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In this series Rav Shlomo Katz explores the inspiring, powerful Torah and Wisdom of Reb Usher Freund zt"l
Today we're learning לעילוי נשמת לוי בן יוסף and לעילוי נשמת בת יפה בת ישראל. It feels gevalt, so good to go back to Reb Asher. The Mondays, Mondays have been busy with with Yontif, with chagim and with brisses and a bunch of things, but we're back with Reb Asher. I have a bunch of chevre online are always asking, "nu, nu, Reb Asher, Reb Asher." So we're back with Asher.
This is a chevre, I can't tell you how important this letter is. This one had me like it kept me up last night for a while because I was internalizing it with myself and seeing it in in my life. We're on Daf Chaf-Chet, letter Tes-Zayin. This is really, this is really something else, mashu acher legamre, and it's going to demand a lot of bitul and a lot of vulnerability because this letter, I couldn't tell after going through it a few times I couldn't tell what the person was writing about even because I kept on changing my mind.
I still am not sure, Eli will help us, but it seems to me that the letter that was sent to Reb Asher or the the the meeting that the person had with Reb Asher, it seems to me, okay, it mamash just seems to me that it was twofold. One was that the person wanted to write a tefila about geulah, but he must have also mentioned there that he's having a machlokes with a friend. It seems to me that he had a machlokes with a friend. Toda raba.
It seems that that there was some kind of problem going on between two people. It seems to me. Now that happens sometimes, both things happen sometimes. This is mamash, this is heart work.
This is avodas hanefesh in its core, mamash in its core. So Daf Chaf-Chet, letter Tes-Zayin.
ברוך אתה ה' אלהינו מלך העולם שהכל נהיה בדברו. Amen.
Lichvod. Ah, I couldn't tell who it is, okay. Lichvod. In honor.
And you have to and and today you have to really you have to look at each word inside. There's a lot of very important words here and we'll try be'ezras Hashem to go through each one one by one and try to have utmost attention today. Lichvod.
אני כולי תקווה ותפילה שתתהפך לברית חברים נאמנה של אחדות השלמות עם כח הביטול של כל הרצונות לרצון האמת להגיע אי פעם ולו נשימה אחת בכל החיים לברית אהבה הבלתי תלויה בדבר.
To reach a covenant of love which isn't dependent on anything. Okay, there's a lot to unpack in these first few lines. A lot. I'm not ready yet.
שרק זו האהבה חיה וקיימת לעד ולעולמי עד ומים רבים לא יוכלו לכבותה. This is the only everlasting love, talk about everlasting love. This is the only everlasting love. Ein mashu acher.
This is the only everlasting love that nothing can put it out. Nothing can put out this love. The love that doesn't rely on anything? Well, everything he said until now, which we'll go over again in a second. Yeah, yeah.
Definitely, no no, it's good. I bechavana not because I know we will be here till Hanukkah if we if we start... It was just Hanukkah. Exactly.
Exactly my point. Exactly my point. I'll say like this chevre, back in the day when we first started learning together years ago, so that was my kavana that what we would be what we would be learning would bring the chevre that are learning... there is what he's speaking about here, ברית אהבה הבלתי תלויה בדבר, a covenant of love amongst chevre that is not dependent on anything because that he says is the only type of love that's kayam l'olmei ad that exists forever and this is the only type of love that nothing could put out until it reaches a level עד שתאיר את כל מחשכי הגלויות until it illuminates and shines all the darkness that comes from every type of galut ve'itnotzetz or hageulah and the light of redemption will begin to sparkle hageulah hashleimah the complete redemption will begin to sparkle bechol yakrat yif'atah in all of its splendor, glory and beauty על ידי התעוררותא דלתתא through an awakening from below ועבודת האנוש תמיד להתפשט מעצמו כי לא לו very interesting choosing of words here and it comes from man working on himself to get out of the way, to get out of the way.
