Yehoshua, I Am Your Father

By Judah Graber

In Bamidbar 27:18, Hashem asks Moshe to appoint Yehoshua as the next leader of Klal Yisrael:

“וַיֹּאמֶר ה׳ אֶל־מֹשֶׁה קַח־לְךָ אֶת־יְהוֹשֻׁעַ בִּן־נוּן אִישׁ אֲשֶׁר־רוּחַ בּוֹ וְסָמַכְתָּ אֶת־יָדְךָ עָלָיו.”

The Netziv highlights the interesting lashon of “קַח־לְךָ”- “take for yourself.” What does it mean, “for yourself”? As opposed to whom? He explains that it means for Moshe’s own hana’ah, his own pleasure, because Yehoshua was Moshe’s talmid muvhak, and therefore he was like a son to Moshe.

This answer connects to another idea that Rashi, quoting Chazal, picks up on. In Bamidbar 3:1, the pasuk says: “וְאֵלֶּה תּוֹלְדֹת אַהֲרֹן וּמֹשֶׁה בְּיוֹם דִּבֶּר ה׳ אֶת־מֹשֶׁה בְּהַר סִינָי.” The pasuk describes the offspring of Moshe and Aharon, but then only lists Aharon’s sons: “וְאֵלֶּה שְׁמוֹת בְּנֵי־אַהֲרֹן הַבְּכֹר נָדָב וַאֲבִיהוּא אֶלְעָזָר וְאִיתָמָר.” Rashi, quoting Sanhedrin 19b, derives from here: “כָּל הַמְלַמֵּד אֶת בֶּן חֲבֵרוֹ תּוֹרָה מַעֲלֶה עָלָיו הַכָּתוּב כְּאִלּוּ יְלָדוֹ.” Whoever teaches his friend’s son Torah, the Torah considers it as if he gave birth to him.

What this idea seems to mean is that the deepest connections we have with people (even including biological parents and children) are ultimately through our connection to Torah. Rabbi Lebowitz, in a recent shiur, spoke about interviewing Rav Schachter for a YU podcast. During their discussion about his relationship with his father, Rav Melech Schachter, Rav Schachter commented that when he became an adult, his relationship with his father became exclusively through Torah, and he paused, thought for a moment and said something along the lines of, “And that is really the deepest kind of relationship.”

For me, this concept is hard to grasp and hard to explain through logic alone. We have relationships with many people throughout our lives, we can learn Torah with anyone theoretically, are these really the "deepest" kind of relationships? However, when I reflect on my own life, the idea resonates with me experientially profoundly. When I think about my relationship with Hashem, and the times when I feel most connected to Hashem and to Klal Yisrael, it is during and after a great seder.

I also think of Rav Taragin quoting the Gemara in Pesachim 68b, where Rav Yosef says about Shavuos: “אי לאו האי יומא דקא גרים, כמה יוסף איכא בשוקא”-If not for this day of Matan Torah, how many Yosefs would there be in the marketplace? Rashi explains: “שלמדתי תורה ונתרוממתי.” Through learning Torah, Rav Yosef became elevated. Without Torah, he would have been just another Yosef in the shuk.

I feel this in my relationships with people as well. As life goes on, we are constantly surrounded by different people and new relationships. Friends come and go. But for me, anyone I have connected to through Torah, whether in Hakotel, YU, summers, or other places  has a special connection with me that is hard to break, even after long periods of not speaking.

Gershom and Eliezer, the biological children of Moshe, were of course his sons. But we do not know very much about their relationship with their father. Yehoshua and Aharon’s sons, however, we know much more about. That is a different kind of relationship, one built through Torah.

I write this shtikel Torah as mussar for myself. Over the last couple of years, I have myself at times been spotty with my learning Torah and with talking in learning with friends. I have at times felt a distance in my relationships. But the strongest relationships and the deepest closeness to Hashem come through Torah.

May this week’s parsha give us chizuk to strengthen our bonds with each other and Hashem through limud haTorah.