(Way# 35) LOVING CRITICISM: 48 Ways with Rabbi Aaron Dovid Poston

[Music] hey good day everybody welcome back to beyond the seven live from jerusalem with rabbi aaron david poston who i enjoy so much sharing this beautiful course the 48 ways to wisdom and today we got part 35 and it's going to be a doozy especially for someone like me somebody who needs to hear it probably more than most uh i'm just so happy and thankful that rabbi poston stays up so late it's uh it's 11 30 p.m in in uh jerusalem and uh where i am in the pacific northwest it's only 1 30 in the afternoon and uh so i'm just uh thankful that rabbi poston does that that for us and uh all that he does with yebene there in jerusalem it's just beautiful so let's just jump right in and see how the rabbi is doing today rabbi poston you're live on the air and uh we're so thankful that you keep coming and sharing with us these 48 ways to wisdom it means so much to me this class is i know such a beautiful thing that we can acquire uh and and integrate into our lives and i hope all bene know it that catch this series uh take something and and grab that topic and dive into it and study it and literally acquire it in their lives i really hope it's effective thank you dan and i appreciate all the people that are watching now and coming on later and watching it any any other time uh yeah this is an unbelievable series obviously it's not mine this is weinberg produced this series based on a mission in perki avoid chapter 16 when the israelites left egypt we were 49 levels down in in impurity and i mean we were idle worshippers we were uh we weren't on the highest level put it that way and yet we were redeemed anyway so that should give people hope right hashem took us out of egypt and he brought us to the mount the revelation and he gave us his torah and uh in in an interesting way i mean we didn't go to zero in others we were 49 minus and we didn't go to zero we went to 49 plus you understand there was a transformation and that's what this information is supposed to do to somebody and i have to apologize because who am i to give this over i just tried my best and i i wish people could you know purchase the book which is right over my my left shoulder correct my left shoulder and there's also um videos you can see the videos of the rabbi himself giving over in his charismatic um you know he's talking to young and calm college students right and the people in the early 20s and he's so relatable and he gives in such a jovial way with certain sense of humor and command and i i first of all i number one i don't do it justice but i do whatever i can you know and um we're thankful particular way i mean i really appreciate that you asked me to do this series or we chose it together but it's a great review for me because this particular way in particular is one that i find challenging on a daily basis on a moment-to-moment basis because i am very critical and this way is love and criticism loving criticism uh yeah you can you know people can dish it out but they can't take it well i'm almost i'm close to being one of those people so as a constant reminder and this is we're going to get into this um how one should not just uh there is going to be yeah don't don't be reactionary correct no to be able to receive it for the sake of improvement to say yeah constructive criticism is going to be the key that's going to be the key word here um and we're going to find people who you you me right whoever's listening will hear criticism from who maybe we don't trust and maybe we have some some negative feelings towards and we have to see perhaps it's god who's actually speaking to us through this person okay so we're going to come to love criticism hopefully by the end of this hour that we'll come to love criticism and maybe we already do but we're not always reacting uh so positively towards it which is my challenge i guess rabbi for me that the difficulty in today to today's living is it's it's tough to discern when it's actually constructive criticism or just derogatory treatment some people seem to just love acting uh adverse towards the you know certain topics and since i've become a benay nook i mean i've had people just get their hate on just because i'm jewish friendly not because i'm jewish or anything but just jewish friendly and and they don't even know any depth or know me you know just get adverse for no reason and uh yeah look it takes a lot of wisdom to understand that when if when a person is not talking through god you know they're talking from the dark side and you you could um we'll talk about it i mean you can still ponder upon it a little bit to be to you have to be honest with yourself and look yourself in the mirror and say is this really about me or is it their problem the first reaction should not be it's them and i don't have to receive this at all but let's start with some verses i i want to get into what the roshiva says but it's based on some verses if you go to leviticus chapter 19 now i have here verses 16 through 18 but i believe it's verse 17 but if you read all three as it's 13 to 18 yeah as a group and we'll read these three verses just to get an idea um okay it says in 16 it says you shall not go around as a gossip monger amidst your people you shall not stand by the shedding of your fellow's blood i am hashem you shall not hate your brother in your heart you shall surely rebuke your fellow but you shall not bear a sin on his account you shall neither take revenge from nor bear a grudge against the members of your people you shall love your neighbor as yourself i am hashem now we have to unpack this because there's so much really volumes volumes and volumes have been written on this and can be discussed for hours at length um just let's just take the the verses themselves right what does it mean to go around as a gothic maker somebody who looks to put somebody down or to denigrate somebody so this is what we should not be doing but obviously humankind has been doing this for a long time and we're probably guilty ourselves so just starting with that idea knowing that sometimes people lately call false information libel things that are just degrading not for the sake of improving the other person so that's how it starts off obviously if you're a gossip monger and you're that's falls into a sin it's one of the six hundred mitzvahs not to do now the rest of that