Episode 11 BEYOND THE 7 (Shall have no other gods) with Rabbi Aaron Dovid Poston

[Music] oh hey good day folks welcome everybody back to beyond the seven live from jerusalem with rabbi aaron david poston i'm so enjoying this series he's teaching us so much and this is our 11th installment in the series uh but it's now our third class uh on um the six constant mitzvos and last week's class was real exciting really hot i'm enjoying and learning so much so let's just jump right in and see how the rabbi is doing today i know it's getting late there in jerusalem but we so appreciate rabbi you hanging in there and teaching us the beauty of torah and i'm thoroughly enjoying the six constant mitzvah how are you today and uh i'm looking forward to the class sir it's all yours thank you dan i'm so glad to be back with you and everyone who's watching now or watching later but either way we're all here to learn and to grow and that's going to be the message for tonight how to grow because of the second of the six constant mixes which i will discuss in depth but i wanted to give a little bit of an introduction to what we've had already discussed like i guess it would be a very quick review but to pinpoint some very fundamental things such as number one the idea of the sixth constant are under the heading of how to put hashem before me always that was the heading in the shock that we found that the em brought down these minces i just want to show you once again what we call menorah right these are these ideas that when you're darvening when you're praying and not only when you're praying but the truth is this is an idea of a meditation that one should have god whatever that means right at this point what who's god the understanding of god is what we are constantly um developing he is permanent he is a fixed structure right but we're growing we're human we're human and we're very limited he's unlimited the entity called god is unlimited and for a limited um being such as we are it could take a lifetime you know so the torah has given us instructions this is instruction manual how to live our lives how to grow and the mixes themselves are obviously these are um these are tools these are tools in our toolbox that we could use i just want to mention on my ipad i don't have uh i don't have anything coming up so i don't know if the facebook is running but we'll continue anyway just on youtube today rabbi oh okay so i gave everyone else the link for the um for the facebook okay that's good i'll put a live link on it okay uh all right so let's get started these are tools as i mentioned so in order to have a a constant a constant awareness what this will help us do as human beings it's going to shape every one of our thoughts all of our emotions as well and hopefully it'll bring it into action every every time we make a decision to do something this will help shape or mold the final the final action of what we're about to do and and that should be the result of the six constant mitzvas the first one we said was belief slash knowledge of god now it also mentions this is the god that brought us out of egypt and i brought up the question or the quandary how does a non-jew feel about that right was he in egypt so i discussed last week about my own personal bondage my own personal egypt mitzrayim and i think that every human being on the face on the face of this earth should be able to relate in some way on some level some kind of restrictions they find in their life whether it's as worse or as dramatic as as i experienced or even just simply barriers that you find in order to accomplish something and that's going to play a very important part in tonight's discussion because basically you have to know that there's a purpose for life right so what's the purpose so in in a certain sense the first mitzvah discusses it because it's who who is god the one who brought you out of egypt so there is a certain concept of this is the goal the goal is actually freedom happiness and ultimately a relationship with hashem that brings you towards success and tonight's discussion will be which way you're going are you going to go are you going to go in the path of hashem who has given you the tools or you're going to try things on your own which we'll call in hebrew of zara it's called foreign worship because what is the service to hashem what right if we're supposed to serve hashem so anything that is not within the guidelines that he gave us is called far in worship again the word we use for worship it also means right to serve right just serving hashem you wake up in the morning and everything you should do is to serve hashem not yourself or let's just say well we're going to get into this discussion wants success the question is how to get there so i either do it god's way or i do it a different a foreign way and that's where the the discussion is going to come in because the question is what is this idea of a foreign god so let's start off i'm going to read daniel katz's rabbi daniel katz's translation of number two we must not place in we must not place our belief in or rely on any other god power or force besides hashem so this is very like in other words there are other forces but number one when we realize hashem is in in number one is that he is everything actually number three also that he's unified but to rely on any other power is is a sin not only is it a sin the question is why is it so evil right and we're gonna have to discuss when the early i say early the early humanity started idol worshipping is that a word worship idols we're talking about the the generation of anush now we're talking about someone who knew his grandfather adam who was created by the almighty himself so the truth he knew the truth he knew there was an almighty creator of the universe god and yet what did that generation begin to do they sought out ways to shortcut to see results to see would you say cut corners cut corners they wanted the results but they didn't want to grow they didn't want to make the effort to work on your carrot on their character tree okay and so we have to relate this to ourselves ultimately so they did make idols this mitzvah is not about making or not making idols it's about putting your faith and belief and trust in a source other than god so god did delegate he did give certain powers to within nature but he is the overall over overarching power that controls everything and by somebody tapping in to try to bring about a result not through working or not through praying and not through doing what we call the service to hashem is re relinquishing that opportunity for a relationship with god and that's what's so evil about it because you have to ask what's the evil i believe in god and he's the ultimate creator of the universe and he these are his servants and i'm giving honor to his servants what's the big deal okay so there's a big deal okay we call it a worship and it's one of the worst sins basically in today's world we don't have a desire to bow down or to create these idols as they did back then so we discussed the generation of enosh