Rabbi Yitzchak Breitowitz: Mindfulness, Gratitude and Unity

[Music] okay everybody thank you thank you for coming um tonight's share is dedicated a ref for Ben zel and Bor Ben fra and as all those whose Health has been affected by the war especially for the safe and quick return of our brothers and sisters held in captivity uh also everyone knows uh there was a great great tragedy uh was it this morning or just uh in which the building uh the buildings in Gaza collapsed and 21 died and there were three others who died uh for another reason and uh this really was the greatest single number of casualties uh on the part of the Israelis for on know since the beginning of October since October 7 October 7 obviously was was even worse than that and therefore our Shar tonight is also especially dedicated to the Alat shama of the 21 most recent precious Souls of our soldiers who were taken from us in a tragedy on the Gaza border as well as an Alat for Ben elzar and then we have again an anonymous contribution was made for and for our hostages to return safe and totally healthy to their homes and for hashem's protection for cl Isel and for the GMA in these difficult days uh special thanks to all those who have contributed to the Ian's emergency fund I has distributed bem tens of thousands of shekels to displace families tens of thousands of shekels for the production ofits and as of today 50 sets of fillan to soldiers that's a tremendous tremendous thing who have requested them contributions can be made using the link in the YouTube description box below and on the website tomorrow night as you know tomorrow night and Thursday is the uh huh Wednesday yeah tomorrow night is Wednesday and then Thursday next day is Tu bishvat so Wednesday night tomorrow uh is sponsoring a a tu bishvat seder at the Nim show uh it's completely sold out this is what I'm told here uh but anyone that's not able to come personally can watch after the upload on ianz YouTube channel and uh you know wherever you're going to be tomorrow night you should have a and rejoice in the uh for the blessings ofel and for the fertility of the of the land uh let me just mention an interesting kind of precursor it's not the main thing I want to talk about but tuat normally Falls the week of par and as a result uh people try to find thematic connections between Tu Bish and Bish and I would like to suggest one that is based on the idea ofat uh we find The M brings a very fascinating minog uh this shabas is called shabas Shira by the way there's a with no offense to anyone that's who named Shir she was a beautiful name but Rim keski happened to have a thing against new names although is a new name is not a Biblical name either okay that's a it's a casha but he didn't like new names he wanted girls only to be given names that are in tanak so a name as you know innocuous and relatively common as Shir he was very against so when a parent once said well I named my daughter Shira because she was born Shabbat Shira right this is called the Shabbat of the song the sh so if keski said back he was a witty person sometimes uh and he said well would you name her par if she would be born parat par he said he said that wasn't enough of a reason uh to to De it but okay but be as May it's called Shabbat sh because of the sh but in addition this is the par of the month in fact today was a very big deal as brought down in some that on the Tuesday of because Tuesday is a very good ma day because K appears twice one should make a special effort to read the para of the Man twice with the tarus and that is said to be AA for parasa right par so the M of brings a Min that people would feed the birds on shabat they would put out food for the birds and the reason was because when the M fell uh every day but on Shabbat it didn't fall and Moshe said that don't go out and gather the M it will not fall on chabas so DUS and a wanted to discredit mosha Raben and to try to show that mosha was a liar so they took the extra M they had from the double portion they scattered it outside uh of the field so that it would be there on chabas and then they told people go out and get on you see there's M out here and the idea would be that mosu Renu would be shown to be a liar but what happened was the birds came and ate all of that M so there was no M when D took the people out so because of to the birds there's a Min to feed the birds shabas this is an old Min that the M of Records now the EM isly this was quite a controversial Min interesting as innocuous as it sounds it was a great controversial Min because the Mish says inas that you're only allowed to feed animals that depend on you for their sustenance an example would be a domesticated pet that does not fend for itself that expects you to feed it so that I can feed on shabas a Mitzvah to feed it on chabas but a wild animal that can take care of itself the did not want you to go to the T the trouble of feeding it because even if it doesn't involve even though there's no that you're doing it is called a it is called an unnecessary labor to and didn't want you to do unnecessary labors and an animal that is a wild animal that is not that does not depend on a human being for its sustenance uh one should not feed