Is God Speaking to Me?

Hello there. I'm Tanya [music] Kazano and you are listening to Human and Holy. Today we're going to be talking about God's existence in this world. Not just as being [music] a separate existence outside of me, but as being something that is talking to me. [snorts] What differentiates between [music] an acknowledgement of God's existence in this world, God's creation of this world, God's recreation of this world, [music] and this belief that every moment of creation is an act of communication between [music] God and me. that God is always talking to me and am I listening? Today we're going to be exploring a Swasm on this [music] week's para paras. The Swasm was a renowned kidic leader and the second rebasidic [music] dynasty. The Svas MS which is what he is most referred to as is the title of his safer his book. His name is Rabbudalip Alter. He [music] lived from 1847 to 1905 and he built G into the largestic group in Poland. In this week's para paraso, we talk about the last couple of plagues that got the Jews freed from Egypt. The Swasm begins this Torah teaching with a question that was originally posed by his grandfather, the first Grebba of why the 10 plagues were necessary in the Jews freedom from Egypt. Why the 10 plagues? And he quotes his grandfather directly, the khadushe harim, saying that the reason for the 10 plagues were in order to remove the shell and hiddenness of the 10 utterances of creation and convert them into the ten commandments. the hester mares laeres to transform the 10 utterances of creation maros the 10 utterances that God recreates the world with at every single moment into the aseras dipos the ten commandments the instructions on how to live our lives we're going to be looking more deeply about the difference between maamaros utterances and sayings and dbos which also means speech what was the real shift that was happening when we moved from god God creating the world in the background with these utterances to God giving us these commands these asseras these ten commandments that he did when he gave us the Torah. Now each utterance that is creating this world is expressing a part of God in this world but it is also concealing a lot. First of all the fact that we cannot access these asaraamaros on our own. It's something that we are cognizant of, but only righteous people who are really attuned to the hidden matters of creation are able to genuinely experience them. But for the rest of us, this experience of the divine recreating the world at every single moment is something that we can recognize without actually experiencing. So there's a dimension of hiddenness to God's saying the world into existence. This explains that every plague removed the hiddenness of creation of God's presence in creation and every plague correlated with one of the 10 utterances and transformed each utterance into a command. What is the shift from utterance to command or really let's look at the Hebrew words. What is the shift from assaraos to asserbibros? What is the shift from this root of alfme of saying to this root of dalled v also speech? The word leer does not only mean to speak. The word leer also means to lead. God moved from recreating the world at every single moment without revealing his presence to us to speaking the world into existence with leadership with direction telling us where to take the creation of this world. The zor explains the words in the paragraph of shama. We begin with Israel which affirms God's oneness and unity in this world and we continue throughout about loving God with all of our heart and soul and to use our mouths to speak and experience the words of Torah. This means that the recognition of an awareness of God is not seen as just a fact of the universe but is seen as a directive with which to live our lives. Is seen as an awareness that shifts the way we experience the world. The cognizance of God being one allows me to wrap everything in that understanding. Doing everything towards the awareness of God is not about doing more separate disjointed good things. It's about seeing everything in our lives as being wrapped up in this umbrella and sphere of oneness. This means that everything in my life is related to my godly spiritual role. This means that nothing about who I am. Nothing about my circumstances is by mistake. Every single piece of my existence is related to God's oneness and is related to the direction that my life is going to take. So if I trust that God is one, if I trust that God is recreating the world at every moment, if I trust that everything derives from this unity within Hashem, then that translates into living a life where I see the interconnectedness of every part of who I am, of every part of my circumstances and life and recognize that that oneness exists in my reality. And that means that Hashem is not just talking the world into existence and every part of my life into existence, but it through every part of my life, Hashem is talking to me. These are not just sayings in the backgrounds. These are sayings being directed directly towards me and my mission in this world. God is speaking to me at every single moment. The shift from the ten utterances to the ten commandments is God speaking the world into existence without us being able to experience it as God is talking to me to God leading us through every inch of our existence. Every sphere of creation that we are surrounded with the place I live the people I'm around the parts of my character the things I have. Every single one of those things God is recreating at every single moment. And that truth, that reality of God recreating that at every single moment is not just a random fact about the divine, but it is actually the divine directly speaking to me. The Sarah said dibbros are commandments. So every creation in my life is a commandment is a directive is God speaking directly to me. Words are a communication of rutzone of will. God's speech in this world is a communication of God's innermost will to us. So every single creation that I am surrounded with person place thing is God expressing his will to me. Is God leading me? Is God showing me