Changing Lives, Foundation of Modesty, Yeshua or Yeshu and More - STUMP THE RABBI (69)

0:09In the name of G-d, we will do and we will succeed when He sees us in the coming days. All the old faces, new faces, Baruch Hashem, every time we have some new faces, it's always good. Back here in Aventura, Florida, doing our "Stump the Rabbi" series. You guys ask questions, Baruch Hashem, HaKadosh Baruch Hu will give us the answers. Tonight's shiur will be for a refuah shlema for Rabbanit Levana bat Sara, Rav Efraim ben Shulamit, Rabbanit Sara bat Anat, Aurit bat Ilana... All the old faces, new faces, Baruch Hashem, every time we have some new faces, it's always good. Back here in Aventura, Florida, doing our Stump the Rabbi series. You guys ask questions, Baruch Hashem, HaKadosh Baruch Hu will give us the answers. Tonight's shiur will be for a refuah shlema for Rabbanit Levana bat Sara, Rav Efraim ben Shulamit, Rabbanit Sara bat Anat, Aurit bat Ilana, Michal bat Yael, Batya bat Sara, Ze'ev bar Batya, Yitro ben Avraham, Stefan ben Katarina, Yosef Yitzchak ben Bayla Rachel, Yonatan ben Sherry Haley, Talia bat Sara, David ben Esria, and also for a refuah shlema for Shaul ben Farzaneh, Marsha bat Julie, our daughter Ayla bat Marsha.

1:35Oshri ben Doris, Gabi ben Doris, Elad ben Doris, David ben Esria, Yitro ben Avraham, and all of Am Yisrael, especially those who help us do everything that we're doing, Baruch Hashem, through their time and efforts. Baruch Hashem, we're discovering a lot of things. There are even some amazing people who are doing kiruv with the work that we have, with our shiurim, and making videos, even without us knowing. It was a... Yesterday, I think it was, somebody sent me a video. I ran into a video that somebody has been making already for, I guess, the last few months. He takes one minute of one of the shiurim, and he makes a really well-presented video out of it. I'm not usually a big fan of short videos when it comes to Torah, but if you know how to do it, it could be really powerful. He's already made almost a half a dozen videos, publicized the article about me, all types of wonderful things. He never contacted me, never told me anything about it, and it's amazing because you see that when somebody does something like that—there are other people, Baruch Hashem, in different places doing the same thing. uh, it's uh, it could be really powerful, and uh, he's already made almost half a dozen videos, publicized the article about me, all types of wonderful things. He never contacted me, never told me anything about it, and it's amazing, you know, because you see that when somebody does something like that—and there are other people, Baruch Hashem, in different places doing the same thing—um...

2:53When somebody does that, you see that it's l'shma. It's for Shamayim. They want to do it for the right reason. Sometimes people, they want to help, but they want to get paid for it. I don't mean paid just in money. You have all the rights in the world to make a living if this is what you do for a living. But sometimes people want to do things only if they're going to get the credit or you're going to mention them. When it comes to Kiruv, from my experience, anybody that does it for some type of agenda, like they're only going to do it because of this, rather they need this because of this, it doesn't work. It doesn't work. Again, there is a very big... debate among the Chachamim about whether a person is allowed to charge money for teaching Torah. Because as Moshe Rabbeinu said to Hashem, when there was the whole accusation between Korach and his followers, who were 250 of the biggest Rabbis in the world at the time,

4:05There was a big debate between them, and when Moshe was pleading to Hashem, he said, "They're accusing me of all types of things, including adultery, including stealing money—all of this nonsense. Obviously, Hashem knows who Moshe is, but Moshe fights for himself. He says, 'They didn't even pay me for my donkey,' meaning even the donkey that I used to go to Egypt." and be the Mashiach for them, even for that I didn't take money. And just like I taught you Torah for free, you teach Torah for free, in essence, he says. So the Rambam uses that, and he says that a person is not allowed to charge money for teaching Torah. But then some of the Chachamim go into it and say, no, it's not necessarily quite that. It's that it all depends on, you know, what is a person teaching, number one? Is this something that he's doing as a, you know, as he does it for a living? Could he be doing something else? So, in so many words, there's a very big debate about it. Why? Because it's saying, listen, you...

5:22should teach Torah, should teach it, you know, and you should teach it for free. But at the same token, how is a person going to eat? How's the person going to eat? So some people that are very, uh, you know, I guess, removed from the world say, "No, no, you should always do everything for free, for free." Okay, so how is the person gonna eat? Oh, well, you should have worried about them before. Okay, so you do it too then. You do it too. So it's not realistic. So how does it really work? So the Chachamim explain that it all depends on your opportunity cost. Opportunity cost. If, let's say, a rabbi is allowed... To charge, or teach, whoever is allowed to charge, what is opportunity cost? Meaning, if your time, let's say, is worth $500, or $1,000, or $2,000, or whatever it's worth, then that's what you're allowed to charge. Meaning, if with that time that you teach Torah, you could have made $1,000 doing something else, then that's what you're allowed to charge. You're allowed to charge because that's your opportunity cost.

6:25You're not supposed to go into poverty for the sake of teaching Torah. You have to live. Because if you would tell somebody, "Listen, you're only allowed to teach Torah if you go into poverty," no one would teach Torah. It would be very difficult. So that's why you'll see sometimes that there are people who charge for their lectures and pay them at the end. That's why there are some people who charge. So it's not necessarily a sin. But then there is also something that I learned from my Rav that over the years, there is something called Siyata Dishmaya, meaning there's special divine assistance, assistance from heaven that helps a speaker influence the people to do the right thing, meaning If you're teaching Torah, generally speaking, the only purpose of you teaching Torah is supposed to be for the sake of helping people get closer to Hashem. If that person is a Mechalel Shabbat, then your goal should be to help him start keeping Shabbat. If that person is being intimate or married, per se, to a non-Jew and he's a Jew, then your goal should be to get him to get out of this situation that he's in as soon as possible.

7:39if a person is promiscuous, then your goal should be to get him to understand how much of a disaster he's building for himself both in this world and the next. If your student is an immodest woman and she doesn't understand that immodesty is the, you know... straight route to Gehinom, then you have to teach her this. Now, she doesn't understand because she thinks you're only talking about Gehinom in the next world, but she doesn't realize that this Gehinom that you're talking about is the Gehinom in this world. A woman that walks around immodest brings Gehinom to her life in this world. So your goal as a speaker, as a person that's teaching Torah, should be to show her a little bit of clarity on that that's missing in her mind, in her heart. so, if that's your goal, if you're teaching Torah, that should be your goal. But if your goal is to make money, then what ends up happening is that the siyata diShmaya, the divine assistance, is either non-existent to help you bring that point across, or is very limited.

8:51Why? Because your real goal is to make money. It's not really to help the person. If you help the person as an aftereffect, then okay, great. And HaKadosh Baruch Hu apparently is very picky with the people that He chooses that are going to be the nevi'im, the niv sfatayim. A navi is not just a prophet, but it comes from somebody, it's a speaker. Niv sfatayim. He's very picky with the ones that are going to be the niv sefatayim, the speakers, the nevi'im, that are going to help His children come back and get closer to Him, simply because the reward for it is beyond extraordinary. Im totzi yakar mizolel, ke'fi tiyeh. HaKadosh Baruch Hu says to the prophet Yirmiyahu, And I believe it's chapter 15, verse 19. Either way, he says that if you bring somebody to do teshuvah, you'll be like My mouth. Meaning that whatever you pray for, I'll fulfill. So Hashem doesn't just let every average Joe...

9:56succeed in their kiruv, in their Torah speeches, and so on and so forth. And you see it. You see it in the world where there are certain people that perhaps have been speakers for 20 years, and maybe they got 20 or 30 people to keep mitzvot. Maybe. I met one guy that was very proud of the fact that after almost 25 or 30 years of being a kiruv organization, he says he's proud that he has a hundred Jews that he believes are now more observant. Now, listen, every Jew is a world in itself, which of course is very, very precious, but if it took you 25 years to get hundred of them to keep me thought it's a it's and you shouldn't be proud of it because that pretty much means you got four a year. For a year with today's technology is not enough, to say the least. To say politely, it's simply not enough because even a person that doesn't speak, even a person that doesn't have a kiruv organization, should be able to easily get 10 or 15 of his friends or colleagues or strangers to get closer to Hashem every year.

11:08So you see that there are certain people that are able to bring people to do teshuvah in droves, in dozens. Something that I think is one of the most astounding things in the world that has happened quite a few times, but more so recently, is I see that Rabbi Efraim, he... 99% of his lectures are online. He doesn't have a large crowd in front of him, but Something has happened over the last several months where he has an enormous following of secular individuals. But I don't mean just secular, like they live around a Jewish neighborhood and once in a while go to shul. I'm talking about as far removed as possible: homosexuals, drug addicts, all types of people from, like, You know the people that are on TikTok, that application TikTok, which I've never been on. But somebody tells me that's called the filter of the world over there. Apparently, something happened where every one of his shiurim, he has two live sessions at the same time, and he has like two to three thousand people watching. Now, on the Facebook feed, you see ten, twenty, thirty people watching, but the other feed is like three thousand, and...

12:31which is like ridiculous. And the amount of questions they ask, and it's so interactive and so on, but the point being is that a lot of other people get a lot of fans to watch. There are even some people that say, "Listen, I'm doing a lecture next week, 500 people will show up." A big audience doesn't mean much. It doesn't mean you have Siyata Dishmaya. Why do I mention this? because during the lecture, which again is not in front of a living crowd like you guys, it's online, it's a person, the camera, and people are, you know, watching it. At some point during the lecture, he starts asking, "Okay... Who among us is going to start taking something on themselves? Shabbat, Tefillin, this, that. And you see the messages come in droves. I'm going to start keeping Shabbat. I'm going to start being modest. I'm going to start this. Dozens and dozens of people doing teshuva live. Never seen anything like this. Unbelievable. What does that mean? It's Siyata Dishmaya. Siyata Dishmaya because there's plenty of people that speak online and have YouTube videos and so on and so forth, but not everybody has that Siyata Dishmaya. So where does that Siyata Dishmaya come from? If your primary goal is to help Klal Yisrael, HaKadosh Baruch Hu says, you're going to be like My mouth. You say something, it's like I said it. And when Hashem says it, obviously people take it more seriously. On the other hand, if your priority is to make money,

13:55then HaKadosh Baruch Hu doesn't give you that Siyata Dishmaya. So how do you know if somebody cares about the money more than they care about the people? Simply. Ask him, "What's your fee?" He tells you, "I charge $5,000 to come for an hour speech." Okay, fine. We don't have $5,000. But we have 500 people. We have 100 people. Would you come? You know, if he's local, 100, 200 people. If he's far, 500 people. Would you still come? We don't have the $5,000, though. If the answer is no, that means that the priority of that person is money. So he or she may very well be very entertaining, but they're not necessarily going to influence anyone to change their life. Because that's in essence supposed to be the goal of the speaker: to really influence you, not just during the lecture like a movie, l'havdil, You're influenced during the movie; you get emotional, maybe a few tears come out of your eyes. Then, five minutes after the movie, you're back to your life, back to your stresses, back to your problems, back to your anger, back to everything else. The point of a Torah lecture is supposed to be that the impact of it is not just going to stay with you during the lecture or after the lecture but will be strong enough that it will impact your life.

15:15Meaning, you decide, live, I'm going to change my life. How? I'm going to do one of those things that he said. I'm going to do one of those things that she said. Now, how does somebody have such an impact? Simply. Hakadosh Baruch Hu decides this person is going to have siyata dishmaya. When his words come out, it's going to hit certain people. And you see it many, many times. People tell me, "Listen, Rabbi, I can't believe it. I came to the lecture, and I was thinking already, on the way to the lecture, I was going to ask you a question after the lecture. I had three or four questions, but you answered them before I asked." I said, "It has nothing to do with me. It has to do with you. You wanted an answer. I wanted to help. Simple." That's the thing. If a person thinks of kiruv that way, if he thinks of helping people that way, then they can succeed even without being a speaker. Because many times people ask me, "Listen, you know, I don't know what to do. I have friends, family, and so on, colleagues that are, you know, either off the derech or idol worshipers and so on and so forth."

16:21And I tried sending them some of the lectures, and I tried sending some of the videos, but it's not working. The question is, why is it not working? Now, surely it's very easy to blame them. It's not the time; they're not receptive; they're glued to the impurity. Sure, that's the easy thing to do, to just blame everybody else. That's what Adam HaRishon did. HaKadosh Baruch Hu says, what did you do? You ate from the Tree of Knowledge? He goes, no, no, the wife. The wife that You gave me. The wife that You gave me. Meaning he's blaming Hashem. So He goes to Chava. He goes to Eve. What did you do? You ate from the Tree of Knowledge. You gave it to Adam too? She goes, no, no, no. It was the snake. He ate it. It's him. It's him. It's him. HaKadosh Baruch Hu didn't like that. HaKadosh Baruch Hu didn't like that at all. He punished them. So far as to just blame everybody else, oh, the reason why they're not doing teshuva... It's because they're not receptive, or better yet, the speaker is too strong. That's the best one. No, no, listen, Rabbi, do you have a shiur that's not so strong? Because I think it's turning off some people. I think it's turning off some people.

17:33know because that's the shiur that you did, yeah, I liked it, but I'm at that level to like it. I need to give it to certain people, and it needs to be, you know, like PG. It can't be like, uh, rated R. You know, it has to be a little lower. You have something like that? You, my friend, are mistaken. The shiur is a shiur. If the shiur is the way you want it, it won't help anybody. How do I know? The vast majority of lectures in the world are what you want. And look how many people are doing teshuva with those people. Nothing. On the other hand, you look at how many people, Baruch Hashem, are doing teshuva on a daily basis. Unbelievable. Just a few hours ago, I got a message from somebody. I still don't know what the name of the person is, but it's a wonderful message. It's one of those messages that just touches my heart. Why? Because the person says to me, where is it? There you go.

18:34Anyway, the person says to me, "I grew up in a religious household, but I only did teshuva once I started watching your shiurim." Meaning, they lived a religious life, if you will. But they only realized, oh, here it is. Dear Rabbi Reuven, I grew up religious, but I can't say I was religious until I started listening to your shiurim. Thank you so much for teaching me what it really means to be a Jew. I don't think there's any way to truly thank you enough. Now, again, I don't know who this person is. They're from a different country. I believe they're from the UK, I think, or some other country. But the point being is that these messages, Baruch Hashem, come by the dozens. And it's, which shiur did they watch? I don't have any soft shiur. I don't have any fluffy shiur. I don't have any kindergarten shiur. Every shiur is scarier than the next. I get scared of them. I finish the shiur, I say, I can't believe I said that.

19:44Wow, scary. And then some of the guys, God bless them, they make movies out of my shiurim. I'm like, wow, that's scary? He does things with my voice. I'm like, I really sound like that? But that's what gets people to do teshuva. That's what wakes people up. Why is it that the scary stuff wakes people up, more so than the lovey-dovey stuff? Because you can see, listen, there's a lot of lovey-dovey rabbis. A lot of Care Bear rabbis, I like to call them. a lot of them, and you can say, listen, they’re, uh, you know, they’re, uh, saying nice stories to get people to perhaps maybe light some candles on Shabbat. Maybe, uh, they'll get them to put on tefillin here and there. Maybe they'll get them to watch some more lectures, perhaps donate. But For all intents and purposes, you're not getting anybody to change their life. What's changing their life? He's married to a goya. She's married to a goy, and you got them to get a divorce. Not by telling them, "Listen, I'll wait for you at 5 o'clock in the morning, get your bags packed, I'm picking you up." Not that. Simply, you said something in a lecture, explained to this person what kind of danger they're in, they've put themselves in.

21:08they try to rectify it in whatever way they can. They simply can't. The person that they're married to is dedicated to idolatry and they're not willing to abandon it. That's it. They tried, they failed, so listen, I gotta save myself. Or better yet, a couple where one was a Jew and one is not, or perhaps sometimes even both of them are not Jews. watch and they realize they're living a forbidden life. They're living a forbidden life. You get them to do teshuva. If they're intermarried, you get one of them to want to convert and eventually to convert. That's a huge change. Or somebody that's living in a secular world their whole life. Their whole life they're driving on Shabbat, eating pig, eating snakes, eating everything that moves and doesn't move. If it doesn't move, then we push it and move it and then we eat it. Whatever, anything and everything. all of a sudden you mentioned you have a little clip that talks about kosher. The guy's like, "Okay, you know, from now on I'm gonna eat kosher. From now on I'm gonna start keeping Shabbat. From now on." How come? How could that be? That's changing somebody's life. But you know what the biggest change is? The biggest change from my experience, and I believe that there is a...

