Rav Yitzchak Breitowitz: The Secret of SHMAH YISRAEL שְׁמַע יִשְׂרָאֵל

You [music] see your [music] tomorrow. [singing] [music] [music and singing] [singing] Okay. Hi everybody. Thank you for coming and I hope uh your tinus went well today. I'll talk a little bit about that. Again, as always, the shar is dedicated for filot for the lasting unity of amra which will lead to victory and for all of those whose health has been affected by terror. A generous donation has been placed in memory of Jenny Fogle by Rifa Shami with the following messages. Uh with sincere condolences on Jenny's passing rifal note. Uh Jenny Fogle was a young woman, a mother of two children who's and I knew I knew Jenny from the time that she was a little girl and her mother Ellen Tannenburgg uh was a very beloved is a very beloved member of my old show in Silver Spring. And uh Jenny died of cancer. She suffered from cancer for a number of years, leaving behind uh two teenage daughters. And uh once again she handled her illness with great courage and with great amuna great faith in Akadesh Baru. Her amuna never faltered. She accepted all of the difficulties Hashem put into her life uh in a good good spirit. So uh may her memory be be a blessing and thank you Rif and Riff Shami too. Thank you Rifka for for your very kind donation. Also uh the Gushner's parents and grandmother Regina Leven are dedicating tonight's learning. Lehmas bin Yammen is Schlomi and the fifth anniversary of his bar mitzvah. Uh those who have been attending this year for a while certainly remember again that Binyam [clears throat] Israel was a young man who also struggled with illness for a number of years. Tragically he was nifter. The goners are very much beloved part of our our group here and all the people that know them and care about them and uh again it's a bittersweet that this is the fifth anniversary of his bar mitzvah uh but I know that uh he's in Ghanaeden in a place without suffering without pain and I hope that that brings some uh to his parents >> another dedication in the honor of Iban by Wendy Zoldi with the following message. Thank you for your wonderful inspiring shoreim. I just read what's in front of me but thank you. I appreciate the and uh the final few days of the financial year is here are here plural days. Okay. And I has the goal to raise resources for the coming year. Uh please help us reach the finishing line. And you can partner with Ibon to continue so many people through the programs, social events and Torah classes. Special dedications are available in honor and memory of loved ones and more information about how to contribute [clears throat] can be found on the Ibonet website and in the YouTube description box box below. Um I was debating exactly what I wanted to talk about uh uh tonight since we're we're coming right after but since I know that at least one person was at my at the OU this morning so I'm not able to just repeat everything that I said. So it's your it's your fault so to [laughter] speak. Uh sorry. Okay. Other people as well. Uh so I apologize but I just want to mention one little thought from what I said this morning and then I'll I'll talk about a different subject. Uh and that is Sofur writes that is a yumhadin a day of judgment just like rashashana. On rashashana god decides who will live and who will die. And you know the final sign ceiling is yum kipper. Hashem decides [snorts] if the ba mikdash is going to be rebuilt this year or not. It is literally a day of judgment. So we're not just commemorating a tragedy of the past. We are beseeching and praying on this day that the basikash would be rebuilt. If we were Zoha and we don't know yet if we were za then God willing the ba mikdash will be rebuilt this year maybe even tomorrow. So the question that one might raise is so what's the point tomorrow even tonight we're going to be praying for the building of the BA mikes. Now you might ask a very simple question. What's the point of praying? If the omadin was today, so if we got it, we got it. And if we didn't get it, we didn't get it. What's the point of after the tent of takes for the building of the beta mikdash? But the answer is is relatively simple because you could ask you can ask the same question about after rashan and yum kipper. Why do we continue to dive in for life, for health, for prosperity if a final decision was already made at least by yum kipper and even if you extend the deadline to hosana rabba or even kaneka okay but after I believe kaneka is the last deadline and nobody we keep on trying to give you more and more time but kaneka is the outer limit so at this point what's the point of dab for life and the short answer is because the principle Let's feel it stuck up. Repentance and prayer and charity rip up an evil decree means even if God decreed a certain situation, it is always changeable by repentance. The only thing is it's easier to try to get a favorable judgment than it is to get an unfavorable judgment changed. So that's why we front end all of our prayers and the like to get a favorable judgment. But one should understand that even if god forbid there is an unfavorable judgment sincere chuva can always change everything. So as a result even if god forbid we were not successful uh in the in the yomaden of we can still continue to pray do chuva and hopefully that itself will override uh whatever evil decree there was and we should be z to the ba mikdash. So as I say even though is a short fast it's the shortest fast of the year relative to winter and uh it's a relatively lenient fast if somebody was not feeling well or or whatever but there's some very very significant importance beyond the historical event that it commemorates it is considered to be the yin for now the thing I do want to talk about a little bit [snorts] and it straddles last week's para and this week's para So I wouldn't say it's mu to this week's para in particular but it straddles it is some very very interesting references to Yakov and the recitation of keshma and it keeps on popping up in different discrete contexts and there's some interesting connections that are made in that way. Uh first remember that last week when Jacob is first informed what is he told Yseph is still living [clears throat] and not only not only is Yoseph living but he is the ruler over Egypt. So the puss says loheim. Yakov didn't believe it until he saw wagons that Yoseph had sent to bring the bring their their their prop their their their properties back to Mit. Now the has a very very nice thought that's quite relevant even today. They told Yakov two things. Yoseph is still alive and Yoseph is the ruler of Mitim. So says the Yakov could believe either one of those statements, but he couldn't believe both statements. [clears throat] When it says Yoseph is still alive, that's not just a physical statement. That means he's still Yoseph. He's still righteous. He's still holy. That all the years in Mitzim has not changed him. Yoseph is still alive. And the second statement is he's a ruler in Egypt. Now Yakov would say, if you would tell me Yoseph is not from anymore, but he's a ruler in Egypt, I'll believe that. Or if you tell me Yoseph is religious and righteous, but he's not involved in politics, I believe that. But I can't believe the possibility that he remains righteous and dedicated to God. And at the same time he has the nis of being the highest ranked officer in Egypt. Now there made the point as we mentioned a number of times in other contexts that affluence wealth and power can actually be more injurious to spiritual welfare than persecution. Labbi used to say it is easier it was easier to be from in Siberia than suburbia. He knew both experiences to some degree. And it's very very true that of course we don't want persecution. We want Jews to be free. But freedom and especially affluence and especially political power are actually grave dangers for a religious personality. They generate arrogance. They generate hubris overconfidence. A sense that we are in control of our destiny when we're really not. And therefore says what Yakov couldn't initially accept was he could still be Yoseadic and he could also be the ruler in the land of Egypt. Okay? And Hashem tells Yakov don't be afraid to go to Mitraim even though that's the beginning of the slavery. Yoseph will put his hands on your eyes. Yosephis yo al now this is a bit of an odd phraseology I mean you know it doesn't say he'll hug you he'll kiss you it says he will put his hands over your eyes so the zor has a very remarkable comment on that the zoar says right what what mitzvah do we put our hands over our eyes when we recite the schma The Zo says the reference to Yoseph putting his hands over your eyes is a reference to keshma. The question is what exactly is the reference when we say schma you know we don't have somebody else put their hands over my eyes I do it on my own eyes. So the mafaram explained the zor in this way. Let's look at the first PK of Schma. A very important PK. A PK that we recite at least two times a day, maybe up to four times a day and maybe more than that. Is Hashem. Now we know Hashem which is the is God's attribute of mercy. Elohim which is Elohim Shalanu Eloim is God's attribute of justice. So the PK is saying Hashem Eloh the new is going on both in our world. We see dichotoies. We see contradictions. We see the god of mercy and we see the god of punishment, justice and retribution. And although it's one god, it looks like there are two different forces in the world. Just as Zoraststerism said, the god of light and the god of darkness. So what am I affirming every day? Hashem elo from my limited perspective. I see a midatim and aiden [clears throat] in reality. Hashem is ultimately the rahim and the den at a higher level are united and all of them are ultimately manifestations of God's mercy. Den is also rahim but it is hidden rakim. Now again not I mean not that I can tell you a particular explanation you know how was the holocaust an expression of rakim how was October 7 an expression of rahman I don't know I don't know and a member of my sh was a holocaust survivor who was just nif a few years ago very men used to say when I go up to sham he says I'm looking forward he said he actually said he was looking forward to dying he was you know old and he said because I got a lot of questions I want to ask upstairs and you know he's buried in Harum Zum here. uh so I I can't even give you specific answers to this but in a deep deep level that we really cannot fathom in this world even the din of is ultimately ra and that's in itself hashem elo from our perspective there's an elohim hashem it's ultimately a unity of and uh it's only a single one and that's the meaning of when Mashiach comes God will be one and his name will be one and the bra asks what do you mean God will be one is God not one now [clears throat] the answer is yeah well God is one but we perceive two contradictory manifestations the lavau we will understand how everything fit in now in that sense This is exemplified in the story of Yoseph and Yakov himself. Yoseph was separated from Yakov for 22 years. And 22 years, did Yakov think he was dead? Did Yakov know he was not dead? What exactly was going on? The commentaries have different opinions on it. But for those 22 years, Yakov was not in communion with God because of his sadness because of his broken heart. The Shina was not even with him, which kind of superimposed a tremendous pain on top of the pain of losing his son. And now after 22 years, it all comes together. He understands why is Yoseph here? Yoseph is there to take care of Kali Israel as they enter Mitzim. Yoseph is there as we talked about last week to teach us the survival skills of navigating gullet. So Yoseph himself is now an instrument for good. As Yoseph tells his brothers, "You thought to do bad to me, but turned it into something good." That's the message of Schma. So therefore, the Torah is expressing it metaphorically. Yoseph will put his hands over your eyes. The reason we cover our eyes by creeshma is because it's another way of expressing the idea that what we think we see we really don't see. We are really blind. Right? We see dichotomy. We see contradiction. We see cruelty in the world when in reality it all emanates from a higher source of raim. And therefore we cover our eyes as if to say I don't really know what's going on. I don't really understand reality. Reality is much deeper than I can perceive. And that's what Hashem says. Yose will cover your eyes. Yoseph will show you that what you thought for those 22 years was not emiser than that. So that's the first reference to keshma. The zoir's idea that Yoseph will put his hands over your eyes. Meaning this will internalize the lesson of creishes. Now according to that that is not referring to any type of recitation that is not saying Jacob will say whatever it will be that's just saying the lesson of keshma will be communicated in the meaning the meeting rather of yose and but then we have a medish that actually talks about kashima mameish. It says that when Yoseph and Yakov hugged, they met after 22 years. Can you imagine the joy? Says Yakov stopped to read the Schma. [clears throat] Of course, this presupposes he had a text. I mean, the Torah wasn't given yet, but but he had a text. So, what's the you see your beloved son that you thought was dead for 22 years, now you see him. So, you got to say schma. So uh there are different ways of understanding it. If you have a if you're a litak, if you have a litera temperament, you said, "Yeah, that's exactly right. You don't allow yourself to be controlled by your emotions and by your feelings. You do what you have to do." Okay, that's kind of the ethic of obedience. But the moral moral was not a moral lived before the bal. But the moral is actually an honorary because the moral is the great great great grandfather of the balatan of the alterb. So the morale kind of is u grandfathered in so to speak as a as aid and the moral gives a different explanation which is a very powerful one. He says it is the derek of sadikim. It is the derek of righteous people when they feel powerful positive emotion and joy they want to turn it towards God. So you see this is almost the opposite of the litvak approach. The litvak approach is talking about suppression. Oh yes, Yako felt such love but he forced himself to turn away. Right? That's the litfish notion is don't allow your emotions to carry you carry yourself away to do your duty. Which again is also I'm not denying that truth. But the moral is saying a bit of a deeper thought. Yakov was not denying his emotions. his joy, his gratitude, his appreciation. But he said that which I feel towards you, I want to give to God as a gift. So he read Schma because he this may have been the best Shma he ever said in his life. Even Yakov, he turned his his love and his gratitude as a song of praise to Akadesh. And that's why Jacobina readeshma if I have happiness in my life I want to turn it to hashem as a praise tokes. The truth is they have a story about the which is somewhat similar but it's a little different at the same time. They say that one of his sons died as an adult who had been a great potentially could have been a very very great rabbi. He died. The was heartbroken obviously. But at the said, Hashem says in the Schma, you shall love God with all of your heart. So the said, although I tried to do that mitzvah, I could never do the mitzvah 100%. Because part of my heart was loving my son. And he said, "Now that I no longer have my son, I want to give all the love in my heart that I gave to my son. I want to give that to God." So that's also it's kind of the opposite. It's taking the love that no longer has an object to receive it in an earthly sense. Yeah. I'm going to give that love to. So that's the second ref. Right. Right. So again, just counting the references here. So reference number one is the zor Yoseph will put his hands over your eyes is the secret of keshma. Reference number two is Yakov reading Schma when he meets Yoseph. Reference number three is after the 17 years. Remember the Pik says Yakov lived in Mitraim 17 years. 17 years. Um it's a little strange in some ways because it is said that these were the happiest years of Yakov's life. Yakov had a very very difficult life. All of the issues with Asov and then all of the issues with Lavan and after Lavan he comes back to Eric Israel. All of the issues with losing Yoseph and then being afraid he's going to lose Binyamin. In fact, even parro points out okay is not a youngster when he comes to Mitraim. Yakob is 130 years old when he comes to Mid. It's a little strange. How long did regular people live then? But Pyro says, "You look so old. You look so old." Meaning only 130. You shouldn't You shouldn't look as old as you look. [laughter] That's what it says. And Yakov says, "My life has been difficult and hard." And indeed the medish actually criticizes Yakov a little bit for some of the complaining whatever but nevertheless Yakov's life was enormously difficult. We don't appreciate it more so than Abraham more so than the struggles that Yakov