Daily Chidush: Who is a Rabbi according to the Torah?

0:06And of course, this is the holiest day of the week. The holiest day of the year is every Shabbat. Every Shabbat needs to be sanctified and is a time for us to connect to Hashem on the highest level. But today, I wanted to address a very critical and confusing issue in today's generation about who is your rabbi? Who is your rabbi? What makes a rabbi a rabbi is not necessarily what most people in the Western world believe, which is that they need to have some type of certificate called semicha. All of the details that we have in Judaism must have a source in the Torah. It cannot be from our own logic, it cannot be from our own will, it must have a Torah source. So, to clarify this very, very big confusion, we've addressed this in shiurim before, but we need to make a special shiur just for this, to make sure that none of us ever make this mistake and think that something is right when it's really incorrect.

1:20We go back to something that was written nearly 2,000 years ago, which is the Gemara. It's the critical part of the Oral Torah, all of which we received from Har Sinai 3,300 years ago. So, this is not something that some rabbis wrote just because they felt like it, were bored, or had nothing to do. No, all of the knowledge that we have in the Torah SheBaal Peh is information we got from Moshe Rabbeinu from Har Sinai. We weren't allowed to put it into writing; that's why it's called Torah SheBaal Peh. We go back to something that was written nearly 2,000 years ago, which is the Gemara. It's the critical part of the Oral Torah, all of which we received from Mount Sinai 3,300 years ago. So this is not something that some rabbis wrote just because they felt like it, or because they were bored and had nothing to do. No, all of the knowledge that we have in the Oral Torah is information we received from Moshe Rabbeinu at Mount Sinai. We weren't allowed to put it in writing; that's why it's called the Oral Torah. for a little over almost 2,000 years. But when Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi, also known as Rabbi, saw that the Oral Torah, our memory is little by little disappearing and our understanding of the Oral Torah is little by little disappearing, they decreed that we are allowed to write the Oral Torah. So the Oral Torah, the critical part of it is the Gemara. And we go to the tractate of Masechet Bava Metzia. The tractate of Bava Metzia, page 33, side A. In this Gemara, it says there are three rabbis, three of our sages, who answer the question of who is a rabbi. Because, again, remember, in the Gemara, anyone that's mentioned by name is at a level where they could literally have the Kedushah, the holiness, to revive the dead. These are not just your ordinary rabbis who have learned for a few years in a yeshiva and now lead a kehillah (community) of 30 people. The individuals mentioned specifically by name in the Gemara are among the holiest of holy people in our history and in the world itself. As the Tanaim and Amoraim, the teaching says, "Who is your rabbi?"

2:47the G-d-given power to revive the dead. These are not just your ordinary rabbis who have learned for a few years in a yeshiva and now lead a kehillah of 30 people. The people mentioned specifically by name in the Gemara are the holiest of holy individuals in our history and in the world itself. So says Tanu Rabbanan in a beraisa: Who is your rabbi? So Rabbi Meir says, it is the one who taught you Divrei Chochmah, the one who imparted upon you the most sophisticated part of the Torah, which is the Gemara itself, and not the one who taught you the Mishnah, or the one who taught you the Chumash, which is the written Torah. These are simpler to understand and are not as sophisticated as the Gemara. Therefore, if among ten rabbis, one specific rabbi is the one who taught you your knowledge in Gemara, he is considered your rabbi. Then Rabbi Yehuda says, no, it's the rabbi that taught you most of your knowledge. Not just taught you knowledge, but most of the knowledge you possess. Let's say, for example, someone has, out of 100% of his knowledge that he has learned, he's learned it from, let's say, 10 rabbis, but 40% was from one rabbi, and 60% is spread around the other nine. So obviously, the rabbi that taught him most of this knowledge is considered his rabbi.