לא הוא מציאות העבודה he is not the subject at hand אלא רק בחינת למעני ולמעני אעשה that is a pasuk from I believe Yeshayahu HaNavi. You have the footnote? Oh I don't have it by me. That is a footnote from Yeshayahu HaNavi where it's Hashem speaking like everything that I created, everything I'm doing is just for my kavod and to fall under that category. So again chevre, I want to start from the beginning and I need you all to hear every word again and pay close attention.
It must have been that part of this letter was about a machlokes that people had between each other. It must have been. And Reb Usher wants to address the person, he could say I believe he's right, I believe you're right, it's very easy to say that, meaning Reb Usher was a gaon, he was a tzaddik, he was a talmid chacham, he could have easily said listen he's right you're right. It seems to me you brought like a beis din has to pasken, he could have said that.
But Reb Usher is always going to the heart of the matter and it's not about who's right or who's wrong. The only question is over here is are you able to get out of the way of what you believe is absolutely right and how he's absolutely wrong? Because the point of all this is to realize that the Ribbono Shel Olam put you guys together to figure something out. And as much as you talk about big dreams, geulah shleimah, redemption, all these high concepts, the Reb Usher is saying you want to know what really would bring a sparkling of the light of geulah shleimah? If two people that don't get along and have tainas on each other could get out of the way and realize what they have available to them. You see chevre that get along and it's nice, you invite people over for Shabbos and everything, it's a sweet thing, it's a nice mitzvah, it's definitely healthy in a community, but that's not necessarily bringing the geulah hashleimah.
What seems to be based on what he's saying over here to bring the geulah hashleimah is when you realize someone's in your face and you can't stand it and yet davka from that place to say I have an opportunity right now to do something extraordinary that I couldn't do unless I didn't have this machlokes with this person. Yeah Eli. So when I first met Reb Usher, one of the first things he did is he had me go around to different places where people were working together and what I found that was so astounding was you had Satmar, Lubavitch, Ger, and chilonim and Shomer Hatzair and davka anti-religious people in the same room, at a meeting right? I walked in to watch people all working together and I'm like I don't, you shouldn't be sitting in the same room together, what are you, I don't get this. I said do you guys get along? And the person I was speaking with said no, no we don't get along at all.
I said what do you mean? He says we don't get along, we fight and Reb Usher says you should argue with each other, it's a good thing to argue with each other, but always understand you're in it for something bigger than you and we're bringing, this is how Reb Usher wants us to bring geulah. The Tziyoni. That was your name? But he's a dear, dear friend. Tziyoni, right? And we would jab at each other, but it was just I just realized there was just something much, much deeper there.
And so what happens that Reb Asher said in this piece right right at the very beginning is and it's what's what's the source of the argument? The source of the argument is not what appears to be the source of the argument. Whenever you go to therapy for instance they'll go, "And what else? And what else?" until you finally drill down and then everything's your parents' fault and they charge you 200 bucks. But seriously, you understand that there's something deeper and something deeper and it's usually not what we think we're dealing with. And when you realize that the person sitting across from you is also, you know, Chelek Eloka Mima'al, the argument changes and everything changes.
And then you realize you're just chipping away through this argument to get to something much, much deeper. And it's not the argument, it's not what you thought the source of the argument was and that's just not what what matters. Right. And if I was gonna, I mean, Reb Asher had gadlus in many things, but if this, if there was one thing, this this was it.
He would put people together as like, go sit with the guy you love all the time. The guy who grinds your gears, that's who you need to somehow find a common piece with and work and work on that. And he and he would set it up so that this would be the constant, constant work. And it was amazing.
And then you realize this is the problem the world has, it's not just us, right? People are we we fight over everything and we lose the we lose sight of what is absolutely real. Would Reb Asher say that it takes two to tango? Yes, at least two. Yeah. Yeah.
'Cause you argue, you know, something doesn't grind your gears and you finally sort it out with this guy, there'll be somebody else in the corner. Oh yeah, there'll be there'll be someone else. Yeah. And but it's really important to be authentic and to be real and to work through this, but then you you come to a realization that the person sitting across from you is mamash Chelek Eloka Mima'al.
