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Rav Shlomo Katz explores important perspectives and practical insights into our mental health and well-being, based on the writings and teachings of some of our nation's greatest Tzaddikim.
Okay, we're on פרק כ"ו. Do you see, כ"א? Do you see it? I mean it's the second page. ל"א. ל"א.
Sorry, ל"א. ל"א, next page. ל"א. Is it there? Sorry, sorry, ל"א.
פרק ל"א. And this is the last thing we're going to be doing about using the, using the concept of עצבות, of sadness as a, as a tool. We began, this is already again for those who are just learning with us this time for, you know, this segment, that we've been talking about the role of sadness when someone does תשובה. And we saw how Rav Kook explained a certain thing about sadness, and he said the whole point of the sadness is to eventually restore man to his natural state.
What's a איד's natural state, whether we believe it or not? Like, what's our natural state? שמחה. And everything תשובה does is to, even the, even the pain you feel is only to get you to the, to the happiness that comes afterwards. And we saw how he defines sadness, we saw how Rebbe Nachman defines sadness and heartbrokenness. We saw how we've now been seeing how the Alter Rebbe defines it as well.
And today we're going to sum up the whole thing, בעזרת השם. So let's go right inside. This is תניא, פרק ל"א. והנה, אף אם כשיאריך הרבה להעמיק בענינים הנ"ל כשעה וחצי או שתים.
So even if spending a long time profoundly contemplating these matters, which we discussed above, this things that are heavy, weigh heavy on the heart. So how long does he say for? שעה או שתים, an hour or two hours. What did Rebbe Nachman say? How long? A second. More or less the same.
What did Rav Kook say? How long are you supposed to spend with this time? I don't think he even gave a time. Right? I don't think Rav Kook even said how long. But the Alter Rebbe is saying you spend an hour or two doing what? להיות בנמיכות רוח, to be in a low spirit, ולב נשבר. Again, he uses the word and comes to a heartbrokenness.
יבוא לידי עצבות גדולה. He'll come to profound sadness. But here the Alter Rebbe says very important word, two very important words. בוקר טוב.
Look, look back inside, חבר'ה. The Alter Rebbe says, יבוא לידי עצבות גדולה, a person will come to great and to profound sadness. But then he says, לא יחוש, which means what? בוקר טוב. What does לא יחוש mean? Danny, what does לא יחוש mean? Let yourself feel it.
Right? לא יחוש. Don't be scared. The Alter Rebbe is saying, no, you're going to feel sadness. Don't do what, now he's differing from Rebbe Nachman.
Because here he's saying we're not talking about heartbrokenness, we're actually talking about a certain level of sadness. לא יחוש, don't worry about it. Let yourself feel it. ואף שעצבות היא מצד קליפת נוגה ולא מצד הקדושה.
Even though the sadness comes from this bad place, ולא מצד הקדושה, and not from the holy side of things. כי בצד הקדושה כתיב, עוז וחדוה במקומו. When it comes to קדושה, it says עוז וחדוה, עוז and חדוה is happiness, שמחה, is in its place. וְאֵין הַשְּׁכִינָה שׁוֹרָה אֶלָּא מִתּוֹךְ שִׂמְחָה.
שכינה can only dwell in a place of שמחה. וכן לדבר הלכה. So too when it comes to learning, it has to be in a place of שמחה. By the way, there's a אברהם אריה טרוגמן, if you know Rabbi Trugman, called me this week.
He was looking for a מקור. He said he saw it in אבן שלמה on בראשית about a certain תורה about prophecy. I just remembered it right now. There's a crazy teaching.
It says that a person couldn't receive prophecy, he couldn't receive נבואה unless he was in a state of שמחה. Like a prophet would be on the street, he would prophesy. Is that how you say it? You'd prophesy? Prophesize. And even if he would, even if he would prophesize the most horrible things in the world, it couldn't come through him unless, first of all, you know, he had a, he had a band with him, kind of like the לעכאָוויטשער going to the מקווה ערב שבת, בעל עסקא.
רב וויינבערג said that story מוצאי שבת. That's how we start. Well, I had initially learned it from him, he said it that מוצאי שבת. That's how we started.
You were there. So, must be a sign. So, he was there on Shabbos. Oh, he was there.
