The Special Status of Isru Chag Shavuot by Rabbi Yitzchak Breitowitz

okay uh good morning everybody I hope uh everyone's well and uh should be a also a great day of of Celebration and Sim and as well as we're coming towards the great day of Matan Tor the day of shivu so I want to start off with an interesting thing about two myths people have about Shas one is a real real serious myth and the other is maybe a little less so uh obviously when we think about shos the one thing we think about is z matu it is the day or the season of God giving us the Torah now first of all you understand that doesn't mean the whole Torah because the most that happened on were the Ten Commandments okay but we can say that's the beginning of it that's the mass Revelation in theer are all of the 613 Mitzvah of the Torah in fact the ramban actually wrote a contess okay the ramban is okay the ramban actually wrote a contess in which he shows the 613 how they are derived from the 10 right but be it as it matter even if it's only the Ten Commandments we say that that's mat Torah but here's the problem the gamar actually has a among the tan if the Torah was given on the sixth of s or the Torah was given on the seventh of San and based on the discussion which is a little intricate for right now we obviously would pasin it was given on the seventh of s now clearly the one that says the seventh of s didn't change the day of shabos which means according to that opinion we are observing shabos not on the day of Matan Torah but on the day before Matan Torah now that's pretty Stark don't tell your kids this to may give them a nervous breakdown uh ask them what happened onos and they'll tell you God gave the Ten Commandments you'll say wrong what happened on shos nothing happened on shos shos was the day before if I say Zan this is a well-known Kasha of the m one of the great commentators on the who asks how can we say on the sixth of if the Torah was given on the seventh so this is one case where has a little advantage over us because they do have so on the second day of Shas they are actually celebrating the actual day of Matan Torah but we know that is really one day and it's the wrong day so that's one interesting C now actually I'm not going to talk about this that that that question today I'll just mention the mugin of's own answer the mugin ofam answers that the gamar and shabas tells us that Moshe rabenu did a did three things on his own initiative that Hashem agreed to after the fact one of them was he deferred Matan Torah by one day Hashem said prepare for day one and day two and I will give you the Torah on day three of the preparation Moshe told the Jewish people prepare for three days so it turns out that if the Torah was given on the seventh of Sion that's only because Moshe added a day and God's original plan was to give it a day early so says the M AB we celebrate shos not on the day the was actually given but on the day that it would have been given had mosha rabeno not added one day mid uh just to complete it the two other things that Moshe did on his own was he broke the luos by the hasem didn't tell him to do it but Hashem said that was the right response and the third thing was moshe's decision which is not to be emulated by other people to separate from his wife from Matan Torah onwards Hashem didn't tell him to do it but because of his unique status as being a Novi on call 247 that was in fact the proper point so once again it's quite striking that according to the gamor and chabas the Torah was not given on sh it was given the day after sh and we celebrate God's original plan which was not the actual day of mat Torah so that I will call myth number one actually some want to say it's almost a little bit of that's why it's called instead of it's approximate Z but again I think that's not really an answer because we say it by all the so I wouldn't I wouldn't put too much uh reli Reliance on that particular point so that is what we might call myth number number one which is the myth sixth or the seven which day is the my no no the the the call calling the six of SEO is technically a myth again I don't mean that pejoratively because it is God's original day but in terms of historical reality the Torah was given the day after actually I I'll include two myths I mean myth number one is the Torah was given on shos when in fact it's the Aeros that were given myth number two is it wasn't given on the sixth it was given on the on the seventh okay so that's one thing to keep keep in mind now a second idea is one of the names of shos is y orim right the holiday or the day of the first fruits if you ask virtually every uh know talmid in Ina Katana or day school and I would gather even if you ask most to the teachers in the day school they will tell you that the reason it is called ym is because there's a Mitzvah in the Torah uh at the time of uh in the time of the B Mikes only that a farmer in erel would bring his first fruits to the B mikdash and recite a very brief history which is actually the basis of the ha of PES that L the Arian tried to destroy my father ET and you put the borim down in front of the and then the Coen takes it he doesn't have to eat it in the temple he can eat it eat it in uh but uh that is the Mitzvah borim and this is a Mitzvah di