Transcript
Good morning, boker tov, welcome back to Living with Emunah, as always want to thank our very generous series sponsors Avi and Bella Morgen in memory of Rabbi Doctor Brian Galbut and in memory of Bella's mother Doctor Ellen Shanzer. Very grateful to them for their generosity. Also this morning, shiur sponsored by Matti Youngworth in commemoration of her dear mother's yahrtzeit, Rifka bas Leah, whose neshamah should have an aliyah. Thank you so much for your sponsorship. We are finishing up, we are concluding today this chapter we spent many many months learning about simcha, learning about happiness and joy, simchas hachayim, joy for life through the work of Rav Itche Meir Morgenstern, B'yam Derachecha, and he ends very appropriately. There are no coincidences, nothing is random or chance, but he ends with ענין צער על החורבן. How could we spend all this time talking about how our default disposition, how our instinct and intuition has to be for simcha, simchas hachayim, joy and happiness and smiles? What about the churban? Aren't we supposed to be mourning and grieving? Aren't we supposed to feel its absence and loss? Aren't we supposed to be pained by the fact that there is no Beis HaMikdash? There is a siluk HaShechinah, the withdrawal of the Divine Presence, rather than feeling an intense hashras HaShechinah. So how do we reconcile? Which is it? Should we walk around and people say, what's the matter, what's wrong? So, didn't you hear? Didn't you hear what? Beis HaMikdash was destroyed. Many many years ago when we were children my brother was working one summer in a laboratory and he wasn't shaving, it was the three weeks. And somebody there in the lab, a non-Jew, I think it was an Asian person, asked him, you know, I could tell you're not shaving, what's the matter? He said, I'm actually in mourning. I'm so sorry, I didn't hear, you had a loss? Said, yeah, my people, the Jewish people had a loss. What happened? The temple was destroyed. So, I get the newspaper, I read it every day, I follow the news, I didn't see anything. I didn't see anything, I missed it. I said, well, it was 2,000 years ago. 2,000 years ago? And you're mourning and grieving today? And Napoleon is quoted famously as saying when he passed by in his conquest on Tisha B'Av, a group of Jews sitting on the floor crying, and he asked what it was about. And he found out they were sitting in mourning and grieving and crying the destruction of a Beis HaMikdash. He said, a people who could cry for something from so long ago are destined to see it be rebuilt. A people who could hold on and mourn and grieve and cry for something so long ago are destined to see it be rebuilt. That's the challenge of these three weeks. How do we relate to and feel the loss of something we never knew, we never had? It's like saying, you know, on your great-great-grandparent's yahrtzeit you should be in tears and cry and be broken and fall apart. I'm sad, I'd like to know about them, but I didn't know them. I don't know them, it's not like God forbid the loss of an immediate family member who you had your whole life and now they're gone. So the Beis HaMikdash we never knew. How can we feel its absence? But nevertheless, we're meant to not only these three weeks of the year and nine days and Tisha B'Av itself, please God we won't observe it, Beis HaMikdash will be rebuilt speedily. But not only these three weeks of the year, we're meant to regularly zecher l'churban, zecher l'mikdash. We have all kinds of halachos, all kinds of halachos that we remember. We break a plate at the chosson's tish, we break the glass under the chuppah, we leave a piece of our home unfinished, unplastered, so that every time one enters their home they see that unplastered, unfinished portion of their otherwise magnificently decorated home and they say, it's incomplete, and I'm incomplete, because my life is incomplete because there's no Beis HaMikdash. I don't have that place of miracles to go regain that confidence in HaShem. I don't have that place to be able to go achieve forgiveness and atonement. I don't have that place. So my home is incomplete as a reflection and a reminder that I'm incomplete. And we have all kinds of other reminders all throughout the year. Now's not the time to elaborate, but it's a difference between zecher l'churban and zecher l'mikdash. Some things we do to remember there's destruction, like the unfinished, unplastered part of our home, the three weeks and nine days and so on. And then there's zecher l'mikdash. We commemorate the way it was done there. For example, the fact that we shake a lulav and esrog for a week. Really, only in the Beis