Transcript
Okay, good morning. So sorry we're starting late. A little technology challenge. Those watching online, we apologize that we are late. It's always an honor and a privilege and a pleasure to have people joining us not only live and in person, which is the primary and best way to learn, in person, exchanging energy and feeling connected, but also an honor and a privilege that there are people from around the world. Sending love to our friend in Toronto, Mrs. Irene Katt, and friends everywhere, and thank you for tuning in and being part of this. A big thank you to our series sponsor for the year, Dr. Zvi and Bella Morgan, in memory of Rabbi Doctor Brian Galbut, and in memory of Bella's mother, Dr. Ellen Shanzer. A big yasher koach and a thank you to them. Also, this morning's shiur is sponsored by Yanina and Gordon Hauss, in memory of Yanina's mother, Ida Lichtman, Chaya bas Simcha, whose yahrtzeit is the fourth of Teves today, and in memory of Rabbi Pinchas Mordechai Teitz, whose yahrtzeit was yesterday, I believe. Today also? Rabbi Teitz, 26th yahrtzeit, I think. The neshama should have an aliyah as well. He was a great role model for all of us. I remember Rabbi Teitz very well. The family comes from Elizabeth and much time spent there, and much of the rabbinate modeled after things I saw and learned from him. Okay, we continue, we're back. We keep taking a break for several weeks. We're back in the Sefer Ha-Arros, the insights of Rav Wolbe on Emunah. Hopefully, everyone is doing their homework. First bracha of the day with kavana. By show of hands, how well are we doing? That is not a very good grade. Wow. Okay. All you're telling me is that we have to continue to learn, to study, to grow, to remember. I have a dear friend, Ben, texts me every single morning his cup with the words, 'Had kavana for my first bracha of the day.' So everyone else can feel free to do that, too. I'm not going to be able to get back to everybody if you do, but our coffee cups are in production. But we have to remember: first bracha of the day, that shehakol, that first cup of coffee that's going to return techiyas hameisim, it's going to bring us back to life. To thank Hashem for everything that goes into it and everything else. To thank Hashem for waking up that morning, to thank Hashem for the magnificent weather, the ambiance, to thank Hashem for our lives. That's your homework. Let's do a little better at it, to try to be mindful. You're about to lift that cup, and you're about to just take that sip, and you're about to swallow the bracha even as fast as you swallow the coffee on your way to whatever you're doing. Pause, be mindful, slow down. We mentioned last night in the siddur snippet—we're going to get back into the sefer, promise. It's just a free flow of thought, the Emunah shiur. So we mentioned last night in the siddur snippet an insight of the Baal Shem Tov. Piaseczner Rebbe, Hashem yikom damo, רב קלונימוס קלמן שפירא, who was the Rav of Warsaw, the Piaseczner Rebbe of Warsaw, who was murdered by the Nazis, and he wrote a book called Hachsharas Ha'avreichim. Chovas Hatalmidim is his guide for students in yeshiva, Hachsharas Ha'avreichim is his guide for those who are a little bit older, studying, learning in kollel, about how to be mindful, about how to live and so on and so forth. So he quotes in there from the Baal Shem Tov. Baal Shem Tov: we say in the second paragraph of Shema, והיה אם שמוע תשמעו, that if we don't listen to Hashem. Second paragraph begins im shamoa tishmeu. If you listen, why the double language? im shamoa tishmeu. If you open up all the siddurim and chumashim, everybody struggles to translate that. If you really listen. If you hearken and listen. If you listen intently. shamoa tishmeu is the same word twice. Why the double language? Why the redundancy? What is the Torah communicating? It's a beautiful Ohr Hachayim Hakadosh who says, shamoa tishmeu. If you really listen, you're going to hear things. We don't really listen. I just came from a bris that was at a school. I'm not—this is a universal problem. I'm not talking about any specific group of young people; could be adults. But I was walking out of the bris just as school was beginning and all these young people were coming in from the parking lot. And I tried to say hello and good morning and hello, but everybody was looking down. I don't think there was one kid who looked at me and said hi, good morning. Every—they're not bad. I'm guilty, I'm sure, of the same thing from the car into my office, into Shacharis, still catching up and answering and listening and... so we're always on the fly, we're always on the move. And even while we're listening, we're not really listening. We're listening with half an ear, and we're listening—Stephen Covey writes in the Seven Habits that most people listen with the intent to reply. Listening is just our having to take our turn until we get to answer. But while we're listening, we've already formulated our reply, our