Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Hello, my friends, and welcome back to this week's episode of the Practical Parsha podcast. This is Rabbi Shlomo Cohen, and I hope you are well for this week.
[00:00:09] The motto is don't let perfection be the enemy of the good.
[00:00:16] So, as most of you know, during the summer months, my wife works. Actually, for one of the months of the summer, my wife works in a girls camp in West Virginia. It's a great experience for the family, for the kids, and I come up to be with my family for Shabbos.
[00:00:36] So it happens to be this past week, I was here the whole week, and I wanted to do a podcast.
[00:00:44] I don't want, uh, to miss a week of the Practical Parsha podcast.
[00:00:48] But at the same time, things don't go how we plan planned them to go. They go how Hashem wants them to go. And we'll talk a little bit about that later in the episode.
[00:00:59] But the saga is, is that my computers that I have my recording software on, both were not working.
[00:01:08] And it could have been easy for me to just give up this week and pass on an episode, but I really don't like doing that. I like, you know, I know there's so many of you out there that enjoy this every week, and I, I also enjoy saying over Torah thoughts from the Parsha. It's a, uh, very important part of my week as well. So I didn't want to miss an episode, but thank God I found someone in camp who has a computer. The first person I asked the software wouldn't download, could have given up, then decided to ask another person.
[00:01:43] Not so comfortable to ask someone, can I use your computer? Can I download software?
[00:01:49] It's always a little bit of an, uh, uncomfortable feeling, but the person was very gracious. He should be blessed. It's in his merit that we're getting this episode out today.
[00:01:58] And as you might notice, there's a little beeping in the background. So I'm in an office in a building over here in camp. It's, you know, it's not conducive for recording. But the point is that there's these.
[00:02:10] There's this smoke alarm which keeps beeping. You'll be hearing it throughout the episode. I'm sorry, there's nothing I could do about that. But the good thing is, is that we're, God willing, going to be sharing some Torah thoughts together for this week's episode and not missing. So before we begin, as always, if you have any questions, comments, or would like to reach out, feel free to send me an email. At Rabbi Shlomo konkohnmail.com I'd love to hear from you.
[00:02:35] This week's parsha is a double parsha. It's Parshas Matos Mase. And aside from being a double parsha, it's also parsha. It's Chazak Shabbos Chazak, where we're finishing the Book of Numbers. And now we're going to be going into the fifth book of the Torah, the book of Devarim, the book of Deuteronomy, which will really be. We'll talk about it next week. Be a review that Moshe Rabbeinu. Moshe is giving before the Jewish people are going to go into the Holy Land and before he's going to pass on. And just to give a quick overview of this week's Parsha before we jump into some beautiful ideas that I saw is that Parshas Mato starts off with the laws of vows and oaths, that if a person takes a vow, it could have ramifications. And the Torah delineates for us what is considered a vow, what is considered an oath. When is it uprooted? When is it not considered an oath? That is spoken about in this week's Parsha.
[00:03:41] Additionally, Parshas Matos speaks out for us the battle against the Midianites that in this week's Parsha, the Jewish nation wages war against the Midyanim after they try to seduce the Jewish nation. The Parsha also tells us about the laws of koshering utensils that aside from the things that we eat, have to be kosher. The utensils that we prepare them in have to be kosher as well. Many people don't realize as you ask somebody what makes something kosher, they'll tell you the rabbi is going to bless it. That's not it. It's got to have kosher food, kosher ingredients. The utensils that make the food have to be kosher. And that is spoken about in this week's Parsha as well.
[00:04:25] Additionally, after the Jewish nation defeat Midian, we talk about the dividing of the spoils from that battle.
[00:04:34] The parsha continues with the. This interesting incident where two tribes and, um, it'll really be two and a half tribes. The tribes of Reuven Gad and half of the tribe of Manasseh approach Moshe and they state that they want to stay on the east side of the Jordan.
[00:04:57] They don't want to go into Eretz Yisrael. And there's a lot of discussion about this. And Moshe Rabbeinu, there's a back and forth here where Moshe Rabbeinu makes them make a commitment that they have to join the Jewish people in the fight to conquer the land of Israel. And only then after the land is conquered can they go back to their families on the east side of the Jordan River. Parshas masse deals. It's really a summary of the journey of the Jewish people in the desert. And it's actually brought down that there were 42 stops that the Jewish people made in their 40 years in the desert. And we're going to touch and we're going to talk about this today a little bit, but just a little preempt, you know, maybe a little bit kabbalistical over here.
