Thursday, January 19, 2017

Making A Name

לזכות עדינה בת שבע בת נעכא גיטל


The timing is impeccable. The inaugaration. 200 million bucks. [You know what I think of that....]. The biggest name in the world today. Sworn in. Erev Shabbos Parshas Shmos. 

Sefer Shmos. Names. Funny name for this sefer of galus and geulah. "Names" sounds boring - like the phone book is a book of names and is quite boring. But Sefer Shmos is anything but boring.

The reality is that the whole redemption from Egypt which is a precursor for the ultimate redemption of mankind revolves around "names". The topic is broad but one nekudah relating to עניני דיומא: 

Moshe askes Hashem what His name is. Funny question - like, what does it matter? And who says He has a name?! What Moshe is asking is - With what revelation of your existence and mode of operations are you going to redeem us? Hashem answers א-ה-י-ה - I will be. Meaning - my name will become revealed to the world progessively as this geula develops. It is not a one shot deal but this geulah will start the process of revealing my name which will continue throughout history until we reach the day of וידעו כי אתה שמך השם עליון על כל הארץ. 

Moshe doesn't care about his own name and when the Jewish people are in danger of being erased, Moshe challenges Hashem to erase Moshe's name from the Torah instead. For that reason Moshe's name doesn't appear in תצוה and only makes one cameo appearance in the Hagada shel Pesach, because the geulah is not at all about Moshe's name but Hashem. As we say in davening about geulas Mitzraim ותעש לך שם גדול כהיום הזה.

Rav Moshe Schapiro ztz"l: The דור הפלגה built a tower and said נעשה לנו שם. It was all about making a name for themselves. Avraham Avinu made the tikkun and it says about him ויקרא בשם השם א-ל עולם - He called out in Hashem's name. 

Erev Shabbos Parshas Shmos 5776. The most powerful man in the world is being sworn into office [כל פוליטיקאי בעולם, כמעט, חשוד על השבועה ומה הועילו חכמים בתקנתם ]. They wanted to build a Migdal La-shomayim. Or maybe Migdal La-shemim - A tower for their many names. נעשה לנו שם was their motto. He also built a מגדל לשמים. A tower until the sky [almost]. He put his name on it. He loves his name and making a name for himself. A deep look into his psyche will almost definitely reveal that this run for the Presidency was to a great extent about his name. Now he is even greater and more powerful. What is the next hurdle? King Of The Universe?

Ahhh - that post is already taken by the only Reality that truly exists, must exist, has always existed and will forever exist. 

והיה א-ד-נ-י למלך על כל הארץ ביום ההוא יהיה הויה אחד ושמו אחד!!

Check out this amazing shtickel Sfas Emes [spell check disagrees with my spelling of "shtickel" and Sfas Emes. Let them come up with a better spelling...]: