Transcript
Okay good morning boker tov welcome back to living with emuna. I want to thank as always our generous series sponsors for the year, Avi and Bella Morgan in memory of Rabbi Dr. Brian Galbut whose yahrzeit is coming up next week and in memory of Bella's mother Dr. Ellen Shanzer. Very grateful to the Morgans for their generous sponsorship. There's always the opportunity to sponsor individual shiurim as well and we certainly welcome your support and help in sharing our Torah. This morning's shiur is sponsored by Rachel Ginzberg in memory of Dr. Jacob M. Hiller who exemplified and modeled how to live with simchas hachaim, which is what we spent so much time talking about recently. Very grateful to the Ginzbergs, thank you very much for your generosity and sponsorship. We completed our study of simcha; you're never done studying simcha, certainly never done living with and practicing simcha, but we completed that section in Bayam Derechecha Rav Itche Meyer about simcha, and we're moving over not only to a different section, frankly we're moving over to a different volume. There are several volumes of Bayam Derechecha, Rav Itche Meyer Morgenstern's wonderful set of sefarim, insights, and this one is the sefer on Pesach and Sefiras Haomer. So before any of you break out in hives, it is not Erev Pesach, it's Erev Tisha B'av, so why are we learning a section from Erev Pesach? It happens to be there's a high correlation between Pesach and Tisha B'av, they always fall on the same day of the week, at-bash, we eat the egg at the Seder, there's all kinds of correlations, that is not the reason. The reason is because there's a chapter in here which I think is very relevant; it's relevant to the time of year in which we're in and it's relevant to the way that I think many people have been or are feeling. And I wanted to go through his words because I think they're very insightful, inspiring, and they are very uplifting. Hapasuk omer, there are handouts if you didn't get a copy please feel free to take, of course buy the sefer for yourself and support Rav Itche Meyer and his Torah. Hapasuk omer achor vakedem tzartani, דהיינו בעצם יצירת הנברא יש לו שני מצבים shenikrayim bapasuk achor vakedem panim ve-achor. In life, there are two phases or stages or two feelings that we can have. We talk about and we're now up to I don't even know what number shiur of living with emuna, but we talk about emuna like it's binary. You either don't have emuna, you're either some heretic on the street, reject, atheist, with no portion of the world to come, or you're a tzaddik, you have perfect emuna, you feel Hashem's presence all the time, just like click the switch, just turn it on, it's binary. You're either without emuna or you're with emuna. But the truth is that all of us fluctuate in life; all of us have ups and downs, all of us have periods where we feel closer to Him, periods where we feel more distanced, periods where we have confidence and certainty, periods where we have doubt and uncertainty and confusion. All of us go through phases and periods of our lives; we have ups and downs in our lives. In fact, in the one and one campaign if you're not yet a member you should be, which is a dollar a day of tzedaka and a minute a day of Torah learning in the merit of Esty Moskowitz, אסתי טילא בת אריאל ציפורא and please stay afterwards to say Tehillim for her. So recently Rabbi Weberman, friend of mine, had his one minute and he shared an insight from Rav Avrum Schorr that bears repeating. It was brilliant. He said, you know, somebody goes for an EKG. What does the EKG show? There are ups and downs and ups and downs. What happens if someone's EKG shows a flat line? You're dead. If you're living a life which is a flat line, either no emuna, flat, or perfect emuna, flat, if you're living a life with a flat line, you're dead. You're dead. If a test or an evaluation or something that would show your life would show a flat line, it would show that you're dead. Spiritually, physically. It's the EKG that's ups and downs that shows you're alive. So we tend to live life thinking, I wish I had a flat line. I wish I had a flat line, like even-steven, even-keel, can't everything just be like my health, my finances, my relationships, I just want a flat line, I want to live life a flat line. But that's not life. Just like on an EKG a flat line would show that you're dead, spiritually if you're flat-lining in life, you're dead. You're dead. You're checked out, you're tuned out, you're hopeless, you have despair, you're not really a