The Era of the Prophets: A Time Unlike Any Other in Jewish History - Rabbi Menashe Bleiweiss

history. We're in the fifth session of our crash course and we are holding by the period that's known as the Scha team, the judges. And we talked about this a little bit. You recall? Yeah. So the judges, this is now AmIst Israel is in Erit Israel. They're in the land and the project still remains to fight the locals who are depraved on an extreme level. the seven Canaanite nations. The idea was they could see Hashem. Uh they could potentially become loyal to Hashem, lead ethical lives. That's an option if they would if they would uh if they would sign on in the event they most certainly didn't. They retained their pagan ways. And paganism is not just about serving idolatry. But it comes with a host of other what we would what we would describe as really unsavory problematic behaviors like the institution of the kadesh and the kadesha the male and the female prostitute which was intrinsic to almost every kind of idolatry in the world. It was intrinsic with things like child slaughter in certain cases uh all to the gods usually multiple gods and um and other kinds of what we would call barbaric rights. And we're not allowed to have that in Judaism. In fact, you can't have it initial. The land in the Torah is described as a uh like a person with extremely delicate digestive track. And if you feed it the wrong thing, in this case, sins, like idolatry, it actually regurgitates. It throws up the uh the offenders. So, you have this dynamic now with the judges, most of them righteous, many of whom many of them were distinguished individuals with with stories that we're going to maybe just quickly in passing reference to them. But uh the judges were people who came as the people strayed after their neighbors because they never got rid of their neighbors. So they they they fell into their practices. Uh the judges would come up save the people usually fight some kind of a battle against some big baddy and eventually vanquish their enemies. There'd be a period of peace. Peace doesn't always go well when the people have all these uh problematic influences all around them and the people would stray after their neighbors fall into idolatry and and the cycle uh continued through mo most of the period of the chauffeim until we finally get to the last chauffet the last judge whose name is Schmooli is he's a he's a great prophet one of the greatest of all time he's a judge he's a number of things and he'll anoint the first kings who are the first kings official kings even though Mosher Rabenu has quasi king status. Yeshua is sometimes referred to as a king but the first kings to kick off the monarchy as such. Sha is really the first king. He and his son uh and later by David who's really the the decisive king and all the legitimate kings the Jews would know would come from David and Melik. Meanwhile, the leaders are shaft. They're judges and it's an unusual period. Rever describes the period in very glowing terms. Even though the Torah, the excuse me, the Tanakh, the Bible emphasizes some of the ugly uh parts of the period, but he says that reflects nicely. Get this idea, it's really deep. He says that reflects really nicely. Who who wrote the book of Judges? Shmulvi himself. What else did he write? Another book that takes place during the period of the Shaim Roose Roose with uh with her husband Boaz who was who's identified with it, one of the lesserk known judges. But that's the same person he also wrote the third book that he wrote says. You probably haven't heard of it wrote the other book that he wrote and is that was really embarrassing on your part but I'll I'll try not to bring that up with it's keep that between us. You're welcome. So uh and you didn't even know Ruth that would make you ruthless. So uh without that last one. So um in the event the fact that could and did emphasize so many negative aspects. If you remember this is a while ago but in our last episode we talked about uh the whole sorted story of the plegish miga which almost meant almost led to civil war and the and the complete obliteration of one of the tribes of the Jews binyamin in that case. But the that was really that was the worst of the worst of the of the scenarios. But the fact that the prophet can dwell on that actually reflects the exalted nation the nature of the people of the nation itself because they could hear it they could take it. You know if if if people can't hear criticism nobody's going to stand up and criticize you. You can't give a rebuke to somebody who's incapable of hearing it. So he sees it as the positive. And this is these are all the bad points meaning everything else was quite wonderful. And he emphasizes the fact that we we could make do. We didn't need kings. We had prophets who were judges that weren't all prophets but judges who led the Jews. That meant that they were teaching Torah and they came, if you remember, from they they hailed from different tribes uh that would give way to the other one. There wasn't a lot of vying for power and leadership very gracious uh replace they replace each other in a very gracious kind of a fashion. It reflected a very uh idyllic uh positive period in history. Some of the famous judges you know about D'vorah Han right her name is unfortunate