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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.
Welcome. Good evening, everybody. It is so incredible to be back here in our Muser Masterclass, the Muser Mondays. We are beginning a new journey together. Hashem should succeed our way.
We are beginning. which is a chapter of the book of the Chovetz al-Babos. And before we begin, I want to just inform everyone, all of our viewers online. Those of you watching or listening in a podcast or here in the classroom, we will be using this book from Art Scroll, and I'll happily send everyone a link.
I will put it inside our description so that everyone can follow along. We'll be going through the entire book, God willing, in good health, with success, with connection to Hashem, and it should be a great journey for all of us, a journey of tremendous, tremendous, Gross. Before we begin with the teachings of Rabbeinu Bachya Ibn Pekuda, who is the author of this book, this magnificent work, my grandfather actually says in his writings that this is one of the fundamental things that every Jew needs to know.
So hopefully together we will endeavor through this book and enjoy it.
that I would like to read together. In Sha'ar Bitochon, Chovas Halavavos discusses the fundamental concept of Bitochon in Hashem. That is, placing one's trust in Hashem and relying on His providential management of one's affairs. The term Bitochon is often translated as trust, like the gateway of trust.
However, Bitochon means more than mere trust or faith.
So we're going to see throughout the book, we're no longer going to be using bitachon as trust, but rather reliance. And I think it's a much better, more accurate definition of the word bitachon, completely reliant on Hashem. In fact, after studying the words of Chavos HaLavavos in this sha'ar, in this gateway, one realizes that there is no single English word that can fully capture the profound meaning of bitachon. In this work, we use both trust and reliance interchangeably as translations of bitachon.
These are the most convenient English terms, but in all cases, the reference is to a deep, profound level of trust and security, that manifests itself in relying on Hashem completely in every aspect of life. King David, Davod HaMelech, expresses this concept in the verse, Cast upon Hashem your burden, and He will sustain you. Okay, so you understand this idea that if you put yourself out there, you put yourself out there, put all of your needs on Hashem and He will sustain you.
So now it's important for us to discuss what is the difference between Emunah and Bittachon. We've discussed numerous times in a previous series that we did. I think it was a nine-week series that we did on Bittachon. We did the incredible teachings of Rabbi Laser Brody in his book Bittachon.
And over there, he gave a very interesting, very simple way for us to understand the difference between Emunah and Bittachon.
of Hashem, to know Hashem. But there's a step beyond knowledge of Hashem, which is now I rely on you completely, where I see myself completely dependent on you. So once I know that you're there, what Rabbi Brody says is that's the bachelor's degree. When you want to get to the master's, that's when you have to get to the level of bitachon.
But the very basic is we need to have emunah, which is faith, belief, knowledge, and bitachon, which is trust or reliance, related ideas. But emunah is conceptual, whereas bitachon is practical. A person with emunah knows in his mind and believes in his heart that Hashem can provide for all his needs, but has not necessarily applied that faith in actual practice. A person with bitachon, however, leads his life in accordance with the knowledge and belief that Hashem provides for him.
will not resort to desperate measures to save himself, nor will he take steps that are unbefitting him. Rather, he will deal with the situation in a way that reflects his conviction that only Hashem can help him, and any measures he takes toward resolving the crisis will be consistent with that attitude. The same applies with regard to the effort one invests in obtaining his income. In this chapter, in this shahar, in this gateway,
the person with Bitzchon will seek his income in ways that demonstrate his faith that he will ultimately receive no more and no less than Hashem has ordained for him. I was just having this conversation with my daughter. And she has her own little business that she started. She lives in Israel.
And we got into this conversation about, you know, what she does and how she does. And she said, you know, I have this competitor. I have this lady down the block who has the same exact business. She does.
And she says, and what's most frustrating is every marketing idea that I have, the next day
she does the same exact thing. It's like everything is like.