that is described in par the Mitzvah of Bim and again just to make it very clear although we translate Bim as first fruits it's daa the first fruits uh it is sh so that includes s wheat barley geen The Grapes TAA the Fig uh remon the pomegranate Z SH the olive or the olive oil which of course means date honey so we don't call fruits but they are in Bor so the mishna there's a whole tractate that many people learn on shu of mishna called there is no Babylonian t on that M because generally the M of the order of Zim do not have a Babylonian talmud except for M which is not about agriculture in thei there is indeed and the M indicates that the BM season begins from Shas onwards ergo call now almost everybody thinks that's the reason that is also a myth because let me explain something about borm borm is a private offering borm is not a communal offering every individual farmer has to bring his own B private offerings are not brought on yto when the mishna says shos is the start of the borim Season it actually means also the day after no borm we're brought brought into the bik starts after sh not sh itself so if that's the case why does the Torah call shos the day of be answer it is not because of the Mitzvah Bor it is for a totally other reason and that is we mentioned before on the day of PES a special communal offering was brought of barley and that is called the OM offering and we mentioned last week that the Omar offering has a very special function because you are not allowed to eat Kash you're not allowed to eat the newly grown grain of er Israel until the OM is brought and therefore the Omare is said to be a maer m it permits the eating of when we don't have a bikash you'll recall the gar explains that technically it is the morning of the 16th of Nissan that mat is even without the OM andak made a Tak that you got to wait until the 17th of Nissan one day one day later but bik you are not allowed to eat the until you bring the OM well on shos there's another grain offer offering that you bring and the grain offering that you bring is two loaves of bread now actually technically it's hard to even know why it is called a carbon at all because there normally the definition of a carbon is at least a portion of it is burnt on the M right even something like a peace offering where you know the person eats most of the peace offering but there's a of the animal that's burnt on the M the as well the fistful is burnt on the m and then thean bake the rest and they eat it the is kind of unique as a Corban there is literally nothing that is burnt on the altar they take these two the kohanim take these two loaves of bread they wave them up down forward back in front of them is be and then they are eaten 100% this is very unique because even the showbread the the 12 which are indeed eaten totally but at least there was Leona there was frankincense that was burnt on the M that allowed the eating of the upon him the literally have no at all but they're still called a corbon because they are waved there is T before the M now there are two fundamental differences I'm sorry three fundamental differences between the of p and the of difference number one is what I just said that the OM has a that's burnt is and the is not number two the OM is barley and the is wheat and now this I think we already pointed out the gar in that explains that barley was typically fed to animals and wheat was a human consumption and P which is freedom until it's linked to mat Torah it is simply the freedom of the wild animal and that's why the OM is uh once you come to sh that gives meaning to the freedom it is now right so difference number one vers difference number two versus difference number three is very surprising the Omare had to be unleavened meaning it had to be baked before it became now now I want to point out you might think that's obvious because it's during PES but actually that's not the reason I mean that's also a reason but that's not the only reason every offering in the B mikdash the whole year had to be unloved the B mikash was a free zone the Holier the only exception for at least a public is the of sh which were actually now this is very unique again people make a mistake you know people think oh well the OM had to be because it was P well that that that that would be true also but that's not the reason all are mat except for why is that we understand the barley versus wheat because that's be to but why would all of a sudden you bring in so maharal of prag says a beautiful beautiful idea he says the following he says that if you remember when Moser Abu during the 40 days went up to shamay to get the rest of the Torah besides the so the were arguing with God that he should not give the Torah to the Jewish people they're not worthy they'll violate it they're not spiritual enough why are you contaminating your Torah by giving it into the hands of human beings who are going to mess it up over and over and over again leave the Torah in heaven and the gamarra describes in very Vivid terms that Moshe rabenu was terrified I mean he's in sham all these things are happening the angels and Moshe rabenu is scared and God says to Moshe answer the Angels give them the counterargument and Moshe was too frightened to talk and and Hashem said to him again these are