Should we be HONEST or NICE?

Hillel says she's beautiful she's somebody worth praising shamai says but you're lying Hillel says I'm not lying I just see things differently than you you're going by what's in front of you but there's always goodness and I'm going to try to see it okay friends The Story begins the Talma talks about the ethics of how to praise a bride which is an interesting thing because why would you praise a bride that's not yours but there is a concept of praising the bride take a look at the text on the bottom of 16b I'm going to try something new you guys know me and my English reading skills I'm going to read it in Hebrew and translate it and um you're welcome to follow along with me in the Hebrew or the English but tanu ran the rabbis had taught how do we dance in front of the Bride there's a Mitzvah to bring joy to the bride and groom on the night of their wedding and that's through dancing um and I I think by the way this is worth mentioning one of the notable differences of a traditional Jewish wedding and perhaps a wedding in the world outside of Judaism is the dancing in a traditional Jewish wedding the dancing centers around the bride and groom you're dancing for them to make them happy whereas I've seen other weddings where it's there's a bride and a groom and they're dancing and I'm dancing and you're dancing and we're all dancing and we're all just having a good old time at this nice party but you wouldn't notice it's a wedding where you had walk in in the middle and not realize what the V what the event was because everybody he's dancing because they want to have a good time but in judism it's very centered focused and it's focused on bringing Joy to the bride and the groom and the Tom says how do you dance in front of them now as Rashi tells us it doesn't mean dancing in the literal sense um you are supposed to dance literally but that's not what the tal mode is getting to right now it actually means praising now why it uses the expression of dancing when it means to praise we'll get to that soon but how do you do this so we have two opinions we have the opinion of Base sh says let's go to the next page top of the page the way you praise her the bride say it like she is say it as it is she is literally translate how do they translate it here in the English the Bride As she is say her as she is if she's great say she's great if she's beautiful say she's beautiful if now what if what if uh you don't have that opinion of her okay right now you're stuck but shamai okay we understand shamai in the school of shamai how they run we know through learning shamai and Hill's discussions shamai is usually the more no monkey business type person right which is reflected throughout many stories in the talmud and many uh many of his quotes throughout the talmud but this is what he says H says the school of Hill says the bride is pleasant and kind or beautiful or fine different ways of translating so shamai says say it like it is H says no talk about her fine qualities both of these um statements seemingly are problematic uh the school of sh says to the school of H what if she was lame right not ambulatory o what if she was blind are you gonna or or what if she had some sort of quality that was not something she was necessarily proud of are you going to say this is a nice fine bride are you going to say that the Torah says distance yourself from the words of falsehood from lies that's a good point right that's shamai shamai says be honest because you got to be honest you got to praise people that's a nice thing it's a nice nice to to to um to give people praise but it has to be done with honesty responds to according to your words somebody who buys something from the marketplace do you praise them that was a good find or do you say what' you do that for would you do that have you're not gonna be nice to people praise here the sages teach a person's mind should be empath they translate it as empathetic you see the word empathetic there empathetic with mankind that's not what it means literally but empathetic is it works if you look at the word in the Hebrew mevis means for lack of better terms but uh assimilated your mind should be assimilated with other people should should should um help me out here guys should um should jive with other people what's the word is that the right word okay you get what I'm saying get along with other people your mind you should you should be on the same page as other people get along with people that's essentially what it's trying to say now I I want to take a step back here the concept of praising somebody's bride in front of them like why would you do that um this isn't really practiced today right it doesn't always might not even be appropriate but but it it's interesting to note and this was especially the case in 2,000 years ago what was courtship like what was dating like how well do they know each other before the wedding you have an obligation to not have an arranged marriage actually arranged marriages are not are not a Jewish thing um you have an obligation to pick your wife and to choose her and to be okay with marrying her but how long do you think they were dating for back then probably not that long right um it's interesting the divorce rate wasn't that high back then either