The opening comment of Rashi in Chukas seems to be rather enigmatic. Commenting on why the pasuk (19:2) dubs the parah adumah a ‘chok’ (a mitzvah which we cannot comprehend), Rashi writes that the Satan and nations of the world would mock Klal Yisrael in asking ‘what reason does this mitzvah have and what’s the point of this mitzvah?’ Therefore, HaShem names the mitzvah a chok, saying ‘it’s my decree and you have no business looking into its reasons.’ How exactly does this answer respond to the attacks of the other nations? At the end of the day, the nations of the world were mocking this mitzvah for having no reason, and HaShem simply responds ‘you’re right, it has no reason – but you’re not allowed to think about it.’ What kind of response is that? The answer seems to be that the real, underlying criticism of the nations was that it does not make sense to have a mitzvah with no fathomable reason; nothing is achieved by such a mitzvah. But HaShem responds that this is incorrect; there is a benefit to performing a mitzvah which might have no reason whatsoever – there’s a benefit of having a mitzvah which is purely aimed at relying on HaShem and doing what He says regardless of what you understand. This is what it means ‘you have no business to think about it’ – since the point of the mitzvah is that it is intentionally set up as being beyond your comprehension, there’s no point in pondering it.
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