The secrets of Kabbalah behind the month of Sivan - Rabbi Alon Anava

There's a sham tonight is going to be Rosh Chodesh Sivan. And as we do every month, we learn a little bit about the month and what can be achieved on the month and a little bit of uh spiritual and mystical significance of the month, but mainly what can be achieved during that month. And Sivan is a very, very special month because that's the month that the Torah was given in. So, when we learned about Nissan, the dominating part of Nissan was Pesach. We learned about Iyar, the dominating part of Iyar was Lag BaOmer. Every time, every month, there's something that is very dominating in the month. Some months don't have any anything special. Don't have any holiday. But in the month of Sivan is a very special month this because the Torah was given and not nothing happens by chance. It wasn't that it just worked out according to the party planner that the Torah should be given on Sivan. It's a It's a more of a divine plan. And if we see that the Torah was given on the month of Sivan, means that it's a has something very, very special in it. And Sivan we know is the third month of the calendar counting from Nissan of course. Most people understand that the first month is Tishrei just because it's the beginning of the year but really the the the calendar starts from Nissan. So Sivan it makes it's the third month. Which we see that the cloud the Torah is called Torah Mishuleshet. The Torah is called a triangle the Torah or more comes from the word Mishuleshet not from the word triangle rather from the word Shulosh three. And we find in the Torah many things that come in three. First of all the Torah itself comes in three groups. We have the Torah Nevi'im Ketuvim. We have three three sections of the Torah. The five books, the prophets and the scripts. So already we see the the three in here. Then even in our nation we are divided into priests, Levites and Israel. Even almost in anything that you're going to look in the Torah you'll find that it's divided into three. The three fathers. Even the person who gave the Torah which is Moshe Rabbeinu. Moshe Rabbeinu was part of three siblings. Which was Miriam, Aaron and Moshe. They were three prophets. And it all started in the merit of Miriam. If you remember Miriam was the one who actually went and put Moshe in the in the water and then guarded him and then Aaron was the leader till Moshe came. So even there you see the this combination of three. And we see it in many different times that this concept of three. We learned in the last week when we had classes about Shavuot we mentioned couple times that in the physical way world and according to the oral Torah we see that the world is supported on three pillars, which is called Torah, Avodah, and Gemilut Chassadim. Torah, learning Torah, Avodah is praying, and Gemilut Chassadim is charitable acts. These are the three pillars that the world is supported on. In the spiritual teachings of the Torah, the teachings of Kabbalah explains that the world is basically supported on three lines, what is called Shlosha Kavim, Gimmel Kavim. And we mentioned that last last couple classes when we learned about Shavuot, that these three lines, these Gimmel Kavim, are the Kav Hayamin, which is the line comes from the right side, the Kav Hasmal is the left side, and Kav Ha'emtza is the the middle. Which in the Sefirot, you will see that it's the structure of it is always a right side, Chochmah, Chessed, and Netzach. And on the left side will be Binah, Gevurah, and Hod. And then in the middle side, you'll have from Keter, and then Tiferet, Yesod, and Malchut. There's always the right side, the left side, and the middle. Now, when the Torah comes in in in and calls itself uh Torah Meshuleshet, we see that there's always the relations between one side, another side that are two opposites, and then the middle side is what's going to be connecting them. And this is where it's it's called that we're connecting two opposites. The entire Torah is about connecting two opposites. This is the greatness of Hashem that is able to take two things that are completely opposing each other and put them together. Now, the the sign is called Teomim. Teomim is twins. I think the English word to it is How do you say Gem- Gemini? Gemini? Gemini. Gemini. In Hebrew, it's Teomim. Teomim is a And who are these twins that the Torah is referring to? The Torah is referring to the twins which is which is Moshe and Aaron. And they were so close to each other that they were literally like twins, even though there was a 3-year difference in their age, but they were like twins. Where else do we see the concept of a twin in the Torah, especially in the giving in the Torah? Is the two tablets. That are twins. One tablet holds five commandments. The other tablet is holding the other five commandments, but they equal. They resemble each other. This is another concept where we see the twins. Now, in the month of Sivan, we're celebrating the holiday of Shavuot, which very interestingly, it's the holiday that has the most names. The holiday of Sukkot is called Chag Sukkot. And the holiday of Hanukkah is called Hanukkah. Okay, some maybe call it the holiday of light. Purim is called Purim. Pesach is Okay, Pesach is might call also Chag HaCherut. But Shavuot has four names. It's the holiday that has most names. And the first name that we find in the Torah, it's called Chag HaKatzir. The holiday of harvest. And the reason why we call it Chag HaKatzir is because that's when they used to harvest the crops. The last crops that came out, after that, they wouldn't harvest any more crops. So, it says in the in the in the Torah, it's called it Ktzir Hitim. It's when the the the wheat when they would grow during the winter, and around the time of Shavuot, that was the time when you can actually harvest it, and that's it. Then you're done for the summer. You would plant something else. The next name of the holiday is called Chag which is what is mainly is called. We call it Hag Shavuot. Why we call it Shavuot? Because Shavuot in Hebrew is weeks. And before Hag Shavuot, we count seven weeks. We count the weeks. And it says that we have to count weeks. So, we call it the the holiday of weeks, Hag Shavuot. Another reason why we call it Shavuot is because Shavuot can also be read the letters exactly as Shavuot. Shavuot is a is when I when I