And when you when that becomes real, then Lema'ani Lema'ani E'eseh, you know, it it God is working through us to achieve a you know, real goal and not what we talk about as some kind of astral goal or whatever everything's we talk about. It's not it's not saccharine, it's like real. Nachon. So sometimes when people tell us, like, I've heard this from different mashpi'im that, you know, listen, this is his tikkun.
That doesn't that doesn't that doesn't help me so much. Like then I'll I'll say I'll choose a different tikkun. Those things don't that doesn't really me'orer the thing the heart. The me'orer the heart is to go to the shoresh, like you're speaking about over here, like like Reb Asher is saying over here, to go to the root of it and realize it's part of your tikkun, he's not your only tikkun, that's part of a of a bigger thing, but these are the things that bring Geulah to the world.
These these mamash these things. Yes, you want to turn on all of Eretz Yisrael, put on tefillin, I'm sure that's part of it, but it really starts from here. And call me naive or crazy, but my dream was and still is that us chevra here, that we reach a place of ahava, what's the lashon he uses?
אהבה הברית הבלתי תלויה בדבר, a covenant of love that's not dependent on anything. How many people could say that in their life they have friends that are that they hold a covenant of love that's not dependent on anything? Don't raise your hands.
I'm just I want you to think about these things. There are some people go their whole life and they never really trust anybody. They love everybody, it looks like it's love in everything, but they don't really love anybody. But let's see if there's like one place, one person that you have of אהבה הבלתי תלויה בדבר.
Now the way you usually discover if you have a ברית אהבה שאינה תלויה בדבר, the way the world is set up is only through possible machlokes. One time I wanted to kill Naftali. Just one? More than once. I'm gonna can I embarrass the yeah, I know.
Yossi's... I want Yossi to keep on coming to shiur so I have to give over these things. So the knives come out, starting knocking out. This is this is pre-clean days, right? So so Naftali's in the so decides at the age of 30, probably 30, 29, 30, 31, to put out an album that has every single Jewish singer and their grandmother on it.
Okay, did you see the cover of this album? It's called Naftali Kalfa Project. You recorded one of the songs with someone else. Remember which one? Bivani? Yeah. And it was my first time, we had just gotten to know each other really well that year.
It was my first time and I said to myself, bememet, I remember where I was sitting. I was sitting in the car right across from where, even before Noah lived in that deserted, where Feigenbaum lives now. Before that, that house was deserted for, right? For a few years. There was no one in there, nachon? For a while there was no one in there.
I was sitting in the car and I was, I love this guy so much, but if I don't say what I'm feeling right now, I can't, I'm gonna continue to pretend and it's gonna grow resentment and this and that. And I told him, I was, this doesn't make any sense to me and davka with that guy who used to get on my nerves, right? And it was a matnas chinam because there was total bitul at that moment and even said, you said, you know what? I'm gonna delete that track or take him off and put you on. I didn't even want to be on it because I only wanted to be on one or two songs. I ended up being on how many? Four, six? Right.
It wasn't about that. It was just the feeling of ne'imut. From that moment, every time, and it's baruch Hashem a long relationship, I know it's אהבה בלתי תלויה בדבר because I will and he will always say if something's in the way. Always.
Doesn't mean you reach this state of peachiness. Oh man, we went through that and now it's all peace and love. It's high and it's low and it's gevalt. But halevai, but it's אהבה בלתי תלויה בדבר.
And I wonder sometimes with chevra here if I actually told them what I think I needed them to hear, if they'd actually be able to come and look at me the next day. And it's a very interesting thing. Just a matter of whether we're being real. If we're really being real, then we'll be able to see each other the next day.
If we're faking it, then no. Let's talk after shiur. It's easy to, it's easy to say those things. It's very, very, very, very difficult.
Why? Because these are things that the geula stands on. And this is all in the ruach of Tam, today's letter. Tam would not be able to stomach machlokes amongst deep handpicked people that live in the community. Wouldn't be able to stomach it.
Now he continues: כשידידים אמיתיים ישכילו להבין עד כמה הם רחוקים מהשגת בחינת עבודה זו. When real friends will be enlightened enough to understand how far they actually are from holding, holding this avoda.