22:27No doubt that this is indeed the biggest change that somebody can do altogether, in anybody's experience, is getting someone to stop immorality. If it's a man, stop wasting seed, stop being promiscuous. If it's a woman, then stop being promiscuous, stop obviously doing anything that's forbidden with herself or with others, and also become modest. If you can get a person to change their life in such a drastic way, you're a superhero. Why? Because that is a brain rewiring, a heart rewiring about simply how you look at life altogether. And if you're able to get somebody to, let's say, keep Shabbat, it doesn't necessarily mean they're going to go to heaven. Why? Because he can keep Shabbat, but he's still married to a non-Jew. she can keep Shabbat, but she can still be doing all types of filthy things and walking around immodestly and so on. So Shabbat in itself, or kosher in itself, or even learning a little bit in itself, is not always enough to rewire the brain and the heart of the person.

23:45But if you get the person to understand that so long as they're immoral, so long as they're promiscuous with themselves or with others, they are, in essence, putting themselves in a situation where they are an enemy of Hashem. Not because He wants them to be an enemy, but because they're making themselves one. They're murdering His kids, both the living and the ones that are not yet. If you can get a person to stop such a thing, that means that that person has to look at life completely differently from that point, and also mitzvot. Why? Because there's no way that you're going to convince that person to stop being immoral simply because it's unhealthy. Oh, listen, wasting seed, being promiscuous, maybe it's not good for health because of the brain cells, or perhaps maybe you can get an STD, or perhaps maybe this and that. No, you're not going to get somebody to stop for that long. at life completely differently from that point, and also mitzvot. Why? Because there's no way that you're going to convince that person to stop being immoral simply because it's unhealthy. Oh, listen, wasting seed, being promiscuous, maybe it's not good for health because of the brain cells, or perhaps maybe you can get an STD, or perhaps maybe this and that. No, you're not going to get somebody to stop for that long. Why? Because the Yetzer Hara will have a million and a half excuses. The only way you get a person to stop doing all that stuff is simply by telling them this is the will of Hashem. The will of Hashem is for you to stop. And once a person accepts that will of Hashem, all of the other mitzvot become easy. All of the other mitzvot become easy. Keeping Shabbat becomes easy and even pleasurable.

25:08Learning Torah becomes easier and even pleasurable. It's like, listen, I'm already changing my whole lifestyle and mentality. Let me at least find out why. Now, to do such a thing, to get somebody to stop being immoral, according to the Torah, cannot be done in a lovey-dovey way. Simply can't. Simply can't. You can't teach the subject that way. You can't teach the subject, listen, wasting seed is not good. The end. The guy's looking like, "I'm going to prove to you it's good? Let me show you my girlfriend. Let me show you my boyfriend. Let me show you movies." Wait, it's not good. Who says it's not good? God says it's not good. Maybe God does make mistakes, huh? The guy's going to think, "What do you mean it's not good?" Unless you tell the person, "Listen, Habibi, every single time you waste seed, you are murdering people. Every single time you, woman, walk around immodestly, you're not only murdering people, but you are actually bringing poverty," the Gemara says, "you're bringing poverty to your husband and your kids. So much so, so much so," the Gemara says, "that the kids will be considered as if they're nothing in the world."

26:33What does that mean? Have you ever met, sometimes there are certain people that exist in the world, and it almost seems as if they don't exist? Meaning, there are certain people who stand out. They stand out. This guy, this woman, they're a go-getter. They do stuff. They're part of the community. They build things. They make things. They're somebody. Like everybody, "Oh yeah, that guy, yeah, I know him." People know who this person is. It's always those people, Baruch Hashem. But then there's somebody that's almost like wallpaper. don't notice that they're even there. Like whether they showed up to the party or not, no one knows. Whether they attend the same school, no one knows. Whether they existed and they lived in the same neighborhood, "Oh, you live here? You're visiting?" "No, I live here for 15 years." "Come on, seriously?" "Yeah, yeah." "Where do you live?" "Next door to you." "Whoa, really? Are you serious?" Yeah, some people are like this. There are some people like this.

27:44now, if that's intentional, because the person is very modest, and they are to themselves, and they're learning, and they're doing their thing, not necessarily a bad thing. But the Torah promises otherwise. The Torah promises that if you learn Torah, and you are that way, and you are... doing everything that you're doing, your modesty, your seclusion, is for the sake of Heaven, Hashem will publicize it at some point. Meaning it won't stay that way forever. At some point, your kedusha, your holiness, your glory, will be publicized to the world. Because that's a kiddush Hashem. Meaning that if a person is not that way, he's not learning Torah all day, he's just an average guy, average Joe, keeps or doesn't keep, but he's like wallpaper. Where does that come from? That comes from me, modest mother. Why? A king, no matter what he does, will always be recognizable. When a king walks into the room, everyone's quiet.

28:53Everyone's quiet. We learn this from a Midrash on the Mikra of what happened with Eliyahu Hanavi after he ran away from Achav. And HaKadosh Baruch Hu commanded him to go to Mount Sinai, Mount Horeb. And the Tanakh says that first there was wind and then the Bat Kol came out and said, Hashem is not in the wind. And there was an earthquake. Hashem is not in the noise. And the Gemara says on this, when did Hashem eventually come to Eliyahu HaNavi? When it was all quiet. The Gemara says, from there we learn that when the king arrives, everything's quiet. There's no rah, rah, rah, nothing. Everything's quiet. Why? It's the king. Everybody knows it's the king. You don't need a big show. That's the king. And there's nothing the king can do about it. The king will always be recognizable as the king. When HaKadosh Baruch Hu wants to show His glory, He doesn't need much. Look at the world today.

30:00A year ago, the world thought that everybody was on cloud nine. The most powerful armies in the world thought they were the most powerful. The most powerful economies in the world thought they were the most powerful. The most powerful politicians in the world thought they were the most powerful. Everybody thought they were powerful on cloud nine. Some people even thought, "Maybe I'm never going to die because I have so much money." Some people thought they were going to rediscover the wheel, go to different planets, maybe mutate humanity to the extent of, you know, making multiple people from one cell, and so all types of crazy things that people do. And everybody was doing good. Why? Because there was a lot of money, a lot of sustenance, the economy was doing good, more or less relatively peace in the world with the people that you want to have peace with, and war with the people that you just can't have peace with anyway. But everybody felt strong. The whole world. The one that was losing felt strong, the one that was winning felt strong. Everybody felt like they were strong. The guys from Venezuela, their entire economy dropped 99%, but yet the guy running it, that rasha merusha yimach shemo, still felt like he was on top of the world. His entire civilization over there is virtually eating from the garbage. But he feels strong to stay in his way.

31:20North Korea hides their poverty from the world. The guy feels strong. Iran—the whole world hates them, their economy is practically in shambles, but the guy feels strong. America has its own issues, practically on the verge of civil war any other day. Everybody felt strong. The Jewish people—eighty percent assimilation. One or two generations away from there being no Jews, Hashem Yishmor, with the way things are going. We felt strong. Hashem looks at everybody and says, "Oh, you all feel strong?" He sends a little microscopic virus that no one can even see with the naked eye, and all of a sudden everybody becomes frail. You're wearing a mask? No mask? You're putting everybody in danger. What danger? From what? Where do you see danger? Where's the danger? Where's the danger? No, it's the virus. Where's the virus? Show me. Show me the virus. Where's the virus? No. I'm not leaving the house for the next nine months. What happened? Nine months ago, you were a superhero walking around the street with no shirt on, sometimes no pants on, sometimes no head on, everything. You were strong. You could lift 500 pounds over your head.

32:42You were strong nine months ago. How come this little microscopic virus that you don't even know—a virus, disease, this, no one knows the difference—how come all of a sudden you're wearing a mask like a little poodle? What happened? Where's the strong person? Where's the strong Iranians? Where's the strong Koreans? Where's the strong Americans? What happened to everybody? The King showed up. But He doesn't have to show up with all of His glory. He just sent you a little microscopic, tiniest, the smallest of His creation. The smallest of His creations show you, I'm running the show. I'm running the show, you're nothing. So we see here, Rabotai, that the King of Kings, His glory, when He wants to show it, there's no way to miss it. By default, that means that the prince and the princess of the King they also will always be recognizable. A flesh-and-blood king, if he sees his daughter looking like a street woman, is either going to throw her in a jail cell until she does teshuva and realizes that she's a queen and she's a princess and she can't walk around like this, or he'll kill her. Simple.

34:05If he sees his kid, if he sees his son walking around like some thug with his pants down and he has a limp like he just came out of prison or something, guess what? He's going to put you in prison until you realize you're not a thug. You're not from Harlem. You're not from the projects. You're a prince. No matter what the prince or the princess wants to do, they have to continuously look the part. Throughout all of the generations, since the time we received the Torah, and even beforehand from the time of Avraham Avinu, the Jewish people have always been recognizable, and we stood out like a sore thumb everywhere, no matter how big the civilization was. Hated us. That was running the world. We stood out. These Syrians conquered the whole world, but yet they cared about the few Jews that were around them. A few minor Jews, not even a small neighborhood. They cared about where the Shabbat was. The Assyrians destroyed. Those few Jews suffered a little bit, but until he destroyed the Assyrians, the Babylonians conquered the whole world—127 countries.

35:30Hashem said to the prophet Daniel, "Tell Nebuchadnezzar he's going to be the strongest king that ever lived until Mashiach arrives." A promise from HaKadosh Baruch Hu. He conquered the whole world. What did he care about? A few Jews. A few Jews. Not even a small neighborhood. He has millions of people. A few Jews he cares about. We stood out. We're the story. The same thing with all of the other civilizations. We constantly stood out. why it doesn't matter how great a number you are. As Hashem says to Avraham in this week's parasha, it doesn't matter how great a number you are. "I chose you, you're the smallest number, but still you're always going to stand out." The world population today is nearly 8 billion. We're not even a rounding error as far as our population of Jewish people in the world, yet we stand out constantly. so the prince and the princess, whether they like it or not, the world identifies them. The world recognizes them. The world sometimes can't stand them. But needless to say, knows that they exist. Now, how many Mongolians are there in the world? Does anybody know? How many Japanese people are in the world? Does anybody know?

36:52There's a lot of Japanese people in the world, you know? You don't know. There's a lot of Mongolian people in the world. You know that, right? No, you don't. How many Kazakh people are there? How many Georgian people are there? Do you even know where Georgia is? No, not the Georgia next to Florida. Georgia the country. guys even heard of Georgia before Japan, probably because you haven't. Sony, uh, something in your house. But the reality is, there are so many huge countries, huge civilizations you've never heard of before, and yet they have 50-100 million people. You've never heard of them. Jews are spread around the whole world. a few million here, a few million there, finished. That's it. It's not like a few million everywhere. Half of them are in Israel, half of them are in America, a few small little tidbits around the world: Australia, England, so on and so forth. That's it. But you hear about them every day. Why? Because that's the prince, that's the princess. I want to make sure you realize who they are. But yet, the whole point is,

38:04that among ourselves, there are princes and princesses who can live their entire lives as if they didn't exist, like wallpaper. He could live next door to you, and you would never know. She could live next door to you, and you would never know. How could it be? I mean, you're the prince; you're the princess. This is one of the curses that comes on a woman's children when she is immodest. Because HaKadosh Baruch Hu says a woman that's modest understands that she is a princess and therefore her children will be kings, kings and prophets. But a woman that walks around immodest, then, unfortunately, what ends up happening is that not only does the blessing on sustenance in the house suffer, even if the people have a lot of money, they end up spending it on things that they don't want to spend it on, like IRS and medical bills and so on. But on top of that, their kids become nobodies. Not nobodies like, he had a company and the company made $100 million. But nobody knew.

39:31Look, it had no impact in the world. The second he died, it's like, finished. He built a company. Today it's worth $5 billion, but nobody knows who he is. Why? Because somebody bought the company at some point, and that guy put his name on it. And, you know, maybe when they have a documentary on him or something, one day, 500 years from now, as part of a commercial, they'll put his picture somewhere. That's it. אל תשאל. That's a curse. That's a curse in itself. Why is HaKadosh Baruch Hu so critical of a woman who is immodest? Because, Rabotai, this is one of the fundamentals of creation itself. When HaKadosh Baruch Hu says, "You be holy because I am holy." He says to them that your holiness is your modesty. But that holiness didn't begin with you, but rather it began at the time of creation. When? Literally creation. The Midrash Rabba, in Parashat Yud Chet (18:2). After you read this Midrash,

40:53You'll see how foolish people are when they say, no, no, I only read the Torah. I don't go with those Midrashim. It's all fables and fairy tales. You know what that means? Anytime somebody tells you a Midrash is a fairy tale or it's nonsense, you know what that means? They never read it. That's what it means. Because the amount of wisdom that you see in the Midrashim, you simply will never arrive at an inkling of Yirat Shamayim without it. But let's see. Rabbi Yehoshua of Sikhnin said in the name of Rabbi Levi, from the word "Vayiven" we learn certain things. What do we learn? This is to teach that who contemplated from where in Adam's body to create a woman, meaning we all know that created first and then He took his rib bone and made her. But it wasn't like, "Oh, you know what, that rib bone looks suitable; let me make a person out of it."

42:16What the Midrash is trying to tell us is the thought process, the divine thought process that went into why the rib bone and not the toe? Why the rib bone and not the nose? Why the rib bone and not the, I don't know, one of the fingers? You've got ten, maybe take one off. That's it, you've got nine. You don't need all ten. Why the rib bone and not maybe, I don't know, somewhere else? Why this one? said, "I will not create her from the head so that she will not bear her head proudly, and not from the eye so that she should not be overly inquisitive. We'll elaborate on these points in a moment. And not from the ear so that she should not be an eavesdropper, and not from the mouth so that she should not be too talkative." and not from the heart so that she should not be an envious person, and not from the hand so that she should not be one who touches that which is not hers, and not from the foot so that she should not be one who steps out. Rather, I will create her from a place on the man that is private, that even when the man stands naked, that place is private.

43:40In order to instill in her traits of modesty. Meaning, HaKadosh Baruch Hu chose a section of the body that even if a man were to stand naked, it's still covered. And there's really only one part of the body. And that's the ribs. Why? Because your arms are covering it at all times. I mean, even if you walk, you don't walk around with your hands up all the time. Generally, naturally, a person covers their ribs. That's modesty. Why did the source have to be modest? Why instill modesty in her? Now you're going to say, wait a minute, but we also know that when Hashem first created Adam and Chava, they were walking around naked. So where's the modesty? From here, we learn that modesty is not only in your clothes. Modesty is the behavior of the person. Surely the clothes have to fit the behavior, and the behavior has to fit the clothes.

44:40But the point being is that from here we learn that, yes, Hashem created them to be naked. Only because they sinned are they now, and we are supposed to, wear clothes. But modesty was still expected from the moment of creation despite being naked because modesty, in its real source, is the behavior of a person. So then it continues. And with each and every limb that God created in the woman, He would say to her, "Be modest, be modest." He put the little finger in there, "Be modest." He put another finger, "Be modest." Put another finger, "Be modest." Another finger, "Be modest." The jaw, "Be modest." The toes, "Be modest." And so on and so forth. every little inkling of the woman's body, every bone, every, you know, anything that He has in her body, He talked to and said, "Be modest. That's your whole job in the world." And yet, nevertheless, God said, "And you rejected all my counsels," as it says in Proverbs 1:25.

