"Hillula D'Rebbi Shimon 5785" - The Embrace of Halacha & Kabbala

Yeah, I want to thank everyone for coming tonight. My father's fifth York site tonight. Thank you. Um and it's also Rafua for Kaya Shiraza Maka. You have to sit there. Um very close to our family. You need to sit where M. And on top of that, whoever does not have a Laga Ome book, this is the one and only, the great one, guy over here. Um, it's that great. You just have to buy it. Please buy it. Thank you. Who does not want to bring it home? Yeah. The Rebbitson said he has enough in the in the closet. Exactly. In the garage. And please get rid of them. Sell them. Thank you. Okay. Welcome everyone. Thank you uh to the Zultt family to Gordon and his wife and uh the whole family for hosting the our annual uh Laga Omar event. Leo Nishmas Gordon's father Gon Ben David Alvi Shamish Aliyah she'll be a male for the whole family and Shala foraya Shira roa basy is okay we have a very uh important topic tonight even though it looks like you're in Cedarhurst right now and it feels like you're in Cedarhurst but we know that on were elevated to a new plane. Aside from the fact that tradition has it that Lagimar is the dehilah of the rashi there's another great personality who also passed away on we spoke about him a few years ago and that is the rama is raosha is list who lived from 1530 to 1572 he lived 42 years even though actually son visited cro Krakow. The never made it to Krakow. The stayed only in Western Europe. He never made it to Eastern Europe. But the son went to Krakow. And said that his son told him that he saw the writing on the on the grave of the Rama. And it said the Rama was nif in Shinlammed Gimmel in Shinlammed Gimmel. That Shin Lammed Gimmel was 1573. By the way, he made a mistake. He misread the Kev. It's actually Shin Lammed B. Or maybe he just took the liberty to be one off or he wanted to connect the the Rama to. So even though the said son said that the Ramo was nin gimmel, he was really nifin bay. I was there. I saw the Kev. It says Shinlam B. He said that the Ram was nif at 33 years old. That was also an error. The Rama was not 33. He was 42. He said the Rama wrote 33. We are not aware of 33 swarim that the Rama wrote. But he did he said that the Rama passed away on and that is definitely true. We all know it is our tradition. The taz brings it down. The rama passed away on lag. Actually in Krakow the minis that many raonim who served in Krakow would be maspid the rama gave on. Starting in the year 1857 the maharash shak who was related to the was related to him gave a drussa on the ramiart site. Rib Shiman Syer who is the Robin Krakow gave a druss on the Ramos yard site. Rabshiman Cipher's son Rabunim Cyer gave a drard. By the way, Rabunim Cyer pointed out the Ramos yard site almost always falls out paras because Emar are the letters Rama. This week's para Mr. spells out Rama. The Rama always his yard set is always the week of paras and angel gave dashas on and gave drus on and I had a dream that one year I wanted to go to lag. I wanted to go to Krakim and if I ever got to the shul I would take over the podium and I would also want to give a dasha on. So you want to know so what did I say? I actually went last year on Lagimar to Kraka. This that's why last year was the only time in 14 years we did not get together lag b you don't remember this we you know nobody can how come nobody said hey why didn't we have a lag b last year you thought it was because it was matzah shabisk I'm glad you thought that the real reason is cuz I wasn't here it was the only time I miss lag bimr because if I'm not going to be in Gordon's house then I'm going to be in krakow okay and so I'm going share with you a little bit of what we were able to say on Ra's shul and something uh amazing new for this year as something very interesting has it that two personalities passed away on the same day and that is the rash and the rama is these are two very disparit personalities you know the rashbi was the father of kabala the rashbi was the one who composed was all the traditions of the mystical traditions of the Tory and the Rama is the backbone of you know Rama we follow the Rama all is based on the Rama the Rama um founded Ashkanaz based on the mahar and Bruna so you have the all-time great passed away and you have the greatest poin who passed away on. What would the connection be? Why did Hashka have it that the Rashbi and the Rama passed away on this day? Like what commonality is there between and is like like it seems pretty random, you know? It it would be like saying that on a certain day it's the yard side of a great Lithuanian Russa and a Hungarian Rebba you know like you couldn't find two more polar opposite personalities seemingly then and what is the connection between them so actually the first to deal with this question is cipher