Tomer Devorah with Rabbi Avigdor Miller's Commentary 9 Chapter 4 Lish'erit Nahalato For the Re

Shalom. We are learning Tom Devor. Last time we started a new character trait of Hashem, the aspect of mercy called for the remnants of his inheritance. And we said that the Jewish people are considered Hashem's close relatives. And as such, we are treated differently. Although Hashem loves the entire world and takes care of the entire world, nevertheless, just like we would treat our relatives differently, so too, Hashem treats us with more care, more love, more patience. And we said that similarly we need to treat others the same way. Every Jew we meet we have to say he is my close relative. He is my family at least my cousin. This attitude requires work. But if Hashem has shown us such an example, it's for the purpose that we should emulate him. We should work hard to acquire the attitude that every Jew is our flesh and blood brother. And now Rabbi Card continues, "And it is written, Hashem was greatly distressed by the affliction of Israel. He is distressed, so to speak, because God cannot tolerate their distress and their shame that they were receiving from the Gentiles because they are his relatives. And now Rabbd Miller explains if a person's relative is put to shame the entire family is embarrassed. Likewise when somebody insults a Jew, he insults Hashem and Hashem feels the shame. There's a a commandment that when um a Jew commits a capital crime and deserves death penalty under some some circumstances after the court kills him, they have to hang him. Um, and the Torah tells us that when you hang him, make sure he doesn't hang past sunset. And for sure, he doesn't remain hanging overnight or multiple days, God forbid. And therefore, the court would hang him a few moments before sunset. And then at sunset they would take him down. He would only be hanging for a few seconds. Why? Because it says in theori because it's a curse. It's an embarrassment for God when a human being is hanging. Why? Because a human being was created in the image of Hashem. As Peravot says, a human being is precious. Any human being. Why? Because every human being, even the Gentile, was created in the image of God. And then the Perke says, "Jewish people were shown even more love by Hashem because they received the Torah, because they were chosen, they received a special higher soul." And uh the example that we we see in the Torah that even a criminal, even someone who murdered someone, someone who desecrated Shabbat, someone who served idols and was killed, Hashem loves him, and he still made an image of Hashem. And when such a person needs to be punished, it's it's um an embarrassment for Hashem. So certainly when a Jew who is a otherwise a good Jew is suffering, Hashem feels their pain, distress and shame. If a person's relative is put to shame, the entire family is embarrassed. Likewise, when somebody insults a Jew, he insults Hashem. and Hashem feels the shame. This is what is meant by the verse. I shall bless those who bless you and those who curse you I shall curse. Why should Hashem bless someone who blessed a Jew? Because Hashem feels that when a Jew is blessed, God is blessed. When a Jew is cursed, God is cursed. And just like we, if someone would curse us, we would be unhappy and we would tell the person that what he's doing is wrong. So to Hashem, when someone curses a Jew, Hashem takes up the fight of the Jew and Hashem curses that man. This applies not only when a non-Jew blesses a Jew, but also when Jews bless each other. When we bless other Jews, we will be blessed by God himself. The opposite is also true because making light of a Jew is like despising Hashem directly. The Torah says that enemies of the Jewish people are enemies of Hashem as well. We have to realize that these verses are teaching us the lesson that every Jew is a close flesh and blood relative of God. And we should also act toward one each other one another with the same love we would display to our own brothers. Same patience going beyond the letter of the law and the same forgiving that we would give to our close relative. Of course some people are not so well behaved even with their own brothers. However, Hashem has given us a model and by following this model, we fulfill the mitzvah of walking in his ways. The author is going to explain how to apply this concept in practice. We should know that these lessons are not intended merely to be read. Just by reading them, you will not succeed in understanding them. In order for these concepts to become part of your awareness, you need to feel the truth of these statements. And this can only be accomplished by repeating them to yourself over and over again. It's important to write these lessons down. Remind yourself, focus on them, think about them for a minute, for two minutes. Think about how I will love my fellow man, my spouse, my siblings, my neighbors, my friends, co-workers, my fellow uh synagogue attendees, how I will look at everyone with a good eye and how I will feel that that man is my relative. He is like my brother. And for ladies, that lady is like my sister. Hashem loves us like his children. He is our father. He loves you more than your mother does. There is nobody in the world who loves you with such an intense love. If your father and mother love you, you're lucky. But it's only because Hashem caused them to feel a fraction of what he himself feels. God feels tremendous love for his children. And he says, I want them to feel that love. So, I'm going to put people in their life who are going to show them that love on a small level. I'm I'm going to give them parents. I'm going to give them siblings. I'm going to give them people that like them, that are friendly. And every time someone smiles at us, we have to feel that God is smiling at us. He