Metzora

The sicha for parshas Metzora is in Vol. I of Likkutei Sichos.

This Shabbos, the Rebbe said, as with every Shabbos of the year, is connected with a particular parsha in the Torah, but doesn’t mention by name because the Freidike Rebbe always avoided mentioning the name of the week’s parsha. In many seforim, the parsha is called parshas Tahara, but the Freidike Rebbe avoided mentioning any name, instead he would give the date, the day of the month, but not mention the parsha.

It is also the month of Nissan the time of yetziras Mitzraim. As with all things in Torah, there are no coincidences, so the fact that we read this parsha during this time in this month, must mean that there is a connection between them and a lesson to be derived from it. Concerning the coming out of Mitzraim, Chazal say that it happened b’zchus haemunah, on the merit of the faith of our fathers that they came out of Egypt - emunah and not understanding. What is the virtue of emunah and how is it connected to coming out of Mitzraim?

Human beings have belief and recognize the existence of a Creator. However this is not true emunah, but a recognition that comes as a by-product of sechel, of logic. Anyone who stops to think about the existence of the world based on the principle that no thing can create itself must come to the recognition that the world has a Creator. But since the existence of G-d in the abstract is not familiar to human beings, it is the existence of the world that brings them to the recognition of the existence of a Creator. They will therefore only recognize that part of G-d that is connected to the world, to the creation, which means it is restricted to the level of nature. That part of G-d which is beyond nature, which is beyond creation, this they have no recognition of.

The emunah of a Jew on the other hand, doesn’t come from existence, we don’t believe in G-d because the world exists, rather, G-dliness feels familiar to the Jewish soul, and so the Jew recognizes that part of G-d that has no connection to creation, and is not involved in the act of creation. And so Chassidus explains that the difference between human faith and Jewish faith is that Jews believe in Hashem, the name of G-d that represents past, present and future all in one word which transcends nature, and human beings believe in Elokim, as in the case of Pharaoh and his astrologers. They could not relate to Hashem, “we don’t know G-d”, they said, but they did recognize that the plagues were the finger of G-d, of Elokim. So they recognize Elokim but not Hashem.

To further clarify, in every event that happens in the world, the human being will try to explain according to nature, unless a miracle is so obvious that it can’t be denied And even when he sees a miracle and must admit that it is a Divine intervention, he still tries to minimize the miraculous and as much as possible fit even the miracle into the framework of nature. The exact opposite is true of a Jew. In everything that happens, the Jew looks for the G-dliness  of  it. In  perfectly  natural  events  the  Jew  demands to see the
G-dliness behind it, as the Yerushalmi says that a Jew plants his seeds because he believes in the Creator of the world and he trusts in G-d who will bless his efforts and make them grow. Even though everybody knows that according to the laws of nature, when a seed is planted something will grow from it, the Jew is obstinately convinced that it is only the blessing of G-d makes things grow.

Just as a miracle that is not within the realm of nature is certainly coming from G-d who created this Divine intervention, the same is also true of everything that is perfectly natural. However if we want to deceive ourselves then even the biggest miracle won’t convince us otherwise. We can always find a rationalization to explain away the miracle. And that is why we see that even with the greatest of miracles, the splitting of the Sea, there was the possibility of making a mistake and thinking that it is natural, and not a miracle at all. It says in the Mechilta, that during the time of kriyas Yam Suf, when the waters split, all the waters in the world split as well, except for the river Pruss, as the Rebbe Maharash writes in a maamar. All the nations were overcome with a great fear when they heard that the sea split for the Jews. But the fact that all the waters in the world split as well left a possibility of dismissing the miracle and attributing it to nature. It could be rationalized that if were happening only for the Jews, then why would all the waters in the world have to split? And because all of the waters in the world split, that left room for the human being to deny the miracle, and thereby make freedom of choice possible even after the miracle.

So if you want to deceive yourself, no miracle is ever a miracle. And if you don’t want to deceive yourself, then nature is never natural, and everything in nature is itself miraculous, a Divine intervention.

This is meaning of the redemption coming in the merit of emunah. Mitzraim means restrictions, limitations, of which there are two types - the limitation of holiness and the limitation of unholiness. The limitation of holiness as we said before, recognizes G-dliness but in a limited fashion. It knows that there is a Creator, but only to the degree that the mind dictates, as the emunah in the name Elokim, but not in the name Hashem. And this makes possible the second restriction, the restriction of unholiness of kelipah, where G-d forbid, one forgets completely about the presence of G-d, and gets drawn down into the lowest levels of unholiness, the forty nine levels of tumah.

But by virtue of the emunah which Jews have, in that we completely dismiss the laws of nature, and recognize the Divine within the world, not only is the spiritual unrestricted, there is no Mitzraim of the kedushah, of the spirituality of the Jew, but even in the physical where Jews are apparently similar to all human beings, even here Jews are unique. So this emunah, this uniqueness of Jewish faith, brought about a revelation that is higher than nature and resulted in yetziras Mitzraim, coming out of restrictions, not only the restrictions of kelipah, but even the restrictions of kedushah.

And this is also hinted at in the week’s parsha where it speaks about negoim, the leprous spots. The Rambam writes that these negoim, whether they happened on garments or houses or a person’s skin, were not a natural phenomenon, but rather a sign from Above that warned the Jew against lashon hara, against slander.

