B"H
Monday, Tammuz 11, 5785 / July 7, 2025
This Shabbat we will read Parshat Balak, in the Book of Numbers (Bamidbar).
Balak, King of Moab, solicited the services of Bilam to curse the Jewish people, hoping that if Bilam curses them he would be able to fight them and win. But G-d warned Bilam not to curse the Jewish nation. In the end, G-d placed words of blessing in Bilam's mouth and, instead, he blesses them three separate times.
In one of the passages of Bilam's blessings he says, "He [G-d] has not beheld sin in Jacob, nor has He seen perverseness in Israel. The L-rd his G-d is with him."
Rashi explains this to mean that even when the people of Israel sin, G-d is not extremely strict with them. He does not abandon them even when they sin and is always with Israel.
We saw this prophecy fulfilled during the past two thousand years. The fact that we are here as a nation successful and thriving, when so many of the nations wanted to do away with us, is witness to this prophecy.
Our sages tell us that the mitzvot which G-d gave us, He too, fulfils. G-d commanded us to, “Love your fellow as yourself.” This implies that just as we tend to overlook our own faults, so too, we have to overlook other people’s faults and focus on the good in them.
Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Barditchev was one whose unconditional love for his brethren was legendary. He always saw the good in everyone. He was able to look beyond the person's external acts of the moment and see the essence of the Jew's Neshama-soul. Rather than judging people for their shortcomings, he would focus on the good and positive.
Rabbi Levi Yitzchak was once walking in the marketplace and saw a Jewish coachman, enwrapped in Talit and Tefillin. In the middle of his prayers, he was greasing the wheels of his carriage in preparation for a trip.
Someone else would have scolded the coachman for his lack of respect for his prayers. Not so Rabbi Levi Yitzchak. He lifted his eyes upward and exclaimed, "G-d, see what a great people you have. Look how devoted this poor coachman is to You. Even when he's greasing the wheels of his couch he cannot refrain from praying to you!"
There are those who find fault with others even when the other person is performing a good deed and then there are those who see only good in others, even when they may be doing something deemed not so good.
As a small child, the previous Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneerson, of blessed memory, who was released from Russian prison, on the 12th of Tammuz 98 years ago, for his unconditional commitment to Torah education, once asked his father, “Why did G-d create a person with two eyes? One eye is enough to see."
His father replied, “A person needs two eyes so that with the left eye, he should look at himself in order to find his own faults and correct them. At another person, however, one should always look with the right eye - with compassion and kindness."
HAVE A VERY GOOD, HAPPY, HEALTHY AND SUCCESSFUL DAY
OUR HEARTS ARE WITH OUR BROTHERS AND SISTERS IN CAPTIVITY - MAY THEY ALL BE RELEASED NOW