probably but I don't know I feel like maybe people were more simple back then maybe the expectations were different but the point is you want to make the the groom feel good want to make him feel good for what he for for what he has entered into for this new life phase that he's entered into now how you make him feel good do you make him feel good with compliments that's hillel's uh view compliment him now what if it's not true we'll make it true doesn't mean to lie but find something good you can I'm sure you can find you know that's how commentary is understanded find something good about her and and say it um shamai says you don't need a compliment you need to say she's perfect for you the way she is that's how it says in Hebrew K the way she is she's perfect for you what do I care if she's what do I care about her ex her exemp exemp qualities that's not my business she's good enough for you and that's good that's how commentaries kind of understand this piece of [Music] to side note this can almost be parenthetical but I think it's worth mentioning going back to the bottom line of that paragraph where it says we derive from here from hillo that a person's disposition should always be empathetic with mankind um that's not the exact translation it says second to last line in the last line what's from the word the mind of a person should be empathetic with other people doesn't say you should be empathetic with people it says your mind should be empathetic with people so there was a famous spartic Sage his name was which is an acronym from for yavid one of the famous commentators in and many areas of Jewish works and he says reason why it says the mind has to be empathetic is because you can't just fake the empathy on the outside you have to actually believe it when you are giving a compliment make sure you believe that compliment when you're following hillel's path and by the way the does follow Hill in this case Bas H not B when you're following Hill's path of complimenting her make sure it's a legitimate compliment in your mind not just a verbal compliment a political PC type thing like a PO ition be real be legit otherwise it's it's not going to work otherwise this is going to backfire the commentaries take this obscure story of how to praise a [Music] bride and unpack incredible relevance to everybody um tonight every single one of us watching this is not at a wedding otherwise you should shut this off right now and be at the wedding right so we're not at a wedding right now we're listening to and partaking in a Torah class so how is this relevant to me I don't plan on going up to my friend's bride or up to my friend and say good pick man but there is some sort of deeper relevance and as we had discussed earlier the talmud has practical significance but very often the talmud and the sages of the talmud are conveying deeper mess mes using mundane Lango and this is no exception and what I like to do is share two different interpretations alternative interpretations that are not literal of what this section of T could actually mean praising a bride what is a bride a bride is a euphemism in Jewish mysticism what is a bride a euphemism for think think give you a hand think of chabas think of Friday night services think of the come my beloved let's greet the bride the queen right the face of Shabbat P Shabbat Nala come greet the bride we're going to receive the face of Shabbat Shabbat is euphemistically referred to as a bride a bride in Jewish mysticism is God's divine presence that's what a bride is and how do you dance in front of the Bride go back to the go back for a second to 16b on the bottom of the page because I want you to see the Hebrew word for a second Kad how do we mired how do we mired you know what mired means means a few things it means to dance it has another meaning it can mean to refine to almost to sift it's a variation on when you're sifting flower one of the things that's prohibited on chabas it's called mtin you're you're sifting means to sift and when where are you sifting before the bride the bride has not yet come God's presence has not yet manifested this world in a palpable perceptual way in a meaningful way God is present in a way that we can believe that he's here even though we don't experience him fully but until msia comes and while we're in Exile God has not fully manifested this world the bride the divine presence has not fully integrated with this world in a perfect meaningful way so before that happens before mssiah comes how are we going to refine the world how are we going to refine this world how are we going to fulfill our mission our purpose prior to the bride coming prior to God manifesting this world the bmov had a student his name was I just looked up his name his I wrote a book called which means the opening up the hiding SP space opening up that which is hidden this is the name of his book the author's name was yob ysep of palon he was a cabalist and later in life he had discovered the bov in his teachings and became part of the community and apparently much of the teachings that we know from the bem to have come from him because the bashem to have taught a lot of Torah andus the the perspective ofus obviously comes from the B but a lot of it came through him because bash didn't actually write anything