Likkutei Sichos Shlach #1: How Do We Understand G-d’s Anger in the Bible?

He's bringing the soy sheets. He's bringing the soy sheets. Starting a moment. We'll begin in a moment. Oh, I read about it. Yeah, I read I I read a Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, with the children. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. And I heard an interview with her, yeah. I heard an interview with her by uh Yeah, I'm I'm the famous writer. She quits from the New York Times uh Barry Weiss interviewed the author of Bad Therapy. Yeah, long interview. Think a podcast. So, you read the book? Really? Yeah. About the shift in a generation, yeah? Yeah. And it's a show. Yeah. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Uh Good morning. Good morning. Good morning. Oh. Thank you so much. Thank you for the copies. Oh, on the Bema? Okay. Yeah. Of the Bema, the copies of the Bema. Yeah. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Yeah, okay. Good morning everybody. Welcome. Thank you to for the copies. Today's class is dedicated by Robert Morgan in appreciation of all of the inspiring learning. Thank you, Robert, very, very much and lots of blessings and success in everything. I also want to dedicate today's class to Leia Pearl North. This is the wife of uh Isaac North, one of the pillars of our classes for many years. His wife Isaac North, his wife passed away right before Pesach this year. Leia Pearl at a very young age. To her soul life. We're all very, very sorry for the loss. And uh her light should continue to be a source of blessing and inspiration for husband and her entire family, mother and all of the and of course her children of this. With only revealed goodness and blessings. Okay. So, today we're going to learn a from the Rebbe Rebbe on partial It's published in the volume 23 Schlock base, the second Schlock Schlock of them. Here you have the copies. The Rebbe said this on Schlock at the of Schlock partial Schlock Schlock of them which is 1980. And the second part, the end, is from a fabric and of who cause ball of toy Shabbos who cause ball of tough should limit test 79. Sometimes they combine a few of the talks together. So the first half is Schlag tough should men. The second half, the last few part the last few sections is with toy Shabbos who cause ball of tough should limit test. As I said, it's published in look at the sickest volume 23. And learning it they have a project look at the sickest where they learn sickest every every week they're learning this also this week. In this sickest, in this talk this year the Labovitch Rebbi tackles a very very fundamental question on the parsha, but it's also a fundamental question in our shkofa, in the way you look at the Yiddish guide. In fact, I did a few years ago in the moon series. Right, where we dealt with a lot of questions that people have on Yiddish guide. And a lot of its approach was based on this sickest, based on this talk. He asks a question. It's one of those questions, you know, when you children ask it, children see them and they ask them. Unfortunately, we don't always get the right answers. Or worse, we get denigrated for asking the question. Sometimes when people don't have an answer to a question instead of saying, "Wow, that's an incredible question. Let's go search. Let's go find out." Sometimes it triggers something so negative or I don't know, maybe an insecurity or a fear in the heart of the one who received the question that uh he or she lashes out and attacks the questioner. Rather than really appreciating the question. So this was a very instructive lesson, not just in terms of the sicha itself, but also the approach of asking such a question in publicly, as you'll see. It's quite an intense question. And then the whole approach that I begin gives us a fundamental way of looking at Torah and Yiddishkeit. And this is really one of the reasons I chose it because, you know, we live in a generation where there's many, many people Some people call it religious trauma. I don't know if that's exactly the right term, but maybe it is. But it's not so relevant in the term. But a a point where the Yiddishkeit that they experienced or they have been taught or they learned on their bones from nature or nurture the environment, the home, the school, whatever it is has so many, so many negative messages and they struggle with it. And uh they're very authentic and they need real real answers, real explanations. And this sicha confronts one of these questions. But also gives an approach which deals with many other questions. So, let's begin. Aleph. We're going to begin today and base Hashem I will plan to finish it. The second class will be Thursday, 7:45. We'll finish the second half. Aleph. It's in Yiddish, but I'll translate. Chen gedet fil mol as in Rashi befurush al ha Torah shteit zich up if yedder inyan versus shver oder fardert be'erem shidushim mikra. Um ven Rashi hot nit kein asbara fun any shidushim mikra, schreibt er any idea ve kayatsa bazeh. We've spoken many times that Rashi is the basic commentator on Chumash on Torah. His job, the way he defines his job, the Rebbe was a big Rashi uh teacher. He developed a whole system of how to learn Rashi on Torah. So, one of the foundations that he always used to explain is that Rashi will stop at anything that is difficult or needs explanation in Shulchan Aruch. In the literal interpretation of how to read the possuk, if there's something difficult, Rashi finds it as his responsibility to address it. And if Rashi doesn't have an explanation, he's going to write, "I don't know." Why does he write, "I don't know"? Don't write anything. Rashi sometimes writes any idea. He brings in number two told us Am Yitzchak Am Yitzchak says about Esau and Jacob that it says about Rebecca, she was the mother of Jacob and Esau at the end of any idea I don't know I don't know why this is here. Why does he have to say, "I don't know"? Don't say anything. So from here, you see that Rashi wants to tell you here I don't know. That means other places if there's a difficulty yeah, it's addressed. So what happens when you do confront a difficulty and Rashi doesn't address it? Rashi addresses every possuk. And he doesn't usually say the question and then the answer. He just explains it in a way that addresses the difficulty. What if you see there's a difficulty and he's not addressing it? So from Rashi's perspective, it's one of two things. Either Rashi believes that if you would really contemplate it, you'll see there's no question. In other words, on a literal level Rashi explains there's different layers of Torah. There's there's there's there's there's a lot of different layers. What we're talking here, Rashi writes many times I need to bust in the fire of Am Yitzchak. So based on the there's no question or he already said something in the past that if you remember that, it addresses this question. Who sees the difficulty in Shulchan Aruch? This is the premise to the following discussion. There's a difficulty in the literal interpretation of the in this week's parsha. Even a child sees it immediately. It's a Yiddish expression. This means it throws itself in front of your eyes. You can't ignore it. It's not like a question that you have to work hard to find the question. It's a question that is blatant and obvious and conspicuous. It's called in the again. It's right in front of your eyes. Like as they say in English, the elephant in the room. The big elephant in the room. You can't ignore an elephant in the room. You can ignore an ant in the room. You can't ignore an elephant in the room. And nonetheless, Rashi doesn't address it even though there are as he brings in three, that quite a few commentators do address. Can I trouble you for a a blue a blue one of the blue ones? What's the question? See start base. No, that the middle of them get to the others. Are you sure of it? After the spies come back from touring the land, from scrutinizing tour means touring, observing the land. When they made a declaration, the famous declaration, we cannot go up there to Israel. Why? The people there are more powerful than us and even more powerful than him. Even more powerful than him. I shall. And what happened is they and what happened is they dissuaded the entire nation. The Jewish people did not want to go anymore in today so what does tell my son? Quote This is Perek Yud Daled, Pasuk Yud Bais in Shlach, as he says in footnote number five. Hashem tells Moshe Rabbeinu, "Akenu ba dever v'arishanu v'esa oscha l'goy gadol v'atzum mimenu." Hashem says, Perek Yud Daled, Pasuk Yud Bais. Yeah. After this whole rebellion of the Jewish people were not going in, Hashem tells Moshe, "How much longer are they going to provoke me and not believe me after all these miracles that I did? Akenu ba dever, I will strike him, the people, with a dever. A dever is a pandemic, an epidemic. And you will become the new nation. I'll turn you into a gadol, a great nation, v'atzum, a powerful nation. You will inherit Eretz Yisrael, you and your family." That's was Hashem's message to Moshe Rabbeinu. He says, "Esa oscha, I promised Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov that their children are going to get Eretz Yisrael, right? I made an oath. So, I can't just nullify the oath. All the Jewish people will die and there's nothing left. We'll do you. You're not guilty, Moshe Rabbeinu. You'll You'll be the man." That's what he says, "I'll turn you into a great nation. You will become this nation." So, Moshe responds, yeah? Moshe is never passive. Moshe responds. What does Moshe say? I have them at Moshe goes out to Maybush 10. So, Moshe tells Hashem as follows. He says, "V'sham'u Mitzrayim ki alisa b'chochah I'm a zombie curdle. Mitzrayim will hear about this. Remember, news travels fast, even before WhatsApp. Egypt will hear that you took up this nation, you brought up this nation from Egypt in the kibble from a midst Mitzrayim. You brought it up because I got with your power. It wasn't so easy. You had to defeat para all the 10 plagues, get them out of Mitzrayim, but you got them out. And he continues, and they heard that you were there with them, and your cloud was there with them, and you went before them by day and by night to a cloud by day and fire