all allegorical Expressions we don't know exactly what they mean hold on to my throne and you will get courage and mosu raenu holds on to God's throne and gets the courage and the wisdom to answer and he says um Angels you want to keep the Torah let me ask you the Torah says don't eat meat and milk do you eat now yes it's true when it came to Aram you made believe you were eating but you don't really eat honor your father and mother do you have you know biological parents uh do you have a Yates or Hara meaning the Torah is not relevant to you the Torah is not just like theoretical theological speculations about God the Torah is about actions Deeds or inactions things you're not allowed to do and it presupposes a Yates or horror and it presupposes the struggle of free will you have no connection to the Torah the Torah has to be given to people who have the capacity to violate it because the whole point is the struggle of Good and Evil and M raenu won he won the argument uh the Angels conceded that they don't really have a connection to Torah in that way so says maral it's we know that symbolically represents the the arrogance and the leg now we only got the Torah because of the meaning had we been like angels we wouldn't have gotten the Torah at all so therefore the is entitled to a place on the table on because hey I'm the reason you got the Torah you can't kick me out and that's why the which ises gains admission to put it in a different way which may be what the morale means in practice when you have Torah you know how to deal with the I can now bring in even my because I'm given Direction how to fight it how to win against it and that's right that's right if the the is called the manov the disgusting person uh or disgusting entity and it says if that entity is disturbing you bring him to the Bas medish and you will through the Torah learning you will be given the strength to fight that so all of this is the contrast that you need to know between the Omare and the but now I'm going to add something else the same way the OM the allows you to eat this has a m function and that is you're not allowed to bring from new grain until the is brought meaning to say the following I as an individual can consume the new grain as soon as the OM is brought but meal offering between p and have to be from the old grain until the so in the language of the mishna permits the consumption of new grain outside of the temple permits the new grain for in theik so and again may not be an earth shattering uh myth but so the concept is this the reason shu is called the day of Bim is it is the first day that you bring from new grain until that point you have to bring you had to bring your from old grain so it is not referring to the mitvah of inav that does not start until after it refers to the which is the inaugural meal offering although it's not sacrific per se but it's the first Coran from Kash okay which means to say that the heter of a my eating kadash kicks in earlier than the het of bringing kadash in the B mikash Myer of kadash kicks in after the bringing of the OM but you still cannot bring kadash for a until you have to use from the old year is not going to be until the and that is why is called it is the inauguration of as a as a okay so just again as I say those are some misconceptions uh that people have about the reason why sh is called y now I want to in a sense skip the holiday of Shas for a moment and I want to concentrate on the day after Shas although we're going to work backwards and uh explain how that's relevant to Shas the day after every and again this is not because sh is the seventh of seven the day I'm talking about generally the day after every we know has a special status it is called now is is borrowed from a the end of which literally means is the now there means the sacrifice tie the holiday of the sacri the sacrifice of the holiday to bring it to the m but kazal borrow the term to refer to the notion that the day after a should be tied to the in a spiritual way there's a spiritual light of the that carries over and therefore you don't say Etc so it's brought down in the uh in the that the of is more sign ific than the is of P or the is of or you know now one answer might be because that is actually the day of Matan Torah sth of s but that's not the reason that's given the reason the reason that's given is has a certain designation in the gamor it is called y the day of Slaughter so this requires a little bit of background we know that for Theos so what does the Torah say every male he can bring his family along but technically women are not obligated in this but every male has to make a pilgrimage to yush physically appear physically appear the a in the courtyard of the temple so it's a physical requirement and must bring a sacrifice that is a burnt offering called an a burnt offering when you make when when you're seen by God in the then it says don't go do not go empty-handed by the way just to show you sometimes uh in this day and age where where Kus has gone out of Vogue and we have very informal ballet so sometimes people are not so sensitive to the nuances of n they'll bring in a car thing every whatever it would be um sometimes even rock rock songs rap songs whatever it would be but the truth is uh again I'm not a