the reason the malach told Hagar not to flee: how can you leave Eretz Yisrael?!

1) Rashi interprets the angel's question to Hagar, וַיֹּאמַ֗ר הָגָ֞ר שִׁפְחַ֥ת שָׂרַ֛י אֵֽי־מִזֶּ֥ה בָ֖את וְאָ֣נָה תֵלֵ֑כִי (16:8), as a rhetorical device. The angel knew where Hagar had come from and where she was headed to, but wanted an opening to engage her in conversation. Abarbanel, however, reads the pasuk as a statement and not a question:

והנה המלאך אמר לה ראשונה הגר שפחת שרי אי מזה באת ואנה תלכי ר״ל איך לא יעלה על לבך מאין יצאת שהוא בית אברהם עשיר ונדיב לבב אוהב אותך ואנה תלכי במדבר השמם הזה התמצאי בו בית נכבד כבית אברהם הביטי וראי גבול מה שממנו נסוגות וגבול מה שאליו תלכי.

The malach was telling Hagar to think carefully about the fact that she was leaving the home of a rich, benevolent person who loves her to go wander in the desert. For what?  Will the grass really be greener elsewhere?

Seforno also reads the malach's words as a statement, and I think Seforno's reading fits nicelywith theme of our entire parsha, namely the importance of Eretz Yisrael.  Seforno writes that the malach stressed to Hagar that by fleeing she was not just running away from Avahram's home, but also from Eretz Yisrael:  

 והנך הולכת בחוצה לארץ אל מקום טמא ואנשי רשע. 

Such an appeal only makes sense if Hagar could understand the importance of Eretz Yisrael, the kedusha of Eretz Yisrael.  Perhaps it's not by accident that it is davka Hagar's descendants who are fighting us tooth and nail for Eretz Yisrael. 

2) In the last halacha in the last perek of Brachos in the Yerushalmi (67b), there is a sugya that reads as follows:

אַבְרָהָם אָבִינוּ עָשָׂה יֵצֶר הָרַע טוֹב דִּכְתִיב: וּמָצָאתָ אֶת לְבָבוֹ נֶאֱמָן לְפָנֶיךָ. אָמַר רִבִּי אָחָא וְהִפְסִיד אֶלָּא וְכָרוֹת עִמּוֹ הַבְּרִית.

It sounds like R' Acha is asking a kashe, but it's not at all clear what the kashe is or what the teirutz is. How can a person lose anything by overcoming their yetzer ha'ra? Isn't that something we should be striving for? The Pnei Moshe must have been struggling with this point.  In order to make sense of things he changes the girsa. Instead of וְהִפְסִיד, he says the word should be והפשיר. It's not a kashe but rather a statement:

והפשיר עמו וכרות עמו הברית וגו׳ – כצ״ל וכן הוא בסוטה היצה״ר עשה פשרה ושלום עמו ודרש וכרות עמו הברית אדלעיל ומצאת את לבבו וגו׳

Chida in his sefer Rosh David (my cousin-in-law R' Avraham Wagner quotes the mareh makom in his sefer Afar Yerushalayim on the Ylmi) on our parsha defends the original girsa and explains what bothered R' Acha. If you don't have a yetzer ha'ra that fights back, then וְהִפְסִיד, because you lose the reward of overcoming the obstacles, challenges, and difficulties that stand in the way of your avodas Hashem.  We may at times bemoan the fact that we have to struggle so hard, but it is that struggle gives value and meaning to what we achieve.

Chazal tell us (Kid 31a) דְּאָמַר רַבִּי חֲנִינָא: גָּדוֹל מְצֻוֶּוה וְעוֹשֶׂה מִמִּי שֶׁאֵינוֹ מְצֻוֶּוה וְעוֹשֶׂה. Even though one might think that doing something voluntarily is greater than obeying a command to do so, Tos explains נראה דהיינו טעמא דמי שמצווה ועושה עדיף לפי שדואג ומצטער יותר פן יעבור ממי שאין מצווה שיש לו פת בסלו שאם ירצה יניח. When you have to do something, when there is a command to do something, the yetzer ha'ra fights back and tries to stop you. When you do something voluntarily, the yetzer ha'ra doesn't get in the way because there is no penalty for just walking away if things get too tough.  When there is no pressure and no obstacles to success, the accomplishment is not as great, and the reward for success, in turn, is diminished.

The teirutz of the Yerushalmi is that Avraham didn't lose, because it is only as a *result* of his pushing to overcome difficulties and do a milah that Hashem rewarded him with that blessing of וְכָרוֹת עִמּוֹ הַבְּרִית. Turning the yetzer ha'ra to good was not a means to enable him to do the mitzvah without any obstacles, but rather was a reward for having overcome the obstacles and done the mitzvah.

(The Chida gets involved in this whole discussion to solve the following problem: some explain that while Avraham did all mitzvos even without a command from G-d, he did not do a milah until commanded because he wanted to do it as a מצווה ועושה and not as an ֶאֵינוֹ מְצֻוֶּוה. Other mitzvos he could do multiple times, but when it comes to milah, you only have one chance.  Asks Chida: if the advantage of being מצווה ועושה is that you have a yetzer ha'ra to fight against, as Tos explains, then what did Avraham gain?  He had eliminated his yetzer ha'ra? It must be, says Chida, that that transformation too place as a result of the milah, but not beforehand.  Ayen sham for other approaches he offers.)

3) A famous gemara in Brachos 10a

הָנְהוּ בִּרְיוֹנֵי דַּהֲווֹ בְּשִׁבָבוּתֵיהּ דְּרַבִּי מֵאִיר וַהֲווֹ קָא מְצַעֲרוּ לֵיהּ טוּבָא. הֲוָה קָא בָּעֵי רַבִּי מֵאִיר רַחֲמֵי עִלָּוַיְהוּ כִּי הֵיכִי דְּלֵימוּתוּ. אָמְרָה לֵיהּ בְּרוּרְיָא דְּבֵיתְהוּ: מַאי דַּעְתָּךְ — מִשּׁוּם דִּכְתִיב ״יִתַּמּוּ חַטָּאִים״, מִי כְּתִיב ״חוֹטְאִים״? ״חַטָּאִים״ כְּתִיב.

Beruria tells R' Meir to daven that sin חַטָּאִים, be abolished, but don't pray for the demise of sinners, חוֹטְאִים.

Is there really such a difference between these terms?  Sefas Emes asks: what about the pasuk in our parsha (13:3) ואנשי סדם רעים וחטאים לה' מאד? The word חטאים there refers to the people, not to their actions?  Take a look at the meforshim on the Ein Yaakov.

4) A bit of trivia: a din buried in hilchos brachos that is learned from our parsha. OC 46:4:

צריך לברך בכל יום שלא עשני גוי שלא עשני עבד שלא עשני אשה: הגה ואפי' גר יכול לברך כן

The M"B explains the Rama as follows:

יכול לברך - פי' שיאמר שעשני גר דמיקרי עשייה כדכתיב ואת הנפש אשר עשו בחרן. ויש חולקין בזה וטעמם דלא שייך לומר שעשני דהגיור לא היתה כ"א מצד בחירתו הטובה שבחר בדת האמת

don't throw the raven overboard

The gemara (San 108b) relates that the raven had an iron clad argument to object to being sent out by Noach (parenthetically: the Brisker Rav asks what was the point of sending out the raven and the dove to check if there was dry land?  Even after he found that there was dry land and the ark made landfall, Noach did not leave the teivah until he had a tzivuy from Hashem to do so?):

וַיְשַׁלַּח אֶת הָעֹרֵב״, אָמַר רֵישׁ לָקִישׁ: תְּשׁוּבָה נִיצַּחַת הֱשִׁיבוֹ עוֹרֵב לְנֹחַ. אָמַר לוֹ: רַבְּךָ שׂוֹנְאֵנִי וְאַתָּה שְׂנֵאתָנִי. רַבְּךָ שׂוֹנְאֵנִי – מִן הַטְּהוֹרִין שִׁבְעָה, מִן הַטְּמֵאִים שְׁנַיִם, וְאַתָּה שְׂנֵאתָנִי – שֶׁאַתָּה מַנִּיחַ מִמִּין שִׁבְעָה וְשׁוֹלֵחַ מִמִּין שְׁנַיִם. אִם פּוֹגֵעַ בִּי שַׂר חַמָּה אוֹ שַׂר צִנָּה, לֹא נִמְצָא עוֹלָם חָסֵר בְּרִיָּה אַחַת? אוֹ שֶׁמָּא לְאִשְׁתִּי אַתָּה צָרִיךְ

אָמַר לוֹ: רָשָׁע! בַּמּוּתָּר לִי נֶאֱסַר לִי, בַּנֶּאֱסָר לִי לֹא כׇּל שֶׁכֵּן?

How does Noach's response address the complaint of the raven?  How did Noach justify sending it out when there was no other raven left for its mate?  Maharasha comments as follows:

מזה דרשו שראה נח תשובתו הנצחת ...ואמר ליה נח רשע וכו' קראו רשע על שעבר על מצות קונו לשמש בתיבה וז"ש במותר לי נאסר בתיבה בנאסר לי עם אשתך לא כל שכן שלא אעבור על מצות קוני והיה לו זה קצת תשובתו דלכך שלחתיך לפי שאתה רשע ושמשת בתיבה ואין לחוש עליך כמו על שאר העופות גם כי אשתך הרה ממך ונמצא שאין עולם חסר בריה ובבריות אחרות שלא שמשו יש לחוש על כך שיהיה חסר במינם

Simple pshat in Maharasha is that Noach was telling the ravan that since he is a rasha, he deserves to be gotten rid of and that's why he is kicking him overboard.

R' Mordechai Kukis (R"Y of Porat Yosef) quotes his son, R' Uriel, in a one line footnote here, who says a brilliant pshat that flips the gemara and Maharasha on its head.  The ravan at this point had nothing going for it. By rights, it had lost its "zechus ha'kiyum," it had forfeited whatever merit it had to be saved in the ark and be spared the plight of all the other creatures.  But Noach wasn't trying to get rid of him.  Aderaba, Noach was throwing the raven a life preserver!  Why did Noach send out the raven?  Because he was giving the raven something positive to do that would benefit everyone -- go out a see if there is dry land and food -- so that the raven could restore that "zechus ha'kiyum" and prove that it still has value, it still deserves a chance to live, despite the fact that it had sinned.  

Chazal are not telling us Dr Doolittle stories. Chazal are trying to teach us a lesson for our own behavior. When someone has done wrong, the solution is not necessarily to throw them overboard. Sometimes the solution is to give them an avenue to build themselves up again, find a way for them to restore their sense of self worth and their sense of brining value within the community.

why is this month different than all other months? A chiddush of the Ba"ch

The gemara on the last daf of R"H has the following din:

 אמר ר"א לעולם יסדיר אדם תפלתו ואח"כ יתפלל

 

You have to prepare your davening in advance.  (The poskim write that if someone davens from a siddur, that is sufficient.  If you daven by heart, you have to look over the tefilah.)