ויתברר להם עד כמה הם שקועים בלי משים ובלי דעת בתוך עצמם without even noticing. It's not bechavana.
You don't even realize it, you don't even notice how much you're in yourself על ידי הצר הצורר אותנו על שעה through the, now this is an interesting thing. Usually tzar hatzorer is usually like a dictator. It's a governor. Oi, he's making me feel so small and so little.
Hatzar hatzorer osanu is the subconscious chatterbox that's going on. And what is it really doing? When it says you're right and he's wrong, you're right, he's wrong, what does it really do? At the end of the day, it's marchikenu mehakodesh. It takes us away of holiness להיות נפרד מצור לבבנו וחלקנו שורש חיותנו. It separates us from being a part from the rock of our heart and that which makes...
It makes us alive for real. It takes us away of shoresh hachayim, of the root of life itself.
או אז יתחילו לחיות עם עוצם הסכנה להיות חלילה מנותק מן השם יתברך. What ends up happening afterwards is that you actually start living with a clear and present danger to be disconnected from Hashem.
Disconnected from Hashem. Then the person, yes, Eli. So this is the inyan, right? When he says, do you have a, does he have a mic next to him? It's over there. I would bring it closer because this is very important stuff and I want it to be heard.
Thank you. So this is the inyan. When we separate, I still need you louder just for me. Sorry, sorry.
When we separate from our friends, we're mamash separating ourselves from Hashem. Right, because as you're saying, you're speaking to a chelek Eloka mima'al, and if you're, and we do it subconsciously, like something all of a sudden something triggers me, and then I'm focused only on that, and I'm not focused on the person anymore, I'm not focused on what's real anymore. Right. And if I'm smart enough and I'm self-conscious enough, I wake up to that fact because the biggest disaster, right, in the world is to be disconnected from Hashem, and that's why Rav Oshie's derech hachlal is so revolutionary because he would say it's not revolutionary at all, it's what we've been learning all the time.
But it's a matter of כל העולם כולו גשר צר מאוד, what's the gesher? I am always, if I slip off to the right or left, I could become further away from my root, from the root of my existence, which is God. But I don't notice it. I'm only woken up to it when I have a pain or I have something grinds my gears, whatever it is. Then I realize how easy it is for me to get off track and without even noticing it, like in a second.
In a split second, completely off track, forgetting what any of this is all about. Correct. In a split second. The power of distraction is, there are siblings that haven't talked to each other in years and years, all stemming from a moment of distraction, and buildings and buildings of misunderstandings and alienation, all stem from that.
Now, they've already built a picture in their mind of what it's really all about. Maybe like this guy was writing Rav Oshie, like I know what, no, it begins, it's true that that's what you're feeling, and you're under the assumption that you totally know the reason for this bigger picture. It stems from a moment of being distracted from the notion that aside from not liking the person so much, there's a whole build up that is in the mind in terms of what it's really all about and it's not kasher to anything. We're all good? Okay.
Then there's this moment of awareness that happens, and I realize nituk, nituk, disconnect.
ואז תתעטף נפשם בתפילה בבחינת תפילה לעני כי יעטוף. Then their soul is connected in davening in the aspect of the prayer of a pauper, of a person in poverty, ki ya'atof, that that's what I'm wrapping myself with.
בחינת עני ממש של דלות וריקנות גמורה.
Feeling completely and totally poor.
שאין לי שום דבר. I have nothing.
ואינני חפץ בשום דבר.
And I don't want anything.
ואין אני עתיד לקבל אלא להיות יחד עם הבורא. And I am not, the only thing I want to receive is to be together with the Creator.
כי מה אני ומה חיי.
What's my life all about?
ואם תצדק מה תתן לו. This is lashon that comes from, I don't know by Sefardim, by Ashkenazim in Tefillat Neilah, yeah? The lashon there is אתה הבדלת אנוש מראש ותכירהו לעמוד לפניך כי מי יאמר לפניך מה תפעל ואם יצדק. I forget the rest of it but basically at a certain point, like when we come to Neilah and we're ready to just be real, we say, and if I'm right, and then what? Like what, we always think that only if like I'm right, then the, then it'll be clear. And then you're right.
