REBUKE WITH LOVE - MUSSAR Iggeret HaRAMBAN (2)

0:12We're back here in Aventura. We are continuing our new series on the legendary Igeret HaRamban, also known as the Letter for the Ages, one of the most well-known, most important letters that was ever written in the history of the world, not just for Am Yisrael, because anyone that actually delves into the letter can simply learn every good midah, every good character trait, from this letter. And the Ramban, Nachmanides, wrote this letter to his son, choosing the words carefully. As you can see, the letter starts with a pasuk from the Torah, from Mishlei (Proverbs). You can simply learn every good midah, every good character trait, from this letter. And the Ramban, Nachmanides, wrote this letter to his son, choosing the words carefully. As you can see, the letter starts with a pasuk from the Torah, from Mishlei (Proverbs). There's an enormous amount of commentary that's been written about this letter. So last week, we did an introduction to the series, just talking about the Ramban. We always have to, when we talk about the Torah, we talk about the sages. I think even more so in our generation,

1:34It's very important for people to know who said what, who said what's being said. And the reason why is because in today's world, people don't have much appreciation for Torah, for mitzvot, needless to say, for the sages. They think that when you say Ramban, it's the same thing like you're saying Einstein, l'havdil. you're saying some Aristotle or you're saying, you know, any other type of legendary secular wise person. The reality is that the truth couldn't be more significant, more different than that. So in today's shiur, we're also going to do it in English, not for Renee, but for Rosa. Rosa, and may Hashem have mercy on her, and also for a refuah for David ben Israel, Doris Levana bat Sarah, Rabbi Ephraim ben Shulamit, Rabbanit Sarah bat Anat Elisha.

2:48And all of Am Yisrael, b'ezrat Hashem, will have refuah shlema, refuat hanefesh, refuat haguf, and also for an iluy neshamah and a refuah shlema to all those who have been injured or, Hashem yerachem, killed, murdered in cold blood by the evil terrorists. Hashem yerachem, what's been happening in Eretz Yisrael over these last few days. In just 48 hours, they shot 700 rockets. 700 rockets. Now, these are not BB guns. Some of these rockets are six, seven feet. Six, seven feet long rockets. We're talking about things that are bigger than most people. At least not in America, but in Israel. America's a big country; there are big people here. But the Ribbono Shel Olam

3:48is giving us a lot of signs. He's giving us a lot of signs. And I guess some people are seeing them clearly. Some people choose to remain blind. Some people see it, some people don't. Please, whoever comes in, just give them one of the books so they have... Whoever wants to take charge, yeah, that's good. And some people are seeing the writing on the wall, you call it. Some people don't. It's very clear that the Gemara in Masechet Sotah is coming true. Every one of the signs that it says at the end of days. happening before our eyes. Many of them have already happened, some are happening as we speak. Some I've talked to you about, some I have not, and some I won't. But it's clear that there's something going on, there's something in the air, and the

5:16who is trying to wake up anybody that's interested in being woken up. So, a little bit of an update before we start the series, just to give you a little bit of—almost like throwing water in somebody's face, just to explain to you the level of stupidity we're dealing with in this generation. We start off with our dear frenemy from England, Mirvis, who just wished a mazal tov to the Queen and Prince of England for their newborn son, which is not a bad thing, it's okay, you can do that. But what, of course, he can't finish with just saying mazal tov. I mean, how can you be a kofer just by saying mazal tov? So, he wrote that he wants everybody to add the son, the new child, and the parents into the prayer this weekend. All of Israel has to pray for some goy, some goy kid, for this weekend and Shabbat. Pray for him, pray that he brings his parents a lot of nachat.

6:44How come he didn't say to pray for the parents that lost their kids over the last few days in Eretz Yisrael? How come he didn't say to pray for the kids that lost their father in Eretz Yisrael from the terrorist attacks? How come he didn't say to pray for the countless people that were injured by the terrorists? How come he didn't say to pray for them? Why do we have to pray for some kid? Doesn't even belong to our nation. Why do you want to pray for him? Okay? Let's pray for him. How come we can't pray for it? He said also, how come we can't pray for all the Jews that are off the derech? How come we can't pray for all of Am Yisrael that does not even know the real truth? How come? If you're going to be a leader, lead right; if not, be quiet. But it's not even his fault. It's the people's fault that put him in power. I Unfortunately, it's our fault for all the sins we've made in our lives. That's the type of leaders you get when you make sins. A generation that makes sins gets wicked leaders. If that's not enough, everybody's favorite Prime Minister, Bibi, Bibi that everybody likes a lot. I honestly don't know if he's gonna finish the year. I

8:05I'm not a prophet, and I'm not a son of a prophet, but I honestly don't know if Ribono Shel Olam is going to let him finish the year. I don't know. Why? He just did something that if Hashem has mercy on him, he'll actually undo the stupidity that he did. Which is what? Bibi decided that Am Yisrael needs to be like the goyim. So we need to bring Eurovision to Eretz Yisrael. This is like a concert where all the goyim from all of the nations compete to see who's the best singer. It's full of pritzut, it's full of goyim; it's disgusting for any Jew that knows anything about modesty to want to watch such a thing. They bring a dance. He says not only are they bringing dance, he said, what does he say? You're allowed to violate Shabbat. 30,000 people, 30,000 Jews are being given permission from the government, from the Israeli government, to violate and desecrate Shabbat. Why? For this concert? The employees, the companies, the businesses, all the staff, because in Israel there's a rule: you're not allowed to violate, you're not allowed to work on Shabbat. People still do, and they get fines. They get fines from the government if the local mayor or whatever enforces it. They get a fine for opening their business on Shabbat, and...

9:30Because there's a rule in the country. Unfortunately, many violate it. But not everybody gets fined for it because many times the mayor himself is also secular and violating Shabbat. So he doesn't care. He doesn't enforce it. But never in the history of the 70 plus years that Eretz Yisrael has been around, the modern Israel has been around, has the Prime Minister said, "No, by the way, that law that we have, we're gonna cancel it for some goyish concert. So 30,000 employees, 30,000 Jews could violate Shabbat, could desecrate Shabbat. For what? So we could be like the goyim. How many Shabbatot? Two Shabbatot." What does the Torah tell us? What does the Torah tell us? HaKadosh Baruch Hu told us, if you keep two Shabbatot, you keep two Shabbatot as a nation, I will bring Moshiach on the spot. I will bring Moshiach on the spot. The foolish leader that they have over there running the government says, by the way, instead of keeping two Shabbatot, violate two Shabbatot. Violate two Shabbatot. This is the opposite of what we're supposed to do.

10:38Everybody's always impressed with Bibi because they say he has a high IQ. According to my knowledge, he's a complete moron. But they're impressed because he has books. Every time he talks, he has books behind him. The critical part of books is to read them and then do what they say, but if you just have them, it's no different than just having a painting. No, they're impressed because he has a Tanakh. But having a Tanakh is only meaningful if you actually do what the Tanakh says. Oh, they're impressed because he has a good relationship with America. Yeah, he's their puppet. He does whatever they say. So, this, rabotai, being anti-Zionist or anti-government is not anti-Semitic. it's just understanding. We have Torah. Torah is above everything. If Bibi and his friends comply with the Torah, more power to them. But if they violate Torah, it's no good. If they cause other people to violate Torah, then they become our enemy. Why?

11:53We are obligated to hate Hashem's haters. And anyone that causes other people to sin is considered Hashem's hater. You tell 30,000 Jews, "You have full permission from the government to violate Shabbat," you become officially an enemy of the state. State of what? State of Am Yisrael. So, this rabotai is critical to know because everybody always says, "No, you're not supposed to say that. No, it's not nice." There's nothing about being nice. Do you love Hashem or do you love somebody else? Who do you love more? There's a certain level of honesty, intellectual honesty that we have to have with ourselves. A father, even though he loves his son, has to rebuke him once in a while. Why? Because if he doesn’t, the son is going to grow up to become a Hitler. You understand? So, we as a Jewish people, have a mitzvah from the Torah. You must rebuke your people. You must. Especially when they're so ignorant and blind, they don't realize the damage that they're causing.

13:03Nearly a year ago, when I came out and spoke about the dumbest hire, the dumbest corporate hire, government hire in Israeli history, people said, "Oh, you're just a fanatic. You're just crazy." What did I say? I said that Bibi Netanyahu just hired a Christian missionary to work for his office and That's what I said about this kid who makes a lot of YouTube videos. He's a Christian missionary, and he works in the office of Bibi Netanyahu. I said, why would you hire him? Why would a Jewish state, a Jewish Prime Minister, a Jewish government, hire a Christian missionary? It doesn't make any sense. I'm not saying you have to hire Chabad, you have to hire Breslov, you have to hire the leader of Hasidut, but why hire somebody that's technically considered our enemy? Why? So when I say that, people are like, oh no, you're fanatic, you're fanatic, you're crazy. But you see, the writing is on the wall, rabotai. When you make one mistake, it leads to another. And you see the same thing happening all over the world.

14:16For all of those who are very big fans of Donnie Trump because so far he hasn't caused any terror, at least not openly, to Eretz Yisrael and Am Yisrael, you should know also, just as a side note, that last week we talked about how a person who trusts man is cursed in this world and the next. You should know, don't put too many investments behind Trump or anybody for that matter, because technically every single religious figure that surrounds Trump is a Christian missionary. Every single one. Every single one of his advisors are top Christian missionaries in the world and... his best friends, so he says, "Yeah, I love Israel. I love Israel. I love Israel." No, he says, "I love Israel." People say, "No, it's because his daughter converted." It has nothing to do with his daughter. You know why he says he loves Israel? Because that's what evangelical Christians say. They love Israel. Why? Because their number one plan is to convert Israel. That's why they're the number one donors in Israel. That's why they're the number one tourists in Israel. That's why...

15:29I'm not saying to go start a riot, start a war, start anything. This is just food for thought for people to understand that we are arriving at times where we have nothing to rely on other than Avinu Shebashamayim. We are arriving at times where we will have nothing to rely on other than HaKadosh Baruch Hu saving us from the trouble that we caused ourselves. So... The Chachamim explained to us that our job in this world is to fix our character traits because, by fixing our character traits, by becoming more forgiving, more generous, less angry, and more in tune with the Torah, we end up becoming similar to HaKadosh Baruch Hu, as He says in this week's parasha. be holy because I am holy. What is He trying to tell us in simple language? You don't have to be a genius. We're trying to tell you, Am Yisrael, I want you to be like Me. That's what Hashem is trying to say. Now, obviously, we can't create a world. He's not talking about that. He says, "I want you to act like Me. I'm forgiving, you be forgiving. I'm generous, you be generous."

17:00I don't speak Lashon Hara, you don't speak Lashon Hara. I watch my eyes, you watch your eyes. You understand? Make sure you are like Me. That's it. So how can we be like Him? We have to listen to the ones that emulated Him the best, and that's our sages. Now, in recent generations, people mention names like Einstein or Nietzsche or Aristotle or Plato. Any of these people had some intellect for sure. But for whatever reason or another, people assumed that they're on the same level or perhaps even a higher level than the sages of Am Yisrael. The reason for that is simply because they spent a lot of time, or at least hopefully a lot of time, about Aristotle and learning about Plato and Nietzsche and the author of The Art of War and all these philosophers and scientists. So, they arrived at a conclusion that these people are much smarter than them and therefore they’re really smart. So, they say, “Okay, this is

18:07The best. And they assumed, well, I don't really know anything about the Rambam. I don't really know anything about the Ramban. I don't really know anything about Rabbi Akiva, or Moshe Rabbeinu for that matter. I don't really know anything about them. I just know what I heard in a lecture here and there, or maybe I read on Wikipedia, a little bio. So I heard a few things. So he seems smart, this Rambam guy. He seems smart, this Rashi guy. This Moshe Rabbeinu seems like a really nice guy. So, at best case scenario, he's almost like Einstein. Best case scenario, he's almost like Nietzsche. He's almost like, like, like Aristotle. Almost, almost, maybe at best case scenario, he's like somebody's a fan. He's a Shabbat. He says they're the same. Why? Because they know a lot about the secular, nonsensical mentality, but very, very little, if anything at all, about Am Yisrael's sages. And the reason why is because to know that... All of these philosophers require maybe ten minutes' worth of work. You go on Wikipedia, go on Google, you type their name, you read a bio: born such-and-such date, discovered something, wrote something, a few people hated them, a few people loved them, some people published his work—the end. That's it. You want to know about the Rambam?

