Divine Knowledge In The Torah: HOW MANY STARS & AGE OF UNIVERSE (8 minutes)

1:41So if you see the remnants of 10 explosions, that means that this galaxy is approximately 260 years old. One of the things that they don't tell you is that in our own galaxy, scientists are estimating that there were fewer than 250 explosions. Which, if you do the math, makes the world somewhere in the neighborhood of 6,000 years old. which is very, very close to what Am Yisrael has been saying for 6,000 years. Another thing that they don't tell you is that NASA has spent close to 900 billion dollars on different programs to discover different things about the stars, the galaxy, and the sun.

3:04One of the things that they've tried to identify is exactly how many stars we have in the universe. In 1994, NASA came out, connected a supercomputer to a very high-end telescope, and they did a calculation, an estimate of how many stars there are in the universe. According to their estimate, there are 10 to the 20th power, which is 10 with 20 zeros after it, approximately, in stars. In the year 2004, 10 years later, a university in Australia came out with a slightly smaller number, and they said, no, it's not 10 to the 20th power; it's actually 10 to the 18th power. Now, they could have saved all this money because, in Gemara Masechet Berachot, page 32, we have the exact number. Now, most people, when they read this Gemara, don't usually think about stars. So I'll read this Gemara to you, and you tell me what you think. The story goes where, after Am Yisrael suffered from the destruction of the Beit Hamikdash, they screamed to Hashem, and they said to Hashem, "Hashem, even a husband..."

4:22that divorces his wife. Still, if you ask him years later, do you remember the wife that you divorced? He says, yeah, I remember her. But you have destroyed our house, you destroyed your house, and we feel like you've left us. That's what Am Yisrael says. The fact is that although we were there for the destruction, we did not mention it. Similar to us today, we always complain to Hashem, but we don't look at ourselves in the mirror. Why would Hashem give me anything good if I'm not keeping Shabbat, not observing Taharat HaMishpacha, not keeping Kosher, not following any laws? The last mitzvah I kept was giving a dollar to a homeless person. Before that, I went to the Beit Knesset once last year. So, we must give Hashem a reason. In the Gemara, Hashem answered them; they had more merits than we do. The Holy One, blessed is He, responded to her, meaning He's calling His daughter: "My daughter, 12 constellations that I created in the firmament, and above each and every constellation, I created 30 army commanders. And about each and every army commander, I created 30 legions. And about each and every legion, I created 30 ra'aton."

5:34And about each and every rakatan, I created 30 karkon. And about each and every karkon, I created 30 gastera. And about each and every gastera, I suspended in the firmament, meaning in the sky. I'll explain all of this in a second. I suspended in the firmament 3.65 million stars, corresponding to the days of the solar year. And all of them I created only for your sake. And you say that you've forsaken me and you've forgotten me. It says I created all of this for you—all of these stars. But before it gives you 3.65 million stars, which the actual number in the Gemara is 365,000 times 10,000. So before it gives you this number, it gives you all these obscure terms, and it is computed as 12 times 30, times 30, times 30, times 30, times 3.65 million. What is this referring to? Chazal (Our Sages, of blessed memory) explain that this is actually the calculated number of stars. The 12 represents the 12 partitions of the universe, which we refer to as the mazalot or the zodiac constellations. There are 12 constellations in total.

6:56And then he says each one of these constellations has 30 parts. And each one of those 30 parts has another 30 parts, and he gives them a name. Furthermore, each one of those 30 parts has 30 parts. In essence, each one of these is a number of stars. The calculation is 12 times 30 times 30 times 30 times 30 times 3.65 million. This results in a number, which is 1,064,340 followed by 12 zeros. The number is approximately 10 to the 18th power. So finally, they caught up to us. Finally, they caught up to the Gemara in Masechet Berachot, page 32. They could have saved all this money, maybe given some tzedakah. We live and learn. They wouldn't get the grant, Chazak u'Baruch, that's what it is.