Transcript
Okay good morning, good morning boker tov. Im yirtzeh Hashem it should be a good morning for Am Yisrael, for Klal Yisrael. May we hear besoros tovos, should hear good news, good tidings. The hostages should be brought home, the soldiers should be reunited with their family and im yirtzeh Hashem we should celebrate a sweeping, sweeping victory. Want to thank our series sponsor, emunah series sponsors for the year, Avi and Bella Morgan in memory of Rabbi Dr. Brian Gabbat, in memory of Bella's mother Dr. Ellen Schanzer. We remain very, very grateful to the Morgans for their generosity. This morning is also sponsored for the refuah sheleimah of Yaakov ben Sarah, should have a complete and speedy painless refuah sheleimah. Reminder right after shiur, everyone's invited and urged to stay. We'll complete all of sefer Tehillim several times. The more who stay, the easier it is to give out and the more who can join and participate. Okay as always we're going to share some emunah emails, emunah stories from you. Thank you to those who share and uplift and inspire all of us. And then we'll continue and hopefully finish today Rav Druck's sicha from now a little over a month ago about the time we find ourselves in. We've been talking about the kol kol Yaakov, the yadayim yedey Eisav. When our kol is the kol of Yaakov, when we can express and we can pronounce and we can proudly promote and practice our Yiddishkeit, then the yadayim yedey Eisav, the hands of Eisav cannot win. It's either or. They're incompatible. They don't go together. That's what Chazal understood. We saw last time that's what Yitzchak observed. Yitzchak says this doesn't add up. This doesn't go together. Something's incompatible here. I hear the kol kol Yaakov, it sounds like Yaakov, but these hands feel like Eisav and they don't ever go together. They're incompatible. They don't go together. So Chazal understood that when the kol is kol Yaakov, when we are talking like Jews, behaving like Jews, acting like Jews, practicing like Jews, proud Jews, the yadayim yedey Eisav then the Eisavs can't lay a hand on us. And when we are ashamed and assimilated and embarrassed and hiding and defensive and apologetic about our Yiddishkeit, when our Yiddishkeit is muted and silenced and we lower the volume on it, then yadayim yedey Eisav, then anti-Semites know, pounce. This is your moment. This is when they jump. So our mission, part of our responsibility now, we saw that the battlefield is of course the battlefield, Gaza, the north, the north seems to be heating up even more, it's very, very scary. We daven for all those in the south, in the north, and all throughout the width and breadth and for Jews around the world right now. We daven. And those are front lines and those are battlefields and that's where it's all taking place. But we know what really informs the outcome of that battlefield is the other battlefield, which is the shul, the beis medrash and wherever we are with every Tehillim you open, with every zechus that you earn, with every meritorious behavior, every good choice, every improvement, every effort to be a better us, every time that we live with emunah, when we welcome and invite and see and feel Hashem in our life. This is His world. And He's waving right at us and He's saying "I'm here" and maybe some of us were failing to notice. We were living and coasting through life, either not seeing Him behind the struggles and challenges or not crediting Him with the wonderful good and the triumph and the success and the success and I was recently reading, I don't remember where, I was reading somebody who was talking about emunah. They were talking about a friend who was going through a very, very hard time. And the friend came to them and confided in them all the difficulty and all the challenge and all the circumstance and the hard time they were having and they said two words, "Why me?" Why me? Yesterday in the parsha class we spoke about schar giddel banim versus giddel banim. Normal raising your children challenge and exceptional challenge. When the giddel banim only gives you tzar, when you put your heart and soul into raising children and all you got out of it was pain and anguish. So there are people they go through a hard time and the person said "Why me?" A health challenge, a financial challenge, a relationship challenge, whatever the challenge, "Why me?" So this person answered his friend and he said, "How old are you?" And the person was, I don't know, say in his 40s. He said, "Let me ask you, your first 40 years of life, your first four decades, how were they?" Things were pretty well, everyone was healthy, I made a living, life was good. He said, "Did you ever stop and say 'Why me?' I got a new car, why me? I got a raise at work, why me? I made money, the stock did well, I sold at a high, why me? I got my annual checkup, the labs, everything came out looked great, looks great, why me?" You never say "Why me?" when everything's going well, you say, "Of course me! Makes sense! Makes sense! I take good care of myself, I work hard, I earn a lot of money, I'm smart, I'm ambitious. What do you mean why? Of course me!" So if you never said why me when everything was going well, why should you feel it's okay to say why me when you run into a wall? You ran into a challenge. That all of a sudden is why me? If you thought you deserved one way, then who says whatever the outcome is, the outcome is. So if you didn't ask why me when everything was well, then don't ask why me when you're struggling. All of it, all of it's not about you. Of course it's all about you, but it's not about you. It's Hashem. Hashem is the one who delivers the success and the breakthrough. There are many people as smart, many people worked as hard, many people went to the same school, many people put in the same effort, and they didn't have the outcome you did. So should you be proud of the work you did? Yes. You worked hard? Absolutely. Be proud, but realize you're the junior partner, the senior partner, it's all Hashem. And you should say why me? Hashem you're amazing, I don't deserve it. Katonti mikol hachasadim, I'm undeserving of all of your kindness. Why me? I'm undeserving, but thank you, endlessly thank you. Thank you for a blessed life, thank you for a good lab report, thank you for a good doctor's visit, thank you for a good paycheck, thank you for a good... why me? Really I'm taka, I woke up this morning, I opened my eyes, my legs work, my hands work, my lungs... why me? Somebody else didn't wake up this morning. Somebody else woke up and things aren't the same. I'm sharing with you these Emuna emails. Why me? Why me? So never take too much credit, you don't deserve