The law of damages can be summarized as "The obligation to guard oneself from harming others." Our ability to fulfill these laws depends completely on protecting our heart from coveting that which belongs to our neighbor because desires of the heart effects the eyes which is the root of all damaging (hezik re'iyah). When a person has jealousy in his heart he goes with a "bad eye" causing damage to his friend, but a person who is generous and looks with a "good eye" is, on the contrary, a source of blessing to everything he beholds. Now the Torah makes us liable when we damage through negligence and we even have to pay for harm caused when we are unconscious, asleep. But how can a person guard himself from damaging when he is unconscious? When a person is sleeping and his daat (consciousness) ascends, the person remains with his faith alone. If he has kept himself from destructive thoughts he is protected then by the "chashmal," the silent speaking that emanates from the heart of one whose speech and heart are truthful with each other. And through this he merits protection, like a child that is watched over by his mother (See Rav Nasan, Lekutei Halachot, Nezikin 2).

"Come up to Me on the mountain and be there, I will give you the tables of stone and the Torah and the commandment which I wrote for their instruction." (Sh. 24:12). The height of the mountain represents the point of a person's life where he reaches his greatest realization of truth. Hashem says "Go there." A person in some sense already knows that which he will reach but before he arrives there it is necessary for him to pass through all the wisdoms of the world in their proper order. Then finally he comes to this pinnacle of understanding. "And be there" - the place of purity, the root of life, is always present and always there. All the wisdoms are passages and after all is said and done you will come to that level which is the main place for you (Mei Shiloach on the parashah).

Mishpatim
Reb Shlomo Minyan HarNof
(R. Raphael, email: [email protected])

Going Home After A Hard Week
"If you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve for six years, but in the seventh year he is to be set free without payment. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the woman and her children shall remain her master's property. The slave shall leave by himself. If the slave declares 'I love my master, my wife and my children; I do not want to go free,' his master �shall pierce his ear (Sh. 21:2-6).

Why does the Torah use the uncommon term "Hebrew" in regards to enslavement when everywhere else it uses the name "Yisrael"? This is in order to emphasize that slavery contradicts the essential nature of the Jew. The Jewish soul is meant to freely relate to Hashem Who is not limited by the boundaries of this world. The term "Hebrew" comes originally from Avraham who crossed over the river to the land of Canaan. This passing to the other side made people refer to him as "Ivri," one who makes the journey across the boundary to freedom.

We express this freedom (or meaningfulness) in our lives through our inner life of relation to Hashem. When we live our lives in this way we are free of the enslaving influences of this world. But when we forget this, then we are in a precarious state, vulnerable to the manipulation of external forces. An example of this is the midrash that tells us that Moshe didn't comprehend why the Jewish people had been enslaved in Mitzrayim till he heard Jews speaking slander against him. "Now the thing is known," says Moshe. Now I understand that our inner connection to Hashem is weak and so it is only natural that we have become bound by outer forces of oppression.

The law of the Hebrew slave is invoked when a Jew steals. Stealing means taking the inner freedom of "Ivri," and binding to outer things through "aveirah," transgression. Through that act he attaches himself to externality. His body becomes a vehicle for tying him to the burdens of this world. Now physical reality is related to the six days of the week and the six middot (the lower sefirot). Once the Jew who has stolen atones through his bondage for six years he can return again to the level of seven which is Shabbat. Since the soul, in essence, always remains pure, once the onus of his transgression has been removed this rising again towards freedom is automatic.

This is comparable to the Torah law that one who transgresses certain prohibitions shall be lashed "forty-minus-one-times." Why doesn't the Torah simply state thirty-nine times? We can understand this by going back to the original formation of a person. During the first forty days of pregnancy a baby is fully formed in the womb and it is on the fortieth day that he receives a nashomah. When a person receives lashes, the punishment is concerned only with the externality of the body. Once this is done the soul's purity automatically resumes its expression of holiness through the body. (Shem MiShemuel on the parashah).

Stealing From Ourselves If one person gives another money or an object to watch (without payment) and it is stolen from the house of the guard, then if the thief is found the thief pays the owner double what he stole. If the thief is not found then the guard will swear that he hadn't meddled in the thing with his own hand. (Sh. 22:6-7)

We can draw a deep lesson about coming back to Hashem from this law if we read it in terms of teshuvah. Gd gives us precious vessels for safe keeping. Silver vessels represent "cisufim," our will and desire for holiness. Indeed, the whole creation of man was only in order that we serve Hashem. But this essential nature of man needs guarding since the inclination towards waywardness can rob us of our better nature. If we have the merit to guard ourselves there is reward. The thief (our inclination towards waywardness) will have to pay double, its power actually strengthening us because we have kept away from evil. The way to achieve this is through the struggle to distance ourselves from gratuitous sensual pleasure. In the law of guarding this is what is referred to as "meddling by his own hand," and according to the halachah, once he gets involved with things he has been warned against, he becomes responsible even if some untoward event occurs. In other words, once we give into this wayward side of ourselves, even though we cannot see exactly how this corruption effects us, we are accountable for the momentum created by the deed which takes us to places we cannot foresee.
The Gemara says that if the one who was guarding decides, even after he meddled in the thing, he can pay the simple value of the missing item, immediately after it is demanded by the owner (Baba Metziah 34a). This is like one who does not withhold himself from returning to Hashem after he has sinned. This will entitle him to receive a double payment when the thief is found since at that point the guard becomes the owner of the lost item retroactively. Thus, even though he acted improperly, since he is moved in his heart to return to Hashem, his owning up to his liability actually enables him to come to a higher level of holiness than he was at before because he has harnessed his waywardness to the good through his teshuvah. Taking responsibility for wrongdoing results in a doubling of merit. This is the uniqueness of the baal teshuvah whose transgressions are actually transformed into merits (Sefat Emet 112).

