Kosher Astrology (Part 5) Rabbi Robert Rhodes

[Music] okay good afternoon everyone I've got a few new faces we haven't traditionally done introductions because we're here to learn and yeah we can introduce ourselves and schmooze and figure out who everyone is a little bit later on let us review the three cardinal principles of kosher ecology I mean obviously we use the term asteroid in a very broad sense and the sense that I'm certainly using it is sources in the writings of the Hasidic master the Masters that touch upon and deal with things that we would normally call astrology the three cardinal principles are number one the constellations are just stars the stars line up in the sky and they form a picture of some sort according to our point of view at our particular point in time and our cultural backgrounds all right so we look up in the sky and we see Leo we see a lion for the month of which is the method is just ending and other people's in other parts of the world with other backgrounds and other sets of mythology so different things and over the course of several centuries since the Sumerians started doing this sort of stuff the alignments of action changed the universe is expanding various other astronomical issues that affect the positions and the way the stars lie now the Stars don't mean anything they just give us a picture of something that helps us understand things number two not prescriptive anything that we learn here is not telling you go out and invest in it is telling you of course make a substantial donation to keep on there lipo student is very happy to take any any donation from you but seriously you can't look in for example the shame where the second Rebbe of Safa Jaffa and saying we're coming up to the end of the month of our or I am going out on a date - with someone who was born in a certain month should I marry them or not that's not gonna be there you're gonna get an understanding you're gonna get help you're gonna get inspiration but beyond that I don't think there's anything else number three Hebrew months only the number one paradigm shift you have to make when you start doing this stuff is I was not born in the month of July I was born in the month of the Tablas that is extremely important because that will frequently change what the constellation is what the whole month is about and what all the things connected with the month are gonna be all right so I thought originally I was Leo there is no one in the face of this earth that I am a Leo I am 100% a SART I'm I'm a cancer I'm a little crab and if you know me I tend to get very crappy at times but that's just a pun these are time the water sign the things that crabs do these are issues and points that resonate greatly and help me understand who I am and how I relate to and connect to other people so that's what that's what we take out of all of this I want to make this whole thing simple I know I've given out I think five different sets of handouts and I do have a few extras printed and if you have come a little bit late to all of this the few that I really want you to have are number one the high elbow worksheet I'm recycling things have been brought yeah there's three three of you who are here for the first I don't know I think I may have one more of these sure and if I don't I think you just have to look guys I could have sworn I don't know the 12 months of focus is taught by the mayor Sheila this is where we started and this is where we really are focusing all of this entire course since I started doing this a month or two ago is focusing on the Torah as taught to us wherever a more defined yosef of Bishops this book is known as the math she lost it's available in English under the title still waters I believe that is the title it's it's a translation by round by the toil Edwards others mean words in small ways I'm trying to be cheap with with copies I mean you will excuse me on that but okay the other one that you have gives you the things that are connected with each month and we're kind we're going to go through all of this the basic point that I really really wanted everyone to take away from this it is that every single month of the year has a specific focus to it we started off doing the eight habits of highly spiritual people then we did the eight habits of getting through life and being a good person as we learned from Noah in the ark and this those are of course eight habits that you're supposed to be doing all the time here we're looking at one thing to focus on every month and a lot of them felt was a lust and eating and consumption and we're going to get to the one other time the mashie law gives us very clearly what to do what to focus on and there's a great deal of background that is behind a relatively short piece of text and if you're interested I can give you the original handout that did but I just don't want to burden you with too many things and the things that were connecting on if you look here we're gonna be on the third page of where it says hi a little worksheet this is something that we produced for the holiday of Iowa which was very important in the commodity world but every single month has a verse from the Torah attached to it and connected to that and found within it in terms of first letters of last letters of words is one of the permutations of God's name so all of this stuff plus a lot more is behind what you have in the first column 12 months of focus all right so the ones involved in bold letters that say here's what you look at here's what you keep in your mind in this particular month these come from these right so basically in terms of history and where it are originates it's this one which goes with all of the verses