all the credit when it works, and don't ask why me when things don't go right. It's always all about Hashem when we lean in, when we surrender, when we submit, when we recognize, when we invite, when we welcome, when we engage this relationship, this conversation, when we talk to Him and we hear Him talking to us, when we express that Kol kol Yaakov, that Yiddishe neshama, that Jewish soul, the Jewish soul that's crying out and calling out, the Jewish soul that knows and feels it's part of something so much bigger. I think one big change for Klal Yisrael since October 7th is that there were Jews, even practicing Jews, observant Jews, Orthodox Jews, Torah Jews, but Hashem was missing from the equation. They were just going through motions of life. Gotta do my davening, I keep my kosher, I keep my Shabbos, the next Yom Tov's coming up, I put my kid in the right school, motions, the motions, the motions. And October 7th and it shook us, and it startled us, and it's still doing it. When we wake up in the middle of the night, later, early in the morning, when we're finally supposed to get up and we keep checking our phone and נבך רחמנא ליצלן לא עלינו we keep seeing faces and names and young ages and boys and it's endless. It's endless how painful, how painful. And we feel I'm part of something so much bigger than myself. I'm part of a people, I'm part of a nation, I'm part of a purpose, I'm part of a story, I'm part of a destiny. This is so much bigger. Until now we were just thinking where's my kid going to camp, what are we doing for Pesach, do I have the latest fashion, did I try the latest charcuterie, do I have the whatever was on our mind. Not to say that people's lives were so wonderful, they didn't also have difficult challenges to think about, but and now people are still doing all that, but it's also in the context there's something bigger. There's a Hashem and this is His world and אין לנו על מי להישען we have no one to lean on other than Hashem, and the whole world's a narrow place and the main thing is not to be afraid, and we are maaminim bnei maaminim, we are people of faith, the children of people of faith. It got us through slavery of 210 years in Egypt, it got us through the Inquisition and the Crusades and the Holocaust, and being the children, people of faith, the children of people of faith will get us through. We are maaminim bnei maaminim. And this is a time of a gut check of Kol kol Yaakov. You know it's not enough to just see that news, look at that WhatsApp or that notification and... or even to cry or to forward the video or to... it's not enough. How does it change us and transform us? How are we forever different? What did it awaken within us? What did it arouse within us? What did it transform within us? Where is our Kol kol Yaakov? How are we different Jews? How are we different Jews? And it can be measured in so many different ways. It can be measured by your bank account. What will your bank statement say? When your grandchildren and great-grandchildren will pore through your bank statements, I'm not saying they will or they can, but in theory, if they would pore through your bank statements after October 7th, what will they find? How many contributions and donations, how many efforts, how many times did you respond when there was need for tactical gear or vests or helmets or food or relief or mental health support? What will your calendar say? Where were you, what were you doing? Did you make the time, did you stay for the Tehillim? What will it all say about us? What was our Kol kol Yaakov? What will our lives look like? Did we take on certain kabbalos, certain practices? I started... doing X, I really worked hard on Y. I was recognizably measurably different after October 7th. You know before October 7th, they would get angry and be outraged about everything. But afterwards they had perspective and scope they reframed everything in life, they saw what was important and what were priorities, and they were a different person. They were patient and kind and peaceful and looking for common ground and not looking to be outraged and angry about everything. Maybe maybe we'll have shalom in the world if we could have shalom in our bayis, in our marriage and with our children and with friends and with family and with colleagues and in partners and in life. Again there are million examples I could give of different things we can work on but our kol is to be the Kol Yaakov, the Kol Yaakov. So let me read to you some emails and we'll get back to Rav Druck's piece. Hi Rabbi Goldberg. My husband and I are serving as a couple on campus in a certain campus in a certain community. I never really know when it's appropriate to share my story sometimes I feel like it's so intense overwhelms people but I want to share with you listening to the weekly emunah shiur I feel like it might be a story of emunah. We served in a small community which is a posh community of traditional Jews in a certain place but very few observant families. Really sweet warm community we arrived in the second lockdown of the pandemic and bought a used car during the fourth month we were there. I was eight months pregnant with our fourth child. I was driving by myself up the motorway to collect some cake and pizza for the kosher shops when the car completely shut down in the middle of the middle lane. I tried restarting the car shifting gears but nothing helped. I lowered my window to yell for help all within maybe the 60 to 90 seconds I had before I knew someone was going to hit me from behind. Can't imagine the car shuts down you can't get it started you're in the middle of the highway cars are whizzing by and coming up in the rearview mirror and you're helpless. Nothing you can do. I got nervous just reading this email. I kept watching the rearview mirror and saw one car swerve out to the side and it didn't hit me. And as corny as it sounds I started saying Shema Yisrael because I thought this was it. I blacked out and I remember vague scenes from the medics that put me on the ambulance. I woke up in the hospital to make a long story short Baruch Hashem the baby was fine they were monitoring her. I had a small puncture in my spleen it healed itself and bruising and a sore back. My husband looked at the pictures of the car and the car seats after the accident for the police report and the car was crushed like an accordion. Baruch Hashem there was no one else in the car with me, didn't look like the airbags deployed from the pictures anyway. I was someone of emunah before the accident and I was shaken by the accident and went around thinking how am I alive? Why did Hashem choose to save me? And now after the accident I know I have