PREPARE FOR YOM KIPPUR - STUMP THE RABBI (24)

0:08Okay. Oh, I forgot to turn this one on. There we go. Sorry. Let me try this again. Okay. Baruch Hashem. Shanah tovah, shanah metukah to everybody. Just completed Rosh Hashanah, Baruch Hashem. We are now in the 10 days of Teshuva, the time frame between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. We have a few days to prepare. Hopefully, you guys have some questions. Today's shiur will be for Ilui Nishmat Avraham Ben Rachel. Also for Refuah Shlema, Refuat HaNefesh, Refuat HaGuf, for Avi Mori, David Ben Esria, Doris Badjora, Levana Bat Sara, Rabbi Efraim Ben Shulamit, Rabbanit Sara Bat Anat, Elisheva Bat Chaya, Dvorah Bat Mercedes, and all of Am Yisrael, B'ezrat Hashem, will have Refuah Shlema, Refuat HaNefesh, Refuat HaGuf.

1:27Hopefully, everybody had a fulfilling Rosh Hashanah. I know that this time of year, for anyone who goes to shul regularly, you get to see a lot of people that live in your community that you never even knew existed because they don't go to shul regularly, but they still have a connection. They still have a connection to Torah, to Judaism, and also refuah sheleimah for Esther bat Zipporah. You see that some people still want to have a connection with HaKadosh Baruch Hu and do what most of us did growing up, which is you do whatever you want during the year. without really two considerations about it. But then you figure you're going to fix all your mistakes in one or two days. You go to shul on Rosh Hashanah, but for sure you're going to go to shul and fast on Yom Kippur.

2:37If you think you saw a lot of people on Rosh Hashanah, wait till you see in a few days. Everybody shows up, especially in the last hour and a half, two hours. The last two hours when there's Ne'ilah. Everybody thinks that the Shofar is blown, it fixes all their problems. So they go just for the Shofar. They sleep all day because they're fasting, like everybody was supposed to do today. You're supposed to fast today. Tzom Gedalia. Tell some people, you have to fast. Why? Because Gedalia died. They go, yeah, but I don't know him. It's like, yeah, you don't know Rabbi Akiva either. You don't know the Talmidim, but you have to fast. They go, yeah, but it was a long time ago. Okay, it was a long time ago. Moshe Rabbeinu was also a long time ago. They go, yeah, but I'm hungry. It's like, yeah, but it didn't happen yet. Tomorrow is the fast. No, no, I'm already hungry today about tomorrow. So today was a fast. Today was an obligatory fast, and trust me when I tell you, nobody likes to fast. Even the people that do it, like tzaddikim, do it at times when you don't need to do it, which we'll talk about a little bit today. There are times that you don't need to fast. But if you want to be a tzaddik...

4:04Maybe you should. But like anything else, before you do anything, you have to ask your rabbi. Because your rabbi is the one that knows if you're capable of doing it or not. Not physically capable of doing it, but spiritually capable of doing it. Because sometimes people jump too fast, and they do things that they're not capable of doing, and they end up breaking because of it. It actually happens very often in the teshuva world. where people get really zealous very quickly, all of a sudden they want to rebuke the entire neighborhood. They just learned the first three halachot of Shabbat. Don't light fire, don't murder anybody because the blood is tzovea also, it's not good to murder, and it's also not good to make the blood everywhere. And have Kiddush, they already think, oh no, they're Moshe Rabbeinu. Two days, they're Moshe Rabbeinu. Start rebuking people, and in reality, they're walking Chilul Hashem.

5:05Your rabbi knows where you stand, whether you can or you can't do it. And if you do things based on your own assessment of yourself, you're guaranteed to become a rasha. With your teshuva, you're going to become a rasha. Why? That's what the Shulchan Aruch says. The Shulchan Aruch says in Orach Chaim, Siman 571, first halacha. Person who's fasting by choice, in essence, to do teshuva for certain sins that a person did, it's not enough to just stop sinning. It's not enough to just stop sinning. Sometimes you have to fast to repent for those sins. Sometimes you have to pay money, sometimes both. But Rav Yosef Karo says someone who's fasting by choice to do teshuva... and can sustain it. He is at a level that he can keep the fast. He's called Kadosh. He's a holy person. Holy person. He comes to your house, and you say, "Honey, a Kadosh is coming to the house." Why? He's a person of faith. But if he's not, if he can't sustain it, if he's not at that level, if he becomes weak and sick, Rabbi Yosef Karo says,

6:27He can't really function. He's called, what? A sinner. He's called a Rasha. Why? But he's fasting. It's not a mitzvah. Everybody is complaining about fasting for Yom Kippur. This guy's fasting Mondays and Thursdays. How come Rabbi Yosef Karo says Because the purpose of fasting is to do teshuva. The purpose of fasting is to do teshuva. It's not to just stop eating. If you just stop eating, that's called a diet. It's called a diet. There's no mitzvah for dieting. You don't go to Gan Eden for being on a diet. You go to Jenny Craig maybe. Maybe be on a commercial that you dieted. Maybe they'll pay you some money. But as far as Gan Eden, you don't get Gan Eden for doing Jenny Craig. You don't get Gan Eden for being on SlimFast. You don't get Gan Eden for not eating all day. All you get is maybe a stomach ache. That's it. Why? Because the whole point of fasting, we learn from the Gemara Masechet Ta'anit...

7:46HaKadosh Baruch Hu tells the Prophet Yechezkel to tell the nation, "I'm not interested in them ripping their clothes and putting sacks on and putting ashes on their head as a form of repentance. I'm interested in them ripping their hearts." Meaning, change your actions. Be sorry for what you did and do something about it. Some people are really, really busy with the sorry, but they don't do anything about it. The key is to do something about it. Now, the commentary on the Shulchan Aruch called Be'er Hetev by Rabbi Moshe Ravkash says that a person who's in the middle of eating and stops himself right before he takes a certain bite that he wants to eat. If you ever noticed, the last bite is usually the best one. Last bite is usually the best one; it has all the flavors. It's the one you always want. So, the Be'er Hetev says that if he stops himself before he eats it for a few seconds, like he wants to eat it but he says hold on to it, and then he eats it, that's a form of ta'anit. That's a form of small suffering, like we just fasted a little bit without actually fasting. What do we learn from here? I

9:13it's not about your diet, that a kadosh who really cares if you eat or you don't eat. It's showing that you've taught yourself how to control yourself. You're no longer an animal; you're not like a dog that's untrained, where as soon as he sees food, he runs, goes through the closet, jumps through the wall, or through the window. He doesn't know; he sees food and jumps after it. No, you're like a trained person who knows there's a time to eat and a time not to eat. Because even withholding something delicious from yourself for a few seconds, even though you eventually ate it, a few seconds is actually a form of ta'anit. We call that ta'anit by the Ra'avad. The Ra'avad is the one who came up with this chidush. It's a form of ta'anit. It's a form of fasting. Obviously, it's not a full fast. It's not to the same level as a full fast, but you get the idea. Now, Now, who’s doing these fasts? Somebody that used to be a rasha. Somebody that used to sin, used to commit all types of sins. And he realizes that, okay, I’ve got to fix myself. There are certain sins that I committed. Okay, I have to do the steps of teshuva. The first step of teshuva is to stop. The first step. The first step is to stop the sin.

10:38you're addicted to any type of food, intimacy, television, all types of things that take your time, attention, money, and so on. These remove you from Hashem. Stop. First, stop. You don't need to drive on Shabbat. You can drive on Sunday, you can drive on Monday, you can drive on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. You can drive any other day. Don't drive on Shabbat. Yeah, but I want to go to shul. Walk to shul. Yeah, but it's too far. Okay, don't go to shul. If the shul is too far from your house to walk, then don't go to shul on Shabbat unless you can make arrangements to live close to the shul during Shabbat. Yes, can you ride a bike? The Chachamim say no, and the reason why is because Not that it's the same, riding a bike is not the same as driving a car, because driving a car is mamash lighting a fire, many fires. And this is the opinion of all the Chachamim; it doesn't matter if you're Ashkenazi, Sephardi, Litai, Hasidish, everybody knows that driving a car or even being on a horse and carriage was never allowed.

11:47But bicycles brought a question to Chachamim. They said, technically, it's not fire. The Chachamim still said it's not allowed. Why is it not allowed? Because what if the bike breaks down because the chain falls off? If the chain falls off, you're going to fix it. You're not allowed to fix it on Shabbat. That's makeh bepatish. You're not allowed to fix on Shabbat, which means that this bike—what are you going to do? You have a $300 bike. you're on your bike, you want to go to shul, and all of a sudden, the chain falls off, which happens very often. The chain falls off, and you might say, "Oh yeah, I'll fix it." But now, Technically, you can't, so you shouldn't do it. Because if you leave it here, you're going to take it with you, which creates problems. Chachamim say, don't get yourself into a mess. You are not allowed to go on a bicycle. Now, unfortunately, you're going to see in the more modern neighborhoods, especially in America, it has almost become like a trend that people go on bicycles today, and the rabbis don't say a single thing about it.

12:49In many shuls here, you see that people ride on their bicycles and the rabbis don't say anything. Sometimes they even make a special space for them in the shul to park their bicycles on Shabbat. Although it's not right for people to go on their bicycles, because Chachamim told us not to, it's not wrong 100% for all of these rabbis to not say anything right away about it. Why? Because it's not Yisrael like the car. It's not forbidden like the car. Now, the reality is we spend every lecture, at least half the lectures, rebuking everybody. In this case, I understand the situation that the rabbis are in. Why? Because right now we're in such a disaster in America, in Florida. I don't think there's a single Beit Knesset that doesn't have an operating parking lot on Shabbat. People drive to shul here as if it's a mitzvah and

13:52So the rabbis are in such a problem, such a dilemma. They say, listen, I got one guy, finally, he's not driving. He's on a bicycle. I'm going to tell this guy something. Let me deal with the other 90 guys that are driving to shul first. Then I'll deal with the guy that's going against the chachamim and going on a bicycle. Technically, you're supposed to tell everybody, including the guy that's on a bicycle. But in reality, you have such a big disaster where 90% of the kehillah is in a car. And he's scared to tell them something. How are you going to tell the guy that's on a bicycle something? Go tell everybody else from now on, don't drive to shul or don't come. Go tell them something before you tell this guy something. Right, so that's the dilemma. So you should know you're not allowed to be on a bicycle according to the chachamim. And I promise you, you don't want to go against the chachamim. If they said it, there's a reason for it. But if you see a new baal teshuva... Riding his bicycle to the Beit Knesset, don't become crazy, zealous, like Pinchas all of a sudden, and start screaming at him in the middle of the street, "Hey, hey, Rasha, Rasha," don't say anything. Wait, let him do what he's got to do. At some point, maybe invite him to your house, talk to him, and say, "By the way, I got this chiddush, I never heard it before." Pretend like you're hearing about it for the first time, and you play this.

15:08They say, look, it's not allowed. Chachamim say it’s not allowed to go on a bicycle. Why? Unless you turn, you know, you fix the chain. And then this Chacham, he's going to be more Chacham than you. What is he going to say? "Yeah, but today there is a chainless bicycle. A chainless bicycle." And he says, "Yes, you're right. It's a bicycle without a chain. It exists. It's a bicycle without a chain. It exists. Still not allowed." Why? Chachamim said already by default, "Walk. Walk." It's not really the bicycle. It's the fact that this is also bringing the mundane to the holy, and that's also the issue with people who are going with their little scooters or skateboards. Apparently, nobody knows how to walk anymore. Hashem gave everybody legs; nobody knows how to use them. Oh, it's far. How far? Oh, it's a whole 12-minute walk. Rabbi, what am I, crazy? I go on my scooter, two minutes. You want me to waste time? Yeah, I want you to waste time. Why? Do you know how many sefarim, how many sefarim I read on the way to shul already?

16:16I try to make sure that I go, anytime I move, I try to live, you know, far from the shul. I don't want to live close to the shul. I lived close to the shul one time; it was the worst thing in the world. Why? I stopped reading. But I live far from the shul, a 15-minute walk. Far, not like three miles away. Far is like within a mile. Within a mile. That means I'm walking a mile there, a mile back, 15 minutes each way. With me, I'm kind of slow because of my health. Sometimes it takes me 25 minutes, a half-hour. Do you know how much I can read in 25 minutes, a half-hour? So the whole time I'm reading, I'm finishing books. Everybody else is in their scooters making aveirot. I’m, Baruch Hashem, doing mitzvot, walking to shul. It becomes a mitzvah to walk to shul. Take a little book, take a little pamphlet, take something good, read it the whole way. Yeah, aren't you going to run into something? Yeah, you're going to run into mitzvot. Eventually, you train yourself; you know how to walk while reading, it's no problem. I've been doing it for years, Baruch Hashem, it works. Point is, you have legs. You have legs that G-d gave you for a reason. Now, what if somebody doesn't want to listen? I'm going to tell you a story. True story. I know it firsthand.