and this one here with just a list of things but I really really really cannot emphasize enough that the point here is yes take the journey go the whole way and looking to all of these deep cabbalistic concepts but we're here to learn how to live what am I supposed to be thinking about in this month the new month of Elul is going to begin right and that's going to be month number 12 we're changing the months starting from history that's a whole separate issue we're to the moment start from but we're about to begin the last month of the year and then go into the first month of the year and we have a lot of background those of you who have grown up among Jewish communities and have read a little bit about the way Jews do things on these these times of year these are incredibly sad and intense periods of time where we're going our Sephardic brethren are starting to see hoped next weekly penitential prayers azam get off a little bit easier we've got about three weeks to go before that starts but this is a period where we try to be as good as we possibly can be we try to be as focus and as serious as we can be as religiously observant as we can be and we forget the element of happiness and we forget the element of joy and we forget the really big overarching notion of permanent relationship with us and that's interesting I mean my sort of take away until I came to kasi do it for me menorah was I have been a bad person the prayer books seem to be full of confessions of every permutation of every wrong thing that I could opossum don't be depressed right depression and I don't really see that or maybe that's exactly the point what should not be said that is the natural reaction ie I can only tell you my experience and I come from generally speaking a place of depression no that's where I like I get sent by God for some some particular reason in previous incarnations it's all about guilt Gollum folks it's all that incarnation and reincarnation but I think the over the overall feeling across the board with Jewish people is this is not the happiest time of the year that it's a time of despair and that it's a time of stocktaking and resolving to be better looking at your's I see it I see it in theory but I don't I don't sense it in yeah I mean you're quoting the right tax but I think that pretty much every community that I've been in and every place I've been to for this sort of time of year the the notion that for example the relationship that God has with us is like like a couple on the wedding night right this is the the masala batula we'll get a little bit into this right a couple a couple of sessions down the road while we're into the month of lol that in size so much joy it's absolutely perfect this is like a total shock I I certainly never heard of this soul ten years ago I just don't see it and the way people as a whole approach this time of year maybe I don't hang out with the right issue did I ever go to the issue how dare you accuse me such a thing I learned in the UH Kohanim for four years that's that's that's where that's where we're going here that's what we're going through and that's that's why I've numbered them from Tishrei through and we're going to start before the show which starts in Friday night just a week a couple of days from now and it's the whole point of you've been through this entire year and God still loves you God still is going to look after you you can't lose the the wine done that we've said quite a few times is your set up for success and even when you fail it's still fine right the bits that I really want to focus on is the lines go for it says focus MHS which sounds from a Sheila and for the month of Elul God supports you and if you have a little difficulty with the Hebrew I definitely have these verses transliterated because these are worth taking a taking a look at because the verses that come to us through the permutations of God's name which is it which is a difficult and a complicated thing to deal with do lead us into what the month is about what the focuses the measure of himself has next nothing in terms of origins of how he gets to tell you all of this but there's a huge amount of background and if you go into the next generations of the issue pits rods and family you get to see that and if you go into the Zohar you get to see it even more so there's a lot of things here but really focus on what am I supposed to be working on in this particular month and when the month changes in thirty days from now well Nora Shoshana comes along what am I supposed to be focusing on and I think this is incredibly valuable and it's it's it's good for me I try to do it I don't always get there but I do definitely try to do it okay so we're looking at on the sheet which has multiple pages page number three the very last one and I counted up there's about a dozen things that are connected with each with each of the months right and the Seyfried seer out of the book of formation lists five things that connects with the month a letter of the Hebrew alphabet something to do with the body sometimes it's a sense a constellation the name of the month and a part of the human body the capitalists add the name of God and a verse in the Bible that connects with that and they also add a tribe a tribe of the people of Israel the mashallah which is where we start him where we're really trying to trying to keep our to keep ourselves and our focus adds also the name of the Prince of the tribe the precious stone and our major focus point here which is what to do each month what to be focusing upon okay so month number 12 which is ll connect to verse number 25 in chapter 6 of diversion the book of Deuteronomy and it tells you that God supports you