I was talking to... I was talking to, I'm not going to get too detailed, but I was talking to someone that was, two people that were in this inyan. And I said, "Listen, imagine right now that this person comes to the realization that you're right. And, like, what, what's going to be after that? What, what changes? What's the aftermath of that, of right?" Here he's saying over here you could stand before the Ribbono Shel Olam and have the greatest taynas as to why you despise this person and why the machlokes you've already made it up in your mind it's l'shem shamayim.
Hashem says, "yasher koach. You know what? You're right." So you walk out of there saying, "gevalt, oh my god, I'm right," but you see that Hashem still looks the same, kiviyachol. I say, "Hashem, wait a second, emes came out right now, you said I'm right." That's not the type of emes we're talking about. Again, this is not a halakhic dispute about money and stuff.
I'm talking about nefesh stuff, just to be clear. We have beis din, we have a way, you know, there are places to go for claims v'chulu. And if you're right, and then, then what? But when and when a person realizes that just because I'm right it doesn't mean anything. Now, this is unbelievable.
Reb Usher describes what happens to a person. Fifth line. I actually, I'm b'safek, do we, is it fifth line by you too? Harei az... No, I'm a bit of a paragraph.
Yeah, I'm in the middle of the paragraph too. Harei az niftachim? Hmm, it's just formatted differently. Okay, but it's in the fifth line, just so we have the same... No, like 11 down.
No, it's like 11 down. Oh, okay, okay, okay. So, sorry, I guess I have an older version. Do you want this other? You know, for now, just for the sake of the shiur, yeah.
Yeah, fifth line.
הרי אז נפתחים לפני האדם שערים של אמונה שלמעלה מהשגתו שישארו כך תמיד. This is so beautiful. He says what opens before a person when they reach these places of realizing that even if I'm right, now what? Then gates of faith open for a person which are much higher than where your grasp was and they stay there because what have you basically done? You've entered into a new domain, you've entered into a new realm.
This is unbelievable. We're always like working hard on how do I how do I keep a high going. Like, people ask me all the time like, "I was so high on davening Friday night, but then I went..." Everyone's always talking about, "How do I keep a high going?" right? A spiritual high. And here he's saying, you know, the real avodah, which is, listen, what he's talking about today, this is the hardest thing, be'emes, it's one of the hardest things.
And the real real avodah about being able to reach that recognition of even if I'm right, it doesn't really change anything about the matter and that all I want is to never ever be disconnected from you and I must see it through this interaction I have with this person that gets on my nerves. He says then you reach a gate of emuna that's lemala me'hasagaso, that's above and beyond your comprehension, she'yisharu kach tamid, and it lasts, it actually stays.
כי תכלית הידיעה שלא נדע. Because we all know that the ultimate level of knowing is recognizing and realizing that you never know, you never know.
I always tell you, how did Reb Shlomo start off every time he told a story? "Everybody knows, everybody knows." And he ended off every time by saying, "You never know." So which one is it? Both. It's that everybody knows at the end of at the end of the day that you never know.
אבל יהיה בבחינת תינוק המתרפק על שדי אמו שאינו חסר דבר כי יונק הוא ממאכלה ומשתייתה. He's saying the eventual place that the emes that we are all longing for is to feel that our relationship with the Ribbono Shel Olam is like a child in its mother's bosom and receiving sustenance and being satiated and having everything that they need because essentially what do we essentially what what do we need at the end of the day like in the shoresh what do we need to taste ta'am hachayim and to be chai, to be connected to shoresh hachayim, we need to be in this in this state of being that we are like a child that knows in this place I have everything that I need.
I have everything that I need. Now, I'm doing Bnei Machshava Tova now with the chevra in the machon and it's bringing me back to a lot of unbelievable memories. I felt that when we were learning that we had everything that we needed. But then it's time to evolve and grow and find more Torah that makes us feel like we have everything that we need every time I learn a letter from Reb Usher.
