Rosh Hashana Perspectives - 3 Lessons from the Akedah

good morning booker tv and welcome back to our parasha perspectives for today on er of rosh hashanah now you may notice that there is no parsha that we read the shabbos the shabbos is rosh hashanah and sunday and that's why rather than address a particular parasha i want to spend our time this morning briefly looking at one of the readings for rosh hashanah the dominant reading which is akidas yitzhak and the reason i say it's the more dominant of the readings is because the theme of al-qaeda's the theme of the binding of yitzhak is not just the torah reading that we do the second day but rather that theme informs and inspires and guides many of the practices that we have is referenced in part of the davening the very chauffeur blowing itself and so i want to take a look at akita's hitchcock the end of parshas vallera and back and save her braces and to look at three specific lessons then not from a parshanu perspective but rather a rosh hashanah perspective can help inspire us and guide us and get it get us ready for rosh hashanah this year i want to thank our sponsors this morning first of all the series is generously sponsored for the year my dear friends becky navi cats and family loving memory of david grossman leila nishmas this morning's class in particular is sponsored by the gel goldman and shaknovsky children in honor of their parents dr david and susan gelb wishing them and all of caught each other healthy and a happy new year and indeed that is our wish our hope and our dream for all of klaisrow thank you for the sponsorship and thank you for being with us so the story of the arcade though we all know the story of the arcade and it was after these things after which things it's after the story of the um the bris the covenant which is formed with avimella and then the torah tells us what many consider to be the 10th and ultimate test that avraham endured it happened hashem tested he tested which is the simple translation of the word nisa we'll see not everybody agrees to it but you may love avraham he called out to abraham by omar and avraham said he named me here i am i'm showing up i've arrived here i am i'm ready to answer the call i'm ready to do my best i'm ready to be present hiney not present like members of congress present which we're critical of present as in yes i'm answering the call to realize my purpose and my mission in this world so again i want to share three different insights some of which you may have heard or read from me recently but they bear repeating and particularly as we get ready as i said to not only hear the torah reading of the second day roshan the akedah but also draw from its lessons and its themes as well what was the goal the purpose of this nissan hashem tests why after the first nine was it not established that abram is a loyal servant so many of you so many of us have been tested by aspects of life by years of living and here we are now with this pandemic here we are now corona covet if it doesn't test us directly by compromising health thank god if we're lucky then it tests every single one of us indirectly by challenging and compromising our yantif with whom we can be our capacity to socialize to go out financially to earn income in so many different ways it is challenging it is testing many and just like avraham there's a sense there's a feeling that many have been tested through their lives some who are listening on the many platforms that we're broadcasting right now have experienced loss have experienced grief have experienced suffering been tested enough hashem we've stuck with you we've clung to you why another test why does it seem like it doesn't end and that's the question for avraham avinu avraham avinu endured nine attests he overcame he triumphed he persevered through nine evaluations of his loyalty of his fidelity of his faith why this one the ultimate one the biggest one to sacrifice his son not just his son his everything his everything rashi here eludes we know khazal already see that avraham waited a hundred years to have yitzhak he finally has the son and god says this is the one your legacy will come through him he will be your continuity he will be the mouthpiece he will be the advocate he will be the ambassador who picks up the mantle after you who preaches and teaches ethical monotheism who continues this mission of transforming the world when avram finally realizes that and he has this son and the son is 37 years old coming into his own ready to serve as the assistant rabbi ready to take over readily to share the mantle of giving russia's ready to continue to partner to transform the world hashem says yeah you know that son you waited for you know the one i promised that you'd have a continuity through i want to take him top of the mountain slaughter him that's how i know you love me kill him and with him kill everything that you've dedicated your life to kill your future and kill your your um continuity i want you to kill everything by killing him why why would hashem ask this why would avraham have to endure this why would he go through this so the rambam in mourinho him in the third heirlook the rambam writes the following and more innovative in the english murder was not written in hebrew even to begin with i read it to you in the english the hebrew itself is a translation the rabbi writes it comes to inform us the extent and limit of the love of hashem and how far the year from extends adam is commanded to do a certain act which cannot be equaled by any surrender of property or by any sacrifice of life it goes beyond anything