Parshas Re'eh: The Malbim Reveals the Inner Workings of the Universe

this torah class is brought to you by torahanytime.com okay good morning rabbi uh this morning we're going to be doing something a little bit differently we're going to be learning uh passion for a since we don't have an opportunity to get together during the rest of the week and i would like to explore a few aspects of the parasha based on the writings of the melbourne i had the privilege this week to visit my grandfather zelda sunshine in pittsburgh and my grandfather has a very strong connection to the album his grandfather was a rav together with the album and lynchitz at the end of the 19th century and my grandfather has devoted a very large part of his life to learning the pairs of the album antenna in fact i have over here my grandfather's personal album that was published in the end of the 1800s with as you could see you know hundreds and hundreds of papers notes and hagais and on uh notes here on the album on devarim notes on the album on the michele very interesting the album is really illuminary that as appreciated as he is people are not mocker his greatness because um it is said in the other yeshivas especially by the briskers they say there are three achronim that have the kayak of arishon three sages who lived in the last 500 years that actually have the forest of sages that lived in the times from uh of the reshena from the year 900 to 1500. who are they so the riskers say of course the villenegoine which is uh unanimously recognized the goyin was like a re-shine the going would even argue with reshine him sometimes they would say refrain brisker right because the rescuers are and the album and the album in fact the base halevi once said and i have it in a print but levi said that there's aposic in tehillim that none of them are first whom were able to explain none of them were farsha not none of them we shine them even except them album sales said the only way the album was able to explain this passage was when he writes about his own perish i believe on the tara's kaya nym the sky writes i'm not writing it like a god obi israel would right and says and what's an example of a god of israel the album is so the album was highly recognized as a towering mind okay so i want to just explore a few things uh the beginning of the parasha okay the first plastic says see that i give you today blessing and curse what in the world is a plastic saying right we really yeah right we read it we understand what does this mean see that i give you today blessing and curse first of all what does it mean c god uh presented them with like two boxes and behind do you know what's in box number one look look blessing and look what's in box number two what does it mean c what are they looking at what does it mean what's the point of this pasta okay so parishes the parsha before speaks about the reward that god will give us if we keep the torah and the punishment we'll get for violating the torah whereupon partial surah says the following that means like this the album points out that the torah is different than any of the documents of the nations of the world you know the documents of all the nations of the world are full of promises of the world to come you look in the documents of any of the ancient religions or any of the modern religions all the promises are you keep the law you'll get this in the world to come you'll get that in the world to come paradise it's full of paradise guess how many times the humish explicitly talks about the world to come zero the world to come is only alluded to but is not explicitly mentioned of course in the missionaries and tarshish about certainly the world to come is one of the most fundamental principles of our religion we have to know what we're here for we're here to gain oil and yet the hummish makes no explicit yeah they're veiled references thomas snapchat mostly sharim he was gathered onto his forefathers but there are no explicit doesn't talk about what um is like that it's wonderful it's pleasurable everything in the torah speaks about this world that if you keep the torah you'll have rain you'll have paranosa you'll have health right and so forth your family will be successful the only promises given in the torah are promises of this world says the album that is what this week's parish is emphasizing after precious accept which discussed that if we keep the torah god will reward us with the reign with children with family with success with physical benefit yeah what's partial for a saying pasha says look how everything i tell you god says is for today i'm not giving you any promises for the future you know why because if you tell somebody join me i'll hire you i'm not going to give you a salary but when you retire in 50 years oh will i reward you so if you're a sane person you're saying you're thinking to yourself can i trust this guy how do i know this guy will come through for me he's promising something in the far off future i can't trust him so says ribansham i know that if i tell you keep the mitzvos because as much as you know i'm the creator of the universe but something that's promised for the future people always have questions about they they can't be guaranteed they can't be certain and therefore says god whatever i tell you look i mean i give you everything today all my promises you keep the torah you'll have rain today you'll have health today meaning in this world in this world all the