What if the greatest famine isn't a lack of food or water—but a famine of the soul?
What if simply doing mitzvos isn't enough?
Through a powerful message from the Ponevezher Rav and the Radomsker Rebbe, discover the hidden light within every mitzvah—and why Hashem is waiting for us to take that first step.
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Dedicated by Abe & Toby Hikind לעילוי נשמת ישראל דוב בן יהודה צבי ווייס.
Parshas Toldos 5787
A pacifier can quiet a hungry baby for a little while. He may even fall asleep with it in his mouth. But when he wakes up, he’s still hungry. I wonder how often we do something similar in our avodas Hashem. We do what we’re supposed to do, feel better about ourselves, and move on with our day. When was the last time we walked away from a mitzvah wanting a little more?
ויהי רעב בארץ מלבד הרעב הראשון אשר היה בימי אברהם.
There was a famine in the land, aside from the first famine that occurred in the days of Avraham (Bereishis 26:1).
A devastating famine had struck Eretz Yisrael, and people were struggling to find the food they needed to live. Rashi tells us that Yitzchak Avinu considered going down to Mitzrayim, as his father Avraham had done during an earlier famine. Hashem told him, “גור בארץ הזאת ואהיה עמך ואברכך — Remain in this land, and I will be with you and bless you” (Bereishis 26:3). Hashem would provide for Yitzchak, and His promise to Avraham would continue through him.
A Different Kind of Famine
On the words ויהי רעב בארץ, the Midrash teaches, “עשרה רעבון באו לעולם, ten famines came upon the world (Bereishis Rabbah 64:2). It takes us through the generations, beginning with Adam HaRishon and Lemech, and going on to the days of Avraham, Yitzchak, Yaakov, the Shoftim, David HaMelech, Eliyahu, and Elisha. People lived through terrible hardship as they struggled to find enough to eat.
The Midrash concludes with “ואחד לעתיד — and one in the future,” and quotes Amos HaNavi. You may recognize the words from the Yehudah Green song.
והשלחתי רעב בארץ לא רעב ללחם ולא צמא למים כי אם לשמע את דברי ה׳.
I will send a famine upon the land, not a hunger for bread or a thirst for water, but a hunger to hear the words of Hashem (Amos 8:11).
Imagine a table set with dry-aged ribeye, the finest sushi, aged Bordeaux, and vintage Champagne. Yet none of it can satisfy someone desperate to hear דבר ה׳. He’d leave the whole meal on the table and travel from one end of the land to the other for a single word from Hashem. And after all that searching, ולא ימצאו, they won’t find it.
ונעו מים עד ים ומצפון ועד מזרח ישוטטו לבקש את דבר ה׳ ולא ימצאו.
They will wander from sea to sea, and from north to east, seeking the word of Hashem, and they will not find it (Amos 8:12).
The Malbim places this in the days of Bayis Sheni, after the last nevi’im. Like someone wandering for bread during a famine, a Yid would travel far to hear דבר ה׳. But ולא ימצאו. With no navi to turn to, he would return empty-handed.
When Crumbs Feel Like Enough
The Ponovezh Rav, quoted in the ArtScroll Midrash, asks a fascinating question.
The words “כי אם לשמע את דברי ה׳ — but to hear the words of Hashem,” seem to describe tremendous dveikus and hisbatlus. A Yid has enough food and water, yet hungers only to hear דבר ה׳.
If a Yid is hungry exclusively to hear the word of Hashem, why does the Navi describe that hunger as a famine? Isn’t that a brachah?
The Ponovezh Rav explains that when people live through a famine, they get used to surviving on crumbs. A piece of bread that once would barely have counted as a meal now feels like plenty. The same thing can happen in ruchniyus. A Yid can get so used to getting by on a little that he stops feeling anything is missing. That’s the klalah. We can go on for years without asking how much more we’re capable of or how much of our tafkid we have yet to fulfill.
How easily our avodas Hashem can turn into a checklist. Davened? Check. Put on tefillin? Check. Learned a little Torah? Check. Even when we call our parents or speak with our spouse, our minds may already be on the next task.
That’s when Yiddishkeit becomes a pacifier. We can do the same thing with a mitzvah. We come home from a shiur, say it was a good vort, and go right back to doing things the way we always did. We checked the box, and that’s enough to quiet the feeling that something is missing.
