Devarim - The Strange Centrality of Leadership

[Music] for what was one of the greatest speeches in all of human history exactly 37 days before his death Misha got up to address the Jewish people camped right on the border of erell the Jews were as close they had ever been to finally entering the land they had waited 40 years for Misha in his final opportunity to teach and Inspire the nation he so masterfully nurtured the last four decades he gathered them all together cleared his throat and addressed the entire people the people leaned in eager to hear what his parting words would be now what's strange is what mha chose to talk about first the very first thing he spoke about was seemingly only applicable to less than 1% of the population discussing laws regarding judges and leaders being fair and honest leaders wise and Discerning should lead you with impartiality and righteousness mosha beckoned us now granted proper leadership is an important topic but is it more important than I don't know reminding us of the dangers of assimilating into the Canan culture is it more important than the reminder to focus on spiritual Pursuits like building aam mikos or to prevent the material aspect of the land from taking dominance is it more important then reminding us not to forget about Hashem as we settle into the land why was the reiteration of the importance of balanced and fair leadership and judgment the absolute first thing that mha imparted in his farewell speech we we find a similar occurrence in the beginning of peris peras the authoritative guide book to the morals and ideals of a Tyra life does not begin with Concepts Like Loving Hashem or kindness or the importance of prayer topics you would think it would begin with the the very first thing it begins with is the importance of judges to be patient while adjudicating judgment the very first mission in all the P us begins it calls for leaders to think through their decisions before making them why is that of all things what the official book of our morals and ideals begins with aren't there other ideas that would seem far more foundational let's take a step back for a second ever wonder why the Jewish people often refer to their leaders by the books they wrote and not by their actual names if you were to go visit the G rabba back in the day rabuda AR alter one would have told the wagon driver to take him to the house of the SAS Ems for that's what he was called he wouldn't know what you were talking about if you asked him where's Reb Yehuda AR alter or when we talk about Reb abam yesaya kellet or rur we call them the Ander we say stories about the yosua and the AUD we read about the passion of the and the isn't that a little strange why don't we refer to them by their real names no other group in society does this we don't refer to Leo Tolstoy as War and Peace if you would meet JK Rowling on the street you wouldn't run home and tell your friends that you saw Mrs Harry Potter so why do we do that with our leaders I was once giving a class to a group of college kids in Highland Park and I asked them the following question if you were to walk into a bar and see your chemistry teacher completely drunk and engaged in a fist fight with someone would you have any less respect for the material he teaches you the next day in class they all said no so then I asked him if they were to walk into that same bar and see their Rabbi drunk and engaged in a fist fight would they respect the rabbis toyra class less they all answered yes what's the difference between the two scenarios the answer is that toyra is like any other is unlike any other sub in the world T is transformative knowledge it is knowledge and wisdom that is supposed to transform and uplift its Learners and teachers even parts of T that are Technical and procedural and seemingly Unholy like the laws of farming or the makeup of a cow esophagus have spiritual Sparks embedded in them which should Elevate the learner to moral and ethical Heights so it stands to reason that a teacher of Tyra that did not become elevated by what he is teaching is likely an unqualified teacher the Tyra's intrinsic Holiness buried deep within it is supposed to utterly transform and Elevate those that allow their souls to tap into it hence therefore our Tyra leaders who have devoted their entire lives to the holy books of tah they authored have become elevated by the very books they wrote its transformative knowledge it transformed them therefore the very name of their book becomes Anonymous with the name of the author for it is to some degree the name of their soul it is who he is it is who he became so a Jewish leader does far more than merely ensure that the general populace maintains peace and that no riots break out a Jewish Tyra leader elevates the entire Jewish Nation by elevating himself he creates new definitions of normal we look to our leaders as our connected to hashem's toyra and ideals if they are not balanced and righteous they do not they not only render the Torah into a mere subject they threaten to derail the entire Jewish people they guide us and they prod us and they show us the right way of life if they don't live a life of fairness and humility then how can we when mosha looked at the Jews poised and ready to enter the land he knew all too well that if the leaders they would follow would be morally corrupt and Unholy the very Bedrock of the nation would crumble in order for the nation to flourish spiritually to throw first and foremost the most important thing was for the judges the leaders the teachers to be kind and patient and balanced and fair no matter how concret how concretized a society seems if the leaders at top are hoty dishonest and corrupt that Society will crumble a clear example of this is ancient Rome ancient Rome was far more sophisticated than virtually any society that preceded it and way more sophisticated than almost any society that came after it for close to A Thousand Years years they had a formal government with a congress they had elections they had complex aqueducts and running water and sewer systems they had an army that conquered virtually the entire Known World so what went wrong how did such a thing disintegrate what caused the ruin of Rome the answer is good old-fashioned greed when di oian died in 286 CE a fragmenting fight broke out amongst his two successors maximinus and Flavia seus and before long the lack of peace drove the Roman Empire perhaps the most complex and accomplished World Empire in all of human history to its end if there's corruption and haughtiness at the top there is little hope for the bottom that being said there is still a puzzling point if mha was calling attention to the importance of quality leadership why did he address the entire Jewish people as a whole why not just address the leaders and future leaders gather all the leaders into a conference center serve a little coffee and give give this talk to them why give it to the whole people perhaps the answer is that there is no one in the Jewish people who is not at at least on a small level a leader some people lead cities some people lead communities some people lead schools but other lead Sisterhood some people lead organizations and others lead households whether we're a high ranking position or not we lead we lead our own personal lives and leading AAL lifestyle is completely incompatible with hardiness selfishness and right unrighteousness leadership of any level requires humility and compassion and a heaping dose of selflessness