What Yosef Taught His Brothers About Guilt & Anguish

Welcome everybody. Thank you for gracing us with your presence. Today's class is dedicated in the loving memory of Esther Bastrik for her yard site on the fifth day of Tavis. If you remember, she was murdered last year in the forest in Talmanasha. And uh this class is dedicated in her uh holy and beloved memory by her husband and her children and her grandchildren. Hashem Kamma. May Hashem avenge her blood and uh her memory and her light and inspiration will always remain with us for eternity. The class is also dedicated by Farah Azar as well as by Harry Levy. Thank you so much for your friendship and contribution and partnership. The trio of the three paras ves mik vigash each year when you learn them you can reveal new layers of meaning and depth within them. the the suspense and the mystery doesn't Wayne from year to year even though we have heard and read the story so many times but the buildup and the depth of the tragedy and the journey of Ysef ultimately till the day he reveals himself to his brothers and reunites with his father in parash which continues through vay of mikates and vayash always challenges us to go a step deeper and to uncover deeper layers of meaning. So in previous years we have explored these portions quite elaborately. We have discussed Ysef's secret of resilience by reframing his life and saying to his brothers, I was not sold. I was sent. We spoke a lot about the transformation of Yehuda from the person who sold Ysef into slavery to the person who's now ready to become a slave so that his younger brother Binyamin Rahul's only second ch Raul's second child can go free. We spoke a lot about that literal metamorphosis in Yehuda's life and his conversations with himself when he faced Ysef and other aspects in this story. And today we're going to explore yet one more dimension of this incredible narrative. And let's begin with actual text. You can open your source sheet. It's one page. It's the first source which is the text of the opening of parishes vayash Genesis the end of chapter 44 and the beginning of 45 various the end of Mdallin and the beginning of mehe now we all remember the context the context is always important the backdrop the background the brothers at last are all in Egypt every single one of them they have forced to bring down their baby brother Binyammen because the prime minister would not give them any more food if they don't bring down their youngest brother Binyammen. So despite Yakov's plea and insistence that he can't let Binyammen go, he's already lost Beyammen's only whole brother Ysef and Shiman has also been in prison. So he's already bereft of two children. He really can't let the third one beyammen go. But Yehuda says if we don't send Binyammen, we're not going to be able to obtain any food. The only source of of grain is in Egypt. And the prime minister, who of course they don't know who he is at the time, will not let them get any more food without Binyammen. So Yakov acquiesces and he sends Binyammen. And now for the first time in 22 years, all the brothers are together in the same home. They of course don't know they're all together, but Shim is there, Binyamin is there, and the prime minister is there. It's the first time the 12 brothers, the sons of Yakov, Leia, Rahul, Bilah, and Zilpa are together, not Ben knows to to themselves even. They have a wonderful meal. They drink. They're inebriated. Vayishu Vayishkaru. It seems like the story is coming to a happy ending at least from their perspective. They're on their way home with grain, with gifts from the prime minister. He was graceful to them. And then at the end of Mikate's tragedy strikes yet once again where they are accused of stealing the ga the silver goblet of the prime minister of Egypt. Of course they deny it. They would not do such a thing. The sacks are searched and lo and behold Binyamin has it within his sack. Of course it was Ysef's strategy and scheme. He is the one who had the person running his home hide, his personal goblet, his personal becker, his personal silver cup in Binyammen's sack. And now Binyammen is caught as the thief. Ysef says, "All of you go back home, but this man who stole my personal goblet should remain as my slave. You go in peace back to your father." This is how parish mikates ends. You don't have anywhere in the that three paras that two paras should end with complete suspense not knowing what's going to happen next. Vayesv ends where the butler forgets about Ysef. He goes free from prison and he forgets about the person who helped him interpret his dream. And only in Mikates does that story continue. And Mikates ends where Yseph says go back to your father. The prime minister says go back to your father and you remain here. It's at that moment that Vayigash continues the narrative. I love Yehuda. So Yehuda approaches him and we understand who him is. Him is the person who's running who's pulling the strings here. the prime minister of Egypt and Yehuda begins to talk to him. Now, this conversation is one of the longest, if not the longest conversation in the whole Kush. Yehuda speaking to the prime minister of Egypt and trying to persuade him not to hold Binyammon as a slave. The finality of the speech is where Yehuda says, "Let me become the slave. I understand he stole. You're looking for somebody to be punished. let me be the slave and let him go back to our father because there's no way that our father Yakov will survive losing this second son of his binam after everything he has been through and I simply cannot go back how can I go back to my father without this child I can't their souls are so connected how can I go back I cannot look at the suffering and the pain that I will be causing that we will be bringing to our father when we come back without I simply can't. So take me instead as a slave and let Binyammen go back. But that's not that's the punchline of the speech. But that's not how Yehuda begins the speech. The conversation or the exchange I should say the dialogue begins with Yehuda repeating the story of their descent into Egypt. Now let's see what happens. This is his introduction. My master, I want to speak to you. Don't get upset. I have respect to you like I have for but I want to speak to you. Obviously, he's saying these words because he's going to speak from his heart and they're going to be intense words. And he begins, let's remember how this all happened. We came to Egypt for food. My master, the prime minister of Egypt of Israel, asked his servants, which means me and my brothers, do you have a father? Do you have a brother? We came to buy food, but you asked me. You asked us if we have a father. We have a brother. We told you. Yes, we have a father who's old. He has a young child who's still young who's at home. He has a brother who died referring to. And therefore, he's the only child who's left to his mother and his father who love him so much because his brother died. And he continues to tell the whole story. And you said to us, "Bring him down. I want to see him." And we said, "We can't. His father will never let himself be separated from this child." And you said, "Don't come back. I will not see your face again if you don't come back with that boy." And we come back to our father. We bring him the food. He wants us to go get more food because the hunger is so profound. And we tell him, we cannot go back down to Egypt unless you give us the younger brother. And our father tells us, you know that I have had two sons from Raul. One was devoured by an animal, and now you're going to take this one, and he may also die, and I'm going to go down to my grave in tremendous grief. This is all Yehuda repeating the story that happened to Ysef, to the prime minister of Egypt. Then he comes to the punchline and he says he says now when I come back without the child and their souls are so connected my father is going to die immediately. We will be sending him straight into the abyss. I am the guarantor. Let me be the slave instead of him. I cannot go back. What happens next is the new chapter insh Genesis 45 cannot any longer contain himself. He can't hold back. He can't conceal the truth. Says remove every person. He doesn't want any strangers there. No ish, no human being was present when revealed his identity to his brothers. Ysef begins to sob. The sobs are so profound, are so are so intense that even the people working in the house of par, the Egyptians can hear the sound of Ysef's tears. And Ysef tells his brothers those two words, I am. Is my father still alive? His brothers cannot respond because they are startled. They are overwhelmed in his presence in front of his face. Says to his brothers, "Come closer to me." They approach him. And he says, I am your brother, the one you have sold to Egypt. And then he communicates this message them now. Now, don't get depressed. Don't get despondent. Don't get dejected. Don't get sad. Don't even get angry that you sold me because Hashem has sent me to provide life. There's already a hunger that has been going on that has been raging for two years and there's going to be another five years without plowing and without harvest. So, Hashem sent me ahead of you to be able to create a remnant in this country that we should be able to survive, a place where you can be rescued and live. You did not send me here. Hashem has sent me and he created me as the prime minister for parro as a master on his entire home and government as the ruler of the entire land of Egypt. And that's when he continues to tell them to go back and bring tell the news to his father Yakov and relocate with the entire family here to Egypt. Now this story it's very obvious that there are endless layers in this story. Literally every pussk is another another universe and even beyond and beyond. But I want to tune in to one aspect that the commentators struggle with. Yeah. Tell him that he has a father. Why is he asking again? That's a good question. Yehuda just spoke about their father and how he's going to take the news. So why does he ask is my father still alive? Not only does Yehuda mention that he has a father in Yehuda's conversation with Ysef, he mentions the word my father 14 times. 14 times he mentions the word my father. Not once and not five times. 