Transcript

ואמרו רבותינו ז"ל כל הלומד שלא לשמה נוח לו שנהפכה שלייתו. ואמרו רבותינו ז"ל כל הלומד שלא לשמה נוח לו שנהפכה שלייתו.

It would have been better had his mother miscarried. v'pa'am amru

לעולם ילמוד אדם שלא לשמה שמתוך שלא לשמה בא לשמה.

So Tosfos and the Rishonim already talk about this, about this apparent stira between the two Gemaras about the status of shelo lishmah. ויובן על דרך זה ki hineh yaksheh

מאין ימצא בחינת שלא לשמה בעולם הרי כל הדברים חיותם הוא מהתורה.

This yesod that we've been learning about, ואתה מחיה את כולם, so it's not only true for physical objects, it's true for ideas also. Right? We're very sort of physically oriented, so we think in terms of what's concrete, what's tangible, what's visible. But it's true in terms of ideas. Where does the middah of shelo lishmah come from? That also has to have a chiyus, but in order for something to have a chiyus it has to be at least potentially positive. It can't be something which is a negative. There's no chiyus from Hakadosh Baruch Hu in something which is intrinsically negative, which is off.

הרי כל הדברים חיותם הוא מהתורה ומי הוא הנותן חיות לבחינת שלא לשמה. אך הלא מה שלומד שלא לשמה הוא בשביל איזו מידה רעה או בשביל התפארות בני אדם ולהתגדל.

For self-glorification. He's using the Torah as a way to elicit praise for himself from people. As a way for self-aggrandizement. או בשביל חשק ממון וכדומה. No, maybe he thinks it's the path to a well-paying job because of his desire for money. וזהו מידה של התפארות וחשק שנפל בשבירה. So here the first time of it recurs in the Meor Einayim the concept of middos nefutos. Again, literally a middah that has fallen, which means that the middah is being misdirected. The middah is being channeled the wrong way. So the middah to be concerned that Torah should be a vehicle for glorification, that's intrinsically a positive middah. That there's cheishek associated with learning Torah is intrinsically a positive middah. v'zehu middah, when a person experiences the middah of hispa'arus of glorification in the sense of directed to self, of self-glorification, or the middah of cheishek of desire as desiring mamon and he's using the Torah as a kardom lachpor bo. So what he's basically doing is he is misdirecting, he's misapplying those middos, והעיקר הוא התפארות הבורא וחשקו. v'zeh, this person who's learning shelo lishmah

נוטל ההתפארות וחשק לעצמו. וכשהוא מבין שזה נשתלשל מתפארת הבורא מאהבתו,

and when a person understands that what he's experiencing... saying in terms of his desire for self-glorification, what he's experiencing in terms of his cheshek for mamon when he understands shezeh nishtalshel that this is something which he allowed to wrongly metamorphose mitiferes haborei umeahavaso from the splendor of Hakadosh Baruch Hu and from love of Hakadosh Baruch Hu so ocheiz obviously not physically not literally ocheiz

בשורשו של דבר וראשיתו כי החכם עיניו בראשו של כל אומה

right as as the Maor Einayim we saw yesterday hachacham einav berosho again doesn't mean in the chacham the his berosho doesn't mean his head the chacham's head berosho shel davar right that which he's looking at he sees what the again and again in in the mystical concept what the chiyus is and a pragmatic sense what the avodas Hashem potential of the situation is venimtza here the note on the bottom suggests that that there's a taos sofer here that it's supposed to be כשנופל לו מחשבה של חשק והתפארות when when a person again is experiencing a midah nefulah of cheshek vehispaurus

כשנופל לו מחשבה של חשק והתפארות לעצמו בחוזר ממנו אל שורשו

so the idea is as follows it's an extraordinary idea if I don't know if we can cash in on it it's an extraordinary idea the idea is that when a person that within the within the midah nefulah inheres the potential that a person can take advantage of it because now in quotation marks all unquote all he has to do is just redirect that midah so it's not the it's not that he has to sort of okeir the midah so a person has the midah that he's looking again that his learning should be a source of to feed his gaavah for self-glorification so we would have thought the avodah is okay so first he has to he has to attack that that yeitzer hara he has to be mevaer hara and then move on to asei tov and the Maor Einayim says no אוחז בשורשו של דבר וראשיתו and he's supposed to just redirect what when he's experiencing that midah so the avodah again in quotation marks all he has to do unquote is redirect that midah

ונמצא כשנופל לו מחשבה של חשק והתפארות לעצמו חוזר ממנו אל שורשו נמצא בה מבחינת שלא לשמה תיכף אל בחינת לשמה

so within the shelo lishmah the potential and the launching pad as it were exists for the lishmah because he has the midah it's sort of you know the mashal is I don't know a person wants to put on a sweater so it's a pullover sweater so if he doesn't have a sweater so then his avodah is he has to go out and sweater let's say he has a sweater but he's holding it backwards so again in quotation marks all he has to do is turn the sweater around right he's closer he's closer to having the sweater he's closer to being able to wear the sweater the way which is the goal he's closer to that when he holds the sweater the sweater is upside down than than if he's bechlal not yet holding the sweater and that's what he says that's the peshat of מתוך שלא לשמה בא לשמה that within the shelo lishmah he already what's the shelo lishmah cheshek mamon okay so you have you have already the midah of cheshek but it should be a cheshek to come closer to Hakadosh Baruch Hu which a person does al yedei Torah

