Tetzaveh Class: "Why Should I Serve G-d Around the Clock?"

the yeshiva.net. >> Okay. Good morning everybody. Welcome. Thank you for gracing us for today's class paras of Tamos. Today's class is dedicated in the loving memory of the unforgettable Rabbi No Michelle in honor of his 11th yard site on the 18th day of Tambos by his son and daughter-in-law Dr. Michael and Liz Michelle. Those who knew him, he was one of the pillars and founders of the Muny community. Born in Tarnov in Poland, escaping the Germans to Siberia, Rabnaka Michelle ultimately arrived in the United States, received Mikah from the renowned Rabbi Zv Gustman, one of the great uh of the last generation. And for more than 50 years, Rabbi Michelle headed the Ashar Yeshiva Day School in Muny, mentoring thousands of students, inspiring hundreds of families, one of the early builders of Muny. Came here in 1956, instilling in his disciples a love for Yiddish, for Israel, for Tanakh, for Lashesh. A teacher to his core, he continued to teach throughout his life, including his Tuesday Na'vi class for women until his final days. You were there. Okay. In honor of site on the 18th of Tamos, also dedicated today's class is also dedicated by the loving children of Donil Benavid and his wife Ainsworth. Bastra Ysef Mardai Nifelic they passed away together on the 14th of Thomas 5781 in the Surfside Florida tragedy and today's class is dedicated by their loving children the children of RVI and his wife Ainsworth in tribute to their yard site And may their memory and their love and conviction always be present with their children, families, communities until amen. Today's class is also dedicated by Dr. Miriam Gross Leonish, her dear father on his yard on the 50th day of Thomas. His childhood was cut short when the Nazis invaded Poland followed by all of the hardships that came thereafter. losing his whole family, he yet went on to build a beautiful, amazing family after the war and see children, grandchildren, great grandchildren. And we dedicate this class in tribute to his loving memory and may his soul always be with you. dedicated also by Sharon Klesch in memory of her beloved father Abdavid Ben Mikall and Rahul in honor of his yard also today the 14th of yesterday the 14th of Tamos today is tas yesterday was sorry he was very active creating classes in the Barian community in the 1980s helping many find their way back to Yiddish thank you very very much Okay, you have your source sheet. Today we're going to discuss what is the most important verse? What is the most important in the entire in the entire now? It seems like a strange qu strange question because the whole is the whole was dictated by so there's no really one verse more important than any other verse. Obviously, if it's in the Tyra, God felt that every single verse is vital and indispensable and important. Still, still if I were to ask anybody sitting here, if you had a the following exam, the following question, choose one sentence, one statement, one paragraph, one verse that should define and become the most defining definition or statement that captures the essence of Judaism. What would it be? Okay. So you very good. You say love your fellow like you love yourself. Anybody else? Could be a it could be a it could be a statement. Okay. Very good. You say powerful. Powerful. Anybody else would like to chip in? Huh? Okay. Beautiful. Holy shall you be because I am holy. >> Yeah. That's the beginning of you should be holy. Beautiful. Okay. So, we already have four and to you. Anybody else? Isra the beginning of the ten commandments. I am the god who has taken you out of Egypt. Okay, beautiful. It's interesting none of you mentioned for example the pik or the mitzvah that a nazer should not cut his or her hair as the most defining verse of Judaism. Right? Nobody mentioned here not to eat a goat cooked in the milk of its mother. Nobody mentioned the mitzvah to bring a goat as a sin offering every rash khadesh or not to plow your field with an ox and a dunkey tied together or to leave the corner of your field for the poor or not to wear a cloak that is woven from wool and linen together or even to destroy the comets on the 14th day of Nissen. None of you mentioned that. You didn't go in that direction. Not because I suspect that you uh don't give great credence to these mitzvah but nonetheless these are all individual obviously important mitzvah part of the blueprint part of the constitution of Yiddishkite but one would not say that this defines or summarizes the essence the zeitgeist the nama the soul of Judaism. Now as you can guess this is not just a theoretical question. This is a question that was raised by our sages and uh of course as in any good Jewish text there was a debate. There was not one opinion, there were four opinions just like here. Okay, so we're on the right track. There were four opinions and each opinion had another thing to say. And then came the final opinion and then they had to decide the verdict. Who's right? As always, there's always the debates and then usually based on majority opinion, they define the verdict and they define the verdict. And it's fascinating that the first three are rejected and the fourth one is chosen. And when you look at that, it becomes enigmatically very very puzzling. So let's see what we're talking about. Okay, one of the earliest midrashik texts is known as kayim which means the teachings of the kayanim. It's a commentary on which mostly deals with the laws connected to the priest the offerings the Bikto purity impurity so this medish called that's Leviticus chapter 19 and this is also brought in Jerusalem Talmud track date chapter 9 let's see the first statement is very very famous because Rashi quotes it in and it has become a very famous statement the second one is not as This is famous statement that the verse you shall love your fellow like yourself in parad somebody mentioned here says this is not just a it's not just a mitzvah it's not just important it's a cl it's a great principle of benaz baz who was in the same generation like rabaka in fact they both entered into the cabalistic orchard from which ben raka came out. Benaz never came out. He passed away in the process. He says I have another pafer told us. This is in birious right in the beginning of creation. The says told us this is the book that chronicles the story of Adam. On the day that Hashem created Adam, he created him in the vis in the image of Hashem says this is a greater principle than sees as the great principle of Judaism says I have something even greater and that is he doesn't explain why it's greater. The give different explanations. One explanation is that says in the commentators of the carbon that there was rabbi of Berlin Rabbi David frankly wrote a commentary on called carbon and he says is talking about your friend means your friend. The second verse is talking about every single human being. Every single human being is in the vis of Hashem. Like it says in It's actually a quote from Rabaka. Soaka doesn't disagree with that. That's one interpretation why it's a greater principle. Another interpretation is the moral of Prague explains this and this is very very fascinating and very very profound means treat somebody else like you treat yourself which is known today as the golden rule or as Hill told the non-Jew who wanted to convert to Judaism and he said teach me the whole Torah while I'm standing on one leg which means in 10 20 30 seconds this the Gmorra tells the story in tract chabas page 31 lammed alf And said what you dislike to be done to you don't do to somebody else. Then six words I teach you the whole everything else is commentary on this. So says this is the which means treat the other person like yourself which is the basis of any civil society. Any civil society could only be based on a basic code of morality which begins with the fact the way