Pinchas - History’s Most Mysterious Man

[Music] One of the most, if not the most mysterious characters in all of Tanakh is Pinhas, a seemingly unassuming grandchild of Arun, who goes ahead and kills Zimry, the leader of the tribe of Shim, amidst his adulterous act, is then rewarded with the enigmatic bree shalom which rabbaya writes shalom is the acronym for shalom mace he won't die he was rewarded with ultimate longevity penas then goes on to become the novi elohu who has surfaced and resurfaced throughout the duration of Jewish history and continues to do so until this very day the garan sanhedrin pad states that when the writes the word and he will atone in hashem's blessing of pinas it does so in the future tense, hinting to the fact that Pinhas will forever be the savior of the Jewish people. Pinhas/awani seems to show up wherever we go. At every bris, we set up a chair for him. At every peser, we set up a cup of wine for him. We even go so far as to open the door waiting for him to come in. Every time we say, we ask Hashem to send to bring us the good news. as Eliohani every mo Shabas we sing songs hoping for his arrival the list can go on so what was it about Pinas that gave him this honor what did Pinas do that granted him the status of being the perpetual savior of the Jewish people in every generation just because he got up and killed Zimry don't we find many people in the Tyra who did great things and yet they were not rewarded with anything remotely as dramatic as Pinas people like Schlommo and David and Shel and Misha and Aaron and Amram and Ysef and Yehuda. What was it about Pinhas that made him so remarkably great that he became the immortal savior of Jews for eternity? So there is virtually no way to explain the mystique of Pinhas without entering, albeit cautiously, into the dazzling world of Tyra secrets, the proverbial deep end of the Tyra's endless ocean. And there we learned that Pinus was not as unassuming as we may have thought. We learned that his spiritual energy was bottled up inside of him for years. In fact, it actually preeded him. the Rami Pano, an Italian sage who lived in the Italian city of Fano in the 1500s in his work Gilgoule Nishamas page 155 and the Arisal in his safer safer guula both write that Pinhas was actually the Gilgal the spiritual reincarnation of our forefather Yitsk. The zoyar emparaas pinhas points out that the gimatrius the numerical values of the word pinhas and the word yitzuk are the exact same 28 telling us that they share the same soul. The tune zar similarly says that the names can be read kitai alluding to the fact that the soul of will be around until the end of days. The question is why? Why of all the many souls that graced our planet, all the many haliganes is the one that lives in the world forever, the soul of Yitzk. So they explain that Yitzk was the ultimate paradigm of spiritual strength. Our forefather Yitsk willingly allowed himself to be bound up and burnt as an offering to Hashem. Yitsk would live his life completely enveloped in God and his Tyra. He was about as perfect as a human mortal could be. Perfect except one flaw. He was blind. On that fateful day when Yitzluk was laying on the altar waiting for his father Aaram to sacrifice him, the angels in heaven were looking down and crying and those tears dropped into Yitsluk's eyes and blinded him. Hence writes the Arizal there was one function he could not accomplish and that was observing the world around him and lending kindness to it spiritual perceptiveness. He couldn't detect spiritual or physical detriments around him to the same extent a man with proper eyesight could. And this he needed to achieve before his soul's mission could be completed. So thus at the end of his life, Yitzk's soul was left a tad incomplete. It needed to re-enter this world and achieve what it previously could not. It needed someone upon whom it could rely to accomplish this. Pinhas was the perfect candidate. He was the grandson of Aron the Kayangodo and the spiritual leader, the ultimate lover of peace, the practical sort of guidance counselor to the Jews at the time. And conversely, he was also the grandson of Yro, a former idol worshipper and priest who converted to Judaism. Pinnus was a man who saw it all. He absorbed it all. The love of Jews, the titanic spiritual abilities of any man, the ludicrousness of idol worship. And additionally, Pinhas demonstrated great humility when all his cousins became khanim. And he didn't. Unlike his cousin Kyra, who made a big fuss about his status, Pinhas accepted his with a smile. while he did what needed to be done. Inim it says that never in his life did Pinas sin not even once. So when the Tory focuses the story on Pinas, it begins with the word Var. He saw which means explains the Rami pano that Pinas saw what Yitzk could not. He picked up where Yitzk left off. When Pinas was standing there in the back of the crowd watching as Zimri, the leader of the Shiv of Shim committed his horrible act with a midionite woman, a wave of spiritual energy suffused him. The soul of Yitzk discovered its perfect landing spot and Pinas realized that he was on this earth to defend the Jewish people. That presently meant to rid the world of sinners. So he grabbed a spear and he killed them both in one blow. Right