CHAZAQ's Torah Talks #162 HaRav Yaakov Skoczyles - Living A Life of Torah

this bra is for this thing and this bra is for that this is for this thing that I need you know it's interesting when I went to the store there was no line and I was able to get out quick and I went over here and I didn't miss the bus and I took my children here and I you know I felt good today and I went to my I went to the and I understood the learning and all the all of a sudden they come to life but a lot of times we don't think about it a lot of times we don't think about the words people just say things cuz they used to saying it but if you would just stop let's work day by day how to understand more of the of we'll connect so much more to it and then we can appreciate so much more how much is throwing on us so much and every person in his life he can recognize and he can see you know I DAV for something and it came [Music] true and welcome to T talks kak program with special guest we have with us all the way from welcome back to Queens such an honor such a privilege and we're going to be speaking about the living life of Tora and uh you get a little background about the rabbi and the great work you are involed with okay so thank hasem that we grew up in this wonderful neighborhood Queens queens has many places of Med so we were around a wonderful neighborhood that was filled with such wonderful people and such inspiration was kind like he is to everybody to guide us into making it to Isel after growing up and spending the high school years in Queens and we made it to some of the yeshivas in Isel including the M Yeshiva course over there we got to meet some of the Wonder and we got to learn intensity when I got married I I went back to Isel and on my first morning of daving shakas in I said where am I going to DAV I want to be like it says that's brought down in that a person should find himself a place to be the will be heard better in the place that is the place that he sets and I decided after getting some advice that there's one of the he was then the and I didn't know my way around but they told me that it's somewhere near Mayim and I pushed myself to find this place early in the morning while it was still dark outside and from that day to the last day that he was on this Earth we had a special catcher together because I was in the surroundings of the poor every morning day in and day out I was able to receive this tremendous drive to want to become great to try to become great we all have to try to become great and I spent a lot of time with him and I observed him like it says in the the it's greater to be than the learning itself because when you are around the you know exactly how to act you know exactly how to behave you don't have to go and think maybe the is like this or like that you see a how he behaves that's the way you know that is the to do like a true so I had the of being in his in his surroundings hasem and that gave me a new opening and learning that in order to become like the PO to try to become like a great a great I have to be o I have to be involved in learning also and to fast forward a little bit after tremendous amount of tremendous amount of help from hem we were able to continue in that path and meet many G is including his son-in-law kki that we carried also a tremendous this connection with him and other who we carry a tremendous CER with that today we also get to discuss with himot very very hard and difficult questions that come from all over the world and we get to discuss it with him and bring answers back to people all this came about with a tremendous help from Hashem but I've believe that a lot of the a lot of the the reasons why we were able to see such was because when you're around big people it gives you a push to where you to where you have to get to every Jew has to think about how he can go and raise himself up the raise the bar a little higher how he can push a little more because the more you push the more you get andem that we we got that I want to also add if I may of course for my my father you I don't you heard much about my father Dr scotus Who was a tremendous o t he he loved Torah he supported Torah he loved people used to say about him that when he would come to Earth Isel and he would come DAV in the Min together with the PO all the PE all the all the over there big they would see him and they would ask me who is this your father this is the I thought you said your father was a doctor he looks to me like a big sadik he sits there in davin's word by word inside the sitter like a like a big sadik and he was and he invested a lot of his strength and also monetarily to be able to be involved in supporting Torah learning of the Torah and spreading of the Torah he specialized in geriatrics he was a person who knew very very well the the the elderly people their body and all the medicine that they were involved in taking and the family of the elash they wanted to seek they wanted to seek his advice rash was then in his 990s and you know they were getting some advice from people but they wanted to hear something new so one time when my father came to Earth Israel and he used to get a br from RE yashiv he shook his hand after that in and re yashiv gave him a and he went on his way a few months later the same thing he came to visit re yashiv and he shook his hand and he got a he went on his way after that day of shakar the grandchildren asked my father to come upstairs and they said please we want you to go and see our grandfather and we want to hear advice from you medically so my father told him he said you know I see that your grandfather is eating much better and they said why did you say that he said well last time I was here he looked like he was malnourished he didn't look he didn't look like he was eating so well and when they asked him the dates when he was here last they they were all of a sudden very shocked they said how did you know that he wasn't that he wasn't eating he said well I shook his hand and they said so what said no you know when you're a doctor like me and you shake 200 people's hands a day in a hospital so you know how they're how they're eating and they saw right away that he had a uni unique he had a tremendous he was very soft and he was not and he was not looking you know to go and get any publication for this he was just trying to help the God lador and they asked him to come inside and since that day till the day that rash was nter he had a very close connection and was able to help the go Lor with tremendous amount of AA and advice and medical advice and also provide him with different medications that