I would not like to be treated. I should not treat the other person. I don't want you to lie to me. I should not lie to you. I don't want you to deceive me. I should not deceive you. I don't want you to harm me or steal from me or damage my property, etc., etc. I should not do that to anybody else. So, this is the basis of a benaz says there's something much deeper. It's not just the basis of a good society. There's also something sacred about it and that is the human being is created in the visage of God. So it's not just okay I'll treat you as I treat myself as part of a societal contract right and if I treat myself badly so I'll treat you like I treat myself but rather Benaz says there's something even more important and that is understanding the sacred quality and identity that every person is actually a reflection of Hashem of the creator so you encounter God in the face of the other you're encountering Hashem in the face of the other person even the stranger. So we have we have benaz they both chose to one is one is told us now comes the next phase there's a very very famous book called has become a classic in Judaism it's a compilation of all of the stories and homalytical interpretations that are recorded in the garra much of the gmorrah's laws and the background and the rationale and the debates. But many parts of the Talmud of the Gomorrah are stories, anecdotes, metaphors, parables. They're called agodis. So the anac compiled all of them into a series of works known as a yak of the eye of yakov. This was authored by a man named Rabenu Yakov, Ben Kav. That's why it's called a Yakov. His name was Yakov. and he was one of the great uh sages in Spain who then became the leader of the Spanish exile in Salanaki in Greece. So he lived in the 1400s in the 15th century. He passed away 1516 and he wrote a book called it's a comp compilation. He didn't write it but he has an introduction and the introduction to any it's called the introduction of the writer he says that he found a medish and like many midrashim over the years this is before the printing press everything was copied from one manuscript to another manuscript by hand. So therefore, if something was lost, it was sometimes lost for for eternity or at least for many many years until it would be discovered because there was no printing press. Everything had to be copied from an previous handwritten manuscript. So there are many medrashim and and works that were lost unfortunately through the long history of the Jewish people. The wanderings, the exiles, the persecutions, the decrees and so forth. This is a medish he found quoted. He says, "I've been looking for the source. I don't know the original source, but he publishes it over there and it's been quoted and requ of the commentators based on this." And there he brings a fourway debate about the most important. Let's see. Ben was also part of the argument. He was also a contemporary of a benaz. He also went into the orchard with them. He says we have found a verse that is even more encompassing. The wordal comes from the word cole which means inclusive right a prat is an individual and a is a collective. So I have a verse that is even more. It's more collective. It's more encompassing of the mitzvah of Yiddish. You see how well our women did here today? Pretty good. No, we have a we have a benan comes the son of Nanos and he says no. We have a verse that is even more encompassing and he agrees with love your fellow like you love yourself. Okay. He says this is even more encompassing than interesting in the competition between these two verses says triumphs shim the son of py says we have a verse that is even more encompassing and that is a verse in this week's para theory says One sheep you shall offer in the morning, one lamb you shall offer in the afternoon. This is the mitzvah recorded in known as the carbon tit every single day in the mishk and later in the bikdash. There was an offering in the morning and an offering in the afternoon 365 days a year. Shabas holidays Sunday through Shabas every day. This is known as themed which means consistent perpetual. This was the lamb in the morning, the lamb in the afternoon. This is the most encompassing verse of the whole more than more than more than debate who's right a particular reb. And that name obviously was lost in his manuscript. So he just writes pay which is which means somebody we don't have the name stood up on his legs on his feet the law follows shimi the most encompassing vital verse is the lamb in the morning and the lamb in the afternoon and I'll prove it to you the says in parish tells to build a sanctuary ary and he says I'm going to show you the image the tavvenness is the structure of the mishk and the structure of all of its vessels all of its pieces of furniture how to build the exterior of the mishkan how to build the interior of the mishkan how to design all of its vessels and so shall you do this is his proof that shiman ben pazi is correct now obviously this entire medish quoted by instruction is quite enigmatic. I can understand well the contribution of which in many ways was a sociological revolution a revolution in our entire understanding of society and human relationships. Love your fellow like you love yourself. We can appreciate the great contribution which Benazi focuses on. The human being was created in the image of Hashem. If the first is a revolution in sociology, the second is a revolution in psychology. And that is that the human being is not just a random inconsequential valueless blimp on the surface of infinity. A random heap of trillion cells that came about mindlessly and by mistake. but rather every person is formed in the image of his or her creator. It tells you about the value of life, the value of a person, the infinity of the soul. And this is non-negotiable. It's absolute. These are the foundations of life. These are the foundations of how to understand the human being and his or her place in our cosmos, in our society. that we understand. We can appreciate of course the indispensable contribution of Israel which is the opinion of Ben Z who says this was a revolution not only in sociology and psychology but also in philosophy in theology the basis of monotheism we all come from one source there is a oneness in the universe hashem hashem is one our creator is one and therefore there's a singular code that binds all of us. There's a singular truth that we're all part of. We're all part of this oneness of and this revolution of Israel essentially is one that is responsible for the entire idea of the oneness of the universe and of course also the oneness of humanity. In many ways, the three opinions are not even arguing so much because each of them is so deeply connected with the other one. They're really all deeply interconnected because when you think about it, is really a statement about the nonduality of the universe. In other words, when we look at the universe at first glance, there is so much duality. There's so much diversity. Everything is splintered. Everyone is fragmented. Everybody is on their own. That's what nature looks like from the physical perspective. As we spoke last week says about the Jewish people, they eclipse the eye of the earth. They introduced a deeper vision rather than the vision than the eye than the perspective than the shaing of earthiness. And that is that essentially everything is oneness. Everything is divine energy. That idea that we are I am separate from you. You are separate from me. We are separate from each other. That is a very external vision. Really there's nonduality. Non-duality means everything is as the says there's nothing outside of him as the said in gut is gut. So why are we different and we are different and I'm standing here and you're sitting there and the answer of course is each one of us is like an antenna that channels a particular dimension