Transcript
Good morning, Boker Tov, welcome back to Parsha Perspectives for today. Hope everyone had a beautiful, wonderful, uplifting, healthy, happy Pesach. Of course, we continue to daven for our brothers and sisters in Israel and for peace around the world, and as always, we remind you to remain afterwards to complete all of Sefer Tehillim in that zechus, in that merit. Our Parsha series is generously sponsored by Becky and Avi Katz and family in memory of Becky's father, David Grossman. Our learning should be l'ilui nishmas David Menachem Monisch. This morning's shiur is sponsored by the Dikman family in memory of their daughter and sister, דניאל רוכא בת שלום עזרא. Also sponsored anonymously in the merit of אבנר בן אברהם הכהן, שיינדל בת דוד משולם בן דוד, David ben Meshulem, Nissan ben Shimon, v'Chaim ben David, אשרה בת יוסף הלוי, and by Myrna Hirschhorn in memory of her beloved husband, our dear member Marvin, on his sixth yahrtzeit, very much missed. Such an active member of our community and a good friend. His neshamah should have an aliyah as well. Thank you to all of our generous sponsors. We have the privilege this week of learning and reading a double Parsha. If you love one, you're going to love two: Tazria and Metzora. So we begin with Parshas Tazria, page 608 in the Artscroll Stone Chumash, and we'll try to make our way sharing thoughts and insights from both. Let's begin, let's begin with Rabbi Sacks, the Rabbi Sacks Chumash. He writes the following: The laws at the start of this Parsha about the sacrifices brought by a woman who has given birth have challenged and puzzled many commentators. That's how Tazria starts. The word Tazria means to conceive. וידבר ה' אל משה לאמר: God spoke to Moshe. דבר אל בני ישראל לאמר: Teach this law, that isha ki sasria when a woman conceives, veyaldah zachar: so now we have the laws of childbirth. When she conceives a boy, what happens if she conceived a girl? How long is the impurity? Why is it different for a boy and for a girl? We've covered much of this in the past: the days of impurity followed by the days of purity, the sacrifices, the korbanos that this woman who conceives and gives birth that she brings, and ultimately we get to the bris, on the eighth day is the bris. So Rabbi Sacks points out that many have been puzzled why this woman who's given birth brings these sacrifices. We could easily understand if she had to bring a thanksgiving offering. A woman is blessed to have a healthy child, so many long and wish and wait, so many spend endless and countless amounts of money in the pursuit of fulfilling that dream of having a child. So you would think that a woman who gives birth, she's healthy and the baby is healthy. We take for granted today, please God, that women who give birth are healthy, in sterile hospitals with medical care, and they recover fairly quickly. Insurance companies would like them to recover by that afternoon and get them out. Maybe they stay for one day, used to be a lot longer. But you think that that woman would bring a Korban Todah. You think that that woman, when she recovered, would bring a thanksgiving offering. Tremendous gratitude to the Ribbono Shel Olam. Instead, she brings a burnt offering together with a purification offering. Wonders Rabbi Sacks, why in the world does this woman need atonement? What did she do wrong? Because she gave birth, because she conceived and went into labor, because she brought a child into this world? What does she need atonement for? So Rabbi Sacks quotes several interpretations. The Ibn Ezra, Rabbi Avraham Ibn Ezra, says that during the anguish of labor, the woman may have thought or expressed ideas that she wouldn't be proud of or that she now regrets. So I'll elaborate on the Ibn Ezra. Of course, not from personal experience, but I'll elaborate on the Ibn Ezra, that while her husband is trying to figure out where to be, what to say, and how to preserve and save his life in that moment, maybe he's offering her some encouragement. Breathe, relax, push. And she turns to him and she says all kinds of things that I won't repeat in front of an Aron Kodesh, maybe including, says the Ibn Ezra, vowing this is the last child, this is the last time I'm doing this, this is never, ever happening again. We're talking about this was before, what's it called? Epidurals, thank you, before epidurals. I like to joke about someone in my life, I won't say whom, maybe I'm related to by marriage, that she likes to get the epidural when she sees the second line come back on the pregnancy test, that's when she's ready for it. So today we have an epidural, but before an epidural, a woman in that extraordinary pain might call her husband certain names, the doctor certain names, maybe God, how could you do this, why would you do this, and take a vow, this is never, ever happening again. The Ramban explains that sacrifices are kind of ransom for having survived the dangers of childbirth as well as a form of prayer for a full recovery. So the Ramban says, don't see it as something negative, that it's a burnt offering or a purification offering. Don't see it as something negative, the kind of sacrifice that she's bringing. Realize that that's part of atonement, and that's part of also gratitude, prayer for recovery. The great Meshech Chochma, Rav Meir Simcha of Dvinsk suggests, if you didn't read the article in Mishpacha over Pesach by my friend Dovi Safier on the Meshech Chochma you must, you can't learn a Meshech Chochma the same after you read his extraordinarily well-researched, incredible article. So the great Meshech Chochma suggests the burnt offering is like an Olas Re'iyah, an offering that was brought when appearing at the temple on festivals. The woman celebrates her ability to appear before Hashem at the Beis Hamikdash. Her eligibility, her recovery, her purification represents marks her return to be able to come back to the Beis Hamikdash. So just like someone who goes and sees God brings an Olas Re'iyah in that moment, so she too, her eligibility, her recovery, her reinstatement, she brings, she brings that. She brings that. Maybe you could elaborate on that Meshech Chochma. The same way one brings an Olas Re'iyah when they see and they're seen by God when they go to the Beis Hamikdash, the place of great revelation, maybe, maybe what the Torah is telling us is that childbirth is a moment of great revelation. We have sanctity in space; that's called the Beis Hamikdash, and today our Mikdash Me'at, our temple in miniature, which is the Shul. We have sanctity in time; that's called Shabbos. Shabbos and Mikdash go together for that reason. But maybe there's also sanctity in experience. The closest one can come, the greatest imitation, say closest one can come, the greatest imitation so to say of God is creation itself is conception, which of course is only in His hands, the keys are His. And when one brings a child into this world, it is nothing short, nothing less than a miracle, a moment of revelation. And maybe her Olas is like the Olas Re'iyah, just to expand on this Meshech Chochma. Maybe the reason she brings this Karban is that by being there in that moment, by being the source, the conduit, catalyst of that moment, it's an Olas Re'iyah, she has seen God. It is a moment of revelation. It's really quite extraordinary. We won't get into now, hopefully you all know, but how the ingredients are mixed that leads to conception, but the idea that hopefully a loving couple, a married couple, hopefully in the appropriate time, place, relationship, context, simply unite their love and the result is a human being, a person with a personality, somebody who will grow to be an adult and be able to pay that forward and also be a progenitor. It's extraordinary. It's revelation. It's creation. It's miraculous. That's a moment of revelation. Maybe that, just to expand or add an additional idea to the Meshech Chochma. Back to Rabbi Sacks. Without displacing any of these ideas, we might suggest