Nasso Class: The Infinite Process of Surrender

the yeshiva.net. >> I want to thank everybody for gracing us and for coming today. It's a pleasure and honor to have all of you. And today's class is dedicated in loving memory of Judy Weiss, Hindab Bas Rebendel, in honor of her ninth yard site today, the 10th of Civ dedicated by her children Ariel Weissur. May her soul be an everlasting source of inspiration and love and blessing. Also dedicated by Rebbitson Esther Roose Shalom Lasishmas in loving memory of Rab Aaron Ben Lily who was a Holocaust survivor and went on to build a beautiful legacy. May his soul be elevated with compassion and blessings and be a source of tremendous flow and inspiration and empowerment. Also dedicated by my one and only mother-in-law Yes, truly one and only Mrs. In loving memory of her dear father, my wife's dear grandfather who we used to call popup is yakayen benakducka, one of the pillars of the community in Pittsburgh, the president of the federation who was instrumental in helping so many individuals and Jewish institutions on the occasion of his 14th yard site this week on the 12th day of Civ. Also I want to mention Miriam Yehudis Bester. Amen. Today we're going to explore one of those fascinating stories in the Tanakh and that is one of the famous riddles of Shimchin known as the story of Samson Shimsha. The problems in Gaza did not begin today or a number of years ago. The problems in Gaza began thousands of years ago. This was the center of a nation known as Pishim. The Philistines who when the Jews were living in the first commonwealth in Israel did not seize waging guerilla warfare, wars, conflicts against the Jews. One of the most enigmatic and fascinating biblical characters is known as Shimchin Hagibber Samson the mighty one and his story is explored in the of this week. Parasi. Parasi includes the mitzvah of the nazer, a man or a woman who decide at some point in their life to live a life of lofty holiness, of sublime holiness, known as a nazerite, a nazer. And this lifestyle comes with many different stipulations. For example, no drinking wine, not cutting the hair, letting the hair grow long, not touching the hair, not allowing themselves to become contaminated or defiled by spiritual impurity from contact with a corpse. That's the lifestyle of a nazadesh. He should be holy or she should be holy. And it's a whole it's a whole fascinating it's a fascinating mitz with many different laws. There's a whole ma a whole track date called Nazer in Mishnayas and Gomorrah which delineates very practically and intricately all of the laws connected to a nazer a man and a woman in our own generation. This is also known was one of the greatest sages of the last generation was known as the raach gone. You've heard of him rau ysef roen. You ever saw a picture of him? Long here. And it's not clear. He never said it clearly. But this circulating story is that he did not touch his hair because he may have accepted upon himself the laws of Nazirus which can be applicable even nowadays. In there was a famous Jew known as Rabbid Hanaz. Rabbi David Cohen. His son Rabbi Sherish Kayen was the chief rabbi of Khifa and his father was a student of Rabbi Ramitzkayen Cook. He was known as David Haner. The Nazer also also had long hair. The ha tells the story of another nazer and that was shimshin and his mother could not have children and an angel appears appears to her and then to her husband manak predicts going to be a child but also tells them how they have to behave with this child and this is all from the book of judges from chapter 13 I believe chapter 13 which is dedicated to the story of shan the next few chapters now this is a very very enigmatic story. Shimshin is not a regular figure. Hashem predicts through the angel great things about Shimshin. He's going to be the leader who's going to begin to save the Jewish people from the pushin the Philistines. There's going to be a spirit of holiness conferred upon him and therefore he grows up in a very very holy ambiance and he becomes a nazer already from childhood. He is one of these nazeras which is why he's so known for his hair which ultimately his wife the leela or thea would have the philistines cut cut shin's hair. Now he dedicates his life to battling the enemies living in Gaza which is the south of Israel the way down to Egypt. And this is what he's dedicating his life. They sought the annihilation of the Jewish people. In one of the very strange stories in the Tanakh and that's a lot because the Tanakh is full of there's not a single story in Tanakh. I told you many times that when you finish reading it it's like and they lived happily ever after. That does not exist. Put it this way the Tanakh is not a bedtime story to help you go to sleep. And the reason is as we once said because the stories in the Tyra are not meant to put you to sleep. They're meant to wake you up. and therefore they never end smoothly. It's like, okay, great. Let's go have coffee. IT'S LIKE, NO, THIS doesn't make sense. I'm protesting. Okay, good. You're awake. You're up. You're alert. You're thinking. Amazing. You're challenging your status quo. Good. That's why if you needed an explanation, there's not a single story that ever ends like ah gashmak Cinderella was triumphant and they enjoyed ecstasy forever. What ecstasy? What enjoyment? What's going on? Why do the bad guys win? Why do the good guys lose? Where? What happened? How do you do such a thing? How is an ethical person? All of these questions and dilemmas are touching upon the mysteries of life. And from among these stories, some of the most strangest and difficult to understand are the stories around Shimshin. We're going to focus on one of those stories today which has become a timeless classic because of the riddle that Shimshin has posed to the Philistines. It's known in Hebrew as Shimshin the riddle of Shimshin. And it's it's really it's a riddle within a riddle within an enigma within a mystery. So it's many layers of riddles wrapped up in each other. What's the point? Why does the tal tell us the story? What is the relevance? what was Shiman trying to teach etc. So let's see this comes from the book of judgesim to refresh your memory from the days when you learned novi you remember when you learned prophets. Yeah, this halva would be more introduced in schools and yeshivas that people should learn Tanakh. It's been uh a neglected uh a neglected uh book. Sometimes Jews think that the Christians gave the world a Tanakh. They don't realize that it's a Jewish book. So this is from Judges chapter 14. It's a longer chapter, but I quoted here a few so you get the the you get the thrust of it. Once Shimshin or Samson went down to a city called Timna, obviously had to go downward down a slope. And while he's in Timna, he notices a certain young Philistine woman. She's one of the daughters of the pushim of the Philistines. And what happens is as the Tanakh describes he comes to his parents and he says this is my this is who I want. This is who I want to marry. His parents are not very thrilled to put it mildly. They say this you're a good kid. You're an amazing boy. You can't get a Jewish nice Jewish girl in Muny in Lakewood and Tom's River. We can go to if you want. They were in what do you have to go here? This is what they say from and from all people. You're going to go to pushim and chimshin tells his father he is she is the right one in my eyes. She is the right one in my eyes. Now the tanakh says his father and mother did not know that this was all orchestrated from God. They thought it was just Shimshin was having a bad day. You know, your child comes to you and says, "This is the girl I want." And you're like, "OMG." And you don't mean, "Oh my Google." All right? And you tell your husband, "Not on my dead body. Not on my dead body. I knew the mother when she was 16. I know the father. I know the baba. I know everything. We're not getting close. They do not know Kashmi." This was all orchestrated by God because really Shimshin was trying to infiltrate the world