of God's light through the prism called self. But we can often mistaken that and just hijack the energy and make it believe that it's just mine and I'm disconnected from everybody else when really each of us is channeling a particular dimension of Hashem's energy through our individuated identity through the chemistry of our mind, our body, our psyche, our soul and our heart. And that is ultimately God having a human experience through us. So you are infinite consciousness having a human experience. Infinite consciousness having a finite experience. So is really talking about the truth of existence all oneness. As a result of that as a result of that you understand everyone is a mirror. Everyone is a reflection and you're mirroring the light that is mirrored through you as I am mirroring the light that is mirrored through me. And that's why we all need each other because nobody has the entire light and together we recreate that oneness. That's all very very powerful and from this you build an entire perspective of life and live that way and it's life-changing. The surprising thing is the last opinion. The last opinion, it's a mitzvah every day to bring a lamb in the morning and a lamb in the afternoon. I get it. It's one of the mitzvah. 613 mitzvah. But if you're going there, maybe you should say not to wear shnas. Don't wear a jacket that has wool and linen. A naz shouldn't cut his hair. You shouldn't eat cheeseburgers. That's also a mitzvah. You shouldn't eat spinach on kipper. I mean, there's 613 mitzvah. Shim says not none of these. My vote is a lamb in the morning and a lamb in the afternoon. And if you already want to talk about there was so many offerings that were brought on Shabas offerings offering Shimipper sukus pes every holiday had special offerings called carbon musf. There were sin offerings there were asham offerings. the toid offering schlum so many different categories. So why this one in our portion there's many many others. This is what he brings. What's even more astounding is that the med concludes this is the he stood up on his feet and he said now this is also strange. Why did he stand up on his feet? Throughout all of the debates we have many times that the Talmud concludes this is the but here it's not just this is he stood up on his feet as though if he would say it when he was sitting it wouldn't work. Why am he say what happened to me? He stood up on his feet, maybe he got very excited. But the fact that this is recorded in the medish means that it's an essential element of the story. So now if I ask you what is the summation of Judaism, it's not the one that speaks about love or monotheism or the dignity and glory and infinite value of the human being. The foundations of ethics, the foundations of morality, the foundations of civil civilization, these have failed in the ultimate competition. It's the verse that tells us to bring a lamb in the morning and the afternoon. This became the representative of the foundation. What is the foundation and the backbone of Yiddishkite? One of the great seinal thinkers of Yiddishkite I mentioned earlier is known as the Maharal of Prague. Maharal of Prague lived one century after the author of Ayakov. Raenu Yakov bin Kav I told you lived in the 15th century in the 1400s. The Maral lived in the 16th century. His name was Rab Yehuda Leva. Maharal is Marenu Harav. Rabenu Leva. Rabi Yehuda Leva. He's called the Maharal. And he was the chief rabbi of Prague, Czechoslovakia. He was born in 1525 and he passed away in 169. Now he was a author of many many works. They're very profound, complex philosophical works. The language is also difficult. Living a century later, he quotes this maj from the and he asks this question and he gives a fascinating and I would say marvelous, marvelous answer. It's not just an answer. It gives us really a perspective of how the sages understood really the essence of Yiddish. A number of years ago, the British chief, former British chief rabbi, Rabbi Jonathan Sax of blessed memory wrote an essay on paras and he also uh focused on this medish and brought it out in his own way and I was struck when I read it a number of years ago how he began his essay. I'm going to read a few quotes. This is how he began this essay on Pinas. Beethoven, one of the most famous composers in history, rose each morning at dawn and he made himself a coffee. He was very, very consistent about this. Each cup had to be made with exactly 60 coffee beans, which he counted out each time. He would then sit at his desk and compose music until 2:00 p.m. or 3:00 p.m. in the afternoon from dawn till the afternoon. Subsequently, he would go for a long walk ting with him a pencil and some sheets of music paper to record any ideas that came to him on the way. Each night after supper, he would have a beer, smoke a pipe, and go to bed early, 1000 p.m. at the latest. Emanuel Kant considered one of the most brilliant philosophers of modern times was famous for his routine. Getting up, drinking coffee, writing, giving lectures, taking a walk, eating, everything had its time. And the neighbors knew precisely that the time was 3:30 p.m. when K when Emanuel Khan stepped outside his door with his gray coat and the Spanish stick in his hand. You could set your clock to 3:30 seeing when he came out of the house. These details together with more than 150 other examples drawn from the stories of philosophers, artists, composers, and writers each who made a huge contribution to the world come from a book by Mason Curry entitled Daily Rituals: How Great Minds Make Time, Find Inspiration, and Get to Work. And the point of the book is very simple. Most creative people who are successful have daily rituals. These form the soil in which the seeds of their invention grow. Note the paradox. Rabbi Sax writes, "These were all innovators, pioneers, groundbreakers, trailblazers, formulated new ideas, originated new forms of expression, did things no one had done before, at least not in that way. They broke the mold. They changed the landscape. They ventured into the unknown. Yet their daily lives were the opposite. Ritualized and routine. One can even call them boring. Why? Because genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. The fact is that the pathbreaking research, the widely successful new product, the brilliant novel, the award-winning film, the almost or the great music are almost always the result of many years of long hours and attention to detail. Being creative involves hard, consistent work. I quote this because it gives us a very good background and introduction to what the moral of Prague says to explain this medish. Let's see it in the Maharal. You could see the last source. The moral has a book called Pathways of Eternity. Pathway of loving your friend. Chapter one. Omari Beni says this is an even more important quality of principle of why it's the idea that the person serves Hashem with complete and continuous consistency. He defines himself or she defines himself as a servant. Just like a servant does not take off a day. He doesn't sometimes say today I'm not an anymore. I'm done. The definition of an EV now often in society was in a very negative way in times when slavery was part of reality until Lincoln came in the United States of America and liberated the slaves. What is the definition of slavery which we loathe and abhore? It's the idea that the person is not in their own domain. They're working for somebody not just on a contract. Well, that an evidia or Jewish slave was for six years and after six years you go free unless you wanted to stay but the general idea of avdus is I'm an evid means it's day in it's day out there's no exception you had shabas you had yumpt if nobody was allowed to work etc but generally this is the idea of e so the moral says it's the consistency that the person is always an of This verse was sp speaking about the