The Yanuka Rav Shlomo Yehuda-פנימיות חכמת הנגינה שאלות ותשובות עם הגאון הינוקא - חוה”מ סוכות תשפ”ו

3:04 The moment they took up the violin he said to them, "Move, move!" — he couldn't listen. They began — "Get out of here!" He didn't want to hear them even playing, and then they knew that he truly was... And they looked into him, and afterward it turned out that he was impure. Therefore music must come in kedushah. Why? The kelipah has no music. Wailing — that is the kelipah's. Because of them, on Tishah B'Av we don't wash the hands, because that is their portion; because this day has no Torah in it, and we don't learn Torah and cannot learn, so it is already...

3:32 it is the day of the... the chitzonim, the outer forces, have a very great hold on this day, because there is no music and there is no Torah either. They have vitality. So that is why on this day they have much greater power. And that is yelalah, wailing. Yelalah is exactly the reverse of haleli, "praise." Haleli is the niggun; it is the Tikkun. The yelalah is the flaw; it is something that is, as it were, reversed. Therefore, when we engage in music and play, we sanctify and purify and repair all the chambers and the corners — what cannot be attained except through a niggun.

4:06 For only by the power of the niggun can you attain this sifting of the imagination. And without it — that is what you see, that the world has many fantasies. For example, there is a person who has many fantasies. There are people who have fantasies. Many fantasies — he dreams that he is such and such. That is a sign that he has no music in his mind. If he had music, he simply takes the power of imagination out of himself. The more music a person has, the less he lives in fantasy. Those who have no music live in fantasy. They can enter into fantasies, think that they already... they imagine many fantasies.

4:36 Music is the sifting of the good spirit from the evil spirit, and it truly repairs. And also, for every niggun, for every note — we have seven notes. One, two, three. Do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, si — how many is do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, si? It's seven. Seven. No, no — do; it's seven. Across the octave it is seven: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven.

5:09 Once more: two, three, four, five, six, seven. Seven, corresponding to the seven days, right? Chesed, Gevurah, Tiferes, Netzach, Hod, Yesod, Malchus. Now, we have Keser, which in fact is Chabad — Chochmah, Binah, Da'as — the light that will be revealed in the future.

5:34 That is Chabad, the upper ones. That has still not been revealed. That corresponds to the eighth note, the ninth and the tenth. The eighth, the ninth and the tenth note will be revealed only to King David. That is why King David alone said, "On a ten-stringed harp I will sing to You." I will know the tenth note. "Whereas you will not know" — that is what King David said about himself.

5:58 What does "you" mean? Even the King Mashiach will not know the tenth note. Only King David. The King Mashiach will attain only the eighth note. The eighth, yes. The ninth and tenth... Why? He said, "On a ten-stringed harp I will sing to You," in the singular. "I" — alone. He did not say anyone else. King David didn't have a piano; he had a nevel, a harp.

6:23 A nevel is a piano. What is a piano? It's a harp with hammers. That's a piano — it's a harp like that. Instead of it standing upright and being plucked, it has the striking of hammers. The hammer strikes it and it produces sounds. — How much time a day is enough? Of music? — Ten minutes a day is enough. There's no need to know. — "I will raise him up, for he knows My Name." One who knows the Explicit Name in its order — does he then also know the tenth note, or does that not have to be so?

6:52 — What do you mean? — One who knows the Explicit Name — the Rav said, "I will raise him up, for he knows My Name." Why? Because "he knows My Name" — the Name of Seventy-Two, in its order. Because today it is not in order. — Right, the Name of Hashem is only in its order. — In its order. No, today it is not in order — and "I will raise him up, for he knows My Name." — Wait, I'll explain to them, because they don't know. Rabbi Elazar of Germaiza, that is the Rokeach — he writes that there is a Name of Hashem, right? The Name of Seventy-Two, the Explicit Name.

7:21 The Explicit Name of Seventy-Two — you know that today it is not found in the correct order. You have surely seen it in the siddur, in the words of the Ramak; [unclear] you have surely seen it in the siddurim — it is in Matok MiDvash, in all kinds of siddurim. You can see it; it is there in Krias Shema too — on each and every word you can see from the Name of Seventy-Two, the Explicit Name. For example, we also say — in the Hoshanos we say, "Ani vaHo, hoshia na."

7:52 What is "Ani vaHo, hoshia na"? What is this "Ani vaHo, hoshia na"? So in truth — from Rabbi Yehudah — what is "Ani vaHo, hoshia na"? In the Mishnah in Tractate Sukkah, chapter 4, mishnah 5, it is written, "Ani vaHo, hoshia na." What is "Ani vaHo"? "Ani vaHo" — "vaHo" is from the Name of Seventy-Two. That is, he did not say "Ana Hashem" — but "Ani vaHo." It is part of the Name of Hashem, of the Explicit Name of Seventy-Two.

8:18 From the Explicit Name of Hashem — it is a direct appeal to the Holy One, blessed be He, by His Explicit Name. "VaHo" is from the Name of the Holy One, blessed be He. That is, if you look at the Explicit Name, there are seventy-two Names, which is 216 letters — 72 times 3 is 216. That is, each one of us has a few names, and there are those called by two names, three names, four names — those are a person's names.

8:47 The Holy One, blessed be He, has 216 letters, seventy-two Names, and there is another Name, Ana B'Koach, which is brought in Rashi in Tractate Kiddushin, page 71. That is Ana B'Koach: "By the great power of Your right hand, release the bound one; accept the song of Your people; raise us up, purify us, Awesome One" — that too is of the Names of the Holy One, blessed be He. Ana B'Koach — if you have noticed — is the Name of Forty-Two. The Name of Forty-Two; it is called the Name of Forty-Two — "and you shall speak of them," bam, "v'dibarta bam." "Bam" is the secret of the Name of Forty-Two.

9:20 Corresponding to the forty-two journeys, corresponding to "v'dibarta bam." What is "v'dibarta bam"? You shall speak "bam" — in the secret of the Name of Forty-Two. The Name of Forty-Two is a very great and deep secret in the Torah, which it is impossible to stay on and expand upon. "You will see only its edge, and all of it you will not see" — how many secrets there are in the Name of Forty-Two, the Name of Ana B'Koach. What is the... tell me? Jumbo.

9:45 A jumbo jet. Jumbo is mem-beis, forty-two. Mem-beis. What's that? Something is being asked here. — What about the half tones? We said, the black ones. — The black ones? — Could one say that it perhaps corresponds to... — Ah, in a little while I'll explain about that. I understood what you mean. These, right? Half tones, quarter tones. That is still part of the letters.

10:11 After all, you have no more here. It is not an eighth or ninth or tenth note. Because in the end, the same niggun that you do on the white keys you can also do on the black keys. It's just that on the black keys it's a harder niggun, more complicated, and, like, subtleties and very hard scales, and many people don't know how to play on that, because it's very, very hard. — Does it correspond to something? — Certainly, everything is secrets; but it is still not included in the eighth or ninth or tenth — that is the question. It always remains... it comes out of the seven. It's like, within these sevens, it is included inside.