else that can be done and belongs to a class of actions which are believed to be contrary to human feelings he had been without a child he had been longing for a child he had great riches and respecting the nation would come forth from his seed after he had given up all hope a son was born to him how delighted he must have been with that child how intensely must have loved him and yet because he feared hashem and love to do what hashem commanded he thought little of that beloved child and set aside all his hopes concerning him and consented to kill him after a journey of three days the fact he performed it three days after he received the commandment proves that this followed thought proper consideration and careful examination of what is due to the divine command and what is in accordance with the love and fear of hashem he writes do you know why alvin was tested not for abram he had established he had proven himself hashem had known it was confirmed abram's love loyalty and faith this to teach the world just how far away and year ago how far it stretches and reaches when one has a loyalty and love for hashem after all what does hashem say at the end of the arcade when avraham passes now i know the rama says read it that now it's publicized what type of person avraham is now the world knows now it's on record now there's a precedent emunah faith what it can draw in a person says the rambam the purpose the al-qaeda was not about abram at all it was educational it was pedagogic it was to teach and inspire the world that the world would forever look back and the world would forever point and the world would forever know just how deep our faith can go just how far our faith can reach just how much it can take us enable us strengthen us to overcome all that's asked of us now the eben ezra the ibnesra doesn't like the rambam's interpretation because the ibn ezra says that can't be the reason it was educational pedagogic it was to teach a teachable moment who knew about it who was there to see it to observe it yes we have the torah and we read it we read it on rosh hashanah we read it and say vibrations but nobody was present to have learned from it at the time so what was the education that came out of it the ibarbanel has a second interpretation by the way there's a very compelling question which we're not going to address but which bother many it may bother you this rosh hashanah and always which is avraham when he heard about the fate of stone stood up challenged god protested objected and now hashem says take your own son's life and he's silent he says nothing no objection no protest no argument no moral why is he quiet when it comes to his own son and when it came to the wicked and evil people of stone that's when avraham found his voice and here he's silent very compelling question not for now not for now so the abarth has a second interpretation of what this word is writes that a nase it means a miracle a nace means a test but nace also means a banner an ace means a banner for example we say in our dominant cabochon the son there doesn't mean perform a miracle to gather in the exiles the sun ace in our own davening means wave a flag raise a banner the son nace lift the nephesh benefice logo the kabats and gather everyone from all over wherever they are so says the abba banel hereto the word nisayan el kimney sa's means a banner tell the world teach and show a muna raise a banner that talks about how far faith can go for the rambam it was a teachable moment to the non-jews of the world to the world to humanity for the abar banel it's for the jews for all time that we jews would know that whatever we're going through in life whatever we face whatever obstacles we're challenged to overcome we have the dna and avraham avraham inside us we are his progeny we are his legacy we are his children we carry his genetic material and just like he had the faith to persevere so too do we nissan this is a banner this is a reminder this is held up for us to know and to know for all time just the capacity and the strength that we all have to overcome whatever we're being asked in the moment the rashfam rash's grandson of schwab mayor has a different interpretation of the word nisa this is all part of point number one i'm building up to all part of point number one a third interpretation of what the word nase here means the rashfam writes kintarovitsiyaro ki daksivani sadavarillah from other contexts and proves from there that the word nase can mean not only a test not only a miracle and not even only a banner the word nase also has another meaning which means provoked or angered it says the rashfam elokimni says he provoked avram you know he poked avraham afram you know that son the one you waited for you know the son the one you're invested in you know the son the one that you believe everything will come through he provoked to me angered and he poked him a little chimney agitated and aggravated him in order to be able to draw out from in order to be able to learn from him after the breasts with abimelech after that covenant hashem a little a little a little poke and he saw a little provocation in order to see what avraham was was made of but the ramban finally and this is the point that i really want to get to as point number one the ramban and ultimately the ebenezer have a different interpretation their unban rights what is the goal of a test and i would argue to you my dear friends maybe this is why we read on rosh hashanah you see the simple understanding of why we read the story of the akita rosh hashanah is rosh hashanah we're being hashem we're coronating god