So I sat my daughter down and I said to her, listen to me very carefully. Hashem designated exactly how much income you will make this year. Your neighbor down the block, your competitor, quote competitor, is a competitor in your mind only. She will not take one penny away from you.
She won't make a dollar more than she's supposed to, and you won't make a dollar less than you are supposed to. You won't make a dollar more than you are supposed to, and she won't make a dollar less than she's supposed to. We need to instill this in our consciousness to know. You know, there's a great story that's told about a baker in Meir Shaarim.
near the old city of Jerusalem. He was the bakery and he hired this young guy and he taught him all the ropes and he worked by him for many years. And then finally one day this young guy says to his boss, he says, you know, I decided I'm going to open up my own bakery. And he leaves.
And where does he open up the bakery? Right across the street. So he takes him, the boss takes him, puts his hand over his shoulder, and he tells him, listen here, I want you to know exactly where you should buy your machinery from, where you should buy your flour from, where you should buy, and he's giving him all of his tips, all of his secrets. He's giving him all of the secrets.
So the... The family is, what in the world is wrong with you? Why in the world would you give your competitor, your competitor, you're giving him all of the advice, all of the wisdom, all of the things that your years of experience? Why would you do that?
Why would you give away all the secrets? And he explained to his family the same thing. What was designated by the Almighty at the beginning of the year on Rosh Hashanah will not change because of him. I won't make an extra dollar more and I won't lose a dollar.
Nothing will change because it's predestined by the Almighty. And if God wants you to have it, you'll get it. And if God does not want you to have it, you will not get it. When we live in that reality, when we live in that reality where we know that everything...
that is designated to us will come, and everything that is not designated to us will not come, we have nothing to worry about anymore. So what's the result? As we'll see in the opening words of the Chovas Alvavos, we're calm, we're relaxed, because we're not worried about it anymore. And this is the gift of what we are going to study together in the teaching of the Chovas Alvavos.
A person with a munah knows in his mind and believes with his heart that Hashem can provide for all his needs. but has not necessarily applied that faith in actual practice. A person with bitachon, however, leads his life in accordance with the knowledge and belief that Hashem provides for him. When facing a crisis, the person with true bitachon will not resort to desperate measures to save himself, nor will he take steps that are unbefitting him.
Rather, he will deal with the situation in a way that reflects his conviction that only Hashem can help him. And any measures he takes towards resolving the crisis will be consistent with that attitude. You got to know that Hashem will take care of it. I don't need to yell, kick and scream.
I don't need to fight. I don't need to be angry. Nobody's my competition. No one's taking anything away from me.
The same applies with regard to the effort one invests in obtaining his income. As Chovas Havavos explains in this shahar, the person with bitachon will seek his income in ways that demonstrate his faith that he will ultimately receive no more and no less than what Hashem has ordained for him. Ramban, in addressing the relationship between Amunah and bitachon, explains that bitachon, is an outgrowth of emunah. And emunah is like a tree.
And bitachon, reliance on Hashem, is like the fruit that the tree produces. Emunah can exist without bitachon. But bitachon cannot exist without emunah. Bitachon cannot exist without emunah.
For it is emunah that gives birth to bitachon. Now that I know Hashem, now I can put my reliance on Hashem. Recognizing and believing that Hashem controls all events enables one to actually rely on Hashem to fulfill one's needs, whether in moments of crisis or periods of tranquility. So having this clarity, having this knowledge is the key.
is the key. You want to live a calm life? You want to live a pleasant, what do you call menuchat ha-nefesh, equanimity, to just be calm and relaxed every day of your life? Put your reliance on Hashem.
I know that Hashem will take care of me exactly for what I need. Earlier in our class today, we discussed, we had a lengthy conversation about the contrast between needs, necessities, and luxuries. You see, the difference between a necessity and a luxury is what happens when you don't have them. If you don't have your Bentley, You can live life, but if you don't have bread and water, you can't.
