מסילת ישרים term 3

פרק ו:

זהירות is what you aren’t supposed to do, but זריזות is an עשה. The פסוק says, "סור מרע ועשה טוב"- before you do good, you must turn away from bad. The idea of זריזות is the way you have to do מצוות and finish them. "זריזים מקדימים למצווה"- you must do מצוות and do them fast. Just like we must guard ourselves from the יצה''ר’s trap, we must also be very alert to grab מצוות and not let them slip by. Just like the יצה''ר tries to catch us in the net of חטאים, he also tries to prevent us from doing מצוות. If a person is lazy and doesn’t grab after מצוות, he will remain empty.

The nature of a person is to physically heavy- we are thick and lazy. Therefore, a person who wants to serve ה' must overcome his nature and have זריזות, or he won’t succeed. The תנא says in פרקי אבות, "הוי עז כנמר...". A נמר is a little animal that isn’t afraid to attack a bigger animal. It stays around it’s nest to keep watch, doesn’t give up and is fast and strong.

תורה and מעש''ט need חזוק. יהושע was told that he must be "חזק מאד"- he needs a lot of strength in order to do what the תורה wants. A person needs a lot of strength in order to take his nature and turn it upside down. שלמה says, "מעט שנית..."- a little bit of sleep and poverty will come upon you like a visitor, what you are lacking will come on you like an armed warrior. A lazy person isn’t doing anything bad, but not doing anything at all can also be bad. Someone who makes you weak in your work is a brother to the יצה''ר. Even though he isn’t doing something bad, he isn’t doing what he is supposed to be, and that is also wrong. So he is a contemporary to doing actual wrong.

The ספר gives a graphic description of a lazy person: if you pass the field or vineyard of a lazy person, it will be covered in thorns and vines. We must take מוסר from this- if you are lazy, poverty will crawl up on you.

Someone learns and doesn’t understand what he is learning, but he is too lazy to look into the ענין properly. So he makes up his own פירוש and says that something טהור is טמא and vice versa. He is פורץ גדר of חכמים. Someone like this, it’s like he is suffering from a snakebite- in the beginning he won’t notice that he is doing something wrong, but slowly he will go off the correct path. He will go from one bad to another until he ends up totally off, all because he was too lazy to learn properly. It’s bad enough that he didn’t learn properly, but it is only going to get worse. He is to make things up and distort the truth. Then he will be פורץ גדר and he will die. So when a person is too lazy to do the right thing, remember that it is like a poison which spreads slowly.

Why don’t people do the right thing when they know they should? People make up excuses because they are lazy. Every excuse is so that he won’t do what he really has to. He will also bring ראיות from the תורה and warp it so that he can use it as an excuse.

"חכם עצל בעיניו משביעה משיבי טעם"- a person who is lazy thinks that he is smarter than seven advisors of the king. His laziness doesn’t allow him to think, or listen to the rebuke that people are giving him. He thinks that they are wrong and he is the only smart one.

When a person wants to grow, he must have in mind that "כל קלא צריכה בדיקה"- everything that seems easy, investigate it to make sure that it is really ok. (There is a play on words here- "כל כלה צריכה בדיקה"- you must check out a girl before marrying her.) There are some leniencies which are correct, but it is likely that most are just the work of the יצה''ר. So if someone informs you of a leniency, check it out. We must get rid of the laziness that stops us.
"גברי כח עושי דברו לשמע בקול דברו". Also מלאכים are strong and do the work of ה' at all times. But we are people, not מלאכים, so we can’t achieve this level of strength. There are some people though who come close:
1. שומרי שמיטה- they have a tremendous נסיון and many excuses.
2. הנעלבים ואינו עולבין


פרק ז:

There are two parts to זריזות-
1. Before you start the מעשה
2. Afterwards

When you have the opportunity to do a מצוה, don’t let it become חמץ, don’t delay. A person has three opportunities to do a מצוה:
1. מצוה that has a time.
2. It happens to come in front of you.
3. It occurs to you.

