Rabbi Yitzchak Breitowitz: We Will Hear and Do! Can a Jew Fulfill All the Mitzvot?

[Music] okay everybody thank you thank you for coming and um our share tonight is dedicated aame for Nat Ben zel and for all of those whose Health has been affected by the war and uh for the safe and quick return of our brothers and sisters that are held in captivity alzer and an additional sponsorship from Reena and Mark costell in honor of R and for a speedy victory in Gaza and a safe return of all a speedy return of all our hostages so again all of us uh are thinking of the and the and is and and the like you know when I was in saneda today and there was a riot going on and initially I was very very scared I thought maybe an Arab thing but was just our being a little unruly so it wasn't a problem I mean it was a problem I mean a boy had tragically died of un unexplained causes and uh they were afraid that the uh government would do an autopsy so there was a concern but it it had nothing absolutely nothing to do with the the matv in in in Gaza but still uh we have to be Miss poo for our brothers and sisters uh special thanks as well to all of the volunteers especially those who have come from kit to help uh erel and the b erel in the difficult situation that we're going through uh people often describe that as empathy but I don't think it's empathy empathy is when you feel the suffering of another but I think it's not the suffering of another all of us are in the same Sor and by coming uh you're giving a lot of to th those of us who live here and to the and to the families and everyone else so all of us are very very deeply grateful to the fact that you are m in thear of is in this difficult time and as say those who are in thear of the will be to be m in the ga and the Yeshua and theim of the so may all of us be together to experience the Redemption of Hashem I think I had mentioned I'm not sure but it's fascinating theam cyer actually says something that may strike you as very bizarre in fact when I first saw it it struck me as a little bizarre but it's a very interesting point he said that if you look at these mil as a precursor to the coming of mashia you actually don't want the war to end before it's ready to achieve its accomplishment so theer says you don't directly pray May the war end because you might be Del Gul you pray that you know may we reach the mat where GAA is ready but you don't pray you don't you don't specifically focus on the end of the M because you might be truncating a process that is supposed to go on for a certain duration again very very fascinating an interesting interesting point okay uh so uh this par uh for those who like the portions of gor is a very very fascinating para this is the lawyer para this is the Tom's para the para of so many different laws uh and in fact it's been well said I think Ruda cooperman the founder of m a very great educator once said that Aid who knows with rash can no longer be called an yeah you've achieved like basic Jewish literacy in if you know and of course it's a foundation of two tractates in the T B and are all based onim in but I want to go back though and and just focus on one thing now last week we had the Ten Commandments um reason I always remember Ted remark I don't know appropo I don't I have no idea he just said you know they're called The Ten Commandments not the 10 suggestions I don't know for some reason that's always struck in my mind but anyway uh and the normal way we envision it is five on one side and five on the other side but you know that in the T well first of all two things first of all in the common picture of the Ten Commandments there are actually two mistakes number one the tablets are joined like one piece of stone when in fact these were two blocks number two they were squared or even cubed they were not rounded on top and the rounding of the acerro really comes from Christian imagery I don't know why they went in that direction and alems mosha raen was holding two cubes of stone uh which are separated that's one thing but the other thing is there's a huge number of M in terms of what was written on each Cube some say the typical five and five which once again is the common representation some say 10 and 10 some say 10 on all four surfaces so you have a cube right so on all four surfaces is 10 and all four surfaces is 10 and some say six surfaces top and bottom as well and some even say um up you know uh upside down meaning 10 going from this side to that and then 10 coming up on each side right on each uh configuration so there are many many different ways of looking at it and uh these uh some pictures are actually cubes big cubes with the aeras libas and all of them but let's go for a minute just to keep it simple let's go with the standard configuration that it's five and five with the additional idea of the nce that you could read it from the front and from the back right that's a separate a separate inion so it's yua that the standard understanding of the five and the five is that the first five are between man and God and the second five are right that's the standard understanding now the truth of the matter is that works pretty well well but the the problem is going to be with the fifth commandment right the first commandment I am the Lord your God by the way what commandment is that so the rambam says that's the Commandment of amuna believe in God ramban by the way says he doesn't understand that how can there be a commandment to believe in God if I already believe in God I don't need a commandment if I don't believe in God who's commanding me to believe in him I mean it's like you tell an atheist believe in God and the atheist says why says because God says you got to believe in him right so the ramban