Thursday, April 4, 2019

Thursday's Parsha Tidbits - Parshas Tazria

The following is a brief summary of some of thoughts said over by R' Frand on the parsha this evening. I have attempted to reproduce these vorts to the best of my ability. Any perceived inconsistency is the result of my efforts to transcribe the shiur and should not be attributed to R' Frand.

R' Frand began by quoting the famous gemara in Erchin in which R' Shmuel Bar Nachmeni states that tzara'as comes for one of seven reasons, including speaking lashon hara, killing, adultery,  stealing, being stingy or being haughty. 

The Ba'al Haturim notes that the Torah states in Vayikra 13:45 that the person who has leprosy "Rosho yehiyeh paruah" - the hair of his head should be unshorn [translation courtesy of Art Scroll]. The Ba'al Haturim states that there are four times in Tanach that the word Rosho appears - twice in connection with the Metzorah, once in Noach in connection with the Migdal Bavel (Bereishis 11;4) where the head of the tower was to be in the heavens and once in Job in which it states that his head was in the clouds [feel free to post the cite in Job in the comments if you know it]. 

The Ba'al Haturim explains that the tzara'as comes because a person thinks too highly of himself and his head is in the clouds.

R' Frand next noted that when the Metzorah brings his sacrifice, in addition to the pair of birds, he also brings cedar wood and ezov (moss). The moss is amongst the lowest of the plant life and the cedar the tallest. Rashi explains that this is symbolic that the person was afflicted with tzara'as because he was haughty and he needs to lower himself like the distance from the tall cedar to the lowly moss.

The Sfas Emes asks - why is that the person needs both the moss and the cedar? If the point is to humble him, why not just use the moss alone? The answer is that the person needs to do more than just feel humble, he needs to recognize what he has been given and the source for the gift. 

R' Frand explained that the afflicted person was haughty for a reason - he actually had certain gifts that he felt prideful about. The cedar is the symbol of that greatness, but he needs to realize that the gift is from Hashem. This is the purpose of the moss, to drive home that he is not the reason that he has these things and that he is nothing without Hashem giving them to him.

R' Frand said that he once heard a story from R' Meir Zlotowitz who said that the Chofetz Chaim was heard late in life saying - what can I do for You Hashem to repay You for all the good? One would think that the Chofetz Chaim could feel that he deserved what he had because of all the seforim he wrote, but he felt like he owed a debt to Hashem to repay Him for the gifts.

R' Frand closed the vort by going back to the Sfas Emes who noted that Moshe was the greatest Anav because he was also the wisest person and recognized that everything came from Hashem.

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