feeling person. If you have a flat line, you're dead. So there's ups and downs, there's achor vakedem. achor vakedem means behind us and in front of us. Or the lashon of panim ve-achor. There's our face and there's our back. המצב האחד הוא כאשר אור שמו יתברך מתגלה לנברא שזה נקרא קדם פנים. On the one hand you have this notion of when you feel entirely plugged in, connected, certain, confident, there's Hashem, He's involved in my life, I see Him everywhere, I'm grateful to Him, I know it's all for a good reason, calm, cool, collect, tranquil, faith, connection, emuna, dveikus, bitachon, that's kedem, I see in front of me. Sometimes we're in a different place, הסתרת פני השם יתברך, sometimes you say Hashem where are you? Where are you? I'm looking everywhere and I don't see you. I'm desperately trying to hold on, I'm looking for a connection, I'm trying to feel something, I'm trying to plug into my davening or my mitzvos or my yantiv or my emuna. Where are you? Where are you? I'm trying to connect to you and where are you? And there's a notion of achor, it's as if Hashem is so to say turned his back. All we see is his back. We can't see his front, we don't see it's not a face-to-face conversation, it's a face to back, we're chasing, we're pursuing, we're looking. But there's doubt and there's uncertainty and there's confusion and there's even anger. There's anger at Hashem. And anger at Hashem I think is a legitimate emotion. It's not one that's a mitzvah, it's not one that we encourage, but anger at Hashem is also an expression of faith. We've shared many, many times that the person who's angry or disappointed, it's better to scream at Hashem than not talk to Hashem. Person who doesn't talk to Hashem has checked out of a relationship. If you don't even talk to him, if you're done with him, if you have no conversation, ongoing conversation with him, you know, you're checked out of a relationship. I do a fair amount of marriage counseling, not professionally, I always refer to a qualified, competent professional, but rabbinically, complement it with rabbinic counseling. And I can tell you that when you sit with the couple and you learn what are the problems, so the couple who says we fight, you know, we love each other tremendously with tremendous energy and passion, and then we fight with energy and passion. And then you have another couple who says you know we don't fight, we're just, we're just like roommates, we just overlap in the house, we don't even talk much, we're just in the same space but we're not even connected. So if you're not even talking, if there's not even screaming, that's when the, that's when the relationship's in the ICU. A relationship's in the greatest trouble when there's not even anything, when there's no conversation. If there's screaming, if there's anger, if there's disappointment, if there's feelings, if they're trying to navigate, then, then the relationship is alive. There's something to work with. And the same is true in our relationship with Hashem. The person who's checked out, who's quiet, person who doesn't talk to him, doesn't listen to Hashem talking to them, person who says yeah am I angry? I'm not angry at God. I don't know if I'm an atheist, I didn't really give it enough thought to decide whether I believe he's there or not, I just I don't really I don't really have a relationship with him. I don't talk to him, I don't hear him talking to me, I don't think about him much, I'm just living my life. That relationship is much, much more in trouble than the person who says God where are you and I'm angry at you, how could you do this? And where are you and why aren't you answering me? So to scream at Hashem is certainly a greater expression of faith than to not talk to Hashem. Person who doesn't talk to Hashem, you know, maybe you'll think at least they're not chutzpadik or rude or brazen to Hashem, but they're actually checked out of the relationship. It's much more on life support than the person who screams or yells, who's angry, who's disappointed, who's frustrated, who says to Hashem where are you and what's going on. I've told you a million times the story of the Holocaust survivor's funeral I did. I'd never met the woman but we're meeting with the family and I asked what was her faith like after the Holocaust. And her son-in-law said to me, you know, she wasn't a practicing observant Jew. He said but she was angry at Hashem, she was angry at God ever since she lost everything she lost in the Holocaust. And then he said to me one of the greatest lessons