The Yesod of Teshuva

In EmunahSpeak: A Real Deal Teshuva we said that, Teshuva is not a once a year spiritual form of Pesach cleaning or something to be pulled out of the bull pen on the ruchniyas equivalent of rainy days, to level out the speed bumps that we invariably hit as we navigate our way through the minefield of life’s challenges.

Although, by all rights Teshuva should be part and parcel of our daily routine no less than negel vasser, the sad truth is that for most of us it has become seasonal, with opening day being Rosh Chodesh Elul.

But unless one digs down deep, foundation wise in Av, the how, what, and why of the mechanics of Teshuva that will dominate one’s thinking hours in Elul will be anchored in something less than solid bedrock.  For as we explained in EmunahSpeak: A Real Deal Teshuva-part two, if you build a roof in Elul in lieu of a foundation, instead of growth you’ll end up with a levitation act which will predictably succumb to the laws of spiritual gravity.

The hardest thing in this world is to change.  Everyone has a defense or justification for maintaining the status quo ante, and as Rabbi Chaim Malinowitz lets us hear, it should therefore come as no surprise that the biggest impediment to Teshuva is probably self-justification.

To do Teshuva you have to strip away all of the excuses.  So say goodbye to all of the ifs, buts, and maybes, as you take yourself down to your spiritual socks.

Rabbi Malinowitz tells us in the name of the Chovos Halevovos that to properly develop a yesod for your Teshuva you must look at yourself in the mirror and open your spiritual eyes wide enough to see that you need to change things.  And that takes Knia (humility), because the only way to see what needs to be seen in that mirror is to mevatal yourself to the extent that you break down your ego.  Then and only then can you discern the disconnect between what you should be and what you have become.

And accordingly, the Chovos Halevovos places Sha’ar HaKnia just before Sha’ar HaTeshuva because Knia is the stepping stone to Teshuva.  It’s so foundational that without this yesod of Knia, the most intense and sincere Teshuva will lack the capacity to affect the gut-rehab level of change that’s needed to present yourself anew to Hashem.

A Unique Mission

Who are You Anyway?

It’s quite common for a person to feel that he’s no more than a cog in a wheel or even worse, an interchangeable part that can be shunted from one task to the next with neither identity nor relevance, be it economic or one’s standing as an individual.  Such a person is oblivious to the essence of who he is and where he’s going.  And we’re not necessarily talking about assembly line workers here.  In the fast pace, computerized, number crunching society that is ours, even professional people have been sucked into the great abyss of the unknown as it pertains to the who of who am I(?).

Rabbi Yonoson Rosenblum suggests that all this indicates that we have lost our conception of self.  We, in effect, live in a virtual missing persons bureau of the soul in which we don’t know who we are.  And if one doesn’t know himself then how can he even begin to know anything outside himself?

And more importantly, how can he know Hashem?

The good news is that while this outlook may be quite common, it’s about as close as one can get to a 180 from reality because we are reminded by Rabbi Rosenblum that each of us is born with a unique mission in life to which no one else has been assigned, and Hashem gives us the necessary ability to bring our unique mission to fruition.  No one but you can bring your strengths, your challenges, and your perspective on life to the table for the task at hand.

In the same way that no two sets of fingerprints are the same or that no two people have the same DNA coding, Hashem doesn’t delegate the same task to more than one person, which by definition means that if you don’t dig down deep enough within, deep enough to hear the niggun of your tachliss in this world, it simply won’t get done because that certain task that was given over to you was given over to the contextual you. It’s about you and you only, so if it can’t be done by you it can’t be done at all.

This concept of our singular uniqueness means nothing less than if it were theoretically possible for someone NOT to have something unique to contribute to Hashem’s world, he simply wouldn’t be here.

To take it even a step further, Rabbi Rosenblum informs us in the name of Rav Shraga Feivel Mendlowitz z”l, that a person will be judged on how he handles the unique commission that was his and his alone in the same way that the Beis Din in Shomayim will judge the tog taiglach of his very existence as a Jew vis á vis his mitzvah observance and his hashkafas.

The truth is that there are actually two separate concepts in play here.  One is the G-d given talents that are ours and the other is the unique task that each of us was given. 

The Chovos Halevovos teaches in the Shaar HaBitachon that if a person finds his heart drawn in a certain direction, be it music, art, mathematics, carpentry, mechanics or any other skill that might serve as cover for making a living, then he should hearken to that voice within and seek his parnossa accordingly.  And what’s good for parnossa is certainly no less appropriate for executing the special charge with which each of us has been blessed.

As per the Chovos Halevovos, we have to ferret out our special strengths and inclinations from our weaknesses and leverage them to successfully fulfill our purpose in this world.  More often than not, those strengths and inclinations will dictate the direction in which we will go. And if we dutifully follow them we will eventually leave our imprint on this world in one form or another, be it in neon or invisible ink.

But Rabbi Rosenblum tells us that there will be times where a second step will manifest itself. 

You saw something that needs fixing?  Maybe you have an insight into a way out of the shidduchim crisis.  No one else does.

And it doesn’t matter a whit if you’re exactly one day back from seminary and you grew up in house without brothers or you’ve never married off any of your children and you presently have five girls in the parsha with the youngest being thirty.

If you saw something then maybe it’s your task.  Maybe you’re Hager and no one sees the well but you.  And maybe if you saw something, Hashem let you see it because he’s sending it your way.

And He’s sending it your way because you’re unique, you have a mission, and you have something important to do on your sojourn in this world.

Gently Speaking

Iggeres HaRamban

The actual mussar of the Iggeres HaRamban opens with the Ramban’s admonishment to his son that he should accustom himself (yourself) to speak gently to all people at all times.

Rabbi Moshe Hauer tells us that there is no deep meaning here that we have to ferret out because the Ramban’s words are to be taken literally, as in all words, (whatever comes out of your mouth), to all people (even those below you), and at all times (whenever and wherever you are).  And he adds that this general principle to always speak gently may be the most important rule in the entire Iggeres.

The what of this we understand, but what of the why?