14 times. So why is he asking? Right. So that's a great question. It's a great question. And one of the famous answers for it is and I guess the most straightforward answer is like is it possible that my father is still alive after everything he's been through and this is of course an introduction to what he's going to say maru hasten do this fast with elocrity go with elacrity go back and bring him back as fast as possible that's one of the interpretations there are others but this is one of them but let's understand what is happening and how yhuda approaches Yehuda of course doesn't know who he's speaking to. That's the whole point. He's speaking to the prime minister of Egypt who has been really handling this family in a very very tough way. You could say in a cruel way. He is demanding things from them that are irrational to them. And they themselves earlier when they were arrested the first time when they came down the first time and he arrested them with the accusation of espionage. He told them they're spies which they knew they were not spies. They were just customers who needed to eat. But in prison after 3 days in prison when he released them and he said one brother is going to stay here until you bring back to prove that you're honest people and you're not deceiving me that's the moment that for the first time they confessed for what they did to y more than two decades ago in parish mikates the brothers tell each other we're guilty for what happened here even though we're not spies but the fact that they were accused of something that they didn't do reminded them of something that they did do and what did they do they said we were deaf to our brother's tears more than two decades ago when he begged of us to spare his life. We did not listen to him. We threw him into a pit. They sold him into slavery. They are now confessing that sin. So they were triggered in a very very profound way. Ysef of course knows who he's talking to. Yehuda doesn't know who he's talking to. when Binyammen was now arrested because he supposedly stole the personal goblet of the prime minister of Egypt, which is something that's not just a crime. It's a it's it's a horrific crime. He says, "This is my personal my personal goblet. It's the one that I use also for for for for knowing things that other people don't know for divination. And you steal this." They even said, "If you catch the thief by us, let him die." They were so certain it wasn't one of them. He says, "No, but I'm going to take him as a slave." So now Yehuda is approaching the prime minister and trying to set his brother free. What do you think is the logical thing to talk about? So at the end, he really says, "Listen, I understand he may be guilty, but I want you to think about his old father. It's not his father's fault, and his father is going to die, but you want a slave. You want somebody to pay the price. I'll be the slave. I understand that." So what is Yehuda really saying? you is saying he may have stolen but I'm asking you to have compassion for our father let him go and you want a slave I'm going to be that slave but that's not what Yehudet Yehuda will say at the end but before that most of his conversation with the prime minister of Egypt says some talks about something that seems completely irrelevant to what is going on and that is let's go back to the beginning of the story we came back to Egypt we came down to Egypt to get food. You asked us if we had a father and we had a brother. We told you the truth. You told us, "I want to see your baby brother. We said we can't. Tati will not let him go." You said, "Okay, the relationship is over. No more food for you. What is the point of this conversation?" And then he says, "This is what happened." We went to Yakov. Yakov said, "I'm not letting him go." We told Yakov, "We can't get any more food." Finally, Yakov had to surrender and acquies and send Binyammon down. And now he gets to the point and if I come back without Binyammen, what's going to happen? I'm afraid that my father is going to go down to his grave immediately with such grief, with such sadness, with such endless mourning and pain and suffering after what he went through with Ysef and then Binyam. But this whole introduction, how is that going to help out the situation? Binyammon, so to speak, is a thief. At least from what it seems later, we of course know the background of the story that he was was a setup. But from Yehuda's perspective, he doesn't know it was a setup. He thinks Binyammen may have stolen the goblet. In fact, the Medish even says that the brothers had a very very sharp exchange with Binyammen. They told him, "You're like your mother, Raul. Rahul stole from her father, the truffim, and now you're stealing from the prime minister of Egypt." But there's a difference between when you steal from your father and you steal from the most powerful person in the world. They were very upset at Binyammen despite the fact that they accused Binyammen of this because they couldn't believe that the prime minister would do this. Doesn't have anything better to do than to hide his personal goblet's back. Despite the fact Yehuda literally sacrificed himself and his future for Binyammen which was really what showed Ysef that there was a transformation in the family and there was a transformation in Yehuda and not just a transformation generally but particularly towards Binyammen who was Yseph's full brother and other child of Raul who Yakov loved so deeply and so profoundly. But how does it help to tell Ysef by the way we came down you asked us if we had a father or a brother. So Rashi says that what he meant to tell Ysef was what's your business if we have a father or a brother? I came into a grocery store to buy food. Why you asking about my brother? Rashi says what? We want to marry your sister. Somebody wants to marry your sister. You want to do a shiddok with one of our daughters? Why you asking about our family? These are un these are questions that were unwarranted and yet we didn't ignore you. We answered you. Zine, let's say Ysef, I you come into my store. I asked you about your family. I didn't have to ask you about the family. You brought down Binyam. Why did I want to see Byam? I wanted to see Binyam. The bottom line is the guy stole. The end of you heard this speech. I understand. He stole. Let me be the slave because my father's not going to be able to deal with it. This happens in court cases constantly. Somebody did something, broke the law, has a prison sentence, and witnesses will be called to the stand. And what are they going to talk about? They're going to talk about the impact on the father, on the mother, on the wife, on the children, on the siblings. Sometimes the judge is sensitive to that. Sometimes he's not sensitive to that. And Yehuda says, "I'll pay the price. I want to pay the price." But the fact that Ysef asked him all these questions and that's why he asked him to bring down Binyam. Okay, you're telling us what happened. How is that consequential to the issue at hand? The prime minister says your brother stole my goblet. He is a criminal. He stole my personal gave. Somebody who steals the law is he has to be a slave. So now you're telling me that what? When we came down, you asked us if we had a brother. We told you we had a brother. You said you want to see the brother. We brought Binyammon down. And now he stole the goblet. Now you pay the consequences because you started the conversation. So it's your fault once against the matter for the Okay. How how well do you think will that work in a court of law? Why didn't they end with well what happened was initially they were accused of being spies and they told him about all their their family that they're not spies. They're a fine family. They told him their whole story. They told them it was like they said the truth. They said we're 12 brothers. One is gone because he was gone and one is still by his father. So Yis says bring him down. They didn't know that's going to happen. Fine. So now he the man was accused of stealing. By is accused of stealing. Ysef takes him as a slave and Yehuda goes through this whole story and it's not one verse. Most of the conversation he's having with Ysef is focused on this. So that's my question. Is it a little suspicious? Absolutely. Absolutely. But remember, you know who it is. Hindsight is 20, right? Think about it from Yehuda's perspective. He's standing now in front of the prime minister of Egypt. He's trying to get this brother out of jail or actually trying to emancipate his brother from slavery. And by the way, you're guilty. You asked us if we had a brother. That's true. I asked you if you had a brother. I told you to bring his brother. Why exactly did he steal my goblin? How do you want to set him free? And why is that going to be consequential to convince the master? So this is this is a this is a very good question. It's a good question because when you're reading it and you put yourself in your hood's shoes like you're trying to convince me to set your brother free. Explain to me why just because I asked you the question and you told me about him therefore he's allowed to steal my goblet. So there are different approaches but I want to share with you today one approach and it comes from a cafer known as may hashoak. But before we see what he says, I want to learn with you another medish medish rabba parishes bes. That's the third source in your source sheets. By the way, the source sheets are available later if you go to the yeshiva.net. T-sha.net. Every class has source sheets so you could review them later as well. Medish rabbes bes. It's a fascinating medish. It's impressious. Adam and Kava ate from the tree of knowledge. After they ate from the tree of knowledge, Hashem sends them out of garden of Eden. Why? He says, "Now, now maybe Adam is going to send forth his hand and eat also from the tree of life and live forever." The word is and now the question is what it's going to be now versus in an hour or tomorrow, in a week. I mean, he could do it in a week also. What's the now? The point is not now or tomorrow or after tomorrow or in a week. The point is he may eat from the tree of life which for some reason now is not going to work. So the med says so say our sages say whenever the Tanakh uses the word and now it's actually an intimation of chuva. It's an invitation for repentance. Hashem was actually actually inviting Adam to return to repent to take responsibility to say I was wrong and say let me see what I could learn from this. Instead Adam did other things. He blamed his wife which has been going on since. And then Kava blamed the snake, right? And then the snake said, you know, what do you want from me? They should be listening to you, not to the snake. It became a blame game. But the word was an invitation for chuva. Why? Because means chuva. How do we know? Because it says invash. And now hashem. And now what does hashem ask of you? Only to fear him. What does mean when he says and now? It's tomorrow also. It was yesterday too. Now is actually referring to chuva. Now what is the meaning of this? It's a fascinating concept. Of course here