There is no danger like the danger of delaying a מצוה, because something will come up which will stop you from doing the correct thing. We see an example of this in תנ''ך, when שלמה was supposed to be crowned. דוד told בניהו to take שלמה down to גיחון. בניהו answered, "אמן כן יהי רצון'"- he meant to say, what’s the rush? ה' already promised that he’ll be king! But דוד wanted him to hurry because there are many קטיגורים between here and גיחון.

"ושמרתם את המצוות"- מצוה הבאה לידך אל תחמיצנה.

A person should hurry up and be the first one to do a מצוה. We see this from לוט’s daughters- since the older one went first, she was זוכה that her descendant רות should come into כ''י four generations before נעמה.

A person should run after מצוות, even on שבת.

זריזות is a מדה שלמה גדולה and a person’s nature stops him. Anyone who runs and grabs, לעתיד לבא he will get שכר for it.

A person must complete מצוות, he shouldn’t stop in middle. A person should worry that maybe he won’t finish his מצוה. It says that anyone who starts a מצוה and doesn’t finish it will bury his wife and children. This is referring to יהודה, who didn’t save יוסף all of the way. This עונש is מכ''מ because a wife is a husband’s השלמה and the children are his future.

A מצוה only gives credit to the one who finished it. שלמה said, "חזית איש מהיר...". The חכמים say that this is referring to שלמה, who built the בהמ''ק right away and משה, who built the משכן as soon as he got the מצוה.

Examples of people who hurried:
1. א''א
2. רבקה
3. אשת מנוח- she hurried after the מלאך who came to her.

It is the way of צדיקים to hurry. A person who wants will never be lazy. He won’t stop until he sees that something is finished. Even if a person isn’t inspired to do something fast, the זריזות will bring him the inspiration to do so. But if he does everything slowly, his spirits are going to be like that too.

"כאיל תארג..."- just like the איל is thirsty for water, my soul is thirsty for You, ה' and my flesh is longing for You.

Even if you don’t have it in you, if you act with זריזות, the desire will come because "התנועה החיצונה מעוררת הפנימית"- your outer movements will inspire your inner ones. Obviously, you have more control over your actions than your inner movements. So if you do something fast, inside you will be like that too. If you do everything that is in your control, you will get what’s not in your control too.

The נביא says, "ונדעה ונרדפה..."- you will know and chase to know ה'. We will do a מצוה with the כח that a lion puts forth when he roars.

פרק ח:

קנין הזריזות = קנין הזהירות.

They both have the same three levels:
1. שלמי הדעת
2. פחותים מהם
3. כל ההמון

Whichever way you acquire זהירות, you are going to do the same thing for זריזות.

What is going to make your decision to be careful? Look at all the טובות that ה' ever did for you, and then how can you not repay ה' by doing what He wants from you?

Even if a person only has a little bit of good, he must still recognize the good that he does have- he is alive, has food…

Doing the right thing does include enjoying and relaxing.

שלמי הדעת know how to enjoy and live properly. פחותים מהם skip out on the little things, and the המון עם just doesn’t want to get punished.

If we look back and see how grateful we have to be, how can we not repay ה' by doing what He wants?

פרק ט:

Why aren’t we all זריזים? Because the nature of a person is to be lazy. We want physical ease, we love pleasures and easy things and hate to be bothered with hard work. For a lazy person, everything he has to do is a burden. Anyone who wants to eat slowly, sleep without being disturbed and sleep slowly will have a hard time hurrying for a דבר מצוה (ex. waking up to go daven). If a person is constantly programmed like this, it’s going to be hard for him to hurry when he has to. He is chained down by habit and it will become second nature to him.

But this is not what we are here for. We are here to work hard and exert ourselves. We are like day laborers who get paid only for the work that they do. We must be like soldiers who eat fast, sleep when they can and are always ready for emergencies. "אדם לעמל יולד"- we are born to work hard. He should make this הרגל because he has to prepare to be like this. He must live "פת במלח תאכל..."- he must live like this so that he won’t be spoiled with luxuries.

Another problem is fear. There are two kinds of fear:
1. Real fear
2. Phobia- for example, I can’t go out in the rain because I might get pneumonia. These are fake fears.

ה' gave every person a שכל ישר- you can decide if something is a real or foolish fear.

