Was Haman a Zionist?

0:12we're back in Sunny Isles. We have our weekly shiur, questions, and answers. Sometimes you guys ask questions and I give you answers. Sometimes I ask the questions and I give you the answers also. Since it's actually a questions and answers session, I have, Baruch Hashem, plenty of material here to talk about Purim, talk about Zionism, some very, very interesting things to talk about Zionism. I know people love me because of my belief about Zionism, but again, it's a mistake to think I'm not pro-Israel, which we'll discuss. And... I give you the answers also. So, since it's actually a questions and answers session, I have, Baruch Hashem, plenty of material here to talk about Purim, talk about Zionism, some very, very interesting things to talk about Zionism. I know people love me because of my beliefs about Zionism, but again, it's a mistake to think I'm not pro-Israel, which we'll discuss. And... There's lots of interesting material, but if you have some specific pressing questions or anything that's really interesting, or even if it's not interesting, you can ask it anyway, since at least we'll pretend this is a questions and answers session. Last week, you asked one question, and we did a whole shiur off your one question. So your questions are pretty good. So, no? Anybody? Questions, same price as last week. Same price. Questions in the back? New people get questions first. Old people, no, no. Not so much.

1:28That's my whole shiur. Okay, so we have, Baruch Hashem, we have Purim. We have Purim coming up in a few days. And Purim, there's been actually an article that I've been trying to write for almost two years now. It's almost like a book. It's long, it's extensive, with a lot of sources, but one of the points that I start the article with is that Purim has quietly become the symbol of Judaism today. Most people don't view it as that; they just view it as a fun holiday that's not obligatory. You don't have to do anything. You don't have to fast really—I mean technically you're supposed to fast before, but only the religious keep that one. If you're not really religious, you don't even know you have to fast. is that Purim has quietly become the symbol of Judaism today. Most people don't view it as that; they just view it as a fun holiday that's not obligatory. You don't have to do anything; you don't have to fast, really. I mean, technically, you're supposed to fast before, but only the religious keep that one. If you're not really religious, you don't even know you have to fast. And even if you're religious, it depends on how religious you are. Like, is this one of those obligatory fasts or is this a rabbinical one that you don't really have to observe? Because I'm really hungry at 9 o'clock in the morning. You know, one of those things. When does the fast end? It just started. It's 9 o'clock. Why are you always asking when it's going to end? Most people fast; it's better they don't fast. Why? Because their fasts are like a diet plan. All they think about is food the whole time.

2:58The whole time they're fasting, they're thinking about food, they're thinking about coffee, they're thinking about what they are going to eat, they're thinking about the menu of how they're going to eat, what they're going to eat, and exactly at what time and which dish they're going to get to eat. They ask their friends, "What do you have ready for before the fast?" Three days before the fast started, they're already ready for the fast, thinking about what they are going to eat before the fast. And then, "What are you going to eat after you break the fast?" And the whole thing turns into being about food. Why? Because they are not going to eat for a few hours. People like that, it's better off they don't fast. Why? Hashem says that He is not interested in your sacks. He was telling Am Yisrael through the prophet Yeshayahu. Hashem is not interested in your sacks. You know, Am Yisrael used to wear sacks when they would mourn. He's not interested in your sacks. He's not interested in the ashes that you put on your head, which is, by the way, where the Catholics got their... Their custom of putting ashes on their head, you know, a few times a year, Wednesdays or something like that. Most ridiculous thing I've ever seen in my life, by the way, because sometimes you see people show up on TV interviews with this stuff on their head. And I know in the beginning, you know, years ago, I didn't know what it was. I'm like, "Yo, somebody should tell that guy he has something on his forehead." And then you see the reporter also has something on their forehead. It's like, oh.

4:25Something in between them and then somebody would, you know, laugh at me and tell me, "No, no, no, it's their Catholic." So what's wrong with their heads? So anyway, that's actually where they got it. They got it from the Jews. The Jews, when we would mourn, we put ashes on ourselves. And most notably, the main minhag that was kept all this time is the fast. We wouldn't eat, and Hashem tells the Prophet to tell Am Yisrael, "I'm not interested in their fast. I care less about their fast. I What, are you making money out of their food that they're not eating? What do I care about their fast? I care about their teshuva. If their fast is going to fulfill its purpose, which is to lessen the material in order to increase the spiritual, meaning because they're not eating, because they're not thinking about food, because they're not worried about what's on the menu and what's not on the menu, which restaurant to go to, which restaurant not to go to, and what sauce to put on it, and what sauce not to put on it, and whether there's too much salt, or whether there's too little salt, and whether you really are in the mood for something sweet. Because there's always room for a cookie. If you're thinking like that, don't fast. Why? Your fast is like a diet plan.

5:41Fast, then eat, go, go, do whatever you want. But if you're not going to think about that stuff, and you're going to say, you know what? Since I'm not eating, I have to do something with myself. Oh, you know what? What's the point of this fast? Oh, to learn Torah, to take it closer to HaKadosh Baruch Hu? To do teshuva, to figure out why there is even a fast? Did we do something wrong? And you start thinking, oh, Yom Kippur, yeah, we did a lot wrong. Tisha B'Av, how much we did wrong. Not a day goes by throughout the year that we didn't do something wrong. You think about any day during the year we did something wrong, we have to do teshuva for it. If it's not us, it's our previous gilgul, previous reincarnation, previous generation, and so on and so forth. The point of the fast is to do teshuva. Hashem tells the prophet, I'm not interested in your fast. I'm not interested in your clothes. I'm not interested in you ripping your clothes. I'm interested in you ripping your hearts. Rip your hearts, do teshuva. That's what I'm interested in. If you're not going to rip your hearts, don't fast. It's a waste of time. Same thing goes with a korban. In those days, when we had the Beit HaMikdash, somebody would make a sin accidentally.

6:51They were able to repent for that sin by bringing a sacrifice. But if the person was not sorry about the mistake that he made, then his korban was called a pigul. Meaning if he thought, yeah, I'm only bringing this cow Because just to show face, you know, to show people that I'm really like, I'm part of the system. But in reality, I didn't do anything wrong. So what? I turned the light on Shabbat. Big deal. Happens. Happens. Like he's not really sorry for it. He doesn't realize that it's supposed to be him getting slaughtered, not the cow. The cow didn't violate Shabbat. Miskena, the cow. Poor cow. If the cow was speaking Hebrew, it would tell him, "Hey, hey, you violated Shabbat. They should slaughter you. Why me? What did I do?" But the cow didn't speak Hebrew. That's why they have to slaughter it. See? You have to learn how to speak Hebrew. So anyway, the key is that a person does not feel sorry about his sin. They said that his korban is worthless. Same thing if a person does viduy. Sephardim do viduy every day except Shabbat.

8:02Ashkenazim in America don't do it. They only do it a few times a year, but in Israel, many of them that I met actually do it just like Sephardim. Because they pray with the Siddur, I think of the Arizal, I believe. But anyway, the Ramban says that if you do viduy, Which is chatanu, avinu, pashanu, I'm sorry Hashem, I did this, I did this, I violated this sin, that sin, every sin in the book. The Ramban says if you don't have kavana during the vidui, it's better off you don't do it. That's why the Ashkenazim don't do it here. It's not because they don't care. No, it's because they know that unfortunately, because of all the sins we've made, we've gone to such a low generation that most people don't have kavana even during Amidah. He says, the Ramban says, if you don't have kavana, you don't have meaning. During vidui, it's better off you don't do it. Why? Because then it works as a case against you. It's like you're laughing in Hashem's face. "Hashem, I stole. I lied too. Oh, what's the baseball score? Oh yeah, and I didn't care about Your prayer." Ramban says, don't do it. Don't do it. Why? You're telling me all the sins you're making while you're talking during tefillah.

9:19The chazan is saying Kaddish and you're asking the guy what the stock market did today. Don't do it, don't do it. Do yourself a favor. Why? Because you make yourself a special VIP section in the hot place. So, it's very important to have kavana when you're doing vidui. It's very important to do it. You do vidui also before you go to sleep. The reason why you do it before you go to sleep is because the Gemara in Masechet Berachot says that going to sleep is 1/60th of a death. Technically, you die when you go to sleep, and your neshama goes up to Shamayim and reports everything you did that day. And it says to Hashem, "Hashem, listen, this guy is a thief. He went to work, but he didn't actually work. He played on his Facebook all day." And this woman, all she does is make other people sin, Hashem. Look at the clothes she wears. Why did You put me in this body? I don't want to go back there. Then the neshama complains about the body. It says, Hashem, I don't want to go back to the body. Hashem says, but you have to. The neshama asks, why? Hashem responds, because I command you. The neshama questions again, but why? Because today she's going to do teshuva. Today she's going to put clothes on. I promise. It's two degrees outside. She has to put clothes on.

10:35Today he's going to pray, today he's going to do teshuva, today maybe it's actually going to work. He's not going to steal anymore. And Hashem forces the neshama to come back to the body, and that's why the first thing that a Jew does when he wakes up in the morning is say, "Thank you Hashem for having emunah in me." Returning my soul. What I'm not, and we're not, that I'll do teshuva. That's the only reason why You put my neshama back into my body, which means that every day we don't do teshuva, we're not in a good situation. So now, a person that does teshuva through their korban is doing good. A person that does teshuva during the vidui is good. A person that fasts and does teshuva is good. But if not... we're missing the point. You have a question relevant to what we're saying? Could you raise your hand twice? Yes.

