Vayikra: Why Korbanos Require Salt but Forbid Se’or and Devash

Transcript

Parshas Vayikra, korbanos. Shh. Korbanos. There's two mitzvahs which are universal to all the korbanos, which means it's not for only a chatas, it's for a mincha and olah, all the korbanos, you hear? And that is no se'or and dvash, no yeast and no honey. Another mitzvah, melach, that it needs salt. No honey, no yeast, but yes salt. And these are two mitzvahs. In the Chinuch, mitzvah kuf yud zayin is the issur of putting honey or yeast in any korban. Shh. In mitzvah kuf yud ches, we have the mitzvah of bamelach timlach, v'chol korbancha, bamelach timlach, that you have to put salt. We're going to look it up inside now in the pesukim mefurash. Perek beis, pasuk yud aleph and pasuk yud beis. Perek beis, pasuk yud aleph and yud beis. It says like this: Kol hamincha. And the truth is, it's not only mincha, it's every korban. The mefarshim already are me'orer, why does it say it by mincha? Lama ze katuv bamincha? Ze din bchol hakorbanos. Okay. Od me'at, im yirtzeh Hashem. Nit'asek b'she'eilah zu, but let's first get the mitzvah. The mitzvah is, mitzvah kuf yud zayin, lo te'aseh chametz. Ki chol se'or v'chol dvash lo taktiru mimenu isheh laShem. No honey, no yeast is allowed to be niktar, to be brought to the mizbeach, isheh laShem. One korban, yeah, korban reishis, the first korban, which is the shtei halechem on Shavuos, which is brought from the new wheat, and also bikurim, reishis. All the reishit could come from se'or and it could come from dvash. For example, the shtei halechem, they put yeast inside. In the korban shtei halechem on Shavuos, we put yeast. What about bikurim? It could come from dvash, fruits which have in it dvash, which are sweet, sweet fruits, right? Because dvash doesn't have to mean only honey; it can mean any sweet. Rashi explains any pri that gives off sweet, like te'enim and tmarim, is called dvash. So the bikurim, yes, dvash. Shtei halechem, yes, se'or. Reishit, all korban reishit mutar. What about salt? Kol korban, pasuk yud-gimmel, kol korban minchascha ba'melach timlach. Salt. So these are two mitzvos in Taryag mitzvot. Mitzvah kuf yud zayin, lefi the chinuch, lefi the mispar of the Chinuch. The issur to put se'or u'dvash here, lo saktiru mimenu isheh laShem. Any isheh laShem, any fire, any korban is not allowed to have se'or u'dvash. Mitzvah kuf yud ches. Mitzvah kuf yud ches, bamelach timlach, salt. Okay, we have to salt all the korbanos. Now we're going to discuss two groups of ha'aros. The first thing we're going to try to understand: why? What's the taam ha'issur for se'or u'dvash? Why is shtei halechem and bikurim different? Why melach must be? We'll discuss that. And then we'll also discuss the second group of ha'aros, the leshonos, the wording of the pasuk, which is a little bit tzarich biur. It needs to be explained. So let's begin with the ha'aros on the yesod ha'sugya. What is the whole mitzvah about? Okay, so first of all we have to ask, why not? What's wrong? It doesn't say in the Torah. It doesn't say in the Torah why not. It just says, because you can't. Ki. Because you can't have yeast and honey. It doesn't say why not, though. It says you can't because. There's a because. It says because.

Because. But it doesn't follow through because why? It just says because I told you. That's all it says, right? Because I said so. Biglal shezeh kacha. Aval lo katuv biglal lama. Also, if there's something no good, quote unquote, there's something wrong with se'or u'dvash, so why by korban reishis could you bring it? If there's something bad about it, if it's something not good about se'or u'dvash, that it's not fit for a korban, so why is shtei halechem and bikurim different? Also, why salt? Yes, what salt is any better than—it's also not very sweet salt, right? It's either smar, and if any doctrination of the korban—you know what doctrination means? To doctor something. Lasim, you see, you doctor something with salt and pepper. You didn't know that? I didn't know the word. You never heard doctor something? When you want to fix something, when you want to add, yeah, spices, that's called doctoring. You have to doctor the bishul. Okay, it's a word in English. Now, the point is, if se'or is no good to doctor, is to fix up the— and dvash is no good, so why melach yehe? Why is it different? So this is not my question. This is all the Rishonim discuss this. This is starting from the Rambam to the Ramban to the Chinuch to the Ralbag to the Abarbanel. They all discuss what's no good about se'or u'dvash. And if it's no good, so why is it good for korban reishit? And, and why melach is yes good and yes needed? Lama? The pashut pshat, zeh sakas. If someone asks me, you know what I would have said? It's because Hashem said so. זה מה שכתוב, כתוב: זה לא, זה כן, ובקורבן ראשית כן. So that's it, right? That's what it says. But you see, the Rishonim weren't happy with this, and the Rishonim go out of their way, great length, to explain what's no good about seor and dvash, why is it good for korban reishit, and yet melach is chiyuv. Okay, come, let me tell you what we're discussing. There's two mitzvos. There's two mitzvos by korbanos, all of them: הגם שזה כתוב אצל מנחה, אבל האמת הוא זה בכל הקרבנות. מצוה קי״ז: כי כל שאור וכל דבש לא תקטירו ממנו אשה לה'. Second halacha, mitzvah: melach. Every korban needs salt. Why? Why is seor and dvash no good, and why is melach yes good? And the truth is, seor and dvash is good for korban reishit. The next pasuk, by korban reishit, which lechem, שתי הלחם on Shavuos, and bikurim, you're allowed to bring seor and dvash. שתי הלחם had seor, and the bikurim was made from dvash, tamarim, was made from sweet fruits. So why, why if it's no good, seor and dvash, אשה לה', so why for korban reishit is it yes good? So, kipshuto, there's a kasha, a kasha. Baruch Hu amar, right? Hashem said so. Hashem said so. L'maaseh, the Rishonim are ma'arich, ma'arich with great length, להסביר למה אסור דבש, אסור, למה korban reishis can mutar, v'lama melach tzrichim asor melach. But before we get to the Rishonim, I want to ask you now a group of ha'aros on the lashon of the pasuk. Now, again, it says it by korban minchah, but it's by all korbanos, that you're not allowed to have tevuah. אסור להביא סעור ודבש בכל קרבן. יש הקרבן אחד שמותר, korban reishis, כתוב בפסוק. This is pasuk yud-beis, korban reishis תקריבו. Yes, to be makriv seor v'dvash, which is every reishit, every lechem, shtei halechem on Shavuos is reishit, and bikurim is reishit, the first fruit. There you're allowed to have seor v'dvash. If it's no good, it should be no good even for korban reishit. This question the mefarshim, this question. Melach, yes. Why? Why melach, yes? Okay, so we have to discuss this in the Rishonim. But before we do, I want to discuss with you the lashon of the pasuk, and these questions.

