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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.
00:01 - Intro (Announcement)
From the TORCH studio in Houston, Texas, featuring leaders and personalities from Jewish communities around the globe. This is the Sunday Special Edition of the Jewish Inspiration Podcast with Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe.
00:22 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Welcome back, my dear friends, to a very special edition of the Jewish Inspiration Podcast, our Sunday special. We have today a magnificent guest, a dear friend and a mentor, Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Rabbi Wogi) as he's known now in living in Israel, in living in Israel, and I hope that we will be able to learn about and from Rabbi Wohlgelernter and learn from his incredible life story as much as we can, hopefully. So, Rabbi Wohlgelernter, welcome to the Sunday special of the Jewish Inspiration Podcast.
00:59 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Thank you very much. It's amazing to be here.
01:02 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
It's really an honor and a privilege. You're here now in Torchwood. It's not the Torch Center at the moment, as we're making this a brief transition, so can you tell us a little bit about where you grew up, your life story and where do you currently live?
01:23 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Sure, I grew up in Long Island I actually was born in Crown Heights and then we moved out to the island and went to a day school on the island and a Kowei day school, I guess I can say that Went to a Kowei day school and then after high school I was supposed to go away to Yeshiva and Eretz Yisrael, which wasn't a thing in those days. Now it's in all the Jewish day schools, it's a thing. The majority of percentage of kids go, and I was supposed to go to Eretz Yisrael three days before I chickened out. I just couldn't imagine being away from my parents for such a long period of time there and being away from my parents for such a long period of time, there was no such thing as coming home for Sukkot or for Pesach. You know, you went, you went and you went for a good part of the year.
02:10 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
You were lucky if you came back two years later.
02:11 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Yeah, absolutely correct. So I chickened out and decided nothing else. My father said he had learned to know your soul back in the day, and he said that maybe you're going tohru Sol, because I couldn't get into Wayu at that point and Nehru Sol was where in Baltimore in.
02:27
Baltimore. That's right, and the dream was, of course, to get me to Yeshiva University, and I went for a year to Baltimore and that turned into six and then I went to after I graduated college through the Yeshiva in Baltimore. I went to after I graduated college through the yeshiva in Baltimore. I went to Johns Hopkins and then I decided to go to Eretz, yisrael, to learn, and I went to what was then a small yeshiva, what became a larger yeshiva and a very important yeshiva in the sense that it produced a lot of today's leadership in Torah teaching. It produced that leadership in an incredible way. We studied under many which yeshiva is that it's called Mishkan HaTorah. It was a break off of Itri Yerushalayim.
03:13 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Split tree.
03:13 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
So they called it split tree.
03:14 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
We actually had Rabbi Mordechai Becher on the Sunday special.
03:18 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
So he did that. That was our chabura and we studied with Rav Moshe Shapiro. And the names that came out of that yeshiva are just incredible, he being one of the premier ones, but there are many, many others In the chinuch in Israel, in education in Israel, in the educational system, in the American yeshivas, in Eretz Yisrael a lot of the current names. So I was there, I was learning and I got married and was there for my life.
03:51 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
You got married in Israel.
03:52 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
I got married to an American girl from Vermont, burlington, vermont, and we came back to America to get married. We met in Eretz Yisrael. We came back to America to get married and then we moved back to Eretz Yisrael made Aliy married. We met in Herzl. We came back to America to get married and then we went. We moved back to Herzl, made Aliyah. We were lifers. It was part of the agreement was that we were going to stay in Israel for the rest of our lives, and I was into it. I had started already a master's in counseling, but I decided living in Israel was much more important and I let that go. And then we got sent for a summer to Australia and that's what did me in. So we went for the summer, we stayed for a couple of years and once I was out, so then there were people from Israel that had encouraged me and sent me really to Australia that decided that I needed to be in America. No, no discussion about how long.
04:47 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Rabbi Becher mentioned, and he blamed you for his career in Jewish outreach because you invited him and told him he has to come down to Australia.
04:55 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
That's right, I'm happy to take the blame. So we ended up, I ended up actually, when we left here. We went to Israel and I had a job lined up working in a yeshiva. We ended up. We ended up. I ended up actually, when we left here. We went there to Israel. We went to Israel and I had a job lined up working in a yeshiva, like perfect. And then when I got there, the rabbi said to me this is not where you belong and he pushed me to go to America. He was for a Shabbos in San Diego, happened to have been in a house where somebody from the north part of the city happened to have been there for Shabbos and he was saying how much he wants to start a shul. Those days they were studying with a Yitzchak prisoner and he was a very beautiful work on tefillah and he used to come down once a week, once a month, to San Diego.
05:44
So they asked him not to come down once a week, once a month to San Diego. So they asked him not to come down one month and he said why? They said because we're bringing in a guy from Israel and that'll be his tryout. And he looked into me, wanted to make sure it was okay for him not to give his class, and the rest is history.
06:03 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
He gave his blessing.
06:04 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
He gave his blessing. He gave his blessing and that group turned into. I mean, I could keep you for hours telling you the story of how that thing started I'd love to hear it.
06:12 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
I love to hear the world of it was incredible I'm now.
06:15
I'm now in my 20th year here in houston, so I have an unbelievable appreciation for your work and your everything you built in san diego. I would love to hear it. I don't know if the audience I think they would. I think they'd be very intrigued. I'll do it quick, okay, I'm sure it's like you know, to me I think the most incredible accomplishment in life is change and for someone to make a change. I just sat with someone for over two and a half hours and talking about change, of a little like a minuscule change, I said you're a giant To make a change, who made a change in their life. Mamish had changed a real, considerable change in their life. People change. They go from non-kosher lifestyle to kosher. It's an unbelievable thing Going from non-Shabbos to Shabbos, going from non-Jewish to Jewish, going from you name it in every area. It's remarkable. So the change that you've influenced in people is just to me it's breathtaking. I think our listeners will appreciate hearing the tales, tales, the challenges, the sweat and the tears.
07:25 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
So it started early because they put they had a list of people that they showed me when I was there, of people that would potentially theoretically be interested in getting involved in a new synagogue. Nobody was Orthodox, nobody was religious and nobody was a part of an Orthodox synagogue. It was all conservative, reform or secular that were coming to these classes and so fine. So I had paperwork that I had to do because I was living in Australia and Israel and I had to work all kinds of things. So it took a few months to get us all organized.
08:03 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
You were hired right away.
08:04 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
I was hired right away.
08:06 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
So you came for the interview and stayed.
08:08 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Came for the interview. I had to go back to Israel and I had to close up there. I had to do a few things and then January, we moved. In January 3rd or 4th we moved to San Diego. Now we had nothing, there was no community yet there was nothing. I hadn't even spoken to people and approached them, you know. So we came, I was going to work part-time in the san diego hebrew day school, um, and then part-time in the shul. No such thing as a part-time, but okay. But. But that was. That was what the plan was. We get to san diego, I land in san diego, I was supposed to be picked up by this one person who wanted to start the shul and I get into the air. He's not there. And then one of the rabbis from the day school comes running and he comes to me, Shalom Aleichem. He greets me and he says you know, I understand, you're the new rabbi in Lehoia.
09:01
He says your balabas your main man is no longer your main man. I can't tell you what went on, it's not important, but he was discouraged in a very real way of not being involved. It was seen as competition to certain things. So they asked him not to be involved and he wasn't involved.