So anyway, you, the prophets would be there. רב שלמה said it would be a whole band, they stand on the street corner and they would all be singing and then the prophecy would come out. Because you cannot receive a, you can't hear a בת קול משמים unless you're in a state of שמחה. Okay, so now listen to this.
רב שלמה says in the name of the ווארקער רבי, it says that אברהם אבינו took his son יצחק up to the עקדה and he was about to לשחוט אותו. But what happened to him? Why didn't he לשחוט אותו? What did he hear? Bless you, what did he hear? He heard a בת קול. Bless you. הראיה, this is proof that אברהם אבינו was able to do עקדת יצחק בשמחה.
Because if he wasn't בשמחה, he would have ended up killing his son. Because he wouldn't have heard the בת קול. Oh my gosh, that's wild. Because he had to be happy in a state of שמחה to hear that.
Oh my gosh. It doesn't make, there's, he couldn't hear the בת קול any other, you can't hear the בת קול any other way. I don't understand what that means at all. Like I still, like forget about.
It begs the שמחה question. What does שמחה really mean? Right. It's okay, we'll get there. We're pounding our heads with עצבות only in order to get to what, what does שמחה mean? Right.
Look at שמחה from another angle with עצבות. Right. It's all planned. Well, שמחה is a result of proper עצבות.
Is it עצבות or לב נשבר? Ah, so, so same thing. I, I would say that too until, until today's learning. It's going to really mess us up right now. ברוך השם, okay? Messed up again.
Because now, up until now everyone was feeling, we understood life and knew everything and now we're really going to get messed up, okay? Okay, now let's continue. אלא שאם העצבות היא ממילי דשמיא, but if a person's sadness comes from what's מילי דשמיא, heavenly matters, היא בחינת טוב שבנוגה. That's the good aspect of the נוגה of that, of that קליפה that could be either good or bad. That's a good thing.
You should have worries and sadness over your low state of spiritual consciousness. That should be a good thing. Like I always say, if at night you're really sad and it's because you feel like you're far from השם, you should feel so happy that that's what you care about. If that actually plays any kind of function in your life, you should be the happiest about that.
That should make you so happy. That's the אלטער רבי saying. Now, כמאמר, now, ולכן, now look at this, this is a little bit difficult, but this is געוואלד. ולכן, כתב האריז"ל.
The אריז"ל says, שפירוש דאגת עונות אינה ראויה כי אם בשעת הוידוי. The אריז"ל says, therefore, worrying over your עבירות, being sad over the, what the, the, the damage that your sins have done to you, it's suitable when? Only when, בשעת הוידוי. When, well, most of you haven't converted yet to נוסח ספרד but you will, and then you'll go like this, you know, go like this every single day, right? While you're going like this, or you're going down for תחנון, you're saying וידוי, that's what it's for. The אריז"ל says that's when you focus on it.
But לא בשעת התפילה ותלמוד תורה. But not while you're דאווענען, and not while you're learning תורה. Why? שצריך להיות בשמחה מצד הקדושה דוקא. You, you have, when, when you're learning and when you're דאווענען, you can't be busy worrying, oh my God, I'm such a schlubber.
Oh my God, I'm so low. Look what my עבירות did to me, I'm such a, he says that there's not. Why? Because תלמוד תורה and תפילה have got to be coming from a place of שמחה. A major minor תורה.
Yeah. That's the major minor תורה, yeah. Yeah. הלוואי.
הלוואי. הלוואי. אף על פי כן, nonetheless, the אלטער רבי says, הרי כך היא המידה, לאתכפיא לסיתרא אחרא במיניה ודוגמתא. He says the way to overcome the סיתרא אחרא is to use its own nature and example.
What does that mean? One more line. This is in honor of our holy brother Matis. כמאמר רז"ל, like our sages have stated, מיניה וביה אבא לשדיא ביה נרגא ופגע בו כיוצא בו. I'll explain that.
From the forest itself comes the handle of the ax, chopping him down, chopping him down. That's what it is. From the forest itself comes the handle. This is where it's from.
No, no, this is this is the אלטער רבי. Matis took it from the אלטער רבי. The אלטער רבי didn't take it from Matis. This is where it's from.
But let's, you ever wonder what the what that line meant? From the forest itself comes the handle for the of the ax. התבודדות? התבודדות. He goes forest, he goes רבי נחמן. Stick, stick Lubavitch for a little bit.
