Ari Goldwag - Nasso - Hashem is Always There

you're listening to the weekly partial podcast recorded with hm's never ending assistance in Rael 5776 2016 this week's para is para is noo if you're in if you're outside of Israel and soon we're going to get to the thought that I have for you on this week's para but before we do just want to give you an update where we're up to trying to raise $10,000 for my safer for my book which will be coming out within the next few months and uh so far as of now we've raised we've had B nice response so far we've raised $782 60 so we've since last week gathered over $430 and I'd like to thank everyone who has already donated and I'd like to encourage all of my listeners to take part in this Mitzvah a great opportunity to spread Torah to spread inspiration you can do it by going on to my website arold wag.com and clicking on the contact page there there's a donate button and when you donate you can write in that it's for my Torah book I'll also add that sponsorships are available for a donation of $500 or more $1,000 there will be Pages the beginning of the book for dedications and sponsorships now to the thought that I'd like to share with you this week the Torah tells us that Hashem gave a command this is in chapter 6 verse 22 God spoke to Moses and said of speak to Aaron and his sons and tell them this is how you are to bless the children of Israel say to them as follows this is a famous blessing the Priestly blessing may God bless you and protect you may God shine his countenance upon you and give you Grace may God raise his countenance toward you and may he give you peace I'd like to share with you a medish a beautiful medish that brings down the verse and in the song of songs applies it to our verse of the blessing of the priests but also applies it elsewhere i' like to see how whenever the maish does this it's not just daring and and saying ideas that are not connected as you know it's always saying an idea which is indeed deeply connected there's a lesson to be learned from the fact that it was placed in the Mish these ideas that were ju supposed so we need to understand what is the connection of them now we have the verse in sh and song of song the verse tells us verses in the second chapter of the song of songs the voice of my beloved which is a reference to God God is our beloved it's coming skipping over the mountains jumping from The Valleys verse Compares God to a deer or to a young Ram there's that exuberance that skipping that jumping that movement and then the verse says something really interesting the verse talks about God our beloved as standing behind a wall Looking Through the Windows and taking a glance from between the cracks so the verse here describes three different ways where God interacts with us one is from behind the wall as it were one is looking at us through the window so to speak and the Third Way is is taking glances at us from between the cracks now the M says something really interesting about one of the modes of God interacting with us is as if we're looking at him through the window or he's looking at us through the window when God said to Aaron and to his sons that this is how you are to bless the Jewish people the people of Israel said to God Master of the world you're telling the priests that they should give us blessings we don't want blessings through intermediaries we want your direct blessings we want you to bless us directly from your mouth and this is something that we find elsewhere in the Torah this is what it says in the verse in Deuteronomy 26:1 15 look down from your exalted holy Abode in the heavens and give a blessing to your people of Israel so we see that God blesses us directly the Jewish people were challenging and saying God why do we need to have an intermediary why do we need the pre the priests to bless us why can't we get the blessings directly from you so God responds to the Jewish people and he says you need to understand something that even though I told the priests that they are the ones who should bless you I stand with them and I I bless you with them an amazing thing and therefore when the priests give this blessing what do they do they pick up their hands in the air why are they picking up their hands why don't they just say the blessing without anything to do with their hands it's an indication of the fact that it's not just us doing it we are acting as a channel the blessings of God are coming through our hands through our arms and they're coming out to the Jewish people God Is Standing God is standing behind us so to speak and it also says in the verse that God is looking through the window that God is also standing not just behind them but God is appearing through between the priests if you look between them so to speak you can see that God is there giving that blessing not only that the third aspect of the verse which is taking that quick Peak so to speak from between the cracks that's also indicative of what's going on with the blessing of the priests that God himself is peeking through the cracks the the Kohan of the priests when they give that blessing so they separate their fingers there's a crack between their second and third fingers which allows the blessings of God to come through to slip between the cracks so to speak now what I want to understand when we read this mes what is the idea the Jewish people are saying hey we want a direct revelation we don't want to be behind the wall we we don't want to be we don't want Hashem to reveal himself from people Hashem we want to get a blessing directly from you why is it that we need to receive it from the priests and Hashem says no no no I I'm doing this directly but I'm doing it through them that's a contradiction what is the understanding of the fact that Hashem is saying I am giving you a direct blessing but I'm doing it through them I'm standing there I'm speaking through them they are a channel but it's still not direct what is the idea of this blessing that the priests are giving to us why can't we receive that blessing directly from from hashm what indeed is the response of God to the Jewish people now I want to back up because the way of the Mish is that the Mish will quote a verse which it wants to eventually use to explain the verse that we're speaking about here in our paraa but it will first bring explanations which seems to be which seem