Rabbi David Sutton — A Daily Dose of Pesukim of Bitachon Volume 2

[music] >> Welcome to Inside ArtScroll, where the books that we read and the people that write them come to life. It's a pleasure to welcome back to ArtScroll Studios Rabbi David Sutton. Shalom Aleichem, and thank you so much for joining us yet again. Yes, always a pleasure, as I say. Are you I think we're like frequent flyers in this frequent white writers, right? Is that how it is? So, Baruch Hashem, we're here to celebrate beautiful, beautiful sefer, a wonderful book, A Daily Dose of Pesukim of Bitachon, volume two. Correct. So, if there's volume two, there's a successful volume one. Baruch Hashem. And we're going to talk about volume one, cuz I think it's important to understand how you got to volume two. I think maybe the best the best opening question is explain to us what it means daily doses of Pesukim. And why it's important, and most importantly, like where did it come from? It's not a Rabbi David Sutton original. Right. A lot of good questions. So, we'll go backwards. Where it came from is interesting, and that's why there's a volume one and volume two, and who knows if there'll be a volume three. Is different Gedolim over time, not necessarily in contact with each other, had this idea or this concept to list Pesukei Bitachon. One of them is Rabbi Yisrael Salanter has a list, and that was the sources of volume one, and this is based on the Maharal. There's a list that is safer called Toras Hakodesh put out a list of Pesukim from the Maharal of Bitachon. And the concept is that by saying a Pasuk of Bitachon every day, >> [clears throat] >> that gives you the ability to strengthen your Bitachon. So, it's one a day, or it's Pesukim a day? It It There's There's no rule of how many a day. You know, daily You know, at least one a day is good. You know, if you want to do more, it's also good. possible way >> day keeps the doctor away. Right. And the Ramchal also has a list of Suke Be Token, which is the one that we didn't work on yet. So, there's more than one. It's interesting, some of them overlap. >> Mhm. So, it forced me to come up with another lesson on the same pasuk, but many of them did not overlap. And the truth is, as you read through Tehillim, you see there's endless Suke Be Token. So, it's not clear why one shows one over the other. I'm not sure. What's also interesting is that of Yosef Zundel went in chronological order. And this one is in alphabetical order. So, for whatever reason. And the Ramchal's? The Ramchal is neither. The Ramchal's is cabalistically set up. Fascinating. Yeah. Spelling Shemos Hashem and things like that. Okay, so if a person wants to work on their bitachon, get into the bitachon zone, one pasuk a day at least, Right. um Rabbi Sutton's commentary, practical takeaways, which is what I love about all your sefarim. They just You don't just write. At the end, you're like, "Okay, so what did we just talk about? And what can I do with it?" Right. Um and when they when when we take when we do that pasuk, you're supposed to think something, you're supposed to think about your life. What's the What's the practical way of of learning the safer? So, actually, this I heard from Rav Volbe, more than once. He says, "A pasuk grows on you." And Rav Miller used to say the same thing. Take a pasuk, whatever it may be. Hashem S'fosi Monu Misgav Lanu Heiyakko Sela, which by the way is the earliest source of Suke Be Token, cuz Yerushalmi says Rav Yochanan says, "These Psukim, he lists three Psukim, one of them is this, should never leave your mouth." So, here you have this pasuk, Hashem S'fosi Monu Misgav Lanu Hashem L'keiv Sela. So, it's not just You know, you say, "Well, what does that mean?" I could be walking to the train, I could be just sitting in a doctor's office, and I take this pasuk, and I chew on it. What What does it mean to me? Misgav, it's a stronghold. What does it mean to a stronghold? Imagine I'm in a tower, and I take the pasuk, and I chew on it. And I let it grow on me. This pasuk is not is not just like a nice, you know, like you said, "An apple a day keeps the doctor away." That's a nice, you know, saying. But a possuk has an energy in it. It's a possuk. It's divar Hashem. And a divar Hashem um bitachon means you have in that possuk tremendous energy. It's a nuclear reactor. And you could sit there and tap into it and chew on it and bring it out. Now, the this safer is really more of an something a facilitator of sorts. Where after you read the lesson, and now you go back and you look at the possuk and say, "Wow, I never saw I never saw that in the possuk." And now you could continue to chew on the possuk. It's It's not like read the lesson and go on. No, take that possuk and live with the possuk for the day. Or for the week or for a year. You could live with a possuk. And so that's >> Beautiful. Like you're saying, you you could be walking to the train. You could be between phone calls at work. You could be between one kid's homework and the next. And you're like, "Okay, Hashem. Hashem tzeva'ot imanu, misgav lanu Elohei Yaakov selah." Or whatever it is. >> Wa'yaakov. Right. Yeah. And by the way, you're saying this to your shul me. This is something that bothered me all the years and I never got a good shot at