09:24
This fellow turned to me and he gave me this rabbi, gave me, um, a envelope, a manila envelope, with the names of all the people that might potentially along pages and pages and pages of names and telephone numbers of people that would theoretically be interested in starting this congregation. I felt like it was mission impossible, mr phelps, if you take this mission. And uh, and that was what I had, that's how I started. So the day school told me don't come in for two weeks, go do what you gotta do, set yourself up, and then you'll start in two weeks time. So I went around and I called people, called from this list would you be interested? Let's get together. I went around and I met, and I met people and I put together six families that were interested in starting an Orthodox synagogue, and met, and I met people and I put together six families that were interested in starting an Orthodox synagogue.
10:08 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Did it ever occur to you like how are you going to support your family?
10:12 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Well, this is an incredible thing Wolfson was doing. Started six or seven shuls around the country that were Kirov orientated. It was really like one of his first projects like this on that skill, that's right. And we were one of them, so he was giving us, he was paying for half the salary.
10:35 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Right. So for those of you who don't know Zev Wolfson, who was a magnificent philanthropist, I had the privilege of meeting him multiple times and he was very, very passionate about Jewish outreach and put his money where his mouth was and challenged many, many outreach rabbis and professionals around the world. I know I was one of those many years later, in 2004, where he invested a tremendous amount in building Houston. I know because I know what he gave to Houston, not only to Torch, but to the day schools here and to the shuls here. It's unbelievable. So you're one of those incredible awardees.
11:18 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
There were six or seven of us. Only two lasted Wow Irvine, the synagogue, the Orthodox synagogue in Irvine, california, and us, and it was just an incredible thing. We'll tell you what the amounts were In those days a full salary. This goes back close to 40 years. $30,000. That's what we're talking about and it was a lot of money. So I knew where. I knew at least for a year, I'd be taken care of and I was teaching in the day school, part-time, and I loved teaching. It was fine. My kids were little. I didn't have to worry about their education. I didn't have to worry about the fact that there were no Orthodox people. There was no. Nobody did anything. I didn't have to worry about that.
12:02 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
You were on an island.
12:03 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
My kids were little. My oldest kid was three at the time. You know, yakov was three, so I didn't have to worry. So we put together this group. I remember in those days I had to go to meet people in all different kinds of places. One of the premier guys who ended up really really building the place was a fellow who's a jazz musician. So on one night I had to go to a jazz club and after his performance, so then he and I sat and schmoozed and we put together this group of six and people were saying to me like when are you going to start this shul? And I said February 20th. And this was like January, middle of January. I feel like there's so much groundwork that has to be done, there's so many things that have to be. I said, whatever, we're starting.
12:52
We started the first Shabbos we had 70, first Friday night we had 70 people. Wow, but that was because people came from all over the place. They heard a new synagogue. A lot of South Africans came because they were an Orthodox synagogue. They didn't belong to Orthodox synagogues. When they came to America they went to conservative synagogues. But they were very excited to be part of the potential of an Orthodox synagogue. The first week we had 70, and then from then on we had a million. Friday night, shabbos morning, just a million, and that eventually grew. But the whole thing was such an incredible adventure. This guy who wanted to put it together eventually came back for a little bit and got a little bit too orthodox for him, so he didn't last.
13:39 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
I have two questions. First is about the too orthodox. What does that mean? Because I know to many people the word orthodox what does that mean? Because I know to many people the word orthodox is a dirty word. It's not a four letter word, because orthodox is more letters than four.
13:53
But to many people it's like there's many terrible things in the world and orthodoxy. So can you explain to our listeners? What does it really mean? I always tell people I don't believe in orthodoxy. I don't believe in reform or conservative or reconstructionist. They're just a bunch of labels and it's nonsense. I believe there are two types of Jews. There's growing Jews and stagnant Jews and everything else is just the labels and distraction. But to what they're looking at. Can you help give a definition to what?
14:24 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Yeah, we had an incredible policy. We, when you walked into the shul, we were all equal. There weren't people that kept Shabbos, people that didn't keep Shabbos, because there was nobody that walked to shul. So you didn't have Shomer Shabbos. You didn't have the people that were fully observant and those that weren't. But when you walked into that synagogue, the synagogue was fully observant and that made some people not many, it made some people a little nervous and that was the two Orthodox. Two Orthodox was you know, I'm not Orthodox. What do I have to do all this stuff for? You don't have to do all this stuff Inside the shul. This is what we do, but if you don't do it personally, that's not.
15:06 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
What happens outside is not our business right.
15:08 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
It's not our business at all. There were no value judgments, there was nothing, and that's why we grew very, very strong, very fast. It was a constant, steady growth once we moved into a permanent place. First six months we were in this office building. We were permanent place. First six months we were in this an office building.
15:32
We were in the hotel only setting up friday night, saturday morning, and then, uh, met rabbi naftali newberger from baltimore um, a blessed memory. Called me just to check in see how it was doing. So I said, uh, when I told him everything and he said to me, are you in a permanent place? He said no, he said you have to go into a permanent place. So he taught me something that in my first year he said I said, rabbi, I don't have any money. Nobody was giving any money yet nobody. Nobody was investing in it. On, on that level, it's all young people. So he said to me, jeff, he said he had a very distinct voice. He said if, if I waited for money to build things near Israel and Baltimore, there would be no yeshiva. He says you can't wait for money, you do what you got to do, the money will come. And that was the principle, really the guiding principle of the show.
16:20 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
If I could just ask you a practical question so you find the building that you want. If I could just ask you a practical question Okay, so you find the building that you want and now like what contract, what agreement are you making with zero dollars to pay for it?
16:31 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
So I sat down with my group and I said we can't stay here. The reason why we're not growing beyond this number. And the number was amazing. We had 10 every Shabbos. Never had a Shabbos without a million, which was incredible. Not always the same people never had a Shabbos without a minion. One Friday night. We're 9 and we're sitting in the hotel in like a conference room. We're 9, we're waiting. We do a couple of Shabbos, we sing, we bring in the Sabbath it was beautiful. We go, Damar, if you need a minion, wait, wait, wait, can't wait anymore. Just about to start my life, all of a sudden there's a knock on the glass doors of this room from the outside and we look and some guy says in Hebrew I heard there's a minion here, Is it true? So I said, yeah, come on in Number 10.
17:20
Wow, so, that was our Eliyahu HaNovi. We never missed a minion.
17:25
It was an incredible yeah, really an amazing thing, so you sat with the group I sat with the group and I said to the group look, we've got to get out of here. And all of a sudden, now people are looking at themselves and saying, okay, maybe I can give this, maybe I can give this. And people pledged the first year's worth of rent. Worth of rent. We're going to rent the place, people. People pledge the first year's worth of rent, and, and that's what we did, and that's the way and then eventually you bought the building.
17:48
And eventually no, and eventually we bought a property. Ucsd was was dumping a property and we got it at an incredible price. And I had I had brilliant businessmen who bought a property way too big for us and they sold off half of it and used that half to fund the other half. It was really an amazing thing. Today you go to La Jolla the building is stunning, there's a mikveh, it's just a stunning place, wow.
18:18 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Unbelievable.
18:18 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
And we had in those days, on Shabbos morning we would get 20, 30 people. It was big. It was huge, but it constantly grew, constantly grew because everybody was comfortable no religious people and eventually people started to become more connected to their observance. And there were people that were living far away and they would start keeping Shabbos and before they were ready to really buy another place or to buy a Shabbos place, or they were ready to really buy another place or to buy a Shabbos place, or to move their family To move.
