We continue in Chapter 119, in the stanza of the letter Reish, focusing on three verses: "I saw the treacherous and quarreled," "See that I love Your precepts," and "The beginning of Your word is truth." These three verses are interrelated: zealousness for the word of Hashem in the face of the treacherous, the plea that the Holy One, blessed be He, repay this with lovingkindness, and the great foundation that all words of the Torah are truth from beginning to end.
רָאִיתִי בֹגְדִים וָאֶתְקוֹטָטָה אֲשֶׁר אִמְרָתְךָ לֹא שָׁמָרוּ׃ (קיט, קנח) - I saw the treacherous and quarreled, because they did not keep Your word.
What is the meaning of va'etkotatah ("and I quarreled")? The Radak explains it simply, from the language of ketatah (strife or quarrel). And where do we find such a root in Tanach? In the verse recited once a week: "For forty years akut bedor (I quarreled with a generation)" - akut denotes quarreling, I contended with the generation. It is likewise very common in the language of Chazal: ketatah u'merivah (strife and dispute).
Thus, David HaMelech says: I would quarrel with the treacherous. Over what? Not over petty disputes, and not even over the harm they caused me - which is certainly not trivial and they deserved rebuke for it, yet that was not what I fought with them about. I disputed with them over one thing alone: "because they did not keep Your word" - why do you not keep the commandments of Hashem?
The Radak brings an additional explanation in the name of his father: va'etkotatah is like "naktah nafshi bechayai" (my soul loathes my life), in the sense of "I am weary of my life." That is to say, when I saw the treacherous, I was disgusted with my life on account of the abundance of their evil deeds.
The Malbim establishes that the central point here is amrot (words or sayings): I saw the treacherous and would quarrel with them for failing to keep Your word. And this is also the reason for what was said in the preceding verse, "Many are my persecutors and adversaries" - because I did not turn away from Your testimonies, and I would see treacherous people and quarrel with them, and therefore they persecute me.
רְאֵה כִּי־פִקּוּדֶיךָ אָהָבְתִּי יְהֹוָה כְּחַסְדְּךָ חַיֵּנִי׃ (קיט, קנט) - See that I love Your precepts, Hashem; according to Your lovingkindness, give me life.
The Radak explains that this is a direct continuation of the previous verse: See how much I have loved Your precepts, to the point that I go and contend with the wicked when they do not keep Your commandments. And this entire dispute is for Your sake. Therefore, "according to Your lovingkindness, give me life" - perform an act of lovingkindness with me and preserve my life, and do not deliver me into their hands.
The Metzudat David explains: "I love Your precepts" - I desire to fulfill Your commandments, and even though I do not merit to fulfill all of them, I certainly have love for them and a desire and aspiration to fulfill them. This is a wonderful explanation: If I am fulfilling the commandments, why do I need lovingkindness here? Rather, there are commandments that I loved but did not merit to fulfill - and for that I already need lovingkindness. What lovingkindness? That the Holy One, blessed be He, joins a good intention to action. The very fact that I wanted to perform Your commandments is reckoned to me as if I fulfilled them. Master of the Universe, perform an act of lovingkindness with me and give me life for the very fact that I loved Your precepts and aspired to fulfill them all, even if I did not merit to achieve it.
The Malbim explains that this verse focuses on the concept of pikudim (precepts): See how much I love Your precepts, to the extent that I go and quarrel with those who transgress them. Consequently - "preserve me according to Your lovingkindness." Until now he asked, "preserve me according to Your justice," but here he asks that Hashem preserve his life with lovingkindness, for "with the pious You act piously." Why do I deserve chesed? Because when I go to contend with the wicked, I risk my life for the sanctification of Hashem's Name, and that is an act of piety (chassidut). I am not obligated to go and argue with the wicked to make them fulfill Your commandments; rather, I act beyond the letter of the law out of piety. As the Gemara relates regarding Rav Yehudah, who sacrificed himself for the sanctification of Hashem's Name, and anyone who performed an act involving self-sacrifice for the sanctification of Hashem's Name was called a chassida (a pious person). And the Holy One, blessed be He, acts measure for measure: If I act with piety and do what I am not strictly obligated to do, then You too, Master of the Universe, act with me in the manner of chesed and grant me life.
