Rinat Chaim: O'King Who Desires Life with Rabbi Aaron Dovid Poston

[Music] My birthday [Music] tomorrow morning. [Music] Shalom. Welcome back to the midash and we are learning the safer reinatim right by Rabbi Freedellander. He was one of the great rabbis in Panovich uh student of Rabbi Destler and he is well it's a big book describing our prayers during the 10 days of chuva specifically um well we're at the point where we the additions there are additions we add in and we're dealing just with one small actually it's three words melik oh king who desires life, right? So the truth is even though these additions we put in specifically during the 10 days of Juva, during the holiday of Russip and all the days in between, the the truth is that these are principles, general principles for Judaism, right? And we're we're here just not to learn, right? We're to to apply it, right? not just to learn some what I'll call uh you know academic information but how to transform our lives and it begins with our thinking okay so how do we think about these words and we say oh king who desires life so what is life and what is desire he god has wants god has desires and he he he wants life he is life itself so what what could it possibly So we're going to learn as I said certain fundamentals in Judaism and the rein brings down right away in a book of his explaining the the prayers these words welcome We're talking about you. God wants you. God desires life. God desires that it's not the intent. We're that God wants life itself. We're not talking about the but rather wait to you this most of I'm going to tell you this. If you're learning things that are intuitive, you're not learning. Learning means you're learning something that is counterintuitive. Because right something that you wouldn't have thought of naturally after you hear it and it resonates great now you understand that this is what you learned while you were in your mother's in your mother's womb the whole Torah you learned the whole Torah before you were even born when we're born we forget it i.e E for the purpose of trying to recuperate re re with the to get it again right that's the challenge of life so pay attention rather what does God want turn the page he's what he wants is the people the human beings that are full of life. He desires life. He wants us to have life. He wants us to experience and we have to define what that is. But to really be alive, for us to be alive, that's what he desires. Year may seem he desires life more obviously than death, right? But he desires those people who are alive more than those people who are dead. Their souls are dead. They're dead while they're still alive. Meaning prior to death, they're already dead prior to physical death. They're already spiritually dead prior to their physical death. That's what he desires. He desires life. He wants you to live. He wants you to experience life. But we'll have to discuss what that is exactly. Why? Now these words may be hard to digest but David at dinner mentioned them. [Music] He desires that we serve him. What does that mean to serve God? God doesn't need anything. He certainly doesn't need us to serve him. But our service to the almighty to the the the power that's emanating all of existence right havay right that we spoke about earlier yud vke is really hav itself existence itself if we're in tune with existence if we're really experiencing his ex existence we're what does it mean to serve him to worship him right and I have to say I mentioned about uh Charlie Kirk uh many many Um many people are praising this guy to no end. So I limited my praises to him, right? That he was a moral force. He was for free speech. He was as I mentioned, right? Anti-gun control, right? And I mentioned why? Because God gave us the ability to control ourselves, right? It's amazing the the the split between what we call right-wing or let's say you know conservative small government self-control people helping each other like we spoke about in the last class or no responsibilities except pay your taxes and make a big government and let them control everything. Right? And I mentioned that it could be it's just a theory. You'll have to write in the comments what you think that people who don't believe in God, don't believe in free will, which is the greatest gift that God gave us. What what does that mean? It says he gave us the greatest gift of free will. He says he created us in his image. What is his? He has no image. I'll tell you what his image is. His image is the ultimate boundless free will. No, you can't deny that. That's what God is. He's the ultimate in free will. And we're just an image. An image. Like I say, when you put your hand, you have the sun or a light. You look on the table, there's a shadow. We're Butelum Elohim. Sail means shade, shadow. We're in the shadow of God. We're like, it's almost not there. It's a faint bit of God. That's what we are. We're like, we have we