Bitachon 261 - God Destroys Israel's Enemies

You're listening to the 261st edition of the We're Talking podcast. We are learning together the Sukkot that have to do with the story of Yehoshaphat, the king of the Jewish people, who faced off with the enemies of the Jewish people. Old theme. And he stood and he davened in the Beit Hashem, in the Beit Hamikdash, and the result was they sang, they thanked Hashem, and they were saved. Our enemies were destroyed. So, we're looking together at the Sukkot one by one. Not all the Sukkot, but a number of them. As it says, this is in Divrei Hayamim perek chof, pasuk tes vov. Vayomer, "Hakshivu kol Yehudah." So, Yehoshaphat says, maybe it's uh Yechaziel, the uh the prophet, says like this, "Hakshivu kol Yehudah, listen up, all people of Judah, yoshvei Yerushalayim, and those who sit in Jerusalem, u'melech Yehoshaphat, and the king, Yehoshaphat, ki amar Hashem lachem, this is what Hashem has said to you, al temau tiru v'al techatu, do not be afraid mipnei hahamon harav hazeh, don't be afraid of this great multitude. Ki lo lachem hamilchamah ki le'Elohim. The war does not belong to you, this war belongs to Hashem." Says Rashi. Al temau v'al techatu, musav al shamra'am b'ruach l'tei'am. Hashem is responding through his navi Yechaziel to the first point, which was that they're so they're such a great multitude, so many people. Don't be afraid of them. V'navi amar lahem af al pi she'eim rav mikem al tiru tir'um mehem. Even though they're uh much more in number than you. Don't be afraid of them. Kill all the king. And then in response, which we spoke about last week to to that which we said We don't know what to do. Right, I'm not sure. Should I invest my efforts into the natural means that I have, the the armies that I have, or should I trust in you, Hashem? So Hashem is responding to that and saying the war is not yours, it's God's. You don't have to worry about it. I'm with you. I'm on your side. And the Navi is saying like this, it's certainly true as you said Place your trust in Hashem. Turn your eyes towards Hashem to save you. That's what you should do. Because this is indeed going to be a war that's won by Hashem. That's Rashi. And then he brings from Rabbeinu Saadia Gaon. In the first chapter it speaks about Obadiah was a Ger from the people of Edom. And he speaks about the destruction of Edom. We're going to see here Rabbeinu Saadia Gaon says that one explanation of what's going on in Obadiah is that it's referring actually to the war that Yehoshaphat fought. Fought. Because amongst or perhaps the main instigators of the war were Amaleki people who were from Edom, who were from Esau. Now the possuk there says that there will be a an axis of evil that's going to be sent and we are going to say "Kumu v'nakumu aleihem l'milchama. Let's get up and face off with them for war." And we'll see that the kumu, which means to to get up, to stand, doesn't I mean it sounds like it means let's go and and battle them. We're going to see it's referring to the Arab Sukkum and how it refers to not just standing up in battle, but actually standing up to watch how Hashem is going to save us. V'yado'atem she'lo vi'chaziel. So, the Saadia Gaon says this is a reference. I'm not sure if Y'chaziel is the same person as Obadiah or not. It's not clear to me, but um it's certainly a reference to what happened with Y'chaziel. V'yisa Y'chaziel ben Y'chaziel v'yishafat. This is a war of Edom. There's a note here and he goes into showing that the even though the possuk refers to B'nei Ammon B'nei Moab, the Moabites and the Ammonites were fighting against the K'lal Yisrael, but it also mixed in with them was the people from Seir, which was the people of Edom, which is Amalek. Ki Obadiah ben Obadiah says the Saadia Gaon says that Obadiah was in the days of Y'hoshaphat. K'asher bo'u l'hilachem B'nei Ammon u'Moab b'Seir, when we came to battle with Ammon and Moab, the mountain of Seir, k'asher m'foresh b'Divrei HaYamim, as is explicit in Divrei HaYamim, that's our possukim. Sam Y'hoshaphat v'yispalel l'Hashem. So, Y'hoshaphat he fasted, he brought the Jewish people generally to fast, and they all davened to Hashem as we saw. K'asher hu kasuv, as the possuk says, "V'shalach Y'chaziel b'yad Obadiah u'vahem." And Hashem sent the prophet Yechazkel to prophecy about those nations. Yechazkel said, "You stand aside. Stand aside and I'm going to save you from Edom." The war is not yours. Right? It's our possuk that we just read the beginning. Just like Hashem said to Moshe Rabbeinu when Klal Yisrael was going out of Egypt Hashem said, "Stand aside and you will see the salvation of Hashem." Sometimes it's not necessary for us to fight. When we're in the right spiritual place we don't have to do that much. Hashem does everything for us. Right? So, the possuk says as we pointed