take an oath. And on the time of Matan Torah, there were two oaths giving. One of them was giving by Hashem that he he basically swore to us. Nishba, Shavuot comes from the word Shavuah. Hashem swore to us, he took an oath that he's not going to change us with a different nation. He says, "Doesn't matter what you're going to do. I know you're going to be annoying me now for the next 3,000 years. But, I'm not going to change you for any other nation." The second oath was by the sons of Israel, by the Jews, that they took an oath, they swore to Hashem, "We will never change you to a different God." So, the name Shavuot is named after the two oaths, Sh'tei Shavuot. Two oaths, one that Hashem gave and one that we gave. The third name is called Hag Habikurim. Bikurim is that they used to plant their their their fruits, their crops, their trees. And the farmer will go to the orchard, and the first and most beautiful fruit that will come out, he would take it out, put it aside, and and he would say, "This is going to go to the Kohanim. This is going to go to Bet Hamikdash." And Hag Habikurim, they used to take baskets to Bet Hamikdash with all the best of the best of the fruit and the vegetables. And they would bring it into the holy temple and bring it to the coin. And that would be considered the the bikurim, the offerings. And that was the the the best of of of their Excuse me, of their crops or their vegetables or or or fruit. And if they would find something better a week later, then they would replace it. But the point was that to bring the best of the offerings to the coin. And the last name that we find to the the holiday of Shavuot is we call this holiday atzeret. Atzeret. Now, the the the sages explain that at the end of Sukkot, we have a holiday that is called Shmini Atzeret. And on Pesach, we don't have an atzeret. Our sages explain that Shavuot is the atzeret of Pesach. Meaning the end of Pesach. So, technically, from Pesach till Shavuot is one long period. And Shavuot is the time that it ends Pesach. We're finishing a complete period. So, just as a side note about the holiday of Shavuot because it is connected to the month. And if the holiday is on the calendar in the month of Sivan, then then it means that the holiday has a connection to the month. Now, other than that, this month is called the month of unity. Chodesh Ha'achdut. This is the is the month that started the unity. And this is the month where you can derive and and so to say benefit from the power of the month to to create unity. That's why we see that the sign, which is uh the the twins, is they're united. Twins are together. It's a It's a symbolizing the unity of two. Two become one. Two resemble to one. And the the the Zohar says that the two twins in the sign, it's one person. It's the concept of connecting the right and the left. Cuz I explained we have the right side, we have the left side, kav yamin and kav smol. Something has to connect them. Something needs to connect them is the the power of connection, the power of unity. And the entire avodah that we do is creating this yichud. Everything that we do, we say Kriyat Shema, we're doing uh something that is called yichud, is a unity. All the mitzvot that we do is we uniting Hashem and the Shechinah. You find in many siddurim, especially by the Sefardi siddurs, that before every uh part of the prayer, they say "Leshem yichud Kudsha ubrikhu ubrikhu ushchinteh." For the sake of the connection between Hashem and the Shechinah. So everything that we do is connecting this unity. Anything that we do, I'm talking about in regards to Torah and mitzvot, not when we peel bananas. I mean when I everything that I do in my service of Hashem is for the sake of uniting the supreme attributes, the midot ha'elyonot. So this month is the the the source of the connection between the right and the left. That's why the sign comes in a in a form of two individuals. Now what really do I need to do? What is my main spiritual work? Is to take something negative, connected with the positive, and now make the positive overpower the negative. Cuz it's very easy to take a negative and a positive and make the negative overpower. But that's not what I should need to do. I need to take something negative, something positive, put them together, and now make something positive out of that. This is the concept in the Torah that is called "Ve'ahavta lere'acha kamocha". Exactly. You take two nigudim and two opposites. But the concept of taking something negative and creating something positive out of it, this is the concept of "Ve'ahavta lere'acha kamocha" that you should love another person like you love yourself. That you're taking something negative and you're creating something positive out of it. This is in the in the term of the Zohar called "Hafacha chashocha le'ora". Transforming the darkness into light. And and he continues by saying "U'mariri le'mitikun". And bitterness into sweetness. So, at the end everything will be clear. Whatever is not going to be clear be'ezrat Hashem I'll answer. But the point is that the power of unity, the power of the month is to connect two opposites and to transform something negative into positive. Now you see that what was the main motion be from at the time of the redemption of Egypt is that they went from slavery into freedom. And so to say, till Shavuot they were working on climbing into the level of receiving the Torah. But the main motion that happened was it's called they went out from "Avdut" "Lecherut". From slavery into freedom. This is basically our entire work, our entire labor throughout our life. Is going out of slavery, the motion of going out of slavery into spiritual freedom. And every day I have to go out of my slavery. That's why our sages say "Uvechol dor vador chayav adam lirot etzmo ke'ilu yatza miMitzrayim". Every generation a person has to see himself like as if he went out of Egypt. And comes the Baal Hatanya, the Alter Rebbe, and he He "Bechol yom vayom". Every day a person has to go out of his limitation. So, I have a responsibility to go out of my slavery and to break this limitation into freedom. Slavery can be being addicted to cigarettes, being addicted to chocolates, being addicted to my iPhone, being addicted to anything. I mean, in our generation you call it addiction. But, people don't even realize that they are addicted to very little things. People are