נמצא בה מבחינת שלא לשמה תיכף אל בחינת לשמה וזהו לעולם יעסוק אדם ב

I'm not sure but I think he's also then saying that the way again on this level the way to taitch the words of לעולם יעסוק אדם בתורה שלא לשמה he should be osaik in understanding what the shelo lishmah is. Right? The simple pshat in the words of the maamar is let's say it's 8:59 time for morning seder. I don't see that I'm holding by opening the Gemara lishmah. Fine, so go learn shelo lishmah and then the Torah u'ma'shpia and and you'll come lidei lishmah. And he says in addition that there's another level that לעולם יעסוק אדם בתורה שלא לשמה he should be osaik in understanding what the shelo lishmah is. And if he'll understand what the shelo lishmah is that he has the necessary middos, and again in quotation marks all he needs to do is he's holding the sweater. You don't have to go find a new sweater. You don't have to start your search all over again. You don't have to dump this sweater and go looking for a new sweater. No, he's holding the sweater already.

וזהו לעולם יעסוק אדם וילמוד עצמו שילמוד עצמו שמתוך השלא לשמה יביא עצמו לידי לשמה.

And that's the maamar of

לעולם ילמוד אדם לעולם יעסוק אדם בתורה שלא לשמה שמתוך שלא לשמה בא לשמה. וכשאינו עושה כן ונשאר בשלא לשמה זהו שאמרו נוח לו.

But if a person doesn't look to redirect the middah, doesn't look to raise to elevate that middah nefela, so that's the mayla of noach lo. והנה התורה נקראת אור כי נר מצוה ותורה אור, right? The pasuk in Mishlei. v'haksil Shlomo Hamelech also says b'choshech holech osaik shelo lishmah and in that sense v'eino madlik or.

והיושב בחושך צריך להדליק אור וזהו וחושך על פני תהום.

Again so he's been interpreting al derech haChassidus the opening pesukim in the Chumash. והארץ היתה תהו ובהו so we saw that yesterday. So now וחושך על פני תהום. וזהו וחושך על פני תהום, right? Tehom the deep, right? mipnei shemishuka because he's deeply entrenched. He's wallowing b'artziyus in in just physicality ואינו מדליק אור התורה. Now again they suggest that the next two words are not u'mipnei zeh but u'mipnei mah. ומפני מה נמצא בחינת שלא לשמה בעולם? And so he could have just said ein hachi nami it's because we sort of we misdirected it. But he says

על זה אמר ורוח אלוקים מרחפת על פני המים שעל ידי זה יוכל לשוב ולהביא עצמו אל חיות העצמי ואלוקות כאמור.

So apparently the reason that he says this pshat is that when Chazal say

לעולם יעסוק אדם בתורה שלא לשמה שמתוך שלא לשמה בא לשמה

so it does sound like that again it does sound like I don't know whether everyone will be maskim but I think that's clearly how the Meor Einayim understands the mashmaos and and you definitely do hear it that Chazal are even telling the person to learn shelo lishmah. Not just they're not just describing a b'dieved. No, they're describing this is going to be the mahalach. The mahalach is going to be that

לעולם יעסוק אדם שלא לשמה ומתוך שלא לשמה בא לשמה.

So then if that's the case so then that's sort of part of the original plan so then that generates the question

ומפני מה נמצא בחינת שלא לשמה בעולם? על זה אמר ורוח אלוקים מרחפת על פני המים שעל ידי זה

meaning al yedei the the shelo lishmah meaning so he'll access the middah of cheshek the middah of hispaarus on a very. Artsyisdega level, on a very physical level. The cheshek will be for cheshek mamon and the and the hisparus will be for hisparus atzmus, self-glorification. But

ורוח אלהים מרחפת על פני המים שעל ידי זה יוכל לשוב ולהביא עצמו אל חיות העצמי ואלוקות כאמור.

So right the overwhelming majority of us are not sort of not holding by just leapfrogging to the madraiga of lishmah. So the madraiga of shelo lishmah is a way of grasping the relevant middos and then redirecting them. So וחשך על פני תהום this chosech when the person is meshuka b'artsyius, the tehom representing the the depths of artsyius in which the person is entrenched and the ruach elokim is if a person will recognize again that the chiyus of those middos, what it really is, so then he can he can redirect it.

שעל ידי זה יוכל לשוב ולהביא עצמו אל חיות העצמי ואלוקות כאמור. ויאמר אלקים יהי אור כשעוסק לשמה לשם אלקים אמירתו אז מדליק אור.

So I think he's tayching on on this level, obviously the pshutos mikra is Hakadosh Baruch Hu said Yehi Or, it was one of the עשרה מאמרות שבהם נברא עולם ויהי אור. I think what he's tayching, I'm not sure, ויאמר אלקים יהי אור כשעוסק לשמה לשם אלקים אמירתו, if the person learning right the person who's been described as והארץ היתה תהו ובהו as meshuka b'artsyius, if when he recognizes the ruach elokim in the middah that he's experiencing, if his amira now his learning of Torah will be l'shem Hashem Elokim, so then the this ksil who previously had been b'choshech holech will generate the light. מתחילה היה אור וחשך משתמשים בערבוביא. Torah is or but he's learning shelo lishmah which is choshech. So or and choshech were intermingled, כי התורה נקראת אור והפניה הזרה and the shelo lishmah the alien motivation as it were nikra choshech ועתה ויבדל אלקים בין האור ובין החשך right continuing with the psukim.