11:57Thinking about food because you're hungry is different than if all you think about is food, meaning that you're not even giving yourself the opportunity to connect to HaKadosh Baruch Hu. Because when you're praying, you're not really praying to connect to Hashem. You're praying just to get it over with so you can eat. When there's a break in the prayers, instead of learning a little bit and connecting to HaKadosh Baruch Hu, usually there's not that much break on Yom Kippur, for example. Just like an hour, hour and a half, depends on whether you're Sephardi or Ashkenazi, what kind of prayer you have. With Sephardim, I remember in New York, we only had about 45 minutes to an hour break on Yom Kippur. But then in Florida, it's a little bit more. So it depends on what the minhag is, how fast you pray. But anyway, there's a break during the day. If during that time you're learning, a little bit, then it's good. But if during that time you're sleeping, and you're sleeping extra, you're missing the first hour or two of the prayer, because you can't wait for it to be over, you're missing the point. a little bit, then it's good. But if during that time you're sleeping, and you're sleeping extra, and you're missing the first hour or two of the prayers because you can't wait for it to be over, you're missing the point.

13:02you're missing the point. We're not trying to tell people to stop being human for a day and not to be hungry. Yes, being hungry is part of the point, but don't forget that there's a reason. There's a reason why Hashem is saying you should fast today: because you should decrease the material and increase the spiritual. So a person needs to do everything possible to prepare. One of the great examples that I think would maybe put this point in a slightly different perspective is that, for example, what is the holiday that we call the holiday that we got the Torah? What is it called? Shavuot. Now, in reality, we didn't get the Torah on Shavuot, by the way. We only got the Ten Commandments. But anyway, we call it Shavuot. Now, why do we call it Shavuot? Shavuot means weeks. Shavuot doesn't mean we got the Torah. Shavuot means "weeks," right? So where do we get "weeks" from Matan Torah? It should be called the holiday of Matan Torah, the holiday we receive the Torah. That's what it should be called technically, but it's not called that. It's called Shavuot. Why is it called Shavuot? Because the whole holiday is not about us receiving the Torah.

14:25The whole holiday of Shavuot is about us preparing ourselves to receive the Torah. That's why we count every single day, every single week, throughout those seven weeks, to prepare for the Torah. Why? Because if you prepare for seven weeks, then you'll be worthy to receive the Torah on Shavuot. If you don't prepare for seven weeks, In fact, if you don't prepare at all, then your Shavuot is going to be about cheesecakes. That's it. Yeah, somebody, what do you do for Shavuot? Oh, I got two cheesecakes and a little bit of Ma'adan, specially shipped from Israel. That's Shavuot for them. What about you? Oh, I got one cheesecake and some other cake with some cheese in it, but we call it something else. That's their Shavuot. What about Matan Torah? Oh, yeah, yeah, that too, that too. We have that too also in our house. So the point is that, yes, we're supposed to be human at all times as long as we're in this world. It's okay to be hungry; there's no problem with being hungry, but let's not lose perspective. The same thing goes with Purim. Somewhere along the line, Purim became subconsciously the representation of Judaism today.

15:46One of the reasons is because it's a non-obligatory holiday. You don't have to really fast. You don't have to really go to the Beit Knesset throughout the whole day. You have to go to hear the Megillah. And some people do it and some people don't do it. But even the ones that do it, they know, "I'll do it." It's not really a big deal because it's not that long. It's not like you have to be there for hours and hours at a time praying and repenting or anything. No, it's just like you go there and it's fun. Why? Because you get to see everybody in a silly costume. And you get to look silly once a year, and people like that stuff. It’s a lot of fun for people to get drunk. They think that the mitzvah of Purim is to get drunk. Which, by the way, that's not the mitzvah. You're not supposed to get drunk like most people get to a state of drunkenness where they cause damage, and that's a problem. If you can't hold your liquor, then you have to know that. Why? Because you're not supposed to get drunk to a point where you can't tell right from left, and you're pretty much falling over yourself, and you're not allowed to pray. What a lot of people do, unfortunately, I've seen it, people call themselves religious, they drink so much during the day, and then they go to synagogue to pray Mincha, and they're drunk. They're not allowed to pray. Hashem killed Nadav and Avihu for this.

17:10Not to pray drunk. You're allowed to drink; you have to drink until you get even a little bit buzzed or tipsy even. But then you have to sleep for an hour or two. Why? To get it out of your system. You can't show up to shul drunk. Same thing, you can't go to shul high. People make a mistake because they think the main mitzvah of Purim is to get drunk. It's not right. There is a Gemara that talks about how... People that lost control during their drunkenness during their celebration, as a result of being drunk, have made mistakes. Even some of our sages have stories about them where one of the sages got up and slaughtered his fellow as a result of being drunk. Rava got up and slaughtered Rabbi Zeira, Gemara Masechet Megillah page 7b. Now, there's different types of commentary. Rabbi Fein says that it's not really that he slaughtered him, really, like he didn't actually murder him. But the point is that this is a story that we know that as a result of celebration getting out of control, bad things can happen.

18:27A person should always have control over themselves. Why? Because if you think constantly that Hashem is constantly next to you, like David HaMelech says, then how could you allow yourself to get so drunk that you can't walk straight, and Hashem is right next to you watching? A person should always think like this. Now, what happens if somebody gets drunk and he causes damage to another person? And the Poskim talk about this extensively. And Rabbi Ephraim spoke about this also in his book, Doresh Tov. We translated one of his articles, which we'll put in our next Alon Kodesh, b'ezrat Hashem. And he talks about it, and it says that there are some Poskim that say that if somebody is celebrating during Purim and he gets drunk and he causes his fellow damage, let's say he breaks something in his house or some other type of damage, there are some Poskim that say, you know what, he doesn't owe him any money. Even though at any time during the year he does, on Purim he doesn't owe him.

19:30Some poskim, not all poskim agree with this, but some poskim say he doesn't owe money. But either way, all poskim agree that this is a special time to be a ma'avir al middotav, to be someone that forgives the retribution. But technically, you're saying, yeah, he broke your stuff, so he should give you the money for it. You know what? Let it go. Why? On this special day, you get a special merit for letting things go. Somebody made you upset, you should forgive him. Why? You get the special segulah on Purim to let things go. Because if you let things go, they let things go in Shamayim. And a person that actually achieves this specifically on Purim could be in a very good status in Shamayim. Why? Because at the end of Purim, they could feel like they're completely clean of sins. Because they overcame their own bad middot of always wanting to take revenge. Now, Purim became this holiday where most people like to dress up, drink, and eat. Even though a Pew Research report that came out a few years ago said that only 10% of American Jews observe Shabbat, which means 90% do not, the statistics do not get much better anywhere else in the world, including Israel. It's not that much better, and...

20:58which means that 90% of Am Yisrael right now is in the status according to the Rambam, according to the Shulchan Aruch, according to the Zohar, according to pretty much every single halachic book that talks about Shabbat. Many people in Am Yisrael that are violating Shabbat on a regular basis are putting themselves in the status of an idol worshiper. Bar Minan. Horrible, horrible status for our brothers and sisters. You tell them, why don't you keep Shabbat? It's like, nah, come on, Shabbat's too much for me. That's too much for me. Oh, why don't you come hear the Megillah? Oh, yeah, let's go. Where is it? Where can we go? No one says no to the Megillah. No one says no to, you know, why don't you come to my house to have some hamantaschen? Oh man, you know those triangles. They say for some reason the ears of Haman were triangles. Fine, let's call it triangles. Let's do that. Fine, I'll share some triangles with you also, while we make some noise every time we say "Haman, Haman, Haman." You make noise like everybody across the country can hear. That we'll do. We'll make noise, we'll eat cookies, we'll get drunk, we'll wear costumes. Last year he was a Ninja Turtle, this year he's a Power Ranger, next year he'll be Pikachu. He has a whole wardrobe of costumes. Keep Shabbat, not so much. Why? The biggest reason we have religion where it is today, Judaism where it is today, human nature where it is today, humanity as a whole where it is today,

22:28is a combination of ignorance and manipulation. Ignorance in the sense that most people do not actually know what the Torah says. Most people have heard somebody say something that's referencing the Torah, but they never themselves read even the Five Books of Moses from the beginning to the end with basic level commentary by Rashi to understand what's actually happening here. Most people never did it. that's referencing the Torah, but they never themselves read even the Five Books of Moses from the beginning to the end with basic level commentary by Rashi to understand what's actually happening here. Most people never did it. I didn't even, I went to religious school until I was 10 years old, but I still never finished it. And you still, when you're 10 years old, you don't have the same mind as you do when you're 20, 25, 35, or 45. So you don't have the same understanding that, hey, Hashem destroyed the generation of the flood. When you're six, seven, or eight years old and you learn it for the first time, you're like, "Oh yeah, they were bad people." You don't understand what that actually means.

23:32So you have to read it again when you're 25, 35, and 45 to really get the gist. That when we say on Shabbat, on Friday night, that Hashem sat down and did nothing as the flood was destroying the world. We say this on Shabbat, right before Shabbat comes in. Right before Shabbat comes in, hey, by the way, you should know the flood happened, Hashem let it happen. Why, what does one thing have to do with the other? Why do I need to know that Hashem did nothing about saving the world when He was actually the one destroying it right before I go to Shabbat? To teach us: if you don't keep Shabbat, guess what? There's no point to the world. I can destroy it like I did before. That's what I'm saying. It's not that mankind is the purpose; the Torah is the purpose. The confused people that we have today think the opposite. So most people are ignorant; they simply don't know, and I include religious people in this equation. Most religious people today, unless they make a special effort to learn Mussar,

24:46outside of the yeshiva. Outside of the standard of teaching, they're never gonna know. What does the Rambam mean by reward and punishment? There are 13 principles of faith. One of them is that there's reward and punishment. If you do not believe in reward and punishment, you are considered, according to Halacha, a heretic. We cannot count you in a minyan, and You cannot be a witness in a Jewish ceremony. Why? You're considered a heretic. You don't believe in punishment. This, by the way, puts a lot of people that call themselves religious in that status. So, what is reward and punishment? Ask people, what is reward and punishment? Go ask religious people. Go. Go on Shabbat. Next Shabbat, you go to the community. Ask them, can you do me a favor? What's reward and punishment? No, you get good if you do good, you get bad if you do bad. What does that mean? What does it mean? Give me a little, give me a little peirush, could be a Rashi for me. Do me a favor. I don't know anything. Do me a favor. Tell me what does it mean? Reward, I'll start over. Reward, you get Gan Eden. Hey, they did okay, reward. I heard from the other guy, same thing as you. Okay, so I guess he's right. What's the punishment part? What is that? What does punishment mean? Oh, you know punishment, you should have a bad life. What do you mean? Oh...

