Hillel Eisenberg - Pre Selichos Pep Talk With Zusha- At Yeshivat Noam

Thank you very much for that. Nothing like following, you know, an exciting dance concert with words of inspiration. Yeah. Anyway, my name is Hill Eisburg. It's an honor. It's as close to be here. I have the great distinction of being the nephew of Rabbi Haggler. And despite being the nephew of Rabbi Haggler for several decades at this point, I have never been here. It's surprising, I know, because I know all the politics and all the inner workings and maybe even more than some of you, but I never bear. So, it's great. It's a It's an honor. It's also to be standing next to a fine band who not only makes some of the finest Jewish music out there, but inspires Jews from around the world. In fact, 3 weeks ago, I was in Vietnam in a very remote location of Vietnam, and I saw some Israeli backpackers and they were blasting Zusha. So, you never know where your inspiration and your music can go. Pretty cool. Pretty cool. I want to share with you an idea in hopefully 10 minutes. Yeah. We are about to embark on a uniquely Jewish thing. Partake in something that is uniquely Jewish. I do not mean eat large amounts of food at ridiculous hours of the day and night, which is also uniquely Jewish. We've cornered the market for for like 3,000 years. I am talking about repentance. Chuva and repentance is a uniquely Jewish phenomenon. No religion in the history of the world has had a chuva repentance process that is as rigorous, as detail- oriented, as spiritually multi-dimensional than the Jewish people's chuva process. Some religions have days where they confess or New Year's resolution. No, no, we don't have days. We have weeks at a time where we have and we have and we have and then we have and then you have all the way until it's a never it's a completely drawn massively long period of time. And the problem is that for most normal people it's hard. No one is interested in examining all the bad things that they did and rehashing all those moments where you said what you shouldn't say and looked at what you shouldn't look at and eaten what you shouldn't have eaten and did what you shouldn't have done. It's uncomfortable. And the problem is as you get older in life, you can't even hide behind all the good change that you've done that year because change becomes harder to detect. It's less quantifiable. When you were running around in third grade or in second grade, the hallways of this I know change was pretty detectable. Hey, last year I only learned this year I know. Last year I knew this year I know. Last year I knew this year I did. This last year I did this doing last year I did but I couldn't sit during this year I sit there. Last year I couldn't sit for a half hour to learn. How I could sit for a half hour to learn. There's quantifiable growth. But then you get to a certain age and you quote unquote get into the real world and you're working Manhattan and you wake up at 4:00 and if you could dab with him in you're flying through it and you're trying to learn Dakomi in a train and the guy to your right is blasting a Mr. Beast video and the guy to your left is listening to WF and debating Jackson Dar bring back Mike White and and you're like trying to learn that feel. You're in real life. This is real. come back home and your your your wife is not under and your kids are flinging schnitzo across the floor and then you have to march into so we sort of come to where we're miish just a little bit it's difficult it's an uncomfortable time it's always way too early way too late I don't know threearters of the word at at best it's 10 million miles an hour I have 10 million other things I'd rather do. So, we say, "You know what? Let me just go through the motions, mumble the words, and then wake me up when the flanking soup is being served in the suka." Okay, just breeze, coast, make it till sukus. I want to offer you a perspective that I think could change that. Here is a gumar and a zara. The garra is asking the million-dollar question. How could the Jews commit the eagle? These are the greatest Jews possibly who ever lived. And they just saw Hashem's revelation more so than any other Jew basically ever. And yet they're committing. So the gives an interesting answer. We all have our different and listen to what says the Jews were not on the level of committing. They were way higher than that. Hashem orchestrated that their guard was lowered temporarily. their le their their level was lowered so that he could introduce to the world the power of chuva. That's what says. Let's take a step back and ask an obvious question. Can you wait 3 months to tell me the power of chuva? I'm all into chuba. It's great. Does it have to come at the exact same time as the greatest spiritual moment