full faith that Hashem wants me to continue on my journey through life to fulfill my mission to raise my family to continue my avodas hakodesh. But during that moment would that be emunah? Was I accepting the fact that Hashem had decided this might be the end? It wasn't. So now it's obvious to me I have emunah I'm still miraculously here but before I also had emunah Hashem does everything for a reason. A lot of the stories you share are ones where emunah has a quote unquote moment and I wonder if there is an emunah moment in there. And I think there is one. And I think it's a powerful email to me because a lot of people could live those moments and say where is Hashem and why me? The car had to break down, I had to get hit from behind, I had to puncture my spleen, I had to be in an ambulance and hospitalized, why me and where is Hashem? And there's two ways that we can see things. I spoke about it last Shabbos, it might be the article for this week I'll see how much time I have to write something else but Yosef HaTzaddik who Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks zichrono livracha talked about as introducing us to the concept of the cognitive reframing that's used today in cognitive therapy, reframing: the same picture but put a new frame around it. When you put a new frame around the same picture you see it differently. And you know how we think impacts how we feel how we feel impacts how we behave and how we respond and when we put a new frame we could see that same old tired picture in a new light. And the picture that made us feel one way we can feel different, we can see it differently by putting a new frame around it. Yosef saw the same picture as his brothers how he was thrown in a pit and sold into slavery and abandoned for 22 years but he put a different frame around it that Hashem had done so for a mission and instead of looking back with negative energy and negative feelings of the past that new frame gave him a positive perspective on his future. And I spoke about on Shabbos the mother of one of those hostages who could have heroically been welcomed home and instead was accidentally shot and killed by one of our own but she put a different frame around it and she invited those soldiers to come give her a hug and sent her love and talked about it being for a purpose and she put a new frame and all of us could put a frame around that picture. And I think these emails are another example. Rabbeinu Bachya writes in his Shaar HaBitachon, Rabbeinu Bachya writes that emunah is the frame we put around every picture. The picture could be a glorious picture of a simcha, it could be a picture of your promotion at work, it could be a picture of breaking through with prosperity, it could be a picture of your lab report and how wonderful everything is and you put the frame of emunah. Thank you Hashem it wasn't random it wasn't chance and I don't deserve all the credit there's a frame of emunah. And it could be a picture of a car accident. Could be a picture of a bad lab report. Could be a picture of getting fired, or the person breaking up with you, or the shidduch not working out, and you could still put a picture of frame of emuna and bitachon and dveykus around even such a picture. It's what Yosef Hatzadik did, it's what the mother, it's what the mother did, and it's what these emails. This young woman who write me that wrote me that email, wrote us, not me, wrote us that email. She's putting the frame of I was in this car accident, baruch Hashem the baby's okay and I was okay, but she doesn't put the frame of bitterness and resentment and why me and where was Hashem and why did I have to go through that. Instead it's thank you Hashem and it's a new lease on life and I'm still here for a reason and I have a lot of work to do. What a frame. I want to go to that framing store. Is that Michaels? Where where can you get such a frame? That's the only store I know to get frames. Amazon? Where can you order such a frame? You know where you order such a frame? You order such a frame, living with emuna, רבנו בחיי שער הביטחון, the countless emuna email WhatsApp groups, sefarim, books, and so on. Couple more emails quickly and then back to the text, because the emunas are powerful as the Torah. To see people living it, practicing it, and painting a picture for us how we can too, it's powerful. And these next two are unbelievable. I want to thank you for the emuna shiurim blah blah blah blah blah. I'm not one to write the rabbi, blah blah blah. Only because during the shiur you say send letters I want to express hakarat hatov and share this story with you, probably which wouldn't have happened without the shiurim. One day when I was driving, today's brought to you by car accidents, one day when I was driving, I was stopped at a stop sign and happening, nothing is by chance, to be listening to the emuna shiur when someone hit my car from behind. First I was annoyed because this is annoying and inconvenient. I'll have to get the car fixed, my ride home was going to take longer than expected, and then I realized I'm in the middle of listening to the emuna shiur and I said to myself, maybe this is what Hashem wants. This is what's supposed to happen. Let's see what adventure this takes me on. Right, one of the things that we talk about is when you live life, when you look through the windshield of emuna, not a windshield of bitterness and misery and resentment and anger, when you look through the windshield of emuna, you say ooh an adventure! Let's see, let's see where this takes me next. I got out the car, the man not Jewish asked if we could settle it between us and not go through insurance. I thought to myself, I want to be nice, but I don't want him to take advantage of me, I need to do my hishtadlus. So I said let's get a police report and be happy to settle it without insurance afterwards. After the police report we went our separate ways. Over the next couple of days I got a few different quotes from local body shops to fix the car. Various body shops said it would take four to five days to fix the car, we'd need a rental car while it was being repaired. I shared the estimates with him including the cost of the rental. He was very upset about how much it was going to cost. He said I was trying to take advantage of him. I reminded him I was being kind I could have just gone through insurance. He apologized and requested I use a body shop that he had used and located near where he lived. I did my independent research and it was a reputable body shop. This man works as part of the ambassador's office for the Bahamas. Interesting. On the one hand the body shop was thirty minute drive from my house, one hour round