literally helped him till his final day and everyone who knew the story were always very humbled how very simple nice special doctor from Queens made his way to take care of the poor un unbelievable and uh the r didn't mention I guess Ia about the amazing farm that the r has had the school to to publish send 20 different volumes of this one speci your father uh was uh the one that asked you to put this uh together and uh when II got a copy of it like I have over here with he was me he was studying it for a half hour so that must have been a very big and Tora is this is our life and you know we have to learn it every single day and every single night it's an obligation but many people feel like when you have an obligation is a it might lose that excitement that enthusiasm what message could you give over to such an individual wellan you mentioned something that is very important every Jewish person has to think about it and make a calculation of how they can go and make more of their life and more of their time to being connected to Torah and you also had mentioned this for that also have a lot to do with this answer so I'm just going to start by mentioning something about the Forum that you mentioned over here the the that we are aware and that we know that is brought down also in Sim also there's a big in the of the that discusses the many different guidelines of to how much a person is supposed to learn and how much a person is supposed to try to know in this world and I want to First mention about the farm that that that you're showing us over here that I myself when I was trying to go and get clarity in certain suot in certain discussions that were discussed inar that were discussed in so I took the advice of what's written it's also brought down in some of this you see in the he writes over there that you know people should try to write you definitely get a Clarity when you do such a thing and one of the biggest Miracles that happened to me in my life is that when I tried writing a safer I wrote it for myself because I wanted to get a Clarity in the in the learning andem after I wrote it I thought that I was going to give a present to my parents who were so supportive of me sitting and learning the holy Torah and I tried to find a place to go and print a safer and they told me you can't just print one you have to print few hundred and I said what am I going to do with the few hundreds Farm I said I don't have a few hundred relatives maybe I should give it to a few hundred friends so I took the safer and I listened I took their advice and they printed for me a few hundred and to make a long story short K I don't know if it was I don't know why but chose that the safer was something that was it made it to the tables of many great Rabon and Kim and a lot of it came about by a person recognizing what you mentioned in the beginning is what is Our obligation how much do we have to go and push ourselves how much do we have to do for to take it to the next level so that one thing is for sure is that each person according to what he spends his time how much time he has to spend he has to think and make this calculation how much can he get from the Torah how much can he better himself in Tor so in my simple life I was able to push myself to a point where I said you know after learning this of Tora you have to go one step further and that led me to theim so in my situation thank that we were able to also beb Tora through our writings and it all came about because how we looked at this of T now I just want to say that for the hamon the world we all who we all love to listen to the words of theim and what we're supposed to be doing for Theon every person has to go and make for themselves a as much as he can I want to just share something which is unbelievable and I see it with my own eyes in Isel and I'm sure of I'm sure you see this also that sometimes it's not about for a person who doesn't have the whole day to sit and learn the Torah but he has certain amount of time that he can do every day a li some whatever Li he can do it's not about how many hours he puts in it's about how much Sim he has when he learns it's about how much enthusiasm he has when he learns now we know from experience and we've seen this and we see it all the time that when you have a family where the father he goes out even if he goes out to a sheir and DFI which is a wonderful thing if he's able to do it but if the father is very tired and he's not able to show sim and enthusiasm and the children see that you know ABA when he makes it to the shear he's crawling to the shear he's just getting there bosi he's getting there it's very hard for him but he makes it over there so it's obviously a different impression it's obviously a different influence that comes from Li on himself and also on his family for sure now I want to share with you that different is I've heard from them and also ones that I haven't been to meet said over many times that a person who calculates for himself a special time in the day and also a topic whether it's whether it's whether it's whether it's whatever it is if he sets aside the time and the children know that so he wins in two on two sides number one himself he builds himself he builds his character because he's living Al the Tor he's breathing the Torah he's living according to the way wants to see all of his children acting and number two is that the children see that this thing is important this thing is important is very important and they get a tremendous impact from the F from the father and the mother and the house is a different house we've seen many many h Homes that that they look much different when a father came and made a calculation of how structure how much time he should be able to put what should he do and then of course comes the next stage which is how much enthusiasm and Sim he has from the Tor 100% so uh very very true something we have to take upon ourselves jumping on to shabbat it's a source of all of all blessings give some some inspiration on the topic of Shabbat how to make it make it for generations for the kids so what I personally believe in my humble opinion the way to be able to answer such a question is to think of something which is number one proven it's it's it's something that we see that it happens and it works so like this there can be a constructive purpose for the people listening that they can that they can take from here example of people who try something like this and it worked and I'll explain we've seen many times I've had it in my own home when I had guests from different from all different types of backgrounds that