in this simple medish that's so easy to gloss over and say okay ata means chuva. You have one of the most fundamental ideas about life and that is what we call today the power of now. But even more than the power of now the fact that there is something called now because that's what all truva is based on. Truva is based on the fact that I have the re re the ability to reinvent myself now. Today, there's a concept called today. There's a concept called now. And by the way, it's more novel than we imagine it is because usually many people will say this and many people certainly believe this. There's no such a thing as now. The now is simply the effect of what happened in the past. What's happening now is simply a result of many many antecedants many many causes elo ci where based on either genetics or experience nature or nurture environmental influence or my inner psyche what's happening now is just a script that has been predetermined and pre-written playing itself out I'm simply responding and being triggered by how I am conditioned to be triggered. Now that's a powerful argument because when you look at people's behaviors, so many of people's behaviors is simply a result of previous behaviors which are result of previous behaviors which ultimately can be blamed on my neurons. I have 100 billion neurons who fire up different ways and those neurons are all based on my DNA molecules. Now who chose those molecules and who designed them? So is there really a concept called ata? Now if there's no awareness of the challenge, there's no awareness that there's a possibility of now. But when there is awareness, then I could say yes, I could respond to the past. I could completely be a victim of my past. But chuva is that glorious and really infinite idea that there is also a possibility to say now. and not an easy not and not not always easy because instinctively I'm going to fall back into the trajectory to the neural pathways as they call it that I'm accustomed to drive to you know I remember I moved to a new house in Muny I used to live on a in a street called Fieldrest for a few months there were times I just went back to my old house I knew that I don't live there anymore and I was looking I thought I was looking but it's irrelevant because my neural path Pathways have been conditioned for years. This is the highway you this is the road you go on and then I stopped. Yeah. I once even got out of the car. I didn't I didn't go into the house and uh you know lay down on the beds over there. I didn't go so far. At some point I was made aware that uh I I live somewhere else. But when it comes to our internal life, it's actually happening all the time. This is the road I'm used to. You said this, you said this. This is what happens. This is the highway I go down to. It takes a lot of mental focus and awareness to be able to say. So when Hashem tells Adam, it's always lashen shuva. It's an opening to say there is now. But you made a mistake. You ate from the tree. But there's a possibility for renewal. There's a possibility to reinvent yourself. Why did I bring in this media? Because you'll realize after Ysef tells his brothers I'm Ysef, the next words are and now don't be depressed now. But wait, what about tomorrow? They should be depressed. Yesterday they should have been depressed and now he could have said don't get depressed over what you have done. You did not sell me. God sent me. Beautiful words. But he says and now. What does he mean by that? at now, tomorrow, a week, they also shouldn't get depressed. And a week earlier, they also shouldn't have been depressed cuz God still sent me a week earlier. He actually sent me 22 years earlier. But Ysef uses that word va. Let's go now to what the says about our first question. how Yehuda was trying to persuade the prime minister of the superpower to emancipate his brother binyamin who's now been taken as a slave to the prime minister. Now the mehashyak is aidic work that was authored by a man named Rabbi Mardekai ysef liner. He was the reb of Ishbbitza in Poland. You may have seen in my seventh clip of Kaneka about the young boy who was uh who ran away from the ghetto of Ishbbitza in Poland where 4,000 Jews were massacred in November 1942. And this young boy Hershel Greener ran away and he became a bishop, a priest. Gregory Pavlovski, he just passed away and he was buried a few weeks ago. You saw you saw the video. He was buried quite a story. He was buried a few weeks ago in Ishbbitza right near the mass grave of his of the 4,000 Jews from the Ishbageta which included his mother Miriam and his two sisters murdered in 1942 and it's right near it's very close to the grave of Rabbi uh Rabbi Mardo Liner who's known as the Reb of Ishbitz in Poland or his work is called Mehash his yard is actually this week he passed away on Zion Tavis T Yud Dalad that would be 8h Shabas Shabas this coming Shabas 18 1854 he was 54 years old he was a student of and afterwards a student of Mendel of Katsk and then he left the Katskar in tough 1800 and he became a master a reba in Ishbita Poland and he passed away Zenavis 1854 before and his grandson published many of his teachings in this work called which means the waters of the spring which is from where they took the waters for the reason is said about him that his teachings are like the spring of if you ever went to the spring the water flows slowly but it's deep so he said the water flows slowly but it's deep so his grandson named it may and may is also that's his first So this is from him. Let's see what he says. Yehuda is not bringing up any explanation or rationalization or excuse or answer for what Ysef accused. He's a thief. He stole. He's a geneva. Now you're telling me you're the one who asked us if we had a brother. You're the one who told us bring down your brother. You're the one who said if you don't bring him down, he cannot come and you cannot come get any more food. I got it. But I'm telling you that he's a thief. How is Yehuda justifying it? This is the question. This was not just a prelude. This was not just Yehuda repeating a story that everybody knew. Ysef knew it cuz he's the one who did it. They knew it because they were the ones who experienced it. He wasn't just repeating a story for drama. This was part of what he was saying. It's completely inappropriate to penalize a person for a flaw or a challenge or a wound or a u a temptation that is embedded inside of him or her if it's not actualized. People struggle with all types of proclivities and types of instincts and cravings and challenges all the time. That's part of the human condition. You don't blame somebody for struggling with something. It's the most inappropriate and cruel and unethical thing to blame somebody for having a challenge, for having a struggle. So the fact that somebody is struggling with something to penalize them for that doesn't make sense. comes Yehuda and says, "Suppose everything you say is true." Byam struggles with theft with with what do they call it? Uh huh. Okay. I don't know if I should use that word, but let's say Beyamin is struggling with something. He has a real flaw in the issue of geneva, theft. Let's say if he would have remained home this would have never happened simply he would have never had the opportunity. It's the challenge that happened as a result of the journey that caused this whole situation. love. So what Yehuda is telling is never wanted to come down to Egypt. You're the one who forced us to bring him. So therefore, you at least shoulder part of the responsibility. I you didn't steal. He stole. But Yehuda is telling you this was something maybe dormant in him. you unjustifiably. Nobody warranted you. Nobody needed this. There was no need for it. There was no threat here. But you insisted stubbornly that he has to come down. And this is what triggered. Even if it's true had a challenge, this challenge would have remained dormant and latent. But you're the one that caused it to come out and be actualized. And therefore, Yehuda is not saying that he was allowed to steal, but he's saying there's a lot of factors here that are not just about Binyam. And you're one of those factors. You're the one who ultimately triggered this whole downward spiral journey to Binyam actually stealing Hashem. But now he takes it to the next level. Yehuda wasn't only speaking to the prime minister of Egypt. He was also speaking to the prime minister of the world. He was also speaking to Hashem because he believed because he really believed even the fact that the prime minister demanded that they should bring and they were forced their ties weren't their hands were tied. This was by the will of Hashem because he's the one master of the universe. So even if it was Ysef's Mishagasan, the prime minister's Mishagasan demanding from them something unjustifi unjustified. There was no need for it. What they do to deserve it? This is what God wanted. If this is what God wanted, he was talking to Hashem also. And what was he telling Hashem? Yes, he's now going to be a slave because he stole. But who is the one who ultimately caused him to steal? You'll say, well, these are stuff that he has inside of him. I got it. But at home, he was innocent. At home he was good. But the journeys of life, maybe the stress, maybe the anxiety, maybe the temptation, maybe the opportunity, whatever it is, he has a struggle with something. And that struggle had to be triggered. Cuz if there's no trigger, it could remain asleep for the rest of your life. It remains unconscious or subconscious. Or even if it's conscious, but it's still relegated to the realm of thought, not to the realm of execution. It's ultimately the circumstances of life that brought it out. So he says Yehuda was not just telling this to Ysef, he was also telling this to Hashem. So at the end of the day is Bin Yammen completely guilty or you actually God play a major role in what happened because it's only these circumstances that brought brought this out from beyond. And if I could take the words of the mash for a moment and apply it to our lives because isn't this a recurring theme in so many of our lives. A person goes through certain journeys. A person behaves in certain ways. Those behavioral patterns are sometimes very unproductive. sometimes very destructive. We hurt ourselves. We hurt our loved ones. I may make decisions and do things that betray the very purpose of my life and what I would really like and the person I would really like to be and to become. And what Yehuda is telling Ysef and he's telling Hashem is does a person have choices? Of course, a person has choices. But is it not true that so much of it happened because of journeys and circumstances that were completely beyond the control of the