1. Why did he curse Hashem? What happened? Rashi gives us one version
– he heard that we are to place the bread an entire week and laughed;
‘before a human king only fresh bread is good, certainly before the
King of Kings’. He went ahead and cursed Hashem.
What does laughing have to do with cursing? Indeed, perhaps it is
strange that week-old bread is before Hashem, but what of it?
The human response is strange: when confronted by a strange mitzvah,
we do not take the obvious path – that the unacceptability of the
Mitzvah indicates that Moshe made it up – rather we reject it despite
being Word of Hashem. Small little people that we are, we take on
Hashem Himself.
Tell a feminist about seemingly masculine Mitzvos and she says ‘I
cannot accept that’. Not – mind you – ‘Are you sure its the absolute
Word of G-d?’, but that be it so or not, it is unacceptable. A human
rejecting G-d.
This is normal. It makes no sense, but so are we wired, that we feel
entitled to accept or reject Hashem based on if He makes sense to us.
The curser had rejected Hashem. He heard a Mitzvah that did not make
sense to him and rejected G-d Himself. He fully believed that Moshe
was not lying, and this was His Word. He rejected Hashem because it
sounded silly to him, and he thought Hashem was weird and didn’t make
sense.
Later on, when faced with a difficult situation, he went ahead and
cursed Him, for he had already rejected Hashem in his heart.
One important part of our mission here on earth is to sell ourselves
on Hashem. To accept Him, to embrace Him. To convince ourselves that
its okay not to understand. To relinquish our ego.
Its not easy.
2. ‘If you sacrifice a Todah offering, may it be to your Ratzon. On
that day it must be eaten, none shall be left to morning, I am
Hashem.’ What is this ‘Ratzon’ we are enjoined to? Why the reminder
that He is Hashem?
We suggested that too often a person brings a korban out of
obligation. Perhaps this occasionally can work, but never with Todah,
the thanksgiving offering. There one must sacrifice with gusto, energy
and thrill. It must be done with excitement and will.
This is ‘Ratzon’. Thanking sullenly is worthless.
Thats why it needs to be eaten all in one day – this shows the
eagerness of the bringer, his appetite and interest in the korban. He
is all into it. That is what Todah needs to look like.
We thank Hashem a few times a day. Modim, benching, brachos and so on.
Look alive a bit, will you?