addicted to their phone. So sad the reality is that if they don't have their phone for 2 hours, they they lose touch to to reality. So, there are strong addictions, there are soft addictions. I have to call it soft. Addiction is an addiction. But, basically I don't like calling it an addiction. I would rather call it a limitation that I'm stuck in some type of a limit and I need to go out of my limitation. This is called the concept of going from of dude the hero of the slavery into freedom. When we got the Torah, our sages say that when we got the tablets, tablet in Hebrew is called Lua. Lua Lua the breach stay Lua the breach. That it's the it says that the letters were engraved on the tablets. Lua is when it's engraved. When you take a piece of paper and you write on it with ink, the ink technically can be removed from the paper. It's two different entities, the papers and the ink. But, when you engrave something, you can't take the letters out of the stone anymore. That's it. You engraved it. It became now one. When the sages in the mission says that the letters the the letters of the Torah were engraved on the tablets, it says out the crack out. And I had it out. Don't call it out. Don't call it engraved. Rather call it freedom. Call it out. It's the same the letters just read a little bit different. So, the concept of the giving of the Torah is the final stage of going out of my limitation into freedom. And this is the concept of the month of Sivan is I complete the liberation, so to say. The fact that we left Egypt in in Pesach, we just left Egypt, but I didn't get rid of the Egypt yet. I left my limitation, but I didn't still get rid of it. This is the difference between the the work of a tzaddik and a work of a a simple person like us. The tzaddik actually completely transforms the the bad. He doesn't have any bad in him anymore. That's the difference between the tzaddik she'eino gamur, tzaddik that is not a complete tzaddik, and tzaddik gamur. The tzaddik gamur, he completely transformed the bad in him. He doesn't even have bad in him. Tzaddik she'eino gamur, he's a tzaddik, but he still has bad in him. It just doesn't come out to the surface. So, everything that we do, we have to take the negative and completely transform it into positive, completely, from one side to the other. Now, in previous classes, we learned and we know that every month has a certain star. The star of the month of Sivan, in Hebrew, it's called Kochav, star. In English, it's called Mercury. This is the month the star of the month. But in Hebrew, interestingly, it's called Kochav. And it's called actually Kochav is a star. Now, this star is a very special star. It's a star that has the power to connect two things, two opposites. Where do we see a hint in it? Take the word Kochav in Hebrew, it's spelled kaf, vav, kaf, bet. Split it in half to get two sides. The right side becomes kaf and vav. Kaf and vav is a numerical value of 26. Yud key. The first uh uh the the the value of uh the yud key vav key, 26. Yud key vav key is the motion of giving. In the name of Hashem, the motion of Hashem of yud key vav key is giving, netina. The next part of the kochav is kaf and bet. Kaf and bet is 22. 22 corresponds to the 22 letters of the alphabet. That this is the foundation of the world. The world is built on these letters. The the the 22 letters is the foundation of of of the universe. Now, what does it mean the kaf vav and the kaf bet? Is connecting the Kadosh Baruch Hu with the Shechinah. The aspect of the divine that is called Shechinah and connecting Hashem with it. This is two opposites, so to say. This is kind of like the connection of the male and the female. In the Sefirot is also the female aspect of it and the male aspect of it. And again, this is connecting the right to the left, the kaf vav to the kaf bet. This is connecting in the time of the giving of the Torah, there was a connection between the heavens and the lower realm, shamayim va'aretz. Up until Matan Torah, anything that had to do with the spiritual was in the world above, anything that had to do with the physical was in the world world below. At the time of the giving of the Torah, it says, "Elyonim yordu la'tachtonim." The supreme, the above came down below, "V'tachtonim alu la'elyonim." And the lower went up ascended went up. Where do we see it? Moshe went up to the mountain and from the mountain went up to shamayim, and Hashem came down on the mountain. So, this is the time when the heavens and the earth they got connected, the spiritual and the physical. So, this is the the the month of connecting shnei hafachim, two opposites. And we see also with the motion of the of the star. Now, the Zohar explains that a human being basically lives in two dimensions, in the spiritual dimension and in the physical dimension. You can connect yourself to two dimensions and you will operate in these two dimensions, in the spiritual and the physical. Many people, unfortunately, they don't connect themselves to the spiritual dimension, so they're living in one dimension, only the physical dimension. So, they're missing out a whole dimension where they where they can operate and where they can live. And the whole concept of mitzvot is to connect to opposites. That's why what do we What did we get in the giving of the Torah? We got mitzvot. We didn't get the story, we got the mitzvahs. Hashem Moshe came down from the mountain and started telling us, "Okay, you have to observe Shabbat. You have to eat kosher. You have to do this mitzvah, that mitzvah." With the giving of the Torah, one can simplify by saying we got a list of commandments. Okay, you can call it the Torah, but technically what we got is a list of commandments, is mitzvot. And the whole concept of mitzvot is to connecting two opposites. In the very simple level, you see what is it connecting into opposites? The physical and the spiritual. I'm taking a piece of leather, like tefillin, that was made out of an animal. It goes through a process, and then I'm making something spiritual out of it. I'm connecting now the physical and the spiritual together. Most of the mitzvahs, I can take a a etrog. It's a very physical thing. I put a lulav together, hadas and arava. I have four species now. Now I I transformed it into something spiritual. And I'm using it for something spiritual. Same Same thing with a sukkah. Same thing with many