fan of Kus myself but the truth is in the nuances of there's very very deep Traditions I don't want to SN for you necessarily but when says right so if you listen very very carefully it actually is the for again it's hard to recognize it because it's in the joyous but the concept is when you talk about the idea that we no longer are able to go to the B mikdash they incorporate a musical motif of in that so these little things are actually very very significant they're not just accidental things but anyway so there's a mitvah now how many days do you have to bring the so let's take each holiday separately p is seven days so the is you can bring it the first day even though it's yum but if you didn't bring it the first day you have six days you have the whole holiday to make it up except for chabas and noia cannot be brought on chabas so for p you have seven days to bring it minus the chabas for sucos is the smell bothering everyone down here yes okay so we have permission to actually move upstairs if you guys want to go upstairs right now I'm sorry to drop the rabbi I don't like disturbing shum of course um so if you guys would rather stay here until the end of the sh it's up to you but we can't go upstairs to the shore from now for the smell there's a smell there's a smell there's a gas in the air right now called radon that's come up from the ground if the smell is bothering people we can move upstairs right now to the shore this this is this is Ron yeah I thought I thought I thought Ron was or I'm leaving it up to you guys I'm saying the sh the sh is a able if people want to go if if you want the sh to move it's going to be from the next year onwards it's going to be either way the sh room will be upstairs [Music] okay okay again I apologize for the for the unpleasantness yeah yeah yeah okay all right okay okay so we talked about this so again for PES you have seven days for sukos you have days can be a part of the makeup for sh you also have seven days now it says though that sh was because people did not bring their their they brought it the day after now this is a unique quality only for because the you couldn't bring the it's too late the is which is after is too late so the only is where you could bring the is the is because that's within the seven days therefore the is is very very significant because it was the day that people brought the Olas that's what it means y it was the day of Slaughter of theas the other ISS were too late the M asks a very very good question the idea that the day after sh is y is only true according to B Shi and not basilla let me again a lot of this takes some some background let me explain this there is a in we know you cannot bring anas on chabas that's for sure can you bring an on y b sh's position actually is you cannot bring anas on y why is that so because B says the of doing cooking is only for human consumption it is not for divine consumption and therefore since an Allah is totally burnt to God it is not included in the of now again let me be very clear B is not talking about communal offerings like the carbon tamid and the corbon Musa that of course is brought on yam because that's even brought on chabas but remember the ol is a private offering and B says a private offering that is going to be totally burnt is not included in the of therefore it's us B however argues is almost a if you can do it for your consumption you can certainly do it for God's consumption and therefore he although not on so says the so it turns out that according to B people could not bring the on the first day of and the you know the of so the earliest possible opportunity was is and even though they did have seven days but so they try to do it as early as possible so is was the big day where people tried to bring the but according to B Hill they didn't have to wait until is according to B Hill the ol could be brought on yto itself the day after is no different than the other six days it's just a makeup day so why would the is be so significant as a y when according to b h you could bring it on y right so apparently the designation of is as Y is only Le it is not Le now we always know of course in the overwhelming majority of cases including this one when you have is like B got a problem so the of that the first reab of kabad called the alter Reb who was called the balat he goes by a number of names but he also compiled kind of a not a revision but kind of a a special which is really with a lot of explanations a lot of commentary a lot of supplementary uh information and explanations and obviously for aabad person that's their thing but the Emma says I need to it's very important to recognize that what is called the or the of the is considered to be an authoritative source of across the board the mishura for example who was notab quotes or cites the all the time so uh even though we don't necessarily pasin like him if you're not kabad but it is considered to be a very very very classic work of so it's not just like aage thing or although that's not so bad either but it's not just aad thing it's he was considered to be one of the was the right way to do it if I said wasn't accepted by other everybody else well some made it seem like that was well well like anything else there for example the balat might be with Theon