cipher was a ravan krakow and shiman cipher pointed out something very interesting Cipher pointed out that there are only two individuals in history who their father's name is seared onto their name. Who is Yay? Shim's father. So what do we call him? We call him Barry. Does he have a name? Yeah. Yeah. His name is Shim, but he's more well known by his father's name. Bario. You know, there are a lot of songs with it. Yep. But did I get it right, Mayor? Yeah. Okay. His name is Bario. That means his father's name is seared onto his name. Who else in history's father's name was seared onto their name? The Rama Ram Mosha Iserles. Who's Iserless? Iserlin was Iserel was the father of the Rama. Actually, legend has it that the reason why Iserlin was to have a son like the Rama is because he was a merchant. He was a businessman. He sold different materials and all of a sudden his and his policy was he would close the store Arab Shabas at noon. He didn't want to engage in any business afternoon Arab Shabas. He didn't want in it to infringe upon his uh cover chabas. And all of a sudden at 11:50, the Duke walks in and he's like, "Show me 10 reams of, you know, of the silk and I'll have uh 50 yards, 50 yards of the of the turquoise wool, and I'll take a 100 yards." And basically, is about to get the biggest order he ever got. And the Duke is taking his time. Does he want the red, the purple, the green, the polka dot? And Raisel says, "You know, it's 11:55. I have to close the store in 5 minutes. And the Duke says, you know, look, I'm sure for an order like this, you could stay open a bit longer. And Revis says, "Make your mind now because I'm closing at 12:00." And it's 11:59. And the Duke is taking more material and he's looking here. And Riser said, "Listen, this is my policy. We close at 12 sharp. Make your order now or you could come back on Sunday or Monday." And the Duke was taking his time. Ravis said, "I'm sorry. I have to close now. Come back at your convenience." And the duke never came back. Raisel lost the order but he was rewarded with the son the rama rama's name is his father's name is seared onto his name. So said there are two individuals in history who their father's name was seared onto their name. The king the father of kabala to indicate did not invent kabala. He didn't invent mysticism. He merely gathered all the mystical teachings that existed before him. And the Rama the Rama didn't invent pisqueke ashkanaz the rama merely gathered all the collected sakim that ashkanazic jury observed until then. So to indicate they didn't invent anything they were just following tradition. These are the two individuals whose their father's names are seed unto their name. And that's the lesson and the message of the fact that these two great passed away on the very same day. Okay, that's whatifer said last year on in the Ramos at the same podium. I had to come up with something. What is the connection between the rashi and the Rama? Oh, you want me to say you want me to say it? Oh, you want to hear it? I thought you might want to hear it. I'm going to I'm going to say it. Even though you could go back to a rerun of Torah anytime, I'm going to tell you now. But obviously we have new material for this year. Last year we said like this. You doing good? Last year we said like this you know after the 24,000 students of Rabika died the Garra says in the Gumar says Rabika went to Rabbi Shabadar the rabbis in the south. We pointed out many times according to Jewish thought the directions have significance. The north symbolizes Midasin the attribute of strict justice. When God tells the Niia that Bavl is going to come destroy Israel. He says Bavl is going to come from the north. Bavl Babylon is not north of Israel. Babylon is west of of is east of Israel. But mystically the forces of evil are always in the north. Okay. The on the other hand the south is midas. The south is midas. If you look in the abrau only travels in one direction. He's always going south. When he goes to Egypt he goes south. How about when he returns to Israel, you would expect it say to say he goes north. The Torah doesn't say he goes north. He went back to the south of Israel. That's the most seemingly backwards way of speaking. No, Abraham always goes south. South is if the garra says that after Rabika's student stopped dying, he went to the rabbis of the south. I think what it means is that he had to tweak the so to speak the world of Torah that he had to offer. The Torah that Rabika now taught had to be a Tory of And who did he teach? He taught Shimai. He taught Rabi Mayor. The Torah of the Rashi, the Torah of mayor was a Torah of You may have heard that Ra mayor's opinion is that we are always considered the beloved children of Hashem. You ever hear that the mayor holds that's a very sympathetic viewpoint toward the Torah and to