18:48
So they would. You know, they would keep Shabbos, like everything was Shabbos, but they would drive to Shul. And there was one very beautiful family that they would drive to Shul and they were like developing. So they were very much into Shabbos. And they would come home from Shul and the kids would developing. So they, they were very much into shabbos and they were. They would come home from shul and the kids would tell me that the parents would take the keys as soon as they walked into the door.
19:11
They would throw them right because they're moksa, you can't, you can't, you can't do with them on shabbos. So they had to put them down. But they weren't yet up to kosher, so they would sit down to challenge milk and meat no, I, not kosher. But they were growing, growing and eventually they became a fully observant family with fully observant children. Really an amazing thing. And this is what we were seeing, person after person after person, because it wasn't too orthodox, because there was no push to anybody, no expectation, but there was an underlying expectation of you know, just taste this, expose yourself to this because it's amazing.
19:51 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
So I'm going to jump, because this is typically. I have a process of it. So one of the themes that I talk about a lot profusely in our podcast, in our classes, is that we must take small steps, and I'm asking, on behalf of our listeners, what is your guidance to those who are terrified of taking the next step? They're terrified. I'm not orthodox, I'm not Shomer. Shabbos I want to keep Shabbos, but it's like it's a million miles away. You know, keeping kosher is not realistic. I eat, you know, cheeseburgers and whatever it is You're telling me. I live out in Humboldt and Kingwood and you know all these outlying. You know Conroe there's no kosher food there, you know. So they're going to to ask like what's my small step and how do?
20:52 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
how do I protect myself? Because if you jump, you'll fall. So what's your guidance for that? My guidance for that is is just learn Torah, because the more you learn, the more you become aware of the whole system, the more you become aware of God and the role that God plays in your life. So then you don't have to make a decision anymore about whether you're going to keep Shabbos or whether you're not going to keep Shabbos.
21:11
You're going to come to a point, you're going to come to a place that you're going to say it's obvious that this is where I have to go, and it's not a question of whether you're ready or not ready. You're ready because you're starting to understand it. When you're still discussing in yourself should I take this on? Should I take that on? That's not always, but often an indication that you're not really ready for that, because you're still deliberating. But when it becomes something that is so obvious to you this is something that I need to be doing, it's because you're understanding it. You've connected to it. So just expose yourself, keep learning, keep studying, keep going to classes, keep listening to podcasts, keep doing all of this stuff, and then it'll all fall into place.
21:50 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
So what's if someone is going to respond and say thank you, Rabbi Woge, but we've been learning for 20 years and we haven't seen that change, we haven't seen that clarity yet, we haven't had that epiphany of like, oh, this is the step to take. So what's your guidance there?
22:10 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Maybe not studying the right things.
22:11 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Okay, it's possible.
22:12 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Maybe not studying the right things. You have to grow in your learning also, and then maybe it's time to take more steps in your learning, to learn things that are deeper and more compelling, because maybe you're beyond the baby steps and beyond just the simple remedial kind of learning that maybe it's time to start diving in. There are things also that you can do that don't turn your life upside down, and that's if you want to ask for practical things to do. Practical things to do is things that are not going to necessarily turn your lifestyle around, because, again, if you're not feeling it, then then that's not going to, it's not going to be beneficial.
22:53
But praying every day praying every day doesn't mean an hour and a half every day. Praying every day means bring prayer into your life every day. Bring bring that godliness into your life every day. Daily study of Torah Not just weekly classes, weekly online things. Daily study of Torah with a live person, a personal guide, somebody that can spend time with you and talk to you and help you start to open up some of those ideas in your head and also in your heart.
23:25 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Beautiful, beautiful. All right, we're on a mission.
23:30 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
There were times in our shul where there were more people learning than would come to Shabbos morning. There were more people involved in classes.
23:39 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
At the end of the day, knowledge is power. If you don't have the knowledge, if you don't have wisdom, then you can't. You can't grow that's right yeah, so so you were saying about the, the shul. Oh, I had one other question about the contract you had with your wife about living in israel. So she was okay going to australia, moving to la jolla. Was there ever a conversation of like, hey, what happened to our promise of being in the Holy Land?
24:05 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
That's another podcast of holy Jewish women who looked at things and said, yeah, I want to be in Israel and I would love to be raising my kids in Israel, but clearly that's not where God is sending us and clearly God wants us here in America doing what we can do, which is why, as soon as that started to shift a little bit in the sense that we've been doing it for 33 years we had built up something, something magnificent, and there was room to continue building, but it didn't have to happen with us anymore. There were other people that could do it now and at that moment we looked at it. We came on a sabbatical and we said, okay, we hit the place, we returned back to Israel.
24:53 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Amazing. It's funny because I had by my son's bris. It was a miracle baby. It was a lot of medical challenges and Baruch Hashem. You know, three and a half months later we had his bris and it was an amazing, amazing event, amazing celebration.
25:10
People from far and near came. My siblings came from Israel. It was really special just for a bris. It was very, very, very unique and I spoke over there and I said that what are we really doing here? We really should all be in Israel, but we have a job to do. And I remember one of my students was so appalled how can you say such a thing? What do you mean? We're here to stay. This is our homeland. It was an interesting conversation we had to have, but indeed our place is to be in the land of Israel. And I agree with you 100%. I'm only here because I have a mission. I'm not here to run a business. I'm not here to make money. I'm here to serve Hashem and to bring His children as close to Him as possible. So it's not. You know, there's no other.
25:58 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
I used to get it the other way, that people would say that you know what are you doing here? How do you justify being outside the land of Israel? You call yourself, you're a Zionist, you're a lover of Israel, You're phony, you're living in America. He used to say I'm only living in America because I have to live in America, because that's where you are, and if you go to Israel, I'll be able to get there also.
26:22 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
So on that I'll tell you a story with your crazy story. So, rabbi Yashiv Zecha Tzaddik L'Rochah, the great leader of the Jewish people, for his tenure that he was leading the Jewish people, I was enamored and obsessed almost with his greatness. And when we landed in Israel I think it was 2007, for my brother's wedding, I took my children. I said we have to go see the tzaddik, we have to go see, you know, rabbi Yashiv. So we went from the airport, we got to Jerusalem and we went into the old Me'er Shalom and we're going between the buildings, the little alleyways. We ask around where's Rabbi Yashiv's house? They said he's not at home. He's giving a class now. At the time I think he was 94 years old and I finally get to the little shul that he would give the Dafyami, the daily folio of Talmud study. And he was giving the class at 94 years old and he was giving it as vibrant as an 18-year-old playing tennis. It was like, with all of the exuberance, with all of the energy, it was like l'hav. Not to compare between holy and unholy. Some would consider Tennis very holy, but it was amazing to see the fire, the passion. So after and I was holding my children up to the window just to see, just see what greatness is.
27:44
And after he finished teaching the class, the evening service, the daven ma'arif, and then he went into this little golf cart and they carted him off to his house. And again, it's little alleyways, you know, all of the masharim is the hundred alleyways or the hundred gateways. And then he goes to his house. We of course followed with him, my wife and my children. We followed along and he goes into his house and that's it, doors closed. Everybody leaves the whole entourage, everybody's gone.