trip. It was inconvenient to go. On the other hand with everything going on in the world I thought to myself, maybe this is what Hashem wants, I can make a kiddush Hashem. The downside is I lose an hour plus of my time. I agreed I would go. I met him at the body shop he requested. The body shop charged much less and fixed the car the same day. I agreed to go with the body shop and asked this man how I should get to work after I drop off the car. I thought he would say he would pay for an Uber or a car service. Instead to my surprise he said he would drive me, forty five minutes out of his way. I would never tell any child of mine or lady to get in a car with a stranger, though for myself I felt he wasn't going to try to hurt me. A few weeks later I was called by the auto body shop that the piece was in, I should bring in my car. I brought the car the next day at 8 AM and called the man. I gave him an out. I said if he's busy I could take an Uber. He told me he'd be there in ten minutes to pick me up. First fifteen minutes of the car ride he was telling me about his values, his views of materialism, about his kids, asking about mine. Then he started telling me he's a Seventh-day Adventist. He continues he's getting more frum by not going to restaurants on the Sabbath. He's praying each day to the God of Abraham. He asked me what I know about Jesus. I responded I know he was a Jew. Then he asked me how I thought I, we, Jews are the chosen people. Thanks to other shiurim from you I felt I had good responses. I responded to him with a question. In your religion, do people look up to the priest? He responded yes. I asked him is that because the priest is a man of high standards, morals, and leads by example to be a role model? He said yes. I asked him if the priest was better than everyone else in the congregation? He said no. So I said we the Jewish people are a nation of priests. We were chosen to be a nation of priests to be a people of high moral standards, to be role models. I asked him if he could imagine how much better the world would be if all the nations viewed themselves with the same responsibility. He seemed impressed, it was nothing he had heard before. After more talk I asked him that I don't believe there are many Jews in the Bahamas, has he ever met a Jew before? He responded I was the first Jew he ever met. This was the reason he wanted to drive me. He had questions that he wanted to ask someone but didn't feel comfortable to ask anyone he thought he could ask me. As we pulled up to work and I'm about to step out, I felt he pulled a script from Malki-Tzedek and started giving me and my family blessings of success and happiness and said it was a pleasure to meet me. As I walked away I thought to myself, this is the reason Hashem wanted me to go through this journey. Maybe there's more to it and he'll call me back one day. If you have any feedback advice I'd love to always hear blah blah blah blah shiur blah blah blah blah. So he said he understood, right? So you could, you could look at the picture: I was just hit from behind, hit from behind, fender bender, I gotta go to the shop, it's an hour out of the way, I'm gonna be without my car. Or you could put the frame around the picture that says, ooh, an adventure! Let's see where it goes, let's see why this happened. Sometimes we get an answer, sometimes we don't. In this case, the man chose through that frame to see he had a chance to make a kiddush Hashem. Can you put a value on a kiddush Hashem? Is there a time that's worth spending on kiddush Hashem? Kiddush Hashem in today's world, growing anti-semites and the Jewish brand taking a hit, and you have the chance to make a kiddush Hashem? Ooh-ah! Who knows the trickle down? Who knows this man from the Bahamas, how else it gets spread and so on. Last email, then the learning. I saved the most powerful for last. Wow. My name is blank and I'm from blank. I've been listening to shiurim regularly for a few years. I'd like to share an emunah story with you, highlighting the impact the emunah shiurim have had on me and how listening regularly really does make a difference. Apologies in advance, it's quite long. It sounds like me at the beginning of a drasha. My husband and I got married a year and a half ago and after living in such a place for nine months, we moved to Israel after Pesach to join a kollel. We set on our path to share our goals of doing our part for Klal Yisrael. Our story begins on the first day of Selichos. My husband was riding his electric bike to kollel through a valley in a certain community in Israel when he was attacked by hyenas. Did you know there were hyenas near Yerushalayim? He called me straight away, not remembering exactly what happened, but somehow waking up after around 15 minutes covered in blood, 200 meters from where he remembered last being. After visiting the local doctor's clinic due to the possibility of a concussion and memory loss, we were advised to go to a different clinic, sent to the emergency room for a CT scan to make sure all was okay. You ready? To cut a long story short, we were asked to stay overnight in the hospital. Doctor said something they weren't happy about in the CT scan. Following meetings with different medical professionals and an MRI at 4:30 AM, we met with the head of the neurosurgery department to be told that my husband had a brain tumor. To say we were shocked is an understatement. He had no symptoms whatsoever of a brain tumor. Following a whirlwind of medical tests, over 20 rabies shots, meeting with medical askanim and rabbanim, our mothers flying out from wherever they were to be with us, we asked a sheila, we were encouraged to go ahead with the surgery just a week later, two days after Rosh Hashana. My husband was released from the hospital three days later, a few days before Yom Kippur. As you can imagine, it was a surreal Yom Kippur experience, overwhelming gratitude to Hashem for a successful resection surgery and my husband being unable to fast on Yom Kippur without even relying on minimal shiurim for the first time in his life. Unfortunately, two weeks after surgery, Chol HaMoed Succos, we had to rush in an ambulance to hospital. My husband had meningitis, needing emergency surgery to stop internal bleeding in the brain and remove part of his skull bone that had become infected. He ended up needing to be in the hospital over two weeks following the surgery to fight the life-threatening meningitis infection. This is where we were when the incomprehensible events of October 7th took place. Struggling to cope with our own reality while hearing the horrific news compounded our feeling of devastation and overwhelm. To add another moment of