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A new learning series with Rav Shlomo Katz on the sefer יין ישן by Rav Nissan.
Rav Shlomo returns to the inner foundations of Jewish life through a sefer that brings the world of Chassidus into clear, living language.
These shiurim are about the basics in the deepest sense: Emunah, closeness to Hashem, the Jewish soul, and the foundations that help a person live with more depth, simplicity, and truth.
Okay, Boker tov, good morning. The month of Cheshvan is sponsored by Dina Tobin for the refuah sheleimah of Malka Riza bas Mazal, by the Finns for the refuah sheleimah of Yehudis bas Sarah, anonymously for the זיווג הגון for Esther bas Bracha, Nechama Miriam bas Penina Perl, Yael Avia bas Chana Devorah, and Galia bas Yehudis, and the week is sponsored by the Berkow family for the refuah of Rachel Bracha bas Penina Roiz. First of all, the sefarim are in Eretz Yisrael, and they're in Ra'anana. I forgot to ask my father, איזה טעות שלי, I forgot.
I didn't realize you were there yesterday. Oh, you'll be there Thursday? Oh, great! If anyone wants to steal the mitzvah from my father...
איזה יום? Okay, so one of the... Thank you.
Okay, בסדר גמור, יופי. Yeah, the sefarim are in, thank God. We we we got a bunch of them, so I'm very very much looking forward to the to you holding the sefer in your hand, and I've been in touch with the family of the מחבר this last since like since the מחבר's brother, right, the מחבר's brother is the one that put out that video that I sent you guys, and it's just a beautiful what a beautiful, beautiful family, such a לא יודע, נעימות, such נועם.
ככה, we have good news today.
The good news is the perek that we're learning today. This is actually very, very good news. If you look at the title of today, האמונה היא בירושה, that basically tells you everything. Emunah that we're so longing to to discover, to enhance, to surround ourselves with, emunah comes down through inheritance.
Now let me ask you a she'eilah. With with din of not to go too deep into the halachot of this, but if there's a yoresh, right, if someone is a legitimate yoresh and someone that inherits halachically, can he, can that person, the person that is yoresh deny his yerushah? Can a person deny their own yerushah? What do you think? Yeah? You think you can? Halachically? Let's go הלכתית, סתם, let's start with halachah. Can a person denounce his denounce is well, it's two different words, denounce versus deny. Can a person deny their yerushah? No.
Can you denounce it? Yes. But even if you denounce it, you cannot deny it, right? No, the no, you're mekabel directly to you, yeah. So that's a very so I want you to keep that in mind if we say that emunah, and and he's going to show here על דרך החסידות how what what that means, that there's something that you cannot you cannot deny. You may denounce as much as you want, אבל האמונה היא בירושה.
Faith, something that we already have because we were born into the family, because we were born into the mishpachah. That's it.
ברוך אתה ה' אלקינו מלך העולם שהכל נהיה בדברו.
אמן.
Now similar to the way that we learned out the two different types of holiness in Friday's shiur, there's a level of emunah that can kind of get נפגם, it can get blemished, and then there's a world of emunah that exists within us that can't be touched. It's the same zach. Like we were learning regarding inyanim of kedushah, it's the same exact thing, works the same exact way. So let's start off let's start off right away.
אות ג': האמונה היא בירושה. This is a beautiful sefer, I'm sure you the Slonimer Chassidim in the room, you have this sefer. This is a beautiful sefer called Torat Avot.
כתב בתורת אבות בשם הרב הקדוש ר' נח מלעכאוויטש, זכותו יגן עלינו, שיהודי צריך להאמין אשר בפנימיותו הוא מאמין באמונה שלימה.
A Yid has to believe that deep down inside he he or she believes באמונה שלימה, ורק שעבים מכסים אותו. It's just that thick layers of fog is blocking it. But a Yid has to believe, this is crazy, he has to believe that he believes. Sounds funny, right?
צריך להאמין אשר בפנימיותו, not only does he believe, הוא מאמין באמונה שלימה.
