Bringing Bracha To Your Business ( Manhattan - NEW YORK)

0:12we're here at 47th Street in New York. We're going to talk a little bit about Judaism. We're going to talk about a little bit about blessings for business. We're in a business world right now. You know it's very difficult to get people to stop business and think about Hashem. Even though sometimes you know the businessman has a kippah, it's hard for him to stop the business and go back to Hashem. That's why I tell people all the time that it's a sign of you being religious. It's not just a kippah, it's not just tzitzit, it's not just a long beard. The beard grows for free. The Maraz says even a goat has a beard just to show you it doesn't make you religious. So the beard doesn't make you religious. The sign of you being religious is not just a kippah, it's not just tzitzit, it's not just a long beard. The beard grows for free. The Maharsha says even a goat has a beard, just to show you it doesn't make you religious. So the beard doesn't make you religious. The kippah doesn't make you religious. Tzitzit doesn't make you religious. There are a lot of reshaim that do all that stuff. But there are also a lot of tzaddikim that don't have that stuff. Sometimes you see somebody, a Tzaddik Yesod Olam, who doesn't have a beard. Sometimes you see somebody who is not ready yet to wear tzitzit, but he has a heart of gold. Sometimes you see somebody who has a certain profession that, if he wears a kippah, his life would be at risk. So he doesn't wear a kippah.

1:16For example, if you walk around in France with a kippah, it's pikuach nefesh. Why? One of these Muslims, who has a pretty much open policy to kill Jews in the street, could kill a Jew just for wearing a kippah. They actually have a Jewish fashion designer who created a kippah out of hair, out of human hair. So now, if you want to wear a kippah but you don't want to get killed, you put it on your head, but it looks like hair. But this shows us, number one, the sign of our times. It also shows us the lack of bitachon we have. But it also shows us how foolish we are sometimes. Between us. Why do you live there? The world is so big. Why do you have to live there? Your house is there, your business is there, and everything is there. But yeah, but your life's at risk. If the life goes and the business stays, what is it worth? So sometimes we forget how to prioritize things. But he asked a fantastic question. If HaKadosh Baruch Hu is so important, if Judaism is so important, if Torah is so important, how come Am Yisrael does not missionize? Meaning, how come Am Yisrael does not do what the Christians do, which is go, "Hello sir, yeah, I want to talk to you about Jesus. Hello sir, I want to talk to you about the Lord. Hello sir, did you ever hear of Daniel chapter 9, Isaiah 53, and all types of things that are in the Torah, but are vague, and most Jews don't learn them."

2:37And the Christian thinks he learned them. All he learned is how to manipulate them. He doesn't know it himself sometimes. And they go to Jews and they missionize, trying to get them to convert to Christianity. And unfortunately, they're succeeding in a very big way. Right now, as I said a few minutes ago, the Christian church is investing over $300 million a year in Israel alone to convert Jewish people to Christianity. And they're succeeding at approximately 1,000 Jews a week in Israel alone. 1,000 Jews, Israeli Jews, a week are converting to Christianity. We're talking about enormous numbers. Enormous numbers. In America, 30,000, you know, 1,000 people is nothing. You throw a rock, you hit 5,000 people in New York. You know, in Israel, 1,000 people is a lot. America, it's much worse. In Canada, it's much worse. Why? Because there is an organization of kodesh named Jews for Judaism run by my dear friend, Rabbi Michael Skobac and Rabbi Blumenthal, and a few other tzaddikim. They did a statistical analysis, and they said that in the last 20 years...

3:42500,000 Jews, 500,000 Jews converted to Christianity, Hashem. Now, if you said 500,000 Americans, 500,000 Africans, 500,000 Chinese, 500,000 ants, 500,000 dogs converted to Christianity, okay, okay, 500,000, it's a dime a dozen. Oh, it's not so many of them; 400 million Americans, there's billions of Chinese. 500,000 Jews, you're talking about big numbers. because right now we have approximately 15 million Jews we know for sure And there's maybe another 100 to 200 million we don't know about. But 15 million we know for sure. The other 100 million or so are in different places around the world that we're not 100% sure about. For example, in Africa, there's a place called Igbo. The Igbo Jews believe that they're part of the Shevet Binyamin. Also in Afghanistan, there's the Pashtuns. Pashtuns, they look like Arabs, but they're, for the most part, 100% Jews.

4:46they do shechita, taharat mishpacha, they wear tzitzit, they follow the Written Torah, they don't have the Oral Torah, they don't have Gemara, but they follow the Oral Torah. The only nation in the world that keeps taharat mishpacha, where the wife, once she menstruates, she's not allowed to touch her husband until she goes to a mikveh and everything else, is only Am Yisrael. Shechita, the Muslims try to pretend like they slaughter their cows, but all they do is torture them even more. So these specific rules are only for Am Yisrael, and there are 16 million Pashtun Jews in Afghanistan. So there are a lot of Jews we don't know about, but the ones we do know about number 15 million. Some say 13 million, well that doesn't make a difference, give or take. What's the point? The point is 500,000 is a big number. 500,000 Jews going to become Christians is a big number. The worst news yet is that because I deal with these missionaries all the time, they attack us all the time, they try to infiltrate our groups on WhatsApp and pretend to be Jews. There was a couple, a couple of Christians that moved to New York a year and a half ago, looking like Hasidim. The guy has payot, the guy has payot, the woman has kisui rosh, everything she looks.

6:01Like she just came from Mount Sinai. What are they doing? 100% Christians trying to missionize people by pretending they're Jews. After they caught them, they moved to Chicago. They moved to Chicago and did the same exact thing. Miracle from Hashem. Hashem had mercy on Am Yisrael. One of the people who lived in New York went to visit Chicago, a friend in Chicago, on one Shabbat. And he sees in the kehillah, he sees this Christian missionary that's pretending to be a Chassid. starts yelling, "No! This is a missionary! What is he doing here? Oh, he attacked us!" They confirmed it. They asked the guy. The guy's not even pretending. He's like, "Yeah, yeah, I'm here to get all of you to become Christians, to believe in Jesus." Like, he's not even pretending. He's pretending with the way he looks, but as far as once you ask them, they're not allowed to lie. They're not allowed to lie about it. One of the things that real Christians believe is if you ask them, "Do you believe in Jesus?" they're not allowed to say no. Nothing for them. It's like if you say no, it's like you're going to hell forever. Little do they know that if they continue believing in Jesus, they're going to hell forever anyway. But anyway, they are investing billions and billions of dollars, so much so that they got some of the best Jews in the world. I don't mean the best Jews as far as the most religious. I mean some of the most talented Jews in the world have converted to Christianity, and today...

7:23The biggest, most successful Christian missionaries in the world are actually Jews. Donald Trump's cabinet, Donald Trump's cabinet, he tries to be pro-Israel. But a lot of people don't know, he's surrounded by Christians. But he says, "I like Jews." You know why he says, "I like Jews"? Because all the Jews that he knows, except his daughter, they're all Christians. His cabinet is the biggest group of missionaries in the world. All of his friends, all of his buddies, they're Jews, but they're Christian missionaries. Now, you ask yourself, they're investing so much in this false religion, how come we don't invest even half as much, 10% as much, in the right religion? Part of the reason is because we're ignorant of the problem. Most Jews don't even know that what I just said to you is even a problem. Most people don't even know this exists until it comes to their own house. until one of their sons thinks about it, until one of their daughters thinks about it, or somebody they know, until it arrives at our own home because of intermarriage, or because somebody has some type of ספק or doubt about Torah and he's thinking about exploring other religions. Most Jewish people don't think Christians are a problem. They don't think the New Testament is a problem. And what do they do? They say, "No, you should be nice to them. Why? They allowed us to come to America. They're nice to us. They give us freedom of speech. They give us your Torah. I could say whatever I want and no one could go against it. But the reality is..."

