[Avodah] Laasok beDivrei Sorah

[Micha Berger via Avodah]

>From R' Eliezer Eisenberg's blog Beis Vaad L'Chachamim (highly
recommended), at
http://beisvaad.blogspot.com/2015/05/bechukosai-at-my-grandsons-bar-mitzva.html

A couple of personal comments ellided, mostly to save myself the bother
of transliterating more Hebrew text.

A belated mazal tov to the author,
G'Shabbos to all,
-micha


Friday, May 15, 2015
Bechukosai. At my grandson's Bar Mitzva
Drasha at the Bar Mitzva of Avraham Jofen, 5/14/15
...
The Gemara (Brachos 11b) and the rishonim there talk about the issue of
hefsek in Birkas HaTorah. There are those that hold that if a person
stops learning, he has to make a new bracha when he begins again, because
it is a hefsek from the first bracha. The Rishonim, the Agur and the
Rosh, say that it is not a hefsek, because even when you are not actually
learning, you have to consider what you can and cannot do according to
the dinim of the Torah. Even when you are in a place where you cannot
learn, you have to behave in a manner that is prescribed in the Torah.
As the Hafla'ah says, when you do business, it is not a hefsek, because
you are learning Choshen Mishpat. Every decision you make is examined
in the light of the Torah, so that is not a hefsek in limud.

I would put it this way. Torah is only a mitzvah when you learn al
menas laasos. Al menas laasos means that you don't learn superficially,
you make the Torah a part of who you are. On the contrary, if what
you learn is just on the surface, the learning itself is bitul Torah.
If the Mitzva of limud hatorah requires that it should make you into
a different person, do you think that carefully living the life of an
ehrilcheh ben Torah is a hefsek in limud hatorah? It's not a hefsek,
it is a hemshech, it is a kiyum, of the mitzvah of limud hatorah.

My father Ztz'l was very friendly with his lawyer, Bill Rosenthal.
Bill was an assimilated Jew. The only contact he had with the Jewish
religion was when he shook hands with my father. Nonetheless, he and
my father were good friends and respected each other. A lawyer for a
mortgage company once asked him which university my father studied at,
because he could brilliantly analyze contracts. Bill told him that my
father studied at Slabodka U.

He once asked my father, "You and I are very ethical and honest men.
I wouldn't take a penny that wasn't mine, and I have the highest standards
of behavior in business. You, too, are very moral, but you do it because
of your religious beliefs. Is there really any difference between us?
My father told him, on the spot, that there are three differences.
One is that for you, a dollar is a small matter, and a question involving
a million dollars is a big matter. To me, there is no difference. The
principal, the law, is what matters, and the sum of money is irrelevant.
Another difference is that let's say you carefully think an issue through,
and you decide the other side is right, and you let them win. you will
toss and turn at night, ,thinking that maybe you were really right. I,
on the other hand, if I decide that I am right, and I keep something that
had been disputed, I won't be able to sleep at night our of a concern that
maybe my decision was influenced by self interest. The third difference
is that while you and I are both successful people,, and we've both made
a lot of money, you think that you made the money yourself, and it's
100% yours to do with as you please. I believe that God decided that I
should have the money, and God gave me the money, and every dollar that
was given to me was given so that I use it in the right way.

So it's true, my father learned how to do business at Slabodka U.
Because he learned how to do business at Slabodka U, he was able to
give, on the spot, three excellent and lomdusheh chilukim about the
difference between Bill Rosenthal's moral code and his own moral code.
Doing business like that is not a hefsek in the mitzva of limud hatorah.
Farkert, it is the biggest kiyum and chizuk of limud hatorah and mussar
and yashrus. This is a kiyum of the passuk [im bechuqosai seleikhu],
as Rashi explains, [shetihyu ameilim baTorah].

It is this mesora which we bequeath to the Bar Mitzvah. ...