where I need to go? This is the shift that happened through the 10 plagues. And this is the shift that each of us begins to make in our own lives when we recognize that if God is speaking the world into existence, God is speaking to me through existence. And every single moment is an opportunity to listen in to God's energy and to ask what is being asked of me. Where am I being led? What am I being called to? What am I being commanded in this moment? The Zohora says that Dbor was in exile when the Jewish people were in Egypt. And this is why Moshe said, "I am not a man of speech." Because speech of God, this direct commanded to you speech was only activated through the plagues which led through to the giving of the Torah. The plagues allowed us to access the Aseras had. And when God gives us the Torah, it says at the giving of the Torah elim and God spoke. And when Moshe receives the Torah, he says, these are the words. What was activated was a redemption of debour, of speech, of speech that leads us, of speech that is present with us, of speech that allows us to experience the oneness of God in every detail of our circumstances and creation. But God cannot do this speaking to us on his own. The reality is is that when we respond to God's speech by going in the direction that God is calling us to, the Sarasa dibbros are the foundation of the entire Torah, which teaches us how to live our lives. This attunes us to God's speech and brings it to life. God's presence is concealed in this world by beings that feel that they have created themselves. Parro said, "It is my river and I created it." Kaduca holiness says God created it and God is guiding me somewhere with this. Not only have I not created it, but I'm also following a direction and a guidance through this creation of God. Faith is about taking a mirror, taking God's speech, taking the 10 utterances of creation and recognizing it as zebore, recognizing it as a deep expression of God's will in our lives. My friend sent me an excerpt from the book letters to a bitist Jew by Akiva Tat and David Gotautle which speaks directly to this point to why we sometimes choose to perceive the creation of the world as being separate other not a direct speech to us. What is it that we are avoiding? Paru saying I've created the river myself is fracturing the creation of the river from the source within God. When we recognize everything as being one with God, then we also see everything in our lives as being that directive. As soon as we begin moving away from seeing the oneness in all of creation and the way that God, we also move away from seeing God as speaking to us. Let me read you this excerpt from the book Letters to a Buddhist Jew. The real difference between worship of the source and worship of intermediaries is this. One who serves the source is concerned about what his obligations are. What does he demand of me? How do I give myself to him? One who serves the intermediaries is concerned about what they can do for him. The intermediaries are after all the approximate source of all human needs. all natural functions of the world. The idoltor looks to the immediate source of power, love, wealth, and asks, "How can they serve me?" He does not need to look further. One of my revered teachers used to say that idolatry is like the behavior of an individual who enters a department store and wants an object which is too expensive for his liking. He offers the clerk behind the counter a bribe, so that he should hand him the object. He is prepared to pay the price of the bribe, but not the full price of the object. He relates to the departmental clerk, but does not concern himself with the owner of the store. The owner does not deliver the goods. The clerk does. So to an idoltor, he's prepared to pay some price for his needs, but not the full price. The full price that constitutes genuine service is all that you have, all that you are. And that is too much for him. He seeks to pay off the source that delivers the goods. That is his sole concern. But the owner of the whole enterprise is not his concern at all. Where can I get the goods? The one who stands behind the creation is irrelevant when you only seek the goods. Those words, the full price that constitutes genuine service is all that you have, all that you are. There is something encompassing about a connection to the source. God through his Torah, through the mitzvos, asks for all that you have and all that you are. This is what it means to truly see all of creation as a direct command from God, as a direct guidance and direction of where we need to go. It's not only through Torah and mitzvos. It is also through the gray areas of what it means to be a Jew living in connection to the source, how we treat others, what path of life we take, how we see ourselves in a position of mission for the rest of the world. This is what it means to move from the Ten utterances to the Ten Commandments. The exile, the exiling of speech was an exiling of God's guidance through words and the reclaiming of God's speech happened through the Torah, where we can experience the creation of the world as the Ten Commandments, where we can experience the creation of the world as God's guidance and direction on how to live our lives. Thank [snorts] you so much for listening. May we all be able to leave exile and to experience the shift to experience how God is not just talking the world into existence, but God is truly talking to me at every single moment in incredibly detailed ways in every one of God's words is an invitation to me to step into my own mission, my own path, and my own direction that will express the oneness of God's [music] presence in my life. Thank you so much for listening. Hope you enjoyed today's episode. And if you did, don't forget to leave us a fivestar rating or review. It's [music] a small lift from you, but it really supports Human and Holy and helps other people find the podcast. New episodes come out every Sunday and Wednesday morning. We love hearing from you, so email us at [email protected]. [music] You can find us on Instagram at human andholy. 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