פרשת בחקותי תשכ"ד - "ואם לא תשמעו לי..."

ואם לא תשמעו לי BUT IF YE WILL NOT HEARKEN UNTO ME to study the Torah laboriously in order to fathom the textual interpretation of the Sages…, I also will do this unto you, etc. One might think that this refers to the fulfillment of the commandments! When, however, Scripture states immediately afterwards: “and ye will not do [all my commandments]”, it is evident that the fulfilment of the commandments is mentioned there! How, then, must I explain לא תשמעו לי? Obviously as meaning: “But if you will not hearken unto Me to study the Torah industriously” as I bid you do when I said אם בחקתי תלכו (cf. Rashi on v. 3). And what is the force of the word לי? (To express this idea would it not have sufficed to state: ואם לא תשמעו?) It implies that your disobedience is directed לי against Me. The word לי is used only in the case of such a one who knows his Master and yet of set purpose rebels against Him (i. e. the entire chapter containing these threats of punishment is addressed only to such a person, not to one who sins against God unwittingly). Similarly in reference to Nimrod: (Genesis 10:9) “a mighty hunter before (לפני) the Lord” which means that he knew Him and yet of set purpose rebelled against him. Similarly in reference to the men of Sodom: (Genesis 13:13) “[But the men of Sodom were] evil and sinful against the Lord ('לה‎) exceedingly” — they knew their Master and yet of set purpose rebelled against him (Sifra, Bechukotai, Section 2 1-2; cf. Rashi on those two verses).

and if ye shall reject My statutes, and if your soul abhor Mine ordinances, so that ye will not do all My commandments, but break My covenant;

ואם לא תשמעו לי BUT IF YE WILL NOT HEARKEN UNTO ME to study the Torah laboriously in order to fathom the textual interpretation of the Sages…, I also will do this unto you, etc. One might think that this refers to the fulfillment of the commandments! When, however, Scripture states immediately afterwards: “and ye will not do [all my commandments]”, it is evident that the fulfilment of the commandments is mentioned there! How, then, must I explain לא תשמעו לי? Obviously as meaning: “But if you will not hearken unto Me to study the Torah industriously” as I bid you do when I said אם בחקתי תלכו (cf. Rashi on v. 3). And what is the force of the word לי? (To express this idea would it not have sufficed to state: ואם לא תשמעו?) It implies that your disobedience is directed לי against Me. The word לי is used only in the case of such a one who knows his Master and yet of set purpose rebels against Him (i. e. the entire chapter containing these threats of punishment is addressed only to such a person, not to one who sins against God unwittingly). Similarly in reference to Nimrod: (Genesis 10:9) “a mighty hunter before (לפני) the Lord” which means that he knew Him and yet of set purpose rebelled against him. Similarly in reference to the men of Sodom: (Genesis 13:13) “[But the men of Sodom were] evil and sinful against the Lord ('לה‎) exceedingly” — they knew their Master and yet of set purpose rebelled against him (Sifra, Bechukotai, Section 2 1-2; cf. Rashi on those two verses).

ולא תעשו AND YOU WILL NOT DO — Because you will not learn you will not practice the commandments: thus you have two separate sins mentioned here (Sifra, Bechukotai, Section 2 3).

ואם בחקתי תמאסו AND IF YE WILL SCORN MY ORDINANCES — scorn those who practise them.

משפטי תגעל נפשם [IF] YOUR SOUL LOTH MY JUDGMENTS — This implies hating the Sages.

לבלתי עשות (lit., that my commandments should not be done) — this therefore implies that one prevents others from practising them. (That they themselves do not do them has already been stated in v. 14).

את כל מצותי ALL MY COMMANDMENTS — This refers to him who denies the Divine origin of the commandments, asserting that I have not commanded them. It is for this reason that Scripture states, “all My commands” and does not state, as in v. 14, "all these commands”.

