Rabbi Hertzberg: Hoshana Rabbah 2020 Marathon

it is a pleasure and a very very big honor to be part of this wonderful wonderful kazakh event and this is something that has grown so beautifully now giving curse a talk to all the people who are involved in it and uppermost of course that we are here and that we are able to work together and provide this kind of a service to to to the cloud this being hashanah i thought we would see whether we could understand a little bit about the ushpezen those that we invite and what i would like to propose is a question i have a terrific question we invite every night an extraordinarily honored guest we invite avraham avinu yitzugovino yaakov avinu moshe rabano we invite aaron a cohen can you imagine a lineup like that joseph atzadek and so let me ask you six months ago we sat well not this year so much but ordinarily six months back we would be sitting at a beautiful table with all sorts of people around the guests and all sorts of invited and family members silver we have the most beautiful dishes out we have wonderful food it's in a beautiful house it's air-conditioned it's warm whatever you need is there who do we invite well we mentioned at the very beginning of the haggadah what do we mention we say yes we don't mention it again in the entire haggadah we don't mention it again at any other time of the week not one word six months later it's sometimes cold it's sometimes raining some places it's even snowing there are bees there are mosquitoes i remember the sukkah that we had many years ago on the upper west side it was in an air shaft it's in the middle of a building it was dark it was not particularly nice it was made up of old doors it took curtains and whatever sheets whatever we could find and we hung them on the doors we took tables that were hammered together from nothing and benches with no backs and that's that's the kind of sukkah the canvas some sugars that are a little bit shaky so not shaky it has no roof and that's the kind of asuka that we're inviting these terrific guests there for why why don't we invite them on when everything is so beautiful and yet we don't to understand that a little bit i would like to take a look a little bit more at the progression of the progression it is a mason that's what we call this sidhu that we use as a maxson it is a cycle it keeps going around and around and around it represents many things because who built into that those three yemen tovin some wonderful wonderful ideas and things to keep in mind let me propose one of them there is a life cycle a child is born the child's parents take care of that child cannot do anything on its own when the child is a little older and can understand they feed the child out of bays they feed the child they beat shema maybe and little by little they build onto that and from that the child develops into a someone a a young person who can go to yeshiva wonderful rabies will teach them all sorts of things they teach them [Music] everything that that child needs to know that child gets in those in those few uh years that they are there in the yeshiva when they mature the next step is the shotgun knocks on the door it might be a shock from from the city from another city from another country who is the best of all he provides and the child then gets married and begins to cycle over again they have a child and that child cannot take care of itself they take care of it they heat it the olive days and so on and so forth and it keeps going around that is what the the first hag is the birth of a nation we were born we were in slavery we didn't we didn't have anything we could not do anything power was the worst possible ruler and all the mitzrayim joined in in this in in in treating us miserably cutter sparrow who took us out kind of shot him we took us out and he provided us with everything we had none we had the anania covered we had the the miriam we had the we matured ladders to mature in 50 days in 50 days all of a sudden we were ready for the the next step to receive the torah and when we were finished with that what happened sadly we didn't have air we brought the eggo because gave moshe the the ingredients the the the the uh the opportunity to plead on our behalf and andyom kippur we got the psychologist four days later four days later we were in that process of keeping the four days we were forgiven and that's why we celebrate pesach not on when it happened happened right after we celebrate after success we celebrate circus right after yom kippur because that's the time that we were forgiven we were brought into the sukkah as an as a as a method of being forgiven with many of the the that this is the if this is the badge that we go into the sugar that we will forgive so we now what do we do we set up a the next step which is a small house similar to the very big house a temporary dwelling that that emulates that's similar to the dearest kevin that the the permanent dwelling the question is where do we learn that where do we learn what to do in this little so is whatever you would do in the house you would do in this account it is supposed to be just like that which is the same way a child who gets married they look back they see how their parents built a a a a proper home how their grandparents they look back in the door that came before they built a beautiful beautiful home based on so this is that is the the next stage and of course what we do we begin to cycle over again next year we had pesach and then we actually worked and then we have survived we have big birth we have the the the maturing they're getting the torah learning what to do and then we have which we start again so we have here a progression of life there is another element to sukha the progression of pesach which is that represents a time where similar to those times in our history where everything was wonderful we wrote on top there was a time in spain 400 years in spain before the spanish inquisition before ferdinand and isabella in that period of time we were we lived in spain as the first first class citizens we had everything we wanted it was a wonderful time and there were other times the time of shalom and maybe our times right now we live in relative comfort maybe more than than almost any other time that is a pesach that is a way to live in a method of pesa we are like as the royalty would do it that was a wonderful time on the other hand there's another time and that is the time where we are chased around everything is not quite the way what we don't live where we would like to live we don't have what we would like to live we have to move out of our homes we have to go away and we've sadly had