person. So Yehuda tells Ysef, you're now turning him into a thief and you're making him a slave for eternity, but you know very well that he is not the only person who is guilty here. So many other things had to happen and that was not that was not something that he had control over in order to bring this out in a person's life. Think about any mistake you ever made. Think about any wrong or immoral decision people you know made. They should have known better. They should have had more awareness. All true. But then ask one more question. Where was God in this whole process? How many things happened until this point? How many wounds? How much ignorance? How depth the lack of awareness? How many survival skills did this person had to develop have to develop in order simply to survive and cope? It doesn't it doesn't turn the story into a sweet story. But what Yehuda is telling Ysef is can we have here a larger perspective comes to Mash and says this is what Yehuda told Ysef because he felt that this is going to persuade him. And what happens? What really happens? What happens as a result of this? Ysef opens up and he says, "I'm Ysef." In other words, Binyama never stole anything. He's not a thief. Actually, nothing bad happened. He didn't sin. In fact, he's the only brother who did nothing wrong. He didn't even sell me into slavery. So, what you thought was a sin, you were accusing Binyamin of being a thief, was really nothing because I'm Ysef, your brother. So he was stealing my goblet. He didn't even steal my goblet because I'm the one who put it into his bag because I'm the one who created this whole misa. So what is he really telling Yehuda? That sometimes you're looking at somebody's life or you're looking at your own life. You're blaming yourself for terrible, terrible things that you have done by Yehuda opening you up to the fact that there is a journey here beyond that beyond my control and beyond my expectation. I suddenly realize there's another layer to the story that I was unaware of. And that is of course Bin Yammen is not a thief. Binyammen didn't steal Yseph's goblet. Ysef is not only the prime minister of Egypt, he's also Yseph's brother. And suddenly the very same story takes on a whole different picture. Why? Because Ysef revealed the truth about himself and the truth about Binyam. Why did he reveal it? When Yehuda revealed to him and to the Hashem saying, "Look at this journey." And then suddenly what you thought was such a heinous crime was not even a heinous crime. Beyammen was completely completely innocent. But this is only a prelude to the real story. Beyammen didn't steal the goblet, but the brothers did sell Ysef into slavery. They were not guilty of what the prime minister was accusing them of, but they were guilty of something much more heinous. They're stealing a cup and there's kidnapping a person. There's stealing a silver goblet which may be precious beyond preciousness, but then there's abducting a child, a 17-year-old boy. This one can say didn't happen. It was just an illusion. It's not like the story with the goblet, which was just a setup. But here in this exchange about Binyamin, it becomes an introduction for a much more serious exchange. And this is not going to be part of Yehuda's words to Yisf. This is going to be part of Ysef's words to Yehuda. Because here comes the bigger question. It's very nice to say, you know, I said something, I did something. I'm blaming myself or I'm blaming you. It was so destructive. It was so foolish. It was so counterproductive. It was so unethical. It was so hurtful. It was so clueless. And then you say, "Okay, but you're not the only one who's guilty. There's a lot of genes that you have inherited. They call it epigenetics today. There's a lot of things you endured. I got it. So I could turn to Hashem and say, "You're the one who triggered this all. You're the one who instigated this whole story. It's an important piece." Kuritzer once said that in all Jewish confessions, we always confess in the plural, which is not the way to confess if you would ask me. Asham knew, but God knew. Gazal knew, right? We sinned, we betrayed, we stole, we spoke inadequately. The same is true the sin that we sinned now I want to ask you a question if I really hurt you and I come to apologize right what's the first thing I should not do right imagine your husband to bring it home did something wrong okay present company excluded but a husband I know once in 40 years people make mistakes Right. He said something hurtful. What's the worst thing he can do is we we were insensitive. Oh, really? How many other people are involved in this marriage? We Who's we? Me, my mother, my grandmother, my great-grandmother, all the way to Kava. Me, my therapist, my therapist sponsor, and his therapist. Who's this? We the other self. The first prerequisite for confession is accountability. The prerequisite for accountability is the buck stops here. I am sorry. I lied. I stole. I apologize. I fell prey to my baser lower angels, lower instincts. Not we. But in Jewish confession, you will not find a personal confession. Asham knew, but God knew. Isn't that strange? Why am I confessing for you? [Laughter] parents before now you got to throw your parents under the bus too, right? I mean, it's usually what happens in a therapist's office, right? Yeah. Good question. Anything else? Yeah, there was Reb knows that when he was a child in the where he dedipper there was a who was dinging and for he wanted to put his sitter somewhere so he could clap. So he was like seven or eight years old and he was leaning a little bit so he put his m on him on his back and he started to clap. So the boy turns around and he says sinning you sin on your own but banging al is on me doesn't work that way a Jew came to the and he said give me a path to truva how do I repent teach me he said who taught you how to sing you didn't come to me before you sinned to ask me how to do But it was a very profound idea. In other words, the whole idea of tru is it's about you. It's not about me. You did. If I'm going to tell you how to do it, it's me doing it. It's not you doing it. But when it comes to it becomes in the plural of kar who was a student of the BMP says something extremely profound and daring. He says new is me and Hashem. You're talking to Hashem. You say Hashem knew. We send God knew. Gazal knew. We we but this is what Yehuda is telling you. Of course, I take responsibility. But the journeys of my life were not so simple. I didn't design all my genetic sensitivities. I'm not the one responsible for everything that's been going on in my genes for the last 5,000 years. I'm not responsible for everything that I developed. All the beliefs, all the belief systems, all the compromised ideas about myself that I developed through my years. You also take part in it. You're ultimately the one who said Binyammen has to go on this journey. You're the one who faced Binyammen, who put Beinyam in front of this goblet. Asham knew. Why is that so important? It's so important because it tells you how to have compassion on yourself and on your mistakes to be able to appreciate to be aware because judgment and negative self-loathing actually reinforces those very thoughts that brought me into the abyss the first time because I become more anxious. If I'm responding to some deep stressful belief and now I'm screaming at myself, what happens? I become more stressed. So now it intensifies those very actions that I'm trying to free myself from. Did you understand what I just said? Sometimes my path to is anything but that I'm trying to escape from that inner wrath that I have. But this actually allows me to free up the mental space and actually become aware with compassion. Say ashamnu. It also tells God if you were part of this journey. There's a purpose here which is now the next step. Brings us to the next step because this is all beautiful by when it turns out abracadabra. Ysef removes the masks. Nothing ever happened. But something did happen. Not with Binyam. Something happened with Ysef. And this is where Ysef tells his brothers after he says, "I'm Ysef. Come closer. I'm Ysef, your brother who sold you to Egypt. I'm Ysef, your brother whom you sold down to Egypt. And now don't be depressed. Why shouldn't you be depressed? Because you did not sell. Don't be depressed that you sell sold me because Hashem sent me." So take a look now at the next step. This comes from the one generation later the was a contemporary of the's grandfather the firstbush was the third reb of g who passed away hes and he writes as follows. This is which would be 1898. We know our sages say always represents. So when Ysef told his brothers now don't be depressed. He didn't only mean now and not in a week. Now means I want to introduce you to the concept of chuva. But wait, did theatim do? Did they not do? says they did a long time ago when they first came down to Egypt months earlier accused them of espionage. He threw them into prison for 3 days. Then he let them go and he kept their brother Shim until they bring back. This is in the previous portion. They told each other and we are guilty because we were deaf to our brother's cry. This was months earlier and Ysef heard it. They thought he didn't understand because he was communicating with them through a translator and they were speaking Kadesh and Ysef turned around and he cried. Rashi says he saw that they they are remorseful for what they did. So they did chuva a long time ago. They felt horrible guilt for what they did. But now he says what's now a concept of chuva. says their truva then was truva out of fear. They say clearly look at it sorus God gave us we are now so confused our life is in danger our life is now turned chaotic out of this fear of the consequences they did chuva they said what has gone wrong in our life that's tru out of fear was now inviting them to a different type of chuva a chuva out of love not out of fear of consequences you're going to get punished there's going to be taurus look what's happening to me I need to do chuva actually chuva out of an appreciation of the truth out of a love for the truth which tells me I want to go away I want to step away from a life that's false it's chuva out of passion out of love not just fear of consequences the gmorra says in chapter Yum page 86. There's two types of repentance. There's repentance out of fear, repentance out of love. The difference is when somebody repents out of fear, their sins are eliminated and they're treated like mistakes. Rakkesh says this in Gomorrah. He was the big expert on chuva because he himself was a ba. He says if you do chuv if you do chuva out of love now the sins are transformed into mitzvah. Not only are the