[00:05:41] 42 is actually significant because 42 represents one of the names, letters of God's name. And the idea is that these 42 stops really, uh, sort of portend to each and every one of us, because each and every one of us have 42 stops in our lives along the journey that we take. And again, there's a lot of talk and commentary about this, but the Torah specifically repeats to us again the specific stops of the Jewish nation in the desert.
[00:06:10] And some of them, you know, Jewish people thought it would be a good place, but really was not a good place some place they thought it would be a bad place and was good. But the point is, is that these were the stops of the Jewish nation. It is clearly delineated from where they went to the next place it's listed in the Torah. And on a deeper level, this helps us understand that in our lives there are 42 stops that we make. And perhaps we will get into that a little bit later. In the episode, the Parsha also talks about the borders and the boundaries of the land of Israel and the different way it should be split up between the tribes.
[00:06:47] There's also, uh, besides for the different tribes getting a portion, the Levi and the Levites, they did not receive a portion in the land of Israel, but rather they received cities where they would live in Eretz Yisrael in Israel. And additionally the Parsha speaks out for us the mitzvah, uh, of Oremiklut, which is referred to as a sanctuary city. Now, the sanctuary city that the Torah is talking about is a situation where somebody kills by accident and he has to run to this city of refuge where he's protected. He has to stay there until the death of the high priest.
[00:07:26] Now, and, um, the commentaries explain what was the purpose of this. It was a way for a person to gain atonement these cities that were the cities of refuge were mostly the cities of the Leviim, the Levites who were the teachers, the spiritual leaders of the Jewish nation.
[00:07:42] And I think the idea, one of the ideas here is that the person's. If a person came to a situation where he inadvertently killed somebody, there is obviously something there that he has to rectify. And by going to the cities of refuge, he'd be able to have a good influence by the people around him, by the spiritual leaders that were there around him, and he would stay there until the death of the high priest, when he can go back to his family.
[00:08:07] Finally, the parsha finishes with telling us how the Jewish nation, how the different tribes could marry into each other, which cemented the 12 tribes as a one unit and one nation.
[00:08:21] The first idea I want to share with you today takes us to the beginning of the parsha. So as I mentioned earlier, Parshas Matos starts off with the laws of oaths and vows.
[00:08:34] Now, this might seem very, you know, far from us, hard for us to understand. Oaths, vows, you know, for us, words are cheap. Words don't mean anything. People say things all the time, and they say, I promise. They even, like, use the word swear.
[00:08:49] And it doesn't really mean anything to people.
[00:08:52] But the Torah's understanding of these terms is very, very powerful. And actually it affects action.
[00:09:03] When a person would make a vow that would have real world ramifications for a person, that he would not be able to do something depending on what his vow was. If he made a vow that he wouldn't eat meat, he couldn't eat meat until he, you know, he would be forbidden from eating meat according to the Torah. Right? That. That's the Torah. The Torah spells out for us until the vow would be over, or he would go to, you know, the Talmud tells us if you go to a chacham, a smart person, a wise person, a rabbi, to annul the vow, but it's binding, it's real.
[00:09:38] And if a person would transgress that vow, that would be a sin.
[00:09:43] Now, similarly for oaths as well, and there's many different examples that can be given. And in fact, there's a whole track date in the Talmud which deals with oaths and vows. It's called Mesekhtas Nidorim Tractate Nedarim.
[00:09:58] But really what I want to bring out here is that contrary to what we think from the world we live in, words have impact, words have meaning. You know, we say sticks and stones can break our bones, but words will Never hurt. That's false. And I've talked about this in the past.
[00:10:19] The Torah teaches us that aside from obviously hurting someone's feelings, but the words we say have an impact on the world around us, right? The Talmud tells us that a person should always be careful with the curse, uh, of a simple person, right? If a person utters a curse on somebody, we shouldn't do that. We shouldn't say bad about another person, because when we speak it, it manifests itself in this world, even though it's words.
