Transcript
Okay good morning and Chodesh Tov sorry we're a couple of minutes late I don't think we ever have been before but it is Rosh Chodesh so we were delayed with the Iggeret HaRamban the new series on the Ramban's letter to his son great to be back together again living with Emunah. Want to thank our generous series sponsors Doctors Avi and Bella Morgan we remain incredibly grateful to them for their generosity sponsoring the series living with Emunah in memory of Rabbi Dr. Brian Gabbot in memory of Bella's mother Dr. Ellen Chenser. This morning's shiur is also sponsored by Estie Mirzov לעילוי נשמת ראובן בן חיים Ruby Grunbaum grandfather of Ari Richey Mirzov and Rina and Shlomo Berkowitz survived the Shoah whose levaya was on Yom HaShoah Nishmata shetihye l'aliyah thank you so much for your generosity. And by Bru Pool a member of our wonderful chaburah learning l'iluy nishmat her father חנוך בנימין בן אברהם she lost recently very special neshamah Nishmato shetihye l'aliyah as well an example of living with Emunah and Bru you should have a lot of nechama a lot of strength and a lot of comfort. And as well in loving memory of Ava Stein in commemoration of her third yahrzeit by her husband Colin Stein by her children Ruth Hayley and Jonathan. Ava of course also was a member of our community and of our shul and we miss her a modest and quiet but incredible example of Emunah and of growth in Yiddishkeit and her neshamah should have an aliyah as well. So thank you to all of our generous generous sponsors. Okay I mentioned over Pesach everyone was too busy to have Emunah so they didn't write any letters just joking. They had a lot of Emunah because Pesach is the Chag HaEmunah the Yom Tov of Emunah. We don't even just talk about Emunah on Pesach we don't only have props about Emunah on Pesach we actually ingest we eat Emunah on Pesach the matzah is called the michla d'mehemnuta it's the bread of Emunah I say we ingest Emunah we struggle to digest that Emunah some still have yet to digest that Emunah but we ingest that Emunah on Pesach so it is the Yom Tov of Emunah so everyone had a lot of Emunah they worked on Emunah on Pesach but they didn't have time to write about and share their Emunah. But now Pesach is over so Baruch Hashem we got an influx of Emunah emails and I'm happy to share some of them with you because you make the shiur it's not me we learn the Torah of someone else and I read the emails of someone else and I just get the privilege of sitting up here and it's an incredible incredible thing. I'll share with you with a lot of excitement it's also kind of cool it's not a flex it's because it's our collective shiur and I'm reading your letters but my daughters flew back to Israel yesterday two days ago and on their flight on El Al you can now listen to living with Emunah as one of the options the living with Emunah series is there so wow all right I don't know it's your shiur it's your shiur it's your letters but there are people who are thirty-five thousand feet in the sky and they're able to tap into your letters so when you send the letter know you're not just hitting our audience down here on the ground but you're hitting the people who are in the sky many of whom probably their head is back their eyes are closed and they're drooling but at least in theory they're listening to living with Emunah while the row in front of them is banging their knees. Anyway so here are some Emunah emails and exciting stories for this morning then we'll dive back into what we've been learning from Rav Moshe Shapiro I hope you got a chance I posted on our WhatsApp group a little biography about him about who he was I think it's really important when we learn someone's Torah to not only see their words but to know where they come from they come from a real person who had a real life and who had real experiences and that's why I shared it with you if you're not on the WhatsApp group you should join we put a lot of bonus material and follow up and other ideas there as well as well as we put the video I told you about the terror event on Erev Pesach where the gun jammed the miracle of the gun jamming הללו את השם כל גוים we don't know how many times the gun jammed Hakadosh Baruch Hu's nissim v'niflaot we know how many times it went off and we don't understand it and we object and we protest and we say Hashem we love you we accept you but we don't we don't accept we know how many times it went off but we don't know how many times it jammed and that's why only הללו את השם כל גוים those who tried and it didn't work can praise Hashem better than we I put that video there as well okay here's an email. Dear Rabbi Goldberg as you said last week no one had time to email you about their Emunah stories amidst the preparations of Pesach now it's over I want to share my Emunah story I knew it was a Rabbi Goldberg Emunah story as it was happening is there a better compliment in the world afterwards my son-in-law shared that as the story was unfolding he too kept thinking it would make a great Emunah email it had all the trappings of the trademark Emunah emails an airport flight delays thinking we should be on a different flight and realizing oh yes Hashem is in charge Baruch Hashem. All our children are in Israel my eldest daughter her husband and son and my second daughter lives there and my son is there for the year no one wanted to come home for Pesach so we happily