reward mentioned in a cave left you okay that's an important uh principle to remember that all the promises of the torah are not for allah are for oil however the album um explains even though the reward in this world is something that is inexplicable if i put on fill in it's going to rain more how is my fill in going gonna affect the rain i could you could say if you preserve maybe if you preserve the oceans and you don't throw soda cans in the oceans so the water in the ocean will remain pure and that will produce rain and then you'll have rain so you want to say preserve the ecological systems and you'll have rain that i get but that don't speak lashin hara and you'll have rain don't speak lashin hara and your stocks will go up don't speak lashing hara and you'll do better business what is one thing as what is my business what do my customers have to do with whether i learn every day or whether i dive in properly that's something that doesn't make any sense it's you know cause and effect i don't see the cause and effect what should one thing have to do with another i'm gonna be healthier because i wear it sits this what does my health do with synthesis if i if i eat properly and i exercise i'll be healthy what does it have to do with my observance of mitzvos says them album idea what the tara is saying is kiloy kasha yoduma not like you think don't know don't make the mistake that rain is a natural process that your finances are dependent on your business acumen most people think ain shum yes what is the rain what does the weather have to do that means you're saying if the jewish people don't act properly there's going to be drought drought has nothing to do with our actions drought is dependent on a different combination of the wind and the the angle of the sun at a certain time and if certain factors come together that will produce drought no that's not what produces drought if the jews don't learn torah that produces drown or the security right what is it our observance of mitzvos affects the security of israel israel's security is dependent on whether the prime minister deals in a in a correct diplomatic way if he if he makes the right maneuvers then we'll be secured if you don't know the security of the state of israel is dependent on whether before i eat i make a bracha properly my brah affects the state of israel yeah hell that's how god set up the world that even though it looks like there's a natural process and this is echoing the words of the ramban at the end of harshasbhai a believer understands there's no teva there's no teva you think yeah rain is a natural process you see the sun from 93 million miles away sends down light at a speed of 186 000 miles per second it then shines on the ocean waters the ocean the the sun then causes the waters to evaporate to condense into the clouds and terrain no that's how it works that's how it looks but that's not how it works your your finances your health and everything in a person's life is connected to one's action obviously in general in general there's uh there are exceptions there's sadiq for alloy there's rush of a toyboy but those are the exceptions to the rule the general rule is it's dependent on a person's mice okay that's the first that's the first point of the mountain the album continues the next passage what's the blessing if you listen to hashem your god okay mama makes a very subtle point and that is let's say you're a master and you tell your servant hey servant i want you to sweep the floor mop the floor slice me a bagel put some egg salad on it prepare a nice coffee for me and if you do that i'll reward you would you say that the reward you're giving the servant is inherent in what the servant did for you no what the servant did for you is one thing and the reward that the master gives a servant is completely dependent on the will of the master the master decided that if the servant serves him he will reward him but there's no inherent connection between the service and the reward says the torah it's not that way with mitch voice let's say a person goes to the doctor person uh he has a let's say a strep throat yeah so he goes to the doctor the doctor says here take penicillin and now you get better would you say that the benefit of of taking the penicillin is not inherent in the taking of the penicillin it's just dependent on the will of the doctor of course not inherently in the penicillin is the cure it's not when a master rewards his servant the servant's service is a and the reward is something that the sermon deposit decided upon but when you take a medicine the benefit of the medicine is the medicine that's it's inherent in the medicine it's the same thing with the mitzvah says i'm album don't think that when you put on fill in it just so happens to be that god decides that you'll have certain benefit by putting on the tone no the system is that inherent in the putting on its villain are certain physical benefits that you get it's not external it's not superficial to the villain it is inherent in the mitzvah the mitzvah brings the bracha you know what the bracha it's not that the blessing will come as a result no the blessing is part of the mitzvah es okay then the parasha continues and possible says when god will bring you to the land that you're coming to inherit you know you should place the blessing on har grisem we all know the jews visited hagrism and harahival whereupon some shepherd and went to one mountain some shot one