25:59What does that mean? What? So everybody is getting punished then? Even the guy that's religious? Even the Chafetz Chaim? Even Rav Ovadia? Even Moshe Rabbeinu? All of them had a difficult life. So why are they getting punished? For what? They never made a sin. Most people do not know what punishment is. They don't. If he starts telling, oh yeah, you know, there's like this concept of Gehinnom, or hell, or something. Whoa, what does that mean? Give me. No, no. Elaborate. They won't know. we don't talk about it, I'll tell you. Why do they say we don't talk about it? Because they actually don't know themselves. They don't know themselves. They honestly don't know. This is a very serious problem we have in Judaism today. So, ignorance is a massive plague that we have in our generation today. Even sometimes people that do know ignore it because they don't like to face the facts.

27:01They don't like to face the fact that this status of punishment has to apply to sometimes people that you love. You see that your daughter is walking around immodestly. She's a machtiyat rabim, meaning that she's causing other people to sin through her immodesty. She herself is sinning by being immodest. That means she will have to get punished at some point. You don't like to think that way. Why? Because she's your little baby. Even if she's 35 years old or 25 years old or two, you don't want to think like that. Why? She's your daughter. She's your baby. I don't want to think, "Oh, my daughter's gonna get punished." It's the worst thing in the world to think about, but that's reality. So even sometimes when people know, they escape it, they run away from it. And that's a problem because if you run away from this, you're running away from half of Judaism. There has to be reward and punishment. There's no neutral. So that's the first reason why we have what we have today. Reward and punishment mean that if you fulfill the Torah, you will get rewarded eternally. No, jacuzzi is a physical pleasure that some people think is actually gross and disgusting. Other people think it's the pleasure of pleasures. So jacuzzi is just something in this world. Reward means that your neshama, your real you,

28:28Not gonna just be here forever. The real you is not this body. The body is like clothing. It's like this jacket jacket; take it off. He doesn’t let go and give a lecture somewhere else. He stays in a room. The real you, once the body dies and the worms eat it, the real you comes out. All right, that real you goes to a world before you go, and then in that world, they give him a judgment. Did you do good versus bad? What you do more of for the good, you'll get rewarded for; the bad, you get punished. The reward is an eternal reward. It's heaven, meaning that you get a spiritual pleasure eternally. Eternally means that even a million years is not even 1% of the time; eternally is forever. So, the soul will get a spiritual pleasure that's unlike anything else you could ever imagine in this world and... is it like in this world? I'll give you somewhat of an understanding. Now, when somebody, for example, hears a joke, a really, really funny joke, you start laughing. Now, are you laughing because you got physical pleasure? No, there's no physical pleasure; he just said a few words and you found it funny, right? It's not physical and...

29:49you got a physical pleasure. You get a physical pleasure from something that's not really physical. Another example is if somebody has a dream. Sometimes you have in your dreams certain pleasures; you feel like you're flying, you feel like you're laughing, you feel a certain type of ecstasy, and so on. Those are pleasures that are not really explainable in this world. It's not a physical pleasure, not connected to food or to sex or to anything that's physical. It's something that's beyond the physical. Eternity magnifies everything I just said to you by infinity, and that's just the beginning. Why? Because you get a spiritual pleasure. Now, the Torah doesn't give us too many details about the infinity of good. The reason why is because we actually don't understand what good really means, because most of what we want, most of what we desire, is actually bad for us. We want food of all types. Well, you eat too much food. Guess what? It's not good for you. We want sex every two seconds. Guess what? You're probably gonna get a disease.

31:05We want money. Everybody wants to be rich. Guess what? Everybody that wins the lottery curses the day they won the lottery. It's an overwhelming statistic. Over 95% or some ridiculous number like that end up declaring bankruptcy and cursing the day they won the lottery. Around the world, not just in America. You want to buy a lottery ticket, buy a lottery ticket, but... Listen, it depends if you prepared for it or not. If you prepared for it spiritually, then it may not be. If you didn't prepare, I don't know, then it is a curse. The thing is, though, that actually there's a halacha. There's a halacha. They talk about it. Also, they say that when somebody loses money, they should do a blessing. Why? Because losing money technically was instead of them getting a physical punishment, and... Blessing, you should bless for the good and for the bad. Even the bad, you lost a lot of money, is a good thing. So many say, wait a minute, but what about if you made a lot of money, you won the lotto? Should you do a blessing? I mean, some say don't do a blessing. Why? You won half a billion dollars; shouldn't you do like Shehecheyanu or a special dinner? I won half a billion dollars. No, don't do a blessing. Why don't do a blessing? Because sometimes it's a punishment and...

32:30Sometimes the punishment, like Hashem gave the snake a punishment. He told the snake, "Guess what? You could eat everything. You have become a trillion trillionaire. You can eat anything you want, just don't pray to Me." Meaning, it's a punishment. Hashem says to a person, "You're going to have all the parnassah you ever want in your life. Just don't talk to Me anymore." Why? Because we talk to Him when we need something. There are obviously righteous rich people, but not many. It's a very, very hard test. So anyway, the things that we desire are typically not good for us, and therefore there's not much explanation in the Torah about the ultimate good. Because if Hashem gave us the definition of the ultimate good, we simply would not see it as good. For example, what do you think we do in Heaven? I'll tell you. What they do in Heaven is they learn Torah. That's what they do in Heaven. Everybody that's in Heaven, that's what they do.

33:30I mean, the Torah is universal. They have their part; we have our part. If they're going to make it to Heaven, they have their own version of the Torah they have to learn, same thing with the Jews. But the goyim have to observe it in this world also, just not as much as the Jews. We have 620 laws—613 from the Torah, seven from the rabbis. The non-Jews have seven Noahide laws and all the ethical laws, which is about another 55 or so, and... So they have to observe the Torah that way. And they have to observe it because Hashem said so, not because they think it's nice to do it. So now, when a person goes to Heaven, he's going to see everybody learning Torah. Now, if he never learned any Torah in his life, he's not going to look at this as if it's Heaven. He's going to look at it like it's Gehinom. He's like, "I didn't learn Torah over here. You want me to learn Torah here for eternity? Who wants to be here? Let me check out Gehinom for a little while. Maybe over there they're playing pool. Maybe they're watching movies over there." Maybe there's a pool. I could go swimming, you know, a beach, a Jacuzzi, something. So he wants to go to Gehinom. He doesn't want to go to Heaven. He doesn't realize Gehinom is not pool tables, though. So, a person that thinks, "Now you're gonna learn Torah for eternity in Heaven," does not view it as something fun. And the reason why is because he doesn't learn enough Torah here. If a person learns enough Torah here and...

34:55learning Torah for eternity in Heaven And the reason why is because if you learn enough Torah here in this world, you do get both a physical and a spiritual pleasure. It's not just a spiritual intellectual pleasure that you get. A lot of people think that learning Torah, oh, you got a chiddush, you got a new insight, you found out that Moshe Rabbeinu is this, you found out that Tzipporah, you found out something nice, something new, something clever, and it gives you an intellectual pleasure, it's a spiritual pleasure. That's not it. That's just the beginning. That's the first shiur, the second shiur, the fifth shiur. But if you really get into it, you're going to eventually start getting a physical pleasure, unlike any other physical pleasure available in this world. Now, I've never done drugs in my life, but they had to put some drugs in me for all the surgeries that I had. So I don't know what it feels like to take ecstasy or cocaine or any of that garbage. I always liked my brain, so I never put that stuff in my body. But when they put morphine in you, you stop feeling pain. That's a pleasure. When you have a lot of pain, not having pain is pleasure. Now, even that pleasure...

36:10is not even a microscopic percent of a percent of a percent of the physical pleasure, not spiritual, physical pleasure you get from actually getting a serious amount of Torah, let's say a nice eight, nine-hour session of learning straight. You're never going to compare it. Why? Because that physical pleasure you get from the morphine, it's something that's not long-lasting, usually just a few minutes at most. And it's something that takes you away from yourself. Whereas the physical pleasure you get from Torah is not taken away from you. It's you. It's you magnified. Anyway, all of this stuff will probably sound like mumbo-jumbo fairy tales to most people. I'm sorry, you have to feel it in order to believe it. There's no other way to explain it. That's why the Torah itself does not explain it. But punishment, it does explain. And the reason why is because we know what punishment feels like. Did you ever break a foot? Or a finger? Or an arm? It hurt, right? A lot? Can you remember the pain? But I'm saying if you think about it enough, you can remember that it felt really, really horrible. So you can understand pain.