17:35Chazal says something, if people mistreat it, HaKadosh Baruch Hu takes it personally. Chazal, they're not taking it personally. Why? They're in Gan Eden right now. They're having a good time. But HaKadosh Baruch Hu, in the honor of His children, of His soldiers, to sanctify His name, He takes it personally when you go against Chazal. So Chazal made a takanah where they said that when you say the Kiddush, Kiddush, on Yom Shishi, It's common among everybody, whether you're a Sefardi or Ashkenazi, it doesn't matter, to sing the song "Shalom Aleichem." "Shalom Aleichem." Everybody knows the song, right? You guys have heard the song, right? Okay. Why? Because when you come back from shul on Friday, in essence, what's happening? You're bringing two malachim with you. The Gemara says you bring two malachim with you. One is a good malach, one is not so good. But they're both coming with you. Why? They come to see the house. If the house is ready, it's holy, the table is set, and the house is prepared for Shabbat, if the environment smells good, it's good. Then the good malach says, "May next Shabbat be just like this one," and gives you a bracha.

18:52But if it's not, if your house looks like it's Tisha B'Av, the chairs are flipped on the table, there's nothing on the table, your notebooks and tools are still there, muktzeh is all over the place, no one's prepared, your wife is still wearing a robe, she doesn't even know it's Shabbat yet, the kids just got out of bed, no one knows what's going on. Then the bad malach says, he curses, well he says, "May next Shabbat be just like this." Everybody's fighting, next Shabbat also. So now, these malachim, everybody knows these malachim. The Gemara says, the Gemara says, malachim say, they come to your house. So in the honor of these malachim, when we sing "Shalom Aleichem," these angels, that's what we sing, the song. "Shalom Aleichem," aleichem, it's not talking about Hashem, it's talking about these angels. Welcome these angels. In the honor of these malachim, what do we do? These special guests, these honorary guests, what do we do? We stand. We stand. Chazal says, stand. Now, if you sit down during that time, nice try. If you sit down, you're not going to get there in the Olam HaBa. If you sit down, you're going to get to Gan Eden for coming to the shiur, though. Gan Eden, you come for the shiur. Now, if you sit down during Shalom Aleichem, you go to Gehinom.

20:18No, you don't go to Gehinom. Why are you going to go to Gehinom? It's not halakha, you have, no. But do the sages get offended? I told you that in Gan Eden, who gets offended? Hashem gets offended. Why? How come you're treating My malachim with such disrespect? Now people think, ah, no, come on, no, no, come on, you fanatic, crazy, ISIS, Daesh, you, Hamas. Okay, I'll tell you a story. one time there was a guy who, uh, says, "You know what? I don't think you need to stand up. Why? For what? You're singing to the malachim, you're not singing to Hashem. This, that, yeah, all the exclusion." Well, no, he doesn't want to stand. He wants to sit down. "Okay, sit down." Everybody's singing; they ask the question, "No, nobody wants to do anything." Oh, I'm sitting; everybody else, the whole family, is standing. But this guy wants to sit down. Okay, what are you going to tell him? Nothing. He can't do anything. It's like a family of rabbis. Okay, he's sitting, sitting, sitting, sitting, sitting. One Shabbat after another Shabbat after another Shabbat after another Shabbat. Nothing happens. No Gehinnom. One day, he feels like his leg starts to hurt. His leg starts to hurt. Oh, let's go to the doctor. The doctor says, I'm sorry, sir, but...

21:45Your knee needs to be replaced. My knee needs to be replaced. Replace your knee. Where do you want my knee? My knee's good. He goes, oh yeah, your knee is good, but it's old. Yeah, but it wasn't old six months ago. Six months ago it wasn't old. Today it's old. I don't know. Something happened. Something happened. What happened? He didn't do the cheshbon. The knee started getting worse and worse. Then the other knee started getting worse and worse. Little by little, over the next three years, he wasn't able to walk anymore. Now, everybody in the family knows this is the reason. Everybody in the family knows this is the reason because he didn't stand up like Chazal says. That's the reason that started this problem with the legs. But everybody's scared to death to say anything. Why? Too late. What are you going to tell the guy? "Told you so." It's too late. So when Chazal says something, you should definitely listen to them.

22:46Because if they said it, that means that it's not for nothing. Now, the different kehillot today have so many different leniencies that a lot of people don't really know the difference between a minhag and a halacha. And a lot of people get frustrated and leave Judaism not because of halacha, but rather because of minhagim. And they blame the religion for it. They blame God for it. In reality, they should only blame themselves. Why? It's their fault that they didn't know the difference between minhag, which is a custom, and halacha. Sometimes people take on a minhag so seriously, they add it as a chumrah to their life, as a stringency to their life, when in reality, they shouldn't have. If they had asked any Talmid Chacham that knows them well, he would have told them, "Don't do it." Why? You're not on that level. But one of the most frustrating things that you get to see from this position, from dealing with the public and trying to help guide people to do teshuva, whether they're newly religious or...

24:09They thought they were religious their whole life, but now they're doing teshuva finally. Whatever it is, one of the most frustrating things is people that are know-it-alls. They just decide to do whatever they want. They read something in a book and they start doing it. And I'm not talking about halakha, I'm talking about minhagim. They start taking on all types of stringencies. All of a sudden they become the Ben Ish Chai. All of a sudden they're Rabbeinu Tam. All of a sudden they want to do all the chumrot. And tell everybody else, tell all of Klal Yisrael, they're all reshaim. In reality, they're the biggest rasha. Why? Their whole teshuva is not real teshuva. It's all ego. It's ego, it's just another way for you to think that you're better than everybody else. So, until you are an expert in the basics of halakha, an expert in all the basics, should not even consider a single chumra unless your rabbi specifically told you this is for you. And if you think you're clever enough and you say, "No, no, but I felt something. I think I can do it," go to your rabbi and say, "Rabbi, can I do it?" Just like my little kids ask me for permission if they can touch something on my desk and

25:31You have to ask your rabbi. "Rabbi, can I do this, please?" Not, "Oh Rabbi, I decided that I'm going to take this on. I decided I'm going to start fasting Mondays and Thursdays. I decided that I'm going to start keeping such-and-such. I decided I'm going to keep Shabbat an extra hour every week." Who decided that you're allowed to decide? I saw on YouTube. Okay, so call YouTube then. What are you telling me? Call YouTube, Rabbi YouTube. Help me. I need l'chav for something else now. No, but YouTube doesn't answer. So how did it give you this chiddush? That you're allowed to take on this stringency? No, I mean it was the rabbi I saw. Okay, so call him. What are you calling me for? Go call him. Ask him. Oh, he has an answer. Okay, so when he answers. You have to understand. Rabbis are not puppets. You cannot, you know, use it, abuse it, get bored of it, and replace it with something else. Go to a toy store, go buy something else. When it says, this is something Chazal says, you have to be afraid of this rabbi like you're afraid of God. Then why do you have him as a rabbi?

26:49If he's a real talmid chacham, somebody that has yirat shamayim, you have to be afraid of him like you're afraid of God. Why? Because he's the one that's going to get you to Gan Eden. Yeah, but I can do it myself. Okay, good luck. Good luck, do it yourself. Korach thought he could do it by himself also. A lot of people thought they could do it by themselves. But the Gemara says, no, you can't do it by yourself. Why? Because we need to have rabbis. Now, unfortunately, sometimes the rabbis are prisoners of their own kehilot. where the funding for the kehilla comes from rich people that don't exactly care so much about Torah. And the rabbi is afraid to rebuke them. I feel bad for such rabbis because it's a horrible, horrible place to be in, especially if you have a family, kids. When you make a decision whether you're going to tell people the truth or not, it's not just about, oh, is it good for them or bad for them? It's natural for you to think also, "Wait, they're probably gonna fire me. So where am I gonna get a job now after they fire me?" Just over here by my house, they fired two rabbis in the last year. Two rabbis they fired in the last year. Why? Because both rabbis told them, "You have to start keeping Shabbat. Stop driving on Shabbat." They fired two rabbis. So the point is that it's not so easy. It's not an easy job, and...

28:17But at the same token, it's not allowed to simply say nothing because you're afraid. One of the Gedolim in the Syrian world is Rav Tzion Levy. He was the head rabbi in Panama. And When he was still young, before he became one of the Gedolei HaDor, they asked him to come and become a rabbi in Panama. Over there, he was an Ish Kodesh. And he saw that there was a lot of intermarriage, all types of tza'ar nefesh, all types of things that were against the Torah in the community. He couldn't stand that way, so... He saw that the president of the shul, his son, was going to get married to a goya. So he invited the son on the day of his wedding to his office. He said, "Listen, I want to give you a present. Come to my office."

29:42invited the son to his office, and the son said, "Okay, the rabbi's day of the wedding, Baruch Hashem, he's going to marry Christine, and the rabbi is going to give him a present too. Why? Because his father is the president of the shul, and he's got a lot of money." So the rabbi invites him to his place, And he comes in. He goes, "Listen, one second. I got to go get something. I'll be right back. Stay here, okay?" So the kid, on the day of his wedding, says, "Rabbi, I got to go in a few hours to the wedding." "No, no problem, no problem. I'll be right back." He closes the door behind him. And the young man, It's about to marry the guy. He sits in the office. He's waiting, waiting five minutes, ten minutes, fifteen minutes. Oh, maybe the rabbi has stomach aches in the bathroom. You know, who knows? Fifteen minutes, the rabbi can't say nothing, right? Come on, come out, rabbi. Twenty minutes. Okay. No, twenty minutes. I got a wedding in three hours. Pictures, this, that, you know, the whole balagan. Twenty-five minutes. The guy starts pacing back and forth in me and...

30:55room says, "You know what, let me go check," and he tries to get out of the office. He sees the door is locked. He starts smashing on the door, but to no avail. Nobody else is in the building; it's a Sunday, and everybody's off. Nobody else is in the building. He goes, "Huh, what's going on? He locked me in here?" He runs to get the phone. The phone is disconnected. "Disconnected phone, no phone. Thank you, it's going to be the phone disconnected phone, nothing." The guy starts smashing on everything; nothing he can do, this is before the days of cell phones. He can't do anything. The next day, the rabbi comes to the office, opens the door, and the guy gets up without even saying anything to him, just runs out. goes to see the one he was supposed to meet, Christine. Goes to see her. "Hey, I'm sorry." In a second, she says, "Ah, you dirty Jew. I can't believe what you did to me, you filthy..." All the gaon nefesh in the world. She spews it at him. Embarrassed her in public. There was a big reception. They paid everybody already. All these guests show up, and the chatan doesn't show up.

32:22She sends him to Gehenom. So now this guy says, "I'm going to take my revenge against this rabbi for doing this to me." The next day, Rav Zilberstein is walking down the street, but he hears somebody walking behind him. He stops. The walking continues. ...turns around and he sees the kid with a gun. "Because you ruined my life, I'm going to ruin yours." Now all of us, what are we going to do over there? All of us. No, please. We're all losers. It's for you. It's for you. That's what we're doing. You know what he did? Right here. Right here.

33:22why I rather you kill me than you kill yourself. I rather you kill me in this world than you go to Gehinom forever. Now this story is not finished. The kid couldn't believe it, couldn't believe the rabbi was willing to put his life on the line. He couldn't do it. But the father was still upset. still upset the whole thing was happening. So Shabbat came, and the father insisted on getting an aliyah to be the first. First aliyah to the Torah. The rabbi says, I'm not reading if he's here. Rabbi, I have my aliyah, I'm the president of the shul. The rabbi says, If he's inside the shul, president, if he's inside the shul, I'm not reading from the Torah. Not only is he not getting an aliyah, if he's inside the shul, I'm not reading. Nobody else knows how to read. Nobody else is going to go against the rabbi publicly, even though not necessarily everybody is a tzaddik, but they're going against the biggest community, the president of the shul, like this. The president got his embarrassment, said,

34:50I'll deal with you after Shabbat. He leaves and continues the aliyah. There are a lot of people there. He's not going to hold up everybody else. The Rav goes back home. He says to his wife, "Honey, after Shabbat, we'll have a conversation about a few things. Something happened in the shul. Most likely we'll have to move." So Motzei Shabbat comes in. The door of the rabbi, outside the window, he sees the entire community is outside his house. He says, "Hashem, they came to lynch me. Public lynch, what are they going to do? What are you going to do? We're here, we're here, we're in Panama, we're not in New York. Panama." Opens the door, the shul president is at the head. He says, "Kvod HaRav, I'm here to apologize."

35:52You're right, you're wrong. And that's how he became the Gadol HaDor in the Syrian community. Now, he was a huge talmid chacham, very close to Rabbi Ovadia, and many of the things that he taught them helped save the Syrian community. I wish they had more like him, because there's a lot of issues that happened after he died. that took some of the things that he or other Chachamim in the Syrian community said out of context that have made that community a fantastic community in regards to having beautiful shuls, beautiful siddurim, machzorim, and things of that nature. But unfortunately, it's another one of our communities that needs to work on learning Torah seriously because There are some very big mistakes that are public now. For example, the whole issue with the way they treat converts. Now, the Takkanah in the Syrian community from over a hundred years ago stated that they saw there was so much intermarriage that they said, "We have to save our community. From now on, we're not allowing converts within the community." That's what the Takkanah was.

37:14To save the community, Chachamim are allowed to, in essence, add a law in order to save the community. But it's temporary, it's not permanent. Unfortunately, the Chachamim that made that law died, and no one ever took that Takkanah off. And the people of today, didn't continue it the way it was said, but elaborated on it. Where instead of, "we're not accepting any converts anymore within the community," today they outright reject converts. Meaning, if you're a convert, you want to go to Safra over here, you're going to see the first thing in the door: "We do not accept converts." Now we don't accept converts to, you know, if you're a rabbi, they're not going to convert you. Don't come to our shul. Don't come to our shul. Some of them even go crazy to the point where they kick you out of the mikveh. This happened to one of our students. Two of our students, actually. This is not what Rav Tzion said. This is not what the Chachamim said. This is the craziness of today. This is when someone's zealousness goes out of context, and it's not what the original Chachamim said.

