The Road to Hell is Often Paved With Many Good Intentions,
When you read this week’s parsha, you see the tremendous self-sacrifice
of Lot, as he tried to protect the guests he had invited into his home. As the
story continues to unfold, Lot looks like a real tzaddik. But then, something
astonishing happens. Lot tells the people of Sodom who have come to harm
his guests, “Look, stop! Don’t do this dastardly deed. Here are my daughters
instead. Do whatever you want with them but leave my guests alone.” What?!
How is this possible? First, Lot looks like a tzaddik and then he looks like a
madman. What’s going on here?
The answer, my friends, is that this is what happens when a person makes
up their own Torah. Lot left his spiritual mentor, Avraham. He’s his own
man, following his own perverted sense of right and wrong. So, because he
has no Torah and no Rav to guide him he went off the deep end. Our holy
Torah is the ultimate arbiter of what’s right and what isn’t. Follow its ways
and you will never go wrong.
Wishing you an inspiring Shabbos,
Rabbi Moshe Gruenstein