another perspective. So we had the Ibn Ezra, the Ramban, the Meshech Chochma, my humble suggestion, and now Rabbi Sacks. This is related to the word Tamei and Tahor, pure and impure. Tamei does not mean defiled. It is a technical term referring to people being in a condition that prevents them from entering the Mishkan or the Mikdash. Tahor means the opposite, that they may enter. As we've noted, the Mishkan and later the Mikdash were symbols of the presence of Hashem within the human domain. God is eternal and spiritual. We and the universe are physical. And whatever is physical is subject to birth, growth, decay, decline, and death. It is these things that must be excluded from the sanctuary if we are to have the experience of standing in the presence of eternity. What bars us therefore from entering the holy is anything that reminds us or others of our mortality. Hence the supreme source of impurity is the Avi Avos Hatumah. What is the greatest source of Tumah? The biggest transmitter of Tumah, the greatest contaminator is contact with death, with death. Is there a bigger sign or source or symbol of mortality than death? Contact with or proximity to a dead body. Paradoxically, childbirth defiles even though it represents a new life. The reason may be that until recently, it was a hazard fraught with the risk of death. Many babies were stillborn, many died young, and many mothers died giving birth. The very loss of blood was dangerous. So childbirth may render one impure because it is an encounter with the risk of death. Alternatively, it may simply be that it defiles because it is a reminder of the passing of the generations. Birth, like death, is a signal of mortality. The Mishkan and later the Mikdash is the space set aside for consciousness of eternity. So the Mikdash, the Mishkan first and later the Mikdash represents a place of immortality, of contact with eternity, with the Ribono Shel Olam, the source of existence and the endlessness of existence. So anything that represents temporal, temporary, fragile, mortal mortality, that is not allowed in the Mikdash. So that's why death contaminates and even here there's contamination, which also connects to the end of the Parsha and the end of Metzora and Rabbi Sacks comes back to this too, which is another lesson of purity and impurity. At the very end of Parshas Metzora, we have the law. Pasuk lamed aleph והזהרתם את בני ישראל מטמאתם ולא ימותו בטמאתם בטמאם את משכני אשר בתוכם that people who are contaminated, impure cannot come to the Mishkan, if they do, it is a death penalty because they can't introduce contamination and impurity to Mishkani, God's dwelling place asher b'socham that Hashem is trying to be in our midst. What are these laws? These are the laws of a woman who is a zav, a zava, or a nidda. A man who is a zav, a woman who is a zava or a nidda. The body has all kinds of emissions. Today it applies to women, but in the time of the Mikdash, men too were subject to zav. Men too would have all kinds of emissions, which would render them impure and they too needed a purification process before they were eligible to come into the Mishkan and later the Mikdash. But a woman who has her menstrual cycle, her monthly cycle, renders her a nidda and she needs to go through purification. Today we think about nidda in the context of marital purity, in the context of Mikva, in the context of abstaining and then reuniting. But in the time when sanctity was observed, both with foods, interactions and certainly with entering the Mishkan or the Mikdash, the law of nidda was a law of purity and impurity. And a woman needed to become pure much like a man did as well. So what are these laws? So Rabbi Sacks continues this idea here at the very end. We started with the beginning of Tazria, skip to the end of Metzora. Concept of purity and impurity as we know have their main application in relation to the holy space of the Mikdash. To enter its precincts one has to be pure or purified. The chief exception is of a woman's issue of menstrual blood from which she had to be purified not only to enter the temple but also to resume relations with her husband. In general, pure and impure are not categories applying to life as a whole. They're not ethical terms like good and bad, right or wrong, which apply to secular as well as sacred space and time. They only exist because Hashem has stipulated that they exist. So as for example, Shabbos only exists because Hashem ordered it. You cannot tell that a certain day was Shabbos because the quality of the light or the air or the temperature. So too the concept of impurity is not like the idea of uncleanliness which could have physical manifestations or measurements. Tuma and tahara are spiritual categories brought into being by Hashem's command. Concept of holiness and purity, the two organizing principles of the priestly mind, are about the intense and vigilant preparation we must make before entering Hashem's space. Hashem is that which is not mortal, finite and physical. Whatever inescapably reminds us of our physicality and mortality, whether it be birth or death or a skin disease or the flow of blood or the unusual discharge of bodily fluid or contact with the carcass of a repulsive animal, they all convey tuma, a state from which we must be cleansed before entering the domain of the holy. There's nothing intrinsically defiling about our physicality. To the contrary, the Torah asks us to seek Hashem within the physical world, to sanctify rather than forswear physical pleasures such as eating and drinking and the marital bond. There's nothing ascetic or otherworldly about the Torah's ethic. Rather we have to ensure that we have divested ourselves of all lingering traces of that which reminds us of mortality and physicality, our vulnerability to disease, decay and death. Not because we can escape them nor that we should deny them, but simply to remind ourselves that Hashem utterly transcends all such accidents and attributes of material reality. In the Beis HaMikdash, we are in the presence of radical transcendence. So the way to remember the presence of radical transcendence is anything that's the opposite is the reminder or mark of mortality, fragility, how temporary we are, of death or any corollary of it, that is what is not allowed. A woman's nidda cycle, that monthly cycle is a reminder, unfortunately, sadly, of certainly for those who want to conceive, the endometrial lining of the uterus prepares to receive a fertilized egg, and if or when it doesn't, it sheds that endometrial lining. That's the source of a flow which renders a woman a nidda. That means to say that her body is designed monthly to be prepared to conceive. The default is that it's a factory, a manufacturing plant, it's a laboratory. It's ready to receive, it's ready to conceive, it's ready to produce a beautiful, healthy child, a neshama, a tzelem Elokim. And when that didn't take place, intentionally or unintentionally, by choice or with disappointment, that shedding of that lining, of that endometrial lining, that causes that status of nidda represents the opposite of conception or birth. It represents that so-to-say death of possibility, that death of potential. And therefore that's a corollary of death, loss of potential. So an actual corpse is the avi avos hatuma. That is the primary driver of impurity. But corollary of it, loss of potential, failure, mortality, all of these things, says Rabbi Sacks, that was what this is all about. I want to share with you I got from his. great-grandfather of the great Rabbi Sacks and Posek, Rosh Yeshiva of Landers, and my friends the Landys. And they produced a, they reproduced Menachem Zion. There's an old original version of his Sefer, but they actually added more of his Divrei Torah and material and printed it and reproduced it and I highly recommend it and very grateful to them for it. I believe they're working on a translation as well which they should, because his Divrei Torah are outstanding. He doesn't need my endorsement, but they are amazing. So he begins our Parsha, וידבר ה' אל משה לאמר, דבר אל בני ישראל לאמר, אשה כי תזריע וילדה זכר, now in Perek 12 Pasuk 2. So we started out with \"And God spoke to Moshe saying, speak to the Jewish people saying.