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Part I.Hashem is HereHE’STAMEI, HE’STAMEI, HE’STAMEIכל ימי אשר הנגע בו יטמא, טמא הוא, בדד ישב מחוץ למחנה מושבו – “All the days that thetzara’asis upon the person he shall betamei,tameihe should be. He should dwell alone; outside the camp should be his place of residence.” (13:46) When reading thispossuk, we are immediately struck by the repetition of thetameistatus of themetzora, “He shall betamei,tameihe should be” and that requires an explanation.So we’ll say as follows: The root “tum” denotes something that is “closed off”. That’s what the wordtumahmeans, and that is the principle underlying all the laws oftumah. Wherever we findtumahwe must understand that itis a decree of Hashem to teach us what should be avoided and shunned.So we read thepossukas follows: “All the days that thetzara’asis upon the person he shall be ritually unclean” – the first word “tamei” speaks of the status oftumah. He is anav hatumah. It’s information we have to know. It’s a technicality the Torah is teaching us; the basic law that this man istameiand makestameianything that comes in contact with him. But the second expression oftumah, “Tameihe should be,” is giving us thereasonfor thetumahbeing imposed on him; as if to say: “He shall betamei, because Hashem desires that he should beclosed offfrom society.” “He istamei”, because “tamei, shunned and avoided, he should be.”THE LONELY SEDER NIGHTNow that’s something we have to study. Because we’re talking here about afrumJew. He’s a father, a husband, a loyal servant of Hashem who puts ontefillinanddavensthree times a day with aminyan. His home is a kosher home and his children are allfrumboys and girls. He’s one of us! And yet, one morning he wakes up withtzara’as;and now he must take leave of his family and friends and make his way beyond the walls of the city to live alone. This friend of ours, a fellow Jew, is nowtamei; he’s closed off from the rest of Mankind.Badad yeishev– “He shall stay in isolation,” meaning that even othertamei’imare to avoid his company (Rashi ibid.).So our fellow Jew is now sitting alone outside of the walls of his city; and there he will remain until thetzara’asheals. He’ll miss the Shabbosseudoswith his family. He might even be spending the Seder night all alone! And it’s no accident of fate here. The Rambam says thattzara’asis not a natural form of leprosy; it’sa miraculous phenomenon. “Tzara’asis one of the miracles that Hashem provides to His nation” (Moreh Nevuchim 3:47) and that’s why agoycan’t becometameiwithtzara’as(Negaim 3:1).Hashem miraculously sends upon a Jewtzara’as,and now he has to be shunned. And it’s not because of contagion, or merely because he can bemitameiothers – it’s because Hashem wants him to be “closed off” from people. Hashem wants that he should leave themachaneh;that he should separate from society and dwell alone outside of the city.LOOKS CAN BE DECEIVINGAnd that’s because actually this man is a dangerous man; he may appear to be veryfrum, but thegemara(Eirechin 15b) says: כל המספר לשון הרע נגעים באים עליו. “One who speaks wrong words, he uses his mouth in the wrong way, is stricken by leprosy.” And so we understand that this man misused the gift of company of people; when he was healthy he sat around with his friends and wagged his tongue – not only that he ridiculed and belittled other people, but even just to talkd’varim b’teilimis misusing the tongue.And so in the great days ofnevuah, thenegaoftzara’asspoke to this man the word of Hashem: “He shall betamei, and he should be closed off from people and avoided.” He will dwell alone where he won’t have anyone with whom to speak; and now he will begin the study of how a person is to use his tongue, and he will understand thatthe proper way to use a tongue is primarily by not using it.BRING MANUFACTURING JOBS BACK!The Rambam gives us an insight into this: לעולם ירבה אדם בשתיקה– “A person should always beproducinga great deal of silence” (Rambam Hilchos Dei’os 2:4). You hear that? You have to produce silence as much as you can. Imagine you’re producing goods for a certain purpose. Let’s say you’re making toothbrushes, or you’re a tailor and you’re sewing suits. Whatever it is, you’re producing. So you have to keepcheshbon, “How many goods did I produce today?” “Did I do better today than yesterday?” “What could I do different tomorrow in the factory to produce more toothbrushes?” And it’s the same with silence. A man should always beproducingsilence in this world. You have to think about that! “How much silence did I produce today?”And it’s considered a service of Hashem: לך דומיה תהילה – “To you Hashem, silence is praise” (Tehillim 65:2). That’s an interesting idea, because we always understood that theHallelukahsand thebrachosare praise.Ashrei,HoduandModim, that’s how we praise Hashem. And now we’re being told thatkeeping quietis the real way to praise Hashem; to produce silence is actually a career of praising Hashem. And that needs a good explanation.A LESSON FROM THE WISE MANAnd so, who better to turn to than thechochom m’kol adam.Shlomo Hamelech tells us in Koheles (5:1): אל תבהל על פיך – “Don’t be in a hurry to express yourself, ולבך אל ימהר להוציא דבר לפני השם – Your heart, your mind, shouldn’t be in a hurry to say something in the Presence of Hashem”. When you’re sitting at the table with your family, your friends, Hashem is present. So keep quiet! כי אלוקים בשמים ואתה על הארץ – “Hashem is in the heavens and you’re down below on the earth, על כן יהיו דבריך מעטים – Therefore your words should be few”. Oh, now something else comes into the picture;Elokimis now in the picture!Elokimis inshomayim, above you, looking at you. And you’re down on this earth. על כן יהיו דבריך מעטים – “That’s why your words must be few.”If a man opens up his mouth and words flow out without restraint, so it means he doesn’t feel like he’s inanybody’spresence! Let’s say you were standing in the presence of the mayor, or in front of the president of the United States – he’s not such an important person today – but still you wouldn’t talk too much in his presence. You definitely wouldn’t be shooting off your mouth.DO YOU HAVE EMUNAH IN THE PRESIDENT?Now להבדיל אלף הבדלות, if you are talking with thegadol hador,with let’s say Rav Shach, Rav Moshe Feinstein, whoever is thegadol hador, would you talk much? If you have any sense you wouldn’t say a word! Let’s say you meet the Sigheter Rav, you’re standing in front of the Satmerer Rav, and somebody comes over to you, “Hey, Chaim! What time is it?” Would you say, “It’s three o’clock”?! No you keep quiet, you keep your mouth shut; you’re standing in front of yourrebbeh! Lethimtalk; you keep quiet. חכם אינו מדבר בפני גדול ממנו – “Someone withchochmadoesn’t open his mouth when he’s standing in front of somebody bigger than him” (Avos 5:7).So the fact that you keep your mouth closed indicates that you realize that you’re standing in the Presence of Hashem. It’s a demonstration that you possess a sensory perception of the closeness of Hashem; it’s not merely words, theories. Just like you wouldn’t talk in the presence of somebody important, you don’t open your mouth in the presence ofElokim bashomayim.You keep quiet, at least as quiet as you would be in front of the President. At least that! If the President of the United States was standing here, you’d be careful with every word that comes out of your mouth! That means you believe in the President more than you believe in Hashem!THE PECULIAR MAN OF OURPARSHASo now we can understand why thisfrumman is shunned by Hashem, sent out to live in solitude. If he’s hasty with words, if he doesn’t think before he speaks, so he needs to be sent out where he will have time to think about this great principle ofElokimbashomayim. Themetzorahad to cover his mouth, did you know that? It’s an openpossuk:ועל שפם יעטה, it means that he had to wear his cloak in certain way so that it covered his mouth. What for? Because he was proclaiming to the world this lesson! Part of hiskapparahwas to walk around dressed in this peculiar way; and he had to make a lot of noise too: טמא טמא יקרא, wherever he went he had to proclaim to everyone that he’stamei.So here’s a man with his cloak covering half his face, all the way over his mouth, and in his muffled voice he’s crying out: “I’mtamei, I’mtamei!” It was a strange sight, and anyone who saw him took his condition to heart and learned that he’d better get busy covering up his mouth before thenegacomes tohim. And so we gained a lot by seeing ametzorawith his covered mouth.GAINING EMUNAH; A GUIDEWhat we’re learning is that no matter howfruma person is, he has to havehargasha,emunahchushis, that he’s standing in front of Hashem and that’s why he doesn’t talk. What does that mean? Suppose you’re an ordinary Jew who never worked on these concepts; you don’t actually feel the Presence of Hashem. But you’d like to do it; you aspire to become ama’amin. Now, certainly you won’t admit that you’re not ama’amin, but at least you’ll admit that you don’t feel the Presence of Hashem all the time. And so by training yourself not to talk just for this purpose; each time you wish to open your mouth you remind yourself: כי אלוקים בשמים ואתה על הארץ על כן יהיו דבריך מעטים – “Hashem is listening and therefore your words should be few.” And little by little you bring into yourneshamaan awareness of this tremendous principle, and you thereby achieveyiras Hashem.When someone approaches you and makes a remark, don’t be in a hurry to answer. You’d like to talk; you have a wisecrack or a rejoinder, you want to say something. “No. I won’t say it because I’m standing in front of Hashem.” Sometimes you don’t have to answer at all. If someone says something to you, do you have to say something back? Let’s say a cow says moo, do you have to moo back? A dog barks as you pass by, you have to bark back? So if someone speaks to you, unless it’s necessary, don’t say anything. Just listen. Who says you have to answer?And suppose you must answer; sometimes youmustsay something, so you should count your words. You know, some people are like a faucet; they start pouring out all they have. All the emptiness they have in their minds comes pouring out. That means that they’re beingmasiach da’asfrom Hashem. A person must always keep in mind that Hashem is listening. Keeping your mouth closed, and keeping your words few when you do have to speak shows that you haveemunahthat wherever you are Hashem is listening. If you open your mouth and you talk without restraint so it means you think you’re a free bird. It means that you have noemunah,becausebelief in Hashem requires that we should keep quiet. He’s standing right here after all, and He’s listening.Part II.Your New ProfessionEXTRACTING HONEY AND GEMSNow in order to appreciate more this career ofyiras shamayim, we have to see how thegemarain Chullin (89a)darshensapossuk. As a matter of fact, the followinggemarawas once used by the Alter of Slabodkazichronol’vrachaas an illustration of how to appreciate every word of ama’amar chazal.The Alter thought about every word that thechachomimsaid and he sucked as much honey as he could from thema’amar.Thegemaraquotes the followingpossuk: אמנם אלם צדק תדברון – “The truth is, silence is appropriate; only speak righteous words” (Tehillim 58:2). That’s theposhut pshat,butchazaldiscovered some hidden gems in thatpossuk.First I’ll say the words of thegemaraand then I’ll tell you how the Alter explained them: אמנם – מה אומנתו של אדם בעולם הזה – “What is a man’s profession in this world?” From the word אמנם, comesumnus, profession. And thegemaraasks a question: What’s your job here inOlam Hazeh? And thegemarasays that the next word in thepossuk, אלם, that’s the answer: יעשה עצמו כאלם – “Make yourself as if you were a mute, as if you couldn’t speak.” So we read thepossuklike this: אמנם, what’s yourumnus, your profession? אלם, to be a mute. That’s your business in this world.BARUCH HASHEM FOR ACCOUNTANTS!The first thing we see is that man has aprofessionin this world. A “profession” means it’s not justa hobby to keep silent, it’s not even just a good thing, an added perfection. No; silence isyourbusinessin this world; that’s what we came into this world for. Now at first glance that’s hard to understand; because how could everyone have the same profession? If everyone was a shoemaker so we’d all have comfortable shoes, but we’d have to tailor our own pants. Without good Jewish accountants we’d be paying a lot of extra money to Uncle Sam.So what we’re learning now is that whatever you’re doing in your life; that’s only your second job, a side business; you have to pay the bills after all. But your mainbusinessin this world is to bek’ileim, to keep your mouth closed.Now, the Alterzichrono l’vrachamade the point that anumnusis not something that you just pick yourself up and do; you have to train yourself for a profession. It’s necessary to undergo a course of training to learn the skill of silence, just like you would for any other serious profession. If you want to be a plumber, let’s say, so you’ll just put on a pair of blue overalls, grab a wrench and that’s all?!BECOMING A PLUMBER IS NOT EASYNobody ever became a plumber by saying “I decided I’m a plumber.” You’re going to have to roll up your sleeves and get under a sink. And you’ll have to lie there on your back and watch the master plumber for months and months learning all the tricks of the trade. You’ll have to carry his tools for him and you watch: When do you use this tool? When do you open that valve? When do you close it? It’s achochma, and there’s a lot to learn. And if silence is our career in life, that means we have a lot to study.To become a professional mute, you can’t just buy a padlock for fifty cents at the corner hardware store, lock your mouth firmly, and then walk around the street without worries. It’s not that easy. If that’s all it was, it wouldn’t be a profession; it would just be a fifty cent expense and finished. But no it’s a profession, it’s the “profession of a person in this world.”Now the Alter points out something else in thisgemarathat’s worth our attention: It says “What is the professionsheladamin this world?” The profession of anadam! It’sthisprofession, making yourself into anileim, a mute, that will cause you to earn the title ofadam. Anadamis expected not to open his mouth unless it’s justified. And only the one who has mastered this art can boast that he’s made it, that he’s graduated. Otherwise, you’re not anadam. Maybe you’re a croaking frog, or a blue jay; something you are, absolutely; you’re making noise after all. But you’re not yet anadamunless you’ve mastered this career of silence.GET BUSY BANGING YOUR HEAD!Now, what usually happens when I speak on this subject? I’ll tell you. There’s always one idealist who wants to get busy accomplishing. Why not? Rabbi Miller said so! He said it’s a profession foreveryone. A young man who comes here and he’s inspired by the words of theAlter; he’s ready now to make changes! So he goes home after the lecture, and as soon as he walks into the house he hears his mother talking on the phone. So he bangs on the table, “Uh, uh, uh. Nu, nu!” He wants to make sure his mother knows whathernew profession is!So theAltertells us that we have to know how to learn ama’amar chazal.Thegemarasaysya’aseh atzmo– “Makeyourselfinto a speechless person.” Yourself! Oh, that’s a different story already. What are you banging on the table for? Get busy banging onyour ownhead! Don’t bother others!That means when a man comes home to his wife, and he heard my lecture tonight, and now his wife wants to talk, she wants to tell him about what happened with the children today. And also she’s talking about what her sister said and probably some other things as well. So he should let her talk about whatever she wants. He shouldn’t say, “Keep quiet; in this house we work on producing silence.” He’s a dumbbell! He’s working onhersilence!Ya’aseh atzmo!He has to makehimselfanileim; that’s who he has to worry about.TALK TO PAPA!Now this profession, this career we’re speaking about tonight, wouldn’t be so difficult if all you had to do was to buy a padlock. Mazel tov, you’re anileim! But that’s not what Chazal are demanding of you; it doesn’t say you shouldbeanileim, it saysk’ileim, likea mute. You know that the extra letterkafseems like an unnecessary addition. It could have just as well said, “Make yourself into anileim.” What’sya’aseh atzmo k’ileim, make yourselflikea mute?What it means is that youcan’tpadlock your lips shut! You have to make yourselfk’ileim,likea mute,as ifyou can’t speak. You have to talk, and sometimes you have to talk and talk, but you have to talk like somebody who is anileim. If you have to walk through the street, you have to say good morning or good evening to the people you see. You can’t just walk around with a deadpan face ignoring people. Why should your neighbor suffer because you’re learning a new profession?! You come into the home, so you have to walk in and say, “How was your day Chanaleh?” At least that you have to say! You can’t come in and be anileim. A boy comes in from the yeshiva, he can’t walk in quietly and go to his room. He has to say “Vus machstu mammeh?” “How are you Papa?”Somethinghe has to say! He’sk’ileim, not anileim mamish.That’s why thegemarasays,Yachol la’kol –“You might think that once you adopt this practice so you shouldn’t open your mouth foranything.” תלמוד לומר צדק תדברון – “So thepossuksays, ‘Speak righteousness.’” When it comes to words of righteousnessyou have to talk.”DivreiTorahyou have to talk. Words of kindliness you have to talk. If someone is sad and dejected youmustgo over and put your arm around his shoulders and say a few kind words to him.Tzedek tidabeirun. Good things youmustsay!DON’T COMPLIMENT THE CHALLAH…To say words of encouragement to your fellow man, to comfort a fellow Jew, that’s what you have a mouth for, that’s part of your profession. You don’t have to babble though. Think of ways and means of making people happy, by saying a timely word. If it’s a child then sometimes a littlegletton the cheek and a word or two can be a lifesaver. Tell him something that buoys his self respect, something that gives him the ambition to continue improving.If you tell your wife that she cooks well – that’s very important by the way – that’stzedek. You make sure to compliment your wife when she serves you anything: “Chanaleh, this challah tastes excellent.” Now if she bought it at the bakery, make surenotto praise thechallah; find something else to bem’shabeiach. “This chicken soup ism’ein Olam Habah,Chanaleh. Yi’yasheir koi’ach”Now usually itdoestaste good; you can find many things to compliment. Don’t be bashful! It’s not the time to bek’ileim– now it’s time fortzedek tidabeirun.And even if it happens, an unusual incident, when supper is not such a success, if you’ll say it’s excellent, there’s no harm either. Only that most people have it all wrong; when they have what to complain about, then the words come gushing forth, pearls of “wisdom.” But when it’s time fortzedek tidabeirun,then suddenly this “tzadik” remembers his profession of beingk’ileim.PRACTICE MAKES