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Normal time. It's very good to be back at the Feder home. Thank you so much for hosting. Sure. I'll try not to say anything inappropriate. Torah tonight should be a schuz. I don't know exactly what happened, but I just heard from my brother-in-law that my nephew had a near-fatal something over Shabbos. So the Torah tonight should be a schuz for a full shalome. Mayor Gavriel Ben Chana. From what I understand, everything's okay, but it's disconcerting to hear that. You wake up after Shabbos and hear these things. And bechol lalos, just for all of Klal Yisrael, we're in a hard manzef. The Torah tonight is a combination of two Torahs: one from the Nisiv Shalom and the other from the Kedushas Levi. I think this is what they meant. As best as I can say, I think what I'm sharing tonight is what they meant. Medrashim vayikar Rabbah says, Rav Yechanan Amar la'olam altekale beinecha mitzvah sa'omer.
Rav Yechanan says, don't take lightly the mitzvah of the karbona omer. Shalideh mitzvah sa'omer zochav ramavinu liyorei sheseretz kana. Because through the mitzvah of Aimer Avram Avinu was zayche to the inheritance of Eretz Yisrael As the pasuk says. So Nisiv Shalom asks three questions on this medrash. He says it's a medrash plio. The first and most obvious question is that these psukim are not referring to carbon imer, but referring to the mitzvah bris mila. So we all know the reason why Avram Avinu was zaycheh to be yairish Eretz Yisrael is because of the mitzvah of bris mila, and not because of the mitzvah of the carbon imer. So the shaila is How could the Medrash come along and say that it's because of the mitzvah of carbon aymer? It goes mamash against the Pzukim. So Medrash always has to add context to what's happening, but not Chazav Shalom to go against what's happening. That's the first question.
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The second question is If the Medrash has to tell us, 'I'll take kala beinecha mitzvah saimer,' we shouldn't take lightly the mitzvah of carbon aymer. It would mean that there would be some reason that we would take it lightly. There's something about the mitzvah of karbanah omer that would not be taken seriously, and the question obviously is why. And the third question that Sivah Shalom asks is a very beautiful question. Is it says la'ailam, la'ailam l'chayra means that we're talking about forever. Meaning there's some sort of quality to this mitzvah that le'dayraysham forever and ever, Klal Yisrael is going to struggle with the mitzvah of karbanah omer, and we have to make sure to take it seriously because this gives us a yerusha in Eretz Yisrael. But why? In our generation, I don't think we struggle very much with the mitzvah, obviously. But I'm saying, why is that something that lo elam forever? A Jew has to be worried that they shouldn't chas v'shalom be mezalzel in any way in the mitzvah of omer.
Those are the three questions. Is the fourth question a fourth question, which is it's a famous question? Can't say it's the nisiv shalom's question. This everyone asks is why don't we have a mitzvah of shechyanu on sfera saomer? Like any time-bound mitzvah, we should have a mitzvah of shecheyanu in it, just like we have a mitzvah of shecheyanu on Pesach, but we don't have a shecheyanu on Sefiros HaEmet. The question is, why don't we have a shecheyanu on Sefiros HaEmet? Those are the questions we're going to ask tonight. The idea here that I'm going to share now is from the Kedushas Levi. It's the kedushas levi in parshas pekudei But I want to try to speak it out in a very specific way because there's an idea here that's a little bit difficult to convey And it goes something like this: Do you remember when we were growing up? You asked the question. I asked the question.
If miracles are real, why don't we have miracles anymore? Have you ever heard that question? What happened? I also want to see Kryashevsky. Everyone wants to see Kryashevsky. Why don't I get to see Kryashevsky? What happened to Kryashevsky? So The truth of the matter is I want to be careful how I say this because I don't want to chassid shalom be mezazel in the question because there's emes to the question But in a certain way, the nature of the question is very childish. Why is it a childish question? Because there's something about day to day life In a certain way, it brings an advantage over the miraculous. Is there something in our day-to-day lives, the way that we live? That in some way it's more, it creates a deeper relationship with Hashem Baruch Hu than if we would see Kriyas Yamzef. So there was a Tufa in world history where we had the miraculous, and because we're getting closer and closer to Mashiach, because our relationship with Hashem Baruch Hu is becoming deeper and more sophisticated So now we live in a Tufa where there's the absence of the miraculous, and that's by design.
What does this mean? So it goes as follows: When a person experiences a miracle in their life What's the feeling that a person has? And I don't mean a miracle like today. If we would be sitting at Kriyas Yamsuf, what would we experience? What would be our mindset? What would be the worldview that we would have? When a Jew was sitting at Kriyas Yamsuf, when a Jew saw the Makos and Mitzrayim So the feeling that we had was that Hashem has dominion over everything in nature. In other words, what we experienced was a feeling of awe in the face of Hakadosh Baruch Hu's limitless power. That's the nature of what we experienced when we were at Kriyas Yamsuf, when we saw dams, faraday, kinem, etc. As we looked at the world, we said Hakadosh Baruch Hu is a limitless power. But there's a, and obviously that's necessary in the building of the relationship. But there is a certain chisaron in that. There's a certain challenge that comes along with seeing the miraculous.