we're celebrating his inauguration we are establishing and expressing our unending faith in him who is the one who taught us that faith who is the paradigm of the perfect and the greatest faith none other than avraham so if you'd ask me why do we read the akadah on rosh hashanah why do we draw the lessons the show for the tasha so many of the other parts of rosh hashanah come from the story of the akedah why first of all the zoar the majors tell us that uh that happened on rosh hashanah rosh hashanah is the anniversary of the story of the akedah itself but if you'd asked me why are we drawing so many of our lessons from the akedah because it's the model of the ultimate faith the paradigm of faith and we too are meant to have that same faith but i want to flip it on its head and what i want to share with you this morning and these three points are different lessons or different um inspirations that we can draw from the al-qaeda not only pressure on us not only evaluating us for just how far our faith goes but maybe also strengthening us through the difficult and challenging times that we go through so ramban writes what's the purpose of a nace what's the purpose of an isaiah of a test why does god do it bk shack of lay shade bashava yaakov wanted peace and quiet and frankly so do i so do you who doesn't want to retire to south florida sit under a palm tree sipping pina colada learning the da feel me reading a book playing shuffleboard enjoying life heading to the early bird dinner and going to bed early who doesn't want that life because of leicester bashava everybody wants quiet we want peace test me he tested me with coronavirus and testament with the economy and testing me with five named hurricanes in the atlantic ocean right now because we don't have enough challenges in 2020 testing and testing and testing it who needs all these tests who needs these tests hashem if you really love me don't test me if you really love me let let me live peacefully let me have some quiet and serenity so ramban says that wouldn't be love that wouldn't be love why wouldn't that be love why wouldn't that be love listen to the ramban song you see we're going to talk about this on shabbat shiva you could have a good heart but you know you're not what's in your heart you are what you do we are the product of what we do not what we think not what we believe not who we are in our heart who you are in your heart is lovely it's nice between you and you and you and god but who you are evaluated by those around you is what you do so hashem says i want to bring out of you the best i want to help you realize who you could become i want you to fulfill or at least make progress towards your potential i don't want you to be an underachiever i didn't create you to only use a tiny fraction or percentage of what you could be i want you to over achieve in every area of your life but how will you do it so the sad fact is that most of us unless we're pushed against a wall unless we're backed into a corner unless we're forced we don't realize who we could be i'll tell you something very personal about me unless i have a deadline i am the world's greatest procrastinator i struggle with laziness and procrastination and pushing things off and getting things done and if i didn't have a deadline if i didn't have a pressure external or internal whether pushed upon me or chosen or set by me then i likely would not get done much or most of what i do the bottom line is for many of us who are not necessarily self-starters for many of us who are happy getting away with more minimum than maximum if we weren't challenged or pressured or forced then we wouldn't become the best of who we could be minakawa which is potential el hapo to the realized from what's in our heart to what's in our actions the purpose of a test is to be the people that were meant to be because you know when we're tested we discover all kinds of things about ourselves that previously heretofore we didn't even know we didn't even know i once read a story many years ago about it was uh obviously a muscle not a real story about a wealthy individual who hosted a a party at his estate and he invited his colleagues and friends and before they sat down for their fancy dinner they went for a tour of the estate and there were multiple homes and gardens and benches it was a magnificent estate and it had several pools and as the host walked with the entourage of guests past one of the pools the host said you see this pool this is my pool that's filled with piranhas and sharks and there's fish this is where i keep the exotic fish that can risk your threat in your life and then the host jokingly challenged the guests and said you know whoever jumps in and can swim to the other side and come out alive i'll give you whatever you want so all the guests turn to continue on their tour of the estate and suddenly they hear a splash they all turn around and there's one of the guests in his tuxedo and his bow tie attending this fancy dining party and he's swimming ferociously he's swimming with all of his life trying to navigate around the piranhas the sharks the dangerous fish and he makes it to the other side and he climbs out of that pool and he is dripping wet and he can't catch his breath and he has just swung for a swim for his life and the host making good on his promise can't believe what he sees and turns to his guests and says i i can't believe you took me up on the offer i can't believe you jumped in the pool he swam to the other side but i promised whoever could make it out alive i would offer whatever they want tell me what is it you want and the