by night. And then suddenly they hear they might as all my sake is shut. And then you kill out him out of the word mace. You kill out, you annihilate the entire nation as though it was one person. Another blow right the entire nation. That's what they're going to hear. That's what you want to do. What's going to happen? The arm rule have going. All the nations that heard about this, what are they going to say? They're going to say me built to your a sham the hobby is all my Zelda sham is below him by a shotgun in the mid bar. Simply God was inept. He's incapable of me built to your he doesn't have the he doesn't have the power. He doesn't possess the prowess to be able to finish the job. He can't. He can't bring this nation to the land that he you swore you're going to bring them. And therefore, what are you doing you can't do it by your shotgun in the mid bar. He slaughtered them in the desert. That's what they're going to say. That's what they're going to attribute to your ineptness, your your your limitations, your fear, your own your own inabilities. Rashi explains that para he could defeat, but 31 kings living in the land of Canaan, he can't confront them. They're much more powerful, they're much stronger. As the Miraglim said, they're giants and children of giants. Over there, you simply couldn't do it. So, what do you do? Instead of saying, "I can't. I'm sorry." You just kill them out, so you don't look bad. That's what they're all going to say. This was Mosha's counter counter attack This is Mosha's response to what Hashem wants to do. That's what he says. And therefore, I say you should forgive them. And of course, we know the story of Hashem said, "I forgive them." Okay. He got a point. As usual, Mosha got a point. Atka is in ganz nicht verstanden. Do something completely that we can't that's difficult to understand. Wie kommt es? Mosha doesn't even talk about the fact that you're going to kill out an entire nation. And you're talking about 600,000 males besides women and besides children. Plus besides males younger than 20 and older than 60. The number 600,000 and change is between 20 and 60 and only males. So, how many females do you have? Double or maybe much more than double. Could be there were more men than women. Right? Huh? So, that's 1.2 at least 1.2 million women. Could be more women. So, could be like 1.5 million women. Then you have children both males and females and males till 20 and after 60, which were also not in the number. So, you're talking about very easily between males and females between 20 and 60, it's maybe 1.2 or 1.5 million. Now, add males and females till 20 and 60 and above, right? Could be easily another million or maybe another million and a half. So, if that's the case, you're talking about 2 and 1/2 or 3 million people. That's approximately the number. Could be even more. But you're dealing with 2 3 million people. Not a question. Moshe doesn't express any taina, any complaint, any tweet, any demand about that. What's his taina? His taina is, if you kill them, the Egyptians are going to have what to say. The Yentas in Mitzrayim are going to say, "You're not as impressive as we thought you were. You think you know how to split a sea. You You could bring frogs. You could turn water into blood. But push comes to shove, you know, you also have your limitations." That's his taina. Yeddei eine versteht a filo kind. Everybody understands even a child. As der Umkum, you know what Umkum means? Umkum in Yiddish means the obliteration, the death. Der Umkum Everybody understands that the death of so many people, even when you talk about a regular human being, that's much more, uh, so with under, that's much more penetrating than what people are going to say about you. This is even a regular person. Certainly, we're talking about Hashem and about crea- creations that he himself created. They're his creations. It's any creation. Certainly the Jewish people that he calls his children. Took them out of Egypt, chose them as his treasure people, etc. Suddenly Moshiach appears. And who's Moshiach? He's the one who led the Jewish people till this point. The man who himself sacrificed his life for the Jewish people. Earlier in Parshas Ki Sisa, he told Hashem, "If you don't forgive them for creating the golden calf, erase me, blot me out from the book, from the safer that you have written. I don't want the connection here." In other words, he put himself on the line. Either them or me, you have to choose. If you want to get rid of them, you have to get rid of me, too. You have to choose. I'm going with them. In Parshas Beha'aloscha, he says, "Kill me. I don't want to see my suffering that he can't feed the Jewish people with everything they needed." This is last week. This is the man who led them and completely dedicated his life to the point of absolute utter sacrifice for them. And when Hashem says, "It's time to get rid of all of them. There'll be a pandemic, they'll all die out. We're done, I'm done with them, we're finished. We'll start over with you, right?" Control, delete, restart. Moshiach said, he doesn't say, "What? You're kidding me? You're going to "Umbrengen" means you're going to destroy, you're going to annihilate and see your own children. You call them Israel. This is in Egypt before Martin 30 says Israel in this was before Martin 30. Tell Padre that this is my oldest son. Israel is my oldest son. My son. What's your whole time now? It's not going to look good. The Egyptians are not going to be impressed with you. But think think about children. Think of a father, a mother. Something happens in the family. I don't know. The children are rebellious after hundreds of times or dozens of times or a few times. To the point that mother and father are upset beyond upsetness, right? And mother declares a father declares, "That's it. I am killing every single child in this family." Every child dead dead dead. We're done. We're done. And then there's a neighbor or a friend who sees what's happening and says, "There's a problem. What's the problem? Problem is that the neighbors are going to say that you're mentally ill. They're going to say, "You know why you killed them? Not because they're bad kids. You killed them because you're about to have a nervous breakdown. And you simply can't raise a family. And because you can't raise a family, therefore you're blaming them and it's really your problem because you are inept." Moses says, "Now, that's a GOOD REASON." THE NEIGHBORS ARE GOING TO SAY this about you or maybe somebody in shoulder is going to say that about you. Oh oh that So I didn't think of that. It's strange. Moses doesn't even say anything else. I shall say I'm going to kill them all and what does he say? There's a problem. The problem is Egypt is going to hear and they're going to say, "You don't have the koach." The etzem inyan that every Jew is going to be obliterated, every Jew besides Moshe Rabbeinu and his descendants, which is only three people. Moshe had two sons. Maybe he'd leave Yehoshua and Kalev alive, the two spies, whatever. That he has no ta'anah. Now you will ask And even though what Moshe is saying is that the name of heaven will be desecrated because the Egyptians and the nations will say, "You don't have the power." Moshe should first say the main thing. And then you can add. He can add. This is a second thing. And your name will be desecrated in the WHOLE WORLD, TOO. A PROOF TO this question is look what happened by the chet ha'egel. This is a raya, a proof, and a chacha, a demonstration. What happened by the chet ha'egel? It was exactly the same story. And there we did take a Moshe spoke differently. Chet ha'egel happened earlier. This is the story of the spies. According to the way Rashi says it, based on a Gemara in Ta'anit, the chet ha'egel happened only 40 days after Matan Torah. That's just a few months after they left Egypt. The story of the miraglim happened 1 year later. Mamash 1 year later. Because the miraglim was sent on the 29th day of Sivan, the second year. They left Egypt at 12 Nissan. Matan Torah was the beginning of Sivan. The chet ha'egel was in Tammuz, right? 16th of Tammuz, the 17th of Tammuz, Moshe broke the luchos. That's a few months after yetziat Mitzrayim. 1 year later He sent them chof they came back 40 days later and this whole story happened. So the happened before. What happens over there? And this what happens at the brings the biggest proof that the question is a good question. When when says after the sin of the golden calf also tells that he has this is not going to work anymore, right? He says over there Allow me I will eliminate them and you will become the new nation. What does say? tomorrow mission when the the llama llama llama llama llama the guy man sure I don't know how to So what's the first thing he says? The first thing he doesn't say is that the Egyptians are going to say something about you. It's not going to be your reputation is not going to be so good. The first thing he says is Why are you getting so upset at your own it's your people. It's your people. That's the first thing he's invoking. It's your people that you took out of Egypt of of the golden calf That's the first thing he says. Then he adds another llama why are you going to give Egypt this this satisfaction and this information that they're going to say he took them out only to kill them. below some lot of bottom up to them He says in 18 tomorrow mission tomorrow mission The Over there the time is you took them out to kill them. It's going to be a desecration of the honor of the Jewish people. You take out a people just to kill them. Here he's focusing it's going to be a desecration of your power. They're going to say you couldn't. Over there it's going to be your cruelty. You take them out but you just want to kill them. You took them out to kill them somewhere else. Here it's going to be Yeah, you're incapable. So he changes in the second time he changes. He says ain't coming climate to discuss that change. But what we see here is he doesn't start off, what are they going to say about you, you're not a nice guy. Or you're incapable. You couldn't take them into what he says the first thing is about that. But here, no he doesn't even say that. It's like only only issue I have is that it's