Spiritual Remedy for Foot Pain | Letter #17

good evening welcome to 30 letters in 30 days class number what is tonight letter number 17. and uh again go to 30 letters 30days.com to download your PDF and I have good news for you we are working on uh getting you a actual physical booklet like we had last year uh it may not be ready until after the course is done but if you want to have a Keepsake a Memento way of going back to these letters and studying them again and again that will be uh that will be possible God willing okay um tonight's letter Let's Just Jump Right In you test other new test Brooklyn the dev is writing to a man by the grace of God the 19th of the second month of other 5719 that's the spring of 1959 Brooklyn great England blessings in response to your letter is from over a month earlier only now arrived here it only now reached me but cautious you ask for a blessing in the format known as a pan pan is an acronym a soul Redemption we've spoken about a pawn before earlier it's a specific type of letter that hasid writes to a rabbit requesting blessings it's a specific type of Correspondence and has a very specific formula where one requests blessings and uh it is it is usually properly accompanied by uh some monetary uh um there needs to be a gift of tadaka there needs to be a monetary component with with the pawn um sort of the way I've heard it described metaphorically as like putting a stamp on the envelope um so that's what a pawn is and uh the Reba would receive these these petitions for prayer and bring them to the oil the resting place of his father-in-law that's what the devil would do with a pawn that's what he would explicitly say in fact he's going to say this right now I'm going to mention you at the resting place of my father-in-law for everything that you need all right so the guy wrote all we know so far as he wrote about his Health situation referred to guy asked for blessings regarding his health situation what is his specific Health situation we don't know yet we're going to find out pretty specifically but we don't know yet uh let's see what the devil tells me hey looknesses you have because because you have a role in a shul now I'm gonna make some guesses here I'm gonna guess this guy's not the rabbi I think if you were the rabbi the rabbit would have said that very clearly because you're a leader of a of a congregation and we know that no leadership position is by accident and that even the guardian of a of a well is appointed from Heaven you know whatever brings that my khazar quite often so the fact that nebus says you're involved in a shul I'm assuming that he's not um the rabbi I I'm assuming he's not even like the big money guy um because I feel like that I would have said explicitly something about that as well about supporting the show it sounds like he's just involved in a show maybe he's just one of the more um one of the more uh vocal members maybe has some type of unofficial capacity maybe it's an official capacity I don't know but the numbers is you're involved in a shul uh another thing I would guess is that the guy probably mentioned it to the rabbit maybe he mentioned it in passing maybe it wasn't really the main point of his ladder maybe the main point was about his health problem but the the debit is taking that piece of information and building on it so the devil says because you're involved in a shul o interesting that episode in our generation and these Generations is also a study hall there's a distinction made between a base Kinesis and a base madrush base Kinesis means the place of gathering which is literally a synagogue in uh in Greek place for gathering together um and that's for davening then there's a base madrush which is a place for learning interestingly caduceus-based Madness is greater than a caduceus base kinesis place where you study Torah is even holier than the already high Holiness of place where you Daven so the Nemesis in our generation shulz pretty much are the study halls it's an interesting observation yeah there are some exceptions to that but um usually you know I guess yes they Daven where they learn but most people learn where they Daven you understand what I'm saying like it's your shul and then you happen to that you happen to learn there as well um so the devil says in our day and age most Jewels are the place where people learn as well and this means specifically the idea of studying Torah in groups um what does it mean studying in groups um somebody's posting in the chat and YouTube chat the the Greek for uh synagogue yeah we can do more uh etymology if you want as well let me see if I can find something that comes up in the flow of things um so you have so much fun live if you join live you get to interact like this anyone else want to say anything in the YouTube chat I'll check it intermittently okay [Music] um or you could always email me I won't be able to interact with you in real time but if you have feedback questions comments you could email me at Rabbi at soulwords.org and I will uh try to get back to you okay um so limited means specifically Torah study that is done in groups and it has a special advantage Torah study obviously is very powerful and uh it brings great blessings to those who who study the Torah but there is an exponentially greater advantage to limit as as explained in many places in Exodus specifically the advantage of learning in a large group and even a minion even though we normally think of a minion as being something that's a function of communal prayer and we don't necessarily think about needing a Minion for a Torah class there's definitely a special a special uh indwelling of the divine presence that occurs when we study Torah in large groups specifically in a minion or larger movement of a gun push it so it is understood and obvious