Pesach - What's the Story

Good morning, good morning and welcome back to breakfast on the class. Breakfast on the class today. And the learning for this week is dedicated by the Daniel S. Lovatov, the Silver Donors Mars and Esther Levy. Love you, remember Mars as far as Stephen and Levy, I wish I would have been a Shia Yasha, I would have been a Del. For the four Ashina Maov, the Avesham Razaf, for Daniel Ghanah and Khayim Fahban, for you that. And as well for the continue to help for Ghanah, but similar figure. We want to wish Mars out on my brook to Andrew and Carol Arya on the breakfast morning of the San Ashina Maov, bless you with only Nahat, Mehta, Baadonam. Okay, let's begin. Let me give you one idea from Rev. Desler that I am really obsessed with and I have been for quite some time. Rev. Desler writes a very interesting line in the story of the Haggadah. We have an obligation as we know, Mitzvah, Lenin, to disappear. We have an obligation to tell over the story of Yitziyat Mitzvah in a best way that we can. And the rabbi's tell us on this in the Haggadah, Kolamah, Mitzvah, Pab, Yitziyat Mitzvah, Harazim, Shubakh. Comes along with the Haggadah and tells us. Afilu, Kulano, Ghachami, Kulano, Nivoni, Kulano, Yodhim, Etatora. Even if all of us were wise, we were smart, we knew the Torah, we were experts in everything. Still says the Haggadah. Mitzvah, Lenin, to disappear, Yitziyat Mitzvah, we have a Mitzvah to tell over the story. And Kolamah, Mitzvah, Yitziyat Mitzvah, Harazim, Shubakh. Anyone who tells us about the story of Egypt is praiseworthy. And the more you tell over, the more praiseworthy. In fact, by the way, little known, the Shukhan Aruch writes that a person has an obligation to tell over the story of Yitziyat Mitzvah, and she tahtafinoshina until he falls asleep. So let's say you finish the said there 1130. You feel great. Oh wow, look how fast I finished. You feel fantastic. You can't go to bed. What do you do to prevent the death of the death of the Shibiflej? Your mind goes till three. That's your worst nightmare, Jack. No. You stuck at a table till that all hours at a night. We go until three, four o'clock in the morning. The kids are all up. Everyone's going, you know, Baruchah Shibiflej. We put in a lot of effort playing games, doing this, telling the story. You got to back or forth, you know, engaging as much as we can. So that's the Mitzvah. And the Mitzvah is a very interesting thing. Mitzvah to tell over the story and to do as much as you can. Says the Hagada, a story that supports this. What's the story Mark? Maase? Right? Rabit Arfon and Rabi Akiva. All the rabbis, the who's who? Of the rabbi playing cards, okay? Where were they? Ayyum al-Subim, the Beneb-Erak. They were leaning in Beneb-Erak. And what were they doing? They were telling over the story. It's Yaman Trab. Until the students said to them, "Higia, Zaman, Kiryat Shema, Shesha Harid, the Halakhah is you have to tell over until you fall asleep. What did they do? They didn't go to sleep. They went through the entire night telling over the story. Who they telling the story to? Some guy they found in the hotel? No. Some kid that rocked up in shul on the holiday with his phone in three earrings? No. Rabi Akiva is telling the story to Rabi Tarrfon. Rabi Tarrfon is telling the story to Rabi Al-Aza. They all know what backwards and forwards. What information were they sharing? Says Rev. Desler, an unbelievable Redouche. He says, "The point of the satire exposition of this story is not to introduce new material. Although you should, as much as you can, come with ideas or things that maybe no one's ever heard before, so they're not bored. But the Mitzvah is not that you should learn something new. What's the Mitzvah? That you should learn something deep." Therefore, the great Khachami'im, that's what the Haghadah is trying to communicate to us. There's nothing they didn't know about it. But they went over the story again and again. A very good Khachami'im, Khulano Le Bonim, Khulano Yodim Tattora, Mitzvah Aal-Aza, and Ulysa Peeh. Right? Khulam, Abab, Aal-Aza, and Mishubah. A rabbi is a communicating, a very different style of learning. Now, Rabissar al-Salatir was the leader of the Musaar movement. What was the Musaar movement? A decision that they made that people who learn in a lot of Torah, but their character traits weren't changing. So the guy knew all the Halaqot, the guy knew, you know, this Gimara, that Gimara, you know, this Midraj, that Mishnah, knew a lot of things. But the person wasn't changing. His character wasn't changing. So, Rabissar al-Salatir instituted a style of learning and processing information that led a person down to Musaar path. So, a lot of people don't understand what Musaar is. Let me explain. This class, let's say right now, is a class about the holiday. But there's an intersection where the class about the holiday becomes about something that will change your life, change the way you behave. So, as an example, I gave a class in my Musaar class on Monday night. For the boys, we talked a little bit about the idea on Pesach of recognition and gratitude of small things. We talked a little bit about that. So, imagine a person walks away from the said there, a little bit more grateful, but not for, you know, big things, small things. To the point where when we read about this, what do we say? Right? Ilu Hotsiano-Mistrain, Ilu Ilu Hotsiano-Ra-Hotsiano-Mim-Mistra-Day-E-Nah. If he did this, but he didn't