Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
This Jewish Inspiration Podcast is dedicated to learning, understanding and enhancing our relationship with Hashem by working on improving our G-d given soul traits and aspiring to reflect His holy name each and every day. The goal is for each listener to hear something inspirational with each episode that will enhance their life.
You're listening to Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe of TORCH in Houston, Texas. This is the Jewish Inspiration Podcast.
And now my dear friends, 197 This is the last one my dear friends. This is so exciting the last part of the book of the Treasure for Life edition of the Orchos Tzadikkim, the Gate of Fear of Heaven, page 1010 in the middle.
Softover, bottom line says the author, The phenomenon of creation and phenomena of the divine chariot are all intimated in miniature in man. HaKol Romuz ba 'adam e 'at meze 'er. Ve haYodeh haso dadover, and anybody who understands this, yav in eflos Hashem Yisrael. You understand that you are the entire world.
You'll understand a greater, you'll have a greater grasp of Hashem. Of his greatness, of his nifla 'os. Al kain, Nikro ha 'adam olam kat, and therefore man is called a small world. Va 'avur asher guf ha 'adam mitzuyar dugmas ha 'olam ha 'elyon, ve 'olam atachton, and just like man is a representative, a model of the upper and lower realms, L 'khein nitna bo ha 'nefesh shehi doma me 'at meze 'er libora.
This is therefore a person was created with a soul, a lofty, holy, great spiritual soul, which is a miniature of its creator.
Ve 'al kain omar david, ma ha 'nefesh mimalo asaguf, ve'soveles asaguf, u'mevale asaguf yechido ba 'guf, ve 'eino ocheles ba 'guf, roe ve 'eino nireis ve'tohoro hi ba 'guf, ve 'eino yesheinos, he says this is what was intimated by King David, just as the soul fills the body and bears the body and outlives the body and is unique in the body and does not eat in the body and sees without be seeing and is pure in the body and does not sleep, so too.
Kach, ha 'kadesh bor 'chum im 'alei solom, so too Hashem fills the universe as it is written.
Do I not fill heaven and earth, says Hashem, and he bears this universe, his universe, as it is written, I have made and I will carry and I will bear, and he outlives his universe, as it is written, they shall perish, but you shall endure, and he is unique in his universe, as it is written, here, O Israel, Hashem, our God, Hashem is one, and eating is foreign to him, as it says, will I eat the flesh of bulls or drink the blood of goats?
And he sees without be seeing, as it is written, they are the eyes of Hashem, which scan the entire earth, and Hashem can see, but is not seen, and Hashem is pure in his universe, as it is written, and Hashem does not sleep, the Keeper of Israel will not slumber or sleep.
Therefore, let the soul come, which possesses all of these attributes, and extol Hashem, who possesses all of the attributes. He will exalt Hashem, who possesses all of the attributes. The soul reflects upon its Creator, whereupon it clothes itself in humility and fear of the Blessed One. And it clothes itself with humility and fears the Blessed One.
Therefore, a person has to contemplate about himself and understand who he is. What is his root? Where does he come from? Who created him?
How he was created from a putrefied drop of sperm, molded into flesh, molded into flesh, inspired with a heavenly spirit, woven with bone and sinew, blood and marrow, clothed with skin and flesh, and invested with face and features, and uniqueness of that.
He must impress upon his consciousness that his nostrils are passages to the face and throat for smelling and breathing, that he has ears to hear with and eyes to see with, that there are many colors within the eye, and that he has eyelashes and a mouth and a throat and a palate and a tongue and lips to open and close and teeth and cheeks and armpits and legpits and body cavities and fingers and joints and nails, noting how each is different from the other, and how he is imprisoned nine months in his mother's womb and came out naked, lame, blind, deaf and limping.
And then what happens? A person should think of all of these and consider and say, Who gave you the ability for your mouth to open, your eyes to see, and your ears to be able to hear? And who perfected your body?
And who made you hear black when you were younger and white when you're older?