38:31So, it's not anything against the Syrian community per se, chas v'shalom. The Syrian community from Aleppo, they have the oldest codex, the oldest codex that we have, which is the way we know how to do nikud in a Torah, how to read a Torah. The only reason we know how to do it is because of the codex. They have the oldest version that we have in the world today. But unfortunately, many of the people today have become modernized, modernized, modernized. The only Torah that they know is what they hear in an occasional shiur. And the rabbis today are unfortunately prisoners of the community. If you see one of their big rabbis tell the community, hey listen, don't treat converts like that. That's not what the Chachamim said. Guess what? Tomorrow he's looking for a new job. Tomorrow he's looking for a new job. Tomorrow he's on the unemployment line. If he tells the community, "Hey, you're not allowed to go to the mixed beaches. Whether it's summer or it's winter doesn't make a difference. You're not allowed to go to mixed beaches like a lot of people go." What, tomorrow? He's on the unemployment line. "You're not allowed to drive to shul." Unemployment line. "You're not allowed to wear wigs." "Yeah, but Ashkenazim wear wigs." Okay, Sephardim don't wear wigs. Even if you want to rely on the Ashkenazi for wigs, forget about the Avodah Zarah part.

39:56That's only for Ashkenazim. It's not for Sephardim. What are you, Syrian or Bukharian Sephardi? What are you doing wearing a wig? Whose heter are you using now? Why did you become Ashkenazi for one mitzvah? Guess what? The rabbi is on the unemployment line if he does this. So, what's their solution? What's their solution? They go to the unemployment line. Or they can bring me for free. They can bring Rabbi Mizrahi for free. They can bring anybody who wants to tell the truth for free. Why? That's what your responsibility is. You don't want to lose your job? Okay, HaKadosh Baruch Hu knows that. But He still gave you a gift. He gave you a shul, 500 people, 1,000 people. Each one is richer than the other. Each one has kavod for the Torah and so on and so forth. But they all decided to become their own rabbis. It's your job as a leader who knows the truth to redirect them.

40:58Now you know that they're not going to take it well if it's coming from you. That doesn't absolve you from the mitzvah. You still have to do it. You still have to do it. Unfortunately, though, sometimes the problem is the rabbi. In some communities, the biggest problem is the rabbi. One guy called me one time. And he says, "Listen, I'm looking, can you help me with a shidduch?" I said, "I'm sorry, I'm not in the shidduch business. I try to help people do teshuvah, do a shidduch between them and HaKadosh Baruch Hu." He goes, "Yeah, but your cousin told me about you. Maybe you know a lot of people, this, that, and the other thing." I said, "Listen, once in a while, I get to know people. And I try, but don't rely on me. Go to a real shadchan." "Okay, so what do you need?" I said, "Send me your resume." Send me your shidduch resume. If I ever have something, I'll tell you about it. So the guy sends me a resume, I see he's well-to-do, he has every degree under the sun, a doctor in this, a doctor in that, he's older. All types of doctors, and he's also from some royal family in some different country. This guy, he's a convert.

42:11Said, "Oh, we have many converts like this. We could build yeshivot every day with such converts. All right, go down the line, go down the line. What is he looking for? He says, 'Boy, no resume.' He's supposed to be, 'What are you looking for?' Frum from birth, no ba'al teshuvah, no convert. I go back to the top. I say, 'Convert.' But the convert doesn't want to convert. So I said, it has to be a typo." Convert doesn’t want to convert. It’s like black-on-black crime. What the heck's the matter with you? Listen, go hate the white people at least. At least you have a reason. Why are you hating the white people? What’s the matter with you? What’s the matter with you? So this guy, I call him. I say, listen. I text him something. said, "Yeah, I think there's a typo here. It says that you don't want your convert." He goes, "Yeah, convert, this rabbi, okay. But you're not willing to take a shidduch if she's a convert and if she's a ba'alat teshuva." He says, "Exactly." I said, "You might tell me why?" He goes, "Well, listen, my community won't accept her."

43:25i said, "I can't even make up a story like this." I said, "What do you mean your community doesn't accept? You're a convert. You remember that, right?" He goes, "Yeah, but they accept me. But they won't accept me marrying a convert." I said, "Why?" He goes, "I'm in a Syrian community. Over here, they don't accept converts. I got in. Next to my name, there's a net worth called a billion dollars." That's how he got in. If you have a billion dollars, you could be Arafat. Showing what's showing in that particular part of the Syrian community, the rabbi is the problem. It's not the entire Syrian community. That one, that particular one, that shul. It's not the kehillah, it's the rabbi. It's the rabbi. It's not the kehillah. Others, unfortunately, mix nachas. Point being, Rabotai, we can't just go out there and make enemies with everyone and anyone. I'm not making, this is not to, chas v'shalom, insult everyone, but it's to simply understand what's a rule, what's a halacha, what is a minhag, what is a chumra, what's what? What are we doing here? Why are we doing what we're doing here?

44:44And that's why the Shulchan Aruch says, if you want to do teshuva completely, you have to take on some fasts as part of your teshuva, not right away. Later on, as you get more and more deep into your teshuva, you're gonna have to take some fasts on. And the Baal HaTanya says that you really need to fast at least one time for each one of your sins. the rest of the hachamim said, "Yes, one time, but the 84 fasts for every time you wasted seed, or almost just as much for being with a goya, or even more for being angry, and so on and so forth. No one can do that in this generation—we're a weak generation. So what do you do? You have to give money. How much money? Each time you're supposed to fast, you give a replacement of a meal. So let's say, for example, wasting seed 80 to 84 times for every time a person wasted seed."

45:44So let's say the value of a meal is $5. In America, let's say it's $5. I don't know, if you're in South America, it could be $2. If you're in different parts of France, it's, I don't know, $100. Who knows, a cookie, $100 over there. So whatever, it depends on where you're eating. $5, let's say, a meal. 84 times 5, it's $420. Every time a person wastes seed, they have to give $420 specifically for the sake of teshuvah. This specific sin. Now, a person right now is looking at himself, looking at his pocket, like, wait a minute, $420? I have $4.20. How can I get started? He doesn't have anything. He doesn't have anything. Don't worry. Who knows what you don't have? Don't worry about this part of the teshuvah. Worry about the other stuff first. Stopping, committing to stop, watching your eyes, getting other people to stop—focus on that first. Hashem, who sees that you're seriously trying for the things that you can do, will give you the ability to do the things that you can't do. Don't worry about the things that you can't do. You're not being judged for them. You're not being judged for not being rich, and therefore you can't give $400,000 for all the sins you've made.

46:55You're being judged for the things that you can do. You can stop. You can watch your eyes. You can watch your mouth. You can watch your ears. You can do a lot of things. Focus on those things. Focus on that. Now, a person is not going to be able to fast, and therefore he's going to use meals or money instead. But the Ba'al HaTanya says, even if he could use money, he should at least fast one time for each sin. One time, not 84 times, one time for each sin; but the rest of it, pay with money. So if a person wants to do such a teshuvah, the Shulchan Aruch says, if he's fasting for the sake of teshuvah because he could sustain it, he is an ish kadosh. She is an isha kedoshah. They're holy people. But if they cannot sustain it, they become weak and sick as a result of it, it's not even teshuvah. It's actually another sin added to their whole regimen of sins. What do you mean? But he fasted all day, the whole day the guy is suffering, poor guy. Why is it another sin? Because he did not get rabbinical permission to do this.

48:13You have to get permission to do it. You can't just do whatever you want in Judaism. "Yeah, but the rabbi on YouTube said I could do it." Okay, so go to the rabbi on YouTube. Go to him, ask him. Maybe he'll fight for you and gain them too. Why do the chachamim say such a thing? To show us that the same exact action, the same exact thing... It could be considered holy or a sin. Same exact thing. That's how important it is to know the difference. The same exact action. You could drink the same cup of water. If you say a bracha, it's a mitzvah. That mitzvah creates an angel. That angel is going to help protect you and encourage you to do more mitzvot. Why? Because you drank some water, but before you drank it, you said a bracha. You created another angel. And that angel is going to fight for you as a soldier. On the other hand, you forgot about Hashem for two seconds. You drank the water. No bracha. No bracha. Guess what? You also created something, but it wasn't an angel that's your friend. It was a demon that's going to hurt you. It's going to encourage you to make more sins. Now you drank this, he's going to encourage you maybe to go to White Castle. He's going to encourage you to maybe get some McDonald's. He's going to encourage you to maybe look at some illegal websites on the internet.

49:35That angel, we didn't create it from nothing. No, you created it. So now, rabotai, the same action can do two things. Now, when a person is doing mitzvot, comes to a shiur Torah, comes to a shiur Torah, Figured he's in good shape, comes to the Beit Knesset. You figured he's in good shape. How come there are so many resha'im at Beit Knesset? Some Batei Knesset are experts. They collect all the resha'im. It's like the Erev Rav go to the Beit Knesset, only Erev Rav. Some Batei Knesset have, Baruch Hashem, all types of people—some more, some less—but some Batei Knesset, you see that everybody over there is a mechalel Shabbat, doesn't keep anything, makes fun of the Torah, and... Now, you would think, people go to Beit Knesset, don't get the protection of the Torah, they should all become tzaddikim by the time they leave. How come not? Who has an answer for me? Somebody goes to Beit Knesset every day. Not once a year. Not on Yom Kippur only. The whole year. He goes to Beit Knesset every day. All year. Never misses a day. He even goes to Netz.

50:57But in Shamayim they still call him Rasha. How come? How could such a thing be? How come the Torah that he's learning and the tefillot are not helping him? No, you guys have to give me an answer or I'll give $50. No, who'll give me an answer? The guy's going to shul every day. He learns Daf Yomi. Still Rasha. How come? How could such a thing be? No, chizuk. See, he's been coming to the shiur. You guys are sleeping. You guys are sleeping still. Wake up! Ten days of teshuva. I'm gonna scare the death out of you by the time we finish the shiur, what happens in ten days of teshuva. Then you're gonna wake up. What does it mean? It means this person goes to shiur, learns Daf Yomi, learns Torah, comes to the shiur! but is not committed to doing teshuva yet. Meaning, he comes to the shiur because it's something to do. It's interesting. He comes to Beit Knesset because it's something to do. He grew up this way or his friends go there. He's not doing it because he's using the Torah as the instruction set to live his life and to fix his horrible middot. He's just doing it because, just because.

52:18So the same Be'er Heitev says this person is still considered a rasha and all of his actions and all of the Torah that is learned by this rasha who does not want to do teshuva does not go to his merit. In fact, it gives increasing strength to the kelipot. Every single mitzvah that he does gives more strength to the Satan, to the horrible side. Yeah, but he goes to shul, he learns, so I don't feel me everything, yes. But because he did not use these mitzvot, and he did not fulfill these mitzvot for the sake of Heaven, he's not trying to do teshuvah. He's just doing them just because. He goes to shul just because. He learns just because. He reads just because. He has nothing else to do. He's old. He's 90 years old already. What else is he going to do? Play Nintendo? What is he going to do?

53:19So he reads, okay, reads the Chumash. I know somebody, Rav Zev told me, he says he knows somebody, every Shabbat he learns Gemara with a cigarette. Every Shabbat, he says. He finishes the entire Shas learning with a cigarette in his mouth. Smoking a cigarette. On Shabbat, learning Gemara. Meaning that the Torah by itself is not fixing anything for him. He's learning another subject. So in Shamayim they say this person not only is a Rasha, But worse yet, all of his mitzvot are giving more strength to the opposite side until he does teshuva. So instead of the Torah and the chizuk and the shiur that you gave him bringing him back, unfortunately, it's not doing anything for him. Why? Because he himself has to want to help himself. How? By desiring to change. Now in Siman 565, The Shulchan Aruch says, sometimes there's a person that publicizes his fasts. He tells people, "Hey, listen, guys, take it easy on me today; I'm fasting." "Oh, why, why?" "No, no, no, it's Monday." "So why are you fasting?" "You know, people like me, we fast Mondays and Thursdays. I didn't tell you about the time I fasted three days in a row. I didn't tell you about that. But people like me, we fast Mondays and Thursdays."

54:49The Shulchan Aruch says in Siman 565, someone that publicizes his fast gets punished for that fast. Punished! Now the Be'er HaTev that wrote the commentary says what? What is he saying on this? He says, even if people ask this person that's fasting, "Are you fasting?" he has to lie and say, "No, I'm not fasting." Why? Why do you think you're better than them? Don't tell anybody. Keep your mouth shut. What are you doing? You're fasting. You want to be a big tzaddik? You want to elevate yourself? No problem. Quiet. Don't show off that you're fasting. Unless they ask you to eat. No, no, come on, eat with us. It's not nice for you not to eat with us. Not nice. And he can't excuse himself. He says, listen guys, I can't, I'm fasting. He's allowed. But then there's another condition. When are you allowed to tell people you're fasting? The Be'er Hetev says you're allowed, and you should publicize your fast if your fast is for the sake of teshuva. If you're fasting because it's teshuva.