sins treated like mistakes. Somebody slammed the door on my finger by mistake. It hurts. But I'll forgive you. But no, the sin becomes a mitzvah, which seems strange. I did shuva out of love. How does the sin become a mitzvah? How does the negative action suddenly become a positive action? The marsh says over there in doesn't even make sense. It's not fear. A sadic who never sinned has a certain amount of mitzvah. A baluva who sins and then returns out of love. Now all their sins are transformed into mitzvah. So they have mitzvah that they could never have. The marsh says it's not fear but that's what the garra says. What's the mechanism for this? So this we have to understand says this is telling them I know you did out of fear and now I want you not to be depressed. Now I want you as he says I don't want you to go to a place of fear and sadness and melancholy. I want you to learn about out of love and then the sin is transformed into something positive. That's why tells them you didn't sell me. Hashem sent me. He sent me to bring life. What does this mean? The very act that you thought was so destructive really turned into a source of salvation. So the very negativity really from a different perspective comes out emerges as one of the best things you could have ever done. You literally created life for all of Egypt, for the entire fertile crescent, for the entire land of Israel, for our entire family, for the future of the Jewish people, who could have not survived without Ysef's being in Egypt, becoming the prime minister, interpreting Paris's dreams, and ultimately creating an economic system where during the years of famine, they had plenty of grain from the years of plenty. This is how life works. All the means all causes all factors in life ultimately can be attributed to the author of all the factors of all the narratives of all the reasons means reasons. Everything that goes on is something is something caused it. So who do I blame? There's always a sa there's always a cause. I react I'm reacting to something. He says good but go back more and more and more and you'll see the ultimate one to blame is the balib the one who's the author of all of the factors the one who began you know the pushing the first domino you know the one who shaped the first DNA molecules back to ashamu asham this doesn't mean somebody who didn't do any who did something wrong is not responsible if I had a choice I'm accountable for what I have done and therefore I need to apologize. I need to make amends. I need to say I'm sorry. When the person does say I'm sorry and their repentance is accepted, now something else happens. Now the very sin, every sin is transformed into something that's positive, something that's that's potent and divine and holy. It's a it's a merit also means it's refined. It's not an exaggeration. It's literal. This is why tells his brothers afterwards these words which seem simply at the surface untrue. Take a look again in Ysef's words, the last in our second source. You did not send me here. God did. Is that true? Is that true? Of course they sent him. Who sold him into slavery? But they sold him to a different place. It was the French lander who created it. They should go. They just sold him to the Israeli. But that also did they not do it? That's what they did. No, but he's saying you didn't do it. Come on. Says this is They did send him. Of course they did it. They did it after retroactively. It's not their action. It's God's action. That's only if they do because they did chuva out of love. That's why he says you cannot do chuva with depression only with love. What is this F is saying here? Who sold Ysef into slavery? The brothers. And this was a horrific, this was a heinous sin. But they did it. What is Ysef telling them? We now need a deeper level of what's that without depression, without fear, with love. Then what's going to happen? You did not send me. Hashem sent me. Why? Because the sin becomes a mitzvah. If it's a mitzvah, it means it's what God wants. So, it's God's action, not your action. But how does that happen? I did it. I did it. So, let's think about this for a moment. Every mitzvah has what's called a hexa mitzvah. Before you do a mitzvah, you have to prepare for the mitzvah. There's no mitzvah in the world you can do without you can accomplish without preparing. I want to blow and rash. I need to prepare. I need to cut a ram's horn and and excavate it and hollow it out so I can blow shaifer. I want to make kdesh on chabas. I need somebody to make wine to squeeze grapes and make wine and ferment the wines. I can have kdish for shabas. I want to put on fillin. Somebody has to make the fillin. I want to sit in a suk on sukus. I need to get lumber. I need to get and I have to build a suk. It's called mitzvah. You want to light chabas candles. You want to light kanaka candles. Somebody first has to create a candle. Somebody has to squeeze olive oil so that you have olive. Somebody has to build you a manra. Whatever type of manra but that's called mitzvah. I have to go to the store, buy myself a candalabra, buy myself oil, buy myself wix or buy myself a candle. Every mitzvah is actually there's no mitzvah. You want to have a meal on Shabas, somebody has to cook. I probably don't have to elaborate on that. Not everybody realizes it. But somebody has to Now the question is one of the mitzvah is chuva to do chuva to return to hash. What's the ha mitzvah what prepares you for chuva? What's what's the thing you have to do as a preparation as a prerequisite to be able to do chuva? Sin. If I didn't sin I can't do chuva. I can only say I'm sorry if I did something hurtful. But here's the problem. How could you call sin a mitzvah? How could you call sin a preparation for doing chuva? If when I sin, I'm thinking about the fact that I want to prepare for doing chuva, then would I sin? Of course not. The whole reason I'm sinning is because I'm not thinking about a mitzvah. If I'm thinking about doing God's will, I would never sin. The only reason I'm sinning is because I'm not thinking not about a mitzvah and not about an extra mitzvah. So how does it really work? So how it really works is as follows. When I sin, I sin. When I do chuva and I do chuva out of love, what happens now is retroactively, my sin is redefined as a ha mitzvah. It's redefined as the prerequisite for chuva. And therefore the sin itself becomes part of the chuva. But why is it that way? Because what's the difference between chuvat of fear and chuvat of love? Trouvat of fear means I'm afraid of the consequences. Trouvat of love means that I actually have learned to appreciate what truth is. The very mistakes of a person create the deepest awareness of what's true and what's not true. There's no awareness like the awareness that comes from facing my own adversity, from facing my own challenges. So when I do chuva out of love, what's fueling that love? What's fueling that appreciation? It's like somebody who was ill and they appreciate health in a different way. Somebody who during corona had a hard time breathing and then they can breathe freely. There's nobody that appreciates every breath you take like that person. Somebody who hasn't eaten in a few days. Somebody who's stuck stranded somewhere and then given a cup without food, without drinks, and then given a cup of water. says, "My soul is thirsty for you in a parched barren land devoid of water." It's a different type of It's a different type of thirst. Absence makes the heart grow fer fonder. When somebody is absent from their own life and when somebody notices their own patterns and the mistakes and the lost opportunities and that becomes a catalyst for awareness then the appreciation of their new life is so much more profound only because of the negative experiences. So now what happens? So now when I do chuv out of love retroactively my sin is now redefined from a sinful act into what? Into a springboard into a catalyst for unprecedented growth. So now the sin becomes the greatest ha mitzvah the greatest preparation for the mitzvah of chuva. It goes one step deeper. Quantum mechanics helps for this. I'm going to say it in one minute. It's a little abstract, but just to plant a seed. If Hashem controls the world, can I really have choice? If I really have choice, can Hashem control the world? Where does his control sees? And where does my choice begin? At what point? If you look, every single action that I do can be attributed to a thought. Every single thought can be attributed to an emotion. Every single emotion could be attributed to another thought, to a primal feeling, to an experience, to a trigger. Go deeper and deeper and you'll see that the realm of self-control seems to become narrower and narrower and narrower the more we learn about neuroscience and how people's minds work. Everything can be attributed to what forces that are deep inside of me that I may not even be aware of. survival skills I developed at the age of three and I have not let go of them because at every moment for me the lion is coming into the room and is about to devour me and therefore I react how I have to react so who's really in control of life and the truth is that Rizel says that there are parallel universes there is one realm in which you absolutely choose you have complete free choice you're going to make the choice of what to do the next minute are you going to listen to what I'm saying or You're going to start texting. That's going to be your choice. That was just a joke. But yes, it's one of the choices you make. Taking notes. Huh? Or taking notes. Yeah. You're going to make a choice how you're going to speak, how you what you do, what you don't do, how I react, how I don't react. These are my choice. On another in another realm, God is making all the choices. So you'll say, how both do both realms coincide? Good question. That's why I said quantum mechanics can help. Paradoxes are the essential fabric of reality. Now, so this is how it works. Let's say I do something that's wrong. I chose to do it. I said something that was hurtful. I reacted in a destructive way. I made a choice in life that really was unhelpful not to me and not to others and maybe more than not helpful. Maybe choices you made with your child, with your children, choices you made for yourself as a youngster, choices you made in your marriage, choices you made in your career, choices you made in your relationship with friends, with Hashem, with the world. These are some serious choices that we make. I make these choices. They turn out to be horrible. Maybe I was aware. Maybe I was unaware. Maybe I was 50% the maybe I was blind. Maybe I was clueless. Maybe I was traumatized. Maybe I was just trying to survive. Maybe I lost