“Draw, and take yourselves a sheep . . .” (Exodus 12:21)
The Midrash (Mechilta, Bo 11:2) teaches that “draw” in this verse—concerning the commandment to prepare a Paschal Lamb—means “withdraw your hands from idol worship, and then take yourselves a sheep . . .”
In his holy book Imrei Elimelech (p. 183) my father asks, “Does this mean that our teacher Moses, up until that moment, did not order the Jewish people to desist from idolatry?” The Imrei Elimelech, in the context of this question, also refers to another question posed by the Prisha.
The Prisha’s commentary on the Tur, Shulhan Aruch, Orach Chaim cap. 402 asks, “Why is the Sabbath before Passover referred to by our sages as Shabbat HaGadol and not Shabbat Rabbah? If the decision to name this Sabbath specifically was made by the Rabbis of the talmudic era, it should reflect their preference for Aramaic nomenclature. The Hebrew word gadol is hardly ever used by the Rabbis to designate something ‘great.’ Hence, Yom Kippur is called Tzoma Rabbah (The Great Fast) by the talmudic sages.” The Prisha infers that the “greatness” in the name of this Sabbath refers not to a specific miracle, as was previously believed, but to something more classical and general.
A possible explanation may be as follows. In the Talmud (Berachoth 33b) we learn; R. Chanina said: “Everything is heaven—sent except the fear of heaven, as it is written (Deut. 10:12), ‘And now, Israel, what does God want of you? Only that you fear God your Lord . . .’ ” Is the fear of God then such an easily discharged endeavor? Has not R. Chanina taught in the name of R. Simeon b. Yochai that God has nothing in His treasurehouse but His vaunted hoard of the Fear of Heaven, as it is written (Isaiah 33:6), “Fear of God is His treasure.” O Yes! For Moses it was a very small matter indeed. As R. Chanina explained, “A parable: If a man is asked for something big and he has it, it takes on very small dimension; if, on the other hand, he is asked for something small, but does not have it, it grows in stature.”
Behold, God is close to every Jewish person, even when the person is not fit. As it is written (Deut. 4:7), “What nation is so great that they have God close to them, as God our Lord is to us, whenever we call Him?” Besides its commonly accepted meaning, this verse, with its use of the Hebrew word gadol for greatness, also hints to us that even though the Jew may, God forbid, not merit God’s closeness and His salvation, nevertheless the Holy One, blessed be He, is close to that person and saves him.
When Moses calls the Jewish people gadol—great—he is referring to a particular greatness whereby God is still very close to them even when if asked “Are you close to God?” they would have to answer, “No.” At such times the Jewish person is like anyone who when asked about a small matter that he lacks considers it a great matter, as was illustrated in the parable from R. Chanina above. So Israel’s greatness is that even when they lack closeness to God—and this closeness seems overwhelmingly great to them precisely because they have so little of it—God is still very close to them. God’s closeness is their greatness, and this is what Moses meant when he said, “What nation is so great . . . ?”
There is a famous midrashic teaching (Yalkut Shimoni vol. II cap. 355) quoting R. Mathia b. Chairaish: “God saw that a day would come when the Jewish people would not merit redemption. He gave them, therefore, the two blood commandments, the blood of the Paschal Lamb and the blood of their circumcision, as it is written (Ezekiel 16:6): ‘I passed over you and saw you wallowing in your blood and I said to you: “Through your blood shall you live.” ’ ”
From this teaching we learn that by the time the Jewish people were redeemed, they had acquired merit through their observance of the two above-mentioned commandments. But on the Sabbath before Passover, they had not yet acquired any merit, as the two observances were still in their future. Though they were without merit, God was close to them; and they were given the commandments to take a lamb for the Paschal sacrifice and to circumcise themselves. They were bereft of closeness to God, and so they considered it at the level of “a great thing,” as was discussed in the parable above. Therefore this Sabbath is known as the Great Sabbath—Gadol, Great—in memory of their closeness to God.
The verse (Psalms 147:19) says: “He teaches His words to Jacob, His statutes and laws to Israel. He did not do this for every nation, nor did He teach them His laws.” We need to understand why the verse says first “His statutes and laws to Israel,” regarding the Jews, while regarding the nations it says only “nor did He teach them His laws.” Why is it not written that God denied the nations knowledge of His statutes as well?
A person may think that he understands logical concepts because of their intrinsic comprehensibility, but he is mistaken. The truth is that the capacity to understand is complicated by one’s personality. One’s essential, individual self puts limits on every attempt at pure intellectual objectivity. Even such “self-evident” laws as those prohibiting robbery and murder are not logical, rational, or natural “laws”—for as we see now, there are nations whose objective and self-evident reality necessitates and clearly proves that it is right to rob any man of his wealth, and even to murder people.
That is why Maimonides, of blessed memory, notes in the sixth chapter of his work “The Eight Chapters,” that our holy sages were very particular in their choice of language when they made the following statement (Torath Cohanim, Kedoshim): “A person should not say, ‘I have no desire to eat forbidden mixtures of milk and meat,’ or ‘I have no desire to wear forbidden admixtures of wool and linen,’ or ‘I have no desire for forbidden sexual relationships.’ Rather a person ought to say, ‘I would like to do any of these things, but how can I, when my Father in heaven has forbidden me?’ The sages chose for this dictum only those commandments that are statutes. They did not say that a person ought to say that he desires to rob or murder. Obviously, any person who refrains from robbing and murdering only because he is forbidden to do so, and not because he is repelled by the act itself, is a perverse and corrupt human being.”
A perverse and corrupt person does desire robbery and murder even though they are everywhere considered rationally, logically, or naturally forbidden acts. A corrupt person can justify and rationalize anything. Only someone who is essentially good understands that these acts arc intrinsically wrong.
Consequently, when a Jewish person draws himself close to the Holy One, blessed be He, and to Torah, then even those commandments that are statutes, and not intrinsically comprehensible, also begin to seem obvious. This understanding does not come from intellectualizing or from logic or from any particular reasoning. Only those things that are essentially unnatural or counterintuitive are understood through these reasoning processes. Things that are an integral and essential part of a person, however, are understood and grasped with the same kind of simple cognition as that with which a person perceives himself.
Returning to Psalm 147:19, the verse says: “His statutes and laws to Israel.” The “statutes” of the Torah are also natural, logical, and rational “laws” to the Jewish people because the Jewish people are so intrinsically connected to the Torah. The psalmist goes on to say, “He did not do this for every nation, nor did He teach them His laws,” because the nations cannot comprehend that “statutes” are as natural as “laws.” Only a Jew has this level of understanding.
Although the actual first commandment in the Torah was “This month shall be the head month to you,” (Exodus 12:1) it was observed only by Moses and Aaron at that time. So the first commandment given to the Jewish people was the commandment relating to the Pascal lamb, which is essentially a statute. To understand a statute as naturally as a law, one must become united with the Torah. Therefore, when the Jewish people came to observe their first commandment, and God was drawing very close to the Jewish people even though they did not have any merit, the verse that opens this chapter told the Jewish people, “Withdraw your hands from idol worship.” The Hebrew words for “idol worship,” avodah zarah, may also be translated as “strange worship.” Moses was saying, “Let not the worship of God, the Torah, and the commandments be strange to you.” They must become part of your essential being.