it. You know, you talk about it in the safer that your shul me says you should say three pesukim. And it's brought out in korbanot. We have it in the korbanot every single day. And I always wondered like and I saw the Yerushalmi. I always wondered like why these three pesukim? I mean, there's so many pesukim on bitachon. There's three different authors and there's an endless amount. Why these three? And I think in the safer you talk a little bit about it. Correct? >> Yeah. Okay, amazing. So someone has to buy the safer if they want to know the secret. Okay. Um it's so fascinating that you're saying this because your father-in-law, Rabbi Sherman, should make his own. Um we had an interview about the the Chazon Ish on emunah and bitachon. And I asked him, "So how does a person work on bitachon?" And he says, "You got to look learn it. You have to live it, you know?" In his inimitable way, you know, has to become part of you. And this is a beautiful way that a person could potentially do this. >> As I'm talking, I'm thinking that the safer chareidim quotes his rebbe, I think Mar Isaac Herzog, that you should like when you're hamas hamaton, like take take a something that talks to you. His example was um in zechronos of Rosh Hashanah, we say um ashrei ish sheleishka chachmo ben adam misameach b'sivcho. So, that's like something that talks to you. That's he There was lines in the in the in the in the mussaf prayer that spoke to him. Take those things that speak to you and turn it into a jingle. We we sing that on Simchas Torah, That's the back of it. Right. Right. But it it could be something that stays in your mind after Simchas Torah. Right. Right. It's not exclusive. Yeah. Okay, so this book is follows volume one, which you like you said was taken from a different a different >> the author. What How has the reaction been? What's the feedback been like from volume one? >> I always like to go with numbers. We sold over 10,000 copies, which That's amazing. >> That's That's numbers means people are interested. And it seems that the most popular way is it's and it's it's people that get together in a group and they'll learn it. They'll sit down 10 ladies on a on a Sunday morning or whatever the time is, and one person reads it, and they'll just do, you know, one a week. And they'll take that and go over it and speak about it, and that's their way of working on bitachon in a group together. Some do it as a zechus for someone, whatever they need. They'll have a family chat, and they'll, you know, post it and talk about it and have a conference call. It's a nice way to unite the families, but I see that that's that's the a lot of feedback I get it for people that have these, call them study groups or a book club. That's beautiful. If you may, and they they work on it together. Right, it's the power of a bunch of people trying to do it together. You're not just one person that's figuring it out. >> Or it's, you know, seminary girls reach out to me after seminary wanted keep keep keep keep up with my roommate. So, once a week we'll we'll do the safer, we'll learn a chapter. So, it's it's it's something that is uh group friendly. Rabbi Satmar, when we grew up, like bitachon wasn't that talked about. It wasn't taboo, but okay, you got a mussar shmooze. People weren't learning bitachon. People weren't working on bitachon. It was kind of like, okay, fine. And we we tried to crack the Chazon Ish's Emunah Bitachon code, and none of us were successful. What happened? What happened that, you know, I I think I'm asking this to the right person, the Beis HaLevi on bitachon, best-selling ArtScroll sefer, I think, perhaps, in history. One of them, at least. >> Yeah, it's it's depends what you call. There's books and there's sefarim. On the sefarim list, it's it's pretty high. >> Okay. Baruch Hashem, it's close to 50,000, which for a sefer is is pretty good. Yeah. >> So, there's 50,000 people learning about bitachon. >> Right. Right. Right. >> So, what happened? >> Like, why did we transition? That's a great question. So, I have a few answers. >> Okay. Uh one answer is, supposedly, they asked they asked Rav Simcha Zissel, who is the son of of Lubavitch, of Simcha Zissel of Lubavitch, who put out all of Rebbi Rucham's sefarim, they asked him a certain question about bitachon, hashgacha pratis, "Did your father ever speak about this?" And he said, "No, my father never spoke about it. But, I heard about it from my mother." Which means, I think in the old days, the emunah bitachon was something that was such a staple, and you just were raised on it, that there wasn't it wasn't something that had to be taught. It's like they say, "Why do we have Beis Yaakovs today?" We didn't have Beis Yaakov yesterday, cuz the house was the Beis Yaakov. So, I think the house was the place where bitachon was developed and built upon. It wasn't something you had to learn in school. It was something that was just that was in the air. >> It was lived. It was lived. That's one possibility. Um okay, but so then why you know but why is everyone yearning for it? >> Right. So, I have a second reason, a little psychological. The Volva writes there's a um Contreras he put out that's not in print. Uh it's in a medical journal. He gave a lecture to psychologists and psychiatrists