Rabbi Guy Matalon - Mesilat Yesharim - Chapter 11 - Part 2

hi welcome to another installment of our class in mesilati asharim the path of the just and we are in the middle of chapter 11 discussing the aspects the multiple aspects of the moral virtue of cleanliness okay can i be out in character and be normal now because i'm not feeling it okay so here we go we talked about the two major categories or aspects where we should remove our desires for sin right we discussed whether it's better to have the desire and control it and or get rid of the sin altogether ramhal's position is that there are some things that we should remove the sin altogether the desire to sin one was gesell what is gesell does anybody know what ghazal means thievery right different ways of what is considered theft of time of opinion of someone's mind when you are telling when you're lying to him in a particular way you are essentially stealing from him we talked all about these things then we spent a whole day talking about someone's grandmother right that we should remove the desire for erva for inappropriate sexual relations that we should not have a desire at all for another person's woman ah if you want to come back and tell me about rabbi what if the woman doesn't belong to anybody how you doing it's okay i saw this great line that said women are not here for men's entertainment or not are not here for men's entertainment and there is this notion that you know we are when you go out to ben yehuda just sitting and watching the people walk by that's a form of entertainment and you are enjoying things that are not yours but then you say no she really wants it otherwise why is she parading back and forth with a flag i have to give an example that isn't realistic otherwise you will have an idea in your mind and i want to stay away from that i have no idea so that's what we spoke about yesterday i want to move now this is the first time we've done this i'm going to skip a few pages not because you can't handle the truth but because everybody get the reference good because the truth is too complicated to explain at the stage of where we are because the ramakhal provides us other examples of sins that we should remove completely the desire to sin so i will tell it to you just in general so he talks about cursing right and that was our discussion that you didn't understand why do we have to get rid of cursing well there's nothing wrong with it it makes me feel good which i said you've got lots of work to do the other one that he talks about which i think is a given we don't really need to spend the whole day on this is eating forbidden foods right we all in our yeshiva understand that there are certain foods that we can eat and there are certain foods that we are prohibited from eating like pork can't have bacon for breakfast or lunch or dinner or snack you don't have to write that down you should know that okay you said you have to get rid of that desire yes that's not the rambo it's not the ramble correct good i'm glad you're holding very good that's what i want to see so you keep the ideas in your mind so you're learning what is called shitas there are different ways of understanding jewish text the rambam has a his wife here has a different way okay yes um so like i would write don't eat bacon on the ceiling above my bed today i really struggle like going to a nice barbecue rib joint that's a huge problem in israel well not that that's literally a problem here but the wanting of that is is a problem for me so like things that are like a given like that um see i you you can put it in front of me and that wouldn't bother me it doesn't do anything to me it doesn't do anything to me anymore it did for like two years when i first gave up good so from here you hear that keep going and it'll go away still smells good when i smell it yeah okay lots of things smell good so does nail polish right so this doesn't mean i want to put that on my food i'm just giving an example you know listen if i can control my desire to pistachio ice cream you can control your desire to eating pork ribs but you can have other types of you can have beef ribs or lamb ribs oh everybody's getting hungry so i think everybody should put in 100 bucks and we will buy a real sheep and and have its ribs how many ribs are in the sheep no but we want the ribs we don't care about the rest sam what about how many ribs does the sheep have probably about all right 24 ribs because if there was a vegetarian here they'd be pretty upset right now wait why it's okay this whole conversation like oh we just want the red meat it might only be vegetarian for health reasons though not humanitarian reasons vegetarians are for food a lot of vegetarians are good my wife is vegetarian but she's not she's not right just for health she just can't eat meat i know a girl who's never eaten it she just never liked it as a small kid her parents never pushed on her so she never tried it now you see it aaron listen to this do you see what happened here the evil inclination took a conversation and now instead of learning torah we're talking about how many ribs i'm guilty how many ribs does a sheep have and with this and now we're going to talk about that and talk about that's what the yetzel does and and the ramakhal warns us about it you have to pay attention you have to stay on track okay telling you this because you need to remind me okay because you're the new kid right the other guys you see they're with me they'll go with me wherever we go on the roller coaster are you you have an honest face save us save us we're corrupted already okay here we go so he talks about forbidden foods and then he has a category that is very very important because we mess this up all the time which is social sins sins that we are we have because we live among other people okay so he talks about the following i'm going to give you all of them and then we'll talk a little bit about each one okay i'll give it to you let me explain before you argue with me you want i will give it to you in english right now here it starts ready on your marks it's i'm going