Parashat Qorach: The Cost of Holiness

[Music] this week's Torah portion is parashat korach the name korach obviously is a reference to the cousin of Moshe aharon who in this restorah portion attempts to usurp attempts to challenge and overthrow the Kahuna or the priesthood that was bestowed upon our subtitled is teaching the cost of holiness is built upon the concept of what we call a mahluchit a dispute now when Jewish thought a Mach logic can have a positive and negative impact there's two categories of a mock located one is known as a dispute that's for the sake of heaven or a Mahal a dispute that's not for the sake of Heaven and so adhere in every Market is essentially an element of falsehood now in relation to Quran with his cousins there was the claim that claw Israel that every single Jew is rooted in kadusha and if that is the case why does Moshi naharon make themselves appear to be more holy we take a look here at the very beginning of the Torah portion about mid bar numbers 16 verse 1 through 3. and we read SAR the son of Levy which is very interesting that the genealogy would go all the way back to Levy the progenitor of the levitical tribe and that's another topic we get into for another day specifically with the name korach which actually is not a very kosher name within itself in fact you will find it named first mentioned in the homashid amongst the genealogy of Asaf amongst his descendants and that's something we could talk about for another day but we see besides korach we seize so we have datan and aviram the sons of elav and also n Ben palette on the son of pellet who were from the children of Reuben fascinating and this is 250 men excuse me missier Ada that these were leaders if you will resp this is respected of the name but they were really respected leaders men are renowned I'm not really fond of that translation but anyway it means that they were very respected individuals okay from amongst the tribal rule vein okay and from the other tribes as well uh individuals mostly it's from rufain but these are very respected individuals and then the verse goes on to say afterwards and it says they gathered against moshine and they said to them um this is very interesting claims are stating here it is too much for you for the entire Ada or the assembly uh all of them meaning all of Israel Are Holy to Hashem okay so why do you exalt yourselves over the congregation of Hashem this is interesting but I want you to take a notice here at the very first two words the Tauruses took okay what does that mean it means that he took himself to one side what does that mean he took himself to one side well the word that is used here to take is actually a transitive verb however the verse does not provide an object that therefore the implicit object is korach himself and so the Torah is saying that korok separated himself from the Assembly of Israel now it doesn't mean that he physically separated himself but that he spiritually separated himself and what's interesting is that Uncle Los and the Aramaic translation of this verse he translates the phrase and he actually says he separated himself we see her uncle losing number 61 and it says Clorox the son of yitzhar the son of kahat the sunolivi separated himself with data and naviron the sons of elav and um now what's interesting is that the word here is related to the Aramaic word literally means dissension separation Rashi in his commentary explained that the phrase means [Music] took his Essence very fascinating Rashi says small that he took himself on one side now at small it's from the word edsem which means like the very essence of himself he took the Ace of his himself to one side this is a separation here a pluchta but this is spiritual separation with the view of separating himself from the Ada from the community so what that he might rise up to protest regarding the Kahuna or the priesthood in which Moshe had appointed to his brother and this is what Uncle Louis met when he renders it in the Aramaic with that he separated himself from the rest of the community in order to maintain dissension or as Rashi puts in the Hebrew now this is interesting because we see according to rashif is essentially meaning that korach argued within himself internally he had a makaloket between his ego and his soul now when the Torah mentions the names of dattan aviram and also own from the tribal rovane the orh explained his commentary the reason why korok appealed to these respective men from benejo vein is because as the firstborn tribe of Israel the beneval vein had still harbored a certain resentment against Moshe because they felt that the privilege of the Kahuna originally belonged to them and remember the whole transition of the firstborn was made after the episode of the eagle zahav all right so in this situation this is when Chevette Levy became portion to Hashem was selected to actually be the leaders of the Kahuna originally if we go by the progenitors of each tribe we know that wuvane was the firstborn and so naturally his tribe should have actually had that position but they didn't and so there's been this resentment or a lease what was plugged into their ear from korach a sense of manipulation to rise up to challenge Moshe and we see here in the orhagimes comment he says it was Clorox attempt to contest acharon's appointment as konhagadol by using the claim of the beneval vein against for they were