Episode Details

 This afternoon’s class opened with a striking question:
how can a parashah that begins with death—אַחֲרֵי מוֹת, the tragic loss of
Nadav and Avihu—lead directly into one of the most beautiful and demanding
mitzvot in the Torah, וְאָהַבְתָּ לְרֵעֲךָ כָּמוֹךָ? We explored a powerful
idea from my rabbis: that true closeness to HaShem is not built on passion
alone, but on the capacity to love—deeply, patiently, and without condition.
The Kohen Gadol, who enters the Kodesh HaKodashim on Yom Kippur, cannot do so alone—he
must have a wife, a bayit, because only someone who has learned to live with
another soul can stand before HaShem on behalf of a nation. 

From there, the shiur unfolded into a profound rethinking
of love itself—not as a feeling, but as the foundation of Torah life. We traced
how the Torah builds אהבה step by step: first removing hatred, then revenge,
then grudges, until a person becomes capable of real connection. Through
Chazal, the story of Rabbi Aryeh Levin, and the tragedy of Rabbi Akiva’s
students, we saw that Torah without love cannot endure. This is not a side
mitzvah—it is the structure that holds everything together. A powerful and practical
class on marriage, middot, and what it truly means to be קָדוֹשׁ.