The Secret Conversation of the Shofar - Rabbi Dr. Aaron Adler

Erev Tov. I'd like to dedicate this year to the memory of my father, David Ben Gershon, zichrono livracha. We just passed Friday was his 10th yahrzeit. And I mention it because my father, of blessed memory, brought me to the first shiur that I ever heard from our great Rebbe, Rabbi Soloveitchik, zichrono livracha, back in 1968. It was the uh teshuvah drasha at the RCA, Rabbinical Council of America. The Rav delivered an annual shiur that lasted, and I'm not exaggerating now, about 4 hours in the presence of a crowd of about 3,000 people. I cannot say, as I was then a high school student, that I understood the shiur, but I did get bits and pieces out of it. But I also knew, categorically, that from this man is worth our while to study Torah from. And um I'm indebted to my father to having brought me into the sphere of studying Torah by the Rav. I remember my father prepping me the Shabbat before that great shiur with the source material. I say this because with time we did have a tremendous zechut of getting close to the Rav in the shiur and for some time as his um private driver in New York City. The um The Rav was a very, very versatile teacher. He had a talent of being able to adapt to different crowds. He once told me that what says in shul many, many Aron Kodesh, da lifnei mi ata omed, you should know who you're for you're speaking, it usually means you the person who's davening, the mitpallel omed, palel it's standing before God, da lifnei mi ata omed. But the Rav said no less important is when you're teaching. Know your crowd. Dial up name it out made and you should not overshoot and go over the heads of people and not undershoot and insult the integrity and intelligence of people. And the rough told me once that he would love to have the opportunity to teach in a first grade class commission Rashi and he said I would prepare. I would prepare for that after that exercise and teaching. Because you have you know the teaching children is one thing teaching adults is something else teaching high school kids and so on. And I say this as introduction because there is a market difference between teaching high school students and teaching adults when referring to a particular shoe or that I had a great school to fairing from the rough a year to chew the Russia in 1973. It was already tough shin llama dollar after Russia Shana 1973. The reason why it's difficult cuz if it's a high school student group so they weren't there and from all practical purposes when you talk about the rough it's like talking about Rashi Rabbeinu Tam and the Rambam and and and these are people in the past. But when I teach at the OU center I'm teaching to contemporaries and more often than not people in the audience are acquainted with the rough and some of his shoe room. Looking right at the Rabbi Yakov Lerner in front of me. I'm sure he was at the sheer 1973. But as Kazan always said in Beit Midrash the low key douche there's also always something novel no matter what you give over in the way you make the presentation that makes the sheer not just informative but also downright exciting and um um spiritually uplifting. The Rav began the shiur by reminding people that he's going to look at the Rambam, the first chapter of the laws of teshuvah. That wasn't new. He did it every single year. And he began by saying, "Let me say it in Yiddish first and I'll translate it cuz I remember the Rebbe said, 'Ihr veist alles ist der selbe Rambam over skait in shine der selbe shiur.'" I'm telling you right now, so some people got it. I'm telling you it's the same Rambam, but I'm promising you it's not going to be the same shiur. That was his greatness. He was able to see different things at different times of his life, sometimes even contradictory things. Those of us who had the great fortune of studying by the Rav in one era, the '50s, the '60s, the '70s, and they'll say, "Well, I heard the Rav say something." And somebody else will say, "I heard him talk about the same subject and he said something else." You're both right. It's very likely that you heard accurately what he said the time that he said it in 1950 or 1960 or 1970. The The issue is that the Rambam The Rav sometimes adjusted his thinking and rethought the subject. In the case of the shiur about bisot sia ha shofar, the secret of the the conversation of the shofar, the Rav characteristically begins with the Rambam in the laws of shofar in this case. What was interesting was that he rarely talked about the shofar, and this is after Rosh Hashanah. So, if he wanted to say something about the shofar, it was at the Yeshiva the week or two before Rosh Hashanah or at the weekly Tuesday night shiur in Midtown Manhattan at the Maria shiur, Shul Congregation. But at the teshuvah drasha, he would deal with the issues of teshuvah and aseret yemei teshuvah and Yom Kippur. That was the subject. And for some reason or another, he