19:33You want to know about the Rambam? You want to know about anything, any of the sages? You actually have to learn their work. Because you will never arrive at a correct conclusion of their significance. The significant difference between us and them cannot be understood by simply reading their bio. You have to read one of their simplest chiddushim. The simplest, simplest thing they ever wrote. Study one line. Then you'll understand why the greatest among the seculars are closer to monkeys than they are to any of our sages, needless to say us. So this is why in Am Yisrael, every little bit of work is that we have the merit to review the Chachamim, whether it be in a Halacha book, or it be a Segula, or it be a letter, we study it. Because we know that the sages pick their words very, very carefully. They're not like us, where we just write, "Dear John, how are you doing? How are the kids? How's the weather over there in Tennessee this time of year?"

20:56How's the dog? Do you still have it? Does the cat get along with the dog? What do you feed them during Pesach? What about the fish? Do you still have those fish? I remember those fish. One was golden and one was a little gray color. This is the type of letters people write to each other. This is the type of nonsense. Or, what do you feel about the stock market? You know, it dropped 400 points this time last year. Do you think it will do the same thing this year? What about Trump's new policy about building a wall? Are you going to invest in the wall? Because some other guy that used to be a soldier raised $25 million. He said he's going to fund the wall, but then he decided after he got the $25 million that he's not going to fund the wall. So, God only knows what he's going to do with the money. Did you give him any money, Mr. John? And that's the type of letters people have. These are the discussions of people. How do I know? They send me these types of emails. People ask these. This is the conversation. This is what's going on. This is what's going on in people's heads. This is what they care about. But we look at Chachamim, what they write, how they write. They write letters like a Sefer Torah. Every word is chosen carefully. Every sentence has to have a source in the Torah. Every idea has to have a common element, some type of synergy, some type of connection, Tavorich Baruch. Everything, from beginning to end.

22:27If it's a letter, like I just explained to you, it's not coming from a chacham. It's coming from somebody that, you know, maybe wears a kippah, maybe has a nice little beard, but he's not a chacham. He's a regular person. Maybe Shomer Shabbat. You have to think like a Sefer Torah. So, the Rambam, wrote this letter in such a way that, if we study it, we really could study it similar to Pirkei Avot, similar to any of the other works that the sages have put together. You can study every word for years, but obviously, we're going to try to finish this series before we all get old and not able to listen or see. But I bought you guys a present for all of you that attended. As I promised last week, Baruch Hashem, or really Be'ezrat Hashem bought it. I just happened to be there. And we bought you a copy of the book. This book is one of many. There are several, obviously, rabbis and sages that have written commentary on the Iggeret HaRamban, this letter from the Ramban.

23:41But this is actually the one that I'm using. I obviously have other commentaries aside from it, but nonetheless, this is the copy that I bought so you can follow along and also study on your own. Study on your own because there are some things that I'm going to mention that are written in this book, and some things I'm not. But this is a present from B'ezrat Hashem. If you would like to donate because, obviously, they're not free, you can donate. If you don't want to donate or you don't have money to donate, don't worry. We won't hold it against you. The key is to please bring it each time so I don't have to give you a new one every time. But we're also, B'ezrat Hashem, in the merit of this series, going to include it from now on in our Kiruv packages and... We have included them in the past from time to time, but from now on we're going to include it in our Kiruv packages. So anybody that is getting a Kiruv package will also get this. At the beginning of this book, you will see that there's some commentary that we went over a little bit last week. Then you have a copy of the letter, both in Hebrew and English.

24:54Ramban himself says to his own son that you should read this letter every single day, and every day that you read this letter, you'll have much blessing and success. I recommend that you listen to the Ramban, just like the Chida. Just like the Chida says, praiseworthy is the person that listens to the words of the Ramban and at least reads this once a week. If you can't do it once a day in the beginning, maybe you're excited and you'll be able to do it once a day, but then it starts becoming monotonous when you start reading it every day. So, you can start disrupting your reading, and it starts giving you work to do. So, your goal should be to complete the letter once a week. Once a week, you should complete this letter and... Because even though after a little while you're going to memorize a lot of it, if not all of it, you're always going to be able to learn something from it, especially since we're going to be learning it in depth. Each word, each sentence, what does he actually mean here? So I highly recommend that you apply this to your life. This could be at least a part of your daily mussar. And we'll begin now with...

26:03The first verse, the first line of what the Ramban says to his son, he says: The Ramban says, "Heed, my son, the discipline of your father and do not forsake the guidance of your mother." The first line in his letter is actually a verse from Mishlei (Proverbs) chapter 1, verse 8. And... For anyone that's following along, it's page 23. And if you don't have the book, just grab one, it's free. So, he says, he uses a verse to start a letter. Already we see there's a pretty big difference between him and us. We say, "Dear John," "Dear Steve," "How are you?" That's how we start letters in the world. There's no "dear" or anything. He doesn't even mention his son's name. We never went to his son, but he doesn't even mention his son's name. Why? Why waste the words? Already you see the train of thought that the chachamim have. And this is something to learn from. How much do you value your time? How much do you value your time? I remember, Baruch Hashem, before

27:27quit, and it's been several years now. Before, over 20 years ago, I smoked cigarettes. Smoking cigarettes, by the way, if you don't smoke and you start smoking, it's a sin from the Torah because you're not allowed to smoke — you're hurting your body. If you're already addicted to it, there are leniencies. It's not good for you, it's technically not allowed, and it's definitely not the will of Hashem, but there are leniencies. regards to smoking addiction, smoking cigarettes not drugs. Drugs are not allowed by any stretch of the imagination—not marijuana, not heroin, not anything unless obviously taken for medicinal reasons. And that's a lecture of its own. Anyone that wants to know the details of drugs and Judaism and Torah, at least the truth about it, I have a lecture about it on the internet and When it comes to smoking cigarettes, I remember that part of the at least imaginary joy of smoking cigarettes is they just burn time. You want to think about something, and you get to a point where you're used to thinking while doing something, and you just smoke, and you just waste time. Oh, what are you doing? I'm waiting for my appointment. When's the appointment? In 15 minutes. So what do you do now? I'm just smoking cigarettes until the appointment, meaning I'm burning 15 minutes and...

28:43I'm occupying myself with absolutely nothing because I have an appointment in 15 minutes. Meaning that 15 minutes is not really important. So I'm just going to burn it. I'm just going to do nothing. Do you know how much time we burn every single day, people? The Vilna Gaon cried at the end of his life. And his students said to him, Rabbeinu, "Why are you crying? You're going to be in Gan Eden momentarily. Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov are probably waiting for you. What are you crying about?" He says, "There are two moments in my life that are unaccounted for." And I said, "What? What do you mean there are two moments in your life that are unaccounted for?" He says, "There are two moments, like two seconds,

29:43my life. I don't remember what I did, meaning the rest of the time he remembers what he did, and he knew that that was the will of Hashem. He did what Hashem wanted during that time, but there are two seconds he's not sure about. It's not that he did something wrong, he's just not sure what he did during those two moments. We have two moments a day, an hour, that we could say we can't account for because we're not sure. Maybe we did a mitzvah, maybe we didn't do a mitzvah. If we can accomplish that an hour already, but you see how someone that learns Torah already re-evaluates their time, re-evaluates their life, and looks at things very, very differently, to the extent that even to write... Joe, dear Steve, dear anybody, they simply don't. Next, the Ramban starts with one of the most critical tools that a person needs to know how to use in their life both to serve Hashem and also to help his fellow men.

31:06and also to help his fellow men. It says "Shema." "Shema" means listen, heed, pay attention. It's the first word in his letter. He's trying to tell you the first thing that you need to establish when you're going to tell somebody something, when you're going to rebuke somebody, It's first, you have to determine whether they're a potential customer or not, whether they're willing to help themselves or not. You can't help somebody that doesn't want to help themselves. You know, people always tell me their difficulties about how they rebuked. You know, they listen to a shiur. The shiur says that you have to fulfill the mitzvah, you must rebuke your fellow. You know, their sister violated Shabbat. They tell them something. Their brother went out with a goyah. They tell them something. Their father did something, something. They tell them something. Their cousin, their fellow employee. You know, people like this mitzvah. Once they hear about it, they like it. Why? Because people like to tell people what to do.

32:15People love telling people what to do. They don't like looking in the mirror that much, but they like telling people what to do. Why? See, it's fun. "Hey, you're going to die. Rabbi Reuven says you're going to die if you keep driving on Shabbat. Hey, you're wearing that mini skirt. Oh, Rabbi Reuven said." It's not Rabbi Reuven. It's Moshe Rabbeinu. But anyway, it's a different story. They blame me for everything. But they like telling people what to do. But after they tell them what to do, 99% of the time, guess what? Rejected. Rejected. Whatever they just told them, they don't care. Moshe, Yaakov, thank you for your care, your charisma, your compassion, your passion, and your zealousness, but listen: thank you, but no thank you. Keep your opinion to yourself. Keep your little Rabbi Reuven and Moshe Rabbeinu and all that stuff you said to me. Do me a favor. I know God. Me and Him, we get along. We're getting love my own business 99% of the time. The rebuke is rejected now. It's very easy to say, "Wow, we live in such a low generation that nobody wants to do teshuvah. Nobody wants to listen." So, that's it? I'm good, right, Rabbi? I'm okay. I'm finished. I told her, she didn't want to listen, and I said, "I'm finished," right?

33:42I told her, "Don't drive on Shabbat." She said something I'm not allowed to say on camera. So I'm OK, right? I'm fine. I'm finished. I told my parents that it's not allowed to do such and such. And they said, "Listen, son, go to your room." So I'm finished, right? I'm done. I'm... They're low generation. They're losers. These are reshaim, all these people. Oh, people love to call people reshaim. They're reshaim, these people. They're evil. They gave you birth, no? Aren't they your parents? Aren't they your brother and sister? Isn't he your boss? Isn't he your cousin? Isn't he the guy that writes your paycheck? Didn't you just say you loved them two minutes ago before you said? Because we too don't know what we're talking about. If you're going to rebuke somebody, the Ramban is trying to teach us that you can't just tell people what to do and expect all of them to simply listen to you like robots. We are not robots. Quite the contrary. We're a nation of am k'sheh oref. We're a stubborn people.

34:59The last thing we want is somebody telling us what to do. Like if you pick, what are the worst things that somebody can do to you, I bet you anything, on top of the list, telling me what to do is usually top three for everybody. Don't tell me what to do. Nobody wants to be told what to do. So if you go tell somebody, you stop violating Shabbat, you stop dressing this way, you stop dressing that way, automatically they're going to reject you. It doesn't mean they're resha'im. means they're normal. You are actually the problem. Now we're contradicting ourselves. Why? We said the mitzvah is to go rebuke them. They said, "No." I'm saying they're normal, and then you guys are the problem. How could this be? It's because you have to understand people. You have to understand human psychology, and you have to understand... They are in their life. You are saying, "Keep Shabbat," because you see the picture clearly that Hakadosh Baruch Hu gave the Torah and Hakadosh Baruch Hu wrote in the Torah, "Don't violate Shabbat." One of the places in the Torah that He writes it is this week's parsha, where Hashem said, "Keep Shabbat." You see it clearly; they still don't. So you tell them, "Keep Shabbat." They say, "Why?" But they're saying to you in a different way.

36:22You're seeing something clearly and you're assuming that therefore they will see it clearly, but they're not. So that's when you're gonna say, "Wait a minute, so that's why I'm telling them because they don't see it." But then they reject you, so now what? Now you have to establish a cause—a cause for why they're rejecting you, why they refuse to listen to you. Because the Chachamim explain that the reason why the Ramban wrote Shema is to establish whether this person is willing to help themselves or not, whether this person is at a point in his life or her life where they are willing to change. If they're listening, meaning you can talk to them, they may or may not agree with you, but they keep listening. Continue, continue. You're in a shiur. You're given a shiur. Some people say, some people say, I'm not really sure what he's, I think he's a little cuckoo, this guy. But you're still staying in the chair. You're still here. You're going to eat a little bit of free food. You're going to take the book. You're maybe going to come back next weekend. We'll continue with you. But if the guy comes to the shiur, and five minutes later he leaves, or the whole time he's playing with his phone, I can't do business with him.

