Audio of shiur Sicknesses and Their Cure
Neither transcript nor post has been reviewed by R. Mizrachi chlita
Summary Briefing
I. The Source of Sickness and Cure
The shiur begins by establishing a foundational principle: G’d alone controls sickness and healing. While doctors play a role, their efforts are ultimately governed by G’d's will. This applies universally, regardless of a person's religion or background. The Torah emphasizes this point, stating that it is G’d who "removes from you all sickness" when His commandments are followed.
II. The Intertwined Nature of Sin and Sickness
The shiur goes on to explain the connection between sin and illness. Engaging in sinful behavior increases the likelihood of experiencing sickness. This principle is rooted in the concept of Divine Justice, where actions have consequences. While righteous individuals may also face health challenges, their suffering often serves as a form of purification for past transgressions, sparing them from harsher consequences in the afterlife.
III. Deciphering G’d's Language: Specific Ailments and Their Corresponding Sins
Rav Mizrachi highlights that the nature of a sickness can offer clues about the specific sins a person might be engaging in. He illustrates this point with the example of breast cancer, the most prevalent cancer among women today. This, he suggests, is a consequence of the widespread immodesty prevalent in society, a stark contrast to the standards of previous generations. Similarly, he links prostate cancer, the most common cancer in men, to transgressions related to sexual immorality. This concept of "measure for measure" suggests a direct correlation between the sin and the afflicted area of the body .
IV. Fertility: A Blessing Contingent on Righteousness and Divine Plan
Rav Mizrachi addresses the sensitive topic of fertility, emphasizing that G’d's blessing of children is a general principle, not an absolute guarantee. Some individuals, due to their actions in previous lifetimes or pre-determined life paths, may face infertility regardless of their current righteousness. However, righteousness generally increases the likelihood of fertility. The shiur emphasizes that true blessing encompasses both numerous offspring and the financial means to support them.
V. Facing Challenges With Faith: Israel's Victories as Evidence of Divine Intervention
The shiur stresses that maintaining faith in G’d's protection empowers individuals to overcome fear, even when facing daunting obstacles. The example of Israel's victory in the Six-Day War, despite being vastly outnumbered and outgunned, serves as a powerful illustration of this principle. G’d's intervention, as recounted by an American pilot trainer who acknowledged the miraculous nature of the victory, underscores the idea that human logic and military might pale in comparison to divine assistance.
VI. Understanding Divine Timing: The Gradual Process of Change
Rav Mizrachi cautions against applying human logic to G’d's actions, particularly concerning the pace of change. G’d often orchestrates events gradually, for reasons that may not be immediately apparent. He uses the example of the Israelites' conquest of the Promised Land, which unfolded over seven years despite G’d's power to eliminate their enemies swiftly. This gradual approach, he explains, serves a purpose, even if it remains beyond human comprehension.
VII. The Enduring Relevance of the Torah: A Timeless Guide for a Complex World
The shiur emphasizes that the Torah is not merely a historical record but a living guidebook, relevant to every aspect of life. Its teachings provide guidance on a vast array of topics, from interpersonal relationships to spiritual practices. Ignorance of Torah law is not an excuse; it is considered a transgression in itself, highlighting the importance of actively seeking knowledge and understanding.
VIII. Identifying Authentic Religious Leadership in an Age of Deception
In an era saturated with information, the shiur stresses the crucial need to discern between genuine religious authority and those who promote falsehoods. True Torah scholars, Rav Mizrachi argues, emphasize both the rewards and consequences outlined in the Torah, urging their listeners to align their behavior with G’d's will. He cautions against charismatic speakers who may entertain but ultimately lead their audience astray with distorted interpretations of Judaism.
IX. Recognizing the Dangers of Heresy
Rav Mizrachi strongly condemns individuals he deems heretics, such as a figure he refers to as "Santa Claus," (Manis Friedman) who, despite presenting himself as an orthodox rabbi, promotes teachings that contradict the Torah. He calls for religious leaders to actively denounce such figures and guide their communities toward truth and authenticity.
X. Finding Strength in Individual Commitment During Times of Declining Observance
The shiur concludes with a message of hope: when the majority neglects their religious duties, those who remain steadfast in their observance gain even greater merit. This concept, illustrated by the story of Rav Ben Zion Abba Shaul who continued his Torah study even as others ceased for Shabbat preparations, emphasizes the power of individual commitment, even amidst widespread apathy or decline.
XI. Shabbat: A Sacred Covenant Beyond Mere Rest
Rav Mizrachi ends by emphasizing the paramount importance of Shabbat observance. Far from a mere day off, Shabbat represents a sacred covenant between G’d and the Jewish people, one that impacts both this life and the next.
Table of Contents
Section 1: The Miracle of Torah and the Persistence of Amalek (Paragraphs 1-10)
This section begins with Rav Mizrachi discussing the miracle of Moses writing 13 Torah scrolls in a single day, drawing a parallel to other miracles throughout Jewish history.
He then transitions to the concept of Amalek, explaining the mitzvah of wiping out their memory and how their mixing with other nations makes this commandment difficult to fulfill.
Rav Mizrachi explores the lineage of Amalek, connecting them to Esau and suggesting historical parallels to the Nazis and Palestinians.
Finally, he delves into the topic of Moses' death and the authorship of the final verses of the Torah, introducing the concept of G’d's control over life and death.
Section 2: Divine Intervention and the Purpose of Suffering (Paragraphs 10-22)
Rav Mizrachi illustrates G’d's control over life and death through a story of a woman who died as predicted by her deceased mother in a dream.
He connects this story to the four forms of capital punishment in Jewish law, explaining how G’d enacts justice even without the Sanhedrin.
The lecture then pivots to the vastness and complexity of Jewish law, using the laws of Shabbat and financial matters as examples.
Rav Mizrachi emphasizes the importance of a G’d-fearing judge in Jewish courts, contrasting it with the flaws of the secular justice system.
He then returns to the theme of divine intervention with another story of a woman whose Sabbath observance prompted a visit from her deceased father in a dream.
The section ends with a discussion of G’d's role in sickness and healing, emphasizing that G’d sends sickness based on a person's actions.
Section 3: Blessings, Fertility, and the Importance of Modesty (Paragraphs 22-27)
Rav Mizrachi analyzes the verse "And G’d will remove from you all sickness," highlighting the connection between sin and illness.
He draws a connection between lack of modesty and illnesses such as breast cancer and prostate cancer, suggesting these are consequences of disobeying G’d's commandments.
He challenges the idea of a "friendly" G’d, emphasizing the importance of accepting G’d's laws and judgments.
This section also covers the concept of "measure for measure" punishment, where the nature of the suffering reflects the nature of the sin.
The discussion then moves to G’d's blessings on fertility, exploring the seeming contradiction between righteous people struggling with infertility and wicked people having many children.
Section 4: Financial Blessings, the Holy Land, and the Power of Faith (Paragraphs 27-39)
Rav Mizrachi analyzes the phrase "and He will bless," highlighting its appearance in two distinct contexts: blessing on income and blessing on children.
He emphasizes the importance of both blessings for a complete life, explaining that one without the other leads to hardship.
The lecture then transitions to the Israelites inheriting the Holy Land, emphasizing the role of G’d's intervention in their victory against more powerful enemies.
Rav Mizrachi discusses the Six-Day War and Yom Kippur War as examples of G’d's help and the importance of faith in warfare.
He emphasizes that victory comes from G’d, not from military might, and warns against trusting in human strength over divine intervention.
Section 5: Conquering the Holy Land and the Difference between Gentiles and Animals (Paragraphs 39-43)
Rav Mizrachi explains G’d's command to conquer the Holy Land gradually, citing the need to prevent disease and wild animals from overrunning the land due to mass casualties.
He addresses the question of why G’d would intervene to defeat enemy nations but not manage the animal population.
This leads to a discussion on how G’d judges Gentiles versus animals – Gentiles based on righteousness and wickedness, and animals as beings without free will, acting as G’d's instruments.
Rav Mizrachi reminds listeners that the Israelites receive the land not through their own merit, but through G’d's promise to the patriarchs.
Section 6: The Sanctity of Burial, the Dangers of Heresy, and the Importance of Rebuke (Paragraphs 43-58)
This section discusses the prohibition of cremation for both Jews and Gentiles, emphasizing the importance of burial and the soul's connection to the grave.
Rav Mizrachi then shifts focus to the dangers of straying from the Torah, criticizing contemporary figures who promote heresy and those who follow them.
He criticizes specific individuals and groups, highlighting their actions as damaging to Judaism and warning against associating with them.
This section also touches upon the importance of learning Torah and rebuking those who spread harmful ideologies, stressing the responsibility of Jewish leaders to guide their communities.
Rav Mizrachi emphasizes that ignorance of Torah is no excuse for sin and calls for greater engagement with Jewish learning and observance.
He concludes by urging listeners to utilize available resources, such as his lecture app, to strengthen their faith and commitment to G’d.
Audio Transcript:
Good evening. This is a lecture, with the help of G’d, on the performance of the Jewish people; Joshua ben Shifra, Shlomo ben Rachel Eliezer, Levi ben Rachel, Avram ben Sima, Ori ben Dikla, Sarah Batfrida, Rivka Batmiriam, and also the prophet Gloria Bat-Saili and Yedidia Eitan Yecheskel Ben Sandrin Miriam and Eliyahu Ben Shalom Shmuel Ben Chaviv Paroch Diana Bat-Yosef Baruch Hashem.
On Shabbat, we read Parashat Ekev. We are now in the 11 weeks of Deuteronomy. Sefer Devarim ( Book of Words) has 11 chapters, 11 parashiyot ( Torah portions). Every Shabbat, a different parasha. This is the speech that Moses (Moshe Rabbeinu) gave the last day of his life, the last month, the last 36 days of his life, all together was 11 chapters in the Torah. The entire book of Deuteronomy took 36 days. Hele ha-devarim, hele, aleph, it's one in numeric value, lamed is 30, he is 5, together 36. It hints that these words of Moses were about a month, 36 days, five weeks. The last day of his life, he wrote 12 Sifrei Torah ( Torah scrolls), 13 actually all together. One he puts in the ark as a sample. In case you have a doubt, you can go and compare. And one he gave to each tribe.
And how can you write 13 Sifrei Torah in one day? All by miracles, obviously. If it takes a year to write a Sefer Torah, if you work all day it takes you about a year, it's 304,805 letters and it's with a feather you dip it inside the ink and you go, it's a very, very slow process you know, so sometimes you have to correct, it didn't come out perfect you have to shave the letter and rewrite it, so together, then after that you do a computer scan and another person goes over it to make sure no letters are missing or there's no extra words, and after this entire process takes at least a year, usually it's more than a year, but if you're really in a rush it takes a year. How can you write 13 Sifrei Torah, a job of 13 years, in one day? Just like all the other hundred miracles that are described in the Torah, that bread is falling from heaven and manna and blood all over Egypt, and the Red Sea split and billions of frogs covered Egypt, or grasshoppers and hail and fire came together, fell from the sky, even though usually fire and water don't go together, the water puts off the fire, but now G’d (Hashem) decided that they will go together. And many other miracles as they had Moses lift his hands and the nation of Israel win the war and when his hands are falling down, they're beginning to lose. What do the hands have to do with the war? G’d shows clear miracles.
It's a period, there's 40 years in the desert, plus the one year in Egypt that took place, all the 10 plagues, together there were 41 years of miracles. But the miracles didn't end here. The last day of the life of Moses, when he passed, that's the end of the Torah. Right after that, you have the book of Joshua and what do you have over there? Also miracles, they come, they occupy Israel, they win seven massive nations with a massive army who were sitting here established in the land of Israel, kicked the Canaanites, the Amorites, all these nations that the Torah mentions, seven cursed wicked nations, idol worshippers, terrible people. It's a very big sin for a Jew to marry any one of those seven nations. Not only not to marry them, not to have mercy at them whatsoever. Some other nations of the Gentiles ( Goyim) are not as bad. The Torah didn't speak any derogatory comments about them. Or even if the Torah spoke bad about them, it wasn't so severe like these seven nations. These seven nations, together with the nation of Amalek, are the worst Gentiles in the history of the world.
Today, you don't know anymore which Gentile belongs to those seven nations. Even though today you meet an Italian guy, very possible, that his grand-grand-grandparents 3,300 years ago, eventually linked to one of those seven nations. So how are you going to know? There's no way to know. Once G’d made a situation in a world that there was a king named Sennacherib. It was a big war and he was a big very cruel king and his nations were making all the other nations running around for their life, you know, like you have refugees running from one country to another, so the Gentiles started to mix with each other, they ran to all over, Gentiles go from this to here, from this city to that city and it all got mixed, once the good Gentiles and the bad Gentiles all got mixed, there is no way anymore to know for sure who is Ishmael, who is Amalek, who belongs to Esau, who belongs to any other nation, there's no way to know, so all the Gentiles became like one group even though you know, some of them linked to a kosher source and some of them linked to a non-kosher source, but since today there's no way to know it that's why we have one mitzvah ( commandment) from the Torah that is basically not relevant today. Machot imche et zecher Amalek ( erase the memory of Amalek). It was a mitzvah that when you see these Amalekim, that's where the Nazis came from, not to let them live another minute. Mitzvah to kill them. This is what G’d said. If you see an Amalekite, you must kill him immediately. That's what one of the 613 commandments.
But at one point this mitzvah became not relevant. Why? Because once Amalekites got mixed with the rest of the world, there's no way to identify them. Why did G’d do it? Because up to a certain point, it was mitzvah to kill them. Once G’d decided that they don't have to die anymore, he got them mixed with the other nations, there's no way to identify them. Why? Because to change the Torah, it's not possible. One of the 13 principles of Judaism, that the Torah will never be modified, will never change. Now one letter will ever change from the Torah. It's the same Torah that G’d gave us will remain forever. Even after the Messiah would come, there will be days of Messiah, and everything in the world will be different. The Torah will still be the same exact Torah. Nobody will be able to erase one letter or add one letter to the Torah ever. Once it was given in the original divine version that G’d gave us in Mount Sinai in front of millions of witnesses. So we have to know that. So to change the Torah, it's not possible. So you have one of the 613 commandments is to erase the memory of Amalek.