verse says you should not stand idly by your your fellow's blood so what does that mean look let's say somebody does need criticism right the reshiva started off with a story uh i don't know if anybody knows this but the knesset in israel is in this the capital the capital is jerusalem so let's say somebody went and you're walking around tel aviv the knesset is not located in tel aviv so you walk around saying you know excuse me sir can you please point me in the direction of the knesset so if somebody doesn't say to you excuse me sir you're in the wrong city so you're going to be wasting your time i mean i'm giving you a very shallow idea of standing by you're you're you know watching your your fellow's blood be shed but on a certain extent certain level obviously when someone has a legitimate criticism to give to somebody and you don't get it so you're allowing them to i mean you know the secret you know what they need to hear to improve and if you don't share that with them so look the person is not going to succeed in whatever he's out to do which is akin to shedding his blood so that's a very we'll talk about some deeper um examples better mine reminds me of the first time i flew into los angeles i remember asking for directions to uh my hotel was at the car rental place picking up a you know a higher end car rental and i got shady directions and i find myself in the wrong side of east l.a and uh i just had to turn my way around and get out of there and i mean i've driven through dark sides of detroit years ago and stuff like that but i was not comfortable in that neighborhood and i went driving you know retrace my steps because i was given wrong directions until i found a lit store with a couple of officers there and asked them for directions and yeah i was fed directions in the wrong way and boy oh boy could have gotten ugly yeah if that person had you know the intentions and wanted to see you harmed that's akin to murder right he could say which is very difficult for many people nowadays especially men right say i don't know it comes to directions we all want to figure it out but it's better to say i don't know that to send somebody to their you know god forbid demise or even being robbed or just to waste their time um okay but let's say let's give another example somebody who really is in a medical emergency and maybe it's an older person and you see that there's no way they're getting up and you want to help them get up and they're like no no i'm okay okay i get it okay they don't want to be i don't know if it's called public shaming on a certain level but they want to catch their breath and whatnot but let's say you see blood or you see it's a real medical emergency and they say no i'm okay you know and please don't call an ambulance or don't call doctor or whatever it is don't make a big deal out of it and it really is a big deal so if you don't help them again it's the same similar idea you could be sending them to um to a worse situation so you don't always have to listen to the person who says you know and that's what we're going to talk about because we also put up a wall when we hear the criticism or someone's reaching out to help because we really need the help just imagine we're walking around with these personality defects we're not perfect remember the villenegon says the purpose of this world all the challenges we face whether it's in relationships whatever in business whatever it is all the challenges we face is really ultimately for personal development for character development so um when you know someone's basically in denial it's it's a big problem so how to deliver we're going to talk about that how to deliver a a proper rebuke but also how we should respond um okay so then the next verse says you shall not hate your brother in your heart which we understand right it's it's here in the heart okay i'm pointing my heart off to the camera um so that's only something you know and how you uh present your affection or the opposite is is going to come out in your relationships and your interactions but then it says you shall surely rebuke your fellow so you should right don't hate him in your heart you see him doing something which you would think as either evil right would you consider to be evil maybe it's objective maybe it's subjective but also him making a mistake so you think oh he's so stupid or he's whatever it is don't come to hate him in your heart but rather you show rebuking it's like in one go it's part of the same sentence part of the same verse so in other words don't bear the sin on his account that hate and verbalize it in a way where it's not hate at all because when we talk about you it has to come from love it cannot come from that you feel that this person is evil no what he's doing is evil but he himself is not evil and i want to see him improve i really should start off as soon as we finish these verses we're going to go back and define what love is and what rebuke is because if the the way is to love rebuke and in hebrew it's to love um we'll have to talk about what they unpack the word uh so we have to define those as well but in the meantime let's go through the verses and the last part of that verse is but you shall not bear a sin on his account now there's two ways to look at this i mean they're both true one is you see him sinning and you have the opportunity to rebuke and you don't rebuke him you carry his sin you're you're considered as guilty or in a certain way for not doing something to try to help correct him on the it also can mean and does mean that you shouldn't embarrass him in public in other words yes you should rebuke the person right not hayman in your heart and don't bear a sin on his account because he's doing something wrong you what they say two wrongs don't make a right just because you know what the truth is and you're going to try to correct this person you could be doing the act of trying to rebuke the person could end up being worse than the sin he's even doing so you hear what i'm saying so we're going to have to unpack all this and how to deal with it and then the last verse i gave you you mentioned right you shall not you shall neither take revenge from in the person or bear grudge against members of your people and then the the biggest principle of all right rebecca says love your neighbor as yourself right what does that mean first of all you have