went through. But the last 17 years he finally got the whole family was together. Remember there was no slavery until the last brother died. So there was no slavery. Then they were in Gan. Uh by the way, some say Gan was legally our land because it says that Pyro gave Sara all the way back in Ham's time. Pyro gave Sor Matanote different gifts. Some Midrashim say he gave her Goshan. So Gan was legally our territory within Mitam. Some even posit that Gan might be within the boundaries of Erit. You have to look at a map and you have to figure this out. But some actually situate gan to be a so uh which would be good because what what bothers me otherwise is isn't it a little inongruous that the best years of Jacob's life are the years that he's in mitim and not in Israel. I mean how could that be? I mean obviously not being in Erit Israel is a spiritual [clears throat] how could that be the best years the best of the years but if you learn that goofa go itself can be situated within the boundaries of Eric Israel so then Yakob passes cake and eats it too he's in Eric Israel but he's living a life of peace and tranquility under the protection of pyro in other words Asab is no longer around to herang him uh or or the like. Now Jacob lived 17 years, but now he's on his deathbed and Yoseph comes to visit him and uh Yakov makes Yoseph swear that he will take his body and bury it and bury the body in Israel in Mar in the cave of Adam and Abra and Sah and Rifka. And even though his beloved Rael is not buried there, his beloved Rael is buried in Bethlehem Kev Rael. So Yakov explains the way Rashi says that I put Raul there so that when the Jews are being led to exile at the time of the destruction of the temple, they're going to walk by that Kev and Rael Henu was going to Daven for them, going to pray for them and the like. Again, interesting anomaly. Rael was Yakov's most beloved wife and Rael is the one that is not with Yakov. Yakov was with Leia and with his own parents and grandparents and and the like. So Yakob then gathers together I'm just summarizing the his sons all of his sons [clears throat] and he wants to give them a braha right these are the famous brahos that Yakov gives to each of the tribes although Ruain Shiman Levy didn't necessarily get a braha but but he had some he had words to give to every tribe but Rashi brings that originally Yakov wanted to reveal the end of days wanted to tell them when the redemption is going to come. And right when he was about to tell them, Hashem made him forget it. He couldn't re he couldn't remember. So YaKob looks at his children and he says, "Perhaps one of you has deviated from the worship of Hashem and that is why I no longer have access to this prophecy." So all of the children answered in unison. But this medish is taking it in a very different way. Yakov's name was Israel. That was the name the angel gave him. So they're actually talking to their father when they're using that pama Israel. Here Israel. Of course the question is how can they call their father by his first name? That's actually a good question. But Shama Israel, there's nothing wrong with us. We all declare Hashem, our God, Hashem is the only God. So according to that, this is very different. When Yakov read the Shma, he was saying the P like we say it. You're you're talking to God. You're saying to the Jewish people, Jewish people, we are affirming that God is one. According to the medish here, when the brothers are talking to Yakov, they are talking to their father here. Yakov, our father Israel, Hashem. And Jacob then answered with the words cavode blessed is the name of God's glorious kingdom forever and ever. And this is at least one origin of shame. You understand is problematical. Barak shame is not in the Torah. It's not a in the Torah. If you look in part, it says there's no afterma. So what is the origin of borm? In truth, we have two different origins. Origin number one is this was response when the said so we are imitating Jacob that after we proclaim the unity of God we praise the glory of his kingdom so the origin is Jacob but then the glorim says there's a second origin for and it comes from Moshe Rabenu Apparently the Baruk of Yakov was forgotten maybe through the slavery. When Moshe went up to get the Torah, he heard the angels praising Hashem. And one of the praises they said to God was and the way the Gmorra describes it, Moshe stole that praise and he brought it down to earth. Moshe took it from the angels. So the Gmorrah says in the following by right we shouldn't say it because we're kind of stealing but we have a right to say it because it originated with Yakov. Maybe the angels got it from Yakov. So we say it because Yakov said it but we say it silently not to antagonize the angels. Right? So we recognize that Moshe got it from the malar. So it's not that they don't hear necessarily. They they they probably hear even a low low voice. But by saying it low, we're acknowledging that this kind of belonged to them. So this is the combination of the Yakov story and the Moshe story is why we say but we say it we say it silently and the only exception is of course Yom Kipur and Yom Kipur. One of the very features of the liturgy that stands out very conspicuously is we shout out because on yum kipper all of us reach the level of the heavenly angels and that is why we can invoke the praises of the heavenly angels. In fact, it's a very interesting demotion that you experience at the end of Yamiper, right? There's nila and after the sash of there's a volcano. Of course, Eric Israel has a peculiarity a little bit. Um maybe you've experienced it. uh that because we do in at least we do we for and you're not allowed to after sunset and is very