Shaaar HaBitachon Lesson 8 with Rabbi Shais Taub

welcome back we are continuing now we are going to start tonight the first chapter actually we're going to start and complete probably the first chapter because the first chapter is very very short far shorter than the compilers forward that we've been learning until now just to uh remind you we've been studying the the introduction america thus says the the compiler which puts at the beginning of this shah shah ruby talking and the function of the introduction is basically to sell us to uh to feature the attractive points or the advantages or the benefits of having trust in hashem and uh i mentioned i think the last year the one before that if you don't yet have been talking you know you're still more in a selfish mode so you kind of need this what's in it for me uh salesmanship you know why should i be talking well how will it benefit me obviously after you have been talking you know you know then you're beyond that but the the the preface is very much about selling us unbe talking so i'm just gonna read the end of the preface where he sums up uh the preface and then he introduces or gives like a little index so to speak to all the chapters that are going to be coming okay so he here's the text the cave in shibayati me now since i have explained the benefits of trusting in hashem and the advantages or perhaps the advantages and the benefits both in regards to plato one's one spiritual life as well as islam one's secular life or god forbid to say that a jew has any secular life but in in your mundane affairs as as occurs to me as it whatever occurred to me as the selling points of bittorrent i'm going to explain now me indiana talking shiva dvaram the actual concept of bittoken in seven ways seven aspects of the talking in other words we didn't really explain what the talking is yet you're wondering well what is this be talking yeah well that was the point this the the the preface was to get you hooked this be talking sounds great i got to get some but tell me more about it right that's so it did its job after we've explained the the benefits the the tialis that one has or the toyoloice the benefits plural that one gets and the hana the the the advantages um now we're going to explain what the talking actually is and that's what the the chapters are all going to be there are uh seven chapters one of them what is the causes what would induce trust in the created beings why would a creation or created being why would a human have trust what cases would uh foster a sense of trust iii is the grounds that make it obligatory to trust in hashem and at the same time not a contradiction to employ means to gain a livelihood we spoke about this actually earlier that uh is going to explain it's not a contradiction varav the fourth thing the instances in which trust is applicable where it is praiseworthy and where it is reprehensible in other words there is such a concept as misplaced and we're going to find out what that is that's chapter four the hamishi the fifth thing the difference between the way one who trusts in hashem employs a means of obtaining a livelihood and the way one who does not trust in hashem employs means of making a livelihood lashing in the sixth thing of gnus but it's an explanation of the different ways one is obligated to condemn the view of those who advocate protracted pleasure seeking in this world um and they have the hope they their their soul hopes the kabbalah vedas that they will accept upon themselves serving hashem the service of hashem when they have fulfilled these desires in other words these are the people who say that you know your talking is very good but let me first make sure that i'm having uh pleasure in this world and then i'll get to my be talking so the rabbena bachaya refers to these people uh with an interesting name we actually mentioned it in the introduction the haim bali hamashi noise these are called balay hamashi noise the collateral collectors they take a mash coin they take a pledge you know like when somebody gives a loan and he doesn't know if it'll be paid so he wants to secure the debt he takes a pledge you know about the guy the uh the jewish businessman who came to chase manhattan bank the uh the branch down in manhattan you know that one chase manhattan down in manhattan right the big one then the fancy you know in the in the skyscraper there anyway so he comes down there and he says i want to take out a loan for a thousand dollars so uh thousand dollars okay they pull the credit there he passes the credit you give him a loan for a thousand dollars to say hold on a second you need a couple you need collateral he says well i'll tell you what i got my rolls-royce out front here are the keys you can take the take the car they said okay fine that's good collateral because that's the way they do things at chase manhattan bank you just give them the actual physical car right there anyways don't worry about it it's it's worth it okay you're gonna be you're gonna be happy you followed along with this anyways so then the guy he leaves and he comes back a month later and uh after he comes back the the the the to pay the the loan so the president of the bank is waiting for him and he