It is a very thin line that divides liberty and bondage, a
free man from a slave, and that is the knowledge of to whom
one must be bound, whom one must serve. The sign of true
freedom is when the possessed recognizes his master. One who
deludes himself out of foolishness into thinking that he is a
liberated man is in reality a slave, for he is shackled to
the impulses of his evil inclination and the desires of his
heart.
A Jew is commanded to be a servant of Hashem, for only in
this manner can he give full expression to his liberty. By
subserving himself to the Torah, he is exercising the utmost
and ultimate in the power of free choice which the Creator
granted him. "There is no man as free as one who is immersed
in Torah" (Pirkei Ovos 6:2). The converse is equally
true: one who chooses the "freedom" that appeals to him while
rejecting servitude towards Hashem, becomes enslaved to every
possible enticement, compulsion, and obsession that comes his
way.
"If you buy a Jewish slave . . . " The juxtaposition of the
portion dealing with the Jewish slave and the previous
portion which deals with the giving of the Torah at Sinai is
to teach us that freedom was granted to Israel at matan
Torah; it protects and prevents us from becoming enslaved
to any other thing save Hashem (Sfas Emes, Mishpotim
61b).
And if, notwithstanding, a Jew is sold to pay back his theft
or out of poverty, he bears the title of a "Hebrew slave"
(eved ivri), which is a temporary state. The Ohr
HaChaim notes that the word "ivri" actually designates
his transitory state as something passing, oveir,
rather than permanent as with the Canaanite slave. Hashem is
the Master of all Jewish slaves and He decreed that they be
released before the seventh year of their servitude.
Shem MiShmuel explains this in a similar manner: "The
name `ivri' denotes `eiver hanohor,' the other
side of the river, and it indicates the essence of the Hebrew-
Jew who is essentially from the world of the free. Therefore
Jewish bondage cannot be forever. Enslavement cannot bind
them because they are intrinsically fetterless. And even if a
Jew has succumbed to sin and has been forced to sell himself,
it is only a temporary state" (Mishpotim 1).
The Jew who thinks that he is free from the yoke of servitude
to Hashem and His Torah and thus enjoys a state of "freedom"
is sadly mistaken. The very opposite is true. He is
regressing to the dark age of history where "In the beginning
our ancestors were idol worshippers." He is galloping
backwards to the benighted period where mankind was enslaved
to false gods, back to Terach and those who preceded him.
And even if he denies this angrily and insists that he is
progressive and enlightened, he is mistaken. For a Jew has
only two choices: to be a true free man who elects his real
freedom out of understanding that his allegiance to Hashem is
what liberates him from all other drives and pressures, or to
live in the bitter delusion of a spurious freedom where he is
enslaved to whatever false god or false ideology is in
fashion at that particular period.
"The reason why the Torah uses the term `ivri' and not
`your brother' or `Israelite,' or a combination using the
word ivri, like `If your Hebrew brother or Hebrew
sister shall be sold to you,' is to denote that `all the seed
of Avrohom were from the other side (eiver) of the
river,' where his ancestors were idol-worshippers. After the
Hebrews entered the covenant of the Shechina, they
assumed the name `Israel.' This sinner, who was sold to pay
back his theft, reverts to the name Ivri since he
returns to the practices of those who preceded Avrohom"
(Kli Yokor).
*
There are two stages in the state of Hebrew servitude as
taught in this parsha. The first is the act of being
sold due to circumstances, where we relate to him
accordingly. We find, "Even though he is a slave with regard
to marrying a Canaanite maidservant, he is still considered a
Hebrew and is obligated with all the mitzvos and you are
bound to treat him with mercy and compassion, as you would
your Hebrew brother sold to you" (Oznayim LaTorah
201).
Then there is the second stage of "And if the slave shall say
to you . . . " If the time has come for a slave to be
liberated and he says, "I choose not to leave . . . " then he
is designated as a slave and not a Hebrew, and the Torah even
refers to him as `THE slave,' ho'evved. He has assumed
the slave mentality and is essentially a slave.
At this second stage, he is no longer coerced by
circumstances to submit himself to bondage but chooses it of
his own free will. In other words, he rejects the servitude
of Hashem in exchange for human servitude, and he is duly
branded as a slave. Then "His master shall pierce his ear
with an awl and he shall serve him le'olom."
Rashi notes, "Why was the ear chosen of all bodily organs [to
bear the stigma of servitude]? Said R' Yochonon ben Zakkai:
This very ear that heard at Mt. Sinai: Thou shalt not steal,
and went and stole -- shall be pierced. And if he became a
slave because he was sold out of poverty [we say to him]:
This ear that heard at Mt. Sinai that `Israel are slaves unto
Me' -- and went and acquired a master for himself -- shall be
pierced" (Mechilta).