What does this mean that from the forest itself comes the handle for the ax? Chicken egg situation. ממש. Same thing. But what does it mean? How did he use it here? He says you're going to you're going to win over the sadness? Use its own weapons.
You're going to use sadness as a tool to come to to overcome sadness. It's a homeopathic remedy. It's from, exactly. Exactly.
That's only that sadness that's coming from that the the worry about feeling far from השם, for example. Ah, so that's where so now again, this is where we're crossing over. רבי נחמן said that this can only come when you check in and you say, what is it that's causing my sadness? If the sadness is that I feel far from you, bring it on. Bring it on.
That's the that's what I want to that's what I want to have. I don't want to be sad ever, but if that's the sadness I'm going to feel in this world, bring it on. Not sadness because I'm not holy, I wish I was holy, I wish I could, you know, I wish I didn't feel guilty. That's that's nice, but that's still not that's not the deepest depths yet.
But again, so what does it mean from the forest itself comes the handle for the ax? That like an ענין of of of שעפינג נאכעס. Like the tree can be chopped, oh. Like my brother can knock me down. Right, right, right, right, right.
כל הכבוד לך. I'm dying. I think it's the first time my my father saw that my brother and I got a gig that he that he normally got. One year.
We got from the forest itself. I think it's I think one year that happened that we got a call that he that he, oh my god, we've never... Don't talk to me. Right.
We're so proud of you. That'll all go into my account. That's that's one of... That's that's into my pocket, yeah.
So so basically the way we're learning it out is that is that when a person is sad and he seems to be depressed over it, so he's he's allowed, he's like allowed into the realm of the סיתרא אחרא and then he can he can attack it from within. Right? You're go you're attacking it from within. You say, okay. Okay, I'm going to go with that sadness, I'm going to go from inside it.
ועל זה נאמר, look back inside. This is an amazing concept, no? Yeah, it gives you tools and weapons to fight. It gives you נשק. Where's that from, זוהר or no? The no, the גמרא.
The גמרא in סנהדרין and then and then the גמרא in שבת. Yeah. It's a really, it's a really powerful con... I remember when he when I first listened to that track, I said these these words sound a little bit familiar.
I'm trying to figure out what, where is this concept from? Like, he did he write those? Those lyrics are really cool. Right? I was like, what? Did you guys know this from the תניא? No. You're suing for copyright now. Who has the rights to this? Who has the rights? We do.
ועל זה נאמר, and on this it's said, בכל עצב יהיה מותר. Remember we learned this before that in every sadness there is profit. Not that the sadness מצד עצמו is good, but there's a there's a benefit, there's a profit that comes from the result of letting yourself feel it. Yeah.
If you have the right sadness. נכון. נכון. This is all this this is exactly what he's saying.
He says you want to benefit... afterwards, know what kind of sadness we're speaking about. Correct. The other way, there's nothing to learn from.
וההיפך. People that sink into the other realm of sadness are stuck in there forever. It's not from the forest, there's nothing. You're in the forest, but there's no access, no nothing.
You're not doing anything.Okay. ויתרון. You see inside? ויתרון, the words ויתרון. ויתרון היא השמחה הבאה אחר העצב כדלקמן.
The profit that we're speaking about is the joy that follows the sadness like we'll see, כדלקמן. But now, Jerry, this is important, what you just said, אך באמת. אין לב נשבר ומרירות הנפש על ריחוקה מאור פני השם. He says, really, a broken heart and a bitter soul resulting from being רחוק from God והתלבשותה בסטרא אחרא, and even clothing itself in the other side, אין נקראים בשם עצבות כלל בלשון הקודש.
When it comes to לשון, the way we refer in Hebrew to sadness, this what we said before, לב נשבר and מרירות הנפש, the bitterness of the soul, and broken heart, they're not called עצבות at all. That's not עצבות. At all when we speak in Hebrew. That's not real עצבות.
That's on a certain level you could already sense the שמחה that's coming out of it. עצבות is something else. לב נשבר is not עצבות the Alter Rebbe is saying. Which brings us back to who? Does this sound like? רבי נחמן.
Because now he's saying again, stay away from, he's saying this is not עצבות. לב נשבר is something else. Being heartbroken is not, it's not sad. I saw Rebbe Shlomo say this week, he said anything, anything that means the most to you has to make you whole and break your heart at the same time.And he said that's what was the problem with the מרגלים is that they didn't, ארץ ישראל didn't break their heart.
