Priceless Kindness, PHILOSOPHY, Names, TALENT, Words, WORLDS, Reincarnation etc-STUMP THE RABBI (57)

0:17We're back here in Aventura. During our weekly shiur, our stamta rabbi, you guys ask questions. B'ezrat Hashem, HaKadosh Baruch Hu will give us the answers. Tonight's shiur will be for Refuah Shlema for Levana, Rabbanit Levana bat Sara, Rav Efraim ben Shulamit, Rabbanit Sara bat Anat, Dvora bat Mercedes, Esther bat Zipora, Elisheva Chaya bat Sara, Orit bat Ilana. During our weekly shiur, our stamta rabbi, you guys ask questions. B'ezrat Hashem, HaKadosh Baruch Hu will give us the answers. Tonight's shiur will be for refuah shlema for Levana, Rabbanit Levana bat Sara, Rav Efraim ben Shulamit, Rabbanit Sara bat Anat, Dvora bat Mercedes, Esther bat Zipora, Elisheva Chaya bat Sara, Orit bat Ilana, Also David ben Esriah, Doris bat Jorah, Yitro ben Avraham, Talia bat Sara, Aliza bat Rivka, and also for hatzlacha rabah for Elad ben Doris, Oshri ben Doris, Gabi ben Doris, Shaul ben Farzaneh, Yitro ben Avraham,

1:38and all of Am Yisrael, and especially all of those wonderful people that help us do everything that we do, whether by donating their time, their money, their skill set, all the things that require mesirat nefesh, require self-sacrifice, because the person that's born in this world is simply born selfish. You know, we are not only in a generation of selfish people; we're a species that's selfish. Everyone cares about their self-interest. So when someone spends either their hard-earned money or their time or anything else to help other Jews do teshuva, especially if those Jews are not related to him, not related to her, they don't even know who they are, and you're going to invest money into Am Yisrael, there's really no bigger chesed, bigger kindness that you can do in this world than that, simply because although it's a very nice gesture and a nice chesed to give somebody a meal, give them a job, give them a lift, give them some good advice, even a compliment, all of that can count as chesed.

2:59But every one of those things has a clock connected to it, which limits the value of that gift you're giving somebody. Even if you save somebody's life from going into an accident, chas v'shalom, or you save their life because of your skill set and you're a doctor and you cure their cancer or their coronavirus or whatever it is, Truth is, all you did is just buy this person more time, of course by Chasdei Hashem, and you bought him more life in this world. But if that person is not going to keep Torah and mitzvot, if he's in fact going to, due to you buying him more time, violate the Torah, he's going to steal, he's going to lie, he's going to cheat, he's going to violate Shabbat, he's going to commit adultery, and all of the different things that HaKadosh Baruch Hu Himself says are forbidden in very, very strong language, where 12 times He mentions in the Torah that someone who is Mechalel Shabbat has no share in the World to Come, meaning

4:22that person is not going to see Heaven. So if you buy somebody more time to live and they're going to do this with the remainder of their life, our Chachamim teach us that it was better off that he died. Why? Fewer sins. Fewer sins would mean that you would get less punishment. Which means that if you actually help another person do teshuva directly or indirectly, By giving them a CD, sharing a link, or donating money for somebody else to do it, in essence, what are you really doing? You're buying this person a ticket to Olam HaBa. You're buying this person an opportunity for an eternity of good. A gift that will never stop giving. A gift that is simply too valuable to put a value on. I guess they call it priceless. So when someone invests their time and their money and their everything into helping Am Yisrael do teshuvah, there is no higher kindness than that. And that's why the Gemara in Masechet Sanhedrin

5:39In Perek Chelek, when the Chachamim hear the scary details of what will happen and what will be at a time before Mashiach, they ask their Rabbi, Rabbi Eliezer ben Horkenos, how can we be saved from these birth pangs of Mashiach? And, thank you. And Rabbi Eliezer ben Horkenos, the Rabbi of Rabbi Akiva, says to them, Torah and Gemilut Chasadim. Know the Torah, follow the Torah, but in addition to that, do Gemilut Chasadim. Do overwhelming kindness, overwhelming kindness for Klal Yisrael, for the world at large, in order to get yourself protected from these growth pangs, from these birth pangs of Mashiach. Because HaKadosh Baruch Hu has different rules that He gave Himself for how He runs the world. One of those rules is called measure for measure, midah k'neged midah. So because you saved another person's eternity of shame, eternity of pain, eternity of agony, and embarrassment,

7:02by giving them a CD, by sharing a link with them, by inviting them to a shiur, by doing whatever it is that you did in order to get this person to recognize his Creator or her Creator. Because you did that, the measure-for-measure reward for that is not only the reward of a greater Olam HaBa for yourself, an additional 310 worlds in your Gan Eden, but also a very special protection in Olam HaZeh at a very, very critical time that we are living in called the era of Mashiach. So, Ashreichem Yisrael, that you're taking advantage of the opportunity to help Klal Yisrael do teshuva. Now, what does it really entail to do teshuva? Now, of course, you can say, Well, Torah says keep Shabbat. Okay. Torah says keep Taharat HaMishpacha if you're married. Good. Torah says you have to keep all of the family purity laws, which include even if you're not married. Meaning that if you're not married, you're not allowed to be with another person. And if you're a woman, you're not allowed to be with a man if you're not married. Why?

8:27you're niddah. If you're not married, you're not allowed to go to the mikveh, which means that every single Jewish woman who is single and unmarried is niddah. And if she makes the mistake of being intimate or even hugging another Jew, She's not only putting herself in a sinful situation, which is a sin itself, but in addition to that, it's Issur Niddah. Now, this is a very difficult test for many people, but anyone that wants to go to Gan Eden simply says, I have no choice. I want to go to Gan Eden. Not just the Gan Eden after this world, but even the Gan Eden in this world. I don't want to make myself so impure that by the time I get married, I don't understand what I have. You know, many times you tell people there's an enormous benefit to keeping yourself pure before marriage. And it's hard for people to understand because they say, what's the big deal?

9:50the big deal, so I have a girlfriend or two, I have a boyfriend or two, what's the big deal? Once I get married, I'll be loyal to him, I'll be loyal to her. I didn't decide to have a hundred boyfriends or a hundred girlfriends, just had a little fun. I thought she was the one, but she ended up being the three. now I can speak until I'm blue in the face, and only if you're gonna hear it. And the reason why is because you have to live it, experience it, and understand the tragic situation that we're in, in order to really fully comprehend what I'm about to say. You see, the Western society is at a put himself in a situation where you have a better chance of having a plane land straight into your face than staying married past five years. That's how low the chances are in Western society. Meaning that the divorce rate is so high right now, over 80% generally and in some places over 90%.

11:17that it's easier to flip a coin in the middle of your pool or lake five times and more likely to get the coin to land on the same side than to stay married past those five years. You don't believe me? Go flip some coins. We'll see. The truth is, the marriage situation in the world today is a tragedy. When I was a kid, In Eretz Yisrael, if somebody smoked a cigarette, parents would say, "Don't hang out with him." Why? Because he's a bad kid. Bad kid. Why? He smokes cigarettes. Does that make him a bad kid? Whether you were right or wrong, in my days, if you smoked a cigarette, you were a bad kid. Today, a nine-year-old might be smoking marijuana with their parents. In my day, which wasn't too long ago...

12:19If you came from a broken home, your parents were divorced, many parents would say, "Don't hang out with him." Why? Because his parents are divorced. Who knows what happened there? Whether right or wrong, it doesn't really make a difference. But we know that back then, divorce was taboo. It wasn't the norm. It wasn't a standard. Why? Because people struggled and overcame their struggles in order to remain married. Divorce was a last resort. It wasn't something that was so common. Today, if you're married only once, past five years, that's uncommon. Ten years? Wow. Twenty years? You're from a different generation. They didn't make so many like you. You look at your parents, married 30, 40, 50 years. They're from a different time. They might as well be a different species. Divorce is no longer taboo. You tell somebody, "Yeah, I just got married." "Oh, okay, mazal tov." "No, no, no, not mazal tov. I'm getting divorced now." "Wait, but you said you got married." "Yeah, that was last month. This month I'm getting divorced. But it's good I kept the business card of the rabbi. So I use the same rabbi for both. Maybe he'll give me a group discount."

13:47Truth is, divorce is no big deal. Every day, I get phone calls, text messages: "Rabbi, help us, we're about to get divorced." Truth is, by the time you came to me, it's already too late. I try to help, try to give some guidance. But many times, by the time people have decided to get a divorce, they've also decided that they've given up on their relationship. And if you're not willing to invest in the relationship, there's nothing to fix. What does it mean to invest in the relationship? Invest in yourself. Make yourself a better person. Now, if you don't think there's anything for you to improve on, there's nothing to talk about. But the point is that today it's very, very normal to get a divorce. It's very normal to go off the derech, become non-religious, even if you grew up religious. The things that were taboo in yesteryear are very, very normal today. Now, as sad as that may be, it's simply because we don't understand the value of hard work.

15:04of how, in order for us to succeed in anything in life, we have to work hard. Whether we want to succeed in being a good chef and making a delicious dinner, or we want to succeed in being a good husband or wife and having a beautiful marriage, or we want to succeed in being a good son or daughter and fulfilling the mitzvah of honoring our parents, all of these require hard work—something very rare in today's world of convenience and instant gratification. very rare in today's world of convenience and instant gratification. Now, if we change, we are better for it. We learn from the mistakes of our generation and we become better for it. If we don't,

16:05your conquerors, your destroyers are within you. Meaning, we are self-destructing. Now, when it comes down to doing teshuva, the first and most important thing is that you need to know that you need to change. You need to start keeping laws you didn't keep. You need to have a certain belief you didn't have. And teshuva is for everyone, whether you were frum from birth, or you will grow up secular, whether you're Chassidish, Litvish, whatever you are. Teshuva is for everyone, no matter where your starting point is. Every single human being on earth needs to do teshuva; that's why you're alive. But one of the frustrating things for a new Ba'al Teshuva—and a new Ba'al Teshuva doesn't necessarily always mean newly religious— Because I have quite a few students that are Ba'alei Teshuva but have been religious their whole life, though. But they're Ba'alei Teshuva. Why? Because they weren't really religious enough according to Hashem's definition of religious. They didn't have enough Emunah according to Hashem's requirement. They didn't have enough Yirat Shamayim according to Hashem's law. Because the Gemara says in Masechet Shabbat, Hashem has nothing but your Yirat Shamayim.