that this is what they did what was so evil so basically it's that shortcut as you discuss as you mentioned and today it would be somebody who's taking a denial right there are people who will deny god's existence or maybe their indifference there's an indifference to god's and we would basically label that as heresy and so in today's world this is what we're we're really discussing somebody who is giving the power to something else other than hashem and basically they're claiming there's an independent power other than god and there is no independent power other than god and the biggest pitfall we will fall into ourselves i didn't even finish reading the whole thing of cats but the that we actually think were that power right in today's world with technology and everything else we either put it onto technology or we put it to ourselves and so even if we don't have that strange desire that we can't even relate to of worshiping an idol worshiping a rock worshiping a statue or the sun or the moon or whatever it is that people do or have done in the past but we do fall into the the idea that it's us we have that power now that's going to be a catchy um it's going to be a sliding slope because god did create us in the image of him and therefore when we are not tapping into the true image of god within ourselves then this is idol worship okay this is a problem let's continue with the translation that rabbi cats gave in exodus 20 verse 3 that's where it says you shall have no other gods before me every even one who acknowledges that hashem controls and guides everything but still thinks that he capital he entrusted the governing of the world to an angel or to a constellation and is somehow less involved meaning that god is no longer this is what the greek earlier greek philosophers basically believed that yeah perhaps there was a god created the universe but he is so way up there we cannot relate and therefore he left basically the stage left he left and uh he left up to us to these um these other powers and to to garner success or happiness we should um tap into them so basically i know in america they had these uh maybe they still do you had um a rain dance you know by the indians and you had probably other rituals by other other religions other pagan religions that basically would do certain rituals in order to elicit a certain reaction from the gods favor right so you're putting your your trust your your reliance your bitcoin in your actions or your rituals that are bringing about the results but it's also putting it into anything but hashem himself let me continue reading so basically when you put your trust in the governing of the governing of the world to this angel the constellation and um you're basically saying and the the god himself is somehow less involved you transgress this mitzvah and is considered worshipping worshiping and outside force this is known as worshipping of odazara strange worship strange service rather one must know and believe that hashem itself and no other guides and directs all the worlds above and below no creature in existence has even the power or capability to go against the divine will it is for this reason that hashem is referred to as the supreme power over all powers now one of the i think it's called i i'm trying to develop my own thought about this at least in christianity i'm not so sure about islam but i have a feeling that the same thing applies there that within the doctrine i'm not saying all of christianity is like this i'm not an expert but there is this idea that there is a satan who is a fallen angel we call it in english like they call the devil and he is very powerful which is true there is a a um not a fallen angel but there is a force that we call evil the eight sahara the angel of death but they would claim that it is so powerful god actually needs our help to combat it and that is a big mistake the we're going to talk about tonight the frustration that god gives us the negative happenings and these are all going to be keys towards growth right these are called opportunities for growth right some people would say um you know i can't believe this happened to me [Music] it's a real problem when this evil comes into the world and it throws you off your balance i get it but they're they're missing the point that this is an opportunity they look at it as oh my god this is a force that is battling and we need to somehow fight we god needs our help now i'm sure that not all christianity and not all islam has this belief but there is a very strange idea that this is a fallen angel that has um i i mean i i know where they get it from not going to go into that tonight okay um but it's man's way of trying to deal and then therefore you have dualism and this is we're going to talk about it next week about the unity of hashem okay so basically this is a big yeah go ahead um yeah i just wanted to ask a question on that point i mean is that not a degree of uh being irresponsible in the sense of you know denial put the blame on rather than uh take responsibility for our own yetzer hara and put it into check um i think i think you're right this is exactly the point of tonight's class so we'll discuss this in depth um i'm glad you brought that up just to mention the other rabbi that talked about the six constant mitzvahs recently rabbi mikhail he compared the first with the fourth the second with the fifth and the third with the sixth i talked about that last week so number two is we're never to believe in any other gods besides him and that would leader correspond to having awe of hashem so he mentions like this the way to achieve or of god is by realizing there is no other power other than him and that all the wonderful energies i'm going to say all the wonderful energies powers and miracles in the world come from him in other words even the devil even what we call the satan even those seemingly negative energies are god's will he directed them they're in the world and it's for our growth we have to tap into that and only then we'll actually be able to um at the end say we participated and again you mentioned the atara this is also going to be a very key to tonight's class that god gave us the i'm going to say like this he created us in his image if he has no image so what does that mean in his image it means that he has ultimate free will he gave us an inkling of that free will he gave us like a a shadow of that free will and therefore the choices we're going to make and we can never go ahead and say the devil made me do it right isn't that what like you were leading to oh the devil made me do it so i take no responsibility whatsoever for it okay so knowing that i want to now i think worse than just saying the devil made them do it or made us do it um they actually believe that um yeah they're involved in it like you were starting to say um but yeah they uh they have to resist it and um yeah it it just forms a distinct entity beyond themselves and apart from god that is what avada zara a strange worship in a sense yeah look there's a lot to discuss so i'm gonna like just take one page from this book right i'm only going to discuss one point about the idols within so in them psalms 81 10 if you want to read the whole verse from me that would be great i'm sorry i was reading rabbi psalms 81 verse 10. 