of the Philistines, the world of the push. Okay. The Torah continues and tells the story how they acquies and they go down with him to Timna. What happens then is there is a a group what is it called? A platoon aras a pride. Huh? A pride. Yeah. a pride of lions yelling or roaring towards Shimshin and because of his strength what happens is he encounters the lion and he kills he slays the lion and he's saved but when this happens he was al alone so his parents did not know about the story they did not know what happened with the lion okay the continues and says he did not tell anybody what he He went he met this woman in Timna and he really appreciated her. He went back home and then it came the time for marriage. So he goes back to Timna that's the next he returns the following year to marry her. He saw her, he met her, he went back home and now it's back time for marriage. He turned aside to look at the remains of the lion that he encountered a year before when he went to Timna to meet her. The lion that he managed to triumph over and save himself. He went to see the remains of the lion. In the lion's skeleton is a skeleton. In the lion's skeleton, he finds a swarm of bees and honey. bees decided to create a beehive in the skeleton of the lion. So this is what Chimsha now sees happen to his lion. So now let's understand the structure. He wants to marry this Philistine girl in Gaza. He encounters a lion who wants to maul him. He manages to slay the lion. A year later when he returns for the marriage ceremony, he passes. He goes to look for the carcass for the corpse of the lion that he killed and he disco discovers that a swarm of bees have built a beehive in the carcass which is now filled with honeycombs. I don't know if any of you ever actually went into a beehive. It's one of the extraordinary uh phenomena of nature. um on Spookra a number of years ago there was a fellow who had a bunch of beehives and I went there one day and I dressed up in the suit and you walk into the beehive and you're talking about tens of thousands of bees who are working in synchronization perfect synchronization everybody in charge on the job all there to serve the queen bee mama be who is the matriarch of this family of tens of thousands of thousands working hard 12-hour a day shifts nonstop. No wonder they die after 30 days. They're exhausted. They're exhausted. They don't go on vacation. And it's extraordinary how they do it. They fly out. They get their nectar. They bring it back. They develop it into honey. They build these beautiful honeycombs. And then they even manage to put a lid on the honeycomb. Fresh honey for everybody to enjoy. Right? Right? There's something very special about the honey that comes out of the bees known as dvash. There's something even called a bee dance. You know what a bee dance is? It's an extraordinary natural phenomenon. You ever notice springtime, summertime in your garden, a bee comes in and is looking around and you only see one bee. 25 minutes later, there's 30 bees. Who told them the news? which who gave them your WhatsApp number that they know to come to your garden. Suddenly there was one bee and now there's 30 bees. The answer is the bee that was visiting went back to the beehive and gave the message. But how? How? And the answer is this is fascinating. The bee dances. I've seen it. You could see videos. The bee actually dances. And the dance is telling its buddies, "Go, there's food. God has given you food. the dance. But how does a dance tell them where the food is? So this is this is it's it's it's it's hard to believe, but this is pure facts of nature. And that is the length of the dance tells them how far the food is. So it's crazy. And how it knows that I believe it's a second per kilometer, 2 seconds per 2 km, 3 seconds per 3 kilometers. And it literally starts dancing. It starts jumping around like without the music. You could put you could put on your own music and but three so let's say 3 seconds 3 kilometers. Okay. But we're 3 km. 3 km could be east, could be west, could be north, could be south. YOU GOT TO THE HIVE. The answer is the bee dances on an angle and it's the angle of the sun and that's how they know 3 kilometers this way, this way, this way, this way. So you could see if the bee is dancing straight, you just go with the sun. Two seconds, two kilometers, YOU'RE GOING TO FIND THE GARDEN. YOU'RE GOING TO FIND Goldberg's garden. You're going to find Finkelstein's garden. If the bee dances on a 90 degree angle, 180 degrees, 45 degrees, that's you go out, you look at the sun, and the bees know exactly where to go. Much better than Google Maps, and they don't get lost. And that's why a few minutes after that bee went home, you're visited by 30 bees who watched the dance and said, "Let's go off." Now, this is fascinating because it's basically the bee in touch with the fact that it's fulfilling its mission on the world. And when it can tell the bees what to do, there's a dance. There's almost like an inherent joy. There's a joy now. So, Shim comes and sees. So, I So, I put on this I was telling I put on this suit and I go into the be and I was watching all of this for a while just to watch it. It's really incredible. You know, we eat honey from a jar and you don't realize like everything how it happened, what it takes to actually develop. So, Shimshin discovers in the carcass of this lion an entire very sophisticated beehive swarming around with honeycombs. What happens next? He takes some of the honey and he shares it with his family. He scoops it into his hands and he ate it as he went along. He rejoins his father and mother. He gives them some of the honey and they eat it too. He didn't tell them the source of the honey. He didn't tell them that he scooped out the honey out of the skeleton of a lion. What happens next? What happens next is it's time for the marriage ceremony with this Philistine woman that brought him to Timna and there's a huge party. There's a huge feast and there are 30 Philistine friends that friends of the family of the bride's family that are celebrating and that's when Shim says Shimshin says I want to I want to tell you a riddle. If you can decipher the true story of the riddle over the seven days of feasting, what we call I will give you a great trophy. I will give you a great prize. And basically what he wants them is he wants these young Philistines, friends and relatives of his new wife. He challenged them with a riddle and if they guess the meaning he will give each of them a linen tunic and a full set of clothing right altogether 30. So he will give them 30 linen tunics and 30 sets of clothing for each one of the 30 friends. If not then they have to give it to him. So they say great tell us the riddle. What is the riddle? That's what he says. Let me propose a riddle. If you can give me the right answer during the seven days of the feast, I will give you 30 linen tunics and 30 sets of clothing for these 30 friends. If you can't, you must give me 30 linen tunics and 30 sets of clothing. They said, "Ask your riddle and we shall listen. We shall listen. Okay, great. So he says to them, out of the eater came out something to eat. Is an eater. Is food. It's the thing that you eat, right? Give me the is the object that we eat. The food item is called the one who consumes it is called the eater is the food. So from the eater came out the food. The eater became something to eat. And from the powerful one came out something sweet. That's the riddle. What do I mean with that? For three days they could not answer the riddle. They searched and they could not answer the riddle. Remember said to them, "If you find discover the riddle, you're going to get the prize." And they can't. On the seventh day, they threaten his wife. Either she extracts the information for him or they will burn her and her family. That's the threat. So basically his new wife comes and sobs and weeps and pleads with him and says, "How do you not share with your own wife the riddle?" And he says, "I also didn't share it with my father and my mother. Why