Pesach Is Easy Today

Um we have Pesach coming up this year. Uh very very soon. We just spoke a little bit about it. As far as working on our midot, working on our character traits. Uh trying to fix ourselves, really work on our inner chametz. Instead of uh just focusing on the bread. The bread's important. Don't eat bread. Don't eat cakes that are not kosher. Don't eat cookies that are not kosher. But the reality today, between you and me, it's actually extremely easy to keep Pesach these days. It's so easy that if Hashem made a new mitzvah today and he said, "It's Pesach the entire year." Especially if you're if you're Sephardic, nothing really would change. Because technology's advanced so much that they make perfectly delicious cakes and cookies and pizzas and pretty much all the food that you can eat the whole year in a kosher for Passover way. Okay, it's not as great. It's 90% of the way there. It's 80% of the way there. It's not like when they first started it was much like I think 20 years ago it was like disgusting. Today, baruch Hashem, it's delicious. So the food doesn't really change. Unless you're Ashkenazi can't eat rice if you still keep the the you know what your avot told you as far as to keep kitniot and things like that. In reality, nothing really changes. But what really changed today is that we have forgotten why we keep it. That's the bigger problem. We keep a lot of things, but we don't really know why. Whether you go to religious people or not religious people, you ask them why do you keep Pesach, they'll tell you basically, "Oh, cuz my uh forefathers came out of Egypt. They were slaves, they came out of Egypt. Hashem saved them and so on and so forth." When you start talking a little more seriously to people, you spend some more time with them, and you ask them a basic bottom line question. Let me ask you something. Do you really believe every word in the Torah? Every word. Like everything that it says happened. It says Moshe Rabbeinu, according to the Gemara, Maseches Shabbos, Moshe Rabbeinu was 20 ft tall. You believe that? 20 ft tall. Tall guy today is considered uh 6 ft 5. He's three times bigger. Moshe Rabbeinu. And not only him, all the major Leviim were 20 ft tall. You believe that? Hashem spoke and all the words were in the sky. You were able to see the sound. Do you believe it? Hashem split the ocean into 12. Do you believe it? It's like serious questions. And you find out, before I take your question, you find out that a lot of people they believe the overall story is real, but there's different details that maybe yes and maybe not. Maybe there's like a safek. There's like a doubt about small points here and there. And our sages explained to us is that if you believe that one letter, a single letter in the Torah is wrong, is not true, not a whole sentence, not a whole commentary, but one letter, one letter in the Torah, you consider the kofer baTorah. You have a serious problem. You consider the heretic. If you don't believe not just what the five books of Moses mean, but one word in the Gemara, the Gemara says Moshe Rabbeinu was 20 ft tall. You don't believe one word out of that sentence, you have a serious problem. The Gemara says someone that looks at the hand of a woman, looks at a hand of a woman, not when he's giving her change, Gemara Maseches Berachos. He's giving her change, he's doing business with them, she's buying something, and he's giving her change, but he decided to take his time, take his time give her change so she so he could look at her hands. He's enjoying how pretty her hands are. He says nothing will save that guy from gehennom. Meaning, he must go to gehennom for that. You have a problem believing that? You have a problem. Just by saying? Just by saying that you don't believe it. Now, obviously we all do Torah. We can always fix ourselves and and and and work on ourselves. The point being is that a person needs to understand that Torah is Torah kullah. It's either you believe everything or you believe nothing. Because according to our Torah, if you think one word is wrong, the whole Torah is wrong. And that's that's what a lot of people simply don't understand, don't know. And that's where we have to have these shiurim. Where you explain to people and you give people an opportunity to ask questions. You have a question? You Where do we get such and such mitzvah? Where do we get such and such story? What's the source for such and such? Shiurim like this and that's the point. The point is to take all these empty spots that you're not sure, these doubts that you have, and try to address them. So, there's plenty to talk about, but I'm sure you guys have some questions. So, B'kavod, who wants to start? What question? You have a question. I know you have a question. How did he split it into 12? How? Yeah, the ocean. How did Hashem split it into 12? What do you mean? How was it 12? Wasn't it like seven? Seemed or something like that. No, so what happened is that when we left Egypt, uh we had we have 12 tribes. We have 12 tribes, each representing one of the sons of Yakov Avinu. Now, when we left Egypt, each one of these tribes had their own people. Tribe of Yehudah, the tribe of Reuven, the tribe of Shimon, each one had their own crew. So, let's say this guy was Yehudah's crew. This guy was Reuven's crew. This guy's was Benjamin's crew. Now, each one of them stayed with each other. They didn't uh all combine together. They have their minagim, they have their minagim, and so on. Like us today, Sephardic, Ashkenazi, Litvish, Chassidish, and so on. Similar to that to some extent. Now, Hashem wanted all of them to feel comfortable that they're not going to change so much, not such a drastic change overnight. So, you can still stay with your own people. So, he literally made such a miracle. The Rambam explains it, and it talks about it also in um Midrash Ma'aseh HaLo'ez, that he split the sea into 12 different tunnels. So, let's say for example, we're trying to get from this point to this point. Okay? Now, the the Torah actually says we didn't cross the ocean. Like, we didn't go from let's say from uh this side to this side. Didn't go from here to let's say the end of the room. That's not what we did. Actually, what it was it was a half a circle. Which means that we went from here We went all the way all the way around. We came back here, the same side. That's actually what the splitting ocean and Hashem actually the Rambam draws it in his book. He says that he literally split the ocean made it 12 different tunnels of water. So, each tribe was able to go with their own people, but at the same time he made the water clear, like a clear wall, that each one was able to see each other. So, like he didn't think the other guy died. His friends from the Benjamin tribe or the guys from the Shimon tribe He didn't die. So, Hashem made it miraculous, obviously. And he split the ocean in 12 different tunnels. As the Torah is good in Arabia, Ben Doris, he has to be blessed in the name of Hashem to be successful and to be blessed in the name of Hashem to be blessed in the name of Hashem to be blessed in the name of Hashem.