37:26Every human being can understand pain. He broke an arm, broke a leg, somebody, chas v'shalom, died. Everyone understands pain, a broken heart, and so on. Everybody understands pain. The Torah has extensive volumes, volume after volume after volume, discussing suffering, discussing punishment, because that is something we do understand. Hashem wants us to know that all the punishment you could ever experience in this world is zero next to a moment of punishment in the eternal world. The Ramban says in the commentary at the beginning of the book of Iyov that Iyov suffered the most of any human being in existence. But his suffering amounted to one year. In one day, all ten of his children died. All. One day. He was a multi-billionaire. In one day, all of the money he had, gone. But not gone like, oh, he still has a few million dollars in the bank, so he's okay, can still pay the mortgage. No. In one day, he became homeless. All of his business burned to the ground.

38:49marriage torn apart. And if that's not enough, his perfect physique and health became a distant memory because his entire body was full of abscesses. And anyone who doesn't know what an abscess is, I'll explain it to you. I had, baruch Hashem, a few of them. And they're not so much fun. They're not as much fun as they sound. An abscess is having an internal infection, but it's not like an internal infection that just goes away after a while. No, no, this infection doesn't want to go away. This infection grows rapidly and multiplies in size faster than cancer. In fact, if cancer multiplied in size like an abscess does, no one would survive it. You wouldn't have enough time to go to the doctor. to get chemotherapy. That's how fast it grows sometimes. And it's nice. It creates a nice little beautiful pool inside your body and just continues to grow and grow and grow and expand. And every time it expands another millimeter, another millimeter, another meter, it's so much more fun.

40:00you guys would just love it. You guys would just love it. It's just so much fun. By the way, the smallest little tiny abscess that doesn't look so big, let's say half the size of this bottle cap — the smallest size of it — you can't move for a day. If it gets to the size of the bottle cap, you finish the day. If it doubles in size and gets bigger than the bottle cap, you're cursing the day you were born. Now, if it's really, really one, you have a nice specialty ken. You get one the size of one or two fists, you are just having so much fun in this world. You're saying, Iyov, Iyov, where are you? Why? Because his whole body was full of it. Now, what's the only cure? The only cure really is to cut yourself and open it and let all of the infection come out of your body, which is even more fun than the abscess itself, by the way. guess what, he had his entire body full of this, head to toe. Not one abscess that you can't survive a minute with, not two that you can't survive an hour with—his whole body. He got so sick that the worms started coming out of his body, not going into his body.

41:19You got the point of Job. You don't have to read the Book of Job anymore. You got the point now, right? Okay, now Job suffered this for a year. You suffered the story for five minutes. You're already in pain—I see all of you. This is worse than my game. I see all of you. You suffered the story for five minutes. He actually suffered the physical pain for a year. The Ramban says, all of this—the kids, the money, the wife, and all of it—for a full year. If you suffered it for 70 years, meaning a whole life, a person who suffered this for their whole life, it is not equivalent to one hour in Gehinnom. So now, who wants to go to Gehinnom? Raise your hand. Why do you guys get so upset? The reality is we understand what I just said. I try to make you laugh, but in reality, we understand. No one wants to go to Gehinnom. This is really as much as you need to know about Gehinnom. If you want more details, we have a three and a half hour shiur about it. But this is as much as you really need to know—that I don't want to go there. Most people do not know this.

42:36Most people think that suffering is only in this world. That if somebody got cancer, chas v'shalom, or someone lost money, chas v'shalom, or someone lost a child, chas v'shalom, or a marriage, or whatever, they lost something that was dear to them, they think, oh, that's Gehinnom. No, my friend, that's not even an inkling of Gehinnom. If you think that's Gehinnom, guess what? You're going to continue sinning. Why? Because you're going to forget that it happened a year later. Even death we forget after a year. A person needs to know this stuff because he needs to know what to do in order to avoid this horrible place. Today, most people do not know it. The ignorance we have is a tragedy. The second reason is manipulation. The manipulation is a combination of what happened as a result of Christianity and what they've done to our Jewish people, what they've done to our Torah, and

43:37but also the fake Jews. You can call them Mityavnim, the ones who became Greeks. You can call them Zionists. You can call them Reform. You can call them Conservative. You can even call them sometimes modern or strictly Orthodox because there are fakers everywhere. Clothing means zero. People can call themselves modern, strictly, I don't know, Haredi, Hasidish, call themselves whatever names they want. Judaism is not defined by the hat you wear. It's defined by how you act. Who's under the hat? I know a specific woman. She looks, I'm telling you, Rabbanit. Like she just came from Mount Sinai. The kisui rosh she has is like three levels. First level, second level, third level, mamash, like a kisui rosh, like wow. She makes the kisui rosh look like fun.

44:41Very modest person as far as the way she looks on the exterior, but she's one of the biggest Machiavellis in American history. Why? She tells people she spends a lot of effort, a lot of time, telling people not to go to our lectures. "Don't go to Rabbi's lectures. Don't go to this rabbi's lectures. Don't listen to this. Don't listen to that." She has a whole website about this. She has a whole website to tell people not to go listen to talks. I Why are you religious, I ask myself? Maybe she just likes the way it looks. So, religion is not based on clothing. Yes, of course, clothing is important. You need to be modest in your behavior and your clothing and so on, but it's not everything. The Christians manipulated our Torah to an extent that we sometimes find ourselves in a debate with Christians, and sometimes it looks like they know more than some Jews. They don't. They usually only know a few chapters in the Tanach. You know, Isaiah 53, Daniel chapter 9. A few chapters like this they know from the Tanach, but if you ask them about the Torah or what they call the Old Testament, they don't know very much. And quite frankly, they don't know very much in general. But still, they look knowledgeable because they're very, very confident about their knowledge—the little bit that they have. Fools are usually very confident about their foolishness, hence the foolishness.

46:09But the Christian church has manipulated our Torah to such an extent that many Jews think of it as a loving religion. There's nothing wrong with it. I remember before becoming religious, I thought that Christianity is simply number two. I didn't think it was fake; I just thought it's number two. It's good for them. I think it's silly, but I have no problem with it. Most Jews don't understand that the founders of Christianity, the ones that have perpetuated Christianity and built it to what it is now, were the biggest anti-Semites in the world. They literally created almost every single one of their holidays around killing Jewish people. I'll give you a small little tidbit you maybe have never heard of before. You know the Christmas tree... You know the Christmas tree? You know the Christians love Christmas trees. And some misguided Jews actually have a Hanukkah tree instead. Hanukkah bush, they call it. I remember 25 years ago, some kid in my school told me he has a Hanukkah bush. I had no idea what he was talking about. What's a Hanukkah bush? I wasn't exactly the most religious person in the world, but I knew we don't have bushes on Hanukkah. And he told me it's something that they have. And I said, something's weird about this kid.

47:31wonder what happened then anyway. Now this Hanukkah bush, we're trying to replicate and copy the green. Let me tell you a little secret about the original Christmas tree. The original Christmas tree—you know the little lights and little stars they have today that you buy from the store for a few bucks? You know, in the old days they didn't have Walmart, they didn't have... Target didn't have Amazon.com to sell you the little stars. Do you know what they put instead of little stars? Who wants to guess? Huh? Magen David? No, no. I'm talking about the Christians. The Jews only started doing Hanukkah bushes in the recent 30 years, 40 years. Huh? They would put Jewish children's hands, hearts, eyes, all types of body parts of kids they killed. That's what they would put on the Christmas tree. Chag Sameach. Go check the history books. Go check the history books.

48:48Body parts that were on the tree, body parts of Jewish people. So we do not know our own history, and that's the reason why we want to be going sometimes. Now, I have a question. He asked a very serious question: What's the main lesson that we need to learn from Purim? Now, like a good Jew, I have to ask you a question as a response. If Haman was here today and My mom was here today. Would he still do the same thing he did 2,500 years ago? Would he still go to a hospital and give him 10,000 kikar kesef, which I did the math one time according to today's price is approximately 348 million dollars? Would he be willing to give him nearly half a billion dollars and...

49:48a billion dollars to go and do what he wants with the Jewish people because they're united and they're different and they don't want to listen to the goyim and Would Haman do all this? Because that's what we're in Megillah, two days from now. You guys all have to know this. When you go to Megillah, they're going to say in Megillah, Haman did this. And you go, ah, okay, wait, don't do that yet. Hold on a second. Listen to what he says. He's saying, I want to destroy them because they're united and they look a certain way that's not like us. And they don't want to practice the same religion as us. And they don't want to look like us. they don't want to eat like us, and they don't want to play sports like us, and they don't want to be doctors and lawyers like us, and sports players and celebrities, right? So we're just like that now, right? The problem is, Rabotai, if Haman was here today, guess what? Purim would never happen. Why? He'd say, "Where are the Jews? Oh, they killed themselves. What? The two million that supposedly keep Shabbat?"

50:56Who cares about them? There are 8 billion who don't. There are 8 billion people in the world who couldn't care less. That's the reality. The reality is, Rabotai, that if Haman were here today, he wouldn't need to do anything. Why? Because Judaism has almost killed itself. Right. That's why we got the punishment. At the time of Purim, even though the Jews looked and acted much more religious than they do today, they started making exceptions. The first exception they made was that when they got the invitation from Achashverosh to come to his feast, not only did they accept it, but they rationalized that they should accept it. And if they're already accepting it, they should enjoy it. You're already there, might as well enjoy it.

51:59Now the Gadol Hador, Mordechai, was visibly Jewish. The Ben Ish Chai says, why does it say Mordechai HaYehudi? Because he was visibly Jewish. You could see a Jew from a mile away. His peyos were as long and big as can be. His beard was big. He looked different. He acted different. Everyone knew he was a Jew. Today, most people you can't tell if they're a Jew. Sometimes even if they wear a kippah. Because the rest of them don't really look so Jewish. You ask the guy, "Well, listen, what's this week's parasha?" "Oh, let me check." He checks his phone. "Wait, it's already Thursday. You were supposed to finish the parasha twice already by now, and the third time by tomorrow. You don't know what the parasha is? It's Thursday and you have to check your phone? We have a kippah. No. What's the kippah for?" What's the kippah for? Oh, no, I just wear this. For what? For business? Because people like to do business with Jewish people? Until the market crashes and then they blame us? That it’s our fault? So you see, rabotai, the problem today is that the Jews have been acting like goyim so much they forgot what’s the difference between Jews and non-Jews. This is the reason why Purim has become...