37:46Can't work with a person like this. Why? He's not willing to listen. He's not willing to change. He's not even open to change. He's not even open to entertain the possibility that he may need a change. Hence, we need to establish, first and foremost, is this person listening and... Is he listening? Is she listening to me? I'm not saying she's listening and she's going to agree and she's going to do, and next week she's going to give shiur because she's going to learn so much in one week. She's giving shiur. No! Is she listening? Is she attentive? Is she into the conversation? Is he into the conversation? Are we exchanging words? Are they saying, wait, but, yes, but, are we engaging? Or it's just... Yeah, you know, that Moshe guy, he sounds interesting, but you know what? I'd really much rather talk about the stock market. You want to talk about the stock market? Worst thing I could ever hear at the end of a lecture. Three or four hours you talk, and somebody says, "Rabbi, so you still deal with the stock market?"

38:57Because I have some money invested in Amazon and in eBay, but I'm not really sure if it conflicts because of... I look at them and I'm like, I spoke three hours of Torah, and all you can think about is if I can give you investment advice? I must be the worst speaker on earth. And then I have to go home and cry to Hashem, "Hashem, please make me a better speaker." I spoke to the guy about Moshe Rabbeinu, and he's asking about eBay. If I spoke Chinese, maybe I would have gotten better results from that. But sometimes it's not your fault. Sometimes it's because they're just not willing to listen. This is one of the lessons that we learned from Yitro. Yitro, a giant among giants. The parashah of Matan Torah, the parashah in which we received the Torah, is, in essence, the climatic point in the entire Torah. If you could point to one moment in the Torah that's the highlight.

39:58If there's a beginning, middle, and end, if there's the whole story, climax, greatest part, Matan Torah. We go to Har Sinai, Hashem talks to millions of people in the open, He opens the heavens, He gives the Aseret HaDibrot, greatest parashah in the world. Even the goyim, even the heretics, even the atheists, everybody knows about this parasha. What is the parasha called? It should be called Parashat Matan Torah. The parasha where we receive the Torah. That's what it should be called. What is it called? Parashat Yitro. Yitro used to be a goy. Yitro used to be a rasha. Yitro used to be the pope. So how could we call the parasha of Matan Torah, the greatest point in the Torah, after somebody that used to be a rasha, menuval, everything bad in the world? Why? Because the parasha says in the beginning, the first couple of words, Vayishma Yitro. Yitro heard. What did he hear? He heard about the God of Israel, and that was enough for him to want to join. Meaning he not only heard,

41:10Heard enough. He heard enough to say, "I'm finished with all this avodah zarah. I'm finished with all of these fake wigs that come from India. I'm finished with all of this chillul Shabbat and making money on the side like a Shabbat goy. I'm finished with these mini skirts. I'm finished with the non-Jewish boyfriend and girlfriend. I'm finished with the non-kosher food and the non-kosher business. I'm finished." Why? Heard the God of Israel made all these miracles for them, made the slave into the master and the master into the slave. Never in the history of mankind has that ever happened before or after. That's enough for me to know the God of Israel is stronger than anything else in the world. "I'm going there," he thought. He didn't only hear; he did. If you have such a person that hears you and starts taking things on, invest in them. Sometimes they're slow learners, but as long as they're learning and they're doing, keep going. But if you hit a wall, you tell the guy, "Shabbat," and he says, "Yeah, but what about TV?" You tell the guy, "Yeah, but what about Shabbat?" He says, "Yeah, but what about, um, how do I make money in the stock market?" But let's go back to Shabbat. You know, fire on Shabbat. "Okay, the fire on Shabbat is pretty interesting, but can I make money with fire though?"

42:31Okay, but let's just focus on Shabbat, just the seventh day of the week, no fire. Okay, okay, fire. I don't have a bonfire. Why are you obsessed with this fire, Rabbi? Forget the bonfire. But I could go and I could trade stocks on Shabbat though, right? Because the phone is not really fire, right? No, no, no, you can't. Forget the trading. Keep Shabbat. You're dealing with somebody like this, it's very difficult to work with him. Why? He doesn't really care what you're saying. He's just trying to figure out a way of how to do what he wants to do, but still, you still like him. But if he's listening and he's progressing a little bit at a time, he's trying to do the right thing. He just doesn't know how to do it. Keep working with him. Some people grow fast. Some people grow slow. Some people skyrocket. Some people don't even start. Don't judge people simply because of the way they look. Sometimes you're going to see a guy who looks like a rabbi. He's a two-week Baal Teshuva. Just happens to have a suit and a white shirt, and he already had a beard made at home. But he looks like a rabbi. Everybody thinks that someone who wears black and white and has a beard is a rabbi for some reason. Go to Wall Street, you'll see a bunch of them. They don't even wear kippahs though. It's called business suits. People wear them. It's like this big scam. Somebody made a suit and then replicated it a million times.

43:59Don't make you religious. White shirts don't make you religious; it's just a white shirt, a color people tend to wear. What makes you religious is how you act. If you're willing to listen to Mussar, which is something that's contrary to your predisposition, contrary to your pre-existing belief, contrary to how you're currently behaving, you're willing to listen to it. With an open mind, we can work with you. But if you're not willing to listen, the Ramban says, stop. You're wasting your time. You're talking to a wall. Go invest your time somewhere else. Don't force this person. Why? All you're going to do is bring a kitrug on this person. There's going to be a case against them that's even worse from Shamayim. Let Hashem do His will. This guy doesn't want to listen, then he's going to have to listen from Hashem. How? Oh, well, usually when it's Hashem, it's a little more painful. But remember that there's still a reason why he's not listening. We haven't answered that yet. Now, hearing...

45:22the most critical sense that you have. How do we know? Because the Gemara says that a person who causes damage to another person—physical damage, let's say they got into a fight, or some type of incident happened, and you damaged another person... If you damaged his eye, you have to pay him the value of the eye. "An eye for an eye" doesn't literally mean you take your eye and put it in his head, like some people think. No, "an eye for an eye" means you have to evaluate how much his eye is worth. Why isn't every eye the same? No, not all eyes are the same. If he's a guy that, let's say, is a paratrooper, Most likely he can't be a paratrooper anymore. Why? Because it's too dangerous to have only one eye. So now you have to evaluate that eye's cost at a certain amount. But it's still not going to be as valuable as the eye of a surgeon. Why? Because a surgeon without an eye can't be a surgeon at all. The paratrooper could still serve a different position in the army, could still do something else. But the surgeon can no longer be a surgeon. So if he was making a million and a half dollars last year, next year he's going to be on Social Security. Why? There's no eye. He can't be a surgeon with one eye.

46:43There's a night and day difference. So the eye of this one, the eye of that one are a world apart. You have to value it. But then there's the hearing. If you damage the hearing, it's not like the eye. Why? The Gemara says, if you damage his hearing, you have to pay the value of the entire person. Yeah, but he still has arms. He still has legs. He still has eyes. He still has his head, Baruch Hashem. He's still okay. says no. If he can't hear, he's no longer going to be the same person. Why? He can't learn Torah the right way. He can't learn to live. He can't listen to Mussar. Yeah, he can read some things, but it's never going to be the same because your hearing is the most critical thing you could possibly have. We have a source for this in the Mishnah in Avot that we learned that... some time ago, probably about a year ago, Mishnah in Avot, chapter 4, first Mishnah, Ben Zoma says, "Who is wise? Someone who learns from every person." How can you learn from every person if you can't hear? You can't. If you can hear, that means you can learn from every person. If one of your students asks you a question, if you're listening to the question,

48:09Most times you'll know that the answer is inside the question. But even more important, if you're a good teacher, you'll also learn a lot about your student himself or herself through the question. If you're listening. If you're not listening, what are you going to say? Ah, this annoying guy is sending me a text at 3 o'clock in the morning. He doesn't have anything else to do. That's what you're going to say. Because you're not listening. But if you're listening, say, wow. He's thinking about Torah at 3 o'clock in the morning. This guy must be a tzaddik nistar. This guy is like one of the 36 tzaddikim. He's a kid. All he thinks about in the middle of the night, 3 o'clock in the morning, is to ask me a Torah question. This guy, this guy, I have to invest more time into this guy. Somebody thinks about Torah at 3 o'clock in the morning. That's all he thinks about instead of Game Boy, PlayStation. This generation, you might be the Gra. The Vilna Gaon you are. So, There's a shomer and there's a shomer. There's a person that listens and there's a person that listens. Meaning, one person can be the type of person that listens to you, but he doesn't retain anything. Goes in one ear and out the other. He's here, he attends the lecture, comes to all the shiurim, even presses like on Facebook. A year passes, nothing changed.

49:36Same behemah that he arrived these days. Nothing changed. Yeah, but he's been coming to shiur for a year. How come nothing changed? Because he's not really retaining anything, because he doesn't really apply anything, because he doesn't really take it seriously. He just wants something to do, and it's cheaper than a movie. So he comes to the shiur. He has nothing to do at 9 or 10 o'clock at night. So he watches the shiur on the internet, on Facebook Live, while he plays a little bit, and he has a beer. He makes himself a little shish kebab and maybe some chicken cutlet too, because he's really hungry and he's still trying to grow and all types of things. But he says, "Rabbi, look, I press like on every lecture. I watch every shiur." I said, "Wait a minute. You watched every shiur? You watched every shiur?" Yeah, I said I have to quit if you watched every shiur, and you're still a behemah. I have to quit. I have to do teshuvah to my wife if you watched every shiur, and you have not changed—if you stayed exactly the same. Either I have to quit while I'm ahead, at least Hashem is not going to punish me for being such a bad teacher that nothing has happened in a year, or you're not really watching.

50:55If you're watching this kind of shiur for a year, and you don't change, something is wrong with one of us. Now, how do we establish which one of us it is? We have to look at other people. If 99% of other people are changing and you're not, then obviously it's not them. But on the other hand, if nobody's changing, if everybody's still driving on Shabbat to the Beit Knesset for 20 years, then most likely it's the rabbi. This also answers the question of how do you pick your teacher? How do you pick the one you listen to? How do you pick the guy whose YouTube videos you're going to watch? How do you pick the guy whose shul you're going to attend and listen to his drasha on Shabbat? How do you pick? There are so many rabbis. Everybody looks the same. Everybody says Rabbi Akiva, Moshe Rabbeinu. They all use the same names. They all say that they're teaching Torah Emet. They all use similar lines. How do you pick one?

51:55The way you pick one is by determining who's the one that's bringing the best out of you. Who is pushing you to be better than what you currently are. If the rabbi that you go to and listen to keeps telling you you're the best just as you are, Hashem loves you just as you are, you're wonderful just as you are, so guess what? You will stay a behema just like you are. But I'll tell you, no, it's not a behema. It's a puppy. An expensive one. A poodle from Spain. But if the guy keeps telling you, HaKadosh Baruch Hu says you have some rotten middot. You have some character traits that are despicable, disgusting, awful, an abomination. But He loves you anyway. Why? He created you with those middot. Why? So you can fix them. Fix them and become like Him, kadosh. Yeah, but it's hard. Exactly, that's the point in life. It's hard. If that's the kind of rabbi you have and that's who you listen to, shayach, you can actually have a chance of arriving at Gan Eden one day.

53:17But if you want somebody to tell you that you're perfect and you're wonderful, and the Rebbe is going to save you, and this one's going to save you, and if you just give enough, it's going to save you, and someone is going to save you, JC Penny is going to save you, Muhammad is going to save you, some bunny rabbit on Easter is going to save you. You want that? Good luck in getting home, what can I tell you? It's a little hot there, so... Shomer that listens with one ear out the other is not somebody that wants to change, but a Shomer who listens, understands what you're saying, and then takes action. Takes action. Okay, you know what? The Shabbat thing is too big for me right now. I just started. I just started. It's too much for me. Can you give me something else? Well, technically, you still have to keep Shabbat. Yeah, yeah, I know I have to keep Shabbat, but I'm not ready. Can you give me something else? Now, what are you going to say to the guy? If you hate him, say no. You don't want to keep Shabbat? The heck with you. Don't talk to him anymore. When you're ready to keep Shabbat, come back to me. That's if you hate him. If you love him, say, you know what? You're right. You're not ready. Let's do something else. I'll work with you.

54:34he's willing to buy in; he's just not ready yet. In our generation, some of you, it's before your life; some of you, it's during your life. When I was a kid, there was a horrible story in the news, but the horrible story had a fantastic story in the makings. There was a soldier that one day had his vacation and like most soldiers in Israel, he hitchhiked. So the soldier came from the kibbutz, completely irreligious, barely even heard the name Moshe Rabbeinu in his life.