just sent this person as a messenger to show me love. Hashem's inheritance and his estate includes all of space in the universe with millions of huge worlds and this and on this earth there are many nations. Yet, Hashem is interested only in the Jewish nation. Who? He is Hashem, our God. Even though his judgments are in all of the world, yes, Hashem's power and his control extends to the furthest points in the universe, billions of light years away from us. And Hashem is still there. And he controls every atom and every being in the universe. Everything that happens in the universe happens only because of us, the Jewish people. Whatever Hashem does in the world, he he does it as our God, the God of Israel. whatever happens in a far away galaxy or whatever happens in a neighboring country and even whatever happens in a uh Chinatown or in uh uh Brownsville or East New York where wherever it is, it's happening because of the Jewish people. The ver this verse is the key to understanding all of history. If you want to know why Russian history went that way and why French history went that way and whatever other countries in the world, why did their history go that way? It's only because it had something to do with the Jewish people. Because in God's mind, nothing else is important. nothing else exists because Jewish people are the ones that are fulfilling the purpose of creation. The purpose is that Hashem should have a relationship with another being. And Jewish people are the only nation that stood up to this task and said, "Hashem, we would like to have a relationship with you." And Hashem said, "Thank you very much. I am choosing you as my nation, as my children, as my spouse. Any non-Jew who would like to join the ranks of God's children can do that. This is the second most important principle of the holy scripture. Scriptures following the first principle. What's the first principle? In the beginning, God created. First, we have to know that there is God and that he created the world. The second thing we need to know is that he wants a relationship and only those who answered his call will have a relationship with him. In the beginning, God created. This is a tremendous concept and you'll have to do a lot of work to feel the reality of it. But you can't escape it. The Torah discusses it everywhere. Hashem spoke to Moshe again and again saying, "Speak to the children of Israel." Did he speak to any other nation? No. As it says in the [clears throat] parasan, the book of you can inquire from one end of the universe to another end of the universe. Did God appear to any other nation in the world? And the answer is no. God appeared only once in history and only to one nation at Mount Si. He appeared only to the Jewish people. He spoke to us and that was the last time that any multitude of people saw God. Individuals had prophetic gifts that they were able to communicate with God. But on a national level, that was the first and last time. We must think about this very frequently. My ancestors stood on by Mount Si and they spoke to God. They saw God and they said it to their children and their grandchildren. And my greatgrandparents said it to my grandparents and to my parents and to me. We come from a a royal lineage. Above us there's no royalty, only God. The highest class of people are those who are God's relatives. We must think about this very frequently. It takes a long time before it sinks in and becomes part of our personalities before we begin to look at every religious Jew as our family. Why are they our family? So we have to remind ourselves that we all come from Abraham. We all come from it. We all come from Yakov. We were all in Egypt. We all came out. We all stood by Mount Si. And we all survived the entire Jewish history, all the persecutions, all the pagans, the Holocausts. And those that are living today and still recognize God and are still committed and communicate with God are really special. We are the survivors. the remnants, the remainder of our ancestors, of our grandfathers and grandmothers. Of course, other Jews are our relatives in a spiritual sense, but to Hashem, that's more real than any physical relationship we may have. And we have to think about it genetically. We might not have too much in common with Jews living far away. However, spiritually we are all one. Not only related, but we are actually one, part of the same body. Just like the cells in the same body. There are trillions and trillions of cells in the body. But all the cells in the body, all trillions of them have the same DNA. Each cell is in a different place in the body, does a different function in the body, is part of a different system of the body, but nevertheless, they all share the same DNA. You might look at a skin cell and a a brain cell and a muscle cell and various organ cells. They will all look different, different sizes, different shapes, different colors, [snorts] different functions, and they you might say they're completely different. They come from different organisms. But when you look inside at the code the the the nishama the soul of each cell you will find that it's exactly the same. So too the nishama of every Jew is connected to the soul of every other Jew. We all form one unit, one spiritual body. >> [clears throat] >> Now the author says if it's the case that Hashem considers all of AmI as his close relatives then [snorts] Rabbi Cord continues that is how a person should behave toward his fellow Jew that he is your relative. All Jews are actually flesh and blood with each other because all of their nish shamote are included together. Rabbi Miller comments, "The author is telling us something that is spiritually true, but we should realize it's true in the physical sense as well. Even though genetics wasn't understood in the author's time, we all descended