down so he had written down a lot of the teachings a lot of the teachings we have come from him and this is the this is how he understands the gar based on the theal based on the B's teachings how do we refine this world prior to the divine presence being here in other words while we're in Gul and we seem exiled from the divine presence you know how you know what the answer is well there's two answers there's bami's answer and there's Bill's answer bami says kala the bride the divine presence it is what it is you got to deal with the situation you got to work with what God gave you how am I going to survive Exile how am I going to bring light into a world that seems so fragmented and dark and corrupt and Confused how am I going to allow the Oneness of God to be expressed in the most mundane parts of my life do what I can that's the Exile mindset that bami has you do what you can right Kal this is just the way it is you have to have a certain level of acceptance what what what's the Serenity Prayer um it's been a while I'm kid but the Serenity Prayer is something to the effect of give me the strength to change the things that I can and the knowledge or wisdom to accept what I can't there's certain things we have to accept and and that by the way the Tanya does take that um perspective to a degree when you study chapter 27 of Tanya where he discusses the person who's feeling a deep sense of shame because of the emotions that they're experiencing that they're less than proud of the lusts they're experiencing that they're less than proud of the thoughts that's swarming their brain that they're less than proud of and the ban or aspiring ban says I feel ashamed of myself and the Alba says I have a solution embrace it embrace the limitations that God had given you and maybe your job is not to become perfectly inside maybe your job is to work on your behavior and not on your internal self focus on what you can change and not get bogged down by what you can't this is what Shai says kala the bride just the way she is just the way it is this is the way it is what is BAS Hill says the school of Hill Kal the bride beautiful and fine and fair Pleasant bam B says if you want to refine the world even though the divine presence isn't here palpably you have to learn about how beautiful that divine presence is the kala the divine presence of God even if we don't experience it yet we have to believe that it's a beautiful thing we have to believe that it's we have actually want it how are we going to bring God's presence down in this world when he seems so far from this world I mean first of all we have to know that it's it's not that far the world is not that far from experiencing the light of God from bringing mhia in this world from integrating the Oneness and truth from God in this world even though it seems very corrupt um we'd probably believe it a lot more if we shut off the the news right um but the answer is we watch less media less time on social media and more time in the books learn about the beauty of God the kala the divine presence of God is beautiful it's fine it's Pleasant it's something that we're attracted to it's something we're excited about and when we have that mindset even though the divine presence isn't here um in a way that we can meaningfully experience it because there is no B there is no uh the era has not yet arrived that era in time where Isaiah the scribes the world be filled with the knowledge of God has not yet arrived but just Envision how beautiful it would be think about it this way what if the divine presence was here in this world what if msia came what if the world was filled with the knowledge of God and that the God's divine presence the kala was meaningfully integrated in every part of my life every part of life reflected that let's say I was living in line with that like a sadic almost think about that and ask yourself what is the first thing you would notice about yourself what difference would that make in your life this is the question you have to answer for yourself what would I do differently how would my doing be different how would my motivation to do Mitzvah be different how would my capacity to give charity my motivation to give charity be different and that might be a meaningful change a manageable change we could actually Implement because the kala the divine presence is beautiful that this is Hill's perspective okay it's not here yet but still a beautiful thing and it's going to be here so what difference will that make in my life if it was here let's start living like that now let's start living with the msia lenses now this is H's perspective when the cites this section in talm it doesn't even cite Shai's opinion it cites Hill's opinion just saying because generally follows Hill okay this is the this is the view point the vantage point of the bmov this is how bmov interpreted this based on the teachings of the by Rabbi yob Ys po I want to share with you a different way of interpreting this section of the Talon based on the Reb teachings the rebit points out something fascinating and not very many people can do this but the rabbit in this very long teaching of his takes many diverse samples throughout the talmud where you see a cons a reoccurring theme in the motivation behind the arguments of sh and