Pinch never liked Purim. It was too happy of a day, and frankly, Pinch wasn’t into the whole happiness thing. Pinch hated passing playgrounds filled with kids happily climbing and swinging, he hated weddings filled with smiling dancing people, he hated bris ceremonies, bar mitzvahs, graduations, and any other event where smiles reigned supreme. But most of all he hated Purim, the holiday that filled the streets with revelry and joy. There was no way to avoid all the crazy happy people! What was everyone so happy about?
Pinch grew up as Pinchas Yankel Shneider, the son of a poor tailor and seamstress in the poor shtetl of Grodny. Growing up, there was never enough to eat, the kids fought over the bigger portion of the potato they would split for dinner, if there was dinner. In cheder, the taciturn Rebbe would always find some excuse to yell at Pinchas and tell him how worthless he was. On the streets, Pinchas tried to make some money selling the pipes he whittled out of tree branches, but everyone sneered at him and told him his wares were worse than the cheap imports from the Orient. And at night, as he lay freezing on his lumpy mattress, he would hear his parents working for hours, the clacking of their needles the only accompaniment to their never ending tirades against everyone and anyone.
There was not much joy in Pinchas Yankel’s childhood, and that was what he grew accustomed to. It made sense to him. Joy and happiness were diversions, a drug to fool the unsuccessful into thinking they had meaning in life. The real world was a tough place where you had to fight for every kopeck, and the only way you moved up was by trampling other people. And Pinchas sure did that. The scrappy little son of a poor tailor and seamstress learned to sell products at a lower margin than anyone else, and soon began putting all the Mom and Pop shops out of business. He traveled to the Orient, came home with boatloads of cheap products, and ruthlessly undersold everyone else.
By the time he was forty, Pinch as he was now called for his famous miserliness, had amassed a fortune selling anything from pens and pencils to clothing, lamps, pots, purses, bedsheets, and all manner of sundries. His big store on Main Street bustled with business, after all, he had put most of the competition out of business years earlier. Sure his products were shoddy; the pens would run, the clothing would rip at the seams, holes would appear in the pots and pans after a few dozen uses, but who had the money to buy anything at any other store?
Pinch built himself a massive home on the hill overlooking town, and in his home somberness was the only mood allowed. If a worker was caught laughing or joking they were summarily fired for the crime of frivolity. When children passed by his window laughing loudly, Pinch would get out on his porch with his blunderbuss and yell at the kids in such a fearsome manner that they would flee in fear. He would walk the streets muttering about how terrible everyone else was, and woe to the person who dared to try to cheer him up! As a rule he avoided children, they were all crazy, and loved to laugh and play despite the world crumbling all around them. For the most part, Pinch was quite successful at building an impregnable fortress of bitterness and negativity all around him.
The one day that beat him every year was Purim. No matter what he did, no matter how much he raised the prices on graggers, costumes, and wine, people found a way to celebrate Purim with reckless abandon. There was just no way for him to shut down Purim. One day a year, the shtetl filled with gleeful laughter, people broke out in spontaneous dancing all over the streets, the joy in the air was so thick and pervasive that it made Pinch sick.
The year 1893 was the year that Pinch had enough. The potato harvest had been exceptionally good, the rain had been bountiful, the weather mild, and people were flush with cash and good spirits. A week before Purim, the townspeople hung streamers and signs all over the streets, a few people even dressed their cows in Haman costumes! Purim was looking like it would be spectacular, and there was no way Pinch was going to let that happen. Sitting in his tomblike home on top of the hill, Pinch schemed and plotted, and finally decided that this would be the year that Pinch stole Purim.
Two days before Purim, early in the morning, Pinch sent a stream of workers into all of his competitor’s stores where they bought everything in stock. Every bottle of wine, every pound of flour, every jar of prune filling, every costume, every Mishloach Manos basket, everything. He had it all brought to his own megastore, which he locked with a massive padlock. On the door, he hung a sign that said “Gone fishing, closed until after Purim.” He then retreated back up the hill and locked himself in his study, ignoring the banging on the door from the distraught villagers.
That night, Purim night, Pinch got up in the wee hours of the morning, dressed himself in dark cape, and ran through the village ripping down every streamer and sign, and by morning the village was as drab as it ever was. Satisfied that he had truly beat Purim, Pinch went home and climbed into bed with a satisfied scowl on his face, and fell into a deep sleep.
The next morning Pinch woke up to an unmistakable sound, the dreaded sound of laughter and singing. He looked out his window and couldn’t believe his eyes; the townspeople were dressed up in homemade costumes, they were dancing and singing in the streets, and they were bringing Mishloach Manos to one another. Sure they were a bit modest, the baskets of wine and hamentashen were replaced by miniature hand-carved potato baskets filled with mashed potatoes and chopped egg salad, but the merriment was the same as it was every year. Once again he had failed, and joy had prevailed.
