In a peculiar anecdote in this week’s פרשה, the פסוק tells us that משה רבינו got angry at his brother, אהרן הכהן, because אהרן and his sons had burned the שעיר החטאת instead of eating it, which in משה רבינו’s opinion was wrong and inappropriate. However, אהרן responded with his rationale that since he was an עונן, it would’ve been wrong of him to go ahead and eat from the שעיר. משה רבינו then conceded to his brother and realized that it was in fact he who was wrong and agreed that אהרן had in fact done the right thing.

The מלבי"ם tells us that משה רבינו made this mistake because he got angry. If he had managed to control his anger, he would have taken the time to analyze the situation and realized that אהרן and his sons had indeed behaved appropriately and done the right thing. However, once אהרן explained his reasoning, משה רבינו realized that he was right, and displaying his incredible עניוות, he admitted that he was wrong and did not attempt to defend himself, because he had forgotten that ה' had told him from the very start that the הלכה would be exactly like אהרן had ended up doing anyway.

This is a very appropriate lesson for this time of year. Over פסח, many of us were with our families who we don’t always see so often, living together in closer spaces than we are used to. At times things can get frustrating when we don’t always get what we want or someone might have done or said something that we don’t particularly like or approve of. We must learn this lesson from משה רבינו that unless we really analyze what is really happening, we might get angry and make a terrible mistake. However, even if we do ח"ו lose our tempers, we must also try to have the humility required to admit and accept if/when we are really wrong.

In the זכות of working on such a difficult מדה, may we be מתקן for the עבירות of the 12,000 זוגי תלמידים של ר' עקיבא שלא נהגו כבוד זה בזה.

Have a wonderful שבת קודש!

מרדכי שמחה טיפנברון