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In this year We mentioned there's two parts: there's the fundamentals and the technicals. It's pretty much split 50/50. But in the beginning of the year, we focus much more on the fundamentals, and as the year goes on, we get more into the sitter and into the technicals. Even within the fundamentals, there are different dimensions of tefillah that we speak about. If there's, I always say, have patience because if there's one aspect of tefillah you're not particularly a fan of Usually I don't spend more than a few Four or five shiurim on one particular inyan, and then we usually go on to something else that might speak to you more or less depending on the situation. So we thus far, it's been a while since we had tefillah here because the tefillah last week. Thus far, we've spoken about the concept of speaking to Hashem. Really going back to the original source of tefillah before there was a sitter.
Going back to the real mitzvah of tefillah, where tefillah really began The tefillah of Chana, the tefillah of Moshe, of speaking out and reaching out to the Rebbeim Shalomim in your time of need. The sitter we'll get to later. We're not there yet. We're going through history. In the beginning of history, there was no sitter. The tefillah not of karbanos. But the tefillah of Avos, of Avraham Yitzchak and Yaakov, that kind of tefillah is the one we're speaking about. And we've spoken, showed the sources, both in terms of the tefillah of Chan and Moshe Both in terms of going through the sources and seeing that the mitzvah of tefillah What there certainly is, at the end of the day, is a very different mitzvah than reading in a seder. The mitzvah is speaking tash. So I'd like to spend the next year. Rounding that out And try to give you advice as to how to best integrate this idea into your tefillah. There is no one aspect of tefillah that's going to change everything for you.
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It's really a combination of working on everything—the things you connect to and the things you don't connect to. And most importantly, as I said at the beginning of the year There are the guys that come and listen to the shiur, and there are guys that do the shiur. And I really encourage you to be the guys that do the shiur when I give you an assignment. You don't have to do it because it's homework. You should do it because if I want to take these ideas and internalize them and actually try to improve my tefillah, the work that I give you is designed to make you uncomfortable. If it was easy for you, it wouldn't be much of an assignment. It's an assignment because for many of you, it will be difficult to do these things. And I believe fully that even more important than the lessons I give More important than the shirah I give. The lessons you'll forget.
But the internalization of the lessons, the work that you do And that actually becomes part of your tefilla and part of your connection to Hashem, that's what's going to stick with you. At the end of the day, the tefillah shir, someone's going to come over to you in five years and say, 'Do you remember any of the shirim Rav Lands gave?' Bits and pieces, but you probably won't remember. You're not going to remember the source. You're not going to remember much. What's going to be the remembrance of the shir is how you're davening. Is the fact that in five years, you're davening significantly better than what it was before you came here. So then we did something. So therefore, the homework The assignments are extremely important. There's more here. Do I have a pen? Extra pen, no. That I don't. It's a very interesting Gemara.
We'll start off the Gemara in Brachos. See about three lines. Tana Rabanan Chasidim Harishonim. We're going to quote this Gemara quite a few times this year. I won't show it to you inside all the time. We'll show it once, and I'll be referring back to this. If there is one Gemara that is the most significant Gemara on Tefillah In my opinion, this is probably it. You won't exactly know why at this point. But there are so many different ramifications of this Gemara in the sitter in Tefillah in general. Because much of tefillah was modeled after this concept, so it's an important gemara to see inside. Tana Rabbanah hasidim have shown him the original pious people how you show in Sha'achas they would before davening they would prepare themselves for an hour. Literally, 'show it' means to wait. Umispal in Sha'achas, and they would daven for an hour.
The cholzrin v'shovin shachas, and then they would go ahead and wait another hour after their tefillah. Now I know you're probably thinking that's a lot of waiting time. Before, during at least fine. The second hour no one has a kasha. I know people be problematic. They ask a kasha. How do you spend an hour davening today? We had slichos and we finished in 40, 30, 35 minutes. How do they daven for an hour? That's good kasha. But a better kash is what were they doing that first hour? What were they doing that last hour? Fair question. Hold off for now. We'll get into many details about this, about what the first hour was, what the third hour was. We're going to speak about it briefly today to bring out one idea, but we'll get into this much more. So the Gemara says. So let's do math. You guys are good at math.
