Galus Mitzrayim: How Yissurim Build Emunah and Prepare Us for Geulah

Transcript

Also, we have the Moshe Rabbeinu's answer. Onim l'Moshe Rabbeinu al mashu amar, lama re'ota lama zeh, lama zeh shelachtani. Hashem answers him. Hashem gives him an answer, and says, Hashem as follows: Va'eira el Avraham, el Yitzchak, v'el Yaakov, lachen emor livnei Yisrael. This is what I want you to tell the Jewish people: Ani Hashem, v'hotzeiti etchem mitachat sivlot Mitzrayim, v'hitzalti etchem me'avodatam, v'ga'alti etchem bizroa netuyah uvishfatim gedolim, and the next pasuk is, v'lakachti etchem li l'am. These pesukim should be very familiar to you, because we all know that these are referred to in the Chazal as well as the Rishonim, arba leshonot shel geulah. These are the four vernacular terms that the Chachamim, that the Torah uses, l'gabei yetziat Mitzrayim: v'hotzeiti, v'hitzalti, v'ga'alti, v'lakachti. And of course, there's the fifth one, v'heveiti, which is the next pasuk, v'heveiti etchem el ha'aretz. For this we drink four kosot shel geulah, four kosot shel geulah. And the fifth one, Veheveti, is Kos shel Eliyahu. This every child knows. Arba leshonot shel geulah, four cups of wine. The fifth is Veheveti, and for that we drink Kos shel Eliyahu. This is kids' talk, as they say. Every child knows this. Any person who ever went to cheder, any person who ever learned by a morah, will know, V'hotzeiti, v'hitzalti, v'ga'alti, v'lakachti. Today, we're going to grow up. Today, we're going to go from being little children in cheder, little children in a nursery who learn the parsha and the Arba Leshonot shel Geulah as little babies, to being grown-ups, to learn it as somebody who thinks, somebody who is ma'ayen baTorah, should understand the four leshonot shel geulah. And I begin by asking you a simple diyuk. If you notice, we refer to them as the Arba Leshonot shel Geulah. Did you ever think to yourself why we need four leshonot shel geulah? Is the pshat that HaKadosh Baruch Hu looked in the dictionary and He found four leshonot which mean the same thing, synonyms. I think that's what they call it in English. When it's forward, we do the same thing. What do they call it in English? Don't say cinnamon, people get hungry. Sounds like Danish. Cinnamons, cinnamons, or cinnamons, whatever you want to call it. So you think that the Torah used these four leshonot because it happens to be there are four leshonot that you could use? That's good for pulpit rabbis. Pulpit rabbi has to say things in four different languages to make it look flowery. You know, say, tivko, anti, and... You got to stop this music. I don't want the cell phones here. I don't want it. Lasuv bemtza shiur. Rabotai, if the Torah took and used four leshonot shel geulah, obviously there's a significance to four leshonot shel geulah. It's not just שיש כאלו לשונות שיכולים להשתמש, and we used all four of them. Only yeled, only a child would think that way. The Torah doesn't speak double tongue. HaKadosh Baruch Hu lo kofel leshono...

Why is it important to have four, four leshonot shel geulah? It's not just because there are four leshonot that could be used, but obviously there's a significance to the four leshonot shel geulah. And I want to point out something even more important. Rabotai, as children you grow up thinking arba leshonot shel geulah is the lashon. That's the way it's brought down, four leshonot. The truth is, in Arvei Pesachim, in Arvei Pesachim, Rashi, the Rashbam, and the Tosfot all bring it down that way. כנגד ארבע לשונות גאולה. But they're quoting a Yerushalmi. I went to look up that Yerushalmi. The Yerushalmi is on this Mishnah in Perek Yud. And the Yerushalmi doesn't say כנגד ארבע לשונות גאולה, but actually כנגד ארבע גאולות. It never says in the Yerushalmi that the four leshonot are four leshonot of geulah, but actually the four cups are כנגד ארבע גאולות, which proves my point that it's not just leshonot of geulah, but actually each one signifies, meramez. Al geulah atzma, the geulah for itself. What are these four geulot? What are they? Klal Yisrael left Mitzrayim. Geulah, they were redeemed. How do Chazal interpret that actually there were four redemptions here? What are the four geulot? But we know the leshonot are leshonot of geulah, but we're pointing out that it's not just leshonot. You see that it's arba geulot, not stam leshonot shel geulah. Yerushalmi says it clearly, that each one signifies a geulah le'atzma. What are they? What are these four geulot? Now, before we begin to answer this question, I want to show you a few more questions in the pasuk itself. The pasuk continues, V'lakachti etchem li l'am, v'hayiti lachem l'Elokim. Isn't that kefel lashon? Isn't that self-understood? If Hashem takes us l'am, meaning He takes us under His kingship, so of course, v'hayiti lachem l'Elokim. Why does the pasuk, why does HaKadosh Baruch Hu tell Moshe the hen v'hafuch, meaning the two sides of the coin, v'hayiti, v'lakachti etchem li l'am, so obviously that means I'm the King. So why does it say v'hayiti? Lachem l'Elokim. It's all understood. Hashem takes us as His nation. What does that mean? That He'll be the King and we'll be the am, we'll be the nation. So we understand, memeila, that it's v'yiti lachem l'Elokim. I have another question, another question. I don't understand why, and if you think about it, those that learn the pasuk well should really ask this question themselves. Moshe Rabbeinu was asking about what? The shibud of Mitzrayim. So the Ribbono Shel Olam answers him that the shibud of Mitzrayim is with a cheshbon. V'hotzeiti, v'hitzalti, v'ga'alti. All this is the shibud, and I'll take you out. Now what is v'lakachti? What is v'heveti? Is that tied back to the shibud, or that's a havtacha michutz al hashe'eilah shel lama yesh shibud Mitzrayim? Again, pay attention, rabosai. V'hotzeiti, v'hitzalti, v'ga'alti, these are all answers to why there was a shibud, right?

You're saying, Lama hari'ota, lama ze shelachtani? And the answer is, Votzeiti, v'hitzalti, v'ga'alti. What about the v'lakachti? Is the v'lakachti, and now I also promise you v'lakachti, and I also promise you v'heveiti? Or this is also an answer to lama hari'ota, lama ze shelachtani? Notice, it's actually two different, three different pesukim. The pesukim begin, Votzeiti, v'hitzalti, v'ga'alti. That's all one pasuk. V'lakachti is now in another pasuk. Are we to understand v'lakachti is a hosafah, b'havtachah sheHaKadosh Baruch Hu mavtiach, or is it gam tirutz la'she'eilah, lama hari'ota, lama ze? You understand my question? Interesting point. When you read the pesukim, you should be asking the same question. When the Torah writes, Votzeiti, v'hitzalti, v'ga'alti, v'lakachti, so the beginning we know is an answer to the question of lama hari'ota, lama ze shelachtani. What about v'lakachti? What about v'heveiti? Are those also an answer to the lama hari'ota, lama ze shelachtani? Or this is HaKadosh Baruch Hu mavtiach לו, chutz meha'tirutz? Besides the answer, lama hari'ota, lama ze shelachtani, I want you to know, b'nosaf על זה, יש הבטחות טובות לישראל, ולקחתי אתכם לי לעם, והייתי לכם לאלוקים. Why should I think not? Well, Sfas Emes maybe so much, why not? But I can come and say that it's not an answer to the Lamariota. And what about the Veveiti? And what about the Veveiti? Veveiti you can say, but— Aha, so you'll say that. I hear. You'll say, well, lakachti is— I could come and say it like this: You want to know, Lamariota, and the answer is, don't worry, they're going to go out of Mitzrayim. The v'lakachti etchem li l'am actually is referring to something else. The v'lakachti etchem li didn't happen right as they left Mitzrayim. You know when the v'lakachti li l'am happens? Later, with Kabbalas HaTorah. This is not just leaving. You see, if you read the pesukim— Well, so why did Hashem then say— I mean, maybe we can have some fresh air here, or there's a mitzvah to shout here in the heat. So why did Hashem then say, Shalach et ami vya'avduni? Et ami. So vya'avduni, that's it, in the midbar, vya'avduni. Vya'avduni, they will. Vya'avduni, no, in the midbar, Kabbalas HaTorah. Of course we know that in the midbar and through the midbar they became Am Hashem. Yes. You ask me, it's a very simple thing. You see, till this question, it's pretty easy. Now you have to start thinking. Understand that this is an answer. This is an answer to the why did you do bad and why did you send me? So the answer is, don't worry. Vhotzeisi v'hitzalti v'ga'alti. What about the v'lakachti? Because that's actually not as they leave, but that's throughout the midbar. That's really the next stage of the events that took place. V'lakachti eschem li l'am, what's that? You'll go in the midbar and you'll be mekabel the Torah. And then the next stage is v'heveti. Are those two stages, v'lakachti eschem li l'am, which is the whole midbar scene, v'heveti אתכם אל הארץ, are those havtachot that Hashem promises him, don't worry, I'm giving you plus l'mareiotav and l'mazeh shelachtani, meaning, you're going to go in Mitzrayim, it's going to be difficult, but don't worry, I'll take you out. Binosaf al zeh, v'lakachti אתכם li l'am, binosaf al zeh, v'heveti אתכם אל הארץ, it's a very big nafka mina. I've been asking, obviously there's a nafka mina. Meaning, first of all, it's a nafka mina b'pshat. It's a nafka mina b'pshat: is this an answer to the l'mareiota and l'mazeh shelachtani? A. And the second nafka mina is, are we to understand the l'mareiota is a reason, a base...

