A Special Night of Chanukah Mussar

0:12It's the first night of Chanukah, very nice to be back in warm Florida after a fantastic trip that we had in Montreal. I can't say enough how good the trip was. We had, I think, a total of maybe six hours, no, five hours of sleep total, Baruch Hashem. And it was mamash, lecture after lecture, shiur after shiur. And each place was packed. Each place was packed. And for a first time out over in Montreal, it was a big surprise for me. I didn't think it was going to be that many people. I know there's a lot of people. We had, I think, a total of maybe six hours, no, five hours of sleep total, Baruch Hashem. And it was mamash, lecture after lecture, shiur after shiur. And each place was packed. Each place was packed. And for a first time out over in Montreal, it was a big surprise for me. I didn't think it was going to be that many people. I know there's a lot of people. stay in touch and send emails and text messages and ask questions. But still, it always surprises you to see the face behind the voice.

1:23But Baruch Hashem, may Hashem bless Rabbi Gad Ifrah and his wife and his family for organizing such an extraordinary event. Really, no menucha, no rest, but a lot of siyata dishmaya. Before we continue to tonight's shiur, we also want this shiur to be for refuah shlema, for the twin babies, Esther bat Miriam and Malka bat Miriam. B'ezrat Hashem HaKadosh Baruch Hu, give them refuah shlema, refuat hanefesh, refuat haguf. Also, b'ezrat Hashem, refuah shlema to David ben Esriah, Doris bat Jorah, Dvora bat Mercedes, Elisheva, Chaya bat Sarah, Levana bat Sarah, Yehuda ben Dvora. And all of Am Yisrael, b'ezrat Hashem, will have refuah shlema, refuat hanefesh, refuat haguf. So, we're back here in Florida, in Sunny Isles, in our Sunday shiur. We're going to talk a little bit about Chanukah. We're going to talk a little bit about today. What's the difference? Who actually won the war that we fought a couple of thousand years ago? I've had a couple of shiurim already in the past four years.

2:46about Chanukah, about the details of the story. I think we've covered many parts of it. Of course, there's always more. There's always more that you can cover, but anyone that wants to know more than what we covered today, b'ezrat Hashem, you have plenty to find on the internet. You go to our website, bezratHashem.org, or you go to YouTube, and you just simply type Yaron Reuven, Chanukah, And you'll find something. Or if you want, you could even text one of our team members, our Va'ad member, God bless him, and give him health and strength to continue doing what he's doing. You contact him, and he'll send you a plethora of shiurim, regardless of what topic you want. But in reality, you should search yourself. It's always good to do a little bit of the work yourself and not just ask for handouts all the time. Baruch Hashem, we covered a lot. Over the last few years, we covered a lot of material. We had the merit to meet many, many people and record a few hundred shiurim, a few thousand hours of Torah. And I have to say that there was constantly a story that I had in my head

4:11that always stood out, like not a story that I heard, but a story that I experienced that has to do with Chanukah. But now I have a second story after this trip. I have a second story. The good news is you can learn a lot from the story. The bad news is it's not such a fun story. meaning that it tells us where we are in the most obvious way without Yaron Reuven being extreme, without Yaron Reuven being fanatic, without an opinion. Maybe about a year, year and a half ago, I was invited to give a shiur at the yeshiva, and Young kids, teenagers, all anywhere, I think, between around 15 years old, 16 years old. And these talmidim, these are not chilonim. These are not secular people. These are not kids off the street. These are not goyim trying to convert. These are not goyim in general. These are talmidei yeshiva. They study. They wake up in the morning. They pray. They put on tefillin. They pray Shacharit.

5:36They eat and then they study. How long? Until 9, 10 o'clock at night. Then they have a little bit of free time, whatever you call a little bit, half an hour, an hour of free time maybe, not that much free time. They go to sleep, and they repeat the same thing over again the next day. And these talmidim don't go home. They live there. So you would think that in reality, it doesn't get better than this. Meaning that if you're going to teach anyone, and you have a choice of who to teach, this should be it. And the reason why is it's the easiest student in the world. Why? You have him full-time. You have him full-time. You have his full attention. It's not like you call, "Mommy, Mommy, I want to go home." He knows what he's getting into. Even though he's young, he knows what he's getting into. He wants to be there. It's not like he wants to really be a dancer on the side. He wants to be there. He wants to be a Talmid Yeshiva. He wants to go there. He wants to be there. He has a little bit of background where he has learned the Chumash. He's learned a little bit of Gemara. Obviously, different levels, different people. But nonetheless, the basics should be the same.

6:57This type of talmid is the best type of talmid. You have a lot of time with them, meaning that any type of influence that you want to implement on this talmid, you have all the time in the world to do. If you want this kid, To be someone who's precise with all of his mitzvot. That's what you're going to teach him. If you want him to be crystal clear on what you need to learn when you learn Gemara. Crystal clear. What's the number one thing to learn with Gemara? Learn the pshat. As we were talking about before the shiur started, Rav Wasserman, zt"l, was well known to tell people that the only thing they need to focus on, only, not just, not in addition, not maybe, the only thing they need to focus on is the pshat, meaning the very basic meaning of the Gemara. First, get to that, be a master of the pshat. Don't start going into any of your own chidushim, don't go into pilpulim, he used to, see, he says, he writes in his bio,

8:09Deir Eid says Rav Aslam, alav ha-shalom, would get upset because all these people, they go and start becoming Rashi. They start doing their own ideas. Who cares what your idea is? Get to the pshat first, then we go from there. He was so well known that talmidei yeshiva from different yeshivot used to come to him just to learn a shiur. Whenever he would give a shiur, they would leave the yeshiva they were in, in a different city, and they would come to him just to sit in a shiur. Why? Because they knew for sure when they left the shiur, they learned a pshat. But if you arrived a minute late, please, you're interfering. You have to leave. In a very nice way, but you're interfering, please, you have to leave. If you want to teach a kid Gemara, you have to teach him what to learn and how to learn. And if he's with you all day and practically all night, you have all the opportunities in the world to teach this kid Gemara.

9:22If you want to teach him to be a master of the Chumash, know all the Midrashim, Midrash Rabbah, Midrash HaGadol, Me'am Loez, and so on and so forth. There are tons and tons of Midrashim. You have the time. With that being said, when you see that some of these kids end up becoming confused, at the yeshiva. Not after the yeshiva. At the yeshiva. They're still confused. Who's really God? Like what's His job here? What does He do? Where did He come from? Who created God? And other basic questions that, for whatever reason or another, many Rabbanim do not like to answer. Or perhaps they don't know how to answer. And you see many of these kids lose interest in the Torah Because it starts becoming something that is hard to believe. It's hard for them to understand. And you see many of these young kids become confused. And now their attention starts going elsewhere. Because the metikut of the Torah, the sweetness of the Torah, loses its value. It's no longer sweet if you don't have answers. It's no longer sweet. It's sweet as long as you have answers.

10:49If you don't have answers, once, okay, fine, no big deal, not everybody knows everything. Twice, okay, you know, I'll ask another rabbi. Three times, what am I doing here? Four times, is this even the right subject to learn? Five times, is this even real? By the sixth or seventh time the kid asks you a question and you as a rabbi don't have an answer, you as a parent don't have an answer, the kid is going to start searching elsewhere. He's looking for answers. So when I went to this yeshiva, I started the shiur with a very, very basic question. How many people here, and it was a room full of kids, How many people here want to be like Moshe Rabbeinu? If you ask the average Yid, the average Jew, a generation ago, two generations ago, five generations ago, all the way to the generation of Moshe Rabbeinu, not only are you going to get a few hands, most likely everybody is going to raise their hand. Who doesn't want to be like Moshe Rabbeinu?

12:06With all the kavod, with all the headaches and the problems that he had, still Moshe Rabbeinu, the best of the best. He speaks to Hashem face to face. He can go and speak to Hashem whenever he wants. Miracles like it's natural. Who's better than Moshe Rabbeinu? I asked in a yeshiva, the ideal place, the place where they sleep there, the place where they learn there, the place where the Rabbanim are next to them at all times. How many kids want to be like Moshe Rabbeinu? Not a single hand was raised. Not one. Not one. Now, if that's not sad enough to make you want to break your own heart, I asked a follow-up question just to see where we stand in this generation. How many kids want to be like LeBron James? And before I was going to describe who this person is, I assumed Talmidei Yeshiva should not know who LeBron James is. I said, LeBron James, the famous, everybody raised their hand. The whole room raised their hand.

13:21Even the kid that was crippled, can't walk, he raised his hand, he wants to be like LeBron James. I thought I would have to describe who LeBron James is. I know because I used to live in that world. I haven't watched TV in years and don't plan on it, but nonetheless, I know who the person is. Talmid Yeshiva, you know who LeBron James is? I'm not saying you need to be completely closed off from the world, but... I felt like maybe I should describe who Moshe Rabbeinu is first. I was planning on saying LeBron James, the NBA player. I didn't have to. They already raised their hands. Maybe I should have said Moshe Rabbeinu, you know, the one from the Torah. He spoke to God. They call him Moses in English. This, Rabotai, was something that's been troubling me. I've lost several nights of sleep because of it, and I really can't get my head around it. Until I came to a school in Montreal, and I had another story to add. Baruch Hashem, the desire that people have to learn the truth is extraordinary.

14:42The first night, the place was packed. Before I got there, there were already 75 to 100 people, and people just kept coming in. Throughout the night, there was standing, sitting, on the stairs, on top of each other, everywhere. I couldn't believe it. You see some of the pictures we put online, you see people literally sitting on the stairs. unbelievable, and they all stayed the whole night. It's not like they stayed 15 minutes, thought "ah, this guy's fanatic," and left. Not a single person left. Not only that, one of the women that came to me at the end of the night said, "Listen, this has never happened in Montreal." I said, "What do you mean? You have lectures in Montreal?" She said, "No, no. You could hear a pin drop the whole night. No one spoke a single word." for two and a half, three hours. I'm like, well, it's a lecture. He goes, yeah, not here. Here we join in a lecture. Not a pin, nothing. Everybody was into it. The questions were wonderful. The Siyata Dishmaya was above and beyond. And people just loved it. At the end of the night, you'll see from some of the pictures,

16:05I brought tzitziot and mitpachot. I brought tzitziot, which I usually do in many lectures that I travel. And I planned on giving them over the next, you know, three days I was there. We finished all of them the first night. Everybody took on a tzitzit. Whoever didn't wear a tzitzit, took on a tzitzit. Whoever was wearing a tzitzit, took one for his brother. Everybody took on a tzitzit. But for the first time, because of the suggestion, I say it lightly, suggestion. It's not really ever a suggestion. It's more of a commandment. But my Rav told me to bring mitpachot. He told me to bring kisui rosh. He told me to bring kisui rosh, and we bought a bunch of them from Yerushalayim, and we had them delivered. And I've had them for, I don't know, I guess the last month or two, thinking, when am I going to have a shiur about kisui rosh? I can give this to people. I brought some, hoping that maybe one or two women would take it. You can see from the pictures, they were jumping at me, like, "Just give me kisui rosh, this, this." It was unbelievable. A woman is asking you for kisui rosh. "Please, can I have kisui rosh? Kisui rosh." Am Yisrael is dying for the truth. They just need somebody to say it. It has nothing to do with me.

