Should ALL JEWS make Aliyah IMMEDIATELY? - STUMP THE RABBI (53)

0:17We're back in Sunny Isles for our "Stump the Rabbi" series. You guys have questions, Kadosh Baruch Hu has answers in His Torah HaKadoshah. Today's shiur, b'ezrat Hashem, will be for Refuah Shlema, for Talia bat Sarah, Yitro ben Avraham, Orit bat Ilana, Doris bat Jorah, David ben Esria, Rabbanit Sarah bat Anat, Rav Efraim ben Shulamit, Rabbanit Levana bat Sarah, Orly bat Jana Dina... Today's shiur, b'ezrat Hashem, will be for Refuah Shlema for Talia bat Sarah, Yitro ben Avraham, Orit bat Ilana, Doris bat Jorah, David ben Esria, Rabbanit Sarah bat Anat, Rav Efraim ben Shulamit, Rabbanit Levana bat Sarah, Orly bat Jana Dina, Dvora bat Mercedes, Esther bat Zipora, Pserach bat Batya, Batya bat Sara, Elisheva Chaya bat Sara, and all of Am Yisrael, refuah shelema, refuat hanefesh, refuat haguf, and also hatzlacha rabah for Yitro ben Avraham, Shaul ben Farzaneh, Oshri ben Doris, Gabi ben Doris, Elad ben Doris, David ben Esria

1:40And all of Am Yisrael, especially the ones that donate and support with their time, with their money, with their efforts, to do all the wonderful things that, Baruch Hashem, we've had the merit to do. Uh, now, um, just as a slight, slight, small update, uh, this shul is moving to a different location. So we have probably another week, maybe two weeks, in the shul, and then we're going to have to change locations. Uh, they're moving, uh, I think to South Beach or something like that. So, we'll be here again next week, and then I think maybe another week after that. But I'll give you guys the exact date. Long story short, we'll say goodbye to this place after being here for some time now and go to a different location. So stay updated in regard to the WhatsApp groups or the Facebook groups as far as the new address when the time comes.

2:46Secondly, the website has the new USB cards. Anyone that's on our email list got an email a day or two ago with the new USB cards that you can order with the Mussar Pirkei Avot series. Baruch Hashem, these are, you know, lots of work, lots of Torah in them, and the people that have been listening to them for some time now, Baruch Hashem, are telling me it's changing their lives and their personalities in a lot of positive ways. So anyone that wants to order it, go to bezratHashem.org and place the order. There's also the Tikkun HaBrit USB. uh... same thing on the website and is obviously for the sake of, uh, of kiruv to help the public and, you know, distribute things for free for the masses. You could distribute the CDs because they're much cheaper to distribute and to make, so that's also on the website. Or if you are on a budget, you could even go with the...

3:53flyers, the flyers that we have on the website. All of these different things to get Am Yisrael to turn back to Torah. One thing that I've noticed in the last couple of days, we spent a lot more time than I want, but unfortunately, it's necessary, ...looking for a new community, looking for a new house, and I couldn't believe how many places have gone out of business. I mean, I knew that people haven't been working for the last couple of months because of this coronavirus, but only in the last few days did I really get a reality check of how many businesses have gone bankrupt... Here in Florida, I know people in New York were struggling. In other places, people were struggling, but not to the extent of bankruptcy. You know, you lost the money, okay. So, you don't work for two or three months, fine. All right, you see lots of money lost, but you're still in business. You can't wait to go back, and people are going back.

5:05You go to the shopping centers in some of these different places that we've gone to in the last few days, you have literally entire shopping centers with hundreds of stores empty, empty, empty, one after another. Supermarkets, out of business. Walgreens, out of business. Since when does a drug store go out of business? a pandemic, all people need is drugs. Out of business, out of business, one after another. I'm surprised the real estate market hasn't crashed yet, but surely that's going to happen because when there's no business, there's no buying, there's no this, there's no that. Some people have asked me about moving to Florida recently and uh I would not recommend buying any real estate right now simply because, with only 20 years of investment knowledge, I think this is not a buyer's market. This is a "if you're lucky enough to sell" market. you should sell yesterday... because as soon as reality sets in and people realize that... things are changing... I think that it's very likely that the market will start dropping. But, you know, there is something that could help to a certain extent that people are relying on, which is that there is a lot of anti-Semitism in New York...

6:23so it's causing many New Yorkers to want to move to Florida. So people are saying, "Yeah, but we can sell to the New Yorkers, and they're used to already paying a lot of high prices." That may be true; that may be possible uh... but needless to say, it's a... you know, the local economy here has suffered tremendously, uh... and it's not one of those things that could easily bounce back. Like, if the store is closed, you're waiting for, you know, the customers to return. You wait to turn back on. OK, that could be a... what's called a V-shaped recovery, meaning you went fast down, and you went back right up. But when you shut down the business, and the store is empty, in order for you to come back into business, you probably have to set up a whole new company, order new goods, or even if you have goods from your previous company, just a different name, you have to sign a whole new lease, you have to do a whole new negotiation, and most likely hire a bunch of new people. It takes time. So... The retail markets have suffered tremendously. I couldn't believe what I was seeing in the last few days. But some actually have prospered. Some have actually made a lot of money over the last few months. So, you know, HaKadosh Baruch Hu mezaveg zivugim. He connects the dots. He connects the mates. Sometimes the guy that made money when times were good is now going to lose money. And the guy that wasn't making a penny, wasn't barely surviving, is now...

7:47Banking it every day. He's making millions while everybody else is struggling. Yeah, it's like HaKadosh Baruch Hu runs the world that way and that's why I always tell people, worrying about parnasah is a fool's errand. Nine out of ten times you talk to people, they have problems with parnasah. Either they have no emunah that they're going to have enough tomorrow or they already don't have enough today. Or they're so worried they're not even sure what they have. Thank you. They're not even sure what they have. But constantly, people are worried about parnassah to the extent where it literally ruins their lives. And this too has a lot to do with a person's avodat Hashem. And when a person is simply worried so much about parnassah, many times, not all the time, it's because of their lack of connection to Hashem. And I don't mean lack of connection to Hashem by saying Shema Yisrael every day, going to pray in a minyan, or maybe making a bracha before you eat. I'm talking about their learning of Torah, their avodat Hashem in regards to purifying their neshama, which we'll talk about a little bit later. Usually, a lot of this comes from a lack of learning Torah. Less emunah means less Torah. Less Torah eventually leads to less emunah.

9:05Because the more you get to know Hashem, the more you realize that He's the One that gave you the problem and He's also the One that's going to bring you the salvation. So what are you worried about? But that's the problem. A lot of times people are worried about parnasah. They're worried about money constantly. And it sometimes makes them go into a worse situation because they're so scared and concerned about their parnasah and their situation that they become like a deer in headlights where they don't know what to do. They don't know what, you know, they have opportunities, but they don't know which one to take because they're so scared to make the wrong decision. So this too is one of the things that's happening everywhere. But like I said, worrying about parnasah is a fool's errand. Because if a person simply understood that his lack of parnasah is coming from the same hand that will give him parnasah. Meaning, HaKadosh Baruch Hu is the one you're praying to that's going to give you parnasah, right? Well, guess what? Who is the one that took it away that you don't have parnasah now? The same HaKadosh Baruch Hu. Same one.

10:13So, to worry about it, for what? But it's a difficult test. Why? Because if you don't already know this and live this before the test, it's almost impossible to learn it on the go, to learn it once you're already in the fire. know, to talk about things theoretically right now is easy. Why? Because we're all sitting here, the air conditioner works today, it's not Shabbat, you know, you have a seat, you have a comfortable chair, everything's good. Yeah, you don't put it on easy to talk theoretically, but when you're in the middle of tests, it's much harder. So how do you get ready for those tests? You have to do it theoretically every day. You have to practice and practice and practice for when the tide may turn, and eventually, it does turn. And that's one of the things that a lot of people don't prepare themselves for. And that's, I believe, one of the reasons why people are in a panic right now, where they're panicking about what's going on in New York, with all the anti-Semitic situations that are happening with the government, with the people. They're panicking about all the protests, you know, starting to compare it to Nazi Germany and the like.

11:28I mean, don't get me wrong, it's horrible what's happening right now, this destruction of poor people's businesses and communities and so on, but we're not quite at Nazi Germany. Want to know about Nazi Germany? Read some books. Very different from Nazi Germany. Very, very different. So we're not quite there. I don't think that we're far off from it, but we're not there. So to start comparing the two is a little bit extreme. You're a little fanatic. You're a little fanatic. Uh, you should calm down. Don't be so religious. And then people are starting, every... every... I'm telling you, I was telling you before the shiur, I don't know, right now, 15-20 questions a day: "Do you think it's time to make aliyah? Should I go to Israel? Do you think it's time to make aliyah?" Watch the shiur! I made two of them about it just in the last two weeks. What do you want from my life? Go watch the show! All you're telling me with that question is you don't watch my shiur, but you still want me to answer your questions. It's like there's no bigger level of chutzpah. Somebody came to Rav Ovadia one time and told him, "Rav, I heard an issue that when there's a question about Taharat HaMishpacha..."

12:46And when the wife does the Bedikah cloth, and you're not sure if it's a Ketem, you're not really sure if it's Tahor or Tameh, you have to take it to a Rav. So I brought my wife's Bedikah cloth for the Rav to please tell me if she needs it or not. The Rabbi says, I don't want to answer you. Rabbi in the world, imagine you go to him, you waited in line, you can't wait, right? You come to him with your question, important, the only question in the world you care about. You give it to the Rabbi, and the Rabbi tells you, "I don't want to answer you now; I don't know the answer." Of course, you know! You know the court who lies in his right and left hand. Somebody asked about you one time, "Is it true that you know the entire Talmud by heart?" No, no, don't, don't, he says to him, don't exaggerate, don't exaggerate. Don't exaggerate. What? The Rabbi knows, the Rabbi knows. No, don't exaggerate, maybe half. Maybe half. He says, huh? Which half? He says, which half do you want? So this guy comes to Rabbi Ovadia and he says to him,

14:00How come you don't want to answer my questions? I don't want to answer your question. I don't want to answer it. He says, but it says in the shiur that you have to go to a rav. He says, you're right. You have to go to a rav. You have to go to a rav. You're right. That's what it says. So I'm coming to a rav. Okay, you came to a rav. I don't want to answer your question. But why? Why don't you want to answer my question? Ah, that's a question. He says, "What do you think? A rabbi is just there for you to come and ask him questions whenever you want? Don't you think a rabbi is...?" He says, "A rabbi is someone whose Torah you learn. You learn the Torah day and night. Every shiur that he teaches, you learn. Like clockwork. Like it's Mount Sinai. That's a rabbi. You want to ask questions whenever you feel like it, go find somebody else." You want me to answer your questions? You promise me right now you're going to come to every single shiur that I do. He says, I promise. He says, oh, you promise? I'll answer your questions. It may have been that Rav Ovadia had Ruach HaKodesh. It may have been he had just giant wisdom. Whichever one you want to say. But that young man

15:16That young man not only went to every shiur, but also became one of the most important rabbis in the world today. So it's important for people to know that you watch shiurim, you have your rabbi, you ask questions, and so on. You have to make sure that if you're going to call somebody a rabbi, it's not just because you're sending them WhatsApp questions. It's not just because you send a few dollars in the mail once in a while. It doesn't make anybody a rabbi. Your rabbi is, you learn every single shiur. Yeah, but it's a lot of shiurim. No, you should say thank you to Hashem that your rabbi is still alive to give you a lot of shiurim. What if your rabbi was the Rambam and he died 800 years ago? No, what happened? What are you going to do? Then you have to learn his books. It takes a lot more than nine hours a week. So the point is, Rabotai, a person needs to know that when it comes to questions and things of that nature, if you ask your Rav, and your Rav is a Talmid Chacham, he'll give you Da'at Torah. He'll give you the answer based on what the Torah says. Not based on his opinion, not based on your opinion, not based on what you like, not based on what he likes.