17:29He has nothing in His world other than your Yirat Shamayim. May He have mercy on us and how little we have to give Him. Now, the tough part of being newly enlightened is that once you wake up, you open your eyes, you see the world in a completely different perspective. The first thing you want to do is get people to join you. And there starts the problem. There's a famous story in the philosophical world. Even Plato used it to teach us philosophy, but we're going to use it for holiness. And the story goes like this: A group of prisoners were all thrown into a cave. at a very, very young age to the extent where they did not know a life before they entered the cave. Very little light entered the cave from the outside, and all they knew is what's in this cave. They grew up, and they had a leader, and they had followers, and they gathered their food from within the cave. Once in a while, someone from the outside would sneak in

18:58food, and they just simply thought that there is no outside world. Rather, the food that snuck in is just the way of the world; it just happened that a bunch of loaves of bread appeared by this rock every Tuesday morning. They didn't really think very much about there being an outside world because their world was simply darkness. Their world was simply limited. didn't see any type of possibility, nor did they have the desire to exit the situation because they didn't think there's anything beyond the rocks that are blocking the entrance. They didn't think that it was an entrance; they simply thought it's the same thing as the other side. As time would pass, everyone would live their life one of them grew tired of the darkness and was inspired to see if there was something beyond this darkness. He followed this tiny little light that seemed to start from a certain point beyond his ability to see, but he wanted to track it and see if there was something there.

20:24And he tracked the light and eventually he saw that it was coming from a tiny little hole between the separation of the big boulder or big rock and some other rocks. He thought to himself, "What if I remove some of these rocks? Will there be more light?" And he removed the rocks, and he saw that there was more light. But to his surprise, there was also something beyond the light. After much effort, anguish, and pain, and the development of a few scars even, he exited the cave. And he got out to a whole new world where there was such a beautiful light of the sun that it made the previous light he had seem like darkness. There was such a beautiful world full of fruits and vegetables that it made the worms and maggots and all types of creatures of the ground seem filthy and disgusting next to these juicy fruits that he'd never seen before. The colors were so beautiful that he couldn't believe he had been living without them because everything he saw was the same color, black.

21:51After tasting the fruit, enjoying it, and enjoying the wonderful light, the beautiful, enormous world that he now discovered, he knew there's much more to discover. But yet it hurt him that the people that he grew up with, the people that he was raised with, the people that he actually held dearly, were still in a darkness that they knew no way out of because they knew nothing beyond it. And he decided to make the sacrifice and break back into the jail in hopes that he will free his friends. After much effort, toil, and a few more scars, he entered back the cave. was still in darkness that they knew no way out of because they knew nothing beyond it. And he decided to make the sacrifice and break back into the jail in hopes that he would free his friends. After much effort, toil, and a few more scars, he re-entered the cave. saw his friends and was excited to tell them about this new world he discovered. "It has fruits, it has vegetables." "What's a vegetable?" "What's a color?" "Well, it has trees." "What's a tree?" "Well, there's a sun."

23:09You cursing us? No, no, it's a light. What's a light? You mean the thing that's right behind you? A little thing? No, it's not little. It's huge, it's enormous, it's beautiful. What's beautiful? How can you tell the difference? And he tried to tell them in all types of ways to no avail because no one would even understand what he was saying. In fact, they thought he was crazy. and he would just go from one after another, from one friend to another, from one friend to another, and he told the leader, and he told the followers, and he told the men, and he told the women, and he just told anyone he possibly could, to the extent where they found him really annoying. And they decided, we gotta kill him. Why? He's disturbing the peace. And he's questioning... our livelihood, our reality. Now, that's the story. And that's what they did. They killed him. In fact, this was not a chiddush by Plato. This is the story of Am Yisrael. Every one of the prophets that saw the light of Hashem, spoke to Hashem, saw His words, saw things,

24:33beyond the heavens, whether it's Yechezkel or Yeshayahu or Zechariah or Moshe Rabbeinu. They all saw the light. And they wanted to tell Am Yisrael, this is the light. And the minute that this light conflicted with their reality and required them to change, required them to go through a chasm, required them to endure pain, required them to do something unusual, they mocked them, they rejected them, they destroyed their names, even called Moshe Rabbeinu an adulterer, a thief. And they even murdered our prophets. Whether it's Zechariah, whose blood remained boiling for hundreds of years, or it's Isaiah, whom his own grandson cut into pieces. This too is the battle of a new Ba'al Teshuva. Because surely,

25:51You're changing your life because you saw the light. But you're dealing with a frustrating reality because your peers, your family, your friends, your loved ones—not only are they not listening to you most of the time, but they actually think you're crazy. They actually think you're a fanatic. They think you're insane. And you can relate to this story as if it's you. The only good part of the story is that you're still alive, Baruch Hashem. The good news is, this story is every Baal Teshuva that wants to help Klal Yisrael. The better news is that Hashem runs the world.

26:52And when a person makes all of the hishtadlut, all of the effort that he or she can, to help Klal Yisrael do teshuva, Hashem rewards them one way or the other. Now, if a person is truly interested in helping people do teshuva, the first thing they should do is not focus on their family and friends, but rather focus on Am Yisrael in general. Because then you're putting yourself in a position where you're showing Hashem that you simply care about Him and His children, even if His children may not necessarily be your best friends, even if His children may not necessarily be people you know. But you know Him, and as a token of your appreciation for everything He's doing for you, has done for you, and will do for you. And as a fulfillment of the mitzvah, that you love your brother like you love yourself, you take the time and help Klal Yisrael do teshuva. And you now put yourself in a position where Hashem has to reward you with several things, measure for measure. First, Mishna Avot says, the reward of a mitzvah is another mitzvah.

28:19You help one person do teshuva, you show Hashem you like it, guess what? Hashem's going to send you more people. All of a sudden, you're a little Moshe Rabbeinu. All of a sudden, you're a little Sarah Imeinu of your neighborhood. All of a sudden, everyone's asking you for a bracha. Everyone's asking you, who's your rabbi? I want to hear him too. Why do you want to hear my rabbi? I don't know, I knew this girl for 10 years and she wasn't religious until she met you. How come? I want to be like that. Why do you want to be like that? I don't know. She looks happy now. I saw she was cracked out for five years that I knew her. Now she looks like a normal human being. She looks happy. She just got married. I want to be married. I want to be happy. It took a while to see the results, but nonetheless, now that I see the results, I want it too. All of a sudden, other people are going to come to you, ask you for blessings, ask you for what's your secret. Have more people come to you, that's one. It's how mitzvah goreret mitzvah (one mitzvah leads to another mitzvah). The reward for a mitzvah is another mitzvah. You donated money, you donate for my Torah, you donate for my kids. I'm going to give you more money. Why should you give more money? I'm going to give you more money so you can give more money. What's the deal?

29:28I'm going to give you more money so you can give more money. Why? Because you gave money when you didn't have a lot of money. When you had $100, you gave it. So I'm going to give you $1,000 this time. Yeah, but I only gave $100. Yeah, but you showed me that you gave when you didn't really have that much. So, therefore, I'm going to give you a lot so you can give more. Second thing is, measure for measure. Torah says that someone that causes the public to do teshuva, sin does not come to his hand. And the Chachamim say, commentary on that Mishnah, says how come the sin doesn't come to his hand? It says because as a measure-for-measure way that Hashem runs the world, He cannot allow such an injustice to happen where The guy that made everybody, or the girl that made everyone go to Gan Eden is in Gehenom herself, for the sins. You made everybody do teshuva, but you're a sinner, so you go to Gehenom. Can't not be. So Hashem gives such a person special protection. Doesn't mean that they can't sin. Doesn't mean that they don't sin. But Hashem will give people special protection, special privileges, so much so that...

30:48like walking on clouds in comparison to the rest of society. And one of the great benefits there is that part of being in Gan Eden is that you want good things to happen not only for yourself but also for some people that you care about. So if you cared about Hashem's children, Hashem will also reward you measure for measure for caring about the people you care about and doing everything possible to give them a chance to do teshuva, even without your direct effort. Why? You helped Hashem's other children, so Hashem says, "I'm going to help your children too." And the reward list continues without limit. So much so, that the Chachamim give all types of descriptions of the reward for someone that helps people do teshuva to the extent where they say that even if someone knew Torah like Moshe Rabbeinu, had mitzvot like Moshe Rabbeinu, you compare this tzaddik

32:08There's someone that helps people do teshuva, and there is no comparison. Why? The guy that helps other people do teshuva is in a much, much higher Olam HaBa. Yeah, but the other guy was a tzaddik like Moshe Rabbeinu. The other guy knew the whole Torah, whole Shas by heart. Everything, all the books, every book, everything you know is my heart. Yeah, you're going to go to Gan Eden, don't worry. We're not going to put you in Gehenom, don't worry. But you cannot be like that guy. You cannot be like that girl. Why? But they didn't know half the Torah that I know. Yeah, but they took Hashem's children out of Gehenom and they put them in Gan Eden. Is there such a thing that Hashem loves more than His people? Is there such a thing that Hashem limits Himself to rescue His people? No! He wants to do everything for His people. And if you want to be a partner with Him, He'll help you with it.

33:21So when a person invests in such a thing, time, effort, money, whatever it may be, they reward themselves in such ways that are literally unimaginable. But you have to know, in order to succeed in kiruv, in helping people do teshuva, self-sacrifice is the basic first-level requirement. You're going to have to sacrifice everything. The more you sacrifice, the more success you'll have. The more you limit your sacrifice, the more you're limiting your own success. You have to sacrifice your time with your kids, you have to sacrifice your joy in the world, you have to sacrifice even sometimes your learning of Torah. Why? You're saving neshamot. Now, it doesn't mean that you don't learn, and it doesn't mean you don't spend time with your kids, and it doesn't mean that you don't do all these other things, but...