17:31They just need someone to volunteer their body and tell them the truth. The first night was exceptional. The next day we started early. We went to the first school. We went and had, I think it was three shiurim in the morning, one after another. First class, second class, three different classes. But each one, Baruch Hashem, was packed. Two different schools. And one of the shiurim, the first shiur, I just told them a little bit of my personal story and a little bit about the purpose of life. That shiur is not online because the Yetzer Hara won the match. The camera didn't work. So, Baruch Hashem, all we covered in that shiur, we covered in the second shiur, plus more. But there was one main difference between the first shiur and the second shiur. Second shiur, I started with two similar questions just to see who I'm dealing with. I see that this school is full of teenagers. All the boys are wearing a kippah. All of the girls are wearing a uniform. I don't necessarily approve of the uniform, but who asks me anyway? Nonetheless, they all look somewhat religious, somewhat connected to Hashem, somewhat connected to the Torah. It's a Jewish school and...

19:01It's named after Rambam, Maimonides. And it's a mixed school, which according to halacha, Rabbi Ovadia said, is not a good idea and not a place that you should send your kids. But nonetheless, they're very pure Jewish neshamot that you're only going to reach if you go to that school. You go and speak to them in that school because their parents don't really see the difference between an all-boys school and an all-girls school. They don't really see much of a difference. Like, what's the difference? He needs, she needs to meet some boys to eventually get married. What's the problem? He needs to meet some girls. What's the problem? He has sisters. What's the difference if he meets a girl that's not his sister at school, and you know, they hug and stuff? They would say it's cute. It's cute like the goyim. It's cute. Maybe he'll sleep over for Shabbos. Parents don't see, so it's not the kids' fault. It's not the fault of the kids. It's not the fault of the teachers. Teachers have to teach. Baruch Hashem that there are teachers who actually have a kippah and actually teach there. Why? Because who's going to teach there? Amalek? Who's going to teach there? You have to have Jews teach. So, I'm not frowning upon the school, Hashem.

20:28But I did see a problem. And the problem is not necessarily with the teachers or the school or the parents or the kids, but rather everyone. All of Am Yisrael. It's our fault. It's my fault. It's your fault. It's everybody's fault. The fault is that I asked everyone First question, I asked them, has anyone ever seen this picture that I provided them of something called a flagellar motor, which is one of the many proofs that the Torah is divine. It's one piece of your body that you depend on to move your cells, your bacteria, from place to place. It was a digital image of it. Has anyone ever seen it? Everyone answered no. Later on, I explained why this is significant. But the two other questions that were very, very interesting was that I asked them, "Has anyone seen the picture?" and I showed them the very famous picture, or at least a likeness of the picture, of how evolution describes where we came from, our origin of how we began from monkeys.

21:42So it starts with a monkey, and then there's an ape, and then there's a human being. The picture was funny. It also added a robot at the end. But nonetheless, I asked everyone, "Has anyone ever seen this picture?" And all the kids raised their hands. Everyone has seen this picture that starts with a monkey and ends with a human being. Everyone has seen this picture. Where do they see it? On the internet. Where else are you going to see it? You see it on the internet. Everything's on the internet. I'm on the internet, by the way, also. So I asked them, "Has anyone ever seen this picture?" They said yes. So I asked them again, "Does anybody here believe we came from monkeys?" Now again, I have to repeat this in case you didn't pay attention and you were sleeping until now. This is a Jewish school. Everyone wears a kippah. All the girls are wearing skirts, even though they're a little too short. The reality is, this is a Jewish school named after the Rambam. The same happened in other schools, by the way. It's not something specific about this school. The same happens in other schools that I've been to.

22:58In fact, the same will happen in probably every yeshiva that you go to. A question that's supposed to be frowned upon, a question that's supposed to be like, what do you think, we're goyim? What's the matter with you? What kind of rabbi did you bring us here? That's the response that you're supposed to get for such a question. Instead, I got six, no less than six kids raised their hands proudly. said they believed that they came from monkeys. Now, six is not really the real number. Six is just the ones that were proud of it, that they were sure we came from monkeys. The others were still in safek mode. They weren't sure. Now, should I really say it? Should I really admit what I really believe? Or should I just wait until I graduate and tell everybody that, by the way, the whole time I was in yeshiva, I didn't believe a single thing? You know, a lot of people tell me this. "I went to yeshiva. I went to yeshiva for 20 years." I said, "So how come you're a kofer? How come you're mechaleil Shabbat? How come you married a goyah? You went to yeshiva for 20 years, you said." They respond, "Yeah, but the whole time I didn't believe a single thing you said. I didn't believe anything. I didn't believe anything the Torah said. Nothing." I asked, "So why'd you go? Why'd you go if you don't believe a single thing the teacher said?" "Oh, my parents made me go."

24:19You know how many kids like this, or adults now, I've met? They went to yeshiva, but they didn't believe a thing. They went to yeshiva, but they didn't follow a thing. They couldn't wait to leave. In my own eyes, I saw six young kids openly and happily admit that they believed that they came from monkeys. Now, to give us some hope, ...the future. When I asked the follow-up question, "How many people believe in God?" everyone raised their hand. Everyone raised their hand, including the six people who believed we came from apes. So it gives us some hope. So in that shiur, which you should watch—it's only about an hour, much shorter than what you're used to...

25:20We covered why we did not come from apes. We covered why we didn't come from apes. And I saw the faces of those six kids. I saw at least three or four of them while I was talking, paying attention to them, to read their faces, to see how they're responding. Are they buying it or are they saying, Nonsense. Nonsense. I'm going to go back to the Discovery Channel after this Yule to prove them wrong. I want to see what kind of response I'm getting. It's very important to know if the crowd is listening to you or if they can't wait for you to leave. A few of them were nodding to each other like, like, Chidush! Chidush! We didn't come from a monkey! Ima! Abba! You're not monkeys! Chidush! So, b'ezrat Hashem, you see that there is hope. There is hope, but there's also red flags in our system. When I was on Wall Street, my wife and I combined career was over 35 years. Part of our job was to analyze different

26:41economies, markets, businesses, and even people. That's what we did. That's what consumed a large part of our day. We did analysis for ourselves and for our clients. Sometimes it's because of recommendations that we wanted to make. Sometimes it's because somebody came to us asking if they should invest somewhere else in something. And everyone that has an idea is always very excited about it. Every idea, believe it or not, sounds good. Every idea, or else it would never make it to become an idea. If it doesn't sound good, you would never dare bring it to somebody else and share it with them. "Hey, by the way, I have this horrible idea. What do you think?" No one's ever gonna do that. No one normal is gonna say, "By the way, I have the worst idea in the world. You want to buy it?" I have this food that tastes like... What do you think? You want to buy it? So, you know, he went to the zoo. The food over there—you see in the cage with the lion—my food tastes like that. What do you think? Good idea? No. Oh, no. No one's gonna come to you like that. Everybody's telling you, "Listen, my food is the best, my car is the best, my new technology is the best, my new this is the best." They're not gonna come to you with a bad idea. Every idea sounds good, even when they're horrible ideas. In fact,

28:02the most horrible ideas sound the best to somebody. But every idea, regardless of whether it's a big idea or a small idea, a good idea or a bad idea, every idea has red flags, has signs that something could go wrong, something that could very well not only go wrong, but something that is wrong. Every idea has red flags. My job was to find the red flags. Now, to say, no, no, if there's no red flags, that's a good idea. No, if there's no red flags, that means you didn't do your job. You didn't look hard enough. There have to be red flags. There have to be problems. The question is not whether it has a red flag or not. The question is, how big is the flag? How big is it? Can I deal with this? Can I handle this risk? Okay, that's a problem. But is it a problem like if I put a little rubber on it, the water will stop coming out? Or is it a problem like the pipes broke and I have to change the entire insulation system? What's the problem? What's the measurement of this problem? How big is this problem? It's a flag, but how big is it? Everything has a flag.

29:22Doing this for the last several years, we've encountered many, many circumstances, and we see time and time again that there are many, many confused adults who used to be confused kids. These kids are going to be adults one day, and they are going through the same education system, whether it's the horrendous public school system or... Jewish parents sacrifice their children and send them there, or it's yeshivot that sometimes are not up to par because they don't want to teach the kids certain things that are necessary for day-to-day, especially in today's day. You see that there are certain people that are coming out confused; they have no idea what they want to be, and...

30:22You also see that many times the teachers today, outside of schools, the rabbis in Kehillot, the rabbis in different organizations that are very, very well known, the biggest ones that you know, all of them, are constantly trying to be cool, to be popular, to take the kids to Israel, to take the kids on a hunting trip, take the kids, you know, mountain climbing, to take the kids rafting, to take the kids bicycle riding, to do all these things that they want to do, and that's the big show. And hopefully, in between the rafting, And the other stuff, hopefully I'll give you a little shiur for 15 minutes and call it parashat shavua. Call it, it's Torah. The whole thing has to do with Torah. I'm taking him to the mountains so he can identify with Hashem. He can see Hashem. I'm not saying you shouldn't take kids out. I'm not saying that you shouldn't have fun. What I am saying is

31:34that when the ikar, when the main thing has become the bicycle riding and the mountain climbing and the rafting and the basketball and the football games, and when that has become the ikar, when that has become the main thing, the main attraction of this Shabbaton, of this event, of this keitana, this camp, that's the main thing. This is a hundred percent evidence that the Greeks won the war. We all light candles, and we all celebrate as if, wow, Am Yisrael Chai, we're here, we're here, we won. What won? You're still acting like Greeks. The problem is that this is not the only red flag. The other parts of the red flag are that the kids are not coming out of the yeshiva, and even while they're inside the yeshiva, they have no desire whatsoever to be Moshe Rabbeinu. They have no desire to be Rav Wasserman. They have no desire to be anything. They have a desire to make money. They have a desire to be somebody because it's not enough to learn Torah in their eyes.

33:03That's a problem in the system. Now, there are many Rabbanim, many Rabbanim, but it's not because the Rabbanim want to be Rabbanim. It's because the Rabbanim want to write a blog. and they want to run a kehillah and do Shabbatons. You collect another five thousand from the caterer, another fifteen thousand from the guy that arranges it, another twenty-five thousand from this one, and to build a kehillah. Now you have three, four, five, six hundred families coming in, donating. Not all the money is needed for the shul. How much can you possibly expand a shul? So the extra money, we put it in the other account. And all of a sudden, you see that the biggest house on the block belongs to the rabbi. This is not normal. It's not supposed to be this way. We're not saying the rabbi is supposed to live in a shack, but you're not supposed to go into Rabbanut for business. You're not supposed to go into Rabbanut because you're going to make money. Yes, you're allowed to make a living. Mabrook, enjoy. But if that's your goal, and you're going in there because it's similar to being in medicine or in accounting, or it became a profession, we have a problem.

34:17Even the goyim knew very well that public service is not a career. The American former president Ronald Reagan once said, "We saw that we have a problem when politics became a career." Because in the old days... Politics was a stepping stone before you got a real job, meaning you would graduate school, go into politics to learn the ropes of how to communicate with people, wheel and deal, network, meet a few people, and then get a real job. Once politics became a career, meaning you're there, hoping to stay there permanently, then we have a problem.

35:19Chachamim also said that when the rabbis aspired to also have "Doctor" before their name, you knew that anytime you saw "Doctor" and "Rabbi" in a title, that the doctor is only there because the rabbi is sick. The doctor is there because the rabbi is sick. We have a lot of sick people. The good news is most of them believe in God, even if they believe we came from monkeys. The good news is that when you tell them the emet, they not only buy it, they go all in. Now, I only see a small part of what actually happens as a result of these shiurim. I only see it if people tell me. I don't have Ruach HaKodesh. I don't have Nevuah. I don't go up to Shamayim and talk to Hashem. No, Hashem, what's the report? I don't know. People tell me. Baruch Hashem, every day somebody tells me.