have God inside of us, but it's it's so small. Right? We're like small gods. Okay? I mean, that sounds crazy, but we have the power of free will. So, these godless people who don't believe in morality. See, Charlie Kirk believed in morality. Okay? He was of a different religion. I don't think he truly understood the unity of Hashem. >> He kept Shabbat. >> I don't think he understood the unity of Hashem. You could keep many non-Jews think they're keeping Shabbat. Okay? Let's not get into that right now. Whether they can or can't or how they but he did not believe in the absolute unity of Hashem. Okay. So that I want to mention because we're going to discuss that here. That's the true service of Hashem is to know that God is one. Okay. So with all the praises and I think he was a great lover of the Jewish people, a great lover of what he called the Old Testament. Nevertheless, he was still a denier in the unity of Hashem. So, we're not going to criticize him at all for that. That's not at all what we're doing here. We're actually telling you that he had a lot of things right. Okay? And probably, whether you agree or not, he probably had a great part in getting President Trump elected. Uh the power of what's the word? motivating kids on campus to have a dialogue to have without violence, right? The what do you call it the market of free ideas, right? That's what the Talmud he praised the Talmet for that. So there's a lot of good stuff. We're not going to talk anything negative because there's nothing to say. But the the alkalites, the the praises only go so far. That's all I wanted to say. Now, we're going to talk about she abdu to serve Hashem is really to unify to know that God is one. But I didn't you didn't hear that from me yet. Let's see what he says. Somehow the idea that God needs us in the last class. So, we say God doesn't need us. But there are some rabbis of thought that yes, God does need us. And if you listen well in the last class that God's ultimate essence is to give, right? To bestow great goodness on the world and to us. Well, guess what? It has to be earned to a certain extent. Some of it's going to be grace. Some of it's going to be merciful. But the basic idea is like free choice to choose it to earn it. By our choices, we're earning it. By our actions, we're earning it. So serving Hashem, making a decision that I know that God is one. Okay. Who serves Hashem? Only the live, the living. The living serve Hashem, not the dead. It's famous. We're going to see soon. It's a great statement, right? When the righteous person dies, he's still considered alive. When the evil people are alive, they're already considered dead. Remember we said, what does God desire life? He desires those people who are really truly living, serving Hashem. And um I do believe that non-Jews, right, Ben Noites can certainly get as really close to the octus of Hashem as possible once they drop the J man, right? Once they drop this human being they consider to be God, there's there's hope for them. Okay? Right? Evil people, they're not serving Hashem. They're not serving Hashem. Most likely they're serving their own desires. Right? Even David said in Psalms 115:E17, "Loham, yahallelujah, the dead do not praise Hashem." King David, this is in Psalms, the king, I'm sorry, that the dead do not praise Hashem. Now, why would David need to write that? Of course, the dead don't praise Hashem. And right they're dead. No. King David was according to Rabbi Freedellander in saying it can't be the actual dead because that's so obvious. It has to be something deeper. For sure they're not praising Hashem. They're dead. It's talking about while they're alive. these evil people while they're alive. Ailim, they're the ones that are called dead while they're still alive. These evil people, if you go to Ezekiel 18 verse 32, it says that's a strange verse, right? I have no desire in the death of those who are dead. So, what does that mean? So while they're alive, God does not want them to remain rash. He wants them to do cha to become sadikim, to become alive. When you're at sadic, you're alive. When you're a Russia, you're already dead. So that's why that double language I don't desire the death of the dead. I don't desire the rash to remain rash. I want them to do chuva according to simple uh Hebrew what it should have said according it should have said I don't desire the death of the living but it says I don't desire the the death of the dead so therefore you're forced to understand that is Russia I don't desire the death of the Russia now just imagine And you all know the story of Ravi Mayor and his wife Bura. Ravi Mayor was bullied on his way home many times, too many times. And he comes and he complains to his wife and he says, "I wish they were dead. I'm tired of being bullied." And his wife says, "Bura says to him, that's not shot in the Pik." And I'll tell you what the Pusk in a second. The shot is, well, maybe we'll