much towards uh the end of so in a sense the has to be more or less finished by yam kipper however is going to go on for at least another 40 minutes now that did you finished with 40 minutes or at least 30 minutes left to go. So as a result, what happens in Israel is something that you're not going to see in that is the Aino malcanus have to be stretched out excruciatingly slow. See this is not a problem when you're not if you're noting you just do going into the night and then then you can do a regular Aino volcano. But when you have to finish by you got a very long window took me a while I remember the first time I came to you know years ago I didn't understand why are we doing every single Aino volcano so long but it's it's primarily because of the issue of okay but be as it may what do we do after a volcano we say then we say three times out loud still out loud three times and then we say seven times. Hashem and the idea of seven times is there are seven heavens and each time you say God is the only God. God is ascending one level higher and higher and higher and higher till by the seventh he's like no longer in the world. He's beyond. We're no longer in the proximity of the shina. The seven hashem is like saying goodbye to that intimacy with God and kadesh etc. And then you go to my of the weekday right a person might figure I've been dabbing all day. I got to do daily my I mean you know listen shouldn't I get a pass? No you don't get a pass. Regular life has its claims. But in that first five minutes before I was shouting, five minutes later, I got to say it again. Think about the demotion here. You're no longer an Hey, you were an angel five minutes ago. No longer. And uh the idea of doing it balash is because it's the combination of the Moshe story and the Yakov story. We say it because of Yakov. We say it silently because of Moshe except Any Kipper. But here there's a very interesting observation uh that one of the commentaries makes. You know, one of the most important filos in our liturgy is kadesh. And kadesh is recited at the end of every it's recited the kati kadesh is recited at the end of sections of the as you break it up. And as been pointed out many many times although there is a kadesh that in a says kadesh is not a prayer about death. Not at all. There's no mention of any death in kadesh. Kadesh is a prayer for the sanctification of God's name and the coming of redemption and the coming of Mashiach. And the most important part of the kadesh is the is the responses responsive answer. May God's great name be blessed forever and ever. And it's brought down. Anyone that answers with all of his strength, once again, even if there's an evil decree against him, it'll be ripped up. There is a mak. What does co mean? Some say koko means with all of your kabana, you mean the words. Others say it literally means as loud as you can shout it. If you ever go to toron in they scream they scream yea they follow that view of call ka but uh there's something very special about rabba and it is connected with saying it out loud so someone pointed out that rabba is actually and of course kadesh is in Aramaic because Aramaic was the spoken language in the time of the second temple and it was so important that people understood the kadesh that they wrote it in Aramaic which is funny because we don't know Aramaic so much but but nevertheless uh the importance of it was Aramaic now the question is Rabba could actually be an Aramaic translation or at least a very close paraphrase of shame let's compare it blessed May your great name be blessed. May the name of your glorious kingdom be blessed forever. So there's one difference in there and that is uh in in it simply says your great name is the name of your glorious kingdom. There there is a difference there. I actually don't have a a precise explanation why there's a difference but mfor point out that rabb is actually the Aramaic for the so if that's the case let me raise a very simple question we are supposed to say silently except when it's yum kiper which is an Aramaic paraphrase of we are supposed to say out loud why aren't I afraid of the angels is kavode out loud so the answer that's given is this theor chabas tells us that when you pray for a sick person you can pray in any language you want but you should not pray in Aramaic lest you know Aramaic. And the reason is because angels carry our prayers to God. And angels do not understand the Aramaic language. They understand French. They understand English. They understand German. They certainly understand Hebrew. But Aramaic is too close to Hebrew. So it confuses them. So when you're praying for a sick person, do not pray in Aramaic because the angels don't know where to deliver your prayer. This is the Gmorra in Shabas. The Gmorrah then says if you're praying in the presence of the sick person, you can do it in Aramaic because God is directly with the and therefore he takes your prayers directly. You don't need the postal service. So if it turns out that and again I understand and know this is really all beyond our ability to fully understand it but if we go with the basic idea that angels don't understand Aramaic you have a beautiful answer to the question I cannot say out loud because the angels are going to get real angry that I that I appropriate their prayers but when I do it they don't know what I'm saying they don't get Aramaic therefore I get to do the in a very powerful way without inciting the jealousy of the angels. Now, why after more than 2,000 years the angels don't pick pick up on this, I don't know. Uh but this is a mahalik. Why you're allowed to say shame in Aramaic even though you wouldn't be allowed to say it out loud in the uh in the Hebrew. And