55:35Believe it or not, there are still people like that in the world. Even in Eretz Yisrael, Hashem yerachem. Anyway, this soldier was hitchhiking, and as Hashem would have it, some chassid that was friendly with Rav Yagen, alav ha-shalom, pulls over, says, hey, Where are you going? He goes, I'm going to such and such place. So the chassid, being friendly with Rav Yagen, you can't be like a regular person. You have to be a person that's passionate about Torah. So he sees this secular soldier hitchhiking. He wants to go someplace that's a few hours away. He says, perfect opportunity to help this guy do teshuva. Yeah, yeah, come on board, I'm going there. Where are you going? I'm going. Where are you going? I'm going. Wherever you're going, I'm going. Yeah, okay. He jumps on board, he goes in, and they start driving. Little by little, they start chit-chatting, they start talking. And as they get closer and closer, the soldier says, "Yeah, yeah, it's over here. It's this exit." He goes, "Well, listen. I was thinking, probably, I mean, Shabbat's coming soon, later today, Shabbat, and..."

56:47you've probably spent Shabbat with your family your whole life, and you guys don't keep Shabbat, you don't do Kiddush, nothing, right? He goes, no. So your whole life, you know exactly what Shabbat looks like over there, right? He says, yeah. He says, but you don't know how it looks in my life. Why don't you come to my house for Shabbat? I'll show you what Shabbat looks like in a religious family. The soldier says, sure, why not? But how am I going to get back home after Shabbat? He goes, I'll take you. I'll take you. He said, okay, fine. So they went, continued, they got to Bnei Brak, Shetibach Shemo, he goes to Shabbat, and he sees something he's never seen in his life. All the little kids are happy, singing "Shalom Aleichem, Shalom Aleichem," and there are little, you know, pictures, and they say, "Oh, that's Rabbi Akiva, and that's Rabbi, and that's this," and everybody's excited about the pictures and excited about Torah. The little nine-year-old kid gives a chidush, and he never saw such things; the little nine-year-old is even given the ability to speak.

57:48Among the adults, and all the adults are listening. "Wow, that's the parashah this week. Chazak u'Baruch." And he's like, "Wow, this kid, this kid's a genius." And then he sees the eight-year-old do the same thing. And then he sees the seven-year-old do the same thing, each in their own way. And this soldier that's 20 years old, he's never seen such a thing. Seven, eight, nine-year-old kids are saying things that happened 3,000 years ago. He doesn't even know himself. At the end of Shabbat, he says, "I have to tell you." He tells the chassid, "I have to tell you." This was the greatest—not the greatest Shabbat—the greatest day in my life. I've never seen such beauty. So much food, love, and happiness, and everybody's singing and happy, and you talk Torah and hear the wonderful stories from the Rabbi. It was unbelievable. The chassid says to me, "You know, this is every week; we have this." You didn't do this just for me? No, every week is like this. It's for Hashem. He goes, amazing, amazing. He goes, why don't you do it again? He goes, listen, let's be real with each other. If I go back to the army and I tell my commander I want to start keeping Shabbat, they're going to put me in a cell that doesn't have windows for 30 days just for making such a stupid comment.

59:08They're going to put me in a prison. Instead of putting the terrorists in a prison, they're going to put a soldier in a prison because he wants to keep Shabbat. I can't. They're going to make fun of me. I'm a serious soldier on special missions. Come on, you know Hashem is real. I know Hashem is real. After this Shabbat, it has to be real. Can you give me something that nobody else can see? He goes, "What do you mean? Give me a mitzvah. I want to do something for Hashem to at least tell Him that I know it's real. I know He's real, but I can't do Shabbat. Why? Because if I do Shabbat, everyone's going to know I do Shabbat. They're going to beat me up. They're going to make fun of me. I can't do it. Give me something else that nobody knows that I'm doing it." So the Chassid thinks, and he says, "You know what? I'll give you something no one's going to know." He says... When you put your shoes on, there's a way to put your shoes on. First, you have to put the right shoe on. Then, the left shoe. Then you tie the left shoe and then the right shoe. The soldier says, "What? You guys have a book of rules and it says how to put shoes on? God cares about how to put shoes on?" He says, "Yes." He says, "Yes. I like this halacha. I like this rule. This is a rule. No one's going to know. I know I'm putting the right shoe on, the left shoe on. No one's going to know."

1:00:30No one's going to know that I'm putting this right, left, who cares about how I put my shoes on? It's the perfect halacha. This is, I love this mitzvah already, I haven't even done it. The soldier is so excited about this mitzvah, he says, "Hashem," he talks to Hashem that night, "Hashem, listen, I know You want me to do all this Shabbat, all this, I'm not ready yet. But I promise You, Hashem, this one, I'm not going to let You down. I'm not going to let You down with this halacha. I'm not going to let You down. I'm going to do this." And this soldier wakes up in the morning, and he remembers he's so excited: the left shoe, and then the right shoe, and then ties, and the right. And he's so excited about how he's tying his shoe, and no one even knows why he's so happy—he's just tying his shoes. And he goes back to the platoon over there, and the soldiers are there, and everybody's looking at him. It's like, every day he's smiling, tying his shoes, like, what's wrong with this guy? I... Easy, like he has some type of imagination about what his shoes are. Did he eat mushrooms in the morning or something? What's the matter with this guy? No one knows what's going on. Everybody knows that this guy is a fanatic about his shoes all of a sudden. One day, early in the morning, he runs to the camp with everybody else, and then he realizes, "Oh no, I forgot about the shoes."

1:01:45General, listen, I have a little injury in my leg, and it's hurting me in my boots. I got to go back to camp quickly. Goes into his little tent over there, takes off his shoes, takes off his socks. He's machmir. It's not just the shoes. Yeah, the shoes, the socks, everything. Start the whole day all over again. He takes his shoes off and the socks and everything. And then again, left and right. And goes back to camp. A couple of days later, it happens again. What are you going to tell him? Foot hurts again? He says, hey, it worked last time. He says, uh, General, um, foot, my foot, what's wrong with your foot again? Can't you just go quickly? Go, go! No, go, go quietly. Five minutes, you have five minutes. Enough with this nonsense. Learn how to put your band-aids on. He goes, he changes, takes the shoes off, puts the shoes back on. He's finished. He goes back. As Hashem would have it, only a couple of days pass, and the same thing happens again. He forgets the shoes in the morning.

1:02:59forgets to put it the right way, and he goes and he tells the general, "I have the shoe again with the shoes again. What's the matter with you? You don't know how to put shoes on?" He says, "Just please, can I go?" The general says, "Go, go, go." But this time the general didn't buy it. He didn't buy it, so he followed him. He followed him. to see what kind of wound this guy has on his foot. Did he get shot in his foot? Like, what's wrong with this guy's foot? So he peeked in and saw this guy take off his shoes, take off his socks. And there's not even a scratch on his foot. He breaks into the tent and says, "You've been lying to me this whole time. You've been lying to me. 30 days in a cell." Calls, no letters, no light, no nothing. Thirty days they put him in a cell. And the very next day, there's an emergency, a well-known emergency. There's an attack, and his entire platoon of almost 70 people goes on a special mission. They go in a chopper.

1:04:21Anymore, Shimon, busy from the evil terrorists, blows up the chopper and kills everybody. Everybody dies. The next day, that soldier, they open his cell and tell him what happened. They said, "Listen, your entire platoon is dead. Go home." Before he goes home... He calls his friend, the Chasid, and he says, "Where can I go to learn more about your Torah?" He says, "What? Your Torah, your Torah that Moshe Rabbeinu and Rabbi Akiva and all those rabbis, where can I go learn about that?" The Chasid was surprised. He says, "Well, aren't you afraid of your friends and your general and your mom and your dad and all these other people?" What are they gonna say to you? He says, they're all dead. And the only reason I'm alive is because of the one mitzvah I did. I know I owe Hashem a lot more mitzvot. So where's the nearest yeshiva? The guy became an avreich. So you can't just reject people if they're willing to buy in even a little bit, you understand? Which leads us to the next point.

1:05:51The Ramban says, "Shema B'ni, Shema B'ni." Listen, my son. Why "my son"? He wrote this letter not just for his son; he wrote it for everybody to listen to. Why "Shema B'ni"? Why? If you're going to rebuke somebody, you can do it in a couple of ways. You can say to the guy, you know, by the way, the fact that every day you have a new wife, the fact that every day you have a new husband, the fact that everything that you see that moves or doesn't move, you eat, and the fact that everything that moves, you look and you don't look, whether it's your wife or it's not your wife, you know you're like an animal, right? You know, like a disgusting, filthy, gross animal. In Shamayim, they think of you as gross, and you're right. That's actually how they look at him in Shamayim. But it's not going to work. Why? No one wants to be called an animal. No one wants to be insulted. Even if you're right, who wants to? I want you to remind me that I'm this and I'm that and I'm this and I'm that. But if you tell them, you know, my son, you're smarter than that.

1:07:11You should know somebody as smart as you. I mean, you're good at math. You're good at history. I heard you got great grades at school. You look like a stand-up guy. You look like you have your head on your shoulders. You should be able to understand that, of course, Hashem created the world, right? Of course, Hashem created the world. So if you can figure out that Hashem created the world, of course, He gave instructions, right? Of course, He gave instructions. Because even somebody that manufactures a small little device like this for $50 has instructions for it. So if this has instructions, of course, the world has instructions. So if Hashem wrote instructions, we can prove they are His instructions. And if we can prove these are His instructions, of course, we should follow them. We should read the instructions and do what they say. Why? Because it's Hashem. He's the Creator. You're smarter than that. You should realize that you're not supposed to be with a new wife every day. You should know that you can overcome it. You're not an animal. The animal can't overcome it. The lion, the donkey, the rooster—they can't overcome it. Why? They're animals. But you're not an animal. And you show him love like he's your son. You're rebuking him. You're telling him the truth.

1:08:23But you're telling him in a way where he still knows you care about him and you're not just there to insult him. You're not just there to abuse him. You're not just there to call him names. And that's the problem with most people that rebuke. They simply focus on the attack and very, very little is invested in into looking at these people as people, looking at these mistakes as mistakes, looking at these people as the former you, before you did teshuva. You weren't always like this. You used to be like them. What, you became all high and mighty? You forgot you used to be with a new wife every week? You forgot you used to eat treif for lunch? You forgot you used to make every sin in the Torah knowingly, unknowingly? You forgot? You did the same thing. So what? You're better than them. And that's the problem, Abutai. People don't like to look in the mirror. Like, yeah, but I did Teshuvah. Okay, you did Teshuvah. If you did Teshuvah, somebody else can do Teshuvah. If you did it, somebody else can do it.

1:09:33Give him a chance. Don't just attack him, you're a rasha, you're the worst, you're ugly, you're this, you're that. Unless there's a reason to. Sometimes there's a reason to. Sometimes there are certain people that like to make other people sin on purpose. Knowing it's a sin, knowing it's bad, they like to go against. People like that, it's a mitzvah to hate them. But there are not that many people like that. They exist, but it's not the majority. Most people are simply ignorant. If you show people insults, even if you're right, you're not going to be able to help them. But if you treat them like b'ni, if you treat them like a son, while you're rebuking them, you're going to be able to succeed much more. You may not succeed fully; some people just don't want to listen, some people just don't want to do, or some people simply don't want you as the vessel. But nonetheless, always remember that we have halachot in the Torah. We have rules in the Torah. And the Rambam writes in Mishneh Torah in Hilchot Teshuvah, chapter 5, second halacha: Each person is fit to be righteous like Moshe Rabbeinu, or wicked like Yeravam. You can't be a Navi like him. You can't be a prophet like Moshe Rabbeinu.

1:10:57But every one of you here, everyone that's watching today, tomorrow, next year, in the next 10 years, whenever, every single person has the ability to be like Moshe Rabbeinu. Like him. You can't be Moshe Rabbeinu. Why? Because he was 3,000 years ago. Righteous like him. Prophet? No. You're not going to be a prophet. No one's going to be a prophet like Moshe Rabbeinu. No one's going to talk to Hashem like Moshe Rabbeinu. But righteous like him, where he was humble, where he was an Eved Hashem, constantly serving Hashem, constantly sacrificing his life, constantly praying, constantly teaching, constantly doing good things, you could be like him. That's the halacha. That means it's from Mount Sinai, Moshe Rabbeinu got a psak from Hashem. Hashem said to Moshe Rabbeinu, Moshe, tell everybody they could all be like you. Just my generation? No, no, no, Moshe. Everybody can be like you. From that generation 3,300 years ago, all the way until Mashiach comes. You have the potential to be like Moshe Rabbeinu. And obviously, a woman version too. Why? Because Hashem has a piece of Himself in you. But you also have the potential to be like Yeravam. Yeravam is one of the worst people that ever existed.