So what is the alternative? You have to hide Amalek. How do you hide them? You mix them with the rest of the world and nobody knows today who is Amalek. We can guess that Amalek is the Nazis, the Germans, for what they've done we can guess that they are the Palestinians, the Hamas, usually when you see among the Gentiles huge cruelty, it's very possible that these Gentiles are from the Zerah Amalek ( seed of Amalek), like Haman, Haman Agagi wanted to kill all Jews, to murder children, to murder all people, to murder everyone, there was Haman Agagi from the family of Agag, the king of Amalek. So he was Amalekite. The Germans, Germany in general, are from the children of Amalek. They came from Esau. The Gemara says that Jacob (Yaakov), Jacob our father, Jacob, you know, Israel, he said to G’d, please don't let my brother Esau succeed. It's written in the Gemara in Masechet Megillah, page 6. The Gemara said that Jacob said to G’d in his holy vision, please G’d do not let my brother Esau succeed in his plan. The Gemara said, what does it mean? What's plan? The Gemara now discussed, the Oral Torah is explaining what the meaning of the words of Jacob. The Gemara said, don't let Esau succeed because Esau is Germany of Edom.
Now you have to remember when the Gemara was written there was no country named Germany, this was 2000 years ago, there was no Germany. So the Gemara discussed who Esau will become, one of the nations that will come out of him will be called Germany. And guess what, like 17-1800 years later that's exactly what happened. There was a person named Bismarck and he united all the barbarian tribes in the area, what we call today Germany. There was Westphalia, Silesia, Bavaria, all these tribes, different tribes. And he decided, he called all of them and said, let's become one nation. How are we going to call it? The German Republic. And later they got rid of that name and they became Germany. First there was West Germany, East Germany. Then they decided to unite to one nation. They knocked down the Berlin Wall and became one nation. And until today, that's who they are, Germany. And the Gemara already told you that Germany of Edom will be built from 300 tribes. It's written in the Gemara. That's what the Gemara says. Of course, this is all information we got all the way from G’d in Mount Sinai, that these Esau will become Germany. And who Germany will be built from? From three hundred tribes, exactly as it happened later on, like 1700 years later. You can see the prophecy here. It's clear, clear prophecy.
So this is Germany of Edom. However, you may come and say, okay, here you go. So you have Amalek. Germany of Edom is Esau. Esau is Amalek. Who is Amalek? Esau had a son. His name was Eliphaz. Eliphaz had a son. What was his name? Amalek. So Amalek is the grandson of Esau. And Haman and Agag came from this family. And Hitler came from this family. And the Nazis came from this family. However, we don't know about all the Germans. It doesn't mean every German now is Amalek. Some Germans they used to be Italians or British or Arabs or, you know, from different countries. Two, three hundred years ago, maybe their parents came from Spain into Germany, and they settled there. Three generations later, the children speak German. But they're not really Amalek. So even among the Germans you don't know for sure that each German is for sure Amalek, because if you would know you would still have this obligation to kill them. But G’d made it in such a way that there's no way to know, there's no way to know. I saw in one of the books that before the Messiah would come there will be a nation that will be very cruel, the filthiest nation in history, that will be built from four nations and one of, it will be one-quarter Amalek. Who is he talking about? The Palestinians. Because he described that they're going to give us very hard time in the land of Israel. And the only Arabs that give us hard time mainly are these Arabs that live, you know, in Gaza, in Jericho, in Judea, in Samaria, in Jaffa, in Haifa, in Sidon, you know, on the border of Lebanon. So you see, this is it. It was all written in advance.
So going back, so Moses, he gave us the Torah and he gave one to each tribe. Then he passed. There is an argument in the Gemara, not an argument but two opinions, who wrote the last eight verses of the Torah? Did Moses write it, meaning the scribe is dead now? The last 8 verses of the Torah is that Moses passed away. So did Moses write before he died how he's going to die, meaning he knows in a few hours that's what's going to happen to him because he just wrote it in the Torah? That's one opinion anyway. It's the last day of his life, he doesn't cancel his free will. G’d doesn't tell people the day they die, he doesn't tell them the date, he doesn't tell them what year and they have no idea. It can happen any second of their life. The reason he doesn't tell people when they're going to die is because if a person would know in advance, let's say he's now 40, and he knows that he's going to live at least to 80, because he knows the day of his death, there's no rush to repent. I'll repent in the last few months of my life. Become a very, very strong, righteous person. Give tons of charity. Learn Torah non-stop. Repent for all my sins. Apologize to all the people I offended. You know, and I'll be perfect tzaddik ( righteous person). So what did I live 80 years for? It was enough the last two months of my life, three months to become perfect tzaddik, pray, Tehillim ( Psalms), Torah, you know, become a very nice person and that's it and die righteous. Then what were the 80 years for? Was a waste of time.
The idea that you don't know when you're gonna die forces you every day to repent because maybe today is the last day of your life. If tomorrow you die and you didn't repent, you just lost, you missed the train. That's why G’d doesn't tell a person the day of his death. But the last day of his life, the person does not have free will as he had his entire life. He doesn't choose anymore what to do because now G’d has to walk him into the exact place that he has to die. Whether he has to die when he sleeps, or in an accident, or in a lightning, or in a flood, or by an Arab terrorist. It has to be where G’d wrote on last Rosh Hashanah, where He's going to die, and how He's going to die. Him, her, Jew, non-Jew, doesn't matter. Everyone has a time they will have to die. But that minute that it will happen, and how it will happen, and where it will happen, and by whom it will be done, this was all already written. And that's why if a person, for instance, has to die in a certain intersection, for whatever reason, only G’d knows his calculation, He's going to bring him to that intersection.
I'll give you an example of a story that happened in Israel. There was one woman on a bus. The story is known to us because the religious person that was with this woman on a bus later sent a letter to Rav Zilberstein, who published it in his books, he has a few books that we have to praise G’d about, unbelievable supervision. So this woman, she asked him at 10 to 6 p.m. in Tel Aviv on a bus, she saw a religious man sitting on a bus, she asked him what time is it, he told her 10 to 6. She saw she's very nervous, it's like, you know, you see people when they're very uptight. Five minutes later she asked him what time is it, he told her five to six. You okay? She said I'm not sure if I'm okay. He said what happened, can I help you? She said, well you religious man you will know that I'm not crazy. My mother was a religious woman and since she passed, she started to come to me in the dreams. Every few days, a few weeks, she comes to me in a dream. Shame on you, you wicked daughter, you're not keeping Shabbat ( Sabbath), you're embarrassing me in my place, that I have such a daughter, you have to repent, you have to keep Shabbat. But I'm not interested to be religious. I ignored my mother's dreams again and again and again. I continue with my Shabbat bad habits. Now she came to me yesterday, the last night, she said to me, this is your last chance to accept on yourself to become Shomer Shabbat ( Sabbath observant). Will you do it or not? And I told her in a dream, no, I'm not going to do it. So she said to me, if that's the case, please meet me tomorrow at 6 p.m. in Kol Bo Shalom.
Kol Bo Shalom at that time was the only tall building in Israel. There were 33 floors. There were no tall buildings in Israel 30 years ago. Everything you see now, Tel Aviv, all these huge buildings all over the country, it was all built in the last 30 years. When I was in Israel as a teenager, the tallest building in Israel was 33 floors, and everybody knew that building. Kol Bo Shalom was a building with offices and a department store. And kids wanted their parents to take them to see the building. It was an attraction. Today we laugh when we talk about it. But it was an attraction. I remember when I arrived to New York, it was 1989, September 1989. And the first time when I saw Manhattan, I was a week in shock. Complete shock. I never saw tall buildings in my life. Now I see hundreds of them. I walked in Manhattan and I looked at this building, how people built such buildings. Because in Israel you don't have buildings like this. Today, Tel Aviv is full of them. But back then it wasn't the case. So she told her, meet me tomorrow at 6 p.m. in Kol Bo Shalom. How can you meet a dead woman in Kol Bo Shalom? Right? She also wondered how. So she's very nervous now. What does it mean, meet me in Kol Bo Shalom?
So now it's 5 to 6. She's worried that the bus will make it on time to Kol Bo Shalom. The religious man realized it has to be a story here. That a dead woman comes to her daughter a few times. You have to keep Shabbat. You have to keep Shabbat. And he decided to get off after her on the bus stop. It wasn't his stop. But he decided to get off and follow her. As she walked off, it was two minutes to six. She was walking towards Kol Bo Shalom. And he follows her quietly. She crossed the street to the other side of Kol Bo Shalom is across the street. Just when she crossed the street, a car came in full speed. Boom! Hit her on the spot and she died at 6.00 p.m. This is exactly what her death was. Stoning. Death by stoning.
Today, we don't have executions because there's no Temple in Jerusalem like it used to be. When there was a Temple, there were 71 judges sitting in a Sanhedrin ( Jewish high court), the big court, and they would judge cases. And among those cases are cases of people that deserve executions. Murderers, people that break Shabbat, idol worshippers, people that, you know, committed sins, that it's death penalty. You know, so now, when we don't have this Sanhedrin, there is no way to execute the wicked people, those who violate the rules of the Torah. So the Gemara said 2000 years ago after the destruction of the Temple, the Gemara said, what will happen to all the sinners that deserve to die? The Gemara said the court cannot execute them, but G’d will. Someone that needs to be stoned to death will get hit by something, by a horse, today we have cars, can fall from a building, meaning he's going to get a big hit, and that will kill him. Someone who has to be burned will be burned. Someone who has to be choked will drown, or will choke from smoke. And someone who has to be killed by a sword, today can be killed from a gun, from stabbing, from sharp material who flies, from a glass who fell on him. It can be many different ways. The death has to be similar to the four forms of execution.
Four forms of execution are a part of the 613 commandments. You should know when you say that a Jew has to keep 613 commandments, it's not accurate. Because some of those restrictions are not for the individual. For instance, there is an obligation to the Sanhedrin, to the court, to execute the wicked people. That's not for me. It's not for him. It's not for her. It's for only those judges who sit in Sanhedrin. I'm dismissed from this law. There are four of them. Stoning, burning, sword, and choking. Right there, you have four off the list. The 613 just became 609. Some of the sins, of the restrictions, is only to a person that slaughtered the animal. He has to do it in a specific way. And you know, so this doesn't apply to me, I'm not slaughtering any animals. So that belongs to him. Some belong only to women, a man doesn't have it. Some belong only to men, the woman doesn't have it. Some of the commandments only to a boss, someone that has employees, to pay them on time, not to hold their payments. Or some of the mitzvot ( commandments) is only when someone did a job for you, so you have to pay them on the right day, not to stall their payments. This is not something for the individual of every day. Some of the mitzvot is once in a blue moon. Like every seven years there's a year of Shemitah ( Sabbatical year). It's not every year, it's not every week, it's every seven years. There's an entire year that it's Shemitah. Some of the mitzvot, for instance, is for the Yovel ( Jubilee year), once every 50 years. You may have it once in your lifetime that it.
So, you know, all of these mitzvot, not all of them are applied to every Jew. It's applied to specific Jews, specific groups, male, female, rich people, poor people. Overall today, today it's B'cholali ( in our exile) they have a huge discount if you can call it a discount, that today when we don't have the Temple, hundreds of the commandments are not in effect, all the sacrifices, all the holiday sacrifices, all the sacrifices of sins, sacrifices of a sin that you're not sure if you committed it, it's a doubt, there's a different sacrifice for it, sacrifice for the rich, sacrifice for the poor, sacrifice for unintentional sins, all kinds of things like this doesn't apply today, today you don't have this. Sukkot ( Feast of Tabernacles) alone they slaughter 70 cows, 70 different cows. Today you don't have this, you don't have Bet HaMikdash ( The Temple), some of the mitzvot is only in Eretz Israel ( Land of Israel), only on the land of Israel, doesn't apply here in America or in other exiles. In the end, someone did a calculation, it's approximately 60 commandments are in effect. And a few rabbinical restrictions as well. When we say 60, it's not accurate. Why? Because to keep Shabbat, you have hundreds of laws. Maybe thousands. But we consider it as one mitzvah. Lishmor Shabbat ( to observe the Sabbath). To keep Shabbat. But this mitzvah of keeping Shabbat has 39 restrictions. Each restriction is a breaking Shabbat by itself. And in each restriction have babies, meaning that comes out of it. The restriction is the father, but the father has many sons, meaning that comes out of it, which it can be hundreds of different ways.
So to learn how to keep Shabbat perfectly, it takes years. It's harder than to be a doctor. It's harder to know how to keep Shabbat correctly, accurately, perfectly than to become a regular general doctor. It's harder. Why? How long does it take to be a doctor? How many years you have to learn? Do you have to learn 7 years full day? No, I don't think so. I mean, I know it takes years to become a doctor. But I don't learn full days like in yeshiva ( religious school), 12, 14 hours a day. I learn maybe 4, 5, 6. Correct me if I'm wrong. So overall, if you connect how many years it took, medical school and college and all together, it may be less than seven years. To learn, someone once did a calculation, to be knowledgeable in all the scenarios of Shabbat 100%, you have to learn Masechet Shabbat ( Talmud tractate on Sabbath) a few times, which will take you many, many months each time. And then you have to learn all the laws of Shabbat in Shulchan Aruch, in Tur, in Rambam, and repeat it a few times. And today, we have a lot of devices that didn't exist hundreds of years ago. So you have to learn Yalkut Yosef or Shemirat Shabbat Ki Hilchata. These are more modern books who talk about our generation. Because remember, the general rules never change. But there are always new devices. So now you have to examine each device in what category of the general rules it falls. And to decide what kind of sin would be to use it. Or maybe it's permitted.
Like cooking. You're not allowed to cook. Right? You're not allowed to take something and heat it on Shabbat if it's liquid. But what happens if someone gives you a pad that has a liquid inside and you want to put it on your injured knee? Because you need warm compression. So you want to heat it up. And this water is going to become now very hot. But it's not for the sake of eating. I'm not cooking now to eat. I only eat this liquid, the gel inside, because I want it to be on my knee for X amount of time. Permitted? No, not permitted. But if I did it, is this a sin from the Torah or it's rabbinical? There's hundreds of questions. It relates to, you know, what did G’d mean when he says that one of the 39 restrictions is cooking. You're not allowed to cook. So it's only when it comes to liquid. Something dry, you're allowed to eat. Something that is liquid, you're not allowed to eat. Why? Because when a soup becomes cold, nobody wants to eat it. When food becomes cold, you can eat it. You can still eat it. So it was worthy, it was good to eat it even before. Of course, eating it makes it more delicious. But it was already cooked, it was already ready to be eaten. But something that became very cold, cold freezing soup from the refrigerator, who wants to drink it? Nobody wants to drink such a soup. Soup has to be hot. So if you heat it, you now made it deserve to be eaten. Before that, nobody wanted to touch it. There are rules about it and believe me they are more complicated than to be a doctor, without underestimating or underrating the difficulty or how difficult it is to be a doctor, because it's one of the hardest things that we have in the world today, at least when you are a good doctor.