HaMikdash it was taken for a week, outside the Beis HaMikdash it was only taken the first day. But it was established רבן יוחנן בן זכאי that we too would take the lulav and esrog all week, other than Shabbos, to commemorate the way they did it in the Beis HaMikdash, to remember zecher l'mikdash. And we have many many other examples. So it's not only this time of the year. It's throughout the entire year. Do we not include in our davening Es Tzemach David where we're longing for the blossoming and the sprouting of the redemption? V'li'Yerushalayim ircha, we want it to be rebuilt, Boneh Yerushalayim in the present, because any generation in which it's not built means had it existed today it would have been destroyed. We spoke about that on Sunday night when we spoke about judging favorably, going from hypercriticism to hyper-. per compliments. You could still listen to it. And we spoke about Bonei Yerushalayim in the present because we need to be rebuilding Yerushalayim because we're responsible for its destruction. If it existed today, Hashem would look at us and say, uh-uh, I'm taking it down. So we should feel that pain, that absence, that hole in our hearts all the time. So יש לשאול את רבינו תם על מעת החורבן יש להתאבל על בית המקדש. איך נשמח כאשר בית קדשנו חרב? How can we be happy and joyous when our home, our true home, our eternal home has been destroyed? It's been decimated, it's been leveled, and we are suffering the consequences of it. Absent the Beis HaMikdash and siluka d'Shechina, Hashem's withdrawal means that we're living in a place of doubt and uncertainty. Hakadosh Baruch Hu the almighty is hidden. We're living in a time of anti-Semitism, of hatred, of danger, of threats, of cynics and scoffers from the nations. So how could you be besimcha? How could you be besimcha? Your house is burnt to the ground, you're homeless, you're going to be besimcha? You're going to smile and laugh? Someone's going to meet you, how's it going? Amazing, everything's great. I'm besimcha, I go to the Emunah Shiur, I'm besimcha. How's that possible? Isn't it fake? Isn't it disingenuous? How can we really be besimcha when there's such a thing missing? וביאור הענין הוא כדכתיב. אל תשמח ישראל אל גיל כעמים. Hainu, אסור לשמוח בשמחה סתם כמו הגוים ששמחים מתוך תחושה שלימה גשמית כי אין לישראל שלימות גשמית כל זמן שהמקדש חרב. Here's how we understand it, based on a posuk. Our joy and our happiness are there, but they're incomplete. They're incomplete. The simcha, he says, of non-Jews who don't suffer from an absence of a Beis HaMikdash, that simcha's complete. Good steak, good bottle of wine, purchase a new car, a new dress, new jewelry, make new money, have a new relationship, celebrate a new birthday, so that simcha is entirely complete. It's entirely whole because there's nothing missing from it. But for us by definition, definitionally we are missing. You know, a person who lost a parent, a loved one, and then had a simcha. So it's a, it's a mixed experience. It's a, it's a mixed experience. It's a bittersweet, we use that expression. It's bittersweet. It's sweet to be at the wedding of a child, it's sweet. It's sweet to be at the wedding of a child. It's sweet to be at the birth of a child, the birth of a grandchild, but there's a bittersweetness because you think about who didn't walk down the aisle. You think about who wasn't the sandek. You think about who's not there for you to call and tell the good news to. There's an incompleteness and a bittersweetness to it. And that's the life of a Jew. There's simcha, but our simcha is by definition always bittersweet. Hashem, I walk around joyful and I'm happy and I'm grateful and I'm focused on what I have, not what's missing. And we spoke about last week that the Baal Shem Tov: Besimcha the same letters as machshava. It's all about where I place my thoughts and what I choose to think about. I am besimcha when I place my machshava, my thoughts on what I have, not what's missing. But in that simcha, there's a bittersweetness. There's a bittersweetness. I'm so happy, Hashem, but really I wish I could be happy with You on Har HaBayis in Yerushalayim, in the Beis HaMikdash. I wish I could offer a korban to say thank you. I wish I could offer a korban to say I'm sorry. I wish I could come close to You and witness the daily miracles that happened there. When I feel doubt or distance and I need to know that You're there, I could just come to the Beis HaMikdash and see the ten daily miracles and have certainty and completeness. שמחה של מצוה מותרת ומחוייבת. The joy for a mitzvah, not a frivolous joy, not a fleeting joy, not a superficial joy, but a simcha shel mitzvah. ובשמחה של מצוה ענין השמחה בהשם יתברך. What is a simcha shel mitzvah? It is a simcha ba-Hashem Yisborach. It is a simcha ba-Hashem Yisborach. It is tapping into Hashem. We don't have Him in the building, but we have Him in the mitzvah. We don't have Him by going to the destination or the location, but we can still tap into Him through the mitzvah that we do. ולכן נכלה גם שמחה סתם עם כוונתו לפתוח את הנפש לשמחה מתוך רצון להגיע למעלת השמחה. So a person makes a lechayim, a person has a beautiful Shabbos Yom Tov meal, a person transforms and elevates the physical into the spiritual, and that's the will of Hashem, that too is a mitzvah. So we have 613 mitzvos which are mitzvos proper. 