booked tickets to join them for the chag they were raised well to begin with we were cutting it close leaving Sunday afternoon arriving early morning of Erev Pesach I had a stomach ache to begin with about the flight but kept reminding myself have Emunah it will all work out Hashem will put us where we need to be as did everyone on Motzaei Shabbat April thirteenth we were glued to the news listening to the miraculous events took place the night of I spent the next few days debating with my husband whether or not to try and change our flights. He was happy to leave them, but I was concerned and found myself caught between Hishtadlut and Emunah. And those are those moments. I find actually, and the author is completely correct, it's those moments where you're not sure what to do. How many times have you been in an airport, your flight is delayed and you say, you know, I checked, there's another flight out of LaGuardia, there's another flight here in the same airport, it's the one going up to Palm Beach, and you say, I don't know, is my initiative, is my effort, is Hashem want me to do, put that other flight on my radar, go take it, go switch to it, go change it? Or is Hashem saying, hey moron, just get out of the way, I got a plan, don't change anything, sit tight, this is where you're meant to be? And it's those place, that's that conflict, I don't know, I don't know. Am I supposed to take the Shidduch, do I take this job, do I reject this job, do I make this deal? We can believe in both. I know I need to take initiative, I need to make effort. I know that's what makes the world run. That's what the last days of Pesach were all about. The seventh and eighth day, Kriat Yam Suf, the splitting of the sea are when Hashem say, hey, close the Tehillim, close the Siddur, stop talking to me, stop being a passive spectator waiting for me, and start walking. Start walking. מה תצעק אלי דבר אל בני ישראל ויסעו, stop talking, close the Siddur, close the Tehillim, and get to the doctor. Close the Siddur, close the Tehillim, and get to work if you want a Parnassah, if you want a livelihood. So we know we need initiative. That is part of our philosophy. I like to say, I like to put it, we pray with our lips and we also pray with our hands and feet. We pray with our lips from the Siddur and the Tehillim, but we show Hashem and we pray, we demonstrate our faith through the initiative with our hands and feet. We have to also take actions, we have to take initiative. So it's that place, that intersection, that tension, that conflict between Emunah and Hishtadlut, between initiative and faith. That's where it gets complicated. That's where there is no heavenly voice whispering to us, here's what you're meant to do. Here's what you're meant to do. Take this action or sit this one out and sit still. That's where we have to figure it out on our own to the best of our ability, and that's what the author of this email is writing she was trying to do. Do I move the flight earlier? Do I sit tight where I am? In that conflict, what do we, what do we do? We've spoken about this a lot in Emunah Shiurim and shared some Torah about how to approach it. We decided to try and fly out earlier, and my husband booked us on Emirates Air to Athens and then El Al to Israel. We were to leave Wednesday night, but Wednesday afternoon, the flight to Athens was pushed to a Thursday morning, which was alright because we could still make the connecting flight to Israel. We woke up early Thursday morning to head to the airport. However, we had an email waiting for us that the flight was delayed again and we would no longer make the connecting flight. We cancelled the tickets at 6:00 AM, only to get an email at 6:30 that the flight was back on. Which is exactly what makes you doubt every time you take initiative. What are you doing? Just get out of the way, He's got a plan. At that point my husband was headed into work and with the cancelled tickets, we clearly were not getting on that plane. It was not meant to be. We learned later on in the day that there was a once-in-a-century flooding in Dubai and all flights were grounded. Baruch Hashem we had not cancelled our Sunday afternoon tickets, so we had one more chance to make it in time for Pesach. What I find most interesting about the experience was how leading up to our attempt at earlier flight, I was a ball of anxiety, not being able to think about anything else other than the flights. But then right after as we understood that we were not making it to Israel before Shabbat as we had hoped, a calm came over me and all the anxiety and worry I had carried since Saturday night was completely gone, replaced with a strong sense of Emunah and understanding that Hashem is so clearly in charge and I did not need to worry at all. He would put us where we needed to be. Baruch Hashem this is an Emunah story with a happy ending. Our flight on Sunday got us to Israel early Monday morning. We enjoyed a beautiful Pesach with our children. I am not convinced we were right in trying to get out earlier than originally planned, instead of having Emunah that we were on the right flight for us. It certainly was a reminder that Hashem is in charge and when we surrender to Him and have Emunah that it will all work out, as it is supposed to be, we can let go of the anxiety that comes from thinking we have control. Thank you for all you do to strengthen Klal Yisrael with