that McGill says that that reflects negatively on her she's a bumblebee she was she didn't speak with proper respect towards her husband was called it was called Barak or Lidut uh but she was a great warrior of all things and she took out one of the enemies of the Jews Cistra uh when nobody else could stand up to him she did in big battle by heartavore she would judge under her palm tree meaning she was careful with yehood not to seclude herself with any men and uh consider considered one of the finer people uh of this period. You had a figure named Gideon who was so modest he hailed from the tribe of Manasha who when he's told in no uncertain terms by Hashem that he's going to rise up and save the Jews from their enemy in his days. He resisted like any great leader. He didn't want the power. Wasn't interested in the leadership. He got rid of the uh the Bal cult. Bal was one of the big idolatry problems in their day. He also led I'll just mention this to fight the enemy Midan one of Aram's descendants children. and then the nation of Midyan to fight Midan. Uh Gidon actually um used employed certain military tactics that were unique. He uh he's the first true militia in modern terms. He was the first one to use what we would call today Molotov cocktails which are pure psychological warfare. You just put a big you put a torch in a glass that he told he told his men. They make a big noise. They don't really do much. They don't really kill the enemy. But you know most of war is psychological in that way, right? If the enem is convinced that, oh no, they've got a superior uh militia out there. They've got superior arsenals, so we're going to leave. And the the mid mid midionites just fled on mass. So, it was effective. So, he used what we would call mallet of cocktails. He used um he was the first one to dare to fight at night. Nobody did that. You know, you were scared to fight when when there was no sunlight. But he had he had Hashem on his side, right? He also led the charge. Follow me, he said, as opposed to the most of the ancient warriors, the generals would say, charge, boys, and good luck. Send us a postcard. Let us know how it turns out. The major taint on the period was a Turkey by the name of Avi Melik who uh he's the only leader of this entire period to seize power during the period that lasts about 400 years. And he seized power. It only lasted for three years before he was taken out. a woman standing by the gate with threw a threw a millstone over and and uh almost killed him and he had he had a arms barrier finished the job so it wouldn't be said that he was killed by a woman. Shimshon Hagibore Shimshon arguably the most colorful and maybe the most famous of of of the various judges. He he judges for 20 years and he was a a contradiction in terms in many ways. He was on the one hand the guttle had the great leader Torah scholar. He never used executive privilege. He didn't want anybody to fetch anything for him. His court, his basting was likened to that of Mosha and our own and schmol. That's pretty good. What was his undoing? Which part of his body? What's that? Women, particularly the eyes. His eyes were his undoing. He strayed after those women and they certainly most famously the Leila, but there were others as well. And um there's actually in modern days there's a psychological complex called shimshon complex where a man has difficulty a weakness for women even though otherwise he's an upstanding person uh not unreasonably named but he also vanquishes the enemy of the Jews the pleim the philistines were our eternal enemy during this entire period and he has great fear of hashem and he he takes them out one of the seven women prophets during this period. Anybody will try who are the seven women prophets? Thear migill tells us sorry even though all the imahos were prophets but she's singled out for her prophecy. Who's the other one in the Torah? Famous woman you know her name. Well I said all the other imos were also prophets but the seven leading women prophets Miriam. So Sarah and Miriam right in the period of the judges. So D'vorah was also a prophetist. uh in the next period that's just bordering between the prophets and the kings and I've mentioned her son's name already as the last prophet his mother was named Kana so Kana is a great figure she is u she stands in Shilo where the Mishkan is situated and she davins the cogul doesn't understand her mis misinterprets her behavior instead of sincere davining he mistakes her for a drunkard he criticizes her she said, "No, you got it all backwards." She said, "Um, you read the tumim." You know, the tumim is the breastplate, and they're given divine messages. You read it, but you don't know how to read it properly. See, you saw the letters uh shin, and you inverted them. You thought it spelled shikur, that she was drunk. When in fact, it didn't say shikor. rearranged the letters and it said that she was a I is a a kosher woman or ultimately she was she was like saru in her righteousness and her holiness and indeed she was and she dav sincerely to this great this is great agar and braos certain people spoke with um what we call it uh they threw their words to hashem with great impudence she said hashem I'd like to have a baby she didn't have a baby a lot of our great women did not have babies. Hashem