should I share it with you?" And then she says, "Obviously, you hate me. You don't love me." And she nudges and pleads with him. And finally, he dulges the riddle. And what happens is when it comes the seventh day, this is the deadline, right before the end of the due time to give the riddle, they tell him the answer. He told him the riddle. On the seventh day before sunset, the town's people of Philistines say to him, "What is sweeter than honey and what is more powerful than a lion?" That's the meaning of your riddle. They pose a question. What is sweeter than honey and what is more powerful than a lion? And of course, this is the answer they're proposing for the riddle which they heard from his wife. And he says to them, and he says to them metaphorically, if you would have not plowed with my calf, you would have not discovered my riddle, which means I understand that you infiltrated into my own domain, my own property, and you forced my wife to give you the information. And basically what happens afterwards is Shimshin has to pay. He said that he's going to do all of this if they know the riddle. Now, but what did they say? What is sweeter than honey? And it was what is more powerful than a lion. So when Shimsh said the eater became food and from something strong came something sweet. What did he actually mean? The eater, the lion became food. In other words, it became the source of honey. The bees created their hive there. And now they were using the skeleton of the lion as their home, as their center where they were producing their food. Suddenly from the skeleton, he got his honey. So from the eater came out food and out OF THE STRONG LION CAME. YOU DON'T GO INTO THE SKELETON of a lion usually to find honey. But here the honey comes from the most powerful creature the lion the king of the jungle comes all these sweet things. Shimshin is furious at their deception at what they did. He goes and he kills 30 philistine terrorists. He gives their clothes to the men who answer the riddle. He has to he has to pay his debt but he decided this is not to do it in an ordinary way. He wants to chastise them for their cunning deceit. So the Titus says he goes down to Ashkaline which is also a center of the Philistines at the time and there were 30 Philistine oppressors there. He strips them from their clothes and he gives it to the wedding guests. He's returned and uh he returns to his father's house. his relationship with this woman does not work out very well as the Tanakh continues. This is the end of this story. Then there's other equally enigmatic stories about Shimsh. Now when you think about this story, right? It's a very strange story from beginning to end. What is the riddle supposed to mean? How is even anybody supposed to figure out what he was referring to? The Malbam says, "Were they supposed to be prophets to know that there was a beehive in the carcass of a lion?" And what's the whole point of the story? In other words, when you say a riddle, you have to give potential for people to figure it out. It's like an interesting idea, an interesting concept. They should have some facts to be able to work with. Unless they have divine prophecy, how are they supposed to figure out what he's supposed to mean? In other words, it's just like an impossible riddle. So, you're opposing a riddle. For what point? It's like you'll tell me some fact that's based off something that's happening in your house. How is anybody supposed to know about that? Right? You'll say a roof, a towel hanging on the roof. Okay? If it's some concept that people could come up with, it's based on a fact. Either you know the facts or you don't know the facts. But they didn't know what happened here with the lion. Nobody was even knew. His parents didn't even know. So what's the point? Is it just to antagonize them? There's no real solution. The only way actually there's a solution is by knowing the facts. And generally, what's the whole point of the story? And what does this even mean? Did the lion really become food? The lion has a skeleton and the bees created a hive over there. Did the sweetness come out of the lion? And essentially any story that's in is a lesson. There's a there's a there's a relevance here. What's the point here? What's the message here? The Malim in his commentary on on on this story says actually was a concept. It wasn't just a fact. It was a concept. And the Malam says that every single living organism we know needs food. There's no living organism that can live without food. including a bush, a shrub, a tree, a plant, every insect, every bird, every fish, every mammal, every human being. A living organism needs food. That's the system of creation. The food that we eat becomes who we are. That's how it is. The food is actually converted into your very being. And when one animal is eaten by another animal or when we eat plants or when we eat fruits, when we eat vegetables or when we eat chicken, when we eat meat, we take the very energy that has become absorbed into the physical organism and we eat it and that becomes part of our own physical organism. And that's how the food chain or even larger the food web works in our ecosystem. But there is the exception of the bees, which is the reason why we're even allowed to eat bee honey. The Gomorrah says, "How are we allowed to eat bee honey?" Usually, if something comes out of a non-clean animal, even an egg, if an egg comes from a tray, a bird, right, we eat chicken eggs because chickens are kosher. But if an egg comes from a ostrich or another bird that's not kosher, you're not allowed to eat the egg. Why? And the answer is because the egg is the egg is not kosher. So, how is it that we all enjoy beehoney? It's a gishmaka food and rash. You dip the apple in the honey and that honey is bees. And the answer is because the honey is not created from the body of the bee itself. The body of the bee serves like a factory mama factory. The bee eats the nectar and the nectar is converted that goes through a process through the enzymes and the bee deposits it is as a separate reality and that becomes the honey. So the malam says this is the one exception where the food comes out of the eater instead of becoming part of the eater and the refuge comes out of the eater. Usually in all living organisms our organism distinguishes what we can digest. We digest it. It becomes part of us and then the body says this I can't do anything with you got to let it go. And that's the system of evacuating the system which every living organism has in its own unique way. And the fascinating thing is I think I saw this in one of the books by Rabbi Avda Miller that uh the whole digestive system is something that is unconscious. Meaning nobody nobody figures it out. I mean you could learn about it but our system knows it inherently the moment we're born how to digest food. And it's an incredible system already. Digestion begins with the saliva on your tongue. The saliva already begins to break down the food. Right? When he touches the tongue, digestion begins. And it's all involuntary. You don't know how long it takes. The body knows this own wisdom. There's only one element of digestion that is voluntary. And that is the process of going to the bathroom of evacuation. That's the only part that the body waits for you to decide. And here you see how God implanted into the very living organism the respect for the human being that all other parts of digestion it happens when it happens you're into it you're not into but this last part it waits and you decide so that the person can do it in an appropriate and modest way it's fascinating but other animals many of them don't have this when they need to do it they need to do it it's part of the system so with all living organisms the food goes into the body to nourish it it replenishes our cells, gives nutrients and then what the body can't deal with, it says goodbye. I have nothing to do with it. This is called the refu it rejects and the body knows exactly this I could store away as fat. For those of us who have a