Who Should Light the Menorah? (Parshas Behaalosecha)

this is a little story about four guys named everybody somebody anybody and nobody there was an important job to do and everybody was sure that somebody would do it anybody could have done it but nobody did it somebody got mad because it was everybody's job everybody thought that anybody could do it but nobody realized that everybody wouldn't do it so it ended up that everybody blamed somebody when nobody did what anybody could have done there you go okay so i where did i get that from that was a sign on a wall at an office that i used to work at like back in the 80s remember they used to have office signs maybe they still do but before there was like internet memes and stuff like that there were like these little signs that these people used to put up at the water cooler the water cooler yeah so that was a famous water cooler sign okay the the job with the four guys okay so why are we talking about this we're talking about this because we're talking about a job um that seemingly somebody was told to do but maybe it's possible everybody could do but um it's also possible that nobody's going to do it and that's that's why we're going to talk about it because really anybody should do it that's really the whole class the job is you know this week's pasha so the job is that's uh a job that was specifically spoken to arun akai hashem tells aaron the brother of moshe who's the high priest the queen gobble esca is when you lift up the candles and there's reasons why the toyota uses the word lift up as opposed to to kindle or to light and that's a subject for another class someday but what is very interesting this is what i want to focus on today is that in the gemato in uh yuma of dalat base and then it's also brought as halocha in the rambam mishnah tess chapter nine in zion it says that even a non-coin is allowed to light the menorah in the basal mikdush surprising surprising um let's give a little background i mean we're familiar with the hanukkah because that's uh you know that's part of our day-to-day or at least year to year judaism but the hanukkah monitor is based on the original moneta which was a candle abram in the in the holy temple it was one of the main holy articles which was used on a daily basis it was a seven branched candelabrum which would be lit every single day and um lighting the miner in the basement is one of the 613 commandments it's an eternal commandment we we're not able to do that commandment because we don't have the base of ignorance right now along with many many many other commandments which we cannot yet do again until meshiach comes and we have the third base of makdush but at any rate the lighting of the minute on a daily basis is one of the six eternal 613 uh commandments and the interesting thing about it is that the gemara as well as the who codifies this for us in obviously that album is the pasik when it comes to things like this um you know shulkin talks about things that we do even in in today's day and age but it doesn't talk about things that ceased when the uh when the temple was destroyed so for those things we're looking to rambam because the ramen deals with everything everything that ever was kept and ever will be kept and uh so over there that am says that surprisingly and i i i hope that it is surprising to everybody if it's not surprising that i need to explain myself a little bit better surprisingly um although it is an initial preference that a coin should light the mineira really technically it could be lit by any jew that is surprising to everyone you understand like for instance carbonis the the animal offerings right um everyone could bring one as an offering but then this the actual service the implementation of it would be handed over to a cayenne i mean that's what a coin actually means the name coin needs to serve these were the people who were appointed they were the descendants of arunachalene and that was their job to handle all that stuff in in the base of mikdush so it's very surprising that lighting the monado would be something that would be um it could be done by any jew um furthermore just to uh magnify the question the location of the moneta you know where the manera was located it was located in the area called the kredesh i'm sure you're familiar with the krishna the holy of holies and that's a place where even the even the kahanam did not enter only the kangaroo entered and even the korean gala only entered once a year onion kipper that was the holy of holies and that's where the the oran the the ark with the the tablets of the covenant was located but then in front of the holy of holies there was the holy chamber in the holy chamber you had the menera right the candelabrum you had the table with the with the with the loaves and you had the golden altar smaller altar which was just used for incense so um and then more external to that or exterior to that was the the courtyard where you had the large altar which is also known as the copper altar where the animal sacrifices were performed and non-coin couldn't even go to that part of the courtyard with the with the altar let alone go into the holy where the monado was located so it's a little bit interesting technically a non-coin any jew can light them inerta but you can't even go to where the moneta is located so then the whole question because well how would it actually occur so there's different explanations they could bring them into out and light it out there and then bring it back or another explanation with a long pole you have a long stick with a like a like a with a shamish at the