admiration, so-and-so and such-and-such. So again, another example. This one had a good ending. They don't all do, but all we get here every Wednesday morning, we get together for me to repeat the same exact thing. It is shocking that you actually show up to hear. We just repeat the same thing every week, which is, which is that life is so much better when we live with Emunah. Just, it'll be the way it's meant to be. This is the Hanhaga, this is the way it works out. Someone got sick, we made it, it was delayed, it didn't... it's just, it'll work, it's the way it's meant to be. Surrender, let go and let God, lean in, submit and accept and there's just a calm that washes over you. A calm that washes over you. I remember when I had meningitis years ago and was hospitalized for over a week and I got out and I had this enormous headache that wouldn't go away, which was meningitis, the meninges of the brain, they were on fire. Was terribly painful. Some of you lived here then, maybe you remember, it was when I first became the rabbi. Anyway, it's a whole other story. So I couldn't find relief, and I for a while was taking OxyContin. I'm not embarrassed, I'm not proud, it was the only thing. And at a very high dose of it and I wanted to and did wean myself off of it. I tried everything, ultimately acupuncture, yoga, I don't know whether they made me feel better or it was just time to feel better or whether it was a placebo. I have nothing against them, they're wonderful, I did them for a while and they worked. But when I was on OxyContin for that time, I remember every pill I took, and I understand, you can understand why it's addictive, why it needs to be so highly regulated, why it's abused, because every time I took the pill, I'd be in unbearable pain. I remember back to when I was in the hospital, I was attached to a pain pump that you could just click it. It had Dilaudid. And I remember I would just click click click click and set off this alarm till the nurse came because it just because you have this unbearable pain and then you take that what's it called the narcotic and all of a sudden this like warm calm relief just washed over you. That's the way I experienced it. People have different experiences. When I would take it, it would go from this pain and agitation and aggravation and angst, unbearable, relentless, to all of a sudden this just like woo, this calm, like it would just wash over you. And you could and then it would wear off. You understand the cycle and the addiction and the danger of it because it would wear off and then you just want that again and then you need more to get it again because your body is acclimated to it and it's a very very dangerous and obviously needs to be in the appropriate setting and so on. Why am I giving that example? Because you can experience and receive a similar sensation through emunah and bitachon. I'm not exaggerating. When you feel my heartbeat, my pulse, my sweat glands, my nervousness, my anxiousness, and what will be and you take those deep breaths, neshamah, neshimah, you restore your soul with deep breathing, which is a Jewish concept, meditation and deep breathing and restoring the soul. נשמה שנתת בי טהורה היא, the neshamah, neshimah, breath, soul, the same word. And you could feel, Hashem, you're in charge, you're in control, I'm submitting to you, there's a plan, this is for a reason, this is not random, this is not chance, I'm not a victim, there is a reason, there will be another side, there will be a tomorrow, I can get through this, I will put one foot in front of the other, one day I will learn in this world or the next why it happened. You will give me the strength, I can lean on you, and you can get me through this. And that's like the pain pump. That's like the Dilaudid pump. I think the nurse eventually came in and took it out of my hand and said you can't have this anymore. But that is the we have an emunah pump. And don't over-use it and don't abuse it and don't become desensitized to it, but it is good to become addicted to. But we have an emunah pump, you know, when you're going through the day and when we're going through life. And again, don't abuse it. Not everything needs the emunah narcotic, sometimes it could use an emunah Tylenol. Doesn't need the emunah narcotic, sometimes it could use the emunah, I don't know, herbal medicine. You don't always need the highest level pain pump emunah, but we've got it. We've got access to it. You don't need a prescription for it. You know what the prescription is? Your tselem Elokim. Your tselem Elokim. You were born, you have a connection to God, you have a חלק אלוה ממעל ממש, a piece of God inside you, you've got an ongoing endless prescription. Refills. You've got a refill of the emunah prescription, endless refill, endless. You know how annoying it is when you've got to call the you go to the pharmacy, it turns out your refill's expired, you've got to get a hold of your doctor, please call the pharmacy, refill emunah, endless refills, endless refills, unregulated, no no alarm or shut off to the pump. Whenever you need it, lean in, whenever you need it, pump it through taking a few deep breaths, closing your eyes, disconnect, go for a walk, have that conversation, talking to Him, talking to yourself, grounding, centering, and saying and you will feel the same sensation of that warmth, of that flow, of that letting go, of that