Parsha Points To Ponder

QUESTIONS

1)Why does the Torah say the seeming extra word FOR YOU when it describes the soldier taking the yefat toar as a wife? (21:11) Of course if he marries her it will be FOR HIM!

2)Why, when choosing an example of a non animal in the command to return loss objects does the Torah choose a shirt (simlah)? (22:3)

3)Why does the Torah call the person who deserves lashes BIN HAKOT instead of BEN which is usually used to describe a person? (25:2)

ANSWERS

1)The Kli Yakar explains that this hints to the fact that there are going to be problems with the children which come from such a union and not a marriage from a true relationship. The marriage will be FOR YOU but it won’t be beneficial to the children from that marriage.

2)The Sforno explains that it is very uncommon for a person to lose a shirt. The finder could justify keeping the item by saying that the person clearly left it there deliberately. Thus, the Torah uses this example to teach that every lost object must be dealt with according to the Torah’s laws of trying to return it to the rightful owner.

3)The Ohr HaChayim answers that the reduced number of dots in the change from the segol (BEN) to the chirik (BIN) hints to the fact that the court should assess whether the person can handle the complete 39 lashes or not and, if not, then they can hit him less times.

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 6th, 2008 at 3:05 pm and is filed under Weekly Question. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.