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Rav Shlomo Katz brings Lag Ba'Omer to life with a soulful compilation of Torah teachings on Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai (Rashbi). Through niggunim and Chassidic wisdom, he explores Rashbi’s divine light, the joy of Torah revelation, and Am Yisrael’s unity. This series offers a transformative journey, celebrating Lag Ba'Omer’s bonfires and the eternal flame of Rashbi’s legacy.
Welcome everyone. Thank you for coming. It's almost like ל״ג בעומר. And every year we try somehow to get ready for ל״ג בעומר.
To to be very blunt, it always for me the most overwhelming and intimidating day, ממש. Nothing to do with מירון בכלל, but it's just such an for me, it's it's just I'm I'm saying this out of my, I'm not this isn't a מעלה, this is like a a חסרון. I'm not saying something nice about myself. I'm just being real.
For some reason, ל״ג בעומר is so it's so big, I feel that no matter what we learn every year, לא גירדנו. We haven't even scratched the surface. We haven't scraped the surface of this very big day. You were saying Jack when I walked in here, it's a very it's very bizarre, the whole הילולא.
Very strange, very very strange.So there could be two types of שיעורים. One is, how did ל״ג בעומר become ל״ג בעומר? That's a history lesson. לא הכי מעניין אותי right now. I don't know about you guys.
It's not the most interesting thing for me, as to, you know, when did ל״ג בעומר become what ל״ג בעומר is now? We can we could do a whole thing on that, but I don't know, who wants to learn history at, you know, at night? During the day, maybe I like learning history, but at night, it's not. No, we we could do it and we could see like this קיבוץ, the gathering that happens on in מירון, when it really began to take off. Was anyone here ever there on ל״ג בעומר? Yeah? חיה, you went? Really? I went last year at the end. It was insane.
מוצאי ל״ג בעומר. Like yeah, we drove up in the afternoon. Of ל״ג בעומר day. Right.
You were there tomorrow? No.So, it's you were there? Yeah. At night? Yeah. Yeah. So it's it's...
And during the day. That's right. And during the day. That's right.
It's something it's something it's something else. It's something else. I love going during the year. I went a few times this year and it's so so special, so sweet.
It's I'm sure, you know. But anyway, this day, ל״ג בעומר, every year we try to get in through like a different a different way to connect to this very very holy day that that צדיקים like like the הריז'ינער, ר׳ צדוק הכהן say that the קדושה of יום כיפור בנסתר is given to each the טהרה that you get on יום כיפור the way the Torah says like כי ביום הזה יכפר עליכם, like on יום כיפור, the Torah says you're going to be purified on this day. So this this happens so to speak, בנסתר, in a hidden way on ל״ג בעומר, the same type of טהרה. Because ר׳ שמעון's whole this whole thing is סודות, this whole thing is secrets.
And something about ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי is is so inclusive in what happens to the in the process of of purification. Now if that's the if that's the story, then where's my עשרת ימי תשובה of getting ready for ל״ג בעומר? If it's such a deep day with such a cleansing going on. So I found written somewhere the following statement. Listen to this.
I found written in the ספר. The students brought down the זוהר. It says, שביום י״ד אייר יוצא כרוז. There's this uh, it's like a an announcement, a proclamation that comes out מן שמיא.
This is what the זוהר says, on on י״ד אייר which was yesterday. There's a כרוז that happens. It comes out like this. It says שבע ימים פתוחים which means for seven days now the gates are open, from yesterday, from פסח שני.
From פסח שני. From פסח שני is something cracks open. פסח שני is also the הילולא of רבי מאיר בעל הנס and רבי יהודה בר אילעאי was today. And there's there's so much going on in the air right now till, um, I guess it would be what's seven days, כ״א.
כ״ף כ״א, um, אייר. That these seven days, the gates are open, these days of רחמים, עת רצון, that each person should take utmost advantage of them. ממש, utmost advantage. The people say like when you find out about something around these days, it's like this השם is sending very clear messages and it shouldn't be ignored.
There's something in there. Now we usually don't talk like this because we usually try to get much more תכלס למעשה. Let me learn a פסוק, let me learn a פשט and then let me take a twist on it. Through ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי, it's it's so fascinating that you know how we walk around with stories of the צדיקים, how many stories do you remember about ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי? Does anyone want to admit how many stories they know or remember about ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי? Don't be embarrassed if you know a lot of them.
Did he live in Tekoa? I don't know. That's what I read in the brochure from Tekoa. Listen, I've been on tours by Jeremy and Ari's farm right here by a lot of people that may have lived there. I just don't know uh.