53:25Symbolic symbol of Judaism today because Judaism today is unfortunately under danger. Because most of us celebrating Purim don't even know what the holiday is about. The holiday is about how someone wanted to destroy Judaism. Someone wanted to kill all the Jews. But in reality, we have plenty of those people today, and we celebrate them. Now, most American Jews, unless they're lefty liberals, have a very serious connection with Eretz Yisrael. The research by Nishma Research, done about a year and a half ago, A research about Modern Orthodoxy today says that what do they strongly support according to their research? Well, 87% support stopping BDS, stopping the movement that's in essence an antisemitic movement against Jewish people. By the way, I don't really think anyone should spend a single penny stopping BDS. You should let them happen. You should let it happen. You should let them boycott Israel for a week. Let them boycott Israel and watch all technology in the world stop working.

54:3087% support stopping BDS, stopping the movement that's in essence an antisemitic movement against Jewish people. By the way, I don't really think anyone should spend a single penny stopping BDS. You should let them happen. You should let it happen. You should let them boycott Israel for a week. Let them boycott Israel and watch all technology in the world stop working. The number one technology place on earth is Israel, even more so than Silicon Valley now. Why do I say even more so than Silicon Valley? Because Google is here and a lot of other technology companies are here. Apple is here, big technology companies. But by the way, today, cybersecurity is so critical to the world that no serious firm can exist without having real cybersecurity. Number one place on earth for cybersecurity firms, Eretz Yisrael. Best chips, microprocessor chips in the world, Eretz Yisrael. The software, office software for Microsoft, Eretz Yisrael. And so on and so forth. All the phones you have, Eretz Yisrael. So let them boycott Israel. Let's see if they do it.

55:49Let's undo it for a week and the whole world stops. I don't know why people get so worried about this BDS movement. Who cares? But we spend millions and millions of dollars fighting BDS like it's something. Reduce aid to the Palestinian Authority: 80-79% agree with this. Maintain a unified Yerushalayim: 77% agree with this. making sure that the U.S. recognizes Yerushalayim as the capital. Like, I don't know, when did we start caring about other people's opinions? 63% agree with the right to build housing in all of Yerushalayim. 61% agree that the Palestinians should face trial in the U.S. for terrorism against Americans. 55%. I don't know what's relevant. The right to build housing in the West Bank, 51%, and so on and so forth. You see, we have a unified liberal opinion about some things that really have absolutely nothing to do with Judaism, but nonetheless, many religious Jews consider important. Fine, no problem. There's no problem with worrying about the country you're living in. It's just that a lot of this doesn't actually have anything to do with anything, but fine. We spend millions of dollars supporting this stuff. Now, 79% of Modern Orthodox Jews

57:09have a belief in their connection to Eretz Yisrael. They believe their connection to Eretz Yisrael is very, very important to them. 18% say it's somewhat important, and 4% say it's not important to them at all. Are they active in supporting Israel? 59% say so. Is their shul active in supporting Eretz Yisrael? 71% say so. Okay, so what about, what kind of education do our yeshivas teach us here in America, in Mitzrayim of the modern day? 91% of the Orthodox Jewish day schools, 91% encourage kids to go to college. Even though college is one of the number one reasons why people become secular today, nonetheless, people believe it's very important to go to college and destroy your neshama over there. I went to college. Unless you have a direct plan of attack, it's a waste of time, especially today. Today, for the most part, you don't need college. College is a waste of time. Grad school, on the other hand, that may be useful to some extent if you have a specific profession.

58:20Doctor, lawyer, architect, something like that that requires college. But if you're gonna do what 95% of people do, especially Jews, which is become an entrepreneur, college is a complete waste of money, time, and destruction of your neshama. If you don't know how to think by the time you're 18, college is not gonna help you. Strong Jewish studies. People ask me about college all the time, but you know, no one listens anyway. Now, what else? Okay, so they encourage 91% of people to go to college. Fine. I... What about their Jewish studies? Seventy percent believe that the Jewish studies are very, very strong. So, if seventy percent of religious Jews believe that the Jewish studies in the yeshiva are strong, that means that most of us should be religious today. Most of us should actually know at the very least the basics, the Thirteen Principles of Faith, what's reward, what's punishment, and so on. What about the secular education? Yeah, sixty-one percent think it's also strong.

59:22Okay, so now if we have strong religious teachings, that means that the religious teachings are supposed to teach us what? Religious is different than secular. Secular is stuff that you may need for your day-to-day or stuff that happened, like history and... Secular, like math, sciences, English, things like that—stuff that you may or may not use. Most of the stuff you don't actually use, but some stuff you do use. Religious is supposed to be technically stuff that you'll take with you forever, meaning even beyond this world. Now, the Gaon of Vilna said, "Why did you come?" Somebody, his student, came to him and said, "Why did I come to this world?" He says, "To fix your middot." Wait, so what do I need this for? Why isn't there a mitzvah out of the 613 we have that says, "Fix your middot," fix your character traits? So, the Gaon says, because the whole point of all the mitzvot is to fix your character traits. Meaning, if the mitzvot are not fixing your character traits, you're not doing something right.

1:00:30The Torah that you're learning is not fixing you as a human being. You're not becoming more generous, you're not becoming less angry, you're not becoming less anxious, and so on and so forth. If you're not becoming a better quality human being, then there's something wrong with your so-called religious studies. Well, the same parents that believe that the Jewish studies were extremely strong and... Only 50% of them, 52% to be exact, believe that these schools actually teach about middot. Only 46% believe that they teach how to think critically. Only 32% believe that the special education needs are met, and only 22% believe that it even teaches about good tzniut. you see, Rabotai, we have a distorted understanding of what religious studies are because everything that we're getting weaker at is religious studies. Religious studies are not learning about Moshe Rabbeinu. Religious studies are not learning about Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov. That's part of it, but it's not religious studies. Religious studies are the stuff that you're going to take with you beyond school and

1:02:00Now, how does this materialize into actual next-level results? How do we see this in the world? It says that 16% of children, or 33%, of children are less observant than their parents. While 33% are more observant than their parents and 34% are the same, meaning the results are all over the place. So where do we stand? Let's say, for example, the Modern Orthodox, which includes about a quarter million American Jews—almost half the religious people in America are Modern Orthodox. Where do they stand? Only 65%—now these are Modern Orthodox, meaning they consider themselves religious, and... Only 65% are strictly observant with Shabbat. 65% are strictly observant with halacha that if you don't keep it, you're not even considered religious at all. Like the kid that I met in the gas station, I told you about, and I asked him, "Are you religious?" He said, "Yeah, I'm somewhat religious." So I asked, "Do you keep Shabbat?" He goes, "No, I drive." He goes, "But my father is very religious." I said, "Oh, your father doesn't drive much, right?" He replied, "No, he drives on Shabbat. He just drives to shul only though."

1:03:22He's very religious. My father. I said, "What makes him religious?" He drives on Shabbat. He goes every Rosh Hashanah, and he and Mr. So-and-so from the Beit Knesset have a contest of who wins the donation contest—who gives the most amount of money to the Chabad Center in Palm Beach. Because a 30 million dollar building is not enough. 65% keep Shabbat strictly. 66% keep kosher strictly. 66%, meaning 34%, eat treif. It's okay, no problem. Salads from outside—62% put on tefillin every day. The Torah says a Jew who doesn't put on tefillin every day has no share in the world to come. But 62% of so-called religious Modern Orthodox say they keep tefillin halacha strictly—62%. And the worst of it all, only 58%.

1:04:22of married women observe Taharat HaMishpacha strictly. 58%. Which means, Rabotai, that 42% of the religious children coming out of religious parents, unorthodox, according to the study by Nishmat Research, you can see yourself, 42%, may be from nidah. May be a result of karet. Maybe an actual walking sin for their parents for the rest of their life. Maybe not 100%, but maybe according to the statistic. The child himself has to do teshuva; obviously, he has to become frum. He has to become much stronger than his parents. As for the parents themselves, how do they fix it? They have to do teshuva seriously. Say sorry for the mistakes that they made, but also support as much kiruv as possible to encourage other people not to make the same mistakes. This same study said that only 17% of religious people believe we need more kiruv. Seventeen percent, meaning within a statistic like that, you would think we are at the Beit Hamikdash inside right now because everybody's religious and...

1:05:50But the reality is we're seeing that we have horrible statistics within the religious community. Most religious people are not as religious as they even think, even according to their own information, even according to what they are saying about themselves, not what your own opinion is. Only 74% believe that Hashem created the world. How do you call yourself religious if you don't believe Hashem created the world? Only 51% believe that Hashem is involved in our day-to-day activities like Hashgacha Pratit. Rabbeinu Bechaye says that people like that are more dangerous than atheists. Dangerous than idol worshippers. Why? The idol worshipper believes there's a god for the sun, a god for the moon, a god for money, a god for flowers, a god for everything. At least there's something. The one that doesn't believe that Hashem watches everything, just believes in nothing except himself. He's become God. He's responsible for his own parnassah. He's responsible for his own zivug. He's more dangerous.