34:21Your life no longer has the same freedom that everybody else has. Why? You are now in the business of saving neshamot. Now, why should you save neshamot? That's the question. Aside from the reward that none of us really are here to see yet. Olam HaBa, 310 worlds, Gan Eden, all that stuff is great. But how do we really understand that we're saving people from not just in the next world—punishment, horror, and all that stuff—but actually here. The Torah tells us in many places that when HaKadosh Baruch Hu gave the Torah, He wasn't making a suggestion. In fact, He was making an obligation. In this week's Parashat Matot, it says, "Everything that comes out of his mouth, he must do." This pertains to you when you make a swear, but needless to say, pertains to your Creator who lives by His own rules. If He says something, He'll do it. If He says that someone...

35:45someone that's intermarried and dies that way, someone that goes against Him and doesn't do teshuva, and He's going to punish him, nothing in the world can change that. In fact, there are some Chachamim that are Rishonim, from the days of the Rambam, that are of the opinion that you're wasting your time praying for dead people. Why? If they're wicked, there's nothing you can do about it. Now, oh, there are Chachamim that say, no, no, we have proof in the Torah, in the Gemara. Rabbi Meir Baal HaNes prayed for his rabbi that went off the derech, Elisha ben Avuya, and we saw something, Chazal says, that changed. He says, yeah, you be Rabbi Meir Baal HaNes, and maybe it'll change. Reality, you're not Rabbi Meir Baal HaNes or Yehoshua's. And anyway, his rabbi had a lot of Torah, and that was his merit. Now, most of the opinions say, no, no, you should say Kaddish, and you should pray; anything can help. What do you have to lose anyway? Do it, it'll go for their merit, do more shiurim for them, do more prayers for them, and that's the common opinion. But the point being here is that there is a very, very strong opinion that

37:09You gotta get it, you're getting a shot right now. Don't mess around. Don't mess around. Gehinnom is not a fun place. It's not a laundry machine. The Gemara in Masechet Berachot says it has several different types of fires and horror and nightmare. Don't go there. You see it? Turn left. Turn right. Turn anywhere. Now the Gemara says... that in Masechet Shabbat, page 129, that when HaKadosh Baruch Hu gave Am Yisrael the Torah, it wasn't just like what the Gemara said earlier in Masechet Shabbat, that He lifted the Har Sinai, the Mount Sinai, on top of Am Yisrael, and said,

38:11you accept My Torah. This is like a lot of people, millions of people. You need a mountain to cover them. If you don't do it, we're going to drop it on you, and this will be your burial ground. Later on, they say, "How come you're not allowed to do Shavuot?" What's the big deal? You could do it at other times. Why can't you slaughter something on Shavuot, which is the day of Matan Torah? So the Gemara says something scary. It says, because this shechita, slaughtering a cow, even if you mean it to celebrate and have a nice meal, or even as a korban, Bad idea. Why? It is symbolic of what was about to happen at Har Sinai. Here's My Torah. Accept it. Good. You don't accept it? I already have the knives ready to slaughter all of you. And the rest of the world.

39:35They went into details. Initially, He said something. Secondly, He gave the details. So don't remind us of that scary day. We met Hashem firsthand, and He told us, "Here's the Torah." Because it wasn't a suggestion. So here we see already, you're helping a person that's in the world today, Jew or non-Jew. And let him know, by the way, you know God? Yeah. He didn't suggest the Torah. He didn't recommend it. He obligated it. He commanded it. And I highly, highly recommend, since I'm not the king, I can't force you. I highly recommend you listen. Why? Watch this guy. Press play. He'll explain. I told you, he'll explain. This already clarifies one thing. Now, the prophet Isaiah says in chapter 42, verse 22, and talks about Am Yisrael.

41:04After they've sinned, Hashem has this to say to them. But it is alluded, downtrodden people, all of them trapped in holes and hidden away in prisons. They are alluded, and there is no rescuer. Plundered with none to say, "Give it back." Who among you will give ear to this? Will hearken and hear the outcome? Who delivered Yaakov to plunder and Israel to looters? Was it not Hashem? He against whom we have sinned. They did not wish to go in His way and did not listen to His Torah. So He poured out His fiery wrath upon them and the power of war. It burned them from all around, but they would not know. It burned within them, but they did not take it to heart.

42:06Kadosh Baruch Hu tells the prophet to let Am Yisrael know. You see all this destruction, the Beit HaMikdash, the horror, the blood. Everyone's a prisoner. What do you think, it just happened for no reason? What do you think, it happened because they had a stronger army? The Iranians just decided to pick war with you out of all of the nations in the world? The Russians decide to support them. This one and that one all of a sudden just hate you just because? No. Why did it happen, Hashem says? Why did all of this horror happen? Because you did not listen to the Torah. You did not listen to His ways even after He gave you a warning. You got a virus. You did nothing about it. government of the places that you live in went against you, you did nothing about it. Your own communities were plundering and going upside down, you did nothing about it. You didn't learn the lessons from all the warnings; you just thought, "Oh, bad luck, bad season, bad generation, weak this," all types of excuses, and now you have nothing to help you. Page 32b

43:32says for the sin of unfulfilled vows, someone who says something and doesn't keep his promise. We learn from this week that if you say something, you better keep your promise. Don't be one of those people who say, "I'll be there in five minutes," but you know it's going to be an hour and a half before you get there. No, I'll pay you back on Tuesday. Three years from now. Don't do that. Why? The Kadosh Baruch Hu doesn't like it. How much doesn't He like it? It doesn't seem like such a big deal. Chilul Shabbat sounds like a big deal. Wasting seed is a big deal. Committing adultery is a big deal. Keeping your word? What's the big deal about that? Chazal say, for the sin of unfulfilled vows, a person's children die. May Hashem preserve us and save us from ourselves. These are the words of Rabbi Elazar, the son of Rabbi Shimon. Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai is talking about this. However, Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi says, neglecting Torah study causes people to die. Children die because of that. Hashem Yishmor.

44:57Now, according to the one who says that children die for the sin of unfulfilled vows, the reason is understandable. But the source for this is, as we have stated, Ecclesiastes 5:5. But according to the one who says that children die for the sin of neglecting Torah, what's the verse for this one? But I was asking, okay, we understand. Somebody has to keep his vows. We have a specific obligation in Torah to keep your vows. Don't make a neder for no reason. Don't promise things for no reason. Even saying a "promise is a promise," even saying "I'll be there," is, in essence, a form of a promise. Not quite as much as a neder, but don't say things knowingly that you're lying. You make a mistake; you make a mistake. You say, chatati, aviti, pashati. But don't knowingly be a liar. Why? The Mishnah says, the same God that destroyed the generation of Noach with the flood, and the same God that destroyed the next generation, the Tower of Bavel, is going to be the same God that destroys those that do not keep their word.

46:26Meaning, Hashem hates liars. Why? It's the opposite of Him. Just like idolatry is the opposite of God, you're replacing everything which is God with nothing, which is the idol, because the idol is not even a creation. The idol is the creation of the creation. It's lower than the creation. So you're replacing everything, the Creator, with the creation of the creation, the lowest form of creation. So just like idolatry is hated by God because it is the exact opposite of Him, sheker is also the opposite of Him. Lies are also the opposite of Him because He is complete truth. So, He says, we have verses, we have sources, where liars have big problems. And here we're talking about intentional liars, but sometimes even people that unintentionally lie get hurt. You have to be careful. So the Gemara says, okay, we understand this very clearly, but why is it that someone who doesn't learn Torah gets the same type of punishment? Bittul Torah. Why? Would you want to go play basketball and that's it? What, somebody's going to die because of that? I just decided to play some video games and that's it? Someone's going to die because of that? I just decided to just watch TV. Waste, burn a few hours, as people call it. I want to burn a few hours.

47:50you burning, you keep going burning this way, they're going to keep burning you after. Why? Getting so used to burning, people want to burn time. "I have an appointment in two hours, I gotta burn a couple of hours, so I'm just driving around." Why? Nothing to do? Your brain is what, like a little mouse on a wheel? There are a million and a half things to do. How do you not have something to do? How do you ever get bored? Ah, you know how you get bored? The Rambam writes that the only people who sin moral sins are people who have nothing in their minds. And because they have nothing in their minds, meaning no Torah in their minds, they get bored. And when they get bored, they end up sinning moral sins. So now, someone says, "Okay, I understand, don't lie, be an honest person, Baruch Hashem." But if I don't learn Torah because I feel like just doing nothing, you're telling me it's horrible? The Gemara says yes. So the Gemara asks, what's the source? It is written, the Gemara says we use a source from Yirmiyahu chapter 2 verse 30.

49:13In vain I have smitten your children, for they had not accepted the rebuke, the Mussar. So the Chachamim explain, Rashi over there says, this is where we learn that Torah and Mussar are synonymous. They mean the same thing. When you neglect Mussar, you're neglecting Torah. When you neglect Torah, you neglect Mussar. It's the same word. And Hashem says, when you neglect my Mussar, then you're just going to get hurt and still there's nothing that's going to come out of it. So, here we see that your fellow Jew that's not learning Torah at least a little bit every day, has put himself and his or her children in danger. How? By simply not learning what the Creator obligated him or her to learn. So you telling him, listen, I'm not telling you to go to yeshiva and become the next Rav Moshe Feinstein. Take it easy.

50:30But everyone here in the world has 24 hours. Can you put 15 minutes, 30 minutes, an hour aside every day to maybe listen to a shiur? You can, right? You spend 15 minutes, a half-hour, or more reading a newspaper. Let's replace the newspaper with something else to read. The newspaper is what? The media tells you to buy. The Torah is what God says to learn. Let's, let's, you've been listening to the media for 30, 40 years, right? By buying the New York Times and Daily News avidly every week, every day. You're a subscriber to all types of newspapers. You're a big believer in the Wall Street Journal, right? What about God? Let's give Him a shot too. 15 minutes can change your life, but not 15 minutes whenever you feel like it, once in a blue... Just like you read the newspaper every day, read the Torah every day. That little bit of Torah can literally save lives. How? Hashem says, finally he's learning Mussar. Finally she's learning my Torah. It's not 24 hours a day, and it may not even be 2 hours a day. But at least she's paying some attention to Me.

