Searching for the Real Thing | Rabbi YY Jacobson

I want to share with you an incredible, incredible insight. You know, sometimes we find ourselves being drawn to something. A very, very strong temptation. It's so powerful, it's so overwhelming. And there are two ways of dealing with it. One is, you know, get out of it. Do whatever it takes to get out of it. There's also another method. Sometimes go deeper into it. And when you go deeper into it, you will see that this is fake news. It's not what you're searching for. And I learned this approach from an incredible teaching of the Maggid of Mezeritch in the story of Yosef. Yosef HaTzaddik succumbs, according to one opinion, ויבא הביתה לעשות מלאכתו he succumbs and he surrenders to the incessant pleas of Potiphar’s wife, who's pleading with him on a daily basis. She wants him to betray his morality, his God, and betray the wholesomeness of her marriage. And finally, Yosef surrenders, he succumbs, ויבא הביתה לעשות מלאכתו and then, at the last moment, he sees the visage of Yaakov, his father, and he abstains. וינס ויצא החוצה. That saves him. What does this really mean? What does it mean? And one of the interpretations, based on the teaching of the Maggid of Mezeritch is It's not that Yosef saw the image of his father elsewhere. Rather, he looked deeper, he gazed deeper into his emotional reality at that moment. And that's where he saw the image of Yaakov, his father. What does this mean? Says the holy Maggid of Mezeritch, Potiphar’s wife embodied Tiferes. She embodied profound beauty and splendor and harmony. And then Yosef looked and said: What am I looking for? I'm looking for Tiferes. But Yaakov Avinu, it says in the Zohar, was the embodiment of Hashem’s quality of Tiferes. Yaakov was a conduit and a channel for Hashem’s attribute, for Hashem’s beauty and charm and splendor and grandeur and harmony and Sheinkeit. So Yosef says, What I'm really looking for is Tiferes. Why should I choose a lowly manifestation of Tiferes, why should I choose the dregs of Tiferes, when I can get the source of it? What I'm really looking for is Tiferes. He saw the image of his father. What I'm really looking for is Yaakov Avinu. I want a relationship with Yaakov Avinu. I want a relationship with real Tiferes. There’s a void in me. I think I'm going to fill the void through this type of behavior, but look deeper. What you're looking for is real Tiferes. There's only one way I can get it. I have to get it within my soul. I have to find יעקב אביו. I want to find the מידת התפארת. I'm looking for that type of charm and beauty and splendor and love and oneness and harmony and compassion. Yosef HaTzaddik realized what he was searching for. He was searching for יעקב אביו. And then he said, I'm not going to surrender to fake news, to a camouflaged, lowly, fake version of it. I want the real thing.