So psychologically speaking over here, what does this mean? What does this do to a person? If you They have to train themselves to say, no matter, despite whatever happens, not just that I still believe in you, I believe that deep down I still believe in you even when I mamash on the outside don't believe. believe in you.
אתם מבינים? Feels like I don't believe in you. Feels, whatever, nachon, on the outside, it feels mamash like I don't believe in you.
A Yid's avodah in this world is that davka then to remember that deep down inside, I actually have אמונה שלימה in you.
אמונה שלימה in you, and I just have עבים, I have these thick thick layers of of clouds, of fog, of confusion that are standing in between that, which is אמת לאמיתו, that I believe in you באמונה שלימה, to what I'm feeling right now, to what seems to be like reality. Let's continue to have him develop this for us.
וביאור הדבר הוא, כמו שכתב Tanya, as the Alter Rebbe writes in the Tanya in פרק י"ח, שהאבות הורישו לכל אחד ואחד מישראל נשמה מהעשר ספירות.
So our our our forefathers הורישו, they left as an inheritance to each one of Am Yisrael a neshamah that emanates from one of the ten Sefirot.
כי הם עשו עצמם מרכבה לשכינתו יתברך. They made themselves to be a מרכבה, the chariot, the wheels on the chariot for Hashem's Shechinah.
והנחילו זה לזרעם, and they, I don't know what the right word in English for להנחיל.
Bequeathed. Bequeathed. Sure, that's what I I was about to say that, actually. I'm sorry, yeah.
Eli, you could have given me one more second, I would have gotten there. In the next gilgul I would have gotten there. And they bequeathed this to their to their offspring.
ובתוך ספירת החכמה שבנשמה מאיר אור אין סוף ברוך הוא, ולכן כל ישראל, אפילו עמי הארץ, הם מאמינים בהשם, כי בתוך פנימיות נשמתם הם מרגישים מציאותו יתברך שמאיר בקרבם.
Even those that are ממש עמי הארץ, how could it be that they have an inyan of emunah? How could they feel emunah? How could they be attached to emunah? What did he What did he say here based on the Alter Rebbe? It's inside them. Through which sefirah? He called it out. Through chachmah.
כולם בחכמה עשית, right? So chachmah is the lower level of those three, right, levels of חכמה, בינה, and daat.
So through the sefirah of chachmah, he says, based on the Alter Rebbe in the Tanya in פרק י"ח, that's how it could be that you have עמי הארץ גמורים that are walking around with some kind of a sense of emunah. Where did it come from? Because this is a yerushah. This is a ירושה מאבותינו. Zot omeret, I want to explain this a little bit outside.
What does it mean that they became a merkavah for the Shechinah? What does that mean? What does that mean? It means that the concept of bitul that we all like to throw around, וכל זה, by them it was mamash like that. They themselves were completely nullified, completely self-removed, they didn't get in the way at all of the רבונו של עולם's shining in this world. Once a person does that, it's like if you want to know how you give your kids a real yerushah, once once the once you do that, that you completely nullify yourself in the holiest way to אור השם יתברך, and what he wants you to do in this world, and what he wants the world to receive from you through you, then he says you create a yerushah for your children. And what's the yerushah for your children, which is the greatest yerushah you could ever leave them? That they mamash believe that they believe be-emunah sheleimah in in Hashem.
There is no greater yerushah you could leave for your kinderlech. Nothing. Nothing in the world. That's the greatest thing in the world you could leave for your children.
And that's how he's saying what the Baal HaTanya is saying that explaining how someone that kivayachol seems to be so such an עם הארץ, he feels something because even through the once they did that, all the זרע that comes after Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov forever has in them as a ירושה אמונה through one of the sefirot, through a different way, shines in different way for different people. But everyone has something, the דבר משותף. Mordechai ben David was right.
אנחנו מאמינים בני מאמינים.