8:32safek or doubt about Torah, and he's thinking about exploring other religions. Most Jewish people don't think Christians are a problem. They don't think the New Testament is a problem. And what do they do? They say, "No, you should be nice to them. Why? They allowed us to come to America. They're nice to us. They give us freedom of speech. They give us your Torah. I could say whatever I want, and no one could go against it. But the reality is... is that they're not giving us freedom of speech. They're not giving us America. Hashem is giving us America. And that's what we forget. Everything that's happening in the world is because of HaKadosh Baruch Hu, not because of Christians, not because of Arabs, not because of anything else. All HaKadosh Baruch Hu. So if HaKadosh Baruch Hu wanted us to go to America or to Australia or to England or different parts of the world... For different reasons. One of the biggest reasons, as Zohar HaKadosh says, is before Mashiach comes, HaKadosh Baruch Hu promises that every single person will have an opportunity in their lifetime to do teshuva. Every single person will have an opportunity to discover the truth. They'll be given the opportunity.

9:38Someone will come to your house and say, "Hi, this is Hashem. It's in the Tanakh, I can prove it to you. I'll give you a CD, show you, here's Hashem, I can prove it to you. You have a lecture on 47th Street, in the middle of the workday, I can prove it to you." And so on and so forth. Somebody will have, one way or another, the truth will arrive at your door. Once, twice, five times, ten times, every person different amounts, but HaKadosh Baruch Hu says, you'll have an opportunity. You'll have an opportunity. Why? Because once Mashiach comes, there's no more opportunity. The Gemara in Masechet Avodah Zarah, at the end of 3A, page 3A, says once Mashiach comes, no more conversions, no more nothing. Time's up. say, "Yeah, but I believe in God." Okay, do you keep Shabbat? No? Okay, then your believing in God is only in your heart. Hashem only follows what you do, not what's in your heart. There's no such thing as "religious in my heart," like "I really love God but I just don't feel like listening to Him right now." That doesn't work in Judaism. So, most people are going to have an opportunity that's going to be repetitive—one time, two times, a WhatsApp message, a Facebook message, a CD, a lecture—different opportunities.

10:55The other thing is also that Hashem wants you to use that opportunity that once you discover the truth, to use it to spread His Torah. Why? He said, "I put you in Australia, I put you in America, I put you in Africa, I put you in different places." Why? Because before Mashiach comes, I'm going to make sure that all four corners of the world... are going to have Jews there. There's going to be Jews everywhere. Even though we're a small nation, there's going to be Torah in every one of the four corners of the world. Why? Because I want to give everybody an opportunity to do teshuva. Because once Mashiach comes or once a person dies, there's no more... So now, if we all know this and we all believe this—technically we're obligated to believe it, we're Jews—how come we don't go door to door? How come most of Am Yisrael doesn't go door to door? Most rabbis, they give a little drasha for their kehillah, you know, maybe once in a while put a YouTube video, but we don't aggressively go to different places to try to shed light. One of the reasons is because until recent history, meaning the last maybe 40, 50 years, Jews didn't have such freedom like we have today.

12:07If you expressed your religious beliefs during the times of the 1930s and '40s, you were killed in the middle of the street. If you expressed your religious beliefs 500 years ago, when a lot of Jews were doing great in Spain, but you started expressing your religious beliefs to goyim, they'd hang you. You weren't allowed to do such a thing. The goyim said, okay, you can be a Jew, but be a Jew at home. Don't be a Jew over here with us goyim. Don't try to convert us. And that's why there are certain converts, once goyim discovered that Judaism is the only true religion and wanted to convert to Judaism, HaKadosh Baruch Hu says, "I love him; I love him with such a love that it obligates all of Am Yisrael to love the convert even more than a normal Jew. Why? Because a Jew, a regular Jew, first of all, didn't pick to be a Jew. Second of all, I'm the Jew's father. But the convert, I'm his father and his mother." Why? Because once he converts, if he's a real convert and she's a real convert, he loses everything.

13:14His mom and dad are no longer considered his mom and dad spiritually. His past friends cannot be his past friends anymore. Why? Because they're going. Why is he going to be friends with them? What do you have in common? His old place of employment may fire him. His community, in essence, changes to such an extent that in the past, they'd actually kill them. The goyim would actually kill the people that converted to Judaism. There's a famous Ger Tzedek named Avraham ben Avraham. After he converted, they killed him. And the Arizal, alav haShalom, says, "I want to be buried next to him." The Arizal, Gadol HaDor of Am Yisrael 500 years ago, says, "I want to be buried next to him." Why? Somebody like him, who knows he's going to convert and then he's going to die, that's halvai aleinu to be such a tzadik. So, for the most part, we weren't allowed to go door to door because we were always a small nation. We were always a persecuted nation. And if we started preaching our beliefs everywhere, we would be putting our own nation at risk. The second reason is because the reality is right now, out of about 15 million Jews that we know about, only about 3 million keep Shabbat. 3 million keep Shabbat. We're talking about 20% or less.

14:30That's being conservative. Really, it's probably less than that, but let's say it's three million. Now, why do I say Shabbat? Why did I say three million? Do three million eat kosher? Three million? Why? Because Shabbat is the foundation of Judaism. If you keep Shabbat, you're still classified as a Jew, even if you steal, even if you rob, even if you lie, even if you do a lot of other things that are not good. With all the other sins, you're considered a rasha. But if you don't keep Shabbat, the Torah says you're not even a Jew. You're considered 100% an idol worshiper. Same thing like the guys that worship the cows. Somebody sent me a video two days ago of the Indian people in India. ...have a cow, they have a cow standing over there, and then they go bow to the cow. They lay down under the cow, and the cow puts her foot on top of them as if she's giving her mission. They walk away, and then another line out the door, maybe 30-40,000 people. They go under the cow, the cow puts her leg—I'll show you the video after the shiur, you'll see it—the cow puts the foot on the little girl, on her father, on his sister, on the cousin, and they walk away. They think it's God. You know why they think the cow is God?

15:37...because it takes her nine months to give birth to a baby, so they think because it takes nine months for a baby, that means she's God. If a cow walks across the street in India, traffic stops. If a cow urinates, there has to be an Indian that catches the urine. Why? They sell it in the supermarket to clean the houses, to spiritually clean the houses. In India, they use cow urine; you can buy it in every supermarket. The Jews have HaKadosh Baruch Hu. But unfortunately, most of us still act like goyim. Most of us still act like goyim. Why? We want to go to the beach on Shabbat. We want to go to the beach when there are naked people there. We want to do a lot of things that are not allowed, like watching movies on Shabbat. We want to light a cigarette on Shabbat. Who says? He says that's the problem. You see, Am Yisrael is so small, only three million of you are really...