tell you what the PK is. In Psalms 104:35, it says sin now could mean sinners because you can read it either way. Sinners, let's go with sinners. That's how he read it. Sinners shall be destroyed from the earth and the wicked will be no more. So he prayed for their death. That's what he thought was. And maybe it is on a certain level. But his wife says, "No, women have a certain intuition. called binaashem I have my beina my wife bina and um she said to him no sin shall be destroyed and once the sin is destroyed then you will have no more evil people because the sin is no longer like in other words it's a natural occurrence once you get rid of the sin then there are no so basically he she told him pray for them to do chuva he did and they did chuva See, so that's the same idea. Hashem does not desire for these people to continue in their evil ways. God does not desire that the Russia should die. Rather that he should reverse. He should do truv. He should return from his way and live. Remember he desires life meaning he should stop being dead. What how do you do that? So someone you know I'm not one of those messianic types but uh I tell people I could I could resurrect the dead. I've resurrected many people from the dead first of all myself. But with Hashem's help, basically, you know, rabbis are supposed to be soul doctors, right? To try to help people find the path, find the right path. So he says like this, God wants them to stop being dead, meaning that their their soul should no longer be dead in his in his or from his evil acts. the but rather returned in repentance and basically become resurrected. He has resurrected resurrect your soul. You have the opportunity right to resurrect your soul and to live once again to actually be high. God loves desires life. It's a whole another just think simple. Of course, he loves life, right? The the righteous people have fear, healthy fear of judgment. Ready for this? They're involved in Torah. We're talking about, and I'm going to tell you for the the non-Jews that are listening, find a rabbi. Don't read the Tanakh on your own. There's an oral Torah that explains every word, every dot, every tit, whatever you want to call it, everything. And you will invent your own religion if you sit on your own and read your what you call your scripture. But you want the truth. And here it comes. So if you with fear from they're involved in Torah now they unify Hashem really it means to serve the one God the one true God that's the definition of serving hem is the unifying of hem by the way I just want to mention we talked about this the other day about the word mitzvah it's Modicv what's the root the root of mitzvah it's not command right I mean it could be you can look at it oh we look at the word as mitzvah I have a commandment and maybe it's a burden maybe it's not it's a command I get it but the real root is rashi twice in sh that I know of could be more when the word mitzvah comes up he translates it or interprets it or explains it as to uni to unify to connect. So the word mitzvah means to connect in atbash. What's atbash? Atbash is a a way of doing gamatria but not necessarily only gamatria. It's also switching letters. So a it would be z in the American alphabet in the in the English alphabet. And then b would be y, right? So inbash alf bet shin. So they're transferable. You have the word mitzvah which is really sevit. Sevit I mentioned is a what is the word sevit is a um staff. You have you know you go to a restaurant the people on the staff you have the waiter you have the the the mater you have the dishwasher you have the cook you got the owner sitting you know collecting all the money but whatever it is everybody's working to make uh the customers happy and as much money as possible. They all have one goal. They're unified in their mission. That's what sevit means. Therefore, the word mitzvah ultimately means unity and unifying. When you do a mitzvah, the the the v and the he there is a v and a which is the last two letters of god's name. When you do on the the me and the sadic, mem is yud, sadic is hey. It's yud. You're connecting the yud and the he to the vv and the he through doing a mitzvah in the proper way. You're actually unifying Hashem's name. You may not be aware of it. Wouldn't it be helpful if you were aware of it? You would probably do the mitzvah with much more, much more intent. But that's what it means serving. How do you serve Hashem? Each and every day with your entire hearts, with your whole hearts, in your lifetime and in your death, even in your death. What do they say? I'll just He doesn't bring it here. It says when you go to a shir and when you speak it out when right now I'm speaking out the words of this rabbi who passed on or we learned the clear car, it says that their lips are moving in the grave. when you quote them goes back to that discussion we had why the illusion of lips moving in the as if their lips never stop