Women's Chanukah 5786 Lecture - Why the Chanukah Struggle Continues: Choosing Experience over Reason

begin with a chapter of Tahillim for our brothers and sisters in Sydney, Australia and especially all those who need a recovery of the dozens wounded in the horrific massacre the first night of Kaneka in Sydney. So let's say a cap tom for them and for our brothers and sisters in Israel in the holy land. So we'll say capital which is 124d 124 and which is 125 for. And the next 125 125 Shave. [snorts] So Kaneka, happy Kaneka to everybody and welcome. I know it wasn't so easy today with the weather and the big snow that we had. So thank you for braving the weather and gracing us with your presence. Everybody be blessed with a bright kaneka and a happy Kaneka for you and your loved ones among all of our people. Next week, please remember there's no class. I'm away next Tuesday but the week afterwards Ber Hashem we will resume. Today's class is dedicated by some very very special people. The class is dedicated in honor of the marriage of Ephraim Wolf to Batva Fox from their friends and families from Sydney Australia. Rabbi [snorts] Ley Wolf was one of the great rabbis of Sydney of Central Synagogue. married off his son Ephraim, [snorts] two foxes from South Africa. So maztov maztov and an amazing life and a day also dedicated by the cups and lefawitz family celebrating today the pion of their greatgrandson named after his grandfather Stanley Paul cops. May the beas and may he grow with all abundant blessings and joy and tranquility and and all of the blessings materially and spiritually. Today's class is also dedicated by Michael Yardin in honor of her son Mal Mardin Mazav in honor of her son Yehuda Ben Mal's 25th birthday which is connected to Kaneka which is on the 25th day of >> and that's when he was born. Wow. Okay. Amazing. And forim good for her family. Amen. >> Amen. Easy, smooth, yes and happy. [snorts] Today's class is dedicated in honor of the nth wedding anniversary of Kani and Kakay Kaplan on the 11th day of Kisv Maztov. Happy anniversary in a day. [snorts] And finally, today's class is dedicated by the Turnour family in honor of their wedding anniversary. Maztov may their wife and mother gi continue to be a steadfast pillar and guiding light bringing joy, warmth and love into their home. Amen. Thank you and maz to everybody and thank you very very much. We always be able to celebrate together with open hearts and joyous hearts and [snorts] experience the ultimate joy and the ultimate victory and the ultimate redemption when we will light again the minor in the baashi not just in our homes. Amen. So there's always this terrible paradox that I think all of us feel on a Kaneka like this as we welcomed the festival of lights, a time of gratitude, a time of joy, a time of celebration, a time of [snorts] family unity, a time of Jewish unity, and a time of light dispelling darkness. Everybody was horrified and really shaken at our course to hear of such a uh horrific horrific massive massacre of Jews whose only crime was that they came together to celebrate Kaneka in [snorts] Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia. what was organized each year by Rabbi Ali Schlanganger, the Kabach there, who was murdered in cold blood together with uh many other Jews, including two Holocaust survivors and a child and another rabbi, another Schlakh there, Hashem Yin Kim, may God avenge their blood and so many dozens wounded. What they have there is Kanek at the Sea. I've visited the community of Sydney. It's one of the most uh beautiful gorgeous communities in the world physically [snorts] and spiritually especially the Bondi area simply stunning and marvelous and each year Rabbi Schlanganger [snorts] organized Kanek at the sea for all types of Jews even less affiliated and more secular and more traditional to bring them together close to a thousand or 2,000 people there. And when we hear this, it's very hard. It's very devastating. And then we go to light the candles and sing and eat lotkas and celebrate together. You know that paradox, that challenge emotionally. You know, what do we tell ourselves? What do we tell our children? As you know, I'm not the person uh who has answers for any of this. This is way way above my grade my pay grade and probably all of our pay grades. But I was I was thinking about the Shia this week, the class this week for Kaneka. It's really a conversation also with myself. Not just a conversation with you, but a conversation with myself that doesn't really answer big questions, but I just think help maybe can help. At least it helps me navigate some of this internally to be able to help us show up the way we could and should and are empowered to show up during such times, during such paradoxical times, during such elevating and yet challenging and difficult times. >> [snorts] >> So that's what I want to I want to address but take it back to the context of Kaneka itself of understanding what Kaneka itself is really all about. You should always understand how in Jewish history there is a very deep pattern that is a very comforting pattern and that is whenever Jews face serious crisis from without they go deeper within. That's always the rule. Not because anyone is trying to escape. That's never an option to escape. Jews must fight back in every possible way. Must protect themselves in every possible way. Must be secure in every possible way simply physically. Yet we also know that in such circumstances and when you see such darkness, you need to fortify yourself and your loved ones from within. So we go much much deeper inward and it's the deep depth inward that allows a person then to be able to fortify themselves also outwardly externally on every level physically emotionally psychologically and spiritually. In the source sheet I prepared today we have the origin of the Kaneka story in Gmorra Shabas. This is the Talmudic source for what happened on Kaneka. It's a very brief description of our sages and it became immortalized in Jewish consciousness and Jewish history. And I want to note to you a very interesting way of how they describe the main part of the story which would seem counterintuitive and even difficult to understand. So you can take a look in your first first source. We have the original which is in Hebrew and then an English translation. Shabas that's fract Shabas page 21 the second chapter of Shabas which is the source for the laws of Kaneka and the laws of Shabas candles as well but and the way the Gmorra introduces it with an interesting question of my Kaneka which means what is Kaneka now assuming everybody knew what Kaneka was we know what Kaneka is and we're living 2500 years after the story of Kaneka when the Gomorrah wrote this there was only a few hundred years after the story of Kaneka Kaneka has become Not just a Jewish household name, but it's become entrenched into Jewish life. Just like everybody knows what Shabas is and what Trishan is and what Yamiper is. People knew what Kaneka is. So when the Gmor is asking my Kaneka and especially the question is not in the beginning of the discussion after many laws of Kaneka. It's like what is Kaneka? Well, you just discussed all these laws. So why you asking now? Ask it in the beginning. So it's obviously a deeper question. My Kaneka not just technically what is Kaneka? What is Khan means? What is its inner theme? What is its inner method? And that's also a question. Why are you asking the question? Everybody comes together to celebrate each year. They probably know what it is. The Greeks and the Syrians and the Jews and the oil and the but obviously wants to tell us something and maybe negate something else. What is that? So he answers our rabbis have taught, the sages have taught. I'll read it in the original but you also see the translation on the 25th day of begins the days of which number eight eight days and one made doesn't make eulogies then one doesn't fast because it's a time of joy what is the reason for this when the Syrian Greeks the reason I'm saying Syrian Greeks even though it says yanim is because essentially what happened was Alexander the great conquered much of the world. He was from Macedonia, from Greece. But then when he died, those who took over couldn't hold on to the empire. So the empire of Alexander the Great split into four four parts. And ultimately it was the Syrian the Syrian Greeks which was but it was following the Greek tradition of Alexander the Great that created the whole Kaneka story their fight against the Kashm and against the Bamed and against the Jews. That's why we usually say Syrian Greeks even though Sedivanim Greeks because technically Dantis wasn't Syria. the north of Israel. So he says when the Syrian Greeks entered the what is the is the inner chamber of the basikt the Bik stood on the temple mount on Harabas in your Shalim. Of course this is the second basikt and you had many sections to the basikt. It went on a slope. It's a mountain. Later the Romans flattened the mountain. I think they lowered it by a thousand feet and they flattened it. That's why Temple Mount doesn't look like what it looked like then was a har is a mountain. Today it just looks like a flat plaza, an elevated plaza where the mosque is. So the basikdash was on a slope and you went up higher and higher and higher. So there was the outer part of the mountain. There was the courtyard which was surrounded by a wall. And then there was that but that was without a roof. And then there was the heel. The heckl was the inner chamber of the basikt which was its holy space where nobody almost almost nobody entered besides the kayan. And over there you had the minra. You had an inner altar where they burnt incense, no animals. And over there you also had a shulan a table where