out at the beginning in in Ovadiah it says we we will get up and we will fight the fight. Sounds like they're going to do something active, but in our psukim it's talking about something passive. It's when it says we're going to get up doesn't mean we're going to get up and fight. It means we're going to get up and watch. Like Yechazkel says, "Stand up and plant yourselves and watch what's going to happen. Asher Sham Yisrael Yisrael Yisrael Now, when they heard this so they understood that there was advice here. Right? He's telling you to stand. What does it mean to stand? It means just to stand aside and watch or it means stand aside. Are they supposed to do something? This is important. So, they understood that the implication of standing aside doesn't just mean stand and watch. It means stand and and say how great God is. Stand and sing. Stand and praise. Right? He He took advice from the nation. Or he gave advice to the nation and he said um get some singers. Let the singers sing to Hashem. That's our job as singers. And in so doing >> [snorts] >> he fulfilled the will of Hashem. Oh, better. Not just he fulfilled the will of Hashem. He brought about Hashem's will. Hashem's will came true, so to speak, because of the fact that he did this, because he stood up and he sang. You see them in all of them. Hashem saved them from their enemies. As we saw, as soon as they started singing, as soon as they started thanking Hashem, it happened. At the time that day began singing, that's where the That's where the salvation happened. That's where the enemies of the Jewish people were destroyed. So, I said an incredible thing. I really just contemplate, ponder. An incredible thing. A person is supposed to have a sense that Hashem is going to take care of them. Person is supposed to have a sense that Hashem is going to save them. The person is supposed to get up. We're supposed to learn from Yehoshafat. That's what Ram Zvi is teaching us by placing these pesukim that we said all the time. We're supposed to say these pesukim all the time. Think about it all the time. Contemplate. Hashem is saving me now. Let's start singing. Let's start praising Hashem. Let's start saying thank you before it even happens. And the thanks itself causes, brings out the promise of Hashem that it's going to be it's going to happen. I can tell you right now in Eretz Yisrael we're we're concerned. We would like to see our enemies vanquished. We would like to see the job done. Now's the time to sing. Now's the time to thank Hashem for all that's been done until now to vanquish our enemies and all that will be done. Cuz certainly Hashem is standing there by our side. I saw an interview with one of the politicians who's in the inner sanctum, not from but he said it was clear siyata d'Shmaya. There was undeniable divine intervention in all that that went on there during the war. So let's acknowledge it. Let's say thank you Hashem. And let's praise Hashem for the completion of it too, even though we don't think that we've seen it yet. Let's praise Hashem for it now. Brings you from the Talmud of the Ramchal, the Ner Yisrael. Says like this, "When he saw Yehoshafat flee because Hashem had decreed that he had to flee from the war." It says Yehoshafat was afraid because he felt pressured in the moment. He didn't He wasn't ready for for a war. That's just not where he was holding. He wasn't ready for it. Also the king, he was humble. This is important also. Like Sometimes we might feel like, "Oh, I have to talk to him. Oh, I'm doing what's right. Hashem should help me." You got to be careful about that. The melech anav the king who was talking about Yehoshua, the king who was humble didn't feel confident in his own merit. He didn't feel confident in his warriors. Kim is in Hashem Yishuasa. The only thing that he felt confident in was Hashem. Hashem's help. Hashem's salvation. If you call Vayar Yehuda al panav. As the possuk says that Yehoshua felt looked and he faced his face. V'al av rak al am Yisrael. That means that he all of his aspirations, all of his hopes where they placed in the direction of Hashem. All of his efforts went into saying, "Hashem, help me." "Hashem, save me." Vayikra tzom al kol Yehuda and that's why he called for a fast for the people of Yehuda. Ki lo horas rachamim. Because that's how you awaken Hashem's compassion. It's through humility. It's through subduing my own passions. It's through not eating. Making myself weak. Weakening my ego. A melech hatzadik rotzeh l'hispalel l'Hashem l'einei kol ha'am. Look what a look what a leader is. Look what a leader is. The leader, the tzadik, so he gets up and he prays. He davens to Hashem in front of everybody. Ki l'fi she'hispalel gam heim k'eilu asah. This is what a leader does. Leader gets up, he prays so that everyone else around him will pray. And by