Bereishis

The sicha for parshas Bereishis is in Vol. V of  Likkutei Sichos.

This is a very exciting sicha where the Rebbe finds so much meaning in one rashi, that it covers from the beginning of history to the end, and from the most basic levels of studying Torah to the highest levels, as we will soon see.

The rashi is the first rashi on Chumash where Rashi says that the Torah should have started, not with Bereishis and the story of creation, but with the first mitzvah that was given to the Jewish people, “hachodesh hazei lachem,” which was given just before we came out of Egypt.

Because the Torah is primarily about mitzvahs, the question Rashi is asking, is why does the Torah begin with a story, with the Sefer Bereishis, which has the description of creation and then stories leading up to the Giving of the Torah, why doesn’t it begin immediately with the first mitzvah, “ hachodesh hazei lachem.”

The answer Rashi gives, from the Gemarrah, is that the Abishter wants to tell us something about Eretz Israel and what to answer the umos haolam, the nations of the world when they say, that we were wrong in taking the land of the seven nations, that we stole the land. To this, the Torah tells us the answer, “if the nations of the world will say to Jews, you are thieves, because you captured the land of the seven nations, then the Jews should say to them, the whole world belongs to G-d, He created it and He gave to whom He found worthy in His eyes, by His will He gave it to them, and by His will He took it from them, from the nations, and gave to us.” This is the simple meaning of the rashi, the way it was always understood. We should say to the non-Jews, who accuse us of stealing the land by capturing the land of the seven nations, we should say to them, the entire world belongs to G-d, because He created it. Then He gave it to who was worthy in His eyes, which means the nations of the world, and by His will He gave it to them, and by His will He took it from them and gave it to us.

And on this, the Rebbe has many, many questions. We will mention just a few.

1. Rashi is asking, why do we start the Torah with the story of creation, we should start with the mitzvah in Shmos of “ hachodesh hazei lachem.” But why shouldn’t the Torah start with the story of creation, when belief that G-d created the world is so central to Yiddishkeit?

2. There are other mitzvahs in the Sefer Bereishis, like the mitzvah of mila, circumcision, or gid hanoshes, not eating the sciatic nerve, what about those mitzvash that are mentioned before “ hachodesh hazei lachem.” Why shouldn’t the Torah begin with those mitzvahs?

Also, there are many stories after the story of creation in Sefer Bereishis that are not explained by Rashi’s answer. Rashi says that the reason Torah begins with Bereishis is to tell us that the whole world belongs to G-d, and He gave the land to whomever He wants. But what about all the stories of Noach and the flood, and Avraham, and Yitzchak and Yakov? All those stories are not explained.

3. When the nations come and argue that we stole the land, there has to be some justification that the Torah should want to answer this question. In fact the question is not valid at all. We are told when Noach, after the flood, divided up the land among his children, Eretz Israel was part of the portion that was given to Shem and the children of Shem. After that, the Canaanites, Canaan is a grandson of Ham, they came and they capture the land from Shem, and it became Eretz Canaan. So how could they now come along and say, that we stole the land from them, when in fact they stole it from Shem?

4. What Rashi says in the answer to the nations is the entire world belongs to the Abishter because He created it. This we could know without the story of creation. We know this from the Ten Commandments, when in the laws of Shabbos the Abishter says that He created the world in six days.

5. Why does Rashi say all the land belongs to the Abishter, when the question that is being discussed is only the land of Israel?

Also if stealing the land is really a sin, as the nations argue, then it is a sin according to the Seven Noahide Laws – one of the seven laws is against stealing. Why then don’t we find anywhere in the Torah that when one nation captured the land from another nation that they should be held responsible and be punished for this, for violating one of the seven mitzvahs. So we see from this that capturing a land in a war is not considered stealing at all. So again what are the argument and the complaint of the nations that the Torah has to explain it?

And finally, if Rashi’s explanation that our answer to the nations is that since the world belongs to G-d, He can give it to whomever He wants, and He gave it to us, why does Rashi have to mention, by His will He gave it them? The question is not why they have it; the question is why we have it, why the land belongs to us? So Rashi didn’t need to mention, that the land was given to them, he needs only to explain that it was G-d will’s and not our own doing that the land belongs to us because G-d gave it to us. So why does he mention that He gave it to them first, and then gave it to us?

So here the Rebbe explains the whole rashi with a unique and original approach.

First of all, the Rebbe says, when did the Yidden become a unique people? This happened by the Giving of the Torah, and just before, when they were preparing to leave Egypt. Until then, the Jews basically were a unique category within the Bnei Noach, the Noahides. But they hadn’t yet become the “am sigulla m’kol ha’amim”, the chosen nation from among all other nations, that they should be completely unique and not one of the Bnei Noach.

