The Aron at Beis Shemesh: Responding to Tragedy with Tefillah, Not Resignation

Transcript

This Torah class is brought to you by TorahAnytime.com. Holding Shemuel Aleph, Perek Vav, where the pesukim tell us that the Aron Hashem was captured by the Plishtim and was returned. It didn't stay long in their hands because the Rabbeinu Shlolam taught them a lesson to return the Aron. The end of the perek speaks where the Aron came to when it returned. So the perek tells us, Perek Vav at the end, it went to Beit Shemesh. The agalos that were carrying the Aron traveled towards Beit Shemesh, and the pasuk tells us the situation in Beit Shemesh and the people, what they were doing when the Aron arrived in Beit Shemesh. So this is in pasuk yud-gimmel, Perek Vav, pasuk yud-gimmel: U'vei Shemesh kotzrim ketzir chitim ba'emek. They were out in the fields. They were cutting the wheat, as we will see from Rashi and the Rishonim, based on the Gemaras. This is an important nekudah. It's important to know that what they were doing when the Aron arrived, that they were koitzrim tzechitim b'emek. The pasuk tells us that what was their response to seeing the Aron? Vayis'u es eineihem, they looked up. Vayaru es haAron, they see the Aron. Vayismechu liros, they were happy to see the Aron. When you read the pesukim, it seems like something very good, mistafridim, they were happy, Baruch Hashem, the Aron returned. The Aron was in the hands of the Pelishtim, and suddenly it appears—can you imagine the simcha? And this is l'choira the pasuk. The pasuk is telling us, Vayismechu liros. It's not only that they were happy. If you read further in the pesukim, in pasuk tes-vav, it says that the Leviim took down the Aron, and the anshei Beit Shemesh, the end of the pasuk says that the people not only were ecstatic, happy, but helu olos, vayizbechu zevachim bayom hahu laShem. They brought korbanos, simcha, thanking the Ribono Shel Olam that the Aron returned. L'choira, so far it sounds that the people of Beit Shemesh reacted properly. They acted in accord. The Aron Hashem shows up all of a sudden out of nowhere. They were happy. They brought korbanos. But that's not exactly the outcome, the end. If you look further in the pesukim, pasuk yud tes, Vayach b'anshei Beis Shemesh. The Rabbeinu Shlolam plagued, he hit Beis Shemesh, ki ra'u ba'aron Hashem. They looked at the aron Hashem. Vayach b'am shivim ish. The Rabbeinu Shlolam caused that seventy should fall, chamishim elef ish, fifty thousand. Is it seventy? Is it fifty thousand? Rashi, Chazal, they discuss it; we'll get to it in a minute. But the outcome was not that of happiness. It was a tremendous tragedya, a tremendous tragedy. Vayach b'anshei Beis Shemesh ki ra'u ba'aron Hashem. Vayach b'am shivim ish, chamishim elef ish. Vayis'abelu ha'am, ki hikah Hashem ba'am makah gedolah. The Rabbeinu Shlolam hit with a tremendous makah the people of Beis Shemesh.