going to be very unimpressive for you. They're going to say you have issues and you're not the big God that everyone thought you were. You're saying the reason is because by the most of them didn't didn't worship it and here everybody was part of it. Everybody was weeping. Everybody was crying. It's a good vibe but you see clearly that by the he also said I'm going to destroy everybody. So there was an Indian or whatever it is that felt everybody not just the Indian. So there was over there also and what was my response? Maybe but about that. Cuz over there he also said by Khalid everybody. He's not saying that there was no sin of the people. Moshe also didn't say there's no sin of the people. Yeah. Let's say everybody sinned. But invoke forgiveness for your people. These are your children. Before telling me how unimpressive I'm going to be by people who are going to say I'm weak. Nachman is being vague to something even more misunder- That's not understandable. What is even more misunderstand is not only Moshe but the response. That's this complaint of Moshe. That's what created atonement. What happens after select what's select? I forgave. So Rashi says what's select? Rashi takes I forgive because of your words in accordance with your words, per your words. IN OTHER WORDS, THAT'S WHAT TRIGGERED THE FORGIVENESS. That's what aroused the forgiveness. That's what Rashi says. Select what? Select. Because of what you said that they're going to say that I'm incapable of bringing them into Israel. What is my via? Rashi explains. In order that my name shouldn't be desecrated through this plague, this magefa, this pandemic. This massive devar magefa. Where everybody will be killed and they're going to say, "I couldn't bring them into Eretz Yisrael." I want to avoid it. So, what what's going to happen? I'm not going to kill everybody in one shot. It's going to be very slow. It's going to take 40 years, slowly, slowly, but this generation, anybody between 20 and 60, they're not going to come into Eretz Yisrael. So, in other words, Moshe this taina of Moshe Rabbeinu, this is what was effective. This is even This is even This is This is even a greater difficulty. Like, that's what worked more than anything else. The PR God's need, God's yearning for good PR among the the the the the Egyptians. They should say good things and therefore salachti kidvaracha. Omega fitni tzarashis also going to be heard of them. And based on the premise of the sicha, Rashi completely doesn't address this. And this is a question that is al pi pshat, every child should ask this question. Every person should ask this question. Even if it's a taina divortus, even if it's a taina, I understand it's a taina chillul Hashem shamayim. But, number two, not number one. He asked the question in a very aidel life and belashon nakiyah, right? Could it's the Rebbe, but I'll tell you how somebody else asked me once the question. Just to bring out It's It's It's resting it It's a fundamental approach when you read Torah. What's the impression you get of God? Somebody once told me when he reads Chumash, he just doesn't read Chumash cuz he reads Chumash, he gets triggered terribly. Sounds like Hashem is usually in a very bad mood, Kavyochol. For him to get angry, it's faster than most men get angry, which is pretty bad. Gets into moods as I in a second ready to kill out everybody. It's like, "Okay, they don't want to go into exile. Fine. It's a sin, I get it. We're going to murder everybody. Everybody's going to be dead." Just 1 second, my son is calling us. Yeah, I'm giving a share here. Yeah. Sorry. And it's like almost like this fit of rage, Kavyochol. I'm just I'm saying what this person was expressing cuz that's what that was his feeling. It's like this fit of rage, and everybody will die. And like Moshe needs to find up a something, right? So, he can't talk about the issue itself cuz who cares? We'll wipe them all out. Okay, yeah, 2 million Jews dead, 3 million Jews. Okay, next. There's one issue, and that is reputation. What are the newspapers going to say? God is not as powerful AS WE THOUGHT. OH, SO I HAVE TO GIVE IT BACK TO HER. BUT YOU KNOW WHAT? WE'RE KILLING THEM out in 40 years. I'll take 40 years, and nobody will realize, and they won't be able to say I'm inept cuz nobody's dying. The nation is dying slowly, so it's not a big piece of news. Every year another some Jews die. At the end of 40 years, they'll all be finished, and we're done. This story and many other stories in Homish when you don't have the you say this the right foundations it creates a perception of a very very negative and toxic relationship with God and therefore with Judaism and very often it's based on maybe other things that trigger this and other words if there's foundations of nurture and warmth so maybe these things fall into place cuz you don't think about them so much or whatever they just don't trigger you the same sometimes if there's other factors so these things become you know what's called Zev Zev Godem it also becomes very powerful but actually however you don't describe it this is this these these are impressions that are getting ingrained in people and even when they're 40 50 60 years old or even 70 or 80 years old there's still a a a a picture of Judaism and of religion and of God that could be very very very uh negative to put it mildly. You understand what I'm saying? Some of you relate to what I'm saying I think no? Ah? So like you would have said like if you wouldn't have said this of course I wouldn't forgive them. We're going to kill them anyway but nobody's going to realize. We avoided the issue we avoided the issue why? Nobody's going to realize I'm not doing it in one if I do it in one shot it's a big piece of news. How do you do that of love? Yeah you know in my in my question. You also see he's not afraid of asking this question you know a lot of people if you were in your Shiva you asked this question. What's this cruelty here? When do we just kill out a whole nation? They don't want to go into it. Okay. So, I'm not going to take you in. Okay. Kill out everybody? And children The children are also guilty. What do you want from the kids? And all the women Everybody Everybody's dying here. And the only reason you're not is because the people are going to say you're not powerful. You know what are they going to What are they going to tell you if you ask this question? At least some people. Apikorsus. Apikorsus? Huh? It's my patch. Not better. But that doesn't answer questions. Calling somebody an apikorsus or giving them a patch doesn't doesn't answer questions. It only tells them that there's no answers. Cuz if you had something intelligent to say, what do you have to smack me? And what do you have to call me an apikorsus? Have a conversation with me. Now, you may not know. Fine. You could say, "It's a good question. Let's think about it. Maybe let's go to somebody else." That's fine. But calling somebody an apikorsus cuz they're asking a legitimate question that's bothering them That makes them an apikorsus. As somebody once told me, before I asked my father my questions and he got upset at me, I had 50% doubt that there's an answer. After I saw his response, now I knew 100% that there's no answer. The father is screaming at him or the teacher is screaming at him because he wants to save his emunah. He doesn't realize that till now he had 50% faith that maybe there's some something here. And now it's over. What he was trying to protect, he actually destroyed from this child. But you see your also an approach. He's not afraid of asking the question. Taka balashon hakiyya with a eidelkeit with respect to this, but he's not afraid to ask the question. You know, what's the answer? Huh? It's way better. The answer gives us an approach how you have to look at things. The Rebbe says the whole answer is in one word, and actually doesn't have to address it cuz he actually realizes that if you really really learn Torah with with the proper foundations at least the way the Rebbe taught it. You'll already understand it on your own. It's all in one word, a very interesting word that Moshe uses. You don't have this word anywhere in Chumash besides one place, but over there it makes sense. It's a unique word that is never used in this context. You You You see the which interesting word Moshe uses here in this conversation? That's very unique that he uses it. Anybody noticed? Okay. Huh? Yeah, shachting. Byishchotem, shachting. Yeah, very good. Byishchotem bamidbar, it stands out that word. You're going to slaughter them, you're going to shacht them in the midbar. That word is used for behemos, it's used for animals, it's not used for people. We'll see from this first time behektem Moshe eloshin and see him from Moshe's aid. V'amru hagoyim The are going to say byishchotem bamidbar. V'dosis l'chayim nitkan loshen hamurgal b'nigel anoshim. It's not a term that's used about people. Or b'frat as Moshe alenu tzu gezogt v'heymatem sham azah. Und der Rebbe sh'lita gezogt loshen akana b'deve. Moshe himself used a different word. The possuk before that Moshe said v'heymatem sham azah. Heymatem is the right word from the word misah. That says a lot. Acharei Moshe u'vnei Adam v'yamusu lifnei Hashem. That's That's the word for death, misah. V'heymatem. So that's what he should have said. V'heim mata is some kind of word. He suddenly changed Moishe himself said v'heim mata. If you kill them, they're going to say V'YISHCHATU B'MIDBAR. AND HASHEM also used the word. Hashem said akenu b'dever, akenu. He didn't say ashchotem. A pandemic is not shchitah, it's not slaughter. Akenu, akenu is the right word like it says by Moishe v'yachas Mitzrayim, right? He struck the Egyptian. Makeh, makeh, to strike, to hit, to strike, to beat, to kill. Akenu is the right word. Heimata is the right word. They themselves Hashem uses a different word, Moishe uses a different word. And then suddenly when he's quoting the Egyptians, he uses the word v'yishchotem. He says in 23, v'nimtza d'ach pam achas b'Chumash b'negel Yitzchak. In the whole Chumash, the story of death is very often. Right? By it says already by other morasha, the day you're going to eat from the tree b'yom achalcha mimenu most tamus. Again, most, heimata. That's the word. In the