When a Jew chooses slavery, he is betraying his unique inner
essence, for the very nature of the liberation from Egypt,
from the House of Bondage, was to be removed from bondage
forevermore. And here he goes and does the very opposite of
what is expected of him: he sells himself as a slave! He
justly deserves the shameful stigma of "an eved
nirtza."
R' Shimon used to explain this passage homiletically: Why
were the door and the doorpost designated for this act of
enslavement out of all the parts of the house? Said
Hakodosh Boruch Hu: This door and doorpost were the
witnesses in Egypt when I passed over the lintels and the two
doorposts and I declared: To me are the Children of Israel
slaves, they are My slaves and not slaves unto slaves. And
this one went and acquired for himself a master - - [his ear]
shall be pierced before them" (Rashi, Kiddushin
22b).
*
"They are My servants, and not servants to servants." These
are the two choices facing a Jew at all times. Either to be a
servant of Hashem or a slave to slaves. Our diasporan history
is rich with examples of Jews swarming to all kinds of
"refuges" and illusory havens of freedom and equality,
especially in the past two centuries, when a plethora of
movements and ideologies mushroomed throughout the world,
each promising utopian bliss, and all, inevitably, ending up
in a great disappointment, after having physically buried
under their debris hundreds of millions of people including a
great percentage of Jews who were swept up with the winds of
the times, Jews who turned their backs on the everlasting
choice that the Torah offers them.
Who can count the numbers of Jews incarcerated under the
detritus of the downfall of these false movements, where only
a very few managed at the last moment to catch themselves in
time and grab hold of the lifeline of Jewish eternity? These
few realized that even under the crushing wheels of the
compressing tortures and troubles exerted against them by
their persecutors and enemies there was far more liberty for
a Jew who holds on tightly to his faith in Hashem and keeps
His commandments, than there is in all of the splendid
palaces of glittering promises offered for human happiness,
from those who turned out to be different oppressors and
despotic enslavers.
And these, in turn, were no less slaves to their own personal
inclinations, to their lust for power; they sought their own
good and not the public weal. These were the selfsame slaves
to whom the Torah warned Israel not to be become enslaved.
"They are My servants, and not slaves to slaves."
This was the core of the message of liberation from the
bondage of Egypt, the deliverance from the House of Bondage.
And lo, these same Jews are alienating their inner souls by
virtually turning themselves about and returning there. For
this is the commentary of the verse, "I am Hashem your G-d
Who took you out of the land of Egypt, from the House of
Bondage." The fact that I designated My name upon you to be
called "your G-d" was the reason why I delivered you from the
land of Egypt and the House of Bondage. You were meant to be
enslaved for a full four hundred years.
We have Hashem to thank for delivering us both from Egypt and
from the House of Bondage. And what was the purpose of our
exodus? Not simply to shake off the yoke of slavery but in
order to experience the historic event of the Giving of the
Torah at Sinai where we accepted upon us the yoke of Heavenly
allegiance, to be Hashem's people and to bear the torch of
our loyalty to Him forevermore.
For without this, there is no purpose in our having left
Egypt. Anyone who intends to become enslaved to anything
other than to Hashem forfeits his name as a Jew because this
is diametrically opposed to the essence and basis of our
people. "If you shall buy a Hebrew slave . . . " He is called
"Hebrew" because the Torah was loathe to couple the term
"slave" with "Israelite" and preferred to say "Hebrew"
(Ohr HaChaim).
*
The exile and bondage that was visited upon the Jewish people
through Divine decree, the very exile we are living through
until the eagerly awaited Redemption comes, is one matter.
The exile of the spirit and the mind which, to our regret, is
visited upon Jews by their own folly as they flock to
subjugate themselves to all kinds of follies of the times --
is another.
The first pains us and we pray to Hashem to redeem us from
it. We pray that the designated "six years indenture" pass
already and that we enjoy the liberation of the "seventh
year," as is alluded to in a holy work that "the seventh,
which is internal, restores the world of freedom to its
source and place" (see Shem MiShmuel, Mishpotim 1).
The second type of servitude however, which is a product of a
person's choice, is also a punishment in the same manner as
the Jewish slave who wishes to remain with his master is
punished, as we see, "And if he verily says: I love my master
. . . " -- he is branded with a pierced ear.
It can be asked why he isn't maimed immediately after he is
sold by beis din or he sells himself? The answer is
that a person is not judged and punished on two accounts. If
a thief is obliged to pay double and he has the means to do
so, he accepts his sentence and is absolved of further
punishment. If he was sold by beis din to pay for his
theft, his punishment is servitude. And if he was sold out of
dire poverty, this is beyond his control; it is the necessity
of circumstances.