For not only the v'eitzeti v'hitzalti v'go'alti, but that's also the shoresh of the v'lakachti, and that's also the shoresh of the v'heiveiti. You see the difference? You don't understand what I'm saying. You know why you don't understand what I'm saying? Because you're paying attention. You understand why I'm saying it? Because you want to know. And you understand why I'm saying it? Because you're with me for years, and you know that I'm not just wasting your time on an eve. What do they call that? ... I'm not just wasting your time. I thought that's ... ... Okay, whatever. ... It was last night, so what's today? Adam. Okay, today's day. I'm sorry. Okay, now, pay attention. Try to pay attention, and try to be ma'ayen, because this is nogea to pshat, as well as it's nogea to yesod, meaning to understand the yesod of the shibud and the yesod of the geulah. Understand that this sedra is the answer to the end of last week's sedra. Why did you do bad? Why did you send me? And the answer is, lachen ... v'hotzeiti v'hitzalti v'go'alti. That answer is lama zeh shelachtani. That answer is lama harei'ota. I want to take you out. I make the shibud quicker so you work more. I take you out. Now this also, the answer, the answer to this is also v'lakachti, is the answer also, and by the way, because of this, v'heiveiti, or he's giving him havtachot. He's saying like this: A, don't worry, because I'll take you out. And don't worry, there's ... There's a lot waiting ahead, good for Klal Yisrael. But it's not necessarily an answer to the lamah ri'ota and lamah zeh shelachtani. Now you understand what I'm saying? Moshe, now you understand what I want? I want to know, is the v'lakachti, is the v'heveiti also an answer to the lamah ri'ota? Is it also an answer to the lamah zeh shelachtani? Or the answer is, v'teitze mitzrayim ... Stop. You should know, יש ... so much waiting ahead of you. What? V'lakachti, v'heveiti. This is one of the points that I think it's kedai to be me'ayen. What's the nafka mina besides the pshat of the pasuk? Do we argue to learn the lamah ri'ota and the lamah zeh shelachtani is already the makor, it's the base. This is also a reason that brings out the v'lakachti, and it also brings out the v'heveiti. Now, if you look at the pasuk, there's another question that has to be asked. In the pasuk, v'lakachti etchem li l'am, v'hayiti lachem lElokim, and I ask you, itself understood, if I take you l'am, meileh I, Hashem, will be the king over you. So why does it have to say it? But the next part of the pasuk is also very difficult. V'yadatem... Ki ani Hashem Elokeichem, hamotzi etchem mitachat sivlot Mitzrayim. That's also understood. I mean, if the pasuk begins, Ani Hashem, motzi etchem me'eretz Mitzrayim, so Moshe is being told, I am Hashem, and I'm going to take you out. So then, v'yedatem, you'll know. I mean, what ma mashmaus is this? It's already כתוב, Ani Hashem, motzi etchem me'eretz Mitzrayim. So we understand, v'yedatem ki Ani Hashem. If I took you out of Mitzrayim, you'll know that I took you out. Unless, unless the pasuk is trying to say, היה יכול להיות על פי דרך הטבע, על פי דרך נס נסתר. So I'm telling you, v'yedatem, it's going to be in such a way שיהיה אפשר להכחיש את זה, right? Maybe. V'yedatem ki Ani Hashem, I understand Ani Hashem. I understand motzi. But maybe it's going to be in a way that you won't be able to see it bavur. It'll be על פי דרך נס נסתר, על פי דרך הטבע, שיהיה מקום להכחיש את זה. אז זה אומר הקדוש ברוך הוא, זה יהיה כזה אופן שלא יהיה שייך להכחיש, v'yedatem ki Ani Hashem Elokeichem. אולי. יכול להיות, right? Maybe that's what the Torah is saying: Ani Hashem.

I saved you, good. But how is it going to come about? Are we going to have to sit and learn it through the Midrashim? Does the Midrashim teach us that that's what happened? Or is it going to be in a way that everybody, יהיה ברור וגלוי לכל, that Hashem took us out? Maybe that's why the pasuk says, וידעתם. That's maybe the havtacha, וידעתם כי אני ה' אלוקיכם, שיהיה בידיעה ברורה. זה יכול להיות. אבל אחרי השיעור, after we start figuring out the pesukim a little bit better, we'll see there's a whole new pshat, a whole new kavanah. Why does Hashem have to say, וידעתם כי אני ה' אלוקיכם? רבותי, בואו נתחיל לטרץ כל השאלות. Why did we have to go to Mitzrayim in the first place? How did the whole thing of shibud Mitzrayim begin? And the answer is, Avraham Avinu said to Bameh eda. How will I know ki irashena? HaKadosh Baruch Hu right there tells him, you say Bameh eda? Perek tet-vav, pasuk ches, you say Bameh eda? I answer you in pasuk yud-gimmel, yadoa teida, ki ger yihyeh zaracha b'eretz lo lahem. So when somebody reads this... He thinks that it's a type of onesh, that the four hundred—yeah, thank you for saying it. You know, in the black churches, when the pastor speaks, all the members go, Oh yeah, oh yeah. ... Yeah, yeah. It's a ... yeah, yeah. What's a ...? Yeah, yeah. He's edging me on that I'm right. I know I'm right. I just don't want to say over pasuk. I didn't say anything. Now, so when you read it pashut, you think that this is a kaparah, so to speak, a kaparah for Avraham questioning Hashem b'ma eda. So I saw Rav Aaron Kotler, zichrono tzaddik livracha, Rosh Yeshiva from Lakewood, zatzal. He says, You're making a big mistake. If you learn that this is an inyan of kaparah and onesh, you didn't learn it right. The reason why we went to galut was l'taken et ha'emunah, not onesh, but tikkun. Not onesh, but tikkun. Not a punishment. Actually, when you have a class, every teacher knows there's two methods that we could use. We could punish, and also we could teach lessons. You see, there's a difference between punishing and teaching a lesson. Was galut Mitzrayim, was galut Mitzrayim a punishment? That's how you learn as a little kid. Avram said, Bama'eda, and Hashem punished him with four hundred years of galus to his children. But if you think a little bit deeper, it's actually not a punishment, but it's a lesson. What's the lesson? Sometimes, through distress, through fear, through sevel, a person learns his lesson a lot better. When a person sits back and he listens to a shiur, for example, and it's comedic, meaning it's funny, and it's entertaining, and it's interesting, sometimes you don't understand the lesson from the shiur. You know why? It gets lost in the pleasure that you had in the shiur. But if the shiur is frightening, for example, you know at any minute I could turn around and hit you, at any minute I could turn around and shake you up till your ayim start to shake, so then you see it differently. Zrok mara b'talmidim. The Gemara says that a rebbi is supposed to command fear. So pashut you learn kavod haTorah. Not so simple. It could be deeper than that also, because from fear...

You learn better. When you know you have a test, and you might flunk the test, you learn a lot better than when it's just done. ישומע דברים יָפִים לטובים. The lesson of the ma'eidah, says Rosh Yeshiva zatzal, had to be taught b'shoresh nishmatam, that you don't ask such questions. Emunah had to be so barur to them that there was no room to ask such questions. How do you teach somebody such a lesson? Al yedei sevel, al yedei shibud, al yedei yisurim. They had to go through Mitzrayim, not kaparah for the bama'eidah, but to fix the bama'eidah. How? By learning that you don't ask bama'eidah. By learning that you don't ask bama'eidah. And how do you learn this? You learn this through sevel. You learn this through difficulties. I tell you this all the time, rabotai. Gemara, Rishonim, Tosafot, that you learn b'igiah, u'b'sevel. Sevel hamoach, sevel haguf, sticks with you a lot longer than if you learn relaxed. If you learn b'menuchat hanefesh. I told you over many times the story that my brother told me, Eliyahu. He told me that he was once arguing with his Rosh Yeshiva about a pshat in Tosafos. His Rosh Yeshiva is the mashgiach of Lakewood, Rav Tzvi's son, Rav Elya Ber Wachfogel. She was ... Remember, ... yeah. He had a lot of ... in his life. Not to go into it, but suffered tremendous amounts of matzavim kashim b'chayim shelo. Some of the bachurim here know. Unbelievable. Most people wouldn't be able to take it. So after arguing barichut with Rav Eliyahu Ber Wachfogel, so Rav Eliyahu Ber turns around to my brother and he says to him, You know how I know I'm right? If you would know kamas sevel, how much yisurim hayah li k'shelamadתי את הסוגיא הזה, אי אפשר שלא כיוונתי על האמת. Not possible. It was so much שיגע, and there was so much suffering I had to go through while I was learning this Tosafos, it's impossible shelo higati l'maskanot hanechonot. It can't be. It can't be. A person who learns mitoch yisurim, a person even from life learns through lessons from life. They are bigger than life. It's an expression in English. The lessons from life are bigger than life. You know why? Because you learned it mitoch hanisayon, mitoch hasevel. So then it becomes mushrash b'kirbecha. Hashem wanted that Klal Yisrael should learn emunah not just through what someone should come and teach them from a sefer emunah. They have to live it, and they have to suffer till they were koneh b'shoresh nishmatam in ענין של האמונה. He brings down, he brings down in the Rosh Yeshiva zatzal, a very interesting Gemara in Yuma. The Gemara in Yuma says that the talmidim of Reb Shimon bar Yochai asked him, Why does the man have to fall every day? What's wrong if the man fell once a year? Maybe once a year it should fall, and they should have enough. It's anyway miraculous. It's not going to rot. It's anyway miraculous. So he said a very interesting pshat of Reb Shimon bar Yochai, and it's interesting that it's Reb Shimon bar Yochai who said it. Interesting. And he said like this: If it falls every day, at the end of the day, you know what you have to think? To worry about tomorrow. Yesh li mishpachah, I have a whole family. If it would fall once a year, all year you'd be b'menuchas hanefesh. Yesh lecha shanah shleimah. And a person has parnassah, he feels secure. This year is secure. The midbar, the lessons—oh, he likes it. I'm telling a lot of people are thinking that way: If only I had security for one year, huh? Parnassah, the nisyonos of emunah that come from parnassah had to be mitoch hasevel, and the sevel is not...

