Rav Yitzchak Breitowitz: Did Abraham Keep The Whole Torah Before it was Given?

You [music] see your [music] tomorrow [singing] [music] [music and singing] [singing] Okay. Hi everybody. Uh good to see you. Hope uh your is going well and uh first our dedications. Uh we are still praying for the lasting unity of Amy Israel which will lead to an ultimate victory and on behalf of all those whose health has been affected by the war uh remember that there are still that are dying to this very day and we need Rakame. Uh we're not quite we're not quite there yet. Uh Rafu Schma to Moshe Ben Rael, husband of Zakash and may he have a rafu Israel. Thank you for the support of Torah. May it be and aliyah. Uh tonight is the art site of the late husband of Sandy Guilford Ben Schlommo Zalman and Miriam. uh and uh once we hope that uh the learning of Torah should be an ely for his and as well uh the outside of Bat Mikel the mother of Dy Red. Once again we we hope and we pray that the Dora should be leat. [clears throat] Uh just as a little aside uh tonight is a very important night in for those of us who live in Erit Israel. We change over tonight from Vain Braha asking God for a general blessing to Vain Talumatar. This is a very very important change because if you don't do it you got to dab the again. Uh the strange thing is that insets the changeover is not the seventh of the changeover is parad interestingly a secular date either the night of December 4th or December 5th. It's astronomically based on when a rainy season would begin in Babylonia. That's why there's all shila. Why should the US follow Babylonia? Follow Iraq. But uh therefore one of the interesting sha says if you are a ben erel who's going to America and uh you're there before December 4th uh what do you do? So so the is pretty clear that if you would leave after Wednesday night after you already became in talumar you would continue it there. uh but if you left let's say today or left earlier than today so there's a how do you dive in in so the the compromise is you actually dive in the way they do in you say the same until you come back but in the omnibus blessing of or you could add all sorts of things you also say is so that that's what you would do uh if you are in America uh before December I'm sorry before Zion Keshvan until you come back uh before December December 4th you essentially incorporate both uh they tell the story you know um you know now I'm so self-conscious I mean I I always use the word yucky for a German Jew uh and many many people do that but I got a very very uh angry email saying that it's very offensive to German Jews. So I don't know what to do. Okay. Yaki Ashkenazi. Whatever the Can I say it in advance? Whatever is considered to be the polite lashon is what I want to use. But the one thing that is known about the Jews of German descent, maybe it's a caricature or a stereotype, is they're extremely punctual. Unlike the pilid or whatever it is in which time is relatively a liberal concept uh the German Jew is very very disciplined in terms of time. So the story goes that the evening of December I'm sorry yeah the evening of December 4th in he was going to Arvitz and he told his wife I'm going to be late tonight. I'm coming home late for supper tonight. And when she said why? He said, "Well, because we're changing from Vain Braha to Vain Tamil Mat, so that's two extra syllables, things will not be things will be a little late." So if any of you are yakkesh or any of you are Ashkanazi, so tonight uh you're going to go home a little later than usual. If you stay from my that is not everybody stays from my because the Arvid is going to be a little bit a little bit longer. So we now come to really the beginning of Jewish history. Until now, the emphasis of the Torah has been very universal. The creation of the world, uh the story of Noah, the reinvention of humanity, version 2.0, new and improved. But now, as it were, we're beginning to focus on the uniqueness of Ami Israel. And we begin uh with the saga of Ara who actually was already mentioned at the end of parat Noah. You know it's very very interesting if you just look at the things are very surprising. Uh we are told that a man called Terak. Terak is Abraham's father took Abraham and Sarai and Lot his again that was his grandson. It's Abraham's nephew and it was Terak that was traveling to go to the land of Cananan. It doesn't say Aram took Tak took Aram, but they stopped over at Karan in Mesopotamia and Terak decided to stay and that's when Hashem comes comes to Abram and says you shall leave your father's house and come to the land that I will show you. So it's interesting why was Tak going to the land of Cananan? Who told him? God didn't tell him to go. Now kazal say they left or cast him because of the story of the fiery furnace which I'll get to but that doesn't indicate why they would go to the land of can. So there are a lot of possibilities and the answer is the forum don't really give us a clear answer but I think there may be a real real profound muser thought here. I saw an article that somebody wrote and it was I I just I didn't read the article. I just saw the title uh and the title was very moving to me. It says Terak, [snorts] the man who almost was. It seems that on some level, maybe because Terra saw the miracle that happened to Ara, which I'll get to, Terak himself was inspired and Terak himself was attracted to the land of Kanan, Eric Israel, because even he had a sense that this is a holy land, a place of closeness to God. But what happened with as you might say ter settled he got to it which was convenient easier life you could get skippy peanut butter what whatever it would be Ben and Jerry's get that