whole Chumash you have however once by Yitzchak. What does it say? V'yishlach Avraham es Yitzchak l'machales es lishchot es b'no. V'oidve but it's once, v'oidve acharei she'nasa oilah. But over there the main thing is it's once, but where? The whole idea is he becomes a carbon oilah. Halechu k'achas Yitzchak halechu sham l'oilah. Bring him up as a carbon oilah. And then he takes a knife lishchot es b'no because he's like the carbon oilah. That's the the whole idea of that kedah. That he's becoming an offering that's going up to God. So, over there you can make sense of it. Here, it's not like he had a knife HE'S GOING TO V'YISHCHOTEM B'MIDBAR. Very interesting expression. And it's interesting all the the meforshim struggle with this. In 25 he makes a summation. Deven Ezra says, if you look at the Deven Ezra says, cuz it says b'midbar. And in the desert usually you slaughter sheep. So, Moishe already used the same word. That's what David Nezer says, that Barbanel. The Haim says, they're going to turn God into a physical being and therefore he's limited. So, then they also use the word he slaughters. Yeah. The Shach says that from a pandemic from uh from from a dever, your skin becomes red. It looks like your blood was spilled. All these they're all struggling with the word because it's such a rare rare term to use. So, they give different explanations. You have David Nezer, you have the Barbanel, you have the Haim, you have the Shach. It's still difficult. What's the remember? They're all giving justifications why he uses the word but earlier he used a different word. See, he Moshe knew a different word. Hashem had a different word. I can't. So, it's interesting in this word Rashi understands that everything is understood. The layman has a buzz. The whole story has to be read differently. He's not going to deal with a few basic premises in Yiddishkeit. But it's I'm just going to say this as a disclaimer. Sometimes we can understand this philosophically, but in the body and the nervous system, there's still angst that's not worked out. So, this is not just an idea, you know, it's here. That's also important. The mind is important, but permeating living with it is sometimes an avoid. I'm just saying this because I mean you can hear ideas, but if I don't feel safe in my body, it's not going to help. Because the nervous system reacts to things and it has its own language. And the language of the nervous system is not intellectual because it develops pre-verbally before there was intellect. It develops on a very, very primal, primal level. From what? Oh. From that story? No, it's important to acknowledge that. Sometimes people do a lot of work on themselves and they still don't know, why did I respond this way? Because the body has its own language. Body has own language. I remember at my father's funeral, Elie Wiesel spoke. You know Elie Wiesel was? So, he said like this. I still remember what he said. He said that they were very close friends. They were both journalists. So, he said in Halacha, you have Halachas of Avelus for parents. How do you grieve for parents? For siblings. Yeah, for spouses, for children, chas v'shalom, chas v'shalom. There's Halachas for Avelus. He says, "But there's no Halachas what happens when you lose a best friend." What happens? What do you do? You don't do Keriah, you don't sit Shiva, you don't say Kaddish. What do you do? It doesn't say. It's a best friend. So, he said he was speaking in Yiddish, he said, "Aber the heart hot in the eigen Halachas." But the heart has its own Halachas. The heart has its own Shulchan Aruch. So, first I thought it was an Elie Wiesel, you know, enlightened you know, as Let's put it this way, a Litvish upstart. A heimisha ehrlicha Yid is going to say. Then I was learning Maseches Sanhedrin. And it's the I think Perek Gova, Perek Zayin, it speaks about people who get the death penalty. So, the din is that ein misabelin al ein. The Halachas of Avelus, you know, if somebody was Avodah Zarah or murder and Beis Din kills them, so the regular Halachas of Avelus don't apply in terms of Shiva, Keriah, all these things. The Mishnah says, "Avel mis'aynin al ein." But the family still grieves. "She'ein aninus ela bil Because a new news is in the heart. You can't tell a mother or father or child and there's you know your son was a criminal. It's true my son was a criminal, my daughter was a criminal, my mother was a criminal. You're right. But ain't a new news Allah believe, you know, the heart heart to Reagan Allah has. So I saw that too. It was a missioner. I'm saying we have to understand as the good for to Reagan Allah has. That's also part of God's plan. So when we learn about these things, there's the cover, which is critical. But there's also equally critical is how the translates into my nervous system cuz that's the language. That's the bridge between the mind and the body. The bridge between the mind and the body is the nervous system. I'm saying this as a premise to be able to understand the to be able not just understand but to relate to this. The word gives the answer. Why motion did not demand and complain? Well, what? Are you kidding me? Cannot obliterate millions of people. That's not what you do. And it's your children. Anyone. Anyone, but especially your children and the people that you invested everything in. What's the the meaning of slaughter? The concept of slaughter that we call slaughtering. What's the concept of slaughter in Yiddish? So he says even a ben chamash, even a five-year-old child understands that shita is not we want to kill animals. We're animal killers. That's not what the word shita means. If you want to kill an animal, go kill an animal. The word shita is not to kill an animal. That's not the point. In fact, just to kill an animal is very problematic. Sa'ar ba'alei chayim is mid'oraita. Shita is not we're animal killers. What's the idea of shita? The idea of shita is to be machsher the ba'al chai, to make the animal uh machsher How do you say that? Uh fitting fitting kosher Yeah, that's the word kosher, right? Machsher, to make it kosher, which means make it fitting that it should be ra'ui for a person to eat it. It should be The person should be able to eat it. Uh Since you're talking about a child learning chamishah chumshei Torah, he brings in 26 says in parshas Mikeitz, "Utvach v'hechev v'hochin." Yosef speaks about the meal for his brothers, right? So, shecht the animals and prepare it. Prepare it. That they should be able to eat it. Rebbe Pirkei Avos told us, "Shcheit yafeh." Yitzchak sent Esau to go hunt. So, he said, "The way I want you to do it is I want you to shecht the animals. V'al tachileni neveilah." So, Rashi already says, "Why are you shechting it? Just put an arrow into the animal." "I need you to be to shecht yafeh. You should shecht it." What's yafeh? Yafeh means He's telling Esau, "You have to shecht it properly cuz if not, I won't be able to eat it." If there's no shita, it's a neveilah. If you just kill an animal or it just dies, it's called a neveilah and I won't let you eat it. So, the whole meaning of shita is it's a process that makes it fitting and edible that a human being, the Jew, should be able to eat it. Which means in other words that the point of shita is not we want to kill the animal. Kill it. That's not the word. The contrary. The shita is in order that the animal should actually be able to become part of the part of the adam, part of the human being. And that's the only reason that Yiddishkeit I mean in parentheses I'm saying it's not a discussion there. But that's the reason that Yiddishkeit even justifies shchita. It's the system that God created not to kill animals. It's a system of sublimating the chai to be able to become part of the medaber. It's explained in in in in in in Sefer HaIkkarim, Rabbi Yosef Albo, and also in Chassidus it's a big idea that the whole system of the the ecosystem that Hashem created the domem serves the tzomeach, the tzomeach serves the chai, the chai serves the medaber, right? Domem is earth and water, it serves the tzomeach. Which means it serves the whole world of botany, planting, all the all the all produce and vegetation, which can't happen without soil and without water, of course. And the tzomeach serves the chai, the whole animal kingdom, from insects to mammals to fish to birds, all live from the tzomeach. And the chai, the animal kingdom, serves the medaber, the human being. And the whole ecosystem, everyone is giving, everybody is contributing. Without earth, there could be no produce. Without water, there could be no produce. Without produce, nobody would be able to live. No mammal could live. Nobody could live. This is their nourishment and oxygen. Yeah? And then man returns to earth, afar adam afar tashuv, and that's the cycle, right? The whole ecosystem, it's so intricate and incredible. So everyone is serving, everyone is contributing, and then the medaber, right? Redu, you rule it, right? You could control it all, and then the medaber stops. He says, Here it goes into narcissism. It's all for me. I get to eat the steak, and what happens with me? Nothing. I eat the steak and I look for the next steak for tomorrow. Doesn't work that way. When the medaber serves Hashem, so now the whole world is sublimated. So the domem is part of the tzomeach, the tzomeach is part of the chai, chai is part of the and the is now subsumed in the divine. And now the cycle continues. So, there's a symphony. It's not like the buck stops here. Suddenly, I became God and I now rule the world and everybody is for me. That's a dysfunctional perspective. You extricate yourself from the symphony of the cosmos. That was a very nice way of putting it. You extricate yourself from the symphony of the cosmos. So, the idea of is not we're animal killers. Let's go kill animals. No, the idea of is on the contrary that the goes through a that becomes a little bit free by that kind. You have it in also by that kind. When tells about and he takes the sword to slaughter the sword to slaughter his kid, then we define himself as a child killer. My religion teaches me that you take children and you slaughter them, you kill them. The word is God. Of course, it was only a test, but what was perception? This is an order of God. That he