 

The gemara then qualifies that statement:

 

מר רבי אבא מסתברא מילתיה דר' אלעזר בברכות של ר"ה ושל יוה"כ ושל פרקים אבל דכל השנה לא איניוהא רב יהודה מסדר צלותיה ומצלי שאני רב יהודה כיון דמתלתין יומין לתלתין יומין הוה מצלי כפרקים דמי 

It seems like 30 days is the threshold for what constitutes an interval of פרקים.  Does that mean day 30 is already outside the limit, or does that mean going *beyond* 30 days is the limit?  The nafka mina would be tefilah on Rosh Chodesh.  Tur in Siman 100:

 

וצריך להסדיר תפלתו קודם שיתפלל כדי שתהא שגורה בפיו  ודוקא תפלה של פרקים לפי שאינו רגיל בה אבל תפלות התדירות לא וכתב הרמב"ם ז"ל של פרקים כגון של ר"ח ומועדות וא"א ז"ל כתב של פרקים הוא משלשים יום ואילך ולפ"ז ר"ח א"צ

 

For some reason it just dawned on me this year that Rosh Chodesh Cheshvan should be an exception to the above machlokes.  While it is possible for Rosh Chodesh of other months to fall within the 30 day limit, it's impossible when it comes to Cheshvan.  Our tefilah on R'Ch Tishrei is not a Rosh Chodesh tefilah -- it's the tefilah of R"H.  Therefore, when Cheshvan rolls around, it's actually been 2 months since the last R"Ch davening.  I found the point in the Ba"Ch:

 

מיהו אף לפי זה של ראש חדש מרחשון צריך הוא להסדיר שהרי לא התפלל לתפלת ראש חדש בראש השנה ואיכא ח' שבועות מראש חדש אלול עד ראש חדש חשון שלא התפלל תפלת ראש חדש

So there you have it -- something unique to this Rosh Chodesh.

whose tzelem was man created in?

וַיִּבְרָ֨א אֱלֹקים אֶת־הָֽאָדָם֙ בְּצַלְמ֔וֹ בְּצֶ֥לֶם אֱלֹקים בָּרָ֣א אֹת֑וֹ זָכָ֥ר וּנְקֵבָ֖ה בָּרָ֥א אֹתָֽם:

The word צַלְמ֔וֹ is possessive - his tzelem.

Whose?

Is it the tzelem Elokim? That would make the entire next clause, בְּצֶ֥לֶם אֱלֹקים בָּרָ֣א אֹת֑וֹ, redundant.

R' Aharon Soloveitchik in his sefer on chumash explains (see Ibn Ezra and Ohr haChaim) that the tzelem of בְּצַלְמ֔וֹ means the tzelem of man himself. Tzelem is the purpose for which every individual is created. It's not by chance that you were put in the world in a particular time and a particular place and given particular abilities. Hashem put you there and gave you the talents you have because that is exactly what you need to fulfill your purpose in creation -- to live up to your tzelem.

Rav Kook makes the same point on the words we said in viduy: עד שלא נוצרתי איני כדאי, ועכשיו שנוצרתי כאלו לא נוצרתי. Before this time and place in history, איני כדאי, there was no need for your neshoma or my neshoma to come into the world.  Now that we are here, עכשיו שנוצרתי, we say viduy and bemoan the fact that in this particular moment in time and space that beckons for our creation and which gives out life purpose, כאלו לא נוצרתי, we fail to live up to who we should be, to the tzelem for which we are created.

If you have the time for it there is a wonderful talk from R' Mordechai Greenberg of Kerem b'Yavneh which captures this idea, among others:

the mystery of the last 8 pesukim, Moshe's seat 8 rows back in the shiur of R' Akiva, and Shmini Atzeret

Menachos 29 relates that Moshe asked Hashem why he was putting crowns on the letters of the Torah.  Hashem answered that in the future there will be a Rabbi Akiva who will darshen halachos from the crowns atop the letters.  Moshe asked to see him, and so Hashem dropped him into R' Akiva's shiur in the 8th row from the front.  Moshe couldn't understand the shiur and was upset until he heard someone ask R' Akiva the source for a din and R' Akiva answered that it is halacha l'Moshe m'Sinai.

Why was Moshe placed davka in the 8th row?

R' Noson Gestetner suggests that this is an allusion to the gemara that speaks about the last 8 pesukim of the Torah.  How could Moshe have written about his own death?  According to one opinion he wrote it "b'dema."  Some interpret that word to mean that he wrote it in tears, but the GR"A interprets it to mean a mixture, like the word dmai.  Ramban writes in his intro to chumash that the Torah in its original, pristine form in shamayim is a code of letters that spell the shem Hashem.  Hashem took those letters and put them in an order to spell the words that we read in olam ha'zeh.  When it came to the last 8 pesukim, Hashem could not leave the Torah incomplete, so he gave those pesukim to Moshe, but he only revealed it to him in the encoded form as Torah appears in shamayimm, but not the actual words that describe Moshe's olam ha'zeh death.  It is those jumbled letters that Moshe wrote. 

The same is true of the torah of R' Akiva.  Moshe was given everything at Sinai, including the halachos R' Akiva taught, but the source was a jumble, it was something he could not make sense of through the prism through which he saw Torah.  He was in the 8th row of the shiur, meaning that for Moshe, the torah of R' Akiva was like those last 8 pesukim.  R' Akiva saw Torah through his own prism and was able to unravel the code.

Everything in the world is contained in Torah.  What happened Shmini Atzeret 2 years ago is somehow also a part of Torah; it's the number 8 like the 8 pesukim that are a jumble that we cannot make sense of, it's like those 8 pesukim written b'dema in the other sense of the word, meaning tears.  We may not be able to unravel the jumble, but that we know contains within it shem Hashem, His presence.   

As I write these words the entire Jewish word is awaiting v'shavu banim l'gevulam, we are awaiting Hashem saying, "kashe alaei p'reidaschem," the seperation of the hostages is too much to bear already and they will return home.  We pray as well that Hashem this year will declare "kashe alai p'reidaschem," the seperation of all of us from Hashem, from our nation, from our homeland, in this galus has gone on too long already. 

the 955 pesukim of Devarim and the 955 gates of Heaven

רְא֣וּ עַתָּ֗ה כִּ֣י אֲנִ֤י אֲנִי֙ ה֔וּא וְאֵ֥ין אֱלֹקים עִמָּדִ֑י אֲנִ֧י אָמִ֣ית וַאֲחַיֶּ֗ה מָחַ֙צְתִּי֙ וַאֲנִ֣י אֶרְפָּ֔א וְאֵ֥ין מִיָּדִ֖י מַצִּֽיל

What exactly did Moshe see at this moment beyond the miracles of the 40 years in the desert that triggered this reaction?

R' Yosef Shaul Nathanson writes as follows:

ְThe Midrash in last week's parsha teaches that when Hashem told Moshe הן קרבו ימיך למות, Moshe responded and said, "How can you say that to me when I used that very word to proclaim הן לה׳ אלקיך השמים?" (Devarim 10:14) Hashem answered that this is the fate of all man from the time of the cheit of Adam, because הן האדם היה כאחד ממנו לדעת טוב ורע ועתה פן ישלח ידו ולקח גם מעץ החיים ואכל וחי לעלם.

What's the magic of the word הן that led Moshe to think that just because he used that word in connection to praising Hashem, Hashem therefore cannot use that word to tell him he is going to die ?

The AR"I has a teaching as follows: There are 955 levels in the heavens, corresponding to the gematriya of שמים (final letters continue the hundreds count after ת=400, so final chaf = 500, final mem = 600, etc). Of those 955, 900 have angels appointed over them, but the last 55 are filled with Hashem's presence alone and no angels may enter. This is the meaning of הן לה׳ אלקיך השמים, i.e. הן = 55 levels of the 955 = השמים belong to Hashem alone.

By coincidence (not), there are 955 pesukim in sefer Devarim. With every pasuk that Moshe recited, he opened another gate in heaven.

With every gate that Moshe opened, he tried to appeal the gezeirah against himself.

The malachim were all sworn not to help Moshe, and so for each of the first 900 gates that Moshe knocked on, so to speak, the malach in charge refused to carry Moshe's tefilos to Hashem and he was turned away.

When do you do when you get bounced from customer service agent to agent and can't get help? You ask for the manager, of course. Finally, after 900 pesukim, after being turned away by 900 angels, Moshe stood at the levels of heaven, the gates of prayer, that even angels had no power over -- only Hashem himself was there.  He could now take his appeal directly to the top.

Pasuk 900 is that pasuk of רְא֣וּ עַתָּ֗ה כִּ֣י אֲנִ֤י אֲנִי֙ ה֔וּא וְאֵ֥ין אֱלֹקים עִמָּדִ֑י אֲנִ֧י אָמִ֣ית וַאֲחַיֶּ֗ה מָחַ֙צְתִּי֙ וַאֲנִ֣י אֶרְפָּ֔א וְאֵ֥ין מִיָּדִ֖י מַצִּֽיל

Moshe Rabeinu now said to Hashem, b'shlama until now, it was angels turning me away, but I recognize that you Hashem have control over these 55 higher levels, הן לה׳ אלקיך השמים. Why then are You slamming the door in my face? Why even on these highest 55=הן levels do I deserve the same message of קרבו ימיך למות?

And the answer is that as great as Moshe is, הן האדם היה כאחד ממנו, no human can access those upper 55 levels lest man turn himself into a deity, as Chazal darshan כאחד ממנו refers to the "Yechido shel olam."

ain ma'avirin al ha'mitzvos - Avnei Nezer's chiddush in when to build your sukkah

The against (Meg 6b) writes that when there is a double Adar, according to R' Eliezer bar Yosi the megillah is read in the first Adar because of the principle of  דְּאֵין מַעֲבִירִין עַל הַמִּצְוֹת.  When you have one continuous block of time and can do the mitzvah earlier or later within that same block, there is a din of zerizus to do it earlier, but that's not a game breaker.  In his case, it's not a contiguous block of time.  There are days in between 14 Adar I and 14 Adar II when the megillah cannot be read.  Therefore, we come on to the principle of אֵין מַעֲבִירִין עַל הַמִּצְוֹת. 

Based on this gemara the Avnei Nezer (OC 459)  has a chiddush din that when there is a shabbos in between Y"K and Sukkos, a person must build his sukkah before shabbos.  You cannot build the sukkah on shabbos, so we treat the days before shabbos and days after as two separate time periods and apply the rule of אֵין מַעֲבִירִין עַל הַמִּצְוֹת.

