Mishlei 3:12: Tochacha from Love

Good morning Rabbas, passuk Yud-Beis. Perek Gimmel, passuk Yud-Beis.

כי אשר יאהב ה' יוכיח וכאב את בן ירצה. כי אשר יאהב ה' יוכיח כי אין דרך להוכיח רק לאוהב אשר ליבו דואג על רעהו ובוש שהולך בדרך שאינו טוב לו הוא מוכיח.

So the mitzvah of tochacha, both in terms of motivation as well as how one engages in the mitzvah, is to be concerned with the welfare of the person who's on the receiving end of the tochacha. The mitzvah is not to tell the person off. The mitzvah the way the Rambam defines here in Perek Vav, Hilchos De'os, Halacha Zayin: הרואה חברו שחטא או שהוא הולך בדרך לא טובה, mitzvah lehachziro lemutav. So the mitzvah, again, the mitzvah's not to tell the person off. The mitzvah is to have a positive influence on the person, lehachziro lemutav, to get him back on track. ולהודיעו שהוא חוטא על עצמו and to make him aware that the one who, Rachmana litzlan, suffers from chet is the person himself,

שהוא חוטא על עצמו במעשיו הרעים שנאמר הוכח תוכיח את עמיתך. המוכיח את חברו בין בדברים שבינו לבינו בין בדברים שבינו לבין המקום צריך להוכיחו בינו לבין עצמו.

It should be done in private so there's no unnecessary discomfort, so there's no unnecessary embarrassment. וידבר לו בנחת ובלשון רכה ויודיעו and the mocheiach should convey, should communicate to the one who's receiving the tochacha שאינו אומר לו אלא לטובתו ולהביאו לחיי העולם הבא. So the mitzvah of tochacha, again, is not to tell a person off. The mitzvah of tochacha is to out of love to be concerned with the welfare of a person. If you see someone who's, Rachmana litzlan, running into the street and doesn't see that there's an oncoming car, so what motivates a person to get involved is not that he's looking to tell the person off for his reckless behavior. He's looking to save the person's life. That's both the context and the content of what he's doing. And that's what the Go'on is explaining, this passuk in Mishlei, that when we receive tochacha, that's an expression of ahavah.

וכן מסתמא כאשר מוכיחך הקדוש ברוך הוא מסתמא הוא אוהב אותך.

Mistama doesn't mean probably. Sometimes we colloquially use the word mistama to mean probably. Clearly here in this context that's not what it means. What it means is, meaning that's the default setting and therefore that's how it should be understood. Even when tochacha is given as gently and properly as possible, for us who are on the receiving end, it stings because no one wants to be wrong and having to come face to face with being wrong is very difficult for us. So tochacha inevitably stings and no matter how sensitively it's done, inevitably there's an element of unavoidable embarrassment. And because of that, so we kind of project sometimes onto the mocheiach that the mocheiach doesn't mean it letovaseinu. But lema'aseh in an ideal world that is and hopefully in the real world as well that is what tochacha represents. What does the Gaon continue? וכאב את בן ירצה הוא נגד המוסר שאל תמאס. Again our posuk, the Gaon, we've seen throughout the parallelism between different psukim. So here too our posuk is following up on the two halves of the previous posuk. Uch'av ben yirtzeh is following up on the מוסר ה' בני אל תמאס. Again in each case it invokes the imagery of av and ben.

כי אין דרך לייסר רק האב את בנו ואפילו לאוהב אם אינו שומע לתוכחתו הוא עוזב אותו ללכת בדרך אשר חפץ.

Right, let's say in shul and there's a bunch of children running around and they're making noise and maybe they're climbing in a way that's dangerous. So the parents will come, they'll certainly look to rebuke all the children, but the one that they'll rebuke most is their own child. So why is that? Because the parent, out of the parent's love for the child, the more love there is, then the more of a responsibility the parent feels to provide that guidance. So too that the oheb will give tochecha, but at a certain point he's going to relent.

אבל אב את בנו אם אינו שומע לתוכחתו אף על פי כן אינו עוזבו.

