Smashing the Modern Day Idols (Parshas Masei)

there was this uh public school teacher and he he had children in his class from all different religions so he was doing a unit on uh world religion so he was asking does anybody have any religious objects holy objects in your home so one of the little kids raises the hand he says yeah we have this in our house this picture of this uh this woman and my mother she lights a little candle in front of it and she whispers something and that's our that's our holy object he says oh it's very good yeah it sounds uh that's uh sounds like you're catholic yeah does anyone else have any holy objects so this little kid says yeah uh we have this little gold statue of this uh very uh fat man and my uh my parents like incense in front of it and they they whisper some words in front of it then that's our our holy object says oh sounds like your buddhist and uh another little kid says yeah we have uh we have a holy object in our house he says oh what is it he says um it's in the bathroom it's this little flat mat which has numbers on it and that's uh it's a holy object so the teacher says why do you say it's a holy object he says i don't know my mother goes in there she stands on it she says oh god okay half the people cracking up having people like what are you cracking up yeah okay fine anyways little idolatry joke never hurt you know by the way that's the only thing you're allowed to make jokes about says in gemara that the only thing you're really allowed to scoff at is uh idol worship okay so i'm going to talk a little bit about about idolatry why because in this week's halftorah we are now in the three weeks and we have these these are three weeks of national mourning between the 17th of thomas and the 9th of of and uh in addition to the different practices of mourning that are observed during this time there or par as part of the the morning that's observed during this time there are three special have taurus they are called the tlossa de puranusa the three have torahs of tribulation or of turmoil problems and they are have taurus which generally include negative or foreboding or ominous prophecies one of the prophecies or one of the things that the prophet says in this haftarah this week which is the the second of the three weeks is a rebuke against the people's idol worship specifically against their deification of objects of material objects so the navi says the prophet says he says to the jewish people look what you do they say meaning the idol worshipers among you law eights two a hunk of wood and eight means wood ovi atta you are my father well evan and they say to the stone at you speaking to the stone second person yolida tonu gave birth to us like you're our mother what does this mean that the idol worshipers were saying to a piece of wood you're my father into a stone you are my mother this is so unrelatable this is this does not sound like a problem that many of us struggle with not only do we not struggle with it it's hard to even put ourselves in that place and see why it's a struggle so we have to understand the the source of idolatry we have to understand idolatry from a more um philosophical point of view you know we spoke last week and uh if anyone wasn't here you could watch the class on soulwords.org you go to parsha and watch the class on pinhus so last week we spoke about materialism we spoke about the reductionist view that everything in the world can be reduced to matter and that there basically is just this one plane of existence to the exclusion of of spiritual reality um remember the story that i told last week uh i told a bunch of stories but one of the stories i said was about the frida kareba about the previous libav chadebad that when he was being interrogated in russia and the communists were trying to break him so they pulled out a gun they brandished the weapon they tried to intimidate him and they said this little toy has been known to make people talk so the the phrase could have said this little toy is effective on those who have remember this one world and many gods but i have two worlds and one god very good so last week we spoke a lot about what it means to have two worlds that the frida kadaba was saying not just hey don't worry if you kill me in this world i'll go to heaven i'll go to the afterlife the fairy god was saying more than that he was saying that even at this moment things are not what they appear from a purely physical perspective because i'm in two worlds right now right now i'm in two worlds there's a there's a deeper reality that's going on so we explained what it means i i'm living in two worlds we didn't really explain the other part what and we explained what it meant that the frederick was saying that these materialists these communists who are dialectical materialists are living in one world but what is what does it mean that the frederick said that this this toy is effective on those who have one world and many gods what are the many gods we didn't really speak about that last week what does it mean many gods so here's the thing i think the word gods first of all is is giving us trouble let's go so let's instead of instead of the word gods let's just use the word power let's use the word power materialist lives in a world where there are many different powers now in the pagan world they had names for them for these powers they they referred to them as various deities again that's not so