hashgacha pratis, my husband's cousin—listen to this story which was in a major Jewish magazine a few weeks ago—my husband's cousin was driving home in Yerushalayim, my husband's cousin was driving home in Yerushalayim when two women standing on the side of the road as their car had broken down. He offered them a lift to the bus station and while passing the area, one lady turned to the other and said, "Oh, this is where Yehuda was attacked." This sounded familiar and sure enough, these two ladies just happened to be two of the amazing nurses who looked after my husband in the neurosurgery ward. Of all the people to give a lift to, and of all the people to offer a lift, what are the chances it would be my husband's cousin and these nurses who cared for him? A clear indication that Hashem runs the world. I strongly feel that without the foundation that learning about emunah has given me, I would have fallen apart during this time. Believe me, I definitely have been struggling; I haven't included the details of the story that are truly traumatic, but I shudder to think of how indeed if I would have been able to cope without the lessons I learned and internalized from the emunah shiurim. I wear a ring every day, she says, I wear a ring every day—I don't know where you order the frame and I'm not sure where you order the ring—but I wear a ring every day that says Ein Od Milvado. There is no one but Hashem. Sitting in the neurosurgeon's office hearing that my husband had a brain tumor and literally feeling my world collapse, looking at my hand and my finger and seeing the reminder there's no one else but Hashem running our lives, and the doctors, medical professionals, and even the hyenas themselves are just shlichim, they're agents of Hashem, kept me going. The doctors, the nurses, and The doctors, the nurses, and the hyenas are all agents of Hashem. She shows other challenges. The hashgacha pratis in our story astounds those around us every day. If my husband hadn't taken that specific route to Yeshiva, which he'd only discovered from a friend who'd only joined the kollel a couple weeks before hand, he wouldn't have been attacked by hyenas, which never have been known to attack humans in Yerushalayim before or since the incident. We wouldn't have been referred to a CT scan, we wouldn't have discovered my husband had a brain tumor, quite possibly until he was experiencing symptoms which often is indicative of a large late-stage tumor and much riskier potential outcome. Baruch Hashem we've seen firsthand how Hashem runs our lives, turning something seemingly terrible into the biggest bracha we could have ever imagined. If this realization doesn't boost our emuna, I can't imagine what will. This isn't one of those amazing stories where we can see how emuna had a direct impact on the outcome. We're still very much only in the beginning of the journey. But this is a true account of how having emuna muscles ready can carry us through any given situation. After all, it's all from him. I'm not going to give you his name. She gives it to me, but please continue to daven in her tefillos that he should have a speedy and complete refuah shleimah. I hope the hyenas are okay. I don't have their name, I don't have their name to daven for them, but again, she could say: why did he need a brain tumor? Why did there need to be hyenas? Why did he take that route? Why did he have to have meningitis? But she puts the frame around the picture. The picture's not going to change. The reality is the hyenas were there. The reality is the brain tumor was there. The reality is the meningitis came. It's all the frame that you put around it. And these are examples of emails, that's why I read them as much as we learn this text, because they are real living practical examples for us. When the picture gets not so happy and good for us, that we have the frame that we could put around it. And that frame, have the ring that you can spin on your finger, Ein od milvado sitting in that office, waiting for those results, going through that challenging circumstance, waiting by the phone, have that ring. Where's that? Can we produce? Is Ilana here? Maybe we need to put our logo on a ring, make a little money for the shul. Ein od milvado rings, Ein od milvado cups, and turn the page notebooks, and our hats, and our whole merch of emuna. Emuna merch. So we're in those moments. Ein od milvado, ein od milvado. My good friend Big Ben on his steering wheel has Ki ata imadi. Hashem you're with me. Ki ata imadi wherever you are on his steering wheel. I get the picture every morning on his way to the daf in the dark. Ki ata imadi which is good. The sticker reminds him, and then he reminds me. Ki ata imadi. Hashem you're with me. I don't fear anything. I could walk through the valley of hyenas, it's a new translation of Kapitel Chof Gimmel. I could walk through the valley of hyenas and I fear no evil ki ata imadi because you're with me, ki ata imadi, ein od milvado, ki ata imadi. Put it on bumper stickers and billboards and rings and mirrors and steering wheels and wherever you need to because that is the message. We are in the second side of this maimer, this sicha of Rav Druck about the Hakol kol Yaakov and how Chazal understood when Yitzchak says it's incompatible. It's either or, it can't be and. We can't be proclaiming our kol Yaakov, we can't be proud practicing Jews and yedei Eisav, the hands of Eisav will be strong. It's either or. The hands of Eisav are strong because we need to look in the mirror and check, is the kol kol Yaakov, is our voice the proud strong voice of Yaakov? וכן מבואר בחז"ל סנהדרין. One, two, three, four, the fifth paragraph down, this also appears in the Gemara Sanhedrin דף קח עמוד ב. The Gemara in Sanhedrin שכל זמן שהיה המבול נאסרו נח ומשפחתו בתשמיש המטה ופירש רש"י בפרשת נח שהטעם הוא משום דכיון שהעולם שרוי בצער אזי מחוייב אדם להשתתף בצער ואסור לו לומר שלום עלי נפשי אין אדם יכול לפרוש מן הציבור. Rav Druck is emphasizing again, nobody can say, "I'm good, I'm healthy, I'm happy, I have the same head count, I feel safe and secure". If Klal Yisrael's in a eis tzara, if the Jewish people are in a time of crisis and difficulty, then we're all in a time of crisis and difficulty. If the left hand is bruised or broken, the right hand doesn't say, "I'm good, my fingers are working, elbow's working, bones are all whole". The right hand doesn't say "I'm good". If the left hand's broken, the right hand says, "Ouch, we're broken, we're hurt, we're in pain". All of Klal Yisrael, we are one people, we are one body, we're one whole. And if part are hurting, we're all hurting. And we have to be, we can't be poreish min hatzibur, a person cannot separate or be