36:28I did this, I did that. Did you buy? I got married. All these different wonderful things. But still, it's a small token. Even all the messages you send me, and people send me from all over the world—from Zimbabwe, Australia, Israel, America, everywhere in the world, even Saudi Arabia and Dubai. I have people send me emails. You should have action. Why did you buy? How are you living there is my question. I want to answer, but I don't know. Never believe people in Iran somehow. They were allowed to watch a lecture. I didn't think they were allowed, but somehow they got to my lecture. Anywhere in the world you have somebody, she was made for them. They got it in the tuba, but it's still a small part. Once in a while, Hashem wants you to know it's more than just small. So, Rav Gad Ifrah, he sends me a message. He tells me when we were there, he goes, you don't see what's really going on. You're busy with the lecture. You're talking to people. I see the people after. I see what they're saying and this and that. He says, you have no idea what happened here. Okay, fine. Baruch Hashem. Whatever happened, happened. It's all Hashem anyway. It has nothing to do with you. You're just a vessel. But then the messages start coming after the shiurim. And he tells me today,

37:54Hashem, one guy that came to the shul, he's never been in this shul. He's never been to the shul. He doesn't go to shiurim. Better yet, he doesn't go to synagogue, doesn't go to synagogue, keep nothing. He came to synagogue on Shabbat without a car. He just started a shiur two days before he came to synagogue on Shabbat. What changed in this person? I mean, it was monumental in reality. In the Shamayim, you just created worlds. You just got back to Olam HaBa. You just became a Jew again. You just came back to Hashem and said, Abba, son! It's the most fantastic event in the history of mankind. It just happened. Just a few days ago. You guys didn't pay attention. It happened. This kid came, Abba, Hashem said, son! And they're running to each other. Why? He kept Shabbat without a car.

38:56But what happened in his mind to get to that point? Discovery of the emet. Discovery of information that he did not have a day before. That's all. There's no Ruach HaKodesh. There's no Nevuah. There's no prophecy. There's no magic tricks. There's no sorcery. There's nothing. Simply telling him, by the way, we did not come from monkeys. Now that you know we didn't come from monkeys and we came from Hashem, we have to find out what Hashem actually said. you start telling them, "By the way, you know that tough time that you have and you really don't know what's going on? It's like a little bit of depression you have, and you keep trying to fill it with stuff. You bought a car and a restaurant, and maybe rented a plane for $35,000 for the night. You went to a casino, and you had a new girlfriend every week, but you're still a little bit of a wreck inside. You want to kill yourself really, but you're pretending to be happy because you just bought a new watch and you put it on Instagram. You know those people?"

40:08You know, you're like, they look really happy, but the next day you see them in the papers; they killed themselves. You know, they're gehakte tzores. I said, oh, that's because your neshama is suffering. You're torturing your neshama. Your neshama doesn't want a watch. It doesn't want a car. It doesn't want a new girlfriend. It wants Hashem. That's all it wants. He wants Hashem. But not Hashem, theoretically speaking, maybe I'll believe in Him whenever I feel like it. Maybe I'll just do whatever is easy for me and convenient. No, the type of Hashem where you know that if you do it, good. If you don't, what kind of problems are you going to have in your life? But I'm not even talking about this life. I'm talking about the other one, the real one. It starts after this life. Reward and punishment. The first lecture, the first night, the people didn't want to leave. It was almost 2 o'clock in the morning, and they didn't want to leave. Why? For the first time in their life, most of them, and many of them are religious actually, the first night was comprised of mostly religious people. Meaning Shomrei Shabbat. Some Kisui Rosh, some without Kisui Rosh, some Sephardim, some Ashkenazim, a different mix, but for the most part, many of them were okay.

41:26They had some basics, but for the first time in their life, they realized reward and punishment is not only real, it is a requirement of Judaism. Meaning that if you do not believe in the principle of reward and punishment, you, my friend, cannot call yourself a Jew. Of anything you want, Pikachu, like a Jew wants to be a Jew? Jew like kosher, like all types of things, Joe. Nonetheless, you cannot. Why? Because you do not fall under the definition of a Jew. Your mom was a Jew, and hopefully, she died a Jew. But you, my friend, cannot call yourself a Jew, be'emet (truly) a real Jew, unless you believe in reward and punishment. Because that is part of the requirement. They discovered it and they liked it because it's real and their neshama knew it. I didn't have to do any convincing. That's the best part about Torah. You don't have to convince anybody of anything.

42:32Your neshamah already knows the truth, so as soon as you hear it, it hurts a little bit. It's like, ah, yeah, that was right there. Right there, man. Right there. Yeah, that hurt right there. Yeah. Ah, that's the first time I ever felt that part of my heart. Where'd you get that from? That was Torah. Whoa, what's that? I heard Torah from this other guy, but it's not like yours. So yeah, he's reading a different one. Apparently, there's a remix. You know, there's always a fake. China makes fakes of everything. You tell people the truth, and they wake up. One woman sends me a text message from there, and she says she's never been to a shiur and stayed for more than a few minutes. She's a Jew. She grew up in Beis Yaakov. Yeshiva, everything religious, now like half religious, religious the whole thing. One day, she started thinking for herself while she was still a teenager, and she decided that everybody's full of it. Why? It doesn't really make any sense.

43:49Certain questions are unanswered, and certain things don't make any sense. What do you mean Hashem loves everyone? It doesn't make any sense that He loves everyone. So you're telling me that if I go kill people or if I don't, He's gonna love me? If I violate the mitzvot or keep them, He's gonna love me? He's just gonna love everything? It doesn't make a difference, so why should I keep anything? Why are you keeping anything, Mr. Rabbi? It stopped making sense once she got a brain and... She said, "I'm leaving." And she went off the cliff. Off the cliff as far as you can be from Judaism. A girl, holy of holies, left the derech in such a way you couldn't even imagine that a Jew can do. Why? It didn't make any sense, this Judaism stuff. But life goes on, and Hashem wants His children back because, after all, He does love them—not unconditionally. There is a condition. The condition is that you have to come back. He's going to love you as long as you still have an opportunity to come back. But if you finish this world, or He decides that you finished...

45:14And you haven't come back yet. You haven't done Teshuvah yet. There's no love in Shamayim. I promise you. There's not a single book in all of Am Yisrael that says so. There's not a single book in all of Am Yisrael that ever contradicts a single word I've said to you today. If you have one, show it to me. She left, but then Hashem, miraculously in His natural way, brought her into a certain circumstance where somebody from a different country was going to visit, and she had an unusual desire to go see what this person had to say. For no reason. She had plenty of things to do. She had a lot of crises going on, actually. Many big decisions and problems. She was very confused. She didn't know right from left. She didn't know what to do. This relationship, that relationship, this is going wrong, that's going wrong. She didn't really know what was going on. Yes, she went to yeshiva, but that's history. A long time ago.

46:29She tells me that she's never sat in a lecture for more than a few minutes. But that night she sat there for three and a half hours. Three and a half hours, and she said it changed her life. It changed her life. It changed her perspective. It helped her make decisions, and it helped her realize that she must come back home, come back to Hashem. But not halfway, not 50%, not 60%—the whole thing. If it's a mitzvah... It has to be 100%. If it's sheker, it's sheker 100%. It's either we're eating chazir with cheese on it on Yom Kippur, or we keep all the mitzvot and stop making excuses. So here, rabotai, you see every time Hashem miraculously surprises me because it's just amazing to me. ...no idea who is God and whether He's real or not, whether He really cares or not, whether this and whether that—very basic second, third, fourth, fifth grade questions. We don't know. Sometimes you ask the teacher, he doesn't know, she doesn't know, and...

48:48no idea who is God and whether He's real or not, whether He really cares or not, whether this and whether that—very basic second, third, fourth, fifth grade questions. We don't know. Sometimes you ask the teacher, he doesn't know, she doesn't know, and They tell you, "Yeah, you're right. Yeah, yeah, you're right. It's tough to understand free choice. Yeah, it's right. Yeah, it's tough." Yeah, the scientists, the scientists said the monkeys kind of look like us. Technically, 99% of the genes between you and a monkey are the same. It's true. 99% of the genes between us and monkeys are the same. but also nearly 70% of the genes between us and a banana are also the same. Does that mean we came from bananas? Does anyone think we came from bananas? Raise your hand, please. We have to have a different shiur for you. Yes, 99% of the genes are the same. It doesn't mean we came from them.

50:08It simply means there's a lot of similarities. But, rabotai yekarim, it's very, very important for us to know who, what, when, and where. You have to ask yourself what's the purpose of your life on a regular basis. You have to teach your kids what's the purpose of life on a regular basis. You have to get them answers. Don't leave your kid hanging with no answers. Because if you do it one too many times, he's gonna go search elsewhere. And trust me when I tell you, you're not gonna like what he finds. You're not gonna like what he finds. You're not gonna like what she finds. Because they're definitely not going to the Torah. They're going everywhere else. They're going to science, full of kefirah. They're going to Christianity, full of wrong ideology and avodah zarah. They're going to the Muslims, full of criminals and murderers and rapists and all types of tortures that look good, though, in pictures.

51:08If you look at the marketing materials of the Muslims, I wish we did it. Marketing materials of Muslims, they show you this handsome boy and his wife next to him with her kisui. She's covered everything. It's like, wow, look at the handsome boy and his wife. Wow, she's modest. He's this. They look rich. They don't know that in reality, neither one of them is Muslim. And if they were, the Muslims would kill them just for posing like that. But the reality is their marketing is impeccable. They don't show you that after the wedding, what he does to her and the nine other wives that he has. The reality is, Abutai, that Am Yisrael has a very, very serious problem today, and it begins with the fact that we have not realized yet that we've lost the war—the war between the Greeks and the Jews.

52:09was not one permanently; it was only one temporarily. The reason why, and the proof of that, is that we're still trying to be Greeks. We're still aspiring to become the next NBA player. In one of the shiurim, I talked about Shabbat, and this little young kid, probably 12 or 13 years old, comes to me and says, "Wait, so I shouldn't aspire to be an NBA player?" I He's so cute. I want to take him home. So little, like I want to tell the kids, like between us, like really, even if you were the best player in the world, you can't make it to the NBA. You're half a foot tall. The basketball is a little bigger than you. But you're not gonna tell that to the kid; you start talking about Torah and things like that. It's the most absurd thing in the world that Jewish people want to become basketball players and Seeing Jewish kids with kippah and their tzitzit playing basketball, I find, is the most absurd thing in the world. First of all, we're not athletic. Let's face it. We're not athletic. That gene was not given to us. Hashem skipped us. We're not athletic. Yes, there are a few of us that are fast. Yes, there are a few of us that are pretty strong. But in general, we're not there. We're not starting a new league in the NFL. We're not.

53:35Seeing the young little Ashkenazi or Sephardi kids with his tzitzit and the kippah falling off on Shabbos, and he's chasing the basketball, I find is the most absurd thing in the world. It's like, why are you leading this kid to have some type of illusion that something's going to happen out of this? Like one day if he plays with the basketball enough and he knows how to mix it and do this and that, something good will come out of it other than wasting time. What does it do? We don't have those genes. Trust me, I tried it. I thought I was going to be an NFL player until everybody was Amalek. Everybody was five times my size. I said, whoa, how is the weather up there? It's a different weather system. Everybody's nine feet tall. I said, why did you come out of your mom? She must be bigger than you. She must be a mountain to have such a kid. They run so fast. I couldn't believe it. Yes, there are a few of us that are athletic, but for the most part, we're not. Second of all, our brain is way too valuable as a nation to use it for sports. It's no secret that Jews have been the smartest people throughout all of history, and even throughout all of the anti-Semitism, the hatred, the Holocaust, they still can't stop it and

55:01When they decided to measure accomplishments among mankind, they didn't think that the Jews would even be a statistic to consider. When the Nobel Prize began, they didn't think that Jews would even be something that you would consider. Number one, they were killing them in the streets at that time. And number two, they are one out of 500 people in the world; they're nothing. One out of 500 people is a Jew. It's a statistical anomaly. It's not even a rounding error. Who would ever think that nearly 25% of the Nobel Prize winners in history have been Jews? Who would have thought? Other than the Jews. Jews by nature have a healthy brain if they know how to use it and don't destroy it with drugs, alcohol, and all types of garbage. "No, I'm only smoking for medicinal reasons." "Why, what happened?" "Yeah, I hurt my back when I was eight years old." "Yeah, you're 38, buddy. Your back doesn't hurt; you played basketball three hours ago with the other guy with the kippah, and..."