number one this the the shulan Shabbat right we like to say many times the father and the mother are not a police they're not policemen right they're the children you know of course they should sit by the table if they can if they're able to and they're able to enjoy but it's not this is not a police station we're not coming to go and you know make sure that every person feels like thean Shabbat is a place where everyone has to sit down and buckle up and other otherwise we're not going to be able to enjoy it because we want the children to enjoy we want the CH to children to be interactive we want them to go and say over what they had learned in the schools so they can go and also give us an idea of what they know of what they're proud to know what they're proud to to learn but it's proven you've seen it many many times that when we have guests or even our own children and you bring out an idea you bring out something let's say a question a practical question many times we like to give this example because we've seen so many people who connected to it I'll just I'll just first mention something that uh I don't know if I had mentioned this to you but in the last year we had the to go and put out a question and answer weekly and what this what this question and answer weekly is which is really related to the shulan Shabbat is something that we try to take three of the most interesting questions in and we write it down in English and we send it out and we put it out in the shoes to many people all over the world recently we heard that people have been telling us that the Shan Shabbat is different and I asked them why he said because you know you bring their questions and these questions are practical questions but are interesting not always is it something which is straightforward and brought down in the sh and all of a sudden I hear such a question and I have I say you know what I want to say my opinion and a person wants to go use their opinion and say wait you know maybe the should be like this right away they're engaging themselves they become a part of it and becoming a part of it and they're being engaged in the topic of a Torah topic something which you know they could have been talking about you know Shalom maybe politics or something else and instead they said no you know let's go and be madesh and they're talking Tor talking Tor Tor talks and you come and you say over a question which can have usually like every sh has two sides to it and each person says their opinion and then it carries with them through the whole week it carries with them till next week and they say you know what I also want to discuss on shab is something which is interesting something which is also a place that can give a person his his room for saying his opinion what he feels about it and especially if if the person if he says that's the right answer he says wow I just you know was I was intended now to a T and he and he appreciates it and he lives with it and the Sim that one gets when they go in when they involve their guests their children into this discussion this Torah talks is a totally different shabat table it makes Shabbat great and every time I should know I had times where I had people who came from secular backgrounds and they were guested by me Israel and they said what are we going to talk about some people don't know you know some of the basics some people don't know you talk to them about a question basic question somebody rented a apartment in the summer or he rented a car in the air condition didn't work and you know he decided that okay how can I rent this house I want to give it back but he had no way of renting another car or another apartment so he just lived with it so the question was whether or not such a person is is able to say Hey listen if you really didn't like it so you would have complained right away but the fact that you didn't say anything and you drove in the Heat or you slept in the heat means that you're able to live with it so I don't know if I have to refund you and you know speak you speak about a practical question to any person from any background regardless of how much they know all of a sudden they're involved and sometimes you can carry on for an hour and people are fighting and the arguing back and forth it should be the should be like this and you have a person from any background is getting involved and all of a sudden he has a tremendous 100% and the children girls get involved with these type of questions and say their opinions I think is very very important so we're talking about the living a life of Torah we discussed Torah we discussed Shabbat major part of living a Torah life is is prayer and we you know do the same more or less every single day for three three times a day someone might feel it's robotic you know saying the same thing what what inspiration can the give over I want to try to tie in and what I think could be and inspiration um we'll try to connect some of the questions that you mentioned before which is has a similar answer to the to the question you're asking about one of the one one of the important things that I think we forgot to mention this is that we mentioned the word sim a few times with happiness very we have to serve AEM and hm wants to see everybody happy he wants to see his children happy especially when they're doing their aod when they're getting close to him through through Torah he just wants to see people happy and we know kazal teach us that a person reach achieves happiness when he knows the Torah that he's learning if a person would just read words in a in a but he doesn't know what the words mean how could he be happy he doesn't know we totally forgot to mention this in the background how can we not mention about the's amazing the that the has Ines and and the fact that they don't just sit and learn but they have a they have an enjoyment from the learning so very important if you want we will mention that also yes we'll mention that also okay so when you learn when you when you're learning so you can if you read the text so you covered a lot of you covered a lot of ground but it's hard to say that a person is going to find SIM from what he's learning because he asked him what did you learn today I don't I read a lot of words which I don't know because I didn't I didn't even pay attention I only looked in the Middle where the was or if you ask him which para did you learn he didn't look at the heading because he was just wanted to read the words to get to say he went through the par which is nice but you know what if a person is trying to achieve the ultimate goal the Tor which is learned is a