Parshat Korach: Moshe Rabbenu was nothing
More secrets of the Torah with Rav Eliezer Berland, shlita.
Shemayim (Heaven) designated Korach to perform an enormous task. Hashem gave him a tremendous gift of the gab. Due to the kindness of Hashem, he was a wonderful orator, and he was meant to have used that gift to unite and strengthen the people, so they would return to believing in Moshe Rabbenu.
Because Korach well knew who Moshe Rabbenu was, it’s just that he couldn’t overcome his own feelings of jealousy and hatred.
He should have unified the people in regard to believing in Moshe Rabbenu, and included each person in the gathering together of Jewish souls. What does it mean, to ‘include each person in the gathering together of Jewish souls?’ It means that I know that I’m the least of the least, and that I’m less than any other Jew, and this is what Moshe Rabbenu merited to achieve.
Moshe, the humblest man
That’s why it’s said of him: “And the man Moshe was the most humble of all men on the face of the earth.” And so, if they would have succeeded in gathering together the whole of Am Yisrael, and in bringing the whole of Am Yisrael back to Moshe Rabbenu, then the people could have risen up to a very high spiritual level.
Because the people already didn’t really have a connection with Moshe Rabbenu, who was walking around with a veil over his face, and who was hiding himself from the public. Slowly, slowly, the people started to forget, he was out of sight and out of mind. When you don’t see someone or something, you forget about it.
When a person is sunk deep within materialism, and sunk deep within ‘the body’, then he doesn’t see things. Rav Natan of Breslov says that Korach’s job was to bring the people back to having emuna in Moshe Rabbenu, and get them out of their state of ‘forgetting’.
But Korach didn’t do this, because of his pride and inflated ego, and his lust to rule.
Korach could have been leader
[This occurred] even though Korach was initially worthy of being the leader of Am Yisrael, (as the ‘Esser Ma’amorot’ explains). Everyone saw Korach rise up into the air. The whole of Am Yisrael saw how Korach, and his family, and his brothers all were lifted up into the air, because they used to carry the Ark of the Covenant, and ‘the Ark carried those who carried it.’
If Korach could float in the air, then why wasn’t Moshe floating in the air? But Moshe was hiding his true level, so he walked on the ground. No-one saw Moshe levitating in the air, but they saw Korach and his sons floating in the air, while the ‘odd one out’, Moshe Rabbenu walked along slowly, with his staff.
And so, everyone ran after Korach.
Use your talents for the greater good
Are people running after you? Great, excellent – but use it for the good! Tell everyone about the true greatness of Moshe Rabbenu. That Moshe Rabbenu, who you see walking along the ground, he’s really something else entirely! Moshe Rabbenu is hiding himself.
If Moshe Rabbenu could arrange things so that Korach could fly in the air, then he could certainly also fly in the air himself, and that all of Am Yisrael would travel on the ‘wings of eagles’.
Korach’s big mistake
Korach fell into making a big error: He thought that the whole thing with Moshe was just a question of innate ability and talent. He saw that Moshe was blessed with great abilities and skills, so slowly, slowly, Korach also started learning these skills himself, and in this way, he also acquired them for himself.
As well as this first mistake, that Korach believed that [Moshe was only leader] because of his abilities, he also fell into another mistake, too: He believed that Moshe got his strength from Am Yisrael, he didn’t understand that Moshe was actually influencing the people with his own strength.
That Moshe was equivalent to all of Am Yisrael, and that he was the root of all the souls of Am Yisrael.
He thought that the leader gets his strength from the people, and that the more chassidim he has, the bigger the community he has, the more popular he is, so the more strength he’ll get from everybody, and then he’ll be able to do miracles and perform wonders, and to ascend to heaven.
Rav Natan says that the inyan, the essence, of Moshe had nothing to do with his innate talents or accomplishments, in fact, the opposite was true: he stammered his words, and didn’t have an agile tongue, and he didn’t know how to give a nice speech or persuade people. Rather, Moshe was completely ‘nothing’.
What was Moshe’s accomplishment? That he was nothing.
Moshe was included in the light of ain sof, the infinite light, he was totally included within Hashem, and was nullified from any other reality. No other reality existed for Moshe, [Hashem] wasn’t hidden from him, he didn’t have a connection to anything else, he just did everything leshem Shemayim, for the sake of heaven, just for Hashem Yitborach.
And this is why Hashem could choose him to be the leader of Am Yisrael, who took them out from Mitzrayim (Egypt) and brought down the ten plagues on Pharoah and the Egyptians, and who brought the Clouds of Glory, and who brought the Torah down from heaven. Because he was completely nothing, and he didn’t have any other talents of accomplishments, and he didn’t get his strength from Am Yisrael, rather, Moshe Rabbenu’s strength only came from Hashem.
You can’t fake ‘nothing’
Because he was nothing – and it’s impossible to mimic that. You can emulate being a good speaker, or being a good sermonizer, and it’s possible to emulate being a leader, but Rav Natan tells us: you can only reach the level of ‘nothing’ by nullifying yourself to Moshe.
And by believing that Moshe is something else entirely, that we can’t even begin to understand. We’re unable to understand it, we’re unable to grasp it. It’s not abilities, and it’s not nice speeches, it’s nothing at all like that. Moshe didn’t bring the Clouds of Glory down with a nice speech, and he didn’t take Am Yisrael out of Egypt because he was a good orator.
He wasn’t some ‘talented leader’, or leader because he had God-given abilities. He was the leader because he was nothing, completely nothing, mamash he didn’t even exist.
And Rav Natan tells us, this was Korach’s mistake, that because of his tremendous jealousy and his arrogance, Hashem blocked his eyes from seeing who Moshe really was, because Moshe was only nothing.
And no-one else can be ‘nothing’ except for Moshe.
Throughout all the generations, no-one else can be nothing, [this only comes] by nullifying to Moshe. In order to truly be ‘nothing’ you need to receive it from Moshe himself.
Translated from the Tzama Nafshi newsletter.
