Introduction
We stand in the final section of Chapter 3, in the series of verses corresponding to the letters Tzadi and Kuf. Here, the lamenter describes the hunt the enemies conducted against the Jewish people, the pit and the waters that flooded over his head, and the turning point: the realization that everything is a heavenly decree, and consequently there is no one else to turn to but the Master of the World. We will proceed through the order of the verses, along with the explanations of the commentators presented in the lesson.
"They Hunted Me Down Like a Bird" - The Wheat Trap
צוֹד צָדוּנִי כַּצִּפּוֹר אֹיְבַי חִנָּם׃ - My enemies have hunted me down like a bird, without cause.
The Lechem Dimah adds and explains that there is also an allusion here to the Egyptian exile. As is known, when we begin to lament over one tragedy, the lamentation stirs up all prior afflictions along with it. The analogy is: just as one hunts a bird by throwing grains of wheat before it, and being hungry, it comes to eat the wheat and falls into the net, so too were we hunted. What brought us down to Egypt? Wheat. "Buy us a little food," and from there we fell into the trap. The Jewish people descended to Egypt due to hunger, and afterward the Egyptians enslaved them "without cause" - not like someone who purchased a slave for payment and incurred an expense, but as slaves acquired for free. This is "my enemies without cause," making us their unpaid slaves.
The Lechem Dimah further explains: when they came against Jerusalem, other nations joined them with whom we had never had any conflict. This is the very concept explained earlier: the moment people hear that Jews are involved, there is an immediate mob mentality, and everyone volunteers to join in. Moreover, do not think they hunted me because I possessed silver and gold, seeking to gain something from me; rather, it was entirely gratuitous, without cause.
He adds another explanation: people who take captives as slaves feed them, but here they gave me no sustenance at all, rather "they ended my life in the pit," as the next verse states - and this is "they hunted me without cause." The Ahavat Yonatan explains that in Egypt there was at least food for the time being: "We remember the cucumbers and the melons," we remember the fish. We do not know if it was in great abundance; the Ibn Ezra notes that it was the practice of the Egyptians to feed Israel matzot, and that is why we eat matzot in commemoration of the Exodus - not only because their dough did not have time to rise, but because it is the way of oppressors to feed their slaves matzot, as matzot plug the stomach and give a prolonged feeling of fullness. In any case, in Egypt there was food. With us, says the lamenter, it was not so: "without cause" - they did not even feed us after hunting us down.
And this is similar to what took place in the terrible and horrific Holocaust in Europe, may such affliction never arise again: one of the dreadful things described by anyone who survived the camps is the terrible starvation. Anyone who looks at the photographs is shocked - one cannot believe a human being could be reduced to mere skin and bones. You look at legs and see sticks. There is no flesh left, only skin clinging to bone, and it is impossible to understand how they continued to live at all. This is the reality of "they hunted me without cause" - they did not even grant me the food needed to survive.
They Hunted Us with Smooth Talk
Furthermore: the enemies trapped us with their speech, which has always been their method. When Pharaoh wanted to enslave us, he effectively claimed that "work sets you free." Pharaoh himself went out for a day of labor in the field. The Midrash relates: Pharaoh took a basket and a tool, hung them around his neck, and went out to work. Everyone saw Pharaoh and his retinue going out for a day of labor and said: If so, everyone must go out. Who could see him go out and stay behind? Everyone came. Then, with a smooth tongue, they trapped us: Pharaoh commanded that each person's exact output be recorded. The next day, he announced that everyone must report, and woe to anyone who failed to meet yesterday's quota. Everything had been documented. Only this time it was no longer a volunteer effort: Pharaoh sat in his palace, and we had already fallen into the trap.
And this was also the method of the Nazi enemy, may their name and memory be blotted out: a method of pacification. They lulled our senses. For a very long time, people did not know what was happening to the Jews; there were only rumors - that they were exterminating people, that they did this and that - and it all circulated as mere rumor. Because of this, there was no widespread uprising; everyone thought it would end any moment, that the war would finish, that it was temporary. They told us we were being taken to labor camps - so why not work and endure this period? We will work a bit and survive the war. "Arbeit macht frei" was emblazoned at the entrance. Afterward, when they arrived, they were told that they needed to maintain hygiene and enter the showers - and we all know that the showers were gas chambers. The enemies' method has always been smooth speech, dulling our senses and luring us in - just like the bird before which seeds are scattered, thinking it is about to receive something, and in the end it is captured.