56:04then you should publicize it in order to teach other people that they should do teshuva also. What about being arrogant and showing off and so on and so forth? It's okay. It's okay to be arrogant about doing teshuva. It's okay. Don't worry. It's fine. It's okay to be arrogant about that. Meaning, not okay to be arrogant, but it's okay. We'll take that risk. Why do we take that risk? Because someone that does real teshuva someone does real teshuva, the first step of doing real teshuva is destroying your arrogance. If you're still arrogant, you haven't even begun to do teshuva. Why? Because it says, Hashem hates every single person that's arrogant. So if you still haven't worked on your arrogance, you still think that you're better than everybody else, you haven't even begun to do teshuva yet. But if a person has worked on his character traits, then the Gemara in Masechet Berachot, page 34b says, in the place that Baalei Teshuva stand, even Tzaddikim cannot get to. So then there's a big question I'm going to ask you guys. I'm sure all of you have heard somehow, somewhere, that Hashem even loves the Resha'im. He loves the Resha'im. Now, there's many verses in the Torah that say the opposite.

57:32Hashem says to the prophet Micha, et Eisav saneti. Eisav, he's a Rasha, I hate him. Oh, Hashem says, ein shalom, Hashem amar laresha'im. Hashem says, no peace to the resha'im. But then, there's a Chachamim that say, Hashem loves the resha'im too. Now, who wants to give me an answer on this? Why would Hashem love the resha'im? He said he doesn't like them. Why would he love the resha'im? Chavrutah. You, you. You're already on a roll. I'm going to give you another one. Mitzvah, go ahead, mitzvah. Maybe He loves them in this world, but He hates them in the next. He loves them in this world, but He hates them in the next. Why? Why would He love them in this world? If they're resha'im now, why would He love them later? Interesting, interesting. No? No?

58:36They helped the righteous do teshuva? How is the rasha helping the righteous do teshuva? How did Esav help Yaakov do teshuva? How? He left him for 20 years. He didn't see him. And then the one day he saw him, he said, listen, I don't want to be with anybody. Me and my sons are going to be here. I'll catch up with you. He never caught up with him. Yetzer Hara is the obstacle. He's doing his job. Rasha is not doing his job. Rasha is a traitor. Rasha is going against his Creator. No? Chavot, Chavot, yeah? He's Jewish. Okay, so Nebuchadnezzar was also Jewish. You know, Nebuchadnezzar. Nebuchadnezzar destroyed the first Beit HaMikdash. Chidush. Yeah. Chidush. See, you guys came to shuir to hear chidushim. Nebuchadnezzar destroyed the first Beit HaMikdash. The Gemara says that Shlomo HaMelech made a mistake. He wanted to bring Mashiach. He used his wisdom thinking, "Oh, Mashiach is world peace. Okay, so how do you make world peace? I'll marry every queen from every country, convert all of them to Judaism, and there'll be world peace." So when he married the queen or the princess from Egypt, her name was Sheva.

1:00:01She, even though she converted, still brought her idolatry with her. And HaKadosh Baruch Hu got very angry about this, and the Gemara says that Malach Gavriel, in that moment that he married Sheva, came with a spear, hit the middle of the ocean, and created an island. That island was later known as Italy, Rome. Why is that significant? Because the Romans are the ones that destroyed the Beit HaMikdash. So, Rebbe Shlomo HaMelech wanted to build the Beit HaMikdash, bring world peace, and bring Mashiach. Unfortunately, his actions led to the destruction of the Beit HaMikdash. So, this Queen Sheva had a daughter, and that daughter had a son. That son's name was Nebuchadnezzar. This is the makor? Pirush Rashi, Sefer Melachim Aleph. I brought the chidush for you guys here, while you guys are asking the question. Rashi talks about it on Sefer Melachim Aleph, chapter 10, pasuk 13, and also commentary from the Arizal.

1:01:28Commentary of the Arizal also further, there is a Sefer HaDorot. Sefer HaDorot discusses it as well, and there’s a few others. Also, the Chida, the Chida also talks about it. So, a few places talk about this. So now, back to why does Hashem love resha'im? Nebuchadnezzar was Jew was a rasha, so since the Chida is the one that gave us the hiddush on Nebuchadnezzar being a Jew, the Chida is also going to give us the hiddush on why Hashem loves resha'im. Why does Hashem love resha'im? The Chida says that HaKadosh Baruch Hu loves resha'im because every day He looks at the rasha and He says, in one second you could become a baal teshuva. In one second, you can become a Baal Teshuva by simply deciding to stop sinning. And if you become a Baal Teshuva, it is written about you that even the tzaddikim cannot reach your level. Meaning, Hashem doesn't love the rasha's actions, but rather He loves their potential.

1:02:46One second, you, the rasha, can be a tzaddik by doing teshuva. You can get to a level higher than a tzaddik by doing teshuva. That's what I love. I love your potential. But if a person dies like this, like the chacham over here says, that person gets, he gets kaf ha'kela, and then once he finalizes with kaf ha'kela, he goes to gehinom. Misken, the guy is going to regret the day he was born. So, we see here, rabotai, that It's not so simple to just do teshuva. It's not so simple to just do whatever you want. But at the same token, Hashem doesn't give up on anybody. But we have to understand what we're doing and why we're doing it. Now, lastly, and you guys can ask some more questions if you'd like. The Rambam writes in Hilchot Teshuva that on Yom Kippur, on Rosh Hashanah,

1:03:48The tzaddikim get signed for life. The resha'im get signed for death. But the Benoni, the middle, safek. In the middle. He's in the middle, his judgment is in the middle. To be determined. He has ten days of teshuva and then Yom Kippur. He needs Yom Kippur. And the Rambam writes, Unless he does teshuva during the ten days of teshuva, this Benoni, this middle ground, is not going to be Benoni; he's going to be Rasha. So, the commentary on the Rambam says, wait a minute, if he's a Rasha and he gets decreed to death, okay, we get it. If he gets decreed to life, okay, we get it. But the Benoni, the guy that's in the middle... Why is he getting such a decree that he has to do teshuva to fix it? Why isn't it that he just has to do one more mitzvah? If he's 50-50, 50% sins, 50% mitzvot, it should be that if he does one more mitzvah, he's good. He's tzaddik now. Right? How come the Rambam says, no, no, not a mitzvah. He has to do teshuva.

1:05:14This is Beinonim. Alevai, we are Beinonim. Why does he have to do teshuva and not just another mitzvah? B'chavod, give me an answer. No, no, I need an answer first. No, no, but he says for now, right now we had Rosh Hashanah. Rosh Hashanah, tzaddikim, they're good. Resha'im, bad. Beinonim, the middle ground. 50-50. No judgment yet. He needs to do teshuva by the time he gets to Yom Kippur in order for Hashem to put him on the favorable side, on the tzaddikim side. So the chachamim ask, how come he has to do teshuva and not just one mitzvah? Like, for example, go pick up an apple, say, "Baruch atah Hashem Elokeinu Melech ha'olam borei pri ha'etz," you made one more mitzvah, finish, you're a tzaddik. Why not? It's 50-50. Okay, that is, we're not saying he can disappear. He's 50-50. Let's say he's not 50-50. You guys are in the right direction, 50-50 though. Okay, so we'll combine all of your answers.

1:06:40We'll combine all your answers. This is the scariest part. Chavrutot, give me another answer. Okay, so here's the commentator. Chachamim say the following: If a guy is a Benoni, he's middle ground. He's got 50 mitzvot, 50 averot, 50 sins. Logically, if he does one more mitzvah, he has one more mitzvah than sin. He should be counted on the righteous side. But the Rambam says no, if it's the Ten Days of Teshuva, which is where we are today, he has to do teshuva, not another mitzvah. Chachamim say, why? Because if he has not done teshuva already after Rosh Hashanah has passed... And he still hasn't done teshuva. He arrived at the Ten Days of Teshuva without doing teshuva yet. That means that the decree in Shamayim is much heavier on him. And doing a single mitzvah is no longer enough. He has to do complete teshuva.

1:07:50He has to completely rewire his brain, his ideology, and realize he has to do complete teshuva, not just one more mitzvah. Why? You arrived a couple of days before judgment day, and you don't even realize it yet. You don't realize that you're also on the line to be hanged or to be rewarded as a king. 50-50 chance. You're thinking, oh, because I keep Shabbat, I'm okay. You're thinking because I go to a shiur, I'm okay. You're thinking because I give a little bit of money for tzedakah, I'm okay. That is what makes you not okay. That's what makes you not okay, and that's what the chachamim say. The Rambam paskened halacha that this person must do teshuva. Because if he hasn't changed by the time he arrived at the ten days of teshuva, that means that no mitzvah will be sufficient to help him other than the mitzvah of teshuva. So what happens to all of those reshaim, the people that don't do teshuva? You see them still alive.

1:08:59Last year there were resha'im, this year there were resha'im, two years ago there were resha'im, and they continue living now. So here, Rabotai, it's important to know that HaKadosh Baruch Hu still punishes, but even in His punishment He has mercy. So what's the mercy? It's that He gives people the death penalty in different ways. One of the most common ways that He gives people the death penalty is by shortening their life. So, a guy comes to the world, he's decreed to live 120 years. He's decreed to live 120 years. He's already 13 years old. He's considered a man. He continues, Yom Kippur comes, he hasn't done teshuva. He hasn't done teshuva, Hashem says, okay, now it's 115 instead of 120. He just lost five years. He got the death penalty. He doesn't realize he got the death penalty. But he got the death penalty. He just lost five years of his life.

1:10:00Next year he doesn't do teshuva, okay, now it's 114. Next year he doesn't do teshuva, there's more sins, oh, now it's 110. Next year, next year, next year, by the time he's 25, he thinks he's got the whole world in his hands. He doesn't realize he's only got five more years to live. He thinks he's got the whole world in his hands, he's just got a business, he's got this, he's got that, he's got everything. He doesn't realize he's got five years left on his clock. Unless he does serious teshuva. Change everything which is not so simple in essence. He's getting the death penalty every year. This is the reason why if you look at the statistics online, you could see that almost 18 and a half million people die every year around the world. It's not a fair balance where you say, "Oh, it's mostly people that are a hundred years old who die." It's not even close. Most people that die are much, much younger than even half their life.

1:11:00Much, much younger. They got the death penalty. They died younger. They were supposed to live 120 years, but they didn't. Why? They lived 35 years, 40 years, 45 years, 50 years. Yeah, but he had all the money in the world. Yeah, the money's here. He's not. And that's about it. How could HaKadosh Baruch Hu... ...fulfills the verse. At the end of Parashat Va'etchanan, it says Hashem pays His haters cash to their face. How? He gives them a lot of materialism in this world in order to destroy them. How so? He gives them the reward for whatever mitzvot they did here, but at the same time, He's shortening their life and even more so, He doesn't give them... the thought process, the wisdom that they need to have to think, maybe I need to do teshuvah. Maybe I need to do teshuvah. Some people get the worst punishment of all in this world, which is that they lose the inclination to do teshuvah. Hashem removes their free choice. They don't have any thought process whatsoever of doing teshuvah. That's what the Rambam writes in Hilchot Teshuvah is the worst punishment in the world, where a person is not allowed to do teshuvah. This is rare. It's not common at all. Anyone that's watching this shiur, I promise you, you're not part of those because people that watch this shiur, Baruch Hashem, usually do teshuvah at some point or another.

1:12:29But a person that doesn't, that got this punishment, doesn't even think about a shiur. Doesn't think about anything. So that's the case. Okay, b'chavod, who has some questions? In the back, yes. So, you know how God created everything? Hashem created everything, yes. Why did He create illnesses that could cause Him to put you down? And why couldn't He just put you down? Why did Hashem create illnesses that will help them die? So the Midrash Me'am Loez talks about the different requests that the Avot HaKedoshim, Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov, asked from Hashem. And Yaakov Avinu asked Hashem for a favor. He said, "Hashem, until now... Everyone looked the same throughout their whole life. They got to be a baby. They got to about 20 years old. At 20 years old, they matured. Meaning, whether that guy is 20 years old or 120 years old, he looks exactly the same. No gray hairs. No limping. No pain in the back. No teeth missing. Nothing. He looks like he's 20 years old. And then one day, he sneezes, and he dies. All the street, he goes, "Hey."

1:13:30Throughout their whole life. They got to be a baby. They got to about 20 years old. At 20 years old, they matured. Meaning, whether that guy is 20 years old or 120 years old, he looks exactly the same. No gray hairs. No limping. No pain in the back. No teeth missing. Nothing. He looks like he's 20 years old. And then one day, he sneezes, and he dies. All the street, he goes, "Hey." I'd say dies. This is why, Rabotai, until this day, it became customary that when somebody sneezes, you say "God bless you" in English, but in Hebrew, you say "labriyut." Labriyut means "to your health." Why? Because in the old days, if you sneezed, that was it. It was the last sneeze. It was death. It's like a heart attack. A sneeze used to be like a heart attack because there was no illness. So Yaakov says to Hashem, this person doesn't know when he's going to die. So he doesn't have time to prepare his family, to prepare his estate, to give the inheritance to the right people. There's a lot of fighting, a lot of conflict. Hashem, give us something to prepare us.