One can chas v'shalom become impressed with the miracle And not with Hashem. It is possible for a person to experience the miraculous, but they don't experience Hashem. They experience the miraculous nature of Hashem, but not Hashem Himself. I'll give an example of what this looks like. Please forgive me for bringing this example. It's the best example I know. But when you are dating a guy So if he's a good guy, obviously I don't mean to say that he's miraculous. He's not, but if you find a good guy and he does big things. You know what I mean when I say big things. Like you're dating and he has that extra sensitivity and he goes that extra mile, and he knows that you're having a big test and so you're not going to eat. So he shows up with a salad. That's by a man that's called a miracle.
Baruch Atvad. Or the gift that he got you was an especially expensive gift or an especially meaningful gift. So a person In a certain way, this should happen—it's the natural tava of a relationship. A person falls in love with things about a person. But not necessarily with the person themselves. In fact, sometimes the gesture is so grand. That you find yourself not talking about the person, but about the gesture. You'll hear girls talk about what my husband did. My husband did for me. This guy I'm dating. You know what he did. You're talking about the action, not about the person. And that's natural. It's normal in a relationship. So we become focused on the action, and that's how we bring ourselves to know a person. This is why there's always that. It's always that debate. I don't know. I'm sure it happens in girls' schools also, but I know in boys' schools this is very big fight. If a boy tells his rebbe that he loves the girl that he's dating, and then the rebbe says, No, you don't. You know this fight.
You familiar with this fight? The rebbe says, No, you don't. And he goes, How? And the boy always gets very offended, and he goes, How dare you tell me what I am and I'm not feeling. And the Rebbe, sometimes in a condescending way, will say to the boy, "It's cute that you think that you know what love means, but you have no idea what love means." And it becomes this big thing. Eventually, the boy makes his way to a different Rebbe and says, 'Do you know like you do that thing when you're in seminary yeshiva? You do like the polling the Rabbi thing. You like go to different people. What do you think? To think what you think about things, you have to see like make a list.' Boy comes back and he goes, 'Okay, I have five rabayim on this side and three rabayim on this side. Rebbe, what do you think? I don't want to be involved in your polls. It's like I'm not running for president.' The truth of the matter is both are right. That boy who thinks he loves that girl is experiencing love according to the level of the relationship.
So if you asked him to show you that he loves this girl, he'll tell you all about his gestures. Because that's the beginning of any relationship. How do you learn about a person? The word about a person is sort of a very hard thing to grasp. Even what does that word mean? What does it mean to know someone? At best, all I can know is about them. If you ask me about my wife, I can tell you all the things about her. So how can you articulate knowing someone without talking about them? You hear the problem? I want to know you. I don't want to know about you. I want to know you. This is what it means. Real intimacy. Intimacy doesn't mean that I can tell you a list of things about a person. Anyone could Google somebody. Anybody could write a Wikipedia entry and give their whole bio of what they've done in their life. But all those things are only about a person. About a person is a very healthy, normal stage in the beginning of a relationship. But if a relationship remains in the state of I know about you I know what you did, I know how you did it, but I don't know why you did it.
There's something that when a person is married to somebody for 50 or 60 years, there's something they know that's beyond articulation. I don't know if I can express it better than this, and I'm sure I myself don't know if I know what I'm talking about. But maybe if you'll come with me on this journey, you know that elderly couple that's sitting next to each other And they don't have to say a word to each other. Like in my mind, they're sitting. This is the way I see it. They're sitting on a front porch. It's a screened-in front porch of a nice house. And it's like ma and pa. You know I'm talking about, and they're like in their rocking chairs And she's sitting there knitting, and he has a book. And the sun is setting, and they're totally comfortable, not saying a word to each other for hours, and the feeling of closeness is beyond expression.
And there's nothing that either of them could say in that moment. That would be able to articulate all the things they know about the person because of the relationship they have with each other, after 60 years of being with each other, after 60 years of fighting with each other and making up with each other, after 60 years of raising children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, after 60 years of going through catastrophe and all the tragedy of life, but also all the hope of life. Their relationship is no longer based on gestures. In fact If there's gestures in the relationship, it means something is wrong. If that elderly man would come home with a piece of jewelry for his wife, she'd go, "Why'd you do that? It's not what they want anymore. The relationship has advanced beyond what we can do for another person. It's just the intimacy of togetherness.