guest took another deep breath still catching his breath and turned to the host and said what do i want what do i want i only want one thing i want to know who pushed me in what's the lesson if you weren't pushed into that pool everyone would turn around and keep walking but sometimes we get pushed into positions pushed into pools pushed into places in our lives which force us to dig deep and discover a tenesh a tenacity a resiliency a resolve strengths character traits qualities that unless we were pushed we would never know that we have chris barclay says i want you to live your best i want you to fulfill your most i want you to over achieve and you're not going to do it on your own it's not going to happen if i leave it up to you so he sometimes puts us in challenging moments in order to discover things about ourselves that we otherwise never would and so while for the rambam it's to teach the world and for the rashfam it was to teach the jewish people the power of prayer the power of faith for the ramban and the even ezra it's to teach us the power of us the potential in us and this year as we read the arcade to that second day of rosh hashanah and we blow the show for that specifically from an isle of ram to invoke the image of the akedah and we'll say tasha by the body of water which also is a reference we'll mention in a moment to the akedah as we keep coming back to the al-qaeda over and over again this rosh hashanah i submit and suggest to you then not only do we use it in order to stretch and to reach to have the faith of our forefather avram but also to think about the tests in our lives and instead of feeling as if we're not loved because we're tested to realize that we're tested only because of hashem's tremendous love for us and to try to evaluate in what ways we've grown by being tested how we become different better bigger people and how can we yet continue to grow how can we not look for tests not jump into the pool of life intentionally but when we're pushed there how can we embrace it how can we instead of be a victim and instead of being complacent and apathetic and instead of blaming others and instead of crying why me embrace that test in order to discover who we're meant to be and to grow to be to become the best that we can be all that is point number point number one about a test point number two the imagery of the al-qaeda again second day rosh hashanah rosh hashanah is the anniversary of the story and the unfolding of the akedah and this i just mentioned yesterday in the colosseur but i want to repeat it for the many who are not on it and it bears repeating torah tells us the story that was point number one the different interpretations of the word nisa and avraham answers the call he named here i am test me i'm ready i want to discover the best in me i'm ready to embrace your challenger test hashem so hashem tells him what to do and vaishnava alvin wakes up early in the morning and this is the mocker the source that we learn about zurich the notion of alacrity and zeal and enthusiasm and energy that there's reason that the people who are righteous and virtuous magdemon limits us we don't wait and we don't delay and we don't procrastinate we don't turn our mitzvahs into hamitz but we run to fulfill them we embrace them with joy vayash he wakes up early in the morning in order to fulfill the will of god and he saddles the donkey himself also a lesson avram was a very wealthy man he could have afforded to delegate that task to others but when you want to show your enthusiasm and energy to do something for someone you care about you don't delegate you don't outsource you run to do it yourself and he heads to the place that god tells him and what happens all of a sudden we skip the text itself skips by omash next thing you know lo and behold when is it the third day he lifts his eyes and he sees the place from a distance the first says by the way very so it means god is a place that's far off inaccessible seems that a distance was struggling here abram doesn't understand why he's been asked by our samakham he sees god but it's hashem feels like he's at a distance so it's the third day you stay here with the donkey i'm going with yitzhak we mentioned in the parachute several weeks ago why did this happen the madrid fills in because when he's still at the distance he points he's with eliezer yeshmal and avra and the yitzhak and he points to the mountain har hamoriyah the temple mountain he says new children boys what do you see what do you see eliezer i don't know obviously a mountain what do you see dirt earth nothing a barren desert he says yitzhak my son what do you see what do i see the cloud of hashem you see the heavens opening up i see the revelation of god he says boys eliezer and ishmael am hadon you see no further than a donkey kamur miloshim material all you see is right in front of your eyes yitzhak is a dreamer he sees above he doesn't just see what's right in front of him the homie the more you're you yes you're like a donkey all you see is the material of the homer you truck you see beyond you have a vision you have an imagination you into its spirituality that's it hashem doesn't give the coordinates of the mesa make dash he wants us to be a mavaca shadow he wants us to intuit to search to look to imagine that's what the rav writes that avraham said he says new you come with me but i want to draw your attention to in the text it skips it's missing a core part it says hashem testafram says i'm ready god bring it on hashem says here's what you got to do and next thing you know all of a sudden the text says it's the third