10:45 It's not something that is beyond that. The sound sounds very, very beautiful. For example, look — a niggun on the white keys; one can do, say, the... [music] That is on the white keys. Now the same niggun on the black keys. [music] That sounds a bit richer.

11:24 Did you notice? It sounds deeper. Did you notice? So it's not always possible, say, to sing — or for people to sing along — with these notes. Now, every niggun — all these seven, all the seven — that corresponds to what we said: Chesed, Gevurah, Tiferes, Netzach, Hod, Yesod, Malchus.

11:54 We have those that will be revealed in the future. Soon we'll get there. In truth, every note, every sound that we hear — right? every sound has a letter. It has a letter. Like you now hear this — it has a letter. Every sound has a letter. Why?

12:22 Right — twenty-two letters. If you listen, every sound has a letter, and every letter that you hear has a niggun. After all, in the future to come, what does the Holy One, blessed be He, do? He takes the entire Torah, the entire Torah — He includes the whole Torah; the whole Torah He includes within one parashah, and that whole parashah He takes into a column, into a verse, into a word, and into a letter.

12:50 He gathers and includes all the letters, all of them. From where do we learn this? "The land on which you are lying — to you I will give it, and to your offspring." That is, He folds up the Land of Israel and includes it within the head of Yaakov. Yaakov did not lie on the land — he lay on the ground, on a certain spot. He did not lie on the whole land. That is "the land on which you are lying." As it were, he lay in one place, and the whole land was included in it.

13:18 So the higher one goes, everything is included and included and included. Notice: the more we ascend like this, we ascend, ascend, ascend, and are elevated. We ascend and are included in the thing. The higher a thing is, the more the thing is nullified, utterly nullified, and included in its root. You go to the root, the more you go to its root. Now, the Torah is Tanta: te'amim, nekudos — the cantillation notes, the vowel points — tagin and osiyos, the crowns and the letters. The higher you go, you are in the te'amim; after that you come down a little more, you already see nekudos, the vowel points.

13:48 You already have pronunciation. The pronunciation — already you are coming down here to something. You have tagin, something that you see; you come down further, you see letters. If I go up, I am in the te'amim. The te'amim are something abstract. You don't see it; it is in Atzilus. Right, it is abstract. You pronounce them. When you read the Torah, you read it with the te'amim.

14:13 That is, without the te'amim you cannot read the Torah. Because you won't understand the Torah — you have no punctuation. As the author of the Shemen HaTov, Rabbi Shmelke of Nikolsburg, writes — the brother of Rabbi Pinchas, the author of the Hafla'ah: "If a man has a son — wayward and rebellious he is not; he heeds the voice of his father and his mother, and they discipline him, and he does not listen to them." I distorted the whole verse with the te'amim alone. One can read it differently. Exactly — the parashah of the wayward and rebellious son, we read it the opposite way. That is, without the te'amim there is a different meaning here to the verse, which changes it from one end to the other: that a person has a son, and wayward and rebellious he is not —

14:49 he heeds the voice of his father and his mother. What is the reason that he doesn't listen? That, as it were, he does listen — "and they discipline him, and he does not listen to them." That is exactly the opposite of what the Torah... That is, the te'amim are the garment of the understanding in the Torah. That is, without the te'amim you will not be able to understand the Torah, and you will change its meaning. So the te'amim are above, the highest — which is the secret of the niggun — and because it is so high, it is not clothed in letters. But in its root it has a letter, it has something that gives it life and connects, and you can, through this letter and the connection — the bond — you bring down and reveal something here in this world.

15:26 I'll give you an example. I now want to sit in a big hall in China. I go to China. Ni hao, gaoxing. Ni hao, gaoxing. Be joyful — you, be joyful. Gaoxing, gaoxing. Chinese — in Chinese it's "ni hao gaoxing, ni hao gaoxing," right? Are there Chinese people here? There aren't. One more... the Chinese here. Now, I want now to sit with the Chinese.

15:54 I want to make them joyful, that they should be in joy. I want to be in joy; I tell them: be in joy. Now, I don't know how to speak with the Chinese. What do I do? I do this for them... What do I understand from them? That they want to rejoice, right? I make them joyful; by themselves, through the niggun, they are joyful — all of them, all the Chinese are joyful. And if I want to cause them to cry — that is, the niggun can cause one here to cry, one here to rejoice, without understanding any language.

16:28 I play a niggun; the niggun will bring about in them either sadness or joy. That is, the niggun is a kind of language, of letters, of words, so that through the niggun I can influence all kinds of people and all kinds of languages without speaking with them at all. That is, I can cause the Chinese or the Japanese or any nation in the world to understand my message without saying anything to them.

16:55 I only need to play, and they understand the wisdom of the niggun. By the way, the Gra — Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin said that the Gra was very pained that he did not know the wisdom of music. He said that in order to understand the chambers of the Torah in completeness, one must attain the wisdom of music. He did not understand the wisdom of music; he said that he did not understand the chambers of the Torah in completeness. Understand how important it is — the chamber of melody, the chamber of music. But...

17:21 What's that? The wisdom of music is a very, very complex wisdom, very deep, and it includes everything within it — the whole wisdom of music. Whether it is knowing how to play, to produce, to create, to compose — a niggun is a very lofty thing, it's a thing... do you know what it is to compose a melody? Think about it sometime. It's a very hard thing. Are you thinking about it? To compose a niggun.

17:47 To bring out a niggun that is, like, a beautiful melody — you hear it, you say, "Where was it created, this niggun?" Like, I'm speaking of very deep niggunim, niggunim on very high levels. You know, today — you know, just as today you can tell about a person whether he is a Torah scholar or not a Torah scholar, one can see things today that are evident. You see today where the world's head is, where it is at. So too with a niggun. In the wisdom of the niggun, one who understands music can know how high the niggun is — whether it has a kind of, you know, as many as possible notes and different combinations, and ascents and descents.

18:24 The more complex the niggun is, and it has ascents and things, stirring things, and things, and scales, and the niggun is rich — then you understand that there is great wisdom here. If the niggun is shallow, and it's two chords and notes — "pa-poy, pa-poy, pa-poy" — there are many niggunim like that, where — it's not pleasant to say — the niggun is not on such a high level, but everyone sings and goes "wow, wow" and gets excited.

18:49 But one who understands the wisdom of music understands that it's "nice." Suitable for a phone's ringtone. What's that? It depends for what. Come — have you seen compositions by Beethoven, Bach, Mozart? Did you ever hear that they have niggunim like that? That is the wisdom of music, what they have. The non-Jews have the wisdom of music — unequivocally, certainly. Unequivocally. They have the wisdom of music on a level of...

