{"id":8216,"date":"2016-02-07T00:04:24","date_gmt":"2016-02-06T22:04:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ph.yhb.org.il\/en\/?p=8216"},"modified":"2018-05-24T12:33:21","modified_gmt":"2018-05-24T09:33:21","slug":"03-07-04","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ph.yhb.org.il\/en\/03-07-04\/","title":{"rendered":"04. The Value of Birkhot Ha-Torah"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #000000;font-family: Times New Roman\">After the decimation of Eretz Yisrael and the exile of the Jewish people, a major question arose, reflected in the words of the prophet (Yirmiyahu 9:11): \u201cWhy has the land been lost?\u201d Everyone certainly understood that we were exiled from our land because of our sins; they were asking which sin was at the root of the spiritual collapse that led to the destruction. The Sages, the prophets, and the ministering angels were asked this question and did not know how to answer, until God Himself explained. \u201cGod says: \u2018Because they abandoned My Torah which I had given them\u2019\u201d (<\/span><i><span style=\"color: #000000;font-family: Times New Roman\">ibid<\/span><\/i><span style=\"color: #000000;font-family: Times New Roman\">. 9:12). The Sages of the Gemara interpret this to mean that they did not recite the <\/span><i><span style=\"color: #000000;font-family: Times New Roman\">berakha <\/span><\/i><span style=\"color: #000000;font-family: Times New Roman\">on the Torah before engaging in its study (<\/span><i><span style=\"color: #000000;font-family: Times New Roman\">Nedarim<\/span><\/i><span style=\"color: #000000;font-family: Times New Roman\"> 81a). That is, although they studied Torah, they did not relate to it as divine instruction. Because of this, they were considered to have forsaken the Torah of God. For anyone who learns Torah as if it is just another discipline of human wisdom is not considered to be one who studies Torah. However, when we recite <\/span><i><span style=\"color: #000000;font-family: Times New Roman\">Birkhot Ha-Torah<\/span><\/i><span style=\"color: #000000;font-family: Times New Roman\"> properly, we indeed approach Torah out of faith and attachment to its Giver.<\/span><span style=\"color: #000000;font-family: Times New Roman\">\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"margin: 0px;line-height: 107%;font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif;font-size: 11pt\"><span style=\"color: #000000\">The Sages further inquire (<\/span><i><span style=\"color: #000000;font-family: Times New Roman\">Nedarim<\/span><\/i><span style=\"color: #000000\"> 81a): Why is it that not all the children of Torah scholars continue in their parents\u2019 paths and become Torah scholars themselves? Presumably, the parents made efforts to educate their children to follow in their footsteps and become engrossed in Torah all their lives. If so, why did they not all succeed? Moreover, in those days, it was widely accepted that every son continued in his father\u2019s profession; sons of carpenters became carpenters, sons of farmers became farmers, and so on. Consequently, the Gemara\u2019s question is all the more perplexing \u2013 why don\u2019t a relatively large percentage of sons of Torah scholars become Torah scholars themselves? The Gemara offers several reasons, the last of which is that of Ravina: it is because they do not recite <\/span><i><span style=\"color: #000000;font-family: Times New Roman\">Birkhot Ha-Torah<\/span><\/i><span style=\"color: #000000\"> before studying. That is, the sons of Torah scholars often study Torah only because they saw their fathers doing so; as sons like to mimic their fathers, they too make efforts to study Torah. However, Torah can only be acquired by studying for God\u2019s sake, out of a personal attachment to its Giver. Therefore, those sons who study out of habit or by mimicking their fathers do not succeed in their studies.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After the decimation of Eretz Yisrael and the exile of the Jewish people, a major question arose, reflected in the words of the prophet (Yirmiyahu 9:11): \u201cWhy has the land been lost?\u201d Everyone certainly understood that we were exiled from our land because of our sins; they were asking which sin was at the root [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[111],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8216","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-03-07"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>04. 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