Marriage, Yeshiva Education and Much Need Reminders (10 Minutes)

0:02Shimon ben Shetach was the brother of Shlomtzion HaMalka, the queen of King Yannai. Yannai was a murderous king who killed many tzaddikim. His sister's name was Shlomtzion Alexandra. Among Shimon ben Shetach's many achievements were two major enactments. One of them is that he instituted the Ketubah that we have in marriage, which gave more protection for women. And he also established the first Jewish elementary school. So, these two interesting facts completely twist common knowledge about the Torah on its head because most people do the secular on its head because most people view the secular

1:05that don't really have an idea of what Torah really is. They view Judaism as a sexist religion. It's against women. It's not favorable to women. They think of us like we're the Iranian monarchy or something like that. We beat up women, we cover them, and all that stuff. So here you see... Once you start thinking about what is a ketubah, what is the marriage contract that each Jew is obligated to sign in order to get married, this is before prenuptial agreements ever existed. In essence, actually, prenuptial agreements came into being because of the knowledge about ketubot. The ketubah is protecting the wife from an evil husband. If this husband is just a womanizer, and he just wants an excuse to have another woman in his life, and he's not interested in supporting her, he's not interested in being a good husband, then at the very least, there is a contract before they get married, that at least if she leaves, she's not going to leave with nothing. She's not going to be left in the middle of the street with nothing and three kids.

2:27if he doesn't fulfill the marriage, he's obligated to fulfill this Ketubah. Now, if he doesn't, as we read in the Halakha by the Rambam, a husband that's not willing to give his wife a get, he's not willing to fulfill the Ketubah, so the wife has a right to have a get. to leave, to get divorced. If he's not willing to give the wife a get, according to the halakha, back then and forever, the Rambam says, you beat him up until he says, yes, I want to give her the get. And until he gives it, until he gives the get, he's not considered part of Am Yisrael. You're not allowed to include him in a minyan. You're not allowed to say amen to his blessings. He's completely going against the rabbis and the beit din. Somebody like that is not even considered as a Jew. He's considered as someone that has his Judaism on suspension.

3:38So it's very, very dangerous ground. So here we see that Shimon ben Shetach, one of the original Tannaim, already instituted, already added a law that, you know, everybody that has a problem with Judaism, they always have a problem with, oh yeah, the rabbis added this, they added that. Okay, look what they added. They added things for our protection. They put a fence around Hashem's fence. Hashem says that your marriage is holy. It has to be a holy marriage. event, a holy process, but obviously there are wicked people in the world. So the rabbis instituted something to protect women, who are usually more vulnerable in a marriage, against evil people. Additionally, he also established elementary schools. This is also something that's very, very important, especially in today's world, because when you Look at schooling today. I mean, it's... Even going, even people that are not Jewish are starting to think that sometimes they're better off keeping their kids at home and homeschooling them than sending them to some of these public schools. With all the crimes that happen every day and the shootings, it's become normal. I remember maybe 15 years ago, 20 years ago, when they first had the shooting, I think the Columbine shooting, it was probably maybe 15 years ago or so, or longer. The whole country was shocked. Everyone was shocked. It was, you know, a couple of crazy kids killed a bunch of innocent people. Everyone was shocked. And rightly so. But you fast forward a little over 10 years, every other week we hear somebody shot somebody. And it's like, oh...

5:08The whole country was shocked. Everyone was shocked. It was, you know, a couple of crazy kids killed a bunch of innocent people. Everyone was shocked, and rightly so. But you fast forward a little over 10 years, and every other week we hear somebody shot somebody. And it's like, oh... Another shooting, another private school that got shot, another public school that got shot, another kid whose parents had too many guns, another kid who was able to order guns over the internet. Oh yeah, it's their fault, it's this one's fault, it's that one's fault, it's this one's fault. Okay, but fifty people just died this week because some kid killed them because he's playing too many video games. So here you see, the Jewish elementary schools, it's not saying, you know, he didn't establish elementary schools. It specifically says he established Jewish elementary schools. Why Jewish elementary schools? Different than anything else. Because if it's Jewish elementary schools, it's going to teach you Da'at Torah. It's going to teach you the mindset of Hashem. And Hashem, even before He gave us the Torah, He gave the Goyim, He gave the whole world, the seven Noahide laws.