little fat, this is going straight into the bloodstream. This is good for this type of blood. This type of blood, it's brilliant what the body does. You know, if you would study uh nutrition for 190 years and get six PhDs, you wouldn't know what the body of a one-day old child knows in terms of what parts of the food have to go to which parts of the body and how they figure that out is incredible, right? Say, etc. The only exception is the bee. The bee actually what it spits out is the honey not the it spits out the from the one who eats he actually releases the so the malam says that actually Shimsh was giving here an idea the other part from the powerful one came sweetness the malam says that's why said you're going to have to go find my riddle and what he meant was walk around the city and discover the lion and then you'll be able to find it. That's how the Malbam explains it. Still, we're trying to understand what's the essence of what he's trying to teach them and what is the timeless message here in this metaphor and in this story. There is an incredible teaching on this that comes from the alterb from the balata inutra. It's actually in par. You'll see why. It's based on a medish over there. And he reveals the deeper meaning of the story of Shimshin and how it's connected to Shimshin. And we see here that there's a whole deeper message that is really being developed here. Shimsh is not what you would say with bees, but he was actually teaching something and teaching something very profound about his life and as a result about everybody's life. We have it here in the source sheets. It's a little bit of a complicated idea. So I'm going to uh translate it and uh explain it. As you could see this is called the says in many people say this you will eat it's like double redundant. You will eat which is that which is eaten. You will eat that which is eaten which is a redundancy because of course you eat that which is eaten. You can't eat that which you can't eat. And you will praise God's name. He did wonders with you and my nation won't be humiliated ever again. Chapter 2 to understand a little bit of the meditation that one ought to have when they eat. We speak about eating with mindfulness. One of the great challenges in life is at least for me how do you eat with presence? Because very often we eat not with presence we eat as a number. If I'm stressed, I'm anxious, there's food, you eat it. And because we live in a time when the pantries are usually filled with food and the refrigerators and freezers are filled with food. So it's a great numbing agent. Ancient times food wasn't so available. But it's also fascinating, you know, people open the refrigerator, there's nothing there that they like. 5 minutes later they open it again. So either it shows how faithful they are that they believe that within five minutes the mana came down from heaven and God himself replenished the refrigerator or it's such desperation that five minutes ago what I wouldn't use as a number now I'm 5 minutes more desperate so therefore even that which is in the refrigerator is going to do the trick if it doesn't work I'll come back five minutes later for reopening the refrigerator but the truth is food is a very serious avoid when a person eats when they're stressed or when they're anxious or as an escape mechanism, we all know what the result is. They're not really eating. They're just distracting themselves. And to use the food as a distraction is a betrayal not only of the person, it's also of the betrayal of the food. Why? So that's what is going to explain something fascinating. All food is really divine energy. It's divine energy that has been reincarnated into food. It starts off with this with the nutrients, the food of the angels. Food doesn't begin with physicality. Angels also eat. What do you mean they eat? What do they eat? What do they eat? Bapka. What do they eat? Cheesecake. Healthy cheesecake with coconut sugar. What do the angels eat? So he says they also need energy. They need spiritual energy in order to be able to experience godliness and serve him with all their heart. That's energy. Energy means the substance that creates your consciousness that needs energy. It needs more energy than a physical body. The med says in par that the angels are nurtured from the word. They get their food from the radiance from the light of the just like the process of photosynthesis. All trees in the world convert sunlight into glucose. Sunlight becomes sugar literally. That's the only way the trees can live. Sunlight itself needs energy. The sun itself also needs energy. So everything gets from a higher source, a higher source and it goes back to we say in davening you give life to everybody. So the angels also it's divine life and nutrients that creates and replenishes their consciousness to be able to serve him with all their heart. in the chain of levels is like shall in science there's something called a food chain or the food web that's called in the chain of steps through myriads and myriads of steps and bridges of this chain of angels throughout all the world the flow of energy goes through and goes through transformations as it comes down from world to world between them. We say in nishmas are kishkas intestines. The inards that is where the the digestive system operates the general intestines the intestines of a person are called that is essential to break down the food and digest. That doesn't only begin in our world. In all of the worlds, there are spiritual intestines that break down the spiritual food and pass it down to the next level. The food itself, the way it is, can't do anything for our bodies. But our intestines take the food, break them down, and then convert it into the energy that our blood and our cells can use in order to be able to live. This doesn't only happen in this world. It happens in the highest worlds. It starts off with pure divine energy. In each world, it goes through a process through the spiritual intestines that break it down and can pass it on to the creatures of that world. And then it goes further and further and further. So the food chain and the food web, we know on this earth you have, of course, grass for example or hay or plants and they're eaten. They're eaten by animals and then those eat animals become sources for other ones and other ones and that's how it goes and it goes and then it goes back to earth and there's a whole very complicated food web where one thing becomes a source of energy that feeds something else and feeds something else. begins in the spiritual world where the divine energy is broken down and digested into every creature to be able to get it and absorb it and give it life and then it can be passed on to the next and next and it goes down until it becomes physical food. The say there's no grasp below that doesn't have a spiritual energy that helps it grow. Every piece of food has energy in it. And that energy comes from a higher form of energy and a higher form of energy until it goes to the highest angels where it's pure divine energy that they received in order to be able to serve Hashem with their consciousness. And then it goes through a devolution. It assumes a physical incarnation where it becomes a physical plant, a physical fruit, a physical vegetable, a physical animal. For example, the souls of all mammals comes from's vision of the face of the ox and the chariot. From the face of the eagle come the birds. as the food flows in the higher worlds, it trickles down to the lower worlds. And so every food that you touch is really divine energy. It's God's energy. It may look like a tomato or a cucumber or a kernel of grain or of barley. It may be a piece of bread. It may be a plum or a peach or honey. But what is it really? It's energy. And the energy is spiritual energy. It's divine energy. It assumes a physical packaging because we're physical people. So he says, "And look at it. When you're looking at a piece of food, don't isolate it as just a piece of food. This piece of food comes from energy. This energy comes from a