Thought for the Week Parshas Eikev Prayer A Spiritual Heart Angiogram, Rabbi Yaakov Winner - 5786

How are you? I hope everyone is I hope everyone is healthy, strong, and happy physically and spiritually. As usual, we'll start off with Msiah. Now today we're going to talk about what I would consider one of the most fundamental comprehensive aspects of our relationship with Hashem and in a certain sense the most important one and that is prayer. You know, it's interesting when we talk about a person's temperament. There are those that for them it's easier to pray because they're more emotional. They feel that they're have a relationship. And there are those that it's more comfortable for them to study, to learn. They're more intellectual and they're uncomfortable with prayer. When they're studying, they're learning. They're gaining knowledge. They feel like they're growing. They feel like they're accomplishing something. But prayer, they don't feel it so much. It doesn't speak to them like studying. So this is what I would like to accomplish in today's shir to maybe inspire myself to have a greater feeling and a passion towards prayer. And I believe as usual we have to start with the definitions and that's what we're going to discuss today which many people don't realize what prayer is and what is the opportunity of prayer. So twice in this week's para we have the idea of prayer. One is in the second par of which you say in par and we're going to read from that because we say it every day many times a day. So therefore it's part of ding. So it will be that if listening you will listen to my commandments that I command you today to love Hashem your God and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul. And what does say serve him with all your heart? This refers to service which is with the heart and that is prayer for prayer is called service. As it says your God whom you constantly serve. Now is there a temple service in Babylonia? is referring to because so he brings a proof that the term service is called prayer. But what's the explanation? But wait, there's more connecting it to the para. And by the way, from this verse, according to the Rambam, we learn out the positive commandment of prayer. Now, in the same So says which is previously in this para this we just mentioned the P that we're talking about now is a very interesting P because according to some Not four. You should fear him. You should serve him that goes on prayer. You should cleave unto him. You should swear in his name. But anyways, right over here brings it down to serve him. you should serve him. This was repeated many times also brings out where it says we should serve him and brings that. Okay. So we see in this week's para possibly two of theukim from when we learn out one of the positive commandments to pray. So let's start. What does it mean? Why is prayer called service with all your heart. So what that means on one level we say that where do we see V comes from sacrifices. And what does it mean that we serve them with sacrifices? We offer a sacrifice. We serve him. Prayer means that we gather all our faculties, our entire being and we offer it up to Hashem. And that's what it means with all your heart. Are you all in? Are you really involved? If you have a love for physical things, then it's not it's not really a true love. A true love means it's totally dedicated to Hashem and to nothing else. And as the Ram gives an example, a famous example about someone who's in love. He wants to be with that person 24/7. Never tires of it. So when we're talking about love, there's a feeling of longing. There's a feeling of yearning. There's a feeling of attraction and you have to really feel it. So now the first level of service means like a sacrifice you're serving it up to Hashem your totality and it means in a physical way as in the of which is in two days from now three days from now the says that just like Mrs. Till means you have to have a specific place in your heart. in your in your head and in your arm. So too when it comes to the mitzvah of love and fear and he says the following the parameter the measurement of this you have to feel it in a physical way with the physical heart and he describes it and this is what I believe is going to be one of the results the outcomes of today's sh that we know what we're striving for you know What's the desired result? What's the desired outcome? Imagine there's a good friend you haven't seen for a while. You're missing him and now you meet him. You you you just enjoy it. You get uplifted. things that are disturbing him, he forgets about it. Even more than that, it arouses him with a feeling of positivity, with a positive hope, with an inner vitality. He gets filled up with that feeling. He live by he feels good by himself. His heart feels good. So you know it's like Abdullah we see this so much. You know when people are watching the sports game it can go into extra innings it could take longer. No one's complaining. A tennis match goes on for hours or the finals. They're sitting there with excitement. They're roaring every time the team wins a point and they're feeling on top of the world. Imagine every time we're going to dab to a certain sense, we're looking forward to dabing. Not that it's a burden, it's boring, it's going to take so long. But on the contrary, every second that we're in the presence and we have this opportunity to stand in front of the king, we're basking in the glory of Hashem and this level of activity which arouses that love. So that's number one service as building up the love that I should feel that feeling that emotion towards Hashem exactly as he describes it in this then there's another aspect not connected to work but just I want to bring it out before we get to the next definition there is a translation of the word as pill which means judge that means you're judging yourself it's an examination it's an x-ray of where you're holding as I go towards hashem and make a request which is also part of prayer and the truth is it's a very long discussion and we spoke about this many times about prayer on the one hand it's a wish list what's called who are you going to call in a time of need hashem because you know that he's running the world. And that's one of the major themes of prayer. And that's actually the essential point of davening is to know that there's only one power. There's only one authority and that's Hashem. And he's the only one that can make a difference. So before we stand before the king to ask him to fulfill our will. So then so we look inside ourselves the Mishna says. So we look inside ourselves and we see where are we holding. If I take