Is that really true?  The gemara (MK 9a) writes that Shlomo haMelech made a celebration for chanukas Beis haMikdash before Sukkot so as to avoid the problem of מְעָרְבִין שִׂמְחָה בְּשִׂמְחָה.  That year they did not fast on Y"K because of this party for chanukas ha'Bays. The gemara asks: maybe Shlomo just happened to complete the job before Sukkos and that's why he made the celebration then?  How do we know it's because of the issue of מְעָרְבִין שִׂמְחָה בְּשִׂמְחָה?  Answers the gemara: if מְעָרְבִין שִׂמְחָה בְּשִׂמְחָה was not an issue Shlomo would have left a small part unfinished and timed the completion for Sukkos rather than schedule the celebration on Y"K.  (This topic comes up with regards to whether one dan delay a siyum until the 9 days.)

 

According to the Avnei Nezer, if in theory the Mikdash could have been completed either before Y"K or after Y"K, and obviously it could not be built on Y"K itself, wouldn't delaying the completion until after Y"K be a problem of ְאֵין מַעֲבִירִין עַל הַמִּצְוֹת, just like delaying building the sukkah? 

 

See more here.  The more more fundamental argument against the Avnei Nezer is that not reading megillah in the intervening days between Adar I and Adar II is a din in megillah; not building sukkah on shabbos is not a din in sukkah, it's just an extraneous problem of melacha on shabbos that gets in the way.

make your requests l'shem Shamayim

The Tiferes Shlomo comments on our parsha:

ונתנם ה' לפניכם ועשיתם להם ככל המצוה אשר צוויתי אתכם. הידוע מספרים הקדושים שכל מצוה מתרי"ג מצות אם האדם עושה אותה רק לשם שמים ליחד קוב"ה ושכינתי' פורחת לעילא ומצוה כזאת גוררת מצוה אחרת אבל אם האדם עושה המצוה להנאת עצמו אף שיש בו מצוה לא פרחית לעילא. וע"ד שכ' הר"ן בנדרים בענין מצות לא להנות ניתנו אם יש לו הנאת הגוף בהדי מצוה לא אמרינן מצוה לא להנות ניתנו הה"ד בכל המצות. ובזה אמרתי הטעם מה שמצינו במלחמת ישראל שהחרימו את ערי עובדי כוכבים ושללם בפ' חוקת וישמע הכנעני וילחם בישראל וידר ישראל נדר לד' ויאמר אם נתון תתן את העם הזה בידי והחרמתי את עריהם ופרש"י אקדיש שללם. הנ"ל ב"ה שזה הי' הכוונה כדי שילחמו לשם שמים ולא להנאת עצמם כלל:

This is the theme of aseres ymei teshuvah that can bring us success on the ymei ha'din. If you are looking for bracha for your own sake, then good luck with being zocheh to it. But if you are doing things for Hashem's sake and ask Him for help and success, then nothing will be withheld.

We see this idea in the bakashot we add in shmoneh esrei. The Meshech Chochma (in Zos haBracha) quotes a Chazal that before speaking about ourselves, we have to give shevach to Hashem. וְזֹאת הַבְּרָכָה אֲשֶׁר בֵּרַךְ מֹשֶׁה אִישׁ הָאֱלֹקים אֶת בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל לִפְנֵי מוֹתוֹ actually does not begin with a bracha to Bn"Y, but rather speaks about Hashem coming down to Sinai to give the Torah ה׳ מִסִּינַי בָּא וְזָרַח מִשֵּׂעִיר לָמוֹ הוֹפִיעַ מֵהַר פָּארָן וְאָתָה מֵרִבְבֹת קֹדֶשׁ מִימִינוֹ אֵשׁ דָּת לָמוֹ. If so, asks Meshech Chochma, why do we stick זכרנו לחיים in the first bracha of shmoneh esrei? Shouldn't it belong later, after the first three brachos that are birchos ha'shevach to Hashem?  Tos already asks this question, but the M.C. gives his own spin on things.

The M.C. answers that zochreinu is not a bakasha for our sake. "Ain Melech b'lo am." Our existence is a testimony to Hashem's hashgacha. The fact that Klal Yisrael has survived and thrived proves that Hashem is in charge. זכרנו לחיים... למענך אלקים חיים. We ask Hashem to grant us life for His sake kavyachol, as a testimony to his greatness.  

This explains why we ask "zochreinu l'chaim" in this opening bracha, but later in shmoneh esrei we ask, "ksov l'chaim tovim..."  When we are asking for ourselves, we don't just want a job -- we want a good job.  We don't just want a house -- we want a nice house.  Chaim alone is not enough -- we ask for 'chaim tovim."  The first bracha, however, is not about us.  For Hashem's hashgacha and majesty to prove themselves, it's enough that we simply continue exist through history.  Chaim, even if not chaim tovim, is sufficient (Mishne Berura quotes a different hesber for the difference in bakashos.)

There is a chassidishe vort that sharpens the idea further  Most of us read the bakasha like this:

זכרנו לחיים מלך חפץ בּחיים וכתבנו בּספר החיים

comma

למענך אלקים חיים

But you can also read it like this:

זכרנו לחיים מלך חפץ בּחיים וכתבנו בּספר

comma. 

What sefer do we want to be inscribed into? We say to Hashem that the book to put us in is the book of

החיים למענך, אלקים חיים

We want to be put together with to those people who dedicate their lives l'shem Shamayim, who are החיים למענך and not for their own sake.

Chazal give us a little behind the scenes in the story of the haftarah of the first day of Rosh haShana. Chana brought Shmuel to the Mishkan at age two. This little child noticed that people were waiting around, delaying offering a korban. They all thought a kohen was needed to do shechita, and so they were waiting for one to be available. Shmuel stuck in his two cents and told them that it was not required. Shechita is OK if done by a zar. Everyone is learning zevachim now in the daf yomi and so mistmama people know this halacha, but at the time, this was a chiddush gadol and not the accepted norm. Eli wanted to punish Shmuel and get rid of him for this sin of being moreh halacha b'fnei rabo. This is where you have Chana's plea to Eli:

אֶל הַנַּעַר הַזֶּה הִתְפַּלָּלְתִּי וַיִּתֵּן ה׳ לִי אֶת שְׁאֵלָתִי אֲשֶׁר שָׁאַלְתִּי מֵעִמּוֹ

וְגַם אָנֹכִי הִשְׁאִלְתִּהוּ לַה׳ כׇּל הַיָּמִים אֲשֶׁר הָיָה הוּא שָׁאוּל לַה׳ וַיִּשְׁתַּחוּ שָׁם לַה׳

Shmuel was just 3 years old. Why was Eli such a stickler? Why couldn't he let things go? He couldn't overlook a mistake of a little 3 year old?!

I saw in the Chashukei Chemed of R' Zilberstein the following answer: Rashi in parshas Korach tells us that Korach thought he would be a success because his great-great-descendent was Shmuel haNavi. Eli knew that Shmuel had the DNA of Korach in him. Korach was the original "moreh halacha b'fnei rabbo," undermining the authority of Moshe Rabeinu. In that episode even the children were punished. The threat of Klal Yisrael being torn apart by machlokes, by different leaders/people pulling in different directions, is so great that the normal rules of mercy don't apply. Eli saw the tremendous kochos ha'nefesh of little Shmuel and his lack of fear to challenge authority that he feared another Korach was in the making. Therefore, he applied the same principle of showing no mercy even to a child.

If so, what was Chana's counterargument? What did she say that convinced Eli otherwise?

R' Zilberstein answered that Chana declared that her tefilos to have this child Shmuel were completely l'shem Shamayim. She did not want a child for her own sake, but for the sake of serving Hashem, and that is why Shmuel was given over to serve in the Mishkan. About a decade ago I posed the diyuk of R' Chaim Volozhiner on the pasuk וַתִּתְפַּלֵּל עַל ה׳ (1:10). Why עַל ה׳ and not אל ה׳? Chana was not davening TO Hashem for her sake, but rather ABOUT Hashem, meaning for the sake of kvod Shamayim. She said that if she has a child, there would be greater kvod Shamayim in the world and Hashem's greatness would be increased. When your tefilos are purely for the sake of kvod Shamayim, when your life is dedicated completely to kvod Shamayim, then your tefilos are answered, and nothing untoward will happen because of them.

the lesson we can learn from the confusion of the satan; the shofar's echo into the future

1) We do a lot of things before R"H with the intent of confusing the satan.  Some explain that the reason we don't bentch rosh chodesh Tishrei is in order to confuse the satan so he doesn't know that Rosh haShana is upon us.  The gemara (R"H 16) also talks about blowing tekiyos d'meyushav in order to confuse the satan (see Rashi and Tos for different explanations of what that means).   We don't blow tekiyos on erev R"H to confuse the satan and make him thing he missed the holiday (if the reason was simply to separate the tekiyos d'orasysa of the chag from the tekiyos of the month of Elul which are only a minhag, then it would be enough to skip blowing during the daylight hours before yom tov; the additional reason of trying to confuse the satan precludes blowing even during the night of erev Y"T).  My wife commented on shabbos that the satan must not be the sharpest crayon in the box.  Every year we do the same things to confuse him, and every year he falls for it! 

I think this is exactly the Chazal want to ellicit in order to make a point.  The gemara tells us that the satan= the yetzer ha'ra.  Every year we ask for mechila and slicha and promise to do better, yet every year the yetzer ha'ra appeals to us with the same tricks as the year before and every year we fall for it again!  If you laugh at the yetzer ha'ra for falling for the little rouse we pull, the jokes on you for falling for his even simpler tricks.  

