Rav Yitzchak Breitowitz: Bringing Passion into Your Yiddishkite

[Music] Okay, hi everybody. Thank you. Thank you for coming and this year is dedicated as always praying for the victory of our children. The lasting unity of the people of Israel and for all of those whose health has been affected by the war. For the safe return of all of the hostages. As you know. They are being released. If you see the most recent hostages, you can get a true picture of what actually was going on with Islam. The suffering is just unbelievable. All the they are back. Um. My speculation is that Hamas stopped the deal because they want to fatten up the rest so it shouldn't be a repetition. Of the very bad visual. But. Problem is this is not just a visual. This is a CS. Of things that were actually done. So you know. We still need we still need we still need as we always do. And all of those who are still in captivity should come back. Safely in good health and those who were released also should. Be emotionally and physically restored in every in every way. In addition we shall not. It's been a year. And again we appreciate the Torah. We now come of course Israel. This is a big e. This is not Torah. This is really the whole reason for the Exodus in the first place. You know I remember. In the 1970s. When there was a lot of agitation to free Soviet Jews every show. Conservative reform Orthodox. Had a sign. Quoting the verse let my people go. Truth is that's not a totally accurate translation. The Hebrew is sent forth my people. But besides that. They left out the next word let my let my people go or send forth my people by you have to do me so they will serve me. Meaning freedom. Was not an end in and of itself. You know a person can never make the argument. The purpose of life is to be free. Because that that that just begs the question free to do what? Free to be what? Freedom. Is a beautiful thing. Because it creates the conditions under which you can accomplish what you need to accomplish. But freedom does not give content. To that life. Eric Fromm who happened to be Jewish but he was a disciple of Sigmund Freud who also happened to be Jewish but once made the point. That. Society makes a very big mistake. When we define freedom as freedom from something. Freedom has to be towards something. It has to be towards a goal. And for us it's a lot of Torah. That's the goal. In fact that's why the whole idea of sphere if you think about the idea of counting the Omer. Counting the Omer is a connector. It is a linkage. Between the holiday of freedom. Which is Pesach. And the holiday of us. Which is Torah. And in effect the actually writes. That the period of counting of the Omer will talk more about it when we get into that period. Is actually a one long meaning Pesach and are really one holiday. And there's a long wait. So if you tell your boss. You don't work during wait. And you don't show up from Pesach to you you have some excuse. Although I absolutely cannot guarantee your job will be waiting for you. After that type of of absence. But the idea that it's one holiday is because Pesach without has no meaning. Has no purpose. From office means nothing. Unless it results in a dedication of your freedom. For a higher purpose. Now this actually explains. An Ashkenazi custom. It's a custom. It's not a it's not an obligation by any means. Of the idea that the first bit of food that we have after the matzah and the maror at the Seder. Is we have the hard boiled egg. Hard boiled egg. Now some people treat that like it's one of the 613 they can skip the matzah but they have to have a hard boiled egg but the hard boiled egg is a Ashkenazi. And there are different reasons that are given for it. One reason is. That an egg. Is the food that you give a mourner right after after the a funeral the very first food that's eaten. Hard boiled egg. And the reason for that is eggs are oval in shape so actually chickpeas would be good as well. But the idea is that life is like a cycle. There are bad times but it turns go go there. The turning wheel of life. That don't be me I wish. So in a sense last Seder which of course is largely a happy day. There's a certain element of mourning last Seder because we don't have the carbon Pesach. So we want to have the comfort of the egg to be kind. I will. Comfort the mourner. But in a deeper way it's been pointed out. That under the Jewish calendar. The first night of Pesach. Is always the same night of the week as meaning the first day of Pesach is the same day of the week as above. Now and therefore we kind of think about last Seder. But why would we want to bring in last Seder? So here is my speculation. I didn't see a particular source for this. The first night of Pesach. Is the only night. Which you're not connecting freedom to Torah because you don't start counting the Omer. Till the second night. So the first night represents. Freedom. That is not yet circumscribed. By submission to God. And maybe the lesson of the calendar is. A freedom. That is not combined. With all my acceptance. Of the oak of heaven. Will ultimately lead to a above. Freedom alone. Will be destructive. Anarchy. Immorality. Hedonism. And therefore in a sense having the egg last Seder. Is the substitute. For not counting the Omer last Seder. We'll discuss later why don't we start counting the Omer the first night of Pesach and we'll we'll talk about that maybe some other time. But the point basically is that freedom when it's not linked to Torah is going to be destructive. Now there's another explanation for the egg. That leads to exactly the same conclusion but by a different route. This is from the picture. The picture. Very beloved kind of brought him to the popular front. He goes back to the 19th century. The picture was a very profound revolution actually revolutionary thinker in many many many ways. It's one of those thinkers who says. All sorts of provocative things that get censored or or or muted or or whatever it is. He was actually the rabbi of the government. Who is actually more known in the world but the tended to teach in. Short