He says that's why חורבן הבית, בית המקדש, he said we, it made us whole, but it stopped breaking our heart. We just felt complete. We always felt שלם with it, but it never, it didn't break us. לב נשבר is the, is the good breaking of the heart.
You know, with love, with your children. Your children make you whole and they also break, they break your heart. I don't know how to say it another. I don't want to start giving רש"יs on this because each of you feel it differently.
Everyone should be privileged to have children, healthy children. And you feel it differently. Each one of your children breaks your heart in a different way. I know with my girls, they each have their own way of making me feel שלם, like לנצח, complete, complete שלימות.
Complete, like whole, ממש whole. And on the other way, not that they, not that they drive me nuts, but that they break my heart. They touch a chord. They have a look in their eyes that makes me completely heartbroken.
Maybe it's that it's that the world isn't perfect yet. I'm not sure what it is. I'm not sure what it is, but it's definitely not sadness. The heartbreaking that children cause you is not sadness.
Now don't get me wrong. There are cases when children can cause you sadness as well. That's not what we're talking about. Not that any of us around this table know what that means.
But why are you laughing? But but you know.חיים's been breaking his parents. What are we talking about?That's what it is. That's what it is. Okay, back inside.
And now he's going to, so even though Alter Rebbe's used this word sadness, the bitterness is not really sadness. Look what he says now. This is awesome. Okay, so listen.
כי עצבות. Look, I want you to see these words inside, this is important. כי עצבות הוא שלבו מטומטם כאבן. He says, what's sadness? Sadness is when a person's heart is, what's מטומטם? We know it means stupid, but what is what does it come from? No, no, no, no.
It comes from the word אטום. אטום, which means, you guys weren't here in ninety, ninety-one for the Gulf War. Were you here already Menachem? Danny, you were here. Where'd you have to run to? חדר אטום.
חדר אטום. The sealed room. He's saying, you know what we do? We run to our sealed rooms. The heart is a sealed room.
You can get, oh after. כי עצבות היא שלבו מטומטם כאבן. Sadness happens when a person's heart is like sealed, dulled like a stone. ואין חיות בליבו.
There's no vitality in his heart. That's, that's עצבות. You know what that is? He's saying, that's sadness. Sadness is, you know what's depression? frank.
Depression is that not only can you not see a good tomorrow, you're not even looking for a good tomorrow. You don't even believe in a good tomorrow. You're in a sealed room. It's done.
There's nothing. Depression isn't, I'm trying so hard and I feel moments of שמחה and then I fall. There's no moments. There's no, forget moments of שמחה, there's no, there's no attempt.
There's no attempt for moments of שמחה, because everything, you're in a sealed room. ליבו מטומטם כאבן, like a stone. אבל מרירות ולב נשבר, but bitterness and a broken heart, אדרבה, on the contrary, הרי יש חיות בליבו להתפעל ולהתמרמר. When a person does experience bitterness of the heart, broken heart, on the contrary, you feel a lot.
It hurts. You're alive. You know tomorrow will be better, but right now, אבא! Right now you're screaming. Right now it kills.
Right now you're screaming. אבא! says that's not sadness, that's that's life. So again, what did he say right now? What's sadness? Sadness is the depression. Depression is when what? ליבו מטומטם כאבן.
When a heart is dulled like a, ממש like a stone cold. What does stone cold mean? Dead. Dead. That's what this, that's what ליבו מטומטם כאבן means.
Sealed. You see marriages, people can live for 20 years in a marriage that's מטומטם כאבן, that's sealed. Why don't they get divorced? No reason. Maybe just it'll cost a bit more or something, but the marriage is is מטומטם כאבן.
The marriage is completely אטום, completely stuck. Why even try to go to therapy? Why even try to make things better? There's no even, you don't even experience moments of a רצון to try to make things better. רק שהיא חיות מבחינת גבורת גבורות קדושות. Okay, look inside again, try to focus on the on the words.
רק שהיא חיות מבחינת גבורות קדושות. But this vitality, this חיות of a broken heart, where does it come from? It comes from גבורות קדושות, holy, holy גבורה. והשמחה, but and שמחה, מבחינת חסדים. שמחה comes from the חסד that's in the heart.
This is very important. Again, לב נשבר comes from גבורה that's in the heart. שמחה comes from חסד that's in the heart. כי הלב כלול משתיהם.