different life it's a different life and I'm going to get to in a minute you mentioned about the col that we have that after we spoke already about my tremendous father Dr scotus so the codal five years ago was opened up in his memory and we started the and we said we're going to open a CL needs Rim needs poim they need people to go and address their questions and to be able to help them and we opened this Co in his memory and the main idea of the K which is my which is my purpose and I try and I dive into Hashem every day that I should fulfill this is to be able to take people who learn in this K and show them that through their learning not only are they going to become big but they're going to be so happy that they're going to want to just go from year to year from subject to subject and just conquer as much Tor as they can and be the greatest people they can makes a person happy right that's why we're going to have that's why you know people can't learn Tor because the that it brings that's for sure but what type of Torah we live in a very practical world right we have to speak practically not every time a person goes and connects himself to Torah even by reading does he feel that Sim so for example in our I took some of the wonderful that already had been learning for many years and they told me that they wanted to go and find a in that will bring them a tremendous amount of that not every year they will look for a new to learn other topics and I told him I said the way to do it is you have to understand what you're learning and you have to review what you're learning so you don't lose it because if you lose it if you don't if you lose what you're learning then you're going to say oh you know I invested so much time and I didn't remember and we know thear works very hard the works very hard and he wins and we we have to keep fighting and the way to keep fighting is to keep going andem we have today after 4 and a half years a very special Mak that is building poim and raim all over the world and it all came about from the fact that we instill in the guys that the more you understand and review and you you make that kinan you acquire that Li mood you're going to be much happier because that's what kazal promised us that when you go and you learn and you keep on learning and push yourself to understand more and more you're going to become a much bigger and you when you remember your your Li and people ask you new Rabbi so what's the what's the answer to this question and right away you tell them the answer you feel happy and when you feel happy you say you know what this is great I want to learn more it's a very practical way of get of approaching so we are able to say that is blessing us that it's working wonderfully and we we use that method we use that M of the of themselves go and teach us this that you have to go and understand what you learning and you're going to have happiness from that so let me just back up for a second you asked this wonderful question about and Torah also of course now is the same thing if a person takes a sitter that it should have translation he should have a translation if he doesn't understand the words and learn of the words that he says and understand what he's saying then he's then he's going to appreciate so much more when he realizes the showers upon Him showers upon us every day we don't always pay attention we don't realize the Divine Providence that is going on every single day and a lot of times it comes from a person who gave a heartfelt F especially if you understood the words he said he will connect so much more to it he will understand that this bra is for this thing and this bra is for that this is for this thing that I need and all of a sudden when he looks back at night and he said looks at his day and he says you know it's interesting when I went to the store there was no line and I was able to get out quick and I went over here and I didn't miss the bus and I took my children here and I you know I felt good today and I went to my I went to the sh and I understood the learning and all the all of a sudden they come to life but a lot of times we don't think about it a lot of times we don't think about the words we don't think about the we don't appreciate what we're saying and like like you mentioned that people just say things because they used to saying it but if you would just stop the same thing like with learning and say you know what let's make a system over here let's work day by day how to understand more of the of we'll connect so much more to it and then we can appreciate so much more how much is throwing on us so much and every person in his life he can recognize and he can see you know I ding for something and it came true I ding for something I don't want to I don't know if if I'm allowed to share a personal story of course but I myself you meant we spoke a little bit about the background yeah I will just say quickly something which is unbelievable from the many many does for every person and myself included I once had a special story with when I was a Yesa B I went on a trip to go and find one of theim of our old ancestors who perished in the Holocaust no one had found this C and since he was buried and I said you know what I'm going to go on this trip with a group of people that go to Europe you know they have wonderful trips I think Rabbi cron has trips many many wonderful trips that people go to see the terrible tragedies that happened to cloud is and to ourselves in and realize everything is from hem and I went on a search in a in a B farot for my my grand my great-grandfather who I'm named after yov who I shared the same name and my grandmother she living be well she asked me can you go and try your hardest because until now nobody found it I'll just tell you quickly I was working very much in those days beat on this what we're talking about now I'm understanding and connecting to through our daving through our through our learning but especially through our and I really felt that the more I understood the I feel like is in the room is right here he's listening I went to this bet where they told me you're probably not going to find it there was a few I don't even know maybe tens of thousands of in this bet in Lodge and I went over there searching in the snow there was Thorn bushes there was Moss that was on all the all all theim it was so hard to read the words it was almost impossible to find this somebody who was there a who lived in Lodge then he guided me he said you know what I think it's in this section but there's like 10,000 farum over here you'll try to find it over there and I had