We've been trying over the past couple of weeks to gain at least a measure of understanding and appreciation as to the stature, moral, spiritual, intellectual of chachmei hamesorah. That measure of appreciation should translate into again, not only as we discussed, a sense of confidence and conviction and pride in the mesorah, but also a sense of hachna'ah vis-a-vis the mesorah, vis-a-vis the chachmei hamesorah. את ה' אלקיך תירא לרבות תלמידי חכמים, the Tosafot, Rashi in Pesachim says it means rabo. Doesn't mean all talmidei chachamim, means rabo. The Tosafot HaRosh in Kiddushin adds that not only is the את ה' אלקיך תירא לרבות תלמידי חכמים refer to rabo, but to any rav muflag. Any outstanding, truly outstanding talmid chacham. Well, what's the equation between a rav muflag and rabo? Rabo is someone shelimdo rov chochmaso. Well, what's that equation? So itachen that the pshat is that that special chiyuv of mora rabo is because this is the person sherov chochmaso mimeno, so he's the person who represents to the talmid the mesorah and the chachmei hamesorah throughout the generations. Oh, if that's the case, so then the Tosafot HaRosh says that lichora the same should be true for a rav muflag even if one doesn't have that direct personal contact and relationship, but he too, by virtue of his stature, by virtue of his persona, also represents the mesorah and chachmei hamesorah throughout the generations. Tosafot in Berachot has a very similar comment to what the Tosafot HaRosh says when the Gemara in Berachot says that Shmuel was guilty of being מורה הלכה לפני רבו when he said in the presence of Eli that shchita keshera b'zar. So Tosafot is bothered that Shmuel had just now come to Shilo, he had just now come to Eli. He hadn't learned anything from Eli yet, he hadn't been mekabel anything from Eli. Tosafot answers the way we're understanding it, I think there is proof for this. Tosafot gives two answers. One is that ba lilmod, that he as it were had already been mekabel Eli as his rebbe by coming to learn from him. And then Tosafot says additionally that עלי גדול הדור היה, that Eli was the gadol hador, he's part of the shalsheles hamesorah and as such he had the status of rabo. So the again, the measure of appreciation of understanding as we understood the Midrash last time in Devarim Rabbah of mechetzo ulema'ala elohim, one would naturally expect that to translate again into a posture of hachna'ah where there's yirah, there's hachna'ah. It's you don't have one without the other. And takeh yitachen that that's what the pshat in the din of מורא רבך כמורא שמים. As you're all familiar Chazal tell us also by av v'eimo that השוה הכתוב כבודם לכבודו ומוראם למוראו. And presumably that's to be coordinated with the comment that Chazal have, it's coordinated with gimmel shutfim b'adam. That since Hakadosh Baruch Hu allows av v'eimo to partner with him in bringing their child into the world, so by virtue of that shutfus with Hakadosh Baruch Hu, השוה הכתוב כבודם ומוראם. Yitachen that's also the pshat in מורא רבך כמורא שמים that just as av v'eimo are shutfim with Hakadosh Baruch Hu in creating human life, so the Chachmei HaMesorah, the Chachamim throughout the generations are shutfim with Hakadosh Baruch Hu in the Torah. The Yerushalmi that the Rishonim acharonim quote, Yerushalmi from the fourth perek in Sanhedrin, when Moshe Rabbeinu’s on Har Sinai and Hakadosh Baruch Hu was telling him about different shaylos mem-tes panim tahor, mem-tes panim tamei, mem-tes panim mutar, mem-tes panim assur. Moshe Rabbeinu says hodieini heichan halachah, Hakadosh Baruch Hu tells him acharei rabbim l'hattos. That what the Chachamim will be mivareir, what they'll be mechadeish, that's Torah. So the same way there's a shutfus, and only because there's a shutfus with Hakadosh Baruch Hu in creating human life can one understand the השוה הכתוב כבודם ומוראם של אב ואם לכבוד ומורא המקום.
So too there's a shutfus that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is also allows the Chachamim to be shutfim in Torah. And that's the pshat again mora rabbecha, says the Tosafos HaRosh, say Tosafos, it's also Rav Muflag, Gadol HaDor, the mora, the hachna'ah is vis-a-vis the representative of the Masorah. Because the Masorah, the Chachmei HaMesorah are shutfim with Hakadosh Baruch Hu in His Torah. When Reb Itzele famously describes how his father would be overcome when he would mention the name of the Gaon: כן כימים אשר למד לפניו באימה וביראה ברתת ובזיע מנהר דינור דהוה נגיד ונפיק מן קדמוהי כן כאשר לימד והודיע לבנו ותלמידו הימים אשר עמד לפניו עם סדר רבו הוה ליה במורא נפלאה כאילו עומד לפניו במראה. וכאשר פתח בשמעתא ודכר שמיה דרבי
when he would mention the name of his rebbi, of the Gaon, הוי מרתת כולה גופיה וזיווהי שנו עליה. You could see that his complexion changed מאש המתלקחת בלבבו בהגיגו דרכי צדקתו וחסידותו וטהרת קדושתו ואוטראתו נקנית לו כאשר היה כוחו יפה במעלות שהתורה נקנית בהם.
So what this beautiful, powerful description underscores that the eimah and yirah that Rav Chaim Volozhin felt wasn't linked to the hakaras hatov that he had to the Gaon. It wasn't linked to the fact that he had benefited so much and so greatly from the Gaon. That was relevant in that that was the context in which he had exposure to the Gaon, but that sense of yirah and hachna'ah was because who the Gaon was. What engendered the trembling was the thinking and seeing in his mind's eye the דרכי צדקתו וחסידותו וטהרת קדושתו ואוטראתו. None of that is a function per se of being a talmid. The relevance of being the talmid, of having been a direct talmid, is that that gave him the occasion, the opportunity to experience it and to see it up close and to have that intimate view. But that yirah is commanded by who the Gaon and who the other chachmei hamesorah were. The best way to try to gain again a measure of a measure, a small one, whatever we're capable of, but a measure of appreciation and understanding for who the chachmei hamesorah throughout the generations have been, the stories are very instructive, but what's most powerful is to learn. There are a lot of great stories about Reb Akiva Eiger, but to learn, if it's pashut, the Ma'aracha Drush Ve'Chidush is just priceless in terms of its value, in terms of its worth in trying to glimpse who one of the relatively recent chachmei hamesorah was. The more we learn, the more we appreciate, the more we ma'amik bedivreihem, then the more natural. That posture of hachna'ah and mora dictated by את ה' אלוקיך תירא becomes, and sadly, one of the greatest dangers in not having that sense, again, of hachna'ah as part of mora, one of the greatest dangers is ignorance. Ignorance makes it possible to project all our inadequacies and shortcomings and failings and katnut hamochin onto others, even rachmana litzlan onto chasidei elyon. A person learns, does his best to learn, to appreciate with some depth a blatt Gemara, a Rambam, a Ramban, a Beis Yosef, a Bach, a Ktzos, a Reb Chaim, a Maharal, a Ramchal, all one can do is feel that sense of hachna'ah towards the masorah and the את ה' אלוקיך תירא just becomes a very natural and immediate reaction.