Tisha B’av - How Could It Be??? (Ep. 247)

well it's Tish again in the time of the second Bas mikdash Tish was a Yanti and when the Gula comes Tish will once again be a Yanti and K this one is not it's the same Tish we've had for almost 2,000 years fasting hungry and thirsty sitting on the floor mourning the destruction of the Bas mikdash the loss of that special connection with a k and a realization that once again we have lost the chance to be able to get close to to have a bias where we could live together as an isan Isa the first trick to change is realization when you go to one of the various support groups for different problems they always start off by saying my name is so and so and I am an addict because if I don't recognize that I have a problem I'm never going to change it and so we come to Tish and we need to understand why are we still sitting on the ground 2,000 years later saying kinis as we've said from ages ago still trying to find how to solve the problems that we've been in mton and so usually we go through a particular K I want to take a little theme of kenis this year if you will indulge me I hope it's the last time we do it so if I manage to deal with a number of them maybe that'll make life a little easier for us Ken Zion starts that's how k z begins K Tess it continues AR own it's of course the onos your giml starts sort of with you you see a lot of kinis start with the word a now obviously it's a starting off point because the kinus of yyah is what we call M and after the Y who is looking at the destroyed City and the destroyed people and saying how could it be the word of TSH is how could it be and that is the k of that is the of Y that we read on the night of T how could it be that sits alone the city that was filled with people now it's like a widow that which was great among the Nations SOI Medina's princess among the Nations is now a tributory we look at as Rashi tells us Zan shid vulin was on the coast and they would involve themselves in pmaa in Commerce and they would travel throughout the Mediterranean Basin and people would come to them and when they would come to do business with vin they said you know we came all this way here already let's go to Y and see the Bas mikdash and they would be so moved by the experience that they would decide to join the Jewish people you I am sh is attached to Shala it was the greatest of cities the says people with clean thoughts pure thoughts is called an ear from a word of youu wakes you up you go there you become a different person that's why there's a Mitzvah three times a year to go toim cuz just the experience of being in y will change you as a person and now it's been destroyed H how could it be one of the five tragedies is AAS burned the sa Torah until that point no one burned the sa Torah how could it be after yamu attacked us how could it be we were so great no one would touch us how could jeruselam be desolate the city that was filled with people filled with with TOA filled with intellectualism filled with with kadha religiosity with the Bas of mikdash with all the things that were there how could it be destroyed you is walking around saying how could this have possibly have happened that is the question of tishu that is what we approach tishu and ask how could this be it's a terrible terrible situation when we realize that we don't even ask the question anymore we accept it's okay you learn to deal with it as one thing after another after another is taken away one uh uh destruction after another we don't even ask the questions anymore how could it be Martin Gilbert in his book The Holocaust tells a story about the Nazis came and decided to kill everybody in the local hospital and the guards kept all the people back and they went into the Maternity Ward and started throwing the babies out of the window and some of the Nazis asked if they could have the privilege of catching them on their bayonets and one of the people who's writing the story says we cried until there were No More Tears there were no more words to describe it the horror says how could it be say the there were three people who used the mosu now the truth is you can find the word in other places as well the obviously telling us that there is a connection here so how could it be that was destroyed the most powerful City the most beautiful city the Fest the holiest the the the most intellectual City how could it have been destroyed by these barbarians and so the answer is the a of yes yahu which is what we read uh as the his uh vision and it's how yes starts and also uses the word and you read the to the same tune how could it be that it became like a harlot and a moral woman the faithful city a city that was so faithful how could it have turned to immorality Malay y it was a city that was filled with a just and and now now they're murderers they uh they mix other things into the metals so to as fool people and think they're getting silver when they're getting other things mixed in with it the wine mixed with water the princes have turned away become a group of Thieves everybody wants a bribe they don't care about the Widow and the orphan and they take advantage even of them yesu answers the of Yu y says how could it be that jerus is destroyed the greatest of all cities how