answer, what we want to say. We're not actively listening. We haven't shut off all the output so we can allow input. There's output in our own mind, how we're processing what the other person's saying. We're not bothering to listen because we already know what they're going to say, or we already know better than what they're going to say. And then when it's our turn, because hopefully we have some etiquette and courtesy, then we answer. So we don't really know how to listen. He has a whole chapter about active listening. What does it mean to be a real listener? Something we learn from Yisro: Vayishma Yisro. Yisro knew how to really listen. That's why he heard the message. Everybody else read headlines. lines, Yisro heard what was really happening all around him. But we're living it; that was a challenge and a problem then, all the more so today, where there's so much noise and so many devices. And there's things coming in buzzing and beeping and vibrating on texts, on email, on everything is coming in. Carrier pigeon's going to land on your shoulder and give you a note. We have things coming in every which way and every which direction. How could you possibly be zoned in and listen? On the average day between Mincha Maariv, I'm not ranking on our members now, you know how often I'm standing up there and I'm giving a d'var Torah and I'm looking out at a room that some are chap a shluf or dremmel between Mincha Maariv, God bless. But others are, you know they're looking down, they're scrolling. I was at a wedding on Monday night, you see at the chuppah, someone had a laptop at the chuppah. I'd never seen that before. People, somebody had a laptop they were getting stuff done. I was a little jealous of them but also thought it wasn't the right wasn't the right thing to do. We're not listening, we're not present in anything that we're doing. So the Or Hachayim Hakadosh says: im shamoa, if you really listen, tishme'u. You're going to hear things. If you're really engaged and listening, if you're listening actively, if you're looking around this world, if you're trying to see and feel Hashem, im shamoa, Hashem is speaking to us all the time. Is our antenna extended? Are we tuned in to the frequency to pick Him up? He's sending out the radio signal all the time. There are messages that come across, there are coincidences, and there are brachas and blessings, and there are things that happen that are clearly orchestrated and designed. But if you're always like this, you don't even realize wow, harbe shluchim lamakom. Harbe shluchim lamakom. I was involved last week with someone who experienced a miracle of Chanukah. Someone waited a long time for something enormous and it came through on Chanukah. And you know why it happened? Because Hashem harbe shluchim lamakom. Hashem has a lot of messengers. And in this case He sent a dog. A dog? What did the dog do? The dog bit someone and that someone was replaced by someone else and that someone else spiraled into a series of events that led to this other person getting a miracle, a salvation that they had been waiting for that they started to believe was never going to come. All because of a dog bite. There's no way that dog was here by accident or bit that person by accident. I wish the person well, but Hashem orchestrated the entire thing and nobody, nobody in that individual's world who were rooting for her and cheering for her and fighting for her, nobody for all the money in the world could have predicted that that's how it was going to come about. Nobody. That a dog would bite and the person would be replaced and that would start a string of events and that would lead to her freedom. Nobody thought it in a million years. Get out of His way, let Him do His thing. Never stop believing that He can that He can make it happen. He's Hakol Yachol, He's the King of kings, the Melech Malchei Hamlachim. So He's speaking to us all the time. He's speaking to you when you go outside and it's a clear beautiful day, He's speaking, He's it's unbelievable when He speaks. Im shamoa, but if you're listening tishme'u. Last night I I have a Honda Accord, it's a year or two old, the lease it changes, I'm not flexing right now because nobody's ever quoted having a Honda Accord and flexed. It's a Honda Accord. It's not a flex that, you know, it's a lease, a three-year lease. But last night I was with Yocheved somewhere, we get in the car and I press the button to start it, and the car started but the dashboard didn't line up. It was weird. So I turned it off and did it again and it didn't happen again. Then I turned it off and I left it for one minute and it came back on. So first I was all flustered and frustrated and how do you drive, and there's no speedometer and I could do okay with that, speedometer doesn't usually influence how fast I drive anyway. So you know, but the whole screen, Waze, I can't live without that, you can't live without, you gotta know where the policeman is and where the traffic is. So I