And this is the shift that we go through in history. We start off with a miraculous relationship with Hashem. That's what we're supposed to have. Kadosh Baruch Hu comes ten Makos, Kriyas Yamsof. It's unbelievable. But then what happens? Then we go into the tzira of the Omer. We go into the harvest. Now we're not seeing Hashem in action anymore. Now we're seeing Hashem in nature. Our relationship with Hakadosh Baruch Hu takes on a completely different role. It's an organic role. It's I'm seeing Hakadosh Baruch Hu in everyday life. So what's the shift here? The shift is as follows: a relationship of action is a relationship of yira. A relationship of nature is a relationship of avahav. Explain what I mean. When we stand in awe of Hakadosh Baruch Hu and His limitless nature, there's a feeling that He's awesome, and yet I'm distant from Him. That's the natural feeling that a person has.
But when a person starts to see Hakadosh Baruch Hu in nature And they start to develop this deep consciousness and awareness that Hakadosh Baruch Hu not only has mastery over everything in creation, but is found within everything in creation. So the feeling that a person has is It is worthy for me to serve Hakadosh Baruch Hu because I am one of His creations. You hear the difference? It's not because Hakadosh Baruch Hu did something and His action is impressive and His action is limitless, but because I find Hakadosh Baruch Hu in everything, in every creation I see Hashem, including in myself. So the reason that I serve Hakadosh Baruch Hu now is not because I'm inspired by Hashem's limitless potential But because I engage Hakadosh Baruch Hu in everything in the world, and I feel so close to Hakadosh Baruch Hu because I find Him in every aspect of my life, including in my very own being.
So it shifts, the Kedushas Levi says, from a relationship of yira to ahava. And in this context, the Kedushas Levi takes it one step further, and this is a very important nikkuda. In this context, even the miraculous starts to take on a new character. If such a person who sees Hakadosh Baruch Hu in every single action in their life, every single aspect of creation, they see Hashem, including in themselves, then when Hashem does a miracle for them, when they encounter a nase, they're not just inspired by the limitless nature of Hashem. But it's incredible that Hakadosh Baruch Hu, who loves me, rises above creation in order to do a miracle for me. So there's an amazing shift that occurs here. The shift is I'll say it again in case I wasn't clear. I probably wasn't clear. I'll say it again. The shift is: in the beginning of the relationship, we're inspired by what someone does for us. Fifty, sixty years later, I'm no longer inspired by what you do for me. What you do for me is almost irrelevant. I'm inspired by you. I want to be connected to you. The action is tangential.
But in that context, if you do an action It's not that I'm just like, wow, my husband is amazing because he can do this. It's my husband is amazing because he can do this, and he chooses to do it for me. Of all the places that he chooses to use that energy, he chooses to invest that energy here. So it changes the nature of action in a relationship. Initially, we fall in love with somebody because of their actions. We're inspired by what they can do. And then shifts. I'm not inspired by what you can do. I'm inspired by you. And the action that you've chosen to dedicate towards me is what creates that feeling of ahava. It's a completely different way of looking at it. I spent the Shabbos with a friend of mine. We've now been friends for twenty-three years. Beautiful Shabbos And he has an incredibly beautiful relationship with his wife.
And we were sitting at the Shabbos table. The meal started at probably they have shorter meals, but you know how when you have guests the meals could go on for five hours. So I was that guest this Shabbos. I think the meal went on for four and a half hours. And a significant amount of that time, I was curious about their relationship because it's It's so incredible. There's so much love there, and there's so much respect there. I was just trying to understand what they've done and how they've come close to each other. And I see. This is a person. The husband is a person you should know. I don't want to say any details, because I'm sure everyone in the room has heard of him. But he has limitless talent. This guy is exceptionally talented. But I saw the way his wife lit up.
If somebody knows where I was for Shabbos, don't say. If you saw me on Shabbos, don't say. But if you did, he's a person with unbelievable talent. But I saw when his wife was talking. Of course, she loved him. But one thing she mentioned that touched me very deeply is that he has a very specific talent. I can't say any details. He has a very specific talent. I have to be very careful now. He has a very specific talent. And she told me about an instance where he used that talent in her direction. And he made her feel like a million dollars because of it. But I saw the relationship was much deeper than the action. She wasn't saying he used his talent for me; it was much bigger than that. I'm married to him, I'm married to that guy And he uses all those talents in my direction. I saw how she lit up from that.
As we get closer to the times of Mashiach. We don't want a relationship of action. We want a relationship of presence. This is the key. This is what everybody in the entire world right now is looking for. It manifests itself in the way that we act towards the Rebbeim and Shalalim. That's why you have all these kids today, and they're right. All these kids are rebelling, and they're saying the same exact thing. I'm tired of doing things without feeling a connection to Hashem. They're a hundred percent right. These kids, they're right. They're right. I don't want to open up a sitter anymore if it's not going to speak to me. I'm not interested. I'm not interested in opening up a sitter if it's not going to speak to me. And they're not. Maybe there's a part of them that's saying in a very 2024, like narcissistic, selfish way, like it has to mean something to me. But really, if you listen carefully, that's not what they're saying. They're saying I'm tired of a relationship of action. I want a relationship of presence. I want to be able to feel Hashem. I was just now, you asked me to come a little bit later.