But when you examine, for instance, the things that the Torah obligates the Talmidei Chachamim ( Torah scholars) to learn, it's much, much harder. And by the way, there are things that are much harder than the laws of Shabbat. For instance, Choshen Mishpat. The laws of money, inheritance, properties, delegations, stolen goods, interest, currency exchange. You know how many hard laws you have? It takes you 30 years to learn to be a good judge, a Dayan ( religious judge), in a Beit Din ( religious court). To be a Beit Din in a tefillin ( phylacteries) that I bring, the special tefillin, which I get maximum two pairs per month, because the writer is a big good friend of mine for over, for by now 30 years. He gave his life for the Torah. In his 40s, he already became a Dayan. It's unheard of. He was sitting in a court, in a Jewish court in Israel, with judges that are in their 70s. When he showed up, you know, as a Dayan, they made fun of him. You want to be a Dayan in a Beit Din? How old are you? 45? Come back in 20 years. But he has a very big Rabbi, which was a very big Talmid Chacham, the Rabbi called them up and he said to them, I tell you, I'll make a deal with you. I'll come and test all of you. If his mark will not be the highest, throw him away. But if he gets the highest score, accept him as a judge. I already guarantee you that he knows better than all of you. Just find, check him, see who he is. Why? Personally, I gave his life for the Torah and learned non-stop, non-stop, non-stop. Shabbat, weekdays, holidays, day, night. Doesn't do anything besides learning, learning, learning. Gave his life for the Torah and became someone huge. Very holy person. Huge Talmid Chacham. Wrote already eight books thick like this about Choshen Mishpat. How many people in the world can do such a thing?
And he's a very holy person. He writes tefillin, beautiful writing, knows all the laws, all the shitot ( differing opinions), plus the most important thing, he's a very holy person, has a kosher phone, no access to the internet, watching his eyes, mikvah ( ritual bath) every day, Torah, he is a Rosh Yeshiva ( head of a yeshiva), also he is also a Rosh Kollel ( head of a Torah learning program), he is a Shochet ( ritual slaughterer), he is a Mohel ( performs circumcisions), everything you can be he is. Understand someone like this that writes your tefillin, it's worth billions. Why? Because there's holiness in it, when you put it on G’d is very happy. It's not just tefillin you bought in a store in a Judaica store, who knows who wrote it with his short, short pens, listening to the radio when he writes it, some modern sofer ( scribe), no, you have to know, Rabotai ( my friends). So here I'm just giving you an example. He's a Dayan, Ashbe Beit Din. He has his own court now. And very strong cases coming there. All kinds of issues, money delegations. It can be hundreds of details in every court case. It's not like the secular court. Basically, the judge makes up his decision based on a hunch. He decides, and he decides how much he's going to pay, and it's up to his mood. If he likes you, he'll give you a break. If he doesn't like you, he'll give you the worst punishment. Why? That's the way it is.
But not in a rabbinical court. People are shaking from G’d. A judge is afraid to make a mistake that Reuben will have to pay Shimon and he actually doesn't owe him. It's on the judge's responsibility, it's not like the judge is, here they go to sleep well at night and they send an innocent person for life in prison, they have no problem. And even if after 20 years they will find with the DNA that the person they sent to jail was innocent and there was a doubt about it and they ignored the doubt, they still sleep well at night. They won't give up their sushi tonight or their steak, they just found out they put an innocent person in prison for 20 years or executed him in Texas, the person you just killed never killed, it was innocent. It's not up to me, it's the prosecutors, the defense, they did a horrible job. They don't take responsibility. Why? Because when you have no fear from G’d then don't expect anything from that person. If he's not a G’d-fearing person, everything is possible with him, you can see the Israeli politicians, how dirty they are, and the American politicians and the European politicians, you can see how dirty these people are, all they care about is bribe and honor and to force their opinion on everyone and everyone who disagrees with them becomes their enemy. Why? It's all for their own ego. Not for the sake of the country. They care about the country. They only care about the future. Once they retire, they'll sell books. They'll write their biography. They'll make hundreds of millions. Look at Hussein Obama. Look at all the other bums that became multi-millionaires once they gave up office. That's all they care about. And this is what's going on today in the secular world. But in a rabbinical world, G’d forbid to be like this, because remember in the end you're going to have to stand in front of G’d and whatever you did and it's corrupted you're going to have to pay for it big time, you're not going to get away with that. So people have to know these things, that's why the judges in a rabbinical court they rather in the end reach a settlement because they're afraid, because one tiny mistake and we will rule, there's no guarantee, maybe we made a mistake, there's hundreds of details, we may miss one, so what do they do? They rather make a settlement, let's say, compromise, reach an agreement between you. Why? Like this, it's not on me, they agree with each other, he gave them half of the money, whatever the case was, I can go to sleep well at night.
The judges today will do everything they can not to rule a verdict when it comes to money. Why? Because there's a very, very strong possibility that you missed one detail or one detail was not brought to your attention, or one witness did not say the truth, or one document was forged, or anything like that, and I can change the entire verdict. Why would I take such a responsibility? You understand? I give you an example. I have a friend, I started to give you an example about the woman with the Kol Bo Shalom that her mother came to her in a dream. I have a friend from LA, he's a builder, he builds buildings, he's a very good builder, professional, one of the best. And he's a very good person, he's very righteous and his wife is very righteous, she even gives lectures to the ladies, very, very fine family. And he is a Baal Teshuva ( newly religious) for decades and also her, and his mother, an Iraqi Jew, she was not Shomer Shabbat until a month ago, all her life, I assume that she is older than 75 based on his age, so all her life she is not religious.
He sends her my Shabbat film to his mother in Hebrew. She lives in Israel, his mother. He sends her my film about Shabbat. She watches the film and immediately she accepts on herself to become Shomer Shabbat. That's the power of this film. The people are not even considering to be Shomer Shabbat. They watch it and right away they change their entire views and understanding about Shabbat. So he sent her my video about Shabbat. She watches it and becomes Shomer Shabbat. He sends me a recording. I even sent that recording to a few people. He sent me a recording on WhatsApp. He said to me, I want you to know what just happened. A few days ago, I gave my mother your film about Shabbat. She was not Shomer Shabbat all her life. An old woman in Israel. She watched the film. She became Shomer Shabbat and she kept Shabbat, now he's telling it to me after Shabbat, this is after Shabbat, maybe it was Sunday I believe, maybe it was Motzei Shabbat ( Saturday night), right after Shabbat. Her father was dead for more than 30 years, something like that, decades, and never came to her once in her dream from the minute he passed, and he was a religious, righteous man, her father, this grandma, her father passed 30 something years ago, from the minute he passed he did not come to her one time in a dream, she was hoping that her father one day she would dream about him, especially women, they have dreams more than men, that Shabbat she kept for the first time, right away he came to her in a dream after. After 30 years. As soon as she kept Shabbat, he came to her in a dream. What do you see from this? For 30 years he did not have permission to talk to her. She's Mechalelet Shabbat ( Sabbath desecrator). I don't have to tell you what G’d thinks about Jews that are not keeping Shabbat. How despicable they are in the eyes of G’d. If they only knew, they would never dare to break Shabbat. All of them are not keeping Shabbat because of lack of knowledge. If they once in their life would read what G’d thinks about them as Mechalelei Shabbat, I promise you, for millions of dollars each Shabbat, they would not agree to break it. If you're not sure about what I say, watch my film about Shabbat. And you tell me after if I exaggerated or not. Once they watch it, they get the shock of their life. You can see in the comments. See what the people wrote in the comments. I wish I knew all these things before. Nobody ever told me. If I knew it, I would never dare to be in the Sabbath.
So this is it, Rabbi. So, going back to what I said. So, Moses, he gave the Torah. The Torah, Moses passed to the next world. He was 120 years old. He lived a full life. There's an argument if Moses wrote the last 8 verses of the Torah or his student Joshua wrote the last 8 verses of the Torah. One opinion is Moses wrote it, why? It's no contradiction. He can write that in a few hours he will die and how it's going to be, anyway it's going to happen, it's the last day of his life and he knows already he's going to die today because G’d told him so. There's no surprises here, if G’d comes to a person and says in 3, 4, 5 hours from now you're going to die, go out to the mountain, look at the land of Israel, you will not enter there because you hit the rock and didn't speak to the rock as I instructed you, your brother Aaron already died for it and now it's your turn, but you asked me to see the land, you cannot enter the land, but I would let you see the land from the mountain, so he saw the entire land as it's written in the last parasha of the Torah, and he also saw all the generations to come until the end of days. Moses saw everything that will happen in Israel. Generation after generation. It was all a vision, a prophecy, like a holy vision. And then he passed.
And now a student entered the nation of Israel into the holy land. And there was, like I started to explain, there were seven massive nations there. And the Torah already said, don't be afraid of them. I will help you to defeat them and I will kick them out of the land because I promised this holy land to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And they will inherit. You're going to inherit this land not because you are righteous. Because you are the children of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. And I made a covenant with them and I swore to them that I'm going to give this land to their children. And now the time came for it.
This is now the introduction to the beginning of Parashat Ekev. The parasha starts, after you're going to listen to my laws, you will be careful not to break those laws and you keep them, meaning there are positive laws and restrictions, you will keep the commandments and you will avoid the restrictions. It's two different categories of sins. That if G’d told you to put tefillin on your arm, that's a positive commandment. If you do not put, you do not violate a restriction. You violate a command. You got an order and you ignored it. That's called not keeping mitzvah aseh ( positive commandment). There is a mitzvah to do something and you don't do. You stay the way you are. Then there is worse category, that G’d said, do not dare to do this. And you break that restriction. Do not eat pork and you eat pork. Do not eat shrimps and you eat shrimps. Don't steal and you steal. All of those restrictions, 365 restrictions in the Torah, the punishments for them are higher and worse than the punishments of not keeping the positive commands, remember this also. A person has to be willing to sacrifice all his wealth not to break one time one law of the Torah. That's how strict it is.
But when it comes to a positive command, you are only obligated to give up up to 20% of your net worth. So meaning, if you have, for instance, you're a young guy and you only have $10,000 to your name and the guy stole your tefillin and you need them, let's say, I don't know, he locked you in a place, and you didn't have time to put tefillin all day. And that tefillin is in a car. And you call this guy, hey buddy, do me a favor, I have this bag in my car, can you go get it? What am I, your servant? You are in jail now, you're not going anywhere until tomorrow. Now you know soon it's going to be sunset. Once it gets dark, you missed the day without tefillin. So you tell them, look, I'll pay you for that. How much? I'll give you a hundred bucks, go get the bag, I need it. No. For $100 I'm not going down to your car. I give you $500, I give you $1,000. Up to how much? Up to 20% of your net worth, meaning if your entire net worth is $10,000, up to $2,000 you have to be willing to give him not to miss the positive command. But if he wants $7,000, that's already 70% of your, then you don't have to. Someone that is G’d-fearing will give the $7,000 and not to miss the day of tefillin, of course. But the question is, if he didn't, will he be punished? No. It's called Ones ( coercion). Ones Rachmana Patre ( G’d exempts the coerced).
Now the Torah says, if you're going to listen to my laws and keep them, and be careful not to break the restrictions, there are three things in this verse, right? What would be as results of that? That you're going to listen to me and follow my instructions and avoid my restrictions. Ve'esir Hashem mimcha kol choli ( And G’d will remove from you all sickness). I will remove from you all kind of sicknesses. We just learned two very important principles about life. One, the one that gives sicknesses and the one that takes them away, it's only one, it's G’d. With all due respect to the doctors, as great as they are, the main shelter, the main switch, is G’d. The doctor can do hundreds of attempts, trying, use his experience, his knowledge, do everything to his ability. If G’d decided this patient will die, nothing will happen to the doctor. And if he decided that he would live, nothing will happen to the doctor. He will live regardless of this doctor, or he will die regardless of which doctor performed the operation. Why? Because it was written in Rosh Hashanah ( Jewish New Year) and when G’d signed it, a billion doctors cannot save him. So remember this.
But it's not only that. It's not only that. There is another aspect to it. What's the other aspect to it? That not only G’d gives the sicknesses or removes them, He does it based on the behavior of the person. So the next time when a rabbi says in a speech, someone that behaves in this bad way, is subject to get cancer, I know many people get angry. But so what? Let them get angry. You have to say the divine truth, even when people don't like it. We're not here in a show that you make a request, and the genie is going to perform for you. It's a different world. Here we have to teach what G’d wrote in the Torah. And what is it? If you will commit sins, your chance to be sick is much higher than someone who does not commit sins. Now I know what you're going to say, but I've seen righteous people who also got sick. My only wicked people get sick. No. Sometimes righteous people also get sick. But the Torah already discussed that. Sometimes a righteous person has X amount of years to live and he needs to die in certain age, 40, 50, 70, according to the original purpose. Once he has to die anyway this year regardless, even though he's righteous, he's not dying because he's wicked, he finished his purpose, he goes to heaven, but he has few sins are pending, no one is perfect, he made millions of mitzvot, but two, three hundred sins in forty years of life, fifty years of life, once in a while he spoke something he wasn't supposed to, maybe here and there he looked at something he wasn't supposed to look, by mistake he ate something that wasn't strictly kosher, one time he woke up late and didn't pray on time, it can happen, things happen, overall every person has X amount of sins when the time for him to die came.
So now, because G’d doesn't want this person to go to hell, to get purified over there with pain, instead of sending him to hell, he sends him cancer for 10 months. Chemo, problem, injections, all these problems that the sick cancer patients have. And then the treatment didn't help, and he dies. And everyone feels, oh horrible such a righteous man, why did he have to die like this, such a nice modest woman and righteous, why did she have to die with such suffering? People don't understand. But the Torah already said that when G’d loved the person, he gives them his punishments for the few sins that he had in his life in this world, it's short and to the point and it does the job. What is the job? To purify the soul. And when a person dies, the soul goes express to heaven forever and ever. And it doesn't have to be reincarnated back into this world. Ever again. The fact that we keep coming back in reincarnations, it's a sign that all of us did not fulfill our mission yet. And we still have pending sins that we did not erase. Bottom line in one word, we are all losers. If we were winners, winners don't have to come to prove themselves again, they already did the job and they got their mark. You failed the test, you have to try again. And you try again. And you try again. Just like in driving. You have a road test, you fail. And you fail again. And some people fail 10 times. But in the end, Baruch Hashem ( Thank G’d), they pass the test and they learn how to drive. So the same thing over here. But if a righteous person suffered the last few months of his life or the last few years of his life, now you know he got cleaned completely from all the negative he had.
