Q:
If the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash was so terrible to Hakadosh Baruch Hu then why did He destroy it?
A:
And the answer is He destroyed it because of something that was more terrible. And more terrible is when a Jew forsakes the path of righteousness. That’s the biggest tragedy.
The Gemara says when a man becomes arrogant; כל אדם שיש בו גסות הרוח – A man who is arrogant, it says שכינה מיללת עליו – the Shechinah wails for him. That’s a tragedy. That’s just one man and he didn’t do any sin but merely became arrogant. Arrogance; שכינה מיללת עליו.
And that brings us to the importance of a cheit, and also to the importance of a mitzvah. When you do a mitzvah, any mitzvah. Let’s say you put up a mezuzah. You must know you didn’t do something here below. You have started a great motion; waves have been set in motion. And these waves set in motion entire worlds of which we down here are unaware. In the olamos ha’elyonim a mitzvah sets in motion great worlds. It’s a commotion! That’s what it says in the medrash.
The medrash says as follows: ויקרא אלקים לאור יום – Elokim called the light ‘day’, ולחשך קרא לילה, — and the darkness He called ‘night’. So the medrash says why does Hakadosh Baruch Hu have to call anything by any name? Don’t we ourselves have the ability of giving names?
So the medrash replies, אור אלו מעשיהם של צדיקים – Hashem said when a tzaddik does something—when you put up the mezuzah or you bentch after eating you’re a tzaddik at that moment. So the deeds of tzaddikim are actually a light to the world. Suddenly the world has become illuminated. Our eyes don’t see it. There are many things our eyes don’t see, as was prefaced before. But a mitzvah sends a light on the world. The whole world becomes happy. It’s illuminated. It becomes brightened up because of a mitzvah. But we don’t see it. We’re not capable because down below we’re deaf and we’re blind. That’s why ויקרא אלקים לאור – Elokim called the light – מעשיהם של צדיקים it means – יום, day.
Of all this we down here are totally unaware. We are like moles burrowing down under the earth entirely oblivious of what is happening on the surface. But there is a possibility of enhancing our awareness of supersensory things. There is a way of sharpening our minds so that we become more receptive to supersensory phenomena.
The Chovos Halevavos gives a parable to explain it. In this parable there is a man who wishes to know what is doing on the other side of a high wall. And he raises aloft a sheet of metal and on the surface of the metal is reflected an image of what is taking place on the other side of the world; like a periscope. But since the metal is dull no image at all is apparent. But when he takes this sheet of metal and attempts to polish it, he makes it smoother, clearer, and then he raises up that sheet of metal over the wall and looks from his side and he begins to see an image of what is transpiring on the other side. The more he polishes the metal, the more clearly it mirrors what is doing in the other territory which he is not able to see.
And so by polishing the mind, by purifying, by making it more clear, it is possible for the mind to look beyond the senses and to perceive what is taking place in the upper worlds. And like the Chovos Halevavos says ויראה בלא עין – he will see without eyes, וישמע בלא אוזן – and he will hear without ears. Like the expression of the Gemara. אף על גב דאינהו לא חזי מידי מזלייהו חזי – Even though he himself doesn’t see but he has something in him that does see. The soul is not only in the body. The soul extends beyond the body. And if the soul is purified and is clear enough to mirror what is taking place in the higher worlds this information is transmitted to the mind below. ולחשך קרא לילה – And the darkness He called night, אלו מעשיהם של רשעים – these are deeds of wicked people.
Now nowhere in the world will you find an equal to this Torah concept that dignifies the human race. The human race is so important that no matter how much we’ll aggrandize it we’ll never come near to what they actually are. But the Torah states at the beginning that בצלם אלקים עשה אותו – He made man in His image. And if we’ll study that all our lives we’ll still never appreciate the true greatness of mankind that that verse declares.
Now of course today all the academic world is busy negating that. The entire literature is trying to push man down into the swamp to make him an equal of the animals. But when we enter the world of Torah we see that everything is the opposite. The outside world is a topsy turvy world and man is so supreme that even angels are inferior to him. ותחסרהו מעט מאלקים – He is lower only to the Creator Himself. And no matter how much we’ll talk about the greatness of mankind we’ll always fall short because our minds are not big enough to comprehend it. Therefore when a man does a sin we don’t appreciate the tragedy. It’s not a small tragedy—it’s like suddenly the sun set in midday. It happens sometimes. Suddenly there’s a gloom that falls upon a city and people panic! It happened in certain places. A gloom, thick cloud, falls upon a city and there’s a panic. And the truth is there will be a bigger panic if people would appreciate what one sin means.
And that’s why there’s no tragedy as big as a sin. And there’s no success, there’s no happiness as big as doing one good deed. If you can get a Jew to put on tefillin tomorrow just once—don’t think it’s only one time; don’t think the Lubavitcher are wasting time when they get a man to put on tefillin for a minute. It’s a tremendous achievement!
And a sin is darkness, a terrible gloomy darkness. We don’t have time to talk about it. We’ll never have time because you’ll have to sit all your life and plumb the depths of that statement, that ולחשך קרא לילה. It’s actually a night when somebody commits a wrong.
And therefore when Hakadosh Baruch Hu destroyed the Beis Hamikdash it was because of something that was worse, because there had been sin and because of those sins He found it necessary that there should no longer be a Beis Hamikdash around. Exactly how the Beis Hamikdash fits in with sins, that’s for a different time. But He destroyed what was so important to Him because there was something still more important and that’s the virtue of mankind that was being infringed.
(July 1975)
