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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.
00:00 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Welcome back everybody to day number five in Orchah Tzaddikim. We're on page 25.
V'yeish odom sh'hu yedeah midos harois sh'yeish boi. And there is a type of person who knows some of his negative traits V'choish avlotes, behem velechos, be'midos ha'teves and he decides he's going to venture out there and change those negative traits and stick to his positive traits. And even if he doesn't succeed every day, such a person potentially cannot succeed in finding this proper way of sticking to his good virtues, to his good traits, because he's lazy in seeking the proper way to attain those positive traits. We said earlier that Ruven was looking for Shimon, but he doesn't know who Shimon is, he doesn't know what he looks like. But now he's saying a different example with that Saying Ruven knows who Shimon is. Even though he knows him, he still doesn't find him. Why? Because he's not looking properly to find him. And this the verse states in Proverbs in Mishle the tongue of the righteous person is of the choicest silver. Now the author gives us a whole parable of what is going on here in this verse and what Shlomo HaMelech, what King Solomon is telling us here. If someone borrowed money, now he's paying it back with silver. If the person who's receiving his debt back, doesn't know the value of silver or he doesn't know at all the values of these things. He says in one way or another, if he's not experienced with dealing with silver he's going to take the wrong amount of weight of silver and he's going to end up losing money. Even if he understands in weights and measures and value of silver, if he doesn't carefully weigh it there can be mistakes that come up with it and he's going to lose out on the money on his return. But if he understands he understands in weights and he understands in values of silver then only then will he get his money back. So here the Orch HaSaddikim in our introduction here says L'chein dimoloshon tzaddik l'kesaf nivchar. Therefore he says that the righteous is compared to the choicest of silver. Ki ha-tzaddik tzorch l'hakir ha-tov ha-aral li-yos boki be-erech kol midah. He says and he needs to remove himself from all nonsense and to embrace understanding and remove a mixture of waste from that from them, and to have it pure, and then his neshama can be perfected and crystallized. When the waste is removed, then the vessel will be refined. When waste is removed from the silver, there will come forth a vessel for the refiner. So once you're able to clean out all of the imperfections, then you're able to bring out a fine product. Peirush, what does it mean? Kishi yosira sigim? When you remove all of the imperfections, all of the flaws, then you can have a perfected vessel.
05:00
So what is the author here telling us? The author is telling us that we many times find a good trait we hear a great lecture, we hear a great speech, a a great drusha, and we're like you know what I have to be more humble. And he takes on a midah of humility. And then the next day he hears another drusha, he hears another speech, another lecture, a sermon, and it tells him to work on his Lashon Hora. He shouldn't speak Lashon Hora, he shouldn't speak negatively about another person. So he takes that minug and he drops the previous minug, and then each one. He keeps running from one to the other and he doesn't have a clarity, he doesn't have a direct path to elevate him and uplift him in his midos and he continues to run from one trait to the next trait and he's jumping from one lecture to the next trait and he's jumping from one lecture to another lecture, from one inspiration to another inspiration, but not having a path. It's compared to someone who's trying to get to a specific city. He doesn't know the path, he doesn't know the roads, he doesn't know the proper direction, he doesn't know the proper path to get to that city and he gets all confused on the way. He goes miles and miles this way and he doesn't get to the city. And then he goes another miles this way and he still doesn't get to the right place. And this is what Shlomo HaMelech says in Kaheles.
06:40
In Ecclesiastes, king Solomon tells us the toil of fools exhausts him and he does not know how to go to the city. So a person can travel. He's traveling west and he goes the wrong way. He travels east, goes the wrong way, travels north, south. He doesn't know where he's going. He's never going to get to the right place.
06:59
Therefore, he says we have to have pity to people who invest all of their energies in futile tasks, in futile endeavors. We have to teach them the proper ways. And he's going back now to the parable of the silver. We have to teach them what it means to have pure silver. We have to teach them what it means to have pure silver. We have to teach them what it means to have pure midos. A person has to be guided on the right path. We have to get him to the fertile land which is Yerushalayim, fear of heaven, as we said all the way in the beginning of the introduction, which this is the bottom line of everything. The bottom line of everything is for a person to have Yerushalayim to have fear of heaven, for a person to have Yerushalayim to have fear of heaven.
08:01
V'hi yashela asher ha-Shem yisbarach, sh'mo yishoyel mikol adam, and this is the demand and the request of the Almighty in Devarim, in Deuteronomy d'chsiv, as it says in the Pasuk ma'a Hashem alokecho shol mi'imach ki im liyira es Hashem alokecho. What does Hashem? There's no action that if we do work on any midah, we work on patience, so we work on laziness Any midah, if we don't immerse it with proper fear of heaven, then, god forbid, it will be a futile and wasteful effort. And that is the guide here of our author and our chassadikim, guiding us to make sure that everything we do should be completely infused with Yerushalayim, it should be infused with fear from heaven, because only that way will we attain proper perfection in our traits. Hashem should bless us all that we should succeed to attain this greatness, amen.