Suspending Daas
26 Adar I 5782
“Let Your hand be ready to help me, for I have chosen Your precepts.” (Tehillim 119:100)
This verse in Tehillim gives us an insight into the the order with which we must approach Divine service. First we choose His precepts, we firmly undertake to put His Torah above all else come what may, and then we hope for His help.
“Betzalel, son of Uri, son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah, had made all that the L‑rd had commanded Moses.” (Shemos 38:22)
Why did Betzalel merit such great wisdom that he implicity understood what the L‑rd had commanded Moses? Not what Moses commanded him (Betzalel), but what the L‑rd commanded to Moses himself directly on Mount Sinai (Rashi).
“The answer, says the Meshech Chochmah, lies in his roots, for Betzalel’s wisdom derived from an attribute which was embodied both by his tribe in general and one of his forbears in particular.
The tribe from which Betzalel came was Yehudah. Chazal relate that when Bnei Yisrael stood at the banks of the Yam Suf and saw that they were being pursued by the Egyptians, it was representatives of the tribe of Yehudah who risked their lives and entered the sea even before it had split, thereby sanctifying Hashem’s name.
This same attribute of mesirus nefesh was exhibited much later on by a scion of the tribe of Yehudah, namely, Chur – Betzalel’s grandfather. The Gemara recounts that when the people were constructing the Golden Calf, Chur publicly opposed them and was killed as a result.
The quality of mesirus nefesh demands – among other things – a suspension of one’s faculty of daas. If one were to employ one’s daas, it is possible to rationalize avoiding offering one’s life in almost any situation. Indeed, most telling in this regard is the observation of R’ Yosef Yaavetz, known as the Chassid Yaavetz, who states that in the times of the Inquisition, it was generally the unlearned Jews who remained steadfast in their faith, even to the point of sacrificing their lives, while it was the more scholarly and philosophically inclined who were prepared to rationalize and justify an abdication of their religious beliefs under pressure.
This, then, is the background to Betzalel’s extraordinary wisdom. It derives from the Divine system of midah keneged midah – measure for measure. The tribe of Yehudah generally and Chur specifically were prepared to suspend their faculty of daas in order to offer their lives al kiddush Hashem. In response, the Source of all wisdom rewarded the heir of such sacrifice – Betzalel, with an abundance of daas such as would allow him to build the Mishkan through a profound understanding of the cosmic significance of each of its component parts.”
“This applies only to one’s companion—one’s equal—in the study of Torah and the observance of the mitzvot.” (Lessons in Tanya, Likutei Amarim, middle of Chapter 32)
Tanya explains that you are only allowed to hate your equal in Torah and mitzvos if he transgresses a specific commandment. What does this mean on a deeper level? That those who know less also possess a certain merit that precludes them from hatred, the simple faith in the One G-d, which feeds their entire belief and service of Hashem, without rationalization or explanation.