But after his six year term, he has been removed from those
circumstances and can be a free man again. But if he is
determined to remain in this servitude, regardless of the
reason that forced him into it, it is a matter of choice. He
is removing the yoke of Hashem upon him as a free man and
opting for the yoke of the slave. In any event, that ear of
his deserves a stigma for not having listened to the message
at Sinai and preferring servitude over the freedom of serving
Hashem independently" (Kli Yokor).
The State of Israel has been carrying on a campaign of
"independence" ever since it achieved statehood in 1948. And
that independence has not yet been achieved for it is based
on the heretical premise of the founders of Zionism who
sought to liberate the Jewish people by rebelling against its
bondage to the yoke of Heaven. This built-in contradiction,
this denial of true freedom which was acquired by our exodus
from the House of Slavery in order to become servants of
Hashem, and the attempt to bring about the ultimate
redemption by literal force, cannot possibly come to
fruition.
Heads of government rise and fall with lightning speed, along
with the herd of their foolish followers, alternately
cheering or groaning in commiseration, seesawing to positions
of power in a rising rate of change -- all because they
refuse to bend an ear to the rebuke of the prophet, "Thus
says Hashem: cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes
flesh his arm and whose heart departs from Hashem"
(Yirmiyohu 17:5). The Malbim translates those words as
following: "The arm is the part that activates the hand. In
reality, that hand does not move through the power of the
flesh but by the might of Hashem. Hashem is the arm, as it
were, whilst man thinks that the flesh is the arm, in other
words, he thinks that motion is a natural process . . . "
*
Let us give credit to the tribe of Levi of modern times, the
growing, burgeoning corps of Torah scholars, shomrei
mitzvos with adherence and exactitude. For even in this
generation of gross materialism, they prefer the eternal
spiritual world of Torah over servitude to the vanities of
this world. They forego luxuries and comforts and are
prepared to live a life of material deprivation and choosing
the wealth of spirituality. They willingly espouse the truth
of "There is no man as free as one who is involved in Torah
study." It is they who are blazing the way for the imminent
Redemption.
One of the ills and evils of this suffering generation is an
enslavement to keeping up a "standard of living" which is
anchored in self love, albeit misguided, where one imagines
that for the personal benefit of himself and his family, one
must toil arduously in order to attain the maximum of
comforts and luxuries in life. Any lesser degree is falling
short of one's obligation. Such enslavement also deserves the
stigma of the pierced ear, as is brought by the Kli Yokor in
this parsha.
"Herein lies a hidden message to all those blind ones in the
Hebrew camp who assume throughout their lives the burden of
all kinds of enslavement upon their shoulders, toil and pain
for the sake of increased material acquisition. These people
sell their very souls for life in order to obtain more and
more, all the while declaring that they are forced to earn
more and more for the upkeep of wife and children. Everything
is only for their sake and such a person sees himself
continuing to toil to the end of his days. He is, in effect,
repeating the words of the Hebrew slave who wishes to remain
in bondage after the completion of the six years: `I love my
wife and my children; I shall not go free.'
"He is enslaved to them and their welfare and will never rest
until he has used up all of his strength and wasted his whole
life in the pursuit of their security. He is in constant
feverish activity, rushing along for the sake of his family.
But they will accompany him only as far as the grave, and
then will take their leave. This is also coupled in the
statement that `his master shall bring him to the judges,'
which also denotes the Final Judgment.
"Each person will have to defend his actions during his
lifetime. At this juncture, he will not be able to claim that
he `loved his wife and children.' They did not love him
enough to accompany him past the grave and to his final
judgment. They leave him at the door, so to speak, where sin
lurks in waiting. They will not pass through the gateway in
order to defend him. Here sin will appear and plead its case
of condemnation. This idea is very profound and is an
integral part of the mystic Torah."
"You are My servants." The servants of Hashem, and this is a
prime secret of our exalted life.
It is told that the Sfas Emes of Ger zy'a once
addressed his followers on Succos and told them that if they
concentrate deeply on the words "Onno Hashem" during
Hallel, they would be able to accomplish anything and
everything. On the following day, the congregation of
chassidim verily roared -- half of them cried aloud
the first half of the verse, "Onno Hashem hoshi'oh noh
[Hashem, save us]" while the rest vent their might upon the
second half, "Onno Hashem hatzlichoh noh [Hashem,
grant us success]."
At this occasion, his son, the Imrei Emes, remarked,
"I think that my father really had another Onno Hashem
in mind: `Onno Hashem ki ani avdecho -- I plead with
You, Hashem, [to hearken unto me] for I am Your servant . . .
' "