episodic. Thoughts with tended to be much more lengthy in terms of developing. The thoughts but the was indeed his rabbi and us. And the says the following if you look at an egg an egg is laid by a chicken right chicken egg. So you see that a chicken is born in two stages. There is the laying of the egg. And then there is the hatching of the egg right the chicken lays an egg and then. Whatever days later the chick emerges from the egg unlike mammals. Which are born. Live right and chickens or birds generally. Have a double stage the egg and then the hatching of the egg. So he says Israel. Is exactly that way. As a nation we experience a double birth. It's us like the laying of the egg. But we're not really born as a nation. Till we get the Torah and therefore the egg itself again it's ultimately the same idea. That we shouldn't think. Our completion as a nation. Is you see us right here. We have to recognize that Torah. Is our ultimate completion. And in fact you can actually see this from the four cups of wine. I mean two weeks ago. We learned the source as you know anyway for the rabbinic drinking four cups of wine and that's because in era there are four the show notes. Of redemption. I take you out the I will save you. I will redeem you. I will take you on to me for a nation. And because of these four of all of them. The sages. Enacted that we commemorate it by four cups of wine at the Seder. All right, this is a well-known idea that the takana derabanan, it is derabanan, I want to emphasize, this takana derabanan of dalid kosos at the Seder is connected to four leshonos of Geulah. And if you want to hear a shiur on the four leshonos, you can go back 2 weeks ago and hear a shiur. But I But I want to make a very simple point at this point. The fourth leshon of Geulah, I take you unto me for a nation, is actually referring to the revelation at Sinai. It is not referring to the Exodus from Egypt. Lakachti etchem li le'am. So, it turns out that it's implicit, actually explicit, that Matan Torah is part and parcel of the Exodus from Egypt, because in point of fact, the fourth leshon of Geulah is because of Matan Torah. You see? So, you see very clearly that Matan Torah is not frosting on the cake, it's not something that's added to the experience of freedom, but it is the very reason why that freedom exists. Now, we know that there's a mitzvah every single day to remember Yetziat Mitzrayim, every single day. In fact, day and night. That's why in the third paragraph of Shema, when we say the verse, Ani Hashem Elokeichem, right? Hashem says, I am the Lord your God, asher hotze'sicha me'eretz Mitzrayim, who took you out of Egypt to be your God. So, if you look in the ArtScroll Seder, you will actually see one should have intention when reciting this verse to fulfill the mitzvah de'oraita of recounting the Exodus. In fact, these are two different mitzvahs. Leil Pesach, which is an annual event, there's a mitzvah called sippur, elaboration, a long story, the Haggadah. During the year, there's a different mitzvah that's called zechirah, orally remembering it in brief. Right? Sippur is the long story, zechirah is the short story, uh but there's a daily mitzvah connected to the Exodus. Now, the Ramban writes in the Sefer Hamitzvot, again, uh Sefer Hamitzvot is of course a book written by Rambam, Maimonides, but Ramban wrote a number of criticisms and disagreements and comments on the Sefer Hamitzvot. For example, he argues that the Rambam should have included certain commandments that he didn't. Among them, which is not our topic, is the famous uh shitah of the Ramban that living in Eretz Yisrael is a positive mitzvah de'oraita, which the Rambam, Maimonides, does not count, and Ramban says should be counted. So, among the Yeah, I'm sorry. But he he said Rambam, sorry. Yeah. I'm confusing with your accent, sorry. Um okay. So, among the omissions that the Ramban criticizes the Rambam for omitting is actually a mitzvah that the Ramban says that every person is obligated, just as they are obligated to remember the Exodus every day, they are obligated to remember the revelation at Mount Sinai every day. So, actually it was Rambam Yeah. It's implicit in the Yeah. He said that there's only three reasons why one should be outside of Israel. Mhm. It was Rambam said that. Which was to marry, Yeah. to make a to make aliyah to Israel, to teach Torah. No, that's that's very, very true. Uh the problem is uh more of a technical problem, and that is in the listing of the 613 mitzvot, Rambam does not have a mitzvah called living in the land of Israel. So, you're dealing with a problem of listing, and the Ramban says that should be added to the list. Now, I don't want to get into the methodology, but you understand there's a certain problem here because of the number 613. Meaning, if you're committed to the idea that you got to come up with 613 commandments, 248 positive and 365 negative, that actually means every time you add a mitzvah, you got to figure out a way to take out Take it there It has to balance out, right? So, so All right, just take it on faith that uh the rishonim deal with this problem. Meaning, every time there's an addition, there's a subtraction, or you include it in something else. Uh the Ramban figured all of this out. Uh so, whenever he adds, he also subtracts. Usually, by subtraction, I don't mean eliminated, but kind of subsume it under under something else and the like. And that's That's a whole chachma that the rishonim have to go into. Although, Ramban does make a bit of a subversive suggestion that who says we got to go with 613? I mean, uh this is actually an isolated opinion of a rabbi in the Gemara that there's a total of 613 commandments, but you know, it's not an article of faith. I mean, we believe everything in the Torah is from God, but that it has to add up to 613, the Ramban actually suggests, you know, maybe not. Uh what would be wrong if we would say there are, you know, 700 mitzvahs in the Torah? The Ramban actually flirts with that suggestion. He then says, "Yeah, but it's pretty clear Chazal go with the 613, so we