[00:10:48] It's really more than that. I think this idea of oaths and vows, where it has ramifications on the things that we do, you know, this, uh, is what the Torah is telling us, teaches us the power of speech, the power of our words. And I think the practical lesson we could take from that is that we should be careful how we talk about another person or how we talk in general.
[00:11:11] There are some people, they won't say if they're giving. You know, some people joke around, oh, I'll kill you, I'll do this right? They'll never say you. Or they'll say, you know, if they're talking about a bad situation, uh, instead of a person saying, and I'm not referring to any of you, but I'm just using this as the example that if you get cancer, right? We never say this, that you say if a person. You never want to refer words that are negative, never want to attribute that to somebody because you got to be careful with words. You don't want to, God forbid, put a. Like, you know, it gets into a little bit hee gee, bee Gees. But you don't want to put a curse or just really more than that, even putting a curse.
[00:11:49] It's the words that we say have effect, and we have to be careful with what we say and how we say it.
[00:11:56] Second idea I want to share with you from Parshas Matos is regarding the laws of Kashuring, the laws of koshering utensils. So after the Jewish nation defeated Midian, the Midianites, they had the spoils of war.
[00:12:10] And in some of these spoils were the pots and pans and vessels and utensils of the non Jewish Midianim, the Midianites. And in this week's Parsha, the Torah tells us how those utensils are. Kashir, that's the term for making something kosher. How do you make a pot kosher?
[00:12:31] Can it be koshered? The answer is, in most situations, yes. But there's a Process and obviously in the Torah, gives us the brief, um, understanding of what to do, of how do you kasher a utensil, but happens to be most utensils, metal utensils, um, can be kashured. And the general rule of thumb of how you kasha something, how you make something kosher, is that the same way that the flavor came into the vessel, into the utensil is the same way it goes out. Right?
[00:13:06] So even though a vessel is clean, perfectly clean, there's still absorptions of flavor within the walls of the utensil. And therefore, if something came in, it was a pot which used water, it was meant for holding liquid, and it was put on a fire. So it means the same. The way it went in was through that medium of boiling water on a fire. So you would. The way you Kashur it is filling it up with or dipping it in boiling hot water. If something is used directly with a fire, like a, uh, pan, uh, you know, a rack for a grill.
[00:13:41] Right. Obviously, besides for the step that has to be cleaned and you have to wait 24 hours. I'm not getting into practical halacha, uh, of how you do it. You have to ask your local Orthodox rabbi for that. But what I'm trying to get is the general idea here. The general rule of thumb is that if you have a grill grate or something that was used directly with fire, so you need fire a blowtorch or put it in directly in coals to get that flavor out, meaning the way it goes in is the way it goes out.
[00:14:09] I saw a very beautiful idea brought down from the Chavez chayyim, that this lesson of kashrus, of how you kasha utensils, teaches us a very important idea when it comes to. To us to try to rectify things that we've done in the past.
[00:14:26] Many times, if we've done something wrong, if we've acted incorrectly. And now we've, you know, we realize what we did, we've gotten more mature.
[00:14:35] Um, we've grown up.
[00:14:37] We just forget about it and go on with life. You know, maybe in certain other religions, you just, uh, you confess and that's it. In Judaism, that's not the only thing that we do. You know, there's such a concept of confession, but it's not the way that the other religions have.
[00:14:54] Think of it when it comes to fixing up our ways. It's not just confessing, but it's also. It's leaving the sin behind, Leaving it behind and also making a commitment to not doing it going forward. And the Chavitz Chaim explains, we see from the laws of Kasharing that if we did something negative in one area, we should try to find a way that we could rectify that sin in a positive fashion, the same way.
[00:15:19] So if we spoke Lashon Hara, if we had evil speech, we should try to speak good about people, uh, aside from leaving it behind, the Lashon Hara, not wanting to do that anymore and committing to not doing it forward, but actively find positive ways to rectify the negative action that we've done in the past.
[00:15:35] That's what we see from the laws of Kashuras that we see from Kashari, where you're taking, you're using the force that made it not kosher, you're using that same force to make it kosher again. Right? So, so too for us, when we want to become the best people, we want to reach our potential.