What does it mean, shivim ish and chamishim elef ish? Is it seventy? Is it fifty? Says Rashi. First he brings a targum Yonason: V'katlu b'savya ama, shivim gavra. From the elders, Sava, the elders, he killed shivim, seventy. Uv'kahala, and the hamon am, the regular, the regular kehillah, the regular people, chamishim alfei gavra. So it's seventy and fifty. Seventy, like zekeinim, and chamishim, fifty thousand b'kahala. Rabbeinu amru, yet Chazal tell us that actually it's not two groups. It was shivim ish shekol echad hayah shakul k'chamishim elef. Seventy, which each one of the seventy was shakul like fifty thousand. Or chamishim elef ish shekol echad shakul k'shivim of the Sanhedrin. So it's not two groups, seventy and fifty thousand, but it's either seventy, that each one was like fifty thousand, or the fifty thousand, each one was like the seventy of the Sanhedrin. Chashuv people, a lot of big, big people. Now what was the chet of the anshei Beis Shemesh? From the pesukim, you don't see much. You see they are happy, they brought olos uzevachim. The pasuk does say in pasuk yud tes, Ki ra'u b'aron Hashem. They looked. They saw. There's a lot of reading the Rishonim and the Acharonim. If there's an issur v'lo yiru, liros kevales hakodesh, that you're not to look at the aron, pasuk by the Mishkan. If it applies only to the time in the Mishkan in the Midbar, or does it apply even later, Mishkan Shiloh? And there's a machlokes Rishonim, and there's a lot of talk that this was the problem, vayiru, like the pasuk tells us. They looked, where the Torah tells us not to look, b'Aron Hashem. Literally, they looked at the Aron Hashem, and you're not allowed to look at the Aron Hashem. Yet Rashi and the Gemara does not say this. This is not brought down, not in the Ragachover, not in the Gemara. The reason why Beis Shemesh was hit so hard, what was their chet? The pasuk says, ki ra'u b'Aron Hashem. Rashi, and soon we'll learn the Chazal, the Gemara in Sotah, daf lamed hei amud aleph, says Rashi, pasuk yud-gimmel, vayismechu liros. Hayu mistaklim heich hu ba levado. They were looking at something. The mefarshim say the vayiru is a lashon of havanah. They were looking in, they were thinking into something. It doesn't mean literally they looked. Vayiru. Hayu mistaklim heich. They were trying to figure out, how did the Aron just show up out of nowhere? Umi simchasam. No agubo kalus roish. Rashi tells us clearly that the chisaron was the type of simcha that they had. It wasn't that they were mesameach, tasa guta zach, but the simcha was there of kalus roish, and mimeila this was the taina on the people of Beis Shemesh, shelo hayu mistaklin b'eima, b'derech kavod. So we have a Rashi here that tells us, l'choira, that the problem was the type of simcha. The reaction wasn't that with eimah v'yirah; it was a reaction of simcha. You look at the Maharsha, uses a loshon, they should have covered up their eyes with garments and fell to the floor from eimah and yirah. Instead they were dancing, and they were medabrim devarim, they were just talking and schmoozing. I'll let you on your own imagine what the mussar that has to be taken from that. We'll just leave it at that. That the Maharsha learns that what was the lack of kavod, he used the lashon, it's a lack of derech eretz, mitkatan, mitgishprungen, mitgeredt, mitgedarshen, etc. It wasn't...

fitting of the reaction that should have been when they saw the Aron Hashem, and this is this part of Rashi. What's the beginning part of Rashi? The beginning has nothing to do with the end of Rashi, l'choira. Hayu mistaklim, heichu ba. I mean, they were looking how it came. What does it have to do with the simcha of jumping and happy and not having derech eretz, mitkalelsh roish? The pashut of Rashi, it's lein tzachnish; it's not reading straight through. Rashi says, Hayu mistaklim heichu ba levad. How did it come alone? Okay, so that's a question, a pondering. Is that something wrong with thinking that? I don't know. Is there something here that we're missing? The end of the Rashi is pashut, misgaven tzuful b'ailulus. What's the beginning of the Rashi? So the truth is, Rashi, sheinei azov, is really a Tamtzis of a Gemara. I want to read to you the Gemara, what Chazal say. Chazal already asked this kasha. The Gemara in Taanis, daf lamed hei amud aleph, perek, Vayach b'anshei Beis Shemesh, ki ra'u b'Aron. Mishum d'ra'u, vayach? Because they looked at the Aron, they got smote, they got hit? Now again, remember we said there's a shaylah if you're allowed to look at the Aron, v'yavo liro'os kevalas haKodesh. You see the Gemara wasn't dealing with that. That wasn't, obviously, that was not the need of the Gemara. That was not the answer of the Gemara. Says the Gemara, so then what is the problem? What did the anshei Beis Shemesh do? Sat the Gemara, Rabba bar Rav Elazar. It's machlokes Rabbanan, Rabbi Elazar. Chad amar, koitzrim u'mishtachavim hayu. They were cutting. I