Yisro the Baal Teshuva

One going back to parshas Yisro, again. One of the advantages of being up to date with the parsha is that it's this week's parsha and it's really something that we mentioned in the post game last night at the end of the first Chumash in parshas Yisro, but I think it's good to have it over now and we'll have it with a little bit of an extra punchline. And that is the first Rashi in parshas Yisro, "Vayishma Yisro" Parsha, the possuk seems to be saying that Yisro heard about the fact that the Yidden were taken out of Mitzrayim and all the additional events that took place and it motivated him to take Tzipporah, Gershom and Eliezer and come join the party, come join the Bnei Yisroel. But Rashi says right in the beginning of the parsha, "Vayishma Yisro mashmua shama uva." What exactly was it that Yisro heard? Krias Yam Suf u'milchemes Amalek. What he heard was Krias Yam Suf and milchemes Amalek. And everybody from the beginning of time, from the first time a person got up and said a dvar Torah in parshas Yisro, Jews have been wondering aloud what's so special, what was so unique about Krias Yam Suf and milchemes Amalek that Rashi Hakodesh says "Vayishma Yisro, you want to know mashmua shama uva? What he heard was Krias Yam Suf u'milchemes Amalek." So the Chasam Sofer in his very first piece in Terus Moshe says a dvar nefka. Everybody knows, it's a well known Chazal, that Paroh in the beginning of parshas Shmois, when he said "Hava advisors, Bilam, Iyov and Yisro. And he called them in and he said that the Jews are posing a problem, they're multiplying at a very fast pace, at some point they're going to become such a powerful force that in the event that there's a war and they decide to join the other side, we may be in big trouble. We have to come up with some sort of solution, quote unquote. We have to figure out what exactly we're going to do. So the cabinet gets together and they all voice an opinion. Bilam says, "I think you should kill them. I mean, or at least deal with them, figure out something very very bad to do with them." Iyov said, "I plead the fifth." Fifth Amendment, right? I'm not sure. Yisro was baruch. Yisro said, "I need the bathroom." And he wasn't heard from again. Chazal say that Bilam sheyatz, he ended up being killed later in the Torah. Iyov sheshasak was nida beasurim, like the Brisker Rov said, "Al yifsoch tzu tvei shreitman." And Yisro that was baruch, he got rewarded, he was zocheh that Bnei Bonav yoshvim balishkas hagazis, bazoch der Heiliger Chasam Sofer. Even though Yisro technically walks away from that story looking very good, but Yisro had a very guilty conscience about how the events shook out. Because at the end of the day, once the Jews were enslaved and things started becoming very very bad for them, he started feeling, it started tugging him that maybe I should have done more, maybe I shouldn't have ran away, maybe I should have voiced an opinion, maybe I should have put up a fight and maybe had I done that I would have been successful, I would have been matzliach. And this was something that bothered Yisro throughout the time. And the Chasam Sofer says it's mistaber and it's yutachin that if it bothered Yisro, Yisro probably did teshuvah. He probably fasted and he probably did gilgul sheleg and who knows what he might have done in order to try to be mesakein the fact that in his mind, in his mind he didn't do enough. But then time passed and the Jews were taken out of Mitzrayim and they came to the Yam Suf. And what about the Yam Suf? The Mitzrim all drowned in the Yam. When Yisro saw the Mitzrim drown in the Yam, what Yisro realized was that when Hakadosh Baruchu punishes, when Hakadosh Baruchu thinks and operates, he operates middah knegged middah. "Ki b'davar asher zaddu aleihem." Why did the Egyptians die in sea? The reason they died at sea is probably because they made gzeirah that every little baby boy that's born should be thrown into the sea. So middah knegged middah, like Rashi speaks out, that's why they were punished at sea. So he says, "I've been doing teshuvah all along because I feel that I sinned greatly towards the creator of the world. I think my teshuvah might have not been a perfect teshuvah because I see that the way the Eibishter likes things is middah knegged middah. And maybe my teshuvah also has to be middah knegged middah." And you know what teshuvah middah knegged middah would be? It's what we know as teshuvah mishkal. So he says, "What I need to do is I need to be mesakein my cheit." So Yisro said, "How am I going to be mesakein my cheit? What did I do wrong? I had an opportunity to give advice that would have saved the Jews and to the contrary, by me running away I hurt them. What I'm going to do is I need to wait and I have to find an opportunity where I'm going to be able to give an eitzah that's going to help the Jewish people." And he was waiting and he was waiting for that opportunity. And then Yisro