Do you want to ease the burden of their problems?

Do you want to ease the burden of their problems?

Leo kazin

- Please, wait, Rabbi soon come, - said the wife of a rabbi to a young student of the Lithuanian yeshiva Telsa Mordechai Schwab, who came to the Chofetz Chaim in Radin for a blessing.

Suddenly guest heard someone crying in the next room.

- The woman has a difficult birth, Rabbi prays about it - explained Rebbetzin.

- If Chofetz Chaim able to cry for the neighbor, then I want him to learn Torah! - decided Mordechai Schwab, who in the future, one of the spiritual leaders of American Jewry ...

... Rabbi Yisrael Meir Cohen wrote the book "Chofetz Chaim", dedicated to speech and human relations ethics laws. Since the book's title, full of love for people, and it became his name. As the spiritual leader of the people in the pre-war Europe, Chofetz Chaim enormous effort to aid Soviet Jews ...

"Everyone is destined to bear the burden of his life, - said Chofetz Chaim. - When you take on the burden of neighbor problems, doing a favor not only to him but myself, for ease the burden of their problems! "

Do you want to ease the burden of their problems? Well, take on the burden of others.

Of course, compassion - a very important quality of the human soul. But unless it is related to the knowledge of the Torah? Why Rav Schwab decided to teach Torah in Chofetz Chaim, seeing how he sympathizes with maternity? ..

Enumerating the forty-eight conditions that are necessary for the comprehension of the Torah, the rabbis ( "Ethics of the Fathers", 6: 6) mention a trait of the soul, as the ability to "take over the burden neighbor." But why compassion for one's neighbor is a condition of Torah learning?

Due to what qualities the soul Almighty chose Moses for a great mission - to convey the Torah to the Jewish people?

Describing Moses, the Torah does not tell about his intellectual abilities, and emphasizes only one of its quality - compassion for people. "And it was in those days, when Moses was grown up, and went out to his brothers, and saw their suffering" (Exodus 2:11). Not only through the eyes of Moses saw the suffering of Jews trapped in slavery, but the heart felt their pain, Rashi explains ...

"What does it mean to" see the suffering of the other person? " - asked Rabbi Shaynerman, citing the book "Lev Shalem". - View from the side, as one looks at the museum? Or maybe breathe a shrug? No, this is not enough! If only a person can, then let a shoulder and really helps a friend to carry his heavy burden! "...

Feeling the pain of his brothers, Moses left Pharaoh's palace and stood up for the Jews, who beat the Egyptians. Moses also protect the Jews, who raised his hand another Jew. Moses was told to Pharaoh, and he was forced to flee to Midian. However, seeing that the daughters of the shepherds offend Jethro, Moses, the stranger rose to their defense. The award Jethro made him his shepherd. One day Moses saw that one sheep strayed from the herd, and began to look for her. Then Gd first revealed Himself to Moses, turning to him from the burning bush: "I have seen the affliction of my people in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their oppressors ... and now go, and I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou hast brought forth the people out of Egypt ..." (Ex 3: 7-10).

"Moses took care of even the weak, strayed from the herd of sheep, because the Almighty has made him the shepherd of the people!" - explain the sages of the Talmud.

- What shall I say to the Jews when they asked me, "How the name of Him Who sent you to save us?" - Moses thought.

- I will ... - answered the Almighty. - I'll be with you in this trouble (in Egypt), as well as be with you when you are enslaving other kingdoms (in the future expulsions), explain the Talmudic sages (Berachot 9). Almighty revealed with fire, which symbolizes the suffering of exile, as if to say, "I will share your pain!" Almighty opens to Moses as a reward for showing compassion.

So why compassion is a prerequisite for learning Torah? Anyone who feels the pain of one's neighbor as one's own, fulfills the commandment "Love thy neighbor as thyself!". Rabbi Akiva taught that the great rule of the Torah and the innermost essence is love of neighbor. Because the Torah is opened to those who fill their hearts with love. Compassion, people show love for each other, the spiritual leader of the yeshiva wrote "Peace" yeruham Rav Leibowitz. Love unites people! Not coincidentally, when the Jews came to Mount Sinai, he says: "Became had pitched Israel" (Exodus 19: 2). The Torah emphasizes the singular: not the Jews and Israel. "As one man with one heart" - explains Rashi.

Showing compassion and love for people, the Jews found unity and the people won the Sinai revelation.

In the spiritual sense of the giving of the Torah it is not a thing of the past, and each generation is going through it again and again. Because today honored to learn Torah, only those who know how to be compassionate and to love people!