if that's the case then the notion of putting out food for the birds Shabbat Shir would be problematical because these are birds that can fend for themselves so they are defends the Min of shabat by basically saying hey you're not going to The Birdhouse and putting the food in You're simply shaking out your tablecloth that's an activity that you could stum do anytime you want so the fact that I'm positioning it that the birds get the crumbs that's kind of just a consequence of what I'm doing as a regular permissible Shabbat activity assuming of course you have an arv if there's no AEV you can't shake out the tablecloth because that would be carrying from inside to outside but be it as it may this is an old Min and that that was was widely practiced among ashkenazim I I'm not sure if spum had this Min but among ashkenazim in Europe in Poland and Russia it was widely practiced to feed the birds on Shabbat Shir like least the way the said it now if you look at this though I think you see three dimensions in the union of AAR first of all you see that a is intergenerational because it's obvious that whatever Birds I'm feeding today are not the same birds that ate the m in fact it's not even clear how you could trace any descent but nevertheless it's not the same generation but you see that there is a principle of AAR satov if your great great great great grandfather did something for me I have to be ma your to and we have Kama stories in which great Dolan would often show tremendous aov to a great great grandson of somebody who did them atova like a 100 years ago 90 years ago a spans Generations that's Point number one uh Point number two is that it applies not only to humans but it applies to animals we have to have a to animals right you're showing aov to Bal now the truth of the matter is we can even see more than this we find takarov not only to animals we find takarov even to inanimate objects objects that are not even animals uh for example we read that the first two maos blood and frogs D and Safara which were generated by hitting the Nile with the staff had to be performed by Aon it could not be performed by Moshe and Rashi brings again from the gamorra that the reason is that mosha owed a special Deb of gratitude to the N for giving him shelter and protection and therefore it would be a violation of his to afflict the Nile and therefore it had to be done by Aon even to the in adamant and who to animals that have done a TOA uh for for me uh indirectly this might also be seen in the well-known H that when you make kidish uh Friday night so the Kalos are supposed to be covered morning as well Theos are supposed to be covered and not to be uncovered until either after KES or some even until after Hami and there are a lot of different reasons why we cover the Kal but the best known reason which is a reason that that the rash brings in among other reasons is we don't want to embarrass the bread why because normally you begin a meal with bread hamotzi h is pride of place but shabas night and shabas day the bread is relegated to an inferior secondary position that's kind of embarrassing so to speak for the bread so in order not to be Mish the bread we don't bring it to the table or we don't uncover it until after we made KES once again one might look at this as a hakar type of gesture in which we appreciate the importance of bread as the staff of life life and therefore we don't want to do anything that humiliates so to speak the bread so Point number one about the birds is hak is intergenerational point number two about the birds is applies to animals and then I would extend it even to inanimate objects now Point number three you know you might argue with that I'm not sure but Point number three is intention you know people sometimes say fact I even I even heard this about although I think it's frankly a Despicable remark that somebody said you know why should we have gratitude to he says that's their job he says uh would you be grateful to the garbage man who picks up your trash that's his job well first of all the answer is yes you are grateful to the garbage man who picks up your trash I mean the very example that this person is using to prove his point itself is a wrong example but so that's totally wrong yeah you're supposed to be grateful to the garbage man but to then compare the were risking their lives to a garbage man I mean this is like you know bad on top of bad I mean the example is bad and and the analogy is bad you know but but whatever it is the point is should not depend on motive if someone did something that was good for me even if they get paid for it even if their intention is not to be my benefactor I am grateful for the fact of the Tova because we can assume although you might debate this that the birds did not eat the m in order to disprove D the birds ate the man because the man tasted good Eli what they did turned out to be a TOA for Isel so we have to have so our three points are intergenerational even animals and motivation doesn't matter right even if the motivation was not to do me a favor I have to be grateful for it now we come to tubish tubish is really a holiday about we'll talk about this tomorrow more of course it's a holiday about gratitude