Rewarding Relationships - Rabbi Eli Mansour

It's a uh distinct privilege to be here tonight in Queens and the vet uh for a special lecture that's being hosted by our good friends at Amuin. This organization has taken upon themselves a very difficult uh task in dealing with a very sensitive topic that most people probably would not want to get their hands dirty with. But the good people at Amuim identified a problem in the community which needs experts and a lot of a lot of knowhow how to navigate and they rolled up their sleeves and they're really making a difference. Their reputation precedes them. So I was asked not as a professional but as a rabbi uh to talk about what I guess is on a more broad uh spectrum uh the relationship of Benadam because that's where all these things we talk about relationships it's man to his fellow. So I'd like to begin with the first four words of which you probably heard Moshe to me and that's it. Moshe received the Torah from Sinai. Now talk about a very unimpressive way of starting a a book. I mean who doesn't know that? We learned that in first grade. should have been and received the Torah from Is anybody going to fall off their chair when they hear that? When you when you open up a book, you try to open up with a punch to catch the listener. When you're making a speech, a rabbi is never supposed to say the puk says. Everybody falls asleep. Another guy with a puk. And over here, the starts and the reader says, it's obvious. There was a great rabbi called Rabbi Bartinur. So he explains why the Mishna opens up with Moshe Kel and he says is a selection of Mishnayot. What are Mishnayot? Mishnah is synonymous with the word. Anytime you hear the word Mishna, Mishna means and all Mishnot talk about. So if you want to learn don't start with that's the last book the first stop is and if you want to learn the laws of marriage and if you want to learn the laws of the holiday Mishna and we all agree and it's obvious is where does haka come from? Haka comes from Moshe, from Sai, from God. You can't go to Barnes and Nobles and find a professor that's going to write a book on because it's not his domain. Is the domain of the divine. However, the do not have any in them. It's a book of ethics. It's a book of conduct. or as we would say in Hebrew, it teaches you how to behave between you and your fellow. It'll tell you be patient, don't get angry, give the benefit of the doubt, be hospitable. It'll tell you, be a good friend, be a good neighbor, don't go after jealousy, curb your temptations, don't seek a claim. These are all in the realm of personality traits as we call it in the yeshiva midot. And if you go to Barnes and Nobles, there's a whole section of books that are written on ethics and morality and decency. As a matter of fact, there's a big encyclopedia, the book of etiquette, written by Emily Post, and she'll tell you the right thing to do, at least according to her opinion, in every situation of life. Today there are ethicists in the hospitals that make decisions between right and wrong how to deal with their fellow with the patients ethical boards. Lest anybody thinks says Rabbiuda that these ethics of are man-made like those books lest you make that mistake and think that these were ideas that the rabbis themselves professed they were their own ideas their own inventions says the that just like the of Shabbat and the of Yumipur and theot of Kadushin And the law is divine. Ethics are also from Sai Moshe. Even this part of Torah comes from Sai. When God gave the Torah, there was two parts. There was a legislative part. And then there was another part of the Torah that's just as important and that's to teach the person how to conduct himself and how to behave is not just a bunch of suggestions or good ideas is just as much of Torah as the rest. It is no less than and The Torah demands of us not only to be a Jew but to be decent as well. and decency was given at Sinai and that's why it's a when you read it even this yes and I think it's neglected because when we talk about matan tora which obviously we're creeping up to the day few weeks she So if I would ask you where in the Torah do we study matan? You'll say you're right. That's where we read about the dramatic events. But there's a there's a postcript to matan that's written in that part of matan people skip over it because it's a little technical and they really don't understand what's taking place. But over there there's a great message. They're in front of the mountain. Moshe builds a misbehanote. A ganot are flasks or jugs. And he catches the blood. And the puk says, "How much blood did he put in the half the blood? May I ask you a question? What does half the blood mean?" I'll tell you the way I understood it before I came here tonight. Half the blood means I mean about half. I mean Mosher doesn't have an apparatus to measure exactly half the blood. The point is it's close enough. If you look at it you say it's about half. That's why I understood until I read the rashi. Now she comes along and says he took half the blood and then she asks the question who divided it I mean she's question basically is who is capable of dividing it to make sure that it's 50.00 O as great as Moshe is, he's a prophet, but he's not an expert in dividing blood in one shot to make it