16:30And that's the way it's supposed to work. But unfortunately, a lot of people do not have a rabbi or they simply don't listen to the person they claim as their rabbi. They make their own decisions based on their own mind, their own understanding of the Torah. And what ends up happening is they go into a panic. Why? You have some terrorism by some people that call themselves protesters. You have an economic decline that's around the entire world, no exceptions. You have all types of strange weather all over the world, all types of strange agricultural issues all over the world. You have the world changing in a very unusual way. People are worried, and they start saying, "Okay, maybe it's time to make Aliyah," like, according to their mind, that's the solution. As if you're going to go on a plane, you're going to call, go on the internet, elal.com, or whatever other airline goes there, you're going to buy a ticket, $1,000, $2,000, $3,000, if they're even going to let you in with Corona, which, by the way, most people can't even go to Israel right now. I don't know what people are thinking. Did people forget there's Corona? Most people can't enter Israel right now. But that's a different story. We'll leave that for the travel agent to tell you. Anyway...

17:42Then they go on a plane, they think they're going to land in Eretz Yisrael, and everybody at the airport is going to say, Mashiach, Mashiach, Mashiach. What do you think is going to happen? What do you think is going to happen when you get to Eretz Yisrael? You have to go find a job. You have to go learn what to say to the guy that's taught to give you the goods. You have to go find a place to live. You have to go find some school for your kids that's actually going to accept you. Or what? You think because you're an American they're going to accept you? You think because you have a few dollars they're going to accept you? You think that you're a convert they're going to accept you? Rabotai, I have right now a situation, a nightmare. A nightmare of nightmares. An avrech. An avrech. just told us, this is an avrech for many years, one of our avrechim, a tzadik, a serious talmid chacham. His wife just had a miscarriage. He says, "Oh, miscarriage, za'pan rabbi."

18:54Not like this. Why did you have a miscarriage? From the amount of sadness and anxiety they've been experiencing over the last couple of months, trying to convince the yeshiva to accept their daughter into the seminary. They won't accept her. You think, oh, maybe she's not smart enough; she's the best in class. Maybe there's too many people. No, plenty of room. Maybe they don't pay. No, they pay. They scratch every penny to make sure they pay. No. Why? Why are they not accepting this little girl? A 12-year-old girl, a wonderful girl, comes from a good house. To have such a home, such as tzaddikim, parents, such tzaddikim brothers and sisters. Oh, obviously, she will be like them. How come? Abba is an avrech. An avrech, his whole life is dedicated to Torah. Avai! Everybody's going to have such people. Why don't they accept her? She's Sephardic. She's Sephardic. That's her flaw. She's Sephardic.

20:07That's it. And the menahel, he's Ashkenazi. So, no, no, no. She's not for us. Why is she not for you? She was here last year. She was in the school last year. It's not her first time. Yeah, yeah, no, but she's not for us. She doesn't fit. She's not good. She's not good. Not for us. For three months, they're trying to convince him. Let the girl go to school. Let the girl go to school. The girl's crying every single day. All her friends are going. Everybody. And it's not like, okay, so just I said to myself, I said to the Rav, you know, go find a different place. Let this guy go to Gehinnom that he's setting up for himself. Tell your daughter to go somewhere else. He says it's impossible. Why? The closest other place is almost an hour away. They live in a dangerous neighborhood full of Arabs. You don't want your 12-year-old little girl coming home at 6, 7 o'clock at night and it's dark and there's a bunch of Arabs everywhere. It's not exactly an idea of safety. So this is the only place that's next to us.

21:09And he refused to let her in. So the girl hasn't been going to school. Can't go to school. Nothing. You think it's the only story? This is story number two just this week. Another one told me they won't accept his kids. Why? The Sephardim. That's the chisaron. The Sephardim. Sephardi. No, you're like, you know, like, not from the same type. Not a Jew. Not a Jew. Unfortunately, Rabotai, this type of racism, this type of sinat chinam, is unfortunately running rampant even in Eretz HaKodesh. Even in Eretz HaKodesh. Even there. It's happening here too. It's happening everywhere. Why? Why is it? Do you guys really think it's because of the Ashkenazi Sephardi? That's the excuse that Satan uses to make you think, "Oh, maybe if the Sephardim will start building yeshivot, that's the answer." No, it's not going to be the answer. Sephardim will give you problems too. "Oh, so maybe I'll pretend like I'll be Ashkenazi, change my name like some people are doing. That's going to solve the problem?" Not going to solve the problem. Satan is going to come up with a different thing. Different thing. What is it? Lack of kedusha. Lack of kedusha for the nation as a whole.

22:24increased amount of tests, changed environment, difficulties coming to all of us. The point being, Rabotai, this is one of those times where a person needs to know: if you're not going to have a Rav that you're glued to, you're going to have a very difficult time surviving spiritually, a very difficult time. Many people want to be their own rabbi, ask their own questions, and answer their own questions, and it's a very, very big tragedy. I see it every day. So a person needs to know that right now is the situation, and people are panicking, and they think that if they go to Eretz Yisrael, it's going to solve their problem. For some people, it may. For some people, they're going to benefit from Eretz HaKodesh, a wonderful place. Some people are making a lot of money there. Some people can't make two nickels to scratch their hands with. Nothing. Can't do anything with it. Some people have beautiful homes. Some people are living in miklatim. You know, I don't know what a miklat is in English. How do you say miklat in English? Like a, huh? Miklat. It's like a room underground, not a basement. It's a room underground where you protect yourself from bombs. Some people live there. Cellars. Bunkers, bunkers, like that. Some people live there.

23:49Some people live in apartments, two, three million dollars. Some people are rocking and rolling over there. They're doing fantastic. Some people can't buy bread. Some people are accepted in the schools and everything is good. Some people, no. The point being, is that you have to ask your Rav, where do I fit? Where do I fit? Should I go? Should I not go? And he's going to ask you, let's see, do you meet the requirements that the Halacha says? You can have parnasah over there, you have something set up, or you're just going to go and be one of these Arabs that works in a shuk today, in a house tomorrow, and maybe cleaning people's houses the next day. And if that's not enough, maybe kill a few people. You know, it's just fun. What are you going to do? You have something? No. Okay, so when you have something, then we'll go to question number two and three. Okay, Rabbi, I have something. Okay, what about your wife? What about your husband? They want to go with you. Not so much. Okay, when it becomes so much instead of not so much, come back for question number three. Okay, Rabbi, I convinced my wife, I convinced my husband, they want to go. Okay, so now you're learning with me a few times a week. You have something set up over there you're going to learn?

25:10Well, I'm going to take my books with me, Rabbi. Oh, you're going to take your books? Okay. Take your books. Good luck to you. Take your books. You think that the book is going to replace the Rabbi? Good luck to you. Go ahead. Go ahead. Two years, you're chiloni. Maximum. Two years, you're chiloni gamur. Why? It doesn't work that way. It doesn't work that way, Rabotai. But people don't think. They don't think. They think they're smarter than the system. They think that, no, no, I'm going to do it. And I start quoting Chachamim. No, no, the Rambam says it's a mitzvah to do it. Yeah, where did the Rambam live? He lived in Israel? Where? In Netanya? Tel Aviv? Where? In Yerushalayim? Where did he live? He didn't live in Israel. Rabbi Yosef Karo, where did he live? Where did he live? In Beit Shemesh? Herzliya? Tveria? Where did he live? He didn't live in Israel. Does that mean it's bad to live in Israel? Chas V'Shalom, I never said such a thing. For some people, it's the greatest thing they can possibly do. And they should do it. But for some people, it's completely forbidden. How would you know? Ask your Rav. What's the problem? People go to a Rav, they ask him the question, and once in a blue moon, you find a decent Rav, and he gives you an answer, and you don't like the answer. So what do you do? Okay, Rabbi, thanks a lot. Honey, we need to find a new Rabbi.

26:35Why? What's wrong with him? He died? No, no, no. Chas v'shalom. Honey, don't say such a thing. No, no. He's alive and well. He's young. He's only 55. No, he didn't die. No, so what happened? How come we're changing rabbi? He's been with us for 10 years. No, I don't know. I think he's not the same as he used to be. What happened? He's not the same. I don't know. He said maybe we were making a mistake. I don't agree with him. Oh, so you don't agree with him, so you replace him? That's what happens. People change rabbis like they change underwear. That's the problem. You treat your rabbi like underwear, that's what you're going to get in life. That's what you're going to get in life. You're going to go, you're going to suffer, you're going to make mistakes, you're going to regret the day you were born. And you're going to say, oh, you know what, I wish I would have listened to the rabbi. I wish, I wish, I wish I would have listened to the rabbi. Yeah, but it's too late. Now you're going to suffer. Why bring yourself suffering? So, Rabotai, listen, going to Eretz Yisrael, for some people, like I said, and I'll say it again, for some people, mitzvah gemurah, you have to go tomorrow. You should leave the shul. Right after the shul, go to the airport. Some people. Some people. Some people, if you go there, don't even bother complaining. Why? We don't want to hear it. It's your fault. It's your fault. Don't complain. You go. Good luck to you. I spoke to somebody today. I told him, listen, you have two options.

27:58You go to Israel, you come to America. Those are the two options you have. Why? For them it fits. For them it fits to go to Eretz Yisrael or to come here. Both of them are just as good. The advantage of being here is they want to come learn with me, Baruch Hashem, so that's a—let's say you call it an advantage. Over there you don't have that. I can't be in two places, Baruch Hashem. But for them, it fits. Another person asked me a question. I said, if you go to Eretz Yisrael, most likely you're going to get a divorce. Most likely your kids are going to be off the derech. And most likely you're going to call me in two, three years from now and say, "Rabbi, how come you didn't tell me?" So I'm telling you. I'm telling you. So it's not a one-size-fits-all. It's not a one-size-fits-all. And for all of the superheroes on the internet that already live in Israel and are telling you, "Ah, you shouldn't listen to him, everybody should go to Israel, we should be united, it should be this, it should be that," every single one of them is an am ha'aretz at best, and most likely a boor who does not know an ounce of Torah. Why? That's not daas Torah.

29:09Go find me one place in the Gemara that says you're obligated to go to Eretz Yisrael the way it is right now. One place in the Gemara. Oh, you don't learn Gemara? So what do you learn? Where do you learn now? YouTube? Where do you learn? Facebook? WhatsApp? Posts? What's the last book you read? How to Be a Jew? You finished it? Or are you only on page 115 and you think you're a Jew already? What do you know? You have Da'at Torah? How long are you religious? 5, 10, 20 years? You think you have Da'at Torah by now? You're bigger than the greatest Chachamim in history? You can make up your own mind? You can make up your mind? Go do it. Make up your own mind, go do it. But the reality is, most of these people don't even know Aleph Bet. Most of them don't know how to read, not in English or in Hebrew. But they have an opinion, a very, very strong one. And anyone that contradicts their opinion, oh, he's Amalek, he's Rasha, he's Esav, he's Erev Rav, he's this, he's that, ooh, wah, ooh, wah. What's a klala nimretzet? All the curses in the book. Why? Because they have their opinion. We do not work off of opinion in the Torah. We don't work off of opinion. You go to Gemara, you start learning Gemara...

30:28One of the chachamim says something. The most common question in the entire Torah: Where'd you get this from? That's the question. The most common question in the entire Gemara. You can see it on every page in the Gemara. Somebody says something, first question: Where'd you get this from? Where's it from? Where's it from? So you can tell me, I have a source, it's from a pasuk in Sefer Devarim, in Sefer Shemot, in Sefer this, in Sefer that, and then they're going to start going back and forth, saying if they agree that this source is really valid for what you're actually saying, and back and forth, and back and forth, depending on the level of the complication. One time, Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, in Gemara Masechet Shabbat, comes to one of the chachamim and says something, He says, "Where did you get this from? Where did you get this from?" Rabbi Shimon says, "No, I figured it out." The chacham says to him, "You think I care about what you figured out? Why do I care about your opinion?" He says, "Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai. Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai was able to kill people by looking at them. Looking at them. He saw one person desecrate, looked at him, he died on the spot. On the spot."

31:42A bunch of times it happened. One time they sent him to the Roman emperor to convince him to remove a decree on Am Yisrael. But they said, "Oh, why don't you take somebody with you?" Nobody wanted to go. So one of the young guys, one of the young chachamim came and said, "I want to go." His father said, "No, no, no, Chassan, what are you doing? Don't go, don't go. Don't go." "No, Abba, I want to go." "Don't go, son, don't go." "No, Abba, I'm going to go." Everybody's looking. Why? All of you are asking, why would you want to be chavruta with Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai for a three-week trip? Imagine! Because his father knew Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai. He says, "Son, you don't understand what you're dealing with here. You're dealing with the fire of Torah. You make him upset, you're going to die on the spot." Not because he wants to kill you. In Shamayim, you make Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai upset, he kills you. Guys, Shamayim kills you. HaKadosh Baruch Hu kills you. You make Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai upset. So he told Rabbi Shimon, Rabbi Shimon, if you can take my son, please promise me, you're going to bring my son back. Rabbi Shimon says, I'm not going to get mad at him. No, I promise. Some say he didn’t come back.