here too but but in the olden days would be harder to get [clears throat] and there is a hidden muser here that Terra himself [snorts] may have had a some some level of spiritual sensitivity But he was willing to forego it for convenience for ease and therefore he was the man who could have been the greatness was assumed by Abraabu but potentially Terak might have been a founder as well. Again it's only a speculation. We don't know for sure. But the one thing we do know for sure is that Terak [snorts] was the one who initially took the family to go to Israel and it wasn't about Pashem. It was an instinctive understanding. How do you get that instinct from afar? That I also don't know. But somehow was like a magnet. He knew this is the place to be. Now the actual reason though for the departure they left your costume. So we know there's a very very famous medish that everybody knows that or castim literally means the furnace or the furnace of the Babylonians of the Calaldians the castim and the story goes as you know that terosa was selling idols and one day he put Abraham in charge of the shop >> and what Abraham did was he destroyed all of the idols and he put axes and weapons [snorts] in the arms of the smashed idols. And when Terak came and said, "What happened to the merchandise here?" And Navam said, "Oh, the idols killed each other. They destroyed each other." And Terak says, "Don't make up stupid stories. Of course, the idols can't move and they can't do anything." So, Abraham said to So, how come you're selling it? How come you're promaggating belief in these idols? you yourself admit that they can do nothing. Okay. So, act two of the story is Nimrod who was not a good guy. In fact, I really really don't understand how can Nimrod be a name in in Israeli society. I I really, you know, even Yeshel, which there is of course a great Rabbi Yeshel. Yeshile is described as a person who did Shouba etc. So, you know, there are ways of getting him in. But Nimrod is a Russia from beginning to end. So, how can we use that name? I really don't know. But be it as it may, Nimrod wanted to execute, not execute, throw Ara into a fiery furnace uh to destroy him for repudiating Avodor. And Abraham had two other brothers and not [snorts] is a place. This is and it is said that Haran was also kind of given that challenge. Uh do you believe in idols or not? And Haron waited wanted to wait and see what would happen to Abraham. So Abraham gets thrown into the fiery furnace and Abraham is saved. So that makes Haran a believer and Haron says I believe in God too and he's thrown into the fiery furnace and Haron dies and that's why the says at the end of Noah Haron died in the lifetime of his father because Haron was also in the miracle of war and Haron was burnt. Harun was the father of Sorai became Sora uh and the father of Lot and Nar who is the other brother who for some reason was not involved in the orast incident uh was the father of Bouel who was the father of Rifka. So in effect all three brothers have a role in the founding of Khlo Israel. Now people sometimes look at Harun as not a righteous person because [clears throat] uh he didn't affirm his belief in God till he saw Aaran was saved. In point of fact Har is also a very righteous person. Haran died alkesh. The only thing is Haron did not deserve the supernatural miracle of being saved in the fire because he didn't have the unconditional amuna. Meaning it's not that Harun is bad. that harin is righteous and that is why indeed Sarai became part of Ami Israel etc. uh but nonetheless he was not z to right. So this is the very very famous story of war costume the furnace of custom and this was the immediate reason why decided to skip town and go to it can the interesting issue is that the Tyra itself makes no mention of this story except through indirectly the name or castim which means furnace. Why does the Torah not mention the story of war customitz [snorts] uh who was a very renowned uh teacher of Tanakh a very religious woman as well. Uh so her early career in her early years uh she spent a lot of time teaching in the army she would go to army bases she would write gilonut for soldiers etc. So she used to tell the story that some midrashim are so familiar to us that we literally feel they must be in the in other words our our memory of thesh is that the story is there and even though it's not there and the example she gave is the story of whereim is not in the kish it's not in the kish so she used to say there was this gruff old general who had been raised in a in a religious home but was totally not religious but in his older years was trying to go back to the kumsh the soldier said what are you saying of course it's in kumsh I remember it from the time I was you know 5 years old so she gives him a tan and she says find me the story of war custom and the general is turning and turning and turning and he knows Hebrew so it's not such a problem for him he's turning and turning and turning the pages and nothing is there so finally he says to her why do Do you give me ket? Why do you give me a brbridgements of the Torah? I want the whole Torah. Of course, the story is there. And yet, the story is not there. The story is well known from but it's not in the at all. Another example from a Gillatester. Everybody knows that because Vashi refused to go to Akash. Akash had Vashi executed. Everybody knows that. Well, look at McGiller. And the simple meaning of the verses was that Vashi was simply demoted from being queen to being put in the general harrow and the like. It's only the commentaries and that say she was actually executed and yet we're so familiar. So he was making the point that we have to be careful in [snorts] our own learning and in teaching our kids as well to kind of differentiate between the midrashim of kazal and what the puk actually says. Not that the midrashim are not true. We we believe them to be true but one has to understand that this is being superimposed on the language of the puss. So the question now becomes a very good question and that is why does the Torah not tell us the miraculous story of or constant right the Torah gives us many many miracles why doesn't it give us the story of this miracle as well so there's a beautiful answer from the moral of prague moral of prague says the following idea there is a famous Mishna in pureot that talks about ava love that is conditional love to yavar versus an unconditional love that does not depend on any external aspect and what does the Mishna say any love that is conditional on something so what's the problem when that particular thing disappears the love goes goes away [clears throat] is an unconditional love. No matter what happens, that love can never be destroyed. And it mentions an example. What is an example of tuyabor? This was the romantic infatuation that David's son Amnon had for his sister Tamar, her halfsister Tamar, if you remember, he actually raped her, etc. uh because he was so I mean we really wouldn't even call that love but it was just a lust and as soon as he satisfied his lust he hated her an example of [clears throat] is the love of David to his beloved friend Yonatan which is an unconditional love and closeness so here is what the baral says the Tyra wanted to communicate that God's 's choosing Abraham was in the nature of an unconditional love. In fact, you can simply ask a question. If I read the Kish and all of a sudden when Abraham is 75 years old, Hashem appears to him and says, "Go from your land and go from your family and go to the land that I will show you and I will make you a great nation and those who bless you will be blessed and those who curse you will be cursed and through you the the all the nations of the world are going to be blessed. Hashem promises these wonderful, wonderful things and enters into a relationship with him. We ask ourselves, why? Why did God choose to enter into a relationship with Ara? Now, of course, there are reasons. One of the reasons is our custom. Ara's faith in Hashem, his understanding that there's a creator, his desire. Of course, there are reasons, but says the Haram, the Tyra does not want to give you those reasons. Because if the Tyra would have given you those reasons explicitly, that would have meant Hashem's relationship to Ara and the Jewish people is a conditional love that depends on certain things happening. And why is that dangerous? Because what happens if in the course of [clears throat] time we don't live up to those standards? What happens if we're not serving Hashem in that way? The reason for the love goes away. [snorts] The love goes away. Hashem wanted to structure the covenantal relationship with Abraham in an unconditional way. And therefore, the Torah is saying, again, it's a little complicated. Certainly God had his reasons. We're not saying God chose Avam for no reason. God had his reasons, but he wanted to describe the relationship as not having any reason because that makes it to because you see if we would have had the story of war and then Hashem goes to Abraham, I would have said, "Oh, because Ara demonstrated his faith, that's why God chose him." So, what's going to happen when Jews don't demonstrate their faith? Maybe they're going to be cut off. And therefore, although our relationship with Hashem is not always going to be an easy relationship, there is reward, there is punishment, there is galut, there is, there are going to be tragedies, there's going to be accountability because God cares so much about us that he does have standards that we have to try to live up to. So, it's not going to be an easy relationship in that way. There are going to be ups and there going to be downs. And in our own time we've experienced much of that. But the relationship itself will never be abregated. The relationship will never be destroyed. No matter how bad we are as it were, God is stuck with us and we are stuck. Although that's a good thing, we are stuck with him. We can't get rid of that relationship. That's why even if a Jew converts to to any religion in the world, according to Jewish law, he he or she is a Jew. There is no such thing, right? Judaism is a one-way street. You can convert in. [clears throat] >> We do not recognize the possibility of converting out. Once you're a Jew, you're a Jew and that cannot be escaped. you know, um, in the Nvi, one of the Naveim, uh, in the 12, they call them minor prophets. That's an awful name. I mean, there's no such thing as a minor prophet. All prophets are important, but these are smaller books. So, the 12 Nive are together, Treyasar. So, the first of the Treyasar is the Na'vi Hosa, not Yahosua, Hosa is the Nvi. Uh and uh the beginning of Hosa is a very very strange story where God commands Hosa to marry a well-known prostitute whose name is Gomer and Hosa is a little surprised but if God says to marry the prostitute he marries her and she continues to conduct her trade even after she's married. uh and there is a big makus among the fortune. Did this actually happen or is this a prophetic dream? Meaning is so dreaming this story which is one interpretation. It's a dream vision or the other interpretation is he quite literally married this prostitute. And what's going on with this? So the gar gives us a backstory that illustrates what's going on. Hashem, this is before the destruction of the first basis. This is even before the exile of the 10 tribes. Hosa is a ni