Could be, I don't know. I don't know. I've never heard that. I've never heard that.
I didn't know. If someone can make a few more rubles of giving a tour like that, then, you know. It's like they came to the בעל שם טוב around the time that people started writing like these books on קבלה but it wasn't anything like uh, it wasn't it wasn't deep and it was very concrete and half the time it wasn't even that accurate. So the בעל שם טוב says, if another אידל can can bring home חלה and grape juice for שבת because he sold one of these ספרים, who am I to say that, you know.
So I don't know. Anyway, I don't know. Could be. Could be his headquarters.
Could be Tekoa was really פקיעין, they got mixed up with the letters and that was really, you'll find the cave there. You'll see carrots. I don't know. I don't know.
There is a Tekoa in the in the גליל by the way. Maybe that's what they were talking about. It's one of those names that repeats north and south. Maybe, it could very well be that's what that's the story over there.
I don't know. I don't know. What whatever it is, I found a way to try to get in to ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי this year that I never saw before. In the past, we've spoken about, we we actually learned inside the זוהר describing the death of ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי, the day he died, what happened the day he died, how he died, and we've learned it, it's it's ממש fascinating.
It's in a previous שיעור. I'm going to send out we have a list now of all the ל״ג בעומר שיעורים. I'm going to send out a link whoever wants to catch up from from past years. We also spent one year discussing how really it should be that ל״ג בעומר should be much more about רבי עקיבא than about ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי, if you think about it.
I mean, if you if you stop for a second and realize what's this day really all about, ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי is the one that took it upon himself that he'll make sure Torah will never be forgotten, כי לא תשכח מפי זרעו. ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי, when is he born? Does anyone know? He's born, it seems like he's born 50 years after the חרבן הבית. And he sees that things are starting to dwindle down and he says, I'm taking upon myself that Torah will not be forgotten. But in whose merit could he even say such a thing? רבי עקיבא.
Now what what's the celebration of of it's like in the הלכה they bring this down, why is ל״ג בעומר such a שמחה day? Because they stopped dying. Like when someone's when 24,000 students stop dying, it's like, okay, let's make a שמחה now. That's that's hard to understand as well. It's very strange, you're right.
But we did the calculation the other day. But how many people had died in the Holocaust, you were saying. Not the Holocaust, the Israeli. Since the independence.
Right, the Israeli wars. what year that started. Right. Right, no but 24,000 is the number of רבי עקיבא's students.
So what what did you say? I said that you wouldn't know it stopped only in hindsight. Only looking. I don't know. רבי עקיבא, I wouldn't put anything past him.
He might have had, yeah. No, right, right. נכון. Well maybe.
Unless that was all of his students. No, but it but it was all of his students. So that's how we know. Oh, he wasn't left with anyone else.
No, that's so there weren't any more. That's the whole חידוש of of Exactly. So then came afterwards. Exactly.
That's the חידוש of רבי עקיבא's שמחה is that there was no one left. So you might think to yourself, I should probably choose a different profession if being a rabbi led to 24,000 deaths, right? What now if it was about him, he would have chosen another profession, but it wasn't about him. So what does he do? I'm going to start from scratch. And he starts again with five.
So that's why that was one of the angles we also went into the depths of ל״ג בעומר and seeing that a real Rebbe is one that has so much what means to him more than his own Torah being shared is having נחת from his תלמיד. So that's maybe like רבי עקיבא's שמחה is that it's about ר׳ שמעון and not about רבי עקיבא. I don't know, could be, we were thinking about that. Then one year we discussed the words that ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי shared with his תלמידים when he called them to the אדרא רבא, that was the famous gathering where he summoned them all to come in.
The אדרא רבא, like the the the great gathering where he had everyone get up and give a give a דרשה. And each one spoke about a different part of the face. It was famous story about the פרצופים. At the end, three of his students actually died because they revealed the secrets and they finished their תפקיד in this world, which is also it's all so mysterious, so far out, so not from this world.
It's all secrets. The whole thing is secrets. So we're trying to grab on to something on a level of עבודה and saying, okay, so למעשה, how can how can we get into ל״ג בעומר this year? I want to try through the ספירה of ל״ג בעומר. Through the ספירה, like the the the actual מידה that we work on ל״ג בעומר, which is a very deep, deep night, הוד שבהוד.
This week of הוד is very, very special. הוד can mean a number of things. We've discussed this before. הוד literally means glory, right? הוד, but הוד can come from the לשון הודאה, gratitude, and it can also come from the לשון of אני מודה, I admit, meaning being humbled.