do that, it's enough. And if he did that, but he didn't do the other thing, it's enough. If he did the third thing, he didn't do the second fourth thing, enough. What are we training ourselves to do with Day-E-Nuh? To find gratitude in each step. Now, a lot of times a person skips a lot of steps. We're an elevator society. We're in straight from the bottom floor to the 30th floor, all we saw was zero and 30. But in between zero and 30 are 29 floors. And by the way, you know when you find it out, only once. Only when the elevator is broken. And then you climb and you climb and you climb and you see zero and one and two and three and four and five. Day-E-Nuh is that process. Is the decoupling of the story into its disparate parts with each piece of that getting its own gratitude. So Musa is to say, not I have an obligation to do this and say thank you, but rather to develop the thank you muscle of a person, the noticing of the various parts of the favors that people do for us, most of all who. Hakadosh Barahu. And through that to change into a person that lives with that kind of awareness. If you thought that way, you'd be praying all day. Why? Person tells you, "How things going?" The guy says, "Ah, I'm having a surgery on my, I have a ear surgery." What the guy do? Just I want to point out. How many pieces does he have in his body? 248 different limbs organs. How many sinews? How many veins? 365. The guy has 613 different parts of his body. And when you estimate how it's going, he told you only about the one that's broken. But that's what it's like, isn't it? Right? I always love how people say this. It's developed even into the way we talk. You meet someone you haven't seen in a long time, what do you say? Everything okay? All okay? What should we say instead? Anything okay? Anything okay? Everything okay invites the person into a space. I'm saying, "No." Not everything is okay. Anything okay? I mean, maybe you don't have time for that conversation. Let me tell you about my left pinky toe. Aruch Hashim, what do you have to tell me about it? Nothing, it's perfectly fine. Let me tell you about my second left toe. What are you gonna do? Right? Long time. But really, we're developing a narrative which is very unhealthy. So the Musa look at the Seider is Daienu. Enough. I have this, it's enough. I don't know the other thing. What I have is still enough Daienu to be able to think, to feel like I do have. Right? So I think the this concept of Kulano Kha'amim, Kulano Nivonim is telling us that you could be a very smart person, an api a happy person. You could be a very grateful person. Sorry, you could be a very, excuse me, why is person an api a grateful person? Mitzvah Alainoulis Saper. I think that there's a very interesting correlation. In the world, in the word Sipur, which means the story, Lissapir, Mitzvah Alainoulis Saper, in that word, the word Sipur, which means the story, Simon, you speak Hebrew. What else does the word Sipur mean? Besides for a story. We have it on the second night of Pesach. When we go from Sipur, it's the atmosphere I'm in the evening too. Sifirata Umar. Lispor means to count. The nature and the definition of a story is to count the blessings. Again, if you want top line, you cut out the story. What's top line? We're not in Egypt anymore. We were, we're not. That's facts. Sipur is to count one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. In fact, the Banishchai writes a very interesting expression. We know that when the Jewish people left, they sing a song at the Yamsuf. And the Pasuch says, "Vayari Israel." Itayada Gidola and the Jewish people saw the great hand that Hashem had stretched across or against Egypt. Vaya Aminu Badonaay, Moshia Avdon, Nebelid, and Hashem, and Moshia's server. Says the Banishchai. What would the Jewish people mean? What did they mean when they said it? And they saw itayada Gidola the big hand. Says the Banishchai. They said at the Yamsuf, "Oh, I remember a big hand." That's working. I just have it further from my mouth. I remember the big hand. Maybe it's not. Yeah. What's the big hand? The big hand refers to the beginning of the story. When Moshia's floating down the river and Batiar reaches out to his basket and her hand stretches a long way. So the Jewish people say, as they're going into the river, I remember the first detail of the story. Says the Banishchai. From here we learn that when a person is giving thanks to Bure Olam for the good things that happened in his life, he has an obligation to go back to the beginning. Look, Vaya Yisra'el, itayada Gidola. Going back to the beginning is this process of counting one, two, three, four, five. So the Banishchai stretches it one step further. He says, "If that's the case, that when I am obligated to share about miracles that happened to me, I become obligated to share all the miracles that happened to me." He says, "A person on the night of peace, I should also mention the miracles that have happened to him in his personal life because that's also part of the obligation when recounting miracles, we share all the miracles that happened to us." Remarkable, never heard that before in my life. But what do you see? They're crossing the ocean and they're talking still about something that happened. How long ago? No, they're stretching out of the hand of Baya. How long before? 