first prominent members of the tribe's ruvain the firstborn Yakov and as such they could claim a right to the priesthood that when the Torah describes the 250 leaders opposing Moshe under the phrase shame which is translated as a Renown or men of renown these were individuals once again from benue ruvain with korok who felt entitled they were the ones manipulated who got into her head psychologically to allow them to look at Moshe and as some type of dictators and then a very a very important observation about this rebellion in relation to the Kahuna is that the people coveted the role of spiritual leadership however what we see is that these individuals were not built for it it's a very valuable lesson that we see here from the Torah it says sometimes a person could covet something even though the Lord says the Torah says that you should not covet something of your neighbor or someone else for that matter and most of the time he was you're not built for it you're not qualified for it so while the benevue vein may have been manipulated even korok felt jealous none of these individuals were built for the Kahuna they did not live discipline a disciplined life worthy of being the teachers of the Torah and that's one of the things that the sons of were in fact one of the things we find in the mission of perkier Vault is this former musar this ethical uh if you will teaching to basically shun a role of leadership in a sense and this we see here vote 110 is brought down it says shamaya afterlong who were the rabbinical leaders of Halal and shamai they received okay the tradition the oral tradition that is brought down the name of shimaya they mentioned that you show that you shall love work however you should us you should despise or hate the rabanut or a place of rabbinical leadership any position of power and do not attempt to draw near to the ruling Authority so what that is is really a an ethical lesson and not trying to be envious of something that doesn't belong to you love work is not just saying love and into five per se but love the work that Hashem has given you to do whatever your purpose is in this world if you're not a Cohen in this sense then you do what the job is you need to do right maybe you're in finances who knows whatever the case may be that's the whole point however when we take a look at korok's argument we see this the manipulation that he uses is very fascinating is that he was a very interesting character per se and he chose his words wisely like uh well-spoken politician this is after all the first political upheaval on Israel's history and he attempts to make the argument that basically the entire nation is Holy to Hashem this is the argument that he used once again going back to number 16 3 they gathered against it's too much for you why well the entire assembly all of them are holy to Hashem and therefore why is it that you Titanic you exalt yourselves over the congregation of Hashem so korak's first argument was based on let's say flawed logic there's no denying that the whole Community Israel is not holy the aspect of Israel's Holiness is based upon their chosenness in fact this argument that korak is trying to make is rooted back in partially as a role Exodus 19 19 5-6 which God told the nation that you should be the 10 Lee sigula because a treasure people Kili to me amongst all the Earth that tend to you leave and you are to be to me a kingdom a priests a holy nation and that means that every single Jew possesses intrinsicity as far as Holiness is concerned there is no distinction between let's say Moshe and an average Jew this is why korok asks why do you exalt yourself over the congregation of Hashem and so Korra raised the millennial argument based on the equality of all people however quora was wrong was unaware of the twofold character of what we call kedushat Israel the Holiness of Israel over impartial Ray the Torah recalls the very verse from parashiger that we just read Exodus 19 6. by remembering the Jewish people by reminding I should say the Jewish people of their chosenness we see here in Deuteronomy 14 2. it says for you are a holy people to a shame your God um and therefore and Hashem has chosen you for himself to be a treasure of people from among all the peoples of the face of the Earth now if you take a look at this verse it appears to be superfluous and I explained many times before that whenever the Torah appears to be Superfluous is not assuming that we weren't paying attention the first time it rendered something it's there to teach us something another meaning there's a there's a deeper meaning here let's think about it if the people are already chosen to be a treasured possession to Hashem why does the verse have to put emphasis that Israel is different from [Music] all the other peoples that are on the face of the Earth I mean after all most of the world even though the Jewish people make up such a small portion of fragment of the population of humanity there's still this separation of Jew and Gentile right so why does the Torah have to put this emphasis here Rashi and his commentary explained that when the Taurus said that you are a holy people that the Holiness of the Jewish people is attributed to the father so avraham and this is Rashi based upon de siflure and it says over here your actual the essence of your Holiness comes from your fathers from Abraham Isaac and Jacob now in addition to