of emuna I ever learned. He said I guess her being angry at God was a really powerful form of faith because you're not angry at someone that you don't believe exists. You're not angry at a figment of the imagination. You're not angry at something which is theoretical or conceptual. You're angry at your mother or father who you expected more to protect you and they disappointed you. So that's not, that's not good, it's not the model of the relationship that we're striving for, it's not what we're teaching, but it is a relationship. It is a relationship. So says the Sfas Emes if we're honest with ourselves, if we have a flatline in life, we're not alive. If our spiritual existence, if our spiritual existence reflects a flatline, we're not alive. If it has ups and downs like an EKG, then that shows we're alive. There's panim ve-achor, achor ve-kedem. There's behind and forward, there's our back and our front, Hashem's back and his front. So sometimes we're on fire, we're plugged in, it's clear as day, we see him, we feel him, we're talking to him, we're talking about him, and other times like where are you? Where are you? What is going on and why does the sky feel like it's falling? And how come I keep asking you and turning to you and reaching for you and you're elusive, you feel like you're not there? ואז במצב הזה השם יתברך לא מגלה אור פניו אל הנברא. So that I want to talk about this because now we're in the three weeks, soon we'll be entering the nine days and Tisha B'av. And this is the inverse, you know, the High Holidays is all about Hashem, Elul, אני לדודי ודודי לי, Hashem brings flowers and cards and chocolates and I'm in love and you're in love and I see you everywhere and I'm working on it and I'm putting in time and we're... having date night all the time and we're going to come to Rosh Hashanah Yom Kippur it's going to be amazing. The end of Yom Kippur we're going to have Neilah, lock the door, Rabbi Shlomo's beautiful insight, Neilah's not God locking us out, Neilah is we're going to go in a room with God and lock the door behind us, Neilah to lock. So Neilah by the time we get to Neilah, oh, the goal is we're going into a private room, a Yichud room with Hashem, we're going to lock the door behind us. So that's love and romance and energy and confidence and certainty, but this is destruction and exile and tragedy and sadness and pain and suffering and crying. Where's Hashem in that? What does a relationship look like in that? What do you do about your davenning when it's not flowing? Should a person just close the siddur, like what am I doing? It's not it's just not flowing. I'm putting in the motions, at the end I think I read the words, I don't even know, I'm not even sure, I wasn't really paying any attention, just showing up or I'm just doing it because I'm supposed to, just going through the motions. So is that a relationship? Is it better to not daven than to have an inauthentic davenning? Is it better to skip davenning than having a davenning where you're checked out? Or what's the value of a checked out, angry, doubtful davenning? What does it look like? So that's what I want to talk about through the prism of בימי דרכך אחור והוא מאיר. There's also a beautiful piece in Rav Volbe, maybe we'll do that next, although I don't want to get too depressing. By the time we get to it we'll probably be in Elul, we're supposed to be on date night with Hashem. But Rav Volbe also has a beautiful piece about ימי האהבה וימי השנאה והיאוש, days of love of Hashem and days of sinah where you don't love Judaism and days of yeish, days of like I give up. I give up. I've spent a lifetime trying to connect to this mitzvah or this davenning or this part of our religion and I give up. And what drives a lot of people to give up, me included, they want to give up in Judaism because of the Jews. A lot of people want to walk away not because of God, but sometimes the very people who claim to most represent God most turn you off to God. Sometimes it's hard, you know the old adage: don't judge Judaism by the Jew, don't punish God because of His children, but sometimes it's hard to differentiate and separate them out, sometimes. So this is kind of a down topic, but I think it's a real one. An Emunah shiur that only talked about like oh we're on fire and Emunah let's make brachos let's say amen to each other let's Baruch Hashem. Like okay yeah there are times there are moments that's great that's what we're striving for. But if we flatline with that then we're fake, we're dead, we're not we're not really