Ness the more that you put forth an effort to improve the awe of Heaven and the study of Torah in the show the Merit of the many will help you say who it's going to add to your blessings of Hashem including in the matter of Health which is what the guy wrote about he wrote about his health so the number says oh I got a perfect thing that'll help your health it'll it's good for everything it brings down blessings in general but including Health you're involved in a shul so you should really be involved in limited um that's going to be good for you okay Israeli [Music] foreign because for a Jewish man and woman I don't think people realize how unusual the Deb is uh choice of words truly is um the way that Hebrew works you can just use the masculine and it includes everybody the fact that the Debbie says is not typical rabbinic idiom it is really a unique innovation of the river and whatever does it often um that that one's really uh it sticks out and and I have to tell you to people who aren't used to the debit speech patterns it's actually jarring I don't think you hear most uh rabbis use that expression right every every individual everyone but the devil will use the masculine and The Feminine um form so that I was writing to a man here doesn't even have to mention women wow who who brought up women who's talking about women right but the devil says the man or the woman of Israel Jewish man or a woman their materiality and their spirituality go together this is also a huge Concept in the devil's worldview that gashmir and rochnius it's interesting that ever wrote kashmias first the physicality and the spirituality go together if I had to make a list of top five recurring themes in the Reba's teachings this would for sure be on the top five list the idea that that spirituality and materiality go together that there's never a conflict we've spoken about this before that um it's not like a good Jew is going to be forced to to forego success in this world in order to fulfill God's will that doesn't even make sense in the Bible's worldview because the same God who gave us the Toyota is the same God who made the world so he didn't make a world that is antithetical to us he made a world as a forum within which for his Torah to be manifest and the most objective level therefore when you follow hashem's will that itself will bring success in the world so yeah physicality and spirituality go together so therefore this is a really wild idea you're able to have an effect on the health of your body strengthening the the health of your soul now I just want to bavarin as we say I want to um I want to make a disclaimer and preclude the notion that the Debbie will respond to people's health issues with purely spiritual instructions anyone who's read a good number of egress I don't even think you'd have to read more than half a volume you would you would pick up on the pattern that the debit tells people speak to your doctor follow your doctor's advice um seek natural means natural meaning non-miraculous I don't mean natural like um you know herbs although why not but I mean natural like non-muraculous means for your healing um so the rabbit definitely is into the idea of rishus as I say just say the Healer was given permission to heal and that the way that hashem's healing comes in the world is through a natural vessel so I just want you to know that that's the disclaimer here in this particular case we don't see that I've been mentioning any conventional um measures that the person's supposed to take for his healing and perhaps we don't know this but perhaps in his letter the person already told the rabbit that he is seeing a physician and so that part of it is covered or or not I don't know I'm this is the only conjecture right now but in this letter that Abbott tells him look the way that a Jewish person's life works is the spiritual and the material go together so you can have an effect on the material through the spiritual you want to improve your body's Health improve your Soul's health especially how should you improve your Soul's Health through the performance of Mitzvahs okay any mitzvah let's find out there's a concept that the 248 positive Commandments obviously there are a lot more dues than just 248 and a lot more don'ts than the 3 inches 65. but we're talking about biblical Commandments actual biblical Commandments and then there are rabbinic offshoots and various almost innumerable uh literally innumerable halachas because uh tarish about past still evolving actually um so there are there are unlimited that that uh grow forth from the 613 Commandments but at any rate there are 248 positive 248 dues and 365 don't uh our sages say the 248 dues correspond to the 248 limbs of the body yes there are 248 limbs of the body we mentioned that in the uh prayer and when we say that the healing should be sent from on high to the 248 limbs of the person who is in need of healing so the mits was correspond to the 248 limbs of the body moving so it's understood that a pain in the feet foreign the spiritual remedy for a pain in the feet is sadaka it's moving at least that ever didn't say move and began push it moving is more like you know there's this is more like you know after I tell you you could it'll make sense to you like I know I don't expect you to figure it out on your own but yeah what mitzvah corresponds to the feet and what Mitzvah can you improve in which will be a spiritual way of improving your physical feet uh tadaka White duckerberg sadaka is referred to as standing someone on their feet when you give to DACA what do you do you save somebody from becoming destitute you you give them a chance to make a comeback and hopefully to become a uh a breadwinner to actually earn money and you don't want to see anybody become uh destitute to the point where they can't come