Koheles teaches us that the words of the wise are heard when they are gentle.  And as Rabbi Hauer puts it, locks don’t work by force and neither do the words of the wise. The chacham anticipates certain situations and makes his words heard when things are calm, before a crisis hits the fan.  In addition, the chacham deliberates in calmness so that everything will be focused.

Clarity comes with confidence and confidence comes with calmness.  Rabbi Hauer lets us know that the more we’re able to bring a certain calmness to a situation before it becomes stressful the better we will be able to ride out the storm.  And the only sure way to bring that certain calmness into whatever it is that’s going on is to talk the talk as per the Ramban’s dictum.

Many people hear good things.  Some hear it on a constant basis and others even hear it over the course of many years, but it has little if any impact on their lives because they don’t internalize it.  And the reason that they don’t internalize the mussar that they have heard is because from the outset they never set their mind to be mekabel (to accept).

Unlike mere listening which is passive, being mekabel is an active response that requires a person to fully engage himself in order to acquire that which he is being taught.

Rabbi Yisroel Brog tells us that in order to effectively be mekabel the thought that the Ramban is trying to convey with the words accustom yourself, a mentch has to take on a new minhag.

Taking on a minhag in the context of accustom yourself to speak gently means making up your mind to speak in a certain way all of the time.  You can’t change your speech depending on who you’re talking to.

It has to be something immutable.

You have to speak all of your words gently without exception, meaning that you speak the same way to your wife as you do to your chavrusa, as you do to your children, as you do to your employees, as you do to the cleaning lady, as you do to the cab drivers in Yerushalayim, and as you do to the illegal Mexicans who cut your lawn.

In order to accustom yourself to speak gently to all people at all times you’ll have to accustom yourself to be the new you to all people at all times because the old you simply won’t cut it.

Heed, My Son…

Iggeres HaRamban

…the discipline of your father and do not forsake the guidance of your mother.  And so begins the Iggeres HaRamban with this quote from Sefer Mishlei.

The Rabbeinu Yona in his sefer, Shaarei Teshuva, introduces us to a person who shuts himself off from mussar, which is the spiritual equivalent of shutting oneself off from oxygen and then some, because whereas the lack of oxygen will only impact on a person’s life in this world, the lack of mussar will also severely circumscribe his breathing in the next.

Rabbi Moshe Hauer tells us that if you're your own rebbe you're in big trouble because a person is incapable of seeing his weaknesses.  A good friend doesn’t look at you through rose tinted glasses.  He gives it to you over the head if need be.

The key to Teshuva, as the Rabbeinu Yona has made clear, is to be open to guidance.  A person has to be mekabel, and he acquires this trait by training himself to be a shomaya (one who hears),  and it’s with this fundamental yesod that the Ramban begins the Iggeres with the words Shema beni (Heed, my son).

Shema beni is a clarion call to open oneself up to guidance, and who is the most basic person to give guidance/mussar if not a parent?

But as Rabbi Hauer explains it, it’s really a two way street because while the child most definitely has to bend an ear in the right direction, in one way or the other it’s incumbent upon the parent to create the circumstances in which the child will be inclined to bend that ear and open up and pay attention.

And exactly how does a parent go about creating an environment in which his child will be motivated to absorb that which he is striving to give over?

Rabbi Hauer lets us know that the best way to influence someone is to be a role model that the person would want to emulate, and that probably counts double for kids.  Today we often refer to this as mentoring but the Ramban was ahead of the curve on this more than seven hundred years before mentoring found its way into a dictionary.

And this is the big key to Shema beni, because before the Ramban actually gets into the mussar that permeates the Iggeres he introduces himself as the conveyor of that mussar.  He is both the parent and the role model par excellance, and as such he is a unique position to focus his son’s attention on the content of the Iggeres.

But he wasn’t the only game in town.  In fact, he wasn’t in town altogether because he had been exiled by the King of Spain, and he chose to go to Eretz Yisroel, and it was from there, in Acco that wrote the Iggeres.  In light of this reality, the Ramban puts down one more contextual marker so as to further lay the ground work for the ultimate acceptance of his words.

The Ramban didn’t jumpstart the Iggeres with half a verse.  After opening with Heed, my son, the discipline of your father he finished off the verse with and do not forsake the guidance of your mother.

Rabbi Hauer enlightens us with the fact that with the second half of the verse the Ramban put the idea of co-parenting on the table with both parents being in sync with a common language and a common approach.

The Ramban’s lead into the body of the Iggeres proclaims to his son that he should pay close attention because he has something important to say.  And then he follows with the words and do not forsake the guidance of your mother, thereby signaling to him that if he should ever be in need of direction he should seek out his mother because whatever she will tell him in his father’s absence is part and parcel of their common Torah. 

The Ramban was not only speaking to his reality that was compromised by geographical separation, he was also speaking to ours in which the father of the house sets the instructional tone and the mother imparts it on a daily basis.

If You Feel Blessed (2)

In EmunahSpeak: If You Feel Blessed, we learned from the Chovos Halevovos that: …if you feel that Hashem has bestowed you with extra tov you should feel obligated to pay back a little more by adding something to your avoda, be it an extra twenty minutes of learning, a little more kavana in davening, or perhaps resolving to put more effort into doing chesed.

This principle also works on a national level.

Can anyone deny that Hashem has given his people, the Am Segula, more than He has given any other nation in the world?  Just to recite what Hashem has done for us as recorded in Dayenu, which is one of the Haggadah highlights of every Pesach Seder for both frum and not yet frum Jews alike, would already be way beyond the scope of this piece.

And that’s just from the get go.

Are we not the only member of the ancient nations club that answers present at the roll call of 2012?  Where did the rest pack out to?  Most of them have disappeared without a trace while we can practically trace every route we’ve taken on our long march through history.

And yes, even in this two thousand year most recent golus, with all of its expulsions and persecution, Hashem has still dealt us a better hand.  Rav Miller z”l was wont to point out that throughout the length and breadth of the this bitterer golus, with the exception of the local aristocracy which in any case was a miniscule percentage of the overall population, the Jews always lived better than the goyim amongst who they dwelt.