I mean like anything else the balat is considered to be one of the greatest poim that's very true but there were other poim who argued with him so sometimes the consensus is like the balat sometimes you know it is not in kabad it's considered to be absolutely definitive because he was there the AL Reb outside of kabad the balat is considered to be one of the greatest of the poim but he's weighed with with different different opinion I don't think the is considered absolutely binding on other groups but within kabad of course I have to say that there are some rare cases where even does not follow the um I mean I'll give you two two classic examples uh two I'm going to get for some reason I have I have lers that listen very carefully to everything I say so I so whenever I say something that may be wrong whatever it is they're very very quick to correct me um but I want to mention two things uh present kabad practice is not to sleep in a sua at all even if the climate is good even though the absolutely Ely pasin sleeping in the C which of course the Mish paskin that way and the second aspect is the present meaning ofad is not to eat a on bread for whatever the reason and the says very specifically that one should have a sud bread so there are rare cases in fact they may that may be the only two cases where for some reason departed from the but in the overwhelming a majority of cases uh that is their there that is their definitive and in fact when a person says the not they usually mean but but the point that I do want to communicate is that uh he is really one of the greatest greatest greatest uh pokim and all all pokim uh cite him and quote him with tremendous respect and tremendous reverence uh for his learning another my love is that um it is extremely uh explained in such a clear way you know you look at the kind of gives you a dry rule gives you the background gives you the sources gives you the explanations what is the what is the EV and why that is so so just as a matter of learning it's an underutilized Source it's a very excellent book to not maybe not so much for the bottom line the bottom line May differ but it is an excellent source to understand and that itself is very very valuable it's somewhat similar in style to a later work the is later but they kind of have the same goal to not just give you the rule but to give you the reasons and the sources for the rule so you understand t u very well so anyway the balat deals with the m of's question and that is what is so special about is of shabos and you're telling me because that's when everybody brought the Olas so the mugin of asks that is only true according to B shami who didn't allow you to bring it on yum but since according to B you're allowed to bring it on yam then presumably most people would Z you do a mitvah as quickly as you can most people would have brought it on so why would this get the special designation of Y so the answer that's given is that even though they could have followed Bas H but the Minh of the people was to follow be shami and defer the till the the day after question is what sense does that make why would if the is like B why would people have a Min not to follow B and do like in fact we have a m that that is in fact not even a correct Behavior do you remember the second m in there's a how are you supposed to read the because when the Torah talks about read the sh twice a day it says when you lie down when you get up so you know what Bei says Bei says very literally the shma of has to be recited when you're lying down and the shma of the morning has to be recited when you're standing up B however says no that's not what it means the Toyah is just describing the time you read the shma the time when people begin to go to bed night and you read the other shma when people get up in the morning now theoretically I could do both right I can read the shma of the evening when I'm lying down so so it mentions Rabbi Taron mentions that I was once traveling at night and I wanted to follow the view of be shami and lie down when I recited the shma and I almost got killed by robbers who attacked me in a vulnerable position so Reby Tarin was looking for sympathy from his audience but but he unfortunately he got tough love and they said you deserve to die because you're following sh when the law is like we're not going to have compassion for you you shouldn't have done it so here don't we have a very similar issue allows you to bring the but the was so number one why would you why and number two they shouldn't do it even if they had a reason huh it's crowded still okay no again we're not questioning that some people brought it the next day but some people brought it the day after they had six other days to bring it but it wouldn't be a specially designated day so the balatan does not explain it in full he just says so I want to share with you a very very the beautiful explanation of the bat's great great great grandson the last Direct in fact the the family named SCH son you understand comes from schn zman the alter Reby was schn zman so The Descendants were the the sons the descendants of shn of of the balatan and he says the following he says first of all what doeses the alter rebbi mean that even though they could have brought it on yum they brought it