carbon in the morning and in the evening. This is the cloud of because the ultimate purpose is that the person redefineses themselves as a servant of Hashem. Meaning it's 24/7. All the rest of the is a commentary on this. Why is it a commentary on this? Every mitzvah is just another tool. It's another mechanism. It's another expression. It's another way of serving the creator completely. So each mitzvah is another way of facilitating this, of executing it, of implementing it. BUT THE CORE is a lamb in the morning, a lamb in the afternoon and it's tmed which means every single morning, every single afternoon. What is the moral saying here? He's saying something that is extremely simple but also extremely profound. What the moral is telling us is the other verses is a revolutionary idea. You could talk about it for 70 years. You could talk about it for 100 years. You could talk about it for a thousand years and still not grasp the full depth and infinity of this idea. The non dual the nondual nature of the universe. The same is true with the same is true with the fact that the human being was created in the image of Hashem. All these as we said revolutionize our perspective our hashkafa on the world on people and ourselves sociology theology philosophy psychology and so forth but the moral is saying what chimazi is teaching us is that the ultimate power of yiddeshkite is the but why and His insight is because all the other verses are talking about ideas. They are all perspectives, important foundational perspectives. They give rise to the entire hashkaf and constitution of yiddishk and all of the mitzvah. But the real power of the Jew and the real power of Yiddish is the consistency, the loyalty, the dedication, the belonging, the fact that the person defines themselves as the moral puts it here as an evashem, as a servant of Hashem which never seizes. There's no day or moment or second or hour and I say that I'm out of this domain. Now this I think needs a little clarification and explanation. what the moral I think is teaching us here at least the way I understand it today at least one aspect of it and that is often this could seem like a terrible pressure it's such a burden call it an ev I'm not a slave right freedom is something we cherish so deeply I'm a free person I decide my life I decide who I want to marry I decide how I want to live how how my schedule shall be I don't want to work for somebody else And even if I'm working for somebody else, still I want it on my terms, I want it to make sense for me. I want it to benefit me. And if I don't enjoy it, I'm going to leave. That's why the concept of aus of slavery is seen and rightfully as such a negative thing. One person owns another person. Why should you own me? Right? That was the abhorance of slavery that one person should never be owned by another person. I don't want to be owned by you. I can't own you. If you work for me, okay, if there's a normal deal and transaction where I benefit and you benefit, fine. That's all the that's how business works. You have employers, you have employees with the rights of both. But there's a huge difference between being anem and being a slave to another person. As the says, you're my servants. You're not slaves of other slaves. When you're a slave of a person, you're a slave of a slave. when you're my servant, you're my servant. Why is that any better? And this is what the moral is teaching us here. What the power of this really is? And here we'll see why this really is the essence of Israel. It's the essence of it's the essence of but it's the essence of these verses the way it's actually play the way it plays out actuality on a daily basis from hour to hour minute to minute second to second and even millisecond to millisecond because what it means to be an evid hashem what does it really mean it means literally that you're living in flow of life when we use the word god There's a mistake here in Tanakh. You'll never find the word God. The word God comes from much later. It comes from the Greeks and different philosophies. The problem with that word is God becomes a noun, an entity. There's a beimma, there's a table, there's a cup, there's a drink, there's a tissue box, there's a person, and it's God. Now, you may say God is big, God is strong, God is the creator, God is infinite. But it right away puts God versus me. That's a mistake. We need to liberate ourselves from that. What is when we say the word hashem? The word that's always used for example in the cabal is an means it's reality. Instead of using the word god use the word reality. Where is reality and that is everything is part of reality. Are you part of reality? I hope so. So in other words, who is God? Everybody. We are all living in reality. We are all parts of reality. We're all extensions of reality. We are all manifestations of reality. So now imagine there's a plug plugged into the wall. And the plug is channeling the electricity that comes from the outlet in the wall into your refrigerator or into your computer or into your vacuum cleaner or in the summer months into your air conditioner. And the plug complains and says plug and the plug complains and says, "I don't want to be a slave anymore. I WHY DO I HAVE TO BE CONNECTED TO THAT WALL? I AM DONE. I WANT to be free to roam the world. I would like to go to New Zealand for 6 months, to Peru for 6 months, to China for another few weeks, maybe to the Congo. I'll maybe visit even Hawaii and Los Angeles, maybe even come to New York for a couple of hours. Why should I forever be stuck and bound up to that wall, not having the ability to move? So you ask the plug, "What would you want me to do?" The plug says, "Set me free. I'm done with this wall." And of course, you pull the plug out of the wall. And the wall, the plug is about TO SCREAM, "FREE AT LAST. FREE AT LAST." The only problem is at this point, it's dead. The electricity is not coming through it. The refrigerator is dead. The computer is dead. The AC is dead. The vacuum cleaner is dead. Having the plug in the wall is not a punishment. It's actually what allows it to channel the energy that it can channel to bring life to whatever it's giving life to. And when we unplug it, what we're doing is the plug is now just a dead wire. Imagine a leaf on a tree and the leaf sees you walking down the tree and the we leaf tells you, "I am jealous of you. Why? You're walking around and I'm attached to this tyrant to this dictator called a tree always holding on to me. Who does the tree think I am? Who think he is? I'm a slave. So you ask the leaf, my dear leaf, what would you like? GET ME OUT OF THIS TREE. I WANT TO BE ON MY OWN. I'M A TEENAGER. I'm independent. Mommy, stop mixing into my life. Don't tell me where to be, what to be, who I should be friends with. I WANT TO GO TO ANOTHER TREE. So you say, "No problem." and you tear the leaf off the tree and the leaf now starts is now on the ground and starts dancing. And then a few hours later you come and you see that the leaf is near one of the drains in the corner about to be lured into the sewer system. Its color changed and you look at the leaf and you say goodbye. What was the mistake of the leaf? The tree was not its dictator or its tyrant. The tree is its life. The leaf is not disconnected from the tree. The leaf was growing by the tree. It is what allows it to be a beautiful, beautiful leaf. Just like the wire, when we talk about a relationship with Hashem, we have to change often the CD in our heads. It's often experienced as a form of servitude, of negative surrender. Instead of being you, authentic, independent, creative, powerful, free, now you're an eved. You're a slave. YOU DON'T OWN YOURSELF. OH GOD, WHAT DO I DO NOW? OH, WHAT DO I DO NOW? OH, THIS YOU CAN'T EAT. What else can't I do? I'll give you another 365 rules that you can do. That's not very exciting. And in fact, this is one