decided to go back to the subject of shofar. And if you look at the so first source, which is in the laws of shofar, it happens to be a triple-edged title, the laws of shofar, sukkah, and lulav. The Rambam says in his prologue, before he even gets to the halakhot, the Rambam gave us an index, which is something very rare from anybody in the Middle Ages. The Rambam writes his book in the 12th century, and he gives us an index. And the printers put the index a before each section of halakha. And it says, "Hilkhot Shofar u'Lulav, yesh bahem shalosh mitzvot asei. There are three positive mitzvot." So, two of them we're not going to talk about today, sukkah and lulav, but the first one is obviously shofar. And three of the eight chapters of this segment of Mishneh Torah of the Rambam are the laws of shofar. And he says, "Vezehu partan, and here they are. Aleph, the first one is lishmoa kol shofar be-ehad be-Tishrei, to hear the sound of the shofar on the first of Tishrei." First Tishrei is Rosh Hashanah, fine. That's fine. There's no issue here when you read that. Except that when you look at source number two, which is how the Rambam begins the corpus of the halakha, he starts by saying, "Mitzvat asei she-Torah, it is a biblical commandment, lishmoa teruat ha-shofar be-Rosh Hashanah, to hear the teruah, the teruah." One second, the teruah? I remember what a teruah is, you all remember what a teruah is, do do do do do do do do do. The machine gun blast of the sound of the shofar. But that's not what the Rambam's talking about. He's talking about something that relates to the phrase in the Humash itself Yom Teruah Yelahim It is a day that we sound a sound that is defined as a Teruah. The Hahamim are going to have to struggle to interpret that word Teruah in a pragmatic way. And the Hahamim say, well, it might be what we call a Shevarim. It could be what we call a Teruah. Do do do do do do. And it could be the combination of both. Do do do do do do do do do do. And it could be the combination of both with a break between the first and the second or hyphenated the first and the second. And and that's why the ones who blow shofar in shul are instructed by their rabbonim or those who are the the makri, the one who call out the sounds, whether it's Shevarim Teruah, that's together, or Shevarim Teruah, and the ba'al tokea knows that he has to take a pause, a momentary pause, between the Shevarim Teruah. So, you have different sounds. All of the above are the biblical Teruah. Yom Teruah Yelahim. And that's the way it's found in um in Parshat Pinchas. And in Parshat Emor, it says Zichron Teruah Mikra Kodesh. We have to understand what is the difference between Yom Teruah and what is Zichron Teruah. But, let's just begin with a little ABC here. The Torah doesn't tell us we have to blow the shofar. The Torah tells us that we have to hear the shofar. Well, obviously, if somebody doesn't blow the shofar, nobody's going to hear it. So, the ba'al tokea, as we call it, and we call it colloquially Tkiat Shofar, the mitzvah of Tkiat Shofar, that's what we call ba'al batish. That's not really what the mitzvah is. The mitzvah is to hear the shofar as the bracha says, "V' tzeevanu lishmoa kol shofar." Now, I know somebody's going to tell me, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, but some of the rishonim say that the bracha is v'tzeevanu al tikias shofar." Fine. That doesn't mean that they believe that the mitzvah is the tekiah. That's a digression. I don't want to get there. But, the mitzvah is defined by all as the mitzvah to hear the shofar, which means that if somebody is profoundly deaf and does not and not able to hear, I don't want to get into hearing aids now and cochlear implants, but if somebody is totally deaf and cannot hear the sound of shofar, so that person is excused from the mitzvah of shofar, just as a person who has an arm amputated from the shoulder down is going to be excused from the mitzvah of putting on tefillin of the hand. And if somebody is without a head, the person's excused from the mitzvah of putting on tefillin on the head. I happen to know more people without a head than without an arm. The um the idea of a person who is exempt from the mitzvah of shofar, so that person might be a perfectly great ba'al tokea. Because perhaps the person went deaf late in life because of meningitis, because of some trauma, whatever it may have been. Um but, the person still knows how to blow the shofar, right? Beethoven was deaf, but was able to compose music. That person can no longer be the ba'al tokea to have anybody fulfill their obligation. Cuz as we'll see in a few minutes, both parties, the one who sounds out the shofar and the one who listens to the shofar, have to be fully obligated in the mitzvah. So, the Rambam says in source number two, "Mitzvah d'oraita lishmoa tru'as shofar b'rosh hashana." How sh'ne'emar, as it says, "Yom tru'a yihyeh lachem." How does that compare to source