33:12So imagine somebody holy like this. Someone that the Shechinah, the Shechinah itself, HaKadosh Baruch Hu himself, cannot tolerate anyone making him upset. Here he said, I have an opinion. Another Chacham says, what do I care about your opinion? Where did you get this from? Well, even Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai's opinion does not matter when it comes to the Torah. We need a source. Everything has to have a source. Everything. You don't have a source? Keep it to yourself. Maybe make a diaper out of it if you want. For Torah, it's not. And that's what people don't tolerate. They think their opinion matters. They think their opinion matters. Everything matters today in this politically correct world. Their opinion matters. Black lives matter. White lives don't matter. Everything matters.

34:13Everything matters. When it comes to the Torah, your opinion doesn't matter. If you want it to matter, pick a different religion. Pick a different religion. Why? Torah? We need to know what is the Torah. When a person truly understands this and wants to clean themselves up, wants to purify their neshama and serve Hashem completely, he realizes that he or she has chisronot, they have deficiencies from day one. They're not fulfilling the word of Hashem completely. All of us have deficiencies and you start fixing them. Rav Saadia Gaon, Halava Shalom, one time was traveling and he went to a new city and no one knew him. wants to purify their neshama and serve Hashem completely, he realizes that he or she has chisronot, they have deficiencies from day one. They're not fulfilling the word of Hashem completely. All of us have deficiencies and you start fixing them. Rav Saadia Gaon, alav hashalom, one time was traveling and he went to a new city and no one knew him. But this gvir, this rich person in the city, saw a talmid chacham and said, "Chacham, come, come by me." He invited him into his house and hosted him for a week. He gave him food, gave him bread, and treated him really, really well, with nothing missing. After a week, Rav Saadia Gaon said to him, "Okay, thank you very much. I'm going to leave now. I appreciate you hosting me very, very kindly, very generously. May Hashem bless you and your family and so on and so forth." He said, "Chacham, what's your name?"

35:42What's your name? For a whole week, he's studying Torah. They're not in the backyard playing ball and jumping into the pool. He's hosting him. He gives him food, and he studies Torah all day. So he's not bothering him. So at the end of the week, he still didn't know his name. He says, "Chacham, what's your name?" So the Chacham says, "Saadia." "Saadia?" You know Rav Saadia Gaon? That's how you were named after him? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know him, I know him. How do you know him? How do you know him? You know him, what, he's like family? Eh, the guy starts asking questions, do, do, do, do. After a while, okay, it's me, it's me. The guy starts crying, starts shaking. What? What? You, the Gadol HaDor, have been in my house for a week. Oh no, oh no, he starts crying. He goes, what happened? Why? I can't believe it. You've been in my house. The Gadol HaDor, the biggest rabbi in the world for several generations, is in my house for a week. I didn't know, and that's how I'm treating you? He goes, Baruch Hashem, you treated me really well. Every time there was something to eat, there was no room on the table; you gave me so much. What else? What are you going to do? Had I known that it's you that's in my house,

37:06Surely things will be different. Please, please stay in my house for at least another few days and let me give you the kavod that you deserve. He says, what would you do differently? He says, now that I know that you are Rav Saadia Gaon, completely different. Rav Saadia Gaon, stop crying. The guy thinks he made the kavod harav upset. No, no, kavod harav, sorry. Why make you upset? He goes, no, no, no, ashrecha. You just taught me so much mussar. Me? Teach you mussar? He says, yeah. He says, you see, every day we thank HaKadosh Baruch Hu for giving us a neshama. And we thank HaKadosh Baruch Hu for giving us the Torah. And we thank HaKadosh Baruch Hu for letting us learn this Torah. And we thank HaKadosh Baruch Hu for doing this and doing this and doing this. In essence, to use all of these different tools, right off the top of the day, to revisit HaKadosh Baruch Hu, get to know Him more, at a much better level than the day before.

38:11Now you see, yesterday I served Hashem the best I could. I learned Torah; I did the best I could. Today, I did the best I could also. The problem is, it's the same thing. You just taught me. Had you known that I am who you think I am now, surely it would be different. What does it mean? That means that I haven't really served Hashem the proper way since yesterday. Why? Because, obviously, I should have known Hashem even better as a result of yesterday, today, and serve Him better today. And I didn't. What answer can I give Hashem now? What answer can I give Hashem now that I served Him the same way today as I did yesterday? What answer do I have for Hashem? when a person wants to sanctify themselves, they may not understand the story and how it applies to their personal life in the year 2020, and they're barely twenty years old, but they will understand that this is really the way to do things when a person has more knowledge.

39:22He also has more knowledge about what he's missing. And if Rav Saadia Gaon understood that he was missing in his own servitude of Hashem because he didn't serve Hashem even more than he did the day before, despite spending the entire day learning Torah, surely we ourselves have some deficiencies, to say the least. Does that mean that we should be sad? Absolutely not. That would make it worse. We use such information and such stories as a motivator to inspire us to serve Hashem even better every day. Now, when a person understands that HaKadosh Baruch Hu watches everything and understands everything and knows everything, he looks into that in every aspect of his life. Rav Shach, zatzal, was asked thousands of questions every single month. And they asked Rav Shach, What goes through your mind when somebody brings you a question? This type of question, that type of question. Rav Shach says, the only thing that goes through my mind is that when I eventually meet HaKadosh Baruch Hu at the Beit Din of Shamayim, and they're going to ask me, why did you make this Psak on this question? I want to make sure that I have all of the possible excuses and reasons.

40:46why I saw this as the right answer, no matter what the question is, whether it's what blessing you pray on an orange, what blessing you say on an apple, or whether this business is allowed to be open on Shabbat. No matter the question, every question I measure the same way. I want to make sure that I analyze this question in such a way that when I go up to Shamayim, they can ask me, "Why did you make this psak?" I'm going to give them every single angle of what I thought about, of why what I said is the right answer. That's what Hashem wants. That's a person that has Yirat Shamayim. He doesn't shoot from the hip, just answer whatever he feels like, because he understands that one day he's going to meet HaKadosh Baruch Hu. He has to have an answer for it. He's not going to say, no, no, listen, I wrecked my whole life by making an irrational move because I thought Mashiach is coming next week. Well, did he come? No, actually he didn't come. When did he come? No, actually I died, and he didn't come. Oh, so you stayed. After a week, he didn't come.

41:52Why didn't you go back? Well, I figured maybe he's coming the next week. No, after two weeks, he didn't come. What happened? Well, you know, I didn't have the money to go back. Oh, so how long did you stay? 20 more years. How come you didn't go back to fix the things that you broke? Because I figured he's going to come. Oh, so you stayed a thief for 20 years because you thought Mashiach was going to maybe pay the bill. He's like the Social Security office. People make irrational decisions. And they think that if they go to America or some other place, or if they move a house or community, all of these things are going to save them, but that's not how the Torah works. You have to work based on Da'at Torah. Now, Da'at Torah is one that does not necessarily always make sense to someone who does not have it. The only way you could have Da'at Torah is if you either have literally studied enough Torah that you understand the different rules of how to get to the right answer, which means you've studied for decades, or at the very least you've completed the Shas, you've completed Shulchan Aruch, you've completed all of the basics numerous times and hopefully, hopefully you got to Da'at Torah, hopefully, still no guarantee. And second of all, you remove any personal desire whatsoever from your life. Not that you don't have any pleasures in your life, but when it comes to Torah, when it comes to what opinion you have in Torah, none of your own personal biases are included in that opinion.

43:14completed the Shas, you've completed Shulchan Aruch, you've completed all of the basics numerous times and hopefully, hopefully you got to Da'at Torah, hopefully, still no guarantee. And second of all, you remove any personal desire whatsoever from your life. Not that you don't have any pleasures in your life, but when it comes to Torah, when it comes to what opinion you have in Torah, none of your own personal biases are included in that opinion. The second you have a bias, it's not Da'at Torah anymore. Now, that's one way of getting Da'at Torah. The second way, you listen to Da'at Torah. You go to a Talmid Chacham, tell him, Rabbi, what's Da'at Torah on such and such? Rabbi tells you, you say, thank you. Yeah, but I don't agree. Yeah, but it doesn't make sense to me. So what? So what if it doesn't make sense to you?

44:14It doesn't make sense to you to start stabbing a person and cutting up his body and making maybe little squares in his body. It doesn't make sense to you. Why? You're not a surgeon. But the surgeon that's doing it says, "I'm saving his life." You have no idea what you're doing. So it doesn't make sense to you to cut the guy's body. But the surgeon that's an expert, that's the only thing you do. When you don't have Da'at Torah, you cannot say whether Da'at Torah makes sense to you or not. You're not a qualified analyst of whether it makes sense or not, or whether you agree or not. But this all has to do with ego. How big is your ego? The bigger your ego, the more impossible it is for you to accept Da'as Torah at face value. You're going to ask questions and questions and questions until you have the answer you want, and not necessarily Da'as Torah. Now, I'm not saying you shouldn't ask questions. Torah is not like Christianity and Islam, where you're pretty much not allowed to ask questions. But is the question asked in a way because you want your answer to be the answer? Or is the question because you're looking for the truth? Now, a guy had a question, and he decided that, you know what?

45:30I don't think the Rabbis in this generation are the right Rabbis. Why? I read in the Gemara Masechet Shabbat, second perek, Hillel HaZaken, somebody came to bother him on Friday numerous times, just busting his chops over and over again, Hillel HaZaken had all the patience in the world for him. Rabbis today don't have patience for people. And to himself he says, you know, I'm going to prove it. I'll prove there's nobody like Hillel. So what does he do? Opens up the phone book and then in Israel starts looking at the rabbis. Okay, we got the resh... starts going down the list. Starts calling the numbers. "Hello?" "Yes, yes. Who is this? Who is this?" "Okay, yeah. Yeah, rabbi. What's the blessing on an apple?" "What? What's the blessing on an apple? It's three o'clock in the morning." Click. See? Call the next rabbi. Next rabbi. Hello? Yeah, yeah, okay, are you okay? Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, rabbi, I just wanted to know. Kevod HaRav. Kevod HaRav. Respect. Kevod HaRav. What's the blessing on an apple? Click. What's the blessing on an apple? Click. Ah, you see, I'm right. You see, nobody has patience. He's not answering my questions. Eventually, he gets to who? The Rishon LeTzion. Rav Mordechai Eliyahu. Three o'clock in the morning.

46:58What's the blessing on an apple? Ah, you asked a big question. It depends. If you're going to eat the apple as it is, then it's ha'etz. But if you're going to squash it, grind it, and make it into a juice, then it's shehakol. But maybe if you're going to cut it into little pieces and bake it into a cake, then the mezonot of the cake makes the apple insignificant, and therefore it's mezonot. And he gives him a shiur at 3 o'clock in the morning. The guy is shocked. He says, Rabbi, you're like Hillel, I'm going to do teshuvah. And Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu said this in his lecture. He said this in a lecture years ago. He says, imagine, imagine I didn't have patience like many other people that he called. Imagine I didn't have patience. Why? Because that's what the Satan told him.

48:11But in reality, in reality, is that a normal, reasonable expectation from this guy? Yeah, it's good that he had, that Hashem gave him, you know, the Hillel of his generation, to answer the phone and answer him and give him all the attention that he needed. But it's not reasonable. And people are simply not reasonable sometimes. Why? Because they're not looking for the answer that's in it. That's the Torah. They're looking for their answer. And the source of that stems from their own arrogance of simply wanting to be right and not wanting Hashem. They want themselves to be Hashem. They want themselves to be the one that decides, not God. I want to make the rules. Okay, go make the rules like Paroh. Paroh made the rules. He had a little more money than you. A little more power than you. It didn't end up so well for him, though. But go ahead and try. Maybe they'll write a book about you too. Go ahead and try it. Chabad. Many people. 8 billion people in the world trying to do it. It doesn't end up so well. You want to do it? Bechavod. I don't recommend it. I can't stop you.