And that’s why Rashi asks, the Torah should begin with the mitzvah of “hachodesh hazei lachem” which was giving just before we left Egypt. Because that was the first mitzvah given to the Jewish people as an “ am sigulla”, a unique nation and not as a part of the Bnei Noach, whereas the mitzvahs that were given before then, were mitzvahs that separated Jews into a separate category within the Bnei Noach. The mitzvah of circumcision, for example, didn’t yet make the Jewish people into a unique nation but rather unique among Bnei Noach. So the Torah which is primarily mitzvahs given to the Jewish people as the Jewish people, that began, those mitzvahs began with “hachodesh hazei lachem” and it is emphasized and underscored - this month is the first month of the year “lachem”, for you, for the Jewish people, and not for anybody else. So Rashi is asking, since the Torah is primarily mitzvahs given to the Jewish people as the Jewish people, the Torah should have started with “hachodesh hazei lachem” and everything else should be learned either in the Oral Torah or written separately, but it shouldn’t be a part of the Torah.

The answer to this is: the reason the Torah writes the story of Bereishis and so on, is in order to tell us how to answer the non-Jews.

Why is the capturing of the land through war not called stealing? It is because G-d first gave it to the nations, and then took it from them and gave it to us. To understand the argument and the complaint of the nations, the Rebbe says that the land of Israel was different from all other lands once it became Eretz Israel. Generally when a piece of property belongs to a certain group, or to a person, and then it changes hands, either by being sold or being given away as a gift, or by being captured in war, in whatever manner it changes hands, the land itself remains the same. It is the same land, only before one flag flew over the land, and now that it has changed hands, another flag flies over the land. But the land itself remains unchanged.

However when it came to Eretz Israel, once it became Eretz Israel, it became permanently the property of the Jewish people. It was no longer the same as all other lands, that can potentially belong to whoever captures it, to whoever inhabits it, to whoever happens to own it. Eretz Israel became different. It was taken out of that category – it is no longer potentially the property of any other nation forever but has become permanently Eretz Israel, our land. And that is why even when we talk about the time of golus, when we say “golinu m’artzenu”, we were exiled from our land, “v’nsahak m’almaseinu”, and we are far from our land, yet at the very same time, we call it “our land, our country.” Because even when Jews are not there, it remains permanently Eretz Israel.

And to this, the nations come with a complaint, and say, how could you do that, how could you steal the land by taking it out of the normal condition where every country is potentially up for grabs and whoever grabs it can own it, and you take Eretz Israel and  you say, no, this land is different, this land can’t be captured, can’t be taken, can’t be owned by anybody else. In fact, even according to halacha, you are not allowed to sell Eretz Israel to a non-Jew.

So this is the complaint of the nations. How do you make the land unique and different from all other lands? It should remain, they say, like every other land, potentially the property of whoever captures it. And the answer to this, Rashi says, is that “kol ha eretz shel HaKodesh Baruch Hu, that the entire world belongs to G-d - not all the land belongs to G-d, “kol ha Eretz” means in quality, not just in quantity, that the entire land, the whole condition of earth belongs to G-d, and therefore He can create the land that it is qualitatively different from all lands. G-d can actually change the nature of the land. This land, the land of Israel, is not in its quality like other lands, and therefore cannot ever belong to non-Jews.

This is not yet a sufficient answer to the complaint of the nations. Because the nations are saying that originally by nature, Eretz Israel belonged potentially to anyone who would capture it, like any other land. So by what right does G-d have to come along and take it away from that condition, and make it into a unique land, no longer available to anyone else.

On this, Rashi adds the words, that “ Hu bara”, G-d created the world and gave it to who is worthy in His eyes, meaning to say that right at creation, not later, at the time of the conquest of Eretz Israel by Yehoshua, but right at creation when “ Hu bara”, when G-d created the world, He created it for those who are worthy in His eyes. And that’s Yidden, the Jewish people. At creation G-d made Eretz Israel unique and different. It never really belonged to anyone else, even in potential, that it was right from the creation, that Eretz Israel belonged to the Jewish people.

So the Rebbe is saying that “kol ha eretz shel HaKodesh Baruch Hu, Hu bara” - the entire land belongs to G-d, He created it – He created it for those who He found worthy in His eyes – to the Jewish people. So it is not that it first belonged to everyone, then G-d changed it because He is G-d and He can do whatever He wants; it’s that it never belonged to the non-Jews in this first place because it was created for the Jewish people.

Now there is a new complaint, a new argument. If Eretz Israel was created right from the start for the Jewish people as Eretz Israel belonging to Jews, then how is it just and how is it right that G-d should give the land to other nations, taking it away from the Jews?

To this Rashi says, that “it was by G-d will that He gave the land to the other nations, and it was His same will that took it from them and gave it to the Jewish people. When it was given to the nations, it was for the purpose of eventually giving it to the Jews as their property, as their inheritance. When He gave it to the nations of the world, it was the first step towards giving it to the Jews.