הוד שבהוד means take this מידה to its highest level and bring it into your heart. So I I think we're going to see something tonight that is going to be very helpful and very I think very למעשה. Look, I hope it'll be very למעשה. This is from a צדיק, ר׳ צבי מאיר זילברברג.
We we've learned his Torah before. He's alive. He's here in ירושלים. He's he's young.
He's I think in his mid-50s. He's not he's very young. He's something else out of this world. It's like we know, we've been learning from the צדיקים that are alive today.
It's something very strong. Like ר׳ קלוגר, ר׳ יעקב מאיר שכטר, who's a bit older, but this צדיק, ר׳ צבי מאיר has uh his Torahs are are mind-blowing. And this is a piece of a teaching of his that he that he gave over in 19, uh, what would it be? תשנ״ט. 1999? 1999, right? 99, right? Right.
ס׳ was 10 years ago. We're in ע״ט right now. So this is 20 years ago. Yeah, תשנ״ט.
This is 20 years ago ל״ג בעומר. We're only doing three paragraphs from the whole שיחה of his and I think that this will be our way of entering into ל״ג בעומר this year, preparing for ל״ג בעומר this year. It's interesting the kids are the ones that really prepare for ל״ג בעומר. Right.
Running around looking for crushing the need to give what counting, we're going to continue counting anyway. נכון, נכון. Someone said to me uh when they hear we have more pages over here. Someone said to me, uh when they saw the posting for this year preparing for ל״ג בעומר, they said they thought I meant like, we're going I'm going to show you where you could store your wood.
Okay. Where you can gather it. That's important. You're right.
Yes. Now, it's also very selfish here because I'm a כהן. So when when when the weeks of הוד show up, it's it's extra because הוד is always correlated to the מידה of, does anyone know? From the from the seven shepherds, הוד, אהרן הכהן. אהרן הכהן was one that embodied the מידה of הוד.
Okay. Now there's a lot on that but let's let's jump in. You see where it says י׳? Okay. It's very very easy Hebrew.
Don't don't worry. You're not going to get stuck. Don't worry. Very easy Hebrew.
השבוע של הוד הוא השבוע של אהרן הכהן, שמידתו היא מידת הוד. ורשב״י, רבי שמעון בר יוחאי, היה לו את הכוחות והאורות של אהרן הכהן. He's going to say, really, in the פנימי פנימי place, we're going to see how ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי had the כח, he within him was embodied the מידות and the כח of what אהרן הכהן was all about. שהרי אהרן הכהן היה הראשון שנכנס לפניי ולפנים.
What does it mean that he was the first one that went inside to the deepest place? The Holy of Holies. The Holy of Holies, the קודש הקדשים. ורבי שמעון בר יוחאי הוא זה שנקרא קודש הקדשים. When we refer to ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי, it's like we refer to all it's funny, we we have a lot of תנאים.
No one gets as much focus as ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי. No one's referred to as קודש קדשים in other literature other than ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי. He's referred to as the קודש it's like everyone's קודש, ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי is קודש קדשים for a million reasons and it's still a mystery. It's still very hard to really understand.
ורשב״י הוא זה שנקרא קודש הקדשים. וכמו כן, אהרן הכהן הדליק את הנרות במנורת בית המקדש. אהרן הכהן was the one who lit the candles in the מנורה of the בית המקדש. And what's רשב״י known as? ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי, what's he called? בּוּצִינָא קַדִּישָׁא.
Do you know what בּוּצִינָא קַדִּישָׁא means? Holy candle. האור הקדוש, the holy light. He's always referred to as light. אהרן הכהן היה שושבינא דמטרוניתא לקרבן לתורה.
That אהרן הכהן, what was he basically doing in this world? Bringing people together, bringing them closer to the Torah, loving people. כמו שכתוב מצדיקים, זכותם יגן עלינו, שאהרן הכהן היה ניגש אל כל אחד מישראל, אפילו אל האדם הנמצא במצב השפל ביותר. אהרן הכהן would approach each Jew, even one that felt that he was in the lowest level, שלא ירגיש את אהבת ה׳ יתברך אותו. You know what's so sad is that we're all we're okay with just keeping Torah and mitzvos without paying attention to do I feel that השם loves me or not? Whatever, I'm going to go on a tangent now.
I'm going to go stop. Stop and continue. היה לוחש באוזנו. אהרן הכהן would whisper into the ear of the person that felt completely rejected.