49:31Can't stop you. All right, but listen, if you don't answer my call right now, I'm going to do something. Do it. Go. Go. Go do it. What do you mean? You don't care? No. No, I don't care. If you don't care, why should I care? I care only if you care. When you care about your neshama, I care about your neshama. You don't care? You never cared. That's the problem, Rabotai, that we have constantly and it has a lot to do with ego. It has a lot to do with how we treat Hashem's Torah. I'll finalize it with an extraordinary chiddush I learned just today with Rabbi Ephraim from the Chatam Sofer. The Chatam Sofer in his Sefer Derashot, regarding Selichot, page 48. He says in Sefer Devarim, the book of Deuteronomy, it says in chapter 29, verse 18.

50:52It says, long verse, God says, Perhaps there is among you a man, or a woman, or a family, or a tribe, whose heart turns away today from being with Hashem, our God, to go and serve the gods of those nations. Perhaps there is among you a root flourishing with gall and wormwood. So the Chatam Sofer says, why is the Torah... lengthening this sentence so much. I mean, it's three lines. What does this bottom line say? Is there anyone among you worshipping idols?

51:55Because we need some shish kebab on a barbecue in the Beit HaMikdash. We'll put you there if you want. Anyone of you worshipping idols, Yoshke, Buddha, something, anyone of you? Hatam Sofer asks. So the Jewish question, what's the whole thing? It's one of you, or somebody's family, or somebody's father, or mother, or tribe, or this, or that. Just say, anyone worshipping idols. Tachlis, bottom line. Get to the bottom line. What's the extra? Hatam Sofer says because the reality of the questions being asked right now is not about idolatry. It's about the process of idolatry. How do you get to idolatry? Hatam Sofer says Are you involved with any simple leniencies that will eventually get you to become an idol worshiper? Where a person says, this mitzvah, it's not a big deal. I don't have to do it 100%. I can be lenient on this one. That one, I can be lenient on that one.

53:14A guy's daughter comes to him and she says to him, "Abba, can I go to the mall?" Well, my friends, no, tzedakah, you know we don't go to the mall. First of all, that mall operates on Shabbat. Everyone's a mechalel Shabbat over there. And second of all, the whole mall is full of places selling immodesty and pritzut and so on. That's not for tzaddikim. Oh, Abba, Abba, all my friends are going. Honey, you can't go to the mall. It's not for us. Come on, you stay at the house. You know, help ima a little bit. It's not for us to go to the mall. I mean, that's not, come on. "No, Abba, what am I going to do all day? All my friends are going." "No, okay, okay, okay. You know what? Go quickly, come back quickly, okay?" "Thank you, I love you." "What's that? Small leniency, small leniency. Why? You didn’t want to get annoyed. You didn’t get annoyed by his daughter. Okay, go to someone that’s not really where you're supposed to go." They're not supposed to go there. But go, it's not that big of a deal, okay? Her friends are going. Her friends are going after her. She's not going by herself. She's not going by herself. She's not going dafka to eat non-kosher. She's not going dafka to buy immodest clothes. She's going with her friends to get a coffee or something from the kosher place. What's the big deal? Well, you see, it's not a tiny one. Rabbi,

54:40So Chatam Sofer says, Rabbi, everyone's doing it. What can I do? He says, what can I do? Chatam Sofer says, what can I do? Everyone's doing it. Wait, blame me. Everyone's doing it. This leniency, it's not such a big deal. Chatam Sofer says, he says, those types of leniencies where in reality you know it's not the right thing to do. It's allowed. Allowed. You're not really supposed to do it. You're allowed to go. You're not really supposed to go, though. You know it. That's the best thing. You're allowed to eat, but you really shouldn't. You're allowed to go, but you really shouldn't. Why? It's not for you. Why? You're a tzaddik. You're trying to be a tzaddik. You should be a tzaddik. You want to go to Gan Eden. allowed, but you shouldn't do it. He says those types of leniencies are what's going to get a person to eventually fall when the real test shows up, and he doesn't have any defense system. Why? He doesn't even limit the allowed. Needless to say, when the not allowed comes, he has no defense system.

55:52When the not allowed comes, he doesn't know how to defend himself. She doesn't know how to defend herself. And guess what? Eventually, they follow the Yetzer Hara everywhere. And like the Gemara Masechet Shabbat says, they worship an idol. Why? If you want to be an ish kasher, you have to even restrict the allowed. Why? That's what it takes. Because when you do such a thing, you say to your daughter, "Honey, you can go to the place that's not exactly for religious people." Don't be surprised if one day she says, "Abba, I want you to meet my friend." "Who's your friend? Does she go to your school?" "No, it's not a she, Abba." "What? What do you mean it's not a she?" "No, it's just Jimmy. Jimmy, come out!" Who's Jimmy? What's this drawing on his face? No, it's not a drawing, Abba. It's a tattoo. Isn't he nice? Isn't he artistic? Who's this Jimmy? Who's this Jimmy? Who are you, Jimmy? No, no, no. Hi, sir. Hi, sir. Hi, sir. Mister. I'm not a mister. I'm a rabbi. Hi, Rabbi. Hi, Rabbi. Who's your father? I don't know him. I don't know him.

57:15What yeshiva did you go to? I don't work in the yeshiva. What is that? Is that a food? No, school. Oh, no, no, I dropped out, I got a GED, Rabbi. What? Why do you keep calling me Rabbi? Are you Jewish? No. Why, do I have to be Jewish? Hashem yishmor v'yatzil. Where did you meet? Where did you meet my daughter? Oh, no, she one day came to the mall, and I was selling, you know, jewelry. There was a good deal, $5. And I, oh, I saw your daughter, and I thought she looked really cute. Get out of my house! No, Abba, he's my friend. You know how many of these stories happen every single day? 80%. ...of the Jews in America are intermarried. That's how the story starts. One leniency, and eventually everything's gone. Intermarriage is not an accident. It's a systematic attack by the Yetzer Hara himself to make you make the small mistakes. Why? So eventually he could destroy the whole thing.

58:37And when a person says, no, no, come on, this rabbi, you know, he's kind of entertaining, but it's not going to happen to me. Shalom Yihyeh Li, the pasuk says, peace will be upon me. HaKadosh Baruch Hu himself says, anyone that says Shalom Yihyeh Li, I'm not going to fall, davka would fall. And I will not forgive him, He says. Pasuk in the Torah. You have such confidence that you can beat the Yetzer Hara when I told you don't mess with him. It's not going to happen to you. Dafka, it's going to happen to you. And I'm not going to forgive you. Why? Because you had an attitude of arrogance. You didn't want to accept Da'at Torah. You didn't want to accept the warning from Heaven. You wanted to have your own system. Their blood is on their hands. And that's what happens on a daily basis. And you see it. Tell people, don't send their kids to a mixed school. Boys and girls studying in the same school, they're already seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven years old. It's not a good school for Jews. Boys should be in one school, girls in a different school. "No, Rabbi, the rabbi is there, nothing's happening." One day, the boy comes home, 13 years old. "Ima, gotta tell you something." "Ma?"

59:57You got good grades? No, no, no. It's not about my grades. What do you want, honey? What's the matter? You know that girl I told you about, the rabbi's daughter, you know? Yeah. How about if she was like, you know, like she brought you a grandkid. What do you think about that, Ima? What? Is this a joke? April Fools? What is this? Where did you learn this? You go to yeshiva? No, it's a Jewish school, Ima. It's not exactly a yeshiva. What? What do you know about kids? You're still a kid yourself. Yeah, I know, Ima, that's what I'm asking you. What do you think about that? I don't think about it. It's a nightmare. Why would I want to think about it? Well, Ima, hopefully you could change your mind. She's here, and we have something to tell you. Every day this happens. Every day. These are the stories we deal with on a daily basis, and every single one of them, it's not an accident. The yetzer hara has been working on it for a while. He invested in that person for 20 years before he broke him completely. One little leniency, one little party, one little cigarette, one little drive to the wrong place, one little friend that they shouldn't have had, one relationship, one anything.

1:01:23One thing. That's all the yetzer hara wants. One. Once he's got that one, it's like having, you know, a bug in somebody's room. You only have to plant it once; you can hear everything they're going to say forever. That's how it works. That's how the yetzer hara works. And the Chatam Sofer says... The biggest excuse that people have is that it's not going to happen to me. Why do they have such an excuse? Because they say, listen, I haven't done it yet. Look at everybody else. I'm much more religious than everybody else I know. This guy, he's not even going to keep Shabbat. That girl, she doesn't even know that she's supposed to wear clothes. This guy doesn't even know what's kosher. That guy is this. This guy is that. What does he do? He compares. She compares herself to everybody else. That's what the Satan is telling them to do. Today you're better than everybody else. Why are you so worried? Today you're the most religious guy in school. Why are you so worried? Look, the rest of the class doesn't even know alef-bet. You already know how to spell. The rest of the class doesn't keep Shabbat. You already know hilchot Shabbat. The rest of the class is doing all types of things not allowed. You, tzaddik. No, so you can go hang out with them. You'll do kiruv.

1:02:40You'll do kiruv at the party. You'll do kiruv at the club. Satan plants one seed. You let him in, finished. Why? Satan says, I got you. And I'll come back whenever I want. That doesn't mean a person is guaranteed to lose. But it means that for sure, they're going to have a test of a lifetime that they don't want. Had they protected themselves from the small ones, they would have actually been able to be strong enough for the big ones. And Chatam Sofer says, it's known that people want you to do things because they say, listen, why is it that every time I ask you, you want to do this, you want to do that, you say, no, not allowed, not allowed. No, come on, let's have some unity. Why so much machloket, Rabbi? Why so much machloket? Every time, no, no, no, everything not allowed, you know, mot yumat, death penalty, mechaleil Shabbat. No, just accept everyone as they are. No, Rabbi, be a little bit, no, come on of today.

1:03:55Chatam Sofer says, we all know that shalom desired by non-kosher people is the beginning of the worst machloket. Because a person is telling you, make a leniency for shalom. Make a leniency to make shalom, but this is not a kosher leniency. He says, yeah, but you're gonna make this leniency because you're gonna avoid machloket. Chatam Sofer says the opposite. That leniency that you're gonna make in order to make shalom, that's exactly what's gonna make machloket. That's exactly what's gonna cause the problems. You're making that leniency because the second you did it, the whole Torah went into the garbage. But they're gonna tell you, no, come on, be more liberal. Why so this? Why so that? When it comes to Torah, rabotai yikarim, There is no such thing. There is no such thing as using your own opinion. You just simply use what Hashem says, His Chachamim said, and nothing else. And the Chesed LeAvraham, Rabbi Avraham Azulai, he says, people who don't make themselves holy by forbidding themselves the permissible, will ultimately turn the permissible into the korban for the Satan.

1:05:19so much so that a person that does not pay attention to the minor details of even things that are allowed to do today, eventually, he is going to turn everything as simply as a korban to the Satan. He is going to be a full-time, she is going to be a full-time employee of the Satan, and that's unfortunately what happens every single day with religious people, not religious people, all types of people, and they don't even know what happened. How did I get so far until it's so late it's almost unrecoverable? So, this is one of the things that a person needs to pay attention to, and not always necessarily look for things to make sense or always necessarily agree with everything that the rabbi says. It's okay, lady. It's okay if you don't understand what the rabbi said. It's okay. It's okay if you don't think that the dress is good, but you know it's kosher. It's okay. Just do what it says. Why? You're going to win in the end. If you're going to look to be right all the time, you've already lost. So now that you guys have a little bit of new insights about the permitted and the forbidden, hopefully it gave you some ideas for some questions. So, B'kavod, who wants to start? B'kavod. Is there a mic? No, we didn't bring the mic. There are so many rules—why limit the permissible? When you have rules, you have a way to be holy.

1:06:45The way to be holy, for example, if you look at the Mesilat Yesharim, The Path of the Just, chapter 11, he talks about cleanliness. How a person can get to the level of cleanliness, and everybody that reads Mesilat Yesharim, at some point he talks about attaining Ruach HaKodesh. Ruach HaKodesh is like understanding what Hashem wants in real time. is a microcosm explanation but it gives you an idea. The Mesillat Yesharim writes the sefer like a ladder. Every step you do, okay, now you're ready for the next one. You do this, now you're ready for the next one. It's like a ladder where you can't skip a step. Like, if you want to get to Ruach HaKodesh, you have to do the first 25 steps. You can't just do 1, 3, 17, 4, go back to 2 again, then eventually 20. It has to be in order, and it has to be perfected in each one. In chapter 11, when he talks about cleanliness, he says, what is the way to attain cleanliness? A person has to, first and foremost, avoid all sins.