exactly half because when the Torah says, it means so who helped him? So that she says a tremendous God sent out an angel from heaven in order to assist Moshe in this great divide. Wow. I mean, we talk about angels doing great things that they're definitely qualified for, like destroying Saddam, like healing Abraham, but to send an angel to involve himself in weights and measures, it seems that is he's overqualified. Why would God need such a miracle? What's the lesson of the blood in the Agon? That's 50%. Well, let's see what he did with the blood. It says he took the blood in one agon and he sprinkled it on the misbay. A sprinkling ceremony and then he took the other half of the blood and he sprinkled it on the people. A strange ceremony indeed. What is the lesson? Why would the Torah tell us such a ceremony prematan Torah? This happened the day before we received the Torah. There was a great rabbi called Rabbi Hutna and he explains if we were to ask somebody what makes a person religious a religious Jew. So the first question we would say Shabbat, he ask how many minutes after sunset does he wait? 72 minutes. There you go. That sounds religious to me. And and sometimes he even waits 90 minutes. Okay. No more to be asked. Somebody waits 90 minutes for Shabbat. All the stars are out by then. He's religious. Some people will say what's his level? He keeps all year long. Even after he keeps okay goes without saying very very carefully. He hasn't eaten a strawberry in 30 years. And this is a I'm not saying it's not a barometer to judge religious behavior. It definitely is a barometer. I mean, how do how should we judge religion? Shabbat. And then the next one would be yes, they order they're careful in the laws. And then if you'd ask uh the person who about 90 minutes that only eats and is very careful they said but what type of person is he or she? Well she's a little conceited. She has arrogance and he's a miser and uh he has a little anger streak in him. Okay. But that has nothing to do with religion. That's just personality. But bottom line for the shatan check the box religion and he has some personality traits which who cares anyway? That's not the way we measure says hutnut. That's your mistake. And that's why made an experiment that had to go exactly and precisely perfect. 50% blood in one and 50 in the other. And what is teaching the people? 50% of this law is sprinkled on the misbay. That's the laws between man and God. And the other 50% of this law is sprinkled on the people because the other 50% is manto man. It's a divide right down the middle. Which is more important? They're equal. And you can't be religious if you're not a Shabbat. And you can't be called religious if you're not a mench and you're not a person and you don't have good personality and you don't have midot because the same God at Sinai that gave us the laws of kashut is the same law the same si that gave us the laws of and there isn't a tilt when God gives us toot it's written in but the word is missing above And if it can be read, which sounds like one stone, well, it was two stones, but it's written as one. And she says, why? To teach me that both sides were equal like one stone. Now, I don't think it only means in size, but it means in in importance, in priority. The right side of the luhot were the laws between man and God and the left side were the laws between man and his fellow. And the puk says it was one law. They are shave. And nobody should think well the right sides a little heavier. The ceremonies and the rituals that's the important part of religion. And the other stuff whipped cream. It's so nice. It's extra. It's a huml. It's nice. We don't say no but it's not critical wrong. You cannot call yourself a religious Jew if you do not have the midot and the and the mutual respect that demands of us. So we have now the time between I mean, I'm going to tell you now, you've heard, but I don't think you've asked the the most important question. You've heard about the students of Akiva. He had a big yeshiva, 24,000 students, very reputable. And we all know that they perished in a short amount of time. They died a very, very painful death, esphyxiation, can't breathe. And we all know why they died. We learned it in first grade again, whatever that means. There was a lack of respect. They were great learners. But when it came to mutual respect for each other, there was a deficiency. Far be it for me to judge the students of the greatest respect. But the gam says it. So we cannot whitewash away their their their deficiency. The gam says whatever it means. They didn't tell each other good morning. Maybe they were a little rude. However you want to learn, I'll leave that to your imagination. My question is where do we see in the Torah that if you don't have good people skills, why is that punishable by death? I think we overlook this. We assume, oh yeah, they didn't respect each other, so they died. Where do we see is punishable by death? Yes, Shabbat. But guess what? Not so easy to get a death penalty in our Torah. The says in in in Makot that if they killed one person in 70 years, it's a lot because there's a lot of technicalities how to kill a person. And all of a sudden over here, Yeah. Boom. 24,000. Where do we see in Torah that gets a death penalty? It's like