turned it off, I left it sixty seconds and I tried it again and it came back on. So my first reaction was like this is ridiculous, why didn't it work? Pay a lot of money, this monthly lease, what are you kidding me? And then I said, wow, every time it works, it's a miracle. A car is a computer and you push a button and all these things light up and everything works. Why should we assume it should work every time? It's unbelievable every time you step on the gas, every time you step on the brake. Every time you turn the steering wheel. Rachmana litzlan lo aleinu, God forbid there are people who step on the brake and it didn't work. They step on the gas and it doesn't work. Something happens wrong, the car malfunctions. So that was Hashem speaking to us. It was a little reminder. I know you took for granted for the last twenty years when you get in the car and you turn the thing everything lights up and works. Let me not let it work for one minute, sixty seconds, so that at least for one day when you get in the car again you'll be like wow, it's a miracle, it turned on. It's unbelievable. Im shamoa, if we're listening to see Hashem everywhere around us, tishme'u. Okay fine. Now this is what I wanted to talk about. What was my point? Because then we get to im shamoa tishme'u, but if we don't listen, we're not obedient, we're not observant, we don't we don't execute God's will, we're not meeting His blueprint, His formula for life. We think we know better, we think we're smarter, we think we're going to figure it out on our own, so we dismiss Him. So Torah says: ve'atzar et hashamayim. Gonna fold... Hold back the heavens, *velo yihyeh matar*, it's not gonna rain, *veha'aretz lo titein*, and the earth is not gonna give its abundance, you're gonna go hungry, you're gonna go hungry. We go to Publix or Winn-Dixie and we expect the food to be on the shelves. We're not farmers, we don't live off of and rely on the rain. But if you're the farmer, your income, your livelihood, your food, your next meal relies on the rain. And *Hashem* says I'm gonna give you immediate feedback. It's not gonna rain if you're not living a proper life. And then all of that was a build up to these two words: *va'avadtem mehera*. So the simple understanding of the words *va'avadtem mehera* is that you will be quickly thrown out of the land. The land of Israel is a *shemittah* year. Israel is no ordinary land. The land of Israel has a life, has a personality. The land of Israel has *mitzvot hateluyot ba'aretz*, the earth, the soil is holy. When I make a garden in America, there's no *mitzvah* of *terumah u'ma'aser*, there's no *mitzvah* of *shemittah*, it's just dirt. In America, outside of Israel, it's dirt. Again, we love the earth, we have to take good care of it, *yada yada yada*. But it's just dirt. It's dirt. It's there to serve us, we're not there to serve it. It's just dirt, soil, it's earth, it's dirt. In Israel it's not dirt. It has a personality. It's *Eretz HaKodesh*, a holy land. It has a spirit. And the *Torah* tells us that if you don't live properly on it, it will spit you out and vomit you out. We will be forced into exile. It cannot tolerate moral corruption. It cannot tolerate, it cannot tolerate immorality. And it will spit us out. *Va'avadtem mehera*, you will quickly be exiled from that land. Okay, all this was this build-up. So the *Ba'al Shem Tov* says, read it a little bit differently. *Va'avadtem mehera* doesn't mean that you'll quickly be dispersed, you'll be exiled, you'll be kicked off the land. Says the *Ba'al Shem Tov*, if you want to be a good listener, you want to get back to *im shamoa tishme'u*, you want to be a good listener, you want to lead a rich and meaningful and purpose-driven life, *va'avadtem*, you have to get rid of *mehera*. Stop being in such a rush. *Va'avadtem*, dismiss, get rid of, says the *heilige Ba'al Shem*. The *Piaseczna Rebbe* says, how many bad decisions do we make because we were in a rush? We didn't stop, we didn't think it out, we didn't consider all the angles, we didn't see the holistic picture, we didn't consult other people smarter than ourselves. We're just in a rush, we're moving, moving, moving. Always looking down, typing, moving, running, going, doing, noise. And how many relationships do we sabotage? And how many decisions is our judgment clouded? *Va'avadtem mehera*, get rid of that sense of *mehera*. *Va'avadtem*, destroy, obliterate, get rid of that attitude of *mehera*. Slow down to the speed of life. Slow. Take that deep breath, regroup, make that decision. *Va'avadtem mehera*, we've got to get rid of that *mehera*, get rid of that attitude of moving, moving, moving, going, going, going, doing, doing, doing. Because you know what happens when you're living with *mehera*? You can't see Him. You'll never hear Him or see Him. It's hard enough when you're paying attention. It's hard enough when you're mindful. It's hard enough when you're moving along slowly. But if you're running, racing, moving