Why Were You Created? | Torat HaChassidut (23)

to everyone. We are back here on our Sunday night katanasidut the series about the foundation of and uh this uh lecture is certainly going to be uh one of the top ones in the series because it begins a miniseries uh that uh is very much relevant to every single person that's living on planet earth today. Uh tonight's show is going to be for the and all of and all the righteous Noah that continue to support the organization, continue to help us with our kals and all the other wonderful things that are happening. Uh there is a uh lots of stuff that's on the way uh very very close I would say probably within the next couple of weeks or less that we'll have added to the Kiru store. Of course, it's always a first come, first serve, but we ordered a bunch of different things that uh are certainly going to help uh Duke in the uh in the near future, both to Israel and uh the US. But you could still get the uh Ailia posters that are behind me. These boxes that uh you can get to distribute in your community. You could also get uh the USBs. uh Robert Fry's books. I believe we're out of my books, but there's a couple of them that are actually going to be in the store. Uh new ones that uh we've been waiting for for some time. Uh probably within the next week or two. Uh everything is in Hebrew, so make sure that you're giving it to people that speak Hebrew. Uh giving it to English speakers uh is not going to do anything for them. Uh so with uh with that being said, anyone that wants to support, wants to partner with us, be a sponsor of the lectures, uh or uh simply just donate to support, you could donate on our website, be bzadashem.org. If you want to uh order the uh stuff, the free supplies to distribute in your community, you can do that on the Kiru store, kirutore.org. And of course, the uh very beloved app that answers all questions regardless of whether uh it's a question about the Torah or it's a question about it's the question about uh life. Go to the AI Rabbi app and download it today. Uh you can get uh pretty much every answer with many sources that will give you some uh clarity on the things that are going on. Uh a rabbi.org or uh or you could just simply go to the app store on Google and on um YouTube and just uh type in AI rabbi. So with that being said, Abu Tai, we are back in this uh series and uh like I said, this is going to be a uh foundational lecture uh not just in the series but in general and the reason why is because as we titled it so far uh why were you created? Why were we created? This is a question that at some point in people's life, everyone asks why were they created? Sometimes they ask out of curiosity. Sometimes they ask out of desperation and destitute. Uh they're miserable and they're asking, crying uh and figuring out why they're even on this earth. Very sad situation that unfortunately uh we've uh encountered and have tried to help many people answer that question. But tonight, really of is uh his katan gives us a big answer and it's going to begin unraveling this answer alongside the clarifications of the ramal the kadosh and other talmudic sages from the obviously from the bavli uh and other places that will give us extraordinary clarification on this which will build up over the next couple of lectures because if you're serious about your purpose or you're curious about it simply or even if you're desperate for some answers, the Shir is for you. Pay attention to the details. Reflect at every moment, even if that means you have to watch it a few times because the answer could actually transform your life. Rabenu Kadosh Rabime of Leinsk in the section 16 of Tatil Katan says as follows. Human beings are created in this world only so that they might break their natural inclinations. Therefore, a person should strive to fix his personality traits when he is 18 years old as I will explain. For instance, a person who is naturally stubborn should break his trait by doing precisely the opposite of what comes into his mind to do for 40 consecutive days. Similarly, a person who is innately lazy should practice doing everything quickly for 40 days. Whether on the way to bed at night or getting out of bed in the morning, he should dress quickly, wash his hands, relieve himself, and immediately after studying from a go quickly to the synagogue to pray. Rabenu continues further but instead of wasting time we are actually only going to focus on the first two sentences which is why were we created and how a person has to fix his personality traits as we say in Hebrew midot why did this happen now if you ask the average person that's not learned in Torah that's not And certainly not someone that has read the why were they created. The average person is going to give you an answer that is subject to time and space. Meaning that their answer is going to be, oh, I was created to have a family, get married. What about all those people that don't get married? So you're telling me that so long as they don't get married, they don't have a purpose? Or they'll tell you, you know, to have fun, enjoy life? Well, I mean, does in fact, the vast majority of people spend more time suffering in life than having fun and enjoy. So are you saying that the vast majority of their life is purposeless? Oh, yeah. Well, you know, it's to have kids. Well, you know, there's a lot of good people that don't have kids. So, did God make a mistake there? Oh, you know, it's um leave a mark in the world, you know, leave a legacy. Well, you know that leaving a mark in the world or what you call a legacy usually is uh by very successful people, people that have built things, made things. And if even if you want to say it doesn't necessarily need to be the Elon Musks of the world, the uh billionaires of the world, still are you saying that if this mark that he made is unknown by the majority of the world's population, then technically it's purposeless or it has any less purpose than if it was known by more. You see, when you don't know what your purpose is, then you will define it by the things that you're aware of, by the things that you spend time doing, by the things that you're most interested in, the things that you aspire to. But the reality is the purpose of a person could only be given by the one who is who created him or her. And therefore the the uh katan tells us right off the bat what is the purpose? The purpose has nothing to do with material. Has nothing to do with time and space. Has nothing to do with how much money you have, where you live, how big your house is. Rather, it has to do with your personality. In fact, the flaws in each and every one of our personalities because we were created in order to break our natural inclinations to fix our midot. It doesn't get any clearer than that. But of course, we have to break it down to understand what he's saying, why he's saying it before we go into the actual advice of how to do it, which we'll do in our next lectures. Now, many times people that are unfamiliar with the