Treasures Behind The Walls

I got an idea. It's nice to be to be back in Yeshiva after Yontif. Yontif is beautiful, but it's nice to be back with the back in Yeshiva. And even though a a large part of our Khabura is all over the United States at different Simchas, there's a large Khabura in Baltimore tonight. There's a Var tonight. But um yes, I got to all of you for holding down the forts while the goes to be started in the Simchas to be able to keep this this holy minute of getting ready for Shabbos together. To keep it going. One of the incredible Midrashim in Parshas Tazria Metzora has to do with the Tzaraas on on houses. The Rashi says it says that there'll be a Tzaraas in the base of Azazel. There'll be a Tzaraas in your homes. Rashi says that it's a Nevua that there's going to be Tzaraas on the homes. Why? So Rashi says cuz the 40 years that Israel were in the desert the nations in Eretz Israel knew that the day will come that Israel will conquer Eretz Israel. So they made holes in the walls of their houses and they hid tremendous amounts of treasures of Kessef and precious stones. They made they left all kinds of Oitros in hidden in the walls of their houses. When Israel comes into Eretz Israel like will put a Nega Tzaraas in the base of Azazel. What's the Halacha of a Nega? That you have to chip away at it to get rid of the Nega. And when you're chipping away at the Nega will open up the holes behind the walls in the houses and it will give Israel all of these tremendous treasures. If you know anything about Tzaraas you know that it's not worth it. So that's a devastating spiritual disease. And it's fascinating that the Torah chooses to give us treasures by afflicting us with tsaraas. Which comes about through lashon hara, through looking at other people poorly. What's the connection? Seems like such a jarring measure. What's the connection between the fact that tsaraas is an onesh for lashon hara. And the amazing indication that gives us like winning the lottery that we find these treasures in our houses. One of the things that the navi in sefer Yeshua is madgeish is that we're not going to have to build our own houses when we go there to Israel. We'll find the houses built. So they moved into houses lo banisa the pasuk says. And then we'll get tsaraas in those houses. How convenient. And we'll find all the treasures. That's how you want to find treasures? Couldn't make like a little blinking red arrow pointing and I'll open those areas up? It needed to be through tsaraas? A rebbe of mine once said an unbelievable shot that's like divrei emes that when you hear it you know it's true. And it's very very very important. He says like this. He said that we're not supposed to speak lashon hara. Even when it's true. Lashon hara is when it's true, right? Why not? It's true. This guy did that thing. It's true. Why can't you speak lashon hara? What's wrong? What's really wrong with lashon hara? What's really wrong with it? I once I once took part in a um in a sheer in a in a school where the hanhala of the school were interviewing myself and an and an and another rav to find out the dinim of when they're allowed to say lashon hara about a student. Like like is it one teacher allowed to tell another teacher lashon hara about a student? Like how does that work in terms of like sometimes students in a school you find the the hanhala finds out lashon hara. So how does that work? Sharing lashon hara about students. The other rav that I went with is a tremendous yediah halacha. He knows kol ha Torah kulah. I was sitting there like, "Okay, I don't know what I add to the conversation here." But I did say one thing. He was answering the halachas in the Maggid or all the dinim of lashon hara with his encyclopedic knowledge. But I said one piece. That was my piece. And I said like this, "All of these halachas of lashon hara are very important to know. But if you don't understand why lashon hara is bad, you're going to end up speaking lashon hara. Because this is very very very important to understand what the issue of lashon hara is. The issue of lashon hara is that it is a lie. What? What are you talking about? It says in the Sefer Chofetz Chaim that lashon hara is true. What do you mean it's a lie? It's not a lie, it's true. No, it's a lie. You know why it's a lie? I'll give you an example. I'll give you an example. I love this example. It's one of my favorite examples. Many many many years ago, I was just telling a maiseh shehaya, a small little little story, but it'll bring out the point. Many years ago, I was living in Eretz Yisrael with my wife. And we were we were married, you know, we were married living there and and we were we were alone in in from both of of our families. I didn't have any family in Eretz Yisrael. She didn't have any family in Eretz Israel. We were there all alone. Okay? But, we were mice and efforts to spend time living in Eretz Israel. Anyway, my wife had to go out one night. I was babysitting the my baby. We had one baby at the time. My wife was out. And it was Hanukkah. And that night while I was babysitting, there was a knock on