51:51At least she's reading some of My Torah. He's reading some of My Torah. That gives Me hope that they're not going to get back on that track. And I don't need to hit them. When you tell people about learning Torah as the most important mitzvah to start with, you're telling them something they may not realize. But you're telling them a way of how to protect their own life in this world to the extent where they can even turn their own life in this world into heaven. How? Simply, go into a shiur, that's a quality shiur, press play, sit back, relax, and make sure to pay attention. Very simple. You want to get some books? Start with the Chumash. You have some commentary; you go to one of the well-respected kosher publications, Jewish bookstores, and ask for a Chumash with commentary. Start reading everything that's on the page. If you want something with a little more detail relevant to today, you could ask your Rabbi or the person that influenced you to do teshuva, your mashpia.

53:21What should you start with? What book? And you get started every day. A little shiur audio, video, maybe a book, and then you start. That way, Rabotai, by you telling them, "You have to do the whole Torah," that sounds too much. Why? They're in a cave. they're in darkness for 20, 30, 40 years, didn't even know that the outside world was an option, didn't even know that the Torah world was an option because they've been trained to hate the Torah by practically everyone they know. Why? How are religious people viewed today? Just pick an ugly word; that's usually how they're viewed. Oh, you religious people, you're always taking handouts, you don't work. Really? We don't work? Do you know that we actually pay more taxes than non-religious people in many cases because we make more money? In fact, the average income of a religious person in America is actually higher than a non-religious person, $164,000.

54:42Not only showing that keeping mitzvot doesn't affect your income in a negative way, but in fact, in many cases, you actually make more money. But the stigma is, if you're religious, you're poor. Now, sure, there are poor religious people, but there's also poor secular people. But the stigma is, no, religious, no good. all types of other stereotypes created by lefty liberal mindset people to distort people. All the Torah is now relevant to this generation. Did you ever read it in order to determine that, or did you just hear somebody say that and you're piggybacking off of his stupidity? Are you an original stupid, or are you piggybacking? There was one time... guy that wanted to start a shiur in his house, so he sent out a message in the community that he's going to teach the ethical teachings of our sages. They do it on such and such date at such and such time and hopefully a lot of people show up, and we could make a series out of it every week.

56:10prepared the house, made sure the kids went to sleep, made sure the wife agreed, got a bunch of snacks for people to munch on because if there's no food, people don't come. You ask them, "Oh, we're having a shiur. What do you have to eat?" "It's not a restaurant." "Oh, no food? Okay, I'll come." Oh, no, today there's shawarma. "Okay, what time is it at? Hey, can I come a little early? I'm hungry. Listen, last week you had shawarma. You think maybe you can make sushi this week?" So the guy prepared some snacks, prepared the books, prepared himself. Nine o'clock comes. Nobody showed up by 9:05. Zero showed up by 9:30. By 10 o'clock, still nobody. He gave up and called it a night. The plan failed. The next week he said, "You know what, let me try something else."

57:34advertised teachings of Sun Tzu, "The Art of Beating Life," "The Art of War," "The Art of Whatever," "The Secret of the Stars," and "How to Manage Your Life by Seeing All Types of Wisdoms from All Worlds." We'll also serve sushi. To his surprise, nine o'clock, packed house. He doesn't care. Starts teaching. Sun Tzu said, do, do, do, do, do. And Mi Tzu said, ba, ba, ba, ba, ba. Sun and Xin and Bin also said, do, do, do, do, do. Everybody said, "Wow, genius."

58:36Genius! Wow, I wish you... I... I... Where were you my whole life? Can you do this again every week? Wow, really, for free? With sushi? Wow, that's amazing! I love this community. Finally, somebody's doing something for the people every week! nine o'clock, packed house, Sun Tzu and Mitzvah teach you XYZ and ABC and the secret of this and the secret of that and how to overcome this and how to overcome that. Shortly later, somewhere around nine or ten months later, he says, "Today is the last section. Today is the last section." after this, we're going to learn the Chumash. What's that? Is that by Sun or by Sin? No, no, no, no, it's by God. Ah, really? Well, I really, really like these Asian mystical teachings. I'm not really sure I can make it. Well, before you decide whether you can make it or not, I want to let you know today's the last page.

1:00:03and I wanted to tell you guys that I'm sorry, but I'm not sorry. You see, I'm sorry I lied to you a little bit, but I'm not sorry that I lied because it was for your interest. You see, when I advertised that I wanted to teach the teachings of our Jewish sages with sushi, no one showed up. But the second I changed, Jewish sages to son and sin and two, all of you wonderful people showed up. Yeah, because it's much more interesting. Well, before you say that, let me finish. You see, because I knew you thought that and you have this stigma that you learned your whole life that "son and sin and two" were much more interesting than Rabbi Akiva and Rabbi Shimon, I did you a favor. Every time it said Rabbi, I said son. And the entire nine months that we've been together learning son and son and two, it was really the very same Pirkei Avot that I wanted to teach you originally. We just changed the names, but the teachings are the same exact teachings of our sages.

1:01:29You just said you liked it. In fact, you said it changed your life. Now I'm telling you, let's go learn about their G-d too. You see, sometimes Abu Tayyik Karim, we have these stigmas. that the Torah is not interesting and not relevant even though we know nothing about it. I have countless young people and older people asking me about different wisdoms. I tell them, listen, you can find this in the Gemara, you can find this in the Chumash, you should buy this book, you should watch this video. Many times people listen, but once in a while you get a tough nut. What's a tough nut? Someone that simply refuses to listen. So you give them, they ask you a question, you give them an answer, and say, all right, thanks, Rabbi. And they come back to you with the same exact question in a different format. But then they throw you a curveball, where they say, Rabbi, listen, do you think I can find wisdom in Christianity? Rabbi, do you think there is wisdom that I can find if I read the Quran?

1:02:45the Muslims, Robert, what do you think about Buddhism? Really, don't you think it has some good stuff in there? Maybe I could check it out. What about the teachings of the Hindus? You know, those ones that use urine to clean their house and purify it. They must do it for a reason, Rabbi. What about the Torah that I've been telling you to learn for the last several months you've been texting me at 3 o'clock in the morning? I haven't gotten to that yet because I'm really into this Quran first. I'm really into this New Testament first. I'm really into this Buddhism. But you haven't checked your own heritage yet. You haven't checked your own instructions from Hashem yet. And yet you are driven to look into something else. Why are you so disinterested? Answer is, to learn Buddhism, Islam, Christianity, or any other form of idolatry has no yetzer hara. In fact, the yetzer hara will encourage you to do it and do it well. In fact, why don't you become a scholar in Islamic teachings of the 14th century? But what about Torah, Mr. Moshe?

1:04:12Mr. Yitzhak, what about the Torah from 3,000 years ago? I didn't get to that yet. Why? The yetzer hara keeps telling me, go somewhere else. And sometimes the yetzer hara comes as your best friend, as your parents, as your teachers, as people that are around you. You made a bad choice of friends. you're in an unfortunate circumstance, you are one of the prisoners in that dark cave, and they all are like-minded like you, living in darkness, thinking that that light they call the Torah, it's not possible, it's just some fairy tale. Let us check something else out. Now, guess what? Without the hand of Hashem Himself, those people will never come out of the cave. They'll stay in darkness. They'll become scholars in every foreign and forbidden teaching known to man. It's no surprise that some of the worst things on planet Earth were actually created by Jews that went against Hashem. One perfect example is communism. Karl Marx was a Jew. A rasha.

1:05:36A real rasha. But he's the one that had the manifesto. Lenin, who followed him, made it much bigger, much more violent. A Jew. These people literally destroyed societies, but not because they followed the Torah. Because they didn't. Instead of following the Torah, they follow the yetzer hara. They follow the stigma, the stereotype that the Torah cannot bring any light to this world. We need to check something else out. Let us check Kabbalah Centre. Let us check Hinduism. Let us check Yoda and yoga and whatever you want. Let us become experts in Star Wars. Let us do everything but Torah. Now, why do I tell you all of this? Because as you can see, these are all people living in darkness. This is the vast majority of Am Yisrael today. And only the hand of Hashem can rescue them.

1:07:01or you, you that saw that little light and through your own suffering overcame the battle to see the light clearly, have a choice to make. Do you just completely abandon all of them, take care of your own tuchus ...enjoy the light for yourself. Hopefully, somebody else saves them. See you in the corner, see you in the end, see you around them, maybe not. Or you go back into the cave, drop off a CD, and say, "Watch this." When you do that, you now become the hand of Hashem. Hence, the reason why the reward is so big... Without further ado, hopefully, this gave us some encouragement. Ask me some questions. Hashem will give us the answers. Chabad Joshua. How does a person's name play a role in their mission in life? Um...

1:08:24names are a unique identity to a person as long as it's a name that, uh... is connected to something holy. Now, if you're one of the unfortunate people that has stupid parents that call you, like, Or, Nike, or Luther or Nimrod, or one of these names that either have no real meaning or significance, or perhaps are even the opposite of good. Nimrod being the first person that went against Hashem in idolatry. You might as well just call your kid Hitler, which, believe it or not, some people still do. Hopefully not Jews, but you never know.

1:09:24The point is, as long as your parents were somewhat normal and called you a normal name, then your name is significant, and you should be called by that full name. Now, what I mean by full name is that if you have two names, you have, let's say, Yisrael Meir, like the Chofetz Chaim, his first name was Yisrael, second name was Meir. You're supposed to be called by that full name every time. Meaning, don't be like the Americans who give their kids a middle name, but no one really knows it. Unless the kid hates the first name and just decides that the second name is their name. Both names are your names, and you should call yourself by both names. You introduce yourself, "I am Avraham Ben-Tzvi." "I am Yisrael Meir." "I am this." If you only have one name, then you have one name. that's fine too. Second thing is, when it comes to names, don't shorten your name. Like, if your name is, let's say, Eliyahu, don't change your name to Ellie. Don't change your name to Ellie. Why shorten your name? You could shorten your life. So it's a very bad idea to shorten your name.