many many opportunities and many situations and opportunities for situations where that has occurred we had the inquisition that i mentioned before we had the crusades we had the the of course we had not that very long ago where people were thrown out of everything that they had and then and murdered in in in unprecedented ways was absolutely horrendous it was terrible that is represented by sukkah we leave our homes then we go into a temporary dwelling and we feel for a very very brief moment in a very small way what it is like to go through many many of these types of problems and these are two different elements of how we live each one has its problems each one has its dangers and what is in between in between is the one tool that we have from which we can live properly in the good times and make our way through the difficult times and that is schwartz that is the the torah the torah sits right in between life and the sukkot life it's right in between i will tell you a very very beautiful dubai from absence where charleston fall hirsch was one of the great great leaders he saved german jewelry from becoming entirely assimilated in the middle in mid-1800s still takes hold today it's still used by the german community and it's emulated in other areas too but it's it was a unbelievable uh effort and he was successful in doing that he says as follows what do we say when we take out the torah what are the problems that we have the problems are that the iran which is the schools and the communities they move they're constantly on the move because they're being chased from here and chased from that the small communities in europe were chased down i have at home a a a book that was printed in the 1500s and in the 1500s it is an edict by maximilian the emperor max million throwing the jews out of the austro-hungarian empire but did they move wrong not much they were thrown out of england there were many many years in which there were no jews in england this is the time where he's been so our alone is moving it's moving it's moving what are our problems the asset kurdish girl who you the girl who take care of our enemies get rid of our enemies but he didn't let's get rid of our enemies because that is our problem we are being physically attacked when we are resting and everything is wonderful we have everything that we need we have beautiful homes and beautiful shoes and fancy cars and everything that we could probably you can shop anywhere we can travel anywhere no one is stopping us what is the danger there there it's no longer a physical danger there it becomes a more spiritual danger we have the internet and we have the the the the sad texting in the middle of davening we have the attitudes we have the the arrogance of how we walk and how we talk and how we dress and take a look at what we say and what would be the attitudes that we have take a look at people as they look they seem to have no interest in the in this villa they're sitting laying back yawning it's there's and when it comes to foods we have everything we want but of course people need to to to go out anyway and find this and find that this would travel everywhere is there a minion there's no minion it doesn't make a difference after all i will do what i have to the danger is not a physical one it's a spiritual and of course you go a little further you have conservative jewelry you have a reformed jewry they are wonderful people they are our brothers but sadly they are brothers only in the fact that they're all jews but not in the way they keep the torah and if we keep the the mitzvot bring back the thousands and the millions of jews that are lost that are sadly lost that we don't have any more that is what being sheltered from here explains these and they are so very true one represents and the dangers of the passage situation the other one represents the sukkot that the problems that we have in sukkot so now we sit down having understood that what are we now going to do we're going to take that and take a look at how we can approach these problems the problems that we have on sukkot where we are we we sit and we we are concerned of all the things that are in each way that we are being attacked and the problems of pressure how we do that so i will tell you something that is a fascinating at the end of the tsuka kumar says is this there were 24 mishmas mishna that took care of the things in the dash there were 24 of them and it outlines each one gives the names and so on so this little history and so on it comes to one and that one has to and it explains that the mishwa builder and the rings in the dash there were 24 rings one for each mishma and this ring was able to swivel it had an opening they would put the head of the animal in the opening and swivel it back around and the animal was restrained it was easier to shed that animal this mishma bilga their ring was welded shut so that they could not use it if you went into the ulam on the right and the left of the olympia 2 there were two chambers one and they were charged with this was the the place where they kept the knives one side they had the dull knives the other side they had the knives that had already been sharpened each mishma had a window a little cubby where they could put their knives the mishma bilga it was cemented clothes they could not use it tomorrow says why did they have that sadly that problem says because at one time during the time of the freshman the ivanim came into the vitamin dash there was one young lady who was from this mishra builder her name was miriam buzz bilga and she went into the battami dash she banged down took off her sandal and banged down the mizbeh and said lucas lucas wolf wolf she said why are you taking the money off the jews without helping them but the problem was that she said something extremely nasty and she went into the veterinarian did something like this and because she did that the ring was welded the the cubby was cemented asks an obvious question he says because she did something wrong the whole ishmael has to suffer says yes why because a child does not say in the street but they do not hear in the house what we do in our house has an extraordinary impact on the children if we do not care about something the children will not care if we care about it then the children will care i might guarantee it but that is generally the way it works however obama once said something very very beautiful he says that if a person wants to his children to learn if a person says i want my children to learn then his children will want their children to learn the person says i want to learn i want to learn myself then his children will want to learn