Part 49: Keep the Connection with Hashem Alive

okay good morning everyone sorry for the delay help yourselves to some coffee if you like our learning uh in the amuna class as it always is but additionally our learning should be for all those who are ill and in particular our dear friend Ben Rifka Bas should have a complete and Speedy and painless amen amen we're going to have a special tonight at SCH at 8:30 um following the woman's class the special Mida class taking place at 8:00 at the misis at about 8:35 we'll begin with theim here at sh for him and for is okay we uh completed I realized still a couple minutes ago that's why I was late making these copies we completed the shalom's discussion of amuna in his uh in his section so I want to learn with you a piece from this week's para from para's Bak which I hope will also very inspiring and touch on some of the principles of amuna that we've been working on as we've shared so many times the goal of our amuna she is um is simply to be mindful and cognizant it's a support group it's a exercise group some of you go to work out once or many times a week and you are motivated by being with other people working out that's working out the body and this is working out the soul this is about being mindful of amuna we don't necessarily have breakthrough moments um where we uh learn things things that we didn't know but it's a matter of remembering and applying the things that we already know so we begin with in the third attempt of billum to curse the Jewish people that is transformed from a curse into a blessing billum says those iconic Words which really have begun the sitter we say it as part of our daving the great Praise of the Jewish people how how great how wonderful how beautiful how goodly are your tents yov and your Dwelling Places Israel yesterday in the para classes para class we offered a few interpretations of what's the difference between an o and a mishan the interpretation of of Rashi thisno we saw rook and now we'll see the Shalom on this very same P everyone see where we are page if there are any more copies going around please feel free to pass them if there are any extras from the in of that Wicked person bam who from the simple text doesn't seem so wicked but we know we have a tradition what a villain he was but from the blessing that resulted from him one can learn what was in his heart his goal was to eradicate the holy SES what is the life source of the Jewish people namely the study hall and the sh B stood up and he wanted to say may your studs may your and your be eradicated may they be destroyed may they be eliminated and when he opened his mouth to do it instead what came out a great a great BR bam understood that the life source of the Jewish people are our gathering places where do we derive strength where do we derive the will where do we derive the faith to endure so when we get together in sh we pour out our hearts in when We Gather to be able to learn Torah together this is the very life source of of the Jewish people we just returned from our trip to Poland and so many of the shs were destroyed those that remain are anomalies but the Nazis understood that to to erase the Jewish people you have to erase their life source which is the sh which is the study hole we went to a few shs and sadly in communities in in Takin and uh in tarau where there are no Jews there's just an abandoned empty sh we tried to bring back to life you went to where May shap began the the and tried to bring that by learning the da in that very place to bring that b Med back to life but the strength of the Jewish people is not when they're dispersed or isolated or living alone it's when we have a gathering place to pour out our hearts in prayer and to grow in in bilum understood that and that's why that was he understood the soft spot the vulnerable place of the Jewish people he sought to curse us there and that's where God reversed his curse into a blessing that Not only was it not destroyed but how praiseworthy all of the curses that were reversed into blessings ended up resulting in curses with the exception of the shs and the study that even though temporarily God reversed the curses to Blessings tragically that didn't last with the exception of the reversal regarding our shs and our stud says how do we understand this where is the expression of love from God that the curses became blessings if ultimately the blessings became curses again number one number two what is so unusual what is so important about the strength and the health of our shs and our yeshivas that God specifically chose whatever unworthiness we had that we were unable to sustain the rest of the Bros that God granted us those Bros in perpetuity what what is so important what is so specific about the two of them says you have to understand what is a and what is a you know what a is in life a is good health and a is from children and a is parasa and a is all these wonderful things but you know what the greatest when you are connected with when you cling to when you feel the presence when you feel the love and the affection and The Guiding hand of the almighty on your shoulder that's the greatest BR you know why because that enables you and empowers you that wherever else and whatever else is going on in life you have the strength to be able to endure life for