Educating Children: The Wise Among Women Build the Home – From Ruth to Bat Sheva

THE DAILY CHIZZUK FROM MOREINU HARAV ELIEZER BERLAND SHLIT”A – WHAT WAS RUTH’S DESIRE?  WHAT WAS BAT SHEVA’S DESIRE?

TUESDAY, 4 MARCHESHVAN 5785

ALL THAT RUTH SOUGHT WAS TO SEE THE TEMPLE.  SHE SAYS, “I WANT TO CONVERT, I WANT TO SEE THE ‘YOUNG MEN,’” THE TEMPLE – THE “YOUNG MEN” ARE THE CHERUBS.

The Zohar Chadash says that the entire essence of Ruth in “She envisions a field and buys it” (Mishlei 31:16).

WHAT IS THE MEANING OF “SHE ENVISIONS A FIELD AND BUYS IT”?

It is written in the Midrash HaGadol in Bereishit, “She envisions a field” – this is the Temple, that Bat Sheva would pray that her son would build the Temple!

LIKE THE GEMARA SAYS, THAT BAT SHEVA TIED HER SON SHLOMO TO A COLUMN.  IS THIS EDUCATION?  IS THAT HOW WE ACT?  HE’S ONLY 16 YEARS OLD, A YOUNG CHILD, A SMALL CHILD.  SO WHAT HAPPENED, HE SLEPT A LITTLE BIT?

All of Am Yisrael came to open the Temple, and the king was sleeping.  “Shame on you,” his mother, Bat Sheva, says.  “What kind of child did I bring into the world?  What, you got drunk?  You married Pharaoh’s daughter and [now] you sleep on me until 10.”

Because Pharaoh’s daughter made for Shlomo a sky with stars, with the moon (Midrash Rabba 10:4), so his mother tied him to a column.  “The words of Lemuel the king, the burden with which his mother disciplined him” (Mishlei 31:1).  What is the meaning of “his mother disciplined him”?  That she tied him to a column and gave him murderous blows.  “Why did you fall asleep and make an embarrassment out of me among all Am Israel?”  Like Channah said, “This is the child I prayed for” (I Shmuel 1:27).  For this, I prayed for a child?  I prayed for a child who is a Torah scholar, a child who is a Tzaddik, who rises is the morning and prays at sunrise.  Not for a child who sleeps until 10.  For this, I prayed?  For this, I made vows?

I made vows, I brought sheep, I brought oxen, I brought offerings so that I would have a child who is a Tzaddik.  And all the prayers I prayed so that I would have a child who is a Tzaddik.  Suddenly, he sleeps on me until 10.

So she took him and tied him to a column, and said to him, “You had a father who is a Tzaddik [King David].  Therefore, they will say that the blemish is because of me.”  Because the blemish comes from the mother, everything comes from the mother.  Ninety percent comes from the mother.  Because the child is inside his mother for nine months, and he nurses for twelve months.  By way of the milk, he receives all of her intellect.  If the mother is a Tzaddika, then the child will also be a Tzaddik.

He nurses for two years, and he is in her belly for nine months, so everything is dependent on the mother.  If the mother was a Tzaddika, then the children will be Tzaddikim.  Therefore, you need to take and marry a righteous mother – “and from Hashem is an intelligent woman” (Mishlei 19:14).

About this, the Rebbe says in Lesson 2, section 2 [of Likutey Moharan], “Who led me on a path of truth” (Bereishit 24:48).

https://vimeo.com/1026234088