19:16 Certainly, that is what they do. "Wisdom among the nations — believe it." For us — we need to listen to what is in kedushah; we cannot listen to their niggunim. We need my niggunim; those too are poor niggunim. What do you need to listen to their niggunim for? — What do you say — between song and music? — No, song is one thing. Joy, clapping, joy — exultation and joy. Clapping, too, is a niggun.

19:40 Right — in Tractate Shabbos, in Tractate Beitzah, in the Yerushalmi, chapter 5, halachah 2, and in Tosafos in Beitzah, page 36, as the Beis Yosef ruled in siman 339 — the prohibition of clapping hand on hand on Shabbos, lest one come to fix a musical instrument. So clapping, too, is a kind of song, a kind of niggun, a kind of sound that gives a person joy. You now clap hands on Shabbos; you now see people clapping — it gives a kind of niggun, of joy; it gives something that gives joy. Now they are clapping, so you know that people are joyful; there is a rhythm of joy.

20:18 That is, it's a kind of musical instrument, a kind of niggun, and that is why they forbade it on Shabbos. That is, from here you learn that one can make a niggun also with "they snap before him with the finger" — since he might fall asleep. — Yes. — Is there any point in a simple person, like me for example, learning music? — No. I'll explain something to you. Don't get into music; it will entangle you.

20:43 If it's taking a guitar and a keyboard and so on, I'll tell you what will happen. You'll sit with a keyboard for a good few years; it will stay in the house with the socket and the electricity, you'll make a few sounds once, and with that it will end. And in the end, for a person to hear a niggun — take, listen to someone who has already worked on it. It's as if you are playing; you hear — it's as if it's you. What difference does it make who is playing? It simply takes a lot of time; it is a bother, it is not...

21:09 There is no need to learn it, to be busy with it. It will not bring a person to anything. It is better for a person to learn Torah, to hear words of Torah, to learn Torah, to be busy with that. Being busy with music and with playing is bittul Torah, a waste of time; there is no reason to be busy with it. Only one who knew that he connects to it, when he was small, who knows it. That is all. There is no need to make a matter of it. The most pleasant thing is to sit and hear it ready-made.

21:34 Why do I need to play? You play, your head is busy: what to press? You have to move, press this, and this, and this, and the head is divided into a great many parts. Do you know how much that is? You press this, a second later that, a second later that, a second later that; if you do not know, you are off by a tiny hundredth, and already there is a mess in the niggun. It is hard, but it is a bother. This way you sit, you hear a ready-made niggun, and do I need to be busy with it? I can look at the sky, I can look at the stars, go into hisbodedus. Why does the head need to be inside the keys?

22:05 There are those who play on a guitar or something, but there is no need for it. The most beautiful niggun and song is Mishnah, when a person sings and says Mishnah, some saying of the Sages, Gemara with a niggun. That is the best niggun there is. To be busy with playing, with the organ and all that: my opinion, my personal opinion, it is not worthwhile. A waste of time. I, why do I play? Because people hear it.

22:32 You hear it, you have an awakening, you have an elevation; people... Now, that is what I play for. If I am not playing so that people will have strengthening and elevation and thoughts of teshuvah, why do I need to play? I do not occupy myself with it. — Only for [unclear]... — What do you mean? So what is there to play for? That is what I am telling you. What is there to play? I mean, if it is not for the purpose that Jews should come close to Hashem, return in teshuvah, have thoughts of teshuvah, that there be a good atmosphere, that people have renewal, that there be elevation, what would come of it?

23:04 What comes of... What comes of it? Just playing? It is a waste of time, just playing, what... — That is the Beis HaMikdash, the Holy Temple. In the Beis HaMikdash it is the Rav's niggunim. — With Hashem's help, if only. If only they would bring them into the Beis HaMikdash, my niggunim. — Rav. Rav. — A niggun. The higher the niggun is, it draws down for you an illumination from a high place, and it redeems you. It lifts the soul high, high, and can redeem a person from denial, from heresy, from apikorsus.

23:39 Now, there is song and there is playing. When you sing songs, that is song with the mouth. That is song. Song, song, it can be to the Holy One, blessed be He. And there is playing. The niggun is expressed through the hands; it can be something without words, and song is the articulation of words. That is to say, song is lower down, the niggun is higher up. It is like in Tanta: the te'amim, the cantillation notes, above, that is the niggun, and the letters, below, that is the song. Song is in Asiyah and the niggun is in Atzilus.

24:11 Because it is so high, it has no words. So it is not clothed in words, and so it is a niggun. When it comes down into real physicality, then it is revealed in words and in letters. Therefore, at this time, you can reveal it and draw it down into the world, whether it is song or something. — What is the Song of Creation? — Yes, that is excellent. The birds, too, have a special song on Shabbos.

24:39 Listen to the birds chirping: on the day of Shabbos they have something different. It is not the same chirping at all. They have a completely different chirping. Whoever can tell the difference, let him listen to the birds that chirp every day in the morning. And if he has the chance to listen when he walks to the synagogue, he will hear that the chirping of the birds on Shabbos is something else. What you asked about the Song of Creation, which is attributed to King David and to King Shlomo, which the Mabit used to say, for it is a great thing; he says that in its virtue it is more than all of Tehillim, the Song of Creation.

25:13 And Rabbeinu the Chasam Sofer had the custom of saying the Song of Creation every Erev Shabbos. Every Erev Shabbos he would sit and say the Song of Creation. And it is a great virtue to know the Song of Creation, as it is said: "Whoever occupies himself with Perek Shirah." "Occupies himself"; it is not written "whoever says", but "occupies himself". One has to delve into it. There is the commentary of Rabbi Binyamin HaKohen, there is the commentary of Maran the Chida, there is the commentary of the holy Or HaChaim, there is the commentary of Rabbi Eliyahu Deitsch, the author of the Pi Eliyahu.

25:40 There are many great sages who composed commentaries on the Song of Creation. It is a very, very great virtue, and also "Perek Shirah" is the gematria of "oro shel haMashiach", the light of the Mashiach, perhaps the same number. When people learn Perek Shirah they make the light of the Mashiach shine in the world, and it is a great virtue for a person to know the Song of Creation by heart: whatever comes before him, birds, a swallow, a spider, he sees trees, he sees the sky, he sees clouds, he sees the moon, he sees the stars.

26:06 Every time he sees them come out, he should say for each one its song, what it says, and it is a segulah that they will be nullified before him and will not harm him. — But how does one say it? — You open Perek Shirah and say it. It appears in siddurim, there are siddurim, there are booklets, there are special sefarim that were published for the Song of Creation. The commentary of Rabbi Binyamin... how? So there is a dispute between Rabbeinu [name unclear] and the Rabach, Rabbi Binyamin HaKohen, [name unclear].