Therefore, we have to do better than the other nations of the world towards Hashem because He has given us more and continues to do so.  Moreover, the fact that we are members of this exalted group means that we have to factor our national/group identification into the personal hakoras hatov that we owe to Hashem.

What price tag do you put on the honor you have every day of saying Blessed are You, Hashem…., Who did not make me a Goy?  For that alone we should feel obligated to bump up our Avodas Hashem.

But the Chovos Halevovos is not finished with us just yet.  Having already taught us that if you get more in this world in one form or the other you should feel the need to ratchet up the practical level of your gratitude, it now comes to close the circle.

Let’s say that you married off your last daughter in the midst of a shidduchim crisis without so much as breaking a sweat or you have never had to give any thought as to where you would get money for Pesach, even though you are of modest means, and you took stock of your situation, relative to those similarly situated, and did the right thing by Hashem by increasing your avodah in which ever way you deemed appropriate.

What goes around, comes around is not just merely a saying.  It’s a Divine Attribute because the Chovos Halevovos promises that if you met Hashem’s gaze by responding in kind to the beneficence He is bestowing upon you then Hashem will continue to shower upon you that special shefa that distinguished your lot from that of others.

And He will even add to it.

If You Feel Blessed

One of the major foundation principles of the Chovos Halevovos is that we owe everything to Hashem.  The problem is that there is nothing we can do for Him.  The closest we can get to doing something is to acknowledge that he has given us everything and, as a consequence thereof, being makker tov to Hashem should be the focus of our lives.

Our whole Avodas Hashem, as per the Chovos Halevovos, is predicated on the concept of paying back something of what we owe.  

Rabbi Chaim Malinowitz fleshes out the Chovos Halevovos and lets us hear a very big chiddush in its name.  To whit, if you feel that Hashem has bestowed you with extra tov you should feel obligated to pay back a little more by adding something to your avoda, be it an extra twenty minutes of learning, a little more kavana in davening, or perhaps resolving to put more effort into doing chesed.

The more you get the more you give.

And we’re not just talking gashmius here.  The Chovos Halevovos is telling us that our obligation to bump our avoda transcends the obvious scenarios such as windfall profits from a big deal in the midst of a recession, a big raise, or even a lottery winning.

If you are zoche to live in Eretz Yisroel and/or to learn in kollel your debit with Hashem is somewhat bigger than it otherwise might be.

Hashem placed you in an area which has a Bais Yaakov high school in addition to a yeshiva high school for boys, and therefore you don’t have to send your children out of town to board?  It matters not that everyone in your town is in the same position as you.  In relation to the thousands of Yidden living in areas that have no choice but to dorm their kids far away from home, you are the beneficiary of a little something extra.

How about the fact that we live in a dor (generation) that has ready to eat food and ready to wear clothes, not to mention the full gamut of modern conveniences such as refrigerators, washing machines, cars, and the like?  If you wouldn’t want to live in 1870 then how do you express your appreciation that you don’t?

The Chovos Halevovos divides our Avodas Hashem into two distinct approaches. The goal of a person in his life should be to discover Hashem on his own using his seichel.  For a number of reasons it is not possible to head straight for that goal so Hashem, in his great mercy, gave us rules (mitzvahs) of the Torah in order to level the playing field so as to give us a stepping stone or better yet, a jumping off point toward the higher level of Avodas Hashem based on our seichel.

These rules of the Torah train us to give thanks, by way of the mitzvahs, for everything Hashem did/does for us (Pesach/our freedom, Birkas HaMazon/for what Hashem just gave us to eat etc.).

Therefore, if Hashem gives us more, we understand from the structure of the mitzvahs that we are supposed to do more than we have heretofore done.

Or put another way, if you feel blessed you should be putting a little more on the table.

The Brocha of Achdus

And may it be good in Your eyes to bless Your people Israel, at every time and at every hour with Your peace.  Blessed are You, Hashem, Who blesses His people Israel with peace.

So ends the brocha of both Sim Shalom (Shacharis) and Shalom Rav (Mincha and Mariv), the nineteenth and last brocha of the Shemona Esray, and as with the other brochos the chasima (end) of this brocha is a microcosm of the thirty-four words that preceded it.

For every other brocha in the Shemona Esray, you are flying solo, be it in relation to the personal or communal requests that you are making from or the praises you are giving to Hashem.  If the guy next to you is not with the program, then it’s his wish list that will take a hit, not yours.  Or at the very worse, there will be one less vote counted for the rebuilding of Yerushalayim or the ingathering of the exiles.

The brocha of Sim Shalom is cut from different cloth because it’s the brocha of achdus and we’re all in it together.  On that score, Rabbi Yitzchok Kirzner z”l tells us that this is the only tefillah in the Shemona Esray in which we ask Hashem for something that depends upon our being united. 

Boruch Dayan HaEmes.  We’re doomed.

If we can’t get it together achdus wise, then what can we possibly bring to the table in the first part of the brocha, where we ask Hashem to shower a host of goodies such as peace, kindness etc., upon us and upon all Israel and then a few words later, when for good measure, we ask Him to bless all of us as one?

The good news is that we’re not collectively being held hostage to our inability to achieve even a minimal level of achdus in the world beyond Sim Shalom.  The truth is that the whole question of achdus, as it impacts on the blessings that we are attempting to invoke both upon ourselves and the Klal, near the beginning of Sim Shalom, is in each individual’s hand.  Even if the guy next to you is somewhat less than a team player, you can still push the envelope on achdus in the context of Sim Shalom.

We have on numerous occasions in a number of EmunahSpeak pieces decried both the lack of achdus in Klal Yisroel and the over hyping of certain situations and events as being paradigms of achdus, which in reality have nothing whatsoever to do with the subject.  And we did so because neither the fact of nor the lack of achdus is a group phenomenon.  It’s not quantitatively expressed by the size of the crowd at Citi Field or the head count at the Kletzky levayah.

And as we said in EmunahSpeak: Nu?:….when a family of Torah Jews is slaughtered in their beds or eight Yeshiva bochurim are gunned down in their Yeshiva we seem to be incapable of stepping outside of our label saturated existence long enough to attend the funeral.  It matters not a whit how many people show up because it’s not a numbers game.