too you can always shift it but it's much better to bring you back home and do it yourself miriam spilga heard what she heard it in her house and she went out and she did what she did it was terrible do you want to know how to solve the problem take a look at the beginning of massachusetts says how do you build a sukkah well cannot be too high can't be more than 20 i'm not high cannot be too low can it be live it cannot be less than 10 for him it cannot be completely open has to have walls it doesn't have to have four walls it will have three walls can have two walls and a little bit and there are four walls too but it can have even a little less it cannot be solid you get out of a solid ceiling you cannot put in a roof but on the other hand you can add an open roof you have that a little bit a little bit there so that that is how you have to treat a child a child has to have an ego the ego should not be too high child should not get arrogant shout to child should not think they can do anything they want on the other hand you cannot compress and press down the child the child has to have the know that the child can accomplish that it can do something the child has to know many many things but not everything that everything is is either important and not everything is good for the hashkaf the child so the ceiling has to be open but not too open let a little bit of sunlight in let it be shade in but not everything the child has to have friends who are those friends what do they do how do they act child has to have walls around sometimes the child has to know there's a limit to where you can go and limit to whom we can get involved with that is the sukkah that is what the sukkah teaches us and therefore if you do that what happens down the line of course what's going to happen is that you will not have the miriam bastoga now let's get to the ashbison why are they so let us take a look at who we are inviting we are inviting all the most exalted and the greatest individuals but let us take a look a little bit of the history of avinu he was the great abramovino he brought the the the understanding of huawei who was to the world right however he had a very tough life he left his home he had to travel for a long time he didn't have what to do the the wherewithal he had to borrow later on he paid it back he was 100 years old he had one child not the finest child one could imagine that you smiled and when he did finally have a child at 100 years old tested him he says i want that child back i want you to give me that child back and have marina said yes of course can you imagine the difficulty in doing that and nevertheless whatever dina do he rose above all that and he his father took him he was ready to shaft him and when he did when he came back from that he became an old out to me now he could not go wherever he wanted he couldn't go on a vacation to cancun and he could not go on a vacation to india he had to stay in that room he had to stay exactly where he was he had to live a life of pure taharah and he rose to the to the level where he was able to produce two children one sadly was asa much potential but did not work quite the way it should have and jacob produced jacob jacob terrible problems he had to run away from israel then he had to deal with love then he had to run away from love then when he finally got back he had the the story of dina and then after the story of dinah he had the story of yosemite because he wanted to sit and rest comfortably came upon him and he lost jose for all those many years and when he finally got him joseph back he got his son back what happened he had to dislocate move away from this holy arabic road and move into terrible the depraved metria the worst place in the world what about joseph he was sold with the slavery he was a jail then he had trouble and even after he became a viceroy everything became a great man that towards the end of his life pyro forgot about him did not drink him properly throughout his life he had these issues that he had to and yet you know he's the only one in the shrub was called the topic he was able to rise in a place of pure depravity everything there was momentum to be to to to to to to make to forget that there is and yet look what he did he rose to a very very high level and then you have mushrooms was born he put into a basket and put on an aisle who knew what was going to happen to him right who made it that way that he would then become the stepson so to speak of the of paro what happened then he was chased out of the time he had to run to israel yesterday put him in jail for a little while and then he got married he came back he says all right he's going to come back and he's going to what happened coachbook says no no i'm sorry got a lot of work ahead of you he's 80 years old and he suddenly becomes the ruler of many many people with all venezuela that the ego and the and the manga and all the different problems they say you know he had these problems let's go to the next step iron coin lived a life in which he was very constrained in what he could do all he could do was sit in beta sit in the mishkan and that was it he was not allowed to go anything they're not allowed to do many things even if people passed away your two sons had passed away he couldn't do anything he couldn't could couldn't uh didn't want him to really to to to to make any changes in his either he had to be silent any sound can you imagine being silent at a time like that when we have next we have the yosemite right so it's how did we mention of the problems that he had and then finally we have let us take a look at doubling he had a very tough life very very tough life he got married his father-in-law wanted to kill him wanted to kill him so he ran when he got friendly everything settled down sean now sadly was killed so he became the member he became the miller he had two sons who wanted the maluha instead of him and they gave him a very hard time they fully fought wars and he fought wars and throughout his entire life he had a very very difficult life and yet think of what he was able to accomplish think of what aaron cohen was able to accomplish he exemplifies obviously strong he exemplifies the love of another jew what a wonderful thing that is what the harakoin did yesterday he was the one who accumulated all the material for the base amigdas this was his great aspiration to be able to build or to be able to be part in building a base in english he couldn't do it but yet he collected everything everything that was needed and when he collected that he gave him covers and ultimately that is called in his name and even further than that is the harbinger