the day after was that only on what about P now again I don't mean but did they not bring the on the first day of P they brought it what about suus meaning is the alter rebbi stating a general rule that they always followed B shami on this issue or is it only Shu specific so the rebi wants to say it's shuo specific they followed sh but not because of B's reason B shi's reason is you're not allowed to bring an that would apply P according to the was always the day after but the in which even though we follow B where is specific and that is the following we know that is the celebration of Matan Torah now we find a very interesting when the Torah describes y the Torah describes yam sometimes as a day for Hashem and sometimes a day for you eating and drinking and rejoicing so how do you reconcile the idea that Y is either or so we have a RAB elzar and REI yosua rebi elzar actually says surprisingly you have a choice how you want to designate your yum you can make yum totally for God which means according to RAB elzar you could fast on you could spend the whole day learning and ding you're not to have a meal so you could make it totally for God or the other way around you can have a minimal Ding and spend most of the day in eating drinking or rejoicing so according to RAB which we do not pasin like y can either be K or this is rabi elazar rabi yosua has a different reconciliation he says you got to split it meaning you have to have a festive meal you have to enjoy your Foods in addition you need to set aside extra time for Learning and the like we like Rua that you don't have the option of or you got to do again doesn't necessarily mean 50% but you got to devote significant time to the the physical joys of yam and significant time to the spiritual joys of yam now the gamar then says a surprising statement that on one level appears to be a nonsecretor it says the m is about PES and sukus that rabi elazar I don't mean to say but during the day you can skip the meal like rabbi elzar but when it comes to shos everybody says you got to do it half and half you got to have a sud meaning even rabi elzar who gives you the option of skipping a meal an says you got to have cheesecake you got to have blindes you can't just say I just want to learn this is what the gar says now if I had to finish the sentence I might have said the opposite I might have said there's a by can you go but that's the day of mat Torah I would have thought everybody says I could give it all to God it's Torah and yet counterintuitively that's not what the gamar says the gamar doesn't say you have the option I'm Sor sorry the doesn't say uh that you at least you have the option of Kem it says the other way around you must be Kul I'm sorry not it must be why on the day of that's when I have to have my festive meal the answer is it's all connected to the story of the angels and that is the Tyra is about sanctifying the physical and material and animalistic aspects of our being in other words how does a person how does a Jew relate to physicality how do I relate to eating drinking intimate relations things that I share in common with animals there are some religious Traditions that teach that the path of holiness is through asceticism and renunciation So within the Catholic Church the ideal holy person is celibate takes a vow of poverty course we know how how much celibacy has worked there but but putting aside that but it's based on a Model that Holiness involves withdrawal from the world yes so the average guy who's not holy so we allow you and fact that Paul the Apostle who of course was Jewish he claims to have been the T of reban G we don't know if it's true but uh Paul said why should people get married better to marry than to burn in hell meaning to say you know you have these urges so we'll give you we'll give but but it's all B meaning the ideal of Holiness in those Traditions is one of separation and repudiation of the world Judaism teaches a very different D Judaism teaches that through Torah the path of Holiness is not through renunciation the path of Holiness is to take the material animalistic parts of our existence and Elevate them dedicate them to Hashem eat and drink and enjoy what you're doing but do it to serve Hashem by making Bros by by having orim that need Hospitality by eating to have the energy and the strength to be able to serve Hashem whatever it would be in other words the Torah is about sanctifying the physical not escaping it because if the Torah would be about escaping the physical the angels are better than we are at that so then the Torah would have been left with the angels our whole claim to the Torah is that we are involved in physicality we have to elevate that is why on shos even like Rabbi elzar who would give you the option of learning the whole day and fasting you have to have a fested meal because the Torah is about sanctifying elevating the physical as opposed to repudiation now if we look at the different types of Corban notes that are brought so a Corbin Ola is totally burnt on the M right so the Ola represents service of God based on renunciation I give up everything for God as opposed to peace offerings schlim there part of it is given to God but part of it is given to kohanim and part of it is eaten so in a sense the Ola represent