Questions I'm going to ask you are not mine; it's the Chasam Sofer in Chumash. Chasam Sofer asks the following questions in the parsha. Question number one says, Kol haminchah asher takrivu laShem lo se'aseh. It should say, lo ta'aseh chametz. Why does it say lo te'aseh? You know the difference between ta'aseh and te'aseh? Ta'aseh means to make it chametz. Lo te'aseh, it should not be made chametz. So say simply, sho'el haChasam Sofer, sheyehei bepatach v'lo bekamatz. Look, Chasam Sofer asks. Then the Chasam Sofer asks, ki chol. Now what is ki chol? Ki chol is nesinas taam. It's a reason, right? But you're not telling me the reason. Matchil lagid taam, aval lo mevi et hataam. Ma hu hataam? Ein taam, right? Ki chol. Ki chol is not the reason. You know, could you imagine I tell you, Don't make it chametz because you're not allowed. Yeah, don't make it chametz. So that's it. That's the halacha. It can't be chametz, so you're not allowed to use the... right? Why does it have to give a nesinas taam miktzat, v'lo gomer? Ma hu hataam lazeh? What's the reason? What's the reason why you're not allowed to use se'or and dvash? That's the second question the Chasam Sofer asks. A third question: the pasuk is very much mareich, lo saktiru mimenu. Just say, lo saktiru, isheh laShem. What's the mimenu? What do you mean mimenu for? It should say, because, don't make chametz, ki chol se'or vchol dvash lo sachtiru. Finished. From it. It's an extra word. Now, the truth is, Rashi in Zevachim, daf ayin vav amud beis, explains the Gemara there, and I don't want to be ma'arich in the Gemara; it's a whole Gemara. But the Gemara's doresh the word mimenu because it's miyutar. So the truth is, it is a question already in the Gemara and in the Rishonim. Rashi already discusses in the Gemara, Zevachim daf ayin vav, that mimenu is miyutar. We're going to give a pshat today why it says mimenu. It doesn't need to say it. All it has to say is, Lo saktiru isheh laHashem. Lama kasuv mimenu? Then the Chasam Sofer asks also a beautiful question: Lo te'aseh chametz. Why? Ki chol se'or vchol dvash. Who talked about dvash? We're talking about chametz, no? Kol haminchah asher takrivu laHashem lo te'aseh chametz. Why? Ki chol se'or, not because of dvash. Where does dvash come in here? Dvash lo machmitz. It's a beautiful ha'arah. These are the shittos that the Chasam Sofer asks. Derech agav, Chasam Sofer. עכשיו אתם מבינים, אה, שאלה. כמו התירוץ שלך, אתה מבין השאלה. שאלה. זה השאלה. עונה החתם סופר להלכה, לפי הסוגיא הוא מסביר את הסוגיא. אני לא רוצה להיכנס לתירוץ של החתם סופר. He says a pilpuldike... he has a whole pilpul in the Gemara, but the Mishneh LaMelech, a whole story. I'm going to explain in pshatov in the pasuk. But before we get to this, now we have to go back to the reasons. We have to be magdim, magdim the reasons. What's wrong with sar and dvash? I love sar and dvash. All our good cakes come from sar and dvash. Could you imagine if sar is no good and dvash is no good? No challah. No challah. No kugel. What's sar and dvash? Where'd it come, the whole? The best stuff is sar and dvash. What's wrong with sar and dvash? So now let me give you a tiyul. Now let me give you a tiyul through the Rishonim. What's wrong with sar and dvash? What's wrong with sar and dvash? The Rambam in Moreh Nevuchim, and the Ramban brings him down here in the parsha. The Rambam in Moreh Nevuchim, chelek gimmel, perek mem-vav, writes that for avodah zarah, they used to bring korban chametz, and they would put in honey. So when we bring korbanos to Hashem, no chametz and no honey.

Because that's the way they did it for Avodah Zarah. Now I want to point out that I saw the Ramban, and I went back to look at the Rambam. I went to see the words of the Rambam, and I noticed discrepancies, chilukim between the way the Rambam writes and the way the Ramban brings the Rambam. The Teretz is very simple, because the Goyim used to do it that way. And then he even explains that's why melach is good. Why is melach, yeah, good, says the Rambam? Because the Goyim never put melach. Why would they not put melach, says the Rambam? Because they like the blood, the blood. They loved the blood. The blood was what they gave to Avodah Zarah. So if they would put salt, it would take away the blood. It draws blood. So they never put salt on korbanos, so we put salt on korbanos. Whatever they do, we do the opposite. They make chametz and dvash and no salt, so we make no chametz and dvash and salt. Good? But I went to look at the lashon of the Ramban, and I noticed two differences. The first difference I noticed is that the Ramban says that the korban wasn't chametz. That's not what it says in the Rambam. The Rambam says they would put seor inside, and therefore we don't put seor. It doesn't say chametz; it says seor. The Ramban says that the korban, no chametz, it wasn't chametz, while the Rambam actually doesn't say about the korban not chametz. He says that they put in or didn't put in seor. It's about seor. There's another chiluk that I noticed, which I thought was very interesting. The Rambam used the lashon, the Ramban used the lashon, hayu me'arvin, l'arev, they would mix in honey into the korban. But the Rambam used to use the lashon, melachlechin korbanehem b'dvash. And I guess the root word is lichluch. They used to make it dirty with honey, like. Chaf? Melachlechin, lichluch, dirt. It's an interesting lashon. You see, this is—let me teach you how to learn. You see, what do I do? I teach you how to learn. I heard the Ramban, very simple, it seems like very pashut, the Ramban, right? We don't make chametz, so we don't make chametz, right? They made it chametz, we don't make it chametz. The Ramban says about the se'or, right? The pasuk says, Ki chol se'or v'chol dvash lo taktiru, right? Okay. Notice also, it talks about lichluch of dvash. The Ramban just says they would mix in honey. The Rambam uses lashon of lichluch. Why does the Rambam speak about the se'or and not the chametz itself, that the fact that the korban was—their korban was chametz, ours is not? And why does the Rambam use a lashon, lichluch? Hayu melachlechin korbanehem b'dvash. Why lichluch? What kind of word is lichluch? Okay. I saw the Torah Temimah has a sefer called Tosefes Bracha, והוא שואל, כמעט שאלה שדוקר. It's like he's attacking the Rambam and Ramban. He says, I don't understand. Do you know why we have korbanos? The goyim have korbanos. If what the goyim do is no good, so we shouldn't have korbanos at all. If the whole thing is because we don't have what the goyim have, the korbanos started by them. Lo sizbachu od la'seirim asher heim zonim... Right? It says clearly in the pasuk that they did it in the fields, and we do it now in the Mishkan. So if the whole idea is not to do what they did, so we shouldn't have korbanos at all, unless that's enough of a difference, that the way they makriv—there, it's not the idea of the korbanos; it's the way. They're makriv it in the fields; we makriv in the Mishkan. They're makriv with honey; we makriv without honey, I guess. But this is the shaylah of the Torah. I felt I had to tell it to you. He's asking, l'chora, the whole idea of korbanos comes from the goyim. So if we're trying to avoid doing like the goyim, why are we making korbanos? Okay. No, no, he gives his own pshat. Then he goes into his own pshat: what's wrong with sour and dvash? But we'll get to that later. I don't want the Acharonim now; first I want the Rishonim. Let's first go through the Rishonim. The Chinuch explains the reason for the issur.