2) Almost all Yamim Tovim celebrate something that happened -- leaving Egypt, sitting in sukkot in the desert, being saved from Haman, the victory of the Chashmonaim.  The holiday of R"H is בַּכֵּסֶה לְיוֹם חַגֵּנוּ.  We are celebrating the creation of the world, an event long past, but we are also celebrating something that hasn't happened yet, something that is still concealed and hidden from us.  R' Tzadok haKohen writes (Divrei Chalomos #14):

ומצות שׁופר בּר"ה אין הקדושׁה מתגלית בּלב עדיין והוא בּכּסה רק אח"ך היא פּועלת בּהתגלות לבּו

כל מחשבות של יראת שׁמים הבּאים ללב האדם בּכל ימות השׁנה הכּל מקיום מצות שׁופר בּר״ה 

We don't necessarily feel the full effect the shofar has upon on us R"H, but as the year goes on, it's sound echoes within us inspires.  Shofar is not just about the past, but it heralds the future, as we look forward to בּיום ההוא יתקע בּשׁופר גדול.

what a difference a day can make

פֶּן־יֵ֣שׁ בָּ֠כֶ֠ם אִ֣ישׁ אֽוֹ־אִשָּׁ֞ה א֧וֹ מִשְׁפָּחָ֣ה אוֹ־שֵׁ֗בֶט אֲשֶׁר֩ לְבָב֨וֹ פֹנֶ֤ה הַיּוֹם֙ מֵעִם֙ ה׳ אֱלֹקינוּ לָלֶ֣כֶת לַעֲבֹ֔ד אֶת־אֱלֹהֵ֖י הַגּוֹיִ֣ם הָהֵ֑ם פֶּן־יֵ֣שׁ בָּכֶ֗ם שֹׁ֛רֶשׁ פֹּרֶ֥ה רֹ֖אשׁ וְלַעֲנָֽה׃

וְהָיָ֡ה בְּשׇׁמְעוֹ֩ אֶת־דִּבְרֵ֨י הָאָלָ֜ה הַזֹּ֗את וְהִתְבָּרֵ֨ךְ בִּלְבָב֤וֹ לֵאמֹר֙ שָׁל֣וֹם יִֽהְיֶה־לִּ֔י כִּ֛י בִּשְׁרִר֥וּת לִבִּ֖י אֵלֵ֑ךְ לְמַ֛עַן סְפ֥וֹת הָרָוָ֖ה אֶת־הַצְּמֵאָֽה׃

לֹא יֹאבֶה ה׳ סְלֹחַ לוֹ כִּי אָז יֶעְשַׁן אַף יְהֹוָה וְקִנְאָתוֹ בָּאִישׁ הַהוּא וְרָבְצָה בּוֹ כׇּל הָאָלָה הַכְּתוּבָה בַּסֵּפֶר הַזֶּה וּמָחָה ה׳ אֶת שְׁמוֹ מִתַּחַת הַשָּׁמָיִם.

How can a person hear the tochacha and react so cavalierly כִּ֛י בִּשְׁרִר֥וּת לִבִּ֖י אֵלֵ֑ךְ?

If you want to say that the pasuk is talking about someone who is not a maamin, then, as the Nesivoas asks in his sefer on chumash Nachalas Yaakov, the continuation doesn’t make sense. What good is threatening such a person וְרָבְצָה בּוֹ כׇּל הָאָלָה הַכְּתוּבָה בַּסֵּפֶר הַזֶּה? If he didn’t believe in the theats of the tochacha, then why would this threat be any more believable? The pasuk must be addressing itself to someone who does take the threat of punishment seriously, and nonetheless, feels like he is immune to the danger.

The sefer Tiferes Banim (the son of the Bnei Yisaschar) has a nice psychological insight here. The yetzer ha'ra is not dumb. Were he to try to convince a person to take a 180 degree turn and go from shemiras hamitzvos to kefira, it likely will never work. You find even non observant Jew who, when they are threatened and pushed to renounce their yahadut, will find the strength to be moseir nefesh. So what does the yetzer ha'ra do? He creeps up on a person one degree at a time. It's not a 180 degree turn in the opposite direction, but it's just a small turn, putting things a little off kilter. An example: A frum guy goes to work, comes home at the end of the day, and goes out to learn the daf yomi. He does it every day -- it's daf yomi after al! But tonight is the superbowl and his home team is in it (obviously not a NYer). Tonight is the world series. So the yetzer ha'ra says, "You are not giving up night seder. Chas v'shalom! This is just a one off, a minor exception. Just for tonight, you can take a break and enjoy the game." This, says the Tiferes Banim, is what the pasuk is describing, אֲשֶׁר֩ לְבָב֨וֹ פֹנֶ֤ה הַיּוֹם֙ מֵעִם֙ ה׳ אֱלֹקינוּ The person hears the tochacha and says, "That's not talking about me! I'm just making an exception this one day -- הַיּוֹם֙ -- and that's it." It's not a 180, it's just one degree! But the truth is אם תעזבני יום יומים אעזבך.

I would just add 2 small cents. What we say about a midah ra'ah is true even more so about a midah tovah. How can you defeat the yetzer ha'ra?  If you try to do a 180 degree turn and change your life completely, he will fight you tooth and nail.  But if you turn just one small degree, you can slip things by him.  An example: A guy never goes to daf yomi.  One night in Elul he says to himself, "There is nothing good on Netflix tonight anyway, football is still in preseason, the shul has free cholent on Thurs, so maybe I'll go to the shiur tonight."  No promises about the future, no promises even about tomorrow.  He will tell you that he is still not a daf yomi guy, but for that night, he's there.  He changed one degree.  אַתֶּ֨ם נִצָּבִ֤ים הַיּוֹם֙ כֻּלְּכֶ֔ם לִפְנֵ֖י ה׳ אֱלֹקיכֶ֑ם  It's just one day -- הַיּוֹם֙!  But if turning one degree in the wrong direction and thinking that it won't make a difference can lead to disaster, then turning one degree in the right direction, with the intent that it will make a positive difference, will inevitably lead to better things.  More good days will follow.

We say in our davening on R"H that היום הרת עולם. Why speak about hirayon? Since the world came into being, why not speak about "ha'yom leidas olam," or something like that?

The Mishna at the end of Brachos has a din that one is not permitted to pray for something that already happened and is fixed in place. The example Chazal give is praying that your pregnant wife should have a boy. It's a done deal; the sex of the baby in her womb is already determined, so there is no point to asking Hashem to do something about it. The gemara, however, raises a question. The Bavli presents the question is as follows:

מֵתִיב רַב יוֹסֵף: ״וְאַחַר יָלְדָה בַּת וַתִּקְרָא אֶת שְׁמָהּ דִּינָה״: מַאי ״וְאַחַר״? אָמַר רַב: לְאַחַר שֶׁדָּנָה לֵאָה דִּין בְּעַצְמָהּ וְאָמְרָה: שְׁנֵים עָשָׂר שְׁבָטִים עֲתִידִין לָצֵאת מִיַּעֲקֹב, שִׁשָּׁה יָצְאוּ מִמֶּנִּי וְאַרְבָּעָה מִן הַשְּׁפָחוֹת, הֲרֵי עֲשָׂרָה. אִם זֶה זָכָר, לֹא תְּהֵא אֲחוֹתִי רָחֵל כְּאַחַת הַשְּׁפָחוֹת, מִיָּד נֶהֶפְכָה לְבַת, שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר: ״וַתִּקְרָא אֶת שְׁמָהּ דִּינָה״

Leah knew that there were going to be only 12 shevatim. She was carrying a boy but petitioned Hashem to change the sex of the child so that she would have one less boy and Rachel one more. By doing so Rachel could be zocheh to bring into the world at least as many shevatim as Bilha or Zilpa.

How could Leah's prayers work when she was already pregnant and the sex of the child was already determined?

The gemara gives two answers: 1) it was a miracle, and we are not on the level of the Imahos to ask for such a thing; 2) she petitioned Hashem early enough in her pregnant before the sex of the baby was determined.

The Yerushalmi (Brachos 9:3) and Midrashim present the story a bit differently.

דְּבֵית יַנַּאי אָמַר בְּיוֹשֶׁבֶת עַל הַמַּשְׁבֵּר. הָא קוֹדֶם כֵּן יַצְלִי. עַל שֵׁם הִנֵּה כַחוֹמֶר בְּיַד הַיּוֹצֵר. רִבִּי בְּשֵם דְּבֵית יַנַּאי עִיקָּר עִיבּוּרָהּ שֶׁל דִּינָה זָכָר הָיָה. מֵאַחַר שֶׁנִּתְפַּלְלָה רָחֵל נַעֲשִית נְקֵיבָה. הֲדָא הִיא וְאַחַר יָלְדָה בַת וַתִּקְרָא אֶת שְׁמָהּ דִּינָה. מֵאַחַר שֶׁנִּתְפַּלְלָה רָחֵל נַעֲשִית נְקֵיבָה.

According to the Yerushalmi, prayer is effective up until the moment the women is about to deliver the baby. Leah is not an exception to the rule – anyone can do the same. The Yerushalmi quotes words that we are also very familiar with from our tefilos on Yamim Noraim: הִנֵּה כַחוֹמֶר בְּיַד הַיּוֹצֵר. We are clay in Hashem's hands, and he can transform us in an instant.

This is why, says R' Chaim Kanievsky (Taama d'Kra), we say "היום הרת עולם." It may be R"H already, but don't give up. We are still "expecting," the delivery is not yet complete. There is still time for tefilah, there is still time for change.

I don’t know that היום need apply only to R"H. We can say about every day and every moment that it is היום הרת עולם, pregnant with potential to be the moment of that first step, that turn in the right direction. Carpe diem! Just like אֲשֶׁר֩ לְבָב֨וֹ פֹנֶ֤ה הַיּוֹם֙ מֵעִם֙ ה׳ אֱלֹקינוּ means frittering away one day, one moment, can thereby throw someone off track, every day is the day, the moment, where one can get back on track.

One cannot do a 180 in a day, even a great day like R"H or Y"K. Change happens in small degrees. But even a change of one degree, a change of one day, can set a person on the path to improvement.

why no nechama after the tochacha -- my 2 cents

I want to add something to what I wrote last post. To review, Shu"T Radbaz (2:769) gives three reason why there are no pesukei nechama at the end of the toachaha in this week's parsha:

A)First answer is that there is nechama. His example is the pasuk גַּ֤ם כׇּל־חֳלִי֙ וְכׇל־מַכָּ֔ה אֲשֶׁר֙ לֹ֣א כָת֔וּב בְּסֵ֖פֶר הַתּוֹרָ֣ה הַזֹּ֑את יַעְלֵ֤ם ה׳ עָלֶ֔יךָ עַ֖ד הִשָּׁמְדָֽךְ׃ Although Rashi interprets יעלם – לשון עלייה, the Zohar interprets it as העלמה, i.e. Hashem will turn aside and ignore the punishments that might be deserved. As Radbaz notes, the pshat is certainly like Rashi (see Sifsei Chachamim who explains grammatically why Rashi is correct), but at least derech remez, we see that behind the scenes there is something positive going on.

B) It is the shem Havaya, the shem of rachamim, that appears throughout the tochacha. The fact that everything done is b'hashgachas Hashem and for our benefit in the nechama. The Chida similarly writes that the total # of letters that appear in the tochacha (I'll take his word for it) is 676, gematriya of רעות. The shem Havaya appears 26 times. 26x26=676. This is what tempers the effect of the tochacha.

C) The bris of the tochacha concludes not in our parsha, but continues in Netzavim. It is there that the pesukei nechama which conclude the discussion of the bris appear. This helps answer the question of why, even though there is a takana to read the tochacha at the end of the year because tachel shana v'kililoseha, we actually read it one shabbos before the end of the year and read Nitzavim next week. R' Tzadok haKohen explains that the blessings of the upcoming week come down to the world on the previous shabbos. Had we ended the year with tochacha, it is tochacha which would come down to the world for the week of Rosh haShana. We therefore insert a break, so that we have a shabbos in which bracha can come into the world for the upcoming week when we will celebrate R"H. According to Radbaz, the question is moot. Ki Tavo goes hand in hand with Nitzavim -- it is one kri'ah spread over two weeks.