transcends his physical state as a soul embodied in a body and he becomes a carbon only becomes completely divine. A carbon That's the idea. And over there the word is used. And that's what means in God. Based on this, we'll understand why uses the word in the middle. He's going to say here a few paragraphs, which is like olive base of God, but sometimes we we forget it. Or we never learned it. Remember he's trying to explain to that Rashi doesn't have to answer this question. Cuz if you learned Chumash with Rashi well, you already know the answer or you figure out the answer. That's why everything is going back to the basics. It's known also in traditional making in many Sukkot that Hashem is a home, he's compassionate. He's gracious. He's the ultimate of goodness and kindness because he's the author of goodness and kindness. In other words, the greatest goodness and kindness that any human being can cultivate in life. People are very kind, especially people sitting in this room and full of love. Whatever you have, where did you get this? Love didn't come from some blind cell that after billions of years decided to experience and give you an experience of love. A mindless cell even after billions of years won't experience the consciousness of infinite love. So all the love and all the goodness that we experience in the world that comes from the author of kindness and goodness. So he's the author of kindness. The second thing is when I let you know the author I read this to what every child needs to learn in school. And every that Hashem gave to people any people certainly the that he gave to his treasured people, the Jewish people it's for the it's for the goodness of the people who received it. If it's coming from the foundation of goodness and kindness and from the author of goodness and kindness, every is for the goodness. It's not only a spiritual thing. You do this and you're going to get a check and that's not the word, it's much more than that. By living according to this manual, this blueprint, their life in this world is the way it should be even materially. That's the whole theme of if you follow my laws I'll give rain etc. All the blessings. The point here is that even the child learning understands number one that God is the author of kindness and the ultimate kindness. And is a and a kind And number two therefore all the bits for that were given it's for the goodness of the person and not just goodness in a mystical way or in the future world but in this physical world the best goodness. From them it's not a it's not it's not to torture to oppress to to to take vengeance to control to curtail to oppress. From them first statement leader is What's the what's the converse side of this the other side? As when the folk need the may be civil. What's man is for them mine is for this and is need the the owners goofer but they to make him sign the sign him in the mansion other than the stumble shuffle. No this is the sign This gives us a perspective whenever you talk about punishment. The word punishment is a very very harsh term and it could be misunderstood. People think when it says in the you're going to get punished. What does it mean? I want to punish you. Why do I want to punish you? Revenge. You started up with me. I'll teach you who's boss. Maybe revenge. Maybe I'm angry. Maybe I'm impulsive. Maybe I lose myself. Maybe I'm out of control. I don't know what to do. But that's a misunderstanding of the whole year site. The way it has to be understood is that when the person is not aligned with these civil as it says in the title it's not the when you speak about punishment, it's not the punishment itself in order to take revenge of the person. And he says God forbid to say that. God forbid to say that. It's like even with parents, think about human parents. You'll say when they stay, they discipline or punish their children, they want to take revenge from them. Because you didn't go to bed when you were supposed to, because you didn't eat your dinner you're supposed to, because you didn't do your chore, because you didn't listen to me, because you ran into the street, therefore I'm going to take revenge. You know what you're going to think about such a father and a mother, right? They're busy taking revenge from their children. Or they have to show who's boss. You're not going to think you're the boss. You I have to basically it's an ego thing. Or I just lose it. I just lose it. I don't know why I'm doing it. I I just lost it. All these things are normal human things. And we put it all on God. Cuz you know, our models for Hashem, right? As children, who becomes our models for God? Huh? Yeah, the people who are our protectors. They become our models for God. So we, you know, we we right away project. And then you open up a mission and the whole mission is experienced through that lens. And when it's experienced through that lens, it wreaks havoc. And the worst part is you have to love me, too. I had a classmate whose father was a abusive father. He was a abusive father. He was a Soviet trauma victim. And he was beaten as a kid and he would beat his kids constantly. The worst thing was when he finished, they had to kiss his hands. The hands that helped them. You understand? So now you have to love me, too. At least if I know you're a and you're a dangerous man, so at least my system knows you're sick, you're crazy, and I have to protect myself. But here, the poor child, you don't know already, like so your nor your sanity is played with. Now you have to love me, too, cuz I'm your best friend. So abuse is really friendship. And beating somebody is really kindness. You Sometimes this is worse than the abuse itself. Cuz you don't have self-respect anymore. That means I can't trust my feelings, my body, my mind. You completely mishuga. And the results are quite evident. The thing you say, "If you do a mitzvah, serve Hashem with joy." And if not, are you going to burn in Gehenna? I'm telling you you're going to burn if you don't serve Hashem with joy. Tell me, how much joy can you experience through that? So if joy means I pinch my cheeks like this, I'm happy if I use Hashem with joy. And then the after Hashem Elokecha. Every day, the after love God. Who should I love? This vindictive, impulsive, what I'm experiencing as impulsive, vindictive, tyranny, oppression. That's why it's so important to be able to heal from these things. People sometimes never heal from it. So he says Has v'shalom to think a punishment is I want to take revenge. Other than stam bestrafen. OH, YOU KNOW WHAT? JUST STAM, NOT even for revenge. You broke the rule, I punish. WHY? I HAVE TO punish you. You don't start up with me. As I say, it is. Cuz I said so. No, das ist l'tova sadam. It all has to be seen in the prism of it may be difficult and sometimes painful. Painful He's not saying it's not painful. But l'tova sadam, there's a goodness here. The ba'al da'as and also they have punishments in Torah that take away a person's life. You have death penalty. Or you have the different magafis that you had throughout the Torah where people died. So, what's the little tova sodom here? What's the goodness? So, the ball, that's a schnitzel. Give it back to Does from mighty I'll translate. Because a person did not live according to the civil to the commandment of Hashem, which only then can the person live a life that is true of the name life. Interesting expression. A life that's worthy of the name life, you know, calling you're living. You could be living and you could be a zombie, a living zombie, you know, a dead man walking. Only when a person is living a life that's worthy of the name life, both spiritually and physically, materially. But when this person went away from that because they did not follow the mitzvah of Hashem. And the person transgressed these sins and especially chamudis very serious. In order to avoid a chiyutzar, a life of pain in this world. A person should say, "What do I need life for?" Or or furthermore, like Rifka said, "Katzti bachaya. I'm disgusted with life." Life is disgusting. I'm disgusted it life. It's so much pain. So, Hashem takes away the life of this world for the benefit of the person to avoid from him He shouldn't endure means exhausted, depleted, anxious, difficult, challenging life in this world. Rashi says in that Avraham Avinu, who was a tzaddik and a complete tzaddik and fearful of God, etc., etc., and he died 5 years before his time. 175 instead of 180. Why? So, Rashi says because Esau lost the moral plot and to avoid from Avraham Avinu this pain in this world from seeing Esau and how he's behaving, Hashem took away 5 years. 1 second. When you have a sin like this, so sometimes there's something else. It's not just life here is painful. It's that the person needs to go through a purity and a cleanliness. They should be able to experience which they would never be able to experience without this. What is he saying here? When we talk about death, right, from our perspective, so death is the end. The person is alive and then they're dead. We don't see anything. It's just a corpse. You bury it. But really, what's the emes? The truth is that the word death is not really the appropriate word. Life, you know, is there life after death, right? That's a big question. And the answer is if something is dead, it's dead. There's no life after death. But if something is alive, it doesn't die. Because if it's really alive, it's alive. Life is is alive. Life doesn't die. That which is not alive dies. It also was never alive. That which is alive lives. So the word death is a word that we use, but what's really the right the right term? The right term for it is really unplugged. Unplugged. What do I mean? Yeah. If I could use a physical metaphor, it's not accurate it's not exactly, but it's just a little muscle. Take a refrigerator. When you unplug a refrigerator, nobody's going to say yeah, the electrons died. The electricity died. Electricity doesn't die. Sorry. Well, you unplugged the refrigerator. No. What happened was the refrigerator does not manifest electricity. Electrons don't die. So what happened to the electricity before and now? When the refrigerator was plugged in, the electricity flowed through the wires and the refrigerator could cool the food