of Sor and Dvash, very, very interesting. He begins by saying that you should know the mitzvos ha'mechudos me'elam, they're very hidden; it's hard to understand the taamei hamitzvos. He introduces as an introduction, hakdamah to this mitzvah, kasheh l'havin taamei hamitzvos. It seems like he says, ne'elam, it's like a hidden thing to understand the mitzvah over here. Here, I'll read it to you. Shrashei mitzvah zu ne'elamim me'od. Limtzo afilu remez katan meihem. Even to find a little bit of a remez, it's very difficult. Deep, very deep. Isur dvash and seor is deep, says the Chinuch. Ve'ulam, but I already told you that we're going to have to look for taam hamitzvah because the young generation needs it. So therefore, I'm going to write what I think we could think of in this mitzvah. What could we say? Ve'omer, and this is what I'm going to say: Kinyanei hakorban, the whole idea of korbans, to meorer, that a person should learn from it, right? He should take away from the korban something. Hirchik hachametz, so therefore he pushed away the inyan of the chametz, because chametz slows the process down. Matzah without seor goes quickly. Twelve minutes you have a matzah. Could you make a challah in 12 minutes? Of course not, because the se'or, slowly. Zrizus is very important in avodah, so therefore no chametz, because chametz is atzlus. It's slow. V'lamed adam zrizus. You like it? Ki chol se'or, no good. What about dvash? What about the honey? Honey is taivus. So we teach a person in avodas Hashem not to run after the sweets. Sweets. You like it? Very nice drasha, very nice, beautiful, huh? Matok. Madanim. Asur l'hitdaf acharei hamadanim. Metikut, taivus. So therefore these are the two things: chametz, zrizus. You need to be a zariz, so therefore chametz is not good. And the second, right, that's chipazon. We spoke about it, right? Pesach, matzah is chipazon, zrizus. So the yeast. That's interesting, we spoke, matzah, same yesod by chipazon and by the matzah: zrizus, zrizus. Mashenkin se'or makes atzlus. Therefore Hashem said don't bring it for a korban. Dvash, matakin, sweets, don't run after the sweets. Then he brings another pshat, and he says se'or, yeast, rises, makes it a matzah, small, thin, no yeast, makes it nafuach, yeah? Dvash also, he says. Makes maratiach, makes, I guess, I don't know, he brings this as a science, I guess he knows what he's saying. I didn't know this, but he says something along these lines. He says like this, tam issur, he says, chenat vash, mala resichaso harbeh. Also it boils. Boils, I don't know. Okay. Toeavas Hashem kol gevah lev. Hashem does not like haughty, gaiv, blown, nafuach, humble, matzah, without se'or and without dvash. Okay. So these are the shorshei hamitzvah, the taamei hamitzvah according to the Chinuch. Rabbeinu Bechayei, rabosai, says a peldike thing. Get ready for something which is pili ploy. You hear? Pili ploy. Se'or and dvash is yetzer hara. Se'or and dvash represent yetzer hara. Chazal tell us, mi me'akev? se'or sheb'isa. Yetzer hara is called se'or. Hu ha'din, says the Chinuch, says the Rabbeinu Bechayei, dvash is called yetzer hara. Now you ready? All you marrieds, or all you guys who want to get married, listen to what he says. He says dvash is gematria isha, because isha is yetzer hara. And he says that's what Adam HaRishon meant when he said, ha'isha...

V'nasati imadi hinastalim. He was referring to the nachash and the isha, the same. Isha is all the same. It's the yetzer hara. Vas? Gematria isha. Isha, yetzer hara. Rabbeinu Bechaye. So call Rabbeinu Bechaye, call him up. Go to his kever and say, Echad me'elef lo matzasi, aval ani matzati. What are you, taining? It's peldike Rabbeinu Bechaye, no? You knew this? So when someone tells his wife, Here, honey, come here, you meant to call the yetzer hara, Come here. D'vas! D'vas, honey, come here. I need a yetzer hara, I need. D'vas, gematria isha. Isha, ze yetzer hara. Ha'isha... ani omer, ani lo... ani lo... What do you... The nachash is isha. He says, You want to take out Rabbeinu Bechaye? Show it to them. Yeah, let them see it. They don't believe me. I see already everybody's gonna start going home calling their wives, Honey. I see it already. And she's gonna say, Thank you, thanks, such a nice compliment. Okay. Lo be'emtza... shh. Okay. Huh? I don't know. You speak to Rabbeinu Bechaye. The Ralbag, the Ralbag says a different pshat. Ralbag says, Shehateva yoser nichbad mehamelachah. Natural is better than made. You put yeast, you put in honey, that's baked goods. You put work into it, right? Tiv'i, the most natural is flour and water. That's the best thing. Shehateva yoser nichbad. It's more honorable. It's more respectable. Ter nikiyah. When something that you ever walk into a store where they make baked goods, there's hundreds of ingredients of junk in there. They put whatever they... right? It says it. I read it over exactly the way he says it. That's what he says. Dvash is gematria, ishah, ishah is yetzarah, ishah asher asati. Good. The Ralbag is saying, ki chol sar vechol dvash, because then you're doctoring. You're putting, you're adding to what Hashem made: flour, water. That's no good. So therefore natural is good. What's the opposite when they say not natural is? Not artificial, but also when it's what? No, when they put chomarim, what? Additives and preservatives, that's no good. Synthetic. Synthetic, additive, preservatives. Natural is the best. Okay. Now what does he mean? Does he mean to say that he was a health nut? What exactly is the Ralbag? Ralbag is referring to the health nuts in the store. Well, what's he referring to exactly? Organic food. What does he want? For the Beis Hamikdash, you can only have organic food. Is that what he means? I don't think he means. I'll tell you what I think he means. Either he means, like, for kavod of the korban, which is called lechem Hashem, Hashem's bread, so you give natural food instead of cake. You know, what's more respectful, a good cake, a good bread, or to give a cookie? A cookie is junk. It's junk food. The word nichbad is mashma it's a shaylah of kavod. You give natural food when you want to give a king something. You don't give him junk food, artificial junk. You give him good natural stuff. Or he's saying something deeper. Man creates, then there's kochi v'otzem yadi. Then man feels that he did it. Hateva, what Hashem created is much more respectable than hamelachah, more than the melachah. You understand? So therefore, for Hashem, you give...

V'lo maaseh... not what man added, right? You ever notice anybody take chaveis, what do they call that, kavod. Does anybody come and take a chaveis, give me a compliment over the pita I made? Nah, pita, I don't want it, water and flour. But if you put, you know, all the different types of, what do you call that, recipes. Recipes. It's my recipe. I made the kugel. I made, right? Right? Who? Men make the bread. And who make the kugel? The woman. No, no, what I mean to say is like this: bread is pashut. Simple. Hashem, Hashem, flour and water. But once you have to start... here, I'll give you the best example. When a guy makes bread, does he walk around thinking he's a big chef? I'm asking, does he walk around thinking he's a big chef if he makes a pita? But if a guy walks around and he makes cuisine, French cuisine, he walks around thinking, who knows who he is, right? Walks around with the hat as if he would be Moshe Rabbeinu, like the Kohen Gadol. You ever saw that? But you're making food, sachakol, you're making Hashem's food, right? The Torah says there's kochi v'otzem yadi in it. So for the Beis Hamikdash, you have sort of a chef. He walks around thinking he's God's gift to mankind, right? Natural. So again, either it's a shaila of kavod, that to a melech, like Hashem, you give natural, which is not junk food, adding preservatives, seor and dvash. Or the pshat is because what? Or the pshat is because there's no koach chiyutz. It happens here: a matzah bakes by itself. Flour and water bakes by itself. They don't do anything. What do you do? Mashein kein, bread, you have to put work into it, right? Eggs, sugar, right? Okay. Abarbanel says a very interesting pshat. He says like this: seor and dvash prolong the process. Dvash, at the same time, could be eaten by itself. Are you listening? Are you listening? Why not? Oh, you're benching. He says like this: you know, the korban, the kohanim were hungry. So if they put in seor and dvash, it would take longer. Maybe they wouldn't completely cook it. Maybe they would rush, says the Abarbanel. Rare, right? Takes time. If you make a pot stew and you put in all the flavoring, it takes time. Hashem, if you put it on a grill, one, two, three, and finish. So we're afraid that they're going to be m'maher to eat it when it's still not ready to be eaten. And he says, and the honey, you know, they'll do, they'll put their finger in and eat it with the honey. Barbenel says this. You can eat honey plain. You know what? They'll take the honey before it's even ready to be eaten, and then they'll have a problem of eating it, shelo k'derech haro'ui l'achilah, and they'll come out a big problem l'halachah. That's what the Barbenel says. Then the Barbenel says—he's looking at me like I'm—watch, I do it. Barbenel says this. I didn't make it up. Did I make it up? Barbenel. Yeah? What happened to the fresh here that we asked for? I turned it off. Yes, it's going? No, I turned it off. Then the Barbenel says enough. He says, you know what's wrong with dvash? Dvash is segulah neged haseichel. It works against seichel. So he says, honey works against seichel. What does he mean? That's what he says. He says honey is something that works against the seichel. So this is not the right thing to use as an ingredient in the Beis HaMikdash, in the Mishkan, he says. See, the first thing was a technical.