somebody double parking his car. They catch him. I give him the electric chair. Electric chair. Give him a ticket. What's the explanation? I'd like to say a big kadoo and I say it with with all the respect and with some fear and trepidation as well because it's a big hadouch. Did you ever hear of a concept that's called? What is means that it's a big mitzvah to observe to maybe like we would say to intern by to have an apprenticeship with to watch them to study them. It's called shimush. How important is the G actually says is even more important than learning. Now don't believe that for a second. Nothing is more important than learning. Period. But how could the gam say that there's something even more important than learning observing that's more important than learning the says that when you observe that's a form of learning that's a form of so he says inm's two ways you could learn from a book and then from watching from looking and the more effective of the two ways of learning Torah is shim. I'll give you an example. A personal example that happened to me. I was in yeshiva in Israel 1986 Jerusalem. If you remember those days, they didn't have cell phones. We had a pay phone in the yeshiva and my parents would call once a week. The phone call only lasted a minute and then we try to reverse the charges. And it wasn't a um what should I say? It wasn't a a a call where we just chatter. It was are you still alive? What's your vitals? What's your blood pressure? What's your pulse? And that's it. I'll talk to you next week at the same time. But it was always an exciting moment those few minutes that we're able to talk to our parents overseas. Today the kids go with the phone that FaceTime they're talking to their parents 10 times a day. Anyway, my time my parents would call was usually on Sunday nights about 10:00 and you know that that's your spot at the payful. Anyway, we were praying that night in the yeshiva and they were a little late and now they say and all was a guy comes upstairs and says your parent your mother on the phone America that's like mashiach. So by knee reaction is to run and then I wait after say kadesh. So I waited for the kadesh but my one foot's out and I'm listening to the kadesh and then they say and then I run and I speak to my parents and send more money and whatever it is and that's it. Right after I finish the phone call one of the older bahim comes to me and says Mansour the rashiva wants to talk to you. I'm thinking what what did I do? What aon did I do? I'm going to all the that I've done and potentially figuring out an answer. First of all, deny everything. No matter what he says, it wasn't me. I'm thinking, what am I going to answer? I don't even know what I did. I come into Rajashiva's office, which is very odd. At 10:30 at night to call the boy into his office, and he looks at me, and I wasn't even looking at him because I was so embarrassed. He says, "Manssour, what do you know about that I don't know?" I lifted my eyes up. I said, "I don't know anything about." And he said, "You must know something. I was watching you. You got a call from the states. Most kids would just run downstairs, but you waited to answer. Tell me the secret that you know. I don't let you leave until you explain to me what you know about that forced you to remain even when the call from America was pulling you and attracting you. So I looked at the rashiva and I said I'm sorry to disappoint you. I never read anything about I cannot tell you any facts about it. I don't know its spiritual level or components, but I could tell you one thing. When I was in eighth grade, we had a minyan in the school and there was a big rabbi was the shalom, my rabbi. He was in charge of the vignyan. We were 13 years old and it was at the end of the prayers and me and my friends were talking and I guess there was a kadesh that took place. I don't remember it. And I guess there was a but I was talking right through it. Shalom. Turned to the dean. His name is Rabbi Green. And he says to him, "Not talking to me. Mansour just lost a million dollars." And Rabbi Greenus answers at least a million dollars. And they walk away. I said, "What? What are they talking about? What are they talking about? Million dollar? More than a million dollars?" And then the rabbi comes to me and says, "Must be what you were talking to your friend is worth more than a million dollars because you gave up a bar that's worth a million dollars." So must be that conversation had great value. On that day, I learned the value of the bar. Not from a book, but from the reaction of my rabbi. We learn a lot from shimush. And from that day, I can never miss a bar. I still see my reb's face. Every time they say million dollars and no matter what happens, I have to answer it. It's not because I learned it. I saw it. I have an advantage that's called I was once in Morocco and I saw the daughter of the baba and they said this is a great sad geta said of course and then somebody said you know this lady she's a very old woman she never got jealous she never got jealous that's that's a great accomplishment so I went up to the rebre said, "I'd like a blessing, but I'd like to ask you a question. Could you tell me how you how you cured yourself from jealousy?" She says, "Oh, that's easy. I was young with my