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BAAL SHEM TOV STORY
Following the Weekly Torah Reading
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THE STOLEN PIPE
"G·d said to Moses: "Come to Pharaoh
(and warn him) for I have hardened his heart and the
heart of his servants...." (Exodus 10:1-13:16)
'Go in to Pharaoh' and warn him. Rashi
Moses was afraid of Pharaoh and his servants
because their hearts were hardened by G·d.
So instead of saying 'go' to Pharaoh, G·d
said 'Bo' meaning come with me and confront these
hard hearted people. Zohar
During the time of the Baal Shem Tov, a tobacco pipe
was one of man's most important possessions. In
those days, the Jewish people were so poor, they
barely had enough food to feed their families. So
when a man would come to visit a friend, the host
could at least afford to offer his guest a pinch of pipe
tobacco and a cup of tea.
The Baal Shem Tov had a very special
tobacco pipe. It was said that his pipe was so long
that he could rest the pipe stem on the back end of the
wagon while sitting on the seat and smoking.
And then there was the time that the Baal
Shem Tov was traveling in his wagon with several of
his followers and his wagon driver, Alexei, at the
reins. They were smoking their pipes and discussing
a concept of Torah. Suddenly, three soldiers of a local
of governor approached them on horseback. When
the soldiers got close to the wagon, they pulled out
their swords and planned to steal some money from
the Jews in the wagon.
"Listen up, we are the soldiers for the
Governor and we demand twenty ruples for the right to
travel on the Governor's road," the commander of the
soldiers said with a snarl.
"We're sorry," answered Alexei, "but the
Rabbi and his students don't have any money."
Just then, the soldiers noticed the Baal
Shem Tov's pipe.
"In that case we'll take this," said the commander, as
he leaned down from his horse and snatched the pipe
out of the Baal Shem Tov's hand. With that, they
galloped off, holding the pipe in the air as if it were a
sword.
No one in the wagon spoke. The students just sat,
still feeling the fear from the encounter with the
soldiers. The Baal Shem Tov seemed to be far off in a
deep meditative state. As for Alexei, he reached under
his seat and took a little nip from a bottle of whiskey
he always kept there.
About an hour passed. The Baal Shem Tov
looked around and said to Alexei, "Unhitch the horse
from the wagon so that you can ride it. Then go (Bo)
down the road in the direction that the soldiers went.
When you finally catch up with them, take back the
pipe and bring it back to me."
"But Rabbi, they aren't going to give me that pipe and
they are armed!" said Alexei with a lot of concern in his
voice.
"Don't worry," said the Baal Shem, "you'll be able
to take it."
As Alexei rode of in the direction that the soldiers went,
he wondered, "I sure hope the Master is right."
After riding for about an hour, Alexei saw the
three soldiers sitting on their horses. He slowly
approached them wondering how he was going to
retrieve the pipe. But as he got closer, he saw that the
three men were all sound asleep on their horses.
Then he saw the Baal Shem Tov's pipe secured to the
saddle of the commander of the soldiers.
Alexei rode up as quietly as he could and
snatched the pipe from the saddle. Then, he rode
away as fast as he could. When he returned to the
Baal Shem Tov he was nearly out of breath.
"Well Alexei, what happened? Did you get
the pipe?" asked the Baal Shem Tov.
Alexei handed him the pipe and said, "Rabbi,
you won't believe what happened. They were all
sound asleep on their horses."
"Oh Alexei, you know I'm a man of faith, I do
believe that happened!" the Baal Shem Tov said with a
warm smile and little chuckle in his voice. Now
harness the horse to the wagon, take a L'chaim and
we'll be off."
And so it was.
Freely adapted by Tzvi Meir HaCohane (Howard M.
Cohn, Patent Attorney) from a story in Shivchei
HaBesht as translated in In Praise OF THE BAAL
SHEM TOV by Ben Amos and Mintz.
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Sefer Baal Shem Tov
The Baal Shem Tov's Teachings on the Torah
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And Moses said: 'Thus says the L·rd: At
about
midnight, I will go out in the midst of Egypt.
(Exodus 11:4)
The main thing is that one's intentions be for the sake
of G·d, even when one's deeds are
questionable,
such as in the case of the Lot's
daughters.1 And if you raise a objection
from the case of Baal Pe'or, where the people's
intentions were pure, but they were punished
anyway,2 we would have to say that this
requires deep contemplation and deliberation, to
know whether one is acting for the sake of
G·d, or
not.1 One should seclude oneself and
study Torah to attain a level of objectivity. Then the
verse will apply: "And G·d said, Let there be
light"
(Genesis 1:3). That is, G·d will enlighten you
from His
Torah as to how to proceed. This corresponds to
something I wrote elsewhere, on the verse: "At about
midnight, I will go out in the midst of Egypt." Doubt
occurs at midnight - when an issue can go either
way4 - then "I will go out among Egypt" -
into a person's limited awareness,5 to
enlighten him.