actually argues that is not a Mitzvah it is a preliminary to a Mitzvah okay U I don't want to get into that either but just but but again the rambam counts it as the Mitzvah ofuna the second one is don't have other gods the third one is don't take God's name in vain the fourth one is shabas so far so good the fifth one is honor your parents so the question becomes if the first five are then why is in the First Column because K we would normally look at as an interpersonal Mitzvah so here too thefor explain that is a mo it is a road towards honoring God because I love and I cherish and I honor my parents because that at a minimum they gave me life they gave me much much more but at a minimum they gave me life so when I cherish the one that gives life I cherish God that is the ultimate source of life and therefore from K we come to kav now there's another aspect though in which becomes and this is really a message to parents more than a message to Children you know it's been well said that if there's a mitvah to honor my parents there would be a corollary that parents must strive to be honor rabal meaning I need to be a parent who is worthy of honor that's on me I have to be an honorable someone that is worthy of now the thing is a child's image of God is formed very much by the image they have of their parents how does a child view their mother and father because mother and father maybe especially father depending on the home has like ultimate power like I'm a little kid you know dad decides everything life and death so Dad is King dad is God in fact I remember I think parents remember this that there was a certain point in a child's life where like Dad is like the strongest guy in the world and the you know Superman and everything everything else kind of miss those days you know afterwards the kid learns reality but there is a point in which uh abim are actually all powerful so if a child perceives his parents as arbitrary capricious Moody inconsistent that is going to form their image of Hashem yeah Hashem is all powerful Hashem is super parent okay how do I view my parent if on the other hand I see in my parent love and compassion and fairness then I can extrapolate my image of God now I understand that one is going to say well gee is our image of God limited to what was formed when we were 5 years old don't we grow up don't we have a more mature understanding of Hashem in part but not totally the images we form as children are very very very very powerful images so is put in the colum because in many ways the way we perceive our parents is the way we perceive God and therefore it's an ultimate responsibility on a parent to try to live a Godly life so the child will have a vision of Hashem that's commensurate with God's love and God's rim and God's fairness and and and the like okay but be it as a m so let's go with the classical definition that the first five are and the second five so the mid Moshe Ben yose Tran who was a contemporary of roseo inat was the Ra ofat was the B ofat interestingly enough they had some very very very bitter M about going all the way back at one point threatened to put the so they had some very severe disagreements but both of them are great great gadolan and theit wrote In addition to his chos he wrote a work in Jewish philosophy which unfortunately is not learned that much today and it's never been translated it's called the Bim which goes through a many many philosophical problems in Jewish law or Jewish hashkafa and he makes an interesting observation he says if you go with the five and the five the first five have a lot more words than the second five right the second five were staccato don't kill don't steal don't commit adultery uh and uh and and and the like and but they still covered the engraving covered the same surface area so you have a problem if you have fewer words that cover the same surface area then by definition the Engravings on the second column or the second you know Cube must be much larger than the Engravings of the first Cube because the engraving of the first Cube you have to have more words within a certain area so when M raenu comes down from the mountain with the luas okay the first luos we never really saw they were smashed but let's say it's yum Kipper and mo is coming with the second luus and I see someone coming down from harini and I put on my glasses to try to see what is on those things which Commandments am I going to see first I'm going to see the B before I see the because the are larger in their engraving so theit says we see from here the Primacy the Torah puts on interpersonal relations again this is a real because when we think today of what is a Rel religious Jew uh we think ofin chabas kasas cus which of course are true we don't think necessarily in terms of how kind is the person how compassionate we think that's like know that's just general human decency and yet the Torah puts such an emphasis on the that in a sense it was even given greater prominence in the aser than the this is the idea of the um of theit in fact I remember when rarin lonstein was n great rash in thei world he was the sonin-law of fact his coming to ER Isel you know many years ago in the 1970s was very controversial because he had left he was he would have been the rash University and he went raal invited him to be his COA at gush and g at the time was a very small little thing so a lot of people thought RAR was crazy for for making that decision but he wanted to build his life in ER Israel and he did so with great distinction uh he was a brilliant man he had a PhD in Harvard from Harvard in English literature uh but you know he was totally totally totally UK in Torah that that was his thing uh but there were so many stories about his mid his