The truth is, I was running late, so it was like a big bracha that you asked me to come later, because the place where we davened on Matzah Shabbos had the Rebbe there with some sort of habringin matzav and it went And I'm watching these Jews sit there. Mincho was at eight. Mincho was at eight o'clock, so Mincho was over eight twenty. Myrev didn't start until nine thirty-five. The entire chaver was singing the entire time. The lights were off. It was a beautiful matzav. And I'll tell you the truth: I wasn't into it at all. I wish I could tell you it was like one of these times I was flying. I wasn't into it b'cholav. I didn't feel comfortable. It wasn't my matzav. It wasn't like my friends. I was. I wasn't going to let loose. There was too much vulnerability in the room for me to do it. There's a whole tirah why I didn't want to. But okay, I'll say it. But I was. But I was very inspired by the fact that this is what Yidden were doing. It wasn't just damishal shuvas. It wasn't just dam. Somebody put out gefilte fish.
It was a matzav. That's what everyone is looking for today. We're looking for a relationship of presence. The biggest bracha in the world is that we don't have miracles today. If we had miracles today, every kid would be sitting there with their phone out, like snapchatting and instagraming. Check it out. I don't know, it's a miracle, but it's sus. I know all the words. I've been studying these 18-year-old kids. Low key, that was a big miracle. We would be so obsessed with the miracle we would have no shot for a connection. So every one of us grew up. I also want to see a miracle. We don't. The last thing we want to see is a miracle. If we would see a miracle, we would be so distracted by the miracle that we would never get to know Hakadosh Baruch Hu. And this is the Torah of Pesach and Shavuos.
The Torah of Pesach is the beginning of a relationship. There's a focus on salvation. There's a focus on building a relationship with Hakadosh Baruch Hu through action. But as a result of that, our understanding of Hashem was very simplistic, and that's why we eat the matzah on Pesach. The matzah on Pesach is the representation of the simplicity of our relationship with Hashem. It was not yet a sophisticated relationship. It had not risen to become something more deep. There was less conscious awareness of Hashem and more conscious awareness of His actions, and that's why matzah is made in a flash and we're taken out of Mitzrayim in a flash. The entire thing is very fast. There's no depth to that relationship. But as we march towards Shavuos, we shift out of our relationship Of one of action and into one of finding Hakadosh Baruch Hu in nature, and so it might seem like this very mundane type of thing, like I'm getting involved in the ktsira of the omer.
It's like a very mundane farming type of life. But it's not true. It's the opposite of that. That Jew who is involved in bringing the carbon omer and in this entire process, he's becoming deeply conscious and aware not of Hashem in his action, but of Hashem in his presence in every aspect of creation. And it changes the way we experience Yisias Mitzrayim. That's the big chiddush here. Yitzias Mitzrayim is no longer a relationship of action. It's Hakadosh Baruch Hu with His limitless potential orienting those actions towards us. So the entire nature of Pesach changes, and that's why we know that the Ramban already speaks about the idea that Pesach and Shavuos are connected, and Sfira Soemer is the chalamoy between Pesach and Shavuos. This idea is a very sophisticated one that the relationship we have with Pesach has to be evolving. We think that's something new. I think that's something to focus on for a second. That a person goes through Pesach and they think now I had Pesach, now I have Sfiras Omer, now I have Shvuas. And even if we hear this tirah of yes, there's a Hemshchik, but somehow the Hemshchik is always like the focus on Kabbalah Torah, the Chiddush of the Kedushas Levi. And I think it's something very important, that it has to change the way we see Pesach. That a person goes through Sfiras Omer and it changes his relationship that they had to Yitzias Mitzrayim.
And it's important in the development of any relationship. If someone is married to their husband and they're still looking for those grand gestures That's the worst thing in a relationship. It's like what went wrong that you still need those grand gestures. There's obviously no yachas. That's why sometimes you'll see that when a couple is struggling with their shalom bayis, the husband tries to fix it with a grand gesture. But what he doesn't know is that's the worst possible thing to do. It's the thing that is going to drive his wife even farther away. Because what does he need in that? What does she need in that moment? She needs the closeness of nothingness. She needs the closeness of presence, not of action. In other words, this guy who says, "let's go away for this big week, and we're going to make it awesome, and after that, everything's going to be okay." That's not what she needs.
She needs pasha, like the day to day healthy interaction of just someone to talk to her. I was telling the story today. A chaver of mine got a piece of advice when he was newly married. I'll give you this piece of advice. I didn't listen to it because I didn't know it when I was newly married. I wish I would have known this. A chaver of mine got a piece of advice from his shvare when he was newly married. He was told You must go out to eat every single week with my daughter. That's what his shvare said. He said, "What's it going to cost you?" Let's. And he said, "You have to go out to eat because if you don't go out to eat, it's not going to work. Because you say, okay, we're going to make a date night, but we'll go like on a walk because it's cheaper." You'll end up not going on the walk. You have to go out and you have to go to a place every single week. He said, "What's it going to cost you?" Seventy-five bucks. So it's seventy-five dollars for two people. It's going to cost you three hundred dollars a month.