Yeah, the first thing was tactical. What do you mean tactical? That it prolongs the whole, it prolongs the whole process, and since it prolongs the whole process, so the carbon is not going to be cooked properly before they start eating it. Okay. Second thing is it's something about the ingredient. The ingredient is no good. Yeah? What's wrong with this ingredient? It's negative. It works against, against the mind. So I want to explain what that means. The Gemara tells us, before a person is mispallel that Torah is nichnas b'soch me'av, sheyispalel shelo yikanes l'toch me'av ma'adanim. He should be mispallel that he shouldn't have sweets and goodies in his diet. Why? What's wrong? So pashut you would say taiva, that in order to be mekabel Torah, first you have to be a clean muchshar. You have to be a utensil fit for Torah, and if a person has taivos, he's not fit for Torah. I want to tell you something very interesting. Today, there's different types of diets, and one of the diets is carb-free. Carb-free. Carbs make a person drowsy. I don't know if you know that. Carbs make a person drowsy. Carbs. Aleichem has carbs. There's a lot of carbs, right? Pachmemot, right? Protein gives you a boost. You eat— More carbs than you eat proteins, you'll be sleepy and your mind won't be sharp. It's part of the pyramid that they teach you today. One of the most carb per spoon, so to speak, condensed in one, in the smallest, is honey. Sugar and honey. Huh? What's sugar? No, it's not the artificial. It has nothing to do with the artificial. It's condensed, the sweet, the carb. So could be that's what he needs to say. He needs to say it's a segulah. He doesn't mean, rabosai, he doesn't mean spiritually. He means physically. Science. It puts a person to sleep. It makes you not sharp. Carbs make a person not sharp. That's why you eat a big meal, you want to sleep afterwards. You can't think straight after cholent, after all— you can't think straight. It's full of carbs. That's what it is, right? The only problem I have, only problem I have, l'maaseh, Shlomo HaMelech talks very highly of honey. Shlomo HaMelech in Mishlei says, Achal b'ni dvash ki tov. He talks that you should eat honey. I want you to know that the bombers, the B bombers in Britain during World War II were force-fed honey because they ta'ina there's something in honey which is merakez. It gives tremendous recus. You know that? The British bombers— Pilots were force-fed honey, and they tell you honey has a tremendous amount of vitamin B, and vitamin B is good for rikus. So I don't know, I'm not sure what's going on over here, but there is a sugya. There's something about honey and seichel. The lashon again of the Abarbanel is, she'advas segulah keneged ha-seichel. Now I want you to go into this. I want you to do your research here. Is honey good for the mind, or is honey not good for the mind? Huh? Well, the truth is, Rashi says it could be any honey. It could be honey not only from bees, but it could be from any sweets. Rashi says clearly it could be any fruit that has sweet. Tamarim. We know tamarim is mishtakeh; you fall asleep when you drink tamarim. It's one of the things that are mishtaker. So that's maybe what he means, it's segulah keneged ha-seichel. So it's not dvash dvorim, I'm telling you. So it could be only dvash dvorim is good, but dvash peiros is carbs. And it's something interesting. There's something here, okay? I don't think he means segulah bad, right? I don't think he means segulah like that olives, right? Segulah for shikcha. I don't think he means that. I don't think he means olives segulah for shikcha. Olives are a segulah for...

So, סוגל לשכוח. So I don't know if he means that it's segulah, or he means physically there's something about honey, because it's mishtaker, it makes a person sleepy, so it's כנגד השכל. I don't know what that Barbenel means. But either way, Shlomo HaMelech says to eat דבש, אכול בני דבש כי טוב. I once told you pshat in that, אכול בני דבש כי טוב. Remember the pshat I told you? Reb Leib Chasman explained, what's the ma'alah of דבש? דבש, the bee takes the best of all the flowers, and he puts it together and he makes honey, he makes sweet. Shlomo HaMelech's teaching: take the best of everybody and put it together. Certain people, I only learn from this and this type of... and they don't like to learn from everybody. If you take the best of everyone, you put it together, and you make it honey. That's called making honey. That's דבש. אכול בני דבש. Reb Leib Chasman, אכול בני דבש כי טוב. Now I want to point this out. I saw the Tosefes Bracha says that what's wrong with honey, his pshat, because I told you he didn't like the pshat of the Rambam. He says because באמת דבש comes from a davar tamei, a bee is tamei. The Gemara in Bechoros, daf zayin amud beis, says a yesod: כל היוצא מן הטמא, טמא. It's tamei. So be'etzem, honey shouldn't be mutar to eat. Why are we matir to eat? So the Gemara explains because it's actually not his. It's not יוצא מן הדבורים. It's coming from all the different good flowers. So it's not through the body. It's not something from the body of the bee. The Gemara in Sotah, daf mem-ches amud beis, says that Tosefes Bracha, that's pshat. That's pshat in the Gemara. דבש is not so good because it's כל היוצא מן הטמא is tamei. But I don't understand. If I care, if I care, we say it is kosher. So what do you want? If it's the same reason why it's kosher, then it should be kosher for the mizbeach. I don't know. This is his shtikel Torah, and I'm telling you, Shlomo HaMelech said that it was good because of this reason. It's very hard to come and say that that's the reason why dvash is no good. Okay, rabbosai, don't sleep. Come, let's chazer. You ready? Okay, let's make a quick chazara. Okay. According to the Rambam, se'or and dvash, the goyim used to do it, right? We don't do it, okay? We don't bring for the korbanos se'or and dvash. According to the Chinuch, what's the reason? The reason is because—two reasons, right? The first reason is because rezus. We don't want the chametz, because chametz, slow. And the second thing is to teach a person not to run after sweets, not to have a sweet tooth. Sweet tooth. So we tell him not to be rodef achar what? Mitukin. Okay. Another thing we said was that the se'or and the dvash is magbia, it's gaivah, rises. Hashem doesn't want gaivah, okay? Then we had Rabbeinu Bechaye that says because it's representing yetzer hara. The se'or and the dvash represent the yetzer hara, like isha dvash, okay? Then we said over a pshat from the Ralbag that the teva is yoser nichbad mahamelachah, that a teva more natural than to have—we worked on, okay, what you put work in, artificial. A barbanel. That se'or is me'acher, and dvash is memaher. Se'or is me'acher, dvash is memaher, and we're afraid that it's not going to cook the way it's supposed to cook properly, and also the kohen might eat it early. And then he says a yesod that it's keneged, the dvash is keneged haseichel. Somehow it works against the seichel. So we said, is it segulah? He used the word segulah. Does he mean physically, chemically, the chemistry of the brain when you drink, when you eat, they open up a window. When you eat dvash, it goes against the brain. Okay. Then we said over, because maybe dvash is kol hayotzei min hatamei is tamei. I want to tell you over what other Rishonim say. The Daas Zekeinim Baalei HaTosafos says, you want to know what's wrong with se'or and dvash? Because if you put se'or and vad, you can't put salt; they don't mix. So one is luma... that's what the pasuk puts together: Ki chol se'or vchol dvash lo saktiru mimenu laShem. The next pasuk says, put salt. So the reason for not se'or and dvash is you can't put salt after.