number one? And this is the rub puts it the table right away. Lishma kol shofar be'echad betishrei. Both use the word lishma to hear. But in the first source it says the sound of the shofar, and in the second source it defines the sound as the teruah sound. However, we may practically sound it out. But and he's using the biblical uh source for it, Yom Teruah Yelechem. That's difference number one. The difference in kol, the sound, and the teruah, naming it. And the second difference is that in the first source the Rambam gives us the date, be'echad betishrei, first of Tishrei. And in the second source he gives us the name of the Yom Tov, the Rosh Hashanah. Now most people just just, you know, just gloss over this and don't even think about that there was any difference. Hardly any people read the introductory words, by the way. But the rub was careful to read everything. And he also noticed that in this source number two there's a continuation. The Rambam says shofar that we blow whether on Rosh Hashanah or on the Yovel year. We don't have the Yovel year today at all, the 50th year after seven shmita cycles. There was an obligation for every Jew to blow shofar. Ba'avur hatem teruah bechol artzechem. So with regard to Rosh Hashanah because the mitzvah is defined as hearing the sound of the shofar we can whip out an interesting halacha called shome'a ke'oneh. If I hear it from somebody else, I it's as if I, you know, did it myself. It's like kiddush for that matter. Everybody has to make kiddush Friday night, men and women. Without a question. But one person can make the kiddush and everybody listens to the kiddush and has, you you kavana, has intention to fulfill obligation, and that works. But you can't do that with what's called a mitzvah she b'gufah. A mitzvah that you yourself have to perform. Like eating matzah. Imagine, I don't like matzah, it gives me indigestion. Do me a favor, eat another piece of matzah for me and have kavana to be motzi me, you know? The motzi is good for the brachah, motzi lechem min ha'aretz, but it's not going to be good for for being motzi me, to for have me fulfill the obligation. Or sitting in a in a succah. I don't have a succah in my house, but you have a beautiful succah, sit in there another hour, have me in mind. It's not going to work. And taking a lulav, for that matter, that's not going to work. I mean, they say the story of of of of only in America you can have this kind of a shaila that a rabbi can get. The fellow thought he had a shiva for his father, but you know, time is money, so after 3 days he was going back to work, but he has a neighbor who's a is a retired person. He asked the neighbor, "Do me a favor, sit complete the shiva for me." He thought that was okay. So, what was the shaila? Shaila to his rabbi was, "Do I have to go be menachem avel to the neighbor?" So, you know, you obviously, aveilus is not transferable. There's so many mitzvot that are non-transferable. So, the um the the the mitzvah of blowing shofar in the yovel year on Yom Kippur, not after Yom Kippur, on Yom Kippur, is a mitzvah like eating matzah. It's a mitzvah like taking a lulav. It's a mitzvah like sitting in a succah. It's a chovat haguf. Which means today, if you don't know how to blow shofar, you can get away with it. Just go to shul and get somebody to to sound out the shofar on your behalf. But in the yovel year, that's not going to work. Everybody's going to have to blow shofar by themselves. So, the mitzvah there is a mitzvah of t'kiah, to blow. It's not a mitzvah to hear. But the mitzvah of shofar on Rosh Hashanah is lishmoa. So the Rambam continues and he says the shofar should be talking between the Rosh Hashanah and between the Yovel. It has to be a keren hakvasim hakafuf. It has to come from the horn of the animal that might be you call it kvasim but it's not sheep. I mean we use a ram or ram and has to be curved. Now you can have a straight shofar. If you go to the the zoo, you might see an animal that has a horn that's completely straight. It will look like a trumpet. So that might be a shofar, but it's invalid. Well, there's a whole discussion in the Gemara Masechet Rosh Hashanah if you can use a straight shofar. But the Rambam decides in accordance with the opinion that it must necessarily be a curved shofar. And he says it in the context of this halakha. And the Rav asked, why? Why such a stickler that it has to be a curved shofar? And to get into this discussion, the Rav reminds us that there are two categories of understanding a mitzvah or two sides of any particular mitzvah with using terminology that were developed by his own grandfather Rav Chaim Soloveitchik, the Rav of Brisk. And it became axiomatic language jargon of all the lamdanim of the Brisk style of Yeshivot. And that is the difference between the maaseh mitzvah, a mitzvah act, and the kiyum hamitzvah, the very fulfillment. Now let's try to understand this. The mitzvah act is technical. The