It’s all about the mosaic of Torah Jewry.

In Shomayim, three hundred of EVERYBODY at a levayah will trump thirty thousand of only a certain SOMEBODY every time.

Reduced to its lowest common denominator, achdus is qualitative, and in the context of the brocha of Sim Shalom it’s brought to fruition by the power of one.

Notwithstanding the fact that it is Hashem that is being asked to give the actual blessing, Chazal have given us, by way of the chasima of this brocha, the awesome power to bless Klal Yisroel.  Given the wording of the chasima it’s as if each and every Yid actually invokes it while making Hashem his shaliach to carry it out.

So how do we score one for achdus by merely reciting the nineteen words at the end of Sim Shalom and what does it have to do with Hashem bestowing the manifestation of His finest attributes upon us, upon all Israel, and blessing all of us as one?

It’s all in how you say it and what you’re thinking at the time.

If you’re not blessing all as one, then how do you expect Hashem to do it when you ask Him earlier in the brocha to bless us, our Father, all of us as one.

You either have everyone in mind when you say the words, and may it be good in Your eyes to bless Your people Israel or you don’t.

You can't run, hide or try to dance your attitude under the radar.  And you also can't internally hold your nose because it’s only you and Hashem, and He's occupying more space in your head than what you're pleased to call your thoughts, so who are you kidding anyway?  Do you really think you can mentally exclude Lakewood, Satmar, or YU without rendering your effort a brocha levatola?

The bottom line achdus that’s going to unleash the power of Sim Shalom is in your head and the head of everyone who recites it.  The attitude, mindset, and kavana with which you massage those last nineteen words of the brocha will be the template that Hashem will apply to the first thirty-four.

Someone’s Knockin’

We live in a very fateful generation.  It’s a twilight generation, something akin to bein hashmashos.

The period of radiance has passed, and we already hear the sounds of what is to come.  Moreover, we are living in a period when even looking out the window can be dangerous.

Someone who is wise can already hear a voice calling out from Shomayim.

These are the words of Rav Shimshon Pincus z”l, and whether or not he had even heard of the Internet when he said them, he was already seeing past it.

In EmunahSpeak: The Call of the Hour, we quoted HaRav HaGaon Moshe Wolfson as saying that every generation has its mitzvah, and that ours is emunah.  This is where the battle lines will be drawn between every Jew as an individual and the Satan/Yetzer Hora in whatever form it chooses to manifest itself at any given time. 

And the main thrust of that piece was that it is not a coincidence that a number of very serious seforim on emunah in English have been published in the last few years by some very great people.  One of the common threads running through all of these works is the sensitivity of their authors to what they perceive to be the call of the hour.  All of them, including Rav Wolfson, as articulated in his shiurim on emunah, concur that the tenacity of the Satan’s thrust at the emunah infused jugular of every Jew will put us to the same challenges with which Hashem tested Avraham Aveinu.

They have independently come to the conclusion that it is a matter of pikuach nefesh for this last generation before Moshiach to seriously strengthen its emunah in order to stay the course for what’s coming our way.

Simply put, we’re headed for a very bumpy ride, and if we don’t buckle up with emunah we risk being thrown from this world.

We also noted in EmunahSpeak: Living With Hashem, that it’s also as close as we’ll ever get to Jewish body armor because a life with Emunah is a life that is not affected by death, by difficulty or by challenge.  There is always the knowledge that it’s with Hashem, and therefore it can’t be that bad.

Our tachlis, as seen through eyes of Emunah, is to turn into destiny the fate that is subsumed in what Rav Pincus z”l has referred to as this very fateful generation.

Hashem changes the times, and in consideration thereof Rav Pincus  held that we must be cognizant of what is going on around us so as to be able to devise corrective strategies.  

And he didn’t mean keeping on top of the news because he constantly spoke out against wasting time reading newspapers and such.

Being cognizant of what’s going on around us as per Rav Pincus refers to those times when Hashem shows His hand, be it ever so subtly.

As we also said in EmunahSpeak: Living With Hashem, Appearances aside, we are not stuck in situations, we are placed in them. We are where we need to be.  The question asked by the ba’al Emunah is not, why this is happening to me, but rather what should I do now that it is.

In other words, what are our marching orders?

It’s essential to ratchet up the staying power of our Emunah so as to brace ourselves to stand firm come what may, no matter how difficult the circumstances.  But it’s not enough.

We must go on offense.

Our marching orders, as per Rav Pincus z”l, are that we should do Teshuva and swing the whole world to the side of merit.

So why are we leaving Hashem out of the cheshbon?  

He reminds us that the foundation of Judaism that was laid down at the giving of the Torah was the creation of a relationship.  So why are we not leveraging that relationship by crying out to Hashem to morph difficult circumstances into something more benign?

From the words of Rav Pincus z”l, as recorded above, it is clear that he was looking into the same abyss, the only difference being that unlike the others who could feel the coming storm in their bones, he could already see it and hear it, and therefore his approach was more proactive because when Someone’s knocking one has to answer the door already.

The Darkness of Night

The Mesillas Yesharim quotes the following Gemara (Baba Metzia 83b):

You laid down darkness and it was night (Tehillim 104:20). This refers to a world that is similar to night.

If we hadn’t heard in the name of the Vilna Gaon that he didn’t find one superfluous word in the first eight chapters of Mesillas Yesharim we would suspect otherwise because just two sentences north of this quote the Ramchal says that the evil inclination literally blinds his eyes and he becomes as one who walks in the darkness where there are stumbling blocks before him which his eyes do not see.

And we would be wrong because the Mesillas Yesharim tells us that the darkness of night can cause two types of errors in relation to a man’s eye:

• It may either cover his eye so that he does not see what is before him at all (as in there are stumbling blocks before him which his eyes do not see) or
• It may deceive him so that a pillar appears to him as a man, or a man as a pillar.

The Ramchal tells us that the second error is the worse of the two because it stems from the distortion of their sight, so that they see evil as though it were goodness itself, and good as if it were evil, and because of this they strengthen themselves in clinging to their evil ways.

