How To Pick Your Rabbi? - MUSSAR Iggeret HaRAMBAN (20)

0:15Again, a big mazal tov for Elhanan and Michal. HaKadosh Baruch Hu, Yivarech Otchem, Bekol Mikol Kol, Shanim Rabot, Be'ezrat Hashem, Hatzlacha Rabah. HaKadosh Baruch Hu Many cute little kids, tzaddikim and tzadkaniyot, will come to you in your life, b'Ezrat Hashem. Everybody laughs when I say many kids. What do you guys want, one kid and a dog? Everybody laughs when I say many kids. What do you guys want, two puppies? That's what we have, Am Yisrael has kids, b'Ezrat Hashem. So, b'Ezrat Hashem, you have a lot of bracha, a lot of hatzlacha. Chaim arukim, shlemim, edayim Torah, mitzvot, b'gemilut chasadim. Also, this year will be a refuah shlema for Avi Mori, David Ben-Asria, and my dear mother, Doris Bat-Jorah. Also, for refuah shlema for Levana Bat-Sara, Sara Bat-Levana, Rav Ephraim Ben-Shulamit, Rabbanit Sara Bat-Anat,

1:40And all of Am Yisrael will have, so as you guys know, it's been in the news for anyone that hasn't been sleeping under a rock that, unfortunately, again, the Arabs are using the excuse of us, you know, killing a terrorist as the permission for them to start shooting missiles at innocent civilians and been in the news for anyone that hasn't been sleeping under a rock that, unfortunately, again, the Arabs are using the excuse of us, you know, killing a terrorist as permission for them to start shooting missiles at innocent civilians and Yesterday, today, they started shooting dozens of missiles into civilian areas. There was a video that went around that shows the Hashgacha Pratit that a few people had where they were driving on a highway and, you know, like normal driving. I'm sure they were going to work or to something important. And just a couple of cars,

3:06driving, and literally both of them are right next to each other. Less than half a second after they just passed a certain point, two missiles hit that spot. You see a huge explosion right exactly where they were literally half a second ago—less than half a second. It was a miracle beyond your imagination. You see this in real life. Stupid people who are blind spiritually will say, "Ah, they got lucky." But anyone who understands how HaKadosh Baruch Hu runs His world, at least to the extent that He explained to us in His Torah, will see that no matter what the Arabs want to do, there is a time for every single person. No one can ever take a person's life if Hashem did not decree it. No one could ever take a penny out of your pocket unless Hashem decreed it. Unless Hashem is the one that signed off, saying, take his money. Take, chas v'shalom, his life. Take this. No one is ever going to take anything from you unless HaKadosh Baruch Hu authorized it. Now, there is a very important principle that we'll learn a little bit more about today. We talked about it during the Shema Berachot.

4:32which is the Gemara in Masechet Shabbat, page 32, says that in Heaven it's decided to give the merit to someone who has merit and the obligation to someone who has an obligation. What does it really mean? Means that in Shamayim, HaKadosh Baruch Hu decides that if, chas v'shalom, somebody deserves to die, then He's only going to allow that person to be killed by somebody who wants to kill. Meaning, the guy that killed him wanted to kill somebody, and the guy that died deserved to die, and That's how it works. He deserved the bad. He deserved to do the bad. That's because that's what he wanted. On the other hand, if somebody wants to do a really big mitzvah, he wants to write a $10 million check to B'ezrat Hashem so we could open some yeshivot here to help Florida do teshuva and, B'ezrat Hashem, many other places. Not just any rich person can do this.

5:55Because somebody has money doesn't mean anything. They also have to have the merit. Money they have, merit is questionable. Hashem knows who has and who doesn't have merit. Meaning that whoever is the one that sends, goes on a PayPal and sends $120, sends $200, sends $2,000, whatever they're sending to B'ezrat Hashem, it also has to accompany merit that they have before they press the go button. Because had they not had the merit and... But they still wanted to give. They would just give to a Reform shul. They would give. They want to give. They have money. They have to give. So they have the money. Hashem gave them the money. And they want to give. But they don't have the merit to actually help people do teshuva. So what is Hashem going to do? He's going to have them donate to this year's Hanukkah feast. Feed the entire community with sufganiyot. Get fatter. So they'll donate $15,000 for that party. Are they going to go to Olam HaBa for that? No.

6:58Maybe a few people can say thank you for the doughnut, but that's it. Meaning that the guy who donates has to have merit. The guy who kills also has to have the obligation. Now, the people that today were videotaped for us to see that Hashem saved their lives obviously had a merit. Not only to live, but also for other people to benefit from seeing this powerful miracle in open daylight. But there's a bigger question. How come Klal Yisrael is b'teshuvah? How come Klal Yisrael right now has an obligation, in essence, because what's happening now, technically according to Shamayim... We deserve to get 50 missiles shot at us, 100 missiles shot at us, by these evil terrorists. They want to shoot. But that doesn't mean that Hashem is going to allow them. If Hashem simply allowed them to do whatever they want, they would shoot missiles every single day. They have a never-ending supply. But He doesn't allow them to do it every day. How come He allowed them to today? Now we don't know cheshbonot of Shamayim, but I could just give you some things, or one thing really, that

8:21Seems to my little mind logical. A day before the missiles were shot, the government in Tel Aviv, the officials in Tel Aviv passed the law. You are now, from now on, allowed to have public transportation on Shabbat, and Until now, since they founded the modern Israel in 1948, there was no public transportation anywhere in Eretz Yisrael. But a couple of days ago, Tel Aviv says, no, no, no, this is not for us. We're modern, we're liberal, we're homosexual, we're a lot of things. We want to drive on Shabbat and you're not going to tell us what to do. Okay, you're not going to tell us what to do. They allowed public transportation this Shabbat, this Shabbat. First time. A day later, missiles come to Eretz Yisrael. You didn't want to give people a break from working on Shabbat.

9:27Now, today, people were forced to not work. Why? Because they're scared of the missiles. They're scared of missiles. Now, although we don't know for sure why Hashem does what He does, the Gemara does tell us in a few different places that we learn even from David HaMelech that you are supposed to use your mind to see what's happening in the creation and do some cheshbon nefesh. What did I do in order to deserve this? What did we do in order to get this? We saw it in the shiur this week. Chachamim, you know, went into a town. They saw that the town is suffering because the rats were eating all the food. The Chacham, Rabbi Pinchas Ben Yair, says, okay, it's because you guys are asking why you're suffering. I'll find out for you. Oh, it's because you're not giving ma'aser. You're not giving ma'aser. Your money is not protected. If your money is not protected, the rats are being given the permission to eat all of your parnasa.

10:28Why did they have the merit to have such a gadol hador come to them and tell them, "Listen, this is the reason why you're losing all your money from the rats eating it"? How come this Rabbi Pinchas Ben Yair doesn't come to, you know, Aventura over here and tell me why they lost money in the stock market? It's not because he's not alive. It's because we don't have the merit. Why? Because we didn't ask, "Why did we lose the money?" Town, although they lost money, they asked why, meaning they had a little bit of emet in them. That's some emet in them. They're trying to find out, "Why is Hashem doing this to us?" If you seek the truth, Hashem will send you the answer. This, Abotai HaKedoshim, is critical for every single Jew, whether you're a civilian or a rabbi or whatever you are. To do hisbonenus, to do self-accounting, is critical for each and every single one of us. Because, as we see right now, there are a lot of problems in the world. But we're seeing that the problems are unlike anything we've seen for a long time. Right now, the education department of the Jewish people is under attack. We thought we had religious freedom in America until last year.

11:47New York, they're now trying to pass a law which is going back and forth in court. The government in New York is trying to force all of the yeshivot, all of them, to teach their kids seven hours of secular studies. That's actually more secular studies than public school. I They're forcing the yeshivot to teach the kids seven hours of secular studies, and maybe you'll have an hour left in a day. Okay, you can teach them Torah for an hour. Meaning you're going to learn more secular studies in a yeshiva than in public school in California. New curriculum includes in the education in public school, private school, and these different places. The new curriculum includes anti-Semitic material, meaning your kid goes to school innocent at 9, 10, 11 years old. He loves everybody the same. You know, little kids like everybody unless they're taught not to like everybody. But he comes to school, 10 years old, innocent. He loves everybody. He comes back a Nazi. This is California.

13:02Unfortunately, if people don't understand why this is happening from Heaven, it's only a matter of time before these things will be nationwide. In England, the rule is you must teach your kids about homosexuality and same-sex marriage. LGBT, that's the shame in yeshivot. Whoever doesn’t teach it goes to jail. Teachers are going to go to jail for not teaching the same thing in New York. That’s what the government said in England: if you don't teach the kids about that, it’s okay, and it’s good. If you don’t teach everything about LGBT, you go to prison. One of the former Dayanim came out a couple of days ago and said this is yehareg v'al ya'avor. It's better all of the rabbis kill themselves, all the parents kill themselves, all of the Jews in England kill themselves, than allow the kids to be taught about LGBT and homosexuality and all that garbage. Better they die. It's yehareg v'al ya'avor. But nonetheless, chazak u'baruch that he said it; he's the only one that's actually an ish emet that actually stood up and said something.

14:19Publicly, but unfortunately, it's not enough. Why does the community have to follow? The community doesn't follow. One guy can't do anything, even if he's a big rabbi; he can't do nothing. But we see again, what do the English people care about the yeshiva? What do the New Yorkers care about the yeshiva? What do I care? So, there's 19 million people that live in New York. Okay, so let's say a million, two million of them are Jews, and... That's nothing. It's 10%. Don't worry about the other 90%. It's private school anyway. You don't want to give them any money? Don't give them any money, but don't force their education. We see, Rabotai Ikarim, everybody that's trying to fight this—the legal battles, hiring a bunch of lawyers, doing all types of campaigns, you know, sign here, sign here to support—that's all good and great and wonderful, but it's not going to help. Why? Because we see, Rabotai HaKedoshim, that this is a Gezeira from Shamayim. This is happening from Shamayim because it's happening in the UK. It's happening in California. It's happening in New York. It's happening in Eretz Yisrael. It's happening where? In the places where you have the most amount of Jews. The most amount of yeshivot. Meaning this is a Gezeira against the yeshiva system.

15:45Anyone's gonna say, "Oh, yeah, it's just like the times of the Beit HaMikdash. You know, the Greeks didn't want us." No, no, my friend. It's not the same. You know why it's not the same? In those days, they didn't kick anybody out of yeshiva just because you didn't have money. In those days, they didn't reject you just because you were Sephardi or Ashkenazi or Italian or this one or that one. You weren't wearing the same hat. In those days, they didn't kick anybody out. Today they do. This, Rabotai HaKerim... an epidemic that I could also see that we failed miserably in addressing. So he's addressing it. He says, you're gonna send all of these young Jewish boys to public school? I'll bring the public school to you. I had a little 13-year-old kid come to the program two, three months ago, four months ago. Kept to every single shiur. Unfortunately, you don't see him anymore. I But he was coming to every shiur before me. He wanted to stay later than me. He would ask questions. Amazing kid. I told him, "What yeshiva do you go to?" He goes, "No, I go to public school." I said, "Hashem, we got to get you out." He goes, "Yeah, that's what I want to talk to you about. Can you help me go to yeshiva?" I said, "Absolutely. I hope you go to yeshiva. Where do you want to go?" He tells me the school. I said, "No problem. I'll call the teacher. Go apply there. Go. Why not? He studies. Smart kid. This, that."

17:14They go, apply, rejected. Why rejected? The kid's in public school. He's in a place where they're going to turn him into a goy. Why? Oh, you know, he's not up to speed. He's not up to level. You know, he's already 13 years old. He doesn't know as much as our boys over here. Maybe you should send him to a different school. You're the school that he wants to go to. The whole point of having a teacher is that the teacher brings them up to speed. If you're not going to bring the kids up to speed, why are you a teacher? Go be a janitor. Go sell cookies door to door. You can't reject a kid for wanting to go to yeshiva. You have no permission from the Torah to do this. Talked to the guy. He goes, "Ah, listen, you know what? I get you. I understand you." I said, "You know, this kid's gonna go to public school, he's gonna marry goyim." "Yeah, you realize this is on you?" "Okay, okay, listen. Let's wait for the rabbi that deals with that grade to come back and then he'll deal with it." "So he's gonna come back tomorrow?" "No, no, he's coming back in a month." I said, "Wait, you expect this poor little 13-year-old kid to just sit on ice, sit on nothing, and wait for you for a month?"