46:01Despite all my advice, I told every single finger to be modest, every toe to be modest, every leg to be modest, every head to be modest. You still didn't listen to my counsel. You still didn't listen to my second counsel. I did not create the woman from the head, yet at times she bears her head proudly, as it states in Isaiah 3:16: "Because the daughters of Zion are haughty." Walking with outstretched necks. She walks around conceited. Why? She just finished her diet. She lost 50 pounds, so she wants the whole world to know. Look at me. Look at me. She doesn't like that. You lost weight. You gained weight. Who cares? Your husband, baruch Hashem. You, baruch Hashem. Everybody else shouldn't even know. Shouldn't even know. Why? that business, if you want your body to be everybody else's business, it's the opposite of the point of your creation. The second you tell the world that your body's public property

47:21You are now literally working against the instructions of the Manufacturer, because He told you the whole point of why He didn't take a piece of Adam HaRishon's head and make the woman out of it. This is so she's not proud, she's not arrogant. But you, talking about your body, talking about your things and this and that, all types of surgeries, what are you doing? You're not listening to Hashem's counsel. not from the eyes, yet at times she's overly inquisitive, as it is stated: "and gazing eyes." What are you doing? Nothing. No, I see you're doing something. Yeah, I'm doing something at my house. Why do you care? You're my neighbor, not my wife. You're my neighbor. Why are you always looking at somebody else's stuff? Why?

48:22Oh, did you see, honey? Did you see what they did to their house? No, I didn't see. What happened? Oh, they just got an extension. Oh, why do you care? I don't know. I thought maybe we should get an extension. Do we need an extension? No, but they're getting an extension. It would be weird if they got an extension to their house and we don't have an extension to our house. Why are you looking? Why are you constantly looking at your friend, at your colleague, at your enemy? What business is it of yours? Hashem did not create you from Adam HaRishon's eyes specifically because He wanted you to not look elsewhere. The only place to look at is your own four amot. Your own life. You want to focus your attention? Focus it on your husband. Focus it on your kids. That's it. You have extra time? Honor your parents. That's it. Finished. More extra time? Do chesed. kindness. Go find some poor people and feed them. Why are you wasting all this time looking at everybody else's life? Because once you do that, it’s its brother. You start looking, you start talking. It's one other way they come. One comes with, yeah, it’s a package deal—two for one, same price.

49:44you're defeating your whole point of creation. And not from the ear yet, at times she's an eavesdropper, as it says in Genesis 18:10, "Now Sarah was listening at the entrance of the tent." Even when Avraham Avinu was sitting with the angels, he thought they were just three different Arabs. He didn't know they were angels. And one of them says, "Where's Sarah, your wife?" She's not hanging out with the guys. Unfortunately, like today's women, you sometimes see women hanging out with the guys more than the guys hanging out with the guys. "Oh, hi, honey. Oh, little Steve's at our house." What do you mean Steve's at our house? "No, he came over, so we were just talking until you came home." Why is a guy at my house and I'm not here? Why are you hanging out with him anyway, even if I am here? No, we're friends. Hey, Rabbi, am I allowed to have guy friends? If you're a girl, no. If you're a guy, yeah. Why not? Because it's inappropriate. You can have co-workers. Hello, hello, goodbye, goodbye. That's the extent of the relationship. You know, if you need to talk about certain things to do with work, no problem. But there's absolutely no purpose whatsoever, no useful purpose whatsoever for you to ask them, "What are you doing on the weekends?"

51:13Why? Platonic relationships are one of the biggest causes of divorce that there are in the world today. Who do people cheat on their spouses with? Their friends. You don't cheat on your spouse with some random stranger you met at Starbucks. You cheat with someone that is friendly. The accountant that became like a family friend. The lawyer that's like a brother. The next-door neighbor that is just like a housemate. The cousin that spends a few months a year at your house. That's what cheating is. Cheating is from that. As soon as you stop distinguishing the difference between men and women, and you simply allow women and men to hang out with each other even if they're not married to each other, You're ruining all senses of shame, all senses of modesty. You're simply ruining the world. Why? Because, in essence, you're telling people that Sarah Imeinu was mistaken when she was in a different room while the men were having a conversation. Yeah, but she wants to talk too. Okay, so get a girlfriend, talk to her. There is no reason for you to talk to the opposite gender. Unless it's, again, like I said, for work purposes.

52:42Why? Because the mind of a man does not work like a woman. It doesn't. No matter what you do. It doesn't work. The woman could look at a guy, or at least that's the way it used to be, and she sees a personality. She sees a guy, he's like, oh, he looks funny. He looks smart. He looks honest. He looks like a genuine person. A guy looks at a woman, she looks delicious, like a steak. That's how guys think; it's a reality. It's a reality of the world. If you deny that, then you're simply naive. Platonic relationships are simply a weapon of the Satan to make you think that this is going to work. No, you're wrong. I've been friends with them for ten years, and nothing ever happened yet. I never an opportunity perhaps, he was never interested yet, maybe he wasn't this, maybe he wasn't that, but the point being is that, just when I tell you, at some point or another, if the opportunity presents itself, he will, or you will. Because that's just the nature of the beast. So even Sarah Imeinu was as modest as she was, she went into a different room, but yet, her nature, still an inclination, she still wanted to hear what's going on.

54:04And the Midrash didn't say women will be allowed to say it. It says that the inclination still was like, listen, would I be socializing with the guys? Alright, if I want to talk to women, I'll talk to women. There's no reason for me to be among a bunch of guys. For what? But I still want to know what's going on. I'm curious. HaKadosh Baruch Hu says, I didn't create you from the ear specifically so you don't do that. What do you care if there's something important your husband will tell you? won't tell you if there's something important your husband's gonna tell you. What do you need to do all this for? But that's the nature, the nature of a person. Even if the person's righteous, they still have a nature in them. Then it says, "I didn't create them from the mouth." Yet at times, she's a talkative person, as it stated, "Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moshe" in Numbers 12:1. Even though Miriam was holier than holy, she was kodesh kodashim. She was a prophet, a Neviat Hashem. The only reason we had a river of water that tasted like whatever you wanted, whether you wanted milk, wine, or orange juice, that river was like the man. The river of Miriam was like the man. Whatever taste you wanted, that's what it was. On what? On her merit. That's how amazing Miriam was. Yet, the moment she had a little bit of time with her brother, she said, Aaron, what's going on with Moshe? Why did he leave his wife Tzipora?

55:34who says that those few words were already too much? Why are you talking about somebody else? I didn't create you from the mouth; you don't talk extra. You don't talk extra, and He punished her for it. Every day we read about it in our tefillah, a reminder of the act that Miriam did. Because as righteous as she was, she made a mistake once in her life. We only made one mistake once in our life, only once. once in our life she made a mistake and Hashem reminds us of it, which is to her merit. But nonetheless, He says, "I didn't create you from the mouth; you don't talk too much." Do I really need to explain this one? Sometimes you have certain women; the husband comes home from work, and she's still on the phone. Tell me, say hello to the husband. 15 minutes, 20 minutes, an hour after he's home, she comes, "Hey honey, how was work?" I've been home for an hour. "Yeah, I was on the phone with my cousin, I was on the phone with my mom, I was on the phone with somebody." In Judaism, your husband is the king. The wife is the queen. What does that mean? That means that as soon as he comes home, there is no phone.

56:45You hang up the phone. My husband's home. Click. Not like, listen, ah, ah, no. My husband's home. Bye. Click. Honey! That's the way it's supposed to be. What? He's a king. If the king shows up anywhere, what are you going to do? Listen, Your Highness, I'll talk to you in a minute, okay? I'm going to finish the call. I'll get to you in 15 minutes, okay? I'll get to you. Does he treat you like a king? And you say, ah, well, he doesn't treat me like a queen. If you treat him like a king, maybe he would. Stopped working? But why is she, why is she, why is she forgetting to treat her husband like a king? She's too involved in her own talking, in her own conversation with her girlfriend, with her mother, with her cousin, with her sister, with somebody else. She's so involved in somebody else's life, she forgets the responsibility of her own life. She forgets that the king just showed up, or maybe the little princess, and the princesses, which are our kids. The kids show up at the house. She doesn't even notice. Why? She's busy with other stuff.

58:09kids are home. Your responsibility in the world is your husband and kids. And who says I did not create you from the mouth specifically to try to remind you not to waste so many words? Because wasting so many words is going to lead to problems. Number one, it is going to lead to לשון הרע (lashon hara), which in itself could cost you heaven. number two, simply talking so much about other people's lives will make you live through them vicariously, to the extent where you'll forget about your own life. You're so busy talking about other people's lives that you forget about your own life. And He said, "I didn't create her from the heart." Yet at times she's envious. As it says in Genesis 31, Rachel became envious of her sister. Why is HaKadosh Baruch Hu saying that envy, jealousy of other people is such a terrible thing that anyone that's jealous will not be resurrected with the dead? They may still go to heaven, but they're not going to be resurrected with the dead. They lose the merit of being resurrected with the dead. One day after Mashiach comes,

59:3040 years after Mashiach comes, there's going to be a resurrection of the dead. All of the righteous people that have lived in previous generations—Moshe Rabbeinu, Avraham Avinu, Yitzchak, Yaakov, David, Shlomo, Rabbi Akiva, all the sages, all the tzaddikim, the ones you know about, the ones you don't know about—they will come out, they will live in this world for a thousand years. If a person dies a jealous person, they lose that right, even if they keep mitzvot. They may still go to Heaven, but they lose the right to be in the resurrection of the dead. Why? Because jealousy is a form of heresy. Jealousy in itself is a form of heresy. Why? You're jealous of somebody else because they have something that you don't. which in essence says that you believe that you should have it. Now, who's the one that gives everyone what they have? Hashem. So, in essence, what are you saying? When you're jealous of somebody else's wife, when you're jealous of somebody else's husband, when you're jealous of somebody else's car, when you're jealous of somebody else's fortune, when you're jealous of somebody else's fame, when you're jealous of anybody else's anything except Torah knowledge. Torah knowledge you're allowed to be jealous of, and you should be. Other than that, you're not allowed to be jealous of anything.

1:00:52When you're jealous of all of those things, what are you in essence saying? You're saying, "Hashem, I'm supposed to have it, i.e., You're making a mistake." Not "You're making a mistake," but "Hashem is making a mistake," is what you're saying. Because you're saying, "I'm supposed to have it." You're jealous because you feel like you should have it. Which in essence, you're saying to Hashem, "Hashem, I think You're making a mistake. You're giving it to him and not to me. I'm more righteous than him. I'm smarter than him. I'm better looking than him. I'm this, I'm that." You're saying that Hashem made a mistake. And Hashem says, "Oh, you think I'm making a mistake? I'll show you it's not a mistake. You have to remove all jealousy from your heart." And the Kadosh Baruch Hu says, "When you're jealous, in essence, you're working the opposite of what the instructions are. I didn't create you from the heart so you're not envious. But yet, our nature is to be envious. I didn't create you from the hand. I didn't create her from the hand, yet at times, she..." She is one who touches that which is not hers. As it is stated, Rachel stole the terafim that belonged to her father. In Genesis 31:19, Rachel, who meant well, stole the idols that Lavan, Lavan HaRasha, had, even though she meant well, to take away his idols. She didn't want her father to worship idols, so she stole them. The Midrash says, yeah, but it's still stealing. Even though you meant well, it's still not yours.

1:02:16It's still not yours. There's a way to do things. That wasn't the best way. That wasn't the best way. Sometimes people will do certain things in the name of the Torah. And you say, listen, I know you mean well, but that's just not the way. That's not the Torah way. There's a way to do things. I didn't create you from the hand because I didn't want you to touch things that are not yours, but yet we constantly do that. We constantly do that. Somebody goes and they touch things that don't belong to them. They touch things that don't belong to them. Sometimes it's money, sometimes it's people. And not from the foot, yet at times she is the one who steps out, as it's stated, "Now Dina, the daughter of Leah..." She had been born to Yaakov and went out to look over the daughters of the land. Hashem didn't create Chava from the leg so she wouldn't go waltzing around the malls just to see what everybody's wearing. What's the fashion today? Go walking around? Why? I have nothing to do, so I'm just gonna walk around. What purpose is that going to serve?

1:03:39If you have a purpose, you need to go buy something, go buy something. But just go waltzing around doing nothing? It's the opposite. Why? All of the honor of the daughter of the king is inside. Meaning, modesty is not just to keep certain things in your house, but even yourself in the house. Why? Because there are problems outside. Even if you are a righteous woman. Dinah was a righteous woman. Young girl, she said, listen, I just want to go walk around just to see what the other girls are doing. Hashem punished her severely. She got raped. Why? What do you care what they're doing? What difference is it to you what they're doing? The point being, Rabotai, is that when a person understands that Hashem went to the extent of choosing the rib bone In order to have modesty instilled into a woman, you see that it's not that He just chose that because of that first thing that I said, because the arm covers it, but rather because there's a reason why He didn't choose anything else also. When a woman understands the depth of modesty, she understands that this is her crown of glory.

1:05:06that's your crown of glory. When you're a modest woman, that's your crown of glory. So much so, that when a woman is immodest, the house itself gets cursed to the extent where the husband loses sustenance, the kids lose sustenance, and like I said, they even lose recognition that they're daughters and sons of kings. But even more so, when she is modest, It's the opposite. When a woman is modest, HaKadosh Baruch Hu blesses the husband's parnassah. So even though the husband is the one that went and made 100,000, 200,000, 500,000, the blessing is coming from the wife, not from him. Not because he's a hard worker. Meaning, if she wants a credit card with no limit to go buy whatever she wants, say, please take it. Why? The only reason why you have sustenance is because of her modesty. The only reason you have any sustenance, your blessing and your sustenance, is because of her modesty. That's the reason. Never be cheap with a modest woman. If she's not modest, be as cheap as possible so at least she commits fewer sins. But that's the reality. That's the reality. So when a woman understands how to view modesty and sees it as a crown of glory...

1:06:32Then she says, you know what, maybe I should be. But to get a woman to that extent, you have to teach some things that are hard to hear. You have to teach some things that are atrocious to hear. But nonetheless, to get a person to desire to change their entire wardrobe from a shemi shmo, what people have today, to a kosher wardrobe. You have to rewire their brain, you have to rewire their hearts, and the only way to do that is by telling them some things that are a little hard to hear. So with that being said, there's a lot more to say, but like I said, I want you guys to talk. I actually didn't even plan to say that much. But anyway, hopefully you guys have some questions. Elhanan, if you want to start, or you want to say something else. to change their entire wardrobe from a shemi-shmo, what people have today, to a kosher wardrobe. You have to rewire their brain, you have to rewire their hearts, and the only way to do that is by telling them some things that are a little hard to hear. So, with that being said, there's a lot more to say, but like I said, I want you guys to talk. I actually didn't even plan to say that much. But anyway, hopefully, you guys have some questions. Elchanan, if you want to start, or if you want to say something else. It's in regard to working with people, and if you're working, let's say you have a job to do for someone. Someone asks you to do a job for them and it's a certain amount of money, and you go there and you perform the work because you know more or less what the problem is. Then, a few days later, the same problem happens. You go again

1:07:49you fix the problem because you know, generally, what it will be. And again, a few days later, there's some problem. Then when you do research and it's the manufacturer's fault, is the money you got paid still yours since you spent the time to do the job anyway? You ordered some—I'm sorry, I lost you at some point. Repeat it again. Okay. You were asked to do a job. So let's say you're fixing something. A job to fix something? To fix something. Like a service job or a job like you're providing a product? Okay, no, a service job. Like, okay, someone has their computer broken and they want it to be fixed. You did the job, okay, and then you fixed it and you came back a few days later, it's broken again. You fixed it a little bit later. You have to charge them every single time. was a resolve at the end of the day is not because the work wasn't done. It was done, but the problem was manufactured. Like, the printer was bad. It's not, I gotcha, connect this up. Okay, okay, so you got hired to do a service job

1:09:01and, uh, you did the job, you, uh, serviced it, but it kept breaking because the actual product itself is broken, not because of you. You still charge for your time; you are still entitled to get paid because, in the business world, it's not like the Torah world. That's the major difference between the business world and the Torah world. In the business world, whether you succeed or fail, you still charge. because if your lawyer defends you in a case, he's going to charge you. He's going to take a five, ten, fifteen, twenty, or thirty thousand-dollar retainer, depending on your case and how much money you have, which he's sure to double-check before he talks to you the first time and decides what the bill is. After he charges you that retainer, he's going to defend you, do some work, and if you lose the case, he doesn't refund you the money.

1:10:03If somebody says, "Listen, I'm the best doctor in the world, look at all the plaques that I have on the walls, look at all the commercials and all the people in the magazines writing about me, and I could do a surgery," and the surgery goes bad and the person dies, guess what? he still gets paid. The insurance company will still give him a check, a big one, for that surgery. Why? Because he still did the work. He still did the work. He has to get paid. Same concept. You got hired to do a job under the understanding that it is not an unsolvable problem, but rather it's a solvable problem because had you known and had the owner known that this is not a solvable problem, you would have never agreed to do the job. You only agreed to do the job because the owner, in essence, gave you information under his understanding or her understanding that this is a solvable job. They just don't know how to do it. They need to hire you. So you only agreed to come because it is a solvable job.