ooh, okay, yeah, wow, that feels different, that feels different. I'll tell you, I can't tell you how often during davening, because that's when I will when I'm distracted in my davening in Shemoneh Esrei and I want to try to re-center, you know, we make the mistake of thinking because many of us have been davening since we're kids, little kids, and it's sort of like you press go and you're off to the races and once you start you can't slow down or stop. And if it was a good davening, it was a good davening, and if it wasn't a good davening, too bad, there's always the next davening, but like once the momentum's carrying you, you're just off. And we don't realize that you know you're allowed to stop in the middle of Shemoneh Esrei, look at your siddur and stop and say one second, this is not this is not good, this is not going anywhere, I'm not really here, one second, I'm going to take a deep breath, I'm going to ground. myself, center myself, and I'm going to continue from here. Just pause. Just a pregnant pause. Just pause. Pause and stop. And the best way to pause was with a deep breath. And you know what I find often that when I'm taking that deep breath it's like my shoulders are over my ears. You're just like you're wound up, especially Shacharis, the beginning of the day, there's so much ahead, there's so much worry and angst and what will be and I gotta take care of and that meeting and that thing and I didn't prepare and I gotta get there and I've gotta, so you're not really focused on what you're saying, you're not really in a conversation or spending time with him, and you're so wound up that you can feel the tension that your shoulders are up over your ears and over your head. You know what you do during that deep breath? And all of a sudden you just let go and relax every muscle and you lower your shoulders and good, now let's go. I'm in. I'm ready. Let's go. We gotta do this. You can't live life when you're wound up. You can't live life when you're wound up. I just saw, read somewhere, Ben Hogan, one of the great golfers, the sweetest golf swing in all time. Any golfers here? You know what his greatest golf advice, which is immortal they say, is simply the tightness with which you grip the club. Forget your swing plane, forget impact, forget velocity, how tight are you gripping the club? We tend to think that the tighter you grip it, the holder you, the tighter you're holding it, the better you're going to swing it. It's the opposite. It's a terrible mistake. It's a mistake. You should be gripping at like a third of the tightness. The looser, the looser you are, the farther it's going to go, the better you're going to swing. Ask a drummer. My wife is a drummer. Anytime she's not here, I have a license to talk about her. I gave myself that license. She's watching my sick grandchildren, it's not her fault, she gets a pass today, excuse the absence, but she's not here so I can talk about her. So she's a drummer. Not recently, but she knows how to drum. She's a drummer. She'll tell you. Ask any drummers here? When do you, if you hold the sticks tight, forget about it, you can't play it. It's the looser, the looser that you're holding them, the better that you're going to play. Every instrument, every sport, in all of life, the tighter you're gripping, the more you're holding on, the worse you're going to perform. And the more that you let go and the looser you're gripping, the more you take the deep breath and you let go, then you're going to fly. Then you're going to soar and then you're going to play the best music. It's going to play the best music. So what's true in music and sports is true in life. Loose grip, let go, relax the shoulders, deep breaths. Take the spiritual emuna oxycontin, the pain pump that we all have, the emuna pump that we all have. Limitless refills as often as you need it. Take it. It's there for us. And again, so many of our examples, I guess it's bad that we're being stereotyped to our emuna stories are all about flights and airports. You'd think that we live traveling. But they're every day and they're everywhere and they're all of life. And just let go and life becomes so much, so much better. Okay, we have more stories but maybe we have to share. Okay, one more quick one and then we'll get back to learning. Shalom Rabbi Gopher, hope you had a beautiful Pesach. I want to say thank you, blah, blah, blah, yada yada. I want to share a story that just happened to me on Erev Shabbos. This morning before taking my daughter to gan, I took her with me to buy some groceries for Shabbos. I took some cash with me, put it in a little ziplock bag. We got through the shop easily, no simple feat on a Friday morning, and we walked back to the car. I put the groceries in the trunk, put the cash on the roof of the car while I buckled my daughter into her car seat. I slowly pulled out of my parking space and made my way to take her to gan, all pretty routine. I still had another errand to run and when I got there I suddenly remembered the bag of cash I left on the roof of the car. I knew without looking that it was certainly no longer there. Sure enough, my heart sank when I realized I had indeed lost it. Knowing the wonderful community in which I live, I immediately posted in a few WhatsApp groups that I had lost this money, would anyone please keep an eye out for it? I got an immediate response from one very kind woman who said she lives