\" What word there is redundant, seems extraneous? Read with a critical eye, what word jumps out at you? The word Leimor. God spoke to Moshe Leimor, speak to the Jewish people Leimor. Why the two Leimor? המילה לאמר נשנית כאן פעמיים, אחת למשה לאמר ואחת לבני ישראל לאמר. God spoke to Moshe saying, who spoke to the Jewish people saying. Why do we need it twice? להבליט שבכל הנוגע להמצווה היסודית של טהרת המשפחה שבה תלויה טהרת הדורות הבאים שלא יהיו חס ושלום פגומים, לא מספיק לאמר פעם אחת על ידי משה הרב ורועה העדה של כל דור. כי אין לך דור שאין בו כמשה. ובחינת משה שפיר קאמרת, רבנו בדורו כמשה בדורו. אלא חובה מוטלת על כל בן ישראל שירא שמים בוער בקרבו, Leimor Befumbei Uverabim, להתריע ולהזהיר את כל המוני העם לא לעבור המצווה זו. Says רב מנחם בן ציון זקס, the son-in-law of the chief rabbi of Yerushalayim, רב צבי פסח פרנק. He moved to America, he was a Rav in Chicago for many years, the Menachem Zion. He writes: this is a foundational Mitzvah. The sanctity of a home, which is the sanctity of the community, which is the sanctity of our people, the strength, the sanctity, the holiness, the Neshama, the soul of our people is the observance of the laws of Taharat HaMishpacha, of these laws of אשה כי תזריע וילדה זכר, of these laws of conception, of these laws of separation, of these laws of Mikvah and family purity. This is the source of everything about our physical, spiritual health. And therefore, it has to be repeated and it has to be reinforced. It's up to a Moshe, it's up to leaders to talk about it. But the Leimor is Bnei Yisrael. It's also critical within a home from a mother to her daughters, from a father to her sons, in the senior year of high school and seminary and Yeshiva, in Chassan and Kallah classes to reinforce and reinforce and reinforce how critically important this Mitzvah is. Not as some punishment, now is not the time I could elaborate on how this Mitzvah is the greatest gift from Hashem. The insight, our creator, the one who designed us, also knows how we work, and he understood that, he understood that separation is good for us. He understood that it restores that sense of longing and craving and yearning, which restores connection, which is the core of all of intimacy. In a world that once had a spike in the divorce rate at the seven-year because of the seven-year itch, that has now been reduced far from seven years to far fewer and less because of the world we're living in, which is filled with all of its enticement and opportunity and challenge. So Hashem created a program called Taharat HaMishpacha because we understood that distance makes the heart grow fonder and much more than just the heart. And therefore the laws of family purity, and how beautiful, and what that's done for the Jewish people, and how elevated it took a base mundane physical animal urge and it put it in a context of holiness and sanctity and intimacy and emotional closeness and of unique exclusive relationship and turned it from something only physical to what we call the Hebrew word for it is Da'as. וידע אדם את חוה אשתו. We call the ultimate knowledge one can have of another is this intimacy. So these laws, not only the details of which there are so many, and there are many minutiae to them, but also the themes and the essence and the ideas and the ideals, they're so important, they have to be repeated and reinforced. And says רב מנחם בן ציון זקס, that's why first Leimor for Moshe, the leaders have to speak, and then Leimor Bnei Yisrael because the people, the community also has to speak, and it's not too late. There are people who didn't have the background, didn't have the education, if they've never been to Mikvah it doesn't matter what age, what stage of life they're in, if they're still married, they should go to Mikvah. It doesn't matter, the blessing, the Bracha. that brings, it brings tremendous, tremendous bracha. כי על פי הרוב מצווים לאמור ולדבר על חומר טהרת המשפחה שהיסוד של טהרת וקדושת האומה על זה עומד. Says Rav Nachman Ze'ev Sacks, many people are reticent, they're hesitant, they don't want to speak about these laws, they don't think it's appropriate, there's stigma, they don't know the language to use, they're going to blush, it feels inappropriate, they're worried people don't want to hear it. That's why it needs the reinforcement and that's why the word leymor is repeated, is repeated twice. Which brings us now to what is the rest of the parsha of Tazria and of Metzora, essentially one theme carries us all the way through, almost all the way through, and that is now tzara'at, tzara'at. Translate the word tzara'at? So most people translate it as leprosy, but Rav Hirsch elaborates and many others, it can't be leprosy. Leprosy is a physical dermatological ailment, highly contagious. In fact, until 2020, when we suffered a plague, I don't want to say its name because we all still have PTSD from it, and we talked about people have to, if you contracted it, what did you have to do? 14 days, it depended on the CDC and what they said that day. You had to do something called quarantine. Until 2020, the only time human beings used the word quarantine was parshios Tazria and Metzora. Or at least in my age. If you were my age or younger, the only time you ever used the word quarantine was you were teaching a parsha class or learning the parsha Tazria or Metzora. But before that, there were people who used the term quarantine and they were leper colonies. Leprosy, before it was contained, people quarantined. So we know this can't be leprosy, why? Because Rav Hirsch points this out. The laws would then make no sense whatsoever. If it covers your entire body, you're pure. Only part of your body, then you're impure. They're paradoxical, they're illogical, they're not intuitive. And certainly they make no sense if you're talking about a contagious skin disease. So we're not talking about a dermatological skin disease, it's not something you could put a little cortisone cream on and recover from. This is something that requires much greater care because it's a spiritual malady. It expresses itself in the skin, but it comes from the symptoms are on the skin, but the illness is in the heart, the mind, the soul, and mostly on the lips of the person who contracts it. And so here we begin פרק יג פסוק א, bottom of page 608: וידבר השם אל משה ואל אהרן לאמור אדם כי יהיה בעור בשרו שאת או ספחת או בהרת והיה בעור בשרו לנגע צרעת והובא אל אהרן הכהן או אל אחד מבניו הכהנים. Hashem spoke to Moshe and Aaron saying if a person will have on his skin a se'eit, a sapachat, or a baheret, so complicated to translate those terms that ArtScroll doesn't even bother to try. If you look in the English, it just translates it as sapachat, baheret, or se'eit. I don't, if you look in the Rabbi Sacks, I don't know how he translates it. Then you gotta go into Rashi to understand what's the difference between the three. A tzara'at affliction on the skin of his flesh, he shall be brought to Aaron the Cohen or to one of his sons the Kohanim. Interesting it says v'huva, he is brought. He's not wheeled, he's not carried on a stretcher, he's not dragged against his will. What is v'huva? Rav Yeruchem Levovitz, a great Mashgiach of the Mir, I just, I'm putting out an article today, I just wrote this last night, contrast this with the Nazir. V'huva, you have the same אדם כי יהיה בעור בשרו, zot torat, this is the laws of the Metzora. If you go to Parshas Naso, you have the laws of the Nazir. And when it comes to the laws of the Nazir, you have very similar language, but you have a major difference between the two. In fact, I'll just find my article and read it to you from there. You have a big difference between the two. We have when it comes to the Metzora, this is the law of the Metzora