H so whenever they have deferring opinions it's not just arbitrary but there is a philosophy and that philosophy is reflected in diverse arguments that they're having and here's the general philosophy I'm going to present you the general philosophy philosophical difference between I'll give you some examples throughout different sections in the tal and we'll show you how that informs the way we view the debate over here and how that changes the way we see people you with me you ready this is g to be a bit of a journey it'll be fun okay okay the general difference between B Shai and B Hill again we know the general en super General difference Shai is the no messing around kind of guy right says it like it is the call the way she is and B Hill is the nice guy um the general rule is shamai looks at the big picture what you first see at first glance that's the big picture right when you meet a person you first see their whole selves but you don't know them in detail then you have a conversation with them and you see people are not that simple it's not just what they had presented to me but there's many multiple pieces and parts that make us up right shamai is looking at the first glance who you are as a [Music] whole hill is looking at the details so I'll give you an example from track Bros one of the blessings we recite Saturday night M shabas when we're making havalah we make the BR on the candle we thank God and praise God for the creation of fire and the blessing we say is we praise he who creates the lights of fire the lights of fire plural the truth is it's not so clear what the blessing should be that is the opinion of Bas Hill Bas Hill says and we follow Hill right so that's what's going to appear in the sitter B Hill say says the blessing that we recite is he who creates the lights of fire but if you look in the talmo there shamai has a differing opinion he who created singular the light singular of fire he says it's in the singular not the plural there's a debate what's the reason it goes back to this principle shamai says there's only one color in this fire it's orange it's one flame Hill says look at it closely man there's multiple colors you're you're looking at from far away an aerial view you see this blaze of red or orange whatever it is look closely there's red there's orange there's blue there's white there's diverse colors mixed in this isn't fire this is fires see the difference this is the difference between shamai and Hill shamai is looking at the bigger pict from an aerial view H's looking at the details I'll give you another example from track chabis this is a more wellknown example there's the story where the convert came and um he wanted to convert he says to shamai tell me the whole Torah while I'm standing on one foot and I'll convert shamai chases him out he then goes to Hillel tell me the whole Torah while standing on one foot and Hill answers him what is hateful to you don't do to others rest his commentary go learn the guy ends up converting again there's the same philosophy shamai says you want the whole Torah on one foot and not going to happen you can't have conditions for your conversion you can't convert if if you're interested in this Judaism thing come to me ask your questions and we you'll convert if you're not interested nobody's forcing you to convert right you can't have conditions for conversion Hilo says conditions this isn't conditions let's get in the details here this guy wants to know he's interested right he realizes how complicated the person is that there's something else prompting him to ask this question and that there's there's M parts of a person Hill is looking at the details at the details of the individual it's not a condition he wants to know because he's burning to understand what Judaism really is what the essence Hill is looking at the depth not just at the bigger picture from an aerial view another example from tractate kulin tractate kulin is one of the tractates where a lot of the laws of kosher are discussed in one of the things that it discusses is the law of not putting chicken or not let's say not eating chicken and milk together right from a Biblical perspective you can't have beef or meat and milk together rically you can't have chicken and milk together okay now how far do we go with this ribic um precaution what if you're eating um a piece of cheese at the table I'm eating chicken and I want to sit at the table with you I want to sit at the same table want to eat we're not going to share food we're not going to is that permitted or no I'm not eating them together so shamai says b shamai says go for it what's the problem you're not mixing the two there's no problem look right now no problem Hill says hold on let's start asking questions me and you are buddies we're good friends we're going to get carried away in conversation and we might actually end up sharing with each other let me try some of that I don't put it at the same table don't do it Shai is looking here and now at what you see in the situation as I see it at this moment it's permitted Hill is looking at what might happen he's looking at the details he's tearing things apart again it's that same theme shamai is looking at the body just this is what's in front of my eyes Hill's looking at the potential or or not