res serving God by renunciation the schlim represents serving God by taking the material urges and elevating it on shos this is explaining we want to emphasize our capacity to sanctify the material world rather than leave it therefore it was customary that we didn't bring the ol on y because the sh is to so according again let be sure you understand this according to there was a reason why you couldn't bring Thea on yum because the heter of food preparation does not apply to that which goes totally to God now according to be Shi that would be equally true first day of PES first day of suos and the of so according to B the was never brought on but is saying the statement of the alter that even though we like the was not to bring the and that's why that was sh specific because since sh is a celebration of our capacity to sanctify the physical we only brought schlam un we did not bring the burnt offerings that represents renunciation because yish kite is about sanctifying the physical and the truth of the matter is this is an idea not not in Shu specifically that the ramban talks about in hos where the rambam says that a person should understand that eating drinking exercising vacationing playing basketball I'm adding some Modern things all of these things can actually become spiritual activities in other words spirituality is not only when you're learning doing doing religious stuff but you can have a mindset where even the mundane activities that you're involved in can become part of your aod Hashem if you consciously think that I'm trying to do this so I will serve Hashem better so I go on vacation so I can get my batteries recharged to Ser a kades uh take care of my health whatever it would be eating and drinking to glorify the Holiness of shabas and yum you know some people have this Min when they eat before they eat something on chabas now now on one level on one level it can strike you as pretentious because it's kind of pretentious who's thisy you know guy sador you know and sometimes you know I know I'm a cynical person unfortunately so I sometimes have these thoughts but on the other hands I got to fight my cynicism on the other hands it it reflects an aspiration meaning it reflects a wish yeah the guy that's eating the chant is probably not only doing it the covered chabis scsh he's eating the CH because he likes the chot but you're at least expressing the idea that I would wish that I could have these cavanas and in Ras wishing to think a certain way even if you're not actually thinking it that way counts as a certain level of thing fact the Aral writes uh it's even I wish that I would wish that he says there are 13 levels I wish that I would wish that I would have a wish that I would have a wish you know even if you're so removed from that level there is a concept that I want to be connected to that idea so people who say or maybe people who think that's not a bad thing even though it may not be where we are at that particular point but it's a statement of where we would like to be and as the rambam says the rambam quotes the Pas in Mish know God in all of your ways not just the religious stuff even the non-religious stuff so to speak uh you think that I'm trying to serve Hashem you know there are actually countless stories I mean I uh I mean unfortunately we live in a in a world where there's a lot of even among religious sometimes but uh you should you know be be be attentive to the kesem sometimes I read stories about um you know eighth grade kids in the United States who took a trip to Washington and uh Washington DC and the bus driver was so so impressed with how polite they were and and how they cleaned up afterwards just he said he had never seen kids like that it's a real no kid kidish kidish hasem and uh sometimes you have basketball games between Jewish schools and non-jewish schools and uh sometimes the non-jewish schools remark on the particular derit of the Jewish students it doesn't always happen I'm not going to I'm not going to be panish but it sometimes does happen and therefore even in the basketball games or the class trips or whatever it is there can be a real significant of VOD hasem in the way uh in the way we can behave and then it becomes a Mitzvah then the things that would not be Mitzvah activity become a Mitzvah a person goes to work so a person can you can have two people two from people two religious people doing the same office job and one person after 120 years will be rewarded for mitzvos and the other will not be because what's your mindset am I trying to make a kesem do I have intention I am working to do the Mitzvah of supporting my family and giving staka just that little meditation before you go to work changes the nature of your work it upgrades it into a spiritual exercise so that's how the rebi understands why Shu the Ola idea was deemphasized because sh is about sanctifying now with this he actually explains another thing which is interesting uh as you know the Min for many people a health permitting is that people stay up the night of sh to learn now it's a little easier in ER to S the night is short I remember I was once in South Africa for I couldn't believe it you're talking about a like a 10hour mishmar like you know it starts like 8 and they can't even D in tillate in the