Then he noticed a strange thing. A growing line of children were making their way up the hill to his house, and each of them had a basket of Mishloach Manos for him! This had never happened before, no one ever brought him Mishloach Manos! Soon they were knocking at his door, and he knew it would only get worse so he ran to the door, threw it open and started screeching, but none of them were listening! “A Freilichen Purim Mr. Pinch!” each of them called out as they deposited their meager mishloach manos on his porch.
He knew that he had to give them back something, it was really bad form not to return a mishloach manos gift. At first he just threw some candies in their general direction, but something strange happened. As he began to give, he began to feel a warmth deep inside him. He wasn’t sure what it was, but he thought it might be the happiness he had avoided all these years. It was a foreign feeling, but it felt good, and Pinch couldn’t get enough of it. Soon he found himself inviting the children into his house and plying them with freshly baked hamantashen, and that warmth just kept growing! He was starting to like this!
By noon, he was feeling so good, that he ran down to his store, threw open the doors, and wrote a big sign, “Come one, come all! Take whatever will make you happy! A Freilichen Purim to all! PS I never went fishing.” The grateful townspeople came running, and the more Pinch handed out, the better he felt! The townspeople decided to have one big unified meal in the shul, and a few women volunteered to cook mountains of food using the foodstuffs from Pinch’s store.
That evening, the whole community packed into the shul, where they feasted and drank, danced and sang, for hours on end. Presiding over the festivities was a beaming Pinch, with a smile bigger than Texas plastered on his face. All the happiness he kept at bay for so many years tumbled into him in one big rush. Right then and there, Pinch decided that from then on, every year on Puim he would sponsor the biggest Purim Party on the Planet. What a vinahopuchu, what a Purim reversal! No longer would he be the Pinch who stole Purim, instead he would be the Pinch who Powered Purim!
Purim is a favorite holiday for so many. From the children stuffing their mouths with impossible amounts of sweets, to the adults whose revelry lasts late into the night, Purim is simply great. But who would think that Purim is a holier day than Yom Kippur?
But the Tikkunei Zohar tells us that the very name Yom Kippurim means a day like Purim, intimating that Yom Kippur is only secondary to Purim. Many explanations have been given on this idea, and I would like to offer another one here today. On Yom Kippur we are wholly focused on ourselves. We are supposed to contemplate where we came up short in the past year, and how we are going to fix it in the coming year. We spend the majority of the day in shul, praying and fasting. And even though there are others all around us, Yom Kippur is really a day of vertical connection, where the majority of our bandwidth should be going from us to G-d. It is a day of total self-reflection.
Purim on the other hand is a day where are wholly focused on others. The Mishloach Matanot gifts of food, Matanot L’evyonim money for those in need, and the Purim Seuda-Feast are all done directly from one person to the other. The majority of the day is spent focused on giving to others, and the majority of the bandwidth goes horizontally from man to his friend. It is a day of total giving.
So what is better? Vertical focus or horizontal focus? Giving to others or deeply connecting to G-d? The Talmud answers this based on a story in Genesis. G-d came to visit Abraham after his circumcision, yet Abraham leaves his vertical conversation with G-d to go service some Arab travelers he sees in the distance. From this the Talmud )Shabbos, 127a) learns that, “Greater is greeting of guests than receiving the Face of G-d.” The reason given for this is that the only thing greater than connecting with G-d is being like G-d. When we give to others we are emulating G-d, who created the world out of kindness, and recreates it with kindness every second.
We have two days of the year that contain enormous spiritual power. On one of them we connect to G-d in the most intense way by cutting off so much of the human functions (eating, drinking, etc.) and talking to G-d for the majority of the day. But on Purim we act like G-d, by using the whole day in the G-dly function of giving to others. And the only thing better than connecting to G-d is being like G-d.
May we all merit to use this Purim properly, wholly focused on giving to others; being Divine.
May you have a Joyful and Divine Purim!
Parsha Dvar Torah
In this week’s Torah portion we read about the vestments worn by the Kohanim, the priests who served in the Tabernacle (the portable temple the Jews used in the desert) and in the permanent Temple in Jerusalem. The regular priests wore 4 garments - pants, a tunic, a belt, and a hat. The High Priest had four extra garments, a long robe, an apron-like garment tied around his waist and reaching his ankles, a golden breastplate with 12 precious stones on it, and a golden plate worn on his forehead.