higher source and a deeper source. Level upon level upon level all the way to the highest angels who receive divine energy. The spiritual intestines break it down and it comes down in each world as another packaged energy until in our world it assumes a physical package. You look at it and you just say it's a piece of food. >> Is it true that the better the food, the more healthy, the more energy? >> Of course, you see that practically that that's the value of food. The value of food is how much energy it has. >> Yes, of course. It's more godly. The less energy the food is, it may be more tempting. So, it's appealing to the external part of you that's not looking for energy. It's looking to numb your energy. Right? You have to ask yourself when I'm am I looking for the energy of the food or am I looking to numb my energy because I'm in a bad mood. That's the difference. And that's going to make you choose different types of foods. Foods that have more energy, you have a different relationship with it. So, in other words, the first thing the Balatana is teaching you when you're eating, you need a relationship with the food. It's a serious thing. >> It's God speaking to you. There's an energetic exchange. Now the question is why did all of this happen? So he says the whole purpose was the whole process comes to completion when the person eats. They all went down. The person can bring it all back full circle back to the beginning back to the source. So, it's actually a tremendous moment of responsibility and privilege because imagine this tomato that I'm touching or this glass of water or this coffee bean that I grinded up this morning to make coffee. What had to happen for it to become a coffee bean? So, you may study the farmers who planted it and how much toil they needed in planting it, which you should when you grind up your coffee. The coffee beans didn't come from nowhere. Starbucks doesn't create the coffee. They're not the origin progenitors of the coffee. So you could look at that process. Yeah. What did it take to plant it and harvest it and package it and get it into your home? But before that, there's a much deeper process. And that is from those seeds it came out. That whole energy that it has is really divine energy which comes from a higher world and a higher world and a higher world all the way back to the beginning of school and it comes DOWN ALL THE WAY UNTIL it becomes a coffee bean or becomes a plum or becomes a tomato becomes a piece of food or a piece of chicken or a fish and now when I eat it one of two things happen either I bring it all back to the source through my consciousness because human consciousness is aligned with the divine. Adam is adam comes from adama which means you're a mirror of the divine. So the whole web the whole web comes back to its source. The food now goes all the way back to its original source. Or when the person is disassociated they continue to allow the food to be disassociated from its source. So that's the presence that happens when a person eats. And that's why there's an energy exchange. I'm giving something to the food as much as the food is giving something to me. The food is giving something to me, but I'm also giving something to the food by recognizing what it is and its true spiritual nature. I'm contributing to the food as much as I am also being given a gift by the food. And he continues the next paragraph. Even the souls today relative to the souls that are going to be revealed when Msiah comes in they're called animals. What does this mean? The word is the same letters like the word is the word. Why? Because every piece of food is like an angel. It's an angelic being. There's a spiritual energy there. We know when Mashiach comes, they talk about a lot the meal that's going to be there, the Levasan and the Shabar, the Leviathan and the wild ox. So you're going to have both fish and meat. Yeah. They say a humorous comment from the Kaz. They asked him why do they need two courses. He said because there's going to be Jews who are not going to eat from Mashiah. They say it's not a good for me. So they say no problem. You can stick to the fish. The question is what do we do with the vegans? I don't know. Okay, it's going to be a separate issue. The vegetarians will have to find something else. What's this idea of a meal of yasan and shhabar? What is this idea? So the balatanya says something very deep. He says and are also an energy of souls. The souls of today are going to be sublimated yet to a higher level of consciousness. So therefore the eater of yesterday becomes the food that gets sublimated today. So every piece of food that I'm coming in contact with is asking for something. It was brought to me because there's energy for me to sublimate. That's why the only way I could eat is if I myself I'm present. If I'm not present, if I'm just a recipient of the food, the food is like why did I end up by you? So every piece of food is waiting. It's like an invitation to be sublimated. They say that it was the reb was once eating soup and lux and he was picking up a piece of lux and it slipped away and he picked up a second time it slipped away a third time and he looked and he said it's not ready yet. They're not ready yet. It's fine. Right? That's called eating with presence. It's not ready yet. So there is there there's a there's an energy there's an invitation here the andabar on a spiritual level represents the souls of today which have been sublimating all the food and they themselves now going to a higher place of consciousness are going to go through a new sublimation because everything is always relative. So my sublimation today today I may be a sublimator but tomorrow I need to be sublimated and that's the secret here of the so now let's understand here this will bring us back to the says this is the offering that Aaron has to bring on the day that he's anointed as a there's a special offering that Aaron brings says the what the says from the eater shall come food was responding to a question. The lion eats all the other animals. The lion is on top of that chain. You don't start up with the lion and now he becomes food. How does that happen? Aaron is the one who eats all the offerings and now he has to bring an offering. He's the one who eats all the offerings. This is what the Medish says. Shimsh was bothered by a question. How is the lion which eats the animals becoming food? And how is Aaron who eats ALL THE CARBON IS BRINGING A CARBON? Says what's the big question that Aaron can't bring a carbon? The answer is if you're going to sublimate something, it means you already have worked through your stuff. I can't elevate something if I myself I'm still stuck. That's why a person has to be careful with eating before unless it's for health reasons. They have to be careful. when you're eating, you're elevating the sparks. But if I'm still connected to below, I didn't find my own light. How can I bring up the food? If I don't find the godliness in my soul, I don't have the presence to be able to elevate the food. So in order to elevate something, I have to be in a state where I can shle you up. You don't send a lifeguard into the ocean into the swimming pool to bring something out if he doesn't know very very well how to swim. If not, you could be slept down. You have to be able to be in a position where you're present that you can know who you are and who the other person is and then bring them up. So to eat, he says, you have to d first because I need to be able to be connected. It says in the B mikd, the first bas there was the fire that came down from heaven and it was crouched like a lion. It looked like a lion. The lion ate the carbonus is osius lion. It's also the same letters of which is also connected to the name Aaron who was the kind. So the lion eats carbonas. If you're eating it, it means you yourself have already been sublimated. That's why you could suppleate the food. So how now is becoming the carbon which means he has to be elevated. If you're bringing the carbon it means you need to be sublimated. Iron