The Ten Commandments - as we read in our Parasha - conclude with the Commandment:(20:14) ’You shall not covet your fellow’s house. You shall not covet your fellow’s wife, his manservant, his maidservant, his ox, his donkey, nor anything that belongs to your fellow.’
Ibn Ezra comments: Many have wondered about this commandment: how can one not covet in your heart, a nice thing, which is goodly in his eyes?
I will now give you an answer, by way of a parable: a villager who is sound-minded, and sees a daughter of the king, who is beautiful, will not - in his heart - desire to lie down with her, because he knows that this is not possible..just as a man does not desire to have conjugal relations with his mother, though she be beautiful, as he has been trained from his childhood days to know that she is forbidden to him.
So, too, every thinking person has to know, that a beautiful woman or money, will not come his way because of his wisdom, but only when Hashem has allotted it to him, as his portion.
Therefore, the thinking person will not covet his fellow’s wife, knowing that she has been forbidden to him by Hashem - though she may be more desirable in his eyes than a king’s daughter - but will rejoice in his lot, and not covet or desire in his heart that which is not his, as he knows that Hashem did not want to give it to him, and that, therefore, he is not able to take her by his force or machinations, and he will therefore trust in his Creator that He will sustain him, and will do that which is for his good.
Sforno adds: ’Do not covet’: the object should be in your eyes absolutely unattainable, because the unattainable will not, in the natural order of things, be coveted.
Rav Avigdor Nebenzahl comments: The concluding Ten-Commandment is the prohibition of ‘do not covet, which raises the question: Is there significance to it being the closing Ten Commandments? - true, this question would arise had the concluding Commandment been some other prohibition.
Nevertheless, since nothing in the Torah is random, the question is a valid one.
Just as we explain why ‘I am Hashem your G-d’, is the first Commandment - that it is the foundation of the Ten Commandments, and of the entire Torah - so too, we need to understand why ‘thou shalt not covet’, was chosen to be the concluding Commandment.
In truth, on first contemplation, when we consider this prohibition, an even greater question arises: why was this prohibition included at all in the Ten Commandments? One who transgresses it, is not even liable to מכות: ‘stripes’.
There is therefore a fundamental difference between it, and the other Ten Commandments, and moreover, other severe transgressions which are not even included in the Ten Commandments.
Rashi has already provided an answer to this - based on the teaching of Rav Saadia Gaon - that, the Ten Commandments are אבות: ‘fathers’, and all the other Mitzvot are תולדות: offsprings, in regard to them.
‘Thou shalt not covet’, is a ‘father’ in itself - a commandment which has many ramifications; therefore, though there are more severe ramifications from other Mitzvot, it merited a place in the Ten Commandments.
Perhaps we can add to this elucidation.
Ibn Ezra, as we have brought, ‘offers an exposition of this prohibition: it is the only one that is addressed to one’s feelings, and not to one’s deeds.
How can one be commanded as to feelings, which are not in our control?
True, the Torah obligates us not to do things which are not in our control, but when a man sees a lovely object, is it not natural that he should want to possess it?
Ibn Ezra answered this, but let us rephrase the answer: We all know, that there are some things which are not in the realm of us wanting them.
For instance, a man wakes up in the morning, and decides what he is going to eat for breakfast - in a sane person’s mind, he does not, in making this decision, have a doubt whether he should have bread, or, instead, a poison pill.
That exactly, is how the Torah wants you to feel regarding that which belongs to your fellow - that there should not be even a הווה אמינה: an inkling in your heart, to want it.
True, you would like to have diamonds - but it would not enter your mind, to eat diamonds; so, too, your fellow’s money, has to be in your eyes like ‘eating diamonds’.
Now we come to the difficult part of the matter: how can we get to this level - every man ‘needs’ and wants diamonds, a house - how can these things which he so naturally craves, come to be seen as things which are ‘un-natural’, and lacking importance?
It needs to be said, that the very commandment of ‘thou shalt not covet’, the fact that your desire is opposed to the Will of Hashem, this, in itself should make it foreign to your nature, in the extreme - that it should be so illogical in your eyes, to want something that is opposed to what Hashem wants.
True, we are not as יראי שמים: in Fear of Hashem, as we should be - and this is why this demand of the Torah appears to us as ‘against our nature’ - but this is what the Torah demands, and, if this is what the Torah demands, it means that it is possible, as, since this world was created according to the ‘blueprint’ of the Torah, it is not possible that there should be in existence, something which is contrary to that which is written in the Torah.
To covet something that belongs to your fellow, and to persuade him to sell it to you - in short, to go against the Will of Hashem - is, therefore like coming before a mighty King, and saying to him:’I have a suggestion for you - forego your throne, and, in exchange, I will give you ten shekels.
The place for this impudent person, we will all agree, is in prison, or perhaps in the insane asylum!
Would it cross the mind of a sane person, to forego his throne for such a worthless sum?!
This should be plain to you, that it is nonsensical to forego that which is the Will of Hashem for the diamonds of your fellow.
We can now return to answering our opening question: ‘Thou shalt not covet’ was chosen to conclude the Ten Commandments, because it contains the key to performing all that is said, preceding it.
In its rationale - which addresses our inner will - we come to the foundation of that which underlies the rationale of the Mitzvot, to the infrastructure for the observance of all the Mitzvot: the Will of Hashem.
Therefore, this commandment does not come only to teach us about itself, but to teach us about all the Commandments - just as coveting that which belongs to your fellow is lacking any relevance to you - because it is contrary to the Will of Hashem - so, too, with all the Ten Commandments, it should be as distant and lacking any rationale, not to observe them, because, to do so, is contrary to the Will of Hashem.