Talmud, especially if they're anti-Semitic and they're simply looking for a pretext, an excuse to hate Jews, they'll take different parts of the Talmud or the Torah and misinterpret things, exaggerate things, take things in such a convoluted way that they literally try to turn Jews into monsters. But the truth is that even if a person is not anti-Semitic, they're just simply unlearned, some of the rules in a Torah seem like why are they there if a person doesn't know the purpose of them? For example, slavery. Slavery has been something that was acceptable in society throughout 95% of history. It's only in recent years that slavery became unacceptable. Of course, slavery in the Torah is very different than the slavery that they had in America and in other foreign lands, but slavery in the Torah certainly is acceptable and not something that we do today. But nonetheless, why do we still learn about it today? Why is it still verses and that describe it? Because there are many other things that we learn from it. And I'll give you an example. The Mishna in chapter 4, Mishna number five, this actually you will also find says what happens if a slave is owned by two Jews and one of the Jews frees the slave while the other Jew doesn't free him. So he's half free and half slave. Mishna says in the case of one who is half slave and half free man because only one of his two owners emancipated him, he serves his master one day and serves himself another day. This was the statement of Beiel. Betai disagrees. He says through such an arrangement you have remedied his master as his master loses nothing through this. Meaning he still works for his master that still owns him. However, you have not remedied the slave himself as the slave himself remains unsustain in an unsustainable situation. Why? Why is it unsustainable situation? I mean he has one day he works one day's off sort of like part-time worker. No says Betai. You see it's not possible for this slave to marry a maidervant another gentile because he's half a free man and therefore he's prohibited for him to marry a maidervant. On the other hand, it's also not possible for him to marry a free woman, a Jew. Why? Because he's still half slave. Because what ends up happening when you freed him, he automatically converts to Judaism and keeps the laws. Right now, as a as a slave, he keeps the laws similar to a woman, but as a man that is freed, he keeps it like a natural-born Jew. So, he can't marry as a slave. He was a complete slave owned by two different Jews. He was able to to marry another non-Jewish woman, another Canaanite woman, and uh have a family and do what he wants to do. And while he's still a slave, he can't marry a Jew cuz he's a slave and he's also not Jewish. On the other hand, if he's free completely, he's now a Jew and now he can marry a Jew. But if he's half and half, he can't do either. He can't marry a maid servant and he can't marry a Jew. Now if he should say listen why do we care you should just not marry says but we learned isn't it true that the world was created only for procreation as it says prophet Isaiah 45:18 he did not meaning mashem did not create it to be a waste he formed it to be inhabited rather for the betterment of the world. His master is forced to make him a free man. In so many words, our Torah tells us who created the world in order for people to have families, to get married, to have children, not for them to just roam around and do nothing, stay single until they're 45, and then ask for a shiduk as if he's going to find or she's going to find anybody when they finally woke up and they realized they can't stay the rest of their life alone. No. No. He said this slave if he stays a slave he can't marry anyone. That's not that's that's against the nature of the world of how Hashem created it. You have to free him. The other guy has to free him. And therefore, because it's for the betterment of the world, we have to force his master that still owns him to free him also. And the slave can write a promisary note accepting his responsibility to pay half of his value to his master over time when he has it. And Betile ultimately retracted his opinion to rule in accordance with the statement of Bet Shamay that the halfslave must be set free. So here we see the bai that yes although we do not have slaves today certainly we can learn something extremely valuable about the purpose of life to have families to build a family wife kids husband kids you know depending on who you are but at the same token we just said moments ago that the purpose of life is not to have a family and kids. So what's the contradiction? It's not a contradiction. Hashem created the world in order for us to serve him by doing his will. Part of his will is for us to better the world and bring more children to the world. have normal honest relationships and make sure that we have do we are doing everything we possibly can to serve him and have our family serve him in the best possible way. Now, one thing that gets in the way though is that people have desires not to do this. Instead of getting married to one woman and having children with her and building a nice family, many young people are immoral. They don't want to get married. They want to have a different woman every week. She wants to have a different husband every week. whether it's the nightclubs or the beaches or the friends and unfortunately mistreat each other and torment each other and then they're surprised that they live a full life full of heartbroken misery. Now why has this happened? If Hashem wants us and Hashem in essence created us to bring children to the world and develop families, why is it that people have this inclination to do the opposite? You see, this is the secret behind why people have lust for immorality. Because since Hashem instilled this into a person in order for a person to want to do his will, to want to fulfill Hashem's will and actually have a family, this very same nature that's instilled strongly into each and every single person is actually the reason why the the powers of impurity try to do everything possible to cleave on to a person and convince him or her to do the exact opposite because the greater the power of the will of Hashem, the more the powers of impurity want to attach themselves to that person. In so many words, this life source is for man is either going to bring in more kaduca or become a breeding ground for tuma for impurity. So on one end we see that the katana is telling us that we were created to break our natural inclinations. And the Mishna in is telling us yes one of the things that a person has to break is this particular battle against their lust against their desires to do the opposite of what Hashem wants. Now the will help us clarify things and who by the way lived at around the same time as begins his famous path of the just in the first chapter. The go says was certainly written with this is not a normal and the begins chapter one titled man's duty in this world what is the purpose of a person and he