as I say, the origin of Barakim is the combination of the Moshe story and the um and the Yakov story. Jacob story came first. Uh and you know, you [clears throat] do see though that even though shame is not um is not part of Schma, but whenever we say Schma, we do put in the shame except when you read it in the Torah. When you're reading in the Torah, you just read the verses uh as they are written in the in the Torah itself. So now in this connection I want to share with you a a very very interesting thought about shame to take it a little further. Uh and that is the following. There is a gamorrah in maknazir and the gammorrah says in maknazir god amen. The person who answers amen to a braha is even greater than the person who made the braha. Meaning I make a braha. I glorify God. You say a just means it's true. A comes from I affirm that this is true. Amen. Amen. So it says the one who answers a has done a greater mitzvah than the one who made who made the brah. This is a garra. Question is that doesn't seem to be that sensible. The guy who made the braha made the whole braha. You just said a you're just tagging along. Why would your response be even greater? By the way, that's why um some people have a min. I I have tinas on the min, but I'll tell you some people have a minute that um they they go to show and they ask each person to recite their morning braas. Let's say you have 20 people. Uh each person says his morning brahos to the other group so they could all answer a that way they get a for 20 different 20 different bras. I am not uh in favor of that muk simply because I find it that it can disturb a lot of people in dining. People are learning or people are dabbing or people are doing things and there's this a club of of 30 people trying to do their thing. Uh so the truth is sometimes these types of mitzvos may cause more inconveniences to other people in which case as kazal say the gain is offset by the loss. One one needs to think about but think about [clears throat] this okay but be it as it may I don't want to be the crashy old man but be be it as it may uh what is the meaning is greater than making the braha. So the Maharasha gives the following explanation. The gamatria this is a bit mystical. The gamatria of a the numerical equivalent of a is 91. Right? The ol is one. The me is 40 and the nun the final nun is 50. So it's 40 50. The gumatria of a is 91. Now 91 is also the sum of the name of God that we use in our prayers when we say when we say hashem the name so if you look in the sitter or the kish the name of god that is actually there is yudk the tetrogrammatin but we don't pronounce that name so we pronounce the yudkb 99.9% of the time very rarely it's pronounced differently but we pronounce yud vke the y the hey the v and the hey which is the ultimate highest name of god we pronounce it adnos alo right so we we we we read the shame havaya as if it's just a shame adnos god is my master which is a lower name of god now the gamatria of adnos okay you have to do a little relatively simple Arithmetic here alf dollar daled is five nun is 50 55 y. So the gamatria of adnos is 65. The gamatria of shame havaya y vke is 26. 65 and 26 is 91. Okay. Again I I hope this is making sense so far. In other words, a is a gamatria of 91 and that equals the sum of the shame adnos and the shame havaya. So what is happening when you answer a person who made the braha only used the shame of alfal nuny. He did not link into his braha the extraordinary spiritual power of the shabaya. But the person who answers a it's like putting the braha on steroids. He's invoking and putting into the braha the shame havaya which is a higher source of divine energy and power. >> [clears throat] >> Therefore, the marsh says he who answers a has made the braha itself much more powerful than the person who made the braha because the person who made the braha is invoking spiritual energy from a lower level than the person who answers a because he's bringing into the braha the unpronouncable name of God which is the shame havaya this is the marsha we often don't associate the marsha with maybe more cababalistic thought in point of fact by the way I should mark the Marsha was in fact a great cabalist yet he's not necessarily known for it but this is not a a fluke I mean the Marsha generally was very shakua very involved in in cabala as as well so then the Marsha comes on with a beautiful beautiful additional thought to this the garra says in mak's tinus that in the bikt They also had dab. They had dabing services in the B mikdash as well with the corbanos. They would have dab. If you learn to you will see there was a seder of tila in the ba mikdash. But it mentions that when the kazan would say brahos we don't answer a to brahos that are made in the ba mikdash rather the response to a bra made in the ba mikdash was [snorts] shame. So when the said you did not answer you said by the way I actually saw YouTube I was very surprised but I can understand the makor of people who were dabbing in the harabayat. I I I myself do not go in the harabayat because of the concerns of of impurity and the like but there are religious Jews who feel we can go to the harabayat and um for many many years you weren't allowed to have any prayer services at all the police would literally stop you they would arrest you but apparently maybe this was illegal I'm not even sure but apparently maybe isolated places where you might be able to get 10 minutes or so to don and I believe I heard that when the was doing and said they answered because they are in the area of the beta mikdash interesting question I mean number one the basa mikdash is destroyed and number two they're not in the basa mikdash they're in fact