living. A real life, a real relationship, every real relationship has ups and downs. So how do we navigate that place? How do we navigate Eicha? How do we navigate a relationship with Hashem where we're sitting on the floor? How do we navigate a relationship with Hashem which is Bein Hametzarim? כל רודפיה השיגוה בין המצרים. Pasuk says in Eicha that כל רודפיה השיגוה בין המצרים, all who pursued her caught up between the straits. So the name of these three weeks, the nine days, Tisha B'Av, this unit, this period of time is called Bein Hametzarim. So the Baalei Mussar, the Baalei Machshava, the Rebbes all say read that pasuk differently. כל רודפיה if you're chasing Hashem hisiguha, you know where you can catch up to Him? Bein Hametzarim. Sometimes it's in a lowly place, sometimes it's in a down and out place, sometimes it's when you feel beaten up place, sometimes that's where you're actually most best positioned to find Him, to find Him. So there is a relationship to be found even in this state, even in these moments, even in this place and that's what we're going to look at. ואז במצב הזה שהקדוש ברוך הוא לא מגלה אור פניו אל הנברא אלא מראה לו רק את אחוריו כביכול, Hashem says you can't see My face all you see is My back. היינו שנותן לו את אחוריו, I'm going to provide for you, I put money on your debit card but don't call. Put money on your debit card but don't FaceTime, don't visit. Beli l'isgalos lo. ואז השם יתברך מתנהג כמו אדם שזורק מאחורי כתפיו מטבע לחברו שמורה שהוא לא נקשר אל פנימיותו. It's like a person who throws a coin over their shoulder, right? The poor person's chasing them, a child is chasing you, Abba I need money, I don't have a roof over my head, I don't have food to eat, Abba I need money. And you know what you do? Without even turning around you throw a debit card. Without even turning around here's a hundred dollars. Without even turning around here's a check. But the child is saying is not only do I need money to pay the bills but I need you, I need your comfort, I need your embrace, I need your support, I need your kind word. And sometimes there's a feeling of you know I have the roof over my head I have food to eat I don't want to be kafui tov I don't want to be unappreciative of that but Hashem I don't just want you to say yes to the roof and the food and I woke up this morning and I'm breathing, I want that relationship, I want to see you, I want to feel you, I want to know with certainty that you're there. ואז נראה לאדם כאילו השם יתברך לא איתו חס ושלום. Sometimes it feels like He's not with me, sometimes it feels like where is He? It's just not happening. שני מצבים אלו נקראים בשם שמות נוספים we have additional names to describe this phenomenon לפי העניין שהם עושים ulemashel for example benefesh ha'adam when it comes to our soul הם נקראים גדלות וקטנות sometimes we have periods of greatness, of largeness, and sometimes we have periods of smallness. I don't even know if this is proper English, but that's how you translate it, gadlus and katnus. We call it gadlus hamochin and katnus hamochin. Mochin means more than what I'm going to say, but mochin means a mindset, a perspective, an attitude, a feeling. There's gadlus hamochin. Sometimes your mind is just expanded, it's just on fire, it's just perceiving and seeing everything and everyone and Hashem in everything. And then you have mochin dekatnus where you just don't want to get out of bed, where you see yourself as small and everything as small, where your ambition and your drive is small, where your feeling of connection, not only to him, to people, to loved ones, is small. גדלות זמן שיש לאדם השגה ומאיר לו מציאות השם יתברך. Gadlus is I see the greatness in me, I see the potential for greatness in me, I see the greatness of this world, it's awesome and I want to consume every part of it, it's delicious. והוא חי את החיבור עמו. It's just amazing, it's geshmak to be a Yid. I'm just singing and dancing through life and I see him everywhere. ויש לו חשק לזכות עוד ועוד. I just want more, I can't wait. I've had periods of life where you can't wait for the next davening. Davening is so on fire and so connected, it is such an anchor and such an inspiration that you're like what, Shacharis is over? I guess I have to wait for Mincha. I can't wait to take those three steps forward, we've been talking about in Chassidus snippets, we're doing our introduction to the Amida now, I can't wait to take those three steps forward and to transport myself to be in the presence of Hashem and just to lose myself in conversation with him. Hashem, listen