The Journey of your Life — Lesson from Parshas Masei

so there's this one shul every year that would come to the parsha where yankee would tell jacob to go to his brothers and then they would throw him in a pit this woman would scream out from the women's rule yes don't go they're gonna throw you into a pit so one year finally the valkyria the one reading the torah he got tired of it so he came up to that line and he waited he stopped let her do her disruption finish and then he'll go on and he waits and it's silent he waits it's still silent so finally he turns to her says are you gonna interrupt and she says no he says why not she says listen he went last year he went the year before he went the year before that if he's not going to learn that's it i'm tired of warning him these are the journeys of the jewish people 42 jaunts in the wilderness the baal champtov taught it's brought to us in the safer of his grandson the de gaulle mach nefrayim that the massey benestrol these are the journeys of the jewish people are not just speaking collectively historically about the jewish people who came out of egypt and entered the holy land but really it's speaking to each and every one of us in every single time every single jewish person will live out these 42 journeys leaving egypt is birth entering the good wide land is when we leave the body after 120 and enter the world to come and all the 40 journeys in between are all the different stations in life all the different milestones the things that happen to a person in a lifetime so obviously this big this begs the question does that mean that life is scripted does that mean that life is already laid out and there's really no free choice it's all predetermined that's one question then there's another question more specific question which is if our lives follow the 42 journeys in the desert well a lot of those journeys were connected with bad stuff i mean failures spiritual failures on the part of our ancestors so basically not only is my life scripted but it's scripted to have a lot of failure negative moments low lights as opposed to highlights so how am i supposed to understand that so in order to begin to understand this we have to understand the difference between potential and actuality the truth is that every single one of those incidents that that transpired in the desert at every one of those 42 stops could have been positive had the potential to be glorious and free choice is what determines which direction it will go so there are two potential directions a glorious moment or abysmal failure but the potential there is for it to be glorious for instance i'll give you an example one of the stops along the way is called chivras hataiva kiva sativa literally means the the graves of craving why because the jews were craving meat in an inappropriate way in an animalistic way and it led to many deaths and many people died there so they were buried by their lust graves of craving but sidness explains that really potentially that challenge they could have overcome that they could have conquered their lost instead of their lust conquering them and then instead of being graves of craving it would have been cravings grave they would have buried craving in cuba sativa the same name same stop same situation same test just instead of failure it would have been passing with flying so the potential there was for for glory give you another example the quintessential example the greatest moral failure of the jewish people in the 42 journeys and the greatest moral failure in history on par with the sin of the tree of knowledge the sin of the golden calf how is that potentially good how could that have been good that's that's a such abysmal failure well where did they get the idea of a golden calf there are many explanations but one of them is that at the time of the revelation at sinai the time time of monteiro the nation experienced mass prophecy they were elevated the levels of the greatest prophets one of the things the great prophets saw was the merkava the celestial chariot and one of the features of the merkov of the celestial chariot is the pinay the face of the ox which is really an angelic being which metaphorically or symbolically has the face of an axe the point is that's the image they saw which is a very lofty image in fact it's it's in the haftara and chavus when we read about the giving of the torah we read that that prophecy of the the merkava the chariot with the with the different faces on the chariot pinesha the face of the ox now later on they misused that vision and they turned it into islam the the social merciful should protect us from such a such a failure to to turn that into an image of an idol but in its source in its potential it could have been an incredible thing it could have been a glorious thing it could have been the golden calf didn't have to literally be a golden calf of idolatry god forbid it could have been in a completely different form it could have been a completely different the story it's hard to to even rewrite it because you know it didn't happen this way but in theory it could have been something very holy where they didn't make a golden calf they didn't make a statue there was no idol worship it was something very holy and pure and uh you know very god conscious involving their their vision of seeing the the face of the ox on the side of the of the chariot but with no idolatry whatsoever to the contrary only worship of god it could have been not only it could have been it should have been except there's free will and so that's not what happened now i want to get a little bit more pointed into the example of kata ego of the golden calf um and bring out an example from an actual figure in history who had his own golden calf moment when our sages talk about sinners when they talk about someone who was a real failure morally the quintessential example they hold up is jeroboam the king says in piccadilly obvious he he's an example of a guy who can't even do it he sinned he made others sin how did he sin how he make others sin he was jealous there was a schism there were two kingdoms the bash the holy temple was in the other kingdom he didn't want his subjects going to the other kingdom so he built the competition with the basement and he built an idol a golden calf an abysmal failure terrible terrible terrible sin the worst sin possible and uh the question is you know did it have to be that way did your of them have to be such a moral failure and the answer obviously we've just said no he didn't have to be this way it could have been completely different let me tell you where where your of him comes from let me tell you a little bit about his background you know who your have russo was his study partner was somebody went out from islam he was a child when he went out from its ryan later on he was the teacher of elio navi elio navi the great elijah the prophet he learned from atheists as he was study partners with with akhiya and it says the gemara tells us that when arhia shalani used to learn with europe was so sharp in his studies