ל' תשרי תשפ"א יום הולדת 44

י-ה-ו-ה מָה אָדָם וַתֵּדָעֵהוּ

תהילים קמד ג'

As I enter into my 45th year (as the Gemara in Eruvin 80? Says, a child who is 6 means in his 6th year)… מה אדם ותדעהו. מה = אדם. The yesod of אדם is אדמה - which is the אותיות of אדם-מה. Because that is all we are. Just like חכמה is כח-מה, the ability to know we don’t know, as Richard Feynman (who was Jewish) famously said: "If you think you understand quantum mechanics, you don't understand quantum mechanics”. Which basically means, true understanding of the physical world is to NOT understand it. And he was one of the greatest minds of the 20th century. As they say, חכמה בגוים תאמין, they too can achieve this כח-מה, and I believe perhaps this statement was the first time that humanity came to a level of true חכמה. (And if that is true of the physical world, how much more so of the spiritual world, that we can’t even BEGIN to even “not” understand it!). So too it is with אדם, the שלמות of man is דווקא his knowledge that he is nothing. מה אנו, מה חיינו, מה חסדינו, מה צדקותינו, מה נאמר לפניך ה’ אלוקינו. This means “We are - מה. מה is our life. מה is our chesed. מה is our tzidukus ( אם צדקת “מה” תתן לו). .is. מה is the only thing we can say before You, Hashem our G-d.. ומותר אדם מן הבהמה אין - the only יתרון we have over the animal is בחינת אין, the ability to know we are nothing. והחכמה מאין תמצא. When a man knows he is nothing, that is when he is something. When he makes מה out of his physical body which is אדמ-מה, then his spiritual self is all that’s left. And that is when he is something. Because the spiritual self reconnects with Hashem when the אדם is מה. That is when he is zoche to ותדעו, as it says וידע אדם את חוה אשתו, he becomes one with Hashem. י-ה-ו-ה מה אדם ותדעהו. When מה is all there is between Hashem and man, then you shall know him and he shall become one with you.

In Divrei Hayamim it says that Dovid Hamelech said to his son Shlomo, דע את אלהי אביך ועבדהו. Know the G-d of your father and serve Him. How can we possibly know Hashem Who is infinitely great and infinitely wise? Perhaps the answer to that question lies in another Pasuk that says, בכל דרכיך דעהו. In all your ways you should know Him (Hashem). As we said before, what is knowledge, דעת? To know someone is to be one with them, and becoming one with someone is to know them. When we unify our will with Hashem’s will in all our ways, בכל דרכיך דעהו, know Hashem in all your ways, in other words, when our eating and sleeping and everything we do is for Hashem, then we are unifying our will with Hashem’s will, we then become one with Him, and therefore we KNOW him. Just like the brain knows what the hand is feeling, and the body feels what the brain feels. So Dovid was telling Shlomo, דע את אלהי אביך - know the G-d of your father. How? ועבדהו by serving Him. בכל דרכיך דעהו - know Him in all your ways and then you will KNOW Him.

So to know Hashem in all our ways is ultimately the purpose of everything. It means we have taken our desire to receive and purified it to the level where everything we do, even the pleasure we get, isn’t for ourselves, it’s for Hashem.