And even if you use any chemical, anything in the world, it won't make it black, any wash. And then it turns white when you get older.
He says that the more you think about this, the more humble you are, the lowlier you'll feel, and the more fear of heaven. Lowly doesn't mean that you will be in despair. On the contrary, you won't be in despair. You'll feel, wow, Hashem has invested in me so much.
You'll feel such a responsibility. You will feel a greater closeness to Hashem and a greater fear of responsibility that we have to fulfill the will of Hashem. And now, my dear friends, we conclude this magnificent study.
The end of all matter, all having been heard, fear G -d and keep His mitzvot, for this is the whole man. My dear friends, mazal tov, congratulations. I just want to share with you a word or two now that we concluded this incredible journey of study. We started all the way back in the beginning.
We started, we spoke about humility, haughtiness. We spoke about all of the characteristics that are more external. Shame. We discussed love.
We discussed arrogance. We discussed so many, so many hatred, mercy, cruelty, happiness, jealousy, worry. I mean, each one of these is really, really fascinating and things that are visible. But what the author here is concluding with is that we have to look internal, beyond the external, beyond seeing what's outside, beyond what we can recognize as the anger that we see, the jealousy that we see.
And we can even hide it from some. What's inside? What is inside? Esselo kim yirav es mitzvosav shemar?
Forget how you look. Do you fear G -d? Forget how people see you. Forget how you want people to see you.
Do I fear G -d? Do I have my relationship with G -d? Is my relationship with G -d where I want it to be, where G -d wants it to be? That's internal.
And a person has to invest. We have to, each of us, invest our entire lives in the service of G -d, in contemplating G -d, seeing G -d every single day. Understanding that we don't understand everything. Understanding what we do understand and take lessons and internalize them and make them part of our day -to -day life.
Not to be inspired and just walk away and say, oh, that was inspirational. How was your day? Right? No.
How it was inspirational, but how is that going to change me? He doesn't say, he says, Esselo kim yirav es mitzvosav shemar? Gizeko adam. He says, everything, at the end of the day, G -d knows everything.
So what do you need to do? Fear G -d. And what? Perform his mitzvahs.
There's an action. There's an action that we need to associate with it. Put it into action. So tonight is a very special night for me because tonight is my Hebrew birthday.
Thank you. And it's, I'll tell you that our sages tell us, why do we have a birthday? What's what, why, who cares? Who cares about a birthday?
Our sages tell us that a birthday is like a Rosh Hashanah for a person. G -d gives you your soul. G -d gives you life on this day. Why should G -d give you another day?
Why should G -d give you another year? Why should G -d give you more? Maybe you're not worthy. And this is why we try to celebrate and show the goodness, show the love, show the, all the things that we may have accomplished on our birthday.
What did we do this year? And hopefully make a commitment, make a resolution for another year of commitment and dedication to Hashem. That's what we need to be focused on, on our birthday. Today being my birthday, I want to give a blessing because our sages tell us that on the day of one's birthday, you have a tremendous powerful blessing.
So I want to give you all a blessing. And I know we're still live on Facebook and YouTube and Twitter. My dear friends join me. Okay.
It's a blessing for all of our friends at Torch, those who learn with us and those who are partners in what we do in investing, a small investment, it's just financial, the bigger investment is investing our being into the Torah that we learn is that Hashem should succeed our way in growing and connecting with Hashem to have a real relationship with G -d, not one which is superficial, not one which is external, one which is internal, like the things that we just discussed today to understand how our body functions and to realize that this is an entire universe that Hashem created within us, that we can recognize the awesomeness of the world that Hashem embedded within each and every one of us.
Oh, my hand is hurting. Oh, my head is hurting. Oh, I lost my job. We have all these complaints.
We have all these things. Or we can turn around and look and say, I'm the most blessed person on earth because Hashem invested in me today. Hashem gave me a day. I want to bless each and every one of you to have a year filled with good health, to have a year filled with happiness, true happiness.
Eizehu oshir hasomeyach b 'chalkoi. You want to be the wealthiest person in the world? Be happy with your shir. Happy means that you're satisfied with what you have.