desires the feel of the righteous. So she said, "We could do this one of two ways. You know, we can go the normal way. Give me a baby. That'd be nice. But I hear, you know, that may not be what your plan is. And that's fine because I can always get myself secluded with a foreign man." And of course, the the ritual of the sot involves the husband giving the wife a warning. And if she doesn't hear, he by the warning and then she continues to seclude herself with a certain man. She's taken to the in this case, the Mishkan. We're still in Shilo. We don't have a B mikdash just yet. and she has to drink uh a certain concoction and it involves erasing Hashem's holy name. Well, that would be a shame, she says in her in her. But what's a girl to do to get a baby because of course I'll be innocent and like your Torah promises um I'll get a baby in a year. So, we could do it by erasing your holy name or we could do it the natural way. Whatever you choose, Hashem and um by anybody else be absolute blasphemy, right? Even the the Noah are forbidden from speaking uh what's called burkasm to to curse Hashem. Uh they say it in a euphemism. was such a terrible concept but by Kana it was so pure and her intention so noble she's likened to Mosher Rabenu who also spoke with impedence and Elvi who later speaks with impedence but it's not impedent when you're doing it Shamayim Hashem sees her grants her a son his name is Schmool rises up and becomes uh he was a disciple of Eliha Cohen and uh he saves the Jews many instances this is just a summary just kind of give you some of the highlights They uh Ellie's house is cursed. He's uh he has sons that are not quite um disciplined. It's not as bad as it appears and pinas, but it's not good either. And they fall in war when they take the holy ark out to battle the pishim and um Sheilo is destroyed. So you see that Shilo is completely wiped out and the Mishkan moves now to a place called Givon. And the people come to Shul with a bold request. They said, you know, we'd like a king. You allowed to have a king. What does the Torah say about having a king? Doesn't say that. Actually says there's old suga in paraim about having a king and their laws and restrictions. Like everybody has laws and restrictions. He has to write his own sacred Torah. He has to carry it with him. Can't have too many wives, too many horses. That wasn't the issue. As I'm saying now, my point is I'm I'm trying to make this point. The Torah allows for the possibility of a king. Seems to be a legitimate thing. The problem was not the king factor. The problem was uh the way they asked. This is the big defect. They said, "See, all the nations of the world around us, they all have kings. We just have, you know, we got cheap seconds. We got we got we got shelf team. We have judges. We like a king." What's wrong with that statement? >> Right. We're not supposed to go after the ways of the of the non-Jews. I mean, we have hem, we have the Torah, we have a complete recipe for a life of holiness. And so, it's not about imitating them. And somehow, oh, they seem to have it better than we do. Okay. So, that was a problem. And the Musimon said, excuse me, Schmool said, "Okay, you have a king." So, you have a king, but um it's not going to be good because you're not you're not asking for it in under the right circumstances. He tries to talk them out of it. They're not listening to it to him. Uh leading the Jews would never be an easy prospect. There's a quote from the um first person who filled the uh the job the figurehead job of being a president in the state of Israel named Whitesman. Whitesman Institute's name for him. Uh troubling figure in many ways from a tour perspective, but he had a he had a great oneliner after the state was established and he was newly installed as the president. Harry Truman, the American president with the same title but a totally different political role. The president's the main person in America, not in Israel. In Israel's like the king of England. So, but anyway, Truman said to Whitesman, um, you know, how is it to be, uh, a leader over the, uh, the Jewish nation, you know, the president? And, um, Whitesman responded. He said, "Mr. President, you preside over 150 million citizens. I preside over 200 two and a half million presidents." >> You have to think about that one, right? In other words, to lead the Jewish people, which is we are called an amche or we're a stubborn bunch, right? And each of us kind of thinks that we could do if if I was one of the Gdole Hador, that's another picture on the wall. If I was one of the the great leaders of the generation, this is what I would do. I would do it much better than they would do it. Very hard to lead a bunch of presidents. And that's part of the problem that the Jewish kings would find. How do you have a people who are going to be docel and subservient to you? In the event uh Schmool does elect in with with Hashem's help, he finds a king. Uh his name is the first king you said before, Sha Shalamelik who's an unimposing, very tall. He stood a neck taller than most the average man. Very tall person who never in a million years expected to be king. He came from Binyam which is a big question since our kings are really supposed to come from Yehuda, not from Binyam. Okay. The Mafarim worked that out and Shaw