[00:15:55] So we all make mistakes.
[00:15:58] Sure, we have to leave those mistakes behind.
[00:16:00] But part of reaching our potential is when we find ways to channel those negative actions into positivity, into. Into doing good for others, into improving ourselves and the world around us. That is a beautiful thought we see from this week's Parsha. When it comes to the laws of Kasharing. It's not just the halachic laws of Kashuring that we see from this week's Parsha, but there's a beautiful lesson here on how we could conduct ourselves to be the best we can be.
[00:16:33] The last idea I'm going to share with you for Parshas Matos before I jump into Parshas Mase is that we see this whole episode of Reuven, Gad and half of the tribe of Manasseh. These two and a half tribes stayed on the eastern side of the Jordan River. And the Torah shows, uh, a back and forth between Moshe and these tribes. Now, it's interesting at the end of this episode, Moshe includes half of the tribe of Manasseh that they're gonna stay on the eastern side side of the Yarden of the Jordan River. And the question that's asked is that it was only the tribes of Reuven, of Reuben and Gad that asked to stay. We don't see that Menashe, the tribe of Manasseh wanted to stay on the eastern side of the Jordan River. So why is Moshe including half of the tribe of Manasseh to stay on the eastern side? And there's different answers that are given, but two of them, which I thought are very beautiful and I think give over to Us a very powerful lesson. Number one is the tribe Hashib.
[00:17:42] Number one is, is that Moshe Rabbeinu wanted it to be that these tribes that were staying on the eastern side of the river, they should still be connected to the Jewish nation, to the Jewish homeland, which is Eretz Yisrael, which is the land of Israel.
[00:18:01] So therefore, specifically, he split up one tribe in order that if there's family in Eretz Yisrael in, uh, Israel, they're gonna go there, they're gonna be connected. They're not gonna be separate totally from the rest of Clau Yisrael, from the rest of the Jewish nation.
[00:18:20] And that effect of even just one tribe, of half of the tribe of Menashe, would have a positive impact on the tribes of Reuven and Gad as well. And I think the lesson we can get from this is, number one, is the importance of family ties.
[00:18:37] But even more than that is us being connected to the Jewish people and the land of Israel. It's something we should always have in our heart and always remember and do whatever we can to feel connected to the Jewish people. Number one is if something bad happens to a fellow Jew, to the Jewish nation, think about it, process it, feel bad about it, you know, have some empathy. And specifically, when it comes to Eretz Yisrael as well to the land of Israel, which is our, uh, Jewish homeland, to also feel connected, to have concern, to not feel distant, to not feel disconnected, rather to make it part of us, to make it connected. Because this is. We're all together. We shouldn't feel separate from Klay Yisrael. We need to feel together because that's who we are. We're the Jewish nation. Even though there's the 12 tribes, but we're all one. And I think that's reinforced by the end of this week's Parsha at the end of Maase, where the tribes are permitted to marry into each other, or it's reaffirmed that everyone can marry into each other and it's one nation.
[00:19:46] We have to remember this concept all the time. Second explanation I saw regarding this, why Moshe split the tribe of Menashe is because Menashe was a tribe that had many great scholars and because Moshe civilly wanted the tribe of Menashe with their great scholars to be partly implanted with the tribes of Reuven and Gad, because that would have a positive impact on the nation. Because if there is.
[00:20:14] If there are Torah leaders, if there is people who are Torah scholars, then Judaism can continue, the Torah will survive, and the People will survive.
[00:20:24] And this is something which we see time and time again.
[00:20:29] What keeps us as a people. It's not gefilte fish, it's not raisin challah, and it's not even the land of Israel, because there's been thousands of years we've been without it, unfortunately. But what keeps us as a people is the Torah, is our connection to the Torah, is our studying Torah.
[00:20:49] And more specifically for the children, it's giving our children a Jewish education to making sure that they're, you know, they're educated in, you uh, know, not going to Hebrew school once a week. It's not enough for someone in today's day and age for us to keep that Jewish identity, to not intermarry. We need to chinook Jewish education is integral in keeping our uh, Jewish identity, keeping Judaism strong and vibrant. This we see from Moshe Rabbeinu. Specifically he wanted the Torah scholars, he split up a tribe to have this impact, to keep that the Reuven and Gad that they should have people that will have positive impacts on them, to teach them to keep the laws of the Torah, to keep the lessons of the Torah, to impart it into the next generation. The last idea I want to share with you today takes us to Parshas Mase. I want to share one thought on Parshas Mase because it's a double parasha and a beautiful idea.