back from that or say just say it's like a donkey that's being crushed under its load which is also another Mitzvah by the way that if you see that it's knees are buckling and people come and they save it and they help to shift the load or lighten the load it's much easier than if the donkey already has buckled under the load if he already is crouching and he's down it's very hard to lift him again so it's DACA is called putting someone on their feet and that's really what stock is about in in Yiddish kite it's about restoring someone's dignity so that they can be self-sufficient again and yeah so the devil says like the saying of our Sages and um that is uh or that idiom derives from so if you want to strengthen your body you can do it through spiritual means specifically if you want to strengthen your feet you can do it through it's DACA because tadaka is called standing someone on their feet okay V8 and furthermore and this is the main thing so you ain't seen nothing yet because what we're about to hear is the real main thing I don't think this is a separate thing I think it's a related thing and I think that because for many reasons but also because I've seen the rabbits say this in other places that there's material to dock on the spiritual to DACA and spiritual DACA is um to help people get closer to Hashem so I think this is related I think that I've been maybe be telling him not only to give to Dhaka but to help others with their immuno uh which would then automatically include also strengthening his onamona at any rate so now that I've started to speak about a mono shihi the Ramona is that which stands up the entire person you follow what that I was saying to DACA corresponds to the feet because tadak is called standing someone on their feet foreign that which the person stands on like you stand on your feet and like our sages Rule and it's very interesting that everyone calls it hip sock din not a mimer kazal but a sack meaning it has ramifications foreign and stood them up on one what's this talking about says that Hashem gave 613 Commandments to the Jewish people came and he simplified it and he said I got one mitzvah for you that if you have this one then you're gonna have all 613. so he made it simple debt consolidation one he rolled it all into one easy monthly payment but it's called standing it up that's why that I was relating it to the feet here so Havoc came and he can he he stood the entire Torah on one mitzvah like it says Where in the book of like it says yeah the righteous person lives by his faith so halakuk said if you have a Muna if you have a Muna if you have faith then you have everything oh but it says yeah the devil loves to add that one and when it says Sadiq is talking about all of us we're all the Sadiq I want to mention by the way that today is called Zain other which was the day induction on base 1992 that that ever suffered a stroke and that we did not speak publicly again after that the day before meaning Sunday was a Sunday dollars and it was to be the last dollars and there was a a man named Gabriel Aram a philanthropist from Toronto originally from Hungary who was the publisher of Lifestyles magazine which is an executive magazine not a Jewish magazine it's a magazine for for wealthy people and quite out of character for the type of magazine that it was he decided that in honor of the upcoming 90th birthday right because we said this was the 26th of other uh the spring of 92 so of Nissan on base level turned 90. so in honor of the rabbit's upcoming 90th birthday which would just be 15 days later well you all know that we're doing 30 day 30 letters 30 days as a preparation for unit of Nissan so I'm telling you something that happened it was the Same convius by the way because I know there was a Monday and of the day before was a Sunday and there were Sunday dollars so we're talking about yesterday talking about exactly um yesterday in 1992. so Gabriel Aram came to the river uh in the dollar line and said that he's writing uh a a magazine article about the debit on over his 90th birthday uh that wants to know what's that of his message the the video is uh is to be found online you could easily find it uh and and Rebecca is speaking in in English so the Rebus says what's his message for the world he says um 90 that was turning 90 is Sadiq in Hebrew every letter in the Hebrew alphabet has a numerical value so the lesson is that every Jew can be at Sadiq you hear that here this magazine publisher is telling the debit we want to write a whole article about the debit what does that ever do which is so typical of the rabbit he flips it on the guy and says don't make it about me make it about all of you it's about you you want to be you you want you you want to look at me and and be in awe of me no I'm gonna flip this and put it on you you do something awesome you're the tadiq by the way Gabriel Aram asked because it wasn't a Jewish magazine so he said oh then what's that this message for the non-jewish world the rabbit did not hesitate even a half a second that I said same thing through the seven Noah hide laws every human being can be at Sadiq there's such a term sadike um the righteous of the Nations saw the entire Humanity as sadikim just thought I would add that at this juncture foreign but it'll also help you add it to the added to the combination over here and we basically uh merge with the formula that the key to everybody's spiritual service is a Mona and once you have the Amana once you have the faith then you have everything else so that's why it's called the feet that's why Moana is called the feet all right that's a very interesting part of the letter now all Jewish people are called Believers the descendants of believers in other words it is inherent it is innate in your very essence to be a believer so although