Rav Aaron Dovid Poston: The Pharisee Myth: Everything You Got Wrong

Heat. Heat. Shalom everybody. Welcome back to the Bate Mash. Welcome home to Torah. A warm welcome home to Torah. As you know we deal with the fundamentals here especially using the clear as the basis for our discussion the clear wrote other and just to remind you we are dealing with gibburim and he always starts off with the medish. I just want to remind everybody that what you could do is go on to the Yiba website, look for the right year, look for the right title, and follow along in the original Hebrew source sheets. If you're interested in the English source sheets, then please send me an email and I'll add you to the list so you can receive the English sheets. as well. If you want to join our shear on WhatsApp, you can also send me an email and we can add you to the shear as well. Okay, so let's get started. Uh before we do, I'm going to give you a little bit of an introduction. We're going to deal with things that are I'm going to say very problematic or controversial when it comes to Jewish hashkafa. Okay? So even though we're dealing with fundamentals, you'll find and see at least according to me there are some issues and it could be it could be that this is part of the development of I'm going to say makus but the development of the controversy between and and miss nagdim. It could be. It could be. I'm not so sure. I'm not so sure it's the root of it, but I think that the idea could be a consequence of it. And you'll understand why as we go along. So, let's start with the medish begins with the first verse of the parha. Look on source number one. So, the Lord said to Moses el Moshe, speak to the kanim. Notice it's going to say speak twice. And more eloim. And who are they? the children of Aon and you should say to them that a Cohen should not defile himself for the a dead person amongst his people. Now in the Hebrew, you know, we're just, you know, it's we're just reading. Wait till you hear what the clear has to say about all these words and what they mean. We'll start with Rashi anyway. Rashi brings to our attention that the word emore does say it is said twice, right? Speak to the cone and say to them. So look at Rashi on source number one. Emor the ama speak to the cone and say to them literally say and you shall say. So what is the double expression? Why is it? So according to Rashi brings down earlier sources of course he doesn't make up anything on of his own pretty much and he says from the Gammory of Vamos in 114a that the double expression comes to admonish the adult kanim that they should be responsible for the minors that they must not contaminate them meaning like an adult Jew a father and a mother they're not going to feed their children, pork, you know, bus of a meat and milk. They're not going to feed them things that are forbidden. So for a regular Jew, it's not forbidden to defile yourself, but for the Cohen, it is. And as a child who is not really obligated to mitzvah, nevertheless, the parents must bring them up with holiness and not not allow them to contaminate themselves. Now also the latter part of the rashi I highlighted that let none of you defile yourself for a dead person among his people. Now while the dead person is among and we're reading Rashi while dead person is among his people we don't know what that means right his people that mean he's a co other kanim or does that mean non-coim right and therefore and therefore has people meaning no non-con to bury him what what this comes to exclude is what we call a mace mitzvah what's a mace mitzvah a ma remember these words a mate mitzvah if god forbid one of us founded dead body and there was no one around. There were no relatives. There was no people that could bury. We have an obligation to bury that person. So the Cohen who's normally not allowed to become spiritually impure through the dead except for the seven closest relatives plus this mace mitzvah and it's going to be very important for our discussion later on. So let me just read the words. This comes to exclude the prohibition of a coen who comes across a mace mitzvah. What is that? A dead person for whom no one is calling and no one is in calling distance to attend to his burial. And thus it is incumbent you know normally for people to attend to him but there is nobody else but this cohain. So he must defile himself for someone he does not a close relative at all. Doesn't even know who he is. Okay, that's the medish and we'll stop there and we'll go to the next paragraph. But I'll just read the Hebrew say why is that double expression to warn or admonish the adults regarding the children. This applies not just in this case to the making sure their children are at least the boys. We're talking about the boys because it's only incumbent upon the men um to um to teach them about tumahara about purity and impurity and to make sure that they're following the rules. Okay. So now let's go to what the kakar has to say. Now this is going to sound very strange and I think I should give a little bit of a background. Many of us who grew up in a Christian world, Christian countries, America or maybe even Europe or whatever the um Christian countries were familiar with the word Pharisee and it has a very negative connotation in the New Testament in their book, the Christian book called the New Testament. And they're the bad guys, okay? They're they're not the the sweethearts. You know, the Good Samaritan story. I don't really want to feel, you know, at ease talking about it, but I might as well. The Good Samaritan is a very anti-Semitic story. Yeah. I mean, there's a Good Samaritan hospital in every city, and we use that in the vernacular. Oh, he's just a good Samaritan. Well, the Samaritans were non-Jews who lived in the land of Israel. They were replaced. All right. The northern tribes were exiled and the Samaritans were brought in and they were being attacked by lions. They were being attacked by lions. They couldn't figure out why. And they approached the Jewish leadership and asked, "What do you think it is? You think it's because we're still serving our gods and we're doing our, you know, we're not following the laws of the land." And they said, "Probably it's good, good, good idea." So they converted. I put in, you know, air quotes because their conversion was only fear of being eaten by lions. It wasn't because they wanted to join the Jewish people and believed in God. They converted, but we were not really allowed to marry them because we did not believe that they were full-fledged converts. The point is this at the time of Yashka. So the story is that there was a Cohen walking down the street and he saw this poor person and he ignores him. This is how the story, the narrative is written. He ignores him. Cold-hearted person can't even reach into his pocket or ask the person how he can help. Same thing, a lady walks by and then finally Israel walks by and they all shun the person. Don't even look at him. Don't have a a soft heart for him. And finally, this non-Jew Samaritan, he reaches into his pocket. He's helpful. So that's why I say the whole narrative is based on anti-semitism, Jew hatred. Now it could be, you