or the computer could function or the telephone could function. If you take out the plug, what happens? The electricity doesn't die. It's just the physical object is not manifesting. It's not channeling the electricity cuz it's not plugged into the source of electricity. Death means unplugged. When we're alive, what we call alive, is it Does Does a soul die? A soul can't die. Electricity doesn't die. A SOUL DOESN'T DIE. WHATEVER IS ALIVE IS ALIVE. It's alive. If it's really life, life doesn't die. Hi lad be kind to that sir. Physical life means you're plugged in. In other words, the goof is a channel for the electricity of the soul. For the electricity of the currents that vitalize and vivify the body. What does death mean? God forbid, what is death? It means life doesn't die. Life can't die. It's unplugged, meaning the manifestation of the body manifesting it and being channeled, it's not in the body anymore. I don't mean to compare a body to a refrigerator, obviously. But my point I'm just trying to bring out the point the soul doesn't die. It's just I don't see it anymore in the body. When a person is alive, the body is channeling the electricity. Both the electricity, you know, giving the pumping, huh? Pumping the blood and what that electricity represents is the consciousness of the soul that's giving it life. Now, it's like unplugged. So, for example, if there's an illness, God forbid. So, the body now, it's like the wire that's damaged. So, it can't channel it, right? Or you damage the computer, so it can't channel it. So, there's an interruption in the flow. But the life flow is completely present. It's just we don't like it. It's hard for us. It's it's it's painful for us because I want to see it channeled in the physical body. So, I could talk to you and I could see you and I could touch you. And now the body is just silent, but nothing happened to the life. That's the whole idea of eternal life. So, the pain and the grief is very real. But the pain and the grief is because I have no way of accessing it within my physical experience. Because we talk to each other body to body. But the soul, the life that's being channeled through the body, that life doesn't get interrupted. It's just not in the Caleb. It's not in the vessels. It's not in the container. It's not channeled through the physical item. So, that's the side we have to understand. When somebody understands that it's not like oil in haba is some weird reward afterwards. Oil in haba means that the person continues to live. They're not living channeled in the physical in the physical realm. In another realm. In a different realm, yeah. It's not less alive. In many ways it's much more alive. Why? Because now the soul lives through the tools of the body. So it's limited by that. How how far can I see? I could see whatever the retina, the chemistry of my eye allows me to see. How much can how long how for how far can I hear? How much could I even understand? Based on my brain, my physical brain, what I could understand. When the soul leaves the body, it also sees. But what does it see? As the Gamara says, it sees from one end of the world to the other end of the world. Why? Because it doesn't see through the physical eye. It sees through spiritual vision. Spiritual vision is infinite. What does it understand? We don't even understand the Rambam says that you can't even understand the bliss of the shamah that it experiences. He says, "Go explain somebody who was born blind colors." He said, "There's nothing to talk about." It's like old concept, it's concepts. The bliss of the soul when it's plugged into the source is incredibly powerful. Every bliss that we have in this world is just a fraction of a fraction. So he says like this. If the whole point of the mitzvah is for the goodness of the person to be able to be alive, to be able to believe live the best life physically and spiritually, the point of the punishment is always for the person. There's no such a thing a punishment cuz I want to punish you. Sometimes you have very severe punishments in Torah. For example, life is taken away. The pshat is because their life in this world is going to be an is gamata to leben. It's going to be a useless life. Just like you have sometimes people who live life, but they're dead even when they're living. Like Rifka says, "Kasti bechaya, I'm disgusted with my life." Unfortunately, we sometimes see when people are depressed, you know, or have crazy levels of anxiety, and they say, "I wish I'm not alive." You sometimes have that people, they wish uh you know, unfortunately, everybody should be familiar with it, but sometimes you have a person literally prays for their death. It's a horrible horrible thing. People who never experienced don't understand it. They're like, "How could you be like that?" Cuz a healthy person doesn't do that. A healthy person loves life. But there's people that have so much pain for whatever reason or they're suffering so much that simply their physical life is unbearable, unbearably painful. Sometimes for a soul it's unbearably painful. Huh? Yeah. Rifka said "Katzti bechayay." Eliyahu Hanavi said "I don't want to live." Moshe Rabbenu said "Hargeni na haray." Who said "Tov maysi michayay." Tov maysi michayay. Yonah said it. Better it for live than to die. Yirmiyahu Hanavi said "I wish that the when I came out of my my mother's womb I was stillborn. Haras oilam racham, I should have remained pregnant forever, died in the womb." Yirmiyahu Hanavi, talking about the greatest of the greatest, because they were so sensitive, because they saw so much pain, they all wished on themselves death. They didn't kill themselves. Chas v'shalom. Huh? What? He knew that the pain of Avraham Avinu was such that it's going to be so powerful. Avraham Avinu changed the whole world and his own grandson Esau became a ruthless murderer. That would have killed Avraham Avinu more than anything else. That would have taken it, would have destroyed him. So that's what Rashi says. So you see a it's not because Avraham hate God hated Avraham, going to take revenge from Avraham. Because in in in Judaism the spirituality the the the life beyond the body, before the body, another body is very real. It's not like death is is a fake thing. Remember, all of us we have a period that we live. You know, Abraham has not been here for almost 4,000 years. He's not less alive. Motion of it hasn't been there for 3 and 1/2 thousand years. He's not less alive. They were just here for a couple of years. Where are they all? Again, it's hard for us to relate cuz our job is to be in this world. But it it's just important to understand how physically, right? When we speak about Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, life is not defined by the fact that the refrigerator says, "Oh, I'm alive. Now you're alive." And suddenly you unplug the refrigerator, all of life is gone. It's Thomas. In 1985, the previous Lubavitcher Rebbe that I had a grandson. Garari was his name. And he took books from his library. You probably know this story. He went into his grandfather's library. It's a very very priceless They have a lot of very old forum and he started to sell them. You know the mice? There was a whole big tunnel. Huh? Yeah. Yeah. And he said that the previous Lubavitcher Rebbe had three daughters. One was killed in Treblinka. There were two left. One was Garari and another one married the Rebbe. So, he died in 1950. So, you split it 50/50. So, Lubavitcher Rebbe gets 50% I get 50% cuz he was a grandson and I could sell it. He made a lot a lot of money from it. The Rebbe said that the library didn't belong to my father-in-law. It belonged to the movement. It belonged to the system. I can't sell it. You can't sell it. It's It's It's doesn't It's not It's not personal property. So, it was a big It was a gun to mice. So, he said that once out of the Fabrengen. It was very, very how he said it. He said, "Person tells me, was What do you want? Schon 35 years Yeah, schon 50 for the schwer is not tough." So, already 35 years that your father-in-law's gone. What do you want? Like 35 years How long, you know, it's finished. So, he said, "Ich habe nicht mit dem kein suffer mit der Fest. I don't I don't have any common language with a person who speaks like this." He says, "If it's 35 years, was er wird starker und hecher und lebendig. It's 35 years, yeah, that the life grows." Cuz it's a whole different hashkafa, how you look at it. You look at it either as an neshama is real or it's not real. If neshama is not real, so then, yeah, death is death. If neshama is real, it's a whole different perspective. So, when you speak about even a punishment that he says here, where the life is taken away in Olam Hazeh, never should a person think it's vindictive or vengeance. It's because their life in Olam Hazeh at this point would be purposeless. Sometimes we don't understand why or how. But something in their life is going to be a a very, very difficult experience in this life to the point of katzvei chaim. It's a It's an ausgeimate leben. And the best thing for the soul is to go into the bliss of Olam Haba, meaning of intimacy with God not being embodied in the physical kailyn, the physical manifestation. One second, one second. Sometimes it's even more than that. And that's what he adds, the second point is that sometimes the punishment itself or the process itself, whatever that punishment may be, sometimes it's not death, is necessary in order to bring the person to the purity that they need so they should be able to experience with their soul everything they have to experience. Sometimes a soul comes to the next world after a person passes away. Yeah, and if there's a lot of toxicity connected to it or dirt connected to it, it simply cannot experience the bliss of connection. It has too much filth and dirt attached to it. So that cleanliness is not a punishment in a bad way. It's the best thing you can do for it. Why is it the best thing you can do for it? Cuz you you cleanse it in a way that can experience what it really is. Now, it doesn't mean it's not it's easy. Right, but everybody knows taking and then, you know, some forms of therapy or other journeys where you have to spit out stuff, it's very very painful. But painful is painful, but