In this part of Chapter 127, we continue exploring the foundational principle established in the opening verses: human effort is not what produces results. "Unless Hashem builds a house" - its builders labor in vain, and rising early and staying up late do not add anything to a person's livelihood beyond what has been decreed for him. Now King David adds: children as well - their birth and their upbringing - are a gift from Hashem, and human effort will not avail regarding them either unless it has been decreed from Above. Along the way, we will learn what constitutes a worthy child, and how to raise children and disciples toward their true purpose.
הִנֵּה נַחֲלַת ה' בָּנִים, שָׂכָר פְּרִי הַבָּטֶן. - Behold, children are a heritage of Hashem; the fruit of the womb is a reward.
Rashi explains that Hashem's heritage to that person is children, referring to disciples, for a person raises students who are considered like children to him. "The fruit of the womb is a reward" - this refers to the reward for the fruit of Torah kept in the heart, as it is said, "For it is pleasant if you keep them within your innermost being [literally, your belly]." That is to say, this is not speaking of the physical womb, but of the Torah guarded deep inside a person.
Radak explains according to the plain meaning: King David says, I see that children are a heritage of Hashem - the goodness that the Holy One, Blessed be He, gives to His beloved in this world is children, and this is his heritage. And I too have a good heritage in my son Shlomo. "The fruit of the womb is a reward" - the reward that Hashem gives a person in this world for his good deeds is children; this is his heritage, this is the fruit of his womb, this is the reward for the good deeds he has performed.
Metzudat David connects this verse to what preceded it: Why do you wake up early and sit up late? After all, what will you do with all this wealth? The truth is that most people do not enjoy the lion's share of the assets they accumulate in this world; instead, they leave inheritances - the house, the business, the property - to the children who succeed them. Yet children themselves are Hashem's heritage, which He gives to whomever is upright in His eyes. If so, what will all your toil avail if Hashem does not desire to give you children to whom you can bequeath your assets? What will come of all your investment if someone else inherits it? It turns out that a person must do the will of Hashem in order to merit that very heritage.
The Malbim explains: After clarifying that human effort is of no avail - whether you go to sleep late, wake up early, or exert yourself beyond measure, you will not earn a penny more than what has been designated for you - David adds: Know that both the birth of children and their upbringing are a gift of Hashem. "Children are a heritage of Hashem" - these are mature, grown sons. "The fruit of the womb" - these are young children, who are still like small fruit, and they are God's reward to one who finds favor before Him.
The core concept is this: When a person performs an action or completes a task, he is given wages and compensation for it. But when someone loves another and is close to him, he gives him an inheritance, a heritage. A father bequeaths a heritage to his children because they are close to him and beloved to him, whereas to his workers he gives wages. A hired worker receives wages; a beloved relative receives an inheritance. So too here: In return for merits and mitzvot, the reward is "the fruit of the womb" - that his wife will not be barren. But when a person is closer to Hashem, the Holy One, Blessed be He, gives him an enduring, eternal heritage for generations upon generations: grown children who will establish generations of heritage, who will serve as a continuation, who will embody "Israel, in whom I will be glorified." This is the greatest reward for one who walks in close cleaving to Hashem.
And having mentioned Rav Gershon: Anyone who attended the funeral knows that some people complained about its length. But why did it take so long? Because it was impossible not to accord honor to people. One son-in-law is a rosh yeshivah here, another son-in-law is a rosh yeshivah there, here is a prominent rav, here is his brother, an accomplished talmid chacham, and here are his sons - each of them an exceptional Torah giant. A man passes away at the age of one hundred; these are not seventeen-year-old boys. Each of them is great and formidable in his own right. A son who comes to eulogize his father - shouldn't he be given ten minutes? Shouldn't he be given fifteen minutes? And aside from the roshei yeshivah, Rav Baruch Mordechai arrived - won't he speak? Rav Dov Lando - won't he speak? A situation arose where, Baruch Hashem, they were all like olive shoots: each one receives his ten minutes, plus another ten minutes just to make his way through the massive crowds to reach the podium. In short, the funeral took several hours.
But one must understand what an extraordinary merit it is when a person is privileged to have all his children be Talmidei Chachamim, all of them Gedolei Torah, and all his sons-in-law seated along the prestigious eastern wall. This is precisely the meaning of the verse: the closer a person is to Hashem, the more he merits an enduring heritage. The Holy One, blessed be He, does not merely grant him "the fruit of the womb," which is like a temporary wage, but an enduring heritage - illustrious sons who establish generations as a lasting inheritance.