relatable to us but in the modern world we also have a notion of of various different powers you ask a simple person what are the powers in the world maybe they'll tell you you know natural powers like the wind or or or the sun or maybe someone who's a little bit more poetically inclined they might say love is a power or maybe even they'll say you know greed human greed is a is is a power um someone who's more scientifically inclined they might say something like well we've reduced it to certain basic powers like electromagnetism and the nuclear the weak nuclear force and the strong nuclear force there are different ways that intelligent people today will describe the powers that are in the world but they'll all tell you a number of powers they'll all tell you that there are a number of powers now there's something called the unified theory of everything is a model that does not yet exist and it's basically consensus that whoever will come up with a viable model for the unified theory of everything will be considered the greatest mind whoever lived einstein was in search of this of the i think he called it the unified field theory where he could take all the different powers all the different forces and and reduce it to one formula that would that would address all of it at once and and no one found it yet but that's basically what science is in search of this unified theory of everything that puts together all the different theories in one simple and elegant theory the point is that the predominant world view today and the accepted world view and the quote-unquote normal world view is one in which there are various powers so when the federal was saying to this uh interrogator that this toy works on people who have one world and many gods what are the many gods the many gods mean that you're you're living in a world where there are various forces to contend with and however a person interprets that however they however they translate that into their day-to-day life the forces that they feel that they have to deal with whether it's luck or fate or um human nature or their own uh experiences and upbringing whatever their narrative is there are these various forces that that are at work in their in their in their narrative of their life or of the or the macro of history itself it always comes down to these various forces in the world that are that are working upon us so obviously from a jewish perspective that is the essence of idolatry from a jewish perspective there are not various forces at work in the universe there is one force at work in the universe at all times there is only one force at work in the universe and everything else that we identify as forces are not in and of themselves forces or powers certainly they are not autonomous but even less than that they are not they are not even forgive the philosophy for a moment they are not even ontologically independent meaning they do not even they do not even have their own existence let alone their own volition so whatever powers there are in the world they do not act independently of god in fact they do not even exist independently of god god is enlivening them and bringing them into existence something from absolute nothing at every single second and as such since these powers don't even have their own existence then they don't even exist independently so obviously uh they do not have any influence on us that cannot be attributed directly to the will of god so if you boil it all down there's one power there's one force there's one will which is totally and constantly acting within the world and that is the power of god okay yeah are all of the things that we've mentioned like it's really god's power right so you don't have power of their own but it's just god so you know we have the power we have the divine name hashem we have the divine name elokim right so elokim is the name of concealment that's where the gematria the numerical value of elokim is 86 which is hatava which is the nature that means that hashem hides himself in nature so what does it mean hashem hides himself in nature it means that when hashem acts upon the creation he garbs himself within these forces but not that these forces have their own will or volition and are choosing how to act you know it's like my hand for instance if i send forth my hand here to get the coffee my hand is completely subservient to me has no will of its own it only does what my what the will of my brain wants it to do right so that it's it's sort of like that of course there's such a thing as a hand just like there's such a thing as electromagnetic fields right there are powers in the world but don't think that those powers act autonomously and not only do they not act autonomously again sorry to be philosophical for a moment but they do not even exist autonomously they don't have their own existence they're being constantly recreated something from nothing it's god's manifestation of himself in nature correct everything is a manifestation of god that is right that is right so everything is a manifestation of god now the word that we have in the holy tongue to describe being able to see the underlying oneness within the plurality within seeming plurality is shalom shalom means peace but also means reconciliation if you never have a uh conflict then you can't have a peacemaking the conflict is the conceptual conflict where it appears that the world is fragmented it appears that there are