from the same ancestors. So we have certain genes that we inherited from them. [snorts] Many times even cousins look alike because they are descendants of the same people. So it is true that if you analyze all Jews who came from Araken Yakov, there will be some commonality among their genes as well. For example, they checked out kohanim and they found that indeed there is a gene that is present in all kohanim doesn't doesn't mean that a certain person is a kohhan because sometimes kohanim may become disqualified and they can turn into a um a kalal or even worse a mam physically their genes will still show that they're kohanim but spiritually they're not kohanim anymore. So we cannot use genetics to prove that someone is a kohhan or not. But uh we can show that he is related to Kohanim that there's a possibility that he is descendant all the way from Aaron Kohhan but at some point he may have lost his uh kahuna and uh even though it may be harder to see commonality between all other Jews, nevertheless if we had the tools tools necessary we would be able to find out that all the Jewish people are related physically as well but that doesn't matter phys physical connection is not important what's important is that we are part of the same nation that committed itself to have a relationship with Hashem and our relationship with Hashem unites us each person has a portion in the other. That's a new statement that Rabbi Cardo Cordova introduces and Rab Miller explains. We all have a certain share of each other's character. Each other's nam for example each person has within him many characteristics and one or more of those characteristics are shared by the next person. This is further explained in a book by um one of the lubes in his book. He writes that every Jew has a part of every other Jew in him. and every other Jew has a part of me in them. And he says that when it says love your fellow like yourself, it's because your fellow has a part of you. And you cannot love yourself unless you love another Jew, unless you love every Jew. Because if you hate even one Jew, that means you hate that part of you that's in him. That means you don't recognize part of you that's in him. If you recognize yourself in him, you would be able to find something good in him and you would be able to love him. And we can see it on a physical level as well as I already mentioned that all the cells of the body have the same DNA. They look different but they are all the same on the inside. So to every Jew, our spiritual DNA is the same as every other Jews. And that means on a spiritual level we are exactly the same. We are one. [snorts] Therefore there is a difference when a great number of people do a mitzvah. And this is because they are all included in one generalization. And Rabil explains, if a person does a mitzvah, he does it only with the partial abilities that he has with that part of his spiritual essence. But the mitzvah is not complete because not all the Jewish people are doing it. That is why we have a responsibility to help other Jews to learn about Judaism, learn about Torah, learn about God. Why? Because as long as there is a Jew in the world who doesn't have a connection with God, that means the connection with God is not complete. Even my connection with God is not complete. The entire earth suffers because the flow of good, the flow of bounty is not clear. There are some uh blockages in it. Why? Because some people did not establish a connection and therefore we all suffer from it. And therefore part of our soul is missing the connection with God. If a if one person does a mitzvah, he does it only with the partial abilities he has. But when many people, each of whom have different abilities, are unified in a mitzvah, each one contributes his spirit. A mitzvah done by a multitude is more perfect. It's like if many engineers get together to design a certain project, each one contributes his unique talents. Likewise, when people get together to do a mitzvah, such such as prayer with a miny or communal Torah learning or raising money together for some good purpose, everyone can contributes his unique spiritual component. And the Mishna in Pavot says [snorts] that when 10 Jews get together, there is divine presence among them. But even when five Jews are learning together, there is divine presence among them. And even when there are only three Jews, together there is divine presence. And even when there are two Jews, there is divine presence. And even one Jew who is sitting and learning Torah and connecting with God, there's divine presence. But the more Jewish people you have, the greater holiness surrounds them, the greater uh presence of God is felt. So we make a a minimum a number of Jews to create a minion and that is number 10. The greater the minion, the more Jews participate in that particular prayer, the greater that prayer becomes. Everything being equal, you should join more people that are doing mitzvah because the uh impact is going to be greater. Their collective efforts [snorts] are a synthesis of many different individual characteristics together. This creates a completeness and perfection in the effort. And therefore we have to practice look at every Jew and say can I love him? And if I already love him that's great. But if my first reaction is why did he come over here? Why is he sitting like that? Why is he not looking at me? Then we have to remind ourselves he is my relative. Not only that, let me imagine that he is my brother. And let me imagine even further that he is my son and I love him and I wish the best upon him because he is my son. Just like God looks at the Jewish people say and says they are all my children. So too we should look at all the Jewish people and say they are all my children. We will continue next time. In the meantime have a great day.