New Release THE LIGHT AND THE SPLENDOR - Why the Chanukah Story Was Hidden From the Jewish People?

this torah class is brought to you by torahanytime.com good evening everyone and welcome back to the wednesday night program which is uh hosted by the wonderful organization khazak who they do such amazing work for claudius trial especially in the area of getting children into yeshiva so i thank ravi yaniv and rib robbie and of course ravilan schlita and this shir is sponsored by yadidi by my dear friend rabbi newman on behalf of chickens for shabbos which is such a vital organization for the jewish people that they are dedicated to feeding yiddin putting food on their table for shabbos but especially for rabbayim for malamdin for grushoice for agunos and you could go to chickensforshabbas.com or you could go to the yada aliazza website and there's an icon you click on for malam dim agunus and grouchois and you're literally upholding claudia soil because without rabbayim without our teachers without the uh moire derek for the next generation we don't have the next generation so literally you can feed cloud israel and and that's the chosen should be on all of us tonight's year is dedicated in in honor of the new safer on chanaka published by our scroll called the light and the splendor that hakadosh in his great rachel has allowed to come to the light of day and if anybody wants to purchase this beautiful safer please see our new website rabbidg.com where this safer is available together with all the swarm the mystery and the majesty and this maganarakiya on purim and pesach or you could go to the rsco website where all our scrollbooks are now 20 off i want to thank my very dear friend robhayem mohler dr mueller for uh being the main editor of this work and uh as well as the mystery and the majesty and barkhashem many have given very tremendous feedback about some of the content in the safer and i would like to share with you very briefly tonight two chapters of uh the book the light and the splendor first i want to share with you a brief thought that i once heard in the name of harav avigdor miller this is the chapter on page 229 called what to think at a hanukkah party as we know that there's a lot of discussion in the playskin whether the parties of chanukah are considered a sudha snitzwa are they a uh a uh are they meals that we fulfill good deed or are they discretionary entirely in other words you want to get together and eat latkes and eat donuts gesundheit height no problem do whatever you need to do but you don't you're not fulfilling any specific mitzvah by rejoicing and celebrating on hanukkah and i once heard in the name of the great sadhaka of the viktor miller that there is something that we could do that could really infuse our purim our hanukkah parties with the great meaning and significance there's apostate in tihillim that says as follows actually this appears ascribe to god o families of the nations ascribe to god honor and strength amazingly this passage is addressing the family unit typically in judaism in yiddishkait we have obligations that evolve on the individual we have obligations that devolve on the sibor and rarely do we have a mitzvah that is that rests upon the family unit and here we it says in other words there is a particular concept that even though every individual has to display gratitude to god and every community has to display uh gratitude to god but aside from that it is incumbent upon the family unit to to ascribe to hashem and to offer to hashem uh honor and gratitude and therefore says harava viktor miller since the whole for function and objective of the umptive of chanaka is to display and to show gratitude so okay the sieber shows gratitude by in china s ray we say al-anism and the individual expresses gratitude in their personal shema so everyone's doing what they have to do both the individual and the seaboard but when does the family unit fulfill its obligation of expressing their gratitude hashem this is something that could be fulfilled at your um hanukkah party so at your hanukkah party aside from making sure that everyone has their copy of the light and the splendor and aside from making sure that you tell everybody about the importance of contributing to chickens for shabbos it is also very worthwhile and quite important to stop and reflect and maybe somebody should get up and say a few words on behalf of this mish bachha we offer our gratitude takadash baruch for giving us the yum tif of fakhanaka for preserving the torah for us for preserving mitzvos for us for allowing the shalshala sazhov the golden chain of yiddish guy to continue now i want to share with you something that's strictly confidential it's just between me and you don't tell anybody else about whoever is listening on torah anytime on khazak live on podcast on shas illuminated this is strictly confidential information i want to present a perspective on hanukkah and this is a very unique perspective but one which is quite relevant to our times and that is we say in the alhanisim after the whole miracle of chanukah afterwards your children came where did they come from where were they they weren't hiding we knew where they were why the expression and afterwards your children came another very fundamental question what exactly we celebrating on chanukah we're celebrating the miracle the oil that they found enough oil to last for one day and it lasted for eight days since when do we celebrate miracles in the temple doesn't the mission of saying parque always every single day ten miracles transpired in the basan mikdash oh you know the the column of smoke went straight up and the wind didn't blow it do we celebrate um that miracle do we have a day on our calendar where everyone gets on their back porch turns up the barbecue and make sure the smoke goes straight up or there was a miracle every day in the temple that the meat did not spoil so do we leave out do we have a yumpta for a holiday to commemorate