Q&A: The Emissary of the Rabbis
The Emissary of the Rabbis
Question
To our teacher and rabbi, a prince of God in our midst, the great genius, breaker of rocks and splitter of mountains, a Sinai and an uprooter of mountains, the genius, the pious one, the humble one, of the disciples of Abraham our father, holy with every kind of holiness. That man for whom no secret is hidden, master of the entire Talmud, a metropolis that contains everything within it, from whose mouth we live and from whose mouth fiery torches go forth; the mouth that forbade is the mouth that permitted. A holy mouth. Better to sit as two than alone, a half-coin in a jug. Go out and see: a bud in bud, the glory and splendor of the generation, the Rebbe, our master, teacher, and Rabbi Michael Abraham, may he live long and well. May he merit length of days; may he prolong his days over his kingdom. And I, in my poverty, say: the teaching of the master is the Mishnah; expound, for it befits you to expound.
I took my life in my hands and came to entreat your honor with a question that has been troubling me, and I knew that it is not fitting for a clipped-wing gnat to come ask before the king. Were it not that the words of our sages strengthened me, who said that the bashful person does not learn, it would never have occurred to me to come before the lion. And now my soul asks: may the teacher instruct us, and his reward be doubled from Heaven:
Sparks of hatred have been stirred in my heart toward the emissary of the rabbis, Rabbi Aryeh Deri, may he live long and well, and not by my will or desire, nor through anything I initiated; certainly the evil inclination has leapt upon me. And Maimonides, as is known, writes that if a person hates one of the Jewish people in his heart, without the hated person knowing, he transgresses “Do not hate.” Must I inform Rabbi Aryeh Deri that I hate him, until I succeed in overcoming the evil inclination that has leapt upon me? And I ask our rabbi to instruct me in a way of rectification for my hatred.
Thus speak the words of the blind bat, the clipped-wing gnat. The fool, the self-righteous one, the idiot, the ignoramus and boor. The simple wagon-driver, the mole wallowing in the dust, the obtuse one and the holy sufferer. He who signs with his face to the ground in tears, and girds himself in sweat.
Yitzhak son of our teacher Rabbi Abraham, may he live long and well
Answer
I am utterly astonished at you, sir—what is troubling you here? After all, it is a commandment to hate the wicked, and all the more so those who desecrate God's name.