Three hundred dollars a month is going to cost you thirty-six hundred dollars a year. That's not expensive. I know it sounds expensive when we're young. Thirty-six hundred dollars is not a lot of money. You get older, you'll realize thirty-six hundred dollars flies out of your house like nothing. Thirty-six hundred dollars is like dresses on Pesach, like a mamish flies. It flies out the window. Even in Eretz Yisrael today, everything got super expensive. Thirty six hundred dollars is nothing. And if Shver said, 'I'll put my money where my mouth is,' he wrote him a thirty six hundred dollar check. He said, 'I'll pay for the first year' And he did it, and he followed through, and they never missed a week. When they lived in America, they did it on Sunday nights. When they lived in Eretz Yisrael, they did it on Thursday nights. But they never missed a week. At some point a couple years ago, this chaver of mine went completely off the derech. Out of nowhere, nobody saw it coming. He was learning, he was davening. He was an unbelievable guy, and just something snapped, and he went off the derech.
For a year he was off the derech. He also started doing other funny things. He started smoking again. I don't mean cigarettes. He started doing silly things. He was in a very bad place. Gansa Maisa. He ended up somehow in Uman for Rosh Hashanah. You know how the rest of it goes. Today is the best. He came back from a moment. I said, "How was it?" He said, "Rabbi Nachman saved me." I said, "Okay, welcome back." Then I asked him, "How did he not get divorced in that year?" He said, "We went out to eat every single week. Our relationship was so solid." That's a pela atzum. I said, 'There was no grand gestures.' Where'd they go, Rabbi? When they lived in Arizona, where can you go? There's nowhere to go in Bishamish. Where like the fanciest restaurant is like in a gas station. It's not like we're not talking about like fancy things, but it's the presence, it's the day to day grind, it's finding each other in all of the hidden ways. That's where the relationship develops.
It's a slow burn, but it's really the right way to do it. That's where it comes from. This idea of the. Of the shtei alechem is the expression not of the quick matzah, but of the slow development of that challah. Can I be honest with you? I don't know anything about challah, but I see it made every week. But this is what I know. I know that my wife puts up the challah in the morning, and she puts it in this metal like mixer thing, and it rises. And I know at some point I should. I'm supposed to. Punch it down. That's the whole tire I know about challah, and then at some point later, my daughter comes and makes it. That's like our Friday thing. My job on Friday is to do that. That's my job. I don't really understand why or how any of it happens. I wish I could understand the science of it. The yeast makes it rise. There's some, and I know there's a difference between if you do it with your hands or if you do it with a machine. But if you're married and who has time to do it with a machine, but if you're single, it's like you want to do it by hand. This I've learned. This all the stuff I've heard over the years.
I actually have no idea what any of it means, but I know this. I know that matzah is not delicious. And not because I'm also craving matzah when it comes, but nobody's eating circle matzah in Tammuz. There's a reason for it. There's some when we I know there's a big thing now. The Shabbos is a big thing in this country now about sourdough bread. This is all the rage. So this person where I was for Shabbos, they had sourdough bread. We have amazing sourdough bread. I didn't know it was a thing to be excited about, sourdough bread and dips. That's the new Torah here. So I am still catching up. But the idea that bread is delicious because there is a slow burn, because it takes time to develop, because there is even though you know naturally on Pesach we hear all these shmos about the gaiva of bread, but the emphasis that the development of bread is something that we do have for the entire year and we do have a carbon taida. The carbon tida is made of both matzah for shavuos. The carbon tida is made of both matzah and bread, because as we said a moment ago, the way that we have sferas oimer changes the way that we see tzitzis mitzrayim. It changes the way we see the matzah.
So when it comes to the carbon toida of shavuos, we have both. We have the miraculous nature of the relationship. I'm inspired by you, but we have the intimacy of I'm inspired by you, not by your actions, but by your presence. I want to share with you a story. We have someone here that can vouch for the story that I'm not exaggerating in any way. Last week for Shabbos, I was in Cleveland. I was in Cleveland for Shabbos. NCSY had their Central East Shabbaton, a beautiful Shabbaton. I was zaycha to go to Cleveland for Shabbos. So they fly me out, and I'm supposed to speak. I'll tell you honestly It was the worst because you never want the speaker who goes before you to be better than you.
And you figure like what NCSYer is going to be like so inspiring that I'm gonna have nothing to say afterwards, but last week by Ebbing a girl got up and as she's speaking I realized like I have nothing there's nothing for me to say she gave the best speech I've ever heard in my entire life I'll tell you the truth it was an unbelievable speech it was no Tyra all she said was a very simple thing it was very dramatic she started off as NCSYer it was very dramatic she starts off with like a date like it was like March 10th you know whatever thing yeah. She said that was the day that social services took me and my siblings away from my parents for domestic abuse. That's like a serious beginning. And she tells the story. She tells the story that they took her to a foster family.