the sanctity of vested from the fathers Hashem chose the Jewish people as his special segula his special prized possession if you will and what we learned from rashi's comment is that first the community as a whole is Holy is Sanctified it's set apart Israel is not just a conglomerate of people not just a multitude of souls it is an individuality in other words an entity unto itself a personality and that is what the root of the word is in scripture when we'll go back here to Deuteronomy 14 2 which repeats was this excuse me you're a holy people but if we go back to Deuteronomy here or Exodus in which the Torah says that you are the kadosh you are a holy nation versus let's say here in Deuteronomy where it says a holy people the word going I explained this many times before comes from the root word give ya give yah deals with physiotomy okay which means that you are a distinguished from the there's a distinguished personality trait within you your character everything about you makes you different than the rest of the people on the Earth and so this is why you can have someone be let's say a secular Jew or secular Israeli but yet still stand out from the rest of the secular world the sanctity of Israel's covenantal Community is inherited from their ancestors and so unorderly claim to that sanctity the individual must draw upon the resources of sanctity available to the community if the individual derives the sanctity for the community then Moshe derived as much sanctity from the community as the average Judah and so from this perspective every Jew's sanctity would be commensurate and equal Community nourished kadusha is inherited from one's ancestors however the Torah is not satisfied with the social aspect of kadusha at the community were the only source of sanctity that the individual will be deprived of his creative role his individual initiative his originality and uniqueness the individual would not be able to develop into a great leader therefore the Torah teaches there is a Second Source a second classification of kadusha the condition that dwells in the inner recesses of the individual each individual has their own unique Edition that cannot be shared by somebody else in fact over a month second explained that just as people have different ideas so they also have different kirushant that there is a separate caducea attached to every individual we find this brought down to 58a the sages taught that one who sees multitudes of Israel they say over there blessed is he who knows all the secrets okay why is this he sees a whole nation whose minds are unalike each other and whose faces are unalike each other and he who knows all secrets God knows what is in each of their hearts from this perspective the community derives kadusha by integrating the numerous caduce experiences of the individual members of the community and that means the caduce of individual can Sanctified the community in relation to the dispute were able to sanctify claw Israel via their kadusha and so with this explanation we can better understand the verse in parashah which speaks about the Holiness of Israel we can understand this in two parts once again this is what we see Deuteronomy 14 2 echoing back to Exodus 19 6 ATA you are a holy people to Hashem your God foreign you for himself to be a treasure people from among all the peoples that are upon the face of the Earth so we have highlighted here the differences in yellow and orange what the Torah is saying is that you are holy because you are a member of the holy nation verses in Exodus 19 6 it says you are a holy a giviyah you were you were a nation amongst the Nations but there's something that makes you different from them here we're talking about the nation itself directly that you are you the people as a nation are Sanctified set apart the Torah mentions the nation precedes the individual but then at the same time the verse continues in the transitions to what I have highlighted in yellow and it says Hashem has chosen you you the individual and the nation Hashem has chosen Lee Holt to form to become a treasure people for himself and so here in the second part of this verse is describing the individual the individual precedes the nation the amsigula and so this teaches that even though Israel as a nation has been bestowed what could you should do to this or the Merit of the fathers God has still charged every individual Jew with the mission to become a treasure people within the treasured Nation and so as far as the election of individuals is concerned their endowments cannot be equal each individual receives the endowment which reflects the greatness of his or her personality the individual kadusha experiences are incommensurate with each other they are proportional to the individual's involvement and dedication as well as the individual's depth and determination this is why we also see amongst the Navy in specifically amongst the greater prophets who which by the way were all co-edin yes these are not just nomadic Jews okay they had a gift of Prophecy these were priests committed to the Torah but yet each of them had a different degree of Revelation in their vision and as the rambam tells us that to the degree that an individual sanctifies himself consecrates themselves will determine the degree of how much how much they perceive Hashem and how much God will reveal himself to them so we see that some have greater Visions