81 10 says there shall be no strange god or there shall no strange god be in thee neither shall you worship any foreign god so what could it possibly mean there shall be no strange god within you within you el czar so we're talking about the yeats of the inclination that god gave us without that inclination believe it or not we would have no children right we would not be interested in in reproducing so god gave us this inclination in order for us to grow in order in order for us to i'm going to use the word produce but not just produce children but even to have competition to to excel to succeed so this is a fine line because you're always going to be faced with choices the greatest thing that god gave us right was was free will so this is a a tight rope we're walking on because he gave it to us but then we are faced with choices and we could make the wrong choices but that is life this is what life is about making choices taking responsibility as you said but it's really about growth it's really about self-perfection about working on our character so i want to discuss what this uh page it's basically a page and a half says so we just read the verse in psalms 81 10. now how could it be that there's a strange god in us because right it says there shall not be a strange god within you well what do what does that mean that we had surgery and while we were sleeping right somebody implanted a strange god within us so basically in the gomorrah in the oral torah shabbos 105b explains the strange god is the actual evil inclination that god gave us okay but the question we're still faced with why is that evil why is it evil okay um there's just so much here i'm not even sure wow you got us on our seats rabbi i know okay so he explains the tactics that are employed by the yates of hurrah basically everybody wants to be successful and happy right and what does the gates of hurrah he's going to give us like you said it's that shortcut there's going to be and therefore when you do that shortcut there is no growth right you you want the results but what does god really want from us he how much we we went through the facility we talked about it he wants us to be kinder he wants us right it says in in the torah that we are supposed to follow god's way right so that means just as he is merciful so too you shall be merciful right just as he bury the dead you should bury the dead just as he visits the sick you visit the sick right we discussed all this this is all to do with a character development okay so he gives an example if you're like you're doing not competition but you want to see who's taller so you have two guys standing back to back and everyone's going to do the best they can to straighten themselves you know as much as they can but if you if you want to cheat so then you'll stand on your toes you'll tippy toe a little bit but you know if you're really evil you'll kick the guy in the shins right and then he'll bend over so everybody wants success the question is how are we going to get there so i can't stress this over and over again god gave us the instruction manual how to do it and that's the torah and therefore that's called the serving hashem properly and anything that is not doing right not following the torah is simply strange service okay and this is how i'm trying to bring it down in today's world where we don't really have this inclination to bow down towards idols but we have to be cognizant of the fact that we're constantly serving this idol within and that's going to be what we call the ego and the self um my mother i hope she's listening if she's not listening now she'll listen later that rav north weinberg said to say i can't is idol worship now i thought that very strange but my mother really was keen and she listened to this lesson that he taught very well and she discovered that within her she always had desires to do something and thought that she couldn't do it and she was able to tap into the true power the true power meaning the true power of hashem and she did something that she dreamed about her whole life and i'll tell you what it is she wanted to play the piano and she always thought she could never do it so she taught her kids right i played the piano my sisters played the piano but my mother never did so she invested a lot of time and energy into her kids but she herself um i don't know what the word is she sacrificed or she gave up on the dream but she heard ravnich weinberg speak about it and she decided to do it and she accomplished it okay she reminded me of that a lot now it's a little bit complicated why saying i can't is like idol worship so on a certain level saying i can't when you're giving enough an opportunity to do there's two ways to look at say i can't do this but i can do everything else that also is saying it's not my it's it's my power right if i'm saying i can't about one thing it means i can about something else so that's one level of understanding but also the very fact that who says you can do anything anyway you can only do whatever it is you're going to do with hashem's help and that is going to be key here because the worshipping of the idols as we described is to arrive at a successful conclusion not through working on your character but through shortcuts so i want to bring this i want to really bring this home to this idea and that is it's really almost the entire chapter um chapter 8 of deuteronomy it's a lot of verses but i guess we'll we'll try to and we'll try to focus on just several of them chapter eight of deuteronomy is where we're our benching when we um eat bread we eat a meal and we're satisfied and we bless the lord our god why we why we first of all it's very important that we bless hashem because otherwise we think it was our doing that nourished us in the beginning moses is the one who instituted the first of the four blessings in what we call beer catamar zone after we eat and that is because of the man that came down from heaven the mana that came down from heaven was purely it was all hashem now we're talking about eating bread where humankind is the one who develops it right there are 10 processes processes process to go into making the bread that's why when we make the bracha hamotzi leshan minharets there are actually 10 words and we actually put our 10 fingers to remind us we're partners with hashem right it was uh i'm not going to go into ho gamora but basically um one of the roman um i think it was a caesar he asked rabbi kim what's better you know what god makes or what man makes you know you have here a colonel and here you have a loaf of bread what's like you want to say you jews are partners with god and so yeah you know what we say the bread is better the colonel god made but look what we can do with it right so we're partners with god we cannot do anything without god's involvement okay so so we make our blessing