my checklist, am I am I charitable enough? Am I generous enough? Am I forgiving enough? Am I spiritual enough? Am I too materialistic? Am I with the program? Am I involved in voluntary work? Am I a community person or I'm more selfish? Whatever the story is. So means you're looking inside yourself. You're judging yourself. You're making a self-examination before you start praying. So that's part of what is and maybe we can also connect that with and this is mainly this talks about this a lot also means work. It's a workout. And this is very very clear also from Tanya chapter 15 which we're not going to elaborate right now with speaks about the idea of and we spoke about this I'm sure I'm sure which means sweat the small stuff which means like this dvening and by the way and this was one of the um arguments on the part on on the people that were opposed to that all of a sudden they made a major focus of pray your prayer. For some reason whenas came along the came along there was a greater emphasis on Torah study and scholarships and the scholars were seen as the elite and the upper class and the first class citizens and the people that were more the simpleans. The wood shoppers going they were seen as lower class and the came along and spoke about how the simple saying Thank you. That is the most precious of precious of precious things you can imagine. So he revolutionized the idea of prayer. Put it on top of top of the values. So let's go back. Another aspect of prayer in our spiritual skill set is what's accomplished through Torah study which whatever it says in my that all stands but at the same time prayer and this is another whole subject which discusses which now is not the time to get into it. Prayer is compared to the spinal cord and that's the backbone to everything to the entire body. It keeps it in order that everything should be working properly. I.e. When a person learns like we say the famous language many learn they forgot to give you the for some people learning could be like an intellectual exercise and it's there's nothing as gish as enjoyable as total logic. So for the people that enjoy learning it's unbelievable it's indescribable. The problem is take a good look at yourself, at your insecurities, at your temperament, at your disposition, at your character traits. Did you ever take time to examine yourself properly, about your anger, about your patience, things like that, about your kindness? do the unc do the uncomfortable thing and really take a good look at yourself including your ugliness. Be true to yourself, who you really are. And by the way, I see this so many times you see a person acting a certain way and myself included and you marvel, how could it be this guy's 50 years old or the guy's 45 years old and he's acting like that? And the answer is simple. because he never took the time to look at this aspect of himself and to work on it. It could take a lifetime to work on a character trait. If a person is triggered easily, anger management so to speak, if he doesn't take the time to work out that he should become a better person, he could ignore it and he could be 40 years old and 50 years old and 60 years old and still be be very impatient and be like for example a judgmental person. Unless you're really really working yourself to change, you always be judgmental. You're always looking down at somebody else, etc., etc. And the only way that's going to change is if you look deep deep inside of yourself and make what are you holding and what's going on with your your laziness your your whatever it is and here comes the good news we were given davening that is the time of the day where you're meant to work on YOUR NEPHAS DIRECT EFFECT GOING for the jugular when you're learning to in a way you could say you're just going higher you're elevating yourself in a higher reality and you're forgetting about you never which I don't want to get into this whole subject right now the contrast between but what I do want to bring out is and we spoke about this many times before it says in that every time you're going into it's the battlefield field. Every single time you're going into the war with your it's the clash of the titans. What does it mean? You're actually talking to that's what it means after which means you got to get your involved your ego your FLAWS THOSE PARTS OF yourself that are imperfect and work on them. And that's what ding is about. And that's the only time right now until Mashiah comes where this takes place for the most of us. The only time of the day where we take a good look, we grab the bull by its horns and say, "Relax. Relax. Why are you getting excited over a beer? There's things that are much more important. This is not important." You start realigning your your your your value system. You start thinking of greater things and meditations everything the talks about and it goes into length what is about what's about what's what's what's what's about what's about what's about all it is is going higher and higher becoming more and more spiritual that your value system is correct you're graduating you're graduating from worried and being focused on petty triviality ities on small things like a three-year-old that cares about balloons and bubble gums and Matchbox cars and you start caring about real things like it says that but really it should be which one definition of that is instead of looking at physical things as that's reality and important and spiritual is not so important to you which should be the opposite way Look at things of spiritual that that's really lasting that's eternal that's important and look at other things that is not so important materialism etc. So now we have it says this comes along and says stay away from the person who's in his nose. We spoke about this many times because who is he meaning to say what does it mean stay away from a person that is in his nose that means he did nothing with his it remained in his nose blew it to his nostrils a soul but he didn't do the workout the cadular vascular workout the nama workout THE CALISTHE THENICS THE exercises that's what he has to do every single day. When is that ding? So ding is it's a work. Wow. What does it mean work? It means work exercise with your heart and according to it means hearts you have to work on your heart you know like you make the massage on the heart to on the heart means when you're meditating you're speaking to your heart you're speaking to your working on it to influence it making resolutions why did I do that why did I do think that I should be in in a better place and then when you speak to Hashem you begin different aspects of the feelings like we spoke in of you feel