1:10:45Now, in regards to a task or role in the world based on your name, that may or may not have some deep roots within the Kabbalah world, but again, I think it has to do with teachings that are beyond the scope of what we're learning, number one, what I can teach, number two, and number three, what's relevant to most people in the world. Your main role, first and foremost, is the general role for all people, which is to serve Hashem. Do everything possible to fulfill the entire Torah. That's your role in the world. The second role in the world is to overcome your obstacles, specifically the ones that are most difficult for you as far as character traits. That's the second role, regardless of what your name is. If you're an angry person, you have to work on that character trait. In order to become someone who does not get angry, but rather understands that life does not revolve around you, but rather around Hashem, you have to work on your anger. If you're a stingy person, you have to work on your stinginess. Hashem does not like people who are stingy. You have to become more generous. How? The Rambam suggests starting by giving a little bit to a lot of people. Instead of giving a hundred dollars

1:12:11to one person, give one dollar to 100 people. After a short period of time, you're going to start liking giving because it gives you a spiritual benefit. You'll start giving more money to fewer people, but nonetheless more money or whatever it is that you're giving. So, you have to work on your generosity, and so on and so forth with all of the character traits. So, the general thing is to follow the entire Torah. Secondly, overcome your obstacles, mainly being your flawed character traits. And thirdly, look at how gifted you are, whatever gifts Hashem gave you, and see how you can utilize those gifts to sanctify Hashem. A very well-known artist came to one of the gedolim—I forget who it was—and he said to him, "Rabbi, I'm a very well-known artist, but all the things that I drew are unacceptable according to the Torah, and now I'm doing teshuva. And I know that my job is forbidden. So what do I do? How do I make money?"

1:13:38Rav looked at him and said, "You're clearly gifted. Hashem gave you the gift of being an artist. So use that gift and create art for kedusha. Learn the Gemara, learn the Mishnayot, and draw things that explain them. And you'll be able to make a parnassah." guy did it. He did it with the Mishnayot first. His name was Yoni, and not only did those Mishnayot become the most famous Mishnayot to teach young and older people, but he became one of the most well-respected, successful Jewish artists in the world still today. Same thing with Gadi Palak. Gadi Palak also was a very well-known and established artist in the secular world. But once he did teshuva, got the same idea, whether it be by his Rav, or siyata dishmaya, or a combination thereof, decided to utilize this special gift that he has of art in order to sanctify Hashem's name. And today,

1:15:01He is perhaps the most sought-after artist in the Jewish world. To get him to do the art for your book, you need to first know how to find him, which is practically impossible. He's like in hiding. But every so often, you see another masterpiece come out because his art is not like secular art where you just draw something to get people to understand what it is. His art is that he is drawing what the Midrash says. He makes you see what the Torah says, which means that it's not about just being an artist, but rather you have to be a talmid chacham first. You have to know what the Midrash says, what the Gemara says, what all the commentaries are saying in order to see how this art is perfect. And aside from that, beautiful. So, see what gift God gave you. And find out how you can utilize it to make a living by sanctifying Hashem's name. And this, rabotai, is another example of how Hashem says that I gave you the Torah to live by it and not to die by it. Meaning that Hashem gave you different talents, different skills, and you can utilize them in order to do good things.

1:16:24You don't have to necessarily change your career all the time unless your career by default is not kosher. For example, if there is no way to kosherize your career. But for the most part, most things that are ethical and legal, you can find a way to do it in a kosher way. And also, you can find a way to do it in a non-kosher way. I can tell you what my father says. Long before I became religious, he said to me, any business in the world you can do in two ways. could do it the right way or the wrong way. The wrong way, you'll make a lot of money in a short period of time, but you won't survive; eventually, it'll end. The right way is much harder and takes a lot longer, but you'll not only survive; eventually, you'll become successful. And that's the type of ideology that I was raised in. And that's what we followed. We always did things straight. Not because we were religious, but rather we got good teachings of ethics. Now, it made my life more difficult than perhaps what it looked like the others were doing, but in the end, one after another, you always see that in the end, the right way always wins. So you can do whatever business that you're doing in the right way...

1:17:47more importantly, in the Torah way, just utilize your gift—whatever gift Hashem gave you. If He gave you a gift of the ability to speak, the ability to draw, the ability to see certain things in a certain way, creativity, salesmanship—whatever it is that He gave you—patience, which is a very rare talent of its own or ability of its own. Whatever it is, people have different things that you can utilize and do great things with them. How about the next question? No, the rest of the Torah, that’s it. Okay. Okay. Like. Uh-huh. So here, when you see that there are countless places in the Torah where you see, like you said, superfluous words, in essence, words that seem like we don't really need, where it seems like it could be used without them.

1:19:03and the Gemara and the Midrashim always, always, always have not just one but sometimes many reasons why that extra word is there. In fact, there are countless teachings about how some words are spelled, the same exact word, but spelled two different ways. And there are countless teachings there. Sometimes there are even lessons to be learned from where a word is within a sentence. So the Torah is literally endless with the amount of teachings, and one of the ways you can see it is it says, "Honor" your father and your mother. So, the Chachamim say, anytime you see "et," which means "and," that's to teach you an additional lesson.

1:20:17Aside from what the basic meaning is. So the Chachamim say, okay, so what about this verse? "Honor your father and your mother." Chachamim doesn't say honor your parents. Honor your father and mother. Or there's just another way to do it. So there's just a few ways to do it to shorten it. Why the extra word? So, the Gemara says that's to teach you. Honor your father and your mother, but the "et" is, in essence, representing your older brother. You have to respect your parents, but also your older brother. Honor him also. So now the Chachamim come back. And say, okay, anytime there's the word "et," we learn from there that it's a secret, that extra word is a secret, because you can use "vav" instead of "et," just replace it with one letter, "ve," instead of "et." So that's to teach another halacha, another thing there. But then, one of the chachamim that taught this, one of the talmidim that he has, very smart, he says, okay, rabbi, it says,

1:21:32It says, fear Hashem. You must fear Hashem. Who else other than Hashem? So the rabbi didn't know. He says, okay, I don't know. Cancel everything I just taught you. For the last three hours, cancel it, mistake. He says, no, no, the rabbi was not mistaken. Here is what the Torah is teaching you. Hashem says, honor Hashem. But it has that et, that end Hashem, that's also to teach you, honor your rabbi. Why? He's Hashem's messenger. How much do you honor your rabbi? From there we learn, you have to honor your rabbi like you honor Hashem. Fear Hashem, fear your rabbi. How much do you fear the rabbi? Fear the rabbi like you fear Hashem.

1:22:33That's how much honor you have to give to Talmidei Chachamim. That's how much. Now, this is one of the most difficult things for people to do in the beginning. One of the reasons is because we view rabbis and Talmidei Chachamim as people just like us, but maybe they know a little bit more. We don't necessarily view them as messengers of Hashem. So many times, people do not appreciate wisdom, appreciate the toil that it requires to acquire wisdom, appreciate Torah for what it is. It was like, ah, big deal. He said it. So what? He said it. What? He's the king of the world. He's just a rabbi. What do you mean? He's a big rabbi. He's a talmid chacham. He's quoting Gemara. He's quoting Poskim. I could quote it too. But you're not! He is! Talmid Chacham! As supporters, as this, as that! You're not respecting it? Eh, only if it agrees with my reality. And that's why, Rabotai HaYekarim, many people never acquire wisdom themselves. And one of the reasons is because the Gemara in Masechet Berachot says, Hashem gives wisdom to those that have wisdom.

1:24:03He does not give wisdom to fools. Why? Because fools are fools for a reason. They're fools because they don't appreciate wisdom. So even if Hashem gave them wisdom, they wouldn't know what to do with it. They don't appreciate it. But whereas the wise appreciate wisdom, and that's why they acquired it, and therefore Hashem will even give them more. So many times you see somebody not succeeding in learning Torah, not succeeding in becoming a Talmid Chacham, not because he's not reading, because he doesn't appreciate it. He doesn't appreciate who the who the is what's. He doesn't appreciate it. It says you're a fool. "Yeah, but I read a lot of books." So what? So what is given by Hashem? So, we learn from Rabbi Akiva, how much should we honor and fear our Talmidei Chachamim? As much as we honor and fear Hashem. Why? It has that word, et. That superfluous word. And countless, countless other places, there are countless ways and lessons to learn, so much so that Rabbi Akiva himself, when Moshe Rabbeinu saw in prophecy,

1:25:21life of Rabbi Akiva, he saw him teaching in a classroom, from the ketarim, from the crowns on top of the Hebrew letters. Anyone that has ever seen the way that the Hebrew letters are drawn, sometimes it's not just like on the computer, but rather sometimes they have crowns on them. And it's beautiful, but it's not for beauty. It's not those crowns on top of letters. They're not for beauty. It is beautiful, but don't ever think for a second that they're drawn there for beauty. It's a mistake. There are lessons, halachot, major, major secrets to learn from those crowns. And Rabbi Akiva was teaching them. It was such a high level of Torah that Moshe Rabbeinu says, "I don't understand what he's talking about. Why don't you give him the Torah? Why are you giving it to me?" Moshe Rabbeinu became self-conscious. Hashem says, "Wait a second, let him finish the shiur." At the end of the shiur, Rabbi Akiva says, "And all of what I taught you, we learned from our Rabbi Moshe Rabbeinu."

1:26:29Meaning what? All we did is expand on the teaching of Moshe Rabbeinu, that's it. We continued toiling and toiling and toiling in the Torah, and more and more layers of the onion were peeled off. More of the core was uncovered. More beauty was revealed. More light was shown. And that's what we have right now. But not because we're new and we're smarter. No, no, no. We piggybacked off of Moshe Rabbeinu. Without him, we're nothing. Meaning that Rabotai HaKedoshim, even the crowns on top of the letters, Hebrew letters have halachot and extraordinary secrets. In fact, one time someone asked, why does the Torah spend any time writing the names of all of these people that lived 3,000 years ago, 4,000 years ago, especially if some of these people have no descendants left in the world? Like Cain. Cain, there's no descendants in the world from Cain.

