The Great Merit & Responsibility of Learning in Yeshiva Today {Los Angeles Weekend of Chizuk 2025}

speaks of two different types of and they're both amazing. They're both very accomplished but they are very different in one specific way. You have one type of who focuses on himself, on his own growth, on his own of improving himself, making himself a better person, becoming as great of a Talm as he can be. And that's an amazing thing. And he's able to reach very, very high levels. And yet you have another Talm who in addition to doing all that stuff, working on himself, learning Torah. You know what else he does? He tries to focus on others as well. He tries to share his knowledge, his wisdom. He tries to inspire other people to do a Hashem the way they the way they are meant to be. Now if I was to ask you who is going to reach a higher level what would you say the first guy or the second guy? The second guy all day he's sitting and learning in depth working on himself versus the other guy the other who in addition to learning he's helping others he's trying to inspire them to become better people. You know what the tells us? He says the first Talm is no nearly on the level of the second one. The second Talm who focuses on others in addition to himself is able to reach levels in Gan Eden that nobody else able to attain. Today we have the zus of having such a person with us. Rabbi Gladstein, in addition to being an unbelievable talam, storehouse of knowledge and depth and wisdom of the Torah, he has dedicated his life to inspiring others, traveling from place to place, from city to city. It's hard to leave Lakewood, you understand? I mean, I'm sorry, Brooklyn, right? That's where you were born. I stayed at your house, Bashem. I did. I when I was learning with your brother, Ari. >> Yeah. or hashem. So to come to LA it's you know but uh Rabbi Gladston is with us and we have the to hear D bra and I owe you a thank you because I went through half of Tanak with your sh on the malim and uh yesterday we're listening to your shir on tshoua that you just gave in the young Israel and it was fascinating please give your full attention to gladi Thank you very much Rabba Yusup for the very kind introduction. Was I there when you came to my house for Shabas? >> I don't recall. >> I don't remember. Brish Rabbi Goldberg. I would like to perhaps elaborate on a very important teaching that Rabbi Yusup mentioned. Presumably this is the very beginning of the school year, right? When when did you begin? >> Two days ago. >> Two days ago. And we sort of take it for granted. We live in a Jewish community. We live in an observant community. We are have the opportunity to come to yeshiva. And of course, we come to yeshiva. Who which Jewish child doesn't go to yeshiva? And sometimes we don't have the proper appreciation to really take advantage of what it means to be in a yeshiva. I want to share with you a story that as the years go by, the story like produces more stories. It's interesting. A story sometimes has a life of its own. I originally heard the story when I was a little kid and then I heard a different uh great RV tell over the story and the impact it had on him. And just this past Shabas I read how this story has grandchildren already. Perhaps many of you heard about uh a great RV who passed away recently. Uh he was also a very interesting personality. He was a historian. He was a producer. He was a writer. Rabbi Barlow Wine. And there's a story that he tells over that he says actually was the turning point in his life. But it's something I heard when I was a little child from a completely different source. My grandfather was a Holocaust survivor. He was the Tal of Raim Za. For me to come here this morning just so you should hear the name Ramsemba is worthwhile. Rabman Za was the greatest God is before the Holocaust. He was a Gassid. He would go to sit by the GBA. But in learning Tory, he was the acknowledged god Alhadar. In fact, my grandfather remembers going to his house and seeing a bookshelf. Most people have in their house. Whether they use thearim, that's a different story entirely. Sometimes they say, you know, maybe we should just sell book covers and this way they'll look maybe instead of buying the book for full price, you should buy the book for half price, empty on the inside. This way it looks nice on nice on the shelf. But Raim Za didn't just have a bookshelf of Raakim Za had a bookshelf of that he wrote you know he wrote a parish on the entire Rambam he wrote a pair on the entire US he was invited to be the rashiva of yeshiva kaklin when Shapiro passed away he was invited to be the chief rabbi of he didn't accept any of the above and when he was in the wars ghetto he had the opportunity to save his life and he would not leave the rest of his people. So my grandfather was not only a student of Raman Zamba, he was a Benbias. Basically he came in and out every single day. And after the Holocaust, my grandfather who was a survivor, a Polish survivor was made the head of the religious department of the joint distribution comm uh committee which means he became part of the American army. He had learned English in Poland uh before the war. He was educated. He also had sika and the army made him the gobetween between them and the Polish survivors. In fact, when uh the cloenberba was in the camps, my grandfather was the translator of the cloenberba for General Eisenhower. Eisenhower later became the president of the United States. when Eisenhower came in and he spoke to the survivors. My grandfather was a translator between Eisenhower and the Kenberger Rabbi. Anyway, my grandfather's in the camps and a great person was coming to