Perek 12

So Kaf-Tes of today, the Malbim's hakdama to the Kaf-Tes, to Mizmor seven, sorry, Mizmor Kaf-Tes. This is actually the Malbim's hakdama against ba'alei lashon in his time, אשר דיברו עתק נגד ה׳. Asak is to speak forcefully in a sense of with brazenness. אשר דיברו עתק נגד ה׳ ודרשו פלס בתורתו and interpreted the Torah in all kinds of false ways, ואשר דיברו לשון הרע בין איש לרעהו. The the three three areas of speech: divrei kefira against Hakadosh Baruch Hu, rachmana litzlan, let's say in inyanei hashgacha, distorting the meaning of Torah and lashon hara. This is sort of just a somewhat eclectic group that David Hamelech has assembled here. We'll take the ba'alei lashon, we'll take the kofrim, we'll take those who distort the meaning of Torah. Rather, do they have anything in common, this group? So the tzad hashaveh is that each of these stems from ga'ava. Sometimes in inyanei emunos v'deios people are genuinely confused. That's got nothing to do with ga'ava. But sometimes divrei kefira don't come from a sincere sense of confusion; sometimes they come from a brazenness where a person is sitting in judgment on Hakadosh Baruch Hu. The person has his ideas about how Hakadosh Baruch Hu is mechuyav, in quotation marks, to be running the world, and if Hakadosh Baruch Hu isn't living up to this person's expectations, so the person speaks with a brazenness. Doresh pales betorato is the same thing. A person basically manipulates Torah to mean what he wants it to mean, instead of being machnia himself to what the Torah says, what the Torah teaches, to the Torah's values. He looks to, it has to reflect him, it has to reflect his opinions, his beliefs, his desires; it has to accommodate him. Whenever a person speaks gratuitously, disparagingly about someone else, dehinu lashon hara, there's also a sense of condescension, a sense of superiority which the person feels that gives him that perspective to look down on people. To look down on people, a person has to elevate himself. If a person doesn't elevate himself, then he's going to be at eye level with people, or maybe lower than people. When a person talks lashon hara, he's looking down on people. To look down on people, I have to elevate myself. In a false sense, in a false sense. So

למנצח על השמינית מזמור לדוד. הושיעה ה' כי גמר חסיד כי פסו אמונים מבני אדם.

Hakadosh Baruch Hu save us, save, bring a yeshua. There are no more chasidim and even faithful people, not just devout, passu, they're also... passu is loshon efes without the aleph at the beginning, כי פסו אמונים מבני אדם. So the Malbim kedarko distinguishing the nuances of meaning, here it's not a nuance, here it's a major difference between chasid and emunim. So here the Malbim is following

כי גמר חסיד שהיו עושים חסד בדבר שלא הבטיחו כלל.