And it was another Jewish family, but it was terrible for her there also. And she was in that family, and she had to make the decision: Do I want to leave my siblings? Do I want to stay with my siblings? She finally made the decision to leave those siblings. And she went to a gentile family. At this point, she's done with religion, done with God. All she has is hatred and anger. And she ends up, her mother ends up being able to come back and take her and her siblings, but she's out. She's not interested in Yiddishkeit, and of course, somehow she ended up with NCSY. And last year, Yarchei Kallah. She heard a class from one of the teachers there on the importance of lighting Shabbos candles. So she said, "I'm capable of lighting Shabbos candles next week. I'm going to light Shabbos candles." Friday night next week comes, she leaves the house and remembers she was going out to the basketball game. It's like the big thing in Detroit where she's from to go to the public school basketball game on a Friday night. She leaves the house.
And she realizes I forgot to light Shabbos candles. She goes back into her house and lights Shabbos candles. Then she remembers the teacher said that you're supposed to not just light the Shabbos candles, but you should hang out by the Shabbos candles for at least a little bit. So she's hanging out by the Shabbos candles, and her phone starts blowing up with messages, WhatsApps, DMs, the whole nine yards. Where are you? Are you okay? You have to check in. It turns out there was a school shooting at the game in the place right on the wall where she normally stands, and they couldn't find her. The Shabbos candle saved her life. That's not the part of the story that's good. Just because you know there's a school shooting doesn't make it Ashkach haPratse. You know I'm talking about sometimes if I miss a bus I'm like Chaval. Now everyone on that bus has to die.
What they do wrong? I just missed the bus. It's the only way it's going to be Ashkach haPratse. That's not the impressive part of the story. The impressive part of the story is that she said after something like that you would think that I would become religious and it would be easy because that's the way all the stories go. She's like, but it wasn't easy, and it's not easy for me, and I still struggle with it. But that's why I chose to go to Eretz Yisrael next year because I want to keep fighting for it. And that's why I was so inspired by this story. It was an incredible story. I'm sitting there going, how am I going to get up and speak after that?
She said all the Torah that we all need to hear. She said the Torah of like she had this amazing, miraculous moment, and it did touch her, and she was inspired. But it wasn't an art scroll book. It wasn't like, and now she's from, and now she's like the head of NCSY Cleveland. It wasn't like. Wasn't one of those things, and that girl was me. It doesn't have to be. Doesn't have to be that story, in order for it to be amazing. The amazing part is that she's still in the fight. The amazing part is that she's going to Eretz Yisrael next year, and she's staying in it to try to find Hakadosh Baruch Hu, not in the action, but in the presence. That's the gist of it. Says the Nesiva Shalom. This is the pshat. This is the pshat in the relationship between the karbona aymer and the mitzvahs mila. When do we have the mitzvahs mila?
Mitzvahs mila is done with no moichin. It's done with no intelligence. A little baby, an eight-day-old baby, has no idea what's going on. They're not even participating in it. It's something that's happening to them. This is there are different kufas in our lives. There's kufas in our life where we're on fire and everything is gevaldic and it's amazing and when we're flying in our yiddish kai. That's not what we're talking about. Milah is that mitzvah that I have. I have no interest. I'm beyond the miraculous. I'm after the inspiration. I'm in the day-to-day grind of my relationship with Hashem. Where we yoyrish eretz Yisrael from? We yoyrish eretz Yisrael from the mitzvah of milah, not from the grand gesture, but from the place where I have no interest in serving our Kadosh Baruch Hu. That's what the mitzvah of milah is. It's the hiskashrus with no intelligence. It's just you and me. That's the nature of a bris.
The Nesiv Shalom says, and this is a beautiful pshat. On an individual level, we serve Hashem with the mitzvah of milah, but on a national level, we serve Hakadosh Baruch Hu with the karbona eimer. The karbona eimer is the mitzvah of milah. It's the mitzvah that we have after Pesach, after the inspiration of Pesach is worn off, after the miracle no longer inspires you. Now you have the karbona eimer. It's finding Hakadosh Baruch Hu in nature. It's that day to day grind. And if you can serve Hakadosh Baruch Hu in that space, and you can find Hakadosh Baruch Hu's presence in that area where you have no tayva to serve Hakadosh Baruch Hu, it's just mamish something that's happening to you. It's just I'm in it with you, and I'm searching for you everywhere. Like the kedushas Levi says, I'm playing hide and go seek with God, and I'm finding Him everywhere.
