Disciples of Avraham vs Disciples of Bilaam

0:01The disciples of Avraham enjoy the fruits of their deeds in this world and inherit Olam HaBa, the world to come. But the disciples of Bilaam HaRasha, they inherit Gehinom and they descend into the well of destruction as it says in the Pasuk in Tehillim. And You, O God, shall lower them into the well of destruction. Men of bloodshed and deceit shall not live out half their days, but as for me, I will trust in You. Another question, Another question: how is it that the donkey, Daton, saw the angel, but Bilaam didn't see the angel? Why not? Why didn't Bilaam see the angel originally until after the fact? The simple part of the answer, rabotai, is the same thing as we mentioned in the Gemara. A person does not see the obligation in himself. He sees everybody else's mistakes.

1:18But for himself, he only sees the good things. You tell somebody, "Listen, you know, really, you have to work on your middot." "Yeah, but you know what kind of chesed I do? But you know what kind of this I do? You know how much tzedakah I gave? You know, I learned yesterday." He mentions all the good things that he does. "I'm not asking you about, I'm not saying you're not doing good things." I'm not saying you're not doing good things; I'm just saying you should work on such and such. Yeah, but you know how I do this and you know how I do that. I'm not saying you're not doing it; I'm just telling you that you should work on these one, two, three things, these few things. No, but you know how I do this—this is a typical person. Why? Because the person does not want to address the negativity in himself, because addressing the negativity hurts. Bothers him, that means that in reality, he's not all that. In reality, she's not as much of a tzaddekes as she thought she was. Yeah, but you know how much I read Tehillim every day. Yes, you read Tehillim, but you tell everybody you read Tehillim. Yes, you invite guests, but it's only because you want to show them how good of a cook you are.

2:27Yes, you do a few good things, but you don't stop saying Lashon Hara. I'm not saying you don't do good, you do good things. I'm just saying stop the bad too. People think that they can do bad because they do enough good to fix it. And that is one of the first differences between the students of Bilam and the students of Avraham. The Mishnah here in Avot tells us that there are three Middot that the students of Avraham have, and that is they have a good eye, a humble spirit, and an undemanding soul, whereas the Talmidim of Bilaam HaRasha have an evil eye, an arrogant spirit, and a greedy soul. Horrible, horrible people. This would have been enough had the Mishnah ended here. But the Mishnah continues and it says, "Talmidav shel Avraham Avinu ochlin ba'olam hazeh, v'nokhalin ha'olam haba shene'emar, 'la'hanchil ohavai yesh ve'otzrotayhem amaleh'; aval talmidav shel Bilam ha'rasha yorshim Gehenom, v'yordim le'be'er shachat shene'emar, 'v'ata Elohim toridem le'be'er shachat anshei damim u'mirmah lo yechetsu yemeihem, v'ani evtach bach.'"

3:36Talmidav shel Avraham Avinu ochlin ba'olam hazeh v'nochalin ha'olam haba, shene'emar: la'anchil ohavai yesh v'otzrotaihem amaleh, aval talmidav shel Bilam ha'rasha yorshim gehinom v'yordim le'be'er shachat, shene'emar: v'ata Elohim toridem le've'er shachat, anshei damim u'mirmah lo yechetzu yemeihem, v'ani evtach bach. So it says, after we've learned the three middot that each one of them has that's the opposite, still the Mishnah repeats it again and says, yeah, but what's the difference? What's the difference between the two? We just went over it. One has a good eye, the other one has an evil eye. One is humble, the other one is arrogant. Isn't that enough? Why are you asking again? It gives more details. It says, How are the disciples of Avraham Avinu different from the disciples of Bilaam? Now we're not talking about Avraham or Bilaam, we're talking about the disciples. The disciples of Avraham enjoy the fruits of their deeds in this world and inherit Olam HaBa, the world to come. And it says in Proverbs, "to those who love me to inherit an everlasting possession," which means the world to come, and "I will fill their storehouses," which means the reward in this world. But the disciples of Bilaam HaRasha, they inherit Gehinom, and they descend into the well of destruction, as it says in the Pasuk in Tehillim, "and You, O God, shall lower them into the well of destruction. Men of bloodshed and deceit shall not live out half their days, but as for me, I will trust in You." So first and foremost...