to the way Hashem sees us. That's a very compassionate type of Torah that we're always the beloved children of Hashem. How about the Rashbi? You know that the rashi says that he and his son Rabbazar could exempt the whole world from going to ganam from being punished in the world to come. Alani lift. So the rashi also had a very compassionate. He had a way of of being for us like we say in this who what do we say who? How does it go? who yeah that is our is like our so had a very compassionate viewpoint the also the Tory of the Rama was a very compassionate I'll give you a few examples does anybody know the very first in first is get up like a lion in the morning so that you get up the morning. You ever hear this is you need to wake up the morning the morning can't wake you up. So in other words, the the first states a Jew must get up and then while it's pitch black outside say to the sun, "Hey son, top of the morning. When are you going to rise already? Get up already. You, that's the first. You must awake the morning and the morning can't, In other words, it can't be you're lying in bed and the sun is shining through the shutters and it, you know, disturbs your sleep. No, then the morning's waking you up. The states you must wake up the morning. It's the first and some people look at that and say, "Okay, this book is not for me. I'm going to learn I'm going to learn." Forget the you know that's that's where got its bad rap. What's the first comment of the Rama on the Rama says you don't have to get up so early. You don't have to get up at 4:00 a.m. You could get up at 9:00 a.m. As long as you get up for that's the first Ram. That's a very compassionate by the way you know many people don't know what the main objective of going to schul in the morning is you have two things you got to do okay the two main things you have to do number one is you have to make sure you say so that means you got to check the clock you got to check the go to cedarman there are twoimm there's the mug of keshma if you can't do that at the you have to at least do the keshma grisheshma these days is about 9:14 you must say shama before that's the first objective of being Jewish in the morning the second thing you got to do is in shul you need to start with the if you go to shul and you don't start with the you may be a good Jew but you didn't d with a minion it is not considered ding with a minion unless you start with the so in any event just think about what the says says and what says the says you got to get up the morning. You got to get up at 4:30 a.m. and wake up the morning. The Rama says uh it's okay as long as you don't delay. The Rama has a more so so to speak sympathetic world of I'll give you a few examples. You ever hear of the the rule he said maruba you know there's certain things they're not kosher. you do certain things with your oven, it's a problem. But if you're going to lose a lot of money, you could be lenient. It's a rule in certain things are prohibited unless you're going to lose a lot of money. Who invented this principle that really it's user? But you could be lenient if it's going to cost you a lot of money. Who invented it? Summar is the one who invented the concept of heid maruba. You know what else? Rama created that even though in general if you have a maybe you should be mm but what if you have two one one on top of another the Rama says we're not m on two things simultaneously the created many leniencies in so I would say the Rama is also what we call Shabadim he's from the world of Tyra of the south a more lenient compassionate Tyra So there's a similarity between the rashi and the rama. They're all in the category of that's what we said last year. But now we're not in Krakow. So if you can't be in meron and you can't be in Krakow, your best option is the Zeiss Hold's backyard. It's right. It's almost it's like meron. It's like meron. First of all, there are more rabbis surrounding this house than even in meron. In meron on I don't there no rabbis. You have rabbis. There no rabbis, you know. But here you're surrounded on all sides by rabbis. I don't even know how you could tolerate this. You know, I'm a rabbi, so I'm not surrounded by rabbis. But you're, you know, on all sides. You're surrounded in the east, the west, the north. So, and the south. What about the north? The garross. What? Yes. Now I would say the Mala Muk says nobody can make a makita in the north. The north is never you'll never have in the north. Actually the word of the Gar says the word is. Okay. So brand new for this year, I want to share with you uh I think an amazing idea. You know the rashbi is the paragon of kabala. He is the father of the z and the rama is the backbone of halaka. Did you ever notice if anybody ever learned garra when the garra wants to bring a proof? Anybody know the terminology the garra