to do it like uh do you remember the um there were warner brothers they had these two animals that would do like the whole countries and real quick not speedy gonzales you don't know your warner bullets and the maniacs they would do like this so that's what i'm gonna do in english ready an adverb really is it's a very good very difficult term for me to come up with means that you are presenting things not the way they are it's a form of lying it's a false presentation yeah advertising right second embarrassing people publicly third giving bad advice to people literally it means causing a blind person to stumble by giving him the wrong advice what does that mean blind person it means that when a person isn't let's say i want to buy a car and everybody who knows me knows i know nothing about cars nothing i know where the glove compartment is nothing i don't really understand i know how to drive i drive both hashem well but something goes wrong i don't know it's gone fill up a gas huh what so if i went to buy a car and you're an expert in the car and i say to you listen i want to buy a car and you say listen get a volkswagen bug i am considered a blind person with regard to a car and by you giving me a bad advice you caused me to stumble that's what he means that we have to be very careful when we give advice to our friends because they are in a sense blind to the issue that they're seeking advice and when we give them an answer we have to give them an answer that fits them not what fits us so we have to be very very careful with that okay so that's number three number four gossip gossip is a big one right third hatred and seeking revenge oh yeah you cut me in line i won't leave you any cold water i didn't do the dishes you didn't sweep my room like we agreed it was your tweak to sweep if i get it i'm not sweeping next week right that is sticking into the person i'm allowed to do that yes but what if he deserves it so the other day we were talking about stealing time and i was out running an errand this lady cuts in line in front of me and it was that at a proper grocery store it wasn't like at the shoot where people throw their hands out is it a proper line i'm in line she jumps in gives the lady her tea and a 20 shekel bill and the cash readers saying she just does it she looks at me for like a second like and i'm shocked and the lady looks at me like she knew she did wrong waiting for a response and i'm thinking i would yell at her but i don't even speak hebrew she wouldn't matter to her and culturally maybe this is okay and i was mad at them but was that unjust like should i have like at least like like wave the finger like at what point is it it depends on what finger you're waving right i usually do like just show them that excuse me but is that even okay just say what's going on but like it's almost like a negative smirk to it no if i went like this that would be bad that would cause i would get in big trouble tonight fumble fumble yamako on the ground get it like wouldn't it be better just to be like it's okay what to give that like like i'm kidding now you're like reading into it but that lady is technically stealing his time correct it is wrong correct you shoot an appointment to get to too i was a little late no no the reason you were late was because of her the reason you weren't here because you were going to get here but you didn't get here because too much thumbing i only have two letters right what about embarrassing each other in in public what if it's like you and your body and you guys just do it as like a fun back and forth game so i did this once i was sitting in a restaurant with my best friend who's having a bar mitzvah for his son tomorrow so we sat in a restaurant and we're eating and then i jumped up from my seat and i said will you stop touching me and he's like what are you doing like sit down and i sat down like nothing happened and you're like what are you doing it's a great thing to do so is that considered inappropriate yes of course it's inappropriate but everybody doesn't actually care you just like he does it back to you one day you do it back to him you guys are having fun it's even your buddies are you allowed to have an embarrassment are you allowed to have fun on other people's expense is it really it is expensive he kind of likes it you know if you're if there's a guy drinking and you stand behind a glass door and you're like hey come here and the guy walks into a glass door everyone's laughing and he's like right because he's drunk does that mean that it's okay no what it's a glass door yeah yeah i mean you should have seen that coming that should have been the text don't put a glass if the yeah person is a little bit different you shouldn't it's wrong it's wrong but i think what we what he means here is that we don't embarrass people publicly like if you went to the lady and said what's the matter with you lady don't haven't you who brought you up this way and you know but in israel that she would be she would say to you turn around and says where the hell do you think you are you're talking to it like okay lady easy on the garlic goodbye good question no you shouldn't embarrass why why do you have two sets of rules immense you're a mensch they're created in the image of god also just like you i was frustrated especially with all the you know heat right now and she cut in front of me and i was already irritated so i didn't say anything but then i was like when does it end when is it not revenge and it's justice like do i you know you have to wait to not do it justice you know it's even would be bad if you did the following okay let's say you see her tomorrow and you're in line she's in front of you and you say she looks at you and she say and you tell her you know i can cut in front of you and do what you did to me yesterday but i am not like you that's not allowed either because that essentially you are sticking it to her and you shouldn't if you let it go you let it go as if it didn't happen god runs the world really is this news flash someone's been paying attention what is that noise oh again