28:14
So I wait a few minutes and my wife is like what are you doing? I said I'm going to knock on the door. I want to get a blessing for our children. So she says yeah, but we don't have an appointment. I said okay, we're going to try. So I knock on the door and the Gabbai, the assistant of the rabbi, opens the door. He says do you have an appointment? I said no, I don't have an appointment. He says I'm sorry, you can only come and see the rabbi with an appointment. Okay. So I knew I was only going to be there for a few days. I came for a wedding and we were heading back to Houston. So my wife's like okay, let's go, we tried, we gave it our effort, let's move on One second. I knock on the door again. He opens the door, a little frustrated, like I just told you. I said to him I just want to ask you a question Whose job is it to go and teach Torah to the world?
29:06
Is it Reb El Yashav's job or is it my job? He says you know, the leader of the Jewish people should be out and teaching the world. I said yeah, but I'm the one in Houston, texas, teaching Jews Torah. I said I'm doing his job. I said I'm demanding for my children a blessing. That's what I want. He says, okay, come inside. He brings us inside and of course we see him sitting already. It was what? Three minutes after he got in, he's already sitting and learning Rabbi Yash. He was sitting over. So they said don't interrupt him, he's going to get up in a few minutes and when he gets up we'll ask him to give a blessing. And indeed he got up a few minutes later and he said you know this rabbi in Houston and he's teaching Torah to Jewish people and he wants a blessing for himself and for his children. And he gave a blessing. It was so beautiful, so special. But that was like you're saying, it's like it's not my job. I mean, it's all of our job. Collectively, as Jewish people, we're responsible for one another and that's why it's like if you know Aleph, teach Aleph.
30:01
The great Rav, noah Weinberg, would always say whatever you, you teach. So, my dear listeners, if you know something, you listen. You're inspired by something. Don't say well, I'm not a rabbi, I'm not ordained. Who am I to teach? Everybody can teach, everybody can share. I'm a nobody and I try to teach. Whatever I do know, and it's not my job, it's the great rabbis, like Rabbi Wolgeler, and you know Baruch Hashem. It really is a blessing that whatever I try to learn, try to understand, I try to share it as well. But what intrigued you into Jewish outreach? You grew up in Long Island. You grew up in, I'm sure, just an ordinary Jewish home, a Torah observant.
30:47 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Torah observant, but what I always tell people and this may be another podcast I grew up without God. And when I say I grew up without God, my parents were from people. My father was a yeshiva. He learned in Baltimore.
31:00 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
So he learned in a yeshiva and he was observant.
31:04 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
My grandfather was a Rav. He came from a very observant stack. We come from a very long line of Rabbanim and but Judaism in those days there was no such thing as yeshiva, shumat and orthodox. No such thing. It was. I'm not that old, but it just. Of course it existed in packets and places, but the average Jew didn't live that way. We weren't modern Orthodox, we were living in Long Island, but we saw ourselves as totally observant and religious people. We kept Shabbos, kept Kashras, totally observant.
31:39 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
So what does it mean without God?
31:41 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
So without God means that when you ask a question so why are we keeping Shabbos? It wasn't because the Rebbe Anishinaabem created the world in six days and he wants us to emulate him and to be like him. It wasn't about God. It says in the Torah that I worked on six days. I rested on the seventh day. Therefore, you keep my Sabbath. That's it finished.
32:02 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
It's like Fiddler on the Roof type Judaism, 100% it was beautiful Judaism Exactly.
32:09 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
I'll tell you a great little story. My uncle grew up and he wasn't religious. One of the reasons why he wasn't my father's brother, he was on the other side. But one of the reasons that he did not take to religion was because every time he asked a question he was told it's G'shribin. G'shribin means it's written. It's written, that's the way it is. So he marries my mother's sister who they were religious, but she married somebody who wasn't religious. She became not religious. My mother married somebody religious, Okay so, and they lived a beautiful Jewish life.
32:43
He was a president of an Orthodox synagogue in a small town in Connecticut and the rabbi wanted to build an Erev. My uncle got very involved. They built an Erev together, Very involved. One day in this newspaper of the town they printed a picture of the rabbi putting up the Erev and under it it says that the Jews of Nowak, Connecticut, now have an Erev, and under it it says that the Jews of Noah, Connecticut, now have a Erev which allows them to smoke and to drive on the Sabbath. So my uncle comes in with the newspaper and he goes to my father and he says you know why I smoke and drive on Shabbos?
33:21
it's because it's written down that's right, but that's the Judaism that I grew up with. But ours was totally, completely observant. Because it says in Shulchan Aruch, because it says in the Code of Jewish Law this is what we have to do. This is the way we observe. Why can't I touch this on Shabbos? Because it's Mokhtar. You can't touch it on Shabbos. Don't ask questions. This is what it is. There was no sense of relationship with God. Why do you daven? Because you daven. What's the matter with you? You davens and it was posh and it was beautiful, but it wasn't compelling. It didn't do anything. I'll tell you crazy. When did I figure out that I didn't know God? I must have been 21 or 22. I was 22,.
34:05
I think I was just married and I was running a summer program for NCSY and I was in charge of many buses one of these you know, in Israel and we had to come up with a curriculum for the kids to learn, so that they had classes every day. So we sat down with a bunch of the advisors and young kids, young adults, and they said you know, we decided maybe we'll learn about God. So I said we'll teach the kids about God. So I said, ok, great. So you know. They told me you're the learned one, you're the yeshiva man, you have to come up with the curriculum. Ok, so I sat down that night, took out a piece of paper, wrote Roman numeral number one, god, letter A, and it was dead in the water. What am I going to say about God? God is great. What am I going to say? So I go back to the advisors and I say to them I don't think we should teach about God, I think it's going to be too difficult for the kids, let's pick a different topic. So we decided to do Shabbos. And they did the same thing Roman numeral one, shabbos, letter A, dead in the water.
35:17
Come back to them and I say I think Shabbos is much too complicated, it's too big, vast, it's too hard for the kids. Let's come up with something else. Everything we came up with, I ended up in the same place. Everything we came up with, I ended up in the same place. I said I have no idea what I'm doing. Atoises, I could tell you Commentaries. I could tell you I was successful in my yeshiva learning, but it wasn't connected to anything and it was at that point that I realized that God is behind all of this. That's why I say learning Torah Maybe I should be more specific it's not just learning another Pasha and it's not just learning another law of the Sabbath or even another page of the Talmud.
35:53
It's learning God's Torah and connecting with God. And when you connect with God then you realize that's the center of my life. My Shabbos needs to be connected with God. Am I ready to keep Shabbos or not? I don't know, but I'm ready to connect to God. So I'm ready to take that step because it's about God and that's you know. I feel like there's been a shift in our world, in the world of Kiruv, in the world of, you know, jewish education and outreach, that it's much more now about God.
36:21 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Flavor and feeling a connection.
36:23 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
But the inside, the inner Torah of what it really is connected to.
36:28 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Amazing. I personally have gone through my own journey. I also grew up in a religious home and my parents are great people. They still live in the home I grew up in in Mansi and it was great. But I didn't know why I was doing things. And I remember the point where I was in yeshiva and I was putting on tefillin every day. I was keeping Shabbos every week, but I had no idea why. I had no idea why and I started investigating Not investigating saying okay, if it makes sense to me, I'll continue doing it, if not, I'll stop. I just I wanted to and suddenly it. I felt that I had a responsibility. I never wanted to be a rabbi ever. I felt I had a responsibility, that I needed to share this with the world, because if everybody understood what I just understood, there's no way that they wouldn't observe this.