How many hours were they daven shachers? Three. How many hours were they daven mincha? How many hours did they daven mitzvah? Three. So if we're saying that they used to spend nine hours a day on tefillah How did they protect their Torah? They didn't have a lot of time to learn. How many hours do you have in a day to put into your energy? So how did their Torah stay strong? How is it protected? How would they make money? What about their careers? The Gemara says when we talk about shechasiim heim Because they were these kinds of pious people Torasa mishtemeres, their Torah would be protected Meaning they would not need as much chazara. Their Torah would last. The what they learned, they would remember with ease Without having to do as many chazaras as a normal person would. Umelachtan misparachas. They would do malacha. They would do work. It's not saying they wouldn't learn. It's not saying they wouldn't do work, but their learning stuck.
And their malacha was blessed. That they did avodah. They did work like everybody else, but it was more productive. The work that they did didn't require as much to accomplish as much. And that is what the gemara says. Fascinating gemara. This gemara, first of all, the idea that chassidim are rishonim or davening for nine hours a day. Just that concept. Forget about even. The three different hours that we'll talk about another time, but the fact that they were davening for nine hours a day And that the impact that nine hours a day had, there were three impacts. Impact number one was that their Torah was protected. Impact number two was that their malachah was blessed, and impact number three was they were chassidim. This is what made them into the chassidim haryshonim. This is what specifies them. This is what makes them who they were.
The greatest impact was who they became as a result of this tefillah. Obviously, it's unrealistic for anyone in this room, anyone in our generation. Pretty much Besides a few To model themselves after this concept. What could we possibly glean from such a gemara? There's another interesting gemara. Turn to the other side of the page. Rav Lozer Amar. Towards the bottom of the page, I bracketed it for you. Rav Lozer Amar. Sufik kara kriyas shema, Sufik lo kara. If you have a doubt as to whether you said kriyas shema or not, bisman Choser v'kara kriyas shema. You should say it again. Say it again. Be safe. Sufik ispalel, Sufik lo ispalel. But if you have a doubt as to whether or not you davened shmona esrei, you don't go ahead and do it again. In other words, has ever happened to you? Go walk into Mincha. Happened to me once in my life.
Not so long ago. I was very excited to daven Mincha in a certain place, and I went in and davened Mincha there. In the middle of Shmona Esre, I remembered I davened Mincha. Has it ever happened to you? Happened to me. So you go ahead and you daven. You want to daven again? Can you go ahead and daven again? The first opinion is no. Rav Yochanan Amar. Rav Yochanan says you absolutely can, provided you do it as a neda'va, not as a chova, not as an obligation. You state that I'm doing it as a donation offering. You could do it, and he says, "Ulevai sheispalo adam kol yomkuv." How should I? It should be that people should daven all day long. How? Really? Daven all day long? I don't know about you, but how many times could you say the tefillas? How long could you daven for? What does it mean? Halavai sheispalkol. So we have the idea of the Hasidim Rishonin that daven nine hours a day. Let me just develop the idea, and then I'll take nine hours a day. And then we have the opinion of Rabbi Lozer, who I brought down the Rambam, who we pasquin like We pasquin like this That a person literally halavai that they should daven all day.
What in the world is this? Why is this important? What can we glean from this in terms of our own avodah tefila? Because the mice, at the end of the day, no matter what a good job I do with you, you are not going to sit and daven a whole day. You will not daven nine hours a day. You won't daven any close to nine hours a day. Question number one was, what in the world were they doing? What do you do for nine hours a day? What were they doing? And question number two, why was it important? And then, of course, what could we glean from this? What could we learn from this? So I had a lot of things I could have quoted for you In order to explain these gemaras. I could have quoted a beautiful piece from Rabbi Nachman. I could have quoted you a few things.