1:12:20Because of his ego, he decided to cause other people to sin. And as I told you before, sinning by yourself is horrible, but causing other people to sin is evil. Even Chaim Nachman Bialik, who wasn't exactly the most righteous person, to say the least, learned in one of the best yeshivot in the world, in Volozhin. He knew a lot of Torah, but later on in his life, decided to become a kofer. But he was a very, very popular person, and people liked him. And one person decided to put his picture in his restaurant in Israel. And Chaim Nachman Bialik passed by the restaurant, saw his picture, took the picture off the wall and ripped it up. The owner is surprised and says, "What did I do to you?" He says, "You think I'm going to have my picture in a restaurant that desecrates Shabbat?" The restaurant owner replies, "Last I checked, you also don't keep Shabbat." He says, "Yeah, but I do it privately."

1:13:42What I do in my home, it's my business. You do it openly. You open your business on Shabbat. You cause other people to sin. It's different. It's different. Both obviously have a case with Hashem, but it is different. Causing other people to sin is very different. An immodest woman is very different than a woman that simply doesn't keep everything. Why? Because if she's modest, but she doesn't keep everything, she has problems with Hashem, but nonetheless, it's not to the extent where she's causing other people to fall. But if she walks around immodestly, wearing a miniskirt, a tank top, exposing herself, or clothes that are so tight that you can't tell if it's skin or not, guess what? Everyone is looking at her. She's getting the attention of people. She may be happy with it today that she got everybody to look at her. She may be excited. "Wow, he looked at me. See, he looked at me. He looked at me. He looked at me." She's very happy. In Shamayim, she's not going to be happy.

1:14:44It's not going to be happy. Why? In Shamayim, every single time somebody looked at her, it's a sin. Every time somebody looked at her, she created a demon. That demon goes with her everywhere for the rest of her life. How does she know she has a demon next to her? Sometimes she has anxiety for no reason whatsoever. Nothing happened, but she's worried. She's not really sure why. She's worried. Sometimes strange things happen in the house. Things fall, things break. She lost her job. Husband doesn't like her anymore, her kids are mouthing off. Strange stuff, stuff that's unusual in her life, starts happening. Why? It's all the creations. You think it's any different for you boys? Same exact thing. It's even worse, though. Why? Because after the guy looks at the girl, she made one sin. One guy looked at her, finished. The guy completed the sin. Many guys, they end up wasting seed and

1:15:48that creates millions of those mazikim (harmful spirits). They lost their job. They lost their wife. They lost their money. They lost their mind. They don't understand. They read a book. They can't understand what it says. 500 times they read it. They still don't know why. They can't pass a driving test. They can't pass a math test. They can't pass a test for vision even. They don't know what's going on. Everyone's against them. Everyone doesn't like them. Their best friend all of a sudden doesn't want to answer their phone call. What's happening? Hashem says, I'm very upset with you. Why? You're causing other people to sin. causing other people to sin. So you see, Rabotai, a person has the ability to be righteous of all righteous. First and most important is to start considering the fact that you're not alone in the world; there are other people So if you're going to do something that perhaps is not the will of Hashem, at the very least, don't do it involving other people. If you want to go to the movies, you're never going to be allowed to go to the movies. But if you want to go to the movies, don't ask your friends to come with you. Go by yourself.

1:16:59If you want to go to the club, you're never going to be allowed to go to the club. But if you want to go to the club, don't ask your friends to go. Don't be the guy who says, you know what, I'll drive everybody. I'll drive everyone to the club. Don't be that one. You want to go to the club? Go. But don't bring anyone else with you. Why? Because once you bring other people to sin with you, then you're creating a much bigger damage. So therefore, the halacha is that Yirmiyahu says to us as a source. The mouth of the Most High, neither evil nor good comes forth. Accordingly, it's the sinner himself who causes his own loss. Jeremiah says to us, you see all of the problems that you have in your life, whether you want to call it the Holocaust, that's a national Holocaust, or personal Holocaust, a personal tragedy. Family's tragedy or a national tragedy, Jeremiah tells us all of that is your fault. Any rabbi or speaker or someone that tells you, "No, no, it's not your fault," is lying to you. It is your fault. I'm not saying be depressed about it because what does the Torah want you to do?

1:18:22But don't think, no, this is a mistake. Hashem made a mistake. Oh no, it's His fault. No, no, it's your fault. It may be His fault too, but it's your fault too. It's this other guy that stole from you too, but it's your fault why he stole from you. And this is the problem that people have with the explanation that the Torah has about the Holocaust. You see, the Holocaust is a very, very emotional subject for people. And when you tell people that the only correct answer of why did Hashem... The Holocaust, which is the reason why, is because we sinned. People have a very big problem with that. Why? Because they want to believe that it's simply the Nazis that were evil, and therefore it happened as if something is beyond the control of Hashem, as if somebody can dictate to Hashem what they're going to do with the world. The Torah says if we go by Hashem's rules... We get blessings if we go by His rules. If we go against His rules, we get curses. That's what the Torah says many times. And there are at least three places in the Torah that give a description of exactly what's going to happen if we go against Hashem on a continuous basis, and it gives exact details that are very, very similar, if not exactly the same, to what happened in the Holocaust and the Spanish Inquisition, at the Beit HaMikdash, and so on and so forth.

1:19:48When you tell people, "Where was God during the Holocaust?" there is only one answer, which is, "What do you mean? Where was He? He's the one that did it." People don't like to hear that answer because they want to believe that God is good and therefore He's incapable of doing something that would be bad. And that's the mistake we make. Yes, He is good. But He also can make things that look bad. Ultimately, they are all good. But temporarily, they're definitely going to be bad. Why? Because death is going to be viewed by us as bad. Now, how could we put all this together into a single thought? When Am Yisrael violates the Torah, HaKadosh Baruch Hu has an immense amount of patience. He waits for us sometimes for decades, sometimes for even centuries, to do teshuvah. He tells us time and time again through different signs that are happening, whether it's economic crisis, family crisis, wars, disease, all types of things that happen in the world. He makes all of that happen in order to wake us up. Even if somebody looks into their pocket,

1:21:11find a quarter, and instead of finding a quarter, they find a penny, and That's not for no reason. That's Hashem trying to tell you, by the way, that little bit of suffering that you have, just a little bit, it's not a lot of suffering, just a quarter. All you have to do is put your hand back in your pocket and you get a quarter next time. But still, it took you an extra two minutes, an extra two seconds, an extra effort to get what you wanted. That little bit is an indication from Hashem, I want you to start paying attention to what's going on in your life. Why? I'm unhappy with some stuff. I'm not perfectly happy with you. I'm not hating you. I'm not giving you a disease, but I want you to pay attention because something's missing. If it's something bigger, if it's a pain, if it's a disease, if it's a divorce, if it's a financial crisis, if it's something like that, then obviously Hashem is trying to tell you something even bigger. So, not only am I not happy with you, I'm upset with you. You did something seriously wrong. we continue to treat His signs as if they are just nature, as if they are just coincidence, as if they are just a sign of the times, and

1:22:22depression, a recession, a, you know, mid-life crisis—all types of explanations that rationalize these signs. Hashem says that "Im talchu imi be'keri"—you think that what I'm doing is just happenstance, just nature, just things that happen. "Va'alachti imachem be'keri"—your punishment will be that I'll show you it’s anything but nature. You'll see that it cannot be nature; it has to be Me. I This is indeed what happened to us several times throughout history. The Holocaust is not an exception; it's also one of those times, as we went over last week throughout the timeline. It's very, very easy to reflect in hindsight to see the signs. If all of us lived at that time, we might have also been blind. and not seen. I don't know. All I know is that now it's easy to see. Hindsight is 20/20. But then people have a problem with that. Why? Because they say, wait a minute. So what? Do you mean that just because we sinned, Hashem punished us, so therefore the Nazis are right? The Nazis are okay? The Nazis are not evil? No, that's not what we said. At all. Not even close to it.

1:23:44The Nazis, may their name be blotted out, and everyone that even says their name in a favorable way be blotted out along with them. No, that's not what we're saying. What we are saying is we sinned, there's a punishment to it. The Nazis, the terrorists, the Palestinian terrorists, the Arab terrorists, the Christian terrorists, anyone that hates Am Yisrael is a terrorist, even the ones that are anti-Torah terrorists, They are still evil. They don't become good because we deserve punishment. On the contrary, they were also horrible and they got a different punishment. What's their punishment? Hashem used them to punish His children. Why? They wanted to do something bad to Am Yisrael. Hashem said, oh, you're so evil, you want to hurt My own children? I'm gonna let you know why, because then your punishment will be eternal. Yep, I'm gonna let you do what you want to do. You want to hurt them? I'm gonna let you hurt them because they deserve to get hurt. But you, my friend, you are gonna be my enemy forever. Just like HaKadosh Baruch Hu helps the righteous who want to do good do good, He helps the wicked who want to do bad do bad, and...

1:25:07It's not justifying the evil, chas v'shalom. It's simply explaining midah k'neged midah. And the Rambam uses Yirmiyahu as one of the sources to explain to us that this is one of the foundations of Torah, everything in the world that's happening in your life, you are at fault for it. It doesn't mean you're evil. It doesn't mean you're bad. It also doesn't mean you're perfectly righteous either. It simply means that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is talking to you. Pay attention! That's the first word: Shema. Shema means listen, pay attention to what's going on in your life. And that's why the Rambam continues and he says, "Therefore, it's proper for a person to cry and mourn for his sins and for what he has done to his soul, the evil consequences that he brought upon it." This is implied in the following verse, also in Jeremiah: "Of what should a living man be grieved? A man of his sins."

1:26:12The prophet continues explaining that since free choice is in our hands and our own decision is what prompts us to commit all these wrongs, it's proper for us to repent and abandon our wickedness, for this choice is now in our hands. This is also implied by the verse, also in Jeremiah: "Let us search and examine our ways and return to God." In so many words, Jeremiah repeats it time and time again, and the Rambam uses it as a source in Hilchot Teshuvah. If something is happening in your life and you don't like it, that's HaKadosh Baruch Hu doing you a favor by speaking to you, by instructing you, and by trying to navigate you. So Hashem is going to try to treat you also as B'ni. He's not going to give you the hammer on day one. He wants to rebuke you. He's going to start with Shema. He's going to start with saying something to you. If you pay attention to what the Rabbi says, if you pay attention to what the lecturer says, if you pay attention to what the Rambam says, if you pay attention to what the Ramban says, what Tanach says, what the Chumash says, you pay attention, we finish there. You pay attention, you do, finished. You have nothing else to worry about. Why? You did it, you got it. I'm finished.

1:27:36Just wait for better times because they're gonna come. Why do you have to wait? Because you still have to pay for some of the stuff you haven't fixed yet. But if you're gonna ignore it, then Hashem says I have to speak a little louder. But because you're still My son, I'm not gonna go from one time and then hurt you really hard. I'm gonna send you a text message and then a WhatsApp, and then a voice note. I'm gonna leave you a voicemail and then send you an email. I'm gonna call you and then I'm gonna send you a letter. Eventually, I'm gonna have to show up at your house and say, "Hey, hey, don't you listen? I'm God." But by then, it's almost too late. By then, it's cancer. By then, it's a shame. You understand? So you can technically do teshuva immediately by simply listening to this. You figure out, "Okay, you know what? I got it. I got it. The guy with the laces, that was enough," and

1:28:36I'm gonna start wearing my laces the right way. I'm gonna start putting my shoes on the right way. I'm gonna start keeping mitzvot. I'm gonna start doing something. Or you could continue coming to the shiur and grinding water, doing absolutely nothing about it. Enjoy the shiur like it's a movie, and nothing changes. It depends; it's up to you. But, Rabotai, if you're gonna rebuke other people, you have to know that you have to show them some love. You have to show them that you actually are doing it because you care. If you're going to rebuke just anybody because you like to tell people what to do, then you should know that you are probably the problem, not them. And that's what Shlomo HaMelech was trying to tell us in Proverbs, chapter 9, verse number 8. Don't rebuke the scoffer. You know, somebody that makes fun of religion, somebody that makes fun of rabbis, don't even bother rebuking him. Nothing's going to happen. In fact, you're going to lead him to sin even more. He says, don't rebuke the scoffer, lest he hate you. Meaning, you try to help him, he's going to hate you even more. He's going to make fun of you. He's going to make fun of your religion. He's going to make fun of your beliefs. Don't waste your time on him.