apart. And so we see that, the whole time they were in the teiva, Noach and his family were in the ark, and they refrained. enjoying, experiencing pleasure would be inappropriate. So they abstained and they refrained and we've spoken about the examples of the people who say while this war is going on, no chocolate, taking away one of my pillows. I'm going to hold off no manicures. I'm going to hold off on something. Someone here right now changed their schedule and gave up something they love to be at the Amuna Shiur. Happens to be she gave up exercise. Now most of us would be like I'll take one for the team, I'll go to shiur, one less exercise. This person loves exercise, one of those strange people, likes exercise, and gave up something she craves and loves because she said right now during this war, I gotta show up, part of the front line, our front line, Amuna Shiur, our front line, finishing Tehillim afterwards, our front line is showing up. No soldier can call in and say I'm tired, I need a break, I'm out, I'm done, I disagree, but I really want to be doing something else. They don't have that luxury. They can't take off their boots, they don't have a normal night's sleep, they haven't had a normal meal, they don't have that luxury and neither can we. That was Noach on the teivah, the Gemara in Sanhedrin says this is a precedent. When the world around us is being reset with a flood, when there's a flood of anti-Semitism, and a flood of hate, and a flood of missiles, and a flood of loss, we can't be in our little teivah. We can't be in our little ark, our little cocoon, protected, happy, and gleeful, and indifferent to the pain around us. וקל וחומר בנדון של קל וחומר שכולנו נמצאים בתוך אותה צרה ומלחמה. And it's not that we're in a teivah. We're in the same war. We are the targets of the same enemies. והסיבה שעדיין אנחנו נמצאים בתוך המערכה הזאת ואין מסתיימת המלחמה הזאת משום שחסר עדיין קול קול יעקב. Why isn't this war over? Every day this war continues, says Rav Druck, is not because we don't have enough soldiers or we ran out of ammunition or because there are more tunnels or because there are more ambushes or because the UN or other countries are holding us back, that's not why this war is not over. We need to live simultaneously when you live and look at the world through a windshield, through the glasses of Emunah, then there is the physical world and the metaphysical world. You know, we're all obsessed and consumed with the news, but the news only describes the physical world. It's only giving you the data, the statistics, the update, it's only giving you the alert and the alarm over everything in the physical world. Fighting in the north of Gaza, the south of Gaza, in this community and we surround and we took over this tunnel and we sent in the canines and can you believe a car can drive through the tunnel and up north and these missiles were launched and here's what's happening and a drone was shot down and you got the in Yemen and you got the American the carrier. All the news and all the alerts and all the updates is only giving us a perspective, it's only telling us what's going on, a window into the physical war and the physical world, and it's truth and it's important and stay informed and care and be motivated and move to daven from it, but that's only a small part of the picture. There's a much bigger picture going on. We as believing Jews believe that what happens in the physical world is a shadow and it's a reflection of the metaphysical world. What's happening down here is because of what the parallel that's happening up there. So if there's a war still going on down here, it's because the yadayim yedei Esav energy in the world is still strong and it needs to be offset by a prouder and bolder and stronger kol kol Yaakov, voice of Yaakov. There's a war, there's tension, there's conflict physically and there's a war, there's a tension, there's a conflict metaphysically. Metaphysically there are energies and metaphysically there are ideals and ideologies that are at war. This is not just physical war. This is a war of ideologies, a war of energies, this is a metaphysical war, this is a battle of the cosmos and that's what we need to be focused on in our battlefront and our contribution to this conflict and to this war, to being counted and to show up. הלכה ידועה שעשו שונא את יעקב. We know Chazal tell us that there's an institution of anti-Semitism ever since Esav and Yaakov, two twin brothers, ever since that original conflict, עשו שונא את יעקב. The offspring and progeny of Esav, who are the offspring and progeny of Esav are Edom. Edom, the galus of Edom. And who is Edom? Christendom, Rome. And what's Rome? Rome, the Rome is the the galus, the exile of Rome, and who are the offspring of Rome? Christendom, Christianity, which we forget because there was supposedly some progress and change. But for two millennia and longer, essentially since it began, Christianity was responsible for persecution, oppression, and mass murder of Jews. I posted yesterday because I was so upset about it. It doesn't do anything but makes me feel better when I write something. So I posted yesterday, I think the Pope is egregiously irresponsible with his words and his moral equivalence of Israel's war. AOC, yimach shemah, makhshefah, and CNN having a priest on on December 25th calling Jesus a Palestinian and vilifying Israel, given Christianity's history of genocide against Jews, nothing short, the responsibility to be particularly accurate and to stand up for Israel at this time, where are our Christian friends to stand up for Israel, to stand up for Jews, to try to repair and atone for their mistakes of the past and not repeat it now and be responsible with their words because Esav soneh l'Yaakov. Esav soneh l'Yaakov and many and some have and we could and should be very grateful to them. In fact, I don't know who they are, when I wrote this on Twitter yesterday, an anonymous woman wrote, 'I'm a Christian and absolutely it's wrong and I stand with Israel' and I'm grateful, we should be grateful and we should thank and reward and appreciate those who are and those who are getting it right. Esav soneh l'Yaakov. Esav is Rome, Rome is Christendom, and for two millennia, including in the Holocaust in which they were complicit, as recent as the Holocaust, and while there's supposed to be a change and a shift, it seems to me a setback and there should be a clarification. And then of course we have Yishmael and the offspring of Yishmael and Yishmael's battle with Yitzchak and the battle between the offspring of Yishmael and the offspring of Yitzchak. And Yishmael's described as pere adam, a wild beast of a person, a pere adam. Barbaric, a