56:25Stop making up excuses to smoke marijuana. Yeah, but it's legal. So is jumping off a plane without a parachute. Go do that then. We destroy our brains, but you need to value our brain. because our brain is a very serious tool for us to connect to Hashem. The average Jew can be smarter than any Nobel Prize winner that ever lived, including the Jewish ones. Part of the reason is because the average Jew reads nearly a book a day simply by praying. Simply by praying, you're reading nearly a book a day. Pray Shacharit. If you're Sephardic, you've read 200 pages. Ashkenazi, maybe even half. Still, 100 pages to start your morning. Good morning, you read 100 pages. Maybe more, I'm not exaggerating. Still, it's a lot of pages, 100, 200 pages. In between, you learn a few halachot. Each one of these halachot could be five minutes worth of talking. You know how many words are in five minutes worth of talking?

57:49Five minutes' worth of talking. You're talking about two, three pages. You add all that, by the end of the day, every Jew that goes and prays and does basic stuff, reads a book. A book a day. Go find me one scholar in the world that reads a book a day. People say, no, Bill Gates reads a book a day. Yeah, right. Reads a book a day. He has plenty of other things to do with his life. He's not reading a book a day. Trust me on that one. used to read a book a day. After he made a hundred billion dollars, he stopped reading a book a day—maybe a book a week, a book a year, or something. It's not a book a day. When you have stuff to do, you have to manage a hundred billion dollars; it doesn't manage itself. You have phone calls, you have meetings, you have stuff to do. A book a day? People say, "No, all these billionaires, they read two, three books a day." Yeah, okay, buddy. Do you see them? you see them read books, but you see them when they sign a and uh and in the park with you. "Oh, yeah, what are you reading?" "I'm reading Sherlock Holmes." "What about you?" "The Shining." Okay. All these people make these crazy statistics that are unreachable and

59:02I've met many millionaires and a few billionaires. They're very, very normal and just like you. They still have to put their pants on one leg at a time. Nothing different about them. Nothing different. Maybe more disciplined, more determined. But intellect is not the reason why people become wealthy. There are plenty of smart losers. Plenty. Plenty. Plenty of fools that are rich. So, with that being said, we realize that Hashem gave you a brain—you need to use it. Hashem gave you a heart—you need to make sure it continues working. Hashem gave you tools. Hashem also gave you the Torah. Gave you the ultimate emet and it's your duty, your obligation, your purpose in life to toil in it and toil in it without ever stopping until you discover the emet in every single aspect of your life. They met about why it's hard to wake up in the morning and go to shul.

1:00:27But it's never hard to wake up in the morning and go to the airport. You're never going to be late to a flight because you're afraid. You're afraid of losing the ticket. $500, $1,000. You're afraid of that. You're dead afraid. I remember one time I had a Shabbaton in Arizona. I had a Shabbaton in Arizona. I woke up on time. It was a 6 o'clock flight. Some godforsaken flight they bought for me. But I made it on time. What was the problem? How come I missed the flight? I went to the wrong airport. Why? There are two airports in Florida. I went to the wrong one. I was there at 6 o'clock in the morning. But hey, it's the wrong airport. I didn't pay attention. Instead of Fort Lauderdale, it was Miami. Instead of Miami, it was Fort Lauderdale. Whichever one it was, I ended up having to pay $900 out of my pocket. Why? It's not their fault I missed the flight. It's not their fault I had to miss the flight. I had to buy a flight. It's either I skipped the whole Shabbaton or I paid $900. But the point is that to make it on time, for sure, for sure, you're never going to miss a flight in the morning. Why? You're afraid. You're afraid of losing a little bit of money. But to go to shul in the morning, ooh, it's so hard. No, I'll daven at home. I'll daven at home. I'll daven at home. No, no, I'll daven at home. It's 9 o'clock. I'll daven at home. I'll daven at home. I'll daven at home. The guys over there are not serious anyway. Who wants to daven with them? All of a sudden, they're not serious anyway.

1:01:50All of a sudden, out of this shul, this shul. It's not even a real shul. Like the rabbi is not this one. And I'm not really sure I should even go there. All of a sudden, at eight o'clock in the morning, you have all these philosophical arguments in your mind of why you shouldn't even go to shul ever again. Because it's so hard to get out of bed. That's the only argument. You have to find the emet. Stop lying to yourself. I'm talking to myself. You have to find it. You have to find the emet in everything, every aspect of your life. You come home, and your wife has an upside-down smile. Why is she so upset? Why is she upset? When's the last time you gave her a compliment? Oh wow, we're married for eight years. Thank you. Who wanted to marry you? Miskina, she's kaparat avonot for a lifetime because she married you. What does that have to do with compliments? When's the last time you gave your wife a compliment? For heaven's sake, what does it cost you? People forget to give their wives compliments. I have no idea. How do you live together? What do you think? She's like a baby oven. She makes babies and you say, ah, ooh, ah, and then you go to work. That's it. She changes them. She feeds them. You just get to say hi and play with them for 37 seconds and then you go to work.

1:03:19Give a compliment. It doesn't cost any money. A good word. Say, honey, thank you for changing diapers. You are isha k'dosha. Why? Because you changed diapers. You changed diapers. You're much more holy than I can ever be. I learn Torah all day. You are much holier than me for changing diapers. Why? I can't do what you do. Can't do what you do. I can't change diapers. I'll jump off a bridge. I'm not changing diapers. Why? All men are going to say that? No, you check. No way. I'm not doing it. I'm not doing it. I'm not doing it. I'm changing the religion now. Well, I'm not going to change diapers. What does that mean? She's better than you. Say thank you. Appreciate her. Kiss her hands. Kiss her feet. Buy flowers, you cheapskates. Buy flowers. Don't wait for birthdays. Jews look for opportunities. Why? It's a mitzvah. You signed on; it's a mitzvah to make your wife happy.

1:04:54If a woman has a bad husband, she's already in Gehinnom. In this world. I don't remember it. Neither here nor there. It's always the husband's fault. It's always the husband's fault. It's always the husband's fault also. I'm not saying that she's not wrong. Hashem wouldn't have given you a woman to torture you if you were such a big tzaddik. The Gemara in Masechet Sotah says that a person gets a wife based on his actions. If you're so righteous, you're gonna get a tzaddeket. So how do you explain the people that were tzaddikim kedoshim but had a very difficult wife? Even some people in our generation. You know for sure they're tzaddikim.

1:05:55But they have difficult wives, and it's known. We're not going to mention names, but it's known that they have difficult wives. Why? Because they are on such a high level, Hashem says, I want to give you extra. Extra tikkunim. This is a different shiur. The point is, Rabotai, a man has to look in the mirror and realize it's his fault. Why? If I was a bigger tzaddik, she'd know it. A woman has to look in the mirror and say, it's my fault. Why? If I was a bigger tzaddeket, he'd know. He'd know. I wouldn't wait for him to ask me to make him tea. I'd just make it. I wouldn't wait for him to ask me, what did you cook? I'd just put it on a dish. Honey, the food's ready. The reality is that most couples struggle to survive because everyone is so selfish and is constantly thinking about what have you done for me lately.

1:06:59The mentality we have today is, what have you done for me? Oh, he doesn't do this, he doesn't do that. Every time you talk to a wife, yeah, he doesn't do this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this. She has a whole list, a megillah of all the things he doesn't do. And he has a megillah and Antiochus together. He has a megillah of all the things she doesn't do. No one says, yeah, but you know, he does do a few good things. No one starts the conversation that way. Everyone starts with the things that are missing. Why? Because in reality, relationships today have reached a point where they are based on self-interest. I'll do this if you do that in return. It's become a transaction: you give me this, I'll give you that back. You buy me a present, I'll buy you a present. You don't buy me a present, I don't have to buy you a present. It's not my fault that you were born on this day. Tell your father to buy you a present; he brought you into the world. That's how men behave, and that's how women behave. It's all business. when you stop worrying about yourself and you start worrying about your spouse and the world around you, your life starts to change. You start becoming productive, you start becoming fulfilled, you start becoming valuable to yourself and to others. But because most people are so selfish and can only see themselves in a mirror, they never reach this truth. It's our obligation to do that.

1:08:28People that are supposed to keep Torah and mitzvot, that are trying to keep Torah and mitzvot, the first thing you're supposed to do is find a way to help somebody else before yourself. Find a way to help somebody else be productive, do chesed. And don't do chesed because you're going to get kavod because of it. No, no, I'm going to do this because this is, it's important, it's kavod. It's important for me to be the ba'al koreh at the synagogue so everybody knows I know how to read from the Torah. If that's why you're doing the mitzvah, do us a favor, don't do it. Why? Do yourself a favor, don't do it. That's the mitzvah, lo lishma. You're ruining all the schar. Work on yourself and then do it. The Gemara tells us that Hanukkah happened at a time when Judaism was very weak. Weak how? The Kohanim decided they wanted to become Modern Orthodox. The Kohanim decided that they didn't really want to be so religious. It was difficult to be religious. Maybe Hashem doesn't need all these korbanot. It's expensive. Maybe Hashem doesn't need all the things that we're doing; it seems like it's an overkill. So the Kohanim started slacking. Now why is it so critical that the Kohen...

1:09:50didn't really want to be so religious. It was difficult to be religious. Maybe Hashem doesn't need all these korbanot. It's expensive. Maybe Hashem doesn't need all the things that we're doing; it seems like it's an overkill. So the Kohanim started slacking. Now, why is it so critical that the Kohen never slack because he is the prime example. He's the one that everyone looks at and says, "That is the model Jew. That's who I wish I could be. Whatever he does must be kosher." If you're going to be a rabbi, you're going to be a leader, even of your own family, a father, a mother, a

1:10:53you should know that for somebody, you are the Kohen Gadol. You're the Kohen Gadol. If you're a rabbi of a school, a principal of a school, and you have three, four, five, six hundred kids in every grade, they all look at you, you're the Kohen Gadol. You are the best, which means that if... you're gonna make a move, you have to consider there are 600 kids watching, thinking, and whatever I'm gonna do, they're gonna say it's kosher. Why? They believe I am a Sefer Torah. Whether you like it or not. If you're a father or a mother You think that you're absolved from this problem, that only the teachers have this problem. You're mistaken. The responsibility is even bigger on you because your kids spend even more time with you and see you at more uncomfortable moments than the kids in the school see the teachers. So if you want to watch sports and you think that your kid is not going to play sports, sadly, you're mistaken.

1:12:05If you think that you're going to talk business on Shabbat, and your kid's not going to end up doing business on Shabbat, you're sadly mistaken. You are the Kohen Gadol. you think that if you wear pants at home because you're allowed to wear pants at home as a woman with no problem where there's nobody there, but your daughter can't decipher whether it's allowed or it's not allowed. She's 12 or 13 years old, and she sees Ima walking around at home with sweatpants the whole day. She says, "Oh, so what's the problem with wearing pants?" Okay, so when she goes out, she dresses up. but the fashion has changed in her mind. It's like, oh, in the old days, in my mom's generation, you wore pants inside. In my generation, we wear pants outside. So the girl sees the mom wear pants regularly, not just to go to sleep. And she translates it that there is nothing wrong with a woman wearing pants outside. It's no big secret that today, the vast majority...