The heart is composed of both of these attributes. You want to, you want to get to know yourself? Yourself is made out of both sides, חסד and גבורה. עצבות doesn't fall under into the גבורה קדושה at all. עצבות falls into סתרא אחרא, darkness.
But the bitterness of the heart, the pain that you feel, which leads you to the שמחה that's going to come, it comes from the גבורה קדושה that's in the heart. We all know, the point of our lives is to live with תפארת, which is a combination of חסד and גבורה. חסד is the שמחה I have from always flying, being close to the רבונו של עולם. גבורה on the holy level comes from where? רבונו של עולם, thank you so much that tonight when I went to sleep, I was disgusted with all the dirtiness that my eyes saw today.
I'm so happy that it hurts me and I'm disgusted by it. Being able to thank the רבונו של עולם that that that that my that my soul is sensitive. I remember when one of the first times when I realized that it's okay to not be that guy that's able to be around in every, in every single circle. I was doing a concert in, where was it? Actually, better I shouldn't say.
I was doing a concert somewhere, and there was a backup band, not my band, that was, we did a whole שמחה together. And then after this, in between sets they feed the band in another room. So I went and I was eating with them, with the with the backup band, after we were singing ניגונים. יבנה המקדש, דוד מלך ישראל, סימן טוב מזל טוב.
I could act out a ניגון, שבת קודש. And when we were sitting, and then I realized, and I love the fact that these guys, you know, yeah, I have the beard, the פאות, but it's great, you know, relate to me. It's great. I love, I love the fact that I could always be like that.
And then I, and then the the, I hated though, that moment was that they went right into that dirty talk, talking about each girl they spotted in the women's dancing, what they look like, and who they'd want, and חס ושלום, who they, you know. you could just imagine where they went. So I stopped for a second and I said to myself, okay, right now, look, you're what do you want? You want to connect to everybody. You want to be the guy.
But wait a second, this is this is this is something you can't stand. It's burning your נשמה. It's ממש burning your נשמה. And I sat there for a few more minutes and I was like, they saw I was so uncomfortable but it didn't stop anyone's word.
So after a few minutes, I just I just walked up, not making a scene, and walked to the other side. And I was in such pain. I said, ריבונו של עולם, thank you so much for making me feel like like someone's pouring like poison acid into my heart. It was one, it was a moment, I ממש a very strong moment.
Like we have these moments where we're able to to to פשוט say, like, I mean, I guess the the the stage before that is to say, ריבונו של עולם, how come when people do talk dirty or act dirty or smell like they're up to something really bad, why doesn't that hurt me? You can imagine, like, let's go on the offense now. Say, like, start right now, תשובה might be, ריבונו של עולם, please, I want to feel pain. Not pain like I want to be sad. I want to feel the bitterness of a broken heart that feels far from you, please.
And I guess that's what it that's what last last week's שיעור that I posted about about in בהעלותך of cracking open a heart of stone is the same thing. Like the like the that's that's what we say about they were asking for בשר. As Rav Shlomo says, they weren't asking for meat. They were asking for a heart of flesh, לב בשר.
Which is why Rebbe Nachman said he wants his חסידים to be known as Breslovers that have לב בשר, the letters Breslov. They want hearts of flesh as opposed to לב אבן, hearts of stone. So it's the same thing over here. I think to go on the offense for a second is to be to be able to have enough guts to say, ריבונו של עולם, please, I want, I I know I'm I'm in this world.
I grew up in a modern world. All of us live in a modern world. It has its pros and its cons just like every every other world. I'm going to be around שמוץ.
I'm asking you already right now, ריבונו של עולם, when I'm around it, please let it burn. I want it to burn in me. I I want it to burn so much that I can't stand it. When someone's cheating, when someone's dishonest, when someone even in the name of the Torah makes יידין look stupid, let it burn, let it hurt me.
A few years ago, there was a big רב who today is unfortunately even bigger. Two days before תשעה באב, he said that all Jews that have כיפות סרוגות are like עמלק. And he proved it. Because it says כי יד על כס יה.
That עמלק, כס is the chair of Hashem and עמלק covers over the כס, the chair of Hashem. כס, he said, is ראשי תיבות כיפות סרוגות. That was two days before תשעה באב. He's one of the biggest רבנים in Israel today.