When wicked people celebrate in the world, we just read last Shabbat, a week ago, nine days ago, and Parashat Vaetchanan, the last three verses on the parasha, the scribe, how G’d reserved the reward for the righteous people for the eternal world, and how he pays the wicked cash to their face in this world to get rid of them. Because they have no entry to the place of reward, which is the eternal world, the next world. Since they have no share to the world to come, they lost their share. It's not fair not to pay them for the good deeds that they did in their life. As much as the wicked they did some good things, they gave some charity, they made peace between some Jews once in a while here and there, they participated in a kosher meal, secular people have few good things, they have mezuzot ( doorpost scrolls) in their house, so Rabotai, in the end, even the most wicked Jew in the world has few mitzvot in his life, besides Bernie Sanders maybe, but every wicked person you can find that he does few mitzvot. So where is he going to get his reward for those few mitzvot? Only in this world, since he has no entry to the next world. G’d must pay him here, finish the debt and now he has nothing to come in the next world. And it's written in clear three verses in the Torah. I don't know why people asking why righteous people suffer, why wicked people enjoy, what are you asking? There is a clear verse in the book of G’d that describes why. The question comes because you never read those three verses. If you read the three verses, this question will become obsolete. That's it, it's clear, clearly written by the book of G’d. I paid the wicked cash to their face in this world to get rid of them, and I reserve the reward for the righteous for later on. So if the reward did not come yet in this world, you are a very lucky person. When righteous people get a lot of reward in this world, that's not a good sign. Maybe they're not so righteous as it looks, and G’d decided to get rid of them as well. Some people are unfortunately are fakers. They look very religious, but from behind the scenes they are doing all kinds of things that are not permitted by the Torah.
So right away we learn two things in one verse. Who gives the sicknesses? Only G’d. Not aluminum pans, and not cellular phones, and not root canals, and not cholesterol, and not high sugar cream cakes. These are the tools that G’d used to make a person become sick. Yes, especially if you have a desire to eat and to eat not healthy, he brings the sicknesses on himself by his behavior. But you can be very healthy, jog everyday, gym, diet, not one gram of extra fat, perfect, you eat only healthy and only natural and you stay away from red meat and you stay away from sugar and you eat lots of greens and all of that, and then G’d decided she's going to get lung cancer, even if you're not a smoker, I've seen it. I had a friend, he died from lung cancer at 66, and he never smoked one cigarette in his life, right? His time came, lung cancer. Everybody thinks lung cancer is too heavy smokers. Not necessarily. People who never held a cigarette in their hand also can die from it statistically.
One more thing we can learn from the Torah, even though people don't like to hear it, is that the nature of the sicknesses that G’d sent to a person can tell what sins he commits. For instance, what is the most common cancer by women today in the world? Breast cancer. One out of eight women gets it. Why? One or two generations ago there was not one woman in the world, Jews or non-Jews, that would dare to come with their breasts open to the public, like almost all of them do today. There was no such thing. I can show you pictures from 1920, 1930 and the beach, South Carolina, Atlantic Beach, women used to go with wedding gowns to the beach. There was not one woman with a bathing suit. There's no such thing. Not Jews and not Arabs and not Christians. And not secular. And not even atheist. I'll show you from Hungary. The Shomer Hatzair ( Zionist youth movement). The lefty atheist. Women that were so wicked. You see how they dress. 1933 in Hungary. They dress better than the rabbis in today. More modest. Why? It was a way of life. Regardless of religion. No woman had the shame to expose her body like an animal in public. There was no such thing. Regardless of religion. Even a woman would tell you, I don't believe in G’d. I don't believe in religion. I hate religion. I hate JC, or I hate Moses, or I hate Muhammad, doesn't matter. I'm allergic to religion. But she would never dare to show one inch of her body. Why? Because people understood there is a difference between people and animals. Animals walk naked on the street. And people cover their private parts. And that's the way it was.
Now in the last 67 years, since Hollywood came into the picture and they started to make all these films and it becomes more provocative and more. And now today with the social media, the world became Sodom and Gomorrah. A disaster. And you cannot find one out of a million women in the world that dress modest. That's basically the ratio. From every million women that live in the world, I'm not talking about the Arabs. I'm talking about the secular people. Secular Arabs as well. Secular Jews, secular Americans, secular Europeans. Every million secular women, maybe one of them dress modest. Because she's embarrassed to expose herself in the street. Maybe one out of a million, and I'm being generous, it's just not around, you don't see it, it's impossible to see. You walk in the street, you cannot open your eyes. What happened? G’d retaliates. One out of eight, breast cancer. And some will die from it and some will have to go through a horrible process. Why? You expose yourself when I say don't dare to expose yourself like an animal in the public. What you do with your man it has to be in a hidden room, not in the public. And not in front of other people. And you're not an object. You're not a sexual object. You're not going to walk on the street and guys would look at you and fantasize and think all kinds of dirty things. I hate this kind of lack of modesty. Don't dare to do it. I will do it with or without your consent. That's what the women basically say. You're not going to tell me what to do. I'll decide what to wear and when and where. No problem, you have a free will to do whatever you want, but I have also a free will to send sicknesses, as it's written a few times in the Torah, you ignore what I want from, it will come to you, sooner or later.
Second most common cancer is ovaries, wound the other sexual part. Third one, brain tumors. Three parts that participate in lack of modesty, in being provocative in forbidden relationship, they get hit the most. Now you have the free will to decide if this is G’d's hand or it's coincidence. You can send coincidence, it's your free will to say whatever you feel like. It's my free will to follow the book of G’d and to say no, it's not coincidence, it's 100% G’d's decision. Plus he wrote in the Torah that his decisions are made based on the behavior of the people, men, women, everybody, Jews, non-Jews. So here we just learned from one verse a whole lecture, from one verse, about how many mistakes we do in our life and how it destroys our life. And how many people are not with us anymore because of this alone.
By men, what's the number one most common cancer? Prostate. You can say coincidence. I say absolutely no coincidence. The Gemara says, there's no suffering unless there is a prior sin. Who caused the suffering? And all sufferings are measure for measure, meaning through the punishment, I hint why it's that organ in the body and not that one. You can ignore my hint, or you can open your eyes and learn a lesson. If it happens to your friend, I better fix myself because I may be next. Now people would say, wait a minute, I don't like to live this kind of life. I don't want to have a relationship with such a G’d, is angry, is furious, is aiming to wicked people. Any minute he can shoot them in any given moment. I don't want to live in fear. I want my relationship with G’d to be friendly, like a father and a son. The father lets you do whatever you want almost. I want this kind of G’d. G’d is not according to your request. You don't have a computer that you can design your own G’d. I want him like this and I want him like that and I want him more generous and I want him less angry and I want him more merciful. This is only the mind of the fools that they think that they have the right to design the G’d they want. There are plenty of fools among the religious Jews as well. But we do not have a say who our G’d would be, who our maker would be. He made us already. It's a fact. Nobody asks us if we wanted to be made. We were made, and we had the book of laws, and the book of laws recommend what to do and what not to do. What to do and what not to dare to do.
So, Rabotai, conclusion so far on this verse, I send the sicknesses, and I take them away. Why do I take them away? I just told you. If you keep my commandments, and you avoid my restrictions, and you follow my path, I will remove all the sicknesses that exist. In another place in the Torah it's written, Kol hamachalah asher samti b'mitzrayim, lo asim alecha, ki ani Hashem rofecha ( All the diseases that I brought upon Egypt I will not bring upon you, for I am G’d, your Healer). All the sicknesses that I gave to these wicked Egyptians in Egypt, Pharaoh and his people, I will not send to you. Why? I am your G’d, I am your doctor, I am the one that came to cure you, not to make you sick. But what is the condition on your behalf? You have to be faithful to my Torah and to my commandments. The problem is today that people don't want to listen, they don't want to listen and even when they listen they ignore, and when someone dares to tell them the truth and to warn them from the upcoming consequences to their sins, they get even angrier. Instead of being ashamed and telling the speaker or the rabbi or the friend that rebuked them, I appreciate, thank you so much for caring about me. Thank you for wasting your time coming all the way to tell me these things which I wasn't aware of because I'm not such a great learner in the book of G’d. So I appreciate you do it and you give me the information and for free, free of charge for 30 years, instead of saying this, they would write dirty comments and hide with a fake identity. Why? Instead of blaming themselves, it's much easier to blame the person that came to rebuke you. 100%. And King Solomon, by the way, already wrote about this phenomena. The stupidity of a person will turn him away from the path of G’d and who is going to blame? G’d Himself. Why life is not great? Why I'm sick? Why I'm suffering? Why I became poor? Why, why, why, why? It's all G’d. He doesn't like me. I don't know what he wants, why he does it to me, it's not fair, I don't deserve it, you know, all these things. King Solomon already warned from this kind of fakers. Doing everything against G’d, and then complaining when he gives them a smack.
By the way, you should know, the smacks are not the punishment. I want you to know. If a person loses money, that's a wake up call. That's like a father giving his son a smack, not because he wants him not to feel the pain, he wants him to be aware that the father is very angry at him, of the way he behaves, the way he dresses, the way he talks and what he does late at night in the streets. So the punishment is not for the sake of revenge, the punishment is for the sake of waking you up to know how disgusted I am from the way you behave. Why am I showing you such an angry face and react strictly to what you do? Out of my love to you, not out of hate. It's out of love, not out of hate. And some people will understand it completely wrong, why G’d is doing it to me, G’d hates me. You know how many emails I got until today? I don't know why G’d hates me so much. Why people speak like this? Why? Either because of ignorance or because of stupidity or because they are hungry for attention. They are just hungry for attention so they make up some claim. But it's definitely not because they are knowledgeable because we just read it here on Shabbat, the same way a father is strict with his son, that's how your G’d is strict with you, out of love.
By the way, the word Mussar ( rebuke), what does it come from? From Yissurim ( suffering), or from ethics? When you rebuke someone, you teach him ethical things, you teach him what not to do because it's not ethical. That's called Mussar. I don't know what's the right word for it in English. I would say that ethics, that's probably the closest word for it. What does it mean Yissurim? Liaser ( to chastise) means torture, to make someone suffer, to punish, to take away, to respond aggressively, that's called Yissurim. Sending someone a sickness, that's Yissurim. Taking away his money, that's Yissurim. Sending a person an angry wolf to bother him, that's Yissurim. Sending him a horrible, sending her a horrible husband, it's Yissurim. Sending him a terrible wife, that's Yissurim. Sending him horrible kids, that's Yissurim. As many of Yissurim, that's called suffering. The word Mussar, that's how your G’d comes from Mussar. Father gives Mussar to his son or his father punishing his son, making him suffer. Which one of the two is accurate in this particular verse? The answer is both. Both of them come from the same root for a reason. Why Mussar and Yissurim are the same words, the same family of words? Because everybody that is being rebuked suffers.
The most bigger than a punch or losing money, when someone makes you ashamed, when someone tells you in your face how horrible you are, how wicked you are, what a thief you are, what an ungrateful person you are, what a proud, egomaniac person you are, you suffer hell in your mind and in your heart. Especially if that someone is not somebody important, just a nobody told you the truth in your face, you want to die or you want to kill him. If a great rabbi told you that, okay, at least you can tolerate it, I mean you're still dying from shame. The shame is even greater when a person that is nobody told you something about yourself, you're not so embarrassed, who is he after all? But if the chief rabbi of the world came to you and told you, you have to stop with your anger, you have to stop with your ego and all of that, that makes you more suffer. Why? Look who told me I'm bad, not just someone from the street, the great person told me that I'm horrible, I better wake up. If he told me that, I better take him serious. You know how it is in life.
By the way, let me give you, let me ask you a question. If a homeless on the street gave you a smack or a very big holy rabbi gave you a smack, if you had to choose, who would give you a smack? The rabbi would give you a smack in the park next to people, or this homeless, which is probably taking drugs or whatever the case would be, and he gave you a smack, which one of the two cases is more embarrassing? When would you be more embarrassed? Depends who you are. A smart person would be a lot more embarrassed to get a smack from a rabbi. If the Baba Sali would give me a smack, it would take me a year to fall asleep after that. If some low life homeless drug addict gave me a smack, it would take me five minutes to move on with my life. At best case scenario. Why? I don't take him serious. For me, you know, if a dog barks at me in the street, I get offended? No. If a holy person screams at me in the street, oh, I'm dying from shame, I take it to the heart, very, very bad. Now, when would you be more embarrassed? If the smack is like that or if the smack is like that? When is it more embarrassing? The Gemara, this Gemara discussed which smack is more embarrassing. Like this? Or like that? Which one? Like that. It's more embarrassing. Because it's not even the normal way of getting angry and smacking someone. It's like to make fun of someone. To give a smack like that, if you want to put a person down, that's more embarrassing. And he has to pay more compensation in a court if the witnesses testify for that assault. The shame part of the payments, of the compensation, will be a little bit higher.
You know, when you hurt someone, there are few categories of penalties. You have to pay for the suffering and for the remedy and for the shame and for the pain. There's different categories. It's not just one punishment and that's it. For instance, if someone embarrassed you about someone that everybody sees. I don't know, you have a big nose, you're embarrassed about your nose, and he says to you, look what an ugly nose you have. Everybody knows, knew it. There's nothing new in the world. Whatever they thought about you before, they think about you after that comment. But if he exposed something that nobody knows, that you did everything you can to hide it from the public, that's a much bigger shame now. Now you cannot walk out of the house for months because of the shame. Before, listen, you know, everybody knew it about you. Sometimes exposing someone's secret is almost like a murder.
Let's move on. The Torah is very clear now. Listen to another very wise thing. The next thing the Torah promised, if you keep the commandments, that G’d will bless your fertility, that the chances that you will be barren as a man or as a woman is now going to be much less than someone that is a sinner. So, first thing comes to the mind of the atheist or the other wicked people is, ah, do you know how many religious women cannot have kids? They tried so many years. Is that because they're wicked? I'll show you the Arab terrorists in Gaza, 17 kids, they come out like fish, one after the other, all these terrorist babies, they're all going to join the Hamas in a few years, and murder innocent people, and she gives birth like a chicken, one after the other, and this righteous Jewish, all day she prays to G’d, and she cries, and she's anti-violence, she is not a murderer. She is not a terrorist. She is a very modest woman. She loves G’d. She prays with tears for 17 years. Look at Hannah, the mother of Samuel. 19 and a half years she cried non-stop to have a child. And in the end she had one boy, Samuel. The greatest prophet ever lived. Equal like Moses and Aaron together. The Gemara said. 19 and a half years of suffering and pain. And non-stop crying for a baby and she got one. And the murderers of that generation, 3,000 years ago, they had 50 kids. So what are you telling me? That if I'll be righteous, I have more fertility? It's no contradiction.