in Israel in the uh how it crosses with with uh with religion. And he says that the biggest challenge that modern world has is anxiety. That's because he says whether it's existential, there's nuclear fears, there's fear of war, there's fear of of uh economic downfalls, and there's just we live in a certain state of fear. And he says the only way to survive with that fear is bitachon. And because as time goes on, we live in this global world, which you know anything that happens anywhere is in your living room, and therefore we only hear about the fires and the mudslides and who knows what and the Hashem the accident and we just it's a small world. And people are are scared. And how do you survive a world that's a scary world if you don't have bitachon? And what's very interesting is which gave me a lot of chizuk. In this book in this pamphlet, it's actually I don't know if I should say it's online or on air. It's it's a very deep book. He's quoting a lot of pre-World War II psychologists, psychiatrists. It's very rich. And I didn't think it was for the general public, so I did not put it out through Artscroll. I I self-published this a translation with footnotes recently on this on this memoir of his. Um I think it's available on Amazon, I'm not sure. Anyway, so in there he says that when he saw himself that people that were struggling in mental hospital in London Bnei Brak, and down the block from the Yeshiva there was a mental hospital. He used to visit the patients there. And he said he saw by giving them Sukkat Bitachon that gave them strength. And he he says, you know the possuk El Yeshu'ati v'El Efrati. He said, give that over to someone that's suffering from depression or anxiety or even a real mental illness. But he says those Sukkot give strength. So when I saw that I was in wow, you know, this is you know, it's he he believed in it and he used it. Now what's very interesting is I don't want to retrospectively say maybe he looked at me as a mental case. But when I went to Bnei Brak in 1981 and he that was when he left. I was there for almost a year. And I was broken. I had come from Mir Yeshiva in America. I finally found what who was like to be my Rebbi, so to say. I ended up after he left, he sent us to Rav Avraham Berman's Yeshiva, and I kept up with him for close to 10 years in Eretz Yisrael Yerushalayim. I went to his vaadim, I went to his chaburahs, I went to his shmuzin koltan in the Mir. I had a very close connection with him. And I was I was broken. I came in and I was crying. Literally I was literally crying. And he says he told me, now I'm a Sefardi, we don't have Hinei El Yeshu'ati in our Havdalah. So he tells me say Havdalah. I was saying, I don't what do you mean say Havdalah? He says, Hinei El Yeshu'ati Eftach v'Lo Efchad. Like, how are you going to get through with that? Say a possuk in Bitachon. That that's that's the secret. So if you a possuk has energy in it. Any possuk has energy. A possuk in Bitachon has a lot of energy. And the more you chew on it, and then the more you're going to get out of it. What does it mean when we say every day in Shmona Esrei the same s'char tov b'shimcha b'emes? What does that mean? What's s'char tov? I know I'm asking the right person cuz you have all these things at your fingertips. >> So, the interesting is the b'emes. Mhm. What does b'emes mean? So, that relies you in truth. Mhm. So, this gets back to the Beis HaLevi Chazon Ish discussion. There are those that read it as b'emes means with conviction. I really believe. You got to really believe in in that. Another explanation saying s'char tov is because when you get something based on your mitzvahs or your z'chuyos, that takes out of your bank account. When a person gets something through bitachon, doesn't cost anything. That's why the Chovos HaLevavos says, very interesting, one of his sources for bitachon is b'chanuni na bazos. Tzedakah. No, he's for bitachon. For bitachon, huh? Right. So, everyone knows it's the ma'aser, right? No. And you could test Hashem with ma'aser. Why can't I test Hashem with ma'aser? It's some magical thing. So, the way they explain the Chovos HaLevavos says that the reason why you can't test Hashem is I'm going to put on tefillin and I'll be getting s'char. So, s'char mitzvos b'hai alma leika. You don't get rewarded in this world. So, if I put on tefillin, I can't cash it in. Bitachon's different. You're not getting because of a merit. I'm relying on on my father. It's not cuz I mowed the lawn, I'm relying on my father. He gives it to me. Because of the reliance. So, it doesn't use up any of my merits. The b'chanuni na bazos according to this is not specifically ma'aser. Ma'aser is just an expression of bitachon. Bitachon gives you in this world and doesn't cause you to lose out on the world to come. So, the tein s'char tov, you're going to get good reward >> because this reward is not going to is you're going to get what you want and not cash in at the same time. Beautiful. It's toggling the possible way to say every day the core of Hashem of God. Close your eyes and imagine. Y'all call the call time of earnest. Earnest. Same thing. You got to believe it. Yeah, and I I have a verse of her we learn about God a lot and this is one of the things like you could choose how