If anyone wants clearer notes, feel free to email me @ chumieller@optonline.net. הצלחה רבה!! :)

Thursday, February 11, 2010

Pirkei Avos- Mishna Gimmel

What’s the connection between what בן עזאי said before and what he says here? In משנה ב', he’s warning about קיום המצוות, even the easy ones. Here, he’s telling us:
1. Not to degrade anyone, even a lowly person.
2. To give every person and creation כבוד no matter how small.

תומר Everything that’s created, from the lowest blade of grass to the largest cedar tree, they are
דבורה all דברים מכובדים because they are all created by ה'. Someone who’s מבזה one of ה'’s sheet creations is in essence being מבזה ה'’s חכמה. It says ''מה רבו מעשיך ה' ''- רבו doesn’t mean גדלות, rather כמה חשובים הם.

A person has to have רחמנות on all the בריות- he can’t disgrace them and he has to have רחמנות on them. ה'’s חכמה is spread out on all creations, from the most insignificant to the most significant. Because of this, we are careful of בזוי אוכלים. A person gets פרטית הנאה from food, so he should be extra careful not to be מבזה it for nothing. Story- The ח''ח had black bread, said that you can’t say ל''ה on it. Story- Cow that was being led to שחיטה. רבי said to it ''זיל לכך נוצרת''. Because of this, he got terrible צרות. Why? Because he acted with דין towards the cow. Once, there was a weasel in רבי’s house and his maid wanted to get rid of it, and he had רחמנות on it. Immediately after, the יסורים were removed. They weren’t an עונש, rather a תוצאה.

ג אל תהי בז לכל אדם- אל תתנהג בבזיון לשום אדםאפילו השפל והנקלה ביותר
אל תהי מפליג- אל תחיקאת עצמך
דבר-נברא- דומם,צומח,חי
שעה- תועלת
מקום- חשיבותו בעולם

רע''ב -אל תהי בז לכל אדם to say that פלוני is so vulnerable and he can’t get me back.

-ואל תהי מפליג to distance yourself because of גאוה from everything because every person
has to care for every creation, because every creation has a תועלת.

ר' יונה ר' יונה divides the משנה differently:
1. אל...שעה- don’t disgrace anyone and don’t distance yourself (by dismissing the responsibility) with דבר of disgrace- never say something mean to someone because you think you’ll never see him again, because there will be a time when you’ll be repaid.
2. ואין לך דבר שאין לו מקום- there is no creation that isn’t important, so one has to give כבוד to everything and everyone.

I sheet ''נוח...ברבים''- obviously, it’s not easier in this world, but in the long run, next to ה', it’s easier
than the burning decree of someone who embarrasses his friend in public. Story- מר עוקבא
thrust himself into a hot oven. This story teaches us that even as a תוצאה of a מצוה, you
can’t cause someone embarrassment.

Why is this אסור so חמור?
1. Because it’s like you’re being מבזה ה', since every person is created בצלם אלוקים, and we know ''ובזי יקלו''.
2. Because the embarrassment is so strong, it could take someone years to recuperate. Story- the בית הלוי and the butcher. Story- ר' שמואל מגיד kept his face in the furnace and let the flames rise towards his face until the man who slapped him left. Story- ר' יוסף חיים קפלן was crying because he saw someone embarrassing someone else publicly- it was like he stabbed someone to death.

חסיד יעב''ץ -אל תהי בז לכל אדם ''לכל'' is coming to include even a רשע. The תורה tells us about a רשע,
''כבדהו וחשדהו''. There is never any excuse to humiliate another human being. This applies to a child, or someone with limited דעת.

ספר מוסר -אל תהי בז לכל אדם the אזהרה is קשורה to a יחיד. Sometimes, someone does something and
אבות and you may think that if he could do something so terrible, then you want to cut ties with him. Don’t be מבזה the person in their entirety because of one bad מעשה, one הנהגה that is questionable, or one פגם. Judge them favorable, because you don’t know the whole picture.

ר' שלמה -אל תהי בז לכל אדם אל תבזה עצמך בפני שום אדם. Don’t cheapen yourself by doing or saying
קפלן things that lessen your dignity. It says in דברי הימים, ''ויגבה לבו בדרכי ה'''- we have to have dignity in דרכי ה'. This אזהרה is for a תלמיד חכם because he’s a ספר תורה חי.
It’s a tactic on how a person should relate to his יצה''ר. The יצה''ר makes דרכי ה' look like such a big thing that a person may come to a state of despair. When we have a fall in our רוחניות, we should tell ourselves, ''אלמלא נפלתי לא קמתי''- I fell, but I’ll get back up and put the pieces back together. It says about a צדיק- ''שבע יפול וקם'', but he’s still called a צדיק because he gets back up.