שלמה said, "עצל... הרחובות"- this is a lazy person’s excuse: maybe there will be a leopard in the streets and a lion between the lanes. Our חכמים look down upon this quality and call it sinning. So people who are constantly afraid are sinners. One of the גדולים told his תלמיד, "חוטא אתה" because he was scared.

It says in ישעי', "פחדו... חנפים"- if you have בטחון in ה', you will do the right thing. A person should feel secondary in this world and remove himself from all earthly things. He must have בטחון and not be afraid of what is going to happen.

It says, "בטח בה' ועשה טוב...". A person must make himself incidental, but קבוע in עבודה. He must take advantage of what he is able to do in this world- he must be willing to work. He should distance himself from מנוחה and be involved in work. And he shouldn’t be afraid of all the little things that happen, yet the חכמים say that must take care of yourself. So a person must know "הכל בידי שמים חוץ מצנים פחים". It says, "ונשמרתם מאד לנפשותיכם". You aren’t supposed to ignore this kind of בטחון- even for a דבר מצוה, you can’t put yourself in danger.

Sometimes, having fear is having בטחון, and sometimes it’s just foolish. ה' gave us intelligence and we must use it to reason logically. A person must distance himself from the things ה' created to punish רשעים with. A person who wants to conduct himself in a way where he doesn’t use his intelligence, that isn’t בטחון, he’s just being foolish. ה' wants us to take care of ourselves. So not only isn’t he being careful, he is now guilty of a sin, and he is going to be punished because you can’t put yourself in a dangerous situation.

Real fear, however, is established through intelligence and is appropriate. A smart person sees what is bad and he avoids it. Foolish people don’t.

Someone who has foolish fear puts one fear on top of another. It is going to bring about בטול תורה and he won’t perform מצוות.

How do you know if fear is real fear or foolish fear? If there is likely to be a loss, you must be careful. But if there’s no real fear, you don’t have to worry about it. You only have to worry about what your eye sees.

"ערום ראה רעה נסתר"- a smart person seed if there is danger and if there is visible danger, he hides from it. A lazy person though, comes up with all kinds of fears- there might be a lion in the street!

If you tell an עצל that his רבי is in town and he should go learn from him, he’ll say that maybe there is a lion in the street. If you tell him that he is in the town, not the forest, he’ll say that the lion might come there. If you tell him that the רבי is in his house, he’ll say that maybe the door is locked. And if you tell him that the door isn’t locked, he’ll say that he doesn’t care, he just wants to take another nap. This doesn’t come from fear, it comes from עצלות.

זריזות comes after זהירות because you can’t hurry if you aren’t doing the correct thing. A person who doesn’t have זהירות won’t get so excited and want to do it with his whole heart. He is still drowning in the תאבות of his body and doesn’t want to do anything fast. Once he opens his eyes and wants to do the correct thing, he will be able to get excited.

בן איש חי- when it comes to learning תורה: in the old days when they learnt בע''פ, it was very hard. Then it got written down so it became easier to learn. But still, it was written on scrolls and they weren’t so easily accessible. Next came the printing press, and then everything was organized. But if a person doesn’t want to learn, it won’t make a difference how easy it is.


דברי תורה:

פרשת תרומה:
• פרשת תרומה discuss the כלי המשכן and פרשת תצוה discusses the בגדי כהונה- each one carries such an important message for our lives. Then the פרשה goes on to קרבנות and at the very end it discusses מזבח קטרת. Why is this not discussed with the other כלים? Everything carries key messages that are applicable to our lives. The קטרת has a good, satisfactory smell- "לעשות ריחך". The bottom line of all of our actions is "לעשות ריחך".
• The משכן had high boards put into silver sockets. There were ten on one side, ten on the other side and eight across. They were connected with corner boards- "תומים למטה ותומים על ראשם וטבעת על הראש". R’ Schwab- this is the perfect formula for marriage. You must be compatible for everything in גשמיות and in רוחניות you must have one outlook. Maybe this is the reason you give a ring at the wedding, to symbolize this פסוק.