But instead I decided to bring this out from someone who will never be found guilty of being chassidish. So I bought it out from a very Lithuanian source, a non-Chasidish source. That you could say, that's the guy with the big pay, is crazy, Rabbi Nachman. I want someone. I bought it out from the Rambam, from Maseil Shishar. No more of a Lithuanian snaggish, not I'm not Chassidish and snaggish, but I'm saying like no more of a straight off logical safer than Maseil Shishar, a classic for all the Yeshivas. In this, he's talking about. Many of you have seen the Mitzvot Shisharim. The Mitzvot Shisharim is split into several chapters. And in each section, the Mitzvot Shisharim talks about a different aspect of how to serve Hashem, a certain middah, an attribute to try to acquire. And over here, this is towards the end of the sefer.
He's talking about the more lofty things that a person can acquire in his mission to become connected to Hashem, his mission to become a tzaddik, and in this sefer, this part of the sefer is talking about prishus. Prishus means separation. Separating yourself a little bit from the world. And over here in this chapter, he's talking about Kenyan haprishus. How do you actually acquire it? How do you acquire this attribute? So let's take a look inside. It's the last line on the page: the yoker minakol. And the best of all, the most precious of all Who has Hespodorus? This is the idea of Hespodorus. Of personal prayer Personal meditation Setting yourself aside from the world, away from everyone. What did I just do? Oh no! I'm sorry. It's all out of order. I didn't realize that. In Yanei Ha'Olam When a person can put aside all of the business of the world. In other words, all of us are always busy. We always have friends. We want to School, news, phone calls. When a person can shut that all off for a period of time.
He's able to distance himself from his physical wants, his physical desires, the things that pull him to engage him in this world. The Shevach Isbodus Tzavon Amalek himself says that the importance of this idea of Isbodus va'omar, and he would say miyatin li'ever kayona ufa ve'shcona. How praiseworthy it would be if I was like a bird, like a yona, like a dove. I could fly away and go to the desert to call out to Hashem. I can get away from this all for a little bit. If you would give me wings, the first thing I would do is to fly to a desert to separate myself and do some hispotodus. Vanavim, Eliyahu, Elisha. Matzonu he yosem yachdim ekolam alahar mitnei espo to do something. They used to do in order to perfect themselves. They used to go up to mountains. We're not talking about those kooky, weird Hasidim that live in Sva. We're talking about Eliyahu and Alicia here.
The way they would work on themselves is they would go up to mountains to separate themselves from the world a little bit to get some of their own clarity, their own mind. Think about things with a clear head. Away from all of the craziness of the world. V'chachamim, ha'chasinim, harishonim. Who's he talking about? Our Gemara. These chasinim, harishonim that we just spoke of. Zichronim levracha. Halchu beforseyan. They followed these footsteps. K'matzul hemzeha imsoi ayoser muach l'ignor shleimus aprichus because they found. That spending a large period of time on personal prayer On hishtadus, talking to Hashem in your own words, spending time separating from the world. Was the way they were able to acquire perfection of this mida of frishus. So that they shouldn't fall into the trap that all of us fall into. What is that trap? Go with the flow. Whatever one thing the whole world does, that's what I do. Why? Is that right? Is that wrong? I don't know. That's what everyone's doing. You know how you fall into that trap when you never press the brakes and step aside and stop and think and say "Is this really the direction I want to go?" I think for many of you
You're one of the very few that's fortunate to have this. You actually have a time in your life, a year or two years, to literally press on the brakes and step aside from the world. Most people don't have that. Most people don't get an experience like this to think about their Judaism, to think about their life, to think about the direction they're headed in. They don't get the time to think. No one has time to think. Everyone is just doing. They're just going with the flow. So the Ramchal is saying, you want to know what made Eliezer the Yev. You want to know what made the Hasidim our Rishonim. They took time out of their day. Or from their days in their lives Gave some time to themselves And they set themselves aside, just them and Rebbeinu Shalom. They spoke in their own words. However The ramchal warns: It's not possible for a person to jump from one extreme to the other extreme. You can't go ahead one minute and never do a sboedus.