PERFECTIt’s an art. Sometimes you have to talk and talk, but you have to talk like anileim. You’re always careful not to say what you’re not supposed to say. But what you have to say, you must say. So when you come home tonight and your wife says, “What did he say over there?” Don’t say “Ummmmmm.” Say something. Say it briefly but say something. Don’t just keep your mouth closed.K’ileim,likea mute! Oh, now that’s already anumnus. It’s harder than just lying on your back under a sink studying how to plumb!And therefore we should get busy practicing this profession ofshtikahbecause it means that we’re practicing the career ofyirasshamayim! You’re sitting at the table at the Shabbosseudah, and everyone is prattling away. Talking and talking and talking. So what do you do? You say to yourself, “I’m going to train myself now for my profession in this world. I’m going to sit for two minutes – two minutes on the clock – and listenand not open my mouth.”Let’s say you were forced to go somewhere; sometimes you have to go to visit your in-laws in Boro Park. You can’t say no this time. So they’re eatingmelave malkaand everybody is chatting. Or maybe you’re sitting at achasunaand all around you all the tongues are clacking. While their minds are being ground to pieces by the idle chatter, you can grab the opportunity for getting to work on your profession. So you’re paying attention; you’re trying to seem interested, smiling at the right times. But you’re telling yourself, “Chaim, keep the mouth closed. As much as you can keep quiet becauseElokimisbashomayimlistening.”Part III.The Best MedicineVALUABLE HEALTH ADVICENow, to make a career out of silence because ofElokim Bashomayim, that would be enough. That’s our primary obligation in this world – to prepare forOlam Hababy training ourselves to become more and more aware of Hashem. But it’s more than that; it’s also your happiness and success inOlam Hazeh!There’s amishnahinAvos(1:17) that says the following: שמעון בנו אומר, “Shimon, the son of Rabban Gamliel said, כל ימי גדלתי בין החכמים, all the days of my life I grew up among the wise men, ולא מצאתי לגוף טוב משתיקה, and I found nothing better for the body than silence.” Now, if someone on the street would offer you some health advice, I don’t know how valuable it would be; could be it’s worth something, but you never know for sure. But here you have a man who spent years and years sitting at the feet of the sages. “All my days, I grew up among the sages.” And he heard many important ideas, many important attitudes, and he studied them all. And after many years of investigating he came to the conclusion that of all the things that are good for a person, the best one isshesikah,silence.Now if Shimon bequeathed to us this gem, it pays for us to study his words. He said, “I’ve found nothing better for thebodythan silence.” He didn’t say it’s the best for yourneshama; it’s certainlyisgood for your soul too, but Shimon is telling us here that for yourphysical health, there is nothing as good as keeping your mouth closed. If you’re worried about your health, if you’re a person who wants to live a long healthy life, then the first thing to think about is the remedy of silence. סמא דכולה משתוקא – “The best medicine of all is silence” (Megillah 18a).THE CAUSE OF MOST ILLNESSESYou know that most illnesses, most of the disturbances that take place in our bodies, are caused by emotions that have aroused a raw reaction in our bodies. It’s remarkable what a great effect emotions have on a person’s physical nature. We are full of glands and hormones that stimulate the functions of the body; and if the body is overstimulated by emotions like anger, tension, and nerves, then instead of being beneficial, these hormones are harmful.It’s established already in medical science. All over the body there are results that come from wrong stimulation of the emotions. And how are the emotions stimulated most? Talking! Someone says something and you answer back, then you talk and argue, and that’s when the trouble begins. The metabolism is upset and very many people become ill as a result. A world of illnesses are caused by talking. Very many cases of cancer are due to friction in human relationships.YOUR MIGHTY MOUTHA man told me, “Do you know why I’m blind?” A blind man told me this. Because he was so aggravated – these are his words – he was so aggravated because of troubles in the family that he acquired diabetes and became blind. Blindness many times comes from aggravation, from excitation. When people go to an eye specialist one of the first questions they’ll ask you is, “Do you get angry or excited?” Dovid Hamelech said (Tehillim 6:8) עששה מכעס עיני – “My eye became worn out because ofka’as, עתקה מכל צוררי, it grew old because of those who aggravated me.” So if you talk to people and get into arguments, it’s bad for your eyesight. And if it’s bad for your eyes that means that it’s wreaking havoc in your body; it’s bad for everything.Heart failure too! You open your mouth when you could have kept it closed and the heart becomes subjected to too much stress; the valves cannot take it and there’s a breakdown somewhere, a weakness in a valve someplace. Just by talking too much, there’s quarreling, there’s tension, nervous excitement, and your heart is suffering from it. I’m not saying that it happens all of a sudden, but gradually your big mouth is weakening your heart, and then one day,chalilah, it breaks down.WHERE DO PEOPLE DIE?I know of a man who dropped dead in the middle of an argument with his wife. He was a fine man, by the way, a good man. But if he would have studied thismishnainPirkei Avos,he would have known “Don’t answer back!” And that would have saved him; he’d probably still be alive today. Who told you to answer back?! If you can be a diplomat and say something nice, do it. But if not, don’t say anything. He was afrumyoung man – he probably even knew thismishna– but he never studied it, and so he acted according to his nature and he answered back. He said his piece, and she answered back, and it went back and forth, back and forth until he dropped dead.It happens again and again. Don’t you read sometimes in the paper – a certain man, so and so, died of heart failure. Where did his heart attack happen? Did he die in his business because of his competitors? No, people don’t die because of their competitors. Did he die on the street because someone in the street insulted him? People don’t usually die because someone insulted them. He dies at home! People die because of their wives! Of course the newspaper will never say that. The obituary published in the newspapers will never say, “Mr. Anderson dropped dead Sunday night after an argument with his wife!” No, no, it won’t say that! It says, “Mr. Anderson died peacefully in his sleep at his home this past Sunday.” But if you know how to read the obituary pages, so you already know what that means.COMMUNICATION ISSUES?Why didn’t he die at his business? Why at his home? The answer is at home he has a wife, and most people die as a result of words. I’m not saying he’s right – who told him to react?! Who told him to bump his head against a stone wall? Arguing with a wife? Do you know what it’s like? It’s like he’s sticking a needle into her, a real needle. And she’s sticking needles into him. Is that fun? All of their lives they are “needling” each other. Only that his heart, his constitution was a bit weaker than his wife’s. You can’t win an argument! You think you’ll win an argument with your wife?! You’ll never win! The only real way to win an argument is to avoid it. So don’t get excited over nothing. Keep quiet and that’s all. Just keep quiet! And both of you will live longer as a result. And you’ll live happier lives as well.Women call me up; they say, “We have communication issues. My husband doesn’t ‘communicate’ with me.” The trouble isthere’s too much communication! If they wouldn’t communicate so much they’d be much better off; in most cases people will profit by not talking.IGNORE THE BUMIn Mesichta Sanhedrin (7a) it says: טוביה דשמע ואדיש – “Happy is the man who hears people saying things that insult him, that bother him, and he ignores it, חלפוה בישתיה מאה – A hundred evils will pass him by.” Memorize those words; say them to yourself again and again. Learn to ignore any words you don’t like; somebody said something sharp to you, so שמע, you heard it, but אדיש, it doesn’t bother you. Pay no attention; make believe you never even heard it, and you’ll be spared from many troubles. If your husband is mean to you, pay no attention. If your wife is mean to you, pay no attention. And one hundred evils will pass you by. You’ll live together happily for the rest of your life.Most of the time, a punch in the nose is a result of opening up a mouth instead of ignoring. Suppose you’re walking in the street and a bum says something insulting to you. Forget about it! Don’t feel that you have to stand up and defend your honor. Oh no! Don’t do that. I know a man who did that and he got beaten up. Don’t even look at him; it’s dangerous. As far as you’re concerned you didn’t hear it, you didn’t hear anything. Keep walking and in another minute, you’re out of danger.And thank Hashem that you’re able to keep on walking. If it’s a goy who insults you, so you can give him abrachathat he should drop dead. Don’t let him hear you though! Don’t even mutter; don’t say it with your mouth. The mouth always stays closed!CHINESE WISDOM FOR LIFEI was walking in the street once, and twoshkutzim, two young men came over to me and blocked the sidewalk; they didn’t let me go further. I couldn’t walk; I was stuck. So I got out off the sidewalk and I kept going. I didn’t say anything, I didn’t even take a peek over my shoulder. Suppose I looked back and said, “What do you think you’re doing? What right do you have to do that?” Ohhh, what would have happened to me! Don’t be achacham, a hero. I always quote to you the wise Chinese proverb. The Chinamen say “The greatest hero is the one who runs away.” If you ignore and run away you’re a hero. And the one who opens up his mouth is not a hero, he’s a loser.I always say this story; it’s a tragic story. A young man from YU was going onchamisha asar b’shvatoutingto Madison Square Garden. He was with a group of younger boys, achaburahof boys with yarmulkes on, and he was leading them. And two twenty year oldshkutzimwere ridiculing the boys’yarmulkas. Now this young man, he didn’t take the advice ofchazal. At least the Chinese he should have listened to!Instead he looked at the gentile boys with anger and said something. Now agoy bleibt a goy,so theshkutzimwent back to their car, they took out a hammer from the trunk, and they attacked him. They hit him over the head with the hammer and they killed him. He died there on the street,nebach. That’s why it says, “There’s nothing betterfor the bodythan keeping quiet.”HOW TO DEAL WITH HATELet’s say somebody calls you on the telephone and insults you. It happened to me a number of times. People have called the house and cursed me. You know what I did? I didn’t say a word! Not a word! And they hung up. It happened again a few months ago and I knew who it was; I knew. And after that he came into myshulone evening todavenand I didn’t say a word. And it was finished. But once you start up with these people, who knows what’s going to be? A word for a word and it turns into who knows what! There’s no knowing how it’s going to end up! So just grin and bear it.How many people have lost their jobs by talking back to their boss? Sometimes their boss is in a bad mood, so just swallow down what he said and it could be that an hour later he’ll be a good boss. He might even promote you. I had that experience once. In my first position inrabbanus, a man once came into a meeting of the board of directors and he made a grand announcement: He said, “Rabbi Miller, I greeted you last week and you didn’t answer me! You didn’t answer me ‘Good Shabbos.’” He brought it up to the board of directors at a meeting; a complaint against the new rabbi. So the president of the shul came over and asked me about it. Now, it wasn’t true, but I didn’t say anything. I could have opened my mouth, but I remembered thisma’amar chazaland I kept my mouth closed.RABBI MILLER GETS A RAISE!I met this man again and again, he was a shul member, and I was always friendly to him. One day he gets up by the meeting of the board of directors and he makes a motion to give me a raise.Thisman! No one thought of giving me a raise except this one man! Now, had I answered him back it would have never happened. And so I learned the lesson that it “pays” to keep your mouth closed.I’ve seen it all! I’ve watched as people put themselves in danger by opening a mouth. Just because they answered back, I’ve watched good people lose jobs, lose customers. They lost their wives or their husbands, siblings and friends. And sooner or later they lose themselves; they excite wrong reactions in their bodies and they end up sick. Many lose years from their life because of their mouths.THE KEY TO A GOOD LIFEAnd that’s what Dovid Hamelech tells us (Tehillim 34:13-14): מי האיש החפץ חיים – “Who is the man who wants life?” We think it means eternal life, and that’s true; but it’s not the whole truth. There’s more to it: Who wants to livein this world? אוהב ימים – “You’re anoheiv yomim?” You like days, don’t you? You want more and more of them. לראות טוב – “You want to see happiness and good times during those days?” You want to see yourself getting along well with others? You want a successful marriage? You want to see good health? That’s all included inlir’os tov.“Oh,” you say. “That’s me! I want to live long! I want to see good times!”But you don’t! You’re not really interested in trying to live long. You’ll say it, you’ll repeat it, you’ll even sing it, but you don’t think about it. You have to take steps to live long, and one of the most important steps is tokeep the mouth closed. נצור לשונך מרע – “Guard your tongue against evil”. What does “evil” mean? Not only you shouldn’t say derogatory things about people or quarrel with them. The reallashon harais opening your mouth to say stupid things, to chatter and babble and say nothing. The general rule is to keep your tongue on the inside of the mouth and keep the mouth closed; that’s the rule you should follow. If we live according to that, our physical happiness in this world will increase and we will attain a life oflir’os tov,of seeing good times.A MOMENT OF SILENCESo we go back to the great principle that the job of a person in this world is to learn the skill of being quiet, the profession of being like anileim. And before we conclude we’ll listen to the words of a great man, the Vilna Gaon (Igeres Hagra); these words deserve to be remembered by us. שעל כל רגע ורגע – “For every moment, for every minute, שאדם חוסם פיו – that a man muzzles his mouth, זוכה לאור הגנוז – He’ll be rewarded by that secret brilliance, שאין כל מלאך יכול לשער – that no creature, no angel, is capable of measuring its magnitude.”The splendor of reward is so great for one minute of silence! We’re not talking about a whole lifetime of silence; he says there that for everymomentthat you keep your mouth closed, you’ll be rewarded with a splendor, a brilliance that is so great that even an angel is not capable of measuring the magnitude, the extent of its greatness. I know that this is a very extreme statement but the Vina Gaon is a very responsible personality. So it’s not only a profession ofyiras shamayim, and not only is it the best advice for good health and long life, but it’s a career that will reward you beyond your highest dreams.LEARNING THE LESSONAnd so we have to get busy. How can you read about themetzoraevery year, and continue to ignore the lessons for your own life? Even if today we aren’t privileged to see the miraculous hand of Hashem bringingtzara’ason a person, but the lessons remain as applicable today as they were then. When Hashem separated a good man, a loyal frum Jew, from his family and friends, he was expected to learn this lesson of “Elokimisba’shomayimlistening to you … therefore your words should be few.” And we, no less than him, are expected to learn that lesson as well.And so we have to delve into thesepesukimand apply them to our own lives. This man had to cover his mouth; what about me? Am I anadamyet? Am I producing enough silence? Am I succeeding at my profession of making myselfk’ileim? And so when we study thisparsha, we can’t just let it pass by. As often as you can during the day, a minute here and a minute there, you remind yourself that it’s your job to be as silent as you can. Not complete silence –tzedektidabeirun! But as far as everything else we will try to be as careful as possible and remember that לך דומיה תהילה, to You Hashem silence is praise, and thereby we gain the great reward of Hashem, a reward unknown even to the angels. 