remember I told you it was significant to know what they were doing. They were gone. What were they doing in the fields? They were koitzer k'tzir chitim. The significance is this Gemara: as they were cutting, mishtachavim. They were bowing. Koitzrim, one eye on the cash register, and the other eye on mishtachavim, the avodah. There's big ... acharonim about this, because let's see Rashi. Rashi says, what was the ta'ina? Lo bitlu mi'melachtam. They should have stopped working. You're cutting and mishtachavim at the same time. Lo bitlu mi'melachtam, lichvodei. U'me'eila, v'hai ra'u — when it says ra'u, what it means, ra'u, b'derech bizayon. That's how you look at the ... with one eye, so to speak, on the business. And he brings a pasuk, Rashi, it's chashuv: Al tir'uni she'ani shcharchoreses, the pasuk in Shir HaShirim. And there, tir'uni means don't look at me down in a derech of bizayon. Don't look at me, and look down at me because ani shcharchoreses. There's a re'iyah is a lashon sometimes of looking bad, looking down, without respect, and that's the ta'ina. Azei lernt the Gemara. There's a lot of ... halacha l'maaseh. If you're mechuyiv to stop, if you're in the middle of work, are you mechuyiv to stop to respect the aron and give it its fanfare shalom, its fanfare welcome? The Gemara in Kiddushin, daf lamed gimmel, says clearly, bal yeimnius. Do they stop for a talmid chacham, to stand up for a talmid chacham while they're working? Take care of it. Sure. We should not have to call anybody? He's fine. He's fine, okay. So there's a machlokes in the Gemara: do you have to stop while you're working to be mechabed a talmid chacham? And we know the kavod of talmid chacham is even bigger than the kavod of the Torah. The Gemara says that the bavloyim tipshayim, they stand up for a Torah and they don't stand up for a talmid chacham.

Chacham, and this is a machloikes, two manda'amrim, so this is a big halachic shaila of this Rashi, that l'choira, how could we taina on the anshei Beis Shemesh that they didn't stop mimelachto to greet the aron? It's a big tummel in a chayin. But I'd like to emphasize on the second pshat in the Gemara. So we have one pshat that what was the taina against the people of Beis Shemesh? They didn't stop working for kavod haTorah, and the mussar that needs to be taken from that, I'll also leave you to understand on your own. But then the Gemara says the second manda'amar has a different taina of the anshei Beis Shemesh, and that is, v'echad amar mili nami amru. They also said things they shouldn't have said. What did they say? I mean, the pasuk says they were happy, they brought korbanos. Says the Gemara, they said the following: Man imrayach d'imrayas, u'man asa aloch d'eifais. What does that mean? What caused you to get captured in the first place? What made you come back? We have no idea. How come you were taken, and how come you came back? How did you come back? And if you look at Rashi, Rashi explains, actually we said it even sharper. Mi hichascha? Who got you angry? Kisheka'asto, v'lo yitzlachto, l'hatzil es atzmecha, to save yourself, min ha'shviyah. V'atah, and now, mi mefaischa? Who is being mefayes you? K'shetifsaises lavi me'eilaich, to come back on your own. You hear what they told the Oren? What made you so angry that you let yourself get taken away? ... What caused you to get so angry that you didn't bother saving yourself? The Oren is noisis, noisis. How could you get captured? How could such a thing happen? You let yourself get captured, and out of nowhere you came back. So what did you think in the beginning, and what did you think at the end to come back alone? The dust hub in the Yidden gezogt to the Oren when it came back, anshei Beis Shemesh. Rabosai, what does it mean? Now, al kol panim, we have understanding what Rashi says. Rashi says, hayu mistaklim heichu ba levadai. We asked, what does Rashi mean? They were thinking, they were contemplating, how did it come itself? So what? Therefore what? It's this Gemara, rabosai. Rashi is putting together the two Gemaras, that there was a bizayon and that they were contemplating. Heichu ba levadai, the second man d'amar in the Gemara. Question is, who and why would someone say this to the aron? Chaval al d'mazagin. What's your question? Instead of being happy that the aron came back, instead of bringing a korban that the aron came back, you have to tell the aron, how did it happen that you should get caught and taken away, and how did it happen that you came back alone? So, rabosai, efsher kein is zogen a pshat, with a peledike medrash, a mamash a peledike medrash. The Medrash in Bereishis, Parshas Vayeira, Parshas Nun-Daled, the Medrash says, Lamah laku anshei Beis Shemesh? The question of the Gemara: why did the people of Beis Shemesh get hurt, get hit? Al yedei shehayu melizin ba'aron. Amar HaKadosh Baruch Hu, says the Medrash, because HaKadosh Baruch Hu said to them, Ilu tarnegoltei shel...

