What?Are you being serious??
So before we take this apart, let's ask the time-honored question!
What is really the difference between the "Chacham" and the "Rasha?'
After all they are basically asking the same question!
?חכם: מה הוא אומר? מה העדות והחוקים והמשפטים אשר צוה ה' אלוקינו אתכם
"What are the testimonies, decrees and ordinances which Hashem, our G-d has commanded YOU!"
?רשע: מה הוא אומר? מה העבודה הזאת לכם
"Of what purpose is this work to YOU?"
Yes the Chacham added "Hashem Elokeinu" but he like his brother the Rasha says the word "YOU" meaning he is excluding himself!
Now, one could possibly say that the "Chacham" is no "Tzaddik" after all the Baal Haggada on purpose doesn't call him a "Tazadik" "righteous' but calls him a "Chacham" "Smart "so it is no wonder that he says "YOU", he is excluding himself as well, he is "Smart" enough to know what would trigger his father at the seder table and so to pacify him, he mentions G-D, that's why he is called "The Chachem" but he is no "Tzadik!"
The Givonim also said to Yehoshua "Hashem Elokecha" when they were deceiving him!
There are probably a million explanations for this dilemma; every single year a hundred brand new Haggadas are published with another thousand new ideas on what the author of the Haggada meant!
This year I walked into shul, and a little charedie boy was clutching his homemade haggada which he colored in school. When he got distracted, I picked it up and saw lo and behold 4 cartoons of the "arba banim" ... the four sons!
The "Chacham" wore a Shtreimel" of course, and the Rasha was wearing a Kippah but was holding a smartphone in his hand!
Now, I'm confused, because I know that his father has a smartphone. I'm wondering when the child colored the Rasha and made sure that he didn't color out of the lines, if he for one second gave thought that his own father with the Shtreimel could also be a Rasha!
Wow! A Rasha and Chachem all rolled into one! I am certain that the father did not notice the caricatures of the 4 sons, but if he didn't, someone in the household will, and then what?
Which got me thinking, going back to the question, what is the difference between the Rasha and the Chacham, I thought that there must have been more to the statement of the Rasha that the Baal-Haggada left out!
To find out what else he could have said, I figured out that the answer must be on how we respond to the Rasha, which would tell me the difference!
And sure enough, the response is as clear as day!
לכם ולא לו, ולפי שהוציא את עצמו מן הכלל כפר בעקר
He says "To YOU" thereby excluding himself. By excluding himself from the community, he denies the basic principle of Yiddishkeit"
Wow! Pretty strong words "Koifer Be'ikar!"
The hagadda talks about Paro, talks about Lavan, yet here when we are talking about a "SON" the Baal Haggada uses language that I only saw in the Vayoel Moshe vis-a-vis the Rabbanim that support the Zionists in the Knesset!
The Baal Haggada doesn't even call Paro a "Koifer"!
So what's up with that?
It looks as if "excluding one's self from the community," which the Shulchan Aruch frames as someone being פורץ גדר "breaking the fence," is called a Rasha!
Shloime Hamelech says in Koheles פורץ גדר ישכנו נכש ..... "A snake should bite a poirtz geder"
The "Chacham" the smart one, though he too took himself out of the community, the tone of his question was possibly not as defiant, and by adding "Hashem our G-d" ...the father gave him the benefit of the doubt, but know that he is no "Tzadik!"
What does all this have to do with us??
Those of us who live in Israel ran to the shelters yesterday on the first day of Pesach! In fact, fragments fell in Chevron!
We are still at war with savages that want to kill us all, only because we are Jews!
Just over the weekend, an Imam based in Jordan told the entire world that the war has "nothing to do with land," it is about killing all infidels, and he added that if the Jews gave back the entire Land of Israel, it would still incumbent on Muslims to either convert them or to murder them! The only ones that don't believe this Imam, is the Israeli Left, Satmar, Neturi Karta and BMG in Lakewood
Last week, the week before Pesach, people on the local chats were asking families to invite the widows and orphans of this war for the seder. They were asking people to invite the "Living" widows the living "orphans" whose husbands and fathers will not be at the seder because they are at the front! All the Dati publications were asking families to not forget them and include them.
However, I perused the Hebrew Yated, the Chareidie Chadash, Hapelas, etc and couldn't find an honorable mention of the widows and orphans! In fact reading the Charedie news media, you would not even know that we are at war! They are totally disconnected! Not only won't they do anything to help the country that is so good to them, not only won't they show Hakaras Hatoiv to those on the front, they call them "Garbage Cleaners"
They are being "moitzeh themselves from the klaal"; they are excluding themselves from the community, they are being פורץ גדר
וכאן הבן שואל
What is the difference between the Chacham and the Rasha?