1:29:56Rebuke a wise man, and he will love you. What does he mean by "wise man"? What makes somebody a chacham? What makes somebody a chacham? I taught you this a few weeks ago. What makes somebody a chacham? Anytime you read the Gemara, chacham. Matza chacham. What's a chacham? Talmid chacham. Talmid chacham. Rabbi Akiva was what? A talmid chacham. Rabbi Ovadia was what? A talmid chacham. Talmid means what? Student. Who's wise? Someone who wants to learn. Someone who wants to learn has to learn constantly. He wants to learn; if you rebuke him, he's open to learning. He's open to listening. That's who you root for. The guy who is not listening to you, who is looking into the walls, who is thinking about a The guy's talking about Moshe Rabbeinu. He says, it's a chandelier. It's a chandelier. If it reflects this way, you know what? I'm going to go this way. And he's looking at himself in the phone, a reflection. You know, my hair. He starts doing his hair in the middle. That guy, don't bother with him. It's a waste of time. It's a waste of time. Waste, waste. Don't insult him. Hopefully, one day he wakes up. That's a waste of time. The guy's paying attention. The guy's writing notes. That's who you invest in. The guy's writing notes. That means he's a Talmid. If he's a Talmid, that's who you help.

1:31:11You invest in him. Shlomo HaMelech says, if he's a talmid, you invest in him. Because if you invest in him, eventually he's going to love you. Why? Because he's going to realize you saved his life. And that's why in verse 12, he says, if you've become wise, you've become wise for your own good. And if you've become a scoffer, you alone will have to bear the responsibility. He says, listen, the guy that's trying to help you do teshuva, if you listen to him, good. It's for your own good. You're not doing him any favors. He'll get the reward one way or the other. You do teshuva, chazak u'baruch, good for you. Why? You will benefit in this world and the next. If not, you continue being a heretic, you continue looking at the chandelier the whole time, you continue playing with your phone, you continue focusing on the donuts, you continue violating Shabbat, you continue going out with the Goyah, you'll have yourself to blame. And you will have a very, very big bill to bear by yourself. Why? He rebuked you. He's removed from responsibility. Meaning, if he didn't rebuke you, then he also has the problem.

1:32:35That's why the Gemara in Masechet Shabbat says that Rabbi Elazar ben Azaryah almost got Gehenom for it. Why? He didn't rebuke his neighbor. saw his neighbor; she was a widow, a poor little woman. Her husband died. He says, "What, I'm going to rebuke her? Ah, it's not even a severe sin; it's a rabbinical sin. It's not like a worse sin. What happened? What sin? What, did she drive on Shabbat? What'd she do?" So, she forgot the pa'amonim, the bells on top of her cow, and the cow is not allowed to carry on Shabbat. If the cow carries on Shabbat, it's like the owner carried on Shabbat. And Rabbi Elazar ben Azariah says, this poor woman, she's probably still dealing with the loss of her husband. She probably forgot that the cow still has the bells on it. Ah, let it go. Let it go. He got a message from Shamayim because he was at a different level that none of us could actually be. And he heard from Shamayim

1:33:36He has a very serious problem. Why? In Shamayim, they just put a din: Rabbi Elazar ben Azariah mechalel Shabbat. He never violated Shabbat. It was his neighbor. You didn't tell her. You're guilty. He fasted for 19 years. 19 years, morning to night, he would fast. He would get a drink and start again the next day, morning to night, for 19 years straight until all of his teeth turned black, to do teshuva for this sin that his neighbor committed. Why? Because he understood what it means to violate Shabbat. He understood what it means not to rebuke your neighbor. So if you rebuke, you tell them the truth, good. But you have to remember, you have to do it a certain way. You have to show them you care. You can't say, "Hey, wicked lady, fix your cow, fix your life." No, that's not going to help her. She's probably going to throw the cow at you or a rock or something at you. You deserve it. Don't talk to her like that. Talk to her like a human being. But the point being, you have to do something. Something. If you do it, good for you. If you don’t do it, you'll have to bear the responsibility.

1:34:56Now, again, kaf zechut with what? If he's a talmid chacham, if he's a talmid chacham and there's a reason to have zechut, yes. But if, let's say for example, you see the rabbi driving on Shabbat, You're obligated to give an excuse and use your imagination of why he's driving on Shabbat. What could it be? What could it be that the rabbi is driving on Shabbat? Oh, he probably has one of the kehillah members in the back seat going to the hospital, and he's saving their life. So that's why he's driving on Shabbat. He's driving to the hospital. if you see the rabbi driving to the shul, then it's a little bit more difficult to determine the kav zechut in that sense, why he killed it, especially if he closes the door and nobody follows him. Then you have a very serious problem there; you have to probably change shuls. But if you don't know, you have to have kav zechut as long as this person is somebody that's serious, somebody that you have a reason to give them kav zechut. But just an average person...

1:36:04cannot give them why, because the average person today, by default, is ignorant. By default, it's just most people in general in this generation are ignorant. So I've met people that go to shul for netz. Netz means they go to the first minyan, five o'clock, six o'clock in the morning, driving on Shabbat. They go to the beit knesset at 5:30 in the morning. Because they want to pray really early in the morning, serve Hashem, "I love Hashem, I love Hashem." Well, they're disobeying Hashem by driving on Shabbat. You understand? So, this guy, I don't know if he knew or he didn't know. The first time I saw it, I was in shock. But then I saw, when I was living in Boca Raton, an entire parking lot just like his. An entire parking lot. When it was the first guy I saw, I almost had a heart attack. I said, I have to help this guy. But then it was 200 cars. 200 cars. Each car had 2, 3, 4, or 5 people coming out with their talit. I'm like, wait, is this Reform? What's going on? Reform, Boko Haram, what's going on here? And I realized, no, it's not the people. It's Ephraim Goldberg and his friends. It's the rabbis. It's not here. It's not the people. It's the rabbis. Why? Because the rabbis designated a parking lot just for them. They even have a security guard for them. In essence, telling them, "You're allowed to drive on Shabbat."

1:37:30As long as you drive the big asset, just like the Reform. So people like this, Rabotai, unless they're anashim emet, unless they're real serious people, even if you talk to them, most likely you're not going to be able to help them. And the reason why is because I tried it for a few years, three, four years, whatever it was, and every single time I helped somebody do teshuva, they would start going to shul, and then the rabbi would ruin them. And guess what would happen? They would stop coming to the shiur. They do teshuva, go to shul, the rabbi ruins them, and they stop coming to the shiur. And one after another, after another, after another, 50, 60 people. Filled up the whole shul, they love me, the kehillah loves me because I filled up their kehillah. But then they hate me because I remind the rabbi that he's a kofer. But you see, Rabotai, some people you can help, and some people you can't help. But you have to try. You have to try, but there are certain things that you have to know as reality. You have to use a little bit of your own brain and realize that Sometimes the person doesn't know any better, so you have to be easy on him. Sometimes he does know, and he doesn't care—don't waste your time. Most people don't know; very few people know and don't care. The most dangerous people in this generation, as far as people that know and don't care, have the title "rabbi" and...

1:38:52It's not usually the kehillah. The kehillah is very few and far in between. Every kehillah has one menuval or another, but usually, most people are decent people. They're just clueless. The problem in our generation is that we have a lot of Erev Rav, just like Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai said, most of the rabbis in the last generation will be Erev Rav. That's just the reality. It's not Yaron Reuven. Yes? No, I mean, you can and you can't. I mean, you can't tell just by looking at him. He doesn't have like a sign, like a swastika, Erev Rav under it or anything. You could pretty much tell by simply how, you know, you look at what does he teach, what does he say, how does he react, what kind of results does he have? I mean, it takes a little bit of investment. You can't just, there's no, like, default. And you can't call people out on it. But the point is that it doesn't matter who Erev Rav is. It matters who we are. What are we doing? What are we doing to help our fellow? What are we doing to help our brother and sister? What are we doing to help our community? Don't worry if the rabbi is Erev Rav. You still have a responsibility. Help yourself, help your friend, help your community, and so on and so forth. But the most important part is that if you're going to tell people the truth, you have to tell them in a certain way, where they know that yes, you're guiding them.

1:40:06But you care about them, and that's why it says Shema B'ni Musar. Why is it Shema B'ni Musar? Why is it not Shema B'ni Torah? Shema B'ni Chiddush? Shema B'ni something else? Why is the Ramban using Shlomo HaMelech's verse saying Shema B'ni Musar? Because even if you want to be Like many people that call themselves Chabad in our generation are not exactly Chabad. They call themselves Chabad, but they're not. Or people call themselves Breslev, but they're not. I told you this many times before. I love Chabad. I love Breslev. I love Judaism. But I hate people that are fakers and pretend to be somebody that they're not. So people say, no, no. In Chabad, we don't rebuke. That's complete nonsense. No, in Breslev, we don't rebuke. That's complete nonsense. No, in Chassidut, we don't rebuke anybody. It's complete nonsense. Why? I read the books.

1:41:07Go look at the Tanya, how he talks about how if you ate treif or you ate non-kosher, you get a Gehenom of snow. That's the foundation of Chabad. Go read the Baal Shem Tov. Go read the foundation of Chassidut, how many times he mentions Gehenom. Go read the Torah for Breslev, Rabbi Nachman of Breslev. How many times he talks about somebody as a snake, somebody that's a rasha, somebody that's evil, and so on and so forth. Go read what they say about themselves. So what happens in our generation? People say, "No, no, we're Chabad, we're Breslev, we are Chassidut, so we don't rebuke." That's complete nonsense. What you're saying is anti-Chabad. It's anti-Breslev. It's anti-Chassidut. It's anti-Hashem. But there is a little bit of truth in it, and that's what makes people fail. What's the truth? The truth is, "Shema B'ni."

1:42:09Here, my son, I love you. You're supposed to show them love. You're supposed to show them, come to our shul, come for Shabbat, come for some tzimmes, come for this, come for that. You're supposed to show them love and dance, and yeah, I love you, I love you, I love you. You're supposed to do that part of Chabad. But you can't finish there. Because if you keep telling him, I love you, I love you, I love you, guess what? Nothing will come out of him eventually. 20 years, I love you, I love you, I love you, still driving on Shabbat. 20 years, still dating the Goyah. 20 years, still a thief in business. 20 years, he's still a gambler. 20 years, he's still a loser. If I love you, I love you, I love you forever, and you never give mussar, nothing's gonna happen. So you have to say, I love you, but I have to tell you the truth, gambling, it's not allowed. I love you, but I have to tell you the truth, driving on Shabbat, it's not allowed. I love you, but to be honest with you, your wife is going to put you in Gehenom. What? She's a Goyah. No, she converted. Yeah, it was Conservative. It was Reform. It was ISIS. It was something. It was not Judaism. You and her are going to Gehenom together if you keep staying together. I love you though. Come for the children. But I have to tell you the truth. You have an anger problem. You have a stinginess problem.

1:43:37Telling you because I love you. If I didn't tell you, then I actually hate you. Why? Because if I didn't tell you, there would be no way for you to know there's something wrong with it. Therefore, you would think it's actually right to do what you're doing. You would think it's actually right to drive on Shabbat as long as it's to the Beit Knesset. You would think it's actually right to cheat in business as long as you're cheating for some reason people think that's okay. You think it's right to go and date as many women as you want as long as your wife doesn't know. You would think it's right to to go and marry a Goyah, but as long as you don't have any kids, it's okay. You think it's right to do all those stupid things that the Yetzer Hara says to you, it's okay as long as the rabbi doesn't change you. As long as the rabbi doesn't rebuke you, it's fine. Because if he was wrong, of course, he would tell you something. He's a rabbi, after all. You see, rabotai, the Yetzer Hara is smarter than everybody. He's stronger than everybody.