of the northern kingdom. Hashem comes to Hosa and says your nation has sinned. Go and give them muser. Go and give them to. And Hosa says back to God, "Listen, God, been there, done that. You know, we've given them, we've given them chastisement. Why don't you just exchange them for a more obedient nation? Forget about this Jewish people. Find somebody else." Unlike Mosher Rabenu, when Hashem says, "I want to destroy YI Israel." So Mosher Rabenu's answer is, "If you're not going to include them, erase me." Hosea says, "Get somebody else. So, Hashem wants Hosa to understand either in actual behavior or at least mentally through a dream that when you love someone, it's not so easy to let go of them, no matter how bad their behavior might be. He marries a prostitute. She continues to be unfaithful. Hashem says to Hosa, "Get rid of her. Divorce her. How can you stay married to a wife who is totally unfaithful to her commitments to you?" And Hosa says to Hashem, "It's kind of hard. I'm very attached to her." So God says, "Now you understand the problem. Now you understand what I'm going through. You know, you're just telling me get rid of her. Get rid of Israel. Who needs him? Not so easy. Hosa, when there's love, you can't just say, "I'll get somebody else." And that's why the nua, the whole story of the prostitute ends with the famous verses that men recite every day when they put on. Hashem says about the Jewish people, I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me with righteousness and with loving kindness and mercy. I will betro you to me with faithfulness and you will have an intimate knowledge of connection with God. So that's what the moral says. Hashem didn't want to give us the reasons for why Ara was chosen because Hashem wanted to structure this as an unconditional love which is called Ava because had it been structured as because of this therefore this then possibly that could have led to the understanding that when we don't live up to the standards that's the end of the relationship. Now as you know this is obviously a major major issue within Christianity supersessionism. Uh in other words the traditional Christian and certainly Catholic belief had been that because the Jews were so sinful God replaced the Jews by choosing others to be the new Israel. meaning one of the old designations of the Catholic Church was they were the new Israel. That's why it's called the New Testament and all of those things. Uh and that's called supersessionism meaning super seeding the covenant that God made with us. Uh officially the church backed away from that. Uh but many many Christians do believe it. I'm not faulting them for for what they believe. uh but certainly uh it is our understanding based on the words of Hosa based on based on a number of uh passages in the Nim that that's not going to happen. Yes, there will be punishments. Yes, there will be galut. Yes, there will be but that is not the same as severing the relationship. The relationship itself is eternal. Uh and as Hashem says, even if heaven and earth cease to exist, so to speak, Hashem's love for the Jewish people will never ever cease. So the moral goes back to moral. That is why the miracle of warim is not mentioned in the hum because Hashem did not want to predicate the relationship with conditionality and even causation. It wanted to kind of say, "Yeah, no reason. Of course there is a reason but but by virtue of the relationship it's as if there's no reason whatsoever and therefore it's and therefore even if it's but whatever is nullified is not going to be matel uh the love the love itself. Now as we proceed in the para again there is so much these parios are so so uh rich with so many different themes and uh this is even even without even delving into midrash I'm just reading the uh there are so many things to uh to talk about um for me I have to say that during the um weeks of braitz um in a way I you know I'm always a little worried because my email goes up everybody has of the ksh everybody has answers on the ksh and you know my email goes up and I need to keep it down my blood pressure I need to keep it down uh when I can so I I always look forward to vayikra where I get much fewer questions on leprosy and and and the like butas everybody has questions and everybody has answers as well but the concept of brit the concept of covenant appears in two different stories in parasa The first is called the brit benapsarim the covenant of the parts [snorts] and the second which is much later is the brisma ma the covenant of circumcision. Okay. Now both are are denominated with the term bris a covenantal relationship. Uh the brisbs which occurred shortly after a entered arisel. In fact, let me point out, we don't have time or I don't have time tonight to go into a detailed chronology, but but it is important that Rashi and Ramban understand that although in paras in the beginning it is said that Aram entered Erat Israel at the age of 75 but Rashi and Ramban actually says that Ara had an earlier trip to Eric Israel at the age of 70 and the story of the covenant of the parts actually occurred when Ara was 70 years old. In other words, the Torah is not in chronological order. 