In this week's Parsha, we are zoche to the very last of the 613 mitzvos of the Torah: Ve-atah kisvu lachem es ha-shira ha-zos—the mitzvah to write a Sefer Torah. Many of the Rishonim, like the Sefer ha-Chinuch, the Rosh, etc., understand that the reason behind the mitzvah of writing a Sefer Torah is to have a Sefer Torah to learn from, to keep the mesorah going. That was the only way, before the printing press, we would be able to learn and know the Chumash. Therefore, Rosh says that nowadays, we can fulfill this mitzvah by buying seforim from the seforim stores. Based on this, the Sefer ha-Chinuch advises to buy Mishnayos, Gemoras, etc. But there is an interesting Beraisa that says that even if you inherited a Sefer Torah from your father, it's still a mitzvah to write, have written on your behalf, or at least to purchase your own. So the Sefer ha-Chinuch asks, in terms of the ta'amei ha-mitzvos: If the point is to have a Sefer Torah to learn from, if you inherit one from your father, you already have one. If so, why do you need to write another one and end up with two? Therefore, he suggests two very practical answers. One: Because it's good to have extras to lend them to people who could not fulfill this mitzvah for one reason or another. Therefore, if someone inherits one, it's not unfair of Hashem to ask them to write one, because even if they were lucky to inherit a Sefer Torah, it doesn't mean they should not take responsibility to write one in order to lend to someone less fortunate, so they can also learn Torah. And his second peshat is—and I guess this is the makor of Oz ve-Hadar Gemaras min ha-Torah—that inherited Sifrei Torah are old, and people don't like learning from the old Sefarim. They are faded a little and don't look so nice. It's much more geschmak to learn from a nice, shiny, new Sefer. And therefore, one should always have a new one. But the Ksav Sofer, in his chidushim on the Torah, says be-derech drush, that there might be something deeper going on here. Why would you have to write another Sefer Torah if you inherit one from your father? The Ksav Sofer says that there is something in the process of writing your own Sefer Torah that you don't get when you inherit one from your father.Ultimately, what does it mean to inherit a Sefer Torah? Look. In Judaism it's very important—and it's a basis of why the Jewish people are still around nowadays—that you follow in your father's footsteps and his traditions. You learned what they taught you in kindergarten and in your home when you were a kid. You are following that derech. Ok. That's very important for the continuation of the Mesorah. But the Ksav Sofer says: That's not enough. Just following what your parents and grandparents did and what they taught you in kindergarten is nice. It keeps you from becoming a goy. But it doesn't allow you to properly acquire the Torah. Everyone must “write their own Sefer Torah,” meaning: I should put myself into it and figure out what the Torah means for me. In what way does the Torah speak to me? It's not enough to just say that I am following my father. Everyone has to say: No! I am finding my own derech in Torah. I define what the Torah means to me. And you know what? I live in a different generation and a different place than my father. I have a different job and lifestyle and must grapple with different issues than my father. What does the Torah say to me? What can I find when I write this Torah that wasn't in my father's Torah? How can I make the Torah personally meaningful to me? And the Ksav Sofer says that ultimately, everyone should write their personal Sefer Torah because everyone has a personal cheilek in Torah, as we say: ve-sein chelkeinu be-Sorasecha. Everyone has their cheilek in Torah. Everyone has something that hinichu avosav le-hisgader bo—some chidush that they can add to the Torah. You have to say: How can I make the Torah meaningful to me, my surroundings, my culture, or my lifestyle? What in the Torah really speaks to me—something that has an answer for everything going on in my life, when I look deeply into it. What is Hashem saying particularly to me in His Torah? But not only that. The second step is that I have something to be mechadesh and add to the Torah. In a deeper sense, when I write my own Sefer Torah, I am writing chidushim that were not in any Sefer Torah before me. Because everyone has their unique perspective. Everyone was sent into this world with their brain, talents, abilities, and circumstances. And everyone has something to add to the Klal Yisroel's understanding of the Torah. And I think that although Ksav Sofer's pshat is a little more drush than the one of the Sefer ha-Chinuch. And drush may not be pshat, but that doesn't make it any less emes—and sometimes it's more emes if it's not just peshat. Ultimately, what does it mean to be a Ben Torah, as opposed to being just a Jew who doesn't go off the derech? It means looking into the Torah and saying that I am not just going to do what everyone else does, or what my father and my mother did, and just keep my lifestyle as a culture. Rather, it means: What is Hashem saying to me? What message am I getting from the Torah? What is my cheilek in Torah? What do I have to add to the Torah? Everyone has something to add to the Torah, even if you are not a Gadol ha-Dor. Everyone has an insight, and application, something they can do lema'ase with the Torah that no one has yet thought of. And, be-ezras Hashem, we should all be zoche to write our own Sefer Torah, even though nowadays, for

various reasons, the minhag is not to. (See Minchas Chinuch, etc. for why not everyone is mekayem this Mitvza ke-pshuto). But everyone should be zoche to write their own Sefer Torah, in a sense of putting ourselves into Torah, and come out with something—some chidush, some cheilek in Torah that no one else had before, that we could add to the Jewish people. Something that we can add le-hagdil Torah u-le-hadirah. And that's a kiyum of ve-sein chelkeinu be-sorasecha. Shabbat Shalom