I mean, that's not his, I mean it's It's his Of course, leave it to Elman for Right? What you do with gematriot, he's like that with Jewish music, you understand? Okay. On the bottom, ולפיכך, אפילו קל שבקלים ופושעי ישראל מוסרים נפשם על קידוש השם. And therefore, even the lowest of the low and the poshayim of Am Yisrael, they give their life for Kiddush Hashem.
וזהו מה שאנו קוראים נקודת ישראל.
I never heard this before. You ever hear this concept before?
נקודת ישראל שיש לכל יהודי בתולדתו, בתולדותו. Zot omeret, I have a nekudah of being a Yid, that nekudah of being a Yid means זה ייעוד.
זה זה חי- זה זה אצלי, it's my destination.
And that's chochmah. And that's ח- well, it starts, meaning it it always for everyone starts from chochmah, but because of the way that he mapped it here, and how the Alter Rebbe continues there, in פרק י״ח and I think also in פרק י״ט, for other people, the he'arah of their neshamah is coming from a a higher sefirah, so their access to the emunah that they we all have is a bit more tangible. But b'chochmah is the I would call the מכנה משותף. That means the common denominator, upon which everyone has some access.
And they know b'emunah sheleimah that this is for true, this is this is real. And all of us have that, אפילו קל שבקלים.
אלא, יש על ידי שמשקיע עצמו בתאוות גשמיות לא ירגיש באמונה זו. So why don't I feel it? Well, what are you running after? What kind of yerushah are you trying to leave for your children? What kind of yerushah are you trying to leave for your kinderlech? How many people, they put so much effort into gashmiyus behind the notion of I want my kids to have more than what I had growing up.
That's a big thing in our dor, because many of us in the last, you know, previous generations or two generations ago, what did they have? You know, I I, it came up as a memory on my phone. It was nine nine years ago I think, I was with my brother in Argentina for my uncle's I I guess if it was nine years ago, Abba, then it was the first yahrzeit, right. So, my cousin took me to the apartment that my father grew up in in Buenos Aires, okay? I'm not kidding right now. The apartment that my father grew up in, the whole apartment, my father, his parents, and his brother, was maybe half of this room, the whole place, the whole place.
And many of us have grandparents that, you know, lived in those kind of conditions, and their whole inyan is to give more to their children. Now that's a that's a very healthy and normal and beautiful thing. But בפנימיות של הדברים, it doesn't have to לסתור את העובדה, doesn't have to contradict the fact that they can give us more than maybe I don't know if they can give us more than what our grandparents gave those kids. Why? Because maybe the grandparents gave the kids emunah.
I'm so happy you said that. Why? Just I am. Yeah? Because for all the right reasons, the world we live in. Yeah.
Is that a... Say it. Sitra achra tells us it needs to be like this, but it maybe doesn't, maybe it's more deeper than that. That's what we're learning right now.
נכון. Trying to say like it's a normal it's a normal gut reaction for someone to want to give their children more than they had. That's good, it's ma'alin bakodesh. The the shaila is is it on the cheshbon of something or not.
וזה, ממש לא טוב. So, he's saying over here, when you're משקיע yourself in getting more and more gashmiyut, you're not going to feel that which you which you actually believe in, which would be horrible.
כי החכמה שבנשמתו נופלת לבחינת שינה ואינה פועלת פעולתה.
כמו שכתוב בתניא.
Yeah, like the Tanya says in the next chapter, the chochmah that you have went schluffy, and it's not doing what it's supposed to do in this world. Like we have so many muscles that aren't doing what they're supposed to be doing in this world, why? Because they're not exercised. They're not being used, they're not being prepared for a time of you know, real usage, which brings us back to Leo's speech, Rav Leo Dee's speech at his wife's levayah. Or maybe it was at his the two daughters' levayah, because it was two different levayot, where he said that he was speaking big words of emunah at that funeral, and all of us thought he was you know, משהו לא בסדר.