day what happened on day one what happened on day two what was going through avraham's mind you know put yourself in avraham's mind for a moment for a moment god tells avraham listen don't tell anybody but here's the deal i know that you tell the entire world don't kill your kids because the pagans in those days would murder their children as an act of idolatry and you avram have been standing on your soapbox you avram have been tweeting and facebooking you had zooming and youtubing you've been telling the world through every means and platform possible don't murder your own children to serve god that's absurd that's idolatry that's paganism don't do it it's unethical immoral it's depraved don't do it well you know you've been preaching don't do it i want you to do it go do it and don't tell anybody what in the world is going through avraham's mind take your son the one you waited for the one you love the one you love takes out from a while to figure out who it is god's talking about god says i take your son says my son i have two sons the singular son abram says they're both singular each is the only son to that mother as asha hafta take the one you love this is very interesting avram says i love them both i love yitzhak and i love ishmael finally hashem as if exasperated okay enough he can't tell anybody three days avram's traveling it takes him three days to go from being asked as the rambam wrote three days to go from being asked to get to the mountain what was he thinking in those three days what was he thinking how is he feeling he couldn't tell sarah we know sarah didn't know because the beginning of kaiser when she finds out about this she is shocked to death she has a heart attack from the thought that yitzhak was almost taken from her sarah doesn't know yitzhak doesn't know obviously he doesn't tell anybody avraham is suffering in silence avram is going through a test and it's not a test that there's telem rallies and everybody's taking khala and everybody's getting together doing mitzvos and everybody's learning shas and everybody's doing everything in his merit this is a test that he's enduring this test quietly without anybody's knowledge so what in the world is he thinking for those three days by yomi shlishi he gets there on the third day what is going through his mind for the three days so what the text leaves out the medrash fills in and the madras accosted him and appeared to him in the guise of an old man and the old man said where are you going and avraham said to the satan i'm going to darwin so the turn to him and said you've got a diamond you're going to pray since when do you pray you need a pile of wood and an axe what do you need a fire and a knife avram says because you never know what could happen on the way maybe on my way to pray i'm going to get hungry i'll need to shake i'll need to cook maybe i'll need a fire maybe i'll get stuck so i said something hey old man this is not me it's the major says the son to avraham old man who are you kidding do you think i wasn't there when god told you to kill your own son i was there and i heard it and i know you're going to kill your son you waited a hundred years to have him you think it's moral and ethical to kill him and said abram to the satan you can't stop me nevertheless i'm going so the sultan said don't do it because tomorrow god's going to accuse you of being a murderer today you think he asked you to do it but tomorrow you're going to wake up and he's going to say how could you have done it you murdered your own son and again avraham said nevertheless i'm going nothing can stop me and the medrush continues with this extraordinary imagery that the satan fails to persuade avraham not to go so what does the satan do next saturn takes on the form of a river and avram plunges into the water it reaches his knees and he says to yitzhak follow me and you could see avraham and it's like side by side they're walking and wading through this river and they reach me the way the waters come up to their neck and abram looks up to the heavens and he says almighty didn't you choose me and reveal yourself to me and you told me through me you would make your name known in the world and then through my son yitzhak and now these waters are endangering my life if yitzhak and i drown your word will have been violated who will proclaim the unity of your existence and hashem answered abram and said through you shall the unity of my name be proclaimed and rebuked the river and the salt and it dried up avraham stood on from ground and by yomashlishi and it was the third day what does this mean who is this satan we believe in a satan is there some external voice the devil does he wear red does he have funny horns and a pitchfork who is this satan what is the image of this satan i want to share with you an extraordinary insight from the khamalaib in her commentary on honest back and save her boracious she writes the following and listen carefully listen carefully this rosh hashanah this coveted 2020 tough shin pea allah means is the satan is not some external voice this satan is not someone outside of avraham avinu you know the satan is you know the guise of the old man who comes to challenge avraham is it's avram's alter ego it's the voice within avraham's own head of doubt and uncertainty it's that own sense with an album that says maybe this isn't the right thing to do it's avrom's own hesitation and reluctance so one by one these doubts the assailant first it's his paternal instinct it challenges him can you really kill your son the one you waited a hundred years for the one you waited forever for the