than others because that was all based upon your individual determination and commitment to Hashem one who is more consecrated receive greater understanding Revelation wisdom knowledge Etc so this kadusha is an expression of one's greatness and not all people are alike as far as greatness is concerned we learn this truth especially when the Torah goes on to say afterwards here in numbers 16 5. when Moshe is trying to settle the issue with korok trying to challenge him in our own's Authority and Moshe says to him fine you want to challenge us in his attire his entire assembly limousine in the morning interesting Hashem will make known you make known the one who is his own and the Holy One and He will draw him close to himself and whoever he chose He will draw close to him when Moshi affirms that one's calling is dependent upon their level of consecration he Compares it to the morning to book air right this is fascinating why should people have to wait until the morning time for Hashem to make known who is this shows a vessel couldn't Hashem just do it right then and there on the spot this is the creator of the world why can't he just speak right now what is booming done there is voice why in the morning this also reveals to us between something that took place at night right was it nighttime okay so what's the economy here between night dark Etc has the connotation of discriminating and differentiating between individual forms Booker represents a period of recognition of things events and people where on the other hand Arif we call night but is the mixture of the afternoon and tonight it is the contradistinction the time of of of excuse me here the time of basically the I had to work under my mind and just lift off me because I remember something that was in my notes but anyway Arab is the Contra distinction of time of something of being uninformed something that's not informative it's uniformity and therefore it's something everything is blurred okay you can't discern something Arab is a time of apprehending the surroundings as a an amorphous formless Mass where individuals merge into one homogeneous black reality Moshe was telling korok that his definition at kadusha is essentially associated with Darkness it's pretty wild because in darkness you cannot discern the uniqueness of individual's kadusha bulk or on the other hand marks a time when the world emerges from the nightly anonymity into a world filled with a full of individual freedom and greatness and so what we see here is that essentially korok if you will did not like the way Moshe ruled and not like the way aharon ruled and so we see even further in his argument he makes the claim here he says it's not enough that you have brought us up from a land look what he says here it's not enough that you have brought us up from what the errors from a land flowing with milk in the honey honey is this fool talking about Miss crime let us not forget to partial to go in bahalo attacker that Midway through that Torah portion there was this upheaval the people becoming nostalgic to go back to the land flowing we could filter fish and falafels right and shashuka and all the other good things that you got on Section a welfare amidst crime right they wanted to go back to living in the ghettos of its rhyme and here this this this concealed this fool comes along and says listen you brought us from a land flowing with milk and honey and there's a reason why and this is a there's another inside thing the Torah is pointing out here but I'll digress back in a minute and that is because korok when he was amidst rhyme he was appointed as a specific trustee by the Midstream in other words he was somebody who was a guardian over specific goods and treasure he was a very wealthy individual okay he was very greedy that's essentially what he's getting at here he wanted more power so when he talks about a land flowing with milk and honey well the rest of the Jewish Nation may have been impoverished to the degree that they experience tolerating their lack of spiritual power amidst rhyme korok if you will was was living off of basically being a traitor to a certain degree and so here he's saying oh you brought us from that to this and then he goes on to say afterwards he is a repetition here yet you seek to exercise authority over us even to dominate further fascinating korok repeats the Hebrew word here it's twice the word Saran Hebrew means Prince however it's used here in the heat pile or the reflexive form which means to Reign Over in other words korach is claiming Moshe is ruling over the Jewish people like a dictator like a dictator like a Mussolini of some sorts contrary to koros claim he is dead wrong the Covenant Hashem has with the Jewish people is not based on being a political Community rather it's based on being a community that learns the Torah in a sense Moshe is not a king he's not a governor he's not a political leader of any sorts however he's a spiritual leader he's a morale he's a rebe and throughout the ages of Jewish history the central figure in the Jewish Community was never a king but the spiritual leader in this case it would have been the cornhagadal but through Exile it's always been a rabbi Arabi per se the king concept only came to fruition really in the days of David but after that with the split of the kingdoms there was never a king per se which is why when Ezra and the answer is returned