Skip to main content

Thought for the Day: Olam Chesed Yibaneh for Yaakov to Populate Klal Yisrael

We have discussed the Maharal's explanation of how Shimon could marry Dina.  One aspect of that explanation was that there simply was no one else to marry.  Just as Adam haRishon was the beginning of humanity -- ie, B'nei Adam, so too Yaakov was the beginning of klal yisrael -- ie, B'nei Yisrael.  Just as Adam haRishon's children married siblings by necessity, so to Yaakov's children married siblings by the same necessity.  At first glance, this seems to contradict the first explanation (that they were all geirim), because a ger can marry Jew he wants.  (I know, I know... "Jews" as a label really comes from Yehuda and after the destruction of the northern kingdom.  However, you all know what I mean and it is needlessly tedious to avoid the term.)  If, on the other hand, they married each other out of necessity and "olam chesed yibaneh" (at times forbidden relations are permitted for populating the world), then why do I need the geirus explanation at all?
But I think these explanations are really complementary.  Geirus does not make a person homeless, it makes him part of klal yisrael.  In doing so, the ger loses his original relatives and can marry any other Jew.  However, klal yisrael lives at a higher level of k'dusha than the umos ha'olam.  Using a loophole (brothers and sisters are no longer halachically related) simply to permit a previously forbidden marriage is, well, just not done.  You need a very strong reason to push you in that direction.  Having no other candidates together with "olam chesed yibaneh" is that push.  The Maharal points out that Yaakov would not have married another two sisters; he married the two sisters he was supposed to marry.  Shimon would not have married another sister; he married the sister he was supposed to marry.

How did they know when they were permitted/required to do something that the Torah would later forbid?  How does that go along with the fact that the avos kept kol haTorah kulo?  Great questions.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Thought for the Day: Love in the Time of Corona Virus/Anxiously Awaiting the Mashiach

Two scenarios: Scenario I: A young boy awakened in the middle of the night, placed in the back of vehicle, told not to make any noise, and the vehicle speeds off down the highway. Scenario II: Young boy playing in park goes to see firetruck, turns around to see scary man in angry pursuit, poised to attack. I experienced and lived through both of those scenarios. Terrifying, no? Actually, no; and my picture was never on a milk carton. Here's the context: Scenario I: We addressed both set of our grandparents as "grandma" and "grandpa". How did we distinguish? One set lived less than a half hour's drive; those were there "close grandma and grandpa". The other set lived five hour drive away; they were the "way far away grandma and grandpa". To make the trip the most pleasant for all of us, Dad would wake up my brother and I at 4:00AM, we'd groggily -- but with excitement! -- wander out and down to the garage where we'd crawl

Thought for the Day: David HaMelech's Five Stages of Finding HaShem In the World

Many of us "sing" (once you have heard what I call carrying a tune, you'll question how I can, in good conscience, use that verb, even with the quotation marks) Eishes Chayil before the Friday night Shabbos meal.  We feel like we are singing the praises of our wives.  In fact, I have also been to chasunas where the chasson proudly (sometimes even tearfully) sings Eishes Chayil to his new eishes chayil.  Beautiful.  Also wrong.  (The sentiments, of course, are not wrong; just a misunderstanding of the intent of the author of these exalted words.) Chazal (TB Brachos, 10a) tell us that when Sholmo HaMelech wrote the words "She opens her mouth Mwith wisdom; the torah of kindness is on her tongue", that he was referring to his father, Dovid HaMelech, who (I am continuing to quote Chazal here) lived in five worlds and sang a song of praise [to each].  It seems to me that "world" here means a perception of reality.  Four times Dovid had to readjust his perc

Thought for the Day: אוושא מילתא Debases Yours Shabbos

My granddaughter came home with a list the girls and phone numbers in her first grade class.  It was cute because they had made it an arts and crafts project by pasting the list to piece of construction paper cut out to look like an old desk phone and a receiver attached by a pipe cleaner.  I realized, though, that the cuteness was entirely lost on her.  She, of course, has never seen a desk phone with a receiver.  When they pretend to talk on the phone, it is on any relatively flat, rectangular object they find.  (In fact, her 18 month old brother turns every  relatively flat, rectangular object into a phone and walks around babbling into it.  Not much different than the rest of us, except his train of thought is not interrupted by someone else babbling into his ear.) I was reminded of that when my chavrusa (who has children my grandchildrens age) and I were learning about אוושא מילתא.  It came up because of a quote from the Shulchan Aruch HaRav that referred to the noise of תקתוק