He would say to him, אל תתפתה ליצר שאומר לך שה׳ יתברך אינו אוהב אותך. Don't be seduced by the evil inclination that's making you feel that God doesn't love you. דע לך, ה׳ יתברך מלא באהבה עצומה אליך. If you only knew how much love God had for you.
וה׳ יתברך יודע היטב את גודל היצר הרע שלך. Not just that, God knows how hard it is for you to feel his love because he also is aware of how big your יצר is, too. It's pretty interesting. It's amazing if you could imagine this how אהרן הכהן would go and whisper to you like this.
Listen, I know I know it's hard and and he really knows how hard it is. השם knows. ה׳ יתברך יודע היטב את כל הקשיים והניסיונות שלך. This is what this is what אהרן הכהן would whisper into the ear of every Jew.
God knows really well how difficult your life is and how many trials and tribulations you have. והוא ממתין לך ומצפה עיניך. He's waiting for you, he's waiting towards you. הוא יתברך שמו מבקש ומתחנן אליך, רק לנסות ולהשתדל משהו קטן.
So he's saying what how would אהרן הכהן finish this whole spiel? He would say, all God really wants you is to try a little bit of a צעד towards him. Not to become the holiest, not to fix everything and and show him that you've learned from every mistake, but אהרן הכהן would say when you don't feel השם's love for you, all השם is waiting for is one little צעד, one פנייה, one means like a one turn to him. Just one. What's that? An approach.
One but it could be like the smallest thing. It doesn't, you know. Usually we think in order to restore love or in order to get things back in order, it needs to be the whole the whole thing, everything that's wrong has to be fixed. And אהרן הכהן's whole מידה was he was able to get people back by by telling them that all you need to start with is just one turn.
Just one turn. And שבת we were saying the following thing. On שבת we were saying the difference between making a if you're in the wrong direction physically and then you have to get back to the right place, so it's like this, if you're on a plane that if you're basically in Los Angeles and you have to go to San Francisco, and you start and you jump on a flight to San Diego, then how do you start getting back to because San Diego is two hours driving south and San Francisco is about six seven hours driving north. So if you're in Los Angeles and you're driving towards San Diego, what do you have to do in order to feel like you're getting closer to San Francisco from where you started? Take the first exit.
Take the first exit, go go northbound, get back to LA and start going up again in order to feel that you're now progressed from your starting point. Spiritually, it doesn't matter how low you fell, all you have to do is turn. It's a matter of where you're facing which determines if you're back on track or not or if you're closer or not. Not how much did you progress back, but did you even turn to the other side? Right so this אהרן הכהן basically, he's whispering to you, listen, you don't have to first get back to Los Angeles to feel like you're you're doing okay.
Just turn. Just make one פנייה. That's what he would whisper into people's ears. Okay.
This is how this reb is describing how beautiful it was to go to the בית המקדש and get this kind of of a of a חיזוק talk. Can you imagine it? teacher. They do. What are you talking about? teacher needs to learn this.
We this is how every teacher acts. a lot of them. Yeah. I'm being I'm doing a תיקון, I'm being very optimistic on modern day חינוך these days.
It's getting better. Okay, good. I'm also not cynical. Okay, let's continue.
because you were also talking last week about how you don't have to put the whole day in a wash just because you you it didn't go so good. So that's like saying if you turn, if you just the turn, then it That's it. a different way for today. Just a turn.
Just a turn. That's that's what he said. Just a turn. Okay.
Um so again we're like 10 bottom 10 lines in the bottom. הוא יתברך מבקש מתחנן לך, רק לנסות ולהשתדל משהו קטן. Just turn around. Do one thing.
Not the whole thing, do one thing. ומיד תראה איך שישפיע עליך שפע עצום של אהבה וקרבה. The love and closeness that you're going to start to feel by doing one small thing, you're not going to believe it. And it's so important because we're usually under the assumption that what I need to do now is everything in order to begin to feel love and closeness again, and it's not true.
And you know, I have אהרן הכהן to rely on. That's how אהרן הכהן spoke to my great, great, great, great, great, great grandfather. I could I could trust that. Now that, אהרן הכהן, right? So he says like this, וכתוב מהארי הקדוש ומעוד צדיקים זכותם יגן עלינו על בהעלות אהרן את הנרות בין הערביים.
The pasuk says, when would אהרן הכהן light the candles? בין הערביים. When is that? Dusk. בין הערביים. כאשר אהרן הכהן הדליק את הנרות, האיר אור עצום ונפלא בתוך כל נשמות בני ישראל.
