Naso: When You Need An Extreme

Ladies and gentlemen, I'll ask you to parsha in five or in five minutes. We try to give you an idea in the parsha. And this is parshas Naso. What is parshas Naso? It's a lot of things in parshas Naso. We're finishing up all of the last bits and pieces before we begin our triumphal march into Eretz Yisrael in parshas Balak and parshas Pinchas. And we have two interesting halachas that I've brought here, which is of course the din of a sotah and the din of a nazir. The din of a sotah is that if a woman has been warned by her husband not to lock herself up in a room for enough time to have relations with a specific person. And she does it anyway, that's it. They have to get divorced. Parenthetically, that applies today, too. If a husband tells his wife, "I do not want you to be locked up in a room with Bob and you do, you have to get divorced." But in the time of the Beit Hamikdash, a woman could say, "I'm innocent." Today we say, "Well, too bad." You know, sometimes actions have consequences, whether we want them or not. But then she could offer to become a sotah. We take it to the Beit Hamikdash. We try to talk her out of this because if she's really guilty, she's going to die and we don't want anyone to die. Just get divorced and go on with your life, you know. You could always grow from this. But no, she insists. The lady doth protest. And so we take it to the Beit Hamikdash and we undo her hair and we rip her beged and we put a rope around her neck and we make her carry her mincha around and everything to try to wear her out so that if she's really guilty, she'll back out so we don't have to do this. And if she's innocent, she will drink the sotah water and her life will become better. If she didn't have children, she'll have children. If she had childbirth with difficulty, she'll have it better. If her kids were coming out not well, they'll come out better. And if she's guilty, then she will die. So it's we try to discourage her from doing this on the off chance that she's lying. And right after that comes the story of a Nazir. A Nazir is a person who takes upon himself a vow. He says, "I will not cut my hair. I will not drink wine or eat grapes or have raisins or have grape skins, grape pits. And I will not become tummy." The default amount of time is 30 days. At the end of this time, he brings carbonas and uh and he goes on. Why would anyone do this? So, the Gamorah says, "What is the connection? Why did the Torah take the story of Sota and put it next to Nazir?" Key call shuroya sota becoolai yazir as from an ayin. Anyone who sees a sota in her disgrace with her hair undone, God forbid, should become a Nazir. Well, it sounds like it's advice. At the end of his Nazirous, he brings some carbonas including a carbon chatas to ask forgiveness for the fact that he was a Nazir. But you just told me to be a Nazir. So, says Rebbe Elazar Hakapar, "Why does he do it? Because yazir as from an ayin, he refused to drink wine." But you told me I should become a Nazir. If I see a sota becoolai, I should become a Nazir. You're right. You're right. You had a traumatic experience and you need to go through a therapy to deal with that. But that's not normal. It It's something you have no choice. I've had this sometimes with people uh you know, had traumas from their childhood. And they had to go to therapy and they say, "But, they're asking me to say the things my parents did. I'm not allowed to speak bad about my parents." I said, "You're not. But, you have a trauma. You're not well. You need to heal. And so, in that case, for healing, you're allowed to do it." Should you be able to drink wine and see the good in wine? Yes. But, because you saw the sota in a disgrace, it so threw you off that you felt you had no choice to become a nazir. Don't think that that's the right thing to do. Desperate times, desperate measures. And so, sometimes we need to do what we need to do in order for us to continue to be functional. But, that's not normal. It's too bad that we're that way. I'm sorry that this happened. But, we have to go through a process of recovery. And then, after he cuts his hair and brings his carbonas, he drinks wine to remember that wine's not bad. It's just people sometimes use it in bad ways. Let's never speak bad about God's world. Let's recognize that sometimes people use it the wrong way. Chavah's.