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Home > Daily Emunah Podcast - Daily Emunah By Rabbi David Ashear > Parashat Ha’azinu: Heaven is Near
Podcast: Daily Emunah Podcast - Daily Emunah By Rabbi David Ashear
Episode:

Parashat Ha’azinu: Heaven is Near
Category: Religion & Spirituality
Duration: 00:00:00
Publish Date: 2021-09-17 13:00:00
Description: The Midrash Tanchuma in this week’s parasha, Ha’azinu, says, when Moshe Rabbenu called the Heavens and the Earth as witnesses, he used the words האינו השמים ותשמע הארץ , whereas when Ye s haya Hanavi called upon the Heavens and the Earth, he switched around the order, he said שמעו שמים והאזינו ארץ . Both the words האזינו and שמעו mean to listen, so why did Moshe use the word האזינו for the Heavens and Yeshaya use it for the Earth? And why did Moshe use שמעו for the Earth while Yeshaya used it for the Heavens? Rab b i Akiva explained, האזינו is used when a person is very close by, while שמעו is used when he is distant. Moshe Rabbenu was in the shamayim , so he spoke to the Heavens like a man talking to his friend, but he saw the Earth as distant, so there he used the word שמעו . Yeshaya, on the other hand, was on earth, so he spoke regarding the earth with the term האזינו , while using שמעו for the more distant Heaven. With this, the mefarshim explain the pasuk כי אתה שומע קול שופר ומאזין תרועה , the word shofar represents the straight sound, while teruah is the broken sound. When someone prays to Hashem in a broken way, Hashem is so close to him, like it says, קרוב ה' לנשברי לב . Because that type of prayer comes with all the person’s emotions and that’s why it says מאזין תרועה – Hashem is very close to those who pray like the sound of teruah . So when a person is in need, he should pray with all of his emotions and feel that Hashem is very close to him. The sefer Vaveh HaAmudim told a story of a man who we’ll call Yosef who decided to do some construction on his apartment in Israel. He made plans with a contractor and they scheduled to start the work one month later. The job was to take exactly two months and the contractor accepted penalties if he would take longer and Yosef accepted penalties if he would delay the start. Yosef had to find a temporary dwelling for him and his family for those two months and he immediately began searching, but it was not an easy task. Nobody wanted to rent an apartment to someone for just two months. The one or two places that he did find were not in livable condition. Yosef searched and searched the entire month but came up empty handed. Now it was the night before the contractor was scheduled to begin the construction and Yosef still did not know where he and his family were going to live. To delay the contractor starting would cost him a penalty payment for each day and he didn’t have any extra money to afford that expense. He gathered his family together and told them he did all of the hishtadlut possible to find an apartment and now all that was left for them to do was heartfelt tefila . “We don’t know of any available apartments,” he said to his family, “but Hashem does. We need to all beg Him to help us.” His family started saying Tehillim . And then, he went to a private room and poured out his heart to Hashem. Seconds after he finished his tefila, a thought popped into his mind. He had seen another family who lives in the same apartment building walk in a different direction after shul that past Shabbat. He heard they might be moving and now he thought perhaps they would know of apartments that were available. He called that man and told him about his plight. The neighbor couldn’t believe his ears. He said, “Wow, Hashem just answered my tefilot . We did just move out of our apartment, but we have two months left before the lease is up. The landlord told me, if I can’t find a replacement, I had to pay for those two months and I can’t afford it, but I had to move right away. Now Hashem is sending me you to finish up my lease for me.” Yosef was so excited to hear this. Not only did Hashem find him an apartment, he wouldn’t even have to leave the apartment building he was living in. There is nothing like heartfelt tefila. When a person is in need, he should imagine and realize that while he praying, Hashem is so close to him. Shabbat Shalom.
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