you want to live your life. You could either live it by yourself or you could live it with Hashem. If you live with Hashem, Hashem is like, "Okay, fine. Bring me into the equation and and I'll do it for you." Right. That's beautiful. That's amazing. So, you're saying the the first the first volume created groups of people that are learning it. And great, now they probably are doing it a year, they're ready for the next safer. Right. How many are there in total in in here? Do you know? It's close to 100. Close to 100. I think there's I forgot exactly how many there are. Close to 100. Now, what's interesting is which I some people find it harder, some people less. I try to be content-heavy. Because if you really want to so to say live with the possuk, stories are great and there are stories in there cuz people need stories, but you can't walk around with a story. This is something to to to to get into, to to see well, like let me let me open up what's in this possuk and I purposely looked for a lot of different sources. And it's interesting um there's a safer Mikdash Ma'aton Tehillim. I don't know if you ever saw it. It's a four-volume safer with a huge amount of This man was brilliant. Rabbi I think his name was Waldman or Walkin, 1900s early 1900s. It's vast. There's so many Meforshim on these P'sukim. It's endless. And the question over here was not what to put in, what was what to take out. Cuz there was just there's just a wealth of information. And you look at a possuk, you know, that you never even thought of like this possuk um um Gol Al Hashem Darkecha. So, the the translation I is commit your commit yourself to Hashem. Okay, maybe what goal how whatever the whatever the shoresh of the word is in the But my real dis can say the goal is Miloshan Galgal, something that rolls. So he says there's different ways you have a ball, right? You can either throw the ball right far away. You could or you could roll the ball. You're not pushing you're not kicking it. You're rolling the ball. So he says Bitachon there's one one level is you don't do anything at all. I sit back I let the ball go on its own. The other one is I'm going to kick the kick the you know kick the ball out of the park. And the other one is goal. Just going to touch it and roll with it. I'm not going to give it give it too much of a push but I'm not going to sit back and do nothing. He says that's the Bitachon Hishtadlus balance. So he takes this possuk of a goal al Hashem, goal suddenly becomes a Galgal a ball and like you know what was a simple possuk suddenly there's much more depth there. That's what I I tried it tried to to you know show the the depth of what's going on. You know there's there's 70 Shivim Panim and some say there's 600,000 and it says which in a lot of the psukim here are from Tehillim that Dovid Hamelech put into Tehillim every person's need till the end of time. So you can find yourself in the possuk. You're there in the possuk. It's talk it's for you. And that's why it's not just you know catchphrases. It's Divrei Elokim Chaim. So your possuk is there. Right, right. Right. How did you decide just generally to to start doing this series? One day you like came across something you're like it'd be nice to bring this to the pub to the pub you know the general public. Like what's the process of I'll tell you the real the real truth. >> Good that's what I want. So giving a shiur is a mechayev. Big time. So all of my books come from a shiur. And I give it daily. Uh whatever you call WhatsApp chat or whatever those are there email. And I go through different things. I went and I'm always looking I like to you know I don't want to just talk. I like to take a syllabus. So, I went through base aleve. Mhm. I went through all of us all of us share we talking and that's what created the daily dose of we talking. Daily dose this actually daily dose of we talking daily dose of we talking. Daily dose of we talking was I did went through all of us all of us share we talking and I gave I don't know a hundred mini classes and eventually became a book. And I'm always looking now I'm working on something I I hope it's going to become a book. I'm going through all of us all of us share share share we talking. Which is full of appreciating a sham in creation. And I hope one day with a sham's help to have a daily dose of gratitude. So, That goes good with Parashah. Yeah. Yeah. >> also something that Right. I'm looking for I I like to have things like that's also Parashah is is by and large. So, I like to have those you know so once I was like looking you know what what other we talking can I do whatever we talking you know so Parashah is we talking I'm running out of we talking syllabus. So, I I look on I look to books just at some you know whatever the the the is to to come out with something. Rosh Hashanah I loved cuz Rosh Hashanah has the 30 we talking of uh I can't understand the cipher. >> Right. I love that. There's another cipher I'm working on a we talking a god of which maybe one day you'll interview me on. Which also there's also >> There's the we talking in Parashah. I love we talking. There's so much in a Parashah. It's just I I you know I just it's just you have this you know it's like a Pandora's Box. You look at a Parashah you know