Balak

The sicha for parshas Balak is in Vol. XVIII of Likkutei Sichos.

In the end of Hilchos Melachim, where it talks about Melech HaMoshiach, the Rambam says anyone who does not believe in Moshiach, or is not anticipating his arrival, he denies not only the later prophets, but also the Torah and Moshe Rabbeinu, because the Torah testifies concerning Moshiach, as it says, and G-d will return your captives from the golus. Then the Rambam says in the parsha of Bilaam it talks about Moshiach, and there Bilaam prophesizes about two Moshiachs. The first Moshiach is David Hamelech, who saved the Jews from their enemies, and the final Moshiach, a descendant of David, will save the Jews in the end. In that prophecy, Bilaam says, “I see him but not now”, which is a reference to David, “I see him but he is not close” refers to Melech HaMoshiach. “A star will come forth from Yakov”, refers to David, and “there will arise a leader, a judge from the Jews,” refers to Melech HaMoshiach. “He will wipe out Moav,” is a reference to David, and also it is written that he will wipe out Bnei Sheis, refers to Moshiach.

We see that in the ways that David helped the people in the beginning, Moshiach, his descendant will help the people in the end. But since the Rambam is writing halachos and not stories, we have to understand why this lengthy quoting of posukim and the discussion of two Moshiachs. Why in the laws of Moshiach should there be a mention of two Moshiachs? And why do we need all these proofs from the Torah concerning the first Moshiach and the final Moshiach?

And if in fact we are going to talk about the first Moshiach and the final Moshiach, wouldn’t it be more appropriate to talk about the first Moshiach as Moshe Rabbeinu who first took the Jews out of golus, and then Melech HaMoshiach who will take the Jews out of golus the final time? David didn’t take Jews out of golus, so why is he mentioned as the first Moshiach? Also Rambam describes Moshiach as a novi almost as great as Moshe Rabbeinu. David is not described as a novi, nor does it apply to David. So again, Moshe Rabbeinu would be a more appropriate example of an early Moshiach more similar to the final Moshiach, Melech HaMoshiach.

The Rebbe explains that the point the Rambam is making is that the halacha concerning Moshiach, the mitzvah of believing in Moshiach, has many details. The Rambam is not trying to prove by these verses that Moshiach will in fact come. That it says in Torah, and it doesn’t need any further proofs. The Rambam is trying to prove what are the details, that al pi halacha we are supposed to believe and expect with the coming of Moshiach. Concerning this the Rambam says that Moshiach is a descendant of David Hamelech who will come to bring back the original glory of David and bring all the performance of mitzvahs back to the way they were in the beginning.

In other words the function of Moshiach and therefore the proof that he is Moshiach, is when he fulfills these requirements that he concludes what David Hamelech began, he re-establishes the house of David, and he makes it possible to fulfill all mitzvahs properly as they were meant to be. And that is why the Rambam says that it should not enter your mind that Melech HaMoshiach has to perform miracles and change things in the world, but rather the Torah and everything in the Torah is forever, and you don’t need to add to it or detract from it.

What does it say about Moshiach himself? That he is a devout student of Torah, he brings all Jews to study Torah, and to fulfill all the mitzvahs in which they had become weak, and then he fights G-d’s battle, which means he frees the Jews from interference from other nations, so that we are free to fulfill the mitzvahs.

We see from all of this that the Rambam’s main objective is to describe what Moshiach has to accomplish and what Moshiach’s role is in Torah and mitzvah and not that Moshiach will bring something new, something that wasn’t before, but rather Moshiach will bring the truth of Torah and the truth of all mitzvahs to their completion in actual performance. So it is in this vein that the Rambam brings the proofs and the texts that he quotes. How do we know that Moshiach will bring the completeness of Torah and mitzvahs, how do we know that he will bring back the original glory of David’s throne and all the mitzvahs will be performed again. This the Rambam says the Torah testifies to this.

It says that G-d will gather us in from the exile, and from this we know that there will be an ingathering of the dispersed Jews. This is the requirement in order to be able to fulfill all the mitzvahs properly. Jews have to be living in Israel for the glory of David to be replaced and to be able to do all the mitzvahs, so first G-d will gather in the exiles.