Not just that they were honest, not just an honest person who stands by his commitments, who makes good on his promises and guarantees, things in which he has obligated himself, no, but a chasid is someone, even though there's no obligation, he never made a commitment to this other person, or not in the realm of bein adam lachaveiro, in the realm of bein adam lamakom, וכן עשו מצוות יתירות מצד החסידות. So this goes back certainly as far as the Ibn Ezra explicitly explaining the etymology. Chesed, the Ibn Ezra already explains means again without the negative association that we have with the term extreme, haflaga. That's what chesed means. So the Ibn Ezra says in in Sefer Vayikra that when the Torah speaks of the erva of a brother marrying a sister, the Torah says it's a chesed. So Rashi quotes Hagemara Sanhedrin al derech hamidrash that once Hakadosh Baruch Hu as a chesed waived this issur because Kayin and Hevel, who else were they going to marry other than their sisters? So for the world to get started, the world to be populated, so Hakadosh Baruch Hu as a chesed, but this is an issur which... obviously that's a drashas Chazal. But what's the pshuto shel mikra? Drashas Chazal is that davka this erva is being described as a chesed. But what's the... so the drasha is intended to supplement the pshuto shel mikra. What's the pshuto shel mikra? So the Ibn Ezra says the pshuto shel mikra is that chesed means something which is extreme. It can be extreme letova. You have a person who puts himself out for other people, goes above and beyond to help other people. So that's chesed, that's extreme letova. And then you can have, if someone is engaged in behavior which is extremely repugnant, so that's also chesed. Etymologically it's neutral in terms of whether it's letova or lera'ah and can be used in either context. And that's what the pshuto shel mikra is, the Ibn Ezra says. The pshuto shel mikra is that chesed hu, that this is something which, this type of incest is incredibly is off the charts in terms of being depraved behavior. Couldn't all the arayos have been described this way? Ein hachi nami. That's why Chazal have the drasha of chesed hu that Hakadosh Baruch Hu once was matir this issur. The Rambam has it also, also says that chesed is loshon haflaga. When you look in Mesillas Yesharim, definition of chasidus, יסוד העבודה ושורש החסידות means to go beyond shuras hadin. Chasidus means to go lifnim mishuras hadin. It has that same sense of again extreme in the sense of beyond, above and beyond. So ki gamar chasid, so Dovid Hamelach says in looking around in the world, so ki gamar chasid, you look in society, you don't see any chasidim. And not only chasidim don't you see, but כי פסו אמונים מבני אדם. Even people who were not necessarily lifnim mishuras hadin people, but just people. anshei emes

שישמו ששמרו מה שהבטיחו ובמצוות היו עושים הכי הרבה המוטל עליהם.

And it's not just the sort of the absence of the positive, but there's

שוא ידברו איש את רעהו שפת חלקות ולב ולב ידברו.

Malbim actually has, has two pshatim here. The second of the two is shav yidabru in inyanei emunos v'deos and sefas chalakos to be glib, right, to have the, to be a smooth talker v'lev v'lev with the, with all kinds of different kavanos that a person keeps hidden. A person postures, a person is, is fakes. So in his ben adam l'chaveiro interactions, יכרית ה' כל שפתי חלקות לשון מדברת גדלות. Hakadosh Baruch Hu should, should cut off those lips that speak again glibly, smoothly in the sense of where the smooth exterior is, is hiding and camouflaging an interior that doesn't correspond. And again, the verb yachris Hashem carries over to the second half of the pasuk of lashon medaberes gedolos. This is parallel, Malbim explains to the previous pasuk that the siftsei chalakos is the second what was in the second part of the pasuk, the ben adam l'chaveiro trickery and deceit, etc. And lashon medaberes gedolos follows up on the שוא ידברו איש את רעהו in inyanei emunos v'deos. Here again, specifically, the idea we spoke about at the beginning of the kapittel, but here specifically lashon medaberes gedolos when people speak divrei kfiros, and gedolos here means in the sense of grandiose, big in, in that sense. There's a, there's a, there's a haughtiness within heresy. These people אשר אמרו ללשוננו נגביר שפתינו אתנו מי אדון לנו. In both realms, both when they speak against Hakadosh Baruch Hu, lilshoneinu nagbir, we'll prevail, sefaseinu itanu, the sefasayim, the lips with which they speak chalakos ben adam l'chaveiro, mi adon lanu? There's no ריבונו של עולם רחמנא לצלן who's gonna, who's master over us, who's gonna hold us accountable? And we're not gonna have to answer to people either. Contrary to their, their this self-imposed deceit, so

משוד עניים מאנקת אביונים עתה אקום יאמר ה' אשית בישע יפיח לו.