we ought to accept it." But he does say it's not an article of faith. Okay? That's an interesting, very interesting point. So, we don't have to shoehorn things. Meaning, if we If we find extra mitzvahs, we don't necessarily have to diminish it because we're not wedded. Okay. But be that as it may, the Ramban does count as a mitzvah to remember the experience of being at Mount Sinai and hearing God give the commandments. Now, what exactly we heard at Mount Sinai is itself a very, very interesting, interesting debate. The standard rabbinic explanation at Mount Sinai is we only heard the first two commandments. We heard uh God's voice, "I am the Lord your God who who took you out of Mitzrayim." And the second one is, "Thou shalt not have any other gods beside me." And then we were frightened, we were scared, and we begged Moshe Rabbeinu to be the intermediary for the rest. And therefore, we did not hear the 10 Commandments, according to the Gemara. We only heard two commandments, and the other eight were communicated by Moshe, as well as the rest of the Torah. As they write, all the 613 we heard from Moshe. And the Gemara in Makkot derives this from a very interesting gematria. And the interesting gematria is that the pasuk says in Zot Haberachah, Torah tziva lanu Moshe. Moshe gave us or commanded us the Torah. The gematria of Torah, right? The tav is 400, and the vav is six, and the resh is 200, 606, and the five is 611. We got 611 from Moshe, but two of them we got from God. Of course, that does raise an interesting question. And again, I'm going off on all sorts of side paths, which I'm not going to develop, but just for you to think about. And then there's Well, wait a second here. Uh two commandments we heard from God. Then we got scared. So, the rest of the 10 Commandments, as well as the rest of the Torah over time, we heard from Moshe. Uh and that's why Moshe gave us 611, and God gave us two. But what are the two that God gave us? "I am the Lord your God who took you out of Mitzrayim. You shall not have any other gods." But wait a second. What commandment is that first one? Meaning, "I am the Lord your God who took you out of Mitzrayim." Is that a mitzvah? That's a statement, right? So, what mitzvah is in the idea that I am the Lord your God? So, the truth is, Maimonides, the Rambam, actually counts Anochi Hashem Elokecha as a positive mitzvah. It is the mitzvah to believe in God. The mitzvah of emunah. Ramban once again has a logical problem with that. How can you be commanded to believe in God? I mean, if I don't believe in God, what is the source of the authority that's going to make me believe in God? It's like telling an atheist, you know, a person says, "I'm an atheist. I don't believe in God." And I say, "You can't be an atheist. You're not allowed to be an atheist." And he says, "Why not?" He says, "Because God says you got to believe in him." But I don't believe in God. So, Ramban actually argues it's impossible for there to be a mitzvah of emunah. Once you have emunah, then everything God says you have to listen to. So, emunah, Anochi, is a foundational principle that actually predates, so to speak, specific commandments. That's a very strong argument. What would the Rambam say to that? Now, there is The Rambam does count Anochi as a mitzvah of emunah. What do you mean a mitzvah of emunah? So, many understand that the Rambam is saying the following. The mitzvah of emunah cannot be directed to a non-believer because he doesn't accept that mitzvah. It's directed to a believer. And it's basically saying, you who believe in God because you were raised that way, because you were taught that way, you are obligated to undergo a search where you intellectually comprehend the necessity for the existence of God and don't simply believe in God as a matter of tradition or blind faith. In other words, Maimonides, I'll say Maimonides cuz Rambam and Ramban sometimes get mixed up, they're hard to hear, so forgive me using the English or the Latin the Latin term. Maimonides actually says philosophically demonstrating the existence of God is the mitzvah of emunah. Don't do it on blind faith or tradition. Engage in philosophical speculation. I just want to point out that the very thing that Maimonides considers to be a mitzvah, there are other authorities who consider it to be almost an aveira. And they highly discourage philosophical exploration of the existence of God for a very simple reason, you never know where you're going to come out. Now, Maimonides was so confident that the truth will emerge, that yeah, explore it philosophically because for sure you'll come to the right conclusion. And I guess we would believe that too, truth is truth, but the reality of human experience is that we bring biases, we bring agendas, and therefore there is, pragmatically at least, a lot to be said for not opening up Pandora's boxes. So, an example would be if you take a book like The Guide to the Perplexed, Moreh Nevukhim, written by the Rambam, the same Rambam who wrote the Mishneh Torah. So, I remember just this a few just a few weeks ago, a guy from the outside walked into the Ohr Sameach Beit Midrash, and he asked me where the Rambam's sefarim are in the Beit Midrash. So, I showed him this was the shelf that has all the Rambam's sefarim. So, he's looking, he's looking, he's looking, he says, "I don't see the Moreh Nevukhim. I don't see The Guide to the Perplexed there." Well, the answer is, in the yeshiva Beit Midrash, you're not going to see The Guide to the Perplexed. It's not just Ohr Sameach, any yeshiva Beit Midrash. They'll have it somewhere, they'll have it in the you know, some side room, maybe under lock and key. Again, I I this is a topic that's much broader than I I can address right now, but I think it's fairly clear that in many many parts of the religious world, over centuries, there was a strong, what you might call, anti-philosophical bias not to try to intellectually delve into the questions of does God exist, does God not exist, because there was a real real fear that it might undermine emunah. And there may be some