5 years before his second trip, which is again the actual proofs for that, well, well, I'll tell you what the proof is because in the book of Schmos, it is said that the Jews were redeemed from Egypt 430 years. Now the they were only in Egypt 210 years not 430 and Rashi explains it was 430 years from the covenant of the parts when God first informed Abraham there would be an Egyptian servitude. Now we know that from the birth of Yitzk it was 400 years right from the birth of Yitzkar till the exodus is 400 years and Yitzk alam was 100 years old when Yitzk was born. So if the brisbs occurred 430 years before it was 30 years before was born which means Ara was 70. Ah parat says Ara came to Israel at the age of 75. answer. There was a prior trip. But be it as it may, in the Brisbane where different animals are cut up because the way they used to make covenants was the parties would walk between two halves of animals kind of joined them together. So Ara and the divine presence went through the animals. Hashem gave Ara very ominous prophecy. Yo, you shall know ye your children shall be strangers lim and a land that is not theirs and they shall be slaves to that people the enu and that people will afflict them for a total of 400 100 years. And then it says, but the nation that they are working for, the nation that is enslaving them, I will judge, I will punish and afterwards they shall leave. God with great wealth. This is exactly the story of the Exodus in encapsulation. They will be strangers. They will be slaves. They will be persecuted 400 years. I'll get to that in a moment. But God will judge the nation that enslaves them and they will leave with the great wealth of the gold and the silver that they left. So Avam is told the story of the Exodus and it's a very dramatic scene. It's dark and the vultures are coming down to to to consume those animals etc. The vultures have I don't want to turn anybody off. Vultures have a sixth sense of when something is dead. I mean it's it's recorded that um sometimes during the Holocaust when the Nazism would kill a bunch of people. So sometimes someone would be alive and they would just have to pretend to be dead. They would lie in a park. Even now with with the with kamas with terrorists there were there were such stories like that. So they would recount the strangest thing that the vultures would come down to the dead but the vultures would not uh never go to somebody that's alive whatever whatever it will be. So the vultures are attacking. it gets dark and Ara has a great great fear and Hashem gives them this message. So there's a lot to talk about the Brisbane and I'm going to save a lot of it when we get to Schmos. But I just want to mention very quickly a very very famous question that the Rambam asks in Hila Chuva. The Rambam asks the question that we know that free will is an essential principle in Judaism because without free will a reward or punishment system makes no sense. How can you punish a person if they were pre-programmed to do evil? And why should you reward a person if they were pre-programmed to do good? Reward and punishment make sense only when there's autonomy, when there's choice, when there's responsibility, and then one can be responsible for the choices that they make. Right? This is why is such a fundamental idea in Judaism. We don't believe that Hashem makes you righteous and we don't believe that Hashem makes you evil. Every human being has choice. Okay, it's a complicated idea actually. Maybe again other times we'll develop it a bit more. But the Rambam asks the question. But how do you understand this? God decreed God decreed that the Jewish people must be slaves in a land that is not theirs. If God decreed that this is what's going to happen, then the Egyptians were kind of forced to do what they were doing because God decreed that the Jews would be enslaved. So, how could the Egyptians be punished for what they did? Because it was God's decree, didn't that override free will? So the Rambam's answer which is not a simple answer is the Rambam's answer is even though God decreed a certain outcome that the Jewish people would be enslaved. He did not decree that the Egyptians would be the enslavers. You'll notice that in the Brisbane it does not say Mim. It says Eros. There was not a neither Pyro nor any individual Egyptian was compelled to do this evil act. They had unfettered free will. Now, it's true that because God decreed servitude, if the Egyptians didn't do it, somebody else would. And what would God do if he's running out of nations? I don't know. But but God does not make the evildoer. So again this is a general rule for everything because on one hand let's say the Holocaust or October 7th I mean on one level it wouldn't have happened unless God for whatever reason I don't know the reason and we don't know the reason God whatever reason determined that it would happen. So the every bad guy should say hey I had to do what I was doing it was obviously God's will. If it wasn't God's will it wouldn't have been successful. The answer is well no. God didn't make you do it. >> God didn't make you do the evil thing. Uh it was your decision, your autonomy and therefore even if God decreed an outcome in general the perpetrators of evil are going to be accountable. Now, Lamisa Ramban Nakmanes has a problem with this explanation because he says even if we accept that the Egyptians, the Nazis, Hamas had free [clears throat] will. But if Lammy said they were carrying out the outcome that God wanted, then how could they be condemned? Meaning the Rambam is only addressing where's the free will and his answer is they had free will. God was not making them act that way. Ramban is asking another question. Yeah, they have free will, but they're carrying out the outcome that God decreed. So, how could they be condemned? So, the Ramban gives two answers to that one. My manages does not ask that question. Answer number one is intention plays an enormous part. Yeah, God decreed a certain outcome. But is that why Pyro did it? Is that why Hitler did it? Is that why Nazis did it? kamas or whatever obviously they were not doing it because it was God's decree and therefore they are accountable because of their