1:11:06You would have never come and done what you did had you known that you couldn't fix it. Therefore, you have to get paid, even though the job itself could not be done, because it's not your problem, it's not your job to fix. You did what you had to do, and that's, in essence, the truth. You don't have to feel bad about not solving it. The person will feel like, "Oh, you never gave me the solution," so you don't have to feel... Does the doctor feel bad that he killed the patient? Yes, but he still charges the money. Why? Because he still did the job. He still has to get paid. He still has employees. He still has to keep the lights on. Does the lawyer feel bad if he loses the case? Maybe. I'm not really sure about that. But assuming he does, assuming he has a heart in him, and he does feel bad, then he still charges the money. He's like, "Listen, I feel so bad. Let me give you the money back." Never in the history of man has that happened. I know. I spent over half a million dollars on lawyers. have a Harvard degree in lawyers. After you spend half a million dollars, you could know everything about lawyers—all types of lawyers: big lawyers, small lawyers, stupid lawyers, other stupid lawyers, some smart ones here and there, but still not necessarily the best. The point being is, the lawyer takes the job. I'll give you a situation of a lawyer I had. I had an agreement; I was going to sell a piece of my business

1:12:27for a valuation of, I think, $48 million. And I was going to sell it; I was going to get $4.8 million from the guy. I was going to buy 10% of the business. Long story short, he had to come up with the money by selling a piece of real estate, or not selling a piece of real estate, but by borrowing some money against one of his properties. Long story short, he needed some liquid money, and to do some other deal that he was doing. And he asked me, he's like, listen, do you know anybody that can come up with a half a million dollars or a million dollars? I said, yeah, I can give you a half a million dollars. Once we finalize this deal and you get the money for what you're doing, I'm getting $4.8 million from you. So, you know, we're doing business. It's not like I don't know the guy. So I said, I'll give you half a million dollars, and we'll have the agreement that will add this to the agreement that you're not only going to give me the $4.8 million, but you'll give me now $5.3 million because you owe me half a million dollars. But there has to be a separate agreement for this $500,000. So the lawyers drafted up an agreement. They charged me $17,000 for this agreement.

1:13:40Now, when a lawyer charges you $17,000 for an agreement, you don't spend too much time double-checking it. Why? Because you spend $17,000 on four pages of paper, surely somebody out of the 800 lawyers they have double-checked what they're doing. So I signed, he signed, I sent the money, and I'm still waiting for the money 10 years later, 14 years later. How come? How come I'm still waiting? Because the whole market crashed within the deal, meaning he never got the money. for that real estate that he had, he ended up losing the building. On top of it, the stupid lawyer, who was from one of the top law firms in New York and probably in the country, the dumbest lawyer on planet Earth, charged $900 an hour. What did they do? They made the future ownership in my business that the guy was gonna own the collateral for the $500,000 that I gave him, meaning they made something he doesn't own yet the collateral for the money that he owes me. In so many words, it was better that they made the collateral the cat because at least I would have a cat and

1:14:59But that's what happens. So, trust me. Lawyers, you know what the best part is? They still want the money. They still say, "Listen, we did the job, we messed up, but we still want the money. Still want the money." So, do they feel bad? No. The point being is this: Choose your lawyers wisely. That's point one. Point two, double-check everything and don't trust anyone. point two. Point number three is: when you do work, you have to get paid. This is what I always tell people in general. Listen, yes, I know I'm a rabbi, but I still have, you know, a businessman mentality. And, you know, if you're going to be working in the world, make the most amount of money you can in a legitimate way. Don't be humble when it comes to making a living. Don't be like, "Oh, because I'm Jewish, I'm going to do things for a discount." It's not a mitzvah to do things for a discount. It's not a mitzvah to do things for a discount. There's no mitzvah of being a discount broker, of being a discount merchant. There's no mitzvah there. Whatever you do, whatever it's worth, charge that.

1:16:09Why? Because you're working. If you think you're worth a thousand dollars an hour, charge a thousand dollars an hour. If you think you're worth five hundred dollars an hour, charge five hundred dollars an hour. But you're already working. If you're not going to do that, go learn. If you want to live paycheck to paycheck, barely eating, go on a BNF. Don't go to work at all then, might as well. But if you're already going to work, if you're already going to be an engineer, a builder, a lawyer, or whatever you're going to be, and you're doing legitimate business—again, I'm assuming everything you're doing is legitimate... make your money, do whatever you can, charge whatever you charge. Don't think twice, don't feel bad for it. And by the way, as a little side note for a person that knows a little bit about money: people don't like discounts as much as people will make you think. No, no, "I only buy a discount." The guy that only buys a discount, he's not a good customer. You know who's a good customer? The guy that doesn't buy discounts. He wants to buy the most expensive—that's the guy you want. the guy you want. Who are the most successful companies in the world? It's not the dollar stores, I promise you. Dollar stores are always on the verge of bankruptcy. You know who is the most successful? Apple, Coca-Cola. Why? Because they charge a lot, but they make sure it's worth it. They're the first company that said, "Listen, you want a phone? A thousand dollars. Give me a thousand dollars." I could buy a phone for 50 bucks, get it for free. Why would I buy a phone for a thousand dollars? Because it's the best.

1:17:35And they delivered. And now they're a $500 billion company, whatever they are. The point is that people want to pay more, but they want to get what they want. So if you can deliver what people want, you should feel perfectly fine charging whatever you want to charge for it. But if you're a con artist, then it's better that you charge a discount. At least you'll go to Gehinnom for a little shorter time. But the point is that if you're doing business honestly, with integrity, Don't be a discount broker. Don't be a discount person. Charge your money. Do your thing. And it's not a sin to make money. But again, it's under the understanding that you're doing business honestly. And as far as the customer, sometimes the customer wins, sometimes the customer loses. If you did your best and you delivered what the contract and understanding is... it's not your fault, not your fault. You did the best you possibly can. It's not your fault the patient died; you did your best. If you were negligent, then that's your problem. Then obviously you have to pay for it, and you'll get sued, and so on. The reason why the doctor, by the way, as a side note, the reason why the doctor who killed the patient still charges fifty thousand dollars or a hundred or a quarter million dollars for a surgery, even though he killed the patient, is because...

1:18:59he knows he did his best, and he also knows that if he was negligent, then he's on the line for millions and millions of dollars in lawsuits. He knows that at some point someone's going to sue because at some point he's going to mess up. Even if he doesn't mess up, he's going to get sued at some point. The more business you do, the more likely you are to get sued, especially in America. So he's charging a full bill because he knows that if the table was returned and he messed up somewhere, that patient, that family, that grandchild is going to sue for everything he and his descendants will ever have. Why? Because that's the way people are. It's a kill or be killed mentality. So, again, if you're doing business honestly, with integrity, according to the Torah, you should have no problem charging a full price and perhaps even a premium if you could actually deliver what you say you can deliver. The problem that I find with people is not that they charge too much or that they charge too little. The problem that I find with people, and I've dealt with thousands of people in business over the years, is that they can't even deliver what they promise.

1:20:13The overwhelming majority of people are liars by default. They're simply just conmen. People simply cannot even deliver what they promised. Forget about the over-promising. No, no. They tell you, listen, I'm going to sell you this paper, ten cents per paper. I'm going to give you 100,000 of them. Okay, so I'll pay you $10,000 for this paper. Delivery comes. Half the papers are missing. What do you mean? I paid you for a full order. Listen, this was what the print was. Okay, but I'm not paying you. No, what do you mean not paying me? I'm sure. That's what happens. People simply cannot even deliver what they say. If you deliver what you say in this world, you're already worth a premium. You're already worth a premium. If you do a good job, I'll hire you. I don't even know what you do, I'll hire you. I'll pay for it. I'll buy it just because it's the right thing. That's how hard it is to find people that are honest in the world today. People think that dishonesty is the only way to get ahead in the world, and that's become the standard. So if you're doing business honestly, charge your price. Just make sure you're more concerned about delivering what you promise than you are about price. Price is not significant. According to the Torah, you can charge whatever you want to charge, as long as it's worth it. You can't sell something that could be bought on the internet for 5 cents and tell him it's worth $5,000.

1:21:33It's not allowed. That's not honest. But if your business is worth something, especially in a service business, it's not a problem for you to make a living. No problem. Next question. I'm trying to make the response a little shorter so we can get to more questions. So a goyish couple befriends a Jewish couple. The Jewish man was born and raised Jewish, and his wife is a convert. As time passes, the goyish couple listens to shiurim, and they also get invited over to their house sometimes on Shabbat. However, it's grown upon the goyish couple that during Shabbat at their house, they're violating Shabbat, and it just hurts them to see them going through that more and more. The goyish couple has tried; the man has tried talking to the man, but he's somewhat borderline of a scoffer. When the goyish wife talks to the Jewish convert wife, she's just not really interested. ...during Shabbat at their house, they're violating Shabbat, and it just hurts them to see them going through that more and more. The goyish couple has tried; the man has tried talking to the man, but he's somewhat borderline of a scoffer. When the goyish wife talks to the Jewish convert wife, she's just not really interested...

1:22:45What advice would you give to the goyish couple? If the non-Jewish couple is in the process of conversion and they've made friends that are Jewish along the way, but their Jewish friends are not observant, during Shabbat at their house, they're violating Shabbat, and it just hurts them to see them going through that more and more. The goyish couple has tried; the man has tried talking to the man, but he's somewhat borderline of a scoffer. When the goyish wife talks to the Jewish convert wife, she's just not really interested. If those Jews are not observant because they're ignorant and because they simply don't know what they don't know but yet they're interested to know, then yeah, they should grow together with them. They could be each other's helpers to become more religious. But if the non-Jewish couple is serious about their conversion but yet they see that the Jewish couple is not only not serious about Judaism if those Jews are not observant because they're ignorant and because they simply don't know what they don't know, but yet they're interested to know, then yeah, they should grow together with them. They could be each other's helpers to become more religious. But if the non-Jewish couple is serious about their conversion, but yet they see that the Jewish couple is not only not serious about Judaism but actually the opposite, they mock it, they disregard it, they don't think of it at all, then you should stop hanging out with them, especially on Jewish holidays and Shabbat, because, number one, you don't want them to make sins for you.

1:23:53That's number one, which is already increasing their bill as it is. Number two, it could actually discourage you from converting because, as many times as we say it, people still need to hear it over and over again, which is that Jews are not always the best representation of Judaism. You know, there are some Jews that are the greatest representation of Judaism. You know, Rabbi Akiva, Moshe Rabbeinu, Rabbi Ovadia, the Rambam, the sages, the people that toil over Torah, the righteous women. You know, those people are the greatest representation of Judaism. But, you know, unfortunately... Due to our many sins, that's not the majority of our people. The majority of our people are quite the opposite, where they disregard Torah; some of them even make fun of Torah, some of them are against the Torah and anti-Torah. So those Jews, those Ben-Gurions of the world, those heretics of the world, are not the best representation of Judaism. So it's unfair to say that anyone that's a Jew is a representation of Judaism.

1:25:06So you have to understand that if you're serious about God, you're serious about Torah, you're serious about converting to Judaism and so on, you have to surround yourself with people that are like-minded with the right ideology, or else you risk misunderstanding what Judaism really is about. And as the Rambam paskens l'halacha, he says that a person will be influenced by his surroundings. Just it is it is a reality. I studied some psychology in school, in high school and in college and so on, you know, and there's the famous battle: nature versus nurture, whether it's the genes or the outside influence. The reality is both of them influence a person, but the Rambam specifically emphasizes that the nurture, the outside... influences—your friends, your family, your colleagues, and so on—they will influence you whether you like it or not, whether you're a strong person or not, whatever you are. If you're constantly hanging out with gangsters, it's only a matter of time before that will impact you. Maybe you won't become a full-blown gangster and start thugging it out on the streets and doing drive-bys, but you'll start talking like them.

1:26:25You'll start acting like them a little bit. You may even have a limp. And that's just the reality. It's a reality. I mean, I remember seeing it in high school. It was always the kids, the little white kid, nothing, but he lived among the projects and all of a sudden decided that he wants to act like one of the Black kids from the football team. It's like... Why are you talking like this? What do you mean, son? What do you mean? I'm not your son. You're 14. What are you talking about? Why are you talking like that? Why are you talking like you're keeping this project? What's the matter with you? And there's this little white kid, and he's acting like he's like, I don't know. What's the matter? Because he's influenced. That's who he saw. That's who he saw. And I know it's funny to hear a rabbi say that, but I grew up around this. And then you see this little white kid with his pants on his ankles, and he's acting like he's like, you know, 50 Cent. but he's nothing, he's like a little guy. But guess what? That also happens in the opposite direction. You have a guy who hangs around a combination of Muslim terrorists and some white people, and he becomes Barack Obama. Same thing, same thing, same thing. Muslim terrorists, white people, he becomes Barack Obama.

1:27:33Does that mean that all are like this and all are like that? But you are going to be influenced by your surroundings. Yes, I'm not politically correct. No, so the point is, the point is that you have a situation, you have a reality. You have a reality and you have to mock it a little bit just to lighten the issue. But you have to be realistic with yourself. You have to be realistic with yourself. If you're going to hang out with thugs, you're going to be influenced by them. If you're going to hang out with mechalelei Shabbat, you're going to be influenced by them. If you're going to hang out with heretics, you're going to be influenced by them. That's just the reality. Now, what do you do if you are in the process of teshuva? You're getting stronger, but your surroundings are not. That's the real question. That's the deeper question. Why? Because many of the people that are watching this show and are laughing along with you, are in that process. They are changing, but the world around them hasn't caught up yet. What do you do then? Just today I got a question from a nice kid who used to be a sports fanatic, used to love TV, and so on and so forth, and now all he cares about is learning Torah. So his question is very different today than it was a year ago, two years ago. Why? Two years ago he was asking me, "Are you serious about not watching sports?"

1:28:48Today he's asking me, "Listen, what do I do about not speaking mundane things on Shabbat when my family, all they want to talk about is mundane things? They want to talk about politics, they want to talk about business, they want to talk about sports. They don't want to talk about Torah. What do I do?" That's a serious question. Why? Because that's a difficult one. That depends on who your surroundings are. Not just necessarily where they are in their life, but who they are. If it's friends, you can replace friends like you can replace underwear. But if it's parents, you can't be that way. You can't just abandon your parents because you decided to put a kippah on. Because no matter who and what they are, you still have to be grateful to them to a certain extent. Now, unless they specifically tell you to go violate the Torah, you still have to show them some type of honor. But if they tell you to violate Shabbat, you are not allowed to honor them. ...they tell you to go out with somebody that you're not allowed to go out with and do things you know are forbidden according to the Torah. You are not allowed to honor them. There is no honor to a heretic parent who is trying to get you to sin. But if they are relatively reasonable and just not doing what you're doing, you have to honor them. You can't just say, "Listen, from sundown to sundown I'm not going to say a single word to you." It's not going to work out. And by the way, it won't be good for the religion either...

1:30:05not a representation of Judaism. Judaism is not, you know, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai secluded in the cave for 13 years. He was an exception. He was an exception. The average Jew is not going into a cave for 13 years. Just because you decide to keep Shabbat and start learning Torah doesn't mean that you disconnect from the whole world. You have to learn how to bring the Torah to the important surroundings you have. Again, if it's friends, friends, you can throw them out like underwear. That's not so important. Why? Because, you know, friendships in reality, the older you get, the more you realize that you're lucky if you die with one friend. Friends go up, friends go down, friends are, like, you know, like everybody thinks, oh yeah, the younger you are, the more friends you have. The older you are, the fewer friends you have. Why? Because as you get older, you're more picky about who you're going to have as friends. When you're young, you just want as many people around you as possible. When you're older, you want real serious people. When you're a little older, you want people that are honest too. When you're a little older, you want people that are honest, good, but also care about you. And so on and so forth. And if you're lucky, you end up with one good friend. So friends, I wouldn't invest so much into. Chavruta is a different story. Chavruta is not a friend. Chavruta is like a marriage. Somebody you study Torah with is like a marriage.