truth to that. Another example is the sefer Chovot Halevavot, Duties of the Heart. Duties of the Heart is one of the greatest greatest ethical books of musar ever ever written. Uh it's an old book, it was written in the Arabic. It predated the Rambam, and in fact, the Rambam testified that it was his own father's favorite sefer, Chovot Halevavot. Now, Chovot Halevavot talks about faith and loving God and submitting to God and humility and teshuvah, all the important things, Chovot Halevavot. But the first chapter of Chovot Halevavot is called Shaar HaYichud, the gate of unity, and it's a lengthy philosophical treatise proving the existence of God and the incorporeality of God, meaning the non-physicality of God, through logical proof and argument. And a common comment about the Chovot Halevavot is that the Vilna Gaon said, "All of the Chovot Halevavot is holy, but start with chapter two. Don't read chapter one." Right? And to this day, there are books that commentaries on the Chovot Halevavot that start with chapter two and don't do Shaar HaYichud. So, I'm not here to to really address this, I'm just throwing out the idea that the issue of philosophy versus faith has been a major major issue throughout uh Jewish history. And it's interesting that the Rambam, as you would expect, was very very pro uh philosophy, ad ke de kach, that he read that type of philosophical investigation into the very meaning of the mitzvah of emunah. The opposite of what you might think. Uh if emunah is translated as faith, you might think it's the opposite of that type of inquiry, and yet the Rambam says that is the idea of making it an intellectual reality. Uh but as I say, how you how you're going to apply that to yourself and to the education of your own children is a question that everybody does have to grapple with. I will say, uh if you take a yeshiva like Ohr Sameach, which deals with uh large largely, not totally, with with kids who have come from non-religious secular backgrounds, we are by definition much more open to philosophy because the kids have already been exposed to Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris, you know, the famous triumvirate of of apikorsim, some of whom are not alive, uh and their teachings are very they do they do kiruv for their thing, meaning they do outreach, uh heretical outreach to Now, it used to be, you know, the old-fashioned apikorus, uh let's take Elisha ben Avuya. You know, you got to give him credit. Elisha ben Avuya uh is described by Chazal as a great rabbi who became a heretic. And yet we find uh the Gemara gives a story that he's riding a horse on Yom Kippur that falls out on Shabbat, eating a treif sandwich, like he's doing a million aveirot, you know, a treif sandwich on Yom Kippur, riding a horse, which is assur d'Rabbanan, etc. And Rabbi Meir is following him, asking him questions. And Elisha ben Avuya is answering the questions. And at some point, Elisha ben Avuya says, "Oh, you can't go any further because I measured the steps, and this is going to be 2,000 amot from your boundary on Shabbat and Yom Kippur, so you got to go back." To me, this has been very striking to me. Elisha ben Avuya is a heretic. You'd figure he would try to make, you know, disciples. And yet he didn't want to cause Rabbi Meir to violate the Torah. He says, "Okay, I got my problems, but you don't have to take on my issues." That's very remarkable, I I think. Elisha ben Avuya deserves a lot of credit for that particular attitude. The apikorsim of today are not that way. The apikorsim of today want to make converts. They do outreach. So, as a result, in a yeshiva like Ohr Sameach, since our student body has already been exposed to all of the philosophical arguments against God, so we have to get more involved in the philosophical arguments that support God. But if you're in a more sheltered environment, there are those who make the argument, don't get involved. Now, again, the counter-argument is, yeah, but what's going to happen if 20 years later they get exposed Okay, these are good questions. I'm not going to address all of these questions, but all I want to say is uh just the his the simple historical observation that what the Rambam considered to be mandatory, others considered to be prohibited. Prohibited. In fact, there's a very stinging comment of the Vilna Gaon uh about sheidim. You know, there's a whole discussion The Talmud has discussions about demons. And the Rambam writes, "Uh no such thing as demons. Demons are metaphors. Demons are symbols of different things. No such thing as demons." So, the Vilna Gaon writes the following. The Vilna Gaon writes, he says, "If Chazal say," very stern, "if Chazal say there are demons, of course there are demons. And if the Rambam says not, he was led astray by his preoccupation with philosophia ha'arurah, the accursed rational Greek philosophy that led him to dismiss anything that cannot be explained by pure rationality." So, the Vilna Gaon had his thing against that. Someone asked the Kotzker Rebbe in the 19th century, he says, "Who's right, the Vilna Gaon or the Rambam?" So, the Kotzker Rebbe said, "Well, of course the Vilna Gaon is right. If Chazal say there are demons, there are demons." "So, how come we don't see them today?" He says, "Ah, once the Rambam says they don't exist, so even the demons have to respect his view. So, so they get out they get out of the way." That's what the That's what the Kotzker Rebbe said. So, they're kind of both both right. Okay. But the main thought I wanted to share with you is based not totally in the Ohr HaChaim, but it's based on a comment of Rav Chaim ben Attar, the great Ohr HaChaim HaKadosh, uh one of the great rabbis who came to Yerushalayim in the 1700s. He's buried on Har HaZeitim. Uh here his yahrtzeit I think is I think is the 15th of Tammuz, and actually to this day, thousands and thousands of people go to the kever of the Ohr HaChaim on the Mount of Olives in Har HaZeitim. Uh and the Ohr HaChaim says the following. If you look at the hachanot, the preparations for Matan Torah, so it starts off this