4:17But then Rabbi Yossi says, no. So the halacha is finalized with Rabbi Yossi; he says, no, even someone that taught him a single Mishnah, a single halacha in Torah, he's his rabbi. Where is his source? Nothing less than King David himself, one of the holiest people that ever lived. The fourth leg in the chair of Kedusha for Hashem is King David, and we learn this lesson from him. How do we learn this lesson? From the story between King David and his arch-nemesis named Achitofel. Achitofel was a very, very wicked man that tried to... kill King David and become the next king. But King David called him, he called him, "my rabbi, my champion, the source of my knowledge." How could you call your arch nemesis such a name? Why? Because King David says, "He taught me two things in Torah I didn't know."

5:34He's a rabbi, and even though he was an enemy, he still considered him a rabbi. Of course, this is a teaching not only from the sages but one that tracks all the way back to King David himself, three thousand years ago. So, what is the bottom line of all of this? Here we learn that to be a rabbi... the people that are called rabbis in the Gemara are chachamim (sages), We're not like rabbis today that just passed a test and are able to, you know, be the chazan in their cantorate or maybe give a shiur once a week to a few people that come. The rabbis in the Gemara were the equivalent of today's poskim, which are the ones that dictate the laws. They were not just, you know, rabbis of a kehillah. The rabbis of the Gemara were the leaders of the generation.

6:35So, to have rabbinical semicha, when it's referred to in the Gemara and the Oral Torah, they are talking about someone who is at the highest level in the entire generation, not just someone who has learned Torah for the last few years, and okay, we want to call him Rabbi to give him some respect. No. so, who's the rabbi? What do we learn from this? It's the one that teaches Torah. If you teach Torah, you are officially a rabbi. Whether you pass a test or you don't pass a test is irrelevant. If you teach Torah, you're officially a rabbi, but not just anyone that teaches Torah. can't be what if somebody teaches Torah, but on the side he's, uh, sleeping with women that are not allowed to him. On the side, he's the most prideful person on earth. On the side, he tells people you're allowed to drive on Shabbat to Bet Knesset. What about those people? For here, we have to understand these are the fake people that we have today. Unfortunately, there are some.

7:39Hashem, there are a lot of righteous rabbis in the world, but unfortunately, there are also many fake ones who tell people they can do things that are against the Torah. Here we go to another Gemara, Masechet Eruvin, page 45a. The Torah that is present in this person who is prideful is essentially making his own laws with his nose in the sky. his Torah is not from heaven. His Torah, he just learned it like a history book. You're not allowed to learn his Torah. If someone calls himself a rabbi, or calls himself whatever he wants to call himself, but he's full of pride, he's full of nonsense, and he does not have Yirat Shamayim, not only are you not allowed to learn his Torah, it's a sin to learn his Torah. If a person doesn't have Yirat Shamayim, his Torah becomes meaningless in the eyes of Hashem. If someone does not have integrity, you are not allowed to learn his Torah because his Torah is disgusting to Hashem. So now it's not just anyone who passed the test; we already learned that.

8:54It's not just anyone that teaches Torah. We just learned that. First of all, the test is only relevant if you have a specific need for it. So if you want to become a shochet, a ritual slaughterer, you have to pass a test. If you want to be a rabbi that officiates marriages, that's a specific test you have to pass. It's a specific semicha you need to have in order to function in that capacity. To do that, you must be an expert in it. However, if it's for teaching purposes, then you don't need to have a semicha for teaching. You need to learn. You have to pass a test. If you want to be a rabbi who performs weddings, there's a specific test you have to take. It's a specific semicha you need to have in order to function in that capacity, and you have to be an expert in it. But if it's for teaching purposes, then you don't need to have semicha for teaching purposes. You need to learn. But if you're teaching, but your teaching is coming from a wrong place, where you're teaching things that are not in the Torah, or you have bad middot, bad character traits, and you're not a person with integrity, then not only are your students not allowed to learn from you, but learning from that rabbi, from that rasha, that wicked person, is actually a sin. So this is why we all have to be very, very careful about who we learn from.

9:59who we call a rabbi and who we don't, last but not least This is, again, another proof in our generation of the fact that this whole concept of needing semicha doesn't make someone a rabbi. You need look no further than the two giants of the last several generations—may their merit protect us—namely, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef and Rabbi Yosef Shalom Elyashiv, as well as many others. However, those two are the ones that I specifically mentioned in an article addressing this question in the past. Rav Ovadia Yosef, everyone knows he was one of the gedolei hador, a giant of the generation. These individuals were not just rabbis but were the highest level of judges in our generation. Unfortunately, many don't know that neither he nor these other gedolim ever took a formal rabbinical test or received the official semicha.