1:14:43Hashem says, bikashta kibalta. You asked for it, you got it. What am I going to do? I'm going to give you warning signs. What are the warning signs? Illnesses. Gray hairs. The Baalei Mussar say, every time you get a gray hair, it's a warning sign from Shamayim. Your time is getting closer, son. My daughter, your time's getting closer. Yeah, but it's one gray hair, I'm 21. Okay, time's getting closer. I didn't say today. It's closer, meaning every time you get a gray hair, do teshuva. Why? They're calling you in Shamayim. Calling in Shamayim. Somebody gets sick. Why? Your time's getting closer. Don't think that for sure you'll live until 120, even though everybody wishes you to 120, it doesn't usually happen. Every day you gotta do teshuva. So HaKadosh Baruch Hu gave us sicknesses in this world as a way to warn us that our time is up. And this, Rabotai, is important to know as part of teshuva. The first step of teshuva, the first, first step

1:15:46before learning Torah and science and proving that God is real scientifically, before learning the entire Chumash and knowing every one of the names of the Avot and their sons and their descendants and learning before all of that, a person must ask himself one question. And that is, why am I in this world? That's the first step of Teshuva. Why did HaKadosh Baruch Hu bring me to this world? What's the point? He decided that this world cannot continue without me in it. Why? Why do I need to be here? For what? What is my purpose? Once a person asks himself that question legitimately and searches for the answers, he will discover two things. One, he'll discover the reward of a Jew for fulfilling what Hashem wrote in the Torah. Hashem says, do all of these mitzvot, you'll get rewarded both in this world and the next. This world is temporary, the next world is eternal. He'll discover the reward for doing his job. On the other hand, if he continues learning Torah, he'll see the risk, the risk for not doing it. the reward of a Jew for fulfilling what Hashem wrote in the Torah. Hashem says, do all of these mitzvot, you'll get rewarded both in this world and the next. This world is temporary; the next world is eternal. He'll discover the reward for doing his job. On the other hand, if he continues learning Torah, he'll see the risk—the risk of not doing it.

1:17:13The risk of not following what Hashem said in the Torah. Once he discovers the risk, only a fool will continue going against Hashem. What is it like? It's like somebody who got a job at a big company, and the company says, "Listen, we're going to pay you a lot of money, but you just have to make sure that you do your job right." Okay, no problem. Paycheck every Friday. Okay, no problem. Just come in, make sure you wear a suit and tie, whatever. Okay, no problem. A week passes by, two weeks pass by, three weeks pass by, four weeks pass by. The guy is still sitting in his cubicle doing nothing all day. Four weeks pass by, five weeks pass by, six weeks pass by, three months pass by. Now he's getting his paycheck. Paycheck comes on time, never late. But after three months, he gets a pink slip. Tell him, we're sorry, we do not need your services. Or better yet, your lack of services anymore. He goes to the boss, "What did I do? What did I do?" He says, "Exactly, you didn't do anything. You didn't do anything." He says, "Yeah, but nobody told me what to do. So how could I do anything?" If you're waiting for somebody to tell you what to do, obviously this is not the position for you.

1:18:36If you're going to wait for your boss to constantly give you instructions, you are a horrible employee. Horrible employee. If your boss has to worry about whether you're going to do your job or not based on him telling you repeatedly, do your job, show up on time, put a suit on, do this, do that. If he has to constantly give you instructions to do your job, guess what? It's better not to have you. Why? Just the time that he's wasting, Telling you to do your job. He can just hire somebody that knows how to figure things out by themselves. I remember having employees like this in my company. Nightmare to deal with. Every day, you got to tell them what to do. And it's the same thing every day. Why do I have to keep telling you what to do? Oh, maybe something changed. If it changed, I'll tell you. But until then, do your job. And that's why the Chachamim say, as a side note, some people sin in adultery. Some people sin in adultery. Many sin in gezel. And everyone sins in lashon hara. Lashon hara we know already. It's not a... Everybody says lashon hara at some point or another. Adultery, only the real reshaim do it. But gezel, the Chachamim say many, meaning a lot of us. Why gezel? It's because people do not know the laws of working.

1:20:06How to work? A guy goes to work. He works for, I don't know, P&G or something. He works for UPS. But instead of doing his job, he's on the phone all day with his girlfriend. He's on the phone all day with his wife. He's on the phone all day with his bank account because a check bounced. He's trying to figure out, why did the check bounce? So he's sending messages to the bank. No, come on, he's on hold for 45 minutes on his boss's time. Habibi, you're a thief. Shamayim, you're a thief. Or better yet, he's text messaging all of his friends because they all went on vacation to Cancun. He wants to know what they're doing over there. So, for 40 minutes, he's texting back and forth with his friends. "Oh, you met? Oh, wow, you went? Oh, you went there? Oh, why this? Oh, you did this? Oh, you did that?" Guess what? You're a thief. Why? Your boss is not paying you to text message. Your boss is not paying you to do all those things. Now, if your boss says he doesn't care as long as you do your job, that's a different story. But truth be told, most jobs you cannot do while you're talking and texting and doing all types of things for other people. So what happens? A person thinks they're a tzaddik, they go up to Shamayim and say, "Oh, here's the thief, thief, thief, thief, thief." "What thief? I never stole a handkerchief. What are you talking about, thief?" Because, what are you talking about? You worked for this company 30 years. 30 years you're stealing from them.

1:21:2630 years you're stealing from them. Why? You're on your phone the whole time. Or better yet, people do business in different trades, diamonds and things of that nature. They give money to somebody, and they say, listen, I'll give you the 10,000, but you have to pay me back. When you buy the goods, you have to pay me 10,200. Meaning $200 extra, because I'm giving you extra time to pay me. Guess what? That's interest. If that person's a Jew, you just lost olam haba. And all types of laws that have to do with stealing, with ribit, and with interest, and things of that nature, chachamim say a lot of people violate this stuff. Or better yet, a person wants to be chacham. Or she wants to be chachama. Chachama, what? The boss didn't tell her what to do. The boss didn't tell him what to do. So he figures, you know what, I don't have anything to do. You know what I want to do? Let me open a Gemara. Until he tells me what to do, I'm going to read Gemara. Why? He's getting part of my mitzvot.

1:22:27He's getting part of my mitzvah. I'm learning. He's paying me. He's getting part of my mitzvah. I'm learning Gemara. I'm going to finish my second Yom HaAvah here. I'm going to finish. I only have one daf left. It's only going to take me two hours. I'm learning Gemara. What's the big deal? Oh, she decides she's going to read Tehillim. I'm going to read Tehillim for my boss. I'm going to read Tehillim for my boss. I'm going to do a mitzvah. I'm going to read Tehillim for my boss. She starts reading Tehillim. He's not paying her to read Tehillim. He's paying out to, I don't know, build a building. He's paying out to do other things. No, no, she's going to read Tehillim. Who's asking to read Tehillim right now? Yeah, but it's a mitzvah. Not now. Before or after work. Or if you have permission during work. But not just because you decided. A lot of people do this. A lot of people do this without even thinking twice. So it's important to know these things. Yes? How many do you want? First question is, so you said that when a Beinoni is 50-50, what happens if a Beinoni does nothing? He stays 50-50. What happens to Shamayim when, is he in Rasha or is he considered a Tzadik or is he considered a Beinoni? And how does he get judged? How does a Beinoni get judged? Or the Gemara in Masechet Rosh Hashanah says that

1:23:49every single person gets judged every year while he's in this world and the next. Because HaKadosh Baruch Hu opens the Book of the Living and the Dead every year. So the living... The living we understand because the living... Good question. The living... We understand they keep doing more mitzvot, more sins every day. So it is impossible for a person to stay the same. Even if they sleep, if they sleep too much, it's a sin. So you cannot do nothing. You cannot stay status quo. Every second you're alive, something has to happen. That's why HaKadosh Baruch Hu wanted to give us all types of opportunities to get to Olam HaBa. It says that HaKadosh Baruch Hu wanted to reward the nation, therefore He gave them a lot of mitzvot. Chachamim say, giving us a lot of mitzvot is going to help us go to Olam HaBa. It says because if you perfect one mitzvah, perfect it, it becomes your baby. You get Olam HaBa. That's why every Jew should pick one mitzvah and become perfect at it. Why? It's going to give you a share of the world to come.

1:25:07Obviously, assuming you're keeping the others also. Not you're Mechalel Shabbat, but you're the best guy in the world for giving tzedakah. Doesn't give you the opportunity to sin, but if you perfect the mitzvah, it gives you a share of the next life. So the point is that a person does mitzvot every second he's alive. In Shamayim, he gets there, even if he himself, let's say hypothetically speaking, got to 50-50. Like you said, hypothetically 50-50. His actions, what he left in the world, continue to influence even after his death. So let's say, for example, he wrote a book. He wrote a book. People are going to read that book. Now, it's not such a popular book. It only sells one copy a year. So in Shamayim, they wait. He's at 50-50. He's not going here, he's not going there. They are waiting for somebody to buy the book. Somebody buys the book, and they read the book. And it says in the book, oh, it came from a monkey, not from God. Okay, now you're not 50-50 anymore. Now you're going again, Noam. Why? Somebody bought your book. Somebody bought your book. That's a sin. They made a sin. Now they think they're coming from monkeys instead of from Hashem. Or you wrote that Adam and Eve is a parable. Like our dear friend Jonathan Sacks.

1:26:32The former head rabbi of London said that Adam and Eve is a parable. Or his friend says that homosexuality is not such a bad thing. He wrote a whole book about it. All these reshaim, they're gonna be judged not just in this world. They're gonna be judged after. Why? Because people are gonna read their books. Shmuley Boteach has no chance in the world, no chance in the world, to leave this world empty-handed. Why? He's gonna take all the sinners with him. Every one of his books, every one of his books, is no less bad than the New Testament. Every one of his books is full of kefirah. "Kosher Jesus" he wrote, a book with a pornography star, Shem Yerachem, all types of filth he wrote. He calls himself a rabbi, Shmuley Boteach. So this guy is judged every year; HaKadosh Baruch Hu opens the book of the living and the dead. Meaning whatever you left in this world will be reviewed. What kind of results did it generate this year? You left kids in the world like Shmuley Boteach, his daughter just opened a sex store in Tel Aviv. She called it "Kosher Sex."

1:27:37So every year Shmuley Boteach will have to be judged for his daughter's store, how much sales she made. Every year she does the accounting, how much money she made in this "Kosher Sex" store, and Shmuley Boteach is getting burned further and further in Gehinnom. Why? Because what did she say to the TV interviewers? They asked her, aren't you going to be concerned about what the rabbis are going to say? You're the daughter of a rabbi? You're opening, a Jewish woman is opening a kosher sex store? She said, no, I got permission from the rabbi. And they asked her, what rabbi? She said, my father. I got permission from my father to open it. He already started telling me about this when he wrote the book. When he wrote the book 20 years ago about sex, he already told me this is what I have to do with my life. A Jewish girl, a Bat Yisrael, opening a sex store. And she's proud of it, and he's proud of it. Every year he's going to be judged deeper and deeper again. For what? For his daughter. That's the thing. No such thing as 50-50. Everybody leaves some type of trail, some type of cookie crumbs that they have that will lead them one place or another. And I'll give you a joke. One guy didn't do so good in the world. Got up to Shamayim, said, okay, you didn't keep anything. Gehenom. He's burning, burning, burning, burning. After a little while, doors open. They never open in Gehenom. They only open one way.

1:29:04First time, one door opens. It's the exit. Who gets out? Hey, Steve, come. Poor Steve, he's full. He's like coal, full of fire, blood everywhere. This guy's being burned everywhere. He's so excited to get out of the lava. "Oh, I'm out, I'm finished." "Yeah, yeah, you're done. Come, come." "Where am I going? Where are you taking me?" "Oh, I'm taking you to Heaven." You're going to heaven? Wow! Baruch Hashem, I knew Hashem had mercy. Now I go, no, it's not Hashem, it's your son. Your son did it. My son? I know he's not going to let me down. What did he do? He says, your son just gave a million-dollar check to the Be'ezrat Hashem organization to do kiruv. This guy becomes a chasid. In Shamayim, he starts dancing. He's dancing in Shamayim. They're gonna go with the ashes, his hands are falling off, everything, but he's easy. He's excited to go to heaven. He goes to heaven and he sees all the tzaddikim over there. He feels he's excited. Oh, Torah, I'm not really interested in Torah, but it's better than being burned. He starts sitting. He sees Rabbi Akiva is over there and Moshe Rabbeinu is over there. Wow. Wow, it's much better than this Gehenom over there. So he sits over there, doesn't have much to do but he's hanging out. It's better than being burned.