When the Torah gives a blessing, it's a general blessing. Every rule has an exception to the rule. Some women came to the world in order for them not to have kids. Because of past life, they had many kids. Maybe they neglected them, maybe they didn't care about them, maybe they let them get off the path. Now their punishment was to be born, to be righteous, to be religious, but to live X amount of years and never to have a child. Or to be a teacher of other kids, to focus on other kids, but not yours. Or this man was married to four different women in his past life, neglected the women, abused them, abused his children, and his children are all messed up because of him. His punishment was to be born, and not to be married, and not to have kids. And nothing will help him. No matter how righteous he's going to be. No matter how much he's going to pray. No matter what he's going to do, run to all the holy rabbis for blessing, he will not have kids. Why? That was determined before he came to the world. Decrees like that, righteous or wicked does not affect. Because it was predetermined. However, someone that was supposed to have kids and they become wicked and not modest, G’d can give this woman a punishment, from this moment she had a child or two, she won't have kids for 10 years now, because it's very unhappy from the way she turned, this woman or that man. So that's what the Torah talks about. The more righteous you are, the less probability you have to have fertility issues. Remember this. So there's no contradiction.
Okay, let's move on. Now you're going to see something amazing. And you're going to see the brilliance of the Torah even deeper now. I will bless the fruit of your stomach, of your womb, meaning the babies. How many times it's written in the entire 24 books of Judaism, the Tanakh ( Hebrew Bible), how many times it's written, "and he will bless" in such a language? This is right here in the parasha and only one more time. Two times in the entire Tanakh. This word appeared only two times and there is a reason for it. Uverach pri bitnecha ( and He will bless the fruit of your womb) here in Parashat Ekev and Parashat Mishpatim ( Torah portion on laws) it's written Uverach et lachmecha v'et meimecha ( He will bless your bread and your water). Two places in the Torah. Parashat Mishpatim comes before, comes after Parashat Yitro. Yitro is where we got the Torah, the Ten Commandments for the first time. Ten Commandments. Ma'amad Har Sinai ( Standing at Mount Sinai). Right after that, Ele HaMishpatim ( These are the laws). It's unbelievable. G’d says to us in a parasha that describes how He gave us the Torah in a public event in front of millions of people. If you're going to listen to me and follow my instructions, I will bless your income. Your bread and your water. Meaning your parnassah ( livelihood), your living, you will have a higher chance to make a better income. Why? If you'll be very religious, not a faker, you will appreciate, you will be not ungrateful, you will bless when you eat bread, you will keep Shabbat, you won't be a thief, et cetera, et cetera.
So two times, one time here in Parashat Ekev we read two days ago, I would bless your babies, your fertility. And over there I would bless your income, your parnassah. And there is a direct connection between these two words. Every time you have a mutual word appear a few times, there are always a connection between the verses. One verse is teaching us about the other verse and vice versa. That's one of the principles of the Torah. What's the connection? You need both blessings to have a perfect life. If you have only one uverach ( blessing), it won't be perfect. If you have the other uverach, it won't be perfect. For instance, if you have the first uverach, I will bless you with lots of wealth but I will not bless you with your fertility, so you're going to be a millionaire and you don't have your own kids. What good is the money? You don't enjoy it at all. If you will have the second uverach, I will bless you with lots of children. 13, 14, 17. But you won't have the first uverach. No parnassah. No money. You can't pay the tuition. You can't send them to yeshivot. You cannot buy them tefillin for the bar mitzvah. You cannot put food on the table. What good is having so many children if I cannot even feed them a piece of bread a day? It's become almost a curse. Having a lot of money without children, it's a curse. Having lots of children without having enough money to give them just the mandatory things they need to survive, it's also a curse. One out of the two blessings, it's not a blessing. It's only a blessing when they come together. Lots of children and lots of money. Remember this. That's why it appears two times in two different parts in the Torah and has a direct connection between the first blessing to the second one. That's why the language is exactly this word. In other places, it speaks in a different language. Not uverach. Two times in the entire Tanakh to show you that blessing is when you have a lot of children. Children is great blessing when you also have enough money to give them everything they need to grow healthy.
So what happens if you don't have money? You become a shnorrer ( beggar). What a shnorrer means, collect, come every morning to the shul ( synagogue) with the box, shaking the coins. Help, help, help, help. People give you dollar, dollar, dollar. You collect two, three hundred dollars and you have enough to survive. It's very shameful, very embarrassing. It's only embarrassing in the first week or two. Or when you go to a new place. Once you come to the same shul every morning, everybody already knows you. Good morning, how are you? The dollar is waiting already for you. Sometimes five, sometimes a quarter, fine. But you know it's routine, you have the same route, quickly you come, everyone puts in a box and you move on to the next shul. That's what they do, hundreds of people like this. Some people collect for their own family, some people collect for their synagogue, some people collect for other family, you know, a lot of collectors. The shame is only when there is a new place. Once you already got used to the people, you're not embarrassed of them anymore. You hear what I'm saying or no? Only when you go to a new place then you're embarrassed.
Same thing, a woman that goes to the same place twice with the same dress, second time she's embarrassed. But if she goes to a new place that nobody knows, the same dress that yesterday she was embarrassed in, somewhere else, in the wedding tonight she's the star of the evening. Yesterday she was dying because she didn't know it's going to be the same people, so she went with the same dress for the second time. And there were a few ladies who told her, oh, I know this dress, you wore it, remember, a month ago in that wedding? Oh, you were there? Oh my G’d, I'm so embarrassed. But when she goes to a new place, a husband friend's wedding from work, nobody knows her, she comes with full confidence. Why? The shame is determined based on your environment, who you are surrounded with at the same moment. That's it.
So, Rabbi, now, now we still have time, so I'm going to be able to finish the next thing. So the next thing the Torah says, now I'm going to give you the Holy Land. And there are seven nations there with massive army. And you're not exactly such heroes when it comes to fighting. You came out of slavery. You were 40 years in the desert. You're not exactly a trained army or soldiers. You don't have the equipment the Gentiles have. You don't have spears and swords and bone and arrow. And all kinds of guns that shoot rocks. And bones and arrows shoot arrows with fire. You don't have all of that. The Gentiles have it in Israel. They have massive army with horses. And they train. Seven armies would come to fight you. And you are not even a trained, equipped army. What are the odds? Very bad that you will win them. But don't worry, you have me. They don't have me. You have me. I'm more important than army and weapon and quantity of soldiers and training. You have me. In a Six-Day War, Israel was a tiny state against seven nations of Arab that were very equipped with Russian state of the art weapons. It didn't look so great. We crushed them in 6 days. One of the biggest victories in modern times, in the entire history, not just modern times. Why is that? G’d decided we will win.
Five years later in the Yom Kippur War, we almost lost. Thousands died. Thousands, more than 3,000 died. We almost lost Israel. There were already nuclear bombs on the planes. There used to be Phantom planes. One of my generals in the army, he was 20 years older than me at that time. He told me I was in a Tayeset ( squadron) of Phantom. Now we are in F-16 unit. It's a new one, relatively. It was only a few years old. But he was in a previous one. He said on the Yom Kippur War, I was in the army and we already prepared planes with nuclear bombs. Because we were sure that that's it, the Arabs are going to slaughter everyone in Israel. Once they take over, that's it, everyone will be dead. We know how cruel they are. So if we're going to die, we'll take them with us to hell. Yes, Rabotai, that's how bad it was. It was only 5 years after the greatest victory ever.
One Israeli pilot told me that he came to Long Island here for training. They have an American training facility somewhere here. And the pilot, American pilot, who was giving the course, there are pilots from all over the world, from different air force, Italians, British, Argentinian, you know, Israelis. Pilots are coming to learn what the Americans have to teach. And the entire week he spoke about every war you can think of except the Six-Day War. The Israeli came to him in the last day, he said to him, I'm very surprised. You mentioned every battle that you could. And the greatest battle ever, that no air force ever did such an achievement like the Israeli air force in a Six-Day War, you did not say a word about it. How can it be? He thought maybe it's another anti-Semite, there's plenty of those. But the pilot looked at him and said in front of everyone, you think you're smart? I am here to teach realistic battles, not battles that G’d comes and saves his children the Jews and makes them thousands of miracles against all odds. What is it going to help me if I teach the other pilots that the Israelis crushed the Arabs in the Six-Day Wars? Do you think it will happen to them? G’d is not going to do anything for them, they have to learn how to fight, that's what they go, he said. Why he was, I guess with some Christian background, he got the point, he knew the children of G’d, when he wants, he will perform for them.
By the way, it's a clear verse in the Torah, Hashem yilachem lachem v'atem tacharishun ( G’d will fight for you, and you shall hold your peace). G’d will fight for you and you sit and enjoy the show. Be quiet and watch, I will do the war for you. Today, he doesn't do the war for us. He helps us a lot, yes. There are too many wicked people in Israel. Too many lefties. Too many liberal traders. Too many Bernie Sanders, horrible monsters in Israel. Too many fakers. Too many people that want Israel to be destroyed, to be given to all these terrorists from Gaza. They betray us from inside. If you don't kill the traders, why you want me to come and fight for you? First, clean your house from within. Clean everything. Get rid of the traders, throw them out of Israel, judge them, punish them, put them in jail, execute them, do whatever you need to do to get rid of them. Once you clean your camp, you clean your area from all the traders, then I will come to help you. Right now I have no incentive to help you when half of the country is fighting me, kicking me out, does not let my people pray in Tel Aviv, make Tel Aviv the capital city of the gays, make Israel a place of corruption, corrupted politicians, naked people on the streets, intermarriage, so many Gentiles from Russia and Ukraine came to Israel, filled Israel, the worst people in the world came to Israel and they live there. I'm going to make miracles for them? No, it won't happen.
And unfortunately, with this, with the grudge that he has against us, he still makes us miracles. When Iran shot hundreds of missiles, not one hit. That was a huge miracle. Even experts, experts say that the best performers in defense against missiles could be maximum, maximum, statistically, they did all the calculations, maximum 95% defense. Meaning 5% of the missiles will penetrate and make big damage. That's it, 5%. But 5% can destroy the country. You shoot a thousand missiles, Benji, put off the AC, a thousand rockets or a thousand missiles, if you shut down 950, only 50 hit. 50 can kill thousands of people. 50 missiles from a thousand explode in 50 different places, buildings will fall, gas places, gas stations will explode, it can be a disaster. Building can fall on the head of people. Building can crash. Who knows what can happen? A truck that has thousands of liters of gas on the way to a gas station. A rocket hit it and it will explode and knock down 10 buildings. It could be many things. Nothing happened. Do you think these lefties say one word of thank you to G’d? Nothing. Nothing. The opposite, they become more wicked. And that's what's happening.
So now it's a different story. But we are now talking how to do it right. So I promise you that you're going to inherit the Holy Land and you're going to kick the nations that live there now. I know what's on your mind, you think, how a nation like us, small and not equipped, can kick out so many Gentiles, seven nations that live here in the Holy Land. How? Logically it's not possible. So the Torah says, they are so much more than me. How will I even start a war with them? What chance do I have? How can I inherit their land? They're living here. They know the area, they know the rocks, they know the mountains, they know the fields, they have bunkers, they have hidden places. We just arrived. We came from a long journey in the desert. We don't know the land. Plus, they are much more than us in quantity. What? Lo tira mehem ( Do not fear them). Do not fear them. It's an obligation. You have to come to the war against a nation, against seven nations that are much bigger than you, with zero fear. They walk like this into the battle. With zero fear. Not one scratch can happen to me. Why? Because G’d promised. I walk. I'm not afraid. They let them shoot the arrows. I'm not afraid. Today people can do it? No. They will be afraid. Even though there's a clear guarantee from G’d. That we win the war and we kick them out. And no one will get hurt. We will still be shaking today. Why? We don't have faith. Not enough at least.
Now let's see. Moses is talking to the tribes now. Don't be afraid of the Canaanites. Because G’d is on your right to defend you. You will overcome all these enemies. If you're going to say, I'm not able to do such a thing. There will be an enormous amount of people. Do not be afraid of them. The Shlah HaKadosh ( Rabbi Isaiah Horowitz), the holy rabbi, 500 years ago he lived in Safed. He explained the words of Moses. He said, if you go to the war thinking, this is a war between who has stronger arms and who has better tactics of fighting and who has better, more advanced weapons. If you go to the war thinking like that, you're going to lose. But if you're going into the war understanding, it has nothing to do with who is better, is who has G’d on his side, right? Who has G’d on his side? If you are going with this faith, you have nothing to worry about, the quantity and about the weapon and about anything else. Why? Because G’d is doing the job anyway. Anyway, as it is. Do not think that this is what's going to happen now, it's a natural reaction. If you think this is nature, you're going to be under the laws of nature. And when you have a million soldiers against a hundred thousand soldiers, the million will win. Why? Because that's nature. Don't think like that. If you think nature, that means you don't trust me. You don't trust me, I will not fight for you. I will only fight for you when you know 100% that I'm doing everything. And you are just moving your hands. But I do everything from behind the scene.
Do not think that your credit is 100% to yourself. Do not think such a thing. Why? The credit is 100% to G’d. I will destroy them, but not right away, little by little, it will be a process. How many years it took? Seven years. G’d could have killed them in a day, pandemic and they will fall and die. It happened already a few times in history. A few times. But I won't kill them in one shot, little by little, it will be an ongoing war. Why? It's anyway all divine miracle. No. Why? Because if you're going to kill them right away, within days, animals will show up. There'll be hundreds of thousands of bodies. Animals from all over the desert, coyotes, all kinds of animals, dogs, this, that, lions, leopards, will all come. And I want food and they will all come, there will be too many bodies. So if you kill a group, you bury them, or you burn the body, at least there's no dysentery or pandemic or all kinds of problems, then you move on to eliminate the next group and the next one and the next one and the next one. But while you are doing it, you bury or you get rid of the bodies. You cannot leave a million bodies on the street. The bodies will all be smelled and it will create sicknesses and also will bring a lot of bad animals.
I don't get the point here. We will finish with this. We have eight minutes left. I don't get the point. What is it for you, animals, not animals? I don't get it. You are going to make miracles to eliminate seven nations with armies, with so many soldiers. What? Big deal. 500 leopards, cheetahs would come, and some dogs and bears and whatever comes. Who cares? Make sure they don't come. Or let us kick them as well. If a miracle, all the way a miracle. You can perform a miracle against the seven nations of Gentiles, but you cannot perform a miracle against the animals. You hear the question or no? That's not a good question. This question is a question of an ignorant Jew. Or a Gentile. Why? Because if we knew Torah in the right way, we would know that the way G’d judged the Gentiles and the way he judged the animals, it's completely different.