uses to bring a proof? It says tshma come in here. The zar never says tshma. Desire uses a different expression. The desire says come and see is the realm of listening and is the realm of vision. Okay. So is and is in fact the shinar writes on the hill. You have it on the sheet. Shimmy incline your ear to hear and then and then see. Why? Who's the bas? Jews are called daughter. We're called the daughter of Abraham Aino. You know what this plastic is teaching us? that if a person wants to learn the secrets of the Tyra, the mystical aspects of the Tyra, mysticism, first you must learn Gamarra. If you don't learn Gamra and you don't understand the thought process of the Gumarra, you don't have a right to delve into the mysticism of the Tyra because if your mind is not trained to probe in an analytical way, yeah, then you can't study Cabala. So therefore it says shimmy first listen meaning learn gamar and only then only then you could see meaning first you need to learn then you could learn cabala here's another example of this I want to show you another example of this there's a a safer zazar who brings from y of galagav says vish Moshe heard and it was good in his eyes. This is also a mosha heard. Moshe heard means he studied the he studied the gamarra. He studied the revealed parts of the Tyra. Once he did that, then he probed. You know, I'm in the middle of giving a shir. Okay. So, just keep the hands. Okay. listenu listened. He learned he learned the revealed part of the Torah and then he delved into the cabalistic parts of the Tory. So I want to share with you an amazing offering of one of the classic is called Ravid. Ravid Hazov brings down many uh traditions of the earliest masters of that are found nowhere else other than in the safer. We all know that when Jacob Ainu was returning after 22 years in the house of Lavan. So who's coming to greet him? As was coming to greet him with 400 men and Yakov is afraid because uh Asab's coming for the kill, right? Remember that when Asab was coming with how many men? 400 men. And what was Asab coming to do? Bad stuff, right? He was coming to hurt Jacobino. And ultimately, Asov had a change of heart. What did Asov do? What does the PK say? Asov kissed Jacobino. Does anybody remember what Kazal say on those words that kissed Jacovino? The rashi says it is a it is known as hates. So if hates why in the world is as kissing of you don't usually kiss people that you hate Ella. Even though that Asov hates Yakov, his mercy was aroused and he kissed him. Who said that? Rashi. Question. Why did Rashbi say he should just say it's known that hates? What does it mean? It's a it's known. It's like repetitive. What's this double terminology? So the Ravid quotes the Arizal. The Arizal says before you engage in learning what we call pania, the mysticism of the Tyra, the secrets of the Tyra, you have to start, the Arizal taught, you have to start by learning. By the way, the Arizal said six days a week you learn and shabas you learn kabala. The Arizal darioned everything he learned in six ways. In seven ways. Six of them were revealed and one of them was mystical. In other words, a guy who says, you know, I just learned the mystical. He very likely off the deep end. A person must be first steeped in and only then could you delve philosophically, mystically in thought into the Tyra. Al taught before you learn, you must learn. Why? Because in Cababala there's an idea that whenever you have a kernel of kaduca it's covered by a force of impurity. You know what you call that? What do you call the force of impurity that covers the mystical sanctity? The kipa. So how in the world are you ever going to be able to learn kabala? Kabala is like the inner flesh of the nut. The egg. Yeah. But the nut is covered in a shell. So how do you crack the shell? You ever wonder this? How is anyone ever able to learn cabala? Kabala is like the inner dimension of the nut, but the nut has a shell. How do you crack the shell? The reason taught cracks the kipa destroys the kipa. Once you crack the kipa now you can learn kabala says you know that then the p says says one, eight words in a row. First you learn, then you can learn. If you learn first, you're going to be off the deep end. You'll be like a nut. Yeah. So, first you have to learn. Hala cracks the shell. Now you have access to the inner dimension of the Tyra. Then you could delve further. That's the great teaching of the so Rashi's bothered by a question is the biggest Kipa in the world. How did Yakov Aino crack him that he transformed from hating Yakov Au to kissing him? There must be involved here. So you know what Yakabinu did? He wrestled with Asov. And when he wrestled with Asov, a new was created. What was the that from now on we're now to eat from the Gan? Oh, the wrestling match the Yagabad with Asov created a that we can't