Personal prayer and personal meditation and talking to Hashem to suddenly doing it nine hours a day—that doesn't happen. Kizevadai loyal b'yoter—it certainly will not work. And liyiv porish v'holei chmat nash. First, let's do it little by little: five minutes, seven minutes, ten minutes, thirty minutes. Little by little, he's got to work on this. Hayom yeknektsas mimenu, mochar yosuf alav maat yosin. Today do a little bit. Tomorrow do a little more. Until it becomes totally accustomed. Kiyashimlo k'moteva mamish that it literally becomes part of your nature. It could very well be that the lesson I'm teaching today And the lesson I'm starting with in tefillah, the past two three shiurim Is probably one of the most advanced and most difficult. Lessons on Tfilah Because let's just be real. We are so far from this. This is so not the nature of our relationship with Hashem. How many of us, this is a rhetorical question, because I know for most of you the answer.
How many of us feel comfortable in our own skin to be able to separate ourselves from the world for a period of time? How many of us would feel comfortable sitting in a room by ourselves? Covering the blanket over our heads when no one is watching And just sit there and think and contemplate and talk to Hashem and seek His help and reach out to Him about any area. How many of us feel comfortable walking alone? We live in a world of such connectivity. We're always connected. We're always plugged in. Baruch Hashem, we have Shabbos, but one time that we actually can disconnect. People in the world don't have Shabbos. There's never a disconnect. They're always synced and they're always connected, and there's something beautiful about that. I'm not going to be one of those rappers that screams, "Oh, my generation!" There's something really beautiful about that. There really is.
But one of the negatives of that is that much creativity and much self-development comes from boredom. Comes by disconnecting. That's how most of the greats were able to take the time and the space in order to create most of the greatness that they created in this world. Is that by having the border, by having the separation It gives you the space to really work on things and work on yourself. So why am I teaching this at this point in the year? This should be the last thing I teach. It should be the last thing I teach, guys. The highest lesson in tefillah. You know what the problem is? I have to teach it first because it is the most basic lesson in tefillah. Because tefillah, ultimately, when I introduce the sitter The sitter is going to be nothing more than the ability to help you in this personal connection.
I'm going to show you how the sitter does that. The sitter is supposed to be a weapon. A means that we use in order to help us with our personal connection. But if we don't have a personal connection Forget about connecting to Hashem. If we don't even know what it means to be able to sit. On our own, with our phones off, without a gemara in front of us, even just thinking and contemplating our lives. And being able to reach out to Hashem in personal prayer and starting to work on that relationship. How exactly is the sitter going to help you? How exactly are you ever going to be in aivet Hashem be-emes? You'll do the physical things, you'll do the external things, the mitzvahs and the learning, and everyone could wrap their head around that. But it's not going to be an expression of your connection unless you start working on that connection.
So for me to ignore his vodas in tefillah It's for me to ignore the very foundation of all of tefillah, the very mitzvah doiraisa of all of tefillah. Talking to Hashem in your own words. Being able to do this allows for self-perfection. Being able to do this allows for connection to Hashem, and the Chassidim Arishonim knew this. You know why they never forgot their Torah? How does one forget his Torah? They get distracted. They get distracted. They were always plugged in. You see, they learned their tefila was not a hachzik in their learning. It was not a break in their learning. The break in your learning is when you turn on the phone. Your break in your learning is when you start shoozing with your friend. That's your break. You're learning the Gemara. But when you go from Gemara to Tefillah and then back to Gemara, it's consistent.
There's never a hafzik. There's never a stop. It gets protected because you're plugged in. You're plugged in when you're learning. You're plugged in when you're davening. You're plugged into the Revon Shalom. There's no room for separation. There's no room for forgetfulness. And therefore, I feel compelled that this is something we need to work. Even this early in the year, we always make a joke in yeshiva that we wish the calendar was flipped. Yomim Noraim, Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur should be at the end of the year. Should be like not starting the year. We should have a whole year of learning, then finish the year with Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. That'd be great. Instead of making a banquet at the end of the year, finish it with a Shachar Yom Kippur. All yeshiva together after learning for a full year. And we're starting with Yom Kippur. I just got started in yeshiva. I'm not even really feeling it yet. I'm gonna start with the rush of Yom Kippur.
