בס”ד

In this week’s reading we find the commandment of attaching to G-d. Our sages explain that this means emulating His activities, like visiting the sick and burying the dead. How does it apply to words? Can we emulate His words that create the world?

This week’s Torah reading is called Eikev, which means “because of.” The reading begins: “Because you will fulfill My commandments, I,” says G-d, “will keep My covenant with you,” and so on.

The Torah itself contains many, many commandments, and in this particular reading there is one — just one — called in Hebrew devekut. Devekut means attachment, to join, so to speak, with G-d. The Torah says: “You will attach yourself to Me,” says G-d.

Our Sages ask the obvious question: How can you attach yourself to G-d? He is immaterial and spiritual; we are material. What does that even mean? The Sages answer: you must emulate G-d.

Just as He visits the sick — as we know He visited Avraham, our forefather, after his circumcision — so you should go and visit the sick. Just as He buries the dead — as we know He buried Moshe Rabbeinu when he passed away — therefore you should work on burying your dead. In other words, you have to emulate G-d’s actions. That is what it means to attach yourself to Him: be like Him, behave like Him.

Now, there is one detail in His behavior that we apparently cannot emulate. We know that G-d creates the world constantly through His words. This is what the Torah says: G-d said, “Let there be light” — and there was light. “Let there be heavens” — and there were heavens, and so on. He spoke and created the world.

How can we emulate this? Do our words actually create worlds? The answer is no — obviously not. However, our words can have an effect in the world. How do we see this?

I will bring two teachings from two great Sages, from different times and different places in the world, that explain how our words can have an effect on another person.

The first was Rabbi Yaakov Tam, who lived in France in the 1100s. He was the grandson of Rashi, the great commentator on the Torah. Rabbi Tam was a great sage, and he used to say one particular phrase: “Words that come from the heart reach the heart.” They have an effect on the other person’s heart.

If you just talk — and those words don’t really come from you — you’re just speaking, and so on, then that is not going to reach the heart. That is not going to have an effect on the other person. In other words, it is not going to create something in the other person. But if you speak from your heart, those words penetrate the other person’s heart and have an effect there. That’s the first idea, from Rabbi Tam.

The second idea comes from Rabbi Moshe Alshich, a student of the Arizal, around the 1500s in Tzfat, in the north of the Land of Israel. He wrote quite a lot and was one of the very few sages referred to as the holy — like the “holy Arizal,” the “holy Shlah,” and so on. The “holy Alshich” wrote a commentary on the previous parasha, where the Torah talks about the love of G-d.

One of the ideas he brings there, in connection to the Shema and the various commandments in it, is about the verse: “You shall teach your children.” That is the regular translation: you shall teach your children the words of Torah, and so on. But the Torah uses a very special word here.

It does not say, as it says in other places, t’lamed, “you shall teach” — which comes from limud, learning. Instead, it says v’shinantam. Shinun means to repeat. “You will repeat and repeat and repeat” — say it so many times until they understand it, until it is clear in their minds. That is what it means to teach your children.

However, here comes the Alshich’s commentary. He says something very interesting: shinun does not only mean to repeat. It also comes from the word for “sharp.” When something is sharpened, it means it is pointed and penetrating.

The Alshich connects this to a verse in Psalms: “The arrows of a mighty person are very sharp.” What does that mean? When you take a bow and want to shoot an arrow, the more you pull the arrow back — the closer you bring it to your own heart — the farther it will go and the deeper it will penetrate into the target.

The Alshich explains: What does it mean to teach your children? It is not just talking about something, not just repeating it. It is more than that. It must be very deep in your own heart. The deeper it is in your own heart, the deeper it will reach the other person’s heart.

So we see that words do have an effect in the world. Our words have an impact. And through our words, we can learn to emulate G-d. As we learn in this week’s portion: attach yourself to G-d, join Him, emulate Him. How do you do that with your words? The deeper they are in your heart, the deeper their effect will be on someone else.

Talk from Rabbi Tuvia Serber


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