What is The Backbone of Our Torah?

1:34No one really knows who these people are. No one really knows who Jesus was because the writers never actually saw him. But nonetheless, there is a major disconnect between the main character in the book, his followers, and the followers among themselves. And the so-called sages among themselves, if you could call them sages. Like, everybody is their own entity. That's why you're never going to meet two Christians with the same belief. Every one of them believes something else. Every single one of them makes their own version of Christianity. No two Christians believe the same exact thing. There's one who believes he's Mashiach, another one who believes he's God, and yet another who believes he's both. Some might even believe he's Pikachu. Everybody has their own little nonsensical belief that they create, and they just pick and choose whatever they want to believe, leaving out what they don't want to believe. Most of them are really ignorant anyway. They just know a little bit, just enough to make them idol worshippers, but that's it. Now, there's a major disconnect between them and the sages, if you will. Not very different when it comes to Islam; Islam, the whole thing depends on Muhammad. If there's no Muhammad, there's no religion.

3:01You can't say, oh no, no, we pray to Allah. It's not true. They pray to Mohammed. They pray to Mohammed. If this Mohammed is in the picture, Islam is good. Mohammed's not in the picture, Islam is in bad shape. Why? That's up to them. I saw one time them reading their own version of what happened during the Exodus. What happened in Egypt. Their own version. It's like a Midrash almost. What happened with Moses, they call him Musa. and said that Pharaoh was evil. Pharaoh was evil in his heart, even though they're coming from the same place. They say that Pharaoh was evil in his heart; he's going to get us all in trouble. They're writing in their own books, "He's going to get us all in trouble, he's evil." Musa is a good person, peace be upon him, and so on. It's in the Quran. But if... You keep going, keep going, keep going along the story. Somehow, even though he wasn't even alive for another 2000 years, Muhammad comes along. Oh, and Muhammad, what does he have to do with this? He's not even alive for 2000 years. Meaning, without Muhammad, there's no Islam. Why is this a serious problem? Because, first of all, this could be idolizing. But aside from that, that means that everything depends on a human being.

4:27There's a major disconnect. Even though they have what you might call sages or wise men, they don't refer to them in the same way. Everything always goes back to Muhammad, non-stop. Because their religion depends on one person. Christianity depends on one person. Buddhism depends on one person. Everybody has their person. Judaism doesn't have a person with God. We have our sages. If you want to be a sage, you can become one by learning an enormous amount of Torah and making sacrifices from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to sleep in order to achieve this. The reality is, Rabotai, that having faith in these sages from our previous generation is very much the bedrock of our Torah. Because if you don't have faith in our sages, then you're not going to have authentic Judaism. Only when a person understands that his teacher, her teacher, is their connection.

5:51The sages are our connection to Mount Sinai, not our connection to God. For a connection to God, you don't need anybody else. But in order to know exactly what happened and the word of Hashem, what He wants, and how He wants it, we rely on our sages. Not one sage, not two. We have countless sages throughout history. Each one specialized in different areas; some in the same areas, others in different ones. Some debated with each other; some agreed with each other. But the point is, we must rely on many, many sages. Even if we determine that we want to go with one specific opinion, that opinion has to be accepted by other sages. You can't just decide, "No, I'm just going to go with the Rambam on this one" or "I'm just gonna go with this one on that one." You can't just decide for yourself to mix and match, making a salad out of Judaism. It has to be accepted by the modern sages as well. The problem is that when a person does not submit to the sages, submit to the chachamim, submit to the rabbis, he's not going to have authentic Judaism. He's actually going to have quite the opposite because he's going to try to translate the law himself. He's going to read the Shulchan Aruch himself and decide what's halacha. He's going to read the Rambam himself and decide what's halacha.

6:54Submit to the sages, submit to the chachamim, submit to the rabbis. He’s not going to have authentic Judaism; he’s actually going to have quite the opposite. Because he’s going to try to translate the law himself, he’s going to read the Shulchan Aruch himself and decide what's halacha, he’s going to read the Rambam himself and decide what's halacha. And the problem is that he's deciding in five minutes what took our sages a lifetime to determine, as if it's like eating a bag of chips. Meaning he's not giving it the same weight as if it's a matter of life or death. He's thinking, okay, so if I make a mistake, big deal. They made mistakes. Which means that he thinks he's on the same level, or she thinks she's on the same level as the sages. This lack of emunat chachamim, faith in our sages, is indeed a challenge we face today. Only when there is a deep respect for the wisdom passed down from Moshe Rabbeinu at Mount Sinai, can one truly engage with and understand the depths of Torah learning. And that's one of the biggest problems in the world that we have today. The people simply don't have emunat chachamim. They don't have any respect or faith in our sages. And the Machzor Vitri says that only when a person understands that his teachers are part of the tradition of the oral law given to Moshe Rabbeinu at Mount Sinai, can he earnestly apply himself to plumbing in depths.

8:11Meaning that only when he actually realizes that whatever teacher he decides, whoever his rabbi is, that's his connection to all of the teachers between him and Moshe Rabbeinu. This is the connection, there's nothing else. He's not going to be able to really go deep into things because he's too busy questioning everything. He's too busy picking and choosing whatever opinion, whatever rabbi, like he's picking and choosing a new outfit to wear for his new nephew's Bar Mitzvah. And a person like this... Is it until he submits that this is it, this is the connection? He's not going to be able to really go deep into things because he's too busy questioning everything. He's too busy picking and choosing whatever opinion, picking and choosing whatever rabbi, picking and choosing everything like it's a salad, like he's picking and choosing a new outfit to wear for his nephew's bar mitzvah. And a person like this... will fall into the trap of being very cynical and become like the ancient Sadducees and Boethusians who rejected the entire Oral Torah. I see this a lot today with different people that simply do not have a rabbi. They say they have a rabbi sometimes, but the rabbi doesn't even know who they are.

9:16Or they just don't listen to the rabbi. They say he's my rabbi, but when the rabbi says something to them, they don't listen to him. They say, oh yeah, he's my rabbi, I just don't listen to everything he says. That means he's not your rabbi. If you're not listening to everything he says, especially the things that you don't agree with, he's not your rabbi. He's just a guy, you know. That's it. Because the Torah tells us, as part of our holy Torah, you have to have Yirat Shamayim. You also have to have Yirat HaRav. How much? You have to have as much fear of the Rabbi as you do of fear of God. To that extent. Why? He's your connection to the truth. Not a connection to God. You don't need anybody to connect to God. But he's your connection for how to serve this God. What to do. When to do it. And so on and so forth. What's expected of you.