eat the sciatic nerve. Now that cracked Asov, now that we cracked Asov, we accessed him and we transferred him into a supporter. Therefore comes, what's going on over here? He kissed him. How did he kiss him? How did Asov kiss as the biggest in the world? So the rashi begins. He did it with and what happened? We all know hates. So what happened? How did he do it? And then once you have then we could learn. This is the great explanation of the raid haz in this very enigmatic teaching of kazal. So let us now come back to the amazing hashkah that there are two gdylum who passed away on this great day of the year that are so diametrically opposite. You have the rama and you have the rashi. So my father once shared with me that you could be sure that the Rashbi wanted the Rama the Rama's yard to be on the day that the Rashbi passed away because the Rashbi didn't want people just learning you know the mysticism of the Torah and the deep tora if they're not first steeped in and so the Rajbi sent a very important message to the world that today is not only the day of Cabala in its raw form but today is also So the said of the Rama, the father of but now we're explaining that on a on a added dimension and that is you're not even able to learn cabala. You're not even able to access the inner core of the secrets of the Tyra. You can't even get to the cis until you crack open the kipah. So first you need the rama. The raji said today is not just the day of kabala. By the way, even in the cave, the garra says, "What do you think the rashi was doing in the cave?" People think he was learning the secrets of the Tyra for sure that also. But the garra says that when he came out, his analytical skills were sharpened. Certain things that he asked was now they were able to converse on a more analytical level. But the fact that these two gdam passed away on the same day shows us the maybe symbiotic relationship between and kabala that you can't even access the secrets of the z the cisra until you crack crack open the kipa with the that is the teaching and then but let's take it back to the for a moment. Right. The says on the sh it says listen and see. So the way that explained that is first you need to involve yourself in in the and then that's the listening and then see you could learn the cabala but then the says and then listen again. So you're going from listening which is to seeing which is the back to listening. Why back to listening says very interesting you need to crack open the kipa. When you crack open the kipa you could access the cabala which is the vision. And once you learn cabala, you need to then go back and take the cabala and study the with the prism of cababala meaning meaning understand why the demands this. So basically it's a three-step process. You need to start with that cracks open the kipa. It gives you access to the cabala. But once you learn the cabala, you're able to then go back to the and and view and study the cabala with the prism and study excuse me the with the prism of cabala and many it's very interesting there there are uh a very rare genre of who explain the alpabala you know many are familiar many would say okay yeah I Oh, did that you know has basically is the study of but there were even much earlier you had the wrote a safer to where he explains the this is the three-step process shimmy bas shimmy listening is then you advance to that's the language of the z that's and once you do that once you master the kabala then you go back and you look at the then this is what happened to Jacob was able to transform as how does he do it says Okay, these are a few thoughts about the commonality between the lives of and of course the Rama. One more idea of a very interesting uh commonality between them is in the chaos he often points out that sometimes people say you know it's my minhug it's my minhug I once you know I had a guy he told me uh it's his minhug to talk by dab he was serious he really meant that it's his minhug So probably, you know, he said his father talked and he talks. So probably in the next world both him and his father are going to be in the same location, but it might not be so pleasant. So a minhug is not always an answer. A minhug is not always an answer. Rabadi would say minhug is if your minhug is not founded, it's not necessarily correct. So it comes out something very interesting. A good minhug saves you from ganam. A bad minhug could bring you to the wrong place. Not every custom is a good custom. But it's a it's an incredible idea. The word the word minhag and gehennam are the same letters. Which Tana said he has the capacity to save the Jewish people from gehan? He said which P is the greatest champion of Minhag is Rama everybody knows the Rama the Rama many times says don't dismiss this don't dismiss banging by Han no Minhug is the Rama was considered the greatest champion of min a good minog it's going to save you from uh the letters that Minhug spells. So that's another commonality between Rab Shim and Rama. They're both have the kayak and the strength to save the Jewish people from you know I saw uh I saw just the other day that if you look in parasyak it says that the mabble started to fall in the second month. What's the second month? Desar says the second month is what day of the month? Who knows? Anybody know what day of the month did the water start falling? 