intention. The other answer Ramban gives is quite surprising and that is yes God decreed servitude but they did more than God decreed meaning let's say God you know servitude can be a lot of different ways there's m mild aut and there's severe out you know I I tell people if you feel like committing a crime and go to jail uh the best place to do it is in Scandinavia because I saw a little video about prison life in Norway. I I mean Norway is unfortunately not the submitted country, but it's a good place to go to jail. Uh because uh the way the prison system is in Norway is you get to get a job, you get to leave, you get to have a car, uh and you can be out on the street from 9:00 to 5:00. You just got to be sure to report back to the dormatory by 5. Uh you know, pretty good. You know, it sounds pretty good. Um so, [snorts] uh that's a prison sentence, right? There's a prison in Turkey and there's prison in Norway. Both are prisons. So adut can be severe or light. So Ramban says God decreed there'd be an avdut but the Egyptians did it much worse >> than it had to be. Now I I have a problem with that too because number one, how how were they supposed to know how bad it was supposed to be? You know, God says afterwards it was too much. The second issue is a theological issue. How can they do more than God decreed? If God decreed that the object would be at level five, how could they have done a level 10? These are very deep, complicated questions. I'm throwing them out for you to think about and and discuss. I'm not going to address them fully. uh but for our purposes uh the Rambam does use the britbsarim to develop important ideas regarding free will and accountability even though the negative consequences are decreed by Hashem. Okay. Now the second covenant is much later and this is when Abraham is the age of 99. You already had Ishmael and Hashem is saying Ishmael will not be the bearer of the covenant. You will have a child yet from your wife Sara. And Ara is given the commandment at the age of 99. uh and when he is given the commandment of Brit, the covenant of circumcision, that is the point at which Hashem changes the name of both Aram to become Araham and Sarai who now becomes Sah. So what's called the Shinoi Hashem The change of name comes into being only with the commandment of circumcision and the question is what exactly is going to be the connection. Now let me start with another question. There is a rabbitic tradition that Arau even though he lived way before the Torah was given and he was not obligated to keep in terms of if we were to ask what commandments was Araminu obligated to keep the answer he was obligated to keep the seven commandments of Noah like every gentile and when he was given the commandment of circumcision he had to keep the commandment of circumcision avo didn't have to wear fillin didn't have to keep shabas didn't have to keep kosher or meat and milk right so didn't have these mitzvah and we could we could even say he didn't even know about these mitzvah they didn't exist yet and yet there's an old rabbitic tradition that is actually in the Mishna that Abrau kept the whole Torah even before it was given He didn't have to do so. But his understanding of God was so deep that he saw in the structure of the universe, the necessity for all of these commandments. Right? This is a Mishna and Kaducian. Arainu kept the whole Torah before it was given. It wasn't mandatory. It was not mandatory. But this is what he did. So the question that is asked is if Arau number one knew the Torah before it was given and number two he kept the Torah before it was given. Why did he not circumcise himself until Hashem commanded him? He kept Shabas without a command. He warted fillin without a command. Why didn't he do Brit until he was commanded? Isn't that a contradiction to the notion that Abraham kept the whole Torah before it was given? So this is a kasha that is asked by the very very famous commentator on Rashi, the greatest of the commentators on Rashi, Rabbel Leo Misrai, who was a Turkish rabbi of the 1500s and he wrote an exhaustive and extensive commentary on Rashi. And he asks a question why didn't Arainu do a brisma before the commandments based on the aos kept the Torah before it was given. So reom gives a fascinating answer and that is there is another cloud in the garra that when you do a mitzvah that you're commanded to do it is a greater significance than doing a mitzvah you're not commanded to do because once you're commanded it's a higher level. So with every other mitzvah, Ara could do a mitzvah before he was commanded and if he gets commanded later, he'll do it later. Brit, you only have one chance to do it. So if Ara would have done it without a commandment, he would never be able to do the mitzvah as a commanded person. So he waited until the command. That is what Rebel Yo Misrai says. The Maharasha, the great great Polish commentator on Talmud that is every after every track date we have the comments of Mahar Alzar Adles gives a different answer. He says the question doesn't begin. The rule that Abrau kept the whole Torah before it was given was only after he had brit. Brit put him in a different place. In other words, you can't ask the kasha why didn't he do the mitzvah of brit before he was commanded? Because he kept the whole Torah before it was given. No, until he did brit, he didn't. The statement of that he kept the whole Torah before it was given was a consequence of Brit. So it turns out that Brit had two immediate effects in Abraham's life. It created the change of name and it gave him an insight into spirituality that enabled him number one to know the Torah. When I say Torah, I mean the mitzvah. I'm not referring to