becomes the first king. He gets a bucket of oil point poured in his head very unexpectedly >> and the people uh don't take Tim initially because Shawl is such a modest person, so unassuming. They think the this is a king. This is what you call a king. They want to know, right? So uh I'll I'll take the question in a couple in a couple minutes. Let me just let me just finish this thought. So scholas actually we we desire such humility in our leaders. That's what Mosher's quality was and Shaw was like that and he was pretty good. He led an attack against our enemies and and and he was installed at least for a good couple years there. Go ahead. >> How is it that >> Oh, so his son would be for a very short period a replacement of Shaol, but Sha made uh disqualifying mistakes that disqualified everything and and even his dynasty was doomed. And we'll hear in we'll hear in a moment what happens. That did not work out. Once David was installed as the king, he will be the permanent king of the Jews. Meaning it is a dynasty. And uh and and his descendants would have to be would be the leaders by necessity. Later people would rise up and use the title king. Who am I thinking of for example? who were later people who to assumed a leadership of the Jewish people and they even sometimes called themselves kings but they were illegitimate you've heard of the kashim we just finished yesterday right so the lead not not the original kashwim who were mostly sadikim but the later descendants who became Greek themselves became helanized themselves they would take the title king and that's not okay because they were from the tribe of >> ley they were kohanim yeah as such okay uh SH becomes the king. He defeats, this is his big big uh mistake. He defeats the nation of >> Amalik. What are we supposed to do with Amalikch? The Torah tells us, >> yeah, they are defined as evil. They attack the Jews when they were down and out once upon a time. And now Shaw has the prime opportunity. And he almost does the job. He almost wipes them all out. He doesn't quite comply. He leaves the animals and he leaves the king of all people alive overnight. King of Gog. >> No, he did not. He had compassion and Khazal faults Sha for having compassion in the wrong place against somebody who's innately cruel and later he'll be cruel to one who really deserves compassion, namely David. As we're about to see, he does not he spares the king. It's you're confusing the story. It's who the next morning uh takes out the king of Amalik but a little too late because the king that night that night was with a woman and from that >> well I'm not going to get into that now that's not the nature of our class Moshe we we talk we talk about things with modesty here >> yeshiva what's that >> he's in jail how do you do >> no he um escaped he was not in jail and he was with a woman that night from that union a child was born who was the ancestor of a figure later on in history called Haman. Interestingly, because everything in history is symmetrical and you see all of these all these po all this poetic justice, the descendants of the tribe of Binyamin who would take on Haman would be not coincidentally Morai and Esther and they hailed from Binyammen, right? They would be eventual comeuppants. But Sha was was um he was doomed once that happened that he would not be the king. Uh he appoints a young upandcomer by the name of David Amelik as the king of his as the chief of his army after David takes out Golas in a grand show of great fear of heaven and complete courage. I mean take on this giant who was who intimidated the whole world. >> You know I'm doing a rampage through history. So some of this is going to come across as un is unsatisfying and a little bit too much of a summary. But I will back up if you want me to. So, um, the Philistines, we already said, have been the big enemy of the Jews during this period really for periods. I mean, Shimshon took them out for about 20 years, but they came back later on and they they they had their own arsenal. They had their own their secret weapons. And in this case, um, the giant Golas was intimidating and ferocious. And Shaw was so afraid of him, he's he he challenged anybody to take him out. And David at the time was all of 17 years old and a nice cheerful red-headed uh handsome handsome young lad who said I'll do it. He comes against in the valley of Alan, not far from my home in Beamesh. Uh he comes against Golas. They meet on a field in an open field, one giant against one 17-year-old boy. And the 17-year-old doesn't even have proper weapons in his hands. He's got a slingshot. And Golas mocks him. He said he said, "You you think I'm a dog? you could take me out with a couple stones. And David says, you know, you come with all of your prowess and courage. I'm coming with Hashem's name. And he hauls back with his slingshot. One fire. He gets him right between the right right in the forehead. And the giant is taken out. He decapitates Golas. All of the nation of the Philistines all chant together. Do you know it's a very famous grand moment in in the Tanakh? Hashem elohim like what we say at the end of of of Yom Kipur they all acknowledge that this is if this is not a miracle there's no miracle right clearly Hashem is in charge and they they for a moment there wake up and see Hashem it