fulfillment is that which was accomplished. In many cases, they are identical. There's a mitzvah to eat a kezayit's worth of matzah. That's the mitzvah. So, you gobble down a kazayis worth of matzah on Seder night. And that is the fulfillment. The mitzvah, ma'aseh mitzvah, the mitzvah act and its fulfillment is identical. And there's no need to split in any way to discuss different facets and sides. So, too, the mitzvah of sitting in the sukkah. The mitzvah is to reside in the sukkah. And when you reside in the sukkah, you're fulfilling the mitzvah of residing in the sukkah. But there are some mitzvot where the ma'aseh mitzvah, the mitzvah act, and its fulfillment can be split and can be discussed independently. One of the classic examples that the Rav liked to talk about is tfilah, davening. He says where the ma'aseh mitzvah is to say words, their text the text that are in the siddur. The Anshei Knesses Hagdoloh authored for us a text. So, that's the ma'aseh mitzvah. The kiyum mitzvah, the fulfillment, is called avodah shebalev. It's serving God with your heart. And serving God with your heart necessitates focus and concentration. And therefore, a in theory, and we're getting into the practicalities now, but in theory, if a person goes through the Shmoneh Esrei without that focus and concentration, it's as if he or she didn't even daven at all. There are some leniencies that already crept into the world of halacha that allows us to get through Shmoneh Esrei on a daily basis or three times a day with not much kavana. And um these are leniencies. And the Rabbi Norman Lamm, zichrono livracha, wrote a whole piece on this. It was printed in a a very interesting volume that came out in 1986 celebrating the 100th year of what was the original Yeshivas Rabbeinu Yitzchak Elchanan taking on as 10 years from the 1886 of the Yeshiva Eitz Chaim explaining it. That's a sheer in itself. But um But the idea of tfila being kiyum shebalev as opposed to the ma'aseh mitzvah you can talk about both sides independently. And the Rav said, "So is the mitzvah of teshuvah." Teshuvah, the Rambam tells us that there there is no mitzvah in the listing of the 613 that you have to do teshuvah. There were others who argue with the Rambam on this, like the Ramban. From this week's parsha we just read yesterday, parshat Nitzavim. He believed that there is a mitzvah in the Torah to do teshuvah. The Rambam says, "Of course there's teshuvah. But there is a ma'aseh mitzvah. And the ma'aseh mitzvah, the mitzvah act is confession, vidui. And the halacha teaches us how to confess. And the confession itself carries with it a formula of regret what I did yesterday a spelling out the sin and not just glossing over and saying, "Oh, Rabbenu I wasn't such a good guy." Not good enough. You have to spell it out. And then proclaim and declare that tomorrow it's going to be different. Chara'at asher avar cha and kabbalah lehaba, two sides and the present tense that I'm saying I know exactly what I did. So vidui necessitates this. And the problem with our vidui in Yom Kippur, we go through al chet is we're trying to spell out sins, but you know, we say not only on Yom Kippur often enough, but also throughout the year. Not only when we say slichot, but also tachnun. Many people say it every day. Some people say it just Monday Thursday. Ashamnu, bagadnu, gazalnu, which is the aleph bet. It's basically all the sins that start with aleph, ashamnu. All the sins that start with bet, bagadnu. The Chayei Adam, whose name is Rabbi Rabbi Avraham Danzig, who also was the author of the Tfila Zaka that Rabbi Finkelstein mentioned just before. The That's why Sefardim don't say it. They never heard of Hayyei Adam from Avraham Danzig. But the The Hayyei Adam, he gives us a an elongated version of the Ashamnu, where under the Ashamnu, you have a whole slew of aveirot. And then Bagadnu, a whole slew of aveirot that all begin with bet. And he recommends that before Yom Kippur, you take you know, you take a pencil and you underline what's relevant. So you don't just say Ashamnu, but you say everything else cuz you're supposed to spell it out. The Rav once talked about people who say Ashamnu this way, Ashamnu, Bagadnu, and the next guy. You know, because But you know, they're okay, you know, they never did an aveira in their life. The uh So the ma'aseh mitzvah of teshuvah is the vidui. What is the fulfillment? If you just look at just drop down to source number 11, source number 11 is from Hilchot Teshuvah. And the Rambam says, "Af al pi she ketzi far Rosh Hashanah gzeirat hakatu, even though we fulfilled the mitzvah of shofar because it's regimented in the Chumash, in the Torah, remez yesh bo, is something goes beyond just hearing the sounds of the shofar cuz that sounds to be very technical. K'lומר, that is to say, u yesheinim mishnatchem v'nir'damim hekitzu mitardematchem. Wake up. The shofar is a wake-up call. While our Sefardi brethren begin Slichot as they've