the camps. His name was Rav Isaac Halevi Herzog who's the first chief rabbi of Israel. And Rahers told my grandfather that he just came from Rome. And I remember hearing the story, my grandfather wrote this story in his memoirs. Rav Herdzog I actually my grandfather published this story must have been decades ago in a newspaper I don't think it exists it doesn't exist anymore it's called Yiddeshart it was a Yiddish newspaper you know back in the day everybody spoke Yiddish so they read the the editor was Yasulen said and my grandfather published the story that Rhertz told him he just came from Rome my grandfather what were you doing in Romeog said in Rome I went to visit the pope And I brought with me a list of the names of 10,000 boys and girls that during the Holocaust their parents didn't know what to do with them. They were afraid the Nazis would come kill their children or take them away. So they gave over their children to churches to priests to monasteries hoping that these Christian institutions would save their children and maybe the parents would survive the war and they would come and retrieve their children. And Rhertz came to the pope. He says, "Pope, I have the list of the names of 10,000 boys and girls. We know they're our children. You know they're our children. Give them back to us. You're kidnapping them now. You have to give us back our children." And the Pope said, "We cannot even return one Jewish child." You see, all these 10,000 children were baptized. They were converted. And once we convert a Jewish child to Christianity, you can never take them back. We'll never never get them back. And the door was slammed on Rhertz's face. This is what Rahertzag told my grandfather in 1945. Okay, let's fast forward a few years to 1951 or so. So there's this young boy in Chicago. His name was Rabbi His name was Barl Wine. He wasn't a rabbi yet. He was 11 years old. and his father said, "You know, Barl, a big rabbi is coming to Chicago today." Rabbi Wine said, "Who who is this uh who's this rabbi?" Rabbi Herzog. Now, I don't know if you ever saw a picture of Rabbi Herzog. He wore a a shiny top hat. He had a silver cane and he would hold a Tanakh in his hand and he comes off the plane and all the yeshiva bakim in the Midwest came to greet him. few hundred bakim and they escort Rabbi Herzog to the yeshiva in Chicago, the Skoi yeshiva and Ra Herzog addresses all the Balabatim and all the children in Chicago and of course he spoke in Yiddesh and he gave a pilpir in Yiddesh. When the Shir was over, Rhertz says, "Now I would like to have a word with the boys." He turns to the boys. He says, "I just came back from visiting the Pope. I had with me the list of the names of 10,000 boys and girls. I asked the pope to give us the children back. The po the pope flatly refused. He said they were all converted. They were all baptized. And the door was slammed on my face. Revzag is standing there in front of 200 young men in the Skookoi yeshiva and he breaks down crying like a baby for the lost 10,000 children who are lost to Christian families. This young boy sitting there, he said he was never so frightened in his life to see a great RV, a great sadic, a great God break down in such pain that these children were lost forever. After weeping and crying, he lifts up his head and he says to the boys, "There's nothing that I could do for these 10,000 children, but what are you going to do for the future of the Jewish people? You're here in the yeshiva. You're in the sky yeshiva. You're still with us. You're still part of the Jewish people. You could still do something. You could still accomplish. What are you going to do for the Jewish people? And Rabbi Wine would always say that whenever he's t tired or he's a little down or he's a little worn out, he would hear the cry of Rhertz, what are you going to do for the future of the Jewish people? And that was the turning point in his life. That's when he decided he was going to commit himself to do whatever he could to build the Jewish people. So it's interesting. I happened to see last Shabas in I live in the five towns and before Shabas I got a newspaper called the FJJ. I don't think it makes it to uh California, but it makes it to the tri-state area. And they had different tributes and obituaries and has spayed them for Rabbi Barrow Wine. And I saw one little clip uh or a tribute of Rabbi Friend for Rabbi Barrow Wine. Everybody knows Rabbi Friend. Actually, there's a very funny story about the somebody once met Rabbi Wine in the airport and they said, you know, Rabbi, you changed my life. Your books, your tapes, your videos, your, you know, I'm a different person. By the way, next time I know behind every great man stands a great woman. Next time you see Rabbitson Fran, please tell her how much you mean to him. How much you mean to me. In other words, the guy thought that he was Rabbi Fran, not Rabbi Wine. Anyway, so Rabbi Wine said, you know, I don't usually travel with her, but the next time I see her, I'll be sure to let her know. But Rabbi Fran said, you know, he wasn't a student of Rabbi Wine. He didn't learn by him. He didn't maybe know him personally, but he was an admirer of his shirim and his tapes and so on and so forth. And that Rabbi Wine had a big influence on him because in the era when they invented a new technology, I don't know if you know what this is. Tapes. Do you know what a tape is? Yeah. You know what a tape? You know, my kids always laugh. I say, "Oh, did uh did Schweki come out with a new tape?" They said, "What are you talking about? What's a tape? There no tape, you know." So I say, "Oh, a new disc." They said, "No, there no discs anymore either." You