1:30:23One day, two days, three days, all of a sudden, Gan Eden opens, the same Malach Duma comes. "What? What?" He's looking. "You, you, you, Steve, come." "Me? What did I do? I didn't say anything. It wasn't me." "Let's go, Steve. My son is a big tzaddik. He just donated a million dollars to B'ezrat Hashem, this Rabbi Yaron. He's helping people." He goes, "Yeah, yeah, he donated. Come on, come on, you go back to Gehenom." He goes, "Why?" He said, "The check bounced." So, you leave trails. Sometimes we start something good, but we don't finish it. We start something good, we don't finish it. Hashem wants to put us in Gan Eden. We mess up. We mess up. Chaval, next question. So, in terms of interest, so somebody, if I borrow... So okay, so as far as the agreement and loans

1:31:46First and foremost, a Jew is not allowed to lend another Jew money and charge him interest. So there's no leniency there, with the exception of if this Jew that you're lending money and charging interest to is a Mechalel Shabbat. If he's a Mechalel Shabbat, you're allowed to charge him interest. And the reason why is because according to Halacha, according to the Torah in 12 places, Shulchan Aruch in 7 places, and pretty much everywhere across the Torah, a Jew that violates Shabbat is considered 100% an idol worshiper. So you treat him the same way as you treat an idol worshiper. You're allowed to charge him interest. But the Chachamim say you still shouldn't charge him interest because in case he does teshuva, if he does teshuva, you have a problem. You're allowed to charge him interest. And the reason why is because according to Halacha, according to the Torah in 12 places, Shulchan Aruch in 7 places, and pretty much everywhere across the Torah, a Jew that violates Shabbat is considered 100% an idol worshiper. So you treat him the same way as you treat an idol worshiper. You're allowed to charge him interest. But the Chachamim say you still shouldn't charge him interest because in case he does teshuva, if he does teshuva, you have a problem. Forget inflation. There's no such thing as inflation. You give your $100, you get back $100. So now, what happens if a person, let's say, for example, borrowed $100? Somebody, a friend, asked you for $2 and said, "I'm going to give it back to you tomorrow." $200, $2, same thing. "Give me $2, give me $200, give me $2,000, I'll give it back to you tomorrow." And he doesn't do it. He doesn't give it back to you.

1:32:58A person is sinning. Why? Because that person made a swear that he's going to give back your money. It's a problem defaulting on a loan. It's people who don't keep their word. It says in the Mishnah that just like HaKadosh Baruch Hu destroyed the generation of the Tower of Bavel, He'll destroy the people who don't keep their word. Because HaKadosh Baruch Hu keeps His word, you have to be like Him. So, you cannot tell people that you are going to pay them back and then not pay them back. In fact, when it comes to business, you have to be so careful that you're not even allowed to borrow money unless you know that you can pay it back. Meaning, if you say, "Listen, I need to buy a house. I need to borrow one hundred thousand dollars from my friend," and... How are you going to pay it back? You are not allowed to borrow that money. You are not allowed to take a risk with his money. If you borrow money without knowing how you're going to pay it back, you are called a rasha (wicked person) in the Torah. For every single second you don't pay him back, you are called a rasha.

1:34:02Why? Because you took a risk with his life. His life being his money. Money is considered damim. It's considered life. So you took a risk with his money. If you know, okay, I have collateral. If I don't pay him back, I can give him my car. I can give him my house. I have this job that makes me the money. I have a way to pay him back. Now it's like, it's not that I'm going to pay him back. No. But if you have a way to pay him back, you're allowed to borrow the money. So you're not even allowed to borrow money from people if you don't know if you can pay them back. this means that most people who borrow money are not allowed to borrow money because most people who borrow money do so when they're in dire straits and have no other choice. So what do you do if you have no other choice? You don't have a way to pay back? You need ten thousand dollars because you need to do such and such. You're in a jam; you just lost all your money in the stock market, you put everything into bitcoins or something, and you lost everything. And now you need to pay rent, you need to pay the mortgage, you have kids, you have responsibilities, you need ten thousand dollars to close the month. You haven't paid rent or mortgage in three months. You need $10,000, and they're going to kick you out on the streets. What do you do? You say, okay, can you pay me back? I don't have a job. If it's not Hashem, I'll get a job. That's not an excuse. You're not allowed to borrow money. So what do you do? Ask for tzedakah. Tell him you want tzedakah. I need tzedakah. Yeah, but it's busha, it's embarrassing. Okay, good. Good. It's better to be embarrassed here than to be a rasha. One second, over there.

1:35:30And also being embarrassed is a form of teshuva. So, borrowing money has to have an agreement. You lend somebody a thousand dollars, let's say. You have to have a shtar iska; you have to have an agreement. I'm borrowing this money for an extra amount of time, let's say for a year. And a year from now, you're going to give me back a thousand dollars. You borrowed a thousand, you're going to give me back a thousand a year from now. During that year, There's no inflation worries whatsoever. But even so, you pay him back what you borrowed. You don't pay him back what happened to it in 80 years. It's a form of interest. It's a form of ribit, yes. you have to have a special study session with a serious talmid chacham to see if you could structure the loan as a partial investment and partial loan. For example, if the person takes the money—let's say it's more than $1,000, let's say it's $100,000—and

1:36:40And you know that if you give him the $100,000, you don't have access to the $100,000 anymore. So that means you are losing an opportunity. You could use the $100,000 to invest the money and do a bunch of other things with it. But now you don't have it anymore, so he has it. So you're losing an opportunity. You want to get paid for that opportunity. But at the same time, you don't have to charge interest. So what do you do? You do an ishtadlus, where you structure that part of the money is a loan, where let's say $50,000 out of the $100,000 is a 100% loan. Meaning he has to return you, no matter what, he has to return the $50,000 back. No matter what, it doesn't matter if he goes broke, if his idea works or doesn't work, he has to return the $50,000 out of the $100,000, no matter what, in a specified amount of time. If he doesn't have that amount of time, he gets more time, but the point is, he has to return the money. He owes you the money. permanently. Even if he dies, his family has to pay the loan. Now, on the other hand, the other $50,000 is an investment. That's risk, meaning if that $50,000 turns into $200,000, invests $100,000, whatever he wants. Let's say he buys a business, and that business makes an extra amount of money. So that $50,000 is a loan, that's a loan, but that $50,000 is an investment. That investment is permitted to get a piece of the profits and

1:38:00of that business, you get a piece of the potential reward that's going to happen, but at the same time, if his investment goes bust, he doesn't have to pay you back. Meaning that entire $50,000 is at risk. If it goes to zero, it goes to zero. He doesn't have to pay you that money back. This way, you can structure it where you don't take 100% of the risk, but at the same time, you're not losing any potential reward. You could potentially make money. And that's how people structure loans when it comes to large sums of money, if they have opportunity and things of that nature. But generally speaking, when it comes to interest, when it comes to inflation, when it comes to even giving a person a gift, you're not allowed. Like, for example, if, let's say, for example, somebody, you borrowed something from them, You borrow an iPad. You borrow an iPad, but it was a used iPad, two or three years old. That was, let's say, worth $200. Okay? While you had it, it broke. You feel bad. You tell your friend, "Listen, the iPad broke, but I got you this new one. Best one on the market. It's $1,500, on me." Not allowed. Why? That's interest.

1:39:19You can give it to him as a gift, but it's not the returning of the money. Only $200 out of the $1,500. But if you give him that whole thing, just like that, oh, this is payback, it's everything. Not allowed. Why? That's giving him interest. You're not allowed to give him more than he gave you. Because the sin of interest is both on the borrower and also on the lender. It's on everybody. It's not just one party. Everybody is in trouble. Yes? Yes, you'd say it's definitely an aveira. That's why we have the Beit HaMikdash. The Beit HaMikdash and all of the korbanot, like the korban chatat, were for accidental sins. So if somebody turned on the light and... turned on fire on Shabbat accidentally, not on purpose, as soon as Shabbat comes out, he realizes, "Oh, I made a mistake." He has to go take a korban, close his business, travel with this korban all the way to the Beit HaMikdash, sacrifice this korban himself; he can't send somebody else. He has to go bring the korban all the way to the Beit HaMikdash in Yerushalayim. He loses a week's worth of work to bring this korban for an accidental sin.

1:40:42not for a purposeful sin. If it's on purpose, it's a death penalty. So all of the korbanot were for accidental sins, which means that we still need to do teshuva for them. So if a person accidentally charged interest, accidentally stole money, or accidentally violated Shabbat, it doesn't absolve him from the sin. It just means it's an accidental sin. So it has a lesser punishment, but it's still a punishment nonetheless, unless he does teshuva. If he does teshuva, that sin is wiped out as if it never existed. as if it never existed, and you can even turn it into a mitzvah. Yes? How could anyone realistically do teshuva on every single transaction you've ever done in your life? You've never been careful. I'm saying, as far as ribit goes, people know the classic example of ribit, meaning, I'll give you 100, if you give me 150, let's say, but for just items, like for just so many things, how could someone realistically do that?

1:41:45So that's why a person needs to learn serious Torah. If a person wants to become a chacham, he has to learn all of the masechtot of Bava—Bava Metzia, Bava Kama, Bava Batra—to become an expert. And the laws of business, that's also a way to become a chacham. But further yet, he should always, always, always consult with a talmid chacham before he conducts business, before he does everything. Before he buys stuff, before he makes any major transactions, he has to consult with a talmid chacham that knows what he's doing and has yirat shamayim. People think that it's too much to ask before you do everything, but the reality is it's the only way you can get yourself out of problems. We ask our rabbi literally everything. Everything we ask. Baruch Hashem, HaKadosh Baruch Hu has mercy on us, but also it's part of the reason because we use this knowledge to benefit the public. Whatever I learned from my rabbi, I teach you guys, I teach the people online, and I help other people. So we use that, and it's worth it for Hashem to give me a chacham who is pretty much an encyclopedia of Kedusha, who has all the answers. That's why Rav Gideon ben Moshe

1:43:00One of the head rabbis in Yerushalayim said at the Siyum HaShas of Rav Efraim last week. They had a Siyum HaShas celebration in Yerushalayim last week. Rav Efraim finished Shas, Baruch Hashem, once again. And Rav Gideon ben Moshe says, you know, different places have computers. They have this. We have Rav Efraim in our Kollel. The Holy Scroll says, different places they have computers, they have this, they have that. We have Rav Efraim. Anyone wants to know something, they go to Rav Efraim. You ask him, "Where is this?" Rav Efraim says, "Over here, over here, over here, over here." So it's worth it for HaKadosh Baruch Hu to give me such a chacham that knows all these things. I ask a question, he gives me an answer. It's worth it. Why? Because I benefit you guys and everybody else. If a person uses the Torah that HaKadosh Baruch Hu gives him to benefit the public, it's worth it for Hashem to gift him more. But if he's selfish with his Torah, then Hashem is going to give him less. If HaKadosh Baruch Hu uses the Torah to fulfill the will of Hashem, it's worth it for Hashem to give him more and more chiddushim. If he's selfish, it's going to give him less. So what happens if a person wants to be righteous, but he doesn't know everything?

1:44:04Or even if he thinks he does. Rabbi, allowed, not allowed. I'm about to do this deal. I'm about to buy this house. And the deal with the house is that I'm not going to buy it right away. I'm going to rent it for a year. I'll rent it for a year. After a year, I have the option to buy. But the deal is that I could buy it for $500,000, unless there are certain terms. The market goes up, the market goes down. This happened, that happened. So you have to have the rabbi review this agreement, pay money for his time. Because he doesn't live on money. Pay money for his time. Rabbi, can I do this? Can I do that? You send it to the Beit Din. There's a Beit Din in Lakewood, full of Chachamim. They're raising, I think, like a million dollars right now for their Beit Din. And this is, you see the pamphlet, the website of this Beit Din. They have probably, I don't know, Baruch Hashem, many, many, dozens of rabbis, the Chachamim, and they review these cases every day. You ask them, am I allowed to do this deal? Not allowed to do this deal. They review contracts all day. You send it to a Talmid Chacham, or if you have a rabbi, so on and so forth.

1:45:05Now, that's part one of the answer. Part two is, realistically, as I said in a recent movie that came out, a short film that we released, realistically, none of us could do teshuva for all of our sins without doing kiruv. And the reason why is because it's not just about the sins that you know about that you have to worry about. It's the sins that you don't know about that you have to worry about. Many times we commit sins and we don't know that they're even sins. Like the example you just gave me. You gave somebody something and you didn't even realize that you gave it to them and it's really a form of interest or it's a form of a problem. So what do you do? You have to help Am Yisrael do teshuva. And the reason why is because when you have another Jew do teshuva or you have a non-Jew convert and become a tzaddik, that goes to your merit. Every time they do a mitzvah, that goes to your merit.

1:46:06They are, in essence, helping you rectify your past mistakes. Whether you know of those mistakes or you don't know of those mistakes is irrelevant. They're still actively rectifying your mistakes. And this is why Rebbe HaKadosh, Rebbe HaKadosh who wrote the Mishnah, from him we have the entire Oral Torah, when he found out that his cousin, Rabbi Chiya, How he's treated in heaven and how Rabbi Chiya is the only one that can go from world to world whenever he feels like it, unlike all the other tzaddikim that need a malach to take them. You can't just walk around wherever you want in Olam HaBa; you have to have a malach take you from world to world unless you're Rabbi Chiya. Rabbi Chiya can go wherever he wants. So Rabbi asked Shamayim, the Holy Spirit, how come Rabbi Chiya, who was my talmid? How come Rabbi Chiya gets such kavod up there? Zohar, Rabbi Chiya, Rabbi Chiya gets kavod. Rabbi Chiya helps Am Yisrael do teshuva. You help people do teshuva, you get whatever you want. You go higher than anybody else. At that moment, Rebbe HaKadosh started crying.