it. My took over. However you want to define it. It was my choice. I'm accountable. But here is the profound truth on another level which I'm unaware of. God runs the world. And therefore, it was God's choice. But it was my choice. I have to do chuva. Yes, I have to do chuva because it was my choice. I have to be responsible. As the says, I'm responsible. However, when I take those mistakes and I learn to do truva out of love, meaning each and every one of my mistakes becomes a lesson in self-discovery, a lesson in a new awareness, a lesson in how to become the person I'm destined and I'm supposed to become. A lesson in what not to do and how to make amends. a lesson in ultimate profound growth. And I embraced that lesson with love and with a passion that I could only experience because I saw the other side because I know the pain of what I c because I know the pain I caused. Now what happens is as follows. The two worlds I spoke about converge and what I used to think was my choice suddenly emerges as whose choice as Hashem's choice. And if it was Hashem's choice, it couldn't have been a sin. It was perfectly good. It was a mitzvah. As long as I don't do chuva, my world and Hashem's world are so to speak not aligned. I'm living in this kipa in this shell in this husk of trauma and darkness. But when I open myself up to a new discovery, I am so hot. Anybody else hot? Finally warming. Okay. But you enjoy the heat, please. I'm generating heat from within. So this is such a bread. So this is a It's fine. It's fine. The women come first. It was freezing. Yes. So okay, let's go back. Trouva, let's go back. Let's return. As long as long as I'm in a world that is misaligned. So then I did something very wrong and I take responsibility for it. Hopefully when I really take responsibility for it out of love I rembrace the lessons out of love I do chuva may now the very absence brought me to a place of closeness to a place of authenticity to a place of depth to a place of ems that I could have never experienced without my mistakes. Suddenly you could turn around and you say, "Ah, if this is where the mistake brought you to, this wasn't your action. It was God's action." If Hashem did it, it had one purpose. The purpose was to get closer to him, to get closer to truth. This is what Ysef is telling the brothers. Once you will realize that you can do truva out of love, you know what's going to happen in his words? You didn't send me. Hashem sent me. What do you mean? But they did. They did send him. Yes, they did send him. And they sent him because they wanted to send him. They sent him because of their terrible mistakes of the way that they thought about Ysef and they thought about their father. Whatever caused them to do what they did with all of the justifications. You're talking about the but nonetheless relative to their level there. It was a miscalculation. But there's an opportunity for altevou instead of getting depressed, instead of getting angry, which is also true. I feel so horrible about my life. I destroyed my brother. 22 years. 22 years my brother was in exile. I threw him into a pit. I sell him into slavery. My father's life was destroyed. My brother's life was destroyed. How can I ever forgive myself? Good question. That's what they said earlier. Look at the sorus. The sorus woke them up to what they did. Now said, I don't want you to go into a place of depression. How could we not? How could we not? If you're a normal person and you're suddenly aware of what you did, how could you not? So Ysef said, can you really really reach the point to realize you did not do it? Hashem did it because chuva turns the sin into a mitzvah which means you were following God's will. You were just a conduit. How can you explain that? Well, look what happened. I could have stayed by Tati. But by me becoming the prime minister of Egypt, the whole world was saved. The whole world was saved. Not that you had this intention when you sold me. You were not thinking about God's will. You were thinking about your own calculations. But truava retroactively aligns the two worlds. There's now synchronization between the world of my choice and the world of Hashem's choice. And suddenly it turns out that my choice is the divine choice. So the garra says, "So every sin becomes mishvah. You were just doing what Hashem wanted. But the only way I can reach this space is through remorse. Cuz if there's no remorse, you know, I hurt somebody and I say, "Oh, God wanted it to happen." No, no, no. This is even more. This is worse than the original sin. The greatest crimes that are done to people that are abused beyond the abuse is how they're treated afterwards when they're blamed. Oh, it's not me. Hashem wanted you should be hurt. Now your ego and narcissism and sadism has become so profound. Person may never be able to even go into a place of cha when I can experience real remorse and real pain. And that pain now brings me to a new awareness and a new love and a new sensitivity and a new empathy. So as the grandson he's known as the he writes again these are very deep and sensitive points. He says the ultimate chuva is that you realize that you don't have to do chuva because it was Hashem who did it. But the only way you can reach that place is if you do a lot of chuva and I can't skip that place cuz if I'm not ready for chuva I'm not real ready for that healing for that transformation. I'm not ready for alignment. I'm just trying to protect myself and get rid of the blame which is everything that's antithetical to healing. So Yisf now introduces them into this new deeper space. The question that remains is granted but now what are they supposed to do with their lives when they see what they did to Yakov and they see what they did to YV? emotionally. Emotionally, what do I do with this? Intellectually, mathematically or quantum mechanics, it can work. But what do you do with the emotions? What do I do with that pain? So, we now come to the next step. Take a look at the next source. Okay. But remember again how Ysef introduces himself to his brothers. And I want to focus on one point here. Ysef obviously is trying to comfort them. He's trying to heal them. He's not telling them, "I'm Ysef and I'm going to take revenge for the rest of my life." He's saying, "Don't worry. Hashem did this. It's fine. Bring YaKob here. We're going to live together." Obviously, Ysef, the great spirit that he is and the great human being that he is, managed to reframe his life. He did this years ago. That's why he could survive and thrive. He reframed his life. Ysef saw his entire journey as a as a mission not as a sentence that was imposed on some victim but as a of Hashem as he says it three times to them. Whenever a word is used three times within three verses you know that that's the key word as they call it key words. The key word here is instead of being sold, I was sent which we did another year, a whole class, being sold or being sent. But now take a look. Ysef says, "I'm Ysef. I'm Ysef. Is my father still alive?" They can't answer. They're frightened. They're overwhelmed. I get it. So Yseph says in come closer. And what does he say? Oh, you think they had different YFs? They thought he was. He said, "I'm Ysef." How many Yvs did they know? Says, "By the way, I'm the guy you sold to Egypt. Besides, you're trying to make them feel better. Why you telling them I'm forget?" Next 1876. You're trying to comfort them and give them solless. You're now embarrassing them by telling them you sold me. Now they know that they sold him. He knows they sold him. That wasn't a question when he says I'm Ysef. Everybody knows who this Ysef is. He's not talking to some strangers from the Philippines. He's talking to the people who sold him. If anything, Binyammen didn't know that they sold him. And for the first time, Ysef told them in front of Binyammen. So if Binyammen didn't know the story, he literally humiliated them, which would make sense, but it's contrary to the whole zeitgeist to the whole energy that he's trying to to relax them and saying, "Don't telling them don't get depressed. Don't be furious. You did not sell me. Hashem sent me." But he says, "You sold me." And isn't he contradicting himself first? He says, "I'm Ysef. You sold me. By the way, you didn't sell me. God sent me." Oh, you didn't send me. God sent me. What? What's the theme here? Says, listen to this. who was kaducious. For the first time in their life, all the brothers felt the holiness of Ysef. Remember, they didn't know who Ysef was. If they would have known who he was, they wouldn't have done what they have done. They hated him. They loathed him. They wanted to get rid of him for whatever reason. They didn't appreciate. The Pik says in Miku, he recognized them. They didn't recognize him. So, Rashley says because he left them without a beard. Because when he was 17, he didn't have a beard. Now he had a beard. So they didn't recognize him. The Balatana says it also means something deeper. He recognized them. They did not recognize him. They never recognized him. They didn't have a they didn't have an understanding in who Ysef was. We once gave a whole class about the difference of Ysef and the brothers. It was a whole different hasham. They couldn't appreciate who Ysef was. So this says now for the first time Yseph didn't only tell them I'm physically he opened himself up to them. They suddenly saw an they saw I'm Ysef. You know sometimes you can tell me your name. I know your name but I don't know you. When Ysef said I'm Ysef, he wasn't only telling them his name. He was telling them look suddenly everything came together. Everything he's been doing with them and to them, it was all part of this plan. And suddenly, for the first time, they realized here is a person who went through so much. He now rose to become prime minister of Egypt. All the dreams that he had that we hated him for were all fulfilled and they realized his holiness. That's why the says they couldn't answer him. They got afraid of his face. What do you mean of his face? It should have said they were afraid of him. What of his face? Not of his arm. What of his face? He says means they were startled from his face. They saw his face. They saw his punim, his pimus, his face, his kadusha's holiness. They were awed. They were startled. They were overwhelmed. They were astounded. They froze. They saw this holiness. What bothered them? They suddenly saw who Ysef was and then they realized what we did. We thought we were throwing into a pit somebody who wants to kill us, somebody who loves to gossip about us, somebody who wants to throw us out of Clusel, somebody who's a roy. We thought we're throwing away somebody who doesn't really belong in our