end of it and you reach it into there um but at any rate the point is and it's a very interesting halacha that any jew can light the minority in the base of mikrosh a surprising halacha interesting aloha uh counterintuitive and i guess that's what i want to talk about today what can we learn from this surprising truth you know every every law in torah is not just a technicality casual it reflects a higher spiritual truth so and in the depths of those truths are endless but a little bit of unpacking we can do so the question is what what can we learn at least even in some small way to inspire our our service of hashem from this from this strange technicality okay so everyone understands the basic uh the question and the menera and the coin and the non-coin and all that stuff okay fine all right good so i'm going to tell you a story the story is about a jewish businessman from manchester named max cohn and in 1991 max was supposed to go to bangladesh on business and there was a huge cyclone and it killed i think a hundred thousand people maybe more than that it was it was uh horrific and uh so needless to say he was a little bit hesitant to go to bangladesh in the middle of this crisis um and then he heard that they were predicting another cyclone may hit so uh he says i'm canceling but then he called one of his contacts in bangladesh and the contact in bangladesh told them no no you should definitely come it's going to be fine it's not going to affect you yeah it was you know it was a big thing but it won't affect you you should come and we'll do the business deal so he was really not comfortable with it so this max decides uh you know what something like this the only way i'm going to have confidence to go is if i get a bracha from the laboratory rabbit so he started calling maskirus secretariat trying to get through to see if he could uh ask for a bracha and he wasn't getting through so he decides you know what i'm going to start the trip and i'll keep calling and there were no cell phones there's 91. so maybe i mean there were but uh very very rare so i remember i had like uh a car phone one side the little whole story looks like a shoe box and you plug it into the cigarette lighter okay that even that was like 95 i think okay and at any rate so i'm sure this story involves pay phones i'm absolutely positive of it because he got to he remember he started in manchester he went to uh heathrow london heathrow because he can't fly directly to bangladesh from manchester so he got to london heathrow at london heathrow he called um his in-laws and i'm sure it was from a pay phone um or unless he was in like in the lounge and they had like a special courtesy phone or something at any rate he from london he calls his in-laws he's like listen i still haven't gotten abraham from the rabbit i'm really nervous to go to bangladesh and they say no no you did you did get a break from the rabbit they said what are you talking about so it was a sunday and i guess it was already like sunday afternoon in england but at that point maybe even sunday evening but sunday morning that ever used to have the dollar line so people would line up anyone who wanted to line up and get a bracha so max's in-laws son meaning max's brother-in-law was a bacha in 770. it was a yeshiva student named david david went for dollars that morning and when he got to the rebbe he said my brother-in-law max is in manchester and he has a business deal in bangladesh and he's nervous to go because of you know there was there was a natural disaster over there so the rabbit gave david a dollar and said it should be for the good tell your brother-in-law to give this dollar to the person in bangladesh who is involved with chabad activities so this is what david tells his parents max's in-laws they tell max and he's like that's it i got my bracha not only i have a brock i have a schliches because now i have to give the dollar now he didn't have the physical dollar on him obviously but he would you know he would later get it but he understood he was he was given a mission he has to go find now the person in bangladesh involved in chabad activities and now there's no shlike in bangladesh there wasn't then there isn't now but somebody who's like doing the job of the shliya in bangladesh he's involved in activities in bangladesh and i have to give this guy a dollar and that's great because now i'm actually mitzvah and i have an extra protection and an extra purpose for being there it's not just business beautiful so now he is absolutely uplifted and um his van his his ex his anxiety completely vanished and he gets on the plane he goes to bangladesh okay so he gets to bangladesh obviously he's there for business but his main thing is he's earnestly seeking out who is this person who's doing chabad activities in bangladesh so there were very very few jews and the few jews that were in bangladesh he basically kind of already knew because you know that was you know that was the kind of guy max was he was like if there were jews around he would you know know about them so he was asking every jew he knew like who's the chabad guy here in bangladesh and i don't know i don't know who's the bad guy and so he was looking around for jews that he hadn't met and you know it's very few and far between very difficult and uh nothing was happening so on his very last night in bangladesh he's at the hotel and he gets on the elevator and he sees a guy you know when you see someone you just know they're jewish you just yiddish upon them he sees the guy he sees he's this is a jewish guy so max says to the guy says you're jewish right and the