Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
This Jewish Inspiration Podcast is dedicated to learning, understanding and enhancing our relationship with Hashem by working on improving our G-d given soul traits and aspiring to reflect His holy name each and every day. The goal is for each listener to hear something inspirational with each episode that will enhance their life.
Welcome back. We are now on way 15 of the 48 ways. And this is the Oral Law. What is the Oral Law? We mentioned previously that we have the Written Law, which tells us what to do. The Oral Law tells us how to do. It is impossible to understand the Written Law without the Oral, and vice versa. It's impossible. They need to be linked, one with the other. They are inseparable. The Mishnah and Talmud are the principles of our laws.
So the way the Mishnah was written, the way the Talmud explains the Mishnah and elaborates on the Mishnah, the Mishnah was brilliantly written in a way to inspire conversation. The Mishnah doesn't just list off Rule 1, Rule 2, Rule 3, Rule 4. No, it's in a discussion form. It's in a format of argument. I want to tell you a beautiful story. I didn't mention this yesterday when we discussed kindness. But there was a rabbi who was a brilliant,
brilliant Torah scholar who knew Torah inside out. And he would come to the schools to test the schoolchildren in their knowledge of Torah. All the yeshivas wanted their students to be tested by this rabbi. Why? Because this rabbi would only ask questions that had a disagreement in the answer. So he would ask a question, is it permitted or prohibited to do this or that? And whatever the student answered, there was an opinion that agreed with him. So the child was never wrong.
And children who were doubting themselves, children who thought they didn't know, every time they answered a question, he says, that's correct. Beautiful, you answered the correct answer. That's according to the opinion of Rabbi Meir. Now, what does Rabbi Yehuda hold? And they would say, the other says, like, beautiful. You know both opinions. It was obvious. It's either permitted or prohibited. It's one of the two, right? But he would give both. Now, in halacha, in conclusion,
we don't necessarily abide by one of the opinions. It means one who says that it's permitted, one who says that it's prohibited, one of them is gonna be not wrong, but one of them is the way in which we apply to our day-to-day lives. The first is because the way in which they reach their conclusion could be flawed. We don't call them wrong. We don't call them wrong. We don't say someone's right and someone's wrong.
We say that this is the one we follow halachically, and this one we don't, right? I'll give you an example. Always the older opinion, the one who's senior, always goes according to him. Why? Because he's closer to the source. Always the mishnah will give the halachic opinion the last. Let everybody else give their opinion. The halachic opinion is always the last one. And there are times you can have four or five opinions on, one second, you have a Supreme Court justice, right?
You have the Supreme Court. They give rulings. Five vote like this, four vote like that. Who's right and who's wrong, understand? The four that lost on their vote, whatever the matter is, doesn't mean they're wrong. We just don't apply the law the way you wanted it. Don't make them wrong, you understand? So one must have a firm belief in its accuracy and direct transmission. We mentioned that. You can't grow in Torah if you're doubting its authenticity.
The minute you have a verified, and you know what? I know people who've spent months and months and months researching proofs because they weren't just gonna say, oh, the rabbi said it is, it has to be. That's the right way to do it. Because now every minute of their Torah learning, they know that what they're learning is true and it's real. And it's authentic and it's truthful. And it's no made up, there's no fluff. Torah's not fluff. Here, let me tell you a nice story.
And Noah, and that's not the way it works. The Torah can be understood in four primary levels of understanding. The first level is called Pardes. Pei, Reish, Dalet, Samach. Pei for Pshat. What is Pshat? The simplest literal meaning. What we learn here is Pshat. That's the depth of my Torah learning. Let's learn Pshat. Let's learn the literal understanding, literal meaning based on the text and context. In 12th century France, Rashi wrote the famous commentary explaining this level, Rashi.
His commentary on all of Torah and Talmud is that first level of understanding, literal meaning. Second level is Remez, Reish for Remez. Remez is a more sophisticated level of Midrash where different word pronunciations reveal different meanings. A Torah scroll is not vowelized to facilitate these elucidations. There's a reason why the Torah is not vowelized. So you can read the words in different ways. So you can learn the depth of it. The third level is Jerush. Jerush is the Midrash gives the homiletic source
of biblical concepts and how to apply them to living. And then we have Sod, which is hidden. Sod is the last level of the hidden mystical meaning of the universe as explained in the Zohar. So we have these four levels of understanding. If God spoke on Sinai, the message must have been significant because God doesn't like to waste his time, right? Why would God talk to us? Well, look up the explanations of what he said. Do we know the 10 commandments inside out?
What really happened in that 10 commandments? Do research on it, do a study on it. What are the 10 commandments? And God decided that that was important for us to hear directly from him. Now we know, oh, thou shalt not steal. Does God need to tell us something so simple? So why is God wasting his time telling us something that's obvious? Maybe it's not so obvious. Maybe it's not referring to chopping off someone's arm and stealing his Rolex.
Maybe it's not referring to that. Or ripping off a woman's purse so that you can steal what's in the purse. Maybe that's not what it means. Go look at it. Over here we have an entire column of shelves dedicated to learning the portions of the Torah. We probably have 20 books, 30 books dealing just with the 10 commandments. It's tremendous wisdom. And this is a small library, you know. Torah is wisdom for living. The more Torah you know, the more fulfilled you become.
The oral Torah is as absolute as the written. One cannot be understood without the other. Master the Mishnah and now you uncover a whole world of understanding and insight. Much more elaborate than the Torah. The Torah is very concise in words. It's not an extra letter, which we'll see in a few minutes when we start the Parsha. We'll see, we count how many letters of each Parsha because it's not an extra letter in the Torah. Torah is extremely concise.