of the things that bothers a lot of people because they completely misunderstand. It's not their fault. Often it's presented that way. So, it's not anybody's fault, but it's often completely misunderstood. To be a servant of God, of Hashem, is like saying you are plugged in to the source of life. You're channeling your own source of life. The leaf is connected to the tree. The wire is channeling the electricity. It would be like another example would be the heart one day meets the kidney and the heart tells the kidney, I'm also fed up with the brain. This little guy JELLO JELLO TWO POUNDS GARNISHED WITH ONE PINKY we could crush HIM AND HE TELLS US EVERYTHING 24/7 HE tells the heart what to do the kidney do the spleen what to DO WHAT TO DO IS WHO MAY WHO DIED AND MADE HIM KING AND IT'S NOT LIKE HE'S A STRONG GUY I'M NOT EVEN AFRAID of him and all the limbs and tissue and organs and bones and cells convene together and they decide to overthrow the brain and get rid of him so they can be free at last free at last. You know the end of that story, right? A healthy person knows there's oneness. The brain is not your dictator. We are all extensions. It's a manifestation. For any part of the body to be fully alive, it's through being in complete sync and alignment with the brain. The brain is not your enemy. You're all one. Literally one. It's like somebody saying, you know, I hate my genes. I hate my genes. There's only one problem. You are your jeans. There's no other eye. This is either I make peace with or I don't make peace with it. The great truth of life is we are all plugged in to life. The world is alive. It's life. It's infinite. It's very very much alive. To be an Hashem means you're not a slave. You're alive. You're in flow. You're channeling the oneness of the universe. You're literally plugged in. And when you're plugged in, you channel all the power, all the creativity. That's why this says it says in the beginning of the par you should take from and the the question the mafaram say is you don't take contributions, you give contributions. Right? Nobody comes to you for fundraising and they say please take for me charity. Give don't take. The answer is no. It's because actually when you're plugging your wire into the wall, you're taking, you're receiving. It means you're going into the consistency. You're going into the frequency of flow. You're actually channeling. So as much as you're giving, you're actually taking. And because the source is infinite, you could never take too much. There's always more and more and more to take. By plugging yourself in deeper and deeper, by surrendering the ego more and more, you take more and more and more. And this is the key difference between one form of avodus and another form of aus. There's a slavery which wants you to be less. Give yourself up to me. Now I own you. That is degrading. It's denigrating. It's abusive. It's not something anybody would want for themselves or for their loved ones or for anybody else. Is the exact opposite. As the Mishna says, it becomes freedom comes through. Why? The answer is because the greatest freedom you can give yourself is when you're fully plugged in to your own source of life. Just like the greatest freedom any limb can have is when you're fully integrated with your brain. And for shalom. We all know when there's a when there is an interruption between the commands of the brain and the rest of the body that is illness and ultimately the opposite of life. So the greatest form of self-expression is when you're fully yourself. When I am in an ego mode, ego as in easing God out, I'm not fully myself. I'm actually detached from the source of life. It's like the leaf away from the tree. Now, when the leaf is off the tree, imagine the leaf now has to make a new life for itself. So, the leaf is now looking for validation. Could somebody tell me that I'm great? So, the leaf is literally roaming around the streets. Could somebody give me some attention? And that's what we often do. What the leaf didn't understand is that by detaching itself from its source, it lost its true vitality. It doesn't need its substitute life. It's like the wire detached and now the wire is looking for a new validation. When you're plugged in, you're channeling the greatest electricity in the world. There's only one source of electricity. And those electrons never die. Even when the plug is unplugged, it's not like the electrons die. They just go back to their source. The question is if I'm channeling it or I'm not channeling it. So what it means to channel it is that I actually let go of all the parts of me that see themselves as separate from Hashem, as detached, as disconnected, as just this lifeless leaf looking for a new life. And I go in to source. And now I surrender my separateness to oneness so that I can channel infinity. What can be more alive than channeling infinity? What can be more creative than channeling creator? That was good. What can be more creative than channeling creator? You can get more creative. What can be more regulating than being a channel for the source of life and trust and love and bliss? What can be more powerful for children or grandchildren in your home when mom or grandma or whoever it is is actually present fully without defensiveness, without any insecurity, without the need to cover up, without the need to disassociate because the leaf is just channeling the energy of the tree. The wire is channeling the electrons of the anciph. The body is channeling the energy of the brain in beautiful synchronization. And even if the wire gets unplugged, it knows how to go back in. That's what we call chuva. So the QUESTION IS, HOW OFTEN DO YOU WANT TO BE plugged into the source of life? 1 hour a day, 3 hours a day. How often do I want love to channel through me? How often do I want truth to channel through me? How often? an hour, 20 minutes, and then I want to go on vacation. Now, plug me out. I want TO BE LIKE DEAD, DISASSOCIATED, FRAGMENTED. Any person who's somewhat in tuned to any of their truth knows 24/7. There's nothing more blissful, there's nothing more meaningful than that. I don't want to be unplugged. Sorry. I mean, sometimes it happens. And even then, I'm not really unplugged. I'm just going through the stage that I have to go through in order to be able to learn the lessons I need to learn. That's what it means. The EV is always anem. It's 24/7 of being in flow. Being in flow always from the moment I wake up, I say, "God, fasten your seat belt. We're going to have an unbelievable day. Maybe hopefully it's going to be a ferris wheel. Maybe it's going to be a roller coaster. Some of us like the ferris wheel, you know, you go aai slow, you know, the ferris wheel, right? That's sometimes life. And the ferris wheel stops. Yeah. You write on the top, it stops, right? The are taking pictures. The Jews are saying vidu and writing their tavas. And they want to know why it broke and when they're going to die. And they're sending messages to their family. I love you. Don't worry. Whatever. And the go are taking pictures. The Jews are frightened. They're calling the kadesh. And then finally the ferris wheel goes and sometimes the day is like a roller coaster a super dupal loop. I don't know if you ever go on roller coasters, but up and down, up and down. It goes upside down. It's just a minute ride, right? But it seems like a thousand years. But I'm going to stay in flow. And stay in flow means present, openhearted, holding space for everything that comes up and remembering that I do not have to detach and go into a defensive ego modality where I need to doubt myself every single moment and do things to create a substitute for my true reality which is a manifestation of Hashem. And that's why the word evid is used. The garra says the servant of a true the hand the arm of a true servant is like an extension of the master's