On shaboos I saw that the Ohr haChaim also asks this same question as Radbaz and answers that the tochacha in Behukosai is written in the plural and directed at the community, the tzibur. Klal Yisrael as a whole is guaranteed nechama. Our parsha in written (mostly) in the singluar and is directed at the individual. There is no promise that any individual will in fact be granted nechama.

I would like to suggest my own answer to the Radbaz's question. Rashi alludes to Chazal's statement that the tochacha in Bechukosai was given directly by Hashem; the tochacha of Ki Tavo was given by Moshe himself. What Chazal mean by this requires explanation. Sefer Devarim was said by Moshe, but surely Moshe was giving over what was told to him by G-d. Whatever Chazal meant, bottom line is there is that difference.  The Dvar Hashem "digested" through Moshe is not the same as what is given in the other books.

I think this is why there is no nechama in our parsha. We read in the haftarah a few weeks ago (of Shoftim, Yeshyahu 51:12) אנכי אנכי הוא מנחמכם. Only Hashem can provide true consolation to the suffering endured by the Jewish people. As great as Moshe Rabeinu was, he was just a human being (a very holy human being, but still, a human being). He can be the conduit for tochacha, but he cannot give us true nechama. For that, we wait for Hashem alone.

Klal Yisrael has had enough tochacha the past two years. אנכי אנכי הוא מנחמכם. We are eagerly awaiting, and hope to see it this year.

bikkurim -- not just thanks to G-d; why no nechama in this tochacha; choser kol - not if you have a gemara!

1) The Maor v'Shemesh has a striking hesber of the mitzvah of bikkurim that emphasizes the chassidic idea of connecting with the tzadik. At first glance, the mitzvah of bikkurim is about giving thanks.  However, if that's all there is to the mitzvah, then why travel all the way to the Beis haMikdash with a gift of new fruit for kohen? You can give thanks to Hashem at home. Maor vaShemesh therefore suggests that the idea of bringing bikkurim is to connect oneself to the kohen, to the tzadik, to someone on a higher level of avodah, and through that connection to elevate oneself. To quote a taste:

וזהו שפירש"י ז"ל ובאת אל הכהן וכו' ואמרת אליו הגדתי היום וכו' שאינך כפוי טובה אין הפירוש שיצטרך להגיד שאינו כפוי טובה לנגד השם רק הפירוש הוא שאינו כפוי טובה לנגד הכהן ושמכיר שכל הטובה הוא באה לו ע"י המשכת הכהן וזהו שאמר הגדתי היום לה' אלהיך ויחד שמו יתברך על הכהן דייקא להורות מה שאמרנו שמחזיק טובה אל הכהן שע"י ההשפעה שהוא ממשיך בגודל יחודיו הוא אוכל בסבתו

Bikkurim is about hakaras ha'tov, but rather than address our thanks to G-d, Maor v'Shemesh says to address our thanks to the tzadik, as he is the one who enables our tefilos and avodah to do what they need to do.

He emphasizes the point again in the next piece: שענין הבכורים היתה להורות שלא בכוחו ועוצם ידו הוא עושה חיל רק שהברכה באה לו על המשכת השפע שמושכין הצדיקים ע"י ייחודיהם

The next parsha in our sedra deals with viduy maasros. Why is it called viduy? We are not confessing to some crime? Seforno answers that had we not sinned in the cheit ha'eigel then avodah and all the gifts that go with it would belong to the bechorim. When we give away tru"m to the kohanim, we are acknowledging the sin of the eigel that forced us into this position.

The Shem m'Shmuel (5672) offers a different hesber:

ולפי האמור יתפרש בטוב הענין וידוי מעשר שמתודה שמצד עצמינו אין אנו ראויים לדיבוק אלקי ואנו נזקקים לאמצעות הכהנים והלוים ועניים ועדת החסידים כנ"ל:

This piggybacks on the Maor v'Shemesh's idea that we need the help of a kohen/rebbe/rabbi to help us find our way, and bikkurim, terumos, maasros, etc. forges a connection to these people. It's called viduy because of that recognition that we can't get there ourselves. We are acknowledging our limitations, our shortcomings, even as we struggle to reach out and find a way to transcend them.

I'm not so much of a chassid, but I think we can take something away from this idea anyway. When a person is blessed with their bikkurim, with their first taste of success, the reflex of a religious person is to turn to G-d and thank Him. It's purely a bein adam l'Kono interaction. We know our success does not belong to us alone, but comes through siyata d'Shemaya. What our parsha is perhaps telling us is to extend that thanks outward to the world of bein adam l'chaveiro as well. Not because your friend or neighbor directly helped you complete your PhD or close the big deal or put in a good word so that you got that promotion -- that probably was not the case. But do you really think it was entirely your bein adam l'Kono that got you all that? Are your prayers so powerful and effective that they merited Hashem giving you what you asked for? Are your zechuyos so great that they were enough to bring Hashem's blessing? Maybe you got what you wanted because you are part of a community that deserves siyata d'Shemaya.

If it was just about you, then you could stay home, eat your bikkurim, and say a bracha on them to thank G-d. But that's not enough. You have to recognize that you are part of a community, part of a nation, and your success is a product of their tefilos and avodah as much if not more than your own. Therefore, the mitzvah requires that you travel to Yerushalayim, that you connect with the kohen, with the levi, with others who are engaged in avodah which indirectly benefits you as much as themselves.

2) תַּ֗חַת אֲשֶׁ֤ר לֹא־עָבַ֙דְתָּ֙ אֶת ה׳ אֱלֹקיךָ בְּשִׂמְחָ֖ה וּבְט֣וּב לֵבָ֑ב מֵרֹ֖ב כֹּֽל׃

וְעָבַדְתָּ֣ אֶת־אֹיְבֶ֗יךָ אֲשֶׁ֨ר יְשַׁלְּחֶ֤נּוּ יְהֹוָה֙ בָּ֔ךְ בְּרָעָ֧ב וּבְצָמָ֛א וּבְעֵירֹ֖ם וּבְחֹ֣סֶר כֹּ֑ל וְנָתַ֞ן עֹ֤ל בַּרְזֶל֙ עַל־צַוָּארֶ֔ךָ עַ֥ד הִשְׁמִיד֖וֹ אֹתָֽךְ׃ (Devarim 28:47-48)

R' Gershom Eidelstein found a Mechilta (HaChodesh 1:9) that interprets as follows:

. דָּבָר אַחֵר: "וּבְחֹסֶר כֹּל", שֶׁיְּהוּ חֲסֵרִין תַּלְמוּד תּוֹרָה וּמָמוֹן וְדֵעָה וְחָכְמָה וּבִינָה. דָּבָר אַחֵר: "וּבְחֹסֶר כֹּל", שֶׁנִּטְּלָה מֵהֶן הַדַּעַת.

Mashma that you can be in a state of בְּרָעָ֧ב וּבְצָמָ֛א וּבְעֵירֹ֖ם, but if you still have דַּעַת (R' Gershom said so long as you still have talmud Torah, but that pshat in the midrash lists מָמוֹן alongside t"T, so I am not sure limud really stands on its own) things will not be as bad. See Viktor Frankl's book for an exposition on this point.

The flipside is no less true. תַּ֗חַת אֲשֶׁ֤ר לֹא־עָבַ֙דְתָּ֙ אֶת ה׳ אֱלֹקיךָ בְּשִׂמְחָ֖ה וּבְט֣וּב לֵבָ֑ב מֵרֹ֖ב כֹּֽל׃׃ַַ֗֗ means you have רֹ֖ב כֹּֽל, you have learning, you have da'as, you are sitting in front of a gemara all day, but you are not filled with simcha, then that's the cause for tochacha. If you weren't "shivti b'beis Hashem" and parked in front of a gemara, neicha that you feel dissatisfied, but if you are blessed to be able to sit and learn, even if you are lacking in the luxuries of life, you should still feel fulfilled.

3) Shu"T Radbaz (2:769) asks why we don't find any pesukei nechama at the end of the tochacha in Ki Tavo like we do in the earlier tochacha in Bechukosai. He gives three answers: 

A) גַּ֤ם כׇּל־חֳלִי֙ וְכׇל־מַכָּ֔ה אֲשֶׁר֙ לֹ֣א כָת֔וּב בְּסֵ֖פֶר הַתּוֹרָ֣ה הַזֹּ֑את יַעְלֵ֤ם ה׳ עָלֶ֔יךָ עַ֖ד הִשָּׁמְדָֽךְ׃ although Rashi interprets יעלם – לשון עלייה, the Zohar interprets it as העלמה, i.e. Hashem will turn aside and ignore the punishments that might be deserved. As Radbaz notes, the pshat is certainly like Rashi, but at least derech remez, we see that behind the scenes there is something positive going on.

B) It is the shem Havaya, the shem of rachamim, that appears throughout the tochacha. The fact that everything done is b'hashgachas Hashem and for our benefit in the nechama.

C) The bris of the tochacha concludes not in our parsha, but continues in Netzavim. It is there that the pesukei nechama which conclude the discussion of the bris appear.