He wants, ... they don't take salt. What do you ...? Very interesting, huh? Oh, so that's a very good question. It doesn't say. But the point is that the psukim are together. The issur of se'or and dvash and the mitzvah of melach are together, according to the Daas Zekeinim miBaalei HaTosafos. The Moshev Zekeinim says, which is another likut of Rishonim from Baalei HaTosafos, the Moshev Zekeinim says like this: If you put in salt—I'm sorry, if you put in honey and you put in yeast, you don't have the exact amount. You never really know what it is. For example, there's a lot of holes in it, right? A matzah, there's no holes. You know exactly what's in the matzah. Challah, when it rises, there's a lot of pockets of air, right? So your problem is going to be that you can't make a kezayis. Your shiurim that are nogea to the challah, you're not going to have. So therefore they assered anything which was going to make it bigger than it really is, because you don't know the shiur. What's the difference? But you're putting in honey, makes pockets. You're putting yeast, makes pockets. It's interesting. Interesting. Moshev Zekeinim. So it comes out, my boys, I want you to pay attention, that either the problem is the end product, נכון? Because if you have in it salt—I'm sorry, honey and se'or, you can't put in salt. Or the measurements. Where's the primary ingredient? Which is the problem? Is the problem the product? It depends which Rishonim. It all depends on which Rishonim you learn. Is the problem— that's what I want to say. You see, he caught my shiur. But before I get there, okay, before I get there, I want to tell you a little bit more. Now I told you all the Rishonim. Now I'm going to start telling you what the Acharonim say. What's wrong with tzar and dvash. Tiyul. You see, I told you I'm giving you a tiyul today, all the shitos, okay? So we had the Rishonim. I said a little bit from the Tosefes Bracha, but now I showed you even the Rishonim. It's either the final product is no good, right? Because if the product is a salty— I'm sorry, a sweet or a yeast, the salt is not fitting over there, doesn't go in, doesn't mekabel, whatever that means, doesn't accept the salt. Or you don't have the right measurements, you never know, okay? Or the pshat is the ingredients, tzar and dvash is not a good ingredient, okay? Now let's see what the Acharonim say. Acharonim say the following explanations what's wrong with tzar and dvash. Tzar and dvash are big liars, big liars. You know what tzar does? Takes a matzah, makes it bigger than it is. Dvash takes something and makes it a lot sweeter than it is. These are added to change. The lashon they use is, Hatzar mishaker shemata bkamus. Hadvash mishaker shemata bchashivus. How much is a pita? You know, how much is a pita? It depends, 20 cents, 30 cents. How much is a cake? A dollar. Makes it moist. It's cake. Hatzo'er, mateh b'kavus, hatvash, mateh b'chashivus. Therefore, melt doesn't change it. If you put salt, but not salt, things out the taste of what it is. It doesn't change anything. Salt. You put salt on a pita, I think I'm more expensive because it's the salt. Now, the kitzur, anything which is sheker, away from the Beis HaMikdash, away from the Mishkan. Another pshat. This, all the mefarshim say, avodas Hashem can be extremes. What's the most mar, the most bitter? Se'or. Machmetz is also lashon, chometz. Se'or is considered a bitter thing. Dvash is considered the sweetest.

In avodas Hashem, you can't have two extremes. You need emtzai, like the Rambam says. This is a very interesting... That's how the Acharonim explain why not se'or and why not — don't have extremes. Machmitz is a lashon of bitter, right? Se'or is a bitter thing, you know. Mashenkein matok, too sweet. Not too sour, not too sweet, no extremes. Emtzai in avodas Hashem, like the Rambam brings down in Hilchos De'os, perek beis, halacha zayin. Okay. So I pretty much told you what's wrong. You hear? What's wrong. Now I want to explain: what does it mean that it can't accept salt? What is this? That the sweet can't accept — I guess what it means is that sweet and salt are opposites. Se'or, I guess it would be too sharp if you put salt in it. What do they mean that the se'or and the devash is not mekabel, it's not mekabel melach? So I want to say pshat like this. If you notice, the goyim don't put melach. That's what the Rambam tells us, right? Rabosai, do the goyim put melach? No. Why not? It says... That melach because they wanted all the blood. The Ramban explains that it's very important to put melach because a korban, or a meat, or a bread without salt is called tafel, with a taf. Tafel, not tes, but tafel, which means not a finished product. You notice when we make hamotzi, we stick it into the salt. Why do we stick it into the salt? Because that's the final toivel pito b'melach. That's a bread is a raw product if it's lacking salt. You ever notice you bring the food to the table, what's the first thing everybody complains? It's missing salt, right? A product is not—maybe it's a salt-free thing, maybe that's how it's supposed to taste. Eretz is without salt, you don't have the tafel, okay? So it's called tafel. Says the Ramban, so it's not good here, it's not good to have a korban which is not called a finished product. It's missing salt. Imagine they bring it to the Beis Hamikdash, it's missing salt. It means it's not finished. Don't bring that as a korban. The Chinuch, mitzvah kuf yud tes, explains that salt sweetens the meat. It makes it delicious. If you have meat and you don't put salt on it, right? First thing your wife puts, right, salt. Chicken, meat, salt. Meat without salt is nothing. So a korban has to be sweet, it has to be areiv, so therefore says the Chinuch in mitzvah kuf yud tes, you need salt. Also says the Chinuch, salt— It protects the meat from spoiling, and you want the korban to be fresh, to be clean. It should be a good product, so you need salt, right? Says the Chinuch, salt is lekayem, to protect, that it should last. Otherwise it's a little spoiled and it won't be tasting good. Rabbeinu Bechaye. Rabbeinu Bechaye explains—I'm sorry, I said before the Ramban, excuse me. Rabbeinu Bechaye is the one that explains why, why the goyim didn't put salt. I thought I said it over from the Ramban; I meant Rabbeinu Bechaye. Rabbeinu Bechaye explains because they like the blood, and the salt takes away the blood. Now listen to a Chasam Sofer. The Chasam Sofer says, he says like this: Kina, taavah, and kavod. Those are the three things which motziin es adam min ha'olam. Chametz, se'or is gaivah. So which one is that? That is gaivah. Kina, taavah—taavah is kavod. Dvash is sweet; that's taavah. Salt. What is salt? Salt is the symbol of kina. Why? What is salt all about? So Rashi even tells us that the waters from the lower complained that they also want to have...