that would study the laws of sacrifices of kachin and every halacha yoruba would bring out 103 novel interpretations 103 hedosham from every halacha now what's 103. why 103 it's a funny number know what 103 is bigger matriarch eagle half iron is 70 gimbal is 3 limit is 30 70 plus 3 plus 30 103. well hold on a second so what does that mean that means even back when he was good when you're off and was still holy and he was still studying today and he was if he is friend you see the seeds of the evil that came out later the 103 the calf was already it was always there all along no no no it's the opposite it's the exact opposite from the fact that you can see the 103 was there from the beginning you see what it should have been what it could have been the glorious potential it had now he squandered that potential and then he did the worst possible sin and it turned into a golden calf but just like the jewish people the golden calf didn't have to be the golden calf it could have been the pinay on the cover the face of the ox on the side of the chariot they didn't have to squander it they didn't have to to to to drop the ball so you see with your oven his connection to the golden calf didn't have to be the golden calf it could have been eagle in the sense of 103 novel interpretations of every halacha what's the point the point is like this let's take it personal think of your moment of greater spiritual failure i don't i don't want to cause anyone any pain but for the purposes of growth for a moment not beat yourself up it's not the time right now this is not hajj but enough is time we're not making a moral inventory but for the purposes of reflection at this moment think of your moments that you are appalled at yourself about the the the the thoughts where you it's more than cringe-worthy where you are ashamed of the person who you were your lowest moments not your lowest moments where people caused you pain i'm not talking about that that's a different subject for a different time i'm talking about your lowest moments where you were the culprit and you're ashamed and you're appalled at yourself i want to tell you something that lowest moment of your life could have been the most glorious moment of your life it didn't have to become a downfall it could have been an amazing success with just a different choice it would have been think about that your moment of failure could have been your moment of breakthrough that would have lifted you up to such a powerful level could've should have would it now we're all feeling regretful we're feeling mournful we're feeling remorse that's not my point because i want to finish i want to tell you something the fact that that moment of failure could have been a moment of glory means this it still can be a moment of glory because in potential it was good all along and we messed it up but only temporarily we can go back and we can get it we can retrieve it we can transform it we can reclaim it how can we reclaim it because all along really it was positive it was it was positive all along was always supposed to be good okay so we messed it up but we can go back and reclaim the inherent positivity the potential that was there and that is through what's called teshuva to show them returning to hashem out of love and when we do that it's dangerous a culprit sins where we were we purposely sinned we were rebelling the worst of the worst of the worst can be transformed not only to be canceled out but to become merits why because when we look back and we see how did i let something separate me from hashem it pains me so much i let something separate me from hashem and that pain becomes the springboard to greater sensitivity and greater vigilance where we are so careful to nurture the precious bond that we have with hashem and if we had never been cut off like that we would never today cherish so much our connection so this moment of failure becomes a moment of glory becomes transformed from negative the lowest moment of your life through teshova to a springboard to totally new growth and the reason it's able to become transformed into something positive because really all along that's what it was except that we squandered it temporarily for the moment but all along it was really positive could have been positive and and will become positive and of course this lesson is connected to the three weeks right now that we're in three weeks of mourning which the rambam passkins is a matter of halacha in us that these days of mourning will be transformed into yemen the fact that the jewish people fell so low in the time leading up to the destruction of the temple only shows us how it could have been a time of such high accomplishment they fell low because that was commensurate and proportionate to the potential for soaring high it was the lowest because it could have been the highest and since it could have been the highest this is the lesson for today it still can be the highest and so the destruction the corbin the golis the exa can become redemption and rebuilding and the perfection of the world mashiach because really that's what it was all along except temporarily we got sidetracked because of free choice which hashem gives us but we can use that same free choice to go back and reclaim it and re-channel it and and and take hold of the potential that was always there all along and once we realized this what do we realize as we go through the 42 journeys of life whatever journey you're on whatever number you're on you have a certain number of journeys behind you and you have a certain number of journeys ahead of you so here are the rules whatever journeys we were already on if we didn't do what we're supposed to do we go back and we change it through teshuva to sentence out of love and whatever journeys we weren't yet on that we're going to approach we're going to be so careful so exceedingly careful to bring out that only the positive scenario should come out so i'll close with the story there was a shidduch between rabbi sorel and the hershrim another and the two potential or prospective um got together they sat down and derozan has started and he says in our circles when we talk about a shidduch the first thing we do is we discuss is that i'm the great grandson of the maggie of mesrich the grandson of avraham der malach my great uncle's reb chernobyler my uncle is my parents died when i was five and my relatives couldn't support me so they apprenticed me out to a tailor and i was raised by this tailor he was a simple guy and basically i you know i had room and board in exchange for working in the tailor shop and that was my upbringing but i'll tell you from my upbringing as the taylor's apprentice i learned two things old things need to be fixed and new things have to be protected from being spoiled fix the old and take care of the new. i heard this he said as we go through the 42 journeys whatever journeys are behind us fix the old whatever journeys are ahead of us take such care of the new every moment is potential glory that's what it was designed for that's what it was meant to be