KLM A Pesach Epiphany of Freedom, Amaze the Angels and The 4 Cups by Rabbi Asher Baruch Wegbreit

[Music] welcome back to klm the awareness movement for the precious mitzvah of having cavanaugh mitzvahs and as a dear friend put it with a few seconds thought you can actually triple your ulama ba now for those you that's not your motivation still if your oluba is tripled the that means you're getting very close to hashem for sure in the next world but even in this world it's an incredible investment incredible a few seconds triple quadruple i mean we don't really have terms for this but it's profound so now klm meets pesach and lael seder what a union what a union you have to realize how many mitzvahs there are on the theater night now the vilna gohan who spent his time very well he didn't waste a second he felt it was worth his time to calculate how many mitzvahs there were on uh seder knight and he came up with 66 not bad right and uh there's other kind i call them mitzvah magicians there's mitsubiticians who count how many misses there are and if you include uh rabbinic and men hogging etc we'll discuss their one one came out with about a hundred and fifty okay now that's starting with the entry of the evening etc so it's a gold mine and i want to try to give you a muscle based on a real fact from the zohar to get you to understand what an opportunity this is the zoar says this falls well actually you know let me back up there's a zord that's very similar it talks about hashem sending an assembly palm pamlaya like pamlia shell angels an assembly of angels to hear the jews now where is this first mentioned so the mishna brewer brings it by elaine alicia there's actually legions of angels every time recite it you know now i was worried that the angels might come and then they go really back to hashem he said well we went to here elena but i don't know it was finished in a few seconds so so the truth is uh elena we should we should and we will talk about elena sometime but listen to this it says on lael sater that the pamlaya of akashborohu hosts a huge assembly of malachim of angels they come to listen to us on saturday night and they say ashrae praiseworthy are the are the people for this they are amazed at what we're doing how we're praising the kardashian el seder now tell you a little story to set you up on what the angels might say if you have kavanagh mitzvahs when i was at yeshiva you know our rebbe really got us like on fire about learning uh gemara et cetera so we were at a wedding one time and my rebbe is ready my grand rebbe was at the wedding right and one of the um one of the rabbis of the yeshiva pointed us at us bakrim we were sitting at a table and he said he wanted to give our grand he says review at them they all have little gemaras you know in between the break and the wedding they're learning gamora so the grand rebbe he smiled but then he says take another look they're enjoying it they love it that's even greater so now imagine this imagine this seder the angels show up and they're looking down and they see everything they see the wine and the matzah and the table and everybody there and they they said wait a minute they have kevana they have confined their infusing intentionality they're infusing all these kavanagh mitzvahs into the seder you imagine imagine the praise they'll they'll express to kadash boroku so that's aim number one tonight i want to give you a map a guideline how to fill your seder with this other dimension of cavan elements okay so first of all i want to just tell you the categories of mitzvahs that we have this night and then there's these five very special ones that i want to teach you okay so first of all on lil seder you have i'll call it three categories of mitzvos you have torah commandments you have rabbinic commandments and you have men men hogging customs and traditions okay every one of those is extremely significant okay now first of all torah commandments i'm just going to mention i told you the vilna going 66 another 150 in fact by the way i have full lists and um if you'd like one just email me hit the link below and email me we'll get we're not gonna cover all the details tonight just some guidelines okay so torah commandments but let's just mention a couple right famously matzah eating matzah is a torah commandment telling over the story of yetis mitzrian is a torah commandment right that's another one how about this to be in a state of joy another torah commandment and as i mentioned a couple seconds to say hashem i'm eating this masa because you commanded me i'm rejoicing because you commanded me i'm benching etc there's some torah commandments okay rabbinic commandments the four cups of wine the morrow for it to name a few and listen to this right we're required to make a hundred blessings a day so it's absolutely unbelievable but if you start with the evening prayers and you finish the seder you haven't done the rest of the day 32 blessings you're we're going to make 32 brachas right and remember rabbinic commandments are also torah commandments because hashem said i command you to do what the rabbis tell you to do right all right so now another layer the traditions the minhagem wearing a kettle all sorts of the karpas all these minhagem the source to follow jewish tradition it comes from malik and mishla which means it's divrei kabbalah which means it's a very significant rabbinic commandment when the written torah reveals a rabbinic commandment it's high level and the seder is filled with countless