it's a holiday about and the is ultimately of course to but there's also a concept of to the Earth itself the Earth itself which uh is to produce all of the things that it does produce that one needs to have to the Earth in fact I also read by another example uh when a certain God would have to discard uh articles of clothing that he had worn for a long time that had to uh be discarded he would always do it in a very respectful way because he says these clothes were mamish me they did a lot of to me and therefore I need to treat them with respect of course today uh you would never throw away a guttle should never throw away clothing because his family can sell it for a few million dollars afterwards you know I think it's an amazing thing they're selling off uh different articles of clothing from raim kki pair of pants a shirt whatever it is they're getting astronomical amounts of money people are paying like a million dollars you know to get a pair of pants or whatever it is so uh gulum should know that they shouldn't they shouldn't dispose of their clothes at all because this could take care of their family for you know many decades uh as a result but okay so this is the isoda fakar I've mentioned I think more than once the tremendously beautiful thought of theas EMS about how important gratitude is in Judaism because it's the very meaning of the word Jew the very meaning of yehudi because the question is obvious yehudi means somebody from Yehuda now Yehuda itself can have two meanings what is somebody from Yehuda it could mean somebody from the tribe of Yehuda or it could mean somebody from the land of Yehuda the land of Yehuda was the kingdom of David H and uh in erat Yehuda which is yam and around yam was not only the tribe of Yehuda it was also the tribe of binyamin as well as kohanim and levim but be it as it may Yehuda is not a totality of the Jewish people it either refers to the tribe of Yehuda or it refers to Aruda so why are all Jews no matter what tribe they belong to why they all called yehudim so the says a beautiful thought that why did Leia call her fourth son Yehuda because she said haam now OEM now I am grateful to God so why is she grateful to God now so Rashi explains based on the medish that she knew with rues that there would be 12 tribes and she he knows there are four women from whom the 12 tribes will come Rifka I'm sorry ra Leia Rael bah and zva so 12 / 4 is three each mother is entitled so to speak to three so when it's m when it's kumir when I get something that I think I'm owed and I'm entitled to I'm not grateful it's coming to me but when she got number four she wound up having six but when she got number four what did she say I got more than my when you get more than you think is coming to you that is when you have gratitude every single Jew is called a Yi because we must go through life with the attitude that Hashem has given me more good than I deserve you know we sometimes go through life with a certain complaining mentality things didn't turn out this way didn't turn out this way you know there's a famous cartoon from The New Yorker years ago in which it shows um at the end of Noah's flood the animals are coming out of the Ark and the two ele two elephants are coming down the Gangplank and one elephant is saying to the other what a Lous ification it didn't stop raining for 40 days you know not realizing as it were that your life was saved you know because you were in the you were in the taba uh so we often go through life like focusing on the negatives and the like but the says the very definition of yehudi is the person who feels Hashem has given me more good more good than I deserve notal yes sir so the very definition of a Jew is to be a grateful person it's very interesting you know um in the American Heritage dictionary I'm not sure if it's still there but I remember 20 25 years ago uh after the regular part of the dictionary they had a section on slang usage slang meaning not official English and uh in the slang part of the dictionary they had under the word Jew is to cheat people in business and they said this was a southern usage that in some Southern States you might say to somebody don't Jew around with me which in the South some place in the South meant don't cheat me and what what New Jersey right so Jew was used as a verb now a lot of people were protesting the the Anti-Defamation League you know said you got to take it out but you know L said dictionary is a dictionary I mean you know i' like you know i' like to know this I'd like to know why are Jews called why are Italians called wops there are actually reasons for this a is an abbreviation without papers a lot of Italian immigrants came to the United States without any documentation so in Ellis Island they would put WAP with without papers under the name now Kik comes from a German word for Circle I don't remember the exact German word for Circle and it represented the fact that um many Jews were not able to sign their name in English so they did a circle you know an X I guess they did a circle at some point so kite meant the person who had to sign his name right so slang has you know even the uh pejorative names have interesting histories to them so if Jew meant