know, we have to look at ourselves. If these stories are true, which we don't believe, but if they were true, then there's something that we have to look into and change. There's no question about it. And I think that's what we have to do. Even if they're not true, meaning it's a lesson for us. The Pharisees, for example, were called the the synagogues of Satan. And you know, I mean, there's there's plenty of verses within the New Testament that that puts them on a pedestal and says they're the ones who are carrying the true uh message from Moses. Okay, that's that's true. But the point is here, the Pharisees were that's who our greatest rabbis, right? Shim Benel, Rabaka, Rabime Mayor, all the Tanoyim, all the greatest rabbis were what we call in Hebrew Perushim. Perushim, they abstained. they they refrain from associating with the general population. And it kind of reminds me a little bit of today with the there's a little bit of a removal from the general society. And we'll see this is the clear car 450 years ago. He's going to be quoting things from the Talmud, from the Midash that go, you know, 2,000 years ago and beyond. This is what Jewish philosophy really is. But we'll see. There has to be a change. And that's why I mentioned the controversy between and it could be that was part of the development of the change that maybe was necessary. And I'll explain why. So the first thing we say is it's already been explained in many places that a a sage we're going to call him an academic. But we're not talking about a secular academic. We're talking about a sage of Israel who knows the Torah and lives the Torah and he's living like a sadik. He's living a righteous lifestyle. He needs to be separate from all I'm going to use the word interactions or business. There's a certain level of removal from business. Not only that, he actually needs to be more scrupulous in his actions than other people because from him people are going to learn. That's what he is. He's a teacher. Okay? He's a teacher and he's a preacher. And if he ain't living like his his mouth is not matching up to his actions, people are not going to listen, right? He has to be true to himself. And we'll talk about this also. His insides have to be like his outsides. That's why Tomakum has to dress a certain way without any spots or uh what's the word I'm looking for? Stains. He has to dress in a certain way that that looks clean. it because just like the outside is clean, so too the inside should be clean. Now, this is going to be very strange because we have to translate the word. There's two ways to translate. There's the vernacular, which usually means just someone who's ignorant, someone who's not that well educated. That's one way. And that's going to be a difficult way to put in here because he's going to call these people evil. And then there's the people like Rabbi Kea before he became religious. He said, "I was an amates." And the definition of Amar Aar is someone who wants to bite the head off the rabbis. Who is so full of hatred towards the religion and towards the rabbis, he wouldn't open up a book. He would stay far away. So, we're going to be going back and forth a little bit because I think he's using the word in the vernacular way, but it's a little bit strange because he's going to call them Rashim. So, we'll we'll leave it open for now. Um, basically what happens when Aritz is not so well educated when we had the temple and not just the priestly class, but of course, even people who want to go to the temple, I say the temple, right? They had to be clean. You had to be pure. go to the mikvah. So if you um are involved let's say with the zav or you know you're touching um or even the the amarit who doesn't know how to do uh separate trumas and micers he doesn't know how to tithe properly and he's going to give it to the cohen or the ley how is the ley or the cohen going to trust that this was tithe properly so you can understand why there's this need for a separation from so much involvement especially since um they were living a life of purity for the sake of the temple, the ability to enter the temple. Okay, so it's a little bit strange, but here's the translation is so too that the anyway and they were talking as well, they need to be distance themselves from the arets because the amarets could cause tumor to extend from him. Now, it could be through his vessels. It could be if he spits. Could be there's Zav with sitting on on the couch after she sat or he sat on the couch. There's a lot of issues that we don't have to deal with unfortunately because we have no temple. We don't have the tomb in Tahara. But it will come back. It will be back and we'll have to familiarize ourselves with it. It says that back in the time of the early Tanoyim that every child was fluent. They all knew the laws. a child, a 5-year-old knew the laws of Tumahara. And today, it's one of those subjects that is very difficult for us to comprehend. So, he mentions this Gammoran St. Hedb. It's number three on the source sheet. I'll read it in the Hebrew first. How is the sage is the righteous person. How is he viewed in the eyes of an Amaharitz? So it must be we're not talking about the extreme hatred of the Amarit. We're talking about just an ignorant person perhaps. Perhaps he says shel or as the other version is um like a picture of gold that pours water. Okay, it's very nice nice expression that the is viewed by the ignorant person as something valuable as a picture of gold that pours water. Right? Right? That's a ketone like a canteen or a pitcher. And then it says and then when he begins to talk with this right the starts to have conversations now it could be mundane conversations that's how we translate it that he has less value in the eyes of the he's looked at as a picture of silver right silver is less valuable than the picture of gold and then If and when the begins to receive or accept benefit from the amar, how does the amar look at this person? Like a earthnware vessel which number one has even less value maybe even no value. The truth is we're going to see a cleis there's no way to fix it if it became impure. See the gold you can take to the mikvah the silver you can take to the mikvah. If the became impure which it can only become pure impure from inside then what happens? You have to break it and start over. You know crumble it up make you know put it back into the clay state or just break it and glue it together with mortar. Anyway there's no way to fix it. Very interestingly I saw a yada you guys don't have this sheet but I'll read it out to you that he's trying to explain a little bit of insight what does it mean that the the is viewed by the as a vessel of gold nearly according to the he says that this vessel is where you drink water from. Now I don't know if you drink it directly if it's a pitcher but it pours water and you drink the water that the he's like a vessel full of water. What is water? It's Torah. Torah is nickname. So the water is always representative of Torah meaning that it always goes down to the lowest place. It's humble and it's purifying. Okay. So the the word for water is always representing Torah. And since this is a picture that