limited time because I had a driver who took me from place to place in in Poland I went over there and I went back and forth and the whole time I was ding to I was saying to and I was connecting to to the words that I was saying through my and I asked I said I've been doing this for 4 minutes I said I I said a heartfilla I said please I don't want it to come empty-handed and I said with kavana certain and I felt that I was so so so close to hem because I was talking to hm and I understood the words that I was saying and I was about to leave because it was already 45 minutes and time came up and all of a sudden I took my next step and then my shoe fell off a bush was connected to my shoe and it took and it and it yanked off my shoe I put my foot on the snow and all of a sudden I'm feeling the snow where's my shoe hasem made it that the storm Bush took my shoe and it yanked it behind me didn't fall over here and I had to make a 180 I turned around and I see that that was the cover and I told myself at that point I said you know what unbelievable I said heard a from a from a from a person who was working on trying to understand the words of of course with a a broken heart and I saw that hasem right away said here we take care of you sometimes isal himself right away through sometimes it fills in there's a tremendous amount ofar but we were able to see right away a tremendous connection through ding through understanding and appreciating the of through that story what a powerful story wow wow wow unbelievable F boom on the spot enjoying every single moment uh Rabbi scotus we have a minaga custom of a final message for our abroad audience right um I mentioned about the idea of sim how important it is today and one of the things that we speak about besides Sim is also for all Jews around the world every person we all struggle with something thing I think that we have to build our confidence right confidence is a very important thing when a person feels confident about what he does he goes and does a lot dis SK the limitan is a tremendous you have you have tremendous confidence and look what you built over here kak it keeps on it keeps on growing growing and it comes from a tremendous amount of confidence that you have and that every person is searching for how do we get to that confidence so the same that we mentioned before the same idea that finding ways practical ways in life to be able to understand better our a to understand better the liur Tora that we have every day whatever we could do to understand better the then all of a sudden we start to become happier like I mentioned because you get that special understanding of the of the limit that you invested your time into and you feel connected to it and once all of a sudden you say you know I know something automatically you become more confident you don't feel that nobody should speak to me about any topics of Torah or engage in any conversation of Torah the more we connect ourselves and the more we invest time and K into our families and trying to instill that mid that special of what I think that is is be called confidence that when a person has this special confidence he's able to push himself and do a lot lot more if we practically work on trying to do things that make sense you know a little bit every day understanding more what we learn having a special time to learn Torah understanding our we automatically become happy when you become happy you become much more confident I'll tell you something very interesting I want to end off with this if you you let There was the yid in who was the talmid from R and he learned in the Yesa of P the greata very famous Isa after a year of being in the K in ponich he told ofak that he really had to be do for par and he had to go and make his way to find himself some business so said okay no problem but do me a favor every day I want you to take a safer that's called was written on the in the order ofan and he said every day try to spend five 10 minutes learning that he said what why because you learn a little bit about the M the mishna thear he brings there a summary of the door of the and and afterwards you see also he mentions then almost 150 years ago practical things that came up like this you'll have a connection to some type of and he did this for a while I bumped into a big Grove in is a big Grove of a big and he told me he said you know I'll tell you something so interesting a story about a balabas who connected himself to Torah every every year when he would say his she his of shabas aod and shabas Chua before PES and before ker this babus would come either to sell the or to say sh and he would ask him new what are you discussing this year and he would talk to him about this very in indepth sugya and every time he would ask him this or what about this and what about that and a few times you know he said today you own a big Factory I can ask you why do you sound like a big goor what happened he says you know he was embarrassed to say there of but he I don't really see you around the bid I don't even see you in the D here what's going on over here so he told him this story he said my Rosa told me that I have to do something kava something which I think is practical and that's what I'm going to do and he said you know for the last 30 some years I am it takes me a few years but I get through this whole safer and I get the whole set and I get to the whole set and this is what I know this is the Torah that I know and the person knew so much because of a little bit that he did every day with understanding and with that he was able to converse with the r of a of thousands of which is unbelievable thing so I I I Davin together with you that all the listeners all the wonderful ofak we should all be to have this special of from hem amen that hem will open our eyes and allow us to understand the Torah and make those that we will learn the Torah and we will connect to the Torah all for the ultimate goal of having tremendous tremendous confidence to be able to push ourselves more and more that we can get to the next level come and bring us the amen amen what powerful words of of inspiration everyone every single Tuesday night 8:30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time kak T talks with special guys with an amazing Tor talk we just had with RAB scotus I personally got inspired very very much I'm sure all the listeners as well will get inspired complete Redemption special thanks to our friend at T anytime with all the different podcast players and platforms and to daily giving as well and T and the entire team over here at Kakak beautiful very nice amazing [Music]