1:31:24But a friend, like someone you socialize with, don't invest too much into it. If these people are conducive to your spiritual growth, continue the relationship. If they're not, and in fact, if they hurt your spiritual growth, disconnect from them like you would from a virus. On the other hand, your parents... And siblings, you have to be a little bit more careful with. You have to be a little bit more careful and simply more understanding. But at the same token, you can't abandon Hashem for them either. So what do you do? If, let's say, for example, this young man's question about what do you do if you want to speak only Torah the entire Shabbat. And then I really want to talk about Torah the whole Shabbat. So what do you do? You have to do a few things. Number one, you have to plan ahead. Don't plan on the go. Meaning, before Shabbat starts, you already have to have a schedule. Okay, I'm going to wake up, you know, I'm going to go to the shul right before Shabbat. I'm going to get home at such and such time from the shul. After that, we're going to have dinner. I already have one or two things to say about the weekly parasha.

1:32:36Then after I say it or whenever I say it during that time, anybody else is going to talk, I'm going to try to stay as quiet as possible and let everybody else talk about whatever they want to talk about. I'm not going to tell them not to talk. I'm not going to tell them not to breathe. Let them talk. Let them do whatever they have to do. Why? Because that's where they are in their life. Now, if they ask me to talk, what I'm going to do while they're talking is try to scan their words and try to figure out where I can take something that I learned and fit it into their conversation. So he's talking about the president, so I'm going to talk about Moshe Rabbeinu. He's talking about politics, I'm going to talk about the fight between Moshe Rabbeinu and Korach. He's talking about something else, so use the things you studied to show them, "Oh, you know what, that's interesting because I learned something similar in my learning, in my Torah." And try to bring the Torah into their conversation to show them how the Torah is relevant. Now, if you haven't studied enough, if you haven't studied enough to know how to fit the Torah into conversation, then you shouldn't really be so judgmental of them, and also of yourself. You shouldn't be so judgmental in the first place. But if you can fit the Torah into everything, then okay, try to fit the Torah.

1:33:43So many words, try to finish dinner, then try to say, okay, I got my learning schedule, good night, and don't stay the whole night with everybody else. Say, I have my learning schedule, you finish dinner, you hang out with everybody for a little while, be social, be nice, be cordial, and so on. Try to see if people are responsive to what you're saying. If they're responsive, if they're into it, continue the whole night with them. But if you see that they're completely... oblivious and careless about Torah. They care, they're mocking it and everything else. Pick your legs up, bye-bye. "Where are you going?" "Oh, I gotta learn." "No, but we're talking." "Okay, you're talking, listen, I have a schedule. This is my life. I have to finish this tractate, I have to finish this book, I have to finish this." And people, by the way, in the beginning, they'll bust your chops a little bit. Over time, they'll respect you. Why? Because you have a system, you have a schedule. You know when they won't respect you? When they know you're full of it. How do they know you're full of it? Because one day you're like this, another day you're like that. One day you're with the book, another day you're watching sports with them. One day you're with the book, another day you have a girlfriend. One day you're with the book, another day you're cursing like a truck driver.

1:34:54So if you're really serious, ultimately everybody's going to say this guy is serious and they'll respect you for it. But if you're a hypocrite, then guess what? They're going to call you out for it. And they'll mock you more than you can even imagine. Why? Because it's funny. It's funny that you're pretending to be something that you're not. And they're right. So that's the thing. So if the people around you, especially parents, are conducive to your spiritual growth, stay close to them. Little by little, they'll grow with you. If they're hurting you, you know sometimes you have to make a very difficult decision: you have to run away from them. Now, if it's your parents, and like I said, if they're anti-Torah and there's nothing to do about it, then even that you'll have to cut off. But hopefully, you know, you're not in that situation. But if it's friends, try, try, try a few times. especially parents are conducive to your spiritual growth, stay close to them, and little by little they'll grow with you. If they're hurting you, you know sometimes you have to make a very difficult decision: you have to run away from them. Now, if it's your parents, and like I said, if they're anti-Torah and there's nothing to do about it, then even that you'll have to cut off. But hopefully, you know, you're not in that situation. But if it's friends, try, try, try a few times. But don't sacrifice your life for them. You know, don't sacrifice your life. Next question. Are you guys asking? Good questions. Yeah. Give him the mic next to him. So it cites that if a person curses another and seeks divine justice, even if he is a good person, he is punished before the one he has cursed.

1:36:18He will not escape great evil. His deeds are carefully examined and all his sins are recalled. So, with this in mind, is an individual Jew or a minyan exempt from the consequences when saying the blessing against the heretics in the Amidah? Is an individual exempt from the consequences? I don't understand the question. When you say, with this in mind, essentially when we say the blessing against the heretics in the Amidah, is an individual Jew exempt, or is a minyan exempt? Who is exempt? Oh, you mean, like, is it part of the blessing? Ah, okay, okay. So, there is a teaching that we should watch our mouth to the extent of... Make sure not to curse anybody else, because even if you are as righteous as Sarah Imenu, you should not curse somebody else, especially if they don't deserve the curse, if that person is a righteous person.

1:37:20...that person is a righteous person, you shouldn't do what Sarah Imenu did, which is she said to Avraham, "Hashem will call judgment between me and you." And the reason why she did that is because she said that, "Look, before I gave you Hagar, we didn't have any kids. But after I gave you Hagar, right away you had a kid with her." Which, to my understanding, she says, that means that when you prayed for kids, you only prayed for kids for you. not for both of us, and therefore you got the kid in the end, but I'm still barren. I still don't have a kid, and she was upset at Avraham Avinu for what she thought was that he didn't pray for her. So she said, "Hashem will be a judge between me and you," and she was wrong for it. That's also why she died many years before Avraham Avinu. The reason why is because, again, it's a she... when you... say specific curses, especially it's not just any curse. When you say, "God will be the judge between me and you," in essence, what you're saying to Hashem is, "Judge this case because I'm very confident that I'm right."

1:38:33So because you're calling Hashem to judgment, in essence, you're calling Hashem to get off of His throne and judge your case. Because you're saying you're so right, Hashem says, "Okay, so let me check. Let me check if you are right. Before I look at the case, let me check if you are right. Let me check if everything you ever said is really true. If everything you ever did is really true," which the reality is, many times we fail, and we don't even know our own failings, so it's a mistake to ever do that. Even Sarah Imenu did it. She cost her her life, cost her many years of her life, and that's why in Parashat Chayei Sarah, you'll see that in the word that Avraham cried over Sarah, it has an unusually small "kaf." And the Chachamim say the reason why the letter is written smaller in the Torah scroll than the rest of the letters, is half the size. You have a regular kaf that looks like a "c," but in this word, the whole word is normal size on a Torah scroll and even in your Chumash. However, that one letter is half the size. Why? The Chachamim say that this special letter symbolizes that Avraham cried a little bit over Sarah, the minimum requirement. And Chachamim say it's because

1:39:53You're not allowed to cry over somebody that committed suicide. You're not allowed to mourn over somebody that committed suicide. And in the eyes of the Chachamim, in the eyes of Avraham, when Sarah Imeinu said, "Let God be the judge between us," she was committing suicide. She was committing suicide. So now that's, in essence, the background. The question is, during our Amidah prayer every day, we do it three times a day, there's a section in the Amidah that we say, that on the... the missionaries or the ones that cause others to sin or the ones that sin on purpose, there won't be any hope for them, and Hashem will remove them from the world, and so on and so forth. Now, in essence, you're cursing every day, three times a day, the people that are wicked, and you're wishing for Hashem to kill them. So if the guy is that person, and you're wishing for that gift, so...

1:40:57How does it fit? On one hand, you said don't curse. Here, you're cursing actively during your prayer. So his answer was, is it because you're praying in a minyan that you're exempt? What about if you pray by yourself? you are exempt because it's prayer? No, it's not because of that. Yes, it is partly because of that. It's a nice answer to say because you're praying you are exempt, but it's different. Also, why? Because you're talking about the wicked. To pray for the wicked to die, to pray for the wicked haters of Hashem to be destroyed is a mitzvah. I'm not talking about the people that are wicked without even knowing it. guy never heard about Shabbat and he's driving on Shabbat because he was born in some jungle or something and he never knew that he was a Jew. To pray for him to die, we don't pray for him to die. I'll talk about the guy that knows you're not allowed to drive on Shabbat but he still does it anyway. The guy knows you're not allowed to be intermarried but he still does it anyway. The guy knows you're not allowed to eat non-kosher but he still does it anyway. That guy, we pray for him to die. Not because we hate him, not because we hate him, but because it's better for him.

1:42:06to die. Why? Because every second he's alive, he's doing more sins, meaning his punishment will be greater. for his own interest, let him die already or do whichever one happens first. If he does, that's obviously better, but if he's not going to, it's better for him to die sooner. Why? Because his punishments will be lesser. But the point is to hate the haters of Hashem. So that's why cursing them is not a problem. The issue was that what he was mentioning in Me'am Loez and in other places is when you are calling people that are righteous. to the judgment to do that is always a bad idea. As a side note, never be the judge or the jury of people and decide for yourself who is righteous or who is wicked. Simply let us be the judge. Meaning, if what they're doing is clearly against Hashem with no doubt whatsoever, they're clearly heretics, they're clearly haters of Hashem, then there's no problem for you to hate them.

1:43:07On the other hand, if this person maybe has a few bad character traits or things like that, there's no need for you to hate them. Secondly, don't do this with your spouse. you learned from Avinu it didn’t work out so well. Don’t do this with your spouse; don’t do this with people that are important to you. Don’t, uh, do that. Pray, you know, ideally for people to do teshuvah. But again, there are some people that are haters of Hashem and, you know, those specific people, uh, it’s actually, uh, better for them and even better for us for them to die. I actually met one particular person that I told him I’m gonna pray for him to die every day, um, and, uh, he got offended. I told him, okay, you know nothing I can do well, and the reason why is because he was an unusual case. I've met a lot of types of people in my life. Some people are Torah observant, some people not so much. Some people are atheists, some people are not. But even the people that I've met that weren't, you know, very religious, for the most part, many of them have been respectful and decent people and

1:44:18In this particular case, this guy initially showed himself as if he had some questions about the Torah. After I answered his questions in a live lecture we had in New York, and I guess he got embarrassed a little bit, he said he had some more questions, and I told him, listen, I'll give you my number, and you can ask me whatever questions you want. And after that, some people told me, this guy is a famous heretic. I said, what do you mean he's a famous heretic? They're like, this guy works on getting people to stop being religious. And I didn't really want to believe it because he seemed like a nice person. Confused, but he seemed like a nice person. But then when I talked to him personally, he glorified that he got seven people who were Shomer Torah U'Mitzvot to stop keeping Shabbat. he was proud of that, like those were his medallions. So at that moment, I told him, "This is the end of our discussion. From now on, I'm going to pray for you today three times a day, and if I can, maybe more—five extra times. Because it's not a matter of you not being religious. If you're not being religious, I'm going to try to help you. And if you don't want me to help you, I'm going to let you do your life. Do what you have to do."

1:45:39But if you are such a hater of God, such a hater of the Torah, to the extent that it bothers you that I am religious, it bothers you that he's religious, it bothers you that other people are keeping the Torah, that means you are an enemy. Because I can tell you, listen, I'd like to help you, but it doesn't necessarily bother me that you decide not to eat the same food I eat. It bothers me for your own sake, but it doesn't bother me. I don't think about it on the weekends. Like, oh, what happened to Joe? I don't think about that. You know, I think about Klal Yisrael. I pray every single day for Klal Yisrael. But it doesn't necessarily bother me that you specifically have a different diet that's not kosher. But if it bothers you that I am keeping kosher, you're a bad person. Because it shouldn't affect you. shouldn't affect you. My religiosity, my beliefs don't affect you. It doesn't affect you that I go to shul. It doesn't affect you that I read books that call the Torah. It doesn't affect you that we keep family purity. So why are you working so hard to make me not religious? That only comes from evil. And if you're evil, it's a mitzvah for me to pray for you to die.

1:47:04mitzvah. And, as you know, unfortunately, let's say there's one person. There's another person I met like that, but I never really prayed for him to die. Maybe I should stop. He's still alive. But man, seriously, there are some people that are just evil. Listen, there are some people that are evil. It is what it is. Listen, let me make it easy for you guys to understand because I know some of you are like, "Wow," some of you are understanding, and some of you are looking at me like I have three heads, like I'm some mass murderer. Let me explain it to you in an easier way. Imagine, imagine, this is going to be a little graphic, but I need you guys to understand how bad this is. Imagine a little baby. Imagine a little kid, two, three, four, five years old, and some pedophile, filthy, disgusting human being does what they do with them. Right? That's what pedophiles do. They simply destroy that kid's life, right? Are you going to pray for that person to have a good life? Are you going to pray for that person? Oh, hopefully he does teshuva. Maybe if he's not your kid.

1:48:13Maybe. If you're so righteous, like a little Moshe Rabbeinu in disguise, if that's not your kid, maybe. In reality, if that's your kid, you're praying for that person to die. If you can actually help him to die, you'd help him. That's in essence what I mean here. When a person is bothered by my brothers and sisters serving Hashem and he wants to kill them, It's killing me. So I pray for them to die. It's worse than the pedophile. It's worse than the pedophile. Just like you would pray for some pedophile or some rapist or some murderer to die. Same thing. Same thing. Same thing. It's the same concept. Because again, that kid didn't bother that person. He didn't have to do that to that kid. The fact that he has crazy desires and is a sick person shouldn't be that kid's problem. That kid shouldn't have trauma for the rest of his life because he has a sick mind. That girl who was walking around innocently isn't at fault that he has a sick mind and feels like he's allowed to touch her.

1:49:28that person that was walking around and doing whatever he's doing, he shouldn't suffer because you like to kill people. So again, when somebody violates another person and that person is close to you, you pray for them to die. It's even more so when someone is keeping Torah, and there's somebody out there that's trying to kill them spiritually. That's even worse. So surely, you pray for them to die. that's in essence because it's actually according to the Torah. It says that someone who causes another person to sin is worse than a murderer. He's worse than a murderer. There's actually a whole Midrash about it. We see from the Midianites in Parashat Balak... Parashat Balak in the book of Numbers, chapter 25, verse 8, discusses the issue of Zimri from the tribe of Shimon sinning with Cozbi from the Goyim. As a result, Hashem sent a plague and started killing many Jewish people.

1:50:47until Pinchas, the son of Elazar, the son of Aharon the Kohen, came and killed both Zimri and Cozbi. Right? So, the halacha is that if a Jew is a true zealot, which we really don't have anybody like that in the world today, but someone like Pinchas was allowed to do it because he was always zealous, If someone is a true zealot and they see a Jew cohabiting with a non-Jew, actually in the act, not like after the act or before the act, but during the act itself, and that person is a zealot, it's a mitzvah for them to kill them. So now the Chachamim say, okay, so to kill the Jew, to kill the Jew that's cohabiting with a non-Jew, we understand it's a death penalty. That's what the Torah says: a Jew cohabits with a non-Jew, it's a death penalty, it's terrible, and so on and so forth. But why kill the Goyah? What did she do? Okay, the Jew, Zimri, is not allowed to be with a Goyah. Fine. But why kill the non-Jew? Why kill the woman? She's just a woman. Why does he have to kill her also? Who wants to give me an answer? Do you have an answer? So? So?

1:52:15So the answer is exactly what he says. The Rambam writes in Hilchot Issurei Biah, chapter 12, halacha number 10, that when a Gentile engages in relations with a Jewish woman, if she is married, he should be executed, and if she is single, he's not executed. Now, by contrast, if a Jewish male enters into a relation with a Gentile woman, when he does so intentionally, she should also be executed. Meaning, if they both know what's going on, and he's Jewish and she's not Jewish, you don't only kill him, but you kill her too. Why? She's executed, the Rambam writes, because she caused the Jew to be involved in an unseemly transgression. Just as the law is with animals, this applies whether the Gentile woman was a minor or an adult, whether she was single or married, and it even applies if the Jew is a minor of nine years old.