17th. But you know, Rashi says the first day didn't count because the night wasn't with it. Which means the first day of the mul was the 18th of year. You hear this? 18th of year is the first day of the m. You know what the 18th of year is? Boim. That means the mabul began on. Nobody ever said that before. It comes from the vim. The mul began to fall on. Many people have a custom and actually Gordon has the biggest bow and arrow on the in the eastern hemisphere. Seriously, before the sh we were practicing. Where is he? Gordon, where'd you go? Here. Here. He shot it from here to the other side of the street. It was right. How big was it? How tall was it? Four feet, three feet. It was it was the rashi would have been proud. And people want to know why do we shoot a bow and arrow on? So some say, well, you know, while the rashi was alive, he was such a sadic. He didn't need a rainbow to as a promise that Hashem wouldn't destroy the world. He was the promise. So that's why we shoot the bow and arrow on like what in the world does the rashi have to do with the mul but according to this it comes out he has a lot to do with the m the m began on comes the rashi and the rashbi on the day the m came he brought to the world his personality that protects the entire world from being destroyed. So I realized, you know what other historical event happened on? Theam says the man began to fall for the first time on. What language does the Tory say about the man? God sent it. You know what does it say? He sent it. He threw it. He delivered it. Who remembers? It rained. It rained the Isn't that interesting? So on the day that it can either rain a mabble, it could rain the mun meaning this day right now is a day of great packages from heaven. You know shea is going to pour down from heaven on this day. It could come down in the form of the mabble. A few years ago we had a great tragedy on lag. Anybody know how many people passed away on that lag? How many people were killed that year? How many? 45. 45. And people want to know what's the symbolism of 45. You ready? We We have to do this now. Okay, fasten your seat belts. The number 45 is inextricably bound with the day of Lagimar. Okay, you with me? I need you to focus for a minute. Okay, Lagimar is a day of great compassion. It's the 33rd day. What is so significant about the number 33? Okay. So we have Hashem's name alf then a he then a then a what is the numerical value of al l and then a and a jacob 86 86 fine he's my uh he's my numbers man. Yeah teaches that is but if you take the letters before elim it sweetens the miden. So what letter comes before an alf. Nothing comes before a result says remains an alid becomes a he becomes a dalid y becomes a test final me becomes a regular me 86 becomes alfal test 86 becomes 74 al if 86 means comes 74 ad is 74 it's when you have troubles in life you know how you sweeten it you realize that you know what came before your troubles Hashem is giving it to you for a good reason if you take the letters before that's 74 that's by having you sweeten okay 86 is sweetened and it becomes 74 however the alf didn't really change right it became an olive the final me didn't really change it became a regular me. So teaches what really the the essential transformation is what transforms into what's is 20 is four test is nine 33 the essence of is 33 you got that transformed test 33 and what's 45. So when the midas does not transform into 33, it remains at 45. So when we don't have midas, the midas is 45. You know how eerie it is that 45 people passed away on. Do you understand? Do you understand the essence of lag? It's the midasin which is 45 transforming into 33. You understand that it's 86 into 74 but you take off the book ends because they don't really change. 45 changes into 33. But the Ezra Hashem this is a day of great shaf. It's a day that the mabble came down to the world. It's a day that the mun came down to the world. And on this day, we have to dive into Hashem to transform the mid to midim and in and transform all of the challenges of our generation of the m of our generation that it should be transformed into the of our generation and bezem should be mashia on all of us. is a great day of with the children with parasa and with all of so we all are together should be mashem should bless all of ushim amen