God has always got your back right and the verse is and it will be for our merit that we keep to observe all the commandments before God as he has commanded us I think that the connection is simply in the Hebrew words that Catalano we tend to look at CENTCOM as charity as something that you get for nothing right that you get whether you deserve it or not gift in judging put the air conditioning on because I'm totally using my abilities if you think here I keep it a little bit below zero when we're fine right the other the other pieces here on the page which tell us what the constellation is what the tribe is what the action and what the thing of the month is these are issues that we will deal with down the line but going back to the original mash Aloha and if you recall what we looked at the very very first time we got into all of this was a whole list of words in the Talmud honor Shoshanna where the rabbis had difficulty with some words that they had in different contexts mostly Biblical verses and that's the the right-hand side of the 12-month focus part which I don't want you to ignore but I want you to realize this is here with an additional set of meaning and kind of nuance in it right the verse the verses on the words were twelve in number so the math she Louis is saying there are twelve things here got to be connected with the months of the year right all 12 is fit together so the verse that they connected it with is in Psalm number 55 hush Lake L Hashem Yahav aha God says cast upon God your burden that refers to the month of hell because if you will say a calf Charlotte barrera how is it possible to clarify myself to purify myself in all of these things right it's month number 12 and I've tried to do absolutely everything on the list alright we're doing this from the end for some reason or other I do things backwards that proves that I miss our time right the crab walks at least sideways there's no no no accidents here right so Psalm 55 has this particular verse you have you have is burden and if you say I've gone through the past 11 months I've done each of these things and if f-sharp it's how is it going to be possible for me to do this thus the verse says TIMSS or at-ats Mokelumne para whoo-hoo you very old ha pass yourself give yourself over to God and he is gonna clarify and purify you completely right simple straightforward you can't you think you cannot do it you've tried you've done 11 different things some of them related to each other some of them not and it hasn't worked you're not a better person you know that you've failed in every single thing you've tried give it over to God God has still got you back and I think the verse connects by saying God supports you which is that katia honor God is going to give you the merit God's gonna give you the credit just for trying right makes a certain amount of sense so far then you switch over to the very beginning and we go to the month of Tishri we will if you stick with us and if you'll stick with us go into these two particular months in it integrate and a great deal more detail right the first month of the year is the month where we have all of these holidays where we have Rosh Hashanah Yom Kippur Sukkot all of these all of these things and the verse is and the focus is the door is always open how does how does he actually say this in the in the text itself and referring Tishrei to the trumpet of the jubilee year Right the yova freedom refers to the month of Tishrei because in this month the person has to understand that God can take Israel the Jew the individual juror all of us to complete freedom and show us hello hi you mokuba dim may allow that we were never enslaved the nations of the earth never enslaved us below Masha Allah hemiola Rock who live at oh and anything that is holding us down is really only directly from God himself alright Tishri is the month of Rosh Hashanah it's a month of freedom it sounds like Pesach to me but here here's where we're getting it right the verse that connects with this is Bridget chapter 12 verse 15 the euro toss sorry Pharaoh talking about Sarah Pharaoh's Prince's sore they praised her to Pharaoh and she was taken to the house of Pharaoh right there's a couple of ways we can reconcile this or make this fit with the basic notion that you thought you were in prison but the door was actually open all the time he could have just walked out one of them is that God is always in control that the fact that Sarah was taken to the house of Pharaoh and placed in a very difficult situation under armed guard and was at least about to be forced to do something with the Pharaoh didn't happen all that happened was was she was terrified unhappy but had to realize from the beginning printing it back onto our our our sort of look at this that there was no danger at all it's one of the classic lines in diminishing another we talks about what is the Messianic era going to be like how is it going to magically appear what's the difference how quickly is it going to turn over from the way things are to the way things will be and he talks about the example of Joseph and the brothers right you familiar with the story Joseph is the senior officer and whatever Minister in Egypt and he's playing with his brothers the brothers have sold him into slavery he's the standard reading is he's trying to test them to see if they're sorry for what for what they did and it comes to the point where the brothers say we give up take us as slaves what we did to Joseph has brought all this upon us and then Joseph says though I'm Joseph your brother Anil safe actually if Emma says three simple words and everything is over it's all turned around and that is Howard more does iosef says this