What comes tomorrow? The fear, the yisurim that a person has to go through thinking, ma yihyeh machar, ma yihyeh machar. HaKadosh Baruch Hu, natan li. HaKadosh Baruch Hu can He tend me? Emunah kazu that's learned through yisurim, that's learned through life experience, is the greatest emunah that a person could learn. Because if he learns it from a Chovot HaLevavot, v'hu yoshev b'bayit sheyesh sham parnasa, ma hu lomed Shaar HaBitachon? בסדר, bitachon can, bitachon not, because HaKadosh Baruch Hu אומר, הערבה מה שיהיה לי ביטחון, החובות הלבבות מה שכן יהיה לי. But if you have to live it every day, lo yom b'yom, that's how you learn bitachon. Yeshiva Zatzal, יפה מאוד בגמרא. Very nice, you hear? The way he understood a Gemara, that the Gemara is teaching us that the lessons of emunah—you hear, gabi? You listen to this. Don't listen to it only with the ears; you listen with the heart. The ma yulad yom of parnasa is the greatest lessons of bitachon. And how do you learn the bitachon? By living it. If you learn it from a sefer, or you learn it from a rav who gives you a shiur once a week, you're not going to have much from it. So you kanes. If you don't have wax in the ears, you kanes, so קצת יותר. If you don't have hearing problems, you kanes עוד יותר. סוף סוף לא נכנס לו ללב. You want it to go into the dam, you want to go into the lev, live it, live it. Mefinot, says Rosh Yeshiva, that's why we had to go to Mitzrayim. We had to go to Mitzrayim, litovateinu, for our good, to teach us. It's not lonesh, but actually it's ltovateinu. Says the Rosh Yeshiva zatzal, and since I know you're here, I want you to pay attention, because this is the type of question you would ask. Ask the Rosh Yeshiva zatzal, it has to be, it has to be, that this was the matarah of going to Mitzrayim, ltovateinu, to teach us this lesson of emunah, that we should come out bigger and better. How does he know this? Now listen to a question. Peter Rosh Yeshiva zatzal asks, I know you would ask the same type of question, because you've asked these type of questions in the past. He's coming close, Baruch Hashem. Bo titkarev, you hear? איך אני שייך להגיד, איך שייך להגיד שאני חייב להודות להשם על שהוציא אותי ממצרים מכניס אותי שם? כן, you see, he likes it. You know why he likes it? Because he asked these type of questions. You ask me this with yetzer hara. Hashem, you put yetzer hara, deal with it. It's not my fault, not my problem. The Rosh Yeshiva zatzal gives a mashal. He says, could you imagine, throw a guy off the street, you put him into jail, and you give him yissurei איוב שמה, and then you say, okay, you had already 200 years worth of this stuff, come out now. Oh, thank you so much, ממש ... להודות, להלל, לשבח. ... להודות, לשבח. Who put me there in the first place? I should be angry that you put me there in the first place. I love you. You don't remind me? Iraq, this year. Tifaldik. What did they do? They're trying to show Saddam, the Mashgiach of Zichronos, trying to show that he is a good person. So what is he doing? He's letting out all the people that he put into jail, and he tortured them for years. He's letting them out. And these stupid Iraqis are running around, ‘Ooh, Saddam, because he's a tzaddik.’ He tortured you for years. Why did he put you there in the first place? No, no, no. Oti, oti, oti, because it's tzaddik, because it's a... They don't, because they don't know what's going on in the outside world. But those that know what's going on in the outside world, because they know that there's such a thing called a newspaper, even in Jewish. If you read the Yated, they have these stories. Yes, you don't know, because let me tell you, Iraq is a place in Babylon. No, I'm sorry, yeah. Why not? That's right. Why do you think I'm bringing this out? Ooh, very maiseh, very good. Says Rosh Yeshiva zatzal, this is what Moshe is saying now, that because it was l'tovateinu, if it was onesh...

We could say, ... there's a pasuk: I don't want not from your sweet and not from your sting, right? A bee, you know what you're telling? ... if you could stop stinging me. Same thing here too. Hashem, you took me out. Yeah, but who put me there in the first place? If, you learn, says Rosh Yeshiva zatzal, beautiful, that the whole thing was l'tovah, that we should grow from it. Vika, anachnu chayavim lehodot, l'halel, l'shabeach, says Rosh Yeshiva. Yeah, yeah, it's the whole thing. We thank You for everything, from putting us in there and taking us out. Sounds familiar. I'll tell you a cute story. I told the bachurim; they know the story. The story goes that Reb Leizer Silver, zichrono tzaddik livrachah, there's a book about him, The Silver Era. He was a gaon atzum, and he did a lot for Klal Yisrael during the war. He went to Washington. He even put on a uniform. He put on an army's uniform, you know, as a general, famous thing, a famous picture. Reb Leizer Silver, he put on an army uniform, and he went to Washington to speak to the president to get the Jews out of Hitler. This is a big tzaddik, Reb Leizer Silver. Goyen unbelievable. Charif nifla. So he was once at a meeting, and he was cholek on one of the other roshei yeshivot b'inyan mesuyam. He held differently. And they used to fight around about most things, especially about this particular inyan that they had the meeting about. So as he's talking, he got so excited, shezeh ta'ut, vezeh... He got so בהתלהבות that he screams, וזה שהוא אמר את זה, הראשיבה זה שהוא אמר לפרטיכים לזרוק אותו מפה. Get the frum out of here. And he was getting all worked up and excited, so they tell him, ... someone whispered to his ear, He's not here. ... לזרוק אותו. So bring him out so we can bring him in so we can throw him out. Standing here too, who took us in that we thank him for taking us out? You brought us in, ... What's the big thing? You brought us in and take us out, so who should we thank for that? Had you never brought us in in the first place, it would have been better off. And the answer is, says Rosh Yeshiva ... ומאחר שזיכיתנו, אפילו על הכניסה, even the fact that we were taken into Mitzrayim, says another nekudah. If you take a look, the goyim, the goyim, they heard what happened in Mitzrayim. It says in the pasuk, אז נבהלו אלופי אדום, נמוגו כל יושבי כנען. Fear, ... the fear. The goyim heard everything that happened in Mitzrayim. Tell me, did it change them at all? They went back to being ovdei avodah zarah. They went back to being ... Yisrael. Why? If all the miracles, all the miracles that happened, was so much to change the Bnei Yisrael, why were these miracles not enough to change the goyim? Why did they go back to their aveirah, and even more? Amalek, such an Amalek. Well, what? They heard. Chil achas, they were frightened, frightened. It still wasn't mashpia on them. Why not? And the answer is, says Rav Shimon Shwab, this nekudah. There's a difference by seeing, hearing, living. The Bnei Yisrael had to live through it. The Bnei Yisrael had to learn these lessons mitoch yisurim. That remains a lesson by a person. Lessons that you hear as lectures, lectures, good, it moves you a little bit, it frightens you a little bit, but you go back to the next, the next day you go back to the way it was. In and out. Chil achas, they were frightened. Namoku. You know what namoku means? They melted. Namoku kol yoshvei Kenaan, they melted. And you know what? They melted, but they came back the next day. Why? Telo nichnas toch toch. When is it nichnas? איך זה נכנס תוך תוך? Klal Yisrael.