they're not even in the courtyard of the bas mikdash because they wouldn't be allowed to go there they're on the temple mount outside of the courtyard so it's not clear to me at all that even in the time of the basik you would have the exception from answering a but be it as it may in the base of Mikdash itself and in the courtyard a mikdash the response was shame out loud because in the base of mikdash we're also like angelic so the marsh says why don't you answer the mikdash why don't you say a so here's what the marsh says in the ba mikdash Every braha was said with the shamaish the shapesh was pronounced if the purpose of answering our main to a braha is to augment the braha with the spiritual energy of the shamurish when the braha already has the shame there's no reason to say amen instead blessed is the name of god's glorious kingdom the name is the shame hopes itself and that's why now again the marsh is addressing a very common misconception that people have people think only on yum kipper the cohen guttle pronounces the special divine name and people bow down and what do they say shame cavode muso right they bow down when they hear the coen say the shame I'm authorish. So people get the impression that this was unique to yum kipper. Obviously there are many things that are unique to yum kipper but this actually was not. Uh the shameish was used in the B mikdash every single day and anyone that heard the shame would bow down and say if anything was special in Yum it could be they used something even beyond the there's a 42let name of God there's a 72let name of God there's even beyond but the shameish was every single day and the marsh says that that is the reason of a oninikt because the braha already has the shame already has the shame havaya within it and a very amazing amazing marsh and this again brings out that shame was the response to the shame in fact someone want to say that when Jacob said when the brothers said perhaps they use the shame and that's why Jacob responded with shame. So that's just something to think about. So when we d we say we should think about all of these different uh inim uh and the ability to access holiness from higher places, higher worlds. We don't fully understand the process because God is one. God is everywhere. God is unitary. So the notion of higher and lower uh is not necessarily an intelligible idea for us. You know God is not in heaven. We I mean on one hand we talk about Hashem being in shayim but Hashem is not in Shamayim. Hashem is everywhere. And yet and yet at least in Cababala we do talk about higher realms, lower realms, not necessarily spatially higher but in terms of sanctity in terms of removability from the physical and therefore different levels of divine energy is accessed from different uh from different points. Um a final point I wanted to share with you is actually from that last week's para and that is last week's para is called vayash and it's based on vayash a love yehudah yhudah draws near to yose. So the medish comments on that p that there's a verse [clears throat] in the ni that he hashem talks about mashiach the days of the mashiach and it says behold days are coming the nigashes that the plower the one who plows the lands is going to encounter the one who is harvesting. Now what does that expression mean? So the simple idea is that days of prosperity are coming where the harvesting is going to be so abundant that people are still going to be harvesting the old crop when it's time to plow the ground for the new crop. Right? In a normal agricultural cycle, those events never happen the same time. We finish harvesting before the summer and we don't start plowing until the rains rainy beginning of the rainy season. So the Nvi is trying to describe an idea of prosperity that is so great that you're still harvesting your old crop when it's time to plow for the new crop. So the guy who's there to plow bumps into the guy that's still harvesting the grain. Meaning the pit is is a description of fertility, prosperity and the like. But the metric says venosash is the same verb as vigash. This is a remes and yudah. Yehuda is the plower and Yoseph is the harvester and the meeting of the plowman and the harvester is the meeting of Yoseph and Yehuda. So the question would be metaphorically why would we call Yehuda the plow person and Yoseph the harvester the and the kiter and in any event why would refer to an almost is way in the future I mean why is just referring to a past event I mean the puss says days are coming so the medus is connecting it to the meeting of Yoseph and Yehuda that's a past event. So the the abnorb the father of the shamisher was one of the gdoleador mamesh offers a beautiful interpretation and it's so interesting because it's based on hash shabas now the abnor wrote one of the great great on shabas called the so it's interesting that even when he applies it toic thoughts he thinks in categories we know that in Shabas two of the 39 m is plowing and there's a mala called cozer harvesting the definition of plowing is to soften the dirt right you plow you soften the dirt to make it receptive to growth coats is when you sever something from its source of growth an apple is grown growing on a tree. I pluck the apple. I'm digg so says the egg or the abnor same person. Yoseph and Yehuda are both righteous people but they represent different models of righteousness. How do they deal with temptation? Yoseph had a great sexual temptation. Potifer's wife enticed him and enticed him and enticed him and enticed him. And Yoseph took the position just say no. To quote uh Nancy Reagan, just say no. Yoseph is cozer meaning he separates himself from his earthly behavior. Yoseph represents that