says you know sir uh you know while you were away we were very curious about the loan we we actually we looked into your financial portfolio and we see that you're worth half a billion dollars and um it's kind of strange we were wondering you took out a 30-day loan for a thousand dollars why would you need and then you know why would you need a thousand dollar loan for 30 days so the the businessman says let me ask you something what was the collateral he says well we took your rolls-royce we parked it in the in the garage of the bank right because the bank has a bank has a garage that's where the employees park this is also important for the joke so a lot of a lot of work to okay i hope this will be worth it anyways so uh yeah so i gave you the collateral the car gave me my rolls-royce right for 30 days yeah it was a 30-day loan right okay and now i came back i had to pay the loan thousand dollars that i borrowed right plus the interest the interest on the loan the 11 yeah it was 11 that's right he says and for 30 days i've been gone right so 30 days yeah he says 30 days i went on a business trip for a month yeah and now he came back and i paid you the loan with 11 you know plus 11 interest he says yeah but sir you're worth a half a billion dollars why'd you do all that he says you think i got rich spending money for frivolously i'm about to about the blunder the whole punch line after all that setup he says you think i got you think i got rich spending money frivolously where else in manhattan can you park your car for 30 days for 11. anyways that's called collateral um people who um they tell hashem yeah well after i have all my pleasure and i have all my taiwas in this world then i'm gonna get started not on that pitakan thing right okay so they're called uh balay hamash hamash koinoise that they want to have a mash king they want to have basically they're telling they're setting terms with hashem they're telling him i'll have be talking but only after uh i feel that i'm taken care of when i have my ducks in a row then i'll start be talking so urbino bakaya doesn't like that okay yeah so somebody sent me a private chat thank you he says this somewhat contradicts the story of the tsam sadiq in the hosted you told at the end of the last class yeah i was thinking about that as well and i wasn't going to bring it up but you did but you did it in a private chat so i appreciate that because you didn't want to make problems but i did think about this actually um so i'll tell you something there's a difference between saying i'm not going to start having be talking until certain conditions are met and being honest and saying look i'm going to start now i'm ready to start now but uh you know sometimes you have to give the nephew bahamas you have to give the animal soul a little comfort you know it's like why we serve matzo ball soup at the shabbos table and we invite people to experience shabbos really what's shabba shabbas isn't matzo ball soup it's a spiritual thing but the matzo ball soup gets the animal soul there and that's the animal soul brings the body and then they get to experience the spirituality of it so if it's a condition and you're saying no hashem i'm not ready to start working on the talking until you prove something to me by putting money in my in my account that's we don't set terms with hashem that's khutzba but in the story it was more like yeah i'm ready to start now but you know what would take the edge off you know would it would make me less distracted so i could focus on learning i could learn about the talking if i wouldn't have things i have to take care of by the way what's that similar to similar to the whole reason that abam gives that when meshiach comes that we'll have prosperity we'll have abundance he says do you think that we're waiting for mashiach so that we can sip pina coladas you know that we could you know all of a sudden have uh you know material abundance that's not what we care about the point is when there's material abundance then we'll be free to focus on on learning toyota and connecting to hashem okay anyways thank you for bringing that up and anyone else who has good questions uh send them in the chat and if i can't handle i'll just ignore it it's fine don't worry it won't it won't disrupt it'll only it'll only add okay and mahashvi the seventh thing factors that inhibit trust in hashem the homage etc and then a summation of the whole topic about pitakin and a brief survey of its various aspects or parts and that is uh an overview an index so to speak of the forthcoming chapters okay so let's do wow we're ready to start chapter one um but before before we do so i want to share something with everybody before we get started with chapter one very exciting we're about to start chapter one um this is a letter that is printed in the in the igriskaidish and it is letter um this what you're seeing is a copy of the original meaning not the way that it looks in the egress but the way that it was received by the one to whomever wrote the letter which um you see there it says to uh mendel shi which is uh mendelshamtv oliver shalom and i'm very very grateful his family trusted me with this letter i mean it's been out before it's not a secret