"Save Me, Please, from the Hand of My Brother, from the Hand of Esau"
One can add further, and although it is difficult to make a comparison, it is truly no less severe. When they told the Chasam Sofer that Napoleon was offering emancipation, he began to weep. They asked him why: after all, it offered equal rights; the Jews would emerge from the ghettos and be able to do things they never could before! The Chasam Sofer answered them: "Deliver me, please, from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esav" - I am more troubled by "my brother" than by "Esav." Because when he is Esav, all my defense mechanisms are on high alert; but the moment he presents himself as "my brother" - "How are you doing, brother?" - all those defenses fall asleep. We all know where we hear these kinds of "brotherly" embraces: all those who seek to bury us anew every day, you hear plenty of "brother" from them. And this refrain is familiar to us from "Deliver me, please, from the hand of my brother."
The Chasam Sofer was deeply fearful, and how right he was. Emancipation and equal rights - in Germany, Jews attained the highest positions: banking, theaters, universities, deans, everything. There was a Jew who was in the ghetto together with the Klausenburger Rebbe, and we once recounted his story at length here; he was an apostate Jew who had restored the Polish currency to its feet when it was virtually worthless, and his signature was on every banknote. And where did he end up? In an extermination camp together with the Klausenburger Rebbe, sleeping on the floor, while not even his gentile wife or his gentile children showed the slightest interest in him or even came to see what had become of him.
We see that when the non-Jew draws you close, it is a form of "They have trapped me like a bird": he scatters a few seeds, you approach without noticing - it is a honey trap. "Come to America, it is pleasant and comfortable here; come to Europe." And indeed, what are the assimilation rates? What will remain of my children and my grandchildren? Rav Finkel ztz"l, Rosh Yeshivah of Mir, once remarked that what Europe did not do to us, and what the Nazis did not do to us, America has done to us. For if a Jew marries a gentile woman, you have lost a soul from the Jewish people; you have severed your branch, leaving no continuation. How many millions have perished in the crematoria of America? The crematoria in Europe were physical, and those who perished merited the life of the World to Come; the crematoria of America are spiritual. And the great danger is that you do not feel it; it is enjoyable: they embrace us, we have rights, we have a powerful lobby, we have clout in the Senate - and you fail to realize that the Jewish nation is steadily being consumed, without feeling it and without noticing. "They have trapped me like a bird": the bird feels fine, it is given seeds, but it does not realize that the net has already closed over it.
"They Have Cut Off My Life in the Pit" - Total Identification and an Allusion to the Exiles
צָמְתוּ בַבּוֹר חַיָּי וַיַּדּוּ אֶבֶן בִּי׃ - They have cut off my life in the pit, and cast stones at me.
The author of the lament says: Some were cast into a pit; some were struck down by catapult stones - "and cast stones at me"; and some were cast into the sea, as the next verse states, "Waters flowed over my head." Varied and diverse forms of death. And note: he describes it all as happening to himself - "they have cut off my life in the pit," "and cast stones at me" - because there is total identification here between the author of the lament and all the afflictions that befell the Jewish people. He feels as though these things are happening to him directly, as though he himself were undergoing this horrific ordeal.
There is also an allusion here to the exile in Egypt: babor ("in the pit") has the numerical value (gematria) of 210 (beit, beit, vav, reish: 2, 2, 6, 200), corresponding to the numerical value of redu ("descend"). The letters of babor are the same numerical equivalent as redu, except that instead of a dalet (4) there are two beits (2+2). Thus, "they have cut off my life babor" hints at those 210 years in Egypt. It is also an allusion to the Babylonian exile, for Babylon is deep like a pit.