there's no one for whom life is a picnic everyone is battling something for some we know it's visible We Gather to say for them for many in fact for most it's invisible we will never know those battles everyone is battling something but the biggest BR is having the having the weapons for the battle and the greatest weapon we have is which enables and encourages and empowers us to be able to endure and to find the strength through whatever it is that we're faking facing in a moment that a Jew is clung clings to the almighty that in itself is the now here May mean and some believe that the moreas you have the greater BR you have meaning the more you are aware of God's presence in your life the more you cling to your father the more you call out to him the more he protects you the more blessing he bestows upon you literally that if you have more amuna and the more Amun you have the less vulnerable and exposed you are to hardship and suffering and tragedy but we know that's not true we just spent a week in trinka and midon and aitz and birkenau we visited and said to Hill and K and Kadesh at Mass Graves into coachin and outside tarau at a grave of 800 children whose inscription on the tombstone is is mindboggling survivors a year after the war found this Mass grave where 800 children and the inscription in Yiddish says I'm going to blow the Yiddish my yish is not good enough but something like um it said basan kees eight here are 800 galapa kees or something like 800 basan heads of children rest in this Mass grave they didn't have perfect these children they did they did sins we sikim we stood at the crematorium in birkenau and we listened to the testimony of who led the recitation ofma for all those who were cramped into the gas chamber as they went to their final they didn't have the anim we sat in trinka and we sang the tune of the am that was composed on the train to trinka and somehow by somebody jumping off the train and getting the notes to the ma in New York That Tune has lasted for us they sang on IM on a train to trinka they didn't have amuna so it doesn't mean thatuna guarantees you life and health and happiness and Anda and G the best of people the most righteous the holiest people Moshe to over 500 times he says let me in let me realize my dream let me enter the land Moshe didn't have nobody had greater daas and Hashem tells Moshe sometimes the answer is no so the the clinging to Hashem is so first of all we hope to reverse his decree and get a yes we never give up we never forfeit we never concede the power of prayer is so enormous the power of prayer is so strong it can transform hem I just mentioned earlier the that one of the languages of is it says that intreated Hashem on behalf of his wife Rifka when they wanted a child says why right which has 13 synonyms for prayer one of them is we have so many verbs for prayer P Saka zaka Rea what's and the says a pitchfork just like a pitchfork flips over the the the hay so to our prayer can flip over can reverse hashem's will sometimes Hashem needs our attention and he gets our attention in a very startling way he takes a drastic measure and it gets everyone's attention and when he has our attention and when we transform ourselves in a result it flips over his decree he says I have your attention good you're new people the person is worthy of a new decree and things will get better so the power of prayer is to be able to achieve a different result but at its core the power of prayer is to achieve its vacas is to create a connection to cling to the almighty to concede and forit and submit to our father that he knows best and to recognize that no matter what we stick with him that he has our back individually and collectively and that that act of that clinging to hasem gives us the strength to be able to endure that is the ultimate the is says we are most vulnerable we are most exposed which again can be understood literally that hardship will visit us or can be understood symbolically that we can't endure the hardship when we lack the in our lives so understood when of the Jewish people most vulnerable when can I get them when they have yush when they become hopeless and helpless when they become disconnected to their father in Heaven when they don't believe that there's a reason and meaning and Order and purpose to the universe when they start to think that Life Is Random and chance and people are a result of Statistics when they give up on God that's when they're most vulnerable that's when I can get them because only when we have hope can when we endure only with faith can we survive so billum tried to create a disconnect he tried to sever that relationship from our leaning and relying on hm because he knew that if we're divided if we're broken if we have given up our faith that's when we are the most vulnerable that was his that was his goal because when we're disconnected from the almighty when we've given up Faith when we are hopeless in a situation that's when we're vulnerable to CLA that's when we're vulnerable to the greatest curse told the story on the trip of her grandfather who was in uh was in aitz and uh one day for whatever reason upset a Nazi officer in the camp who decided to take it out on him with his whip and beat him senseless resulted as being blind in one eye for the rest of his life his face was