is eating all the carbonas. How is it that he now needs to bring a carbon? This is a question. The second to last paragraph, this is the idea that food become the eater becomes food. What was yesterday an eater who sublimated food now becomes food that is becoming sublimated by another eater like and which are souls that have now become food that ARE BEING SUBLIMATED TO A HIGHER LEVEL. This is the secret of Shimshin's riddle. The garra says in cited page 10sh had the name of the word comes from the wordhim. It says inim 84 is the son and the shield the protector. What does this mean? the sun has a se cover that we should be able to deal with the light of the sunshim the name of also has a shield which is which eclipses which is the sunshin is sheh that means he's rooted in the name that's higher than the shield All the angels received through the cover is the son even that which is an eater. In other words, you're sublimated. But when you have to get to the level of the son from you have to become food which means you yourself have to be sublimated even though yesterday you were sublimating others. So the lion the ate the carbon becomes now a carbon that has to be eaten that has to be sublimated. Shimshin understood this and that was his that was his riddle the becomes the what does what what what what what's the message here what is he saying here I want to try to bring this down at least one it's a it's it's a it's a very deep concept I want to bring out at least one point and make it relevant now before I drink this water I really have to do some mindful work here I set myself up you know what you can't just drink a cup of That that was the whole she by the way if you realize that it's called saying it the to the point right to the point everything comes into existence through his energy through his words >> of course everything in life is the same cycle everything and it's a it's a fascinating cycle it's also a perplexing cycle because the creator could have done it differently But there's nothing that doesn't have to become something else and then become something else and it's converted. There's nothing that gets destroyed in the world. All matter is converted into energy which is converted another form of energy, another form of energ form of energy. Even as a carcass dies, could be a chicken. It could be a deer. It could be an antelope. It goes back to the earth and it's broken down. becomes the nutrients of the earth that now produces a new generation of produce which is then eaten and becomes the energy of something else which becomes the energy of something else and it's a cycle that doesn't stop from the first moment of creation and everything in the world even the water itself right the sun acts like a pump and it elevates it pumps it it it literally literally the water vapor rises from the sun it rises from the oceans and the rivers it turns into water vapor vapor which then become clouds which then the wind distribute the clouds all over and then when it's heavy enough the water comes right back to irrigate the earth and create a whole new cycle of life. So everything happens like this and what's the real per real reason is that the energy is constantly alive and the reason it's alive because it's all divine and that's why everything is one. Everything is interconnected. There's no such a thing as separateness. Separateness is an illusion. We're all interconnected. The oxygen that just went into you a few minutes ago was inside of me. I mean, I don't mean to uh spook anybody out, but you're basically dealing with me whether you like it or not, and I'm dealing with you, RIGHT? I I LIVE ON MY OWN. NO, you don't live on your own. You just breathed. Where do you think you got that oxygen from? You made it. Your company produced it. You have a PhD. Like, who made this oxygen? We're all sharing it. I inhald it and I exhale it and then somebody else the whole the whole the whole planet works that way. And the truth is the whole universe works that way and all of the universes work that way. And it's just an exchange of energy. The human being is the one who can act with agency with presence. Everybody else, they just do exactly what they're supposed to do from the rivers to the lakes to the animals to the birds. But the human being has that ability of agency. And this is where the buck stops here because everything is serving something else. If you look at the world, the do serves the serves the serves the right. The earth becomes a catalyst for all growth. All growth becomes a catalyst for all living organism. The caterpillar needs to live and it comes to the leaf of your bush and it eats the leaf. And the same is true the deer. You probably saw this morning 4 in the morning. The deer came to your garden and enjoyed a beautiful breakfast. That sak serves the kai. The kai the animal kingdom serves the madab the human being. If you ate chicken on the kai served the madab. So everything is serving and going up and being sublimated and now it comes to me. So it stops the buck stops here and what am I doing? I'm just eating. No, the madabra brings it all back to the source to the divine. So the food web is now complete full circle. The person here on earth takes the last incarnation of the food and can bring it all the way back. That's why eating is an act of sublimation. You're actually a teacher. You're a mentor. The worst thing for a teacher to come into a classroom and not know why they're there. You've taught many years, right? What's the worst thing a teacher can do is I come into the classroom, I don't know why I'm here. I'm just one of the kids. They notice it right away. That insecurity and it's a disaster. I'm a teacher. I'm here. I have a role. I have a mission. I'm not better than anybody else, but I have a mission. Right? A mother or a father don't know their role in a family. It's a disaster. People need leadership. When I'm eating, I'm a teacher. I'm a leader. I'm a pres. I'm I'm a present voice. The food is looking at me and saying, "Rabbi W, what are you going to do with me? Don't tell me, "Oh, I'm just stressed out. I'm going to use you because I'm stressed out." Well, one second. I went through a lot to get here. I went through A LOT. TRUST ME, GOD. GOD, HEAVEN KNOWS WHAT I WENT THROUGH TO GET HERE TO your counter. Don't just disregard me. I'm not garbage. I'm not garbage. Right? That's the That's why like realize this orange is not living in a vacuum. IT DIDN'T JUST POP UP RIGHT here because I want an orange. I may want an orange. The reason I want an orange is because there's an energy in the orange that I need to serve Hashem. And there's something in the orange that I'm going to give to the orange. I'm going to bring the energy all the way back up. Yeah. >> What do you mean by sublimate? >> Sublimate means elevate. Like you sublimate something. Sublimate means you you identify its divinity and you bring it back to its source. You you're asking the English word the meaning >> sublime. You know the word sublime. >> It's like laalis to elevate it to be milo. And that's why everything we come in contact with is a form of food eating. In other words, it's a form of there's energy for me here that I can bring up. Can I bring up to the source and that's the comes and says and I want to teach something new. The eater becomes food. What does that mean? The eater doesn't become food. The eater eats the food. The food becomes the eater. The eater doesn't become the food. If the eater becomes the food, it's a problem. They say a story that once showed his students, he put his hands on his students Friday night and they closed their eyes. They were singing a niggan and suddenly they saw this a story in Yiddish an ox mastimel. They saw an ox, literally a bull with a and they were flabbergasted. And the bos said something unbelievable. He said there's a person there's a Jew who's eating now meat for Shabas. He's eating an ox and he's so enthusiastically immersed in the steak that he has actually become the ox. You know when you suddenly become so addictedly immersed