There is a takana to read the tochacha at the end of the year, tachel shana v'kililoseha. We never actually conclude the year with Ki Tavo, but always have Nitzvavim/Vayelech separating it from Rosh haShana. This makes perfect sense according to this final reason, as Nitzavim is really the concluding section of the bris in Ki Tavo.

one small step in the right direction

לֹֽא־תִרְאֶה֩ אֶת־שׁ֨וֹר אָחִ֜יךָ א֤וֹ אֶת־שֵׂיוֹ֙ נִדָּחִ֔ים וְהִתְעַלַּמְתָּ֖ מֵהֶ֑ם הָשֵׁ֥ב תְּשִׁיבֵ֖ם לְאָחִֽיךָ

וְאִם־לֹ֨א קָר֥וֹב אָחִ֛יךָ אֵלֶ֖יךָ וְלֹ֣א יְדַעְתּ֑וֹ וַאֲסַפְתּוֹ֙ אֶל־תּ֣וֹךְ בֵּיתֶ֔ךָ וְהָיָ֣ה עִמְּךָ֗ עַ֣ד דְּרֹ֤שׁ אָחִ֙יךָ֙ אֹת֔וֹ וַהֲשֵׁבֹת֖וֹ לֽוֹ׃

וְכֵ֧ן תַּעֲשֶׂ֣ה לַחֲמֹר֗וֹ וְכֵ֣ן תַּעֲשֶׂה֮ לְשִׂמְלָתוֹ֒ וְכֵ֣ן תַּעֲשֶׂ֗ה לְכׇל־אֲבֵדַ֥ת אָחִ֛יךָ אֲשֶׁר־תֹּאבַ֥ד מִמֶּ֖נּוּ וּמְצָאתָ֑הּ לֹ֥א תוּכַ֖ל לְהִתְעַלֵּֽם׃

I can't remember who says it, but it's interesting that the pesukim in our parsha in this section (22:1-3) as well as throughout the perek refer to אָחִ֜יךָ, while in parshas Mishpatim, כִּ֣י תִפְגַּ֞ע שׁ֧וֹר אֹֽיִבְךָ֛ א֥וֹ חֲמֹר֖וֹ תֹּעֶ֑ה הָשֵׁ֥ב תְּשִׁיבֶ֖נּוּ לֽוֹ (23:4), the Torah speaks about אֹֽיִבְךָ֛. Before cheit ha'eigel you could speak of sinners and saints, those who are אֹֽיִבְךָ֛ and those who are אָחִ֜יךָ. After cheit ha'eigel, we are all tainted and are in the same boat together.  Everyone is אָחִ֜יךָ

The meforshei pshat clarify that וְהִתְעַלַּמְתָּ֖ מֵהֶ֑ם is not what you are supposed to do. That phrase is connected with the the לֹֽא־תִרְאֶה֩, and is what to avoid. Ibn Ezra writes: והתעלמת – דבק עם לא תראה. Chazal derech derush do read it as a stand alone command, as there are times and circumstances where a person is allowed וְהִתְעַלַּמְתָּ֖ מֵהֶ֑ם to ignore the lost item and avoid fulfilling the mitzvah of hashavas aveida. But following the pshat reading, the question that begs asking is why the pasuk seems to be phrased so awkwardly.  If the meaning is that one is not supposed to turn aside, then why not just phrase it in the negtive, like the last pasuk does, לֹ֥א תוּכַ֖ל לְהִתְעַלֵּֽם?  Why phrase it in the positive so you need a peirush Rashi or an Ibn Ezra to make sense of things?  In fact, why say anything at all in this pasuk when you have that לֹ֥א תוּכַ֖ל לְהִתְעַלֵּֽם at the conclusion?

A second problem in the pshat of the parsha is that the third pasuk seems like it could be eliminated entirely. Instead of speaking only about שׁ֨וֹר אָחִ֜יךָ א֤וֹ אֶת־שֵׂיוֹ֙ in the first pasuk and then adding an entire pasuk about חֲמֹר֗וֹ and שִׂמְלָתוֹ֒ and כׇל־אֲבֵדַ֥ת אָחִ֛יךָ, why not stick all of those items in the first pasuk? Why not say לֹֽא־תִרְאֶה֩ אֶת־שׁ֨וֹר אָחִ֜יךָ א֤וֹ אֶת־שֵׂיוֹ֙ או את חמורו או את שׂמלתו etc.? (Granted you also need to explain why each of these items has to be mentioned, but the gemara takes care of that question.)

Lastly, it's worth noting the formulation of לֹ֥א תוּכַ֖ל לְהִתְעַלֵּֽם instead of אל תתעלם (or something similar). לֹ֥א תוּכַ֖ל in other contexts means, "It can't be done," as opposed to here, where it means, "It may not be done."  It's not impossible, it's just not allowed. We've discussed this formulation in other contexts, but it's still worth noting.

So what are we to make of this all?

The Alshich solves all three problems in one shot. This section, as well as other sections in our parsha, demands that we rise above the direction our natural inclination pulls us. You see an animal wandering in a road or a field, you know it is lost and needs to be taken care of and led home, but do you really want to go out of your way to do so? After all, we are all busy, we all have our own things to take care of -- who has time to get involved? Let the owner go find his animal and deal with it. וְהִתְעַלַּמְתָּ֖ מֵהֶ֑ם is what we are all thinking, what we all want to do, what human nature drives us to do. B y phrasing the pasuk this way the Torah is telling is that it knows exactly what is going on inside our head. But don't do it, says the pasuk. Overcome that inclination.

How is a person supposed to do that? The answer is הָשֵׁ֥ב תְּשִׁיבֵ֖ם לְאָחִֽיךָ. Chazal take note of the double phase here and teach us הָשֵׁב תְּשִׁיבֵם. הָשֵּׁב. אֲפִלּוּ מֵאָה פְּעָמִים מַשְׁמָע. The Alshich draws on the principle of mitzvah goreres mitzvah. If you work hard and manage to do the right thing once, הָשֵׁ֥ב, then it get's easier, and תְּשִׁיבֵ֖ם, you will end up doing it a second time as well. Once you take the first step in the right direction, the next step down that road comes more naturally and is even easier.

That first pasuk singles out ־שׁ֨וֹר אָחִ֜יךָ א֤וֹ אֶת־שֵׂיו because in those cases there is the animal to think of. You may not want to get involved, but on the other hand, it's hard not to take pity on an animal, especially a b'heima tehora. But once you take that first step, things snowball from there:

אך עתה אחר שהחלות לעשות מצוה זו בטהורים מובטחני בך שוכן תעש' לחמורו עם שהיא בהמה טמאה. ועדיין אפשר שיהי' רצון טוב במצוה למה שהוא בעל חי משום צער בעלי חיים אך מזה ימשך לך שוכן תעשה לשמלתו ואחרי ששלשת במצוה מאז דע לך שכ"כ תהי' מושרש ומלומד במצוה שמעצמך לא תוכל להתעלם

Once you do the right thing when it comes to a lost b'heima tehora, you will end up doing the right thing when it comes to a chamor, and then when it comes to a lost shirt, and then whenever the opportunity to do the mitzvah arises.  After time, you become habituated to do the right thing. לֹ֥א תוּכַ֖ל לְהִתְעַלֵּֽם Not just that you are not allowed to, but at this point, you can't turn away. It's now built into your nature to do good.

It's hard to know whether there is a rhyme or reason to the smichus ha'parshiyos in Ki Teitzei. Some meforshim try to link each section to the next, others avoid dealing with the problem.  The Alshich offers an explanation here, but I would like to suggest something a little different than what he writes. The parsha opens with the din of yefat to'ar, which is followed by ben sorer u'moreh because one bad turn leads to another -- gving into the temptation to take the yefat to'ar leads to the problems of the ben sorer. The ben sorer u'moreh himself is neherag al shem sofo, because given the direction he is headed, future crimes seem inevitable. A step in the wrong direction is followed by other steps down the same road. Our parshas of hashavas aveida is the same principle in action, but in a positive way. Instead of one bad turn leading to another, in this case it's one good turn leading to another, one positive step snowballing in the right direction until it is goodness which becomes inevitable.

Many meforshim talk about the message these parshiyos, which are always read this time of year, have for us in Elul. The lesson here is simple. If you are aiming to do an about face and break all your bad habits on erev Rosh haShana, it ain't gonna work. True change comes about gradually and takes time. That's why we have a full month to prepare for Yamim Noraim. You can't change everything at once, but what's important is to take that first step in the right direction. Change one small thing, and then mitzvah goreres mitzvah; that will lead to the next step in the right direction.  Over time the transformation will happen.  The wrong thing will eventually be a לֹ֥א תוּכַ֖ל, just not possible anymore, as an inclination toward goodness will become the norm.

revenge is not a mitzvah

Way back over 10 years ago we discussed the difference between the two words the Torah has for "maybe" -- פּן vs אולי.     The word פּן is used when the outcome is not desired.  When you see פּן  expect the English translation to be something like "lest..."  The word אולי is used when the outcome is desired.  HaKsav v'haKabbalah writes that we know Eliezer was secretly hoping that his mission to find a wife for Yitzchak would end in failure and Yitzchak would marry his daughter because Eliezer says to Avraham אוּלַי לֹא תֹאבֶה הָאִשָּׁה לָלֶכֶת אַחֲרַי (24:5).  He doesn't use the word פּן , i.e. "What will happen if/lest the girl not come with me," but rather the word אוּלַי because that is what he wanted to happen.  Similarly, Yitzchak argues with his mother than he cannot impersonate Eisav because  אוּלַי יְמֻשֵּׁנִי אָבִי (27:12).  Yitzchak does not say  פּן, "lest he be discovered," because in his heart of hearts he did not want to fool his father and he wantde to be discovered. 

 

Given that background, let's turn to our parshsa.  According to one opinion in Chazal (Makkos 11a) there is a mitzvah for the goel ha'dam to pursue a murderer and avenge the blood that was spilled.  Why then, asks R' Yosef Shaul Nathanson , does our parsha use the word פּן in the pasuk  פֶּן יִרְדֹּף גֹּאֵל הַדָּם אַחֲרֵי הָרֹצֵחַ כִּי יֵחַם לְבָבוֹ וְהִשִּׂיגוֹ (19:6) and not the word אולי?  Isn't having a goel ha'dam something we should want and encourage if he is fulfilling a mitzvah?

 

Malbi"M in his peirush reads the pasuk in a way that gets out of the problem:

 

פן ירדוף גואל הדם והשיגו – ר״ל פן ישיגו והכהו נפש. ומלת פן אינו בא על הרדיפה, שהרדיפה מצוה לשטת הספרי

 

I'm not sure I understand what he is saying. Is the mitzvah only the chase?  When the goel ha'dam catches the guilty party, isn't the mitzvah for him to carry out the penalty of misa?  

 

R' Yosef Shaul Nathanson offers his own answer based on a yesod we've discussed before: 

Ramban in P' Lech Lecha asks why it is that the Mitzrim were punished for enslaving Bn"Y when Hashem had told Avraham that his children would be punished by being forced into servitude.  The Egyptians were fulfilling the nevuah, the ratzon Hashem!  Ramban explains that ain hachi nami, had they done so lishma, that excuse would work.  However, the reality is that they enslaved Bn"Y for their own ends alone.  Without the l'shem shamayim, it's not a kiyum of ratzon Hashem -- it's abuse and torture.  The Chofetz Chaim similarly explains that when Shaul haMelech failed to kill Agag, the navi Shmuel accuses him, "VaTa'as ha'ra b'einei Hashem," of doing wrong.  You would think that Shaul's sin was in NOT doing what he was supposed to -- killing every member of Amalek -- not what he actually did do. Yet, that's not what the navi tells us.  The sin is "VaTa'as," what Shaul did, because once he allowed his own cheshbonos and thoughts of right and wrong to enter into the equation, he was following his own agenda, and not purely the ratzon Hashem.  To wipe out a nation based on your own agenda is genocide, not a mitzvah.  We also find by the cheit ha'eigel, before the Leviim took up arms Moshe told them, "Mi l'Hashem ei'lei," (32:26, see Netziv), as only those motivated l'shem shamayim had a right to participate.  You see from these sources and more that even when there is a heter, even when there is a mitzvah to cause harm, it has to be done carefully for the right reasons.