16:45In the club right now, if Mashiach came right now, we'd be in serious trouble. Because brothers, sisters, cousins, aunts, uncles, Mashiach can help them. Who says when the Goel comes, when Mashiach comes, who is he going to help? He's going to help the people that are doing mitzvot, not people that want to do it in the future. So what happens? Now, since there's so few of you that are in the club and so many that are not in the club... You can't spend your efforts, your resources, your money, going to recruit 8 billion non-Jews. You have to spend all your efforts recruiting the Jews. If the non-Jew comes to you, he wants to convert, help him, like I did, Baruch Hashem, yesterday. I have a student, almost four years, with me, learning, Baruch Hashem, a met, tzaddik. Yesterday, Baruch Hashem, we took him to the Beit Din, he completed his conversion. This is a person that's mamash, mamash, neshama Torah. That's a big addition to Am Yisrael. We try to help whoever wants to be a real convert. We bring them to the Beit Din. We help them. We don't charge a penny. Everything we do is for Hashem. And HaKadosh Baruch Hu provides one way or the other. Now this person came and changed his whole life. Why? Because he wants to be like you. He wants to be a Jew.

18:01And he came to the Beit Din and they asked him 500 questions. The Beit Din says, maybe he should be a rabbi. This guy knows so much. He's like a rabbi. They started asking him questions. After a while, they said, let's just keep asking, just to see how much he knows. And they keep asking, asking, asking, asking, asking, asking. Eventually, we're running out of time. Okay, you passed the test an hour and a half ago. But let's say, we just want to know how much you know. So then after the shiur, usually I talk to people. uh, last night we finished the shiur, maybe almost 11:30, something like that. But we were there until almost two o'clock in the morning with private meetings. Now, he was with me the whole time, just sitting over there, listening to some of the conversations, learning a little bit. And then, when it was private, he had a sefer, learning halachot in the middle of the street—learning halachot of Shabbat. What do you do in the morning? He's learning in the middle of the street at 12, 1 o'clock in the morning. That's a Jew. That's a Jew. I saw Jews like that. I want a million of them. So how come he wants to do it and sometimes we don't want to do it? How come? He knows what's valuable. We are unfortunately confused about what's valuable. The second reason why we don't missionize is because we have enough problems with our own nation that we need more money, more resources.

19:18and more emet, more truth, to spread among our own people because that's the priority. But if the convert comes to you and wants to convert, the Shulchan Aruch says in the third halacha when it comes to gerim, Garrett comes to you and wants to convert. He says, "I want to be a Jew." You say to him, "You realize that they may kill you? We're a persecuted nation." He says, "Yeah, I know." You say, "You know, last week you drove on Shabbat." "No problem. Next week, if you drive on Shabbat because you're a Jew, they might kill you. Moshe Rabbeinu killed someone who violated Shabbat." He says, "Yeah, I know." You say, "You know, last week you ate pig, you ate non-kosher. No problem. As a Jew, if you eat chelev, it's a death penalty." He says, "Yeah, no problem." He goes, "Really? Okay." They convert him on the spot. Shulchan Aruch says they actually convert him that day. Meaning, not only do they convert him today, they tell him, "You don't have to be a professor in Judaism. You don't have to be a rabbi. You have enough." What's enough? You know what Shabbat is? You know what kashrut is. You know you want to be a Jew, that you're going to be persecuted. That's enough for you to be a Jew. The rest of it we're going to teach you over time. Now, today it's not the same. Today you have to go through a conversion process, conversion school, conversion course. You have to know somebody. You have to have money. You have to have a lot of things. It's very, very difficult to convert. Why? Because over the last couple of thousand years, we've had a lot of problems with fake converts.

20:41people that converted for the wrong reason because baruch Hashem, many Jews succeeded in life monetarily, became very, very wealthy, and decided to start dating whoever they wanted to date and figured, okay, she's a goya I want to date, no problem. Once she's ready to get married, I'll just pay the rabbi a few shekels under the table, a few shekels over the table, a few shekels around the table, and she’ll become a Jew in a week. And that's what happened. So much so that a little over a hundred years ago, the Syrian community had such a problem with fake converts, they did a takanah. They made a rule where they said, we're no longer allowing converts. We're no longer allowing anyone to marry a convert. You marry a convert, you're out of the kehillah. Now, This was a good rule for them at the time because there were a lot of problems there. The bad part is they never fixed it. They never stopped. So even 100 years later, when it's really no longer a problem, people know what's the truth, what's not, and so on and so forth, they never undid it, and it got to a point where it became actually a little bit of a problem, a little bit of a...

21:51where they are so anti-convert that even if a convert comes to the kehillah, he converted someone else 15 years ago. He already became a rabbi, talmid chacham, learns all day, wrote a book, tzaddik. Tzaddik, we want a million and a half of them. He comes, he wants to pray in the kehillah. You come to Florida, the big Syrian beit knesset has a big sign on the front of the door: "We do not accept converts." Now we don't accept them to marry us. We don't accept them in the shul. You want to come to a shul? Anyway, we're not going to give you an aliyah. We're not going to give you an aliyah. We're not counting you in the minyan. So on and so forth. This is a chilul Hashem. It's not. It's against the Torah. Thirty-six times in the Torah it mentions you're supposed to love the convert. You're abusing him? Okay, maybe don't give him extra kavod, but don't insult him. And that's what happens. So it's a problem. It's a very serious problem, but the Syrian community has to deal with it. The rest of the Jewish communities have to realize that, yes, we would love to have more and more righteous converts, but we have to be very careful. You have to ask them why they're converting. You have to make sure that they want to be part of the community. You have to make sure that they know what they're talking about. And you have to make sure that they want to make the necessary sacrifices.

23:04you know, as far as their life sacrifices, which are required to be a Jew. Like, if they want to become like a half-Jew, where, you know, they like to go to Beit Knesset, they like to listen to shiurim on YouTube, but they're not so sure about kashrut. You know, sometimes kosher, sometimes not kosher. Do them a favor, tell them no. Be a righteous Noahide. Be a righteous Noahide, keep the Sheva Mitzvot B'nei Noach, keep approximately 50 ethical rules, and you'll be a good non-Jew. You don't need to be a Jew to go to Olam HaBa. But if they want to do everything, no problem. We welcome them with open arms. Either way, the big thing is that when it comes to Judaism, the last part of the puzzle is that in order for us to truly missionize, in order for us to truly missionize, because if you look at the Gemara, how they talk about somebody that wants to convert to Judaism, they get so excited about the person, and the Gemara talks about it. Somebody says, "I want to convert to Judaism," they give him so much kavod, they love him so much, they give him honor, respect, everything. They are so excited about the convert. The Torah says you have to give special treatment. You’re not even allowed to negotiate with him like you negotiate with a regular person. Why? You negotiate, two Jews negotiating, it looks like a fist fight.

24:14Two Jews negotiating about diamonds. I see you guys sometimes negotiating about a diamond. I feel like somebody's about to take a knife. Somebody's taking a knife. And then, at the end, they hug and kiss, and somebody gives somebody else money. Unbelievable. With a convert, you're not allowed to do that. Why? If you pressure the convert, it's like eating pig. You pressure the convert, you put too much pressure on him, it's like you ate pig. No different. So you have to be careful with a convert. So, the Gemara says we should love them. The Gemara says we should promote Judaism. So how come we don't? Part of the reason is because we ourselves are sometimes not even sure of ourselves. And the reason for that is because we don't learn enough about who we really are. Who we really are. We're not proud of who we really are. And that's why sometimes a person is a Jew, and he goes to Beit Knesset, but he's embarrassed to wear a kippah when he's doing business. Sometimes he's excited to be a Jew on the weekend, on Shabbat. But during the week, he hangs out, socializes, and speaks in a language like the goyim. Why? A goy says, "What are you? You're frum, you're a Jew?" "No, no, you know, from the Middle East." He's embarrassed about himself.