1:07:11Whether they believe the biggest problem in Judaism today is that 90%—89% to be exact—believe that the cost of Jewish school is a problem. It's the biggest problem in Judaism today. Now, I agree that Jewish schools are very, very expensive, but I think the problem is not that. I think the problem is the schools are terrible because if people come out like this... where only 50% of them believe in Hashgacha Pratit, 74% believe in God at all, and they still call themselves religious? 60% actually keep Taharat HaMishpacha, and that's the religious ones? Obviously, there's something wrong with the schools. Why am I going to send my kid $30,000 a year to become secular? I can do it for free. Now, why do we have such a situation? The statistics get worse, by the way, but I think I've depressed you enough for today. Let me give you an understanding of why. Why are we where we are? I went to a few yeshivot and spoke at a few yeshivot, and I asked a question to the kids: How many kids want to be Moshe Rabbeinu? I have yet to meet one kid that wants to be Moshe Rabbeinu.

1:08:34Asked the same question, "How many kids want to be LeBron James, the basketball player?" Everybody raised their hand. We idolize the wrong people. Most American Jews idolize Zionists. Most Israelis idolize Zionists. Little do we know that the Zionists, the original Zionists like Herzl and his friends, are worse than Haman. Haman wanted to kill the body. Herzl and his friends wanted to destroy Judaism. Now before everybody starts hanging me instead of Haman, let me give you some proofs. Once a person looks into Zionism, he'll find some very famous names. One of the names is Chaim Nachman Bialik. Chaim Nachman Bialik was one of the biggest philosophers or authors in regards to the Zionistic movement. And he writes the following in the Mechazei HaDerasha: Judaism and Zionism are not one thing. In fact, they are two completely different things that contradict each other.

1:10:04Judaism and Zionism contradict each other, he says. When a person can't be a Jew, he decides to be a Zionist. Why? Because Zionism begins after Judaism is destroyed. Zionism is not a continuation of Judaism. Zionism is the opposite of what Judaism is. I believe he says that Eretz Yisrael is not Judaism. He is a Zionist. Nachman Syrkin. In Merasheb, he's one of the heads of Poalei Tzion, one of the heads of Zionism. He would continuously make fun of Judaism, calling Zionism the light and Judaism the darkness, and a holy war between the two. That they have to spell Bekol Kochot HaShechor VehaAzadon HaLalu.

1:11:31But a hundred or so years ago, now, Zionism, so you understand, is not a problem with religion. I used to always think that Zionism was pure communism. It's not. Yevsektsiya is pure communism. Zionism is not an anti-religious movement, per se, all the time. Zionism is an anti-Judaism movement. Why? We go to another one of the famous Zionists, the author Yosef Chaim Brenner. In 1921, he is one of the ones that was in the founding of modern-day Israel or the Zionist movement. What did he say? He says the New Testament is our book.

1:12:46The New Testament, that's our book. It's from us. It's like from within us, the New Testament. This is like flesh from among us. A person can be a good Jew and not have any fear of Christianity, like it's some treif. Ad rabba, he should treat it with respect and a religious soul. He wrote this in HaPoel HaTzair, Cheshvan 1910. This will also be published in our... not have any fear of Christianity, like it's some treif. Ad rabba, l'yit'yaches eleha b'respekt v'nefesh dati. He wrote this b'safrut u b'itonut HaPoel HaTzair, Cheshvan 1910. This will also be published in our You can see all the sources again now. If this wasn't enough, Hashem said, He says that if you're gonna try to destroy My Jews, if you're gonna try to destroy My Torah, I'm gonna take personal revenge on you.

1:14:11by destroying you and everything that has to do with you. Where is it written? It's written in chapter 15, verse number 30. B'tocham Torah achat yihyeh lachem le'oseh b'shgagah, v'hanefesh asher ta'aseh b'yad ramah min ha'ezrach u'min ha'ger et Hashem hu megadef v'nichretah ha'nefesh ha'hi mikerev ha'am, ki devar Hashem baza v'et mitzvato heifer ha'ikaret tikaret ha'nefesh ha'hi avonah bah. I'll just read the end of chapter 15, verse 31: "For he scorned the word of Hashem and broke His commandment. That person will surely be cut off; his sin is upon him." Those are the famous words: a person who disrespected or scorned the word of Hashem. Now, who are the people that scorned the word of Hashem? Let's see what happened to them in history. One of the founders of the Reform Movement, his name was Moshe Mendelssohn. Now, Moshe Mendelssohn, most people won't like that I say. Why? Because he was a Jew, and some people consider him religious. But he coined the phrase that you should be a Jew in your house and a person outside. Now, Hashem didn't really like this expression. So, out of his children,

1:15:34Let's see what happened to him. He was the beginner of the Haskalah, the Enlightenment movement, Reform, Conservative—all the garbage. So, let's see what happened to Moshe Mendelssohn. Moshe Mendelssohn considered himself religious. Four of his sons converted to Christianity—four out of the six sons converted to Christianity and nine grandkids. Only one out of his nine grandkids remained a Jew. His grandkid, Dr. Arnold Mendelssohn, eventually became a Protestant and then, after that, a Catholic. meaning that ultimately, in his lifetime, all of his descendants were completely removed from Judaism. Now, this obviously shows that in his own house, his own beliefs didn't really work out so well. Now, what about his students? One of his students was David Friedländer, and

1:16:58born in Königsberg in 1771, and he was the friend and main student of Moses Mendelssohn. After Moses Mendelssohn died, he, in essence, took over, and in 1799 he sent a letter to a Protestant priest by the name of Wilhelm Abraham Teller. It's publicized that he's suggesting to him that he and several heads of Jewish families are ready and willing to become Christians. Here we see Moses Mendelssohn's belief of being a Jew in your house and a person outside not only didn't work out for his own household, but even his students eventually gave up everything. The next person was someone who also had a lot of the thoughts and...

1:18:19Zionism and so on, and his opinion about Judaism was as follows: He says, instead of believing in this religion, I have no problem believing in Darwin. I have no problem believing in science, that we all came from, you know, survival of the fittest, monkeys, amoebas, and so on and so forth. And Why? Because he called Judaism a tragedy. Judaism as a religion, he called it a tragedy. So he made fun of Jewish education, yeshivot, and so on and so forth. And

1:19:20he wanted to make sure that when Israel became a country, became a state, that there would not be any Judaism, any religious studies whatsoever. His daughter, her name was Rachel, decided to follow her father's footsteps and also not to deal with the "tragedy" called Judaism. Run away from it. So she married a journalist, Michael, also known as Jean, who wasn't Jewish. But her father didn't like this so much, and he called that a tragedy. He said that because you married a goy, you’re cut off. I don't understand; you called Judaism a tragedy. What's the problem if your daughter marries somebody? It's not a tragedy. I

1:20:20So you see that some of them are hypocrites, to say the least. But this, he lost his daughter, obviously lost his daughter, did not continue Judaism and therefore he lost his seed and his ability to continue in the world. The famous one is Herzl, Binyamin Ze'ev Herzl. In 1892, he wrote that he prefers that all of the Jews would convert to Christianity. And he says in this letter to Moritz Benedikt, he had a son that he didn't circumcise. And he says, I prefer that my son would convert right now, today or tomorrow, so his whole life starts off on the right foot.

1:21:21He himself can't do it right now. His father was still alive, apparently. That's the first reason. So it doesn't make any sense to publicly disown Judaism so long as I can take advantage of it when people are going against it. i get money from donors. I get, you know, political support. We just have to be patient. We have to be patient and after we get everything we want, we'll move all of the Jews, bar minan, bar minan, to Christianity. This is what he writes in the letter to Benedict, this is much worse than Haman. This is in Kitvei Herzl, Chapter 2, Yoman Aleph, page 14. Herzl himself would celebrate the Christian holidays and

1:22:47...would make sure that his children would celebrate and pray the Christian prayers, and he is celebrated today as if he's the greatest Jew ever because people look at his beard instead of his actions. Now, what happened to Herzl? What happened to his family? His wife Julia died at age 39 in 1907; it looks like it was a heart attack of some kind. His oldest daughter Paulina... was a promiscuous woman to a very high extent, apparently to the extent that she was hospitalized. She kept getting married and divorced, eventually running away to France where she became a morphine addict and died at age 40. His son Hans, born in 1891, was Didn't have a brit milah because obviously his father Herzl did not believe in it. But at 15 years old, after Herzl died, the Zionists figured, you know what, we've got to make this kid the next leader. He's only 15, but he's gonna be the next leader. So, let's pretend he's Jewish, so they convinced him to get a brit milah at 15 years old.

1:24:14Well, you get a brit milah, you get five brit milahs, it doesn't make you Jewish though. Just a procedure doesn't make you Jewish. Following Torah makes you Jewish. A brit milah is a procedure, so his brit milah only hurt, but it didn't make him any more Jewish than he was. And he became a Protestant. He became a Catholic, and he became a Baptist, and he became a lot of different things. Eventually, he wanted to become a Jew, but he found out that his sister Paulina died, so he killed himself too. Then the youngest daughter of hers had the only grandchild. only grandchild. The health of this child declined rapidly after she gave birth, leading her to be institutionalized in a mental institution. Unfortunately, the Nazis targeted individuals in such institutions, and she was killed. They decided to starve her, and she died of starvation in 1943. The only grandchild left was Stefan Theodore, who...

1:25:29decided to join the British Army and called himself a Brit. He did not call himself a Jew or Israeli or anything. He was very, very successful in money, but apparently, that wasn't enough because, in 1946, he went to the Massachusetts River and jumped off a bridge in November 1946. I mean, look at this. Herzl was probably the most well-known Zionist there ever was, and most people, even to this day, who live in Israel or live in America and learn about Zionism, do not know what I just read to you. I learned Zionism in Binghamton University. Not a single word that we just read was in any of the books. Why? Because this is actually from their letters, from their writings. Who reads their letters? Who reads their writings? You read what the teacher tells you. The teacher tells you what the book tells you, and the book tells you what the Zionists want you to hear. They don't want to tell you that Herzl wanted all the Jews gone, like worse than Haman.