family. That's what we thought. Suddenly they realized who Ysef was. The only one who's called Saddic in the whole Tanakh. Even Mo called is called besides we call the zy says and now they realized what suffering they brought him. What do you do with that emotion? Some people sometimes have that experience. They live a life with somebody, somebody who is saintly, somebody who is extraordinarily holy, but because of their own limited tools, they mistreated that person. And suddenly you wake up one day to that awareness. What do you do? So told them Y said, "You see the holiness on me. I reached this because you sold me. It's the journey that you put me on that turned me into the person I became." who possessim. They thought to themselves, we separated the of the generation and could have been together for 22 years. How much light would have come to the world? And because of us, because of our hatred, we splintered. We separated these two. Not only what we did to Ysef, what we did to Yakov, what we did to the world. what we did to the world by splitting up from Yakov. So you know what Ysef says to them? Says, "You're wrong. What you see in me today, the holiness, the light is because the journey you put me on. You know why I'm this that you see? Because you sold me to Egypt." He wasn't trying to embarrass them. It was all part of teaching them how to redefine the story of their life. How he told them already, I'm but now is when they lost it. If you're how could we have been so cruel, so deaf, so blind, so insensitive? How how how traumatized, how limited, how finite can one be? So Ysef says, "Come closer." They come closer. They look into his face and he says, "The holiness you see, this is all because you sold me. It's only because I went through what I went through. There's a therapist he said this publicly also but he shared it with me once his name is Rabbi Shiman Russell and many of his children struggled in terms of yiddeshkite and he told me that one of his girls one of his daughters who left Judaism at a very young age living in Lakewood after years and years of inner work she returned and she was getting married before the kupa She asked her father if she can have a few words with him. And she said, "Before I go into my ka, I have to apologize to you cuz I know what I did to you and mommy all these years. I took you through the ringer and through that super duper looper roller coaster in the amusement parks for so many years. And I know how much pain and sleepless nights and aggravation I caused you. and I just want to apologize before I go into my he told me that the words just came into his mouth like from heaven. He looked at his daughter and he said, "Apologize to me. I have to be thankful to you because me and your mother could have never been the people that we became without you. the levels of self-awareness, of inner work, of closeness to Hashem, of authenticity, of truth. We were living a very shallow, superficial life in a bubble. It was called religious and godly, but it was really very small, very narrow. You're the one who opened us up to what real love is and real pride is and a real relationship with God is. So we have to thank you. And for her that was so healing because before she wanted to she went to the she wanted to get her father's forgiveness. You don't want to go into your knowing that father you love you hurt so badly. And what he was telling her is it's not just I forgive you because I love you and you're apologizing. That's one level. That's true of what Ysef was telling them was the Y that you see the Y that you're so horrified what you did to him that is the Y that you created. And it goes one step further. If you look in the next source in Hebrew grammar there's something off. He should have said I am your brother who you sold. What's our sages say to say in Shabas page 87 Hashem tells carve out two tablets two new tablets and I'm going to write on them the same words I wrote on the first aer So I'll say what's a comes from the word like from isher means confirmation when somebody says means your power kudos onto you your power should be more upright more powerful more strong from the word it should be straight and erect and powerful and and forceful so is not just that you broke I confirm I confirm the fact that you broke it. More strength to you for breaking the says this was saying, "Thank you. Thank you for breaking the tablets." Because Ysef saw his life as a blessing. This doesn't mean Ysef didn't feel pain. There's nobody who cries in the whole Tanakh as many times as Ysef. Ysef in Tanakh cries nine times explicit in nine times. Nobody Adam we never see him cry. I'm sure he also cried when Cayenne killed he certainly cried but it doesn't say Ara cries once at the funeral of Sara. Yitzk we never see cry. Yakov cries once when he meets Rahul. Yv cries nine times. Nobody cries like Ysef. He felt pain more than other people because he never closed up because his pain never produced a trauma that caused him to to fight or flight or freeze. So his emotions remained open. So he could cry. He felt the pain. But within the pain he said, "I wasn't sold. I was sent by Hashem." And if you can go to that space, your sin becomes a mitzvah. There's no need for depression. So now we come back full circle. Yehuda told stole, but you know you're guilty. You're the one who made him come down to Egypt. That's what triggered it. Yehuda was telling Hashem, "Yeah, we all sin, but you know, Hashem knew. You're the one who did it." And suddenly you realize Hashem did it and I didn't do anything. Bey is innocent. Now Ysef says let's go one step further. What happens when God did do it? Yes. A lot of my choices were done were made because of my own limits, my own blindness, my own wounds, my own ignorance, my own temptations, my own insecurities, my own fears, my own crazy stupid beliefs about myself. True. But ultimately this is where I am. This is what I chose. The harm was done. The harm was done. What does a shamu now mean? A shamnu now means something much deeper. If God did it, is it really a sin? If God did it, if I do what Hashem wants me to do, that's a mitzvah. It's not a sin. But Hashem didn't want me to do it. This is a sin. This is a mistake. That's why I have to do chuva. Ysef said, "But if you could allow your truva to be done out of real love, you're going to redefine your past and the mistakes will suddenly turn out to be divine orchestrated actions and then you will rediscover that you're a conduit for Hashem's plan. and that what I did ultimately was here to create love and light and hope and awareness in the world. But this can only happen if I'm ready to go through the process of tears and remorse and making amends because if not I bury myself yet even deeper in a hole of selfdeception. So the ashamnu becomes weened and if you were part of it that means that there's another way of looking at it and I can turn it around into a source of healing for myself and then of others and y is teaching his brothers how he treated it and therefore how they can deal with it which now brings us to our last source with which we're going to finish This comes from the dives the shin of vayash. He was the oldest son of Sanzim was one of the great masters in Galitzia and sons. His oldest son was halasham shag alam known as the he's known as the shin of because he lived in shine. This is in galitzia eastern Poland and his yard site is vavis. Okay. Friday. Yeah. Dalt's cup which is your birthday maz. So we have the yard his yardite is he passed away ness 1898 bel I believe once said that from is every word of which is his commentary on is filled with divine inspiration. So this is what he says. The last source we learned what means when people do people get so depressed and anxious because of the sin. I'm doing but should I not be anxious? Look what I did. We call this good Jewish guilt. A Jew feels guilty. And even when you're doing cha, you feel even more guilty because you realize what you did. And we call this holy. And if you're not guilty, what do you do? You blame yourself, right? So told his brothers, what's telling them these words? Whenever you go into a place of chuva, als if it's real chuva, there's no anxiety. Why not? Why not? Of course, there's anxiety. I'm repenting for what I did. In other words, what I did was immoral, unethical, wrong, insensitive, hurtful, destructive, destructive. If there's there's no room for anxiety. But why not? And then sometimes people get anxiety because they're not having anxiety. You know that type of anxiety? It's like I'm guilty because like I'm not guilty. Oh my god, why am I not anxious? It's really not Jewish not to be anxious. You don't have to be anxious. So now I'm anxious about the fact that I don't have to be anxious. And it never stops because that anxiety is is such a profound voice and I have to accept that too and not become anxious about the fact that I'm experiencing anxiety because the more I can make space for it, the more I could release it. But why not? So this is what he says. You have to realize again these are very intense words. a placebo. You could blame yourself from today till tomorrow, but always remember there's a cause and a cause for a cause and a cause for a cause. And ultimately there were factors that brought you to this point. Even though he says, you see this is not whitewashing everything and saying, "Oh, everything is beautiful and dandy." People sometimes misconstrue these messages very profoundly. He uses the word may God preserve us from but still it's painful but it was sometimes there's a soul that fell into a spiritual aby abyss. It would seem to me that a word fell out here from the book probably. I'm not sure because the sentence doesn't seem to be complete. But the point is sometimes there's a soul that fell into a spiritual abyss and she cannot get herself out. So how do how does she come out? She can't do it on her own. A prisoner can get out from their prison. The Gmorra says, "So, Hashem allowed me to do this mistake and by falling down I go into that abyss where that soul is and I extract the divine spark. When I lift myself up, I lift up with me all the holiness that has become swallowed up in that pit. And that's what meant when he told his brothers, when you do, why not? Because God sent me into the pit. You threw me into a pit or I threw myself into a pit. I could get very depressed. I can get very anxious. And if I'm doing chuva, I should be even more anxious because I'm aware we only if I'm not doing real chuva. Real chuva is different than not real chuva. That was brilliant. There's something that looks like chuva and there's something that's real chuva. Let me tell you the difference. Looks like chuva means