25:26Why? He figures that if I tell people I'm a Jew, maybe they will do business with me, maybe not, maybe this. He's not so sure of himself. The only reason for that is because he doesn't know how significant it is to be a chosen person. How amazing it is for you to be a Jew. You have to think about it this way. Torah HaKedoshah says the following: HaKadosh Baruch Hu created the Torah 974 generations before He created the world. He looked at the Torah as a blueprint—what's in the Torah—and then He created the world. He said, okay, in the Torah, I have kashrut, I have kosher laws, so I'm going to have to make kosher animals and non-kosher animals so people can tell the difference. okay, I have taharat hamishpacha, okay, so I'm going to make male and female, and the female is going to have a time of the month where she is going to be able to fulfill this obligation of taharat hamishpacha. I have all types of other laws, and He created mamash after looking at the Torah. He created the world, but who did He create the world for? He created the world for Am Yisrael, meaning the whole world exists for the Jews to such an extent that the Midrash says that...

26:39Hashem could give some Arab sheikh... 50 billion dollars, so one day he gets so bored with his money after he bought 500 Rolls-Royces and he has a whole slew of cars and houses and buildings in Dubai and in Saudi Arabia and everywhere else. He gets bored. So what does he decide? He decides that he's gonna develop the desert somewhere else where there's nothing else. There's no stores, there's nothing, so he's gonna build a building literally in the middle of the desert. There's not even a next-door neighbor. He's gonna build a 150-story building and... Hashem is going to give him the money. Why? Because a hundred years later, a tzaddik, a Jew, is going to go through that desert. He's going to get hot, so he's going to need the shade. He's going to need the shade. He's like, ah, so I'm going to let this Arab have this building, build a building, 150 stories, 30,000 people build a building. For what? So the one time the Jew goes through the desert, one time for 20 minutes, he can get the shade. That's how much HaKadosh Baruch Hu loves Am Yisrael. That's how much HaKadosh Baruch Hu loves Am Yisrael.

27:40to that extent. Does that mean we're better? Yes, it does mean we're better. It doesn't mean that we have to present ourselves as arrogant or anything of that nature, but yes, the world was created for the Jews. Now, if a Jew understands this, then he should go deeper. If the world was created for the Jews, now you have eight billion people in the world today approximately, and Out of the 8 billion people, as I told you, 15 million are Jews, but only 3 million keep Shabbat. Which means, out of the 8 billion people, the world exists for whom? It doesn't exist for the Mechalel Shabbat, It doesn't exist for the Jew that converted to Christianity. It doesn't exist for the Indians that are bowing to the cow. It doesn't exist for the Christian that's trying to kill the neshamot of Jews. What does it exist for? The 3 million Jews. Which means if you now keep Shabbat, you start keeping Shabbat, you already keep Shabbat, you give honor to Shabbat, guess what? You are the reason why the world exists. You are a statistical anomaly. Why? You look at it. What's 3 million out of 8 billion?

28:50What's 3 million out of 8 billion? 1% of 8 billion is 80 million. Now, I'm sorry, 800 million. 800 million is 1% of 8 billion. 1% of 8 billion is 80 million. 10% of the 1% is 8 million. Meaning that the 3 million is not even a rounding error. It's not even a tenth of a tenth of a percent. It's not even a tenth of a tenth of a percent, and you happen to be one of them. That means that there's more of a chance of a person getting hit by a plane in the face, like my brother told me one time the statistics for it, than you being a Shomer Shabbat Jew. You being a Shomer Shabbat Jew is more unlikely than getting hit by a plane in the face in the middle of the day. There are actually statistics. Somebody does statistics on what's the chance of a plane hitting somebody. And it's actually more likely than you being a Shomer Shabbat Jew. That's how special you are when you keep Shabbat. And this leads us to the next point.

30:05do we get bracha in our business where you know what? We can give honor for the Shabbat. We give honor for Shabbat. Page 119 says there are three reasons why a person becomes rich. Three reasons why a person becomes rich. One of the reasons is k'vod Shabbat. Why? Your whole week you prepared for Shabbat. On Shabbat you're talking about Shabbat. You're talking about Divrei Shabbat. You're talking about Torah. You're not talking about business on Shabbat. If you're talking about business on Shabbat, you're Mechallel Shabbat. Talking about business on Shabbat is business. It's not just doing business; it's also talking. Sefer Yeshayahu, the prophet says, talking about Divrei Chol on Shabbat is a sin. You have to talk, you have to go to a Shabbat table with something you read in the Torah during the week. Oh, I heard this Chiddush, oh, I heard this good story. You have to talk about Shabbat stuff, not about what you're going to do on Monday.

31:09You know, they say, "Oh yeah, I just bought this building, what do you think?" That's not Divrei Shabbat. You have to talk about Shabbat stuff, talk about Torah. You give kavod to the Shabbat, you spend money on Shabbat, Hashem says, "I'll make you rich." Why? Because you understand the point of life. One time, the Gemara says, one of the tzaddikim was hosted by somebody, and it was Shabbat, and he saw... this guy was very, very wealthy, big house, but now it wasn't enough. Right before Shabbat came in, 16 big guys, 16 muscular Jewish guys, came in and said, "Okay, let's do it." They went into a different room. Moments later, they came out with a table completely made of gold to fit To fit all of these people, 16 people had to pick it up. 16 people had to build, had to pick up this table of gold. That's how big it was. The rabbi says, and then he hears all the people that are picking it up, it's like they're doing a mitzvah while they're carrying this big, massive table. So he asked the owner, "How did you become so rich?" He goes, "To tell you the truth, I was..."

32:23Not only was I not rich, I was broke. But I had a few sheep, I had a few cattle, and I said, you know what, the Torah says you have to give kavod for Shabbat. So now, since my business was to sell sheep, I knew that people wanted to buy the best one, the juiciest one, the juiciest cow. But I said, how come he should get it? Why should he get the best cow? Why should he get the best sheep? Shabbat should get the best sheep. Shabbat should get the best cow. So every week I'd see, what's the best sheep? What's the best cow? And I'd keep it for myself. Why? For the honor of Shabbat. For the honor of Shabbat. Everybody would make fun of me. It's like, what, are you crazy? You're barely making ends meet. You haven't paid rent in six months. What's the matter with you? He says, this is for Shabbat. This is for Shabbat. This cow is for Shabbat. HaKadosh Baruch Hu says, ah, you spent extra money just for my Shabbat, I'm going to give you a lot of money. So that's one of the secrets of a person having good parnassah. On the opposite end, a person who does not keep Shabbat, it is impossible for him to have bracha on his money. He can have a lot of money, but he cannot have bracha. Those are two different things that most people don't understand. When I was on Wall Street, I knew a few guys who would make two or three million dollars a year...