So Malbim here the difference between an oni and an evyon, so Rashi has this al hatorah also, that evyon is lashon to'eiv, desiring. And evyon is someone who's more destitute than than an oni in that he's to'eiv l'chol davar. Is that he, he has nothing. It's not that, it's not that he has, he has a house but he has no food to eat. He has nothing. He's to'eiv l'chol davar. He doesn't have, he's, he has, he has no resources. The oni is, is poor, is impoverished, but not to the, not to the same extreme as the as the evyon. So that's why mishod aniyim means Hakadosh Baruch Hu is gonna rise up עתה אקום יאמר ה' against the the plundering from aniyim, aniyim there is what to steal from them. An oni has something, there's what to, to steal from from an oni. From evyonim there's nothing to steal. So evyonim Hakadosh Baruch Hu is gonna be toveia elbonam in their cry, the cry that the evyon when the evyon turn to, to people, turn to society for help. So then he was totally, totally ignored, but that's there's nothing that you can that you can take, that you can steal from the evyon. משוד עניים מאנקת אביונים עתה אקום יאמר השם to punish them, אשית בישע יפיח לו. Vayipach be'apov, to exhale, to blow out, so Hakadosh Baruch Hu says, I'll issue a I'll speak out words of yeshuah for the evyonim.

אמרות השם אמרות טהורות כסף צרוף בעליל לארץ מזוקק שבעתים.

So Imrei Hashem are described in the pasuk A as being tehoros, B they're compared to kesef, to silver. So the Malbim says: נגד הדוברים עזות באמונה the Malbim in pasuk zayin: נגד הדוברים עזות באמונה, those who speak brazenly in the realm of emunah, והמשתדלים לזייף תורת השם ולדרוש בה דרשות של דופי. Unfortunately, it doesn't take imagination to come up with examples of zayif Toras Hashem and ולדרוש בה דרשות של דופי, one doesn't have to do research about what people said millennia ago. So

נגד הדוברים עזות באמונה והמשתדלים לזייף תורת השם ולדרוש בה דרשות של דופי, אומר אמרות השם אמרות טהורות. היינו המאמרים והמליצות והסיפורים שבתורה שהם לבושים וגויות,

they're like clothing and the body to החכמה האלוקית והסודות הצפונים בה שהם נשמות עליהם. Hem tehoros,

שגם הסיפורים והמליצות שבתורה הם נקיים מכל סיג. לא כאמרי הפילוסופים שילבישו את החכמות בסיפורים בדויים שאין בהם מועיל, לא כן התורה שגם הנגלה ממנה שהוא לבוש על הנעלם היא טהורה ומלאה חכמה ומוסר.

So the Malbim here, I think it reflects I think a Meshech Chochmah that Rav quotes from from the Zohar Hakadosh, this idea that the stories in Chumash, the Zohar says all have a nistardika meaning as well. Yitzchak Avinu and his avadim, there's more to the story than digging wells, but when Yaakov Avinu is shepherding sheep, there's something more that's being there's something on a very different level which is being depicted metaphorically, al derech mashal, in that. But here the Malbim says what characterizes mishlei haTorah is that not only is the nimshal pure and of incredible value, right, compared to kesef, but even the mashal.

שגם הסיפורים והמליצות שבתורה הם נקיים מכל סיג התורה שגם הנגלה ממנה שהוא לבוש על הנעלם היא טהורה ומלאה חכמה ומוסר.