to cheat in business you know I'd like to know that that's an interesting thing but the point I'm making is if you really want to know if you're going to take Jew as a verb to Jew somebody means to be grateful for them that that's actually what the word means so that's the essence of what being a Jew is so these are things that want you think about during and the par is is that great the point out that really we should look at all of our parnasa as man you know the M was a supernatural miracle coming minay now we don't have M today in that sense we go to work we have to earn money so we tend to think that we're in charge of our parasa right we think there's like a cause and effect I go to the office I get paid I sell merchandise I get paid in reality all all of it is Mone except the m in the midbar was open and obvious the M of parosa is very mysterious but in reality it's still M meaning there's no logical cause and effect necessarily between the effort you put forth and the braa that comes the braa comes from hasem fact this explains a phenomenon that many people who collect money for yeshivas often note that often a fundraiser is trying to get money from a certain source and that Source just doesn't provide them the money but all of a sudden somebody dies in a will and leaves the ISA a million dollars so the person might think well but why did I have to waste all my time with this guy if I would get the million dollars in the will the truth is that's not true meaning there's a certain amount of hisas that you have to put forth to get the BR of Hashem but that hisas doesn't mean that'll be the ultimate source of where you'll get the braa meaning we got the braa from there only because there was a hus here without the isus here there wouldn't have been the braa there because it's not a logical cause and effect system it's Hashem gives you bros but there's a certain requirement you got to go through a certain amount of of effort and that effort could be something that's totally unrelated to where you actually got the money from okay so that was one thought I wanted to share with you some of gratitude how important it is for the know re vior Miller who taught over many many many many years is teaching career was over 70 70 years he had a number of themes that he would talk about a lot some of which are a little controversial but one of the non-controversial themes that he talked about quite a lot was the idea of hakar satov of gratitude to Hashem for the life that Hashem has given you in fact he has a famous famous like meditation on an apple and a banana I can't really do it justice he talks about color and he talks about texture and he talks about dur the case of an apple the balance between acidity and sweetness and how you kind of again in modern Parliament we would call this mindfulness he didn't use the word that wasn't the that wasn't the term in those days but the notion of being in the moments of being fully aware of what it is that you're doing and that kind of mindfulness experience brought you can bring you to a very deep level of gratitude so he even talked about the idea that we should habituate ourselves when the weather is so-called bat to kind of turn it into a positive you know it's raining so you say oh the rain another day of rain instead of that say you know rain is coming down and especially in ER Isel where we don't have rain for a lot of the year that every time it rains it's a braa or when it's sunny instead of saying it's too hot how the Sun you know enables to f photosynthesis plants to produce oxygen and he says there a whole mentality of hakar atov in which instead of complaining about things uh one tries to develop a positive attitude and this he says is very valuable in how you raise your children because it gives your children kind of an optimism and a resilience when they face the challenges of life it goes back to that idea that life sometimes has very very serious challenges but if you kind of build build a foundation of optimism resilience that for little in little things in little things that builds uh a capacity for bigger bigger challenges what prepares us for big challenges are the little challenges that we have to go through uh the little challenges kind of give us the spiritual stamina to meet the big challenges right so that was uh one one I want to focus on another part of the par obviously when we think of par special although the man is a very important part of the para but most of us think instinctively about the splitting of the Red Sea on the sth day of pesak which was the conclusion of the Redemption uh and culminating in the Shir the song of O Yos that to this very day is part of our Shak every single day and uh there is a very very interesting teaching we know that on pesak all of the we recite H but on suus the including we recite a full Hal for all eight days in it's all nine days and on whether it's one day or two days full Hal but P we split it we recite a Hal shal only on the first day again it's the first two days but the rest of we only recite a half hollow similar to what we do on so one simple question is why is p a half Hal except for day one when sukos is a whole Hal for all eight days eight days or nine days so