different forces at work that there is a plurality and then you look deeper and you realize that the nature of these forces is that not only do they not act independently they do not even exist independently and therefore behind it all there's one and that's called shawling shaolin is the reconciliation of the false model that there are a plurality of forces in the world and you realize there's only one there's one okay now it's interesting there's a there's a line from the rambam where the rambam actually says the entire purpose of torah is to bring about this shaolin to bring about this peace or this reconciliation this is from from the end of chanukah god al-hasholim great is peace because the entire title was given in order to make peace in the world why in the world because the world is the place where it appears to be a plurality right shinema like it says its paths the paths of torah are pleasant paths and all of its ways our peace peace here means reconciliation it means finding a model within which we can reconcile the fact that we do observe a plurality of forces in the world and yet we realize that at bottom there's only one you see there are a lahavdil there are other worldviews that will say well the materialist world worldview will just say that there are many forces in the world then there are uh religions that'll say well the plurality is a is an illusion really the the physical world and the phenomenological universe meaning the world of that you perceive with your senses isn't even real it's just completely it's a it's a dream right so what do we say we say no braces the toyota begins by testifying that hashem did create a world the world is real it's not an illusion and yet simultaneously ain't no vader there's nothing but him how do you reconcile beresha's borderline right there is already plurality there's a heaven and there's an earth right and then within the earth you have so much more plurality you have the water you have the dry ground you have all the different creatures that remains true and yet at the same time in eight melvade there's nothing but him how do you reconcile the way you reconciles you realize that all of it is a manifestation an extension of his true existence and the ability to perceive that is called shawling okay in in very practical terms in emotional terms day-to-day terms that we can relate to what does that mean it means that we go through our lives and we feel like there are different powers that have sway over us that can affect us that can help us that can hurt us and we stop and we realize no it's not true there's only one power in my life and there's only one relationship that i have to worry about and that's hashem that perspective is called shawling when you realize that no being in this universe can help you or hurt you except as an instrument of god according to god's choosing in god's will that is called charlotte so i'll i'll tell you a a story about a person who had a moment of shawling of reconciliation in this precise manner i used to give a class a tanya class many many years ago this this has to be maybe 20 years ago now it was uh in milwaukee wisconsin where i was for many years and this tanya class consisted of basically it was all women who were were not observant and had not studied very much uh in in in in their past they hadn't studied a lot of jewish women they hadn't studied a lot and i'm telling you this for a reason because as we studied not that it was my objective to bring up practical halacha all the time but it just you know it sort of happens from from time to time um one of the it was it was a tanya class so we were studying i mean what was the subject of your nephew shalom is you know your godly soul your animal soul and learning how to i mean that's really the focus is learning how to listen to your godly soul and to uh not allow the animal soul to to run riot so at some point the idea of lighting shabbos candles came up and one of the women said she wants to start lighting shabbos candles on time i think she had lit before just not regularly and and certainly not on time that wasn't a concept uh you know lighting it you know exactly the time that it says on the lua she didn't come from that kind of background but we started uh talking about it and she got excited about it now when did she get excited about i think it was like this time of year june july so it's pretty easy because candlelighting time is seven eight whatever and i remember at the time one of the women in the class said yeah it's easy now but in the winter candlelight is going to be at like 4 p.m what are you going to do you have to run home from work it's going to be really difficult so she says you know what i'll deal with it i'll deal with it when i when it when the time comes so she was doing really really well and she had a streak of you know a good three four months and it was i think it was october it was like right after the high holidays if i remember correctly and we're in class and she comes in and she's like really really proud you could you could tell she's like beaming with pride and she says i have a story i want to share a story an experience that happened to me over the weekend okay go ahead she wants to tell everyone so she says this was the first week where candle lighting time was before 5 pm and it was like 4 55. so she says i got all prepared for it and i knew i was gonna have to leave work early and all that stuff