26:33 What really... who really says the song? For if it truly had a mouth, it would have been fitting for it to say it. Some say that it is the angel above it, that he is the one who says this song. Some say it is an angel: every thing in creation has an angel that stands over it, and he says this song. He said: birds. Birds. Seemingly it would have been fitting for them to say this song. If they had the ability to speak, they would say it.

26:59 Some say that they really do say it, in their own song, only we do not understand; some say it would have been fitting for them to say it, if they were able to speak; and some say they have an angel who says this song in their place, for them, and it is as if they say it. Those were several opinions. One can say that on Shabbos there is a different, special song. You can hear them chirping in a wondrous way; it is something. The birds themselves: one just hears them in the synagogue, sitting at prayer, when we pray here too, pay attention: the quiet, the birds, you hear their chirping in a wondrous way.

27:32 It is very different from the chirping of the birds on a weekday. You hear them on a weekday, but really, with the birds... For example, pay attention to the birds: they also know how to tell where there is air pollution and where there is clean air. Have you noticed that? Have you ever been at factories? Did you notice that there are no birds there? You have not been? Pay attention. Walk along a street where there is air pollution. Factories, places like that: there are no birds.

27:59 You do not see birds flying. But you go to a neighborhood, you see trees: full of birds, full of birds. If in a certain place there are many birds, it is a sign that the air is clean. If you go to a place where there are no birds at all, you do not see a single bird passing by, there is no shiluach hakan there, nothing, then it is a sign that this place is truly, truly, truly not healthy. So one should check that.

28:23 — Is it better to say a little Perek Shirah and understand, or a lot by... — No. Only to read a little and understand. I have already spoken about this. Even though in Tractate Avodah Zarah it is written, on page 17, on page 19, where the Gemara says: "A person should always recite, even though he does not know what he is saying, as it is said: 'My soul is crushed with longing,'" not to learn by girsa, just reciting the words, at all. Nothing, nothing. Not Perek Shirah, not Tehillim, not anything. You say one chapter with commentaries, you say the Song of Creation, one chapter, with a commentary.

28:49 You do not say anything by girsa. That is what I told all the students, everyone who hears the things I say, who takes the advice: do not recite anything by rote. Learning by girsa is bittul Torah, a waste of time; it does not bring a person to wisdom, it does not bring a person to knowledge, and in the end he will get up from the sefer and not remember anything. He recites by rote. Once, in their times, it was good to recite by rote, because they had a lot...

29:14 they did not have sefarim with explanations and commentaries. They already knew the spoken language, so for them, reciting was what full understanding is for us today. So they could say: recite, recite. Many holy ones and many sages spoke of the virtue of girsa. I do not disagree with them, Heaven forbid. I am simply saying that today, in our days, girsa will lead to a wasting away of the brain. In the end a person will recite and recite. Yes, why recite the Zohar by rote? Why?

29:40 Why recite the Zohar by rote? Why? Do you know what diamonds there are in the Zohar? More than 150 times the halachah was ruled in the Shulchan Aruch in accordance with the words of the Zohar. Washing the hands, the first halachah, that we wash our hands, is from the Zohar, Vayeshev, page 184. Washing the hands, washing the hands: a person washes his hands in the morning, netilas yadayim, a halachah from the Shulchan Aruch, its root is from the Zohar. The whole Zohar is full of treasures, full of mussar, full of fear of Heaven.

30:06 Why recite the Zohar by rote? Why do this injustice? Why? Certainly, yes. Nothing is to be recited by rote, nothing. — Matok MiDvash? — There is Matok MiSilan too, my own commentary, Matok MiSilan. What?

30:32 I did not understand. Give me the gist; what do you mean? The Or Yakar? To learn Or Yakar? Fine, but look: Or Yakar, the commentary of the Baal HaSulam, these are wonderful commentaries, but again, once more, these commentaries themselves need commentaries. Today I would recommend Matok MiDvash, where he did outstanding work, truly, he did the work; he also explained everything, which the Baal HaSulam did not do for everything.

30:58 Matok MiDvash is truly a work in which that sage, that gaon, tzaddik, Rav Daniel, did wonderful work, from Heaven, and truly he was helped from Heaven to do it. It is a wondrous commentary, really from Heaven, which has both an explanation of the plain meaning and Kabbalah. He brings much from the words of Rabbeinu the Or Yakar, truly a virtue beyond measure. But learn as much as you want; whoever wants should learn. The Komarna, he would say that if they would educate small children, from the time they are small, to engage in this, they would be pure and holy, with fear of Heaven upon them.

31:37 He recommended it then, in his time, and in Zidichov the custom was to educate the small children already to learn Zohar from the age of 13. Fine, but it depends. Today the Zohar is midrashim. The whole Zohar today is midrashim; it is not some sefer of Kabbalah. The Kabbalah is found between the lines, for one who understands. Kabbalah is found in the Zohar Chadash, Kabbalah is found in the Tikkunei Zohar. That is more Kabbalistic. Most of the parshiyos of the Zohar are words of Aggadah. The Zohar is a blend of 60% aggados and midrashim and another 40% words of Kabbalah, sealed and closed. What a person does not understand, he moves on; but there is no need to stop and leave the Zohar, or the learning, because of that.

32:19 All learning by girsa is not a learning that belongs to us today. Even though I know there are many who encourage it and all that, but I do not recommend reciting a lot of Tehillim by rote. There are those who say a great, great deal of Tehillim, reciting a lot. Read with intention; understand what you are saying. Understand, make use of it. Every moment you are turning to the One Who spoke and the world came to be. One cannot recite His Name by rote like that, recite like that. You know, in Tractate Shevuos, page 39, and Nedarim, page 7: the severity of the prohibition of mentioning the Name of Heaven in vain.

32:50 Rabbeinu the holy Shelah writes that in Tractate Menachos, page 43, it says, it was taught: "What does Hashem your G-d ask of you"; do not read "mah", what, but "me'ah", a hundred. A person is obligated to take care to say a hundred blessings every day. That is to say, not only will the person not receive reward for the hundred blessings, he will be judged for a hundred times that he mentioned the Name of Heaven without intention. Did you hear? It is frightening. That is to say, you think you are fulfilling a hundred blessings every day, and in the end you did not fulfill a hundred blessings. You will be judged for a hundred times of mentioning the Name of Heaven without the proper intention. See what Tosafos say in Nedarim, page 7: wherever you find the Name of Hashem, you find poverty, death, such things.

33:25 It is no joke. People recite the Name of Hashem by rote; it is dangerous. You say the Name of Hashem, you say Tehillim: say a few, unhurriedly, calmly. You say Mishnayos, you say Zohar: there is no need to recite by rote. There is no competition, there is no competition. Where are you rushing to? Where are you rushing to? What is the pressure? The Moda'ah and Gilui Da'as, the declaration of intent that Rabbeinu Yosef Chaim instituted, is a gift from Heaven.