could it be and the answer is because the city that was so faithful underneath it there was rot there was immorality there was injustice people didn't care about the poor people were only interested in seeing what they could do to take advantage of other people I didn't care about anybody else as long as I can make a few bucks as long as I've got power as long as I'm okay I don't care about all the people I have to step on along the way so when Yim yahu looks says how could it be that yusim has become desolate yes says I asked that question how could it be you became imoral how did that happen and the answer to yes's question is the a of mosenu which seems strange by comparison and we also read it with the [Music] how can I handle myself all your arguments and all your fights I'm going to set up a court system that's the sounds like a great idea they say to MOS and moso sets up a court system listen what Rashi says you are only interested in your own benefit who would you rather learn from from you or from your students you went up for 120 days to the mountain you didn't sleep you didn't eat you didn't drink you heard it from you came down with rays of light shining out of your face of course I'd rather hear it from [Music] mosu n it's too hard it's too hard you know MOS didn't come up with this idea on his own we find out in darar he only mentions himself and Clau but the fact that the matter is um that yro is the one who mentioned it originally he says this is too hard for you to have the people standing all day and waiting well if this was such an obvious problem why didn't MOS reeno figure out himself and there's a very simple answer because it wasn't Rashi says yeah and Rashi says that's not possible to say explains because this was the day after yipper and that's the beginning of aak so he had to come down and teach them all about the mishan and tell them what to bring and start collecting everything he didn't have time to judge the people all day so Rashi says what it means is a dying it's as if he did it the whole day doesn't even have to mean an hour it can mean less than an hour right cries himself to death B says he didn't cry for an hour that means that mosha been to judge him for a very short period of time and Y said hey mosha this isn't working and M is like why what's the problem he says the people don't want to wait he says it's not a very long wait they still don't want to wait it's not worth it to them it's too much effort so here in the of moso he says and when yra said this to me I said to the Jewish people would you want me to set up a whole bunch of court and judges or would you rather come and hear it from me and they're like nah too hard to listen to you would you have a chance to go and see mosuo the there were there were people who would travel great distances just for the to be able to look at a Isel to see him to meet him even not to talk to him just to see him it was this story that were coming back from a conference and uh retical conference and at every stop so the gulum would get out you know on the platform and wave to the people and all the people would cheer and you know it was didn't come out so finny May Shapiro he says uhin he says how come the r isn't coming out that people want to see you he said what for they want to see an old Jew there're plenty of old Jews he says they don't want to see an old Jew they want to see a god of Israel he says yeah I'm not a god of Israel he says well they think you are he says they're wrong he says so what would be so bad if you came out and waved and pretended you were go to be Israel and you're really not he says Checker he and so what if a checker I'll go to geh he says and it's not to go to gam to make thousands of yiden happy he says the next stop was the first one off the [Laughter] train to have to be able to look at the G Torah unbelievable opportunity and here you have a chance to go and ask your question directly to mosha raenu there's a story with mosha Feinstein where someone calls 11 o' at night and answers the phone he says yeah he says I have a sh I have to ask the r says what's the Shila is Wrigley's gum koser he says 11:00 at night you're calling and and bothering the rub with this I don't trust anybody else you have a chance to go and ask you a question to MOS said by the way what did Hashem tell you exactly no it's too hard or has a publication called the oret and uh the ornette has a question and and like a asked the rabbi section Anonymous and one of the people who worked there this story is 20 years old I don't know about today but he said a lot of the questions that we get are from from people who are basically asking sh is they don't know who's answering the question they have no idea who the rabbi is it's a group of rabbis not one person in the as the rabbi section of the or and I said why don't you ask your R he says uh I I don't have access to a RV where do you live Brooklyn he says and there no rabbis none that are accessible I have to wait too long I much rather type a question in to an anonymous Rabbi and get an answer than to have to wait online to talk to a ISC or a or to go to their house and actually ask them a question it's too much effort most feels bad but hasem says don't feel bad after speaks per yeah we