This is kind of what this is. It's like I'm teaching one of the loftiest lessons in Tefillah that basically says, take your siddur and put it aside for now. Take all the things that you normally associate with your Judaism, your Gemara, your siddur, your Chesed, your whatever it is, and put that aside for the purpose of this year, for this one hour, for a moment, and let's talk about you. Let's talk about God. It's a very uncomfortable conversation. Most people are not comfortable with going there. But I'm telling you from experience: if you start to work on this You will find that every other aspect of your Judaism will become more enhanced, because those are all supposed to be expressions of your relationship with God. You can do all the things that your wife wants you to do. But she will feel so much more love if you actually take the time to feel for her and care about her.
And build your relationship with her. Then all the things you do will be not obligations, but will be an expression of your love. Ultimately, we do everything Hashem wants us to do because azoy zot—that's what it says in the Torah—and we're Jews and we're obligated to do it. We're going to get tschar and einish. We're going to get reward and punishment. But the real motivation that someone should have. The highest level motivation for wanting to do the mitzvahs is Hashem. This is an expression of my love. This is an expression of my feeling. This is my expression of me showing gratitude for you. This is part of what it means to be connected and have a relationship. And therefore, I don't care what the Torah says. If the Torah tells me it's a mitzvah to put my right foot first or my left foot first or scratch my left ear with my right hand, I couldn't care less. If that's what you want through Moshe Shalom, I love you so much. I'm working so much on my relationship with you.
That's what I want to do And a person doesn't even know what the concept, the relationship with Hashem, means. It's not even something I can explain to you. It's something you just have to put yourself out there and you just have to try it and you just have to do it. So I'm going to give you a challenge. Not a small challenge. It's a large challenge. I already gave you a week or so to take five minutes out of your day. To talk to Hashem in your own words. Don't raise your hands. How many of you did it? Less than 10 percent. I know. You know why? Because I'm looking at your faces, and you don't look like people who've been inspired by personal prayer. I don't have that kind of chush. I'm not a meditator. I don't really know where you're holding. But I know.
How do I know? I know most guys don't do these kinds of things. It's uncomfortable. I probably wouldn't if I was you either. Don't feel bad. But this you are going to do. I'm going to hand out a pamphlet that I want you to read. You can start reading it now. There's only 12, 13 minutes left this year. But I'm giving you a mission: I want you to read this by the end of the day. Today One of these pamphlets. There's two parts to this. There's a piece from Lekutet Maran. It's the not you don't have to read the small print on the bottom. Rabbi Nachman's Torah on the importance of Isbodus. Lekutet Maran number 25, Lekutet Tnina, which goes through the concept of Isbodus in English. The second part is from a sefer from Rav Harosh. Who is a big Preslav Rav Who talks a little bit about the practical side of doing hishtadlus.
Remember, I said, Rabbo said The shir has two parts: the shirim and the heavy lifting. The heavy lifting is not reading this, although it's a heavy bunch of pamphlets. The heavy lifting happens tomorrow. Rabbo said tomorrow. It just works out this way. I do the same thing every year. You can ask the guys from last year. It just works out this way that tomorrow I am leading at Uman every morning service. There is officially a tefillah year tomorrow, but I will not be here for it. But it doesn't really matter because the tefillah year just so happens to fall out that the tefillah year tomorrow is the same exercise I do every single year Which is I want you to spend tefillah year trying a hispota session. What does that mean? I want you to have read this already. So before you do it tomorrow during tefillah year after mincha.