I feel that if I was real with what he's saying over here, I have everything that I'll ever need. Every letter. Every letter is ripping at the chords of the things that most people don't want to talk about. And sometimes people walk out of a Reb Asher shiur with the understanding of this is just these levels are too high, too hard and hey look at his chevra they were a bunch they didn't really get it together, said maybe his Torah was meant for us, I don't know.
Maybe it's meant for people with different set of keilim. Could very well be, I don't know. But all I know is that I want what he's saying over here. Okay, so I come to the realization that I want what he's saying.
That feels great, I want what he's saying. What do I have to do to get there?
אוי וויי איז מיר. What do I have to do to get there? What do I have to do to get there? Inside you could say okay I'm modeh like I understand like it's not about this nekuda and the argument or whatever but tachlis like what am I actually doing in the moment? Should I just give in to the other person? Do I admit or do I just say we both don't know and No no, never say we both don't that's a trigger, you can't, it has to be on you, yeah the listen let's meaning in a machlokes you agree with me to not know, right? Like of course not. No, I know.
Right. But then at what point do you let go of something? And what if what if the thing that you let go is so important? You know, you feel like it's so important whatever but obviously on a deeper level it's not important at all. In the deepest level it can never be that important. In the shoresh hachayim level it can't be that important.
The whole avoda was to realize that. That's what's important. Until you get to the bottom of it, it's still important. But that is still a tzar hatzorer, that is still like a dictator dictating to you how you should feel about another person.
Mazel tov so you're holding on to your truth. In the meantime what's happening? haemshech vehachurban. No geula. Right.
That's what's happening. Very good. In the meantime what's not happening?
התנוצצות אור הגאולה השלמה. Nachon.
Nachon. What do you do if the other person has no desire to be with you? I'm telling you the whole shiur that's the question that's in the back of my mind. Mamash. The whole shiur.
Yeah. That's exactly. It doesn't matter, it's matters what you do with yourself. You can't control yeah it's on that meaning you can't control you can't control them.
You have to make yourself a kli that's ready for geula. But be sure that if you've really gone there in yourself, there's more of a chance for that to be an ohr chozer on the person that's still holding on on the other side. No benefit no guarantee but there's more of a chance of the ohr chozer to go the reflective light to bounce back onto them. More of a chance.
Not guaranteed. At the end of the day this is matnat chesed Hashem. Yes Eli. You tell me if I'm repeating myself.
I might have said it once before. At one point I couldn't take it anymore. I couldn't take the derech anymore. And I spoke to the to the person who brought me in and I said I don't understand this, I have to be a shmatte? Like 24/7 I have to be a shmatte? I can't.
Everything I've been taught and raised I can't do it. Right. So this shocked the person and he went to Reb Asher with the question and he came back the next week because you had to wait a zman on Shabbos. So I gave Reb Asher your question.
So yeah. And he said he's right. But you see it works. So I chewed on that for a little bit and it was very hard.
But over the course of time I realized every time I left the derech it was much worse than when I was on it. Oh wow. It was much every time I got slammed I had no choice. That's I think what it means when you sort of get it for real.
It's not like it's all hunky-dory. No. You're not living in Nirvana and bliss and so on. But there's an anchor of how you approach it so that when the storm comes again, you don't get thrown all over.
Bidyuk. Why because you've entered into what? What does this mean you entered into shaarei emuna? What does that mean? You've understood you've touched eternity. I mean nothing less. You've understood that there's something far below the surface of everything you think, no matter what you think, that is eternal and there.
And what you think is what you think for the moment. It's the trigger, it's the distraction. And so I realize it doesn't mean I don't get angry. It doesn't mean I don't get upset.
It doesn't mean I don't get depressed. But I have some I know it exists. I know it exists. I know it exists.
And that is just allows you to... I know that it exists. Yeah, Erez, yeah. It's an interesting thing because there is that idea that if someone's criticizing you and you say nothing, you get the greatest reward, right? And I always thought about it like oh, in the next world I get the reward, but maybe like he's saying the whole point is that no, it's actually by not saying anything the reward happens right now.
