HaRav Shmuel Eliahu is Chief Rabbi of Tzfat.
There could be no giving of the Torah before the war with Amalek. The Torah was granted only after Israel rose up with valor to fight the vicious tribe of Amalek. Moses said to Joshua: “Choose men for us and go out and fight with Amalek; tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the staff of God in my hand.”
After the battle, God explained to Israel that without this war against the root of evil in the world, the light of God could not be revealed: “The Holy One, blessed be He, swore that His Name and His Throne would not be complete until the name of Amalek was utterly erased. Only then will His Name and His Throne be whole.”
Thanks to the courage and readiness for self-sacrifice of Joshua and all the Israelite fighters, the Shechinah rested upon the People of Israel. As our sages taught: “The Shechinah only rests upon one who is wise, strong, wealthy, and of stature.” From Moses we learn the significance of all these traits for Divine Revelation.
Thus, Israel stood with strength against Amalek and weakened him. In merit of this, the newly-formed Nation was privileged to experience the Revelation at Mount Sinai, where God's Name and Throne were made manifest.
In many instances, we see that the bravery to save fellow Jews leads to profound spiritual elevation.
Rambam writes: “The beginning of the degrees of prophecy is when a person is Divinely moved and inspired to perform a great good deed, such as rescuing a noble community from a wicked group.”
This Divine urge motivated Moses to save the Hebrew man from the Egyptian. It was the same Divine Spirit that empowered David to fight the lion, the bear, and the Philistine “with this spirit of the Lord” (Moreh Nevuchim 2:45).
Thus, Israel merited being empowered with the Shechinah after their self-sacrifice at the Sea. Because of this Divine Presence, they sang the Song at the Sea. Our Sages tell us that their prophesy was at an exalted level, seeing “What even Ezekiel son of Buzi the priest did not see.” Similarly, Abigail tells David that after his self-sacrifice in fighting Goliath, he would be entirely bound up with God:
“The Lord will certainly make for my master a faithful house, because my master fights the wars of the Lord… and the soul of my master shall be bound in the bond of life with the Lord your God, but the souls of your enemies He shall sling away from the hollow of a sling” (I Samuel 25:28-29).
So it was with Esther and Mordechai, who risked their lives and merited to write the Megillah with Divine Inspiration. So it is with all those fighting, both IDF soldiers and civilians, since the Hamas attack on Simchat Torah and the subsequent war on seven fronts (cf. Rambam, Laws of Kings 7:15).
From Moses, Joshua learned that strength and devotion to Israel are prerequisites for ascending to God and receiving Torah. Like Moses, Joshua was a war hero, conquering thirty-one mighty nations. He said:
“The Lord drove out from before you great and strong nations; and no man has stood before you to this day. One man among you shall chase a thousand, for the Lord your God is He who fights for you” (Joshua 23)
The courage and might of Joshua and the Children of Israel in conquering the Land earned them a great revelation of God in the world:
“And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed in its place until the nation had avenged itself upon its enemies” (Joshua 10).
In contrast to such bravery, there is cowardice among those who could have saved Israel but failed. Their fear cost them great spiritual heights. God commanded Moses to take the Elders of Israel:
“Go and gather the Elders of Israel... and they shall listen to your voice, and you and the Elders shall go to Pharaoh” (Exodus 3).
Moses and Aaron gathered them and told them the message of Redemption, asking them to join in confronting Pharaoh. But on the way to Pharaoh’s palace, they all fell away in fear “until none remained.” In the end, only Moses and Aaron stood before Pharaoh and declared: “Thus said the Lord, the God of Israel: Let My people go that they may celebrate before Me in the wilderness.”
Pharaoh, seeing the lack of unified leadership, rebuked them: “Why do you, Moses and Aaron, distract the people from their work? Go back to your burdens!”
Rashi, citing Midrash Rabbah, says that God punished these Elders who were meant to help free Israel but failed. Later, during the Revelation at Sinai, they were only permitted to worship “from afar” as it says: “Moses alone shall come near the Lord, but they shall not come near; and the People shall not go up with him.” (Exodus 24)
They did not overcome their fear and did not approach Pharaoh when Israel needed them. Therefore, they were denied ascent to the spiritual heights of Sinai. Of these nobles, it says:
“And upon the nobles of the Children of Israel, He did not lay His hand; and they beheld God, and they ate and drank” (Exodus 24).
Instead of repenting and mourning their failure, they sank into physical indulgence and later complained against God: “And the people were as if complaining evil in the ears of the Lord; and the Lord heard, and His anger was kindled, and a fire burned among them and consumed those at the edge of the camp” (Numbers 11:1).
Later, God commanded Moses to appoint seventy new Elders. The original Elders, where were they? The Midrash says: they perished in the fire at Taverah. They had acted irreverently, “like one who bites his bread and speaks before the king” as it says, “They beheld God and ate and drank.” God did not wish to bring about mourning during the giving of the Torah, so He punished them later.
The same applies to those who did not come to help in the war led by Deborah and Barak: “‘Curse [the city of] Meroz,’ said the angel of the Lord, ‘curse bitterly its inhabitants, because they did not come to the aid of the Lord, to the aid of the Lord among the warriors’” (Judges 5).
The angel who issued the curse was Barak himself, described as an angel in order to show that his curse was Divinely mandated. The Talmud (Shevuot 36a) states: “Ulla said: With four hundred shofars Barak excommunicated Meroz.”
Barak excommunicated the town because it did not come to aid Israel. Essentially, it failed to come to aid God Himself.
It is worth noting that “excommunication with four hundred shofars” also appears in the Talmud (Sotah 47a) regarding the excommunication of Yeshu by Rabbi Yehoshua ben Perachya, symbolizing a sage who understands the value of Torah but fails to grasp the worth of the Jewish People.
May our Elders today be saved from making the same mistakes as those made in the past when the exaltedness of Jewish valor in war was looked upon lightly and not recognized as an essential component of Torah.
[Translated by Tzvi Fishman]