they had bread 12 loaves of bread that the would exchange every shabas and eat the old ones and bring in the new ones. That's what you had. Then later inside of that you had the holy of holies where only the so is the inner roofed chamber of the mik when the went into it. What's what did they do? They defiled they contaminated all the oils that were in the sanctuary. The oils that were designated to light them in because we light them in every night in the Bik with olive oil as the Tory clearly says they contaminated the oil. So what happens when the monarchy when the monarchy of the overcame and emerged victorious they came and they searched they find only one cruise of oil that was placed with a seal of the high priest meaning it was untouched and unsoiled as Rashi says from the seal they could see that nobody opened it wasn't touched says it was hidden in the earth. It was obviously nobody had contact with it. So there was no tum. There was only one jug, one jug of oil, one p, one cruise of oil that had this status that still had a seal. Everything else was defiled and contaminated. The problem was it only has enough oil to light for one day. The great miracle occurs and they lit from this jug eight days. The next year, that year was amazing. The next year The sages instituted these days and they turned them into holidays, festivities, good days, a time to say halal, praise, and a time to give gratitude. This is the way the garra summarizes the entire [snorts] experience to answer the question. What is Kaneka? What is curious about this? Look how they mention the victory of the war almost in passing, right? You say, When theashim prevailed over them and were victorious, they went into the Ba Mikdash, they searched and they couldn't find any oil that was uncontaminated and only one cruise of oil. So the victory is almost like in passing. Yeah, they had to win the war in order to reclaim the basikash. But that's not like the real story. The real story is they search and they can't find anything and finally they find one jug and now they're still stuck because there's insufficient oil for what they need. they only have for one day and they didn't have more oil and the miracle happens. Now what's curious is it seems like the victory on the battlefield that's the main story because let's imagine for examp let's say just for argument sake that they didn't find a jug of oil they came to the bdash they search and search and search and all the oil is contaminated and there's no pure oil. So what do you think would have happened? What would have they done? >> [laughter] >> They would have to make new oil and they would have to wait another few days right till they light the man inra. So for those days they wouldn't light them in just like they didn't light the mana before because the whole bame mikt was ransacked and conquered by the Greeks. Now they also wouldn't. So what would have happened? There wouldn't be for another few days. But what happens if they would have lost the war? What do you think would have happened if they would have lost the war? >> Huh? a slave. >> It would be the end, right? If if if the if the Jewish people would be helized, there would be no Judaism. There would be no Jewish people. They would be assimilated. So, it seems like the main story is not the oil. The main story is what? The victory. That's the main story. Without the victory, there would be no Jews in Judaism left. Without the oil, the bino wouldn't be lit for another few days. Yet, what do they make the main story? All about the jug of oil. The victory is almost impassing. It's very interesting when that's the main story. Imagine, okay, in 1967, there were seven armies. Seven armies that wanted to destroy Israel. And as the Nasser said, we'll throw them into the sea. And they planning another Awitz 20 years after the first Awitz, another Awitz in 1967. Six days there was a miraculous victory. Israel tripled or almost quadrupled its size. Defeated all of the armies, liberated the old city of Jerusalem, [cough and clears throat] Yehuda and Shamron and Aza, the golden heights including Kev [snorts] and Crabas. All of these things they wanted another Awitz and yet there were eight or 900 Jewish casualties, more than 800 casualties. But the Jewish people were saved. There were 3 million Jews then in Israel. Now imagine if afterwards there was a flame in one of the sh in your that burned for 8 days. Very beautiful. A beautiful icing on the cake. But is that the story? I mean let's face it. And if it wouldn't burn for 8 days it wouldn't burn for 8 days. You see my point? And yet the victory is mentioned in passing. The real story is somehow this oil. The question becomes even stronger. The P Yeshua asks the is which means you're not allowed to use impure oil for the minor but that's only when most of the people are pure and you have pure items but when you have the is in a state of tum and you don't have oil that's so the is under these circumstances you're allowed to do it with impure oil of course it's better with pure oil but when you don't have anything else and in that situation all coming from war everybody was soil contaminated. You're allowed to light the manure under these circumstances. That means they could have even lit it with impure oil technically. So the says it doesn't even look like it was a necessary miracle which is very interesting. So not only don't they focus on the war and they focus on the oil which doesn't seem so significant in the oil itself. It seems [snorts] like like this was just an extra thing that's very nice. It's very gishmak. It's very beautiful but how essential was it? So that's number one what we need to understand. Another very interesting thing is to see it from the perspective of the Greeks. The Gmorrah says when you want to understand what Kaneka is when they came into the what's the first thing they did? They contaminated all the oil in the it seems like this was their now it's interesting when an enemy comes and conquers the defeated what's the first thing they focus on? They want the booty. They want your treasures. They want your silver. They want your gold. They want your diamonds. The B mikdash had a lot of treasures even though it wasn't as expensive as later. Whereas the first B mikd but it's what did they come? They came in and what do they do? They contaminate the oil. Now contamination is not even something tangible. You can't go you can't go to the bank with tum when they came recently into the Louv museum. If you saw burglars came to the Louv museum in Paris you saw the story and they stole in eight or nine minutes the crown jewels of Napoleon and his wife. $100 million. $100 million of crown jewels. They figned themselves. They imagined they they they looked like construction workers. They went up with a little cherry picker from their pickup truck, construction truck. They took the $100 million worth of crown jewels and they ran away. They can't even sell them as they are. So, they have to melt them. Whatever they're going to do with them, or I don't know if they found them. I don't think they found them yet. They dropped one of them. So, they uh that that was they didn't find them yet. Crazy story. Here the Ivan come in timu they contaminated the oil. What do you have from contaminated oil? Well, they were experts in they were experts in and it's like come in do your thing. It looks like this was their agenda to come and contaminate the oil. But this explains why the sages were so focused on the oil. If they were focused on the oil, so therefore the Jews were also focused on the oil. But what's this fascination and obsession with oil when the real issue is who's going to win politically, militarily, who's going to own the state, who's going to have sovereignty, whose culture and identity is going to prevail. If you look at the prayers of Alanism where we do focus on the victory over there we do focus on the victory and the exceptional miracle of the victory itself because it was we say in the that you have delivered the strong into the hands of the weak the many into the hands of the few. So this was an exceptional victory because the powers were not balanced. The Jewish army, the guerilla army of the Kashmayam was very, very small. At most, it was a few thousand Jews. The Greeks had then the Syrian Greeks had one of the most powerful armies in the world. You're talking about probably between 50,000 or 100,000 troops. So, it's like having an arm wrestle, like having a wrestle, having one person being wrestled by 200 people. It's impossible even if you're strong and mighty, like an ant trying to fight a person. And yet, the Kashm proved victorious. They drove out the Syrian Greeks. They liberated Yuralim. They reconquered the Bam Mikdash and they dedicated it. Which is why it's called Kaneka rededication. So it's not like the victory on the battlefield was a small victory. It was an exceptional story. This makes it even more perplexing that the sages don't zoom in on it. And it's like this is the story. My Kaneka they won the war. After that they also let them which is very fine. But as you see here that that became my this is what they want you to remember. This is what they want you to focus on. Not God forbid that they're minimizing the amazing quality of the war victory. And we mentioned it in Alhanim, but in the story of the Gmoran, that's like the that's the foyer. That's the intro to be able to get to the crux of the story, to the meat and potato, I should say, to the oil of the story, pun intended, which is the lighting of the manura with the pure oil, right? Now if you look in Alhanim in the second source, how does it start? We say this in all of the dvening and the benching of in the times of Matau the son of he was the high priest. He