other things. So, the essence, the purpose of the mitzvot is to connect the spiritual to physical. That's what Hashem wants. So, Hashem wants us to take the physical and connect it to the spiritual, which is basically taking the something negative and transforming it into something positive. That's the the the the essence, so to say, or the purpose. Now, in the word mitzvah, we have already a beautiful hint of this whole concept. Because in the word of mitzvah, again, cut it in half. Cuz if everything with that we have in our reality is the reality of the kav emi, we cover small. This is the reality. There's always going to be two sides. So, you take the word mitzvah and you cut it in half. You get the mem and the tzadik, and then you get the vav and the hey. The mem and the tzadik, if you counting the letters in the system that is called atbash. Atbash is when you switch letters from beginning to end. Aleph will be switched with tav because aleph is the first letter, tav is the last letter. So, aleph now will be switched with tav. Bet will be switched with shin. That's why it's called atbash, by the way. Aleph tav, tav bet shin. Last months, if you remember, we talked also about the atbash. If you take the letters mem and tzadik, and you look at it in the system of atbash, it will switch it to yud and kaf. Because it's the 10th letter from the beginning, 10th letter from the back. So, the mem and the tsadik becomes yud and and hey. Let's make a quick calculation. It's the It's the What would be the mem starting from the beginning and starting from the end? And same thing with the tsadik. So, tsadik will be the hey will be the fifth letter in and tsadik is the fifth letter from the end. Same thing with the mem is the 10th letter in and 10th letter and and and the yud Sorry, yud will be 10th letter from the beginning and mem is the 10th letter going back. So, in the calculation of atbash, mem and tsadik from the mitzvah will be switched into yud and hey. So, and the vav and hey of the mitzvah that we cut in half, that's the vav and the hey. So, it's basically the name of Hashem Yud Kay Vav Kay separated again in half. We have the yud and the kay on the right side and the vav and the kay on the left side. The concept, the essence of a mitzvah is to take the yud and the kay and connect it to the vav and the kay. This is two parts of Hashem's name. Which What does it represent? The yud and the kay, they represent the world above, the elyonim, the spiritual part of the the the the spiritual realm, the spiritual dimension. The vav and the hey represents the tachtonim, the lower realm, the the the physical dimension. Now, to continue in the Sefer Yetzirah, the book of formation is always talking about the letter that the month was created with and the letter that the star of the month was that was created with. The letters of this month, the letter of the month is reish and sorry, zayin and the letter the letter in Sefer Yetzirah is zayin, the letter of the month, not vav, and the letter that created the the star is Zayin, forming it together the two words of raz, of secret. Talking about what Sefer Yetzirah says, there are other books, what the Bnei Yissachar explains, and many other Kabbalah books, but what I'm talking about Sefer Yetzirah right now. Sefer Yetzirah explains that the the month of Sivan was created with the letter Zayin. And the the star that is called Kokhav was by the letter Reish, which forms together the the word raz. Raz in Hebrew is a secret. Raz also has the numerical value of 207, which is the numerical value of or, of light, which means that the secret is the the the the same concept of light. And what is this concept of raz? It's chibur. Secret is the concept of chibur, of of connecting two opposites. Same thing, this is what the light does. The light connects two opposites together. What is the purpose of this connection? It's called balance, izun. Because again, Hashem created the world in a certain way, and he created it again, there's always going to be shtei hafachim, the right side and the left side. The whole concept of this connection is creating balance. If my life is not balanced, it's going more to one side or more to the left side, and my life will be out of balance. One day I have a good mood, one day I have a bad mood. One day I'm happy, one day I'm not happy. One day I'm upset, one day I'm not upset. Today I love you, tomorrow I don't love you. I'm constantly unbalanced. And that's the sad reality of most people, that their life is very unbalanced, which at the end of the day can drive you crazy. Because we're looking for balance. You have a relationship, I want to have a balanced relationship. I want I'm looking into my livelihood, I want to have a balanced livelihood. I don't want one month to make 50,000 and the next month to not to make anything. That puts a lot of stress onto me. That's why a lot of people they they prefer being working for somebody because I have my paycheck every month. I know I make 2,000. But there's no such thing as balance because Hashem is in control. So it's always changing like you were saying. Yes, but we want to strive to get into balance. This is the whole concept of our avodah to Hashem is to put balance in my life. You're right. It is constantly going to be motions. There's nothing wrong with emotion. Even emotion, it still has to be balanced. The motion of Hashem which we spoke about many times is the motion of up and down. This is called in the term of Kabbalah ratzo vashov, in out, up down. But in that has to be balanced. The balance is from side to side. You don't have balance from up and down. Take a ship. A ship is in the in the in the ocean. It moves from side to side. The waves can take it up and down. But what would cause you to be seasick and to throw up is the side to side, not the up and down. So there is the motion. But the balance has to be between the right and the left that they have to be constantly balanced. That's why you see that if you take a dreidel for example and you turn it, what makes it so to say straight? The motion that it's turning around. Once it starts stops turning around, up, falls on one side. Same idea is in the concept of the Sefirot. If you look at the structure of the Sefirot, the Keter is above and the Malchut is below and then in between you have the rest of the midot and the Sefirot. So technically, if you turn