the narratives and to keep those mitzvah. So what exactly is the shas? What exactly is the connection? How does the Brit elevate a person to that particular level? So we know the following. Um there's a famous thought that is uh it's a gammoros but it's said at every not not necessarily at every but every in every week of it will be said at least once that's for sure. And this is the famous Gamorrah that looks at the name ish and Isa. Ish ish is the name for man and isha is the name for woman. And they share two common letters alfin which is the man has a y and the woman has a he yud and he is God's name. We pronounce it. So it says when God is in their marriage, men are men, women are women, everybody's doing the proper thing. You take God out of your marriage, you're left with an allconsuming egotistical fire of of destruction. Right? So when Hashem is in the marriage, men are men, women are women, shalom, each one is doing their function. Each one is living the meaning and the toughkit of their lives without God in their marriage. They will destroy themselves and each other by the fire of makus. Okay. Famous famous famous gumar. And as I say um virtually anyone that has a week of is going to hear this gumar probably more than once. But the maral takes the gammorra a little further. Why is it that the man gets the yud of God's name and the woman gets the he? Yeah, yud and he are God's name, but why does the man get the yud and the woman get the hay? So he tells us that there's a Gmorrah in Mess that said that Hashem created Habah through the spiritual power of the letter Y and Hashem created Haz through the spiritual power of the letter H. And that's the meaning of the verse that we recite every day in davening through sim God created the worlds. You see the yud created the he created. Why is the letter yud? Because olaba is a spiritual existence. There is no physicality in olaba. And yud is the least physical of any letter because it has the smallest amount of ink. So yud represents pure spirituality. Pure spirituality is olam haba. What is he? So moral says hey can be understood as a composite letter dalit right visualize hey dalit and the left hand leg of the hey could be seen as a yud dal. Now again I know the way we write a hey it looks more like a v but if you actually look at a safer tora look at a hey in a safer tora it looks like a dalled with a with a yud. Now if y represents pure spirituality, dalid represents pure materialism, you have the four directions and you also have the four dimensions [clears throat] of matter. You have length, width, height and time because time is matter exists within a framework of spaceime. Right? Einstein didn't was not the first one who invented that idea. So yud is because it's pure hey is bringing the yud into the dal in other words sanctifying physicality by bringing godliness into gashmas bringing godliness into materialism right you understand that and that's Ola maz is hey because what is our tapid what is our purpose in maz to bring godliness to the physical so says the marel women again this is a generalization it's always j dangerous to generalize I understand but these are general tendencies women are naturally better at this integration than men often get corrupted by their encounter with omaz. It brings out the testosterone, the egotism, the competition. And therefore, the same way a person with emphyma needs to be in pure oxygen, men need to retreat into environments that are more spiritual and devoid of confrontation with haz at least for short terms. So a man got to go to schol and be part of a minion. Man has to go to yeshiva go to base medish because when you're involved in that world it drags you down. And that's why the man is the yud because the man needs the pure oxygen just like the emphyma patient needs the pure oxygen. The woman has a gift that she has a superior capacity. Hey to integrate spirituality into the physical realm, running a home, raising children. And in many many ways, the moral says when the Torah describes a wife as aero to be the helpmate to her husband, it actually means to be the teacher to her husband. >> [clears throat] >> to teach the husband that holiness is generated not only by separating from the world. Holiness can be generated by active involvement in the physical details of raising children, setting up a home, whatever is involved in that because that's not the man's instinct. It actually goes back to the notion. You know, it's interesting that there is a gamarra that some people say is very porative, very negative to women, but it actually may be very may be highly complimentary. Gomorrah that talks about nashimot that means women are lightaded. They're flighty. They go from thing to thing to thing to thing. Normally that's taken and again I understand this a generalization and I I I know that there are many exceptions in everything. Uh feminine and masculine characteristics are mixed in different measures. I I get that not I don't mean to create stereotypes. Got to got to say that um but but the thing is that it looks like an insult. Women are flighty but actually not. What it's saying is women have a superior capacity for multitasking. They can go from here to there to there to there to there because that's the nature nothing else of being a mother. You go from thing to thing to thing as opposed to men who get very very fixated. So whether a man is learning Gomorrah or a man is watching a football game, you're going to get the same type of thing, there is this intensity. Don't disturb me. I'm doing my thing. Woman multitasks do right. Uh in fact, uh there was a a very famous social psychologist uh Carol Gilligan who died a few years ago. She was a professor