Gentiles are judged based on if they're righteous or wicked. If a Gentile is an idol worshiper, his chance to die is much higher than a Gentile that is not an idol worshiper. If a Gentile is a murderer, his chance to die is higher than someone who is not a murderer. If a Gentile is a thief and the other one is not a thief, this one that steals has a much higher chance to die in an accident or any other way of death because of his crimes. And there's hundreds of examples in the Torah that when the Gentiles did bad things, they paid the price. Animals, they do not judge based on reward and punishment or based on righteous or wicked. Animals are not righteous and animals are not wicked. Animals are all robots. They are moved with G’d's remote control. And when the time for them comes to die, G’d decides how they die and they die. That's it. And those who are supposed to live another week will live. And it's nothing to do with if they are a righteous animal or wicked animal. There's no such thing. Because animals don't have free will to be righteous or wicked. And then on the Torah. When the animals need to eat, why will I make the animals suffer when they see so much food and I won't give them access to the food? Animals are not guilty. They are not criminals. I will not make the animals suffer because I want to help you. I will help you against the wicked Gentiles. Not because you, the Jews, are righteous. Because I promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, I swore to them that I'm giving you the land. I am forced to give you the land. But if you would ask me, it's clear verses what I'm telling you, we have to be honest, we cannot hide the truth, if it was up to me, if I did not swear to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, I would not give you the land, but because I made that promise to them, I must give you the land. But I'm not giving you the land for eternity. Your behavior in the land will be tested later on. If you are righteous, you will still have the merit to live in the Holy Land. If not, I'll send the cruel Gentiles, the Romans, the Babylonians, the Philistines, from all over, to fight you and kick you out of the land, back to exile. Which happened a few times. Happened a few times. Lo timchar ha'aretz l'tzmitut ki li ha'aretz ( The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is Mine). The land will not be given for good. It's given to you as long as I want. Why? I am the master of the land. It's my land. It's the holy land. Eretz asher einai Hashem ( The land on which the Lord your G’d has His eyes fixed). The land that the eyes of your G’d is focused on from the beginning of the year until the end of the year, more than the rest of the world.
So, Rabbi, now G’d is forced to give us the land. That's it. He made a promise to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the three holy righteous fathers. So we got lucky to be born to the right family. We are now cashing out on their righteousness. But the animals don't have to pay the price for it. So what would we do? You kill a thousand, bury them, while you're killing the second thousand. Or burn the bodies, whatever you have to do. By the way, you should know, even Gentiles are not allowed to burn the bodies. Cremation is not allowed in Judaism, it's not allowed by the Gentiles, because already it's written in the Torah, you came from the sand and you must return to the sand. You must return to the sand. So if Tony cremated his father Vinny, he's a criminal, it's a crime, he will be punished for it. What does he have to do? To bury him, he has to bury him. Ah, it's expensive the funeral home, to buy a grave, buy in a cheap place, not all cemeteries have the same price, buy in a place, I don't know, but it's not so expensive, make payments, all the brothers and sisters will chip in. But when they cremate, usually the reason for it is a few thousand dollars on a burial. These few thousand dollars that the Gentiles will save on, it would cost them billions of suffering for that because when a person was not buried, the soul has no rest, that is, doesn't have a grave. Not only that, even if the grave of a person that passed was smashed or was broken or was run over by a car or a tank or a tree fell on it, the deceased people suffer from it. We have hundreds of cases that people came to their sons or to their daughters in a dream to tell them that they're very upset because the grave is neglected and it's broken and nobody cares about it. And once they fixed it and cleaned the place, they came back and said now they feel a lot better.
It's very interesting. Why? A part of the soul remains in a grave until the resurrection of the dead. That's why people go to graves and talk. They're not talking to the marble there. Right? When people stand in front of a grave and talk, a grave of a righteous rabbi, a grave of your friend, your wife, your husband, your parents, who are you talking to? You're talking to the spirit. Why do you have to go to the cemetery? If the spirit is somewhere, you can talk anywhere to the spirit. No, because everybody understands the concept. We learn from the Torah that Caleb went to pray in the grave of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in Hebron. Why do you need to go over there? You can pray anywhere. Why? Because when you go to a grave of a righteous person and you pray there, the righteous people are, the soul that is a part of it is in a grave connected to the part that went up to heaven. The soul can come to G’d and ask for you, like a good lawyer, to defend you. We asking if you can help our son or this Jew or this Gentile. That's why people go to the graves of righteous people. So it's very interesting now.
G’d says, you will not destroy them right away, it took 7 years to get rid of them, 7 years, in the meantime they will keep burying them, making a big hole, throw all the bodies in and covering it, so you know. And I will finish with that, there is one more reason for it is, when, when you go into war and you kill everyone, it's a mitzvah, you don't have mercy on anyone. G’d said, don't have mercy on them. You kill everybody. If no one will remain, then the animals will come. Right? What do you learn from here? If you only kill the men, and you leave the women and the children, the animals won't come, because there are people living there. When people are there, animals are afraid to come. They only come when there are no people. There are just dead bodies, and no people walking around. But if people walk around, there's still men that are alive, women walks around, children, teenagers, then what do you see over here?
So over here we learn from here in between the lines, when there is Milchemet Mitzvah ( obligatory war), when there is a war that G’d commanded you to start, it's not a war that someone attacks you and you defend yourself, a war that there is a command to go and start a war against Amalek, for instance. Then the Torah specifically says you are not allowed to have mercy on them. And you are not allowed to make a peace agreement with them. And you're not allowed to receive bribe from them or give you money, don't kill us. You're only allowed, you're only allowed to surround them from three sides and leave one side open for them to run away. You rather not kill them, you rather that they run away for their life. First priority is not to murder them, not to kill them, is to give them a chance to run. You run, we won't touch you. It's not like the Arabs. They must kill you. They have to slaughter you. They have to drive with a tank over you. And you want to run, they chase you to kill you. No. You have to let them run. If they're willing to run without a fight, you let them live. Ah, the idol worshipers, they deserve death penalty, like the Torah says. It's not my problem to execute them. It's G’d's problem. I only have to clean the Holy Land from their idols and from their service. But if it's not in the Holy Land, and they all ran away, and I smash their idols, then I don't have to chase them to China or to India or to anywhere else they live to judge them. I'm not the judge, G’d is the judge. But if they come to do it in my living room, in my backyard, I have to do everything I can to stop it. That's what the Torah says. You have to clean the bad and the negative from among you. Your camp, your territory has to be holy. No naked people, no lack of modesty, no idol worshipping, no people that break Shabbat in public. It has to be holy.
If there are people who ruin the holiness of the place, you must take actions against them. By the way, it's not only Gentiles, it's also against Jews. If the Jews will worship idols in Israel, you also have to execute them. They want to run, let them run. But if they want to live in Israel and worship idols, you're not allowed to allow them. That's why Elijah the prophet, when there were 450 fake prophets and people would worship them and go to the Ravod HaZarah ( idol worship), what did he do? He killed all of them in the Carmel Mountain in the north of Israel. All 450 fake Babas were all killed by Elijah the prophet. Why? Because they destroyed Israel from within. But if these false prophets would run to Syria, would run to Europe, would run to Turkey, would run to Egypt, you don't have to chase them there. They're not in the Holy Land. They're not a threat anymore. The rules are all divine. If the Gentiles will all be destroyed right away, animals will come to eat their bodies. And therefore, he will jeopardize all the Jews who just entered the land. So if you finish the job little by little, little by little, then there is enough time to bury the bodies and make sure there's no pandemics and no animals that come. And the rest of the thing, this is for tonight. Tomorrow I have a whole different subject, still that we didn't even touch yet that comes from this parasha.
But we should know, Rabotai, the Torah is not a history book. The Torah is a book of instructions, a book of ideology. How to behave, how to learn, how to talk, how to dress, how to get married, how to raise children, how to fight, how to treat your enemies, how to treat idol worshipers, how to treat other sinners. How to treat righteous people. How to treat holy rabbis that learn Torah all their life. There are millions of topics in the Torah. Literally. The only way that we know today what to do and what not to do, it all comes from the book of G’d. Nobody sits and makes up his own rules. Every law that was ever written in the holy books comes from the Torah. When you eat, when you make a blessing before and a blessing after, and what happens when you eat bread, and with the sins, and with the sicknesses, and what happens when a person is sick, what does he have to check in order for him to be healthy, when is he allowed to go to the doctor, what should he do, go first to, go to the doctor and then to the doctor, or the other way around. There's so many questions in life. If a person won't learn and won't listen to lectures of good, honest, strong, strict speakers, only, not fakers from the university, only strong, valid speakers that teach exactly what's written, not their modern, rotten ideology that they got from the university in Manhattan. No. Those who stick to the text, stick to the Rambam, stick to Shulchan Aruch, stick to the Chumash ( Five Books of Moses), stick to the Zohar, all the holy sources, that's the only speakers you'll have to listen to. Anybody else, Hashem Yirachem ( G’d have mercy), not only it's not mitzvah for you, it's a sin to listen to them.
You have to be very careful. That's why I made my blacklist. And Baruch Hashem, thousands of people got that blacklist, and they had a few people in that list that they used to listen to. Not everyone is clever or has enough knowledge to determine what parts of the lectures of those faker speakers is illegal. Not everyone knows it. Sometimes these speakers have charm, charisma, they speak, they tell jokes, stories, it's entertaining. But while they entertain you, they inject their venom and destroy your soul for eternity. Some of them do it on purpose. Santa Claus does it on purpose. The other Rasha Merusha ( wicked person) from England does it on purpose. Mirvis and other Rasha from England does it on purpose. Some of them do it on purpose. Why? Because people told them hundreds of times that it's heresy what they do and they insist to do even more. You know, there was one guy who was like that, we fought him very much. That's it. He doesn't come to New York anymore, he got the point, he didn't give a lecture in my opinion seven years. One of them from the list died. This guy is eliminated. Another one from California is also eliminated. He became old. So three people from the list are not a threat anymore. They're only a threat from old recordings that they have. That's why I keep them in the list. Unfortunately, today someone can be dead and continue to destroy souls. People listen to his old recordings, unfortunately.
So, Rabotai, when it's written in the Torah to follow G’d's instruction, to follow his commandments, to avoid his restriction and to follow his path, I asked on Shabbat in my speech in a shul in Monsey, it was a bar mitzvah, there were a lot of people, I asked them, it's written to follow his commandments, to avoid his restriction, meaning not to be wicked, not to violate the rules of the Torah, but what does it mean go in his paths, follow his footsteps, what does it mean? What is it? Metaphoric? Or it's literal? What is it? I'll tell you what it means. It means you must be like him in everything. His ideology should be yours. What he hates, you must hate. What he loves, you must love. What he says he likes, you have to like. What he says that he hates, you have to hate. It's no joke. He hates lack of modesty, you have to hate it. He hates terrible dirty music with terrible words, you have to hate it. He hates specific ways of clothing, the way people dress, you have to hate it. He hates cheating, you have to hate it. He hates stealing, he hates corruption, he hates lies, he hates liars, he hates proud people, he hates stingy people. He loves Kiruv ( bringing people closer to Judaism). Nothing he loves more than saving his children's soul. The greatest thing in his eyes.
So what do you do if you're smart? You give all your money to Kiruv. To someone who has success in what he does. Some people do Kiruv but have zero success because they're powerful, they're not aggressive, they're not shaking anyone up. Here and there somebody gets inspired from something they say. It's not less because a person has no fear. With no fear, it's very difficult to change your bad habits, to sacrifice what you like to do for the sake of G’d, it's very difficult. The help to do it comes from the fear, from the punishment and from the shame from G’d. How can I be so ungrateful? And then there are some people in the world that still know how to do it. In the past generation, almost every speaker was like that. It started to go down in the time of the Chafetz Chaim ( Rabbi Yisrael Meir Kagan), and he called all the rabbis to warn them not to become modern, to continue in every lecture to highlight the fact that everything in life is either a reward or a punishment. That's what the Chafetz Chaim told the people. I warn you, do not speak just about knowledge. People have to leave the lecture inspired, shaken up, shaking, fearing. Wow, if this rabbi already taught now, half of that I'm doing. I better wake up before it's too late for me. Otherwise there's no point of making lectures. Really no point. No point. Not only no point, some lectures make more damage.
When Santa Claus speaks his garbage to his followers, of those fools, he says to them, I didn't ask to come to the world, G’d has no right to tell me what to do, he has no right to judge me, I don't have to apologize to him, he has to apologize to me. That's the biggest criminal maybe in the history of the world because even the idol worshipers among the Christians and the Muslim murderers, Imam who wants to murder everybody on Earth, are not making such a damage to the world like him. And that's what people don't understand. Ah, it's entertaining. I learn other things. I know when you speak heresy. No, no, no. It destroys your soul. And the people are sleeping. They're comfortably numb. Someone who actually declared a war against G’d. There's no other words to describe it. You don't tell us what to do. We run the show here. No Jew is a criminal today. No one. Not a gay, not a, not a murderer, not a big thief. Made of his righteousness, Bernie Sanders is righteous, everyone is righteous according to him. Everyone. He has no right to tell us what to do. He brought us to the world because he's a defected G’d. He's a needy. He was alone, he was bored. I asked you to make me, you made me. So deal with that. Stuff like that that he speaks. This is the biggest crime. How he's not afraid from what's coming to him in the next world? I don't know what's on the mind. Just to get attention. Or maybe to sell books. Who published his book? The most wicked newspaper in the world. In Israel. Ynet. The biggest, most lefty, haters of G’d and haters of Torah. Published his book in Israel. It's like New York Times will publish my book. I'd rather die than it happen. If New York Times will come to me and say, Rabbi, we want to take your book and make 200 million copies of them. And distribute them to the whole world. But we put on the side, New York Times publication. Would I agree to such a thing? It's the biggest Chilul Hashem ( desecration of G’d's name) in the history. Better to die a hundred times. Better to be in hell a hundred years. Than such a shame.