one that's so precious to you and then avraham turns to his own paternal instinct and says yes i have to do it. and then the voice of his conscience calls out and says maybe today you think it's right but tomorrow you'll wake up and realize you're a murderer how does the stim how does this work with your own moral conscience on compass and abram says nevertheless i have to do this and then then the satan takes the form of the river which is the form which is the metaphor says of the obstacles and impediments that stand in our way the things when we know what we're supposed to do and then we encounter an obstacle that we make an excuse and we cop out and we blame the obstacle instead of overcoming it running over it or around it or even running through it and avram says this river can't stop me now by the way this is the source what we spoke about yesterday in the afternoon cola you can listen online the history and the background and the customs of tashlach the mahario the maori who is the entire source of the minute of tashel the maharil says the reason that we say taslich is to go to a river a body of water and to remember that the satan tried to block afro from the akedah and when we look at that body of water we realize the things that try to block us in our lives and the need to overcome them and that we cast into this water saying to our sins and you know what's the biggest sin underachieving the biggest sin is not becoming who we can and we are meant to be the biggest hate is that we we ran into those obstacles and we gave up and we turned around and we lay down instead of running over or around or running through them so we go to a body of order to invoke the image of the ikeda the sat on that voice in our own minds and why am i sharing this with you as point number two today because this rosh hashanah when we read the akedah again think about avraham's unparalleled faith and how we too have that genetic material that dna that even when we're going through hard times we too can draw from that faith the well of faith that avraham implanted in us but i think there's also this other second message which is it's okay to have doubts it's okay to have uncertainty it's okay to hesitate and pause you have to put one foot in front of the other like avraham did by yomashlichi by the third day he gets there but you know we sometimes read the story of the arcade though and we think that avraham had doubt free i've met her perfect faith so me when i hesitate because i we bury a 53 year old woman a pure outstanding beautiful neighbor and therefore i have doubts i have questions i say hashem how could you and where are you and why would you and then we feel grossly inadequate and we feel ashamed and according to the kham alaimit's reading of the al-qaeda we shouldn't because none other than the great avraham avinu had to contend with those voice of doubts he too had to answer the satan in his own mind he answered successfully he put one foot in front of another so much so that by omash on the third day he arrived and so can we i'm not suggesting that it's okay to give in to the voice of doubt or uncertainty to give credence or credibility to the voice of doubt and uncertainty to allow the voice of doubt or uncertainty to defeat us shalom god forbid what i'm telling you is that you have license to have that voice to contend with those doubts to be able to try to overcome them and to grow from them and to be better ultimately as a result of them that is point number two about the akedah point number three about reading the akedah this year read in the aka the three these are alternative lessons of the akita again our point is that the simple understanding is the okay that we read it why because this is the measure this is the expectation of the of the type of faith that we're capable of and the three alternatives i'm reading are number one to embrace the test to realize that the purpose of a test is to help us grow is to realize our potential is to become better is to overachieve embrace the test if we're being tested with corona or any other test in our life don't look for it don't welcome it but lean into it embrace it and use it leverage it to be able to be the best that we can be point number two are the voice of doubts and uncertainties none other than avraham to contend with them and we too have license to contend with them however we too must ultimately overcome them we by yamashishi have to arrive having passed our tests and the third lesson i want to share has to do with the chauffeur and the aisle and the aisle this again was my article from this past week you'll forgive me or bear with me for the khazara for the repetition of it but i feel strongly about it we're going through a tough time and you know i saw an article towards the beginning of corona so we're talking four five six months ago and the article said that many millennials are going through the hardest the first time they've had to struggle in their lives we're living in a generation of helicopter parenting we're living in a generation of a time where we bail out and we rescue and we pay off and we take care young people don't know what it means to struggle they don't know what it means to struggle my wife jacob loves to point out that when we were kids on parent-teacher conference night we children shook in our boots we trembled our parents were gonna come home and boy they were gonna if we weren't behaving or under achieving we were in trouble now teachers shaken their boots on parent-teacher conference night that the parents are going to come in and boy they're going to give the teacher a