613 that are counted, that are defined, that appear in the Shulchan Aruch. So we have to light candles and to put on tefillin, we have to observe the holiday, we have to keep kosher. We have 613 rules and regulations. And then we have everything that falls between. Everything that falls between. Where it's what we might call reshus. It doesn't fit into either mitzvah or aveirah. It's neutral. When I choose what to wear, when I choose what to eat, how I eat. I have to eat what's *kosher* and I have to make a *bracha* before and after I eat, but the attitude and the way I eat, my philosophy of eating, countless other examples of what we call a *reshus*. But they're not really a *reshus*. *Rabbeinu Bechaya*, *Baal HaTanya*, explain that the truth is there's only two categories. Everything I do I need to stop and ask myself: what does *Hashem* want? What mindfulness, what attitude am I meant to have right now? What is this experience? Am I living to eat or eating to live? Is the food nourishing only my body or am I eating in a way that this experience is nourishing my soul? And when we bring the right mindset and mindfulness to all that we do, to all that we do, then we take that which seems mundane and we make it holy, and we transform it and we elevate it. And we find *Hashem* in it. We find *Hashem* in it. In fact, maybe we'll learn this next, I don't know yet, but he has in his *sefer* a beautiful *perek* on *achila*, the philosophy of eating. You wouldn't necessarily think a *sefer* of *chasidus* of *machshava* would have a *perek* called *achila*, eating. I mean you would if you know the Jewish people, but you'd think it'd be recipes and recommended restaurants and all kinds of other things like that. But it's not, it's a philosophy of eating. And what's the philosophy of eating? I'll just give you one insight that he has. He says, if we don't eat what happens to us? We die. You can't live without eating. The *briya*, we were created and designed in such a way that the human being needs nourishment, we need to eat in order to live. If you stop eating you can't live. That means that what's inherent and intrinsic in the morsels of food that we put into our body, the life force, the life source. We're actually, when we eat, we are actually making contact with the driver of life, with life force, life energy, with life. And who is the one who sustains, who is the one who gives life? *Hashem*. So every time we take a bite and we swallow, we are imbibing *Hashem* into us. We're taking a *cheftza*, a physical manifestation, an object of food and in that object of food are nutrients and nourishment that will sustain us, so we're swallowing a life force and *Hashem* is the life force. Now *Hashem* of course is infinite and omnipotent and can't be contained. *Hashem* is not in the morsel of food, you can't put him in a box. *Hashem* doesn't come with a label, how much carbs and how much sugar and how much whatever is in it. You can't put *Hashem* into something physical, but it means, says *Rav Itche Meir*, that every bite we eat and every act of eating and every experience of sitting down to eat you say: I am in the process of dying, I need to experience life, *Hashem* is the sustainer of life through this act of eating, I make contact with the divine. It's an amazing and entirely different philosophy of eating. That is very different than shoveling into our trap as much food as we can. Mindlessly and thoughtlessly, just eating as much as we can while we gossip or *shmooze* or watch something or distract ourselves by solving the Wordle or whatever. You know, that, it's a very different philosophy. Am I present, am I centered, am I mindful? And he writes that's the purpose of a *bracha*. I make a *bracha* so that I'm saying this isn't food, this isn't physical, this isn't just carbs and sugars and proteins. This is a life force. I'm about to imbibe what will sustain my life. And I'm going to ground myself and focus and I'm about to see *Hashem* in