the truth of the matter is the gumar itself asks the Kasha people uh don't always realize that the gamar itself asks why is pesak different than sukus and the gamar gives a technical answer the gamara says that with sukus every single day of sukus the Corban musaf is a different offering the musaf offering changes as a result we regard every single day of sukos as a unique and distinct hug and as a result every single day requires its own full H because every day is a unique the mus not the carbon PES but the mus that is brought on the seven days of PES is the same Musa every single day so as a result instead of looking at PES as seven distinct holidays as sukus is eight distinct holidays including sh we look at p as one which has a duration of seven days so as a result the full Hal is only said on day one you see whenever let me explain this a little bit because you might say so why do you say a half don't say any Hollow anytime we say half Hal that is only because of a meaning to say thees was not a requirement was not an O it became a requirement because it was assumed as a custom half Hal is min meaning whenever there's a of it's always going to be H which means for PES the of is only day one and the other days is only and the says because p is only one y because the mus is the same so that's actually the reason the gumar gives that's a technical reason however the sh that is a one of the reim in Italy gives a another reason based on a medish and this other reason is actually more famous than the talmudic reason even though the Garis reason is more authoritative the sh brings the medish which is in the gamorra too that when the Egyptians were drowning in the sea the Mal wanted to praise God for God's Great U miraculous destruction of Egypt and Hashem said my creatures are drowning in the sea om You Want To Praise me while my creatures are drowning my creatures here pachus refers to the Egyptians Hashem so to speak is commiserating Hashem is expressing a sadness interpret it like that this is a mid it's not what what is the who who says this interpretation about the Egyptians no no I want to be very very very clear uh this is not just the shal this is the simple meaning of the gamar and that's how Rashi understands it as well see I'm going to differentiate what the does is extrapolate from the med the the says that said statement of said my creatures are drowning in the sea and you want to say Shir therefore the MIM were told to be quiet now that's number one that statement is quoted in and it is also a medish that is in the medish and in the gamarra and the gamarra does not say the words Egyptians it does not say my say Yi equals Egyptians uh but Rashi says that in other words the the most of the commentaries actually say Hashem is expressing a certain commiseration uh for the Egyptians themselves uh now that is the gamor and that is the medish the however brings another part of the medish that we do not have in our medish that this is the reason this is the extrapolation of the half Hal the other days of PES because since the Egyptians drowned in the Red Sea we don't want our joy to be complete we diminish our Joy by going down from a full Hal to a half Hal okay just be sure people understand the statement where Hashem says my my creatures are drowning in the sea and you the MIM shouldn't say sh that is in the gamar and the medish but as a reason for the half Hal and the the other days of PES that is thees of the which he claims is a quote from a medish which we don't have now this is probably the best known reason that people give but the Taz one of the great commentaries on the raises an obvious question he says well wait a second that only explains why you don't say a full on the seventh day of PES meaning Bish the gar is reason that since the carbonos are the same you don't say a full Hollow after the first day that explains everything but if you're telling me we don't want to say a full Hollow when we commemorate the destruction of the Egyptians that should only mean we ought to say a full halel until day seven how does that explain why you don't say a full Hal until day seven so the Taz explains that we never want to be more more prestigious than AUM so you work backwards if on the seventh day of PES which is a we're not going to say a full Hal because that commemorates the destruction of Egypt then we work backwards we're not going to do it because if I were to do a full Hal and then do a half Hal on the seventh of PES I would be elevating to be greater than the so you need to add to the sh the Taz reason that you never want to be better but be it as it may this idea of Y is a difficult idea and there an idea that you know we grapple with even now I don't want to be Mar too much I've talked about it before the notion of commiseration with the suffering of an enemy even when that enemy tries to destroy us now keep in mind that this was not pacifism Hashem didn't say oh the Egyptians are my creature my creation so I'm not going to destroy them Hashem destroyed them Hashem did destroy them just as we have to destroy the enemies that try to kill us okay so we're not talking about turning the other cheek we're not talking about pacifism we're not talking about