But he was speaking, if you remember, some of the chevra I know that were here, we we we went, he was saying words לא יאומן what he was saying. But I have two other children. And he said, I want you to know the reason why I'm able to to talk like this, is because I learn emunah every single day. He didn't start learning emunah when he heard there was a פיגוע and his family's in it and he's in the he's he's in the חדר he's in the hospital and he's starting to to to to upload shiurim on emunah.
He has a seder in emunah every day, and he credited, mamash, he he credited Reb Ephraim Goldberg with one of the most powerful statements I ever heard about emunah, that emunah is paying attention and focusing on what I have versus what I don't have. That's emunah. So that and then he said that amazing amazing powerful line, where he says, I could look here today and said, I had five children, or we were a family of seven. And he said, "Instead, I'm standing here and I'm saying we are now a family of five.
This is what we have." A person that's משקע in תאוות of gashmiyut can't come to those It's just that they'll never say words like that. They'll never get to a מסקנה to think or talk like that, you know what I mean? It's just not part of the program. Because they're, like the Alter Rebbe says, their chochmah, that which Reuven was speaking about from such a wise place, that level of חכמה נרדם, it went to the בחינה of שינה. You know, I have to tell you something.
Yesterday I went to the funeral of a really special Yid. This guy was something else. If you've ever spent time in the Rova, did any of you learn in the Rova? Yeah? Oh, right, right, right. It was still in the Rova then.
Do you remember Reuven Halevi? Reuven Halevi. Reuven Halevi, old-school Shlomo chevra.
אבא, אתה זוכר אותו עוד ממנהטן? He married emunah Witt about 20 something years ago. He was He would dance with you like it's no one's business, right? And I think it was either a big Rav or a Rosh Yeshiva got up yesterday to give one of the hespedim in Har Hamenuchot.
And it was amazing how he was speaking about the level of a Yid that lived with conscious emunah all the Well, literally cuz her name his wife's name was emunah, but also living with living with this level of emunah. And I would always wonder, why is he so He was, you know, he never got he didn't get married, didn't have his own children. And yet, whenever I saw him, and I saw him since I'm a kid, this Yid was on He would grab like the end of your hand and start dancing with you, bopping with you. Bopping with you.
I don't know, it just it popped up for me over here right now.
ואפילו בשאר בני אדם, אף על פי שיש להם אמונה במוחם, אין האמונה חי בקרבם. What a line. There are plenty of people, if you ask them do they believe, they say yes.
And you ask them do you believe in hashgachah? Yes. Now you ask them all the she'elot about emunah, everything, and the answer to everything is yes. He says you could have that in your moach, but the emunah is not חי בקרבך. It's not alive.
It's not in practice. You're not training, you're not training it.
כמו שכתב הפלא יועץ, שאף גם שבני ישראל הם מאמינים בני מאמינים בטבעם, it's true, and according to our nature we are מאמינים בני מאמינים, עדיין צריך לקשר האמונה וההכרה, a person must connect emunah to recognition, שיהיה ממש כמו שרואה בעיניו. It has to reach a level as if it's like you're looking at it with your eyes.
ועל זה נאמר: ורעה אמונה. Now, over here, ורעה means to shepherd, like shepherd faith.
ורעה אמונה. Rabbi Nachman has a very It's a few very powerful teachings based on this pasuk in Tehillim.
He just He says the first two words of this pasuk: שכון ארץ ורעה אמונה. The dwelling in the land that we're living in is in order to shepherd faith.
ורעה אמונה, to shepherd faith.
שצריך לראות, what does that mean to shepherd faith?
שצריך לראות with an ע.
You have to shepherd ולפרנס, and what do you do with your with your flock? You have to give them Take care of them.
ולגדל האמונה. Emunah is our צאן. We are רועה צאן, in our whatever, we're shepherds.
You have to take care of them, you have to shepherd them, you have to faith them. Meaning it's not enough that I say I believe in Hashem. It's just not enough. It's like they do all these like סקרים, all these How do you say סקר? Poll.