hard time about why their children isn't succeeding or getting an a didn't get the trophy what's wrong with the teacher that the child does they don't realize that their child is perfect we're living in a time of helicopter parenting bailing out there was a wall street a new times article several months ago before corona about parents going to college campuses in order to make play dates for their college age children the children don't know how to make new friends or integrate parents need to go there and help them so maybe it's an exaggeration maybe it's an exaggeration maybe it's not that our children don't know what it means to struggle because we can't bear to see them struggle so we are living in an affluent time where we can afford often to not have to see them struggle by the way struggling means that they don't have the latest version of the iphone that's that's the struggle that we want to spare them they should go without the latest version of the iphone we don't want to we can't bear to see them struggle but we're doing a terrible disservice to them because the struggle the scion the nace is how we become who we're meant to be it's how we grow and break through break through barriers it's how we begin to achieve and how we begin to over achieve and so there's this notion even in religion that we have to preach and i know that i sometimes record videos with my my son shai kashmak to be a year that it's geshmaq to be a yin and it is it is geshmaq it's beautiful it's great it's fantastic it's awesome it's pleasurable it's fun it's fulfilling it's satisfying gratifying it is geshmaq but you know sometimes it's also schweitzein ramosh feinstein famously said that we can't tell our children to schweitzer it's difficult to be a jew you have to tell him it's kashmic to be a yidd because ramosha was talking to a generation who survived the holocaust and if you tell the second generation or you tell these survivors that it's sure to be a yid that it's difficult to be a jew you have to be a jew anyway they'd say i'm out of here sayonara i'm out so you have to tell them keep shabbos keep kosher rosh hashanah yom kippur in a difficult challenging year do it and why should you do it because it's kashmak to be a year you can't say to uh to schweitz but i argue that we've gone to the extreme the pendulum has swung too far in that direction that all we ever tell our children is it's kismak and sometimes we have to remind them that it's not always geshmaq it's not always geshmaq doing the dishes and sweeping the floor and taking out the garbage in relationships it's not always geshmaq sometimes it's fair you want feliciacs and she wants milfix it's mama schwere sometimes it's schwer it's kishmak when she says i want you to be happy so we'll have felix but when she says it's my turn and i want milfix it's schmer in every relationship be with our spouse and be it at work and be it with our parents and be it in with hashem and be it in life for the most part it's geshmaq we should feel it and live it and have that smile on our face but there are times that we are going to encounter that it share that it's not always easy and maybe the third lesson of the akita maybe another lesson of the akita is the notion of mysterious nephesh the notion of the struggle the willingness to sacrifice the willingness to engage and encounter the struggle you know on rosh hashanah we use a chauffeur and the shulkr writes that when we use the chauffeur of rosh hashanah one should preferably use the chauffeur of an isle of a ram although all chauffeurs are kosher we universally use the chauffeur specifically of an aisle the geman rosh hashanah to zion wonders why why do we blow the show for specifically of a ram why specifically we have an aisle and the gemara answers who says blow for me with the ram chauffeur so i will remember this yitzhak and i will consider it as though you were bound on the akedah before me use the chauffeur so i'll remember aki desi and i'll consider it as if you were bound on the ikeda before me i just occurred to me i never realized this before it's fascinating maybe you all realize this i just realized this right now in real time the gemara doesn't say who who does who is the gemara identifying as the hero of the story of akidas yitzhak when hashem here is the chauffeur he doesn't say i will remember avraham your willingness to sacrifice your son who does he remember i will remember as though you were bound before me on the akedah from hashem's perspective and the image of the chauffeur who's the hero of akira's yitzhak yitzhak's willingness to be bound yitzhak was not five years old yitzchak was not a bar mitzvah boy he's 37 years old he's a man and he's not a stupid man he knows what's going on he is a hero an unsung hero of the story of the akedah and when hashem hears the chauffeur and specifically the chauffeur of an ayal hashem says ooh the io the ram that reminds me i will consider it as if you are bound on the akita in other words i will consider it as if you are being most your willingness to sacrifice your willingness to submit your willingness to concede your willingness to give up your willingness like avraham to answer the call with a hiney here i am i don't just show up when it's fun i don't just show up when all is good hiney he i'm not just a member of the shule when i can attend i'm not just a member of ashore when you put out a good kiddish he name me i maintain my membership even in tough times because that's what it means to be mostly an effort for community for claudius claustro for yahada's i don't just answer when i can have the good shallow