in the food there's no distinction anymore like I am the food. I'm receiving from the food. I'm a student of the food. So they asked about so why is there a strim? He says because it's a garment of shabas. So that didn't turn into an ox. all other parts of him his imagination his heart his soul everything now became part of that so where I want to be that's where I am but the retained it's shabas it's it it's quality what the bash was trying to tell them is not it was not a like a magic trick he was trying to show them that everything is real energy there's a relationship when I'm eating something either I become the food or the food becomes me you can even feel it you know either I become steak or the steak becomes me depends if I'm just starving and I'll eat whatever you put down. You know, they say, "No, don't go don't go to a restaurant when you're hungry because people like order the whole menu." You know what I mean? And then they have leftovers for three weeks, but it's also a pretty big bill, right? Whenever people are starving, they're just not in control so much. So, either I become the steak or the steak becomes me. Comes and says, "The eater becomes the food." What do you mean the eater becomes the food? No, the food becomes the eater. So, Shimsh is telling us, you have to understand how it works. Sometimes you have elevated so much in your life. A lot has become elevated. In other words, you grew and you were present and things that came in contact with you elevated because food here is a metaphor for everything in life. The home we live in, the people we're connected to, right? Whether it's a spouse, whether it's children, whether it's family, all these people bring energy into our life. And we have the ability to elevate, to bring love to them, to bring light to them, to bring more goodness to them. That's a form of ev showing them who they are. It's identifying the spark in the food just like there's identifying the spark in your student laavd or in your child or in your friend or in yourself. Right? We all have parts that need to be elevated. We have our ungodly parts, our physical parts, sometimes our mundane parts, sometimes our broken parts. Can you identify the sparks there? And instead of throwing them away or numbing them, you actually elevate them. You inspire them, you embrace them. And a person sometimes does this and does it very very successfully. And then suddenly one day there's a curveball in life. And the person feels like they're completely disoriented. Like everything they knew about reality and everything they prepared for is all taken away from them. It's like whoa. Literally back at square one. And it's like where did all this work go? Like it's a process. And then you like almost feel like you you came to the to the end zone, right? You you you hit the home run, you're finishing, you're finishing and then suddenly there's a curveball in life and the same person is now in a very dumbfounded and confused state and says there's a secret here. The eater, the eater who was elevating everything else now needs to be sublimated to a completely different plane of consciousness. And for that there's a new form of surrender that needs to happen. So the surrender of yesterday is not enough. There's a whole new level of surrender for the person to be elevated to a completely different level of consciousness. And what this means in a person's life is that a person grows and you often grow and you work through a lot a lot of stuff and you're talking about a person who really works through things and then you feel like you graduated and you want your doctorate and go home and live happily ever after says that's not how it works. On the contrary means that this becomes a and that's the secret of the andar represent a soul going from one space to another place the transformation is so powerful that for this transformation to happen I'm not anymore an eater I become the m when something is eaten up it looks like it's disappearing it's not really disappearing It's going through a transformation to go into a higher place. What do they say? Sometimes in life it feels like you're being buried, but really you're being planted. The difference is if I'm buried, it's the end. If I'm planting, it's the beginning. When I'm eating, it means I'm in the presence of mind that I can bring up that which I'm eating. I'm elevating that which I'm eating. When I am the food, it means I'm losing my form to become something else. All food loses its original form. How does it do that? It's a very deep form of surrender. We call it mitsas. It literally gives up its form in order to be transformed into a higher form of energy. This food that I'm eating, it's not going to look like this anymore. It's going to completely give up its form. I have to ask my question. The question, am I deserving to do this to the food? really it's losing its entire form to become me. Is that really the proper thing? Like what am I bringing here? If I'm bringing in my own ego, it's not fair. Don't do this to the food. Right? That's our only justification to really eat. Sensitive people are very very perturbed by the fact that we eat food. Right? Some of you would probably remember at one point in your life, I once had one of the children in my family decided that eating all meat and chicken is a form of murder. And whenever he saw me eating chicken, he was very, very, very upset. He's like, "How can you do this?" And it's really a good question, especially if you, you know, you see how animals grow up. I have chickens now and I see what it takes to lay an egg and then they sit on the egg for 21 days and a chick emerges and they take care of that chick for months and months, right? It's a certain sensitivity like this didn't happen on its own. You don't have to go to the, you know, all all fresh and this chicken there. Like there was this real and it's really it's all divine energy. And I was I remember I was once at university for Shabas and the students were very, you know, very into this like you're not allowed to eat anything like and I said, "What about tomatoes? You're also tearing it off. Just because you don't the tomato is not screaming, it doesn't mean" And they said, "You're right. You're right." And they said, "You know what? I have even a bigger problem. When you get all out of your bed and you step down on the floor, you kill probably a billion mites. Yeah. And when you walk out to the sidewalk, you're going to pro you probably kill a hundred hundred million or billions of mites every single day. Everybody should be locked up for life. Everybody. Yeah. I said, "What's your justification?" So the student said, "So what am I supposed to do?" I said, "Kill yourself. That's the only justification. If you don't want to kill anybody in this world, then don't be here. It's it's hard." And the truth is it's a sensitive question. And the only answer to that question is it's true. If I'm here to serve, if I'm here to serve, then I'm entitled. Not because I'm entitled, because I'm channeling the energy. Mayor Pmishlan once said, and I know this is a tall order, but I want to to show you the sensitivity of a saddic. Permishlan said, the only person who's allowed to eat meat is somebody who feels like the behemoth during the when they eat it. In other words, it's it's it's a sensitivity. Now, I I'm not I want to bring out to you how they how he felt about it. Like, he wasn't just eating a piece of meat. He understood what was going on here. That's why because he elevated animal he served them for a year. >> Yeah. He served the animals for a whole year in the marble. Yeah. After that he can eat it. So the truth is that as a result of that it's an elevation that allows then the food says if that's the form I'm going to be losing in order to become you. Ah beautiful. Thank you. Thank you. That was the whole idea of carbonus mikt. Mikdash was this was the epicenter of the world where this was exercised constantly and that's why the mindset of the cayenne was crucial. If the cayenne had a was not good it was