11:00that is constantly referred to today as the semicha that makes the rabbi. But if you look them up, they do have a semicha. So what is this semicha that they have? The semicha that they have, the certificate they have, is called Gaon Mukkar. a known genius. Once someone is recognized as a genius in Torah, where they know the Torah by heart, it means they have mastered all aspects. They know the Written Torah, all the Poskim, all the Midrashim; they know all of these things. They're just geniuses, and they obviously live accordingly. then they don't need to pass a test to show anyone anything. It's already a known thing amongst the community that these people are very, very special, holy people, and they were not only given the semicha of rabbis, but they were given the semicha of being Dayanim, the heads of our generation. So this is not only a source from the Gemara that we know that the semicha of today does not make somebody a rabbi. Somebody can pass the test 50 times, but if they don't have yirat Shamayim (fear of Heaven), then what is the purpose of that semicha?

12:03They don't have fear of the Almighty. Their Torah is disgusting. Their Torah is not holy. You're not allowed to learn it. They tell you to drive on Shabbat to Beit Knesset. You're not allowed to learn from them. They tell you it's okay for a man to be with a man, a woman to be with a woman. Their Torah is disgusting. They're heretics. They tell you to do things. It's okay to eat non-kosher once in a while. It's okay to do things that are against the Torah. You're never allowed to learn from those people. They're not rabbis. They're nothing. They're zeros. But... If someone is teaching Torah and is mamash contributing his time and his whole livelihood to teaching people Torah, he's a rabbi. He doesn't need a test. If he's at such a level that he not only has the fear of Hashem and he's teaching Torah, and he's putting his life on the line all the way to the point that he gets to a point where he knows the entire Torah, or a huge part of it by heart, and he lives it and he teaches it, and he does all of these things to the point where it's recognizable that he's a gaon, that he's a gaon mukar, no smicha is ever needed for such a person, as we learned from Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, Zecher Tzadik Livracha, and Rabbi Eliashiv. So again, before we jump to the conclusion of who's a rabbi, where's your smicha, do you have smicha, do you not have smicha, none of that stuff matters. What matters is... ...or a huge part of it by heart, and he lives and teaches and does all of these things to the point where it's recognizable that he's a gaon, that he's a gaon muvhak. No smicha is ever needed for such a person, as we learned from Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, Zecher Tzadik Livracha, and Rabbi Elyashiv. So again, before we jump to conclusions about who is a rabbi, where is your smicha, do you have smicha, or do you not have smicha? None of that stuff matters. What matters is...

13:29who are you, how you behave, and what is your source of knowledge? If your source of knowledge is the Torah, and you're teaching it just as Hashem said it, and not from your own logic, then rabbi, you're a phenomenal rabbi. If you're sacrificing your life to save Jews around the world, to teach them and to bring them back to Hashem, our Gemara, our sages tell us you're as much of a rabbi as the biggest rabbis in history. But if you have all the degrees in the world, but you're teaching things that are against Hashem or you're not teaching things that you know could be used to save souls, then you are not fulfilling the true role of a rabbi. Rabbi, you're a phenomenal Rabbi if you're sacrificing your life to save Jews around the world, to teach them, and to bring them back to Hashem. Our Gemara, our Sages tell us, you're as much of a Rabbi as the biggest Rabbis in history. But if you have all the degrees in the world, but you're teaching things that are against Hashem, or you're not teaching things that you know could be used to save souls... worthless. So, this is a very, very important question to know and understand. The key here is that everything must have a Biblical source; everything must come from the Torah. Even the answer to this very confusing question was asked a few thousand years ago. And Baruch Hashem,

14:38Here's your answer. May Hashem continue to bless all of you. May you all have a Shabbat Shalom Mevorach. And I look forward to speaking to all of you soon. Kol Tov.