is what how the messianic era is going to come around and this is how it is with us ordinary folks as well that that which oppresses us that which holds us down that which seems to be playing with our lives arbitrarily really will reveal itself to have been our own brother and one of the things again that we learn from all of this astrology sort of stuff is that God wants the relationship with us to be like that of a twin right which which month of the year is the Torah giving it so they survive I want to see if I are the must all the constellations - mmm this is a big toe in the B'nai so so far what I think is you know what one of the most powerful ones that there is and I say that a lot because there are a lot of them God wants a sort of relationship that we know twins have with each other right I mean my son was twin brothers and what what I know is they supposedly they do have a level of communication and a level of connection that is above just ordinary brothers and sisters and that's the kind of connection that goes looking right there are another couple of issues that come up with this particular verse right because when you think of it it's really not a terribly inspirational line you know what do you have in terms of verses in the Torah that will get you turned on to the spirit of the month of Tishrei this is not one that comes to mind right one of the opinions on this is that Sarah the matriarch was noticed by the servants of Pharaoh what does that mean at this particular time there is a deep connection between the Jewish people and the nations of the earth I don't fully agree with this but it's it's out there because during the festival of Sukkot we make sacrifices on behalf of the nations the nations of the world like us more and we get along with them better at this time of year take it take it or leave it right I think also we have a tendency during this time of year and that made me goes back to what we were just towards it we were talking about earlier that Rosh Hashanah Yom Kippur Sukkot we tend to be very much wrapped up in ourselves that the focus of Jewish people of that particular time of year is us and that's simply me thinking about what the verse might mean and what it what it means to me I think ultimately that is the the basic point that I want to put out here the focus and then you have a verse of a classical Torah that has the potential to speak to you and if it says something to you wonderful it says something other than what I say that's okay too right I think that during this whole period of the month of Tishrei were very very inner inward focused we're looking at ourselves as individuals we're reassessing ourselves as a community and then we have this whole Sukkot holiday which is total absolute amazing pleasure especially here in your shoreline right it's a good idea to take a minute or two and say there are people in this world other than Jews and we have a certain amount of responsibility to them one of the the incredibly powerful and I'm just going back to it was the Syracuse New York years it was quite quite a few years ago we invited a number of people from a certain church to come visit us on Sakai and they did together with the pastor some of the children and I forget even what the motivation for applause it was some program that was going on in the whole whole city with one of the Interfaith organizations and these people came into the sukkah Bible believing Christian men and women and they were blown away by it it resonated so deeply with them and gave them an enormous appreciation of what we have done with the commandment thou shalt sit in booths for seven days etc etc right and how it's helped us and what it means to us and how much away there is in it and they have it in the Bible there is something that well the ancient Israelites did that I think there is there is an opportunity for us that we we don't do and we don't notice and over the years I've gone on and off and wax hot and cold about bothering with the the Interfaith community and because all of these things are very rewarding and some of the things are a total waste of time and some of the things are achieving you know quite harmful to get too involved with but I think it is a lesson that comes to me from from the month of Tishri open the door a little bit we did it again going back to the syracuse years those we did beginners service for Rosh Hashanah Yom Kippur right how do you fit in an extra service in a day that's a hard one it means you're you're in the shul and you're doing stuff all day and we literally got on the front page of the local newspaper and we had a good friendly relationship with it with the media then and newspapers actually meant something back twenty something years ago show the world that there is something called Judaism that has something to give to you and that's not usually thing that takes an enormous effort nonetheless my point always with these particular verses is not the technicalities not the analysis not the Zohar and the commentaries behind it but that these are verses that are picked and selected not by natural means but from out there and they're meant to jump out and they're meant to give you something that Spurs you to do something okay so let's - right you get off the hook the door is open get-out-of-jail-free card right I spent far too much time playing Monopoly both as a child and as an adult never got into other sorts of games but monopoly I certainly liked how does the door of your prison cell open we find ourselves in prison by many different types of things how do you gotta go does God open the door for you from the outside do you have to do something magical no you just have to see that it was