1:27:34So what's the point of knowing that Cain gave birth to this one, married this one, and married that one? Who cares? It's not like you could say, "Oh yeah, I'm a descendant of Cain." No, nothing. So what do I need to know about his family for? Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai says, in those names, the sections where all of us think is a waste of time, why do we even have to read names for two pages? The tribe of Reuven gave birth to this, gave birth to that. What do I care about these people and remember them for some test? What, Hashem is testing me like I'm in high school? What do I need to know these names for? Okay, Moshe Rabbeinu I understand, Aharon HaKohen I understand, the key people I understand, but what are all these people for? Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai says. The secrets that he uncovered for the Zohar, for Kabbalah, for all of the mystical stuff, and many, many other things, he found exactly in those places. Those very same places other people thought were a waste of time. And that is why, Rabotai, there is no verse in the Torah that is more important than another. Every verse has the same exact value.

1:28:47whether it's or whatever other verse you can pick. This is the tribe of Reuven. Whatever you want to pick. Every one of those verses has exactly the same value. And that's why the Rambam writes that those who stand up when it gets to Then it talks about the Ten Commandments; there are kehilot where they have the custom of standing up when they're reading the Ten Commandments. He said they're mistaken, it's forbidden. Why? Because you're giving those verses more value than any other verse in the Torah, and that's not allowed. Every verse in the Torah is exactly the same value. Infinite amount of lessons. Infinite amount of lessons from the verse. Infinite amount of lessons from the superfluous words, like the Sefat Emet was mentioning. Infinite amount of lessons from the crowns. Infinite amount of lessons from how the words are spelled sometimes in multiple ways.

1:29:49And sometimes even how the sentence itself begins and ends and what letter connects the last parashah to this parashah. There's literally an infinite amount of lessons to learn from the Torah, where you could learn it day and night, 24 hours a day for a million and a half years, and still not even know 1% of the Torah. 1% of the Torah, even if you had an IQ of a thousand. IQ of a thousand. Even if you studied for a million and a half years, 24 hours a day, you still wouldn't know 1% of the Torah. And that's also in the Gemara. Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus, he said, how much Torah do you know, Rabbi? He says, I know Torah to the extent that if you take all of the land and make it into paper, and all of the trees and make them into pens, and all of the water and turn it into ink, write all the Torah that I know. It wouldn't be enough. It wouldn't be enough. All the world turning into paper, all the ocean into ink—it wouldn't be enough to write the Torah that I know. And he says, the Torah that I know is not even a lick that a dog makes in a lake, in an ocean, in comparison to the Torah of my Rabbi.

1:31:13So, literally, the ones that knew, in comparison to us, an infinite amount of Torah, are themselves saying they know nothing in comparison to how much is available out there. So, there's a lot of lessons. If you look, if you want to study some of the more intricate details of the verses, I highly recommend reading the Midrash Me'am Loez. That's a very, very good start. Or Midrash Rabbah. It's also very good. And there are many, many other Midrashim. Chizkuni is one of many. Each one of these Midrashim will give you layers upon layers upon layers of every single verse in the Torah. And of course, the Gemara, Zohar, and so on and so forth. So it's a lot of lessons, and some Chachamim focus on one thing, some Chachamim focus on other things. But the most important thing for a Jew to do, to start off with, is to become well-versed in what Rashi says. Until you become well-versed in what the basic commentary by Rashi is, don't delve into other things.

1:32:26Because that's the basic, well-accepted among all of Am Yisrael. Ashkenazi, Sephardi, whatever it is, doesn't make a difference. Rashi is the standard. He is the standard. Without Rashi, we don't know anything. So first, you become well-versed in what Rashi says, and then you start delving into others, and so on. Next question. Sonny, I heard from Hashem visits 18,000 worlds a day. I mean, that could be one of the Midrashim that talks about different aspects of the world, different things. I'm not familiar specifically with that teaching; that doesn't really mean much. whether he's referring to spiritual worlds that are in the upper world, because as we know, the physical world is limited, because we have material and physicality. The spiritual world is not limited; there is no limitation to it. For example, for every...

1:33:47person that you help do teshuvah you get in addition to your olam haba your world that you're going to get as a reward for all your good things you get an additional 310 worlds. 310 worlds, which means that all you got to do is just get 500 people to do teshuvah and you got your own 155,000 worlds that Hashem could visit every day. So as far as the spiritual world, there's literally no limitation. Tzadikim go visit each other in their own world. Everybody gets their own world and visits each other every day. Some Tzadikot also visit each other. Avraham visits Sarah, and Batya bat Paro is the only one allowed to visit Moshe Rabbeinu. Ruth the Moabite visits David HaMelech’s grandmother. They go to their worlds.

1:34:48Now, Rabbi HaKadosh, Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi, saw, in the Holy Spirit, that his talmid, who is also his nephew, Rabbi Chiya, who died before him, had a unique privilege in the next world. What was his privilege? Anytime you want to go from one world to the other, you have to have angels take you. Rabbi, where do you want to go? Tzadik, where do you want to go? Where do you want to go? Oh, I want to go visit such and such. Oh, let's check the account. Oh, yeah, you have the right to go over there. Let's take you. Yallah, let's go. Free. No Uber, no nothing. Angels take you wherever you want to go in their world. The more righteous you are, the more privileges you get to see wonderful things. But Rabbi HaKadosh saw Rabbi Chiya, his nephew, who was his talmid, and saw how they were treating him in Olam HaBa. says he can go wherever he wants. No angels; he goes everywhere. No angels run the show. How come Rabbi Chiya did kiruv? Rabbi Chiya was the gadol hador in his generation. He obviously got...

1:36:03...making sacrifices, hunting the deer, taking the leather, writing a Torah on it, then teaching the kids the Torah. One kid, he taught him Bereishit, another kid Shemot, and so on. Then after he finished Bereishit, he taught the other one Shemot, Shemot taught him Bereishit. Then he wrote the six Mishnayot... You learn the first one, the second one, the third one, the fourth one, the fifth one, the sixth one. Each one, he taught them. "Okay, now you teach each other. Then after you teach each other, you teach each other." You teach Chumash, you teach Mishnah. You teach Torah, you teach Oral Torah. And he went to communities where there was no Torah, like Cooper City. No Torah. He went over there. Rabbi HaKadosh says, "Look at my nephew, my student. My student runs the show in Olam HaBa. Why? He brought Am Yisrael to do Teshuvah." No malachim can touch him. Where can he go? Anywhere he wants. Oh, today I'm going to go and visit Moshe Rabbeinu. Kavod. Rabbi Akiva. Kavod. David HaMelech. Let's go. Can we keep you company? Can we come with you? No, no, no. I'm going to go by myself. Oh, okay. We'll wait for you here.

1:37:16That's Rabbi Chiya. Rabbi HaKadosh was Gadol HaDor. The Gemara says, if the Mashiach would have come at the time of Rabbi HaKadosh, he would be Mashiach. And Rabbi started crying. Why? Because until that point, Rabbi didn't do Kiruv, unlike his nephew. He started crying. He says, "I got to do Kiruv. I got to help people do teshuva." He started running in the streets looking for people that are off the derech. In those days, you had to look for them. So, I'm looking for them. He says, "I want to have the same Olam Haba as my student." Surely he does, because the only reason why we have the Oral Torah is because of him. But the point being, Rabotai, is that the more knowledgeable a person is in Torah, the more he understands how much of a gift it is, and how much of a gift Hashem is looking to give us for helping more people know it. So, as far as the many worlds, I don't believe he's referring to physical worlds. I believe it's spiritual worlds of probably different tzaddikim and so on. That's what I think he's referring to. But again, I don't know that specific Midrash to quote you for sure that that's the world, but I'm certain that that's what he's talking about because there are no 18 worlds like this world. There's no like 18 planet Earths or the like. That doesn't exist. Next question. Yes. Yes.

1:38:39He gets hit, and he forgets everything. Hmm? No. Converts? You guys are Kabbalists, you people. The Arizal says, the Arizal says in Sha'ar HaGilgulim, that different people, for different sins, reincarnate into different things. Sometimes a person, rachmana litzlan, could reincarnate into a cow, a dog, a cat, different types of animals, plants, trees, a rock, a wall, and...

1:40:04have to pay some type of bill for sinning in some way. Sometimes they'll come back as just another person, which all of us are reincarnations several times over from the time of Mount Sinai. But sometimes a person gets punished for desecrating the Torah, and let's say, for example, being intermarried you know, a Jew marrying a non-Jew or a Jew converting to Christianity. And the Arizal says that the punishment for such a person could be that they would have to reincarnate as a non-Jew with a tikkun, meaning a goal and a purpose of converting back to Judaism in order to rectify the sins of their previous life. So, the question is, that particular neshamah that was in the person that learns the Gemara Masechet Niddah, says that when a person is in his mommy's belly, there's a malach that teaches him the entire Torah. Now, what about this person? This person that...

1:41:29reincarnated from, you know, was a Jew and reincarnated as a goy. Does the malach still teach him the same Torah? Although I don't know for sure because I don't remember being a non-Jew, nor do I remember being in my mommy's belly, I can tell you that since it's already a Jewish neshamah, we already know that this neshamah already knows the Torah. It was already taught the Torah at some point or another beforehand. At some point beforehand, in their previous life or so on. So it doesn't necessarily need to be a special case for that person; that person would learn it, another person wouldn't learn it, meaning that it is a given that that person would come to this world with some type of knowledge in order for them to achieve their purpose. Because in essence, what is the purpose of this malach teaching you the Torah in your mommy's belly if you're going to forget it anyway? What's the purpose of teaching it? The purpose is that many times, when you toil and toil over Torah, suddenly new ideas come to you, but they're not really new. Meaning it's almost like you remember, even though you never learned it. Because you already know it.

1:42:45So what you're doing is, when you're studying Torah, you're not in essence learning new information, but rather you're toiling over Torah in order to justify Hashem uncovering the things that you already know. So that person that reincarnated as a non-Jew with a tikkun to become a Jew, surely Hashem would make sure that he knows whatever he needs to know. once he does convert to a Jew, so whether that is something that is taught to him during the nine months that he's in his mother's womb during that very time where he's, you know, he's reincarnating as a non-Jew, or perhaps it was already in him from a previous gilgul, that part I don't know. uh, but either way, it's needless to say that surely he would have all of the required tools in order to fulfill their obligation. And that's why there are certain converts, for example, who were very, very unique converts. They weren't just traditional converts who simply converted to Judaism, became standard, very nice, good Jews, and that's it. No, there were some really exceptional converts.