says the bedrock of so he's talking also just like the bedrock of and the root of flawless divine service lies in man's effort to clarify and verify what his duty is in his world. In so many words, he begins by telling us the foundation of whatut is and the root of serving in a flawless way is the answer to this question of what is your duty in this world. He must determine what he is aiming for and how to achieve this in all his labors throughout his lifetime. In so many words, the tells us if a person must he has to spend his entire life trying to figure out this answer. But no worries, you don't need to spend your entire life trying to figure out this answer because the gives us the answer which is actually a continuation of what and he says our sages of blessed memory have instructed us that man was created for the sole purpose of reveling in the eternal and delighting in the splendor of the divine presence. This being the ultimate joy and the greatest of all pleasures in existence and the true place for this pleasure is in the world to come which was created with this purpose in mind. In so many words, the ultimate purpose says fix the character traits says is to enjoy and delight your connection to as this is the ultimate place you can get to. However, the path that helps us reach our desired objective says the in this world as the sages of blessed memory have said in the world resembles to a corridor before the world to come. This means that lead men to this goal are the mitzvot that the eternal may his name be blessed commanded us to observe the place for doing the mitzvot is in his world. And therefore a man must first place was first placed in this world. And through these means provided for him here, he will be able to reach a destination that has been prepared for him, the world to come, where he will fill himself with the goodness that he has acquired through these means. As our sages of blessed memory have said in page 22a, you do them today and receive their reward for tomorrow. Now here he's telling us a little more clarification in order to get to that ultimate place of enjoying your connection to enjoying being his servant delighting in this the splendor of the divine presence. Hashem gave us the mitzvot of the Torah to fulfill. But the problem is that the mitzvot in and of themselves if let's say for example somebody eats a kosher chicken versus not kosher chicken that in itself is not going to change their character traits. If a person sleeps all of Shabbat and therefore he doesn't violate it, that in itself is not going to make him a better husband, a better son, a better teacher, a better student. And therefore the spends the rest of the detailing all of the character trait developments that a person must do in order to perfect themselves. Utilizing the mitzvot to perfect yourself. Meaning the mitzvot in and of themselves must be performed. But the ultimate purpose of the mitzvot is to perfect your character traits. In essence, reach the goal of what said, which is breaking the natural inclinations. Now many times people that are unfamiliar with truth, needless to say they're not familiar with our shim. see a clip or one of the films and if they're not looking for the truth or if they even at a point of impurity where they repel the truth they ask why so scary why is why are you teaching such scary things such as punishment such as gay such as uh not that every sh is about that but nonetheless certainly me mentioned regularly why why scare people why not tell them that God loves them no matter what and uh everyone is good. They're all trying their best. Well, the simple answer is that's because it's not true. Not everyone is great. Not everyone is perfect. And certainly, as the Rambam says, before a person does Chuva and starts observing the Torah, he was hated and disgusting in the eyes of Hashem. He was an enemy of God. But after he does chuva, after she does chuva, he's beloved. He's his friend. is uh uh you know he he loves him. Meaning that Hashem does not treat everyone the same way. But then people will say, "Yeah, but um somebody told me that I should serve God out of love and not out of fear." Well, who's better to answer that than our sages? Should we serve Hashem out of love, out of fear, out of both? We go to another siege. They lived around the same time as the and as commentary on the Torah is legendary. Certainly something that is not for everyone because it has a lot of cababalistic teachings in it as well. some elevated things. But certainly if a person has studied Rashi commentary on the entire Torah and then on the entire Torah multiple times and studied and so on, at some point they could delve into the as well. It's certainly not for beginners. You're just wasting your time. But here we're going to talk about something that says that should be understood by everyone whether expert or new. Inan clarifies whether one should serve Hashem out of fear or out of love. What's the meaning? What's the difference? And he says as follows. based on the fact that there are two levels of serving Hashem. One is service out of fear. This level of service is incumbent upon all humanity. For we are all servants of Hashem. And every servant fears his master. In so many words, if you're alive, then you must serve God out of fear. Why? If he's your master, you must fear him. Every servant fears his God. Fears his master. There's no such thing as serving your master just out of love. Doesn't exist. As the Torah says, the prophet Malachi chapter 1 verse number six, Hashem says, "If I am a master, where is my fear?" Says Hashem, which clearly states that he is a master who is entitled to be feared by his servants. This is also the meaning of the Torah statement in the book of Deuteronomy chapter 12 chapter 10:12. Now, oh Israel, what does Hashem your God ask of you? Only to fear Hashem your God. Clearly, fear of Hashem is a basic minimal requirement, says. The second level of serving Hashem is serving out of love, which is a great and awesome mitzvah. However, although serving Hashem out of love is a mitzvah, it's not something that is automatically incumbent upon every human being simply because the person is a servant of Hashem. For a servant does not have love for his master, does not have to love his master. It's enough that he does not dislike his master and serve him as required. That is only that is the only thing a servant is obligated to do for his master to fear him and in return his master is obligated to feed and sustain him in accordance with the master's means. The basic obligation stemming from servitude are that the servant shall fear and obey his master and that the master shall provide him with his minimal living needs. The servant is not obligated to love his master and the master is not obligated to reward his servant. Performing Hashem's service out of love is a level beyond that of a regular servant. Now in regards to the basic obligation incumbent upon every person simply because he's a servant of Hashem, the previous