way. BaChodesh HaShlishi, it was the third month let's say Sefinei So, B'Eretz Yisrael, from the time that they left Egypt, because it's the month of Sivan. BaYom HaZeh, on Rosh Chodesh Sivan, Bo Midbar Sinai, they came to the Sinai Desert. So, it already tells me they came to Sinai. Then it seems to go backwards and repeats. It says "You shall marry feed them." They traveled from the oasis of Refidim. That's where we encountered Amalek. And they came to the midbar Sinai. But it just said they came to Sinai. And then it repeats they encamped by the desert. They shall be so negative or and says and they encamped adjacent to the mountain. So there's a lot of problems here. Number one, the whole second is redundant. I know from the end of last week when we encountered Amalek, we were in an oasis that was called Refidim. And the first of the period tells me we got to Sinai. So putting one and one together, I know we left Refidim and we came to Sinai. So why does the second have to say we left Refidim and we came to Sinai? It's redundant. Second of all, within the itself, it repeats because after it says we came to midbar Sinai, it says they they camped at midbar Sinai. Well, if they came, they camped. And then it repeats again they encamped by the mountain, but you'll notice it doesn't say it in plural you know, singular. So the whole second is redundant and within that second it there are redundancies and repetitions. So the gives a very very beautiful answer. And that is the following. The first is is describing the trip in terms of its geography. They came to Sinai and I know from the end of they left Refidim they came to Sinai. The second is is not describing the physical journey but it's describing the spiritual journey that they had to go through to prepare for Torah. A four-step spiritual journey. And since the says we have to relive the experience of Sinai every day the same four-step spiritual journey that they had to go through then is a four-step spiritual journey we have to go through now. So let's break down this paragraph base into the four steps. Step one, you must leave Refidim. Now what is Refidim? Refidim is a place indeed and that is the place where Amalek attacked us. But also say that the name Refidim has a symbolic meaning. It's a contraction of rough you damn. Their hands were weak. Now this is an idiomatic expression in Hebrew for a lack of passion, a lack of intensity a lack of commitment. The expression would be that when you're holding something that's very dear to you, you're holding your baby for example and you're crossing King George you're going to hold the baby tight. If you have you know something that's unimportant to you, you have a tissue I so hopefully you're not going to intentionally throw it in the street or the lot of people do that you know, but but you're holding it loose if it blows away, you don't really care that much. So weakening of the hands is an idiomatic Hebrew term for not caring about something, being complacent, not being invested. So make the point that the reason we were vulnerable to Amalek is because even though we you know we were keeping whatever we had at that time that's before Torah remember in the oasis of Mara we got a number of myths was but we were doing it without enthusiasm. We were doing it without intensity. And when there is coldness of the heart Amalek enters. Cuz remember the fundamental idea Amalek on the outside has no power over Russia unless there's an Amalek on the inside. It's the Amalek on the inside that makes us vulnerable to the external Amalek on the outside. And what is the Amalek on the inside? It's not necessarily vicious evil. It's coldness of the heart indifference complacency. So the first step towards truly accepting God's Torah is to journey away from Refidim. Refidim is the state of complacency indifference lack of passion lack of smack. This is a real problem. A person could be very firm, a person could be very very observant. But there's no excitement. There's no passion. There's no sense of enthusiasm in their Hashem. This is coldness. This is boredom. This is indifference. Somebody once described the situation of sometimes Orthodox Jews that instead of 613 votes they look at life as 613 problems that you got to figure out ways around in order to do what you really want to do in life. Meaning they don't look at us as life. They look at us as barriers that are preventing them from living lives. And yeah, they're committed to navigating those barriers, but it's all about navigation. As opposed to the idea that this is life. So step number one is embrace enthusiasm. Miss those with her. Now obviously much easier said than done. Well, okay. Well, how do I do that? What do I do? One has to think about it. One has to work. One has to think about how do I bring his hot shot? How do I bring renewal? How do I bring passion? How do I bring excitement? It may be especially hard because there's a lot of things that are repetitive. I mean we have three times a day. Especially when when you have a constant repetition there is always the risk of routinization. And we have to constantly think about how to be fresh. How to innovate excitement in our Hashem. This is a major major challenge. People are always asking how do I get my kids to be excited about God? Well, that's a very good question. But part of the answer is if we would be excited about our kids would be excited too. So it's not always a question of how do I motivate them? It's actually a question of how do I motivate me? And when I'm motivated, that's going to be contagious in many many ways. So that's the first step. Leave the world of Refidim. Embrace the world of passion. Now the next step is coming to the desert. For your vote in by Sinai. So here the notion of desert, you know many people actually find many photographers actually find the desert a beautiful environment. Not necessarily that you want to live there. But they find the desert beautiful precisely because it's so empty. You know the world as we live in is a very cluttered world. Building stuff hordes of people whatever it