1:53:30She's executed. The punishment is explicitly mentioned in the Torah, in exactly what I mentioned, the book of Numbers, chapter 31, verses 16 and 17, where it says, "Behold, they are involved with the children of Israel, according to the advice of Bilaam. Execute any woman fit to know a man through lying with a male." So we see that the halacha, according to the Rambam, according to the Torah, is to kill the woman. And it says simply, simply, that it's because she enticed him to sin. So what's the final point? Why is it so bad to entice to sin? So comes Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, and he says from here we learn that someone who entices a Jew to sin is even worse than the murderer himself. Because if he murdered a person, then he's only killing his body. But if he's enticing him or her to sin, then he could be killing their Heaven. He could be killing their next world. He could be killing their soul itself. Therefore, in the eyes of God, it's a much, much heavier judgment. That's why not only does the person, the Jew, get punished, but also the non-Jew gets punished because just the fact that they existed, even if they're an animal, the animal didn't entice the guy to sin. What did she say? Moo? What did she say to him?

1:54:55What did she say to him? Nothing. But the fact that you are the cow that the guy sinned with, and you are the woman the guy sinned with, and Hashem is, in essence, forced to kill His own son, forced to kill His own daughter because of you, it cannot be. The reality cannot be that He kills His own son or daughter, and the person or the animal that was involved is still alive. It cannot be. That reality cannot exist. And therefore, Hashem has to kill both. The question. Next question. No? Again? Start again. What's wrong with this thing? Memory? Ah, if it's memory, then stop. Don't bother. Go ahead. Hashem communicated to Avraham in this proposal. In your opinion, how did um, so what we said earlier today is that when the king shows up, everything is quiet. In essence, the point of that was that

1:56:19When a king is there, everybody knows. Everybody knows. Now, what's the biggest difference between Judaism and all of the other religions? The difference is that while all of the other religions, as promised by God, were started by a single person. whether it was Mary having a dream that God entered her through her ear, and therefore gave birth to little Yoshke, thereby starting the whole of Christianity, or it's Muhammad, who was illiterate, meeting by himself in the desert with the angel Gabriel who told him all of the secrets of the Koran, or it's Buddha getting the light, seeing the light. All of these other religions, every single one of them, they all claim to have talked to God, but it was always, as God promised in the Torah, it was always started by one person. Judaism, on the other hand, is the only religion that was started at Mount Sinai, where HaKadosh Baruch Hu, for the first and last time,

1:57:36unfolded and uncovered Himself in front of millions and millions of people. And everyone knew, including the non-Jews, that that's what happened. That Hashem spoke to Am Yisrael, spoke to everybody else. And one of the strong arguments that Judaism has against all of the other religions that claim to be a continuation of the Torah, i.e., the Koran as Islam or the New Testament as Christianity, is that if the New Testament or the Koran were a continuation of the revelation of God, then surely the major event that happened in the past at Mount Sinai would be repeated again, at least as much, if not bigger. Meaning, when God wanted the whole world, especially the Jewish people, to know that He is the God of the Jewish people, and He is giving us a book called the Torah, He made sure that it was big enough that no one could dispute it.

1:58:48Because he wrote things in the Torah about the people that were there, not just the people that died. He didn't just write about Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov who weren't there on Mount Sinai. He also told them things about the people that were living, that were alive there. Where there are verses in the Torah that Moshe Rabbeinu tells all of Am Yisrael, "All of you heard God's voice. All of you." So if somebody says, "Listen, I didn't hear God's voice," there's a mistake in the Torah. Somebody would have said something. So the point is that Hashem, when He gave us the Torah, wanted to make sure that everybody knows, indisputably, that God is talking and He's talking to millions of people. With the other religions... They started with an individual. In essence, it's all blind faith. Everybody just follows based on blind faith. That, you know, hopefully she really did have that dream and she's not really a prostitute. Hopefully, he really did have that dream and he's not high on hashish. And hopefully, he really did have that light and it's not just, you know, the sun. You know, it's just hopefully. Everybody's working on blind faith, and billions of people are relying on this blind faith.

1:59:52Now, which means that when God wants to show you Himself, He makes sure that it's indisputable and it's undoubtable. Right? So, Avraham talked to God. How did he know? It's not that Avraham knew based on his own intellect, but rather God made it so that it was clear as day. It was clear as day that it is God that's talking to him and nothing else, and one of the main ways that he understood that it's God talking to him is that Hashem did certain things that only God can do, whether it be saving him from when Nimrod threw him into the fire. clear as day that it is God that's talking to him and nothing else. One of the main ways that he understood that it's God talking to him is that Hashem did certain things that only God can do, whether it be saving him from when Nimrod threw him into the fire or it was the other miracles that happened there where Hashem fixed his wife's uterus, in essence put the uterus back in her body, or made his wife's body go back to when she was 20 years old in an instant, and so on and so forth. So Hashem made sure that it was not only clear to Avraham, but it was also clear to others that it was God talking to him and not simply him.

2:01:13you know, being high, why? Because when God is talking to you, He's gonna make it clear. You're not gonna think you're crazy. You're not gonna think you're crazy; it's gonna be as clear as day to you. Now, I recommend, you know, there are some people that say, "Listen, God spoke to me, God spoke to me," and you know what? You may be right, God may have spoken to you, but my suggestion is to keep it to yourself. Why? Number one, no one's going to believe you. And anyone that does probably thinks God speaks to them also. So I recommend, if God spoke to you, keep it to yourself. That's my recommendation. Generally, because it's possible God spoke to you, and if He really spoke to you, you would know for sure. You wouldn't think you're crazy. If you think you're crazy, most likely it's not God talking to you. Most likely it's just your imagination, or maybe a demon likes to mess with you a little bit, which they like to have fun with people sometimes. They do. They do. They do. Demons can come to you in all types of forms. They come to you as your mother. They come to you as your father. They come to you as your cousin. They come to you as some big sage. They come to you and you can have a dream. Somebody says, "Oh, I'm Eliyahu HaNavi." It's really a demon, just likes to mess with you. It happens. But the point is that if it's God, I promise you, you wouldn't have any doubts. Because if God is talking, that means He wants you to know.

2:02:37He wants you to know. He wants you to know that it's Him. So I believe that when it came to Avraham, because an entire people were dependent on this conversation and this relationship that Avraham had, it had to be as clear as day. And that's where there were many, many supernatural things that happened. The Brit Bein HaBetarim, when he brought the sacrifice to Avraham, when Avraham brought the sacrifice to Hashem, and if you look at the Midrash, there are all types of spiritual things that were happening there. A special spirit, if you will, a wind went through the animal. There were all types of other things that made it as clear as day that it was God talking to him and not simply his mind. And again, that's not because of Avraham's intellect, even though he was the smartest man ever, really. Some say even smarter than Shlomo HaMelech, but it was because God made it clear. God made it clear. Hopefully, that was sufficient. Yeah, behind you. Give him the mic. So, to write on that question, there's a lot of Christians

2:03:57...visions and supernatural encounters and all these things that, with what you just mentioned, might have allowed them to get fired up, right? To be like, "Okay, so you see, I do have that kind of blessing," per se. Or you know, they believe in all these prophecies. How would you kind of just cut them while they're mentioning that? How do you just cut that conversation and let them know, "Hey... you're in disbelief, or you know, you lost your soul there. That's an answer I can give you in two seconds, or I can give you 25 minutes, and we'll end the shiur with it. And that depends on whether you want me to give you a quick answer and we'll move on to other questions, or you want me to show you another way to destroy Christianity in a second. Which one do you guys want? Well, that's you. We have a lot of other people here also. The simple answer is this: There is no way to connect to God when you're doing things that are against Him. There's no way. I actually got something just yesterday. Somebody showed me, just a regular church has on their website what they believe in. And

2:05:15He writes on his website, "We believe in the 66 books of the Old and the New Testament," meaning that believing in the New Testament is a foundational belief of Christianity. Furthermore, they believe that God exists in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. all three persons of the Godhead are equal and eternal in essence. They believe God has three parts. That's idolatry according to our Torah, so there is no way to connect to the real God through idolatry, no way to get Him to favor you, and so on. We believe that God reached out to us by becoming a man. The eternal, omnipotent God entered the human race when Jesus was born in Bethlehem. Becoming a man in no way diminishes His deity, and being God did not make Him any less than human, except that it made it impossible for Him to sin.

2:06:27So, again, I'll spare you the foolishness, but in essence, the point is that this is the belief. The belief is that God is a man, which, according to our Torah, is 100% idolatry. Thinking that God is three, that's idolatry. So, according to our Torah, and we have many, many verses and famous debates throughout the years that the sages have had, whether it was the Ramban, a famous debate, or it was the Kuzari, a famous debate, or other debates that showed that Christianity, bottom line, is 100% idolatry according to our religion, according to our Torah. which means that if the person that you're talking to understands that what he believes in is idolatry, then he would know that there's no way that it is God that's talking to him but rather the sitra achra is talking to him or one of his soldiers. Meaning, it's either the Satan or one of his demon minions that are talking to him, even if they say whatever they say. Why? Because they are involved in the tumah of the world, the impurity of the world.

2:07:38If the person obviously and most likely doesn't believe that Christianity is idolatry, then he'll say you're crazy and you'll say he's crazy, and then it's just simply a waste of time. So the most critical thing that you want to do with such a person... If you think that they're intelligible and open to seeing the truth, then I would recommend you show them the material instead of debating them directly. You just show them the material. You show them, let's say, Rabbi Tovia Singer's website, Outreach Judaism, or Rabbi Yosef Mizrachi's debate, or perhaps my shiurim about Christianity. And if they speak Hebrew, Rabbi Efraim has about 60 shiurim about Christianity. many other things to show them the facts of what Christianity is. It's simply idolatry; there's nothing else. But if the person is not open to it, then just move on. Move on, don't waste time. There are a lot of things about Christianity that people don't know, but in essence, the ultimate thing that you need to know is that it is possible that some people

2:08:48could see things, hear things, even do things. But it's not coming from the holiness, but rather from the impurity, from the impure side. And the impure side is also strong. But that's because God allows it. God allows the impure side to have a certain amount of strength in the world because that's part of our free choice. ...part of our free choice. So it is possible that they see things; it is possible that they do things. There are a lot of things that are possible, but you need to know that it's coming from the impure side. So just because you see that somebody can perform a miracle doesn't make them righteous. That's why there's a verse in the Torah that says don't be impressed by anybody that can perform miracles. It doesn't mean that they're righteous; it doesn't mean that they're holy; it doesn't mean anything. You know, we don't decide who's righteous based on miracles. We don't just decide who is a messenger of God based on miracles. We decide whether they're righteous or not based on the Torah, meaning there are rules in the Torah of what they need to do and not to do and so on. Jesus of Nazareth was a, or he's also called Oto Ha'Ish, that other man, or Yeshu, that person, he started off

2:10:05on the left side because his mother, you know, was a woman that cheated on her husband. She cheated on her husband, but of course, if her husband knew that she cheated on him, he would have to kill her. So, you know, the Beit Din would kill her, so she said, "No, it's God who came into me," and that's how it's a virgin birth. And that whole story doesn't make any sense, but two and a half billion people believe it, and But anyway, that means that Jesus himself was a mamzer. A mamzer is not a child out of wedlock. A mamzer is someone that came through adultery. That's who Jesus really was. But still, that didn't mean that the Jewish people gave up on him. He actually still went to yeshiva, and he actually had one of the greatest rabbis ever, his teacher, Yehoshua ben Perachia. Yehoshua ben Perachia was his teacher, and he was one of the original sages, one of the Zugot.

2:11:08And he was an extraordinary person. It's mentioned in the Gemara in a couple of places. Now, if you buy an ArtScroll Gemara or one of the modern-day Gemaras, many of them will not have Jesus' name in it. But that's because of the censures that we had to implement over the years because they were persecuting us. The Christians didn't like that we told the truth about Jesus in our Gemara, in our Talmud, so they started killing many Jews and burning it, and so on and so forth. So, many of the Gemarot don't have the name; they have things that allude to it but don't state the name itself. But we know it is, and anyway, we still have some of the old Gemarot that say his actual real name in it. Now anyway, it's mentioned in the Gemara, literally in Masechet Gittin, Masechet Sanhedrin, Masechet Avodah Zarah, Masechet Sotah. And the story between him and Yehoshua ben Perachiah is mentioned in Masechet Sotah, page 47, and also in Masechet Sanhedrin, I believe it's 107. And it talks about how

2:12:15Yehoshua ben Perachiah, his teacher, was fleeing the country, and they went to Alexandria, which is in Egypt. And the host over there, the woman that was hosting them over there, was a very nice woman. And Yehoshua ben Perachiah, the rabbi, was a tzaddik, and he said, oh, he told Yeshu, ah, look at how nice she is. and uh, Jesus in Hebrew is Yeshua. Now, we don't call him Yeshua; we call him Yeshu. Yeshu is an acronym for "Yimach Shemo VeZichro," which means "May his name be blotted out." Why do we omit the 'Ayin'? We'll find out today. So even though you want the short version, I'm still going to give you a long one. So now, what happened there? He He said, "Look, she's a nice woman, a kind woman, she's helping us, you know, if they were in danger, life danger." And Jesus was a person that liked to, you know, freshen up his eyes, if you will, by looking at girls. So he was like some of the modern-day fools today who think that their rabbi is just like them.

2:13:35You know, it's like, oh listen, what's the big deal that he's a rabbi and I'm not? We're just the same, we're both people. No, if he dedicated his entire life to learning Torah and you didn't, you're not the same person. You think you are, but that's foolishness. So anyway, Jesus was one of those fools, where he thought his rabbi was thinking the same thing. So when his rabbi said, look at her, she's such a nice woman, and he thought that he’s complimenting her looks. So he said, what's nice about her? Look at her eyes. She has weird-looking eyes, like little pebbles in her eyes. Apparently, she wasn't an attractive woman according to Jesus. And the rabbi said, "This is what you use your eyes for? This is what you do?" And he kicked him out. Kicked him out of the yeshiva. Now, Jesus came back a few times to say, "I'm sorry," but the rabbi wanted to teach him a lesson and show him that he couldn't think like this because apparently this wasn't his first offense, it seems. He had looked at women several times and apparently he was like this with the ladies, even though he was learning a lot of Torah and even though he was apparently a smart person. Anyway, as the story goes, the rabbi told him "no" a few times.

2:14:53But then, when he was ready to accept him back, Jesus came at the wrong time. He came during a time when the rabbi, Yehoshua ben Perachya, was praying. And halacha is, if you're in the middle of praying Shema Yisrael, you're not allowed to stop to say hello to somebody. You're not allowed to stop and talk to somebody. You have to pray. You pray to Hashem. But Jesus didn't care about that, so when he came to him, came to the teacher to say, "I'm sorry," the rabbi was praying, but he didn't want him to go, so he told him like this. He made a motion with his hand, like stop, meaning wait for me. Jesus ran out of patience, and Yeshu thought he was rejecting him again. He ended up leaving and started committing idolatry. He found a rock and started worshipping it. He began using all types of witchcraft to do various things to get people to follow him, and so on. So, the...

2:15:54The Gemara says that really, although he was a rasha, and he's judged with a very heavy judgment, page 57b, says that where is Jesus? Jesus is now in boiling feces. Even though he was judged harshly, the Gemara also says that the rabbi was incorrect in how he treated him. in a sense that he was too harsh with him. He was too harsh with him. It took him too long to get him to come back. So don't be like him. Be a little softer. If somebody is a tough student, don't reject them constantly. You know, be a little softer with him. Not to just let them run over you, but, you know, if he says, "I'm sorry," okay, yeah, move on already. Move on. So anyway, surely he knew what he knew. Now, the question is, why Was it decided in heaven for Yeshua, which was his real name, to now be known in the Jewish world as Yeshu?

2:17:09meaning there's a missing letter in his name now. The Christians love to argue, "No, it's not Yeshu. You guys are talking about a different person; it's Yeshua." Especially in recent years, all the Messianics, they like to say Yeshua, Yeshua, and feel like they're all Jews already. Why? What's happened now? In reality, that's his real name; his name was Yeshua. But why do we say Yeshu? Like I said, it is a curse, a curse because he created a lot of damage for us, and we suffered a lot because of him. The most amount of Jewish people killed has been because of him. But the point being is, why was it decreed in Shamayim? So, in a sefer called Pinkas HaRe'i, Rav Avraham Kook, who was one of the head rabbis of Israel and... And he was a great talmid chacham, but very, very misunderstood by many. And when somebody spoke against him one time, next to Rav Shach, Rav Shach said, "How dare you speak against Rav Kook, who is a person that hasn't looked at the face of a woman other than his mother and his sister since the age of nine."

