Key to All Relationships - R. Yaakov Moskowitz - TorahAnytime.com

Yeshua ben Perachiah says you should make for yourself a rav. U'knei l'cha chaver. And acquire for yourself a friend. V'havei dan es kol ha'adam l'kaf z'chus. And judge all people favorably. The way I always understood the Mishna until like three days ago when I saw this in one B that I'm about to read was that Rebbi Yehoshua ben Perachiah is teaching us three different things. Three totally different things. One is get yourself a rebbe. The other thing is get yourself a friend. And the third thing is you should judge everyone favorably. This Pirkei Avos that I found on my shelf, Avos Al Banim Pirkei Avos, um he says the following thing. And we'll read it in English in the interest of time. He says he's bothered by what what why are these all together? These three things. What's going on? And he says that the concluding words to judge everyone favorably are coming to fulfill the opening words. These these three things are really all connected. If you don't judge every person in all their actions favorably, you will not be able to have a rav for yourself because you will not view him as an angel of Hashem. And similarly, you will not be able to acquire a friend for yourself because you will see many flaws in them. It's only when you judge him favorably you are able to make this happen for yourself to have your rav and to have your friend. He puts it all all together in the Mishna. The reason why these three things are there is because in order to have a rav, a person needs to be able to be dan l'kaf z'chus because the rav inevitably is going to make mistakes over time. He's a human being. And or there may be things that happen that the rav does or says that you assume are negative but aren't really negative or whatever it may be and that will affect your relationship with having a rav to ask the shailos to and to talk to. But as well, which is the topic of our conversation, U'knei l'cha chaver, it's to acquire for yourself a friend. There is no way, he's saying, that a person can have a friendship without the middah of being dan l'chaf z'chut. It will not last. And I saw, I didn't put it on the sheet, my apologies, but the Alshich on Pirkei Avot says a similar idea. He says that what the Mishnah is coming to address is that, you know, a person may say, he thinks he says that the Mishnah is talking about a chavrusah, but it's the same idea, that a person may say, "I don't want to have a chavrusah because if I have a chavrusah, I'm going to end up doing aveiros. Cuz we're going to end up talking about other people. We're going to talk lashon hara. He's going to end up saying bad things about me, and it's going to affect the relationship, right? Or I'm going to end up saying bad things about him. It's not worth it to even get started with having this thing called a friendship." Right? So he says, to combat that, the Alshich says, you have to be dan l'chaf z'chut cuz that is the key to having friendships. That is the key to having all relationships.