1:44:42If you only listen to part of his advice, you fall into his trap perfectly. If you say, "Listen, in my lectures, I get 500 people. In your lectures, you barely get a minyan, Mr. Rubin. What's the difference? I get 500 people; you get five people. So obviously, I'm better than you." Well, what do you say in your lecture? Well, I tell everybody that Hashem loves them. I tell everybody that Hashem adores them. I tell everybody that all of Israel has a share in the World to Come. I tell everybody that Hashem is going to put them in Gan Eden, and the Rebbe is going to save them, and the Baal Shem Tov is going to save them, and this one's going to, everyone's going to save them. That's what I tell them. 500 people show up to my lecture. So I show success, right? I said, yeah, you and the 500 people probably are going to be together for a long time. in a different environment, because the reality is that's not showing. That's not proof of success. Proof of success is what happens to those people in the end. What happens to them in the end, meaning not just after this world. Here, 20 years later, they're still going to look the same: same clothes

1:45:59same measly prayer, same stinginess, same rotten middot. I'd rather have five people than 500 people. Why? My five people are actually going to be tzaddikim. And I promise you, if your 500 people knew what the five people are getting, they'd be 505. You see, rabotai, the mussar is a necessary ingredient. You have to tell people the truth, even if it hurts them. How? Remind yourself they're your son and you have to remind them, "I love you," by saying, "Listen, son, I know that I got you to come to the party by saying it's a party, but then when you arrived at the party, it turned into an intervention." It wasn't really a party. And it wasn't really comfortable because I was telling you, by the way, your addiction is a problem. By the way, your girlfriend's a problem. This is a problem. That's a problem. This is a problem. That's a problem. I told you, you have a lot of problems, right? But remember, the Musar is coming from Avicha. I love you. I'm telling you because I'm your father after all. And that's why the Chachamim say in the Gemara, several times, you teach somebody Torah, you're just like his father.

1:47:29you become a spiritual father. Why? You created him. Before he was doing teshuva, he was considered dead in the eyes of Hashem. Spiritually dead. He was alive, flesh and blood, he was alive. But spiritually considered dead. Resha'im, even during their life, they're considered dead. Once he did teshuva, once he became a tzaddik, once he started becoming a tzaddeket, then she's considered alive forever in this world and the next. Who gave him that life? You. You gave him a CD. You donated to the rabbi that gave him the CD. You did something. You arranged a lecture. You invited him to a lecture. You did something. You're their father. Hashem says, "Me and you are partners. Me and you are partners." That's why we need to put things in perspective. Now, Once a person shows that he cares, he shows a person that he wants to help him. But then after that, he starts helping them with some things that are a little bit difficult to hear. That person may recoil a little bit, may go back a little bit. Rav Yisrael says, no, no, remind them you are his father. How? You have to understand human psychology. You see, the average person, Rav Yisrael says, the average person

1:48:58in his imagination, in his imagination, he's free to do whatever he wants. But in his reality, he's a prisoner. In his imagination, he thinks, I can do whatever I want. Why? Who's going to stop me? I can eat whatever I want. I can climb anywhere I want. I can marry who I want. I can make as much as I want. What are you going to say? In his imagination, he can do anything. In reality, He has a conscience. He realizes, after all, I can't really marry whoever I want. I mean, technically, I can't really make whatever I want. I mean, I'm technically only working here at UPS. I'm technically only working here at the shul. Technically, I can't really make much. I can make maybe an extra 5,000 on the side. In reality, he realizes, no, no, no. I'm just imagining. He says, you want to help the person? You want to help him like a father is supposed to help him?

1:50:03him how to have his mind overcome his imagination. Show him how all of those things that he thought and believed that he could do whatever he wants, and therefore that's why he does whatever he wants, but then he realizes that it was the wrong decision. Show him before he makes those bad decisions. Helping get stronger mentally and realize that this imagination is indeed an imagination. Stop thinking you could do whatever you want. Remember, you can't; there's a consequence to everything. Yes, you technically can drive 150 miles per hour on the highway on the way home, you can technically. But eventually, it's not gonna work out so good for countless reasons. Technically, you can spend money as if it's going bad, like milk. But realistically, it's not going to end so well, even if you have a lot to start with. It's not going to end so well. If you want to help somebody, you have to remind them that yes, in your imagination, it seems like everything is allowed.

1:51:27Everything is possible, everything is for the taking, but we both know that's false. You have to help the guy constantly have reality and honesty in his mind. Because if a parent wants to be a good parent, the first thing they have to press on with their kids, even before teaching them About all the details of the Torah, about the mitzvot and everything else, even before the educational age usually starts around six, even before that at four or five, there's one thing you want to make sure to teach your kid and press on it as much as possible: always remember to do it in the right way. And that's honesty. Because honesty... if you teach them honesty when they're little, they'll be honest when they're old. If you don't teach them honesty when they're little, all bets are off. You see, the Chachamim say that even when somebody makes a mistake in their life, it didn't come from nothing. The Saba Mislabodka gives an analogy. He says, you see, one time,

1:52:56There was a kid that came from a religious family, a really good family, that stole an apple. And you know, in a religious community, it's not common for a kid to steal an apple. Even though today things are different, things are different, to say the least. In the old generation, even the secular kids usually didn't steal. Needless to say, the religious kids. So when a little religious kid stole an apple... It was a little bit of a shake-up in the community. Sabba of Slabodka says, wait, you think it started with the kid? It didn't start with the kid. It didn't start with the kid. This started two generations ago. Two generations ago it started. It was how? What, gilgul? No, not gilgul. No incarnation. His grandfather, his grandfather pretended to be more righteous than he was. He was righteous, but he pretended to be a little bit more righteous than he was. a little bit more. Like, you know, like one of those people that says they do things, but in reality, they don't do them. Like he says, "What did you do today?" "Oh, I studied all day." The guy studied maybe an hour. "No, I was in front of the book the whole day." He was in front of the book the whole day, but he was sleeping.

1:54:09Pretend like he did something. He's a decent person. He's not a Rasha. He's not Haman. He's not Korach. He's not a Rasha. He's good. But he's like a little bit more, you know, like everybody finishes Amidah, but he takes an extra 25 minutes. But in reality, he's sleeping the whole time, but he just knows how to move. Like he pretends like he's at Har Sinai every prayer. Like he's never, if he's really doing it. But he's not. He's pretending. But only he knew he was the one pretending. Nobody knew he was pretending. Everybody thought he was real. Sabba Mislobodka says in Shamayim they knew he was real. And guess what? At some point, the people in your house are gonna know you're fake too. So his son saw that Abba is a little bit of a faker, a little bit, not a lot of a faker, a little bit of a faker, a little bit of a faker. So the son said, it's not so bad to be a little bit of a faker, not a big faker, no, not a little bit of a faker, a little mini faker. So one day the son gave a shiur. Son, son, it's a big kavod for the family to give a shiur. So the son gave a shiur and he said a chiddush.

1:55:20Now, the chiddush came from the Maharsha, who got it from the Rambam, who got it from the Gemara, who got it from a source in the Torah. But the guy said, it's such a beautiful, delicious chiddush, I'm going to put my name on it. Nobody knows in this kehillah. Anybody here know who the Maharsha is? You don't know who the Maharsha is. Anybody know who the Rambam is? You don't know who the Rambam is. I'm going to say it's me. I'm Steve. I have a chiddush. What a chiddush. You probably were at Mount Sinai for sure. Everybody gives Steve kavod for this chiddush that he just gave. It's not his chiddush though. And Steve goes home and he says, what a chiddush I gave these people. Not even for a second does he think I'm a thief. I just said a chiddush in my name. And it's not my chiddush. It's not my insight. Yeah, but the Maharsha, he's not even in this world anymore. He was here a few hundred years ago. And Rambam, he's in Gan Eden. He's with Moshe Rabbeinu. What are you talking about? Yeah, but I'm only lying a little bit, a little bit fake. Grandpa was also a little bit. And guess what? This rabbi that said a chiddush not in his name, instead of the rabbi's name, his son also sees.

1:56:45It's okay to be a little bit fake. A little bit. Just a little bit of a lie. A little bit. I'm going to tell the clerk this. Yeah, yeah, I'm looking for some groceries for my mom. You have oranges? You have apples? Okay, you know what? I'm going to get this apple. And you know, I'm going to pay him for one apple, but I'm going to take two. After all, it's only 10 cents. This guy owns the whole store. Look how many apples he has. He has like at least 500 apples. What's the big deal? I paid for one apple. He's probably making at least 100% on the one apple. So he's not losing money on me because I'm taking one, buy one, get one free. It's just a little bit. A little bit fake. A little bit of a lie. And the Saba of Slabodka says, how did it all start? With just a little bit of an exception. If you want to be a good parent, you want to be a good parent, the Shelah HaKadosh says the most important quality to teach your kids when they're still young is honesty. You have to teach your kids honesty. To such an extent that the Shelah HaKadosh says one time he met a Sephardic Chassid.

1:58:07that was above and beyond honest. Like one of these people, straight arrow, yes, yes; no, no. He says, I'll be there. He's there. I'm not going to be there. He's not going to be there. One of these people that it's like amazing, like it's too good to be true. He says to him, wow, you're really an honest person. He says, well, it's all thanks to my father. He says, why? He says, when I was a kid, My father, anytime I would admit that I did something wrong, instead of punishing me, he'd reward me. I did something wrong, but because I was honest about it, he gave me a prize. When would he punish me? If I lied. If I lied about doing something wrong, then he punished me severely. And from that, I learned, what? You get rewarded for saying the truth even if what you did is bad? You get punished for doing bad. You might as well be honest in either case. I'll be okay, and little by little I realized, wait a minute. I not only want to be honest, I also want to be good too. And it applied to the rest of my life. You see, it's these little things that we take for granted, that we think are not a big deal, like when a parent doesn't feel like answering the phone, so he tells his son, "Tell them I'm not home."

1:59:35Tell them I'm not home. No, nobody's here. No, I don't have any money. Somebody came for tzedakah. No, no, no, we don't have any money. We don't have any money. The guy has $50,000 in his bank and maybe $500 in his pocket, but he doesn't feel like giving it. No, no, I don't have anything on me. He has $30, $40, $50, $100, $200. He has it. He doesn't want to give. And his son knows he doesn't want to give, but he teaches his son that it's okay to lie. Small things like that will end up causing a lot of problems later on in life. It seems like nothing, but later on, it becomes a very, very serious problem. And that's what the Ramban is trying to teach us here within the first few words. He's saying yes, make sure that they're listening and... Yes, you have to make sure that you show them some love. Give them a hug, give them a high five, give them a compliment. If they're already listening, they deserve a compliment, but don't stay there. You have to tell them the truth, even if it hurts. Mussar hurts. Nobody likes to be told what to do. Nobody likes to be told that they're wrong.

2:00:55I promise you, if you tell them in a way that shows them that you're telling them only because you care, they will love you in the end. If you show them that you care about them as if they are your children, they're never going to dislike a rabbi who tells them that they really have to work on themselves. They're never going to be happy about it, but they'll be happy with the results. They'll be happy that you're honest with them. this, by the way, is one of the things that kills the Erev Rav. Why? One of the things that baffles people is how their equation doesn't work. What do I mean? So you see all of the fakers that tell people that they're all great and they're all wonderful and nobody has to do teshuva. We tell them, why don't you tell people the truth and... no, if I tell them that they're not allowed to drive on Shabbat, if I tell them that they're not allowed to do this or do that, they're not going to come anymore. They're not going to come anymore; they're going to be turned off. So you see, they have in their mind that if you tell people the truth to help them, you're actually going to hurt them. And this works in their mind. What turns that entire equation on its head

2:02:22is when they see that somebody told them the truth. And not only did people not run away, they actually did teshuvah. And not only did they do teshuvah, they brought more people. And not only did they bring more people, there are millions of people that want Every day, thousands of more people are watching the videos. Every day, thousands more people are doing something about it. Every day, more and more people are spreading it around the world. More people want it. This kills them. Why? Because they think, "Wait a minute, if you tell them the truth, they're going to run away." But he's telling the truth, and they're not running away. He's telling the truth, and it's actually kind of popular. He's telling the truth, and... it's got a million views on just one channel. We have 67. 67. Between two channels. How could it be a million views on one channel? He talks about the Holocaust, and we talk about Gan Eden, and we have 67 views. Wow! Because that is the power of Torah. The power of Torah is so extraordinary that...