what I'm eating because He will extend my life, He's giving me life itself in what I'm about to eat. *Shehakol nihiya bidvaro*. המוציא לחם מן הארץ. He brings out a life force from the world. It's unbelievable. It's unbelievable. So you could eat like an animal, we use that in our vernacular, we describe somebody as eating like a pig or eating like an animal, and when all you do is shove it in, then you're eating like an animal. But if you pause and make a *bracha* and you mindfully say, I'm about to make contact with the divine, I am about to experience a connection with *Hashem*, I am about to imbibe *Hashem* in me through the gift of the nourishment and the life force that He's given that I could eat. Wow. Now the act of eating is entirely different. So says *Rav Itche Meir*, גם בשמחה סתם אם כוונתו לפתוח את הנפש לשמחה. Even with *simcha stam*, a good steak, *psh*, that's *simcha*. Rare, black and blue, a little char on the outside, nice and rare on the inside, maybe some fried onions with it. That's, that's *simcha*. That's *simcha*. But if it's just eating like an animal, so that's a *simcha stam*. But if I elevate it because I say *Hakadosh Baruch Hu* you love me so you've given me a chef who knows how to properly prepare a black and blue steak, which not many do and it's not easy but that is the proper way to have a steak, black and blue, char on the outside and really rare, you want the piece of meat still moving a little bit on your plate, black and blue. אם כוונתו לפתוח את הנפש לשמחה, l'simcha. If the kavana is to open the nefesh b'simcha, you want to be geshmak to eat the steak, you're going to make a shehakol on it, that's to an unbelievable shehakol, you're going to find Hashem in it, מתוך רצון להגיע למעלת השמחה, maalas hasimcha. So our simcha first of all is bittersweet because of the churban. Hakodesh Baruch Hu, I put bimachshava, besimcha is machshava. Where I put my thoughts, I am besimcha. Machshava is besimcha. Simcha, lismoach is litzmoach, Hirsch taught us. Lismoach, when I'm happy, I'm blossoming, I'm flourishing, I'm growing. The sin and the tzadi are interchangeable. Lismoach, litzmoach, I'm growing, I'm blossoming. Machshava, besimcha, same letters. I'm focused on the bracha, I'm focused on what I have, not what's missing. I'm focused on what I'm grateful for, not what I want to complain about. I'm focused on the bracha in my life, not on the challenges. Machshava, where I put my thoughts and my focus and my mindfulness and my meditation, that machshava yields, it makes me besimcha. But my simcha is bittersweet because as happy as I am, you walk your child down the aisle, you're on cloud nine. But if a parent or someone you love is not there, is missing, you could be on cloud nine laced with a little bitterness too. And the churban is that laced with bitterness. הגדרת אבילות היא געגוע. So how do we understand? We'll go back actually and read the bracket. ובאמת כל עניין אבילות רחמנא ליצלן אינו שייך כלל לעצבות. How do we understand mourning and grieving? If there's such a mitzvah to be besimcha tamid, we're meant to be besimcha all the time and always, how do you tell it to a mourner? Someone loses a loved one, they're sitting on a low chair, they're wearing their torn shirt, they're not getting a haircut or shaving, and they should be besimcha? So he says, aveilus is not atzvus. Aveilus is not synonymous with sadness. וזה מוכרח כי הלא עצבות איסור גמור. Sadness is forbidden. A Jew can't be, it can't have atzvus. No sadness. ועוד כי באמת מה שייך להיות עצב האמת היא שהכל מאיתו יתברך. And if you live knowing that everything is from Him and everything is for the best and everything is right and just, and our loved one is in a better place for them, experiencing the ultimate ecstasy of being in the presence of the divine, so what room is there for sadness? וכל מה שעושה השם יתברך לטובה. And all that Hashem does is for the good. איך יתכן שיהיה חיוב להתאבל? How could there be an obligation to mourn, to grieve, to cry, ולהראות חס ושלום ההיפך מאמונה? Isn't when you sit and you cry and you mourn and you grieve and you say why and how and where are you, isn't that the opposite of emuna, of faith? Isn't faith saying I accept and it's from You and it's for the best? Isn't it a stira minei ubei, isn't it a contradiction? אלא הגדרת אבילות היא געגוע. So aveilus, and here Rav Itche Meir gives a philosophy of mourning, which is not easy, I'm not suggesting it's easy. But the avel, the avel should not have an existential crisis or a crisis in faith through their loss, and the avel should not be sad in the sense that I'm sad my team lost in sports, I'm sad I tore my favorite outfit, I'm sad