pours water, you're he's full of Torah. Gamoro ketone oios tikun happens to be that the same letters for ketone which is the word for this picture of water is the same word for tikun. What's tikkun mean? To fix to right to improve to to make it work. So that's what the is. He's the fixer. Okay, I like that word. He's the fixer of the world. He maintains the world. There's a P in Jeremiah 33 verse 25 that said God says if it wasn't for my covenant day and night, I never would have created the world. Basically, if somebody had not taken the reigns of the Torah, accepted responsibility for the Torah, the world would never exist. Now, it says you don't have this on your sheet. If he begins speaking with the person right now, he has he's talking mundane things. He's having a conversation with the it says he's what is that the more you touch the silver what happens? It tarnishes. It's tarnished. Now, I don't know that much about I don't think I've seen too many gold goblets. Um, I only seen gold rings and gold jewelry, but apparently it doesn't tarnish like silver does. Okay. Now, it says that if you benefit, if the benefits from him, it's like a is the earn vessel when he finishes. Maybe it means the finishing of the first but when all is said there's no way to fix there's no tikun because this like Benghazi with Alicia and right that the story is that he took money and once you start benefiting from the amarat there's no fixing there's no way to improve right that first impression right that that he will no longer honor you once you have degraded yourself in his eyes once the has been degraded like a there's no fixing there's no tikun that's the end anyway that's the first paragraph now the second paragraph so if you just go back just a few verses in paras kadoshim it's it's chapter 20 it's actually verse 25. So you notice I gave you all three verses just for context. But this is, you know, you should be holy kadoshim to you. That's what the parha is about. And you, the Jew, you shall distinguish between clean animals and unclean ones, between unclean birds and clean ones. And you shall not and you shall not make yourselves disgusting through unclean animals and birds and any creature which crawls on the earth that I have distinguished for you to render unclean. Now the Hebrew is so there's God is telling us that we have to distinguish we have to make a clear separation between different types of animals. We don't eat them. Okay. And it also says so you don't make yourself disgusting. Now the clear takes this verse and he's going to apply this to the and I think we should all want to be we all want to be learned. We all want to be righteous because it says you cannot and ignoramis cannot be righteous because they don't know what to do. So we have to dedicate ourselves to learning and I think that's what the Jewish people have done for thousands of years. We've dedicated ourselves to learning. The learning is supposed to transform us. Okay. So he's going to apply this idea not just to the kanim but to the people the Jewish people who are called. We are a kingdom of priests. We have to and I'm going to use the word separate. We have to separate ourselves. I'm going to call it a lower class right. the the unlearned is unfortunately a class that you would want to separate yourself from. Now I do want to say that this is a problem today because most people most Jews unfortunately are probably in this category and you can't separate yourself from most Jews. when you lived in the second temple period, even the kids knew. Today, we're in a shasum. We're in an emergency situation where every should really if they they could go out and teach your fellow Jew. They're they're like captured by the Gentiles. The reason they may be ignorant is because of the strong influence of the secular or gentile society in which we grew up in. Okay? 2,000 years of exile. it's going to do it to us. So, and I I'll tell you why I think it's a a big difference in Allah. Now, I just want to stop for a second and read to you another story that you don't have, but there's a famous incident um in the Talmud in Goros. Rebel was removed from his position and um rebelary was appointed as the Roshiva. What happened was Raar Rab Lazar Benazaria was appointed. Why? He was a brilliant young scholar. Being a a brilliant scholar, what he did was there was a previous I'm going to say censure. They only allowed boys to learn yeshiva whose insides reflected the outside. So they dressed all nice on the outside and they all had good meos. They all had great uh learning and a good cup. Rabeler felt that they should be admitted. They should be admitted. Rab was very strict and Rabzer felt they should be admitted. And guess what? He had an argument and they he won and they opened the doors. So the doors were basically closed only to the elite. This is going back 1900 years, 18800 years. And only elite, only the top 1% of the students can get in to learn. But once they changed the room, they added according to one 400 benches, another 700 benches, a tremendous amount of benches were added. This shows you that this idea goes way back to who is an ignoramis and and these students were not ignoramis but they were on the lowest part of the totem pole in terms of learning and they weren't allowed in until they changed the rule and all of a sudden wow and you know what because we're about to go in exile wasn't such a bad idea either to educate. Education is always the best policy. However, as an institution, you do have what they call damage control. Whether it's for the name, whether it's for the students, you don't want to call dumb it down. You don't, right? But we're in a shas we're in a moment of emergency. That was the situation then. I think that was the situation when came along and that's exactly the situation we're still in today. Maybe we were always in that situation, but the times show us that this was the right thing to do. So in terms of today behaving I think it's correct for your own family and for your own um you know survival you have to make what's like a like a fence around you know your learning and your family and your community but at the same time you have to reach out there has to be a certain amount of outreach and by the way yanet does a tremendous amount of that and just keeping that in mind let's continue where the clear car leaves left off He said it's we already know from the Torah what was considered clean and was what is not clean. What is kosher and what's not kosher. Why does the Torah need to repeat this idea? It's to get this point across. There needs to be some type of distinction. It doesn't say separation. Although the word perushim the Pharisees were separate but here he's using the word there has to be distinction between what is um between the sage and the ignorant masses. It's so interesting how he brings a verse. It's also in last week's para chapter 20 23. I'm sure you're all familiar with this verse. It says now really we're going to translate as It's not you're not allowed to follow the practices of the nations, right? That's what Hashem tells us. You shall not follow the practices of the nation that I am sending away from before you. We're