right there and would go out and look for it. Mi ke'amcha Yisrael? This very generous woman walked all over the shopping center with her baby in the carriage just looking for my money, but unfortunately with no success. Another kind neighbor offered to go to the grocery store to see if anyone had turned it into the main register. Unfortunately, no success there either. Just as an aside, wow, like these two people stopped what they were doing, went to the place. Mi ke'amcha Yisrael is right. Beautiful. Not because, by the way, these were soldiers on the front line, we rose to the occasion of the war, it's just an everyday person who made an everyday mistake and Mi ke'amcha Yisrael, Jewish people are amazing. While all this was going on I was reminded of a recent emuna shiur where you, Rav, have spoke about one of the many differences between non-Jews and the Jewish people, other nations of the world would try to take credit for things that they did, the Jewish people benefit from even when it wasn't their intention, and that a Jew, even if he did, or that was when we learned from the Pnei Menachem. And that a Jew, even if he did or did not do an action that was not with the intention of helping another, Hashem gives them the schar for the mitzva. You gave the example of a Jew if he loses a sum of money he says, I'm not happy I lost my money, but if it goes to help a poor person I could walk away happy knowing it was used for a mitzva. How apropos an example. I tried to flex my emuna muscles and internalize this message saying, Hashem... As I'm in the middle of writing this email, my husband has confirmed he now has the cash in hand. Thank you Rabbi Goldberg, yada yada blah blah blah, wishing a beautiful Shabbos. Another great email, another one that has a very nice happy ending, has nothing to do with an airplane or an airport. I don't know if they'll put this one on El Al or not, but another wonderful. But again it just gets you through. Instead of panicking over what I lost and how will I replace and how will we have money to spend, hopefully a poor person found it, this was all part of Hashem's master plan and we'll see if it will work out and after the fact, the receipt and I love that line that she had at the end because this is a something I'm trying to work on and I think we can all work on is in those moments to not all go, oh, I guess I got the parking spot, oh, Baruch Hashem I got the cash back, oh, Baruch Hashem the thing worked out, but to say, Hashem, I feel you smiling down at me. Smile back. Look up and offer him a smile back. I feel you winking at me. I feel you smiling at me. I feel the hug that you're giving me. And I just want to sit in one moment in that embrace. I could use a hug and I feel the hug. This is not a coincidence, this isn't random or chance, something worked out that I didn't think would, you're giving me a hug and I'm reciprocating. I'm not only experiencing and I'm taking the hug, not trying to struggle. Hugged one of my kids recently just pulling away so where are you going said I didn't say it's okay to hug me right now I don't want to hug said I don't care I'm your father and I want to hug you right now I don't know if that's right or wrong but Hashem gives us the hug don't wiggle away if he's giving you a hug don't wiggle away your father's giving you a hug lean in take it take it we never know and you have a father and he's giving you a hug take it there'll be a day that you'll wish you could get one more hug there'll be a day that you'd give anything to get one more hug so if your father's hugging I don't care what you're in the middle of status-ing texting your friend whatever you're list- shopping ordering something online whatever you're doing you could stop if your father's giving you a hug believe me there'll be a day you wish one more hug lean into the hug Hashem gives you a hug lean in I don't care what you're in the middle of Hashem you're giving me a hug something worked out thank you I'm ex- oh delicious I'm experiencing the hug and I'm hugging you back. Okay, we are on page Chaf. We began last week this piece of Emes Ve'Emunah. רב משה שפירא זצ"ל, you want to learn more about him, again that article is in the WhatsApp group. Emes Ve'Emunah. We always see these terms this expression go together, why is it? Because, says Rav Moshe Shapiro, we mistranslate. Emunah is not the knowledge that there is a creator, that there's an originator, that God created and runs the universe. That's not Emunah, that's Emes. God didn't doesn't need you to believe in him to exist. He exists. Believe in him, don't believe in him, see him, don't see him, trust in him, don't trust in him, surrender to him, don't surrender to him, lovely. He doesn't need you to do those things to exist. That's the Emes. The Emes, the Emes is he exists. Now tonight on Behind the Bima, we had an incredible over an hour interview with an outstanding young man, Shabbos Kestenbaum, who's on the front line at Harvard, suing Harvard, fighting Harvard, protesting at Harvard, an amazing young man, fascinating young man in a million and one different ways. And and one of the things he pointed out is that, you know, on Harvard's logo its emblem it has the Latin word which I don't know but that me- Veritas which means truth means truth and he said it's a cesspool of sheker the place right now is just a cesspool of lies and exactly its logo and its