over bread we're reminding ourselves that we're just partners with god in the sense that nothing we we could not have even done this without god's assistance but we are this is what the gift that god gave us the ability to create okay so in in chapter 10 where we do have this idea of did i say chapter eight sorry chapter eight so it begins with all the lesson of food right the entire commandment that i command you today you shall observe to perform so that you may live and increase which is about growth life is about growth to come and possess the land which is the ultimate success well i wouldn't say the ultimate science but it's part of the process of a jew living a proper life living in the land of israel but hashem had swore to our forefathers to give us you're going to remember you should remember the entire road meaning the journey right which hashem your god led you these 40 years in the wilderness so as to afflict you the affliction which i mean we're going to chalk up sometimes to the satan to the to the other those forces that are challenging us but what is it what's the purpose in order to know what's in your heart what's really in your heart whether you will observe the commandments or not whether you're going to follow this path of like the number one mitzvah knowing there's a god or are you going to worship or tap into other things he afflicted you and led you hunger let you hunger meaning we had affliction we had hunger but yet he fed you the manna that you did not know nor did your forefathers know in order to make you know that not by bread alone does man live but rather by everything that emanates from the mouth of god does man live your garment didn't wear out upon you your feet did not swell for these 40 years you should know in your heart that just as your father will chastise his son so we have this ultimate loving relationship with god that he loves us so much he wants this he wants to see us grow he wants to see us do the right make the right choices i lost my place uh just as so so too hashem your god chastises you you shall observe the commandments of hashem your god to go in his ways this is you're supposed to follow his ways and fear him for hashem your god is bringing you to a good land this is you know again it's almost like the um the goal but it's it's in order to really fulfill our goal we should be in the land i take this opportunity to invite all the jews who are listening to come home a land um i'm sorry [Music] a land with streams of waters of springs and underground water coming forth in the valley in the mountain a land of wheat barley grape thick pomegranate land of olive oils and date honey a land where you eat bread without poverty you will lack nothing there so this is this is like success right a land whose stones are iron and from whose mountains you will mine copper you will eat and you will be satisfied this will be mentioned in the prayer after we eat when we're blessing hashem as it says you'll eat and be satisfied and bless hashem your god for the good land that he gave you now this is where the idol worship i'm going to say strange worship not worshiping god properly comes in take care lest you forget hashem your god the whole idea of the the called a negative commandment the the um the warning not to worship other gods not to have any other gods not to put trust into the other powers remember these powers do exist that god put into the world as um servants for him to he delegated certain things so let take care lest you forget hashem your god by not observing his commandments were his ordinances and his decrees which i command you today lest you eat and be satisfied and you build good houses and settle now listen you're going to go ahead and do all these things which you call successful right you're going to eat you're going to be satisfied you're going to build these i guess strong houses and you're going to have settlements and your cattle and your sheep and your goats are going to increase what what kind of success is this is unbelievable and you increase silver and gold for yourselves and everything that you have will increase and now comes the dreadful warning and your heart will become haughty and you will forget hashem your god who took you out of the land of egypt from the house of slavery so what did we say this is the god within remember in psalms we said it was eighty-one psalms eighteen so this is the strange god that you have within you meaning you're putting the power that you succeeded in all these things we just mentioned i think it's verse 14. i'm sorry it's really verse 13 maybe 12 actually you know starts at 12 right you're going to eat you're going to be satisfied you're going to build these houses you're going to have all these increase in your wealth right whether it's your cattle and your sheeps and your goats or the silver and the gold and number 14 your heart will become worthy and you will forget hashem your god who took you out of the land of egypt the house of slavery who leads you through the great and awesome wilderness the snake fire all these i'm you know the what the sutton puts in front of us right all the different um obstacles and difficulties whether we remember that was the snake the fiery serpent the scorpion the thirst where he had no water who brings forth water for you from the rock of flint who gave you the manna who gave you all these things which your forefathers knew not in order to afflict you in order to test you to do good for you in the end in the end so we have to have our eye on the ball the end is success but how do you get there are you going to choose god's way or are you going to choose what you're going to now say in your heart listen to verse 17 and you may say in your heart this is that idol that's within you my strength and the might of my hand made me all this wealth and then verse 18 then you shall remember hashem your god it is he who gives you the strength to make wealth in order to establish his covenant that he swears your forefathers as this day and then what do we have right away it shall be that if you forget hashem your god and go after the gods of others this is the this is trying to understand what does it mean don't go after the gods of others it's it's all about following god's way and not the other way again verse 19 it shall be that if you forget hashem your god and what's the result you're going to go after the gods of others and worship them and prostrate yourselves to them i testify against you today that you surely perish in other words what you think is success is not success it's an illusion right you want real true success that's permanent and real you gotta go the slow journey of personal growth prayer and self-development you're going to perish like the nations that hashem caused to perish before you so will you perish because you will not have hearken to the voice of hashem your god okay i think i hope i made that clear what do we do i love it rabbi beautiful stuff how should we act when we're faced with i'll use the word test obstacles things that make it look like we're