1:47:16started crying and running in the middle of the street, looking to help people do teshuva, looking for chiloni'im, looking for secular people. And on that he said it's worth it for a person to chase one person to do teshuva for 70 years. One person, you help them do teshuva. All 70 years of your life, it was worth it to come to this world. Why? Because how are you going to be treated in Shamayim? So from here we learn, Rabotai, kiruv is not a suggestion. It's an obligation, number one, to save ourselves from our own past mistakes that we know of and don't know of. And furthermore, to give ourselves a good treat by giving us a nice olam haba where they treat us like Rabbi Chiya. Yes, Chabad. So, if your friend tells you, "Give me two dollars, and I'll give you back three dollars tomorrow," you have to say, "No, tomorrow you give me two dollars." Because if I take three dollars from you, that's interest, and that interest means that I would lose Olam Haba.

1:48:43A Jew is not allowed to charge another Jew interest, so you're not allowed. So even if he offers, you're not allowed to accept it. Unless, like I said before, it's an investment of some kind, and therefore you're not really lending him the money; it's actually you're investing in his business, or perhaps he just decides to give you a gift on his own. He gives you two dollars, and he says, by the way, here's a dollar, go buy yourself a nice, I don't know, Twizzler or something. Make some noise in the lecture. Here’s a dollar to buy Twizzlers. So he decides to give you a gift on his own, that's not a problem. But you have to make sure that it's clear that this is a gift completely, completely disconnected from the loan. Generally speaking, you should try to stay away from that so there's no confusion in case somebody else is watching and doesn’t understand why. Ideally, it’s better not to take gifts from anybody. But definitely, definitely never charge interest and never pay interest. if you have to borrow money, for example, to buy a house, don't borrow money from a Jew if he's going to charge you interest. Borrow from a bank that's controlled by non-Jews, which are pretty much all of the major banks controlled by shareholders. The majority of shareholders are non-Jews. You're allowed to borrow money from them because non-Jews are allowed to charge you interest, and you are allowed to charge interest to non-Jews. But if it's a private bank that's owned by one Jew,

1:50:05you're not allowed to do business with it as far as borrowing money from them. Yes. Yes. Yes. No, some people have different... birthmarks for different reasons. You know, gray hair is just one of the signs that could be, not definitely is, but could be a sign from heaven that they're calling you in Shamayim, meaning that they're trying to wake you up to do teshuva. But if a person, let's say for example, is an albino, He's an albino; there's no color pigmentation in his entire body—his eyes, his eyelashes, everything is white. That's not a sign that he's three years old. So that's not necessarily a sign. It could be a sign, but it's not necessarily. But birthmarks come from different reasons. For example, if somebody's born with a birthmark on their side, on their head, or different body parts, that is usually connected to their previous incarnation.

1:51:31There's a very famous story that was publicized of a little boy, and you can see the movie of this; it's on the internet. When the little boy began speaking, he kept waking up in the middle of the night from a nightmare, the same recurring nightmare that he was being murdered. His parents would ask him what happened, and he kept telling the same story: "Oh, he's killing me again! He's killing me again!" They asked, "Who's killing you? How do you even know about killing at three years old?" This was before every house had a television like today and games that kill people for fun, even for three-year-olds. This was maybe 30 years ago, before the parents ruined the generation. So now, the little boy is scared. Every night he's waking up. It's called night terrors. So they took him to a psychiatrist. And b'Siyata Dishmaya, it was intended that this be known. This specific psychiatrist was an expert in the field of trying to follow people that have memories of their previous life.

1:52:51the movie that Rav Mizrahi did called "Life After Death" has many of these types of stories. In that movie, you go to his website, divineinformation.com, and you go to "Life After Death." There's a two-and-a-half to three-hour movie there; very, very interesting. Anyway, so now this boy went to this doctor. The doctor says, "Okay, tell me about your dream," and he starts telling about the dream. And he says, "Do you remember who did it?" He goes, "Yeah." He goes, "What's his name?" He tells him the name. He goes, "Do you remember where it was?" He goes, "Yeah. It was in this country." And the parents are confused. Like, how does he know this country exists? It's in India. We are in Europe. The kid has never been to India. How does he even know the name of this country? How does he know the name of this city? So the doctor says, "Let's follow him. Let's follow the story. Let's track the story. Can you take us to where it is?" The boy says, "Yeah." Take me to this specific city. They all get on a plane and go to that city in India. He tells them, "Take me to this city here." They go to the city. "Okay, take me to the woods in that particular city." They go to the woods. "Let's go inside the woods." The parents follow this little boy, four years old at this time, into the woods. They're walking, walking, walking. The kid stops.

1:54:10Everybody stops. "No." "You tired?" "No, no," he goes, "I'm here." He goes, "Why are you here?" He goes, "I'm here on the ground." They start digging. They start digging. They find the body. Right next to the body, right next to the body is the murder weapon, the axe. And in the middle of the skull of this body, is a mark that the axe made an indent in his head. The boy had a birthmark right over here, right where the axe hit in his previous incarnation. They tell the cops. One of the cops was clever. He says, "Young man, what's this guy's last name? Who is this guy?" Because in Nilna, they only have one name. "What's this guy's name?" They look at the database. This guy is still alive. They go to the guy. The guy admits it. He goes, "Yeah, I did it." This is a goy, it's not a Jew. And there are many stories like this. So people that have birthmarks, it's a connection to their previous incarnation. Now please, please, I'm warning you, don't start sending me pictures on WhatsApp of your birthmarks. I'm not a psychiatrist or a Navi, nor am I interested in your birthmarks. But Hashem gave it to you for a reason. It's not for no reason. Everything is done for a reason. Next question.

1:55:35Last time I said something about dreams, since then I'm being tortured with at least five dreams a day. Everybody made me a dream whisperer. Every day I get somebody's dream. Oh, I dreamt that my dog was limping. Does it mean something bad? Do you have a dog? No, but I had one in the dream. Okay, so I don't know, maybe it means that one day you'll have a dog and the dog's gonna have three legs. I want you all out of my life. Go ask the dog. Go ask the dog in a dream. Everybody thinks that their dream is like Nevuchadnetzar. It's the prophecy. 99% of your dreams are nonsense. But generally speaking, there's always a reason for everything. You have a question. Yes. I'm warning you about the dreams already, so you're not even sure if you want to ask the question. Yes, Hashem can give a person warnings of certain things that could happen and

1:56:56to warn the person to do something about it. It's not common, but it does happen. I'll give you a story. I haven't told you a story in a long time. A rabbi again, alav ha-shalom, used to have the best stories. And all these stories were first-hand stories, meaning he saw the stories, he experienced the stories. So, There was a... In Israel, it's a small country, so everything that happens, everybody knows. Even if it happens in a different city, everybody knows. You know somebody that's related to this person. So years ago, a young girl, a late teenager, 18, 19 years old, was hit by a bus and died. But... before she was hit by a bus, people saw her act strange. And one of those people was an avrech who was going to the kollel of Rav Yagen. And he comes to Rav Yagen, he tells him, "Yeah, that story that happened in the news, the girl who got hit by a bus, I saw the whole thing." He says, "What happened?" He says, "A few days ago,"

1:58:25A few days ago, this girl came to me and told me that I knew her. She was like a neighbor or something. And she told me that she keeps having a dream. And her mom that died says to her in a dream, "Come meet me on this street at this time, on this day." And she kept having that dream, day after day. And she asked me, what does it mean? And I said, ah, I don't really know what it means. Maybe you should go to a dream interpreter or something. Go to a rabbi. The poor guy, this avrech was new. He was new. He didn't really know that when something like this happens, you have to go to a real serious rabbi. People that are dead telling you to go somewhere is not such a simple thing, especially if they keep coming back. So anyway, he says, I was interested. So she said, you know what, I'm going to try it. I'm going to go. So I went. I was following her. She didn't know I was following her. I was following her. I was on the bus. She was on the bus. And the whole time, I see her anxious to go see where her mom keeps telling her. Her mom died five years ago, but she's telling her, "Come see me on this day, on this block, on this day." And she's going. She's anxious. She's anxious. And I'm watching her the whole time.

1:59:54And then I see her get off the bus. I get off the bus and I'm following her. And then I see her stop, look across the street. Traffic's still going, but she looks across the street. It says, and she starts running, boom. The bus comes and hits her and she dies. True story. And stories like this have happened. This is just one of those eyewitnesses who were there, and one of them happened to be a talmid chacham. So, did the girl get a sign that she was going to die? Yes. She just didn't know how to read the sign, and she didn't go to the right place. Apparently, she didn't have the merit, and apparently, that was her time. Whatever the case may be, I don't know what Hashem decides and how He decides it. But the point is that some people do get different warning signs that their end is near unless they change something. This has happened many times throughout history, and it's documented many times throughout history with different people. Put it this way: if Hashem has to give a person

2:01:14type of sign, then that means that Hashem has given them every other sign and they're simply not paying attention. Like somebody came to me the other day and said that she's having a recurring dream that she's feeding her baby, and the baby keeps dying. So I'm not a dream interpreter, nor am I really such a chacham, but I read a little bit, and certain things happen. So you don't need to be a dream interpreter to use a little bit of what Chazal says. So I asked questions. I said, give me an answer to this. Number one, does this woman keep Taharat HaMishpacha? Two, does she eat kosher? She eats kosher?

2:02:17The answer to both was no. She doesn't keep Taharat HaMishpacha, and she eats kosher only sometimes. You know, when it's convenient. When the chocolate bar is kosher, she eats it. If it's not kosher, she'll still eat it. When the bacon, egg, and cheese is from soy, it's kosher. If it's not, it's okay. So I said, oh, okay, so this is a clear warning from Shamayim, that if you don't change, Hashem is going to kill your kid. Simple. It's not a chiddush for me. It says it in the Torah. It says in the Gemara. That's what happens. A woman doesn't keep Taharat HaMishpacha, Hashem kills her kids. It has nothing to do with the dream even. The dream is just Hashem having mercy on you. He's trying to tell you, "Well, listen, you didn't want to listen to the shiur. You didn't want to listen to this." He's trying to give you a dream. You want to listen to a dream? You don't want to listen to a dream? Okay, so in X amount of time you're going to call...

2:03:20Somebody tells, "Listen, bad news, bad news." We'll finish off with this. There's a well-known Bukharian rabbi in Eretz Yisrael. He has some really emotional stories, and he says one time... shul he sees this young kid, a Kavkazi kid, and it's you coming to every shul, comes to every shul dedicated. One day, the kid says to the rabbi, "Rabbi, I need to talk to you." He comes to him, "Yeah, what can I do? What happened? Is everything okay?" "Listen, Rabbi, I love you. You changed my life." tshuva feeling everything. Oh, I'm sorry. I can't come to the shiur no more. What? Usually, it's the opposite. Usually, it changes your life. There's a hergesh (feeling) that comes to you. There's no rabbi. I'm sorry, my father hates it. He says every time doing tshuva is the worst thing in the world. I'm ruining everything. That's not the way we are. Our family, we're religious in our heart. I

2:04:40Don't start telling people to keep Shabbat, this, that. No, you're not allowed to go to shiur. I forbid you from going to this rabbi's shiur. I had one time a talmid, Russian guy, came to me an atheist. After three shiurim, shomer Shabbat, shomer mitzvot, started learning every day. Baruch Hashem, learned HaKadosh Baruch Hu is real. He told his mom in Eretz Yisrael, "Ima, I did teshuva." His mom started crying. She goes, "Oh, I wish you started doing cocaine instead." I'm telling you, he told me this. I said, it's a joke, right? He said, no, these are the words she used. He said, my mom told me, "I wish you became addicted to drugs instead of doing teshuva." Some people, they're so far from HaKadosh Baruch Hu that they think it's a bad thing. Shem HaShem, imagine living your whole life thinking that Hashem is bad. That's already a punishment of its own. Now, this young kid tells the rabbi, Rabbi, I can't come to the shiur because my father says it's no good. It's not our family. We don't become rabbis in the family. We are grandfathers of rabbis. That's it. We work. We do our thing. That's it. We're religious in our heart. So Rabbi, I can't come. He says, listen, you got to stay strong. This, that. Next time is shiur. A week later, the kid comes. But...

2:06:09A surprise comes with him also. This hothead, Kafkazi old man, just looks at the rabbi like this. Points to the rabbi, I want to talk to you. The rabbi comes to him and goes, yes. He goes, listen, you don't know who I am. You know, like one of those tough guys. You don't know who you're dealing with here. But I'm telling you, my son, your shiur, no more. Don't mess with me. He says, "What do you want me to tell him? Not to come? He comes. Tell him to come. What do you want from his life? Let him learn Torah." Because listen to me, he talks to him like an avaryan, like a gangster. "Because listen to me. My son, your shiur, no more. Don't mess with me. Because I'm not going to tell your son not to come. You don't know what you're dealing with here." Warns him a mash. What's the rabbi going to do? He didn't say anything. But unfortunately, the kid saw this. Next shiur, he didn't come.

2:07:09Another week passed, he didn’t come. Another week passed, he didn’t come. Another week passed, he didn’t come. Kid, what are you going to do? Your father goes against it. This one goes against it. It happened to me over here two months ago. Young kid, baruch Hashem, started doing teshuva. His father ruined the whole thing. Had a whole argument with his father. His father ruined the whole thing. The kid, Hashem knows where he is right now. He's not even a kid. He's 25 years old, but still has the influence of his father. Anyway, hopefully he's watching this part because the conclusion of this story gives you an idea of what's going on. So after a couple of months, the kid is not in a shiur, not in a shiur, not in a shiur, not in a shiur. One day the rabbi gets a phone call. He picks up the phone. Who is it? The gangster father. Kvoda Rav, I beg you to please come to my home for the levayah of my son. My son died, Hashem yerachem. The Rabbi comes, he sees everybody's crying, the kid's young, he's 20, 25 years old, young, little baby.

