“And the son of a Jewish woman – and he was the son of an Egyptian man – went out into the camp of Israel, and they fought in the camp, the son of the Jewish woman and the Jewish man” (Vayikra 24:10).
In the 210 years that the Jewish People lived in Egypt, only one woman had a child from an Egyptian man. This child grew up in Egypt and left with the Jews, living through all of the miracles of the Exodus. Shortly after the Torah was given, there was an altercation between him and another man. He said the explicit name of Hashem that he had heard at Mt. Sinai and committed blasphemy.
The question is: What caused this man to rebel against Hashem? Rashi explains that his rebellion came right after the kohanim were given the laws of the lechem hapanim. These breads were baked on Friday, and miraculously remained fresh for an entire week. When the blasphemer heard this law, he scoffed, “Is it possible that a mortal king should eat freshly-baked bread every day and G-d should eat week-old bread?” This question caused him to become a heretic; he said the explicit name of G-d and cursed Him, c”v.
This explanation is very difficult to understand. Why would this question lead him to heresy? First, Hashem doesn’t eat the lechem hapanim; the kohanim do. Second, all the Jews at the time had just experienced Hashem’s revelation on Mt. Sinai. The Midrash tells us that they had all reached the level of prophecy; it was as if the heavens opened up and they perceived everything a human being could. If that is so, though, how could the blasphemer have asked such a juvenile question? And if he was going to ask a question about the lechem hapanim, shouldn’t it have been: Why does Hashem – the creator and maintainer of the heavens and earth – need bread in the first place?
The answer to this question can be understood by focusing on the way Hashem created human beings. If you are like most people, you can think of an occasion when you got mad – really mad – and in your anger said things you later regretted. Maybe it was a day or a week later when you said to yourself, “What was I thinking? Why did I say those mean, hurtful words?” And you truly lamented what you said.
Now, here is the curious part: Why did you say those words? Clearly they were out of character for you. You normally wouldn’t speak that way to anyone, certainly not in that tone of voice and using those expressions. So why did you?
The answer is that anger isn’t just a feeling; it changes the way you think. At the moment you said the hurtful words, you no longer viewed your fellow as a friend who said something careless. He was an insensitive, unfeeling brute – a heartless creep! Someone not ever worthy of respect. When the anger passed, the mindset passed as well, and you reverted back to the person you were before.
It was almost like a red filter covered your vision during your anger and changed the way you looked at things. After the filter passed from your eyes, you saw things in their actual light, and you realized that while you weren’t pleased with what your friend did or said, it didn’t make him less than human and didn’t make him unworthy of respect.
Interestingly, it’s not just anger that colors our vision. Jealousy does too – as does greed, desire, and arrogance. When they flare up, they color our vision, and we see the world in a different way. Reality may not have changed, but our perception of it does.
A way to better understand this phenomenon is to imagine a family with five school-age children and one computer. When dinner is over, each child wants to use the family computer. One wants to do his homework, one wants to work on a science project, and one wants to play a video game. What shows up on the screen is determined by which child has control of the keyboard. When the child working on his math project sits down, the screen shows a math program. When the child writing his science report sits down, it’s Microsoft Word that shows up on the screen.
The brain is like the computer; what it thinks depends on who takes control of it. Have you ever had a thought you didn’t want to think – but there it was? You said, “Go away” but it was still there. You said, “Stop it! I don’t want to think that!” but it was still there. Why is that? Aren’t you the brain? Why can’t you stop yourself from thinking things you don’t want to think?
The answer is you aren’t your brain. You are the user of your brain. You think through your brain and you process information through your brain, but the thoughts that run through it are not only controlled by you. They are also controlled by your animal soul and your character traits.
When I am cool, calm, and collected, I can use my brain to think things out. When I get angry, the brain becomes a tool to serve my anger, spewing out all types of arguments that prove that I should be furious with someone. When my jealousy is triggered, my mind begins processing the world through a prism of “It’s not fair.” We could say the brain is the servant of many masters.
Based on this analysis, we can understand why the blasphemer became a heretic. Because he came from impure lineage, the level of holiness to which he was exposed was too much for him, and within him welled up a desire to rebel –not to accept a Master over him. His mind then became a servant of this desire and came up with a silly argument: “Surely G-d wouldn’t eat stale bread.” The fact that this argument wasn’t logical didn’t matter. It wasn’t his thinking mind at work; it was his rebellious desire expressing itself through his mind.
This explanation is important for us to remember. Whenever we feel even a tinge of something “personal” about something, we must question our thoughts and get comfortable with the concept that just because my mind tells me something, that doesn’t mean it’s true. We must seek counsel and advise from others – friends, relatives, rebbeim – and allow them to help us see what we are so often blind to.