to not be related that are connected to other places in the Torah and then it comes back to our verse so I just Shar with you the really the end of this Mish but I'd like to now go back to the first pieces in the Mish which bring this same verse from Shir from the song of songs and use it and apply it in a different place in a different way seemingly and once we start to understand what's going on in those places we'll get more of an understanding of what's going on in our verse in regards to the Priestly blessings so the measure says like this God is standing behind the wall zi this is a reference to the Wilderness of sini to the Sinai desert God looks out from the windows that's an open revelation God is not behind the wall God is not just you know in the in the wilderness and and helping us out from behind the scenes but rather Hashem is openly revealing himself looking at us through the windows that's where Hashem comes down on Mount sa reveals himself gives over the Torah there's also an aspect at Mount Si as explains bringing from sh where God is looking at us he's taking a glance at us or we can glance him from between the cracks where do we see this is called in the in the Ten Commandments when God speaks to the Jewish people the entire Jewish nation has an open revelation of God so the first two Commandments were said directly to the Jewish people God himself spoke and said I am hem your God those first two Commandments were said directly however as kazal tell us after that it switches the language of the verses switch no longer is it speaking directly because it's not hasem speaking directly to the Jewish people but rather it was Moses MOS was the one who was giving over the rest of the Ten Commandments to the Jewish people acting as God's Emissary so here again we see that there are three different modes three different ways that Hashem reveals himself to us interacts with us one is behind the wall behind the scenes as we are traversing the Wilderness of sin God is there he's giving us the M he's giving us the Mana he's giving us the water all the things that are miraculous but not openly clear that Hashem is there then we have the second one which is where God looks at us through the window we see God directly and that's the first two Commandments and then we have the way that God reveals himself he's peeking through the cracks not as openly clear speaking to us through mosha through Moses now here too I want to try to understand try to get to an understanding of why is it that there were are these three different ways that hasm interacts with us why is it sometimes behind the wall why is it sometimes openly revealed and why is it indeed sometimes that no I need it through an emissary I need it through a mosh Rao I can't have that direct revelation of Hashem what is the understanding of these three modes I'd rather have it directly from Hashem why do I have to hear hashem's word from somebody else this is about my relationship with God why can't I have that direct and open Revelation all the time now I'd like to share with another last piece in the me a beautiful description of an idea and it's as follows the verse says part of this verse it says that God is compared my beloved one is compared to a dear says the people of Israel said in front of God Master of the world you said that you would come to us first that you would reveal yourself openly but that's not what it seems like as we just described there was an open Revelation but then it was taken away you are like a you are like a deer amazing thing just like a deer if you watch a deer running through the forest sometimes you can see it sometimes it gets hidden behind foliage so very interesting it seems to be saying two things one is that God reveals himself so he's seen you can see him if you're looking you're watching carefully but he's running by and he's getting hidden by the foliage so to speak and it's also true not just for Hashem himself but the person that he's manifesting through when it comes to the concept of Messiah of the Messiah so you have the same idea we see that when it came to the G the Redemption the Messiah of Egypt which was MOS which was Moses so what happens is he comes and he says here I am I'm the Messiah I'm going to redeem you Jewish people but immediately after that he was gone he disappeared for a few months the mag is going to say that he was gone for 3 months there's another mag says that he was missing for 6 months what is the idea here we see the GU he comes the Redeemer comes he appears but then he's he's missing got reveals himself to us then he disappears so to speak he hides himself says in the name of an amazing thing that not only is it true that in the Exodus the first Redemption mosu that we find that he revealed himself and then he he was hidden for a bit before he came and he did what he needed to do in order to completely redeem the Jewish people it's going to be true also in the Final Redemption when the Jewish people are redeemed from the Exile there's going to be an open Revelation mhia the Messiah is going to reveal himself and then he's going to hide himself there's going to be an opportunity for us to see him he's going to disappear it's going to seem like he's gone the Redemption is over it's not it's not happening and then he's going to reveal himself again and then the Redemption is going to happen completely now what's interesting is the mes tells us that when it came to M he was hidden for three months when it comes to the when it comes to the final Redeemer he's going to be revealed and then hidden for only 45 days now what happens in that interim period so the mees tells us like this where does the final Redeemer bring them to whoever follows after him who believes in him where where's he going to bring them to it's the the midm Yehuda there are those who say that he's going to bring them to the Wilderness of Judah and there are those who say no he's going to bring them to the Wilderness Area the sin area the SI desert now it's really interesting whoever believes in him whoever places their faith in this Redeemer and follows after him so they eat these different types of herbs meaning it's going to be a challenging time they're going to have to forage for their food out there in the desert area let's say somebody doesn't follow after him what's going to happen and he goes and he makes