would be. And the desert has a certain beauty precisely because it's empty. It's the void of a lot of materialism. And therefore the second lesson to be Hashem's Torah is to try to divest ourselves of an over involvement in stuff in things. Now this is a little bit complicated because Judaism certainly does not advocate poverty. It does not say deliberately to live a life of asceticism and renunciation. One should try to have a relatively comfortable life because understands that this is gives a person a certain expansiveness in which they could do and learn Torah in a good way. But we also have to be very very careful about kind of ruling over our possessions and not having our possessions rule over us. I remember years ago Pepsi-Cola Pepsi ran a campaign that if you drink a certain amount of Pepsi you can redeem the uh the thing for prizes. Fact I remember as a teacher there was actually a case. They had a commercial which was totally intended to be a joke where if somebody got 6 million Pepsi points they could get a carrier jet. Of course they made a that this would be impossible. No human being could possibly accumulate 6 million Pepsi points. But some kid managed to do it. Maybe he was working with Iran. And he accumulated 6 million points. He demanded a carrier jet which actually would be illegal. I mean you can't just even if you have the money you can't just buy a jet for your backyard. And he took them he took Pepsi to court. And uh you know, Pepsi's argument was, "Hey kid, it's a joke." Okay, I might as well Pepsi won the case that it was a joke, but nevertheless, uh the motto of this campaign was "Drink Pepsi, get stuff." Get stuff. Doesn't make a difference what stuff it is. I just want to get stuff. It's almost like just getting stuff is the end of things, no matter what the stuff is. And we recognize that the more we're filled with materialism and the like, the less sensitive we are to spirituality and to ruchniyus. That's something. And And there There There actually is even a psychological reason for that. You know, one of the concerns with internet, and it's interesting now that even secular colleges are now wanting to cut down on the use of uh internet and and the like, because they say that with internet, uh forget about pornography and the bad stuff, but just the web surfing, the phenomenon of web surfing means you just go from thing to thing to thing to thing. Uh there's no concentration, there's no analysis. You can't sit still for anything that's complicated. That's why they say it used to be a standard college class was always 50 minutes, 5-0. And now when they do online uh courses, a lot of them are 20 minutes because they've actually found that nobody could concentrate for more than 20 minutes at a time. Uh and the answer is because we get habituated to instant gratification. And when you get habituated to instant gratification, you don't take the time or effort to master things that are slow. So, whether it's junk food versus French cooking, take that example, whether it's comic book versus Shakespeare, this phenomenon that once we get habituated to the instant, we don't take the time and the effort for things that are actually much more valuable. That's the way it works. So, materialism and ruchniyus is exactly the same thing. Material pleasure tends to give you instant gratification. Spiritual pleasure, which is so profound and real, but it takes work. You know, you open up a Gemara, you're not going to get automatically an instant nirvana. You work about it, you think about it. So, as a result, the Orach Chaim says, if stage one of the journey is to leave Rephidim and embrace enthusiasm and passion, stage two is try to keep your life simple. Don't be overly involved in the material pursuits of life, because that can drag you down very very very easily. You know, I remember uh we hearing a story from Pesach Krohn. He once had a uh he or somebody once had a guest for Shabbos who was a chozer b'tshuva who had been a competitive cyclist. He had been a bicycle rider and races. And he had to leave it because most of these long bicycle races are on Shabbos. So, he stopped doing it. Probably it was a big sacrifice. So, the question becomes that he you know, he always gets asked, you know, uh "How was it like to give up, you know, something that you had a passion about?" So, the the gentleman said, "Actually, I find there's a lot of similarities between keeping the Torah and doing marathon bicycle racing." Does What's the comparison? He says, "You know, when you're a marathon cyclist and you're competing like every any Olympic sport is like that, you're competing against people who are very talented. The differences between the gold and the silver and even the gold and the copper and even the people the gold and the people who are not even copper could be very very small. They could be like they swimming. These could be a difference between the first place and the 10th place might be 2 seconds. Right? Nothing that's really normally significant except in that championship context. So, when you're a bicycle uh you're riding your bike and you got all these people in back of you that are breathing down your neck, you got to learn to get rid of everything you don't need. Get rid of the scarf, get rid of the cap, because every little thing might be holding you back. So, what I learned from cycling is get rid of the baggage you don't need. And that's what I learned from Torah. Get rid of the baggage I don't need, whether it's material junk, whether it's resentments, whatever your baggage baggage can come in many many different different forms. My angers, whatever it would be. So, that's the idea of midbar, emptiness. Create a space for God by kind of getting rid of the stuff that distracts you from God. So, that's step two, right? Vayisu me Rephidim vayavo'u midbar Sinai. Step three though repeats the word midbar. Vayachanu bamidbar. So, midbar has a second appearance in the verse. What is the meaning of the second appearance? So, here the Orach Chaim says, midbar has another connotation. Besides simplicity and