We are being told that everything in Olam Hazeh is total darkness. In a literal sense a blind man is better off because he is not susceptible to the second mistake.

With this teaching before us we can readily understand how hardcore Leftists, Islamists, and their like can see wickedness and sheker as goodness and truth.

And we also see that at the end of the day Lewis Carroll’s Wonderland was not an inversion of reality. The Mesillas Yesharim makes it very clear that the bottom line truth of this world is that due to the darkness of night things aren’t as they seem which describes Wonderland to a tee.

Our world is the real inversion of reality because it lets us think that things are what they appear to be. 

As we said in EmunahSpeak: So Who are You Relying on… That we live lives of misplaced reliance flows naturally from the fact that we have misplaced reality itself.

Over and above any improvement computers have brought to the lives of literally billions of people alive today and billions more who have passed this way in the last thirty years or so, they have also enriched our understanding of how Hashem runs His world.  The words virtual reality are more than simply a code name for the digital Potemkin village that holds forth on every computer screen only to vanish in a nano second with a flip of the switch.

Virtual reality is also an accurate description of what we carelessly refer to as the “real world,” the one we physically inhabit. 

This is the Ramchal’s darkness of night brought into the digital age.

So how does one make his way through the darkness of night with his neshama intact?

Night vision goggles!

That’s what Rabbi Avigdor Miller z”l, would say if he were still amongst us.  When he gave his aitza on how to navigate through the sheker laden darkness of the night of this world, night vision goggles weren’t known to the wider public so he used spectacles/glasses as a moshal (example) instead.

He taught us that the one and only way to exercise one’s bechira (free will) within the darkness of night that is this world, and land on one’s feet in the process was to see this world through the words of the seforim (with his two most favored being the Mesillas Yesharim and the Chovos Halevavos) as one looks through his eyeglasses. 

It’s the only game in town that isn’t rigged against you.

With merely one’s own eyes to rely on a person can figuratively go over a cliff, and not even realize it even after hitting the ground.

The irony of this world, which is enveloped in the darkness of night, is that to the extent that you think it's real, it's not real at all.  But if you see it, or rather see through it for what it actually is, then it’s very real indeed.

The darkness that is night is the very antithesis of the phrase, what you see is what you get.

Or maybe not.

Maybe what you see is what you get after all if what you see is actually something in your eyes, because if what you see in this world has substance in your eyes then that’s what may well pass for substance in terms of your portion in the next.

Protection Trumps Salvation

Two stops short of the finish line in Tehillim 145, which we recite thrice daily under the code name of Ashrei, in verses 19 and 20 to be exact, Dovid HaMelech reveals to us that we essentially write our own protekzia ticket vis á vis Hashem, in that the way He relates to us is dictated by the way we first relate to Him.

In verse 19, Dovid HaMelech tells us that He (Hashem) will do the will of those who fear Him and He will hear their cry and save them.

In the eyes of the Malbim, as brought to us by Rabbi Asher Boruch Wegbreit in his sefer on Ashrei, it works something like this: Hashem will hear their cry, and only then will He save them.  Or put another way, as long as the sun is out we’re flying solo, with Hashem not putting in an appearance, salvation wise, until it starts pouring.  Moreover, those who fear Hashem are only saved from their enemies.

What’s this business about only saving us?  How about whacking the bad guys while You’re at it?

This brings us to verse 20, where we hear that Hashem protects all who love Him and (that) He will destroy all of the wicked.

As can be seen, the first posuk speaks of fear which means fear of punishment.  And even though unstated in this particular case, the flipside of fear is always the expectation of reward.

Reward and punishment is no small thing mind you.  The Rambam includes it in his list (ani ma’amins) of 13 bedrock principles of Judaism.  And yet even so, as important and fundamental as it surely is, the fear of Hashem is but the handmaiden to the love of Hashem that is spoken of in verse 20.  And this is born out by the different ways in which Hashem takes care of us, as recorded in these two verses.

As we saw above, those who fear Hashem are only saved from those who would do them harm.

Verse 20 comes to tell us that Hashem does it one better for those who love Him by protecting them.  As Rabbi Wegbreit explains it, Hashem’s protection means that His loved ones (those that love Hashem) never encounter situations that would force them to cry out because Hashem shields them completely from the sources of distress.

In contradistinction to how Hashem deals with those who oppress the G-d fearing amongst us by merely extricating His People from the evil that they are enduring, when it comes to the enemies of those who love Hashem, He will zap them totally simply for the evil they intended to do but couldn’t, due to Hashem’s all encompassing protection of those who love Him.

Rabbi Wegbreit sums up the fear addressed in verse 19 and the love spoken of in verse 20 as follows:

If they fear Him, He saves them from the source of their fear.

If they love Him, He spares them from the fear itself.

A Soul Choice

The body wants to do what feels good.

The ego wants to do what looks good.

The soul wants to do what is good.

If you have ever felt like you were being pulled in several directions now you know why.

That the neshama wants to do what is good should come as no surprise.  After all, it’s part and parcel of the Ribbono shel Olam, so what should it want to do if not good, as that term is generally understood by those who don’t believe that the concept of good is relative?

And it’s also not what one would call a shocker to posit that the body wants to do what feels good.  Are not the cravings of the body the clock by which most of us mark our time in this world?  We want to eat, sleep, bathe, and indulge our eyes and ears now or at the earliest possible convenience for one reason and one reason only.  The myriad of sensations that come to us by way of our five senses on our terms make us feel good.

But when it comes to the ego it’s somewhat of a different story, and we would do well to let Dr. Dovid Lieberman tell it.

For starters he lets us know, as was mentioned above, that the ego wants to do what looks good, and then hits us with the fact that the ego is no less than the Yetzer Hora.  We are to understand from this that just as it would be risky to sit with our back to the door if the doorman was the Yetzer Hora, any aspect of our life that is driven by form as opposed to substance is being driven recklessly with the Yetzer Hora in the driver’s seat, or as Dovid Lieberman puts it, when we are motivated by ego we do things that we believe project the right image of ourselves.  These choices are not based on what is good but on what makes us look good.