Polls! All the time, about a million things, right? And one of the polls is like, okay, מה אחוז המאמינים בעם ישראל? Right? So, ברוך השם, in עם ישראל the אחוז of ma'aminim is very, very big. It's very strong. Focus on the good. Very high, very strong.
Now let's focus on the bad, right? Now, within that, let's say, from the 100% of the ma'aminim, right, then you ask, אצל כמה מהם זה עניין של ורעה אמונה? No, because in yeshivas that we grew up in, and the yeshivas, many of them that still exist today, that's not part of the curriculum. It's not part of the curriculum. Rabbi Kook changed, I mean, Rabbi Kook really, in Merkaz Harav, they really they really put an emphasis on ללמוד אמונה. It's a little bit, you know, different than maybe the מהלך we have here, because they were always they were they were always asked, okay, so what does that mean? What ספרים should be learned in order to shepherd faith.
So you know what the main one for Merkaz Harav is, right? The Kuzari. Rabbi Yehuda Halevi, the Kuzari. Now that's like a that that's Rav Tzvi Yehuda was really the one that pushed that and made that to be like the shepherding of of of faith. Gevald, Baruch Hashem.
But whatever it is, it has it must be that we have to shepherd faith. We have to we have to activate this. It can't be something lying dormant, and you can't bank on Friday night davenen for this stuff either. That's not how it works.
זה משהו יותר גדול, it's an everyday life. Every single day. I think it I think it comes down to שיחות חברים. Like what kind of conversations are you having with friends, and is emunah is emunah part of the conversation? A lot of guys say, "I need guys that I could just, you know, talk our heart, like spill my guts and everything." But wouldn't you want like that together with a a a a faith-based conversation?
שזה גם חלק מזה, חייב להיות.
ובזה יתורץ מה שיש, second paragraph, ובזה יתורץ מה שיש מקשים איך שייך לצוות על האמונה. Now we can ask the obvious question: how is it possible to command mitzvah the emunah of being a mitzvah? How can you command to have an emotion or to have a belief?
הרי אמונה תלוי בלב, ואם אינו מאמין איך יכול לכפות את ליבו להאמין? Great question.
ואהבת, same שאלה. 100%.
It's going to be a different answer, but it's the same שאלה. How could the Torah say How could the Torah command an emotion? So the Torah doesn't command emotions. That's not what the Torah does. The Torah commands you to get to the gym.
That's what it does. 100%.
ולפי הנ''ל יובן כי האמונה כבר נמצאת בקרבו. Emunah already exists within you.
Emunah If emunah didn't exist within me, then I can understand maybe like, "Okay, now you have to develop this thing called emunah." No, it's already in you. It's already in all of us.
ואינו צריך אלא להקיצה משנתה. All you got to do is stop hitting snooze and shake yourself up.
What was Matisyahu's song? Shake up Thank you.
גימטריא? Shake off the dust, arise, right?
התנערי מעפר קומי.
ולהסיר כיסויה, remove the blanket. Take the blanket off.
You know, we're going into the winter, so it's going to get cozier and cozier, right? Last year, the year before it was we had other things waking us up in the middle of the night.
חלילה, we should never have to have that. Let's if we wake if we take off the blanket when they're supposed to take come off, all of us together with such emunah sheleimah, our אויבים have nothing on us. We know this already.
That's the idea when it says Moshe's hands had emunah.
ויהי ידיו אמונה. Yeah, but how do your hands have emunah? Because it's action. It's not just up here, the hands are above the head.
נכון. Nachon.
ולהסיר כיסויה על ידי שיתבונן ויעמיק בענייני אמונה ושאר העצות. I mean, it's great that we have this for for for helping us, but start a chavrusa with someone in emunah.
Just start some Just don't don't think too much. Right now, like right after shiur, say, "Let's let's start learning half-hour a week emunah together." And the chevra that are learning online, find someone. Just right now. Why not? The best time is right now.
