By: Yisrael Yitzchak Rosenfeld
A good and blessed week, friends.
“This is the statute (Chukas) of the Torah that HaShem has commanded, saying:
Speak to the children of Israel, that they bring you a perfectly red heifer,
without blemish, upon which no yoke has ever been placed.”
(Numbers 19:2)
A mitzvah that lies beyond human understanding is called a chok—a divine decree.
Yet a question arises:
Why have Jews throughout the generations been willing to give their lives not only for those parts of the Torah that they understand, but especially for those that they do not understand?
The Lubavitcher Rebbe, of blessed memory, explains:
The word chok derives from the root “chakikah”—which means “engraving.”
What is the difference between writing and engraving?
When writing, two separate elements are joined together:
ink and paper.
Engraving, however, means that the letters are carved directly into the material itself.
They are not added afterward—they are part of the substance itself.
So it is with the Jew and the Torah.
A Jew does not merely study the Torah as though it were external knowledge.
The Torah is deeply engraved within him.
It is part of his very essence.
That is why the Jewish soul is touched most deeply precisely when it comes to a chok—a law that transcends human understanding.
For in such a case, the Jew is not defending something foreign to him,
but rather something that is already an integral part of his own being.