For our purposes, the essential importance of the ego is in the context of the self-esteem/ego continuum.

The vast majority of us have internalized a distorted image of what the ego is all about.  We tend to think that a person with a healthy ego who projects an aurora of confidence is a poster boy for self-esteem.  As Dovid Lieberman tells us, nothing could be further from the truth.

We only gain self-esteem when we are able to make responsible choices and do what is right regardless of what we feel like doing or how it appears to others.  This is a soul choice. In turn we rise to a higher and healthier perspective, because self-esteem and the ego are inversely related; like a see-saw, when one goes up the other goes down.

In case you missed that, the point being made was that self-esteem comes from making good choices which by definition are soul choices because the soul, not so incidentally, is the Yetzer Tov.

Logic therefore dictates that if we are in control of ourselves and act responsibly, we can never be deeply bothered by anyone or anything (which translates into a healthy sense of self-esteem).  And then Dovid Lieberman adds that we are not a casualty of anyone or anything other than our own behavior because nothing affects us; we affect everything by virtue of our soul choices.

The Fundamental Rules….

….to follow by one who wants to guard his tongue is to be patient and also to be mivater:

• as in letting things go
• looking the other way
• passing, on what’s very much in one’s face
• and goin’ ostrich by just plain closing one’s eyes to what would otherwise drive one up a wall

Rabbi Yitzchak Berkovits takes it a step further by telling us that the basic principle of loshon hora is not restraint, but self-respect.  It's beneath our dignity to dwell on the negative. 

With these fundamental rules in hand, all one has to do is to learn Sefer Chofetz Chaim with the commentary of the Be’er Maim Chaim, both parts of Sefer Shemiras HaLoshon, Kuntres Chovas HaSemirah, and Kuntres Zachor LeMiriam.

And if one can then figure out how to make all of that knowledge the property of his tongue he can then safely open his mouth without trepidation as to the consequences.

Phew!

Those of us, who would like to get a firm handle on what emanates from the workings of our tongues, take note of the dos, don’ts and exhortations contained in these aforementioned seforim and others, and sometimes feel overwhelmed by what we perceive to be the impossibility of seriously getting with the program of Shemiras HaLoshon as laid out, for the most part, by the Chofetz Chaim z”l.

Intimidating it is, but hopeless it’s not.  

In an attempt to morph the fears of failure into hopes for success in the life and death struggle over the disposition of one’s tongue, we are, Chasdei Hashem, proud to announce the launching of a new blog (in addition to EmunahSpeak, not in lieu thereof) which will be dedicated to matters of the tongue et al.

It’s called GuardYourSpeak, and it will, IY”H, go a ways in making what was heretofore thought by all too many to be impossible, to be not only possible, but most definitely probable.

As will be noted from the slug line under the title, the leitmotif of this effort will focus on what we say, why we say it, and why we shouldn't be saying most of it.

It’s a mouthful to be sure, but we’ll do our best to kasher it.

B’Chochma

In the brocha of Asher Yatzar, which is recited upon relieving oneself,

we bless Hashem, Who fashioned man b’chochma (with wisdom)

and then we go on to detail several manifestations of that wisdom:

and created within him all manner of openings and all manner of cavities.  It is obvious and known before the throne of Your Glory that if there would be ruptured (even) one of them or would be blocked (even) one of them, it would not be possible to survive and to stand before You.

Query:  Why did our rabbis choose, what to most of us is a somewhat unpleasant necessity to illustrate the perfection of Hashem’s creation?

What’s so special here anyway?  We couldn't make similar observations about a plethora of bodily functions such as the heart beating, the lungs breathing etc.?

The other bodily functions work 24/7/365 in the background.  The heart is always pumping, the lungs are always breathing and the kidneys are always filtering.  At what point exactly in our day/week/month/year/life should we acknowledge them? 

The emes is that those parts of the body whose combined functions result in the elimination of bodily wastes also pump away on the backburner 24/7/365.  But unlike the incessant beating of the heart and a breathing mechanism that supports the illusion of being on automatic pilot, those organs and orifices that work in tandem to remove what is no longer useful to us bring their work to fruition several times during the day, and it’s at these finite points in time that we have the opportunity to bless and praise Hashem, not only for the chesed that he shows us by purging us of toxic and noxious substances, but also for the overall functioning of all of our organs and bodily functions whose incessant activity give us no specific time frame in which we can acknowledge their critical importance to our well being.

It’s sort of a twofer in which we leverage the occasion of our daily needs to bless Hashem for the absolute Wonder of the totality of our moveable parts.

Once we are given, as per Asher Yatzar, a bare bones description of our physical makeup with its attendant fragility, is it not self evident that the human body, inside and out screams out the fact that it was designed b’chochma? 

Why does the nusach of the brocha have to proclaim the obvious?

The brocho of Asher Yaztar is not narrowly focused.  As we mentioned above, it blesses Hashem both for the seamless perfection of our bodily functions in general and also specifically for the processes that cleanse us from the wastes that are detrimental to our health.

But it’s even more than that, because in addition to its function of being makker tov to Hashem for the aforementioned bodily wonders, without which one could not survive, the brocha of Asher Yatzar also serves as the poster child for our obligation to be makker tov to Hashem for the perfection inherent in all of creation, which if not addressed by its own specific brocha, is subsumed in the praise we give to Hashem in the brocha of Asher Yatzar. 

Hashem….fashioned man b’chochma and the b’chochma of Asher Yatzar extends past the immediate context of the brocha to the most infinitesimal and insignificant of His Works, even if not so obvious to the unlearned eye.

The Asifa

The Real Achdus

If you were looking for a post-mortem on the Asifa at Citi Field, fuggedaboutit.

We’re talking here about the Asifa that never was.

In EmunahSpeak: The Satan’s Achdus we said, When our Rabbis admonish us as regards our lack of achdus they are not referring to the touchy feely variety that was on display in Boro Park at the time of the Leiby Kletzky a"h, tragedy. 

And it was different by the Asifa?

The Torah oriented Jewish papers all kvelled about the unbelievable achdus that was on display at Citi Field.