Echad meihem avdo. If one of your chickens got lost, hayah machzer aleha. The person would go after to try to get it. Expression Yiddish. New generation, I don't know if they know all this Yiddish. They would have put in rules to get back their chicken. Kama pesachim lavia. They would open up so many doors to try to get it back. V'hareini b'sdei Pelishtim. My aren, it was lost in the fields of Pelishtim, shiva chadashim, v'ein atem mashgichin bo. And you do nothing for it. Habeisi, is that a medrash? It's not Rashi. It's not the Gemara in Sotah. Another reason. Now what's the reason? Hayah tachin. You didn't put in the effort to get it back. Frekt yafeh toar on the bottom, what did you expect them to do already? It was captured not because they wanted it. It's because the Pelishtim was stronger and they took it away. Frekt yafeh toar, af al gav d'yad Pelishtim oseh tekifah, l'maaseh the Pelishtim was stronger. U'mai yachlin la'asos? What could they have done? What did you want them to do? What was the ta'ina? Avadeh, if you can't get back your chicken because the guy who took it is much stronger than you, so... what are your ta'ina against the people of Beis Shemesh? What's the ta'ina? Zogt di feytaya mikamaka, im yochol livdosei b'ritzei kesef. They should have bought it back. Money. For a price. If you want to pay the price, you would have gotten back the... It's lunch and learn, we have to give a little bit of a gevalt. My great uncle, Reb Zalman Sorotzkin, was a big chacham, very wise person. There was a discussion at the time to restart the Sanhedrin. Rav Yankev Kamenetsky was very much involved in that. So they asked him, what is his opinion about restarting the Sanhedrin? We're back in Eretz Yisroel. I'm not going to get into the halachic background of the shaila. So he said he rather was for it. He thought it might have been a good idea. So they asked him, but I don't understand. In order to have a Sanhedrin, you need dayanim of the highest caliber. You need dayanim with the most moral ethic, and that is sonei betza, that they hate money. What do you mean, who hates money? They hate their money. And Rashi explains, b'shem Chazal, sheson'im mamon b'din, which means any money that even though it comes them, it's their money, but they have to go to a din Torah to get it. If it had to come through a fight to get it, they don't want that money. Where are you going to find dayanim today, in today's age and time, that meet that moral standard? A few dollars we could find, that is. If you're willing to pay the price, you can get anything. Okay, now that I have you all smiling, let's get back to the Chazal, to Yefei Toar. The Yefei Toar is not pshat. You write that the Pelishtim took it. Pay your price. Give your price. For the right price, you would have got back the aron. A second pshat. And he says, Uvifrat, achar asher kibed Yad Hashem baAshdodim, vayakin bachalim. If you look at the pesukim before the Pelishtim sent back, it says there clearly that Ashdodim got a zelche clap. They got so beaten up, and that's why they sent back the aron in the first place. So you should have went and negotiated, so to speak, for the aron, because you know that they're already weak and they're ready to give up anyway, the aron wasn't for them. And then he says, Bli sofek, im bikshu Yisrael mehem lahashiv es haaron, az heshivu b'simcha.