passes they don't become monotheist after that but that's David's great moment and now to get back on our track so the Ple team have five major bases there are five big cities uh I'll also point out are all on the western coast they are And if we identify these uh modern cities in any way that's close to these ancient cities, there are three on the coast in uh from north to south. Ashcolon, excuse me, Ashto first, then Ashcolon, then Aza, known today as Gaza because the guttural ion. You know how that works when we pronounce the ion. In English, it's a guttural sound. So you say aza, which sounds a little like Gaza. That's how in English you have a G. Sodom and stone and what's the Hebrew word for the other city? We usually say so and Amora which became Gamora because of the guttural iron. Same idea. Anyway, those three cities plus another couple inland that were called Echron and and Gat >> and they were in the southern coastal region but they branched out and we're going to we're going to hear of them. Look, the it's the Ple team who ultimately take on Shaol and most of his sons, including including the Sadik Yonatan, and they ultimately they they battle them in the Jezrael Valley and and and they they do away with Sha and uh we'll hear of the police team for some years to come and um and David is the one who takes them out. >> It is. >> Correct. Correct. Well, no, because the Jews, if you remember, never did the job adequately of getting rid of their enemies. So there are a lot of different nations non-Jewish who are living in the holy land shouldn't be but that's the situation unfortunately and and that's why we keep hearing about these police team when you go through the Tanakh which you should do sooner rather than later even though it's against popular practice uh in my experience uh people just don't learn the Tanakh nowadays there reasons for that but it's a mistake it's an oversight we should know our history and and the Tanakh is muser it's history it's our heritage uh it's profound it's relevant. Uh, and um, among other things, this should not be the reason you learn it, but it's a lot of fun, too. Okay. Uh, this is just some of the highlights of what we what we hear and how how we're what we're supposed to take away. When the people naturally gravitate towards David while Shaw is still the king, Sha becomes jealous. And then Sha loses what's called a she has a certain divine inspiration that leaves him. And when you on that when you're on that level of divine inspiration and boom, you suddenly lose it. It doesn't leave a vacuum. It goes to the opposite direction. He now gets what's called a in the DSM manual. They would probably diagnose him as having some kind of manic depression. And he goes somewhat insane. He decides quickly enough that David is insubordinate and actually is planning an insurrection. Wants to overtake his throne. David's innocent, but that doesn't that does not persuade Sha. At one point, one of one of his daughters is one of David's wives. And these days, you're allowed to have more than one wife. And David, we actually derive from David that the minimum that the maximum number of wives a king is allowed to have is 18. Uh and he has just 18. And Mikall Batshaw is one of them. And uh when he when Shaw goes after him, Mkhal actually helps David escape, he she helps him out the back window and he he runs off and it's >> that's Shaw's daughter Mikall >> marries David and she helps her husband David flee from her father in his in his uh in his surge of insanity when he decides that David Dove is trying to get him. That night, by the way, is a fateful night. David goes and he um gets safe refuge with that night. Schmill teaches him a couple things. You know what? He teaches him the entire oral Torah. You know, they don't make them like they used to. The entire David is primary disciple of Shu in the link in the chain of our entire Msora. It's conveyed in one night, but they were uncommonly smart back in the day. Now I should say about Shaw before we tie up his story, he is taken out. He's decapitated by the police team. Khazal actually if you just read about Shawl in the text you get a you get a negative impression but Khazal described him in otherwise glowing terms. He was a tragic figure who made mistakes but he was very righteous. He uh gave his fortune of money away to the poor. He g he helped brides get married. He fought for the Jews valiantly. He's replaced by David who now asserts himself as the king even though the people have not yet taken to him. So the people are still split. Some of them are in the north with Sha's son. David sets up his own kingdom invron for for seven and a half years and he rules from for seven and a half years. David's name appears more in the Tanakh than any other figure without any close competition over 1,000 times. Dominant figure. He was the guttalador. He learned constantly. He slept. Do you know this? How often did David sleep every every given day? >> Yeah. But not in succession. Meaning he slept for four halfhour intervals every day. Who else in history had this? Uh, we have testimony. We said this before. Does Rashem in less than a week I hope to dive in by his Kev in Vna. >> The Vagon. How'd you know? Yeah. Uh, David learned he had a military man, Yoo, but David was uh was mostly a it's not