81 years. They went back 81 years to the beginning of the story. So my friends, I think that one of the beautiful things, the gifts of the Pesach, one of the gifts of the Musaar of this process, is to allow us to take the lens that we normally look at life with, which is very close. We're very up in exactly what's going on right now. That we obsess over it. Instead of pulling back the lens far enough to be able to see the entire story. I remember I shared a story a long time ago about, I believe it was of Shimon Schwab. He was an elderly man. He could no longer walk. He needed a wheelchair. He's going to the wedding of his great grandson, whatever. Now he's going to go in a wheelchair. So the kids said to him, "You know, doesn't it bother you? You're not upset. Now you're going to be in a wheelchair. You can't walk for your dance, for your granddaughters wedding, great granddaughters wedding." He said, "For 80 years, God gave me a gift every morning." Then one day, if the 80 years, he took it back. I should be upset and angry and miserable because of the one day he took it back when I got it every single day for 80 years. Someone let you a car. For 80 years, then 80 years later, I'm so sorry, I'm going to need the car back. I have to go take a nap. No! We got a person takes their car back if the 80 years of lending it to. This concept, counting blessings, pulling out the camera. You have people, unfortunately, you know, they at some point, they're business closets and they're so bitter, so angry. You know, I can't believe it. I put in all this effort and we're out of my now. Where's the bit? Nowhere. I think that's insane way of looking at it. You bought a cow. For 80 years, you drank the milk, you used the thing, you made butter, you had cream cheese and lippone. Now the cow, dive. What was the whole thing? It was not worth anything. There's nothing left to show for it. We mean there's nothing left to show for it. This 80 years that you got to show for it. There's summers and there's winters and there's bar mitzvahs and weddings. There you got to show for it. But what are we focused on? Now, and because now there's nothing left from it or sometimes there's a lot left but there's not enough left or there's not as much left as there was before. We think it's nothing. One of the big challenges though is not thinking or talking about these things on a knowledge level. What's the job? The job is to drive it deep into your consciousness, into your psyche. And that unfortunately has nothing to do with wisdom. I know people who are very dumb and they're very proud of the fact that they're not smart. And they're very happy people. Not because ignorance is bliss. Not because of that. But because in their minds, They're happy. They're grateful. They haven't figured out, I gotta want you to go and stay when I mean when I say dumb. They didn't figure out the most complex version of events where that business or that job or that relationship or that whatever could have been stretched to maximize till the end of time. What did they look at their business? Have a good run today. Thank you very much. What's going to be tomorrow? I'm not that clever. I think sometimes when we say Afilukulano Khachamiim, Khudano Nivonim is being read the wrong way in the Hagadah. We think Afilukulano Khachamiim, even though we're wise, it's a Midswali Saper. That's how we understand. Why? Because I would have thought, if you know it, I don't have to, come up to my land, no, you have to. I think sometimes the more wisdom we have, the worse off we are. Can I give you an example? Sometimes you meet a Balte Shuvah. A guy doesn't know anything about Judaism. You meet a person who's gone the road of conversion. They come to a Jewish community. They see a synagogue packed with people. They see everyone is praying. No one's on their phones. Wow. What is this? They never saw Shabbat in their life. They come to the Shabbat table. They see a whole family sitting around the table. Again, no phones. Everyone's talking. You know, unbelievable. They're washing. They're complimenting each other. Telling it, "Whoa!" I remember I had someone once come to my house. He saw Shabbat for the first time. The guy was so blown away by what Shabbat was. He's looking at the Shabbat table with the family around it. He says, "How do I get this?" Tell me what I need to do in order to get this. Look, we'll have to learn a little bit. We'll learn together. But Shabbat made such an impression on him that he changes entire life. The guy became a devoted, observant, religious man with leading a beautiful home because he saw one Shabbat meal. Did I ask you one question? Had the guy seen 50 Shabbat meals and then walked into my house. You think it would have had the same impression? Sometimes because we know more, we're more jaded. Sometimes because we know more, we don't allow things to surprise us. Yeah, yeah, okay. Whatever. It was blood and there was frogs. Did you ever stop to think how insane the story is? How did game that we played once with the kids? I made up the game for the kids only because I thought you know what this would be an interesting way of keeping the kids involved and awake on the night of the set there. What was the name of the game? The name of the game was 9-1-1. How do you play the game? Everybody gets called on for one of the Macquart of the 10 plates and you had to pick up the phone, sketch phone obviously. And you had to make a 9-1-1 call to report the emergency that you were seeing. Hello? 