33:53 It is a tremendous, wondrous thing that brings about salvations and miracles and great things. The Moda'ah and Gilui Da'as that the sage, the Kabbalist, Rabbeinu Yosef Chaim instituted. The Moda'ah and Gilui Da'as is a wondrous thing: a person declares his mind and reveals his will, that if anything else comes up in his thought it shall be null and void. And that is an excellent thing. It is excellent, it is excellent. It is excellent to say it, because it can have an effect on a person.

34:20 It is excellent to say every day, every day. I would even recommend... I took the text of Rabbeinu Yosef Chaim, and I added and changed a little; I made it shorter, with the addition of important things. There is also my own text for it, if you want. You had it just now; a week ago they handed it out, on Rosh Hashanah. In the Rosh Hashanah [unclear] I brought it. It helps and it is excellent.

34:49 You mean that there are words of Kabbalah there. Do you mean the words of Kabbalah? Look, all the words of Kabbalah, like for example when we say Leshem Yichud, all these things, all the words of Kabbalah about these things: you surely already know the dispute there was with the Noda BiYehudah, and Maran the Chida in his sefer Simchas HaRegel, where Maran the Chida said to say it, yes, to say it.

35:17 For what was the concern in their times? In their times, when they would fulfill a mitzvah, the view of the Noda BiYehudah: when a person fulfills a mitzvah, the very fulfilling of the mitzvah already does its work in Heaven. Why do you now come and need to make yet another Gilui Da'as? What will a Gilui Da'as help you? It will give you nothing. But in practice, if we would understand something very important: Maran the Chida writes in Simchas HaRegel that the virtue of Leshem Yichud is very great. Now, let us give strength and support to his words.

35:47 In the Beis Yosef, in siman 8, we know, regarding the mitzvah of tzitzis, that if a person wraps himself in tzitzis and did not have in mind to fulfill all His mitzvos, blessed be He, he has fulfilled his obligation bedi'eved, after the fact. He has not fulfilled his obligation lechatchilah, in the proper way from the start; he has fulfilled his obligation bedi'eved. That is to say, he needs intention. Now, with Leshem Yichud, before fulfilling the mitzvah I say Leshem Yichud, and when I say the Leshem Yichud, what am I saying?

36:15 I direct my mind to the whole mitzvah that I want to fulfill. In the Shulchan Aruch, siman 60, se'if 4, the Shulchan Aruch ruled that mitzvos require intention. So if I now say the Leshem Yichud and I mean everything that I am saying, at the time that I fulfill the mitzvah I fulfill my obligation. This way, even if I did not have the intention, the very saying will bring me to fulfilling the obligation of the mitzvah properly.

36:43 And then I have no problem, because I said the Leshem Yichud; you have fulfilled your obligation. Therefore there is a very, very great virtue in indeed saying Leshem Yichud, and one who cannot have the intention because it is long should say only "Leshem yichud Kudsha Brich Hu uShechintei", and right away say the shortest possible form of what he can, only so that the verses of the mitzvah, what is brought in the Leshem Yichud...

37:10 That would be the sefer Or HaShanim, from 200 years ago, 170 years, by a sage, which Rav Aryeh composed, in Or HaShanim, where he composed all kinds of Leshem Yichud for all kinds of small mitzvos that a person fulfills: before shiluach hakan, and before each and every mitzvah, to say a Leshem Yichud and a Moda'ah and Gilui Da'as for every mitzvah one fulfills. That too is a sefer of very, very, very great virtue. In Responsa Rav Pe'alim, part 1, siman 1, Rabbeinu Yosef Chaim brought there the great virtue of the service and the Tikkun and the prayer when a person utters the words "Leshem yichud Kudsha Brich Hu uShechintei". It is the Tikkun of the Shechinah; it is a very, very great virtue, and it is a tremendous thing. He explains it in very clear language, what the intention is, so whoever wants can

37:55 look it up there: Responsa Rav Pe'alim, part 1, siman [unclear]. — For which mitzvos can one say it? — All the mitzvos, if you can; everything, everything, every thing that you fulfill, especially the tallis, the tefillin, things like that. There is the prayer that I composed for Shabbos. There is a prayer that I composed for Shabbos. Do you know that after they typed it, the person who typed it checked: there were exactly 702 words in it, the numerical value of "Shabbos".

38:23 Exactly. That is what he told me. I did not know that, truly. I composed the prayer; I did not count so that it would match 702 words. I wrote it, and he told me, by hashgachah pratis, that he sat at the computer afterwards, having typed my handwriting, he took the handwritten pages, typed it all, and it came out to exactly 702 words. That is what he said. — Regarding Shabbos: we see "Askinu seudasa deMalka" at all the meals. — Correct.

38:47 — At all these meals we stress: "Da hi seudasa deMalka", this is the meal of the King. And then there is a difference between the meals. At the first meal we say: "Da hi seudasa deChakal Tapuchin Kadishin", of the Field of Holy Apples; at the second meal, Atika Kadisha; and at the third meal it is Ze'ir Anpin. This refers to the words of the Zohar in Parshas Yisro, where there is a teaching of Rabbi Shimon, and after that, how Rabbi Shimon would sit and what he would say at the meal, and after that, what Rabbi Elazar asked his father.

39:18 In the first teaching Rabbi Shimon says that "Then you will delight in Hashem" is the first meal, and "I will feed you the heritage of Yaakov your father" is the second meal, and the third meal is "and I will feed you the heritage of Yaakov your father, for the mouth of Hashem has spoken." Now, in the first teaching Rabbi Shimon in fact says that the first meal is the meal of the Holy One, blessed be He.

39:45 In the second teaching he says that the three meals are the meals of the Holy One, blessed be He. In the third teaching, where he answers Rabbi Elazar, he tells him that the first meal is that of Chakal Tapuchin Kadishin. So there is, first of all, a difficulty from Zohar to Zohar, from Rabbi Shimon to Rabbi Shimon. Second, why [unclear]... and I also saw in the siddur Torah Or of the Alter Rebbe, it is not there: they left out the first teaching of Rabbi Shimon and addressed only the second and third teachings, and that is how they accepted the teaching [unclear].

40:17 — Well, that is why, if you look, there are siddurim that refrained from saying this text. You surely saw that too, right? You saw several siddurim that refrained from saying this text, and not everyone had the custom of saying this text. All the meals of Shabbos, and especially the first meal, which is the highest meal, which is the meal of great and holy virtue in which we merit to be in Chakal Tapuchin Kadishin, which is the reason for the Chiddushei HaRim of Gur and the Maggid of Kozhnitz, who revealed to them that they should eat an apple on the night of the holy Shabbos: these apples correspond to the apples, to Chakal Tapuchin Kadishin, the Field of Holy Apples, where in fact an illumination is drawn down to us from the greatest mercies of the Holy One, blessed be He,

41:02 and these mercies come down and flow on the night of the holy Shabbos, on the night of Shabbos, when the revelation of face to face takes place, when we in fact say "Bo'i Kallah, Shabbos Malkesa", and therefore there were many sages who refrained from saying it, because no one really knows the level and the influence of the meals relative to one another. Some say that the third meal is the highest there is; according to the words of the Alter Rebbe, the third meal is the greatest level there is.