2:03:41Rav Pincus used to say, I would swear on it, he says, I would swear on it, that it doesn't matter what you teach people as long as it's emet. Why? You put people three, four days in a room, teach them anything, don't even teach them proofs, teach them anything, read any Gemara, read Masechet Yoma, read Halacha, read anything, three days, they hold u'teshuva. As long as it's emet. Why? That's the power of Torah. Which means that anyone who's been going to shul for 5, 10, 20, 30 years and still hasn't had teshuvah, that speaks for itself. That speaks for itself. So, all of us need to know that we have to care, we have to rebuke, and most importantly, we have to remember that it has to be true. It has to be true. You have to be an ish emet. Shem next week. We'll continue on this verse. There's a lot more to say, but I think that this gives us a little bit of a rundown of how deep the words of the Rambam are, of the Ramban are, and how it was chosen carefully and not just something you should listen to. This is a good idea. These are not recommendations. These are not suggestions. This is literally an instruction book for life if you analyze it so

2:05:08you analyze it the right way, it'll be an instruction book for life in a better way than you could ever imagine. If you just treat it as if it's just another thing, then, like anything else in life, we have to wait, hopefully, until you follow the first word, which is "Shema." Any questions? Yes? It depends on what the rebuke is. It depends on what the rebuke is. It depends if he would accept you as the vessel. So, in general, when it comes to telling people the truth, you have to identify who the customer is, like we said in the beginning. Sometimes, even if you have the truth, and even if they're willing to listen, they're not willing to listen from you.

2:06:11because they view you as someone that is not fit to rebuke them for different reasons. Many times it has to do with ego; in fact, all the time it has to do with ego, assuming that you're the right person to communicate. But nonetheless, this is the reason why there's nobody that is like, for example, the father of Moshe Rabbeinu, one of the reasons he's mentioned in the Gemara is not just because he's one of four people that never sinned, but also because he's one of these people that did not care where the truth is coming from. When his daughter Miriam told him about the decree, she said, "You just passed a decree that's even worse than Paro's."

2:07:12She is five years old at this time. He is the Gadol HaDor. He's the biggest rabbi in the world, in Egypt. Moshe's father. He never sinned even one time in his life. But he saw that Pharaoh is throwing every baby killing it. Sometimes he's slaughtering 150 babies in the morning, 150 at night. 150 babies he's slaughtering in the morning, 150 babies slaughtering at night. For what? To take all of their blood and make a bath in it. That's 300 babies a day just for that. Then all the babies that are boys, they kill them. They throw them in the water, let them drown. The mothers got so desperate that they would go under an apple tree, have the baby, and leave the baby there. Why? Because they said maybe the baby has a better chance of surviving under this tree in the wild than me taking him back home and the Egyptians taking him. That's how desperate Am Yisrael got. People that read the Midrashim of what happened in Egypt see that it was as horrible as horrible can be. So,

2:08:18Amram, the father of Moshe Rabbeinu, said that it's better that we don't have any more kids. Why? If we have kids, the Egyptians are going to kill them. So he told his wife, you have it, okay, you have it, we're going to separate. Here's a get, finished, no more. So his daughter, Miriam, who's five years old, comes and says, Abba, you know that your decree, what you just did, is worse than Paro. Now, if I was her father, I'd say, go to your room, little five-year-old. What are you telling me what to do? I'm the biggest rabbi in the world. I've never made a one cent in my life. But that's why I'm not him. What did he say? He says, my daughter, why? Why am I worse than Paro? Why? Why is it that I do worse than Paro? She says, Abba, you are the biggest rabbi in the world. You're a Shevet Levi. Everyone's going to listen to you, meaning you divorced Ima. Everyone's going to divorce their wives. You are not going to have kids; no one's going to have any kids. Oh, Paro makes a decree, it doesn't have to come true. You make a decree, Hashem makes it come true. Which means what you see...

2:09:36If you continue having kids, Paro makes a decree that he's going to kill the boys, not the girls. Which means that, at worst case scenario, half die. The boys die, not the girls. So at least some girls are going to come into the world. With your decree, Abba, no boys, no girls. So it's much worse than Paro. Is it true or not? It's 100% true. That's why Amram says, "She's right." Do a Shidduch between me and Abba, you get a thousand from each side. He was the Shadchan and Amram married his wife Yocheved once again, and because he listened to a little rebuke from a five-year-old, because it was Emet, he got the ultimate Ish Emet. Who? Moshe Rabbeinu. Moshe Rabbeinu was born after that. That was the present. You listen to them regardless of where it comes from. Your reward is the ultimate in it. Unfortunately, we don't have an Amram in our generation. In fact, we don't even have a shoe that's equivalent to him. So most people are going to be the judge and jury of every judge and jury that they have unless they don't have a choice. So you have to know who your customer is if it's immediate family.

2:11:01more times than not, it's not going to work. The reason why is because your immediate family is never going to view you like Amram viewed his daughter, where he didn't care that she was five; he just cared about whether what she was saying was true or not. Your immediate family can't see past you; they can't see past you. They don't care what you're saying. So the reality is, most of the time, the people that have known you your whole life are the worst customers in the world. Even if you become a rabbi, they're the worst customers in the world. Why? Because they're always going to remember, "Wait a minute, this little peacock over here is telling me what to do. Doesn't he remember I used to change his diapers? Doesn't he remember I bought him his first toy? Doesn't he remember I was watching him cry at the dentist when they were just giving him a cleaning?" He doesn't remember that I took him to kindergarten and he peed in his pants, and I had to come back from work to pick him up. He doesn't remember that I was in his first grade, you know, getting his siddur for the first time. He's going to tell me what to do. Unless the fathers of tzaddikim, the mothers of tzaddikim, or whoever the person is, are truly righteous ish emet already, it's very, very unlikely for them to see past the diaper, past the past. Very difficult. So how do you help them?

2:12:23Don't do it. Let me do it. Take a CD. It's free. Give it to them. That's it. That's all you do. Give them a CD. Give them a link. Send them an email with one of our shiurim. Walk away. That's what you have to do. Don't be a hero in every battle because they're not going to listen to you anyway. Why bother? Having a fight you can't win. So, you have to know who the customer is. Who is the best customer? Complete strangers. Those are the best customers. Why? The complete stranger doesn't know what you used to be, how you were, or what. So, he already judges you favorably. He's assuming that maybe you're like an angel that came from heaven or something. Maybe you're like his personal Eliyahu HaNavi. Maybe you're the sign. Maybe you're not. They're giving you all types of descriptions that this is what I needed to hear. Why? Because they don't have any

2:13:31predisposition about you unless they're racist or sexist or some type of psychopath or some other kind of different story. But if they're a relatively normal person, it's much, much easier to help strangers than it is to help immediate family or friends. And that's because people are judgmental, and they cannot get past their own ego. Their own ego will not allow them to listen to people that they knew before the change, so you have to not do it directly, but rather do it indirectly. By taking a CD or taking a link of a lecture or a WhatsApp video or something like that of one of our videos and sending it to them, and that's it. Let that do the job. Sometimes it'll work perfectly; sometimes it won't work either. But that's not because of you, and it's probably not because of the speaker either. It's because they're not willing to change. Some people are just not willing to change, and unfortunately, some people will not change. The Rambam writes that before Mashiach comes, you'll have to have merit to be one of the people that actually does teshuva. Not everybody is going to do teshuva like people think. Some people will do teshuva, some people will not. Some people have a merit to do teshuva, some people don't.

2:14:52The longer I do this, the more people I deal with, the more I realize that the people that have merit are few and far between. Not that many people have merit to do teshuva. Some people have merit to do mitzvot. Many people have merit to do mitzvot. Keep this, keep that, keep this, keep that. But real teshuva, to change their entire life, their character, their everything, very few people have that merit. And that's also because they don't want it. They want only part of it. So you can help people, but most of the time it's going to be much more effective if you help strangers than if you help immediate family and friends and things like that and people that know you from your past. Next question. I'll give you a story to take home that I think combines the question and the whole lecture in one. And you'll always remember this. When you talk about people's kids...

2:15:53It's very easy to tell people, "Ah, throw him out." This happens, unfortunately, a lot in the religious communities. A kid starts wearing a blue shirt; parents assume he's off the derech. You know, a kid wants to wear a polo shirt with short sleeves; they assume he's already maybe a kofer. Judge a lot by looks. Some of the most righteous people that I know dress like average Joes; they don't dress in suits and ties. And some of the most wicked people that I know wear suits and ties, quite a few actually. Even some of them call themselves rabbis. Now, when you talk about people's kids... And I tell, "Oh yeah, I'm having a problem with my kid, such and such is happening, such and such is happening, the kid is addicted to this, addicted to that, going out with this one, going out with that one." Always remember, your kid is not their kid. So they're not going to give you the advice that you would give yourself. They're going to tell you things, probably that you don't want to hear, and most of the time it's wrong. Why? It's your kid, not theirs.

2:17:15going to tell all my kids addicted to this, addicted to that. What are they going to tell you? "Ah, throw him out. He's good for nothing, this kid. He's terrible, he's this, he's that." And most of the time it's wrong. Why is it wrong? Because they're not looking at your kid as if it's their kid. Rav Avigdor Miller was one of the most important speakers that lived in the last century. 1991: He had a lecture with a huge audience, and he told Am Yisrael at that moment, "I said that Gog and Magog will be three wars: the First, Second, and Third Wars. We have already seen the first two; the third is coming. You are making Hashem bring it sooner than it needs to be." He warned people, and he got a lot of people to do teshuva, but he also knew how to make people realize that, after all, he loves them. And he said, you see, one time he would make fun of himself. He would tell stories about himself. He would laugh at himself, but most importantly, he could relate to the average person by telling personal stories. He says, one time I was coming home and...

2:18:39And I was approaching my building, and I saw a kid fall right in front of me. A kid fell right in front of me. Pah! His head. Blood everywhere. Little kid. Mama's little kid. I felt, I saw this kid, blood everywhere. I go, I grab the kid. I picked up the kid. I don't know who the kid is. I'm grabbing him to take him home. The kid's blood everywhere. Me, I scan the poor little kid. And one of the neighbors, one of the neighbors, this little, you know, older lady, Says, "Oh, Rebbe, hey, Rebbe, how are you? Thank you for helping the kid. You're such a good Rebbe. But don't worry, Rebbe." Don't worry. It'll grow. He'll get over this. It's okay. One day he'll have a bar mitzvah, and he'll get married. Don't worry. It's just a bruise. Don't worry. And little by little, Rav Shabaton gets closer and closer and closer to this lady. He says, ah, it's okay, bubele. Stop crying. It's okay. It's okay.

2:19:44What happened? She realized it's her grandson. She realized it's her grandson. So the neighbor said, no, don't worry. It's okay. One day he'll go out. He'll have his bar mitzvah. He'll get married. He'll be okay. And Rav Shabaton says, the whole time I'm thinking to myself, what a mussar lesson I got here. What a mussar lesson I got here. Why? What mussar lesson can I learn from this? He says, look, everybody has their own Yankele, and that's all they care about. Your Yankele, they don't care about. They'll tell you to throw him out. They'll tell you to throw him away. Their own Yankele, hatzilu, hatzilu, help me, help me, help me. So you have to make sure that if you're going to give somebody some guidance, some mussar, don't be this old lady that only cares about her own Yankele. Think about their son, their father, their spouse, their whoever, as if it's your Yankele. If you can't see yourself as if they're your Yankele, don't give them advice at all. Don't give them mussar. Don't give them anything. Stay home.

2:21:09Be quiet. Do them a favor. But if you can see them as if they're your son, and they're your daughter, and they're your wife, and they're this, and what would you do? Then you give them advice. This, Rabotai, is one of the most important things to listen to. Because a lot of people ask for advice, especially when it's free. Don't volunteer advice, and don't even accept to be a person that would give advice unless you can be unbiased. Unless you can look at the picture as you would look at it for your own life, don't tell people to get divorced if you wouldn't get divorced. Don't tell people to have kids if you wouldn't have kids. Don't tell people not to have kids if you would have kids. Don't tell people to do stuff you wouldn't do. So first and foremost, work on yourself. Second of all, pay attention. Pay attention to what's going on around you. Third of all, make sure they're paying attention. Fourth, show some care. Emulate, empathize. Next, show them that you're doing it because you care. But most importantly, always remain honest. If you are honest with people, in the end, they'll appreciate it. They may hate you a little bit. Just a little bit. But they'll appreciate it. Tomorrow we have another shiur. We continue in Sunny Isles with our questions and answers. Whoever asks a good question gets 50 bucks.

2:22:38So far, both Hashem each week, we had a couple of winners of the best questions. At least also the books, like I told you. Please, if you are going to take one, please do, but bring it each week because they cost money. If you want to donate, donate to Be'ezrat Hashem (B"H) on the website. If you want to buy one on your own, you could just go to Artscroll.com. It's like three, four dollars, whatever it is, plus shipping. You can buy it from them. And Baruch Hashem Elokeinu. Amen ve'Amen.