motto is what's missing which is which is truth. And and I wish we had had this conversation and I wish I knew Latin before the Shabbos Hagadol drasha because that's what we spoke about that galus exile is this world and cesspool of lies and that's what we're living in an olam hasheker a world of lies. Look what happened this week. Look what happened this week. Hamas pulled this incredible stunt, in many ways brilliant. Meioivai techakmeni, we should learn from our enemies. Brilliant. What did they do? Said we don't even have necessarily, we hope that's wrong and we daven the bottom of our hearts, enough live hostages. They're not interested in meeting these demands of the Israe- But you know what happened? The whole world fell for it. The media headlines all announce, Biden's a genius, behind closed doors he's succeeding, he negotiated an incredible Hamas agrees, Hamas accepts. Nobody did the due diligence. Nobody did their homework. Nobody examined: was this in fact the incredibly generous, maybe overly generous deal that Israel offered? It, it's not believable. It's not believable. Mainstream supposedly media outlets, supposedly trustworthy media outlets. State Department, by the way, was part of advancing that Hamas accepted the deal, without even acknowledging it wasn't the deal. All to try to position that Hamas were the ones willing to... it's... we're living in a world of lies. Lies. The the people, the authority, the outlets that were meant to be the trustworthy ambassadors of truth are the biggest purveyors of lies. That's Golus, that's the exile. And how, how do we navigate such a world? How do we bring redemption and geulah? Only by clinging to the truth. That was the Shabbos HaGadol drasha, just ended a few minutes ago. It was, it was that long. So we spoke all about how to navigate. So that's Emes, Emes. Emes is that there's a Hashem and this is His world and He gave us principles and He gave us prescription and an instruction manual and a blueprint. And that's why He took us out of Mitzrayim to live it, to demonstrate it, to model it for the world, to bring this redemption, to repair this world. That's the Emes that we have to cling to. That's the truth. The Emes, the truth that we have to cling to, and that we have to represent, and that we have to model, and that we have to influence, and that we have to proclaim and project everywhere. That's Emes. That's not emunah. That's not emunah. So what is emunah? If emunah's not that there's a Hashem, He created the world and He runs the world, then what is emunah? Emunah, he said, is the word ne'eman. And then we deviated last week to speak all about marriage and bayis ne'eman be'Yisrael. What's a bayis ne'eman be'Yisrael? Ne'eman is trustworthy, reliable, dependable, who will show up. That's ne'eman. Is this person trustworthy in business? Is this person a trustworthy candidate for marriage, for shidduchim, references, miserable but ne'eman. Are they trustworthy? Research. That's emunah. So emunah is, emunah is: what do I do with the Emes? That's what Rav Moshe Shapiro began to build. Emunah is: what do I do with the Emes? The Emes is there's a Hashem. He doesn't need you to exist. Now what? What's your relationship to that Emes? What's your relationship to it? Do you live with that awareness, that knowledge, that mindfulness, that consciousness? Does it kick in in the moments? Do you turn to the Emes? Uh-oh, flight delayed, flight cancelled, won't work out, waiting for laboratory, waiting for lab report. I got a magnificent email this week. I got a beautiful email. It was one line, it was half a sentence. It was a person who wrote an emunah email last year, and she shared about a struggle, a loss of a child and an issue with genetics that they discovered simultaneously, if you remember, to another child having to go to the hospital, maybe you remember this email. She wrote me this week to say mazel tov on the birth of her healthy baby. I love the follow-up emunah email. After the loss and that's a happy ending a year later, which we'll take, whatever amount of time it takes. Baruch Hashem. It was it was a chesed that she sent that to me. I'll tell you a pet peeve in the rabbinate. People share their problems left and right. They rarely follow up with when something good happens or it works out. It does. You know, every Simchas Torah during Kol HaNearim we have a special tefillah. And we invite people from all over the world and sadly, we have a list of hundreds of names of people who are waiting and struggling and desperately wanting to have children. And Kol HaNearim, when there are in our shul we have the Guinness World Record largest tallis and Baruch Hashem bli ayin hara the hundreds of children who come under it. And Kol HaNearim we sing Hamalach together, but how many don't want to be in shul that day? How many is that day the most unbearably painful day? How much does it ache that there's not a child under that tallis? So we take that moment and we offer a special tefillah. We read a special tefillah and we collect the names from all over. From all over. And you know, it's the most beautiful thing when nine months later, a year later, when we get an email that says, "I gave in a name and I just want to let you know a healthy baby was born." Not not because of our tefillah, because of all tefillos and because of a lot of zchusim and because of a lot of reasons. It's just it's nice to