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Part I.You’re a JudgeTHE WEALTHY MAN AND THE PAUPERIn this week’sparshathere’s amitzvahof בְּצֶדֶק תִּשְׁפֹּט עֲמִיתֶךָ – “You should judge your fellowman withtzedek, with righteousness” (Kedoshim 19:15). Now, in its most simplepshatwhat that means is that if you’re a judge, if you’re adayanin thebeis din, so you must always be on guard that your first inclination, your emotions, shouldn’t be the reason for your decision. Don’t allow any superficial thoughts to lead you to conclusions; instead you must be careful to follow thedinof the Torah in all its details.Let’s say you’re a judge and now there’s a poor man standing before you; he’s one of the two litigants who came to thebeis din. Now, you’re a compassionate man after all – so you might say, “This poor fellow has a tough life – and I should go now and make him guilty and make it even worse?! Let me give him a break!” “No,” says Hashem, “Don’t do that”: לֹא תִשָּׂא פְנֵי דָל – “Don’t follow your superficial emotions in the courtroom and try to give an edge to the poor man” (ibid.).On the other hand, sometimes it might be a wealthy man, somebody important, and so your inclination might be to judgehimmore favorably. After all, he’s much more impressive, this well-heeled fellow, and just seeing him in his four hundred dollar suit makes his arguments seem stronger. “Nothing doing!” says Hashem: וְלֹא תֶהְדַּר פְּנֵי גָדוֹל – “Don’t show any preferable honor to an important person” (ibid.) If you’re a judge, it has to beb’tzedek. You have to follow the strict letter of the law; whatever Hakadosh Baruch Hu prescribes in the Torah. That’s the job of adayan– he has to subjugate his feelings, his emotions, to what Hashem expects him to think, and topasken b’tzedek.AN ADDITIONAL LAYERNow all of this appears to be irrelevant to us here. It’s an admonition todayanimwho sit in a court, but for us ordinary people, it doesn’t seem to apply at all. Where does thismitzvahofb’tzedek tishpot amisechacome into our lives? It could be that one or two of you will one day study the intricate details ofChoshen Mishpat, all thedinei mamonos, and you’ll get a certainsemicha, ‘yadin yadin’.And once you receive that permission to judgedinei mamonosso besides for all thedinimyou’ll have to know, you’ll also have to always remember these words of the Torah: בְּצֶדֶק תִּשְׁפֹּט עֲמִיתֶךָ – “Don’t let your emotions get the best of you when you’re sitting in judgement in thebeis din.” But for most of us it’s not applicable at all.However, that’s not the full meaning of thepossuk. There’s an additional layer of meaning in those words that we’re going to study tonight, and it’s amitzvahthat applies to all of us,all the time.InMesichta Shevuos(30a) the sages tell us that בְּצֶדֶק תִּשְׁפֹּט עֲמִיתֶךָ is also teaching us as follows: עַם שֶׁאִתְּךָ בַּתּוֹרָה וּבְמִצְוֹת הִשְׁתַּדֵּל לְדוּנוֹ יָפֶה יָפֶה – A person who is with you in Torah and mitzvos, bemishtadeil, put effort into judging him favorably” (Shevuos 30a). It’s what we learned in Mesichta Avos: הֱוֵי דָּן אֶת כָּל הָאָדָם לְכַף זְכוּת – “You, every single one of you,should make sure to judge your fellow Jew with righteousness.”L’kafzechusmeans that you have to ignore thekaf chov, the side of guilt,and instead go out of your way to judge your fellow manl’kaf zechus, to the side of merit.DON’T BE A COW OR A LIBERALAnd what that means is thatevery personis a judge – it can’t be helped. As soon as you see somebody, you’re forming opinions. You can’t avoid it! If you were a cow,chas v’shalom, so you’d be able to go through life without thinking, without judging; but if you’re anadamthen you’re already adayan.Don’t be a liberal and say “Oh no, I don’t judge anyone; I would never do that!” It’s not true! You’realwayspassing judgement on people; don’t think otherwise. You’re judging your wife or your husband all the time! Why did he do this? Why didn’t she do that? Why did he say this or that? You’re judging your neighbors all the time! Why did he block my driveway? Why does he let his son ride his bike on my lawn? You’re judging your children all the time! And your co-workers, and yourchavrusa, and the people in shul, and the Rav of your shul. You’re even making judgements about strangers who pass you by on the street! You’rea full timedayan.And even though you’re not publicizing your decision, you’re not telling anybody what you’re thinking, nevertheless, Hashem isyireh l’leivav, He sees what’s going on in your thoughts. And so in the eyes of Hakodosh Boruch Hu, you’re acting as adayan. And so, if you want to succeed in your “career ofdayanus”, you had better get busy purifying your thoughts as much as possible, and doing whatever you can to make sure that you’re judging those around you favorably all the time.WE’RE OBLIGATED TO DRILLNow, if you’re paying attention you’ll note that themitzvahבְּצֶדֶק תִּשְׁפֹּט עֲמִיתֶךָ is a source for two seemingly contradictoryhalachos. On the one hand, the Torah is obligating a judge to issue his verdict on the basis of absolute justice, in strict accordance with the law. And yet, these same words are teaching us that outside thebeis dinwe are obligated in themitzvahהֱוֵי דָּן אֶת כָּל הָאָדָם לְכַף זְכוּת -“Judge your neighborfavorably,” which means that we are obligatednotto be strict and instead to do our utmost to justify the actions and behavior of our fellow Jews.And it’s the resolution to this apparent contradiction that will provide us with the tools we need to be successful at beingdan l’kaf zchus.Because whatb’tzedek tishpotreally means is that we expect from adayanin the courtroom not to be fooled by superficialities. So what of it if he’s a poor man dressed in rags?! Who cares if he’s mumbling or stuttering when presenting his claim?! And if he’s a wealthy man, if he’s dressed in a tailored suit and he’s so impressive looking – so what?! Are you going to pass judgement on the basis of such a shallow thing?! With half-baked ideas you’llpaskenon aYisroel?!Chas v’shalom! Thedayanis expected to ignore the veneer of superficialities and drill down to the core of justice – he’s expected to bedan din emes la’amito.It’s not easy for adayanto see past the superficialities in the courtroom. It’s not easy to ignore what’s right in front of his eyes – it’s there; it’s so real and concrete. What he sees in the poor man is real! What he sees in the wealthy man is obvious; it’s so tangible! And so, it’s very hard to push it all away, to ignore it completely, and come to the right decision. And yet, as difficult as it might be, that’s the obligation ofb’tzedek tishpot amisecha.WE HAVE A BIG JOB!And outside of the courtroomwe’reexpected to do the same! We have that same obligation outside thebeis din; absolutely. In all of your contacts withamisecha, with your fellow Jews – the ones you like as well as the ones you don’t like as much – you’re expected to ignore the superficial things that bother you and instead you’re obligated to drill down to the core of the person and judge him favorably. And that means that we all have a big job ahead of us! Because it means thatyou have to think!So don’t be lazy about it! Nobody said it’s easy; you might have to take a minute or two to think, but you have to do it. You’remichuyavto think, to search your mind for the answer that satisfies you, until you can give your fellow man the benefit of the doubt and walk away without anyhakpadahin your heart.WHO WILL CRITICIZE THE GREAT MAN?Let’s say your wife says a sharp word to you – it happens sometimes. So instead of getting upset, instead of being hurt, you’re obligated – it’s amitzvah d’oraisah– to search for reasons to give her the benefit of the doubt. First of all, maybe you deserved it – it could very well be you deserved to hear some criticism. Absolutely! When a wife criticizes a husband, you should know that she is doing a very great thing. Nobody will criticize this great man. Who’s going to tell him the truth outside the house? And after a while he begins to think, “Maybe I really am great.” So he comes home and right away his wife deflates him. She puts a pin in his balloon and it bursts. That’s a tremendous achievement. It’s a perfection to be cut down to size once in a while. And so, you can forget about being upset at her; you should thank her.And let’s say she was wrong – you didn’t deserve to be told off at all. So you’ll be a failure and judge your spouse because of something superficial; she criticized you; so what?! In two minutes she’ll forget what she said. You’re going to judge her because of that?! Maybe she was up all night with a crying baby while you were sleeping soundly. Maybe she had an impossible day with the children. Whatever it might be, you’re obligated to seek to justify what your fellow Jew does or says by giving him or her the benefit of the doubt.MEASURE FOR MEASURENow inMesichta Shabbos(127b) there is a statement which has to be examined by us if we want to understand this subject more thoroughly. Thegemarathere states as follows: הַדָּן אֶת חֲבֵרוֹ לְכַף זְכוּת הַמָּקוֹם יְדִינֵהוּ לְכַף זְכוּת – “If you judge your fellow man on the side of merit, somiddah k’neged middah, Hakodosh Boruch will judge you favorably.”Now, those words are somewhat difficult for us to understand. Because up until now we learnedpshatin beingdan l’kaf zechuslike this:if a person did something, and you’re in doubt – it’s possible that he meant well, it could be; but it also could be that he did it for a wrong reason, that’s also a possibility. It’s asafek, a doubt, so it’s amitzvahto judge him favorably. You should be charitable and give him the benefit of the doubt.But if judgingl’kaf zechusonly means that you’re obligated to give others the benefit of the doubt, then when thegemarasays that Hashem will pay you back in turn, it means that when Hashem is in doubt about you, He will judge you favorably. But how could we say such a thing? What sense does it make to say that Hashem isdan l’kaf zechuswhen He’s in doubt,chas v’shalom? Doubt?! He’s never in doubt about you! Hakadosh Baruch Hu knowsexactlywho you are. You can’t give the benefit of the doubt when there’s no doubt at all.LEARNING A NEW ATTITUDEAnd so we’re forced to learn another layer in thepshatof what it means to fulfill themitzvahofb’tzedek tishpot amisecha, and we’ll say as follows: To bedan l’kaf zchusis actually much more than learning how to clarify a doubt – it’slearning an attitudein dealing with other peoplethat leaves no room for doubt altogether! What that means is that we’re expected to acquire themiddahof seeking out the positive in people; to be a חָפֵץ בְּטוֹבָתוֹ שֶׁל חֲבֵרוֹ, to want only good things for the people around us, and thereby train ourselves to see only good.When you appreciate people by focusing on theirma’alos, so you begin to actually like them and want them to be azaka’im –you want them to be free of all faults, to always be good. If youwanta person to be azakai– if youactually desireto look at people favorably – so you’ll find ways to explain his actions in a way that it should be az’chus. And even when you can’t do that, you’ll appreciate his otherma’alosso much, that it will weigh down the scale to thekaf z’chusand you’ll overlook the negative. “Who cares about that?! It’s only anarishkeit,” you’ll think. “I love that man!”“Oh,” Hashem says, “You want him to be azakai? So I want you to be azakaitoo.” And when Hakadosh Baruch Hu wants things to be good for you, you can be sure He has ways of accomplishing that; He has His ways. And so when you train yourself to look at the good, to overlook the superficial things that may bother you, somiddah k’neged middah, Hashem treats you the same way.THEY ONLY WANT DIRT ON THE PRESIDENTNow, in order to judge somebodyl’kaf zechus, if you want to succeed in seeing people aszaka’im, so you’re going to need training in becoming anoheivtzedek;you have to love to see people in a good light. You know, when people love to see trouble in the world, so they pick up the newspaper to see what crimes were done. No one is interested to see if somebody did a good thing; if somebody kept the law let’s say, or if somebody helped his fellow man. That doesn’t matter – they wouldn’t put that in a newspaper. “Who was caught doing something embarrassing?” “What new faults did they dig up in the President today?” That’s news! That’s what people want to hear.To say that here we have a President who is a decent man, who minded his own business – I’m talking about Reagan now – that he didn’t want to put big taxes on you and that he wanted to protect the country from the Soviet Union, that they won’t speak about. They won’t tell you that President Reagan didn’t mix into other people’s business. To say that he didn’t try to push theMedinas Yisroelinto making agreements with Arabs, no, that they won’t talk about.He wasn’t pressing anybody; he just wanted to keep Americans safe and wealthy. He was a quiet man and he was good natured and smiled to everybody. But that wasn’t good enough for the journalists, for themeshuganehliberals. No, that’s no good at all, nothing doing. “Reagan, no good!” “Reaganomics, no good!” “The Reagan years were the worst years! He’s no good at all.” Always looking for faults.A PRACTICAL PROGRAMAnd therefore the program for success is to rise above all the faults that you have the tendency to see in people, and to see thetzad zchus, the other side of the scale. Now, I know it’s not easy to think, to always be using your mind – it’s a burden – it’s much easier to make judgments on what you see superficially. But Hakodosh Boruch Hu says that you have to make up your mind to get along with anymeshugas, anything that you think is an idiosyncrasy, that you think is unreasonable. And so you have to, as much as possible, ignore all the faults you imagine you see because that’s what the Torah requires of you; to judge a person by hiskaf zchus,and to overlook thekaf chov.It’s so important to develop an appreciation of the good qualities of the people around you. I’ll give you a practicaleitzahfor accomplishing this – aneitzahthat’s been tried and tested. One of the most practical programs for success in this endeavor is to attach a goodmiddah, ama’aleh, to all the people you know. Your friends, your neighbors, your coworkers, everyone hassomethingthat makes them special. I had a rebbe once, a great rebbe, and he once told us that a person is not one thing, he’s a bundle of things. It was sixty years ago that I heard him say that and I remember it like yesterday. “A person is not onemiddah,” he said, “He’s a bundle ofmiddos.” So one thing might be not good, but something else is good in him.YOU’LL BE SURPRISED AT WHAT’S IN THE BUNDLEAnd so when we see the man in shul who is a nuisance, the one who gets on people’s nerves, wedon’tsee that. Instead we look for thema’alos, for thekaf zchus. He pays the electric bill for the shul. Quietly, without anybody knowing, he pays the bills for the shul. Now, when I see this man, I see the man who pays for the air conditioner; the man who pays for the lights.That’swhat I see and I don’t see anything else! Because our job in this world is to ignore the more difficult parts of the bundle and focus on only the good parts. And once you begin to look at people and see them only with theirma’alos, that’s your ticket to overlooking the superficialities of the things that would bother you, and fulfilling the mitzvah of beingdan l’kaf zchus.Now, if you’ll try to think about a person’smiddos tovos,you’ll be surprised there isn’t a person who doesn’t have good in him.Among theshomrei Toraheverybody has good qualities. In thismiddahhe could be excellent, whereas somebody else is excellent in a differentmiddah.So in case you can’t love the person entirely, love at least one aspect of his personality.Let’s say hedavens well.Love him for that. It says that Hashem is “oihevtzadikim.” Why does Hashem lovetzaddikim?Because they give Himkavod?!They pay him money?!No; He loves thembecause they’retzaddikim; they daven, they learn, they dress withtzniyus. So you can love them too! You see atzaddikthatdavens well. Love that man just because of that! In your eyes, from now onthat’swhat you see when you see him. Another person learns well.Another person givestzedakah.Another person is quiet and well behaved.Find what you can in each person and you’ll be surprised.You’ll be very surprised; people are full of good things. And that’s the only thing you should be looking at.PLANT THE SEEDSTheshomrei Torah,no question that they’re full of good things. They’re raising up families of children who will beovdei Hashem. They’re upholding theshulsand theyeshivoswith their money, with their participation.They themselves aremekayeim mitzvosevery day.There are many reasons why you should love these people. And Hakadosh Baruch Hu loves them for that, so with a little bit of thought you could do the same.Try to like him because of hisma’alos– whatever they are – and little by little it will enter into your heart and you’ll gain a certain warmth towards that person.And that warmth as little as it is, it’s a tremendous achievement.That’s why we came to this world.To learn to be happy with, to see favorably all kinds of people – even theba’alei ga’avah,andthe ka’asanim,and the nuisances; everybody!We’re learning now that themitzvahofb’tzedek tishpot amisechais really a program for life; and it requires planting the seeds of loving your fellow Jew in your mind, of seeing thema’alos– of seeingonlythe positive- of the people around you. It’s not easy; I understand that. But even if you’ll achieve only ama’shehu, a small fraction of this avodah, it’s a tremendous perfection of your character. And the more you plant and nurture the proper thoughts in your mind, the more you’re won over, and the more you’ll be able to fulfill thismitzvahin all of your encounters throughout your life.Part II.How to JudgeTHE JEWS YOU BARELY NOTICENow, thepossukdoesn’t sayb’tzedek tishpot es ‘your wife’ or ‘your neighbor’ or ‘the nuisance in shul’; it saysamisecha, ‘your nation’. “B’tzedek tishpot amisecha”means that “you should judge your fellow Jews– all of them –favorably.” עַם שֶׁאִתְּךָ בַּתּוֹרָה וּבְמִצְוֹת הִשְׁתַּדֵּל לְדוּנוֹ יָפֶה יָפֶה – “A person who is with you in Torah andmitzvos, bemishtadeil, put effort into judging him favorably” (Shevuos 30a). If he’s a loyal Torah Jew, then you have to judge himb’tzedek. Thereshaimwe leave out; it’s not our business now. Beingmilameid z’chuson wicked people, that I’ll leave to somebody else, somebody bigger than I am. But the great mass of frum Jews, we’re obligated to look at them all with favor.So what do we do now with the wholeAm Yisroel– people you pass on the street that you’ve never even thought about, frum Jews that you barely notice? All thosefrumJews are your brothers and Hakadosh Baruch Hu expects you to have a certain attitude of beingdan l’kaf zchuswhen you see them.It’s amitzvahmin hatorah. Amisechadoesn’t mean this man right here who is a good friend of yours; it means all of all the frum Jews. And that means that even the people we don’t know; the strangers we pass on the street, the unfamiliar people we see in shul, everyone from theAm Yisroel, we’re obligated to see them in a good light. If he’s a loyal Torah Jew, if he’samisecha, then you have to judge himb’tzedek.But we’ll say here that the wordamisechais doing much more than including all of thefrummeh; what it does is give an impetus, a dynamo, forhowto fulfill the mitzvah. Because if you train yourself to look at all of your fellow Jews as the עַם שֶׁאִתְּךָ בַּתּוֹרָה וּבְמִצְוֹת, as your comrade in arms – you’re on the same team after all – so you begin to develop a favorable attitude towards all of theAm Yisroel.TAKE A TRIP TO BORO PARKThis is a remarkable opportunity for success in this world. It’s something you can practice all the time in the street. You see a fellow Jew, so what should you think? “He’s my brother, this man. He puts ontefillinafter all. That’s enough!” When you see a Jew in the street with a covered head, whether it’s a black hat or a yarmulke, or a woman with a sheitel, you’re already sold out to that person. “He covers his head like me! He’s ours. He’s wearing a yarmulke, a cap, whatever he has, if he covers his head, he belongs to us.”I don’t care what kind ofyarmulkehe wears, he’s still my brother. And even though he follows a different Rebbi, or a different set of political objectives, nevertheless, don’t lose sight of the fact that, fundamentally,hebelongs to your peopleand that therefore you’remichuyav, you’re obligated, to think well of him. This alone that he isamisecha, that he is on your team, that should be enough for you to always look at him with favor,l’kaf zchus.Let’s say you’re walking in a far-off neighborhood, in Bedford Stuyvesant let’s say, where there are no Jews. And suddenly you see from a distance a man with ayarmulke. Ayarmulke! It’s exciting! So you feel a warmth towards him; it’s abrother, achaver. And it’s true; heisyour brother.But it’s a mistake to think that it’s a thought you only have when you’re in an Italian neighborhood or a colored neighborhood. In a strange neighborhood maybe you’re happy to see a fellow Jew because you feel safer that way. But that’s how you should think when you walk in Boro Park. Boro Park! Bigmezuzos,and everybody has beards andpayos. It’s a neighborhood ofamisechaso you should practice feeling warmth towards everyone on the street. I told you once before – if you have some time, I think it’s worth it to go to Boro Park and just stand there for a half hour appreciating the frum Jews. You watch as they walk back and forth, back and forth, and you’re thinking, “These are my people, and I love them all.” It’s worth every second.THE WORLD IS GOING CRAZYNow all this is work, but Hakadosh Baruch Hu expects that work. Otherwise, you’ll remain a person who sees only faults all of his life. Because when people have that attitude, when they’re looking for faults, so Hakadosh Baruch Hu says, “You’ll succeed,” and that’s what they find. Not only do they find faults in people, but they find trouble too. That’s what happens in this world. The natural tendency is to see the imperfections in people, and all the good, thekaf z’chus,is ignored.Constantly today people can’t get along with each other because they aredaneach otherl’kaf chova.If you’re a rabbi, you’ll sit at the telephone and it’s always ringing. Husbands and wives are fighting all the time today. And in some places – a man told me he was in a certain community; I don’t want to say where it was – and he said that there are divorces, and divorces and divorces. Among Jews! What’s doing here? The world is going crazy; everybody’s fighting.THE HUSBAND WHO IS ONLY TROUBLENow when you speak to them, you see right away that nobody has ahavahaminaof beingdan l’kaf zchus.Nothing doing! Onlythemselvesthey judge favorably. I spoke to a couple of women today. They called me up to tell me that their husbands are no good at all.I said, “Is he working?” “He works.” “Does he bum around?” “He doesn’t bum around.” “Is heshomer mitzvos?” “He’sshomer mitzvos.” “Does he give you money?” “He gives me money.”