that... It's not a sadness, it's what he calls ga'agu'a. What's ga'agu'a? is longing. is longing. is longing. I long for my loved one. I want to hold their hand, I want to feel their embrace, I want to tell them what's happening in my life, I want to be able to pick up the telephone and call them. I have a ga'agu'a, their absence, I feel that absence, and it's creating a sense of longing in me. Not sadness, but longing. משל להורים השולחים את בנם ללמוד תורה בארץ רחוקה. You send your child to go learn in a faraway land. הנה הם יודעים שזה מה שטוב לו. You know that's what's good, that's what's right, that's what's best for them, veshalchum misham meratzon. And you send them with your full heart, you send them willingly. אבל מצד הגעגוע הם יבכו. But you know what happens? You miss them. It's at the airport, you cry and they cry, and then a week goes by and you're crying. They're not crying anymore, no, but they're still crying. Now I'm not talking about today. When my children were teenagers living at home, they had no interest and didn't talk to me. Then they went to Israel, 6,000 miles away, and tried to FaceTime me 400 times a day. I spoke to them by far much more when they were away than when they were home. So today it's a very different experience. When I went to Kerem B'Yavneh, just a few years ago, there were payphones, three of them in KBY, and you waited desperately in line, and you called collect with a little signal to not accept and to call back. And when you called back, you had exactly two minutes to say everything going on in your life because it was 400 dollars a minute. And I spoke to my parents, this is not an exaggeration because of the cost of long-distance calls, I spoke to them every other week for five minutes. Every other week for five minutes. You believe that? Children today don't believe that. So every other week for five minutes. So let me ask you: Did I want to be there? I wanted to be there. Were my parents excited and happy and proud that I was there? Absolutely. Did it create ga'agu'im? Did they long, did they miss me? My mother did at least. I'm just joking, my father did too, I hope. But my parents missed me and I missed them. You could be in the right place and in the best place and long and miss one another. The longing and missing doesn't create sadness. If you said to my parents, "Efraim's in Kerem B'Yavneh, he's away for the year, for two years, are you sad?" I'm not sad, I miss him. I miss him and I long to connect with him, that doesn't have to equal sadness. You could miss someone and long to be connected to them, and that doesn't have to equal and equate to sadness. אין זו עצבות אלא זה כוח בנפש האוהבת שנקרא געגוע. If you are a loving person, an affectionate person, a connected person, a feeling person, then when there's an absence of someone that you love, it creates ga'agu'im, there's longing. There's longing and there's absence, there's missing. שהוא ביטוי לרצון הנפשי לראות ולהתקשר בפועל עם האהוב. This is an expression of the genuine depth of the soul yearning to see and connect physically, practically, meaningfully, im ha'ohuv, with the one that you love, with the one that you love. In other words, when you talk to somebody who's an avel who mourns and grieves, they say to themselves, "You know, I feel the presence of that person all the time. I don't necessarily even miss them spiritually because I feel their presence all the time." The shiur is dedicated in memory of Brian Galbut, who a couple weeks ago would have turned 50, whose yahrtzeit is coming up on Erev Tisha B'Av, and I feel his presence every day. He was a dear, dear friend and an incredible source of inspiration and often I say: "What would he do? What would he say?" I remember some encouragement or the role model he was. You could spiritually continue to feel the influence and presence, but you still miss laughing or hugging or dancing with or learning together or playing ball together or making l'chaim together, that physical connection. And if it's a loved one you miss holding their hand, you miss the embrace, you miss picking up that phone, you miss that text, you miss that text. So what we have is b'poal, the physical realization of the connection. The spiritual connection no one can take away. When you see those pictures and when you live the memories and when you invoke the sayings and you feel the influence and you look at the family, nobody could take that away. That is eternal, that is immortal, that is something that cannot be taken away. But b'poal, the physical connection, that's what we don't have. Now that doesn't have to yield sadness. You could express it not as sad, but I miss and I