never closed at all it was never locked you were never impressive you always have that ability and when you look around you on Yom Kippur water it what are people thinking came back to our original discussion I still will not give in to you on this and since I'm older and I must be much wiser right now I think I just been around congregations more right and I think I don't see people coming into Rosh Hashanah or Yom Kippur happy coming into Rosh Hashanah or young or / happy I've gone to the wrong types of shows I guess it's it's it's a revelation for me it was a huge revelation total to learn all this stuff alright so let's get through the rest of these months because I want to really go back and then look at ello and then history from a couple of texts that I have printed and I have translated for you all right month of Heshbon second month of the year it's on page one of the worksheet thing and it's really a tough one because this goes over two verses all right so what's the focus point of the month of fresh one lust sorry folks we have to gotta talk about all of this stuff bezerra audition this month a person must believe our air that's mummy tava you have to we have to work on our libidos how we look at other people what are we looking at when we see another person are we seeing an object that is desirable or are we seeing the mind-to-mind right and then we're gonna see the lust and the desires come up several times and three or four different times they all seem to connect and we can't be very politically correct about this because this is the way human beings are right this is the way it were made and this is the big big struggle of life right I'm not gonna go into all of the details but youyou get the point and right across all that all the great Hasidic masters we're dealing with keeping our sexual urges under control keeping our mind away from what we're not supposed to be thinking of and using our sexual energy the right way the right time at the right place right because remember in this particular point of view it comes from up here the number one sexual organ is your mind and if you keep your mind pure and you keep your mind focused then you open up the door to absolutely everything good and world right this is when when we get it if you want to do this course doing some organizing and tidying we do have a really nice course ready to go from Repubblica going through one of the students of the musci law about focusing your dreams and finding the prophetic messages that God has send you in your dreams in a nutshell clean your mind up while you're awake then you have less nonsense coming up in your dreams and you may actually hear God talking to you okay but we can we can do that at length and with comparison to what we read from other sources on these things another time right the month of flesh fun is not a terribly busy month of the year but it is a month that we are told here by the Massey law to focus on getting our libidos under control right how do you connect that to this particular verse and then you have to ask the question of why are there two verses here and in one other case the permutation of God's name is stretched over two verses and it's the last word of the first verse and the one two three first three words of the second verse so if you want to put that together it is the words for honey this day Hashem your God which doesn't make an enormous amount of sense unless you want to say that real sweetness is from a show the real sweetness and the real connection and the real feeling and emotion that we can only understand in our world in terms of physical intimacy that is intimacy with God that's the real sweetness that's dvash right they didn't have sugar like we had in and the time of the Bible there's more than one way of dealing with thee with it with the division here and I'm looking at someone else here dvash I know devar - Horsham ocurro meet devar Tommy what is honey honey is something that is pure and kosher and good that comes out of the beat which would normally be considered a very impure non kosher animal thus after the month of Tishrei where we have been very good and we have prayed and we have repented God takes our sins our - ma the bead and produces honey from it thus it is separated into two verses the past is how it was and the future is how it's going to be take it or leave it I can't say that that makes a great deal of sense to me but I'll tell you its source our Foolish reckon I don't know who is it all right but when you google the words 12 permutations of God's name in 12 months this is one of the very few articles that comes up and if Shrek E has something to say here but I don't necessarily agree with but it's worth noting the question of the division of the Bible in two verses is is a sort of interesting one the the way that we have it all is chapters and verses that's really Christian thing it comes from about the 12th century and I believe the first document the first manuscript is from Scotland I believe and divides the Bible up into what we know to these chapters and verses Jews adopted them because of disputations we were forced to dispute and to argue about the Bible and defend the Bible and defend Judaism and they just gave us a relative the same frame of reference nonetheless you go back to the town game you wreck the musical notation that divides the verses up and that obviously predates this whole early Middle Ages thing all together right the dvash word here buddha vash and honey and a verse today hashem your god maybe it's there's a certain amount of context here we're again into varying we're in the book of Deuteronomy we're where the verse says to God look down from your holy dwelling