The Yanuka Rav Shlomo Yehuda-הגאון הינוקא - מעלת השמחה בפורים וענייני פרשת זכור ומחיית עמלק

3:32 We know how often one generally needs to read Parshas Zachor. One must read it - there in the Tosefta we showed that it is read every year. But truly - how can one see something more, some strengthening, to see how often it is read? Every year we read the... Parshas Zachor. [unclear] Rabbi Yeshayah of Berlin, may his merit protect us. He brought a proof, very, very much so, to strengthen the matter that the parshah - Parshas Zachor - is read every year, so that it is not forgotten.

4:04 He says that in chapter 31 of Tehillim: 'I have become like a lost vessel, for I have heard the slander of many' - right? 'I am forgotten like the dead, out of mind; I have become like a lost vessel.' 'I am forgotten like the dead, out of mind' - and the Sages in Tractate Berachos, page 58b, the Sages say: when is the decree that the dead is forgotten from the heart? After twelve months. Twelve months - the dead is forgotten from the heart. It is also written in Bava Metzia, [unclear] side b: When is it - a person's lost object - when does the owner already give up on it? After twelve months a person already gives up on his object.

4:36 So he brings a proof for this - this is a support for it - that one waits twelve months; every year, so that there is no forgetting, and because of this we do it every single year - we do Parshas Zachor so that there is no forgetting, so that we do not forget what Amalek did to us. Now, what did Amalek do to us? What did he do? What did he do, Amalek? In the Pesikta Rabbasi, section 12, it is also written about this. It is written about this too. The Holy One, blessed be He, said: 'My children, if you do not read Parshas Zachor every single year, I will return you to the exile of Egypt.'

5:07 That far - if you do not remember what Amalek did to you. It goes that far. What Amalek did is not simple. Now, what really was Amalek? In the Talmud Yerushalmi, chapter 3 of Rosh Hashanah, the Talmud Yerushalmi, chapter 3 of Rosh Hashanah, halachah 8: Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi said: this teaches that Amalek was occupied with sorcery; he would do all kinds of sorcery. And he would set people out on their 'genusia' day: whoever had a birthday, he told him, you go out to war first.

5:36 'You have a birthday - come, go out to fight for me; you have a birthday - come, go out to fight for me...' And so he would set each and every one to go out to war; and they would go out to war, to conquer and to fight, and so they would win. That was Amalek's way to win. And as soon as Amalek came against Israel - what did Yehoshua do, what did Moshe Rabbeinu do? He switched between the shifts. [unclear] - you go, after that you. This is 'Sun, stand still at Givon.' All through the war that took place he switched between them. 'Sun and moon stood still in their abode.'

6:06 He confused Amalek. He told him: we must fight tomorrow, and then everything was already confused for Amalek; his whole order was ruined, so it was cancelled for him - he does everything by sorcery, everything specific - waiting for another day, waiting for the next day, 'let it pass like this, let it pass like this'... This is another beautiful thing about it. Now, at that time Amalek would take everyone who was cast out of the cloud - everyone who was in the cloud, whoever was impure was cast out of the cloud, and Amalek would come upon him - Amalek seized them. This is written in Parshas Ki Seitzei, in the Tanchuma, siman 9 - also in siman 9.

6:43 It is written that Amalek would come and say before the Holy One, blessed be He - this is written in the Tanchuma, [unclear] - it is written that they would come before the Master of the world, taking the [unclear] and throwing them before Heaven, to the Master of the world: 'So this is what You wanted - here are the [unclear]; take what is Yours before You. And here - and what will You do with this? Here is something; You chose this - the [unclear].' That's how it was. They would [unclear] it as a sign, to show how much they scorn what the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded us; that is what they would do.

7:11 And they lift it up and raise it high like this, and they would scorn, Heaven forbid, this thing - the matter of the milah of the Jewish people. That is how Amalek behaved. They scorned everything the Holy One, blessed be He, told us to do, everything He chose for us - especially the bris. And therefore the bris is also the severe one, since it is what Amalek in fact actually did, for he wanted, Heaven forbid, to make the Jewish people forget the Torah, over what they did to us, and this scorn - so it went on and grew.