get that follow-up, nice to get that so I give us all a beracha. We should all follow up with one another to not only experience and share and comfort and strengthen each other through challenging times but to share the good news, im yirtzeh Hashem, to be able to share wonderful news, wonderful updates, wonderful news, wonderful healing and wonderful strength and wonderful simchas with one another as well. So that's the emunah. Emunah is what do you do with that emes? Emunah is what do you do with that emes? In those difficult times and in those difficult moments and before you could send that email and before you know that there's going to be good news. Hashem is ne'eman, he's reliable, he's trustworthy, that's what emunah is. Do you turn to the trustworthy source? Do you lean on what's sturdy and safe and predictable and that you can count on? And we ended last week with emunah is the feminine is lashon nekeivah, emunah. Emes is lashon zachar. Cognitive, cerebral, intellectual, it's in the masculine. But emunah, putting that into practice, living it, breathing it, experiencing it, that's in the feminine. Because women, again, we're generalizing and stereotyping and we each need to work on it, but just which has it more innately, intuitively, so emunah is in the feminine lashon nekeivah because women more intuitive to practicing the faith, to putting the emes into practice. Men might intuit more the emes, but actually manifesting, experiencing it, practicing it might be more a feminine quality. So we're at the bottom of page chaf. נבוא להבין בשורש הדברים כל אמת נתפסת בתוך המערכת המושכלת השייכת לה. We have to understand the root of the issue. Emes, this truth, the truth that there's a God, there's a creator, this is his world, that we are here to serve him, we serve at his pleasure, that we have to surrender, we take our initiative but ultimately he's in charge, he's the senior partner with all that we do. We have to analyze and understand and unpack and experience what that means. בתוך התפיסה של דעת היא ברורה אך אינה קיימת מחוץ לעצמה. במקום ששייכת ההגדרה שבין אמת ושקר שם נתפסת הידיעה הנכונה כאמת. In the place where you see the distinction between truth and lies, in that spot, in that place, where it's clear as day, where it's obvious what's true and what is a lie, there is the ability to grasp the correct knowledge of truth. אבל יישומה של האמת היא הגילוי הגילוי שלה בעולם להביא את האמת עד למעשה ולחברה למציאות שלנו. Our mission, our challenge, and it's true when it comes to Hashem's existence and it's true so much. You read an article this morning smoking's bad for your health. Okay, so if you're not a smoker big deal, that's the emes and the emunah, the putting into practice is easy because you never struggled with it. But let's say you're a chain smoker, you're an addict, and now you read the medical analysis and it's clear as day, the research that it's going to kill you. Good. Do you stop smoking? The emes is what appears there in that research, in the data. The emunah is are you ne'eman to take the emes and put it into practice? Maybe I'll take one a little bit more relatable. You read the article about eating all those carbs, about eating all the fried food, about overeating the calories. You read the article about the impact of the diet soda, of soda versus water. You read... I'm ruining your day. You read the article about the Cape Cod potato chips. You read it's been a long time since we invoked the Cape Cod potato chips. You read the article about what you shouldn't... okay good, so you read it and you go 'I accept it.' That's the emes. Undeniable, the emes. I'll give you another one. You read the article that correlates how much time you spend on your technology and mental health challenges and illness, which is now not debatable, undeniable the amount of time and the addiction, particularly social media, but technology as a whole. It used to be schools, shuls were afraid to bring these things up because you look so frum, farfrumpt, farbrent. You can't talk about these things, you're a fanatic. But now it has nothing to do with religion or religious fanaticism. It has to do with responsible parenting and responsible healthy living and healthy hygiene, mental health hygiene. If you want to be mentally healthy, then we have to disconnect a little bit, disconnect a little bit. I'll share this with you not to flex but hopefully it can inspire. I was inspired. I told you when Yocheved's not here I can talk about her. She often motivates me and challenges me and encourages me to get rid of some things on my phone. So during bedikas chametz with my family before I made the bracha on bedikas chametz with the candle and the feather and the spoon, I took out my phone and I said 'I'm going to do some biur chametz on my phone' and deleted some apps, deleted some apps that I found I was wasting time and seeing things and didn't need to be on and they were chametz, they're chametz in my life. And I pledged through Sefira because sometimes it's hard to say 'I'm going to do something forever,' but through Sefira, for the period of Sefira from Pesach until Shavuos I'm deleting. Hopefully it will continue beyond. And I know my girls' school Hadar did a similar thing with a challenge and a reward program. If you delete certain things for a period of time, it's a wonderful thing. I couldn't... I didn't even know, it's not like I knew and then I had to go