moving. Okay, it's more metaphysical but uh I mean I don't believe I I'm not I'm not saying I'm not a believer. I'm having a hard time seeing or imagining the lips move in the grave. I think there's a deeper meaning. That's all I'm saying. Okay. Okay. So that's what he says to serve Hashem note not only in your life but also in your death that we are basically spreading honor this great honor and we're going to be honored in great way underneath that very tree of life in the garden of Eden. That's when we're dead. And while we're in our graves, we're going to be given great rest theim. We're going to see a pic in Psalms 149 verse 5 in a second. But this is a very interesting idea that these dead people these sadik they're going to get up from their graves every Friday afternoon and every ro kesh and every kag and other holidays they're going to get up in the graves now I just want to tell you there's a very spooky thing one of my rabban wrote a bookmir sagufa nephish learner with all the spooky stuff in Judaism I actually have a copy and u there is this I'm not gonna say it's a custom because it's many people don't even know so but there is a concept in in uh it's brought down in the ha that on air of shabas you're not allowed to go out to a river and drink the water from the river directly from the river right before shabas comes in if you scooped it up and put it in a bottle before or put in a picture before it's not a problem. This idea is very spooky that these souls that are coming out from wherever they're coming out from where it's very hot and they're dehydrated, right? We know what that is. We have to say it, right? They get the weekend off. They get chabas off, but they're very thirsty. And if you drink that water, you're stealing from them. They need that water to de to hydrate themselves. Okay. It's a nice thing to have in mind because this is something and even shabas right when we start well and the whole deal that they're going back to wherever it is they need to rest in. I told you my rabbi doesn't like me talking about this but anyway it was a very interesting idea. So there are those that will not drink water directly from a river or a pond or a lake. Um but otherwise from the tap it's not a problem. Okay. So, that's what's going to happen on Arab Shabas on the right before Shabas the the the souls are going to come out from wherever they come out from. And look at what it says in Psalms 149:5. Right? Uh this is King David. Let them sing upon their beds. So, in other words, what does it mean in their beds? Means in their graves. Even in the graves, the righteous are going to have an opportunity to sing and they come out and experience a certain level of shabas in this world. God is giving the opportunity for the righteous who are dead to praise him. Why? Because of this famous statement that even when they're dead, they're still considered alive. not only because the basically remains with vitality and life. This is not coming to include except it's coming for a reason that Hashem is giving a certain type of vitality to it says even the goof but um even to the goof perhaps, right? Because it's getting that day off from Shabbat, I mean from gehenn to experience some aspect of on Shabbat where that soul is able to praise Hashem on Shabas has how do you pronounce this word? This is called like opportunities. These are opportunities and reward given to the righteous even the physical body of the dead person is it's still giving praises to hem but the but the do not have that opportunity not in their life and not in their death. So when we're asking Hashem to what that we're reminding Hashem he's I think we should be reminding ourselves to serve Hashem properly that this is called life and we have a choice. We're constantly faced with choices. God says right in the same phrase choose life. I place before you life and death. Choose life. But he's also telling you to make the right choices. Choose good. Don't choose bad. Right? And we were talking about earlier uh doesn't mean you can eat just anything but making bro right behaving not talking lash and har right all this thing is going to have an effect on your DNA it actually can change you it can cure you it can heal you the Torah can heal you so I praise I we're not we're not going to be learning this on online hopefully we learn it every morning though that we all have mamish an upcoming year we should all be written and inscribed for life immediately amongst the sadikim. If we're not, don't worry. Most of us probably are benonim. And uh it's a real opportunity to um to meet Hashem in the field to have that relationship that ongoing relation that intimate relationship with Hashem. And this year should be full of rrookness and gosh gashmis all kinds of spiritual climb right climbing the ladder and we should all be blessed with health and wealth and most of all happiness and with that have a great year. Have good chabas. My body [Music]