9-1-1? Yeah, what's your emergency? I don't know how to explain this but I was getting in the shower. Even on the water and there was no water that came out so this is 9-1-1, not your plumber. No, I understand. I understand. I'm getting to it. It's not that the water wasn't coming out. There was blood coming out. Blood was coming out of your shower, sir. Yes, what are you drinking? I'm not drinking anything. I have not had anything to drink tonight. I'm telling you, I asked my wife to come in. She said the same thing. Blood. Blood, right? She's screaming blood from the other room. I don't know. We couldn't figure out. We were wondering maybe somebody died in the attic and they got into the water. Sir, please give us your address. 424, it's Ryan Wei. Yeah. Also, I'm wondering have you received other reports? Yes, actually, sir. This is not the first report. We just thought the other guy was also drunk. But now we started the corroborate piece together. Have you tried to sink, sir? Hold on, let me do that. Yeah, blood. Anyway, else that you're seeing it, I don't have a goddamn stess. Go downstairs or open up your refrigerator. Open up the refrigerator. Tell me. You have orange juice? Is it blood? You have an open up mechanic Coca-Cola. No one would have been able to tamper with that. Open it up. What's in the Coca--- blood. Maybe there's a problem, sir, in your house. Go outside. Guy goes outside. He goes to the river. Blood. Everywhere. There's no matter. Oh my God. I can't even tell you what's going on. What's happening? He says, I'm getting nervous now. I'm sweating. So why are you telling me that you're sweating? I'm sweating blood. There's blood coming out of my forehead. Blood coming out of your armpits. Yeah. What are you going to do? I don't know. I'm very thirsty now. You see any one in your vicinity has water? No, everyone's-- oh, wait a second. There's a guy over there. He's wearing a black hat. Yeah, it seems like one of them's Jewish guys. I don't know. Somehow, he has water. See these guys? They control the weather. They control the earth. Hold on. Let me go to the guy. Sir, how did you get that water from? I don't know. I just got it from my house. You turned on the water from your water like the sink? Yeah, I got it from the sink. I can't believe it. Everywhere. Really? What's up? Everywhere else? Did you guys guys like, no, I can't really? I went to the guy's house. He turned on the water. Water's coming out. So you know what, sir? If you're thirsty, why don't you drink from his sink? Great idea. You have a cup, I could bar. You're not going to believe what I just saw. As soon as I put my cup underneath it, it turned into blood. How does the sink-- no. Must be one of those AI things I've been hearing about. This is the 9-11 call. And we had every kid call in the maca to the 9-11 to talk about. That is the idea of recognizing-- not of, yeah, there was blood. Where was it? Everywhere. OK. Next. Do you know what it feels like to have a frog in your underwear? [LAUGHTER] People are not thinking like that. Because you just away the frogs everywhere. But it doesn't only say that. Guy makes himself a delicious chala for the Shabat, the triumvirgant version. [SPEAKING SPANISH] You see, leg in my heart. It's cut so open. There's a frog in the chala. In the chala. It cuts it right in half. He has to frog like this one outside. He has to find another side. Everywhere he goes, the guy in the buildings, out of the buildings. The guy says, you know something. There's got to be some place I could go to get away from them. He goes in the sauna, there, there. Checks in the oven, there, there. We're not letting-- we don't let things hit us. We don't let it affect us. We don't let it reach our reasoning. So I think that that's something that every single person could learn from Mike de Mishnah says, don't be so smart. Not only on the said night, but throughout your whole life. Allow yourself to be surprised by things. You meet some people. Their favorite thing in the world is. I knew that was going to happen. Didn't I tell you? I told you. I told you so. That guy is a very smart person who dies very alone. Because no one, first of all, wants to hear. I told you so. Second of all, right? You never change. You never change, because you never learn anything. You know a lot of things, but you never learn anything. You don't learn from the various things that happen that occur, because you already know everything. One of the things that I think would be a beautiful thing to come to the said there with is to come to the said there and say, even if I'm Rabi Akiva, tonight, I'm Shaheena Yaudali Shole. I'm the kid that doesn't even know how to ask questions. Tonight, I'm the kid that is saying, what is this? What I don't understand. What the time's question is very simple. What ma zut? What's this? What is this? A wise person looks at something that they think they already understand and they say, what is this? Because actually, the wiser you are, the more you realize, you don't know. May Hashem bless us with Zat Hashem to maintain the curiosity that makes life worth living. To maintain the curiosity in our relationships which says to us, "Not I know everything there is to know about this person, but I'm curious about them. I want to learn more. I want to know more. I want to connect more." And Zat Hashem, we will be so glad to see beautiful lives unfolding from this magnificent life perspective. Please join us for Words of Wisdom from Rabbi Ruvain Abragmov in Beyond Breakfast and the Class.