הרב שניאור אשכנזי, פרשת לך לך • ברית מילה: למה המצווה הראשונה בחיים היא המילה?

For more fascinating videos: http://shneorashkenazi.com/ Want to receive an update when the weekly lesson goes up? Subscribe! Sources for Parashat Lech Lech 5700 – Why is the first commandment in life circumcision? 1. Genesis 15: And Abram was ninety-nine years old, and the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, “I am the God of Shedda.” Walk before me and be blameless – Rashi: Walk before me – in the commandment of circumcision, and in this matter you shall be blameless – as long as the foreskin is in you, you are a blemish. A Guide to the Confused Part Three, Chapter 9: One of the reasons for circumcision [is] to reduce sexual intercourse and to weaken the organ, so that it may be reduced and restrained as much as it can. Kozari Article One: It is a divine sign that God commanded us to place in the instrument of the increasing lust in man, so that he may overcome it and not use it except as is proper to his nature. Tanhuma Tizria 5: An incident in which the wicked Turnus Rufus asked Rabbi Akiva which deeds are beautiful – of God or of flesh and blood? Rabbi Akiva said: Of flesh and blood are beautiful!. Turnus Rufus said to him: The heavens and the earth, can a man do the like of them?! Rabbi Akiva said to him: Do not tell me anything that is above the creatures, tell me things that are found in humans. Turnus Rufus said to him: Why do you argue? He said to him: I knew that you were asking me about this matter, and that is why I went ahead and told you that the deeds of humans are beautiful from the Holy One, blessed be He. Rabbi Akiva brought him ready-made cakes and pastries and said: These are the deeds of God and these are the deeds of man [and the deeds of man are beautiful]. Rabbi Saadia Gaon, Bemonot ve Dei Third Article: Man as he was created is not perfect... because the Creator created this part with excess over him, and when he cut it, the excess was removed and he remained perfect. Teacher of the Confused: Everyone who wanted to challenge found a place to challenge: How can natural things be lacking and need completion from the outside... [But the goal is the opposite]: to weaken and reduce the storm of desire and excess lust. Ibn Ezra, Genesis 15: 'Walk before me and be blameless' - do not ask why the word. 2 . Rashi 27:5: Because Abraham listened to my voice and kept my commandments, my statutes, my laws, and my teachings – Mishmar 10: Decrees for distancing oneself from prohibitions in the Torah... My laws: Things that the evil inclination and the nations of the world reject such as eating pork and wearing a garment that has no meaning. And my teachings [plural]: To bring the Oral Torah. Likkuti Sichut 5/146: Regarding the verse 'But I will require your blood for your souls', Rashi interprets that the intention is to shed one's own blood [and the word is forbidden]... Therefore, Abraham was forbidden to circumcise himself before he was commanded, for he would have brought the shedding of one's own blood and into illness and danger. However, after circumcision was commanded and the commandment rejects the prohibition. 3. Sefer Hinunchuh Mitzvah 2: Since God, the Blessed One, willed to establish in the people whom He distinguished to be called by His name a permanent mark on their bodies, to distinguish them from other peoples in the form of their bodies, just as they are distinguished from them in the form of their souls, whose origin and origin are not the same. And the difference was established in the 'golden ball' because it is a reason for the existence of the species. Sefer Ma'amarim, compiled 3/ 119: It is in the Midrash that Adam the first said, I am fit to be called Adam, because I was created from the earth. And it is explained in Hasidism that Adam the first called his name by the name of the matter (the body that came from the earth) and not by the name of the form (the soul that resided within him), because Adam achieved through his wisdom that his body was created from the earth [inanimate]. This also has an advantage with regard to the elevation of his soul, because the higher one falls lower. Sefer Ma'amarim 1919/2: The difference between The influence of the intellect is more than a student, which is an abundance of spirituality, and the influence of the drop, which is a physical influence - the influence of the intellect is only enlightenment alone and the evidence that it does not become a new reality, blood that does not have a brain, no matter how much it influences it, it will not benefit anything, as the world says, 'A head cannot be planted.' However, in the aforementioned physical influence, the essence of the brain is affected until it gives birth to a complete soul in the brain and all the powers of his soul, until the son becomes like the father in reality ... and this influence continues in the physical drop because the extension of the essence cannot be through spirituality but rather in physicality, because 'their beginning is rooted in their end.' Likute...