talking about the seven Canaanite nations. They were corrupt. They were immoral. And we needed to uh be separated from them. No question about it. The same h applies by marriage. Even though the Torah literally says you shall not marry them, implying the seven no uh seven um Canaanite nations, the applies to all non-Jewish nations. So too here do not follow the practice of the nations. And the clear says, what is that exactly? What is the nation's um behavior that we shouldn't follow? Wait till you hear this. You have to be sitting down. some of the laws or let's say customs of the nations the way they behave let's say statutes is that the top officers right the the elite of the elite of the non-Jewish nations are whom, drum roll please, the wealthy people, not the academic or spiritual people. I'll read again. people are the wealthy ones much more than their wise ones. That the status depends completely and only on the amount of wealth that they have that someone who has a tremendous amount of wealth and property they say he is holy. That's who they think is holy. I mean, we're using our imagination. I mean, I can list names of people who are just I don't want to get in trouble here, but you know, like certain politicians on the left. They're very wealthy, but they ain't too smart, but they're held in high esteem by the nation. Islam. They don't by them. They don't make a distinction. They don't make a difference. There's no distinction between the wise, the the the sagely people and the ignorant masses. The only thing they're looking at is wealth. But you the Jewish people, you shall not follow this statute, but rather all you should do is distinguish between what is kosher food, not kosher food or literally we're going to get into this idea. It says animals, right? The pik we saw, you should distinguish between the animals and the birds, which one are clean and which are not. And he's now going to explain how sadikim are compared to behemoths which doesn't sound very good but there's a good aspect. So the righteous people can be compared to animals in a positive way and the aha are going to be compared to animals in a negative way and so too with birds. Okay. So let's begin. When the first side, first page, left side, left hand side, five lines down in Psalms. See, King David compared sadikim, righteous people to animals. And not in a bad way, in a good way. Look in Psalm 73:22. You'll see that in number six. But I was brutish. Now the Hebrew is ba, like I was like an ignoramis. I was brutish. the low adah and I didn't know in fact I was a beast but he's talking to God I was like a beast now you read the rest the next verse yet I was constantly with you grasped my right hand so there's a certain level of humility to say I was like a beast I was like an animal you know the animals know how to praise Hashem right there's the the n'vi speak about the the donkey that knows its master and you the Jewish people you don't know your master but the donkey knows its master right so there's certain humility and simplicity to being like as king David says yet I was constantly with you and there's another in Jeremiah let me just read the clearar he says the meaning there's it's like exactly what I said about the humility. The animal doesn't know how to boast. The animal doesn't know how to be arrogant. And so too in Zakaria, sorry, it's um Jeremiah 11:19. So if you look on number seven, I was like a choice lamb. Vani aloof. See, aloof is the top 1%. It means like a general. It means aloof the top the top the cream of the cream. Okay. So Jeremiah says and I was like a choice lamb that is being brought to slaughter. Right. So there's something positive about a sadic. I mean I might as well read it because it's a beautiful puzz the the I was like a a choice lamb that is being brought to the slaughter. I did not know that they had devised plans against me. They said, "Let us destroy his food with wood. Let us cut him up off from the land of the living. Let his name no no no longer be remembered." But of course that this is the sadikim. It didn't didn't it didn't work. The rashim did not their plan did not develop. Okay. So that you see that sadikim can be compared to animals. What about the aha? They're also compared to animals but not in a good way. So he says that the soul of the uh of the ignoramis, his soul is going to descend. It's going to go down. His spirit is going to go down like the spirit of an animal. Look what it says in Ecclesiastes 3:21. That's number nine on the source sheet. Um, who knows that the spirit of the children of men is that which ascends on high and the spirit of the beast is that which descends below to earth. Okay, things pretty clear. That's not a good thing. We don't want our souls to descend to earth. We wanted to ascend on high. No question about it. Um, but that's with the beast. So we see a negative kazal kazal say in cohelis raba that's um the mid on on ecclesiastes he uses these words regarding these ignoramises these are these are evil people well why else come on if you were just ignorant you wouldn't go down to hell right you wouldn't go to gehenn has rock manut especially oneshba Jews who didn't know any better. They weren't educated. God has mercy. So the so we've uh we're flipping back and forth. What does the word ignoramis mean? Is it like Rabbi Aka who wanted to bite the heads off the rabbis or like we said it's just simply ignorant but we do have a choice and we don't want to remain ignorant but okay then that's what the means according to the that we're obligated to distinguish between the pure animals and the impure animals and then in that's Malachi 3:18 18. This is number 11 on the source sheet. And you shall return. See, we're going to come back and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him who serves God and him who has not served God. There's something about whether it's returning in the future or just doing our own. This is the last prophet. So, it's probably talking about the end of days, but every day is the end of days, right? do truly before you the day you die. So there's this idea of when you return, you will be able to distinguish between the righteous and the evil people, those who serve God and those who do not serve God. So there's different types of animals that are described as righteous or good and certain animals or the description of them are not good. And so we see the difference between sadikim and rashy or what about o that's the birds. So he says also we also have this obligation to separate or distinguish o and he's going to compare this also to the also compared to a bird. It says in Proverbs 26 verse two look at number 12 on the source sheet like a wandering sparrow and like a flying swallow. See it says kipur lenude kador kador dor in the liberty bell in Philadelphia I go I'm from Philadelphia right it's that famous pik about yo jubilee that the that proclaim liberty throughout the land that's liberty dur is freedom right after the jubilee year so all the slaves who decided they wanted to remain so the word dur mean liberty He does mean freedom. But even like the word doir, a country is not free if they don't have open communication where