Chayu b'zeh. They lived in al ydei sevel, al ydei yisurim, then it's nichnas toch toch. Yitro. You know, could you get somebody who was makir et haBorei יותר מYitro? No. Yitro, he kir, ha'ish Moshe Yitro, and he comes where? He comes to Midbar. He moves from where he is and he says, Atah yadati ki gadol Hashem mikol haElokim. Mikol haElokim, he's the greatest. Meaning, he kir, hevin, shama kol, hevin hakol. The Lord says, it moved him. Chazal tell us, u'v'simchato lo yismach zar. He was sent home before Kabbalas HaTorah. Let me read you, let me read you the Yaavetz Shimoni, Medrash. Listen to a Medrash. It says in the Medrash like this: Vayishlach Moshe et chotno. Moshe sends away his father-in-law. I'm sure everybody here would like to do that, huh? Vayishlach Moshe et chotno. V'achar kach, b'chodesh ha'shlishi, right afterwards there's Kabbalas HaTorah. Rashi already brings down it's a machlokes: Yitro was before Kabbalas HaTorah, Yitro was after Kabbalas HaTorah. Rashi already speaks about it in Chumash. But this Medrash learns— Yitro was before Kabbalas HaTorah, and he was sent away before Kabbalas HaTorah. He came and left before Kabbalas HaTorah. Yimach shemo, with me? Says the Medrash, why? Omah Shlomo, because of a pasuk that says in Kohelet, Lev yodea marat nafsho. The heart knows its bitter situation. Nobody knows better his bad matzav than the person himself. Uv'simchato lo yismach zar, an outsider has no right to rejoice. Who's this outsider, and what rejoicing are we referring to? Omah HaKadosh Baruch Hu, it's referring to Yitro. Yitro, you're coming to Matan Torah to rejoice? Shalom aleichem. You ever see people come, Ooh, yeah, big mechutanim by the chasunah, yeah, yeah, ooh, everybody's dancing. Tell me, did you work hard for this wedding? Did you prepare? When the father of the kallah dances by the wedding, you know why he's dancing? It was a rough ride to get to this wedding. He has to what? He had to bring up the daughter, and he had to pay all her phone bills on the telephone, and he had to listen to all her chavertes, all her friends. I mean, it was a big thing, right, for a father to bring up a daughter, yeah? Levi, this is not Levi. When a father brings up a daughter, yeah, what happens? Then he has to get shidduchim. You know how hard shidduchim for a girl? It's hard these days, right? And then he has to start paying for a wedding, and then he has to get the best son-in-law in Lakewood. Costs him a lot of money. This is all hotzaot niflaot. You know, right? Anybody has a daughter, you know. The bank book, you have to get rid of your bank account. You have to give over your bank account, yeah. It's the opposite when you marry off your son. Why you kid? The same point. The point is the same. How many nights does the father not sleep because of the son? He's sleeping for you, huh? How many nights, rabosai? Then the wedding and all the problems. He comes to the wedding and he's dancing. He's dancing mibifnim. When the guy from the street comes off the street, Oh, there's a wedding, very nice. Who's the chassan? Who's the kallah? They don't even know, and he's dancing with the bottle on his head, right? The best dancer. Someone asks you, who's the best dancer at the wedding? Ah, this chassidish guy who came in and he danced so beautiful. Not he knows the chassan, not he knows the kallah, but he knows that there's a bank book there, so he comes to the wedding to, you know, to dance and get paid. Fine. What happens? So you're going to say that the best dancer at the wedding was this klapichutz, the one who sees it on the outside, externally sees that he was...

The best dancer. But the one who understands me bifnim—excuse me, excuse me. So the person, the person who looks me bifnim, he knows that who was dancing the best at the wedding? The father, the chatan, the father, the kallah, because they were dancing from real simcha. Yitro, yeah, was like the dancer who comes from, you know, from outside. Did you go through Galut Mitzrayim? Did you suffer a day in your life because of this? Nothing. Says HaKadosh Baruch Hu, Amar HaKadosh Baruch Hu, Banai hayu meshubadim b'tit, u'leveinim, v'Yitro hayah yoshev b'toch beito, b'vetach v'hashket. He was enjoying himself. U'ba lirot b'simchat haTorah. So what, you come here to dance with the Torah? They used to say over—you ever notice whenever they have a hachnasas Sefer Torah, right? Who's dancing? All the people. Most of these guys never learned a word in their life. A whole week you don't see them, but, oh, it's the Torah they're dancing. You know who should be dancing? Who's really dancing with the Torah? The person who's meamel baTorah. The person who sits, toils, and learns the Torah. That's called dancing for the Torah. Hashem didn't want this, that a guy who didn't learn a word, so to speak—I mean, of course Yitro was a chashuv person—but he didn't go through what Klal Yisrael... and then all of a sudden, Shalom aleichem, the dancer is over here. So go home, He told him. Go home. וַיִּשְׁלַח מֹשֶׁה אֶת חֹתְנוֹ, וַיֵּלֶךְ לוֹ אֶל אַרְצוֹ. Pshat? If a person didn't prepare himself for Kabbalas haTorah, he didn't live the lessons. That it says in Mitzrayim and the nisim and the sevel of Mitzrayim, he's not fit. He's not fit to be part of Kabbalas HaTorah. כן, לשמוע על זה בסדר. לקרוא את זה בעיתונים, כן, בסדר. אבל להשתתף בזה באופן אישי ולהיות חלק מהחבורה, to be part of everybody else, no, this is not. You didn't. Moshe Rabbeinu himself. Moshe Rabbeinu didn't prepare himself for Matan Torah. What are you saying? No, he didn't go... He didn't suffer through Mitzrayim. Moshe Rabbeinu, what are you talking about? He was the one who suffered the most. Moshe Rabbeinu suffered the most. He was there in and out, back and forth, suffering with the people. He was ready to give up his life for them. It says in the Medrash, he started carrying the stone, saying, I wish I could die for you instead of you. Kind of questions that. Now, I want to point out another nekudah. Do you know that Moshe Rabbeinu had children, Tziporah, through Tziporah, right? And when it comes after Matan Torah, he doesn't bother to pick them up. Doesn't bother to pick them up. What happens? Yisro had to come and be meorer, come and let's take Tziporah v'shnei yeladim, and the two children, and we'll bring them to Moshe to the Midbar. Why was Moshe Rabbeinu not concerned to bring his own children? Today, this would be room for lawyers. The lawyers would be all over this. Child abandonment. This would be deadbeat father. Moshe, deadbeat father? Bifla, no? Yisro, shnei yeladim, im isha, could buy it Yisro, in the house of Yisro, u'shachach mehem bichlal. He doesn't go after them. He doesn't go to beseech what's going on with them. Pshat is, Kusha עצומה. Yitro has to think to come, and if not for Yitro, it wouldn't be that Moshe goes after them. You know what the answer is? The answer is very simple. For the same cheshbon that Yitro was not supposed to be with Klal Yisrael because he didn't go through the sevel of Mitzrayim, Moshe understood that his children also, they didn't go through Mitzrayim. Mimeila, he held that they can't be here. For them to go through Matan Torah without the hakdamah, the preparation of Mitzrayim, it's not going to work. And I want to quote you a Medrash. The Medrash says that Yitro told Moshe Rabbeinu not to take his children to Mitzrayim originally. When Hashem said, Go to Mitzrayim, Moshe Rabbeinu went, and he took his wife and two children, like it says in last week's parsha. Yitro told him not to do it. Now I'll read you the lashon of the Medrash. Says the Medrash as follows.

Oh, says the Medrash as follows. Oh, says the Medrash this: Vayeilech Moshe. Before Moshe Rabbeinu goes back to Mitzrayim, it says Moshe went down. Leheichan halach? Where'd he go? So Yitro sees that he's taking his family with him. Leheichan atah molichan? Where are you taking them? Amar lo, leMitzrayim. I have to go down to Egypt. I'm taking them down to Egypt with me. Amar lo, otam sheheim b'Mitzrayim mevakshim latzet. Those that are there want to leave. So those that are not there, you're going to bring new people? You try to get everybody out. So not only we're not taking out those that are there, you're going to add more people and bring them? Says Moshe Rabbeinu, ‘Amar lo’—now listen carefully to the answer—‘lemachar hein atidin latzeit. Klal Yisrael is going to go out. V'lamah al Har Sinai?’ At the stand on Har Sinai, ‘lishmoa mipi HaKadosh Baruch Hu, Anochi Hashem Elokecha, uvanai lo yishme'u.’ And my children won't hear it. So I ask you, what do you mean? Go pick them up afterwards. There's two more words in the Midrash: ‘Uvanai lo yishme'u kemohem.’ Ah, it's a different Midrash. That's called learning, see, rabotai? If it would say ‘uvanai lo yishme'u,’ why not? Let them go after Mitzrayim and pick them up. And the answer is, ‘Uvanai lo yishme'u’—two more words says the Midrash—‘kemohem.’ Like them. Why? Because they prepared themselves. They lived through the kur habarzel of Mitzrayim. So they're going to hear ‘Anochi Hashem Elokecha’ one way. ‘Uvanai lo yishme'u kemohem.’ It's not the same shmiah. There's a shmiah mitoch sevel, there's a shmiah mitoch nisayon, and then there's a shmiah adam shomea bli shehu hechin et atzmo, bli shehu shomea mitoch sevel. It's a different shmiah. Uvanai lo yishmu lo katuv, elo uvanai lo yishmu kimohem. It's a different shmiah, yeah? There's one type of shmiah, sitting back with a pina colada and listening, with your feet up on the table. And then there's a shmiah when a person is amek mitoch yisurim, machnis es kol hachayim shelo bizeh. That's a different shmiah. They'll hear. It's possible I could bring them to Matan Torah and they could hear technically, Anochi Hashem Elokecha. But it's not going to be the same the way the Bnei Yisrael hear, Anochi Hashem Elokecha. How does this work? How does yisurim make a person muchan u'muchshar to be an oved Hashem? How did the sevel of Mitzrayim make Bnei Yisrael, make the Bnei Yisrael fit, fit, ראוי to be ovdei Hashem, to be am Hashem?