bless your people Israel the land which you have given us we swore to our forefathers of land flowing with milk and honey this day Hashem your God is commanding you to fulfill these statutes ordinances you'll observe them fulfill them with all your heart and all your soul that's about as much as I can I can pull out of this and again to go back to my original point the reason I'm putting these things out here is because maybe you were born in the month of ashwin and this this particular verse should potentially be saying something to you okay number three kiss leg the thing to focus on according to the mashallah is not lust for but lust for money a specific type of thing kodesh kiss slave kiba's a whole dish to record on that person must live our air that smo become dot nimona how much do you value things in terms of money and again it goes back to the list of words that he is pushing on to the the list of things to do for each month right so the verse is the Canaanites the inhabitants of the land saw the morning at the threshing floor what is the what is the actual background here it's Bray sheet the book of Genesis chapter 50 and Yaakov Jacob is being brought back to Israel to be buried and the Canaanites see a major mourning place at a threshing floor whatever this particular place was and they said this is a great an intense mourning for the Egyptians therefore they called it the place of mourning of Egypt which is on the other side of the Jordan what I'm supposed to take away from that that I'm running again I'm struggling a little bit with right you don't take anything with you when you die potentially again going back to ref Shrek II and his list I don't see him saying anything particularly useful here the month of Kislev is the month of Chanukah where we fought to the Greeks and the Greeks had taken over Israel we were yeah I mean this this is one of the big things that we were talking about a while back is that there's really only one holiday and the Jewish year and there's one there's one paradigm they're all it just repeats in their pants intense morning I don't see an enormous amount doubts it doesn't jump out and tell me anything about the month of Kislev I mean the connection to Hanukkah right Chanukah was about barracks trying to destroy our faith the connection the connections are there and I'm putting these out to say see what you can take from it right I can tell you some of them because some of them make sense to me but some of them don't entirely right moving on to the month of to eighth-grade month number four right [Music] the month of debate kiba's our whole district around lovara I thought SMO the mead ottakar's anger we have to deal with our anger we have to not allow ourselves to be buried underneath our anger the verse is from Psalms through 20 Psalm 34 got blue lash a meat-eating aroma my shoe enough down declared the greatness of God with me and let us exalt his name together right here at the point to focus from the mess she lo I come from the safer here on the book of a book of kind of information both overlap we're dealing with anger here and the general sort of thought is if we realize and express that God is in charge what is it to be angry about [Music] it's another love it's another level of last chance yeah cool okay we're good we're good with this one definitely like that I mean the other sort of reason they're the sort of thought that comes up with when when are you judge in going back to math Sheila and this is one of the pieces that we didn't we didn't do it all that it's in the background of all of this from the very first time we actually brought a list stuff out is that what are you judged for on Yom Kippur come on Rosh Hashanah I'm not sure Shani you're judged which day you're gonna be judged on right which is it was just sort of funny but it's not the same for everyone there is a new year for you in your life there's a new year for you in your business and you're learning whatever it happens to be that isn't necessarily the first of Tishri the first day of the year and that's the judgment that you get when it's going to be your new year I which is another name is here right the month of T fate is the month that we try and deal with our anger right and none of us ever get angry right the perfect a month number five is Shabbat and that is the month where we are expected to be dealing with our eating get our eating under control and again you have one here that fits nicely with the Safe Routes Eli which talks about taste and going back to our original source again the mesh Aloha that this month of Shabbat is Sri Kadam Navarre that's no batata the tavataa vodka Sheila with your desires for eating and he talks about a good morning about a particular word that a bride eats in a very delicate and dainty manner right I have never watched brides eating at weddings right quite a few weddings I've gone to have had separate seating so you never even get to see that other side but I'm guessing a bride would be incredibly careful right more more than the average person when eating yes only the only the new hubby sees that right and then there then there dancing the night away right the basic point is this is a month that is to be partisan that's right 15 we've got things growing those of you who eat fruit and veggies will think of this is a particularly good month I stay away from anything that grows in terms of Enoch that's just my personal issues and spring is here you want to eat more you're happy right if you suffer from allergies it's the worst time of the year right but that's a that's a totally different soil together and I take whatever I don't think they had allergies how does that come in connect with the