Yosef HaTzaddik: How Bitachon and Simchah Protect Kedushah

Transcript

This Torah class is brought to you by TorahAnytime.com. What was it that Yosef did to earn this title, Tzadik Yesod? And pashtus, it was his prishus. It was his ability to be moser nefesh for inyanei kedusha, withstanding eishes Potifar and all the other arayos and degradation of Mitzrayim. I believe, rabosai, that there is more that lays in Yosef's life that earns him this title, tzaddik. We need to go deeper. We need to dig deeper to find out how is it that Yosef is able to be tzaddik, to be this poirish, how he was able to withstand and remain a kadosh in Mitzrayim. What is the underlying koiches and middos that give him the ability to withstand and to be this kadosh? In viewing Yosef, one is really confronted by his strength of not falling into yei'ush and not falling into an atzvus, an anderer volt shoin gebrochen; he would have been broken. Another person would have been lost. Another person would be mamash a meyuash, and he wouldn't be able to withstand any nisayon, let alone the nisayon of eishes Potifar. Chiddah tells us. This is a chiddah in Avodas HaKodesh, Tziporen Shamir, siman zayin, os kuf chaf ches, that the number one thing that brings about tumas habris, pegam in inyanei kedushah, is atzvus, depression. When a person is depressed, he finds outlet in inyanei tumah, in inyanei arayos. So the number one underlying thing to work on and to be strengthened in order to be able to be a moser nefesh against all the nisyonos of inyanei kedushah is simchah. And the opposite: if a person has atzvus, he'll fall into a yi'ush, which leads to all the degradation. Steipler, zecher tzaddik v'kadosh livrachah, writes about this in great length, that simchah gives a person the ability to remain pure in inyanei kedushah, while atzvus is the number one catalyst that leads to all these type of aveiros. So we need to learn, Yosef, yes, the tzaddik in inyanei kedushah, prishus, to withstand the arayos of Mitzrayim. But what is the koach, the underlying middah that gives him this tzidkus, is that he never fell in his resolve, in his bitachon, in his simchah. He never lost himself. He was never b'atzvus. And where does this come from? This comes from his great emunah and bitachon in the Ribono Shel Olam. When one has emunah and bitachon, he doesn't fall into an atzvus of yiush. Chazal tell us, Baruch hagever asher yivtach baHashem, zeh Yosef. Yosef was the great master of bitachon. Yosef excelled in bitachon. The raya is from his life. Another person without bitachon, if he didn't have bitachon, he wouldn't survive all his yisurim. He wouldn't survive all his nisyonos. The fact he was able to remain, the fact he was able to withstand, that's because he had emunah. And when he had emunah, mimeila he wasn't atzev, and he wasn't misya'esh. He wasn't atzev, he wasn't misya'esh. He was able to be strong. He was able to be strong. And he was able to not fall in to the most degrading of aveiros that were around him. You've just experienced another Torah class brought to you by TorahAnytime.com.