1:07:51that are forbidden, things that are forbidden to you. That's how a person attains cleanliness. That's the first stage of cleanliness. Meaning that if a person is still electively making sins, regardless of whether they're big or small, and he's just, nah, I'm still doing it. I'm not ready to stop this addiction to whatever it is. He can't attain that step, which means he's not going to get to Ruach HaKodesh, which means he can't go to the next step, and so on and so forth. So we see from here that each one of the rules that HaKadosh Baruch Hu has, has a purpose for it. So as far as we have many, many rules that Hashem instilled into the world in order for us to attain perfection. Now, that perfection is not just by not making the sins. Not making the sins is in order to prepare us to accept some of the Kedusha that comes and know how to handle it. So first, we have to be clean of the sins. But then, to get the extra, to reach the Ruach HaKodesh, we have to do the extra. Now, if a person wants to be average, he does average.

1:09:02a person wants to be a blue-collar guy, make, I don't know, $40,000 or $50,000 a year, then he's gonna go work at the police force or as a fireman, or I think they make a little bit more these days. Or they're going to be a teacher, perhaps, and they're going to have their normal living. They're going to have their normal schedule and they're going to have a normal living, and that's fine. No one's ever going to say, "Hey, Mr. Teacher, how come you're not a millionaire?" Why? It's not common for a teacher to be a millionaire. Hey, Mr. Police Officer, how come you're not a millionaire? The wife is not going to complain about the wife. You married a cop; he's not going to be a millionaire unless he's corrupt. The reality is that you know what you're married to, you know what it is, average. If a person wants to be average in business, that's fine. But most people don't want to be average. Most people want to be above average. They may settle for average because that's where their limitation is, their ability is. But if they had an opportunity, they'd go for the whole thing. And that's why sometimes you see many people that are blue-collar people end up making a lot more money in their second career than in their first career. Their first career settled them down. Their second career, when they had some breathing room and some money saved up and the kids are out of the house, and so on, they were able to take some risks. They started some companies, and some of them flourished. They ended up making more money from the second career in one year than they made in the first 30 years in the first career.

1:10:26So why didn't he do it in the first 30 years? He didn't have the opportunity. But it doesn't mean he didn't want it. He always wanted to be above average. He just didn't have the opportunity. When it comes to kedusha, you always have the opportunity to be the best. And therefore, you're always going to be questioned, how come you didn't try to be the best when it came to kedusha, but when it came to business, you always tried to be the best. But if you didn't try to be the best in business and in this worldly stuff, you always wanted to be mediocre in everything. Mediocre diet, mediocre food, mediocre wife, mediocre husband, mediocre kids, mediocre clothes. Everything mediocre. All your clothes are brown. All your food is, I don't know, potato chips and some bologna. Everything is the same. You're mediocre, little, I'm just here to survive. You go into this world this way, that's what you want, that's how you are. Hashem says, "Oh, you served Me mediocre, you did what you had to do, but nothing extra. Fine, at least I can't go complaining to you, because at the very least, you are the same everywhere else, to everybody else."

1:11:38But if, when it came to a wife, no, no, no, I'm not marrying her. I'm not marrying her. Why not? Listen, she's three, four, five, seven pounds over what I accept. I can't. I can't do it, Rabbi. Stop with me. I can't. Stop with me. What? She's 120 pounds. What do you want from her? Rabbi, yeah, that's fat in my eyes. What? What? You're a 250-pound fat horse that you are. Yeah, but Rabbi, it doesn't mean that I want to go. It's like me. You're lucky she's even looking at you. Rabbi, you don't understand. Today, you have to have... Okay, you have to have. You're going to be alone for a long time. This happens. This happens. These are all real stories. This happens. This happens. Shidduch crisis, they call it. Brain crisis, I call it. Middot crisis. All types of shtuyot happen to people for their own reasons. Why? They want a perfect wife. Introduce the guy to him. No, no, Rabbi, it's too much for me. What's wrong with him? Listen, he's a nice guy. He's a nice guy. He's just like, I don't know, I think he's, I don't know, he doesn't come from like the family that I'm really, I can see myself as part of. What? You're not marrying his family, you're marrying him. Yeah, him, family, yeah, but I want it to be like shayach. You know, I want it to be, I want my kids to have yichus. You know, I want his father to be somebody. So, you know,

1:13:05You're marrying his father? No, but Rabbi, why don't you understand? Rabbi, everybody else understands. I don't know. I understand normal. I don't understand you. I don't understand this stuff. Normal I understand. You want to marry his family? Go ask his father if he wants to marry you. what happens to me? She wants a perfect husband, he wants a perfect wife, they both end up alone and 45 years old, looking for a shidduch for 25 years. Comes to business: "Rabbi, listen, it's not enough for me; I need more. You already have a million dollars, how much more do you want? More. You have 10 million, how much do you want? More, more, more, more." How come? How come when it came to the shiur, you said, "Rabbi, is this shiur going to be a whole two hours? Or can you cut it short?" Or the best yet, every day after the shiur, on a regular basis, somebody is smart enough to send me this text, just to annoy me a little bit in the morning. It's my good morning coffee. "Rabbi, listen, I see you did a shiur yesterday, but it's two and a half hours. Can you, like, sum it up for me in, like, a two-minute message?" What do you guys think? You think I sum it up?

1:14:29I have a block list. Their number joins it many times. Why? It's disrespect to the Torah, not to me. I don't care. It's just that people don't value it. They think it's like you... Torah is something you read on a post-it note. You can't teach people like that. And that's the problem. When it comes to material, we want the best. When it comes to kedusha, I just want to get by. If that's the case, you're going to be questioned about it. So the reason why HaKadosh Baruch Hu puts the extras is because it'll give you an opportunity to be the best. give you the opportunity to be the best. And that's how you're going to be judged. If, for the regular world, you're average on everything, you're not going to be questioned. I mean, technically you still should be extra for Kedushah, but the point is that at least you're fair. But if you want to be the best everywhere else, then you better be at least trying to be the best when it comes to serving Hashem. Next question. In the back, I think you guys were arguing about who has a question and who doesn't. No?

1:15:46Somebody has a question for me from the internet, so I'll give you guys some more time. He asked me a few days ago. He says the following, "Hello Rabbi, I would like to submit a question to the next Stump the Rabbi. We see all throughout the story of the Midbar, the Jews would do something they thought was correct, but were still punished for being wrong. The Egel, meaning the golden calf, the manna bread, this week it was the spies," The Prophet said in the times of Mashiach, the truth will be very distorted. And we see that today, but this has been happening all throughout history. The question is, why does God punish those who fully believe they have the truth despite being absolutely wrong? Very interesting question. We kind of answered it already, but I'll elaborate. Rabbi Akiva says, "Am Yisrael is like a dove. Am Yisrael is like a dove. Without its wings, it simply will not survive." Chachamim say, "What is the comparison? Am Yisrael is like the dove, and Am Yisrael has wings. What are the wings? The wings are the Chachamim. Without the Chachamim, Am Yisrael can't survive."

1:17:15Nadav and Avihu. The Gemara says they were on a level like Moshe and Aharon. Moshe and Aharon. What happened to them? Hashem killed both of them. Korach was a prophet. His grandson was Shmuel HaNavi, who the Gemara says was combined like Moshe and Aharon. What happened to him? He’s still in Gehinom to this day screaming. Korach. He's still in Gehinom to this day. That's what Rashi says. The adamah opened up, swallowed him and all of his family. To this day he's screaming, "Hashem is emet, Moshe is emet, and Torah is emet." Parashat Korach. One of the sources we have about Gehinom. And not only about Gehinom, that one of the openings to it is in the desert. Anyway, Korach was a prophet though. Korach was a talmid chacham. Korach was a tzaddik. Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai says, we learned from the Pasuk, Tzadik Katamar Yifrach, that this is Derash Teivot Korach, that Korach in the end, he's going to be taken out of Gehinom. Because he was a Tzadik most of his life; he made one mistake, rising against Moshe Rabbeinu. Nadav and Avihu were Tzadikim. They made a mistake. The Gemara says, HaKadosh Baruch Hu killed them, burned their neshamot.

1:18:44spies who are the spies? You look at Parashat Shavua, Parashat Shelach in Sefer Bamidbar, chapter 13, verse 3. They were all that Moshe sent forth from the wilderness of Paran at Hashem's command. They were all distinguished men, heads of the children of Israel, they were they. Meaning these were Gedolei HaDor. What happened to them? Hashem killed all of them, mita meshuna. Mita meshuna. What's mita meshuna? You look at the Midrash, look at the Gemara, it says when the spies came back after HaKadosh Baruch Hu... after they went and spoke ill of Eretz Yisrael, committing Lashon Hara, what happened to them? Their tongues connected to their belly buttons and they all died a slow death. We commemorate that day. Why? It wasn’t right away. It took a while. It took a while.

1:20:10Now, it took a while for HaKadosh Baruch Hu to accept their Teshuva. Somebody's tongue connects to their belly button for a few weeks, a few months, that'll get you to do Teshuva. But these were leaders. These were Chachamim. Korach's followers were 250 of the biggest rabbis in the world. Chachamim. So what's the issue here? Am Yisrael, last week, Parashat Beha'alotcha... HaKadosh Baruch Hu kills a bunch of the leaders, all the leaders that were in the corners, because Am Yisrael was complaining, and so on and so forth. The whole Torah is full of this, where Hashem punishes the leaders again and again. The shepherds are getting punished over and over again. The leaders get punished over and over again. How come? Am Yisrael also got punished, but specifically you see the punishment weighed the two. Most of the time it's the leaders, not the people. How come?

1:21:11When Nadav and Avihu were given the role of being the sons of Aharon HaKohen, being Kohanim. Now, Kohen, is he allowed to go into the Bet HaMikdash? Yes. Is he allowed to go into the Kodesh? Yes. Is he allowed to go into the Kodesh HaKodashim? He's the only one allowed. So how come they died? If they're allowed to do it, how come they died? If someone is a prophet, and he sees things, sees Hashem's ideas, if you will, future, past, all types of things, can he tell you, listen, I think that you're wrong on this halacha? You said that a mezuzah is needed in a house; I say it's not needed in a house if there's a Sefer Torah, that's what Korach said. Can somebody go against the chacham like that?

1:22:15Technically, you could have a different opinion. You could have a different opinion. The Gemara is full of opinions that are different. Chachamim argue back and forth. The Gemara is full of opinions back and forth. Fire at each other. Sometimes, Beit Shammai, Beit Hillel will start fist fighting. In the end, they still loved each other, hugged each other, and married each other's kids. But there was so much fire in the Torah, there was no argument. So in essence, technically, the fact that Korach argued with Moshe Rabbeinu is not a sin by itself. The fact that Nadav and Avihu went into the Kodesh HaKodashim and the Kodesh got a sheep, it's not a sin by itself. The fact that a bunch of Chachamim picked Korach to be their rabbi is not a sin by itself. The fact that the spies didn't like the land, they were scared, wasn't a sin by itself. What was the sin? How come they kept getting punished then? Horrible things. Because they went against the Chachamim. And they chose their own opinion instead. What does that mean? If you are going against the Chacham, by using Da'as Torah, allow it.