By being quiet, by not saying anything. Oh, you're making me feel so guilty right now. Let me go back to him. No, no, no, not about that.
Oh, I was zocher for one of the greatest bushas in the world once. Like the greatest busha in the world. It actually is. He convinced me to take a gig, I don't know if I ever told you this story, he convinced me to take a gig on Chol Hamoed Succos about three years ago, four years ago.
mashu kazeh. Three or four years ago in Binyanei Ha'uma. And it was, I was on the bill with, there was an opening act, I don't know who that guy was. Then it was me, then was Benny Friedman, and then was Ohad Moskowitz.
Completely not my scene, not my crowd. I needed the parnassah and I felt like, and they were willing to pay, and it seemed like this could be a moment of, I know that stage very well, I've performed there so many times, that's a mechubadike stage, this is good. So the thing is, it was מוצאי יום טוב שני. So the guys, it was mainly American yeshiva bochurim, okay, I'm just going to say it.
And they were coming after two days of Yom Tov, right? So they're coming Motzai two days. So you can imagine the energy they need to release, right? I go up on stage, and I have pictures to prove this if you want to see this. In the middle of the first song, they start throwing things at me at the stage. I told you once? They started chucking things at me on the stage.
Yossi, you would have loved this. I remember, I remember you after. You were there? Yeah, I remember. No, no, no.
What was the impetus? Trashed. Trashed. But all the rebbeim were there and they did nothing. Reminds me of Tommy, I remember him telling me he played behind a mesh net, like a chicken wire fence.
Really? There's a reason these stories are trickling down today. And I couldn't believe what was happening. I had three different times I wanted to say to them, you know that I would feel more kedusha in a church right now than being in front of you guys, or other things, really, I wanted to rip all of their rebbeim sitting there. And other things, but there was thousands of people there, this is happening.
And I see Naphtali in the corner, he was backstage like this. At a certain point, they just kept on throwing more and more things at me. Then they charged the stage. And Naphtali jumped onto the stage and charged the guy before he got to me.
It was crazy. And I'm playing, and the guy charges the stage. And then I just stopped. In the middle of all this, I said, what's the emes right now? If I rip them, no one's going to hear anything.
What's the emes? The emes was: stop in the middle of the song, pull out my cord from the guitar, and just walk off. I walked off. Why am I saying this? Because there were two holy people working backstage that came running after me and they put their heads down and they said, can you give me a bracha? Wow. Yeah, they said please, right now, they said this is going to be the highest bracha we ever got in our life, give me a bracha right now.
So I feel bad because I didn't fully, I went up to the next performer and I said to him, I just want you to know what's waiting for you out there. And I was sure that there would be such a bizayon Chilul Hashem, disgusting, mamash disgusting. I remember the next few days I had gigs throughout the country and I was walking through the Rova one day and I saw that this was the talk of the town. That's not limud you're a Rav you should teach them how to it was all these nisyonos to really harp on it but when you have moments when you really are mevuzah you know that means when you're completely embarrassed and cut to shreds it's true that these are moments that if you really really are holding then you when and then in that place you give a brocha to someone maybe that's what it means that in this world already now that becomes your shtickel Gan Eden and then you and then you realize wait I've tasted now entering into a I didn't I could have I could have tasted a much deeper experience I was okay but it could have been much better and maybe that's what it means that I know that that place exists right I've touched it I'm not there all the time but I know of its existence and just knowing of its existence maybe enough for me to make it till the next time till the next time and to not get so startled from things that in the past would trigger and I'd lose my mind that's the deepest level of avoda this stuff that happens over and over again yeah I can't help but tie it into the Friday to the