father. He was by a rich man's house collecting money for the yeshiva, whatever it was. And after he stayed there for a few nights with me, so he left. He thanked the balabide and he wanted to give the balabay the rich man a gift. What is he going to give the rich man? He doesn't need money. So my father bought for his daughter a doll. So my father was wrapping the doll up and I saw it and I said to my father to Baba Sali, I want it. My father looked at me. His eyes were bulging out of his face. His cheeks turned beat red and on top of his lungs he says jealousy. as if I was about to eat cyanide. That face and that reaction of my father burnt any vestage of jealousy from my body. I'm cured. And I said, "It's amazing because I read the I mean that's that's intimidating. It's serious business. can ruin you. It'll take you out of this world and I've read the Mishna 100 times and guess what? I'm not immune because that's when you read it from a book. But when you see the Baba Si's face, the shim, that will have a greater impact. With that introduction, I'd like to present a novel theory. The students of Akiva were not just students. They were transmitters. They called me. The Torah is given in a tradition. Rabbi to student, rabbi to student. And they were in a very key position to be the next transmitters of Torah to the following generation. And as a transmitter of Torah, as a Balmrah, you must be very careful that you present and transmit the Torah as it is and not, God forbid, present a deficient version or a perverted version. It's a great responsibility. What would have happened if the students of those 24,000 would see those rabbis? What would they see? They would see diligent learners. They would see midim. They would see disciplined students that study around the clock, which is very important. And you know what they would also see? They would see that mutual respect is not as important. And that's a perversion of Torah. And if you are in charge of transmitting, you are transmitting the wrong message. And now you're not just not having respect for your friend. That's already contemptuous in the Torah itself in the transmission and that is because if a student walks away and says well you know what I learned from my rabbi I see it every day learning is important are important it's not as important and that's not true and therefore the Torah would be given over in the wrong way and therefore Bam had to take these transmitters away in order that the message should not be compromised. So yes, if you're a transmitter is punishable by death. Well, I have some good news. Not all the students of the Byakiva passed. Actually, there were five survivors. One of them was the Bishimai. I'd like to tell you a story that happened last year. Last year, as my custom, I went to Meon. It was a special year after the tragedy and uh they had invited me some to light the uh or a bonfire for so I was very very appreciative. They gave me the the the stick. They lit it up, climb up on the ladder and as I'm about to light a big sadik tells me, "Hey, hey, wait, wait, wait. What's the reason you're lighting? What's the reason? What in Rome? Everybody's lighting vampires. I don't know. [Music] You don't know. You just lighting. Come back down. Come back down. Come back down. Come back down. And he said, "We need you to light with kabanote." And I don't know any caban of lighting modfires. Maybe because the zar zad is a fire. Ah, easy one. He said, "I will tell you a kadoo that I heard from the Yanuka, the great rabbi in Israel." And he said is famous in the Talmud for many statements, but one he said not one time and not two times. He repeated it three times in different I have a copy of it here. said. A person should rather jump into a fiery furnace and not embarrass his fellow. It is so important to keep the dignity of another person to keep it in the right esteem. It's important not to hurt and say hurtful words to our fellow to agonize them. So much so that it's a better option to jump into a fire than embarrass or speak disparagingly against our friend said the yanuka. When you light the fire of that's what they want you to remember. Jump into this fire before you abuse somebody. That's what the Torah would rather. Before you choose to abuse somebody in any which way, it's a better option to jump in the fire. Most people that jump in the fire not coming out and it's still a better option. That's how serious the crime is. And that's the to remember the fire of and I added and I said because now becomes the new transmitter and he had to undo the 24,000 that were giving a mis a mis message a wrong message had to Yes, of course. But don't forget, it's a 50/50 law. Moshe, he received both parts. We sprinkle half the blood on the misbeh. And nobody should think that you could call yourself religious if you're just a ceremonial or a ritual Jew. You must have edits and a proper behavior. And if you're not a good husband and if you're not a good brother and if you're not a good partner and you don't have a good wife, that's part of religiosity. No matter when you finish Shabbat and no matter how koshi your kitchen is, you're missing a very integral part of Judaism. I get calls from shhat khanim from time to time or from parents that want to get their kids married. A mother calls