Like the starshem in shamayim, like the higher waters, Hashem shall give you what? To be in the Mishkan. I'll put you in the Mishkan. I'll put you in the Beis HaMikdash, that al kol korbancha takriv melach. That's why we put salt. Rashi brings from Chazal. So it came from what? From kinah. Kinah. They were jealous. They wanted to be with Hashem. It's a good jealousy, you see, because that's why Hashem put them in the Mishkan. So al kol korbancha takriv melach, because jealousy is a good thing if it's done for the right reasons. Kinah and taivah, ki chol sar v'chol davar, says the Chasam Sofer, like sakrivu laShem. Taivah v'kavod, no good. But kinah, the melach, yes, it puts melach because you want to be with Hashem. Kinat sofrim. He says kinat sofrim, very, very important. Beautiful, no? What a taanah. It's beautiful, you hear? Beautiful. There's one pshat, rabosai, I did not find in the Rishonim. Why do we salt the korban? And that was the one I was looking for. I didn't find it. And believe me, you see, I did my research. You see how much research I did on this, all the Rishonim I went through and all the Acharonim. Chazal tell us, just like yisurim cleanse a person, melach—I'm sorry—just like melach cleans a person from his... the basar, right? The basar. So too, yisurim. Melach is cleansing. Al kol korbancha takriv melach is the yesod of melach in every korban. You bring your korban, it's—the idea of the korban is... Cleanse. It's a cleansing process. It's memarek. It's machshir. I was expecting, and I write over here, I mean, mitpaleh. Nimitpaleh, says the Lomofia Berishonim, that the reason why we put melach on the korban, because it's what? Machshir. To nimmarek, like yisurim. To cleanse what? To cleanse the person from his chet. פירוש הגמרא, Mr. Kaikov, it's a mefurasha Gemara, that just like the salt kashers the meat, so too the yisurim, it cleans. It's a cleaning, okay? So it's an analogy, hechsher, cleaning, right? Machshir. Clean out the person from his aveiros. Ah, so now I understand pshat. When a person has se'or, and when a person has dvash, eino mekablim hamelach. They don't accept the melach. It doesn't help them. That's the... They don't go together. A person that has gaiva, a person that has taiva, you can hit him over the head a thousand times, you're not going to learn his lesson. It's not going to help him. Take Pari. Pari had gaiva, Pari had taiva, so all the yisurim, it helped him. Didn't help him? No. Was it machshir him? No. That's the pshat in what the Rishonim mean. So either the pshat, it's a physical, it's a technical, you know, problem, a briska zach. Yeah, if you have dvash and se'or, so how could you have melach? It doesn't go here and it doesn't go together. Or the pshat is that it's a raayon, that se'or and dvash is the opposite. Melach is, it works on you, it cleans, it's machshir you. Meileh, that's what the Rishonim mean. Ah, so now we went through all the reasons for se'or and dvash in the Rishonim and Acharonim, and then we went through all the reasons for melach. Let's chazer them quickly, because I don't know if everybody went through it quickly, so let's go through one more time. The Rambam says in Moreh Nevuchim that the goyim did not put melach on their korban, right? The Rambam says that the goyim did not put melach on their korban. Why not? So he said over, Rabbeinu Bechaye, because it takes away the blood. They like the blood. But the way we're learning, maybe we have a different pshat. The idea of korban by them is not melach. It's not about machshir. It's not about working on yourself, fixing yourself. The inyan of melach memarek, melach machshir, that it me'abed the person, they don't have. Dvash, yeah. Se'or, yeah, that's what they put. They put dvash. It's honorary, it's kavod, it's sweet. Is it mar? Is it hard? No, they don't have that. That's not the pshat in their korban. By Klal Yisrael, that is the pshat of our korban. It's memarek, it's machshir, it cleans the person. It's a different idea of korban.

One idea of korban is to look good in front of Hashem, look good in front of God, you know. Gaiva, it feels good. I'm servicing God. Our korban is what? Melach, machshir. It's yisurim, it's memarek, it's to cleanse the person. Just like the salt, like the Gemara says, a mori dike deher, huh? You like it? That's why they don't have it. Oh, what's the reason of the Ramban why we have to have salt? Because otherwise it would be something called tafel, which means an unfinished product without salt. Either because the Goyim don't put salt — I'm sorry, the Goyim don't put salt — or the pshat is because it's not finished without salt. The Chinuch explains that salt brings out the meat, otherwise it doesn't taste so good. Okay. Another pshat: salt keeps the meat from spoiling. It lets the meat exist, stay long. Okay. Sfas Emes says because salt is a sign of kinah, because that's the water, and kinah is good. Kinah in the Beis Hamikdash is good. Okay. Now, comes out a moiridike yesod. I asked you, is the problem the product, or is the problem the ingredient? I started in dvash. Oh, so according to some Rishonim, it's the product. You can't have a product that has holes in it and you don't know the shiur, right? Yes. The product can't be salt and sweet; it doesn't work out. Well, the problem is the ... and the dvash itself. Now let's go back to ... Sfas Emes. Sfas Emes asks, why does it say lo te'aseh? It's not about lo saaseh chametz, the product. Lo te'aseh, it can't be made. Lo te'aseh, it can't be made through chametz, you agree. And that's why it says ki. Ki is explaining the problem. The problem is not the product. The problem is, becausear v'chol dvash, the ingredient. Lo saktiru. Now what's the mimenu? V'vad, the mimenu is the ingredient. It's not about you can't have sdvash and chametz. Mimenu, from it, the ingredient, you can't be maktir. Beautiful, beautiful. Mimenu, from it, meaning it's the product. The ingredient, I mean, the ingredient. Mimenu, you can't be maktir. The pasuk is telling me what's wrong. The product, the ingredient is no good. It's not about product that's also. Hadvash. D'medabrim al hadvash vatzor. Ki chol se'or vchol dvash, not lo taktiru. Lo taktiru mi... mimenu. You're not allowed to use from it. Okay, we're going to talk. It comes out, a big yesod, that the pasuk is teaching us that the problem, the pasuk is teaching us the problem is not the cheftza, but the ingredient. It's not the final product, but the ingredient. What do you... Mimenu, it's not lo morid, lo morid. No, the pasuk is teaching you what the problem is. Ki chol se'or vchol dvash lo saktiru, it's not what it is, it's from it. I understand. It's teaching us, the Torah is teaching us. You'll soon see there's nafka mina lahalacha. You'll soon see. Okay, now, you want a nafka mina lahalacha? Wait five minutes, you'll get a nafka mina lahalacha. Let's discuss a little bit Ashkafa again. Tell me, when a person brings a korban, you think that all this could go through his mind? You think all this could go through a person's mind when he brings a korban? We just—a person is a chayti, he brought a korban. You think he knows that chametz is asar and dvash and gavin and kinan? What, what, what, what? So the truth is, the Chinuch says an interesting lashon. The Chinuch says, Kinyanei hakorban kulam l'oirer machsheves hamakriv, ulefi hama'asan hu yikach dimyonosav b'nafsho. Something about the korban brings some message to the mind. So I was thinking to myself, maybe in those days they taught it, just like today when we do the mitzvahs, there are shiurim and there's artscroll and there's sefarim and... maybe in those days they had on the korbanos explaining the korbanos. Every guy who brought a korban knew, gavin and yetzharan, and they knew all this. Maybe.