Doing Justice In This World - An Exalted Task
On the pasuk, "And these are the judgments which you should place in front of them" (Sh. 21:1), the midrash says that Hashem showed Moshe the Heavenly source of these judgments as it says in Tehillim 147, "He declared His words to Yaakov, His statutes and judgments to Yisrael." Hashem turned over to us laws that mirror the ways in which He rules Creation. Moshe was commanded to make this known to B'nei Yisrael so that they should comprehend it fully. And this is Rashi means that Moshe explained the "reason of the thing."

When a person knows the source of something then he can compare what is down here to what is up there and by relating the one to the other he can come to understand the depth of each. This is the depth of what B'nei Yisrael received through the Torah. The highest spiritual realities were enclothed in the laws of the Torah and this is what is meant by the pasuk, "You did (asah) judgment and tzedakah with Yaakov." You brought the aspects of highest spiritual worlds down to the world of action (asiah) through the laws implemented by the B'nei Yisrael (Sefat Emet 115).

Humility In High Places
"To man and animal, Hashem gives salvation." The pasuk is telling us that man avoids certain pitfalls when he views himself as twofold - not only as human - one who makes himself, but also like a behemah, "a domestic animal," something completely dependent, without an enlarged sense of self. The aspect of animal can be explained through its name, "behemah," which can be broken into two parts boh - mah and the explanation is as follows, "all that it is (mah) is already within it (boh)." In other words, an animal does not pride itself for what it has. In this sense, an animal is simple. There are ways in which it is good for a man to make himself simple especially when he is using his most powerful faculty of intellect.

When a man judges, he enters a precarious spiritual situation where it is all too easy to lose his simplicity. He is obligated to use his intellectual powers to the fullest. In order to probe the depths of a matter of property - or life and death - it is essential to determine subtle matters of fact and law; he has to decide who is lying and who is telling the truth; who is deluding himself and on whose side is justice. In such a practice, man can come to see himself as the real measure of wisdom. He can become proud of his ability. This is a kind of spiritual bribery against which we are warned, "Do not accept bribery, it blinds the clear-sighted" (Sh. 23:8). Hashem is warning us, B'nei Yisrael in particular who have been tutored in the ways of justice, not to flatter ourselves with our own competence.

By treating our intellectual abilities as a Heavenly gift, we can use our capacity without losing our simplicity. We can view ourselves like a simple domestic animal dependent on Hashem for everything that we have. When we see our greatest power, the intellect, in this way, this is our salvation. (Sefat Emet 115).

New Covenant
Moshe told the people�all the judgments (pre-Sinai law including seven commands of Noach and Shabbat and honoring one's father and mother etc. given at Marah) and everyone answered with one voice and said, 'all the words which Gd has spoken we will do.' And Moshe wrote all the words of Gd�(from Bereshit up to but not including the giving of the Torah). And he took the book of the covenant (up to Sinai) and read it in the ears of the people and they said 'All that the Eternal has spoken we will do and we will hear.' And Moshe took the blood and sprinkled it on the people.

The Meor VeShemesh explains that when B'nei Yisrael said, "We will do," this refers to those commandments they had already received before Torah - commands that were required by "common sense" in order to settle the world. At Sinai, when B'nei Yisrael came into direct encounter with the Creator, these everyday matters took on a new significance which was affirmed in the words "We will do." What they had heard on the level of natural reason they now vowed to carry out with a deeper commitment binding their everyday actions to the source of the world, Hashem. The blood of the covenant represents this change of spirit, carrying out "mundane matters" with all of their power and desire knowing that these also were connected to the dimension of doing for Hashem.

With this in mind, we can look at the Rashi in parashat Yitro on the pasuk, "On this day B'nei Yisrael arrived at Sinai" (Sh. 19:1). Rashi asks, "Why doesn't it say 'On the day'? Because the Torah wants to tell us that the commands of the Torah should be new every day as if Hashem had given them for the first time on that day." At the time that this was said it referred specifically to those everyday things which are necessary for keeping the world going. In our service to Hashem we need to renew these every day, remembering that in these also we are doing them for Hashem.

Mitzvot
Sefer HaChinuch lists 52 mitzvot in this parashah. Many are mitzvot between man and his fellow. Some are between man and the Creator.

At A Glance