always portrayed that way, but that's really what give over to us. He finds the Aron Kesh with great fanfare. He brings it over uh to Yaleim. The Aron Kesh had been stolen by the plein. He now brings it back to the Jews. Uh eventually he makes a tent in what's called the city of David. It's not yet installed. There's no B mikdash. But he brings the Aronesh when the temple will be built later by David's son Schlommo. Uh then they'll install the Aron Kodesh in the Holy of Holies. Oh, about 400 years. >> Without a bas mikdash. And it's a great question, great point to bring up. I always emphasize this. The Raman emphasizes this. Um, that's a fault. That's that's a real defect of the Jews in this. >> Yeah. The people should have clamored to build. What's the bas mikdash? If you had to summarize what is the bas mikdash, what would you say? >> Perfect. Perfect summary, right? We should crave that. When the ba mikdash stands, you see these pictures on the wall of the base of mikdash. The is present. That's what the nama existentially needs. You think you want to travel. You think you want material possessions. People are have wander lust. They're they're they're clamoring for all kinds of things in this world. Most of the things people pursue in this world like wealth or beautiful girls or whatever preoccupies people are ultimately unsatisfying because they're drawn after the physical. But we're not physical beings in essence. We're really spiritual beings. What we really crave is a connection with Hashem. That's most easily found when you have a bas mikdash. That's why we don't even know what we're missing. It's been it's been 2,000 years since we had a bas mikdash. So we talk about it. We give lip service. Please, build the base of mdash. But we don't really know what we're missing. And what we're missing is this fundamental core spiritually, >> right? And the people when they came into the land, the whole project coming to land was to set up shop and create the utopian society that the Torah challenges us to build. They didn't quite do that. They never got rid of their enemies. The enemies, as we continue to see, are still a cancer in our midst. We never clamored to build the base of Mikdash. And if you don't ask Hashem for stuff, well, he's not going to give it to you. wasn't a priority, right? And so it takes till David and Melik to build the base of Mikdash. And even David is deemed not qualified to build the base of Mikdash because do you know this? >> Nope. Nasi says it plainly. >> No. Yeah. He's got too much blood in his hands from all the wars that he fought. I mean for fighting those wars because he really put down a lot of the Jewish enemies in that in those days. And it's under David finally the Jews know real peace for a period of time. He expands the borders of Erit Israel to unprecedented great great extents. They it really moves all the way actually what's called the the temporary borders under Davidid reach all the way out to the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. what we think of >> the biggest the biggest expanse would would have until the Messiah comes >> right later on it was diminished but David David is a great warrior but because of all that blood that disqualifies him from actually building Hashem's house that job would fall to the uh his son Schlommo he did not he put the infrastructure he established he located the the place on Harabis uh the Garan in uh in in zakim actually describes how he actually fixed it doesn't say explicitly where you the eternal capital is supposed to be in the Torah. It doesn't say the word yalim explicitly. It refers to yaru and shalem and other seemingly oblique references but it doesn't say explicitly where the location is. And David through combination of of learning the Torah and prophecy is able to fix on where the location is and he establishes the location. He also in Argamar and Makos um it's a great Gamarra where a shard of pottery speaks to him and says don't lift me please and David does the logical thing under the circumstances he says oh wow really and he lifts up the shard of pottery and well no big deal only the um primal depths the waters of creation threaten to flood the entire universe so uh you'll look up the garan makos about how David managed to contain that and save the world in the process uh it's actually thematically very important important scene because um the Marsha explains that by taking the shard of pottery, David gave into his Yates Sahara. Water is equated to the Yates Sahara. It's a violent surging like a tidal wave kind of a force and when it's out of control, it could flood the world. And when you control your Yates, you control the water. He was able to put the shard of pottery back in the ground, set the foundation, the base of Mikdash, purchased it fair and square, and now we have a location to build's house. He buys it for 50 silver shekels, right? Its location, not coincidentally, is by the Evans Shia, the foundation stone. What's significant about that place? Nothing much. Just where the world started, right? The gumar the Mishna says that the zor says that that hashem set the stone in the foundation. It's the same stone generally assumed by most post to be the stone under the golden dome till today where the temple stood >> that's what we hold that's