That's the difference between a luxury. What happens if you take it away? You take it away, suddenly you see. And sometimes we get caught up in the luxuries of life, not realizing that we have all the necessities.
Hashem will always take care of all of our needs. Luxuries. That's what Hashem wants. He wants to give you a special hug, a special kiss. He'll throw you a luxury.
By the way, you know what the Talmud says in the blessing of Borei Nefashot Rabot in the intracted Brachot? You know what the Tosafot says? You know what a luxury is? Kigon Tapuchim.
Apples. Apples. That's a luxury. You don't need an apple.
You can live your entire life without an apple. But Hashem gives it to you. You know why? Because He loves you.
That's a demonstration of love from the Almighty. Where the Almighty gives us things we don't need. And we'll see shortly how much we need to be grateful. So I'm deeply honored that we'll be following the schedule of Hachzeik.
Hachzeik is a beautiful organization and they put together a schedule and we're going to hopefully follow their schedule. So we're going to begin now day number one in the journey through the Shara B'Tachon. And this is from the introduction of this fourth chapter, the fourth gateway known as Sha'ar B'Tachon.
This chapter focuses on the topic of reliance on Hashem alone. And this is the entrance, the introductory chapter to this. to this chapter. It's an introductory chapter to the chapter.
Chavez Havavus begins by explaining why he made Sharbetachon the fourth of the many chapters in his book. Amar Mechaber says the author, He says, since our previous discussion, chapter number three, discussed, which was focused on the obligation to accept upon oneself, to faithfully carry out the service of Hashem.
I saw it fit to follow it with a discussion of the thing that is more vital than anything else to a servant of Hashem. Blessed is he.
And that is reliance, bitachon, reliance on Hashem in all of one's affairs.
He says, bitachon, reliance on Hashem is vital to every servant of Hashem because it provides major benefits in regard to Torah, to spiritual matters. as well as with regards to worldly physical matters. Chovas Havovas proceeds to lay out in detail five spiritual benefits and five worldly benefits of Bittachon.
He says the benefits of Bittachon in a spiritual sense are as follows. He says the first spiritual benefit of Bittachon, he says the first,
Peace of mind. He says, the reliance that one has on Hashem should be like a servant that must rely on his master. Chavos Avavos explains that this attitude of complete reliance upon Hashem is required of one who is truly his servant. If you're a servant of Hashem, you need to be completely reliant on Hashem.
What does that mean to be reliant? What does it mean? It means, when we're talking about being reliant, it means that I myself can't provide any results. It comes not only with a recognition, but an actualization of that.
Where I don't try to push the deal, I rely on Hashem that He will close the deal. I know that on my own merit, I can't do it. If Hashem decided it's not going to happen, it's not going to happen. If you decide it isn't going to happen, I don't need to push.
So this is a very, very, very powerful thing that the Chovah Salvova says here. You see, we typically think that if I don't have trust in Hashem, so it's just a virtue that I'm lacking. Chovah Salvova says no. If you don't have trust in Hashem, you're putting your trust in something else. It's binary options you have here.
There's no alternative. We think like, okay, I won't have so much trust in Hashem. No, no, no. What are you putting your trust in? He says, A true servant of Hashem must rely on him in every respect.
Why? For if one does not place his entire trust in Hashem, he will inevitably place his trust in someone or something other than Hashem. And as such, he is unlike a servant who has complete reliance on his master. So you remember the story with Joseph. Joseph asked the guy, he says, by the way, when you go back to Pharaoh, don't forget me.
Say a nice word. Oh, he was punished two years for that. Two years. Why? Because he said two extra words.
Remember me. At Joseph's level, that was a lack of reliance on Hashem. And that's why he was punished for another two years in prison, as sages teach us. Two more years.
For what? Because if you're not relying on Hashem, you're relying on something else. What did he rely on? He relied on this, on this individual is going to go, the butler is going to go back to the king's palace, and he's going to give a good report about that Jewish guy in the prison dungeon.