1:13:12Jewish women wear underwear to go outside. That's it, with nothing else to cover it. That's what they wear, these spandex that they call. They wear these tight pants or whatever you want to call them, spandex that they go outside with. It's underwear. It's not something that the previous generation would dare walk around with, and... It's underwear, but that's where we're at. The average woman, pregnant or not, walks around society with underwear. Why? Because her mom did it. She saw her mom walk around with underwear at home, not outside. So she figured, oh, in my mom's generation, she walked around with underwear, so I'm gonna walk around with underwear. She did it inside, I'll do it outside. In my father's generation, he wore a tank top all day at home with ketchup on it all day, so I'm gonna wear a tank top outside. That's what kids think. Abba did it, the kid does it. Ima did it, the daughter does it. So if you think you're absolved from the mitzvah of being a Kohen Gadol, you're sadly mistaken.

1:14:41The Kohanim did not want to be religious, at least not as much. And it got to such a point where Hashem had to bring a leader to torture them. The Gemara in Masechet Sanhedrin has a debate: When will the Mashiach come? It's a question. That's probably one of the most confusing questions in Judaism today. Now, it's not confusing for the reasons that you probably think. That the Chabadniks think that their Rebbe is the Mashiach, and the Breslovers think that their Rebbe is the Mashiach, and the Christians think that their messiah is Mashiach. He was a womanizer. What do you want? Everybody thinks that the Rebbe is Mashiach. You think that's the confusion. That's not what I'm talking about. That's not the confusion about Mashiach. The confusion is that people are excited about Mashiach. That's the confusion.

1:16:07Again, the confusion is that people are excited about Moshiach. That's the confusion. Not a day goes by and people don't send me some type of email, text, or some form of communication today. You have to be a genius in technology just to know where to go. And they say, Mashiach now. I can't wait for Mashiach to come. Excited for Mashiach. B'ezrat Hashem, Mashiach will come soon. I can't wait for Mashiach to come to fix this stuff. Everybody thinks that Mashiach is a social security office. They have financial problems. They think maybe Mashiach is going to be welfare. They have marriage problems. They think Mashiach maybe is a psychiatrist. Everybody has these things, these beliefs that they think Mashiach is going to do for them. But everyone, without many exceptions, is excited about Mashiach coming. This, Rabotai, is, I believe, one of the biggest confusions in our generation. And the reason why is because if you look at the Gemara, Masechet Sanhedrin, the most righteous people that ever lived...

1:17:26Not Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, not Rabbi Akiva, but Rabbi Akiva's Rabbi, Rabbi Eliezer Ben-Horkinos. Kodesh Kodashim, a walking Sefer Torah. They said that if you took all of the ocean and turned it into ink, all of the trees and turned them into pens, all of the land and turned it into paper, you wouldn't be able to write the amount of Torah he knew. He said, "I don't want to be alive when the Mashiach comes. I want him to come, but not during my lifetime. I'm scared. I'm scared." Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus, what are you scared of? You're Kodesh Kodashim, you're a Sefer Torah. The Sefer Torah looking at you is like, "Oh, he's like me. He's like me." What are you afraid of? Oh, you think he's the only one? One after another. And the Gemara says one after another. No, I don't want to do it. Let him come. Let Mashiach come. Not during my time. Let him come, but not during my time. Let him come, but not during my time. No one wants to be alive when Mashiach is here. But our generation of resha'im, everyone wants the Mashiach to come. I say it with a broken heart, resha'im. If 80% of Am Yisrael are going against the Torah, what do you want to call them? Tzaddikim?

1:19:00Whatever the number is, Rabotai, it's time to make them tzaddikim. But the reality is that right now, if you're a mechallel Shabbat, you're not a tzaddik, or even close to a tzaddik, or a resemblance of a tzaddik. The point being is that if you're not keeping the mitzvot, and you're saying, "I can't wait for the Mashiach," you're part of that confusion. If your rabbi is calling you a tzaddik, he's the reason for the confusion. People can't wait for the Mashiach to come. They're so excited. But the Tzaddikim HaKedoshim said, "I don't want to be there when the Mashiach comes." Why? It's going to be very scary. Oh, how scary it's going to be. It's going to be scary. And even the scariest movie that you've ever wasted your time watching is not going to be scarier than that day. Even the shiur about Gehinom that you heard and got scared of for a little while is not going to be as scary as that day. Even Gehinom itself is not going to be as scary as that day. You know why? You're out of time. Anyone that could wrap their heads around that can understand why it's so scary.

1:20:22you want to have somewhat of an inkling, a 1/60th of that visual, hold your breath. But don't hold your breath until, like, and then you breathe after 37 seconds, because it's not comfortable. No, hold your breath as if you're drowning. Like you can't, there is no other option. You can't start breathing, because if you're breathing, you're going to start swallowing water. But then in the last second, Obviously, breathe. But right before that last second arrives, that's a resemblance of being out of time. It's a resemblance of being out of time. When reality sets in, and you're there, and you realize, time's up. There's no more teshuva, there's no more shiur Torah, there's no more "maybe I'll work on this," or "maybe I should tell my wife I love her," or "maybe I should tell my husband I love him," or "let me hug my kids," or "let me say Shema Yisrael," no, there's no more time. If that's not scary for you, you're confused. Very confused.

1:21:41People are excited for the Mashiach because they have no idea what's going to happen when the Mashiach comes. And I can tell you, rabotai yekarim, that the Mashiach is not going to be a fairy tale. If a person does not work on themselves day and night to fix all of the horrible traits that they have inside them, all of the evil that they were created with, if they don't remove one piece after another, you're confused. You're troubled. The least of your problems is Mashiach. The reality is you have to get ready for him. It's very, very important for people to understand, because the Gemara doesn't talk about a wonderful time when Mashiach comes. The Gemara says that a lot of things are going to happen. One of the things the Gemara says is that... Mashiach is not gonna come until all things are the same price. What does it mean all things are the same price? Everything is the same price: tomatoes, potatoes, airplanes, Bitcoin, stocks, bonds, gold, silver, houses, chairs, shirts.

1:23:09Waste. Everything is the same price. That's when Mashiach is gonna come. Meaning, everything becomes worthless. That's when Mashiach is gonna come. If you're so focused on building a nest egg, IRA, or 401k, some type of retirement plan—there's nothing wrong with that as long as it does not become your number one priority. But if it is... You're not ready for Mashiach. You're not even an inkling of ready for Mashiach. Because by the time he comes, all those savings are going to go to waste. All of it is going to be wasted. And you're going to regret the day you had a bank account. Why? Because you could have used that bank account to do mitzvot, which is the only thing that's going to have any value whatsoever when Mashiach arrives. People tell you all the time, "No, I can't. I'm sorry. I can't donate. I can't donate. I'm still trying to... still trying to fix this house." Like, why is something wrong with your house? "No, no, no, that's just one of the properties that I own. It's just one of the properties that I own. This is the third house on this street that I have, and the sink broke, so I have to come up with some money to fix the sink." So you're thinking to yourself, wait, so you're telling me that you have no less than three properties, and...

1:24:37Which, even if it's in the worst neighborhood in America, is still worth fifty to a hundred thousand dollars. But in a normal neighborhood, it's probably half a million. So, give or take, somewhere in between those numbers. But you can't afford to donate a hundred bucks? You can't afford to donate three, four, five hundred dollars? You have properties that are worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, but you can't afford 150 bucks a month? No, I... These are the things that people are going to regret, that they have all this stuff that miraculously became worthless. They have a garage full of cars, a lot. Some people have literally like a lot, like a mini parking lot full of cars. They like to collect cars from the '60s, '70s, and '50s. They like this stuff. They like the way they look, and they spend their Sundays fixing them. And they look at them until they can see their own reflection 10 years younger on the car. They don't stop cleaning it.

1:25:40Polish here and they fix here and again here and they bring a guy. "What do you think of the car?" "No, it's not clean enough." Okay, they go back to work. It’s hours and hours of time and hundreds and hundreds of dollars cleaning these cars. And they have car lots. Why? Because 20 minutes from now, it's gonna rain. They're gonna do it all over again. They're gonna regret it. Every single second they spent on those cars, every single second they spent admiring those watches, because some people like to leave half a million dollars in their closet. Why? To have a collection of watches. 20,000, 15,000, the big one, 150,000, the fake one that looks like the hundred fifty thousand, five hundred dollars. But that's the one you're gonna wear because who wants to wear a hundred fifty thousand dollars on their arm? What are you, a basketball player in the NBA called LeBron James? No, you're gonna wear a fake one. But the hundred fifty thousand dollar one you're gonna leave in the closet. I know people like this. I know one guy, one of the guys that worked for me. He bought his wife a twenty-five thousand dollar ring and

1:26:51I bought a $25,000 diamond ring, but she never wore it. It was always in the safe because she had a fake replica of it that cost $2,000 or $1,000, and that's the one she wore all the time. It looked exactly the same; it was just worth a fraction of the cost. Why? Who's gonna wear $25,000 on their hand? She left it in the safe for the safe to enjoy it. The safe enjoyed the ring and Of the safe's friends said, "While I admire you, what kind of ring you have! Your owner must be really generous. People are gonna regret every penny they didn't spend on doing chesed, every penny they didn't spend on doing tzedakah, every penny they didn't spend on Torah and mitzvot. Why? Because eventually, it's all gonna be worthless. I And the only thing you're gonna have left is those mitzvot. I'm not trying to tell people to go into some massive, you know, market sale, sell everything, and send it all to Yaron Reuven.

1:27:58You should calculate yourself, calculate where is my time going, where's my money going. Am I really obsessed with this retirement plan I may never see? I have a retirement plan for this world, do I have the same type of retirement plan for the other world, the one that's permanent? It's a question you have to ask yourself. The time of Mashiach is going to be a time where there's no more time. Anyone that has a little sense should be scared of that. Should be very scared of that. The Gemara also says something that's even scarier because we've seen this Gemara. This prophecy has come to life multiple times, meaning this is not one of those prophecies that we've never seen before. There are many prophecies that we haven't seen before, but this particular prophecy I'm about to tell you is one that we've seen multiple times. The same Gemara in Masechet Sanhedrin says that in the conversation between...

1:29:18Hashem Yitbarach and Malach Gavriel. Malach Gavriel says to Hashem, when are You going to send the Mashiach? And I told you already in the first part of the story. Hashem says when they do teshuva. Malach Gavriel says to Hashem, we both know that's not going to happen. So Hashem says, okay, when the religious people do teshuva. Malach Gavriel says, Hashem, we both know it's not going to happen. They think they're okay. They're religious already. They wear kippah. She wears a kisuy rosh with mitpachat. She thinks she's religious. She doesn't have a single good midah in her, but she thinks she's religious because she wears a scarf on her head. Every single opportunity to say lashon hara she says, but she thinks she's religious. Every opportunity to say something bad she says, every complaint she says, but she thinks she's religious though. She says she's religious. She's positive she's religious. Why not? It's too much for me to hold my tongue. I have to talk. I'm dying inside if I don't talk. I'm dying inside if I don't talk. I have to talk. I have to express myself. If I don't express myself, I may die. I may get cancer. Get cancer. It's better for you. It's better for you than to say lashon hara. Trust me when I tell you.