not dangerous. In other words, the pain is if I'm sitting with some of you know this personally. If you're sitting with stuff for many many years, traumas and wounds, and they became part of your coping mechanism, to get rid of them is going to be very painful. A mess. Crazy pain. But once you get rid of it, ah. Ah, thank you. Wow. You know, you're carrying like a hundred washing machines in your brain. The pressure is not it's not just leaving go. I say, this is your coping mech- this is your survival. To let go is the hardest thing. It's a it's not a punishment. It's a punishment. What's punishment? We use the word punishment when we hear the word punishment is like I'm going to punish you in order to show you who's boss. So you have to change the vocabulary. Punishment is not that. Punishment means the consequences of dysfunction, the consequences of of wounds, the consequences of mistakes that I need to extricate myself from in order to be able to be the person I'm supposed to be. To take away a person from that process is the cruelest thing you can can to them. To help them finish that process is the kindest thing you can do to them. That's a That's the truth, but it doesn't mean it's not painful. It's a pure It's a form That's what tahara means. That's what zichuch means. Sometimes you confront situations and confronting them is very, very painful. You know, sometimes you have to make a telephone call, sometimes you have to have a conversation, sometimes you got to deal with something, and it's going to be painful because it's stuck inside of me. You know, the splinter has been embedded for 51 years. Taking out that splinter is not going to come easy, especially if it's not only a splinter, it's an infection. But people go through that surgery. Why? Cuz they want to get rid of the disease. And the same is true emotionally. So he says, "Sometimes the inner That itself is what makes the person susceptible and a kail for the mahab." Based on these introductions, number one, what schit is, and number one, what God is, and what mitzvahs are, and what punishments are. Now we'll understand why Moshe uses the word vayishchaten, and what Moshe was saying. And that's going to be the last point we're going to learn today. Sif hey. And then we'll con- Okay. Yeah. Sif hey. Now we'll understand, back to our story. When we speak about what happened in our parsha, and why Moshe did not speak up against the very the very punishment of killing out the Jewish people, just like he did it by the chet ha'egel. He himself changed the way he did it. By the chet ha'egel, he said one thing, and now he doesn't say that. When Moshiach was davening by the eagle, right? Shortly after you finished what did he say? Why are you angry against your people? These are your people. In other words, of course they made a mistake. Of course there was a terrible debacle. Of course there was betrayal 40 days after Martin you know middle of the honeymoon. You know middle of the wedding it's like Imagine middle of the wedding you know the color goes and betrays her husband you know in the middle of the in the middle of the wedding that's what the manager says about the they're still by Mount Sinai and they're busy with the I understand. But it's your people it's your child. Let's rehabilitate. Let's forgive. There's concept of truther. There's atonement right? Everything is There's forgiveness in the world. People make mistakes. Who doesn't make mistakes? You forgive. And what's going to happen? And then they'll continue living in this world the way they're supposed to live in this world. Not a life of pain and anxiety and torment and inner emptiness and cuts the because they'll be aligned with the with the with the blueprint of our sham they're going to obey the the commandments of God. So of course he says that. Why doesn't he say it here? My shank in the here from the aglin for the to only Before our sham says I'm going to strike them with the pandemic he says how much longer will this nation provoke me and fight me? And how much longer right? I'd on until what point will they never believe in me with all the miracles that I do do do in their midst? It's not a one-time event. On a like, how long is this going to happen? Like it's constantly happening. This is not the first thing. It's like again and again and again and again, and there's no change. And it's not just a specific thing they're not listening. It's actually affecting the very foundation of the relationship, emunah. They're not going to have any trust and belief in me despite everything that's happening today. Remember, they left Mitzrayim, they saw the makos, they saw krias Yam Suf, there was matan Torah, they were eating the manna, there's be'er shel Miriam, there's the clouds of glory, there was malchus Amalek. Nonetheless, nonetheless, rebelling and betraying and they they don't trust in me, they're not mamin in me. The way Moshe understood this was, and this is what he meant with with vayishkotem is, it's not Hashem had a fit of rage, he lost it, he's like, I am done, I'm going to kill you all and I'm finished with you. I'm angry, I'm upset, that's when you read it, I'm upset, I can't take this anymore. You are ungrateful, you are crazy children, you are horrible children, you are heinous criminals, and therefore we're done, we're finished. And Moshiach says, yeah, it's not going to look good on your resume, so relax. He says, okay, we'll do it over 40 years. The word is vayishatem. Hashem says, this is an isgamu chata lebanon alum haza. Their souls are all suffering. They're constantly provoking me. Constantly antagonistic. Like he said, "I don't want you not sunny. I don't want to loyal me me And what everything happened, there is such a profound trauma here in this world. Maybe from everything in Mitzrayim. That their life in this world is a miserable life. So that I WANT TO KILL THEM, I WANT TO GET RID OF THEM. NO, I LOVE THEM. They're my children. I DON'T WANT THEM TO live in a miserable world and a miserable life thinking that God hates them. The worst The worst feeling in the world is that God hates you cuz that means self-hate. There's nobody that can hate you as much as you hate yourself, you know that, right? When you like yourself, then everybody could hate you and you're good. And when you hate yourself, everybody could love you and it's meaningless. Try it out. Those who hate themselves, the whole world could love them. It's worthless. It's like pouring water into a bottomless pit. If you hate yourself deep down, those of you who know what I'm talking about know what I'm talking about. I can give you a billion compliments a day, it's worthless. And what's the deepest form of self-hate when you think God hates you? Cuz what's God? God is your soul, that's you. The shamash in the satabi tori, that's your chiyus, that's your pnimius. Here's a people that really thinks God hates them. The miserable people. I'm And the more love I show, the more the more they think I hate them. I took I'm taking them out in clubs. All I want to be is be with them. I just want to have intimacy with them. You have this in a marriage sometimes when people are so traumatized and wounded, the more love their wife or their husband gives them, the more they get provoked. It's like, "What are you trying to do?" Cuz the closer you get to me, the more I run away. Anybody knows what I'm talking about? You don't have to all nod at the same time. I hope some of you don't know what I'm talking about. But those who do do, the closer she gets to you, the more crazy you become. Why? Because you hate yourself so much that deep down you know that it can't be that somebody loves me. So they love me either they're trying to manipulate me or exploit me or they're crazy, so I should have certainly not trust them. And that's what's really happening here. THE MORE LOVE LIKE I'M DOING EVERYTHING JUST TO BE WITH YOU AND YOU'RE LIKE EVERY 2 SECONDS LET'S GO BACK to para, you know, the cucumbers in Egypt were amazing. The sushi in mitzrayim when they were throwing the boys into the river were the most tasty sushi in the world. The stupid man that we have here. Adonai Adonai Adonai Adonai. You know what? This is really not working out. My tired kindalach, I want to give you bliss. Let's just Let's This world is a hard place, you know. I maybe didn't realize how how crazy this world is. And this trauma is crazy. So let's unplug. I kind of want to go to a different realm and go to a different realm and we'll have intimacy forever. That's what happened. And that's why he says the word vayishchatem. What's vayishchatem? How do you know that we're animal killers? We love killing animals. We love dead cows. Avraham Avinu hated Yitzchak. He wanted to shecht Yitzchak cuz he hated Yitzchak. He wanted a dead son so he could he could that start dancing from a dead boy. No. Because Avraham Avinu understood that Yitzchak's embodiment in this body is one form of energy. It's a very actually limited form of energy. And now I say give him back to me. I want to have bliss with Yitzchak in Olam Haba. Vayishchatem is not to destroy the animal. It's letayva denishcha. It's moshech merushus l'rushus. Instead of being a bal chai, HE BECOMES A MEDABER. VAYISHCHATEM BAMIDBAR, INSTEAD of living in this world where you think everyone hates you and I hate you and God hates you and you hate you. You know what? Let's be together in Olam Haba and we'll finally enjoy each other. Right. Right. So we have to recognize that that that's also true. You're right. That's why we cherish physical life. And not only cherish it, pikauch nefesh is doche kol ha'torah kulah. God cherishes physical life. So why is there a concept in Torah of an onesh misah? Not because we don't cherish physical life, because sometimes the physical life simply cannot serve its purpose. And then it's torture. Sometimes it's torture in a way that a person knows that it's torture. Sometimes the soul knows that it's torture. Remember, the soul knows everything. If I'm so blocked that my body doesn't know it, it only means my body doesn't know it. But it doesn't mean it's not torture. You know, I want bliss with you. You're my children. I'm not killing you. I hate you. We read Chumash with with a lens. We have to realize we read