then and there, Hashem took a look at Pinas and took a look at Yitzk sitting up high in heaven and smiled. This is what the Jewish people need. A man with the spiritual dynamite of Yitzk. And the love, the perception, and the determination of Pinnus rolled into one. He was perfect. He would be the one to ride the train alongside the Jewish people down history's long tracks. He would be there to correct the wrongs, to love the oppressed, to steer the Jews when they go arai and give them hope when all seems lost. And hence, Pinas became Eliohanavi. Elio who would defend and protect the Jewish people time and time again. He would weed out the sinners. He would inspire repentance. He would encourage the blind, poor, and needy. He was the only person in the history of the world to have an openly chronicled story of going to heaven alive. He lived in both worlds much like Yeetszlak Kuwal on the altar went up to heaven and came back down. Alio says the Ashik went up to heaven specifically in the east bank of the Jordan River for that is the precise location that Pinas killed Zimry they are one and the same. So when it says in Moed that Elo is still alive it means that Elio and Pinas carrying the soul of Yitzka exist in this world in a literal sense. He is here watching and listening and nurturing us, showing up when we need it the most. He's defending us and he's empowering us. The very last person on earth to be graced with prophecy was the prophet Malahi. He was the last person to have heard Hashem's word in prophetic form. The very last thing he heard Hashem say, the very last time Hashem spoke directly to a person on planet Earth was when Hashem said the following. Behold, I will send you Elio one of you before the end of days and he will restore peace within the land. Elio is the one to herald in Mashiach for he is the one who has been with us throughout our journey. Hence, we mention Elio all the time. We give him a seat at our bris. We give him a se seat at our pes table. We sing about him at weddings. We mention his name while benching. And we hear stories about people who are sure that they've met him. So indebted are we to his kindness and his protection that we attach the words. He is remembered for good. We attach that to his actual name. The goodness and blessing he gave and continues to give the Jewish people made him so synonymous with goodness that we literally attach that title to his name. Elio is referred to as El in more than 60 instances in Madr. Even the one time the phrase is tagged onto someone else in Tanakh as inva both the and the Ezra are quick to point out the medish and estab which says that carvona which is spelled differently than the first evil carva mentioned in the beginning of the migilla was in fact Eliovi and he saved the day yet again no person or book can possibly recount all the kindnesses and favors Elio has contributed towards the Jewish people. His benevolence is incalcable. He is the one who taught our teachers Tyra. Men such like Rabbi Rea Ben Aua, Rev Murray, Revas, Rev Anwakadesh, Owen, Medashan, Kuma, Hazinu. He saved Rebi from agonizing toothaches and bracious Ramad. He appeared as a Roman soldier to save the life of Noam is Gamu and Tinfal. He showed up as a horseman to save by Ashi who was being attacked by a snake in Shabisdaf Ku. He disguised himself as an Arab to save a poor couple in med zafal. And he dressed up as a woman to save her mayor from a band of barbaric Romans Alf. He was the one who informed Shiman Bario of the Caesar's death. and he was the one who showed up to Rabbaka's door and enabled him to go to yeshiva facilitating his becoming one of the most important sages in the last 2,000 years according to Nadarim dun and these are just the instances that we know about when Elio is not traversing the world saving Jews in their times of peril or teaching our teachers Tyra writes to say he sits down and he writes down each and every mitzvah that all of us are doing or performing and he signs his name on the bottom and he puts it in a safe place storing it for the day that he will read it in heaven. And when we go to Shamayim, he's the one who's welcoming us in and he reads those mitzvah that we did all our life. He is heaven's doorman. Aside from helping us in this world, he is the one ensuring our experience in the next world is the absolute fullest. Of course, there were great men before Pinas and great men after Pinas, but few harbored as deep a love and as burning a desire to defend and help the Jewish people as did/pinhas/avi the abbanel in Malim Bud writes that Moshe was on such a high level that upon his death he just ascended directly to God's throne in heaven where he now sits beside not that he was rewarded with anything less than pen not less just different ribb Polisher adds that had Moshe not gone through the process of a regular death, the Jewish populace would have wrongly thought he was an angel and would have would have given up aspiring to be spiritually great, mistakenly thinking that spiritual greatness is reserved for angels and not mortal man. He had to go through a normal death process. But Pinhas on the other hand posed no such threat and therefore was rewarded with longevity with immortality. Pinas with a burning desire to save the Jews threatened by