long. ולכן הגדירו חז"ל את אבילות על נפטר רחמנא ליצלן כי עיקרה דהיינו כבוד. כי על ידי אבילות מראים שהוא חשוב ואהוב ומתגעגעים אליו. When you mourn for someone you're giving them kavod. It's called kevod hames. You're honoring the deceased. How are you honoring them? When you sponsor the new building or the campus of BRS and you put their name outside, that's honoring them. And by the way, feel free to speak to me after the shiur if you'd like to do that. That's honoring when you put someone's name on something. But it's kevod hames because you sat shiva? It's kevod hames because you said Kaddish? It's kevod hames because you lit a yahrtzeit candle on the yahrtzeit or you said Yizkor? It's kevod hames because that's kevod hames? The answer is that's kavod, you know why? Because when you say you didn't just disappear and you're not invisible and you didn't, I miss you. I have ga'agu'a, I long for you. I miss you and I long for you and I feel that absence and that hole in my heart, that's kavod. That's honoring. You're not invisible, you didn't disappear without a trace. וממילא אין סתירה בין אבילות הבכייה לבין האמונה שהכל לטובה. So if you see mourning not as sadness, but as longing and missing, then it's no longer a contradiction to emuna, to faith. כי הבכי הוא לא על עצם הפטירה כי הכל לטובה. Because the tears are not for the death because a person who stops and says to themselves, particularly if one's loved one was suffering or struggling at the end of life, as many or most do physically, mentally, then you're not crying really for them. Because when you pause and you think about it you say: "They are in the world of eternity, they are in the world of bliss, they are in a world where they're no longer suffering or compromised, they are in a world where there is no struggle, they are in a world where they are flying and thriving and flourishing, they are in a world where they are experiencing the ultimate pleasure and bliss of the presence of Hashem, and they are still looking down and they're still connected to all of us." We don't cry and mourn and grieve for them. Really all those feelings are for. For us. For them? Good, I'm happy, it's good for them. Like a parent whose child is off in Israel in Yeshiva and seminary. I'm happy for them. They're in the best place for them. They're having a phenomenal experience for them. But I'm sad. But I miss them. I'm not sad, we're not supposed to be sad. But I miss them. But I miss them and I long for them. And so I'm crying for missing them. I'm not crying. You know when we cry? When they're on all kinds of machines and connected to all kinds of tubes. We cry when they're in pain and all kinds of pain medications. We cry when they struggle or suffer in this world. That's when we cry for them. But when they transition to the next world, we're not crying for them. At that point, the tears are for us. For us. I long, I feel an absence, I desire a connection. So that's not a contradiction to faith. My faith, my faith empowers me to know that they're where they're meant to be. They're in a place that's best for them. My tears are for me. My tears are for me. וכך אפשר להבין איכות אבל נכון על חורבן בית המקדש. And with this we can understand how to properly grieve and mourn the absence of the Beis HaMikdash. כי אין עיקר העניין להצטער רק על עצם מה שנחרב הבית. We're not crying because the bricks and mortar were burnt to the ground. We're not crying because the mizbeach was disassembled and the paroches was pierced by Titus ha'rasha. We're not crying for the physical material. Rather, להצטער רק על עצם מה שנחרב הבית אלא בעיקר על כבוד שמים שנתחלל ומתחלל. You know why we're crying? Because that was a place of divine revelation. That was a place of miracles. That was a place of certainty. And now that's missing. We long for it. We feel its absence. We yearn for the physical connection. ועל כך שבזה היתרחקנו מהשם יתברך ועכשיו אנו רחוקים ממנו. And you know why we're crying? Because when a parent has expelled a child from the home and says, "I have to practice tough love." It's not that I don't love you. It's the hardest thing in the world for parents. I've been countless times with parents through that process. But when a parent has to practice tough love and says, "The reason I'm throwing you out of the house and the reason that I'm withdrawing any help and support is not because I don't love you, it's because I love you so much that this is the only thing I can do to shake you out of your circumstance." Tough love. There's nothing harder in the world for a parent than tough love. But yet the loving parent, when the circumstance demands, will practice that tough love. Hakadosh