Female LessonParashat HashavuaSeries'LibraryPiskei Din (Hebrew)Test YourselfOur Parsha records a rather strange story: A man was found gathering wood on Shabbat. Those who found him brought him before Moshe, Aharon, & the whole community. He was put in custody, as it had not been specified what was to be done with someone who desecrated Shabbat. Hashem then communicated his sentence: death by stoning. But "gathering" is certainly not a capital crime, so what did he do wrong? Gemara Shabbat 96b lists possible m’lachot: Detaching the wood from the ground or chopping it from a tree; carrying it in public, or tying sticks together. According to Rabi Akiva, the wood-gatherer was Z’lofchad, whose daughters would later petition Moshe for their ancestral land. Tosfot & the Medrash say he did this as a noble act: After the sin of the spies, he did not want the nation to think that since they now would not enter Israel anyway, perhaps the Torah laws did not apply to them. So he gave his life to show that the Torah must always be upheld.
DO WE DESERVE REDEMPTION? “Blood, Covenant, and Return”- Parshat VaEra
Are we today so much greater than say the Rambam's generation? Why is G-d returning us to Israel & doing so many salvations and victories over Hamas, Hizballah, Syria and Iran in recent years, even if we haven't done Teshuva & seemingly don't deserve it?
The class deals with how to cleave and strengthen the G-dly trait of "Truth", the need to pray for Teshuva, the importance of returning that which was wrongly taken before saying Viduy, and other aspects of Teshuva.
Rav Kook explains why that which is learned on Shabbat is considered so much greater than that studied during the week, and why creativity is that much greater on Shabbat, for better or for worse!
The class deals with not "resting on one's laurels", and that not a few people who lived their entire lives idealistically, "lost it" upon getting older. Similarly the importance of not focusing on luxuries but on the necessities of life.
Seemingly 'Strange' Rabbinical Decrees- Not What You Thought!
Rav Kook suggests a very innovative and important "eye-opening" way to understand some of the rabbinical decrees which are particularly difficult to understand!