hand. The garra says melik the servant of the king is the king. Why servant of the king is not the king. He's a servant of the king because a real eid means that my identity is surrendered to the source. So now actually I become an extension of the source. So in the in the case of humans it's not a very good idea. Why are you surrendering your individuality, your talents, your charisma, your charm, your personality to someone else who wants to control you? And that's why we try to prevent that the doesn't look at servitude in a very very positive positive note to be an of it actually makes you a meal. Now you're the king. You're the queen. Why should you want to give that up even for a few minutes of the day of being the king and the queen? The abdus hashem is not where you surrender yourself to a dictator who's now going to control you. It means that you actually plug into your own source of energy because there's only one energy that defines us all. And each of us, as we said, channels it through our particular prism, through our particular identity, through our particular chem chemistry. Your antenna picks up that kiosus and channels it. That's where the soul is. So now we come back to the debate of our sages. Which which verse defines and says the real power of this type of life is the consistency, the daily routines, the fact that I show up constantly. Of course, I can wax eloquently about ideas and philosophy and psychology and theology that is enriching, that is glorifying, that is powerful, that is life-changing. And yet very often we know great visions, great classes, great lectures, great seminars, great workshops, as we return back to the daily routine, they fall apart. We all know this from our own lives. You could be sitting at this class. You could be sitting at another class. You can be going to a retreat, a seminar. You can experience something very, very powerful. People sometimes go on very profound journeys of transformation and they come out and they say, "My life is changed forever. I saw truth. SUDDENLY I FELT the nonduality of the universe. I had an ego death. Wow. Suddenly I saw WHAT MY REAL TRAUMA IS, WHAT MY REAL blockages are, and I don't want to live there anymore. I really don't want to live there." and they're sincere. But then you look three months later all back to square one. Six months later it's almost forgotten. Not that the inspiration is forgotten. But we have to understand what that is. It's not that people are insincere or inauthentic. It's that ultimately we go back to default mode. We have our coping mechanisms that have been created. We have our structures. We have our modalities. We have what we call templates. The tavveness, the structure tavis hamishkan, everybody has their structure. Our neurons create pathways from the earliest moments of our conception already in our mother's womb and our birth. How to react to certain situations. How to react in a way that we will be able to survive. We'll be able to endure. As somebody once said, it's not my psychology that's blocking me. It's my biology. It's not an idea. is that the body literally responds to certain smells, to certain words, to certain triggers, to certain places. Sometimes you come into a certain place, you may come back to that same home and all of the emotions that once happened there are triggered and the body goes into a certain modality and the person very has even very little choice. Of course, I respond this way. This person makes a comment to you. This person, if some people when they hear criticism, it means that they're in danger. It means that their value is meaningless. Maybe they were criticized as children and it proved to them that they're needy, that they're bad, that they're weird, that they're crazy, that they're a little different. And therefore, they go they go into this very deep place of of bitterness or despondency or anger. Now, you may be 54 years old or 64 years old or 44 years old. The body still has those memories. And therefore, I may have had these beautiful ideas. I may have had these beautiful visions but ultimately I get blocked and stuck by what happens on a day-to-day basis. And this is what Benazi's brilliance was. He says I know I know I know you can experience it. But let me tell you the real power of Yiddish. It's the lamb in the morning and in the lamb in the afternoon. What a lamb in the morning, a lamb in the afternoon. What are you putting this on the same frequency of we have heard Jews in the greatest moments and in the most challenging moments say I never heard a Jew SAY why didn't that become the motto of Judaism a lamb in the morning and a lamb in the afternoon the answer is because it's one mitzvah so Shim Benazi says but I want you to know that this ultimately it may be it may sound monotonous It may sound boring. It may not sound very creative or revolutionary. But this is where real change happens. This is where the real real person emerges. This is where the consistency creates literally changes in our neurons. The neuroplasticity can kick in. The lamb in the morning, the lamb in the afternoon, it's minute by minute showing up being present. When I come home and my wife says something, my children say something, a sibling says something, a parent, a child, a grandchild, a text message, a WhatsApp, and in that very very simple moment, nothing dramatic happened. But right now, I can tune into my body and I can go into two modes. I can fall prey to the template that has been there for so many years where I disassociate or I detach or I go into self-lame or self-contempt or self-hate or self-shame or aggression or avoidance or denial or repression or suppression. Do you know what all these words mean? Okay, you could look them all up. They all have interesting meanings. I know them from myself. Some of you may know them from others or from yourself. But each of them are different responses to things and they all make sense. In fact, it's what allowed us to survive for so many years. Or at that moment, I could say, I'm now going to take my lamb. I'm going to take my animal consciousness and offer it to I'm going to offer my lamb, my animal consciousness to and it's a lamb. A lamb is a very, very delicate animal. It's not an ox. It's not a goat. It's not a undomemesticated beast. As it says in says that they arouse compassion. You ever heard the cry of a lamb? There's something very very adidal about it. It's even an adela animal. There's something very delicate about it. They call it docsel right submissive surrender. Because our relationship with our animal consciousness is not one of destroy it, get angry at it, hate it, shame it. No, it's actually being makit. is offer it to the it's holding on to the little lamb inside of us and understand that it's a lamb. It's a sheep and maybe I had to become a sheep in life in order to survive. That's those of us who become people's pleasers. In Yiddish they call it a shepher I know is an endearing term but it also sometimes means a sheep. Sheep follow the herd. Sheep are very spineless. Sheep just do what others do. Sheep are not very stubborn. So sometimes I had to become that person in order to be able to feel that that's how I'm going to survive. If I could please people, if everybody will like me, everybody will smile to me. If I'll be the quintessential sheep, so nobody can ever have any issues with me. And that becomes my template. But inside a certain part of me can die. Sometimes we respond in opposite ways. Everybody with their own type of animal soul. Some of our animal souls are like goats, very stubborn and absinate. Some of them are like oxes, aggressive, fight, and some of them are like sheep. Flight, freeze, f, whatever it is, especially take that and offer it right now. Say, I'm actually offering it as a carbon to the I feel it. I know it. But instead of responding in that old template where I need