called the whole carbon could be dispol because it's all about your thought process. This food is surrendering its entire identity to BECOME YOU. HOW? WHY? THE answer is because you're surrendering your identity to become divine. Only if I surrender my identity then the food wants to surrender. It wants to surrender. They say that the previous labba once had a guest and uh he was a little bit of an arrogant person and he offered him a cup of tea and he drank the cup of tea and he finished half. So the Reb said, "Why don't you finish the tea?" He says he doesn't want he doesn't want the second half but he says the man tells the reb half of the tea that's jealous of the other half of the tea. What he meant was that the part that he didn't drink is jealous of the part that he drank. So the Reb said true but the question is which half is jealous of which half? That's the question. The half that you drank is it jealous of the other one maybe that you didn't drink? Because the tea now became me. If I'm surrendered, the tea is ready to surrender. But if I didn't surrender, what am I surrender? I lost my form. And what did you give me? But what does surrender really mean? Yesterday's surrender was yesterday's surrender. The eater becomes food. What it means food is that yesterday's surrender is today's what do we say? Yesterday's gula becomes today's gulas. yesterday's redemption becomes today's exile. So as a result of this the I may be now given an opportunity and a gift to be able to go into a whole higher form of surrender. So yesterday I was an eater. Today I became food. What does it mean I became food? I give I'm ready to give up this form also. And this is one of the greatest secrets in life because the stretching here could be seen as just a curse. But really it's a gift and it's an opportunity. Sometimes in our life we reach certain plateaus and those plateaus came with blood and sweat and efforts and sacrifice. And the person says, "Okay, I'm done. I'm finished now. I am the sublimator. I am the eater." And then something happens in a person's life where their entire uh self becomes disoriented. What does that mean? So shimshin is based on the sun sheesh. There's the sun and there's the mug. There's shame v and there's alikim. Elim blocks the energy. That's why we could relate to it. The energy that I may have been present with was shame. And because it's shame, it cames through a lot of covers and blockages. And now you're at the threshold of your true greatness of going to the sun of looking into the sun of becoming a channel of the sun itself. Shimsh. So for this everything that I knew yesterday becomes a coping mechanism and a blockage that I have to let go of. And when I let go of it, it's not that I'm being summoned and punished. On the contrary, it's being invited. It's being elevated to a deeper intimacy with yourself to being cracked open much more for the heart to be even more openhearted so that you become a channel of the rays of the sun themselves. May yats mas and then you see that that which was so strong the lion yats mas it was the opposite of sweetness az seems like that which is so powerful and strong but scary overwhelming mak it becomes sweet and the reason it becomes sweet is because every experience in life even if a person can't understand it and we don't understand it it's never here to break somebody to crush somebody just to destroy somebody. Even food, it's not losing its form just to be destroyed. It's always in the process of being sublimated. Now the question is why this? How? Those are good questions that most of us or probably none of us have real good intelligent answers of how everything works. But the profound presentation here is and Chimchin will have to exercise this in his life again and again and again and again is that that lion which ate all the carbon now becomes a carbon zarbon iron abonov Aaron's uniqueness was he wasn't only the eater of carbonus ze carbon iron he becomes the carbon I should never ever get stuck in any form of spiritual ego any form of spiritual ego becomes an invitation to spiritual paralysis. It's like this is who I am and I remain stuck. I worked enough on myself. I worked enough on my ANIMAL CONSCIOUSNESS. I'M DONE WITH MY EGO. I'M A CHANNEL. And that itself can become a very dangerous place. The real eater says, "And now I'm ready to start over again. I'm ready to surrender even that which I learned in order to reach truth." Because the purpose is truth. The purpose is not that my ego is comfortable which has not even been through ultimately becomes miserable. The purpose is truth. The purpose is real connection. The purpose is real attachment, real relationship. And until that doesn't happen, the soul knows the soul is hungry. The soul is thirsty. And therefore the says, I want to become a I want to be able to surrender. I want to be able to become a student. I want to be able to start all over again from olive base. They say about the Katskar Rebba. He was born in a place called Tamashv in Poland. They called him Reendal Tamishav. Later he became the famous Rebba of Kat. Katsk is a city in Poland but he was born in Tamishov. And the Katskar Rebba once came back to Tamashov and he was already a very famous Saddak and Rebba. So in Tamishov they invited him to stay in the house of the wealthy Jew relatively speaking to Tamashv where he would be more comfortable. So he says no he wants to stay by his Mhammed by the first teacher who taught him olive base he wants to stay when he was three years old he went to this teacher problem is this teacher was one of the poorest people in theettle he barely had a home that was functional was broken down or was caved in it wasn't a place for the katskarba to stay that's where I want to stay okay so he stayed there under the conditions that uh this man can afford but later they asked him the of katsk why why and this is what he He said he said this is the only person who actually taught me truth. He says the only thing that was really true was olive base. Afterwards he says I don't know what's true what's not true. He says also he's the only person who taught me something that I actually know. After that it all became confusing. He's the one who taught me olive bays. This I know and I know it's truth. Afterwards it already became much more confusing. So that's why he went back to that that ability to be able to have that innocence to go back to the beginning to be pristine. I know him. He taught me olive bay. This is it. I never become stuck in a form. I'm ready now to surrender my old form to yet a higher form. I'm ready to surrender that yet to a higher form. This is the blessed process of not being stuck in any form of ego. Even the highest spiritual ego in the highest worlds because it still could be shehim and which is the which is can block. So is the invitation to the sheh and to be able to look at the sun I have to be privileged to be able to look at the sun I have to really be open for that light to be able to look at the sun I have to let go of any need of any blockages. So life invites us, life invites me, life invites you to be able to surrender yesterday's form that this new form of the form of yesterday can surrender yet to a higher consciousness to the point that yesterday's identity was sublimated completely and nullified in a higher identity because the process of surrender is an endless blessed process. It's only seen as a curse when we believe that the purpose of life is to hold on to our egos. But when we understand that the purpose is to crack open the ego and to let go of everything and be completely sublimated in the source of sources where everything is radical love, then actually anything that cracks open my ego more is a gift. I know this may be hard to hear for me too, but that's the truth. Anything that cracks open our ego becomes a gift instead of a curse. Have a beautiful and wonderful week. Thank you. >> This class is brought to you by the yeshiva.net. Please help us continue the classes. 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