verse says Hashem commanded us to perform all of these decrees to fear Hashem our God. And it concludes by saying to bestow good upon us all the days to keep us alive as this very day. This means says the that Hashem's commands to us are based on our obligation to fear him in a matter that the servant is obligated to obey his king because he fears the king. And in return, it is also incumbent upon Hashem to bestow good upon us in accordance with the means of of the king and to provide us with sustenance and support which is what the verse means when it says to keep us alive. Since the master is obligated to sustain his servant. And the verse concludes by saying as this very day. Which means that Hashem will continue to sustain the Jewish people in the same manner that he does this very day. meaning in the wilderness, the time that this was written, where he sustained and supported the Jewish people by bringing the mana bread down for them from heaven and providing them with water and by clothing them properly as the sages of blessed memory in the uh midrasha chapter 7 section 11 says that while the Jewish people were in the wilderness, their clothing would grow with them like the shell of a snail which grows along with the snail and the cloud clouds of glory would launder and press the garments that they wore. So up to here. So far we understand that fear of Hashem is not only good. It is absolute necessity. One who does not fear Hashem, does not fear his master is therefore incapable of serving him. And to say that you love him but don't fear him as the himself says it's impossible. Why? Because if he's your master, how could you not fear him? Furthermore, says the with regards to serving Hashem out of love, the Torah then says in our verse that this is not part of the automatic obligation of a servant towards his master. Rather, such service is viewed as described by our verse, and it will be a credit for us if we will be vigilant to perform his entire commandment before Hashem, our God. with this phrase, if we will be vigilant before Hashem. The verse spells out the essence of love for Hashem. In line with which our sages of blessed memory said in the first and the quote is love of Hashem is the longing of the soul and it's leaning towards the creator. Meaning this love is the clinging of the soul before the pleasant light which is the light of Hashem our God. And our verse refers to this with the phrase if we will be vigilant to perform before Hashem our God. So when the verse says as he commanded us, it means that we will carry out our service of Hashem without any ulterior motive rather solely out of the desire to perform Hashem's command in line with which is stated in by David in Psalm 40 verse9 to fulfill your will my God do I desire for this being motivated purely by the desire to perform Hashem's will is the way to perform a mitzvah with complete love. So here the says what we've been saying for years quoted him and other sages loving of Hashem is not relevant to the vast majority of people because the vast majority of people serve Hashem and do the mitzvot simply because they don't want to lose. They don't want to lose money. They don't want to lose health. They don't want to die. They don't want bad things to happen to them. Sometimes they'll do things because they like it, but usually it's not everything. They're not not going to cheat on their wife or not commit some type of immorality or not not steal money because they love God. Usually it's because they fear that bad things will happen as a result of these things. So fear is an absolute necessity. It's part of the foundation. But if a person can elevate themselves through the mitzvot, through the servitude of through their fixing their flaws from within, they can elevate themselves to a point where they love serving Hashem so much they look for ways to serve him. They look for more ways to do mitzvot. They do the mitzvot with such love and passion that this is what they feel, this is what they see, this is what they want. They eliminate their inner inclinations and replace them with what they now want to do to serve Hashem. In so many words, loving Hashem as another one of the sages that lived around the same time uh of breast says loving Hashem purely serving Hashem out of pure love is not relevant to the vast majority of righteous people even in his generation. He says he says he wishes that people would just you know the the people would serve out of out of fear. That would already be more than enough. Now, this is not to say that some of the mitzvot may not be your favorite and you love Hashem and you love doing that mitzvot and therefore this is not a mitzvah that's not out of love. It could be that you have one or two or three that you do purely out of love of Hashem. But to serve Hashem completely out of love at all times, this is this is great sages that eliminate their own lusts, their own inclinations, their own desires. But just in case somebody wants to get there, says through this matter of serving Hashem out of love, person becomes justified to look forward to and may hope for reward even by right since he has gone beyond the basic duty of a servant to obey his master out of fear and is performing Hashem's service out of love. Hashem can likewise be expected to go beyond his basic duty as a master to sustain his servant and will actually give him a sublime reward. So if a person gets to a level of loving Hashem, serving Hashem out of love, they could literally expect a reward because they're going above and beyond. Now before a person starts thinking that they could just start loving Hashem automatically tomorrow clarifies says now although in truth we should be the one paying our God blessed is he for allowing us the experience of the pleasure and delightful sweetness of feeling love for him in our hearts which is infinitely sweet and pleasant. Nonetheless, a person deserves to receive reward for exerting himself until he is able to experience the sweetness of this spiritual life. In so many words, the's point is that the reward is justified when a person serves Hashem out of love since he has gone beyond the most basic requirement of mankind and has taken the initiative of serving Hashem on a higher level. While serving Hashem out of fear entitles a person only to life and sustenance, not the extra reward that's uh that's in the world to come. But if a person really gets to a point of even wanting to understand what it means to love Hashem, really if a person had that feeling for even a moment, they'd realize that just the feeling of loving Hashem in itself is such a great reward that we should already if we could we should pay Hashem for it. Meaning obviously he doesn't need anything from us. But the point is is that the pleasure of loving and serving him out of absolute love is so exponentially higher than anything we can imagine. If we could reward him for it and not ask for anything else, that would already be more than enough. Meaning that a person that serves Hashem