Who published this book? The biggest enemies of G’d in the world. People that destroy us now in the middle of the war. And soldiers are dying because of them every day. This lousy, filthy, wicked newspaper. Publishing a book of a rabbi with a beard. What does it tell you? That's their biggest assets in the world. They don't have anybody better that does the job for them, to destroy the Jewish nation, than this Santa Claus, the faker. And still Jews with yarmulkes ( skullcaps) listen to this filth. And then they ask why we suffer so much in our life. Then they have the nerve to ask or to go to watch the gay, Modi, the comedian with a black yarmulke and a beard, sitting there laughing for him and his husband, holding hands, unbelievable what the Jews became. People that call themselves religious have zero shame. In the past generation, their grandparents, Sardinians, Ashkenazis, it doesn't matter, Hasidim, their grandparents would get a bullet to the head and they won't enter a show of such a filth. Tell them come, come watch him talking about his life with his husband. Your grandmother, the Polish, the Russian grandma, the Moldavian, the Moroccan, the Persian, she would enter a place like this to look at the face of this filth? With a bullet to the head, they would not agree to go in. They wouldn't. Someone who calls himself religious would dare to go to such a show? Some of them comes with a black hat, believe it or not, in my own eyes I saw it.
I told you once, I was in Brooklyn, we go at 1 o'clock, I wanted to get a sandwich, there's only one place in Coney Island open until 2 p.m., 2 a.m. Usually, when I go there, I usually never go there, but for one time I go there, I get a sandwich there. It's usually five, six people there. Big restaurant with 200 seats. Usually at 1 a.m., after my lecture, there's almost nobody there. I come one night, Tuesday night, packed! Packed! Somebody comes out, I ask him, what's going on here tonight? There was a show here. The show just finished, so they all came to eat. Right here, there was a show. A show of whom? Of this filth, Modi, the gay, and his husband. I said to him, these people, all these religious people with the black hats and tzitziot ( ritual fringes), all black and white, looks like yeshiva bachurim ( yeshiva students) and rabbis, they went to that show? All these people came now from the show? I almost dropped dead, needless to say, I couldn't eat, just went home, destroyed mentally, that this is the face of our generation. Flatbush, New York. I don't know if the people were from Flatbush. The show was in Flatbush. Probably came from all over. This problem exists everywhere. And then they will say, I'm fanatic for saying Aleph-Bet. Aleph-Bet of Jewish ideology. Became fanatic. Became an extreme. That's how low the people are. That is an extreme speech for them, to tell them not to go to a show of such a horrible person, wicked, who has no shame to brag about the fact that he lives in abomination against G’d every day of his life, and he makes interviews about them, in articles, with pictures, with zero shame, and religious people endorse such a thing and buy a ticket that goes to the packet of this couple. Everyone who participated on this show have to fast for hundreds of days and put ashes on their head and wore a sack and sit by the Kotel ( Western Wall) for hundreds of days to cry to G’d, and he won't be forgiven.
Because one Chilul Hashem that Moses did when he wanted to do Kiddush Hashem ( sanctification of G’d's name), he hit the rock instead of speaking to the rock, for the sake of G’d, not to make a show and a circus and abomination. Moses did it for G’d, that's the only reason he hit the rock. It wasn't for himself, it wasn't for his personal pleasure, he sacrificed his entry to the land, to the holy land, after he was trying to do a positive thing, and G’d got upset for the one minute that everyone around was laughing. Moses and Aaron did not enter Israel. The two most righteous people maybe ever lived got such a horrible punishment because accidentally, while they were trying to do a good deed, a mistake happened and the wicked people were laughing. And it was a miracle of one minute, accidentally, by the greatest people. And they got such a horrible punishment. Imagine what's going to happen to these people who sat there for two hours and laughing from this filth. And with zero shame. And then they go and they brag about it. And they pay a ticket to go there. And I'm sure they do a lot of other horrible things. Because someone righteous could not even look at his face a second. A second! For any amount of money. Or in the face of Santa or all these other Rishai, Maktia, Rabim ( wicked people). You're not allowed to look in the face.
Same thing, you're not allowed to look at the face of the people on the news. They show you senior Hamas terrorists, they kill this one, you're not allowed to look at their face. This is mass murderer people. You're looking at their filthy face. This is the reflection of their neshama ( soul). It's true that in the picture it's not as bad, like in reality. But in reality, if you look at the face of a politician, you look at the face, when there is a Jew, when there is a Gentile, look at the face of an idol worshiper, look at the face of, look at the face of a gay, that makes a damage to your soul, you should know it. It's against the law. It's not a recommendation. It's against the law. And people stare in the face of the filthiest people on Earth. When people listen to Santa Claus, a lecture is at least an hour. For one hour, they have to look at the face of such a person that declared a war against G’d and bring thousands of people and make them lose their Olam Haba ( World to Come). To look at such a face, you know what consequences there will be for it? But they don't understand anything. They think they're religious, these people. It's unbelievable. To cry, to be honest with you, if I was a tzaddik ( righteous person), I would cry right now in front of you. I should, I should cry right now that our brothers and sisters, this is how low they became. That's what's going on here.
And the other people, who knows that it's wrong, what do they do about that? Also nothing. A few people speak about it. A few Rosh Yeshivas ( heads of yeshivas) in Israel, in Baltimore, made a recording about Santa, that he's a heretic. In this, where are all the other big rabbis? Not a word. Some are not aware. I give them the benefit of the doubt. He heard something from his speech, right away he said to his student, it's a heretic, big kofer ( denier of G’d). But other ones, I didn't hear a word from anyone. And the responsibility to condemn people like this is really not mine. I have to focus on Kiruv, to prove that Torah is divine and to teach people Mussar. The responsibility is that the chief rabbis of the generation, they have to condemn the wicked and the heretic. They have to publish letters against them. No one is allowed to listen to this and this and put them on a ban, on a blacklist. But when nobody does it, better we do it to warn the people. I wish it would be the greatest rabbis, the biggest, they would write letters and warn the people. They did it a few times, they did. There are some people who are in ban for life. That's it. Either Ovadia put them in a ban, or other rabbis, or Avilashiv. But it's not anymore, unfortunately, it's not happening anymore. Even there, you see there's all kinds of politics between this Hasidim to this one. They publish letters against each other. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm not talking about political fights. I'm talking about teaching the people the right way of the Torah. And teach them how to detect this heretic filth. And stay away from them. And warn others from them. If people would follow what I said in the last few years, they would not have one listener. The fact that they still have views, it's the fault of every religious Jew out there. Those who could have stopped it and did nothing will be held responsible for that.
Some people they won't, they rebuke, but others don't care. I'm religious, I'm not his fan, I'm not listening to him, my kids won't listen to him. It's enough. No, it's not enough. Your brother and his wife does. And the neighbor does. Or your mother-in-law does. How can you not do anything about it? She inject poison into our soul every day, and you do nothing about it? That's the problem. The Torah says when you see someone you can influence to do good and you didn't, and he because of that commits sins, you are responsible for his sins 100%. Not 90%, 100%. You don't rebuke him, you are guilty as much as him. I'm talking to you, simple principles. Not questionable principles. Simple. The foundation of Judaism. Every book speaks about it. Every book. But somehow people missed it. Even though it's in every book, book.
I know it's discouraging that we have such a situation. The good about it, there's one good thing about it. When everyone does horrible things, and G’d is very upset from the majority, those who do not fall into that horrible lifestyle and horrible sins, their reward becomes a lot greater. Rav Ben Zion Abba Shaul on Friday used to learn Gemara all the way to Shabbat. He closed the Gemara a few minutes before Shabbat and goes into the shul and prays Mincha ( afternoon prayer) and goes home and does the Kiddush ( blessing over wine). They ask him, Rabbi, all week you're learning, morning, night, Friday before Shabbat, take a few hours break like most people do. He said, no, now it's a bigger obligation to learn because nobody else learns. Two, three hours before Shabbat, everyone busy, shopping, last minute, organizing the house, guests, the beds, you know how it is. Someone takes a nap before Shabbat. Nobody learns. I learn, I get the reward for everyone who doesn't learn. Why? I save the world right now. Someone that learns Torah when nobody else learns Torah, all the merit goes to him with no partners.
That's why I'm telling you, G’d loves Kiruv, the most, saving souls the most. If you're smart, invest all your 10 or 20% that you give from your income to what we do here, we save souls non-stop. Like today, I told you that for many times, every day, minimum 20 messages of new people, new people. Oh, I just changed my life. I just told you the story about the old woman with the Shabbat film. One hour film, she's Shomeret Shabbat. Her son is a very religious man for 30 years. Do you know how many times he spoke to her about keeping Shabbat? He told me. I can send you his recording, I have it. If you understand Hebrew, you're going to hear it. You know how many times I told my mother, Shabbat, Shabbat, Shabbat, nothing. I sent her your video. One time she watched it, she became Shomer Shabbat. What happened right after? After 30 years, her father passed away. And he was a religious Jew. Finally, he came to her in a dream after 30 years. For 30 years he refused to come to her in a dream because she was Mechalelet Shabbat, his daughter. One Shabbat she kept, he came. Bye.
That's the value of a Shomer Shabbat as opposed to Mechallel Shabbat. It's written in Shulchan Aruch seven times, Mechallel Shabbat is 100% like a non-Jew in the eyes of G’d. 100% like a non-Jew. Bigger shame than that you can get, that G’d called you a non-Jew. He gave you a Jewish soul, you were born to a Jewish mother. The Gentiles kill themselves, those who come to convert, they sacrifice so much. Some of them don't even have the money to pay for the conversion, the few hundreds or thousand or $2,000 that it costs to buy the books, to get a tutor, it takes time, to move to a place close to a synagogue, you need a few thousand dollars to convert. They collect dollar by dollar, they send messages, help me out, I can't, Rosh Hashanah, one guy told me, I die if Rosh Hashanah would pass and I still won't be a Jew, I don't know what I'm going to do. I must convert before Rosh Hashanah. Baruch Hashem, he just did. He just did. He comes to sacrifice so much to become Shomer Shabbat. And Jews that were born Jews kick the Shabbat like it's a piece of garbage. Even though it's written 12 times in the Torah, it's the most precious thing in the eyes of G’d. Shabbat.
G’d gave us the Shabbat before the Torah as a special gift. Before the Torah was given, we already got the Shabbat. And G’d said to Moses, I have a precious gift in my treasury, that's the words of G’d, I would like to give it to the Jewish children of mine, go and prepare them. It's not a little gift that costs $5. For that, you don't have to prepare anyone. When you give a gift of a lifetime, you have to prepare a person for it, it's a big event. Lech v'odiam ( Go and inform them), that's Shabbat. Most Jews have no idea what it is. They think it's a day off from work. A king that doesn't work a day of his life, they have to keep Shabbat? A billionaire that lays in bed all day and watch his stocks going up and down has to keep Shabbat? It has nothing to do with work. Shabbat is an eternal spiritual covenant between the Creator of the world and his children, the Jewish chosen people. A person is not Shomer Shabbat, he has no share to the World to Come. He dies here younger, and he dies in the next world, which is eternal. It's a verse in the Torah. It's a verse in the Torah, Exodus 31. Over there, read. Mechallel Shabbat mot yumat ( Whoever desecrates the Sabbath shall be put to death), will die here and will die again in the next world. I will cut that soul out of my nation. Clear verse. People ask, how do you know, how do you know? It's written in the Torah 12 times. Couldn't be any more clear than that. And still ask, okay, I never read the Torah, what can you do?
Why righteous people suffer and wicked people celebrate? It's a verse in the Torah. Why people get sick and some people get cured and some don't? It's written in the Torah. What G’d loves, it's written in the Torah. What he hates, it's written in the Torah. Everything is written. Just come and learn. You should know, Rabbi, and I finish here. In 80,000 fake religions and cults that started after Judaism, none of them declare that a Gentile that followed that religion or that cult is a criminal if he doesn't know all the rules or if he doesn't know the book by heart. There is no such thing. If a Christian doesn't know the New Testament, he is not considered a criminal. If a Muslim doesn't know the Quran, he is not a criminal. If a Jew doesn't know Torah, he is a criminal. Say, Hashem ( G’d). Why? Because the fact that you know there is a divine book that was given to you in a public event, in front of millions of witnesses, and your grandparents and grand-grandparents, for 3,300 years, gave their life for this book, suffered from the anti-Semite Nazis and Gentiles all over the world just not to move left or right from the instructions of this book, and you take this book and treat it like a toilet paper, there is no bigger criminal than you. Don't even open to check what's written there. That means you know it's a book from G’d, but I can care less about what he wants and what he says. That's a big insult. It's a very big insult. You have a divine book in your home or in your friend's home or in your parent's home and you never opened it once? You're not curious to see what G’d thinks about you? It's pure stupidity. It's pure ungratefulness. There's no other words to describe such a crime.
That's why the Gemara is full of expressions and descriptions about the status of an Am Ha'aretz ( ignorant person), of an ignorant Jew. You better not hear what I have to say about it. How the Gemara defines a Jew that does not learn Torah and doesn't know anything from his life. If you would read what the Chachamim ( wise men) have to say about it, believe me, you'll sit and cry. They're talking about me? I am the surgeon, I am the lawyer, I am the doctor, I am the engineer, I am the pilot, I am the math teacher, and the Torah calls me an ignorant? And I'm an Am Ha'aretz? He deserves to be eaten by the dogs, the Gemara said, such a criminal and such a fool that has a divine book in his book and he doesn't even open it. And I'm not even talking about those who make fun of it. It's a different league of criminals. Not only they don't know anything from their life, when they finally hear a word or two from rabbis, they make fun in their social media, cut parts of their things and make fun, put headlines. Those, there's nothing to even talk about. I'm talking not the evil one. The one that's just ignorant. They can care less. It's such a shame.
And G’d said, not knowing the rules because you don't come to learn, you will be judged as it's all intentional sins. But I didn't know. Because you didn't come to learn. If you would learn, you would know. You didn't want to learn because you didn't want to know because you want to do whatever you like. You are 100% guilty of every crime as an intentional crime. If the judge in the courtroom gives you a booklet, I want you to learn these laws. It applies to your business. I don't want you to come back to my courtroom. This booklet, it's for your nature of business. You do business with customers, learn it, that you don't come here again and you won't be sued again. And you show up two months later and you are sued again. Did you learn the book I gave you with all the laws? No, I didn't have time. Now the judge is going to be furious. I gave you a book to learn that you won't come back into my courtroom and two months later, you are here and you put the book in the garbage? Do you know what he's going to do to you, this judge? Believe me, zero mercy. And that's exactly what will happen to these people. They don't want to hear lectures. They don't want to connect.