at the speed of light, what Greg McKeown in Essentialism calls instead of building momentum you have motion sickness, you're always in motion and you're confusing busyness with productivity and busy, busy, crazy busy, psycho busy, doing busy, gotta slow down. *Va'avadtem mehera*, get rid of the *mehera* and find *Hashem*. Talk to Him, feel Him, connect with Him, be grateful to Him, ask of Him, complain to Him, protest to Him, but He's there. Okay, back inside. I have us on page *pei vav*. You tell me if I'm on the right planet or not. פ"ו י"ב. Yeah? Well, that's where we're starting anyway. You don't remember much better than I do. *Ishay*, *talmid chacham*, המרגשת פעם כשאמרת אמן את התוכן האדיר במילה קטנה זו? Says *Rav Wolbe*, righteous person. We answer *amen* to one another. You stand at *kiddush*, someone says *borei pri hagafen*, *amen*. You're at the *brit*, *amen*. Someone's saying *kaddish* in *shul*, *amen*, *yehei shmei raba*. We're good. We have *amen* groups. I think last week I walked outside, a group of women were still coming out of the *emunah shiur* and I heard one of them with her water or drink make a *berakhah* out loud and the other answer *amen* and I got a lot of *nachas*. It was a beautiful, beautiful thing. *Amen*. We answer and we say *amen*. But do we know what we're really saying? Do we understand what the words even mean when we say *amen*? הן זה צריך לימוד מרובה עד שנגיע לעניית אמן כזו. We need to learn it. We need to think about it. We need to be present with it. ולא בכל תשעים האמנים שאנו בכל יום נוכל לכוון כך. And not with all 90 amens. Granted, you're in the middle of something. Not with every *amen* can you stop and really be present and spend the time to really unpack and really think about it. ננסה להתלמד בזה אמן יהא שמיה רבה בבוקר לפני ברכו ובמנחה מעריב לפני שמונה עשרה. So *Rav Wolbe* writes in his *Alei Shur*. quoting it here that, so let's at least designate, let's identify certain amens that we're going to try very hard to be present for, just like it's hard to be mindful of every beracha of all hundred. The Rebbe said start with ten, and I say start with one. So too it's hard to be present with every amen, but let's identify a few. כמדומני שאיננו מאמינים בערך הכוחות הטמונים בנו. We don't really begin to even understand the power and the capacity and the potential inside ourselves. אין אנו מאמינים שאנו מסוגלים להגיע למדרגה כזו באמונה. We don't even know what we can achieve in emuna, in faith. We don't even begin to understand who we are and how we can live, and how much peace and serenity and tranquility, how much satisfaction and happiness and purpose, how we can have such less aggravation, anxiety, and envy, and arrogance. We have it within us, that emuna. We have it within us to be able to stop and say, thank you Hashem. I see you Hashem, or I need you Hashem, and to have that animate our lives, not just be simply a class we go to or a WhatsApp we subscribe to or a story that we tell at a Shabbos table. But actually when we're in the difficult moment, to catch ourselves and say I'm not going to get frustrated because the dashboard didn't light up, and I'm not going to get frustrated or upset and I'm not going to be envious of what someone else has. I'm going to stop and I'm going to say to myself, Hashem whatever's meant to be I trust you, you're in charge. You're in charge. I'm putting my faith in you. We have that capacity. אם נתבונן כיצד הרגשתנו אחרי שהתפללנו כראוי וכן בעניית אמן בכוונה נראה שאכן יש לנו לאחר מכאן מבט שונה והסתכלות אחרת על העולם. Do you ever walk out of a—do you ever work out? Ever exercise? And when you're done exercising, your body feels more alive. You know, you describe it as your juices are flowing. If you sit sedentary the whole day, so your muscles atrophy. They say there's all kinds of research that more dangerous and more unhealthy than smoking packs of cigarettes a day is sitting still, never getting up. A lot of people are getting very rich off of making devices for your wrist. This is how pathetic we are, that we need things that will buzz and beep and say, stand up you pathetic loser, stand up for a second and then sit down. Don't forget to stand up. We have even more pathetic. Don't forget to breathe. We're the first generation that is being reminded to breathe. Don't forget to breathe. Don't forget to stand up. Don't forget to take a few steps. You think in—historically they had to remember to take steps? All they did was take steps. You were running around, your work, your farm, your home, you were running down to the river to do the laundry, you were running to to shecht the cow, you were running, running, running, running, and we live in a generation that we sit in a chair at 9:00 AM and at 5:00 PM we stand up to go home to sit on the couch from 7:00 PM to 11:00 PM to lie in bed. So we have to make all kinds of apps and devices and people get rich by having things buzz and beep and remind us, don't forget to stand up, don't forget to breathe, don't