כְּחִצִּים בְּיַד גִּבּוֹר, כֵּן בְּנֵי הַנְּעוּרִים. - Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the children of one's youth.
Just as a warrior holds arrows in his hand to fight against enemies, so are the children of youth. Rashi explains that this refers to the disciples one raises in his youth. We typically understand "children of youth" as children in their youth, but Rashi explains that it refers to the "sons" (disciples) a person establishes while he himself is young. These explanations do not contradict one another, for the other interpretation is also true; rather, Rashi applies it to the students a person trained while he was still young.
The Radak explains what is meant by "like arrows in the hand of a warrior": Shlomo was born in David's old age, and the Holy One, blessed be He, designated him to be David's successor. Yet during David's lifetime, Shlomo could not be of help to him, for he was only twelve years old when his father passed away, and a twelve-year-old child cannot offer an older father substantial support. Practical help came specifically from the older sons, as Scripture states, "and David's sons were chief ministers (kohanim)" - was David from a priestly family? Rather, they served in high offices, each holding an esteemed position, and David's firstborn sons standing by the king were the first to assist him.
The Radak adds that all of them were righteous except for Avshalom and Adoniyah, who grew haughty because of their beauty and went astray. It is in his righteous sons that King David takes pride here. Indeed, every person ought to take pride in the worthy children he has, for this is a good portion that Hashem has granted him - not that he should think, "I accomplished something here on my own." "The children of youth" - children in their youth who help and support their parents are like arrows in the hand of a warrior; but specifically those born to a person in his own youth, for a son born in one's old age, like Shlomo, although he inherited the throne, was not able to be of aid and support to his father. But those a person fathered in his youth are already grown by the time he reaches mature adulthood, capable of assisting and supporting him.
The Malbim sets forth a condition here: How does one truly merit children who are an enduring heritage? Only if one raises them toward the desired purpose, which is Torah and the service of Hashem. This is the meaning of "like arrows in the hand of a warrior": a warrior does not shoot his arrows in vain; he does not fire aimlessly into the air. In modern terms: if you give an elite combat soldier a weapon and ammunition, he will not fire into the air - is this a wedding celebration? He shoots with precision at the target, especially knowing that if he squanders his ammunition, that very bullet might have saved his life in a moment of need.
So too, the righteous do not emit their seed in vain, but aim straight toward the true purpose and objective: to raise blessed offspring who fear Hashem and observe His commandments. This is a crucial point: the goal is not merely to raise a son to help out in the family business. If you are looking for hired hands, hired labor is far cheaper. A person must realize that the objective is to raise righteous children, a blessed seed that fears Hashem and keeps His mitzvos. Just as a warrior does not shoot his arrows in vain, so a person of stature does not bring children into the world without purpose, but with the aim that they become great, walk in the ways of Hashem, and fulfill His commandments.
The work Tehilos Maharit elucidates Rashi's interpretation - the disciples a master establishes in his youth - and explains why it specifies his youth. When an educator is young, he still possesses patience. By contrast, when an educator grows old, he has often run out of steam: he merely repeats what he taught in previous years, teaches out of weariness, lacks patience for the students, and when a student misbehaves he loses his temper, at times even speaking harshly. Heaven forbid this be taken as a sweeping generalization; it simply describes the natural burnout a person can experience. In such a state, he often falls short of the mission for which he was brought, failing to reach the objective.
But a young educator is like a new broom that sweeps clean. He arrives with full drive and enthusiasm, follows up on the students, tests them, assigns work and verifies that they completed it, and tracks their progress over time. He supervises their conduct properly. When he grows old, by contrast, it resembles arrows in the hand of someone who is not a mighty warrior. What makes the difference? What ensures that the arrow will strike the target and do so with force? The force of the draw on the bowstring. The harder one draws the string, the farther the arrow travels. But someone who is not a warrior draws it weakly, as though exhausted, and lets fly, so the arrow drops halfway. So it is in education: he begins educating the child but does not follow through properly - testing him, verifying that he truly learned, seeing what becomes of him later on - for he simply lacks the energy. Therefore, "like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the children of one's youth": the students a person raises in his youth are true disciples, because at that time he had all the strength to oversee them and ensure they fulfilled their potential properly.