out of love is not looking for a reward because that in itself is the reward. Even though he will get rewarded. If you want to know more about how that is in practical life, simply read about David. Read about David and how through all the trials, tribulations and miserable experiences that he had nonstop, he cried to Akadosh out of absolute love and dedication. Now to get to a point of serving Hashem whether it's out of love or out of fear person obviously has to desire it. Desire serving Hashem. Now in order for a person to serve Hashem properly. It means that you cannot do the mitzvot like a robot cannot do things just because you have to. You have to put extra effort whenever possible in order to connect to the mitzvah, in order to connect to its purpose. And the more you do, the more you actually start doing the mitzvah properly, the more you actually desire the mitzvah. But even more so, the more you are forced to break your natural inclination, the more you increase your kaduca naturally that will decrease your animal instincts, your lusts. Isant famously said that it's harder for a person to break one natural inclination one mida than it is to finish the entire sh the adm of kosk was once told that there was a bah that completed learning the entire talmud bi very big achievement. And they asked the Ravmo, what does the Rav think of Ruven finishing the uh Tammud Bley? He says it's good that he finished learning the Talmud Bley, but what did the Tomud Bley teach him? Meaning, how did he change as a result of learning it? Did he just read it like a bookworm and stay exactly the same person or did he apply the teachings to his life and therefore became a better person as a result? Now when a person wants to develop themselves and better themselves, it's not only going to benefit you as it's going to make you a better servant of Hashem and therefore more reward, but it's also going to make you a better person, a better husband, a better wife, a better son, a better daughter, a better boss, a better businessman, a better leader, a a better follower, a more loyal person because the root of all sins says the is bad character traits bad are the reason why a person violates Hashem's will. When he has too much greed, he's going to allow himself to steal, to take what doesn't belong to him, to lie about his job where he tells his client that he's doing the work even though he's not. He tells his client that he's going to finish the job in two weeks so he can get paid now even though he knows he's not going to finish it for another two months. He's going to go into a predatory business like cash advance. He's going to do all types of things because he has greed. That bad character trait leads him to be dishonest when it comes to money. Now, he may be a good husband that says cares about his wife and spends times with his kids, but his greed could corrupt him elsewhere. And eventually that corruption will manifest itself in other places. If a person has hunger for things that don't belong to him, every sin under the sun is within his reach. Maybe not on day one, but given enough time without control, everything will be in the beginning. That greed, that sense of everyone owes me, that entitlement that is so common today in the beginning may allow him to justify stealing other people's money, corrupting, doing things that are corrupt, cheating people, thinking he is uh it's okay to steal from the rich because he is poor. But later on he'll also justify adultery because he wants more than just one wife at least for today. He'll also allow himself to take what doesn't belong to him. Even if that means killing his parents. There are stories that parents that taught their kids that money is everything in life. Their kids grew up and desired money so much they literally killed the parents so they could take their money. So when a person has bad character traits, the longer they are out of control, the more corrupt that person will become. And you see this magnified in the world of celebrities in the so-called powerful people. If you look into their personal lives, they're the most corrupt people known to man. Why? Because there's literally no sensors, no limitations, completely everything is up for grabs. And therefore, they literally do everything. When you find out about their personal lives, literally if you don't vomit, there's something wrong with you. You may be one of them. Now says that if a person wants to break a lust, break a bad character trait where they're jealous of other people or they want more than what they deserve or they feel like they need everything or all types of things. He says, "You can't break a lust because if you break it, you'll have two lusts." In order for you to remove this natural inclination that you were born with, you desire more than what you have, that you're not happy with what you have, you have to uproot it from the source. For example, if somebody had a thorn bush, if they didn't like the thorns, every time they walked by them, a few of those will hurt them. And if they decide to just cut the horns from the top, what they'll end up having is even more horns, more more thorns. Why? Because they cut them from the top, but now the seeds are spreading in more places. And now certain parts are now renewed and more thorns are going to grow. If a person wants to remove that thorn bush, he has to remove it carefully from the root. My kids, God bless them, I learned so much from them just simply by watching their life. We have uh as it's common here in Florida, a um these huge trees, coconut trees, and uh we're not exactly big eaters of coconuts, especially since you need to know how to open them and so on, but so they fall they fall off the tree and uh we don't always pick them up and they stay on the around. My kids took one of these coconuts that fell and, you know, stayed outside for a while, opened up, and they decided to plant it. Decided to plant it. See what's going to happen. Well, guess what happened now? We have another coconut tree growing from that coconut that looked like it died, that looked like some since nobody ate it, nobody did anything with it, it withered from the sun. Well, guess what? There was still enough life in this coconut that now there's a whole new tree that's growing in my backyard from that coconut. Hopefully, they don't do with too many coconuts because then we're not going to have enough room for the house. But it's a beautiful thing. I was amazed by seeing it. Look, this little coconut that you think nothing of. I saw a bunch of coconuts all over the place. We don't think much of of them until somebody picks them up and throws them out or eats them or whatever it is. But this one, no, no, we're going to plant this one. And look, we have a whole new coconut tree growing. And this guy looks pretty strong. This guy looks like he's going to bring some coconuts. Same concept. When a person just nips at their character traits saying, "Okay, so if he's angry person, okay, I want I won't yell at people in