forget to move, don't forget to call your wife, don't forget to—we have to be reminded of what should be the obvious and simple and most basic things in the entire world. So when we work out, this is my experience, it's not nearly often enough, but if or when we exercise, I always feel afterwards more alive. Your juices are flowing, you're awake, you're alive, you could still feel your muscles pulsating even after you've worked them a little bit. And then you say, I feel different than I did beforehand. I'm more mindful, I'm not going to eat or put that poison in my body that I just worked hard to take care of. I'm more conscious of my breathing or of my of my muscles or my posture or how I feel, we're more alive. So says Rav Wolbe, what's true physically is also true spiritually. If you walk away from a davenning where you were really present—so it's not a Shacharis you said while you were still putting the dishes in the sink and you were then getting the backpack packed and you were still making the coffee, pressing the Keurig, coffee snobs it's okay, Keurig is fine, we're not—right? You're not, it's not a—it's a davenning where you sat still, you took a siddur and you said and your finger and you said every word and you tried to be present and you said I'm in a conversation with Hashem. And like yesterday we said in the parsha class, Vayigash elav Yehuda, first we talk to ourselves before we talk to Him to gather our thoughts and think about our day and build the confidence and the courage and the conviction for what we need to ask. And when we have a davenning like that, when you walk out of a davenning like that, when you make a bracha, when you make that shehakol, ברוך אתה ה' אלוהינו מלך העולם שהכל נהיה בדברו. Amen. That, I'm just showing off for you. I wish I made brachas like that the whole day. I just, you know, I talk about it, I gotta—I'm just showing off a little bit here. Halevai those would be the brachas I made all day long. But when you make a bracha like that, the rest of the cup of coffee is a different cup of coffee. It's it. Every sip you're imbibing emuna, you're imbibing Hashem, you're tasting, you're feeling, you're alive with Hashem. So he says, say amen with a... different mindfulness. Make a bracha with a different mindfulness. Daven with a different mindfulness. Go outside in the car, kinderlach, carpool, before you rush in and you fight and who gets to sit where and you're still don't spill the oatmeal, just look just stand before anyone gets in the car. Everybody deep breath, clear blue sky, the sun, the breeze, this weather, pump, it's unbelievable. Okay now Hashem is in the car also. He doesn't complain about his seat. Hashem's also in the minivan. He's also on the way. He's also on his way. So we have that capacity in us. We have that capacity. I told the story in a drasha several months ago, it's already several months ago so I don't really remember the details. But there was a woman whose grandchild was playing outside and she heard a scream and she went out and she found him pinned under the car. She mustered all her might, she was able to lift and move the car to be able to free him and he wasn't hurt badly. And of course this was major news. She was close to 70 and that's very young today, that she was close to 70, it's very young. But she came outside and you know most 70-year-olds are not lifting cars. Most 30-year-olds are not lifting cars. So it made headlines, it was a story. And all the news tried to get an interview with her. How'd you do it? What'd you hear? Were you afraid? Did you panic? And she refused to be interviewed for years and years and years. And finally somebody found the story years later and got through to her and was willing to interview her and said how come you refused to ever be interviewed? Why would you never tell your story? So she said, it was a motivational speaker who had found and contacted her, she said, you know why? Because I'm ashamed and embarrassed. He said ashamed and embarrassed? Saved your grandson's life. It was an act of heroism. What do you mean what are you ashamed and what are you embarrassed about? She said, you know right afterwards I had this horrific feeling. If I have the strength to lift a car, why had I never done so until now? If that strength was latent was potential was inside me all along, why did it take my grandson being trapped underneath for me to realize it, for me to use it? So this motivational speaker who interviewed her said you know it's not too late. And at 70 she went back to college, she finished college which was a dream of hers she had never done, she became a professor at college in her 70s and into her 80s and he said that strength is inside you all along. What are the strengths that are inside us? That's what Rav Wolbe's writing here. He says we have that capacity to live with emuna. So you know what happens? We get trapped under the car. We all know how to daven. The atheist in the foxhole thing. Right? So you have a massive