“So what’s the trouble?” I said. “Oh, he’sonlytrouble,” she says. He does this wrong, he says this wrong, he acts like this and like that – a whole laundry list she’s reading off to me. “He’s so mean to me; he’s inhuman,” she said. Now, if I askhimI’m sure he’ll give me a report about his wife. She doesn’t do her work. She’s nagging me; this and that. And I’m sure that everybody’s right. A little bit everybody is right. Butthey’re all wrongbecause they’re all sinning against this great quality which Hashem said you should try to gain – to judge your fellow manl’kaf zechus– to ignore the faults of people and train yourself to focus only on their good qualities.FORGET THAT HE FORGOT YOUR BIRTHDAY!When she thinks about her husband, she should think that he goes to work every day. He’d like to sit home instead. He’d like to go thebeis medrashto learn and instead he’s wasting his life in the shop where he’s working. It’s a great pity on him, but he’s doing it out of loyalty to his family. And she should think, “Look, my husband is anish ne’eman.” He works hard by day and then he comes home at night. There are so many loafers today in the world, unfortunately. Some people loaf around in Brooklyn and then they take a vacation from loafing to go to Atlantic City to loaf some more. The frum loafers, they go toshtiblachto loaf; they sit inshtiblachand open agemaraand get busy loafing – he doesn’t learn a word. You ask him, “Why don’t you get a job?” he says, “תּוֹרָתוֹ אֻמָּנוּתוֹ”, he says, “Myumnessis learning.” What he means is that “Loafing is myumness.”Butyourhusband is a decent man. He’s working, supporting his family; he’s giving away his life. His life! And the wise woman appreciates that. When she sees her husband walking up the steps to the door, that’s what she sees – the man who comes home and he gives her money she needs and she appreciates that. She should think, “I love that man! He’s working all day long to support my children.” “I admire my husband thetalmid chochom.”She doesn’t see that he opened his big mouth last night and said something stupid. She doesn’t see the man who forgot it was her birthday. She’s overlooking thekaf chovand she’s beingdanhiml’kaf zchus.CHOLENT FOR THE MINDThat’s your job in this world – to look for the good in each person. You’re going to say that you can’t find good in your wife?! You can’t find good in your husband?! Come on; come on!That’s nothing but wickedness!And Hakadosh Baruch Hu pays the wickedness with wickedness; they seeonlyfaults and they suffer as a result.Every man has a tendency to have complaints against his wife – it’s only natural; you’re living together and your tendency is to see the faults of a person. But theavodahwe’re learning now is to train yourself to always see thekaf zchusand to let the good side of the scale outweigh thekaf chov. Awise man understands that his wife is important; that she’s raising the children, and feeding the family. Not only does she fulfill her duties in the home; sheisthe home! But it’s not enough to know that in general terms – he has to study the details of that so that whenever he sees his wife,that’s what he sees!Let’s say your wife made for you acholent. Don’t say, “It’s nothing; it’s just food.” For the wise man, for the one who wants to bedan l’kaf zchus, even acholentis enough to win him over. If you think about it, your wife gave you cooked potatoes; but not only potatoes, she knows how to make it brown and tasty. She added in onions for you, and barley and beans too. It’s a whole meal that she prepared for you. And if while you’re sitting there and enjoying it, you think about that wonderful thing that she did for you, so it will become part of your personality. Not only does it go into your body – it becomes your hair and your bones and your eyes –but it goes into your mind.Your wife should be a different person in your mind after a goodcholent. And after every supper she becomes even more and more precious in your eyes.DON’T STOP THE DRILLINGThat’s how you should think about these things; the appreciation for the food she made for you should fill your mind at the same time it’s filling your stomach. Now, I’m just giving one little example. There’s no end to the appreciation you should be feeling for your wife; itsmamishendless. And once a person begins to think in these terms, he’ll find ways and means of assessing the importance of his wife in his life, the happiness that she’s giving him by taking care of the children and the house, and for what she creates in the kitchen. It’s an endless happiness that she brings to your life.And so you have to train yourself – it won’t happen by itself. So you see your wife you should say to yourself, “I love that woman over there.” You see her on the street from far away, she goes shopping, and now you see her coming back carrying shopping bags, so you say, “I love that woman over there, carrying home the food for my children.”Only that what happens? The husband ignores all the good that his wife does and he sees only the superficialities – she nagged him, she complained, she wasted money – he never drills down past the superficial things to the core of what his wife really is, and what she means to his life. And same thing with the wife – to be adan l’kaf zchusshe has to be adayanwho ignores all the superficialities of theba’alei din, and focuses only on the truth to fulfill themitzvahofb’tzedek tishpot amisecha.CANCEL THE THORNNow, I only mention a husband and wife because it is the most common interaction and the home is a great opportunity for perfection – but that’s how you should train yourself to look ateveryone, by focusing only on the good; even small things. You must look for good things. No question, everyone has good things. And even if one thing might not be the best, something elseisgood. And your job in this world is to ignore the more difficult parts of the bundle and focus on only the good parts.Here’s a man isroidef achar hakavod, he loveskavod. He’s aba’al ga’avah,he thinks much of himself. Naturally, that’s what sticks out at you – it’s a thorn in your eyes. And it will remain that way forever unless you cancel out thekaf chovby focusing on thekaf zchus. And if you’ll look you’ll find a lot of good! But if you’re busy looking only for what’s wrong, you’ll find that too and that’s how you’ll remain a failure.And the truth is that once you start looking, you’ll discover, you’ll find all types of good qualities. And that’s themishpat tzedek,the righteous judging that Hashem wants from you.בְּצֶדֶק תִּשְׁפֹּט עֲמִיתֶךָ – You should judge your fellow man withtzedek, by focusing only on thetzedek. You’re a judge all the time, and if you’re anoheiv tzedek, so you love to find good things in people, and that’s how you follow the program of Hakadosh Baruch Hu.THE MOST INTERESTING THINGNow, you have to know how to look at your fellow Jews – it’s anavodah! First of all, look at his face, and remind yourself that it’stzelem Elokim. Isn’t that reason enough to honor him and to think well of him?Hakadosh Baruch Hu gave that reason! He said, “The face of a man resembles Mine” (Bereishis 9:6).It’s not an accident. Every person you look at is atzelem Elokim.It’s a beautiful sight, the human face. Look at a person’s face. Eyes! Eyes are so expressive, so beautiful. You can see theneshama,you can see intelligence shining out of the eyes. Even the cheeks, the way the cheeks move, a smile or sadness; it’s expressing emotions.The nobility of the human countenance is unequal.In the entire universe, there’s nothing like it – if you’ll travel, let’s say, to the far off countries; if you’ll climb mountains and search the vast wilderness, you’ll never see anything in the universe as interesting as a human face.Now how to explain that, that’s a different subject. It’ll take us a lot of time to understand that. But we have to at least practice it up – it’s in the Torah after all.So when you look at the face of a fellow Jew, the very first obligation is to think that you’re seeing something very very impressive.Only that we’re very far away from theruach haTorah.The spirit of the Torah declares that when you look at the face of a fellow Jew, you should be very much impressed. Now don’t tell me, “Oh, it’s exaggerated.You’re blowing up, making a whole story out of nothing.” It’s in the Chumash! כִּדְמוּתוֹ – that’s the resemblance of Hashem. And Hakadosh Baruch Hu insists that we should learn the Torah and get into our heads, that when you’re looking at the face of a person, you should think that you’re seeing thetzelem Elokim.Men look in a men’s faces, and women look in women’s faces.And when you look, the first thing is to think, “Tzelem Elokim.”And no matter how much you’ll think, you should know, you’re not thinking enough.Don’t say, “I’m maybe overdoing it.”You’re alwaysunderdoing it! And even if you spend years of this effort, you should know, you haven’t reached the standards that Hakadosh Baruch Hu expects in appreciating what it meanstzelem Elokim.THE GREATNESS OF TALL SKINNY JEWSSo now you have what to be busy with.Instead of thinking what faults you can find in people – he has a comical face; he talks too much; he’s tall and skinny; he’s short and fat – instead of looking for things to ridicule, you have to get busy now looking at thetzelem Elokimin his face. If you can’t do it with all the people around, then start one at a time. You’re standing on the street and looking at your fellow Jews walk by and you’re thinking, “Tzelem Elokim, tzelem Elokim, tzelem Elokim.”Now I understand that these words don’t find an echo in your mind immediately. But you must understand that Torah must be learned; it’s Torah after all. There’s a lot of work to be done and don’t think you can shirk it. It’s expected of us that we should plant this seed in our minds and as the years go by it will take root and it will grow branches and fruit.Of course it’s artificial; in the beginning you’ll be a hypocrite, but הַחִיצוֹנִיּוּת מְעוֹרֶרֶת אֶת הַפְּנִימִיּוֹת.We make an attempt, and after a while, the spark will be kindled in your heart.הַבָּא לְטַהֵר מְסַיְּעִין לוֹ – Hakadosh Baruch Hu will give you assistance and you’ll gain a certain appreciation ofamisecha, the Am Yisroel.Now once you understand the greatness oftzelem Elokim– you don’t yet, it’s a tremendous idea; a skyscraper – but there’s another skyscraper that’s even greater than that one. ThemishnainAvossays (3:14)that while it’s true that all of humanity is blessed withtzelem Elokim,but there’s one nation in the world that is praised with an even greater title. It says חֲבִיבִין יִשְׂרָאֵל שֶׁנִּקְרְאוּ בָּנִים לַמָּקוֹם – “How beloved areYisroelwho are called the children of Hashem.” A child of Hashem! Now, that’s something!The first skyscraper oftzelem Elokimgoes up to the skies, but this skyscraper goes all the way up to Hashem. “How beloved areYisroelwho are called children of Hakodosh Boruch Hu.”TORAH OR GARBAGE?We’re accustomed to saying, “We’re all children.” Let’s say the reform Jews get together on a stage with the NAACP, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and they say, “We stand in solidarity with our African American brothers because we’re all children of the same G-d.” That’s not Torah – it’sgarbage. Nobody is the children of Hashem except for theAm Yisroel.בָּנִיםאַתֶּםלַהַשֵּׁם אֱלֹקֵיכֶם –Youare children of Hashem and nobody else, and make no mistake about it.Now, we don’t care what the world says – they’ll say it’s chauvinism; maybe so, but we stick by the Torah, and the Torah says thatonly weare the children of Hashem.Suppose a man comes to see you. “I noticed that you married my cousin.”So you ask him, “Who are you?” “I’m the son of therosh yeshivaof Ponovezh,” he says. “Oooh-wha!I didn’t know I got such amechutan!Therosh yeshivaof Ponovezh became mymechutanby marriage.” You’re excited over him; he’s the child of somebody great! But you can tell him, “I’m the son of somebody greater.I’m the son of Hakadosh Baruch Hu.”He jumps up!“You’re the son of Hakadosh Baruch Hu?!”“Yes, I am”, you say.“It’s in the Chumash, בָּנִים אַתֶּם לַהַשֵּׁם אֱלֹקֵיכֶם.”THE VERY HEAVY JEWWe’reexpectedto think that way.It’s not written inPirkei Avosfor nothing.Chavivin Yisrael! We are the beloved ones! Now when it says we’re beloved, it doesn’t mean that Hashem likes us like we let’s say, like a second cousin or a nephew. It’s much more than that; it means He loves every single one of us more than anything else in the entire world.And we’re told this for an important purpose. And that is because we’re expected to think that way about every single Jew.Not in general, in a way that’s abstract. Yes, that you’re willing to say: “In general, on all Jews, I can saychavivin. I can love theAm Yisroelin general. But when it comes to this Jew, not this one. And that one? No, not him either.” And that’s a terrible mistake.Chavivin Yisroel,meanseveryone of them! Allshomrei Torah; even though he’s not from yourshtiebel, not from your community.A differentshtiebel, so you might think, he’s not in your neighborhood, maybe not yournusach; maybe he’s aSefardior aTaimani.Maybe he’s a Russian Jew or a Polish Jew, so you think, “Not him, not him.” No, when you see any fellow Jew, anyshomer Torah u’mitzvos, you’re looking at a person who is most beloved by Hashem.If you have a big scale, and you put on one side of the scale the sun, and also the millions of stars and all the planets too; and also all the nations – all the Englishmen, all the Americans, all the French, every other people on the face of the earth, all on one side of the scale. And on the other side is this oneYisroel, this one Jew that passes by you on the street, so he ismachri’a es kulan– he outweighs all of them. That’s whatchavivinmeans, and that’s how you have to think.DON’T BE LAZY!Now, I’m very sorry to say that all of this will not happen, nothing good will grow in your head, if you’re a lazy man. עַל שְׂדֵה אִישׁ עָצֵל עָבַרְתִּי – “I passed the field of a lazy man,” said Shlomo Hamelech. And what is growing there? הִנֵּה כָּסָה פָּנָיו חֲרוּלִים thorns and brambles; all types of weeds grow in the head of a lazy man. Maybe he was too lazy to come to these lectures altogether. Or maybe he came, but it was entertainment, to get out of the house a little, that’s all. That’s good too, it’s also good – but if you never work on these ideas, so what grows in your mind instead of delicious fruit? רֹאשׁ וְלַעֲנָה – “Poison growths.”Sinas chinam, miskabeid b’klon chaveiro, other thorns. But notb’tzedek tishpot amisecha; no, no, that won’t grow on its own.And so you have to always be on guard – you’re busy always weeding out your field, pulling up thorns that creep up in your mind. Let’s say a thought comes into your mind when you see this person, “Why is he wearingthat?” “Why did he do such a thing?” “Why did she say that?” You can’t let a poison weed like that fester in your mind! You can’t be anish atzeil,a lazy person, and allow that thought to grow. You have to do something about it! And so you get busy right away thinking the thoughts we spoke about tonight.Now, don’t think that it’s merely a thought. No, you’re actually planting seeds in your mind. And these seeds, once they take root, they grow into beautiful flowers ofdan es chaveiro l’kaf zchus. Try to judge a fellow man with a meritorious balance, to think well of him. And the more you do it, the more you’ll succeed at this program. And the more you succeed, then Hakodosh Boruch Huy’dineihu l’kaf zchus, the more you’ll succeed at gaining the goodwill of Hashem for yourself. Because that’s the purpose why Hashem brought you into this world, to give you one opportunity to plant a garden of delicious fruits and flowers in your mind, a garden that will last forever.HAKADOSH BARUCH HU WILL LOVE YOUNow how much can you do?! You’ll say, “I should love my neighbor? I should love mychavrusaand my boss? I should love the man who sits next to me in shul? That’s too much!” So Hashem says, “At least plant the seeds; as much as you can always look at that person with a favorable eye. Bedan l’kaf zchus; go out of your way to judge him favorably, to find a reason to make him azakaiin everything he does.” And הַבָּא לְטַהֵר מְסַיְּעִין לוֹ, if you try to be good, then Hashem will help you be good.And one of the ways He’ll help you is by giving you more and more opportunities to perfect yourself – He’ll send you all types of people, He’ll put you in contact with all types of frum Jews. And כָּל עִנְיָנֵי הָעוֹלָם נִסְיוֹנוֹת הֵם לְאָדָם, everything in this world is an opportunity; every person that you meet is a test for you to see if you’ll rise to the occasion and use the opportunity to plant the seeds ofb’tzedek tishpot amisechain your mind.And you’ll live a happier life because of it – you’ll be happy with your spouse, and with your neighbor and your boss, and with all your fellow Jews – the world becomes a happier place. And it’s a good investment as well, this business of thinking well of your fellowman, becauseHamakomyidineihu l’kaf zchus,Hashem will look at yourma’alosand He’ll be happy with you. Hakadosh Baruch Hu is going to love you too; despite the fact that sometimes you can be a nuisance too. Hakadosh Baruch Hu will overlook that and see that you have good things in you. בְּמִדָּהּ שֶׁאָדָם מוֹדֵד מוֹדְדִין לוֹ – “The way you treat others is how you’ll be treated.” And when Hakadosh Baruch Hu does that, He does it with a full hand, a heaping hand of reward in this world and also in the World to Come.HAVE A WONDERFUL SHABBOSGo Back See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. This podcast has been graciously sponsored by JewishPodcasts.fm. There is much overhead to maintain this service so please help us continue our goal of helping Jewish lecturers become podcasters and support us with a donation: https://thechesedfund.com/jewishpodcasts/donate