to become either insecure or defensive, egotistical or ashmata, which is all a form of detachment, I can actually remain present and say this is my offering to Hashem, meaning my offering to the an offering to infinity, my offering to reality, my plugging in to become a channel by surrendering the fear and insecurity and neediness to remain separate from from the source of life separate from being a real channel of authenticity and of love and of courage and of fearlessness. And the Tyra says it's and it's in the morning and it's in the evening because that is also a major part of it. We all have times in our life when the sun is shining. There's clarity. It's daytime. You see things clearly. You know who you are. You know who you're not. You have that inner knowing. You have a clarity because your sun is shining. That's bab. But there's also bayarbay. Bayaray means the sun is soon going to set. It's late. It's afternoon or late afternoon. It's getting darker. There are times when I don't have clarity. There are times when I'm struggling with something. There are times I don't even know exactly who I am. And certainly my feelings and my moods may be sle down. I may be struggling with something. I may be struggling either with a mood or with anxiety. I may be struggling with a sense of blondness and monotony. I may be struggling even with an addiction or a craving. I may be struggling with a certain form of behaviors that are simply slapping me down and I don't even get all of this. I may not even relate to any of this. Sometimes you relate to it. You actually are excited about it. And sometimes it's comes to and says that's the power of Yiddish. I can offer the lamb not only in the morning. Oh, even when there's murkiness, there's darkness, there's a cloud, there's a fog that comes down and can eclipse my inner vision, my third eye, my inner clarity. I'm on a fog. It's Bayar Bayam. It's soon going to be night. It's not dark yet, but it's getting there. And we all know those moments still then I could still show up with my Kev with my lamb and offer it as a carbon and go into flow because going into flow doesn't necessarily mean that everything in my system is perfectly singing the song of kadesh. Sometimes going into flow is a simple statement to myself that right now what's going to come out of my mouth is going to channel my infinity. The behavior that I'm going to do right now is going to channel my infinity. The thoughts that I'm going to go into as the BMP of one said is the same letters like the thoughts that I'm going to go into are going to be thoughts that channel this dimension. And even though there's so many other parts and there's darkness and there's confusion and I may not have clarity even then I could still take the Kev the lamb inside of me and offer it to Hashem be an evashem and ask what does it mean to be a servant of Hashem right now in these circumstances in these situations and that's why in the whole debate the medish at the end says that Rabi Py Raglov he stood up on his feet and he said puzzi. He stood up on his feet. The feet represent the lowest part of the body. What do they call in the military language? Boots on the ground. The feet channel action into the lowest part of the ground. He stood up on his feet and he said, he said, "I know in my head, in our head, there can be other verses. In our heart there could be other verses but in order to bring it down all the way to planet earth to bring it down to your ground to your earthiness stand on your feet to have a real foundation on the ground not just but that's when to really integrate things in our daily life. It's about the daily habits routines rituals which are very very small. They're not grand. They're not big. They're not very philosophical. Only you know them inside of yourself. What do I do right when I wake up in the morning? What do I do the next hour? What do I do the next hour? What do I do the next hour? Those small little decisions, everyone in their own schedule. Am I channeling infinity or am I going into defensiveness? Am I going into my insecurity and my darkness? Or am I going into becoming the posture of an evid hashem? Even if there's still some chaos and some disagreements inside of me. And this is the truth about especially and those of you who are artistically inclined and I know a lot of people who uh come to this class are artistically inclined or even great artists in their own right whatever field that is it becomes even more relevant and powerful because artists generally are very moody people. I speak from experience but that's how God made it. There are people who are more ao I don't know what's the word uh >> yeah they have very very grounded regiment you know I don't want to tick tock tick tock not in the sense of tic-toac but like every minute is accounted for they follow a schedule and nothing is going to deviate them from the schedule the fact that there are emotional experiences and you got a text message this morning from ply almighty good you move on with your day and then there are other people. They're not like that. They're very deeply sensitive. They feel things. HSPs, right? Highly sensitive people, impaths. They can't just move on and say, you know, I have 100 things to get done. Every Jewish to-do list has 100 things to get done every single day. If you're not so strict, it's 94 things. And if your mama is chilled, it's like 89 things. Of course, at the end of the day, if you finished four, you're pretty ahead of the game, right? I usually did one, but if you finished four, you're pretty ahead of the game. But if you're an impath and you're sensitive and you feel people and you feel things, experience it, they touch you, they affect you. And sometimes they can really bring us down into that space. And truly artistic people know this. You know, they like to stay up late at night because they can't just go to sleep. There's too much on their head. And also they love in the middle of the night when everybody's asleep and there's no telephone calls and there's less distraction. And that that's when some people come to life. And in that experience, people often make the mistake and they don't realize the power of this teaching. And that is I wrote this down this morning. Consistency forms the soil in which the seeds of creativity blossom. Consistency forms the soil in which the seeds of creativity blossom. Of course, you need seeds of creativity. Seeds of creativity is where the plant comes from. But if those seeds don't have the soil in which they are deposited, there's going to be nothing that grows. People who are very artistic, they're very spiritual, they're very alive, they're creative, they're wise, they're smart, they're talented in different ways and in different areas, but they don't manage to create that consistency in their life. What often happens is things get squandered. Creativity gets squandered. Their true power and momentum is never realized. I've seen it with a lot of people who are wise and deep, great conversationalists and really wisdom, but they didn't have the discipline and the bit and the surrender to serve Hashem with this consistency. Too much going on. THERE'S TOO MUCH IN their heads. There's too much in their hearts. And that's why he says don't make that mistake is true is true but is true but you want to know the power of yishkite morning and afternoon in rainy days and in sunny days in amazing exhilarating days and in challenging days in days when I'm on top in the world the world and days when sometimes I feel I'm in the abyss days that I'm on a ferris wheel or days I'm on a roller coaster days when I feel the beauty of life and have so much to be grateful for and days when I'm experiencing also a lot of the pain of life and various challenges and difficulties and in all of those days as the morning shines and the sun comes out as the sun is about