PARSHA - Naso

Parshat Naso.
The word naso means "lift up." It is a week after the holiday of Shavuot, the day on which G-d "lifts up" the Jewish people.

The Talmud tells us that on Shavuot, Rav Yosef, one of the great sages, would hold a unique celebration because "If it were not for that day," Rav Yosef would say, speaking about the giving of the Torah, "How many Yosefs would there be in the marketplace?"

Rashi explains, "If it were not for the day on which I studied Torah and became uplifted… behold, there are many people in the street named Yosef. What difference would there be between me and them?

Rav Yosef was telling us that studying Torah uplifts us and makes us special.

Comparing the marketplace to the world around us. In a marketplace, everyone is hustling and bustling, buying and selling, eagerly trying to make a profit.

Our souls, neshamot, are sent down to this market, to "do business" and "make a profit", so to speak, in this world.

Now, what kind of "business" does our neshamah do?

Buying and selling means transferring an item from one person's possession to another's. Who is the buyer and who is the seller when the neshamah does business? Well, let's take an apple, for example, it looks like a regular part of nature. But when a Jew makes a blessing on the apple, the holiness of G-d which is in the fruit becomes revealed. It's as if the apple is now being transferred into G-d's possession.

The giving of the Torah made this type of business possible. The Torah gives each one of us the chance to do mitzvot and bring G-d's holiness into the world.

The Torah lifts us up. Instead of running around the marketplace doing our own business, we are now doing business for G-d; making the world into a dwelling for Him.

Shabbat Shalom!