There was a tremendous light that was lit up in all the נשמות of עם ישראל whenever he lit it. You know, I saw today by the בדיטשובער רבי, רבי לוי יצחק said that when ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי was alive, there was this extra דעת ותבונה that was found in the mind of all Jewish babies being born as long as ר׳ שמעון בר יוחאי was alive. Again, I'm I know I'm throwing out these bombs, not explaining how this works because I don't think we can understand how these but this works. I'm just telling you what what the בדיטשובער says.
So when אהרן הכהן would light the candles, something happened to each and every one of us in our in our נשמות. This light, some kind of light was was burning bright in our hearts and souls. בפרט בתוך הנשמות של בין הערביים. But specifically, the light was shining in the נשמות of בין הערביים.
Now, he says, who are the נשמות of בין הערביים? הנשמות של עקבתא דמשיחא, הנשמות שלנו, our souls. We are the נשמות of בין הערביים. עד שכל הלב מתמלא באהבת ה׳ יתברך. Like how could it be that you and I actually think השם loves us after six million Jews were put into gas chambers? That's because אהרן הכהן lit the מנורה בין הערביים.
How could we still think השם's in love with us? That's not a בין הערביים, that's the darkest night. בין הערביים. No. The end of בין הערביים.
الشואה was the darkest, the darkest night. That was not a בין הערביים. We're on the but we're on the we're on the we're after that. Thank God.
We're after that. Okay, כי עבודת אהרן הכהן היתה עבודת הלב. This was the עבודה of אהרן הכהן, עבודת הלב. How do we know this? Like it says כמו שכתוב, ונשא אהרן את שמותם על לבו.
You know the names of us were all placed on the breastplate of אהרן הכהן, right? So it says ונשא the pasuk says, ונשא אהרן את שמותם על לבו. He carried our names on his heart. שהיו על לב אהרן. כי עבודתו היתה להאיר את האהבה בלב כל אחד מישראל.
Any any educator, any rabbi that wants to coin himself as a follower of אהרן הכהן, which פרקי אבות tells us to do, to be תלמידיו של אהרן הכהן, do you carry your אידלך's names on your heart? That means that when you're doing something holy, do you have כוונה that this should be to enlighten, to bring light into their lives as well? That's a rebbe. Those are his חסידים. But it really this is like this is how it always was meant to be. So he says that's what אהרן הכהן does.
זוהי היתה עבודתו, זוהי היתה עבודת אהרן הכהן, הכהן הגדול מאחיו, שכלל את כל ישראל עמו, it included all of עם ישראל in him, שכולם היו מאוחדים עמו כאחים. It's true אהרן הכהן was the כהן גדול, but if you asked anyone in the עם, what what's your קשר to אהרן הכהן? Are you kidding? He's my brother. That's what everyone felt. He's my brother.
ובכל יום כיפור, הכניס אהרן הכהן את נשמת כל כלל ישראל יחד איתו אל קודש הקדשים. On יום כיפור, when אהרן הכהן went into the Holy of Holies, he did not go on his own behalf. He went there בשם his family, he went there בשם הכהנים, and then he went there בשם כל עדת ישראל and we mentioned this in our תפילה on יום הכיפורים, מוסף יום הכיפורים. He went on behalf of everyone.
And when he went in, it says האיר בתוך נשמתם. What was the point of him going inside? Not just to get כפרה, but it was in order שיגישו את ההרגשה המתוקה של פנים בפנים. He wanted Jews to feel the sweet feeling of what it means face to a face-to-face relationship with God, closeness. That was the that was the pinnacle point of יום כיפור.
עד כדי כך שכשהיו שומעים את השם, היו כורעים ומשתחווים ונופלים על פניהם. So much so that when they did hear the name of Hashem coming out of the כהן גדול's mouth, what was their reaction? They fell on their face thanking God. Why did they fall on their face thanking God? They they they couldn't even believe that such a feeling could ever exist again of closeness and of love. So they fell on their face.
So he says over here a beautiful thing. הם נפלו והתנפלו על הפנים בפנים. They fell on their face because they felt that they were getting close to the face, כביכול. So the face, the place that was directly affected by it the most, expressed it the most.
You know, when when you when you say I have a face-to-face relationship with someone, that means פה אל פה אדבר בו, it's like I have closeness. So that's basically what... a connection to the unknown. Absolutely.
I I said a תורה on on on שבת last week of פרשת אמור that there were so many topics in the פרשה to talk about. אמור is גוואלד, כהנים, מועדים, then you have the לחם הפנים, you have the מקלל at the end of the פרשה. And I wasn't sure what to do. Then I went to הכנסת ספר תורה in the morning, and Friday morning, and I get to write an אות in the ספר תורה in the, the סופר, the רב קדוש, he looks at me and says, \"Okay.