1:23:28You say A. Chacham says B. You have to accept B. But you say A. Chacham says B. Chacham says, why are you saying A then? Ah, A because the other Chacham says A. So it's not really me saying A. I'm just giving you the other Chacham that says A, and he's at the same level as you. Ah, okay. You can accept. You have something to rely on. Because it's not your opinion, it's a Chacham's opinion. So no matter what you're saying, no problem. But once it becomes your opinion, it's not Da'as Torah. Nadav and Avihu, as holy as they were, did not go into the Kodesh HaKodashim because of Da'as Torah. They went into it because of their own opinion. They thought it's a good thing to do. Hashem says, who says it's a good thing to do? You? Death penalty. Yevamot Tzaddikim? Death penalty. death penalty. Why? Your opinion is that you should be the leader. Who said? Who said you should be the leader? You? The people said? Who gave them the right to say it? I said Moshe is going to be the leader. When a person

1:24:43uses his opinion, as the question asks, he's always wrong by default even if he's right. Even if his opinion happens to be the correct data, he's still wrong if he's only choosing it because of his opinion. Meaning, if you're going to eat this only because you believe it's kosher and not because HaKadosh Baruch Hu says it's kosher, and it actually happens to be kosher, you're still committing a sin. Why? Because you chose it because of your own logic, not because HaKadosh Baruch Hu said it. So anytime we chose our opinion, it was a mistake by default and HaKadosh Baruch Hu punished us for it. And that's why Rabbi Akiva, the Rabbi of all the Chachamim, with 24,000 students, our entire Oral Torah comes from him and his students. What does he say? Am Yisrael is like a dove. Without its wings, it's simply dead. Without that Torah from the Chachamim, there is no Am Yisrael. There is no Torah. There is nothing. Why? We see it inside the Torah. Every time we used our opinion, Hashem says, "Failed. Failed." Even if your opinion is incidentally

1:26:05in line with the Torah, it still fails. You have to make sure to do whatever you're doing because the Torah says it. Why? Because that means you're following Tzivuy Hashem, the commandment of Hashem, and not the commandment of your logic. Because if you follow your logic today, and it happens to be right, then what do you say tomorrow? Listen, you've been right ten times in a row with your own logic. You don't even need to ask the rabbi. Go ahead, marry her. You've been lying, you've been writing already 20 years. Look how successful you are. Why do you need to ask the rabbi? Nobody knows everything. You're already, you're talmid chacham already. You went to yeshiva, you watched YouTube, you read at least three, four, five, six books. No, you know what you're doing. You don't need to ask the rabbi. That's a chamor. Not a chacham. says, Rabbi, I have a question. What's the blessing on an apple if it's in a cake? I think it's Mezonot because the cake is more significant than the apple, but I don't know if I'm right. Can you confirm, son? You confirm. You're right. That's the question. You know the answer.

1:27:29weren't sure why you weren't sure. You know it though; you did it before. There was a one percent doubt, one percent doubt. You weren't sure, so what do you do? You ask the question, right? Right. I want to move. Okay, my book, move. Why are you moving to the bathroom? No, no, I want to move communities. Oh, okay. Upset them? So you want to move communities. Why are you moving communities? Oh no, you know the community is not good for you. I want to move to a different community. Okay, so where are you moving to? Oh, I'm moving to a different area where... A different area. Okay. What's the name of the area? I'll tell you the area. Why are you moving there? Because of XYZ. Does it have a shul? Yeah, it has a shul. Is it Reform or is it Orthodox? No, it's universal. Not allowed. A person asks the rabbi everything. Even if he thinks he knows it. Why? To make sure I'm not wrong. Make sure I'm not wrong. I want to make sure. A woman asks me today, "Rabbi, can I eat any egg?" I don't know if she's asking me if she's allowed to eat eagle eggs or chicken eggs. So I can't assume. So I say, "No, you're only allowed to eat eggs from kosher birds." "No, no, no, I know, Rabbi, but I'm just saying eggs, eggs." "No, it's all. Okay, so it can't have blood in it either. If there's blood in it,"

1:28:59Can't eat it. Don't waste your money on organic eggs because the vast majority of them have blood in them and end up going to the garbage. Complete garbage. 8 out of 12 eggs usually have blood in them and end up being a waste of money. But, and again, sometimes you can remove the blood because it's on the white part. But if it's on the yellow, don't even bother. You can't. Because sometimes you remove from the top and it's still on the bottom. You eat it, it's like eating treif. You need to live. Don't mess with it. The point is that, okay, you didn't know? Now you know. Now you know. That's how the Torah works. Even eating, you need to have tzivui Hashem. Eating. Rabbi, I have a job offer. What do you think I should do? What's the job offer? XYZ. Okay. So, is that the deal? Well, no, I'm waiting for the contract. Okay, come back to me when you have the contract.

1:29:59Well, it becomes a reality. Somebody comes to Rav Kanievsky. He says, Rabbi, I'm going to retire in a few months, and I want to know what you think I should do with my retirement, my pension. They're going to give me $250,000 for all these years. And I'm wondering if the Rabbi thinks that I should buy a house or I should invest the money. Rav Kanievsky looks at him and says, come back to me when you have the money in your hand. Rav Kanievsky doesn't speak much. He says very few words. That's how Chachamim talk sometimes. So the guy leaves, scared to death. Why? He says, does Rav Kanievsky see in his Ruach HaKodesh that I'm really not going to get the money? Why is he saying come back when I have the money in my hand? Is he saying I'm not going to get the money? What, are they going to steal the money? Are they going to go bankrupt? What's going to happen in the next few months? The guy is worried sick for three months. After three months, he gets the money, comes back to Rav Kanievsky, "Ah, Kvod Rav, I have the money." "Oh, Baruch Hashem, go buy a house." "Why didn't the Kvod Rav just tell me that three months ago? I've been worried." "Oh, I didn't tell you to be worried. I just told you, come back when you have the money in hand." "Why?" "Because I could only get Siata Dishmaya for your question when it's a reality, not theoretical."

1:31:24When you have the money in your hand, you ask me a question, Hashem is going to give me the right answer for you then. Theoretically, I can answer you at any time. But you want an answer for you. For you, it has to be reality. That's how a person needs to think about his actions in the world. Anytime you have an issue, if it is your opinion, your logic, people call it, by default, it's wrong even when it's right. The Torah is right even when it's wrong. Why? HaKadosh Baruch Hu loves the Chachamim so much that even when they make a mistake, He changes nature to make them right. That's why we ask the Rav everything. And we do whatever he says. No questions asked. Not like, oh, listen, Rabbi, can you tell me something else? But I gave you advice already. I told you to go to the doctor. I told you to get a different job. I told you to leave him. I told you to leave her. I told you to slow down. I told you already. Yeah, but we didn't listen. So what now? You don't want to listen? Go to somebody else. Go to a magician or something. Stop wasting my time. You don't want to listen. So why are you wasting my time? What are you, a guidance counselor in a school?

1:32:44A psychiatrist or a social worker? It doesn't work that way. You ask a question, you're asking for da'at Torah, that's what you get. There's no such thing as not listening. And that's the problem the vast majority of people have. If they don't get the answer they want, they choose not to listen, and then they cry to Hashem why they have problems. Hashem says, what do you mean? You brought it on yourself. You asked for an answer. I gave the rabbi the answer. You didn't want to listen. Now you have problems. What are you complaining for? You brought it on yourself. Next question. How come bugs are much worse than any other non-kosher animal? Because you always say it's five times worse than any other. The Torah says that there are several different levels of tum'ah. in bugs that are not found in regular animals. And there are several differences. You're right. The Torah specifies, when it talks about impure animals versus pure animals and so on, there's more significance as far as tum'ah in the bugs than there is in animals. But it's the bugs that you can see with your naked eye.

1:34:01You know, so if, let's say, for example, somebody wants to eat a salad, they have to, you know, put the salad, put the leaves, whatever it is, in salt water, put some, you know, soap water, clean it several times, make sure that you go through the whole thing and eliminate anything that you can see with the naked eye. You know, if there's a fly in there or some type of worm or whatever it is. I mean, of course, sometimes you see these videos, and you see some guy going with a magnifying glass 50 times, and he finds some little thing that looks like a dinosaur, but in reality, you can't even see it. He's like, "Ah, see? See? It has something." Everything has something. Everything has something. But you're not going to be judged on that something as far as that's a sin if you can't see it with the naked eye. You still should remove it. That's why we put the saltwater and the soap water. But it's likely there's still going to be something. It's likely. You're responsible for the stuff that you can remove, that you can see. You're not expected to buy a telescope and a microscope and ask it to come to your house every time you want to make a salad. You're not going to be judged on that.

1:35:07Now, will it affect you in a negative way? It can. It can. It still brings tumah (impurity) even if you can't see it. But it's not the same as if you ate a fly that you just simply care less about, or you ate some type of other bug that you can see and you simply just don't care to see. You know, so that's the main thing. You have to make sure you do everything you can as far as your hishtadlut to remove these things so you show Hashem that you do care, and Hashem will help you. But it is more significant to eat bugs. That's because the Torah mentions it more times. So, for example, if we see the same thing mentioned multiple times, We already know Torah is teaching us multiple lessons. It's not the same lesson over and over again. So, for example, when it says don't cook a... What is a gedi? The little deer. What is it called? The kid. The kid in the milk of its mother. The reality is that it says it three times in the Torah. The whole issue of milk and meat. It says it three times in the Torah, the exact same thing. Why? It says, first lesson, don't eat it. Don't eat milk and meat together.

1:36:19second lesson: Don't cook it, meaning you can't work at a non-kosher restaurant and make cheeseburgers. Not allowed. Not to cook milk and meat, even if it's not for yourself or somebody else. Not allowed. Third lesson: Why? Third lesson: Not to benefit from it, meaning you're not allowed to sell it. Not to have a non-kosher McDonald's or something where you're just selling people cheeseburgers. And you're not even allowed to benefit from it in the sense that if, let's say by accident, a piece of cheese fell on your hamburger, obviously you can't eat it. But you can't even give that cheeseburger to your dog. Why? Because then you're technically still benefiting since now you won't have to feed him as much dog food. So the Torah teaches you three different things from the same exact verse. But that verse, why do we know it's three things? Because it's mentioned three times. So when the issue of bugs is mentioned several times, we know that each one teaches us a different aspect, a different problem. Next question. What about when a man has a disagreement with a woman, and the disagreement is...

1:37:37So there's going to be many times there's going to be machloket in the Torah. And this is part of the reason why each person has to pick a tradition that they're connected to. There's a mitzvah in the Torah that you must follow the Torah of your father. Listen to the Torah of your father; follow the Torah of your father. So if you're Ashkenazi, you follow the Ashkenazi customs. If you're Sephardi, you follow the Sephardi customs. Now, there are some who say that you can change at one point in your life if you want. But you cannot go back and forth. You can't, like, pick Rav Ovadia's psak here and the Chofetz Chaim over there. You can't do that. You can't go back and forth. So you have to go by the psak of your tradition. And sometimes the poskim agree. He says no, he says no. He says yes, he says yes. And sometimes they disagree.

1:38:58So, but that's not always because of tradition. That's not always because of Ashkenazi and Sephardi. Sometimes, for example, it's both Sephardi who disagree or both Ashkenazi who disagree. So, for example, your example is about milk and dairy and fish. Dairy and fish. To my knowledge, Rav Ovadia allowed it. Dairy and fish. The Chida allowed it, but the Ben Ish Chai, the Ben Ish Chai went against it heavily. So we follow that you're allowed. But some people that I know follow the Ben Ish Chai, say it's not allowed. Say it's not allowed. But it's both Sephardi. Ben Ish Chai is Sephardi, Rav Ovadia is Sephardi. Why? Because both studied the Torah in a certain way, and they arrived at that emet, that this is the truth and this is the truth. The same thing happens sometimes between Ashkenazim and Sephardim, where the Ashkenazim say, let's say, rice is forbidden on Pesach because they say it's kitniyot, from a tradition they have from hundreds of years ago. But the Sephardim never had this issue; it's not kitniyot, and you're allowed to eat it on Pesach.

1:40:05But there are some Sephardim, like the Moroccan Jews, who follow the Ashkenazi custom. Why? Because the Moroccan Chachamim follow the same tradition. Even though, again, they're also Sephardim. So it's not always Ashkenazi versus Sephardi. Sometimes it's Ashkenazi versus Ashkenazi, sometimes it's Sephardi versus Sephardi, and there's disagreements. So that's why everyone has to have... at least two, maybe three, main rabbis in their life that they follow everything they say. One, if you're a Sephardi, usually that's Rav Ovadia Yosef. I know a few people that follow the Ben Ish Chai, but more the general tradition in the world is that everyone who is Sephardi, generally speaking, follows Rav Ovadia. There are some that follow others, some even that follow, for example, the Rambam. Only the Rambam, and you know if they have Chachamim that explain to them how to apply the Rambam to today's world. But nonetheless, most Sephardim in the world follow Rav Ovadia. So if you do that, you follow pretty much everything he says—everything he says, not just sometimes what he says. Where is this a problem? You have some people that call themselves Sephardim.