So just as it is with the negoim, that when they occurred it was obvious that this was not a natural phenomenon but something coming from Above, in the same way, Jews believe concerning all things that happen, that all of it comes from Above by hashgacha pratis, by Divine providence. And just as with the negoim, everything has a purpose and a message, to warn them of a sin and so on, in addition to that, it is also in its essence a hidden good, a blessing in disguise. And so it is with all events in the world, not only with the spots on the house, that all events even if they don’t seem to be good are really blessings in disguise. We are told that when the spots occurred in the house, they would have to break that part of the wall and replace it. Often after breaking down the wall, they would find hidden treasures left there by the people who had lived in Israel before the Jews got there. And so the spot that looked like a plague really turned out to be a blessing. And so it is with all things in the world, whatever looks like it is not a blessing, the Jew recognizes in his unique emunah that this too is for the good.

Based on what we said before, we can now understand a statement from the Gemarrah that says that when G-d created the world He completed three sides but the north side is not yet complete. The reason given is in order to show that the creation of the world, heaven and earth, is something miraculous that human beings are not capable of. Should a person say that the existence of the world is not miraculous then we will say to him, if you believe that then there is a little piece of creation left unfinished, see if you can complete it. And when he sees that he can’t, then he will have to recognize that creation comes from G-d and only G-d could create it.

At first glance this is difficult to understand, how is it possible that a person should say that the creation of the world is not miraculous? But as mentioned before, G-d always leave room for a person to have freedom of choice, and therefore there has to always be room for a person to dismiss any miracle that he sees. So the yetzer hara in its brilliance can convince a person even concerning the creation of the world that he should not consider it a great miracle.

Although the world is created in such a way that it allows for people to be so off-base concerning G-dliness, yet on the other hand, G-d always makes it possible for the G-dliness to be recognized. There is always one detail that remains unfinished, which human beings can’t fix it on their own, and that detail is to remind them, that the world is really coming from G-d, and from this detail they understand the rest of creation.  Just as they can’t master this detail, they really can’t master the world, and they have to depend on G-d.

And just as it is with the creation of the world, so it is also with the conduct of the world. Whether it is natural or miraculous, when a person wants to convince himself that his success for example in business comes as a result of nature, or as a result of his nature, because he is brilliant, and resourceful, the world as it exists, the concealment of G-dliness, allows for such a thought, as for such a belief. At the same time, G-d always provides a detail in which the person sees that he can’t, no matter how hard he tries, take care of that detail. And if he stops to think about the significance of that detail, he must come to the recognition that not only is this detail beyond his control, but in fact all success, this success that he does experience, is not coming from him, but from the Creator.

That is why when a person sees that in a certain area he cannot succeed, rather than try harder and come obsessed with succeeding, he should admit that G-d runs the world and trust that G-d will give him success in this detail as well, and then he will be able to succeed.

And just as it is with the individual, it is true also of the people as a whole, that when we see that there are certain things that are just not working for the Jewish people, we just can’t seem to make it happen as a nation, we shouldn’t try harder and become stubborn about it, but rather we should strengthen our emunah, our recognition that all comes from G-d, and our trust that G-d will provide. And then G-d will complete the world, including also the northern side, which the Gemarrah tells us is where all evil comes from, which has always produced suffering for the Jewish people, that also will become finished and completed. The world will no longer be shaky, and unstable, but there will be a true peace in the world, with the coming of the complete and final redemption, when all the nations of the world will recognize the truth of G-dliness.

Then we won’t have to depend on the kindness and support of other nations, we will depend on G-d Himself who will bring us to the Promised Land, the good and abundant land, the land on which G-d’s eye is upon from the beginning of the year until the end of the year, with the coming of Moshiach, speedily in our days.

In 1954, the Rebbe launched mivza matzvah, and in a sicha here the Rebbe says that in the month of Nissan, we find many categories of mitzvahs - mitzvahs that come from the Torah, that come from the Rabbonon, the Sages, and customs. The main part of the month of Nissan is of course the holiday of Pesach, as the Gemarrah says, that the first day of Nissan is the Rosh Hashanah for holidays, which is referring to the holiday that is occurs in Nissan - Pesach.

In Pesach we find that there are mitzvahs from the Torah, from the Sages, and customs. There used to be a custom that before Pesach the rabbis would send six shmurah matzah to all their congregants so that they would have three matzahs for each of the seder plates or at the very least two matzahs in order to have the kezayis necessary for the middle matzah for each of the seders to fulfill the special mitzvah of matzah.

The simple, practical reason for the mitzvah was to increase the rabbi’s livelihood, as the people would send back money for the matzahs which would go towards the rabbi’s income. But in the process something very important was accomplished. Since there are so many laws and so many details to the mitzvah of matzah, and not everyone knows these laws and can prepare matzah for themselves, the rabbis would take the responsibility to make sure that their congregants would be eating real matzah worthy of the mitzvah.

For various reasons, this custom fell into disuse however if it were up to me, I would say that we should reinstitute this custom, that all rabbis should send shmurah matzah to their congregants. In fact, not only should rabbis do this, but everyone should, anyone who has any influence on others, whether it is a rabbi, a shochet, a reverend, or a shamesh, if there is someone who you could help by bringing them these hand baked shmurah matzah, and the person you bring it to will use it for his seder plate, then it should be done. Through this hundreds and thousands of Jews will be more careful in the fulfillment of the mitzvah, and the mitzvah will be fulfilled b’hiddur, in its most beautiful way. In places where they have collective sedorim, it is obvious that those sedorim should also serve real shmurah matzah.

The effect of matzah is known to be very great as the Zohar says that it brings healing of all illness, and it brings emunah and strengthens the emunah. Therefore we are guaranteed that as a result of the matzah we will have a healthy and blessed year b’gashmius and b’ruchnius.

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