6:26which all of mankind must obey in order to have civilization, you know, civilized. When we have yeshivas and we have an opportunity to send our kids to these yeshivas, you have to literally do whatever you can to get your kid to this school because once he goes to yeshiva, and if it's a good yeshiva where the teachers are normal—not one of these horror story yeshivas where the teachers are really just wearing a costume but they're really wicked people—a normal yeshiva under normal circumstances, you're doing your child the best favor you could possibly do him. And the reason why is because he's going to learn what God said. yeshivas, and we have an opportunity to send our kids to these yeshivas, you have to literally do whatever you can to get your kid to this school. Because once he goes to yeshiva, and if it's a good yeshiva where the teachers are normal, not one of these horror story yeshivas where the teachers are really just wearing a costume but they're really wicked people, a normal yeshiva under normal circumstances, you're doing your child the best favor you could possibly do him. And the reason why is because he's going to learn what God said. and what God said is what he needs to hear. Not just for that time, but forever. One of the major sages, it's considered that he started the Mussar movement, Rabbi Yisrael Salanter. There's a story of one time they saw that his parents are trying to collect money for the kid to go to school, to go to yeshiva, and he sees that nobody's giving any money. Nobody's giving any money, you know, he's studying, he's learning, he's, you know, this is a holy person, you can't just stop the studying for no reason. He sees nobody's giving any money...

7:32saw that his parents are trying to collect money for the kid to go to school, to go to yeshiva, and he sees that nobody's giving any money. Nobody's giving any money. You know, he's studying, he's learning; he's, you know, this is a holy person. You can't just stop studying for no reason. He sees nobody's giving any money. She's the guy, the little kid is doing nothing. He has nothing to do. It's afternoon. He can't go to school. Can't pay for school. Trying to get money. He stops. He says, "Sell the Sefer Torah. Why do we need to sell the Sefer Torah? Sell the Sefer Torah so you can give this kid the ability to go to school. It's more important that he goes to school and gets a Torah education and not have a Sefer Torah." He said that people spend tens of thousands of dollars just to have their name written on a Sefer Torah on the cover. Especially in a Sephardic, you know, kehillot like us. You know, we have our name on the cover of the Sefer Torah. You know, Ashkenazim have the felt, so it's written a little differently.

8:50But the Sefer Torah itself is the same. But we get all the kavod of having the Sefer Torah, and then you have a party, and the party itself costs an extra few thousand dollars, and the Sefer Torah costs thirty, forty, fifty, sixty, a hundred thousand dollars. And the Beit Knesset already has five of them. It's not like they're lacking. There's really no Beit Knesset that's lacking, Baruch Hashem, Sefer Torah. There's some Batei Knesset in New York that have over a hundred Sifrei Torah. But yet, you have many struggling families where they can't afford to send their kids to yeshiva. How could it be? How does anybody wrap their head around it? Instead of spending $50,000 on a Sefer Torah, take that same money and help some kids go to yeshiva. Have some kids actually learn the Torah, not just have some book that nobody reads. Learn the scroll. You already have the scroll. You don't need to buy another one. You'll have much more merit from every mitzvah this little child is going to make by going to yeshiva than you having your name inscribed in a Sefer Torah. Okay, maybe you're not going to have the kavod in this world, but you'll have the kavod in the next world. That's what matters. But unfortunately, we don't know. We don't do.

10:02So here we see that these two sages already, even in the traditional day-to-day life, the laws that they instituted were very wise and very effective and also eternal themselves. We see the Ketubah, how it affected our life. We see how the Jewish elementary schools are affecting our life in essence. When you compare the two, you compare somebody that went to public school versus somebody that went to yeshiva, even though it's no guarantee at all of which one's going to be religious and which one not in this day and age, the reality of it is that it's more likely that the one that went to yeshiva is more likely to stay religious the rest of his life than the kid that went to public school. When you compare the two, you compare somebody that went to public school versus somebody that went to yeshiva. Even though there are no guarantees at all of which one's going to be religious and which one not in this day and age, the reality is that it's more likely that the one who went to yeshiva will stay religious the rest of his life than the kid who went to public school. That's just a statistical fact. So, you see that these Tannaim are instituting things that even have a lot to do with our day-to-day life.