countless minhagen every one of them is precious okay so that's an overview what we have tonight but what i want to concentrate on right now is to give you something to infuse every mitzvah you do okay now for this and and this is one of the things at klm we try to do is to get you in contact with how much is taking place when you do a mitzvah okay because the as we've said the sahara has a vested interest in you being dulled in your awareness of what's taking place so i love bringing this point the zora says as follows we think you do in mitzvah and in the world to come there it is right true definitely true but but guess what things are taking place right now okay we're learning torah okay let's have in mind the mitzvah of learning torah that's what we're doing right now what happens right now is the mitzvah of learning torah you're doing manifests in a supernal realm in the shaman and it places a crown the mitzvah places a crown on itself and says i came from esther i came from oheron and it identifies its sources they made me now that's happening right now and on saturday nights 66 150 times there are crowns being formed and they're every single mitzvah is identifying you as the source but wouldn't it be what does a crown do a crown imparts a sense of glory and majesty what if a crown has jewels on it of course it becomes so much more precious imagine jewels so the evident melech rav hominer zetzal he's one of those mitzvah magicians he points out that there's actually five mitzvahs that serves as jewels to every missile you do meaning every single mitch you do should have these kavana mitzvah components okay and let me just go through them and i want to teach you how to place them on your mitzvahs okay so the i think the best place to start is with this ah hashem every mitzvah you do should express opposition and it's not so complicated really it's about your intention you have to just express to hashem you know hashem the reason i'm doing this mitzvah isn't because i know there's a great reward for it or isn't because i'm just in the habit of doing it i identify identify myself as jewish no i love you and that's why i'm doing this mr i want to express my love and i appreciate all you've done for me isn't that a beautiful thing to place on your mitzvos right and you place it on every single mitzvah ava that's the first jewel next let's go to the other side yira you're as hashem okay now urus hashem has fear of hashem has so many expressions part of yours hashem is simply being aware you're in the presence of hashem and part of yours hashem is being very meticulous to do the mitzvah well because you know hashem cares and you know he's evaluating so that's another mitzvah right now we're learning torah we do it because we love you but also hashem we realize you're aware and you care that's yours hashem so have that in mind and to give you a little boost or or to do this the zora says it's the ava and the yura that you attach to your missus that brings it up okay that's the uh jet engines that bring it up oven europe okay next so we have two jewels you can place on the crown of your mitzvahs third one simpa simcha right now that's actually a torah commandment says rabbenu bachaya we mentioned that you know hashem says you know why i'm threatening you with all these curses god forbid because you didn't serve me with simcha so if hashem would give such a consequence for not serving with simcha must be a torah commandment says okay you do it's hashem simcoe also right so that's every single myth you do every single mitzvah you can do with simcha and again i want to just give you a very simple simple way to do that so it's just think of what a privilege it is to do your do the mitzvahs i also just say up your mood you i am up your mood smile there's a lot of tricks to do it but when you do that and some say it's like it's so important like the the essence of the myths because it reflects your connection to hashem let's review hashem let me place the jewel of allah on this love and then on the other hand i realize i'm in your presence and you care about the mitzvah and how it's done so i'm doing this for i have in mind the midst of yours hashem what a privilege what a privilege two more two more jewels the next jewel is called bahar to bahayan choose life right so that's actually a commandment right hashem says i put before you life and death blessing and curse choose life commandments right and why why is that because hashem loves us and he doesn't really want it to be a choice but this world is mysterious and things that look like life are really death and things that seem difficult and challenging and this and that their life as defined by the torah so every time you choose a mitzvah and you choose to do it well you're choosing life so place that jewel on the crown and you have another one hashem i realized that by learning torah i'm just applying it to what we're doing this moment so you can get you can practice putting jewels on the crown so this torah we're learning right now hashem i realized you're you've got you've guided me to life and i choose to do this okay finally and this is where cavanaugh mitzvahs comes in and i've mentioned this before when were you commanded to learn torah when you became religious when you became bar mitzvah today every mitzvah says the midrishtan kuma is supposed to be done as if you just if as if you're standing at sinai you heard it just now that's right that's called sinai as if you're standing at sinai that's that that