shooters the great speaker the great concert the great khasen the great panel discussion the great shiram hineny even when i'm denied even when it's mostly nefesh even when it's hard hiney i'm willing to answer the call i'm willing to answer the call and so there's an element of the akedah which is often overlooked the hama labids doesn't address it in her in her commentary but here's the question that ramirez shapiro asks for mayor shapiro the founder of the daf yomi rashish and ramir shapiro wonders the following question when avram raises his hand to slaughter his son and the voice of the angel calls out and says stop don't do it now i know that you're god fearing don't do it ask for mayor shapiro how does avram know that it's not the satan again the satan tried to make a argument a paternal instinct argument the satan made a moral conscience argument the satan took the form of a river and tried to block him so the voice that he hears that says stop don't do it how does he know that that too is not the satan maybe it's the satan maybe it's the alter ego maybe it's the voice of doubt maybe it's the it's the uh voice of making an excuse how does he know it's authentic how does he know it's real how does he know it's real so it says of mayor shapiro says of mayor shapiro you know how he knows it's real he knows it's real because avraham looks up and he sees a ram and io struggling in the thicket and when he notices the ram struggling avram is in fact convinced to put down the knife says mayor shapiro that falsehood and temptation come easy truth and meaning are connected to struggle and effort and when ava notices that the ram is struggling when he hears the angel's voice he says in a place of struggle there's truth in a place of struggle there's authenticity in a place of struggle there's that which is real and lasting and when he sees the ram struggling he knows that's not a satan that's the voice of truth the ram struggled to escape but its horns were caught in the bush and it couldn't get out and the shofar represents our challenges and our struggles and we embrace the chauffeur of the isle we use the chauffeur of the aisle to say i don't bail when a time when the tough get going rather i lean in i'm willing to be most inefficient i show up like the ram was willing to struggle the chauffeur was caught in the thicket i am prepared for the struggle i'm ready to be mostly nephesh i understand that judaism is not only the moments of geshmaq to be a year i'm ready for the sharks design to be a year i'd only if i don't only have faith with you when all is going well i have faith with you in you even when we're going through a challenging time and so we saw this morning three different uh additional lessons of the al-qaeda the core the central lesson of the al-qaeda this year as it is every year is avraham avinu's tremendous faith amuna and that we too have that in our genetics in our dna we can draw from we can learn from we have that capacity for that level of ammuna that's lesson number one that's the core lesson but the three lessons that we complemented it with were number one the notion of a nissan don't don't resist the test lean into it embrace it grow from it recognize that it is in fact drawing out of us parts of ourselves that we never would have known so we're being tested by corona we're being tested with our patients and we're being tested with our health and we're being tested to dive in a mask i was thinking actually the other day during slichos that we all have that merit on our behalf it should be a kapara because it's hard enough to daven who doesn't count how many pages are left in the moxar on a normal year it's hard enough to davin to stand to connect to be moved it's hard enough on a normal year to do it through a mask to do it through a mask hashem we're being mostly nephesh it'd be much easier to daven at home there are people who need to dive in at home they're doing the right thing 100 percent of it at home it's the safe correct right thing do it the people who need to but it'd be easy for all of us to bail and to say you know i'm gonna stay home no mask i'll do it on my own but we're willing to be mostly nefish to wear that mask hashem we're willing to endure a challenge to be able to connect with you this rosh hashanah and so hashem let that be on our behalf nisao lean into the nacionos lean into the challenge because we grow from it number two lesson number two is the idea that doubts and uncertainty they're okay avram gave us license avra makes it permissible alvin creates the precedent however like avraham by omashishi we have to put one foot in front of the other until we arrive to persevere to triumph to be tenacious to have resiliency and resolve to maintain our faith in the end to run over or around or through that wall when we need to and number three the serious yes it is but sometimes it's fair and hashem we're willing to be mostly nephesh this corona it poses challenges but we're willing to be mostly nefesh we're willing to sacrifice we're willing to struggle because we know religion means to concede to submit to you to what you have in store for us hashem when we hear the second day the reading of al-qaeda's yitzchak when we stand at by that body of water we listen to that chauffeur and the sound from coming from the ram may we be inspired by these lessons we should all be written and sealed for simatova a year of only the best health and happiness of nachas from family of celebrating should answer all of our desires for the good looking forward to seeing everyone next year as in next tuesday have a wonderful sukkah