not succeeding so there's a famous story about ray by kiva and gomorrah brahat 60b maybe people are aware of this it's an unbelievable story i'm going to read it to you and tell it to you that rabbi akiba was once traveling he had with him three objects he had a lantern a rooster and a donkey so he came to a certain village and he was looking for lodging he knocked on many doors but either nobody answered or they said sorry no room at the end so what did he do he was known to say whatever god does is for the good to know that tonight it's going bringing back you know we're talking about the other all six constant mitzvahs but let's say the first one knowing who god is knowing that he's one which we'll talk about next week knowing that he loves you okay we're going to discuss that but anyway he says whatever god does is for the good gom zulatova he set up a camp in a wilderness nearby i can just imagine he's like on this mountain let's just say you see the village below and during the night a wind came and blew out his lamp so what do you think he said first of all the wind came out blew out his lamp a cat i don't know what kind of cat but some wild cat came and he ate his rooster and a lion came and slew his donkey and rabikiva said gamsulitova the truth is he said gonzalo tova after each one of these incidences in other words when he found there was no room at the end he already said gonzolitova he said it right then and there and when the um when the wind came and blew out the lamp he said gamzolitova he just knew ultimately this is for his good and when the cat came and he ate his rooster he said gums of the toba and when the donkey was beaten by the lion he just said all this is for the good he woke the next morning and he looked down into the valley and he saw the roman garrison marching off all of the people of this village as prisoners and everything was burning everything was destroyed and and he knew at this point wow so what he was saying all along let me just read he woke the next morning to find that tonight during the night the soldiers had ransacked the village which had refused him lodging not only would the rabbi had been captured if he would have stayed in that village that night if they would have had room for him he would have been amongst those people walking out in chains right what if his light had not blown out so they would have seen it up on the hilltop some light and would have sent a few soldiers to capture whoever was up there what about his rooster his rooster would have whatever roosters do say coco depends what country you're in you know different roosters speak different languages depends like in spanish they say one thing in israel they say something else but at least for the people listening i hope they understand what cockadoodle do is so and what about the braying of the uh this donkey again if the animal had not been killed then uh you know this would have been the end of him so how does how should we properly and it's not an easy concept how do we properly deal with what we call calamity i'll use the word calamity because listen it's probably very uncomfortable to have uh have without running water i imagine whatever it is you're exposed to the elements but you know what it was ultimately for as good how do we react right we want success so we're faced with the choice i could lie i could steal i could do things but that's called the making the wrong choices right we're not talking about a life uh what do you call it life or death death uh experience where maybe certain things would be permitted to do right we all know that the big three you know no lighter worship no murder and no adultery those things you have to die for uh well at least jews do talk about it another time about noah's heights but what about the other things right so the torah says these are you should live by them so like if somebody held the gun to my head and said eat this pork or i'm going to kill you i have no problem no problem you know i'll eat the pork or you know violate the shabbat or i'm going to kill you so i have no problem living and violating the shabbat if such a but the big three i have no excuse no excuse no excuse whatsoever so rabbi keep just the life of ramaki itself is a great example of what we should um you know aspire to obviously not to say i can't is is not is not even a possibility but on your own level you're not going to be asked why do you live as driving akiva god's going to ask you why didn't you live why didn't you accomplish what you what i gave to you and what you could have accomplished on this earth with all your particular you know strengths and weaknesses i i have a lot of verses that i picked out that i want to uh share knowing that this whole idea of koak of to say that it was my power my strength that made my accomplishments this is warned over and over again god does not want us to think that it was us we go into the land of israel it's because of our prayer it's because of our misses it's because he swore to our forefathers it's not because of us we say over and over again in our own confessions right it's unbelievable it's not because we're we're so so righteous right it's because we sin we've sinned and yet hashem has so much mercy um we're going to pin it all to hashem's strength so i have a lot of verses and i think that they're all good for meditating on for contemplating about you know in other words to remember it's god's strength not my own we can accomplish anything right to say i can't is akin to idol worship and i thought it very strange i mentioned but the more i just took it as faith like my roshiva said it i have to understand so every time and i try to never say those words say i choose not to right because that's really what's happening here if i really wanted to i probably could accomplish it with god's help because he is the energy that i'm going to tap into to accomplish anything anyway right so here in exodus chapter 15. verses 2 and 3 the eternal's strength and his vengeance were my salvations as we come through the the sea this is my god and i will make him a habitation and god is my father and i will ascribe to him exaltation the lord is a master of war the lord the lord is his name so we come into the land and we fight the seven uh canaanite nations but it's because of us what does the verse say when we we experienced was fresh we experienced leaving egypt and the sea split for us and we're exalted and we understand you know we're in such a high state of of seeing and knowing god so then it was clear what happens we forget right we forget and that's why it's so important to have this as a constant reminder if you ever experienced what i had experienced but i shared last week and i'm sure everyone has on their own level experienced something like that no god know him right no and no god so you'll never forget this and if you have these six constant mixes as a reminder you know i mean you have to bring it into your consciousness and meditate on it how could you ever forget that god is your savior he is your salvation and i just want to