Today’s class is dedicated in honor of Mr. Victor M. Azrak by Aslan Safdie in recognition for all that he has done on behalf of A&S Mezuzah, a wonderful mezuzah company run by Mr. Steven Safdie. A very apropos sponsorship for today, as we are discussing mezuzot. |
We have been talking about the protective power of the Mezuzah. We began with a discussion of Onkelus HaGer, and continued on with the Rambam, who told us that the mezuzah’s protective powers come from the Mitzvah, and not because it’s an amulet.
The commentaries send us to the Rambam at the end of the laws of mezuzah, where he further explains the power of the mezuzah.
The Rambam writes, in the sixth perek of the laws of mezuzah, the final Halacha: a person has to be careful with his mezuzah. He has to be careful to get the best mezuzah, because
שהיא חובת הכל תמיד
It is a constant mitzvah.
So if you just built a house, take into account what the doors cost, what the kitchen handles cost, etc. with all of the “We might as well, we are doing it anyway” that goes on, and think about the mezuzot. They will be protecting your house for a long time, and you get a Mitzvah every second. If it costs $200 or $300 per mezuzah, it is a lifetime investment.
וכל זמן שיכנס ויצא יפגע ביחוד השם שמו של הקדוש ב"ה
Every time you walk in or out of your house, you meet up with the Oneness of G-d .
The mezuzah is not an amulet. It is a mitzvah. And the Mitzvah gets ignited with your thoughts. It says, in the mezuzah,
Hashem Echad- Hashem is One.
ויזכור אהבתו ויעור משנתו ושגיותיו בהבלי הזמן
You will remember your love for G-d, as it say V’Ahavta
Love for G-d has to be activated.
Hashem gave you your house, your family,..
ויעור משנתו
It will awaken you from your sleep
We walk around in a type of stupor. We are not cognizant. And it is interesting that the Rambam uses this term when describing how the shofar wakes us up from our sleep.
It will wake us up from the silliness and the nonsense of the times, and we’ll realize that there is nothing that lasts forever and ever, other than the knowledge of G-d- Sur HaOlam, in Rambams’s term, the Rock of the world.
As we have discussed in previous classes, G-d is a called Rock because we seek refuge in the rock. Even if the rock never spoke to you, you can still seek refuge in a rock.
In our Modim prayers we say Sureinu- our Rock, Sur Hayenu- the Rock of our lives.
And when you realize that this is the only lasting, true thing in the world,
ומיד הוא חוזר לדעתו
You come back and wake yourself up from your stupor and walk on the straight path.
That is the charge of your mezuzah.
He quotes the Gemarah that says that if you have Tefillin on your head, tzizit on your clothing and a mezuzah on your door, you have these three forces,
מוחזק הוא שלא יחטא
It is established that you won’t sin
Why?
שהרי יש לו מזכירין רבים
Because you have many reminders
והן הם המלאכים שמצילין אותו מלחטוא
These are the angels that protect you from sin.
These mitzvot create angels and they protect you- firstly from sin, but as a byproduct, the commentaries say, they protect your life.
Because if it stops you from sinning, that is what protects you.
Like the pasuk says,
חונה מלאך ה׳ סביב ליראיו ויחלצם
There is a camp of angels around those that are G-d fearing and it protects them.
Rambam says it protects them from sin.
So the power of the mezuzah is that it gets your head on straight.
And when your head it on straight, that protects you. That is the source of beracha and protection.
That is what a mezuzah does.
Like the Chafetz Chaim tells us,
It says Baruch Habah B’Shem Hashem...
Blessed are those that come with the name of G-d; they’ll be blessed from the House of G-d, which is full of bounty and all kinds of wonderful things, all waiting for the one that has bitachon.
That is the power of the mezuzah. The mezuzah is a Bitachon-charger.
It is a Hashem Echad charger, a Love Hashem charger.
It is what gets us going; it’s the protective forces of the mezuzah.
That’s what watches and guards us.
It’s apropos now that we mention a Hakarat HaTov to our listeners. This class started almost two years ago, with a small group of about three people in the Yad Yosef Torah Center. It was after we had been getting up early for Selichot, and someone suggested that we should continue our early rising. So we started at 5:45am, 15 minutes before our Gemarah class, with Mr. Sam Sasson, Mr. Ed Saff and Mr. Jack Dweck.
We started with the Bet HaLevi. We chose that because on Rosh Hashana, wanting to learn mussar before our prayers, we went through the small Bet HaLevi pamphlet on Bitachon for two days and everyone fell in love with it, so we decided to continue to learn it, more in depth.
That’s what led us to dedicate ourselves to appreciating Sefer Bet HaLevi.
We went though the entire Bet HaLevi for a year, and that was the beginnings of this Daily Bitachon. When we finished the Bet HaLevi, we went on to Hovot HaLevavot. We were just about finished with Hovot HaLevavot’s Shaar Bitachon when the pandemic started. Since then, we’ve been doing different timely topics, but at some point B’Ezrat Hashem we will revisit Hovot HaLevavot and get back to our original schedule.
And now, just today, ArtScroll has released a new book- Bet HaLevi, on Bitachon, with the beautiful Artscroll approach: translation, commentaries, insight, footnotes, and some beautiful pesukei bitachon in the back, that we’ve spoken about as well.
To purchase this new book, see the link below, and enter promo code RDS for a 20% discount.
https://www.artscroll.com/Books/9781422627211.html
This is not a plea for sales. This is an opportunity to get hizzuk from something you have worked on in the past, and I am sure everyone will gain from it.
So, thank you to our listeners, because, as Rav Wolbe wrote at the beginning of one of his sefarim,
“It was written with the help of G-d, in the merit of the masses.”
Rav Wolbe believed, as all believers do, that when you give a class, you are just a conduit and it’s the listeners that really bring the class down.
So thank you for bringing this class down. You are part of story.
Have a wonderful day.