then the fact that the meat did not spoil no so what's the big deal about the fact that oil that was supposed to last for one day lasted for eight days this is the temple we're talking about this was the place of constant open miracles furthermore the nerma ravi the westernmost lamp in the temple it lit for hundreds of years without extinguishing and nobody ever made a yumpta out of that and all of a sudden it lasts for eight days and we have to we have to celebrate why what is so significant about the oil on the other hand you may say if you look in the alhanisim the main miracle that seems to be commemorated is the military victory that it was a small group of jews actually rashi says in parashats when we say masato khalas many in the hands of the few we're not kidding when we say a few in devarim lamid gimmel rashi tells us that the army of the kashmir name consisted of only 13 soldiers i remember hearing this rashi from solomon shlita so maybe we're celebrating the miraculous nature of the military victory but that too is uh somewhat difficult because throughout jewish history there are many many instances of improbable military victories be it when yahushua benue came into do we celebrate a yomtav oh yeshua been known came and taught israel and he beat the 31 kings let's celebrate and eat eat oil filled round donuts no there's no such yamtif of celebrating yeshua binon's miraculous conquering of the holy land and there were other jana hamelach was defeated in an improbable way and we also don't celebrate that so it would not seem that the military victory in the times of hanukkah should warrant such a major celebration so the oil seems trivial the military victory it was commonplace in jewish history so what exactly are we celebrating on chanaka another question which many commentators address is the fact that while almost every yamtif in fact every empty has their own masaka or sukkah or megillah shabbos there's no masak they're for hanukkah and kharaga is eight days men purim is only one day permiss 30 blot we would expect there to be of 240 black and yet lo and behold it ain't there there is no message for hanukkah and famously posits that with the heavenly review because the hashmonoyam unrightfully took too much malhouse violating the ethical will of yaakov who said so the so rabbi nasi did not grant them their own masaka however we would like to examine an approach to chanaka that offers quite a compelling reason of why there is no masaka on chanaka he advances that there's a widespread misconception an erroneous understanding of what happened on chanaka whether it's the miracle the oil or the military victory and there's actually an unspoken background to hanukkah that and a much more profound reason for the institution of hanukkah and there is a reason why most people are completely unaware of the real meaning of hanukkah and rav salvajic introduces this with a stira in chasse a stirrup between my describes a horrendous sight if somebody witnesses the burning of a safety says the gemara if somebody sees a savatar being torn or destroyed you need to tear your clothing twice you need to tear korea rice kriya twice says the gemara one time for the parchment and one time for the letters as we know they're two dimensions of torah the zayar says there's six hundred thousand letters of the torah and yet if you count it's only a little bit over three hundred thousand and the meaning given is that there's the black and there's the white the parchment is also something that has sanctity and therefore if you see the tearing of a safety tower you need to tear korea twice however astro of salvation tells us the is the tragic story of the murder of hanina ben tradyain he gathered many people together to learn torah and as he taught a safer torah as he thought there was a sabotage in his lap when he was captured by the romans they wrapped the safer tire around him he was encircled in vine branches and they set him aflame they put sponges of wool soaked in water on his heart to prolong his agony his daughter said tata tata this is terrible said yeah it would have been terrible had i burnt alone but now that i'm burning with the torah he who takes up the cause of the torah will take on my cause [Applause] students asked rabba rebba what do you see and he responded i see the clough burning but oyster is the letters are flying off my executioners can only destroy the paper but they can't destroy the words of the torah you could only destroy parchment you can't destroy the words so then why does the gemara say if you see the tearing of the sacred tire or you need to tear kriya twice one for the parch and the one for the words but you can't destroy the words of the torah says of salvation the answer is very simple it depends who's destroying the torah you know there's a concept that in order to defile and contaminate you have to have a connection to purity and sanctity but if you have no connection to purity and sanctity you can't defile and contaminate you could murder obliterate and destroy the gentiles they have no connection to purity and sanctity and therefore they are duly capable of lahash mid-la regular as they attempted to do in the times of purim they are duly capable of murder and destruction they could destroy the physical but because they have no connection to kedusha and tahara they cannot be metame or they cannot render impure and defo and defile therefore says rip salvation you are it all depends on who's destroying the safety torah in the gumara navaida zara it was the romans were burning the safer torah romans are gentiles they have no connection to tara and kedusha therefore they could only be lahashmed lara gulyaba they could destroy the parchment but they have no effect they cannot be payel they cannot defile they cannot contaminate the holy words of the torah and therefore the parchin was burning but the letters were flying off because gentiles cannot contaminate torah they cannot defile tyra i