7:40 So therefore we are commanded to blot out his name, to blot him out - [unclear] - to blot him out completely. And even if his name is written on wood and stones - in the Beis Yosef, Orach Chaim, siman 690, he writes, and brings in the name of the Orchos Chaim; there he brings a Midrash Aggadah, saying that if there are wood and stones, also with the names - wood and stones - they would erase them. And therefore there is a great [unclear] on the Rema; he writes there that from here comes the custom of striking during the Megillah. This is the source for burning them. This is also in the Zohar on Bo - the Zohar, Parshas Bo, page 40a.

8:09 It is also written that the Holy One, blessed be He, said: as much as you erase his name below, so I erase his name above. The Yalkut Shimoni also writes this, also on Parshas Ki Seitzei, remez 938; it is there as well. The Holy One, blessed be He, said: you erase him below and I erase him above - erase his whole name; there will be no trace at all above. Now, the moment Amalek is erased - when they uproot Amalek completely, and the memory of Amalek is erased and nullified - then the Holy One, blessed be He, begins to [unclear] for us and to bring us the geulah, the coming of our righteous Mashiach.

8:42 Now, women too have a great virtue, if they are able - even though [unclear] obligation in this. But the Chinuch, in mitzvah 603, also exempted women, and we already know the Minchas Chinuch, who asked a difficulty on him, that women too must go out in a mitzvah war - and the Rambam, in Hilchos Melachim, chapter seven, halachah 4 - and everyone knows this too. But there is the Tosafos, that is in Tractate Yevamos, page 65b: that women - no: it is not a woman's way to conquer.

9:10 Also in Tractate Nazir, page 59a: that it is not a woman's way to take up war. So from this too, a woman need not go out to war, even though it is a mitzvah war. But as for her going out to war, when the bride goes out from her chuppah and the groom from his chamber, that is only so that at that time she goes out, perhaps, to bake or to do something, but it is not a woman's way to go out and make war. But the Maharil Diskin, may his merit protect us, he would be stringent about this.

9:36 Also the Chasam Sofer, following his teacher Rabbi Nosson Adler - he would obligate women, every woman, to come to hear Parshas Zachor, that she should come to hear Parshas Zachor, for this is a great thing. He whose merit may protect us, the Toras Chesed of Lublin, in his responsa too - Toras Chesed, siman 37 - also wrote that a woman need not come; he exempted women from this. The Maharil Diskin says something logical.

10:01 He says that women, in fact, were also included in the decree, for Amalek and Haman wanted to annihilate women and men the same. The decree is on the woman too, the same thing. The annihilation, Heaven forbid, was on this one and on that one. That is to say, in the rescue the woman too must take part here. So therefore, whoever is a woman - if a woman can come and hear Parshas Zachor, it will be a very, very, very great thing in terms of her virtue, and she will have great reward for this. If she cannot, let it happen at home.

10:31 Now, what is the connection of... after all, we said men too, and we said that the woman too, over the wine in Kiddush. We said the connection of the woman with Kiddush; now this will also fit for us with the parshah of Zachor, for we are one - one part, one body. The man, the woman, the child - the decree was on the whole Jewish people. And when we, in fact, raise the wine - the wine is in fact a very, very high level, for the wine corresponds to the mochin, a person's mind.

11:01 A person's mochin correspond to the wine. When a person now makes Kiddush, does some service, does something of kedushah, this thing rises for him, for it corresponds to the wine; it raises him. This corresponds to a person's mochin. The level of the wine - the Kiddush a person makes - now he is on the level of mochin. It is called a higher level than where he was before. That is why wine has a separate blessing. Its own blessing, its own [unclear], for it brings a person to the level of mochin - mochin degadlus, the expanded mind.

11:29 And wine has the power also to act and to cancel troubles and decrees and judgments and disasters and [unclear]. But the problem is that people do not know how to drink the wine. That is the problem of drinking the wine - they do not know. Drinking wine is a very great avodah, a great service. Not everyone knows how to drink wine. For this, work is needed. Work. The wine, as it affects a person, should bring him to high levels, to holy thoughts, to cleaving to Hashem, blessed be He - when he cleaves to Him and is attached to Him, and he does not [unclear] from Him, and he succeeds in seeing the good in him.

12:09 The wine is meant to reveal the joy of Judaism within the Jewish people. So when all the Jewish people are joyful, everyone drinking wine, then the joy begins to be revealed - of the hearts. Why? Because then the light of Judaism begins to shine, which is revealed in every Jew - the tremendous light that is in him. And it is impossible to reveal this light except through the wine. For when there is idolatry, then he is not revealed as a Yehudi.