2:18:20That's how holy he was. So he wrote in a sefer, in a sefer called Pi Kadosh HaRaya, in Chelek Aleph, Ot Kuf Lamed Bet, that Yeshua made a sin with what? With his eyes. By looking at girls. And that's why he lost the letter Ayin from his name. What did he lose out of his name? It's Yeshua or Yeshua. So why did he lose the Ayin? Because ayin is a letter, but it also means ayin, eyes. An eye. Why did he lose the eye? Because he sinned with his eye. And Rav Kook brings this, and he says, where do we learn this from? We learn this because it says, in the prophet Iyov (Job), chapter 11, verse 20, it says, "the eyes of the wicked will be destroyed." And although the missionaries continue to keep trying to convince the world that it's really Yeshua and not Yeshu, they're right, they have, it is Yeshua, but it's Yeshu. Why? Because he lost it because he followed his eyes. He followed his eyes.

2:19:31And it's well known that the Torah tells us that anybody, anybody that is going to look at immorality, is going to look at immodesty, is bound to sin. It's just a matter of time before it happens. There's no way for a person to continuously look at women and not sin. It's just a matter of time. And Gemara Masechet Nedarim, page 20a, says that anyone who looks at women will ultimately fall to sin, meaning the worst sin—wasting seed, promiscuity, and so on and so forth. And Yeshu was not careful with his eyes; ultimately, that led him to sinning with his eyes, and ultimately that led him to actual Avodah Zarah itself. Now, from this, we learn that there's a measure-for-measure accounting in Shamayim, but also, there's a certain type of treatment that a person needs to have when he or she deals with Christians in the world, because there are still 2 billion people in the world that believe that he is G-d.

2:20:46And even if they say, "No, no, we only believe he's Mashiach," their definition of Mashiach is not the same thing as our definition of Mashiach. So in essence, their Mashiach also means God, by the way. So with that being said, you have to understand that the whole foundation of Christianity comes from the side of Tumah, comes from impurity, from the foundation, from the mother committing a sin, to Jesus making more sins, and all of it comes with the same exact sin, which is immorality. Immorality comes with all of the things that have to do with sex crimes. And that's the reason why you'll see many times in the church, and this is very common, sex crimes are extremely common, whether it's pedophilia or other types of promiscuity and things of that nature. All of those things are very, very common in that world. Not to say that the rest of the world is innocent of other things, but needless to say, for them, it's not necessarily as intolerable.

2:21:48As it should be. But that's also because that's coming from there, and so when it comes to a Jew, you have to know that we are not allowed to join forces with them or do any type of co-working. The Jewish-Christian Alliance is forbidden, and And the reason why is because there's a Gemara in Masechet Chullin, page 44b, that says you have to stay away from something that's viewed as ugly by Heaven, and even something that looks like it's ugly. So needless to say, Christianity is ugly in the eyes of God. But even if it's, no, no, it's Judeo-Christian, it's still ugly. Or it looks ugly. Point is, you have to stay away from it. Stay away from it. But then you say, yeah, but they have a lot of money. They donate a lot of money. King David says in Tehillim 37:1, "Don't compete with evildoers and don't be envious. Don't be envious of them."

2:22:55Why? Because you see that many times people want to do business and they want to do all types of Judeo-Christian alliance type of things because of the money or because it looks like they're winning or things like that. But this is creating much more damage than people can imagine. Much more damage than you would imagine. This is obviously becoming a bigger problem in Modern Orthodoxy today. Even though their leaders, whether it was Rav Soloveitchik or even Rav Hershel Schachter, he himself actually just read something. I read a letter that he wrote years ago. that clearly says you have to stay away from idolatry and from the people that are, especially the rabbis, doing all types of gatherings. I'm sorry, Rabbi Hershel Schachter, he wrote that people that are

2:23:58rabbis that are saying that we should work together with the Christians, and really they have a connection to Israel, and things of that nature, they don't realize that they're playing with fire, they're playing with Avodah Zarah. So, the point being is this: as far as Yeshua, yes, it is Yeshua, but we call him Yeshu, and in Heaven they call him Yeshu. Why? Because he lost the right to have that ayin, because he sinned with his ayin. What happened to his name? It got changed. Now, as far as what happened to him, the Gemara says that he is in boiling feces. Now, there is a gadol, we'll finish with this point, the Maharal MiPrague. The Maharal MiPrague was one of the greatest sages that ever lived. said everything I just told you and more to the king at the time, the non-Jewish king at the time. And the non-Jewish king at the time said it's hard for him to believe this. And the Maharal MiPrague, because he was a Kabbalist and an enormous sage, holy of holies, he says, I can show you. I can show you. And the Maharal MiPrague is the same Maharal that made a golem.

2:25:13took, uh, the non-Jews were hurting the Jewish people, so he needed some protection. He took a bunch of clay, made a golem, made a giant, and that was the defender for the people. Anytime people would come, this thing would come to life and start killing people. Start killing the Jews, and you go to Prague, and there's actually, uh, still to this day, 400 years later, 500 years later, there's a building over there in memory of this golem. The movie Frankenstein was based on that, by the way, just so you know. I mean, obviously, Frankenstein is a fairy tale, but the actual golem actually existed. No, you could say, no, it didn't, but there is a place. I don't know, there's no building with my name on it. There's a building for the golem. So there's a building for the golem. I don't know. Apparently, the people over there believe he existed. So, the point is, the Maharal MiPrague created him. He used Kabbalah Maasit, he created something and put life into it, and this being had the name of God on its forehead, and that gave it life, and eventually, when it wasn't needed, they took it off, and the entity became dust and ashes again. But the point is, the Maharal MiPrague is known for some very, very supernatural stories.

2:26:20That's the one that's very popular of what I told you. What I'm about to tell you, I don't think is as popular. I only heard it from my Rav. I haven't heard it from anybody else. It doesn't mean much, but nonetheless, this is what it is. The king, the non-Jewish king, heard all of the things that the Maharal MiPrague said about Jesus, and he said, it's hard for him to believe. So the Maharal MiPrague told him, I can show you. I can show you Jesus burning in boiling feces right now. And he said, show me. Then the Maharal MiPrague wanted to retract, but the king already said, you said it, do it. So the Maharal MiPrague used what’s called Kabbalah Maasit, which is a different level of Kabbalah, where you can create things. And he brought Jesus from Gehenom to this world in front of the king, in front of the people. He brought him, and he was right in front of everybody. And he was full of boiling feces. And obviously, this stench and the filth are not of this world, so people were suffering a lot, the king was suffering a lot. They told him, get him out of here. You know, I get the point, get him out of here. And the Maharal MiPrague had a hard time, he couldn't take him out. He couldn't bring him back. Until he said a special holy name of God, and he hit him at the same time.

2:27:36that brought him back to Gehinnom. The only problem was that the supernatural filth that's on Yeshu right now is not of this world, and it got stuck to the hand of the Maharal. So from that day forward, he had to always wear a glove and constantly have perfume to put on his hand so other people don't suffer for the rest of his life. So, again, if you tell this to a bunch of Christians, they're not going to be so fond of you. But the truth is that the... There is a Gemara about it. It says, why is Jesus in Gehenom? Why is he specifically in that one? And it says, anyone that makes fun of the sages, of the Chachamim, of Torah scholars, his end is to be in boiling feces. That’s the place designated for those people in Gehenom.

2:28:36that's what Jesus did ultimately. That was his biggest sin. His biggest sin was that he made fun of the rabbis and went against them and got people to follow him, and so on. So Most of what I said is really for your education. It's not really to go and don't use this material for anti-missionary purposes. It won't help. It'll probably be insulting for Christians. They'll probably take it offensively. They won't like it. Or, best yet, they won't buy it. They won't agree with you. The real things that you should use to deal with people that you're trying to get out of Christianity are simply the proofs that there are more mistakes in the New Testament than you can possibly count. whether it's geographical mistakes or biblical mistakes and so on and so forth. Those are the things that are the best to use for that purpose. But again, it's always good to know some of these things for yourself in case somebody comes to you and confuses you with something. It's good to know some of this material to know that, listen, if you follow them in their bad ways, you're not going to be so far away from their leader also. And their leader is not such a good place. Last question and we'll finish for the night. Anything? Yeah. Somebody didn't ask questions. You asked questions. Everybody didn't ask questions? Ken, you have a question in the back? Yeah, I have a question. Give the mic.

2:29:45you're not going to be so far away from their leader either. And their leader is not in such a good place. Last question and we'll finish for the night. Anything? Yeah. Someone who hasn't asked a question yet. You already asked questions. Has everyone had a chance to ask questions? Ken, do you have a question in the back? Yeah, I have a question. Give him the mic. I read a prayer on a Thanksgiving prayer. I don't think it was from a siddur. And at the end, it said, "I am dust and ashes and You are the entire universe." And I started to not say that end of the prayer because I was thinking, like, how can you say that Hashem is the entire universe? I felt it was a little bit blasphemous somehow, even though I understand it in a way. I just thought it was wrong and I felt maybe that was man-made. Is that blasphemous in any way? Where's the prayer from? I think it's from a Breslov center or something. Oh, so it's probably something that they put together. English translations are not always the best, but you should know that in general, even the Rambam wrote that there's no perfect way to translate.

2:31:01Hebrew, really there's no perfect way to translate any language because there are certain languages that have unique words that you can't translate, and you do your best, but nothing will ever be like the original. Now, when it comes to prayer, specifically when it comes to Jewish prayers, there are certain things that are simply untranslatable because those words don't exist in other languages and... But to say that G-d is the whole world and you are nothing is not a problem at all, because He is everything, Ein Od Milvado, He is everything and we are nothing. And we actually say that in the Amidah. We say that in the Amidah three times a day, that He is everything and we are nothing. Is the literal translation of the Hebrew words slightly different than "He is the whole world"? Yes. But I don't know of a better translation than that, though. I don't know if there is a better translation than that, at least not off the top of my head. So I don't believe it's blasphemous. I think it's perfectly fine. But again, if something was written by a chacham, if something was written by one of the sages, surely they got it from somewhere. They're not just creating blessings out of thin air. I don't think so. Anything else? Anybody? Okay. Give them the mic, please.

2:32:30Maimonides wrote about being, more specifically, eating healthy. How much significance or lack of significance do you give to this aspect of daily life? The Rambam promises, he writes this in Hilchot De'ot, in Mishneh Torah, that anybody who follows his guidance is guaranteed not to get sick. Now, does that mean that the body of a person is the same today as it was 900 years ago? No. There are certain things that the Rambam used as medicine that, in today's world, generally speaking, don't work because the body has changed. The body has changed for many reasons. The diets of people have changed. The water has changed, the makeup of people has changed, generally speaking. Again, we're still the same species. We haven't become monkeys, or at least not to my knowledge. But the point is that the makeup of a person has changed somewhat, and certain things that were utilized as medicine in past generations don't always work like they did back then. But if somebody does something...

2:33:49Because it says so in the Torah, i.e., also the sages, because they said it, surely they'll have a blessing for it. So a person should take care of their health. They should do whatever they can to take care of their health, but they should know that if it comes to their health being taken care of, it doesn't mean they have to be a bodybuilder with a six-pack and run every day at six o'clock in the morning. You know, be the best you can, but again, sometimes it depends on what you use your energy for. If you're going to learn Torah seriously, it's going to be very, very hard for you to spend any time in a gym. But does that mean that you should eat like a pig? No, it doesn't mean you should eat a pig. You should, you know, take care of yourself, do the best you possibly can. But if you have to pick your spiritual maintenance or your physical maintenance, your spiritual maintenance is more important. Your spiritual maintenance is much more important. And that's also the reason why you'll sometimes even see very, very big Talmidei Chachamim that are extremely heavy.

2:35:06It doesn't mean that they've abandoned and they don't care about their health. It's that their priority in life is Torah, and their body wasn't necessarily the number one priority. It's not that they intentionally got fat or they intentionally did this, it's just that they didn't spend anywhere near as much time taking care of their body as they did their neshama. and uh certain things follow, certain things happen, but again, people spend an enormous amount of energy taking care of their body and rarely do they take care of their neshama as much. You know, they say, "No, no, but I go to the gym five times a week, an hour a day, two hours a day." How much Torah do you learn? "Oh, I learn 10 minutes." Okay, so you'll have, you know... have a Gan Eden that's, you know, five minutes of Gan Eden you'll have. Why? Because, again, you're worrying, you spend a lot of your time fixing something that's here today, gone tomorrow, whereas the thing that's here eternally you're not spending that much time on. So that's the thing. But again, a person should take care of their body, but don't go crazy. Don't go crazy. Don't, in essence, the main message is do not go to a mixed gym. If there are boys and girls in a gym, it's forbidden permanently.

2:36:24with Corona, without Corona, even though that means that you're not going to be able to work out the same way. Like I said, your spirituality, your soul, is much more important than your body. If you go to a mixed gym, you're committing a sin from the Torah. You'll go to Gehinnom for that sin if you're a Jew. If you're not Jewish, do whatever you want. When it comes to that, as far as going to a mixed gym, it's not a good idea. It's not going to be good for your marriage, and it's not going to be good for your life because you're going to see a bunch of immodestly dressed people. But nonetheless, if you're a Jew, you're not allowed to go to a mixed gym, just like you're not allowed to go to a mixed beach. It's a simple halacha: it's better to die than to go there. That's how severe of a sin it is. Why? Because you know for sure there's going to be immodesty there, and you're still going. Not allowed. So now, a person that understands that says, "Wait, but how am I going to work out?" At home, yeah, but I don't have the same equipment. So what? Your neshama is more important than your body. Your neshama's workout is more important. Your body can do some push-ups, sit-ups, maybe buy some dumbbells, and you'll be perfectly fine. Girlfriend's fine. Or you could just go to a men-only gym. Same thing with women. Women are not allowed to go to mixed gyms either; she has to go only to a women's gym.

2:37:37And same thing with yoga classes and all those other things. Yoga, in general, by the way, is not allowed. You should know that. Yoga, in general, is not allowed. It's a form of idolatry. You're allowed to do certain movements with your body and meditate, but you're not allowed to do yoga itself because that comes from idolatry. Yoga itself comes from idolatry. So aside from that, if it's men and women in that yoga class, for sure, it's not allowed. because, again, immodesty. But the point is that people need to understand that your body is important, but it's not as important as your soul. Your neshama is much more important. If taking care of your body will jeopardize your neshama, it's not allowed. Not allowed. But if taking care of your neshama will jeopardize your body, it is allowed. It is allowed. So, that's that. No, you have a question in the back?

2:38:47So, many times in the Torah, you can see that there are examples where, for self-defense, you're allowed to kill the other person if he's coming to kill you. Or, as you just said, if someone's a Pinchas, which there isn't anybody else; it's very zealous. So, is there any other example where you can kill someone? Today, we're not allowed to kill anybody unless somebody's trying to kill you. somebody's trying to kill you, you're allowed to kill them. But if somebody's not trying to kill you, you're not allowed to kill them because we don't have any permission to kill anybody unless it's an act of war. Meaning, if you're in a war, then obviously a war is a war. But if somebody's trying to kill you, then, you know, and again, they don't necessarily have to say they're trying to kill you. Like if a person is trying to rape a woman and she ends up killing him in the process, it's not a sin for her. It's not a sin for her or anything like that. But generally speaking, you're not allowed to take the law into your hands. It's only self-defense. Only self-defense. So even if somebody's a heretic, idol worshiper, missionary, hater of God, still not allowed to kill them. Not allowed to kill them. Homosexual, gay parade, not allowed to kill them. Not allowed to kill them.

2:40:13Not to hurt them, not to beat them up, nothing. Why? You're not the law, you're not the Sanhedrin, it's in the hands of God. So even though the Sanhedrin is not here, it doesn't mean that the death penalty and the rules of the Sanhedrin are not being instilled into the world. They're just being instilled into the world by God. So in the old days when they would, let's say for example, stone somebody for violating Shabbat, today God just allows a car to run him over. or plane to crash or building to explode or something like that, you know. And so anytime you see somebody, "Oh wow, he died from a plane crash," you know, that's stoning. That's stoning, you know. And then there are also all the different deaths that people have. Usually, one of the punishments in the vast majority of people, if you look at statistics—I don't know if you want to necessarily spend some time doing this—but it's about sixty million people who die every year in the world. Sixty million people. It's a lot of people. Okay, so coronavirus, a million people dying, is not exactly such a big deal. Just so you guys calm your nerves about corona, it's not such a big deal. There are more people dying from the flu, even during corona, than from corona. But still, corona is very good for politics. It's very good for politics. Just like I remember years ago, during the Gulf War, there was a lot of talk about similar things, you know, oil and things like that. All of a sudden, everybody was interested in atomic warfare.

