – the Torah – until
they would be purified from the sin of the Etz HaDa'as. Otherwise, the evil
would have remained inside of them forever, and the Torah itself would have
been contaminated by this evil.
But
how can one be so purified? How can the effects of eating of the Etz HaDa'at be
nullified? The answer was, the Egyptian exile. The three stages of the Egyptian
exile that were told to Avraham Avinu - being aliens in a foreign land, being
enslaved, and being afflicted - all served to remove different aspects of the
evil that was acquired from the "infection" of the snake, who carried
the Satan on him. Kabbalah says that there are three main evil klipot (from
which the others stem). It seems that these three klipot had to be expiated
through the three stages of the Egyptian exile; being an alien in a foreign
land, being slaves, and being afflicted. After those three aspects of evil were
removed, the Jewish People could then go on to receive the Torah, the Etz
HaChaim.
As
mentioned above, all the Jewish souls were contained within the souls of Adam
and Chava, and so all these basic souls had to repair the damage caused by
their sin. Chazal tell us that particularly the women brought about the
redemption from the Egyptian exile, for it was in the merit of righteous women
that our ancestors were redeemed from Egypt. This was the perfect tikun
(correction) because it was Chava who originally convinced Adam to eat from the
Etz HaDa'at and now it was Chav'a extension, the Jewish women, who saved Adam
(the Jewish men) from the effects of the Etz HaDa'as.
And
so we went through the Egyptian exile and received the Torah – only not
completely. The sin of the golden calf caused Moshe Rabeinu to break the first
luchos, which, after the sin, we could not receive. Had we received those
luchos, our knowledge of Torah would have been complete, totally accurate, and
never forgotten. It would have come easily, with great joy and pleasantness,
while living in comfort. Furthermore, we would have had the inner dimension of
Torah, now called kabbalah, which we are now missing. The little bit of
kabbalah which we have now is only a tiny taste of what we will have in the
future. Kabbalah explains the true reasons and inner meanings behind the
mitzvohs, and the deeper explanations of the stories, which we now only understand
on a superficial level. Because of the sin of the golden calf, we lost all this
and it will be regained only with the coming of Moshiach.
And
Eretz Yisrael, too, was not fully achieved because of the sin of the spies
which caused the Jewish People to cry that they did not want to go to Eretz
Yisrael. Although the next generation did enter the land, it was not the same
as it would have been; Moshe Rabeinu did not build the Beis HaMikdash, and the
permanence and full glory of connecting with the Shchina will be only after the
full redemption.
So
the sin of Etz HaDa'as, the sin of the golden calf, and the sin of the spies,
caused us to lose the easy way to olam habo, Torah, and Eretz Yisrael,
respectively. Now they can be gained only through suffering. The sins committed
by later generations caused this suffering to become so much more intense. Yet,
although we cannot feel this while still in the galus, in the end it will come
out even better this way. All the merit of our suffering through the exiles, all
the sacrifices we made to be Hashem's people, will be added on, and this merit it
so extremely great that it will add so much more, lasting forever and ever.
[Author's
not: If a reader wants the source for any idea mentioned here, they can be in
touch with me at my email address:
fastag.df@gmail.com]
To
be continued…
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