to have a healthy image of yourself because if you don't how can you ever love anybody else but i just want to take one quick look at what it does what does it mean to um carry out this revenge or uh carry out the grudge so for those who don't know it may sound like it's the same thing uh rashi over there on that gamora explains um quite quite a quite a lot so this i think it's worthwhile going through the entire rashi right when he said when it says you shall not stand by the shedding of your fellow's blood meaning don't watch his death if you're able to save the person for example if he's drowning in a river or if a wild beast or other robbers come to him you should do whatever you can to save the person you understand so the same thing happens with character development i mean the person is making the same mistakes over and over again and nobody has the guts and again how to deliver it we'll have to discuss but you're saving the person from shedding his own blood um what does it mean you should not bear a sin on his account so that is um when you present the rebuke you should not embarrass the person in public which we mentioned already now what about revenge revenge is where somebody let's say um he he asked you to lend him you you you say to somebody lend me something your lawnmower and uh you lend it to him i'm sorry he says no i'm sorry let's start again you ask something your neighbor lend me your lawnmower and he says no so now all of a sudden he comes to you and says i need to borrow some eggs or i need to borrow a hammer and you say no i'm not going to because you didn't lend me right i'm not going to lend it to you so you actually do not you do to him exactly what you didn't want him to do to you right he didn't lend it to you okay maybe he for whatever reason but you in your head came up with the whole reason and when he comes to borrow from you you say no i'm not going to do it because you didn't lend to me so that's called revenge you're actually physically taking it out on him by not giving him what he's asking from you what about a grudge a grudge is where you do lend it to him but you let him know you know i'm not like you you know i came to borrow your lawnmower and you didn't give it to me but now you're coming to me for eggs or a hammer i'm giving it to you but just keep this in mind i am not like you that's bearing the grudge your mom is you're actually bearing the grudge you're right even though you're lending it in your heart in that case you're it's the same level of sin here because of the verse but ultimately you have to love your neighbor as yourself so this is really going back on everything that's why i put all three uh together all only three verses how do you rebuke it has to come from love it has to otherwise keep your mouth shut or find somebody else who is either more effective more mature who could who can then deliver this uh we'll call rebuke let's just go back and talk about the definitions of love which we have discussed several times in the last few weeks because with that was the top number 30. yeah so what how we describe love was to focus or see have a perspective of the positive virtues in the person and therefore by having a i'm not saying rose-colored glasses but a positive view because the pleasure there's a pleasure from seeing those virtues that elicits the love so too here we're going to find out when someone criticizes you and of course also when you give it there has to be love involved okay because it has it look it's not always going to be what you call um constructive criticism but from your side you should figure out what part of it is constructive how can this benefit me right and then you will come to realize hopefully at least as we talk more about this how beneficial you know that it is for you and you can actually thank the person right i mean that's really the goal is remember the villain is to work on your character traits so if someone is giving you rebuke you can actually love it okay and what is rebuke rebuke itself it actually hebrew i don't know if rebuke is a good english translation we maybe reproof because really proof is what it is you're proving to somebody what the correct or most um advantageous thing to do that's really what you're doing that's what review in hebrew right is to prove to somebody is actually proof so proving something actually creates or hopefully creates a dialogue and we'll talk we'll do some role-playing of how to go about when someone gives you criticism remember i'm the last person here to be preaching this i need this more than anybody else okay so hopefully we'll make some headway personally as well so now that we defined those two terms and so just the way he starts off with who likes criticism come on but you know what people pay for it you know big ceos people who run companies they even have i don't know if you ever notice this i don't know if they do today um suggestion boxes next to the secretary's desk or maybe in the main lobby of the the company you know go to trump tower and as soon as you walk in i don't know i'm just guessing right it would make sense right that somebody who's a ceo of a thriving organization would have a suggestion box a real proper ceo would have um and he'll he hires people why does he hire these people these professionals to obviously you know dig into their brains you know their thoughts their creative ideas but also they want to know what doesn't work whether it's the ceo makes a proposal and the people he pays say it won't work or it won't work like that or we need to change something for it to something else first yeah sure even though it's his i hopefully i mean if you want to be successful people actually pay so think about it if people are willing to pay so much money and they're successful so why wouldn't we be willing to accept it for free right if you think about it you don't know who this guy is you might even have a certain uh a low um you know you might think of him as lower than you and who's he or she to say something like that to you but they don't know you or but you know what it's free so take it take it think about it ponder on it meditate on it and then let it go if it doesn't really apply but at least think about it that people do pay and um so that's remember we're we're going to talk about wisdom as well but let's say for example i mean what do we react we react so