אַשְׁרֵי הַגֶּבֶר אֲשֶׁר מִלֵּא אֶת אַשְׁפָּתוֹ מֵהֶם, לֹא יֵבֹשׁוּ כִּי יְדַבְּרוּ אֶת אוֹיְבִים בַּשָּׁעַר. - Happy is the man who has filled his quiver with them; they shall not be put to shame when they speak with enemies at the gate.
Rashi explains: Happy is the man who has filled his quiver with those arrows - the "ashpa" is the quiver for arrows. "They shall not be put to shame when they speak with enemies at the gate" - these are talmidei chachamim who debate each other vigorously in Halachah and appear as enemies to one another. And the "gate" is always the seat of the beit din, the place of the sages who sat at the gate. The verse is thus speaking of a talmid chacham who contends with his peers in Halachah, appearing like enemies.
Once, a visiting delegation was brought to the Mir Yeshivah - the largest yeshivah in the world. People know the Mir space station, and suddenly they discover there is also a Mir Yeshivah. They walked in and asked: Why are they fighting so much? What is all this arguing about? One is shouting from here, and another is shouting from there! After all, visitors are used to a library. Anyone who has ever been in a library knows that if your phone rings, you feel like burying yourself on the spot, as three hundred pairs of eyes glare at you as if you were about to destroy the country - you disturbed the concentration of the readers and researchers. That is a library. But in the beit midrash - "they speak with enemies at the gate", one appears as an enemy, passionately debating the other.
And what happens when they do not debate? It is told that Rav Yisrael Salanter was informed of a "Torat HaMussar" kollel - a kollel inspired by his teachings, where they worked extensively on the study of mussar, interpersonal derech eretz, proper conduct, and mutual respect. They invited him to come and see a kollel run according to his principles. He arrived and observed that one person presented his argument while the other remained completely silent until he finished, and then asked, "Has the honored sir finished?" "Yes." "May I also be permitted to express my opinion?" "Please do." Everything proceeded with utmost mutual deference. They asked him, "What does the Rav say about this kollel?" He replied, "Gentlemen, mussar I saw, but Torah I did not see."
Torah was given through fire, and it must be engaged in with fervor. When a person studies as if half-asleep, tired, delivering sterile legal arguments - that is not Torah. Sit and learn with passion and enthusiasm! There were gedolim who, while delivering a shiur, would become upset with their students: Why does this not pain you? There is a serious difficulty here, it should hurt! Yet the student simply replies, "Right, right, it needs to be understood," and goes on his way, as if it does not affect him. Torah must matter to you deeply. There were gedolim for whom hearing a crooked piece of reasoning was the most terrible thing imaginable, and they would battle and cry out: How could one say such a thing?! You have to care, and the Torah must permeate every one of your 248 limbs and 365 sinews.
Therefore, "they shall not be put to shame when they speak with enemies at the gate" - at the gate they may look like bitter enemies, but this is the battle of Torah. And as the verse says, "Et vahev besufah" - interpreted by Chazal to mean that in the end (be-sofah) there is love (ahavah). The clash between them is not a personal quarrel, nor is it about who gets the last word or who is right; it is about what the truth is here, what the simple meaning of the sugya is, and what Hashem intended by this statement. If so, they ultimately part in great love.
Radak, continuing his parable of the arrows, explains: "Happy is the man who has filled his quiver with them" - who has filled the receptacle holding the arrows. "They shall not be put to shame" - referring to the father and the sons. When they speak at the gate before the elders, they can converse with them without shame or intimidation. Why? Because the father raised them in Torah, raising them to become talmidei chachamim skilled in the battle of Torah. Thus, when the son comes forward with an argument or a difficulty, he is not embarrassed, and he presents his question without fear.
Until this point, Radak explained the chapter according to one approach, but at the beginning he noted that the entire chapter can also be interpreted as referring to Melech HaMashiach. "Unless the Lord builds a house" - the house is the Beit HaMikdash; "unless the Lord watches over a city" - the city is Jerusalem. From the day the Temple was destroyed and Israel went into exile, Jerusalem was laid waste, alternately rebuilt and destroyed again. Radak presents a historical overview: it fell into the hands of Edom and the hands of Ishmael, and over all the years they waged war over it, these rebuilding it and those destroying it, because the building and guarding of it was not the will of Hashem, blessed be He - and therefore in vain did the builders labor, and in vain did the watchmen keep vigil.