So I want to begin by going through what the mefarshim, the Gedolei HaAcharonim, tell us what the inyan of yisurim bichlal is. Why does Hashem give yisurim, v'ech ze po'el al ha'adam? The Gemara says, Ein lecha adam she'ein lo yisurim. There's no such thing. Every person has a difficult situation. And as the pasuk says, Halev yodea marat nafsho, every person knows his bitter situation. And everybody's sitting here thinking, Oh, my matzav. Oh, if only my, my matzav. Why does Hashem give these matzavim, and how does it make a person mukshar, mukshar, in his avodas Hashem? So I begin with the Chazon Ish, a letter that the Chazon Ish wrote, letter reish aleph, and I quote you: Chavivim yisurim. Yisurim are dear. L'zeh shero'eh otam kishluchei d'Rachmana. It depends how you look at yisurim. If you look at yisurim and you say, Oh, yivei, look at my yisurim, you'll never have from it anything. They'll drag you down and make you bitter, says Chazon Ish. But if you look at yisurim differently, if you view yisurim like the Torah wants you to view yisurim, the way a Jew is supposed to look at yisurim, then it's chavivim yisurim. It becomes dear. Why? Because you look at it kishluchei d'Rachmana, messenger from Hashem. It was heavenly sent, u'mehatkim et hakesher bein yitzur liYotzro. It strengthens, says the Chazon Ish, the relationship. Between the Yetzur and the Yotzer, between the person and HaKadosh Baruch Hu. U'malim oto le'olam shekulo or. And through this, it brings up the person to a olam, a world that's completely light. I once mentioned here before, but very few people were sitting at the shiur at the time, and I think it's kedai to mention again something that I personally experienced with HaGaon HaTzadik Rabbi Yaakov Tolidano, zatzal, from Paris, the son of Rav Balfour Baruch. He was very sick at the end of his life. His life was actually cut short, so to speak, because he was in his prime, maybe just turned sixty, but he was bekoach chazak. He was very, very dynamic, and he was building in France, מקומות התורה, a tzaddik, a yerei Shamayim, really an adam gadol, really an adam gadol. And he got this disease, which was terrible, terrible, terrible disease. I don't even want to mention what it was, terrible disease he got. And this disease crippled him terribly till he died. So I once went to visit him, maybe a month or two before he was niftar, and when I saw him, I was shocked. איך מאדם פאר וכבוד שהיה, look what he turned into, קונט, a kunt. And he saw, he saw on my face that I was shocked. He saw that I couldn't deal with it. So he told me always something very interesting. Rabbi Faul Baruch was a big gaon, tzaddik, and a chacham. People don't know, besides his tzidkus and his gaonus in learning, he was very smart. He understood that in order for his kids to remain al pi derech haTorah v'yiras Shamayim, they had to send them away from Morocco. There were no yeshivot in Morocco, and there was tremendous irvuv. As a matter of fact, all the Morocco Jews who ended up in France, most of them came to France and they ended up becoming not religious. Baruch Hashem, today, yesh... there's a teshuvah, but the Moroccan community in Morocco, the Jewish community suffered greatly. So he understood that he had to send his boys to the yeshivot, and so he did. And today, the Gedolei Torah from his family, they go to Eretz Yisrael. This was all with the chachmah, the wisdom of Rav Raphael Baruch, that he sent his kids to the yeshivas, away from home, to Morocco. The daughters, the daughters, there were no place to send away, and it caused an effect on his daughters, and they were not religious. So Reb Yaakov, this great tzaddik, had sisters who were not religious. So they came to visit him through his sickness. So he told me that his...

Sisters would point him and tell him, Zu Torah v'zu secharah? All your life you learned and you taught Torah and you made nefesh for Torah. This is how Hashem pays you back? This is the payment that you get for it? So Reb Yaakov, with his eyes—he was also a big pikeach, he had a certain twinkle in his eyes—and he looked at me and he goes, You know what I answered them? I answered them that they don't even realize how I thank Hashem for this machlah, because the only way I could have gotten so close to HaKadosh Baruch Hu, like I am now with HaKadosh Baruch Hu, is only through my matzav of yisurim and sickness. They look at it, Oy, chaval, tereh eizeh choli yesh lo. But I מסתכל על זה, tereh eizeh brachah HaKadosh Baruch Hu natan li. He told her, If you only knew how close I feel to HaKadosh Baruch Hu, you wouldn't feel bad, and not only that, you would understand why I am so happy through this machlah. Kach ani shamati. So I heard from Reb Yaakov, from Rav Yaakov Toldano. You know what he's saying, the words of this chassidish? If you view machlah, if you view yisurim properly, then it becomes what? Chavivin yisurim, because they're mehatkim et hakesher ben yitzur liYotzro. It makes the connection between Hashem and the person much, much greater. How does that work? How is it that the more you hit a person, normal people... Get angry. Normal people stay away. Normal people are mitrachek. And here, the more HaKadosh Baruch Hu hits, the more what? The more you get close to Him. How does that work? How does it work that the more yisurim, the more you love Hashem? How could it be such a thing? And the answer, of course, is, l'mi shehoel tam, kishluchei d'Rachmana. You have to understand yisurim. And today we're going to take a little bit of a course, how to understand yisurim. And with all the information that I'm going to give you, we'll go back to answer the original kashya on the parsha, and then we'll understand the entire beginning of Parshas Va'eira. You hear what we're trying to question? איך שייך שכל מה שמרביצים יותר, אוהבים את הקדוש ברוך הוא יותר? How could it be such a thing? ואנחנו לא אנשים נורמליים. A normal person is the reaction the opposite. The more you hit me, the more I don't like you. How could it be that it's matkimet hakesher בין יצור ליוצרו through yisurim? And of course the answer is, l'mi shehoel tam, kishluchei d'Rachmana. It depends how you look at it. Now, rabosai, let's take a look at the mefarshim, the Acharonim, how they teach us to view yisurim. Rav Chaim, Derech Hashem, Chelek Gimmel, Perek... Chelek Beis, Perek Gimmel. He writes as follows: ייסורי הערה להאיר הלב לתשובה. It's a wake-up call. Person is living b'menucha. Nothing fazes him. Nothing fazes him. Person isn't fazed by anything. If you look at all the Sifrei Chinuch, they write, what's the inyan of hitting a child? And the answer is, if you just leave it by giving him a patch, hitting him, you won't have anything. You have to hit him. That wakes him up. You're listening. In two seconds, I might have to hit you to demonstrate that. That what happens is, you hit him, and that gives you a wake-up call, and then you can teach him a lesson. All the Sifrei Chinuch write that in case a person would hit his child and not teach him the lesson, yatza scharo b'hefsedo. You didn't gain anything. People give a whack. How dare you do that? You hit him. That's not gaining anything. You want to explain to him, then give him the patch. Why would you want to do it that way? The whole point is that he only understands after he gets the patch. The point is that when a person has yissurim...