and just like i just give you an example my mom was on the plane back from israel and she was like one of the first persons to stand up and she because she usually she waits for everyone else to get off this time she was like easy for the girls and there was this woman she said like a big quote she said she wants to be on this pro palestinian i knocked her down and she and she was standing right in the middle my and good for you and um she's like you know what i'm not gonna do it i thought in my head i really hope this woman's bag my bag comes out before this one was on the computer she said mom said the first time in her life the you see let god get justice i bet you that girl got her tea and then she walked out somebody bumped into her and poured the tea on her she was scolded and she was crying and i'm not i hope not i hope she had the opposite that's rabbi come on listen it'll be all right yes with gossip let's say that someone asks you okay do you think this person is right for that person oh you would like to say a bad word then it depends what bad word you're using no it's in you can just say no no if you're if they're asking you about them about their their personality traits if you have something positive to say you should say it if you have something negative to say question is what is the appropriate thing to say but when it comes to talking about you know for marriages or business you have a responsibility to say the truth but remember what you perceive may not be the truth so you have to put it in a way that is responsible and to say look i'm saying this toilet i'm doing this not because of lash and hard because i'm really trying to help my experience has been like this and it's possible that i misunderstood this and that and but here's what you know and you have to be careful but i don't think people you should withhold information because we have a mitzvah that we want to treat other people the same we should treat others like we want to be treated so you have to think in two sides here one if it was my daughter if it were my daughter and somebody you know i asked somebody what would i expect the person to say and if it were my son if it would me what would i want someone to say do you know what i mean so you have to think on both sides of this and it's a lot of responsibility but you have to think about it you can't just say oh the guy's a banana you can't what about good advice like what if a friend asked you about someone and you know they're really great but you don't want to oversell and then they're more into it than they should be based on their own point of view find the right balance everything in moderation right joseph i need to give joseph in the back a little bit of love because i haven't seen him in a long time so yes but you know this is not what i wanted to talk about today just so you know it's fine it's a free-for-all you know just sam can't ask any questions because you guys are taking all the time so back home my sister would take a shower and the floor would be all soaked and i didn't notice and i would walk in step with my socks and it would my socks would be soaked so i came to her and so like i would tell her about that's okay right yes be more considerate of you yes yes but depends what you if you're coming in hey i don't do this to you when i take a shower it's not all wet what's the matter with you well maybe you should find a better way to express your feelings right but if you come to this look sis i love you could you please you know make sure that the floor is not wet because of my socks there's no problem with that of course not is that okay no my answer's not okay i thought about what i was gonna ask and then you decided to remove it because it had to do with pistachio ice cream again i don't really like pistachio ice cream it's very good okay so you're that's an american flavor taking oaths people say oh i swear no that's wrong should not do should not have the desire to take oaths to swear lying lying we should not lie how do i look today do i look good hold on when your wife asks you how do i look in this dress how are you supposed to respond to that you're my wife or your wife no there's a different it depends on the relationship i've been married i've been married over 15 years so i could look at my wife and she says how do i look in the dress i could say are we going for the japanese look i mean and i get a look and i know that that's not what i i did okay backtrack but no i was just kidding honey you look amazing but sometimes you say you're going for the chinese look and she's like yeah it doesn't look good right and like yeah it just doesn't so you have to know the person you shouldn't the question is if she if she walk if you are married to a woman and she wears a dress and it makes her look like krusty the clown okay and she said how do i look and you can say honey you look beautiful no that's not fair but what do you say honey crusty the clown look you're going boy because they're hair in them right no that can't you can't say that okay the question is and this is a much longer conversation that maybe on a day that there's a trip and we can get into in depth to discuss what is a lie and rav destler has have you had it enough of judaism that's it you take it off it sits in yamaka and we're done forget it i one time i was teaching at the university and this girl came up to me and said to me do you know that jesus died for your sins so i said i said to her really says yes he she told me the whole thing and i said you know thanks for telling me i'm out and she looked at me like i said he was like what jesus let's not get into that that's a separate class but what i wanted to say about truth and lie not to lie is really a lie it depends on what the purpose is there's a machis in the gemara between hillel and shamai when you go to a wedding do you have to sell tell the bride that she's beautiful who said that but what if she's not do you lie you shouldn't have married her what not me you're a guest you guys and your walker sounds bad what is that appropriate to the bride that she's beautiful