to set there's the consistency of a hashem and what is avoid avoid means the ability to be able to show up to the deepest truth of me to the deepest truth of my soul to the deepest this truth of my divinity to trust not my anxiety but my divinity. As we spoke a few weeks ago in the spies trusted their anxiety not their divinity to be able to trust my divinity and not my anxiety. And as a result of that becomes the consistency that all great people and simple people and everyone is great in their own way understands that it's those moments that really give you the power. Now at first glance it doesn't seem that way because it's like oh here we go again and again and again. It's the same thing. But when you understand that this is really where things happen. This is where your creativity gets planted. It goes into the soil. It has a foundation for it to blossom. Every whenever you make resolutions in life, changes in your life. You want to open yourself up to new things. Great. But always ask yourself what happens the next day? What happens the next week? What happens the next month? what happens the next year because that's where everything either takes root into the soil of consistency which will then change your neurons and transform your life or it becomes like a dream like gone with the wind. It fades away into oblivion and what remains are the elements of inspiration but they didn't become concretized araglov in my feet in my legs we see this in a very fascinating way with laser technology laser technology is a brilliant technology I had surgery some time ago I told you and I had it I it was done with laser technology so they literally get into the depth of your eye to the retina and they make changes without any physical contact. What is laser technology? Can literally do surgeries. You can pierce through diamonds with laser technology. Everything in the world emits light and light is very powerful. However, the light gets squandered in all of directions. Light goes into all directions. So, its power is not unified and harnessed. What laser technology does, it limits the squandering, the dissemination of the light and it channels and harnesses all the light to go into one narrow direction. So you would think that's what slavery is. The light wants to spread all over, right? Yutsu. And now you're taking the light and you're like limiting it and forcing it to GO IN ONE DIRECTION. STOP. STOP DICTATING my light. But what happens then? The light finds all of its power. All of its momentum is now unleashed because it's not frazzled and fragmented and dispersed in all directions. AND WITH THAT POWER, YOU could perform surgeries. With that power, you could pierce through some of the hardest substances in the world. And that's exactly what the moral is talking about when he says to be an evashem. You would think this mitzvah limits me and this mitzvah limits me and this I can't do today and this I can't DO TODAY. I JUST WANT TO BE A FREE PERSON. YOU HAVE TO BE careful because there's a type of freedom that expresses your essence and there's a type of freedom that just squanders my energy at the end of the day. I did whatever I want but I feel empty. You know those days? You remember when you were a teenager and you were finally looking forward. School will end and nobody will tell you what to do. I went to wake up. I want to wake up 4:00 in the afternoon and not have anybody telling me anything. And then you wake up 4 in the afternoon. Day in day out day in day out. You should feel like the freest person in the world. And something inside of you says, "I don't know. Why do I feel like a schmata? Why do I feel like so empty? Why do I feel so depleted? I'm so free. Nobody has me in chains. I COULD DO WHATEVER I WANT. I SHOULD BE THE HAPPIEST person in the world." This is what we see in our generation. The happiest, freesty. I don't know from where, from what. Everybody does whatever they want. As far as I know, nobody's allowed to tell anybody what to do anymore. SO EVERYBODY SHOULD BE SO HAPPY. SO HAPPY. THE FREEST GENERATION HAS SO MUCH anxiety because there's no way a person could truly be internally content if they are not plugged in to their own life energy. If I'm not plugged into my own life energy, I feel empty. I feel detached. I'm the leaf detached from the tree. I'm the limb detached from the brain. I'm the plug detached from the source. I feel terribly like there's an emptiness. I'm not alive and I can only be plugged in when I surrender my separateness and my ego to the source and live it. So all the prohibitions in Yiddish are not prohibitions to squander destroy your light. It's to harness your energy. It's to help you see the depth of who you are. There was an Indian poet who once gave a marvelous marvelous parable. He said, "Imagine the cords of a violin are tied down and the cords of the violin tell you, please untie me so that I can be free." So you take a scissor and a knife and you untie the cords of the violin. And the chords of the violin go out into the beautiful weather and they're in the breeze. The chords are soaring and flying. And then say, "Come play me a most beautiful song." And you take the violin and you start playing and you know what happens, right? Nothing. No music comes out. It's only when the chords are tied down that they can produce the most eloquent and exquisite music. When the chords are untied, there is no music. This is so true about every human life which is a violin. Levy sings, I am a harp to your musical. Shahav borrowed the phrase from in the Lamentations of Tishab. We are all kino. We are all harps. When I tie down my chords, I'm not tying down and crushing my soul. I'm allowing my music to be released. If my chords are just flying all over the place, what happens? My music doesn't come out. My fragmentation comes out. My moods come out. My anxiety comes out. Only when my chords are tied down, actually my music comes out. That's when a person's internal music comes out. You wanted to say something. Very good. Laser focused. Exactly. Exactly. And that's why and here we come to the last point. He brings the PK to prove it. What's the idea? Hashem tells I'm going to show you the image of the Mishk. I'm going to show you the image of all the vessels in your mind. You will see the image of everything. You will see what a Mishk for Hashem is. But then he says two words. Make sure you actually build it. Make sure you execute. Make sure you implement it. But that's a whole different job. That's very, very tedious. You all know you imagined homes in your mind, right? It's easy to build a home in your mind. A lot of people in Muny did that. But now deal with a contractor. That's a whole other para, right? If it takes three years, you're lucky. Some are waiting till beiach because there's a very big difference between the vision and my mind. And the tasu the tasu is very very monotonous. It's about routine. It's about daily ritual. It's about consistency. And it's not in one shot. It's every day showing up in that particular individuated way and knowing that that's where it is says Puzzi. Don't get discouraged. You want TO LIKE FLY BACK TO THE COLLECTIVE to the global truth. It's much more gishmak. But you know where things happens in the I once read there was a great great golfer and they asked him what is the secret of your success ever you take you go play golf and you just amazing incredible and he once said he said I have good luck I have good good good masle but here's the interesting thing the more I train and the more I practice the better my luck and that's where it's not about inspiration but it becomes perspiration. Inspiration is amazing but consistency is the soil in which the seeds of creativity can grow and blossom. Have a beautiful and wonderful week. >> This class is brought to you by the yeshiva.net. 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