The Lechem Dimah explains that he compares these afflictions to a person thrown into a water-filled pit to drown, with no way of emerging alive. And why does he specifically mention a pit? Because if someone is thrown into the sea, there is still a chance he might survive and be rescued. For this reason, Chazal state that if a man drowns in "boundless waters" (mayim she-ein lahem sof), his wife remains forbidden to remarry (an agunah). They tell you: he set sail on a ship, which was seen at a certain distance from shore and suddenly vanished; or they saw him fall into the water - this is considered boundless water, and one cannot testify and release his wife from her igun, lest he plunged in here and emerged elsewhere. But in "bounded waters" - a body of water whose boundaries are visible, where he was seen falling in, bubbles appeared, and that was all - you cannot say he perhaps escaped elsewhere, since all exits are visible. And here the author laments: for me, "they have cut off my life in the pit" - they cast me into a pit, and water flowed over my head, and in a pit there is no chance of survival, nor is there anything to hold onto. Because of this, "I said, I am cut off" from the land of the living, for I no longer have any hope of rescue. It also hints at the Babylonian exile, where Daniel was cast into the lions' den and a stone was placed over the mouth of the pit - this is "and cast stones at me," as we read in the Book of Daniel.
"Waters Flowed Over My Head" - Ducking One's Head Before the Wave
צָפוּ מַיִם עַל רֹאשִׁי אָמַרְתִּי נִגְזָרְתִּי׃ - Waters flowed over my head; I said, I am cut off.
The author of Alon Bachut explains: "Waters flowed over my head" - to every single wave of troubles, I bowed my head. A similar account is told regarding Rabbi Akiva, whose ship was wrecked at sea and who was later seen emerging alive. They asked him: "How did you survive?" He told them: "A plank (daf) from the ship came my way, and that plank kept me alive." In his time, Rav Meir Shapiro, the founder of Daf Yomi, expounded on this: What kept me alive? The Daf Yomi - "a daf came my way," and that is what saved me. In any case, the literal meaning is that a wooden plank from the ship came his way.
Yet there are waves, "All Your breakers and billows have swept over me"? Rather, it is an established principle: whoever presses against the hour, the hour presses against him; and whoever does not press against the hour, the hour does not press against him. When you stand upright against a wave, the wave washes you away; but if you see a massive wave and duck your head for four seconds, and then raise your head again - it is gone; the wave breaks and rushes past. A person who stands tall against the wave will be struck repeatedly, and his chances of survival are slim. This is the meaning of "Waters flowed over my head": How did the waters pass over my head? Because to every wave I nodded and ducked my head, lowering it briefly until the fury passed, and then I raised it once more; in this way, I survived.
And what helped me survive? The Allon Bachut explains: I accepted things with submission, for "I said: I am cut off" - thus was decreed upon me, thus was inscribed regarding me in Heaven. And if the Holy One, blessed be He, decrees this upon me, one accepts Heaven's judgment with love. This is what enabled me to survive and not break. For had I truly tried to look at the full depth of the hardship in my situation, I would have despaired long ago. What kept me from despairing? That "water flowed over my head" and I said to myself, "I am cut off" - thus was decreed upon me from on High, and I accepted the judgment of Heaven with submission and love.
"I called upon Your Name, Hashem, from the lowest pit" - The Right Address
קָרָאתִי שִׁמְךָ יְהֹוָה מִבּוֹר תַּחְתִּיּוֹת׃ - I called upon Your Name, Hashem, from the lowest pit.
The Akeidat Yitzchak explains: The author of the lamentation says - even though I was in a pit, and water flowed over my head, and I already said "I am cut off," knowing this is a decree from on High - and a person in such a state normally despairs and breaks down, saying "I have nothing left" - nevertheless, even from the lowest pit I called upon Your Name, Hashem. I did not despair; I continued and turned to You.
And the Lechem Dimah says: Since I said "I am cut off" - that is, once I realized that all of this is by divine decree and that everything comes from Heaven - this very realization made me understand that there is no remedy other than calling upon the Name of Hashem. For when you think that so-and-so did this to me, that I am suffering because of that person, and that another's wickedness brought this upon me - what do you try to do? You try to act against them, talk to them, influence them. But the moment I said "I am cut off," I understood that my reckoning is solely with the Master of the World, and consequently "I called upon Your Name, Hashem" - I have no one to turn to but Him. Even in the lowest pit, I understand that the only true address is the Master of the World.