In the sefer Zeh HaSha'ar, a homiletic allusion is brought. Rashi, on the verse, "all the illnesses that I placed upon Egypt I will not place upon you, for I am Hashem, your Healer," explains: He teaches you Torah and mitzvot so that you may be saved from them, like a doctor who tells a person, "Do not eat things that will bring you back to illness." This is quite novel: we might have understood "your Healer" to mean that I heal you when sick; Rashi comes and says that the healing itself is the study of the Torah and mitzvot. Just as a physician warns a patient against what might harm him, so the Torah guides a person straight, and through it, he will not come to illness.
And where is it alluded to that "your Healer" refers to Torah and mitzvot? Right here in our verse: "Re'eh ki fikudecha ahavti" ("See how I love Your precepts") forms the acronym of Rof'echa (your Healer). How is "I am Hashem, your Healer" realized? Through my love for Your commandments and my fulfillment of them - that is the healing.
רֹאשׁ־דְּבָרְךָ אֱמֶת וּלְעוֹלָם כָּל־מִשְׁפַּט צִדְקֶךָ׃ (קיט, קס) - The beginning of Your word is truth, and every one of Your righteous judgments endures forever. (119:160)
Rashi cites a Midrashic exposition: The conclusion of Your word proved that the beginning was truth. When the nations heard "I am [Hashem your God]," "You shall have no other gods," and "You shall not take [the Name in vain]," they said, "It is all for His own benefit and honor." Once they heard "Honor [your father and mother]," "Do not murder," and "Do not commit adultery," they conceded that the beginning of Your word is truth. Initially, they thought that the Holy One, blessed be He, came merely to demand His own honor, and they spoke disparagingly. But when they saw that He also commands, "Honor your father and your mother," "Do not murder," and "Do not commit adultery" - meaning that He does not speak only of Himself, but commands us to respect others and protect their lives - they conceded that even "I am" and "You shall have no other gods" were given for our benefit. For if He sought only His own honor, why would He command interpersonal mitzvot?
The author of Tehilot Maharitz asks: What does honoring one's parents have to do with proving that the Torah is true? On a simple level, one could say: A megalomaniac who seeks totalitarian rule cannot tolerate anyone beside him being great, so he demeans everyone else. Yet here, the Holy One, blessed be He, says: Honor Me, but honor your father as well. He bestows honor upon others, and Hashem even equated the honor of Torah scholars to His own honor. From this it is clear that He does not demand honor for Himself.
But the author of Tehilot Maharitz offers a wonderful explanation, which is particularly relevant to the days leading up to Pesach. How do we know that Hashem is true and His Torah is true? From two events: the Exodus from Egypt and the Giving of the Torah. The Exodus alone is not complete proof - even though many foundations of faith were acquired there - for the Rambam writes that miracles might be performed through illusion or sorcery. The Giving of the Torah, on the other hand: our own eyes saw and not a stranger's, our own ears heard and not another's.
Yet one difficulty remains: both the Exodus from Egypt and the Giving of the Torah took place long ago. They saw it - but how does that reach us? The answer is: through our fathers who told us. This is precisely what we do on the Seder night - a relay race: the father passes the torch to his son, and the son to his son, and so on until our own generation.
And who says that what he relates is true? On this, the Ramban establishes a fundamental principle: Fathers do not transmit falsehood to their children. It defies all reason that an entire generation of fathers would conspire to lie to their own children. When a father tells his son, "We were in Egypt, and Hashem redeemed us with signs and wonders," the son knows it is the truth. If he asks, "Father, how do you know? You were not there yourself!" the father replies, "My father told me, and if my father told me, it is certainly true."
