The Broken Matzah

i'll never forget that pesach it was the first night of pesach after my riv the rebel would distribute matzah to around 10 or 15 people one of the people who would receive matzah was my father allah so when i was a child i used to go with him because you know it was a unique opportunity so i was standing there i went in front of my father behind my father it came my turn there were a few children there and he would always give them a piece of a matzah that everyone had a box by his room there were always broken pieces and he would give it that there was a child it came my turn and the rebel was standing and he looked on his side by the box of matada was open and i was looking there and there was a whole matzah so they never picked up to look under another whole matzah he looks for the third fourth fifth sixth and the rubber standing and lifting up matzah after matzah and he thinks for sure there's going to be a tucked under a broken piece no they were all hallmarks i don't know how that happened that ever got to the end of the whole pound of matzo all the way to the last one there were no broken monsters now i'm thinking to myself you could give me a whole mats nothing is going to happen you don't tell i won't tell i was a little kid you know we'll keep it in the family don't worry i won't tell anybody i'll hide it i'll hide it with my father's matsus i'll never forget this never took both of his holy hands he put one hand on top of the pile another hand on the bottom of the pile and he turned over like this he turned over the whole pile and started to go the other direction looking for that broken matzah that must be there and it ever went down again the row there was no broken matzah from my humble childish mind i could see the river reflecting on what to do and he walks away from the backs of matsu into his room it seemed to me to go look into another box and retrieve a broken mat as the rebbe starts walking away he decides to come back he comes back and i realized that ebba did not want to do this but he didn't he took a matzah and he broke it he gave me the broken matzah he looked me in the eyes and he said akasheran afraid and i wondered why did the arabic here so much to give me a hummus i was a cotton i was before bar mitzvah okay the never didn't want to break the matzah i saw he didn't want to he did that was important because he did not want to give me a whole matzah i don't know the answer for that friends i never shared the story before but i reflect on it often was it perhaps to teach me a personal lesson that in life you always have to remember you're a macht you're a half a shekel never think you're our self-contained whole shekel was it perhaps his profound and subtle way of blessing me to find one day my second half my amazing wife or was it maybe the rebbe's subtle message sharing something that i think he taught all his life but it's hard for us to really internalize don't be afraid of brokenness don't be afraid of yakats don't be intimidated when you see brokenness in people when you see brokenness in a world don't be afraid of shvera don't be afraid of your own brokenness don't be afraid of your own wounds don't be afraid of your own unresolved anxiety attention you know why because in the yakats you will find safun suffer means hidden your deepest light your deepest light of ghoula your own little mashiach is always found in your broken pieces and your broken matzah is that not how the rabbi explained why the gemarian sanhedrin calls mashiach amitsara a leper fibre of the beirabi because the light of redemption the deepest potential of people is always found in those unresolved places in those layers of tension and difficulty if you only have the courage not to be intimidated not to run away not to judge not to criticize not to be afraid look straight into the messiah and you will find your own mashiach and you will allow the other broken person to find his or her own mashiach but for this there is one condition and that condition i had the privilege of hearing from the rebbe 1989 it was shabbos udness and i remember when the rebels said yud ken represents a complete structure ten spheroids a minion is made one to ten misper hashem it's the number of completion what's your aleph there are the ten emanations of god's light you're beyond ten you're beyond numbers you're beyond structures and he said much of life is about ten we live structured lives we want to live structured lives there is morning there's afternoon there's evening there's day there's night the shop is this young there's for different hours different seasons different times don't get stuck in worshiping structures you'd aleph allows the jew to understand that you're rooted in a space of absolute infinity unto had the love be ready at any moment to transcend structure and open your heart to what god wants from you at this moment even for that i have to say goodbye to everything that seems so safe and comfortable my ten sphere is my structure i have to be able to embrace the aleph because that's sometimes where you will find hashem the rabbit was a very structured person allah is all about structure and i need not tell you the dik took of quite so showed us how never to turn structure into an idol never to worship structure never to reduce god into structure at a moment's call with the skip of a heartbeat that ever could fluctuate from you to yet aleph and back from your alive [Music] yeshiva.net