I'm just trying to understand. When a guy brings a korban, you think all this mussar is what goes through his mind? This is what he understands in a korban? So either the pshat is, yeah, maybe in those days they brought— we don't bring korbanos today, so therefore we don't know all this. But on the things that we do do, here, Shabbos. Every guy sits there and he knows what Shabbos and the depths of Shabbos and the yesodos of Shabbos. People work on it. It's hanacha nami. Or the pshat is, it's a subliminal, a subliminal message. You notice the lashon that he uses? U'lefi hama'aseh hu yikach dimyonosav b'nafsho. It gives a dimyon, it gives a— it has an effect psychologically on the person. What does that mean? Let me explain to you what I think that means. When a person does a mitzvah, what should he think? You know, every mitzvah has worlds of עומק to it. What should go through a person's mind when he does a mitzvah? Should he sit there and think all the yesodos of the mitzvah? Let's discuss this. Let me begin by Sar and Dvash. Does anybody remember, in the korbanos we say in the braisa, Tani Bar Kapara. Bar Kapara omer, Bar Kapara says, right? Bar Kapara says, in the ketores they put a kurt of shel dvash, lo haya adam yachol la'amod mipnei reicho. Lama ei me'arvin b'trash? Mipnei shehaTorah amrah. So the mefareshim ask, what's the chiddush? If the Torah said... If a person would love to be mechalel Shabbos, it would be great. He would have a great time. Aval haTorah amrah, lo sa'aseh kol melachah. So what's the bracha Baruch teaching? Could you imagine a bracha like that? If a person would be able to go golfing on Shabbos, unbelievable. Aval haTorah amrah, the Torah says... What's aval haTorah amrah? What does it mean? Yeah, it's a very good shaylah, yeah. So the Radbaz gives a very nice teretz. The Radbaz in the teshuvos, chelek daled, aleph, os kuf yud, siman kuf yud. Maybe you're not allowed to put honey to make the whole thing a honey cake, but to put in a little bit honey, b'taroves, right, that you can't, that's not a problem. Aval haTorah amrah, the Torah says, lo saktiru... mimenu. Yeah, he's working with the mimenu, that even b'taroves you're not allowed. You know what the Radbaz is saying? My pshat, it's exactly what I was saying. The thing itself is not a honey cake, but are you allowed to even use a little bit of an ingredient? No, you can't even use it as an ingredient. That's the mimenu. Az ani kivanti bayesod sheli to the Radbaz. It's mamash what the Radbaz is saying. You would say, you know, it's not a honey cake, it's just a little bit. Kamashmalan, lo taktiru mimenu. Even a little, even to take from an ingredient, you're not allowed to even use it as an ingredient. Okay. This is one pshat. In Barkapar, I would say you're allowed to use a little bit, kamashmalan. I want to say another pshat in the Brisker Rav. You say it every morning. What does it mean, Atah Yoreh? Yeah, so what's the chiddush? I don't say, I would put in honey, but the Torah says not to. Of course you say that; you can't put in honey. I don't need Barkapar. The Brisker Rav has a simple question: how could you put honey? It has eleven samimanim. If you add one of the samimanim, you're chayav misa. So what is Barkapar בכלל talking about? What is Barkapar? You didn't know that you're chayav misa if you add another— So it could be the chayav misa is afterwards, maybe, but that's not what it says. Atah Yoreh. The Torah is matzmi—he's saying that honey's no good. Anyway you can't put in honey, because you have to have eleven samimanim, and if you add it, you're chayav misa. Says the Brisker Rav, there's a pasuk: Ma'aseh rokeach. It had to be a— If you're missing one, you add it. What do you mean? The acharach is samanim both. Right, but there's not— Yeah, but you can't add. ... But forget about it. The Brisker Rav asks this for a kashya. I think he knows kach better than me. That's his kashya. He says, how could you have eleven? How could you come and put in honey if you have eleven?

On the mamzi, lamed vav. He says, because it says in the pasuk, maaseh rokeach, yeah? Pasuk says, a shmois lamed, pasuk lamed hei, that it had to be—you know what maaseh rokeach means? Like a dish, like a cake, a certain—what does rokeach mean? A chef's dish. So therefore you would have to put in sweet to make it good, to make it. Al maaseh rokeach, maybe you would have to add, vataira amar. So I want to say—oh, I want to say pshat like this. You can't add, right? Why can't you add? Vataira amar. So that's the teretz already to the kasha too. You would come and say, you would come and say that maybe you should add al maaseh rokeach. The Brisker Rav is saying, vataira amar, which means the question was not about adding honey against the pasuk in the Torah. It's to make it maaseh rokeach, and yet still you're not allowed because you're not allowed to use se'or dvash. So the problem isn't the maaseh rokeach. Al maaseh—I know the dish was able to have honey, but you can't have it through the ingredients of honey itself. That's what it means. HaTorah amrah lo yisaktiru mimenu isheh laShem. For the dish it would be good if it was sweet with honey. That's what the Brisker Rav is learning. Al the dish it would have been good to have that sweet taste. Al the dish it would have been good to put in se'or maybe. The problem is he can't have the ingredients. That's what I think the Brisker Rav means, that the ingredient is the problem. Okay. I want to tell you over what the Kotzker Rebbe... The Kotzker Rebbe said pshat. Hear, rabosai. Was it good with the honey or no good with the honey? Ein adam yachol lamod mipnei reicho. Good or no good? You say it's good. The Kotzker learned that it was no good. It smelled bad. Ein adam yachol lamod mipnei... it was so bad they wouldn't be able to take it. So then why didn't I put it in? You would say because it doesn't smell good. No, because haTorah omrah. That's the pshat. What we're saying is the Torah was made because Hashem told us how to make it. I always learned, ein adam yachol lamod mipnei reicho, it would be so good that a person wouldn't be able... It's a very funny lashon, ein adam yachol lamod. You would say lamod means you can stand, no problem. So the Kotzker learns the opposite. Ein adam yachol lamod mipnei reicho, it was no good. So then why did you put it in? Because it's no good? No, no, because haTorah omrah. HaTorah omrah. Here, what does he say? He's saying a... Listen to what he says. A person wants to make Torahs, right? You can have so many cheshbones in the Torahs. You know what the main cheshbon is? HaTorah omrah. Hashem said. That's the way. That's what I do. You know, every time we say... I want to מקיים mitzvah. You know what the lashon we always use is? לקייםה בכל פרטיה ודקדוקיה. What does that mean, פרטיה ודקדוקיה? Because does it say about the kavanos, or does it say about the kiyum of the pratim and the dikdukim? It doesn't say anything about the kavanos. It says the details, the halachah, the dikduk of כאשר ציווני, the way Hashem commanded me, that's how I do it. You know, there's a very nice maaseh, and this is what I want to get to. You know, we're coming to Purim, Pesach, a lot of mitzvahs, a lot, a lot of mitzvahs, yeah? And each mitzvah, Purim and Pesach, has so much עומק in it, so much. What should be the kavanah? Should the kavanah be, I'm eating matzah with Hashem and chipazon and... We'll soon get to that. Or the mechayev should be is, I'm eating matzah כאשר ציווני Hashem, and I'm baking matzah the way Hashem commanded me. What's the kavanah that you should have? Is it cheshbonos, or is it, התורה אמרה. The Torah says, כי בחוזק יד הוציאנו... I'll tell you over, there's a mayridige maaseh from the Brisker Rav. The Brisker Rav, of course...