1:26:51They don't want to tell you that, in reality, it was an anti-Semitic movement. They don't want to tell you this is what I know. They just weren't religious, but there are religious Zionists today. No, they are just confused people. Because these religious Zionists don't actually know what Zionism is. Religious Zionism today has nothing to do with the original Zionism. Religious Zionism simply today means you support Eretz Yisrael. Bottom line is, if you don't support Eretz Yisrael, you're crazy. Not Zionist, not that Zionist. You're just a simple crazy person. Why? Because there are six million of our brothers or eight million of our brothers and sisters that live there. How do you not support it? You want them to do good. ...doesn't mean you support their heretical government. It doesn't mean you support the secular mentality and the garbage education they have over there. But, of course, you support them. You don't want them to die. You don't want them to be taken over by terrorists. It doesn't require you to be a Zionist to do that; it requires you to be sane... The problem is, today we learn in school that Herzl was a great person, and his holidays, his statues, and his streets all over Eretz Yisrael bear his name and have his statue on them. Everywhere you look, you see his picture. He looks like the biggest rabbi in the world; his beard was nice and long. Little do you know, the guy was worse than Haman.

1:28:10To such an extent the Chachamim say, even in the Torah, Herzl is there. Where is Herzl there? Exactly where we read. We just read, "Ki Dvar Hashem Bazah." Right? "Dvar Hashem Bazah," that someone that desecrated the Torah, someone that scorned the Torah. The Chachamim explain, "Dvar Hashem Bazah," Bazah, scorn Bet, Zayin, Hey Bet, Binyamin, Zayin, Zehev, Hey, Herzl Binyamin, Zehev, Herzl. You scorn the Torah, you'll be ruining the Torah just as someone that Hashem is going to destroy. Pasuk just for you, pasuk just for you. Midah k'neged midah.

1:29:11You try to destroy Am Yisrael, Hashem destroyed everything that has to do with him. The only thing that's left of him is statues. His buddy, Max Nordau, or his real name was Shimon Simcha Maximilian Ziedenfeld. He was a buddy of Herzl. He hated Judaism to such an extent, just like his buddy, that he didn't even want to marry a Jew. So he married a movie star. Christian movie star Anna Elizabeth Dunce. And guess what, when he died she didn't even keep his name. He didn't have any kids with her, nor did she continue his lineage or even keep his name. He not only did not have children, but he didn't even have a name left in this world. So you see how ba'al keri—tamid rasha—is not a... Simple document of history chas v'shalom. It's a letter of instruction from Hashem. If you do good, you get good. If you do bad, you obviously get in trouble with, who? With the worst of all, you're gonna get in trouble with Hashem.

1:30:27The biggest problem we have today is that most people do not know anything about Judaism. They don't know anything about salvation, and they're manipulated by the Christians to believe that certain teachings of the Torah have to do with their god, their false god. One of the most common teachings they have, they have only like, I'll say, a handful or half a dozen different main things that every Christian knows and... Daniel chapter 9, Isaiah 53. But anyone that learns any of these Christian teachings, according to the Jewish sages, sees that none of these things have anything to do with Christianity. Now, one of the famous teachings that I'm going to give you today is seriously how dangerous it is to be an ignorant person. One of the famous teachings that the Christians will teach, is that when David HaMelech in Psalm 22 cries to Hashem, "Eli Eli, lama azavtani," "O God, O God, why have You forsaken me?" Every Christian, every former Christian, someone who watched Christian videos, or lectures, or whatever you want to call it, knows this Tehillim by heart. "O God, O God, why have You forsaken me?"

1:31:55By the way, if you know it, it doesn't make any sense to continue believing in Christianity. Why? Because they're saying that Jesus is God. So why is Jesus saying, "God, oh God, why did You forsake me?" No one ever thought about this? Okay, let's skip that one. But anyway, they tell you that David HaMelech is writing about Jesus. This is the biggest joke in the world. Why is it the biggest joke? Because David HaMelech, he did something that no other human being had the power to do. What did he do? When Shimei ben Gera, one of the heads of the Sanhedrin, and one of the strong followers of Shaul HaMelech, even though it was known that David was supposed to be the king, he is the king, he won the battle, and so on, Shimei ben Gera did not... Switch sides. He continued hating David HaMelech. And when he saw him, despite being with his soldiers, Shimei ben Gera cared less about David HaMelech being a king. He cursed him, a kelala nimretzet. Barath says, what's a kelala nimretzet? Every curse in the book. Nimretzet is the acronym for all the different types of curses he cursed him in front of the public.

1:33:20Now, David's sergeant was right there, and he said, "My highness, why should I let this dog curse my highness? Let me just go flip his head off of his shoulders. Let me just go chop his head off and get rid of this dog." I agree. That's why I'm not David HaMelech. David, the King, what did he say? No, Chas V'Shalom. He's not cursing me. Hashem's cursing me. Hashem's cursing me. Why? If I did not deserve to hear the curse from Shimei ben Gera, of course, Hashem would not allow it to happen. Which means that if Shimei cursed me, Hashem signed off, allowed. That means I did something to deserve it. Yes, he has free choice. And yes, Hashem used him because he actually wanted to do it. But that does not absolve me from deserving it. You understand? Yes, Shimei ben Gera wanted to do it. It's his free choice. It's not that Hashem forced him to curse David. He wanted to curse David. But nonetheless, that still doesn't mean that David doesn't deserve it, according to David. According to me, he deserves a prize.

1:34:46But Hashem agreed with me here. He agreed, David deserves a prize. For thinking like this, he deserves a prize. At that moment, Chazal tells us, Hashem says, now you understand the purpose of the world to such an extent that I'm going to make you the fourth to hold the Merkava. Avraham, Yitzchak, Yaakov, David. Because of this extraordinary act, Shimi ben Gera continued. Eventually, from him, we have who? Mordechai and Esther. Mordechai and Esther come from the lineage of Shimi ben Gera. Meaning if he would have killed Shimi ben Gera, no Mordechai, no Esther, nothing. We would have a serious problem on Purim. Why? Half the story would be missing. Nobody to save us. Nobody to marry Achashverosh. Nobody to tell on the spy, the ones, the treason. So now, David HaMelech had Ruach HaKodesh. You can't compare David HaMelech to anybody like us today. The Gemara says in Masechet Shabbat, anyone that says that David HaMelech made a sin is mistaken.

1:36:05Why? Because you cannot understand who David HaMelech was. Can you understand having Ruach HaKodesh? We don't even know how to spell Ruach HaKodesh. Ruach HaKodesh means you understand what Hashem is thinking right now. We don't understand what we're thinking right now. We don't understand our spouse, what our spouse is thinking. We don't understand when the kid's crying, why is he crying? You have to change his diaper. No, maybe it's something else. You have to change his diaper. Maybe he's hungry. You have to change his diaper. Maybe he's thirsty. You have to change his diaper. Maybe he wants to go play. You have to change his diaper. It changes his diaper. You just don't want to change the diaper, so you try to think it's maybe something else. It's something else. No, no, no. You have to change his diaper. And then do all that something else. We don't understand the kid. We don't understand ourselves. We don't understand our spouse, but we think we can understand Hashem. David HaMelech had Ruach HaKodesh, which means that there was a certain connection with Hashem, a certain level of understanding. Not all complete, but a certain level of understanding that's beyond us. In this Ruach HaKodesh, David HaMelech knew that one day there's gonna be a grandkid. A grandkid by the name of Esther. Not his grandkid, Shaul's grandkid.

1:37:22Shimi's grandkid, and this Esther is going to have an opportunity to save Klal Yisrael by sacrificing her own life. After this, the whole gezeirah that you're going to learn about in the Megillah unfolds. I highly recommend you watch our shiurim from previous years to know the details of each one of the chapters. I don't want to go over the same thing twice. It's already available and... After you go through the Megillah, you understand it, but you see that at some point, Mordechai comes to Esther and he tells her, you have to go and talk to Achashverosh. She says, no, he didn't invite me. And he has a rule, whoever doesn't get invited and comes to him, is subject to the death penalty. Death penalty. That's penalty. Look what he did. He invited Vashti. She didn't come, he killed her. If you would have come without an invitation, he would have killed you. That's the rule. I can't go to him. Mordechai HaYehudi says to her, what do you think, you're safe because you're over there?

1:38:30You're in the same trouble as us. You think you're safe because you're a millionaire. You think you're safe because you have political connections. You think you're safe because you live in Jerusalem. You think you're safe because you live in America. You're not safe at all. When there's a gezeirah, a decree from Heaven on Am Yisrael, no one is safe. Esther says, "No, no, I didn't say..." i thought I was safe. I just meant maybe there's something else, but apparently there isn't. So I'm going, and whatever happens, happens. If I die, I die. She goes to seven chambers, meaning every chamber has sergeants, soldiers. They say, "Not allowed," they kill you on the spot. And throughout this way, Esther HaMalka has Ruach HaKodesh. She starts talking to Hashem. And she says, "Oh God, oh God, why have you forsaken me?" David HaMelech wrote about Esther, not about JC Penney. David HaMelech is writing about the conversation between Esther HaMalka and HaKadosh Baruch Hu.

