Zos Chukas HaTorah

Harav Avraham Abulafia, a rav in Arizona, once had to travel to Toronto to help deal with a get. The travel agent found him the last available seat on the flight, and R’ Abulafia hurried on his way.

When he boarded the plane, he saw who was sitting beside him: a large non-Jewish man of African descent. There was not much room, but this was the seat that Hashgachah had arranged for him.

R’ Abulafia sat down and tried to make some polite conversation. He introduced himself and asked the man his name.

The man answered something that sounded like, “Sha…”

R’ Abulafia thought the man was telling him to be quiet, so he let the conversation end there. He took out a sefer on the parsha and began to learn. It was Parshas Chukas, and on the page before him were the words:

זאת חקת התורה

After a while, R’ Abulafia noticed something strange. The man beside him kept looking at the sefer. He would glance at the words, look back at R’ Abulafia, and then look again.

Finally, the man pointed to the words חקת התורה and asked, “What does that say?”

R’ Abulafia explained that it was Hebrew, the holy language, and that the words were read, “Chukas HaTorah.”

The man still seemed unsettled.

Then, suddenly, he pulled up his sleeve.

On his arm, tattooed into his skin, were those very words:

חקת התורה

R’ Abulafia was stunned. “What does this have to do with you?”

The man said that when he was born, his father had put the tattoo on him. His father had told him that it was some kind of ancient Chinese protection, a special segulah for a child.

R’ Abulafia understood that there was more to the story. The explanation did not sound right. He tried asking from different angles, but the man said he himself had no idea what it meant. For about forty years, he had been searching for the meaning of the strange markings on his arm. He had never even known they were letters. He thought they were just some sort of design. Only now, sitting beside a Jew with a sefer open, did he realize that they were Hebrew words.

“My father is still alive,” the man said. “You can ask him.”

After the plane landed, R’ Abulafia called the father. At first, the father gave the same explanation: it was something from China, a protection for a child. But R’ Abulafia pleaded with him to tell the truth.

Finally, the man broke down and began to cry.

He said, “Listen. I am a Jew. In my youth, I learned in Ponovezh. My rebbi was Harav Shach zt”l.

“I learned in yeshivah, and after my marriage I continued learning in kollel. But the burden of parnassah became very heavy, and I was offered work in an office for part of the day. I went to ask my rebbi, Harav Shach, and after weighing the matter, he told me to take the job.

“For a time, things went well. I learned most of the day and worked for a few hours, and the pressure of parnassah eased.

“Then the company hired a non-Jewish cleaning woman who would be there at the same hours that I was working alone in the office. I immediately went back to Harav Shach to ask what to do.

“Harav Shach told me clearly: ‘You may not continue working there like that. It is a complete issur of yichud.’

“I began to plead and cry. ‘Rebbi, what will be with my parnassah? What will be with my shalom bayis? There is no bread in the house.’

“Harav Shach opened a Shulchan Aruch, Even HaEzer, siman 22, and showed me that it is forbidden to be secluded even with a non-Jewish woman.

“I still tried to argue. ‘But Rebbi, what connection could I possibly have with this woman? There is no closeness here. It is not shayach to me.’

“Harav Shach answered sharply in Yiddish:

‘Mach nisht kein chachmos. זאת חקת התורה. זאת חקת התורה. If the Torah does not allow it, it is forbidden.’

“Do not be clever. Do not make calculations against the Torah.

“But I did not listen.

“I was not able to withstand the test. I convinced myself that I understood the situation better. I told myself that the reason for the issur did not apply to me. I continued working there.

“And from that one decision, everything fell apart. I divorced my wife, left my home and my young children, and married that woman. I followed her to her country.

“But the words of Harav Shach never left me. Day and night, I saw him standing before me and heard his voice: ‘זאת חקת התורה. זאת חקת התורה. If the Torah does not allow it, it is forbidden.’

“When my son was born, I named him Shach, after my rebbi. And I tattooed the words חקת התורה on his arm, so I would remember Harav Shach’s ruling and remember where my fall began.”

Only then did R’ Abulafia understand what the man on the plane had said when he introduced himself. He had not been saying “Sha” to quiet him. His name was Shach.

A person can sometimes persuade himself that he has a good reason. “This issur does not apply to me.” “This situation is different.” “I know myself.” “I can handle it.”

But the Torah is not built on our private calculations. The Torah sees farther than we do. Chazal see farther than we do. A gadol who paskens with daas Torah sees what we cannot see.

זאת חקת התורה means: this is the decree of the Torah. When the Torah says something is forbidden, we do not become wiser than the Torah. We accept it with temimus, before a person’s own “chachmah” leads him where he never dreamed he could fall.

Source note: The story is brought in באר הפרשה, Parshas Devarim–Tishah B’Av 5784, where it says it was heard from the בעל המעשה, Harav Avraham Abulafia of Arizona. There are other published retellings with some detail differences; this version follows the באר הפרשה version as the main source.