The Rambam goes on to say, that in the parsha of Bilaam, there is a prophecy concerning two Moshiachs, the first one who helped the Jews from their enemies, and the final one who will also help the Jews from their golus. He also says all of the details concerning the first Moshiach, which is David, and how the final Moshiach, Melech HaMoshiach, will complete them, beginning at the first stages of the coming of Moshiach and the establishment of Moshiach’s kingdom until the final completion of his kingdom. What David did when he established his kingdom firmly is similar to what Moshiach will do when he will become established, and what David accomplished in his early stages, Moshiach will do in his early stages, and that which was the conclusion and permanent establishment of David will also be the permanent establishment of Melech HaMoshiach.

So Moshiach brings us to the completeness of Torah when we get rid of the yoke of nations and Moshiach becomes the leader of the nations, and then we are able to study Torah and mitzvahs as they are meant to be, free to devote ourselves to the chochmah of Torah as the Rambam says, there will be no interruptions from the study of Torah.

The Rambam introduces all of this by saying, anyone who does not believe or anticipate his coming denies not only other prophets but even in Moshe and the Torah, because the Torah testifies concerning Moshiach. The Rebbe points out that the emunah in the coming of Moshiach is actually not a mitzvah. That is why the Rambam here doesn’t say everyone must believe in the coming of Moshiach. Instead he puts it in the negative, anyone who does not believe, is denying the Torah.

This is all various ways in which the Rambam is emphasizing how Moshiach is not a separate and new event, a change in the world or in the Torah but is in fact the completion of Torah, and therefore the belief in Moshiach is a general mitzvah, it is the belief in the perfection of Torah, in the perfect completeness of Torah which must eventually come. So it is not counted as one of the 613 mitzvahs and therefore is not stated as an obligation to believe in Moshiach but rather as a denial of Torah if one doesn’t believe in Moshiach.

The Rebbe points out, why is it so important in the laws of Moshiach to say not only other prophets he denies but he denies Moshe Rabbeinu and the Torah itself. What a person denies, whether he is an apikoris and to what degree he is an apikoris doesn’t really fit in the laws of Moshiach, it fits more in the laws of tshuva where the Rambam describes the various levels of apikorsis. What the Rambam is trying to do, the Rebbe says, is emphasize what the function of Melech HaMoshiach is, which is to bring the Torah and the mitzvahs to their completeness, or the Rebbe’s expression, shlemas haTorah, shlemas haEretz, and shlemas ham, the completeness of the Torah, the Land and the People.

So the completeness of Torah and mitzvahs was not revealed through the later prophets, but in fact is in the Torah and Moshe Rabbeinu’s words. The Torah itself assures us that there will be a completeness to the Torah, that the Torah will prevail, and in the end Torah will be everywhere. And that is why the Rambam concludes that these matters are explicitly stated in Torah, they include all the details that were added later through the prophets, and everything the prophets told us about Moshiach are themselves a statement of Torah and part of the completeness of Torah.

Then the Rambam brings that there is also a commandment concerning areh miklat, which he places in a separate paragraph, because here the Rambam is bringing not just another proof that the Torah predicts the coming of Moshiach, that there will be a time when the Torah will be complete and the mitzvahs will be complete, but that in fact in the areh miklat we find that there will be mitzvah that until now has not been fulfilled and only with the coming of Moshiach will that mitzvah also be fulfilled and only then will the Torah come to its true completeness.

According to this, we will understand why the Rambam says that it should not enter your mind that Moshiach has to do miracles or change something in the world or resurrect the dead or anything of this sort. By saying this, the Rambam confirms that it is not Moshiach’s function to perform miracles and change the world or nature, and therefore it is also not an indication of who is the true Moshiach, and he concludes by saying, what is important is that this Torah and its mitzvahs are forever and ever.

Since the function of Moshiach is the completeness of Torah and mitzvahs, if it should enter your mind that Moshiach has to do miracles and bring some change in the world, then it is a contradiction to the fact that this Torah and its commandments are forever, because you are saying that something has to change in order for the Torah to be. And since it is the function of Moshiach to complete the Torah and not to perform miracles, it is also understood by performing miracles it does not prove that this is Moshiach, just as by a novi, the test of a novi is that his prophecy, a true novi will predict what is going to happen in the world and his words will come true and then you will know that he is a true prophet.