there's so much inside. Just open it up. There's Parashah and there's Parashah and there's Parashah. If I want to give a Parashah on base aleve it's much harder. Want to give a Parashah on all of us all of there's commentaries, but pesukim are endless. There's endless material on pesukim. So, if you want to have a content-heavy book, pesukim is the way to go. Can I ask a personal question? Sure. As you unpack more and more pesukim of bitachon, do you feel yourself becoming a greater ba'al bitachon? I know it's a personal question cuz there's writing and there's teaching and there's there's living. >> answer is that when I'm giving the sheer, I'm I'm taking it out of my own I'm giving a bitachon sheer, I feel myself on fire. Wow. But it dissipates. Right. And when I'm writing the book, I feel connected. It dissipates. I'm I'm sure I must have told you this story. I don't know. It's always good to have chazarah. I heard this from Rav Volbe. That Rav Chaim Volozhin was in a sheer from the Gaon of Vilna on bitachon. In those days, and some today believe as well, leeches are beneficial for health. The modern And they used to wear leeches. And Rav Chaim was in the sheer and he got so excited, he went to the the doctor, wherever the person was, and he removed the leech. What do I need leeches for? Kadush Baruch Hu is going to heal me. He took off the leeches. A week later, he put the leeches back on and someone said, "What happened?" He says, "I'm not feeling it like I did then." So, Rav Chaim Volozhin admitted to, you know, feeling a lack of the connection cuz he wasn't working on it. So, there's no there's no magic trick. You know, every day you have to say Krias Shema again. What happened to yesterday? And it even says, "Someone who misses Krias Shema once," it says it's "Kilu lo kara Krias Shema meyamav." Someone will say like that, "What do you mean? I never read it?" No, today you didn't read Krias Shema. And every day is a world. And every day needs to be filled with its Krias Shema and its Ashrei and and it's everything. What about yesterday? No, yesterday's yesterday. Today's today. Also, there's the continuity. If you do it each day, you're you're going strong. That's why That's why I really like what you're saying that someone learns, let's say, volume one, they should buy volume two. But let someone learns one. It doesn't mean to say they shouldn't go back to it again because I know personally when I learn I'm learning Hafetz Chaim, I'm you know, the Shmiras Halashon. I'm not I've done it many times already, but as long as you're doing it each day, it keeps your mind even subconsciously. >> Right. I met a guy yesterday. He said it I'm on Beis Halevi on my 17th time. He has a chaverusa, he just keeps on going over and over again. So I might joke always is you got to buy a new one each time you go or you can't use the same one. And yes, they should buy volume two. They shouldn't just chazer volume one. They [clears throat] should. Do you even know Did you notice like a huge disparity um between the types of psukim that the Maharal quoted versus those that the Ramchal quote or those that Ramzondo of Sefas >> don't like I said yeah, I don't know the system why some chose ones, why some chose the others. And even it's interesting in in this one there's psukim that are some of them they're even negative psukim like, you know, they didn't have bitachon. Mhm. And he's trying to teach you that that again, there's no end you could I was going through Tehillim recently. Um again another, you know, mechayev. So ArtScrolls putting out a another a new Tehillim. And it was dedicated by a Sefardi and he wanted to have all new introductions some Sefardi sefarim. So although I'm not using my Sefardi havara right now, but I went through a lot of Tehillim and I had to create a introduction to 150 prakim. Which is a lot of fun. I was what I call a summer project and I was I I did that then and I said there's another few hundred psukei bitachon in Tehillim. You could just, you know, create your own list and and and keep on going. That's what I'm wondering if like the Maharal chose the psukim that he felt talked to him the most. >> Right. >> And Ramchal chose the psukim that And I'm sure even when when a person goes through your book, there's going to be psukim that are going to stick with you. Right. Right. We all have our psukim for our name. Right. Right. Right. >> And they say there's a connection between that person and between you. Yeah. Beautiful. Um Rabbi Satan, this is a it's been a pleasure and as close Always is. And with the one problem with this interview room is there's no clock. Yeah, I've no idea how long I'm going or how long we're going. But we have a way to figure it out. So, I guess I guess when when we get to the point where we're jumping into the content of the book, then we have to stop cuz people have to buy this book. >> That's true. My friends, buy the book, it'll change your life. Take one person a day, take put one person a week, take one person a month, learn it yourself, learn it with a friend, learn it with a cover, whatever it is. But talk and great. It's so hard to have. It's free. Correct. Yes. She continued to write swarm and keep publish them and inspire quality show. Amen. Thank you. >> [music] [music]