me upsul. Can I talk to you about my my daughter? Yes, of course. She's so and so. She's so and so. She reads the whole and her daughter with a bara. I said, "Okay, fine. Sounds like a very very exceptional girl." So now could I tell the RB what I'm looking for? Yeah, fine. We want a boy who any question she asks him in he'll know the answer. I said listen shalom. He passed away already. So but can I ask you a question? Where did you get this barometer of that's what makes a good husband that he's able to answer every question. So you don't care if he has a short temper. You don't care if he talks not nice. You don't care how he treats your daughter. You just care that he gets the right answers for the questions. So why don't you marry a computer? But that's the perversion that we have today in Torah because we're so corrupted in thinking that that's that's what Torah is. He knows everything at at at that 22 years old, no less. But is he a good person? Is he a proper person? That's an extra. That's nice. There's a famous sal when he talks about the puk in the Torah that talks about a parent giving over his daughter in marriage. There's a puk like that that a father gives over his daughter in marriage. The old days was very customary. So it says the father's talking I gave my daughter to this ish salant says wow ish is it's a generic word we would expect theat to say don't you want to No, says you know what an ish is he might not be a and he might not be the biggest sadik or the but an ish is a mench and that's the greatest qualification because the Torah says before he can become a sadik the kadosh, you have to be a mech. You have to be an ish. That's the that's the entry point. If you're not an ish, nothing starts. But I'm sorry. Today, the corruption that we have in thinking that religious behavior is only measured by and not by the and personality and it's second. It's secondary. It's tertiary against the more important things. It's a corruption of Torah. And that's why Mush had to make that 5050 ceremony to remind everybody that it's not the case. It's one law and both sides are equal. We're coming to the holiday of Shabot and we read a book on Shabot the Gat. I asked the question actually somebody came to me from the Shul a few weeks ago. One of the mens quick answer could you just remind me why did we read Mig on on Shabot? I said it's an easy one. Bring me the book. It's only four chapters. I said, "For sure it has to say the word shave in there somewhere." So I just very quickly I'm looking looking. I'm sorry to tell you I didn't find the word shave once. I said, "But for sure I squeeze them again. Noai, no shabu, no ten commandments, no cheesecake, no nothing." And then I started to question myself. It's a great story. Don't get me wrong. It's a great story. But why has that become the story of Shabot? So some say because it happened around time. So it's like the season. It was a seasonal story. So therefore, all right time. All right. Nice answer. Some say, well, it's the story of the birth of King David and King David was born on Shabot. So therefore, which is interesting that answer. So really it's not it's not the story of root actually. It's we read the whole book for the last puk and it sounds like the first four chapters is just to get us to the last worded. And there it is. Okay. Now that's the book. Although we call it migill but it's really not about it's about Davidid. All right. It's a nice answer. But then I looked in the midrash and I found something something incredible. You have to look pretty hard in to try to find any. It's not a book of legislation. It's a story. The midash asks, "So why is it written?" And I'm asking a further question. And why do we read it? It wants to teach us the importance of being a nice person because it's a story about a nice person. Ruth was a nice person. This is a lady that was born in royalty with a silver spoon in her mouth. And at some point in her life, she decides to do the ultimate for her destitute mother-in-law. She had every right to turn back and go back home and live a life of luxury with all the amenities. And instead, she escorts at great danger, mind you, her mother-in-law back to Israel, and she knows good and well that she might never get married because she's controversial. She comes from Moab. it's not so simple that we're allowed to marry them. So, she's willing to give that up as well. And she escorts her mother-in-law back and now her mother-in-law is destitute and povertystricken. And she accepts upon herself to go to the welfare and get the food stamps herself and pick all the gleanings from the field with all the other poor people. Something that I know she was not accustomed to. I'm sure back home she had servants and now she finds herself in a field with the porpus of the time fighting for a few kernels of Bali and wheat all what nice mother-in-law and then eventually we talk about she has a baby and the migila says when the neighbors saw that L had a baby they said you that abi had a baby. That's not true. But the Gimar says that she had so much love for her mother-in-law and her mother-in-law lost two children and she probably had a craving like every lady does to raise a child. So she gave the child to Naomi to share in the rearing of this child to give her the