but that they gave me the the copy of the original and allowed me to share it which i think will it it's definitely inspired me in fact if i can share this with you one of my main inspirations for doing this class was this letter so now you'll see it as well um a little bit of the background that mendel mendel shantov at this time i think he was 19 years old and he had some been diagnosed with some serious health problems and he was shaken up about and he wrote to the web about it so the rebbe's response is the first that ever says i'm taken aback by uh your nephilia by your low spirits and the rabbit tells them first of all and you know a natural way of pursuing a cure you say or treatment he tells them do according to what the two expert doctors tell you to do and then strengthen your battalion in hashem and he'll certainly return you to your strength um you see here what the rebbe adds in the uh saviad koche that was holy handwriting melant melant we learn and we learn on a second lapel but when it comes to actuality the actual practical uh issues vu is there to be talking where is the trust in other words you're learning torah you're learning about hashem and you have all these beautiful ideas but it's too abstract and what's the proof that when you have a challenge in life like in this case the the negative medical diagnosis now all of a sudden it's shaking you up where's the talking you know we spoke about this in the very first class that amban's muscle about the tree and the fruits that people can believe in hashem that's like a tree but not necessarily trust in hashem which is like the fruits if you see a true if you see a tree it doesn't necessarily have fruits but if you see fruits it always comes from a tree so someone who believes in hashem doesn't necessarily trust but if he trusts that came from from belief and that's sort of like the difference here between melancholant that's the belief in hashem knowing about hashem presumably not just learning the revealed aspects of torah gemara but also even panimya where in siddhis it explains things about elecus about godliness but even that's not enough melanchol it has to come down to practicality and practicality means that when a person has a challenge in life that he reacts to it differently because because of his belief that his belief actually is translated into trust and then then the rabbit continues as far as i guess say and as far as i guess advice practically how to start to attain this more practical trust the rabbit says he should study three or four times shattered in and it's understood i don't mean you should sit and read it you know rattle it off like uh tikkun lal shivulis that's not what i'm saying alabama he should cover it in the course of a few weeks so that was my that was my inspiration that we should have a class where we learn shadow bittoken in the course of a few weeks so hashem we're doing it all right let's start now chapter one chapter one is very very short pedigree in chapter one [Music] remember said chapter one is about what is batakin what is this thing called okay ahmad it is the tranquility of the one who trusts the shia and his heart's reliance upon the one that he's trusting in that that person or that entity will do what is good and fitting for him the inion of in whatever it is that he's relying on him for right now he's just speaking about in general he's not saying specifically exclusively trusting in hashem he's saying anytime you trust in anyone kefir yohaltai according to the one you're trusting in's ability to deliver vidayta in according to his understanding of what it is that's good for you what would be considered good for you so that's be talking and let's just say in simple english the talking is that you're relaxed that you're able to breathe he calls it menuchis he calls it a levi that is samoch that is a heart that relies it's a feeling is a feeling a feeling of tranquility a feeling that everything is okay everything is taken care of why because i'm relying on someone who is reliable that's what it means i'm relying on someone who is reliable you know about the rabbi who gets up every week he says his sermon and there's this one guy this one guy yankel always falls asleep in the drasha he always falls asleep so one week the rabbi gets up and he gets up to the the bhima he starts his russia and he looks and yankel's already asleep he says yanko i didn't even start yet and you're already asleep says rabbi i trust you i trust you okay trust means i can rely on you i know that you're going to deliver you are dependable you are reliable like in yellowstone national park they have old faithful old faithful is a geyser it always blows it's uh it's water it's steam at the same time it's dependable it's reliable okay and therefore i relax i have tranquility that's okay but what lies at the root of his trust and gives rise to it you pocketed and if it's missing there will not be talking like what's the secret behind the battalion we said what what's the secret behind it it's that his heart is confident and secure he knows that the person is going to do what he said he's going to do you have to know not just that this person wants to do good not just this person said they're