Didn't put your reliance on Hashem.
We have to be very careful
criticizing, heaven forbid, our patriarch of our tribes, Joseph. And as such, he is unlike a servant who has complete reliance on his master.
Moreover, if someone places trust in any entity other than Hashem, Hashem withdraws his providence from upon him and leaves him to the hands of the one whom he placed his trust in. Oh, you want to trust your partner? You want to trust your boss? You want to trust your neighbor, your friend?
You want to put your life? You know what? You'll be in their hands. That's fine.
I'm out. It's a very terrible place to be. It is as if, it is that which is said in Jeremiah, two terrible things they did.
He says, committed two evils. What are the two evils? Number one, they have forsaken me. Who am I?
Hashem, the source of living waters to dig for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water. I can provide everything for them. They wanted to do it themselves. And secondly, they exchanged their glory for the likeness of the grass-eating ox.
What was that? That was the golden calf. That was the golden calf. Thus, if one fails to place his trust in Hashem alone, he becomes distant from Hashem.
Moreover, he becomes dependent on something unreliable. This is the tragedy. This is the tragedy of one who does not have proper bitachon. If someone does not have proper bitachon, then what they're doing is they're taking themselves out of the hand of Hashem.
And placing themselves into someone else's hands. To something else's hands. And they're taking away their opportunity to be carried in the hand of Hashem. What's safer?
To be in the hand of Hashem or to be in the hand of, oh, that manager who's going to give me the raise. Oh, that's it I care. And you know, we all know people who like, they get so carried away. I need to get that bonus.
I need to get that promotion. I have to do everything I can to kiss up to the HR person. to my boss, to my direct report. I need to be very...
Is that who's going to bring you success? If that's who you think, God says, you know what? It's fine. Go with them.
Let's see how that carries you. How much heartbreak have we all seen because people removed their reliance on Hashem and placed their reliance on men of flesh and blood? The preceding verses spell out the evil of trying to replace trust in Hashem with trust in some other entity. Chauvet Salvova cites additional verses which show that Hashem's providence provides special protection for those who place their trust in Him.
but is removed from those who place trust in others. But Amar HaKosov, as the verse states, we say this every single day. We say this verse, Blessed is the man who trusts in Hashem, then Hashem will be his security. You put your trust in Hashem.
Hashem says, I got you covered. I got you, no problem. I'll take care of you. I take care of you.
What else did it say?
Praiseworthy is the man who has made Hashem his trust and has not turned to the arrogant and to those who stray after falsehood. So what's going to inevitably happen? You see Hashem is totally kind. Hashem is totally giving.
Hashem is totally loving. You think your boss can match that? A human being of flesh and blood? You think they can match the love of Hashem?
You think that they don't have an agenda? You think that they don't have biases? Of course they do. All you need to be is the wrong time of the day, the wrong mood, the wrong request, the wrong moment, and you're gone.
Hashem is not like that. The verse states further, Accursed is the man who trusts in people and makes flesh and blood his strength and turns his heart away from Hashem. He will be like a lone tree in a desert and will not see when goodness comes.
By contrast, with regard to the blessed man who trusts in Hashem, the passage states, He will be like a tree planted near word of Ahoyot Ke'etz Shosolah Pal Gemoyim, Asher Piriyot Yitin B'Ito Ve'oleh Uloyibol Its foliage will always remain fresh, and it will not worry in a year of drought, and it will never stop producing fruit. This is such a fundamental principle. He's saying two important things here.
Number one. Number one. A person who relies on Hashem will have calmness. No worry.
No stress. No anxiety. Menuchas ha-nefesh is what you'll have. Equanimity. You'll be relaxed.
You know why? Nothing to worry about. Hashem has got me covered. Oh, you think Hashem will take care of everything?
You have to do something for yourself. I don't. Hashem will take care of everything. Indeed.
I once, I asked my rabbi whether or not, you know, we all know there's a concept of hishtadlut. Hishtadlut is putting forward an effort. At least send out your application. Make the phone call.