derit uh the way uh you know if is yiva would be on a to he would pick up the garbage in the bus personally he would pick up the garbage Amazing Stories and to me this was very inspiring to see such a great who was so kind and considerate but I actually heard people critical of that they say I don't need to hear stories that he's a nice guy that's not what I want to hear I mean that's L it the beaver that's uh Ward Cleaver nice guy he says I want to hear what a genius he was you know and to me I was very very upset by that that that we so devalue that when we talk about gdolim who exhibit those qualities I don't want to hear that part I don't need to hear that part of the story it's not important well I'm sorry they're dead wrong it's very important which is why I AR also should give me a commission I always uh advertise that people should read the biography of R David Feinstein I got want to be Mar which will show you what Godless B really is in terms of mos in terms of in terms of kindness to me that's what makes a guttle a guttle in addition to all the other all the other qualities and this is what the mait is talking about now issue number two I want to discuss because again Mish is really part two of mat Tor that's my connection to the para and I will connect to the para directly shortly is let's talk about out the first line in P Moshe Kel T me Moshe received the whole Torah at Mount Si meaning what does that mean Moshe got the whole Torah at Mount Si the Torah does not say he got the Torah at Mount Si the Torah says Hashem communicated the Asser had zbros so first of all let me ask a very simple question the tah has narratives of many events that happened after Matan Torah the story of kak the story of the spies the story of Moser renu's farewell addresses 40 years uh later before his death that's in the Torah so Moshe brought that Torah down from sin that means what the people knew ahead of time they were like actors in a movie okay kak you're going to stand here and you know the ground is going to open I'm looking at the script what does it mean Moshe got the Torah at sin just basic shot so it's very very clear that the mishna does not mean he got a safer Torah at Hari in point of fact the safer Torah was written in the G how was the saer Torah written according to one opinion it was written in a peacee way meaning before mat Torah Hashem dictated to Moshe bra and Theos he wrote that and then after Matan Torah he wrote the Ten Commandments and then after the man he wrote The Man and other words God dictated it but God dictated it over a 40-year period which means we did not have a complete safer Torah until the day that Moshe died and indeed there's an opinion in the gamorra that even when mosha died we didn't have the last eight verses about his death yahoshua finished it another opinion says mosha wrote them ahead of time so according to one opinion the tah was written over a 40y year period according to the other opinion the Torah wasn't written at all until the end of moshe's life meaning as our first points out that actually means the oral law was earlier than the written law because there was no written Torah till moshe's death be it as it may we didn't have a safer Torah from Mount Si okay it's very clear just to think about this just simply logical so the question becomes so what does it mean Moshe got the Torah at sin so Torah does not mean safer Torah Torah means the 613 Commandments God gave Moshe all of the 613 Commandments during the 40 days he spent in harini now even that raises a question that is if I read thees I see that mitzvos are given at different times you know after this event Hashem says to Moshe tell B Israel this after this event tell Ben Israel this so what does it mean even in terms of mitzvos what does it mean Hashem gave Moshe the mitzvos at Hari when mitzvos are are given sequentially over a 40-year period it's very clear I just read the Torah mitzvos are released to B Israel at different times in response to different situations so the barbanel and Kish and later they explain again very logically we have to differentiate between when did Moshe hear the Mitzvah from God and when did God give him a green light to reveal the Mitzvah to am God gave Moshe the mitv in advance when Moshe spent 40 days God taught him the whole Torah and not the safer Torah Moshe didn't necessarily know about korak and the moram ahead of time but God gave Moshe the Commandments but Moshe needed a particular authorization from Hashem to reveal those Commandments and they were revealed and one has to understand why only after certain occasions certain stimuli so you have to examine the carefully what is the stimulus what is the green light for it and that is the meaning of the ubiquitous phrase Hashem El Moshe lore so in English we just say it's kind of meaningless and God said to Moses saying what is the saying butal explained leore is to recount it to other people meaning God said to Moshe lore now is the time to recount it see so Moshe t means Moshe got all the mitzvos at har but he revealed them to B Israel over the course of 40 years so if you would take a snapshot of how the Jewish people observed the Torah in year 20 in the desert there would be a lot of MIT they didn't do they didn't have to do them they weren't given them yet they didn't even know them yet Moshe knew them but he was not authorized as hasem said now is not the time based on this the K offers a very beautiful explanation again it doesn't fit every regarding the cases in the Torah where Moshe did not know the remember there are certain situations where Moshe didn't know the den he didn't know the den of people who are t on PES what do they do about makeup he had to ask God and God told him there's PES