18:29Why can't you? You're the principal. Why can't you just say yes now? You're the principal. You're the ba'al habayit. What difference does it make what this other guy says, yes or no? You're a teacher. No, let's just wait. Don't worry, it's going to be... Guess what? Not only did the kid not get accepted anyway, not only did they not call, but when they called, they got rejected anyway. Unfortunately, the kid went back, and unfortunately, as you can see, he doesn't come to the shiurim anymore. Why? He was so disgusted. The so-called rabbis that are running the system. He says if this is the religious leaders, I don't want to be part of this religion, and I don't blame this kid. Unfortunately, I don't know where he lives; if I did, I'd go to his house and beg him to come back. But that's what happens. So now what happens is when these people send these young boys and girls to public school, HaKadosh Baruch Hu is now sending the public school to us. You don't care that they're gonna be learning a bunch of things that are against the Torah? Okay, so I'm gonna also make them learn against Judaism too, which means you. I'm gonna teach you a bunch of antisemitism. I'm gonna teach them to hate Jews. Why? Because you hate them by rejecting them.

19:44Teach them that you came from a monkey because that's what you're saying—that a monkey and you are on the same level. Why? If a monkey came and applied to yeshiva, who would accept them? Nobody. A Jewish kid came to yeshiva, and they accepted them. No? Okay, so the same way you treated the kid—the Jewish preciousness, Am Yisrael's preciousness—am I treating him like a monkey? Okay, so I'm gonna teach our monkey business in your school seven hours a day. But I occur and when... When we made this shiur about Mirvis Harasha, the head rabbi from the UK, about how he made a book saying that we should be more accepting and tolerant and loving of homosexuals, people said, "Ah, come on, another war you're on. No, every day you have another war. Everybody's a rasha except your tzaddik." People thought I was just picking fights for no reason. What do you care? Let him write a book promoting homosexuality. Yeah, but he's the head rabbi. He's not supposed to promote homosexuality. It's against the Torah. Okay, so now what happens? Shortly later, the government of England agrees with the rabbi. They say, ah, you know what? We like your book about promoting homosexuality. We like it so much, now you have to teach about homosexuality in the yeshiva. Rachmana Litzlan.

21:11Better go to public school now, better go home, better go to the desert, go learn math from a scorpion. But this is what we have, this is the battalion. Now if you think the situation is going to get better by itself because you're going to vote a certain way or because you are going to, you know, say "Oh wow, too bad" and make a few comments on the internet that you're upset, if you think that's going to change anything... Sorry to break your heart, but it's not gonna do anything. The only thing that's going to beat this tumah that we have infesting the Jewish world is kedusha. We have to spread emet; we have to make sure that We sacrifice every single bit of ourselves, whether it's time, skill, money, effort, everything, to literally start saving neshamot because we're running out of time and the situation is getting much, much worse, faster than we can imagine. If these laws, any one of the things that I just told you, if any single one of them gets passed, even a single one, forget all of them, if any one of them gets passed...

22:26New York law gets approved, chas ve'shalom. California's approved, chas ve'shalom. The UK's approved, chas ve'shalom. Stuff that's going on in Israel gets approval, chas ve'shalom. That's the end of freedom of religion for the Jews. Because if it's okay in New York, it's coming to Florida. If it's coming to Florida, it's coming to Ohio. It's coming everywhere else, and... It's not just that the people in New York are going to suffer and then it will be okay. So let's send everybody else to a different community? No, no, my friends. Once it's okay in one place, it's like a virus. If they're going to allow anti-Semitic teachings in California, it's definitely coming to the rest of the world. California is the eighth-largest economy in the world. It's bigger than many countries. If they are permitting anti-Semitic material in educational systems, you seriously have a problem, and... So now, that means that we have to do something. Whoever has money, I always tell them, you better stop investing in stocks, stop investing in real estate, stop investing in a bunch of things that you can't really do very much with. Start investing in neshamot. Start doing something about it. Start helping people do teshuva.

23:50Person doesn't have money, has other skills. Start using those skills. But needless to say, start at least doing teshuva by fixing the upside-down ideology that you have. allowing yourself to be a partner to the sin. Sometimes by saying, "Wow, this is not such a bad idea to bring a missionary to a shul like Goldberg, our friend," and not saying anything—like pretty much none of the kehillah in Boca Raton said anything. I had people that I was friends with that said, "Listen, we agree with everything you're doing to stop these missionaries from coming to the synagogue," and I said, okay, so why don't you say something? No, no, you know, our kids go to school here, and you know, we live here. It's not gonna be comfortable to go to shul anymore. Nah. So I said, so wait, so a thousand families are being put in danger because this guy wants to bring a Catholic missionary to the synagogue. A thousand families are in danger, but you're just gonna stay quiet? He goes, yeah, I'm just not gonna go. I said, okay, you're smart enough not to go. What about the other 999 families?

25:07families. Hopefully, they don't go. Hopefully, they don't go. Hopefully, they don't go. Okay. The reason why communities get bad, evil rabbis is because those communities want them. They want the bad rabbis. Boca Raton community that we used to live in, they want Goldberg. They like Goldberg because Goldberg brings them all types of interesting heretics to their shul, like Shmuley Boteach and some guy that the entire slew of Gedolei HaDor put in cherem. Rav Steinman, Rav Ovadia, all the biggest Gedolei HaDor, about maybe 10 years ago, put one guy in cherem. because he wrote a book that's against the Torah in the name of the Torah. Torah against the Torah. They put him on a pedestal. Invited him to the shul. Dr. Ruth, a woman who made more Jewish men sin than probably anybody else in the last 2,000 years. They put her on a pedestal. The guy that started Open Orthodoxy.

26:33version of Reform, another version of Reform. Pedestal he comes to almost annually. All types of heretics come all the time. Meaning, who's funding all this stuff? The kehillah. When the guy Matthew, the Christian missionary, was coming, you think he's coming for free? He got $40,000. $40,000 fee to come for a Shabbaton to teach you about the purpose of life from Jesus’s perspective. Who paid for that? The kehillah paid for it. If this wasn't true, it would be funny. This is every week. You go on the website over there. Every week you see... group of clowns coming to give Shabbatons every week. There's another set of clowns every week. Who's paying for it? The kehillah. Now, some people in the kehillah are decent people. The decent people, the nice people, I met them; I had lunch with them, I had dinner with them, nice people. But no one wants to speak up.

27:53Even though those few are good people, unfortunately, if there's a decree, everybody gets judged the same. Even though there were a bunch of decent people in the world 2,000 years ago, the Gemara in Masechet Shabbat, pages 54, 55, and 56, gives several different examples. Says that even though there were some good people who learned Torah and fulfilled the Torah from Aleph to Tav, HaKadosh Baruch Hu, when He punished, He punished everybody the same. Why so? What's the point of keeping mitzvot? Am I going to be punished with the reshaim? He said no, no, no. Keeping mitzvot means you have to keep all of the mitzvot. And one of those mitzvot is you must rebuke your brother. You must speak up if you see a fire. You must speak up if you see that your rabbi is a heretic, a rasha. You have to do something about it. You can't continue supporting such a community. The stories that I'm getting from different communities around the world are just simply getting worse. And rabotai, it's because we deserve it. Because we want it. And for those of us that are saying, no, I don't want it. I didn't sign up for this.

29:09If you don't want it so bad, do something. Do something about it. Fire the rabbi. Hire a good one. Tell the rabbi you're ready to step up as a community. Shut off the parking lot in the Beit Knesset on Shabbat and Chagim. If anyone in the community has safek kashrut in a restaurant, shut down the place. Take away the kashrut. Something about it. They put us around. Yeah, that's a lot of headache, can't somebody else do it? Yeah, somebody else is doing it. His name is God, and He's doing it right now with different tools, though—antisemitism and the like. So many people ask this question. So, how do I know who is a good rabbi? How do I know who is a bad rabbi? How do I know how to pick a rabbi? What do I do? Okay, so the community is part of the problem. The rabbi is part of the problem. No one's innocent here. Okay, so if I want to get myself out of the trouble that I'm in, how do I do something about it? What do I do? And that's what we're going to learn a little bit today.

30:38The Ramban, alav haShalom, almost 800 years ago wrote us the Iggeret HaRamban, and each and every single week he tells us something very, very interesting. Last week, he talked about how you literally have nothing to be proud of, even if you know a lot of Torah. Meaning even if you technically are following all of the instructions, you're reading all of these wonderful books on the wall and more and... You still have nothing to be proud of. Why? Because that's what you were created for. You were created to read and follow all of these wonderful Torah books. You should be happy that you're following the instructions because you're fulfilling your purpose in life. But you should never look at yourself as better than anybody else. Why? Because you're following your instructions and they're not. You should feel bad for them, not that you're better. Feel bad for them and help them. Buy them a book maybe. Invite him to a shiur maybe. Give him a CD. Do something about it now that you possess the knowledge. Don't just hold it to yourself and say, "Oh, I know and you don't. Ha, ha, ha." What, do you think Hashem is going to be happy with you?

31:50The opposite. Gemara Masechet Avodah Zarah says someone that learns Torah but does not plan on teaching it to anybody—not his friends, not his colleagues, not his family, not his kids. He just wants to keep the Torah to himself. The Gemara says he's like somebody who doesn't have a God. Yeah, but he learns about God all day. He learns Torah all day. The Gemara says, no, no, no. He's learning philosophy. No, no, it's Gemara, Masechet this, Masechet that, all these Gemaras. No, no, no, my friend. If you're learning Torah, that means that you're learning the character traits of HaKadosh Baruch Hu. And the biggest, most amazing character trait that we're aware of is how Hashem gives, non-stop and never receives. So the whole point of the Torah is for us to learn these character traits of Hashem and emulate Him, be like Him. If you're learning about Hashem, but you're choosing not to be like Him, then either you don't believe in Him, or you disagree with Him, which is even crazier, or you simply are just not even paying attention. It's like reading a philosophy book—you could skip a few sentences here and there, no big deal. This, Rabotai, is a problem. And that's why the Gemara says someone who learns Torah without an intention to teach and influence the public is like someone who does not have a God. And not everybody has a speaking ability, but everybody has a teaching ability.

33:11Meaning that sometimes you don't need to teach with your mouth. You could simply teach with your behavior. That's why I always tell people one of the greatest things that you can do to help other people do teshuva is tell them your story. Tell them how you did teshuva. Tell them how you're doing teshuva and the struggles that you're dealing with. We have a section on our website called Teshuva Stories where different wonderful people from around the world have been influenced by our work over the years, wrote a letter, wrote a different story about how they did teshuva, where we came into the picture, and once a week, b'ezrat Hashem, we publicize it. These stories motivate people much more than the shiurim sometimes. And the reason why is because in a shiur you're gonna hear what I'm saying now, you're gonna hear what I'm gonna say tomorrow, you're gonna hear different shiurim, different things that sages said, and some things seem like they're impossible for you to do, some things seem like they're, you know, so unreachable, some things seem like they're unimaginable, it's too big for me. But when you hear somebody else do teshuva,

34:20That had a life just like you. He also came from a different religion. He also believed in Yoshke at one point. He also was married to a non-Jew. He also was eating treif. He also went to public school. She also had this. She also had that. And she did teshuva. That means I could do it. Because I'm just like her. i'm just like him. He's a person. He's not a rabbi. His father is not Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai. Sometimes these stories are worth a million times more than a lecture. That's why, till this day, Baruch Hashem, the most popular and influential lecture that we've ever had has been the personal story. Now, technically, if you listen to the personal story, the original version, two and a half hours, is a little bit of Torah in it, Baruch Hashem. It's a tiny comparison percentage-wise versus the amount of the personal story. That's non-Torah. It's just my life. But when you compare it to the other shiurim that we had, let's say, for example, the Pirkei Avot series. The Pirkei Avot series average shiur was three hours. Out of the three hours, two hours and 59 minutes and 40 seconds were Torah; 20 seconds were the intro. I'm horrible at jokes, so none of the shiurim have any jokes. The joke is there's no jokes. That's the joke.