ר' בונים When the תורה uses the word ענו, רש''י is מסביר in two ways- שפל וסבלן. A person has to be
מפשיסחא humble with himself. When someone slips in רוחניות, he has to be an ענו with himself. He has
to be סובל את שפלתו- tolerate his lowliness, and סבלן אם עצמו- patient with himself. If he’s סובל את שפלתוand סבלן אם עצמו, then he can get back up.

ת''י -יט Even a דומם,צומח,חי that is disgusting, harmful, hurtful, hateful and poisonous, such as a
fly, snake or scorpion, one should not dismiss. ה' created them for the good of the world.

-כ At this moment, this person may seem purposeless- he may be totally empty of חכמה or he may be the persecutor of good people. But it’s not for nothing that ה' lets him live. Either he’s necessary now and you just can’t see it, or the time will come when his contribution to the world will come forth- ''קל דעות ה'''.

עבודת There’s no person that doesn’t have his שעה in רוחניות, where he can turn around his whole ישראל course in life. We learn this from אלעזר בן דורדיא. He was so שטוך בחטא that his תשובה
wouldn’t be accepted. As soon as he heard this, he ran and asked the mountains, valleys, sky, sun and moon to daven for him but they all said that first they had to daven for themselves. אלעזר בן דורדיא then realized III sheet- ''אין הדבר תלןי אלא בי''. He put his head between his knees and cried out until his נשמה left him. A בת קול came out and said, ''ר' אלעזר בן דורדדיא מזומן לחיי עוה''ב''. רש''י says on the words ''זה קלי ואנבהו''- ''ראתה שפחה בים מה שלא ראוי יחזאקל בן בוזי'' - by קריעת ים סוף there was an amazing revelation, higher than the revelation of יחזאקל. But they remained שפחות because they didn’t translate it into reality. You have to integrate it otherwise you won’t grow. A התעוררות is worthless if you don’t act upon it. You must do something immediately to trap it so that it doesn’t fizzle out.

''יפה שעה אחת של תשובה ומעים טובים בעוה''ז מכל חיי עוה''ב'', because in this world, the עולם המעשה, we can take action.
רש''י -אין לך דבר... There’s never a דבר חכמה that isn’t used in our life because all חכמה comes from the תורה- ''הפך בה הפך בה דכולה בה''.

מדרש ''בז לדבר יחבל לו''- someone who is מבזה something that ה' created will be punished through it. דוד questioned ה'’s creations, among them insanity, and ה' said, ''חייך סוף שצטרך לשדות''.
1. Insanity- דוד was running from שאול and came to גת. The king at that time was אכיש, the brother of גליות. When he heard that דוד was in גת, he wanted to take revenge on him. דוד-שמואל א, כא, יג-טז came before him and started to garble his speech, draw on the doorposts and drool on his beard. He portrayed himself as a משוגעה, so אכיש chased him out. It says ''בשנותו את טעמן לפני אבימלך''- at that time, all the kings of גת were called אבימלך, so it’s really referring to אכיש.
2. Spider-when דוד was running from שאול, he hid in a cave. ה' put a spider web on the outside of the cave so it looked like it had been sealed for a long time.
3. Wasp- שאול knew where דוד was hiding and he was going to go kill him with a special spear. דוד snuck into שאול’s camp in the middle of the night to get the spear, but it was under שאול’s head. ה' put שאול in a תרדמה and a wasp bit him. He moved his head a little, and דוד took the spear. When שאול woke up, he was very confused, and he cancelled his plans.

נוצר חסד -ואין לך ךבר שאין לן מקום מקום is referring to ה'- ''ברוך המקום''. There is nothing in this world that isn’t touched by the hand of ה'. Fools call it Mother Nature. הטבע= 86= אלקים. It’s an עבודת עבד ה' to search out the יד ה' because it can be found in everything- ''על כל נשימה ונשימה תהלל קה''.

V sheet What is the שרש העמוק when one humiliates another person or being? לצנות- mockery, scoffing, laughing at, poking fun at… This מידה is so strict that חז''ל say that ליצנים are included in the four groups of people who won’t be מקבל פני השכינה.