we heard God speak every time he speaks we die this is too hard will here's the punch line you go find out what hem wants to tell us you feminine you girl go girl go and tell us says Rashi I said because C I became weak like a woman what does that mean it's not talking about physical strength he's talking about uh the role of men are to be Masia and role of women are to be maab he says I stopped becoming mas and I just became a ma why because I was pained P I became weak CU I saw you weren't trembling to come close to Out of Love wouldn't you rather hear it from God so they come to Har and Hashem speaks the first two dibros and after each one the people die because the experience is so overwhelming and they said okay that's enough MOS find out what hasm wants and tell us don't you want to hear you have the opportunity of hear from no that's okay it's too hard I don't want to die eight more times forget about it you find out and you tell us so when mosha says don't you want to hear it from me and they say no that's too hard Hashem says don't feel bad they don't want to hear it from me either they don't want to listen to me they don't want to listen to you you know why cuz it's too hard I don't want to be bothered says mosu how could it be how could it be that CL after all the N the flows after coming to and having a who speak to them how could it be that they then turn around and say nah I don't want to hear from Hashem and then they turn around the motion and say n we don't want to hear from you either people care so little you know what happens when people don't care it'll take a while but the rot will set in and then it's too hard for me to go out and work hard so I'll water down the [Music] wine and I'll and I'll pay off a judge to get what I want and if I have to step on a widow and an orphan along the way it's worth it to me because it's too hard for me to do it on my own Tori say he supposed to lend money without interest and if the person doesn't pay you back by shmita well the whole loan is canceled a person steals money and he doesn't have a way to pay it back so we sell him as an Evy do you want to buy an Evy well is he like a regular slave no you can't give him any demeaning work to do if you have only one pillow you give it to him if you're having steak for dinner you can't give him chicken he eats steak too oh and by the way you have to support his wife and children along the way who in their right mind would buy this guy why should I want to live a system like this I get taken advantage of somebody uh invested money with somebody and from his point of view it was a hard money loan meaning he gave him money and he was supposed to get 10% back on his money and uh the person the deal they were on went bad and he said I'll pay you back the principal but I'm not going to pay you any return this person was Furious and he came to me if I could somehow influence this guy to pay him back the interest that was due on the loan I said well it's not interest on a loan it's investment money because you're not allowed to ask interest on a loan didn't you sign a het to ISA he says yeah but everyone knows that doesn't mean anything everyone knows that's a joke I want my interest I thought to myself the gar says people Le with interest don't come back and and you are fighting to get that interest you signed a is so that you wouldn't be over this terrible terrible AA and you're upset because the guy is taking the het Isa seriously won't pay you your interest is a FR person not a nonr person FR person and and you you look and you say why would a person do that I learned the term I learned the term somebody taught me this they say oh uh where's Kim he's sitting the person said the first time I heard this I was like sitting where and they'll like get a little embarrassed you know sitting he says it took me a while to figure out they meant like in Otisville he's sitting in prison because he he did some shtick M once said what the Torah calls is Thea yiva guys call shtick shtick some kind of financial shenanigans that landed them in prison okay not even an embarrassment anymore because uh you know got to make a living and you say to yourself how could it be that from Jews are acting in ways that are illegal I have to tell you having worked in Kira for many years we very often have a situation where uh you know I'm doing question answers and people say how do you explain you know Jews who do bad things so I standed answer answer is I said what what are you talking about do you ever hear anybody who's afraid to go into a Jewish neighborhood is some of the lowest crime rates of any group you know in any society this worked until one time I had someone there from the District Attorney's office and he said you're right Rabbi when it comes to violent crimes when it comes to financial crimes what they call white collar crimes the fir Community has a higher percentage of crime than other communities I I I was I was dumbstruck I didn't know what to say how do I justify from people stealing and lying and and acting in all kinds of immoral ways the how does it happen that everyone became corrupt I told this story I'm sure in the past uh I was in uh the Catskills for summer and I went to this farm store in uh Woodburn mosha rosenell moo