verse again it's a it's it's one that's a little bit hard to do he shall not inspect a tithe animal for a good or a bad one nor shall I offer a substitute for it we're in the book of I yet crop right and what we're talking about is animals that are designated for sacrifices an animal has been tithed and you cannot substitute a different animal for the one you have already designated right the mhmm area Murano and if you do in fact make this switch then the one you switched and the one you switched out both of them become holy and cannot be redeemed right oh ho - schemata Mitra Hatchett - Moo rabo'ah switching things around is the feeling of the of the month I'm taking my random article from the internet here right not all of this is from clear documented wonderful sources but the verse here is talking about switching things around eating one of the problems that we do have is some of the additions of the various books that we're looking at have switched these verses around I'm taking everything straight from the standard edition the text of this of the Safeway in serie is that book which is used by rabbi aya calculon in his translation and the text is that from the graph from the Konev Vilna so we got stick with one but we can go back and do this all over again with some of these things done done this like a different order the month of Shabbat is the month where we have to deal with our issue of eating and our desires for more and more food right the month of Adar is a very very obvious one right that we are dealing with the problem of excess frivolity right Adar is the month of Purim right their whole dish in this particular month a person must purify himself meal eights a note from clowning around right the kallu troche and lightheadedness right not lightheadedness in terms of I have had too much to drink in my head is like but taking things too lightly which is a tendency that we do this is very very obvious in the in the time of the month right and one of the basic thoughts that we do keep going back to is that a particular holiday like pouring for example can only occur in the month of Adar where the focus is laughter what is what is laughter and basically the the Hasidic masters I'm looking at in my mind the shame you smile in the second rep you saw each other is it you've got to distinguish between the laughter of the fool and real laughter right there's this funny that you watch a stupid comedy on TV and you laugh it there's not a single full bar in the divine right and that can be good and that has its place there it tastes what we need to watch the sort of TV show if you watch TV of course we assume none of us waste our time on these things watch only sci-fi shows what Star Trek watch Doctor Who because you will then get a great understanding of all of the stuff you learn the time is not linear a lot of good things too they tend to be the cleanest sinless kosher shows on TV um there's the laughter of the forms laughter the wise there's the smile there's the real laughter you have when you've achieved something when you've learned something when you've connected with someone when you're sharing and feel similar right there's this more than one level of laughter and this is the month that is obviously set aside for purifying and working on our level of laughter and what we laugh at because most of us myself included we do have a tendency to look at people and try and laugh at them he's wearing that shirt with those pants right first guys it's not such an issue right but that dress is from last year how how can that possibly be that's that's the sort of thing that we don't laugh at you know and that's one of the things that again going back to Shoals and communities and you don't have the latest fashion you know belong kick you're just a subject of ridicule for us right month number seven Nissan what are we supposed to focus in on month of Nissan other people's property straight out of the Massey law sorry card omelet barrier bikini on she ain't no shallow Qingyuan is to purchase or to buy property of something or other that doesn't belong to you what have you borrowed from somebody and not returned what have you bought what have you acquired that you don't have a right to none of us go into a kind with a gun and steal things right we don't shoplift or anything like that but there are things that we do take from other people and that we don't have a right to some of them literal some of them not so alright month number eight I have euphemistically said seed Zahra which again politically incorrect and not for the genteel of mind and thought here seed Shiraz sorry hah down with bourbon McCrea Lila that a person should be careful not to accidentally omit seed in the middle of the night other than how and where it's supposed to be done right thought the focus is remember your sexual activity comes from up here it needs to be controlled and focused so you can have a real valuable useful productive life and one way of doing this and one sure way of assuring this is keeping your sexual organs firmly under control right not giving yourself the ability to drift off into fantasy and wherever wherever that will lead okay month number eight you have to a director nine number nine see bond amount of civil again very obvious Sivan is the month of the giving of the Torah I have my numbers are in here correctly the resort the debate Torah diligence the month when the Torah is given is a month when you should be incredibly active and incredibly focused on tour that makes very very obvious sense to me right the verse sort of connects I think I have flipped the page here and the wrist does sort of connect its Exodus chapter 19 describing the Mishkan you shall