public anymore. I won't uh, you know, steal. I won't. Yeah, it's good that you're trying to work on it, but if you don't uproot that bad character trait completely, it may end up getting even worse where when you do yell at someone and express anger, it's expressed in much worse ways than it was before. If you do steal, you're not going to steal a little. You're going to steal a whole lot. If you do cheat, you're not going to cheat a little. You're going to cheat a lot. Meaning that as to remove these natural inclinations, it's not a matter of, oh, I'm not going to do it as often anymore. A person has to know that if you truly want to uproot these bad character traits, you have to eliminate them all together. Eliminate anger, eliminate greed, eliminate jealousy, eliminate uh stinginess, eliminate completely, which is a big job. A big job that takes a lot of work, a lot of effort, a lot of dedication, but it's possible. Now to answer the people that ask, "Well, why do you make scary films or scary lectures?" The balm mus famously said, multiple of them said that if Hashem would have put gay in the streets and all the lusts and sins in the book, we would all be righteous because we could live up to that. If we see gay everywhere and the bad desires and the things that are forbidden are only in books, then okay, we won't do those desires because we're seeing what happens to people that uh do them. But what can we do that we live in a world where the lusts and the sins are all over the streets and the teachings of gay are only in the books. This is the reason why it is extraordinarily big mitzvah that we've taken upon ourselves to take the teachings of fear of hem of gay of different things that people most of the time are not going to get to learn at all and even if they do learn it they don't have enough sense in themselves to apply that to their life properly. So when you take just a little bit of it and help people visualize it, visualize the fear, visualize the consequence, it certainly could help people realize why it's not worth it to go against Hashem, why it's not worth it to be that greedy person, to be that thief, to be that adulterer, to be that immoral person, to be that idol worshipper. It's not worth it. Why? because you gave them an illustration of what's written in the books. This is also the reason why the Rambam in his sephit all 613 mitzvot the fourth mitzvah that the Rambam writes fourth positive commandment is that a person is commanded to believe in the awe inspiring nature of the exalted one and to fear him. This includes, says the Rambam, not like the heretics who do as they wish without regard for consequences of their actions, but rather to fear the blessed one's punishments at any moment. This is what the exalted God said in the Torah, "Fear the Lord your God." Here the Rambam clarifies it is a positive commandment to fear Hashem's punishment. Why do we need to fear Hashem's punishment? Because the way that we were created was in such a way that Hashem instilled into us a desire to fulfill his will by producing families. But since that desire is there to better the world, the forces of impurity cling on to the person's desire and tell, listen, you could build a family, but not now. Go make a bunch of sins first. Get 15 girlfriends, 50 girlfriends, 50 boyfriends, 50 this, 50 that. Do it late. Do the good stuff later. Go make sins now. So in essence that fear of punishment of what happens to you as a result of wasting seed, as a result of immorality, as a result of going against Hashem in any way possible, that fear is going to stop you from falling into the trap of the Satan. And this is also the reason why says this purpose of being created to for it to be fulfilled to break that natural inclination that natural desire that is bad for you to put everything under control has to already begin being fixed when a person is 18 years old. Why 18 years old? Because the says at 18 years old, it's time to get married. So, he's in essence hinting us what the sages already said nearly 2,000 years before him. At 18 already, you should be thinking, okay, let's let's find a kala. Let's let's get married. Because if a person whether he's 18 or he's 28, if you're planning on getting married without planning and already working on fixing your character flaws, on fixing your midot, then no love will ever be enough and no amount of money would ever be enough and no material will ever be enough to actually make that marriage a happy marriage. Because the reason why people have miserable marriages, which often end, and if they don't end, they just simply live in misery with each other, is because of bad character traits. He's careless. She's selfish. Uh he's uh greedy. She's uh has uh desires that are abnormal. Uh you know, all types of things, bad character traits. person is not sensitive to their spouse. Even if he buys her a present every day, if he's not sensitive to her, if he doesn't pay attention to her, if he doesn't have patience for her, guess what? She's going to be miserable. Even if he learns Torah and he's good with his and he learns and he yells, he's passionate about his learning, if he uses that same yelling and passion on his wife, it's not going to work. Why? You could yell with your kava when you're learning because we're learning with passionately. But if you're yelling at your wife, if you're yelling at your husband, it's not going to work so good. And many times people, especially today, they get divorced thinking that the next relationship is going to be better. They don't realize that if they don't fix their bad character traits, no relationship is going to be a happy relationship. Because the root of the problem was not the person. The root of the problem was not the gender. The root of the problem was not the time. The root of the problem was not the religion. The root of the problem was bad character traits that simply were allowed to go out of control without any desire whatsoever to fix it. He figures, I was born angry, I'm going to stay angry. I was born uh jealous, I'm going to stay jealous. I was born stingy, I'll stay stingy. accept me as I am. Don't try to change me. No, she shouldn't try to change you and you shouldn't try to change her. You should try to change yourself. She should try to change herself. Why? It's better for yourself as well as better for others. A person that is simply self-conscious about everything will always be concerned about anything that happens to them that's good and eliminate any joy. Why? Because they're self-conscious. So they don't understand why there's any good. And if there's any bad, they'll accept it without even fighting for good. Naturally, forcing themselves to stay miserable. Anxiety causes a person to literally make themselves sick. Why? Because they cannot enjoy good and they simply accept the bad. On the other hand, a person that is greedy, nothing will ever be enough for them. So therefore, they're always going to be miserable because no matter what they have, it'll never be