sheni to be able to bring a Corbin A month later he had to ask Hashem Moshe didn't know what the punishment is for desecrating chabas for the guy who was gathering the wood Moshe didn't know what the punishment was for the the person who blasphemed and cursed God and later at the 40th year Moshe didn't know the law of the daughters of what are the rights of daughters when there are no Sons do they have rights of inheritance these are four situations where Moshe did not know the den he had to ask Hashem and Hashem told him the now the question becomes if Moshe got the mitzvos at Mount Si Moshe got the Mitzvah then what is it that he doesn't know now there are midashim that actually say he forgot because he got angry punished him there are mid that indeed emphasize the idea of but the makes it a much more idea says M knows the but he doesn't know if he's permitted to utilize inside information meaning given the fact that he was not yet authorized to communicate hasem waited till the event happened he wasn't yet authorized for so Moshe Moshe is not ignorant but Moshe has to ask Hashem do I have your permission to reveal it and Hashem says yes this is the green light to reveal these so when we talk about shos as M tah it's not completely well well it's not completed M because because those lus were broken and we got the second lus onum ker that's one thing but even in terms of the luos themselves we got the Ten Commandments but most of the Mitzvah of the Torah we did not get and we got them Moshe got them over 40 days as a private Revelation but we got the Torah over 40 years it's important point to know we received the Tyra over 40 years and it's a worthwhile study to kind of analyze why are certain mitzvos revealed at certain times meaning there were actual times where B did not know these Mitzvah and they were revealed later and the narratives of the Torah for sure were not written down till they occurred because B is were not living through a script they didn't know there would be AEL and a of morim and a of kak even though all of that is after mat is is the middle of the or less than the middle of thees so you can't really say the whole Torah was given at that point so that's that's just a simple p in the mishna mosha Kel Torah M so what that means is and this is really underscores the mait's point even more that which Moshe is communicating to B Israel right after the Ten Commandments is very very special because it's not just what God told Moshe it's what Moshe is telling B is now meaning is before Moshe even went up to Mount Si meaning we hear the Ten Commandments and right after the Ten Commandments Hashem says to Moshe these are the mishpatim and only after the mishpatim is Moshe commanded to go up in ouri for 40 days and 40 nights so the Mish have a special Kash because they were given to us the very same day as Matan Tori now granted the Ten Commandments are still different because we heard them directly from God and that gets into another M I just want to just give you the knowledge you know you may know this I apologize what is unique about the besides the fact that they're Unos is of course this was direct communication from Hashem but the question is what did we hear there are three shos in the Ron what it is that we heard from God Rashi follows the position that is also the G's position in MOS that we did not hear all Ten Commandments from God we only heard the first two Commandments we heard and then we got scared this is recounted inim and we said to Moshe you be the intermediary theor makus tries to prove this point from the interesting gatria toru mosha Moshe gave us the Torah Torah be gatria 611 Moshe gave us 611 God gave us two that's ra the gar in makos and Rashi follows that GAR in maros other re learn theim and this is actually MRA we heard all 10 we heard all 10 and then we were scared so we didn't hear the MIM Fromm we heard the from the MIM we heard from Moshe but still they have a special place because it's before he was it's before he even went up on the mountain it was on the ground level the K I'm I'm sorry the r the r in the has a third view that's very interesting he says we didn't even hear the first two because the ter uses the phrase We heard a call we heard the voice of God the r theim says again many M say the opposite but this is what the ra says in theim that Isel were not on the Madre to be who could make out the words they didn't hear words but they heard the Divine voice that itself was a very high madrea and they heard nothing well they heard the voice but the content of The Commandments only Moser heard so then you'll ask me a and the ram asked the question so what do Kaz mean when they say we heard the first two Commandments according to the rambam we didn't hear that either so the rambam says we understood the first two Commandments intuitively by hearing the voice of God by hearing the voice we know there is God and there is no other so it's not that we heard the words the ram says we understood those words from the experience of the call the call Hashem so we have three sheas according to Rashi we actually heard the verbalizations of according to the Kari we heard all 10 and according to the raham we actually heard no verbalization we just had the sense of the voice of God that inspired us and and made us realize a no there is nothing besides God in the universe right so there are different opinions of what we heard uh but by the time we had the Mish mosha has to be the um the the intermediary so now you have to read theim in order meaning to say uh there's Matan Torah there is uh all the Mish the same day and then at the end of the part it tells us God then tells Moshe to go up to the mountain and Moshe is there for 40 days and 40 nights and of