people can send letters without, you know, the authorities opening them up and censoring them. Uh the freedom of movement, right? The freedom of communication. Dor literally means freedom. Okay. So going back into the clear, we're like six lines off from the bottom on the left side. He says that the lush the language of Dor is the language of freedom. In fact, I have a friend who passed away recently, donated a lot of books. Uh his name he changed it to Freedellander. I'm sorry, it was Freedellander and he changed it to Dor. Okay. When he came to Israel, he decided he wanted to Hebrewize his name from Freedellander to Dor. Okay. So that is a language of kerus, a language of freedom. Now what is kerus? We go back to Exodus 32:16. Famous idea. This says engraved on the tablets. Right? Now the tablets were God's work and the in inscription was God's inscription. Engraved on the tablets al the word is the same word as karot. It's literally to engrave. It's through the law. It's through the engraving of the tablets of the Ten Commandments. The engraving, it's basically creating borders. When you add ink to paper, so you're adding ink to paper, but when you engrave, you're creating borders. That's the law. The law is creating borders, restrictions. And through that, we find our freedom. Okay? Just ask any married man. Okay. Okay. I see everyone's laughing. Okay. So that is the truth. It's through the law that we find our freedom. Many right many people of the other religion see it the other way. But um so that's the word don't read it as but rather and that's what it says in peravote. So I have here in number 14 perkyavo chapter 6 verse2 and the tablets are the work of god and the writing is god's writing engraved on the tablets. Don't read it as engraved as but rather as liberty for there is no free individual except he who occupies himself with the study of Torah and whoever occupies himself with the study of Torah is elevated as it says based on a in numbers 21:19 regarding and we're not going to deal with it right now but that was the the one of the proofs. Okay, let's go on. What about the Mitzim? We're going to call the Mitsim shrine for sure. The Egyptians, the way they treated us, they were evil and they're compared to the that there we talked about birds. There's some pure birds. We love eating chicken and turkey and pez feeasant and duck. What else do we like? Okay. But when it comes to like other birds, birds of prey, scavengers, they're not kosher. So the mitzim, the Egyptians are more compared to these birds, these scavenger birds, okay? That they they snatch up young birds or even the word I'm not sure if it could mean thievery because the word is from kamas. They they act like with cruelty. Okay. So I'm not sure if the word goim is the noun referring to they snatch up the young birds of others or go as in thievery also but either way we get the idea had already been discussed in a few weeks ago in parishi about the kosher animals and the non-coosher animals. Now inra 20 25 Leviticus 20:25 right we saw that right don't eat these disgusting animals because you'll be disgusted you'll become disgusted and this is something that we see in Gmor Shabas 15b you see that number 16 on the sori there's a list of six different things that when it comes to an amma Arts. Amma is someone who's not educated and we're not sure. We pretty are sure that they don't know the laws, right? We're not sure that they know the laws. Basically, we know they don't. So, to a certain extent, we give them the benefit of the doubt. But when it comes to eating their food or Cohen accepting their their vessels as a gift or Truman Mser as you know the the the tithes, who says you can readily accept it? So the Gmorra says vero not only is he tame he's impure but his spittle and his vessels and his clothes and so many things are are not pure because he doesn't know any better and now we're trying to the clear is trying to explain why in last week's para or right it that connection over here about what is pure and impure is Coming up again there's a juxiposition to our para about the coane who you as a coane are allowed to become impure for only the seven closest relatives and what are they let's start the wife the mother the father the son the daughter the brother and the sister who's not married now there's an additional one which is a mace mitzvah and that is for the person who Nobody's around to bury except for this cohen. Okay. So, he's really not allowed to become impure for his people. We'll see what that means. Okay. Therefore, there's this juxosition to this para that's mentioned over here amore ama lish where God is telling Moses to tell his brother that just for any dead body you cannot become impure for his people. So too this idea hints the whole he says the whole para the whole para is hinting to the idea that a sage should distance himself from ignorant people. But really he says even though from himself for the sake of himself how much more he would need to be careful and scrupulous in his actions when he's around other people if he has to be perfect which is really hard to do right there's only one perfect being and that's God but he has to be extremely careful about his actions because we already said people going to learn from him. So he doesn't create a a a desecration of God. Any time this sage does anything that's just a little bit off, a little bit off, it's very problematic. And now we understand why it says Remember, we start off by saying that there's a double language of say and you shall say and that's because there's a statement of that. It's true. But don't take it out of context. God is telling Moses to tell the should not just become impure for anybody, only for certain people. just as the verses say. But there's an additional saying and remember it said say twice that this is a special I'm going to say warning a directive to the to those who are called kanim and who are called kanim by the way it says in chapter 2 of mali verse 7 that you see number 17 on the sori for the priest's lips shall guard knowledge, the teaching shall be sought from his mouth, for he is a messenger of the Lord of hosts. Kiss Coen, right? When you go up to the temple mount to um to go to the Sanhedrin, not all the Sanhedrin are kanim. No, it's uh it's the sages, the judge, right? But they're called kanim. The kanim actually do have a special obligation to sit and learn so they can be teachers. That's true. But the the the Jewish people are called, as we're going to see soon in Exodus 19:6, that the Jewish people are called Met Kohanim. And even King David's children are called Kohanim. And we know they're from the tribe of Yehuda, not from Aaron's lineage. So there's a special instruction to the who are called. We just saw in Mali chapter 2 that Yeshu that right that the people are going to come up to us to yushim to request from the sages the sift coen it's a code name for the sages not just for the cohen that yes the coen has a special obligation to teach but so do all the other teachers have an obligation to have the Torah on their lips on their lips for those who deny the oral Torah what does it say that they are going to request from their