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Wisdom for Living
Rabbi Noah Weinberg on the Parashah
8 min read
"Vayikra… And God called Moses…" (Vayikra 1:1).
Rashi explains that the word "vayikra" is an expression of affection. God not only spoke to Moshe, He made direct, intimate contact with him. This was in stark contrast to how God spoke to the non-Jewish prophets, where the verb used to describe the communication is "vayikar." Vayikar, without the letter aleph at the end, implies a chance encounter, a lower form of communication.
The word "vayikra" at the beginning of this week’s Torah portion is written with the letter aleph in smaller type. The Baal Haturim explains that Moses wrote it this way due to his humility, for he wanted to downplay the public statement of his preciousness to God implied by the word "vayikra." Making the aleph small does not change the meaning of the word, yet at a quick glance the word appears to connote the inferior relationship that "vayikar" – without the aleph – entails.
Moses was the greatest prophet in history and also the epitome of humility. He was aware of his own greatness, yet careful not to flaunt it.
The essence of humility is recognizing that all your strengths, your Torah learning, your blessings, and even your efforts, are all a gift from God.
We mistakenly attribute our accomplishments to our own abilities instead of recognizing that they are gifts from God. The Talmud (Shabbos 105b) explains that the verse, "There shall be no strange god within you” (Tehillim 81:10) refers to the yetzer hara, the evil inclination, which constantly tempts us to believe that our powers are the cause of our successes, instead of attributing these successes to God. As the verse says, "And you may say in your heart, 'My strength and the might of my hand made me all this wealth'" (Devarim 8:17) – in other words, I accomplished this. The following joke illustrates this human foible:
A multimillionaire makes a bad investment that wipes out his fortune. He takes his last $10,000, goes to the racetrack, and picks a horse called Dancer that pays 1,000 to 1. He figures that if he wins, he’ll be a millionaire again, and if he loses he is already broke – so he has nothing to lose.
The race is about to begin and he starts to pray with fervor. "Almighty, the odds are 1,000 to 1. Please make this horse run!" Off they go, and sure enough his horse is running. "Almighty, please, please move him up in the pack!" The horse moves up in the pack. "Almighty, get him up in front, please, please!" Dancer is ahead by a nose. "Thank you Almighty, please, keep him in front!" The horse is ahead by a length. "Please, please keep him going!" He's ahead by five lengths and entering the final homestretch. Then he says, "Okay God, I can take over from here. Come on Dancer!"
When we are just starting out, overwhelmed by the challenges ahead of us, we naturally turn to God for help and guidance. But once we have succeeded, we all too easily forget God's role in guiding every step we took, until we mistakenly conclude that it was only our abilities and efforts that caused our success.
Nor can we take credit for our spiritual accomplishments, even when they require self-sacrifice. Whatever we accomplish is a gift from God; our efforts and self-sacrifice are what make it possible for God to bless our efforts. As the Talmud teaches, "A person's yetzer hara (evil inclination) attacks him every day, and wants to kill him... and if not for God's help, he would be unable to withstand him" (Kiddushin 30b). Even our power to stand up to the yetzer hara is a gift from the Almighty.
We take credit for our accomplishments in order to feel important, but instead of empowering us, this actually diminishes us. By way of illustration, if someone were to ask you if you can recite the Shema twice a day or say Grace After Meals, you would answer, “Of course I can.”
If someone were to ask you if you can know the entire Torah by heart or think about God every second of the day, you would probably answer that you cannot do it.
Which response is more accurate? When you say “I can recite the Shema” or when you say “I cannot know the entire Torah by heart”?
The truth is that you cannot learn the entire Torah by heart because the reality is that you cannot even lift a finger without God's help. But that is not the reason why we answer that we cannot do it. If that were the underlying reason then we would have answered that without God's help we cannot say the Shema or Birkas Hamazon either! We say that we cannot know all of Torah because we think do not have the intelligence and capabilities.
We rely only on our own prowess, believing deep down that it is our power that enables us to accomplish. If we would realize that God is the only power, that in truth we cannot do anything without Him – even say Shema – then we would believe that just as God gives us the ability to recite Shema, He will give us the ability to learn the entire Torah, if we want it badly enough. If God wants it to happen because it is consistent with His will, it will indeed happen– if we show him that we are doing all that is required to succeed.
Therefore, taking credit for our accomplishments does not empower us; it ultimately limits what we believe is attainable. Thinking it is all up to us consigns us to the limited and insecure realm of our own resources. But when we realize that everything that happens comes from God, we can transcend our shortcomings and plug ourselves into the Almighty’s unlimited power.
Saying "I can't" is a form of idol worship because it implies that you are relying on your own power and not God's.
In describing the building of the Mishkan and its vessels, the verse says, “Moses summoned Betzalel, Oholiav, and every wise-hearted man whose heart God endowed with wisdom, everyone whose heart inspired him to approach the work, to do it” (Shemos 36:2).
The Chofetz Chaim (Toras Habayis, Chapter 7) points out that Betzalel's desire to fulfill God's will was the initial catalyst for God's giving him the ability to build the vessels of the Mishkan. This principle applies to all of our undertakings as well. Our job is to foster within ourselves the desire to do God's will. Then God gives us the opportunity and ability to accomplish our goal.
My great-grandfather was the Slonimer Rebbe. After I opened the first yeshiva for baalei teshuvah, I met several of my Israeli cousins, Slonimer chassidim, at a simchah and they said to me, “The great Rebbes of Europe took such pride in bringing a single Jew back to Torah that they put that accomplishment on their tombstones. Rav Noach, we remember when you first came to Eretz Yisroel and wore a light-colored suit. How is it possible that you have made scores of baalei teshuvah?"
I answered them with the following example.
When you walk the streets of Jerusalem, it is not uncommon to see large cranes lifting many tons of building materials and depositing them in the correct location. There is always one person standing at that location who places his hands under the load to make sure it comes to rest at the right spot. A fool, watching this man, thinks he is stronger than Shimshon, for he is holding tons of weight with his bare hands! But a wise man takes a step back and sees the bigger picture: It is the crane that is carrying the burden; the man below is just guiding it into place.
Similarly, the prophets teach that in the End of Days leading up to the arrival of the Mashiach, the Jewish People will do teshuvah and come back to God and His Torah (Amos, 8:11). God is moving the crane and lifting up the burden of the nation. All we need to do is lift our hands and make the slightest effort to guide to the right place those who are returning. When we do, the Almighty credits us with bringing back these souls all by ourselves, as the Mishnah says, “All who exert themselves for the community should exert themselves for the sake of Heaven, for then the merit of the community’s forefathers aids them and their righteousness endures forever. Nevertheless, as for you, I [God] will bestow upon you as great a reward as if you had accomplished it on your own” (Avos 2:2).