a devastating plague brought about due to the adulterous acts they were performing rose up and became the timeless defender of the Jewish people. He took the soul entrusted within him and showed up at the doorstep of Jews in distress for the duration of our history with passion in his heart and a fire in his soul. He wants nothing more than to stand up for us when we are down and lift us up when we lose hope. Be it physically, be it spiritually. Another intriguing example, anytime in Gamarra there is a question so piercing none of the brilliant sages know the answer to it. The Gamarra writes the word teu. The word teu is really an acronym for the words tishparitus vias meaning to say that elio came from the word t that city tishpi will one day tell us the answers to all our questions. It may be later in our lives in the form of a mysterious sage or in the end times when Elio ushers in Messiah. So there's a question why is Elio the one to answer all our Torah questions when Mosher Rabina was the one who handed us the Torah? Wouldn't Moshe be the best candidate to tell us the answers to all our questions? Wouldn't it be more appropriate for the Gumar to write me as in Moshaaritus? Soich explains that Elio is the most fitting to answer all our questions for not only does he live comfortably in the next world with access to the greatest reservoirs of Tyra in existence. He has additionally been here on earth with us through the thick and through the thin. He understands us. He comprehends our issues and our struggles. He speaks our language and hence he will be the one to take all our questions and answer them for he more than anyone intimately knows us. He is the champion of our grandparents and the champion of our parents. He is the champion of us. Us in 600, us in 1433, us in 1654, us in 1822, us yesterday, us today. On September 11th, 2001, at 8:07 a.m., exactly 39 minutes before al-Qaeda terrorist Muhammad Ata and Wid Al-Shari flew American Airlines plane number 11, into the Twin Towers, a group of nine Jewish businessmen stood at a nearby Schul waiting for a minion. Normally there would have been more than enough people filling the minion but that morning over 100 people attended the schllesim the one month remembrance of Jews who died in a Grand Canyon helicopter crash utterly aware of the tragedy that was about to take place. The men began losing patience. These were serious men. These were professionals. And all of them had to be at their desk in the World Trade Center well before 9:00 a.m. At 8:11 a.m., exactly 35 minutes before the horror began, the men were sitting in the shaw impatiently tapping their watches. Let's just dive and be ais, one of them said. I I have a meeting. No, another replied. Let's wait a few more minutes. They waited some more. At 8:15, exactly 31 minutes before the first plane burst through the first tower, one man got up and said, "Okay, I'm leaving. I'm just going to dive into my office." And just as he was about to pick up his tallest bag and walk out, they heard the door of the Shaw creek open. An elderly man they have never seen before walked into the Shaw and marched right up to the um and declared, "I have yard sight and mazdav." The man about to leave groggly sat down in his seat. At 8:17 a.m., exactly 29 minutes before the plane began its slaughter of thousands of people, the old man started domining. Unlike the other members of the minion, he was in no rush. He had yard sight and he was going to make it count. Excruciatingly slowly, the man carefully uttered the words. Wanting to leave, but stuck there to ensure the quota of 10 was complete. The other men stayed until the very last Amain. The very minute the old man finished saying kadesh at the end of divining at exactly 8:46 a.m. The men picked up their belongings and ran outside only to see a sight that is seared into their minds forever. A plane crashing into the World Trade Center, setting the entire building a flame. They stopped in their tracks. They looked up at the smoke. They looked up at the death. They looked up at the fire. They looked up to see hundreds of people jumping from the top floors of the building to their horrible deaths below. They looked up and realized that that should have been them. Had that minion finished even 3 minutes earlier, they could have been dead. They then realized that the seemingly ordinary old man who just happened to show up at that show probably wasn't so ordinary. They ran back in to see who he was, but he was gone. Gone to help the next Jew from his plight. Gone to teach the next Tyra scholar. gone to help the next young widow feed her children. The men looked at that empty shaw and realized that if not for that mysterious old man, they would be dead. They went back outside and ran for their lives. Each and every week for hundreds of years, Jews after making havdala softly sing the song Eliovi. We look to the upcoming week and hope that Elio will be there to guide us and to inspire us. We sing hoping that the soul of Yeitzk with the love and strength of Pinas will be with us each day. But most of all, we sing the hope and the prayer that this will be the week where Elio brings us the news we've all been waiting for and all been crying for and all been hoping for. The news of the arrival of Messiah.