it, there is the opinion in books of Kabbalah that the Sefirot are in the motion of turning. They're not standing like what we see. We see it cuz we draw it. But the Sefirot are in constant turn. This is called Igulim, the circles. In many places in Kabbalah, you will find the teachings that all the worlds are called Dalgalim. The worlds are called circles. And the the motion, the energy of the Sefirot is turning around. Like a dreidel, you turn it around with the energy of the turning, it's not falling. If you Again, if you look at the structure of the Sefirot above and below, it's like a dreidel. The Malchut is below is the tip, above is the Keter is where you turn it around. And if the motion is very healthy, it's going to turn and it will have its course. But then it has the right and the left side that will pull. Some people are more turning to the right, some people are more leaning to the left. The Mitzvot is what basically balances us. And and the Mitzvah is to to connect the two Hafachim, this one side to the other. This brings us to understand that the the the element of the month is the month is the element of Av, of air. Because the air is kind of in between. It's connecting two things together. Interestingly, we see something the Zohar explains about the the giving of the Torah that it says that there were 600,000 men there. And we know that Shishim Ribu, 600,000 people were there. But really, it's only men from the age of 20 to the age of 60. If you make a very quick calculation with the women and the children and the elderly people, we're we're kind of calculating that there were about 3 million people in Matan Torah. That's where we come to the calculation that in Mitzrayim, there were about 18 million people, 15 million stayed in Mitzrayim, they died, and 3 million were about around the amount that were in the time of giving of the Torah. The Zohar explains that 3 million people It doesn't say the word 3 million. It just says that everybody that were there. I'm saying the rough calculation 3 million and it's not me. Almost any commentary will give this calculation. But it says that all these people that were there, they were all there getting the Torah. Each one heard it completely different. Each one understood it completely different. Amazingly I spoke on that last week that the Torah was given on Har Sinai. They didn't look at the Torah like a screen at the mountain. It wasn't like a drive-in that everybody's sitting there. I mean drive-in there for the older generation, they know what I mean. It's saying now to kids drive-in, they don't understand what you're talking about. So, but people having their vision that Torah was a big screen and everybody was standing facing the screen. In the olden days, the theater, you would drive in with the car and you would sit in the car and watch the movie. And then the the waiters or whatever would come and hang hang something on your window, your popcorn and whatever and that's how it was. So, believe it or not, I'm I'm young but I used to go to a drive-in. Yeah, we had a drive-in in Israel. Believe it or not, it was next to the Luna Park in Ganei HaTarucha. So, you know what? I think they still have the screen there by the way. I I mean I don't remember I didn't drive past there for a long time. But we used to go to a drive-in too. Anyways. So, people in their vision think Torah was a big screen and everybody looking at the screen. Torah was on a mountain and the mountain was a circle which means that everybody was around the mountain. So, I was standing here, on the other side of the mountain was standing other people. I couldn't see them, the mountain is blocking me. But, what I saw is what they saw. So, in the entire diameter of the mountain, that's where everybody were standing around it. So, the vision of Matan Torah was 360°. Meaning, the Zohar says that each individual that stood in Matan Torah saw and heard and understood completely something different. And we learn from that what we all see things completely different. I will see something this way and you will see that way. There's a very big argument here in in regards to colors. That I can see something and I say it's purple and you'll tell me it's pink. I'll tell you no, it's purple. And you'll argue with me that it's pink. And it would look the same. I can say orange, you'll tell me no, it's not really orange, it's like peach. And there's always going to be an argument. So, there's an argument actually in science about light. And there's an argument, what is light? Is it a wave or is that a uh a particle? That's how you say particle? Particle? That's the word? In Hebrew, it's called gal vechilchik. So, chilchik in English is particle, right? Correct me if I'm wrong. There's an argument in science if light is a is a wave, it's a little uh it's a it's a beam of like a wave or it's a particle. So, after many years of arguments in science, they came to the conclusion that it's both. Depends how you look at the light. Depends how where you look. Excuse me? It's before you look and Yeah, so when it comes to light, depends how you're looking at it. You look from here, you look from here. So, the Torah was was presented in a certain way. It says Shiv'im Panim LaTorah, 70 angles the Torah has, but really there are millions angles to the Torah. Because in Matan Torah, everybody stood around the mountain, they saw it completely different. This kind of resembles to the concept of a gravity. Because when did humankind find out about gravity? 