Before this Sukkos you can complete Masechta Sukkah with Daf Yomi and Hilchos Sukkos with Daf HaYomi B’Halacha!
Everyone wants to be happy. Everyone wants to somehow achieve the elusive feeling of simcha. In this generation, people are looking for all kinds of things that will make them happy. One person might think it is a new car, another a vacation, and the list goes on. There is, however, a profoundly illuminating Gemara that tells us how we can achieve a profound level of simcha this year—and it starts in about a week.
Let us explain!
The sefarim tell us that a sign of siyata dishmaya in learning is when you come across one area in your learning while learning a totally different limud. That is akin to a Divine smile! This year’s schedule of Daf HaYomi and Daf HaYomi B’Halacha is thus akin to a double Divine smile!
As we are completing Masechta Yoma, the masechta all about Yom Kippur in Daf HaYomi, we are also marching toward the end of hilchos Yom Kippur in the Daf HaYomi B’Halacha.
Amazingly, in a show of complete Divine siyata dishmaya, the Daf Hayomi Bavli will be beginning Masechta Sukkah this coming 29 Tammuz/July 9. Just four days later, the Daf HaYomi B’Halacha daily Mishnah Berurah learning program will begin the halachos of Sukkos followed by the halachos of lulav and esrog. Indeed, by this coming Sukkos, learners in both programs will have just completed Masechta Sukkah and Hilchos Sukkos! What a way to come into the Yom Tov of Sukkos!!
Truly a double Divine smile!
The Optimum Source of Simcha
Chazal teach us, “Davar b’ito mah tov—when one learns something in the right time it is a wonderful thing”:
Rabi Zeira said that this idea is derived from: “A man has joy in the answer of his mouth; and davar b’ito mah tov, a word in due season, how good it is (Mishlei 15:23).” When does a man have joy? When an answer related to Torah study is in his mouth. Another pshat: When does a man have joy in the answer of his mouth? When he experiences the fulfillment of “a word in due season, how good it is,” i.e., when he knows when and how to address each issue.
(Eruvin 54a)
Rashi explains, “When are words of Torah pleasant? When a person knows how to learn and darshan the specific halachos of each Yom Tov on its Yom Tov. Another explanation: When does a man have joy? When does a person enjoy his learning? When you ask him a question of halacha and he is able to answer it!”
The words of this Gemara seem like they are describing the unique time period in which we live today. There is a unique combination of learning about the Yom Tov in the “right time,” as Yom Tov approaches, and the second added dimension of simcha from being able to actually know and answer the halacha about that Yom Tov when one is asked.
“It is clear from this Gemara that if a person wants to merit true simcha this Yom Tov, now is the time to jump on the bandwagon and begin learning both the Daf Yomi, Masechta Sukkah starting at the end of Tammuz, and Dirshu’s Daf HaYomi B’Halacha program, which begins the halachos of sukkah just four days later! It is the ultimate davar b’ito mah tov and the ultimate simcha l’ish! It is an amazing opportunity to come into Sukkos with the true simcha of knowing the masechta in its right time and knowing the practical halacha l’maaseh,” said Rabbi Shlomo Rozenstein, Dirshu’s director of public relations.
Where Daf Yomi and Daf HaYomi B’Halacha Intersect
We live in a time when simcha is so elusive. Everyone wants to feel simcha, feel joy and, especially, to feel the joy of what it means to be a Yid. This Gemara gives us a foolproof formula on how to achieve this simcha. Learn Masechta Sukkah and hilchos sukkah starting next week and complete both before Sukkos!
An amazing side benefit of this learning is that there is no better way to see how Gemara and halacha are more beautifully intertwined and derived from each other.
Let us give just a couple of examples that anyone will find upon undertaking these two limudim. This coming 7 Av/July 16 we will be learning Masechta Sukkah Daf Tes. What topic is discussed there? The halachos of one sukkah built on top of another sukkah as well as a question of building a sukkah under a tree or within an existing house. On that exact same day, in the Daf HaYomi B’Halacha program, we will learn siman 626, se’if aleph in Shulchan Aruch and Mishnah Berurah where it discusses the halachos of having two coverings on a sukkah, such as a sukkah under a sukkah or a sukkah under a tree or within a house. Thus, learners of the Daf HaYomi Bavli and Daf HaYomi B’Halacha will have the tremendous treat and zechus to learn the sugya with its entire natural progression. From the Gemara to Rashi (and Tosafos and Rishonim) and right up until the Mishnah Berurah and the poskim of our time…you will be enlightened on Rav Elyashiv’s psak on whether snow that falls on s’chach is a problem, or what the Chazon Ish says about clothing hanging from a clothesline that are blowing in the wind on top of the s’chach or the Noda B’Yehuda’s question on whether you are allowed to sit under an umbrella in the sukkah.
Similarly, at the beginning of Elul, we will be learning daf lamed daled in Sukkah that discusses the halachos of the four minim, what happens if you have a lulav, esrog, hadassim or aravos where the top is cut off or where one of them gets cut off, etc. Just a bit later, we learn about the halacha l’maaseh of these things in siman 645. In that siman, not only will one learn the Shulchan Aruch and Mishnah Berurah that will teach all the basic halachos, but one will encounter hundreds of psakim from later poskim such as the Chazon Ish, Rav Moshe Feinstein, Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach and more. For example, what if the lulav is beautiful but is grafted? What does Rav Moshe say about that? What if some of the leaves are dry but some are not? What does the Chazon Ish say about that?
These two examples are not the only examples. There are many more throughout both Masechta Sukkah and the Mishnah Berurah.
The most amazing thing about these programs is that if one begins next week, within three months he can master Masechta Sukkah together with all the halachos of sukkah, lulav and esrog, starting with the Gemara and going straight through to the poskim of our generation!
Now is truly the time to join and learn the Daf HaYomi and the Daf HaYomi B’Halacha for the ultimate shleimus in learning, in keeping with the Mishnah Berurah’s psak that the greatest mitzvah of limud haTorah is learning something right through up until and including halacha l’maaseh! Join now and conclude the Mishnah Berurah with the multitudes around the world this coming Chodesh Adar, when Dirshu will celebrate its gala World Siyum on the second machzor of the Daf HaYomi B’Halacha!
Now is the time to truly attain the ultimate simcha of davar b’ito mah tov. What are you waiting for?!
By Chaim Gold
