Who Do You Think You're Talking To? (Parshas Bamidbar)

so the u.s census taker is uh in the deep south in a rural area and he's going from house to house and uh taking the census so he's walking up the path to some old country house and he sees there's a fella sitting on the porch in a rocking chair seems like this is what this guy does just sits in front of his house on the porch in the rocking chair and as the government worker the census taker comes walking up the guy sitting on the porch notices him he says hey what do you see is a stranger a city looking guy what are you looking for can i help you he says i'm uh from the census bureau the guy on the porch says uh i don't know what that is he says oh it's very simple i'll explain every 10 years the government sends out people like me to go door to door and find out how many people live in this country the guy on the porch says oh you got the wrong guy i have no idea okay every country takes a census it's a normal thing yeah everyone takes a census sure just a regular thing that every society does every modern society perhaps even every ancient society it's it's not a new thing it's not a unique thing census okay in this week's partial pashas by midbar we read about a census and the question is what is unique about the jewish census that hashem commands maisha banu to take of the jewish people so we start off this week's passion hashem spoke to mesha in the wilderness of sinai so as reish called lift up the heads that means take a head count count how many jews there are ato you and your brother aha the itham and with you meaning if you need help to count the entire nation you there will be ish ish la mata one man from each tribe ish resh la vezaveis of who the head of each house of fathers meaning the tribal chieftain okay so right there we actually have revealed to us what is unique about the jewish census that hashem commanded maisha to take what's unique so without casting any without speaking disparagingly of people who are census takers it's good honest work so i wouldn't disparage it but you've been a census taker okay so that's a great i have a great question for you how much training and or vetting is there to qualify they give you a math test and a reading test give you a math test and a reading test can you count and can you read okay so it's actually very interesting that someone here has actually qualified as a census taker okay it's not the hardest test you ever took okay all right all right so that's and that makes sense because the work itself really is not something that requires a specialization right it's can you count can you read and that's basically it so and and what difference does it make who does the work here in the jewish senses that hashem commands mesha to take of the jewish people is something very very strange hashem tells mesha ato you and your brother meaning the number one and the number two guy in the whole nation and if you need help oh i got some workers for you the heads of each tribe so this sounds like the a list at the state dinner party it doesn't sound like you know just let's hire some workers let's find people who are available you know anyone who can read anyone who can count this sounds like you couldn't get any more specialized more qualified more elite than this staff and it begs the question why it doesn't think about it like this the purpose of the census is to produce a number to get a count the bottom line is the bottom line so what difference does it make if somebody like may should obey who did the counting or if anybody knows how to count did the counting real it produces the same number you want to talk about the practical result of the census it produces the same number as long as the person knows how to count obviously a person doesn't know how to count you're going to get the wrong number but anyone who knows how to count you're going to produce the same number so what difference does it make why does hashem have to be matriarch why does have to burden the the the someone of not the likes of mushrooms himself literally meshed up a prophet the greatest of all prophets one who speaks face to face with god you i want you to go around 10 to 10 and count so here's the lesson to us the eternal lesson to us there was once a college kid and uh he was taking one of these big tests you know a final test blue book test where they write in the the essays it was the end of the semester and it was a big haul like a big lecture hall with a thousand students one of these big you know 101 survey courses and uh they had two hours to write the essay and at the end of the two hours the professor was sitting at the front of the uh the room says okay pencils down everyone stop writing and this one guy just he wrote just you know one finish one little pencil stroke and the professor spots him he says you up there in the 20th row i set pencils down and you kept writing don't hand in your blue book he says it was just one pencil stroke he says i don't care i said pencils down you kept writing don't hand in your blue book he says if i don't hit my blue book what happens he says you get a zero on the final and you probably fail the whole course if you get a zero on the final because it's a third of your grade so the student stands up from his desk in the 20th row of the lecture hall and he starts walking down the aisle down toward the front of the hall and he says to the professor excuse me professor do you have any idea who you're talking to right now the professor says i don't know what i don't care he says no no i just want to get this straight do you have any idea who you're talking to right now he says young man i don't know and i don't care there are no favorites in this classroom i don't care who you are who your parents are he says no no i just want to know tell me yes or no do you have any idea who you're talking to right now he says no i have no idea what i'm talking to right now the professor the student says perfect he goes to the pile of blue books takes his puts it in the middle walks out of class that's great okay as long as you don't know who you're talking to that's right do you have any idea who you're talking to if you knew who you were talking to you would speak differently when we approach a jew we have no idea who we're talking to you know why because what's a jew is it a race is it a culture is it a language is it a nationality a passport is it a religion it's none of those things because at the end of the day you have jews who don't share all of those qualities together um you have jews who god forbid who denounce jewish faith and are still jews you have jews who i mean i don't want to