accompanies every mitzvah and you imagine the aw and the passion you would do if you just heard it from a goddess pearl right now from c9 okay i'm going to review the jewels and then we're going to i'm going to try to teach you how to place them on the mids of lael seder okay i love you and i'm grateful you're as hashem i'm aware that you're there and you care simka what a privilege it is to do your mitzvahs choosing life by heart to behave i'm guided by you to make the torah choice which is a choice for life and finally today i'm commanded and it's as if i'm at sinai that's the formula this is what you can place the the crowns are appearing as we speak in the deep the highest place of shaman but let's put these beautiful jewels on them okay so now male seder what we're gonna do now is i call it uh a guided cavanatation we're going to do a cavanation meaning i wrote a script for you on how to place the jewels on the seder now really once you get used to this it would be beautiful if you did put it in your own words okay but i want to give you a sample and again this is available send me an email i'll share this with you but right now i want to take those five jewels and tell you how to place them on on your on your seder night on pesach okay now what i suggest you do is um maybe close your eyes unless you're gonna fall asleep don't don't close your eyes if you think you're going to fall asleep but if not i want you to kind of imagine that these words are your words and and i also want to read read it so you get a feel for how you can apply this to your seder so right now we're going to apply the uh the the jewels onto your seder to begin so i call this again it's a cavonitation for lil seder avas hashem hashem i'm performing all these mitzvahs of lail seder not because of the reward that i know awaits me but but because i'm so filled with love and i'm so grateful to you that i can't wait to deepen our relationship tonight by spending a night exploring every facet of the midst of seder and your miraculous treatment of us when you took us out of egypt i'm coming from love your assistant as i stand before you on this awesome night i'm filled with awe and trepidation i want to break out of a rote performance of these incredible mitzvahs and do them in a way with such care that shows you that i i it shows you that i want to bring in that's fear of hashem simcha as the seder approaches i feel like i'm part of the most special group on earth and i'm so happy and grateful for the privilege to be a jew and to praise you in a way that fills the angels with admiration choosing life with every one of the many mitzvahs of pesach i have in mind that you're enabling me to choose real and eternal life and i make that choice with enthusiasm and love [Music] and finally as if at sinai i will approach this seder with a unique freshness and energy as if i just received these instructions from hashem at that incredible gathering at sinai and with that i'm going to run to the home and do this with tremendous passion and excitement there you have it express this to hashem on saturn night and the angels will be even more stunned by how precious it is to be a jew and to have a seder and to do it with kavanagh i have a tradition from my rebbe's rebbe how to bring people close to torah out of my car of a person and since we are facing the seder night you're supposed to bring your family members close if you have guests you're supposed to bring them close and obviously it would be good for you to become closer to hashem on seder night so but let's say you're trying to bring someone else close right so listen to this because it's such a good insight he says if you want someone to have a religious experience have a religious experience in their presence you hear that you want them to you want them to taste the spirituality exude spirituality that's a key secret you're here so it is incredible how the sages designed the seder for us to have a spiritual experience in fact that spiritual experience and since we're at klm cavanaugh mitzvahs we we want to have kavanaugh for this you know you're supposed to tell the story right that's a torah commandment right to relate the the the story and you're obligated to tell in a way that you see yourself leaving egypt right that's that's the commandment that's the so it's incredible that it's a guideline to have the most extraordinary real spiritual experience leaving egypt and one of the main conduits is actually eating and drinking right eating and drinking plays a profound role and i want to uh share with you how this works from a very famous thing i i don't know how many of you have heard of this word it's a beautiful word in english it's called an epiphany okay an epiphany was um something that it's credited to a french poet novelist named marcel proust and proust described an epiphany right and i actually want to share you his epiphany and then the job deal elif abdullah's i want to show you how you can have an epiphany from matzah and especially from the arbokosos on el seder so listen to this listen it's it's really uh powerful okay so he says like this no sooner had the warm liquid with the crumbs touched my palate then a shutter ran through me and i stopped and i was trying to come into contact what's this extraordinary thing that's happening to me and exquisite pleasure had invaded my senses something isolated detached and i couldn't figure out where it was coming from and all the vicissitudes of life became indifferent to me it i just saw everything