negatively somebody uh they left their wallet in the store for example and um okay so someone comes out chasing you down what are they gonna say hey you're so stupid or you know what happened to you lost your head okay so we're gonna react negatively perhaps and all of a sudden they say you know the reason i'm telling you this because you lost you left your while at the store and i have it for you and everything's there all the money all the credit cards all the pictures whatever it is that people carry their wallets so you're going to be so thankful okay you're going to even let that go those those um those insults but that's ultimately um how one should feel if someone's going to correct them ultimately um so king solomon said in proverbs 6. over here you 27 6 reads wounds of a lover are faithful whereas kisses of an enemy are burdensome okay i want to go back sorry to verse 5 as well verse 5 says open rebuke is better than concealed love okay so we're gonna have to unpack these verses as well so let's start with uh five open rebuke is good if it stems from hidden love so the comment here is very interesting and starting with this open rebuke is good if it stems from hidden love however even well-meant rebuke is hidden if it will embarrass its target in other words one should not rebuke somebody if you're gonna embarrass somebody now even though rebuke is painful which we already discussed this idea that it could be um for all of us right quite painful even if it's actually administered openly especially if it's administered openly if it is it is good and should be appreciated if it comes from a loving father or a loyal friend so in other words people we know who we know already has a good heart towards us and has no nothing negative they don't want to see our downfall they actually want to see us improve they invested a lot in the friendship right and so we would take it much better from them alternatively open rebuke is more beneficial than concealed love remember rebuke can improve a person but unexpressed love has no tangible effect how when was the last time you know you said i love you to somebody who you really love you know you should try it more often right quite quite good but anyway when you know somebody loves you you know it's good and um i think i lost my place here okay alternatively and no no we read that already okay so true love is attested to by readiness to administer rebuke when needed okay now how fortunate are the righteous that god does not show them special favor in this room okay this is a jewish concept just because you're righteous doesn't mean all the blessings are going to come to you in this world we already discussed this many times we're talking about the real true reward is in the world to come and the blessings will we will desrat hashem see there the righteous wish to be rebuked if you're really righteous you want to be you want to continue to improve your your ways i just lost my fight with it the righteous wish to review so they will improve this is what they truly want but the wicked detest rebuke because they want comfort not improvement uh the russians spoke about this before he speaks about this to many people and he asked them what's the opposite of pain and people unbelievable what do they say pleasure he says no pleasure is is i'm sorry in pleasure is not the opposite of pain it's on the same side the opposite of pain is indifference is comfort pleasure and comfort are not the same so the ultimate goal when we when you work on a character trait and you know it you get such immense pleasure from knowing that you didn't fall again into that trap learning how to fish you you can feed yourself that's the real work in this world i mean i know people work for a living and they accomplish something and they come home with a paycheck but when you're trying to change the world and you come up with something that could benefit people you you that's worth more than the pay the payment right i mean that's really why you you chose that field perhaps so that's why you invested so much time maybe even overtime maybe even sacrificed other things in life just to accomplish this not because of the paycheck necessarily but because of the actual pleasure and the reason we say that pleasure is not the opposite of pain as we've discussed before they ask a parent what is your greatest pleasure in life they'll tell you they're children right and then you ask them what is the biggest pain they'll say well it's the children so we see that pain and pleasure right we said this i think it was last week or one of my other classes recently the film sarah agra according to the pain is the reward so it's on the same side okay pain and pleasure go hand in hand so when we feel that pain through the rebuke hopefully with clean eyes and a clear sighted excitingness we'll see whatever steps need for improvement or fixing tikkun as we say and bizrat hashem one would feel the pleasure the real spiritual pleasure through that and hopefully that would take you to the next step not to react so negatively if one did that time um the red the verse six mentioned faithful are the wounds inflicted by a lover but superfluous are the kisses of a foe when a loyal friend's rebuke causes pain the wounds are faithful for they benefit the recipient however insincere kisses of an enemy are burdensome it mentions also the suffering and pain that results from the counsel of the good inclination are beneficial whereas the kisses of the evil inclination are disgusting and abhorrent evil inclination argues this is what your yetzer hara says to you i'm sure we all have this conversation in our hands no you know what righteousness doesn't pay right well they say good guys finish last right you've heard that before right now righteousness doesn't pay for the more righteous the person the more he suffers the wicked enjoys success and pleasure a person should not be deluded hashem rebukes openly in this world but reserves the world the reward for the world to come whatever wounds he inflicts emanates from his love we spoke a lot about this in the past i hope this is not any new idea um we should know that hashem is the rebuker we talk about um let's go to proverbs chapter nine did we just do that one no uh proverbs chapter nine verses eight and nine it's really yeah it's really nine but i i want to keep it in context i want to write these together