1:39:49Esther is representing Klal Yisrael, saying, "Hashem, Hashem, why are you forsaking us? My grandmother, Sarah Imeinu, when the Pharaoh kidnapped her, You made miracles happen." My ancestors, You made miracles happen. I've been in Achashverosh's house for years. Nothing's happening. Not only that, all of Am Yisrael is about to get killed, nine years after the feast. Why? Because we not only went to the feast, we enjoyed it too. Not only did we live in the place of the goyim, we started acting like them too. But why are You leaving us? Okay, we messed up. Why are You leaving us, Hashem? So if you look at the commentary of Tehillim number 22 by Rashi, by Tosafot, by all of the Chachamim, you see how every single verse is mamash golden. Golden, golden. I'll give you a little bit of understanding of how far the truth is from where the Christians think and, unfortunately, how far it is from ignorance too. So...

1:41:00David HaMelech writes the Tehillim, the conductor on the Ayelet HaShachar. Ayelet HaShachar represents Esther. My God, my God, why have You forsaken me? Why are You so far from saving me from the words of my roar? Oh my God, I call out by day, but You answer not, and by night there is no respite for me. Yet You are the Holy One, enthroned upon the praises of Israel. In You our fathers trusted; they trusted, and You delivered them. To You they cried, and they were rescued; in You they trusted, and they were not shamed. But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by humanity, despised by people. All who see me deride me. They open wide with their lips and they wag their heads. If one commits himself to Hashem, He will deliver him. He will rescue him, for He desires him. For You are the One who drew me forth from the womb and made me secure at my mother's breasts. I was cast upon You from birth; from my mother's womb, You have been my God.

1:42:21Not aloof from me, for distress is near me, for there is none to help. Many bulls surround me, Bashan's mighty ones encircle me. They open their mouths against me like a tearing, roaring lion. So far she's representing Am Yisrael, but also at the same token representing herself, saying that Hashem, you know I'm an orphan. I don't have any Abba and Ima. You've been my God since day one. You're the only one that kept me until day one. Why are you going to leave me now? All of these people want to kill me. All of the people that were supposedly her servants knew that she's going to her deathbed. They just didn't know which chamber it's going to be. The first one, second one, third one, fourth one, fifth one, sixth one, or seventh one for sure. So each one in each chamber said, "I'm getting the diamonds. I'm getting the crown. I'm getting the gowns. I'm getting the clothing. I get the closet in the first chamber." Everyone was splitting what they're going to get from her. And every single chamber that she's going through, she's crying more and more to Hashem. And this is after she fasted for three days in a row.

1:43:42My strength is dried up like baked clay, and my tongue cleaves to my palate after she fasted for three days. That's what ends up happening. In the dust of death, you send me down, for dogs have surrounded me. A pack of evildoers has enclosed me. Like the prey of a lion are my hands and my feet. I can count all my bones. What happens after you don't eat for three days? Your bones start to show, and... They look and gloat over me. They divide my garments among themselves. Like I just said, they're all looking. "Oh, yeah, I'm gonna get the gowns. I'm gonna get the clothing. I'm gonna get this one. I'm gonna get that one." And cast lots for my clothing. But You, Hashem, be not far. O my strength, hasten to my assistance. Rescue my soul from the sword. What does it mean, rescue my soul from the sword?

1:44:42Rescue myself from the sword, rabotai yikarim, is beautiful. Rescue my soul from the sword. Atzila micherev nafshi. Atzila micherev nafshi. Rescue myself from the sword. Who's the sword? Who's the worst sword in that generation? Haman. Trying to kill all the Jews. Atzila micherev nafshi. Atzileni mei-cherev nafshi. Nun, Haman. Save me from the sword. Who's the sword? Haman's the sword. Save me from Haman. Save me from Haman, Hashem. Save me from the lion's mouth as You have answered me from the horns of the Re'emim. I will proclaim Your name to my brethren; in the midst of the congregation, I will praise You. You who fear Hashem, praise Him! All of you, the seed of Yaakov, glorify Him! Be in awe of Him, all you seed of Israel. And it continues, but you guys really just need to read this for yourselves to see how beautiful the commentary is once you actually know it and understand it.

1:46:03If you actually know the Megillat Esther, you know what happened. You look at this Tehillim number 22, you read the commentary, it's exactly verse by verse, this is what happened. This is how Esther felt in the first chamber. This is how Esther felt in the second chamber. This is how Esther felt after fasting for three days. This is how Esther felt, and so on and so forth. At the very least, every woman should read this. Right? Who do you connect to in Megillat Esther? Hopefully it's not Vashti. Hopefully it's not Vashti. Connect to Esther. Read about her. Tehillim number 22 with commentary. And you'll see how beautiful Torah HaKedoshah is. Baruch Rabotai HaYekarim, without learning Torah, We all can easily be fooled by the Christians to think that this Tehillim is about Avodah Zarah. This Tehillim is about some moron that was a womanizer that died 2,000 years ago. Hence the reason why it's very, very dangerous to remain ignorant. And ignorant does not mean secular. Ignorant means you don't know what it actually says, what Torah actually says. So...

1:47:20There's a couple of good things to do. I'll give you some suggestions to do over these next couple of days. First and foremost, you should already read Megillat Esther. Now, go home. If you don't have it, go to the store. Tomorrow is not enough time to order on the internet. Go to the local Judaica store and buy Megillat Esther. There's one by ArtScroll that's maybe fifteen or twenty dollars. It has great commentary. Read it. Spend a day or two reading it. Know what it actually says—why, who, what, when, and how. Read what it actually says. That's number one. Number two, read Tehillim 22 with commentary. Because it gives you an inside scoop of what happened in the moments of truth. What happened in the moments of truth when Esther was showing who she really was. Some fools will think that she was a sinner. Oh, she went with this. She did this. Look at what she did. When push came to shove, what was she really? Was she a Zionist? No. Number three: Start thinking seriously about what you really believe in. Why do you even celebrate Purim? I know it's fun to have costumes and beer or whatever, arak or whatever it is that you drink and...

1:48:49But that's not the holiday. Because in the Gemara, it says on page 23a that Yom Kippur is like Purim, meaning that Purim Purim is more significant, more holy than Yom Kippur. Because Kippur is Ke-Purim, like Purim. Why? Because the whole purpose of Yom Kippur is for us to do teshuva. in order for us to repent for our sins, to get close to HaKadosh Baruch Hu. The Golden Calf almost wiped us out, but Moshe Rabbeinu went to Mount Sinai for 40 days and 40 nights, specifically just saying, "I'm sorry." By the time he finished and Hashem forgave us, it was Yom Kippur. The same exact thing happened on Purim.

1:50:13And one day Hashem decided, that's it. I've had it with you guys. I'm sending Haman. Eliyahu HaNavi, the Midrash says, went to Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov. He says, how can you be resting here while your descendants just had a decree from Hashem? That's it, they're finished. Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov said, what did they do? They violated the Torah. He says, yes. Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov say, oh, if they violated the Torah, if it's written, it's written. That's it. Eliyahu HaNavi went to Moshe Rabbeinu. He says, good shepherd, good shepherd. Your children, your children, Hashem just signed a decree to kill all of them. Moshe Rabbeinu says, is it signed in clay or signed in blood? He says, oh, it's signed in clay, meaning, yes, the king signed it, but it hasn't happened yet. It was delivered to all the countries, but it hasn't happened yet. Oh, we can do something about it. It's not finished yet. Get them all to fast, get them all to do teshuva. Let's all pray to Hashem because that's what I did at Mount Sinai for 40 days and 40 nights, and we still have hope.

1:51:41That's what we did on Purim. Purim is a time to reflect about HaKadosh Baruch Hu. Purim is a time to reflect about why you are even here. What do you connect to? What makes you Jewish? What makes you a human, even? What's the point? Because a person that wants longevity to think about his past, just like a nation that wants longevity has to think about its past. A nation that does not connect to its past is also a nation that does not have a future. Why? Because if you don't connect to your past, that means that the future won't connect to you as the past. So, there won't be a continuation of you. The French Some years ago, they tried to spend a lot of money and a lot of research to uncover ancient French. They looked at the writings of Rashi, one of the giants among Am Yisrael, and they found 2,000 words that Rashi himself wrote in his peirush in French. He wrote his commentary in French, specific words in French, because he was in France and...

1:53:04Why do the French care how you say "table" in French 900 years ago? Why do the French care how you say "chair" 900 years ago in French, in ancient French? Why? Because they know very well that in order for them to have a future, they must connect to their past. In order for us, Am Yisrael, to have a future We must connect to our past. On a day like Purim, we must connect to what happened on Purim—not just the costumes, the liquor, and the celebration. What actually happened? And also, who is causing it to happen again? The Zionists caused it to happen again. assimilation, intermarriage, heresy, atheism, conversion to Christianity—all of that happened. The Holocaust followed. The same thing is happening today in America, in many parts of America. There's over 80% intermarriage, 90% do not even keep Shabbat, and almost 40% of the so-called religious don't keep Shabbat.

1:54:28Who's left for Hashem? That's what we have to think about; that's the thought, that's the teaching. What makes you different, and what are you doing to not only connect to the past, but to make sure that there is a future? There is a future. Because at some point, worms are going to eat us. What are we leaving? Are we leaving children that have Da'at Torah? Are we leaving other people doing kiruv? Are we learning something? Are we publishing books? What are we doing to have longevity? Instead of donating the inheritance to our pet dog or cat or the local museum or the local Tanachic zoo. Let's think about what we are doing to continue the Torah, to continue Am Yisrael, to make sure Purim doesn't happen again because right now, everybody that I talk to, who actually sees clearly, says the same thing, and it's not good. So that's what you have to think about on Purim, the past.

1:55:52The present and the future. Any questions? We have another shiur on Tuesday night, a different shiur about the new location. It's next door to the Breslov Center. It's literally next door. It's the building next door. same time and that's going to be the new location for us from now on below, the same for Tuesday nights. I'm sure we'll talk a little bit about Pesach, but mostly it's going to be about the Mussar to the kavod Beit HaKnesset. Amen. Amen.