is the baby the the forbearer of what of so we see that when things are very very very difficult we invite each day in the sukkah the things represent the difficult times our difficult times now can you imagine six months to eight months ago we were able to travel where we wanted the shoes were packed beautiful shoes marshalls we were able to do anything that we wanted we had the family around us we could have family meetings we had 20 people 30 people at a table it was absolutely magnificent and all of a sudden it's all gone we cannot do this we cannot do that now in some neighborhoods it's back down to ten people and there's arguments in the disputes and these are terrible times what we must do is we invite the irishman bring them into the sukkah discuss it with talk to each one see what it is that each one offers to an understanding of how to deal with situations like that and we will find that they have the answers they do have the answers they are the very very best of what we can possibly understand they provided us with everything that we need to be able to go through and to be able to deal with these things and deal with them in a proper and in in a in a in a proper way that is what we see in the in the uh the reason as they they they come here let me end with one observation everything that's happening right now is happening for a reason coach brock does nothing without an absolute perfect reason we have to understand why kaddish girl who is taking from us they're right in front of us no one is burning them down no one is destroying them and yet we cannot go into our shoes the way we'd like no one has done anything to harm our families hopefully they are healthy and those are sadly there are some that are not which is very sad but for the most part everybody is healthy and they make sure they take care of themselves they wear a mask they're doing their social distancing all those various things and yet we cannot we're looking at the things that we would like to do we see our family in the front lawn the children come to visit the grandparents again parents can't hug them they see the right in front of us what is our punishment who tried to tell us so let me give you one example of where we can do a little bit of introspection a little bit looking into what's happening and maybe that will serve to show what the the the rest of the of the opportunities are let me tell you the following a young man came to his father and he says daddy i'd like to borrow the car how about can i borrow the car father says child is 70 years old he has his license everything is fine he says sure no problem give you the call and he except he says you know as a parent he says but remember don't text while you drive don't drive too fast i don't want any of your friends smoking in the car keep the car clean make sure that there's oil in the car make sure that there's all the different things take care of the car do it properly son says for sure no problem the next morning the father takes a look goes in gets into his car to go to work the car is filthy there's a smokes you can smell the smoke in the car turns on the dash cam everybody has a dash cam turn on the dash cam and he sees the sun was speeding and he was he was going places where he shouldn't go and he was the conversations were not proper and and he was texting everything he don't know how to do he did he calls his son in he says you're not getting the car i don't know maybe forever but you're not getting the car for a very long time well time goes by a few months weeks whatever it is and the son comes to him and says about you know all right i understand you know i'm taking the bus i'm walking do me a favor can i have the car father says you know something i'll give you a second chance give me a second chance gives him the card but he says remember the rules let's go extinguish all the rules next morning he gets back can you imagine what would go through the mind of the father if he finds the car exactly the way he found it the last time that schmutzy and smokey and everything what would he say we have beautiful shoes we have gorgeous shoes we have some rules they're very simple rules don't do certain things in the show don't talk about in detail in don't don't go in and and talk certainly not improper jokes and and also don't talk business in the middle of davening don't talk in the middle of dublin not a difficult thing it's not a very difficult thing there are many instances where we cannot talk we go to all sorts of things shows this and that we can't do it for two hours what's the problem don't talk right texting don't text doing that happening that's supposed to don't text when you are diving don't text at all right turn the phone off put it away right going to show with some enthusiasm not just you know going with some enthusiasm says look i will tell you what let me see what happens if you do not have the show for three months you can't go to show at all and then the shows are outdoors and indoors and the rain with the pens without a pen tool and all sorts of things there's only 10 people in them 12 people 15 people plastic plastic in between who knows what you have to do coachbook says i'm giving it back to you remember the rules just please remember the rules rubble ty go back into sure take a look at how people are acting the worst part is the children learn from that they learn every single thing that the parent does the child does everything and we have another opportunity a second opportunity what are we doing i'm asking that to go out and take a look see what you are doing the opportunities are there your spiesen show us what to do that we can transfer the information all this wonderful wonderful torah we can transfer it to the next generation and the generation after that but we have to do it properly that is the message that is the message i will tell you one last thing he is extraordinary russia yeshiva in philadelphia he has asked who's asked what do we take out of all this what should we do and he said one simple thing he said you want to transfer to the next generation good take any little two minutes one minute and give it to someone else teach it to someone else it takes two minutes make a call to a friend and say i heard a beautiful developer it will inspire the friend each time you have an opportunity take a minute of what you learned here or any of the other wonderful shirin and simply transfer it to the next generation if you do that then all the ashism will take their place in your sukkah and they will smile and they will say you are doing what we have shown you what to do and we will progress through the abraham of inaudible me