להפרכם את בריתי TO MAKE VOID MY COVENANT — denying the great principle of the existence of God (Sifra, Bechukotai, Section 2 3). — Thus you have here seven sins the first of which brings the second in its train and so on to the seventh. And these are: he has not studied and therefore has not practised the commandments; consequently he scorns others who do practise them, hates the Sages, prevents others from practising, denies the Divine origin of the commandments, and finally denies the existence of God.

And it came to pass, while Israel dwelt in that land, that Reuben went and lay with Bilhah his father’s concubine; and Israel heard of it. Now the sons of Jacob were twelve:

וישמעו AND THEY HEARKENED — The Targum renders this by “and they accepted it from him” (i.e., they agreed with him). Wherever the verb שמע means agreeing with a person’s statement — obeying — as here, and as (28:7) “and Jacob had hearkened (וישמע) to his father”, and (Exodus 24:7) “We will do and we will obey (ונשמע)” it is translated in the Targum by קבל “accepting”, but wherever it merely means hearing with the ear, as e. g. (3:8) “And they heard (וישמעו) the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden”, and (27:5) “and Rebecca heard (שומעת;”, and (31:1) “And Israel heard (וישמע)”, and (Exodus 16:12) “I have heard (שמעתי) the murmurings of the children of Israel”, — all such cases are rendered by various forms of ושמעו: שמע “and they heard“, ושמעת “and she heard”, ושמע “and he heard”,שמיע ,קדמי “there is heard before Me” (I have heard).

'ידעתי כי בתם לבבך וגו I KNOW THAT IN THE INTEGRITY OF THY HEART etc. — It is true that at first you had no intention of sinning, but you cannot claim innocency of hands (Genesis Rabbah 52:6) —

And he took the book of the covenant, and read in the hearing of the people; and they said: ‘All that the LORD hath spoken will we do, and obey.’

And the king sent and called for Shimei, and said unto him: ‘Did I not make thee to swear by the LORD, and forewarned thee, saying: Know for certain, that on the day thou goest out, and walkest abroad any whither, thou shalt surely die? and thou saidst unto me: The saying is good; I have heard it.

That the wise man may hear, and increase in learning, And the man of understanding may attain unto wise counsels;

and if ye shall reject My statutes, and if your soul abhor Mine ordinances, so that ye will not do all My commandments, but break My covenant;

If you despise My statutes. Since the chukim (statutes) are mitzvos whose reasons are not revealed to the masses, the fools will despise them. They will question, “Does Hashem care if I wear this garment that is woven with linen and blue wool? Why should we burn a red heifer and cast its ashes on us?” Everyone appreciates the mishpatim (laws), however, and finds them necessary. Without the rule of law, civilization is impossible for a nation or a country. No one will despise the law of “One who strikes a man so that he dies …” or, “And should men quarrel …” and the laws of the ox that gores, the pit, and the guardians, etc. However, the judgment (mishpat) done to those who transgress the mitzvos will be resented by the wicked, such as [the mishpat done to] one who violates forbidden relations, profanes Shabbos, or makes an Ov or Yidoni, because these mitzvos are a heavy yoke on them. This is the mishpatim it refers to when it says, “And your souls loathe My mishpatim so as not to fulfill all My commandments,” because the loathing of the mishpatim is so they will not have to do the mitzvos. Thereby breaking My covenant. They will break the covenant completely and they will be without Torah, in order to permit forbidden relations in public for themselves, and every desire will be sweet to their souls (Ramban).

If you despise My statutes. Since the chukim (statutes) are mitzvos whose reasons are not revealed to the masses, the fools will despise them. They will question, “Does Hashem care if I wear this garment that is woven with linen and blue wool? Why should we burn a red heifer and cast its ashes on us?” Everyone appreciates the mishpatim (laws), however, and finds them necessary. Without the rule of law, civilization is impossible for a nation or a country. No one will despise the law of “One who strikes a man so that he dies …” or, “And should men quarrel …” and the laws of the ox that gores, the pit, and the guardians, etc. However, the judgment (mishpat) done to those who transgress the mitzvos will be resented by the wicked, such as [the mishpat done to] one who violates forbidden relations, profanes Shabbos, or makes an Ov or Yidoni, because these mitzvos are a heavy yoke on them. This is the mishpatim it refers to when it says, “And your souls loathe My mishpatim so as not to fulfill all My commandments,” because the loathing of the mishpatim is so they will not have to do the mitzvos. Thereby breaking My covenant. They will break the covenant completely and they will be without Torah, in order to permit forbidden relations in public for themselves, and every desire will be sweet to their souls (Ramban).