say painful things we have pe you can have people who are have jewish dna or descended from the jews and because of intermarriage are no longer jews you you you have jews who are who are jews holocaust completely jewish and don't know their jews don't identify jewishly what i'm saying is all the things that we use to to sort of define any people the qualities of the jewish people are like it's it's very elusive you know what language does a jew speak at home what what passport do they hold what you can't even tell what religion do they practice because unfortunately you know they may not be practicing judaism and and still they remain jewish and and so it's and and then conversely you could have a non-jew who just decides to start practicing judaism and he starts learning daffy me and he dobbins three times a day and but he never converted halal he's not he's and he's not jewish so he's doing the jewish stuff but he's he's not jewish so it's so weird you can have someone who is jewish and not behaving jewishly someone's behaving jewishly but they're not jewish what is the definition of a jew and and basically when you when you come down to it you have to say it's a metaphysical condition it is the presence of an ashama the neshama's that hashem uh gave to us at the revelation at har sinai 333 years ago i think it is now and uh jewish identity is all a spiritual thing you know so if it's my point is if jewish identity is a totally spiritual thing who's to say who's a great jew who's a lesser jew these are spiritual things we have very little comprehension of these are otherworldly things heavenly things so what we do know is we know what we don't know we we know that we don't have any idea who we're talking to when you talk to a jew you meet a jew on the street excuse me sir are you jewish would you like to put on philly you know one of those encounters who's great who's higher who's lower you know we have no i don't assume because i'm the one who put on filling already today and i'm helping you to put on phil we know nothing about this stuff this is totally off the charts spirituality okay you want to talk about who identifies more jewishly who behaves more jewishly who you know who can read hebrew more fluently but that's not what defines a jew that's not what defines a jew what defines the jew is like i said that metaphysical condition the presence of the neshama and when it comes to neshama stuff we have no clue so what we have to know is what we don't know that when you're speaking to a jew you have no idea who you're talking to but what we do know is he must be pretty important you know the pope once came to boston he landed at logan and the limo driver picked him up and they're out on the highway and the pope starts begging the limo driver let me drive i haven't driven since i became pope let me drive so the pope uh so the the limo driver is a good catholic you just want to say no to the to the pontiff so he said okay if i pulls over he lets the pope get behind the wheel the pope takes off he's going 90 miles an hour gets pulled over by the massachusetts state trooper so state trooper o'reilly pulls over the limo gets out o'reilly a good irish catholic he gets out of the limo he walks over taps on the glass window rolls down he sees who's sitting behind the wheel the pope he recognizes the pope he's catholic he sees the pope without saying a word o'reilly turns around and goes back to his squad car he gets on the radio he says captain i made a big mistake he says what what's the big mistake he says i pulled over somebody important he says who who did you pull over who's important he says someone pretty big he says how big is this really really big he says who the mayor he says no no bigger than the mayor he said who who the governor says bigger than the governor he says who the president is bigger than the president he says who who's bigger than the president he says i don't know captain but the pope is his driver okay when you speak to a jew how great is a jew i don't know but i'll tell you what i do know maisha bainu is his census taker that's the lesson i can't tell you how great a jew is because it's a spiritual thing and i have no clue how to estimate how to evaluate these spiritual things but what i can tell you the way where i get a glimpse of it where i catch a little bit of a an idea is look i know my shrubenu is pretty great how great again i don't know but as great as i can imagine someone being and this maisha bainu personally goes and counts this jew that's the lesson to us the lesson of the jewish census the reason why they didn't just uh say anybody who you know looking for part-time employment come on you can be a census taker make sure you know how to read make sure you know how to write no no hashem says may should a banu no one less than a missionary if you need help you and the number two guy you and the king god the high priest you can do it oh if you need more help each ish you could have the head of each tribe because when we're dealing with jews nothing less will do than five-star treatment and this is a lesson to us this is a lesson to us how to regard every single jew now bamidbar always comes before shivers schwarz is the anniversary of the giving of the torah so we're getting ready to relive sinai we don't just commemorate it we relive it he's caught him and ask him they're not just remembered they are relived they happen again what is the what is the concept of the revelation at sinai jewish unity that the jewish people were united when they gathered at sinai in fact it was unique the level of unity it was unprecedented before and it wasn't replicated after but it was a precondition to the giving of the torah because in order for hashem to give the torah every single jew had to be present and when hashem gives the torah not only is every single jew there and by the way not just every jew who lived then but every jew who would ever live all the neshamas of the future and even of the righteous converts were all present at the giving of the torah every single jew and not only is every single jew present but hashem then reveals himself and what is he saying i am the lord you gotta take you out of egypt that everyone spoke about this it was the week of pashas yesterday when you when you read the ten commandments and uh that ever gave this really powerful image of uh imagine a a little baby in a in a stroller whose mommy took him to shul or her to sure him or her and and and they're reading the ten commandments in shul and they're reading the very words that god almighty said when he revealed himself to the jewish people and and is singular possessive second person