that is true had a Moon is the faith that a Jew has has to be won specifically that affects his line of thinking all day long a little explanations in order um so this explains often that a money by its very nature can be bedel means transcendent okay maybe that's not any better than saying all right so what does transcendent means like this it means in theory I believe but in practice it's very hard to feel that way and it's definitely hard to make behavioral choices that are aligned with that so in the abstract yes of course hashem's the Creator and everything he does is for the good and yes yes but I'm having a hard time feeling aligned with that so that's what it means the amuna is that it's hovering around so to speak it hasn't been integrated into one's thinking sometimes consider this will cite the uh talmudic expression that a thief is tunneling into a house to do a break-in and he says a little prayer well hold on a second if he's a Believer as evidenced by the fact that he's domining why is he stealing Hashem says do not steal and if he's not a Believer as evidenced by the fact that he's a thief then why does he waste time praying just get in get out and get out of there so this explains he is a Believer but his amona is in other words in the abstract of course I believe in Hashem but when the rubber hits the road and I gotta really really make a decision here I gotta do something it's just it's just it's too hard to act in a way that's aligned with my beliefs and we all understand what that means we all understand that we have beliefs that we're not aligned with and you could call it hypocrisy I suppose it's a form of hypocrisy but so this explains is basically a lack of integration and the goal is to integrate one's behaviors emotions intellect uh and and faith and I say that specifically in that order behaviors being the most external manifestation of the person the emotions being behind uh the behaviors and the in the engine that drives them and then the intellect being behind the emotions which it which the the infinite gives birth to the emotions and then on the deepest level is is the is the amona the the beliefs so the rabbit says yeah I know that you already have faith just because you're Jewish but I'm talking about the kind of faith that is aligned with your thinking that on a conscious level you're not just you're not just believing in God you're thinking the way a person who believes in God ought to think now what does that mean that I was going to say a little bit more clearly this means to say that in every incident and in everything happens you should seek out you should search the Divine Providence that's in it so what does it mean that your amuna has become integrated into your thought pattern it means that you cannot have an experience and not look for some sign of Divine Providence in the experience that you've had and not only that you can't avoid looking for it but that I was going to describe the the urgency with which you look for it in spite of the concealment that nature places over the uh the design the the creation is an inherent concealment which masks creator it appears to operate independently it appears to have its own have its own life its own existence but a person of faith is going to overcome those appearances and he's going to earnestly search for the sign of of divine orchestration in everything that happens to him veeda butter and he's going to know clearly that as long as he doesn't find the sign of Divine Providence that means he still doesn't understand the truth of what happened meaning you can describe something as an event but until you can tell it as a story about God's involvement God's specific conscious directed involvement in your life then you don't really understand what happened that's what a person whose amuna is integrated into his thought patterns is going to live like and this is to such an extent ially he's not going to be satisfied I would almost translate this is it will disturb him I think is in English translated it frustration he'll be frustrated I like that that's good too foreign this this state of this this mood basically that I was describing a guy who has an experience and he's looking for that in the experience and he can't find it and it disturbs him it really perturbs him that he can't find that so the devil says that that type of state of mind that's a proof that his faith is full meaning it's intact it's robust and that it's not just makif like we explained earlier meaning Transcendent meaning it lacks integration or healthy healthy meaning partially meaning he picks and chooses in this area of life I believe in God and this area of life I'm on my own I gotta look out for myself right that would be or even kalki Africa even though obviously even if he doesn't have this this quality that we just described meaning he can have an experience and not find that and it doesn't keep him up at night so obviously he's still in the category that doesn't change the fact that intrinsically latently deep down he's still a Believer but when the belief is well integrated into his Consciousness it's going to affect him in a way that he will be disturbed when he doesn't find this in his life and what I'm about to tell you is pure conjecture I have no way of knowing if this is what that ever meant for this person and I actually don't know if this is what [Music] um is implying from these words but something tells me that that is it's more than a limous means a uh an exonerating argument finding a silver lining but it's more than that what is the debit saying essentially here he's saying that a person who's looking for divine order in life and he's coming up short he's not seeing it life is appearing random to him and therefore he's upset he's upset why is the world so random and chaotic where