Understand this well: such a story cannot be planted into history. It is impossible to decide in the middle of history, "Let us tell the children that there was an Exodus from Egypt and that all of us stood at the foot of Mount Sinai." If such a thing could be fabricated, Christianity and Islam would have fabricated such stories and planted them retroactively. Yet they all tell only of revelations to single individuals: Muhammad, who according to their claims met with the angel Gabriel and received updates to the Torah - although reason dictates otherwise, and scholars also note that he suffered from epilepsy, interpreting his convulsions as experiences of prophecy. Incidentally, they call him a prophet when he never uttered a single prophecy; bring forward one prophecy that he spoke, one future event that he foretold! Not for nothing did the Rambam refer to him as "the madman", particularly in light of the promises he made to his flock. Christianity, too, does not speak of events that occurred before the eyes of the masses: he produced bread and gave people to eat - how many were there? Ten or twelve people, even according to their own accounts. He walked on water - even by their version, only a handful of individuals witnessed it. Why not claim that six hundred thousand saw it? Because one cannot retroactively plant stories into history: if my father did not tell me, and his father did not tell him, how can you suddenly invent that this happened in the past?
If so, the truth of the Torah reaches us through what our fathers told us, and fathers do not pass down falsehood to their children. For this reason, the Torah designates the Seder night specifically for transmitting this message. In light of this, see how wonderful this is: had the Holy One, blessed be He, not commanded us to listen to parents, what would a person say about his father? He is old, "old fashioned", his memory is no longer what it used to be - and we would begin to dismiss him. But because the Torah commanded, "Honor your father and your mother", I understand that there is a message from my father and I must listen to him. It turns out that "Honor your father and your mother" specifically provides proof for the opening commandments - for "I am Hashem your God" and "You shall have no other gods" - that everything is truth, since we received all of this from our father and our mother, who tell us what took place there.
Incidentally, the nations always had to provide explanations. Today we live in a hedonistic generation, but seven hundred years ago, what did kings do in their leisure time? They brought scholars of different religions to debate before them. Today, who is interested in philosophical inquiry? Today people ask how much money you make and how successful you are. But in their day, people were genuine seekers of truth. The story of the King of the Khazars is a true historical account of a king seeking to know the truth. Therefore, when people came and presented the Torah to him, he had to grapple with it and raise counterarguments, and that is the source of the arguments we find recorded.
Radak explains: "The beginning of Your word is truth" - throughout all the days of this world, Your word and Your judgment are truth and righteousness, from beginning to end. It is not true merely at a certain stage; rather, everything You commanded Your people is absolute truth, and "all Your righteous judgment is forever" - they are eternal, unlike the claims of the misguided Christians who argue that these were commandments of the past that are no longer relevant.
Radak further explains: just as You commanded us initially to understand Your oneness - "I am Hashem your God; you shall have no other gods before Me" - so too must we forever observe all Your righteous judgments, for all of them serve as a ladder by which to attain the knowledge of You and Your oneness.
The Malbim establishes that the central focus here is "judgments" (mishpatim), distinguishing between the core foundations of the Torah and the principles derived through human intellect. When a person seeks to uncover the truth on his own, he must examine both sides: if he investigates the existence of God, he must begin with the question of whether the universe has a Creator or not; if he investigates the creation of the world, he must begin with the question of whether the world was created ex nihilo or has existed eternally, as the ancients held. Only by thoroughly analyzing both sides can he arrive at a conclusion.
However, regarding the cornerstones and foundations that God set down in His Torah, He presented only the side of truth. In the Torah, there are no two sides: "In the beginning, God created" - period. The Torah speaks in definitive facts; it does not approach the matter like an investigator who must weigh opposing sides, but goes straight to the truth. This is the meaning of "The beginning of Your word is truth" - right from its very opening, the Torah takes hold of the truth. Who investigates? One who does not know, one who is faced with two possibilities. The Torah has no two sides; it possesses clear knowledge of Who created the world and how reality unfolded, and everything within it is absolute certainty.
A story is told of a young boy who sat at his father's keyboard and pressed the very same key repeatedly for fifteen minutes: plink, plink, plink. His father said to him: "Enough, add some variety! Don't you see how people play music?" The boy replied: "Father, they are still searching - I have already found it."