bribe my children, they told me and they did it and they said 'you know, I won't be able... can I borrow your phone because I can't use this thing now because I deleted it' and that kind of a thing. It's a beautiful thing. And I share it not to flex, me and my children, but to challenge and to invite to join. It's not too late to get rid of some of the chametz. You're allowed to have chametz now, but the metaphysical chametz. Get rid of it, do biur, do some biur. fire, burn, and destroy them. And how can we make up? You want to do one of the most eye-opening challenging things in the world? Nobody ever wants to do it. Open up the screen report on your phone because you can't be in denial. When your phone tells you the data of how much time you spent and what you spent on what, you can't be in denial anymore. Nobody wants to. If it pops up, you X out quickly. It's not accurate, it's not me, someone else had my phone. It's not true, I was watching Living With Emuna, that's what I was watching so much there on the YouTube. But but that's this is that time, Sefiras Ha'omer, we're climbing, we're climbing, we're climbing, we're climbing, we're climbing, we're going to get to the base of that mountain together on Shavuos, we're going to receive that Torah, we're trying to be the best version of ourselves on that day when we stand there arm in arm, unified כאיש אחד בלב אחד. So it's a time of work. Now's the time to work. It's a time to work. And one of the ways we work is by is by deleting, is by getting rid, is by working on it, is by working on it. So that's the Emuna. The emes is, I'm a rabbi, I've given a hundred droshes about how bad technology is for your mental health. That's emes. I know the emes, I've given droshes about the emes, I've written articles about the emes, I've read articles about the emes. That's all emes. The Emuna is good, now what? You delete anything from your phone? Did you put in any safeguards, boundaries? Are you spending less time on it? Good, you read now you know the emes, shoin. Good, wonderful. The Emuna is, are you ne'eman, are you trustworthy and reliable and faithful to take that emes and put it into practice? So it's true in every area of our life from smoking to health and wellness physically, to mental health, to everything. The emes is the knowledge, the Emuna is the practice of that knowledge. היישום של האמת, הגילוי שלו בעולם, להביא את האמת עד למעשה, לחברה אל המציאות שלנו, זה דבר שמחוץ לתחומה של האמת. This is outside of the emes. Whether you practice it or not won't impact the emes. The food is bad for you whether you choose to stop eating it or not, and the technology will be bad for you, choose to stop using it or limit how you use it or not. האמת אינה עוסקת בזה, די לה במערכת של מושגי האמת. The emes lives in the world of intellectually whether it's true or not true. We turn the page to Chaf-Aleph. The emes is lives in the world of analysis, is it true or not true, right or wrong. It doesn't care about what you do. The emes doesn't care about your feelings. The facts don't care about your feelings. That's Rav Moshe Shapiro. A different Shapiro. Rav Moshe Shapiro. The facts, the emes doesn't care about your feelings. The Emuna does. Did you put it into practice or not, but the emes won't be impacted. האמת מצד עצמה גבוהה יותר ממציאות החיים בעולם הזה because that emes is immutable, it's absolute, it's true. It's not compromised or perverted or distorted by whether you live it or not. It remains pure, pristine, it remains the emes. כדי להחיל את האמת כאן, צריך דבר נוסף, והוא האמונה. In order for the emes, the emes lives in an ivory tower, the emes is protected, the emes is pure and pristine, the emes is behind the glass. So so how does the emes connect to you? The answer is Emuna. Emuna takes the emes from behind the glass. Emuna takes the emes from out of the ivory tower. Emuna takes the emes from being protected and being practiced, put into life. האמת חלה על האמונה, האמונה היא כריתת ברית לאמת. Emuna is a covenant, it is a contract, it is a promise with the emes. לתת לאותו האמת את עצמנו. I hereby pledge and promise I give you this emes, I give you myself. באופן שתהיה יסד בל תימוט that it will be a a peg, it will be a foundation that won't move. זאת המערכת הנקראת אמונה הבאה אחרי ידיעת עצם האמת. So first study and learn the emes. What's the emes? Not everybody knows the emes. Some people are lost. Is there a God? Is there no God? Is there a God but he's not involved in my life? How much is he involved in my life? Is he involved only in the big things in my life or only the little things in my life? There's a lot of emes to learn. We spent three hundred some shiur, there's a lot of emes to learn. There's the emes. There's the emes. Why did he create the world? There's a lot of questions. There's a lot of emes to analyze and explore and ask. But that's all just establishing the emes. Then the question becomes, what do you do with that emes? Do you have a contract and covenant, a pledge and a promise, will you put into practice that emes? That's called Emuna. That's called Emuna. To come to the emes shiur every week, to come to the Emuna shiur every week, that's emes. To then put it into practice the rest of the week, that's Emuna. That's Emuna. So we're going to stop here, wish everybody a day filled with emet v'emuna. Should be a day of bsoros tovos, she'nishma wonderful and great things for Am Yisrael and Klal Yisrael.