is God that is responding and saying wow look at your faith that's faith because it means your supposition is that should be readily apparent in every aspect of life and the fact that it's not is something unconscionable to you in other words if you were able to have an experience and not find the practice in that experience and be like no no you know just shrug it off what do you expect yeah the world is kind of random that would be a lack of faith but the fact that you have an experience and you cannot reconcile that with the fact that God is running the world and it's bothering you wow what faith that's what I think that I was saying so it's sort of a reversal of a paradigm that uh you know somebody who has faith suffers in silence and maybe even is oblivious to their uh discomfort and that's what faith his faith is you just roll with things and perhaps that is one definition of Faith but over here that I've been saying actually the guy who's bothered when he doesn't see whatever doesn't use those words here but whatever uses them in plenty of other places the guy who's bothered when he doesn't see revealed good in life that's a myman because the very fact that bothers him means he expects that it should be the case he expects that God should always be revealed in life you hear what that I was saying good stuff powerful stuff okay there's a clear directive of our sages concerning the above they comment on the verse and the faith of your times and and one is that say this what is the faith of your times it is the mishnaic section or order of agricultural laws that's what I say just say I say just say that faith in hashem's times means agricultural laws what does that mean pray tell it means and this is a this is a your xiaomi that's uh brought in Texas it means amuna's essay this is he believes in the life of the worlds meaning God and therefore he plants right when it comes to something so literally Earthly as planting seeds in the ground he does not rely on the laws of nature everyone knows you put seeds on the ground you water them they they grow no that's not why he puts seeds in the ground keying but rather only because he believes in the life of the worlds meaning in God he believes in Godzilla that is the only thing that he relies on when he takes perfectly nice good seeds and throws them in the dirt and expects them to grow why would you take perfectly good seeds and throw them in the dirt well the world will tell you because that's a natural thing to do and the seeds will grow and they'll have plants and they'll have many more seeds and they'll uh you'll you'll uh you'll have a whole crop from throwing those seeds in the dirt that's what the world says the Jew says you know it is a crazy thing and just because that's what quote unquote nature dictates just because that's what has happened every season for thousands of years that's not why we do it it's a crazy thing to take perfectly good seeds and throw them in the ground you know why we do it because we believe in God because God told us that if we work he's going to bless the handiwork that we put when we put put forth effort and and that's that's why I'm doing it otherwise yeah I wouldn't do it but I've got a contract here with God and I'm expecting Miracles yeah those Miracles will not be recognized as Miracles by the world because they'll say it's just nature that makes seeds grow but I know the truth of these are miracles okay so this is what that I was saying that basically a Jew knows that everything's a miracle and he actually expects to be able to figure out the miracle in everything that happens to him and when he doesn't or when he hasn't yet figured out the miracle it bothers him okay now the validity of this amuna of this belief can be seen move and it's understood [Music] from the days of Purim that we're just coming out of right now remember this letter was written you test other Shani so it's five days after Poor that seemingly the salvation of the Jewish people in the porn story TV was totally natural there was no splitting of any Seas no 10 plagues it was totally natural I they shabazzi basically we had a Jewish girl who was married to the dictator of the world so that's a very natural way for things to transpires me and yet we Jews consider the porn Story one of the greatest Miracles and we make a whole day of Celebration based on that and on that day we recite the blessing thanking God for his miracles until this very day so you see a story that seems as natural as the Purim story where there are no overt Miracles but we look at it as a miracle when we celebrate that until this very day um and even this is a very interesting point the devil says that there is a talmudic tract tape of uh it's called mcgilla which is dedicated specifically to Purim African the Hanukkah Miracle which is more Supernatural did not have an entire turmeric tractate devoted to it as a subject it's an interesting thing there are many explanations by the way of why that is we're over time already so I'm not going to get into that especially I I'm not sure exactly in context why the dev is saying this but um the point at least the simple point that I can understand here the devil is saying look we're just coming out of poor poem is a celebration of how God's hand can appear hidden but Jews have a knack for decoding the the uh the mystery and seeing how it's really all pretty clearly divinely orchestrated and that's how we have to live and yeah a person who doesn't see that in his life is rightfully perturbed with esteem and blessing for the issue report good things in all the above mentioned she um yeah no that's it and then we have footnotes yeah blessing for reporting good news and everything that was mentioned okay that's our letter sorry we went a little bit late and uh we'll see you tomorrow night