33:35just for coming to work. One day, Lehman Brothers declared bankruptcy. All of these guys were out of business. All of these guys had no jobs, had nothing. So you figure these guys are okay. They already made two, three million dollars a year for a bunch of years. They should have at least five, ten million in the bank. These guys go to the unemployment office to collect 500 bucks a week. I asked, what do you need this $500 for? You have millions. He goes, I don't have a dollar. How do you not have a dollar? You were making millions of dollars. He says, ah, listen, I didn't know at the time. Now I know. Oh, I spent it on medical bills. I spent it on the IRS. I spent it on audits. I spent it on lawsuits. I spent it on problems. I spent it on a divorce. I spent it on everything else, meaning they made the money, but there's no bracha to the money. What does it mean, no bracha to the money? You don't keep the money. So you made two, three, four hundred thousand dollars, but when push comes to shove, you have nothing to show for it. Why do you have nothing to show for it? Because there's no bracha. No bracha. You made the money, so it looks like it's an illusion that you're making money, that you're a rich guy, but in reality, you look at the bank, and the bank stops laughing at you. Sir, please stop looking at the balance; nothing's going to change.

34:46Nothing's going to change, sir. You looked at it 15 minutes ago, you were broke, and you’re still broke 15 minutes later. Nothing's going to change. The bank stops giving you online access. You're wasting electricity looking at your bank. So now, HaKadosh Baruch Hu says, if you keep My Shabbat, you'll have bracha. If you don't keep My Shabbat, you cannot have bracha. You can have money, but you won't have bracha in the money. That's the first thing. The second thing the Gemara says is that... When a person comes to Shamayim, the first question they ask you is, did you have emunah in Hashem when you were conducting business? What does it mean, did you have emunah in Hashem? First of all, were you ethical? Were you an honest person? Did you cheat people? Did you borrow money you couldn't return? Did you take money and not return it? Did you lie to people? Did you sell them refurbished goods as new? Did you do things like that? Or did you have emunah in Hashem that I'm going to be honest no matter what, and HaKadosh Baruch Hu is going to provide parnassah? What kind of businessman were you? The second thing is, what did you do with the money?

35:50Did you keep it all for yourself, or did you give Maaser? Why? Because the Torah says, "Aser te'aser"—why Maaser? Does Hashem need your money? Hashem says, "Li ha'kesef v'li ha'zahav, ne'um Hashem Tzevaot." Hashem says, "Mine is the money, mine is the gold. Everything is mine." So what? Does He need your 10%? Your little $10,000? $100,000? Does He really need it? No. It's not that He needs it—you need it. What does it mean that you need it? The Torah says how Maaser is given... When a person is, let's say, a shepherd, how is he given? The shepherd gets all of his sheep together. He makes a small little gate where only one sheep can pass. And then he takes paint, red paint, on a paintbrush, and he lets each one of the sheep pass through. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. Tenth one, he paints it in red. And again, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. Tenth one, he paints it. And why? The tenth one is ma'aser.

37:04So the Gemara asks, wait a minute, I don't understand this. Why didn't he just count all the sheep, save himself some time? Why go through this whole balagan, make a small gate for the sheep at the front? Just do it. Look, how many do you have? You have a hundred sheep? Take ten. Go already, go back to work. Why are you wasting all this time? He says, because HaKadosh Baruch Hu is trying to teach us how to fight our own yetzer hara. Hashem knows the yetzer hara. He knows that we think we made the money because we worked so hard. You work so hard. You woke up at 6 o'clock in the morning. "I worked. I worked. I worked. I made the deal. I was smart. I bought it this way. I did this." Everybody thinks they made the money. So when it comes to giving ma'aser, you look, you have $100,000. $10,000 you want me to give? Are you out of your mind? You know how hard I worked for this money? You want me to give it to, wait, what, some rabbi? You want me to give it to some talmid chacham? Let him go work. What do I have to give? I eat. Let him go work. He'll make the money too. Why do I have to give him my money? Because we think we made the money. That's the problem. that's the problem. Who says, "Here's the way to fight your yetzer hara"? Now you're saying you're a Jew, right? You're saying you believe in Hashem, right? Okay, so you've got the first things right. Now let's see if you believe Hashem gave you everything.

38:11So let's count what He gave you. Let's do the partnership. Hashem says, I don't want everything. I gave you everything, but I don't want everything. I just want 10%. But let's see, let's do a partnership. Me and you are going to be partners. Hashem says, let's count what I gave you. First sheep is yours. Second sheep is yours. Third sheep, I got it, but it's for you also. Fourth sheep, for you also. Fifth one, for you. This guy says, Hashem, what a good partner you are. Everything is for me. Hashem says, the sixth one is also yours. I like you. Seventh one, mabrook, enjoy. Eighth one, Go ahead. Give it to the wife also if you want. Ninth one, Hashem. Take one already. Okay, you know what? I'll take number ten. Where is HaKadosh Baruch Hu saying? HaKadosh Baruch Hu is saying first count your blessings. Count what HaKadosh Baruch Hu gave you and then it becomes easier to use the little bit that He gave you and use it to publicize Torah. Use it to help Jews do teshuva. Use it to help the world discover the Torah. Why? Because you realize that that you have to have emunah if you're going to do business. Why? Because if you don't have emunah when you do business, you don't have emunah at all. You're not going to survive because you're going to think that everything is yours, everything you did. And guess what? You go up to Shamayim after 120, they say, "Did you have emunah?" Failed. Okay, they're not going to ask you any more questions. Failed on question number one. They're not going to ask. It's not like a 65 is passing like they do in school here. You failed the first question, we're finished.

39:36So now HaKadosh Baruch Hu says to give ma'aser. Why? Because you're going to benefit. You're going to benefit in a big way because that already establishes that you believe in Me. You believe that I'm giving you parnasah. We're already on good terms. So if a person wants to have berachah in his money, he has to give ma'aser. Now some people are going to say to you, yeah, but the ma'aser really is Deoraita, meaning it's from the Torah, only for people that are farmers and collecting vegetables and fruits and things like that. But really, to give it for money is Derabbanan, it's the rabbis, so it's not as important. here's the real answer. The real answer is there's a lot of mitzvot that are from the Torah, and then some mitzvot—a few mitzvot—from the rabbis. There are 613 mitzvot from the Torah, and seven from the rabbis. Now, if you're going to pick and choose which ones you want to follow from the rabbis, Hashem says we have no relationship. Why? Because you don't want to listen to my best soldiers, and you're going to start looking for ways to use the rabbinical mitzvot to violate the biblical mitzvot. For example...

40:40mitzvah of tzitzit. What does the mitzvah say? If HaKadosh Baruch Hu says you have to wear tzitzit, then you have to wear tzitzit. But the rabbi said, you only have to wear tzitzit according to the Torah. When? If you have clothing that has four corners. If it has four corners, you have to wear tzitzit. So the rabbi said, technically, if it doesn't have four corners, you don't have to wear tzitzit. That's what the rabbi said. You don't have to wear tzitzit if it doesn't have four corners. But if it has four corners, for sure you have to wear tzitzit. Otherwise, it's like eating pig. It's like a sin. So that's, now somebody that's smart says, "Listen, Hashem wants me to wear tzitzit, I'm going to wear tzitzit." But somebody that's not as smart, but thinks he's smart, what is he going to say? He says, "Listen, I'm only going to wear clothes that don't have four corners, so that way I don't need to wear tzitzit. I'm okay." The Gemara in Masechet Menachot, page 25, says, Does everybody have to wear tzitzit or no? It says, well, if they have four corners, yes; if they don't have four corners, no. It's like, oh, so they're okay if they don't wear tzitzit? He says, no, no, absolutely not. We never said that. What we're trying to say is that the obligation is if they have four corners, but if they don't follow the obligation, they're putting themselves in danger. Why? Anytime there's a massive negative decree on the world and...

