The Mesirus Nefesh of Lalla Solica | Rabbi David Ozeri

The year 1492, Spanish Inquisition. Tens of thousands of Jews fled from Spain. Many of them ended up on the shores of Morocco, to the city of Fez. There in Fez, that was the capital of the Muslim religion, and the Jews there were determined to keep their יהדות, their religion. There was a family there by the name of Hachuel, and in the mid-1800s, they had a daughter born. They called her in Spanish, Sol, and this Sol was known as Solica. Solica was a wonderful girl and one day, the ambassador saw her and he said: This beauty should only belong to a king, to a sultan. The Sultan came down and saw her and the Sultan decided that he wants to marry her. She absolutely, unequivocally, refused. They said: Listen, if you don't do it, they're going to execute you in public. She says: Fine with me. I'm not going to convert. I am not marrying a Gentile. It's never going to happen. The Beit Din of Fez got involved and they told her, You're no better than Esther HaMalka, Queen Esther was taken by King Achashverosh. As long as you're passive, it will be okay. She still refused. The King was so upset with her, he said: Okay. Tie her hair to a wagon with horses and drag her through the cobblestone streets, till she dies. And they asked her if she has any requests before she dies, and she said: Yes. Pins. And she pinned her dress, her garment, close to her body, so no one, God forbid, should see any of her flesh when they are dragging her through the streets. And the execution began. They tied her hair to the wagon, they tied her hands behind her back, and they started, the horses started trotting on these cobblestone streets. She started to scream after a while: Stop! Stop! The executioner said: Must be she has decided to change her mind. Let’s stop and see what she has to say. She stopped. The pins came loose. Please pin the pins to my flesh, so that they don’t come loose. Again, they dragged her through the streets, till פרחה נשמתה, her Neshama left her with Shema Yisrael. She was buried in the Jewish cemetery of Fez. She's actually buried next to the רי”ף. It is a shrine. Jews from all over the world come there and they pray at this Tzaddeket’s grave. Not only that, the Muslims pray there. Why do the Muslims pray there? Because there was once a pogrom and they destroyed the cemetery. And when they smashed her grave, they realized that her body was whole. And they realized that this was a very special soul, and even till today, the Muslims pray at her grave. When any Jew passes through Morocco, they go to this Tzaddeket, Solica Hachuel, and they pray at her grave. Why do I tell you this story? You have here a 17-year-old girl who was not only Moser Nefesh, but she gave up her life. She understood what it means for a man to look at her. She was ready to die for it, and not only to die for it, to be tortured while she was dying, to die Al Kiddush Hashem. Don't you think we have to now understand how important it is not to look at things that we are not supposed to be looking at? What a great, great Schar, reward it is to be Vayimaen. The Nisayon is great, the test is great out there, but when we study and we look in Chazal and we see what people did to be Vayimaen, to fall into that category of Vayimaen. She was given a היתר by the Beit Din. She could have been passive and she could have saved her life. She says: I would never do that. And then look at the Mesirut Nefesh, pinning her dress to her flesh. And how important it is to understand from this that really we should not look where we're not supposed to look.