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Parshat Matot-Massei
By: Rabbi Moshe Goodman, Kollel Ohr Shlomo, Hebron

בס"ד

לשכנו תדרשו

Discovering the Holy Presence in Our Holy Land

ראשי המטות

'May Your mercies be aroused HaShem our G-d, upon the righteous, upon the pious, upon the elders of Your people, the House of Israel, upon the remnant of their sages, upon the righteous proselytes and upon us. Grant ample reward to all who truly trust in Your Name, and place our lot among them; may we never be disgraced, for we have put our trust in You. Blessed are You HaShem, the support and security of the righteous.'

This parsha begins with an address to the righteous leaders of the people about the laws of vows and how they pertain to the relationship between father and daughter and between husband and wife. We learn from this address that it is the responsibility of the spiritual leaders of the people, to bring peace between opposites, i.e masculine and feminine.

Even within one person there are masculine and feminine forces that can be found, for example, in the annulment of vows ['hatarat nedarim']. The feminine' force within a person brings a person to find a personal structure which may be at variance with the constant and regular way of the collective. This search for personal structure brings one to make a vow. However, the 'masculine' force is constant, invariant, which brings a person to abstain from making a vow, which changes one's status from that of the collective whole. Therefore, we can understand why, when annulling a vow, one must first find something that one misunderstood, or didnt know, at the time of the vow, which would supply a reason to annul this vow, and then check this reason ['petach'] with a competent halachic authority.

One example of such a reason is saying, 'if I had known that my future-wife likes to bake cakes, I would not have vowed to abstain from eating cakes.' Essentially, this reason ['petach'] brings one to one's previous state, i.e his/her 'constant masculine' state, before 'the change', i.e the 'feminine' vow, and therefore by this 'reason'/'petach' one can annul this vow. After validating this 'reason' with a competent halahic authority, one must go to three men, which may represent the 'masculine constant collective' in our explanation here, to actually annul this vow. Similarly, in the nullification of vows ['hafarat nedarim'] by a father or husband it is specifically the man in this relationship that is given the right to nullify the vow of a woman.

The importance of the leaders of the People in this section of our parsha shows that the spiritual leaders of the People have both the responsibility and the Divine guidance to bring peace between opposites both within a person and in interpersonal relationships. Indeed, our Sages teach that 'Torah scholars bring peace to the world.'

In the past we have also shown how the relationship between Israel and the Land of Israel is compared to a relationship between husband and wife. Therefore, it is not surprising that we find in the book of Shoftim that the 'reward' given to Otniel ben Kenaz who conquered a city in the Land of Israel, Kiryat Sefer, was to marry the daughter of Kaleb, the hero of Hebron who courageously spoke in praise of conquering the Holy Land, despite the plot of the spies. This special connection between Otniel and Kaleb also explains why Otniel is buried in Hebron and not in Kiryat Sefer. Otniel's burial in Hebron ties an interesting connection between Hebron and Kiryat Sefer. Our Sages explain that Otniel's name is a derivative of the term 'anao el', i.e God answered his prayers. What did Otniel pray for? Our Sages teach that the prayer said by Yabetz in Chronicles II 55 is actually the prayer of Otniel, whose other name was Yabetz. They homiletically interpret this prayer in Chronicles to refer to Otniel's prayer, to be a great Torah scholar, to teach many students, not to forget the Torah he has learned, and other similar spiritual requests.

Indeed, Otniel is identified as one of the great Torah scholars of all time who was capable of regaining, by his in-depth Torah analysis, 1700 Torah laws that were forgotten during the mourning period on Moshe Rabeinu's passing. In this way, the city Otniel conquered, Kiryat Sefer - 'City of the Book' - can connote Otniel's special connection to the Book of Books, the Holy Torah. Yet still, Otniel is buried in Hebron which also refers to Torah, as the Zohar teaches: 'Hebron refers to Torah, for one who occupies himself with Torah is called a haber - Torah scholar'.

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 Real Stories from the Holy Land #227

'I usually take a ride with someone. However, one day I wanted to give joy to my wife by calling her on my way home, and this was not possible if I took my regular ride. Therefore, I took a ride on the regular Hebron mini-van where I could talk with my wife at ease. It turns out that just that day this mini-van took a different route than it normally does, which brought me much closer to home than usual.' Y.A.B

Sources: Temura 16a

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