to this, you won't believe what happened, and thank you so much and you're amazing, and please, I need your help with that, and also this, and you're just, ah, I can't wait. And you have other times it's like, ah, it's Mincha, I guess I'll do my three steps forward, say the words, clap my chest. וכנגד זה יש מצב של קטנות שאז אין לאדם שום רצון ושום השגה. It's just very hard, psychologically, in psychology you have this. There are periods that you're awake and ambitious and inspired and very and very conscious. And there are moments that you're, we call it, quasi-depressed, depressed, whether clinically depressed or just kind of out of it, burnt out, burnt out, emotionally drained. We all go through this. והוא לא משיג ולא מרגיש את הקשר הפנימי לאלוקות and you say I just, there's nothing in the tank. I just don't feel connected, I just don't feel like doing it. I don't feel like getting up, I don't feel like going out, I don't feel like talking, I don't feel like davening, I don't feel like sitting at the Shabbos table, I don't feel like it. Katnus. I don't see the greatness in me, I don't see the greatness of the world, I don't really see any reason to connect. I don't see anything to connect. Why is it called mochin degadlus and mochin dekatnus? With no insult to young people, and here we're talking about really young people, ktanim ktanos, because this is the difference in maturity, sophistication, intellectual growth between a child and an adult. Right? ההבדל בין גדול לקטון הוא השגה והרגשה והבנה. The difference between an immature, unsophisticated, undeveloped child and, hopefully, an adult is the notion of how, how deeply we understand, how insightful we are, how capable we are of feeling genuine, authentic, true feelings, not only the pleasure of the moment, of havana, of a deep understanding, a penetrating analysis and understanding of the world. So sometimes even as adults we feel like little children who want to crawl in a ball and stay in bed. And sometimes even a child can have mochin degadlus and see the potential and strive for greatness and be tuned in and tapped into the world. ובדרכי העבודה זה נקרא רצוא ושוב. So this is called, so now we're coming up with our fourth name for this phenomenon. So far all we're doing is naming it. And by the way, there's enormous validation in naming it. I don't know how you're feeling listening, mostly because I'm positioned weirdly today and really just looking at the bookcases and the camera and you're all the way over there. Now I'm giving side eye to the people watching online. But anyway, I don't know if you're connecting to this at all, but sometimes just feeling validated, you know, you could go, you could go through living with emunah, you could be teaching living with emunah, and you say I'm supposed to be on fire every week when we teach this and talk about it and give different examples and parables and metaphors for it, but I don't feel it. You could be in a week where you say I'm drained, I'm exhausted, I got nothing left, I'm broken, and I'm not feeling it, I'm not feeling it. So just naming it, just naming it enables us to deal with it and to navigate it and to make sense of it. And to figure out a way to break out of it, and to figure out a way to grow in it and through it. So naming it is important. Achor vekedem, back and forward, panim veachor, front and back, katnus and gadlus, and now the fourth name. ובדרכי עבודה זה נקרא רצוא ושוב. Ratzo veshov. Again, if you don't have a source sheet you want, there's a pile right here, there's plenty, we're about to turn the first page. ובדרכי עבודה - we're like supersonic speed today. ובדרכי עבודה זה נקרא רצוא ושוב. In the world of avoda, of personal growth, of working on our relationship with Hashem, it's called ratzo veshov. You know what ratzo veshov is? Is running forward, and then retreat. Advance, and retreat. Advance, and retreat. Which is the other way we speak about it in life. Right? People will tell you, "Sometimes it feels like I take two steps forward and one step back." You ask, "How's it going? How's it going with your child? How's it going in your marriage? How's it going overcoming that addiction? How's it going with your health and wellness? How's it going with..." People will say, "You know, I tell you, sometimes it feels like I take a step, two steps forward and one step back. To make an advance, two steps forward, then one step back." כאשר מאיר לאדם הוא עובד ברצוא. Sometimes we're in a state of ratzo. Ratzo means progress, advance, ratzo from ratz, running. אז אדם