YeshivaThe torah world Gateway
Beit Midrash
- Sections
- Chemdat Yamim
- Ein Ayah
Ein Ayah: The totality of creation was created with wisdom, for a lofty divine purpose, which is far greater than the creation itself. Indeed it is normal that the purpose of something of value is more significant than the means that enabled it to come to fruition.
Similarly, divine wisdom is found in the depth of the smallest details of a subset of the creation. There is no need to attribute anything to something that needed to be for a reason outside of the framework of the general divine wisdom that relates to the details. While we may see cause and effect relationships that connect one occurrence to another, it is that the seemingly necessary connection was actually designed as part of the divine wisdom. A lofty intellectual, moral matter is a partner in all such existence. Therefore, there is not even a small thing that has no purpose that can be related to the power of creation other than to the elements of divine wisdom and mercy. This is what the gemara means by saying that nothing was created for naught. "How great are those things that You made; You made them all with wisdom; the world is filled with Your possessions" (Tehillim 104:24).
Related things are connected by means of belonging to a unified broad category of objects. The fly and the wasp are sufficiently part of one category so that one provides the antidote to the damaging power of the other. Sometimes the lower realm is connected to the upper realm of the creation of a species.
A mosquito is a most tiny creature which is at the bottom of the hierarchy of living things. The gemara speaks of it being something that ingests but does not eliminate in a normal manner. In contrast, a snake was created at the highest rung of the animal world, just that it lost from its stature due to its involvement in the sin of Adam and Chava. The low and the high are connected to take away from the danger presented by one of them.
Snakes have qualities that connect them to boils (see Bereishit Rabba 20:4), and snakes are able to relieve some of the suffering from boils. The samamit relates to the scorpion as being opposites. The scorpion causes damage without doing so purposely, but its poison is expelled as it walks. The samamit waits and plans for a long time to trap its prey.
Things are so connected in manners that show great wisdom, which shows the spreading of light of wisdom into all aspects of creation. Since there are so many connections, which employ so much wisdom, it is not possible to say that something was done for naught.
Various Rabbis
Various Rabbis including those of of Yeshivat Bet El, such as Rabbi Chaim Katz, Rabbi Binyamin Bamberger and Rabbi Yitzchak Greenblat and others.
Moreshet Shaul Moreshet Shaul: A Crown and its Scepter – part II
Based on Siach Shaul, Pirkei Machshava V’Hadracha p. 294-5
Rabbis in Midrash
Lessons
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Moreshet Shaul Hashem Is your Shadow – part I
Based on Siach Shaul, Pirkei Machshava V’Hadracha p. 420 – an address from 1941
P'ninat Mishpat A Non-Contractor in Changing Times – part I
(based on ruling 85128 of the Eretz Hemdah-Gazit Rabbinical Courts)
Moreshet Shaul Our King on Rosh Hashana, Our Father on Yom Kippur.
Based on Aroch Siach, p. 221 (Rav Shaul Yisraeli)
P'ninat Mishpat A Non-Contractor in Changing Times – part II
(based on ruling 85128 of the Eretz Hemdah-Gazit Rabbinical Courts)
Moreshet Shaul Hashem Is your Shadow – part II
Based on Siach Shaul, Pirkei Machshava V’Hadracha p. 420 – an address from 1941
Parashat Hashavua Happiness for the Right Reasons
[With painful longing, we share these divrei Torah from our co-Rosh Kollel for close to 40 years, Harav Moshe Ehrenreich zt”l.]