41:57There is a Holocaust. There's a Beit HaMikdash. There's a war. There are 700 rockets being shot at Eretz Yisrael. Anytime there's a bad thing happening in the world, the first people that get punished are the people that do not wear tzitzit. Why? He says, well, he was looking for a way out, so I'm helping him out. He was looking for a way out because it's a rabbinical mitzvah. It's a this mitzvah. It's a that mitzvah. He's looking for a loophole. I said, okay, no problem, Abba. Come, come. We'll get you out of all the mitzvot. You want to look for a way out because of this, because of that? So a person needs to know, rabbinical or biblical, we have to fulfill the entire Torah. It's not, don't try to pick and choose, this is important, this is not important. The only times that the chachamim say, oh this is rabbinical or this is biblical, is in essence trying to tell you certain rules within the Torah of what has leniency, what doesn't have leniency, what's the degree of punishment, what's the degree of reward. It's not just to say because it's rabbinical you could violate it. So ma'aser is an obligation for everybody, and it's something that's going to give you a lot of bracha. The third and final thing, and we'll finish with this, you guys can ask questions. HaKadosh Baruch Hu says, you give ma'aser, you give kavod for the Shabbat,

43:14you are going to be very, very successful in your life. But last but not least, he says, the people of Bavel were very, very rich. In the old times, 2,000 years ago, very, very rich. People of Iraq, very rich. There was a huge Jewish community in Iraq to such an extent that Rabbi Yehuda said, anyone that leaves Iraq and even goes to Eretz Yisrael is making a sin. Why? At that time, in history, all of the biggest chachamim were actually in Iraq. He says, "I'm going to leave the Beit HaMikdash and go somewhere else." Okay, yes, Eretz Yisrael is important, but if there's no Torah there, how are you going to go there? Now, obviously, it is different because there's a lot of Torah, but at that time, 2,000 years ago, you weren't allowed to leave Iraq. You weren't allowed to leave Bavel because there was so much Torah there. So they asked, how did the people of Iraq, how did the Jews of Iraq, become so wealthy? A lot of them were very, very wealthy. He says because they give kavod for the Torah.

44:16give kavod for the Torah. The Rabbi comes, they stand up. The Rabbi comes, "How can I help you? I give you a drink, I give you a ride." They give tzedakah, they publicize Torah. He says, people that give kavod for my Torah, I have to make them rich. Why? Because they're going to use the money they give to give more kavod for the Torah. And this, by the way, I believe, I don't know for sure, but I believe, is one of the secret, secret blessings for certain kehillot. For example, the kehillah Bukharit. The Bukharian Jews, Baruch Hashem, many of them, Baruch Hashem, have succeeded in recent history. And from my experience, I think it's because of how much kavod they give the chachamim and how much they give kavod for the Torah. You're never going to see a Bukharian shul that's run down with the paint peeling off the wall. I went to a Bukharian shul yesterday. I thought it was in a Beit HaMikdash. what a beautiful place. And this is just another synagogue. Today we're going to another one. I've seen it before; it's beautiful, beautiful. They have gold, they have big menorahs. You see, beautiful, beautiful. This is a big thing. You give kavod for the Torah, you give kavod for the chachamim. Who says, "I'll make your parnasa blessed"? I'll make your parnasa blessed. When a person does these few things, he's already putting himself in a good position.

45:33But remember, there's also things to avoid. If you do all these things, you give kavod for the Shabbat, you shomer Shabbat, you give tzedakah, you give ma'aser, you build nice shuls, all that stuff is good, but a person is wasting seed. Or a person is going out with a non-Jew. Or she's going out with a non-Jew. Or you gamble your money. Or you steal. You do all those things. Guess what? Hashem says, I gave you the bracha. But when you did all those things, I delivered the bracha from your... Shh! To somebody else. What? You had the bracha. But, what did you do? I gave you bracha. You decided you wanted to go bet on horses. So I gave it to the horse. What, you think the horse won a million dollars for no reason? No. He got your bracha. That's how he won a million dollars. It's your million dollars that he got. It was supposed to be your million dollars. But he got it now. The horse got it. Somebody that gambles can lose all of the bracha. Somebody that wastes seed, every single time he wastes seed, all of the shefa that HaKadosh Baruch Hu gives him is given out to his "kids." Who are his kids? All the demons he creates. All the demons he creates. This is, mamash, psukim in the Torah that talk about it. So a person, first and foremost, knows what he can do to bring bracha. But even more important, knows what he can do to avoid losing it.

46:46If you do these two things, it's not that difficult. You do these two things, you'll be very successful in life, and in Torah, and b'ezrat Hashem bring a lot of bracha for your family, for your children, and for Am Yisrael. Any questions? So the Gemara Masechet Shabbat, pages 54 and 55, talks about what happened in the Beit HaMikdash. Beit HaMikdash, at the time of the Beit HaMikdash, there were a lot of Jews. They were very, very religious, very righteous. One of them was worth more than all of the rabbis in the world today. But HaKadosh Baruch Hu not only killed them, but He killed them first. Why? He says, initially, HaKadosh Baruch Hu, the Gemara says, HaKadosh Baruch Hu wanted to protect them. He says, no, no, Malach HaMavet, you have permission to kill all the reshaim, all the wicked people, all the mechalelei Shabbat, all the people that went out with non-Jews, all the people that went against Hashem in different ways, them, you have the right. But the tzaddikim, they kept the Torah, aleph to tav, they kept the whole Torah, don't touch them. But then the Malach HaMavet, who is very, very smart, says, wait a minute, hold on Hashem, you're saying they kept the whole Torah? It's not true. They didn't keep the whole Torah. Hashem says, how did they not keep the whole Torah?

48:08He says, look, you have a halacha. It says, you must rebuke your people. You must tell people the truth about the Torah. So you see somebody sinning, you have to tell them. Hey, you know not to drive on Shabbat. Hey, you know not to steal. You know not to do this. You have to tell them. Guess what? They didn't tell them. These tzaddikim, they didn't tell people. They didn't tell people. They kept the mitzvot themselves. But when it came to the other people that were sinning, they didn't go out of their way to get people to do teshuva. So Hashem says, You're right, unfortunately, they did not try to do teshuva. But, Hashem says, I know that this generation was so terrible 2,000 years ago, even if they would have told them, they wouldn't have done teshuva. The Malach HaMavet was very smart and said, Yes, Hashem, You knew that. But they did it. Which means they're still obligated to go tell people the truth. They don't know if they're going to listen or not. 50-50 chance. 50-50 chance. You tell somebody to stop driving on Shabbat, 50% he'll listen, 50% they'll give you a slap in the face. 50-50 chance. You don't know which one it's going to be. You're not supposed to do calculations. You are just supposed to do what HaKadosh Baruch Hu says. You see him violating, you tell him something. He wants to listen, Baruch Hashem. He doesn't want to listen, you are absolved from the sin.