was called and his children. He had his five sons famous Yehuda Makabe and the other brothers. the the kingdom the monarchy of the Syrian Greeks which was wicked stood up on the Jewish people and they had an agenda to make them forget your we're saying this in Davin so we're talking to Hashem they made us they wanted to make us forget your to take them away from the laws of of your will I want you to focus the sages wrote this prayer and every word is meticulous they don't say to make them forget the mitzvah to remove the Jewish people from the mitzvah rather they say they wanted to make them forget your and they don't say all mitzvah there's different types of mitzvah mishb are mitzvah that are very logical any civil society needs them like a prohibition against theft or against murderus are more cultural eneral testimonial mitzvah like they remember like like every nation you have thanksgiving in America. So we have things like shabas like like pes remembering the exodus remembering different events and milestones like pur these are called adus they testify to cultural historic events of a people and then you have what's called are super rational mitzvah here he focuses on and not just the laws of your will so he doesn't just >> [snorts] >> In this precision, in this choice of words, we have conveyed a very very profound message which gives us a whole deeper perspective on the story of Khanek and its relevance. You see, people sometimes make the mistake [snorts] thinking that the Syrian Greeks wanted to abolish and obliterate all of Jewish thought, all of Jewish culture, all of Jewish religion, all of Jewish practice. But it's much more complex than that. It's much more nuanced. It's much more nu nuanced than that. And here just to convey it I'm going to quote a few lines in the next source [snorts] as you could see in the previous lab the sixth lab I'm actually named after him his name was he passed away 1950 so he has a discourse December 1940 middle of the second world war he escaped from the Nazis he came to New York and in this discourse he characterizes in a very powerful way what The battle was a few lines here. Listen to this. As a brilliant intellectual exercise with profound wisdom, the Syrian Greeks can agree to that. They can embrace it. Furthermore, furthermore, because they were philosophers and many of them very brilliant, they were even moved, many of them were even impressed, mesmerized by the deep wisdom in no beautiful. So what's the problem? So what do you want? Their position was that it's God's. It's Hashem's. What do we mean that it's Hashem's? The sanctity of [snorts] it's his wisdom. It's God's wisdom. We'll explain what that means. The Medish says, the Greek said, They asked the Jews to ride on the horn of an axe which was then used often write on the horn of that you don't have a part you don't have a portion the god of Israel meaning the war was against godliness divinity and he says in learn they didn't mind learn it's fine you can even do mitzvah Don't mention, don't experience as a divine experience as his will. Don't mention, don't experience means divinity, godliness. Thus the agenda was the first thing contaminate the oil in the sanctuary. You can use oil. We're not getting rid OF THE OIL. LIGHT contaminated oil. We don't mind if there's oil. Oil light. Do whatever you want. But the contaminated oil. What is the Reb teaching us here? something very very profound which will show us why when we say that the Greeks won that we won the Greeks on Kaneka [snorts] it's a little more nuanced than that and that's why we still celebrate say my Kaneka because it's a good question my Khan it's a question even today what is really Kaneka what are we learning here what is he really sharing here you see historically The Greeks posed a challenge to the Jews like no other tribes and nations before. They dealt with they dealt with a lot of enemies during the course of the first Bamikash. If you read the Tanakh, there were constant constant confrontations with their neighbors and enemies from the Egyptians to the Assyrians to the Philistines to the Phoenicians to the Assyrians to the Babylonians. Of course, the Greeks was the first culture that managed to helanize the Jewish people. The most of the Jews then were known as Msavnim. Msnim means Jews who joined Yavan. What was the enticement here? Because they weren't coming just as barbarians with a territorial conflict or simply violence. I want to destroy you. But there was something much more subtle, much more sophisticated. In fact, it's the Greeks who are credited with developing what later would be known today as Western thought. Mahamarave thought of the western world was deeply deeply impacted, crafted, molded by the tremendous influence of the Greeks. The Greeks were a highly sophisticated people educated, enlightened, cultured. They cherished yes some of the greatest they introduced history, philosophy. Some of the greatest philosophers till the modern age names like Socrates, like Aristotle, [snorts] like Plato, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, three generations. And Aristotle was the tutor of Alexander the Great. When he was a child, his father Philip had him had Aristotle tutor Alexander the Great. They introduced philosophy, literature, Greek literature. art. [clears throat] You're talking about people who cherished science and athletics and beauty and human development and human prowess and Olympics and competition. So you're talking about a a nation that cherished ideas and cherished human development and cherished reason and therefore they were not this mimer is telling us they were not so perturbed by the brilliant intellectual gymnastics of Judaism. Anybody who sits in yeshiva for many years and takes it seriously knows that there's a method methodology. When you learn Mishna, you learn Gimmorra and all of its commentators, there's nuance, brilliance there. There's foundations, paradigms, how to think, how to develop an idea. The paradigms of which the Tyra is based on and how things are developed and how you think about things and how you compare things and analyze and dissect and question and respond. It's a universe of intellectual creativity and brilliance. People could sit if they had the ability centuries and millennia to learn that the analysis, scrutiny and methodical thinking that later develops in Yiddish in such a powerful way in the Talmud and Gmorra Talmud and all of its commentators for hundreds and thousands of years till this very day. This on its own does not drive them crazy. They even have respect for it. As the mimer says, the brilliant ones among them could even be mesmerized by it and enjoy it. They'll even sponsor this in their university. You can have a section for this, make a chair, and you could learn it and you can get a degree in it. Reason, methodology is something they respected. It's something they cherished. Even rituals, mitzvah, every tribe has its rituals. This is your myth. They call it a myth. It's your tradition. It's your culture. It's your history. You do it. They're fine. That's what he says. That doesn't bother them. You have a culture. You have a tradition. It's part of your family history. It's part of your systems. It's fine. So, what is the war? And that's where the oil comes in. As he puts it, they wanted to make us forget your what drives them mad about Jews and Judaism more than anything else is that Judaism is not philosophy. The essential revelation of Judaism is nava. What do we mean? It's the intimate embodied experience of the divine in a person's heart, in a person's nervous system, in a person's body. It's the personal love, the intimate relationship, the ability to surrender my ego and go into flow where I become a channel for divine consciousness. Each person according to their capacity. Of course, the prophets embodied that fully. That's what avi is. But as the says in when we talk about the gula, what's the ga? Every boy, every girl is going to become a prophet. When Yeshua told you we have competition, elder are prophesizing. Arrest them, incarcerate them. What's Mosha's response? You're jealous for me. My agenda is everybody should be a prophet. What is he really saying here at Mat? Everybody was a prophet. What's the idea of prophecy? The idea of prophecy doesn't just mean, you know, somebody who has a crystal and they look and they say, "I'll tell you when it's going to snow or which stock market you should invest or what's going to be the news tomorrow or what Trump is going to text tomorrow." That's part of NAVO. But the essential idea of nava is that the divine presence could be embodied in your own biological, psychological, physiological, and spiritual system. That you're a channel. You're an embodiment of the divine presence. That the inner energy of Hashem, the reality of the world is channeled through you, through your mind, through your heart, through your body. This takes a lot of work, a lot of inner refinement to be able to uh clarify to be able to to fine-tune and purify the antennas of my soul. But essentially, the soul is an ant has an antenna that channels cosmic intelligence and cosmic love. To quote the words of the we always quote, you have a soul that is a piece of Hashem. What does mean a piece of Hashem? Hashem has pieces or is like a birthday cake that you put up into pieces. God doesn't have parts. The word is actually the the uniqueness of a soul because what it means is that every single soul just like a child is part of a parent. When you say your child is part of you doesn't mean god forbid you split it into pieces. It means that even as a child is a separate person, what are they embodying? Even physiologically, this is an embodiment of the seed and the egg and the genes of Tati and mommy