eight reads reprove not a scorner lest he hate you reprove a wise man and he will love you give a wise man and he will become yet wiser teach a righteous man and he will increase in learning okay this also needs to be unpacked i mean it's it's kind of we'll call this on a very simple level i think one can understand it um but we're going to talk about this if there's somebody who is a scorner you know someone who is basically a sinner and doesn't care right and if you try to correct him so he'll hate you more so you know what don't even waste your time it's like broken poking at a bee's nest or something i mean you have to know how to speak to somebody like this and uh we're going to get into a little bit but what about rebuking a wise man he will he will love you okay now the next thing is god and give a one give a wise man what are we talking about giving him what giving him rebuke and he will become yet wiser okay teach a righteous man and he will increase in learning so rashi mentions there teacher with a righteous man wisdom right if he's um if he didn't tie his shoes right i mean if he didn't button his shirt right i mean why would he not be willing to hear what you have to say right he's wise but he's making a simple mistake and you have the answer and if he's wise obviously then he will become even wiser he'll increase his own learning rashi says teach a righteous man wisdom and he will increase in learning from his own knowledge in addition to what he heard so we're going to discuss this also a little bit more because basically when you do rebuke somebody there's a way where you try to get them to understand on their own i mean this also takes a lot of wisdom on our part to be able to okay let's say for let me give you an example right now uh your teacher your rabbi is saying something or acting in a certain way where he taught you the opposite so what are you going to go up to your rabbi and say you're a sinner you're making mistakes you told me this and look you're doing that so you can say to him i mean obviously same thing with a father because you're not supposed to contradict your father except when it comes to torah and the question is how to go about doing it so what's going to happen you can say to your father you can take to your teacher listen you know we learned this a while ago but i need i need to review it right i'm having a hard time understanding this particular point can you explain it to me so in a certain sense you're not rebuking him you're you're getting him to think i mean if he's smart and he's wise which hopefully they are and they realize they have been making mistakes when they review the learning with you either they'll pick pick it up pick up on it and uh make the correction on their own okay now i'm going to the next little paragraph here so now the weight room criticism is based on the right attitude first of all we mentioned about already about ceos paying a lot of money so if you are and what's the word if you are emotionally prepared someone sits down with you i mean they they have this thing i forget what it's called when a whole bunch of people get together they care about you they have a it's a session an intervention so like if you were told and i don't know how it works because it could be you're surprised but even when you're surprised you walk in the room if they explain to you we'd love you to improve hopefully your your mood shifts i mean listen everyone's different how they react to these interventions but think about it someone is giving you can call it again constructive criticism so they say look i have some constructive criticism so that already helps i hopefully will set the mood and hopefully it's constructive and not destructive right so part of it is um knowing that you need the criticism knowing emotionally to let's say reframe your emotions that you think you don't want them to feel ganged up on right so being caught off guard with criticism is a big reason why we don't accept it but if you could um be on guard in fact invite criticism okay go to people who you let's say not just yeah not yeah trust you know their objective and you say you asked them their opinion you've gotten a little bit of a spat with somebody and you want to know if you you they think you handled it right or what you could have done differently or better so again this is you're already an emotionally receptive no to receive the information because you're going number one someone you trust you're also emotionally ready obviously you're picking this person because you're ready to hear what he has to say and you know that something you did maybe is some it's bothersome but you can't really put your finger on it or you're not yet fully honest you haven't reached that point but you you know this person is trustworthy so he mentions get into the habit of seeking criticism even before a crisis arrives and he says once a month ask a few friends who are objective and know you well to tell you different ways you can improve number another idea is be objective and not defensive okay we know that it's very painful and usually comes from a it's wounded pride right there's always this voice inside of us there's oh i'm not good enough and this is like this is an emotional charge for you know a disaster in you know however you're going to react if you think i'm not good enough um but if you think no you know what everybody makes mistakes and i'm just normal right but i should know that i'm really good and i want to improve and i'm willing to have a dialogue with the person to find out what it is that he saw or she saw right so number one um when you are real what do you call it a um instinctive defense reaction is um is to um push it off but no you know ask the person to elaborate have a discussion right tell me exactly what's disturbing you i want to see if there's any truth in your criticism there's nothing wrong with having a dialogue dialogue like that um try to de-personalize it right instead of saying you say let's talk if a person did such a thing i want to hear objectively and try to see it from the other person's point of view um so when you recognize the purpose of criticism is to wake you up and get you back on track you'll be grateful to your critic right get in the habit of saying thank you right i really appreciate you pointing that out to me right even if you have to mutter it and and you