surrender we're not talking about let the person kill you because it's wrong to inflict pain on another human being we do what we do someone who comes to kill you kill him first no question it's important to understand that but at the same time simultaneously with that there is a certain sadness and regret that it had to come to that meaning there's no glorification of this there's no joy you know I killed you know a Palestinian today you do what you do because it has to be done and of course there is a the third time I I hear it from the rabbi yeah this idea and Rashi doesn't say that I'm sorry you take yeah okay the gamar okay the gamar in Miguel okay really I you know we can argue about this and you know you're free to give a counterar if you want to announce that you want to give a share on the top topic no I'm I'm not I I I will come I will I will come uh but but I can't I can't I can't give you proofs for everything if I if I would have to give you a proof for everything I said we would need five hours share and we don't have a five hour share the gamar itself asked theha uh that how can you say that um we shouldn't be happy if rash die it brings a meaning meaning that the gamar understood that we shouldn't be happy when rash die and the gar asks the question and the gamar says that uh there's a reason to be happy that the r I understand but means there's a reason to be happy that they're gone from the world but you're not happy in that they had to be destroyed it would have been better if they would have done shua okay thank you uh I want to talk about a different thoughts uh the PK says the water was a wall to their right and to the left the word Kaa in the Tyra is spelled without a when without a v the word can be spelled can be read anger so K say the water was angry when God ordered the water to split for the Jews the water said or the angel of the water said why are thep Egyptians worse than the Jewish people they were Idol worshippers the Egyptians and and the is Israelites were Idol worshippers there was a kitr a kitri kitri means a prosecution the water didn't want to split let the Jewish people drown in the water too and had to answer yet yeah the Jewish people were not so worthy then but Hashem gave them credit for mat Torah they're going to receive the Torah and therefore they deserve Redemption right this is a famous that the word has a double anandra of versus now the Von points out a gal thing the Von says the actually appears a few earlier it appears twice the first time it appears the word is spelled with a so it means a wall the second time it appears it's spelled without of so the question becomes if intends to communicate and K anger then why does it only appear in the first verse I'm sorry in the second verse and not in the first verse right that's question number one question number two is why does it repeat twice the water was a wall to the right and to the left why repeat it twice question number three is there's a slight difference in the sequencing number one says b Israel went into the sea that became dry land the second P says they went into the dry land within the sea so bitzer the vilon has three questions on these twoim number one why are they repeated twice the same idea the water was a wall number two why in the first p is spelled with the with a and it's only in the second PK it's without a and number three why does the first P say and the second says by three kasas of the vam so he answers the three kasas with one big yot he says the two verses are talking about two different categories of people we know that when the Jewish people are at the shores of the Red Sea and the Egyptians are coming after them so they're proverbi Pro they're in the proverbial between aaq and a hard place they have the Egyptians coming after them they have the sea they have animals wild animals on either side of them they Panic they're fearful they don't know what to do should they surrender should they should they try to fight should they suicide they didn't know what to do they're total panic by the way the ezzra makes a very important observation why are they so scared of the Egyptians look at the numbers there are 600,000 men and there are people below 18 who are still below 20 rather who are still capable of fighting there might be a million three million people but some of them are you know may not be able to fight maybe little children but you you certainly have many many many more B Israel than you have the Egyptians and not only that but the B is were armed when it says they left they left with arms so what are they so afraid of what are they panicking so the ezzar says the famous idea that they had a slave mentality and when the master comes after you you become naturally submissive naturally afraid and even though you could easily overpower the master you can call it the Stockholm syndrome whatever you want want to call it but the notion is the master has come to get me I lose my confidence that is why the Ezra says that the one that God chose to be the Redeemer of CLA Israel had to be a person Moshe who did not grow up as a slave because the one who grew up as a slave would not be able to rebel against that Authority but be it as it may the person