okay this is a big deal for her and as i'm driving home i realized that i wrote a check today remember checks remember we used to have those pieces of paper remember okay she says i wrote a check today and it's not covered it's not covered in the bank and i have another account where i can write a check and deposit it into the account where i made an overdraft and if i don't do it the check's probably going to bounce in all likelihood it'll bounce and i'm looking at the clock and i realized i'm thinking to myself hold on i do do i have time for this no i i do not have time for this i have to go light on the other hand what i'm going to have to go light if i'm not going to go to the bank i'm not going to cover the check the check's going to bounce my husband's going to be annoyed the bank's going to charge me an overdraft fee so she says i i had this sense of conflict what do i do because i can only do one i could i only have to the bank closes at five right it's not possible to do both and by the way i want i want to just point out here she was not shabbos observant yet she wasn't shabbos observant if the bank would have been open until six this would not have been a problem because i'm telling you she would have gone home she would have lit on time and then gone back out to the bank and made the deposit she was not shabbos observant the whole reason it was a conflict is because the bank closed at five so if she didn't go to the bank before five she wouldn't be able to make the deposit but if she did go to the bank before five then she knew she'd be coming home and it would be after the time of candle lighting and although she wasn't shopping observant yet she had taken upon herself she wouldn't light after shabbos began that that part of shabbat she was keeping because she'd take it upon lighting on time so she had this conflict including the 18 minutes they're going to the bank yeah this all includes the 18. it's all about the 18 you live with the 18 minutes okay now even with the 18 minutes you couldn't do both anyways you have to be froomed for many years to know how to do that to know how to get to the bank and back between the the 18 minutes in shia that's like you know expert orthodox mode anyways barcelona she didn't want to want to play it so close she looked at the clock she realized it's not going to happen like she's got to pick one so she says if i don't deposit it there's a lot of other stuff that's going to go wrong first of all my husband's going to be annoyed second of all i'm going to be annoyed third of all the bank's going to charge me money i don't want to pay that money i don't have that money i'm not a wealthy person and it seems like there's a lot more reasons to go to the bank than to go light shabb's candle sometime she says but then i started thinking hold on say that's not the right way to think about it i started thinking tanya hold on tanya tanya is about godly soul animal soul what does my godly soul want my godly soul wants no question go go light choba's candles on time what does my animal soul want my animal soul is the ego and it's very nervous it doesn't want my husband to be annoyed it doesn't want to pay money to the bank for no reason it doesn't want to be embarrassed it doesn't want to feel that it's lacking control over this situation so my animal so for sure wants me to go make the bank deposit what am i going to do godly solar animal soul godly soul and soul godly soul and she went home and she lit on time she was very very proud of this that is shawling that is to me that's like the archetypical example of sean because what it is is a story of somebody who thought she was dealing with all these different powers all these different issues all these different reasons why a certain plan of action made sense and then she said hold on a second no i only have to deal with one thing this this situation is a lot simpler than i'm making it i only have one factor that i have to consider what what is the way to be right with hashem you know there's a amashbia back in lubavitch granum who's called granum so graham used to say a marshall used to say a parable one time this guy sees his friend and shoulder says you look down what's wrong says oy vey i have so many problems says tell me about your problems uh you know i i have all these all this debt i mean debt i i barely can put food on the table now my my daughter got engaged i have to make a hasana uh that then i have to set them up with an apartment i i don't i have so much on my plate i don't know what to do so the friend says let me ask you a question how much money would it take to deal with all of this he says all of it i mean he starts thinking about the debt he starts thinking about what he's got is what he's got to spend every month for his family he's thinking about the wedding he thinks about setting up the new hassan kala with an apartment he says the whole thing i mean what would take care of everything he says 500 ruble so the friend says so you don't have a whole bunch of problems you have one problem where are you going to get 500 ruble that's very simple you have one problem we're going to get 500 rubles so graham used to say like this life's not as complicated as we make it we think we have a bunch of problems we don't have a bunch of problems we have one problem we have one issue we have one factor that we need to consider and that is being right with hashem so that is the idea of shalom