41:30 Rabbeinu Tam would hold the third meal before the Minchah prayer. You pray Minchah after it. It is permitted to rely on this; one who is hurrying to a Torah shiur or something like that can do so. The Minchah prayer and then the third meal: that is according to the words of Rabbeinu the Arizal, according to Rabbeinu Yosef Chaim, the Rav Or LeTzion. A person who does that, it is as if he did not pray; according to the words of Rabbeinu the Arizal, if he did not pray Minchah and then hold the third meal after it, he has not fulfilled his obligation. He must do first of all the Minchah prayer, and then the third meal.

41:58 But Rabbeinu Tam would do the Minchah prayer... he would hold the third meal and then pray Minchah. It does not hold it back; from the time of midday on, it was permitted. And what do they say in Chabad, the Alter Rebbe? That the third meal is Ra'ava deRa'avin, the will of all wills. That is to say, it is the highest, more than the first meal, more than the second meal. So they do not hold it; they say that the light is so high that one does not make it physical through eating. So they rely on the Meiri, on those who say it is permitted to eat delicacies, kinds of fruit. They eat delicacies, kinds of mezonos, they have wine, they make a l'chaim, grapes, mezonos; and they say that the light is so high that they do not make it physical through physical eating.

42:39 So they do not come down and draw the light so that it is clothed; they say: let us go up to the light. As if to say, we need to go up to the upper worlds, and not make the light physical, that it should come down and become physical in eating. That is, as it were, their view. So therefore, today, this matter is subject to many disputes, because some say this way and some say that way, and the third meal, plainly, one must fulfill it and eat, and the fourth meal too, not to mention the fourth meal, which is in siman 300 of the Shulchan Aruch: the importance of the fourth meal is much greater, for the Rambam and the Shulchan Aruch copied the Gemara.

43:18 So you see that you are, as it were, fulfilling the mitzvah of Melaveh Malkah, the fourth meal, and seemingly there is no 'Askinu Seudasa' for it... there is nothing, nothing. But seemingly the fourth meal receives all the light of Shabbos and the light of all of them, because it is Motza'ei Shabbos. And so one must take care to stay in one's Shabbos clothes until midnight, chatzos, whoever has not yet fulfilled the Melaveh Malkah meal — to take care with the Melaveh Malkah meal. The Chazon Ish, the Steipler, many holy men — right as Shabbos went out they would set the table: Havdalah, washing the hands, and the meal. That is what they did — not like us today, who make Havdalah, go off, and eat a few hours later.

43:54 Of course, whoever wants to eat with an appetite and eats later — let him do so; but whoever can, makes Havdalah and right away breaks bread. That was the practice of the Chazon Ish; every time, he was particular to make Melaveh Malkah. You spread a tablecloth, make Havdalah, and right away wash the hands, make a meal, sit down, and prepare a special dish in honor of Melaveh Malkah. Many kabbalists and many sages had the custom of doing so.

44:19 And whoever cannot — you know, one can eat fruit; one also relies on the Gra — you can eat fruit, sweets, I don't know, other things — only that there be something recognizable in honor of Melaveh Malkah. There is the view of the Eshel Avraham of Buczacz, who writes that to eat — to drink tea — has the status of pas shacharis, the morning bread, because it nourishes. And for pas shacharis in the morning, his practice was to drink tea.

44:45 That was his pas shacharis. One has to eat morning bread, but he — by drinking tea, one fulfills the obligation of pas shacharis. So if you want, one can do 'hot drinks on Motza'ei Shabbos are a remedy' — you say: I can drink tea, and then I can — it will count for me as Melaveh Malkah; I rely on that. One can think that way. Perhaps one can say so, and have in mind that this is pas shacharis. If you think one can make yet another arrangement on the rabbinic level, you can do something else.

45:10 You can make the third meal. Of course, during bein hashmashos, twilight, it is permitted to wash the hands for the third meal. You can wash your hands at twilight if you did not manage before. In a case — yes, not as the first choice, but in a case where you are truly under duress and, I don't know, could not eat. You wash your hands, eat, one more kezayis at nightfall, having the Melaveh Malkah meal in mind, and then it counts for both meals.

45:36 What does that have to do with it? I mean the Melaveh Malkah meal. If you pray Arvis, you have lost the continuity — that has nothing to do with it. I am now in Shabbos. I am before nightfall; I was at twilight, bein hashmashos. I ate the meal — Minchah, the prayer — I ate the meal. I am eating the meal; the stars came out, I ate one more kezayis measure, having Melaveh Malkah in mind. That's it. What does that have to do with it? Right.

46:05 I simply said — the other way around — for a person who truly finds it hard, who cannot, who is under duress. He pushed off his eating until he reached bein hashmashos — he should not think that he is forbidden to have the third meal. Rather, even during bein hashmashos it is permitted to wash the hands for the third meal — not, of course, for other foods — but if a person wants to wash his hands during bein hashmashos, he may wash. If, of course, he ate at sunset — 'how good and how pleasant'; all the better.

46:33 But I am speaking of someone who did not do even that. Then he washes his hands and eats a kezayis, and it counts for him as both meals. That is the option one can use. So a person has discharged himself of both the third meal and the fourth meal. Yes — look where we have gotten to; look where you ended up, at the third meal. Yes. — Regarding a woman who says Tehillim, what is better there? — What is the question?

47:07 Once more? Ah, regarding women — — whether to recite or to learn? — To understand. — To understand. Regarding women, I understand. A few minutes ago. Are you in a hurry? — No, not in a hurry. No, not in a hurry. Yes.

47:33 — Are there more niggunim? — Niggunim? Words of Torah now. We have played enough today. We have played enough. So, like this. So where were we? — At the women. — So look: women, in practice, are also obligated in the blessings over the Torah, right? Women too. Why? They have many halachos that they need to know. A woman needs to know the laws of niddah; a woman needs to know washing the hands, the laws of blessings, the kashrus of the kitchen.

48:02 She cooks in the kitchen. She needs to know meat and milk, she needs to know and understand cooked dishes, things, cooking, to know the things that come up in practice: the laws of Shabbos, the laws of blessings, family purity. She needs to know these things. I recommend that women know this as well, and not only recite Tehillim, with all due respect — because if she does not know this, what happens at home? After all, the husband sits in kollel, the wife is at home in the kitchen, cooking, preparing pots — there may be a whole party going on there with the utensils and everything, and in the end: 'if you grasp too much, you have grasped nothing.'