been doing since the second day of Elul, wake up. And where they get that line from if not from Yona on the bottom of the boat when the sailor said, "Ben Adam malech onerdam, what do you Now is not shluf shlunda. Now is not time to take a nap. Kum k'ra l'elocha, call to your God." And the Sefardim lifted that, cut and pasted out of context, and begins their slichos, "Ben Adam, malecha nirdam, kum k'ra b'tachanunim." Wake up. "Uru yesheinim mishneischem." If a person just hears the shofar, and there's no awakening, there's something missing in the mitzvah. No different if a person goes through saying all the words of Shmoneh Esrei, and doesn't have a clue that he's talking to God and requesting things, there's something really off the mark of his tfilah. So, you have here a in shofar, a a a an example of a mitzvah that carries with it both the ma'aseh mitzvah and the kiyum mitzvah. Furthermore, the Rav suggests that the very very object of the mitzvah, the shofar itself, is Why does the Rambam insist that it must be bent? So, if you go up on the page to source number four, I have here the Gemara in maseches Rosh Hashanah. "Amar Rav Levi, mitzvah shel Rosh Hashanah v'shel Yom Kippurim, the mitzvah of the shofar on both Rosh Hashanah and the Yovel year of Yom Kippur when we have to blow shofar, b'kifufin." The um the the the shofar has to be bent. And and the and the Rambam the next line explains what this is all about. The underlying, "B'Rosh Hashanah, kama d'chayiv inish da'atei tfei malei." The more person is bent over, and I'm not talking about the physical bending, even though it became customary because of this Gemara, that when people davening the Shmoneh Esrei on Rosh Hashanah, they don't stand as usual, you know, erect straight straight up, but they're little bit bent over a little bit bent over remember I was taught Tyra in first second third and fourth grade in Yiddish that's because that's way much for being a toilet and that's how we were told and and the word was if I remember correctly aronga banging something like that something I feel banging was bent over you had to be bent over and it be bent over but Rashi tells us that the if you look at source number five Rashi says because the shofar will see has something to do with will ask a kid that it's hot the in on coupon there's something about being bent over that radiates submission hack now submission and the Rambam believes that against other opinions in the he adopts the opinion that says that the shofar must necessarily reflect the person who's blowing and hearing the sounds of the shofar he must be bent over so the shofar actually somehow symbolically radiates the person blowing the shofar as well and I remember the rough just occasionally we do this at the great children whether was the third of Shabbat the yard side of his father that also was a marathon 4 hours here in front of 3000 and the true of Russia he would sometimes just I would say just to break the the the the it was a very tense atmosphere in the sheer of it was very tense and he tried to break it sometimes and throw out a question usually with the person saying something nonsensical and with people break out and laugh and he thought that was very very good and healthy so he asked is there any other example in a locker with the object of the mitzvah something is built in built in to the object to reflect an idea. And I looked at my brother, with Rabbi Yosef Adler, looked at him and I said, he's talking about lulav. Cuz we learned it by him in perek lulav hagazul in the shear, um in the Maria shear, I said, I'm sure he's talking about lulav. Now, the hadasim and aravot have to be three tefachim high, but the lulav has to be an extra tefach, k'dei l'natnei'ah, so that when you do the shakings by hallel, it somehow protrudes and there's an added fulfillment in the lulav itself. I think that's what he means. So, my brother said, "Yell it out. Say it." Now, you know, this is not so simple, you know, through 1973. So, I decided to muster whatever courage I had and I said, "Lulav." And out of nowhere, the rav goes, "V'ERES K'ZAYIS LULAV. WHO SAID LULAV?" I said, you could have called the cardiologist, right then and there. I mean, I was having heart palpitations. And "What did you mean, you know? What did you mean?" Said, "Vas hot gemeint?" "What did you mean?" "What did you mean?" And I was going to say four tefachim and I was so shaken up, I by accident said, "Four amos." Four amot. That's the difference between one foot and six foot. And the rav says, "Has k'zayis a lulav four amos?" Did you ever see a lulav that's six feet? You know. And I kept yelling, "Tefachim, tefachim." Nobody heard it. Everybody was rolling and laughing. But he said, "You're right. It was It was the lulav. It was the lulav." The lulav, there was a built-in tefach, so that there should be an added understanding and fulfillment in the object. But the rav said it with regard to the um the shofar