on the day of his purification, v'huva he shall be brought. When describing the purification, this is not yet the purification, the purification of the Nazir, Torah uses a very similar language. This is the law of the Nazir on the day of his abstinence is completed, he shall bring himself to the entrance of the tent of the meeting. So why when it comes to the Nazir does it say he shall bring himself and yet when it comes to the Metzora it's v'huva? Which is it? Is it v'huva or is it does he bring himself or is he brought? So the great Mashgiach of the Mir Rav Yeruchem says, you know what the difference is? The Metzora couldn't help himself. Couldn't help herself. Wanted to gossip, slander, had some good juicy, some good stuff. And it's a commodity, it's a social commodity. If you're the first to know, if you're the first to share, if you've got the inside scoop, if you're able to talk about the other person, they couldn't help themselves. They in... indulged, they gave in to their impulse, they couldn't control themselves. *Vehuva*, it brought them. Their impulse, their compulsive behavior brought them. The *Nazir* strives as aspirations for holiness. He brings himself. Why I included into the article is I wrote about technology, we're starting next Monday a technology, a thirty day technology challenge. I spoke on *Shabbas HaGadol* about the addiction all of us suffer from. I shared with you the article that baby boomers even more than the young, those sixty and older who are the most addicted these days. After their grandchildren teach them how to use their devices they're becoming the most addicted to them. So all of us across all generations are struggling with it. Starting a fantastic thirty day challenge with a daily challenge and daily idea and reinforcement. For those who complete it, raffles and prizes. It's going to be fantastic and fun, partnering with Guard Your Eyes and *Smichas Chaver* to do it. So my article was about this technology because *Vehuva*, our phones are bringing us. Anything that we're compulsively drawn to. We want to go to sleep, but we stay up a lot longer than we wanted watching and scrolling and typing and shopping and doing all kinds of things. We mean to spend time with our family, but we can't put that thing down. We want to be fully present, but we're absent present in our *davening* and at the park or whatever else we're doing because we are as much as we just celebrated *Pesach* and supposedly marked our freedom, in some ways we are entirely still enslaved, enslaved. So how can we set ourselves, that was right on cue. How can we set ourselves, you think I set that up. How can we set ourselves free? How can we release ourselves from that bondage? So *Vehuva*, this *metzora* is *Vehuva*. He's dragged and he's drawn, she compulsively just doing things she claims she doesn't want to be doing. And that's what the *metzora* has to be purified from. That's what began and that's what led to it all. So we're going to go through three sections. There's the *tzara'as* that appears where? On the person, on their skin. Then we have *negei begadim*. We have the *tzara'as* that appears on the clothing. Clothing can get *tzara'as*. I don't know if you saw, which state was it that the governor just announced an investigation into Lululemon for some chemical in the clothing? Lululemon denies it. I don't know, I thought could you have a better *Parsha*, *Tazria* *Metzora*, something in the clothing, there's *negayim* on the clothing, *tzara'as* on the clothing, *negei batim*, Lululemon and whatever problems it met, Lululemon denies it, *ich veis*. So that's why you shouldn't overspend on Lululemon. Unless they're prepared to send me some free things, in that case they're the best company in the world. So *negei begadim* and then the final category are *tzara'as* that appear where? On the house, on the home. So on this, I got another incredible new *sefer*, *HaLekach VeHaLibuv* *Nezir HaParsha*, *Rav Avrum Schorr* *shlita* זאל זיין געזונט און שטארק be healthy and well. So he just put out *Vayikra*. I'm not sure it's even available in stores yet, but I thank my dear brother *Rav Nechemia* for sharing it with me. I left him a voice note, my biggest complaint is every, you see how big *Vayikra* is, every, every essay is extraordinary, is incredible and I don't know which one to learn, which one to share, which one to teach, which one to give over. They're all amazing. So here he says, *Kasav HaRambam*. The *Rambam* in the sixth *perek* of *Hilchos Tefillin* writes, חייב אדם להזהר במזוזה מפני שהיא חובת הכל תמיד. Person has to be mindful and careful about the *mezuzah* because it's an obligation on us constantly. וכל זמן שיכנס ויצא יפגע ביחוד השם שמו של הקדוש ברוך הוא ויזכור אהבתו ויעור משנתו ושגיותיו בהבלי הזמן. Every time you walk through that threshold, every time you walk through that door you stop, you pause. The *Rambam* doesn't talk about kissing but he does say to touch the *mezuzah* and you remember the values. You remember, I'm walking into my house this is what I'm bringing into my house. I'm going out of my house this is what I'm taking with me into the street. These are the values, *Shema*, these are the values what's in the *mezuzah*. You remember your love, it wakes us up from our sleep. We break out of that mindlessness and that routine and those habits. וידע שאין דבר העומד לעולם ולעולמי עולמים אלא ידיעת צור עולמים. And we know there is nothing that endures or stands for all eternity like the Rock of the world that is God. מיד הוא חוזר לדעתו והולך בדרכים ישרים. And now you're ready to go out in the street. Now you're ready to engage and encounter the world. Now you're ready to come into your home and to remember what's important and to get along and to have peace and to have harmony. אמרו חכמים הראשונים כל מי שיש לו תפילין בראשו ובזרועו וציצית בבגדו ומזוזה בפתחו מוחזק הוא שלא יחטא. *Chazal* elaborate, *Chazal* say that anyone who walks through that door and you want to know what the proper image, at least when it comes to a man, the beautiful, proper, iconic image is that you're walking in with *tefillin* on your head, on your arm and *tzitzis* on your clothing and a *mezuzah* on your doorpost. מוחזק הוא שלא יחטא. Such a person, we have a tradition that that person can't fail. Can't fail. Too spiritual to fail. Too holy to fail. Too high to fail. They can't fail. Yesh lo mazkirin rabbim because they have all these reminders. They're surrounded and they're immersed in reminders. והן הן המלאכים שמצילין אותו מחטא חונה מלאך השם סביב ליראיו ויחלצם. These are the angels that are around us and that protect us. So you see from the Rama, Hakadosh Baruch Hu נתן לאדם מצוות והן עצות איך להיות עובד השם. The Torah gives us these mitzvos and they are advice, reinforcements, angels. These three mitzvos: tefillin, tzitzis, and mezuzah are that a person, a person who is strict to wear tzitzis and look at them and think about them and remember them. A person who is strict. Tefillin were originally designed to be worn all day long. Some communities still do. We put them on in the morning for whatever technical reason. And the mezuzah, when you're walking through your doorpost, we have these signals. They're flashing lights at us all day long. Don't forget. Don't forget where you come from, don't forget why you're here, don't forget what life is all about. Don't forget, make active good choices. Don't just be a creature of rote and routine. Make choices. And what are these signals that are flashing at us? These reminders, these angels that are around us and reinforcing us? Tefillin, tzitzis, and mezuzah. דהיינו שיבוא לקיים שוויתי השם לנגדי תמיד. So opposite, כנגד ג' מצוות שהם באדם עצמו בגדו וביתו. So that's what we find opposite, the antithesis of these three that are supposed to be reminders. If we don't use them, if we're not reminded, if we abuse them, if we fail on them: nigei adam, nigei begadim, nigei batim. אדם כי יהיה בעור בשרו. ד' שמות יש לו לאדם. We human beings have