Sefer Devarim begins with a quite peculiar pasuk “These are the words that moshe spoke to bnei yisrael across the Jordan river…..After he struck down Sichon and Og.” The pashut pshat of the pasuk is that moshe can be “mevaeir” the torah, now that he’s taken care of og and sichon.
Q:The Slonimer asks what relevance does the death of sichon and og have to do with the ability of moshe to be “mevaeir” the torah? The Slonimer Rebbe redirects his questions now to the “hodu” we say every shabbos. We say Lemakeh melachim gedolim ki leolam chasdoh, vayarog melachim adirim ki leolam chasdoh, lisichon melch haemori ooleog melch habashan ki leolam chasdoh. The obvious question is why are sichon and og singled out for thanks to hashem when they are definitely included in the two hodus preceding?
A: for forty years the jews circumvented the land of Israel and now they were about to enter. However the jews were faced with a large obstacle, sichon and og. Sichon and og stood in front of the gates to eretz yisrael, the climax of the formation of bnei yisrael’s ruchniut and gashmiut. It happens often that when a yid is about to reach his destination and “tafkid” that the yetzer hara jumps right in front of him. He prevents the torah and ruchniut from penetrating the poor jew. Yet by removing the yetzeer harah only then can the torah penetrate. As we say in davening “sur merah veasei tov…only after removing the evil can one do true good(torah). Sichon and og had to be first removed by moshe for him to teach over the torah to am yisrael.
We are now a few days before the ninth of av, a day of extreme sadness and despair for the jews. The idea applies here as well. During these summer months we are finishing the parshiot of the torah coming closer to simchat torah. To some the height of spiritual happiness of the year. Yet the yetzer harah jumps in front of us during these summer months. The destruction of the batei mikdashot cause us to feel that how tbne torah be continued and finished. However it is through our perseverance and hasmadah that we will be able to reach our destrination. We will with gods help be able to finish the torah this year in Jerusalem with the coming of moshiach,amen.
David Jasphy (live from Camp Hasc)
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