from Babylon there was a say modification of some things within Judaism that a lot of things became more dominant by a Priestly LED sect which is why the name during the whole upheaval against Antiochus when they reformed the Jewish people after Hanukkah that they became political leaders they want the kingship as well as the Kahuna and that led to even though everyone celebrates the whole Hanukkah thing but it was shortly lived after the internal fighting amongst the hashemon 9 and then eventually the whole subterfuge of uh dominating a force converting many people in the region specifically uh the herodian family that became forced converts and you know the rest is history from that however the King was never the primary focus within Jewish history except at the time when you had a monarch on the David and the people are not considered subjects as in let's say secular political communities Dakota name we're not simply priests as they are seen in other religions no the kohnim are considered the teachers of the Torah we find this throughout various scriptures for instance later in Deuteronomy 33 10 it says that day shall teach your Miss pataka ordinances to Jacob Israel and your Torah to Israel and likewise in Malachi we see here for the Cohen's lips shall guard knowledge and also the torship is from his mouth for he is like an angel so we see here that the emphasis has always been upon the spiritual teacher if you will Moshe was respected amongst Israel not because he was a great political leader no but because he was there rebe and so a saintly person is the leader because he is the teacher korach and the anshay shame came against Moshe because they essentially took an issue with how he taught the Torah they did not want to accept their rabbi's teaching they didn't want to accept anything him or a heron taught and this is why we see here in number 1619 it says gathered the entire assembly against moshine now early on the Torah portion the Torah mentioned and I'll go to this passage here it says right here that they gathered against why is the Torah repeat Korah shame Gathering against moshinaharone what's up with the repetition why is there redundancy once again what's the purpose what is the tour trying to teach us here so the Midwest tells us that we know juxtaposed to the beginning of parasha qurak at the end of Parsha Sherlock is the Mitzvah a seat seat right which is very interesting I did a teaching on that it's on the YouTube channel about the conscience of the unconscious very interesting concept teaching with the with the Mitzvah CC take a look at it and we see that that comes as a very valuable lesson about faith and trust in Hashem seeing what we can't see sight Beyond sight and so the Midwest teaches that when the Mitzvah of seat seat was brought down from Hashem the Moshe and that there is a Patel that one must have a stranded tejed within their sitsiot the korov took an issue with this Mitzvah he thought he was stupid and so the mirrors tells us and I'll pull it up on the screen here because it's a quite lengthy argument but I'm only going to mention the part with the seat sheet that it says here that juxtaposed of course submissive seeds as Clorox jumped in and said the Moshe you say that they shall place with the CC in each Corner a strand one of the of these strands have to have this tejayla color and so he asks the question does a garment so in other words if you have all a whole baguette a whole garment that's of tehele do you have so have to have a tehreli a petal on your seat seat because by Quartz logic if that was the Mitzvah Compass is on this surely wearing a whole garment made of should basically outweigh wearing one strand of the Khalid right so the mirror says Moshe said to them such a garment is not exempt and still requires in the seat seat and they said how's that possible everyone wears All To Hell surely they have fulfilled the Mitzvah they fulfilled it right what is this what's going on here the message behind the midrash is that korok tried to bring a liberal form of Judaism a political correct form of Judaism teaching that all Jews are equal it says all Jews are equal each Jew has the Liberty to interpret the Torah as they please well koram tried to condemn Moshe as a political Tyrant some type of dictator the truth is he was against Moshi as a rabbi and did not agree with how he taught the Torah Quran wanted to Reform Judaism to be given the honorable title amongst the nation as korach rabbeno now regarding Mira's tahuma's story about quora challenging Moshe in the midst of a seat seat it reveals that korok was out to challenge moshe's authority this is what this all boils down to the study of the toran's interpretation Korah argued our exoteric Democratic acts in which every intelligent Jew May engage moshe's claim to be the the exclusive or legal Authority and exclusive interpreterator Torah according to korok was unwarranted quora wants to bypass the measure it takes to acquire insights of the Torah and so like horak there are many today who want to render their own version of the tour based on their subjective interpretations in other words people want to bypass what we call the torship about pay the oral Torah when it comes to mastering the actual Torah the written Torah Torah why is it the Taurus about pay cannot be acquired with subjective beliefs it has a methodology of its own and has a singular approach