know through clenched teeth say it say it several times um so basically number one don't try to defend yourself remember no one's perfect be objective think it about think it over wonder if it's true and why does the other person perceive this because again it could be he heard la shanhara he heard rumors you don't know so find out ask them why they think this is is why why they're criticizing you thank the person again for the criticism and take the step further by asking the person to elaborate okay now we're talking about reaching out reaching out like if you saw a person bleeding on the sidewalk would you just walk by and ignore the person no you would do ever you could to help the person so the same thing if somebody is suffering spiritually right or even emotionally so and they need help just just as much as the person who's suffering physically so don't be a callous person and ignore the person suffering so here that i already gave the example but he says imagine you're walking you you walk over to a bleeding person you start screaming get away get away he doesn't want your help because he's in shock he's think about it he's in physical shock he really is in shock what do you do you you call for help and try to calm him down while you wait for the help to arrive even though he doesn't realize he needs help you still do whatever you can just think about that someone is an emotionally or spiritually sickened state because that's really what's happening and you're trying to help them no get away i don't want to hear what you have to say or you ourselves react that way well guess what you're not going to let them go you have to figure out an effective way show them you really care show them you you love them right so if you see a person acting self-destructively don't just stand by he may not realize he needs your help or needs any kind of help at all but you know that his mistakes will end up catching up with him and cost him dearly since you care you must try to figure out how you can best help the person again giving constructive chris criticism is an expression of your concern now there is a that says a love without rebuke is not love think about that a second i have a verse here in proverbs 13 24. i think a famous saying people probably heard this in this way i'm about to say it spare the rod spoil the child right what does that mean so let's go into the actual king solomon's words remember he was the wisest man who ever lived proverbs 13 24 says he who holds back his rod hates his son but he who loves him disciplines him early okay so superficially i mean we're going to see rashi but i want to show you some other commentators as well rashi says hugh holds back his rod his end will be that he will hate his son because he's going to see him constantly getting to mischief you're going to see the evil grow and grow and grow if you don't try to discipline your child and you'll end up painting him so you thought you were loving him but you're really just loving yourself because you didn't want to experience the pain of having this confrontation with your child in the end he's the one who will continue to act bad or hopefully not but in this case perhaps and you'll end up hating him even more right so another idea what do you mean this disciplines him early meaning every single day first thing in the morning which look again you have to be very careful right again if it's done with love and there's we're going to talk more about how to go about doing this but i just want to go and see some of the other commentaries on this this beautiful verse we said it's 13. 24. okay so one who spares his rod hates his child failure to give musar moosa is ethical teachings ethical uh we'll call it discipline right moosa and discipline to a child is not a demonstration of love it's the opposite because such a parent is permitting his child to indulge in in his wrong impulses rather than improve and mature it is considered tantamount to hatred because eventually the child will fall into bad company and suffer from his sins in the end he will hate his child for he will see the child fall into bad ways now a parent who lets pity his own pity for his child override the need to chastise him in essence loves himself not his child avoiding the pain of chastising his child is more important to him than the benefit his children his child would receive from the discipline and from the acquisition of wisdom homolytically the verse alludes to someone who spares the rot on himself meaning he refuses to acknowledge his own shortcomings and improve himself when he's still young before his children such a person hates his future children because he will set a bad example for them when they are growing up um okay now what about the future but he who loves his him disciplines him constantly in the hebrew it's shakhar shakkar means in the morning here he says like that according to rashin and miri shakuru which is derived from the word shakha which means dawn implies that moosa is constantly given every morning alternatively the matsudas interprets shakhar remember it means early early meaning early part of life the dawn of life so one who loves his child gives him mooser in his youth when he can easily be molded reverse comments that educating a child is not easy it requires much patience and constant applications just think about it um a rabbi and his students they're like his children so he also has to be very careful even you might be talking to an adult but they're you know we're sensitive we're like children um though the task is hard the knowledge that one has given his child a sound upbringing is most gratifying and we'll end this verse with the yakutshimoni it applies this verse to the relationship between god and man since god loves the righteous he chastise them with afflictions in this world to atone for their sins so we discussed that idea before in previous classes as well okay so the first step in correcting others is to love them so the person can i ask a question sure um this this conversation about uh disciplines him early um when can it be overbearing like uh you know i've got a scenario with a nephew and uh my brother who recently they my my brother and his wife went through a breakup and the point being uh had to do a bit with uh my nephew um and um my brother's always tried to you know show his love for the child but he's always been