in all of world history? Can you wait 3 months to a random Tuesday in October? The Jews are doing nothing. counting sand in the desert and then you'll lower their level. They'll commit the and then you'll show the world chuva. It has to come along with the greatest spiritual moment of all time, the giving of the Torah. The answer is yes. The answer is that as Shem is showing humanity and Jews for all time that the Torah is not given to only sadikim. It's given to normal people who fail, who struggle, who have jobs, who have breaking at breaking backs, who have co-workers who are annoying, who have wives who are sometimes who have husbands, who are who have life, real life. The Torah is not given to living in exclusively. Hashem says, "Take Harena, the greatest spiritual moment of all time, the most influential, lifealtering moment ever, and make the ego happen right then to show people for the rest of time, don't you dare think that I am not worthy. I am not good enough. I am not in the elite status I need to be. I am not a a great awesome Jew where Hashem is is I I burst out infinite life from my soul every day of every minute of every day. Hashem says no chuva failure is not just understood. It's expected. It's anticipated. It's part of the package. The same God who gave the Torah, gave the nonus and the challenges in our life, the anxiety, the psych medications that we're on, the challenges that we had growing up, the abuse, the struggles, all our dreams, our self-doubts, our anxiousness, everything was given to us. The same God that gave us the Torah and the mitzvah gave us the issues and the struggles that we have every day for us to show up to and say, "Hashem, I'm not here despite all my issues and my struggles. I'm here because of them. I'm here because I want to overcome and become a better person." True is not saying I'm bad. It's saying I'm back. Listen to this story. I like to travel a lot and I was in Alaska a couple years ago and I went to see Mount McKinley. Mount McKinley is like the cream of the crop in Alaska. Largest mountain in all of North America. And to you don't just take a taxi to Mount McKinley. You got to take a 4-hour drive on potholeinfested streets. And then you got to take a threehour bus from the entrance of Denali National Park to see the the mountain. I'm on this to this bus. The typical tourists are on this bus. You know what I mean? There's the old retired couple in the matching yellow hats. There's the family from London. There's the honeymooners taking way too many selfies. There's the Chinese family. The regular tourists. Then we get there, we spend an hour, do a little hike, take some pictures. We come back on the bus, but this time packed. We picked up hikers and campers who are out there in the wilderness and they're coming back. They're hitching a ride back. And I was amazed. Alaska is not Central Park. There are creatures out there. There are a gazillion brown bears all over Alaska. And brown bears are not black bears. You know the cute little things that you see in the cat skills rumaging through your camp's garbage can to get some Mike. Brown bears is the size of cars. They have claws the size of kitchen knives. And they're not looking for Mike and eggs. They're looking for you. So I I I I'm on the bus and a camper dude, he sits right next to me. The guy smells like he just completed two consecutive three-day. He has pine needles in his beard. He's eating with his hands canned sardines. I turn to him and I say, "Hey, son, why do you camp out there? You're not afraid of the bears." He looks at me and he smiles and he says, "I don't camp out there despite the bears. I camp out there because of them." What? You want me to camp at some local park with mowed lawn and public restrooms and a playground? That's for wimps. I camp out here because this is how you camp for real. Then it hit me. Hashem could have put us straight into gun. This whole world could have been unnecessary, but he didn't because that's not real life. Real life is struggle and it's doubt and it's anxiety and it's saying, "Hashem, did I do enough?" And it's confusion and I'm not sure. I had a whole year. Did I grow? I had a whole long list of bad things. But where are the good things? I'm not sure. That's real life. Do you know that there was a miracle in the B mikdash that the fire blazing on top of the Misbak would never go out even if it was raining. It could be hurricane, hurricane Katrina. It could be a snowstorm rain, the fire was still ablaze. Listen to this question from Salant. He asked an obvious question. Why was the miracle that the fire was always burning? even in the rain. Why can't the miracle just be the the the 16 ft square square square footage over the misb was always just a clear crisp sunny day. No problem. It