going to do good but that they're reliable that they can do what they said and they will do what they said and on that basis is be talking now he's not even speaking yet about having been talking in hashem later on we're going to go through all the different scenarios and possibilities of placing our bittorrent in various different people or entities or forces and powers and we'll figure out we'll figure out that will bring us to it logically where we we we had best place i'll be talking okay and he continues and that he has in mind meaning the person you're trusting and has in mind to benefit him to benefit the person who's having the trust even what he did not commit himself to and what he did not undertake to do out of pure grace and kindness in other words one of the things that the person or the entity the force the power that i trust in has to have not just that it's going to do something it says it's going to do but to have my full trust so i can really have that manuka i have to know he'll over deliver he'll over deliver that even what he didn't promise he's going to do even more than that why because he has my benefit as a priority now i'll just finish off with one concept here tonight and that is this idea of nidovah acid generosity or magnanimous kindness the marau in which has ideas that are obviously applicable here to shadow talking the morale speaks a little bit about about this idea about hashem's hasid he doesn't use those exact words but the idea of hashem being kind so that he'll over deliver um there's a passage in the navi yeshiyo beetho vashem trust in hashem forever and ever kibi yudhke the lord you shall you have an everlasting rock so he explains like this a person might think who am i to assume that hashem is going to do kindness for me i'm not worthy i don't deserve it so he says listen it's not about you well what if what if i'm i'm worthy of punishment what if i've earned the opposite it's not about you hashem is kind like we're like and therefore beethoven trust in hashem always always means in every case whether you think you deserve it or you earned it or you think you don't deserve it or you didn't earn it why because kibayud ke hashem tsureilamin we know that hashem created the two worlds elim hazel and elim habba from those two letters of his name what does this mean it means that since hashem created the whole world and he controls the whole world he can do as he sees fit and therefore he's not limited he's not compelled to follow any rules that he doesn't want to follow and he can be overly generous it's not as if he says to you i'm sorry you know what can i do there's a policy over here and you don't deserve my kindness no hashem can be overly kind he can do even more than than than promised now from the point of view of siddhis we go even further than that and we say that has power to elicit hashem's kindness even when maybe yeah we don't deserve it and how is that what what is that like that that's a hack that's like exploiting the system or it's a workaround or you know finding a bug in the system or you know a price glitch right okay so i want to recommend to everybody just to to learn a secret it's the first secret in perigramid valve and over there it really elaborates in a very rich way and the whole suggy of but i'll just tell you one thing that it says over there i'm sure we've heard the the the the statement trach good feet good this comes from a hostage of the tamartzadek whose son was in grave danger and the khasid went didn't even think he should bother going to lubavitch because the doctors already said the son wasn't going to make it and he got there and and the tamarted told him good feet sign good if you think good it will be good and he got home and his son miraculously had recovered so in this secret rabbi explains like this what does it mean think good it will be good there's some type of uh you know like a workaround uh like uh like a hack what what's going on here so the neva explains like this you're gonna say well hold on i don't really deserve the kindness and then i'm gonna think good and it's gonna it's gonna it's like a trick that it's going to make things end up working out a certain way it's not a trick it's not a trick at all hashem like says hashem is your shadow hashem works reciprocally when you act as if you are going to see revealed good even when you don't deserve it that itself is a cli that itself is a vessel for allowing hashem to act that way toward you so it's not a trick it's actually it's legi it's legitimate work you think it's so easy to be tranquil and to be positive and to let go and and just to feel totally helped already before you see your deliverance that's not easy it's a lot of work so it's not a trick it's it's legitimate work and when we'll do that work it's mental work it's emotional work and we think good then we allow hashem to do good for us even if we don't necessarily deserve it but in the merit of thinking good the work that we put into getting ourselves into that mental space and emotional space that's enough for hashem to deliver the goodness okay that is the end of chapter one with hashem's help we will continue tomorrow night with chapter two thank you so much to everybody