course that's going to segue into agel and everything else but there's one part in The Narrative that's a little problematical at the end of the par Moshe is told to build a m build an altar and bring coronos and sprinkled the blood half on the M this is before there's a mishkan and half on the people and Moser Renu read something that's called The Book of the bris the book of the Covenant and the Jewish people said the immortal words whatever Hashem says we will do and then we'll learn meaning we accept it even before we hear what it is if I just read The Narrative of thees it turns out actually that the famous words of nishma did not precede the Ten Commandments it comes after The Ten Commandments right how do I understand this so here too just in terms of reading thees right this is not uh a deep or complicated P just in terms of straight reading thees there's a big M Rashi and the ramban Rashi actually says amazingly enough that this is an example of the Torah does not always follow chronological sequence and the story of the m and the story of nishma actually occurred on the fifth of San the day before Matan Tor a it's written after of course if you really want to go in depth here you have to ask yourself well if the toret doesn't follow chronological order why doesn't it okay that's a good question but Rashi says it's not in order and the M of Rashi is a gor Mas shabas the gamor Mas shabas says the M the sprinkling of the blood the nishma all of this is before Matan t meaning before the ten commandments so that's kind of salvages our famous assumption that nasma is how the Jews accepted the Torah because even though it's written after Theos they said it before okay now according to Rashi what does it mean that Moshe read the safer habis what on Earth is the safer habis it's not the saer Torah there is no safer Torah so Rashi says very interestingly that the book of the Covenant means the Torah from bit till that point meaning a few chapters or a lot of chapters of the Torah Theos Plus that's called The Book of the Covenant now ran although ramban cannot deny the rule give that rule but ramban it's fair to say doesn't like it the ramban whenever the ramban can make things chronological he tries very hard to make things chronological sometimes it's unavoidable but the ramban do doesn't like so the ran learns exactly as the has it that the sequence was Ten Commandments building the altar sprinkling of the blood nishma after the Ten Commandments and the ran then says and what is saer the Mish in other words since this is after the Mish the safer abis is the Mish can't learn that way because according to Rashi the saer abis was read before there were the m you see in other words thereus about sais depends on the chronological Point see so this is an important M uh when did the built Etc when was the blood sprinkled when did they say now it's true that the ramban happens to be contradicting which is an interesting question but the in the simple meaning of the verse the ran tries to make things chronological so I am going to go now with Rashi because that's what say and we're going to assume that The Narrative of the and the is pre Matan Torah on the fifth based on this let me point out an interesting contradiction that is in par before The Ten Commandments it says the Jewish people said everybody answered this is in whatever hasem said we will do you almost feel like correcting the B noish no the B is right in it says in which according to Rashi and kazal is restating the events before Matan Tor we have the words nasma so why in does it say Nas and in it says because again according to Rashi and the gamorra they're both occurring at the same time so there's a wonderful from the mayor who says like this he starts off with a certain premise the gar says inos that we have 613 Mitzvah exactly how you count them many many arguments about that but we have 613 and we divide the 613 into 248 positive Commandments Thou shalt do and 365 Commandments Thou shalt not do and the gamarra correlates them to the human body the gamor says there are 248 bones and every time you do a positive commandment there is a certain spiritual vibrancy that goes into your bone now obviously this is a spiritual thing it's not referring to arthritis or whatever it would be but the bones get a from the mitv and there are 365 senu or ligaments or tendons in the body and when you violate a Lowa there's some impairment of that spiritual Essence and that's why we have 613 the 248 and the Sha the gim now if that's the case you immediately have a major problem because there has never been a Jew in history who is able to keep the Mitzvah obviously when there's no B mikdash there's a whole bunch of Mitzvah that we don't do but even when there's a b mikash some Mitzvah are only for men and not for women some mitzvas are for women and not for men some Mitzvah are for kohanim and some not for now if you wouldn't have correlated the Mitzvah to the body I would just say all right so whatever you do you do whatever you don't do you don't do but you got a problem here because every single Mitzvah is correlated to a bone or a senu so that means by definition if I don't do a Mitzvah I am impaired I am handicapped I am blemished I am damaged what where is the Divine Justice in Hashem cre creting a system where there's no possible way I can escape being tainted and bloodied and damaged spiritually meaning how is it for me how is it possible for me to keep the 613 Mitzvah how do I not be a in one way or the other so the maam say generally there are two answers to this question one is the path of talmud Torah because even the mitzvos I'm not able to do by learning about them my gets the light of that Mitzvah say it byos anyone who learns the