I know how many people I sent to them, download the app. They don't download the app. It costs them nothing. It takes a second. 15 seconds, the app is on your phone. Our phone, Android. Rabbi Yosef Mizrahi, free. 10,000 hours of lectures in every topic you can think of. You hook, you connect in a car. You come to the car, you start the car, it continues to play. You turn on the app, it continues to play for where you left yesterday. Non-stop Torah. Every second you're accumulating mitzvot like diamonds. He doesn't download. Doesn't download. He loves the lecture. He writes compliments. Sends email. How he just listened to this lecture and he's so happy. But he won't download the app to hear other lectures. Why? The Satan is doing everything to distract him because he knows he's going to listen to 5-6 more lectures and become a very righteous person and that the Satan is not agreeing to let happen. That's already too much. B'ezrat Hashem ( with G’d's help) I hope, B'ezrat Hashem, that these words will open the hearts of these people that are stubborn and stiff neck, and they still move on with their nonsense and they don't want to change. Hopefully, these will get them to think at least. If they change or not, I hope so, but at least to start thinking or rethink the way they behave or who they watch or what shows they're going to. If we reach that, it's already good. Baruch Adonai Le'olam Amen V'amen ( Blessed is the Lord forever, Amen and Amen).
Key Terms from Rabbi Yosef Mizrahi's Shiur
| Hebrew | Transliteration | Explanation |
|---|---|---|
| ספר דברים | Sefer Devarim | Book of Deuteronomy: The fifth and final book of the Torah, also known as Mishneh Torah (repetition of the Torah). It contains Moses' final speeches to the Israelites before they enter the Promised Land. It emphasizes the importance of remembering G'd's laws and living a righteous life. |
| פרשה | Parasha | Torah Portion: A section of the Torah read each week in synagogue, dividing the Torah into 54 portions, one for each week of the year. |
| משה רבינו | Moshe Rabbeinu | Moses, our Teacher: The greatest prophet in Jewish history, who received the Torah from G'd at Mount Sinai and led the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt. |
| ספרי תורה | Sifrei Torah | Torah Scrolls: Handwritten scrolls containing the Five Books of Moses (Pentateuch). They are the most sacred object in Judaism and are used for public reading in synagogue. |
| השם | Hashem | The Name: A common way to refer to G'd in Hebrew, avoiding pronouncing the Tetragrammaton (YHVH), G'd's personal name, out of reverence. |
| גויים | Goim | Nations: A term used to refer to non-Jewish people. |
| עמלק | Amalek | Amalek: A nation that attacked the Israelites after the Exodus from Egypt. They represent the archetype of evil and hatred towards the Jewish people. The Torah commands Jews to remember Amalek's actions and to blot out their memory. |
| מצוה | Mitzvah | Commandment: A divine precept or law given by G'd in the Torah. There are 613 mitzvot, including both positive commandments (obligations to do something) and negative commandments (prohibitions). |
| מחות امחה את זכר עמלק | Machot imche et zecher Amalek | You shall surely blot out the memory of Amalek: A commandment to eradicate the memory of Amalek, both literally and figuratively. This mitzvah is understood as an ongoing struggle against evil and those who seek to harm the Jewish people. |
| גמרא | Gemara | Completion: The analytical and interpretive commentary on the Mishnah, forming the basis of the Talmud. It contains discussions and debates among Rabbis about Jewish law, ethics, and philosophy. |
| שבת | Shabbat | Sabbath: The seventh day of the week, observed from Friday sunset to Saturday night, as a day of rest and spiritual rejuvenation. It commemorates G'd's creation of the world and the Israelites' freedom from slavery. Observing Shabbat is one of the most important mitzvot in Judaism. |
| בית המקדש | Bet HaMikdash | The Temple: The holy sanctuary in Jerusalem where sacrifices were offered and G'd's presence dwelled. The First Temple was built by King Solomon and destroyed by the Babylonians. The Second Temple was built after the Babylonian exile and destroyed by the Romans. |
| סוכה | Sukkah | Booth: A temporary dwelling built during the festival of Sukkot, commemorating the Israelites' journey through the desert after the Exodus. It symbolizes G'd's protection and the fragility of life. |
| ארץ ישראל | Eretz Israel | Land of Israel: The land promised by G'd to the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and their descendants. It is considered the holiest land in Judaism and is the focal point of Jewish history, spirituality, and national identity. |
| תלמיד חכם | Talmid Chacham | Torah Scholar: A person who is learned in Torah and Jewish law. They are respected for their knowledge and wisdom and often serve as teachers and leaders in the Jewish community. |
| דיין | Dayan | Religious Judge: A rabbi who is trained in Jewish law and serves as a judge in a Beit Din (religious court). |
| בית דין | Beit Din | Religious Court: A Jewish court of law that adjudicates matters of Jewish law and practice. It typically consists of three judges. |
| תפילין | Tefillin | Phylacteries: Small leather boxes containing verses from the Torah, worn on the head and arm during weekday morning prayers. They symbolize the connection between G'd and the Jewish people and serve as a reminder to fulfill G'd's commandments. |
| שוט | Shitah | Opinion: A differing interpretation or opinion on Jewish law among the Rabbis. The Talmud and other rabbinic works contain numerous shitot, reflecting the diversity of thought and interpretation in Jewish tradition. |
| צדיק | Tzaddik | Righteous Person: A person who lives a life of piety and righteousness, fulfilling G'd's commandments and striving for moral perfection. |
| אונס | Ones | Coercion: A situation in which a person is forced to act against their will. Jewish law recognizes that a person who is coerced is not held responsible for their actions. |
| אונס רחמנא פטריה | Ones Rachmana Patre | G'd exempts the coerced: A principle in Jewish law that a person who is coerced into violating a mitzvah is not held accountable. This principle reflects G'd's understanding and compassion for those who are forced to act against their will. |
| ויעשיר השם ממך כל חולי | Ve'esir Hashem mimcha kol choli | And G'd will remove from you all sickness: A promise from G'd that those who follow His laws will be protected from illness. This verse highlights the connection between physical health and spiritual well-being. |
| כל המחלה אשר שמתי במצרים, לא אשים עליך, כי אני השם רופאיך | Kol hamachalah asher samti b'mitzrayim, lo asim alecha, ki ani Hashem rofecha | All the diseases that I brought upon Egypt I will not bring upon you, for I am G'd, your Healer: A promise from G'd that the Israelites will be protected from the diseases that afflicted the Egyptians. This verse emphasizes G'd's role as the ultimate Healer and the importance of following His laws for both physical and spiritual health. |
| מוסר | Mussar | Ethical Instruction: A system of Jewish ethics and moral development that emphasizes introspection, self-improvement, and the cultivation of virtuous character traits. |
| יסורים | Yissurim | Suffering: Difficulties and challenges in life, often seen as a form of divine discipline or a consequence of sin. Jewish tradition teaches that suffering can be a catalyst for growth, repentance, and spiritual refinement. |
| לייסר | Liaser | To Chastise: To discipline or punish, often for the purpose of correction and improvement. Jewish tradition teaches that G'd sometimes chastises those He loves in order to guide them towards righteousness. |
| חנה | Hannah | Hannah: The mother of the prophet Samuel, known for her fervent prayers for a child. Her story is an example of the power of prayer and the importance of faith in G'd's plan. |
| שמואל | Shmuel | Samuel: A major prophet in Jewish history, who served as a judge, priest, and leader. He anointed the first two kings of Israel, Saul and David. |
| שנורר | Shnorrer | Beggar: A person who solicits charitable donations. Jewish tradition emphasizes the importance of giving charity and helping those in need. |
| לא תירא מהם | Lo tira mehem | Do not fear them: A command to be courageous and to trust in G'd's protection, even when facing overwhelming odds. This verse highlights the importance of faith and the power of divine assistance. |
| השל"ה הקדוש | Shlah HaKadosh | Rabbi Isaiah Horowitz: A prominent rabbi and kabbalist (mystic) who lived in the 16th century. He is known for his ethical teachings and his commentary on the Torah. |
| מלחמת מצוה | Milchemet Mitzvah | Obligatory War: A war commanded by G'd, such as the war against Amalek. Jewish law outlines specific rules and guidelines for waging obligatory wars, emphasizing the importance of justice, morality, and minimizing unnecessary bloodshed. |
| לא תימכר הארץ לצמיתות כי לי הארץ | Lo timchar ha'aretz l'tzmitut ki li ha'aretz | The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is Mine: A verse emphasizing that the Land of Israel ultimately belongs to G'd. This verse highlights the sacred nature of the land and the responsibility of the Jewish people to care for it and live according to G'd's laws. |
| ארץ אשר עיני השם בה מראשית השנה ועד אחרית שנה | Eretz asher einai Hashem bah me'reishit hashanah v'ad acharit shanah | The land on which the Lord your G'd has His eyes fixed from the beginning of the year to the end of the year: A verse emphasizing G'd's constant attention and care for the Land of Israel. It highlights the special connection between G'd and the land. |
| עולם הבא | Olam Haba | World to Come: The spiritual realm where souls go after death. Jewish tradition teaches that the World to Come is a place of reward and punishment, where souls are judged for their actions in this life. |
| עם הארץ | Am Ha'aretz | Ignorant Person: A term used to describe a person who is uneducated in Torah and Jewish law. Jewish tradition emphasizes the importance of Torah study and living a life informed by G'd's commandments. |
| חילול השם | Chilul Hashem | Desecration of G'd's name: Any action or behavior by a Jew that brings shame or disrespect upon Judaism in the eyes of others. Jewish tradition considers Chilul Hashem a serious sin. |
| קידוש השם | Kiddush Hashem | Sanctification of G'd's name: Any action or behavior by a Jew that brings honor and respect upon Judaism in the eyes of others. Jewish tradition considers Kiddush Hashem a great mitzvah and a testament to faith and commitment. |
| חפץ חיים | Chafetz Chaim | Rabbi Yisrael Meir Kagan: A renowned rabbi and ethicist who lived in the 19th-20th century. He is known for his book Chafetz Chaim, which focuses on the laws of speech and the importance of ethical communication. |
| קירוב | Kiruv | Outreach: Efforts to bring Jews closer to observance of Judaism and connection with G'd. It involves education, inspiration, and creating a welcoming environment for those who are seeking to learn more about their heritage. |
| תורה שבעל פה | Torah She'baal Peh | Oral Torah: The body of Jewish law, tradition, and interpretation that was transmitted orally from generation to generation, alongside the written Torah. It includes the Mishnah, Gemara, and later rabbinic commentaries. |
| רבי | Rabbi | My Teacher: A title of respect for a Jewish scholar or teacher, particularly one who is ordained to make halachic (Jewish legal) rulings. |
| רש"י | Rashi | Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki: A medieval French rabbi who wrote comprehensive commentaries on the Torah and Talmud. His commentaries are widely studied and considered essential for understanding these texts. |
| רמב"ם | Rambam | Rabbi Moses Maimonides: A prominent medieval Jewish philosopher, astronomer, and physician. He codified Jewish law in his magnum opus, the Mishneh Torah. |
| שולחן ערוך | Shulchan Aruch | Set Table: A comprehensive code of Jewish law written by Rabbi Yosef Karo in the 16th century. It is widely accepted as the authoritative guide to Jewish practice for many Orthodox Jews. |
| בעל תשובה | Baal Teshuva | Master of Repentance: A Jew who has become more observant of Jewish law and tradition later in life. This term reflects the Jewish belief that repentance is always possible and that G'd welcomes those who return to Him. |
| מוצאי שבת | Motzei Shabbat | Saturday Night: The evening after Shabbat ends, marking the transition back to the regular week. |
| מחלל שבת | Mechallel Shabbat | Sabbath Desecrator: A person who intentionally violates the laws of Shabbat. |
| עונש | Onesh | Punishment: A consequence for wrongdoing, often seen as a form of divine justice. Jewish tradition teaches that punishment can be a means of atonement and rectification. |
| גיהנום | Gehinnom | Hell: A spiritual realm of punishment and purification for the souls of the wicked. Jewish tradition generally views Gehinnom as a temporary state, where souls undergo a process of refinement before ultimately entering Olam Haba (the World to Come). |
| גלגול נשמות | Gilgul Neshamot | Reincarnation: The belief that souls can be reborn into new bodies after death. Kabbalistic teachings explore the concept of reincarnation as a means of spiritual growth and rectification of past misdeeds. |
| ברכה | Bracha | Blessing: A prayer or expression of gratitude to G'd. Jewish tradition prescribes blessings for various occasions and actions, acknowledging G'd's role in our lives and expressing appreciation for His gifts. |
| לחם | Lechem | Bread: A staple food in Jewish tradition, often used symbolically to represent sustenance and livelihood. |
| מים | Mayim | Water: An essential element for life, often used symbolically in Jewish tradition to represent purity, cleansing, and spiritual renewal. |
| פרנסה | Parnassah | Livelihood: A person's means of earning a living. Jewish tradition teaches that G'd provides for all of His creations and that we should be grateful for the blessings of sustenance. |
| תנ"ך | Tanach | Hebrew Bible: An acronym for Torah, Nevi'im (Prophets), and Ketuvim (Writings), encompassing the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible. |
| וברכ פרי בטנך | Uverach pri bitnecha | And He will bless the fruit of your womb: A blessing for fertility and healthy children. This blessing highlights the importance of family and the continuation of the Jewish people. |
| וברכ את לחמך ואת מימיך | Uverach et lachmecha v'et meimecha | He will bless your bread and your water: A blessing for sustenance and prosperity. This blessing acknowledges G'd's role as the provider of all our needs. |
| מעמד הר סיני | Ma'amad Har Sinai | Standing at Mount Sinai: The event in which G'd revealed the Torah to the Israelites at Mount Sinai. It is considered the most significant event in Jewish history, marking the formation of the covenant between G'd and the Jewish people. |
| אלה המשפטים | Ele HaMishpatim | These are the laws: The beginning of the section in the Torah that outlines the laws and commandments given to the Israelites. |
| ברית | Brit | Covenant: A sacred agreement between G'd and the Jewish people. The covenant at Mount Sinai established the Jewish people as G'd's chosen people, obligated to follow His laws and receive His protection. |
| צניעות | Tznius | Modesty: A Jewish value that emphasizes humility, discretion, and appropriate dress and behavior. It applies to both men and women and is seen as a way of expressing respect for oneself, for others, and for G'd. |
| קול בא שלום | Kol Bo Shalom | Voice of Peace: The name of a building in Tel Aviv mentioned in the story. |
| סנהדרין | Sanhedrin | Jewish High Court: The highest court of law in ancient Israel, consisting of 71 judges. The Sanhedrin had the authority to adjudicate matters of Jewish law, including capital punishment. |
| יומא דין | Yom HaDin | Day of Judgment: The day when G'd will judge all of humanity for their actions. Jewish tradition teaches that we are all accountable for our choices and that we will be judged for our deeds. |
| ר' זילברשטיין | Rav Zilberstein | Rabbi Yitzchak Zilberstein: A contemporary posek (halachic authority) known for his responsa (answers to Jewish legal questions) and ethical teachings. |
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