pleasure. So the neighbor said, "Look, Naomi had a baby. She's a mother again. Brute shared that very very personal and private experience of raising a child that most people would not share with anybody. And goes on to be a very compassionate person, very kind-hearted person to the extent that somebody who is not compassion we say is ruthless. They like to be and that becomes the story on you know why because it's reminding you yes you must keep all the but don't forget the Torah demands from you to be a nice person that's part of Torah there's a nice person clause And therefore reading the story of root on shabot there cannot be a more pertinent story because this is the part that the people are they're going to neglect the other part they know the other part is from Sinai but they know know that this part is just as much and therefore has to reinforce it. So you cannot come and tell me that you wear two and your muz written from the best and you donated a separate and you make uh all sorts of uh h donations to the synagogue. Very good. That's it. That's half a story. It's half a book. How do you talk to your spouse? What's it got to do with anything? How do you talk to your children? What's one thing to do? Well, that's personal. What are you going to give up my personal life? I'm telling you my my cred my religious credentials. Who touched them? And then once we start to measure the Torah on both sides of the we'll start to see that a lot of people we thought are religious are really not. and they become exposed as halfbaked and that's the important lesson that we come to talk when we talk about relationships it's all about midot so you can't be a good Jew and a bad friend at the same time and you can't be a good Jew and a bad neighbor at the same it doesn't go there was one rashiva a man came to him and said, "What do you say about all those religious Jews that cheat and lie and steal?" He says, "What do I say about them?" The same thing I say about all those religious Jews that eat on Yumki. He said, "Religious Jews, Jews who eat on Yumkipur are not religious." And the Rasha said, "Neither of those." That was his point that we measure it if you eat on Kipur or not. There was a great rabbi called Rice Mandal, Rice Mandel after the Holocaust. He came to a certain sh upstate and it was before Sukkot. He tells the story himself. He says, "And now everybody's going to buy." So how do they buy it in that? They put a bunch of dogs on the beima like this. Everybody comes, they pick it up, they look at it, they pick up the first one. Okay, looks good to me and they walk away. Vice Mandel says kind of people are these they don't even have any seriousness about this. The first one they pick up and they look they don't even look at their to us. We have a loop, we have a X-ray to to look inside of it to have a you know all sorts of uh diagnosis and he first one in the handsabad. So he says in my mind I didn't judge them so favorably. Anyway the next day next day is the first day of the holiday. So what happens they had a custom in that where they would invite a special hazan to lead the halal. So I'm sitting next to this guy he says and they come to him the please we'd like you to honor the congregation by reciting the halal. And he says I cannot. Yesterday I told a lie. My mouth isn't suitable to represent the congregation. Our vice mandal said these are the real Jews. He says they take lulah in the but they're all so careful. They're all so careful that they tell the truth and that they're honest. And so much so that a man cannot be the because he feels his mouth is unworthy. He says, "I might have judged these people wrong. These are balanced people. I was only judging them because of the way they prefuncterally take and they throw casually." But these people are actually deep. They're very careful also on personality. And that's the lesson that I say tonight. There's no greater preparation for Shabot than of course to be Jews. Not be it for me to minimize the standpoint and I know the risk of such a dash to many people who are not soly religious and they hear say you see as if this speech gives a to be a Shabbat so long as they're a nice guy and that's not the case because again you need both halves and if you're just a nice guy and you're eating the you got the same problem but I'm talking to religious Jews that that are Jews. We're talking to people that are modest that are that's not our issue. By and large, we keep or we want to keep. We understand the importance of it. It is us that need to be reminded that people are sensitive, people are fragile. more than a piece of La glass. And therefore we have to treat our fellow with white gloves and so much so that it is a better option to jump into the fire of rabish just to preserve the dignity of a fellow Jew. root is read on Shab not because of any consideration but because she was she had a good relationship with her mother-in-law which is a challenge under any situation let alone the situation of and it's reminding you this is the way the Torah wants you to to look you have to look like these people they were religious on both fronts the bloods must be sprinkled on the misbay and the bloods must be sprinkled on the people. Our Torah is a Torah of Ben as well as Badamo. Thank you very much. [Applause]