heard something else. He heard milchemes Amalek. And what happened by milchemes Amalek? Amalek comes out out of nowhere, they literally leave their hometown, they leave their village, they leave their wife and children behind, they say "We're going to go fight against the Jews." Why? I don't even know. But there's something pulling us and tugging us and this is something that we want to do. And when Yisro saw what Amalek did, Yisro learned a mussar, a mussar that Chasam Sofer says, the Chasam Sofer writes and talks about, that you're supposed to learn. And that is sometimes you have to learn from the koach hatumah how you're supposed to go about things of kedushah. He saw from Amalek that Amalek didn't wait for the fight to come to them. Amalek brought the fight on. Amalek felt in their tumah that they want to fight the Jews. They didn't say "When the Jews come to our state or we're going to go out like Sichon and Og did." They said, "No, we're going to bring it on. Let's go on the offense and let's go fight them." And Yisro said that if that's how it works in tumah, azoy darf es gehen in kedushah also. And we have to go bring it. So when Yisro saw that Amalek went at it, he says, "I have to do the same thing. I'm sitting around, I'm waiting for an opportunity to be mesakein my cheit, to do teshuvah mishkal. Al dif in milchemes Amalek I see that I have to pick myself up." That's what the Chasam Sofer said. Chasam Sofer said that mashmua shama uva, Krias Yam Suf u'milchemes Amalek, Krias Yam Suf taught Yisro that the teshuvah that he was doing wasn't enough of a teshuvah. You have to do teshuvah mishkal. And milchemes Amalek taught him that you don't wait for the fight to come to you. You bring it on. That's the way you're supposed to do it. The vort is a little drushy, kidarko shel the Chasam Sofer. But like every drush in the Chasam Sofer, the drush is a moshel. The nimshal is haflei p'la'im. It's haflei p'la'im. How many times have we learned parshas Yisro and maybe not connected the fact that Yisro, who's giving eitzos to Moshe Rabbeinu in the beginning of parshas Yisro, is the same yo'eitz of Hava nischaqma lei, who was one of Paroh's advisors. Yisro was this very prominent, very celebrated advisor. Somebody needed to be sho'eilt eitzah about something, he would try to make an appointment with Yisro and his next availability was in 2029. He was not an easy guy to get in with. But that's where Yisro had a koach and Yisro used that koach in his own mind in a bad way. Wasn't so bad, could have been worse, could have been Bilam and it could have been Iyov. But at the same time, he didn't put up a fight. And Yisro, Yisro felt that I have to do teshuvah and teshuvah has to be done teshuvah mishkal. And how did he do teshuvah mishkal? Yisro waited for the opportunity. And then he brought the opportunity on. And the teshuvah mishkal was he used that same koach that he had of giving advice, he gave the advice to the Bnei Yisroel and as they say, the rest is history. You know, Yisro was zocheh that he has a parsha named after him. Parshas Yisro, it's all out of order. But Yisro has a parsha that's named after him. Why? Because he gave us a parsha in the Torah. Arba arba'im shanah, it's still a little schwer. What's so chashuv? Yes, I hear, he told Moshe set it up this way, set it up that way. I mean, he gave him good advice. I think the story, the oimek of why Yisro is zocheh to a parsha, it's not so much the fact that he gave good advice. It's the story of Yisro. It's what motivated him to give advice. It's that hergesh nifla of the Heiliger Chasam Sofer that Yisro came to do teshuvah and we were mekabel his teshuvah. We were mekabel his teshuvah on such a high level that he was zocheh, he was zocheh that he has a whole parsha. Bilam messed up when he was part of the Hava nischaqma lei. Messed up very very badly. Yisro to a certain extent also messed up. But at the end of the day, Yisro was zocheh to having a parsha named after him. Bilam at the end of the Torah is going to double down. Bilam goes down as one of the worst, gefelich people of all time. People make mistakes sometimes, but there's a koach that a person has to go ahead and be mesakein the mistakes that he makes. Bilam doubled down. And because he doubled down, his name goes down in infamy. As opposed to Yisro, Yisro was mesakein his mistake. Yisro did teshuvah. The atzah of Yisro is so significant, it's so part of the conscience of every Yid, every little child who's five years old, boy or girl, has learned in cheder the story of Yisro and his good advice. There's a tremendous oimek. The oimek is that Hakadosh Baruchu gives a person a talent sometimes and sometimes we use it in a destructive way. You could be mesakein by using it in a good way. There's so much beauty in the story of Yisro. The teshuvah of Yisro, who would have thunk it? This is the first Chasam Sofer in the beginning of Terus Moshe. And we're going to stop here.