Part I.Recognizing the GiftsTZARA’AS IS A GIFT?!כִּי תָבֹאוּ אֶל אֶרֶץ כְּנַעַן אֲשֶׁר אֲנִי נֹתֵן לָכֶם לַאֲחֻזָּה “When you shall come to the land which I give you as a possession, וְנָתַתִּי נֶגַע צָרַעַת בְּבֵית אֶרֶץ אֲחֻזַּתְכֶם and I shall give a plague of leprosy upon a house of the land of your possession” (Metzora 14:34). In studying thispossukthechachomimtook note of the wordnosati, “I shall give to you.” “I will give” a plague instead of the more common, וְשַׂמְתִּי “I will place” implies a gift of sorts,and remarkably, that’s howchazalunderstood these words. “These are good tidings to them that plagues would come upon them”, thechachomimsay.Now, what good tidings could there be in a home that is contaminated withtzara’as, a home that has to be knocked down? Sochazaltell us that upon hearing that the Am Yisroel was advancing towards them, theCanaanimhad concealed their wealth; all of their gold and silver, in the walls of their houses (Vayikra Rabbah 17:6). And when the loyal Jew obeyed the law ofnig’ei battim, and eventually he knocked down the walls as commanded in this week’sparsha, he discovered the wealth that had been hidden there all along.And so, it was thetzara’asthat Hashem had “given” to the owner of this house that became the bearer of good tidings. Because this family had possessed a great store of wealth in the walls of their home, only that they weren’t aware of what they possessed. And it was only when thetzara’ascame that they realized what a treasure they had in the home all along. The family might have lost a wall, and sometimes even the house in its entirety had to be demolished, but what they found in the process was a treasure that more than made up for the loss.THE CASE OF THE MISSING GOLDBut you have to know that gold and silver were not always found. Not everyCanaanitehad treasures – there were middle classCanaanitestoo – and even the wealthyCanaanite, maybe his wife was a spendthrift, a high roller who squandered her husband’s money and didn’t leave anything to hide away. And even the ones who had extra gold and silver, not every one of them hid his treasure between the stones of his wall – some found better hiding places than that.Now that’s a question, because Hashem saysnosati, “I am giving you a treasure when I sendtzara’ason your home.” And for many people, there were no treasures of gold and silver hiding in their walls. So what was the treasure for the family standing outside in the cold and rain, watching the walls of their house being demolished?And so we’ll say as follows: Even when no gold was found, the family gained an even greater wealth, becausethey discovered the treasure of the home itself.When a person discovers that there were opportunities available to him, that’s when he has found the greatest treasure; the opportunities for greatness that he will now make use of for the rest of his life. And that’s why Rabbi Yehuda, when explaining what gift was meant bynosati,“I will give you “a present” oftzara’as,” didn’t mention anything about a hidden treasure;he merely said: “These are good tidings that plagues will come upon them” (Sifra ibid). He didn’t consider it necessary to add that they might discover hidden gold and silver because the treasure they discovered was even more important than that.WHERE ARE WE SLEEPING TONIGHT?The first and most obvious treasure that this family discovered was thathaving a house is fun. Did you ever think about that? Forced to stand outside of their home as thekohenwent inside to inspect the walls, the father and mother huddled together with their children, and they looked back to consider that maybe they had not been grateful enough to Hashem for the blessings of a home, blessings that were now slipping out of their hands. And it was cold outside; it would rain too. “It was so much fun to have walls; why didn’t we appreciate it when we had it?! Where are we going to sleep tonight?” And so the forlorn family standing there were now discovering the treasure that they had always had hidden “in their walls”; the treasure ofhaving walls! Of having a roof over their heads –the treasure of having a home.And this lesson alone, to unearth that treasure of appreciating the walls of your home, that’s already enough of a reason fortzara’asto come onto a person’s walls. And that’s the lesson that we’re all expected to learn as we read theparsha– that we have to get busy appreciating the four walls of our homes and not wait for the lesson to be taught to us in the way it was taught to this family.REMAINING A CHILD FOREVERYou know that a little child doesn’t appreciate a home.He thinks of the street as wonderful, the sidewalk is wonderful – outside, that’s where the fun is. Try to bring a little boy back from the sidewalk into the house; you have to pull him with horses into the house. And most people never grow out of those childish ideas; they remain children all their lives unless they begin the work of thinking, of dilating on each benefit, and discovering the great treasure that the home is.Walls are really fun! What would life be without walls?! You know that if not for the walls, the winds would be blowing all the time, and the rains would come pouring in as well! It would be very cold in the winter if all you had was a roof! You know that in this place we like the rain and the winds; we appreciate them to no end. But we appreciate them most happily from the window, standing on this side of the wall and looking out.I was walking this week with a friend of mine and the snow was coming down. I was carrying an umbrella but he wasn’t prepared, he didn’t have an umbrella. So he said to me; he’s one of my people, so he said, “Snow is like ice cream.”I said, “You are correct, that’s a wonderful idea but ice cream in your ears is not comfortable.” We appreciate the snow, but we appreciate umbrellas too! So we’ll stand on this side of the wall and we’ll enjoy the rain and snow and cold.Of course, we enjoy it; but we don’t have to dive into it.SLEEPING ON OCEAN PARKWAYAnd so you have to learn how to be happy that you have a roof over your head.Here’s a poor woman, a homeless lady, a little bit demented; I see her pushing a shopping wagon on Ocean Parkway. All her possessions are in that shopping wagon; she has nothing. She doesn’t have a bathroom, she doesn’t have a kitchen, she doesn’t have a bed to sleep in. Where does she go when it’s raining? A pity on her. You see, she’s bedraggled, it’smamisha heartbreak to look at her.If she could only have a place to sleep. But she sits down on a bench, it’s freezing weather, she’s trying to get a nap on a bench; on a park bench she’s trying to fall asleep. It’s freezing and she can’t warm up. And you, you have a house with a roof over your head! How lucky she would be if she could have a little place, a shack with a roof over her head; she’d be the happiest person right now. Even without any heat, she could lie down on the floor, at least, and sleep. She doesn’t have even that. So first learn to enjoy a roof over your head. It takes a long time. A roof over your head, what a happiness that is!FALLING OUT OF MY HOUSEAnd privacy! Ah, the pleasure of privacy that walls afford us! Life would be no fun at all if your neighbor would always be peeking over from his dining room into yours; it would be a miserable home. And I’ll tell you something else, and don’t laugh: Without walls it would be so easy to fall out from the house into the street. Life in the home would always be full of danger; you’d be living precariously all the time. I think about that all the time when I see the walls in my house. And I don’t live on the first floor; I live high up, so I enjoy my walls to no end.Now when you begin to think like that, so you realize that walls are not just walls. There’s a lot going on behind those walls. Plumbing pipes! Ah, asimcha! You have to tell your children the benefits of having running water in the house. When I went to Europe to learn in the yeshiva, the first thing that I noticed was that there was no running water in the house. You went out into the backyard, or a block away, where there was a well and you had to carry back a bucket of water with a yoke. It sat across my shoulders, one bucket hanging here and one bucket hanging there.It was a hard job to bring water to the house. And then you poured it into some kind of contraption that was nailed to a wall; and when you wanted to wash your hands you had to bang underneath on the nail, a big nail, and if banged hard enough some water dripped down along the nail. And you had to keep on banging to get your hands wet. You banged and banged as you washed your hands, so little by little the water came out. Each time the nail went up, a little water came out.TEA KETTLES AND BOOTS FOR THE BATHROOMAnd hot water in the home?! Hot water too?! Who could have imagined such a luxury?! In Europe when you wanted to take a bath, there was no bath in the house. So either you went to theschvitz baad, the public bathhouse, or they brought in a tin tub. Somebalabatimhad a big tin tub, and they boiled up water in a tea kettle; one after the other they poured it in, until the tub was half full. Then you bathed in that water, in a room someplace, in a bedroom. So you bathed in a tin tub in water which was boiled in tea kettles. When you got through with it, if you had a little brother, he bathed after you in the same water because they couldn’t afford to fill it up twice. I saw it happen that way.Nobody had a bathroom in the house! In the dead of winter, if you were unfortunate enough to get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, so you had to put on your boots. We had to put on our woolen boots and stomp through the deep snow to go to the so called bathroom, there was no fancy toilet seat. And whatever was there remained there, until finally in the summertime when it already had a big aroma. That’s when a man with a horse and wagon came with a long wooden spade and he took it all out. And for miles around everybody knew what was going on that day, because of the fragrance that was wafted on the summer breeze.THOMAS EDISON AT HAVDALAHAnd you have lights in your home too, don’t you? I remember when there were no electric lights; we had gas lights. And fires used to take place because of them. I once was in a house and there was a fire; the ceiling caught fire from the gas flame. I was watching the firemen trying to put out the fire. And in the streets I remember the lamp lighters used to go around with ladders and light the gas lamps in the street. Of course, today if you speak about electric lights to most Jewish children they’ll laugh at you for appreciating such a thing; but that’s because they’re not being brought up as authentic Jews. An authentic Jew thanks Hashem for artificial light.Actually we do it every week; people don’t know that every week we thank Hashem for artificial light. Every day we thank Hashem for the natural light of the sun,Yotzer Ha’meoros, but for artificial light we thank once a week, on motzei Shabbos.Borei me’orei ha’aish. What’s that? Did you ever think about that? We’re thanking Hashem for artificial lights. Every week. Some people think it’s just a ceremony, afrumkeit. No! We’remakir tovfor fire, electric lights, and all other forms of artificial illumination. After all, in the olden days when it was night time, what could you do? You could sit down and learnba’al pehif you remembered. But if you didn’t remember you couldn’t learn. And now,boruch Hashem, Hakodosh Boruch Hu gave us lights.In 1879 Edison called together a company of scientists and he promised to show them a remarkable thing; for the first time in history an electric bulb was turned on, and they were amazed! They described it as if sunlight filled the room. There never had been such a light before! It’s important to explain that to children; It’s important to explain it to ourselves! To enjoy the light.And therefore you should constantly be telling your children, “Look how lucky we are to have a nice home to live in! It’s so much fun to have walls that keep us warm and dry and safe. Now the child might say, “What do you mean ‘a nice home’? This place is tiny! My friend Sarah down the street has a better house than we do. They have such a big kitchen and a better this and better that.” But you have to drown that out by constantly reiterating to your family all the benefits they are enjoying. They’ll keep complaining and you keep talking about thechasdei Hashem. And it sinks in; trust me it goes into their heads. And that’s the biggesthatzalahfor the family, because it’s the family that doesn’t appreciate thechesedof a home, that’s the home that thenega tzara’asis bound to come upon, in order to teach them about the great treasure that a house is.Part II.The True TreasureAN OPPORTUNITY FOR REPENTANCEHowever, everything we’ve been speaking about is only scratching the surface of what the happiness of a home truly is; and it’s only the first lesson that Hashem intended by the gift oftzara’asthat a family finds on the walls of its home. Because when a family found themselves homeless, they were expected to understand that it was an opportunity for repentance. They were expected to understand that the tribulation of losing their home was intended as a punishment for not using their home properly.Actually, a Jewish home is much more than the physical benefits of walls and a roof, much more than the blessings of privacy, shelter, plumbing, electricity and being protected from falling into the street. All of that is important, and it was the first and most obvious lesson that they learned. But it’s still only part of the treasure that a home is. The aristocratic home of theAmHashemis something much greater than four physical walls. And now when these walls are broken down, after such a drastic warning, this family was expected to exert themselves to begin to utilize the house as a place foravodas Hashem. What makes the Jewish home a true treasure is that it is the place where theAmYisroelis built.BUILDING THE BEIS YISROEL IN FLATBUSHThat’s what ourAvosandImahosdid – their career took place primarily in their tents. The Rambam says that: He writes that the sole intention of our Avos in everything that they did was לְהַעֲמִיד אֻמָּה הָעוֹבֶדֶת אֶת הַשֵּׁם – in order to establish a nation that would be servants of Hashem (Moreh Nevuchim 3:51). And therefore that’s the job of theAvosandImahostoday as well; we walk in the footsteps of our forefathers and we continue to build theAm Yisroelin our homes.And that is the greatest treasure, the greatest privilege, that could be afforded to anyone – the privilege of using the home foravodas Hashem.And it is that opportunity that was the great treasure that the family discovered when they were forced to leave their home. They were learning now that they had treated their home as just a place to live instead of a place of aristocracy, the palace that it really was meant to be. And that was the real treasure that they discovered by means of thetzara’as; and so when the family returned to their home again, theylived there with the knowledge of that treasure they had unearthed, and they were now ready to make use of it as intended by Hashem.DON’T KICK OFF YOUR SHOES JUST YETYou know, when we think of a home so we might consider it possibly as a place of relaxation; the place you come back to after a day of toil in the workplace, where you had to act towards people in an unnatural and artificial manner. And now you can come home and you can kick off your shoes, relax and behave naturally. Because your true career is in the home; it’s in the home that you should be acting your best.They tell about the old Telzer Rav, Rav Yosef Leib, that even in the hottest days of July and August – in those days they didn’t have air conditioners and not even electric fans – and yet he never took off hiskapotehin his house. All summer he wore his long coat, because in his house, he behaved like a prince in a palace. Now, everybody knew that in the house that Telzer Rav sometimes had to take off his coat. He wasn’t amalach;they knew he was a human being who couldn’t be a Rav in his long coat twenty four hours a day. But no matter; he didn’t want them to see him like that. Even for his wife and children he was always the Telzer Rav. He behaved like a prince in the home because he understood, and he wanted his family to understand, that the home is a palace, the place where the most important part of history was taking place – the building of theumah ovedes es Hashem.Yisroelis a name that puts the Jew far above all of mankind; and that means that the home where theBeis Yisroelis being built is a place where there should always be an aura of aristocracy, a feeling that this home is a place of nobility, a place set aside for accomplishing the most important of all endeavors. And when aYisroeltries to live up to this ideal of nobility so his behavior in the home is transformed. You know, it makes a big difference whether a man is a nobleman in his own esteem or whether he considers himself a commoner, a nothing. The things that a commoner will do, a noble man will not even consider. He can’t be be busy with novels and magazines – even Jewish magazines – that are filled with emptiness. He has more important things than that to accomplish, and so his mannerisms, his attitudes, and his aspirations are entirely different than the non aristocrat. The entire personality of a person is transformed when he realizes that he is a prince.EMULATING THE ROYAL FAMILYAnd when we live in a house where only princes live, so that house becomes something remarkable. Imagine there were princes who lived in a palace but because of some adversity they had to leave the palace. And now the princes, the royals, are living in a hut. But it’s not an ordinary farmer’s hut, it’s not a shepherd’s hut. It’s a hut of princes now. Their manners are of princes, they spend their time in the way of princes. Even their speech is that of princes.And therefore in a Jewish home it is of utmost importance to live up to the idea that we arebnei melachim.Before every move made in the home, they consult in their minds the model supplied by the awareness of their royalty; what they think royalty would do in such a case. A man and woman in the home should always be thinking: “What are the royal manners and the aristocratic ideals that should reign in the Jewish home?” Of course, we are all human beings and we can’t imagine that we will succeed in one fell swoop, but we have to always be aware of the perfection we are striving for. And it is those homes where this is kept in mind always that will never have to be plagued by the warning and lessons oftzara’as.THE JEWISH POLITICIANNow, in order to create an atmosphere of an