and of the soul. So even as my soul is in my body, it's embodying it's channeling the divine reality. It's like a piece of Hashem like the ray of the sun that manifests the sun and the sun is big enough that one ray doesn't compete with another ray. But every ray channels the light of the sun in its own unique way. The sun that shines into my house and gives me vitamin D and warmth is the same sun that shines into your house through its unique ray. This is the prophetic experience of Judaism. It's not an intellectual thing. I could prove that there's a god or I can argue against being a god. I can prove this. I can prove that. I can explain this method, that method. Those are intellectual tools. But that's not the essence of Judaism. The essence of Judaism is the embodied experience of Hashem's reality in my bones, in my body, in my nervous system. It's not about words, even though I'm talking about it. Cuz at the moment, people are still not understanding my silence. But very soon, I'll just get up and I'll be silent and you'll have the most beautiful class in the world. But since we still live in a world where we're using words, I'm also going to be using some words, whatever. Unfortunately, my wife sometimes tells me, "What do you talk about so much? What do you talk and talk and talk and talk? Just be quiet." [snorts] Amen. Rabbi Jonathan Saxs Allam was the former British chief rabbi. So he said, "What's the difference between a sermon, a party, and a fabangan?" So he said, "At a party, everybody talks and nobody listens. At a sermon, a rabbi sermon, one person speaks and nobody listens. At a fabbran, nobody speaks and everybody listens. An embodied experience is not about words. You may say words, you may not say words, but your internal nervous system is aware of it. [snorts] That's an intimate relationship. It's something you don't describe through definitions and descriptions because it's your entire being. You you are it. You don't describe it. The essence of Judaism is not reason and rationality. This is not to say Judaism is against reason and rationality. Not the Tyra says this is your wisdom. There was a Jewish leader who once said ah hopefully one day if the if this intelligent people will only have a little we're not against reason and rationality Judaism is full of reason full of full of ideas full of wisdom and when we learn we need to we want to understand I want to understand so what is it reason and rationality are tools tools are amazing a hammer is an incredible tool. An incredible tool. A screwdriver is a very important tool. A knife is an important tool. [panting] All of these are tools. The mind, rationality is an incredible tool to help us navigate the experience of the spirit. The mind, you know what the mind is like? It's like a map. If you go to Hawaii or you go to Miami or you visit Australia or you visit another country in the world, you have a map and the map says, "Ooh, you see, oh, now we're here. Now we're here. Now we're here." And the map helps you. The map describes what it is. The map will tell you the history of it. The map will tell you when it was built, and you have to make believe you're interested. You know, when the tour guides do that, it was built in 1761. Yeah. And they got a fight and everybody's like, "Sure." And then they're sleeping and on their phones. And there's one person who's asking questions. Yeah, you know those tours tours, right? It's like anybody's when are we going to eat, right? A map is helpful in the sense it describes, it gives definition, it gives context, it gives history, right? It can tell you what it is. But let's understand something. It can't replace the experience of being present. Never. You can't experience a visit to Italy or a visit to Greece or a visit to Moscow or a visit to your Shallay or a visit to New York. That doesn't sound so interesting. You can't experience a visit by studying the map. Why don't you sit on your couch, take a globe AND SAY, "OH, HERE IS GREECE. HERE'S Hong Kong. Here's Nepal." The map is not the territory. It sounds simple, but it's not so simple. The map is not the territory. The map describes the territory at best. If you want to see that Italy looks like a boot, you have to look at a map because if you go to Italy, you won't see a boot. But if you want to touch the soil, you need to go there. The map is not going to give me the experience of it. The map is not the territory, although it has tremendous value. When you come home and you want to explain to somebody where you were, you point on the map. If you're there and you want to know where's a right, where's a left, you use the map. If you want some history, some context, some description, but that's not the territory. The Greeks crave to substitute reality with a map of reality. And that made all the difference. And that's what western thought is based on. Reality is substituted with a map of reality. And in many ways, it seems so tempting because with a map, you know the value of a map, you could control it. You have it in your hand. It's under your domain. You see where everything is. Nothing surprises you on a map. So it's very comfortable to substitute reality with a map of reality. So for the Greeks, what is reality? Whatever you could measure with your mind, whatever you can understand, whatever your reason can control instead of surrender to reality. You're a channel of reality. You become the source of reality. Your brain measures reality. Whatever could be measured exists. Whatever can't fit into my brain does not exist because it's not on my map. It doesn't exist. There's something very tempting to it. This is where human being substitutes God. What's the problem with that? The problem with that is reality is infinite. Reality is an reality is divine. [snorts] Reality is infinite oneness. When we reduce reality to reason, we are severed from the prophet inside of us. We don't know the prophet inside of us anymore. We're not connected to the spirit of reality, to the energy of reality. All we have is the mind grappling to figure things out. I need control. I need the map. [snorts] And that's what so many of us do. In fact, that's what we often praise in life. The more in control, I stay safe, small, in control. I get at everything. I define everything. Some of us do it philosophically and some of us do exactly the same thing emotionally. [snorts] In this sense, the Greeks were actually trying to go away somewhat from paganism even though they didn't completely go away from paganism. The zara that the warns about that the Egyptians were so entrenched in that many Jews were entrenched in in the first Bikash. The garra says in the beginning of the second B mikdash it was obliterated. They obliterated desor the for idolatry. It's very hard to understand today why are people why do people worship statues like what's selling all these statues and breaks them and then has them burned. Like what? Like I have other temptations like you have this temptation Lord to take a stone and then worship it and then look at a fish and say this fish is God and then turn a cow into a holy cow and start worshiping a cow and then this one is worshiping the sun and the moon and the star and this one what is this and you're sacrificing children like what is this about and yet you see that Mosha does not stop warning the Jewish people and in the second bas they don't have this temptation anymore this is the Greek challenge it's a different type of challenge So I want to understand I want you to understand paganism in many ways has in it something of the flavor of Judaism. Judaism was a protest against paganism. You know why? Because essentially what is paganism? Paganism is saying everything is God. Everything is spirit. You see this rack? It's not a rock. It's a god. Is that true or a lie? It's a lie and it's true. Of course the rock is a manifestation of Hashem. But it's a manifestation of Hashem. Everything has divine energy. Recreates the world. Isel says even a pebble, a drop of water, a flake of snow has a soul in it. Nothing is devoid of a divine soul. That's what gives it life. But it's all one. It's cosmic oneness. There's no competition of forces. As the pagans said, this god and that god and that god. They have thousands of gods. It's all oneness. But everything is alive. Everything is alive. The world is a living organism. Just like a body is a small living organism. The world is called in the medish gvgu. It's a macro of the micro. It's a ggud. It's a large organ. It's one body. [snorts] Where do I end? And where do you begin? Really? Do you know that the oxygen that is now in your brain? You know where it was a few seconds ago? In my brain. Do you know that? And you didn't even ASK ME PERMISSION. YOU STOLE MY OXYGEN LITERALLY. AND YOU'RE DOING IT TO her right now. >> [laughter] >> THAT'S REALLY WHAT HAPPENS. It was inside of me. I exhaled. Thank God [snorts] somebody else inhales it. And the truth is the entire ecosystem is so balanced. Everybody is giving. Everybody is taking. It's one unified reality. This is true with our planet. And you could see it visibly. And if somebody quits, we're all kaput. If the wind decides I'm going on vacation, it's Khan time. I'm going We would like if the wind go on vacation a little bit. Oh, I'm going. You know what would happen? It's great. The sun could suction out all the like a like a like a like a suction cup. The sun could get all the vaporized water into clouds. The problem is when it rains, it comes right back into the oceans and the whole earth dies. THE WINDS SPREAD THE CLOUDS. So when it rains, there is something fertile. There's fertility. The snow protects the plants like a blanket. People don't realize the snow is a blanket. Besides enjoyable for kids not to have to go to