And why not?  

All those who were opposed to the Asifa for one reason or the other stayed home.  Those who came, for the most part, belonged to either a like minded Chasidishe chevra or to a homogenized Litvishe one.  In addition, they came to hear their Rabbis speak about things that they generally agreed with.

So why shouldn’t there have been achdus?

And as we further explained in EmunahSpeak: The Satan’s Achdus, The reason that the achdus that obtained in Boro Park was not of the variety that keeps the Satan up at night has nothing at all to do with what the people did or did not do.  It was simply impossible for the “Satan’s achdus” to exist in such an environment.

Make that ditto for the Asifa. 

So what exactly is the Satan’s achdus?

As we said when we discussed the Kletsky tragedy, “The Satan’s Achdus” is about getting out of our comfort zone….it’s an achdus that can only be achieved by first withstanding a firestorm of vitriol emanating from the Yetzer Hora.  The existence of such an achdus draws a bull’s-eye around the Satan and then proceeds to hit it. 

The seeds of what could grow into the “Satan’s achdus” are not scattered to the four winds.  They are selectively sown.  In any situation in which you wouldn’t reflexively demonstrate a feeling of achdus the Yetzer Hora is all over you relentlessly justifying your hesitation.  Any attempt at real achdus has to have the staying power to weather the long march through our worst instincts.

This is “The Satan's Achdus."

That was the import of the message in that piece when it was originally written and it was clearly explained as such.  But upon reflection, I have come to realize that the term the Satan’s Achdus embodies two distinct meanings with neither one contradicting the other.  The first is the intended meaning, as explained above. 

The second, which was originally unintended, is no less true, and that is that the Satan’s Achdus is what we generally refer to as stam achdus, as in the Citi Field Asifa, the outpouring last year for the Kletzky family and every other situation where the Satan doesn’t challenge us, thereby allowing our good instincts to prevail by default.  In a certain sense they are two sides of the same coin.

It’s not that these things shouldn’t be engaged in on the merits.  They most certainly should.  It’s turning them into achdus happenings that shifts the Satan into smile mode.  After all, why bother with the tircha of all that is entailed in stepping outside our comfort zone to push ourselves in the direction of real achdus if we already think we’re riding high in achdus cruise control?

We are taught that davening is not results oriented.  The goal, as such, is not that which we are asking for but rather the connection to Hashem that’s in inherent in the act of davening itself.

We are also adjured to daven for others, and when we daven for others we are by extension also connecting with them also.

And this brings us to the Asifa that never was, the one that should have been held ten to fifteen years ago before the wildfire of the Internet began singeing the environs of Lakewood, Williamsburg and other impregnable bastions of Torah and Chassidus.

But this is all somewhat of a misnomer because it more accurately could be called the outcry that never was or even better yet the whimper that never was.

Way back then, when the not yet religious Jews (a.k.a Acheinu B’nai Yisroel) and their children were being spiritually and morally decimated by the tens of thousands, one could have heard a pin drop in the aforementioned impregnable bastions of Torah and Chassidus, given the silence that obtained therein as to the crisis.

It was very much the same reaction that we spoke of in EmunahSpeak: Goin’ Ostrich, where we noted the selective outrage that manifested itself when certain venues were hit by Hamas rockets as opposed to others.  And we said there:

What future is there in a country where the concern of anyone as to what’s happening runs only to the extent that it’s happening to him? 

And as this relates to our collective reaction to the initial Internet Tsunami that blindsided our less affiliated brethren, we paraphrase:

What future is there for a people where the concern of any segment thereof as to what’s happening runs only to the extent that it’s happening to it?

Nu?

We are taught by one opinion in Avos that someone who says what’s mine is mine and what yours is yours is reflecting the middos of S’dom.

Query:  Isn’t the attitude of, I’ll care about my concerns and you’ll care about yours a close first cousin to this middas S’dom?

Theoretical asifas aside, had we davened for them it may have rendered the need for the Citi Field Asifa moot, because as we also know, not only are we adjured to daven for others but we are also told that those that do so are answered first.  Meanwhile, not only didn’t we daven, but it didn’t occur to most of us that there was either something or someone (else) to daven for.

That was an opportunity for Achdus if there ever was one, and we took a pass on it.  Not a conscious pass to be sure, because we were totally oblivious to the conflagration raging around us, but a pass just the same because had we related to them as Acheinu B’nei Yisroel we wouldn’t have been oblivious in the first place.

But we were, and what goes around comes around, so years later here we are reaping the whirlwind.

All of the spin notwithstanding, if the Citi Field Asifa saved even one Jew from the quicksand of the Internet then it was a worthy event.

But had the Asifa that never was put in an a timely appearance it would have been be worthy of Moshiach.

Hashem Gives Wisdom

We have a tradition that all of our Yom Tovim (including Chanukah and Purim) are more than mere markers on the calendar to commemorate events from the distant past.  They are all alive and kicking in real-time with their historic significance being transposed into the present.

In the same way that the first Pesach was all about our freedom, those days on the calendar that we refer to every year as Pesach are infused with the attribute of freedom.  And so on for all the other Yom Tovim.

On the chag of Shavuos that we celebrated yesterday and the day before (in chutz L’Aretz), we were once again zoche to the hashp’ah of receiving the Torah as we are every year at that time.

Rav Shimshon Pincus z”l, says that the truth is that every time we learn Torah we are experiencing a Mattan Torah.

And then he asks the obvious question:

“Then what’s so unique about Shavuos?”

Based on a Shavuos ma’amar by Rav Pincus, Rabbi Yerachmiel Goldman answers in his name as he tells us that it’s Chag HaShavuos that makes it possible for us to receive the shefa of Torah all year round.  It’s the shoresh for all of our Torah.

From that yesod, Rabbi Goldman then reveals to us in the name of Rav Pincus z”l, the unbelievably holy and mystical process by which all of us learn Torah.