I tell myself how horrible I am. It looks like chuva, right? I'm so bad. I'll never forgive myself. I'm the sickest person who ever lived. Looks like chuva but it's not real chuva. It's real anxiety. It's not real chuva. Real chuva is alatu. The shin says alatsvu. Real chuva doesn't come with that package. Why not? Real chuva means I rediscover my oneness with Hashem. I rediscover that I'm never detached. I rediscover that all parts of my life are really one. Even at that moment I was really one. So the choices that I were was making even though from one perspective they were horrible and therefore I feel so bad from a larger awareness from an infinite perspective they were part of my journey and our journey towards infinity. Perhaps by me falling down I could empathize with somebody who fell down. Perhaps by me falling down and having the courage and the resilience and the fortitude to lift myself up, so many other souls who need that strength can lift themselves up. Perhaps by me going through what I went through, I will be able to become a source of inspiration to to people that I could have never been a source of inspiration had I not understood or experienced what they experienced. You all know in your lives that the people who really change your lives are people who are really know what you're going through and they speak to you from that place cuz that's what hits the spot. My wife sent me yesterday a podcast from a woman who actually listens to most of the classes there. Her name is Hana Margullis. She recently wrote a book. So she's from Toronto. She lives in SAS now. and she did a podcast on a on a podcast called human and holy and I listened to a big I listened to a big part of it yesterday and uh she shares something there her her husband encouraged her to share it so she shared it on this podcast so it's not public information and she shared something very what I felt was extremely transformational she said her husband suffers from PTSD B, post-traumatic stress disorder, very serious condition, and anxiety and depression. So, you know, you have a convergence of three things that each one on its own can keep you busy. And she said it turned her whole life around. you know she was a bakov girl was expecting to have a wonderful marriage and build a beautiful home and she's a cemeter seminary teacher and a mkasis and an educator and suddenly she finds out this uh this whole reality and it really uh it really transformed her entire life. I should just mention later on the podcast one discovers that she also suffered years from cancer and chemotherapy and then years of infertility but after all that this occurred and that's what she shares her life story but there's one point I want to tell you that I that I I hear a lot of stories from people but I have to say when I heard her saying this on the podcast I my breath was taken away for a few seconds. She said, "Many people deal with inner wounds." Many people. Maybe everybody or certainly many people. And often people deal with unresolved wounds. People deal with tra trauma from childhood. And people deal with compromised core beliefs about themselves. Say, "I'm not good enough. I'm really not good enough. If you would really know who I am, you would never look at me again. You would certainly never talk to me again. You would certainly never say hi to me again. You'd certainly not like me. And sometimes I'm living with that maybe from age of four. Now I don't walk around saying it. On the contrary, I do the opposite. I build a successful career. I get a great job. I'm impactful. I'm influential. So I'm getting all this validation from people hoping that maybe that will help me start believing that I am good. But of course external validation never compensates for internal trauma because that can't be filled from without can only be filled from within. In fact it's the other way around. The more external validation the deeper the hole because the more I realize that it's not helping the more I become desperate the more I become anxious. So she's describing how you know she too had did that she had her core beliefs but she built a successful career and she says what happens is we get stuck in our jobs and they're doing well and the job is doing well and it's successful and we're getting good feedback but it's not really bringing us to that place of healing. She says when I saw my husband dealing with his depression my instinct was okay let's get you out of this. Let's get you the therapy you need, the medication you need so you can graduate and become a normal person and we can go back to our perfect beautiful from life in the city of Rhnes. But suddenly she said with my husband I realized it doesn't work that way. He could be involved in the most successful endeavor and suddenly his body tells him you're not experiencing inner wholeness and he becomes paralyzed. He can't function anymore. for her initially was the greatest curse. Then she said she learned that this is the greatest blessing because from her husband she learned actually what it means to be completely honest to live from a place of inward wholeness because her husband's body will not let him function if he doesn't deal with the inner wounds that are compromising his essential beauty and oneness. His body says you have to stop. panic attacks, overwhelming fear, dread, paralysis. He can't do anything until he does the inner work, whatever it is, prayer, meditation, study, therapy, the exercises he has to do, whatever it is, his inner work to get back to a place where he can truly embrace himself and accept himself as a mamish. And then his body says, "Okay, now we can continue functioning." So what at the surface seems like such a curse like just cover it up and go on and the world will love you. Her husband taught her I want real wholeness. I want real oneness. I want real fusion. His his body stops. His body signals a message. You're not going to be able to go on with a camouflaged life with a cover up lifest with a lifestyle that's based on coverups. You're going to have to be able to show up to life every moment with your full presence and wholeness. That's the blessing that she discovered from this journey with her husband. And the person asks her, "And how do you feel towards God who ruined your life?" She says, "That's what I always felt that God ruined my life until I realized it's true. He ruined my life. He ruined the life that I didn't need. He ruined the life that I thought I needed. He helped me discover the life that my soul was always yearning for. And indeed, he destroyed a life that was very, very externally satisfying, but internally untruthful. As I was listening to this, I thought to myself, here you have a classic example of what the Drizes is saying. So many people are dealing with these stuff today. And many of you know very well what I'm talking about from your own experience or from your loved ones experiences. But when we hear about somebody else going through this journey, first of all, you realize that you're normal. That itself is a good thing. You're not the only mishuga in the tri-state area. There's another two or three like you. I don't want to say a minion for shalom because we all come from perfect families, but there's at least two or three like you, maybe even a little more. The second thing we realize is how people's journeys are so intertwined and integrated with each other. And when we open ourselves up to that journey and we allow other people to share that journey and we share with other people that journey, we don't only help ourselves come out, we help countless souls come out. By this, Kana Margal is sharing the story of her husband and her going into an abyss and instead of surrendering to despair and shame, learning that this is the journey that I need to confront and work through and find God in that place and then come up. You know how many other nishamas come up in that process? You know how much life is brought to other people? When I cover up everything, I deprive myself from the oxygen I need and I deprive so many other people from the oxygen they need. When I open up Yv says, when you're doing chu and I realize, yes, I fell intentionally, unintentionally, I made a mistake. I made bad mistakes and I fell. But now when I'm lifting myself up, there's so many sparks there. Who knows if there's a soul right there that needs to be able to hear that message that Judaism is not made for perfect people who don't struggle, who don't have mental illness, who don't have anxiety, who don't have addiction, who don't have depression, who don't have trauma, who don't have PTSD. Somebody once told me, "Your classes are very good for people who have emotional issues." He said, "But since I don't have any emotional issues, therefore I don't listen to you." Huh? He heard from other people or he watched the clip. [Laughter] I said, "You know what? You should start giving the classes. Teach us. Gavaldic, teach us. But of course we all understand we all understand that going from a gullless consciousness into a gula consciousness is what Ysef is teaching his brothers. There's the gullis consciousness where I have to bury a lot of parts of the self and I'll never talk about it because it's too embarrassing. It's too shameful. What Yf is teaching his brothers is in Chuva there is complete fusion. there's transformation, there's oneness. So you don't have to bury your past because if you have to bury it, it means you're not really experiencing oneness. In real oneness, everything comes together. And when everything comes together, you could redeem the past. You liberate the past. You reveal that it was really part of part of oneness. So God sent me into that pit to bring life to others. I don't even have a right not to talk about it when so many souls are starving from this language from this oxygen. Sometimes there are people who went through heavy experiences but they're they feel that why should I ever talk about it or share it with anybody? I'm just going to go to the grave with this secret. But I want to say to you that the reason you went through this experience at least part of it I can't say the reason there's no I don't know the reasons but part of the journey of a person is that in our journeys we lift up so many other people in their journeys. So that's what he's saying here. But I did so bad it's terrible. There's the sparks that you're going to elevate because of your descent, your journey. They need to see your journey, your elevation for them to be able to be uplifted. So Ysef said when you do truva, get rid of the anxiety. create space for that experience because it's that experience that allows everybody to go from exile to redemption. Have a wonderful week.