itself. And if we just um carry on, the um indeed, there is a connection between shofar and tefillah. First of all, the fact that we fulfilled the mitzvah of shofar in the context of Shmoneh Esrei. Now, it's true. If you for whatever reason can't make it to Beit Knesset, there are people who are stuck home, they're going to be chayalim who are not going to be able to go to shul on Rosh Hashanah, but they have a shofar. So, all you have to do is blow the first 30 set the 30 30 sounds that are in the machzor before Musaf, and you fulfilled your obligation. Rashi is of the opinion that the biblical command of shofar is actually those called sounds that we sound out in the middle of Shmoneh Esrei. Some shuls do it even in the silent, but all do it in the chazarat hashatz. That everybody knows. And the fact that you have shofar in the middle of davening is unparalleled. There's no mitzvah in the middle of Shmoneh Esrei on Sukkos to take a lulav. There's no mitzvah on Pesach to hold a piece of matzah. There's no such mitzvah on Chanukah to hold a Chanukah candle in the in the middle of Shmoneh Esrei. There's no other mitzvah where in the middle of t'filat Shmoneh Esrei you associate a secondary mitzvah except for shofar. Which means that shofar is actually another medium of prayer, of t'filah. That's what it means. We are also davening. And how do we end the brachot, the special section of shofarot on Musaf on Rosh Hashanah? We say Baruch Atah Hashem shome'a t'ruat amei Yisrael b'rachamim. And that sounds awfully close to to ki atah shome'a t'filat amcha Yisrael b'rachamim, Baruch Atah Hashem shome'a t'filah that we say every day in Shmoneh Esrei in bracha of shma koleinu. It's a similar ending because as we end a bracha of t'filah, we end the bracha of of of shofar because it is indeed indeed a mitzvah of t'filah. We're davening. What are we davening for? What's the text? What is the siach? What is the conversation? It's the shvarim tru'ah and the shvarim tru'ah together. Both possibilities, hyphenated and non-hyphenated. Not the tekiah. Tekiah is a straight sound that sounds the message of of joy of Bochashem, everything's fine. It's an all clear sound, the shofar. And as we say in the bracha of shofarot we refer to creation, we refer to Ma'amad Har Sinai, great moments of Am Yisrael. These are the great ki'ot. And the greatest ki'ah of all will come at the end of days. Vaya ba yom hahu yitaka b'shofar gadol. It was Yeshayahu, not Carlebach, who wrote this, right? Yitaka b'shofar gadol uvau ha'ovdim b'eretz Ashur v'hanidachim b'eretz Mitzrayim v'hishtachavu l'Hashem b'har hakodesh b'Yerushalayim. So, if there's a shofar gadol we're going to be hearing a tekiah gedolah. A tekiah gedolah at the end of days. I'm talking about symbolically, it's going to be a great ending. And Hakadosh Baruch Hu is going to bring back to Eretz Yisrael and bring back to Yerushalayim two different types of exilic Jews. Those are are Ashur and those are Mitzrayim type Jews. Both the Rav and his friend, personal friend, the late Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, they both asked the same question. And I doubt that they talked it over in Berlin in the university hall in 1926. They independently came up with the same question and independently came up with the same answer. Ashur is Assyria. Uvau ha'ovdim b'eretz Ashur, we We will come back from Assyria. Assyria today is Iraq. Who's in Iraq? Not that many Jews. There was a Jewish community in Iraq, of course. The were in Baghdad. 9th century, 10th century, 11th century. They came in in '48, '49, '50. No, nothing left there. So, was it fulfilled already? That's what you shall was talking about. The And how many were in Egypt? It's true. Egyptian Jewry, whatever remnant was there, came back to already in the last 50 years, no doubt. 70, 60 years, 70 years. The famous Rabbi Sabato and all his family, they were all from from Egypt. They're all here. Everybody's here. Rabbi Ovadia Yosef was a rough in Cairo in 1946. But it doesn't exist anymore. Whatever Jews you may have there is the Israeli embassy and not much more. Hardly any tourists there any longer as there was. So, that's what you shall was talking about. And no, both the rough and the rubber they said, Ashur comes from the word aleph shin resh, ashrei yoshvei veitecha, which means content. It's the lands of bounty. That's our Eretz Ashur, the lands of bounty, the countries in the west where people have They have everything, even too much. Those lands. And then they're going to be the lands of of uh issues and problems and troubles. Mitzrayim is the word meitzar, min hammeitzar karati. When you're desperate, when you're when you're really crunched, and so on. Those countries, and there were Jews in so many countries of oppression. This is Eretz Mitzrayim. And through Yeshayahu tells us they'll all come back. They'll all come back. So, Soviet former Soviet Union was land of oppression. It was Mitzrayim. And