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Chanukah - Do G-d's Will bc He wants it and not bc it makes sense - Your Torah - Statutes - Will
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in the alanisim that we began saying
last night for hanukkah
we say that the irvanim
the hellenists
um the greeks the the the the the ones
who
were our enemies at the time and desire
to
destroy
the the jewish people through destroying
the jewish torah and the mitzvos now
what does that mean
so it says in the allah al hanisim
that their desire was
to make
us forget our torah ulaviram and to make
us desecrate
the statutes
of
the will of god of your will
the question is why the language torah
your torah well of course it's god's
torah it's not your my torah it's not
your torah we didn't write it
so it should say
torah
to make us forget the torah
allah
to make us desecrate the statutes
what's the language
emphasizing its gods
three times three different words
why
so the explanation is
considered the following that
the
the ivanim
they were fine
with jews fulfilling
mitzvahs
in particular and studying torah
any part and any mitzvah that doesn't
point to
a transcendental god
a god that goes beyond nature and
supernatural
like we're learning this mime of your
dieter
a god that's within nature
which makes sense they were very much
interested in you in in associating with
any part of torah that supported that
they were very fine with people jews
learning that
but let's say the mitzvah of mila of
circumcision or the midst of shabbos why
does shabbos have to be on the seventh
day of the week why can't it be another
day the answer is because god says in in
in in the torah uh that six days i i
worked on the seventh day i rested so
you should rest too
well that's only because god said so it
makes no sense you can rest on friday
you can rest on sunday
you don't have to rest on shabbos to get
some rest and respite for a work week
so why are we resting on hashem
they said that
we're against
in other words they see they sought to
strip
the divinity
of tata
the divinity the holiness the kedusha
and the same with mitzvos mila
circumcision it makes no sense to go and
cut
a little child at eight months i mean
today you know we already give logical
arguments that it's better for their
health later so why that must be when
they're eight days old you can do it
through later
and you could do it another in other
forms
maybe which is less painful
the answer is because god says so in the
tata on the eighth day you should
circumcise a jewish child
so again this mitzvah is
is demonstrative of a bond to god
that's divine and holy
not humanistic
and that's what they were against
so that's
that's the explanation and that's the
short answer to the question
to make them forget your torah
ordinary torah that that's that's
stripped
from you
they had no problem with but you're
torah that it's holy and divine because
of you
uh
and the same for mitzvos
your statutes and your will
that's what they were against
you decide god decides that it has to be
on the day of shabbos to rest
that's the law
they're upset with that
why because because it puts them in a
very bad light in other words
they sought to turn judaism into a
humanistic culture
and this unfortunately has gone on in
different ways in the in the jewish
community
for many years
you know even
and it really is reminiscent of the of
the of the greeks of the hellenists
what it is
you know to say
that remove
um
sacrifices from the prayer book from the
schwann esri because it's not relevant
today we don't have a temple
is
analog is similar to
stripping and removing certain mitzvahs
because
it's not
sensible
there's no difference
so a person in their service of hashem
needs to know
that
my commitment to hashem
goes
way beyond logic
logic is only a stepping tool
to as we learned also in this mimer to
make our faith in god stronger
for your diet
right all that is
us
you should know god
so that you come to a place where you
have faith in god and faith isn't a god
that transcends as we've been learning
for weeks in this minor
and that's the underlying the kudu
in other words uh that's the underlying
point of hanukkah
that the the the the the greeks what did
they want
they wanted we should have a god of
knowledge be a dieter only via dieter
they don't want of a udaipha that will
lead to
which we're learning about
which really is the
which is real the real meaning in the
verse in voice khan on the odaito
the adait is not is not a means
in in of itself it's a means to an end
a very important one as we've been
learning over and over you have to have
knowledge and study and understand god
and you could
understand god and and you can and you
have to understand god and don't waste
the munna on something that could be
understood
but the flip side is the flip side of
room is
that that the that the faith
is not accessed
i'm totally into the das knowledge and
faith is not important and the same is
true with mitzvos
there are people that can
philosophize and they know a lot when it
comes to mitzvos they're very very weak
at mitzvahs they do a misra
they do it without heart and soul
they do it without excitement
when you put on till in the morning
your body should be so excited your mind
should be so excited that you like like
jumping to do the mitzvah
it doesn't mean literally you have to
jump if that's what it takes okay
but
you're like you you rush out of your bed
you rush out you get him saying you
can't sleep in the morning it's the it's
the first time after halloween we don't
put on twilight
yeah right you jump the shule to be the
first one to shoot or let's say sukis
it's it's still dark outside you're up
pre-dawn so that when when when when the
the sun rise hits you could already have
gone to the midfield if you go to the
midfield if not and you can make the
brach and the sukkah on on the mitzvah
because you're so excited about the
mitzvah
and the excitement starts from within
that that's what they wanted to
eradicate that's they wanted to
obliterate and destroy
and this is why this festival chanukah
is a foundation in judaism
you know we talk about
the uh
the war and we and we won the war we
rested on that we finished the war on