1:30:50Gemara says when one kehillah does teshuvah, Mashiach is going to come. We've been waiting 2,000 years for that kehillah to do teshuvah. But there's an extension to that Gemara that I didn't tell you because that extension is more scary. That extension is something that already happened multiple times and, in my opinion, is probably one of the most scary Gemarot that exists that I know of. If you remember a few weeks ago, we learned from Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi. Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi, who was best friends with Eliyahu HaNavi. Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi, who met the Mashiach. Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi, who went to Gan Eden with his clothes on. He didn't die. Hopefully, we arrive there dead, as Rav Nissim Yagen used to say. He arrived there alive. The same Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi...

1:31:53He says they're gonna do teshuva. One way or another they're gonna do teshuva. He says, yeah, but we both know they're not gonna do teshuva. He goes, they're gonna do teshuva. He says, why? If they don't do teshuva, Hashem is gonna send them Haman or someone like him to force them to do teshuva. One way or another, we read from the prophet Yechezkel, you will serve Me. One way or another, you will do teshuva. This is a prophecy that we have seen one too many times. Whether it was in the Holocaust or people that are still confused. How could such a thing happen? What do you mean? Hashem did it. Hashem sent Haman. He just called him Hitler this time. Hashem sent Haman. He just called him Hitler. That's it. No difference. He wanted to kill everyone. He wanted to kill everyone. He almost killed everyone. He almost killed everyone. The Spanish Inquisitions, the pogroms, the Beit HaMikdash, the first one and the second one, Nebuchadnezzar, Titus, Antiochus,

1:33:17This whole story of Hanukkah, what do you think they wanted? To become your best friends? They wanted to kill Am Yisrael spiritually because they knew that if this happens, we might as well commit suicide. Unfortunately, if we don't do teshuva, Hashem has to send Haman. To me, that's the scariest because that's something that I can visualize. It's hard for me to visualize Messianic times. It's hard for me to visualize what happens in heaven. It's hard for me to visualize, and for any human being to visualize, things he's never seen before. It's hard. You have to have a very vivid imagination. Who says you're right anyway? You could talk to a person on the phone for three, four, five years and have a visual of what they look like. One day you meet them, and it's like they look nothing like you thought. Happens every time.

1:34:17I used to do a lot of business on the phone. And then one day, sometimes, I would meet some of these clients. They never looked like what I thought. And they said the same thing about me. Like, "Wow, you look nothing like I thought. I was expecting someone at least 40 or 50 years older than you." Every time. Never fails. So your imagination is most of the time wrong anyway. But you don't need to have an imagination to imagine Hitler. You don't need to have an imagination to imagine Haman. We've seen them many, many times, directly at us or indirectly at us. Some are inside America, some are outside America. Some are inside Israel, some are outside Israel. We've seen them time and time again, that if they were given the opportunity, they would annihilate every Jew they saw in the middle of the street without being asked a second question.

1:35:20Gemara says that if we don't do teshuva, Hashem has to send Haman again. The story of Hanukkah is a story of warning for us to depend on things outside of Hashem. When the Kohanim did not want to become religious anymore, Hashem had to send them somebody to torture them a little bit. But not quite Haman. He sent them a person by the name of Hordus. Hordus, many people know, remodeled the Beit HaMikdash in such a beautiful way that they say if you haven't seen the Beit HaMikdash after Hordus remodeled it, you've never seen something beautiful. What many don't know is that Hordus terrorized the Jews.

1:36:20Over two years, until they were forced to accept him as their king. They didn't elect him. Hashem didn't choose him. He pushed himself in there. He was a businessman and he wanted to make sure that nothing got in his way and at one point he was in the army and a general, but as soon as his hands got into a little bit of money, he used the money to gain power. One thing led to another, and Hashem made His way into the kingship of Am Yisrael. Now, to make sure that no one gets in the way, Hordus assassinated Horkenus, the Kohen Gadol. He assassinated the biggest rabbi in the world. The one person that prays for all of Am Yisrael on Yom Kippur for a few minutes in Kodesh HaKodashim, that if he prays well, no one will even have a car accident. If he prays well, no one will even slip on a banana peel. If he makes a mistake, people will die.

1:37:45Holders want to make sure that this person doesn't get in their way with their spirituality, with their fanatic religion, and they killed him. After that, they want to make sure that they don't lose any votes, so they got all the fakers to say, "Listen, who wants to be a Kohen Gadol? I'm the king, I can choose. You don't even have to be a Kohen; you just have to have a little bit of money." for years. Every year, a new person bought the position of Kohen Gadol, something that had never happened throughout all of its history. Every year, somebody else would buy the priesthood. Why every year? Because every year, they would have to go into the Kodesh HaKodashim. They would go in there, and if you're not holy, you die on the spot. I always ask the question: I don't understand. Okay, so you have money, you bought the priesthood, but then one day you actually have to face reality. You have a position, you have a job to do—you have to go into the Kodesh HaKodashim, and you know just as well as Hashem knows that you're not a tzaddik. Why would you go in there? You know you're going to die. And if, let's say, the first guy didn't know, the second guy, the third guy, the fourth guy—50 people already died in a row every year. You don't get it? They're dying. It's a real thing. I

1:39:09Our level of emunah was so low that we literally thought that with money we can do everything. Unfortunately, nothing has changed in over 2,000 years. This mindset that money can change your destiny, money can change your eternity, money can change who and what you are here is not a new belief. It's something that, unfortunately, is part of our life and part of our history from the time the world began. As things continued to deteriorate after people chose business to take over religion, it led to continuous disaster. When Hashem sent Horkinos, when Hashem sent Hordus, He was giving Am Yisrael a warning. They didn't take the warning. He started killing religious people, the tzaddikim didn't take the warning, and things continued to deteriorate. Hordus originally was a slave. Literally, he went from nothing to something. Hashem took somebody that was a nobody, that you would see in the street and you wouldn't even give him a dollar, and He made him everybody's king just to show you this had to come from God. But they still didn't take the sign, they still didn't take the obvious and clear message that Hashem was sending them, and...

1:40:36Very much like we're seeing today. There's a new earthquake in every town. It seems like there's some type of holocaust somewhere. People are dying in the streets in different parts of the world. Everybody says, "Yeah, but it's not here." So then, when it arrives home and there are 400 missiles being shot at Eretz Yisrael in a matter of two hours, it's like, "Yeah, but it didn't hit anything major." So then there's terrorism in America. It's like, yeah, but it wasn't in my neighborhood. Then when it arrives in the neighborhood, it's like, yeah, but it wasn't me. It's like we constantly come up with new excuses, saying, no, this is not Hashem, it's just bad luck. You treated me with casualness, meaning that you took the signs and messages that I sent you and said, "No, this is just luck. This is just fortune. This is not Hashem. It's something else separate from Him. It's a message to everybody else except me."

1:41:51Unfortunately, this type of flawed logic breeds even more flawed logic. The education that we have today breeds heretics. We have kids that do not know the answers to the basics of what a ba'al teshuva knows. We have ba'alei teshuva, not knowing the basics of what a frum from birth needs to know. There's so much confusion and separation between the two, it's hard to find yourself. But I can tell you that 2,000 years ago at the time of Chanukah, it wasn't very much different. Nothing new under the sun. What people are mostly worried about We're mostly worried about Esav. There's a little known fact in the Torah: Esav hates Yaakov. It's just like gravity; Esav hates Yaakov. Something bad happens in the world, Esav blames Yaakov. Financial crisis of 2008? They blame the Jews.

1:43:10Holocaust? Before the Holocaust, crisis? They blame the Jews. Great Depression? They blame the Jews. All the things that ever happened bad in the world, they blame the Jews. Good things? They don't ever give us credit. So naturally, we're scared of Esav getting mad at us. People are scared of Esav killing us in the street. We think Esav is strong. What we don't realize... Esav is only as strong as we let him be because Esav's strength is a strength that a Jew is supposed to have. The problem is, rabotai, that in this generation, we treat Esav like he's strong, and we treat Yaakov like he's weak. We're scared of Esav. And the weapons that he has and the money that he has and the numbers that he has because we forget that God runs the world. At the same token, we view Yaakov as a weakling, a loser that can't handle the truth. So, we're not going to tell him that there's reward and punishment. We're not going to give him real mussar that's going to cause him to change his life.

1:44:31...the concept of reward and punishment. We're not going to give him real mussar that's going to cause him to change his life. And this type of attitude breeds losers. This type of attitude breeds kofrim. That's exactly what happened 2,000 years ago at the time of Chanukah. There was a kofer by the name of Tatnai Ben Pachat. Tatnai Ben Pachat wanted to make sure... this simple parashat shavua to tell him exactly what's written. This type of attitude breeds losers. This type of attitude breeds kofrim. That's exactly what happened 2,000 years ago at the time of Chanukah. There was a kofer by the name of Tatnai Ben Pachat. Tatnai Ben Pachat wanted to make sure Everyone knew who he was forever, so this kofer gamur went to the Greeks and told them that as long as the Jews continued to bring sacrifices, they would never beat them in war. Why? Because they're constantly serving Hashem and

1:45:51They're constantly doing korbanot. Korbanot, part of it, is teshuva. So Hashem is going to continue letting them live, letting them win, because they're doing teshuva every day. Even though they're not tzaddikim like they should be, even though they're not as great as they should be, even though they could be a lot better, still they're bringing a korban every day. So this kofer gamur, what did he say? He said, listen, instead of you helping them bring the korban by bringing them sheep, give them a pig instead. Meaning he knew the Torah. He knew the Torah and he used it against us. Who? Our brother. Esav couldn't handle us. Edom can't handle us. The Arabs can't handle us. None of them have power over Am Yisrael. Not Esav, not Yishmael. No one has power over the Jews except the sins.

1:46:53Jews' own actions. You make sense. You're giving soft power. You make sense. You're giving Ishmael power. All the worst things in the world happen after we make sins, including destroying ourselves with this faulty educational system where we're afraid to tell people the truth because maybe for Shalom Bayit. Don't do Teshuva. It's the most absurd logic in history. He told the Greeks that the God of Israel hates immoral behavior. He hates immodesty. He knew the Torah. He wasn't a jokester. He was a Talmid Yeshiva. He learned from Bilaam HaRasha. He says Hashem hates immorality. Hates it. He hates girls walking around with miniskirts. He hates women that don't have kisui rosh. He hates promiscuity, both men and women. Kedoshim tihyu. There's a reason why kedoshim is used in both ways. Kedoshim meaning holy, kedoshim meaning immodest, promiscuous. The same spelling for two completely opposite words. Same spelling.

1:48:19On one hand, it means holy. On the other hand, Hashem is giving us an understanding that when we're immodest and we're promiscuous, we're the exact, the epitome, the opposite of being holy. An immodest woman, a promiscuous woman, a promiscuous man, an immodest man is literally the opposite of holy. Even this kofer, Tatnai ben Pachat, knew this. He told the Greeks, he told them that if you induce them to live sexually immoral lives, you'll end up getting control over them. So the Greeks then made a decree, one of the most awful decrees in the history of the world, that whoever writes a ketubah for his wife will have his fingers ripped off. Why? Without a ketubah, you're not allowed to even touch a woman's hands. One of the most horrifying stories that I heard in my life recently was a woman told me that this so-called frum person who was extremely wealthy told her, "Listen, can you please do me a favor and..."