know, everything is what is it? MP3 right when they invented tapes and what's a tape nobody would go on a tape Rabbi Wine was the first person to give Shirim on tape I think rev Miller also and Ray Fran said when he saw that Rabbi Wine was trying to be Marbet's Torah with tapes he said you know what you know everyone should really do that so think about it the words that Revzog said to a boy in 1950 how it influenced him and Now 50 years later it influenced somebody else and it's really something that we should all think about because you know we come to yeshiv every day and we're going to learnish and we're learn and we're going to learn about we learn about the yumim but sometimes we take it for granted that do you know how lucky you are to have the opportunity to learn Torah in a yeshiva and then you're equipped to actually go out and do something for Kalisra. Well, did you know that even though you look around and it looks like every single boy has a has a yeshiva education, you're only a drop in the bucket. Nine out of 10 Jewish kids today, they don't know Shamal Israel. Nine out of 10 Jewish kids today, they don't know Abrainu from George Washington. They don't know the difference. They never heard of Rabenu. They don't know the words. So if you come to Yeshiva, Hashem gave you a gift. Hashem gave you a present. You're cherrypicked. You're from the mut from this the drop in the bucket of Jews who have the good fortune to be able to learn Tyra to be able to come close. So that gives you an it gives you a responsibility. It's not just for you. You know, Rafa Belnner would say, "What if he had a guy, he's sitting in his at his table and he had a pile of hamburgers and it's just him and uh somebody walks in, he says, you know, those hamburgers look good." He says, "Sure, they look really good. That's why I'm going to eat all of them." And the guy's looking at him, you know, because this guy is pretty hungry. He would also like to eat a hamburger. And then another guy walks in and he would also like to eat a hamburger. What would you call a guy who says, "No, no, no. It's just for me. It's only for me." That's called selfish children, right? In the introduction to the Nephim that their father taught them that the same way in the physical world, if you just take everything for yourself, it's selfish. in the spiritual world. Imagine if you just learned Tyra knowing that the majority of Clal Israel does not have that privilege. It's selfish. So you have really the opportunity of a lifetime. When you come to yeshiva every morning, you know, sometimes, not in this yeshiva, but there's some kids I heard in New York that when they come to Yeshiva, they're maybe not so much in the mood. But when a s a kid in LA comes to yeshiva, this is the most exciting opportunity in the history of Kalisra that you could learn Gamarra, you could learn Kish, you could come close to Hashem and you could equip yourself to perhaps do something for Cla. You know, when my grandfather was in a da, he was on a selection line. You know, these selection lines, they choose whether you go to the right and they let you live a little bit longer or you go to the left and they put you in the gas chamber. And my grandfather was on this line and they said left and they took him and they threw him in to the crematoria. They threw him in and at the last moment a Nazi came, grabbed him by the top of his head and yanked him out of the crematorium. My grandfather would always say it was an open miracle. It's an open miracle. He didn't know who this Nazi was. He never saw him before. He never saw him after. Hashem saved his life. And I always think to myself, yeah, my grandfather was saved from the Holocaust. He was saved from the crematoria. But it wasn't only my grandfather that was saved. Hashem saved my father. Cuz if my grandfather wouldn't have been saved, my father wouldn't have been saved. Hashem saved me. Hashem saved my children. I don't know. I guess Hashem wanted us around. He must have wanted us. And you know what? If you're here today in this yeshiva, you need to know that Hashem wants you. Because for a Jew to have the opportunity and the privilege to serve Hashem today after 2,000 years of gulos, that means you've been cherrypicked from and the crusades and the Spanish Inquisition and the Pgrams and the Holocaust. Hashem cherrypicked you to be here today. You know, Rabb Yakobden famously writes that how can a disbeliever not be utterly ashamed, if you think about the miraculous continuity of the Jewish people, Ryaken writes after everything that has transpired after all of Jewish history, crusades, pagrums, Inquisition, Rabyakden says, he says, "I swear Rabyakden took an oath. He took avoi. That's a very strong terminology because ofden didn't live so long ago. writes the words that was whatever that means on some level says I swear when I contemplate the miracle of the eternity of it's greater than all the miracles Hashem did for the Jewish people when he took us out of Egypt. Sometimes people say, you know, if only I would see a miracle, then I would Yeah. Then I would really learn. Then I would really dive in. You want to see a miracle? You come to this yeshiva and you see a boy next to you putting on fillin after 2,000 years of gulos. That's a bigger miracle than the splitting of the yams. Says of Jacob Emden, the miracle of the eternity of Klis is the greatest miracle in the history of the world. So please take advantage of this wondrous opportunity you have. It's a great miracle to be here. It's a great miracle to learn Tyra, to have a to go to yeshiva every day. I wish you all great in your learning and all of your endeavors. Thank you very much.