out of nowhere if there's a Russian Jew today still in former Soviet Union, it's by choice. It's by choice. I would dare say there's hardly a Jew in the world today hardly a Jew in the world today who is not here because the government is not letting them go. I mean, there are social pressures. I'm fully aware of it. There are sometimes economic situation There are family considerations, for sure. Remember of Ramavino? In Lech Lecha, Lech Lecha, Me'artzecha, Mimoladtecha, U'mibeis Avicha. In that phrase, you have all the legitimate reasons why not to come in Aliyah. No, my family they have this, they have patriotic and this and that. It's all legitimate, everything. My wife told me once the vote from the from the Gary Rebbe, Sfas Emes. That uh why would what did Avram do right that he got the message of Lech Lecha? No, no, no, no. Kads Baruch said it to everybody. He was the only one who paid attention. Not a small matter. Not a small matter. So, here you have something that's uh a extremely vitally important and comes the Rov and he says, the shofar itself actually splits us. If there's just about the kiah himself, he's all by himself and he's going to blow shofar. So, he is actually giving out tochacha. He's spelling out, he's reminding the person. And then there's a recipient. He's the same person. The person who's let's use the word dishing it out, giving it out, is also the recipient of the message. So, shofar seems to be splitting the personality into two. And there's even a very interesting theoretical scenario in Halacha called Chatzei Eved Chatzei ben chorin. Person is half eved kna'ani and half a free person. And that can only happen if a person was um an eved uh kna'ani and uh and and he was freed, well, then he becomes a Jew. He actually becomes a ger uh for that matter. But that can happen if um if if if you have a person um who who had two children and uh it's it's complicated. But you can end up with a status of half and half. So for most mitzvahs, if you're half and half, half obligated in mitzvot and half not obligated, so do it anyway. So eat the matzah, take a lulav, sit in a sukkah. What's the problem? But with shofar it's not going to work. The chatzi eved chatzi ben chorin, he can't blow shofar even for himself. Why? Because half of him is not obligated and that half can't give out the tochacha or that half can't receive it from the one giving it. And the Rav said, it's takes two to tango here with regard to the mitzvah of shofar. But think about it. It's not the shofar that actually divides the person. What divides a person is a sin. We have a tradition, Yisrael af al pi she chata Yisrael hu. A Jew who sins still remains a Jew. What does that mean? There's always something left. In Yiddish we call it the pintale Yid. There's a drop like like a in the old stoves where you know we had a pilot light. The the fire might be out but there's a pilot light. There's something there. And that something can be reignited. Always always always. It was the in Christianity, they believe that there's a total separation between sacred and profane. Judaism rejects this categorically. We believe that the Jew, any human being for that matter, but if I'm Yisrael, we can somehow divine be divided between kedusha, that side of us that wants to be with Hakadosh Baruch Hu, and profanity and tumah. It can be the same person, the exact same person. And what happens with regard to the mitzvah of shofar is shofar is there somehow or another to turn it around for a person that that foul side somehow gets shredded away and and the person returns back to his or her normal self. The Rebbe was elaborate. We don't have time to go into the entire elaboration. But what he did do was he did divide between in a normal sentence structure the difference between a subject and an object. You know, he said, "Abraham writes a letter." So, Abraham is the subject, the letter is the object, and writes is the verb. That's like structure a simple sentence. So, in Hebrew it's called a nosei and a musa, a subject and an object. Hakadosh Baruch Hu is the subject. He is the subject of everything. He's the creator. Kicked everything into motion, keeps everything going. Um Hakadosh Baruch Hu kol yom tovid ma'aseh bereishit. We are subjects, and as subjects we are the objects. We are the object, not the subject. We're not the nosei, we are the object of what Hakadosh Baruch Hu wants us to do. That's normal this situation. But Hakadosh Baruch Hu actually wants us to imitate him. We read it in Parshat Ki Tavo. Okay? V'halachta b'drachav. Just follow. So, if Hakadosh Baruch Hu was a yotzer, a creator, he wants you to be a creator. Everything Hakadosh Baruch Hu does in terms of character, he wants us to imitate it. And wants us to be like him. That's what he wants us to do. And it's a tremendous effort to do that because it goes against the grain, many times, of nature, of society, of rules and regulations of of of a particular