pronoun in the singular i am your god your personal god not collectively the god of the jewish nation but you personally and hashem is speaking to that little baby sitting in the stroller that ever describes it it's it's something of a meditation if you allow it to be yeah [Music] i see people here no it's a different camera but i see i see people here there's two different things yeah okay so uh regarding the rabbi even mentions there that in english we don't have a we don't have different second person pronouns for singular and plural in the south they do you know they have y'all right but officially we don't have a plural second person pronoun we just say you you can be singular or plural so that ebba says that when you're teaching this to a child you actually you know if you're if your language is english you're speaking english you actually have to go out of your way to explain to the child right it's not alike and that means hashem is speaking to you to you the individual dear child and that this is the basis of the education of the child to know that when hashem revealed himself it was on a personal level to to every single jew so this is this is our preparation this is our preparation for for mountain toyota you want to receive the toyota i mean we all obviously we want to receive the toyota what does it mean to receive the torah that means we want to allow infinite wisdom to be our guide in life we want hashem's plan to be our guide in life okay we all want that all right fine so what do we have to do what's the prerequisite jewish unity and jewish unity means the recognition that every single jew is indispensable and indispensable in a way that we cannot even fathom because we have no clue who we're talking to all i know all i can begin to estimate is look i don't know how great this guy is but i can tell you one thing i know about him maestro beno himself was his personal census taker so he must be something pretty great i'll tell you one more thing in connection with this whole idea especially regarding hinok about education of children uh i had a teacher who went into this in a private audience with with the rebbe and uh to his credit he admitted that he was losing his cool with his with his children like he was he was letting them get under his skin he was you know losing his temper so you know that first of all i'm just in awe of the honesty you know that somebody would tell that about that and and and ask for for help so it's very interesting what did the rabbit say i'm giving a webinar right now in parenting parenting webinar which by hashem we got we had like 100 mothers signed up for the yeah it's amazing for the women's in six weeks we're gonna have the men's we'll see how many we had a hundred mothers so probably the ratio we have like three guys now actually walking we already had ten guys sign up and it doesn't start for another five six weeks so welcome maybe there's hope for us anyways and if you're interested more about the webinars you can go to soulwords.org parenting soulwords.org parenting and you can see more about the parenting webinar at any rate so um so this this teacher of mine uh he he went into the lab and he told him he loses a cool with his kids and he doesn't know what to do so that abbott told him it's interesting you know everyone wants parenting tricks and tips they want to be told like do this do that they never didn't tell me anything to do that ever told them something to think it's much deeper than just a behavior it's a it's a it's a it's a point of view i mean change your perspective don't don't don't change your behaviors change your perspectives and automatically if your perspective changes your emotions will change and your behaviors will change so what did the rabbit tell i was abundance in them you should meditate never told me to meditate it's very interesting i'm losing my cool with my kids okay meditate i meditate i need i need practical tips yes that's practical meditate and that ever told him what should he meditate on bona mate you are children to the lord your god you should meditate on the fact who are these children these are hashem's children so that i didn't tell them when you get mad count to ten take a walk around the block what that ever told them meditate change the way your brain is perceiving these children realize these are not just your children these are hashem's children and when you'll realize who you're talking to automatically you'll have a completely different reaction to that so it's not just like well i really wish i could scream at you but you know uh i'm going to go take a walk around the block till i cool off no when you realize who you talking to i'm talking to hashem's child i'm talking to someone who's royalty who maestro rabeno is his own census taker then the reaction from the very beginning is a different reaction so this is this is the lesson not just to change how we treat people and don't speak lush and harder you know don't speak yeah but secretly i'm thinking the lush and hard but i don't speak it no no change your perspective change how you see the jew so that you don't even think bad about them okay tell me something good about them i don't have to tell you something because that's what you're not getting you think this is a regular interpersonal human relationship where there are good people and bad people and some people have middle studies some people have middle soros tell me something good about about him make me respect him i don't have to tell you i don't care if he's bernie madoff i don't care what he did if he's a jew then you have no clue what you're dealing with you have no clue who you're talking to there's in the summer there and maybe sometimes that neshama is in a deep deep deep deep galas which nabha only makes it even a greater rahmanus but then the shama is in ashama which is you're dealing with a jew you have no clue who you're talking to so just remember that and be in awe of that and if we'll really really think about it like as oneness in them and meditation to really contemplate it then our not only our behaviors towards other jews but our thoughts about them our feelings about them our perspective of them will be completely different and this includes first and foremost the people who it's hardest to do this for which is our own children and the people who are near and dear to us and the people who live under the same roof as us because those the people who usually get the brunt of our our judgment unfortunately but that's what it's all about you have no idea who you're talking to this person i can't tell you how great they are but i know one thing maestro bana was his census taker