30 Jun PARSHAS PINCHAS: DON’T BE FRUMER THAN THE SHULCHAN ARUCH

The pasuk in this
week’s parsha says,
“Harass the Midianites
and smite them. For
they harassed you…”
(Bamidbar 25:17-18).
The Ribono shel Olam
tells Moshe that he should take revenge from
the Midianites for what they did to Klal
Yisrael. The Medrash Tanchuma comments
on this: “One who rises up to kill you—
preemptively kill him. Rav Shimon says,
‘How do we know that someone who causes
his friend to sin is worse than someone who
kills his friend?’ It is because when someone
kills another person, the victim still has a
portion in the World-to-Come. However,
when someone causes his friend to be sinful,
he causes the friend to lose both this world
and the next world.
The Medrash continues: Two nations
approached the Jewish nation by sword
(attacking us physically, but not spiritually)
and two other nations approached them by
attempting to entice them to sin (attacking
them spiritually). Mitzrayim and Edom
attacked us physically, but Amon and Moav
attacked us spiritually. By the former nations
we are commanded “Do not hate them”
(Devorim 23:8). By the third generation

following their conversion, we are allowed to
intermarry with them (Devorim 23:9).
However, concerning those who caused us to
sin, it is written “Neither an Ammonite nor a
Moavite shall enter into the Congregation of
Hashem, even in the tenth generation they
shall not enter into the Congregation of
Hashem, forever.” (Devorim 23:4)
Ammon and Moav are on the “Enemies List”
forever, because they did something far
worse than trying to kill us physically. They
tried to seduce us. They tried to take away
our Olam HaBah. Therefore, the Ribono shel
Olam rejects them eternally.
The Medrash continues and says that
someone who has mercy on an Ammonite
will end up suffering. He will come to shame,
to wars, and to troubles. If the Torah rejects
them and places them “off limits” then we are
not allowed to show them kindness or to be
nice to them. This is an old principle: Don’t
be frumer (more religious) than the Torah.
The Medrash gives an example of someone
who had mercy on an Ammonite and, as a
result, suffered terribly: Dovid HaMelech. As
it is written: “And Dovid said I will do a
kindness with Chonan son of Nachash, as his
father did with me…” (Shmuel II 10:2)
Nachash was the King of Amon, and at one

point he did a favor to Dovid (Shmuel I
Chapter 11). Dovid HaMelech now wanted to
repay the favor, so when Nachash died, he
sent messengers to be Menachem Avel to this
Ammonite. The Medrash relates: “The Holy
One Blessed be He said, ‘You have
transgressed My Word to not inquire about or
be concerned about their welfare. And you
showed them acts of kindness. ‘Don’t be
overly righteous!’ (Koheles 7:16)”.
What happened to Dovid as a result of this
gesture? We won’t go into all the details of a
long and complicated story in Tanach, but to
make a long story short, when the messengers
of Dovid HaMelech arrived at the palace,
they were treated brutally, stripped down to
the waist, and half their beards were cut off to
mock them.
This is the point of the Medrash: A person
should only do what the Torah says and not
try to improve on the Torah’s morality. If
the Torah says about the Ammonites and
Moavites “Don’t seek their welfare or their
benefit,” we should follow the Torah and
not be more “religious” than the Word of
G-d.
The sefer Otzros haTorah brings a fantastic
incident: When Rav Moshe Feinstein was
a Rav in Luban, Russia, there was a Jew in
the city who was a moser. A moser is a
person that snitches to the government
against Jews. (One has to realize that this
incident took place in the 1930s, under the
Stalinist Government. The Communists
were at their height of power and were
terrible to the Jews.) There were
unfortunately Jews who were members of
the Communist party, and they would
snitch on other Jews to get them into
trouble with the Soviet authorities.
The moser died and he left a letter to the
Chevra Kadisha in which he confessed that
he had been sinful during his life and
stated that now prior to death he regretted
those actions. He bemoaned the fact that
he was responsible for having Jews
arrested, sent to Siberia, and killed. Out of
shame and repentance, he stated that he
wished to achieve kappara after death for
his actions and hence requested of the
Chevra Kadisha that they not give him a
proper Jewish burial. He requested that his
body be mutilated and abused. “I don’t
want to have a tahara—just roll me in the
gutter as a kappara for what I did in my
lifetime.”

The Chevra Kadisha came to the Rav of
Luban, Rav Moshe Feinstein, and showed
him this “Last Will and Testament” of this
Moser and asked for his advice. Rav Moshe
paskened that they were not allowed to treat a
Jewish body disrespectfully, and that they
had to bury him with a tahara and with all the
honor and dignity accorded to any Jewish
person being buried. He ruled that no person
is the master over his own body, and this
person had no right to make such a request.
“What is going to happen to him after death
is between him and the Ribono shel Olam,
but we cannot take the law into our own
hands and do this to another Jew because it is
against the Din.”
The Chevra Kadisha tried to argue with Rav
Moshe, repeating what an evil person this
fellow was. Rav Moshe persisted: “This is
what it says in Shulchan Aruch. You need to
follow the Din. Don’t be frumer than the
Torah.”
The Chevra Kaddisah buried the fellow,
perhaps not with “full military honors,” but
with normal Kavod HaMeisim. A few days
after the burial, the watchman at the cemetery
reported that officers from the Russian
Government came and insisted that the body
be exhumed. The watchman was not in a
position to tell the government officers
“Sorry, we don’t do that type of thing.”
They dug up the grave. They opened the
coffin. They looked at the body. They closed
the coffin. And they reburied him. Before
they left, the watchman asked if they could
give him an explanation about what just
happened. They told him what happened:
Before this moser died, he sent a second
letter. He sent a letter to the government
stating that he could demonstrate how much
the Jews hate the Communist authorities.
“They are not going to give me a proper
Jewish funeral because I was a friend of the
government.”
Lo and behold, when they opened the coffin,
they saw that he was buried k’das u’k’din and
that the allegation in the letter he sent them
was in no way true. The moral of this story is:
Keep what is written in Shulchan Aruch.
Shulchan Aruch states what we are supposed
to do. We should not try to outsmart the
Shulchan Aruch, and we should not try to be
frumer than the Shulchan Aruch. “Al te’hee
Tzadik Harbeh” — ‘Don’t be overly
righteous!’ (Koheles 7:16).