At the end of Parashat Bereshit, we are told ונח מצא חן בעיני ה׳
And Noah finds Chen/grace in the eyes of G-d.
The word חן/chen always means that you get something you don’t deserve, which means that Noah really should not have survived. He should have perished in the mabul/flood. But he found Chen. This means that there were claims against him, and somehow he made it through.
What causes Chen?
Rav Moshe Feinstein, in his sefer Darash Moshe says,
ונראה פשוט דהדברים טובים שעושה יעשה באופן שיהיו בחן
It’s simple - the good things you do, you’ll do them that they’ll be done with Chen/grace
This means that you’ll do them with בשמחה רבה great happiness, because you know that it’s your whole life. That means not doing a mitzva in pain, or in suffering. You can’t give charity and think you’re losing. You’re not forfeiting or giving up. When a person does mitzvot begrudgingly, that’s not doing them with Chen/grace. And then, b’Middat HaDin/according to strict justice, there is claim against the person.
Rav Moshe adds that most, if not all people, can’t survive according to G-d’s strict justice. So then how do we make it through? חן/Chen.
This is very important. As we start the new year, one of the reasons that we read Noah is to teach us this lesson. We made it through the holiday season and here we are in the month Cheshvan, hoping that we had a good judgment. But what happens if Has V’Shalom we did not?
That is where the concept of ונח מצא חן comes in
Noah found Chen/grace.
We have to do things with Chen. We have to do mitzvot and realize it’s our life.
ובחרת בחיים
We are choosing life.
It’s for us. It’s for our benefit.
We have previously quoted the Ramban, in Sefer Mitzvot, that one of the 613 commandments is
לא ירע לבבך
When you give charity, don’t give it with a sad heart or feel like you’re losing. You should realize that when you give Sedaka, you’re going to get blessing in quadruple. And it’s not just Sedaka- it’s any Mitzvah you do.
Rav Moshe Feinstein continues in Parashat Noah, where it starts off אלה תולדות נח
Literally-These are the children of Noah. Then it says נח איש צדיק/Noah was a Sadik-
A famous Rashi says that this is to teach us that the main children of a Sadik are his good deeds. Why do we call good deeds children? He says that it’s because a Sadik loves his good deeds like he loves his children. When you take care of your children, you aren’t doing it because you have to, you’re doing it because they’re your children. That’s the way we have to look at our Mitzvot.
My learning is my child, my Tefilin is my child, my kashrut is my child. It’s for me.
Furthermore, even if our children have faults, we overlook them. Similarly, we are supposed to proud of our good deeds. Of course, we want to make them as good as possible, but we are proud of them nonetheless. They’re our pride and joy. They are our children.
I recently heard a story from Mr. Shai Stern of California. He shared something he heard from Rabbi Zilberstein, who is well known from his sefarim (the English entitled “What If” series) and gets very interesting questions.
An American tourist was at a Tel Aviv beach watching in horror as a rip tide pulled a small child into the ocean. There was no lifeguard around, and no one else seemed willing to jump in. He announced, “Anyone who jumps in to save this child will get $18,000!” Sure enough, a man jumped up, dove in and pulled the child out. It turned out that, unbeknownst to him, it was his very own child!
The wealthy tourist didn’t think he had to pay the $18,000, because it was that man’s own child that was saved.
But the man protested, saying that was irrelevant that he was the father. The offer was made to whomever saved the child.
When that question came to Rav Zilberstein, he quoted a Gemara that says if you are watching someone in danger, such as a house collapsing onto a person, and just at that moment a bunch of workers pass by, if you ask them to pick up the bricks and they say no, but then you offer them $1,000 to move the bricks to save the man’s life, you have to pay, but you can charge the money to the man who was saved.
Similarly, the wealthy tourist has to pay the $18,000 to the father, but the father now has to pay it back, because that tourist saved his child, and he has a responsibility to pay for that.
What is the point of this?
The point is that here the man went running into the water, thinking that he was saving someone else’s child, but in the end it was his child he was saving!
Our mitzvot are not G-d’s children. They aren’t someone else’s problem. Our mitzvot are our children. When you buy yourself an expensive pair of tefilin, it’s for you. When you spend a lot of time trying to understand a topic in learning, it is for you. If you work hard at doing a good deed, an act of Hessed, it’s for you. It’s not for anyone else. And when we do mitzvot with that understanding, that we are benefiting ourselves, that’s what causes Chen.
When a mother is trying to feed a child, she has to come up with all kinds of games and tactics to get the child to take a bite... “This spoon, take for grandma, This spoon take for grandpa..” for who are all those tricks for ? Is the child doing the mother a favor when she eats? No- it’s for the child. She just doesn’t understand it.
Rav Moshe Feinstein says that when we appreciate that everything we are doing is לטוב לך good for us, that’s what causes Chen.
G-d gives us mitzvot for our own good- not for Him, but for us.
When a person does a Mitzvah in this fashion, it brings about Chen.
B’ezrat Hashem, May this be fulfilled on all of us. נח מצא חן Noah found Chen- and we should all find Chen,
בעיני אלקים in the eyes of Hashem
ובעיני אדם and in the eyes of man.
Have a wonderful day and a Shabbat shalom.