mouths They want to know what to do. They will instruct you what to do. Okay? It doesn't say they're going to point to some verse in the Torah and you're going to follow the verse. It's going to be explained. The verse will be explained. And also in Exodus 19:6, right? You shall be to me a kingdom of priests and holy nation. This is talking to the whole Jewish people. These are the words you shall speak to the children of Israel. Okay? So Moses is told that all the Jewish people should understand that you will be to me a a kingdom of but you can call teachers you can call sadikim call people who are separate right you're all going to se be separate okay so in the last verse he brings from 2 Samuel 8:18 Beni Yahu the son of Yhu Yadah was over the archers and David's sons were chief officers. That's what it says in English. But in Hebrew, Benedu, they were chief officers. They were priests. What does it mean? They were priests. They were meaning they were separate from the people. Now he says why exactly is it that these sages people who are righteous why are they called kohanim priests since the priests the kanim work in the temple their service is around the offerings So too, the sages, the whose business they make the Torah their business. They're dealing with the Torah as it says in page 10 110 side A. You'll see this number 20 on the source sheet, right? Anybody who learns and deals with the laws regarding the burnt offering, the the offering, it's as if he offered. And of course, those who are involved in learning especially about their that's why they're like the because it's as if they're offering the these offerings, these sacrifices. Therefore, all these different details that we find by the priests, we also find by the sages near and all their details are hinted at in this para. And now we understand what it means when we read in Leviticus 21 verse1 which is one of the first verses we read that for a dead body he may not become impure for for his people right amongst his people that's the co what does it mean that a should not become impure on account of the ignorant masses. Now again, I just want to re reiterate that it's probably not true today, right? That was true when we have the temple and it'll probably be true again when Messiah comes because everyone will be on everyone be everyone will beat Sadikim. But in the meantime, we have to reach out to our brothers and our sisters who are considered tino shaishbah. Not the rashim, not the ones who hate the kamim, but the ones who are just captured by the gentiles by a a foreign spirit to bring them home to welcome them home as we do here at welcome home to Torah. Okay. So the last thing we read was that this idea of not becoming not um um not making your soul uh tame impure on account of somebody who's dead. Meaning that the tame should not become tame for an amarat because what is it about these amiratim the real true amiratim even while they're alive they're dead right this is a very interesting idea the righteous people after they die they're considered alive that's in Judaism right it's not aes right you live forever right you're you're righteous you'll go on to a great life in the world come. So when you die in this world, you're considered alive. But the the Russia, even while he's alive, he doesn't have a life. That's not a life. He's like he's dead. And we know about the tumara, the grave, the the most severe tuma comes from the dead body. So you're dealing with an amar. He's like a dead person. We're talking about the worst kind, right? That they even they have influence. they spread their their their um I'm going to call it a disease, but it's not a disease. It's um their impurity. That's why it says for the dead person, you don't become you should not degrade yourself to become impure because when you touch them, when you're involved with them, you you interact with them, it's as if you're touching a dead body. say in amongst his people. What does it mean amongst his people? That's right. While the dead body is amongst his people, this we say excludes the mace mitzvah. Meaning if there's nobody around then you're responsible. If there's other people around, they'll take care of it. That's for the cohen. Meaning to say, So now that we're like kind of like placing this idea of the like the Cohen. So it's forbidden for the for the sage, the righteous person to involve himself with the ignorant masses because he's considered dead even though he's alive. Again, if we're talking about the worst kind of Russia, okay, now in order that you don't say, no, this is something you don't say. So, we're going to say something that you're not supposed to think this is the right truth, but rather this is something you won't be mistaken. Soar that even in his death, right, if someone died, it would be absolutely forbidden to deal with him. So you think that's why the that's why the Torah actually says the Torah comes to fix that in while he's with his people meaning while he's alive. But once he actually dies mitzvah and he's considered a mace mitzvah, meaning there's nobody else to bury him. And I think this is this the key to the idea of a tinoishba that there's nobody else teaching him Torah. He never learned. He's mamished like a mace mitzvah. And therefore, you have an obligation. And I'm going to tell you, I think that's here. So for all those that are listening, we have around us like the walking dead Jews who are ignoramises not at their own fault but because they grew up in the exile in the diaspora with who knows it could be intermarried parents. It could be just for three or four generations they they left they left the orthodox fold and they're they don't know their olive bet they don't know the simple um you know fundamentals of Judaism and intermarriage is is rampant okay so that's what I think a mace mitzvah therefore you're obligated if he's dead then you have this obligation to deal with him but if he's alive and there's other people that can deal with it. Okay, but that's not the case by um most you know people today as now there are going to be cases. Imagine you're and you're married and your own family are amaratim. Okay, what's going what are you going to do if you're not supposed to deal with them while they're alive? Then what do you do? So you have a case. We have the and he has a father, he has a brother, he has a sister or could be other relatives who are living with him in the same house. It's impossible for him to function or them to function without the father, without the brother, without right. It's impossible. You can't separate yourself after the fact that we already heard and it could be that first midish that some shouldn't even talk mundane matters with the ignorant people because maybe someone would say you might mistakenly think that if your close relative that's living in your house, they're ignorant. You might think you can't deal with them. You might think that it's forbidden to even talk to them. That's not possible. It's not it's not going to be the case. rules, right? It says only the closest relative you're supposed to yourself for the mother, the father, and the wife and all that. To them, you should become impure. You have to