If they only asked, they would have gotten it back. Azei lenti fei tayre pshat in the Medrash. Habeisai, let me offer another pshat, which I think is meyudik and taheir. Why didn't they daven? Why didn't they just daven for the aron? The question was, how were they supposed to get back the aron? And the answer is, they should have negotiated, and the question was, but you know that it's in the hands of the guy who's not interested. Also, what about davening? Are you going to ask me a kasha? Who said that they didn't daven? Who said? How do you know that? Habeisai, I found a meyudik pshat in the sefer Teiras Haknoyis. Teiras Haknoyis is this sefer, it's one of the classics on Mesechta Sotah. And over there he asks, and he speaks about what was their reaction. He says a meyudik thing. He says, V'hochi nami hukshu lahem, d'nilkach ha'aron u'plishtim. The Gemara seems to say that they were questioning how the aron came back. What was their issue? What was their question, how the aron came back? So he says they were content that it was gezeiras HaKadosh Baruch Hu, that's the ratzon Hashem, that the aron should be taken away, and therefore they didn't daven for it. Pli plei. What was bothering? What was the question? What were they contemplating? They were questioning how did it leave and how did it come back. What's the question? And the answer is, says the Torahs HaKnois, they were questioning if the ratzon Hashem was that it should be taken away, how did it come back? Nistaros laShem Elokeinu. We're not going to get involved in trying to understand that. So the truth is, the ta'ina was not the question. The ta'ina is why didn't you have the answer to that question? Instead of sitting idle and thinking, it left. We don't know why it left. It came back. We don't know why it came back. See, the ratzon Hashem, let's not touch what we don't understand, ad tisas gevend the problem. That was the problem. We don't find in the pesukim, says the Minchas Kena'os, they davened. You don't just sit back and accept when you see tragedies. You don't just sit back and say, What could we do? It's ratzon Hashem, kabbalit. What do you mean kabbal? No such thing as kabbalit. Unu, dos is pshat in the Gemara, rabosai. The Gemara is saying is not that they said, Hayitochen... Why would somebody be chutzpik to the aron? The aron came, and instead of being happy that it came back, what do you sit there, What made you angry that you should leave, and what made you come back? What's the shaylah? What kind of shaylah is that? The question was, we can't understand. What do you mean you can't understand? Of course you should understand. טעם אין תורה, בישטע. טעם אין תורה, בישטע. Don't just say, throw your hands up, can't understand. Let's go back to the Rashi. Let's go back to the Rashi. They were looking at, Oh, how did it come by itself? What do you mean? It didn't come by itself. There's no such thing as by itself. The taina was, what do you mean it came by itself? Something happens by itself. Everything that happens has a reason, and if it has a reason, it has a chiyuv to go daven to the Ribono Shel Olam to change the outcome. I want to end with a maaseh. Why am I saying this today? The tragedies in Eretz Yisroel, unfortunately, we have to say these shmuzen over again and over again. We didn't have to say them every... Again, tragedies, and every morning we wake up, we invite the tragedies, invite the tragedies, invite the tragedies. At some point...