barbaric animal people. Pere adam, Rav Hirsch writes, it doesn't say adam pere. Normally you have the noun then the adjective. A person who's handsome, person who's smart, a person who's athletic. It says pere adam because you know when it comes to Yishmael, says Rav Hirsch, pere is the noun. Pere is the noun, it's not an adjective. Being a wild barbaric inhuman, I don't even know there are words to describe, those aren't adjectives, that's the noun of who they are. And if you doubted that and if you wanted to label that as Islamophobic or hateful rhetoric, then read the accounts of October 7th. These are not human beings, human beings are incapable, or let me rephrase that, human beings who have a tzelem Elokim, who have a godly soul, are incapable of the brutal barbaric animal acts that they did which I do not need to recount right now. That's Yishmael. That's what we're up against, Esav soneh l'Yaakov, Yishmael, that's what we're up against. So don't live life only on this plane. Don't live life down here, live it also down here. Also down here that you read the news and consume the news and know the news, are informed by the news, advocate, write letters. Absolutely. If I have time the other article I'll write is about that. We're not doing a good enough job rewarding and appreciating our friends, elected officials, celebrities, people of power, of notoriety, of influence. We're not doing a good enough job punishing those getting it wrong and rewarding getting it right. We're not doing a good enough job. We're not. We're not. We have to do better. We have to do better. And we have to be engaged and work on it all down here, but don't work on it all down here where you think this is where it's all happening. That's just hishtadlus. If you're sick you have to go to the doctor, but did you get better or not, that wasn't the doctor, that's not the medicine, that's him. But he says that part of appealing to him is you got to go to the doctor. You can't not take the medicine but expect to get better. You can't not go to the doctor and expect to get better. We live in a world that Hashem said you got to go to the doctor, you got to take the medicine, but know that the medicine and the doctor they're just, they're just pawns in my hand. I'm pulling the strings. And the same is true when it comes to this war and our efforts. When it comes to everything geopolitical, yeah, there's hishtadlus, there are efforts, you got to write letters. If you want to know who to write a letter to, get on Yocheved's status, she'll tell you every five minutes who to write the next letter to. You got to write letters. You have to write letters. In protest you got to write letters, equally important, of thanks. Don't take for granted oh that congressman gets it who needs to thank him. You need to thank him, you know why? Because his office is getting at a ratio of 100 to 1 letters angry at him for what he's doing versus thanking him. And you know what that does to the staff of that congressman? You know what that does to the campaign chair who's worried about his getting reelected? So you got to write letters to say thank you, not just to protest. And we have to, we have to live down here. But we also have to live up here. Chevre, come with me. We gotta go up. We gotta climb higher. We have to live up here. Down here is the elected officials, down here it's administrations, down here it's the UN, down here it's sending money, down here it's getting informed of the news. But we gotta live up here. Up here, it's Esau against Yaakov. Up here it's Yishmael against Yitzchak. Up here it's good against evil. Up here, it's the Kol kol Yaakov against the yadayim yedei Esau. And we gotta live up there too. We gotta see Hakadosh Baruch Hu, we gotta see these energies at work, we gotta see ideologies and a conflict of good and evil. Don't just live down here. Climb higher! Also down here, like Yaakov taught us: סולם מוצב ארצה וראשו מגיע השמימה. You gotta have your feet firmly planted but your head up in the heavens. We can and must live in both places simultaneously. It's what it means to be a Jew. To live here on Earth, to operate here on Earth, to take initiative here on Earth, but simultaneously be trying to get a glimpse and a vision from the heavens. To go with our spiritual drone. Spiritual drone to see from up there what's happening down here. To see what... this is not just people fighting. These aren't just numbers. These aren't statistics. There's something bigger going on. Kal vachomer, the Kol kol Yaakov ועדיין לא זעקנו מספיק את הצעקה גדולה ומרה. And if the yadayim yedei Esav and we're waking up to hear more soldiers, oy, more soldiers Rachmana litzlan are killed, if that's what we wake up to, it's because tza'aka gedola umara, our prayer is not loud enough, heartfelt enough, passionate enough. וכפי שכאשר יצאו בני ישראל ממצרים ורדפו אחריהם המצרים, when the Jewish people left Egypt and the Egyptians were pursuing us, ויצעקו בני ישראל אל השם. we cried out to Hashem. Uperesh Rashi: Tafsu umnus avosam. We grabbed onto the umnus of our forefathers. וזו היא אומנות אבותינו. What does it mean umnus? This is the... what's the word umnus? Umnus? No, the umnus is the craft. The hobby, the craft, the expertise, the passion, the project of our forefathers. What was it? What did they teach us? What did they hand off to us? לזעוק ולהתפלל ולהריע אל השם. They taught us that you don't just go to a doctor, you also cry out to Hashem. You don't just go to work and try to earn more money, you also cry out to Hashem. You don't just try to have the baby, you also call out and cry to Hashem. They taught us, they handed us that formula, those keys, they gave us that precedent and that model. That you can try all you want down here, but if all you're doing is engaging and trying down here, you're fighting, you're battling, you're going to a doctor, you're working, if all you're doing is operating down here, you won't succeed. We have to do what we have to do down here, but all while pouring our heart out up there. That's what they gave us, that's what they taught us. That's what Esther Hamalka. Esther Hamalka. Hanukkah is in the rearview mirror, coming up, Tu B'Shevat, Purim Katan, Purim. Purim's coming up. Start thinking about your mishloach manos. And now start thinking about toning them down and sending the money to Israel instead. Start thinking about your mishloach manos. So mishloach manos, Purim. What happened on Purim? Shushan, the Jewish people are in Haman, Achashverosh's, they're in their target, in their scope. Wants to destroy, annihilate, exterminate the Jewish people. Exterminate the Jewish people. You know, thanks to AI, Hamas just yesterday released