shalom is that we look in the world we think that there are all these different powers then there's not there's one power there's one relationship that we have to consider at all times okay you know what this is my pet peeve you know american jews they want hollywood endings to their stories why do we want hollywood endings the chat bounced that is the happy ending why did we all oh because she chose shabbos her check didn't bounce well that's so corny no no her check bounced but she still chose she showed she chose chavez well well it's a stronger story a hundred percent a stronger story of the czech balances american jews all want hollywood endings to their stories makes me crazy okay at any rate of course the check bounced and it was worth it you know how much people would pay to go to a spiritual retreat so they could have that kind of clarity she had at that moment they paid thousands of rich people to pay tens of thousands of dollars to have a moment where life seemed that clear so what did she pay 40 bucks you know whatever the fees were right okay anyway it's interesting when the rambam says that the entire purpose of toyota is shawling where does he say it what is the context in the context of shabbos candles if he has a situation he has to choose between it's hanukkah and it's shabbos and he has to like either the moneta or the shabbos candles or it's not hanukkah let's say he can either light chaba's candles or he can buy food for kiddish wine and khala for kids [Music] the shabbos it's called near bayside the the candle of the house is given precedence even before chanukah even before kiddish why he gives an answer misum because of the peace of the house hashem's divine name is erased to make peace between a husband and wife so if we don't have that light on the simple explanation the very very uh literal explanation is if if there's not going to be light in the house shabbos knight so the husband and wife are going to bump into each other it's going to cause it's going to cause discord but at any rate he says the purpose of the shabbos candle is shaolin and that's why the shabbos candle takes precedence over the conic manure even over kiddish on shabbos because the shabbos candle brings about shaolin brings about peace now dinim laws of hadlochus nadis shabas talking about the laws of lighting shabbos candles dalton tells us something very interesting and it's similar to what that abam says but the ramen was saying it actually as an aside about shabbas in the overall context of other halakhas here is in the actual halachas of shabbos the the the the altar says our sages established shia lago autumn near daylight bishabas that every person should have a light on on shabbos in because room that he goes in on shabbos why meeshum sholem bias because of shaolin bias that's similar to what the rambam says because of shaolin bias because of peace in the house and then the altareba uses a very interesting turn of phrase shelley kashel so that you don't stumble you don't trip [Music] on wood or stone the shabbos candle was enacted so there's light on the house so there should be shalem in the house peace in the house shall i your kashal you won't stumble but ate a heaven on tree or stone what does this mean on a literal level it means you won't trip on wood and stone on a deeper level what's this turn of phrase ate's a heaven idol worship from our haftarah this is the wording that yermio uses in his rebuke this is exactly the word from our haftarah so on a deeper level this of the rabbit the shalaya khashoggi evan to stumble also means conceptually to stumble ideologically to stumble you need to have the light of shabbos the light of shabbos isn't just a material physical light it is it is also it is also but also it's what it symbolizes and in fact all torah is called terra ayer ner mitzvah vitara like said and the light creates what shalem peace what is shalim shalim is that they are not a diversity or a multiplicity of forces in the universe there's one force in the u in the universe and then when you have that shaolin you will not stumble you will not make the mistake that an aids or an evan or any other power any other created force in the universe has autonomy or influence or sway over you so on a deeper level what is this saying it's saying that when we think that there are different things or people or organizations or countries or economies or laws of nature or whatever it is that can have a factor can have an influence in our lives we have to stop we have to light a shabbos candle proverbially and also literally like chaba's candles but also symbolically light a shabbos kindle bring about shalom get that clarity that light of tita because the traitor was given that obama says for the purposes of what why was the title given for what purpose to create shalem charlie means don't don't get fooled anymore to think there are our multiplicity of forces realize there's one force and now you won't stumble on the eights or the heaven or any other individual power that you are idolizing god forbid right now and believing has has power over you so this this is our lesson our lesson is that we need to search out and adopt and apply the unified theory of everything and that is the ultimate challenge to realize that there's a world god created a world a vast and diverse world mode and yet there's one thing there's one power there's one factor that we have to consider nothing else you