just the potential but at the at the details of and you know prying deeper going back to our section in toml over here shamai says the bride say it like it is say what you see the way she is that's what you're going to say the way she is that's what you're going to say because that's what you see in front of you and that's how we look at life we look at life based on what our eyes tell us Hillel says no no no no no she's beautiful she's fine she's ex she's she's somebody worth praising shamai says but you're lying H says I'm not lying I just see things differently than you you're going by your eyes you're going by what's in front of you but there's always goodness and I'm going to try to see it I'm going to try to see it similar to what the says the divine presence I'm going to try to see it I'm going to try to recognize how beautiful it is the concept of Kala of a bride is also euphemistic of the Jewish people King Solon wrote an entire book called Song of Songs sh hasim where he describes God as the groom the Jewish people as the bride and he describes this beautiful love affair this beautiful relationship that we have with um with God so bride could be euphemistic for Jewish people and the difference between shamai and Hill in how we view the bride might be the difference in how we're supposed to View Jewish people sometimes we look at what we see and if we were living in the times of the Bas Mikes maybe we should follow shamai because the the site was quite beautiful Jews are engaged Jews are inspired Jews are going up for the pilgrimage and everybody's living in Israel together and it's really a beautiful time of Peace especially during the first time of the B the first Bas m in the times of King Salon but now that we're in Exile we adopt H's view because the follows H in it says to follow Hill's view in what's Hill's view you're incredible you're beautiful you do Mitzvah every Jew is full of Mitzvah what do you mean you also sin why do I have to look at that why would I look at that there's other things to look at there's there's there's incredible incredible beauty sometimes it's hidden but it's there it really is and it if we're going to look for it and expect it we are going to find it I I want to conclude with a story some of you heard me say this story a couple of nights ago but as you may know there was a big debate between Sigman Freud and Victor Frankl V Sigman Freud the father of psychology sorry Sigman Freud was the father of psychology Victor Frankl was the um was the father of logotherapy he was a psychotherapist he was a holocaust Survivor and he had a very different view than Freud Freud believed that people are inherently bad people are inherently selfish that is the motivation for people pleasure self-centeredness the ego life is about preserving that so you don't crash you don't you don't uh you know you got to preserve that that was the motivation behind people that this is what Freud believed Victor Franco believed that what motivated people was meaning that's what pushed people and if what what's actually going to trigger somebody to change is not their ego or not exclusively their ego but something more meaningful and eternal than that and the the Reit was a big proponent and supporter of of Victor Frankl to the point by the way that Victor Frankle was he fell into deep depression because he spent his whole life trying to teach these ideas and they were not taken he was not accepted at the beginning in the psych in the in the psych ologists Community he was not at all accepted they did not want to buy that it's bad for business because you could help people much quicker and then you can't charges no I'm just kidding um but but he was he was not accepted and and he fell into depression and um the re had encouraged him sent somebody to Vienna to actually encourage him and there's you can look this up on YouTube on Jewish educational media and and hear the whole story but my point in sharing this is there was the professor of the univers psych of Psychology from the University of Minnesota was a Jewish guy he came to visit the and he says I understand that you're a big supporter of Victor frankl's modality of focusing on what motivates people as their meaning in life um to me as a professor of psychology and of somebody who sees clients I don't know what to tell you I see people and they look nice on the outside but Freud kind of makes sense to me I see people's selfish motives I see people trying to preserve their ego and trying to preserve what's pleasurable to them I see it I just don't see how Victor Franco could be correct how people are motivated by meaning when I see that they're motivated by selfishness he says all I do is dig into people and I just see that that it's you know the RIT told him that you might have a beautiful city with beautiful architecture beautiful landscaping and if you were to dig up that City you're right you'd see dirt but if you don't stop digging you keep digging you keep trying deeper and deeper and deeper eventually you're going to see beauty you're going to see value you're going to hit Wellsprings of gushing water an invaluable resource don't stop digging this is what Hillel says Hill say says let's not go by what we see let's go by what is okay that's my story and I'm sticking to it