It opens his mind. It awakens him that he should be able to learn a lesson. HaKadosh Baruch Hu sometimes gives yisurim, yisurim shel ha'aarah, of waking up, a wake-up call. The Chovos HaLevavos writes in Shaar HaBechinah, perek hei, why does a child sometimes have yisurim? You see children suffer. You go into a cancer ward, you see, nebach aleinu, children. Why are they suffering? Says the Chovos HaLevavos, this nekudah: it's to wake him up to the realities of life, that he should realize that you can't be somech on anything in this world. It's also a wake-up call. Yeah. How can they understand? Four-year-old children? Now, again, I'm not saying about a three-year-old baby that's sick, but as a child gets older, sometimes this neshama of this child needs this lesson. Depends what he came down for, depends what he did in the past lives, but it's a lesson for the neshama: remember what this world is all about. It's not all games and candies. So writes the Chovos HaLevavos. What am I learning from this Chovos HaLevavos? Wake-up call. There's a wake-up call to a grown-up, and you can have a wake-up call to a child too. This is a wake-up call to a child. Chovos HaLevavos, Shaar HaBechinah, perek hei. You, child or grown-up, how would He give you a wake-up call? What should be the wake-up call? Okay. If you take a look at the Rambam in Moreh Nevuchim, the Rambam in Moreh Nevuchim speaks many times, the inyan of yisurim is to'elet—excuse me, no, before we get to that Rambam, I'm sorry, the Ramban. The Rabban in Shaar HaGemul writes, Yisurim is l'chaper al aveiros dakas. Sometimes a person has small aveiros that he has to clean himself from. Today we have no Beis HaMikdash, so we can't say that the Ramban brings a korban, so the Ribono Shel Olam substitutes that. In Shaar HaGemul says the Ramban, the Ribono Shel Olam substitutes it with yisurim kalim. Yisurim, it's to make a person cleanse, the cleansing process for aveiros. If you take a look in the Gemara Niddah, the Gemara Niddah tells us that not only yisurim is for kaparas avonos, but yisurim also has a toeles gashmi. I read you the Gemara Niddah. Says the Gemara like this: David HaMelech says, Odcha Hashem ki anafta bi. I praise You, Hashem, for You scorned at me. Why is David HaMelech praising Hashem for scorning at him? Odcha Hashem ki anafta bi. Pasuk in Tehillim, kuf lamed tes, says the Medrash. Says the Medrash, Bameh ha'kasuv medaber? Says the Gemara, Bishnei bnei adam sheyatzu lischorah. Two people are going out into business. Yashav lo kotz l'echad מהם, and all of a sudden breaks his foot. So he breaks his foot. What does he do? He starts to, under his breath, rats and bark. Why? Because he can't take his trip now to business. He begins to curse and get angry, li'amim. A few days later, shama shetav'asfin tato shel chavero bayam. His friend who did make the business deal, he's not here anymore. You know why? The boat crashed. The boat went down. He begins modeh u'meshabeach. So he starts to thank Hashem. Hashem, thank you for the broken leg. L'kach ne'emar, Yashum apcha v'tenachmeini. Odcha Hashem ki anafta bi. Because David understood this is for his own to'eles gashmi. You never know. You never know what's awaiting in the future. Hashem says what? Hashem says, I'll punish you that you can't make the trip, because who knows what's going to be on that trip? 9/11. You never know. You never know. A guy was sick that morning. So he wakes up that morning, then he sees what happened, 9/11, and he says, Ribono Shel Olam, halavai You should always make me so sick. Every time something bad is supposed to happen, I ask You, Hashem, give me, give me more. I don't even mind. Give me another stomach, a little bit more.

Okay. Now there's a very nice vort I heard from my grandfather. It's a Chassidish vort, but it's interesting. Hachotech chayim l'chol chai. Kol haminim shehu chai v'kayam, hachotech chayim l'chol chai. He cuts chayim, which means he separates the division of life for all those that are living. So he said a very interesting thing. Chotech is not the right lashon. If you want to say that he gives somebody life, it should be noten chayim l'chol chai. It's chotech, to cut. What, you sit there cutting pieces of cutting, cutting? Why the expression of chotech? The Tzanzer Rebbe used to say, Chotech chayim l'chol chai. How much is the gematria of chayim? 68. How much is the gematria of chayim? 68. How much is the gematria of dal? 34. How much is 68 cut in half? 34. Chotech chayim. Sometimes he cuts the life and he makes you what? Dal, l'chol chai, that you should be able to go on and live. Hachotech chayim. Interesting, huh? It's Chassidus, but the mussar of it is beautiful. Sometimes a person, he goes through difficult matzav and he starts to feel bad. I have no money, I have no this. And Hashem says, Don't you understand? This is for your own good. Like this you can go on living. If not, there would be gezeirah on you that you should die. Hachotech chayim. Sometimes he cuts the chayim, he makes it half. So if you don't like the gematria of it, the word itself is beautiful. He cuts the life in half. He cuts up the life, in order sometimes you should live. Sometimes you cut off the leg so the person should live on. A cancer patient, lo aleinu, chas v'shalom, if they catch cancer and they have to cut off the leg, what is he going to start screaming, You have to cut off my leg? Or he's going to say, Cut my leg off. Like this, ma, I can go on to live. Hachotech chayim. Yeah? Sometimes it's to chop up the life, v'chol chai, that the person should go on living. So the Gemara Niddah says that part of yissurim is for what purpose? L'toeles gashmi. The person should be able to go on living. If you look at the Daas Tevunos, siman kuf mem-zayin, he writes as follows: V'zeh ba na'av. This is a rule, she'lechol ilui sherotzeh HaKadosh Baruch Hu latet la'adam. Anything that HaKadosh Baruch Hu wants to give a person, hinei kol zman hizdamen hatov, eino mizdamen uba ela mitoch omek eitza nisteret. HaKadosh Baruch Hu, before He gives the good to a person, He has to understand there's a cheshbon. So therefore HaKadosh Baruch Hu has a matzav before the good comes. You ever have—there's a song that Baruch Chayim ben David sings, Happy days are coming now, soon you'll see. You ever hear that song? Yeah. Okay, those are apikorsim in the song field. Some of you know this, right? Never heard this song, Happy days are coming soon? It's English, English. It's in English, yeah. Al kol panim, I'm just trying to detain you. I'm trying to bring out a yesod from here. Sometimes when happy days are coming soon... HaKadosh Baruch Hu has to first be makdim it with difficult days. Why, says the Rav Chal? Mitoch omek eitza nisteres. HaKadosh Baruch Hu has a cheshbon, and the cheshbon is mechayev sometimes, otcha Hashem ki anachta. First HaKadosh Baruch Hu does difficult to bring out the good. So, Rabosai, this is called to'elet gashmi, a physical hana'ah that you have from the yisurim. The Rambam in Moreh Nevuchim writes—there's also in Yad, of to'elet ruchani—meaning, says the Rambam, a person can never become shalem in avodas Hashem till he has to go through it mitoch sevel v'yisurim. The person becomes who he has to become; his potential becomes mikoach el hapoel, if and when, if and when he does it through yisurim, through hard work. Let me tell you over something beautiful that I saw. Story—it's working, it's not working.

No, no, no. Too much noise. Yeah, yeah. There's too much noise, so give me the small one. Listen carefully. We're trying to understand why is there such a thing as tzaddik v'ra lo. Tzaddik v'ra lo. The Gemara in Brachos says this is one of the things that Moshe Rabbeinu didn't understand. The Gemara says that Moshe Rabbeinu asked Hashem, how could it be tzaddik v'ra lo? Why should it be that way? So we're trying to tell you over from the Rishonim and the Gedolei Acharonim, Reb Chaim Luzzatto, the Rambam in Moreh Nevuchim, the Ramban in Shaar HaGemul, different reasons why yissurim, as they say in English, bad things happen to good people. Why? So we said that could be it's l'chaparat avon a little bit. Could be it's for what, l'ha'ir, to wake up a person. Could be it's because good things are supposed to come in the future, so it has to come through difficult matzavim, like the Gemara in Niddah says. Or it could be—you know what, I don't need it, you know, forget it—or it could be it's l'toeles ruchani, like the Rambam says in Moreh Nevuchim, that the person only becomes who he is if he hammers it out. And this I scream at you day in and day out. How many times do I scream at you this nekudah? You want to grow, you want to be who you could be, you got to work on it. It's got to come from difficult, from learning, from shviras hamidos, from sevel. Then you become the potential who you could become. You bring the potential mikoach el hapoel. I want to tell you over, I saw a peledike thing. Al pi Chassidus and al pi Zohar, they always use the lashon tikun. Yisurim is a tikkun, right? Let me explain to you what that means. There's a peledike medrash, Bereishis Rabbah, gimel ot zayin. HaKadosh Baruch Hu was boneh olamos u'machrivan. HaKadosh Baruch Hu built many worlds before this world, and He destroyed it. Till He came to this world, and He said, Zeh yesh li hana'ah bah. This one I enjoy. Let me read it for you. Says the medrash here: Mikan, melamed shehayah borei olamos u'machrivan ad shebara et eilu. Till He created this world, amar, and He said, Din hanai li. This one I like. This is the world that I think is complete. Says the Nefesh HaChaim, what does that mean? Hashem builds worlds and He makes mistakes? A contractor can make a mistake. But HaKadosh Baruch Hu can't say, I built a world and I don't like it, it's no good, this is the right one. Eich sheyachol davar kazeh? Pshat suma. HaKadosh Baruch Hu is perfect, so He should be perfect on the first shot. Kushya עצומה. The Nefesh HaChaim, in Parshas Bo, he asks this kasha, and he says a very interesting pshat. We all know HaKadosh Baruch Hu ratzah livrot ha'olam b'midas hadin, v'shitef midas harachamim, Bereishis bara Elokim et hashamayim v'et ha'aretz. Originally it was supposed to be Elokim, din, Rashi brings it down. HaKadosh Baruch Hu saw that ha'olam lo mitkayem, so shitef עמו midas harachamim. What does that mean? What does that mean? So he says a gevaldige pshat. The Medrash says, Bereishis Rabbah, ched zayin, that before HaKadosh Baruch Hu created the tzaddikim, He was mamlich, mamlich b'nefashos hatzaddikim how to create people. Yeah? What? It's an interesting Medrash, a pshut Medrash. HaKadosh Baruch Hu himlich. Go ahead, read it. Bereishis ched zayin. HaKadosh Baruch Hu himlich. HaKadosh Baruch Hu went and spoke it over with the tzaddikim. Here, come here, you're a tzaddik, here, come here. Tell me, should we create the person, or how should we do it? Himlich on what? What does that mean? He created the nafshos hatzaddikim. He speaks to the nafshos hatzaddikim and he discusses with them the architecture of creating man. Go ahead, read it. It's a Medrash. Im hamelech v'malchuto yeshvu, im hamelech, melech malchei hamelachim, HaKadosh Baruch Hu, yeshvu nefashos shel tzaddikim, shebahem nimlach HaKadosh Baruch Hu uvara es ha'olam. He spoke to them. Come tell me, what's your opinion about creating the world? What does that mean? Says, No amar li melech. Unbelievable questions. So he says a beautiful pshat. Now listen.