בוא, אתה מקבל את האות הזה." It was מ of the word פנים. I was like, I got the hint. I'm going to talk about לחם הפנים this שבת. And it was, it's true, and the whole תורה was לחם of the face, of the of the inside.
הם חטפו בחינה זו ונפלו עליה. They they they grabbed that now it's a time for closeness, and they fell on it on their face. בבחינת אחזתיו ולא ארפנו. I'm going to grab on to what I'm feeling and I'm not going to let go of it.
וחקקו את ההרגשה הזו בתוך ליבם. And that moment that they sensed that everything that אהרן הכהן whispered into their ears was true, they grabbed, they seized that moment, and they wouldn't let go of it. You know you ever have those moments when you see that your תפילות actually were פועל something or that, you know, all those promises that you felt were made to you, you finally feel it and taste it, you want to grab onto it, you don't want to let go of it. That's what would happen every time the כהן גדול would go into the קודש קדשים and he'd light the, you know, he'd light the מנורה in the קודש and everyone felt that I'm not letting go of this moment of closeness.
They would they would engrave this feeling into their heart. עד שהיו באותה שעה בדרגה הגדולה ביותר של ביטול ודבקות ואחדות. ממש בבחינה של קודשא בריך הוא וישראל חד בהתגלות. It was like a revealed sense that Hashem and his people are one in a revealed manner.That's what everyone felt.
Now, what else was in revealed, what else took place in a revealed manner during the time of בית המקדש? This kind of helps for this feeling. That we were forgiven. נכון? It was it came down in a revealed manner. Do you remember, you know what I'm referring to? What's that? The בית המקדש.
נכון, what what exactly over there? That he would have a string that turned from red to white so everyone could see that they were. Which was a visual to show that this actually did happen. What what's interesting over here is that it doesn't say that they felt this love then, because we don't know how they responded when they saw there, just the שמחה, but it does say that when they hear the name of the כהן גדול, the כהן גדול say God's name when he was in the קודש קדשים, then what would happen? That's when they felt like, wow, we really, really are one. But ברוך השם we also had other things in the בית המקדש which alluded to, you know, the the כפרה taking place or not taking place.
Now, that's that's a beautiful וורט for I don't know, ה' אב, right? That's אהרן הכהן's יארצייט or I don't know what else could it be, a great תורה for, I don't know, the the אושפיזין of אהרן הכהן. I have a good stuff for the stage now as well. Now, let's let's let's kind of tie this in. What did we say the מידה of אהרן הכהן was? הוד.
What's the ספירה of ל"ג בעומר? הוד שבהוד. As you know, this year we're taking the ספירות extra seriously. Right? We're learning about them deeper and deeper and more and more. So now look how he continues over here, the next paragraph.
ובכל ל"ג בעומר, every ל"ג בעומר, אבינו שבשמים משפיע לנו את האור של יום כיפור. The light of יום כיפור comes down in ל"ג בעומר in a more hidden way. Like we learned in the beginning of this piece that the צדקת הכהן, the visionary will refer to the תפילות that take place, this טהרה that takes place on ל"ג בעומר, it happens in a more concealed way, but it's the same kind of light that comes down like יום כיפור. ובו נותן אבינו שבשמים לכל אחד מישראל את האור הנפלא הזה של קודש הקודשים, שמאיר בכוחו של רשב"י, של רבי שמעון בר יוחאי.
He says here, the ריבונו של עולם gives into every single Jew this wondrous, wonderful light called קודש קדשים. Same place that אהרן הכהן would go into, in the זכות of רבי שמעון בר יוחאי who's referred to as קודש הקדשים. Now, what does it mean to receive the light of קודש קדשים? The same reaction that עם ישראל had when the כהן would go into the קודש קדשים what we just described now. שנרגיש ונחיה תמיד עם ההכרה והידיעה.
That we should live and always feel the הכרה, the recognition, the knowing שאפילו כאשר שחורה אני מבחוץ, and even from on the outside, I feel dark, אבל בפנימיות זה מלא ונאוה. That's from שיר השירים, שחורה אני ונאוה, right? אל תראוני שאני שחרחורת, ששזפתני השמש. I'm just burned by the by the outside, but on the inside, since אהרן הכהן started whispering to Jews in the inside, you're so pure, just make one פניה. רבי שמעון בר יוחאי is connected with that exact way of of whispering into our ears that all you need is one פניה because on the inside, you really don't want to be bad.