exactly where it was and where it will be. Yeah that is that that is that is the consensus view in the post scheme and it's the location it's the holy place holiest place in the world. From there the world was created and founded. >> It's not a mosque actually. It's a shrine. The the in the center the golden dome is just a shrine. The southern dome built by the golden dome was built in the in the seventh century by Abdul Malik. Uh and he built it as a shrine because the Muslims often accept the tradition of the Jews that it's a holy place. It's the foundation of the world. It's his son, Wal Ibn Abdul Malik, that builds the mosque on the southern tip of the of the Temple Mount. That's called the El Axa Mosque. But this is not their story. This is our story and a little Jewish history, not Muslim history. We do that another time. David is uh his first years were glorious. He makes a big mistake with Bacheva. He sees her and through prophecy recognizes her as the son of the Davidic line of future kings. Uh she was not in fact a married woman. Her husband Uriah had given her a get on condition a divor of divorce and when he went out to war uh she was really not a married woman at that point. Um so David didn't really do the obvious sin that it seems like he did. >> This is with Bachva, another wife. Uh but in the event he was guilty, the uh great prophet, the prophets were fearless. They could give it to anybody, give rebuke to the strongest rebuke to anybody. And and Nasam would look at David and he said, "You're guilty of of impropriy. You didn't consult the Sanhedrin. You took matters into your own hand." And he said it in the form of a mashall. He said, "There's a rich man and a poor man. And the rich man had everything. The poor man just have one sheep. And the rich man made off with his sheep. What should be done with that rich man?" And David said, "Throw the book at him." him. And Nutson looked at David in the eye and he said, "You're that man." Most of the kings of the ancient world, the non-Jewish kings, would have had Nassen's tongue cut out of his mouth. David's response, typical of David's humility, he accepted it. He made chuva. The baby that Bashva was carrying was miscarried. It was born not in the most pure of circumstances, but later Dove would properly marry Bashva and together they would bear the son Schlommo. And Schlommo, like his name, was uh was a was a king of arguably the most peaceable period that the Jewish people would ever know. He's our next subject. >> Well, that's what it appears. That's what it appears. But he did it >> learn on the subject. Anybody who who says that David sinned in the way it appears that he sinned is making a mistake. In the event Ura was Misa, he was anyway guilty of a capital offense. Let's go look it up. Uh from insubordination to the king, he was more malus. That's what it's called. When you don't accept a legitimate king like David's authority, that's a death penalty because under it under undermines the entire leadership apparatus of the Jewish people. >> Why do you do that? Because he was that was his fault. That was his sin and therefore he was deserving of the death penalty. It was the way the David went around doing it that was not not seen as a proper. And I don't want to digress too much into it. I move I'm trying to move on. >> Yeah. Go ahead. Which one? >> Why did he not listen to >> He thought he knew better. >> Remember that whole that whole a president over over two and a half million presidents point. Sometimes people think they know too much, right? It's a lot of guys in Dar sometimes get like that too. Oh, these are the rules. Yeah, but I know the rules better than Rabbi Brickman, so I'm going to do it my way. >> That like touched a raw nerve. I hope. >> Yeah. not clearly spelled out in cinematic scene. Uh I'll fill in all these details. >> Sure. There's a bit of an argument about where the sight of the B mikdash should be. There's a wise man named Yuravam who's too smart for his own good. A little power hungry that one. And he's not so happy. He thinks that the B should be elsewhere. But David wins. He's the king. David's last years, like his son Schlommo's first years of king, were, get this, the best time ever. When Khazal described the messianic era, they often would cite the great description of the period of David and Schlommo. Uh these are almost I mean if Messiah means anointed one, well, David was anointed. Schlommo were was anointed. They were both messiahs in that way and they had the potential of being uh the actual messianic saviors of the Jewish people and thereby of the entire world. In Schlommo's 40 years, especially the initial period, it never got better. That was the peak time the Jewish people would ever enjoy. And I'll leave you with this final one. If anybody could hit the low keys on the piano after I finish, that would be helpful. Uh Schlommo's great victory was also the undoing of the Jews since we reached the peak. Really all of creation was ready for ready for Schlommo's days when he built the base of Mikdash. It's only been downhill from there. And the Jewish people have known if not total decline, it's been it's been kind of a curvy decline, but mostly downhill from that time. And we'll talk about what did Schlommo do right and what was his what was his great oversight.