[Avodah] The Stature of Moshe Rabbeinu

[Micha Berger]

On Tue, Feb 17, 2009 at 11:14:03PM +0000, rabbirichwolpoe at gmail.com wrote:
: The sneh is an anav that is not burned by the divine fire because it
: lacks the shemetz of gaavah to get burned. As soon as it gets ga'avah
: the fire will burn it (perhaps Nadav and. Avihu's issue)

I based Aishey's bar mitzvah derashah on one of RYBS's motza"sh talks,
which is all about the s'neh, Moshe's anavah, tzimtzum, and how it
showed MRAH's qualification to be av hanevi'im.

>From <http://www.aishdas.org/asp/2005/01/fire-within-bush.shtml>. Before
this quote, I discuss the "qol demamah daqah yishama"...

>     2: And Hashem's angel appeared to him in a flame of fire from the
>     midst of a bush; and he looked, and, here! the bush burned with fire
>     bo'eir ba'eish, and the bush was not consumed.3: And Moshe said,
>     "I will turn aside now, and see this great sight, madu'ah lo yiv'ar
>     haseneh -- why the bush does not burn."

>     4: And when Hashem saw that he turned to look, Hashem called him
>     out of the midst of the bush, and said: "Moshe, Moshe!" And he said:
>     "Here I am."

> In pasuq 2, a mal'akh appears to Moshe, and the bush is bo'eir
> ba'eish. However, Moshe turns aside from that vision. He turned to see
> that lo yiv'ar hanseh -- no, it's not really burning. There is a fire
> within the bush, only at the core. The mal'akh speaks mitoch, from within
> the bush. The truer revelation that Moshe rabbeinu saw beyond the angel
> was one if tzimtzum, Divine Constriction. When Moshe realizes this,
> the nevu'ah is elevated from a prophet's speech to an angel to Moshe's
> unique ability to speak "face to 'Face'" with G-d. Moshe merited this
> nevu'ah because he was "anav mikol adam -- more modest than any other
> man." His anivus is a reflection and imitation of that very tzimtzum,
> which is how Moshe alone would turn to take another look.

> The mal'akh appeared in the big, the flashy. The first glance made it
> seem that the whole bush was aflame. It's like the shofar gadol blowing,
> announcing Hashem's presence. The angel declared behimatz'o -- here and
> now Hashem could be found. But Moshe's response one to the qol demamah
> dakah, he saw Hashem limiting his presence to allow for a response, to
> demand derashah -- seeking Him out. Realizing that you must respond,
> that you aren't simply entitled, that is anivus. And therefore Moshe
> connected to the A-lmighty in a way no one else did before or since.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             It is harder to eat the day before Yom Kippur
micha at aishdas.org        with the proper intent than to fast on Yom
http://www.aishdas.org   Kippur with that intent.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                       - Rav Yisrael Salanter