guy says yeah yeah i'm jewish he's like okay listen i'm sorry for bothering you you know a stranger but i have to ask you something do you know who the libertarian is like yeah of course i know the bachelorette i'm very close with his shliyak in north carolina with robert groener robbie jesse groener in north carolina so and he introduces himself as my name's walter the real guy walter yaris so max kong meeks meets walter yaris and he says okay so you you you know that ebb is you know that abhishel north carolina like what do you do in bangladesh is it well i come here on business but while i'm on business here i try to you know do what the shalia north carolina did for us i try to do for people here i look for jews i try to service them i try to get them jewish resources whatever it is that they need so max is hearing this and he's like okay you know you're the guy you're the guy you're the devil said i have something for you okay i don't have it i have to get it my brother-in-law david has it in new york but i have a dollar from the rabbit for you because that ever said i'm supposed to find the guys doing activities in bangladesh you're clearly the guy that's that that's you so uh walter's very touched by this and uh meanwhile max is still trying to clarify though because this guy doesn't look like a husset he's certainly not a an official schlierer so he wanted to clarify he called up jesse groener he's like uh this is max cone from manchester do you know walter yaris and uh robert groener says yeah no i know walter of course uh where did you meet him says i met him in bangladesh he says oh you know jesse groener says walter really is the one doing the abba's work in bangladesh he's like then you're that seals a deal okay i'm telling you that ebba sent me with a dollar for for walter and and and and max asks robert groener can i ask you something though like did did ever like officially tell matt i tell walter to do this like does he have any official title or any any type of like was he was he sent to do this and uh yossi groener says no no i mean uh he's not he's certainly not an official shleak there so max says does that ever even know that he's there and like did you ever tell the deb about him so he also had to think he thought he says you know what many years ago i was writing a doc you know uh din vechman a report and in the door i mentioned that i have a bala boss i have a guy here in north carolina who travels often to bangladesh and and and that when he goes there he tries to help jews there serving them with uh jewish resources so yeah that how does that even know i mentioned it once in a couple of lines in a long letter years ago and he's like okay well that's it then that's that's how that ever knows about it anyways and by the way this whole story is in the mind counter the gem interviews the my encounter interviews and uh it's very nice so you could check it out but anyways that's the story why am i sharing this story so here let me tell you first of all why i'm not sharing the story i'm not sharing the story that you should be impressed that that ever remembered something from a letter from years ago that was two lines and the reason i'm not sharing that is because the reason that's not the reason i'm sharing it is because there's nothing i can do with that piece of information other than be wowed by it and i guess sometimes nice to be wowed when you read about people who are beyond beyond what we think the human experience is capable of so it's i guess that's inspiring but it's not it's not instructive because for for one very simple reason i cannot replicate that you know i definitely cannot replicate that so why am i sharing the story with you because there is a lesson here that i think that we can replicate and that we can learn from and use as as a model um and and it's a very simple lesson the simple lesson and again it's it is certainly inspiring you know that his memory and that of his care and that of his attention to every individual all that stuff is inspired but that that's that's not my purpose for telling you the story my purpose for telling you this story is is much more simple if you're in business and you have to go to bangladesh what's the obvious thing the obvious thing is if there are jews if but divine providence arranges that you're going to meet jews while you're in business in this faraway country so the obvious thing is you should help these jews what are you there for you're there to help them now did anybody ask you to what do you mean did anyone ask you to who has to ask you to well am i the official emissary is it my job what do you mean it's everybody's job everybody had a job that anybody could have done somebody thought that anybody could have done it nobody did it right then everybody was mad this is the meaning of the minota being lit even by a non-coin this is the meaning what does it mean to light the minor it means to inspire jews for for various reasons first of all because ner hasham nishmas adam that the candle of god is the soul of man which means that inspiring a jew getting their their soul to uh to ignite is like lighting a candle so that's lighting the maneuver is like it's like conspiring a jew or the other way around inspiring raju is like lighting a maneuver furthermore the moneta has seven branches seven branches represent the seven emotional attributes like we had in sphere before schwarz you know between pesa and schwartz we had seven weeks because there are seven major emotional facets so the the moneta has seven branches it represents the fact that there are seven different styles of personality