school and for the children inside of us who love to see the world in white. And the [snorts] same is true with every force in nature. Every worm contributes to the toiling of the earth making it fertile for growth. Every single worm. So it's all spirit. It's all alive. And your body it's all energy. It's divine energy that speaks to us constantly. The pagans turned it into fragmented gods. What did the Greeks do? They went to the other extreme. The pagans saw spirituality in everything physical and it became a god. The Greeks went you don't see anything spiritual in the physical. It's just what you can measure with your own mind and process and be in control of. And that's how you describe. So it's essentially it's a dead universe. Even the word God is not a Jewish word. It's a Greek word. Because in Judaism, God is not a reality. It's not a noun. It's an interactive experience. If you look in Hashem, what's the name for Hashem and utk is, is will be, it's creation from the word mahav creates. Every other word in kabal is called infinity. It's the infinite presence of all reality. We're all channeling Hashem. Everyone is part of Hashem. Everything is part of Hashem. But you're not fragmented. It's all Hashem. It's all oneness. [snorts] So there's alive. There's a living dynamic. You're alive. That's what it means to be alive. Alive means that the spirit of infinity is being channeled through you every single moment. Now the question is how clear I am, how transparent I am because Hashem also creates kipo which are coverups and shells and blockages. that block all of that and try to take us out of reality into the map of reality. The most torturous way of living is living in a map and not living in reality. The map is good. You come home and it's good to have a description. It's good to have a definition. But when the map becomes the only place where I live instead of going anywhere, I just go there on the map. Before Corona, people used to come to classes. You remember today? Yeah. I've we sometimes women they say I used to come to you before Corona. After Corona, you don't go anywhere. You do the map, you sit at home and it comes to your screen and that's it. So everybody has to do what's good for them. I'm just saying in life I'm not going to go visit anywhere. I'm just going to look at the map. It's devoid of the experience of it. So now [snorts] when we reduce reality into reason, we sever ourselves from the flow inside of us from the prophet inside of us. The divine soul and the body which when cleared up can channel the infinite consciousness and intelligence of the universe. The PK says in from my flesh I shall perceive Hashem. So the bal said in Yiddish one needs to sand, crystallize, refine the flesh until you'll see their you'll see godliness there. It's an embodied intimate experience. It's a relationship. If there's some things we understand, beautiful understanding is a tool, but it's a tool at best and it only describes that which the mind can describe. The truth of reality, it can't describe. It could just be experienced the way it's experienced by each person according to the way Hashem wants them to experience the light of infinity through their body, through their mind, through their soul, through the system. [panting and sighs] And here is really where the saying the battle of the Greeks against the Jews was deeper than just we want the territory and we want to destroy your religion. In many ways, it's more subtle and therefore could sometimes be more lethal. Or to put it differently, in some ways the Greeks actually were victorious even though they were not victorious on the battlefield, but they were victorious in the soul. Why? Because for many people, Judaism is an intellectually rich, engaging, and even inspiring mental experience. You learn. I could learn my whole life and I have information and I have thoughts and I have ideas and at the Shabas table I even have ver beautiful ver and insights and perspectives and some of them are nice they're nice they're all nice actually I [snorts] mean some are mgishmak different people different flavors and so on and so forth but it could be all of that [snorts] and there's information and more information and more some of the information could be inspiring and can be enthusiastic and certainly could be intellectual ually rich and diverse. [snorts] But here's the question. Can you feel the bliss of intimacy with the divine in your heart? Can your nervous system experience what the Tanya calls from the Zoya Rusa Liba? Rusa Liba is the deep rapture. Rapture. You know what rapture is? Uh, >> huh? >> Yeah. The rapture of the heart. That's [snorts] not something I could tell somebody to do and it's not an idea. I experience it in my heart, in my spine, in my body, in my nervous system. The very question, let's face it, seems unJewish to many people. When sometimes asked this question, they want to know which Far Eastern religion are you bringing us or what did somebody put into your Kool-Aid this morning? This is not part of the process. This is where the Greeks were victorious. That's what the mimer is saying. I don't care if you learn Tyra, but don't experience the divine in Tyra. It's a beautiful experience. It's another thing to study. I don't even care if you do mitzvah. You just show up and you do mitzvah because of reward, because you're scared of punishment, because your grandmother did it, because it's culture, because it's tradition, there's some nice things. BUT THE RELATIONSHIP NOT the even the intellectual wisdom of is not intellect. It's a divine flow of consciousness that is often enclosed in the intellect. That it's your will that you love this that there's a real relationship here that intimate relationship. Imagine in a marriage or any relationship of two close people where the nature of the relationship is just understanding intellect. Basically we could sit and argue about ideas. Okay. When I was dating I remember my sister said you're not marrying a you're looking for a wife not a go to yeshiva and find yourself a kusa and sit for hours and kill each other debating. You're right you're wrong. You're right. You're wrong. You're right. You're almost right. You don't know what you're talking about. You know, some guys come out of yeshiva and they think that's the way you connect, right? So everything his wife says, [panting] I don't know why so many people are laughing, but okay. And the guy's like, "What? That's how you're supposed to connect, man. I just proved that you were wrong. You should just tell me I'm the most brilliant man that you ever met in your life. You know, I proved the Russian Shiva wrong. I proved the maj wrong. I prove all my friends wrong." And you got to tell them, you know, marriage is like it's not a Greek experience. Now, we cherish reason and reason sometimes protects us. It protects us from cults. It protects us from stupidity. It protects us from being blindfolded. It protects us from being manipulated and exploited. That's why in many ways, reason is a gift, but only when it's a channel for God, not a substitute for God. The map, we like maps. It's good to have a map, but not as a substitute for reality. Just like you cannot eat cake or lattkas or donuts with your brain. I've tried many years. Doesn't work. If and if I wouldn't eat it, I only eat my brain. I would have looked better. But unfortunately, I don't only eat it with my brain. Cuz to eat a donut or a lotka, you need to use your taste buds. You can't live life. If that's true with donuts, how much more so is it true with life? You can't live life with your brain. I can't walk around like that's artificial intelligence. So the Greeks wanted to make everybody artificially intelligent. It's amazing because artificial intelligence is more brilliant than any genius rabbi in the world. The information they have unbelievable within 10 seconds. What 10 seconds? Within a second and a half you say give me a kaneka sermon right style of Rabbi Y. Yeah. Within a second and a half. Yeah. Takes me time. They're much better than the original. Much better. They know me better than I know myself. They know everything I ever said that's ever on the internet that anybody ever put any clip. I don't remember. I don't remember what I said yesterday. [laughter] [panting] I remember once I saw a video there was a painting. He made a painting of the labavatureba and he came to the rebba for dollars and he presented it to him without skipping a hardb says ah better than the original [laughter] better. But what's it missing? It's missing a soul an embodied experience the embodied relationship. The words will be nicer. They'll be fluffy. They'll be eloquent. There won't be mistakes. They don't make a single spelling mistake. God bless them. these guys. So reason is a beautiful tool. It's a beautiful tool. If somebody feels they're being brainwashed or indoctrinated, but when reason becomes the beginning and middle and end of reality, it's a tragedy. So understand what happened in first Bd second bas in the era of a desributed every spirit, every physical reality became a spiritual reality became a god. So the Greeks completely divorced the spiritual from the physical and all reality is what I could measure with my mind what I could define with my understanding and that's reality. So went now to the other extreme and as a result of that the victory of the Greeks is whenever we approach life that way it's approaching life from the place where I want to remain safe small and in control. I substitute reality with the map of reality on every single level emotionally, intellectually, psychologically. So that's why they don't want to make you forget or as long as Judaism is a cerebral religion. Cerebral is the word, I have no problem. It's fine. You