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‘Im bechukosai telechu, vei-es mitzvosai tishmeru, veasisem osam’ (Vayikra 26:3) – If you walk in my statutes, and keep my commandments, and do them.

‘Im bechukosai telechu,’ This bears on the text, I considered my ways, and turned my feet unto Your testimonies (Tehllim 119).
Rav Huna, in the name of Rav Acha expounded the verse to mean ‘I considered’ the reward given for good deeds and the loss entailed through misdeeds, ‘and turned my feet unto your testimonies’. (Vayikra Raba)

The phrase, "bechokosai telechu" is suggestive; elsewhere (e.g., Vayikra 18:4, 26; 20:8) the Torah speaks of observance (shemirah) and performance (asiyah) of chukim. Accordingly, the midrash presents a variety of interpretations, each one prompted by the suggestive phraseology of our verse.

The Yefeh Toar commentary on the midrash amplifies Rav Acha’s interpretation. The Torah’s idiom, "bechukosai telechu" conveys a sense of progression and movement within Torah; a life of Torah and mitzvos is not static. It begins shelo lishmah, motivated by ulterior considerations such as attainment of reward. We ascend therefrom rung by rung, level by level, to even higher degrees of avodas Hashem.

In fact, both the Baal Shem Tov as well as Rav Hayim of Volozhin, commenting on the verse in Zechariah (3:7), "venasati lecha mehalechim", underscore man’s spiritual mobility as his defining characteristic. Whereas angels are spiritually stationary, man is a holech/mihalech; he is spiritually mobile.

A Jew is called upon to live a life of continuous ascent. Accordingly, the Torah’s exhortation of, "bechokosai telechu"; hence the imagery of the Psalmist: "Who will ascend the mountain of God?" (Tehillim 15) We must be aware that the demands of our daily routine can entrap us in a snare of complacency. We are very susceptible to exchanging a dynamic life of spiritual ascent for a static life upon a spiritual plateau. A life of ascent, inter alia, entails constantly deepening our commitment to Torah and Talmud Torah (if possible, quantitatively by devoting more time, but certainly qualitatively that Torah becomes increasingly central to our very being), pursuing mitzvos with zeal and striving for ethical-moral-religious perfection (tikkun hamidos).

The period of sefiras haomer is especially conducive to such ascent. As the generation of Jews who left Egypt ascended from the forty-nine gates of tumah during this time every year we too are offered a special opportunity for ascent in preparation for kaballas hatorah.