mention as as a i grew up as a secular jew but i knew that god was my father i knew he was my father and it says here in the verse and so i always wondered about these christians the claim that there's this like one son of god and i'm always wondering to myself but i thought we were the sons of god every human being on the planet what would make this one guy so special you know anyway so uh just keep this in mind god is your father he is your eternal he is your strength and go to deuteronomy chapter 31 6 god says be strong and courageous neither fear nor be dismayed of them for the lord your god he is the one who goes with you he will never neither fail new nor forsake you he is your your strength okay and i just want to point out the rashi there he will never he will neither fail you lo the word yupaka stems from the word rafa means weak he's not going to be weak thus the expression here means god will not give you cause for weakness resulting from your being forsaken by him you always find strength in him at deuteronomy chapter 20 verse 4 for the lord your god is the one who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies to save you uh rashy on that for they are coming with the victory of flesh and blood whereas you approach with the victory of the omni present the philistines came with the victory of goliath what was his end he fell and they fell with him this i i know people that were i mean i was how old was i in the 1967 six-day war i was um you know three years old okay but people who experience this they experience secular israelis i don't know you know everyone has their own journey but there was a such a revolution of balaycheva people becoming religious because they saw with their own eyes the salvations in front of them that i mean anybody who wants to study what happened during the six day war in fact i think west point has other um universities that deal with uh theory and war have no concrete conclusion or understanding why it is that this little nation of israel actually won that war nothing makes logical sense whatsoever you know from the uh we call it the the types of straighten tight the straights of titan there was these um you know basically israel was corned off there was a siege weeks before there was no hope in sight and basically you know when you count actually physically counted whether it was the amount of tanks we had or planes we had or soldiers we had compared to whether it was five or seven attacking armies or ready to attack us there was no hope whatsoever and uh hashem you know enough people were praying because of god's promise and mercy so to think that you know that the power and might is in my hand if you just take that as a prime example apply that to every possible scenario in your life even when you go into a an interview for a job right it's with hashem's help if the answer is no he knows better what's for you than you know for yourself i oh this is going to be my solution to all my problems if i just land this job i'll be with the right people i'll be able to move my um my cv ahead i'll be able to you know go to the next level in this career whatever i'm in god knows better and if you didn't get it then you still have to work on yourself right there's this idea and i i had a little discussion with a certain person i'm not gonna obviously mention their name but it was very distraught for me i couldn't believe that i heard a religious person say this we were discussing a certain a certain person's issue and the purse i was basically saying got to do the right thing and the other person suggested you got to know the right people so i'm thinking to myself you got to know the right people are you sick now this happens happen to you with a religious um query what are you suggesting that there's corruption here like what do you mean know the right people just no listen if you know the right information anybody who's hearing it will will do the right thing you have to know the right people you know the right people it means that you're basically showing favor you're trying to get a favor out of somebody because he's in that position and that is i understand i get the point but the person was saying it all depends who you know and i wanted to say it's what you know meaning what i'm telling you now it's what you know in terms of the the method which is prayer self-development right relying on hashem that is what is going to get you the success it's almost like the idol worship it's a strange worship it's doing what is corrupt right if you know the right person and you um what was the word she wanted to use almost like extort them by using their weaknesses you know that they have a weakness so if you tell them and then they'll do what you want so it's just anyway it really upsets me a lot but uh life goes on okay and in zechariah 4 6 and he answered and spoke to me saying this is the word of the lord to zerubbabel saying not by military force and not by physical strength but by my spirit all right listen i got a lot of verse i think they're all important what we want to try to drill you know drill into our system is to rely on hashem not on any other power or any other source because the strength is him and him alone and he gave us he gave us a image within us like a an inkling of who he is that is just very powerful and it's unbelievable but it's his strength that he put into us not some foreign power now we're always constantly faced with choices so we have to make sure like i mentioned the very beginning when you have these six constant mixes on your mind you will fit you will face um the the shaping of your decisions of your actions right based on knowing there's a god there is no other power that he is one right he loves you and you have to fear him you have to love him yourself and you have to fear him and that you should not chase after your eye your your eyes or your heart we're going to get into all those in the other weeks that we have in front of us and psalms 44 verses 3 to 4 you with your hand you drove out the nations and planted them you inflicted harm on kingdoms and sent them away for not by their sword did they inherit the land nor did their own arm save them but your right hand and your arm and delight and the light of your countenances you you favored them rashi says you inflicted harms on kingdoms you inflicted harm on the seven great nations you sent them out from before us and with your hand and your strength you drove them out of their land and planted our forefathers in their midst you know when you when you constantly are reading these verses i don't know why they don't stand out to most people but i wanted to bring these to the forefront these should stand out and if you meditate on these every day how could you not want and know that you need to put your your faith and reliance on hashem now isaiah 40 verse 31 but those who put their hope in the lord shall renew their vigor that's where their strength will come from they shall raise wings as eagles they shall run and not weary they shall walk and not tire psalm 73 verses 26 through 27 now what i'm