headache or you're going through a stomach virus or you are have a child or a grandchild because we're only as happy, I was told I'm not supposed to say this because it makes the child or the grandchild feel guilty, but we're only as happy as our least happy child or grandchild. That's a general rule of life. Again, nobody should feel guilty child or grandchild, but it's a reality. I don't feel bad saying it because I think it's a beautiful reflection on parenting, that parents are so intertwined with their children and grandchildren that our happiness is limited, it is defined, it is bound, we are only as happy as our least favorite, as our least happy. Beep beep beep let's back up, back that up a little bit. Wow. We are only as happy as our least happy child or grandchild or grandchild. So chalila you hear news about a child or grandchild, your own health is a scare, you're waiting for a lab report to come back. We know if we stop and think about in our lives there have been those moments where we daven like there was never, we daven like nobody else ever. We were like the Kohen Gadol on Yom Kippur. We were like like we've daven when there's someone something we care so desperately about and we felt so helpless and hopeless to control, we've been there where we've daven. Says Rav Wolbe, you just revealed to yourself that you have that potential. You revealed to yourself that you have that potential. Now you have no excuse. Now you have no excuse. I was not a good student as a child. I say that only so that I can now tell you I have children who mature and develop and blossom to become great students, but when they're younger they did not necessarily appreciate the importance of studying and of school. And so they would struggle with grades and then you know you have an intervention and you gotta buckle down and then they get a good grade because they had a better study habit, they tried, and they get back a 96. And I tell them, this has happened to more than one of my children, I say ooh that's bad news for you. They came home so happy, so proud. Bad news, that's my reaction? It's bad, not like the Jewish father where were the other four points thing, but that's bad news for you. Why was it bad news for you? I said because you just proved to me and to your teacher and most of all to yourself that you're capable of the 96. All along you have these excuses. I can't and I don't want to and my teacher has it in for me and I I have learning issues and I I can't. All none of them necessarily. We're accountable. We become accountable for what we could have done right. I said this with Viduy Maaser. The farmer, when the farmer finishes the process of giving the tithes, they come to the Beis Hamikdash, they recite a Viduy Maaser, a confession regarding the tithes, which is a bizarre confession. Spoken about this many times. Farmer's confession is, I've done nothing right, I've done nothing wrong rather, I'm perfect. I gave all the tithes properly, I did everything correctly, I'm perfect, which is a bizarre confession we use the word confession. So Rabbi Soloveitchik says, it's called a confession because if you did this right, how much more could you have done right? When we admit we did something well and we did it right, we also sort of incriminate ourselves because it means if I could do this right how much more could I do right? So this woman said if I could lift a car when my grandson was trapped underneath it, I have that power and that strength to do incredible things. Why does it take the moment of crisis or catastrophe? And Rav Wolbe would say if I have the ability to daven when I feel hopeless and helpless, if I can daven when there's a crisis or panic, then why can't I daven regularly like that? I have that emuna in me, I have that faith, I have that drive, I have that ability. Why can't I find it? Why can't I find it? בהושענא ובהושענא רבה אומרים on the next page, Daf Zayin. And in Hoshana and Hoshana Rabba we say הושענא של שלש שעות הושענא. קבלתי מרבותי שלפני בוא המשיח יחשוך נהורא בעולם. Says Rav Wolbe, I have a tradition from my teachers that before Mashiach is going to come, there'll be an enormous a tremendous darkness in the world. שום דבר לא יראה. You won't be able to see anything. ואנשים עלולים לאבד את האמונה שלהם. And we'll be able to, we'll struggle with faith. Is the Holocaust not an enormous darkness that fell upon the world? In different ways this pandemic, millions of losses of lives and all kinds of consequences of people who didn't lose their lives but their lives will never be the same physically, mentally, we haven't even begun to measure the impact of this pandemic. Before Mashiach comes there'll be a darkness and you won't even be able to see a light, you won't even be able to see a way out. זמן זה ימשך שלש שעות תמימות שלש שעות של חושך גדול באמונה עד כדי כך שאנחנו זקוקים להתפלל על כך ולבקש הושענא של שלש שעות הושענא. That darkness will last three hours and when we say Hoshanos on Hoshana Rabba, we are already