as brief and illusory this new sensation was like a feeling of love that was filling me with precious essence where did it come from what did it mean and suddenly the memory revealed itself the taste was that little piece of madeline i think it's a cookie or a muffin a little piece of madeline which on sunday mornings at cumbre when i went to say good morning to my aunt leonie she gave it to me she dipped it first in her cup of tea and that sight of the little ma madeleine recalled nothing to my mind until i tasted it and then when i tasted it i had an epiphany to the beautiful capturing of the wonders that hashem has put into the experience of eating and drinking it's remarkable now mitzrayim right we were we there so really the orahaya makadosh says that our souls were in mitzrayim okay and i saw from i think it's the bear mosha very interesting proof of this what does the first commandment say we know for sure it's clear in partisan and subbing i believe that all the souls of all the jews and all those who would come to convert were present at sinai okay now hashem is speaking to that gathering and he says hashem your god who took you out of mitzrayim so it seems like those souls were there okay and again the orahayam says this idea okay so we just don't understand and we can't understand the the divine depth of the mitzvos but when you eat matzah and you drink wine you're really can have an epiphany your soul can have an epiphany it's not an accident they're not telling you to do this by accident you can evoke these emotions you can evoke these feelings otherwise they wouldn't obligate you to see yourself as leaving and it keeps and it brings proofs you you left okay it's not a play act okay so the thing is with all mitzvahs misses are instructions so you have to follow instructions right now here's one that's a little challenging for us and that is leaning haseva now what's the point see the night of the seder was a night of incredible transformation because we came became we were slaves right and we're going to find out we were de-slaved a bit earlier than this then let's say tonight but still we became princes and princesses and complete aristocracy on that night when the divine presence landed in the first four plane we so so the thing is if you're act aristocracy aristocracy you have to act the part right so but we have to grapple with who leans these days that you're like this and you're feeling comfortable i don't feel like a free person i don't feel extra i feel uncomfortable right so uh uh the um i saw a rabbi i have opher ophir uh he said a fantastic way for us to frame this in that even leaning like that is going to be our strike he says we you've all seen this that the judges in england right uh do you know how they dress they wear these wigs right these big long wigs and these garments like these heavy garments and do you think they're comfortable not at all but they have a sense there's a sense of reverence that you treat them with and they they they come across as aristocratic right so that's what we're doing you know imagine with the rig whatever you're when you're doing like this you're evoking aristotle you see that's how aristocracy would have a meal okay so work on that imagine yourself like not imagine recognize your aristocracy and the aristocracy they they looked royal they didn't always feel comfortable that's not necessarily a requirement okay so that's on the reclining i'm now gonna go to the matzah and uh the corbin pesto well please god wouldn't it be great if i'm giving you training also for eating the corbin pesto please hashem there is time there's time so but let's talk about this because i i want to end with a bang the four cups okay but with matzah right so the thing is this uh here let's look at the uh the safer kind of explains from the corbin passage he says there's a there's a prohibition that does not exist by any other corbyn and what is that you can't break the bones of the corbin you hear this any other accordion you're eating there's delicious marrow you know you could do it on chavez you can eat the chicken bone and munch it and have the marrow no problem but not on the seder not on pesach night not the corbin pessah why because he says that's how someone who's ravenously hungry eats right he's like we're aristocracy we don't eat like that we're the we we are the most royal family possible you're the king of kings okay so that so that is not befitting us to eat like that exactly exactly i know no i i'm guilty too i remember i was at a seder and uh um eating the matzo and you know there's the timing it's true it's true between two minutes and seven minutes etc ask your local rabbi the timing but still so i'm you know and so this innocent little kid was at the seder you know it wasn't my my child you know she's about six years she goes look at you you're a mess [Laughter] and i realize hmm maybe there's an aspect of this mitzvah i might not be doing ideally right so we have to remember that we're dignity and we have to eat with uh dignity right and so that's one thing is play the part if you do this you'll have an epiphany we're talk these are instructions follow the instructions what does an actor do right he follows the instructions and he's not faking it he's evoking genuine emotions in the situation right so that's with the matzah right eat it with some dignity right and feel that and also just let's just think about this okay what what happened is that when we're eating that matzah right when we're eating the