[00:21:50] In Parshas Mase it delineates for us the different journeys and travels of the Jewish nation.
[00:21:58] If you look in the first two verses, there's a very interesting observation made by Rav Hirsch. It says Elo Masevone, Yerel Hasher, Yatsu Meretz, Mitrayim. Let's.
[00:22:11] These are the journeys of the children of Israel who went forth in the land of Egypt according to their legions under the hand of Moshe and Aron Vayichto of Moshe Esmote, alpiashem, veila Maseyem lemoysem.
[00:22:26] Moshe wrote their goings forth according to their journeys at the bidding of Hashem.
[00:22:32] And these were their journeys according to their going forths.
[00:22:36] So the obvious question that needs to be asked here is that uh, in the same pasuk, in the same verse first it says that Hashem, uh, asked Moshe to write they're going forth according to their journey.
[00:22:52] And then at the end of the pasik it says, and these were their journeys according to their going forth. It switches meaning. At first it says they're going forth according to their journeys.
[00:23:06] And then at the end it says, and these were their Journeys according to their going forths. Right? Shouldn't it, if it's repeating it, shouldn't it match up? Shouldn't it say it in the same order?
[00:23:19] What's going on over here? So Rav Hirsch explains that the two times in the posse represent two different points of view of the journeys of Klal Yisrael, the journeys of the Jewish people.
[00:23:32] The first time in the posse, when it's referring to the going forths and the journeys it's referring to, so to say, Hashem's God's point of view, that Hashem told the people to go, and when he said when it was appropriate, when he felt it was appropriate for them to go to the next step, they moved to the next step of the journey.
[00:23:56] But the second part of the Pasuk, the second part of the verse, is the Jewish nation's point of view, where it flips it around.
[00:24:05] And these were their journeys according to their going forth, meaning the Jewish people and really people in general, when they're on a journey. In life, we tend to get.
[00:24:19] What's the word?
[00:24:21] Anxious, uh, when things, ah, don't go according to our plan, we have a picture how things should work out, and we think that's best for us.
[00:24:33] When we don't get that raise we wanted to get, or that job we thought was perfect for us, or that house, which was the best thing ever and the best deal, and it doesn't work out for us, we're upset, we get impatient. Why is this not working out? Why are not things going to plan?
[00:24:49] But the truth is, that is exactly how Hashem, uh, wants it.
[00:24:54] Because in life, it's not about what we perceive to be the best for us, but rather it's what's the best, what Hashem determines to be the best for us, and that we see from this week's Parsha. And that's why it says, and these were their journeys according to their going forth, because it was a failure to recognize that the whole point of life and wandering in the desert wasn't about reaching the destination, it was about the journey.
[00:25:29] The purpose, as our verse says, was not the destination, but the journey. And I think this is such a beautiful and powerful idea because in life we have this picture of where we should be and where we want to be.
[00:25:45] But the truth is we don't know if that's best for us. Hashem knows what's best for us. And when that job doesn't work out, or when that Shidduch doesn't work out, or that house, or whatever it is. You plug in the blank there.
[00:26:00] This is precisely the journey that, uh, Hashem has put us on. He knows what's best for us. It's not the destination, it's the journey. And we see when it's going. From, you know, Hashem's point of view, it's all about the journey, because he knows what's best for us. He knows how we're gonna reach our potential.
[00:26:18] And the journey that we go on is the way we get to that destination. Because the way that we get to perfection is. Is by going on the journey that Hashem deems best for us. And that's how we reach perfection. And that's how we become the best people. We come be and grow the closest to. Hashem M. So that I'm going to finish for today's podcast. Hope you enjoyed this live broadcast from West Virginia, and I look forward to speaking to you next week. If you have any questions, comments, feel free to reach out to me at Rabbi Shlomokon kohnmail.com have a great day.