Eventually, we stop asking how much more of our tafkid is still waiting for us.
When we reduce Yiddishkeit to כי אם, to doing just enough to say we’ve fulfilled our obligation, that itself is the famine. We can get so used to living on crumbs that we stop feeling hungry for more.
Bring Me What You Have
Later in the parsha, Rivkah Imeinu tells Yaakov to bring her two young goats so she can prepare the food Yitzchak loves.
לך נא אל הצאן וקח לי משם שני גדיי עזים טובים ואעשה אתם מטעמים לאביך כאשר אהב.
Please go to the flock and take for me two choice young goats from there, and I will prepare them as delicacies for your father, the way he loves them (Bereishis 27:9).
The Tiferes Shlomo asks why the Torah gives us so much detail about Yaakov’s part in preparing the meal. “וילך ויקח ויבא לאמו — He went, took them, and brought them to his mother” (Bereishis 27:14). The pasuk then says “ותעש אמו מטעמים כאשר אהב אביו — His mother prepared delicacies the way his father loved them.” Why does the Torah take us through each step Yaakov took when it was Rivkah who would make the matamim?
Drawing on the Zohar, the Radomsker explains b’derech remez that Rivkah represents the Shechinah and Yaakov represents every Yid. לך נא אל הצאן, “Please go to the flock,” is the Shechinah urging a Yid to get up and do the mitzvah in front of him.
He wants to learn Torah, daven, or do a mitzvah, but worries that his limited understanding or distracted avodah couldn’t be pleasing to Hashem. He struggles even to begin. To that Yid, the Shechinah says לך נא. Go ahead. Begin.
The Tiferes Shlomo gives the example of tefillin. Picture yourself walking into shul a few minutes late. At the front of the room, there’s a Yid with his siddur open, turning page after page as he goes through the kavanos of tefillin. Then you look down at the tefillin in your own hands. You barely know what he’s thinking about. You remember how distracted you were yesterday, and you wonder, “Can my tefillin really be that precious to Hashem?”
Hashem says, וקח לי, “Take for Me.” Put on your tefillin with whatever kavannah you can bring to the mitzvah, and do it for Hashem.
And then comes the reassurance. “ואעשה אתם מטעמים לאביך כאשר אהב — And I will prepare them as delicacies for your father, the way he loves them.”
Hashem says, “I’ll make your efforts bear fruit. You bring Me the dough. I’ll knead it, bake it, and turn it into a delicious challah whose aroma fills the house.”
Light from Within the Darkness
This past Tuesday, on Rosh Chodesh Kislev, I met Reb Tzvi Feuer and told him that Kislev might be my favorite month. He smiled and said three words. אור מתוך חושך. “Light from within the darkness.” I knew we were thinking about the same thing.
There’s something fresh about Kislev. Seeing the Chanukah items on the shelves at Seasons, I got excited. Even weeks before hadlakas neiros, I can feel something of the shefa that returns every Chanukah.
Over the course of a year, we get used to seeing ourselves a certain way. We know how we davened yesterday, and we assume we’ll daven the same way tomorrow. After a while, we take the things we’ve struggled with as proof of all we’re capable of.
Kislev reminds me that a room can be full of light even when the person standing in it has a blindfold over his eyes. The ohr haganuz, the hidden light, is already there. The neiros help us see what we’ve been looking at all year.
And even with a match in our hand, ready to perform a mitzvah, we can hear that little voice. “Who are you? You think you’re a tzaddik? You think you know what you’re doing?” It’s the same voice that gets to us when we’re about to make a berachah, call a friend who needs us, visit someone who’s sick, or learn a little extra Torah.
There’s a mitzvah right in front of us, and somehow we’ve convinced ourselves it belongs to a Yid on a higher madreigah. Once we believe that, it’s easy to settle for Pacifier Judaism. We light the ner, check the box, and move on.
But we can stay by the neiros a little longer and let their light melt away some of the assumptions we’ve made about ourselves and the world around us. Right there, we can remember “קח לי — Bring it to Me,” and ask Hashem to help us see the light we’ve gotten used to overlooking.
That much is in our hands. And the results are in His. “ואעשה אתם מטעמים — And I will make them into delicacies.”
Leave the pacifiers for babies. We have a tafkid to fulfill. There is so much more to do. •