emptiness, it also connotes humility. Because the midbar is the dirt or the sand that people walk on. In a lo chayn yotzer, every day in the Shmoneh Esrei, we say nafshi ka'afar, may I be like the dust that people trod on, that I don't care about my ego. So, that's the third step in accepting Torah, to cultivate the notion of humility. Humility is very very necessary to be open to God's Torah. Cuz first of all, without humility, you're not willing to learn from other people, because you always think you know the best and the like. And when you're filled when we're filled with our own egotism, God's word doesn't always permeate. You see? So, step one, enthusiasm. Step two is simplicity. Step three is humility. And then we finally come to step four. Vayichan sham Yisrael. The Jewish people encamped next to the mountain. And here already Chazal point out that vayichan at the end of the pasuk is b'lashon yachid, it is written in the singular. Earlier in the same pasuk, vayachanu was lashon rabbim, plural. Vayichan is lashon yachid. And here Chazal say we had to be k'ish echad u've'leiv echad. We could not accept the Torah till we were like one person, one soul, unity, togetherness. Ahavas Yisrael. Kabbalas haTorah cannot occur when there's machlokes, dissension. Do you remember in the dayeinus that we recited at the Seder? So, it says, "Oh, if God would have done this and not done the other things, dayeinu, that would have been enough to be grateful." So, some of the dayeinus are problematical. So, it says for example, "If you would have brought us to Mount Sinai and you wouldn't have given us the Torah, dayeinu." Well, one could ask the question, why is that dayeinu? What would the point have been to be brought to Har Sinai and not get the Torah? What's dayeinu? That's nothing. So, many meforshim say, "Well, yes, but it means if we would have reached the level of ish echad u've'leiv echad, even if it wouldn't have been followed by the Torah, that itself would have been something to be grateful for. Kal vachomer, of course, that we got the Torah." So, we have a very neat package according to the Orach Chaim of a four-step plan. Passion, simplicity, humility, unity. These are the four steps all Yisrael had to take in order to be mekabel the Torah. And since every day we have to re-accept God's Torah, these are four steps that we need to work on as well. So, now let me just add something to the Orach Chaim based on a very very well-known story in Maseches Bava Metzia. I'm sure you've heard the story before. This is the story that involves what's called tanur shel achnai, the oven of achnai. Achnai means a serpent. The oven that was shaped as a serpent. And this involved a portable earthenware oven that was cut into horizontal strips like hula hoops, if you remember. Older people may remember the hula hoop. And it would be it would be carried by may, Rabbi Eliezer said it was pure. And the Gemara goes on, again, the particulars of that debate are not relevant to us, but the Gemara mentions that Rabbi Eliezer brought all sorts of proofs for his position. And the sages disagreed with him. And they ruled the halakha was the way they they they felt. Yeah. The Gemara then goes on and says, Rabbi Eliezer could not convince them by argumentation. So, he wanted to convince them by supernatural miracle. That God agreed with his position. And the Gemara recounts he actually did three miracles. The first miracle was, "If the halakha is like me, let the carob tree uproot itself and fly away." And the carob tree uh moved like a rocket. And the hakhamim said, "We don't listen to trees." Okay. "If the halakha is like me, let the river reverse its course." And the river reversed its course. And once again, they said, "We don't really listen to rivers, either." "If the halakha is like me, let the walls of the Beit Hamedrash cave in." And the walls were caving in. And Rabbi Yehoshua ordered the walls, "Don't you dare." And the walls didn't know what to do, uh cave in or straighten up. So, the Gemara says, "That's why they remain slanting." Had I Yoma said, meaning like leaning tower of pizza. And it's explained, "Oh, these walls are slanting because the walls didn't know what to do because they had contradictory commands from Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Yehoshua. But, as you could guess, the hakhamim said, "We don't listen to walls. We don't care about trees. We don't care about rivers. We don't care about walls." So, finally, he pulls out the big guns and he says, "If the halakha is like me, let there be a heavenly voice that says I'M RIGHT. LET HASHEM say who's right here." And a voice from heaven said, "Halakha k'Rabbi Eliezer." And the hakhamim said, which is of course what they meant all along, he says, "You know, we don't even care about that. You said in your Torah, lo bashamayim hi, the Torah is not in heaven. You entrusted halakhic determination to us. We are the ones that you designated as your deciders. Stay out of it. Lo bashamayim hi." The Gemara recounts this was such an unusual thing that somebody asked Rabbi Yochanan Navi, "What was God's response when they tell God, 'Butt out of this.'" And it says, "Kav Yakav, Hashem was laughing." And Hashem said, "Nitzchuni banai, my children have been victorious over me. I will stay out of this fight." This is a huge, fascinating topic, which again, I apologize for bringing up so many things I'm not going to talk about. I will talk about this some other time. I am on a very small part of the story, not not the main part of the story. But, there's a fascinating connection. It's a thought from the Vilna Gaon as to why Rabbi Eliezer chose those three miracles. The miracle of the tree, the miracle of the water, and the miracle of the walls of the Beit Hamedrash. Rabbi Eliezer's initial strategy, which of course is what a talmid hakham does, is he was trying to convince them that he was logically correct. Right, that's that's the first thing you you try to do. And he was not successful. They did not accept his arguments. So, the Vilna Gaon says, "The next thing he wants to do