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This week’s reading contains the second paragraph of the three-paragraph “MOTTO” of Judaism; “Shema Yisroel.

“If you do what I want; to love G-d and serve Him with all your heart and soul, then I will give the rain when you need it and you will gather up your grain, wine and oil and your animals will have grasses etc. (11:13)”

It is written in every Mezuza, in every pair of Tefillin and Jews are commanded to say it twice daily

But seemingly it poses a few problems:

First: Why does it say the reward for serving G-d is only physical grain, wine and oil?! Why not everlasting heavenly bliss or salvation?

Secondly: The Talmud explains that this promise of “gathering your grains”, etc. is a punishment!
Namely that if Jews serve Gd ONLY with their heart and soul then they will have to do the gathering themselves. But if they serve with heart soul AND MIGHT (as it says in the first paragraph of “Shema”) then others will gladly do the menial work for them, and they will be free to learn Torah.

What’s so bad about not serving with ‘All your might’?

Finally: These words “If you do MY commandments then “I” will give the rains etc” were spoken by Moshe (as was all the book of Deuteronomy). How could he speak for Gd? Moses didn’t give commandments or bring rain.

He should have said: “If you do what “G-D” wants, “G-D” will give you!!”

I would like to answer all this with a Baal Shem Tov story.

Reuven was in trouble. Big trouble. Five years had passed since he last paid the rent on his farm, things weren’t improving but he trusted in Gd for a miracle.

The Baron had been so busy that he miraculously had overlooked Reuven’s little farm year after year. But the miracle came to an abrupt end one cold snowy winter day, when a large fine carriage drawn by four splendid horses stopped before Reuven’s old house. The driver opened the door, and out stepped a huge man in an immense white fur coat with high shining leather boots and a long, curled moustache… it was the Baron himself.

Reuven peeked through a window as the Baron strode angrily through the snow, down the path to his door, and gave it two mighty blows with his fist. When Reuven opened up, he grabbed him by the front of his shirt, pulled him outside, shot a steely look at him as though he was some sort of insect, pushed his forefinger repeatedly into poor Reuven’s chest and bellowed: “FIVE YEARS!! You owe me FIVE YEARS!!! If I don’t have ALL THE RENT in a week….DO YOU UNDERSTAND? ALL THE RENT IN ONE WEEK!! You and your family are sleeping in the….” his nose was touching Reuven’s as he lifted him off the ground, then threw him on his back and screamed “…SNOW!!!”

The Baron stormed back down the path, and as Reuven was brushing himself off watching the carriage fade into the horizon, he knew that he was in big trouble. His only hope was the Baal Shem Tov (Besh’t for short).

He set out immediately in his wagon, and early the next morning he was in the town of Mezibuz waiting in line to see the great Tzaddik.

When he entered the Baal Shem’s room, he almost forgot what he wanted to ask. So great was the simple holiness there. But when the Master looked up at him from behind his desk, poor Reuven began weeping, “My family, my wife and five children will be thrown in to street, they’ll all die of cold and hunger. Ooy Rebbe!! Save me!!”

The Besh’t handed him a closed envelope, assured him that he had nothing to worry about, and gave him instructions:

“Give this to the Baron as soon as possible, but DON’T OPEN IT UP!”

Reuven was so overjoyed he wanted to fall to his knees and kiss the Besht’s feet. He thanked him profusely as he backed out of the room, ran to his wagon and joyously began the ten-hour journey to the Baron’s castle a song on his lips. But after a few hours of travelling alone in the beautiful Polish countryside, he began wondering. What could the Besh’t possibly have written that would calm the Baron? And in what language? The Baron only spoke Polish. Could it be that the Besh’t had such a convincing command of Polish? Usually he only spoke Yiddish. But Reven pushed these pointless ideas from his mind, and prided himself for ignoring them.

“I must put my complete trust in the Tzaddik”, he said to himself. “After all, the Baal Shem NEVER made a mistake.”

But a few lonely hours later the thoughts returned. He had taken his mind off them a hundred times, but his curiosity was conquering him. “What possible harm could it make to just PEEK??”

After ten hours, the Baron’s castle loomed up in the distance. “Made it!” he said to himself as he tied his horse to a tree and got out. But as he was walking toward the massive castle door a horrible idea crossed his mind:

“What if the Baal Shem made a mistake and gave me the wrong envelope!! What if it’s EMPTY!! After all, I didn’t see him put anything in it. Wow! Good thing that I thought of it before it was too late!”