And on this, the Rebbe explains as follows:

In order for the land to become truly the land of the Jewish people, Eretz Israel, it has to come through effort, through Jewish effort. Not just as a gift from above, but as the result of avodah, where the Jews, through their avodah make Eretz Canaan into Eretz Israel. And then Eretz Israel belongs to the Jews not only as a gift from heaven but as a result of their own effort and their own avodah.

The Rebbe brings an example. We are told that a child in the womb is taught the entire Torah and then at birth, it is made to forget. So the question is, if it is going to forget anyway, what’s the point of teaching it? The answer is that there is a benefit to learning Torah on your own effort, and absorbing it, internalizing it through that effort. However no matter how much you learn Torah, and how much effort you put into it, it will always be on the level of a created being, as much as a human being can understand of Torah. To make it possible for a Jew to understand Torah on a higher level, the way it is in the world of Atzilut, for this, the fetus is taught the entire Torah the way it is studied in the world of Atzilut, so that when after he is born through his efforts, he can achieve not only the maximum that a human being is capable of, but he can attain even the level of Torah as it is in Atzilut. So you have a combination of Torah as it is above, with Torah as it is earned and achieved through human effort.

The same is true also concerning Eretz Israel; in order for Eretz Israel to be truly the property of the Jewish people, it has to come through the effort of the people, through their avodah. But how much can be accomplished through human effort? How much holiness can Jews bring to the land of Israel to make it Eretz Israel? Only as much as a finite being is capable of. To make Eretz Israel uniquely distinct and different, so that even in potential it cannot belong to anyone else, this has to come from above. Therefore  right from the beginning, when G-d created the world, He created it for those worthy, in other words for the Jewish people. So that comes from above, like the child being taught the whole Torah while it is in the womb. But then, it is given to the nations, it becomes the land of the nations and through Jewish effort, through the capturing of the land, we make the land ours, not only to the degree that human beings are capable of changing a land, but also to the higher level, where we can actually make it a permanent Eretz Israel, where even in potential it cannot belong to anyone else.

Therefore you have the combination of the G-dliness of Israel that is produced at creation from above, and the G-dliness that makes it ours through our own effort that comes from below.

And this in general is the way we are supposed to study Torah – that first the Torah is “chochmaso ratzono shel Ha Kodesh Boruch Hu” - Torah exists on a very high level, it is G-d’s will and G-d’s wisdom, it is one with G-d and so on, then it comes down through the various worlds, until it becomes part of this world, the world of Asiyah, the world of pshat. And by doing and absorbing Torah and mitzvos, on the level of pshat, on the level of the world of Asiyah, this lowest world, we reconnect to the Torah as it is in its origin before it came down where it was one with G-d, which is Torah on the level of Atzilut.

This is also the way in which we study Torah. Rashi tells us, that you might wonder why Torah doesn’t begin with the holiness of mitzvahs as they are given to the Jewish people after they have become unique and different from all other nations, the mitzvah of   “hachodesh hazei lachem.” Rashi’s answer is that you have start with pshat, you have start with the creation of the world as it is a simple world before it is made holy by mitzvahs, and appreciate what the truth is concerning the pshat, concerning the physical existence of the world, and by understanding that properly, you will come to better appreciate the “hachodesh hazei lachem”, the mitzvahs that are given into the world.

And this is Rashi’s way of introducing the study of Torah, by showing us that first you have to learn the pshat, and understand the pshat very, very well, and look at all of the simple details, and when you understand that properly, it will lead you to the deeper meanings of Torah, to the higher meanings of Torah, Torah as it is in Atzilut.

What this tells us, in summary, is that the Torah devotes an entire Chumash, Bereishis and parts of Shmos, to explain to the nations of the world that right from the beginning G-d created the land of Israel to belong to Jews, but He wanted the Jews to earn it by their own efforts, and therefore He promised the land to Avraham, and told Avraham that it would come through the efforts of 400 years of slavery, and then it describes the slavery, how we ended up going down to Egypt, and how we came out of Egypt, all of this, to convince the nations of the world that the land of Israel, although it appears to be a land like every other land, is unique and different in its quality, in that it is the holy land, it is the land of Israel.

And only when the nations of the world understand it and accept it, on a logical basis, so that it is understandable to them, then the world becomes a dira b’tachtonim, it becomes a dwelling place for G-d, that the holiness of the highest levels came down to the earthiest level, where the nations of the world can understand and appreciate that Eretz Israel is a unique and different land from all other lands, and at the same time, appreciating the uniqueness of the Jewish people as qualitatively different from all other nations.

Then when we have that understanding of Eretz Israel and of Jews, then all of Israel will belong to the Jewish people, including the three lands that were not yet given to us, but were promised to us, Kani, Knezi and Kadmoni, and more than that, Eretz Israel will spread throughout the entire world, the whole world will become a holy land, with the coming of Moshiach, b’karov mamush.

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