covered in blood he was bleeding from everywhere he was broken he somehow crawled back to his Barrack and he shared the same Barrack with the and he told the kust that he was contemplating throwing himself on the electrocuted barbed wire he couldn't uh he couldn't endure he was giving up he can't imagine continuing he thought he was going to die that night and he said to the please say V with me please say what is said at the end of a person's life recite the vi with me and the refused and he said if you put your faith in Hashem and if you somehow can get through tonight then I give you a br and the Braha is that the Nazis will be long forgotten but you will be here and remain and you'll have children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren who you will see to be Torah observant Jews and he never told anyone that story until one day he was deep into his 90s asked him what do you what do you uh credit your longevity to why do you think you live such a long life and he said I'll tell you this story because I was in the Barrack and I got this BR from the and it renewed my faith my amuna and it gave me belief that there was a reason there was meaning there was purpose to our suffering and that I had to find a way and a will to endure and because of that bra I think I was he lived to almost 99 years old and in fact left the legacy of children and grandchildren and and great grandchildren he also told a story of a of Aid a yipper night the took a number of people and found an empty Barrack and late at night the who was the only one who knew k nidre entirely by heart led the people there in the recitation of K nidre in aitz is there a greater expression of spiritual resistance of defiance of of amuna not to judge those who didn't and couldn't we can't even imagine but for those who participated participated in that cold nid night to ask for and kapar and when you're going through what what you went through to fast when your whole life is is defined by fasting and to be able to cram into a Barrack to listen to the renew and give you hope and amuna to recite so on this video that we did of him rewatched it in anticipation of our trip he remembered these 50 years later more than 50 years later he remembered the gave him the Barrack that night to introduce and when shared this on the bus there was somebody our trip who said you know I went to theel in in in Brooklyn of the kov and I heard him tell the story of that K the Dre night and of that saying kre which kind of corroborated the story from another not that it needed to be needed to be corroborated in the hardest moment in the worst places in the darkest darkest places on Earth one can achieve Deus it's a very high level we don't judge those who can't but the ability to see Hashem and to renew faith and to cling and to to try to make sense and to to maintain hope is something we can do and for those who who stop that was the mat if you can sever the Jewish people from their Source from God from their father if you make them believe their father doesn't care about them theyve he's given up on them and they give up hope then that's the end and this was the of these two uh these two Temptations so the two ways that bam sought to get to the vulnerability of the Jewish people was through these two enticements one was with the daughters of Moab and the other was Balor and they went hand in hand one was to throw beautiful seductive provocative women at the men as we spoke about yesterday in the para class when our enemies understood they could not defeat us militarily when they understood they could not defeat us spiritually bam tries cursing us and it's revers to a blessing where do they get us what's our vulnerability what Freud understood is the greatest vulnerability of all man in all time they tried to seduce us they tried to distract us they threw the provocative benos moav and uh and the men were distracted and when the when the men were about to be uh inappropriate with the women the women said just one thing before we can uh before we can be with you and they took out the idol and they said you have to worship the Balor and we know many great men many brilliant men many accomplished men who in the moment of Seduction their judgment was so clouded they destroyed their own lives by deing infinitely more foolish things than to bow down to an idol okay if that's what it takes big deal and they in fact worshiped the poor and says the SL why did Bam why did bolock devise this dual plan after the military after Amal couldn't defeat us on the battlefield and after bam couldn't defeat Us in the spiritual field by trying to curse us how did they understand these two things because this represented the moak and the Le this was our vulnerability in our head and in our heart where do we express where do we cling to hem intellectually when we study when we learn when we analyze when we break through and it's in our heart it's in our heart the were commanded to wear on the arm opposite the heart on the head opposite the brain fill in are two satellite dishes that we wear every day in order to bring in the signal the intellectual signal the emotional signal to connect to Hashem in the most in the most powerful way the rsua the leather strap that's worn down the arm is the Kaplan writes is like the umbilical corn umbilical cord that