And so it is with Moshiach, that although Moshiach is a great novi, greater than the other prophets, almost as great as Moshe in prophecy, yet his function is not that of a prophet, his function is that of a melech, Melech HaMoshiach, and therefore the proof, the validation of Moshiach is that he fulfills in himself the Torah completely, and that is why it says when there will arise a king, a devout student of Torah and then he brings others that they should also keep mitzvahs to their fullest, and then he fights G-d’s battles so that everyone is able to fulfill mitzvahs to their fullest, that is an indication that we can assume that he is Moshiach. And once this is accomplished, that Torah has reached its completeness, now that mitzvahs are being fulfilled and practiced in their completeness, then he is Moshiach for certain.

It could also be said that the proofs that the Rambam brings is not only for the general coming of Moshiach and a comparison to David, but it actually gets down to the details of what Moshiach is supposed to accomplish. That is why the Rambam brings the proofs from parshas Bilaam which talks about two Moshiachs because in these details we see how Moshiach develops and what he is supposed to accomplish. Generally it gets divided into three categories: statements about David and Moshiach themselves, their affect on the Jewish people, and their affect on the other nations, their kingdom affecting other nations and the world in general.

The first statement that Rambam makes about Moshiach is that Moshiach will be a king from the house of David who will study Torah in all of its parts. And this is expressed in the Torah –“I see him” referring to David “but not now. I see him but not close” that’s Moshiach. Here we are referring to the people themselves, David and Moshiach, that there is a David and there is a Moshiach, and that Moshiach will study Torah like David did.

The second function of Moshiach is that Moshiach will bring all Jews to go in the ways of Torah and to fulfill mitzvahs that were lacking, and their affect on the Jewish people. Concerning this he goes on to quote “a star will come forth from Yakov”– referring to David and “there will arise a ruler from Israel” that is Moshiach. So we see that they are having an affect on the Jewish people because they are talking about Yakov and Israel. This also shows the greatness of Moshiach and his advantage over David, the final Moshiach over the first Moshiach. Concerning David it says he will be a star – a star is very far from the people, far physically and also far spiritually, much greater and distant from the people, and therefore he refers to them as Yakov which is the lower level, Jews in their descent. But concerning Moshiach it says a ruler, a ruler gets involved with the people, and this is when Moshiach is revealed and he refers to Jews with their complimentary title Israel, the Jews in their higher level, at their best.

Thirdly Moshiach fights G-d’s battles. If he does this and conquers the surrounding nations, that is the job of Moshiach. Concerning this there is the proof text “he destroys the nation of Moav” that is referring to David, and concerning Moshiach it says that he will overcome the people of Moav and he will destroy the Bnei Shais and he will rule from sea to sea. Here we see a similarity between David and Moshiach but also the advantage and greatness of Moshiach over David. By David it says he will overcome the people of Moav, and by Moshiach he will destroy the Bnei Shais, which is a much greater control, a much greater victory over a much greater amount of people. By David it is only Moav, by Moshiach it is all the people of Shais, which is all human beings, all the nations of the world.

The fourth function is that Moshiach will fix the whole world and everybody will serve G-d together as it says, “then I will give all nations clear language that they could all call to G-d in the name of G-d, and they will serve G-d with a common effort”. So the proof text concerning this is when David has captured the people and they become his servants, they serve him and help him. Here also we see the advantage of Moshiach over David, because by David it says that he will rule over Edom, and that they will be his servants and by Moshiach it says that he will rule over the whole region and that the kingdom of the world will be G-d’s kingdom.

When Moshiach fixes the world so that everyone serves G-d together, that is the final victory. It means that the nations that were originally enemies, they themselves will recognize the kingdom of Melech HaMoshiach as it is hinted at the end of the halacha which the sensors had taken out of the text of the Rambam. There the Rambam writes, “and when Melech HaMoshiach will be established in truth, and he will succeed and be uplifted and victorious, the nations of the world will immediately return to the truth of Torah, and they will recognize that their ancestors gave them a false inheritance, and that their prophets and parents had misguided them”.

And immediately they will all turn to G-d and serve together in a common effort. And through the emunah shlema in the coming of Moshiach as it is al pi Torah and the expectation of his arrival which includes also the mitzvah of learning Hilchos Moshiach, a form of anticipation, this itself will hasten the coming of Moshiach.

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