500 years ago, 400 years ago. When did Galileo find out that the world is round? Same thing, 4 500 years ago. 2500 years ago, or more like 2200 years ago, the Zohar already revealed that the world is a ball, that the world is round. And the Zohar has a lot of details that were were already mentioned way beyond before science. And in the Zohar it says that the world is a ball, and people are standing on the top of the ball, and at the same time people are standing on the bottom of the ball, and they're not falling. This is basically talking about gravity. Cuz technically you have this humongous ball flying in the galaxy, which in itself, if you meditate on the fact that a huge ball is flying flying in the universe, that in itself should bring you to believe in God. How does a ball gravitate in a universe and just doesn't fall? This in itself is a massive wonder that anyone that meditates on that and cannot come to the conclusion that there's a creator that is holding the ball in the air, that in itself is is something huge. Just look at how many of these balls are flying in the in the in the air. It says in the the in the in the Torah that Hashem hangs the sun in the air. You know what I mean? That's the verse that it's actually using that it's to lay, it's hanging the balls in the air. Like these balls are like hanging in the air. So the Zohar is already talking about how the ball, this ball, doesn't say earth, it doesn't say planet, it says kadur. It says in in the ball there are people standing on all sides of the balls and nobody falls down. Nobody falls down to the to the bottom. Talking about gravity. So technically again, we see the same idea of this rounded thing that everybody's in the diameter, but everybody's pointing to a different direction, but still so to say being pulled in. This is gravity. In the giving of the Torah, there are many many people, millions of people, and by the way, it wasn't only the 3 million that we evaluated of the Jews. All the nations were around us in another diameter, just they were one step back. So they were in the driving in the back part of the their driving. But everybody was there. Which means that we saw the Torah in many different angles. Which basically again brings us to this whole concept of connecting two opposites. You say tomatoes, I say tomatoes, and let's call the whole thing off. That's what what's his name, Frank Sinatra said. You say tomatoes, I say tomatoes. We will always have disagreements. There's always going to be disagreements, but there's not a disagreement. It's just that we need to bridge to each other. You saw the Torah from this angle, I saw the Torah from this angle. It's the same Torah. Just that we're seeing it a little bit different. You say o and I will say oi when I come to pronounce the words. I actually will say o, not oi. So I should say different. I say, "Oh." You say, "Oy." So, because a lot of people have an issue with how other people pronounce the words. I told you that last week when we talked about uh one of the secrets behind the month of Shavuot of the holiday of Shavuot is that that we all have something that is called machloket. If you weren't here, go and watch the video. It's online. It went online. It's a very very powerful lesson that we can derive on Shavuot because we all have a machloket. We constantly have disagreements. And this is because of this a concept that is called tzimtzum, a contraction of the light. So, the daat elyon, the higher level daat, cannot come into the world. Therefore, it will create a disagreement, a machloket. And I mentioned how sometimes you will find two Jews. One will wear the hat that the end of the hat goes up. And the other one wears the hat that the hat goes down. Arguments. So, we all full of arguments. The point is to connect to the two opposites. And to conclude, we always cover that there are 12 senses. And every month there's a sense to the month. A chush. And the chush, the sense of the month of Sivan is chush halicha. Is the walking. Motion. Now, it's not necessarily talking about the physical mo- walking. Talking about the spiritual walking. This is called in the kabbalistic term, halicha pnimis. Pnimis means internal. That I constantly inside have to be in the motion of walking. The angels are called om'dim. Standing. And human beings are called mehalchim, mehalach. Walking. I constantly have to have the motion of walking in me. Walking means that I'm before, a second ago, I was there. Now, I'm there. I started and be be back and I'm going forward and I'm moving myself from one place to the other. The same way the doctors tell you that it's very healthy to walk every day. It's a very good exercise. You don't want to exercise at least go at least walk 10 minutes. Same thing in the spiritual level, it's very healthy to walk every day. To have this concept of walking. This is called in Hebrew Kadim, to move forward. Now with the emotion of the month, the sense of the month, it it's always corresponding to the tribe of the month. The tribe of the month is Zvulun. Zvulun was a merchant. He used to go and do business. And and the word in Hebrew is called Pakmatya. He used to go and do a business, to travel around. He would have ships and he would go out and do business and come back. This is called in Hebrew Ochel or Socher. Socher is a merchant. Ochel is a more of a somebody who goes and does the business, you know, buy, sells and Ochel comes from the word in Hebrew Rogel. And Rogel is comes from the shoresh regel, from the root regel, like meragel, something that comes that they walk around and they they they walk to one place to get something else. Now in the Torah we know that there was a very special partnership between two tribes, between the tribe of Zvulun and the tribe of Issachar. Issachar would be the one who sits and learns Torah and Zvulun was the one who went to do business and Zvulun would give 50% of the money to Issachar. They would support him. And Issachar would give the benefit of the Torah learning to Zvulun. There was a business deal here. Technically, what a mother? If they shared a mother? Did they share a mother? Yeah. They were brothers. Yeah, they were brothers. No, but she's asking if they shared a mother. Yeah. I know that. So, seemingly, it seems that Issachar had the better end of the stick. I'm sitting air conditioning, learning Torah all day long. Seems that they had a much better part of the deal. Yeah. Really, Zebulun was the more dominating part. Because the mitzvah that Issachar did is one mitzvah. It's just sitting and learning Torah. Technically, an easy mitzvah. Give me now a full day, I would love to sit in Yeshiva all day long and learn. I would very quickly give up everything that I do to sit in Yeshiva and learn all day long. Have a nice cup of coffee, like this, learn from the book. No working, no problems, no arguments, no nothing, no headaches. I don't know about Issachar though. Sitting in Yeshiva all day long and Okay, I'm talking in the concept that you have somebody giving you money. I told you a story last week. It wasn't actually last week, in the beginning of this week when we learned about the the the parsha of Bamidbar. I told you a story uh that there was a certain Hasid of of of the a certain