another and they had the kahanam in the middle and they say gave abraha to those who keep the torah and they gave a curse to those who don't keep the torah fine says them album what is this what is the connection between the blessings and curses on har griezmann so we mentioned in the beginning of the parasha that keeping mitzvos or violating mitzvos brings blessing and curse so the explains he says aside from the fact that the way god created the world is not that when there's a lot of rain a lot of water in the ocean and a lot in a strong sunlight that produces rain no the way the world was created is reign success is dependent on your observance of the mitzvos naveros and it's not external to the missiles and navers but rather it's inherent aside from that god says we're going to set up a second system and the second system is you're going to accept upon yourself a superimposed system of blessing and curse aside from the fact that midsole s having them inherently blessing and curse you're going to accept upon yourself a superimposed alternative additional system that you have accepted that if you keep the torah you accept the blessing on how griezmann evil and if you violate you accept the curses this is an addition to the inherent system you're accepting upon yourself a superimposed system okay so that's just uh the way the album understands the blessings and curses again of mitzvah observance and of griezmann okay just want to point out it would then seem from all of this that by keeping the torah you get reward in this world and by violating it you get punished in this world and yet we know the gemara says in aravind on the last words in practice which we darshan to mean in this world you keep the torah umachala and in the next world you get reward but you don't get reward in this world the gemara says the famous words there's no reward in this world kumar says are you worth filling yeah you'll get rewarded but not here you learn you'll get rewarded but not here you don't speak question you'll get rude but not here so how does that fit with the entire parties akev and practice for a where the parachutes are saying that if you keep the tar it will rain and you'll be healthy and so forth what do you mean sets forth the principle and we've spoken about this in park test the ram says what is up with most of the torah which offers promises of reward in this world right how do we reconcile the concept of with the parachutes of the kevin ray so the rambam says very important principle and that is none of the reward mentioned in practice achievement is reward it's not reward so what is it so random says like this what are you supposed to do with the torah two things number one most importantly you have to follow it you have to keep it and number two and know it in a complete way in a proper way god expects two things from a jew number one keep the torah if you have a four corner garment put sithis put on phone every day you must follow to learn torah you have to have proper being you have to your speech has to be true has to be honest don't insult people and so forth so number one is you have to keep the torah number two is you have to know the torah but know the torah the rambam says means know the torah in a complete way not in a superficial way in a complete way in a proper way you do those two things do you get it's dependent on two things the more you perform the more hassle you do the more is the more you understand the torah the more oil so the more we attempt to try to understand torah how do we understand torah you have to learn it to learn fromish you have to learn navi you have to learn you have to learn gemara after all these things by learning these things we we complete our knowledge of torah if you do that you get aloha says the rambam what's all this reward in this world says promises and with a good heart and we delve into the torah as much as possible god will remove from us the obstacles that keep us away from fulfilling in this world but we need to in other words god sees god put us in the world for a mission what's the mission keep the torah learn the time god sees a jew attempting to fulfill his purpose in this world so god says oh you got it you get it you understand what this world is for i will remove from you the obstacles for example holy illness hunger which give us the ability and the flexibility and the resources to keep the torah for example sova god will give us sustenance the shalom will give us peace the rabbi is kesseth is of and give us a lot of money kadesh nasa call yamino right because a person doesn't have enough money well he's going to spend his whole life making money man a person spends his whole life making money god put him on this world to keep the torah to learn the torah so god says oh the guy gets it i'll help him out i'll make a living a little bit easier i'll have more time is this reward this is not reward this is just god sees a guy he gets it he understands what this world is all about so hashem says let me facilitate it's a facility god facilitates the objective in this world however says the rama but if we forsake the torah willingly then we say yeah torah i'll get there later first let me you know let me make a lot of money let me enjoy myself let me spend my evenings in leisure time then god says this guy doesn't get it this guy misses the boat he's not here in this world to go to shows or to to waste away his time so he doesn't get it i will thereby