can agree, you cannot agree. And that's why the word God is like a noun. It's a philosophical noun. Does God exist? Does he not exist? Okay, maybe you'll prove that he does exist. That's not the God of the Tanakh. God of Tanakh is not something you prove exists, doesn't exist. IT'S A GOOD ARGUMENT. Can somebody who's an atheist is there prove that God exists? It's a discussion, but that's not the experience of Hashem. That's a philosophical piece of information that could be debated this way, that way, that way. Richard Dawkins, who was one of the famous atheists, said that the pagans believed in thousands of gods. The Jews reduced it to one god. So, they got better. And now we'll get rid of that one god. and will finally reach completion. It's his understanding. The real term is it's infinity. Everything is we're all part of. Hashem is something you channel. It's not an existence that exists in heaven, exists there. I please him. I don't please him. He's this. He's that type. Those aren't philosophical constructs that divorced us from experience to the point that people don't even understand this language. That's how deeply the Greeks were victorious. The entire language seems alien to many Jews. And that's why the kazal did not focus on the war victory. They focused on the story of the oil. Oil that's contaminated versus oil that's not contaminated is not something you could see in a laboratory. Kosher versus is not something that's going to show up. The chicken was this way or that way. A married woman versus an unmarried woman. Biologically the Greeks, what's the difference? All these Shabas Friday, Thursday, Wednesday, just another day of the week in the lab. You're not going to see it. Oil that's t or what's the difference? The same oil. I don't care if you like your minor. The difference of t and t oil is an experiential difference. It's an it's an a difference of energy. It's Yeah. Hindi. >> Yeah. >> [snorts] [snorts] >> Great. Great question. >> Excellent. Yes. Beautiful. Beautiful. You can have a relationship. >> Nice. Beautiful. >> Beautiful question. So if we talk about the relationship, what does a relationship then mean? If someone is a relationship, it's separate. So you really nailed it. A relationship with Hashem real means really that we learn that we're not separate. It's like ultimately the most beautiful marriage in the world like the Zara says, it's two halves of the same soul. So what the reason we call it a relationship is because there is the experience of separateness. We live in a world where there is concealment a lot of concealment. So that's what I need to work through. I want to work through the concealment and lean back into a place of trust and to a place of faith and to a place of wholeness. So there is a relationship because it's something we need to create. It's not just when we're created we experience ourselves as channels of infinity. We don't we grow up and we have what the Tanya calls an animal consciousness which is a survival template that focuses on the ego and survival and it takes work to work through the shells and the husks and the kipos and touch the inner space of divinity which when cleared up I am channeling the cosmic love and intelligence and that's why there's an inner knowing where you are a prophet everybody is a prophet the question is only how much it's revealed how much it's manifested to be a Jew is that you're essentially a prophet and ultimately it says even the rock will be a prophet the comes if you come to a tree it's going to be shabas and you want to harvest a fig the tree is going to scream shabas not because thetoria trained them shabas is shabas it means that the energy of the tree the energy of the tree is going to show you who it is so even the tree so to speak is going to be prophetic says everybody will seem everything is the divine energy. So we call it a relationship. Great question. Hindi asks always visionary questions you ask. Thank you because because [applause] for Hindi Marowitz yes I always say she provides our class with vision and perspective. True vision right oil. The oil the oil. So it's a relationship because it's something I need to create. I need to bring I need to bring myself in. There is an autonomy. There's it's it's done by choice. We do it by choice. It's not it doesn't happen automatically. There's in this world. So I'm choosing the connection even though what am I choosing? I'm choosing not just a connection of two separate things. I'm choosing to reveal an experience of oneness. So this is the experience of complete fusion. My soul becomes a channel for infinite consciousness. What's the what's the way to get here? Always through openness and surrender. It's surrendering the need to be in the map, the need to describe, the need to understand, the need to control, the need to figure out. Sometimes I need to figure out things, right? If I'm looking at a bill and I want to figure it out or I'm learning something, I need to figure it out. Or there's a math question, you need to figure it out. That's where the mind is a brilliant tool. But don't try to figure out infinity. Because when I try to figure out infinity, all I'm doing is I'm cutting myself off from infinity. I'm just turning it into some intellectual construct that I simply cannot cannot experience anymore. Yeah. >> A scientist astronomer once told me sense of God. So they took God out of the equation. >> Nice. Scientists can't make sense out of God. So they took him out of the equation. Very powerful. >> Yeah. Very powerful. Yeah. Now what is really? And when we say the word God, where is really? So the word God, I'm telling you, is a Greek convention. It's Hashem as a noun like some form, some picture, some reality. There's a stone, there's a cup of water, you have your iPhone, you have your smartphone, you have your computer, you have your car, right? I have my jacket. I have my tie. And there's also God. I have him. I don't have him. I like him. Am I this? I agree with him. I don't agree with him. He likes me. But what does that do? That creates a philosophical construct. And now we can argue about it. Even if I prove to you that he does exist, it's a Greek concept. It's a Greek reality. Not because the conversation doesn't have value. It has value as an intellectual experience, as an intellectual gymnastic exercise. And when somebody is completely completely alien, that's sometimes the introduction. The introduction is let's talk about it logically and see you when you look at the world you somebody asked me the other day he says he feels that atheism why am [snorts] I not an atheist he says you seem somewhat intelligent so I told him I told him I said I'll be honest with you from I'm not a scientist or physicist or cosmologist from the little I read and I know and I see a little bit I'll [snorts] tell you that today I think to be an atheist you have to have much more amuna than to be a believer and I said I don't have so much blind faith to be an atheist. Because even if you study DNA or you study the construction of the mechanism of the makeup of one cell, it is so infinitely mind-boggling complex that you probably should have to have a lot of blind faith to say it happened all randomly. I don't have that blind faith. I don't I'll be honest with you. You need to have much more amuna today to be an atheist. So yeah, of course you could talk about it reasonably and intellectually and it's it's very very valuable, but that only takes us to a certain space and then it gets stuck. It gets stuck because we're not alive. Hashem is the energy that flows in you, through you, through everything, through everybody and is also beyond everything and everybody. The garra says he constitutes the place of the world. The world doesn't constitute his space. And that's the idea. The once said, "Got is out and out is got." That's an experience. Gut is out and outs is got. Now you'll say, "But right now, I'm angry. I'm resentful. I'm overwhelmed. I'm anxious. I'm sad. What does that look like?" Right? These these are this is real energy. This is what this is what we're contending with. This is where the search for Hashem comes in. This is where a person has to realize there's a lot of darkness in the world. There's a lot of concealment in the world. There's constantly things that can take me out of this. This is the reason I want to become a Greek and just systemize everything so I can be in control because it's very very hard to keep on surrendering again and again and again. Now here you have to understand something. So when the fight of the Greeks is about the oil, the oil is so key for them. And here it's tapa oil. What's the what's the what's the uniqueness of the oil? Everybody knows with oil, olive oil, really all oil, but we're talking here about olive oil. [snorts] Olive oil is very, very oil is a very fatty food. We all know that. That's why people like to put oil. It's very rich, rich in calories. Olive oil is healthier than many other oils. I mean, you shouldn't I don't know what I'm not I'm not going to go on a rampage, but certain oils that are really toxic. Olive oils has quite a few health benefits etc. But oil is fat. Oil is rich, extremely extremely rich. Their war is on the oil of Judaism. What's the oil of Judaism? The oil of Judaism is the richness, the gishmak, the fatkite, the fattiness, the zkite, the oiliness of it. What does that represent? It's not the robotic intellectual experience. It's the richness of it. I want you to take a look again in this source sheet here that we paid. If you take a look in the second paragraph, the last last to the second to last paragraph of the page, the first thing the animal soul contaminates your oil, which is your bliss, your rapture, your ecstasy, your delight, your pleasure, your