Description: Review 04
Review of Volume I
The next step is the recognition that we are the creations of Hashem. Until now, we have worked on recognizing Hashem’s existence, now we will try to internalize that we were created by Him.
Obviously, this is a simple belief that we all have. It seems silly to believe in Hashem and not believe we are His creations. What’s the need for developing this step?
But if we look in the Torah we find a person, quite a celebrity, who believed just that. None other than Pharaoh, is recorded in Tanach as saying, ‘li yeori v’anochi asitini,’ the river (the Nile,) is mine, and I created myself! Pharaoh believed he was not created by Hashem, rather was self-sufficient from creation. He did believe in Hashem – even before the Makkos he said to Moshe and Aharon, ‘mi Hashem asher eshmah b’kolo,’ who is Hashem that I should need to listen to Him? He believed in Hashem’s existence, didn’t think He was all-powerful, and really thought that his own creation happened independently.
Meforshim and our rebbeim have taught us that every aspect of the Torah, each detail of every story, is relevant to our soul – every single person’s soul. Every persona in Torah represents a force, a power in a person’s neshamah. We all have some of Avraham Avinu, Yitzchak Avinu, Sarah, Rivka, Rachel, Leah, and so on, within us. We also unfortunately suffer from the powers of Nimrod, Lavan, Esav and Pharaoh as well.
These aren’t hints, remazim, or mussar thoughts demonstrated by the stories of the Torah. This is much more than that. Avraham is a force of purity, of taharah, of chessed and ahavah, that exists within each one of us. We learn about Avraham to be able to bring out and grow the Avraham potential we have in us – learning about withstanding nisyonos, doing hachnassas orchim, teaching others and so on.
Likewise, on the other side of the fence, we learn about Pharaoh and all the other reshaim of the Torah to identify the forces of evil, of tumaah that reside within us, so that we can learn how to overcome them and control our tendencies, and refine our neshamos. The Rambam writes, ‘Pharaoh is in truth the Yetzer Horah!’ Meaning, every person has a little Pharaoh within them.
The truth is, although it seems weird to us for someone to believe they created themselves, it’s not so distant from those who believe they were created through evolution, natural processes, without any intelligent design. In essence those people don’t believe that ‘they’ created themselves, they believe that it just happened on its own.
We are b”H maaminim – we believe in Hashem, and we believe that He created us. But the same way that we need to bring alive and in the open the belief that Hashem exists and we live with Him every moment of our lives, we need to address and develop this basic belief as well – He created us.
There’s nothing stronger than Emunah Peshutah, that has the ability to chase away depression, sadness, confusion, anger and all the emotions that accompany confusion and darkness of this world. Sometimes we don’t even identify the source of our feelings, or we can’t pinpoint what it is we need to understand, but more than likely it is the basics of Emunah that need strengthening.
Every time the Chafetz Chayim would want to strengthen his own Emunah he would learn through the parshah of Beraishis, review ‘maaseh beraishis.’ He would learn from a chumash in a very simple straightforward manner, translating and imagining every aspect of creation. Do you think the Chafetz Chayim had forgotten what was created on the first day or the fifth day? We might have that problem, and need our kids parshah sheets and drawings – when were birds created? But the Chafetz Chayim didn’t. He had no sefaikos, no questions or doubts. Why then did he learn through parshas Beraishis again?
But the meaning of this possibly is, that anytime we feel weakened in any aspect of our Avodas Hashem, whether it’s difficult to daven, or we are struggling to learn with hasmadah, or to push ourselves to come to learn and to understand what we are saying, it’s not a problem with davening or learning. The problem lies in the basics and the foundation of everything – our Emunah needs strengthening. Not that chas v’Shalom we have doubts or questions. But the clarity, the bright light of Emunah needs to be revived so that it can live in our neshamah and be felt in a real way. When there’s some weakness in the power of our Emunah – it translates into weakness in davening or learning or any other aspect of serving Hashem.