You just never had someone whispering into your ear telling you, you could do it. זה מלא בהוד והדר עצום ונפלא. ואפילו כשאני ישינה, and even when I'm sleeping, עם כל זה ליבי ער. And even when I'm sleeping, my heart's still awake.
כמו שכתוב בחז"ל הקדושים, שליבי ער הכוונה על יום כיפור. It's so beautiful. In חז"ל it says, you know, it says in in שיר השירים, אני ישינה וליבי ער. קול דודי דופק, פתחי לי אחותי, רעייתי, יונתי, תמתי.
אני ישנה, I am sleeping, it looks like I'm sleeping. But what's awake? My heart's awake. So it says חז"ל say that יום כיפור is this day of ליבי ער. The heart is awake.
All the stuff that we do, it might make our body שלוופי. But the heart is more awake than any other day of the year. But there's a taste of this on ל"ג בעומר, he says. וזה מתגלה בל"ג בעומר.
This this, the way I'm awake on יום כיפור, my heart's awake on יום כיפור, is revealed on ל"ג בעומר. שאז אבינו שבשמים מגלה לנו את האהבה העצומה שלו אל כל אחד מאיתנו. Something happens on ל"ג בעומר, especially when you're in מירון or when you're by צדיקים that are busy with basking in the light of רבי שמעון בר יוחאי. No one can say exactly what it is.
But he says that the result of the שמחה that I feel basking in the light of the צדיק is that it's clear to me, this sounds very not Jewish, even though it's the most Jewish thing you could say, God loves you. The Lord loves you. A lot of other חבר'ה took that, and for us it's hard to hear those words even, right? God loves you? Can you imagine a ראש ישיבה comes to you and wants to get your children to come learn in the ישיבה? And you ask them, so what's your basically, like what's the point, what's your thing? Oh, our thing is to make sure our students know that God loves them. Would you spend $25,000 to send your kid there? Probably not.
כביכול השם אוהב אותך. But really, that is the point, that was what אהרן הכהן tried doing his whole life. That is רבי שמעון בר יוחאי set us up for every day of our lives as well. Now, when you learn more about רבי שמעון בר יוחאי's life, specifically what took place on ל"ג בעומר, and especially the words where he told his students, you'll the specific statement that I didn't get to before describing the אידרא רבא, you'll see that רבי שמעון בר יוחאי meant the same thing.
When he said I take it upon myself, תורה never be forgotten, that was a big undertaking. But later in life, רבי שמעון בר יוחאי is sitting with those students and he tells them the following statement: אנן בחביבותא תליא מילתא. Our words, meaning us learning and us keeping the תורה alive is dependent on something. What is it, what is it dependent on? I'm going to say the statement again.
אנן בחביבותא תליא מילתא. What does that mean, בחביבותא? With how much do we like ourselves? Is our word dependent. Us carrying on what we're trying to do is dependent on how much love we feel towards each other. It's dependent on it.
So רבי שמעון בר יוחאי understands for a person to feel that it's on them the mantle, the torch of the continuation of Yiddishkeit, if you're not feeling that Hashem has all the love in the world for you, you're not going to last, and you definitely won't be able to give it over to your children. So on a certain level, we're celebrating ל"ג בעומר because it's the day that whether I feel it today or not, on some level, my נשמה was lit tonight by the torch of אהרן הכהן and רבי שמעון בר יוחאי. That even if I don't sense it all the time, there is this דף פנימי, inside, that Hashem loves me and Hashem is close to me. All Hashem wants me to do is one little פניה, one movement.
Because בחביבותא תליא מילתא. Because it's all dependent, this מסורת, I took it upon myself to make sure תורה is always there. The מסורת is dependent on חביבותא, on feeling the closeness.Now he he ends off here in the bottom, he says, וכעת הכל נשפע באופן של ראיה. Now it's interesting.
The two most potent senses that we have are שמיעה and ראיה. I'm most affected by what I hear and what I see. Would you say that we're more affected by sight and hearing than taste? Yeah. What about then feeling? Touching? For sure.
What about smell? For sure. So, it's interesting. What's רבי שמעון בר יוחאי's name? שמעון, שמיעה. But when he, what does he do? It's an amazing thing.