Carefully. Of course, HaKadosh Baruch Hu doesn't make mistakes. When He was boneh olamos u'machrivan, not because there were no good, because in order to come to a perfect world, you have to have boneh v'shover, boneh v'shover. The person has to go through matzavim. Pili, beautiful, yeah? To come to perfection, it has to come through a mahalach, boneh v'shover, boneh v'shover. You get banged around, back and forth, yeah? You have to go. My Kinder, it's the name of a book, by the way. Okay, you have to go, you have to go, yeah? Boneh v'shover, you hear? You have to go and break and build, break and build. It wasn't—that's not pshat, he made a mistake. That's the shleimus of it, that the ruchnius, that the perfection, the shleimus comes only al yedei boneh v'shover, boneh u'machriv, boneh u'machriv. Who lives like this? The tzaddikim. So he had to be mamlichin the tzaddikim, are you maskim? Because the Gemara Rosh Hashanah tells us HaKadosh Baruch Hu created the world lefi daatan shel kol habruim, and He asked them, Are you willing to get created? Froggie boy, are you maskim to be a frog? David, Hashem asked you, are you maskim? And what did you say? Obviously yes. This is Gemara Rosh Hashanah, daf yud aleph amud aleph. Says the Nefesh HaChaim, HaKadosh Baruch Hu had to speak to the tzaddik and say to him, Tzaddik, are you maskim that you'll have yissurim even though you're a tzaddik? Are you maskim that your shleimus is going to come from boneh olamos u'machrivan? And they were masked, kefaldika. Normally, Melech apologizes a nifla v'nora, nifla, nifla, yeah? Shleimus in this world comes from boina v'soiver and boina. It's not an easy ride to the end. Tzadikim have this. HaKadosh Baruch Hu had to ask the tzadikim if they're maskim to this, because of the Gemara in Rosh Hashanah, that every person had to be maskim that he should be created. Tikun, fixing. Tikunim, fixing. Pshat, a person has to go through his life to reach the shleimus, all the matzavim and all the yisurim, to reach the shleimus. This is what the Rambam means; it brings the person to perfection. Now let's say two more and let's end, because I see before I know it I'll be left here myself. If you take a look at the Mabit in Beit Elokim, Shaar HaTeshuvah, perek tes, he explains that the inyan is for all the... Sometimes the Ribono Shel Olam goes and gives tzadikim yisurim, that they should get their whole reward in the next world. You look at the Ramchal in Derech Hashem, chelek beis, perek gimmel, he speaks about kaparas hador. Sometimes a tzaddik gets yisurim for the dor. Sometimes it's letikun olam. Okay, let's go back now to the original inyan. I asked you, what are the leshonot of geulah? What are the geulos? What are they? I might tell you there are four of them. What are the four geulos? And the answer is very simple. In geulas Mitzrayim and the shibud that the geulah came to redeem, there were many things that went into that. There were many reasons for the shibud. There were many reasons for it, and I'll prove it to you. V'hotzeiti etchem, I'll take you out from what? Mitachat sivlot Mitzrayim, v'hitzalti etchem me'avodatam. Can I ask you a question? Shouldn't it have been the opposite? V'hotzeiti me'avodatam, v'hitzalti mehasivlot. It's a simple question. Just thinking about it, yeah? V'hotzeiti etchem mitachat sivlot, it should be v'hitzalti etchem mehasevel. And from the avodah it should have said, v'hotzeiti, no? Simple question. From the sevel it should have said, v'hitzalti. And from the work it should have said... He left, I can't hit him, so... And from the work it says, v'hotzeiti. Why? You know what the answer is? If you look at it as physical labor, and Hashem is redeeming them physically, then you're right. The v'hotzeiti should be from the avdut, and the v'hitzalti should be from the sevel. The entire sevel Mitzrayim was binyanei ruchniyim. Klal Yisrael didn't suffer so much from the actual work.

As much as they suffered, that the work caused them that they were not taken from the Rabbeinu. What does sivlot Mitzrayim mean? You know what sivlot Mitzrayim is? The real sivlot Mitzrayim wasn't the work in the field. It's the stress that they couldn't be oved Hashem. So therefore it says what? Votzeiti — the geulah is actually from the sevel of Mitzrayim. It's not from the physical work. What about v'hitzalti etchem? What's avodah tam? Avodah tam means that there was a kesher. There was a kesher to the Mitzriyim. We had to work for them. Says the Ribono Shel Olam, that's the v'hitzalti. What we think is the votzeiti is actually the v'hitzalti. You understand? Votzeiti means He took us out. Where did He take us out from? He took us out, you would say, from being slaves. That wasn't bothering Klal Yisrael. What was bothering Klal Yisrael is sivlot Mitzrayim. So on that it says what? Votzeiti. The fact that there was a sakana ruchniyus, to be mitasek with the goyim, that's the v'hitzalti. So what is the v'ga'alti? It's also ruchniyus. These are all about ruchniyus. You see? You like it, huh? Yafeh meod, huh? I see you listening from the back. I appreciate it, you hear? But we think is the votzeiti is actually the v'hitzalti. We have to work for the goy. You know what happens? You have a sakana ruchniyus in that. V'hitzalti — I'll save you from that sakana ruchniyus. Oh, so let's stand up. Zachinu. You say over from the Rebbe, you have to stand up. I was once, I was once at a simcha in France, and I said over a vort from the Lubavitcher Rebbe. And what was I seeing? Everybody getting up. So I thought they were upset I maybe didn't say it over right. I thought they were angry, maybe they're leaving. I didn't know what happened. I know, I didn't know, no. They say that whenever you say over Torah from the Rebbe, you have to stand up, right? Huh? No, see, but the reason is when you say over Torah from the Rebbe, they say, that's what they told me, you have to stand up. You never heard that? So this is the same thing. I thought they're getting up because they're angry at me. I thought maybe I said it over right, I don't know. It's a beautiful vort. I'll tell you the vort I said. So korbanos were tamid. Tamid, right? What's tamid? So actually it's not tamid, tamid, because it's once in the morning, once at night. So pashut, tamid means constant. It doesn't mean consistent, not constant but consistent. There's two words in English. There's constant and there's consistent. Constant means lo heref. Consistent means I do it every day, like something that we don't have over here in this yeshiva called tamid consistency. There's no such thing, right? One day you come nine o'clock, one day you come ten o'clock, one day you don't come, one day you do come. So the inyan of korban tamid is actually consistent, not constant. So the Rebbe says, no, it's actually consistent. It's actually constant. How? Yudi kama boker, makriv korban. Hashpa'os is the kol hayom. Yudi chozer, mebayit mitoch acharei avodah, he does a korban, zeholech kol halayla, mashpia in the whole night. So the korban is physically, we're tamid consistent, but the hashpa'ah of it was constant. Very nice. Shnayim layom olah tamid. It's always. It's taka always. Hayudi hayachaim. It's a very nice vort, beautiful, efes. So I said it over, and all of a sudden, as they're getting up, and I thought maybe I said it over right. Listen, let me tell you one thing you can't be choshed me. When I say over, I say it over right. That much you know. Shani yodea ma shekatuv, ze barur. Then they told me, because there's a minhag that you have to stand up. So I saw he got up and he told me, so, kitzur, this is the vort, yeah? Vehotzeiti, vehitzalti. What we think is the hotzeiti is actually the vehitzalti. That we had to come on to work for a goy, sakana ruchni in that, vehitzalti. What we had, sevel that we couldn't be oved Hashem, that's the hotzeiti. So the veha'alti is the same thing. So according to this, it comes out beautiful. So what's the Vilna Gaon? What's the Vilna Gaon? The Vilna Gaon is, the way we're learning, beautiful. Because of all the yissurim that Klal Yisrael went through in Mitzrayim, they had the v'lakachti etchem li l'am. How did they become Klal Yisrael? So it comes out, remember I asked you a question: is the v'lakachti an answer to the lama ariota? And the answer is, yes it is. Lama ariota, lama zeh? And the answer is, v'lakachti אתכם לי לעם. How did they become Klal Yisrael? Through the lama ariota. That's what.

