He had it! He told himself he wouldn’t eat another pint of Haagen-Dazs in one sitting. But what could he do? After another stressful day he just wanted a couple scoops, but as fate would have it, those couple scoops turned into an entire pint. In a state of frustration and anger at himself, he vowed to never touch ice cream again.
Parshat Matot begins with a discussion about one who makes a vow: “When an ish (person) makes a neder (vow) for Hashem…he should not profane his word.” Kli Yakar expresses a remarkable, yet somewhat perplexing idea that one who makes a neder in a state of anger, not only is that not “for Hashem,” but he is also not considered an “ish.”
It was certainly the right thing for him to refrain from eating ice cream, and perhaps he even did it in order to reach lofty levels of spirituality, separating himself from physicality—it was “for Hashem”—yet Kli Yakar is perhaps teaching us that not only does this expression of self-restraint have nothing to do with God, such a person in some regard has lost the glorious feature of “ish.” What’s the deeper idea here?
When Hashem created human, the pasuk says, “And man became a ‘living soul’” (Bereishit 2:7). Before we get so excited about our elevated status, we may perhaps consider that in reference to the creation of animals it also says that they are considered a “living soul” (Bereishit 1:24). If so, what’s the difference between us and them? So while we know that some unfortunately might agree to that notion, we on the other hand certainly know the human is the pinnacle of creation. If so, what separates us from the wildlife? Targum Onkelos on the former pasuk says that the “living soul” stated in reference to human means that Hashem gave us the function of speech.
When we see this Targum Onkelos, we may begin to realize that the significance of speech is not just imperative, but rather it’s the defining factor that distinguishes humans from animals. The power of speech is evident in Parshat Matot in the context of a neder. When a person makes a neder, that vow attains the status of that of a commandment of the Torah. It’s not a joke. Moreover, Seforno says that one who violates his neder causes a chilul Hashem!
With this understanding we can perhaps identify where the Kli Yakar is coming from. When one makes a neder in anger, it shows that he wouldn’t have said such a thing were he in a calm state. Because of his frustration he lost some control over his speech and blurted out a neder. Although the idea of the neder may show integrity, commitment and a high spiritual level, nevertheless this is not “for Hashem,” and on some level he is not an “ish.” Why? Targum Onkelos teaches us that the ability of speech is the defining factor of a human, and thus if he uses that carelessly, without proper control, by default his exalted status is lessened, and it doesn’t matter how impressive his vow is. The idea of a neder and its violation of it are so severe—and perhaps this amplifies the responsibility we have to be in control of what we say.
There’s countless stories of how only a few words snowballed into tremendous success for another person, while on the other hand a few negative words can sometimes do the opposite, and we all know them. Sometimes, however, we may not realize and be aware of the smaller, seemingly less-significant matters of speech in our daily lives, and whether our speech is on autopilot or whether we are the pilot running the show.
Binyamin Benji is a graduate of Yeshivat Rabbeinu Yitzchak Elchanan and Wurzweiler School of Social Work. He can be reached at [email protected].