the 24th of kisly which was
um
yesterday
and today
uh the 25th the first day of hanukkah we
rested
which means to rest on
the the words
the word hanukkah is comprised of two
hebrew words hanu rest
rest on the 25th day
so you would think that okay well you
know we struggled we fought we won you
know now we have some respite
it's true that's what happened but
that's
that's also
part of a cultural war
in other words we we we fought
the clipper
of apathy
the clipper that desire to remove the
sanctity and the divinity
we fought against it
and and we won and the proof is that we
found a jug of oil
and oil represents as we've been
learning and considers
the
kudus the essential essence of every jew
the neshama the pentalaid as we say
in other words the essence
that's what oil represents that's why
oil always hovers on top as we also
spoke about
versus water which
settles
settling representing
adapting to the lifestyle and culture of
the greeks
this level of
is not just intelligence it
essence intelligence intelligence as
it's from the perspective of essence i
don't want to elaborate on that now but
that's the that's the point so therefore
hanukkah that's what we're celebrating
we're not celebrating we just won a war
big deal
you can win a war and lose you know you
can win the war and lose the
win the battle and lose the war of the
expression but meaning to say what's the
point
the point is that we defeated
this creeper
could you imagine
if we lived in a world
in our personal world in our communal
world in the global world we would where
every we wouldn't have to struggle
against this clipper
for a machine would have truly come but
b
because that's part of the
uh the goalless
mentality
the goalless mentality is
capitulate to the non-jews capitulate to
the yates of
capitulate to the greeks
when in rome do like the romans when
when in china like the chinese and when
in the new hampshire like the those
living there in new hampshire
so yeah you might go out with a yarmulke
and a beard
the question is
what is your attitude
and we need to we need to know that the
attitude has to be
of
of one of la
la
torres
to find the divinity in every godly
experience and the barometer is very
important
how do i act
what decision do i make in my life
if you look from this perspective that
you're going to this base your decisions
on divinity
versus logic
you'll have completely
different results
and this is true for finances this is
true for cheryl and bias this is true
for every aspect of a jew's
behavior in everything
so someone might say to you abraham they
what are you living in
and you say look you're right my
maybe in america i would make more money
and this and that
but
my this is what my soul my soul feels
special here and and i have to feed my
soul
someone else's what yes and someone else
might and someone else might have the
opposite feeling
where they're doing so much
you know to help jews here in in america
or outside register all and in their
stroll they feel stagnant and stale
plenty of people
the rebbe i don't know if i told you the
rebel advised rabbis who retired young
israel rabbis generally not to make
aliyah and to continue helping and
teaching even as um
uh what's it called they call them uh
you know the rabbi have to retire
emeritus rabbi emeritus in america why
because he has people to work with
the republic said you're going to go to
jerusalem you're just going to be
another one
on the block
they have so many teachers and so many
rabbis they don't need you
now if you go to tel aviv or you go to a
suburb or a mushaf and the people are
not from all they want teachers and all
that that's a different story
but if you're just going because you
retired he worked hard for 40 years and
and and but yet you know you gotta you
have to work otherwise you drive
yourself nuts
you're going to be a very unhappy man
and
the son of one of these rabbis he he
gave an interview to gem and he had
admitted my father was miserable
and the rebel
you know when he came back he came back
to america
i'm just saying
there's no right or wrong
it it's for one person
their divinity speaks to them there and
for someone else it's outside of verity
so the point being that it's the
divinity that should make the decision
not
not the logic
that's what hanukkah is about
so it's a tremendous festival
even though it's not roshanayam kippur
the sukkos pesach
and all that right it's a tremendous
it's in a way it's it's it's it's the
foundation of all
holidays to appreciate all the holidays
and to really
live those holidays you need to believe
in a divine god
otherwise
why celebrate in other words if we're
celebrating pesach just because we were
liberated and we're commemorating
passover well i did it last year you
don't have to do it every year how many
times are gonna say the same story
right
and what's the answer i'm reliving the
experience because god is
god is constant god is alive not he was
alive
because god is divine
so where is this
message of divinity hanukkah
the chanukkah festival of eight days is
all about a divine experience
and that's what we're left with and
that's what we need to think about and
talk about for these eight days how to
be more divine
all right
what do you think what what you what any
comments
i think that is the occurrence of the
whole of hanukkah is to to
connect to divineness to
to infuse your magnet not just like just
don't like candles wipe the candles with
cabana and take it forward take that
lava hunk until the rest of the year and
forward and keep that that excitement in
your voter
you know don't just uh go back to the
old thing after hunger's over
exactly
okay we had a good year 15 20 minutes of
talking learning to see this in this way
yeah my pleasure so i'll i'll send out a
whatsapp and i'll let everyone know
whether we'll have sheer from tomorrow
through uh until next week if people are
just too busy with hanukkah things which
it seems like
we're just gonna leave it
up yeah okay it's fine you and i
i i really you know i just i just don't
want to learn the mimer you know the
rest of the mimer and they would listen
you know it's a shame because we're
learning the whole thing have a great
hanukkah nice seeing you all the best
bye bye
take it take care bye bye