I want that to, I want to be sad over that. I want to be sad over that. I I want to I want to cry, I want to be a נשמה that is in such pain over that and disgust. I want to feel that pain.
If my לב is מטומטם כאבן, if my heart is stone cold, things like that happen, they don't even bother me. השם ישמור. It should kill me. So both when people speak in the name of Hashem and make God seem like the most pathetic loser, חלילה וחס, both when that happens, and also when I'm around people that are פשוט disgusting, when the language is disgusting, when the energy is disgusting, I'm asking you, Hashem, please, let it hurt me.
That's the לב נשבר that we're that we want. That's not sadness that we don't want. That's the לב נשבר that we want. Okay.
Okay, a few more lines. והנה לעיתים, so at times, so you see the words והנה לעיתים? Very convincing answer. חבר, do you see the words, yeah? והנה לעיתים. And therefore there are times, צריך ל… this sounds very Rebbe Nachman here.
צריך לעורר בחינת גבורות הקדושות. At a times a person must arouse the attribute of holy גבורה. Why? כדי Jerry, what are the next two words? להמתיק הדינים. In order to sweeten the judgments.
What does what does it mean המתקת הדינים? We always say that concept. What does that mean? Huh? What does that mean? What does that mean to sweeten judgments? Meaning, it's judgments happening. It's there. Are you sweetening it? sweetening it or not? What's judgment? I guess that the judgment is גבורה, right? Now the question is where's your גבורה? Where is it showing up in your life? Where is it coming from? Depression? or or לב נשבר.
The forest feels talks about this and made a huge impact on me that you have to thank הקדוש ברוך הוא for the things that are hard and and you seems bad to you like you would thank him for the good. Same, this is ממש. He says that's what it brings out. It's the same thing.
Over here it's the same thing. שהם בחינת נפש הבהמית. but now he goes right back to the He says, I'll give you some Uman, bringing it right back to the Lubavitch לשם. שהם בחינת נפש הבהמית.
That's the נפש הבהמית. That's the animalistic soul. ויצר הרע and the יצר הרע כששולט חס ושלום על האדם. When it controls you.
By the way, do you ever feel that your יצר הרע absolutely owns you? owns you. Never. I've me neither, so I don't know what, you know. Is there anyone else that ever felt controlled by the יצר הרע? Not in this room, right? But if there was one Jew that ever felt that the יצר הרע controls him, maybe he could help us understand.
Try to pretend what it's like. He says, this is when, when the יצר הרע is ממש like you're on its leash. You're ממש on its leash. There's nothing.
You turn your head this way, it says, no. כששולט חס ושלום על האדם. כי אין, now again this is רב נחמן, כי אין הדינים נמתקין אלא בשורשן. Judgment is only sweetened in its root, in its source.
Back to Matis. From the forest itself comes the handle for the axe. How are you going to sweeten judgments? How are you going to sweeten judgments? By using its own remedy, by using its own thing. Don't try to run away from feeling pain.
Pain is inevitable, like Yossi said before. We're in גבורות are happening. It's inevitable. It's going to happen.
The question is, like just like the axe of the handle, just like the handle of the axe comes from the forest itself, so a person's fight against evil also has to come from within. We're asking for him to allow that we should be able to handle it. It's going to be there. And how do you handle it? through גבורה.
How do you handle it? Yeah, very good. And and how do very good. And how do you handle it? He's saying not by using שמחה. This is why it's not like ננח jumping on vans and you'll you'll you'll fight the war.
Here he's saying, no, use the aspect of sadness and monitor it, get in get in touch with it, and you can and then you can from within turn it back, turn it away. and and sweeten this גבורה in its source. There's definitely attaining different levels of this. You know, like when something really horrible happens, חס ושלום it happens.
Unfortunately in the area around here. You know, when those kind of things happen, it's very hard to to to separate the depression part of it and the It's very hard. and the Very hard. On a national level, I felt like That's where we were last year after the three boys.
I think that we were so swimming between an an ocean of pain over such anger and depression even, but also, how can I still talk to you השם after this? Right. Right. Right. The צדיקים are only busy with, how can I still talk to you השם after this? You know, with the three boys at the מרכז, and all their friends were sitting around singing.
I don't know if you Sure, sure. And I know personally, I felt like I never wanted to leave. I didn't want to disconnect from them because their sadness, what was going on with crying, they were singing בשמחה. I mean, together.