35:45Three hours, you know, the whole thing is still up. That three hours, you helped a lot of people. But in comparison to the personal story, it can't compare. The amount of people that have done teshuvah from the personal story is unimaginable. It was worth suffering just for that. It was worth all the surgeries, the money loss, the enemies, the headaches, all the things that happened and continue to happen. All that stuff was worth it just for one single Baal Teshuvah. been tens of thousands of people that have changed their life. So now we did the movie, Baruch Hashem, even more people. That's why I tell people, do yourself a favor, tell people your story, how you did teshuvah. Why? Because sometimes that story could save another neshama that's not going to watch a shiur with this guy with a beard and the hat and the whole thing. And But that's some regular average Joe that has a little kippah on that tells him that he used to believe that he came from a monkey, but today he only believes in HaKadosh Baruch Hu. This woman that she used to look like a rock star, but today she has a kisui rosh. She looks like a tzaddeiket. She came from Mount Sinai. How could it be? I'll listen to her. Why? She's like me. Just there's a before and after. She's already on the after part. I'm still on the before. I want the after though.

37:14This, Rabotai, is simply putting yourself in a situation where you become a kiruv machine by yourself. You could send us your story. Please make sure to add how you're connected to B'ezrat Hashem in our teachings at all. If you've never learned anything from us, then there are other organizations that you should send it to that helped you so they could benefit from it also. Like if you, let's say, for example, benefited... from Rav Mizrachi, then send Rav Mizrachi the lecture so he can publicize it. If you benefit from my shiurim, send it to me, so I can send it to people, so people can make the connection. You could still send it to me anyway, even if you didn't benefit that much, but the point being is that you want other people to follow the same path as you. So far, we've done a bunch of different letters, then we did a few small videos with the wigs, but b'ezrat Hashem, we will also do some other videos with other people. But the point is, Rabotai, is that this shows us that HaKadosh Baruch Hu can allow every single one of us to help other people do kiruv simply by our behavior. Our behavior. How you act. If the way you act is admirable,

38:31is nice, is polite, is generous, is just something that HaKadosh Baruch Hu can allow every single one of us to help other people do kiruv simply by our behavior. Our behavior. How you act. If the way you act is admirable, people will want to be like you. Guess what? If I want to be like you, I want to be like all of you. So, if Judaism is what's causing you to be this nice, wonderful, amazing person; if Judaism is what's causing your marriage to be so happy; if Judaism is what's causing you to be so generous; if Judaism is causing you to be so classy and modest; if Judaism is causing you to be so smart and studious, I want to be a Jew. I want to be a religious Jew just like you. Want to be like you. Guess what? If I want to be like you, I want to be like all of you. So, if Judaism is what's causing you to be this nice, wonderful, amazing person; if Judaism is what's causing your marriage to be so happy; if Judaism is what's causing you to be so generous; if Judaism is causing you to be so classy and modest; if Judaism is causing you to be so smart and studious, I want to be a Jew. I want to be a religious Jew just like you. So that's why, Rabotai, behavior is critical. If you want to help people do teshuva, you could help them with money. You could help them with your skill set. You could help them with your time. But most of all, you could help them by simply being the example yourself. One of the greatest things that I heard

39:37in all the years that we've been doing this, is some stranger gets in touch with me. I pressed the water, but I didn't know I had tea. I didn't know I was going to have tea. One of the greatest things, I didn't know I was going to have tea. I didn't bless the tea. One of the greatest things that I experienced myself as a privilege was when some stranger got in touch with me. Actually, no, I ran into him. I ran into him in a store, a supermarket. I always have these interesting meetings in supermarkets. And he said, yeah, I saw you’re on the internet. I said, yeah, sometimes.

40:37And I said, oh, yeah, I listened to a few of the shiurim. Yeah, oh, no, no, no. And he says, where do you live? Where do you live? And I said, oh, I actually have a couple of students that live by you. He says, you do? I said, yeah. I have a couple of guys who live by you. They're brothers. And... He goes, wait. It's like, yeah, there's a couple of guys who live by you. They live, they go to some shul, again, something, again, David, something. He goes, those are your students? He goes, oh, I'm going to watch all your shiurim. It's like, those guys are the biggest tzaddikim in the shul. I said, I didn't tell you guys this story. It's one of my personal favorites. Story in the world why somebody says, "I want to watch his shiurim now." Why? Because those guys, I see in shul, they like the tzaddikim. That's the best thing in the world. That's it. That's the result. That's the result of the work. If that's the result, that's what I want to do. Someone told me that they were at some Shabbaton with several rabbis...

41:55although they heard of Rabbi Yosef Mizrahi in the past, they never actually watched his work. It happened to be that at the Shabbaton, Rabbi Mizrahi was speaking. So, the guy tells another guy who told me the story. He says that guy became a fan of Rabbi Mizrahi's before the lectures even started. I said, why? He said, he told me, he says, you know, honestly, I heard so many things about Rabbi Mizrahi, I never actually bothered to listen to any of his stuff, but I said, you know, whatever, let him do his thing, I'm going to, you know, keep my distance, and no, it's not my business. No problem. I don't have a problem with him, but the stuff that you hear is not so good all the time. You know, because usually the stuff that's bad is publicized. Stuff that's good is a secret. Good stuff, secret. Bad stuff, publicized all over the news, first, you know, headline. The guy became a fan. Why did he become a fan? He saw that Rav Mizrahi brought a few of his kids to the Shabbaton. And the guy was looking at the kids. He says, "That's his kid?" He goes, "Yeah, that one and that one are his kids." He says, "Really? That's his kids?" "Yeah, that's his kids." And he just started looking at Rav Mizrahi's kids. I don't even know if Rav Mizrahi knows the story. He started looking, just following Rav Mizrahi's kids.

43:20Because if that's his kids, that's what comes out of him. He's an amazing rabbi. He must be amazing if that's what comes out. Because there are a lot of rabbis that teach, but you only get to see the results from the students. Sometimes the students are like your own kids; sometimes the students are not your kids. The point being, if you see that the students... Something to look up to, you know, that's the greatest thing in the world. Now, the Ramban says that even if you are a wonderful student, you still have nothing to be proud of because that means you're fulfilling your role. You're doing your job. You should be happy about it. But also that means that you were given the responsibility. Now that you were given the clarity to see the truth, you now have a responsibility that comes with it. Now, what happens when you see somebody that's technically more like your before picture than your after picture? So the Ramban continues, and he says the following, נמצא הכל שווה לפני המקום.

44:40The Ramban writes, "Thus, all men stand as equals before their Creator. In His fury, He casts down the lofty, the arrogant. In His goodwill, He elevates the downtrodden." Therefore, humble yourself, for Hashem will lift you. So again, we see that the Ramban embellishes the point repeatedly about how being arrogant, being conceited, thinking you're better than everybody else is the wrong direction if you want a relationship with Hashem. Why? Because in His eyes, all men stand as equals. Between us, how could that be? One guy is half-retarded, the other guy is a genius. One guy looks like he came out of some cave, the other guy, or the woman, is beautiful. How could they—how could Hashem see both of them as equals? His IQ is 160, his IQ is 1.6. How could they be equals? I...

46:00Of course, the Ramban is not making this up. This is a pasuk in the Torah. This actually comes from the Song of Chana in the book of Shmuel Aleph, chapter 2, verse 7. This is a source in the Torah. you'll notice that all the time when chachamim say something, they have what to rely on. They're not giving you any new concept, a new idea; they're just elaborating on a pre-existing idea that's found in the Torah that perhaps you missed. So, who can tell me, how could Hashem look at a genius and a moron as equals? If I was next to give you a kiss, you saved me so much time. He just gave the whole shiur away. Stop by saying HaKadosh Baruch Hu is the one that made the smart guy smart. He's the one that instilled a 160 IQ and

47:13also is the one that instilled the 160 IQ in the other guy, but He says both of them. I view them as equal. Why? The Rambam writes halacha. Halacha means Mount Sinai. Halacha means obligation. Halacha means forever; it doesn't change. People always ask me, "Is this still relevant today?" Yes, if you can do it, then the answer is yes by default. If you can't do it, then it's relevant; you just can't do it. You can't bring a korban because we don't have a Beit HaMikdash, not because the mitzvah is not relevant. It's why it is relevant. If we had a Beit HaMikdash tomorrow, all of us would have to go there and bring some cows. All of us. You should start saving some money for cows. It says that the gerim used to have an obligation to save money... The gerim used to have an obligation to save money on the side for a korban, for when the Beit HaMikdash is going to be built. Why? Because they have to bring one more korban than the average Jew. Why? Why does the convert have to bring an extra, what is it, prejudice? Hashem loves the converts. Why does the convert have to bring an extra korban that a natural-born Jew doesn't have to bring? Because to convert, what is converting? You're doing what we did at Mount Sinai.

48:30You're doing what we did at Mount Sinai. You know you go into the mikveh, right? But what else did we do at Mount Sinai? Everyone from Am Yisrael brought a korban. Everyone from Am Yisrael brought a korban. Now since you cannot bring a korban today because there's no Beit HaMikdash, It used to be a law that you had to save money on the side. So as soon as the Beit HaMikdash is built, you bought a cow, you bring it to the Beit HaMikdash. No questions asked, no delay. Why? To complete your conversion, if you will. Conversion is already complete, but in essence, to complete something that you couldn't have done until now. So all converts start saving like $10,000, $15,000 for cows. No, but seriously, all Jews, if we had the Beit HaMikdash tomorrow, would have to bring a korban. So that's not an obligation that we can fulfill today. So it's a relevant mitzvah, it's just that we cannot fulfill it. If there is a mitzvah that you can fulfill, then of course it's relevant. Now, the Rambam writes that it's halacha, it's from the Torah, that every Jew can be righteous like Moshe Rabbeinu. Not a navi like Moshe Rabbeinu,

49:46Not a prophet like Moshe Rabbeinu, because that's not possible. Hashem Himself says no one's going to be like Moshe Rabbeinu as far as prophecy is concerned. But you can be as righteous as Moshe Rabbeinu. What does that really mean? Moshe Rabbeinu, what was his gedulah? What was his significance? Why was it such a big deal? Because Moshe Rabbeinu reached his full potential. Whatever Hashem gave him, whatever tools Hashem gave him, He fulfilled His will with his full potential. If he had strength, he used all of his strength. If he had money, he used all of his money. If he had speech, he used all of his speech. Everything that he had, he used to get closer to Hashem, to sanctify Hashem's name, to do what Hashem said. This is something all of us can do. If Hashem says that you have to be modest, Then guess what? You have to be modest. Yeah, but it's hard for me. It may be hard for you, but if you're alive, you can do it. If you're alive, you can do it. Yeah, but I don't have that much money. You don't need that much money to be modest. You don't need that much money. The mitzvot don't necessarily cost as much as people think.

51:02You may want to be modest with a style that could be expensive. But the matter is, by default, you can be modest without necessarily having a lot of money. Same thing with food. Oh, yeah, kosher life is very expensive. The steak is, uh, you know, $15 or $20 for steak instead of $3. Yeah, you're right. But who says you have to eat steak every day? Who eats steak every day? What are you, lying? Who says you have to eat steak every day? There's other things you can eat. You don't have to eat steak every day. The point is, Rabotai, HaKadosh Baruch Hu is not asking you to do something more than what you can do. What He's asking you to do is to do the best you can with what you have. Reach your full potential. And since He gave the genius that has a 160 IQ that IQ, and the fool a 16 IQ, He gave them that. He says, "I look at them as equals," meaning they both have the ability to get to one hundred percent by fulfilling My will with the best of what they can do. Which means, if the guy that’s a fool, that doesn’t know anything, gets to one hundred percent—he tries his best and he gets there. But the guy that's a genius, he only gets to fifty percent of his potential, sixty percent of his potential, and

52:27But because he's such a genius, his 60% is still higher than the fool's 100%. However, Hashem is happier with the guy that reached his full potential and gets much more reward, while the guy that only reached 60% of his potential gets punished. Even though his 60% is higher, he was given a gift to reach much higher levels. That's why the Ramban says Hashem looks at everybody as equals. Now, when a person wants to be proud, he wants to show off something that he has and... Ramban is telling them, just think for one minute before you take action on this pride that you have. What you just finished learning, and you want to show off to everybody? You had the answer to the question, and you want to show off to everybody? You have something clever to say, and you want to show off to everybody? Before you do that, think for a minute. Think for a minute.

