Shavuot: Hishtadlut for Spirituality

Living Emunah By Rabbi David Ashear

When it comes to our physical needs, we are encouraged to make a basic effort and then rely on Hashem for the results. We know we'll never lose out by making the hishtadlut that Hashem wants us to make. In the business world, many people might say if you don't cut corners and bend some rules you won't be able to make money. We say, we don't need to deceive or lie to earn parnasa. Hashem decides who gets what, and if we follow His rules we'll always get everything that's meant for us to get. We make a basic effort according to halacha, and then we trust that Hashem will send what He wants us to have. Yet, when it comes to our spiritual lives, we are encouraged to make as much of an effort as possible. If we want to know Torah, we can't make a bare minimum effort and say, “Hashem will put the knowledge in my brain.” When we go to buy tefillin or an etrog, we can't just go into the first store and say, “I did my hishtadlut, I know Hashem is going to give me the best one.” In matters of spirituality, we have to give a hundred and ten percent effort. This is the purpose for which we were created. Rabbi Menashe Reizman brought a question from Rav Hirsch of Riminov. It seems from Chazal that before Matan Torah , the other mountains were all making superior efforts to have the Torah given upon them. That is a spiritual endeavor. If so, why did Har Sinai not make the same efforts? And why was Har Sinai chosen if it didn't make those same efforts? One explanation is that Har Sinai understood that here Hashem preferred humility. And once someone is doing what Hashem wants, then even in spirituality, he can be zocheh to free gifts. If someone makes the effort to set aside time to learn and has a real desire to understand and know what he's learning. But finally, when he sits down and turns off his phone and opens the sefer , someone comes in and tells him he's needed to do a mitzvah that nobody else could perform, which according to halachah means he has to get up and do it. There he can have bitachon in Hashem, the One who commanded him to do the mitzvah and say, He will help him know what he wants to learn by giving him extra Heavenly help the next time he learns to grasp the material and remember it. The Chatam Sofer once said Avraham Avinu was able to see things in the stars beyond what others could see. He was able to connect to Hashem on another level. He could have sat alone all day and connected to Hashem on the highest levels, but instead he chose to take care of guests and bring others closer to Hashem. He understood, that is what Hashem preferred for him to do. And that is why it says, המכסה אני מאברהם אשר אני עושה ? - When Hashem was going to destroy Sedom, he said, “How could I do so before telling Abraham about it?” Abraham could have found out this information by meditating and connecting to Me, but instead he was busy with people. So Hashem said, should Avraham lose out because he was doing My will? I'm still going to connect to him and I'm still going to tell him what I'm about to do. It says in the pasuk that we have a mitzvah to teach our children Torah. Anybody who is yearning to reach higher levels in Torah study understands the value of every minute that can be used to delve deeper into Torah. One may think, “If I take away time from my learning to learn the basics with my son I may lose out.” This is where we have bitachon in Hashem and say, if we're doing His will we'll never lose out on anything. He'll give us more siyata d’Shamaya in our learning because we took out time to do what He wants. The Chassidim HaRishonim used to spend nine hours a day in tefila. The Gemara asks, if so, how were they able to be knowledgeable in Torah? The Gemara answers that Hashem blessed their Torah learning and they were able to accomplish in their short amount of learning what would normally take other people's hours to accomplish. If someone spends time trying to learn one subject of Torah and his evil inclination tells him, if you're working so hard to learn this one little thing, you'll never become a talmid chacham, there's so much more to learn. To this we say נפש עמל עמלה לו - When you toil in one area of Torah, then when you learn another, the first toil will help you learn the second subject easier. Hashem helps us in so many ways with our spirituality. It is true we have to put in as much effort as possible in Torah, but if it's the will of Hashem to do a different particular mitzvah, we'll never lose out on any other spiritual gain Chag Sameach .