four names. We're referred to in four ways. החשוב שכולם כינוי אדם. Right, we have ish, we have enosh, we have gever, we have all kinds of words we can use to describe a person, and yet the Torah here employs the word Adam. כי בשם זה נקרא אדם הראשון על ידי הקדוש ברוך הוא עוד קודם החטא. Adam is our original name. It's our original name. It's the name God gave us before the mistake and the failure. Before the big fail that got us kicked out of the garden, we were called, the original name we got was Adam. And that's how this parsha begins: אדם כי יהיה בעור בשרו שאת או ספחת או בהרת. Adam. ואיתא בספרים הקדושים ובהשל\"ה הקדוש ואחרים שהשם אדם הוא מלשון אדמה לעליון על שם הכוח שיש באדם לקיים ואנווהו shepeirshu Chazal הכוונה מה הוא אף אתה. We have the ability to imitate God. Imitatio Dei, if I impress you with my Latin. Imitatio Dei, והלכת בדרכיו מה הוא אף אתה. We have the ability, we have the capacity, we were designed to imitate the Almighty. Adameh. We're called Adam, man. Adam is the root of the same adameh le'elyon. I can be compared, I imitate the Almighty. ולכן יכול האדם להיות דומה לעליון נמצא שם אדם מורה על דביקות באלוקות. So our very name Adam reflects we are supposed to cling and cleave and connect and imitate and be ambassadors of Hashem. Adam, others, the Bas Ayin, the heilige Bas Ayin says the word Adam comes from the letters Aleph Dam. I never saw this one before. Adam comes from adamah. Adamah is a place of growth. Human beings are supposed to grow, never be finished, never be done. Don't be stagnant, don't be complacent. We're never finished, no matter what age, no matter what stage, we're always growth-oriented. That's Adam from adamah, number one. Number two is the Shlah. Adam is from adameh le'elyon. I can imitate God, I can walk in his ways, I can be like him. Number three, the Bas Ayin. Adam: Aleph Dam. יש באדם דם רותח כי הדם הוא הנפש. We have blood pulsing through our veins. What animates us? What defines us as being awake and alive is the blood pulsating through our veins. הדם רותח עם תאוות רעות Rachmana litzlan. That blood represents passion, and the passion is what gets us into trouble. That drive, that temptation. הדם מביא לידי כעס. When a person gets angry, their blood is flowing, they're fuming, they turn bright red, they're angry. And we know what anger leads to. האדם יש לו הכוח להמליך אלופו של עולם על הדם. But that blood, which is the source of passion and can be of rage, Aleph Dam. But if we place the Alufo shel olam, the one and only Almighty, if the Aleph is on the Dam, if our blood, if our passion, if our life force, if all of our blood flow, if our passions and our energy and our excitement is all directed to the Aleph, the Alufo shel olam, שלא יהיה דם סתם אלא דם ששרה בו אלוקות. That God is flowing in our veins. What's flowing through our veins? Not drive and temptation and distraction and impulse and compulsive behavior. I've got God flowing through my veins. I've got a drive to connect to my creator, to fulfill my mission, my purpose, why I'm here. I'm here to represent Him. V'zeh shem Adam ודעתנו להלביש שם אדם השם המובחר בנעלה ביותר and that's why Adam is the highest name because Adam is the highest name, first of all represents our growth mindset, number two because Adameh l'Elyon we could be like God, I can imitate God, and number three because Aleph Dam I could have God flowing through my veins. I could take that passion, I could take that energy, I could take that drive, I could take that insatiable appetite and I could direct it to the Aleph the Alufo. So that's what it means now Nego'im are the opposite. When a person, their skin, their body, or their clothing or their home is misdirected then you get Nega'im. They're blemished, they contaminate, they're compromised because of it. Now is that a negative of us? He goes on Rav Shor we don't really have time to say הכוונה כי עניין נגעים הם דייקא מצד מעלת האדם ולא מצד פחיתותו. You could read Tazria-Metzora and say man is pathetic, we can't control our temptation, our drive, we can't control our power of speech, we're pathetic, we're lowly. Says Rav Shor it's the opposite. נגע היא הנהגה נסית הנהגה עם השגחה מעל הסדר הטבע that God chooses to transcend the natural order to give us a spiritual malady that makes no sense and appears in no medical journal because it has nothing to do with skin is because He loves us. He believes in us. He's trying to direct us. He's trying to lift and elevate us. That the Rambam writes in Hilchos Tumas Tzara'as הצרעת הוא שם המורגל בשותפות כל עניינים הרבה שקראה התורה צרעת בשותפות השם ואינו ממנהגו של עולם אלא הוא אות ופלא היה בישראל. Hashem is trying to tell us what we're capable of. He's holding us accountable because He knows we can do better and we can do more. We can be big, we can be huge and therefore He invokes the Adam which is the highest sense of self who we could be. And he goes on he has a lot more on this I wish we had time to learn it together, a beautiful Rav Shor but alas we've got two Parshios to cover. So let's move along. Perek Yud Gimmel Pasuk Bais. וראה הכהן את הנגע the Kohein sees this, בעור בשרו ושיער בנגע הפך לבן ומראה הנגע עמוק מעור בשרו נגע צרעת הוא וראהו הכהן וטימא אותו. The Menachem Tzion has something to say here. Back to רב מנחם ציון זקס and he says the following. אדם כי יהיה בעור בשרו. BeVayikra Rabba איתא ביהושע בשם רבי לוי אמר אף הכתוב מחלק כבוד לישראל אדם כי יקריב מכם. It says when it came to the beginning of Vayikra Vayikra was all about sacrifice starts out אדם כי יקריב מכם. Translate those words. It's the beginning of all Seifer Vayikra. אדם כי יקריב מכם translate the words. If someone from among you will bring a sacrifice. ובכאן כשבא לדבר בדבר של גנאי רמז הכתוב אדם מכם כי יהיה בעור בשרו. Look at the next Pasuk. Adam mikem. It doesn't say. אין כתיב כאן אלא אדם כי יהיה בעור בשרו. It doesn't say. Right? Look at this Pasuk. Pasuk Bais. אדם כי יהיה בעור בשרו. It doesn't say אדם כי יהיה מכם בעור בשרו. So why when it came to a sacrifice does it say אדם כי יקריב מכם אדם כי יקריב מכם and here it just says אדם כי יהיה בעור בשרו and doesn't say Adam mikem? When do we use the word mikem and when do we omit the word mikem? You understand the question? Says רב מנחם ציון זקס ההסבר של מאמר זה הוא כי כאשר אדם מישראל מקריב קרבן נדבה הרי הוא מוכיח שצפונים בקרבו כיסופי נפש לקרבת אלוקים ולהתמסרות לעבודתו. אדם כי יקריב מכם. You know what's in our kishkas? You know who we are and who we want to be? You want to be a person who draws close to Hashem. So when we actualize that, when we manifest that, when we bring the korban, we're revealing who we really are. That's what's inside us. That's what makes us tick. That's what we're all about. That's what's inside us all אדם כי יקריב מכם. When you're bringing a korban you are bringing to the surface what was inside you all along. All you want is to be close to Hashem. All you want is to be your best self. הם נענו מתוך רגשת הקדושה תכונה של אצילות נשמתו האופפים את כל ישותו ומהותו בנייני של מהותו. הקרבן איפה ממש מכם. That korban is coming from you, from your kishkas, from a piece of who you are. It's your identity, it's your best self. It is you. מה שאין כן כאשר אדם מישראל חוטא ומלכלך את עצמו. במעשים מכוערים ובמידות מגונות המביאים עליו נגעים. But the exact opposite is true when a person indulged in their worst self, when they abuse and misuse the power of speech to gossip, to slander, when we pursue temptation and compulsive behavior and we lower ourselves and we live our worst self instead of our best self, that's not mikem. That's not who we really are. That's not what we're really about. הם בעצם מנוגדים למהות. We're going against our nature, we're going against our self-definition, we're going against our essence. התוכן של אדם ישראל. הם נבעו מאווירה זרה ומנוכרת. It's coming from our environment. It's coming from something outside. It's coming from something foreign. כרמז מה שאמרו למה על הר סיני וזהמתם לא פסקה. Beautiful, a beautiful insight. And where is it coming from? So note the pasuk said if we have on our skin שאת ספחת בהרת והיה בעור בשרו לנגע צרעת. על ידי מה נגעים באים? The Midrash Tanchuma asks: Why do these nega'im come? הכתוב מדבר במלכויות. This is an allusion to the exiles when we are living among host countries. Se'eis zu Bavel. Sapachas is Madai. Baheres is Yavan. והיה בעור בשרו לנגע צרעת is Edom. The four exiles that we've lived through and we're living through the last are represented and hinted to in the four kinds of symptoms of this disease called tzara'as. ובתנחומא שם מובאים פסוקים מוכיחים על כל אחת. Efshar lehamlitz, says Rav Menachem Tzion Sachs, כי השאלה זו השאלה על ידי מה נגעים באים. What was the question coming from? והתשובה שאין באים לא מכם אלא מהמלכויות. We know this is not who you are. This is not what you're really about. This is not your best self. So where's it coming from? Where's it coming from? Maybe you remember when you were a child or maybe you found yourself having to tell your child, you know that conversation, right? You don't beat the child up for their misbehavior but you say, \"This isn't you. This is not like you. Where is this coming from?