"It is vain for you who rise up early" - this refers to Edom, who conquered Jerusalem first. "Who sit up late" - these are the Ishmaelites who came later, provoked the Christians and took it from their hand, and the others took it back from them, and all their days there is war between them, and so it will be until the redeemer comes. And all of them are "those who eat the bread of sorrows" - toiling and laboring with great anguish. But "so He gives His beloved sleep" - His beloved is the King Messiah, to whom Hashem will give Jerusalem without toil, bringing down the Beit HaMikdash already built in fire. And those who toiled over it will not dwell in it, nor will it remain theirs. And what follows is already the words of David, as Radak explained earlier.
Radak brings a third explanation, which applies to all people in the world as a general lesson. "Building the house" here refers to the endurance of the monarchy, and not necessarily the dynasty of David, as it says, "Hashem will make you a house," which means a dynasty. If Hashem does not build the kingdom, the king cannot establish a kingdom for himself; "the kingdom will be established for you and for your children after you" only if it is the will of Hashem. And the same applies to guarding the city against the dread of enemies: no matter how many watchmen you post, if Hashem does not watch over the city, it will have no protection.
Afterward, Radak speaks of those who occupy themselves with worldly affairs and pursue wealth: rising early for work and staying late until the sun sets, sitting in their shops to sell their merchandise. All of this effort, if Hashem does not assist in it, is entirely in vain. But one with whom the Blessed God is pleased and whom He loves, He will give him wealth without toil and without labor, as if he were asleep. Whomever Hashem favors, He grants him the kingdom; whomever Hashem favors, He guards his city. That is to say: in every single matter, everything depends on the will of Hashem. And subsequently he also mentions the matter of children: whomever Hashem favors, He gives him children, and whomever Hashem does not favor, He does not give him children.
The matter of children is one of the clearest examples where one distinctly sees the will of God. Today there are many medical treatments, yet there are situations where the doctors themselves say: we see no problem whatsoever - yet there is no pregnancy. In other words, ultimately this remains entirely from Hashem: if Hashem wills it, it will be, and if He does not will it, it will not be. And at times there is secondary infertility: a couple had two children, and then for twenty years they cannot have more, and there is no medical explanation. Here one sees in the clearest manner that "children are a heritage of Hashem" - an inheritance from Him and a reward from Him. And what are His calculations? Hashem knows.
And do not say: I will ask for a blessing from a tzaddik. For there were tzaddikim who were not privileged to have children - the Chazon Ish had no children, Rav Mordechai Sharabi, of blessed memory, had no children, and other great leaders and tzaddikim throughout history did not have children. There is no magic formula; rather, one must know that everything comes from Him, blessed be He. Everything might be well and completely normal, yet ultimately it is solely from Hashem. This does not deny the tremendous advancements in fertility medicine today - there certainly are - but can one say that this is in our hands? Clearly not.
And the same is true of rain. No one can decree that clouds should come here and bring down rain. At times people have succeeded in some measure - cloud seeding with silver iodide to induce rain - they did this once, and rain fell in Jordan. Can a person determine where the clouds will travel and exactly when they will pour their rain? And rain is a symbol of livelihood: the Gemara relates regarding several Sages that when rain fell, one would say, "Today there is livelihood," and go out to work, and if it did not rain, he would not. Livelihood also has no precise formulas: how many people work in the very same profession, yet one makes a fortune while the other loses his shirt? In every line of work in the world there are earners and losers, there are those who succeed and businesses that close down, in every single field. And what do you learn from this? That everything is in the hand of Hashem - whether Hashem guards a house, whether Hashem guards a city, whether Hashem builds a house, whether Hashem gives children - everything is from Him, blessed be He.
A person who recognizes this first of all attains peace of mind: why should I strain excessively? The will of Hashem will be done. All I need to do is make the necessary effort, and turn to the One to Whom children belong, to Whom wealth belongs, to Whom protection belongs - to turn to Him and place trust in Him, blessed be He, and through this he will see success. But when a person trusts in himself, or trusts in someone other than Him, blessed be He, the author of Chovot HaLevavot says that Hashem leaves him in the hands of the one in whom he placed his trust: you trust him - turn to him; you rely on him - let him help you. As it were, the Holy One, Blessed be He, says: you rely on him, must I take responsibility? "Let them rise up and help you, let them be your shelter" - turn to him so that he may shelter you and help you.
