Bereishis: Why the Torah Teaches Hakaras Hatov Through Creation

Transcript

Every day, every step, every prat in the creation and how the Rabbeinu Shalom created the world. I've always wondered, what is the need to have this knowledge? Why would the Torah need to tell us how it was created? The Rabbeinu Shalom should say, I created the world, now you're created and now you have mitzvahs. Why did it become an essential part of the Torah to know how the Rabbeinu Shalom created the world? Rashi points out, could have skipped that whole chapter bichlal. It could have started off with Achodesh hazeh lachem, the first mitzvah. No, it's important to know, says Rashi, b'shem Chazal, that the Rabbeinu Shalom created the world. But why is it important to know how He created the world? Every detail, what came day one, what came day two, it should have started with Yehi chol Hashemayim va'aretz. It's all complete. Yet, daascha, I believe, rabosai, an idea that I would like to share. Even the how the Rabbeinu Shalom created the world was necessary and is a hakdamah, an introduction to the mitzvahs hachodesh hazeh lachem. It wasn't enough just to tell me that the Rabbeinu Shalom created the world, but we also needed to learn and to hear how and the details on how He created the world, and that is as well hakdamah to Torah and mitzvahs. To explain this, I would give you a mashal with a story. Zeide Zichrono livrachah told me that the Alter from Slabodka, one Friday night, came to the door of his house. Put his hand on the mezuzah, and he was thinking deep in thought. The people around him, his children, talmidim, they all assumed that he must be thinking some deep ideas about Shabbos. His hand was on the mezuzah, something about mezuzah, the Eibishter. And then he stopped. He went into the house and began the meal, and someone had the courage to ask him, Rebbe, tell us, what were you thinking? What was this? He said, I'll tell you the reason why I stopped to think. I come home, I eat the meal. Now today, Baruch Hashem, there's good foods, you know. A meal takes more than five minutes just because there's so many entrees and, as they call it, Yiddish farshpayzen, and main course and dessert. I can imagine the seudah that the Altas Lubavitch had lit in Europe. It was a trukene soup, a dry soup, and a wet piece of chicken from the chicken that came from the soup, and that was the whole thing. Could have been done. Said the Alter, I eat this quickly. I don't appreciate. Why? Because I don't realize how much preparation that went into it. I don't realize that the Rebbetzin had to go to the store to buy the chicken the way they used to do in the olden times, to pluck the chicken, to bring it to the shochet. A lot of work. The reason why we have so many courses today, because since the preparation chelek of it is easier, a person can walk into a store and get a takeout Shabbos in one minute. So where does it become the ameilus? So it comes into that we give many different courses. It's this course and that, so she has to go to this store and that store. Even in the takeout, you can't come to one store and get the whole meal. The idea is, in Erev Shabbos, there's an inyan of mi shetarach b'Erev Shabbos, yochal b'Shabbos. There's a preparation necessary, and it's possible, says the Alter, I wouldn't realize, I would overlook it, I'd eat the meal in two seconds without appreciating. So I stood by the mezuzah, going through the motions of what the Rebbezin had to prepare, the tircha that went into it. Like this, now I can be a makir tov. I believe this is what the Torah v'ilfunus. The Torah wants us to realize every step. When a person comes and it's all already done, it's all set, you don't appreciate it. Notice how many times it says ki tov. What do we need to say ki tov? Just write at the end, Vayechulu hashamayim v'haaretz v'chol tzvaam, Vayar Elokim ki tov. Why every day after every creation, Vayar Elokim ki tov? And I think this is yesod. In every prat, be makir the tov. And this is the hakdamah to Torah, it's hakdamah to mitzvos. On them, there's no Torah, there's no mitzvos, there's no yadus. Higid l'amo, the Ribbono Shel Olam wants to tell His people, appreciate, understand, because you have to be a makir tov. I created you to be.

Moidu makila boira. This was an important part of Torah, and maybe even the hakdama, the lesson that's prefacing all else that's in the Torah.