We say we're baalei emunah. Gezeiras HaKadosh Baruch Hu. We have no answers. We throw our hands up and we say, How do we know? What do we know? We don't understand. We're mispoel. We ask, What got the Ribono Shel Olam angry? What happened? So we don't answer it. And the truth is, there is a response. The answer is not to come and say it's gezeiras hamakos. The answer is to be mishtadel. You know, today there's big talk: What could you do? Everybody said, What could you do? They're already coming with screwdrivers and knives and cars, and everything becomes a weapon. What are you going to do? There's no such a thing as, What are you going to do? You know who said, What are you going to do? Beis Shemesh. They said, What are you going to do? That's the lesson of this perek, rabosai. The lesson of this perek was, they said, What are we going to do? How did the ... leave us? Who knows? It's ... it's ... it's a pele. It can't be. It doesn't make any sense. So you know what? I can't understand it. Let's leave it alone. That's what the Gemara is telling us. The response has to be, yes, there is what to do. There's something that we could do, like every Yid always was mishtadel, and that's tefillah. That's tefillah, to do teshuvah. You don't just come and say, I go back to my work. First pshat in the Gemara: they were busy with their work and they're mishtachavim. It didn't affect them properly. That's the ta'ina. The ta'ina was, How do you respond? It's saying something. How does an article come back by itself? How did it take—was taken away? How did it come back? He's still busy with the cash register. Something's wrong. Busy with the tzrichitim. Something doesn't klap. I want to tell you over one maise with this. Let you think about it. Let it settle what we're speaking. In life, as you get older, you start to realize, ki oved eitzos. There is no answers. You can think from today till tomorrow, solutions. You're going to realize that at the end you're going to come up short, because there are no solutions. That's the truth. I want to tell you a maise. I want you to understand the maise, and I want you to fit it back into what we're speaking. It's brought down in Nayemes Hagedolim, a beautiful sefer. It's the stories of Chofetz Chaim and Alter from Kelm and the Alter from Slabodka. They bring a maise there of a Yid, Reb Shmuel Schenker, that came to the house of the Alter from Kelm to ask him advice if he should go to Eretz Yisroel or not. It's interesting, today I was told that the Gedolei Yisroel are being dan if bochurim from America should leave Eretz Yisroel. We're always in a quandary, rabosai. Should we go to Eretz Yisroel? Should we come back from Eretz Yisroel? Gedolei Yisrael pasken, they're like neviim. We don't question what they say. They granted, in this case, say to stay in Eretz Yisrael, Baruch Hashem learning in yeshiva, Rav Chaim Kanievsky, shlita, Rav Steinman, shlita, v'chulei v'chulei. Okay. How did the Alter from Kelm respond? He tells Reb Shmuel Shenker, I didn't daven Maariv yet. I want you to come back after Maariv. Why? You have to daven right this minute? Is that— no, what was the issue? He said, no. You're asking me advice. In Maariv we daven, and we say every Maariv, V'sakneinu b'eitzah tovah milfanecha. Rebbe, give me good advice. V'sakneinu. Set me up with the right advice. And every Maariv I'm mechaven for advice, what to do. So if you come back to me after Maariv, sina chatefilah from V'sakneinu b'eitzah tovah milfanecha, I'll be able to answer you. Habei say, what changed from before Maariv to after Maariv? Okay.

I'm not talking that out of ma'amarim that we daven in three minutes today, or six minutes, or l'chol, by Mevin Yavin. Let's say the Alte daven for 20 minutes, okay? So what changed in that 20 minutes? And the teretz is, there are no eitzes unless the Rabbeinu Shlelem gives you the advice. V'sakneinu b'eitzah tovah. It doesn't say eitzah tovah. What does it say? Eitzah tovah? Milfonecha. The eitzah is only from the Rabbeinu Shlelem. This is yesod Yiddishkeit, tefillah. We don't know if we're supposed to go right, if we're supposed to go left. There's no such a thing as saying, I don't have the answer. It's a gezeiras hakasuv. Daven to the Rabbeinu Shlelem for the answer. V'sakneinu b'eitzah tovah milfonecha. And every person in his life, listen to me, is going to come across situations where he just says, There's no answer. I don't have the answers. I'm lost. All the cheshbones and all the thinking, that's not going to give you the solution. The solution is with a ma'ariv, with a tefillah: V'sakneinu b'eitzah tovah milfonecha. You've just experienced another Torah class, brought to you by TorahAnytime.com.