Review of Volume I
The next step is the recognition that we are the creations of Hashem. Until now, we have worked on recognizing Hashem’s existence, now we will try to internalize that we were created by Him.
Obviously, this is a simple belief that we all have. It seems silly to believe in Hashem and not believe we are His creations. What’s the need for developing this step?
But if we look in the Torah we find a person, quite a celebrity, who believed just that. None other than Pharaoh, is recorded in Tanach as saying, ‘li yeori v’anochi asitini,’ the river (the Nile,) is mine, and I created myself! Pharaoh believed he was not created by Hashem, rather was self-sufficient from creation. He did believe in Hashem – even before the Makkos he said to Moshe and Aharon, ‘mi Hashem asher eshmah b’kolo,’ who is Hashem that I should need to listen to Him? He believed in Hashem’s existence, didn’t think He was all-powerful, and really thought that his own creation happened independently.
Meforshim and our rebbeim have taught us that every aspect of the Torah, each detail of every story, is relevant to our soul – every single person’s soul. Every persona in Torah represents a force, a power in a person’s neshamah. We all have some of Avraham Avinu, Yitzchak Avinu, Sarah, Rivka, Rachel, Leah, and so on, within us. We also unfortunately suffer from the powers of Nimrod, Lavan, Esav and Pharaoh as well.
These aren’t hints, remazim, or mussar thoughts demonstrated by the stories of the Torah. This is much more than that. Avraham is a force of purity, of taharah, of chessed and ahavah, that exists within each one of us. We learn about Avraham to be able to bring out and grow the Avraham potential we have in us – learning about withstanding nisyonos, doing hachnassas orchim, teaching others and so on.
Likewise, on the other side of the fence, we learn about Pharaoh and all the other reshaim of the Torah to identify the forces of evil, of tumaah that reside within us, so that we can learn how to overcome them and control our tendencies, and refine our neshamos. The Rambam writes, ‘Pharaoh is in truth the Yetzer Horah!’ Meaning, every person has a little Pharaoh within them.
The truth is, although it seems weird to us for someone to believe they created themselves, it’s not so distant from those who believe they were created through evolution, natural processes, without any intelligent design. In essence those people don’t believe that ‘they’ created themselves, they believe that it just happened on its own.
We are b”H maaminim – we believe in Hashem, and we believe that He created us. But the same way that we need to bring alive and in the open the belief that Hashem exists and we live with Him every moment of our lives, we need to address and develop this basic belief as well – He created us.
There’s nothing stronger than Emunah Peshutah, that has the ability to chase away depression, sadness, confusion, anger and all the emotions that accompany confusion and darkness of this world. Sometimes we don’t even identify the source of our feelings, or we can’t pinpoint what it is we need to understand, but more than likely it is the basics of Emunah that need strengthening.
Every time the Chafetz Chayim would want to strengthen his own Emunah he would learn through the parshah of Beraishis, review ‘maaseh beraishis.’ He would learn from a chumash in a very simple straightforward manner, translating and imagining every aspect of creation. Do you think the Chafetz Chayim had forgotten what was created on the first day or the fifth day? We might have that problem, and need our kids parshah sheets and drawings – when were birds created? But the Chafetz Chayim didn’t. He had no sefaikos, no questions or doubts. Why then did he learn through parshas Beraishis again?
But the meaning of this possibly is, that anytime we feel weakened in any aspect of our Avodas Hashem, whether it’s difficult to daven, or we are struggling to learn with hasmadah, or to push ourselves to come to learn and to understand what we are saying, it’s not a problem with davening or learning. The problem lies in the basics and the foundation of everything – our Emunah needs strengthening. Not that chas v’Shalom we have doubts or questions. But the clarity, the bright light of Emunah needs to be revived so that it can live in our neshamah and be felt in a real way. When there’s some weakness in the power of our Emunah – it translates into weakness in davening or learning or any other aspect of serving Hashem.