connects us to our source of nourishment which is the Reon who guides Us by Kaplan has in his book a whole chapter why women don't wear Fillin I understand I'm speaking to a group of women so he says that what what's the cloth the parchment that contains the paros the four paros andin they're held anyone know what the box is called the B the bottim a bottim is a home and the strap is the umbilical cord and the woman she has a bias within her like Kaplan describes based on beautiful calistic sources that the M or what we call the M the uterus of a woman from which she produces a home she doesn't need to wear the home on the outside side she instinctively intuitively she understands the ability to nourish to nurture in umbilical cord the ability to feed another with one's own body she doesn't need to artificially wear itos in order to generate that image of Hashem taking care of us she's able to conceive of that in the inside it's not apologetics that is a beautiful explanation so where men have to artificially wear the Fillin on the outside to generate those those symbolic feelings women don't have to but what the villain do is they tap into the head and to the heart there's a in the Chim was the of the ghetto who answered questions without access to and scribbled down the questions the answers he gave and hid them in tins and they were recovered after the war later published in six volumes shim the response of from the depths one of the most moving questions I've read in those tros is of a he created a Yesa in the COV ghetto he imagined he had boys rather than say you know our kids say School's Out school's out that's the greatest thing that ever happened this kids school's out cuz the Nazis deprive you from going to school you're shoved into a ghetto they said but we want to learn we need to learn so rash created a Yesa AER within the COV the ghetto for these boys Tom I think it was called and he had an A A really exceptional boy he was an 11 or 12 year old boy who learned extra and doed with fervor and the boy comes to rosi one day and he asks the following question he asks the following question he says rebi I see the men in my life wearing Fillin I've always wanted to wearin I've counted down with great excitement great anticipation to the day I will be able to kiss the Fillin and unwrap them and affectionately put them on me and and connect with them but Reb I'm a realist and I realize that the likelihood of my getting to my bar mitzvah is very small oh the likelihood of my ever getting to the day that I will live to put Onin it's it's greatly unlikely so I'm asking can I wearin already now even before my bar mitzvah so but I can have the experience of doming inin because it's unlikely I'll ever get to the point that I'll be able to do inin and rri goes through the question and the answer and explains you know if a person can maintain the proper mindfulness and proper cleanliness and and of course concludes that this young man can wear the Fain I don't remember if there's a postcript about whether he lived to his bar mitzvah but I don't believe he did and he talks about how extraordinary these were the type of questions that were asked in the coven the ghetto not I want to step on fill and get rid of them but I desperately want the experience of wearing of wearing tan even again in those dark places so thein are the are the heart and the head so bam understands where is the point of our greatest vulnerability where can I attack the Jewish people how can I Sever and disconnect their relationship with where can I get them The Head and the Heart To Worship idolatry is a violation of the head Lous immorality that is a violation of the heart that is drawn the heart is drawn to those things so how can I create an environment where the the curses can fall on them how can I create a platform for the curses to to apply to them if I can sever their connection To The Head and the Heart if I cut off their connection that's when I can go get them so what's the answer what's the antidote if we are most vulnerable when we're disconnected if we lack the strength and the courage to persevere and endure when we hear bad news when we feel the pain of ourselves of our dearest friends how can we draw the strength where can we find the courage what is the antidote the answer is isus what's the antidote Torah the antidote to those who seek to sever our connection through our head and our heart is to strengthen the connection Through The Head and the Heart tah purifies the brain because Torah allows us to purge those foreign influences and values and ideas that contaminate our brain imp purify our they create an impurity within our brain and transforms our heart heart to be feeling and sense and to be turning towards towards Hashem Torah has the capacity the Mish says the tah one of the things that Torah does is what is that word says commentary what does the word means you have a pot it's absorbed a non- kosher taste how do you kaser the pot you put boiling water and it purges the non Kos tast that had been absorbed within its walls so the walls of skull the walls of our brain have absorbed non kosher ideas and images and temptations and desires and how do we purge it not through hot water we purge it through the study of Torah Torah Torah is the H it's the cering agent for our brain so if we want