peace with the nations of the world he doesn't believe in the Redeemer what happens in the end is the person who doesn't end up believing he doesn't have the faith in the Redeemer he ends up killed by the nations of the world but those who have that Faith who trust in the Redeemer trust that hashem's promised Redemption is here at hand so they will be saved not only that says what happens at the end of these 45 days hasem himself brings them down the Mana just like the Jewish people after they left Egypt they had that Redemption and they received this m this Mana this amazing bread so too the Jewish people in the future time after the Redemption if they trust and they go out to the Wilderness to follow after the Redeemer they will also be able to receive this amazing miraculous Mana so here too we see that and this is the lesson of the medish that when Hashem is revealing himself which is the Redemption the Redemption process is really we're moving into a new relationship with Hashem so when Hashem is about to reveal himself he's about to redeem the Jewish people so there's a revelation the Redeemer is here everyone's excited but then he goes off he disappears it seems like he's not able to fulfill his mission it seems like it's just a false hope so what is the concept here what is the idea that there's that Revelation there's a hiding of the Revelation and then very interestingly for those who trust him after 45 days they start to receive the Mana they start to receive the MTH this amazing miraculous bread that rains down from heaven and sustains the Jewish people in a miraculous manner what is the idea of the Mana why is that what follows this whole process now before we answer the question before we get the clarity I want to share with you two more pieces in this medish which really once we get these ideas once we get this concept it will really give us a lot of clarity the medish tells us that in regards to the blessings we spoke about the fact that Hashem gives the blessings sometimes directly there's an idea that you know looks down at us and gives us the blessings Direct irly but really mainly it's through the kohanim he's standing by their side he's behind them he's between them coming through their fingers Etc but there's another place where God blesses us and this is more direct says like this God is compared my beloved is compared to a deer just like a deer it jumps from one place to another jumps from one fence to another from One Tree to another from one protected area to another protected area God also jumps as it were Skips from one besses from one synagogue to another K what is idea he's going around and the explains he's going around collecting the Mitzvah he's looking oh what are the Jews doing in this synagogue they're studying the Torah they're giving giving charity they're praying they're taking different actions bringing me into the world k when God sees all these things he gathers all these merits all these so he does this in order to give blessings to the Jewish people the verse says that wherever you mention God's name God says I will come there and I will bless you so we see that there's a mode of God's blessing which is direct we see that God is directly blessing us when we fulfill the Commandments when we are gathered together to do mitzah together to pray to give charity study Torah God gathers this together and blesses us directly so we see that there are again there's another there's there's multiple modes so again how are we to understand this when does it when is it indeed that God blesses us directly that we see God openly so to speak and when is it that God does it through people what's the understanding here so one last point he says like this what is the Merit where do we get the Merit for these blessings the me says the mer it is from from Abraham it says over here over here it says this is how you should Bless the people of Israel God instructs Aaron and his sons the word K which means this is also used in regards to Abraham it says this is how your Offspring will be there will be multitudes like the stars in the heaven so what do we see there's something that we see in regards to Abraham the meure says which teaches teaches us a profound lesson in regards to how we're to view the blessings of God it says like this God stands behind the the wall so to speak listen to this very interesting idea when God came to visit Abraham it was the third day after he had had his circumcision he was an old man 99 years old the verse says that God revealed himself to to Abraham and Abraham was sitting y the verse refers to the fact that he sat why does it say it that way in other words it's written without of it's not written Yos which means sitting but rather it's written Yin which could also be read as Yos he sat what is this teaching us the verse wrote it in a different way to teach us the lesson that Abraham when he saw the revelation of God he wanted to stand up I shave God says to him no no no I want you to remain seated you are going to do something which will indicate something that your children will do when your children come in to the places of worship to the synagogues to the places of study and they say they're sitting and they're saying they're saying here o Israel Hashem your God hasem is on which is a verse that's an obligation for us to say twice a day what are they doing when they say sh they sit but I'm going to be standing my honor my divine presence will be standing there thus I will be in one state I'll be standing they will be sitting I want you to also be sitting here and I will be standing to indicate that that's what's going to be in the future time as well what is the lesson of this Mish what is indicated by the fact that hasem is standing up and we're sitting we also stand right when it comes to the B when we had the Priestly blessings the priests stand we stand in front of them or the amid the prayer the 18-fold prayer that we say we stand what is it teaching us that there's a part of the ding that we sit and Hashem as it were is standing in front of us and I think that what the maish is trying to teach us is that Hashem has different ways of interacting with us there are different ways that we perceive Hashem there're different ways that we experience hashem's relationship with us and so we talk about him standing behind the wall we talk about him looking at us