רץ ומשתוקק להשיג עוד ועוד את השם יתברך כי יש לו הצלחה בזה. Sometimes running and running and running. I'm in it! I love it! I'm running! I'm doing it! I got it! Ratzo. The word ratzo, ratz, means to run. But what other word does it relate to? Ratzon. What is ratzon? Will! Will, desire, drive, ratzon. Mishna in Pirkei Avos says that a person aseh retzoncha kirtzono. Make your drive, your ambition, your will, your want conform to His. Don't make God's want and will conform to yours, make your will and your want conform to His. Ratzon, ratzon. אין דבר העומד בפני הרצון. People think it's a maamar Chazal, but I don't think it is. There's nothing that stands in the way of ratzon. What's ratzon? Will. Nothing stands in the way of true will, of desire. What is will? What is ratzon? It's from the word ratz. Why? Because you run to the things that you want to do. You run to the things that you want to do. And what happens when you run? If I had the bookcase in the back, if I run to it versus if I walk to it, does it make it any closer? No. Physically it's the exact same distance from me. So it's thirty feet from me, and if I run, it doesn't make it closer. But what happens? I get there faster. Why? Because I ran. So when you have a ratzon for something, you get there faster. When you have a ratzon for something, you're quicker, you're faster, you get there faster. You get there faster. So that's ratzon, ratzo, ratz, to run, to run. So Reb Itche Meir is describing, sometimes when we're in the two-step forward phase, right, of our life in relationship, professionally in our career, in our spiritual health, emotional health, physical health, we're in a ratzon. That's my will, that's my drive, I have this burning - I'm in it, that's it, I'm ratz, I'm running to it. And it's my ratzon, it's all I talk about, I'm almost obnoxious because that's all I talk about. All I talk about is how much I ran or exercised, or how much weight I lost, or all I talk about is my career, how much money I made, revenue, profit, new clients I have, or my ratzon, hopefully all I talk about is how many dafim I've learned, how many new sefarim, how many great new shiurim I'm listening to. When we're in the ratzo phase, we're ratz, we're running, we're ratzo, we're advancing. Ukaasher necheshach lo, but then the light goes out, the light dims, it feels dark. Umatzav shel shov. All of a sudden we're listening to a few less Torah podcasts, all of a sudden we're nibbling a few potato chips late at night, all of a sudden, all of a sudden we're no longer patient and kind, we're losing our temper. היינו שאדם שב וחוזר למקומו. You feel yourself not in a state of advance, of progress, of running, but of retreat, of going backwards. Mitoch havana bekatnuso, because we've given up on our greatness. ומתוך שאינו מצליח להשיג, and we have a little sense of despair. So this so far we've just named it. We didn't just give it one name, we gave the phenomenon no less than four names: Achor vekedem, panim veachor, gadlus and katnus, ratzo veshov. So they're coming from four different angles, but they're all describing the same thing. Four different perspectives, but all describing that same phenomenon of sometimes I'm connected, sometimes I feel disconnected. Sometimes I'm on fire, sometimes my fire's been put out, has been extinguished. Sometimes the light is on, sometimes I'm sitting in darkness. Call it whatever you want, give it whatever name, but we've all been there, we all know it. We all know it. Let's start the next section. והנה המצב של הסתרת אור פניו. והנה המצב של הסתרת אור פני השם shezman hakatanus ha'achor. So what do we do? When you're on fire, okay, good. You could use some direction but you're good. What do we do and how do we get through when we're not? In relationships and in our relationship with Hashem. אינו נובע בגלל שהאדם עשה עבירות חס ושלום. So the first thing is to know that even when we're in that back place, that dark place, that state of retreat, why are we there? How did we get there? Are we there because we've done aveiros? Person who says I'm out of energy, I'm not connected to my davening, I'm not connected to my mitzvos, I'm not on fire seeing Hashem everywhere. Why? Is it because they've become a low-life? Is it because they're consumed by doing aveiros? No, no, God forbid. אלא זהו דבר המושרש בבריאה. This is the most validating thing you're going to hear all day. Says Rebbe Shmaya, you know why that happens? That is part of the creation of the briah that was built into the design, that was built into the definition of