Tuesday night after 9:00 p.m. Maariv. Shaar HaBitachon. And for those who it doesn't work for them, cuz maybe it doesn't work for everybody, ממש משהו אחר. But whatever it is, ומאחר שהאמונה כבר נמצאת בקרבו בירושה, the the the inyan is telling us, remember, it's it's not something you have to you figure out how to get.
You already have it. You got it through a ירושה. You have emunah.
אין צריך לבסס אמונתו על ראיות והוכחות שכליות.
I feel bad for What was Aish's program? Discovery, right, because he's saying over here then you don't have to base it any you don't have to base your emunah on proofs.
ראיות והוכחות שכליות, huh? It shouldn't be an intellectual pursuit. I mean, the truth is that program, though, has actually transformed the lives of hundreds of thousands, but he's saying that He's saying there's a there's a there's a way to get That that should just strengthen that person that already has it, but to base it on proof, you're missing the point. We base it Sometimes you need to nachon, וזה לא וזה לא רע, but our thing is to base it on that which you already have.
Nachon, nachon, and still nachon, and go vayter. Proof negates emunah. It's true. It's true.
Once you have proof, it's knowledge, it's not It's not, yeah. The Kotzker Rebbe said, "I would never ever want to worship a God that I can understand." Nachon. But I do but I do agree that once it's there as as lev, then to then afterwards to build on that, I I think it's gevald. I would do it.
your own your own conclusions to get back to baseline of your of of your ירושה. Yeah. It also it all draws from chochmah. You can't take your mind out of it.
It's got to be part of it. Well, that's the thing. Does it draw from chochmah or not? No no, I but no, I'm talking about the these the the proof stuff. Yeah.
I mean, because I could prove I mean you could you could also disprove a lot of things if you really wanted to. So that's why it doesn't it only works to a certain extent. But the the point that he's drilling home here is that you already have it.
כבר יש לך את זה.
It came up in in the in the women's shiur on Thursday morning. We quoted Akiva. What was his song that he has? I forgot it then, I forget it now. About that that that that you have, huh?
יש בך הכל.
יש בך הכל.
יש בך הכל.
ומאחר שהאמונה כבר נמצאת בקרבו ירושה, יש בך הכל. You already you you got it as an inheritance.
And also like it's good for our anavah. You didn't do anything to get it. You just exist, you know. You come into this world, you didn't really do anything to get it.
So just mimela you tell me like, "Wow, this is amazing." But now the shaila is, "And what and what do I do with it now? Now that I have it." ומאחר שהאמונה כבר נמצאת בקרבו בירושה, אין צריך לבסס אמונתו על ראיות והוכחות שכליית, ואדרבה, יש באמונה כזה חסרון. Like we were saying before, this is actually problematic when it's proof based, ראיות based, כמו שכתב הבני יששכר. Besides Eli Goldsmith, who is the Bnei Yissaschar? Huh? Dinov, what was his name? Tzvi Elimelech. He was a talmid of That's already too much.
Talmid of the Chozeh of Lublin.
כמו שכתב הבני יששכר, שעיקר העבודה האמיתית לאיש הישראלי הוא להחזיק האמונה בקבלה, ולא על ידי חקירה, רצונו לומר, הוכחות וראיות.
כי האמונה בירושה עד אברהם אבינו, ובטבע היהודי ממילא. Like you could go prove or not prove, you're not going to get to the place that you already have.
וכיון שהאמונה מצד הקבלה הוא בירושה, הרי אין לאמונה זו סוף, כי בא מהאין סוף ברוך הוא.
אבל אמונה מצד חקירה אנושית, הנה בא מהאדם עצמו שהוא בעל סוף, על כן יוכל להיות חס וחלילה לאמונה זו סוף. Chazak. Who does he sound like over here in this paragraph? Which רבי does he sound like? It was very much from the Baal HaTanya.
It's all based on פרק י״ח in the Baal HaTanya. To me, this last piece sounded like Rabbi Nachman when he was warning warning us of staying away from from what do you call it?