aristocrat home, an institution where theAm Yisroelis being created, so a father and mother must appear before their children like actors on the stage. You can never be natural; no matter how you feel you must be to your children a hero. A politician,l’havdil, never appears in public acting like he really feels. He’s knocked out; he’s been traveling all night to get here after speaking someplace else. Now he’s over here and he has to get up on the stage; sometimes he even has to speak at the train station as soon as he gets off the train. You can be sure that he’s feeling grouchy and tired; all he wants to do is crawl into bed. Could be he’s just been told by his campaign manager that he’s trailing badly in the polls and that he’s headed for defeat. No matter, he’s waving and he’s wreathed in smiles as if all is wonderful. He displays cheer and confidence; he needs votes, what could he do?Now, a parent needs the votes of his children; he needs their votes to build the happy and successful home together and therefore he should always appear to them as confident; he always knows what to do. He’s never desperate or worried. “Never mind,” he tells his children with a smile, “Everything is under control; it’s going to be just fine.” He’s always happy. What he’s thinking inside, that’s not their business.You know thegemarasays that a person should betocho k’baro,his inside should be like his outside. Why doesn’t the gemara say that his outside should be like his inside?Chas v’shalom, that his outside should be like his inside! “Be genuine,” people say. No, if his outside would be like his inside, the home might become an Italian home, an Irish home. The ideal is that it should betochok’baro, his inside should be like his outside. The outside must always be good, only that the inside should attempt to follow the outside. But the outside always must be good!MUSSAR FROM PRESIDENT REAGANYou are the leader and leaders cannot be sad. A leader who shows sadness, who shows lack of confidence, is a failure. Evenl’havdilPresident Reagan, no matter how much he was insulted, he kept his bearings. Even when he was shot in the assassination attempt, as they were taking him to the hospital, he made a wisecrack to show he was cheerful. That’s because he knew how to act; President Reagan was a good president because he was a good actor. He didn’t concede, he wouldn’t admit that he had a setback.A good leader, a good mother and father, won’t show discouragement – they always maintain a good cheer. I’m not saying that you have to walk around with a big grin on your face, that’s nothing; but an underlying appearance, a facade of confidence and cheer, are essential in the home of aristocracy. It doesn’t pay for a leader to show discouragement; people don’t want discouraged leaders. A prince is a man of confidence. And even when he doesn’t have the confidence, he displays it in his demeanor and his countenance and in the way he talks, because the palace is too important for failure.ON STAGE: QUEEN MOMMYA mother should always appear like a queen before the children. Now, that’s not easy, particularly when the children are in the house all day long. But it’s not easy to be an actor; you have to go to one performance and then to another and then another. An actor would like to go home and kick off her shoes; to relax and lie down on the couch. But for glory you do it; or for money. So she appears on the stage each time like a shining queen. And that’s how a mother should view herself in the home, like an actor on the great stage, putting on the most important performance of her life.And therefore the ideal of aristocracy should be paramount when a couple builds a Jewish home. Not only should he consider his wife a queen and she should consider him a king, But they should considerthemselvesas kings and queens. And the children are princes and princesses. Always cheerful and confident and aware of their importance in building the Am Yisroel.THE FIVE MINUTEMESIBAHAnd it is that atmosphere that becomes the foundation for all the accomplishments ofavodas Hashemin the Jewish home – the home becomes the place, not only of happiness, but of accomplishment. The “mundane” days of the week become days of accomplishing; Shabbos becomes a day of achieving greatness;Yomtivis transformed intoavodas Hashem. How important it is for parents to train their children insimchas yomtiv!Now some parents think thatsimchas yomtivmeans taking out the children oncholhamo’edfor a ride to go to the park or the zoo. Nothing wrong, but that’ssimcha, notsimchas yomtiv.To train children, even little children, that today isyomtiv, today ischol hamo’ed, is so important for building the home. Sit down and make a littlemesibah, even a five minutemesibahl’kavod yomtiv; a little gathering. Wednesday afternoon, Thursday, Friday afternoon. A littlemesibahis more important than two hours in the Bronx Zoo or who knows where. Agoyalso has the Bronx Zoo, but we want to have an aristocratic home of princes and princesses. Sit down and talk for a couple of minutes aboutyomtiv; tell the children, “Let’s sing the songAtah Bichartanu,or a different niggun.” And then say, suggest to them, “Kids, aren’t we having a good time,kinderlach?” And they all chime in, “Yes. Now let’s go to the zoo!” But that’s excellent – you accomplished your mission! Because those few minutes have laid a foundation.He made a special effort to create excitement for Shabbos and yamim tovim. He would do a little dance exclaim with gusto, “We’re having such a good time!” “It’s so much fun to have Yom Tov!” and “Shabbos is so much fun!” Grandchildren recall that when they came to visit on Yom Tov, he made a circle and danced a little jig, singing: “L’kavod Yom Tov, choo, choo, choo!”When his children were young, he took them on Chol Hamo’ed trips, such as to the zoo, but first he would remind them that it was Yom Tov and that Yom Tov was so much fun. Then, with genuine enthusiasm, he pointed out the wonders of Hashem’s creations.He made his children a melaveh malkah filled with exciting antics and then served ice-cream which was a real treat in those days. He made a whole production out of it, especially when dividing up the portions, to make them excited. When putting out the pieces of chametz for bedikas chometz, he put a piece of chocolate in with each piece to make it exciting.With his grandchildren as well he tried to make motzaei Shabbos fun. He had the grandchildren make a recording of themselves singing and then he played it back for them. He allotted fifteen minutes for this, and when the time was up he simply said, “Ah guteh voch,” and went back to his learning. In his later years, on motzaei Shabbos, all the young children who lived nearby would go upstairs to his apartment, where he would give them each a dollar and prizes.-Rav Avigdor Miller: His Life and His Revolutionp. 240-241Part III.The Wise WomanWOMEN IN THE CONSTRUCTION BUSINESSNow, when we talk about building a home, about creating a home that finds favor in the eyes of Hashem, we are reminded of thepossukin Mishlei (14:1): חַכְמוֹת נָשִׁים בָּנְתָה בֵיתָהּ – “The wise woman builds up her house”. You know, Dovid Hamelech said: אֲנִי עַבְדְּךָ בֶּן אֲמָתֶךָ – “I am Your servant Hashem, the son of your maidservant” (Tehillim 116:16). He didn’t mention his father; his father was a great man, but Dovid said “I am your servant,becausemy mother was your maidservant.” You hear that?!That’s why one of the sages, Rabbi Yosi always called his wife: בֵּיתִי – “My home,” because she’s the one who really creates the home (Shabbos 118b); to a very great extent the success of a home depends on the atmosphere that is created by the mother in that home. Without her, the home is just a hollow shell, and she is the one who breathes the most success into the building of theBeis Yisroel.HOME OF PRAYERThe home should be a place oftefillahand it is the mother who must present herself as the symbol of prayer, the model oftefilahfor the Am Yisroel. Now, she can’t stand and pray long prayers; she’s busy with a lot of things in the house. But the mother must be a mother of prayer. Our mothers always prayed a great deal; a Jewish mother should pray even more than a man prays. Men have certain circumscribed duties and because of that, some of them, in order to discharge their duties, gallop through thedavenen. It’s just something that has to be done, so they do it. They gallop through a bigdavening. But Jewish mothers don’t do that. A Jewish mother in the home should be turning to Hashem all day long. The old-time Jewish women had a handbook of prayers – prayers for everything, for every kind of eventuality. She would be praying for help in the home, that her supper should come out tasting delicious. Or for a child who is not well and for a child who is not going exactly on the straight path. Today too, a mother prays constantly that the washing machine shouldn’t break down, that her husband should earn a livelihood, that he should find favor in the eyes of his boss and get a raise.So besides the fact that immediately, the first thing in the morning when the children wake up, they hear “Abba is davening inshul; Abba’s learning.” The children are always asking, “Did Totty come back fromshulyet?” and the mother tells them, “Totty is in shul talking to Hashem; he’ll be home soon.” That’s how the Jewish home starts out every day, but besides for that, the mother spends the rest of the day absorbed in speaking to Hashem about everything. In the olden days the Jewish mother actually was a symbol of prayer even more than the husband; it’s something that’s forgotten today but that is one of the greatest achievements in a Jewish home. A Jewish mother should always be praying and the children who grow up with that know that their house is a home where Hashem resides. The aristocratic Jewish home actually became a Beis Hamikdash.THE BRACHOS MASHGIACHThe Jewish home should be a place of sayingbrachos; all thebrachosshould be said out loud. Not long ago, it was the practice that when the family was about to eat, so they all washed, and the mother stood over them like amashgiachin ayeshivaand she paid attention as each child made thebrachaaloud, “Al netilas yadayim”; you could hear every word. And the mother said, “Amen.” And she had a watchful eye to see that nobody was cheating. And then they came to the table and each one had to makehamotziand the words resounded on all sides; every child thanked Hashem for the little piece of bread in front of him. And they sat around the table likekohanimaround themizbei’ach.When they live this way in the home, the children are raised with the understanding that they are living in something that’s more than four walls and a roof – they’re living in a palace and they begin to follow these principles.THE FOOLISH WOMANAnd now we turn to the end of thepossuk, חַכְמוֹת נָשִׁים בָּנְתָה בֵיתָהּ, “The wise woman spends her days building – וְאִוֶּלֶת, but the foolish woman, בְּיָדֶיהָ תֶהֶרְסֶנּוּ, with her own hands she overthrows the house.” No matter what ailment she is suffering, she must keep it to herself. Some people, usually women, but men too, think that if they constantly speak about what is bothering them it relieves them, they find relief. And it could be true, could be. But one thing is certain, it’s not relieving the home. The atmosphere of nobility, the atmosphere of aristocratic cheer and confidence is undermined by sadness and complaining in the home; the husband shuns his complaining wife’s company, and vica-versa when he complains, and the atmosphere of a place for achieving perfection is lost.Never pessimism, never complaining. Complaining is one of the forms of breaking down a home. Even if there is no quarrel between husband and wife and even if the children are behaving and are loyal, if there is a complaining person in the house – if the mother or father complain frequently – then the morale in the house is broken. You cannot have a successful home, even a non-Jewish home, if there is complaining.Nobody likes a complainer! And even though you feel you want sympathy, and you think that you deserve that they should lend their ears to your sighs and groans – and most probably you do deserve it – but you’re not making your home successful.THE JINGLE THAT RUINS THENESHAMASuppose you wake up one morning and it’s raining, sheets of rain are coming down from the sky, so the foolish mother complains “Oy, it’s raining outside. It’s terrible; I wanted to go out and now the rain spoiled all of our fun today.” So little Chanaleh, whenever she sees a rain come down, she’ll remember – without even thinking, she’ll forget where it came from, but her instincts hark back to that pattern that was first molded on her young plasticneshama, and she knows that rain is a disappointment, it spoils everything. Here you have a mother standing by the window with her children, looking out at the rain. And the children are waiting for the rain to stop; they want to go out and play already. “Rain rain go away.” They’re singing that foolish jingle. There are so many rainy days in life; isn’t it a pity for the child to be molded in the wrong way?If a mother could instill in her child the proper way to think; she says “Look Chanaleh, it’s raining outside. Isn’t that fun?” Chanaleh has no sense; she hasn’t developed an attitude towards rain yet. So Chanaleh says, “Yes it’s fun.” Her mother is still the fountain of all wisdom and so she agrees with her mother. And now for the rest of her life rain is going to be fun!This mother has the most wonderful opportunity. “Kinderlach,look at the beautiful rain coming down. Isn’t it beautiful?! Isn’t rain fun?! Hashem is sending us down all the food that we eat. It’s apples and cherries and danishes coming down from the sky. Rain brings down all good things for us. Let’s say together, ‘Thank You Hashem for the rain.’” Now the children might look at their mother with blank faces; Rain? Wonderful? But it sinks into their little heads that rain is beautiful; that Hashem is beautiful!YOUR NEVER-ENDING ROLEAnd so, no matter what the circumstances are, if a father and mother, a husband and wife, make it a principle always to display to each other and to the children a face of good cheer and confidence, then first of all they affect each other – they create in each other similar attitudes, and secondly they themselves become transformed.What you’re hearing now is of utmost importance. Always in the Jewish home there must reign an atmosphere of confidence and happiness. It’s very important to always remember that you have the role of an actor; you can’t be natural – being natural is not achochma, and you need chochma to build up the house. It’s easy to be sad, to be downcast. It’s easy to let your feelings go and ruin the atmosphere. It’s easy to be a failure.Don’t think that it doesn’t have any effect! When you speak of Hashem in the home, when you constantly talk about Torah ideals, you’re planting those ideals in their minds. Little by little you’re changing your children. You’re planting seeds in their minds and as they grow older, they will water those seeds with their own wisdom. And when they’re grown up, and they’re tending a beautiful garden in their mind, a garden of Torah attitudes permeated with thoughts of Hashem, that’s the garden that you planted so many years before with the words of your mouth.But to be a success, needs planning. And don’t think it’s not going to repay you. The happiness, the satisfaction of a successful day in the house is a reward without end. It’s a reward in this world and it’s a reward forever and ever in Olam Haba.THE TREASURE OF OPPORTUNITYAnd so, the misfortune of a home that was afflicted withtzara’ason its walls actually became the great gift of knowledge, the understanding of what a treasure a Jewish home is for a family. וְנָתַץ אֶת הַבַּיִת – “And he shall break down the house, אֶת אֲבָנָיו וְאֶת עֵצָיו, וְאֵת, כָּל עֲפַר הַבָּיִת – its stones and its timber and all the mortar of the house; וְהוֹצִיא אֶל מִחוּץ לָעִיר, אֶל מָקוֹם טָמֵא and he shall carry them out of the town into an unclean place” (Metzora 14:45). Athough a family might discover a treasure trove that was hidden between the stones of the wall, that was only symbolic of the true treasure that he was expected to discover as they watched the walls of the house being torn down.And that treasure is the awareness of what an opportunity a house is. The breaking down of the walls of a house is a tragedy of great proportions, but the greater tragedy is the breakdown of the Torah Home that had taken place there long before thenega tzaraasset in. The missed opportunities of לְהַעֲמִיד אֻמָּה הָעוֹבֶדֶת אֶת הַשֵּׁם in that home are what really tore down the walls of that home.And as the homeowner and his family watch the physical destruction of the home, the lesson they are learning is the greatest treasure of all. Now they look back at the great happiness that the walls of the home afforded them, and which they failed to appreciate while they still possessed it. And you can be sure that it wasn’t only this family that learned this lesson. When the house is being torn down, and while the family stands outside watching and then begin to carry out of the city all the stone and wood that had once made up their home, all the neighbors watched in sadness and empathy, and if they were wise they also took the lesson to heart.And certainly the lesson wasn’t intended only for them, but even we today are expected to learn the eternal lessons ofnigei batim.And the least that we can do is to remind ourselves constantly, day in and day out, of gratitude for the walls of our own home as well as for the superb institution of the home, the place where the Am Yisroel is being built. And the use of the home foravodas Hashemin countless ways is indeed the duty of gratitude which Hashem expects most; the home where parents and children understand its purpose becomes a place where the child learns optimism, confidence and happiness. And that’s how he goes out to view the world for the rest of his life. And that’s going to make him anovedHashem m’toch simchaand he’ll bema’arich yomim in happiness.Go Back See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. This podcast has been graciously sponsored by JewishPodcasts.fm. There is much overhead to maintain this service so please help us continue our goal of helping Jewish lecturers become podcasters and support us with a donation: https://thechesedfund.com/jewishpodcasts/donate