who eventually jumped in was Ben Ben the head of the tribe of Yehuda had so much amuna in hashem's promise that he jumped up to his neck some say up to his mouth some say up to his nose and only when he showed that he was willing to even die in his belief in Hashem did the water split everybody else followed him afterwards so says the Von galic the first he jumped into the sea that became dry land that's referring to nakan who jumped into the sea with respect to there was no Divine anger why are you splitting and the tribe of bamin who followed him they were baluna of course they deserved a miracle so in the PK that says the word the word is spelled with of because you don't have the double anandra but the later PK says these the people who who waited it for waited for it to be dry land they didn't have auna that's why it says Basha they didn't enter until it was already Yasha and for them the Mal the Mal of the sea said man why are they better than the Egyptians and that's why the is without above so it's a it's a wonderful thing that the three questions of the vagon are answered with one yod why why is the PK repeated because it's referring to two different populations why is the sequence be versus because the first pk are the people who jumped in when it was water the second PK is those who jumped in when it was dry they didn't jump in they just walked in and the first group of people there was no anger on they were worthy of divine Redemption wall it's only the second group of people most of the people in which the becomes becomes a source of anger uh now so this is again a very beautiful uh way in which three different questions are answered by this yot but be it as it may at least for the vast majority of am Israel we find that there was a kri there was a prosecution in Shay Manu why are the Israelites why are B Israel more deserving than the Egyptians so the M asks a very simple question we just had a whole year of 10 makos and in those 10 Macos every single Maca differentiated between Egyptians and Ben Israel it was the water of the Egyptians that turned to blood and not the water of the Israelites it was the Egyptian houses that had frogs and not the house of the Israelites how come the very first time where the malim say to Hashem why are the Egyptians worse than the Jewish people kitr only appears by Kus yamu and there was no kitr with 10 MOS every one of the maros they could have said so says the a very important yite it is true that the Jewish people in MIT were Idol worshippers it is true that they were ofar except for the tribe of Ley it is true that they were not practicing Brisa except for the tribe of Ley it's true that they were in a very low level but as we discussed uh last week they did have they did have certain they had the of of unity they didn't they spoke the Hebrew langage anguage which is you know we share a language they didn't intermar they didn't speak lanara against each other and again I want to point out because people often ask the question theil does say that one of the Z of is is they didn't speak Lon so people ask aasha that when Moser Renu killed the Egyptian and D aam informed parro or informed the police whatever that MOS Renu did it and that's why mosenu had to run away mosha Renu said now I know why they're enslaved because they slander and they liable and they speak lanara so people ask Atasha according to that kazal one of their great AOS was lanara and yet MTA says that one of their Z was they didn't speak lashar right there seems to be a country but the answer is there's no contradiction when it says they didn't speak lashar it doesn't mean they were from and they were learning to of the every day indeed they were very deficient in that they gossiped and they slandered and they said bad things about each other AI that was a weakness but when it says they didn't speak lashar it's a very specific context they didn't turn against each other to get some advantages from the Egyptians meaning there was that group solidarity yeah I might say all sorts of bad things about you to my neighbor but I would never turn against you to the Egyptians to get a certain favor even DUS V A who are the big troublemakers right but they left Mitra because they were task Masters and they were willing to get beaten rather than disclose which Jews did not meet their their quantity of bricks so these are in not of religiosity these are in of not changing their names not changing their language not intermarrying not speaking lar this is what the M says so says the M when is is when they are in unity they get the blessings of God even if they rebel against Hashem even if they're deficient in many many ways so during the 10 plagues even though they were there was no K of man because they had these what happened BYU was that in the Panic of the moments the Yus was lost and each group was looking for its own Survival strategy there is a MTA that says that there were four groups by the YSU one group says let's jump into the sea not like n let's jump into the sea to commit suicide another group said let us surrender to the Egyptians and be taken as slaves a third group said let us wage mil and uh a fourth group said let us call out to the nations of the