Good morning, everybody. It’s a beautiful, gorgeous day out there. No question about that. Just get out there. Let’s take 10 deep breaths of fresh air. Air is a concoction, my friends. It’s a cocktail. It’s oxygen, nitrogen, inert gases. There are materials in there. There’s all kinds of stuff: water vapor. Everything is mixed up perfectly by the creator of the universe for all the creations in this world. Earthworms—everything you could think of—is using this air, this oxygen.
So we’re taking a look outside. Always look up. Look at the sky. I see that beautiful, gorgeous, smiley moon. It’s still up there, that smiley moon. It’s smiling at us. It’s great. It’s great to see that smiley moon. It makes you smile. When you see a smile, it makes you smile.
And we are living with the parasha, living with parasha. This parasha is everybody’s parasha. We get all year for this parasha. Hashem is creating the world again. It’s a preface to all our greats. We’re going to meet with them again: Adam, Noach, Avraham Avinu, all the greats, Yosef HaTzadik. We’re going to see them again, all of them. Bereshit—we learned it in first grade, eighth grade, tenth grade. We’re going to learn it again all the time. There are so many secrets in Bereshit, so many. So we have a new beginning right now. It’s a fresh year, renewed goals, renewed Bereshit. It’s a new attitude with Torah ideas. So let’s think and put some of these ideas into our mind. We have to know that the Torah is the thoughts of Hashem. The thoughts of Hashem. Open a book. It’s what He’s thinking. You can open it any time.
So Rav Miller writes over here in his preface, gorgeous, on Bereshit. He says like this. Listen carefully, my friends: “Of the 613 mitzvot (commandments), only three are found in the book of Bereshit. And it’s the most voluminous of all the books. Yet in reality, this first book of the Torah contains countless mitzvot, which we are required to study and to keep in mind. The most important foundations are profusely found in Bereshit right in the beginning, and one or more of the subsequent mitzvot will obligate us to learn and to remember these foundations. Thus, the creation of the universe by God out of nothing is the foundation of all foundations.”
Let’s say it again. The creation of the universe by Hashem—ex nihilo, yesh me’ayin, out of nothing—is the foundation of all foundations, which you must certainly study profoundly and always remember. Yet nowhere is it stated so clearly and at such length as in Bereshit. “The kindly purpose of creation, the principle of man’s free will, the existence of Olam Haba (afterlife), O Hashem’s covenant with mankind, and Hashem’s choice of the seed of Abraham are examples of the many principles whose chief source is the book of Bereshit.” That’s written by Rav Avigdor Miller in his Bereshit book.
Now, we have many fundamental principles in Parashat Bereshit, and it’s worth enumerating some of them. Let’s hit on some of them, and we’ll enjoy it even better. Number one, as we already said, the creation of the universe out of nothing. It tells us that there’s only one Hashem. He’s it. Number two, free will. That’s all about success in life: it’s only by use of the little bitty bit of free will. Little bit, little bit of free will. We have freedom of choice. Freedom of results. It’s up to God. You can choose to go to work, but you don’t know if you’re going to make any money. Right? So you’ve got to choose. We have judge in the choice.
Number three: Sechar ve’onesh (reward and punishment). Was he Adam? Eight. And he was punished. There’s reward and punishment, my friends. Devastation of sin. Oh, what happened after he sinned? There was death unto the world. Gan Eden. There’s Olam Haba. What a gift. Olam Haba. We’ve got to thank Hashem every day for the Olam Haba. Thank Him. And it’s not a hole in the ground, my friends. What a gift. There’s eternity. We are living here, and there’s eternity. If you live five years, ten years, a hundred and five years, there’s eternity out there waiting for us. We have to earn it a little bit. We’re getting a gift from our Olam Haba, you know, yes. But the type of eternity. But there is eternity.
Number six, Teshuva (repentance) ba’u. What a gift. Usually, if a guy has a hole in his pants, he doesn’t fix it at all. You can go to the other; you’re going to see it. No, God said, “You tear a hole in your soul.” Hashem is telling you, “You can fix it completely and even make it better than it was before.” We just went through the holidays. Number seven, a man is created in the image of Hashem. What a bomb. That’s an atom bomb. That’s said in the book of Genesis. If Hashem didn’t tell us, if I could be careful what it says, we never would have known it. What a chesed that Hashem is telling us that we’re created in the image of Hashem. And He’s going out of the box to say that because one of the tenets is that Hashem has no image. So you have to believe Hashem has no image, and you have to believe that we’re created in the image of Him at the same time.
Look at the kindly purpose of Hashem’s creations. Olam chesed yibaneh (The world is built on kindness). It’s all based on chesed, based on kindliness. The world was very good. After He created six days, He says, “Vayar Elokim et kol asher asah, vehineh tov me’od” (And God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good). Walk out today. It’s a very good day. You’re emulating Hashem when you say that. It’s a very beautiful sky. You’re emulating Hashem when you say that. And He’s saying, Hashem is very good. He said it was very good.
We have over here, we have in the Torah, there’s the Yetzer Hara (evil inclination). There’s the snake. There’s the Yetzer Hara in the world. There’s a revelation that there’s the Yetzer Hara. The purpose of creation is to reveal Hashem. There, and last, over here from this little list, we have more. Hashem rested on the creation on the seventh day. That is our Shabbat. Shabbat is ours. It’s a gift from the Creator. So let’s get out there and enjoy. And open it up. Look at it, Rashi. Look at it in English. Parashat Bereshit is an ice cream cone. Enjoy it.