to clear our head and we want to restore our head to a place that could absorb hashem's will it's through the mechanism through the medium of Torah and how do we purify our heart what's a as he quotes the here in as thei says pour my heart pour out my heart like water only when you pour out your heart that's how you when you pour out your yourself in that's how you purify your heart when you when you DAV with every ounce of your being when you submit and forfeit yourself to Hashem when we turn to Our Father in heaven and realize that it's all within him that he has the power and the solution and the answer that is the means through which we which we purify our heart so The Head and the Heart and this is the beauty of what B Praises within the Jewish people how magnificent how praiseworthy how beautiful how goodly are your tents what's a tent is and the O is the B Med how goodly are your places of learning where you're purifying your head where you're purging the impure ideas from your head and instead replacing them with Torah and how wonderful are your Mish are your Dwelling Places your your BOS where you're not talking where you're not coming late where you're not distracted but where you're pouring your heart into and the result of a pure head and a pure heart is the ability to cling the ability to connect the ability to recognize that everything Hashem does is for a reason so that's why saw our vulnerability there and that's where he wanted to be able to get us skip to b o baz that was the first point I wanted to bring to you from the is that is that the antidote to news the antidote to horrific news that we hear about a beloved friend a family member the antidote to the own hardship and challenges within our own life is not to lose Faith but is to gain faith is not to walk away but to walk closer is not to give up but is to lean in is to realize that only with a only with a belief that everything is for somebody said to me we got this horrible news about our friend or you can imagine this was a theme that was pervasive as we walked throughout the giant Cemetery known as Poland that this was a theme that was pervasive where is Hashem how do you have faith where do you turn to in these moments how can one go on and I have to tell you going on this trip with a busload of most of whom were children of survivors who were grappling and struggling and trying to make sense of their own parents suffering was was unbelievably powerful was unbelievably powerful and one of the things I said to people is let me ask you is the alternative any better so you don't believe in God so you say God could never cause such pain God would never allow such a thing to happen and what's the alternative therefore it's just the evil of man or with illness it's just Randomness it's just chance it's just nature that makes you feel better that gives you more strength to be able to understand it or to get through it the bottom line is these are questions for which there are no answers since the beginning of time these questions have been posed asked why are you doing this to S why would good people die MOS says to Theon shal show me your face let me understand your ways why do bad things happen to good people and Theon shom says you could see the back of my head you cannot see my face which our rabbis understand to mean that maybe sometimes perhaps after the fact you'll understand everything will come into everything will come into a clear picture but you can't understand as it's happening in real time my ways you cannot understand and anyone who claims to understand or to explain why these things happen is trying to be God to play God and that's an act of heresy that's an act of heresy so we can go down the path of trying to answer Lama why why do these things happen and we will continue to walk down a path that has no answers we cannot understand and it happens to the best people to the most amazing people to the most special people to the people about whom you can't say one bad thing and about whom everybody in the world loves them it's not a person who has a bad thing to say which just makes the question more compelling and more challenging and more unanswerable and more impossible the best people so you could go down the path of Lama of why and you'll struggle and you bang your head against the wall and you'll be frustrated and you'll never get an answer or as has been often said by others instead of asking Lama you say Lama for what what can this generate how can this be the Catalyst of change of good we can't understand it we'll do everything we can to reverse it but in the meantime how will we be different what will we do differently what will we transform in 24 hours of our having bad news about our dear friend the amount of tum that's been said the amount of people whove signed up for projects of lar of the Mitzvah of separating Kal of taking extra learning of the T Torah that's been dedicated in the community we can we can go down the path of Lama of why and never get to a destination or we could ask l and we can be the answer we can provide the response a response that a will transform the of Hashem to be something which is only good so it could be bam harasha it could be the Nazis it could be a tumor it could be bad news but all of that tries to L take it tries to sever our connection to