Even though the child doesn't accept the rebuke, so the father doesn't abandon him, doesn't give up, אלא מוכיחו בייסורים עד שעוזב הדרך הרעה. But if necessary, so the father will even mete out yisurim to influence the child. Vehaynu, what accounts for this difference? מחמת אהבתו שגברה עליו יותר מן הכל. Because the love that the father has for the son is greater than for anyone else.

כן לבו כואב על רעתו וחפץ בהצדקו על כן מייסר אותו להיטיב לו.

Again, ayin l'ayil in terms of both the context and the content of the discipline. Vahasiman, how do we see a clear indication shemachmas ahava hu? That the father is acting out of ahava. שאחר כך כאשר יסיר שבטו ממנו, literally when he withdraws the rod, הוא חפץ למלאות רצונו ומדבר אליו תנחומים לפייס דעתו. You see that it was sort of just a momentary, it was a moment of discipline required by circumstances, because you see that the father's love is evident afterwards.

וזהו שאל תמאס את הייסורים כי כאשר מייסר אותך בייסורים מסתמא אתה חביב עליו כבן ואחר כך וכאב בן ירצה אותך וימלא רצונך.

It's clear, you know, we live in a tekufah where, you know, this form of discipline is rarely, rarely, rarely, very, very, very rarely, if ever, appropriate. That's not the tekufah we live in. Nishtanu hateva'im of children in terms of how one influences children, how one should discipline children. We don't live in a tekufah where corporal discipline is effective. In 99.99 percent of cases, it boomerangs. The story is told of Rav Wolbe that a couple came to him, their son had gone off the derech. And they came, you know, lamenting what had happened and I guess asking him to pull a rabbit out of his hat, to come up with an eitzah as to how they could bring their son back. So Rav Wolbe, presumably he had, I don't know whether he had reason to suspect this or this would have been how he would have responded in any case, So Wolbe says to the father tell me did did you hit him when he was a child growing up did you used to hit him? So the father said yeah. So Wolbe says so what do you want from me now? Now your chickens have come home to roost. We don't live in a tkufa where that works. Again we'll have a pasuk later in Mishlei, once upon a time it was an approach. Once upon a time it was an approach. Bizman hazeh it doesn't. Even when it wasn't an approach and bizman hazeh you don't I don't know it's unfortunately not something one really sees. Even when it was an approach the father was mechuyav to do it without a scintilla of anger. There couldn't be a scintilla of anger or frustration. It had to be as the Gaon is saying it had to be machmas ahava. Nowadays when you see parents hitting kids you don't really see it totally free of anger and free of frustration. It's usually just frustration and anger boiling over and okay so then one justifies it in one's mind well that's the way you're supposed to discipline children. But even when even when one lived in a tkufa that that was the way to do it it was never ever allowed much less justified if if it was tinged על אחת כמה וכמה fueled by frustration and anger. One of the ways, this is by no means the only way, but one of the ways to sort of check in our reactions to what extent our reactions are really prompted by chinuch and to what extent they reflect our own frustrations. Let's say a kid is playing ball in the house, which he's not supposed to do because there's too many things that can get too easily broken if the kid's playing ball in the house and because of that there's a reasonable rule that he's not supposed to play ball in the house. And one sees the child playing ball in the house and either one doesn't comment on it or if one does comment on it one doesn't really is not not too forceful in holding the line. And the kid continues playing ball and eventually taka there's an errant throw and a vase gets knocked over and breaks, something of that sort. And then the parent goes ballistic. Mitzad the inappropriate behavior the inappropriate behavior wasn't really greater at the point that the vase got broken than it was earlier. It was the same behavior. The same behavior. So beforehand the parent was tolerating it and now all of a sudden when the vase got broken so it became intolerable. So what's the pshat? So the pshat is no that's the parent is upset that the vase is broken. If the parent were upset that the child you know was behaving in that reckless fashion so even that was true even before the vase before the vase got broken. That's the kind of situation again that's not the only litmus test but that's one litmus test that it's not chinuch necessarily but it's chinuch which is very much combined with a sense of frustration. Tochacha על אחת כמה וכמה even in those tkufas when when the yissurim were the appropriate way to influence the child it always has to be mitoch ahava. Okay we'll stop here for today be'ezras Hashem hope to continue tomorrow. Okay have a very very good day rabosai everyone should be well be safe be'ezras Hashem.