giving you is not even it's not even an exhaustive list it's just certain things i put together i'll tell you the last 20 minutes yes psalm 73 26-27 my flesh and my heart yearn god is my rock of my heart and my portion forever for behold those who have distanced themselves from you will perish remember the idea of believing in other gods or relying on these other or in yourself relying on other powers other than hashem is only going to bring ultimately in the end not a good result you may see temporary success but that is not going to last unless you have worked on yourself and your character and reached that level for that success there's nothing that god can take away from you that's not or any human beings i should say is let's start over no human being can steal from you that which it belongs to you right if you earned it and god gave it to you so ultimately it's yours if it was stolen from you that means it really wasn't yours or there's something you did to lose um possession over it okay just like you cannot steal from somebody else that's not coming to you okay uh psalms 21 verse 27 verse 1 king david said of david the lord is my light and my salvation whom shall i fear the lord is the stronghold of my life from whom shall i be frightened maybe meditate on this there's no question you're you're going to see all those idols call those powers as waste of time those shortcuts will not get you anywhere in the long run so if you're looking for their shortcuts it's a real testimony that you don't believe in hashem that you're not well let's say even temporarily your your faith has has diminished habakkuk that's how you pronounce it habakkuk 3 chapter 3 verse 19. god is god the lord is my strength he made my feet as swift as the hinds he guides me on my high places through the conductor to play with my melodies okay isaiah chapter 40 29 chapter 40 verse 29 who gives the tired strength and to him who has no strength he increases strength right where do we get our strength from uh isaiah 12 2 here is the god of my salvation i shall trust and not fear for the strength and praises and praise of the eternal the lord was my salvation listen i'm not going to go through all the rest i just there's so many it's it's really a lot i love that isaiah 12 2. beautiful verse listen i could just read off so people are interested you go to um uh psalms 46 1. go to nehemiah chapter 8 verse 10. go to psalms 28 7. go to psalms 18 verses one through four psalms 59 verse 17 jeremiah is down well if they they can always pause right they can uh listen to it again yeah rewind jeremiah 32 verses 17-22 and jeremiah 33 verse 6 wow no need for them to ever be dismayed rabbi that's just some beautiful beautiful torah talmud uh tanaka i mean it's just wonderful to get those verses out there as i mentioned before right god gave us the it's but there is no way to actually overcome the yates are out without hashem's help this is something that if we think for a second that we stand the chance right god will not give us anything like any challenge that we cannot handle now what does that mean in one hand we just said god will not give us a challenge that we cannot overcome on the other hand he says there's no way you can overcome it without my help again we are partners with him he created us we are created beings we are not god we are not the end-all and um i think i discussed this when i discussed my own maybe i didn't but i discussed my own private experience part of the recovery is called a realization that i am not god there was a philosophy that we used in our little group and i think was carl young that it's basically a book called not god there's a book called not god it's all about understanding i am not god when you realize you are not god there is actually a hope and opening for that relationship and it's all about the relationship if i didn't say it in the beginning i'm going to say it now it's the journey it's the path right i'm sure people have heard this analogy someone is walking on the on the someone's walking on the beach and they're saying to hashem you know i remember my whole life i was walking on the beach and every time you know i i always saw two footprints in the sand but whenever i experienced troubles and tribulations you know i only saw one set of footprints i i guess the conclusion i came to was i believe that you had abandoned me right and god turns around to the person and says you fool you're the reason you saw i feel like crying when i say the reason i s you saw one set of footprints is because i carried you i was carrying you so it's about the relationship to know that god is always there with you you don't need to rely on other powers now this is an exercise this is not going to come easy this is only the second of the six constant missiles okay so with that i'm going to i'm just going to conclude i just want to make this a shorter video class but hopefully people will get this into their kishkas into their innards that they can live with it they can really live with these ideas because these are not just a mitzvah you think about once in a blue moon it's not something you just study once this is something that and i mentioned i'll say it again when we make the bracha baruch those are the six words in front of almost every single blessing we make we're doing a mitzvah when we're praising hashem when we're deriving pleasure from this world we're reminding ourselves that baruch you hashem that's baroque you were the source of everything right you were the creator you were the all-powerful you were the source of everything atta you and no other that's the next word you atta hashem it's true we don't pronounce that word and i explained in earlier videos why but we're thinking of the uk above k we're constantly meditating on the mercy and love that he has for us but at the same time he is also many attributes he's only one god but he has many attributes and the other main attribute is we call din or judgment or harshness and they go hand in hand we'll talk about that probably next week so you have this one god that has um i'm going to say multi personalities god forbid um that has uh that has um more than one he's got it all than one attribute very good and that's where the name hashem comes in eloquenu our god he's our god there's this relationship there's this loving relationship with our god melith the king that's where the all comes in and that's also related to tonight's class a little bit as we mentioned in in uh rabbi mishael guptmaker's how he puts number two and number um number five together so all of hashem is it's a development you have to put the work into knowing hashem and developing that and of course the last word is the world is not follow after the illusions of this world and the truth be told i want to mention that there is an opinion that the first mitzvah is not part of the 613 it's overreaching uh as a principle everyone agrees it's the torah principle to believe in hashem but not all of the rabbis had counted it in the 613. so let's just leave it as a general principle that's overriding and