חוקרים, yeah. He's saying philosophers' wisdom does not come from Ein Sof. It comes from סוף, meaning it comes from it's limited.
It comes from it's it's a structure. It has a beginning, and chalilah, he says if that's where you're going with your emunah, it may chalilah have an end. But when it comes from Ein Sof, like just חכמתו יתברך, this emunah never ends. It's not a thing that like now I've come to the conclusion, it's this infinite infinite infinite never-ending journey.
Ve'od nafka mina bottom, ועוד נפקא מינה מזה, שהאמונה כבר נמצאת בקרבו בטבע, what's another thing that we could learn out from the fact that you and I have something in us naturally that we did did we did nothing we did nothing to get, it just exists naturally, שאין להתבלבל מחמת ספקות באמונה, שהיצר הרע מכניס לפעמים בראש האדם. But we could just say, not I mean, he says this very easily. It sounds much more simple than than in practicality, but he says, אין להתבלבל, we don't get confused from ספקות in emunah that the yetzer hara puts into us sometimes.
ורק יסיח דעתו מהם.
What does hesech hada'at mean? Distract. Yeah, just distract yourself from it, כי אינם אמיתיים כלל, because they're not real, דהרי בפנימיותו הוא מאמין בשלימות. He's saying if you know that you have this thing called emunah sheleimah inside of you, then when a בלבול comes to you, when a confusion comes to you, and the and Kenny is right there again, then what can you do? Ignore it. Based on what? He's saying if you have emunah of philosophy and מחקרים, you can't ignore it because it's like a bar plugta.
It's like, oh, this is an actual voice that I have to listen to. But if I'm not coming from there, I look at you and I say, you're cute. You know? You're cute. Very cute, Shalom Aleichem.
Or צאתכם לשלום, I would say. Well, not לשלום, צאתכם לגיהנום, you know?
צאתכם לגיהנום.
וכמו שכתב b'Tanya, the last page, שכל אדם, this is the end of פרק כ"ט, כל אדם שנופלים לו במחשבתו ספקות על האמונה, remember this. Like if please we should all remember this.
Any person that thoughts of doubts on emunah come onto a person, הם דברי רוח הסטרא אחרא לבדה. Just call it out for what it is. This is סטרא אחרא המגביה עצמה על נפשו. For some reason, it got access to you, and it's overpowering you, but this is the sitra achra.
אבל ישראל עצמן הם מאמינים בני מאמינים, וגם הסטרא אחרא עצמה אין לה ספקות כלל באמונה. He's saying even the sitra achra I mean, this is mamash the mashal of the זונה that the Alter Rebbe also brings up. Who does the Sitra Achra work for? The Ribono Shel Olam. The Sitra Achra has total emunah.
So it's almost like saying like it would be a mind game to do this, but to start battling with the Sitra Achra and saying, "Oh my God, you're so strong. You're so persuasive. I wish I had emunah like you. I wish I had emunah like you in my shlichut in this world, you know?" And before you know it you need like really like tight a heightened sense of imagery and development of imagination for something like this before you know it, the Sitra Achra comes and gives you a hug and says, "My job is done.
My job is done. I'm out of here." Yeah, I mean, for now. Right, there's a Kenny funeral, and then there's a techiyat hametim, you know? Can I say? Can I say? You were two years old. And I was hired to perform in Acapulco for Chanukah, Shabbat Chanukah, motzaei Shabbat, 100 people, 100 Jews in Mexico.
And I started to play, and a Jew comes to me and says, "Please, can you sing אני מאמין?" זה לא היה בתוכנית, זה בסדר. And I start to sing, "אני מאמין." And I'm looking at this man, and he started to cry, and cry, and cry.
אני אומר אמת, please, אני לא מוסיף ולא גורע. I came to him after the performance, and I said, "ראיתי.
למה? Why you were crying?" And what he told me, he said, "I was one of 10 survivors in Buchenwald. And when the Americans, they came to לשחרר את המחנה, we stood up, and we sang אני מאמין." We are talking about emunah. And I looked at him, and I said, "I know you. You live in Manhattan?" I'm telling you the truth.
