Mishlei 3:15 – Value and Necessity of Torah

Gut chodesh rabosai, I apologize for the delay this morning. Pasuk Tes Vav:

יקרה היא מפנינים וכל חפציך לא ישוו בה. כדרך האדם לרדוף לקנות דבר מחמת שני דברים.

A person is motivated to make a purchase, to make an acquisition for either in either of two situations.

או מחמת שהוא דבר יקר ואינו בנמצא כלל כגון אבנים טובות ומרגליות וזהו לכבודו.

A person buys something which is a precious commodity, a rare precious commodity, and it's it's not it's not an it's not a need but but it's something that that the person contributes to his sense of of pride. או מחמת שהוא צריך לזה מאוד. Or the other type of purchase a person makes is is when there's something which is a necessity, a staple, Kemo tevuah vechadomeh. וזהו שאומר שצריך לרדוף אחר התורה מאוד. Shlomo Hamelech is telling us that that a person has to pursue Torah. Ki migeder hayakar, if you want to measure it, if you want to weigh it on the scale of what's precious, היא יקרה אף מפנינים שהם יקרים מכל דבר שבעולם. From from jewels and and precious stones which are the most valuable. Torah's more valuable. Umigeder hatzorech, and in terms of need, in terms of being a vital basic necessity,

וכל חפציך לא ישוו בה כי לזה צריך יותר מכל דבר כי היא חייך. ומה יש יותר צורך מחיים.

Here this is a question, it's a question which has been relevant previously in terms of other pesukim, it will be relevant subsequently as well but maybe we'll just take a moment here to to begin to reflect on it. Some of these comparisons, I don't know, they they seem to us I don't know. I mean, do we really need to be told that Toras Hashem is more valuable than, you know, than than a diamond? So maybe the answer I guess on one level what I'm about to say can be reduced to Ein Hachinami but but maybe maybe maybe one answer is as follows. There there is a concept that the sefarim talk about of midos nefulos. Certain midos which have which have fallen. What what does that mean? It it means that we we have all kinds of capacities. A person has a capacity to be to has a capacity for ahavah. A person has a capacity for yirah. A person has a capacity for passion, for hislahavus. A mida nefulah means when when that mida falls and and it's it's misdirected and misused in in some kind of mundane or even cheit context. But often a person can recognize just how much a of a capacity he has for Torah from his having experienced that mida albeit in a context that was nefulah. Just to give a moshal I don't mean that this was an example of a moshal nefulah but but in that sense it's not a good moshal. But to give a moshal in in terms of recognizing what one's capacities are in Torah from experiences elsewhere, I remember I was once many many years ago, way back way back, I was once sitting in the back seat and there was a doctor who was giving the Rav a ride somewhere and I remember his comment and the doctor said to him that if he was saying it self-deprecatingly about himself and his chaverim he said, if we had pushed ourselves as hard as we did in medical school when we had been in yeshiva previously, we'd all be bekiim in Shas. I remember that was his comment. Okay so yesh ladon vechulu but what it illustrates is that sometimes we recognize or we can recognize just how much of a capacity we have for something from a mundane or materialistic or a secular context. And then it's takeh relevant as superficial as it seems as facile as it seems but then it takeh is meaningful to use that as a frame of reference in talking about Torah. I don't know what people will do the hours that people will work to amass wealth not everyone is driven to do that but some people are driven to do that and the hours that they'll invest in whatever you know whatever their niche is and however they're trying to amass the wealth. So when such a person discovers learning, if only he would then transpose that same intensity and that same focus. And maybe that's one level by no means the only one one perspective by no means the only one for some of these comparisons of יקרה היא מפנינים וכל חפציך לא ישוו בה if only we would learn with the same sense of hunger and thirst as when we experience physical hunger and thirst, so it would transform our learning and I don't know maybe we shouldn't need to hear this but mistemah mistemah we do need to hear it and that's what Shlomo HaMelech understood. והוא נגד שני דברים הנזכרים לעיל the pninim and vechol chafatzecha again following through on this parallelism שהם כסף ותבואה שהם נגד חכמה ובינה. Then the next six words are rather cryptic just in terms of where the Gaon is seeing this: וכאן הוא דעת שהוא כולל משניהם והבן. So I think what it means again if you're looking in the Philip edition the note eighty-two I think is helpful as well. I think what the Gaon is being medayek here is that earlier the metaphor for chochmah and binah were the kesef כי טוב סחרה מסחר כסף ומחרוץ תבואתה they were both in the singular and here we're shifting to the וכל חפציך לשון רבים. And I think that's where the Gaon sees the remez to again not only the chochmah uvinah that we've been talking about until now but the da'at as well because of that shift to the lashon rabbim. Okay so we'll stop here bli neder be'ezrat Hashem hopefully tomorrow we'll be back to nine o'clock. Okay rabosai have a very very good productive day everyone be well be safe be'ezrat Hashem.