a human being. שכל מקבל אור יש זמן שמתגלה לו האור ויש זמן של הסתרה. Because anything that receives light will have time that the light is revealed and times that the light is hidden. Now, this is true not only for the human being. This is not only true for a human being, this is true for anything that has growth to it, any animate object. Take vegetation in a field. There are periods of blossoming and flourishing and growth, and there are periods of decay and death and rejuvenation. There's forward and there's back. There's light and there's dark. Anything, anything from the vegetation world to the human world, anything has forward and back, light and dark. There are cycles to our life and a rhythm to our life. So he says, it's so important to know, says Rebbe Shmaya, don't blame yourself and don't get stuck and don't beat yourself up in those moments. First of all, that'll compound it and make it worse and make it harder to climb out of, but it's also not your fault. It's the nature of the world. Again, go back to that great insight by Rav Avram Shor. We want to be flatlined. We want to just move that line up. I want to be steady-eddy flatlined. I just want to move the line up in my emuna, in my career, in my relationship, in my everything. But that's not life. To be alive, the EKG shows. Now you hope, you hope that you're trending upwards. So it's ups and downs, right? Any over any extended period of time, the stock market is up, but in between, right now we're at a... but we hope soon. There's ups and downs. If you're alive, if you're engaged, if it's a vibrant, active, dynamic market, then there's ups and downs. And that's our life. So says Rebbe Shmaya, it's critical to know, first let's name it. This is a phenomenon. It happens. You're not the only one. Don't feel guilty or shame. You're not the only one. It happens. It happens to all of us. Number two, it happened not because it's your fault. It happens because that is the nature of the world. That's how Hashem created the world. That's how Hashem designed the world. והראיה לזה שינהג גם לחיות הקודש בין במי מדרגתם ששני מצבים בהם מצב של התגלות והשגת אור אלוקי ומצב הסתרה כמו שכתוב והחיות רצוא ושוב. The actual pasuk that uses that language of ratzo vashov is talking about celestial angelic beings. And even among them, there's forward and back, there's progress and regress, there's light and there's dark. So if that's true for the angels who are pre-programmed for perfection, then all the more so it is certainly true for us, for us as well. It's true for us as well. So don't... know that you're not alone. Know that this is a broad general phenomenon. Know that it's not your fault. Don't beat yourself up, feel regret or shame. Know that it's natural, it's part of the world. והרי אין להם בחירה ולא ייתכן שעשו דבר גורם להסתרת האור אלא מוכרח שזה עניין המוטבע בבריאה וכך הוא סדר הנהגת השפעת השם יתברך שהשפעת האור האלוקי יש שני מצבים התגלות והסתרה. There's revelation and there's hiddenness. There's light and there's dark. There's two steps forward and there's a step back. ויש תועלת ותכלית בכל מצב להם. Now why? Why did He create the world that way? Can't we just have steps forward and no step back? Can't there just be light and never darkness? Can't we only see His face and never have Him turn His back? Why? Why does it have to be this way? And the answer is: come back next week, 8:45, and we will continue. But I want to get to the practical, which we will. Is it worth davening if you're disconnected? Is it worth going through the motions when you're not finding meaning? Is that an inauthentic religious life? Or is it authentic? When you're going through the motions without meaning? When you're davening and you're disconnected? Is that authentic or inauthentic? You could try to keep doing it just to keep that habit going, so hopefully when you're in a better place... but what about in that moment? What am I doing? Is this real? That's where we're going to go with this and continue this conversation and im yirtzeh Hashem next week. Tonight we continue Behind the Bima. Cliffhanger, exactly. Gotta bring you back. Next week, tonight Behind the Bima, Dan Grunfeld, the son of Ernie Grunfeld. Penny, you've got to tell Bob to listen. The great New York Nick player, executive, and radio announcer. Do you know that he was born in Satmar, came to America when he was eight years old, didn't even speak English, wore the number eighteen because Am Yisrael Chai? Find out tonight more Behind the Bima 9:00 PM. Until next time, stay happy, stay healthy, stay holy.