1:43:58Among Am Yisrael, like Shemaya and Avtalyon, Ruth, Rabbi Akiva, the family of Rabbi Meir Baal HaNes, Avraham ben Avraham, and many other converts, Onkelos HaGer—these people were exceptional converts. They didn't just convert; they literally changed the Torah world. They were the biggest giants in the history of Am Yisrael. Yitro. So surely these people had some type of history that is behind the scenes. For example, Yitro. The Zohar says that there are special neshamos that have the ability to change the world, meaning they have a supercharged neshama. It's not a regular neshama. It's one of those neshamot that anyone who knows a little bit of Kabbalah understands the drawing of how Kabbalah is. You have, let's say, for Adam, the higher the level, the closer to the brain, the higher the Kedusha. So there are certain neshamot that come from the head of Adam HaRishon. Because Adam HaRishon had all the neshamot. Most of us are probably coming from the feet. But that's true. It's not an offense, including myself. Most of us are coming from the feet.

1:45:19But there are some neshamot that are unique, that are coming from the higher body parts, some even as much as the head. But those neshamot are supercharged. Moshe Rabbeinu, for example, is one of them. That's how much super. Now, because Hashem wants to make it a fair world, the Zohar says that these neshamot have the ability to do exceptional things, but on both ends. And that's why they're initially held hostage by the Satan himself. And in order to uncover this neshama and get it to the highest level of Kedusha, there's a major test that's beyond human power, beyond the norm. One of the examples the Zohar uses is Yitro. Yitro was one of those exceptional neshamot, where he was a prisoner of the Satan himself.

1:46:20But because he overcame a test that none of us would ever even imagine ourselves doing, he became Yitro. Yitro that we know, and not the other names that he had as a non-Jew, as an idol worshiper, and so on. He became literally the name that symbolizes Matan Torah. And so he's one of them. Ruth is one of them. David HaMelech is one of them. was one of them. These people had the ability either to become Hitler or David HaMelech. That's how much. Why? Because it's a unique neshama. So there are certain people that are that type of neshama. Very, very rare. Generally speaking, the overwhelming majority of the world is all old neshamot that keep coming back, coming back, coming back. But every generation has some brand new neshamot. And those brand new neshamot are, in essence, the pure, the perfect, the giants that do not think like us or even see like us. It's like people that we have seen throughout the generations who don't belong in their generation, in so many words. They simply don't belong in that generation. This has been evident several times, for example, one time the...

1:47:49Baba Sali, Rabbi Yisrael Abuhatzeira, asked his talmid to go and invite Rabbi Ovadia Yosef to come visit him, even when Rabbi Ovadia was still relatively young. Ovadia came to visit Gadol HaDor, the Baba Sali. The Baba Sali was not only a big mekubal, he was a big dayan, an enormous talmid chacham, and he went to visit him. The Baba Sali sat down with him for a minute and said, "Let's have a special seudah, a special feast, and you and I can bring the Mashiach right now." He said, "Kvodo knows I have a shiur Torah right now, meaning..." Yes, we can bring the Mashiach right now. With the amount of Kedushah that we can learn together and toil together, we can bring the Mashiach right now. But I have something more important. I have a shiur scheduled in 20 minutes. I have to go. I have to go to the shiur Torah. It's much more important than bringing the Mashiach. Baba Sali didn't reject him. He says, you're right. Thank you for coming and visiting me.

1:48:54after he left, after you left, the Baba Sali says to his goodbye, "He's not from this world, he's not from this generation. This is a neshama from another realm." And they said the same thing about Rabbi from Satmar, another tzaddik. Other very exceptional people—some we know about, some we don't. So there are, you know, the teachings of neshama have no end. I forgot the name in Hebrew, but it means "complete neshama." There's only three: Adam, Adam, Adam, Adam, Adam, Adam, Adam, Adam, Adam, Adam, Adam, Adam, Adam, Adam, Adam, Adam. i never heard that before. i mean, I know the Mashiach is gonna have part of his neshama and is gonna have a spark of David and part of his neshama is gonna have the spark of Moshe Rabbeinu. But as far as having all of the neshama, never heard that. Show me the source. I'd love to learn it.

1:50:08No, Adam I know. Adam HaRishon is the original neshama. The David HaMelech and the Mashiach part I never heard. No, Adam HaRishon is the pshat. That I know. But as far as the David HaMelech and Mashiach, that's new. Interesting. Next question. Next question. See, I come from there. How? Yeah. No, it says Bereishit. Bereishit, if you look at the commentaries, Ramban writes, Bereishit means BeChochma. Bereishit means BeChochma, meaning that Hashem created the world with wisdom. That the world that we live in is the perfect world. The world cannot become more perfect. It's the perfect world as far as the way it was created. We are ruining it nonetheless, but the point is the way it was created was in its perfect form. What is that like? Rav Shach spoke to his heart surgeon one time, and he said to him, "Do you have a car?" He said, "Yes." He says, "What kind of car do you have?" And he told him the model. He says, "How old is this car?" He says, "Brand new." He says, "Oh, what was your old car?" He goes, "Oh, I had a different one last year." And he said, "How long did you have that one?" He goes, "For one year."

1:51:34And he says, what about before that? I had another car for one year. He says, so what, you get a new car every year? He says, yeah. He says, why do you get a new car every year? He says, because every year, the new cars have new things in them. New features, new tools, new things that are better than the last year. So I keep getting the newest thing. He says, oh, interesting. He says, now you're a heart surgeon, yeah? And you've seen a lot of hearts, many, many hearts. He says, would you, being an expert in hearts and doing so much heart surgery, maybe have a suggestion of something that could be better in the heart? Something that could, you know, maybe make it better? He says, Rabbi, the heart as it's created is perfect. You cannot make it better. Whatever we do is after something breaks. Something's ruined. But as it's created, complete, you cannot make it better, more functional, more nothing. It's perfect. So Rav Shach says, you see, son, you see, the creation of man keeps getting updates, updates, updates, updates. Why? It's never perfect. It keeps developing more and more and more. But the creation of Hashem, it's perfect after one time. So the Ramban writes,

1:53:01Bereshit means with wisdom. Bereshit means with wisdom. With wisdom, meaning the world as it was created, was with wisdom. With completion, it was perfect. Then other commentary says, the Gemara says, Bereshit is also referring to Am Yisrael, which is also called Reishit. Reishit Ha'umot. Bereshit means, Bereshit Bara Elohim Tashar Ha'umot, in the beginning, it's not, it literally means beginning, it says Bereshit, in the head. What does it mean in the head? And the head is really the name for Am Yisrael, who is the head of all of the other nations, the chosen among the nations, meaning the whole world was created for Reishit, the whole world was created for Am Yisrael. So much so that the Midrash says, And the Rambam elaborates on it, and he says, just so you know how much Hashem loves Am Yisrael, loves the tzaddikim, He will give an Arab sheikh an extraordinary amount of money. And not only give him a lot of money, but one day give him some crazy idea to build some tower in the middle of a desert for no real rational reason.

1:54:25Any Arab will do it and build a tower that reaches the heavens. Succeed, fail, irrelevant. Why would Hashem give him this money to build a tower? Because 400 years later, Hashem knows that a tzaddik will go through the desert and will get hot at that time and now he can use this enormous tower just to get shade for five minutes. and then move on his way. Meaning, Hashem loves Bereishit, Hashem loves Am Yisrael so much that He literally will give all of mankind, all types of things, whether it be a lot of money, clever ideas, all types of things in order to create things for the benefit of Bereishit, for the benefit of Am Yisrael. Even if this idea doesn't make any sense to anybody else. Hashem knows. It's for them. It's for Am Yisrael. That may come at some time. Just, I'll give you a billion and a half dollars to build a tower that no one's ever going to use, except 400 years later, some Jews are going to use it for five minutes. After they use it for five minutes, the tower loses its purpose and collapses. But it's worth it to have that tower standing in the world for 400 years for the Jews to enjoy it for five minutes.

1:55:47That's what Bereshit means. Bereshit means for Am Yisrael. And there's countless other commentaries on the word Bereshit. You could probably find thousands, thousands of lessons from that word. So much so that Rav Ephraim, God bless him, says that when he was a teenager, alevai aleinu, to have such children as teenagers, do what he did. When he was a teenager, he learned that the Gaon MiVilna came up with chiddushim about the word Bereshit, whereby he discovered over 600 mitzvot. 600 halachot from the word Bereshit. Secrets that you can learn from the word Bereshit of 600 different halachot. Rav Efraim says, he toiled in it. Toiled and toiled in it, and I am sure that the Gaon MiVilna reached even higher numbers, but he says that when the Gaon MiVilna was a little kid, that's what he did. When Rav Efraim, God bless him, was a teenager, he tried it also, because they didn't report what he found out. He says he got to a thousand. A thousand halachot. Now most of us don't even know a thousand halachot, period. Even if we read them in the book. He got to a thousand halachot from what? From the word Bereshit.

1:57:11And so the point is, there are literally an infinite amount of lessons to learn from the Torah. Whether it's Bereishit or it's Moshe. Whatever word it is, there are a lot of lessons. Next question, we're almost done. You guys are quiet today. Are you on strike? Or are you waiting for the camera to go off? No? Ah, here we go. Hey, you woke up. didn't wake up; he was awake, just didn't talk. So, knowing that a lot of people will read books but don't remember what they read, would the soul, being unlimited, remember whatever they read and be able to do it? Or is it just something like before? Very good, very good. So the Chachamim tell us that Hashem specifically discusses this. It says that when a person goes up to Shamayim and he's going to have to say the Torah, some say, like you said, 40 days straight of Torah. And no jokes. But the Gemara says 180 days.