be willing to become impure for your own family. Um, wears these since they happen to be close. It's impossible for him to live without them. Even though we say that they are ignorant and they're empty of Torah, nevertheless, nevertheless, it's permissible. maybe even obligatory. Of course, you have to do business. You must take care of you must be involved with your family. Now, this is a little bit of a side, but not in public. Not in public. Why in front of other people? Because it'll come eventually to a desecration of God's name because they will say, they're going to think that you have that should or it's permissible for them in general to do business with ignorant people and you're not allowed. That's why it says as the PK says in Leviticus 21:4, "But a husband should not defile himself for a wife that causes his desecration while she is among his people." So what does that mean? Think of think about a second. A car a cohen cannot just marry anyone. So what if he married a divorcee? So that wife, he cannot go to take care of her at the funeral. He shouldn't have married her. Sorry, just the way it is. So normally for a wife, he would go to the funeral and take care of the burial. But because she was the cause of his desecration, he kind of lost a certain status. He does not go to take care of her in the funeral. Now think about a second because we're talking about so he shouldn't become impure um for his wife in this case the one that desecrated him at least in public because she's the one who caused the desecration and again it would bring people to not look highly at God. It's it causes. So basically if she doesn't have any relatives and there's nobody around he can bury her as a mace mitzvah. Again mace mitzvah is when there's nobody else around. So if he married a woman who he shouldn't have married he cannot go to her funeral. But if she was a mace mitzvah then it would be a mitzvah for him to go and take care of her. I the clear card says it seems to me we can actually talk about it in from a different direction that this whole idea is actually coming to warn the Tom that he should be extremely meticulous in his behavior on account of the rest of the people who see how he acts. because we know they're going to act just like him. That's why the Torah says that the husband should not become impure for in for his wife to cause his dec desecration. But it says amongst his people. Now, this is a strange phrase, and I forgive me. I'm not sure exactly what it means here other than it could mean we don't hang our dirty laundry in public. Literally, it says that we don't cook a dish in public. Now, again, it could be also other types of behavior, but let's just say we don't hang our dirty laundry in public. This would bring us to a desecration of God's name because it actually says she's the cause of his desecration. So he's going to go to her funeral. He'll be seen. I mean, this was a downfall for him. For the very fact it says for the dead person, you should not remember we're talking about the whole time. were overlapping with but you shouldn't make your soul impure um um amongst his people that what does it mean that he shouldn't be make his soul impure by doing a sin in public now that in public means amongst his people that's what he claims it means now we all know that you're not allowed to do a sin even in private okay So even in private, it should be forbidden to do a sin. No problem. But by the way, it speaks in the what what should a person do? They have a a desire to do a sin. So it says they should say the schma. Well, first of all, you should fight your number one. You can't, then you say the schma. If that doesn't work, run to the basement. If that doesn't work, think of the day of your death. Okay? You have a whole list of things one should do. And if that doesn't work, then dress up in black, go to a different city. By the time you do all that, hopefully your your desires would go down. But the idea is like if you have a choice to do a vera, a sin in public or a sin in private, there's no question you shouldn't sin at all, but you have to do it in private. So even though in private it's forbidden to make yourself your soul impure by doing sin. Nevertheless, in public, he has an extra duty, an extra obligation to be careful with his actions that he should act scrupulously and not make his soul sull because the people, the ignorant man, they're going to learn from you. And if they see that you lean away, that you stray from the path, even a hair's breath, all that you did as a you strayed from the pathal a hair's breath as yuhatale. Then what would they do? They may add to leaning away from the path to to perversion the size of a a cable like a rope and that's why it says amongst your people in in public also kazal say regarding Moshe so this is a little bit complicated I will maybe try to tell you Moses made two complaints to god and one of them was in private and one of them was in public the first one in private was more severe complaint than the later one that was in public. So if we take a look and it's in Bidab look at number 23 on the source sheet. God was upset with Moses is because you did not believe you did not have faith in me. So at one point he he when God says you know I'm going to bring and you guys are going to eat meat for a whole month. Can you imagine? And so what Moses is like, how are you going to do that God? As if God can't do it. So that was a complaint against God. And uh what? You don't have faith in me? So there was a um a complaint that he had. I'm just going to read three lines down basically comparing these two times when he in private had a greater complaint and then in public he had a lesser complaint. What does it say? It says there too there's a lack of faith and it is greater than this one. Why did he Hashem not decree against him previously when he complained in private to what is the matter comparable? It is comparable to a king who had a close friend who would act arrogantly with him with harsh words whenever they were just alone. Whenever that person that friend was with the king, this friend was very harsh with the king. But the king never took offense because it was private. Sometime later, this friend acted arrogantly in the presence of the army, front of other people. So the king decreed that he be put to death. Here too, the holy one, blessed be said to Moses, the first one that you did was between me and you. Right? You were grievous. You were you were saying things that were harsh to me, but that was forgivable. Now in the presence of multitudes remember sinning in public is it not it's not possible to tolerate and that's why the pik says the original pik um because you did not have faith in me to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel. Okay, let's go back into the text. This is a very important thing because this is how we really started the shar that there going to be times that require drastic moves like Rabiel and um benary there was a need to open up the the bait mash by the time of theim. There was a need to reach out to and I'm going to call them the ignorant masses. You had to get Yiddish kite into the bloodstream of the Jews that