ואם את משפטי תגעל נפשכם, if you treat them as a person who deliberately spits something out because he detests it. You would not have any objective reason to do this as you are familiar with the purpose of such commandments, knowing them to be fair and just.

לבלתי עשות את כל מצותי, your supposed detestation of My commandments was not an objective evaluation of them, but a signal that you wanted to throw off the yoke of Divine legislation, a deliberate act of disobedience. Our sages have often stated that the Israelites who worshipped idols were perfectly aware that these idols were totally helpless, could not help themselves, much less those who professed to worship them. If they worshipped them in spite of knowing that they were all nothing but sham, it was only in order to anger G’d. They did so in order to be free to practice incest in public. (Sanhedrin 63) The Prophet Hoseah 5,4 states explicitly when he writes: “their habits do not let them return to their G’d because of their lecherous impulse within them. They pay no heed to the Lord.”

להפרכם את בריתי, in order not to be different from the other nations surrounding them, neither of whom have been burdened with ethical/moral legislation and rituals such as demanded of the Jewish people by the Torah. The prophet Ezekiel, in Ezekiel 20,32 already challenges the people who would use the fact that they were now in exile, apparently abandoned by their G’d, as an excuse do divest themselves of the claims the Torah makes on them. He accuses them as making all this an excuse to serve deities made of wood and stone.

מכלות עינים ומדיבת נפש THAT THE EYES PINE AND CAUSE SORROW TO THE SOUL — The eyes look expectantly and pine to see that he (the sick) should be relieved and healed, and in the end it turns out that he is not healed, and the souls of his family grieve when he dies. Any desire that does not come to fulfilment and any hope deferred is termed כליון עינים, “pining of the eyes”.

ונתתי פני AND I WILL SET פני [AGAINST YOU] — i. e. פנאי שלי, My leisure, — I will turn away from all My other affairs in order to do you evil (cf. Rashi on Leviticus 17:20).

‎ ורדו בכם שנאיכם — ‎(בכם is taken to signify: those who are amongst you) — this means that I will raise up haters of you only out of your own people and in your own midst. Internal enemies (שונאים) are a greater curse than external enemies (אויבים) for when the nations of the world rise against Israel they seek only what lies in the open, as it is said, (Judges 6:3, 4) “And so it was, when Israel had sown, that the Midianites came up, and the Amalekites, and the children of the east,… and they encamped against them, and destroyed the increase of the land”; but when I raise up against you those of your own people and in your own midst they search also after your hidden treasures. And thus it states, (Micah 3:1—3) “[Hear, O heads of Jacob, and ye princes of the house of Israel…] who also eat the flesh of my people and flay their skin from off them etc.”

ואם עד אלה means AND IF, WHILE THESE ARE YET with you,לא תשמעו YOU WILL NOT HEARKEN,

ותם לריק כחכם AND YOUR STRENGTH SHALL BE SPENT IN VAIN — Behold, if a man does not toil in his field — neither tills, nor sows, nor weeds it, nor clears away the thorns, nor hoes it, and then at harvest time blight comes and strikes it (the field, i. e. destroys that which sprung up of itself), surely it does not matter much (he does not take it to heart). But if a man has toiled — he has ploughed, sown, weeded, cleared away the thorns and hoed it, and then blight comes and strikes it, surely then the teeth of that man become blunt! (a figurative expression for becoming speechless, terror-stricken) (Sifra, Bechukotai, Chapter 5 4).