1:41:18are proud of their Sephardi tradition, but all of a sudden when it comes to wigs, they follow a different Chacham. They don't follow Rav Ovadia; they'll find some other Chacham from Ashkenaz that told them that wigs are allowed even though he never said the wigs of today are allowed. What is that? The Gemara in Masechet Rosh Hashanah says someone that looks the stringencies of Beit Shammai and the stringencies of Beit Hillel is like a fool that's blind walking in darkness. But someone that's looking for the leniencies of Beit Shammai and the leniencies of Beit Hillel, Rasha. Meaning, if someone is always looking to be Machmir, Machmir, Machmir, only the most stringency, the Gemara says you're an idiot, you're a chamor. Who asked you to be machmir? Just do what you're supposed to. That's it. Enough. Only do extra when you can. Not everything davka, extra, extra. You don't have to do that. You're a chamor. Why? You're going to make the Torah ugly that way. Torah told you to be modest. Everything you're wearing, you're covering your face. Who told you to cover your face?

1:42:33Torah told you to eat certain foods; all of a sudden, you are living off of carobs. Who told you to live like this? You know, people go too extreme. Who told you to do that? Who told you to be machmir on everything, to be stringent on everything? Do what you're supposed to! Rabbi says it's allowed, then it's allowed. Oh, maybe he's a rabbi. Oh, you're smarter than a rabbi? Go, go, go. Go to Christianity. Do me a favor. Go. Go! Why? We follow the Torah, not what sounds good to you. Even if you think you're righteous because of stringencies, it doesn't make you righteous; it makes you a fool. There are some times you should be stringent. But if you're stringent on everything the Gemara says, you're a chamor (donkey). The Gemara says, on the other hand, he's only looking for whoever's lenient. Whenever Beit Shammai is lenient, he goes with him. Whenever Beit Hillel is lenient, he goes with him. This is rasha'hu. He's a rasha (wicked person), this guy. Why? He's just looking to get out of jail. He's just looking for any way that he could just give away the Torah to somebody else. He's a rasha, this guy.

1:43:51So a person needs to know, you have to have a psak. What he says is what he says. If you're Sephardi, you follow Rav Ovadia, you have to follow everything Rav Ovadia says, unless Rav Ovadia himself writes you can follow someone else on this specific halacha. So whether you are this one or that one, you have to make sure you have a psak and you follow it closely. So all of the Sephardim that say they follow the Yalkut Yosef, they follow the Yabia Omer, the Rav Ovadia books, and the sons' books and so on, you can't wear a wig. There's no leniency to wear a wig. Forget about the idol worship part. Rav Ovadia was against the wig on all counts. He spoke against it so much. He says that an avrech that wants his wife to wear wig, he's only gonna go out with her if she wears a wig, he says he's a Rasha. Like, what is that worth? Even his Torah is worth nothing, worth nothing. The guy could learn from here till Gehinom. It's not worth anything. Why? That's how much Rav Ovadia was against wigs. He brought over a hundred and twenty poskim that showed throughout history it's not allowed to wear wigs. And you're saying you are following all of Rav Ovadia's psak and still wearing a wig? From what planet? Yeah, but this rabbi says it's allowed. Yeah, but you don't follow him.

1:45:06You can't choose here, choose there. That's posek. Same thing with Ashkenazim. There are certain things the Chacham says, that's it, you gotta stick to it. Unless that Chacham says you have something to rely on when it comes to leniencies on this. But there are certain things that the Chachamim themselves say. Listen, this is my opinion on it. This is what I paskened. But there are some Chachamim that say otherwise, and you can listen to them also. Why? Both this and this are words of the living God. Meaning, it's not black and white. Hashem didn't make this right and this wrong. in everything. Sometimes they're both right, even though they're opposites. They're both words of the living God. Sometimes both are right. But it's only right when? When you followed it because it's Da'at Torah, because the Chacham said it, not because it made sense to you to follow it. If you only followed it because it made sense to you, it's Rasha'u. Yeah, but I made the right decision. He's the Chacham. Yeah, but he didn't follow because of the Chacham.

1:46:11You failed because it made sense to you. Like the dog, it made sense to him to go look inside the fridge to look for food. Made sense to him. That's how you acted. It doesn't work like that in Torah. You follow the Torah. So you have a chacham, you have a posek—that's who you go after. Two, you have to have a local rabbi; you go to a shul, you pray there. This is mainly for men. Women, as I've said, based on the דעת of the Gaon Mevilna and many, many other chachamim, Rav Ovadia did not even have a women's section in his shul. Why? Women should not go to shul. Bottom line, stay home. Take care of yourself, take care of your family. There's nothing for you to do in shul. You want to pray, pray at home. Why? Because the reality is the women's section in the vast majority of shuls is only chit-chatting and lashon hara. So why go to shul to make sins? For what? Didn't you go to shul to do mitzvot? You're going to make sins. And if it's not you making sins, it's everybody else making sins, and you're getting aggravated that they're making sins, and you're not happy by going there anyway. What did you go to shul for?

1:47:14You want to pray, pray at home, no one's going to bother you. That's what the Chazon Ish even said to his own wife. Don't go to shul. Ever. Some women, no, no, no, I'm going to go to shul, and you see the woman going to netz. I saw it sometimes, they go to shul, and you see a woman who shows up at 6 o'clock in the morning. Poor husband. Poor husband she has. She's not even home at 6 o'clock in the morning. She thinks she's an avreich at the shul, praying at 6 o'clock in the morning. Who asked you to pray at 6 o'clock in the morning? No, this is righteousness? Who says righteousness? Who says righteousness? Show me one. Show me Sarah Imeinu going to shul at 6 o'clock in the morning. Show me. In reality, you know where it comes from? Ga'avah. Arrogance. That's where it comes from. Vast majority. Not always. Vast majority, arrogant. She wants to show that she can be like the men. She wants to be. She can do it too. Why only the men are going to shul at 6 o'clock in the morning? I can do it. No problem. The Reshit Chochmah, Masechet Gehinom, has a story about a woman like that. She used to tell everybody about the fasts she used to make. She used to fast.

1:48:31days at a time. Tzidkut. Kisui Rosh and everything. Mitpachat. Not wig. Mitpachat. She used to fast. Go pray, everything. "Hey, listen. No, no, no. I can't eat today. I'm sorry. Thank you. The cake looks delicious, honey. It looks delicious, but I'm fasting. You know, for Hashem. For Hashem." It's the middle of the afternoon. Twelve o'clock in the afternoon. She starts crying. What? Reishit Chochmah says, Gehenom. What did they do with her? They used her ear as the door stopper in Gehenom. This is why everything she did was to tell people about it. It didn't come l'shem Shamayim. It didn't come for HaKadosh Baruch Hu. She didn't fast for HaKadosh Baruch Hu. She fasted to tell everybody else, "I'm more righteous than you." HaKadosh Baruch Hu says, "It's disgusting. Who needs this fast? Who asked you to fast? You want everybody to hear you? We're going to use your ear as the door stopper." I didn't make this up. You can see it yourself if you want to.

1:49:47You can see it yourself. That's how much HaKadosh Baruch Hu hates ga'ava. He hates arrogance. He hates it, hates it. Mitzvot, silence. Righteousness, silence. Big ma'asim tovim, big actions, good things, quiet. Quiet. Unless you're trying to get other people to do it. Then it's a mitzvah to publicize it. But you're telling people to fast, no one's going to follow you because you're fasting. Telling people that you're praying at 6 o'clock in the morning, no one's going to follow you because you're praying at 6 o'clock in the morning, habibi. They want to sleep till late at least. You're lucky if they show up to the 9 o'clock minyan. What are you telling them that you're praying every day at 6 o'clock in the morning for? You're a big hero? For what? To make them feel bad about themselves? So that's what a person needs to know. HaKadosh Baruch Hu doesn't like ga'ava. The local rabbi that you have, you have to make sure you pray for men. Go pray for local rabbi. Sometimes that local rabbi also happens to be a Talmid Chacham, you could ask him questions. If he has Yirat Shamayim, and he knows Torah, and tells you where he got the answer, you could ask him questions too.

1:50:54Listen to a shiur. He can even become your rabbi. Sometimes he's not your rabbi. Sometimes he just uses a shul as a place to pray. He has 10 kosher people in there or more. Baruch Hashem. Then you have the third rabbi, which is the most important, which is the mashpia. The one that's going to influence you. The one that you're going to learn all of his Torah. The one that you're going to read every book he wrote. The one that you're going to watch every shiur. The one that you're going to ask all the questions. The one that's going to know everything about you, including the ugly stuff. In fact, especially the ugly stuff, because that's the real stuff. That's your rabbi. But that means you're going to learn everything he says and listen to everything he says. Now, most people are very happy to have number one, sometimes. Number two, all the time. It's easy to get a local rabbi. It's like a 7-Eleven. Every corner has one. But the mashpia, no, no, I have a few that I listen to, Rabbi. I have a few. I ask him questions. I ask him questions. Sometimes people, people are special. You know, they want to give me a tikkun for the day. You know what they do? They ask me a question, a tough one. I have to go look it up. I have to go look at a book. I have to ask Rabbi Efraim, double-check this, that, and that. I work on a question for a half hour, 40 minutes, an hour, just to get them an answer.

1:52:08Finally, you get them an answer. Ah, don't worry, Rabbi, I already got the answer from Rabbi Mizrachi. Ah, no, don't worry, I already got the answer from Rabbi such and such. So why did you ask me? No, you know, usually I send my questions to two, three, four rabbis at a time. You know what happens to them with me? Delete. No more questions asked. Why? You're wasting my time. You're looking for, you're shopping around. shopping around. Don't shop around with me. Not because I have arrogance. You have enough. If you're already at a level where you could shop around, go shop somewhere else. I have people that don't have options. I have people for whom I'm the only one they're in touch with. I have to deal with them. You have enough. You're rich with rabbis. You have a few. Go to them. I have poor people. I have people that only have one rabbi. I have to deal with them.

1:53:10Start sending questions to five different rabbis, four different rabbis. Go, go. Go somewhere else. Why? Because what's going to happen is, at the very best-case scenario, confusion. Best-case scenario. Why? One rabbi is going to give you an answer based on Halacha. Another rabbi is going to give you an answer based on knowing you. A third rabbi doesn't know the answer, but he feels bad he doesn't know the answer, so he's going to throw something out there. Before you know it, you've got shakshuka. So what do you do? You just do whatever you want. Do me a favor. Don't include me in that list. Please. Please. I already have enough problems in my life. I have enough problems. I don't want to be partners to your sins. I don't want to be partners to your sins. I already have enough to fix. Please. Go, shop around somewhere else. There are supermarkets, there's Winn-Dixie, there's Walmart, there's whatever you want. Don't come to me. Why? Don't do me any favors.

1:54:13takes time to answer questions. It's not like people think, you know, it's like Rabbi Google; you just type it in, and it doesn't work that way. It takes time. So, please, if you can have a mashpia, stick to him. Listen to everything he says, follow everything he says, that's it. That's the third rabbi. Sometimes, like I said, it's two rabbis, sometimes it's three. But does that mean that you can't listen to anybody else? No, it doesn't mean that. You can listen to two speakers, maybe even three if you're really, really bright. I don't recommend it. I don't recommend you listening to more than two speakers because people have too different of a shita. to listen to all of them and still really get Da'at Torah in the end. But let's say if you're a smart person, you're a pike'ach, you can handle the different strategies, understand how to utilize the best of all, okay, fine, no problem. But once you start getting to these people who listen to five, six different speakers, those people end up...

1:55:19Complete ignoramuses. Why? They don't know what's real. They just know he says this sometimes. He says this all the time. He doesn't really say. He's a philosopher. He's an astronaut. He's a doctor sometimes. He's a lord. He's a doctor. He's all types of things. By the time you finish, you have a mishmash. Don't make the Torah more difficult than it needs to be. Find something, somebody that motivates you. Find somebody that inspires you. Find somebody that you can ask them some questions. Find the, you know, the posek, that that's what you follow. Learn those books. Learn those shiurim. Do everything you possibly can. You'll get to Gan Eden. If you don't do it, I'm sorry, I won't be able to help you very much once after you're out of this world. One more question, and we're going to finish for the week. Kavod, who has something? No, I have no questions. Ah, the ladies. Ah, finally, she won the argument. Two hours to argue about who's going to ask the question. Why didn't Moshe Rabbeinu make mention of the manna in the blessing?