"And upon whom can we rely?" - The Key to Redemption
We once explained that this is what the Gemara says regarding the period preceding the coming of Mashiach, when harsh and terrible decrees will unfold - "a daughter rises up against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law, a man's enemies are the members of his household," and so on - and it concludes: "And upon whom can we rely? Upon our Father in Heaven." Incidentally, the precise wording is not "we have no one to rely on" - that only appears on bumper stickers; in the Gemara the text reads: "And upon whom can we rely? Upon our Father in Heaven." Practically speaking it amounts to the same thing, but that is not the original phrasing.
Everyone asks: What does this mean? You recount trouble upon trouble, and then conclude, "Upon whom can we rely? Upon our Father in Heaven"? Did we have anyone else to rely on before this? We have always known that our reliance is only upon our Father in Heaven! Rather, herein lies the key to redemption. They are teaching you: When will the redemption arrive? When, under the weight of these troubles, all worldly ideologies collapse, all false hopes are shattered, and all those you trusted and counted on to help turn out to be utterly powerless. Only when you arrive at this conclusion - "Upon whom can we rely? Only upon our Father in Heaven" - does the Holy One, blessed be He, say: You have reached the right address; now you are ready for redemption.
Yet as long as you imagine that someone else will come to your aid - "Don't worry, the army will strike them, we will show them, we will hunt them down everywhere" - all manner of boastful talk, while in practice, time after time you retreat from Lebanon and withdraw from Gaza, leaving behind communities and cemeteries, constantly fleeing and retreating while indulging in bravado. At that point, everyone already realizes that this is not where salvation lies.
People tell you: We have America, the superpower, the mightiest military in the world; whenever there is a threat, America is right here, and we are its sole friend in the Middle East. And yet, after the abduction of three yeshivah boys, the president takes five days to react and then issues a feeble, half-hearted condemnation. Assad has already slaughtered a hundred and fifty or two hundred thousand of his own citizens, and that still moves no one in the White House to take action - "We do not intervene." America went to war in Iraq over a few barrels of oil; then Iraq is overrun by Al-Qaeda, Mosul and city after city fall, and he is still dwelling in the illusions of an "Arab Spring." Are you trying to reinvent the Arab world? An Arab does not relate to lectures on democracy. Furthermore, you trusted the president of the United States? He speaks to your prime minister with his feet up on the desk, ensuring he is photographed that way so everyone sees how much respect he holds for him and for the State of Israel. And we all know how long Pollard remained imprisoned there, thirty years for espionage - and these are our friends! So that illusion has collapsed as well.
The Holy One, blessed be He, says: When everything collapses, only then will you reach the conclusion that our reckoning is solely with the Master of the World, and that all our challenges must be resolved with Him. This is stated explicitly in the verses: "Where are their gods, the rock in whom they took refuge?" - where is the power you trusted in? "Who ate the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their libations" - those in whom you invested, to whom you offered sacrifices and poured libations - "let them arise and help you, let them be a shelter over you!" Go to Him, beseech Him for help, so that He will shelter you, protect you, and care for you.
We do not have seven hundred problems; we have only one: Where do we stand with the Master of the World? Not what to do about the Palestinians, nor about Iran, nor about Assad, nor about Hezbollah and Al-Qaeda - but rather: Where do I stand in my observance of Torah and mitzvot? Where do I stand in my spiritual growth? That is the real issue. Solve that, and you will see that there are no problems at all, that all the rest were merely virtual concerns. Yet we pursue illusions - let us solve the problem with this party or that one. You are entirely off course! The true course is to turn to the Master of the World, and all problems will be resolved. This is the meaning of: "Water flowed over my head, I said: I am cut off" - I understood that this is a decree from on High, that there is none other than the Master of the World; and once I reached that conclusion - "I called upon Your Name, Hashem, from the lowest pit," I have no recourse other than to pray to the One Who issued the decree, to Hashem, blessed be He.