12:36 The revealing of the Yehudi is when he denies idolatry. And we explained that the denial of idolatry is through holy Shabbos. For then everyone keeps Shabbos. And when Shabbos is kept, the remembering is done over the wine. And when the remembering is done over the wine, and both the man and the woman are fit for it, then this shows that the man and the woman together can bring about this act of drawing close and bring it about that in the man and in the woman alike, the essence and the inner light in each and every one will shine.

13:04 So this also fits: the inner beauty within the wine reveals the good that is in each and every one. In each and every one. There is not a single one who does not have the... So now we come to the Holy One, blessed be He, and say to Him: Master of the world, now that we have the wine and we can drink, here we need siyata dishmaya, Heaven's help, so that we know how to drink it properly - that there should not, Heaven forbid, be some forgetting, or, Heaven forbid, that something should not be right and we not drink the wine properly; for if we drink it properly, then there will be mochin degadlus, and if there is mochin degadlus, then we can draw close to Hashem.

13:40 So here we say to Hashem: 'We cannot do this; You must do it.' We cannot reach such levels of thought. Therefore a person should try to have in mind, when he drinks the wine on Purim, or also when he makes Kiddush - when he makes Kiddush - to have in mind the intention of the tzaddikim and the great ones who know how to have such intentions, for these are awesome things, what happens at the time of Kiddush; it is something above human intellect. So whoever knows - this is a connection of his mind to the great ones and the sages of the generation, who truly know the intention of the matter, and then it rises for him.

14:15 One can also truly explain why the Jewish people said before Hashem - they said to Him - in the Midrash [unclear] on Parshas Ki Seitzei, siman 9. They asked the Holy One, blessed be He; they said to Him: Master of the world, You told us, 'Remember what Amalek did to you.' We - what he did to us, what he did to You - Amalek did to You too. We have no memory in us to remember so much; we cannot remember. They said to Him: so perhaps You remember what Amalek did to You, for Amalek did it to You too - not only to us did Amalek do it.

14:48 And then the Jewish people ask before the Holy One, blessed be He, and this is what we say: 'Remember, Hashem, against the children of Edom, the day of Jerusalem.' And corresponding to this we remind Him - for after all, why was the Beis HaMikdash, the Holy Temple, destroyed? Because of whom was it destroyed? Because of Edom, because of Esav, because of Amalek. So the remembering that is said - that we read this 'Zachor' in order to say to the Holy One, blessed be He: Master of the world, You remember. We will remember, but the true remembering is when we cause the Holy One, blessed be He, to remember us in exile.

15:16 For when a person now sits and thinks that he is hearing Parshas Zachor, he wants all the procedures, in order to fulfill the obligation properly and to be precise in every detail, so that there should not be, Heaven forbid, some loss or some flaw or some dirt or some noise or a rumor - something not good - so that he can fulfill the obligation; he is precise in every detail, but in practice he does not succeed in making Hashem remember.

15:44 So he fulfills his obligation of Parshas Zachor and everything, but perhaps [unclear] he does not remember, because all year he does not remember what Amalek is - that Amalek is a great and terrible impurity, that Amalek is the Satan, truly so. This is the Zohar - the Zohar, Parshas Ki Seitzei, page 282, side a - side b - speaks about the Satan. It says that Amalek himself is [unclear], may the Merciful One save us; it was the Satan himself - Amalek was.

16:17 that he was the Sitra Achra itself. And when Amalek came down to fight Israel, then Moshe Rabbeinu [unclear] said: who can defeat him? How can I at all? This is Amalek, this is 'that one', this is 'the other thing'. To fight Amalek, to nullify Amalek, one needs only someone who is on the level of mochin. He can bring him. Now, mochin is called a student.

16:42 After all, someone who is a truly worthy student - the student who does as his teacher holds - becomes mochin. Now, the teacher is mochin degadlus, and the son is mochin dekatnus, the small mind. Now this has already become double: the student can be double his teacher. So the student's double - he becomes on a level of greater mochin degadlus, because he is double. Now he is on a level double beyond him, for he was now on one level, and now he taught his student Torah.