1:49:46and go to the mikveh, because we do business together, we work together. Can you go to the mikveh? She's single. Who knows if he's single or not? She says, "Single women don't go to the mikveh." He says, "No, no, go to the mikveh because if we're ever working together, there shouldn't be a problem with yichud." Meaning you're not allowed to be alone with a woman in a closed room. So he's telling her, no, you know, if we're ever in a closed room together, it's okay as long as you went to the mikveh. There's no faker halachah than the one that he just created. It has nothing to do with it. Yichud and mikveh have nothing to do with each other. What is he trying to do? He's trying to pacify himself, saying, listen, once I'm with her alone, then I can do whatever I want, really. Why? Because at least it's not being with a niddah, which is a death penalty. So he made a new halachah in his mind. Religious person. If you don't have a ketubah, if a woman does not have a ketubah, she's not allowed to touch the finger of the man. Finger. This kofer, Tatnai ben Pachat, knew this and he told the Greeks, "Make this rule." And that's what they did.

1:51:16Eventually, it elevated and escalated to the point where the Greeks said, "Whoever wants to get married, the Greeks have to try him out first." Who wants to get married under such conditions? They made all types of strange rules to constantly torture us and remove us from the Torah. says in the pasuk, in the beginning of the Torah, "In the beginning of God's creating the heavens and the earth, when the earth was astonishingly empty, with darkness upon the surface of the deep, and"

1:52:18It says this darkness, the choshech, is a prophecy for Greece. Greeks were the choshech. Why choshech? Why were they considered the darkness? Because their number one mission was to destroy our Torah. Unlike the Romans and the Nazis that wanted to kill our bodies, the Greeks wanted to kill our neshamos. By destroying our Torah, By getting us to watch sports instead of a shiur Torah, by getting us to be promiscuous instead of keeping and preserving ourselves until marriage, by getting us to focus on money instead of on mitzvot, that was their job. And the pasuk that we've talked about several times, that Yaakov Avinu says to Hashem... We've said several chiddushim on this pasuk, but there's another one. Yaakov Avinu says to Hashem, "Please save me from my brother; save me from Esav." But then he continues, "Yaakov Avinu says to Hashem, 'Please, Hashem, save me from my brother.'"

1:53:43Tatni Ben Pachat, the Kofer. But also save me from Esav, Greece, Edom. Because I fear him. Who do I fear? I fear the Kofer. I fear the Kofer. Why do I fear the Kofer? Because if this Kefirah continues Then Edom will come and hit me, and then that means there's a decree on Am Yisrael. When there's a decree on Am Yisrael, the decree goes both on parents and their children, meaning that the children get punished for their parents' sins and the parents get punished for their children's sins—something that does not happen ordinarily.

1:54:44You'll read and you'll hear from many other shiurim that the Greeks constantly tried to take out mitzvot: Rosh Chodesh, Shabbat, circumcision, the Ketubah—different mitzvot. The Rambam in Hilchot Chanukah says that the Greeks made learning Torah forbidden. And the Chachamim say it's not necessarily that it was a specific decree like Shabbat, Rosh Chodesh, and otherwise, but rather that they literally tried to destroy the foundation of the Torah, without which there is no Torah. The reason why is because the Greeks couldn't accept the existence of the Torah, as it meant the acceptance of the fact that God actually communicates with man through prophecy.

1:55:48Which, to a philosopher, means that there are concepts that the human mind can't fathom. And to the Greeks, this type of idea was unfathomable, unacceptable. Their idea was that nothing exists that cannot be conceived by human intellect, similar to the scientists and philosophers of today. When did Hashem finally save us? When a handful of Jews were finally willing to risk their lives for Torah. Not for their bodies, because five people against millions? You have to be suicidal to even try it. The level of emunah that the Chashmonaim had to have was unexplainable. Why would you even think to lift a sword or a knife or a rock to go fight millions of people? Even if you kill the first five people, even if you kill the first 500 people, even if you kill the first 5,000 people, all the rest of them need to do is just spit in the air and you drown.

1:57:11Why would five people even think for themselves that it should even be an idea they should implement to go to war against an entire army with millions and millions of soldiers? We're not talking about like the American army that has control of part of the world, but really, no. We're not talking about the Chinese who have control of part of the world, but really, no. We're not talking about the Koreans who are trying to scare everybody or the Russians who are trying to scare everyone. No, no. We're talking about literally someone who actually had control over the world. Literally. Meaning in every place in the world, someone is paying them taxes. In every place in the world, someone says, "Oh, yes, yes, commander. Yes, general. Yes, your highness." Who? The Greeks. You're going to go against all of them? Five of you. Even if you were Yehuda, the original Yehuda superhero, you still wouldn't win. How could this make any sense? Because Rabotai HaYekarim, once Hashem saw that we're willing to sacrifice our lives for Torah, we earned our right to live. As the Gemara tells us many times,

1:58:30If you want Torah, you have to sacrifice your life, literally, not figuratively speaking, literally. That means that if you have to eat a little less so another boy can learn Torah, you're doing it. That means that if you have to work a little harder so another person does Teshuvah, you're doing it. That means that if you're going to have to sleep one, two, or three hours less so you can finish the Daf Yomi, you're doing it. Why? Your life's on the line. If you're not willing to sacrifice your life for Torah, that means you haven't established an understanding of what the Torah is yet. And if we were in a generation of the Chashmonaim, you would be the reason why we would die. This is the understanding that a Jew has to arrive at. Now, when you tell a Jew that he should be famous like LeBron James, a singer like Beyoncé, a dancer like Michael Jackson, and all of these goyim, whether he has a kippah or not, he's still a goy. You've made your child into a goy.

1:59:50If you're telling him that he should look up to these people, instead of looking up to Moshe Rabbeinu, instead of looking up to Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov, instead of looking up to his own Rebbe and saying, "I want to be like him," instead of looking up to his own father that's a tzaddik, you've turned the kid into a goy. Don't be surprised if he actually becomes one. Because in the generation of Mashiach, there's no middle ground. There's no datiloni, sometimes religious. It's either it's all emet and I'm going full force, or it's all sheker. Now, of course, you're not going to even know all of the mitzvot overnight to take on all of them. But you have to acknowledge that it's all emet. You have to acknowledge that you have to start doing it. You have to acknowledge that you're gonna do everything possible to fulfill the entire Torah without a single excuse. Because if you don't, you're the problem. You're gonna breed more like you, you're gonna have kids, and they're gonna be like you. These are some of the most important things that we have to learn during Hanukkah because Hanukkah, Rav Ovadia, עָלָיו הַשָּׁלוֹם...

2:01:13It's literally one of these meets one of these holidays that everybody loves, the religious and the non-religious. The reason why is because most people don't understand Hanukkah. That's the only reason why everybody likes it. In fact, Hanukkah should be the most religious holiday we have in the entire Torah. Again, Hanukkah should be the most religious holiday we have in the entire Torah. Why? Because our entire Torah depends on Chanukah. Our entire Torah depends on the miracle of Chanukah. Because if it wasn't for the miracle of Chanukah, we would not have an Oral Torah today. As the Rabbi of Yad Vashem said, every single Tanna, every Amora, Every giant that we have in the Gemara or the Mishnah came after the miracle of Chanukah. All of the Chachamim that lived before the time of Chanukah, we don't have their Torah. We only have everything after Chanukah. Which means that if it wasn't for the miracle of Chanukah, there wouldn't be an Oral Torah written. Which would mean, Chas V'Shalom, we have no Torah. Because without the Oral Torah, there is no Torah.

2:02:39You wouldn't understand a single page in the Torah. You wouldn't understand a single halacha. You wouldn't have a Shulchan Aruch. You wouldn't have a Rambam. You wouldn't have anything without Chanukah. So instead of focusing on eating and drinking, the most important part of Chanukah is to actually appreciate this and learn the Oral Torah. Pick up a Gemara, start learning it. Pick up a Mishnah, start learning it. Pick up the Chumash, start learning it with commentary, not with your own ideas. Because that's the Oral Torah, that's Chanukah. Once a person starts understanding what it really means to be a Jew, then he wants to become like Moshe Rabbeinu. Why? Moshe Rabbeinu is a winner. Moshe Rabbeinu is the biggest winner that ever lived. Am Yisrael Chai, not because of the secular mentality but because of the religious one. These are some of the things that you have to teach yourself. These are some of the things you have to teach your kids. These are some of the things you have to teach your colleagues, your friends, your kehillah.

2:03:58We have to stop pretending to be goyim. Stop wearing their clothes. Stop walking around with the newest styles. Stop looking up what the newest style is. Stop wasting your time trying to look like a runway model. Stop trying to be goyim so much. Try being a Jew. Without the beard. Don't grow a beard. Be a Jew without that stuff. Be a Jew with the stuff that's actually more important, your neshama. Stop aspiring to be the next billionaire on Forbes 500. For one day, see how it feels. Instead of trying to be the next billionaire, try to be the next Talmid Chacham. Stop aspiring to become the next basketball player, football player, businessman, or some guy that has a TV show. Try to aspire to become somebody important to Hashem, am Yisrael. See how it feels for a day; try two. If you like it, maybe four or a lifetime. If we stop pretending that there's no difference between us and the goyim, then we'll realize that we really are different, which means that our responsibilities are different. Our job is different in the world. You're supposed to be an or lagoyim, not part of the goyim. The mitzvot are an or lagoyim, meaning you show them the way.

2:05:20us and the goyim, then we'll realize that we really are different, which means that our responsibilities are different. Our job is different in the world. You're supposed to be an or lagoyim, not part of the goyim. The mitzvot are an or lagoyim, meaning you show them the way, and to dress, how to act, how to conduct business, how to operate. Not they show you the way, what to wear, who to be with, what to say, what to believe. You go to Battei Knesset, and you think you reached Congress. Everyone's a politician today. Stop. Try being a Jew, a Jew that learns Torah, fulfills mitzvot, and... Whatever work you have, do your work, but your work is part of your life, not your life. These are the things we have to aspire to be. Because that's the only thing that's going to save us. It's either that or it's Haman. That's the scary choice. There's no other choice. There's no third choice. The key, Rabotai, is this holiday supposed to remind us...

2:06:46we have to do because our kids, they're going to school, and we think they're fine because they're going to an institution. Closed doors, there are teachers there. There's money going in, there's money going out, people get a salary, people get retirement, and then the kid comes out Amalek. We sent little Yaakov, and he comes out Esav. What happened? "Oh, I don't believe you're my father. I think I came from an ape." Okay, so go visit him in a zoo at least. The point is that our kids are confused. Why? Because the parents are confused. The parents have no clue. People have no idea why they're even alive. What am I doing in this world? Why did Hashem stop the whole world and have to create me? Meaning that if you're alive in the world, you're so important to Hashem that He literally decided the world cannot exist without you. Now, do you really think that He said the world can't exist without you as long as you have a lot of money? With you as long as you are a basketball player? With you as long as you're a famous businessman?

2:08:07With you, as long as you have a fashion type of mind like Fendi, like Calvin Klein, like Donna Karan? As long as you wear those clothes, then the world can continue? That's why Hashem created you, because you need to wear tight clothes and look like someone who's going swimming all the time? People have to ask themselves these questions. Why are you alive? Why? You're in the world 20, 30, 40, 50 years. Why are you alive? Why does Hashem stop the world and say, "I cannot continue this world without this person"? For what? What purpose do you serve? You made money, you eat, so you're a blender without the buttons. What's the point? The point is, Rabotai, that you came to the world to serve Hashem. There cannot be any other point that's valid. There is no other point. And serving Hashem requires only one condition: that you fear Him. That's it. Nothing else.

2:09:28Doesn't require you to have millions of dollars. Doesn't require you to be a male or a female. Doesn't require you to be the biggest Chacham in the world. Just requires you to fear Him just enough to follow everything He says to the best of your ability. That's it. Which means that if we're doing anything otherwise, we're not following the instructions of the Manufacturer. This is what Hanukkah is all about. It's a reminder to us. What are the instructions of the Manufacturer? Why are we still here? It cannot be that you're here for all of the material reasons that you thought until today. It has to be something else. It has to be. And if you want your kids to believe this, you have to start. You have to start operating like you believe it and...