tzaddik. And he his father-in-law supported him financially. He said, "I know you are a talmid chacham. I'm willing to support you. Just sit and learn Torah." And then at some point, the father died. And the Hasid had a problem. Everybody came to him and told him, "You are very wise, and you are responsible. Take over the business." And suddenly, he had to start becoming a businessman. And he went to his rabbi saying, "Listen, a half a year I didn't learn Torah." And the rabbi told him, "Listen, you you are upgraded. Cuz up until now, you only had one mitzvah, which is the learning Torah. Now, look how many mitzvahs you're doing. You're you're doing business. You you're giving tzedakah, you're giving ma'aser, you you practice you're practicing last be your share to be honest in your in your business, to be a truthful and reliable. So, the the benefit that this guy had is very limited, cuz he only learned Torah. Even though good learning Torah is great. But Zevulun really did Hashem. Really served Hashem. Why? Because you know what it is to be a business owner? First, you have to be honest. Then, you have to be truthful. Then, you have to have faith. You have to have a lot of faith. You have to have faith. You have to be very sure that the business will work out, faith. You know how hard it is to give from your money? To write a check after you worked so hard, you want to buy yourself something. So, and the more money you make, the more money you have to give. Giving money from a thousand dollars is not so bad. I know some people that their money is coming from a million dollars. You know what it is to give a hundred thousand dollars? Suddenly a hundred thousand dollars, it's a Mercedes every month. I know some somebody has big problems every time. His money is like buying a house. So, it's very easy to give two thousand dollars. To give fifty thousand dollars, half a million. I'm very happy I made five million, but to give this huge amount, it's not so easy. So, to be a business owner comes with a lot of responsibility. And we see even in the Talmud it says when the comes up to the first thing they ask the in a second you have to share. If you dealt business honestly, you know how it is to be honest in business. It's one of the hardest things. It's very easy when a customer comes in. Okay, I don't have to tell him this. They don't have to tell him that. So, Zebulun had a much harder job. He literally practiced what's called Avodat Hashem, really serving Hashem. But we see that they had this two this this partnership. Where else do we see a partnership? We said that the word for merchant in Hebrew is rochel, which comes from the word in Hebrew regel. Comes from the root regel. Where else do we find two feet? Two legs in the Sefirot. If you read in Patach Eliyahu in the Tikunei Zohar, it's talking about the Sefirot. So, it's talking about there are two Sefirot that are legs. The netzach and the hod. Netzach is regel mean, and hod is regel small. Netzach is the right leg, and hod is the left leg. And what is the difference between them? What are these legs? Netzach, it represents the ambition in me. The the power, the the netzachon, the victory over my ambitions. We all have ambitions. I want to be a doctor. You want to be an architect. You want to be a great a scholar. We constantly have ambitions. And we need some type of a power to over to basically get these ambitions, to overpower, to win. This is netzach, netzachon. But comes the other side, the left leg. This is hod. Hod comes from the word lehodot. You know why? Because I have limitations, and I need to lehodot, I need to admit. And I have failures in life. That that my plan didn't work out. I need to admit. And I need to be be to come out and say, "I tried. I failed." Or I'm limited. I'm good here, but I'm not good here. This is the power of admitting. We learned that when we before when we prepared for Pesach. To be able to admit my faults is not easy. To come and say, "You're right. This is my fault. It's hard for me to wake up in the morning." Doesn't matter right now, but it's admitting. Doesn't matter if Hashem put that limitation in my life. Everything I put Hashem put in my life. Yeah, but I have to admit. Admitting is not so simple. Many people they'll fail in something. No, it was his fault. The market was not a good market, so I the business deal didn't work out. Uh Just admit that it failed. Okay. Nothing happened. So, you failed. Big deal. You win some, you lose some. So, Hod comes from the power of Lehodot, to admit. Sometimes I win, sometimes I don't. So, Netzach is the the to basically win. Netzach comes from the word Nitzachon, to win my my my my my ambitions. I have ambitions in my life, whatever it is. That gives me the power of winning, but I have to also know that sometimes I'm not going to win. So, there's always the concept of the right and the leg and the right and the left. Hold on. I'm going to be finishing in a minute. Write your questions and we're going to go through everything. So, basically we see in Halacha in many places the concept that you have to start with your right leg. They also I don't know if they have it in English, but in Hebrew there is the saying that you say start with the right leg. Let's kill the regular mean. If two people argue, they have a bad encounter, they say it's going to be regular small. We started with the left leg. I don't know if it's something that is said in English, but in Hebrew Yeah, getting off with the wrong foot. In Hebrew actually say regularly let's start with the right leg. It originates because in the Torah in Halakha we see that in many things we have to start with the right leg. You start prayer of Shmone Esrei, you always start with the right leg. When you even get dressed, you put the right hand first, you put the right leg first. This is according to Halakha. If you look into Halakha, you will find that in all the cases you start with the right hand. But, where do we really see that we start first with the left leg? Yeah, in the army they start small you mean small. This is a very big Kabbalistic thing that technically when I wake up in the morning, which foot do I need to put first on the ground? The right leg. When I wake up in the morning, I say Modeh Ani, I put the right leg down. I don't put the left leg down first. When I get dressed right hand first, right leg first. I put my shoes