re challenge him to make it more difficult for him to get alamba because anyway he's not pursuing it is it a punishment no it's not a punishment but it's a certain system and the system is if you get it god facilitates now it doesn't mean a person says well i'm here in this world to keep the talent to learn the talk so i'm just going to sit here all day and he won't have any troubles in life no no such thing it just means a certain the certain edge this world has certain um necessary difficulties that that that make a person's life challenging when a person really dedicates himself to fulfill his purpose god makes it easier and see that he had a very tough life but he is not going to see an understanding of the stoplight maybe fascinated his understanding it's not just a physical thing what do you mean for ally but just in general i think it's understandable most sadique let's say a guy like um you know you hear in the news the certain actor right a comedian and at age 60 he killed himself right so this guy had all the money in the world he could have whatever he wanted right what did he die of depression right he's a bad he's a comedian and what did he die of he died of depression who killed him he killed himself his life was so terrible that he killed himself right well well it's not his fault because he's an alcoholic what was he have right he's addicted to drugs so here you have a guy he has anything he wanted and he ruined he destroyed his own life so what would have victor miller say he would say you get what you deserve you get what you do there rick miller said he wrote in his seva don't cry for me i had a very good life he had a good life i don't think he ever went on vacation in his life i don't think he ever eat a piece of steak he ate bread and a piece of chicken and for him that he had more enjoyment than the biggest baltiva eating this kind of ability no but there are certain brothels certain health certain peace of mind peace of mind is a bracha peace of mind but some of that some of the hassan is is a person's own acquisition and own madriga that a person worked on and acquired to be able to be somehow but rebecca also facilitates to give a person a certain personality help him develop a certain personality to be happy to be content to be peaceful to be healthy these are all brahos that i don't think anybody will ever be able to point and say oh look this guy is a tadik look look at the reward no it's obviously hashem does it in a certain masked way where we we don't see the dark hashem but this is the promise of the torah that somebody who who keeps the path of the torah hashem facilitates them on their on their path i don't know if that doesn't mean they won't have any difficulties i don't know it's that's oil right says you won't even find one out of a thousand people that have absolute serenity in this world it doesn't exist there's no such thing but there's a certain type of bracha that people have people keep the torah have that they're they're able to continue on that chosen path okay it doesn't mean they're no obstacles but that's the concept of a kevin parishes away okay a few a few other thoughts okay then look at pasuk and park you're based hey hey this is a interesting idea that's talking about where you could bring carbon ice okay where you could bring carbonates looking plus okay malcolm only in the place that god selected me of all your tribes to place his name you should seek out his dwelling place uv-man go there okay so the pasik refers to the basal mikdash as makai place that who selected we selected or god selected the end of the passage says you should seek it out which seems like that no god doesn't select it we have to choose it we have to seek it out i mean after god selected we have to go there so the album says it says what's the siddhishu so the album says very interesting thing he says everywhere in tanakh today is called hashem why is mesa make this called the place that god selected the answer is because we cannot select it it had to be selected through the navi like the like the navi god showed david where the base hamikdash was but even though hashem god has to choose the place nevertheless we find that david was doris after the mikdash where he said [Applause] that david said where is the basically it's going to be where is it going to be where is it going to be he was searching for it like it says in tehran right it says he says i'm not going to go into my house i'm not going to rest i'm not going to give my slumber to my eyes until i find a place for hashem when you can find the place hashem you can't find a place hashem will tell you where he wants to dwell what was david searching for it says i'm album you see from here why him i love navi david did not wait for the navi to come to him but he was looking on his own but what do you mean it says hashem the lee maid david learned why is david looking for a place that he can't find he learned from this passage says what's the difference what does the word dairesh mean dersho hashem behemoth say the word means to investigate on your own unprompted that the base hamikdash requires that jews seek it out and only then limitless hashem was teaching that god will not reveal the secret ali de navioff ah after the correct preparation so we see a very important principle that even though god is saying i'll let you know where the baseline is nevertheless i'll only let you know if you seek it out and you search and you're