4:53which means the World to Come, and I will fill their storehouses, which means the reward in this world. But the disciples of Bilaam HaRasha, they inherit Gehinom, and they descend into the well of destruction, as it says in the pasuk in Tehillim, "And You, O God, shall lower them into the well of destruction. Men of bloodshed and deceit shall not live out half their days, but as for me, I will trust in You." So first and foremost, we see something very unusual. The Mishnah gives us details of the differences, the clear differences between the two, where they literally have the opposite middot. Good eye, evil eye, humble, arrogant, undemanding soul, a person that's greedy. But yet it says, what's the difference? What's the difference? What's the secret here, Rabotai? The secret here that the Mishnah is trying to teach us is that there are many disciples of Bilam that look exactly like the disciples of Avraham. Again, there are many disciples of Bilam, Resha'im,

6:16But if you look at them from the outside, wow, Avraham, Yitzchak, Yaakov, Moshe, Aharon HaRasha. Why? It's not the same one. It's not Aharon HaTzadik. It's not Aharon HaKohen. Looks like him though. He looks like him. Meaning that the Mishnah here is telling us looks can be deceiving. Bilaam was 100% convinced he was a Tzadik. We saw it from the Pesukim. He saw nothing wrong with his actions. He saw nothing wrong with the fact that he's going to curse Hashem's firstborn child. Am Yisrael saw nothing wrong with the fact that he was married to a donkey. He saw nothing wrong with the fact that he was considered a shein in every way, shape, or form, that he was the most materialistic person that ever lived. He saw nothing wrong with it; in fact, he saw the opposite. He said, "Me? I'm a tzaddik. I'm a prophet. I talk to God. Look at the power of my mouth as I talk to God."

7:23So Hashem says, ah, you think because you talk to me, that makes you a tzaddik? Even your donkey is going to talk to me. That doesn't make the donkey a tzaddik. The donkey is going to talk to me. Does it make it a tzaddik? No. Hashem showed us that just because somebody was gifted certain things, it doesn't mean anything. Hashem can give those same things to anyone. You gave the present of prophecy to Bilam to use it for good. He used it for bad, so He showed him, "Don't think that the gift that I gave you automatically makes you good. Because I gave the same gift to your donkey. Even a donkey can talk to Me." Sometimes a person thinks that just because he looks a certain way or his father's a rabbi or his uncle's a rabbi or his great-great-great-great-grandfather's the Rambam or something like that. By the way, you should know anyone that's Jewish from birth is related to some big rabbi. Why? Because we're all related originally to one of the Shevatim, one of the twelve tribes, and...

8:37it could be you, it could be Binyamin yourself, it could be that all of us are related to someone huge, so don't make it a big deal. "Oh, my grandfather wrote a book." Okay, a lot of people’s grandfathers wrote books. My great-grandfather also went to Mount Sinai. Does that make me anything? No, it doesn't. A person will live or die by his own actions. So Bilaam, unfortunately for him, did not take this to heart, and he thought that because Hashem gave him this gift, he could do whatever he wanted. He could do whatever he wanted to such an extent that he could go after every desire that he had. Because sometimes Hashem gives people chokhmah, He gives them wisdom. They go, "Yeah, I don't have to study as much as you." I only have to study a half-hour a day. You have to study 3, 4, 5, 6, or 7 hours. Why? Because I remember everything. I have a photographic memory. I only have to study a half-hour, and I remember more than you. And as we talked about in previous shiurim, sometimes Hashem gives this special gift to people of memory. Or of some type of chochmah. They're just smarter. They have a higher IQ than other people.

9:56But if those people don't use that special gift the right way, Hashem will take it away. They may continue having that great memory, but if they don't develop good studying skills, then what ends up happening is that all they do is spend their time showing off to people that they can remember a phone book. There was one guy I remember in a lecture by Rav Mizrachi. He told a story about him. He met him one time. There was a guy that was gifted with a photographic memory that literally could remember things better than a computer. And the guy remembered an entire phone book—all the numbers, all the addresses, all the phone numbers of every single person in an entire phone book. Now that's cool when you're 15 years old, and you're in public school, and you want to impress the girls or something. But when you're 50 years old, 60 years old, you're already 50% of the way, if not more, on your way out of this world, and you have nothing to show for it, what are you going to go up to Shamayim and say, "Hey, Hashem, I remember the phone book. By the way, Hashem, can you get me to Gan Eden?" Why? "I remember the phone book." Hashem says, "I gave you a memory so you could remember the entire Torah. You remember a phone book."

11:15I gave you a gift, and not only did you not use the gift, you used it against me. I gave you money, and you went gambling with it. I gave you money, and you went and bought drugs with it. I gave you a wife, and what did you do? You cheated on her. Why? Well, enough of one wife. You want a second one too. I gave you kids, and you didn't take them to yeshiva. You took them to public school. Why? Ah, yeshiva is too expensive. I gave you all these gifts, and what did you do? You used them against me. So, Hashem gives all of us gifts. For that, we're supposed to say thank you. But saying thank you in words is only 10% of the battle. The other 90% are saying "thank you" in actions, doing something about it.