like you connected with Hashem and then you feel more relaxed because you're in a better spiritual space exactly as it described as if you haven't seen a friend for a long time you become calm you become more in a state of tranquility and bliss but it's from the heart and then you build up a longing to Hashem and that longing stays for the rest of the day. There's like there's like a um a layer of protection. You walk outside after ding the world looks different because you often hurts on your heart then the heart got excited and you offer up your heart to Hashem. Your heart is in a different place. It's longing and yearning and attracted to things that are really meaningful and things that are really lasting not just a not a bar of chocolate. So now we understand many many many explanations to the idea of work and the idea of service. Service means all your heart like a you give of yourself and it has to be total and it has to be real like Like when you're giving somebody something away from yourself, are you doing WITH A FULL HEART? THAT'S NUMBER ONE. Number two, like it says in that you lift it up. You met a friend that you haven't seen for a long time. And then finally, there's the workout as it's explained. You realize that this is a battle over here. Sometimes there might be a dialogue. You're talking to your inner hippopotamus and he might not go easily along. And this is what ding is about. Knock it into your head. I don't know what the source is that the from that it's a big the is big looks like a hammer. You got to knock it into your head. Them. So that's what we learned today. What does it mean? What does it mean? And now we understand how doing can't be it's not mechanical. It has to be passionate, full of life with a fire, with a drive, everything. And then you know we got somewhere with Davini. So there's another whole discussion about Davi, whether it's a mitzvah or not a mitzvah. We'll leave that for another time. I just want to tas I want to just mention a couple of things that we always have to remember. number one where it's brought down. There's no limits what Davany could accomplish. There are many great leaders in Sadikim including the Reb when he had the heart attack and he wrote a letter thanking that he came out of the situation he thanked the prayers of so all sadikim speak about how the prayers make a difference and that's actually included in the Mishna. I think we mentioned before you should nullify your will to his will so that he should nullify his will to your will which means in other words he changes his mind which means it could be things were a certain going a certain way and then he puts his original will whatever that means but that's the it says clearly Hashem will put his will aside and do your will clearly Now we also understand something also have to think about a lot says there you go it's another Mishna everyone knows and we mention again this idea which goes on goes on prayer. So again again we see the emphasis how prayer has to be a service. It's true that we're offering ourselves up and it's with a full heart but it also means we got to go through the workout every day when you're going. People are so so careful today about exercise and gym like never before I believe in the history of mankind has there been such a focus on exercise. So if we see so in the physical realm surely we have to say the same thing in the spiritual realm and it's hard it's hard today's generation everything is quick microwave is quick internet connection is quick everything is super fast and over here we're saying actually slow down go for the long haul and this is a story and a vert we'll just finalize with many there's there's there's many stories that begin at the same point there's one vert that they say that the bos said that every time he remained in her body after prayer it was a miracle. What was the miracle? Because the transformative experience, the transcendental experience that could be accomplished by Davening could have caused him to expire completely. So we see how tremendous the power of den is and that's connected to the pulum the latter which says by and it says he was then we say prayer is compared to the latter is planted on the ground means earthliness to what degree earthiness to no end and the head of the ladder reaches heavenward To what end? To no end. In other words, the idea of prayer is that you can go from the mat mata from the deepest lowest depth of of mud and cement and quicksand and then you can be soaring to no end to levels of spirituality. And we have to remember that that that ding is that opportunity. And this is what the mash was saying every time he stayed in a body it was a miracle because he was flying flying going from one level to the next is spiritual that who knows and another ver I heard from my that when you ask them um so what's going to be after ding you know people go into ding then they're thinking what's going to be for breakfast then I have to go to immediate I have to have dentist appointment I have a doctor's appointment I have a real estate appointment that's what's going on during ding tell me M you ask them what's going to be after Dining? They said they don't know. Who knows what's going to happen during Damony? Something could shift. There could be a cataclysmic shift or call it a a systemic shift. I don't know what you could say. And everything could change. What's going to be after Ding? Who knows what sort of spiritual religious experience I'm going to have that I can't say what's going to be after It says and it says the same God remained the same before he created the world and after he created the world. There's no change. And it says problem is we're doing but we remain the same you. You know why? Because imagine somebody goes to the gym and he sits on a bench for the whole hour of what was supposed to be his gym session. So Davini was meant to be your close encounters of the divine kind of the first order. And what did you do? Nothing. You mumbled words. You weren't even thinking about it. Your your mind was in another place. Your heart was in another place. And therefore should help. We should start exercising seriously and become really spiritually healthy and mentally healthy. And the will help that if we will work on ourselves to direct ourselves with all our heart and soul to Hashem. Soon upon him, he will also fulfill all our desires. And every single one of us should have all the desires fulfilled in and as said many times from above and onward, we wish each other everyone should be blessed with whatever they need on every single level. And the main request is posting from my home your man in Melbourne.