So Torah, even when something is only the nigleh of Torah, but the nigleh of Torah itself is also tahor, pure, in the sense of being malei chochma. That on the nigleh-dikke level there's also tremendous chochma and there are limudim unlike Aesop's fables. So on the nigleh-dikke level, so it's right, it's nonsense; sour grapes is takke a good lesson. Sour grapes is a good lesson, that such a tendency that we have to dismiss things as sour grapes, but you know, fox don't fox don't talk and they don't and they don't jump for the grapes and they don't, the nigleh is shtus, the nigleh is a fairy tale. Ma she'ein kein אמרות ה' אמרות טהורות. This point the Rambam has also. It's a little confusing because in the pasuk the Rambam is quoting, kesef will represent the mashal and zahav the nimshal, whereas in this pasuk kesef represents the nimshal. So just please bear that in mind. So the Rambam quotes the pasuk in Mishlei that Shlomo Hamelech compares divrei Torah to תפוחי זהב במשכיות כסף. So tapuchei zahav, the inside is gold and the outer, or for a minute we'll translate maybe imprecisely according to the Rambam, the outer wrapping is silver. But the Rambam says specifically, interesting, I think lulai the Rambam we would have said maskiyot kesef, I think we would have said is lashon even maskit לא תתנו בארצכם להשתחוות עליה. It means maskit is lashon hamichuseh al ha'aretz, something that covers. So I think lulai the Rambam we would have said tapuchei zahav. You have the golden these golden balls in silver covering. But the Rambam says no, the Rambam says that maskiyot is lashon, he says the targum translates vayashkef as veistaki. And so he says that what maskiyot mean is a covering which is a type of netting with sort of tiny tiny holes the way netting will have. And he says that what it means is that the Torah's meshalim, even when you have something in the Torah which also represents a nistar, there are two characteristics of the nigleh. Listen to this extraordinary pshat of the Rambam. He says number one, the imagery of maskiyot, that it's netting that you can see, means that there are hints in the mashal, there are hints in the nigleh to what the nistardikke intent is. That's A. That's what maskiyot conveys. And B, says the Rambam, kesef, the fact that the wrapping paper is not cheap paper that you throw in the garbage, the wrapping is silver, so albeit silver is less valuable than gold, so it's not the ultimate meaning, but it's tremendously valuable. So that's what the Rambam says ככה משלי הנביאים עליהם השלום hapshatim shelahem, even the nigleh-dikke level of understanding, the wrapping, the netting which is a For instance לרבות תיקון מצב החברה האנושית, how society should function. Ken nireh, kach nireh from the peshatim of Mishlei and of Kesuvim acherim me'ein zeh. And then the nistar-dikke is talking about emunah and the inyanim relating to Hakadosh Baruch Hu. The same idea as the Malbim here, the two levels, and the chiddush being that even the nigleh-dikke level is intrinsically meaningful. אתה ה' תשמרם תצרנו מן הדור זו לעולם. The difference in the Be'ur HaMillos, so nitzor leshoni meira, so nitzor also means to guard, to safeguard. The difference between shmirah and netzirah, the Malbim explains is that netzirah is even a higher level of shmirah. So the Ata Hashem tishmerem refers to the nigleh-dikke dimension of Torah, and the titzrenu refers to the nistar-dikke, the holier, the more sacred the divrei Torah, so then the greater level of shmirah is necessary. A and B, it's also often more easily distorted. So אתה ה' תשמרם תצרנו מן הדור זו לעולם, the divrei Torah against those who look to distort divrei Torah, so Hakadosh Baruch Hu safeguards both levels of Torah, the tishmerem and the titzrenu, both the amirah, the words themselves, the simple meaning of the words as well as the deeper nimshal intent. The need for this is because saviv reshaim yis'hallachun. In this generation, Dovid Hamelech says, in this generation where reshaim as they as it were encircle divrei Torah, and what characterizes this generation, Dovid Hamelech says, is כרום זלות לבני אדם. Devarim Zolim, which are cheap, which are inauthentic, so that's what's elevated. That's what people want, that's what they're focused on, that's what's elevated for livnei adam, and that's why there's such a need for tishmerem and titzrenu. You know, in our generation it's also very true that in teaching Torah, whether teaching Torah means as all parents do within the context and confines of their home to their children, or whether it means as rabbonim do from the pulpit in shul, or as mechanchim do in the classroom. In all of those venues, there's such a need just to preserve authenticity. There's so much, from some people it's intentional bilbal hamoach, and as a result with many other people it's unintentional bilbal hamoach because of the first group. Basic basic yesodos in emuna and in hashkafa. A person doesn't need to say chiddushim to enlighten people. There's so much of the distortion and the need for tishmurem and tintzrem is a very great one. Okay, we'll stop there. Moving on to the next.