That's the biggest tayra in the world. I'm not in a space of recognition of Hashem. I'm in that dungeon of a total lack of inspiration, a total lack of darkness. But there's great light in that dungeon. In fact, I would say that the greatest light is in that dungeon. That's why we have to go to that dungeon to begin with, to discover the aires that are in that dungeon. So that's why the Kedushas Levi says that a Jew has to forever guard himself that he shouldn't chas v'shalom take lightly the mitzvah of the carbona aimer. Pesach is very exciting. Pesach is the build up to the seder and then it's the seder itself and then it's the next day. How late did your seder go? Talking about what your father did and what was the chab of this year's seder. The kids talk about it like a year later. You remember that time that we did this for the seder is this big grand gesture.
And the natural teva is and then we count imar The natural tevas and then we count imar no it's vakeret. The seder is the big grand gesture, but that's not real. That's not what the marriage is. That has to be reframed. So it's lo oimim. Be careful. Altei kalla beinacho. Don't take lightly the mitzvah of oimer because that's the mitzvah that makes the relationship real. It's where you're no longer in the grand gesture, but you're searching for Hakadosh Baruch Hu's presence. The Ari Zal says that's why there's no mitzvah of shachiyanu on sviur oimer. Because it's on Pesach, he says you have all the irus for all Sfiras HaEmir are there on Pesach. But the moment Pesach is over, all those irus disappear. What are we doing Sfiras HaEmir? We're trying to recapture those irus of Pesach. But why do we need to recapture those irus of Pesach? Just let them stay. The Targum says if they stayed, they wouldn't be those irus.
The R is to come into this world and then to disappear. Mining the R is more powerful than the R itself. It's like you have this marshal and everyone misses the marshal. The marshal is a flash of lightning. If you have that flash of lightning and then it goes away, but now you can find your way in the forest because for a second you were able to see your way. You know that marshal? It's the wrong marshal. Everyone misunderstands that marshal. It's a flash of lightning, and then you could see your way in the forest for one second. And now it's not that you're searching for Hakadosh Baruch Hu in the darkness. It's I'm trying to find what I saw in that moment that it was light. It's not just that now I know my way. It's not, and it's a mistake to think that way. It's like, if there would only be a flash of lightning, then I'd be able to make my way through the forest. The flash of lightning is so that when you're going through the forest, you could find what you were looking for that you saw in those irises.
It's not the shot. The irises are gone. The irises were there in order for you to discover what's after the fact. It's the only reason you got the art to begin with. We don't make a shecheyanu on Sefiras Omer because it's the shecheyanu that we already made on Pesach. These irus are already inside of us, but now the search for the irus is more impressive than the irus being given to us. The flash of lightning is not impressive. It's searching for that flash of lightning after the flash of lightning appears to be completely gone, and having the faith that what I was looking for to begin with has not moved even one kihuzet. This is the biggest Torah in the world. This is the Torah of depression. It's the Torah of anxiety. It's the Torah of a lack of inspiration. It's the Torah of I'm completely stuffed up. It's the Torah of I feel tameh and I have no idea how to find Hakadosh Baruch Hu anymore. Those spaces are the places where you find God. Those people that never suffer, and I give everyone here a bracha, they should never suffer. But those people that never suffer will never have the same depth of a relationship with Hashem as those who do.
Which is why we all suffer. That's why the Gemara says that even if you put your hand into your pocket and you pull out the wrong amount of change, that's also called yisurin. Everybody in the world suffers. Suffering is what gives you depth and consciousness in your relationship with Hashem. It reframes the way you live your life. Suffering is a gift. Obviously, none of us want it, but it's a tremendous gift. It changes who you are as a person. It makes you see the world in a new way. I have a friend who suffered terribly in his life. He lost his mother and his father, and he also was sick. He has siblings who are sick. Mami, he suffered terribly in his life. He told me that within sixty seconds of meeting a person, he knows if they've suffered. Because it changes the way you see the world, and if you're talking to a fellow sufferer, you know you're talking to a fellow sufferer. And this is what the pasuk means: Tisberu chamishim yom v'krafta mincha chadasha l'Hashem. What's that notion of mincha chadasha? The balechasidus point out that mincha chadasha is rasha teves memchess, like the forty-eight ways that were kind of the Torah. It's a change in our mayach. It's a change in our mindset. It's a change in the way that we see our relationship with Hakadosh Baruch Hu.
That's what we have to get to. We have to get to this mincha chadasha of shvuas. That we shouldn't chas v'shalom just look at our relationship with Hashem Baruch Hu as like what once was when I had those miraculous times when I was inspired. When you had those miraculous times that you were inspired, good for you. That's the beginning of the relationship. The depth of the relationship is in the carbonaimer. In the carbonaimer, it changes you. It changes the way you see your relationship with Hashem. You find Hashem Baruch Hu in unexpected places. This is the tire of the entire world today. We're looking at a world that's mamish insane. We're looking at a world that's posh. It lost its mind. There's no two way. You can't say it any other way. The world has lost its mind. Up is down. Down is up. What's moral is immoral. What's immoral is moral. The Talmud this week told me I was in Los Angeles early in the week. He was in UCLA.