doing this so there's an incredible amount of awakening whether below or above. He davens. What happens when we daven? We awaken the desire down here for Hashem to come in and show himself to us. When we awaken that so it brings it down from above. The awakening below awakens something above in shamayim and in the in the heavens and the spiritual realms. So why it says that Yehoshaphat stood amongst the congregation of Judah in Jerusalem in the house of Hashem before the new uh the new courtyard. Okay, so he had up he had upgraded the courtyard of the Beit Hashem of the of the Beit Hamikdash Ezras Yisrael which is the area where the Israelites would stand when they would pray in the Beit Hamikdash. We know says the Arizal that generally there's a principle that only someone from a a king from the house of David has permission to sit in the courtyard. Yehoshaphat wanted everyone to see I could sit down. He stood up from his throne. He gave up his honor in order to pray, in order to lead the people in prayer, this is what you have to do. This is what we have to do. You want to invoke Hashem's name, you want to bring about bitachon, you want to get into I would say a space of bitachon, remember that it's Hashem who gives us the power. And ask Hashem to come down into this world. But again, it's like a giving up of his own ego that's going on. There's a humility. That's what he keeps saying. This is how we pray. They used to say like this, Hashem, the God of our forefathers, you are the God in the heavens. I see as the kind of um mechanics of it. The mechanics of the prayer. He was saying, you Hashem, you are the one who has the power in heaven, which really means to say, their power, the the root of the power which manifests in this world. You want to know why a country has power? It's because there's a spiritual source of that power in the higher realms. But you Hashem, you have power over their powers. They don't have any power. The the spiritual source, the roots, they don't have any power of their own. Any power that the spiritual roots have is from your power, Hashem. Is the source and the ruler over all of the power above, certainly Hashem is the is has power over all of the kingdoms of the nations below. The taikef of the letata, the taikef of talked about le'aila. Interesting, similar concept to what we said before. We spoke about us below, we awaken through our prayer a shafa from above, an influx to come down from from the higher spheres. But we're saying that how does that how should that work? It should work by cutting off the root of the power of those powers above that influence the powers below in our realm. So, what he means when he says you have the power over all of the kingships of the nations. All of the power above and below it's all on what Hashem said. If you if you see in the world if you see that a nation is being vanquished by another nation, it means let's talk about Iran. If you see that that of Israel have power over Iran it's because there's a weakening of their spiritual power. And by the way, the the Muslims understand this. They understand this. We've spoken about it in weeks past. I'm not going to go back to it, but they have a weakening of the power and I would say it's because of their intense hatred. Their intense hatred, the it's like it's like Haman and Russia. Haman and Amalek builds a builds a uh tree a a pole 50 amos high, 50 cubits high in order to hang in order to hang Mordecai. His anger is what brought about his own death. He is hung up. He's hanged on that very tree and and that's the truth of what's going on today. The very anger and hatred that the nation or the leaders of Iran have towards the Jewish people is the very thing that's bringing about their own downfall. Sham takes it away, gives it to them. According to his will. Nobody can stop Hashem. Nobody can can stand in Hashem's way. This is what a boss says. The power is in your hands. No one can stand up to you. So, all of that is the praise. Which of course we're we're praising Hashem saying he has the power to take away their power. Which is implicating the following which is the actual prayer. You want to have a proper prayer, when asking something you have to start off by saying Hashem you are great. Hashem you have the power. Hashem you are awesome. Right, like we say in the in the davening. We start off say how great Hashem is. Recognizing for ourselves Hashem doesn't need my praise. Recognizing for for ourselves that Hashem is the source of all power. Hashem is the one who has the ability to save me, help me, take care of me, sustain me. Then we ask for our needs. Then we go in it and that's what Yoshafa did. Then we go in and we say Hashem help us out. Take care of us. Save us. Bring about the salvation. Thank you so much for listening. We'll see you again next week.