The Malbim explains: what purpose do arrows serve filling the quiver if one cannot shoot them at the target? And this reinforces what he explained in the previous verse - just as a warrior does not shoot his arrows in vain but aims at the target and shoots there, so tzaddikim do not sow their seed in vain, but rather raise offspring blessed of Hashem, God-fearing children who spread His blessed Name in the world. "Happy is the man who has filled his quiver with them" - happy is he whose children are truly devoted to Hashem, and not, God forbid, going toward the Sitra Achra, toward corruption, or toward any sin and transgression.
On the words "they shall speak with enemies in the gate," the Malbim offers a novel explanation: yedabru is related to dever (pestilence/death) - they will subdue the enemies and kill them in battle, as in "those who turn back the battle at the gate" (Yeshayahu 28:6), which is an expression of death. It may be related to the Hebrew word used today for pest control: hadbarah, to eradicate. The verse "He subdues peoples under us" (yadber amim tachteinu, Tehillim 47:4) simply means leading or guiding, but according to the Malbim, it is very possible that there too it means to subdue and subjugate, like the term dever, to put to death. In any case, the Malbim concludes that this does not refer to an actual physical war with enemies, but rather to the "war of Torah" - where scholars initially become like enemies to one another during vigorous debate, and ultimately become beloved friends.
Regarding the first foundation in the verse, one can add another insight: often, arguments arise between regular synagogue congregants where a kollel is housed and the kollel students. Why? Because the kollel students are there all day, leave cups around, and sometimes a bit spills and the table becomes sticky. The beit midrash is a kollel student's second home; he is there all the time, and a home is not always spotless. Then the baalei batim arrive for Minchah at five o'clock and begin complaining: "Look how dirty it is here, no one cares, look at the trash left around." The answer to this is: quite the opposite, you should rejoice that this place is a home of Torah! "They shall not be ashamed when they speak with enemies in the gate" - they argue with the kollel student as if confronting an enemy.
The Maharsha in Kiddushin (30b) explains: there are homeowners who prevent boys from studying in their homes. In their time, there were no boarding schools; rather, a melamed (teacher) would be brought into a homeowner's house, taking several children and teaching them. A wealthy person would hire a private tutor for his son, while one who could not afford it on his own would join with several other children, and the tutor would teach them in a designated room. Sometimes, however, homeowners were unwilling to host the study, because the children made a mess and accumulated trash - one tosses something here, a wrapper there, sand is tracked in, and all sorts of cleanliness complaints arise.
Concerning this, the Psalmist says: "Happy is the man who has filled his quiver [ashpato] with them" - happy is the man who has filled his house with this kind of trash [ashpah]! Torah study, children, a bit of mess - happy are you that Torah is being learned in your home. Even though there is a mess, and even though one must exert effort afterward to tidy up, this is trash that is wonderful to fill one's house with. There are synagogues in north Tel Aviv that are immaculate, and even own shares on the stock exchange - and this is no joke. But the synagogue is a monument: immaculate, but a monument. What does the Master of the Universe gain from it? By contrast, a place about which you might say, "It is not clean here" - happy is the man who has filled his quiver/refuse with them!
This does not mean that one should neglect the cleanliness of the beit midrash - of course one must maintain it. Rather, a place where people are constantly present inevitably brings about some mess, and things will inevitably not always be tidy. Do not speak with the learners as one speaks with enemies in the gate; instead, rejoice that you have a place where Torah is studied and that it is active throughout the week - that is truly a great merit.
The psalm teaches us that everything - home, city, livelihood, and children - comes from Him, blessed be He. "Behold, children are an inheritance from Hashem": for mitzvot, a person receives the reward of the "fruit of the womb," and whoever is close to Hashem, blessed be He, merits an enduring inheritance - great sons who build generations. And this inheritance is acquired through toil: to be "like arrows in the hand of a mighty warrior," not shooting aimlessly, but aiming one's children and students toward the ultimate purpose - a blessed seed of those who fear Hashem and observe His commandments, watching over them with all one's might. Then, "they shall not be ashamed when they speak with enemies in the gate" - they will stand in the war of Torah with fire and fervor, where "love is at its end" (es vahev besufah). And happy is the man who has filled his quiver with them, and whose home and beit midrash are filled with the sound of Torah learners.
And with this, we conclude Psalm 127 in Tehillim.