From the Bottom - Only Upward
The Lechem Dim'ah offers another explanation of the verse, "I called upon Your Name, Hashem, from the lowest pit": It is well known that there is a rock-bottom state where, once a person reaches it - the absolute bottom - there is nowhere left to fall, and from that point the wheel must inevitably turn.
There is a famous story about this, which has been told at length: A man who was a tremendous tycoon owned half the country. One day, his assistant saw him sitting and weeping. The assistant asked him what had happened, but he refused to explain. Years passed, and the business deteriorated into bankruptcy, until he became not just bankrupt, but a beggar extending his hand for alms. Today people do not worry about this as much, as people keep sufficient funds tucked away in Switzerland and elsewhere, but in earlier times - the wheel would turn, and one could reach the shame of literal starvation. The man reached a point where he had nothing left except the clothes on his back, and his assistant still remained by his side.
One day, having nowhere even to sleep or bathe, he took off his clothes and stepped into a river to wash. When he finished and was about to get out - his clothes were gone; someone had stolen even those. "For it is his only covering, it is his cloak for his skin; in what shall he sleep?" He looked for a tree, climbed up, sat among the leaves - and began to laugh. He laughed and rejoiced in high spirits. His assistant thought: Surely the man has lost his mind completely; severe hardship can undermine a person's mental stability; I have no other explanation, what could possibly be so funny? Through Hashem's kindness, people passed by, they asked for a favor, brought him clothes, he dressed, and slowly but surely he returned to work and eventually regained his former standing.
One day, in a moment of candor, the assistant asked him: "I must understand - why was it that back then, when you were in the most ideal situation, you sat and wept, yet when you reached the most dreadful state, you laughed?" He answered: "I will explain it to you; it is simple. When I reached the pinnacle of success, I realized I was at the very top of the wheel of fortune. From there, there was nowhere left to climb, only down - and so I sat and wept, thinking, who knows how far down this will lead me? And indeed, the downfall followed. But when you saw me sitting in the tree laughing, I said to myself: It cannot get any lower than this. Can a person be left with even less than his clothes - what else could happen, will they flay his skin? Not only did I have no money, I did not even have clothes. That was when I began to laugh, because I told myself: This is it, the wheel has reached its absolute lowest point, and from here one can only climb and rise. That is why you saw me so joyful."
This is what the Lechem Dim'ah is hinting to us here: Concerning the Jewish people in their lowliness, the verse says, "and they shall go up from the land" - they are on the ground, so from here one can only ascend and advance upward. And this is the meaning of "I called upon Your Name, Hashem, from the lowest pit": Since I have reached the lowest depth, the lowest level, descent after descent - only then do I call upon Your Name, Hashem, because I realize that from here one can only advance upward.
קוֹלִי שָׁמָעְתָּ אַל תַּעְלֵם אׇזְנְךָ לְרַוְחָתִי לְשַׁוְעָתִי׃ - You have heard my voice; do not hide Your ear from my relief, from my cry.
And following this comes the next verse: "You have heard my voice; do not hide Your ear from my relief, from my cry." Since from such a state one can only rise, it is clear to me that from here on, the Holy One, blessed be He, will not turn a deaf ear, but will bring me relief and listen to the sound of my cry.
In summary:
These verses depict the full depth of the entrapment and the fall: "They have hunted me down like a bird" - the enemies hunted us with seeds of temptation and flattering speech, from the descent to Egypt to "Arbeit macht frei," and from the Emancipation over which the Chatam Sofer wept to the honey-trap of a comfortable exile. "They silenced my life in the pit" and "Waters flowed over my head" - a pit from which there is no escape, yet the author of the lamentation survived nonetheless, because he bowed his head before every wave, said "I am cut off," and accepted the Heavenly decree with love. And from that very recognition, salvation sprouted: If everything is a Heavenly decree, there is no other address - "I called upon Your Name, Hashem, from the lowest pit." This is the key to redemption: When all worldly ideologies collapse and it becomes clear that we have no one to rely on except our Father in Heaven, a person reaches the absolute bottom from which he can only rise, and he is assured: "You have heard my voice; do not hide Your ear from my relief, from my cry."