If this is so clear, why then does this Commandment, of ‘do not covet’, seem to us as if it were impossible, as if it is ‘against our nature’?
The answer is, that before the sin of Adam Harishon, not coveting that which belongs to your fellow was accepted no less than ‘thou shalt not kill’.
We learn this from our Midrashim as to the events at Sinai, when the Ten Commandments were given to us - they relate that, on hearing each of the Ten Commandments, the souls of the hearers departed, and they required the ‘dew of life’ to be revived.
What is the meaning of:’Their souls departed’? - that they nullified their physical aspect, all matters of this world left them, and their only wish was: ‘To see our King’, to cleave to their Creator.
This, in fact, is our natural state, to be tied to the Divine Throne, from which we were taken, and to where we yearn to return.
However, our souls were lowered to the ‘imprisonment’ of our physical bodies, though at that wondrous event, our souls cast off their physical bondage, and returned to their natural state.
At that moment, when Bnei Israel heard: ’Thou shalt not covet’, they had no interest even in permitted physical things, and had someone asked them:’How is it possible not to covet? - they would, as one, answer; how is it possible to covet, when we do not want even permitted physical things, let alone, forbidden ones, which belong to our fellows.
It was only when the Shechina departed Sinai, that the body ‘reasserted’ itself, and the question of the Ibn Ezra began to be asked:’How is it possible not to covet’.
As we are destined to live in this physical world, we have to constantly contend with this question’, and, guided by the Ibn Ezra, to overcome this challenge.
Rav Moshe Sternbuch brings the commentary of the Ibn Ezra, and adds: His wondrous words, that one is required to compare his desire to that which belongs to his fellow, to flying in the skies, which is, as he knows, impossible - and so too, should coveting that which belongs to his fellow, be in his eyes.
The Chinuch adds that it is certainly within the power of man to limit his thoughts and his desires to that which is the Will of Hashem, and he is therefore - as the Sforno posits - warned againsy coveting, in his mind.
According to this, the first of the Ten Commandments, and the final one, are Mitzvot of the heart, the First obliging man to instill in his heart the belief in Hashem, and in the last - also in his heart - to not covet that which belongs to his fellow.
The underlying teaching is, that by observing the first Commandment:’I am Hashem..’, he instills in his heart that everything comes from Hashem, and that that which belongs to his fellow, will only be given to his fellow - and that he has no need for the object; he therefore will not covet the other’s house, because Hashem has given it to his fellow.
It follows that this Mitzvah - of not coveting - can not be fulfilled without fulfilling the Mitzvah of ‘I am your G-d’, and the first and last of the Ten Commandments contain in them, all of the Ten Commandments, as by Emunah he will not come to sin, until even ‘to covet’, he will not transgress.
Haktav veHakabalah notes: Many have expressed wonder at this Mitzvah - how can it be that a man not covet in his heart, a nice object that catches his eye, and which his heart, by its nature, covets, and the Ibn Ezra has given his answer.
It appears - as the Sefer ‘Ba’al Habrit’ brings - that, after Hashem has commanded us to love Him with all our heart, the word ‘all’ requires that, in our hearts, we should have only love of Him - and no other love, such as love of this world, as if both equally fill his heart, we is not fulfill loving Him with ‘all’ your heart.
A person who truly fulfills this Mitzvah, at all times seeks to cleave to Hashem, and, therefore, it is not possible for him to covet or desire any of the earthly things - as in his heart there is no place to covet or desire anything, other than Hashem, like a glass that is filled to overflowing, and has no room for anything else.
It is therefore not possible for a person to observe ‘do not covet’, unless he observes the Mitzvah of ‘loving Hashem with all his heart’.
The two Mitzvot are like two brothers, each one seeking to eject the other, so that only if he observes ‘Love Hashem with all your heart’ - and is always bound in bonds of love with Hashem -will he succeed in forsaking all the pleasures of this world, and his heart will not covet them.
A parting gem from the Bet Halevi: The answer given by Ibn Ezra - to the question as to how we can be commanded ‘not to covet’, something which seemingly is not within our control - is a nice explanation, but even without it, every person can imagine to himself, that if he greatly covets something, and, indeed, is close to attaining it, and will therefore pursue it - his yetser ha’ra burning within him - were the path to reach it being over a river of frozen ice, and - he imagines - that, as he crosses it, his foot slips and he is close to falling, at that moment that he is about to slip and fall, out of fear, he will lose his desire for it, as this is what the Creator instilled in the nature of each of His creationsm- that even the little fear that will arise in the heart of man, will cause his coveting to pass.
Therefore, since the Torah has adjured us not to covet, and has forbidden it, if one has even a modicum of fear of Hashem - like his fear of slippimg and talling on the ice - he will no longer wish to covet.
In this way, the mistake of people - who think that they have an excuse for their wrongful deeds, that they are because of their stength of their yetser ha’ra over them - is not even a minor justification, because if even a modicum of יראת ה׳: of Fear of Hashem, existed in their heart, their yetser ha’rs would have no place, as the yetser ha’rs is totally nullified by a little Awe, and its force is only because the person previously foregoes his Yirat Shamayim.
This is what the Torah teaches us (Eikev 10:12):’What does Hashem your G-d ask of you, only to have Fear of Him..and to follow in all of His ways’ - as only if you have this Fear, you will assuredly observe all the commandments.
This is the underlying reason for the words, shortly after the Ten Commandments:(20:17):’G-d has come.. in order that His awe shall be upon your faces, so that you shall not sin’ - as by the Fear of Hashem, you will be saved from the yetser ha’ra, and will not sin.
לרפואת כל חיילי צהל וכן נועם עליזה בת זהבה רבקה ונחום אלימלך רפאל בן זהבה רבקה, בתוך שאר חולי עמנו.