The Midrash states: "In the beginning God created" (בְּרֵאשִׁית בָּרָא אֱלֹקִים) - the final letters of these three words spell out "emet" (truth). This is "The beginning of Your word is truth" - the very beginning of the Torah is truth. As explained, the Torah goes directly to the truth without needing to explore alternative options, for it is truth itself.
However, two difficulties arise here. First, if Scripture sought to hint that "the beginning of Your word is truth," why was truth not hinted at in the initial letters? Why does the Torah open with Bet, Bet, Alef (in Bereishit bara Elokim) rather than the letters Alef, Mem, Tav? Second, even if it is in the final letters, why are they not in order? After all, the final letters spell Tav, Alef, Mem (in bereishit bara Elokim), rather than Alef, Mem, Tav.
The answer is: truth is discovered only at the end. Anyone who reads Megillat Esther at its beginning sees complete chaos and even injustice; but when one reaches the end of the story, one suddenly sees how everything falls into place. So it is with the Holy One, blessed be He: "The beginning of Your word is truth" - but you will merit to see this only at the end. And this is the answer Hashem gave Moshe regarding why the righteous suffer and the wicked prosper: "And you shall see My back, but My face shall not be seen" - the face, the beginning of the matter, you cannot see; but the back, after the matter concludes, you will see. And sometimes the end is not now, but after one hundred and twenty years, or in the ultimate perfection of the world under the sovereignty of the Almighty, and then you will understand how everything was for the best.
Therefore, the letters are also scrambled and out of order, to teach you that the truth does not appear clear and lucid in this world. Everyone is convinced that the truth is in their hands, everyone screams that truth is with them - one screams democracy and another screams something else. The truth appears jumbled, but know that in the end it will become clear, and everything will be understandable and transparent: who is the Creator of the world, what the master plan was throughout the reality we experienced, and why all of this suffering was necessary.
The Malbim concludes with the category of mishpatim (rational laws) - the part understood through intellect, as distinguished from chukim (statutes) that transcend human logic: "And every law of Your righteousness endures forever." Divine laws are righteousness, and the emphasis is on "forever." Check any country to see how frequently the law changes. Yet with the Holy One, blessed be He, Divine law has not changed since the creation of the world; not a single letter has changed in the holy Torah. When you hold truth in your hand, you do not constantly need to seek replacements and updates; truth is absolute, and there is no need to correct or alter it. Among the nations, laws constantly change, because a law that once fit is no longer suitable today - since the human legislator could not foresee the future. But the Creator of the world proclaims the generations from the beginning, and therefore He alone can legislate laws that will remain valid forever.
The Chida adds a hint: if in "Bereishit bara Elokim" we found the final letters of emet (truth), notice that in our verse, "Rosh devarecha emet," the final letters are Shin, Chaf, Tav - spelling Tashach, which has the numerical value (gematria) of 720. And this connects to the calculation we mentioned: the word Bereishit contains six letters, and its number of permutations is 720 (which is six times one hundred and twenty). Chazal explain that "the beginning of Your word" refers to the word Bereishit, the opening of the Torah - and here the final letters of "Rosh devarecha emet" equal the exact number of permutations of the word Bereishit. It is pure genius to discover such an insight and the profound connection between these concepts.
In these three verses we learned: "I saw traitors and quarreled" - strife solely for the sake of Heaven, not over personal insult but because they did not keep Your word, which is why his pursuers were many. "See that I love Your precepts" - loving the mitzvot to the point of self-sacrifice and pious devotion, which gives rise to the plea, "Revive me according to Your kindness," and even for the very yearning to fulfill mitzvot that one was not able to perform, for a good intention is joined to an action; and as an allusion, the initial letters form "Rof'echa" ("Your healer"), teaching that the Torah and mitzvot are the ultimate cure. And "The beginning of Your word is truth" - the conclusion of Your word proved the beginning, for it is specifically the mitzvah of honoring parents that confirms the chain of tradition, since fathers do not bequeath falsehood to their children; the Torah does not merely investigate between two sides but grasps the truth from the outset; and although truth appears scrambled in this world - like the disordered final letters - ultimately it is clarified, and Divine law stands forever without change.