And and it was a uh Their רב even I mean their רב, their ראש ישיבה, רב זינגר, he encouraged not the depression of it, but he totally encouraged the the the feeling, you know, the Like I have to tell you, I was so turned off in high school. So turned off when when the buses started exploding when what what כיתה were we in? Like ח', ט'? Like ninth, ninth, tenth grade. Buses started exploding. Before the smart Huh? I've just passed by דיזנגוף סנטר a few weeks ago and I said, I remember פורים דיזנגוף סנטר when the מחבל blew himself up on the ממש ערב פורים.
I don't think any of you, were you here Avi? This is ninety-six. Ninety-five, ninety-six. ערב פורים, ninety-five. Blew himself up.
I remember we went that night, I read קריאת מגילה on the on the walkway where he blew himself up because here they clean up the act like 30 seconds after the bomb, right? There's good and there's a lot of bad with that. That's all I hold. There's great showing you guys are going to mess with our day, not a chance, but there's a problem. That we're like so involved in the moving on that we feel like we could afford to keep on getting hit because it's okay, we know how to move on.
You know, it's a very big problem.So what was what was I so turned off? Because I didn't have that experience that you just described. Because in ישיבה, when the when a bomb would go off, they rushed us all to the בית מדרש. No one talked to us about anything that we're allowed to feel about השם, but everyone had to say תהילים right now for the פצועים. And then go back and learn because that's what that's what we need.
They need our they need our our our blood in גמרא. We're 14, 15 year old kids. Sit there like this. Sixty, seventy percent of my friends became לבם מטומטמים כאבן.
Their hearts became אטום, sealed. To definitely to things of קדושה. I don't blame one of 70% of my friends have nothing to do with שבת. I would if it wasn't for Reb Shlomo, I would have been much worse than them.
Much worse than them.There has to be an outlet for the sadness. The channeling of the sadness is is what this chapter is all about. Yeah. Just the wording.
Yeah. Going back, להמתיק הדינים. And then what's this connection? שהם מבחינת נפש הבהמית ביצר הרע, which? What's he referring to, שהם?The דינים. The דינים are? The דינים are a נפש הבהמית.
The דינים, the judgments that aren't coming from holiness are an aspect of the נפש הבהמית. Again. So what are the דינים? So the נפש הבהמית is the קליפת נוגה. It goes either way.
But where and the דינים where do they fit in? Where do they come from? The נפש הבהמית, מקליפת נוגה. So that's what he's describing. The דינים are actually the נפש הבהמית. That's exactly his words.
And נוגה contains That's exactly his words. why would you be להמתיק הדינים? That that's the job of this world. To sweeten because נפש הבהמית is either way. To embrace it.
So embrace and make it the positive side. To deposit it in the right place. How do you deposit it in the right place? By sweetening it in its source.But but to be honest, for this chapter, for this פרק to really, really resonate deeper in us, this is like classic Lubavitch terminology that we we're going to start in אלול בעזרת השם, learning Tanya from the beginning. And we're going to see how these things won't seem too far out.
They're going to be much more these concepts will be much more grounded. We'll understand them much better. And you you grew up with this לשון. You're more you know this a bit more, but even if you grew up with it, you have to still חזר all the time and But it's not learned the same way.
נוגה, just to clarify this, נוגה contains קדושה. I mean it says this here. נכון. And the opposite of קדושה.
I mean. And all we're doing here, ברוך, is sweetening the judgment in its מקור, meaning that you exactly, it has both, both sides. And all we're doing here is attaching ourselves to the good side of it. Part of our personality.
There's nothing you can do about it. No, we always want to sweeten the deal. It's just the way we are. What are you saying in reality? This is not עצבות.
At the end of the day, that's not, nothing related to this has to do with עצבות. Right, but no, what's what what's that what where where does עצבות Where does where can sadness happen in this whole process? Only when you're not dealing with the process. Right. If you're in the process there's no עצבות.
In the process there's no עצבות. This this this is the whatever five step program to avoid עצבות, really. Or to transform עצבות. This is the happiness, this is like the happiness that comes as a profit of the sadness.
But he's redefining עצבות now. Totally. He did. That's why עצבות is no longer part of the dictionary.
When you're when you're in the journey, there's no עצבות. There's no עצבות. When you're in work, when you're in motion, there's no עצבות. Right, he changed, that's that's the whole key to that.