2:41:41and therefore they used that as an excuse to go to war. Anyway, when it comes to... just any mitzvah, any mitzvah that you're going to do, you have to know that if the Sages put it together, if the Sages talked about it, there's a reason for it. There's a reason for it. But in today's world, people disrespect the Torah. People disrespect the Torah. Now, because they disrespect the Torah, Hashem has to enforce His punishment into the world. So because there isn't a Sanhedrin, It doesn't mean that the law is not being enforced into the world; it's just that Hashem does it. So out of the world's 60 million people that die every single year, the overwhelming majority of them, and by majority I mean a very, very high majority, die from unusual deaths. Most people don't die going to sleep, like in the movies.

2:42:43You know, the guy is 90 years old, and after he lived a nice, full life, and he said goodbye to all of his grandkids and great-grandkids and even his puppy, and then finally he goes to sleep, and he's like, ah. And it's not real life. In real life, it's horrible things. It's car accidents. It's cancer. It's strokes. It sucks. It's really what it is. It's a horrible, horrible situation. And guess what? It's all ages. There are just as many people that die at 25 years old as those who die at 70 years old. Why? Because the Sanhedrin of Heaven still works, still works, still works. That 24-year-old who died received a death penalty from Heaven for whatever sin he made, Jew or not. So that's the thing. People need to understand that God is still running the world. He just doesn't run the world the way you would think. You know, He sometimes has patience with certain people, and He sometimes does not have patience with certain people because He already used it up on other things. But when it comes to us instilling the death penalty in our hands, that's forbidden.

2:43:52We don't have the right to do it because the Torah, the same Torah that says that this person gets a death penalty, also tells us that we're not allowed to put that death penalty in force unless we follow certain metrics, certain rules. Like even, for example, the death penalty that a Mechalel Shabbat would get, the only way that the Beit Din would be allowed to kill someone that violated Shabbat is if there are two witnesses. saw him violate and they warned him and they told him about what the punishment would be if he continues. Which means that the person who violated Shabbat and the Torah, the first Mechalel Shabbat, it was not like they just saw him and said, "Oh, wow, he's violating Shabbat. Let's kill him." No, like they saw him violating Shabbat. They told him, "You know you're violating Shabbat." He said "Yes." They told him, "If you continue, we're gonna kill you." He said "Yes," he continued, and then Mitzvot, he broke for sure, but Beit Din is gonna kill him. So even then, it's not like, just like, oh, you see somebody driving on Shabbat, death penalty. It doesn't work like that so much. But that's only because the Sanhedrin was doing it. When it's Hashem doing it, then it's different. When Hashem is doing it, you don't need witnesses, because Hashem, who has the heaven and the earth, is the witness for everything. So that's that. Yes, Chaim, last question. But He sends you warnings before He kills you, I'm assuming.

2:45:16He sends you warnings before He kills you, I'm assuming. He sends you a lot of warnings throughout your life even before death is even an option. Every single day is a warning. The growing of a gray hair is a warning; every time you grow a gray hair, it's a warning that you're closer to death. So, I mean, when a person understands that everything is a warning, everything is a connection to Hashem, then sure, you're getting a warning every second you're alive. I mean, the truth be told is that the fact that you're able to go to the bathroom without dying, or you're able to eat without choking, in itself is a miracle. Because, think about it, you need the very same place that you use to eat to also breathe. And the very same thing that would cause you to stop breathing is what you need to eat. The fact that you're able to eat without losing a breath is a miracle in itself. You could explain it in all types of scientific ways, but the Torah says, the Gemara says, that the hour of eating, the hour of a meal, is the hour of war.

2:46:29It's a miracle that you're able to eat and live. Just eating anything and living is a miracle. To go to the bathroom is a miracle. The fact that this candy, this piece of meat, this, I don't know, whatever it was that you ate, your body knew to take whatever is good out of it and turn it into blood, and whatever is not good, turn it into waste and that leaves your body. That's a miracle. Why? Because if that bad part of the food that you consumed whatever's left of it that your body doesn't want, didn't turn into nutrients, didn't turn into vitamins, didn't turn into blood. That part—if that part doesn't leave your body after a few days—it starts killing you. Like, if you can't go to the bathroom for three days, you start dying. I know, I went through it. You know, my eyes were bleeding and my ears were bleeding and everything else. Yeah, that's what usually happens if you can't go to the bathroom for a week. So again, the fact that you're able to go to the bathroom, that's a miracle. But are you going to think about this? Maybe tomorrow you're going to think about it because you heard about it today. But did you think about it beforehand? Unless you have stomach problems, probably not. Why? Because we get used to it.

2:47:43We get used to stuff. We get used to things. No big deal. You eat? No big deal. You listen to things? No big deal. You see things? No big deal. You know, you walked in the street, a bug flew right into your eye, but right before it damaged your eye, your eyelids closed. How did your eye know that the bug was coming? And how did it react so fast to catch the bug with your eyelid and not inside your eye? But we don't think of it as a big deal. Why? Because we get used to this stuff. So again, when it comes to warnings from God, you're getting them every second you exist. The question is whether you're paying attention. I'm going to try to answer these six questions very, very quickly because they're here. I'm assuming I have to answer them anyway, so you might as well benefit from them also. One: Once a woman completes her full conversion to Judaism, how would she integrate herself into a mikveh? There is no integrating into a mikveh. There is only if she is married. A married Jewish woman is the only one that's allowed to go to a mikveh. If a woman is not married, she's not allowed to go into a mikveh. It's a mistake that some women make and they go to the mikveh without being married. This is a mistake. The sages said it's forbidden for a woman who is not married to go to a mikveh.

2:48:55she's married, she would go to the mikveh once a month when she has clean days. You'd have to know the family purity laws, which require a certain amount of clean days and a certain amount of days that she is niddah. Usually, it's days plus seven days, but again, it depends on the woman and how long she bleeds and so on and so forth. But the point is that she would be allowed to go to the mikveh once she's married, you know, once a month. Giving money to others, I had to do something. Giving money to charities. For example, giving money to the homeless, family members, and the needy. Is that considered a form of tzedakah? Yes. Actually, if you have family members, parents, or children who are immediate family members and are in need, you must give them your tzedakah before you give tzedakah to anyone else. Not that there's a shortfall and they want to get a bigger TV.

2:50:01Like, if they're in need, you actually have to give them your tzedakah before you give tzedakah to anyone else. Your own house first before somewhere else. Before somewhere else. Three, do righteous Gentiles go to Gan Eden? Absolutely. Righteous Gentiles go to Gan Eden, but that's only if they're righteous according to the Torah, which means that they're following the laws of the Torah, which are the Noahide laws. The Noahide laws are seven, but in reality, it's not seven Noahide laws; it's seven categories. It's seven categories that break down into other laws, similar to how the Ten Commandments break down into 613 mitzvot. Many of the categories within the seven Noahide laws are actually part of Jewish law. There's not really that much difference, which is the reason why I suggest for people to convert to Judaism if they can. Four, how did the sages know that the Creator has approved one of their rabbinical laws that involve nature, aside from the story that a baby can grow from a hymen? What do you mean, involve nature? I can't follow, I don't follow.

2:51:11Generally speaking, as far as just answering the question the best that I possibly can, how do the sages know that what they did is approved in heaven? There are rules that we got at Mount Sinai, not just the what's allowed and what's not allowed, but God left a certain portion of the Torah to the interpretation of the sages. Meaning, He left a certain part of the Torah as a gray area for the sages to toil and arrive at the truth of what it is. Why? Because He wanted to make us partners in the Torah and not just robots. Because when you invest in something, you care more about protecting it. So, for example, if I gave you money every time you woke up, every time you faced an issue, every time you laughed, and every time you just got a bunch of money, guess what? Within no time, you'd stop valuing money. Why? Because you didn't work for it. That's why when you spoil kids, you ruin them. Every time you came to an issue, and every time you laughed, and every time you just got a bunch of money, guess what? Within no time, you'd stop valuing money. Why? Because you didn't work for it. That's why when you spoil kids, you ruin them.

2:52:24You know, let's say it's just a reality. So in order for you to care about something, you have to work for it. So God wanted us to work for it. He wanted us to become part of the Torah. So He left part of the Torah up to interpretation. But it can't be up to interpretation based on human intellect. There had to be divine rules. So there are divine rules that He gave the sages. Of these are the divine rules that you have to meet in order to arrive at the truth. As long as you use those rules, Whatever you arrive at is the truth, which means that sometimes two sages or four sages would use all of those rules but actually arrive at different conclusions. Yet the Torah tells us, "Both this and this are the words of the Living God," meaning they're both right. both right. It's not black and white with the Torah. Sometimes it's black, it's white, it's gray, it's burgundy—it's whatever God wants based on those rules. Now, there is a Midrash called...

2:53:32Many years, I myself thought that Targum Onkelos started with Onkelos the Ger, Onkelos the convert. Truth be told, that Targum we already have from Mount Sinai. That commentary we already have from Mount Sinai. And the reason why is because it wasn't just the Torah that God gave us, but also what is the Torah saying that He gave us, meaning it's not just the verses but the simple interpretation. of those verses. Like, what are you actually saying here? Because it's not common day-to-day language. So that Targum started at Mount Sinai, and Onkelos, in essence, brought it back to the world. Because it was lost for a certain amount of time. So, as far as knowing who's right and who's wrong, it's based on whether they used the rules. And that's why you'll see that in the Gemara, you'll see that the sages are constantly using verses from the Torah to justify everything that they're saying. And if someone uses something from the Torah, from the Five Books of Moses, it has to be that this is the reason why this is used. You can't use one verse for multiple reasons. You can't say this verse is for this law, that law, and that law. Not allowed. It has to be for one law. That means you're limited. Now if somebody says, yeah, but I have a verse from the Tanach. I have a verse from the Prophets. I have a verse from the Tehillim. We don't make laws from the Tehillim. We don't make laws from the Prophets.

2:54:58They're important; they're called Asmachta, but it's not like the Five Books of Moses. But again, these are some of the rules that we have in the Torah. Does that mean if you have a verse from the Tehillim or from the Prophets, it's not important? No, it is important. It's called an Asmachta, but it's not like the Five Books of Moses. you want it to be a law, it has to meet the guidance, and one of them is that it has to have a verse in the Torah. So, and again, there are many, many other things, I'm just trying to make it clear for you. So the sages that put something out there, they're following the law. Generally speaking, there are no new laws today, and already for almost 2,000 years, there have been no new laws. Everything that we have today is simply a clarification of a pre-existing law that was already passed many, many years ago. Just that it's modernized. We're using the law of fire on cars. The law of fire on Shabbat on cars. The law of fire on Shabbat on, let's say, other things. For your phone, let's say, the energy in your phone is not really fire.

2:56:07But you could say, okay, technically it is fire, but it's not fire. However, that's not the only reason why you're not allowed to use the phone on Shabbat. The second reason is because it's makeh b'patish. You're completing a circuit. That's also a thing. The point being is that this law that tells us not to use the phone on Shabbat is not a law that was passed today. It's a law that's already from the Torah 3,300 years ago. But there were no phones back then. So we need the sages of today to know how to apply that law from 3,000 years ago to today. Next question: What are some of the 46 commandments that protect converts? One of the main things is that Hashem says that He'll provide converts with food and sustenance. That's one thing. A second example is that people who cause harm to converts, Hashem says He'll take personal revenge against them and even kill them with His sword. So it's a very bad idea to hurt converts. Very bad idea to hurt converts. So bad that Hashem says that He'll take personal revenge against people that hurt converts. You're not even allowed, third thing is, you're not even allowed to pressure a convert. Someone that converted to Judaism, you're not allowed to pressure him. You have to be a very, very civilized salesman if you're dealing with converts. One of those salesmen that's a terrible salesman, like, would you like to buy it? No? Okay, no problem, no problem.

2:57:26No problem. You know what? Oh, no problem. By the way, you do that in my company, you get fired. No problem. What do you mean, no problem? What kind of salesman are you? But if the customer is a convert, no problem. Okay, you know what? How about this? Take it for a week. Try it out. If you like it, you can pay for it. That kind of salesman, that's what you've got to do with converts. Why? Because Hakadosh Baruch Hu says, that's My kids. Everybody, all of Am Yisrael are His kids. But He says that for the converts, He's their father and their mother. Number six, lastly, can someone's fate or judgment be changed after Yom Kippur? Yes. Masechet Rosh Hashanah, page 16a, and Beitza, page 16b, say that HaKadosh Baruch Hu decides how much money a person is going to make on Rosh Hashanah until Rosh Hashanah. But, The Mishnah says that Hashem judges it not just on Rosh Hashanah, but every day. So the Baal Shem Tov comes and says, how could it be every day and once a year? It doesn't make any sense. It's either this or it's that. So the clarification the Baal Shem Tov offers is that the amount that a person gets is decided on Rosh Hashanah, but how he gets it is decided every day.

2:58:43but also even that can change. Not only how he gets it, but how much he gets can change, and even what happens could change based on certain acts that he does. There are certain acts that could hurt your livelihood, and there are certain acts that could improve your livelihood. For example, if somebody wastes seed, they've simply guaranteed that they'll lose money on certain things. somebody gave money for tzedakah for a good cause, for Torah, and so on, they just increased their salary. Why? Because that same Gemara says that the salary that's decided for someone does not include money that's used for mitzvot and for Torah. Meaning, if Hashem decided that you're going to get one hundred thousand dollars this year If you end up spending $20,000 on doing mitzvot, you bought tefillin, you gave some tzedakah, you learned Torah, you did all types of good things, you did kiruv and so on, that $20,000 will be added to your income. Meaning, the money that you ended up with, let's say you ended up with $100,000, wouldn't have been $120,000 had you not spent that $20,000. Either way, it would have been $100,000. Either way, it was $100,000.

2:59:59The fact that you spent $20,000, Hashem added that to your salary. Now sometimes He'll even give you more. But we're always thinking with our logical human brain, our flawed brain, that tells us, no, what do you mean? I already knew what salary I was going to get because my boss already told me that's the salary I'm going to get. That's the salary. How much are you going to keep? HaKadosh Baruch Hu decides. HaKadosh Baruch Hu decides. Plenty of people make a million dollars a year but still go home broke. Plenty of them. Plenty of them. So, a person needs to know that it's not necessarily what your salary says, but also what you keep, and also what happens with the money, and so on and so forth. I think that's about it for tonight. Unless there's something really, really pressing, I'll let you guys get some rest. Unless you want another scary story. No, no. Baruch Adonai le'olam, Amen ve’amen. Baruch Hashem, we've completed another year at Be'ezrat Hashem. Rabbi Ephraim and I are very proud to announce some major milestones that we've achieved, Be'ezrat Hashem, and with your help, our dear partners. Over 60 million minutes of our Torah has been watched over the last year. That's a million hours of Torah to help people do teshuva and get closer to Hashem. Over 300,000 CDs have been distributed around the world for free.

3:01:12We've also made over a thousand lectures between the two of us, as well as with Rav Chaim being added to the roster. Over 60,000 regular viewers are watching our Torah right now across the board. Over 200,000 answers regarding halacha, family, shalom bayit, and different topics are regularly being given to people. Over 10,000 people have been helped, whether it's through food or different financial issues. A thousand families of Torah scholars are being helped by Igud Be'ezrat Hashem. We've published and distributed over 5,000 halachic books, kuntresim, newsletters, mussar books around the world. We are also currently helping over 130 families complete their conversion to Orthodox Judaism. Our TV channel continues to grow, our YouTube channel, our Facebook pages, our WhatsApp pages—everything continues to grow, Baruch Hashem. Thanks to Hashem, and thanks to our dear partners. B'ezrat Hashem, much more next year.

3:02:29where you'll have also newer features where you're able to use the app while using other applications on your phone. You'll be able to share the lectures directly from the app. You'll be able to donate online and support our kiruv and our Torah work that we're doing. And the most exciting feature is that you'll be able to actually ask questions directly on the app and get answers from the rabbis directly from the app. This is something unprecedented, and Baruch Hashem we will be able to offer it. Thank you again for all of your support. Check it out. Make sure you have the Kosher Torah that will re-energize your neshama each and every single day. Kol tuv b'hatzlacha.