The five חלקים of ליצנים:
1. הנותן דופי בבני אדם ללא סיבה- finds fault without a reason. This stems from גאוה and a רוע לב. He wants to make light a person’s reputation before others.
2. מי שלועג בלבו לבני אדם- scoffs others in the inner chambers of his heart. Why? מפני קוצר השגתם במעלה- because you feel that they aren’t up to par. Who designated this job for you? R’ Ephraim Wachsman said that there used to be individual mockers in a generation, but now there is a דור of ליצנים- people who feel that they are above humanity. ''יושב במים ישחק''.
3. מי שקובע עצמו תמיד ללעוג על דברים ופעולות- someone who is addicted to ליצנות, someone who feels that they are a cut above humanity, people look down on him. Someone who mocks events, undertakings, efforts… by saying that they’re hopeless falls into this category. שלמה said on these people, ''ראיתי איש חכם בעיניו? תקוה לכסיל ממנו''- there’s more hope for a כסיל and he’s better off in life than someone like this. Someone like this can come to אפיקרסות because he could be לועג על המצוות.
4. הקובע עצמו תמיד לשיחה בטלה ודברים בטלים בדרך יושבי קרנות- watch out for too much overindulgence in empty talk because it will come to be that you’ll indulge in דברי לצנות.
5. המתלוצץ על מעשים ודברים על דרך מקרה ועראי- many people sin through him. At times, he randomly knocks. Be cautious!


אור יהל
sheet ``






Here, תוכחה means הוכחה, which means שכל. If a person mocks, he doesn’t use his שכל. What caused קרח to get into the mood of מרידה? ה' told משה to appoint אליצפן as the נשיא of קהת. When קרח heard about אליצפן’s appointment, he was upset. He went to משה and said that קהת had four sons. The oldest received to מנות of גדולה (משה → מנהיג, אהרן → כהונה) and the next מנה should go to the next son of קהת. His argument was illegitimate, because in the face of ה', there is no reasoning. קרח was a פקח- wise and he knew that his words had no footing. He knew that משה was just speaking the words of ה'- we know that the שכינה spoke from משה’s throat. קרח’s מרידה was doomed before it even started. Because of his קנאה, קרח aroused the עם for מרידה against משה and אהרן. קרח gathered 250 people and they came before משה. קרח began to mock him-
1. Does a room full of ספרים need a מזוזה? משה said yes.
2. Does a בגד of תכלת need a חוט of תכלת? משה said yes.
קרח mocked, and all 250 of his followers were brought under the spell of לצנות.
ה' brought three groups of punishment on the מורדים:
1. בלועי דקרח- the land opened up its mouth and swallowed קרח, his wife- ''חכמת נשים...'', possessions, עבדים and שפחות alive. (This פי הארץ was created בין השמשות along with the פי הבאר and פי האתון.) קרח jumps up and down and says, ''משה אמת ותורתו אמת''.
2. שרופי דקרח- קרח’s followers were burnt alive by a heavenly fire.
3. הנגף בעם- 14,700 people were killed by a מגפה because they began to question דינו של הקב''ה.
After these punishments, משה told all the נשיאים to bring their מטות and from שבט לוי he took the מטה of אהרן. משה put them before the ארון and said that whoever’s blossoms first, it’ll show that he’s the כהן נאמן. אהרן’s grew almonds and now everyone knew that he was the כהן נאמן.
Why did ה' wait to bring the אות? Why didn’t He do it first so that the מרידה would be quieted? If someone falls under the spell of לצנות, he doesn’t have שכל so no matter how great of an event happened, it wouldn’t be absorbed.
A לץ is like an animal because an animal has no שכל. A human being is a combination of two נפשות:
1. נפש הבהמי- eat, drink, תאבות
2. נפש הרוחני- the control we have over our actions and תאבות.
When someone is a לץ, he’s using his נפש הבהמי.
First, ה' had to remove the לצנות and only afterwards could he show them and they would accept.
A לץ can’t have logic so he ends up having יסוריםand then death because he never does תשובה. Why? A person who’s moved into action and change because he’s התבונן, he doesn’t need יסורים. But a לץ that didn’t feel moved from תוכחה because of כח הלצנות, you have to treat him with יסורים. When a person mocks, he’s now like an animal and what would rebuke help? It says in משלי that ה' prepares יסורים for a לץ. The purpose of the יסורים is to break the לצנות, remove the נפש הבהמי, and only after that will he have the שכל to listen.
קרח turned his followers into ליצנים. With this כח of mockery, a person tramples on everything and nothing makes an impression on him. לצנות shatters מוסר. יסורים break and humble a person. The three sets of יסורים broke them.

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