The Mishnah elaborates and the Talmud elaborates even more. If you have an insight into living, remember it and integrate it. Write it down, don't forget it. Get your share of wisdom that the Jewish people have accumulated over time. This is a lot of Torah wisdom here. It's yours, doesn't belong to the rabbis, doesn't belong to the scholars, to the philosophers. It belongs to each and every Jew. Get your share of wisdom that the Jewish people have accumulated over time.
Jewish consciousness is to know Torah by heart, to repeat and review until it's letter perfect. I remember when I was a child, we had special programs in yeshiva to remember Mishnah by heart. And we had to, we were tested. We'd go on a big trip and we'd have great prizes for those who remembered Mishnah by heart. Why? Because how much memory do we have in this brain? What are we gonna fill it with? TV shows and comic books or Mishnah
or God's words of Torah? Talmud is the next generation after the Mishnah. The Mishnah was written by Rabbi Yehuda Chassid, Judah the Prince. And the Talmud elaborates on the Mishnah because the Mishnah, although it elaborates more than the Torah does, is still written shorthanded. It's written in code. The Talmud deciphers the Mishnah. So every page of Talmud, every tractate of Talmud begins with the Mishnah and then explains it and then the next Mishnah and explains it
and then the next Mishnah and so on and so forth. So all of Mishnah is being explained in the Talmud. Jewish consciousness is to know Torah by heart. Examples of oral law we gave previously about slaughtering animals, Torah doesn't tell us how to. Mezuzah, what is it, where is it placed, what's in it, doesn't say. Tefillin, placed on the hand, between the eyes. The boxes are black. Where does it say that? Doesn't tell us where to put it.
It says you put it opposite your heart. Where exactly? Where opposite my heart, where do I put that? I put it like this, tie it around my torso, you know. Shabbos is juxtaposed to the prohibitions of building the tabernacle. Huh, why? Well, the Mishnah and the Talmud explain why, to teach you that the same laws that were prohibited in the building of the tabernacle on Shabbos, which was prohibited, all of those same laws are what's prohibited on a regular Shabbos.
So, for example, one of the things they needed to do was to give a final hammer blow into the wall of the tabernacle when they were assembling it. You weren't allowed to do that on Shabbos. Guess what, you're not allowed to do that now, and there are many different applications for it. So, everything has a source, everything has a reason, and by the way, the more we observe it, particularly Shabbos, the more we feel connected. So, I just want to end off very quickly
with my own parable. If there's any flaws in this parable, it's my fault, but, you know, when you bought your first luxury car, pulled out of the dealership, and the first time you actually looked in the manual was probably when you went to fill up gas. Pulled up at the gas station, you're like, hmm, till now, I didn't care, I had a cheap car, and I didn't care what type of fuel I put in, but now I have a luxury car.
I can't put the cheapest unleaded in my premium Lexus, doesn't work, right? So, you look at the manual, you open up the manual, and it says, oh, Mr. BMW says to put in only super duper premium. You look at the gas, you're like, are you kidding me? I'm not paying that much money, I can save myself $1.50 just by getting a cheaper gas. So what will Mr. BMW tell you? Mr. BMW will tell you, put whatever you want, I don't care.
But I am the manufacturer of this car, of this ultimate driving experience. If you want to experience a maximization of this BMW, put in the premium. You don't want to put the premium, no problem, put water for all I care, I don't care if you're not going to enjoy the car. God tells us about kosher food. God tells us about taking the Shabbos a day off. And we're like, that doesn't make any sense. If I worked another day, I'd make more money.
If I didn't eat kosher, I'd save so much money. Shem says, you can do whatever you want, but you're not going to maximize the experience. You're not going to maximize the experience. So, you don't have to listen, it's your choice. God, the greatest gift God gave men is the ability to choose. We can choose what we want. It may cost more, but think of this. Some doctors, which the New York Times has disputed and said that there's not a single research
that shows that this is correct. But some doctors said that if you buy organic food, it's healthier. Again, they did, I think it was 150 studies and they couldn't find one benefit. Not one benefit to organic food. Not one, not one. Did people already pay $26 for a box of cereal in Whole Foods? Because the doctor said you'll live longer. But if Hashem told you, you'll live a better life and your neshamah will be elevated
because you spend $3 more per pound on kosher meat. Outrageous, the rabbi tax. I have heard many things. It's good for you. God promises it's good for you. The complete encyclopedic dictionary of living is to be found in the oral law. It complements the written law and is the source for this 48 ways. Let me just repeat your question. You're saying, how do we learn Torah? Should we start with the oral Torah, start with the Mishnah, the Talmud or the written Torah?
It's an excellent question. So to answer that question, I'll tell you. I think the first part is to just learn whatever you can. Learn whatever you can. Whatever you have in your house. No, you have a bunch of books, I know that. Because your wife has a bunch of books. So whatever you have, gobble it up. Then you can start organizing it. And you say, you know what? I want to start from Genesis and then Exodus
and then Leviticus and then Numbers and then Deuteronomy. And then you can go to the Mishnah and you can learn some Midrash. And there are amazing books, amazing high quality publications. You know, we have here, Gateway to Judaism, which gives you a synopsis of everything. It gives you a great summary and understanding of all of the fundamental teachings of the Torah. You have, I mean, you can read storybooks to inspire you. And we have here books on,
you read a book about Reb Moshe Feinstein. You read the book about Reb Yaakov Kamenetsky. You read the books about Reb El Yashiv and Reb Gifter. And you talk about giants, Torah giants. It's an inspiration to like, wow, they didn't waste a second. They understood the value of life. And that could infuse us with a great passion for learning. But I say, that's a great question. Find something you can do, and you can do something new every year.
You can do something new every year. I think it's almost time for us to start another Parsha class. So my dear friends, this concludes way number 15. And God willing, we will see you in the next of the 48 ways.