53:52Because Hashem hates it. And in His fury, He casts down the lofty, meaning that the fact that you are proud of something and you're going to show off, that alone is giving Hashem a reason to bring you down. Forget about all of your other sins and problems that you've caused in your life. Forget about all that stuff. Just the fact that somebody wants to be a show-off is enough of a reason for Hashem to take him down. What is it like? The Gemara in Masechet Sotah, on page 5, says that when a farmer looks at his field, what are the first things that he cuts off when he sees fields full of different plants, different crops? The first things he notices are the ones that grew the highest. Good, I'm going to harvest all of these, chop down all the high ones. The other ones are not big enough yet. I let them go for a little longer. Hashem says, "Ah, you got really high? You're really proud of something? Chop, you off first. I'll punish you first. Why? You're too proud. If you notice, the opposite is true as well. When you plant the seed, if we're going to use the analogy of farming and all types of plants and so on, if a seed

55:20like a proud human being, he would die. Why? Because if a seed is like a proud human being, he'd never want to go into the ground. He'd want to stay above ground. Why? Ah, why put dirt on me? I'm a seed. You know how much potential I have inside? I have all types of potential inside. Don't put me under the ground. He doesn't want to go under the ground. He wants to stay high, roll around with the wind, and fly around. Eventually, he's going to die. But the one that allows himself to go deep in the ground, get himself dirty, that's the one that grows into a beautiful plant. That's the one that grows into a beautiful tree. That's the one that becomes useful to society. The one that brings himself down. Why? To serve his Creator. Now, when a person is proud, there's really nothing sillier than that. Because nothing that he does really belongs to him. It's like somebody doesn't have a suit. A lot of young guys don't have suits. In the old days, that's the previous generation, that's all they wore. You see old pictures in different parts of the world. Young kids, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, all types of ages, little kids, all walking around in suits. All week it's the same suit. They don't have a whole wardrobe like the average kid today does. They don't have 87 different pairs of sneakers.

56:47But they have a suit, and they always look respectable. Even if they are still a little bit of a troublemaker sometimes, they look respectable. They look like a good kid. He's got a suit on. Today, 18, 19, 20-year-old guys, grown men, yes, how come you still come to be connected with shorts and a t-shirt? "Because it's what I have." You don't have an actual suit? You're a grown man. You don't have a suit? "No, why should I have a suit?" I don't know, you're a man. Men have suits. You're never going to go to, I don't know, something respectable other than the beach. You have to have a suit. Go to the Knesset with t-shirts. That's the way it is today. No one has suits. So imagine one time, a guy, 20 years old, he has a party, and he knows he has to wear a suit too. There's an interview, he knows he has to wear a suit too. And he borrows his father's $2,000 suit. You know, one of those suits where the tailor comes to your house, does the measurements, the whole thing. It's got different colors inside. Nice suit. And he walks around because he's the same size as his father. He walks around with the suit like he owns the thing.

58:03Walks around. Oh, you see his friend. Ah, how you doing? Hey, how you doing? He's got glasses on, sunglasses for 99 cents, but it looks like they're $5,000 because the suit's $2,000. Hey, how you doing? Hey, hey, hey. He's happy about it. When does the happiness, when does the bubble explode? One of his brothers says, ah, you borrowed Abba's suit in front of all of his friends. All of a sudden, his ego that he was wearing a $2,000 suit like he bought it drops to nothing. He's embarrassed. He wants to be the seed that went under the ground, but just five minutes ago. That's somebody that's proud. Somebody that's proud is like someone who borrowed a suit and he's proud of something that doesn't belong to him. Your talent doesn't belong to you. Your intellect doesn't belong to you. Your money doesn't belong to you. That's what the Ramban is trying to tell us here. Now, he says that a person who continues going in this direction is going against his purpose. But there are signs that the Chachamim gave us to remind us of this critical point. There are certain things that unless somebody is a talmid chacham or somebody is...

59:27Careful about what comes out of their mouth and what they see, and pay attention to the creation and to the world around them. They're not going to see some of this stuff. But I remember when we learned one of the mishnayot in Pirkei Avot, where it says someone that takes honor in his friend's downfall loses his share of the World to Come. I remember when, you know, when we were learning it, I was amazed. that this rule is literally all over the Torah. Shlomo HaMelech talked about it. Pirkei Avot and the Mishnah talked about it. The Gemara talked about it. It's actually in the beginning of every single Gemara. Every single Gemara usually has a blessing on the cover that you say. You say this blessing, and you say to Hashem, "Please, Hashem, let me not take pride over my friends, and my friends take pride over me." Why? Because if I take pride over my friends, or they take pride over me for my failure or their failure, we both lose Olam Haba. This is literally all over this lesson, but most people don't even know it. Now, this other thing I'm about to teach you is also all over the Torah. In fact,

1:00:44The average Jew that goes to shul and prays three times a day says it no less than three times a day. The danger of ego is so dear, and the right ideology is so important, that Chazal instilled it in our prayer. three times a day at the end of Amidah. At the end of Amidah, after you say Sim Shalom Tova U'Vracha, doesn't matter if you're Ashkenazi or Sephardi, we all have that part. You know, grant peace and goodness. You've gone to the end of the prayer. Now so far, what have you really said in Tefillat Shemoneh Esrei? Almost every single prayer you're asking for something physical, something material. you're asking for parnassah, you're asking for refuah shleimah, you're asking for the Mashiach to come, you're asking for the right state of mind, for knowledge, and so on and so forth. Blessings, you're asking for a lot of things. But then at the end of the tefillah, you're saying to Hashem, one more last request. One last thing, Hashem. Please guard my tongue from evil.

1:02:09and my lips from speaking deceitfully to those who curse me, let my soul be silent. Meaning, Hashem, I'm prone to say bad stuff about people. Why? Because they annoy me. They curse me. They make fun of me. They call me fanatic. They call me blue, black, green, yellow, Sephardi, Ashkenazi, Yemenite. They call me all types of names, Hashem. So, I'm prone to react to these people. But please, Hashem, if You're going to do anything, the most important thing is the last request. Help me not react. How can Hashem help me not react? Because these people are cursing me, You're saying. When you're telling Hashem, please Hashem, help me not react by making my soul silent. Why? Because in reality, Hashem, I am like dust to all.

1:03:20reality, Hashem, me getting upset that she called me a name and he called me a name, and he didn't kiss my hand, and he didn't open the door, and he didn't show kavod, and he didn't say hi, and she didn't say this, and he didn't say thank you, and all of these people didn't give me the honor that I'm entitled to in reality and I'm wrong. I'm not entitled to anything. I'm dust. So, in essence, what are we asking Hashem three times a day? Hashem, please, do me a favor, remind me I’m dust. Remind me I’m nothing. Because that's the only way that I'm going to get myself out of trouble, of having an ego that could destroy my Olam HaBa. Now, The Ramban says that if a person really takes this prayer seriously, as mentioned in the Gemara Masechet Berachot, and he humbles himself, that will give Hashem a reason to do the opposite effect and raise him higher.

1:04:45but if he doesn't, and he wants to feel like he's better than everybody else, act like he's better than everybody else, she wants to act like she's better than everybody else, she knows more than everyone else, she does this, she does that, everybody wants the credit, it's the opposite effect. Now, this is not just in our day-to-day behavior; it's also in our mitzvot because sometimes Satan can actually use a mitzvah to bring somebody down because when you do a mitzvah, naturally, it makes you feel good. You feel like you're righteous, you feel like you did something good, and Every person, after they finish praying, feels like they achieved something. "I'm closer to Hashem now. Hashem enjoyed this prayer. What a prayer I had. Wow. Today is a good day." Oh, you had a bad Shacharit? Okay, I'll make it in Mincha.

1:05:46You had a good Mincha, even though it took me only six minutes. Okay, fine. Feel great about it. You give somebody tzedakah. You saw, you saw, you give tzedakah. Oh, they didn't see it. Hashem saw it. Hashem saw my tzedakah. You feel good about the tzedakah that you gave. Sometimes people give tzedakah and then they send letters to let you know, "I gave tzedakah." Okay, thank you. It's good. Sometimes it's good to let the person know that you sent tzedakah. People send a check in the mail. They listen. "I sent tzedakah." In essence, what you're doing is you're sending the notice to let them know to expect it in the mail. That's a good thing. That's a good thing. Why? Because you're letting them know that I sent you a check in the mail. Gemara Masechet Shabbat says that HaKadosh Baruch Hu told Moshe Rabbeinu, "Go tell Am Yisrael I have a present, I have a precious, precious thing that I'm giving them, that's coming from my treasure chest. It's called Shabbat. Go tell Am Yisrael that I'm gonna give it to them as a gift." Habib says from there we learn that if you're going to give somebody a gift, you should let them know. No surprise party. You should let them know ahead of time you're going to give them a gift. You should let them know. So if you're going to give somebody something, you let them know. If you're letting them know that you're going to give them a gift because that's what the Gemara says, to let them know, listen, I got a check, it's on the way to you.

1:07:11I got a book; it's on the way to you. I got a house; it's on the way to you. Something's on the way to you. You're doing it because the Gemara says to do it, because you want to let them know, to expect it so they're already happy. Now, you're fulfilling your mitzvah. If you're doing it to make them happy now, it's fulfilling your mitzvah. But if you're doing it... Because you want them to say, "Ah, thanks a lot. You're the best. You're the greatest. You're amazing. What would I do without you? You're a Malach Hashem. I'm only going to pay my mortgage because of you. My kids haven't eaten in six days until you came." You want them to thank you? It was better off you didn't do the mitzvah. Why? Imagine how hard it is build a house. You ask anybody that built houses, it's hard work. Imagine how hard it is to build a building. You ask anybody that worked on a building, for example, buildings in New York. Each one is bigger than the next. I used to go to school in the old World Trade Center, the towers that were destroyed. I was going to school on the 88th floor and

1:08:24I went there, taking some courses, and one of the times, you know, when you go to the elevator, the elevator is amazing by itself. You get in this elevator, you get to this thing, you're on the 88th floor, and you look out the window. And you're not really sure if the whole thing is stable; you feel like you're gonna fall. So, you know me, I'm scared of heights. So I'm looking like, you know, maybe eight feet away from the window, like if I get too close to the window, I'm gonna fall out. so I'm looking out, and everything down there looks like ants. Everything looks like ants. The cars look like ants. The people look like ants. Some of the houses and the buildings, everything looks like ants. Everything looks tiny. So that made me very curious to actually see how they built the World Trade Center. It was so big. So I watched some videos on the internet years ago. And how they built the World Trade Center. It was very, very extraordinary architecture, the first of its kind at the time, in how they built the shell. And it was amazing. You look at this work, it's truly unbelievable. Some time ago, I looked at a video of how they build bridges. It always interested me. How do they build a bridge? Like, how do they connect the thing? How does it hang by itself the whole time, especially when there's water under it?

1:09:47How do they get the towers when somebody dives in there and stays down there in the water for three weeks? And you see the technology that they have is unbelievable. So now imagine somebody who came up with all of this, the architects who conceived this, and all of the employees who worked on it. Everybody woke up at 4 o'clock in the morning. So they start off the day early, and they're not just out there; they're beating the sun already. By the time 12 o'clock comes, they've already done half the job. These guys have been working for a long time — four, five, six, seven years of everyday manual labor. It's a lot of stuff. Now imagine you did all of that. You built not only a house, not only a building, but you also built a bridge. In fact, you built an entire city. Imagine you built an entire city. That's what a mitzvah is. A mitzvah is an entire city. In fact, it could be an entire world. A reward for one mitzvah could be literally equivalent to an entire world. But here's the problem. The difference is those construction workers, those architects, they're getting paid every week. They get a paycheck. Before they buy the material, they get money upfront.