interested and and you now what's he searching for if he doesn't know where it is apparently really wanted it and he made a certain degree of preparation what maybe he he was able to try to calculate and try to find and he purchased the land from irvine but god you know when it comes to base i think it's yes god has to choose but only after we put in a certain degree of seeking it out now does that apply to the third base of dash you would think you would think it does you would think if this is not just specific to the first and second base amigos you would think based on this idea of the way the albums bring the pasta that you know you have uh these organizations in there to soil they want to bring carbonace now whether you're allowed to or not probably halachically you can't go but is there a certain torah attitude in what they're doing yeah it might have a kernel of correctness to it in other words you can't just sit back and say well uh we'll come here whenever god you know it's up to god when meshiach will come and you know i'm ready let me know i have my my phone is on i don't turn it off at night you know hopefully i'm getting the text no maybe you have to make certain preparations maybe i don't know what they are maybe you have to learn how to special maybe you have to i don't know i don't know [Music] definitely you're correct that certainly in general you need to take hashem says you open for me peacefully you open for me you make a little effort and i'll help you the rest of the way but by it doesn't explic it doesn't spell out that idea by every mitzvah it doesn't say about situations you take the fraud it sounds like when it comes to the base amiktas there's a special indian of even though it's but it requires the sidrashu it's very interesting okay even even for places pointed out to you doesn't mean necessarily you can uh you you receive everything you have to work for i'm sorry okay right right we have we had when we were learning last year the um there was a stira in the rambam as to how are we going to build the third base amik dash one pasuk says in yeshus gal that it will become revealed to us and yet the rambam says in his introduction to the sabstimidos that the purpose of the middle which is the dimensions of the second base amiktas is to know how to build the third base tonight now those talks about the dimensions of the second base maker it's not the third base that make dash so how will learning that i mentioned the second base of mikdash help us build the third one the third one will be revealed and then when it's built and then when meshiach comes so taisus yamcha said no that only those people who learn massachusetts and learn the dimensions of the second base hamikdash will understand the sukkam and when mashiach comes of how to build the third business in other words the contradiction was that the random says you learn to know how to build the third base of mikdash and yet the random says that only those people who make an effort to learn the dimensions of the second base of ignorance god will assist them that when mashiach comes they'll comprehend the meaning of the tsukemen why why do you have to do that why do you have to first why can't hashem maybe that's an element of the sudo issue in other words we have to put in a certain degree of effort to try to understand the meaning of the based on this and if you do that then makamashi hashem will explain it to us okay okay two more two more offerings over here right okay now we know the the mishna tells us that there were certain periods in history we were allowed to bring private carbonaris on obama right you're allowed to bring your own personal carbonus in your in your backyard right the positive says that you're sir you're allowed to bring obama you're allowed to bring us on obama at certain periods of time why you have not yet come simply you haven't come to shiloh yet and you haven't come to shalom when mishkan shiloh stands when the base of stands you can't bring karbalanos on obama but before shiloh you can after shiloh before the basal mikdash you can kill vasim now if the albums payrosh as much as it's a parish on the sukhum is a parish on the safri safri is the tarshiva pound of them album put in extra special efforts i'll show you how we too my grandfather has in his notes put in extra emphasis to get the correct text of the safri in fact in one place in in this week's parashat the album argues on the gra in the gerson the safri and to argue on the gra you have to have big plates especially in terms of gersa the gra was a masaki in many many portions of the torso anyway the album one one of them is shiloh one of them is you shall i am which one is which is so the album uh says what is this mahalik is based on whether you shallayim is menuha or ishalayim is allah now the review the holds that you shalim is called there's a passage says what's this it's based on is and you stay in someone's house for the gollum you don't have to pay rent why why because i own it now there's an opinion you could knock on someone's door yeah who's there gladstone what do you want it's our beyonce exactly i'm here for yomto right say uh you know how much an apartment is in your success like two thousand dollars i have someone my family lives in arts israel so he moves out of it for many years he moves out of his apartment through him he what he gets for sukkas and pesach he's able to pay like half the year's rent he said no but you