Chumash with a lens of trauma. This is not judgment. I also do. We all do. That's a good question. It's a good question. Why is the Chumash written in a way that it lends itself to the lens of trauma? That's That's a good question. The answer is I don't know what the answer is, but maybe the answer is The Chumash was written thousands years ago in a and then it was not seen through the lens of trauma cuz then death and life it was very obvious what death and life were. After bias ration after the Greeks came to the world and the materialism became everything now when we read Chumash the language of God and the soul and death and life is is is is so archaic it's so weird it's like you must be a crazy weird weird thing. And that's exactly why Torah needed the commentary in order to be able to re visit the original texts from a place of internal empowerment. People say why was Siddur revealed when it was revealed but before the Baal Shem Tov what happened? Baal Shem Tov lived 300 years ago Judaism is around 3 and a half 3000 years so what happened? After 3000 years the Baal Shem Tov made a new religion? Yeah? This Sicha from the Rebbe was said in 1980 so what till 1980? The Pshat is it's not new for Shalom it's never new it's it's it's shining a light on seeing the same thing. So the text of Chumash is written very direct it's it's almost very real it's very real and whenever something is very real if you're not open to the truth of it it can also make you crazy. But it's very very real it's real it's like it's it's raw it's raw it's naked it's without you know fanfare and and drama and sophistication it's it's boom. Huh? Yeah God is like very personal and intimate you know the philosophers turned God into this detached unfeeling being because it worked for philosophy. In Chumash God is very emotional he's more emotional than anybody else. He gets emotional yeah. So some will say that's heresy it's clear. In philosophy it's kafira to say God is emotional. In Kabbalah, it's like all of Kabbalah, of course, he's emotional. He's in love. Huh? Lashon nisi. And the sham lashon nisi. But lashon nisi only means that the emotions come from a place of infinity. That's what it really means. So, Alter Rebbe tried to make peace between the philosophers and that it's not I love you because I need you, it's I need you because I love you. And it's not I love you because I'm imperfect and I have this hole in my heart that I need your company. It's actually a love that comes from the core and because it comes from the core, it's a choice. And because it's a choice, so the love is also infinite. Okay, but all these What I'm trying to bring out is that the language of Chumash is very, very raw. And that's why as generations continue, right? Matan Torah didn't come with Mishnah, it didn't come with Gemara. Things developed. We What happened to the Gemara? What happened to to Einem, Rishonim, Achronim, Kabbalah? And the answer is kol oso yofeh b'ito. Every generation, God reveals the depth of Torah, the pnimus of Torah in a way that the same text becomes relevant to us in the vocabulary that our souls can celebrate it in different generations. But you're right. The language on its own is very, very Yeah, that's why we have this question. If we want We wouldn't have this whole discussion. If it would have said, "I want to take you to a different realm and be intimately blissful with you." The word intimacy you won't find in Chumash and blissful you won't find in Chumash. If you don't read If you don't learn Chassidus. If you don't learn Chassidus, you'll see it in every pasuk. Ani Hashem Elokecha, what does that mean? We say, "I'm the Lord your God." What does Alter Rebbe say? Ani Hashem, Yud Kay Vav Kay is haya hoveh v'yiyeh, which is infinite. Elokechem is your consciousness. Your consciousness, I want your consciousness to be plugged into infinity. Oh, that's pretty nice. Aniy Hashem Elokechem, I never thought I never thought IT MEANS I'M YOUR GOD. THAT'S IT. REMEMBER, I'M GOD, I'm your God, and that's it. It's like leave me alone, do me a favor. We're trying to live in a democracy. I mean trying. When when did when did the When did the Bal Shem was born in 1698? 1698 officially in history is the year that you the European enlightenment begins. Nobody puts it together, but it's all together it's all hashgacha. The enlightenment created the greatest threat for Judaism. There's the physical threats of Judaism, that's obvious, but the enlightenment created a spiritual threat for Judaism. What's enlightenment? Enlightenment is the focus of the individual. The focus is self-expression, self-actualization, the search for science. It's not anymore the king and the pope. It's the fraternity, it's brotherhood, it's it's it's celebrating reason, it's celebrating the self. All these ideas, that became a real threat to Judaism. A sophisticated threat. It's not just the want to kill us. Okay, that's that's that's also a serious threat, but that the Jews dealt with their whole life. And and and that they survived. There was no reform movement in the time of the Rishonim or after Churban Bayis Sheini. I mean, you had the Tzedukim and you had the Issim, you had the Karaites, right? And then they fell away. And the Torah remained. But with the enlightenment, yeah, half of the Jewish people checked out. That became it served as the greatest threat to the Judaism. Because the way to defeat the Jewish people is not through war, like in Israel. The Arabs didn't defeat Israel on the battlefield of war. They defeated Israel on the battlefield of conversation, of morality. When you convince a Jew that he's not moral, that's how you kill him. How do they kill Israel? How do they destroy Israel? On the battlefield they didn't destroy Israel. They destroyed Israel by convincing Israelis that they're an immoral people. You understand what I'm telling you? That's the worst thing for Jews. When you tell a Jew you're immoral, you won. When Jews feel that they're immoral, they'll give you everything and they'll sacrifice themselves and their children. That's what the the nefesh the Jewish people who were insecure did to themselves. My point is that defeated the Jewish people more than anything else. Why? Because it proved to them Jews need a spirit Jews are a spirit they need a spiritual identity. And that's exactly when the was born cuz came to reveal that God is not there. God is is here. is not a superimposed system as religious ritual which worked well in monarchies and kings. So there's a and there's forget it's good. You're all worshipping Louis the 14th the sugar. And we're worshipping the king of kings. But once the whole idea of kingship is ridiculous. So who needs a man? I DON'T WANT A I'M MY OWN MAN. I DON'T NEED A ANYMORE. WE DON'T BELIEVE IN HIM. Even in England they barely believe in him. Huh? I still have to believe in them, yeah. The queen, the king. We we don't need him. So the CAME AND SAID, "NO, IT'S inside of you. You have to understand who you are. It's the yes." So all the texts need to be able to be seen from a lens of of of much more depth. I don't know that I answered your question. Okay. Huh? It was nice but it didn't answer your question. Okay. Yeah. He wants to know why the text is written in such a harsh way that it lends itself to all these misinterpretations. Huh? The text is a harsh text, but the text is a harsh text because our trust is betrayed and we don't know what an intimate relationship is. An intimate relationship has a harshness to it because it's brutal in a beautiful way. Melech says in Shir Hashirim kasha What's the expression? As Ki azah kamoves ahava, yeah? Kasha kasha el sina. kina Uh that love is as strong as death. Jealousy is as harsh as the abyss. What does he mean? Azah kamoves ahava. Love is as powerful as death. Did anybody here experience love, which is as powerful as death? You did? On the psychedelics or regularly? Or both? Kasha, you know, let's What's azah kamoves ahava? We're scared to love. You love shalom aleichem good Shabbos when I give you this kiss. Azah kamoves ahava, love is as powerful as death. You know why? Cuz when you know how to love, it's it's serious. Love is powerful, it's intense. Cuz all your stacks are there. You invest everything there. It's real. It's it's raw. We're afraid of such relationships. Let's face it. We're all protecting ourselves. I'll be nice to you. I'll give you a little hug. I'll I'll do a favor, but we both protect ourselves. And our marriage, certainly we protect ourselves. We learn that. God, you know what you see in Chumash? God is vulnerable. He's like he doesn't protect himself. He's like you know what if you betray me this world is going to go crazy. I'm I can't live without you. That's what what's the whole of Cosa. If you don't do my relax. If you don't do my what's going to happen? NOTHING. GO BACK. BE GOD. WHAT WHAT WHAT YOU NEED ME TO DO YOUR I'M NOT GOING TO DO YOUR some some some some some simpleton his name is Yankel Schmedel won't do your so the whole world is going to go crazy. No rain, no produce, no vegetation, relax, yeah? In California there's a very good anger management therapy. But it's really very vulnerable. No no no. I'm all in you. I'm all in you. I'm invested in you. Not a billion infinitely. I'm in completely. You know the level of trust in that? It's like a child. I need a It says in Charles of Wash. I need a technique, yeah. It's like a child. A child trusts. How much does a child trust? Completely. And then at what age do we stop? After you got enough disappointments, after your heart was broken 500 times, you stop. Right? But God doesn't stop trusting. So at this point he's a kind of so understands that. says by Midbar. I want to live in bliss with them. This is really not working. Let's go to the next world. We'll have unbelievable intimacy. I'm not trying to kill you. It's like by Midbar. And that's why his argument was a very different argument. And that will be some will continue next time. Thursday morning Thursday morning 7:45. Tomorrow there's a women's class here 9:30. You can tell your wives and daughters. I think theoretically what was my car for 2 weeks. So Just one second. Let me Your call has been forwarded to the Well, then I just have to deal with some Yeah, then