necessary for all the 613 and then the 10th of the 10 commandments there are those that believe that this is also just like the first is overreaching that tenth one of not desiring something that doesn't belong to you is ultimately let's just say ultimately the conclusion or the result of having trust and belief in hashem you won't have these strange desires right which really brings us full circle here because if you really believe in hashem and you will let's say deny push down or able to uh kavish control your desires for other powers that's also totally within this realm of what we're talking about tonight that you won't have these i guess strange desires for things that don't belong to you or for things that you're not able to at this moment accomplish your weight until you build up your own strength and your own madrega level in which to get there okay so i'm going to end a little bit early i think we just had one full hour and bizarre to show will continue the idea of unifying hashem next week rabbi just amazing stuff i i mean would you ha would you say i know that this is all part of the sixth constant mitzvot beyond the seven there's there's so much here that i believe a hundred percent should be able to integrate but it almost sounds like a degree of holiness that might only be allotted for the hebrew people to just rise above but but you know this is you you put it within reach is what i what i'm seeing is that you know people can begin to walk i'll tell you why look i i understand your concern why should this only be for the jews no i totally disagree and uh i hope none a non-jew watching this does not think that um number one we did mention in those those 30 mitzvahs those 30 commandments that we talked about originally that a non-jew should keep is the belief in god so that's what that's the first of this of the sixth constant number two right you should not have any other gods before me this is against idol worship if any of those seven any of the no hyde mitzvahs any of these chevron mr chevrolet noah this is the one this is the one that how do you make this real how do you have a desire to worship idols i ask ask any i don't know ask any uh non-jew you know what was the last time you had this desire the strong desire to bend down and worship and kiss a rock you know probably never but if you understand now this one of the seven mitzvahs of forbidding off is not to worship idols we're talking about what we said in um it was in psalms 81 don't have a foreign god within you hello you have a yate sahara just like we do okay albeit it could be that ours is stronger okay and that's a dilemma that we have to deal with and why do i say that because we discussed this idea that if you have a command to do something you have a stronger desire to say no so keep that in mind that the the jew seems to have a stronger yate sahara therefore that's why i'm not an advocate for anti-semitism but i do understand when an anti-semite says the reason for all the world's problems is because of the jews why am i saying that oh happy because got our act together if we had our act together and kept the torah i guarantee world peace and the very fact that we are lacks so we need your help not to persecute us but to encourage us and help us do the misses okay that's why the world is in the situation it's in because of the jews and i mentioned this in my class a message to the world that jude the israel and rome are always going up or down there's no such thing as we're both on the same level either the jew goes up or the jew goes down and there's a result when the jew goes down rome goes up and rome goes down when the jew goes up but it's not because of anything to do with rome rome is a passive player it sounds crazy rome is only going to go up when we go down we're not going down because they're going up when we go down because we're not doing the will of hashem rome goes up it all has to do with what we do because we are the priestly nation that's what it means we have more responsibilities we have more uh these commandments and when we're commanded when you i i mentioned like when you're on the on the way out to bring the garbage you're going outside you're going to take a walk or go to the synagogue so you're going to take the garbage so your wife says not knowing you have the garbage in your hand hey don't forget the garbage all of a sudden there's this hesitation you know i want it to be my idea i wanted to you know so when you're commanded there's this natural inclination for hesitation and therefore that's why the jew and listen it's going to also make the difference between a ben noah who's accepted the mitzvahs wholeheartedly and that ben noah who doesn't know about them or doesn't care he's indifferent that's also going to mean you have a high level of responsibility and i know that recently some of my students took a an oath took a a public proclamation and i think that's great right these non-jews stood in front of a bastion and basically said we publicly declare that we're going to do everything we can to keep these missiles accept upon ourselves it's a higher level of responsibility and that's why even if well we're not going to go into today by making a public declaration brings more a higher level of reward because the the resistance is going to be greater okay so exactly rabbi what a beautiful lesson today i i i i'm gonna have to go back and re-listen to this even though i was taking some notes i probably took more notes today than i have in the last few lessons but this is some great stuff there's some great uh practical aspects to begin to walk and actually overcome that yes or hara and and and in the why the why behind it that just clicks in the mind and actually empowers and enables i love how you brought it out plainly that there's really not any challenge you can't overcome but you can't overcome any challenge without hachem and you know and if you just walk with hashem i think there's hope for the world and i think that's why he created the world and the jewish people it's just beautiful there's some balance there i think this lesson was a wonderful one today and uh kudos to you rabbi thank you so much everybody have a great week you have any questions or no there was plenty in there i just wanted to give a shout out we had uh my friend paul paul's mother uh 91 year old lady uh live in san antonio watching us i want to give a shout out to her thanks for joining us with us today i know that uh uh rabbi always appreciates it when someone new jumps in and joins so rabbi uh until next week are we okay for next week hashem willing for next uh same time next week yes all right well then till then folks we're gonna sign out and let the rabbi get some sleep because it's about one in the morning there in uh in israel almost two isn't it rabbi no it's actually twenty it's almost quarter to one a quarter to one so yeah i'm just looking at the time frame we'll let you get off to bad rabbi thank you so much for sharing with us the beauty of torah till next week folks have a wonderful wonderful week [Music] i