He bases the same idea on a SM"A (CM 425) that writes that the permissibility of killing a rodef to save a nirdaf applies only when the person intervening acts l'shem shamayim.  If he has an axe to grind against the rodef and steps in for his own ulterior motive of settling some other score, that is not allowed.

 

Coming back to our pasuk, the Torah not only to tell us that the goel ha'dam was in pursuit, but also WHY he was in pursuit: כִּי יֵחַם לְבָבוֹ.  Netziv comments that the Torah is just telling us the metziyus.  The reason why the goel ha'dam is able to catch up to the person he is chasing is because he is in hot pursuit, כִּי יֵחַם לְבָבוֹ.  When you are motivated, you have an advantage. שאע״ג שהרוצח נס ובורח במהירות, מ״מ קרוב הדבר שהגואל הדם לא ייעף ולא ייגע בחמימותו עד שישיגו Since according to Netziv it is not a din but just a metziyus, it still begs the question of why mention it.  

According to the Divrei Shaul, the pasuk is in fact telling us a din. The pasuk is talking about פן ירדוף, something we don't want to happen, because we are dealing with a situation of כִּי יֵחַם לְבָבוֹ, a goel motivated by his own lust for revenge and not l'shem shamayim. There is no kiyum mitzvah in revenge for revenge's sake.

does lo techanem apply to aku"m only? heter mechira, land for peace

Shu"t v'Darashta v'Chakarta (vol 1 OC 54:3) responds to someone who claimed that lo techanem applies only to ovdei avodah zarah by saying that this is a chiddush gadol that requires proof to be believable, especially given that Tos seems to say otherwise. Tos in A"Z 20a interprets the issur broadly, writing that it applies not only to the 7 umos, but to all ovdei aku"m. The chesronos ha'shas quotes the girsa of Tos as reading "kulhu umos," not just ovdei a"z. Why narrow the issur when you see the reverse trend in Tos?

B'mechilas kvodo, not so fast. Ralbag in last week's parsha comments on the pasuk (14:21) לֹא תֹאכְלוּ כׇל נְבֵלָה לַגֵּר אֲשֶׁר בִּשְׁעָרֶיךָ תִּתְּנֶנָּה וַאֲכָלָהּ אוֹ מָכֹר לְנׇכְרִ that the reason the pasuk speaks of giving away neveilah to a ger but when it comes to an aku"m is specifies selling it is because:

והנה לא רצה השם יתעלה שתתן אותה לנכרי לפי שהוא עובד עבודה זרה ולזה לא רצתה שנהנה אותו מתנת חנם.

According to Ralbag, the issur of lo techanem is limited to ovdei a"z.

While the Rambam's view in Hil A"Z 10:3-4 is less clear, in Sefer haMitzvos he refers specifically and only to ovdei a"z:

הזהירנו מהושיב עובדי ע"ז בארצנו כדי שלא נלמוד כפירותם, באמרו לא ישבו בארצכם פן יחטיאו וגו', ואילו רצה העכו"ם לעמוד בארצנו אינו מותר לנו עד שקבל עליו שלא לעבוד ע"ז ואולם עובדי ע"ז לא ישכנו עמנו ולא נמכור להם נחלה ולא נשכיר להם בית, ובבאור אמרו לנו הפירוש לא תתן להם חנייה בקרקע

And finally, Ramban in our parsha (20:18) writes as well:

והנה בתורה הזהיר: לא ישבו בארצך פן יחטיאו אותך לי כי תעבוד את אלהיהם כי יהיה לך למוקש (שמות כ״ג:ל״ג), והיא אזהרה בעבודה זרה, כי אם תכרות להם ולאלהיהם ברית, ישבו בארצך הרבים מהם יפתוך לעבוד עבודה זרה.

It is not outlandish at all, and in fact, seems to be the dominant view in Rishonim, that the issur of lo techanem is limited to ovdei a"z.

This is not a trivial issue.  It impacts two major contentious issues:

1) Land for peace -- can we trade control over territory in Eretz Yisrael for peace (assuming the theoretical possibility of such an agreement holding water) with the Muslim population, who are not ovdei a"z?  I am surprised that R' Hershel Shachter (RJJ Journal #16 )in discussing this issue writes, "Although such an act [trading land for peace] would be a violation of the injunction of lol techanem... it is permissible in the interest of avoiding a situation of sakanat nefashot." Before getting to the question of whether there is a heter pikuach nefesh, one can question the fundamental premis of whether lo techanem even applies when not dealing with ovdei aku"m. (Aside from the issur of lo techanem, according to Ramban, there is also a mitzvas aseh of kibush ha'aretz.  Whether when the Torah mandates milchama, which by definition entails casualties, there is any heter pikuach nefesh is another major issue that is not my topic here.)

2) Heter mechira -- can we sell/lease land to Muslims for the duration of the shemita year so that farming can continue? The Chazon Ish writes that doing so constitutes an issur d'oraysa of lo techanem, but R' Ovadya points out that before getting into the nitty gritty of whether sheviis is d'oraysa or whether a temporary sale actually amounts to ceding control and is a violation of lo techanem, the fundamental flaw in the C.I.'s position is that according to many Rishonim lo techanem cannot apply unless you are dealing with ovdei a"z.

Doesn't everyone have free choice? Why does the pasuk call it a gift given just to us?

I'm afraid I don't have much to say this week.

1) נָת֤וֹן תִּתֵּן֙ ל֔וֹ וְלֹא־יֵרַ֥ע לְבָבְךָ֖ בְּתִתְּךָ֣ ל֑וֹ כִּ֞י בִּגְלַ֣ל׀ הַדָּבָ֣ר הַזֶּ֗ה יְבָרֶכְךָ֙ ה׳ אֱלֹקיךָ בְּכׇֽל־מַעֲשֶׂ֔ךָ וּבְכֹ֖ל מִשְׁלַ֥ח יָדֶֽךָ׃

R' Ben Tzion Aba Shaul raises a safeik whether וְלֹא־יֵרַ֥ע לְבָבְךָ֖ בְּתִתְּךָ֣ ל֑וֹ is a bracha or an issur. He quotes the Minchas Chinuch (479:3) who writes that the word הַזֶּ֗הIt in the phrase בִּגְלַ֣ל׀ הַדָּבָ֣ר הַזֶּ֗ה is not referring back to the act to giving, נָת֤וֹן תִּתֵּן֙ ל֔וֹ, but rather refers back to doing so b'lev shaleim, וְלֹא־יֵרַ֥ע לְבָבְךָ֖ בְּתִתְּךָ֣ ל֑וֹ. The implication is that this is not a bracha, but a command to the one who gives. It's hard enough to give, but the Torah demands more than that -- you have to feel good about it too.

The Maggid of Dubno told the story of the man who lost $100 and was quite upset. Next day he found $200, but he was still upset because he thought to himself that if he hadn't lost the original $100 he would now have $300, not just $200, in his pocket. Contrast that with the story of the farmer who was carrying a bag with $100 of grain from the field back to his home and didn't realize there was a hole in the bag. By the time he got home the bag was empty, leaving him pretty upset. Not too long afterwards that same farmer noticed all along the path he took home through his fields there were now new stalks of wheat that had started to spring up, promising an even greater crop than he had originally harvested. The sadness at the loss of his original bundle was now replaced by the joy of the prospect of greater abundance.

When we give tzedakah, we often feel like the man who lost that $100. Even if we receive bracha and get something more in return, we still feel like we lost something. ְלֹא־יֵרַ֥ע לְבָבְךָ֖ בְּתִתְּךָ֣ ל֑וֹ means feeling like the farmer. Whatever we gave up was the seed from which sprang the bracha in return.

2) רְאֵה אָנֹכִי נֹתֵן לִפְנֵיכֶם הַיּוֹם בְּרָכָה וּקְלָלָה 

B'shlama according to Rashi who explains that the ְּבְּרָכָה וּקְלָלָה which the pasuk is referring to are the brachos and klalos that will be given on Har Grizim and Har Eival, neicha, that the pasuk is speaking only to us. But not everyone learns like Rashi. Ralbag, for example, explains the pasuk to mean that we have free choice זכר שכבר נתן השם יתעלה לפני ישראל ברכה וקללה והענין הוא בבחירתם וזה שאם ישמעו אל מצות השם יתעלה תבא להם הברכה והקללה אם לא ישמעו אל מצותיו. Well, doesn't everyone have free choice?  Doesn't an aku"m have the choice to do good or do wrong?

The GR"A in Aderet Aliyahu answers this question as does the CH haRI"M. GR"A writes:

ושמא תאמרו הבחירה ניתן לאדם בימי בחרותו אבל לא אחר שהורגל במעלליו הקשים לכן אמר היום בכל יום ויום הרשות נתונה והבחירה בידו לילך בדרך טובים

The key word in the pasuk is הַיּוֹם. Everyone has free choice to some degree, but it gets harder and harder to break bad habits the more time they have to become entrenched. Hashem gives us an opportunity each and every day to start anew, irrespective of the choices of the past.

The Ch haRI"M, quoted in the first piece in Sefas Emes, says that the key word in the pasuk is לִפְנֵיכֶם:

אא"ז מו"ר ז"ל הגיד פי' ראה אנכי נותן לפניכם. שנקבע בכל איש ישראל שיוכל להבחין ולבחור רק בהברכה.

I've written before that choosing right vs wrong is not such a big challenge for most people. True, a person can succumb to temptation, but that amounts to a passing moment of weakness, not a fundamental character flaw. Most people will not deliberatly choose the wrong thing to so.  The real challenge is figuring out in any given situation what the right vs wrong thing to so is. For example, the Jews I wrote about recently who cry about "starvation" in Gaza think they are choosing to do the right thing, but their whole concept of right/wrong is distorted.  They think that are choosing bracha, but they are supporting the enemy, supporting evil. It's not enough to have free choice between right and wrong; a person needs a compass to point them to what the right thing is. Hashem put that compass לִפְנֵיכֶם, inside each one of us. The outside world is like a magnetic field that pulls the compass in a wrong direction, but so long as we remain true to ourselves, it will show us the right path.