Ben Poras Yosef, p. 18a
1After the destruction of
Sodom and Gomorrah, Lot's daughters engaged their
father in an incestuous act; however, their intentions
were for the best, as the verses say: "And the first-born
said unto the younger: 'Our father is old, and there is
not a man in the earth to come in unto us after the
manner of all the earth. Come, let us make our father
drink wine, and we will lie with him, that we may
preserve seed of our father.' (Genesis 19:31-32).
2"And Israel joined himself to Baal Pe'or,
and the anger of the L rd was kindled against Israel"
(Numbers 25:3). The Zohar (3:238a) explains that this
was done unintentionally. The worship of Baal Pe'or
included defecating in front of the idol. The Israelites
saw this, and assumed it to be an act of desecration,
and so unwittingly participated in the ceremony.
3Literally, "If it is for G d or for Azazel" - a
reference to the Yom Kippur service (Leviticus 16), in
which two identical goats were used: one sacrificed in
the Temple, and the other sent to a demon in the
wilderness. The Baal Shem Tov uses the latter as a
metaphor for one's own ego.
4I.e., midnight represents the mid-point
between the two possibilities.
5The Hebrew word for Egypt, "Mitzrayim,"
is related to the word metzer, which means
narrowness or constriction.
Translation
and Commentary by Rabbi Dr.
Eliezer Shore
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THE PILLAR OF PRAYER
The Baal Shem Tov's Teachings on Prayer
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Section 101
The Baal Shem Tov taught:
If I am not for myself, who is for me? And if
I am for myself, what am I?1
In prayer, one must be completely
divorced from physicality, and not feel one"s existence
in this world. This is the meaning of: "If I am not for
myself, who is for me?" Meaning, when I come to the
level that I neither know or feel "if I am for
myself"2 -
that is, if I am in this world or not - then I will certainly
not be afraid of foreign thoughts. For which foreign
thoughts can approach me when I am separated from
this world? This is, "who is for me?" - meaning to
say, which foreign thought can approach me?
However, "When I am for myself," that is, when I
consider myself as a separate entity in this world, then
the opposite is true - I am not considered anything.
This is the meaning of "What am I?" That is: "In what
way am I important, and in what way is my worship
important to G·d? For foreign thoughts will
distract
me,3 and it is as though I am not in this
world at all.
For a person is created to serve G·d, which I
can not
due to these thoughts."
This also explains what the Sages said: "If
I am here, all are here."4
Tzava'as HaRivash, p. 7a, 12a
1 Pirkei Avos 1:14.
2The Baal Shem Tov is stressing the
words: "If I am not. . . . That is, if I have
negated my existence to G·d, then no foreign
thoughts
can distract me."
3That is, when a person has a sense of
ego and independent self, he becomes subject to
extraneous thoughts in prayer.
4Succah 53a. This statement by Hillel
the Elder, who made the same statement in Pirkei
Avos, above.
Translation and Commentary by Rabbi Dr.
Eliezer Shore
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THE LIGHT OF THE EYES
On the Greatness of the Baal Shem Tov
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Section 38
A great Tzaddik who knows how to
perform unifications and combinations of Divine
Names can rectify a person just by looking at him.
Through these unifications, he immediately causes
the person to have thoughts of repentance. The Baal
Shem Tov said that he could fix a person instantly by
merely looking at him. But if the person stubbornly
refused to be fixed, the Baal Shem Tov would
complete remove the holy spark from within him.
Toldos Aharon, Vayera
Translation and Commentary by Rabbi
Dr. Eliezer Shore
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KESER SHEM TOV
Anthology of the Teachings of the Baal Shem Tov
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Section 133
"Fortunate is the people that know battle cry."
1
The Baal Shem Tov explained this with the following
parable 2:
There was a country that relied entirely on the might of
a mighty warrior, and never learned the ways of war,
for they relied on the might of that warrior.
It happened, though, when war actually came, that
while this mighty warrior was busy preparing his
weapons, the enemy cunningly stole all of them one
by one, until he had nothing left with which to fight. The
entire country, together with him, was then taken
captive.
This, then, is the meaning of the verse, "Fortunate is
the people that know battle cry," that is, that they do not
rely on the mighty warrior, but are familiar themselves
with the sound of war. Then, "they will walk in the Light
of Your Presence."
This is alluded to in the Tur3, where he
says that the
custom is that everybody fasts on the day before Rosh
HaShanah, and do not rely on the leaders.
If this was true in [the Tur's] time, all the more so is it
true today, for perhaps even the mighty warrior himself
does not know the ways of war, nor does he have any
weapons.4
1Psalms 89:16.
2Toldoth Yaakov Yoseph, Emor #10.
3Orach Chaim #581. There, after the Tur
mentions the custom that everyone fasts on the day
before Rosh HaShanah, he goes on to quote a
Midrash that says that the righteous people fast on the
day before Rosh HaShanah, the average people fast
between Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur, and
everybody fasts on Yom Kippur. The implication is that
by the Tur's time, people did not rely on the good
deeds of the righteous, but fasted on their own.
4This does not mean to detract from the
central role of the "mighty warrior" in battle - the
central spiritual role of the tzaddik - but only to tell us
that we must do our own work and not just rely on him.
Translation and Commentary by Rabbi
Yehoshua
Starrett
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