the moment we stepped foot into ER Israel we experienced a transformation from being sheep in hashem's flock to Leading leaders fighting battles leaders building cities leaders founding diverse communities leaders building families in his speech mha pleaded with us to lead with balance and integrity to be exemplary to recognize that our congregants our students our children look up to us if we are selfish and dishonest what hope is there for them each and every one of us is tasked with leading our precious children and implanting in them the Tyra and what it stands for the very first commandment in the T Peru Ru be fruitful and multiply is not merely a Mitzvah to have children and then drop them off somewhere and hope they make it in life there are two distinct Commandments Peru and Ru the word Peru comes from the word pre or fruit just like fruit are abundant and plentiful so we're charged with being abundant and plentiful but then there's also rev which means to increase R explains we are commanded to multiply our child to expand him to inject his life with meaning and spirit we are charged and commanded with raising him in the literal sense of the word from a life of mundane to a life of sanctity if we are immoral and hoty we are unqualified leaders of Our Own children we are missing out on Ru so Misha began his speech by charging us to be humble and balanced and patient the entire pavos begins with the need for our leaders to be patient for if we fail at the top we fail at the bottom one need not look very far to find individuals who led the world be it politically or culturally who Pro to be some of the lowest humans on Earth some of the world's most famous philosophers and novelists and essayists and thinkers and writers and kings and Emperors scraped The Bottom Of Human Society even religious institutions like the church and mosques were plagued for Centuries with abuse corruption and even outright moral Decay the most popular people on Earth by far the rock stars the actors the sports players who billions upon billions of people idolize and look up to are often extremely subpar humans at best and often outright disgusting people at worst they are caught up in horrific scandals they bounce in and out of jail these are the decadent individuals who Adorn the posters on the walls of kids around the world we on the other hand the Jewish people are lucky to look up to leaders who have morals and values leaders that virtually never think self selfishly leaders that almost never put themselves first our children put up posters and pictures on their walls of people who are balanced and kind who encourage us to be caring and honest and humble and righteous mosha was not picked to lead the Jewish people because of his Charisma and flare he had a speech impediment it hindered every word he uttered he was picked because he was a kind Shepherd he was picked because he was labeled by Hashem to be the humblest man on the face of the Earth yua was not picked to lead the Jewish people because of his good looks or his orary skills the Z has it says yosua was picked because he got up early to set up the benches of the room in which mha gave his Tyra classes it was his humility and his care that propelled him to the role of leadership the entire halik world follows the opinion of B over bami why is that not because they were smarter not because they displayed more intellectual prowess we follow their lead because according to the gar and Iran gim they were Kinder and more patient than their counterpart s the entire ashkanazi Tyra World follows theic leadership of a 16th Century Polish scholar from the city of krao named Vera Isis the Rama why is that he realized that Jewish law was way too vast for the typical person to learn in its entirety so he began writing a book organizing and condensing it unbeknownst to him at the exact same time a Spanish scholar living in SAS named rsf Caro the Bas ysep was working on a similar book and instead of publishing his own safer and competing as would have been the case in almost any other arena in society with no compunctions the rad decided to allow the B YF to publish his book and condensed his own safer to Mere annotations of the BS he displayed immense humility by giving up publishing his own safer and accordingly the name he chose to call his annotations summed up his tremendous me the best while r car's book was called the the set tablea is is called his annotations the mappa the tablecloth our leaders are the ones who give us Direction in our lives nurturing us encouraging us we look up to them from our youth as the ultimate role models in life and we should be proud to claim such tremendous people as our leaders my family had a neighbor in Rochester named Gordon Letterman he tragically died young of cancer he was a brilliant fellow and he excelled in his studies and eventually got into Harvard University he was one of the only Orthodox Jews on campus and he knew he was different but he didn't bother he was proud of it now Harvard has a custom that every freshman delivers a short speech at the beginning of the year about an individual who inspires them with the room filled to capacity each freshman got up and talked about a figure they look up to one student talked about how he idolized John F Kennedy another talked about Michael Jordan and after the crowd heard all about Bill Gates and Walt Disney and Martin Luther King Jr and Marlin Monroe and Edgar J Hoover and Fidel Castro and Henry Ford it was finally Gordon's turn he got up and he scanned the room being the only religious Jew present in a room filled with the world's future politicians and CEOs and Supreme Court judges he was acutely conscious of the attention on him as he began to speak so Gordon cleared his throat and began I would like to talk about a man who no one in this room has heard of he lived in utter poverty in a little town in Europe that no one here has ever been to and yet he led Millions upon millions of people throughout his lifetime his writings have been taught in every corner of the globe and have sold more copies than some of the world's best novelists he had some of the the smartest people on Earth clamoring to get even a few words with him his opinion was sought in virtually every area of life from the deepest most esoteric spiritual Concepts to Global political strategies he was known by millions of people throughout the world as the greatest Sage on the face of the Earth he had a steady stream of people waiting to talk to him for the duration of the day for the greater part of the over 100 Years of his life he would give as much attention to a foreign Diplomat or Governor as he would to the crying Widow who had nothing to eat he was enormously scrupulous never to speak even one word of gossip and he even started a campaign to eradicate gossip on a global scale he humbly LED millions of people in the proper path of life and led by example he was the very definition of kindness loving and caring despite having millions of people looking up to him as their leader he lived in a one room house with a dirt floor despite advising and guiding some of the wealthiest people on Earth he could almost count his worldly possessions on both hands this man was quite possibly the most selfless and humble man on the planet this man you've never heard of was referred to as the the global leader of the Jewish people and he is my inspiration with that Gordon looked at the stunned audience Frozen in silence and returned to his seat [Music]