carbonos is as if they brought the carbonos but it applies to everything I learn about leprosy I don't want to become a leper but I learn about SAR so whatever light that opens up right get is a I'll give you give giving a get is one of the 613 Mitzvah in the Torah mean if a person wants to get divorced that must mean there's a bone in my body whose spiritual life depends on the get the get bone I don't know where it is but there's a get bone so what am I supposed to do I go to my wife and say you know I love you dearly but I gotta you know I got to do this Mitzvah right that's absurd well I wouldn't be surprised if there are people who made such a but we would call that crazy so what do I do how do I get the get bone the answer is I learn M and by learning M the gates of T Torah give me the light of that Mitzvah that's why the people know the always wrote that were very very practical the laws of the right wanted people to have guidance about practical things but it's a little less known that the was the person after hundreds of years of neglect to bring the study of kudin corbano back to the tower World it wasn't brisk I mean bris he kind of took it over now but was the one who brought back the learning of and he wrote Kim and he republished at his own expense oldan Kim that had been out of print for hundreds of years and at some point somebody asked him like why are you you know wasting your time so to speak on a part of the Torah that's not no gay as if didn't do enough that was no Gaya and the said two answers answer one is if you believe in mashia thenos are very no we're going to have to get into it tomorrow if you if you're telling me you don't believe carbonos are pra have any practical relevance then you don't believe in the imminence of GAA that was answer number one answer number two is what we're saying now precisely because we can't do it there's an special importance to link to it because that's the way our Nish gets the light of that Mitzvah so that's answer number one how do I keep T the path of T there is answer number two how an individual can keep mitzvos and that is through AK unity in AAS is now you may ask me what's the connection is is a very nice thing but how is that connected to the 613 Mitzvah the answer is it all depends on how you define the you who is the U in the U or who is the me in the me when I put fillan on my left arm I don't visualize it my arm did a Mitzvah today my arm is part of me I did a Mitzvah today because the arm is part of me and you know the old question of identity the philosophers rais that every cell in your body uh if you compare yourself 10 years ago and today every cell is different so why are you the same person every single cell changed again this is actually a philosophical problem of the nature of identity it's almost as if I am a different person but I'm living with a brain transplant meaning I have memories of that other person but that's not me I'm different but that's not the way we view a person in common sense and we say that even if the constituent units change but it's part of the framework of a person with a unique identity a unique experience my identity does not change because the constituent particles atoms molecules cells undergo changes because they're I'm part of one entity now if that's true for me as an individual that can be extrapolated on a communal level if I Define myself as an appendage as a of Amel and amra is a transc transcendental entity with a past present and future then even if individuals come and go born and die the mitzvos of any one unit become the mitzvas of the whole so the Mitzvah of the men are the Mitzvah of the women the Mitzvah of the Coen are the Mitzvah of the is the Mitzvah that were done when there was a Bas of MIT are still my Mitzvah because I'm part of the unit in other words connectivity is both horizontal and vertical meaning to say it's horizontal in the sense that I connect to the Jews alive today and it's vertical going back I connect to the generations before and after me so withas isra it is possible for me to keep the 613 Commandments because even if I as an individual cannot do so but I as part of am Israel can do so because there will always be a segment in am Israel that can do something and if I am part of that segment those Mitzvah are my Mitzvah so these are the two M so says the me this explains the twoim inro and M listen to the inro it says and it says the word everybody answered in unison the to a time when CL Isel will be B will be will be then we can declare whatever Hashem says we will do I can't do it all you can't do it all he can't do it all she can't do it all but we as an AM can be M the because the actions of any one segment become the actions of all but in the word Y is eliminated say doesn't say y That's a Remis there will be a time and maybe that's most of our history where CLA Isel lives in polarization lives in mlo lives in fragmentation lives in separation at that point I can't say NASA because your Mitzvah are your Mitzvah and my Mitzvah are my mitzvah but I have no share in your Mitzvah you have no share in my Mitzvah because we're divided so how do we keep the T so we go to plan B nishma because one of the meanings of nishma is to learn and understand meaning we will do the by our learning so says the when there's a we do the Tyra when there's not a y we pursue the path of tal and this is the remes to these two answers in the the t is kind of I mean what did see what did actually say that that's a good question so what did they say maybe they said both you you know we don't know exactly but you have to understand that salvic makes this point in a totally totally different context uh the two accounts of the creation of man this is the famous essay the