1:56:40Why didn't Moshe Rabbeinu make mention of the manna in the blessing? Well, the original source that the Imrei Emet got it from is from Gemara Masechet Berachot. Gemara Masechet Berachot says that the Birkat HaMazon was comprised, the first part, by Moshe Rabbeinu at a certain time, right after Kriyat Yam Suf. He was celebrating Kriyat Yam Suf, and he was celebrating the sustenance that Hashem was giving Am Yisrael. Then it was, the second part was by Yehoshua Bin-Nun, the next leader, comprised of the second part. Then the third part was by David and Shlomo, David and his son Shlomo. And then the fourth part was by Anshei Knesset HaGedolah. that the Chachamim, some of them were actually prophets, and some of them were just Gedolei HaDor—not just, but they were Gedolei HaDor, where the Gemara says that sometimes a Chacham is more preferable than a Navi (a prophet). Each one was saying it at a specific time, not just because of the manna, or just because of crossing the sea. That was the event that happened.

1:57:53The blessing itself was, in essence, blessing Hashem and being grateful to Hashem. At that point, using that as, let's say, their reminder. So, what is it like? Sometimes, for example, you want to remind yourself of something. So let's say for me, when I have my books, a lot of people always ask me, "How come you have so many different colors on your books?" Do they have a meaning? Is there a code? You know, I bought 15 different highlighters. Do I need all of them? I don't use 15 different highlighters. I use a few. I use a handful or so. But generally speaking, two. Two colors. But sometimes it's more depending on the book, how many times I've read it, and so on. Why do I use a highlighter? First of all, I highlight things that I want to remember more than the normal. More than the normal. So I highlight it usually in yellow. then sometimes I'll highlight something in a different color. Red sometimes happens. Sometimes it's red on top of yellow, which is a third color of its own, even though it looks similar. Point being, this has a system in my head; it's not for you guys to learn. But, number one, it's to assist me in memory.

1:59:07but also assist me in memory at a specific time, and also assist me in memory for a specific reason of why I need to remember this. Meaning it's not just remember this for the sake of remembering it, but remember this, that this has to do with a specific topic. This has to do with a specific issue. This has to do with a specific mood, if you will, even. If I want to talk Mussar, I have to look for the stuff that looks like fire in my book. If I want to talk Emunah or I want to talk Bitachon, that's a different color. So it has different things, but that's not for me. That's just my own brain and how it works. Different people use, let's say, for example, sometimes little post-it notes, which I also use. Other people will use little flags or different things. If you want to remind yourself of different things, you'll use different methods. So the manna wasn't per se the only reason why Moshe Rabbeinu wrote the Birkat HaMazon, and Yehoshua Bin-Nun wrote the Birkat HaMazon, and David and Shlomo wrote the Birkat HaMazon. That wasn't the only reason for each one of them. That was, in essence, the reminder, the flag, the highlight of thanking Hashem.

2:00:18And if you don't know what to thank Hashem for, look, think of the manna. That's enough. You should be thankful to Him until the end of generations for that. And surely you'll know that there's much more to thank aside from the manna. But even if you don't, you have a starting point. So it's, in essence, like highlighting something. And that's in essence what it is. But you're not going to find the story of the manna inside the book of the Mazon, because it's not about the manna per se, but rather what the manna represented, which is sustenance. It represented sustenance, meaning that Hashem provides sustenance, which is one of the major principles that a Jew needs to remind themselves of every single day, that Hashem is the one that is going to give you parnassah. If a person not only said it but really believed it, they would never have emunah problems. Because 90% of our concern usually has to do with money.

2:01:18either not having money, or not having enough money, either today or in the future, we sometimes accept certain jobs or certain work because of money, and we sometimes deal with certain people because of money, but it all has to do with emunah. So the first part of the Birkat Hamazon is, in essence, to remind us that, look, Hashem fed us even in the desert. Even in the desert, Hashem sends us food. Surely, He's going to feed you today. Surely, you're going to be okay. And the Gemara, later on, has Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus say that someone who has food today but is still concerned about the food they'll have tomorrow has emunah problems. He calls them "baby emunah," "little emunah." Why? Hashem gave you food today. Why are you worried about tomorrow? Yeah, because I don't have money for tomorrow. Yeah, but did you have money for today, yesterday? You have money for today, today, right? Okay, so Baruch Hashem. Tomorrow, we'll deal with tomorrow. That's how Hashem works. So in essence, what Moshe Rabbeinu is trying to teach us is the first lesson. There are many things you can learn from Birkat HaMazon. I have a sefer in my house that teaches a lot of different things about Birkat HaMazon. Very, very good sefer. Written by a chacham, a Sephardi chacham in Eretz Yisrael.

2:02:41It's a good one. And there's an endless amount of lessons you can learn from Birkat HaMazon. One of them is the fact that you have to have emunah. Why? Hashem fed Am Yisrael in the desert. In the desert, you're not even supposed to survive. There were scorpions and snakes bigger than people at that time. It was a dangerous place. You went to the desert, you weren't going to survive. Not only did we survive, we thrived. With the clouds of glory, seven different ones, protecting us in all places. The Aron HaKodesh being the GPS, telling us where to go. And food, whatever flavor you wanted. The river of Miriam, fresh water whenever you wanted. The manna was so healthy that the entire manna was absorbed by your blood system. He never had to go to the bathroom for 40 years. For anyone that has stomach problems, that sounds like Gan Eden. Not going to the bathroom for 40 years. Not having to go to the bathroom for 40 years. What an amazing miracle. Imagine. Imagine not having to go to the bathroom. Now, most people, Baruch Hashem, they don't have stomach problems.

2:03:55They're like, "What's the big deal? What's the big deal?" Ask one person who has stomach problems. Ask. Ask him. You'll start crying. If you tell him, "Give him a choice: Don't go to the bathroom for 40 years, but you'll be healthy," he'll start crying. That's Gan Eden. Why? People that have stomach problems know how much suffering it is. If someone says someone with stomach problems doesn't go to Gan Eden, why? The suffering of real stomach problems is already Gan Eden in this world. Again, it depends on the levels and so on. But anyone that has stomach problems, I've met some tzaddikim that have stomach problems. Baruch Hashem, I benefited to have some myself. All of them, if they're tzaddikim, they thank Hashem for it. They suffer, they cry. Pain, agony, nightmare. But they know, whatever mistakes I make unintentionally here and there, at least I'm paying for it here. For sure. Sometimes, I say, I paid for two months. The amount of suffering. That's what it is. So you don't go to the bathroom for two months? Baruch Hashem. Baruch Hashem. So the manna is in the desert. We don't know where to go. HaKadosh Baruch Hu gave us parnassah in the desert. So if HaKadosh Baruch Hu worried about our parnassah in the desert, surely He's going to worry about your parnassah in Florida, in Holland, in England, in New York, wherever you are. Just do what He says.

2:05:18So that's one of the things that it represents. The other thing you're going to learn about Birkat HaMazon is that it's the only blessing that's directly written and commanded in the Torah. Hence the reason why Birkat HaMazon is the most important blessing in the entire Torah, more important than Shema Yisrael and Amidah. And this is one of the things a lot of people don't know. People know how to eat, but thanking Hashem, not so much. A person who is smart should look forward to eating bread so they can do Birkat HaMazon because that's an opportunity to simply ask for everything you want. Everything you want and also fulfill a huge mitzvah that's literally written in the Torah. Any other thing that's pertinent, that's important for anybody who wants to ask? No, you can ask. Oh, you had a question. You can ask me downstairs anyway, so you might as well ask. Let everybody else benefit at least. No?

2:06:19We learn about Amidah, the structure of the Amidah. They also mentioned the short version of Amidah. But is there anywhere else they mention, is there some kind of leniency? Besides, you know, what we see in Masechet Berachot, because I've seen people do it like this in a minute. Oh, so there's a certain leniency for people to do a fast Amidah when it's Sha'at Tzarah, when there's a major danger. Major danger at war. You're at war, you can't sit there for six to ten minutes because you're probably not going to survive. So that's one leniency. There are certain people that are specific employees who work early, early hours in the day—four o'clock in the morning types of people. They have certain leniencies when it comes to even the Birkat Hamazon and other things. But anyone who goes standard to a shul and is not in some type of major, like, you know, halachic permission to pray the short version, if they complete...

2:07:30the Amidah in less than six minutes, they're pretty much not praying. It's a sad situation because you already completed half the battle by going to shul, but you didn't pray. You know, it's sad, but unfortunately, it happens. I've seen people complete the Amidah, you said one minute? I saw somebody finish it in five seconds. He took three steps forward, three steps back, and he finished. He starts looking around the whole time. The whole time he's looking around. That's a person that goes to shul just for a social club. He doesn't want to pray. I'd be surprised if he even believed in God. Yeah, you're going to find one of those in every shul probably, unfortunately. Yeah, but, you know, it's sad. You should feel bad for them. You should pray for them. Hopefully, they do teshuvah. But generally speaking, Amidah should take you, after you've done it for a while, and if you've gotten used to the prayer and so on, it should take you no less than six minutes. Six minutes, seven minutes, eight minutes.

2:08:32Depends. Some people have a lot more kavanah. It takes them much longer. I know one guy who says that every Amidah for him takes 20-30 minutes because he wants to do it that way. I don't have that kind of time, so I can't pray every single time for 20 minutes just for Amidah. I don't have it. But if you can, b'chavod. The Gemara Masechet Berachot says that the chassidim of that time would pray for three hours, prepare for the prayer for three hours, and then go down from there for three hours, meaning nine hours of prayer a day. nine hours. So, hey, wait a minute, how do they learn Torah if they pray for so much? He says, when you pray that much, Hashem gives you a lot of Torah in less time. But in today's world, you're not going to find such people. You're not going to find such people that pray for that much. Very few, very few. They exist, but very few. Most people, if you want to learn Torah, you have to toil over it. You have to learn it, you have to break your head over it, and you have to also pray. You're supposed to say the words with your mouth. Your mouth needs to move. If you're just reading with your eyes, you have a problem and

2:09:49You have to move your mouth. Even if you're not loud or anything like that, you have to read with your mouth. Your mouth has to move; you have to say the words. If you increase the volume, it would be... speech. If you're just saying this doesn't work, that doesn't work. If you're just, you know, one of these people like a typewriter, your eyes just keep going back and forth but the mouth doesn't move, it's no good. You have to move your mouth. You have to move your mouth a little bit, and you have to be loud enough for you to hear, but the guy next to you not to hear. So, it needs to have some vocalization, some vocalization. Now, as far as the clarity of the speech, in a Sephardi tradition, they are a lot more makpid on this; they are a lot more stringent on this, where they say that you have to try your best to really pronounce every single word. The more you pronounce, the more kavanah you're going to have, the better you are. In the Ashkenazi world, not so much. But, halachically speaking, as long as you're saying it,

2:10:51fine, even if you don't pronounce it perfectly, it's okay, it's okay. Most importantly, say it, say it. Now, when it comes down to people who don't know how to speak English or don't know how to speak Hebrew, what do you do? Get yourself a transliterated siddur where it writes the Hebrew word in your language using, let's say, the English language, writes it with the sounds, but before you go and actually use that part and make the sounds, because you don't know what they mean, study the actual Amidah, study the actual Shema Yisrael, study a few prayers that are the key ones. Those handful of prayers, study them, what they actually say a bunch of times,

2:11:52In that meantime, read them in English or whatever other language you speak. But then, after you've studied them for a while, transition into the Hebrew part where you at least understand somewhat of what you're talking about, and over time you'll understand the whole thing. It's not good to read completely like a blind person where you have no idea what you're saying at all. You need to have some type of concept of what you're saying. On the other hand, it's important for a person to also say it in Hebrew. There's a certain significance to it. So if you don't know how to say it in Hebrew at all, then say it in your language, Spanish, English, French, whatever it is. But the ideal is to say it in Hebrew and understand it. And in order to do that, you do what I just said, which is to study, continue in your language, but study those few prayers I just mentioned, enough to understand the general concept of what's being said more and more, and then eventually use transliteration. You’ll be able to do both, and you'll be speaking sometimes even better than the rabbi. They said that you learned Torah. Thank you very much. I will see you guys next week. We are still looking for a house. Hashem is giving us a nice, interesting tour. enough to understand the general concept of what's being said more and more, and then eventually use transliteration. You'll be able to do both, and you'll be speaking sometimes even better than the rabbi. They said that you learned Torah. Thank you very much. I will see you guys next week. We are still looking for a house. Hashem is giving us a nice, interesting tour

2:13:12tour, but there's going to be some very, very big news soon. I can't tell you now for several reasons, but I promise you that the biggest news yet is coming very, very soon. It's going to be an interesting, interesting future.