anticipating and thinking about and davening for when that darkness will descend on this world and those three hours, literally and metaphorically, we will struggle to see or to find you. Hoshana, Hashem save us. Save us from ourselves, save us from despair, save us from hopelessness, save us from that darkness where we can't even see you. כמדומה שאנו מתקרבים כבר לשלש שעות האלו מאחר שאנחנו רחוקים כל כך מהאמונה. Says Rav Wolbe, I think we are in those three hours. So many people are walking around with no faith. So many people have given up. So many people are in despair and despondency. So many people fail to believe. They fail to believe. But you know this story which I know I'm only referencing cryptically of last week and continued in other ways into this week, it gave me such a burst and a jolt of emuna. The person who received this salvation, this miracle, that they were waiting for, the day before the dog got hungry and took a bite had called me and said you know I can't see this ever changing. I'm going to be stuck this way forever. I've tried everything, there's nothing left, it's just not going to happen, this is just my lot, this is my reality. The day before. And the very next day Hashem said that's not your lot, that's not your reality, don't limit me, don't second guess me. And he sent a hungry dog to take a bite, which led to a chain of events which six weeks later let her attain a miracle which she thought was not possible. A Yid doesn't despair, a Yid doesn't break, a Yid doesn't give up, whatever great song is a great song, a Yid never breaks. We don't break, we don't despair. It doesn't matter the darkness that has descended upon us and the hardship and the pain that people have gone through. Tragically we have fewer and fewer and less and less examples. But you see a Holocaust survivor who continues to have faith in Hashem, I don't think there's anyone alive who's gone through no matter and there are people who have struggled the challenges of Iyov. But you add them all up and they don't add up to what a Holocaust survivor who lost siblings and parents and children and was tortured and tormented and persecuted in a concentration camp, we can't begin to, we can't imagine. In our wildest imagination we can't imagine. In our wildest imagination we can't imagine. And when they have faith in Hashem, when they have faith in Hashem, despite the darkness, to find Hashem, to find that light in the darkness, it's unbelievable. I have a good friend, a member of our community, Saul Friedman. We went to Poland together, we took a great trip to Poland. Some good friends here we went together. And there was one night he got up, I hope I'm not going to embarrass him, but if I know Saul, I'm not embarrassing him. And people shared at dinner their experience. The majority of the people who went were second or third generation of survivors who had not been back to Majdanek and Treblinka and Auschwitz-Birkenau and seen the gas chambers and the crematoria and the shooting wall and the mass graves and pits. It's an unbelievable life-changing trip. And for a kid who's it's also life-changing, but for a second generation who has to go through that trip picturing their parents in that barrack or against that wall or standing next to that pit, it's just absolutely life-changing. So the whole trip we were talking about the martyrs, the six million, the Kedoshim, what they went through and who we lost. But Saul Friedman got up at dinner one night, very emotional, and he said he will never think about, not the martyrs, but the survivors the same way again. He said he grew up, his father was a survivor, his father worked in the post office. And he became a big accountant, was a large accounting firm, he's very successful, Baruch Hashem. And he said he grew up and he thought his father was like post office. He broke through. He had an education. He became an accountant. He built a firm. He became a somebody and his father nebach was a post office. But after I think it was the day of Auschwitz-Birkenau, he said, my father was a malach, my father was an angel. My father was an angel I can't measure up to and the tragedy was that so many of the people on the trip, their parents were gone. And the trip stimulated them to have so many questions and to want to have so many conversations and it bore a terrible hole in their heart to now having experienced that trip and not be able to have those conversations, to not be able to connect. Half the trip is here. But Saul in particular, and he continues to talk about it till today, he says we don't do enough to honor survivors. We have all kinds of tributes and memorials and dedications to the martyrs. But we should talk about the survivors. I don't know in all of Jewish history, and please God there never will be again in all of Jewish history, a group of people who went through what they went through and rebuilt, who went through what they went through and... A member of our community was playing