matzah we're actually um you have to imagine what happened that the redemption occurred that night okay this famous thing the mara uh yumara brachas explains that when paro jumped up in shock in his pajamas says the midrist he's running to the streets saying moshe arun leave please leave leave i beg you leave right that was a redemptive moment right so imagine we're sitting in our houses and again there was a dwelling of the divine presence that was spiritually ecstatic we recognize that hashem is the one who made us is our our divine parent it was an incredible experience right so eat the matzah and think about that right that's epiphany number one and now let's uh head towards the arbicosas the four cups and learn how to have an epiphany when we drink them the four cups the four cups according to gemara yoshami are called the arbokosos of gula the four cups of redemption and as we said we're not just eating drinking tonight we're meant to have a spiritual experience to awaken our soul to what we experienced in mitzrayim right now these four cups of redemption teach us that hashem redeemed us in stages and each stage was something we went through and experienced a relief and a delight that was incredible so let's take a look and what i'm trying to guide you to do is when you drink these are each cup like the first cup is kiddish but it's also the first of the four cups and we want you to go back in time and while you're drinking you want to meditate on this experience this and live this okay the i i'm going to begin uh presenting you the the hebrew verse this is in uh parshas vera 6 6 okay the machem says i'm going to take you out from underneath the burdens of mitzrayim redemption number one when did it occur after the first of the ten plagues there was already a redemption the pl the the maca of dawn the plague of bl had devastated them so severely that far far said no more slavery no more harsh subjugation no more being beaten for not making enough bricks it was over he says do not harshly subjugate them right so i'd like you to say something like this is another script for you ready like we just heard the announcement we no longer have to be subjugated no more test measures were free from the slavery baruch hashem first cup have that in mind next yes by the way this explanation is the midrash rabbah and the eerie okay very uh important sources this one is saying i rescued you avodasan from their service this is another dimension the harsh slavery was over if the first plague the next stage was we became we were citizens without any obligations of citizens no taxes no public service we had we were more free than the egyptians meaning ready no more taxes no more citizenship requirements unbelievable unbelievable no more service to egypt right we're getting ready to serve hashem no more service to egypt right at all next the third cup the altius i redeemed you with an outstretched arm godolim and great acts of administration of justice right so now what happens if somebody comes in here i was thinking of uh if i should mention the civil war the american civil war i hope it's long ago that no one's going to be offended by this but right you had the uh anyhow the point is this if you have a a a battle and then there's slaves right so the fight the slaves are let's say freed right but they're they're kind of still kind of lowly you know they have to start to get rehabilitated and get jobs and things like this but they're basically slaves that have been freed right what was incredible and the way hashem freed us with these ten plagues and that like it's he made such a dent on them that we didn't we didn't remain slaves that were freed we were like masters to them and this was evidenced by the fact that every mystery before we left before the 10th plague already every mystery showered us with wealth who's the master and who's the slave they're giving us all their jewels and precious items and their garments and everything so ready were the masters that was the third stage of redemption again harsh slavery over in the first plague later on no more taxes no more obligations then it switches right you hear this we became like their lords what a gift hashem gave us and finally and everyone says this this was the most precious redemption of allah i took you jewish people to me the divine being and master of the universe said i want you to be my people and am kadosh a holy nation that's a very deep thing what does khadosh mean according to rabbi viktor miller zetsaal kadosh means perfect hashem is perfect and miraculously enough once he took us to be his people we partake in his perfection we are capable of a spiritual perfection that's unbelievable and so we were redeemed from the ultimate we were redeemed to become holy people so you hear this cup one that i really encourage you to do this couple and said they just told us no more being whipped for not making enough bricks cup two no taxes think about it think about that your privileged sense it's like your elite guests in the country right with no requirements picture that when you're drinking right send that to the shaman thirdly we are imbued with their wealth and it switches where nola were given aristocracy and dignity already before even the 10th play and finally the most precious thing of all the whole thing was really to take us and forge a bind with the divine it can't it can't be described it's so deep and so beautiful i wish everybody a hog kosher sameach with our bay or obey tons of cavanaugh misos [Music] is