make 40 silver sockets under 20 planks two sockets a whole list of things and it's another the other example of where the God's name comes spelled out at the end of one verse and the beginning of another what connects everything take note of all the sockets all the pegs all the planks all the different details and bring them all together work at it this is the time we give them the Torah this is the time that it is particularly good and easy to start learning torah with much greater detail yep right vert number 10 Thomas all right previous month my birthday the verse is from the book of Esther join with and search for Torah right we got to two months in a row here we're in civil we have to have diligence and detail and focus for learning Torah but month number 10 tom was so really hard on her bare not smoly to rate or on you've got to connect yourself join with Torah and search after them right and the verse comes from the book of Esther where Rahman the major bad guy says all this stuff that I have all this power that I've gained all this wealth that the King has given me is worth absolutely nothing to me when I see more to hide the gym sitting in the Kings gate it's not worth it to me making a calculation based just on dollars and cents or shekels and I GU wrote the calculation of things what's really valuable what's really important is Torah because tour is what it's all about this was this one spoke to me a lot and it was my entry into the whole study of this thing I've said this before one of the things that I've always said oh my an enormous difficulty pushing out is the notion that it's not worth it that there is an accountant to be made and the way I look at it the balance sheet the accounting doesn't come out right and it costs me too much to do this or whatever it happens to be and that comes from a very dark place this is come on this is the evil character when we're being pushed to look at things in these sort of terms that's not a good voice that's the bad angel whispering in her ear right Pinocchio as opposed to the to the good angel right and back to the last month which is number 11 which is with what we're coming to an end here with a general list of all desires that we need to work on we've worked on our sexual lust we've worked on our lust for money we've worked on our lust for food we've worked on our desires to keep everyone else's property now we have this or omnibus lust and again it comes from the the connection with that whole list of words that we started out with a few weeks back in the month of love you have to purify yourself meat coal mean a hand out from all possible lusts and desires and that's what we need to look at what is he getting at here again there is a background to it the month of of is where the nations of the world overpowered the Jewish nation right ninth of our destruction of the temple the end of the Jewish Commonwealth and each of these nations represents one particular level of desire all of them came all of them took over and what we are looking at here in this particular month is the push in the opposite direction there's always a double headed thing here and what I would like to get into it the next thing when we get when we get down to this is that every month has something to do with it that it is not necessarily the focus of the mayor she lost that is the most important one but that's where we started from there is the focus that we get from the safe reading the surroundings various versions and these are generally explained in terms of the holidays or the fasts of the particular year or above the particular month we're looking at in the month of the need to push back against the whole list of things that brought us to that particular time of year okay that's a very quick overview of what all of this is about you do have a list of 10 or 11 things that that we are supposed to be focusing on in each of the months and that are intimately connected with the underlying programming of the month so the way that I tend to look at it and this is simply me explaining it is that once dot main time once God made a thing called a month there is something in that month that we can either let control us which is not the way we're supposed to go or we can say here is a piece here is empowered here is something that I can use to make my life better world a better place all right I can take an electric current and I can hurt somebody or kill somebody with it or I can attach it to a light or I can attach it to an air conditioner and I can do something pretty darn useful whether that is the challenge of all of the months so we're going to start next time with I think the month of lol and then we'll go to the month of Tishrei we'll take a look at a couple of the Hasidic masters in terms of what they're saying and what they're telling us to be doing and what the opportunities are so the things and the focus points are going to be shifting which is one of the really really important things to remember here that here we've got a month it's a month of off we're going into the month of L Oh something is going to be changing what's the focus but you can see quite clearly that there are several different ways of looking at it it is never going to be as simple as here's the month do this you've got to look at these things you've got to look at what the sets of choices apart and say here's what I find resonating with me it was my particular situation and a lot of the time I hope I hope you'll find as I do that these really are magical books and that these are absolutely amazing wonderful ways of improving your life and really understanding what Torah is all about okay 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