heavy-handed in the sense of coming across as a terror and um you know his in you know when i chat with him and try to you know deal with his frustrations um you know i understand that he he wants to discipline the child but in the child's eyes there's a there's a torture or a fear there and um my brother just won't accept the fact that the child is terrified right and it's real and to anybody that chats with the child the kid's afraid of you you know and i can't seem to get that across to my brother that uh you know look i'm not there with the person but he probably seems to have an anger problem as well i mean if ch the children will pick it up first of all you have to be a role model the best way to give criticism and to be um to show somebody the right path if the person giving the rebuke is not living it himself so you know he sees the kids fighting he says oh you can't do that but he himself is doing that it's it's not only a waste it's it's it's giving him a license damaging it's more damaging so they're saying there's so many stories about great rabbis who they would never show any anger in in this in this field of giving the rebuke and then there was one time he did show it and he said i wasn't angry i just had to show him what anger looks like if you're constantly angry you you use the word frustrated right so i don't know how that comes out okay it could be in an angry way it could be just in a uncontrolled he's like uncontrolled it you have to as we're going to see now you have to give 10 portions of love for every one criticism if the kid the child is not getting that message that it's out of love and it has it has to be shown you can't just say i love you while uh you know holding a clenched piss not gonna work it's got to be real and when it's real and you're talking in a tone that is stern but loving and you're the words are expressing the truth and i mean the truth meaning that you love it legitimate feigning of anger this is bad for you consequences and i'm only doing this because i love you as opposed to uncontrolled either anger or frustration saying things that he he's going to regret later because that's you use the word frustration but this is going to backfire big time and the kid is going to be terrified okay every time he does something the father is uh frustrated right i have a feeling you mean angry or showing so there's there's a way to do it and some some big rabbis they would make sure that when they were ready to do it in other words to give over the criticism they waited you to to come up with like a scheme you know an honest to goodness scheme when they're not angry when they're not frustrated that's the last time that's not the time to give it but we all do it and that's a big mistake just wait wait until you muster up the love and hopefully it'll come out in choosing the right words choosing the right tone choosing the right atmosphere right not to do it in public right you know this was just done how am i gonna do it think about it it's better that way you know otherwise you're just lashing out and getting your own frustration out and you're gonna ruin that child because they will pick up on every little thing so number one another idea you have to work on yourself before you can even um work uh say work on it before you can try to fix anybody else so he sounds like he's an isle oh yeah uh big time and uh if they go for like family therapy or he's seeing a therapist it could be the therapist has told him this and he's just in denial or you know he's not he can't even put the two of them in the same room together what can i tell you yeah i mean this is life that we we see things from our parents we say oh never act like that you know i won't talk to my children like that i won't be like that and then we do exactly the same thing so you know hopefully we will pray and we will work on ourselves and things will change but if you're in a state of denial until it might be just too late and the the child will not have a relationship with with the parent i mean i i don't know what to tell you just here we're talking about um number here let me let me just use the words that he has here the rambam writes this is deus a person who rebukes his fellow whether regarding a matter between two meaning between him and another human being or between the human being and god should rebuke him privately right he's listen father says i want to talk to you in the other room that already gives you 10 seconds to calm down right i mean that's already a good start uh hopefully that he's not going to abuse that child when they're alone but um and he should speak to him patiently and gently informingly informing him that he is only making these statements for the person's own good to allow him the to merit the life in the world to come this is what someone who rebukes somebody should say i i really care about you i have to talk in that so if you're if you're already frustrated shut your mouth like seal it and throw away the key and pro until until you could find the key and then you hopefully developed a way to speak to the person to reassure the person you're on their side many parents make the mistake of thinking they can criticize their children without emphasizing how much they love them it's it's the difference between black and white i mean between the zero and 100 right the results you know your parents sits down and my mother's look at me in the eye you know i love you what i'm telling you is going to benefit you right this is my job this is why god gave me to you this is why you gave you to me and this is my job and and i have to say it and you can think about it i mean child you know they have to grow up they're going to be mature at some point but you have to start early with lots of love and i just said protect for give ten portions of love for every one of criticism wow children need to feel that the parents are speaking out of genuine love and caring before criticizing parents need to carefully weigh their words and determine that they will promote a loving trusting relationship they need to reassure their children that they are on their side and express their love before during and after giving rebuke before you give the rebuke during the rebuke and after the review they have to know that they are loved now the idea here is show it how do you show love this is through review it's through the rebuke so the