37:19 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Okay. So I feel I have a theory, like a life's theory, that the reason why there are non-observant Jews is because they're uneducated Jews. Because the minute you find out about something in Torah, the inside of Torah, it is so gorgeous and so compelling that you're naturally drawn to it, and I've tested this many times. I gave classes to many non-religious people. There was a period before we left La Jolla where I was giving classes to Mexican Jews who were very traditional, very traditional, but not doing anything. There was no observance.
37:57
The South Africans were also very traditional, but they were into observance. Their Friday nights had kiddush and had all kinds of things. The Friday nights of the Mexicans were much less ritual than that, but when I would explain things, you see these ladies sitting at the table, totally non-observant. I remember once I gave a show about lighting candles on Friday night. Whenever we were discussing some of the details, they couldn't get enough because it made sense. First of all, they had no idea that it's not necessarily from the Bible. It's not necessarily from the Bible, it's not necessarily from the Torah that we light candles on Friday night. They thought that that was like the center of Shabbos.
38:34
And when they found out where it sat, and then a little bit of an understanding of why we do it, they were so drawn to it and drawn to doing it in the right way. Oh, so we have to do it before the Sabbath starts. We can't do it at the beginning of dinner, which is two and a half hours after the Sabbath starts. And it was just when they found out about things. All of a sudden, they were connected to it.
38:56 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
So I say this, one of my favorite things. I say this wherever I go, my dear friends. Okay, I'm telling you something the Torah itself tells us in the end of Deuteronomy. I'm telling you something the Torah itself tells us in the end of Deuteronomy the Torah does not belong to the rabbis, the Torah does not belong to the scholars. The Torah belongs to you. It's your Torah. Claim it, take it. It's yours. Demand. Find a Rabbi Jeff, find a Rabbi Wolbe, find it and demand to learn more. Demand it, demand it. Demand it. It's your Torah, it's your heritage, it's your gold. Mine Don't say ah, one day push it off, it's yours, it doesn't you know?
39:41 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
it's like Turn it over and turn it over, because everything is there, and the more you study it, the more beautiful you see that it is. It's not history, it's not just facts, but it's life. And the more you delve into that then the more compelling, and it drags you to places.
40:03 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
So we're in a very interesting generation that we're living in. I mean, I grew up. I remember when my father came home with a fax machine. By the way, my son has no idea what a fax machine is. I asked him. He has no idea what a fax machine is.
40:17 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Stop me for one second. You do know that last week, when the beepers exploded, the pagers, yeah, the pagers and we were going crazy.
40:29 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
If you were under 25, you were saying what's a pager? That's right, that's right, that's right. I remember when my father got a pager is the coolest thing in the world. It was amazing. At first it was just the numbers and then they you can write a paragraph. It was amazing thing. You'd call a service and it, but it was mamish I. We all tested it. We had to, you know. I remember it was absolutely exceptional. But what is something that you wish you could bring back from your childhood, something that you would love to see because you know, baruch Hashem, we just celebrated your grandson's bar mitzvah. It's, it's, really it's. It's an amazing new generation. I know that his bar mitzvah was a little bit different than your bar mitzvah was Definitely, you know, different than my bar mitzvah was. But it's like what from your childhood, if there was something that you could bring back, what would you want to bring back?
41:20 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Which will take us on to a whole other podcast. It's not necessarily bring back, but bring back life without cell phones, because I think that cell phones has changed the game and anything that we want to accomplish has become much more complicated with technology, because it's distracting. I'm not worried about all this stuff, the schmutz, that's not my issue, but that it's distracting and that it's an alternative, in the sense that it gives us a little bit of enjoyment, slash meaning and therefore makes it more difficult for us to explore, to be inquisitive, to look into Judaism, because we're happy we have enough stuff to keep us busy.
42:15 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Right. I find that our attendance in the Jewish outreach world like completely dropped. Once there was iPhones 100%, it is like not even. It's not even close. It used to be that people wanted to socialize, so people socialized in person. There was no hey, you can have a date on the phone. That wasn't the traditional way People had to go out to actually meet people. Today, everything is on an app, it's on a phone. Why should I meet them? I can just talk to them. People are homeworking, working from home. It's a different planet and we see the difference with people's attendance to our classes. We also see the difference that people are listening much more to classes online, but with what you're saying, look, hashem, you know. Rabbi Wolgol answered we're not living on an island. We're not, you know, in the 18th century. We're 21st century. The Almighty gave us technology. Shouldn't we use it?
43:21 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
100%. I'm not advocating that, we don't. You asked me where I would like to get back to. I want to ask this question to your listeners.
43:31
Sunday morning, yeah, sunday morning. How many of you are doing dishes? How many of you are doing the laundry right now while you're listening? How many of you are jogging? How many of you, which one of you, is sitting and watching and listening and writing notes? I know your name. Nobody's doing that, so you're right. There's many more people that are listening. There's Dafyoymi online. Wow, it's amazing how many people are sitting without a Talmud, without a book in front of them.
44:03 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
And just listening.
44:04 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
And just listening, which is, hey, it's amazing, but at the the end of the day, it's getting in our way right.
44:13 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
So you're saying it's a quantitative benefit but a qualitative loss?
44:16 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
that's correct. That's correct. That's correct. You, you're going to enjoy this and if you're, if you're really holy, you're going to say to yourself I want to listen again, so make sure that I get. I get all these. So I want to make sure that I get all these points and I want to make sure that it speaks to me. Okay, you don't really there's nothing deep here. You don't really have to listen to this a second time, but you do, because you only had a part of your brain that was involved, because you were involved in something else. So, yeah, I would love to see us back. Listen, I work in a yeshiva now. It's a shul now A yeshiva for boys.
44:50
That high school didn't work for them. They didn't have. Many went to Jewish schools, not all of them. Some of them got thrown out of Jewish schools. Almost all of them were religious, were brought up religious and it just wasn't. It didn't grab, it didn't go in and it's going to be a hard year to go in now.
45:15
Also because of the phones the thing in a lot of schools, in a lot of things you hear about the phones, they say you know, it's so terrible, what's going on with the phones and then they make rules in schools. They say, if you bring a phone, phone, you're going to get thrown out, we're going to take it away. It's not the way to do it. The way to do it is to try to explain to people and to make them understand what life was like when you didn't have a cell phone, when you could go to a simcha and you could concentrate on the simcha, concentrate on the bar mitzvah, concentrate on the simcha, concentrate on the bar mitzvah, concentrate on the wedding, and you didn't have to, every five minutes, sit there and bring yourself out of the picture.
45:52
Take yourself out of that world and disconnect, because the minute that you turn that phone on, the minute that you turn that phone on, you're now in a different world. So my job is not to tell you that you're going to get thrown out of the yeshiva If you're not, you know, if you take out your phone, it's not my job. My job is to tell you why you're wasting your time, why you're wasting your life.
46:12 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Why you're disconnecting.
46:13 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Completely, completely. So. That's what I'd like I would. You know, I dream about what it would be like to be able to teach students.