southern hemisphere so it is hard to go for 10 or 12 hours okay here typically a mish would be four four hours maybe five hours the most but the Min of staying up all night actually started it's not an ancient Min I mean it started in the 1500s there's whole story in the shales about they were learning all night and the started speaking from now there's a f fting article somewhere I don't remember where it is that traces the spread of the minog from marel to the different countries of Europe like when did it become the minog to stay up all night and he correlated this with the introduction of coffee because coffee is from uh the Americas so coffee didn't reach Europe until the 1500s and later and it reached different countries at different times so it shows every country that got coffee developed the minog of staying up all night again it makes a lot of sense so coffee has a great in sh that coffee facilitated all of the learning all night now the MS is not everybody is a fan of it Rebel Yash uh even when he was younger did not stay up all night because he made AES that he learned more if he went to sleep regular time meaning if you calculate the minutes and the hours and the fact that when you don't sleep you know you're kind of ruined the next day a little bit so he said his learning was better if he didn't stay up all night soe he did not hold of that Min but but many people do hold of that Min um even for women although the Min was less prevalent the many women stay up night and in different places there are special uh women shorum other times like the OU there are shur that are open to to men and women but the mcor of the Min the source of the Min which is from Yosef KIRO but the s of the minog is it is said to be a tkon a rectification for a big mistake that the Jewish people made that the night before Matan Torah they went to sleep and Hashem shows up the crack of dawn and they're asleep and he has to wait for them you hasem didn't want to take away our sleep but you know whenever it was so to make up for the idea of keeping God waiting we are kind of there that's why I say by the way people some sometimes ask AA if I can't stay up all night is it better for me to learn late and get up late or to go to sleep early and get up early and D with them so the EM is the logic of the Min would be getting up early is better than learning late because the whole concept is you want to welcome Hashem kav at the crack of dawn so that would be the that would be the choice of course that always creates the little bit of embarrassment in the ISA world you know in the morning uh since people who are up all night cannot say all of the morning Bros so we have to find somebody who took a nap in the Yeshiva World it's a little embarrassing at 4:00 know who's the kid that's going to you know say okay but be make uh the source is that we kept God waiting so the Reby asked the ab's question that's kind of crazy if you had a a major business meeting the next morning you're not going to oversleep in fact you're not even going to be able to sleep the next morning you're getting the T from AES you go to sleep and you don't wake up on time it's not logical that that would happen especially to 600 thou you know all those people so he says the following he wants to say that the idea of the Jewish people falling asleep was a they understood that they're going to they're having an encounter with the highest level of Holiness the highest level of Holiness that can possibly exist in the world and they thought when they're in their bodies they're not capable of absorbing that kadua you know when a sadic sleeps the Nisha leaves the body know we have the animal soul but the spiritual Nisha leaves the body and goes to the highest levels of Shay they wanted to have that out of body encounter their sleep was the sleep of kadus their sleep was the sleep of Ras their sleep was the sleep not of laziness not of indifference but the other way to have a passionate connection with God that they thought they couldn't have in their bodies that's why the medish makes the point that that sleep was so sweet there were no bugs there were no mosquitoes there were no insects it's say if the insects themselves knew this was holy sleep so we've made it such a good thing why are they criticized answer once again because the purpose of Matan Torah is not to escape your physical limitations but to live within your body and make the choices that are virtuous they were looking at Holiness as escaping their physicality when in fact Holiness is embracing your physicality and elevating it again the same idea they were serving God through the Ola concept when in fact on sh we serve God through the schlim concept okay so this is the idea of understanding that we don't consider the material world evil we consider it at most neutral and we can elevate it we can transform and indeed that's our goal because the Torah was given to us because we are material that's why Mitzvah are totally involved in materialism whether it's filling right you got to you know slaughter a cow and and and Etc everything is in the because kadha is not about renunciation kadha is about elevation and transformation so anyway in the last week I want to wish you all a a and may all of us Merit as the Jewish people merited to