1:11:05Our main pay is Olam HaBa. We don't get much here. What you get here is just to enable you to do more mitzvot, to build more stuff. So the Chachamim say the problem is that if somebody does a mitzvah and he goes and asks the person to say thank you, he puts the person in a situation to say, "Hey, by the way..." That's for you. That's for you, this is for you. I did all this for you. Not because he's reminding them, not because he's trying to make sure they remember, not because he wants to get the honor. What happens is the entire reward that he has, that's waiting for him in Olam HaBa, gets paid at that second when you've put that guy or that woman in a situation where she has to say thank you and

1:12:05That's your reward. That's 99% of what you're gonna get for that mitzvah. So that's like building, not a house, not a building, not a bridge, but an entire city, and never getting paid. Every day you worked, you woke up at 4 o'clock in the morning, you lifted the bricks, you beat the sun, you got sick, but you still worked, you did everything, you broke a few bones, you broke a few fingers, you had a headache, you did whatever you got to do. Why? To build this wonderful thing. For what? You get paid at the end. Doing a mitzvah and getting all of the kavod here, you're getting paid. But with what? A simple thank you. A simple chazak u'baruch. Instead of getting paid a city or a world, you got a couple of words that you could live without. Where is this from? One of the sources that we have this in is the Gemara Yerushalmi, Masechet Pe'ah, the 8th Perek, Halacha number 6. It's an extraordinary story about Rabbi Elazar, Rabbi Elazar ben Rabbi Shimon.

1:13:20Rebbi Elazar ben Rebbi Shimon was the son of Rebbi Shimon bar Yochai, and he had some workers in his house. So he left the house and later in the day came back, and he asked the people, "So, what did I miss?" They said, "Well, some visitors from out of town came here to see you. So just like we know it's your minhag to host guests, we hosted them, we fed them, gave them whatever they needed, and after they finished, they had a good time. They said, 'Please tell Rebbi Elazar the Tzaddik that he's amazing. Thank you very much! Wow, unbelievable.'" Some visitors from out of town came here to see you. Just like we know it's your minhag to host guests, we hosted them, we fed them, and gave them whatever they needed. After they finished, they had a good time and they said, "Please tell Rebbi Elazar the Tzaddik that he's amazing. Thank you very much! Wow, unbelievable." They gave you all these compliments. So Rabbi Elazar says, "Oy to me! Oy to me that I just wasted all of my reward in this world. I did the mitzvah, but I wasted all of my reward. Oy to me." Some time passes.

1:14:39And he leaves the house again, and he comes back at the end of the day, and he says to his employees also, so what did I miss? Oh, well today, Kevod HaRav, a bunch of people came from a different city. We hosted them in your name, and they caused a mess after they ate and drank like their heads. They started messing up the whole house. They broke stuff. They made everything dirty. They were uncivilized people. And if that's not enough, right before they left, they started cursing you out: "What a stingy host! Who likes your food anyway? Yeah, who's this rabbi anyway? I'm never coming back here again." Bilazal says, "Ah, Baruch Hashem. Baruch Hashem that I'll have some reward in Olam HaBa for this mitzvah. Why? I did the mitzvah, I didn't get any honor? Baruch Hashem. Baruch Hashem, I did the mitzvah, I didn't get any honor? Perfect. Perfect." Such is the behavior of people who understand the value of getting kavod in this world. Now,

1:15:54The Midrash has some interesting stories of a very rich woman that was in, I believe, a non-Jewish kingdom, who came to one of the Chachamim, Rabbi Shimon ben Chalafta, and she says to him, "God, since He created the world, okay, created, what does He do now?" Now what does He do? What does He do? Ever since HaKadosh Baruch Hu created the world, since then all He does is bring people up and bring people down. The ones that are humble, He brings them up. The ones that are arrogant, He takes them down. Now you'll see every single person that was taken down, that lost everything he had or all types of things, You'll see how these people's pride was in the sky. They thought they were going to rule the world. One day, one of the famous stories that I saw was about Eike Batista, a Brazilian Jew. During the boom in the steel and different industrial industries in the world...

1:17:20He literally skyrocketed his net worth. And in a matter of just a few years, he went from being a millionaire to being worth almost $40 billion and being listed on Forbes as one of the top, I believe, five or six richest people in the world. He had, I think, three or four different companies. And it was unbelievable how rich he got so quickly. Everything he touched literally turned to gold. Literally. It was unbelievable. All types of refining oil and different types of precious metals and so on and so forth. They interviewed him one time. Unlike most billionaires in the world, most billionaires that are old money already, you know, usually don't make such a big deal of the money. But this guy was special. They don't usually make a big deal out of the list on the Forbes 500 of who's the richest or Forbes' top richest people. No one usually makes a big deal out of it, at least not publicly. But he did. What did he say? So...

1:18:40What am I, number five or six now within a couple of years? Bill Gates is no longer going to be number one, and Warren's not going to be number one. No, but I'm going to take all the places. I want to be number one. This is something that's unusual. But what's more unusual is what HaKadosh Baruch Hu was planning in that second. Within 11 months. Now imagine, I don't know how long he worked on... to get into at least a position to make $40 billion. That's a lot of money. You could literally take $100 bills, fill them up from the floor to the ceiling, and you could fill up several buildings like this. Several buildings like this to get the $40 billion. That's how much money it is. We're talking about an obscene amount of money. So I don't know how long he worked to put himself in a position to make that kind of money. But HaKadosh Baruch Hu, within 11 months, he lost 99.8% of his money. To the extent that the government came to his house and towed his cars away. That's HaKadosh Baruch Hu. That's what He does. Makes the lowly higher and the higher lower. All depends on...

1:20:06whose time is when and whose reason is what and so on and so forth. Now, the Midrash says that when it comes to money, which is one of the primary things that usually people spend a lot of time being arrogant about or depressed about... If you notice, there are several different names, about a handful of different names, for money in Lashon HaKodesh, in the Torah. One of them, when you talk about property, property in the Torah is called Nechasim. Nechasim is property. It comes from the word Ne'elam, which means vanish. Because just like

1:21:08The person that acquired it acquired this property; somebody sold it, the person that made money in the market. That means somebody lost it. One day a person has this property, he thinks he has a whole lot and one day it just simply disappears because Hashem decided to take that pound aside and give it to somebody else. Another name for money, or a form of money for four coins, is Zuzim. Zuzim comes from the word Zazim, same spelling. Zuzim means moving away because money moves from one man to another, depending on who Hashem wants to give it to. Another name for it is mamon. Mamon comes from the word monneh. Monneh means count, where Hashem is asking you why do you spend so much time counting your money. Who says you can have it tomorrow? It's a bad idea to count your money.

1:22:09Another name for currency is ma'ot. Ma'ot comes from me'uleh. Me'uleh means what's the time, meaning what is the value of something which only lasts a short period of time. This money, no matter how much you have it, the maximum it's going to last you is your lifetime. After that, you can't take it anywhere. Lastly, another name for money is damim. Damim means blood. Because people spend their entire life, their entire blood, chasing money. What are you going to get for it in the end? What are you going to be able to take with you? That's actually your possession. The answer is, only your Torah and mitzvot that you do with that money. Now, interestingly, many people spend a lot of time being proud of something that's temporary. And many kehillot, built because somebody that had a little bit of money wanted to be the dominating opinion. Now today, Bochurim, there is no shortage of Batei Knesset. Most Jewish communities have more Batei Knesset than they need. The same thing goes with Sifrei Torah. Most Batei Knesset have multiple Sifrei Torah and

1:23:35some batei knesset, like I know there's at least a couple in Brooklyn that have so many Sifrei Torah. They literally have an entire basement with over a hundred and fifty or two hundred Sifrei Torah that they lend out to different places, but most of them just simply sit there collecting dust and Why? Because somebody wanted to donate money and they figured, "Let me get a Sefer Torah," because usually when you donate a Sefer Torah, the community has a party and everybody knows, "Oh, that's your Sefer Torah! Chazak u'Baruch!" The fact that no one's actually going to use it because the community already has 87 of them, or three of them, or five of them, and they don't really need another one because maximum you can use three a week—one on Monday, one on Thursday, and one on Shabbat—that's it. Even if you read a different Sefer Torah and it's not really comfortable. Usually the Baal Koreh wants to use one Sefer Torah. He doesn't want to use a different one every day. You get used to a certain writing, a certain style, a certain role, and so on. So the point is that if your Beit Knesset already has five of them, it's already too much. You're buying another one for what? So you can have a party? Same thing with a Beit Knesset.

1:24:52A guy wants to build a Beit Knesset. Why? Because the last Beit Knesset didn't want to allow him to drink during the tefillah. Like one guy over here. One guy over here, he wanted to drink during the Beit Knesset. During the tefillah, he wanted to drink. Him and his friends. The rabbi said, no, no, no. No drinking in shul while we're praying. He goes, what? No drinking in shul while we're praying? I'm going to open another shul. He opened a shul. Why? Because he wants to drink while he prays. The fact that it says that HaKadosh Baruch Hu killed Nadav and Avihu because potentially they had a little drink... But they were tzaddikim though, and Hashem killed them. No, that part of the parasha he missed. So people building Batei Knesset on every corner. Batei Knesset, Baruch Hashem, we have. Sifrei Torah, Baruch Hashem, we have. What don't we have? Kosher minyanim. That every community is lacking. Every community has lacking. If you compare the amount of Batei Knesset to the minyanim, every community has issues with this. Because in non-religious communities, people only come to the Beit Knesset on Shabbat. In religious communities, it depends on the Rabbi. If the Rabbi is a strong Rabbi, they come throughout the whole week. If not so strong, you know, then he's got a minyan of older guys who have nothing else to do; they're already tired at 75 years old, and...

1:26:18They have nothing else to do, so they go to the Beit Knesset. The guys that are working, hustling, bustling—Wall Street, this street, that street—they go to work. They don't go to the Beit Knesset. On Shabbat, he has a minyan of 500 people. During the week, 15, barely. Why? What happened? Something's wrong with what's going on. This is an issue everywhere, not just in religious communities. Meaning that we have a lot of material wealth, but the neshama part... We're missing something. Now, so this shows us, Rabotai, that money is not exactly something that we're lacking as a people today, Baruch Hashem. We are the richest generation that we've ever had, aside from the time of Shlomo HaMelech. The time of Shlomo HaMelech, Gemara Masechet Yoma says, Shlomo HaMelech, because of his wisdom, knew where all the different types of gold were. There were seven different types of gold in the world, and he knew where all of these golds were. He knew there was a gold tree. There's something that really is a gold tree—a tree, a real tree, not like a tree you made out of gold as a statue. No, like a real tree that has green; you put the grain in the ground, it grows a tree, and the tree brings gold fruits.

1:27:39Kabbalah says, he had the Beit HaMikdash, had a bunch of these trees, and when the wind would come and the trees would fall, the Kohanim would take the fruits and they would sell them. That's how they made their parnassah, selling gold fruit, but gold. That's how rich he was. He had cities of gold. We don't have that today, but nonetheless, Jewish people are very rich today. Materially rich. Spiritually, we're lacking a little bit. One of the reasons is because of what we're going to talk about now. The title we chose today is, well, the topic that we started off today is: How to Pick a Rabbi. With all of the problems that we're facing today, in communities, out of communities, in different countries, different cities, how do we know what is the... Rav that I want to pick, that I know is a kosher Rav. So I learned from Rav Ephraim some of the attributes that a Rav is supposed to have for him to qualify as a rabbi. That you would say, "This is my rabbi," and you should be proud that he's your rabbi. First of all, it should be a he. Rabbi is a he. That's a prerequisite. If it already is a she,

1:29:08Failed. Forget about the rest of the attributes. Second, he must be a human. Human. Listen, in this generation, we have to clarify everything. Third, he has to be born a he. He has to be born a he and remain a he. If he's born a she and becomes a he, it's an it. Next. Next. Sometimes rabbis delve into the secular world, sometimes for professional reasons, sometimes for academic reasons, let's call it. If the rabbi is also a doctor and he actually practices medicine, no problem. Rambam was a doctor, no problem. But if he attained certain degrees in school and he's proud of those degrees... Some Talmidei Chachamim didn't like that so much. One of those Chachamim is Rabbi Yitzchak Charif. Rabbi Yitzchak Charif says that if you see a Rav that has a doctor title, like Dr. Rabbi such-and-such, that should tell you that the Rav is sick.