2:08:33Sees the father is hysterical, and he sees the rabbi. He goes up to the rabbi and says, "Why didn't you yell at me? Why didn't you yell at me? Why didn't you hit me? Why didn't you do this? Why didn't you force me? I killed my son. I killed my son. I killed my son." He says, "What happened? The kid..." Stopped doing teshuvah. He went back to his old life. What was his old life? Drugs, alcohol, parties, ecstasy, clubs, promotion, demotion, Hashem yerachem. Okay, he went to that life. One day he did a little bit too many drugs, overdosed, that was it, finished, died. The father says, "I killed my son." Why would I rather have a dead son over here, or Hashem, a kid that's a rabbi now? A kid that's about to keep Shabbat, what's the big deal? The rabbi says, I felt so bad for the guy, but there's nothing anyone could ever do. For the rest of his life, for eternity, he's going to have to live with the fact that he murdered his son, Hashem yirachem.

2:09:39And all of these parents that live today, that are sending their kids to public school in America, public school in Israel, public school in Europe, or send them to go do whatever they want, give them complete freedom to watch TV, surf the internet, act like a goy, be like a goy. When they hear mussar, they want to start doing teshuva, and the parents stop them. The parents discourage them. The parents tell them, "You're a fanatic. Don't listen to this rabbi." Guess what? In Shamayim, you are a murderer. In this world, eventually, you will be also. Why? Because you're murdering your kids. You're murdering your kids. What would you rather have? A kid that's a fanatic about Hashem or a fanatic about some Game Boy? Fanatic about guns? Fanatic about girls? Fanatic about sports? Fanatic about money? Fanatic about all the garbage of the world? Instead of being fanatic about Hashem, what would you rather they be? Alva, your kid becomes fanatic about Hashem, but you're not gonna let him. Guess what? In Shamayim, they're gonna make you see that, and you're gonna suffer seriously for such a thing. Why? Because you're murdering your own kids. Some parents don't want to do teshuva. I got a kid who came to a shiur once. He was in his late 20s, 27 or 28 years old. Came to one shiur, and that was it.

2:11:02You hear him in the background. This is a shiur I used to do in Boca Raton. One shiur he came, he asked a few questions. That was enough. Some souls are so special, all you got to do is tell them one time, and they change their life. Now after that, since then, I think he's been in a total of maybe five shiurim. But today, he lives a life of a Jew. Goes to shul every day, learns Torah, does mitzvot, watches himself, got blessed, got blessed, he watched his brit. One shiur started watching his brit. 28 years he's whining and dining, never finds somebody, wants to get married. Watched his brit one year later. He finds a Bat Yisrael. He's married now, both of them married now, expecting kids. She's a baalat teshuva. Are you going to find a Bat Yisrael in Sodom and Gomorrah? We live in Sodom and Gomorrah. This guy found a Bat Yisrael. Once he went to, now why tell you this story? As many of those bogus and why tell you this story? It's mamash...

2:12:08empty. No religious whatsoever, nothing. She walks around like she's a sheygitz. What? She walks around like a goy, but she asked, "What's this?" When he started doing teshuva, she said, "Hazak U'Baruch." She didn't get in the way. She said, "You want to do it? That's good for you. Go for it. Go for it. If it makes you happy to be closer to Hashem, go for it." And... No problem. She has merit. Why? Even though she didn't do teshuva herself, she has merit. Why? One of our sons, full ba'al teshuva, Baruch Hashem. So we're not saying that because your kid's doing teshuva, you have to become a rabbi as a parent. But don't get in the way at least. You should be a rabbi as a parent. You should be a ba'al teshuva too. That's one of the nevuaot of the end of days that Hashem says the kids are going to make the parents do teshuva. But at the very least, don't get in the way of the kids that are trying to do teshuva. A lot of kids, Baruch Hashem, are doing teshuva from our shiurim. It's amazing how the neshamos, they hear one or two shiurim, that's it, finished. Their souls are still pure. They're not as filthy as some of ours, adults, from all the sins we've made. So one or two shiurim, that's enough. They already want to do teshuva.

2:13:29They're already scared. You don't have to teach them about Gehinnom five times. One time you mention Gehinnom, they're scared for the rest of their life. Unless they're addicted to wasting seed, then that makes it a little bit more difficult. But the point is, Rabotai, that all of these stories, all of these things, they've happened. Hashem gives each one of us warnings in different ways. If each one of us delves into our own past, you'll see that Hashem is giving you many, many different warnings before He gave you a slap. He doesn't just slap for no reason. He gives you a warning shot, and sometimes another warning shot, and sometimes He gives you a punch. Why? Either because you're not getting the point, or perhaps you're a special soul that doesn't have the luxury of time. He wants you to do teshuvah now. He wants you to do teshuvah now. Not when you're 47 and already half your life is behind you. He wants you to do teshuvah now, already in your early 20s. Why? You apparently have that status of cheshbon. Maybe there's something you're supposed to do. Whatever it is, I don't know. I'm not going to pretend to be God here. All I can tell you is some people get their sign later in life.

2:14:41Some people get their sign early in their life, but everybody gets signs, everybody gets a message, and every time you press snooze on that message and you ignore Hashem, you can rest assured that the next time He talks to you, the next time He gives you a message, it'll be much more painful. It'll continue to become more painful until a person runs out of time. or a person listens and starts doing teshuva, I'll write that we use these Ten Days of Repentance and this Yom Kippur as a day to truly commit to HaKadosh Baruch Hu, that once and for all, we are going to do teshuva, once and for all, we're committed to changing. Not just for the things that are obvious. but the things that are not so obvious. Not just for the things that are simple, but also for the things that are difficult for us. Not for the things that we know about, but also for the things that we don't know about, but commit to learn about.

2:15:53Not just for the things that we like that the rabbi said and it sounded funny, but either way it's good, but also for the things that we don't like and the rabbi said and we're gonna do anyway. That's what got Eliezer, eved Avraham, to the extent of going from being an arur, a cursed Canaanite, to being baruch, going to Olam HaBa. alive, with his clothes on. He never died. Eliezer, the servant of Avraham Avinu, is one of ten people that went to Olam HaBa alive. Halvai, all of us go there dead. To Olam HaBa, Gan Eden, Halvai, it's good enough. He went there alive with his clothes on, with his suit on. How come, when Avraham came to Eliezer, Eliezer told him, "I have a daughter for your son." Yitzchak needs to get married. I have a daughter, my daughter. She's a perfect girl, a beautiful girl. She grew up in my own house, tzedakah. Let her marry your son. Avraham says, your daughter can never marry my son Yitzchak. Why? You're a Canaanite. You are arur. You're a cursed nation. I am baruch. I'm Avraham Avinu. I'm

2:17:10The descendant of Shem, descendant of Shem, am baruch, Hashem blessed us. You, cursed, can never be together, Hashem says no. Now, who is Eliezer at this moment? Eliezer was first in command after Avraham Avinu. He fulfilled the entire Torah, Eliezer. Whenever Avraham Avinu couldn't give a shiur, Eliezer would teach Torah. So you would think you tell somebody, "Listen, you're cursed. I'm blessed." All of a sudden, he says, "I'm blessed, I'm cursed. Okay, I'm fine. I quit. I quit. I did teshuva already. You still call me cursed. I quit." Eliezer, what did he say? When Avraham Avinu says, "You're cursed and I'm blessed," what did Eliezer say? Chazak u'Baruch, you're right, you're right. But he didn't just say the words. In his heart, he didn't get offended because he knew this is Daas Torah. He knew his Rebbe said it. That's Daas Torah. Even though it sounds offensive, it sounds not good, it's Daas Torah. Kadosh. That's what the Rebbe says. The Rebbe says. In his heart, in his heart, he didn't get offended.

2:18:25Hashem says you didn't get offended by the truth, you will never die. You go to Olam HaBa alive. You turn into Baruch. You were Arur, now you are Baruch Eliezer. You turn into Baruch. Why? Because you took the emet and you didn't get offended. You didn't get offended by the emet, you're now Baruch. You're now Baruch. Sometimes Mussar, sometimes rebuke, sometimes the emet is offensive. to your yetzer hara. Your yetzer hatov is never offended by the emet. If you let the yetzer hatov take control of the steering wheel, you're never going to be offended. But if you let the yetzer hara take control of the steering wheel, you'll be offended by everything. You're only going to like the mitzvot that are easy for you. Shabbat you keep, you're going to love that mitzvah. Taharat HaMishpacha you keep, you're going to love that mitzvah. But stealing at work, Since you do it, no, no, this rabbi is crazy. No, no, come on, no, text message? What, three text messages is stealing? Come on, rabbi. No, what do you think, this generation of Moshe Rabbeinu? He thinks that that's okay. No, no, everything that I do is okay. Everything I don't do is not okay. You understand? So a person needs to know. It's either emet or it's sheker. You have to double-check, you have to double see.

2:19:47Doesn't mean that you can't breathe. It just means that you can do everything you're doing in a kosher way. When it comes to work, there's a time and a place to do things. You take breaks, you ask your boss, "Can I do this? Can I do that?" You ask your rabbi, "Can I do this? Can I do that?" Act like a three-year-old, a four-year-old that asks for permission. Because sometimes you won't know. Why just assume that you're right? Gather yourself a lot of sins, and then you don't even know what you're doing on Yom Kippur. You're doing teshuva for a sin that you know about and re-outing shamayim and saying, "What if you only knew the other stuff?" So that's why it's very, very important to be careful with dinei mamonot (the laws of money). Be very careful with the laws of arayot (all the issues of sexual immorality). Intimacy sex crimes. You'll see that right before the end of Yom Kippur, the last prayer is full of that. That's all that you've got; that all of us do is mention every single possible sin that a person can make from intimacy issues, wasting seed, and ni'uf, and so on and so forth. It's very, very important to know this is a very serious crime in the eyes of Hashem, no matter what generation it is and

2:21:06Next week, we have Yom Kippur on Tuesday. There's no shiur next week. No shiur on Sunday. I was planning on doing it, but Shamayim decided that I can't do it on Sunday. There is a small possibility that we may do a shiur on Thursday next week. I'll let you guys know. It'll be a special one-time exception, but maybe I'm not sure. We'll see. Either way, there is going to be plenty of stuff online that will publicize. Maybe we'll do a shiur online only. We'll see b'ezrat Hashem. But these next couple of days, try to make sure that you are preparing yourself for Yom Kippur, not only by preparing the food and preparing for the fast, but also know what you can do, know what you can't do. Anyone that has ma'aser, has money that they can donate, this is a perfect time to donate, especially for the sake of kiruv, because you want to show up to...

2:22:08Yom Kippur with as many as possible. Don't show up to Yom Kippur with your savings account full of money but very little tzedakah. Make sure that whatever you can give, you give. Aside from that, aside from prayer, aside from learning, aside from giving tzedakah, also if you could do chesed. If you have somebody in your community that is brand new to Judaism, to Torah, invite them over to your shul. Invite them over so that, if you have the ability, you should do it. If you don't have the ability, if you don't know anybody, give the ability to do it. You should help people, especially people that are new. Don't just host people that are your friends and pretty much just want to show off your house and your cooking. Invite them over to your shul. If you have the ability, do it. If you don't have the ability or don't know anybody, give the ability to do it. You should help people, especially those who are new. Don't just host people that are your friends and pretty much just want to show off your house and your cooking. People that are new to the community or new to the religion, try to, you know, bring them over and show them how beautiful Judaism is. Try to encourage them to come to the shul. Try to do that as much as you can if you have the ability. If you don't have the ability, whether it's because of shalom bayit issues or money issues, then don't worry about it. Focus on the other things. Only focus on the things you can do. Don't harp on the things you can't do.

2:23:33Don't worry about the issues of, let's say, piryah u'reviyah if you're not even married yet. First, finalize shidduchim. Then we'll worry about piryah u'reviyah. Don't worry about siyum haShas, finishing the entire Shas, if you haven't finished the Chumash yet. First, finish the Chumash, then worry about the Shas. Worry about the problems you have now. Don't worry about all of the sins you've ever made if you haven't even done teshuva for Shabbat yet. First do teshuva for Shabbat. Then we'll start doing some other things. You understand? You can't complete the entire Torah in one shot. Can't complete the Torah in one shot. Somebody told me today, "Listen, I have this guy who doesn't keep anything and I'm worried about all the bitul Torah that he's doing." What bitul Torah? The guy doesn't keep Shabbat. What bitul Torah? What are you talking about? Bitul Torah is when you're wasting time not learning Torah. This guy doesn't even keep Shabbat. What are you talking about bitul Torah? He doesn't even know why he's alive yet. He doesn't understand the difference between him and a cow. You're worrying about bitul Torah? You tell the guy to stop bitul Torah, he's going to tell you to go fly a kite. You have to understand there are certain things that you teach now, certain things you teach later. You can't teach the whole Torah on one leg.

2:24:55So, b'ezrat Hashem, this Yom Kippur, we're going to commit to HaKadosh Baruch Hu once and for all to do teshuva, but also each one of us take on the obligation to help Am Yisrael do teshuva b'ezrat Hashem now and not later. Baruch Adonai le'olam, amen ve'amen.