פרשת תצוה:
• ה' commands בצלאל to build the משכן- "את הכיור הנחשת...". The כיור was made from the women’s mirrors. משה didn’t want to take them because he felt they represented גשמיות. But ה' told him to take them. They were so חביב in the eyes of ה' because it was through them that כ''י was created- the woman flirted with their husbands in order to get them to have children with them. They were called מראות צבאות. צבא- they created an army of כ''י. These woman used their femininity correctly. We are supposed to look nice for only our husbands. The מי סוטה came the כיור- because the סוטה used her beauty in the wrong way.

פורים:
• אסתר and אחשוירוש ruled over 127 provinces. שרה lived 127 years. שרה was a role model to אסתר- שרה was taken to פרעה and she davened to get out. אסתר learnt from her and she was able to live in אחשוירוש’s palace as a true בת ישראל.
• When המן offered the 10,000 שקלים to kill the Jews. So ה' had us give שקלים to build a בנין of קדושה long before he tried to build a מקום טמא.

פרשת פרה:
• Why does it say "זאת חקת התורה" and not "זאת חקת הפרה"? This is a sign for everything in the תורה- we do it because ה' knows what’s best for us.

פרשת תזריע:
• ר' הירש- why does a person become so טמא from a מת that he has to wait seven days, get sprinkled on days three and seven and only then is he טהור? Why does a woman have to wait after she gives birth before going into the בהמ''ק? Because our נשמה rules over our גוף. This is why we have so many מצוות, so that what we are supposed to do will rule over what we want to do and then we will be able to rule over our desires. When a person goes into the בהמ''ק, he must be טהור. But after מיתה, we are so overwhelmed with גשמיות, our bodies are in control. After a woman gives birth, her body rules over and she needs special time to become reconnected with her נשמה before she can go into the בהמ''ק.
• Why is a woman’s טמאה twice as long when she gives birth to a girl than when she gives birth to a girl? Because a boy has a ברית on the most physical organ of his body and he has to learn how to have control. So his ברית מילה is a constant אות. But a woman has to teach her daughter how to have control, so she needs twice as long to prepare.

פרשת קדושים:
• ר' הירש- it says "קדושים תהיו"- the key to be קדושים, "איש אביו ואמו תיראו"- the parent’s job is to teach their children obedience. The Slonimer Rebbe says that the most important stage in a child’s חנוך is before they are בר or בת מצוה- you teach them that they must obey. ר' משה says that if you are a parent or teacher, you must learn what to tell your children they can or can’t do. You must make life pleasant for them, not everything could be “no”. The next half of this פסוק discusses שבת. שבת is also a very big discipline- you can’t just do whatever you want whenever you want. שבת is the cornerstone of becoming קדוש. When you have the ability to overcome and be disciplined, you can be קדושים.

פרשת אמור:
• The הפתרה describes the third בהמ''ק and talks about the בגדי כהונה. When the כהנים wear these clothes, it imbues in them קדושה and inspires them to be who they really want to be. For us, this is our בגדי שבת- they imbue in us the spirit of שבת.

מגילת רות:
• רות becomes the grandmother of מלך המשיח. She was so great. We can learn from here. She was the daughter of עגלון מלך מואב. She was married to מחלון for ten years and they had no children. She was inspired by her mother-in-law and she gave up everything to do חסד. It says, "כאשר תלכי אלך". R’ Ehrentrau- אינו דרך של בת ישראל ללכת לבתי טאטרות..."- this isn’t talking about places which are wrong. But a בת ישראל only goes places with a purpose, not just to kill time.
• When רות goes down to בועז, it says "ותאמר רות כה אשר תאמר אלי אעשה". The word אלי has dots on it, it’s a קרי בלא כתיב. רות said, whatever you are telling me, there is no me. She didn’t have אנכיות.
• What is the connection between מגילת רות and זריזות? בועז married רות quickly, and this was important because he died the next day.
• It is called מגלית חסד. מלכות בית דוד is built on this strength- both בועז and רות did something which was against their nature and שכל, and did what had to be done.
• נעמי told רות to uncover her feet as a רמז that he owes her יבום. יבום gives feet and stability to the wandering נשמה of the מת.
• דוד’s name has two ד- low, and a ו- אמת. דוד didn’t have a sense of אנכיות. He had no גאוה, yet when it came to אמת and חבור to ה', he excelled.