a distinct form of analysis something that's called lambut its own categories its own strange schemata for instance is there a common sense reason to exclude women from being formal Witnesses when the Torah tells us that man and woman were both created in the Divine shadowing God and takes for granted their equality the Taurus about pay has its own methods of conceptualization and in this regard the pulsic legal Authority works like the mathematician his constructs are ideal he does not merely study reality he prepares abstract schemata implies them to the world of sense mathematics is not just a corpus of equations nor is physics merely a collection natural laws mathematics and physics are methods of thinking likewise is the torshiba pay it's not merely a compilation of loss it's not man-made laws as people like to argue if one disregards the Torah about pay they open the floodgates to any ignoramus who could claim Authority like korach the Torah is composed of what we known as the both written in oral and the written Torah the Torah should be Tav consists of what we known as taryak which is an acronym for the 613 Commandments and those 613 Commandments do not apply to every single Jew there's mitzvah for women a woman who gives birth whether to a boy to a girl to a Cohen a Cohen have a doll there's different missile for The Sinner right there's different classification amidstv for different people so not everyone can fill all 613 mitzvotes but that is the 600 the torah's composer written Taurus composes 613 where the Tor Sheba pay the the oral tour consists of what we call shash which refers to the six orders of the mishnah shash is derived directly from the 613 Commandments now this is mind-blowing there are 4 192 mishnayot which consists of 63 or what we call tax treats on average each mishna contains six holocaults which is six legal rulings 4192 Mission equals 25 152 holocault or legal rulings on the 613 Commandments now think about that because there's many mitzvot mentioned in the torsubiktav that doesn't tell you what to do let's say seat seat for example that you should have CC on the four corners of your garment what constitutes a four corner garment in today's world people wear pants belt loops are not for Corner garments right so we have an additional garment wheel underneath a Tali Katan on top of the Telly good doll purely a rabbinical garment in nature but how does one make the tequila where does it come from you have to have the knowledge of the mishnah now of course there's different new sakim or traditions of how one winds their seats whether one's ashkenaz one safaric there's the rambams right the notion is how we come up with the numbers the windings all that have a symbolic you know Gematria to it yes but that concept is not mentioned to fill it right tortoise to tell you how to make them was consist of there's many things that the written Torah doesn't tell us when it comes to soldering animals right this is all mentioned via the oral Torah and this is why people think they have a universal knowledge on the word of God they're wrong because once again there's 613 mitzvot that apply to different individuals in Israeli Society but we have 25 152 legal rulings that apply to those 613 Commandments and so individuals who claim to observe the Torah while rejecting the tors about pay are in fact violating the Torah that they claim to believe in Believers of common says or let's say respect my feelings over facts religion are misled by their personal philosophies of Hashem such people expound a theory of religious subjectivism subjectism subjectivism I'm trying to say you know Season again tongue twisted adherence of this belief system say that God is interested in man's heart God is interested in the emotional world of man individual Believers of the system would argue that rabbinical teachers who live in the world of abstractions cannot determine the Redemptive power of The Commandments only a common sense approach is capable of evaluating the therapeutic energy of each Mitzvah utilize it in the most efficient manner now the midriff which I quote earlier from Mira sahuma it goes on and mentions how korok attempted to argue with Moses over other parts like if one has Seafood Torah a bunch of Torah Scrolls in her home do they have to put mezuzah up on their Gates and their doorposts right what's the point it shouldn't all decisions in a home negate having to put mezuzu up right because inside you only have one cloth compared to all types of whole parchment of Taurus rules right one sauce put mezuzah up at home even if they have a thousand Torah Scrolls in our home right and so korach he makes these arguments specifically with the tej because he doesn't find it possible his are his understanding what moshi's ruling does not appear logical so from the standpoint of Common Sense korok's argument might appear right if I have a Karma to hell it shouldn't that cancel the need of putting fringes on or if I have a whole home filled with Torah Scrolls shouldn't that negate the reason I have to put mezuzah on especially if I live in an anti-semitic neighborhood or people are not too fond of Jews right shouldn't that negate it so korok appears to have some rationale behind this argument a beautiful tequila garment would seem to have a greater impact upon one individual than a single threat because to represent the the blueness of the ocean which