The Torah teaches us an interesting law about the apron and the breastplate, “They shall bind the [lower] rings of the breastplate to the [lower] rings of the eiphod (the apron) with a cord of greenish-blue wool, so that it [the choshen, the breastplate] remains against the eiphod's belt, so that the breastplate does not move from the eiphod.” (Exodus, 28:28). There is a special commandment that the breastplate not be removed from the apron. Why?
The Sages teach us that each of the extra vestments worn by the High Priest effected forgiveness for different sins that the nation committed. Obviously, each individual had to repent, but these special garments somehow aided the forgiveness. The breastplate helped bring about forgiveness for sins having to do with corruption of justice. In today’s terms that would be described as white-collar crimes, such as cheating in business, overcharging, and fraud. The apron helped forgive for the most egregious of all sins, Avodah Zara, idol worship, which denies the existence or power of G-d. From the fact that the two garments must always be tied together we can derive that the Torah is telling us that there is a strong connection between the two sins. What is that connection?
Rabbi Moshe Feinstein (1895-1986, Lithuania-NYC), in his commentary Darash Moshe, explains the connection. Both a person serving idols and one cheating in business has the same problem - they display their lack of faith in G-d. When a person bows down to a statue of Buddha, ascribing it power, it is clear that he is denying G-d’s omnipotence and omniscience. But when a person sits in his office and overcharges a customer, he is actually doing the same thing. If that person really believed that G-d was there in the office with him, looking over his shoulder, watching him steal, he could never commit that crime. It is only by removing G-d from the picture, effectively denying his omniscience that one allows himself to steal from another.
Not only does the white collar criminal deny G-d’s omniscience, but also his omnipotence. When someone steals he is in a sense saying that the only way he can get this extra money is by taking it, and that once they take it, it will remain theirs. They forget that G-d can easily give them money from any one of a million sources if He wants them to have it, and if He doesn’t want them to have it, there is nothing they will be able to do to hold onto it.
The apron and breastplate are always linked to teach us this important message. Stealing from people and corrupting a just system of law is tantamount to idol worship. (I love how this Dvar Torah happens to fall out right in the middle of tax season!) They both deny G-d’s reality.
Today, we have no High Priest, no holy vestments to help us with our repentance for those two sins. But the message for us is the same. We would never bow down to an idol, never ascribe G-dly powers to anything other than G-d. But we need to be just as careful to never take a penny that is not ours!
Parsha Summary
This week we take out two Sefer Torahs. From the first we read Parshat Titzaveh. Parshat Teztaveh begins with the commandment to bring only the purest olive oil for lighting the menorah. It then continues with the vestments worn by the Kohanim and the Kohain Gadol, (the regular priests and the High Priest). Here is the basic breakdown: all priests wore white linen pants, covered by a white linen tunic, wrapped up in a multicolored belt, and a white linen hat (the shape of the High Priest’s hat differed slightly from that of the regular priests.) The Kohain Gadol, the High Priest, wore four additional vestments; a blue robe, an apron-like garment, a breastplate made of multicolored wool and containing a gold plate with twelve precious stones, and a gold head plate with the words “Holy to G-d” engraved on it. After Ha-shem tells Moshe what the Kohanim should wear, He commands him about the sacrifices and services that will serve as the inauguration of the Msihkan, the Tabernacle.
(Quick lesson: Contrary to what many would like to believe, the clothes we wear make a big statement about who we are. They are the primary way we represent ourselves to the outside world, and the first message we give to those who don’t know us through any other medium. It is for this reason that the discussion of the inaugural service can come only after the commandments telling the Kohanim how they have to dress during the service. One cannot say “On the inside I will serve G-d, but to the outside world I can appear any way I would like.” The Torah here tells us that, au contraire, we must first ensure that the way we portray ourselves is consistent with our ideals before we go in to serve G-d)
The parsha continues with the description of the Tamid, a twice-daily sacrifice brought in the Mishkan or Beit Hamikdash, and finishes with a depiction of the incense altar.
From the second Sefer Torah, we read, Parshas Zachor, a special portion read once a year on the Shabbos before Purim as part of a Biblical commandment to remember Amalek. The portion we read reminds us of the battle that the Jews waged with the Amalekei nation when we first came out of Egypt. It tells us to never forget Amalek, and to remember that Ha-shems throne will never be complete as long as Amalek survives. The connection to Purim is obvious, as the archenemy Haman of the Purim story is a descendant of Amalek.
Quote of the Week: If you want an accounting of your worth, count your friends. – Merry Browne
Random Fact of the Week: The smallest known frog is found in Cuba, and is about the size of a dime.
Funny Line of the Week: What would happen if I hired two private investigators to follow each other?
Have a Happy Shabbos,
R’ Leiby Burnham