1:30:30If he has a doctor title next to the Rav, that means the Rav is sick. Why? If you're practicing medicine, it's a different story. But if you're simply, I don't know, you're a PhD. If you're so proud of your PhD more than your rabbi title, that means that the rabbi part is sick. Because no one in their right mind who has Yirat Shamayim, who knows the value of real Torah, would ever compare secular knowledge to Torah. That's why it bothers me to no end when I hear people who call themselves rabbis and Jewish speakers put different tzaddikim's names in the same sentence, paragraph, or even lecture as secular teachers like Tony Robbins and Zig Ziglar and all of these so-called motivational speakers. When someone says, "The Baal Shem Tov, yeah, it's just like Tony Robbins," or "Rav Ovadia, yeah, it's just like such and such," Rich Dad Poor Dad or something. When they put these people in the same sentence, it bothers me to no end because it simply shows me they literally have no idea what Torah is.

1:31:48If you think these two people, the tzaddik that became Gadol Hador, are on the same level playing field as some guy that made a bunch of money selling books that you could write in six pages, you think they're on the same level? You should never ever speak to the public as a teacher again. At least not a teacher of Torah. Go teach Tony Robbins. But that's the problem. Today, people want Tony Robbins, but with a kippah on. So you have people that try to, you know, do the same thing as Tony Robbins. They look like him, they act like him. There's some guy in New York, extremely popular. You literally see this guy in every flyer. $5,000 a lecture, and he's booked every day. Booked every day. Why? He's a... he's just like the goyim. But he mentions Moshe Rabbeinu once in a while. This, rabotai, is part of the confusion. It shows us that the rabbi is sick sometimes. It shows us that when we think that secular knowledge is in the same world as the Torah, we simply do not understand the Torah. That means we're a little bit spiritually sick. Now,

1:33:12There's something that you repeat in your Beit Knesset every single day. It says, this comes from the Gemara Masechet Megillah, page 28b, but it comes from the verse. In the Tanakh, from Sefer Chabakuk, chapter 3, verse number 6, it says anyone who learns halachot each day is promised a share in the World to Come. Where do we know this from? It says this in Sefer Chabakuk. says that the ways of the world are His, meaning who is running the world? Hashem. Hashem is running the world, the behavior of the world, the managing of the world—that's all Hashem. But don't say "alichot olam lo," don't say "alichot"; say "halachot," meaning you're, in essence...

1:34:29playing a little bit of literal language over here, or a game here, where alichot and halachot sound the same, there's only a difference of the nikud, or really one letter, yud, tiny little yud. You remove the yud, it spells halachot. And halachot means halacha, laws, Jewish laws, that in essence, the ways of the world are managed by His halachot. But the Chachamim ask, wait a minute, what does it mean? Don't say Alichot, say Halachot. It's like saying, don't say Avraham, say Metushelach. Don't say Moshe, say David. What do you mean? If it says Alichot, say Alichot. Why Halachot? The Chachamim say really, part of the oral Torah is that there are certain words that are spelled one way, but they're supposed to be read a different way. Many times you see it in a Chumash. Something is spelled one way, but it's supposed to be read a different way. This occurs throughout the entire Tanach. But there's a further reason. Chacham Shalom Cohen, Shlita, said a fantastic chidush I learned from Rav Ephraim. He says, in today's world, the behavior

1:35:57The Derech Eretz, if you will, the way people judge how you behave, is very, very important in the world. Much more important than the Halachot. People are much more obsessed and concerned with if you went to a certain concert. you went to a certain museum, if you have a certain degree, if you went to a certain school, or you live in a certain neighborhood; if you believe in a certain political issue or not, if you're against it or for it, who you voted for. Those things are critical. Political correctness is critical today. And that political correctness unfortunately sometimes causes people who know a few halachot to kiss up to them. The guys who know halachot sometimes kiss up to the people who care too much about alichot. The guys who know halachot sometimes kiss up to the people who care too much about the museum and the paintings. And who designed the house?

1:37:20But in truth, Rav Shalom Cohen says, the only one that should determine we're supposed to behave, what is the right thing to do, how to build the Beit Knesset, how to build the yeshiva, how to build the community, where to put the eruv, who's going to be the rabbi, who's going to be the board, who's going to do this and who's going to do that, who's going to be kosher, who's not going to be kosher. The one that's going to decide the ways, the behavior, the everything should only be the people that know the halachot. The ones that choose the halachot should be the ones that know the halachot. Unfortunately, it's the opposite. Many places that we have today are going down the tubes not because of the people that know the halachot, but rather because of who's hiring them. The boards of directors. I had a lecture at one place. It's a funny story.

1:38:25They invited me to a lecture, and some woman in that community wanted to return me a favor. Why? Because I saved her marriage by convincing her husband not to throw her to the dirt. Her husband called me and told me, "Listen, I'm getting a divorce." I spent the next few hours with him on the phone convincing him not to throw his wife to the garbage because God only knows who's going to pick this woman up. She's one of those people that I'm not even sure how somebody even married her in the first place. Nasty human being. He had it with her, and he wants to get rid of her. I told him, listen, the Gemara says if somebody has a bad woman, he doesn't go to Gehinom. So at least live for that reason. At least live for that reason. But no, I convinced him, listen, do this, do this, do this, do this. Baruch Hashem. Good, they had some more kids, everything was great. So she wants to return the favor when she found out that I was going to give a lecture in her shul. What did she do? She went to the board and complained, "No, he's fanatic. He's crazy. Don't bring him here." Huh? He, huh? This is what he did. Come on, I have to return the favor, right? She went to complain to them two days before the lecture and...

1:39:51get a phone call from one of the guys on the board of directors. He says, "Listen, um, someone is saying here that you said certain things and did certain things, and I just have to ask you some questions about it." I said, "Sure, why not? Everything I do is public. My personal life is pretty much public property. Whatever you want to know, it's public. Whatever you want to know." Oh, did you ever say that Jews are worse than Nazis? I said, well, you could watch all of my lectures; not a single time did I ever say that. I said, the Torah says certain things, but that's one thing I know for sure I didn't say. Did you ever say this? No. Did you ever say this? No. What about the other? So then the issue of semicha came up. I said, do you have a semicha? I said, yeah, I have a semicha. And I told him, I said, but you know, it doesn't really make a difference, right? He says, "What do you mean?" I said, "You know what semicha is, right?" He says, "No, not really." I said, "Well, yeah, I mean, you go study under a certain person and, you know, they give you semicha. But in reality, according to the Torah, there is no such thing as semicha anymore. There's no such thing as semicha anymore. Semicha is something that came up recently, in the last 100 or 200 years again, but many of the chachamim, Gedolei HaDor, Rabbi Ovadia, they didn't have semicha. They didn't go to school and, you know, pass a test."

1:41:18Or g'dolim, no one would even dare give them a test. But the point is semicha. It just makes certain things more formal to ensure people know certain things, but according to the Torah, in Masechet Bava Metzia, page 33a, it says, "Who is a rabbi? Someone who teaches Torah, that's a rabbi. Someone who teaches Torah, that's a rabbi." I mean, you don't need a certificate to teach Torah. So he says to me, "Wow, I didn't know. I didn't know that." I said, "Oh yeah, but you also asked me about this Shabbat thing. You also know that if someone violates Shabbat, you can't count them for a minyan, right?" He says, "No, no, I didn't know." I said, "You know, someone... Nothing he didn't know. Every question, nothing he didn't know. He was coming to question me, but nothing he didn't know. That's who's running the shul. Him and a bunch of people like him that don't know." many, many communities have a bunch of people who don't know anything. It's the ones that have the aliyot. Aliyot is sometimes a little money; sometimes somebody voted for them because they have the nicest suit in the kehillah, the biggest house in the kehillah. But Torah, aliyot, they don't know anything. This is one of the poisons we have already had for the last few hundred years. The Chida said it already many years ago that

1:42:43Judaism declared bankruptcy when rabbis started accepting money from rich people. Not necessarily that we don't want money from rich people, because you need to build a Torah world, you need money. But taking money from rich people as if they sold themselves, like, "If you give me money, I'll say whatever you want," is putting the Torah up for sale. That's the problem. That's when it becomes a very serious problem. So, Rav Shalom Cohen says that when a person is going to decide how to build a community, make sure he knows halachot, not halichot. Because if he knows halachot, if he knows the laws, he could also tell you the proper way of how to behave too, and what to do and how to do it. But if he doesn't know halachot, everything he says to you is wrong. It's the opposite of Torah, naturally. Now, to give you a little bit of an understanding of where Rav Shalom Cohen is coming from, his father was also one of the Gedolei HaDor. Rav Efraim Cohen, Rav Efraim Cohen was an Ish Kodesh, was one of the Talmidim of the Ben Ish Chai. Tall, long, white beard, he had these big, bushy white eyebrows.

1:44:11He would wear a tarbush, like from Bavel, from Iraq. Like if anybody ever saw a picture of the Ben Ish Chai, he had a big tarbush. That's, Efraim Cohen also had one of those. And he had a, like a galabia, like a, almost like a cape, I guess, if you will, or some type of, I don't know what it's called, in black. Almost like a scary figure. And he was like, Kodesh Kodashim. One day, Efraim Cohen sees a young boy and his father in the street in the middle of the day. says, "What are you doing here? Why are you outside in the middle of the day? Why aren't you in school?" He goes, "No, we just came back from Porat Yosef, and they kicked me out." Little boy. They kicked out a little boy from Porat Yosef. He goes, "Why? Why, my son, why did they kick you out?" And the father tells the story. He says, "Listen, my son, he learns Torah at night, and he learns Torah at night, and he..."

1:45:34fall asleep in class because he's tired. So the rabbi over there, when he falls asleep, he doesn't like it. Rightly so, he doesn't like it, but he pinches him. He pinches the boy to wake him up. Now yesterday my son comes home, and my wife sees his hands full of black and blues. She says, "What happened to you?" You're shy. No, no, nothing. Oh, what happened to you? My wife starts screaming and yelling. What happened to you? Who did this to you? Oh, it's the rabbi. Why did the rabbi do this to you? Oh, because I fall asleep in class. My wife started yelling and screaming at me. Go, you go to the yeshiva. You talk to the rabbi. Tell him not to touch our son. Our son is a tzaddik. So I came to the yeshiva today to talk to the rabbi. Take it easy a little bit. They said, listen, you're not allowed to sleep in class. Your son sleeps, get out of here. They were very hard with me. So I said, okay, you don't want my son? Okay, so we leave. And they kicked us out. Rabbi Ephraim Cohen probably had Ruach HaKodesh, because he saw the boy and he heard the same story you're hearing right now.

1:47:00And he didn't just sit there and look pretty like you guys. What did he do? He got up, he said, come on. He took him by the hand. He said, come with me. Took him back to the yeshiva. Now, he came to the head rabbi over there. He says, you see this boy? From now on, he's my talmid. He can do anything he wants here. If he wants to learn, he's going to learn. If he wants to sleep, he's going to sleep. If he wants to play in the middle of the day, let him play. From now on, no one says a single word to this boy. You have a problem with him, you come to me. Now, when G-d comes to you, powerful like this, thank you for coming, visiting us, we're sorry. You listen. And the boy came back into the life of Torah. He was one second away from leaving the world of Torah, maybe becoming some scientist or something. But instead, he became Rav Ovadia Yosef. The story is about Rav Ovadia Yosef. That little boy was Rav Ovadia. He was one second away from, I don't know, being the next Einstein. He was a genius. But he became Rav Ovadia, baruch Hashem. Why? Somebody took him by the hand and went and fixed the situation. There is a Baraita in Masechet Kallah,

1:48:28Perek Aleph Halacha Gimel, where the talmidim of Rabbi Eliezer ben Horkenos come to the Rav and they ask him a question. So far, we know that a rabbi is supposed to be impressed by the Torah, and pretty much everything else is secondary. So far, we know that a rabbi should take things by the hand and worry about every little neshama like it's his own son. But now we're going to see that a rabbi has to behave a certain way that's unfortunately the opposite of many things we see today. So this perek says a story of Rabbi Eliezer and his students. And the students come to Rabbi Eliezer and they tell him, "Kvoda Rav, if there's a chatuna, a wedding, Can someone take a cup from the kallah and say l'chaim? You know, the kallah gives him a cup, and he takes it. He's one of the guests. Not one-on-one. There are other people. There are other people. And, you know, to get some kavod, to say, you know, after all, he came to the wedding. He says, you know, the kallah gives him a cup, and he takes the cup. Can he do that?