46:22 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Actually, during the 40 days between the beginning of Elo and Yom Kippur, I try to move over my life to a non-smartphone, a flip phone, to change that specifically for this reason, so I can focus. It's a time to take an accounting. I haven't yet been fully successful. I still have my smartphone, I use it at night, I need to respond to emails and so on and so forth, but it I I totally, I totally agree with and I, as a as a parent of eight children, I can tell you that my younger for my older for all have phones and bar Hashem, it's balanced. But my younger four I'll do everything I possibly can to ensure they don't have one until they're 25 years old. I have here in this room I have a doctor who's a world-class psychiatrist, dr Rosenstock, and I asked him. I said just tell me, what do you think about this whole smartphone? He said to me like this he said the issue is the development of the brain. He says every day that you keep your children away from a smartphone, you're saving their brain. He says if they get it at 18, the benefits are, you know, if 19, 20, as late as you can possibly delay it, the better. So I appreciate that.
47:58
I want to go on to the next topic of. I'm a grandchild of three Holocaust survivors and a little bit I'm obsessed with the Holocaust because I feel that there's so much that as a people, we need to learn from the Holocaust, that we need to grow from it and disappointed that it's almost not in the vocabulary of the Jews of 2024. You know, the only way we've heard it recently is because they say that oh, what happened October 7th is the worst calamity since the Holocaust. But really I don't find that our children know enough about the Holocaust. I don't know if your parents were survivors. No, they were not survivors.
48:44 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Both of my parents were born to Europeans, to Proto-Shestak, but had come over to the United States already before the war.
48:55 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
So what would you say is the most important lesson for our listeners, for ourselves, our children to learn from the Holocaust? And obviously, I think it 100% relates to October 7th as well. I go everywhere. I have my pin. It's not for other people, it's not jewelry either. It's for me, every time I see it, to remember that I have brothers and sisters who are hostages, who are in exile, who are in tremendous suffering or who are dead and need to be brought to Jewish burial, and this is a tragedy we can't forget.
49:37 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
So ask? I think you have to ask that next question of why can't we forget it? Why is it so important for us to remember that? And I'll give you my answer, and I'm not sure that you know that everybody would agree with my answer, but I'll tell you that, for me, the reason why we can't forget it is because we have to remember where we are. It's not just that we have to remember that there are khatufim, there are hostages, and that a terrible thing happened to us on October 7th. We have to remember that we're living in exile, that we're living in gulis and that we're living in an imperfect world and that we are part of that imperfection and therefore our obligation is to do what we can do in order to be able to bring this world to a place of perfection and that the minute that I think that I am in an okay place, that's the minute that we have to worry.
50:22
We recently learned in the Dafyomi many stories of a rabbi by the name of Rabbi Barachona, and the stories are fantastic stories like crazy stories. He tells over one story that he was once on a boat that got thrown into the sea of Rabba Barachona, and the stories are fantastic stories like crazy stories. He tells over one story that he was once on a boat. They got thrown into the sea and they were swimming around the sea and then they saw what appeared to be an island. They went to the island, they lit a fire. They found some berries and some things to eat. As soon as they started to warm up and to dry out and to become comfortable, the island pitched and threw them back into the sea and they realized that they were on the back of a fish. You read that story and say what was that rabbi smoking Like?
51:06 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
what's going on? How did you not know?
51:08 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
What was that so? The metaphor? There are many explanations for it, but one of the explanations is that the sea is Godless, is exile, and that we're barely treading water in the sea. And then we find these places that we think are our safety, but they're not Jerusalem, they're not Israel, they're not the base of Mekdosh and they're not God. And we think that we've reached home. We start to get comfortable and the minute we get comfortable, we get tossed back into the city. It's amazing.
51:37 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
You know the reform platform in 1807 had that. They declared that Germany is our Israel and Berlin is our Jerusalem. No more. We have a new home. I recently heard that the Jews in Poland call it Poilin, as in Poilin. Here is where I'm going to stay, this is my home. And again, we were thrown out of Poland and we were thrown out of Czechoslovakia and we are, you know, on the precipice of another election that you know is already the most tumultuous election ever in history. I think, and probably will continue to be so, and I think the biggest fear is that, as Jews, we feel like this is our home, like this is our place, and we're meant to stay here, and we hope that the boat doesn't get rocked and we don't get uncomfortable again. And you know, it really is. It's an amazing.
52:45 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
When Senator Lieberman was on the precipice of becoming, you know, vice president, and this was in the beginning of November and the intifada was raging. Keva Rocha was shut down.
53:07 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Rachel's tomb.
53:08 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Rachel's tomb was shut down. Usually on her yard site, there were, there are, thousands upon thousands, tens of thousands of people that come throughout the 24 hours on her yard site. The amount of praying that goes on is so gorgeous and so heartfelt and so beautiful. And there, literally, was nobody by the grave. We in America, we're talking about that. Maybe there's going to be a minion on the grave. We in America, we're talking about that. Maybe there's going to be a minion on the hill that look at, look at what Jews, look at what's happened to us. There's a possibility there's going to be a Jewish vice president, a Jewish, an observant, a caring Jewish vice president. We were so incredibly excited.
53:50
Rachel represents for us the Shavu Banim Likvulam, mama Rachel. Rachel represents for us Mamo Rachel. We call her Mother Rachel. She represents when God gave her, through the Navi, a promise that stop crying, wipe away your tears. You have nothing to worry about, because she sits and cries In the crossroads of exile. She cries over her children that are exiled all around the four corners of the world. And God promises her Stop crying, because they're coming home again. You don't have to worry. And on that day, on that election day, where it was almost, it was almost going to happen. We in America were looking at shops saying, isn't this the greatest thing that ever happened? And in Israel, nobody was there to cry with Mamrechel. I tell it over now I get get emotional. It was such a devastating moment for me and that's what made me realize that we have to remember that we are in Galas. It doesn't mean we walk around depressed and it doesn't mean we walk around like a victim.
54:45
Exile. We are not in the perfect place. We're not in the perfect place. Exile is not a geographic location, it is a state of existence. We are not in a perfect place in America. We are not in a perfect place in France. We are not in a perfect place in Israel Without the Beis Hamikdash, without the temple, without God resting in his place and we resting in ours. We are impaired. It's why, at the greatest moment of joy, by a wedding, we take a moment to remember and to remind ourselves by breaking the glass, that we are not yet home, and that's, for me, the message of the Holocaust.
55:22
I've taken many groups to Poland. I take my boys from the yeshiva to Poland and I think that it's critical for us to understand that this is part of a continuum. It's the most shocking event that's happened to us on that continuum, but it's part of a continuum. It's the most shocking event that's happened to us on that continuum, but it's part of a continuum, it's not a standalone, which is why I have a hard time getting a little political. But I have a hard time with Holocaust Memorial Day because of taking it out of where it belongs, which is in exile, which is Tisha B'Av.
55:47
To take it out, is saying that it's a new event. It's not a new event. It's not a new event. It's just another event along the continuum, and this is not since the Holocaust, october 7th. This is the next step that we're going through, and that we're sitting in a war now, and that we're sitting in a time where there are tens of thousands of people that are not in their homes, and that are exiled in Israel is a reminder to us that we live in exile.
56:15
Wow, jacob has a dream and Jacob sees an angel going up and coming down. Jacob sees a second angel going up and coming down, and he sees a third angel going up and coming down, and then he sees a fourth angel going up and going up and going up and doesn't come down, and Jacob panics because he realizes that these are the four exiles that the Jewish people are going to go through the one ended, the second ended, the third ended, the fourth one seems to be going on forever. And Jacob is taught that the reason why he doesn't come down is because you have to bring him down. The reason why he doesn't come down is because you have to bring him down, that you, through your actions and through what you do, have to set a world, set a stage that it becomes axiomatic, that the exile is going to end and that the redemption is going to happen. That's what we need to remember. It's in our hands now.