think martin luther khan is talking about a jew talking it was referring to when the king yohayakim when he set ablaze to safer torah a jew who has a connection to purity and sanctity not only could he destroy and obliterate he could defile and contaminate and when a jew destroys a safer torah you need to tear kriya twice you once for the parchment and once for the letters only a jew has the capacity to ruin the torah and ruin a contemporary example even today there are many nations that have their set their sights set on destroying the jewish people and if they would be able to they surely would had god not if god would not intervene and we the he shall um however they have no capacity and ability to tamper with our torah to destroy our torah and to have any effect on sanctity or tara it is only the jew who has deviated who has turned his back on his brother and on god and on the torah he could destroy the torah as the navy says in ishayah um sister of salvation you know you look in the al-anism to may and beyond many in the hands of the few impure in the hands of the pure i have one one simple uh opposition and one simple battle that is not mentioned in alanisim why doesn't it say gentiles in the hands of the jews and says of salvation herein lies the secret of hanukkah you know why in allah it says many in the hands of the few god gave the many in the hands of the few and the mighty in the hands of the weak why doesn't it say god gave the gentile in the hand of the jew you know why because in the times of chanaka they weren't trying to kill us they were trying to contaminate the torah they're trying to defile the torah they were trying to influence the purity of the torah and who could influence the purity of the torah not yvonne and you know why it doesn't say beyond israel and because hanukkah was not gentile versus jew it was jew versus jew it was missionary beyond it was a hellenized assimilated acculturated jew in the hands of the jews who remained steadfast says of salvation you know why there's no messiah for hanukkah because we're embarrassed of kanaka it's embarrassing we're going to have a message that the majority of the jewish people they abandoned the religion and they went to theaters and amphitheaters and they genuflected to the physical and they went and started sculpting their bodies and they gave up on god and the jewish people that's embarrassing we would never talk about that how would we ever get shidduchim for our kids if we're going to talk about what what the jews were like in the times of hanukkah so we cover up the story and we make believe it was gentile against jew but that's not the fact the facts were it was hellenized jew against jew and there's no messiah for chanaka because we're down right embarrassed about the hanukkah story cesaro salavec and then your children came you know where they came from they came back from abandoning tyrone that's fine now you say i never heard this before why didn't anybody tell this to me you think this is something we want to tell our children you think there's something we're proud about you saying you think there's something we publicize we're very frightened by the hanukkah story and yet we're very encouraged by the chanukah story now this idea that only a jew has a capacity to contaminate this very interesting baal hamar saktav zara that discusses the gemara that says that the in the times of the evanim the mizbayach was defiled because they used it for idolatry and the question is i don't understand you invite someone to your house and all of a sudden they come and they start worshiping your dining room table your dining room table does not become us or it does not become aveda zara somebody cannot answer something that does not belong to them however there is a concept says idolaters can defile hectic the sanctity is the sanctified properties of the base of dash but says the balamara you know who has the capacity to sanctify the mizbayach the mesbah was not sanctified by the evanim the greeks if the greeks would have worshipped the musera we would continue to use it today you know who defiled the mizbeh you know contaminated them as bay'ah jew the messiah the hellenized jew a jew he could defile he could be mahal and he could be matami so this again substantiates this idea that it depends who's destroying the safer torah a guy destroys the safer torah it's always parchas the letters fly off a jew destroys the safer torah watch out you're going to have to tear korea twice now this point that rav salvajic is making about the historical record of hanukkah is quite intriguing is this in fact what happened in the times of chanukah that the majority of the jewish people abandoned their faith and they left tyron mitzvoice and nobody knows about it why don't we know about it okay we don't know about battle because we've covered it up we don't want to tell people that we're embarrassed but what record what evidence is there so it's very interesting when we analyze the tefila of the map who is exactly this who after serving 80 years in the temple he went off and he became a heretic he became a sadducee was that the yochanan who is the father of the hero of hanukkah matasyahu furthermore what's even more remarkable is that we showing them tell us that this filabime mataseo himself because there are either 125 words 124 words in the main mata 124 gematria or 125 one more word than the numerical value of yacht and yo if you ichinon gado was the yacharan who the bracha says veered off would we continue to say histophila we know that if somebody goes off then their svarim or their torah or their compositions are no longer in use and while the vilnigan is of the opinion that the that is discussed in the gemara brahes is not the same kind of as in recorded in alhanism alanis from beginning to end but yochanan mentioned in the brachas was the yohan's grandson and he eventually went off then this is not that telling because the father of the hero of hanukkah