Count Your Blessings

Sukkos

Posted on October 21, 2003 (5764) By Rabbi Pinchas Avruch | Series: Kol HaKollel | Level: Beginner

SHMINI ATZERES/SIMCHAS TORAH and Parshas Vezos Haberacha – 22 Tishrei 5764

The First Day of the Rest of the Year

by Rabbi Moshe Peretz Gilden

 

Simchas Torah’s celebration of the completion of the Torah involves reading the final portion from the Torah, VeZos HaBeracha, and reading the account of the seven days of creation at the start of Beraishis (Genesis). The Torah’s conclusion is primarily the blessings that Moshe gave the Nation of Israel immediately before his death. But while the Parsha starts, “And this is the blessing that Moshe, the man of G-d, bestowed upon the children of Israel before his death.” (Devarim/Deuteronomy 33:1), before delivering the actual blessings, he first reviewed the giving of the Torah by G-d on Mount Sinai. Why is this interjection necessary?

 

Nachalas Dovid (Rabbi Dovid of Tevil, primary disciple of Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin, disciple of the famed Rabbi Eliyahu, Gaon of Vilna) explains that blessings cannot simply enter our lives.

 

Rather, blessings are requests for additional good to be added to the good one already has.

 

The prior blessing acts as a vessel to receive and carry the additional blessing. Moshe wanted to bless the Children of Israel, but he first needed to awaken their cognizance of their existing blessings. Thus, Moshe started with our receiving the Torah, utilizing the Jewish nation’s greatest blessing as the receiving agent for his blessings.

 

We all know we are supposed to “Count your blessings,” but we do not usually consider that a person who only sees the negative parts of his life he has no vessel to carry any blessings that he may deserve. However, one who is constantly attuned to all the good that he does have can receive even more, for now he has a “vessel” in which to carry them.

 

The holiday of Simchas Torah is a day to rejoice in the completion of the Torah. But it is also the completion of the cycle of holidays with which the Jewish year starts. We now appreciate the gifts G-d has given us: a renewed relationship with Him from Rosh Hashanah, a new lease on life and all of life’s accoutrements on Yom Kippur, and a new sense of trust in our Heavenly Father from Succos. Today we celebrate our manifold blessings: we savor the blessings of these past three weeks, and with them we ready ourselves to receive the bounty G-d has in store for us for the coming year.

 

Have a Good Shabbos and a Good Yom Tov!

 

Pursuit Of Peace

Sukkos

Posted on September 28, 2004 (5764) By Rabbi Shlomo Jarcaig | Series: Kol HaKollel | Level: Beginner

Sukkos

Pursuit Of Peace

By Rabbi Shlomo Jarcaig

 

Our daily evening prayers contain an interesting petition to the Almighty: “Spread over us the Succah of Your peace.” Our Sages explain that the Succah is representative of the six Clouds of Glory that surrounded and protected the Children of Israel throughout their travels in the wilderness. These clouds remained with them through the merit of Aaron,

the Kohen Gadol (High Priest). The attribute that Aaron epitomized was a lover and pursuer of peace. In what way does the Succah represent peace more than the other mitzvos (Divine commandments)? And what is the meaningful connection between Aaron’s loving and pursuing of peace and our observance of this mitzvah?

 

Rabbi Eliezer Dessler (1) explains that when we leave our houses and move into Succah booths for a week, we remind ourselves how little we really control our circumstances. By leaving the “security” of our brick and mortar homes and subjecting ourselves to the forces of nature, we are reminding ourselves that there is nothing given and absolute in the physical world. All of its structures and pleasures are temporal; only our Torah study and mitzvos have a lasting effect.

 

Our only true control is over the decisions we make in the situations in which we find ourselves.

This was Aaron’s unique trait. Aaron was chosen by G-d to be the High Priest, the Divine emissary to connect the Jewish people to G-d. Once the paradigm shifts and spirituality becomes the national priority, the realization soon follows that another’s spiritual growth is to my benefit. There is no room for jealousy beyond the physical world. With this achievement, peace is the natural byproduct.

 

Aaron chased after peace because he understood the “win-win”: everyone involved gained spiritually from the process, and the dividend was communal peace.

 

In our contemporary world of techno-gadgets, the lesson of the Succah is all the more essential to remind us of our limitations and enable our focus on our real priorities. With this may we merit the experience of genuine peace prevailing among us.

 

Have a Good Shabbos and a Good Yom Tov!