enough. These character flaws are absolute necessities to be uprooted. That it's absolutely necessary to uproot them. But when a person doesn't even understand that they need to uproot them, then guess what? They're putting themselves in a situation where no matter what they have in life, they'll be miserable for with it at some point or another. Whether it's marriage, job, business, financial situation, whatever it is, this is why we view that theat meaning fixing our midot as the absolute foundation of serving a because while we're doing mitzvot, it's a start. A person that does not fix their midot is not really different than a cow that doesn't drive on Shabbat. Cow doesn't drive at Shabbat. It also doesn't drive during the week. If it does, send them to the circus. But if a person does meet, but they're still greedy, they're still stingy, they're still a jealous person, they're still arrogant person, they still have these bad character traits with no hope in sight of them ever fixing them. They don't even think they need to fix them. Then they're just something that is serving Hashem less than a cow. In fact say even if a person knows a lot of Torah but they have bad character traits a dead animal in the middle of the street is better than them because at least a dead animal served its creator again shalom said the story where one time he got on the bus and uh at the same time he got on the bus this non-religious Jewish woman and her young son got on the bus also. And she told our son, "Run, run, run, get that seat. There's only one seat left." And the little kid ran pastime again to quickly get the seat and sat down. Of course, was older, respectable person. The people on the bus, both religious and non-religious, were upset at this. Hey lady, what are you doing? Your son just ran through the rabbi and uh just took the seat. Have some respect. She wouldn't hear of it. No, he got there first. I'll be again told the people, "It's okay. It's okay. Don't worry. She is raising him in such a way to bean to be tan to lustful. She's raising him in such a way that he is going to be our punishment. He is going to be our biggest source of suffering in the world because now she's telling him to go take to go disrespect. Guess what? over time he'll do even more to her. And where do we learn this from? From a Torah. The prophet Jeremiah chapter 2 verse number 19 tells us in the name of your evil shall castigate you. Your waywardness shall chasten you. You realize and understand that your forsaking of Hashem your God is evil and bitter and that my awe was not upon you. The word of my Lord Hashem, master of legions. The prophet is telling us clearly, your evil is what's going to cause you suffering. Your wewardness is what's going to cause you punishment. Even before a person gets the gum, even before all the horrible things that we said and showed in the film, even before that, telling kids that money is everything, telling kids that they could do whatever they want is raising little Hitlers. That's what Rav Galinsky would say often because while in the they're five and seven and 10, they're cute when they do whatever they do, but if you raise them that way, they're going to continue doing it in a much bigger way when they're 15 and 20 and 25. And this is why when someone reached out to me some time ago for help. So what's the problem? Said that there's a big fight in their family. What's the fight? The parents very welloff, have a lot of money and gave their kids everything. millions and millions of dollars. And the kids now have these businesses, have these cars, jewelry, houses, all types of things. No one's lacking anything. But now the parents are now at older age. One is practically bedwritten. The other one is still functional and everything is and uh the parents have a very big dilemma. What's the big dilemma that the kids have decided that the millions of dollars that the parents gave them is not enough. Why is it not enough? Why is millions of dollars not enough? Because the parents that are older now in their 70s and 80s still have millions of dollars. What do they need these millions of dollars? Give that to us, too. We're still young. We're in our 30s and 40s and 20s. We want those other millions of dollars. What do you need them for? So when the parent did not said, "What do you mean? I'm still alive. It's my money. I don't want to give it. I gave you enough. You have everything you need. I want my money. As long as I'm alive after I die, Allah, leave it in the will." No. But if you if we wait until you die, maybe you're going to give it to not me, to my other sibling or or to something else or you'll donate it or you'll do this. No, no, give it to me now. And a whole brawl started to the point where the kids took control of the parents bank accounts money in the safe, literally trying to empty them out. And now they're in legal battles with each other. The parent is fighting to get the money back. The kids are fighting as if it's their money. They're lying to the court saying, "No, no, this is really ours. It's really our money." The parents took from us. So they reached out to me and said, "What do you suggest?" I said, "There's nothing that could be done at this point because the parents raised the kids without Hashem. They didn't follow mitzvot. They didn't keep Shabbat. They don't respect rabbis. They respect money. Money is their god. Both parents and kids alike. So to go and tell the kids, listen, you should listen to this rabbi's suggestions is a joke. They're not going to listen to a rabbi. So what do you know? You go stick, you know, go go stick to your books. This is our money. Don't get yourself involved. They're not going to listen to any rabbi. And if you tell the parents something, parents are going to say, "Listen, Rabbi, this is a family issue. You don't understand. It's too late. You've already raised the monster. This is the outcome. You thought that by giving them everything, you are making them more loyal to you. You're realizing that all of your life you worked really hard to get to the level of success where you could retire in comfort is showing you that was all a lie all along and now you get to see it. You're not going to retire in comfort. In fact, the worst time of your life is going to be that retirement because you're gonna spend it in lawsuits against those same kids that you taught to go against Hashem, that you taught that there's a different God called money instead of Hashem. And this, if this was a single story, then I would say, "Oh, maybe I shouldn't say it." But unfortunately, this story is a repeated story. It's multiple cases. It's multiple people and it repeats itself every so often. Another family comes with the same exact story of the kids suing the parents in some cases the kids trying to kill the parents in other kids in other cases the the parents trying to kill the kids. I mean this story just continues. It's like a repeat but from different locations around the world whether it's the UK or the US or it's