The envelope wasn’t even sealed; he just lifted the flap and took a “peek”. Aha! Sure enough, the letter was there. Just another little look here… and before he knew it, he had pried the folded letter partially open without  removing it, and was craning his head around trying to discern a letter or two.

“Gevalt!!” he whispered to himself. The paper was … blank!!!

Suddenly the door opened and the Baron himself was standing before him.

“Brought me the rent, Jew? Very good!! Well, that was quick wasn’t it! Let’s have a look!” He snatched the envelope from Reuven’s hand and took out the “letter”.

Reuven was expecting that any moment the Baron would explode in rage. But after several minutes of pregnant silence, he looked up from the letter and said in a very friendly tone. “All right, Jew. I’ll forget about the five-year debt. Clean slate, O.K.? But from now on I want the rent on time every month. Do you understand? I won’t be so lenient next time”. And he slammed the door shut.

Reuven ran back to his wagon and headed back to the Baal Shem. IT WAS A MIRACLE! The next day he was standing before the Besh’t, big smile on his face, full of gratitude.

“Tell me exactly what happened.” Said the Baal Shem.

“It was incredible! The Baron actually wiped off the entire debt and let me go!! I’m a free man! Rebbe! You saved my life and the life of my family how can I…..”

The Baal Shem didn’t look pleased, “He erased the entire debt? That’s all? Tell me, did you open the letter?”

“Well, umm umm” Stammered Reuven sheepishly, “I didn’t really open it…. that is, it was already open, sort of. I did take a small peek, just to see that there was no mistake.”

“Ahhh! Why did you look!?” exclaimed the Besh’t. “Couldn’t you control yourself?! If you would have left that letter alone, the Baron would have given you the entire farm as a gift, forever!”

This answers our questions. Why only mundane rewards for doing Gd’s will? Why must we serve with all our ‘might’? And how can Moses speak in first person as though he is Gd?

We saw in our story the importance of listening to the Tzadik.

The purpose of the Jews is to reveal G-d in this physical world, and make the world holy. In other words; to show the TRUE meaning in every human and every detail of the world. To fill the world with the awareness of the Creator.

But this can only be done through a true leader: as we saw in our story. The first such leader was Moses.

All the Jews “saw” G-d on Mt. Sinai, but only Moshe Gd the true message. As we said many times; that this PHYSICAL world is potentially ‘higher’ than all the spiritual ones. Because here, G-D gets pleasure from our deeds.

Therefore, Moshe wanted to enter Israel he wanted only to please HaShem here on earth. While the Jews wanted to stay in the desert, which is similar to heaven.

That is why the “Shema” prayer doesn’t mention the rewards of Heaven. Because, compared to the G-dly treasures of this physical creation, heaven is nothing.

For instance; grain, wine and oil represent three levels of Torah each deeper than the other. “Grain” is the revealed Torah, “wine” the secrets, and “oil” the super-secrets; (essence) of Gd in the Torah.

You don’t get that in Heaven.

That is why “heart and soul” are not enough. Serving G-d with all our “heart and soul” means serving totally … but our OWN terms.

While “All our MIGHT” means serving on MOSHE’S terms. (That is why Moshe, Dovid, and Moshiach are called KINGS, because kings command their followers to do things above understanding.

And Moshe himself was the true example of “All Your Might”; he did NOTHING on his own (see Bamidbar 16:28). Even his speech was G-d’s words coming through his mouth.
That is why he could speak in the first person, “I want” and “I give” because he was speaking truly on Gd’s terms.

So let us not be like Reuven in our story. Because he did things on his own terms rather than on the Besht’s, missed out on a bigger blessing; the whole farm could have been his.

Similarly in our generation.  By following the directions of the Lubavitcher Rebbe and being devoted to bringing Moshiach with all our heart and soul AND MIGHT. Beyond all limitations.  Will be revealed the true meaning hidden in each and every creation and all mankind will all announce the Oneness of G-d with all their might.

Then the entire “farm” will be ours, forever! And not much is missing. We are standing on the merits of thousands of years of Jewish Self-Sacrifice.  Now it could be that just one more good deed, word or even thought can bring …..

Moshiach NOW!
Rabbi Tuvia Bolton
Yeshiva Ohr Tmimim,
Kfar Chabad, Israel

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