48:37 So that is why one must know — always an order. A woman should set herself a time for Tehillim, a time for halachah, a time for mussar. That's it — so that she does not cause her husband to stumble. If she does not know the laws of niddah, she causes her husband to stumble. She needs to know for herself the laws of niddah, the laws of the kashrus of the kitchen, meat and milk, the laws of Shabbos. Small things — she does not need to know all the halachos now. Small things, simple things that... no, she can read the final rulings; she does not need to study in depth the Tur, Maran the Beis Yosef, in-depth analyses, the Rishonim — the Rashba, the Ritva, the Meiri — there is no need for that.

49:16 Only simple things — final rulings, simple ones, like those for children. It is enough for her to know small things, basic ones — that's it; no more than that is needed. That's it — she knows that, and also to learn mussar. A woman should learn Orchos Tzaddikim — mussar. In Orchos Tzaddikim, to learn the Gate of Joy, the Gate of Envy. Women must learn the Gate of Envy. Women have envy far greater than that of men, and they need to know this, and so they need to learn the Gate of Envy — so that they have no envy, so that they have no competitiveness, so that they have joy — that she be joyful, to rejoice in her lot. These are things it is important for women to know — and the laws of rechilus, talebearing.

49:54 Because women are talkative, baruch Hashem. So they also need to learn the laws of rechilus. These are the things a woman needs to learn — and Tehillim. And Tehillim — not saying the whole of Tehillim all day. A woman who thinks she will say the whole of Tehillim all day long — I do not know if she will be a great tzaddeikes, yes? A great tzaddeikes she will be if she truly knows the things I said, and Tehillim she should say at set times, in chapters. That is da'as Torah; that is what one must do.

50:18 That is what the Sages bequeathed to us. It makes no sense that a man's wife should say the whole of Tehillim ten times every day, and afterwards go back to the telephone and speak lashon hara from here to the heavens. It is not worth it. A woman needs to know the important things, and Tehillim is prayer; one needs to know when to pray and how to pray. One does not turn to the Holy One, blessed be He, just like that, with no purpose.

50:43 One must turn to the Holy One, blessed be He — there are times, there are ways, there are prayers, like the Amidah prayer. The Sages instituted for us Shacharis, Minchah and Arvis. They did not tell you: pray Shacharis ten times, Minchah ten times, Arvis — thirty times a day the Amidah prayer. No. There are set times — for Tehillim too. She can manage to say, for herself, psalms in the morning, psalms in the evening, with a bookmark, and in between make herself a small order of learning, ten minutes a day: a little of the laws of rechilus, a little of Shabbos, a little of the laws of blessings, a little about foods — that's it.

51:15 And that's it, it is done. There is not much to learn. Baruch Hashem. What? A question — very nice, a nice question.

51:42 I have already been asked this; a very nice question. And I answered — what is that? One moment, I am getting to you, I am getting to you. Truly, the answer — it is a very nice question, this question. I was asked this about a year ago, something like that, and I explained that King David himself will attain the 'on a ten-stringed harp I will sing to You' — he will attain it, and he will teach us this wisdom.

52:15 So he is, as it were, saying — he is, as it were, hoping and looking forward to the time and the season already arriving when there will be revealed in the world the tenth note, which he will know, and everyone will sing it — so that he can, as it were, plant it in the created beings. Because King David does not want to know this for himself. And there is another aspect, another answer: that perhaps the Mashiach who will come to us will be either David or the son of David.

52:41 As it is written in the sefer Degel Machaneh Ephraim, at the end of Parashas Behar. At the end. The Degel Machaneh Ephraim writes, at the end of Parashas Behar: it is written, 'Either his uncle or his uncle's son shall redeem him.' So he writes: 'either his uncle (dodo) or his uncle's son (ben dodo)' — either David or the son of David. So if it will be David himself, then there is no difficulty in what you are saying. But if it will be the son of David, then the difficulty returns to its place, there is a difficulty; what you are saying is a great difficulty.

53:08 It is also written: 'and David their king, whom I will raise up for them' — it does not say 'I raised up' but 'I will raise up for them.' So it teaches that the Mashiach, too, can be David. — But what the Rav said, that the Mashiach knows up to the eighth — after all, King David will teach everyone, and the Mashiach too, in general... — Right, but as you know, the soul of Mashiach is a very high level, and he will know things from the Holy One, blessed be He, even without King David; it is not connected, it does not depend on King David.

53:37 All right? — What is the connection between [unclear] and [unclear]? — What is the connection? I did not understand. First of all, Maran the Chida spoke about this psalm, Psalm 67 in Tehillim, whose virtue is very great — to say it every day, when a person says 'My G-d, guard my tongue from evil and my lips from speaking deceit.'

54:03 In Tractate Shekalim, on page 18, it is written that there were a thousand talents of gold which King Shlomo worked and melted down in order to bring out the Menorah, which was a single talent of gold. I have given you a parable and its meaning: to take billions of dollars and turn them, to refine it all, so that it becomes a single talent of gold. Today we do not have the Menorah, but this psalm was the shield of King David.

54:29 Rabbi Moshe Zacuto writes — of Mantua, the author of Shorshei HaShemos — great secrets and awesome allusions about this psalm: that it was on King David's shield, and it was made in the likeness of the Menorah, and there is a very great virtue in saying it in the form of the Menorah. Maran the Chida writes — in all these times of the days of Sefiras HaOmer — corresponding to the forty-nine days, corresponding to the forty-nine words, forty-nine words, corresponding to the branches — this psalm.

54:55 And it has a very great virtue — Rabbi Yaakov Koppel Chassid in his siddur, [name unclear] in his siddur, the Toras Chacham — Rabbi Chaim de la Rosa — Rabbeinu the Rashash, and many great ones, many tzaddikim, holy and pious men — and further, in the words of the Maharshal, the Rokeach — many tzaddikim who had the practice of reading 'Lamenatzeach' in the form of the Menorah. There is a great virtue in this. And furthermore, Rabbeinu Yosef Chaim wrote that whoever says it is, as it were, as though he lights the Menorah in the Beis HaMikdash. And the virtue of reading the Menorah is not to say the Menorah like this, 'Lamenatzeach' out of the siddur, rather, one should say it like this: opposite your face you raise it like so, in this way, and say it with the branches in this form, and I say it like this:

55:36 'For the conductor, with melodies, a psalm, a song.' To read the branches in the form in which you say them, and then I look either from right to left or from left to right — it makes no difference. One can say it this way, one can say it that way. I simply say it from right to left. — What is the secret of the Name of Mem-Beis, which the Rav began to speak about and did not finish? — Right.

56:02 So, the Name of Mem-Beis... What did you want, tzaddik? — How do we say that there are set times to pray? The Gemara says, 'If only... if only one would pray' — — As Rabbi Yochanan said: 'If only a person would pray the whole day long.' The virtue of prayer — the Yerushalmi, chapter nine [tractate unclear], Right. But there are times that are special times, that are auspicious for favor. But a person does not know when the favor is, so we say, as Rabbi Yochanan said: 'If only a person would pray all day' — let him pray.