country, whatever it may be. And I'm not saying I'm suggesting Kalila, the person should not be a good citizen. But, to be committed to Hakadosh Baruch Hu, you sometimes have to do the absolute irrational act, as in the case of Avraham Avinu, to say "Hineni, I'm ready to do it." The avera is easy because it's a slide. And when you slide, you have gravity working with you. It brings you down. And the Rav points to a Mishna in Maseches Yoma of what the sinner looks like. It's the sa'ir la'azazel, that goat that's thrown off the mountain. Atzina se'avarim avarim. It yored lemata. It just drops and drops and drops. And because of that spiral, spinning slide, you can't catch yourself many times. And you're just you've lost. You have lost. The process of returning is the kamta. The Rav said at the time of Har Sinai, when the egel was made, was lech red, go down, because the people have slid down. But now, the aleh elai harara, come back up. Coming back up is a difficult, difficult task. But it can be done. The kamta ve'alita, coming up to Beis Hamikdash. And I'm not talking about the physical side. All the efforts that Rabbi Frand spoke about the efforts of teshuvah. This is the kamta ve'alita, no doubt. We are trying to go from being, to use again the language of the brisk lamdanim, the cheftza, the object, and becoming a gavra, a person, a creative person. So, that's really what we're trying to do. But what's of great interest is that Hakadosh Baruch Hu, in the process of seeing a person coming back to him, is willing to acknowledge that you now have taken a positive step up, Akadosh Baruch Hu is willing to take a step on the side, and if to say, "I'm now being the object, and you now, the human being, are the subject." Sw- the a switch of roles. And here the Rov goes back to the days that he was in Cheder in the town Choslovich, where his Rebbe and Melamed was a Chabadnik, and the Chabadnik spoke of of of Leil Hachtara, the night of coronation. It was called Koronatzionacht in the Chabad tradition, where they crown Akadosh Baruch Hu king on the night of Rosh Hashanah. And I remember he's saying that he asked his Rebbe, when he was maybe eight years old, says, "Why does God need our king our crown?" He needs our crown. And the Rov said that the Rebbe said something with Kabbalistic language. He didn't have a clue what he was saying then, but years later, he began to appreciate what that Melamed actually was telling him. And it had something to do with the Gemara in Maseches Brachos of um of of of the one of the Tana'im who was asked to go into heard that he was a Kohen, Kohen Gadol, and he heard from Kodesh Kodashim that Akadosh Baruch Hu is calling out to him, "Barchaini, give me a Bracha." What exactly does Akadosh Baruch Hu need a Bracha from mortal human beings? But the Rov understood it later, that it was that Akadosh Baruch Hu was willing to act as if he was the Pa'ul, as if he was the the object, letting human beings rise and emulate Akadosh Baruch Hu as the subject. And he he this crowning line at the end was, "When we say Aleinu Leshabeiach three times a day, but on Rosh Hashanah, it's part of the central it's a centerpiece of Musaf on Rosh Hashanah. It's the beginning of Malchiyos. V'al Kein Nikaveh Lecha Hashem Elokeinu, the whole Bnei Basar Yikra'u The bene basar are people who've just let themselves slide, and they've let themselves um just live a life of of of a a lustful type of life, and and just giving in to all the pleasures of life. They are the bene basar. As opposed to the rish a aretz, the rish define them as the haughty people who thought a lot of themselves, for sure. And here Kadosh Baruch Hu says, both of those are going to have the opportunity to make it back to Kadosh Baruch Hu. Today, there's going to be not a shiur in the world in this Yamim Nora'im that's not going to reflect to our contemporary situation. We ask that Kadosh Baruch Hu who has shown us that we the people of ele v'rechev v'ele v'susim v'anachnu b'shem Hashem Elokeinu nazkir. David HaMelech did not mean that there are those who fight and those who say tilam. He did not mean that. I give a whole shiur on this. David HaMelech was a fighter, and David HaMelech was a spiritual person. And he meant to say, ele v'rechev v'ele v'susim, those with their chariots and their horses alone, those who only put their faith in the tanks, the artillery, and the air force. We have the rechev and susim Baruch Hashem. And with that, v'anachnu b'shem Hashem Elokeinu nazkir. We ask that Kadosh Baruch Hu should continue to be with our chayalim and chayaloat, and they should all come back home b'shalom. The regular soldiers, the miluim people, their families should be able to once again have Simcha in the family in a united fashion and it should be a shnat shalom chayim v'shalom, a year of yeshuot v'nechamot. We need it desperately, desperately, desperately. May the dosh baruch will give us all the metek tiva v'chatima tova. Amen.