Theon an email that says that a beloved friend has a horrible uh diagnosis is a curse like bam harasha getting an email like that or news like that or a phone call like that is a curse like what billum gave us like what the Nazis tried to do to us and the common denominator of all is that underlying it it's trying to break us off from our leaning in onon sh when the opposite should be true we have to lean even further and we have to dedicate our Mo and our our head and our heart through additional learning and through more sincere because whatever the result and of course we dve from the depths of our heart for the positive result but through this journey and process in this particular case or anyone who's ill or struggling being without Hashem won't make it easier it'll just make it harder but being with Hashem like the told AR having that faith in someone to lean on maintaining a sense of hope gives you the possibility and the strength to be able to endure but go to O which is the second idea what did Bam see he saw the Jewish people were dwelling according to their tribes and when he saw us dwelling according to our tribes so then the spirit of hem rested on us when does the power of T come when are we most vulnerable when we're divided when we're individuals but when we are united when we are connected as a people it cannot rain so when you see yourself as an individual isolated and alone when you break off so now you're vulnerable if you're part of a greater good if we complement and supplement one another if we combine our strengths then we have the ability to endure so saw the Jewish people were encamped according to their tribe when we want hem to answer our we have the greatest voice we have the most compelling voice it resonates the most with Theon not when we're private individuals arguing on our own but we combine our efforts when we collaborate when we become one when we show when we are that's when we can exhibit the greatest strength so it's beautiful say to in your kitchen and in your car it's beautiful say to on the road and office it's beautiful to say to H and to do learning privately individually but when we connect when we collaborate when we combine When We Gather and we're are the gathering places Theos and the M Where Do We Gather when we when we raise our voice collectively in Harmony in and in learning we D together we learn together we're not separate we're not disparate we're not apart we're all part of one cl we're all part of one cl and we say and we proteston Shalom you know you hurt your left arm your right arm doesn't say I'm good let the left arm fend for itself good luck left arm left arm you should go to the doctor I'm just fine the left arm hurts the right arm screams ouch and the right arm takes care of the left arm until the left arm heals and the right arm feels pain until the left arm is good so when we are CLA when we are all parts of Limbs and organs of the same one entity of the same body when one of our limbs hurts and we all scream ouch and we all protest it's not that I'm good because I'm okay I don't have a diagnosis I'm not good till every one of my limbs and organs is good when we all cry out and protest when we storm the gates of shim together as a clel not as individuals that's when we have the greatest strength that's when we have the greatest power that's what was trying to destroy was trying to divide Jewish people so we wouldn't be one entity but we would be individuals when we are vulnerable to the curses when we are individuals so he specifically sought to curse the shs and the of the Jewish people because if we're divided and isolated and alone that's when we're vulnerable to the power of a curse That's What reversed left this blessing perpetually it was Timeless that we would continue to have access to these places that bring us and draw us together that we can there's a lot more to say this beautiful essay but the strength that we can gain when we hear bad news when we encounter our own struggles and our own suffering when we're looking for how we can maintain faith in a world that is begging us to have doubt and uncertainty when there's news that comes to us that is as toxic as a curse from bam harasha the way to maintain faith is also to lean on our predecessors and ancestors who showed faith in even worse circumstances if they could put one foot in front of the other if they could lean in if they could rely on the re if they could achieve vas in the darkest places then we too can it's a test it's a test these are all tests to to test to to physical well-being it's a test to Faith and part of the test is will we fall apart in terms of our amuna and and this is why you work out the muscles so when they're needed they're healthy and they're strong and they are there we can go down the path of L we'll never have an answer but if we say Lama okay horrific news I shed my tears and now what what is my responsibility what do I do how do I storm shim what difference can we make how do we never give up hope and how can we bring a better result for our dear friend rasia for all those who are ill or struggling or in need of Yeshua or in need of hashem's intervention we should only have BOS we should have shared good news and good tidings and Sim through the through the Merit of purifying our Mo and our l our head and our heart