on, right foot shoe goes on first. When I wake up, I put the right foot down. But, really left will come first. You know why? Because before I put the foot on the ground, you know what I say? Modeh Ani lifnei'cha. I admit. And that's the Hodah. Is the left, regel small. So, before I put my foot, yes I do put my right foot leg on the ground. But, really I started with the left foot. Because when I woke up in the morning, I said Modeh Ani the right foot is the Netzach and the left foot is Hod is is admitting. And when I say Modeh Ani, Modeh is not necessarily I thank you. Modeh comes from the word I admit, Hodah, Modim anachnu lach. So, there's a very big difference. In order for me to be very successful and to have power, especially the power of victory, I first have to admit. I have to be humble. So, to summarize everything together, we have a month of connecting to opposites. We have the month that the essence of the month is when we got the mitzvot. The mitzvot is to connect to opposites. More than that, we see the star in the month has the concept of the connection of two things. If you remember what we said, the cuff and the vav and the cuff and the bet is taking the letters The letters is the the basically the Torah and the cuff and the vav is the yud kay is connecting the Torah and Hashem. This is connecting the spiritual and the physical. It's all about the month of connections. Taking zevulun and yissachar, connecting them, putting them together, the spiritual and the physical. And this can only be done in the motion in the chush of the sense of walking. If I don't walk, I'm not going to be able to connect anything. And it's not a physical walking. It's spiritual walking. What physically will take me will make me walk is my legs. I have to have two motions. The motion that I want to be better. I want to be closer. I want to be more successful. This is the right leg that takes me. But I have to have the left leg. I can't walk on one leg. I can't. If not, then I'm going to be hopping. Hashem gave me two legs. I have to walk on two legs. If not, I'm not going to That's not going to be going to be considered walking. It's going to be considered limping or hopping. So, I have to lean also on the left leg. And the left leg is the power of admitting. It's the hodah. I admit. I am not so perfect. It's very hard for me to say, "Me? Oh, no. I'm perfect. You are the problem. I'm the perfect one. You are the cause of all the problems." This is the wrong attitude. The right attitude is saying, "You know what? Both of us saw the Torah. You were standing on that side of the mountain, I was standing on this side of the mountain. We are both right. Or we can both be wrong. You know that sketch that now is very popular on the social media. It has a sketch of a six. One person is standing here, one person is standing there. One person says it's a six, the other person says it's a nine. It's a very popular picture that is shared now in social media. They are both right. It's both a six and a nine, just depends where you're standing. Depends how you're looking at it. So, the point is is the power of Hodaya. This coming from the the power of Hod. We celebrated not long ago the Lag BaOmer. So, Rabbi Shimon was Hod she be Hod. He was the only one who was able to transform this meter. Hod, if it's looked in the negative way, read it the other way around is Dava. Dava is a very negative thing. Rabbi Shimon was the only one who was able to go to the depth of the Hod of the Hod and to transform it and to make a light out of it and to to elevate it to the highest level. So, the point of this month that I want to take is is the month of connecting two opposites. Meaning that I can meditate. This is something that you need to meditate on the month on the Rosh Chodesh. Is what in my life are two opposites that I need to connect together? Is it mean my wife? Is it mean my kid? Is it mean my neighbor? Is it mean myself? Is it mean Hashem? Where what's the other two opposites in my life that I need to make a connection to make a unity? And this is the month where I actually have the power to do that. Is the taking the Kavei Yamin, taking the Kavei Smol, the two sides, the right and left, and putting them in the center and connecting them and the result will be balance. And my life is balanced. The center? Kavanta? The line of the middle. You mean in the Sefirot? Then you have Keter, Tiferet, Yesod, and Malkhut. But it's called the term The terminology is Kav Yamin is the right side, Kav Smol is the left side, and the middle is called Kav Emtza. Emtza is the middle, the middle line. The point is that I need to reach in everything in my life to the Kav Emtza, to the balance. When I have a relationship with my wife, it cannot go 100% by me. It has to be 50% me, 50% my wife. It cannot be 51/49. And our healthy relationship is meeting in the middle. Both of us stood in Har Sinai. I stood on this side, you stood on the other side. We both saw it. I'm looking at the light from here, you're looking at the light from here. I think it's purple, you think it's pink. Let's call the whole thing off. So the point is Fred Astaire. Fred Astaire. I know I said Frank Sinatra. Fred Astaire. So, the point I want to take from this is I have an opportunity Yeah. And that's that's the the song. That's the song. You say tomatoes, I say tomatoes. Bananas, bananas. Exactly. So our entire life, all our connections, all our relationships is connecting two opposites. This is the whole concept in Halakha. Look in the Gemara, in the Talmud. Mantana says A, the other Tana says B. They're arguing, comes the third one and says, "No, it's like that." That's the whole concept is connecting two opposites. This is tying knots. Kadosh Baruch Hu calls it liksho ktarim, not need knotting, putting knots in crowns. So we want to take this entire concept and apply it to my life and to be able to constantly merge two opposites, to connect the spiritual and the physical. And needless to say that as of now we are living in complete uh unbalanced hostile zone and we need the ultimate pillar that will connect this balance and this is called Mashiach and Hashem if we work on ourselves and we consider what we need to do this will allow Mashiach to come and bring this unity and connection and bring our life into balance. Hashem should have a beautiful successful fruitful beneficial beautiful month.