From an email that was circulated.....
Shalom sweetest friends!!!
When I was a junior in high my parents apparently felt that I was far too advanced for high school and offered me the option of learning in Israel. I have never been the same. I still have yet to take the SATS but by golly I have found so much more meaning in the years of poring over this Talmud [although I am admittedly quite shvach in Math...]. In elementary and high school I had also studied this holy literature but frankly it never really meant much for me. The starting lineup of the Knicks on any given night interested me far more than whether a widow must take an oath in order to collect her ksuba from the estate of the orphans or what happens when an ox gores a cow and they find the cow's fetus dead at its side. I mean, cows for me were a picture on a milk carton - or dinner.... Boys who were into learning in high school were rare birds [the animal theme continues! Maybe because of the 5 weeks I spent watching dogs walk around Manhattan. I wouldn't have wanted to see their pictures on a milk carton - or to have them for dinner for that matter]. In my day we didn't have - Internet, cell phones, iphones, blackberrys, what's app, what's down, Facebook etc. etc. Today it is even harder to attract the unfocused-A.D.D.'ED-to-death teenage mind to the complexties of Torah study. That is why we must place a special emphasis and invest extra effort in educating our children.
When I was in Israel for that year [and the next] I was fortunate enough to be able to develop a relationship with the only grandparent I ever knew – my great-grandmother Esther bas Shmuel whose yahrtzeit is today – Rosh Chodesh Nissan. In her merit I wanted to share some Torah. She was a women who went through so much in her life and yet was ALWAYS pleasant mannered and sweet tempered. I wish I could emulate her sterling and giving character. Her passing left a void in my life that has never been filled. Had I not come to Israel early I would have lost out on getting close to her during her last two years and it was all Divinely orchestrated. She was so proud of me that I was learning in Yeshiva. I am certain that she is up in Shomayim enjoying the fruits of my decision to spend my life within the confines of the Beis Medrash [may it only continue... May she beseech HKB"H on my behalf! He i$ the One who can make it happen. Once she is already beseeching - may she ask for a few more things that her descendents lack...:-)].
Picture the scene. You are sitting with your family on the first night of Pesach in Miami Beach or the King David in Jerusalem or in Cancun, Mexico or if you are really lucky - in a special kosher for Pesach hotel in EGYPT. You are reading through "magid" because that is a prerequisite for getting to the true redemption - the meal. We say [in a classical talmudic sing-song] "יכול מראש חודש" - I might think that we should already fulfill the mitzva of remembering the exodus from Rosh Chodesh Nissan.... The hagada then quotes a pasuk to disabuse us from this notion and we conclude that only on Pesach night is there a mitzva.
The question that occupied the commentators for many generations is - Why would I think that two weeks before pesach there is already a mitzva to remember yetzias mitzraim?? Maybe I should already fulfill the mitzva from chanuka??
One answer: Rebbe Tzadok Ha-kohen in his Pri Tzadik teaches that all of the spiritual energy of the month is centralized in Rosh Chodesh. Everything that happens throughout the month is drawn from Rosh Chodesh. It is not called תחילת החודש but ראש חודש. It is the head of the month. Just as everything our body does emanates from signals given by the brain in the head - so the whole month is guided by and rooted in Rosh Chodesh. This explains the notion that the mitzva of relating the exodus from Egypt may already be fulfilled on Rosh Chodesh. It is only by dint of Rosh Chodesh that we had an Exodus and are on vacation till this very day [with breaks for work in between holidays so that we can afford vacations].
This symbolizes the theme of the seder. The focus is on passing the mesorah down to the children. All of the miracles in Egypt occurred in order to tell children the wonders of Hashem - למען תספר באזני בנך ובן בנך את אשר התעללתי במצרים - we experienced miracles in order to relate them to our children. The Torah says למען ידעו דורותיכם - so that your children will know [about yetzias mitzraim]. The Pnei Menachem [the Gerrer Rebbe ztz"l] pointed out that the first letters spell - ילד. Yetzias Mitzraim was primarily for the Kinderlach! Just as Rosh Chodesh is the root of the month, so do the parents plant the seeds for their children's future. The way we speak and comport ourselves, the activities we engage in during our free time, the amount of lashon hara we say about the shul and school rabbis, if a mother cares more about her chesed than her sheitel, if a father is careful never to miss a minyan or a set shiur, the places we send our children for school and camp, how we relate to our spouse ["You are so stupid! You have the sense of direction of a broken GPS!"], will all leave an indelible mark on our children. Children have remarkable powers of perception and pick up on the most subtle things.
Many thousands in the Jewish world are finishing Maseches Succah in Daf Yomi this week. The gemara concludes with a tragic story about a Jewish girl who was intermarried to a Greek and came into the Beis Hamikdash and spoke in a defaming way about the korbanos. The gemara relates that her entire family was punished because when a child speaks it is generally what he or she hears from his or her parents. They, too, bore the guilt of her violation of what is sancrosanct.
Today, a child hears LOADS of things from sources other than his parents. All a parent can do is try to ensure that the home is a safe haven from the corrupting influences of the outside world. As one who has dealt with kids for over two decades, I can tell you that things are getting .... worse. As parents we have the power to educate our children as to what is right and what is wrong and then to daven our hearts out that they follow the path that is holy and pure. There are countless victims of the immorality and spiritual indifference of our society. The only way to escape it is to build a little island deep in the middle of Atlantic Ocean - underwater.
If we provide our kids with a positive message and show them the beauty and depth of our Torah they will be much less likely to take the bait of what the Satan and his tireless workers have to offer.
May we absorb into our neshamos on this Rosh Chodesh all of the אורות of this month and see ניסן [gematria ניסים] and finally finally welcome moshiach and experience the redemption of the world and gilui kvod malchuso - Amen!:-)
Bi-ahava Rabba,
Me:-)