seven personality types and obviously there are offshoots and derivatives of that as well but the seven branches represent you know different strokes for different folks you have different uh different kinds of people and yet all seven branches are from one single beaten piece of gold you know how the monetary was fashioned it wasn't soldered together from different parts it was one uh hunk of gold that was beaten into that shape and then that shows that even when there are seven branches meaning different styles and personalities of jews we're really from one entity we are one entity and that's that's the idea of the jews even though there's diversity among jews and different personality types that really were just one one entity one being completely uh completely united and so the the idea of lighting the moneta really is the idea of going around and meeting different kinds of jews and uh serving them jewishly serving them you know by inspiring them sharing with them a good word a word of torah um helping them with the you know to find jewish resources especially if they're in an unfamiliar place or even if they're at home but they don't you know know how to procure their own resources a lot of people unfortunately they they they don't know how to uh to get what they need in order to observe torah on a daily basis and so when you see an opportunity like that whether you're in bangladesh or you're at the corner store the point is that it was divine providence that you should meet this jew and they need their soul to be kindled and you could look around and say well whose job is it you know i'm not the outreach worker i'm not the rabbi i'm not i'm not some uh holy person i'm just a regular guy just a regular gal i'm just you know who who am i let this be the job for people who specialize in that and the answer is no that's absolutely erroneous thinking um anybody can like the miner and therefore should and when you meet a jew that by divine providence it was orchestrated that you meet them and you're aware that there's something you can do for them to inspire them and to make it easier for them to observe yiddish kite so don't look around and say oh where's a coin can we get a coin over here to light this miner no no go ahead you do it now at the same time i want to share with you a little bit of a complexity within the halacha and this this is interesting it says anybody can light the moneta but only a kind can prepare the wicks and the oils very interesting only you have to set up the wicks and the oils in the in the mineral cups and then you light them so the gemara says in the ramen paskins as well that uh anyone anyone can light it but only a coin can prepare meaning to fill the cups with oil and to put the wicks in in the oil so what does that mean what is that talking about anybody can light it but only the kind can set it up only the kind can put out the wicks and the oils so here's here's a another dimension within the the analogy anybody can and therefore must be an agent an emissary to ignite the soul of another jew however only a coin only a professional only somebody who specializes in it can set up the oils and the wicks and that means to figure out what methods are useful in inspiring jews that's where we have to know our place so if i'm sitting around i'm trying to think to myself well what's going to inspire jews what could i do what could raise jewish awareness and i start just brainstorming ideas i don't want to say any examples because i don't want to condemn anyone and i s especially i don't like to throw cold water when people are trying to do good but you see all the time that well-meaning individuals try to come up with ideas that they think will inspire others and maybe it will even get people excited but they're not fully cognizant of undesirable side effects or of the image that it projects and so for for knowing how to inspire jews for that we leave it to the specialist the coin has to come in and set up the oil and the wicks and then any of us can and must come in and light it and let me get very specific what i mean um before the six day war was right around this time of year um so they knew that things were becoming dangerous uh months before and so lag by me which uh was uh about six weeks before the war broke out that ever publicly spoke about campaign for to fill in awareness and for observance of filling that we should go around and get every jewish man and boy above bar mitzvah to put on philly every day other than shabbos and yamtif and that this would increase the safety and security of jews in the holy land and all over the whole world okay now when that ever came out with that initiative obviously that was radical and it got plenty of pushback plenty of pushback i wasn't around in 67 but i remember as a bachelor when i was doing even then you had people who were skeptical of it and judgmental and okay now it's much more of commonplace thing and more accepted but you see you see how much was accomplished with the filling campaign how many people were brought back to yiddish kite and and and given jewish pride and jewish awareness because of it and that's just what we see then there's so much that we don't see the spiritual effects that ever spoke about at any rate the point is for anyone else to get up and say this is the method this is what we're going to do that's above my pay grade i'm not going to go there i don't know what campaign what initiative what programs we need to launch to save claude israel not my job but once a coin has set up the oil in the wick and said here's what we're going to do here's the campaign