57:10 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
And those tools are bringing God's presence into the world, the consciousness into our lives. That's right, and I don't bringing God's presence into the world, the consciousness into our lives.
57:15 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
And I don't have to worry about bringing them into your life. I got to worry about bringing them into mine. So when I'm teaching Torah, I'm not really there thinking that I'm bringing God into your life. I'm bringing God into mine and you know what, when God's in my life, he's going to be in your life also.
57:32 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
I literally just said this in a speech on Sunday Amazing. I said I'm being very selfish here. I said I'll be honest with you. You think I'm teaching you something for you to learn? You're mistaken. It's for me to learn and I'm sharing it with you, but it's like I really I pick. The truth is, most of my classes I pick the topics that I want to learn. I feel areas that I'm weak in and areas that I need to investigate or grow in. That's what I pick. It's very selfish, amazing.
58:06
Now, I believe that the cornerstone of Jewish life is Shabbos. What would you say to our listeners? Why should they even consider keeping Shabbos? What would you say to our listeners, you know, why should they even consider keeping Shabbos? What's your sales pitch? If there were? It was any. I mean, hashem is the salesman here. We're you know. What would you say? Like why in the world should someone even consider observing Shabbos? I'm very comfortable in my life. I do my shopping, I get my cleaners done, then I pick up, I go to the movies, I like to go to the beach. What's your sales pitch on Shabbos?
58:41 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Okay. So if I'm going to sell Shabbos and I'm going to tell you that it's all about observing Shabbos and it's all about keeping the laws of Shabbos, then I'm not going to make a sale. Then I'm not going to make a sale and I'm going to be a dismal failure. But if I tell you that Shabbos is all about recognizing God as creator, I won't tell you a thing about what you can do and you can't do on Shabbos. I won't tell you about not writing and not driving and not smoking. I won't tell you a thing about that. But I will tell you that it's all about recognizing in your life that God created this world. And how do you recognize that God created the world? Stop creating. Stop creating Because you can't see him as creator if you're also involved in creation and therefore God himself came to us and said to us lay down those things that show your mastery of the world and this way, just recognize that and all of a sudden you'll see him everywhere. You'll see him as the creator of the world and you'll understand.
59:38
I won't need to give you a class about why you can't rip toilet paper on Shabbos. You'll get it, because all of that I need to explain to you, maybe, why that's an act of mastery. But once you understand that principle, that anything that's an act of mastery in the world you have to lay down on Shabbos, everything will fall into place. So if I'm going to sell you Shabbos, I'm not going to sell you observance I'm not going to sell you. I'm not even going to tell you that the best thing on Shabbos is a chalant. Oh my God, there's nothing like it.
01:00:05
You've got a good chalant a good piece of kugel. The reason for that is because when you spend time with your family, you recognize that who created this family? Who gave? Who created this world that we live in? God created this world. That's what I'm, that's why I'm keeping Shabbos. It's to recognize God as creator.
01:00:23 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
It's amazing. So what's your favorite part of Shabbos? Chalant, chalant.
01:00:27 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
My favorite part of Shabbos is recognizing God as creator and seeing him in my congregants, seeing him in my children, seeing him in my family, seeing him in my guests.
01:00:36 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
I tell my guests, I tell my students I said I'm going to come for the best food and seeing what a Jewish home is like. Yeah, that's great. I want you to stand outside my house on Shabbos afternoon and just look at the community. Look at the boys and girls running up and down the street. Look at the parents walking with the strollers. Look at the friendship, the camaraderie, the love I mean. Today we're living in a world where people live next door to they don't even know who they're. Out in the outskirts of Houston, you know, in the suburbs, and it's beautiful, it's quaint, it's relaxing, but it's not community. It's like we could almost. We're not there yet. It's not a fully, fully Jewish community yet.
01:01:25 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
But it's getting there.
01:01:27 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
It's pretty close, yeah, and you know, it's really remarkable to see the transformation of how you have a busy street, cars coming going, carpools, this, that Shabbos it's a whole different tone. Just look at the children.
01:01:40 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
That's right, and when you're going to see that, you're going to see in that God's incredible world. I'll tell you a beautiful thing. I think I saw it from Shamshin Pinkus. But we come home on a Friday night. The Gemara says that when you come home you're escorted by a good angel.
01:01:57 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
By the angel, yeah.
01:01:58 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
You come to the window of the house, you look inside and if the house is set for Shabbos, then the bad angel says this is the way it should be. The good angel says this is the way it should be every week, and the bad angel is forced to say, I mean, can you? Also? Is forced to say Amen, may it be God's will. But if the house is not set for Shabbos and there isn't that atmosphere of Shabbos, so then the bad angel says may it be this way every week and the good angel is forced to say Amen. And then we sing Shalom Aleichem. There's something odd here. The whole story takes place outside the house. The angels are standing outside the house, everything is taking place outside the house. And then you say Shalom Aleichem, give me a blessing. And then say Eschema, shalom, go, you can go home now. You can go home now. Eliyahu HaNovi gets a lease to L'chaim Right, he gets invited into the house. He gets to have a drink. The angels on Shabbos they can.
01:02:50
So we know that on Yom Kippur the high priest was able to go into the Holy of Holies. The Torah tells us when he went into the Holy of Holies, the inner chamber, the inner sanctum of the sanctuary, where God's presence emanated to the world from there, and he was only allowed to go there on Yom Kippur, only a few times on Yom Kippur he goes in. Torah tells us there was no man with him. Our rabbis understand what does it mean? There was no man, there weren't even angels in there, because that was the kodesh kadosh, the holy of holies, the most intimate place. It was god and the high priest. When we come home on a friday night, when we walk into our houses and our table is set, we have walked into the holy of holies houses and our table is set we have walked into the holy of holies.
01:03:36
There's no room for angels, there's no room for anybody but us. It's us and god. That's my selling of shabbos and that's my shabbos. When I walk into my house on friday night, I feel the presence of god. When I walk into shul, we turn around and we say you know, know, god, come on in. It's just, it's filled with a sense of godliness on Shabbos.
01:04:04 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Beautiful, wow, all right, so I have a whole list of questions we jumped around. This is for podcasts, so there are a lot of really, really great things happening that we've been seeing in the Jewish people, particularly in the past you know, past eight, nine months, almost 12 months since October 7th but we see the beauty of the Jewish people. We see what makes you know, what makes the Jewish people unique, what makes you most proud to be Jewish.
01:04:37 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
So, first of all, I'll tell you that what is you have to explore when you say amazing things that we've seen? What is it that we've seen? We've seen kindness. We've seen Jews reaching out to Jews. I'm living it every day. The amount of kindness that goes on is unprecedented. It's really outstanding.
01:04:58 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
I mean, I know myself I'm a little nobody here in Houston. I've raised tens of thousands of dollars, sent it to a commander that I know personally in the IDF. They bought specific gear that the soldiers needed. That's mean nothing. I met a friend of mine just two days ago and he told me that he raised. I didn't even know about it. He had his own campaign. They were buying helmets and other gear for soldiers. And obviously you have all of the other institutions, people in the United States who are giving money and giving money and giving money to help our brothers and sisters it's the most beautiful thing. And in Israel, people on the ground who are giving meals and visiting sick people, and it's amazing to see the brotherhood, the love of our people.