Friday shiur with the folding of the tallis oh it's folding and folding again and folding again and it's not and it's mamash it's just I want my ratzon to be your ratzon that's it that's the kavana Hashem's ratzon is that you don't fold with resentment ego death not you anybody I'm saying not Yosef I'm saying bichlal like all this yeah but I was thinking about it there is a reason we fold our tallis every morning not just Motzei Shabbos and now I think about it every morning that I put my tallis away yeah nachon okay let's finish this letter Zos ha'avoda this is the avoda חיוב על כל אדם ישראלי באשר הוא שם ואף אחד אינו רשאי להיפטר ממנה everyone has this avoda on themselves ולא כדעת הטועים אחרי עצת היצר שאינה רק לגדולים אשר בארץ המה ולא עליו המלאכה this is very easy to fall into this what Reb Asher is speaking about is so high and holy only big tzaddikim could reach such levels of of getting out of the way and of looking at nekudas hamachlokes like this he says Ki lo hi that's not the situation it's you it's me it's all of us כל אורך הגלות הוא על ידי כל העולם כולו הנהרים אחרי השקר והבל the length of this galus is a culmination of people running after noharing means more than running Bibi once used this in one of his pre-bechiros and it got him to a lot of tzaros how would you say noher flocking flocking he was saying something else here you're saying the world is flocking to what sheker vehavel now you're saying listen it's not sheker vehavel it's a dispute between friends if it's still more important for you that you're right and that person's know that you're right and he's wrong even if you're right המציאות היא שקר והבל in the B'emes l'amita you under- is that clear even if you're right המציאות הזו היא לא מציאות של אמת Uvintayim in the meantime after you're running towards the sheker vehavel הוא גוזל וחומס כל חלקי הקדושה you are mamash stealing all the all the possible moments of kedusha that could be in your life Be'akshanus nora'ah with such stubbornness Ke'ilu kayam la'ad as if you're here forever you're forgetting brother you're going to be six feet under Ad meah v'esrim you're going to be six feet under הגם שיודע בבירור כי סופו כליה וכל הרשעה כולה כעשן תכלה ותעבור ממשלת זדון מן הארץ Zos omeres you and this bad mida in you are going to be six feet under I can know that and still hold on with stubbornness to what I believe is right Anna chaver yakar Reb Asher is addressing this person my dear friend בוא ונתאחד כולנו להתחיל את העבודה מיד בלי שום פחד let's start this avoda without the fear of what am I going to lose if I let my guard down and I open my heart to a machlokes that I have in my life what should we be scared of רק נפחד מעוצם סכנתנו Let's be scared of real deep danger.
להיות נעלם רגע אחד מן האמא של העולם. To be ne'elam, to be disappeared from Mama, the real mother of the world. And then when that becomes my greatest fear, אז נצעק אליה בכל לבבנו אמא! We'll scream with all our hearts just that, Mommy.
היכן נעלמת מעינינו בזמנים הקריטיים? Where were you in crucial moments when I needed you the most?
וזוהי התפילה הקצרה שביקשת לשאת למען גאולתן של ישראל.
This is the short tefillah that you must have desired to either compose or have learned or what to davven for for the ge'ulah. He must have added that in his letter. This is the ge'ulah. Ima! Where were you when I needed you the most? tefillah sheta'aseh perot.
That's a tefillah that bears fruit.
למען למען כבוד שמו והקמת השכינה מעפרה להחזיר עטרה ליושנה. This is what restores the Shechinah to Knesset Yisrael.
להשיב לב אבות על בנים ולב בנים על אבותם ובקרוב בימינו אמן.
Amen. Amen. We will continue be'ezrat Hashem Reb Osher on next Monday be'ezrat Hashem. And I just want to encourage everyone to come to the shul tonight at what time? 8:30.
8:30. To honor, to honor the soul of, the soul, you know, I just had another memory. One time you, Eliyahu and him went at it during a shiur back in the day, back of Kapot Temarim over Kennedy or or LBJ. Like we're all sitting there, kids of the 80s and late 70s and two bros that were around back then.
I have it on tape. Okay. He got so... when something he didn't agree, when he had his opinion, whoa boy.
Whoa boy. But then he would always go back to the place of what the heck do I know? Always. In his merit there should just be achdut between us and a desire to really be bnei chorin and avdei Hashem and to live a life that the only fear we have is a fear of disconnecting ourselves from living with the presence of Hashem in our life even for one second. Amen.