word has the same root which is proof so the best way to get someone to change is not through harsh rebuke and arguing that only serves to put the person in a defensive mode the tone is telling us that the most effective way to convince people of something is by helping them see the point themselves i mean to have an adult conversation with a child you know you can see what do you think the results would be if you steal or if you do this or if you hit your friend or bite your friend or whatever it is right when a person recognizes and understands what he is doing wrong he is more likely to accept the reality and decide it's time to work on changing uh very good uh remember how the prophet nathan uh rebuked david king david you're right he didn't even see it coming his own idea yeah in second samuel chapter 12 you have the um nathan nelson rebukes david for sending uzi uria to die in battle so nathan uh says that he's come to inform the king of a great injustice a rich man with many sheep stole one beloved sheep of a poor man and had it slaughtered for a feast david is furious at this gross injustice and says as god lives the one who has done this deserves death nothing responds you are that man david is immediately humbled the message is loud and clear he says i have sinned before god so tohacha is not harsh it's not supposed to be harsh it's the beauty of reality staring us squarely in the face there's a few other uh examples of stories let me just see if i can find it that was verses uh four five and six and seven and the midrash tells a story about elijah the prophet he meets up with a fisherman now imagine i mean he wants the man to learn torah right he's a fisherman so he's got all kinds of excuses he needs to make parnassa he needs to make money to feed his family but how does the uh the the fisherman respond to elijah asking him do you study torah elijah asked him now this is called wisdom talk man how to speak to somebody so the per the root the fisherman says no i don't study i'm just a simple man i'm not endowed with any special talent or intelligence now elijah was watching this guy he's got these uh nets that he himself made so he uses this against him so to speak he says tell me elijah asked how do you prepare your fishing nets she says well it's actually quite complicated first i have to select the exact gouge of rope right the tension the type of rope and then i weave it in a net this particular pattern to ensure the proper balance of strength and flexibility so then he says how do you elijah ansen so how do you go about actually catching the fish he says oh that's complicated too so it it has many complex factors you have to think about the season of the year the type the time of the day the type of fish you want to catch weather conditions the water the temperature the speed of the current whoa this is like you know you open up angular magazine and you know i don't even get all that stuff out of it and he says so elijah says to him when you go to heaven you said you planned to testify that you don't you didn't study term because you're just a simple man that god didn't endow you with any special uh talent or intelligence but your expertise as a fisherman refutes your very own claim so if you can get the person to understand the depth of what you're trying to tell him remember it takes wisdom now what you would like someone to do to you you should do to others right just like you would appreciate if someone talked to you with a light switch on yeah yeah so you have to figure out ways that you could do the [Applause] same um there's one more point i think i wanted to make but i think it's all pretty clear um here with some examples and just to leave you with this idea right we so much of our pride is in the way remember everybody makes mistakes don't even try to defend yourself you're not perfect it's okay okay someone comes to you think it over is it true and why does that person perceive it to be true remember to thank the person for the criticism and take it one step further and ask him to elaborate he spoke about this already but to love to love criticism understand that this is the whole purpose of your life and god sent this person remember god prepares the footsteps of man myself and the other person we crossed paths he saw me doing something that he felt and you don't know what he felt but he felt enough to say something right was it coming from a good place from a bad place from revenge from grudges from who knows what put it aside that's right try to be objective you know it would be nice if the person did it privately just like you would want be nice if the person said i'm doing it for you good from the beginning so you can set the tone right just like we're not perfect in giving criticism so neither is the other person but two rights don't make a two wrongs don't make a right not to try not to be so quick to dismiss or dis as they say the other person okay so i think that's i think that's kind of it yeah loving rebuke it's a hard one for me rabbi i mean you know some people just seem to study the person today and look for the button to push rather than rather than come at it with the approach you discussed today and that we all learn to truly be involved and interact with people in healthy manners and true truly loving and caring and uh yeah loving rebuke and that that that means you know not only uh accepting it but but but but loving how to do it correctly i think uh is is is a good part of that and uh thank you so much for staying up uh late there rabbi and sharing with us you know folks you can always find more of uh rabbi poston's uh material on ybnei dot com or on the yibbene uh youtube page he's got loads of beautiful profound messages out there i encourage everybody to check his material out you'll find he's always involved in such loving kindness there in jerusalem and more than that sharing the light of torah and we're so thankful that you take the time so hashem willing are we on for part 36 next week rabbi that's right that's right hashem looking for hashem but wonderful lesson today loving rebuke thank you so much so we're gonna sign out for now folks we hope you have a wonderful wonderful week we will be back with uh part 36 of the 48 ways to wisdom um as handed down and here on beyond the 7th so we hope you'll join us next week everybody have a wonderful wonderful week [Music] here