could be a torrential rainfall, but right on top of the misb it's a clear day. You know what he says? He says cuz Hashem's looking for the the fire in the rain. That's the whole point. I don't want a bay with a fire with a perfect 72°ree balmy San Diego weather. I want a fire in the rain. That's the whole point. That's what I want to see. It's like when the ofublin, one of the greatest masters of all time, I got to be careful what I say in front of these two rebas who are going to fact check me. What' you say? >> He's an >> I don't believe you're an >> You even look like him. The was in 1815. Correct. >> Oh, okay. So that he gave me free reign to make up whatever I want. The one of the greatest masters of all time, many consider like the father of realidas, one of the fathers. He was he died in 1815. And when he died, a fabulously wealthy of his approached his rebbitson, his wife, and said, "Rebbitson, here is a sack of 10,000 rubles. I want to buy the yamaka. I want to buy the Reb's yamaka." The reba had a distinctly large worn out yamaka with sweat and tears and and the stitches were coming apart. I want that yamaka. The rebbitson said, "No problem. Come back to tomorrow. I'll get it. I'll get it for you." So the guy leaves. She takes out the yamaka and she washes it and she's dusting off and she stitches it back up and she perfumes it. The next day he comes back and says, "Okay, where's the ama?" She says, "Here it is." He takes one look. He's like, "That's not the yamaka I want to buy. I don't want some perfumed stitched up yamaka. I want the yamaka with the tears, with the cry, with the mud, with the dirt, with all of problems inside. That's what I want. I want some perfumed yarmaka." It's the same thing. Hashem doesn't want the sadik to come and only them. No, all the sinners stay. Hashem designed the world for people to fail and to get back up and say here I am. And when we say that, Hashem comes back to means I am to Hashem and if I'm to Hashem, he's to me. The acronym of Lashiper. You know what the L? You know what the acronym is? It's the time of year where we roar our way back to Hashem with pride. When you come to Hashem, he comes to us. I want to conclude with one story if I may. I have to say the story with the lights on. Just joking. I have to say the story because it happened three days ago. I spend a lot of There's a company in Lakewood, New Jersey called BP Graphics. Big big company worth tens of millions of dollars. Employees, hundreds and hundreds of employees. And I go there pretty often because they publish my books. and I was there 3 days ago and I'm smoozing with a with a manager and he says listen to this BP Graphics which is like a publishing house a printing press design studio they have many many employees many of which may or may not den with a minion or learn Torah so the owner of the company Mr. Hinaman who's a big sadic. He says, "You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to take our conference room for an hour every day and we're going to dab in Mina as a as a company and we're going to learn Torah together and it's going to be annoying. We're going to have to reschedule a whole bunch of stuff. We're going to do it." So he does that for a while, many years. They come to one month, the conference room is booked. There's international clients coming in. They need a conference room the whole day. So Mr. Heinman goes next door to a large accounting firm and says, "Can I use your conference room? for like a month for an hour and the guy's like, "Okay, I'm not sure. I have to you know what? Okay, you can have it." So they they dive in there, they learn there. A month goes by, Mr. Heindman goes to the to the uh accounting firm, the head of the accounting firm, and says, "Okay, uh the month is up. Can we come back to our printing press? Our conference room is available." The guy says, "You're not going nowhere. I have been in business for 15 years, and we just had the best month of our history. We're we're keeping that menu. Mr. Heinman turns to this accounting firm head and says, "Oh, we're taking our menu back because I've been in business for 15 years and we just had the worst month in our company's history." You think this is funny? This is a true story. It happened 3 days ago. Two companies, one million, one year. Who will get the of the mysterious nephesh to show? If there's a story that encapsulate laz. We are here to open up our hearts and say, "I'm not perfect, but I want more. I'm not bad. I'm back." Hashem, I'm not here despite all my problems and my issues and my anxieties and my struggles. I'm here precisely because of them. And when we say that, Hashem welcomes us back with open arms. I thank you all for listening. I may or may not be back, depending on the time. And we'll see.