He was in UCLA. He saw the encampment in UCLA. And he said he was stopped from going through because he was a Jew. He wasn't allowed to walk through UCLA's campus. So I said, what was it like? He says one of the scariest, and this is not like a light kid. It's like one of these real hardcore Persian. I'm talking about like he's not worried about anybody. So I asked him what it was like. He said it was the scariest thing I've ever seen in my life. He said 50 of them were paid actors, but 50 of them are students. It's 50 of them are students, and they're sitting there and they're convinced that this war was immoral. That antisemitism is okay, and it's a scary thing. He said it very well. I've been saying this. I don't know why people aren't reacting to this. He said it very beautifully. These kids in UCLA and MIT and Harvard and Columbia are tomorrow's leaders. This is real stuff.
And he said he doesn't understand when nobody's paying attention. It's just a bunch of kids. He's not kids. It shapes the way that people see history. This narrative is dangerous and it's crazy. And so a person could say, why are we living through the darkness of these times? Why before Mashiach comes, does it have to be so dark? We're all waiting for that flash of light, and we get these little flashes of light. The night of Iran was a flash of light. You imagine you were all in America, so you know by the time you woke up after Shabbos, it was over. But for us in Eretz Yisrael, I've never had that before. I've never seen anything like that. It was a countdown to the missiles coming to me. It's like something you watch on TV, and you're like. After Shabbos at ten o'clock at night, there was an announcement, and all the videos were going around WhatsApp. It was on all the chats right away. Iran launched three hundred and fifty ballistic and cruise missiles towards Israel. They'll be here in four to five hours.
And you see them. You see them like shooting, and I'm looking at it. Hey, that's me. They're coming this way, right? And then you're it's like. At eleven o'clock, you're hearing that Jordan scrambled their jets, and Saudi Arabia scrambled their jets, and the United Kingdom scrambled their jets, and I'm in Beit She'emes, and Beit She'emes there's an airport, there's an air force base that doesn't exist by us, and they fly right over our house, and now I'm hearing like every two seconds I'm hearing F-16s go over the house, and I'm like, this is real, and at eleven o'clock at night they'll be here in three hours, and at twelve o'clock at night they'll be here in two hours, and at one o'clock they'll be here in an hour. And at two o'clock Said on the news, they're here. I was like. They're here, and at 2:03, my house started to shake from the explosions over the house. This is not like a Katyusha rocket. A Katyusha rocket is like a big one; it's half the size of this table. A cruise missile is an 18-wheeler truck.
And it's filled with explosives. So when it explodes in the air, everything shakes. This is not like a boom. This is crazy. Like if a cruise missile hits your block, there's no more block left. A Katyusha rocket hits a house. It's devastating for that house, but it's just that house. This was like the craziest thing I've ever seen, and there weren't even sirens. It was just shaking the house, and my wife woke up and she said, "What is that?" I said, "That's cruise missiles," and she was very calm. She had a tail lamp next to her in bed. She opened up the tail lamp. She started saying tail lamp, and she went back to sleep. I was in there going, but it's true that what she did makes much more sense. It's not like I could stop it. There's nothing I could do. I have to live with my anxiety, and she lives with Hashem. So it was a miraculous thing. Everybody, the day afterwards, everyone was like, 'I was talking to my friends in America, and they're like, 'Yeah, we heard about it.' I'm like, 'You didn't hear about it. Those missiles were over my house. You didn't.'
Yeah, and then you all saw the videos of those Charedi kids on a tule that they found them. They found one, and they're playing in it. It's because that's what you find on a tule, a giant cruise missile, and then a helicopter came and took it away. These were open nisim. It's true, but was our davening any better two days later? Doesn't necessarily. You should know. This is typical Eretz Yisrael. Matzei Shabbos after the announcement came out that the rockets were coming to us, there were dialers telling us school was canceled the next day. And then in the morning, after it was all done, there were dialers saying we're starting school late. I was like, really? We're having school today? When I chat, I'm like, 'Of course, we're having school today. Of course, kids have to go to cheder. Nothing changed.' But that's the game here. The game is you see the miracles, and it's inspiring for a minute, and everybody gets together. The question is, what's three months later? What's four months later?
The attacks that we had in Eretz Yisrael on October 8th It didn't last as long as I hoped it would. It lasted for a minute. It lasted for a good minute, Baruch Hashem, and then it faded again. And then it came back again, and it faded again. We have to figure out how to find Hakadosh Baruch Hu in the darkness. That's the sight of the Karbanayim. It's the only way to change the way we see the world, is to find Hakadosh Baruch Hu in the darkness. And only through finding Hakadosh Baruch Hu in the darkness are we zayecha to the Memkhas Kinyanei Torah. Are we zayecha to a Shvuas? Are we zayecha to an actual relationship with Hashem, not just of action but of presence. Good tovach.
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