reflects the blueness of the sky which is a reminiscent of the Throne of Hashem so if I wear a whole Garment of blue that impress upon me and others as well the remembrance of God well Quran click others who believed like him they failed to understand the Torah consists of deed and experience the deed without experience is an incomplete act an imperfect gesture there are many mitzvotes that consist of experience for a prime example kiryat Shema is identified with the res with the recital of a certain fixed time in other words when we say the beginning part of Shema in that section we say um when you retire when you lay down and when you react when you rise when you get up these are the two times that you are required to take upon yourself to yoke of Heaven okay however the Fulfillment of the Mitzvah is the inner experience is the experience The Point of Departure must never be the inner subjective experience no matter how Redemptive colorful and therapeutic it may be no matter how great its impact upon a total personality a man so the Point of Departure must always be the objective external act the latter does not symbolically Express or interpret the experience the reverse is true the experience interprets the act and this can be understood when people try to downplay Mitzvah by what I call Super spiritualizing them and claiming that they are serving Hashem from their hearts that nobody should judge them because God knows their heart right very Democratic excuse that people use there are is a or a variety excuse me of reasons for the supremacy of the ACT over the feeling of these solid religious reality over the emotion first religious emotions like any other emotion is changeable is volatile and transient second each individual experiences God their fellow man and the world in a unique fashion if the religious act had to adjust itself to the inner feelings of man we would have to invest constantly changing rituals and unless you've been living under a rock you could see that's what's happening in today's day and age that people are trying to change the definition of the creator right first you know God is this now we can see God as a woman I recently saw what some denominations of Christianity God is transgender uh there's it's constantly changing with cultural change and I'm sitting back and I'm like this is funny right this is this is weird I mean all types of crazy Studio that's going on out there I saw people try to argue David hamelik and and your Natan were you know homosexuals or people who try to say Hey you know uh you know Jesus had two dads right for the Christians I'm like what is going on with the world right and obviously these people have no experience at all historically spiritually and understanding stuff but I'm mentioning this because you'll take a look at the form of the religious World attempts to modify its beliefs based upon the feelings of man in time the appropriate medium of expression today would essentially be obsolete tomorrow because in a world of let's say social justice Warriors political correctness or whatever waltness what is good for my neighbor is not good for me if the religious experience were the Point of Departure and a religious act had to correspond to the experience in other words cater to people's feelings there would be a variety of symbolic actions we cannot speak of a mononistic service of God this form of spirituality would essentially be considered a vote of Zara idolatry and according to Mr sakuma when korok challenged Moshe let's say with regards to the mitzvah's seat seat as I mentioned before he wanted to challenge him with other mitzvotes but Moshe would always conclude his argument by saying the pagans had many laws they had many priests and they can't even assemble together in one Temple we however we have one God we have one art we have one Torah we have one Altar and we have one Cohen hagedal mononistic worship is constant and not exposed to The Winds of Change I'll never forget my time when I was over in in Europe and I visit uh the dohani synagogue which is the biggest synagogue in Europe and it's the only synagogue that was never destroyed by the Nazis when they entered in to Hungary and Budapest and the reason why is because it was a Moorish style built synagogue and they used the top of the spiers for communication Towers so they could communicate back to Berlin with this thing but I remember the synagogue down the street the robinwitz I think it's a robin with synagogue which had mortar shell holes in it from the war that this came at a time with the haskala movement started to wear its head in Europe and the oscala movement means a lightning it's when groups of Jews started to want to think outside the box and to assimilate amongst their non-jewish counterparts specifically in Christian Europe to be a part of their universities and there was the attempts to start changing the skin synagogue around will no longer put the the bema in the middle we'll put it at the front like the church many started to add organs and stuff like that a few changes here and there and I never forget that this the history of this Breakaway movement from the dohani synagogue the Jews that went down the street I never forget seen that there was this this like this Banner wrapped around the the synagogue in Hebrew and at the top I wish I would share the image it's a very very eerie thing what we could read