For starters we are reminded that Mattan Torah also means a matana, not in the sense that we were incredibly fortunate to be given such a gift but rather that it was impossible that we should have been given such a gift because Torah is beyond human comprehension.  Unlike chochmah b’almah where we are hard wired to be able to receive Hashem’s Siyata D’shmaya in understanding the Second Law of Thermodynamics and such, Toras Hashem comes to us by virtue of a wireless hookup because we are only able to understand it because the Shechina is here with us.  Without the active work-a-day presence of the Shechina we would have no chance of understanding Toras Hashem.

By definition that means that if you learn Toras Hashem, the Shechina is there with you.  And as a caveat that means that Torah has to be learned as Toras Hashem, not as just another chochmah, chas v’shalom.

But Rav Pincus z”l, doesn’t stop with the Shechina.  The process of our learning is even on a more rarefied and personal madreiga because we are told that any Jew sitting and learning Torah is receiving it from the Mouth of Hashem Yisborach. 

Or put another way, every time you sit and learn you are learning b’chavrusa with Hashem.

Rabbi Goldman tells us in the name of Rav Pincus z”l, that if Moshe Rabbeinu had to learn from Hashem all the more so us.  If the learning of Torah was up to us it would be constricted by our own limits.

When learning with Hashem there are no limits because it’s Hashem that gives wisdom.

It’s Ours for the Wanting

Shabbos is the day of Hashem. 

The Ramchal tells us in the second paragraph of the first chapter in the Mesillas Yesharim that:

Our Sages of blessed memory have taught us that man was created for the sole purpose of rejoicing in G-d and deriving pleasure from the splendor of His Presence; for this is the true joy and the greatest pleasure that can be found.  The place where this joy may truly be derived is the World to Come….

There is a teaching of Chazal that Shabbos is a taste of the World to Come, and just like dveykus with Hashem is the bottom line of our hoped for existence in the World to Come as per the Ramchal above, so it is with Shabbos.  For as Rabbi Shimshon Pincus z”l, tells us, Shabbos is a relationship, with the relationship being one of attachment to Hashem.

So how do we get from here (Shabbos) to there (attachment to Hashem)?  As Rav Pincus z”l makes clear, the starting point is Emunah.  We acquire Shabbos through Emunah, and through Shabbos we acquire Hashem.

It’s as simple and as difficult as that. 

Kedushas Shabbos is different from all other kedushas in the world.  Unlike other forms of kedusha, which either exist or do not exist, the existence of Kedushas Shabbos is conditional in the sense that one has to plug into it. Without some activity on our part it remains in sleep mode vis á vis us for the 25 hours that connect one week to the next.

The irony is that the only thing interposed between ourselves and Kedushas Shabbos is us, by our failure to manifest the actions and attitude that would pull back the curtain so as to enable us to saturate our senses with the Kedushas Shabbos that was there all along.

So how does a person merit Kedushas Shabbos?  And exactly what actions and attitudes are we talking about here?

With big kavanahs?  Maybe toiveling in a mikvah on erev Shabbos?  Or perhaps the recitation of special tefillahs appropriate for the time in conjunction with a seder in Hilchos Shabbos?

We merit Kedushas Shabbos by preparing special foods for Shabbos and shining our shoes.

That’s it?!

Almost.

Rav Pincus z”l reveals to us that all a person can do to merit this kedusha is to desire it.  Only those who want the gift of Shabbos get it.

You have to want it, and if you do it’s there for the taking because someone who desires Shabbos and who makes a big deal out of Shabbos merits Kedushas Shabbos.

So Who are You Relying on? (part 2)

In EmunahSpeak: So Who are You Relying on… we said that The avodah of bitochon is to train oneself to rely only on Hashem. 

No small statement, this.

After a chapter and verse recitation of a number of things that we do in fact foolishly rely on, we quoted Rabbi Chaim Malinowitz’s take on the view of the Chovos Halavovos as put forth in the Sha’ar HaBitochon:

The avodah of bitochon is that we should rely on Hashem that the store will be open on time, that the milk will be fresh, that the cars will stop at the red light etc..  Bitochon and relying are active verbs.  We are relying on Hashem that the bank will have our money, that our boss won’t fire us. We are relying on Hashem to bring us customers, not the size of the ad that we place in the media.

And so it is.  But that’s not all it is.

The picture that Rabbi Malinowitz painted for us was but a broad-stroke lick and a shmeck of what it means to rely upon Hashem.  But the devil is in the details.

How about a cup of coffee? 

On a very basic level, along the lines of what we previously brought out in EmunahSpeak: So Who are You Relying on… we are relying on Hashem rather than the store that there will be coffee, sugar, cups, lids, milk, and stirrers.  This is Relying on Hashem 101, and it’s a very high madreiga, because most everyone else relies on Costco, the merkolit, or the corner bodega.

But if you would actually like to drink something then we have to take our reliance on Hashem to a more advanced level.

One who relies on Hashem does so to the exclusion of anything else.  In reference to our cup of coffee it means that we rely on Hashem period, not on Hashem in addition to the laws of physics or chemistry.  Therefore we are relying on Hashem that the cup won’t leak.

And unless you prefer iced coffee, you are relying on Hashem that the water should be hot.  And if you do, in fact, prefer iced coffee, you are relying on Hashem that the ice cubes should be cold. And moreover, you are relying on Hashem that those cold ice cubes will chill your coffee.

And if you do want your coffee hot, then rely on Hashem, not the Styrofoam cup, to keep it sizzling.  Use of the Styrofoam cup only gives us the right to rely on Hashem because without either it or something equivalent we would not have done the proper hishtadlus required to bring Hashem into the picture in the first place.

And those whose palettes desire something more than the taste of water rely on Hashem to give the brown liquid in their cup the taste of “real” coffee.  Those who rely on Starbucks to take care of the taste run the risk of getting decaf on the wrong end of a labeling mistake or something worse.

To the extent that we are hung up on taste we are also relying on Hashem that the sugar or its substitute will be sweet.  But that in itself is not enough to put us on a cavity watch, so we are relying on Hashem to that the sugar will sweeten the coffee.

This still won’t hack it because I’m also relying on Hashem that the coffee will mix with the sugar (and the milk) when I stir it.

All this for a cup of coffee.

Anyone for tea?