was running it and uh and I told him the following story I said uh I'm in sh wherever I was staying and it's chabas I was learning and there are three people gathered around the beima and they're talking and one says you know I leased a car and ends up it was 200 miles over the lease agreement they charge a a dollar a mile I wasn't going to pay the $200 says his from person at the beima in front of the or kodesh in sh on chabas I wasn't going to pay $0000 so I found this Israeli guy who has someone who can turn back the odometer so he hooks it up and he's turning it back and it and it breaks what do we do now he says don't worry I work with somebody yeah and uh he'll steal a similar odometer from another car he steals it and I install it and we turn it back to the right mileage he only charg me 50 bucks I saved $150 and the other two guys are going uh and I'm watching this scene in sh on chabas in front of the Aron kodes and he's speaking with pride how he ripped off the lease company stole somebody's odometer to save $150 so I'm telling the story over tomorrow and I said there was a time when Jews used to die for what we believe in and now you can buy a Jew for $150 and he says to me $150 I can buy a Jew for less than that so what do you mean he says I'm a swm store people come in to buy swm and then I add on the tax and they say I don't want to pay the tax I said okay who's your pis cuz mha says you have to pay the sales tax and the SAT says you have to pay the sales tax so foret who's your who's your pisc and they start to get angry at me and I said oh I didn't realize you don't believe in the Abisha they're like what I'm buying SAR what do you mean I don't believe in the aish you think that if you have to pay this 8% sales tax you won't be able to Fe feed your family you won't be able to clothe them you won't be able to pay your tuitions that's going to break you so you have to break H and lie and cheat and steal to save yourself the 8% sales tax on this on this safer that you're buying how could it be how did we become corrupt it's embarrassing it's embarrassing as a fir Jew when you see people act in these kind of ways that was the how could it be and the answer is the of mosu how could it be that people don't want to hear from me answer is because it's too hard and we can't be bothered can't be bothered my parents you never heard them say I don't feel going to work you never heard them say I can't make shabas I can't make PES you do what you have to do that was always the attitude you do what you have to do my father dropped out of school after ninth grade to go to work to help support his family family was starving not like a kid who comes home from school after he had uh breakfast and lunch and snack and he comes home and says Mom I'm starving I mean there's no food starving he dropped out of school at work just to Able have money to buy food milk for his his siblings and nobody helped him he built himself up and started his own business and built things up and he had no understanding of people who weren't willing to do what they had to do one of my brothers told me he was once unloading a truck a 50 lb bags of soil my father comes by and says do you need a hand says yeah says look at the end of your arm that's how my father talked because that's how he lived his life no one helped him had to do everything on his own you do what you have to do who cares if it's hard many years ago I was stay saying with a doctor in Florida and ding was 7:30 he gets the show 7:20 I said oh it's nice to come early he says I don't understand from people who don't he says don't you have to put on and say and and and and prepare yourself you run in in the middle throw on filling you Mumble you what is that on to come a time the answer is too hard ding is too long I don't want to go to a sheer don't you have a zoom hookup what do I have to go for it's too hard nobody wants to do anything that's too hard right vendel the founder of the Hebrew Academy of Nassar County who uh my entire family today is from because of him when I say my family I don't mean my immediate family I mean my parents their children and their grandchildren and they over 100 great-grandchildren all from because of r fendel so he said he used to go to a by RNA and they were in a small room and it was hot and it was crowded and uh raut spoke quietly so he said to one of the organizers he says why don't we move into the auditorium let him take a microphone we can sit like mention and he said because of holds B that you have to work hard to get toyra right that you have to be willing as the gar says to kill yourself over Torah you have to work hard people don't want to work hard walk into a sh and the B are like go ahead rby let's see if there's anything you can say that's G to interest me nobody wants to work hard 35 years ago he had some second Seminary girls at our table and uh I know we're talking about different courses and they said well there's this one course you know but we don't like the teacher he's boring and my wife of course is an intellectual she was like what do you mean he's boring don't you have an obligation to learn and they were like no not if they're boring I don't have to listen if it's too hard if I have to concentrate if I have to slap if