1:49:51The Rabbi of Rabbi Akiva says anyone who drinks with the kallah is like someone who drinks with a zonah. Anyone that does l'chaim with the kallah is like he's with a prostitute. So talmidim were shocked. No, Kavod HaRav, no, he's not one-on-one. Not one-on-one, there are other people. This is Talmid Chacham. He has a kehilla in Brooklyn, in Queens, in Fort Lauderdale, in Boca Raton. He's got a kehilla in Los Angeles. No, he's Talmid Chacham. He just went to a wedding. They invited him to the wedding. And you know, as Kavod, that the Rabbi came, that someone came, the kallah says, "Oh, Kavod HaRav, here you go." And she gives him a l'chaim, and l'chaim, no? It's Derech Eretz, Kavod HaRav. It's good behavior. Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus says, Chas V'Shalom, Chas V'Shalom, anyone who doesn't have Torah on his lips does not have Derech Eretz. Meaning if he doesn't know how to implement the Torah and know that he should never ever take the cup from the Kallah

1:51:10Because taking the cup from the Kallah is going to lead him to think about the Kallah. Ooh, this Kallah, she's going to be with the Chatan tonight. Lucky him. Ooh, the Chatan, hey, he's not all that. I'm probably better than him. No, the Chatan, anyone that feels that comfortable with the Kallah, naturally he's going to do something stupid. Which means his Torah is worthless. So one of the other Chachamim, one of the other Tanaim, Rabbi Elazar ben Azariah made a law. 300 Shofarot, two came out. Law! What's the law? Anyone that takes l'chaim from the Kallah, forget about dancing with the Rachmana Litzlan, like some stupid people do. They give the Kallah to dance with a bunch of strange men, or in front of a bunch of strange men.

1:52:13Not talking about that. Not talking about, oh, all these kehilot, the kallah kisses pretty much half the society in the city. No, I'm not talking about that. But I'm like, hey, kallah gives them l'chaim, l'chaim. Rabbi Elazar ben Azariah says, anyone that does such a thing has no share in the world to come. Loses his olam haba. Lava, I had it; it was good. Let's go while it lasted, like in theory. Okay, it's garbage now. It's gone. You have to earn it again. Why? Yeah, like I'm... This is why I bought it. One of the greatest moments that I've had in the last few years is seeing the wedding of some of my students. Seeing the wedding of Sani, seeing the wedding of Michal and Elhanan. some of these weddings where they're so careful that they simply make the place like the Beit HaMikdash in the community. And only people that know are the people that attend. Everybody else on the outside thinks it's a normal place. They're careful in regards to the dancing, but how careful? No dancing, and

1:53:30how careful? Why? Because we know that if we're going to have dancing in this place, people are not going to follow the mitzvah. Why? Because some of the guests are completely secular, some of the guests may not even be Jewish, some of the guests don't really care, some of the guests are upside down, some of the guests are inside out—who knows what. You know what? Let's solve the problem: no dancing. We're going to have it set—shiur Torah. Doesn't get better than that. Or you have a nice chuppah, kedushah, you have kosher people as eidim, as witnesses. You don't mess around with Hashem. And that's why, same thing I saw in my own wedding, I saw in the weddings here. People came, nothing happened in the wedding. You didn't have, you know, Sonny and Batya come out with a Harley Davidson. You didn't have that. I remember, I have a good memory, there was no Harley Davidson at that wedding. Elhanan and Michal, no Harley Davidson. They didn't come out into the hall with a parachute, smoke everywhere. None of that stuff happened. They just came like normal people, Baruch Hashem, everybody looked. But, average, regular people came up to the chatan and kala in both places, like they came up to us, Baruch Hashem, my wife and I, and said, it's the best wedding I've ever seen in my life. I loved it. Nothing happened!

1:54:47No one knows why it was so great. Average wedding, you spend $50,000, $100,000, $200,000, $300,000, everybody leaves, "Ah, food's terrible. The chatan, he doesn't look so good. I think he's sick. The kala, I think he could do better." Everybody leaves the wedding complaining to no end. These weddings, Baruch Hashem, respectable weddings, but they didn't cost hundreds of thousands of dollars or even tens of thousands of dollars. Respectable weddings, Baruch Hashem, pretty, but people coming up. It's the greatest thing I've ever seen in my life. Wow. I want to get married. Wow. Like they don't know what's happened. You know why? The Shechina is there. The Shechina is there. Of course you're going to be happy, but you don't know why. Because you've never seen the Shechina before. You never touched the Shechina until today. That's what happens when the Shechina is there. You become happy. You become happy and you have no idea what's going on. The Mishnah says when an ish and an isha, they have the right connection. They have shalom bayit, they have ahava, they have all the good tools, the Shechina comes. When there's a kosher wedding

1:55:59Kosher chuppah, kosher kiddushin, kosher witnesses, kosher people, kosher arrangements. You're not planning on having the kosher chuppah. But Hashem, what happens after? Like a lot of people do, the chuppah is kosher, but after it, it's going to be Sodom and Gomorrah with all the dancing. No, the whole thing is kosher. Who comes to that wedding? Closed book. Who comes to that wedding? And everyone becomes happy, but they have no idea why. Except the people that learn a little bit of Torah and oh, that's what the Shechinah feels like. Isn't that amazing? You should do it every day. This, Rabotai Yekarim, is one of the greatest things that you could literally witness. Witness a time where you could see the Shechinah. I wish more people would listen to it. But instead, you have people doing l'chaim with kalot, losing their Olam HaBa, and they don't even realize it. The guy just got AIDS, cancer, and syphilis all at once. He doesn't even know it yet.

1:57:03Now, we'll finalize with a couple of major points you could take home. So far we know that the Rav is supposed to admire the Torah more than anything else. The Rav is supposed to care about every single neshama, even if it's a random boy he doesn't know. The Rav is supposed to make sure that he's careful how he behaves. Make sure that he doesn't become a public desecration of Hashem. Like it says in the Gemara, Masechet Yoma, Perek Bet, Amud Aleph, page 8a, that a Talmid Chacham must be careful with his actions in public to the extent that he should never talk to a woman in the shuk (market), even his wife, and

1:58:06because if he's talking to some woman and the public doesn't know this woman, they might say, "Huh, you see this? No, chas v'shalom, you see this wicked Rabbi? He's talking to married women. See that? You see that guy? He's talking to David's wife; he's talking to Steve's wife. You see that guy?" Unfortunately, there's a reason to worry. Dayan in England, they had for many years a well-known speaker. He was a speaker for a major Jewish organization. Last year, he was the keynote speaker for one of the biggest Jewish organizations in the American world today. This famous Dayan from England was found and caught being with a married woman from his kehillah. Chas v'shalom. The husband was very wealthy, and he found it very strange that the rabbi kept coming to his house to talk to his wife. So he hired a private detective, and he saw on all the cameras and everything that the rabbi, chas v'shalom, was with his wife. So the chachamim say in the Gemara that a rabbi should be careful who he even talks to in public because the public will never give you the benefit of the doubt.

1:59:25because there's nobody that's above the immorality crime. Everybody is subject to fall for that. So you have to be careful. Yeah, what about if she's my daughter? They probably don't know she's your daughter. So you have to be careful talking to her. Don't do things in public. Be careful. Now, if you have to be careful with who you talk to, including your own wife in public, it, you need to use too much of the fuel called, you know, your common sense to understand the halacha from the Shulchan Aruch that says that a Jew, needless to say a rabbi, is never allowed to show any chibah, any type of physical affection, to his wife in public. Is that hard for anybody to understand here? The Shulchan Aruch writes you're not allowed to show affection to your wife public. No hugging, no kissing, not even holding hands. Now, this is for the average Jew, needless to say a rabbi. So if you see Goldberg and company and all of these other yo-yo rabbis have Facebook pictures where they're hugging and kissing their wives or, better yet, just completely strange women, and

2:00:48That alone is enough of a sign for you to take this rabbi, put him in the garbage, and replace him with a real one. This is not Lashon Hara. He's publicizing the pictures himself. These people publicize the pictures themselves. Do you know how many Jewish people who think they're religious have profile pictures on YouTube and Facebook and all of these social websites where they're hugging and kissing their wives or vice versa, she's kissing her husband? It's almost like they deleted this halacha from the Shulchan Aruch. You're never gonna see Rav Moshe Feinstein kissing his wife. You're never gonna see Rav Ovadia holding his wife's hand. You're never gonna see any pictures of the Baal Shem Tov that they drew over the years, you know, giving a nice hug to his wife. You're never gonna see that. Why? It's not allowed. But today's rabbis, Not only do they hug and kiss their wives and teach their students to kiss and hug their wives in public, but worse, they completely disregard all morality laws by hugging and sometimes kissing strange women.

2:02:10You go to their Facebook profiles right now, go back deep enough, and you'll find exactly what I'm saying. At some AIPAC meeting, Goldberg is hugging two strange women. Different AIPAC women, different women. Some other guy here from Florida, every shiur he has, every lecture, every lecture that he has, he starts hugging the crowd. No one says anything. Why? They don't know themselves. So a rabbi has to be careful with how he behaves. Even walking into a non-kosher restaurant to go to the bathroom is forbidden for a rabbi, for a talmid chacham. Why? Because the public sees you walking into McDonald's. They're not gonna think, "Oh, he's going to the bathroom." They're thinking either the food in this McDonald's is kosher or the rabbi is not kosher. They're never going to calculate in their mind that he's going to the bathroom. Once you put the title "rabbi," once you put the title "leader," once you've put yourself in a position where you are the influencer of the Jewish people, whether you have the rabbi title or not is irrelevant. Once you become an influencer to the public, you now have a different class of laws that are in addition to all other Jews.

2:03:42Now, someone came to the Baal Shem Tov and was having a difficulty. The Baal Shem Tov sent his students to different places around the world to go give chizuk to people. One of his students, he sent to the town of Kfarim, the town of all types of Kfarim, but these people were completely ignorant. All they knew were cows, farming, more cows, and some more farming. So the rabbi came. He told them of the Baal Shem Tov and tried to teach them. But he saw these people were like pumpkins. Not listening, nothing. The pumpkin maybe learned a little bit more. How do I get these people to write about what they are interested in? Audition cows? He gave them a whole shiur about cows. A whole shiur about cows! And then, at the end, in the last couple of minutes, he tried to add a little bit of Torah, some halacha in there. They don't fall asleep. He keeps trying, keeps trying. Maybe teach them about crops. Maybe teach them about himself. Maybe teach them about this. Nothing. Nothing's working. Two years.

2:05:06He goes back to the Baal Shem Tov. He says, "I can't do it. I'm starting to worry about myself. I'm not sure. These people are terrible. These people don't listen. They don't understand. They're stupid." The Baal Shem Tov had a Ruach HaKodesh, to say the least, but he had a very unusual way of teaching his students, sometimes just by sending them somewhere and mamash having them experience something to teach them a lesson. He told this student, "Okay, before I say it's okay for you to quit, I want you to go to the train center and..." And go and touch every one of the—when the train comes to a stop, I want you to touch every one of the cars on the train. And analyze it. Tell me what you can learn from touching it. What do you feel? How do you feel? The student didn't know what the Baal Shem Tov wanted from him, but he followed instructions. Okay, the Baal Shem Tov is sending me to the train. Okay. So he went to the train center, waited, and waited. It was very, very cold outside. And the train eventually arrived.