17:12 Now his student has risen and been elevated to such a level that he is double him. So he has both mochin dekatnus and mochin degadlus. But the teacher has only mochin degadlus. He does not also have mochin dekatnus. So therefore, who can reach the level of mochin? Moshe Rabbeinu, who was mochin degadlus. And who can fight Amalek? Yehoshua. Yehoshua? Ah - Yehoshua can fight Amalek, because Yehoshua is his student. Only the student who attained mochin dekatnus and also attained mochin degadlus can attain this, and can... That is why this is called making the remembering over wine: for wine can bring one person to mochin dekatnus, but it can bring another to mochin degadlus.

17:51 'And wine gladdens the heart of man.' And then, when there is mochin degadlus, the Holy One, blessed be He, begins to awaken in a person all the things - the hidden treasures that are sunk in him all year, throughout the whole year. What is special about Purim? What is the lofty thing that is revealed on Purim? Through the wine, through the meal, through the mitzvos? All year we are in a state where everything is sunk, sunk completely, down, down, and we see no point of light at all in what a person goes through. He sees nothing.

18:24 It is not that he thinks his prayer is not heard. It is not that he thinks he is not so special before Hashem. He thinks about the situation he is in. But until it comes - and all these calls that call to him, that is Amalek. For he only wants to break him, weaken him, make him despair, crush him and [unclear] him - only that he should distance himself from Hashem, leave the way of Hashem, and that's it.

18:50 And then he has won. But when a person rises and overcomes, and knows everything the Holy One, blessed be He, does - he knows that the Holy One, blessed be He, is looking at him, and sees that the Holy One, blessed be He, sees him - then he begins to awaken, and begins to bring out of himself all the good in him. And when does all this good come out? On Purim. On Purim the Holy One, blessed be He, begins to bring out all of a person's good, through the wine.

19:16 When a person drinks the wine, all his good begins to come out. And then he begins to bring out hidden things stored away in him; then he begins to bring out good things; then suddenly he begins to see the beauty that comes out of him, the heart that bursts forth from him, all the light that comes out of him. This is what King Shlomo says in Mishlei, this, this, in chapter [unclear], verse 3: 'In every place the eyes of Hashem watch the bad and the good.' The Holy One, blessed be He, sees everyone, and looks the whole year. Now you look: you go on a bad path, you think perhaps Hashem does not see you; you go on a good path, you think Hashem does not see you either; but 'in every place the eyes of Hashem watch' -

20:01 the bad too, the good too, every place. And when the Holy One, blessed be He, looks - when is His time to see this? At Parshas Zachor, for then is the time that whoever remembers Amalek knows how to remember Amalek - what Amalek did to you, that everyone wanted to go and [unclear] us. So Rashi says, on this passage: 'a parable of a boiling bath' - a parable of a boiling bath, that no one can enter, for it is boiling.

20:30 Then suddenly one comes and goes into the bath, and then he cools it for the others. And then everyone comes after this and goes into the bath. He says: what is the problem? 'Nations heard, they trembled; terror gripped the inhabitants of Philistia' - everyone is afraid to fight the Jewish people. But he comes, he says: what is the problem? Why are you so afraid of this nation? And immediately he jumps into the boiling bath, and because of him everyone fights and oppresses Israel. Because of him - because of Amalek.

20:57 And then the Holy One, blessed be He, looks at this and sees: if you remember, and you know in any case that whatever you merited to do, even the smallest thing before Hashem, that you merited to gather it and not to leave it before Hashem - even a hair's breadth that a person did before Hashem - the smallest thing, some movement, the best, before Him, blessed be He - and he values it, and is happy with it, and is thrilled by it, and lives it, and believes in it, and accepts it, and looks forward to it, and for him this is his vitality; this is truly his hope, that he truly lives it - then he remembers what Amalek did to you, for Amalek wanted to cool you down, and he wanted to break you, and wanted to make you despair, and that a person, Heaven forbid, be lost.

21:42 But whoever remembers this, then he topples Amalek, he weakens him; he does not weaken you. You weaken him, and you can defeat him, and you can overcome him, but this comes to a person only at the time of Purim. For on Purim, then they look at both the bad and the good. When are the eyes of the Holy One, blessed be He, watching the bad and the good? On Purim. Why - at whom does He look?