through the window we talk about him peeking through the cracks but that's really always how we perceive it it's never actually how Hashem is interacting or feeling towards us hem is always standing even when we are sitting even when our relationship is sh where we only hear God we don't see God our eyes are closed our faces covered we're saying sh Israel here oh Israel our God is one sometimes we need to hear it we don't see it Abraham when he was sitting there when was he sitting there what was this interaction why was he told to sit down in specifically in this spot because he was experiencing something he had just done hashem's will but he didn't experience such a good result from it he was in pain it was the third day of his Mila he was in pain he had done something which was God's Will and he experiened pain as a result we would think that whatever whenever I do God's will good things come out of it but no Hashem wants him to see no no no you're sitting here you don't see me openly at this moment but I am still standing I am standing but you are sitting my relationship with you is constant my relationship with you Hashem is saying is I'm always standing even when I'm behind the wall you don't see me I'm behind the wall but I am standing I am still in a in a full relationship when someone is standing I'm coming to greet you I stand when I'm coming to receive a blessing I stand when I'm coming to talk to God I stand that's that's that relationship that that 18f prayer this it's a standing it's a full relationship thean when they give that blessing they stand but the nature of our relationship with Hashem is such that we experience it differently than it actually is and it's only from our perspective we see it differently it seems that Hashem is behind the cracks we can barely make out that God is there at all and sometimes I don't see him at really at all it's not even you can't even see between the cracks seems like sometimes Hashem is not blessing us directly there's a blessing that's happening through the priests we want the open revelation we want to experience you directly Hashem that's not the reality that we live in sometimes yes we have that open Revelation but if we always have that open revelation we get burned out that's the reality that's the reality that we live in we live in a place where we can't have that open Revelation at all times but Hashem is saying to us an amazing thing that even though you have a different experience of my relationship with you I am always there standing even when the blessing is coming from the priests it seems it's coming from the priests I am standing here the blessing is really coming from me the blessing is really it's really me you just see it as if I'm behind the priests you just see it as if I'm coming between the priests or that I'm coming the blessings are coming from between their fingers from between the cracks but that's your perception of it and that's not the truth of the reality of it the truth of the real reality of it is that even though we perceive it that way even though sometimes we don't see Hashem or it seems that hem is sending blessings through someone else the truth is that the blessings are always really directly coming from God sometimes it seems like God is hiding in the wilderness we don't see him directly then hashm openly reveals himself and says the first of the Ten Commandments we see him then hasm sends it through moshu don't make a mistake the m is saying it's always Hashem standing behind it all sometimes it seems like the Redeemer has arrived it seems like here he is it's time it's Messiah it's the time the Redeemer has arrived and then he disappears and it seems like God is no longer revealing himself God is no longer redeeming us but it's a mistake and that's why they go off to the midbar to that very place where God stood behind the scenes and provided for the Jewish people and for those who indeed have that Faith despite the darkness realize Hashem is still standing is still standing just behind the wall then they receive the the Mana the Mana always represents the trust of the Jewish people it's the bread of amuna it's the bread of trust which represents the fact that we know that everything that we see that seems to not be Hashem seems that God is not there God is there so those who hold out with their faith they receive that bread and amazingly beautifully one little piece which I didn't share with you yet from this magish the final thing that I want to say is that the says what is this wall that standing behind it's the Western Wall of the temple which you can go to today which will never be destroyed because the divine presence is in the west that means that the very place where God it seems it's not there where the the temple is destroyed the the nations of the world were able to destroy our Temple able to place their Temple Upon Our Mountain that it seems like God has given up on us no no no the the the wall itself the the Western Wall represents the fact that God never gave up the Jewish people that even where it seems there's absolute destruction God is still there even in the place where there's the greatest hiddenness God is still there standing in the same relationship with us as he always had even though it seems from our perspective that we can't see it at all that we have to really strain our ears to even hear that that's happening I want to bless you and please bless me back Hashem should help us to absorb this idea to recognize that is there through it all that he's standing there his relationship with us is always constant that the and the lack is only in our perception should help us to have a full perception and to trust and to live in faith even when the perception is not as clear hasm should help us to recognize that looking at the Western Wall Hashem should give us the ability to see the Final Redemption to meet that final Redeemer to stand by him even when it seems that he has to be hidden and and to remain with that faith knowing that Hashem always was and always will be standing behind that wall and soon standing right in front of our very eyes showing us his relationship with him thank you so much for listening have a wonderful shabus this podcast was made possible through the gracious donations of listeners like you for more podcasts like this please visit www.wag.com or search on iTunes Ari goldwag