world the United Nations to rescue us I've always thought that's the most foolish of the four groups now the understands this in in maybe a little bit of an unusual way he doesn't understand this as Aus about strategy he understands this as a disintegration of community in which each person is simply looking out for what he thinks is best for him meaning the very AK that they had in MIT of not changing their name and their language and the inar and not speaking L that was disintegrated by cre y in the four groups so says the once we no longer have that in unity and we stand before God as individuals then we are scrutinized as individuals and that will bring up all of the aot which Hashem might have been willing to partially Overlook and therefore the K of aod Zara and everything else reemerges itself precisely when there's a disintegration of the and the unity this is a very important says when there's a lack of lack of it's not simply a sin in and of itself which it is but rather it brings to the Forefront all of the AAS that Hashem was willing to be on because you no longer have these of the AK and the AAS Isel that's a tremendous idea that in a sense AAS Isel is a great protector for Isel now of course when I say m i shouldn't say the word m because in point the gamar says hasem is never really M on things but Hashem looks at us with a much greater measure of mercy and compassion when there is unity and that's the nafina that's the difference in MIT there was the unity of language and not intering and not speaking L uh and uh all of those in Yim of not changing their names by K yamu the unity disintegrated and once the unity disintegrates then all of our AAS come to the Forefront now Rashi said a similar idea even not in the context of bash is he said it as a universal idea Rashi in P Noah points out that why was the generation of the flood destroyed but the generation of the Tower of Babel was not destroyed they were only dispersed now this is not even Jews right this is before there was a Jewish entity and Rashi says because even though the generation of the Tower of Babel were actually wanted to fight God they wanted to deny God but they acted with unity and Shalom and therefore they had a certain Merit to be kept alive as as opposed to the dam which was a social disintegration of violence and robbery and and and the like and Rashi says that the of shom and can protect even people who arear or people who are denying God because they at least have that unity and togetherness so again as as I say almost every week uh since the war started uh in October 7 after suus that uh this is the time and bem if there's any silver lining in a very dark time for us it is that I think more and more of us realize how we have to be together we have to care about each other we have to love each other uh we have to think about each other we can't allow the differences of opinion that exist even on major issues to destroy the unity and the AAS Israel and that itself is a great great protector uh of CLA Israel unfortunately uh you know I I I express Express the fear that when the war ends we may go back to our bad habits unfortunately it seems that we may be going back to our bad habits even before the war ends we already see that there is new M that are emerging on one hand these M are some very very important issues I mean I mean obviously the families of the hostages really all of us want the hostages to be returned on the other hand the steps that you might have to take for that may compromise the effort of destroying Kamas it's an excruciating dilemma because some some take the position that hey uh we ought to be like the United States at the end of World War II with Hiroshima and Nagasaki just turn Gaza as they say into a parking lot just get rid of the whole thing and that'll get rid of Hamas or whatever but at what cost God forbid you know that would cause the loss of our life on the other hand if you have ceasefires and nego NE iations you might get some hostages out you know hopefully but at the expense of maybe empowering or embold Kamas so that that type of disagreement is an excruciatingly painful disagreement and there are halakic sources on it as well but the truth is you know I could understand that one I I could give them a pass on that one because that's a genuine dilemma but they're bringing back judicial reform stuff and political leader stuff and a lot of the sin is kind of coming back through the back door and it's very important that we don't go backwards on this I mean ifem this crisis propelled Us in the positive direction of Jewish Unity then we got to hold on to that because if we don't hold on to that it becomes a tragedy compounded on top of a tragedy there's the tragedy of war the tragedy of death the tragedy of hostages yep and then there's the tragedy of not growing and not not learning from the difficulties of these experiences so so be uh I hope that will take the lesson of uh to heart very very seriously and to understand that when there's AK there is divine protection when there is not Aus all of our AAS come to the Forefront and the level of divine scrutiny is uh much more strong than it would otherwise be so have a good uh tuat and take care [Music] it