Part I. Purpose of SorrowTHE DAY OF TEN CROWNSויהי ביום השמיני – “And it was on the eighth day” (Shemini 9:1). In the beginning ofParshas Shemini, we come to that glorious day of thehakamas hamishkan, when the Sanctuary, the Home of Hashem, was finally erected in this world. And theAm Yisroelwould now claim the exclusive glory of having Hashem reside among them. They would be the ones privileged to approach the home of Hashem and worship Him.Now, it’s important to understand that theYom Hasheminiwas a most majestic and joyful day for theAm Yisroel.There were very few days – we could even say no day ever – in the history of the world when there was so much rejoicing. And theGemara(Shabbos 87b) tells us that נטל עשר עטרות, it was a day crowned with ten crowns of glory; an exalted day like no other in our history. TheShechina, the Presence of Hashem, was now coming down to rest among them – and they wentwildwith happiness. וירא כבוד השם אל כל העם ותצא אש מלפני השם… וירא כל העם וירונו ויפלו על פניהם – “And the Glory of Hashem appeared to all the people, and a fire came forth from before Hashem…and all the people saw, and they shouted in joy, and they fell down on their faces” (Shemini 9:23-24).Imagine that! A whole nation; millions of men, women and children shouting in great ecstasy at the sight of theShechina. All together they stood and witnessed this momentous event, and they were electrified by what they saw! It was the thing that they desired more than anything else – to see with their own eyes that Hashem had chosen to reside among them forever. And they were thrilled down to their marrow. It was a remarkable experience – a happiness and a thrill that was never to be repeated. That was the great day of ויהי ביום השמיני, one of the most joyous days in the history of our people.THE HAPPIEST WOMAN EVERNow, themedrash(Tanchuma, Shemini: 2) points out that there was one person who was reveling in happiness more than anyone else; there was nobody happier than her – ever! And that lucky person was Elisheva bas Aminadav, the wife of Aharon HaKohen. For her it was the most special of all days,mamish me’ein Olam Habo. She was privileged to be the wife of theKohen Gadol,and she saw success that no other woman ever saw, before or after. Her husband was the High Priest who put on the glorious gold vestments, garments studded with gems and jewels to serve Hashemlifneiu’lifnim. And not only that, but he was anavias well, a prophet of Hashem.And her sons? Ahh, whatnachasfrom her sons! She had four sons, Nadav, Avihu, Elazar and Isamar, and all of them were chosen to work in the Mishkan, assisting their father. A mother’s dream! And not only was she glorying in the greatness of her husband and her sons but it was only the beginning; because she knew thatherdescendents forever would enjoy this privilege. The family ofkohanimwould descend from her for eternity. And that was a success that no other woman was ever given the privilege to enjoy.HAPPINESS ON ALL SIDESThe truth is that Elisheva bas Aminadav had even more than that. In addition to the greatness of her husband, her brother-in-law was the king of the Jewish nation. That itself is an honor and a greatness. “My husband’s brother is Moshe Rabeinu, the leader of our nation. And he speaks to Hashem face to face.” Her brother-in-law was the greatest prophet that ever lived. And in addition to that was her illustrious brother, Nachshon ben Aminadav, the leader of the twelve princes of theAm Yisroel.And on thisYom Hashemini, all of this pride and joy was coming together before her eyes. It was being encapsulated on the day of thehashra’as hashechina; when the Presence of Hashem entered into the Mishkan; and her husband and sons would be the ones officiating in the place that Hashem has designated as His home. And it was all taking place under the direction of her brother-in-law, the King, as well as her brother Nachshon, the leader of thenesi’im. And so while theYom Hasheminiwas a day of great happiness for everyone, this most fortunate woman was reveling in joy more than all others.THE PARTY’S OVER!And yet it wasn’t to last. Her joy – not only her joy, but the joy of the whole nation – was about to be marred by the worst of misfortunes a mother could ever suffer through. Because on that day, ויהי ביום השמיני, when two of her sons went in to officiate in thekodesh, they were struck dead by a fire that came forth from Hashem and consumed them. ותצא אש מלפני השם ותאכל אותם וימתו לפני השם – “And a fire went forth from Hashem and devoured them and they perished there before Hashem” (Shemini 10:2).Ay yah yay! What a terrible sadness! A most unfortunate event that will forever spoil the memory of this great day.Now most of us, when we study this terrible event, we regard it as a debacle, an unfortunate mishap that came at a most inopportune moment. We shrug our shoulders and commiserate. “It’s hard for us to understand thedarchei Hashem; that such a beautiful day, a most glorious day, should be ruined by a tragedy like that.” That’s how we think. But we’re going to learn now that it wasn’t a chance mishap, that it wasn’t an accident at all.To this tragic day ofYom Hashemini, theMidrash Tanchuma(Shemini 9:2) applies the followingpossuk,and we should pay attention very well now because it’s Hashem talking to us,and He’s revealing to us one of the fundamental ways He deals with us in this world: אמרתי להוללים אל תהולו – “I said,” proclaims Hashem, “to those who are revelling, ‘Do not be too merry’” (Tehillim 75:5). Hakodosh Boruch Hu gives an order here, an order for how this world should run; He says, “I don’t want people to betoohappy.”And that means that anybody, even the most virtuous man or woman – Elisheva and Aharon were virtuous after all – Hakodosh Boruch Hu wants to make sure that a certain element enters into their life, an element that is essential to the success of their career. And that one ingredient that is necessary for success in this world, in addition to all the other components of life, is sadness. Yes, sadness! Sadness is essential in life. And therefore: “I say to the merry, ‘Don’t be too merry.’”A STIRAH TO WHAT WE LEARN HERE?Now for us that’s a big question, a very big question. Because you know, especially if you come here, you already know that in this place we try to live according to the true principle that Hakodosh Boruch Hu is עולם חסד יבנה (Tehillim 89:3), that Hashem made a world of kindliness. After all, we know that Hakodosh Boruch Hu is atov u’meitiv. That’s number one! It’s fundamental, and we are required to assimilate the idea into our bones that Hashem created everything for the purpose of kindliness.I say “number one” because it’s something we learned way back in Bereishis: וירא אלוקים את כל אשר עשה והנה טוב מאד – “And Hashem saw everything that He made, and behold it was very good” (Bereishis 1:31). Not onlytov!Tov me’od. And when Hashem saysme’od, it meansme’ooooooooooooooooooooood! It means an endless good! It’s extremely extremely extremely good. We know it’s a very good world because Hakodosh Boruch Hu doesn’t give His seal of approval “very good” unless it is very, very, very – and forever we won’t stop saying very – good. That’s how good it must be if Hashem says it’s “tov meod.”So on the one hand we’re saying that Hashem is all kindliness, that He’s good, that He’s very good, and very very good. And yet this great goodness is not always readily apparent to us. Because Elisheva the wife of Aharon did not see thetov me’odshe expected. And most of us don’t see it either because Hashem is always tempering our happiness with some sadness. Our successes in life are almost always sobered by the hand of Hashem one way or another. We don’t have all the wealth we’d like to have. We’re not having the fun in life we’d like to have. We feel that we’re being deprived. There’s always some unhappiness that creeps into our lives. We have grudges against people, we feel we’ve been wronged. People don’t appreciate us, we’re rejected and so on and so forth, all the things that make a person unhappy. And don’t think it’s only you, that it’s only certain people. No; everybody has unhappiness like that. And so, it’s a good question: What happened to thetov me’odof Hashem?OLAM HAZEH IS FAKE NEWSIn order to understand this subject we’ll read a selection from ourrebbi, the Mesillas Yesharim. The Mesillas Yesharim, in the first chapter, wishes to impress upon us the importance of directing our thoughts towards the World to Come. And he begins as follows: ותראה באמת שכבר לא יוכל שום בעל שכל להאמין שתכלית בריאת האדם הוא למצבו בעולם הזה – “Nobody who has anyseichelat all could believe that the creation of man was for his situation in this world.” The Mesillas Yesharim is warning us here: Take note, this world is not your purpose. You hear this? This world is so good that the Mesillas Yesharim has to warn you not to get too caught up in it! There is so much happiness in life, there is so much joy in life, there is so much zest and fun in life, that it’s enough to deceive anybody into thinking that this world is it! And so the Mesillas Yesharim makes sure that you know that it’s not real, that it’s illusory and fleeting.And he explains it like this: כי מה הם חיי האדם בעולם הזה, או מי הוא ששמח ושלו ממש בעולם הזה – “Because what is the life of a man in this world? And who is there who is actually completely happy and who really has tranquility and peace in this world? ימי שנותינו בהם שבעים שנה ואם בגבורות שמונים שנה ורהבם עמל ואון – Our days are only seventy years, andb’gvuros,if a man has strength and a healthy constitution, then he can live maybe eighty years. But a great part of these years is filled with difficulties and toil. בכמה מיני צער וחולאים ומכאובים וטרדות, ואחר כל זאת המות – A great part is sadness; various kinds of vicissitudes, pain, illness, troubles and worries. And after everything, comes death.”RAV MILLER KNOWS ALL ABOUT ITFind me someone whose life is not visited with disturbances! There is no such thing! The disappointments; the troubles and turbulence are constant. Every family, every individual, suffers in various ways in this world and I know all about it. I get the phone calls all the time. People are ringing my bell constantly. I know much more than you do. Trouble withparnassah,shalom bayis, shidduchim, sicknesses, fighting with neighbors and mothers-in-law, debts and everything you could imagine – and more. Life is full of difficulties for everyone – even the “fortunate” ones suffer in this world.And even if one would live a long life, peacefully, without any disturbances, the end is almost always filled withtzaros.Before death there is infirmity and sickness. Almost everybody eventually ends up in a home for the aged. Many of those who imagine and hope that they will forever make their way merrily through life, will most likely find themselves one day lying in a bed wearing diapers. Some of them will be laying for years in a bed unable to move and unable to perform their functions without the help of a nurse. You imagined yourself to be a happy success in this world and now you find yourself in a nursing home and an apathetic woman is changing your diapers five times a day. “Made in your pants again? So soon?! I just changed you two hours ago!” It’s no longer fun, I imagine, when you get up to there. Could that be thetovme’odthat you pursued all the days of your life?NO NEED TO SIGN UP!And after all of those “pleasures”, what is waiting for him? The cold clammy clay of the grave.Ay yah yay, the grave! The thought that we push away and hope to ignore forever. Because, of course, onlyotherpeople die. There’s a “chevrah shtarbers,” a club for people who die, and people imagine they’ll be able to say, “I never signed up for that!” That’s how we think.And the truth is that even if you would live a thousand years, and it would be a life of no disturbances at all, OK, so now you’re a thousand years old and it’s coming to an end. So what good is it all now? Those thousand years are not enough when the last day comes. A thousand years is not terribly long. It might be long when you’re starting it, but when you come to the end it doesn’t seem long at all. Now begins sadness. And to a certain extent this sadness pervades the entire life. No matter how jolly a group of revelers seem to be; they’re jumping around, blowing horns, and drinking. It looks like they’re living it up, but they’re not living it up, they’re covering it up. Because all of them have at the bottom of their heart – no matter how much they try to cover it up with good times – laying there is the awareness that eventually there will be death.WHAT HAPPENED TOTOV ME’OOOOOOOOD?!And so the Mesillas Yesharim tells us that this proves that Hakodosh Boruch Hu must have intended for a different existence where that promise oftov me’odwill be fully fulfilled. Because this world may betov, and it may betov me’od,and it may betovme’od me’od,and with another thousandme’ods –but that’s where it stops. It will always come to an end. And the ultimate promise oftovme’odwill only be fulfilled in the Next World. It’s only the happiness ofOlam Habothatwill never end, and that’s where yourneshamahwill finally be satisfied.Now we must know that the Mesillas Yesharim is not talking to people who have to be convinced aboutOlam Haba. His words are directed tobnei Torah,toma’aminimwho already believe in the Next World. He’s talking to people who are born into an environment – this was two hundred years ago or more – an environment where the entire world, even gentiles, all subscribed to the principle of the Afterlife, the Hereafter.But belief is not enough! You don’t just sign on the dotted line הריני מאמין באמונה שלימה בעולם הבא and finished. No! That’s only the first step. And so the Mesillas Yesharim wasn’t writing this to convince us about theexistenceofOlam Habaper se, but to emphasize thatOlam Habais thesole purposeof our stay in this world. Because even ama’aminwho believes implicitly inOlam Habacould think that maybe this world isalsoan end in itself.THE SECRET TO ALL DISSATISFACTIONAnd that’s one of the most important explanations for all the disappointment and unhappiness we see in this world; because this world is not the final goal and we have to be reminded of that. We need to be reminded that there’s another place where the enjoyment will continue forever. And there, the enjoyment will take place in such a manner that we will never tire from it; we’ll always be happy with that pleasure and it will continue forever.And so what happened on thatYom Hasheminiwas part of the eternal plan of Hashem in this world, to interject sadness into the midst of great joy. And the purpose of that was to teach them, during their great joy, that you must always remain focused on the principle that true unadulterated joy will only come inthe Afterlife. Whatever sin the two sons of Aharon may have committed, the severity of their fate and the sadness it brought upon the people was decreed beforehand, to teach theAm Yisroelforever and ever the lesson of supreme importance, the great fundamental lesson ofOlam Haba.It was no accident; it wasn’t something that justhappenedto have taken place during a moment of great happiness. It was the plan of Hashem that especially on this great day of joy, theAm Yisroelshould be reminded of the true joy that they live for, their true purpose in life. And it isdavkasadness that comes about during moments of great joy that accentuates most effectively this great teaching ofOlam Haba.Hakodosh Boruch Hu is talking to thehollilim –that’s us – He’s talking to us all the time, and He’s saying אל תהולו – “Do not lose yourself in the addictive happiness of this world. Remember that you are here only to prepare for the World to Come.”TOO MUCH GOOD IS NO GOODAnd that’s what ourMedrash Tanchumameans when it describes the happy day that turned tragic with these four important words: שאין שמחה ממתנת לאדם – “Happiness does not last in permanence for anybody.” Joy in this world will not continue forever and the one who rejoices today is not necessarily rejoicing tomorrow. Like thepossukin Koheles says (2:2): לשחוק אמרתי מהולל – “About laughter I said ‘It is wild, it is too much’”. מהולל means gaiety, happiness. And Hashem says, “If someone is reveling in this world, if he’s making his way merrily throughOlam Hazeh, getting entangled and absorbed in the success of this world, then I say to him: ‘That’s too much, it’s not good for you. I can’t let a person get lost in his happiness, in his desire to achieve satisfaction in this world, because that’s how a person squanders his life away.’”You’re here for seventy, eighty years after all; it seems so permanent, and you begin to feel that it’s an end in itself, and that’s how a person misses out on the opportunity of life. And so Hakodosh Boruch Hu sends reminders. He gives His order of אל תהולו and He introduces into your life an element of sadness.And so when we study ourparshaand read about the great tragedy that took place on this happy day we understand that it was Hashem’s plan to inject sadness into the happiest day in the history of the world. Hakodosh Boruch Hualwaysbrings into people’s lives experiences that are meant to sober them. And He has in mind this general principle of tempering the happiness and success of life so that a person will be encouraged to keep his focus on the Next World.Part II. The Great ConsolationWHAT’S WRONG WITH A LUXURIOUS HOTEL?If life was merely one thing after another, one joy following the next one, people would get lost in this world. Like a man we once had in our congregation. A true story! In our shul! He and his wife lived in a beautiful home on a tree-lined street with gardens. It was a beautiful street and an expensive home. But they had to go for vacation to the country. I don’t know if the country was any better than their home, but they went to an expensive hotel in the country for the summer.The truth is that I didn’t understand the necessity at all. She didn’t overwork herself here in the city, and they didn’t lack anything in their spacious and luxurious home. But they went to the country to spend the summer in an expensive hotel. A luxurious hotel where they could find “happiness”. Butthen, they left the hotel for a vacation to Switzerland for two weeks. Imagine people who lived that way constantly. They thought that maybe in Switzerland they’d find the satisfaction they were yearning for. But the truth is that they would never find true happiness in this world. Because they were looking in all the wrong places –because they were looking in this world.So what happened eventually? Unfortunately she suddenly contracted cancer. She was quite young and after a long and painful illness she finally had to leave this world. And she didn’t leave as a satisfied and happy woman. Now we understand that Hakodosh Boruch Hu has many purposes; and I’m not the one to interpret any purpose. I’m just saying an illustration. Because even if people have everything in this world, they will keep on looking for other things. And Hakodosh Boruch Hu wants to remind them: “Kinderlach!” He says. “Children! Don’t get lost in this world. Because your appetite forOlam Habais going to be dulled. And I want you to prepare a big lusty appetite for things of the spirit.”HASHEM TAKES AWAY YOUR LOLLIPOPYou know, one of the surprises that little children get is when they discover how “mean” their mothers are. Here’s a little boy who was given, let’s say, a quarter. A whole quarter! He’s on top of the world now! So he goes to the store and buys two lollipops. He comes home so happy, and as soon as he comes home, his mother snatches them out of his hand. And he can’t understand why his mother who is always so considerate and so kind is now so mean to him. His mother can’t explain to him that it’s just before mealtime and she