is he wants to say, 'You ought to listen to me because I have the middot, I have the character traits that make my halakhic decisions more in the tune with the will of God.' And the Vilna Gaon identifies three traits that a talmid hakham must have. The first trait, in his order, is he is not overly involved in gashmius, in the material world. He's not looking for money, he's not looking for possessions. That's symbolized by the carob tree. The tree is testifying because we know the carob was a very very simple is a very simple food. And when the Gemara wants to describe the greatness of a rabbi who does not live for materialism, it mentions the great Rabbi Chanina ben Dosa, who only lived on a measure of carobs from Erev Shabbos to Erev Shabbos. So, the tree is testifying to his simplicity, his divestment from material pleasure. The second quality is humility. And that's water. Water is a symbol of humility as Chazal say, Torah is compared to water because it goes from the high ground to the low ground. Now, this is interesting. So, he's calling on God to make a miracle, but listen to this, to affirm that he is a humble person. Now, that may sound a little bit of a contradiction here. "I am so humble that this water will change its course to say how humble I am." At first glance, you would say, "Well, gee, that's kind of boasting about how humble you are." But, the truth of the matter is, if he felt he had to make a halakhic point, it is legitimate for a person to say, "This is not about my ego. This is not about my kavod. This is not about me. This is about emes. And I will show you that God himself through this miracle will validate my humility. It's not as much of a contradiction as you would see if a person truly has the right intention." Now, 99% of the time, there will be that self-aggrandizement and ego that's involved. But, in some cases, the most modest I mean, you see with Moshe Rabbeinu himself. I mean, listen, Moshe Rabbeinu, the Torah says, was the most humble of all people. And yet, how many times did he assert his leadership? It had to be done. So, the carob tree represents divestment from materialism. The water represents humility. And the final thing about uh the walls of the Beit Hamedrash represents hasmada, diligence, meaning as if to say, he was the first to come and the last to go. Uh the Beit Hamedrash can testify that I put in the time and the effort to learn. So, these are the three character traits he's trying to demonstrate, says the Vilna Gaon. So, what I would like to suggest is that these three character traits, although in different order, do match up with three out of the four of the Orah Chaim. Right, the simplicity of the desert actually matches up with the carob tree. The humility of the desert, albeit desert, matches up with the humility of the water. The passion and excitement matches up with the diligence and the hasmada because when you're passionate, you stay with it. So, Rabbi Eliezer had three out of the four. But, he was lacking one of the four. He was lacking unity in his unwillingness to accede to the hakhamim. He was creating machloket. So, it's interesting that three out of the four match up perfectly. And it was the chissaron in achdus that perhaps was his He was a great man, but perhaps was his downfall. I mean, in fact, the Gemara itself ends with a very tragic story. He was the gadol hador, and he was excommunicated because he refused to accept the decision of the Sanhedrin. And Rabbi Akiva, his disciple, was sent to give him the news. Rabbi Eliezer was sick in bed. Rabbi Akiva came into the uh the chamber. And Rabbi Akiva stood four amos away because when somebody is excommunicated, you're not supposed to be within their four amos. What's four amos? And excommunicated. So, Rabbi Eliezer said, "What's wrong? What's wrong? Why are you standing?" And Rabbi Akiva had to give him the news. "It appears that your colleagues have distanced themselves from you." That's how he gave Rabbi Eliezer the news. And Rabbi Eliezer broke down crying. He said, "I have become like a safer Torah that's totally wrapped up that no one reads, no one will look at." And it really was very very tragic. Rabbi Eliezer died shortly thereafter in a state of excommunication in spite of the greatness that everyone recognized how great he was. That's why the Gemara has an expression, Rabbi Eliezer Shamuti. Now, there are two translations of Shamuti. Some say he was a follower of Beit Shammai, although that's a little difficult. And others say Shamuti comes from the word shamta, which is the Aramaic term for excommunication. Rabbi Eliezer the Shamuti, the one who was excommunicated. But, be that as it may, I think correlating this story with the Vilna with the Orah Chaim's four elements, I think is instructive. Now, as I say, that's a small part of the story. Obviously, the big big part of Tan Shulchan Aruch is the meaning of lo Bashamayim Hi and we'll talk about this some other time. Suffice it to say that it certainly illustrates the the adage no man is above the law because even God is not above the law. Meaning to say essentially I could just borrow who created a system where our Kodesh Baruchu is bound by the rules of the Torah. So how could any human being ever say it doesn't apply to me. God is bound by his Halachic process even if the Halachic process makes a mistake vis-a-vis the divine wisdom. So anyway wish you a very well again a Tu Bishvat Sameach happy Tu Bishvat um we'll talk about this obviously tomorrow but but generally speaking the message is that a human being is compared to a tree as well. So when we talk about the Rosh Hashanah for trees there are going to be aspects of a Rosh Hashanah that applies to all of us. The obvious question is but how do you then differentiate that from Rosh Hashanah of Tishrei which is our Rosh Hashanah? Well if you're going to be able to come to the seder tomorrow you'll hear about this if not you can see it on YouTube hopefully and anyway but wherever you're going to be you should have a meaningful inspirational a Chamisha Assar Bishvat. Thank you. [Music]