22:07 At Achashverosh, at Haman, at Amalek. For we mention 'Remember what Amalek did to you.' And on one side there is the Jewish people. So now before Hashem, blessed be He, [unclear] in Heaven, also the Jewish people, and also the Holy One, blessed be He, looks to see what Amalek did to us. For we mention it before Him; when we say, 'Remember what Amalek did to you,' in us there is an awakening of remembrance, but before Him, blessed be He, there is also an awakening of remembrance. For He remembers what we did for Him, and that we also do not forget Amalek.

22:35 When we remember what Hashem did for us, and what good Hashem did with us, and where we are, then at the same time that we remember, the Holy One, blessed be He, remembers. So in fact this is called 'In every place the eyes of Hashem watch the bad and the good.' For then the Holy One, blessed be He, looks at the bad ones; He sees where they are, and He sees that we are separate from them, we are not connected to them. So we tip them to the scale - we are the scale of merit, they are tipped to the scale of guilt, and then we can go out to a good life and peace, through the wine.

23:06 But one who drinks the wine and turns bad - then, when the eyes of Hashem watch, then they will not know where he is. For perhaps he will be [unclear] and reach mochin dekatnus, but if he will be at mochin degadlus and reach a great level like Moshe Rabbeinu, then the Holy One, blessed be He, will awaken in him, and then all the Jewish people will see the light that bursts forth from him. It is only through this.

23:30 Look, this is only this level. I am not speaking about it being the level of another person; I am speaking only about a person meriting such a level - a level with nothing above it. It depends where a person drinks. Take a righteous man who sits with wicked people and drinks wine with them - I don't know what will happen to him. Dangerous. At least be in good company - with wise men, with good people; then it will already help - the person will be helped. They say that the Rogatchover, may his merit protect us, would sit in the cemetery and speak words of Torah, which is forbidden.

24:04 So they remarked to the Rav: what is this? One must be careful in the presence of the dead - this is 'mocking the poor.' [unclear] - in their lifetime they knew nothing; all the more so in their death they do not know. The Rogatchover, may his merit protect us. In Tractate Berachos it is written about Rabbi Chiya and Rabbi Yonasan, 'they were walking along' - side a, at the bottom. Rabbi Chiya and Rabbi Yonasan were walking along, to the cemetery. They were walking in the cemetery, [unclear] - Rabbi Yonasan's tzitzis fell; he said to Rabbi Chiya: lift it, so that they should not say, 'Tomorrow they come to us, and now they mock us.'

24:41 And in the Pesikta Rabbasi, section 14, it is written 'Rabbi Chiya and Rabbi Nasan', not Rabbi Yonasan. Rabbi Yonasan? No. Rabbi Nasan - such a name. There is a difference there, and it is the same story. There too they expound - the Sages - 'that the dead do not know anything.' And they know nothing. But on the other hand, we do see that there are tzaddikim who do know and do see, and that there are tzaddikim who [unclear] alive. And in any case, there are. So the question is: there is one who is in the grave and he is dead, and there is one who is in the grave and he is alive; and there is a person who is alive and he is already dead, and there is a dead one who is alive like this. It depends - it depends on who. If you drink wine,

25:18 you can be alive. And there is a person who drinks wine and is simply dead. That's it. So if he drinks wine and he is dead, let him not drink. Whoever will be joyful and drinks wine will not be harmed. But let him be truly joyful in Mordechai the Jew. Let him be joyful that he is truly of the seed of Israel; then he will not be harmed. You know, everything the Holy One, blessed be He, does for us - so many reasons for Torah; He gives us festivals and times and seasons for gladness, for joy - so many things.

25:47 So many times, all year. Now Purim; after that we have Pesach, the receiving of the Torah - and every time some special thing shines. But what is special is that what shines on Purim is a light so great that it does not shine in the whole year. For in the whole year such a tremendous light does not shine. And why does such a light not shine all year? Because on Purim one does not know how to tell apart 'cursed is Haman' from 'blessed is Mordechai.' There is no seeing of bad at all.

26:15 So on Purim we look and see that there is only good and nothing bad at all. And when we see only good and nothing bad, then we can know that, baruch Hashem, we fulfilled the obligation of Parshas Zachor and remembered exactly what Amalek did to us. For if we forget it, Heaven forbid, and our coldness in emunah - and while doing the mitzvos we are cold; we do not fulfill it out of joy, out of warmth of heart, out of awakening, out of love for Hashem - then we can know for certain that we did not actually fulfill the parshah.

26:56 We did not hear.