doesn’t want him to spoil his appetite for nourishing food, and therefore she deprived him of hisnosherai.And so too, Hakodosh Boruch Hu sometimes takes away happiness from people in order that they should not lose their appetite for what’s coming later; to keep them focused on the great happiness they should always be anticipating, and that’s the World to Come.THE BOOK RAV MILLER NEVER WROTEToo much success is unhealthy. It’s like too much sweets in your diet. You can’t live on sugar; you need proteins and other nutrients and vitamins too. And you need a little bit of bitterness in life too. And that’s what themedrashis teaching us – it’s an illustration of the lesson that nobody should expect that this life will be nothing but pleasure and good times.You know, many times I was thinking about writing a book. I wanted to write a book called The Pursuit of Happiness. I have a lot of material on the subject and I knew that it would be a successful book because this world is a very happy place. But I didn’t write it because I didn’t want to mislead people. Because this world isnotfor the pursuit of happiness. Although this world is full of happiness, but people would read that title and think that happiness is a purpose in itself. No, it’s the pursuit of achievement, the pursuit of perfection, that’s what we’re here for in this world.THERE’S A LOT OF FUN IN THIS WORLD BUT…And therefore,Hashem has in store a lot of these treatments for everybody; it can’t be helped. Because the treatment oftzarosis the biggesttovahpossible when it causes a person to think ofOlam Habah.When people see that there is no complete happiness in this world, and they understand why that is so, that’s already a perfection of character. And therefore it’s important that Hashem remind people that this world is not for enjoyment and pleasure; although there’s a lot of fun in this world, but there’s a special world that was made for enjoyment. The Next World is especially set up for pleasure – it’s a world of happiness. And this world is not the place for that; this world is set up especially for achievement. And that’s the great consolation of this world –that this world is not it!Like Dovid Hamelech said when he saw that difficulties were coming upon him: אם אמרתי מטה רגלי – “When I thought that my foot was slipping,” חסדך השם יסעדני – Hashem, it was Your kindliness that supported me” (Tehillim 94:18-19). That means that I cried out to You that Your kindliness should help me. And many times it did. And then Dovid continues: ברוב שרעפי בקרבי – “In the multitude of my thoughts in my midst.” Dovid had thoughts, worries, of what was going to happen. He was confronted with peril at every footstep. Shaul was seeking Dovid with armed men; he was ambushing him and Dovid was hiding like an animal in caves and thickets. He was constantly beset with worries. And what did he say? ברוב שרעפי בקרבי – “Because of the many worries within me, תנחומיך ישעשעו נפשי – Your consolations were the delight of my soul.” Which consolations? What consolations?THE ONLY TRUENECHAMADovid was thinking aboutOlam Haba! Because he knew how to utilize his troubles in this world. He knew that one of the most important functions of sadness is to loosen your grasp on this world a little bit. So he made use of his troubles to create for himself a mind that was anOlam Haba’dikehmind. And it’s only the man with anOlam Haba’dikehmind who can weather the storms of this world.Somebody called me up now; he lost his son. A couple lost a son and they wanted to talk to me. Now, if they want to come sit with me, I could speak to them various words of consolation, I could do that. But the only true consolation is the words that we’re speaking here tonight. This world is a place where everybody loses something. But your world shouldn’t collapse for you because of what happened. When you concentrate your life onthisworld, even if you believe superficially inOlam Haba, but you live here with a feeling of permanence, that’s when the world turns out to be not what you wanted. Everything turns dark and it all collapses into nothing.THE BEREAVED FATHERHere’s another man who lost his son; this man was amispallelhere in our shul. And his son was atachshit; a sweet and brilliant man. He was married with a big family and he was eminently successful; successful in the Torah world and in the scholastic world as well. I still remember how the parents were having from this son a tremendousnachas. He really was an example of success and everything was the best that could be. And then suddenly in the midst ofYomtivrejoicing he died. An unexpected tragedy!And the father took it to heart; it broke him and he never really recovered. He didn’t live long after that. He was a healthy man but he left this world soon after that. And that’s because this father made a fundamental error. He was a good father, afrumman, but he made a mistake. The father had concentrated too much of his hopes on this world. And when this world collapsed, he collapsed with it.WEATHERING THE STORMS OF LIFEBut Aharon Hakohen and Elisheva, when their two beloved sons perished on theYom Hashmini, they didn’t collapse. And that’s because they understood the nature of this world; they understood that it’s a world of disappointments. And they concentrated on the thought that they would see their sons again. They would continue making their way successfully through the hallway of this world – what is it after all except for a hallway of seventy, eighty years – and then they would meet their sons again in the world of eternity.And that’s what everyone has to know. You can’t expect to be able to weather the difficulties of life, the small disappointments or the tragedieschas v’shalom, if you’renot prepared beforehand with the proper Torah attitudes. It’s the person who lives withOlam Habaon his mind who is able to make his way successfully through everything that life brings his way. Because he knows that he will see his family again and rejoice with them in the Next World. And he knows that he will receive his just and everlasting reward there, no matter what type oftzaros –big or small – he undergoes here.THE SNEAK ATTACKAnd that’s why the Chovos Halevavos tells us that of all the principles theyetzer haratries to weaken in a man, it is this one, the belief in the next world, that he attacks first and foremost. Because he knows thatOlam Habais theyesodof our lives. It’s our purpose here. So all the other things theyetzer haracan ignore – believe in Hashem, good; believe inMattanTorah, good; believe inYetziasMitzrayim, good; believe inTorah she’bal peh,good; believe in the wholegemara, believe in everything! You can even believe in arebbeh,atzadik! But be weak in just one thing; just be weak when it comes toOlam Haba.“Be weak in that,” says theyetzer hara. “Don’t talk about it; soft-peddle it. Be embarrassed to mention it.” BecauseOlam Habais everything! If theyetzer haracan weaken your awareness ofOlam Habathen everything else falls away. If yourOlamHabais weak, then your Torah is weak, yourmitzvosare weak. Everything else is weakened ifOlam Habais not constantly at the forefront of your thoughts.THE THOUSAND YEAR PHONE CONVERSATIONAnd let me tell you something – theyetzer harais doing a good job on us. There are plenty of frum people who are very weak in this principle. Now you may argue with me but I’m telling you that very many of us have succumbed almost entirely to theyetzer hara.And I can prove it to you immediately by a simple experiment. Let’s listen in to the conversations in an Orthodox home.All they talk about is this world. And they talk about it a lot! With details; all theolamhazehdikehdetails. The little girl listens to her mother on the telephone. What does she hear already?! Sheitels! This kind ofsheitel, that kind ofsheitel. And dresses! The mother is complaining about how hard it was to buy a dress. “I couldn’t get a dress anywhere. I went all over town to find a dress.” Finally she found it in a “special” place – around the corner. This is an Orthodox mother?! And that’s all the child hears. Sometimes recipes, and maybe makeup. All things fromthisworld. She can sit next to her mother fora thousand yearswhile her mother talks on the telephone, and she won’t hearOlam Habamentioned even once.And I’m afraid next to the father is no better. I’m not talking now about the father who is a connoisseur of wines, of bourbons. He has a cabinet filled with all different types of wineand he knows their names! That man I’m not speaking about now. He’s already sold out toOlam Hazehcompletely. He’s already sinking in quicksand; he’s in grave danger and he has to take emergency precautions to save himself.WHERE IS ZEIDY?I’m talking now to thefrummeh, the best. Here’s a father, and his children, all with black hats, sitting around the table talkingdivrei Torah.Maybe the father will say overpilpulimif he’s atalmid chochom; if not he’ll say over someguttaverter, some comments on thesedrah. ButOlam Habah? It’s a rare bird. You can sit sometimes for twenty years at a table and not hear even onceOlam Habahmentioned! Little children growing up don’t even know there’s such a thing. Unless someone dies and so they tell the child that “Zeidehis inOlam Habahnow.” But even then, the child is thinking, “What? Where?” Because nobody is talking about it. And there’s a good reason for that. Because theyetzer harahis most interested that it shouldn’t be mentioned.And so we have to do whatever we can that we shouldn’t fall into the trap of theyetzer hara! We should make it a point to speak aboutOlam Habaat the table. You have to plan ahead, with wisdom, with cunning. “How am I going to sneak in the subject ofOlam Habatoday?” And when you succeed, so you start making plans for the next meal. And even more than that – how long will we have to wait to hear them talk aboutgehenimat the Jewish table? Now that would be a Jewish table! The father and his family discussGan Edenandgehenim. And the father is always pointing out that למחר לקבל שכרם, in the Next World, that’s where we’ll be rewarded for our life’s work. “Chaim’ll, in the Next World Hashem is going to give you everything! Only Hashem can make you truly happy. And you should know, Chaim’ll, it’s notstama reward. A person won’t be able to handle thesimcha! Hashem is going to have to revive you again and again in order to continue bestowing His goodness upon you.” Now that’s table-talk for the Jewish home!YOUNG ISRAEL OF SLABODKAThe truth is that even in the shuls there’s nobody talking about it! How long will we have to sit in the shul and listen to the rabbi’s speeches before we hear a dissertation on the great subject ofOlam Haba? I remember when the Slobodka Rosh Yeshiva once came to America and they invited him to a Young Israel convention – it used to be held here in a hotel in New York City. He didn’t know what Young Israel means; he didn’t know, otherwise he would have surely not gone. So he went and they asked him to speak. Speak?! What is the Slabodka Rosh Yeshiva going to say to them already? Which subject should he speak about? He thought, “I should speak about what the Jews of America need to hear most.” And so he spoke on the subject ofgehenim.But you won’t always have the Slobodka Rosh Yeshiva to tell you those things. And there aren’t too many rabbis who are willing to tell you the truth. First of all, many of them are themselves weak in theemunahofOlam Habah. And even if not, he can’t tell you the truth. You’ll run to the other shul down the block, and your rabbi will lose all of his congregants. I told you once that in my shul we make a “membership drive” once in a while. I tell the shul members the truth, and I drive them out to all the other shuls in the neighborhood. That’s why the otherrabbonimin my neighborhood love me.IT’S NOT JUST THE OLD PEOPLENow I know that many people don’t like to hear about this subject and I don’t blame them. You might think, “That’s all Rabbi Miller is going to tell me?! That this world is not a happy place?!” I know some people don’t want to hear about the Next World; it makes them sad when I talk about it. They want to imagine that they’ll live forever and ever.But what can I do, my friends? It’s so important to internalize that this world is not forever; that everybody will die sooner or later. So a man comes back to the house after thelevayah; the mother of the house is now gone and he’s going to her home now to sitshivah. He sees a nice quiet home; it’s very neat because last week she was still cleaning up. And now she’s gone. What a pity! What a pity! Thealtermotheror thealterfather is gone. They always said such good words to us; it’s such a pity they’re gone now. But he has to know however that someday he’ll be gone too. Everybody mustknowthat he won’t live forever. And therefore we’re in this world only for the purpose of preparing.And the truth is that it shouldn’t make you sad; because when you know you’re living for a purpose, so every moment in this world becomes more precious to you. You enjoy this world even more because of the opportunities it provides for achieving the eternaltov me’od. And so the wise man, thechochomwho isro’eh es ha’nolad,doesn’t invest his hopes in this world. Because he knows that if he puts his hopes intoOlam Hazehso he’s going to be terribly disappointed. And that’s why you find a lot of old people are very soured onOlam Hazeh; because that’s all they were concerned about and now they see that it turned into nothing.THE HAPPY OLD MANI once visited a home for the aged and I was looking around at the old people. It was filled with American style old Jews,burim,amei ha’aretz, and it was a pity to see them. They were sitting around, staring. Life had turned out to be a disappointment. “This hurts me,” “I have none of my own teeth left,” “I can’t go here, I can’t do this or that.” It was nothing but disappointment. Only complaints, that’s all you could hear.And in the corner I saw an old man with a white beard, sitting at a table with agemaraopen. And he was busy getting ready for the next world. He was reviewing everything he had learned in his lifetime. And he was the happiest man in the place! He was busy, he was accomplishing, because he knew that he had a purpose. You know why he was happy. Because none of the disappointments in life had disappointed him! Everything was turning out exactly as expected and now he was getting ready now to cash in. He was busy counting all of his bonds before going to the bank, making sure he wouldn’t leave anything over. He was a happy man!WE DON’T LIKE TRAGEDIESAnd it wasn’t because he searched for happiness his whole life – it was because he recognized all the bumps of life for what Hashem intended them, as reminders from Hashem to remain focused on the true goal. Because he understood the important lessonal taholu,he knew not to get lost in the happiness of this world,and he therefore was the happiest man in this world.How can you be preparing forOlam Habaif you never even think about it, no less mention it? Isn’t that a tragedy? So we’re not going to let that happen to us because we don’t like tragedies. And so, we’re going to have to muster our resources, all of our energy, to fight this battle: Like the Rambam (Teshuva 8:7) says, “A person should always yearn forOlam Haba; he should always think aboutOlam Haba. Like Dovid Hamelech did. כמה כמה דוד לעולם הבא, How greatly did Dovid yearn for Olam Habah, כאיל תערוג על אפיקי מים, like a deer thirsting for drink.” (Tehillim 42:2)THE OLAM HABA PROGRAM – ONLY THIRTY SECONDS A DAYSoinstead of just talking about becoming great, we’ll actually do something about it. Instead of being like the people who just talk about doing things, we’re going to get busy immediately thinking about the World to Come. Together we’ll start anOlam Habaprogram. We’re going to spend at least thirty seconds every day thinking aboutOlam Haba,reminding ourselves that we’re in this world only as a preparation for the World to Come. For one half a minute, remind yourself that this world is just a vestibule, a place to put your things in order, before the World to Come.Every day at least thirty seconds on the clock, we’re going to think aboutOlamHaba. Whether you’re hanging on a strap on the subway, or driving to work; maybe you’re waiting to see the doctor, or even if you’re standing on the corner waiting for the light to change – whatever it is – look at your watch and let it tick off thirty seconds while you are now in the World to Come, thinking about the purpose of life.THE SWEETEST SHALOM ALEICHEM YOU’LL EVER HEARAnd then, when we come into the Next World so they’ll ask you, “What do you want here?” And you’ll say, “I prepared; I thought aboutOlam Habahin the world where I’m coming from. I worked on it!” “Oh!” they’ll say, “Shalom Aleichem! Welcome!” Because you’re superior to everybody else. You’re adagul mei’rivavah,you’re one in ten thousand. You’re a head taller than everybody else because you understood the lessons of what happened onYom Hashminiand you’re thinking every day about the World to Come. Now, whether they’ll give you a front seat, or a middle seat or a back seat, that will depend on how much effort you put into the things we speak about here. But they are going to welcome you; that’s guaranteed.And so, if anyone asks you what you are doing in the world – whether you can tell him or not – you at least have to know for yourself that we’re here to prepare for the great career of everlasting happiness in the Next World. That is the foundation upon which we build everything in this world. It’s theyesod hachasidusv’shoresh ha’avodah,and if you have this before your eyes then you can build. But if not, or even if you do but it’s weak, then you’re building without a foundation. The whole foundation of being a Jew is the clear conviction that our purpose isOlam Habah,the Afterlife. Not that the Afterlife is an annex, something that isalsogoing to be given to us. No –the Afterlife is it!It’s onlyOlam Habahthat counts! That’s your great joy! And do you know what’s going to happen when you train yourself to think this way? It’s going to illuminate your life. It will put asimcha, a deep and profound happiness, into your life. Because no matter what happens, from the smallest bumps of daily life, tochas v’shalomthe most terrible of tragedies, you know that you are being reminded by Hashem of your purpose in this world, and you know that you’re headed for success. And once you assimilate this idea ofOlam Habahinto your bones, then you’ll be capable of weathering all of the turbulence that life brings. And you’ll grow even greater from the constant lessons of אל תהולו that Hashem brings upon you as He prepares you for the great day when you will finally leave thisprozdor, the hallway that this world is, and you’ll enter into the טרקלין, the great palace of the World to Come. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. This podcast has been graciously sponsored by JewishPodcasts.fm. There is much overhead to maintain this service so please help us continue our goal of helping Jewish lecturers become podcasters and support us with a donation: https://thechesedfund.com/jewishpodcasts/donate