Like it says, Vayiti lachem l'Elokim, like the Chazon Ish says, and hiduk, bein haYitzri liyotzro ela al yedei yisurim. That's pshat. Remember I asked you, why does it have to say, V'lakachti etchem li l'am? It's self-understood, Vayiti lachem l'Elokim. It goes together. When a person has yisurim, and through that, V'lakachti etchem li l'am, says the Torah, that's the way to become, V'haya Hashem l'Elokim, l'cha l'Elokim. It goes together. And that's why it says, V'yadatem ki Ani Hashem, like Rabbeinu says, l'tzal. The ikar yedias Hashem came from the lama hari'ota. This is all an answer to lama hari'ota. Moshe's screaming, why are you making it so bitter for them? And the answer is, Votzeiti, v'hitzalti, v'ga'alti, v'lakachti. Plus, V'lakachti etchem li l'am, V'lakachti etchem li l'am. That's how you become an am, through the yisurim. And what happens, Vayiti lachem l'Elokim? And what happens, V'yadatem ki Ani Hashem? This is all through—I asked you, of course you know. I mean, you know Hashem took you out, yeah, but how? What was the mekor of that? The lama hari'ota. They suffered. They suffered. They learned through yisurim. This I understand also, why it says, Veveiti etchem, like the mefarshim say, like the Ramchal says, all the good in the atid comes from what? Mitoch hasevel shemakdim lah. Eretz Yisrael's niknis... It comes out that be'etzem, Veveiti, V'lakachti, V'yadatem is really all an answer to the what? It's all an answer to the original question, lama hari'ota l'am hazeh. And the answer is, Votzeiti, v'hitzalti, v'ga'alti, v'lakachti, V'yadatem, Veveiti etchem el ha'aretz. All this is because of the yisurim, yisurim. Ah. Ha, tahomu parsha, gulu ruchniyus. And I'll prove it to you. Ready? Just give me five minutes. The room's falling away. See, gotta give me five minutes, and we'll talk. Ready? Listen carefully. Listen good. Tell me something. Klal Yisrael do teshuva in Mitzrayim? You say כן. It's a machlokes Rishonim. Machlokes Rishonim. I know. I quote the Ibn Ezra. Give me a minute. I know. Slowly, slowly, slowly, slowly. It says in the pasuk, it says in the pasuk, וַתַּעַל שַׁוְעָתָם אֶל הָאֱלֹקִים. Rav Belsky shlita, the Rosh Yeshiva Torah Vodaath, told me that he heard from Rav Yoinason Steif, that Rav Yoinason Steif was a doresh, he had a drashah niflaah. She said, וַתַּעַל שַׁוְעָתָם אֶל הָאֱלֹקִים — לְאֱלֹקוּת. Elokim doesn't mean that their scream reached the heavens. They screamed, Elokim, they wanted Hashem. I heard this from Rav Belsky once. So I thought it was drush. Then I realized the Ibn Ezra says on that pasuk, וַתַּעַל שַׁוְעָתָם אֶל הָאֱלֹקִים, כי שמעתי את נאקתם, says the Ibn Ezra, teshuva. The naakah, their cry, was a cry of teshuva. Says the Seforno, לא מחמת תשובה, ולא מחמת תפילה, אלא שוועתם — there, yissurim. So I don't understand. Bishlama if the pshat is they did teshuva because of that, so then I understand what's the... But if it's pshat, לא מחמת, says the Seforno, מחמת התשובה, לא מחמת התפילה, so what's the וַתַּעַל שַׁוְעָתָם? The answer is the yissurim themselves, even without teshuva, machshir et ha'adam. That's what you see from this week's parasha. The etzem pur habazal, the yisurim that they had in Mitzrayim, that itself, that itself made them, afilu belo teshuva, afilu belo tefila, etzem hayisurim hichshirotam. That's the yesod, Rabbi. If a person, if a person looks at yisurim and he utilizes it right, he'll realize that the yisurim is the greatest bracha, the greatest bracha that he has. I once heard from my grandfather, zatzal, who said b'shem the Chofetz Chaim, Yehudi mutar lo le'enot, shehayom mar li. Today it's bitter, aval asur lo hagid rach. Rach, chas v'shalom. Mar, ken. How are you doing today? Not very good. Is it good? Is it? Yeah, it's good, but I'm not doing... Mar. No, he's saying better. To say ra, that it's bad, that you're not allowed to say, because it's good. To say mar, mar, that you're allowed to say.

Rather, there's no such thing as רע. All the yissurim make a person who he is. One day you'll realize, you know who you are, you know how you reach your potentials, because you had difficult situations and you grew from it. But this I want to end: אין לך אדם שאין לו יסורים. The Maharal says there's no person that doesn't have yissurim. אשרי אדם שיסורים באים לו מן התורה. A person can come and say, You know what, Hashem, don't give me yissurim outside. Give it to me in learning. Give it to me in learning. This is how you're gonna grow. Let me tell you something. Moish, you ready? You know, I know you got off somewhere, but listen to me carefully. Huh? You got everything? Beautiful. What's the pshat? Pshat's like this. Listen carefully. It's rough to become a talmid chacham. It's rough, it's rough. It's easier not to come and come late and hak a tshaynik and listen to a vort and walk away and walk around. This is very easy. That's easy. You know what's hard? To sit on something till you get it. You know what's hard? It's hard to come every day. That's where you're gonna grow. You're not gonna grow from coming lishmoa ketzas, v'lalech, v'latzet, v'lavo. That's nothing. You're not gonna get much from that. You'll remain the same am ha'aretz you were before, but you might know a little bit, that's all. But the am ha'aretz you'll still be. You know how you become a talmid chacham? You know how you become close to Hashem? Hatmada, hatmada, hatmada. It's hard, it's hard. If you think you're here for easy, then you might as well go to Kol Noa. You're in the wrong place. Here it's not easy. It's not easy. Not easy. Believe me, lלמוד על נקודה בתוספות. אתם יודעים כמה סבל אני סובל, כמה ניצ... You guys know. Lלמד אתכם, to teach you. That's the only way. I know, I understand. I grew up knowing this. There's no easy road. If you take the easy road, you won't have anything. You won't have anything. You'll walk away with nothing. You want to come to your potential, you gotta fight for it. You know the difference between those that are still sitting here? You know, I give shiur for hours, right? Chaim knows. Chaim's ready litpotzetz b'sof hashiur. I don't care. Tirelti, zechpat li lo zechpat li. It doesn't bother me. Ma ani sonei Yisrael? Ani sonei Yehudim? Ma ani nosen shiurim ad sheha'adam mitpotzetz? You know what the answer is? I know it's the tov HaTach. I don't care. I know that the only way you'll grow is by... Ze kashe achshav. Achshav atah matchil ligdol. Now you're starting to become a ben Torah. The difference between ben Torah and not ben Torah, the difference between dabek baShem and not dabek baShem, is not the guy who prays and learns, because everybody prays and learns today. When it's hard, what do you do? Are you here on time? Are you here on time? I'm telling you, I'm telling you, I'm telling you, you will never be matzliach till you uproot min hashoresh this machla. It's a machla. שאתם לא יכולים לבוא בזמן, לעמוד על תוספות עד שגומרים את זה, לעמול בתורה אפילו שזה קשה, אפילו שכואב לי בראש וכואב לי בזה וכואב לי שמה, וסבתא ואבא ורוצים אותי, ויש לי פרנסה... million excuses. I don't care. And you know why I don't care? Because it doesn't make a difference. It doesn't make a difference. You want to know something? I'll tell you a secret. The minute I see a guy who gives me a lot of Torah, I don't bother. I don't know if you know that. Certain people give me a million excuses every day, I have a different excuse. I don't bother them. You know why? Because it's not, I don't get anywhere from that. Once there's a million excuses, I'll tell you a good vart here. Rabbi Chaimov. Moshe, come here. I want to tell you one last thing, one last line. Here, one last line. Moshe, one last line. Come here, I want to tell you. Moshe, come here, one last thing. I was once at a din Torah. I saw a din Torah where a woman came in and started saying about her husband, tanot, meaning the beis din asked, what are the tanot? So she took out a whole notebook full: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M. There was no end to the number of the tanot, no end. Just kept on coming and coming and coming. So Rav Leibis zatzal told her that she's off her rocker, she's crazy, and he's right and she's wrong. So I asked Rav Leibis, how do you know? How do you know? You don't know. You know the guy, no. Maybe all that she's saying is true. When I heard it, it sounded that maybe she's telling the truth. How do you know?

He said a moydike vort, a moydike vort. I want you to learn this. That's called the brilliant mind of a dayan. If you come with one complaint, that means there's something serious. But when you start saying one, two, three, four, five, six, ten, fifteen, twenty-five, thirty, you know what it's a sign of? There's nothing there. There's nothing there. You just don't want the guy. You just don't want the guy. Okay, so then he's right. What do you want? If you come with a complaint, same thing is with excuses. When a guy comes and he has one excuse sometimes, then I know it's serious. But when a guy every day has different excuse, every day, you know what the answer? You don't want to learn. That's the bottom line. I don't bother people like that. If you want to learn and you make up your mind, Moshe, hear what I'm telling you. Listen to me, Moshe. I like you very much. You should know I like you very much. I hope that we're still friends. We might turn into enemies one day. I can see it. I can see it coming.