was not a somebody who veered off but the binay is sasha and barack of meshberg and the cloisenberg arabah o and rabbi yosev was none other than the who went off after being kayan gadol for 80 years now to me this is very telling because if the god al-hadar who for 80 years went into the holy of holies every yom kippur was the biggest leader of the generation one the greatest sadiq in the generation if he went off the darach do you think that was an isolated incident or was that symptomatic of the times of a mass departure from the observance of torah and mid-slice it would seem that if the god al-hadar would call it a day and say that's that's it for me for tara mitsui you would think that many would follow suit and this would seem to substantiate the position of salavaichek that indeed in the times of hanukkah a great majority of the jewish people left the fold in fact the cloisonne bergaraba quotes rabbarch of meshberg who says that yo the father matasio indeed did go off and did become a heretic and he did receive some kind of rectification through the miracle of chanaka and there is a mystical allusion to this in the mishnah shabbas because we know one of the main points of departure between the tsadikim and the prussian were how to perform the ritual of the tourists the opinion of the sad you sees was at first the congratulations outside and then he brought it into the kardashian and we are of the opinion the prussian are of the opinion that no the fire was prepared indoors says the mishna says in shabbos something amazing actually the mishnah says brought in baba kama hindi and he has a candle to give him light if he leaves that candle out in the public domain and someone trips over knocks it down and burns down the whole building the storekeeper if that candle that he left outside was the hanukkah the store keeper's putter because he's authorized to keep the candle outside chanukah but says this has a mystical meaning as well the word could be scrambled to read left his candle his fire outside and that's why if he's liable he's guilty but there through the narcan that we lied outside that was a tick on fury but be it as it may if there is evidence that the great hero of the chanukah story the father of montesio veered off the you would think that that was symptomatic of the times and even according to the guru that this was the grandson of yachini this was still a kain god all who veered off and again it would seem to be somewhat symptomatic of of the times however my good friend rav zakharya holzer of miami he showed me there perhaps is even stronger substantiation in the writings of the show of hadrash verhyan and this is could be found in borasha's page and he says something quite remarkable says the reishirov you know the gemara talks about they defiled all the oil in the hechal except for one flask of oil and they lit it and miraculously lasted for eight nights says the reishirov don't be fooled into thinking that this is literal that we literally celebrate the fact that they found one flask of boy and lasted for eight nights don't make that mistake it's a mushroom they defiled all the oil the jewish people are compared to olive oil the greeks through the hellenists defiled the vast majority aruba the ruba the jewish people became assimilated and acculturated they defiled all the holy oil the jewish people nearly disappeared but there was one flask of oil one small family of kahanim matasiyo and his children who remained steadfast who remained adherent to hakalish baruch to torah to mitzvos to and they did not have the wherewithal that from there they should be able to rebuild the jewish people they only had enough energy to last a short amount of time but miraculously through their dedication and their commitment god allowed the entirety of the jewish people to be built up through one flask of oil through one jewish family dedicated to the ideals of taro mitzvahs this interpretation of the gemara what a marvelous interpretation that the tami to the state of the jewish people and the miracle of the burning of the oil is a miracle of jewish rebirth from a very small group how inspiring it is then when we realize that to rebuild the jewish people we don't need the masses and we don't need large gatherings we just need a few committed men that from there they could literally revolutionize the entirety of the jewish people that's what it then the means of the jewish people came aboard and they came back and they rebounded and they were rebuilt and there was a great renaissance and resurgence of the jewish people so on the one hand the story of chanukah is a story that we don't get too much into detail we'll tell our children there was a miracle of oil we'll tell our children about the military victory but know deep down what really happened but also recognize that we as individuals have the emotional and spiritual energy to rebuild even from a small group a small group of dedicated jews who learn torah every day who dive in properly coming early to the davening making sure they don't utter one word during the course of the tfila making sure they leave their phones outside of the bay sahamadrish jews who are dedicated to smear as halashan to guarding their speech to guarding their eyes a small group of jews from there could rebuild and will rebuild the entirety of the jewish people that one flask of oil has the illuminative power to brighten up and to lighten up the whole world so i thank you for allowing me to share with you a little bit from this safer the light and the splendor i want to thank hazak for hosting i thank robbie newman chickens for shabbos dot com or the yada eliezer website and again to get a hold of this safe air please check out our website rabbi dg.com or the artists girl website thank you so much everyone afraid we should be so to the hanukkah of the third base amigdas so you've just experienced another torah class brought to you by 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