sadic who is so strong that he doesn't fail. He doesn't fail. He separates himself. When Yehuda is faced with a pro with what he thinks is a prostitute. Yehuda succumbs. Yehuda represents the human capacity to fail, to slip, to make mistakes. Yehuda represents the Yateshara that occasionally we give in to our earthiness. But Yehuda is the model of how you rise above it. How through Chuva and introspection and prayer, you take even your earthly part, your gashmas, and you soften it. You sanctify it, you give it back to God. So these are two models. Yoseph is the one who does not sin. And that's a model that we have to be strong. We have to be vigilant. We have to try not to succumb to our earthiness. Rar and even if we don't have a support system like Yseph didn't have a support system in we do what's right because it's right. Yehuda on the other hand represents the person who fails and slips and makes mistakes but shows us how we come back. Yoseph shows us how not to make a mistake, how not to fail. And Yehuda shows us how when we fail, we come back. Now it's very very fascinating that in Yakov Au's final brahos on his deathbed Yakov Au declares that the scepter of royal authority among the Jewish people belongs to the tribe of Yehuda. David Hamel is from Yehuda. The messianic line is from Yehuda. Why would it be Yehuda? One might argue Yoseph. Yoseph is a higher level of righteousness. Yoseph is the righteousness of not sinning. And the answer would be this is the profound idea that we see here and that is a mel in the best sense. Now granted, not all of our kings have been this way. If you read this book of Malikim, you see there have been plenty of failures. But in an ideal sense, a king is a role model to us how we should behave that by looking at what the king is doing, we try to emulate. So to have somebody who is spiritually so strong that they never fail. That's not necessarily the role model I can connect to. I kind of say, "Oh, that guy never makes a mistake. That guy's perfect." But what message does that have to me? I make mistakes all the time. So in a sense, I hate maybe to use this word. It's maybe a little disrespectful, but in a sense wanted a certain flaw in the monarchy. I don't want to say a flawed person that's a little too strong but but in some sense it actually is true to show us that even when we fail we get up again and we turn to God and therefore wanted the malus to belong to and again melik who's Yehuda's descendant went through the same process with David Bach was a tremendous sin now granted I'll It technically was not a sin but Sheba had to get etc. But but spiritually it was certainly a sin. You cannot deny that David's motives were not pure. And David suffered tremendously. He lost a baby and his own son Abshalam tried to kill him. So David suffered tremendously. And yet Mashiach comes from that that flaw because David shows us how to recover from failure. Now I I mentioned I think more than once you know R. Hutner was very critical of the genre of Gdolean biographies. These are biographies of very very great rabbis because he said you open up a typical biography and it says oh when he was four years old he finished shas and then at five he did you shi and then by 10 he read all the z's writings. uh super genius who knew everything every sub paragraph in the with all the commentaries by heart and you look at it you know you're really amazed it's like Guinness Book of World Records you know stuff but you know said what does that teach you what does that teach me we're not that so we're just looking at superhuman feats and you know we're amazed but there's not a lesson there from us but Fner said what we really need to know others problems. If you're allowed to do this because of lash and har that that's really the problem. We really know that these great people also had their struggles. They had their questions. They had their failures. They had their mistakes. And what is more interesting for me to know is how did they deal with the types of stuff that I have to deal with that all of us deal with. Now again there may be issues about how far are you allowed to dig. In fact, [laughter] um, Ramnasen Kamineski wrote a biography, the making of a guttle of his father of Yako Kamineski, which was really not just a biography of his father, but the whole yeshiva world in Europe, in which he exactly went down this road of talking about, oh, this great rabbi had a girlfriend, whatever it would be, all sorts of stuff. And what happened was he got exccommunicated and it was taken off the market. Uh, you know, I remember a making of a guttle in the bookstores uh cost $25. Uh, but after there was a ban and they were no longer selling it. So, somebody put their copy on eBay for $500. You know, a banned book really goes up. It goes up tremendously uh in money and and the like. So, he actually tried he tried to write a book. He wrote a book in that way. He said we need to know the the problems and how they still became great. Okay, as I say there there are some issues of har but the point I'm making is the Tyra itself wants the malus to come from people who have made mistakes and have gone beyond it as opposed to paragonss of perfection [clears throat] who never make mistakes. The person who is a paragon of perfection is described as a harvester because he separates himself from the earth as opposed to the kesh who takes the earth and makes it into something good. So therefore amos is not simply talking about a past event. He's using it as a paradigm for the unification of these two types of righteousness in qual in qual Israel. Okay. So wish you all a wonderful shabas a good week. You [music] my [music] birthday [music] is your sh [singing] [music]