Changing the quality of my learning by renewing my commitment and reinvigorating my attitude
As I feel I could much improve in the area of limud haTorah these days, both quantitatively and qualitatively, I found it serendipitous that just this week I came across a gemara in Yevamos addressing the pasuk in Mishlei (27:19) that was central to what we discussed in this slot last week: “Kamayim hapanim lapanim, kein leiv ha’adam la’adam — As water reflects the face shown it, so too is the heart of one man to another.”
Rashi explains the pasuk as conveying an axiom of human relations: Our feelings toward another person are dictated by his feelings toward us. We reflect back to him the love, hatred, or other emotions we feel radiating from him toward us, which is how it is understood by the gemara in Yevamos (117a).
But in that same gemara, Rabi Yehudah says of this verse that “Hahu b’divrei Torah kesiv,” this is referring to words of Torah. Rashi explains that the extent to which you will succeed in Torah is commensurate with the heart that you invest in it.
This is an echo of a notion we find repeatedly in Chazal: Torah is a living, dynamic reality, and a Jew has an ongoing, symbiotic relationship with it, mirroring our own attitude. When we “smile” at it, by studying it time after time and toiling to understand it, it reciprocates by doing everything it can to ensure our success. But if we neglect it, it takes that rejection to heart and we suffer for it.
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