49:20When the Chachamim, the Tzaddikim of 2000 years ago, didn't do it, Malach HaMavet said to Hashem, "Hashem didn't listen to Torah even though it wouldn't have helped anyway, still they didn't fulfill the Torah." What did Hashem say? Hashem says, "Unfortunately, Malach HaMavet, you're right. Kill them first. Not only kill the Tzaddikim, kill them first." So now, that's 2000 years ago. If 2000 years ago it applied... Needless to say, it applies today. Needless to say, it applied 70 years ago. Needless to say, it's a chok (a decree), it's a rule of the world, which means that when Hashem puts a horrible decree on Am Yisrael, everybody's put into the same basket. Why? Because the only reason the Chiloni (the secular Jew) is secular is not just because he doesn't feel like it or he doesn't like Hashem. No, it's because the religious is not religious enough. So it's not just the secular person's fault, it's the religious person's fault. When the religious people do teshuva, the secular people will do teshuva. When the religious people care about Am Yisrael to the extent of telling them the truth, everybody will do teshuva. But if we all care about ourselves, you care about your family, he cares about his family, he cares about his family, but nobody cares about somebody else's family, guess what? When problems happen, it happens to everybody. Everybody's family is in the same bucket.

50:44That's why I say to people, HaKadosh Baruch Hu said to the Prophet Yechezkel, if you want to do real teshuva, you have to do kiruv. You have to go help other people do teshuva that are complete strangers. Why? Because helping them, helping those strangers, is going to show Hashem you care about His children, even if they're not your children. And if you care about His children, He'll care about your children. But if you only care about yourself, it doesn't mean you care about Hashem. You just care about yourself. You want your kids to be on the derech. You want your kids to be good, to be tzaddikim. But it doesn't mean you care about Hashem. It means you care about yourself. But if you want to show Hashem that you care about Him, then you're going to start helping these other kids that are not connected to you. Go help somebody in Nigeria that says he wants a CD to go learn Torah. You want to help him. Why? Because you know that he's Hashem's son, even though you don't know him, you're not connected to him, you may not even like him. But you like Hashem. When you start helping Hashem's kids, that means you like Hashem, you love Hashem. But if you don't do it, it shows you care less about it. You care less about anything but yourself.

51:46Unfortunately, even though there were many, many tzaddikim at the time of the Holocaust, the general generation had more wicked than righteous. So the righteous, unfortunately, did not do enough. Not that we're even at their level, but it didn't happen for no reason. If they would have done enough, it wouldn't have happened. Just, needless to say... Common sense. If they would have done enough like Avraham Avinu, it wouldn't have happened. But when Avraham Avinu didn't do enough, Hashem still destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. Same concept. Because they didn't do enough, Hashem punished the entire generation, which included a lot of tzaddikim. A lot of tzaddikim died, unfortunately, in massive, horrible, vicious deaths. But the point is that we have to remember that tzaddikim also gave us some insight on the future. The Chafetz Chaim had a meeting with all of his talmidim. One of his talmidim was Rav Elchonon Wasserman, alav hashalom. When Rav Wasserman would meet the Chafetz Chaim once a year on Rosh Hashanah, he would come back from the meetings and be very excited, sharing every single word the Chafetz Chaim said. One year, he came back in 1933 or 1932, and he was in shock. He didn't want to talk about it.

53:03They ask him, you know, what did the Chafetz Chaim, what did the Gadol HaDor say? What did he say to you? Every time you tell us, this year all of a sudden you look like you're pale. He says, all I know and all I can tell you is the Chafetz Chaim can see from the beginning of the world to the end of the world. Meaning he's like a prophet. He's like a prophet. And what he said to us, he didn't tell him all the details. He says, what he said to us, is that he sees there are going to be rivers of blood, rivers of blood all over Germany, all over Europe, coming soon. Another rabbi who was one of the talmidim at that same meeting says the Chafetz Chaim was telling people the Holocaust is about to happen, and obviously, less than a decade later, nine years later, we had concentration camps in every corner, unfortunately, and literally there were rivers of blood, with six million of our brothers and sisters being killed. But now this same Chafetz Chaim says, listen, the First World War, First World War at the turn of the century...

54:08was the first part of Gog u'Magog. First part of Gog u'Magog. He says the one that's coming, World War II, that he was predicting, that we're saying is coming, that's gonna be rivers of blood, is gonna make the First World War look like kindergarten. That's gonna be part two of Gog u'Magog. He says, but part three, the final part, the final part, right before Mashiach comes, is gonna make World War II also look like kindergarten. But there's one big difference. One big difference. In the second one, everybody falls in the same basket. In the third one, the righteous are saved. So if a person does serious teshuva now, takes the things we said today, the things that are in the CD seriously, takes HaKadosh Baruch Hu's words seriously, starts keeping Shabbat, starts protecting his brit, starts protecting his neshama, takes things seriously, he has nothing to worry about. If he doesn’t take things seriously, he has everything to worry about. Everything to worry about. He's on borrowed time.

55:14And that's why I see that HaKadosh Baruch Hu is trying to give people a chance. He invented the entire internet. The entire internet for what? So we can do kiruv. How are you going to get to people in Nigeria? To people in Mali? To people in India? To people in Australia? Austria? All these people that are watching us right now as we speak. They're saying, they're making comments on the internet. Hi from Costa Rica. Hi from Austria. Hi from all these different places in the world. How is HaKadosh Baruch Hu going to spread the emet over there when I'm over here? Where? How? He invented the entire internet just for this. Everybody's going to get a chance. Everybody's going to get a chance to do teshuva. But that means you have to take advantage of it. And not just do your own accounting and say, "I don't feel like it. I'm not ready. I'm not this. I'm not that." No excuses. It's not so hard. It's not so hard to do teshuva. It's not so hard to take on mitzvot. Start little by little. Start learning 15 minutes a day. 15 minutes a day, watch a video. Pick any one of the videos. Don't worry about it if it's three hours or two hours. Don't worry about that. Watch 15 minutes and stop. If you do more than 15 minutes, I'm going to punish you. I'm going to be really upset at you. Don't do more than 15 minutes. 15 minutes. But 15 minutes every day.

56:23Every day. You can do more, do more later on. But 15 minutes every single day. You learn Torah every day. The second thing is you have to keep Shabbat. How do you keep Shabbat? First of all, stop sinning. No driving, no working, no computers. Stop sinning. Then, little by little, use what you learned to start talking on Shabbat. And obviously, get away from the big things that you know are sins. No stealing, all the things that we all obviously know are not right. Little by little, you'll see the Torah will bring blessings to your life. You wake up in the morning with a smile; you go to sleep with a smile. And not take antidepressants, not have to go to a psychiatrist, not have to start doing drugs. Most of this generation are drug addicts. Why? They don't want to live. They want to live an imaginary life. They want to live high, half their life. Why? Because they don't like real life. When you have Torah in your life, you're always high. But you're high on life. You're always happy. So do it. I'm telling you, it's not so difficult. And HaKadosh Baruch Hu will save us, b'ezrat Hashem. Anything else? HaKadosh Baruch Hu

57:36So, I had a shiur a week and a half ago about a business that I have known about for many years, but only recently I discovered that it's even uglier and more illegal according to the Torah than I thought even 10 years ago when I first learned about it. The business, the industry, is called cash advance. Cash advance, in so many words, is you're lending people money with very, very high interest. If you're at a discount, you're cheap. You're the cheapest cash advance on the block; you're at 50%, 60%. If you're like most, you could lend people money at rates as high as 400%. And unfortunately, it's legal because they take advantage of an industry loophole. Now, first and foremost, the Torah says that to lend Jews money with interest is a sin from the Torah to such an extent that a person has no share of the world to come. Even if they keep Shabbat, even if they give ma'aser, even if they give all the money to Torah, they still have no share of the world to come. You don't have to lend Jews money with interest. That's number one. But the biggest thing is that you're also not allowed to lend money to goyim with exorbitant interest, because it leads to chilul Hashem.