נכון. He's changed it where עצבות in our mind isn't the עצבות Right. The language is important. You're spending all his time with עצבות and you'll love with the language, you'll love the Tanya because he's it's very it's hard but it's very clear on a language level.
Very, it's very קצר. I told you I had a hard time. I know. Well, you'll start at level five in אולפן and we'll go to level six.
Take out the other one. Okay, just, you know what? Okay, let's stop here because we can we can go on and on and on. This keeps on going. He basically, I'll just share with you because and we'll see this inside when we learn תניא בעזרת השם in a different time.
But what he says here is that he, what we just described was the process that עם ישראל went through through יציאת מצרים. In מצרים, as a slave doesn't have the luxury to transform עצבות into לב נשבר. A free person has has the capability to allow himself to be in the journey. And when you're in the journey, like we just said right now, there is no pain.
So that's why, why do we mention every single day זכר ליציאת מצרים? Everything is because we're still in it. We're still in it. That's the, such an amazing thing. That's what the Alter Rebbe explains our lives.
What he just described right now was ממש התהליך of יציאת מצרים. Why does it say that if we would have stayed a bit more in Egypt, it would have been the end? Because it would have been a sealed deal of of a sealed heart that is incapable of feeling anything. So at the last second, it was such רחמנות, and then the gates of feeling and being part of a journey opened, which got us out of מצרים, and it continues to get us out of מצרים every single day. It's one of the reasons why קידוש, you know, זכר ליציאת מצרים, we just said it right now in פרשה of ציצית, right? And we've said it every single מעריב, המעביר בניו בין גזרי ים סוף, everything is always reminding us about leaving מצרים all the time.
Why? Because we're constantly trying to really leave the the מצרים, the narrowness. מצרים means narrow. The narrowness of of our emotions. We want it to all, we want to always make it that we're really stop being slaves.
And it's amazing like, what are you talking about מצרים again? We just went through פסח, we went through ספירה, we went through תורה. Like we said, like we said this year in ניסן, if we really learned right what פסח was all about, then we wouldn't have to celebrate פסח again because we would, why are we celebrating leaving something that we're already out of? That's the goal, right? Why would we celebrate something that we're, you know. Because we're not out of it yet. You are.
Everyone else isn't though. No, we're not out of it yet. And I think our... What's that? I mean there's no getting out of it.
We're still in the desert. According to this... Exactly. Right.
So according to the Alter Rebbe, exactly. According to the Alter Rebbe, it, there is no getting out of it, but that's the מותר, that's like the... Since there's no getting out of it, that's the process. You're constantly going back to that.
Right. So if you're gonna, if you're gonna connect the two, then ultimately without the נפש בהמית, you can't have שמחה. But really without the עצבות or whatever you want to, we used to call it. What we used to call it.
Right, right, right, right. Anyway, we should, we should be blessed. We should be blessed to have enough guts to leave this שיעור right now and ask השם today at a certain point, please let my heart burn when I'm around things that are bad for me. Please.
Please. Please. And let me then not fall into the trap of depression with it. Let me know how to then embrace it so that the שמחה that's waiting for me just, you know, is right there in front of me, בעזרת השם.
Yesterday I saw they're fighting this cable car initiative, you know, to bring a cable car to... It sounds like they're gonna take a cable car from like the הר ציון... הר ציון up to, to שער האשפות. Right.
To שער האשפות. And the, some of the חרדי elements are fighting it. And one of the things I read was that they're fighting it because that's going to bring Jews from the פריצות side of ירושלים to the כותל. And of course, I read it and I was like, I laughed.
And then I came, it hit me like in שחרית, מנחה or מעריב or something. It was like, wait, they have a point. Like why wasn't I more upset by that? Which one is the פריצות side? That is the most... Right.
Which one is it? Why wasn't I, why wasn't I upset by that? Like, you know what you're saying. Right. Like I read it, I'm like, these guys are out of control, but like I didn't get upset. There is a point of trying not to, and it's hard to live if you're constantly upset by these things.
Do you know what's so sad? That line, the cable line? You know that's how they used to smuggle in food? At that same line, when there was a מצור on the old city. It's still existing there now? Yes, is it still there? You can still see it. It's still there, right? It's on the ground. It goes from הר ציון hotel...
It's still there... to the, they pull it over every year. They do? They have the card... They want to make it cable...
It's from the Cinematheque to the, to the church.