didn't learn the more mcgill on a regular i own it just as much and there's an opinion like that so it says the album i'll try it this year [Laughter] don't quote me on this then says ignore shimon holds you shall i muslin so therefore you can't call it it's not an akhla nobody has nacho in it so therefore rip shipment holds it's called manuka well fine but but right maybe exactly that's a horizon but in terms of could be called nakhla why who would sheila belong to yosef but you shall aim is what and therefore it is called nakala okay one more thing one last thing okay one last that's only that no that's only that portion of it but what about what about the whole city but the rest of us belong to nobody that's mass like this it's not like this it doesn't matter when he bought it doesn't matter when he bought it it's divided it just happens we don't own it yet but still the question is is it divided is it not divided the fact now it is hilariously the fact that he did not conquer you shall i made it that his other conquerings of aram soba or narayan did not have kedusha full kadusa says like this okay quick quickly it says it says it says during shemitah you can't approach your friend to collect the loan right but a guy to you guys you could have approached a guy and by the way it's the same lotion by ribbos charge interest as i'll say the safri brings down this is a mitzvah that during shemitah collects from the guy that take rib is from a guy it's a mitsubishi and the rambam in uh malvelo whatever brings down it's a mitzvah dairy to charge to collect money from a guy during shemitah or to charge a guy interest so the rivet asks you know i must have missed that day in yeshiva when the rebbe taught about this mitsudai rice of charging interest to a guy it's a mitzvah the charge interest or a guy it's a mitzvah and the torah to collect during shemitah so you have a guy you know what are you doing for i'm interested in mitzvos what misses do you do i go lend money to guardian with interest so that's a mix mitzvah raisa to go lend them money with interest so well you know maybe instead of uh instead of uh doing khasad we should go go extend loans to gain with interest is that mitsuda rise and the ram i'm right zumitsudair isa so raven says that you know i must have missed that day in shiva and the red be taught about this i must have missed that on harsina when god gave us the midst of charging going to interest it's a mitzvah maybe you're allowed to but what's the mitzvah some of them ex defends the rambam by explaining it's not a mitsudai riser what it means is when hashem says collect from a guy during shemitah or charge a guy interest it's allah say i say which means you lend money with interest but you're not allowed to land by in france you can land a guy but you can't land the yid so the mitzvah assay day raisa is lend to a guy not that's not saying that you should daft golem together from there we derived that if you lend to a jew with interest not only you're violating a love you're also violating an assay when the rabbi writes as i say it doesn't mean daft to lend to the guy or daft uh not to cancel out the loan of the like he means from there to derive that there is a mitsubisha say not to do that to a jew okay and really one that is the last thing so it says like this you lend money to jew cancel the debt don't approach him during shemitah only fs you will not have any poor people because god will bless you inaudible in other words what it's saying is in the zuchus of canceling loans you'll have what god will remove the poor from the land as a benefit for your lending money and not collecting it during shemitah the blessing will be that the poor will be eliminated from the world what's the lesson fs fs why does the torah use the word fs isn't that unusual says them album where else do we find the word fs in shalaf it's our it says wonderful it's flowing fs kiasa um but don't go there because the people are mighty fs means despite everything until now but it's a big bot it's a myot what's the need over here it says i'm album look back at the beginning of the parasha and the beginning of the parasha we learned that if a person doesn't advice god usually facilitates your ability to do more mitzvahs god the person learns for example the mom says if you're careful in kidush god will give you hundreds of barrels of wine like we learned yesterday in the morning mcgill if a person is careful in sadaka god will give him more money to do more mitzvahs but not in this case in this case it's the exception to the rule in this case even though you've extended yourself you lent money and you didn't collect it during shmita you should know that this mitzvah god will have to facilitate your ability to do mitzvahs elsewhere but not to be able to lend more money to anim you know why fs because as close to this mitzvah is there won't be any more people so even though normally if you try to carefully to learn torah god will facilitate your ability to learn more talk and if you try to be mikayam kiddush god will give you more wine and if you're careful in mezuzah god will give you better messages but if you're careful not collecting money in shemitah this is the one mitzvah god will not facilitate your ability to do it more you know why fs in this mitzvah this is there won't be any more poor people and you'll have to get your mitzvahs elsewhere you've just experienced another torah class brought to you by torahanytime.com