Parshas Shemini 5785
- Torah Tavlin
- 2 days ago
- 2 min read
וירכבו את ארון ... אל עגלה חדשה ... (שמואל ב' ו-ג)
At the insistence of Dovid HaMelech, the Aron HaKodesh was finally transported from a temporary location to its permanent home in Yerushalayim. Tragically, during the transport process, Uzzah erroneously thought the Aron was tipping. He reached up and grabbed hold of it. He died instantly and the dangers of mistreating the Aron became all the more apparent. In fact, Chazal call the act of carrying the Aron an "עבודה" implying that it was hard work. However, as we know from the tragedy of Uzzah, the Aron carried itself. So why was it so difficult for the Leviim to carry the Aron?
R’ Moshe Betzalel Luria zt”l explains that it is harder to fulfill the mitzvah of עונג שבת לשם שמים, than to fast on Yom Kippur. He explains that the “work” involved in carrying the Aron wasn’t physical. Rather, those who carried the Aron needed to clear their minds of anything mundane and focus only on doing this holy act purely לשם שמים. In fact, even thoughts of satisfaction from doing this holy mitzvah had to be completely purged from their minds. As such, it was this extreme level of holiness that the Leviim had to live on.
The same can be said about studying Torah. Sometimes a person can learn Torah with such a passion simply because he enjoys the intellectual challenges it poses. Scholarship sharpens his brain, and he feels good about it afterwards. However, true Torah study is meant to be done לשם שמים - where one gains no personal benefit from the learning and instead, he does so only to bring נחת רוח to Hashem.