01:05:47 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Right. It's sort of to be expected, because we're created from one soul. We're all connected to each other. Koyesol Erezal Ezez. We are inextricably bound to each other. To me, what's most incredible is our resiliency. This doesn't break us that we continue to live, we continue to grow, despite all the pain that people have been through. To watch the people in pain being resilient and continuing on with their lives, the Polans, the Goldberg Goldberg, poland, hershel's parents Hershel was the representative, the representative of the Jewish people.
01:06:43
Everybody got behind him and when he died, a part of everybody Her. Those that have no purpose flounder, but those that have a sense of purpose and mission. It is astounding to watch the weddings and the brisim and the bar mitzvahs. And there isn't the brisim, there isn't the bar mitzvah and there isn't a wedding that doesn't include prayers and doesn't include mishaberechs and doesn't include tefillos and doesn't include all kindsaberechs and doesn't include Tfilos and doesn't include all kinds of memorials and remembrances of our soldiers and of our hostages. And it's the backdrop for everything we do. But no one is going to break us. They're not going to stop our weddings and they're not going to stop our living and they're not going to stop our quest to connect and to find God.
01:07:37 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Amazing. Now there are also some not such great things going on. Yeah, you know where we have Jews who don't want to stand up for Israel. I will tell you personally, those of you who are listening. We publish an annual calendar. Um, I've been getting tons and tons of requests. You know already we're in middle of september and like, where are the calendars ready? We need the calendars. We need to, my dear friends. They're coming. They're coming, they're being printed, they're being bound. We're going to get it to you as quickly as we can.
01:08:11
But this year we have a surprise in our calendar, and the surprise is that we didn't put every year. We put sort of as a promotion of what we do as an organization. One year we featured our podcast. One year we featured all of our in-person programs. One year we featured the Torch families. Like, we try to do different themes. This year we dedicated the entire calendar to the IDF and to our hostages.
01:08:38
You know the first page is bring them home. Now, that's it. It's a black page in yellow letters with the ribbon, and that's it. You know, october 7th is a black day on the calendar. Now, obviously, again, we're not taking it away from Tisha B'Av, but everything is like. To us it's like, but there are many, many, many people who are going to be irritated. On the front of the calendar and I had a big discussion with my designer about this they're like nah, we shouldn't do it. I said I wrote take a stand, stand with Israel. So unfortunately, there are many people who don't want to take a stand, who don't want to stand with Israel, and I know that I'm going to get backlash from some. Hopefully, more people will be for it than against it, but to me, this is very disturbing.
01:09:34 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
It's the reality. We live within Israel, we live here, of people that are, that are free to identify themselves and identifying themselves with what's going on in Israel is, right now, a very strong source of identity and there are people that are petrified of that. Look, we see in Israel. We see people that are afraid of anything that's really Jewish. In Tel Aviv, they make the rules they can't have public prayer, and this is what started us right before I remember, last year was terrible, last year was terrible.
01:10:15
Yeah, it's the way I feel is there's nothing we can do, nothing real, tangible that we can do to change people's minds. But what we can do is strengthen the people that identify and continue to feed them with abilities to be able to and abilities to be able to, in moments, to be able to identify and, uh, you know, dedicating a calendar to the, to the idf, which is also an incredible thing, because there are different parts of our world that stand for different things and that you know that in in, in other times would have identified with certain things, not identified with certain things. Those walls are breaking down in a very incredible way. Part of the chesed that's going on in Israel, part of this kindness and this outreach, is really the breaking down of walls and that it doesn't make a difference who you are and what you believe in anymore it's like your shul, it's like inside.
01:11:12 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
It's a sanctuary where everyone is accepted and everyone's equal that's right alright, so just any closing words. Rabbi Wolgland, this has been fantastic. I love every second. I can do another five episodes. I'll be happy to if you have time. I know you're catching a flight back to Israel yeah, hopefully.
01:11:32 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
That's a whole other story. I'm sorry to disturb, yeah hopefully.
01:11:37 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
That's a whole other story.
01:11:37 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
I'm sorry to disturb we also see the world and where they stand. Happy birthday, we finally woke up and we're not living in fantasy land anymore.
01:11:54 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Oh, no, the UN just passed a resolution with over 200 votes against Jews being in Jerusalem, in Old City Jerusalem. I mean it's Correct.
01:12:08 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
What world are we living in? Wake up and smell the coffee. We were given a whiff in the Holocaust. We were given a whiff in the Spanish Inquisition. We've been given a whiff all along. The world has a certain opinion of the Jewish people. Stop fooling yourself. Now live with them, do what you got to do, but don't fool yourself, and I think that that's a very profound message that we have to have. I am here living in hostile territory and, even though America was a Medina Shal Chesed for a very long time.
01:12:44
A country of kindness, a country of kindness. What it did for the Jewish people, with all what it didn't do for the Jewish people, but what it did for the Jewish people was incredible. At the end of the day, I believe that that's ended. Now. What does that mean? Practically All it means is be realistic. Stop trusting. Stop trusting.
01:13:02 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Right. So where can our listeners find you online? You have a website, you have a podcast.
01:13:12 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
I have. I'm on YouTube. Just type in Rabbi Wolgelenter and you get to my YouTube site. You can join.
01:13:18 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
I'll share the link in our description.
01:13:20 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Okay, you can join that. I have a WhatsApp group called Torah Torah Torah where I put out. Once a week I put out something on the Pascha usually 10, 12 minutes on the Pascha, just something uplifting, a little bit focusing and then when it comes to holidays I put things on so if things happen in the world, then I end up speaking. I do have classes online on the YouTube channel I put up. I'm right now giving a class in Joshua, in the book of Joshua, so I do put up those classes. To me, parting words is just keep yourself open and learning and experiencing. Any opportunity you have to experience something Jewish and especially to experience something godly and something Torah-oriented. Grab the opportunity Because something, some window is going to open, some epiphany, some moment is going to happen that is going to touch you so deeply and going to send you in an incredible trajectory.
01:14:28 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Amen, alright, thank you. Thank you so much.
01:14:32 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
It's my pleasure, it's an honor to be here. I was always the president of the Rabbi Wolbe fan club and for many, many years I've looked up to you as a person who's accomplishing incredible things for Kalei Yisrael. So I just give you a bracha that you should continue to be able to do this. And to you know, with feedback, without feedback, it doesn't make a difference. You know, just keep doing what you're doing, because and this was this was our sort of our motto for 33 years, which was basically just set the table, set the table, make a beautiful presentation, a beautiful table. They want to eat. They'll eat. They don't want to eat, maybe they won't. But all you have to do you set a beautiful table. Somebody will come along and eat.
01:15:25 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Amen, amen. All right, we should be signed and sealed to a beautiful new year filled with good health. You should have tremendous nachas from your children, from your grandchildren, great-grandchildren, soon. And, yeah, we should continue to celebrate more and more Simchas together.
01:15:46 - Rabbi Jeff Wohlgelernter (Guest)
Until that moment. Then we won't have to do podcasts, because they will be coming back live. They won't be online, but they're not going to be here. We're all going to be in the Holy Land, all in the city of the rebuilt Jerusalem, and there we'll be able to feel God, see God, experience God. Podcasters will be out of business, but they will be the happiest people in the world because together we'll be able to bask in the light and to be able to see the rebuilding of Jerusalem quickly and speedily in our days. Amen, Amen.
01:16:19 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Amen Thank you.
01:16:20 - Intro (Announcement)
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