He takes away your bliss from the divine and now I substitute it with emotions that will give you a little comfort or thoughts that will give you so to speak comfort or words that will give you comfort. I hijacked your oil. That's what the Ivanam want. What does this mean? What this means is every moment of life I have a choice. Do I remain with holy oil? Do I remain with unholy oil? Everybody needs pleasure in life. We need passion. Everybody needs what to wake up for, right? Somebody once said those hes Poland in the tunnels would say they said he would say those who have a why can deal with almost any how. Everybody needs an egg something that drives me. The question is is it holy oil or unholy oil? Shead through which you light the is the oil that creates divine light, divine warmth. The says it's the symbol of the divine presence. It's the fattiness. It's the richness oil here. I'm talking about in a spiritual emotional sense. I'm not telling you to eat extra donuts tonight. But the spiritual oil that you should take extra of. You know, somebody once said, "Why do Jews have so many Latkas and donuts on Kaneka?" Right. So the answer is the oil. You know the oil, the miracle of the oil. But somebody once said because the Greeks were very into looks and athletics and exercise and Olympics and Kaneka we won the Greeks. So we make sure to eat foods that will ensure that we will never look like them. [laughter] So I don't think that's a good idea. Eat less and and and and then Jews should be powerful physically and emotionally and spiritually. What's the inner oil? The inner oil is the richness, the fattiness. When you experience the bliss of your inner soul, the bliss of pymius, you're not attracted to other forms of it's too good. It's too authentic. It's too be too real. Think in a marriage where a husband and a wife are filling each other in a deep way. Each of them has to be out of their freaking normal mind to go cheat, even to go flirt. Why? It's like if I come to a beautiful wedding, there's a smogus board with the most delicious food. I don't go to the garbage and look for a bone that was left over after a duk ate and I take the bone and start licking over it. Why would I do that? Why would I substitute a gourmet healthy delicious meal with garbage with junk? In life the same thing. So look what happens. The first thing the animal soul needs to do is contaminate my oil. When I'm not in touch with my inner divine holy oil, now I need other oil. So now it'll find all types of emotions or thoughts or words that can keep me satisfied at least a little bit. So for example, the M says people flatter each other. What does flattery do? It thinks for the next few minutes I'll be safe. You're going to like me. I'll get the favor I need. Gossip, slander, talks of self aggradisment. These are all fake pleasures that give me the impression that I have some pleasure but it's torturous because I'm divorced from my inner pleasure. I'm not in touch with my energy. Some people who become obsessed, food becomes my pleasure. Drinks become my pleasure. My phone, this distraction, that distraction. Even thoughts of anxiety and fear and resentment and hatred and competition and judgmentalism. All of these are giving people something to hold on to and something to breathe by and all of my different obsessions. But what is it? It's constantly allowing me to lose my touch with my inner oils. He says, "The first thing the animal soul wants to do is hijack your holy oil." Because when I'm present with my inner divine energy, I may have struggles. I may have challenges, but I bring it back in. I know I'm not going to go to the garbage dump to substitute an authentic real presence. My thoughts, my words, my emotions. I want them to be channeling my divine soul. Now, often I'm overwhelmed with stuff. I'm overwhelmed with other stuff. These are the kipos. These are the shells. This is my opportunity to be able to trust to be able to choose the holy oil. But that is why that oil becomes so symbolic because it's the question about the inner spirit. Where is your richness? Where's your fattiness? Where's your egg? If you have with your soul and everybody is capable of that, then automatically I'm in a different space because nothing will come close to that. Nothing will come close to it. Somebody once told me a mentor of mine said you know right why you can have for example you can feed off energies of millions of people you could let's say get validation from millions of people let's say theoretically you have a video that has I don't know 4 million views and 900,000 comments of how you changed their life and it doesn't come close to what it is to experience your own spiritual energy and it's so true I need validation from others when I don't have my own spiritual energy. I'm not in touch with it. My oil was hijacked. So now, could you give me oil? Could you give me oil? And everybody looks for their distractions that's going to make them feel better. And sometimes it could be using religion and God and holiness, but it's really oil that was contaminated. The oil that is pure is very internal. Nobody even knows about it necessarily. It's your own going back into the place where you're openhearted, you're in trust, you feel in a safety. Why not? Because you understand. You don't understand. You don't have to understand. Sometimes you can understand. Most times, let's face it, we don't understand what's going on. I don't understand. But I could channel. I'm channeling. That's what it means to be alive. But be alive doesn't mean I understand. We live in a world where very few things are understood. If anybody understands a couple of things, it's a miracle. The fact that we could understand a few things is unique. Life means I'm showing up to life. I'm channeling the divine energy through me. the love, the light, the truth, the authenticity, and even the struggle that I'm dealing with, that is also part of it. When I bring that into the relationship, I realize this is something I need to work through. This is something that's allowing me to grow. This is something that's allowing me to flex my muscles. It's not here to break me and to crush me and to destroy me. Now, look at the last few lines. He says happens the 25th day of the first is 25 letters if you don't believe me you can do it on your own is 25 letters is and as a result of that essentially is when they find this oil. What is it's really the daily exercise of going back into oneness that there's a oneness in the Bria. The world is one. There's a cosmic one is that every one of us is a channel. Not a channel because I control it and I understand it. A channel because we're all part of infinity. That's the that's going back into the pure oil. And it's sometimes one little jug of oil. The little jug of oil you can't destroy. They contaminated everything. But there's a jug that they couldn't contaminate that's sealed with the kangal seal. And that has enough oil to create a fire to create a passion in your life. It looks very small, but it's anything but that. And you have to understand here something happened with Judaism also. This is a very subtle idea. And that is for Judaism to be able to be transmitted. The sages made a very dearing and profound decision. They hid the jug of oil of Judaism. The physical jug of oil is a metaphor for the spiritual jug of oil. The Greeks and the Romans watched Judaism continue. And yet its essence went under the radar. They didn't see the radar. They hid the essence of Judaism so that they would not fight it because the more external part they hated but not as much this is called and that's the reason the whole all the teachings of which is the the oil of it's the it's the intimate bliss it's not intellectual ideas or even rituals or technicalities when the Greeks and the Romans if you would ask them what Judaism is they would say What many Jews say, endless debates about tedious laws to no end. Like somebody wrote a joke. He says, "Imagine the go would have all the halas with their candle [snorts] with their lights that we have with Armena. Do you write it from the right side to the left side? And what if you have only two and but it's already three, right? And what happens? Are you allowed to use the light or you're not allowed to use the light? And what happens if you put it in the wrong place? And what if you put it on the right side of the door? And what if it gets extinguished before 30 minutes? And what if you don't sit there? And what if there's two people? And what if there's a mana? And what if their two flames are touching? Leave me alone. Those are normal people. JUST LIGHT YOUR MANA AND GO EAT. And this is true in every literally in every it seems like endless debates and everything is so technical, tedious, tedious. This is what it looks like. So that Judaism, the real Judaism went under the radar. It went under the radar. They said, "Okay, we're fine. formulas, methods, the jug of oil went under the radar, but it was always transmitted. It's always transmitted. If you look around today, what's the generation searching for? They're searching for the jug of oil. Learning is exceptional and it's it's really all the learning has it. It's not like it's two separate Judaisms. Every technical detail of is a channel for divinity. That's what he says. It's it's his wisdom. It's a flow of divine consciousness. I CAN GET STUCK in the logic but really it's not logic. It's divine wisdom that goes through logic. So that was transmitted in a very hidden way but it's here it's present in last in the recent generations there's an explosion of it the balm and all these great masters because as you get closer to gulah this is really the essence of it this is really what every piece of gimmar is what every mission is what