He comes, the זוהר הקדוש, what does it say? Doesn't say תא שמע, it says תא חזי, which means come and see. He's fixing both of our senses, of hearing that Hashem loves me and of seeing that Hashem loves me. The more I attach myself to the תורות of the צדיקים, into the תורת הסוד, and I should learn, everyone should learn one thing of רבי שמעון בר יוחאי, one of his teachings on ל"ג בעומר, I hear inside that Hashem loves me more, and I can see it in my life. That's his legacy, that's all he cares about.
That's all רבי שמעון בר יוחאי cares about. You seeing and you hearing that the ריבונו של עולם has all the love in the world for you. And all he, ריבונו של עולם wants is his קרבה, his closeness. So look what he says here.
וכעת הכל נשפע באופן של ראיה, כמאמר השגור בדברי רשב"י, תא חזי. Why is it, why is this a time now of actually seeing? מפני שכעת בשבוע של אהרן הכהן, השבוע של הוד, הכל פתוח. Everything is open. תרעין פתיחין, like we quoted the זוהר before, the gates are wide open this whole week.
If the gates are wide open this whole week, ממילא רצון אבינו שבשמים שנבקש מלפניו שנזכה כעת לחקוק זאת היטב בליבנו על כל השנה הבאה. What are the gates open for? Gates are open, stores are open for what? To take advantage of what? When you tune into the מידה of הוד and you go a little bit into who רבי שמעון בר יוחאי was, take advantage and say, ריבונו של עולם, I'm begging you. It shouldn't take me only ל"ג בעומר, only יום כיפור to feel what I'm feeling now. Engrave it in me throughout the whole year.
See, יום כיפור is like this day that's for the whole year, right? If I don't go through יום כיפור and I don't know and feel forgiven, I'm going to walk into סוכות with my ד' מינים, build a סוכה, feel like a sinner. מה פתאום? I won't. I have to go through יום כיפור with the אמונה that Hashem forgives me and that we're close again. I have to go to שבועות, which is in less than three weeks.
I have to go to שבועות with the same exact thing of I have to go through רבי שמעון בר יוחאי and say, I need to know that this day today, I have to see throughout everything in my life that ברוך השם, every day is a moment of just to just get closer to you. So he says over here, take advantage of this week, תרעין פתיחין, the gates are open. Like the זוהר הקדוש says, from פסח שני throughout this whole week, a lot of big days, ask Hashem for everything and anything. But the most important thing is at the moment there's a sense of hearing how much Hashem loves you and seeing how much love Hashem has for you, it could be from the smallest thing in the world, make a stop and say, הקדוש ברוך הוא, I know I'm being selfish.
Please, just like the יידן would grab onto that moment and fall on their faces, trying to hold on to it in a time of the בית המקדש, I know life gets, I know life is waves, I know life goes up and goes so low. But I need to remember this feeling for to get through my lows. Because then those lows won't won't won't scar me. They maybe will just wound me, but I'll heal.
So this is this is a little bit of the light that comes down, the שמחה of being בשמחה with רבי שמעון בר יוחאי, being בשמחה over the time of the צדיק, this is what he wanted. And we're saying, רב שמעון, we're continuing what you started. You said it's on you, and we're saying it's on us to keep this מסורת alive. And we're very, very aware that if it's not clear to us that there's so much love in front of us, it won't continue.
It just won't last. So I give us all a ברכה, this week of הוד, especially tonight, as I said last week. We always get to learn on תפארת, whatever the מידה is, whatever the week is, is another week, but we've been learning on the nights of תפארת. תפארת שבהוד.
The combination of חסד and גבורה within הוד, beauty within הוד. We should בעזרת השם listen to פרקי אבות and become תלמידים of אהרן הכהן that if we see someone that feels downhearted, if we see someone that really senses, that really believe that they're so far, we should have it, even if we're not feeling it fully, we should have it in us to invite the מידה of אהרן הכהן, the כהן גדול to go into the קודש קדשים on their behalf, ask Hashem so much to shine into them how much you love them, and בעזרת השם, רבי שמעון בר יוחאי's words of keeping the flame alive forever, you'll be part of that chain. And when you realize you're part of a chain that began רבי שמעון בר יוחאי, ל"ג בעומר is going to come, you're going to dance like it's like it's no one's business. Even if it's in your basement in אפרת or wherever you are in the world or, you know, if you're sitting in Kansas City or God knows where, the צדיק's light reaches the whole world.
So this was just another way of trying to somehow get into ל"ג בעומר. We should be privileged to take advantage of high moments we feel this week, fall on its face, grab onto it, and tell Hashem, I'm not moving from here. I need this for the rest of the year. Okay.
ישר כח everyone. Thank you so much for coming and a good יום טוב to everyone and only good news. שכח.