I want you to have read this pamphlet already. And then I want you to go find a place away from your friends, away from where anyone can see you. It might take you five or ten minutes to walk there. That's okay; you have time. Find a place in the forest Find a place down the block. I don't even care if you do it going for a walk down the street. Put that little what are those things called? AirPods. AirPods. The modern AirPods. The AirPods. Put that in. So this way, when you're talking, people think you're talking to someone. And I want you to take the time to think and to talk to Hashem. But I want both. I don't want just thinking. I don't want to just talk. Think and talk to Hashem for approximately half an hour. It will take you after mincha, about five to ten minutes to find your place.
Half an hour, thirty-five minutes, forty minutes, and then give yourself a little time to walk back. You can talk on your way back. I'm gonna tell you right now what's gonna happen for most of you. I'll save you the trouble. Here's what's going to happen. You're gonna sit there and draw a blank. Then you're gonna start saying the stuff you always say. Thank you, Hashem, for this. Thank you, Hashem, for that. Help me with this. Help me with that. And after about three minutes of that. You're gonna stare and be like, "Now what?" Don't leave. Sit through it. I don't care if you sit there for a half an hour and have nothing to say. Don't leave because if you can manage to get through that 10-15 minutes of uncomfortability with your situation. It's going to start to happen. If I'm right. I know it's true.
Is then after you get through all the garbage that you say for the first two three minutes. It's not garbage, but it's garbage. It's not real And then you sit there for five, ten minutes. The real stuff is going to start coming. The real stuff, the words that just flow. The thoughts that just enter your mind and can never stop. And then, when that happens, if that happens, if that doesn't happen. At least you tried. You did the homework. You tried it. That's all I'm asking you to do. After this, you never have to do it again. You want to do it again? Do it again. We're finishing with this boat just today. This is really the last year on this boat. I might revisit certain aspects of it. But this is my opportunity to introduce this idea to you. You never do it again. But at least you could say you tried once. I hope you do try it again for at least a few minutes. But something like this to give yourself the time to really be able to go deep down and to express something real. Remember, we're approaching our Shani Yom Kippur. That should also be motivation to be able to talk about real things with Rabbenu Shlomo.
And don't worry about the fact that how do I know I'm talking to him? Maybe I'm talking to myself. Don't get into that headspace. Just don't go there. I'm going to talk about that eventually. Don't worry about that. Whatever you're talking to, you're talking to the Rebbeinu Shlomo. Don't worry about that. And just allow that stuff to flow out. And for those of you that can tap into that And we'll give you the time. We'll sit through it. Don't look at your phone. Don't even take your phone with you. My experience is that at the And for those of you who tap into that, you're not going to say to me, "Wow, that was a long time. I had to sit there. You're going to say to me, 'Rebbe, why so short? Because when you get to that place, it's going to be a struggle for you to only do 40 minutes. It's going to be hard for you to only do an hour.
There are times where, if I'm doing this, I might have an hour and a half or whatever it is, and it takes even me. It takes time to get there. It could take me a good 20 to 30 minutes to really get into things. And then when you do, the hour and a half goes by like nothing. If it wasn't for the fact that my wife was calling, my family needed, I can spend another three hours out there if I needed to. Because that's when you're with In a place of real connection and real connectivity. Time is sort of like in a different dimension. It's not like something that you even. And you guys all know this is true. You guys all, there's things that you love doing. The things that you love doing, whether it's watching a sports game, you could do it all day and you wouldn't even notice the time passing. So when you connect deep into yourself, it's the same thing.
It's literally the same thing. So I would like you to take the time to work on this, and you could work on this. During the break on Rosh Hashanah, you could take the time. Certainly during the break on Yom Kippur, you could do this. You could do this as much as you want. But that I can't require of you. What I am requiring of you is that tomorrow during Tzav Lishir, you don't take the time off. Don't just sleep. Don't just say, "Oh, if I'm not here, I don't have to be here." Try this. Do this. Sit there for the full period. And I look forward to hearing. I'm not going to ask you in shear, but I would like to hear feedback, good and bad. It's helpful to me to hear the feedback as to how the experience was for a pair of us. I'm going to hand these out.
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