every is it's a channel it's a ki it's a vessel for the jug of oil for the and Huh? [snorts] >> Well, [snorts] >> let's say for women, but also for [snorts] >> I thought you would ask a question the other way around. Could you get to it through learning? [laughter] >> Thank you. Because you get to it through learning because sometimes the learning could completely eclipse this. That's the whole point. >> Sometimes the learning could completely eclipse it, >> right? Yeah. Now, this is not just we're not just talking here about um you know the the there's the simple faith of the Jew that is at the core of it and it's also a very embodied experience. There's an embodied experience of oneness that is full of rapture. It's full of en there's a deep joy. There's a light. There's a fattiness. There's a richness there. There's a she in there. So every single every single person could get to it. Isra that men learn the women learn. Everybody belongs to everybody. There may be different focuses of what people learn and how much they learn. Everybody according to their capacity. >> Yeah. But but is is the is the divine blueprint for life that contains this wisdom. Now everybody has a connection to it. And it belongs to everybody. Of course, everybody according to their capacity, to their their time, their energy, and their ability. But it's not doesn't belong to an elite few. That's the biggest mistake. The divine relationship is equally connected to everybody. There's no hierarchy in this. You understand? So every single child and a female in their way, a male in their way, and every person individually in their own way. But and it's not just it's the whole experience of Judaism, every aspect. It's really this is a 247 relationship is the blueprint for it. But it's in all your ways you know him. You have intimacy with him. So as a result of all of this we can now understand what the issue was. They wanted to contaminate that oil take away that that and now it becomes an issue of how I'm going to survive in a world. This one philosophically and this one through controlling other things and this one through distracting themselves this way and that way. And what was the victory? The victory was that they found the jug of oil. It was there. They found it. And not only that, they used it to kindle the mana. What does that mean in a person's life? Every single time that I know that in the essence of my body and my soul and my nervous system, there is an unsoiled contaminated jug of oil. It's the hidden the hidden oil of Judaism. It's the frequency of intimacy with divine oneness. It's a place where I'm safe, where I'm secure, where I'm loved infinitely. It reflects literally the cosmic love and intelligence. And I let go of my need to control. And I lean into faith, surrender, trust, joy, rapture bliss. This is experiencing the Kaneka miracle. My Kaneka. This is the experience. It's not a story that happened and they liter and it's beautiful and they won the war. Of course, that's the story, the the historical story, but it's a really an internal story because the happiness that I'm looking for is often on the other side of the control that I'm not willing to let go of. Think about that. And the life I'm looking for is offer often on the other side of the life I don't want to let go of. I want that Greek inside of me often to win. I want to be able to be in control. I want to only live with the map. It's very hard to live with the reality. All anger, all resentment, all anxiety is trying to put me in control. I'm angry at you. You're here. I'm here. I'm righteous. I'm resentful. I'm righteous. You're this. Even anxiety. anxiety is I need to figure it out and I'm not figuring it out and my brain is going crazy. What's going to happen? Oh my god, your life is being destroyed. Your family is being destroyed. OH MY GOD. WHOA. WHOA. [laughter] OKAY, GREEK. You need a little hug. Okay. You're not God. You're not a statue. You didn't create this. Lean in. Lean into trust. It's hard. It's difficult. But this is really what it means. Pierce through the kipa. And when I could surrender to that, I opened myself up to the real oil, to the authentic oil. And the authentic oil has no substitute. There's no competition even. I'm not going to sell that. I'm not going to sell a relationship with my true energy for fake energy. It's just simply too nauseating. It's literally like a great relationship. I'm going to give up for a few minutes of fake pleasure that will only satisfy the most external part of me. And even that will be fake news. Whenever you live a life in which you're feeling and in touch with your own inner divine spiritual energy, there's no substitute for it in the world. I've tried. I've tried things. I tried. We try, right? The yvanim did not do that. They wanted to replace Hashem, but there's no substitute for that because it's nothing else is real. Everything else is fake news. It's fake oil. It's contaminated oil. It looks fatty. It looks rich, but it's not. It's like if my pleasure in life is going to a restaurant and ordering this type of steak. I may be hungry and I want to eat a piece of food. But if that becomes my ecstasy in life, everybody knows it lasts for 25 minutes and I'm back to my emptiness. The only way you can experience real richness and fatness in life, it's a pleasure that exists before you have it, while you have it, and after you have it, and even a year later, you can look back and you know that you touch something real. And the only thing that's real that you could really touch real is divinity, infinity because that is everything. That is reality. And that's what I constantly choose. Is the oven in me going to win or is the or not the in me is going to win. And you and therefore and I want to say this I began when we talk about you know such a massacre and such a tragedy. I'm just take taking from my own experience. There's no way the mind can make sense out of these things. Of course, Jews have to learn all the lessons that we have to learn for Israel and the rest of the world about who we are and what people want to do to Jews and how much hatred and evil exists in our world. And it teaches you the holiness of the Jewish people. Why are people targeting 2,000 Jews who come to light? What do they see in this gathering that you could just shoot and shoot and shoot and kill kill young, innocent, beautiful people? I mean it teaches you so much and it gives Jews so many lessons especially in terms of protection and strength and confidence and unity and all of that. In addition to all that, we speak about the personal experience. There's no way the brain could make sense out of these things. These horrors, this darkness, it's very, very difficult. It's very, very challenging. And then you're going into Kaneka and you want to celebrate Kaneka and almost feels like selfish. We're celebrating Kaneka when such a thing happens and so many people including us are reeling and so many families affected and a community you know and shock and and and so much concern and so much anxiety and fear and and main thing is sadness and pain. But when we try to try to control these things with our brain, we automatically fail. There's only one way to be able to live life and that is surrender. Surrender doesn't mean you're weak and you're stupid and you're naive and you don't learn lessons. Surrender means I cannot live life through my brain trying to understand. It's impossible. It's too big. It's too gigantic. And this was really the feminine touch what Jewish women always knew. They knew it in Egypt. They knew it throughout all the generations that life is experienced through a relationship. I show up. I show up with my heart. We show up with our soul. We show up with our presence. We show up with our courage. We show up with song. We show up with supporting each other. We show up with love towards each other. We show up with inner confidence. We show up with knowing that there's a jug of oil that is always present and it never ever could be extinguished. We don't understand the process. We don't know why it has to happen, why there's so much pain, why children have to s nobody understands these things. And if I go there with my brain, it's just a dead end. It's literally it's just a stuck end. It's literally there a dead end literally and there's no answers for and I don't have an intellectual answer. I'm not a Greek and I'm not even looking for intellectual answers because I don't think we could answer it. I don't think we need to answer it. I don't even think we want to answer it. Even if somebody comes up with brilliant explanations, who cares? So, you have another brilliant mathematical explanation. The only answer to this is just a real experience. The real experience is that we're here. We're here in the world and each of us is a channel. It's a channel for truth. There's a channel for love. It's a channel for wisdom. There's a channel for unity. There's a channel for healing. It's a channel for redemptive consciousness. You're looking for the kanaka miracle. It's inside of you. My kanaka. The garra says don't go to the battlefield. It's you want the kanaka miracle. Look inside of you. Find the jug of oil that nobody contaminated that was not soiled that doesn't have to understand. There's an inner knowing where you're in touch with the frequency of all the intelligence and the love and you can channel it. So I want to wish you all an amazing Kaneka, a bright and luminescent Kaneka. Each and every one of you, I want to bless myself and you. You should be able to find your inner jug of oil. Maybe you found it already, but if you haven't yet to be able to find it, cuz know it's there. And the the the lights will burn very very brightly for you, your loved ones, and all of our people.