Thanking Hashem constantly. We should have good health, good health. Hashem should bless all of us to have all of the amazing bounty that we desire so that we can serve Hashem. So that we continue to do good things.
And God willing, we should all merit each and every one of us to travel to Jerusalem and see Mashiach with our rebuilt temple. Amen. Now, whenever we finish a tractate, it's important for us to not just finish. You start the next one.
Whenever you finish a section of study, you don't stop there because it's not the end, it's the beginning of a new, the beginning of a new. So here's what we're going to do. My dear friends, here's what, here's what I want to do. I want to at least start Shara B'Tochon from the Chovah Salah Vavos.
Okay. I don't know that we'll learn it. I'm going to, I'm going to think over Pesach long and hard, but I'm just going to start the beginning of this book and then we'll make a Lachayim. It's written by Rabbeinu Bachia.
Rabbeinu Bachia, Ibn Pikuda, in the 11th century. Here we go. B'tochon aleh Elohim Yisboruch levado v 'zeh Pesach ashar. He says, this gate, this shahar, this gateway focuses on the topic of reliance on Hashem, blessed is He, alone.
Only reliance on Hashem. You have reliance on anything else, you're off. Reliance on Hashem. There's nothing more delicious in this world than forgetting about everybody else and just relying on Hashem.
I don't mean forgetting in responsibility. I mean, forgetting about reliance. Oh, I have that deal that needs to close. I have that person I know is going to help me out.
I have that banker that's going to loan me the money. No, no, no, no. Not anybody. Only on Hashem.
The greatest joy in the world comes from someone who is trusting in Hashem. That's the whole, the whole book that we're going to study, God willing, is going to be talking about B'tochon. My dear friends, mazal tov, mazal tov, we'll make a l 'chaim here. Baruch atah Adonai le 'henu melech haolam shehakol nihiyeh be'dvaro.
Amen. L 'chaim. L 'chaim, everybody. Wow.
Such a huge. My dear friends, what a joy. What a celebration. Thank you all so much.
I feel like it gives us a comfort level that things don't need to go our way. If we rely on Hashem, it goes Hashem's way. Because we're limited to how we, our purview of the world. This is the way it has to be.
Oh, I rely on Hashem. I don't care. You know, your child doesn't care when he's a baby. A little baby doesn't care what, where he goes.
He's not worried. The parents are worried. Oh, what's going to be? Are we going to catch the virus?
You know, I'm with my parents. I don't care. My parents are going to take care of me. Whatever happens, they're going to take care of me.
That's the way we need to be like little children in the arms of our parents. Of Hashem. We're in the hands of Hashem. We have nothing to worry about.
Hashem will take care of everything. He's got everything taken care of for us. He's going to worry that the deal goes through. He's going to worry that we get the job.
He's going to worry about everything that we're concerned about. The only problem is, is that we don't let go. Hashem says, I can't carry you if you're just still holding on to, you're still holding on to the tree. I can't carry you.
Just let go. And I, and I have you, I have you in my full embrace. Hashem takes care of us. He takes care of everything.
Hopefully, hopefully we'll, we'll be able to. This is, this is a very, very special, special thing. All right. My dear friends, I love you all so much.
Thank you. My dear friends, this has been an incredible journey. Thank you. I guarantee you, I cannot learn this myself.
So having all, all of you here with me, I hope I explain everything. Okay. I hope everything is understood. I hope it's enjoyable and I hope it's uplifting because I know it is for me.
Definitely. So even if it's just for me, I appreciate it, but I want it also to be beneficial for everyone else as well. So thank you, very, very much. And love you all very, very much.
Looking forward to learning much more together in the future. Thank you.
You've been listening to Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe on a podcast produced by TORCH, the Torah Outreach Resource Center of Houston. Please help sponsor an episode so we can continue to produce more quality Jewish content for our listeners around the globe. Please visit torchweb.org to donate and partner with us on this incredible endeavor.