2:10:31And stop acting like we're scared of Esav or Yishmael. We should be scared of ourselves. That's it. It's the only thing that's scary. Us. Because we're the ones that cause the most amount of damage to ourselves. This will give us enough to realize that we can literally achieve anything and everything we want, no matter how big, in spirituality. Materialism is all in Hashem's hands anyway. Everything is from Heaven except fear of Heaven. Whether you're going to become rich or not is in the hands of Hashem. Whether you're going to be famous or not is in the hands of Hashem. Whether you're going to be successful or not is in the hands of Hashem. The only thing that's in your hands is whether you serve Him or not. That's it. This Chanukah It's time that each one of us took our own lives in our hands and started realizing that there's no more middle ground. There's no more, "I believe that I'm from a monkey, but I also believe that Hashem exists." You can't believe both. I believe that Hashem is real, but I still need to work overtime.

2:11:47I believe that Hashem is real, but I'm not really sure if I should get married or not because I'm not ready. All these silly decisions that people make because they have no emunah in a full Hashem, in a real Hashem. They believe in like half of Hashem. A partial Hashem. A Hashem that's limited. It's time we believe in the real Hashem. Any questions? If you don't believe in Mashiach, how do you believe in Hashem? whether we stand a chance or not, the question is simply answered by the fact that we're alive and

2:12:56A person that's alive means that he not only stands a chance, but he has a very big chance to succeed. As long as a person has the ability to do teshuvah, as long as a person has the ability to improve, Rabbi Yisrael Salanter says that Hashem lets him continue living. However, a person can lose their right to live when they get to such a point where they either... on a path that makes it impossible for them to do teshuvah in a certain time frame that Hashem dictated that they have to do teshuvah by. Since He knows the future, He knows if they're going to be able to achieve it or if they reject teshuvah. Meaning that even though, for example, one of the scariest things that I ever read was in Or Yisrael, Rabbi Yisrael Salanter writes in one of his letters Let's say, for example, Hashem decided to give a person 70 years. At 20 years old, a rabbi came to him and told him the truth, and he decided he didn't want to listen. So, Hashem, in His mercy and patience, gave him another chance. The same rabbi came five years later and again told him to do teshuvah, and he didn't want to listen. So, Hashem changed the messenger, and another five years or ten years passed.

2:14:23He gave him another sign and sent another rabbi or another event in his life. He said, "Do teshuvah," and he said, "No." At that point, Rabbi Yisrael Misalant says that person could literally lose their right to live, even though Hashem already decreed when He created them that they have 70 years in the world. Once they've rejected the truth and the teshuvah... More than enough times, Hashem can decide also to change the deal. That even though He gave them seventy years, He says, you've wasted thirty-five, I'm taking the other thirty-five, giving it to another gilgul, or another person, or other things that could potentially be. Meaning, the plan changes. Why? Because when a person rejects teshuvah, in essence, they're decreeing themselves their own future. And that future is not bright. This is part of the reason why sometimes you see certain people die really young. Part of the reason, not the only reason. Unfortunately, yes. Unfortunately. So, when it comes to a person doing teshuvah, everyone that's alive can do it. Everyone that's dead can't do it. If you're alive and you can do teshuvah, that means that you definitely stand a chance of

2:15:47more than just a chance. You're likely to succeed when Mashiach arrives. Whether it's your personal Mashiach or the Mashiach that's going to save all of us. Personal Mashiach means when somebody dies—that's Judgment Day anyway. And the ultimate Mashiach that saves everyone is for the whole entire nation. In reality, people shouldn't focus on Mashiach. Because, number one, we're only going to know, as the Rambam says in Hilchot Melachim, we're only going to know what's going to happen with Mashiach once he comes anyway. So all of these lectures that you see on the internet of people talking about "this is going to happen when Mashiach comes," "that's going to happen when Mashiach comes," "this is going to happen when Mashiach comes"—no one really knows. Rambam says this is all guesses, this is all possibilities. But no one knows for sure, and we're not going to know for sure. That's halacha. We're not going to know for sure until Mashiach comes. What we do know for sure is that we have to do teshuva. That for sure we know. Why? Because every single prophet that ever lived said it. Hashem Himself said it. We know we need to do teshuva. The other thing is that we need to understand that even without Mashiach, once a person dies and leaves this world, he has a very similar judgment day. In Shamayim, where they look at every single thing that he ever did.

2:17:14All of these rabbis that talk about embarrassment and Gehinnom, and so on, what they did is they took a small section of what the Zohar HaKadosh said and the Gemara said, which is that when a person goes up to Shamayim, they show him all of the things that ever happened in his life. But not like on a screen, but rather as if he's living those sins. And many people that have died and came back to life said this story, where they literally were embarrassed because they showed them all the sins. Why is it embarrassing to see all the sins that a person made? Because, number one, it's as if you're doing it on the spot. It's not like you're seeing someone else do it on a movie screen. It's like you're doing it then and there. So why is that embarrassing? Because Hashem is watching you right there and then, and you know it. But you can't stop yourself. So just imagine, you know that woman you spoke gossip about, you know that guy you slandered, you know that person you stole money from, you know your father that you cheated, you know your mother that you cursed out. Imagine you do it, and they're right there watching you, like, "That's what you said about me? You're the one that took the money? You're the one that said it? You're the one that took the job?" They're watching you, and they're saying to you...

2:18:40Why? Why? Imagine millions and millions of people you've seen in your life are all watching you and saying, "Why? Yaron, why? Why did you do it? What did I even do to you? Why did you say this about me? So why did I look at you like that? I was in a bad mood that day. It doesn't mean I deserved all the bad words you said." Imagine they're all watching you, and Hashem is there too. That embarrassment, that type of embarrassment, is better than going to Gehinnom. It's better than the fire. So when they say embarrassment, they minimize it because they make you think that if a few people make fun of you, then you go away. Like in this world, they write a comment about you on the internet. They say, "This guy's a loser. Ha ha ha." And he goes away, and you go to the next post. It's not like that. So...

2:19:43the time of Mashiach, it'll be the same thing. Every single person will have a judgment day that they will have to face. They'll have to see it, they'll have to deal with it, they'll have to experience it all over again. Only this time, they know for sure Hashem is watching because He's right there telling them, "My son, why'd you do that to Me?" I gave you a wife, and you go and cheat on her? I gave you kids, and you don't spend time with them? I gave you money, and you still steal somebody else's? I gave you a mouth, and you curse Me with it? I gave you legs, and you go to churches and Reform shuls instead of going to learn Torah? Why'd you do it, my son? Why'd you do it, my daughter? I gave you a beautiful body to share with your husband. Instead, you shared it with the entire neighborhood. Why? Why? Imagine your Father in Heaven looking at you and you just want to die all over again. He's asking you, why?

2:21:04Look how much I gave you, and He shows you all the things that He gave you that no one else in the world has. Only you have it. Meaning that you're even more miserable than you began because now you're seeing everything that you got. And then you're seeing how you returned bad to Him. He gave you money, and you bought immodest clothes. He gave you abilities, and you used them against Him. He gave you a mouth, and you spoke kefirah (heresy) with it. He gave you a position of power, and you used it to draw people away from Him and closer to yourself. Type of embarrassment if you really delve and meditate on it. The next time you go do it with a dude, that's teshuva. Then you're gonna start doing teshuva. Why? Because you're gonna want to die from embarrassment of all the sins that we make. And maybe we'll start having yirat Shamayim at that point. That's real busha. The busha other people talk about today is like nonsense. It's like somebody put their pants backwards, Stuart.

2:22:18is when Hashem shows you everything He gave you and what you returned back, and then all the people that you cared about but in reality talked behind their back, they're watching they're seeing and they're showing you what happened to them because of what you said and how they didn't get the job because of you, and how the shidduch broke because of you, and how the son that was supposed to be Gadol HaDor didn't come to life because of you And how a person didn't do teshuva because you liked your money too much and you wanted to keep it in your pockets or let it collect dust instead of helping another Jew do teshuva. And all types of wonderful things that you're going to have to write home about. Say, oh, whoa, I can't wait to get home. It's much better than this place. It's much better than this place. Acknowledging all the things that I've experienced. This, Rabotai, is Mashiach one way or another. Meaning Mashiach here or Mashiach there. It doesn't make a difference. That's why I tell people, why are you so worried about Mashiach coming here? All that stuff. You should worry about what happens in Shamayim. Because of all the things that we do anyway. Every single one of us is guilty of it. But that means that you're still alive. And if you're still alive, you can fix it. You can fix it. Start by talking less.

2:23:45Unless it's Torah, if it's not Torah, it's better not to talk. Trust me when I tell you, it's better not to talk. What else? What are you really going to say that's so important? Like how important is what you're about to say? Like such and such team won. Who cares? If he really wants to know, look on the internet. He doesn't need you to be the news. What, did you become ESPN? Cares who’s winning in politics? If he really wants to know, open the newspaper. What, did you become CNN? Why do you have to report the news to people? Sports or things like that already, you’ve eliminated half your speech. Stock market? Yes, CNBC doesn’t need you. Already you’ve eliminated so much. To yach. Talking about the neighbors? You have nothing else to talk about other than the neighbors? I You've run out of all words in the world, and the only thing you have to talk about is other people? Or better yet, talking about other people's money. The lowest form of conversation. Even the apes are blessing Hashem for not allowing them to talk about money. It's literally the lowest form of conversation: talking about other people's money.

2:25:05In reality, you start realizing most stuff you don't actually have to say. It's not divrei chochma; it's not wisdom. It's shtuyot, nothing. Nothing. Shtuyot, just meaningless speech. Just to take time. Once you start doing that, already you're becoming holier and holier by the day. Then you're going to have to occupy that time with something else. You're going to go crazy. You're not talking now, so what are you going to do? You have to start thinking. What are you going to think about? If you're not talking about that stuff, there's no purpose in following it anymore. There's no purpose in following the news and seeing who's the best politician if you're not going to share it with your friends. Automatically, you lose interest in politics. You lose interest in a lot of things because you can't share it with people because it's nonsense. So now you have to occupy yourself with something else. You end up learning Torah. You come back home. Which means that, Rabotai, every single one of us watching here, or watching on the internet live, or watching on the internet tomorrow when we post it on YouTube and the website and everywhere else, if you're watching it, you are part of the people that have a chance to do teshuva. Why? You're alive. And you're watching emet. That already makes you unique. There are many people that are alive physically, but not everybody has the benefit and the merit to watch emet.

2:26:34So we have a chance because we're alive. And you're actually seeing things that are from the Torah. What you do after that is up to you. Next question. Same price. What time is it? Late, no? My bedtime. We have another shiur on Tuesday night. We have another shiur on Tuesday night at the Breslov Center. We're going to continue our Pirkei Avot series. I think we're up to 106. I forgot the number. You'll see it. I don't even know what the number is, but I'm losing count. We have the next Mishnah in Avot. As for Wednesday, Wednesday is tentative—no shiur. I'm not a hundred percent sure whether there will be a shiur. So please follow up. If you're not going to attend Tuesday, then follow up on the internet, on social media, or text me, and I'll tell you if there's going to be a shiur on Wednesday. But most likely, there will not be a shiur on Wednesday, although there is a possibility there will be.

2:27:47Listen, if there was a crowd of 5,000 people, we'd actually have to give you guys a decision. But since we're not, this is one of the benefits of not having a big crowd live. I don't have to tell you until the last minute. Baruch Adonai le'olam. Amen v'amen.