You know, I'll tell you something very interesting. I was listening to a class, a lecture from my rabbi, Rabbi Yitzhak Berkowitz, in which he said, that it's a sliding scale. If you have a 100%, 100% reliance on Hashem, you need to do 0% effort. If you have 90% trust in Hashem, you need to do 10% effort.
50% trust in Hashem, 50% effort. 40% trust in Hashem, 60% effort. Because what is the effort? The effort is me, me, me.
I'm relying on me. Reliance on Hashem means Hashem's got me covered. They say a story, one of the Hasidic masters, he spoke about this to his congregants, to his members. And he says, told us Hasidim, he says to them, the concept of trust in Hashem, reliance on Hashem, is that if someone relies on Hashem 100%, they don't need to leave the study hall.
They can sit and learn Torah and have nothing to fear. Amazing, right? So one of the Rebbe's followers took his donkey and sold a donkey. That was his livelihood.
He would schlep things for people. He would do all of these shipments, moving. He sold his donkey. He sat in the study hall and learned Torah.
That's it. And he had unbelievable blessing. He had unbelievable
blessing.
The story goes that his donkey that he sold was sold to a non-Jewish guy. who went and he was going, he would dig in for gems inside the mountain and his donkey, he would load up the donkey and he would go back to the city and then he would sell the gems that he found. And one time the stones fell on him when he was inside the cave in the mountain and he died. The donkey standing there, standing there, doesn't know what to do.
He knows how to go back to his master's house. He goes back to the original master. And there his donkey comes, filled with gold and silver, gems. So they go back to the Rebbe, other people, and they say, look, this guy it worked for, but for me it didn't work.
For me it didn't work. He said, did you sell your donkey? No, I had to have a backup plan. I can't be irresponsible.
He says, yeah, that's not trust. When you trust in Hashem, that means you sell the donkey. Done, I'm done. I have my complete reliance on Hashem.
A hundred percent reliance. Because if it's 90, if it's 90% reliance on Hashem, I still have to do the 10% effort. I got to fill in that with my own wasting time, so to speak. And you're like, okay, well, on a practical level, what's the likelihood that that's going to happen to me?
You have to understand that Hashem doesn't work the way we think He works. With like dollar for dollar, Hashem has His plans. He'll send it someplace else some other way. We all admit, right?
We all agree that there's no limit to Hashem's wealth, right? Hashem has enough for all of us. You think Hashem doesn't want to support us? You think Hashem wants us to miss out on our livelihood by serving Him?
Today there's plenty that a person can do in their livelihood without it costing them their religious life. You know, we're not forced to work on Shabbos. You know, my rabbi, may live and be well, Rabbi Berkowitz, said that when his father came from Europe, so Friday afternoon, he's about to leave work. He tells his boss, I'll see you on Sunday.
He says, what do you mean see me on Sunday? You're working here tomorrow. You don't come back on Sunday for a job. Of course you're working here.
He says, so why can't we work on Sunday? Sunday's a day off. Let's work on Sunday. He says, I'm not going to be able to get everybody to come on Sunday.
Sir Rabbi Berkowitz, his father of blessed memory, his father went around the floor of the factory. And they're all Altayiden. They're all Jews who came from Europe. He says to him, do you mind that we work on Sunday instead of on Shabbos?
They're like, oh, that would be amazing. Because they all gave up on Shabbos so that they can have a job. He went one after another, after another, after another. They closed the business for Shabbos.
And everybody came in on Sunday. He wasn't willing to give up on Shabbos for his livelihood. Today we don't even have that challenge. Today we don't have that challenge.
You can be completely reliant on Hashem. You're not going to lose
your job for not working on Shabbos. Any place.
We have such an easy world, such an easy life relative to the challenges they experienced way back when. So this concludes, my dear friends, day number one. in our journey through the Shara B'Tachon.
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