\" That behavior, that reaction, that way you spoke, that thing that I found, the thing that you said, the thing you did, that's not you, that's not who you are, that's not like you. So where's this coming from? Where's this coming from? What were you exposed to? What were you reading? What were you watching? Who were you hanging out with? Where is this coming from? Says Rav Menachem Tzion Sachs, that's what the Midrash is asking. Because the behavior that leads to tzara'as, that's not like you, that's not who you are, that's not what you're about. So where is this coming from? על ידי מה נגעים באים? Where is this coming from? To which the Midrash answers, you know where it's coming from? Who you're hanging out with. Who you're hanging out with, these four kingdoms: Bavel, Madai, Yavan, Edom. That's where it's coming from. These host nations with their foreign values, that's what are seeping in that leads to a sense of tzara'as. So back to the original question. Why when it came to a korban does it say אדם כי יקריב מכם? When you're bringing a korban, it's coming mikem and yet it says over here אדם כי יהיה בעור בשרו. Why doesn't it say אדם מכם כי יהיה בעור בשרו? Where's the word mikem here the way it was in Vayikra? Says Rav Menachem Tzion Sachs, you know why it's missing? Because that's not mikem. When you speak lashon hara, when you engage in the behavior that leads to tzara'as, that's not who you are. We have to come up with another explanation. We have to find why you're behaving that way because that's not who you are. Bringing a korban, kirvas Elokim, coming close to God, that's who you are. That's innately who we are. That's what we have to fulfill and realize within ourselves. That's who we are in our essence. That's mikem, that's in our kishkas. But this other behavior, misbehavior, that's not who we are, we got to get to the bottom of it. פרק י\"ג פסוק מ\"ד. I see Pesach came and went and nothing changed. פרק י\"ג פסוק מ\"ד. Page 616. איש צרוע הוא טמא טמא יטמאנו הכהן בראשו נגעו. Now the Torah is telling us that the baldness at the front or the back of the head is a person with tzara'as, he's contaminated. The Torah shall declare him contaminated, his affliction is on his head. Here all of a sudden the Torah says where is this tzara'as? Berosho nig'o. It's on his head. נגע שנמצא בראשו הוא הדבר המסוכן ביותר. Says Rav Nachman that a nega if a person has a blemish in their head, that's the most dangerous place to have a blemish. לא רק נגע צרעת כפשוטו. And here we're not just talking about you have the dermat- you have dandruff. We're not just talking about you got dandruff, you got eczema in your scalp. You got Dupixent for that. What what are we talking about? Nega tzara'as means גם ועיקר צרעת רוחניות. It means berosho, your head is messed up. You're not thinking clear. clearly. You're not focused. Your judgment is impaired. מחשבות ודעות רעות מזיקות שמקוננות בראשו של אדם ועלולות להביאו עד לפי תהום חלילה. You have a nega b'rosho. A nega b'rosho means there's something going on. I can't help because I just saw this in the Wall Street Journal and anytime I have to, study suggests that red meat may help prevent against Alzheimer's. Okay, that was just my opportunity to... Nega b'rosho, b'rosho niga. Have a little red meat. Doesn't say kale to fight Alzheimer's, just pointing out. Doesn't say that, that wasn't the study, that's not the headline. Headline is: a good barbeque, shtick fleish, a little red meat, grilled properly, and that's good to avoid the rosho niga. But says Rebbe Nachman, the most dangerous place to have a nega, the most dangerous place to have this blemish, this contamination, this illness, is in the head. When you're not thinking clearly, when you're not prioritizing properly, when you're not focused. Rebbe Nachman writes in Likutei Moharan: צריך לשמור מאוד את הזיכרון שלא יפול האדם לשכחה. Person has to protect and preserve their memory, never to get to forgetfulness. עיקר הזיכרון לזכור תמיד את העולם הבא. And what is the thing that we have to think about regularly? The world to come. Know that we are immortal. We're not mere mortals. Life is not just about this world. This whole world is a blink of the eye. This whole world is just to get to the world to come, eternity. רוב נפילותיו של אדם נובעות מכך ששוכח את העולם הבא. How many Congressmen are resigning this week? How many, three? Two or three? I think a third is also being called on. I don't understand. They have positions of prominence and positions of power. They're the ones who are making policy. And all they had to do is have some decent judgment. Some decent judgment. And yet they can't. So many, too many. Why? Rosho niga. Because when a person forgets that we're playing the long game. We're not here for pleasure. We're not here for this world. We're not here for the moment. But we're playing the long game. We're trying to elevate, we're trying to live our best selves, we're trying to find meaning and purpose, which is the ultimate source of pleasure, ironically. When you pursue hedonistic pleasure, then you destroy your life. How'd Tiger do in the Masters? He didn't play. When your life is the pursuit of pleasure, you sabotage your whole life. Upside down. Resign from Congress. You take time off from your career, even though you were the best ever in the game. But when you live for meaning and purpose, that's when you find the pleasure and the happiness. Jews don't live for happiness, we live for holiness. And therefore, says Rebbe Nachman, it's in the head that we have to remember. We have to remember who we are, what we live for, what life is about. We have to overcome that urge, that impulse, that compulsive drive, even with the opportunity, don't live for the here and now. Don't live for the pleasure of the moment. Play the long game of eternity and immortality and what life is all about. He has a long essay here in this beautiful sefer, Rebbe Nachman on the parsha, based on this, but I wanted to bring it to your attention because that's these words in this pasuk. B'rosho niga. Where was the nega? In his head. So many of our problems, the problem started where? It's in our head. We're not thinking clearly, we're not focused, we're not making good decisions, we don't have good judgment. And why do all those things happen? Because we don't remember. We don't remember. You know, come back to the red meat. You've heard me speak about this before. The studies that show how much we neglect and don't care about our future selves. We live for our present self, at the expense of our future self. And so many studies show if you sleep less than six hours a night, your odds of memory loss, dementia, or Alzheimer's increase insanely. Okay, good, so start tonight, sleeping at least six hours a night, right? But what happens is, the present self says, \"Ah, that's for future self.