a video using AI as a little fake documentary of the murder of Bibi Netanyahu. They put it out, scary, it looks so real because AI can make it. And at the end it says brought to you by Haman, by Haman. It's Hamas, Haman, they go together. That's who they are. They're part of the same genealogy, the same family, I think. I saw that quickly. I think I saw it say that brought to you by... So what happened in that story? Haman, Achashverosh want to eliminate, exterminate the Jewish people, annihilate. And what do Esther and Mordechai do? They concoct a plan that includes lobbying, letter writing, advocating, make a party, get on Achashverosh's good side, give him a few lechayims, and then you're going to ask him. Is that all they do? That's what you got to do down here. Down here, make three parties, earn favor, get Achashverosh positioned well, you know, give him some... give him some lechayims. You got to advocate, lobby, fight, argue, ask. That's all down here. But what really was the game changer? What shifts the entire story? What shifts the entire story, he continues, is צומו עלי ואל תאכלו ואל תשתו שלשת ימים. Esther calls Mordechai and says, "Get the message out, send out an email, constant contact, phone tree, put it online social media, tell everyone: Tzumu alai, fast for three days. לך כנוס את כל... Go and gather all the Jewish people. We can no longer be divided. For judicial reform, against judicial reform, Charedi, Chiloni, Tzioni, forget about all that. Who cares about any of that? None of that will matter if we're all six feet under. None of that will matter if we're all burning in the crematoria. None of that mattered in the Holocaust, none of that matters now. Put that all aside, לך כנוס את כל היהודים, Esther says. Go gather with unity everybody, set aside the differences, find the commonality, our common destiny, our common history, our common enemy. לך כנוס את כל היהודים, go get everybody and sumu alai and fast for me because whether I'll be successful when I write the letter, when I make the meeting, when I go and ask, whether it will work out or not, you know what it depends on? How hard you daven, how well you fast, how much you earn, it's not down here, come we gotta go up there both. We're traveling on two highways simultaneously. We've got to be in both places at the same time. ומרדכי זאג זעקה גדולה ומרה and Mordechai let out a primordial scream, a great bitter and resonant scream, כיון שידע תמיד כי רק התפילה והזעקה לה' יכולה להציל אותם מן המלחמות הצרות והגזירה שבאה עליהם, because they knew and they understood, yes the meeting, yes the lobbying, yes the advocacy, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, but all of that without that, gornisht helfen. Because לב מלכים ביד ה', because the heart of kings and the heart of Congressmen, the heart of senators, the heart of presidents, the heart of prime ministers, is all in the hands of Hashem. So yes we have to go through our motions, we have to make our effort, we have to take our initiative down here, in whatever individual issue we have in life or collectively what our people are going through, but all of that has to be informed and animated and inspired and against the backdrop of what's going on up there. We have to live and see both simultaneously. We have to be in both places. We have to be informed on both parts. We have to be fighting both fights. We have to be battling. Because if the yadayim yedei Esav are still winning, and they're not winning, we are winning this war by a large margin and we will finish them off, im yirtzeh Hashem, it will be complete. But every soldier, I'll end with this. Baruch Hashem with great pride we have lots of nephews and cousins, like all of you, serving right now in the IDF. Woke up today to a picture of my nephew, my sister's son in Gaza, in his uniform. It's proud, he's proud, he looks amazing, but that backdrop is scary. Standing against a backdrop of a bombed-out, destroyed place, and we know the threats that loom all over it. We have tremendous pride and every day that we wake up and you see the names and the faces and you don't know them, you exhale a little bit. And if you're like me, then every day you feel horrifically guilty and beat yourself up. Why did I exhale? It's not my nephew but it's somebody's nephew. It's not my son or grandson, but it's somebody's son or grandson. So how could we exhale? That's how we have to feel about every one of these boys. Every one of these boys. And I don't understand Hashem's plan, but it's like He said, I'm only going to find the most handsome, the most charismatic, the ones that they have the most amazing things to say at each of their funerals. I'm only going to take the best and each one is somebody's nephew, someone's son, someone's grandson, someone's brother, someone's uncle. And so we can't exhale. The power that has to inform the passion of our tefillos, it can't get old. I know fatigue is setting in. How many times can you finish Tehillim? How many times can you be asked to buy an extra vest or boots or socks? How many barbecues can you sponsor? How many gatherings and rallies can you have? How many times can you hear the next person, the shabbos, one of the sherut leumi from another community is going to be here, her sister was murdered at the rave on October 7th, so she asked, can she share a few words. How many stories do we need to? You can't have fatigue set in. How could fatigue set in chalila, God forbid a billion times if this was our loved one, would we ever grow tired of the grief, of the mourning, of the sadness, of telling their story? So that has to be the level of tzaka gedola umara when Mordechai looked and he saw, we're about to get annihilated, we could be destroyed. That was not theoretical, it wasn't abstract, it wasn't for someone else and that has to be the intensity, the intensity of our tefillah has to remain. They can't tire, the soldiers in the frontline don't have the luxury of getting tired, fatigue can't set in for them and fatigue can't set in for us. So we went a little bit overtime, I apologize. Fatigue can't set in. We have to continue. So keep doing it down here. Yocheved status, be informed where you write letters, what you do, what's the latest, also tremendous inspiration. If you want to know who to write letters to and then you want to see something that'll make you cry and be inspired and touched. Know who to write letters to, but you gotta write letters to Him. Every day the letter to Him, that's the most important lobbying meeting you have every day. Every morning, every afternoon, every evening. Stay a little bit longer. Let's lobby together. Tehillim. Should be a great day im yirtzeh Hashem for Am Yisrael.
