The War Against Amalek

Amalek is the symbol of evil and a nickname for the yetzer hara, or evil inclination. His main weapon is the venom of doubt; he injects doubts of emuna into a person’s mind and heart. As soon as a person begins to doubt HaShem, he or she encounters immediate difficulties that are designed to make them cry out and seek HaShem again.

 

The Torah relates (Shemot, Chapter 17) that the Children of Israel defeated the Amalekites only by virtue of emuna. When Moshe’s (Moses’) hands were extended to the Heavens in prayer, Israel held the upper hand. When Moshe’s hands fell, Amalek gained the upper hand. The Mishna in Tractate Rosh Hashana asks hypothetically, "Do the hands of Moshe win or lose a war?" The Mishna answers its own question and says, "As long as Israel cast their eyes skyward and subjugated their hearts to their Father in Heaven, they overcame their enemy – if not, they fell." We therefore conclude that Amalek overcomes when a person forgets HaShem, Heaven forbid.

 

Consequently, Amalek – the evil inclination – strives to destroy a person’s emuna, so that he or she won’t look skyward. With emuna, a person is protected against the evil inclination. When the wall of emuna crumbles – Heaven forbid – a person is exposed and defenseless. By looking skyward and remembering HaShem, Amalek is disarmed.

 

Whenever a person suffers, he or she simply can look skyward, call out to HaShem in personal prayer, and ask for help. No prayer goes unanswered, for HaShem is near to those who call Him in earnest.

 

Emuna, whose practical manifestation is prayer, is the only surefire weapon against the evil inclination. For this reason, we should all strive to constantly enhance our emuna and powers of prayer.

 

 

The purpose of Torah learning is to bring a person to emuna. Enhanced emuna leads to stronger illumination of the soul. The more a soul is illuminated, the more the soul is capable of recognizing its Creator. As such, learning Torah and performing mitzvot – with the goal of getting to know HaShem as opposed to ulterior motives of personal gain, prestige, and so forth – is the expressed purpose of a person’s existence in this world.

 

 

The Gemora (Tractate Pesachim 50a) tells about Rav Yosef the son of Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi who became so sick the he reached the state of clinical death. By HaShem’s grace, Rav Yosef recuperated after his soul had entered the threshold of the World to Come. His father asked him, "What did you see in the spiritual world?"

 

Rav Yosef answered, "I saw an upside-down world; the high were low and the low were high."

 

Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi commented, "You saw a clear world," in other words, an accurate picture.

 

Let’s elaborate on the above simple but very profound thought:  Many people in this world enjoy wealth and prestige, and are considered "high society." But, in the spiritual world, they’re on the bottom rung. The opposite also holds true; in this world, they’re humiliated, ridiculed, or persecuted, yet in the next world, they enjoy a high level of status. A person’s spiritual level is determined by the extent to which he or she developed their emuna and successfully passed life’s many tests of faith during their term in the material world.

 

Emuna is the root and foundation of life. The prophet (Habbakuk 2:4) said, "And the righteous will live by emuna." With emuna, a person is assured a good, gratifying and meaningful life in this world and in the next. As emuna increases, so does one’s spiritual status.

 

 

The prophet says (Shmuel I, 16:7), "For a person sees the eyes and HaShem sees the heart." In other words, we lack the tools to judge the true status of another person. People tend to evaluate the worth of others according to money, wisdom, beauty, or pedigree; such yardsticks are both deceiving and inaccurate. They often show a great person as insignificant, or an insignificant person as great.

 

An illiterate person could feasibly be a greater individual than a doctor or university professor, especially if the former has strong cognizance of his mission in the world and the latter does not. One who possesses a strong cognizance of HaShem far surpasses the person that has no idea who created the world and for what purpose, even if the former is a street cleaner and the latter is a nuclear physicist. Yeshayahu (Isaiah) the prophet teaches (Yeshayahu 1:3) that a person who has no awareness of HaShem is on a lower spiritual level than an ox, when he chastises Israel for forsaking emuna: "An ox knows its Creator and a donkey its Master’s trough; Israel knew not, for they failed to observe." In other words, the ox and the donkey are aware that HaShem sustains them, but he who blindly seeks a life of physical amenities never finds HaShem.

 

 

In light of everything we’ve discussed in this chapter, a person would be smart to invest the bulk of his or her efforts in attaining and developing emuna. Emuna is the world’s most important commodity.

 

The Gemora teaches (Tractate Shabbat 31a) that the first question a person is asked when he or she leaves the material world is, "Did you negotiate in faith?" The basic interpretation of this question is whether a person dealt fairly and honestly in commerce. But, on the allusive level, the person is being asked whether he or she negotiated to acquire the commodity of faith – emuna – by learning emuna, talking emuna, practicing emuna, and striving for emuna.

 

The Zohar teaches that HaShem manipulates entire worlds so that two people will come together and discuss emuna.

 

Emuna is the key to true happiness and success in this world, as well as the only guarantee of success in the next world. There’s no limit to its benefits. Happy is the person that obtains true and lasting emuna.

 

To be continued…