\" But present self wants to stay up a little bit longer. In the middle of doing something, I'm relaxing, I'm reading, I'm not ready to go to sleep, I'm scrolling. So the present self says, \"Who's future self? I haven't met him, I haven't met her, I don't care about them.\" Present self wants to stay up. And that's b'rosho niga. That kind of thinking, where is that? It's b'rosho. איזהו חכם הרואה את הנולד. The chacham, the wise person, in the head, is the person who sees what is going to be born, what is the outcome of what we do today. The wise one is the one who lives for their future self, who lives in the present with an eye towards its impact in the future. That's what you need to be careful with. With that we move over to Parshas Metzora, פרק יד פסוק ב. וידבר ה' אל משה לאמר זאת תהיה תורת המצורע ביום טהרתו. This is the law of the metzora on the day he purifies, vehuva el hakohein. This is the Rav Yerucham I told you earlier. Here the metzora is vehuva, he's brought to the kohein, as opposed to the nazir who goes to the kohein. Why is the nazir very similar language with that major difference? The nazir goes to the kohein and the metzora is brought to the kohein. Why? Because the metzora is brought by things. He's brought, sucked in by his phone, sucked in by the alcohol, sucked in by the drugs, sucked in by the potato chips. Do we want to live a life where we're brought in, sucked in? We have no control, it controls us. Or are we in control? That's the story they challenge. Reclaim control, regain control. Can we regain control? So much of addiction, the 12th step of recovery, is realizing you're out of control and that you can't control. Surrender, submit to a higher power, understand you have to turn to others for help and regain that control. Vehuva el hakohein is because the person has no control, so they have to be brought, as opposed to the nazir who has regained, who does have that control. Says our last רב מנחם בן ציון זקס of the day, in the brand new Menachem Bentzion, I get no commission on, הכוהנים רבני ישראל וראשיה מנהיגיה הם מטרה לחצי לשון הרע של המוני העם מטילים עליהם כל דופי לפיכך אמרה תורה על מצורע מוציא שם רע והובא אל הכוהן סופו שהוא עצמו יזדקק לכוהן שייטפל בו. I would have thought where should he go? A dermatologist. Go to the doctor, go to the internist, go to CVS and pick up your prescription. What are you going to the kohein? You got a skin disease and you call the rabbi? Can I meet with you for a few minutes? What's going on over here? Because what went wrong, where did this all start? It wasn't a physical malady, it was a spiritual one. It was a spiritual one. In בפרשה זו נאמר והובא אל הכהן, in the parsha preceding, it says והובא אל אהרן הכהן. Here it says he's brought to the kohein, but last parsha, Tazria, we conveniently studied a minute ago, it says he's brought to Aharon hakohein. Why are we invoking Aharon's name? Aharon's not going to be alive in every generation to be the one to check every single person with tzara'as. Says רב מנחם בן ציון זקס, you know why? Because how did this person get tzara'as to begin with? What did they violate? What did they do? They spoke lashon hara. You know why a lot of people speak lashon hara? It's not lashon hara because it's true. I'm just telling you something that's true. They make the mistake of thinking that it's not lashon hara or rechilus, gossip, slander—we have different terms representing the different types of speech. It's just true! I'm just telling you something that's true. They broke up, he got fired, she cheated, this, that. I'm just telling you something that's true, it's the truth! Aharon, Aharon cared more about harmony than truth. When Aharon, who was the אוהב שלום ורודף שלום, how Mishnah in Pirkei Avos tells us, how did he bring about that peace? How was Aharon such a peacemaker? Reuven and Shimon were in a big fight, they weren't talking. So Aharon goes to Reuven and he says, Reuven, Shimon can't take it anymore. He just wants peace. He just wants to reconnect. He's nervous to come over to you. You go to be the first to him. Shimon, Reuven wants peace. He just, he just doesn't know how to talk. He's going to come over to you. Did he tell the truth? Sort of. He served a greater truth: the truth of peace and harmony. Says רב מנחם בן ציון זקס, we invoke והובא אל אהרן הכהן. Why? מידתו הייתה לשנות מפני דרכי שלום. Aharon was willing to bend the truth to serve a higher truth, to create harmony and peace, כדי ללמדנו שהקדוש ברוך הוא מעדיף את השקר של אהרן המשכין שלום בין איש לרעהו על האמת של הולך רכיל המפיץ שנאה בקרב אחים. God would prefer the bent truth of Aharon that brings peace and harmony than the absolute truth of the gossiper who is creating and sowing division among our people. And that's why we invoke והובא אל אהרן הכהן to remind us about Aharon hakohein. Today is the yahrzeit of the Koziglover. Who is the Koziglover? Koziglover, רב אריה צבי פרומר. רב אריה צבי פרומר was the Rav of Koziglov, and then he was recruited to become the Rosh Yeshiva of Chachmei Lublin, Rav Meir Shapiro's yeshiva. He was the Rosh Yeshiva of Chachmei Lublin when the Nazis came to power. He suffered in the Warsaw Ghetto. He was deported to Majdanek. Hashem yikom damo. He was killed in Majdanek. Great talmid chacham, we have several of his sefarim, the holy רב אריה צבי פרומר, Hashem yikom damo. Today is his yahrzeit. Today is his yahrzeit. So you gotta learn the Torah of the person whose yahrzeit it is. So in his Eretz Tzvi, the name of his sefer is Eretz Tzvi. Eretz Tzvi, רב אריה צבי פרומר. He writes: זאת תהיה תורת המצורע יש לומר על פי מה שכתוב בחובות הלבבות. Rabbeinu Bachya in Chovos HaLevavos writes in Sha'ar Hakni'ah, המדבר לשון על חברו נותן לו תורת מעשיו הטובים שלו ונותן לחברו. You want a disincentive to not speak lashon hara? Or an incentive to... He has a tradition, Rabbeinu Bachya in Chovos HaLevavos, that if you gossip about someone else, all your Torah learning and all your good deeds get taken out of your account and are credited to the person that you gossiped about. You think you're hurting or harming the person you slandered or gossiped, you've just enriched them. All your Torah, all your good deeds go to them instead of you. V'sefer Shmiras Halashon maybe shoresh l'zeh and the Chafetz Chaim in Shmiras Halashon brings an allusion to this from a pasuk in Koheles, למה יקצוף האלוקים על קולך וחבל את מעשה ידיך מה תורה שיש בך אתה מאבדה שמחמת לשון הרע מאבד התורה שלו. V'al kein, so now the pasuk tells us כי אחר טהרתו שבא לידי תשובה, this individual who gossiped or slandered is repenting and repairing, they've done teshuvah, and this is their rehabilitation, machziran lo toraso. If you get it right, if you come back from what you did wrong, if you take responsibility and apologize, you get your Torah back. And that, says רבנו אריה צבי פרומר, says the Eretz Tzvi, says the Kozhiglover on his yortzeit, that's why this process of purification begins with the introduction of זאת תהיה תורת המצורע שמאז זוכה בתורתו ונעשית שלו. This is the Torah of the metzora, 'cause if the metzora purifies in this way, he'll get his Torah back. You like that? זאת תהיה תורת המצורע. If he does it right, if he's sincere and genuine, if he takes responsibility and apologizes, if he purifies properly, זאת תהיה תורת המצורע, he gets his Torah back. Perek Yud Daled, Pasuk Daled. We have here two birds, the purification process includes: וציווה הכהן ולקח למטהר שתי ציפורים חיות טהורות. He takes two pure birds and עץ ארז ושני תולעת ואזוב, cedar, crimson thread, and hyssop. And he has two birds that he's working with over here. Back in the Nezer HaParsha, Rav Shor Shlita, and he says the following somewhere in here about these two birds. Why two? Why two birds? Why two birds? Oh, here it is. HaKadosh Baruch Hu ברא שפתיים לשמור הדיבור. How many lips do we have? Two. Two lips, choma shel basar. They're walls. The two lips are walls on our flesh. We speak by waving the two lips. יש לאדם בתי שפתים וזה מרמז על בתי כוחות. Sfas Emes writes עיקר בירור הדיבור הם השפתים והשיניים ולכן when we speak we use our lips and our teeth, tongue. Moshe