the door. I answered the door. It's my wife's sister. She came from the States. She surprised us. I was so excited. Welcome. She said, "Is Is Esti home? Is her sister home?" I said, "No, she's not home. Perfect. We're going to make a surprise." Okay? My brother was in Yeshiva in Eretz Israel. My brother had just arrived also. So, he was a bocher. So, I got him to be ready with a camera. And I had my sister-in-law wait in my bedroom. And when my wife came home, I said to my wife, "While you were gone, your parents sent a Hanukkah present for you. It's in the bedroom." Okay? My wife went into the bedroom. She saw her sister. Snap. My son My brother took a picture. And I have that picture of my wife. And I'm telling you, you cannot recognize her. Okay? There's a look of shock on her face that I myself, I'm married for 30 years, I don't recognize that expression. Cuz how many times have I seen that face with such like delight and shock at the same time? So, it's an excess So, if you would ask me, um you know, some of my wife is applying for a job. We'd like a picture of you, an accurate picture of you. And I would give them that picture. Is that an accurate picture of her? No. She never ever ever looks like that. Ever. Well, it's not a lie. It's an We took that picture. She really did look like that. Yeah, but that's still not her. Do you understand what I'm saying? That's not her. The fact that it happens to be an accurate picture doesn't mean that it's her. That's not her. That's the exception. That's not the rule. Yidden are holy people. And Yidden are good people. And Yidden want to be good people. And at the core of our being, we want to serve Hashem. Even if you see someone do something wrong, and it's true, he really did that wrong, but it's a lie. Cuz that's not who he is. That's not accurate. It's incidental. It's a side point. It's not who the person really is. You want to know who the person is? Dig deeper. And if you dig deeper and you look behind the mask, and you look behind the surface, you're going to find [snorts] treasures in there. You're going to find the beauty, the eitz sh'ra the unbelievable value of every neshama, of every single Yid, no matter who he is. And that's why the the the the the houses of the that that the Yidden inherited had treasures hidden in the walls. >> [cough] >> I will say [clears throat] the treasures got into the walls because of lashon hara. Because the only reason it took 40 years for Klal Yisrael to make it into Eretz Yisrael was because the meraglim spoke lashon hara about Eretz Yisrael. So had they not had there not been lashon hara, >> [cough] >> the wouldn't have had time to hide things in the walls. But what happened was when a Yid speaks lashon hara, Hakadosh Baruch Hu wants to send him a message. You think there's something ugly on the outside? Chip away at it a little bit and see what's going on on the inside. And that's why Hakadosh Baruch Hu says, "I'm going to put treasures in the walls." And you're going to have to ask, "Yes, it's to teach us about lashon hara. Yes, it's a message about lashon hara, but it's the most important message because there's goodness inside. Rabbosai, ad kan, I would have said in the last generation. But in our generation, what I said until now, I'd be wasting your time if I stopped now. In our generation, we have to take it a step further. And we have to say, and the same thing applies to you. Because not only are we thinking badly about our friends, in our generation, we unfortunately are thinking badly about ourselves. And we think that because we did an aveira, because we had a tough zman, because we didn't wake up on time, because we ended up failing or falling in a certain nisayon, we think we're tsaraas. And just like you should not be believing lashon hara about the person sitting next to you, and you should know that even if the story about the person sitting next to you is true, you should know that behind that wall, behind that ugly wall is a treasure, you need to know the same thing about yourself. And you need to know that you might think I'm ugly. You might think I've done ugly things. You might think I haven't lived up to where I need to be. And you will, and you'll get there. Keep working on it. You'll get there, but the first step is not to believe lashon hara about yourself, either. But it's true. It's not true. It's true that those incidents happened. It's true that those are the facts, but they don't define who you are. That's the message Hakadosh Baruch Hu tells you. There might be an ugly nega tsaraas on the surface, but we need to believe about ourselves that if we chip away at that surface, we will find a pulsating heart that just wants one thing, as David said that I need Elokim." him I want to be close to Hashem and I might feel that I'm going to end with is that I could just follow should give us all the strength to be able to see that beauty inside of ourselves and that I could just follow should give us this to be able to act on our deepest desire which is to serve our father who and to continue to grow in our and in our time and you have to