אני אומר לך, זה סיפור, כן? "Do you live in 86th Street?" He said, "Yes." "Do you go to Rabbi Besser shul in 84th Street, the shtibl? Rabbi..." "Chatzkel." "Chatzkel Besser?" "Yeah." "I am your neighbor." And he looks at me, and I realized that he is he survived this this Gehinom of Shoah, and he built up himself with Chocolate Barton. You remember Chocolate Barton? My zayde worked for Bartons. Yeah. He's also a survivor of Buchenwald.
But nothing else, only to sing אני מאמין באמונה שלימה. Mamash. It should be, Abba you should be mamash sorry, mamash. How could you do such a thing? Keep them coming.
It's, you see, the the these these stories, the truth is, sometimes sometimes they really depress us because it's like and we're kvetshing over, you know, like like what what what what's our bilbul, you know? What's our bilbul, yeah? What's his what was his bilbul versus our bilbul, but that's not a good thing to do either, because we're in a different world, everything's a different context of the world today that the Sitra Achra comes in different shapes and forms in every דור. But it definitely didn't beat him at all, didn't confuse him. Doesn't mean his life was good or anything, but it didn't it didn't touch him, it didn't touch that place. So just to end off the paragraph, third to bottom line, וגם הסטרא אחרא עצמה אין לה ספיקות כלל באמונה.
It's just that what?
רק שניתן לה רשות לבלבל את האדם בדברי שקר ומרמה. So why why did it get the permission to confuse us so much if it works for Hashem? Like why why?
כדי להרבות שכרו כשעומד נגדו. This is from the Tanya.
עד כאן דבריו הקדושים.
What does that mean? So you can earn it.
כדי להרבות, so I I learned this on two ways. One is, yeah, one is כדי להרבות שכרו, our sechar, that you know, that this, oh wow, we we we we accomplished this. But it also feels like so that the, and it's really because of the mashal of the of the prostitute that the Alter Rebbe brings in the earlier in the Tanya, that they get reward for the fulfilling of their shlichut, right? Well what does that mean fulfilling of their shlichut? That they tempted the person to to an extent, but that they were that somehow through that the person overcame their temptation, and then זה נהנה וזה נהנה.
Like the sechar goes to both of them because they fulfilled their shlichut properly. So in a weird way it's like the the the sitra achra has such a such a koach over us, but it wants to but it but it has emunah sheleimah as well that they're doing it's doing its job, whatever this means. It's a wacky thing to think about, but what whatever this means. So I think that what what what the strongest thing for us as a yesod of chasidut and and at this שלב is that there was a sign on the door to the entrance of the Beit Midrash of the Maggid of Mezeritch.
And על פי one of the עדות that I that I read is that it said on it, we're not here to give you something that you don't already have, or we're not here to teach you something you don't already know, משהו כזה. And all all that Beit Midrash was doing is making a Yid conscious and aware of what they already have. What we have is a ירושה. What's טבוע בנו בירושה, embedded in us.
So it changes me. If I know I already have this, I don't have to create it. It's not a yesh me'ayin, it's a yesh me'yesh. It's not a yesh me'ayin, it's not a how do they say it in? Ex nihilo.
It's not that. It's not that. It's if I if I know I already have it, so I just I I'm more I'm more encouraged to say yalla yalla, let's develop it, let's develop it, you know, let's develop it. And all of us have that.
Each and every one of us has this, and we have to believe this emunah sheleimah. We just got to spend more time talking about it.
דיבוק חברים, שיחות חברים, לימוד, all these things, they all amount to a place that we actually are proud inheritors, and we know what our inheritance is. And that's the greatest gift we can give on to our kinderlech be'ezrat Hashem.
Naftali.
רבי חנניא בן עקשיא אומר רצה הקדוש ברוך הוא לזכות את ישראל לפיכך הרבה להם תורה ומצות.