there is you look so interesting yeah says you do not change because of circumstance we do not change what you say you always tell the truth but hillel says no the truth is what causes the greatest good and you should not cause if a woman on her wedding day the point is not to make her cry like you walk up there and say you're wearing white you know right you can't say that are you white it's not the point is that you should not cause if your wife asks you how beautiful am i do i look beautiful in this the answer is should you cause her to if you she believes that if you see and you could tell when the person when she asks what does she want she want the truth or she she wants or that she really wants to hear you give her a compliment i would say the following the beauty as your beauty has nothing to do with a dress so we talked about the valsheker of lying the last category that we should have as much as complete nicute as possible is the category of the secretion of god's name cleanliness where you remove the desire to sin nicu okay so i want to just mention couple of things about this he says that you have to look the way you live your life and you have to be very very careful that all your actions that people look at you see you as a good and righteous and upright person that is the the aspect of that what he's talking about when you your behavior outside right if they know that you're from arsenal you are essentially when you wear a kippah and you're saying i'm religious your behavior is that you're a a person that is following god and people are looking at you and so if when you let the girl go in front of you that's that's nice it's very nice it's good if you yelled at her that's the secreting god's name okay he then talks about making sure that we observe shabbat and yom tov to a higher degree without the desire to sin during shabbat and yomtov i don't want to speak too much into that and we should the next category which i don't want to start today because it's very very complicated so we'll do something else is to get to a level of nicute purification of our moral behavior in controlling four things the desire to be arrogant the desire to be angry to get angry i want to do them in order the desire to be jealous and the desire for taiwas that you have a desire that you want something that you shouldn't it is sort of all-inclusive okay those are the four moral virtues that we should remove all desires we should not want to have a desire to be angry should not have the desire or we should not have jealousy yeah can you explain desire because i feel like all of us would agree that we don't want to be jealous like it's more of an inclination to be jealous that's a good that's very good i like that it's very good correct but the desire what do i mean by that it means that you have a feeling toward that you're having this feeling of jealousy and he's saying you should remove that completely not to be jealous not to get angry if you get out if you get rid of the desire you cut the jealousy off the legs kind of you're jealous over over what somebody's a girl you don't have her if you don't desire her you're not going to be jealous the way he praised it that's the one thing i needed clarification yeah he's right so much better much more precise when we come to those four um arrogance i was going to give an example but that would be bad right give an example of arrogance because you never know okay when we talk about lying there are different levels there are different types of lying it's not only one category and he says the following there are those who lie and they lie completely they make up everything that they're saying nothing is true nothing why why do they do it because they like to be the center of attention and because they want people to think of them as wise and that they know a lot of things so they make it up wannabe know-it-alls they make stuff up sometimes people i talk to they argue and i have to explain to them listen in this conversation there's room only for one know at all and it's me not you because you don't know it all i do and then i have to prove it to them so i have to make up stuff i'm kidding when you you know when you're a professor you learn how to answer it authoritatively questions that you have no idea how to answer but you know how to formulate an answer that sounds like very important i had a what so that's good to know when i come back to college yeah they you know only the good ones some just can't do it there i had a professor in bible at nyu and he was telling me that he wrote an article for an encyclopedia on whatever i don't remember what the topic was and it was a german encyclopedia they took his english article translated it into german and they sent him the german so he can review because he knew german but he was much more comfortable writing in english and he read the german and he said to me you know i read this thing it was so convincing that i almost started to believe it and things in german really sound you know very so i have to be very careful encyclopedia articles that's the point did you are you raising your hand tell the truth don't be afraid yeah okay do you want to say something aaron no you sure yeah okay how am i doing though very good because i need some compliments these guys don't give me enough aliasaf who usually sits here gives me sort of a an idea of how i'm doing okay so that's one category and then there are people who tell a story and the story is half true half false right that's also a problem you shouldn't do now you're looking at me like yeah how could you say that with a straight face me what there is an out for educational purposes there is but that's a separate discussion so there are people who add these things and what happens is it becomes habitual and it becomes habitual you lo the person who does it loses track of what is reality and what is fantasy and it becomes very very problematic for his audience because he has created his own world because of his habit of talking about different things he is mixed all sorts of components okay let's stop here you