2:06:19And it has 30 different cars. 30 cars on it. He starts from the back of the train, and he touches it, and it's freezing because it's metal and it's cold outside. He touches it; it's freezing. He touches the next one; freezing. Next one; freezing. But he's not learning anything else other than the fact that it's freezing. He hasn't learned anything else. Next one, next one, next one, next one, next one. His hand was so cold he started losing feeling in his hand and started just completely not paying attention that he got to the front cart and he touched it and he burned his hand. Why? Because that one's full of coal on fire that's actually moving the whole train. So he comes back to the Baal Shem Tov with an injured hand and he says, "I don't know, I didn't learn anything. All I know is that 30 cars are freezing except the first one that I kind of burned my hand a little bit." The Baal Shem Tov says you learned everything you need to learn. He says the train has the head one, the head one is full of fire. What does it show you? It shows you that if the Rav has the fire of Mussar, of Halacha, of Torah, of Yirat Shamayim, he could even carry with him 30 freezing people to get them to where he needs.

2:07:50it all depends on the Rav, not on the kehillah. If the Rav has the fire that's necessary, even if they're freezing, he can still get them to where they need to be. So another one of the attributes of a Rav that we need to know is that the Rav needs to have some fire behind him. If he is boring everyone to death, because he himself doesn't care and he can't wait to go home and sleep because he's tired or all he cares about is his own learning and not everybody else's, then obviously we have to change. And Chatam Sofer says that Chanoch sanctified himself so much He literally turned into spiritual fire. His body turned into spiritual fire as the pasuk says in Parashat Noach.

2:08:59Chachamim say, what does it mean that he took him? The Chatam Sofer says that Chanoch sanctified his body so much he turned into fire. He turned into an angel. Which angel? Angel Metatron. We're not even allowed to say his name. One of the most powerful angels and the only one that's allowed to sit down. He sits down and writes all of the merits of Am Yisrael. Talks about a very interesting job that he has. Confused, Elisha saw an angel sitting; he didn't know what was going on here. But the point being about it is that Chanoch sanctified himself, turned himself into an angel. But the same says that Avraham Avinu had the potential to do even more than Chanoch and... Avraham Avinu would have put himself into a cave, into a room, and just learned Torah himself. That said, "Leave me alone. I want to learn Torah." He would have actually gone to a higher level than Chanoch. A higher level. But Avraham Avinu didn't do it, and the reason why is because Avraham Avinu knew that he had to sacrifice his own spiritual growth for the sake of the public.

2:10:19One of the most important and critical jobs of a Talmid Chacham, of a rabbi, of a kehillah, is to sacrifice their own spiritual growth by focusing on bringing everybody else up, not going down to their level. Bringing them higher, meaning, I'm not going to go play basketball with my students, because that's going down to their level. I'm going to learn Aleph Bet with them, even though I already know Aleph Bet. They don't know, so I'll learn Aleph Bet with them and I'll learn Chumash with them and I'll learn Mesilat Yesharim with them and I'll learn all the stuff that I already learned years ago. Because they don't know it. Now, that may not help me grow, but it'll help them, and that's a good job. That's a kavod. I'm a Rav. That's one of the critical parts of a Talmid Chacham. Now, many times people tell me, "Listen, but..." You know, rebuking people, it's not nice, it's not this, it's not that. The Chafetz Chaim one time called a bunch of rabbis to his area and they had a big meeting. He tells all of the rabbis, because there was a big fight among the community in those days, and he told them, "Listen, I'm an old man. I don't know how long I'm gonna live, but I also know all of you are gonna die too one day."

2:11:41I'm just asking you to not mention my name when you go up to Shamayim and they want to punish you for not making peace with each other. Don't mention my name. No, we knew the Chafetz Chaim, Yisrael Meir was really his name and he never told us. No, no, no. I'm telling you right now, if you don't fix this machloket, you're losing all of your Olam HaBa, you're losing all of your zechuyot, you're losing all of your Torah. So don't say I didn't tell you. because I'm telling you now, the Chafetz Chaim was an old man. He was two steps away from going to Gan Eden. Why is he bothering with this? He's fulfilling an obligation that every average Jew has. Placed there's no leader, you be the leader. You see somebody driving on Shabbat, tell the rabbi, "Rabbi, please say something to him, or I'll say something to him. Somebody say something to this guy who is driving on Shabbat." "No, I don't want to turn him off." Okay, but he's been driving on Shabbat for 20 years. There's no more off than that. He's married to a goya. There's no more off than that.

2:12:57She's married to a non-Jewish guy, and she's got three kids with him. She comes to the Beit Knesset with a miniskirt. There's no more off than that. You have to say something. I understand maybe you don't want to attack people the first time they come to shul, I get it, but you've got to say something at some point. You can't allow people to go to shul for five years, and they're still driving on Shabbat, and... Five years, they're still not even doing anything to improve their spiritual status. At some point, you have to say something. Now we'll finalize with this: Avraham Avinu did a lot of good, but in the parasha, it says that Avraham Avinu, after doing the brit milah... was suffering dearly. But he saw that there were three Arabs far away. And he was suffering; it was the hottest day in history. But he saw that there were three Arabs who were not from around here. And he ran to them. He begged them

2:14:23Please be my guests. Now then, when you look at the Torah, it says what did Avraham Avinu feed these people? It says that he fed them with nine seah of dough. Nine seah is anywhere between 70 to 135 kilos of dough for three people. One of the ladies that make challah, what's 135 kilos of challah? You pretty much have enough food for a small civilization. 135 kilos of challah! If that's not enough, he slaughtered three cows for three people. Three cows! Three cows for three people? Even if you're really hungry, three cows? No, come on. Stake-and-a-half already, the biggest, biggest guy is already full. Three cows! The Torah tells us that HaKadosh Baruch Hu rewarded him handsomely for what he did. He paid him a huge reward by feeding his children, his descendants, and...

2:15:44the milk and butter that he gave these angels that really couldn't digest the food because they're angels, but they ate just for his kavod. For the milk and butter that he gave them, HaKadosh Baruch Hu fed millions and millions and millions of Avraham Avinu's grandkids manna in the desert for 40 years. The whole manna The whole manna that we got was white because Avraham Avinu gave some milk and butter to three Arabs that really were angels. He gave them a little bit of water, too, to wash it down. So HaKadosh Baruch Hu said, "Ah, that's enough merit to have an entire river of fresh water." that could turn into any flavor you want. You want Coca-Cola? It's Coca-Cola. You want it to be milk? It's milk. You want it to be wine? It's wine. You want it to be whiskey? It's whiskey. That's the river of Miriam. The river of Miriam was like the manna, any flavor you want. And it followed Am Yisrael for 40 years. Why? Because Avraham Avinu gave a few cups of water to these Arabs. They were really angels. And if that's not enough,

2:17:02because he served the angels that looked like Arabs himself. Seven Clouds of Glory: one cloud under their feet so they don't touch the ground and they don't get tired, so they're floating for 40 years. It also kills all the scorpions and snakes. Clouds on the right and on the left protect them from any enemies. When the Egyptians want to throw their spears, they don't even get close. A cloud on top protects them from the rays of the sun; it gets hot in the desert. At night, it gets cold. You're looking a little fluffy all the time. You're inside a pillow, then there's one in front of you that paves the way, makes the mountains straight, makes the road straight. You have like a construction company in front of you, but you don't hear any noise.

2:18:07Why? Because Avraham Avinu served the malachim himself. Hashem says, "I'm going to send some clouds that are going to serve your grandkids so they don't get tired and they don't get exhausted and they don't have any pain and no scorpion touches anybody and no snake, nothing." Yeah, they're going to be pretty much literally on cloud nine, cloud seven, cloud nine. Why? Why all this reward? I mean, is this the first time Avraham Avinu hosted guests? No. Now, most likely, the other guests that came before and the guests that came after were more hungry than these three guests. Why? The other guests weren't angels; they probably needed the food. These didn't need the food—they were malachim. Better yet, Avraham Avinu did a bunch of other stuff too. How come... These are the things that HaKadosh Baruch Hu decided to feed his descendants, his grandkids, and give them an enormous reward—something that's hard to understand. Rav Shteinman, aleha hashalom, says it's because, unlike all of the other times that Avraham Avinu hosted guests before this or hosted guests after this...

2:19:35This was the most difficult time because it was uncomfortable for him. Not only physically, as he was in pain and agony, but it was also an uncomfortable time because of the part of the body that it was, and because of the situation that he was in. So he had to lower himself. He had to humble himself in public on a much greater level than ever before. And Hashem says, that's the most valuable to you're going to humble yourself and do my will when it's the most inconvenient for you. That means you get the point. That means you get the point. Sometimes, Rabotai Yekarim, HaKadosh Baruch Hu is not looking for the tzedakah that's easy for you to give, for the shiur that's easy for you to give, for the meeting that's easy for you to get to, for the guest that's easy for you to invite. Sometimes,

2:20:37HaKadosh Baruch Hu is actually dafka looking for the opposite. He's looking for the stuff that's the most difficult for you to do. Because that not only shows Him that you love Him and that you're going to do His mitzvot, but it also forces you to humble yourself in front of your Creator by simply submitting to saying to HaKadosh Baruch Hu: "Whether I like it or not is irrelevant; whether I understand it or not is irrelevant; whether it's hard or easy is irrelevant. I'm here to serve You." When a person simply understands and acts accordingly, when he serves Hashem under all conditions, no questions asked, Hashem says, "You get the point." The reward begins already here. This, Rabotai HaKedoshim, if each one of us simply took this into our life, we can be the leader that HaKadosh Baruch Hu wants us to be. In our community, in our house, in our marriage, in our work, in everything in our life. You make Hashem number one. But at the same time, you go and try to help other people as well.

2:21:56If you have the time, you do it yourself. If you don't have the time, then use money. If you don't have money and you don't have time, then use some type of talent. Either way, do something, but at the very, very least, be the example yourself. So at least your behavior is an example of what happens when the Torah influences your life. This applies to every Jew, but even more so to the ones that you would want to call your rabbis. Your rabbi acts like this if he follows this set of instructions to the best of his ability. That's a good rabbi to have. If he doesn't, then you have to start asking yourself: How far is he from this? How far is he from this? Is he committing sins from the Torah, or is he just accidentally doing things by mistake? How far is he from this? If he's hugging women in public, you have to hire a real rabbi. But if he is just, I don't know, forgetful or not careful enough with, I don't know, certain things, or not caring enough with certain things, it's a different story. It all depends on all the things. No one is perfect. We were able to meet all of these conditions. But the point being is that you can now use your common sense to see, can this rabbi help me?

2:23:21Because he is at least at a much better place than I am. Not that he's a much better speaker than I am, or he looks better than I am, or he's taller or shorter or whatever. He meets these conditions. These are the conditions that he has. If he meets these conditions, good. If he doesn't meet these conditions, he cannot be a rabbi. Now yours, not anybody else's. If we started doing this, if we started analyzing everything according to this, we could start little by little rebuilding our Jewish communities. And b'ezrat Hashem, taking our nation out of the trouble that we've got ourselves into. But if we continue moving in this direction, then, unfortunately, things will get worse. The laws in New York, in California, in the UK, in Israel, and in different places around the world that Hashem is simply putting on top of our heads are going to pass. And it's much, much more difficult to undo something that's already passed into law. To, you know, never let it happen in the first place. As I said, we are right now in much greater danger than we've probably been in, most likely since the Holocaust, if not the same exact thing. People don't realize it; everybody's very, very comfortable. The situation is horrible.

2:24:41And if we just start taking things seriously, I think there's a lot of things that we can do to improve the situation. But everyone has to do something about it. Whatever you're doing, do more. This gives everybody a little bit of chizuk to be an influence in their community, in their family, in their life, in their job. And this helps all of Am Yisrael do a little bit more teshuva and get closer to HaKadosh Baruch Hu. Thank you again for Having us in the share of berachot. Baruch Adonai le'olam. Amen ve'amen.

2:25:43Having us in the share of berachot. Baruch Adonai le'olam. Amen v'amen.