at Harvard University and uh she wrote a number of books, pioneering books on gender differences. uh a different voice was her I think her first book or maybe her most famous book and she talked about a test that was administered to kids at a young age like between five and six uh boys and girls and she wanted to show that even at a very early ages because remember feminism was making the claim that any differences between men and women are just social constructs they're not innate and she was trying to demonstrate that indeed men and women do view the world in different ways And uh her test was let's say you have a child who is um very very sick. Child might die and the child needs medicine and the medicine is only available in one pharmacy and the pharmacy is locked for the night. What do you do? Your child might die. So every single boy says well for sure you take a rock, you break the window and you take the medicine. Now that is a good answer actually because you know every girl said well you got to be sure to leave a note and a phone number where you could be reached. In other words this is an example of multitasking in the sense that the man the boy identified the most important issue saving the child which of course it is and that is the only thing you focus on. you only focus on one thing. The woman was able to juggle the different types of considerations and relationships that have to be made. That's why even in the legal profession, uh, women tend to be better mediators. Again, I realize I'm generalizing. I hope you won't hold that against me. Uh, but it is true that women tend to be because men confrontational. There's either a winner or a loser. So I'm not going to be the loser, I got to be the winner. So I'm going to destroy you. Right? So for men, litigation is the model. Women understand there are different aspects that have to be taken into account. So that is why uh they're often superior in mediation uh and consiliation. Okay. So with this we understand in insight. The man gets the hay. I'm sorry. The man gets the yud because the man needs pure spirituality. The woman gets the hay because [snorts] hay is the ability to integrate spirituality into physicality. Now we know that Brit elevated Ara himself to a new level. Now notes the medish actually says this Sarai had a yud and a didn't have a hey. So what actually happened? Hashem took the yud of Sarai and divided it into two. So Sarah got half of it and Abraham got half of it. Abraham got the hay. He got the hay from Sarai. Now the points out why is the covenant that Hashem makes with us specifically on an organ of the human body that you might say is almost the least spiritual whether it's elimination or whether it's sexual drive whatever it would be it's something we share in common with animals it's not a spiritual part of the human being and The says because God is teaching us through Brit that every single Jew has the capacity to sanctify and elevate the physical. Brit is about sanctifying even the animalistic. We share eating and drinking with animals. But if we eat in order to serve God and to praise Hashem and to give thanks to Hashem and to honor the Shabbat, then the animalistic activity of eating and drinking becomes spiritual. Sexual intercourse, reproduction, all animals do it. [clears throat] But we do it to create families and create holiness in our families. It becomes holy. So what is the lesson of Britmah? Sanctify the animalistic and material. What is the significance of hay? Exactly the same thing. Bring the yud into your dalot. So now we understand why with Brit Ara acquires the he because essentially he gets from Sarai that ability to integrate the material the the spiritual into the material and now we understand the Marsha's comment why only after Brit was he able to keep the whole Torah because what is Torah? Torah is about taking the physical world and elevating it. But until he had Brit, Ara didn't have that capacity either. You see? So that is why Judaism is fundamentally different than at least some aspects of Christianity because Christianity looks at the physical world as something evil, something decrepit. And in order to achieve holiness, you need to disengage from the physical world. That's why celibacy, which hasn't worked that well for them, but whatever it is that celibacy is an ideal. Poverty is an ideal because the the more you get away from the physical and material world, the closer you are to God. Judaism starts with maybe an opposite premise. The very first mitzvah is to have children to engage and there is no mitzvah to be poor when is tell us the other way around that making a living and having a beautiful home are ways that one can connect to Hashem by being more serene and calm. Judaism is not about escaping the physical world. Judaism is about elevating and sanctifying the physical world. Men might need the yud occasionally to get away because of the testosterone, but the ultimate goal is the hay. The hay is the ability to integrate spirituality with materialism. And that was the gift that Abramavinu got from the Brit Ma. So, may all of us be able as we go through our lives, we earn money, we go to work. Hopefully, all of those who are not yet married should should get married and have children. Those who are married uh should have children and those who have children should be za to raise them in a good way and to understand that all of the physical things that we do that in some level we even share in common with animals can be elevated to holy activities sacred activities and that is the the says that is the lesson of so wish you all a good week and good shabas and You [music] my [music] birthday [music and singing] tomorrow [music]