lonely man of Faith where he develops the Adam one and Adam 2 a majestic man and Redemptive man that God is describing two aspects of human creativity and but the question still becomes well which one happened the answer is the T is not interested in telling you what literally happened the t is interested in communicating certain lessons by giving you multiple perspectives so I think the same thing if you ask me did they say NASA is did they say NASA maybe we don't know but the Torah is telling us that cabal had to take those two particular forms soit it turns out that we have two Pathways two roads we have the road of AAS Isel and we have the road of Tom Torah Each of which can bring us to a fulfillment of Kala Tula at first glance you would think these are two opposite roads but in reality they are two roads that ultimately converge and become one everyone knows the famous M kazal at the end of that in we recite every day and outside of recite on chabas shom those who learn Torah increase peace in the world that the pathway of toorah should ultimately bring Shalom to the world meaning Obviously good ask me questions about the the empirical msas I I'll talk about that for a minute but kazal are telling me the study of Torah brings sh T brings it brings togetherness it brings and therefore what starts off as T Torah in a time of division can ultimately heal the divisions and bring people together so you may ask me well let's do a reality check I mean is that is that Lisa true is it true that the learning of Torah brings peace to the world so I'll tell you this you know one answer that you can always give is as bad as bad as it is it would be worse without the Torah so yeah we have plenty ofas but you know in net we gain Shalom because without the Torah it would be worse I mean those are kind of unprovable prepositions but that's an answer in fact I I again forgive me for digressing I I I often quote a fascinating comment from the Von nothing to do with our talk tonight but I'll mention it the vnon says in michelan now everyone knows the famous statement Tor is compared to water and there are a million reasons water purifies water is necessary for Life water goes from High Ground to low ground right a million reasons why to is compared to water the gr gives a fascinating reason he says you know water will cause growth on whatever you pour it on so you can pour it on wheat PL you know tomatoes you'll get wheat and tomatoes but you can also pour water on poisonous plants and water will make the poison ground so he says if a person has good meos they're kind caring Tyra will make them more kind and more caring that you know that's obvious but what's not obvious is the person has GAA and arrogance the t is water it'll make him more GAA more arrogant ter is like water so I sometimes say this in groups where maybe I shouldn't say it in fact i' become a little more caution cautious because I I once said it in Lakewood the guy in Lakewood got up and said oh there was impossible I me the only G said it not me impossible so I said well don't you see that sometimes people learn Torah and they're arrogance so he says there would have been worse without it it's impossible that the Torah makes it worse they would have been worse without it so they would have been whatever it is uh 100 measures of arrogance this got them down to 90 it's not the T makes them worse okay so some give the same answer for this always bring peace to the world but when Theus is so bad even the peace they bring they'll still beas but it'll be less mlus okay maybe and I don't want to as they say that's an untestable proposition but okay maybe that's the mius the other way of understanding it is it's really a muser that maybe there's something wrong in the way we're learning Torah in other words if we follow a certain path and we're not getting the result that kazal say comes from that path maybe we have to recheck maybe we're going in the wrong direction I mean say a leads to B I think I'm doing a and it doesn't lead to B well maybe I'm not really doing a right yeah again I mean it's not for me to give any mus just something to think about but the point is that through T ideally ideally we come to show and the truth of the matter is um at least on the micro level we do see this a lot meaning maybe we fight institutionally in this group and that group and that group and that group but you'll often often find on a onetoone situation the study of Torah does indeed build bridges of understanding bridges of connection bridges of sharing I mean I I Know Myself uh situations where Jews who were very very far from observants but they study Torah together with with religious Jews and that builds Bridges it doesn't mean they'll become from it doesn't always mean that certainly but they they feel a catcher they feel a friendship it goes both it goes in both both directions that the Orthodox person sees that the other person is good and decent they have a resp respect for them and the other way the non-religious Jew can see that a religious Jew is a good person as well and tah is a very ideal way of building that connection that it builds the connection of Shalom what is say about the Torah the ways of the Torah are ways of pleasantness and all of her byways bring peace so we got to I think have that goal in mind meaning meaning we do what we do but we have to think about the goals of why we're doing it and what what is the purpose of all of our endeavors and then we can adjust what we do in order to achieve the objectives that what we're doing is supposed to achieve so uh in these par of Matra may we be to pursue both the path of T and the path of is and in that way we will truly be able to be Mel hashem's Torah in its shus thanks [Music] l go