Israel or where literally it's a repeated nightmare story that comes to our table and there's nothing you can do. Why? It's too late. The monster is fully grown. The monster is fully grown. And that's why the stipler the stipler goon when a young couple came to him he doesn't see women but the husband came and the woman was waiting on the women's section and said we want some uh blessing and uh guidance how to uh you know for our kid. He says, "When was the kid born?" He says, "Just born last week." He says, "You're 20 years late." What do you mean? The kid was just born. Says, "Yes, but you had to work on yourself already for the last 20 years. In order for you to know how to raise a kid properly, because in order for you to know how to raise a kid properly, you have to you have to act properly. You have to fix your character traits. your wife has to fix her character traits. Now, of course, it's never too late. A person could always start. That's the point of giving this shim. But the point is when a person sees that they have a lot of problems in their life, in their relationships, especially, you can't just point fingers at everybody else. The first finger that a person has to point on is themsel. What can I fix about myself? Certainly, there's problems with other people. Some people are this, some people are that. There's no shortage of bad character traits surrounding each and every one of us. But there are some within us as well. You can't just point at everybody else. And you can't expect everybody to fix themselves. But you certainly can force yourself to fix something about yourself. Pick something and start fixing it. The concern for others well-being was shown by in ways that most people don't realize. The stipon is the image that I've always had of him was that he was a giant stern cold as ice until you learn about his life. While he was all of that in the world of Torah, but when it came to people, when it came to family, when it came to people asking for things, needing help, his sensitivity, his sensitivity to other people's emotions and well-being, literally broke all boundaries. Even though he grew up as an orphan, which gave him every excuse in the world, to not fix anything about himself, he made sure to work on himself to the point where no one would ever feel the pain he felt. So when his son-in-law died, leaving his daughter with kids without a husband, he took those kids in and became a father to them. This is one of already in his later years became a father to all of those kids, 10 kids, taking them to school even though it was hard for him to walk, checking their homework, having a uh meals for them, literally babysitting each one of them. when he would give when he would have the family over and he gave candy to the kids, he also gave candy to their parents under the table. Maybe they're embarrassed to get it like the kids over the table, but he gave them candy under the table because he knew that when they were kids, they liked candy, too. His sensitivity to the emotions of everyone that was around him was beyond beyond comprehension. Now, while everyone knows about him, his great Torah scholarship, his extraordinary, which we've quoted several times and over the years in our shim, the one thing that many people don't know is how he served Hashem to pure perfection by perfecting his own character traits. The great Torah giants don't become Torah giants because they read a lot of books only. They become giants first and foremost with their character traits using the mitzvot, using the Torah, using the instruction of both the written and the oral Torah to perfect themsel. Whether it's through keeping Shabbat or giving taka, whether it's not lying or not stealing, every mitzvah that a person has, if they truly want to perfect that mitzvah, they'll be able to use that mitzvah to also perfect themsel. And this is why of says, "Hashem created us in this world so that we break our natural inclinations." Because by breaking our natural inclinations, we will be able to do the mitzvot to perfection and even get to a level where it's not only out of fear, but also out of love, too. But even if a person is not even close remotely close to loving Hashem or is by fixing our character traits, we'll be able to serve Hashem like the servants that we are that fear their master. And that is already more than good enough especially if you compare that to what the alternative is. This is where we stand in the first segment of this section to first and foremost understand the absolute need to fix our character traits. Next week will continue this particular section by taking each one of the advice and strategies that gives us of how to do it step by step, line by line to have more tools. But until we have pure desire to actually fix oursself, no strategy in the world will work. So we need to review this, delve over it, meditate over it, and develop within ourselves a desire to be better. a desire to remove bad character traits. Perhaps even make a list of the different character traits that we know that are not good within ourselves and pick one. Pick one we want to work on. Don't try to fix everything at once because one is already more than enough. Pick one and next week everything that we talk about apply it to that one. But first, before you pick one, develop the desire to fix it. Next week, step two. Thank you very much for learning with me. Bless each and every one of us to succeed in serving at Kadu to the absolute maximum of our abilities, to fix our character traits, and to be able to fear him and even love him. Anyone that wants to support can donate on theem website bzashem.org or on the app. You could also do yourself a big favor in also to your family. Get yourself the app AI rabbi. You'll be able to give you tons of answers. It'll help you. It'll be a study guide for you. We'll be able to give you stories, give you answers. Literally everything that you want, you'll have at your fingertips uh in the world of Torah that you take with you. Take with you at all times. If you have a question, instead of waiting until you see the rabbi and still waiting until the rabbi answers, you have it literally in your pocket, which is really a big blessing that we had the merit to bring to the world. And there's a new upgrade coming out for it very soon, which will make it even better than what it's already at uh right now. Thank you very much for learning with me and we will learn again soon. Cou, I'd like to introduce you to your new best friend. We did it. AI Rabbi is here. It's an AI model that is based on kosher Torah sources, 30 different languages that are available to you. So if you want to ask it in Spanish, in Chinese, Portuguese, whatever you want to do, it's available for you. Can you tell me about timestamped to the shield? You press this green button. Hey, Rabbi on your WhatsApp. You'll have the ability to ask questions at will. You'll be providing sources and most importantly, you'll be able to know the truth and be able to rely on sources.