Baruch Hu is practicing tough love with us. Tough love with us. He threw us out of the house and He said, "I love you so much that I need to wake you up and shake you up. I need to do an intervention to get you to change your ways, that I've thrown you out of the house. In fact, I burned the house to the ground. There is no house for us right now. We can't live together right now. You're on your own because of that tough love." And so our tears in this period is not because of sadness, it's missing and longing to be together with Him. It's the reality of that tough love that we are the recipients of it. Not with doubt that He's doing it out of love, but with the reality that He needs to do tough love. ועיקר הבכייה היא על ריחוקנו עכשיו. So the core bechiyah is for the distance now. כי הצער והבכייה עם געגועים לאהבת נפשנו השכינה הקדושה. So these three weeks, these nine days, every day on our calendar when we observe zecher l'churban and zecher l'mikdash, we are longing to be reconnected with Him. We're longing to that time and that place where we can go with certainty and confidence, where we can see miracles and revelation, where we could pour out our hearts and receive a kaparah, atonement. וממילא אין זה סתירה לשמחה אמיתית כי אדרבה שניהם מכוונים על דבר אחד שמחה על מה שכן יש לנו את השם יתברך. So by the way, we have a Kaddish club that meets once a month, those who are in their year of mourning. We learn and we have a sort of support group together. And we often talk about that when you pass that picture or you have that trigger that reminds you of the loved one who's not here and you cry, there's even a little simcha in that. Why? Because you say, "You know, as much as that just tore open the wound again, it ripped off the scab, but it's a relief and it's a point even of joy to know that they were so important to me, I still miss them enough to cry. That that relationship is still so alive that it hasn't dissolved or disappeared, it hasn't lost its intensity. I still love them so much that when I see that thing that it makes me pause or cry, on the one hand I'm crying, but on the other, it's also nice to know that the relationship is still so alive that it brings me to that tear." So that's the same thing in these three weeks and nine days. שמחה על מה שכן יש לנו ואבילות על הריחוק שנוצר מהחורבן כי בוודאי שבזמן המקדש הקירבה הייתה הרבה יותר גדולה וגלויה. We used to be much closer and now we're apart and we yearn and long to be close again. והשמחה שאסורה היא שמחה שאדם שמח לעצמו. So the simcha that's forbidden during these three weeks and nine days is the personal simcha, the selfish simcha, the simcha of... The simcha in knowing that I'm sad that I'm not connected to him, that's an appropriate simcha still. The simcha of the external superficial simcha, that's inappropriate. ומרגיש טוב לו מרוב כל בו ששכחו מהשם יתברך וצער השכינה וגלותה. You know the Chassidim, the Rebbe say many many say, mishenichnas Av, Rosh Chodesh Av is coming up. When the month of Av enters, mematin besimcha. I've told you many times Rav Schwab said, simcha's like a pilot light. Sometimes you raise it, it's cooking, the fire's, it's fire, and sometimes you got to let it, you have to lower it and let it simmer, but it can never be extinguished. So simcha in our life can never be extinguished. In Adar, all cylinders, we raise that flame. The rest of the time it's at a good steady level. Av, we lower it a bit, but you always have to have simcha. So the Chassidim say, not משנכנס אב ממעטין בשמחה. It's not when the nine days start, no laundry and no swimming and no meat and no, no, no, it's mishenichnas Av mematin. When Av comes we have to do less, but how? Besimcha. משנכנס אב ממעטין כמה, how? Mishenichnas Av mematin how? Besimcha. Even when we're mimate, the way that we are mimate is besimcha. You could never forfeit, you can never shut off that simcha. A Yid, a Jew always has to be, always has to be besimcha. Not sad. You could be besimcha even within longing and missing and yearning. So this is the time of year that we focus on the yearning and the longing and the missing, and how do we do it? Even that we do with a sense of, with a sense of simcha. Tonight's Behind the Bima you do not want to miss. Chava Willig Levy is an amazing, amazing woman, motivational speaker, advocate, author. She was diagnosed with two forms of polio as a child and she's confined to a wheelchair. Her husband is blind. They have children and beautiful grandchildren and she's an incredibly inspiring person. You do not want to miss the conversation Yocheved and I will have with her tonight Behind the Bima. Until next time, stay happy, stay healthy, and stay holy.