left from all the uh the deterioration of the building was essentially saying that we have one Torah even though it has two tablets you're not to separate the tour into two and what it was was basically a proclamation against the hascala movement that was attempting to create a separation attempting to change with the times that the people were in attempting to assimilate and what happened was many things started being interpreted differently and don't get me wrong I'm also an advocate of of also questioning everything under the sun I don't believe that everything that Judaism practiced today 15th century ashkenaz European jewry is is the exception of the rule either okay I you know there's certain things that will believe that the ex Judaism of Exile needs to be challenged as well certain thinking Etc to understand how to continue to move forward in a Redemptive fashion specifically with Jews living in Israel so I I understand that what we're talking about here is people attempting to modify their beliefs in Hashem to assimilate or because times are changing and we're living in a time today and not to go off on a rant but the creativity of the generations now there is none there's no originality how many times do we keep seeing the movie that came out in the 80s or in the 90s which were you know a box office hit attempt to be remade like how many times we're going to remake this movie but now we're going to give it an all women's cast and you know what we're going to remake this this um this superhero figure but we're going to make him uh he was white now we're gonna make them black now we're going to make a transient now we're going to make them gay we're going to make them we're gonna make him turn into a tiger who has sexual preferences of that of a monkey I mean it's all types of ridiculous nonsense and then they don't make any sales music people attempt to do cover songs of great hits that were done it's what's going on there's no originality and so those who stay true to their craft and to what they represent they will stand the test of time this is the whole point here with the Torah so when korok and his followers approached Moshe they basically wanted a common sense interpretive approach right they simply had no patience to study they had no discipline right they wanted to reap the benefits of being leaders but they did not want to be in the trenches dedicating their time their commitment to Hashem the Torah tells us korok and his group failed miserably they died emerged Victorious they were hashem's chosen vessels to continue to teach his Torah and to this very day we still study is wisdom and this masura this method of Surah of structures will continue till the end of time and so one of the things that we see here in closing with this teaching is that the cost of Holiness comes with a price I'm not sitting there to say that one needs to be a renegade Rebel uh in the system I don't believe everything is copacetic as well in the realm of Orthodox Judaism either don't get me wrong however if we have a time-tested masura passed down one should not attempt to modify that in order to be subservient or to try to blend in with Society in order to win brownie points that is only asking for disaster and this is also something that most people don't realize what was the great upheaval that happened two thousand years ago with the by Shani the second temple with the essenes the the sekorim the Jews from the Galil if you will in Masada that eventually win against Rome I know Josephus blames him as the primary downfall the destruction of Israel because attempting to surrender to Rome but these individuals were not going to yield to a foreign enemy or Empire an emperor who professed himself to be half God and half man and that when outlawing Judaism and a Torah that they should venerate this individual sitting on a seat in Rome these individuals went to their graves with their belief in Hashem they would not budge and this is what happened with the name with the days of Antiochus that when the Greeks are the outlaw Judaism many Jews were found practicing Brit Mila and her children women they were crucified and killed but nonetheless it would not yield they were not cowered in and that's the same thing today that individuals should not attempt to modify the Torah vashem they should continue to be diligent and the way this world is going today who knows how things are going to turn out everyone's being put to the test and I believe that we have to truly say committed and also resilient to the actual Torah Hashem to continue to be committed that is in everything with our families our individual personalities everything that brings us to a close for the teaching on parashat that you found this teaching valuable and also spark something within you share it with somebody that you feel needed to hear the message and also once again of our organization has been a blessing to you like to donate you can find a link directly below this video we thank you in advance for your support if you have any questions pertaining to this teaching you can also send me an email I'll get to those in the order that they come in until next time bless you and your family shalom foreign

Channel: Sulam Ya'aqov Inc.

Views: 1,919

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Id: uL6JtwX7drE

Length: 58min 2sec (3482 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 20 2023