58:51you're not allowed to just say, "Oh, the Jew, I'm not going to charge him interest, but the goy, I'll charge him 400% interest." You're not allowed to do that. It's chilul Hashem. It's desecrating Hashem's name. It shows that you think of yourself, you're taking advantage of goyim. Now, why does this shake the world, this specific shiur? Because unfortunately, over the last six years, the so-called Jewish community, I don't know, lost their mind and decided that they're gonna invest all of their efforts into this industry where you see a lot of religious Jews, predominantly religious Jews, are controlling this industry. the funding, the brokers, they're literally taking kids from yeshiva. 18, 19, 20-year-old kids that are in yeshiva have no real skill set to be an architect or a doctor or a lawyer. They put them in front of a desk, say, "Go call people, lend them money with high interest." And these kids went from, you know, from Gan Eden, they're going to Gehinnom now if they don't do teshuva for this. Why? Because they're taking advantage of people. But the worst part about it is the two things that people don't realize. Number one is that this industry has a thing called

59:55that was added to the industry over the last six years called "confession of judgment." Confession of judgment means that now, over the last six years, they added a new part of the application that makes the borrower admit that anything that the lender says is true without needing to prove it anymore. Meaning that if you lend the guy money and he misses the payment, tough times, or he forgot, he didn't get the alert, or the bank made an error, Because he signed this confession of judgment, he's not allowed to sue them. He's not even allowed to defend himself. There's no lawsuit. Within 48 hours, the cash advance company can take control of all of his collateral—his house, his car, his boat, his business. Anything and everything that's listed in the application belongs to them without a trial, even if they don't prove that he actually violated the contract. They don't have to provide proof. Why? Because you already provided the proof originally in the original application. Now, this leads to a lot of corruption where people, in their greed, not only make others sign this document but, worse, lie to the court by saying that the person defaulted.

1:01:10He didn't default. He's paying. He showed the records. He's paying. But they go to the court. No, he defaulted. The court says, okay, you have the application signed. He goes to the marshal in Sheepshead Bay in Brooklyn or a few other places over there. They say, oh, okay, we have this contract. Okay, it's the law. The law is they file a death warrant. All of his possessions become theirs in 48 hours. No court. No nothing. And now he goes to the judge. He goes to the judge and says, I can't help you. He goes to the lawyer. The lawyer says, I can't help you. Nobody can help him. Why? You signed a death penalty already. So now they're literally destroying people. Why is this burning in my heart? Because aside from the fact that it's illegal, aside from the fact that it's not right, what's the worst thing about it? Anyone that studied the Holocaust a little bit, studied Mein Kampf, the book by Hitler, knows Hitler hated the Jews. Hated the Jews with a passion. Why did he hate the Jews? You know why he hated the Jews? Why do you think he hated the Jews with kippot? No, he didn't care about Jews with kippot. Why did he hate the Jews? He says the Jews are communists. Jews destroyed the Russian economy, they destroyed the country, and now they're destroying Germany. How did they destroy Germany? With two things. First of all, they brought pornography, homosexuality, and all the most disgusting things on earth to Germany. Berlin was the Las Vegas of its day. Berlin was the Sodom and Gomorrah of the day. All the homosexuality that first went on film, went on film over there.

1:02:34all of the bestiality, people with animals over there, all the garbage of the world over there—it started by who? By Jewish people. So the first rule that Hitler, before the Nuremberg Laws were passed, the first rule that put him in power, he says, "No more pornography." Second rule, he says, "The second thing that ruined our economy were the Jewish people that lend money with high interest." Why? Once you lend somebody money with high interest, 30, 40, 50, 60%, what's the story? It's only a matter of time before he defaults. You can't keep up unless you win the lotto; you can never pay it back. You can never pay it back. So what happens? The Jew takes the business. He says, oh, all these Jews are taking all the business. They're ruining the economy. People are going bankrupt because of them. That was the second rule that he passed, and his second law was passed: no more interest allowed. And within six years, Germany, even though the rest of the world was going through the Great Depression, they didn't have money to eat, Germany became what they call a financial miracle. They became the leading economy in the world in six years. Which means that everything is happening again. Everything is happening again. We are doing things that are against Hashem, and Hashem is saying, it's not only against Me, it's against other people too, and I'm going to make those other people...

1:03:56Recognize that you're doing something wrong. So the Jews who want to protect their own families have to get out of this business. It's an illegal business. I don't care whether people like me or not. It makes no difference to me. I just say what the Torah says. It's allowed, not allowed. Allowed, not allowed. If it's allowed, I say it. If it's not allowed, I don't say it. That's it. And that's what's the most important thing. Because if I didn't say it, guess what? People will continue doing it. And nobody would, they would say to me in Shamayim, they would say, Yaron, you could have saved 500,000 Jews from losing Olam Haba from this business. How come you didn't say anything? Oh, I didn't want them to hate me. Oh, you didn't want them to hate you? So God says, I hate you then. Well, you had an opportunity to save 500,000 Jews. So, Baruch Hashem, over the last week and a half, many Jews that are in that business have been contacting me and saying, okay, now what? What do I do? I can't be in this business. What do you suggest? They're asking me for recommendations. i said, don't worry. If you're going to leave the business for Hashem, Hashem will provide for you. He'll provide for you; He'll give you parnassah in another way, a legal way. You have to get out of this business. It's mamash going to create a big ason, chas v'shalom, a big tragedy to Am Yisrael, and it's happened before. This is mamash, this is a tragic business, and unfortunately, many religious people and non-religious Jews are in this business because

1:05:11they are blind to the yetzer hara that's telling them to do things that are not legal. Greed, obviously, but the point is that people are just, when it comes to money, even chachamim become blinded sometimes. So it's important to listen to the Torah, listen to the emet, and not try to look for excuses. You know, one guy asked me, he goes, wait, listen, I agree with everything you said in the shiur about this business, but do you have a semicha of hilchot ribit? Well, first of all, there's no such thing, it doesn't exist. Even if I wanted one, there's no such thing. There's no such thing as semicha of hilchot ribit. Second reason, this has nothing to do with ribit. This has to do with geneivah. This has to do with stealing. Stealing people's money, stealing people's houses. Why is geneivah called avon? Avon means like a snake. snake, the poison of a snake, it doesn't seem like it's a bad thing, but it bites a person and Hashem yirachem, what happens? So, b'ezrat Hashem HaKadosh Baruch Hu, we'll spread the shiurim, spread the emet to Am Yisrael, help all of us do teshuva. B'ezrat Hashem, tonight we have a shiur in Queens for anyone that wants to join us, obviously a different shiur, a little bit about the personal story and some other things. B'ezrat Hashem, thank you again for learning with me. Baruch Adonai le'olam. Amen ve'amen.