R Tzadok haKohen in Pri Tzadik points out that the pasuk uses the word נֹתֵן, meaning that it is speaking about a gift that Hashem gives us. Bracha is of course a gift, but the word  נֹתֵן applies to the וּקְלָלָה as well.  How is that a gift?  If you understand the pasuk like the CH haR"IM's reading, it makes perfect sense. The gift which Hashem gives us is not בְּרָכָה or קְלָלָה themselves, but rather is the ability to discern between them and find the correct path in a muddled, befuddling world of confusion.

you can't play innocent if your behavior proves otherwise; limud haTorah trumps ahavas haTorah

In 9:7-21 in our parsha Moshe recounts the cheit ha'eigel and the smashing of the luchus. From pasuk 25 until the end of the perek Moshe recounts his prayer to Hashem for forgiveness for the eigel. Sandwiched in the middle, Moshe switches gears and starts talking about other sins that happened in the midbar:

בְעֵרָה וּבְמַסָּה וּבְקִבְרֹת הַתַּאֲוָה מַקְצִפִים הֱיִיתֶם אֶת ה׳

וּבִשְׁלֹחַ ה׳ אֶתְכֶם מִקָּדֵשׁ בַּרְנֵעַ לֵאמֹר עֲלוּ וּרְשׁוּ אֶת הָאָרֶץ אֲשֶׁר נָתַתִּי לָכֶם וַתַּמְרוּ אֶת פִּי ה׳ אֱלֹקיכֶם וְלֹא הֶאֱמַנְתֶּם לוֹ וְלֹא שְׁמַעְתֶּם בְּקֹלוֹ.

Why didn't Moshe finish speaking about cheit ha'eigel before getting sidetracked, seemingly, by these other topics?

The Abarbanel and Akeidas Yitzchak answer that Bn"Y might have argued that they deserve a pass for cheit ha'eigel. They might argue that had Aharon not made the golden calf, they would have had no part in it. Moshe therefore immediately sticks in a rebuttal. Look at all the other wrongdoings that took place in the midbar. The list goes on and on! You can't play innocent when time after time you prove that מַקְצִפִים הֱיִיתֶם אֶת ה׳.

The Beis haLevi has a chiddush din that if there a choleh requires someone to be mechalel shabbos for his sake, e.g. someone needs a doctor to treat them, it is better to have a shomer Shabbos do it than to have a doctor who would otherwise be mechalel Shabbos do so. It sounds counterintuitive. The person who would otherwise be mechalel Shabbos anyway doesn't lose anything, and the shomer Shabbos doctor gets to keep Shabbos, so what's the problem? Says the Beis haLevi, the doctor who is mechalel Shabbos anyway cannot invoke pikuach nefesh as a ptur for his actions. Hashem knows that it's not the pikuach nefesh which is his excuse to break Shabbos. On any given Shabbos he might drive to the mall, turn on his TV or phone, cook a nice meal, etc. vTherefore, even if there is pikuach nefesh, he is chayav for doing melacha because he's proven that he would have done the melacha anyway. It's only the frum doctor who would otherwise keep Shabbos but is forced to not do so in order to save a life who can claim pikuach nefesh as a valid ptur.

This is the same sevara in our parsha. Had Bn"Y demonstrated that they were otherwise on the straight and narrow, they might conceivably have put the blame on Aharon for the cheit ha'eigel. But when all their other behaviors show that they were not interested in doing the right thing anyway, then the excuse doesn't hold water. They would have gotten involved in the eigel with or without Aharon's contribution to the problem.

Perhaps one can add בּדרך צחות that we know that Chazal (Kiddushin 57 and other places) darshen the extra word אֶת as a ribuy that comes to include talmidei chachamim, i.e. ״אֶת ה׳ אֱלֹהֶיךָ תִּירָא״ – לְרַבּוֹת תַּלְמִידֵי חֲכָמִים. We can read that same ribuy into our pesukim. Moshe told Bn"Y: You want to claim that you only sinned because of the great awe, respect, and attachment you had for Aharon and therefore followed him down the wrong path? Sorry, that doesn't fly. מַקְצִפִים הֱיִיתֶם אֶת ה׳ and here too we can darshen "אֶת" - לְרַבּוֹת תַּלְמִידֵי חֲכָמִים". You were ַתַּמְרוּ אֶת פִּי ה׳ אֱלֹקיכֶם, and here too, "אֶת" - לְרַבּוֹת תַּלְמִידֵי חֲכָמִים. On other occassions in the midbar you ignored Aharon, you ignored Moshe, you rebelled against the authority of talmidei chachamim. You can't claim to be a loyal, obedient follower of Aharon when it comes to cheit ha'eigel and use that as an excuse when all your other actions prove otherwise. (see also Agra d'Kallah)

The source for the mitzvah of cleaving to talmidei chachamim actually comes from pesukim later in our parsha (11:22-23)

כִּי אִם שָׁמֹר תִּשְׁמְרוּן אֶת כׇּל הַמִּצְוָה הַזֹּאת אֲשֶׁר אָנֹכִי מְצַוֶּה אֶתְכֶם לַעֲשֹׂתָהּ לְאַהֲבָה אֶתה׳ אֱלֹקיכֶם לָלֶכֶת בְּכׇל דְּרָכָיו וּלְדׇבְקָה בוֹ.

וְהוֹרִישׁ ה׳ אֶת כׇּל הַגּוֹיִם הָאֵלֶּה מִלִּפְנֵיכֶם וִירִשְׁתֶּם גּוֹיִם גְּדֹלִים וַעֲצֻמִים מִכֶּם

Rashi quotes from Chazal: ולדבקה בו – אי איפשר, והלא אש אוכלה הוא? אלא: הדבק בחכמים ובתלמידים, ומעלה עליך כאילו נדבקת בו.

Interestingly, on the pasuk earlier in our parsha (10:20) אֶת ה׳ אֱלֹקיךָ תִּירָא אֹתוֹ תַעֲבֹד וּבוֹ תִדְבָּק וּבִשְׁמוֹ תִּשָּׁבֵעַ, the very pasuk where Chazal darshen ״אֶת ה׳ אֱלֹהֶיךָ תִּירָא״ – לְרַבּוֹת תַּלְמִידֵי חֲכָמִים, Rashi is silent and offers no comment on the phrase וּבוֹ תִדְבָּק. Why there does Rashi not jump in and say אי איפשר, והלא אש אוכלה הוא? and explain the phrase as speaking about talmidei chachamim, especially since there it would fit perfectly with the ribuy in the first half of the pasuk!?

HaKsav v'haKabbalah (please see the parenthetical note** at the end of this piece!) explains that it's not the explanation of the word דׇבְקָה which is bothering Rashi. We find that word many other places, e.g. אתם הדבקים בה׳ אלוקיכם, and we understand that it means having a close emotional or spiritual connection. The difficulty here arises from the context:

אמנם קשיא להו קרא דקאמר כי אם שמור תשמרון את כל המצוה הזאת וגו׳ לאהבה את ה״א ללכת בכל דרכיו ולדבקה בו, דמשמע שכולם חייבים להדבק במקום ב״ה דבקות הנפש, ולפי שזאת היא מעלת הנביאים וכדומה מאנשי מעלה שזוכים לה בחמלת ה׳ עליהם בתתו רוחו בקרבם, והאיך תלה ירושת הארץ בתנאי שיהיו דבקים בו כל ישראל

How can our taking possession of Eretz Yisrael be contingent upon our having dveikus, this high level of spiritual attachment, when such an achievement is clearly attainable only by the spiritual elite? Therefore, Chazal reinterpreted the mitzvah here to refer to divuk to talmidei chachamim (see Taz in Divrei David who offers a different answer).

In R' Dov Landau's chiddushim on the parsha he quotes, in the context of this mitzvah, the story in Avos about R' Yosi ben Kisma:

אָמַר רַבִּי יוֹסֵי בֶן קִסְמָא, פַּעַם אַחַת הָיִיתִי מְהַלֵּךְ בַּדֶּרֶךְ וּפָגַע בִּי אָדָם אֶחָד, וְנָתַן לִי שָׁלוֹם, וְהֶחֱזַרְתִּי לוֹ שָׁלוֹם. אָמַר לִי, רַבִּי, מֵאֵיזֶה מָקוֹם אַתָּה. אָמַרְתִּי לוֹ, מֵעִיר גְּדוֹלָה שֶׁל חֲכָמִים וְשֶׁל סוֹפְרִים אָנִי. אָמַר לִי, רַבִּי, רְצוֹנְךָ שֶׁתָּדוּר עִמָּנוּ בִמְקוֹמֵנוּ, וַאֲנִי אֶתֵּן לְךָ אֶלֶף אֲלָפִים דִּינְרֵי זָהָב וַאֲבָנִים טוֹבוֹת וּמַרְגָּלִיּוֹת

אָמַרְתִּי לוֹ, בְּנִי, אִם אַתָּה נוֹתֵן לִי כָל כֶּסֶף וְזָהָב וַאֲבָנִים טוֹבוֹת וּמַרְגָּלִיּוֹת שֶׁבָּעוֹלָם, אֵינִי דָר אֶלָּא בִמְקוֹם תּוֹרָה

In Kallah Rabasi ch 8 there is the following comment on that Mishna:

א״ר יוסי בן קסמא פעם אחת. אמאי לא אהדר ליה סימני עם הארץ חזא ביה. והא אפילו לעובד כוכבים בשוק מותר אלא דהוה פליג הלכתא ועיין בה ולא אמרין לבתר דפרקינהו וידע בה דישראל הוה. וסבר עכשיו מהדרנא

Our girsa in Avos is וְנָתַן לִי שָׁלוֹם וְהֶחֱזַרְתִּי לוֹ שָׁלוֹם, but it seems from Kallah Rabasi that R' Yosei ben Kisma in fact did not greet or respond to the person who he met. That makes the ahavas haTorah of that individual even more remarkable. Most people would feel offended if their Rabbi passed them in the street and did not offer a greeting. This man offered R' Yosi ben Kisma a fortune to move to his city even though R' Yosi ben Kisma didn't so much as offer him a hello! That's "U'bo tidbak." However, it begs the question: If this man was representative of his hometown, why would R' Yosi ben Kisma not want to move to such a place where there is so much love for talmidei chachamim? I am sure many Rabbis would love to have congregants like that! R' Landau answers that ahavas haTorah cannot serve as a substitute for limud haTorah. Living among people who are mechabeid talmidei chachamim, who may love talmidei chachamim, is not the same as living among people who themselves are talmidei chachamim.

(**Parenthetical note on the haKsav vhaKabbalah: He writes that it is impossible to understand dveikus literally ואפי׳ תעלה על דעתך להמשך אחר פשוטי המקראות בשאר המקומות (וכדברי הראב״ד בה׳ תשובה), א״א לך לחשוב כן בענין הדבקות. The Raavad he refers to is the famous one in ch 3 of hil teshuvah:

האומר שיש שם רבון אחד אלא שהוא גוף ובעל תמונה. א"א ולמה קרא לזה מין וכמה גדולים וטובים ממנו הלכו בזו המחשבה לפי מה שראו במקראות ויותר ממה שראו בדברי האגדות המשבשות את הדעות:

Clearly Kv"K seems to take Raavad at face value, that a literal reading is at least theoretically possible. This is in contast to the pshat quoted in the name of R' Chaim that Raavad only meant that such a person cannot be labelled an apikores because they are shogeg, not to validate literal reading.)