were losing connection. And today with outreach, we need to reach I'm going to call them the ignorant masses, but let's call them unaffiliated the um the people who have distanced themselves for whatever reason. You know, if you're on campus today and you're you're not very connected to Judaism, you're going to get pulled and swayed into the I don't even know what to call it, you know, but the pro Palestinian camps because the way the Jew works, we always root for the underdog. We have we have a bleeding heart for the the the the orphan and the widow, right? The underdog. No question about it. So, there's a very important verse. Look up Psalms 119 126. It says King David says a time to do for the Lord. They have made void your Torah. What does it really mean? And there's a time to act for God when your Torah is at, you know, possible of of being negated. So they negate the Torah in order to keep the Torah. The classic example that I usually give is with the oral Torah. The oral Torah was always supposed to be oral, but when we saw the persecution coming and the Romans and everything that was happening and the upcoming exile, which was already beginning that they decided to write down the Torah. That's called a violation of the Torah in order to keep the Torah. Um the example that we're given here if you notice in number 25 on Nazir 23b so Tamar was engaged in lentious behavior. Actually this is actually the next part. Let me let me read on and then we'll get to it in a second. And so we have that P and there's a statement in Gora Nazir 23b and it says it's a very hard concept to get your head around. Greater is a sin but was is done for the sake of God than a mitzvah that's not for the sake of God. And that was the example I was about to give you. See, Tamar was she was not a prostitute. She was not lentious at all. But she was engaged in what appeared to be lentious behavior with Yehuda in order to have children. And as a result, she married to have kings. Obviously, she went to the mikvah. Obviously, she wouldn't have gone just with any man. She was trying to entice um Yehuda. And as a result, right, remember that even Yehuda should have married her from the Yeum aspect. Okay, Yehuda's sons died. They were married to Mahar. They were married to her and they should have married her and as the result of a Levitic Levitic marriage, um then Yehuda should have stepped up to the plate. But she was engaged nevertheless in a sin for the sake of God. Okay, I'll read the words. Tamar engaged in lasite lentious behavior for the sake of a mitzvah to have children. Therefore, she merited that the kings of the house of Dove had descend from her right King David's lineage trace back to Tamar's son Perro and she also married to have to be the ancestor of many prophets. Isaiah for example. Now what about Zimry in the desert? So what did he do? He engaged in lentious behavior but for the purpose of transgression. several multitudes of Israel fell because 24,000 Jews were killed because of him. So he was doing a uh he was doing a a sin in public. Okay. Whatever it was, it was it was very bad. Um I'll just read the next part. Baritsak said, "Greater is a transgression committed for its own sake, meaning for the sake of a mitzvah, for the sake of heaven, than if a mitzvah performed for its own sake." The Gomorrah questions this comparison. But didn't RV Yehuda say that? Ra said a person should always occupy himself with Torah and mitzvah even not for their own sake. In other words, even it's not in the bizm if you do it for some other reason. Eventually you might come to do it for the right reason. Okay. So let's we're almost finished. A few more lines. Amram all this idea um greater is a mitzvah sorry greater is a sin but if it's done for the right reason than a mitzvah not for the right reason this could be the very reason that we exclude a mace mitzvah mace mitzvah was the body that was found that nobody would bury that you should even the cohatos mimikra meim that the consequences the results of our evil acts are called death. They're called dead. And that would be the opposite. The fruit of the righteous is the tree of life. Therefore, if the sin becomes a mitzvah for the m just for a moment mitzvah, then we're going to call that act a mace mitzvah and it would actually be obligatory. It's a mitzvah. It's a mut. And that's what we mean when we say when the puss says except for his closest relative. Who is his closest relative? It says in Torah Kohanim we know because is means his flesh that when a man gets married he becomes one flesh. So when it says except for his closest relative in Hebrew really means his closest flesh means his wife. And who is his wife? The Torah rea is the Torah is called your wife the woman. And how do we know? So Gomorra Bro 57 side A brings a verse from Deuteronomy 33:4 right we have this famous verse right the Torah which God which Moses commanded us is a moasha moasha means an inheritance but it's an inheritance for the congregation of Yakov but the word moasha which means inheritance That is the connection we have with the Torah. It's the same word as moasa, an engagement. This is a true engagement, a bridal, a a marriage between Israel and the Torah. So this is your wife except for your wife. And this relates back to the idea. Whenever there is a a need, we kind of and you know, it's hard to say, but we negate the Torah to keep the Torah alive. It's it takes a a great group of sages to come to this conclusion. We don't decide on our own, but this was decided several times throughout history by the greatest of the sages. This is what the PK means in Psalms 119 126 that there's a time to act for Hashem to negate his Torah. We're talking about what we call temporarily and only if there's a great need and it has to be proven that it's in order to keep the Torah strong and therefore that's what it's referring back to. And I think that we have an obligation as a proof of outreach at a time where it's necessary. Just like the story of Raml and Alazer bin Aaria where they opened up the bait midash originally they were only taking people to Kabaro whose insides were like their outsides. Here they were taking people of less. They weren't the elite. They were simple people. And I'm going to say they were learned simple people. They're getting the yeshiva. But anybody that wants to learn, if you want to learn, I will not call you and I don't think you have the status of an okay you want to learn and therefore you're I give you a braha. You should continue learning God should give you strength should give you the ability to think to think about words and grammar and deep thoughts and your connection to Hashem. And I think anybody that wants to learn is certainly not in I think it's the greatest gift. It shows how intelligent you are. The very fact that you want to learn, the very fact that you go to Shirim, the very fact that you open a book and make every attempt to learn shows you're not the Amaritz the Reba was before he did chuva and you're probably not an amarat either because you have enough sense to uh to distinguish what is important in life. And with that, I will say good chabas and have a great life. Heat. Heat.