golf with his kids on Sunday, maybe Monday. Started to rain, went into the clubhouse and there was an old man. And they started a conversation here in Boca. He's a hundred years old and he's the last living person rescued by Schindler. And he told them the story about being rescued by Schindler and then just then I went to Israel and I volunteered and fought in the Haganah to found the State of Israel after being rescued and being a skeleton. And these people tell these stories like they're nothing. Like they're nothing. We're going to try to have him on Behind the Bimah. And he's just playing golf and being retired in Boca, a hundred years old. It's unbelievable. Unbelievable. So why am I sharing all of this with you in closing? Because as always our time goes flying by. Because Hoshana sheloshos hoshana. Period of darkness of despair whatever you're going through in your life. I'm not trying to say ignore the pain. Remember we read from Rav Leuchter from Rav Wolbe a few weeks ago they paid the shiva call and the Rosh Yeshiva was acting like this is Hashem's plan, I'm happy all is good. And he said this Rosh Yeshiva is going to crash. Rav Wolbe left and told Rav Leuchter this Rosh Yeshiva is going to crash and burn because Hashem doesn't expect us to not feel pain. You lose someone you love you feel pain. You go through a hard time, you live with disappointment or pain. It's painful. It's okay. But one thing is to experience the pain without abandoning the faith. The anchor, the ship when the storm comes and emuna is the anchor that holds us steady. You're not going to do well by pretending there's not a storm. There's a storm. You gotta steady yourself with that anchor and emuna is that anchor. So when I Baruch Hashem am blessed in life bli ayin hara a billion times to not have meaningful difficult challenges but whatever moment or difficult day or difficult decision or difficult disappointment, you start thinking about the survivors you think about the people around us who've gone through much worse things and have maintained their faith and we latch onto them, we attach ourselves to them, we grab their coat-tails and we ride their back. And we realize that you can find Hashem even in the darkness. Light that candle. Turn up that dimmer. Find Hashem. He's always there. And don't despair. He has extraordinary ways of working. From one day giving up and thinking something's impossible to the next day the beginning of a string of events that bring about something you never dreamt in a million years. And therefore לפעמים אני מתחיל להרגיש חלישות בעבודה ואז אני חושב לעצמי כי הנה מתחילה שעה של קושי ומיד מתחזק בעבודתו. Well, I'm at this line, paragraph tes vav. Rav Wolbe says something you'd never expect, a great Mashgiach of Yerushalayim, Rav Wolbe. He says sometimes I begin to get weak. Sometimes I begin to have a crisis of faith. Sometimes I wonder where is he? And why isn't he taking care of me? And then I remember we're in these three hours. And I need to be mechazek myself. I need to strengthen myself. I need to prepare myself. I need to be able to get through, in order to be able to weather this storm. So that's the period that we're in. We're in that period in the context of Jewish history. We're in that period in this pandemic. We're in that period personally. There are individuals here and who are listening or watching now or later, going through hard times. But we have what it takes. Like the grandmother who lifted the car, we have what it takes to be able to dig deep and find that potential, that power, that will, to turn to him, to attach ourselves to him. And when we feel ourselves struggling or stumbling, find someone with faith and attach yourself to them. Find someone with faith and attach yourself to them and, please God, we'll bring the light to dispel the darkness of despair, to turn things around, and to have only bracha and yeshua in our lives. We're off next week. I have a conflict next week, but we resume in two weeks. See everybody in two weeks. Until then. By the way, you want to hear emuna? Yeah. 9:00 tonight. Justice Richard Bernstein was born blind. He had every reason in the world to have a lot of complaints and give up on God. Instead, he became a Supreme Court Justice in Michigan. He's run 25 marathons. He's competed in an Ironman. While he was training for one of those marathons, a bicyclist in Central Park lost control and ran right into him at 35 miles an hour and broke almost every bone in his body. He was in the hospital for 10 weeks straight. And he never gave up his faith in Hashem. He's a blind triathlete Supreme Court Justice whose every bone was crushed. And you have to hear his positivity and his faith in Hashem. If you don't listen tonight at 9:00 p.m., turn it on on a podcast player, YouTube tomorrow. I promise you, you will not be the same after you listen. His energy, his positivity. He's an extraordinary, extraordinary inspiration. Until next time, stay happy, stay healthy, and stay holy.