now it's i'm not allowed to say well this is a specialization that's not me let somebody you know let a coin let an outreach worker let her let a rabbi come no any jew can and must step up and and and light the enlightened flames inspire a jew you meet a jew inspire a jew so i just want to mention that we have a class a series of classes we do we do them on a monthly basis and all of the the archives are on solewards.org where we go through the uh miftsoyum the mitzvah campaigns and i think we've done eight maybe of them so far um we started in ello just before uh the new year just before tough shampay olive and they're all on they're all on soul words um what was the last one we did i think we did mifsa tyra we did the the campaign for for torah study and we've done uh we've done messages i think mozilla was our first one and we did uh bias molly's fought him the campaign to have a home full of jewish books and we did what else well who was who was that any of those classes we did the the myths of israel love your fellow jew and we did let getting a letter in a seifer toyota we did that one um we've done we've done a number of them oh we did mikveh tarasamishbacha we haven't done filling yet i think filling is the next one that we're doing and then and then we're going to do the mashiach campaign i think is the last one we're doing because that's like the coup de gras that's like the you know the ultimate the meshiah campaign but at any rate the point is there are methods that have been provided for us the oils and the wicks are already there ready to be lit so nobody has to sit and you know rack your brain and figure out i wish i knew what inspires jews what gets jews to identify jewishly and start returning to jewish practice you don't have to figure that out that's been figured out for us the oils and the wicks are all set up the hard part is to have the guts to to be the one who does it and yeah it takes a little bit of humility takes real humility to overcome your uh self-awareness i i gotta say like if you ever wanna overcome self-consciousness or shyness or any of that stuff you should just go be a laboratory teenager and you'll be forced they don't care they don't ask you like what's your personality oh you're shy okay don't worry but you don't have to do this no you you will be forced to get over your shyness and uh it's just it's such great i mean this is not the purpose of it but it's a great side benefit it's it's really great for causing you you know to get over yourself and to realize you know it's not about me it's okay you know like uh i don't have to be so fixated on my ego and my self-concept you know there's something important to do there's something holy to do and i'm the one who can do it you just you just do it so yeah definitely ladies i would strongly recommend you carry the tea lights in your purse and the shop is candlelighting times and you know you know what it is someone throws you a bagel you know that term they throw you a bagel yeah throwing a bagel is like when somebody like hints to you heavily that they're jewish in a very like unnatural way like totally a non-sequitur in the conversation like how did this even come up you know you know you know like my wife has story after story about this like from craigslist whenever my wife buys something on craigslist we always like go there and the the person is always like so yeah i remember when i was in hebrew school or whatever like they like to throw in little references she has like a whole like rolodex of our craigslist uh you know jews who come out of the woodwork and it's called throwing a bagel where they like give you a ridiculous non-sequitur type hint that they're jewish and and you got to catch the bagel which means you know you open up the your purse and you take out the tea lights and even if they say no i already have shabbos candles and maybe they do that's fine but you got to be ready you like the boy scouts be prepared and uh and then don't forget there are people who are already observant but we all need a little kid of 100 and i don't say that humorously or you know glibly i don't care how from somebody is i don't care how solid you think they are in their yiddish guy i promise you they also need inspiration they also need inspiration i promise you and you will never go wrong you will never go wrong i mean if you do it in a busy body type of way where you're like prying and you're like asking so you know give me a report you know uh tell me about your vedas hashem i want to you know go through a checklist how you know which mitzvahs did you do to do did you say broncos then yeah you'll turn people off but i'm saying if you present yourself in a helpful way in a compassionate way and uh you're trying to help somebody to to do their job as a jew i promise you it doesn't turn anybody off and it's it's very appreciated so that's the bottom line the bottom line is that we have to light the moneta one candle at a time one shum at a time and and and whose job is it everybody's but you can't rely that somebody will do it because really anybody can do it and therefore everybody should do it but if we all rely that somebody's going to do it then nobody does it or however that whole story goes and at the same time remember we don't have to reinvent the wheel hashem we do not have to reinvent the wheel the the methods are all laid out for us and that's it really be be emboldened be be empowered you know nobody nobody had to tell walter that here's your uh here's your badge here's your uh here's your id card walter knew that if you're in bangladesh then help jews in bangladesh