1:58:38180 days of Torah, no jokes. No sleep, no lunch either. No smoke breaks. 180 days of Torah. So Elhanan is asking, is it only the Torah that he remembers, or is he going to remember everything? Because you know Torah, but you forget, because your body is limited. So yes, you're right that your Torah, whatever you learn during your life, your neshama remembers. Your neshama doesn't forget. Your body forgets, but your neshama doesn't forget. So if you learn a lot of Torah during your life, b'ezrat Hashem, you'll have a lot of things to teach. During that time, b'ezrat Hashem, after 120, you'll have a lot more than 180 days. A lot more than 180 days. I'm just wondering, are you allowed to say Sipurei Tzadikim? Because those could go on for a while. Yeah, actually some say that, like it says, there are two types of unique teachings that you can only teach specific people and only one-on-one. And one of them is ma'aseh merkavah, which is the happenings of the upper worlds.

1:59:56So he says that the stories of the sages are like the happenings of the upper world, meaning that when you see the lives of the tzaddikim, you see how Hashem runs this world because He runs this world for these tzaddikim. He makes for them all types of wonderful miracles. One example... ...is to see, for example, people know Rabbi Ovadia Yosef based on the Torah that he wrote and he taught, but many people don't know of all the difficulties that he had to endure to get there. So, when he was 26 or 27 years old, his rabbi told him that he has to go to Egypt. He has to go to Egypt and work for the head rabbi of Egypt in a problematic kehillah. So, Rabbi Ovadia picked up his wife and kids and left for Egypt for the sake of teaching Torah. He got to Egypt and found out who the most problematic person in the kehillah is: the head rabbi of Egypt. How much of a problem is the head rabbi of Egypt? He doesn't even put on tefillin.

2:01:09The head rabbi of Egypt does not put on tefillin. So how do you know this? One of the people wanted to prove to the others that he doesn't put on tefillin. Why? He doesn't pray with everybody. So what he would do is every day he would take, he would give him the tefillin bag, the rabbi would go into his room, into his office, and then after a little while come out and say he prayed. So one day the guy says he doesn't pray. I'll prove it to you. What did he do? He took out his tefillin, put two onions in there. onions in the tefillin bag. The rabbi went in, and after the same amount of time, an hour later, came out and said "Good morning." For three days, the same onions were in the bag. After three days, you would at least smell the bag already. It became apparent that he didn't even put on tefillin. That shows how problematic it was. Also... But you found this out, obviously, this was a very big problem, but he was very powerful. And he found out that the head shochet, the head butcher in the Jewish community, is a problem and a half. What does he do? He has Arabs do the shechita, which makes it not kosher, treif. A non-Jew slaughtered the animals; it's not kosher. I

2:02:26Even if he does the same exact thing as the rabbi, it doesn't make a difference. Just like if a Mechalel Shabbat, Mechalel Shabbat slaughters the animal, even if he follows all the halachot, it's not kosher, it's treif. Not allowed to eat it. So this guy, because it was cheaper to hire the Arab workers, ah, no, no, do the shechita, you know, you guys know also how to do shechita, go ahead, do it, yeah, let's go. So he was selling the Jewish community treif. Rabbi Ovadia saw this, he says, took away his kashrut, that's it, no kashrut. The guy threatened didn't listen to him. Young kid, 27 years old. So this guy, this butcher, was a powerful person. He hired two Arabs to kill, but in an unusual way. How? "Wait from here, every day he goes here, he gets to this place, you wait on the roof, you pour a whole bucket or barrel of acid on him." that's what happened. Two Arabs went to the roof and waited. Somebody passed by, and they poured acid, causing a burning tragedy. He ended up in the hospital with his whole body burnt. What they found out was that it wasn't that day.

2:03:46protector of the emet. Somebody else went, somebody else went, but this butcher didn't give up. One day he comes up on nobody with a gun to his head. "You're still not going to get kosher! You sold treif! You're still not going to get kosher!" You could see, though, the guy was so baffled at how he is not scared of dying that he ran away. Years later, 20 years later, the rabbi had already come back to Israel and was the head rabbi of Petach Tikva. One day, he's sitting there in his office with his father-in-law. All of a sudden, somebody goes into the house, and he thought it's just maybe one of the people in the kehillah that, you know, wants to get some answer or something. Who is it? Walks into the office, gun points at the rabbi. Who is it? The butcher from Egypt. He said, "I still can't get any kashrut jobs. I still can't be a butcher even in Eretz Yisrael." So his father-in-law, Rav Ovadia, who was a tzaddik, said, "No, no, listen, he's got kids. I'm older already. If you need to kill somebody, just kill me instead. He's got kids." So the butcher, the rasha, said, "I got kids too. How come he doesn't help me?"

2:05:06So Rav Ovadia says, "I'll help you in any other job, but you're never going to be a butcher again. Once you sold Am Yisrael treif, you're never going to be a butcher again. It's against the Torah. But I'll help you in any other job. But if that's not acceptable to you, it's better that you shoot me right over here, because that way you get it done really quickly. Right here. Why? Hashem runs the world. And the tzaddik knew it." Wasn't scared of bullets, wasn't scared of threats, wasn't scared of nothing. That we understand that the only thing you're supposed to be scared of is Hashem and sins. That's the only thing, be scared of sins. Why? Because sins are the only thing that Hashem finds disgusting. And that's one of the things that we learn from our Chachamim, that you see them talk about a lot of different subjects, But the Mishpat Tzedek in Mussarot 322 says that when Hashem looks at all of His creation, looks at all the animals, the cows, the dogs, the lions, sometimes they're alive, sometimes they're dead, all in the hand of Hashem. Some animals smell good to us, some animals are stinky.

2:06:33But to Hashem, nothing is disgusting. The creepiest, ugliest animal, smelliest animal. To Hashem, perfectly fine. Perfectly fine. In fact, the Midrash says that the Leviathan, the Leviathan, that is Hashem's pet, who Hashem is going to allow us to eat when Mashiach comes. He is enormous. He's so big that his breakfast is other whales. Now, this Leviathan is enormous, but by the same token, he has the smell of something stinky. Doesn't smell so good. When he breathes out, It says the awful smell could literally kill people. So how come it doesn't affect the world? It says because every time it's time for him to breathe out, there's a little bit of heavenly smell. Hashem takes a smell, a wind, a special wind that brings a good smell from heaven to counteract the smell of the Leviathan. That's how awful he smells.

2:07:56To us though, not to Hashem. To Hashem, everyone is perfect. There is no bad smell. The dead animal that you saw on the way here, on the way there, on the road, some little dinosaur over here that somebody ran over, or one of these raccoons that somebody ran over and the skin is over here, teeth over there—everything to you is disgusting. To Hashem, it's not disgusting. Hashem is not disgusting. The smell is disgusting to you and me. Hashem is not disgusting at all. There is only one thing that Hashem finds disgusting. What is it? Sins. That's what Hashem finds disgusting. That's worse than any bad smell. That's worse than anything that we can think of, any horrible-looking thing. The only thing that Hashem finds disgusting is sins. So we see here that the beautiful world that Hashem created has a perfect creation, but that creation can either remain perfect or become disgusting in the eyes of its Creator. B'ezrat Hashem, it will become beautiful in the eyes of its Creator. Last question, and we'll call it a week. No? Who wants to go last?

2:09:19Rishon Rishon Chashuv, starting with the three-peat. The hat trick, it's called? Hat trick. What's the meaning of 974 generations? Ah, 974 generations. The Gemara, Masechet Chagiga, says, before Hashem created the world, He already wrote the Torah with black fire on white fire, 974 generations before He created the world. Meaning, the Gemara says that Hashem knew that the world could not exist without the Torah for too long. Too much wickedness would happen. Too much wickedness would happen. So what He did, rather than have the world wait a thousand generations, Before He gave the Torah, He gave the Torah only 26 generations after He created the world. But yet, there was a rule within the Torah that there had to be a thousand generations before Matan Torah. So what did He do? He took all of those neshamot that would be in those times, that the world would exist without a Torah, saw all of them as evil, horrible neshamot, Erev Rav.

2:10:43he said, "I'm going to take them and split them up throughout all six thousand years of the world's existence. Because if all of these neshamot, or even a big part of them, exist at one time, I would have to destroy the world. So I'll take 974 generations of neshamot without a Torah, full of wickedness, and put a little bit in every generation, like seasoning—just nasty." Nasty Erev Rav over here. Nasty Erev Rav over here. Nasty Erev Rav in Boca Raton. Nasty Erev Rav in the UK. Nasty Erev Rav in Minnesota. Nasty Erev Rav in Tel Aviv. Erev Rav here. Erev Rav there. Yishtabach Shemo. A little bit. Why? Two, there's a rule in the Torah that Hashem made for Himself. You can't avoid it. There's a rule in the Torah. He gave rules to Himself. But at the same token, He wants for the betterment of creation. So the Gemara says, He took the Torah and He complied with it this way. So all of the Erev Rav that you see today, or that you saw yesterday, or unfortunately will see tomorrow, these were already part of the original plan, 974th generation part.

2:11:52That's what the Gemara Masoret HaShas says. Next week we have shiurim on Tuesday and Wednesday. No shiur on Sunday. I will miss you, but you can learn from other shiurim that we will have and we'll launch online on Sunday night. We'll also make some clips to give you some more chizuk, some more inspirational videos. some more interesting Torah. Also, remember for anyone who doesn't know, the USBs with the Pirkei Avot series have 179 lectures—something like over 430 hours of Torah—or the USB with the Tikkun HaBrit. Both of them have hours of Torah and also movies on them as well. It's available on our website, Be'ezrat Hashem dot org. You can just order it, or you can simply tell me, and I'll bring it to the next shiur. I may have some in my bag. But this is a fantastic, fantastic way to learn Torah on the road, on the way to work, in a structured way.

2:13:00you're not just picking whatever is out there, what's new, but rather it's a series—one, two, three, four, five—you go through the whole thing. By the time you finish, you're a little rabbi, B'ezrat Hashem. More and more people do it. And make sure to remember the first part of the shiur where we talked about kiruv. Don't just learn it and think that's enough. Share it and do it. Share it and do it. That's the whole purpose. The purpose of Torah is not just to learn it, say thank you very much, and move on with our life. The purpose is, apply it. Apply it to your life in whatever way you can, and B'ezrat Hashem encourage others to do the same. Baruch Adonai le'olam. Amen ve'amen.