amar, Moshe Rabbeinu kodem hageulah, ani aral sefasayim. עוד מצינו בשפת אמת הבתי שפתים הם כוח משה ואהרן כוח הדיבור וכוח השתיקה. Where do you see Aharon's koach hashtika? Last week's parsha, Vayidom Aharon. Today is Yom HaShoah. Vayidom Aharon. We spoke about it last night at Yom HaShoah program. Incredible speaker, she was extraordinary. Aharon represents the koach hashtika, sometimes we speak, sometimes we're silent. Two, we find double when it comes to speech. Moshe Rabbeinu, Moshe and Aharon, koach hadibbur, koach hashtika. עיקר תיקון הדיבור בתיקון בתי שפתים כוח השתיקה והן כוח הדיבור. So the Sfas Emes writes נמצא שבגם בכוח הדיבור כוח השתיקה. We made mistakes in both directions. We were silent when sometimes we should've spoken, given compliments, and we speak when sometimes we should be silent, when we're gossiping, slandering, when we're knocking people down. These two birds, Rav Shor quotes the Sfas Emes, בתי הציפורים שיש בטהרת המצורע, ציפור השחוטה וציפור החיה. One bird is shechted, one lives. מאי עניין ציפור החיה אם אין עושים בה עבודה? The living bird, what was the point of bringing it, including it, if you're not going to shecht it? אלא העניין כי השחוטה לתקן מה שפגם בדיבור לא טוב ציפור הוא מפטפט בקול מרמז לכל לא טוב שצריך לבער מן העולם. The one that you shecht is the bird that chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp. Why do you have to, why did you become a metzora? Why do you need to purify? 'Cause just like the bird goes chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp, you chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp. And that's when you get into trouble. When you're not talking things of substance, when you're talking about people instead of ideas, chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp, then you get into trouble. So you've got to shecht the bird who just like the bird you chirp, chirp, chirp. V'tzippor hachaya, what about the one that lives, that you let go? היא כוח של דיבור טוב לתקן הדיבור כדי שיהא ביכולתו לדבר דיבורים טובים. That represents the positive power of speech, the good speaking that you could've and should've done, the good positive we should've been. So that's why you always see two: keflayim, two lips, two ability to speak. Sometimes we should speak, sometimes we should be silent. Two birds in the rehabilitation process. Sometimes you have to know what to say, and sometimes you have to stay silent. We were using the power of speech negatively, but what could we have used it for positively instead? We'll end with Tiferet Shmuel from Shmuel Berenbaum. He says velo yitma. Now we're on Niggei Batim, פרק יד פסוק לו, very end of the parsha, the third of the types of tumah. צוה הכהן ופנו את הבית בטרם יבא הכהן לראות את הנגע ולא יטמא כל אשר בבית ואחרי כן יבא הכהן לראות את הבית. You see something on your house, something like an affliction has appeared on the house. The kohen says clear the house out, empty the house before the kohen comes to look, so that everything in the house won't be contaminated. And only after it's emptied, that's when the kohen comes to look. Rashi quotes, because if you don't, the kohen comes and sees that it's a problem, and you have to shut down the house, quarantine the house, everything inside it becomes impure. And the Torah cares about you and your property, and therefore in order to protect and preserve it, it says empty the house before the kohen comes, and before the kohen can diagnose the house. הלכות התורה על כלי חרש שאין לו טהרה במקוה fine. צורך עיון דזה הרי עבר עבירות. This individual who has this manifestation of tumah on the house, he ain't some tzaddik who you should be honoring at the Shul dinner, which is by the way next weekend if you haven't signed up or put in your journal entry, please do. We need your help to make our budget for this year. Our dinner needs to do well. We have wonderful honorees. You know the guy who gets up every week and says turn your ringer off and offers to do it for you? He's our honoree, Ian and his wife David and Joyce, together with the Marcuses. Please come. So this individual though whose house spread with tzara'at, see how I did that? Smooth. This individual whose house spread with tzara'at, he's not being honored at the Shul dinner. He was ovar aveirah. He gossiped, he slandered, or one of the other many things for which tzara'at comes. So why are we so working to preserve his property? Why are we coming to help or advocate for him? למה מקפיד התורה כל כך על ממונו אפילו הכלי חרש שלו. Why? Yesh lomar says Shmuel Berenbaum, דיני הכהן שלוחי דרחמנא. The kohen is an agent of Hashem as the Gemara Kiddushin says. וכשהכהן שליח השם בא לביתו ואינו נכנס לבית עד שיפנו כל הכלים וזהו מראה כמה הקדוש ברוך הוא דואג על ממונו. דבר זה נותן חיזוק גדול לבעל הבית שאפילו אם ביתו צריך להחרב פני עבירתו הקדוש ברוך הוא מראה לו אהבה שדואג בעבורו. Picture the scene says Shmuel Berenbaum. The kohen arrives on the scene. This individual comes home and says I got a problem, Chinese drywall, I got mold, I got a problem. My house, there's a problem. So he calls the spiritual Hatzalah hotline and he says to the kohen you need to come. Kohen arrives, he shows up and he says I don't want to come in until you empty the house. The guy says what do you mean? I got mold, I got problems, I got nega'im, take a look. Kohen says listen, if it's takah a problem, it's gonna be a big problem. And everything inside of it is gonna be gone. But you know Hashem loves you, and I love you, and we care about you, and we care about your property and we care about your things. So take a moment and take the time and first bring it out before I go in, at which case at that time there'll be no turning back. Why? 'Cause even though this person made a mistake, and even though they need to get this punishment, in that moment Hashem wants that individual to know Hashem loves you. And the kohen who represents him loves you. And this is a powerful message. I often meet with people who've made terrible mistakes in their life. They've had indiscretions, they've shown poor judgment, they've made big mistakes with big consequences. And when they're shaking and hesitating and don't want to share or turn or tell me, I always say the same thing. I say I'm not here to judge you. I'm here to love you, I'm here to help you. It's my only role, that's my mission. The reality of what they've done and its consequence has done enough to knock them down. They don't need me to come in there fire and brimstone and tell them what a terrible mistake they've made and what a bad person they are. As a kohen, I'm not a kohen, but as the equivalent of the kohen, the leader of a community, the representative of Hashem, our only job is to say no judgment. You can share, you can tell me, I have no judgment, I only want to help. So the kohen shows up and he says I'm not here to judge you. I'm not here to beat you up. I'm not here to tell you how terrible you are. I'm here to help. And the best way I can help you is first empty the house. I want you to know Hashem loves you and I love you no matter what you've done. We can get you back. Parshas Ki Teitzei when it comes to hashavat aveidah, the lashon of achikha five times, shor achikha, hashev teshivem l'achikha, אם לא קרוב אחיך, ad drosh achikha, וכן תעשה לכל אבידת אחיך. היסוד של השבת אבידה is that every Jew you have to view as your brother. So the kohen shows up and he says hey brother, I'm here to help you. What can I do my brother? I have no judgment brother, I just... want to help you. That's why I'm here and that's the message it sends, the fact that we wait even though this person made a mistake and did wrong, the fact that we, that we wait. Okay, there's a lot more, but we'll stop here. We're on tomorrow for Shiurim back to normal as well. Please stay for all of Sefer Tehillim, our brothers in Israel and we around the world need it for good things and good results. We'll finish all of Sefer Tehillim in just a few minutes, if you please take a moment to stay, have a great day.