was was a medakdek in mitzvahs, not normal. Came to matzos even more. They were crazy about the baking of the matzos. Okay, so there was a Yid, a Chassidishe Yid, who came over to the Brisker Rav after he finished baking the matzos, and he told him over, Chassidishe maiseh. There was once a Rebbe that was sitting and he baked the matzos with all the diyukim, yeah? Chassidishe Rebbe. He walked out of the bakery and there was a Yid crying. So he asked the Rebbe, What are you crying? He said, You know what I'm crying? I saw the way you baked the matzos, yeah? I don't know how to bake the matzos more than just bake the matzos. I come here, I bake the matzos, yeah? So I'm crying to Hashem, halavai my matzos should be as good as your matzos. The Rebbe was so overwhelmed, he switched the matzos. He said, My matzos are not as good as this guy's matzos, yeah? Because this guy was baking matzos with lev and regesh, kavonah, and my matzos are mehudar with halacha, so I've switched. So he tried to ask the Brisker Rav, so you see that it's more important to bake the matzos with regesh and kavonah than to bake the matzos with hiddur and halacha. So the Brisker Rav said, It's a beautiful story. You're proving my point that I'm right. He said, The story is very good, farkert, it's a great story, I like it. Zeh hayah li tzidi, lo l'tzidcha. He says, Why? The one that davened for the good matzos ended up with the hiddurdike matzos. The one that davened to Hashem that he should have good matzos, he ended up with the— because takke the ones that are made with hiddur are better than the ones with the kavonah. You like it? You heard? I say it over a lot. I say it over. It's a yesod. So what did I do? So I went to look to see, maybe it's one minhag, maybe it's Brisk, maybe others have a different shitah. Maybe by the Chassidim you're supposed to bake with kavanah and yiras Shamayim and yesodos and taamei hamitzvos. I went to look a little bit. So let me tell you what I came up with. Many mitzvos, the taam is katuv baTorah. It says it in the Torah. L'maan yeidu doroseichem ki basukkos הושבתי. L'maan tihyeh Toras Hashem b'ficha. By tefillin it says, what's the lashon by tefillin? L'maan tihyeh Toras Hashem b'ficha. There's a lot of l'maans that the Torah writes l'maan. So the Tur in Hilchos Sukkah brings down in siman taf reish chaf hei that sitting in the sukkah is in order we should know the whole Ananei HaKavod. Comes along the Bach. He says, since when does the Tur give taam hamitzvos? It's a halachah sefer, says the Bach, because could be the Tur held that when it says l'maan, you have to be mechaven for the taam and not just to do the mitzvah. L'maaseh, the Pri Megadim and the Mishnah Berurah in three places paskens that even if I wasn't mechaven the taam, I'm still yotzei. The Mishnah Berurah is in se'if katan yud tes by tefillin, siman chaf hei, se'if katan tes by tzitzis. And siman taf reish chaf hei, סעיף קטן נא, l'vai Sukkah. And even though it says l'maan, you're still yotzei. It's l'chatchila you should have the l'maan because the Torah says it, you're yotzei. I mean, it's just a—it's not me'akev, you're yotzei, right? L'maaseh, the b'kriyan k'derech l'ner in Sukkah, taka pasul, you're not yotzei. He says the pasuk says l'maan; you're not mekayeim the l'maan like the Bach, you're taka not yotzei. So here we have a case where you have to think of the taamei hamitzvos. You have to think of the taamei hamitzvos when you're mekayeim the mitzvah. But what about all other mitzvos? That for sure not. I don't have to think when I do a mitzvah all the taamei haminhagim. I don't have to have it. Do I have to go through the taamei hamitzvos? No. I'm mekayeim the mitzvah, okay. L'maaseh, there's something called l'shem yichud, kudsha brich hu, Shechinteh, b'dechilu u'rechimu, l'yached—so they're giving a whole, why am I doing the mitzvah, right? You notice when you write the Chanukahs, al kavanosam v'kavanos hachashmonaim, right? You ever saw the—there's a nusach of tefillah that they say it's from the Bnei Yissaschar, that when you light the menorah, lighting with the kavanos of all inyanim gvohim v'tov. So do you need that?

You need to say, no, b'emes, it's a shaila in halacha. It's a shaila in halacha. I want to tell you, the Aruch HaShulchan in siman samech se'if ches—how come you're not writing this? He knows it by heart. I want to write ikrei... Ah, okay. So, Aruch HaShulchan, siman samech se'if ches, says that kavanah is b'lev v'lo b'peh. So first of all, you don't have to speak out a kavanah. L'shem yichud is speaking out a kavanah, right? So b'chalal, who says you have to speak it out? Okay, you know what? B'mechaven b'l'shem yichud. Aruch HaShulchan writes clearly that it's only b'machshavah; it's not b'peh. The word kavanah—think of the word. What does the word kavanah mean? In the mind. So therefore the whole peh... The Noda B'Yehuda's yedua, he was very against l'shem yichud. Noda B'Yehuda wrote in the teshuvos, Mahadura Kama, Yoreh Deah, siman tzadi gimmel, you're not supposed to say l'shem yichud. Very against it. It's not b'machshavah. The whole thing is—there's no such thing. He said it was a mistake, b'halachah, l'shem yichud, havayah. You look over there, he was very against the whole thing. I found in Chesed L'Avraham, it's a peirush on the Aruch Chaim, siman tes, he says a me'oredike thing. He says, why do we have the l'shem yichud? Why do we have it? So he says like this: l'oir halev l'roimem b'mitzvos. A person does a mitzvah, he should know that there's unbelievable things behind the mitzvah. When he does a mitzvah, it's just that—it's worlds, worlds, worlds, worlds behind every mitzvah. Says the Chesed L'Avraham, v'af sheyesh b'zeh inyanim al pi sod. Even though some mitzvos have things which are so deep, nobody can understand it. V'lav kol inish bar hachi hu. Not every person can understand the depth of a mitzvah. V'kol makom, hashomea k'tzas l'havin, yaskil v'yida. When you hear a little bit, he should be quiet, meaning he should say, you know what? As much as I do know, there's more that I don't know, okay? U'mi she'eino meivin klal, and what happens if a person knows nothing about a mitzvah, he doesn't understand anything, he just knows they have to do it. So yaskil b'limo, yisorer ahavah v'hodah lo, ki ein hadvarim k'pshutam, okay? That you'll know that the things are not so simple. There's a lot more to a mitzvah than just what meets the eye. So here we have an interesting machlokes, that when a person does a mitzvah, what should you do a mitzvah for? Should you do a mitzvah because kach tzivani HaBorei Yisbarach, Hashem said do it, or should a person start thinking there's so much behind every single mitzvah? I found the Kaf HaChaim says a mekor. The Kaf HaChaim writes that in every mitzvah, you want to have a kavanah, yeah—I'm sorry, you want to be mekayem the mitzvah b'machshavah, b'dibur uv'maaseh. So that's why the Kaf HaChaim, siman taf-kuf-pei-tes, os mem-daled, writes that you should say l'shem yichud. Why? Because you want it should be—mekayem it also al yedei dibur, l'shem yichud Kudsha Brich Hu uShchinte, b'dechilu. But that's the—you saw the Kaf HaChaim, Kaf HaChaim, siman taf-kuf-pei-tes, os mem-daled. Okay, good. So that's where it comes from. So we spoke about there's two ways on how to do a mitzvah, you hear? So I want to ta'ina a ma'areh dikah zach, you hear? A hundred percent, you're supposed to know there's more behind every mitzvah, a hundred percent. But how do you get to that? And the answer is by doing the ma'aseh. There's subliminal messages behind every ma'aseh. That's pshat in the Rishonim, כי חלקם וחודבש לא הסתירו ממנו אישה. You think a guy comes to a korban and he brings a korban and he doesn't—you understand? He's not bringing se'or v'dvash. He doesn't even—stop. He brought a korban. He doesn't even know what to think. The fact that there's no se'or v'dvash there is me'orer dimyonos b'libo. It has powers to give subliminal messages for anavah, for not to be rodef achar hata'avah, to be machshi yourself, and so on and so forth. So avada, you don't expect when a guy brings a korban that he should know everything. But the word is the koach of a mitzvah. So b'ikar, a person should say, I'm doing the mitzvah, al taira ama. Avada you should know there's more behind it. And at the same time, you have to know that the ikar is to be medakdek b'proteha, because that's what brings out all the lessons. That's in every mitzvah. So when you come to Pesach, there's going to be a lot of mitzvahs. And again, Torah says we eat matzah because Hashem took us out.

There's a lot more behind it also, and there's zohars and again Kabbalah and sodos. Then you have all the messages, the sodos behind the mitzvah. Then you have all the messages, the sodos behind the mitzvah.