I have to work too hard I don't want to do it as Mo don't you want to hear from me no it's too hard and says m is because of that you know why Yan became immoral you know why everything fell apart because we lost the ability to work hard and care to become better people people to improve ourselves to act morally we look for shortcuts and ways around it and and andl and patent them and whatever we can come up with to avoid having to do what has to be done somebody said a lot of the problems that we talk about in society have always existed is just more welln there's one new phenomena young couples who get the divorced in the first few years of marriage and I've spoken to some of them and they say the same thing almost all the time I don't need this I don't have to put up with this my parents never said that of course you have to put up with it you're married you understand you put up with it you work hard you make it happen don't just complain but if it's too hard why should I do it I don't need this what four I want it easy I don't want I don't mes R left said one year on says you find boys who are willing to be moish to learn toyra if you buy them an apartment then you buy them a car and you support them and you know think he says what's a a serious neish they're willing to get up every morning and go to co I said this over a few times and guy said well not every morning but certainly many mornings understand sirious nees he says I had friends who learned by candlelight because they couldn't afford the electricity I had friends who only ate pasta every night because they couldn't afford anything else and I'm not talking about n I'm talking about in Cleveland Ohio when I was in TS and nobody complained because it was to be able to to to to learn an opportunity now if it's hard I don't want to too hard for me can't be bothered you walk into yiva for daving sometimes they use their fuel dirty coffee cups on the tables no one put back Forum you go into the kitchen a cereal spilled milk spilled nobody bothers cleaning it up the milk is still out all night no one bothered putting the refrigerator it's too much I can't be bothered Sirus nefes not for me sayso why are we sitting on the ground how do we have a Corbin why don't have y why don't have the B mikdash how could it be says you know why it's the Jewish people are no longer the Jewish people how could it be the Jewish people have become corrupt and dishonest and don't care take advantage of people how could it be and moso says because they don't care it's too hard in my parents generation you never heard anybody say I just want to chill nobody chilled I Chade said when he was learning by Rd labelz he once said to the boys you guys don't even know how to bottle even when you're wasting time you don't know how to do it you just you just literally kill time like you have so much of it you can kill it time comes in handy later on life so if we want to see answer the of how could it be is this way then we have to answer the of yes and say because we have lost what it means to be the Jewish people that we were a people apart that our word meant something that we were honest and decent people and if you want to know how to get that back it's the of mosu how could it be that people aren't willing to try to sacrifice to inconvenience themselves to put themselves out of the way sometimes I pick somebody up I live at the top of harno and I and I say where you going and they're like you know I live down on the bottom you could just leave me anywhere it's like a cold rainy night you know and so I drive you know through the neighborhood to to their house and like oh you don't have to do this you know such a extic I said put this in my Arts cob biography it was a cold rainy night and ravski was sitting in a warm comfortable car and instead of just dropping me in the middle of no place so that I could walk in the freezing rain he went five minutes out of his way to bring me home wow there's an art scroll biography if I've ever heard one you know and I said you better write it down because there not that much stuff to get to put into mine so if you got something put it in there but that's already that's already uh Li name sure as I didn't that's like a great thing what any decent person would do just drop you off have to care the Suka says that first mashia Y is going to come before Mash B David and he's going to be the last casualty in the war and then MH whenever will come so Reves explains that Yosef was the heart and Yehuda was the RO and msia is going to come not with the intellectual head but with the emotional heart we're going to start to care about each other again and look out for each other and when we start looking out for each other then we can get the G and we can move to the RO but first we have to care that's what mosu said show that you care and you won't have the of this will be the last year that I have to do a tis podcast sitting on the floor the next one we'll have a live broadcast from the Bas of mikdash and I'll just I'll just simoc cast whatever mashia has to say and share it with my regular audience because we're this close to be able to turn things around all we have to do is show that we're willing to put in the effort we should all be to an EMA n and gula