56:30 You do not know when the Holy One, blessed be He, has that favor, but this... Even if he is not on that level — let him pray. There is no virtue or importance greater than prayer. When you pray to the Holy One, blessed be He, you give the Holy One, blessed be He, nachas ruach, pleasure. But learning — a prayer that comes after learning Torah has a different grace. That is why it is important that a person also learn Torah, because if you pray all day without learning, 'you have grasped too much, you have grasped nothing.' One must learn Torah, and the prayer must come on top of that; that will give more help and assistance.

57:13 Right? Nu, so what is the question? Why? What? I did not understand. Did anyone understand the question? I did not understand the question. You are saying: how can one say verses of Tehillim if I do not believe the verses I am saying — as though I am lying? Is that what you are saying?

57:44 I understand. Then I can raise a difficulty on the difficulty you are raising. Seemingly, how do you pray three prayers every day and say, 'and on Your great kindness we truly rely,' when you are not truly standing there? How can one say it? 'On Your great kindness we truly rely.' That is a difficulty. What is this 'with ruach hakodesh'? What is 'with ruach hakodesh'? Do I have ruach hakodesh, Divine inspiration? Yes. 'To You my heart says' — Rashi explains: 'for You, as Your emissary' — that everything the heart says is literally the words of Hashem.

58:11 There is Likutei Moharan of Rabbi Nachman, Torah 156, where Rabbi Nachman says that all the words of Hashem that you speak with the Holy One, blessed be He — every conversation a Jew speaks with his Maker — is ruach hakodesh. You go out now to the field and speak with the Creator; in your own simple language you have ruach hakodesh, yes? The words you speak are from Heaven; that is ruach hakodesh. A sefer from 200 years ago — Likutei Moharan; it is written there. — [question unclear] — That is only through music; it is the imaginative faculty.

58:42 The moment the music is there, it refines the will within you until your will becomes pure. Every desire turns pure. Music will refine your imagination, so that you are not drawn off to foreign places. What did you understand? — How do I direct the prayer to you?

59:07 How can I bring the prayer to you? — To me? What do you mean? To teach them? You mean hiskashrus, binding oneself. You mean hiskashrus. What do you mean? Hiskashrus... — ...that the tzaddikim are like the Beis HaMikdash, toward which one directs the prayer. — Right. — So how do I direct the prayer to you? — Simple. You say: 'I hereby bind myself to all the true tzaddikim of our generation,' and so on. This early wording appears in the sefer Yosher Divrei Emes of Rabbi Meshulam Feivush of Zbarazh.

59:44 He writes: 'I hereby bind myself both to those greater than me and to those lesser than me. The benefit of binding to those greater than me is that through them my thought will be raised up; the benefit of binding to those lesser than me is that they will be raised up through me.' That is what he writes. That is one wording. A second wording is the first chapter of Rabbi Yitzchak HaEzovi. The author of Yalkut HaEzovi, 600 years ago — there was the author of Yalkut HaEzovi, Rabbi Yitzchak HaEzovi; there he writes to have intention 'together with all Your children who know the Names' — there he also brings a wording like this, of binding oneself to the Sages. It is not exactly the same, but it is similar. If you are asking about the first mention,

1:00:19 it appears in the words of Rabbi Yitzchak HaEzovi. Today, any sage or tzaddik or sage of the generation — your own Rav, or any other sage you want — I am simply not saying this in terms of myself — so bind yourself with whomever you want. Make a hiskashrus to all the tzaddikim of the generation, and you say: 'in particular to' the one you wish to bind yourself with — and so the prayer ascends. But what is hiskashrus today? We pray to the Creator. Can you bring an offering outside the Beis HaMikdash?

1:00:45 — No. — No. So what does one do? One brings it to the Kohanim. The Kohanim know how to raise the prayer up to the Holy One, blessed be He. Our emissaries, who raise it up — [unclear] — Aharon Kohen, Aharon Kohen — excuse me — Aharon Kohen; this is Aharon Kohen, yes, this is Rav Kohen. — There is 'the prayer of every mouth'; before you say that, you can have them all in mind — that is the moment, when one prays Shacharis. Right, honored Rav? — Right.

1:01:14 — Whoever you want to bless — a Rav, whoever one wants to bind himself to — and then one blesses the children, right — everyone you want — and at 'the prayer of every mouth,' before you say it, you bind it. — Rav, it seems to me, these hiskashruyos — is it better to do it or not to do it? — I did not understand all of you. — They are asking about disputing hiskashrus. — Why? Can you dispute Rabbi Yitzchak HaEzovi? — I am not disputing, but it seems to me there was — it seems to me — no, no, Rav, doesn't someone dispute this?

1:01:43 — No, that is not... Once more. Look, there are these and there are those. We are not going into the category of the disputes and all these things now. The plain, simple meaning of binding yourself to a tzaddik does not mean that you are giving to him or that you are serving him. I am binding myself with sages. I am joining with tzaddikim; I am making it known that my will is to be with those who do the will of Hashem.

1:02:09 Where is the problem in that? I bind myself with those who serve Hashem. I bind myself to them so that they will draw me after them. What — where could it be? Yes, what is the problem? 'What is attached to the pure is pure.' — Rav, [unclear]? — Certainly. You can bind yourself with holy ones who have passed away — with the Gaon of Vilna; to make a hiskashrus to Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin.

1:02:37 — And there — that he loves each one of the Children of Israel? — Yes. But we said that [name unclear] writes that one should say: 'May it be Your will that I love.' So that a person does not stumble in a falsehood — for how can he say 'I hereby love' when he, Heaven forbid, does not love everyone? One should say: 'May it be Your will that I love each one of the Children of Israel.' This hiskashrus brings it about that I tie myself to him, and wherever he ascends and roams and places the prayer, my prayer ascends there too.

1:03:10 — But there is the way through Chevron, where the prayers ascend; there really is... — If you know the way to Chevron, go by way of Chevron. — Take us; let us make a hiskashrus to the Rav here. — That is not connected, that is not connected, that is not... Hiskashrus — you are always making your mind known to the Holy One, blessed be He: 'and place our portion with them.' That is all; all hiskashrus to tzaddikim is this wording; this is the meaning of 'and place our portion with them.'

1:03:39 I want to be with the tzaddikim, who do His will. — In Gan Eden as well, say, with them, with the tzaddikim? — Yes, in Gan Eden too. You can ascend with him to Heaven. And if we have time, I will tell you a nice story — if we have time. — I wanted to ask, Rav; I wanted to ask, Rav. — What did you want? — ...something more connected.

1:04:09 — Look: one person connects to the Ramchal, loves the Ramchal very much — the Ramchal's discourses, the Ramchal's kavanos. One connects to Rabbi Yaakov Abuchatzeira, one connects to the Gra, one connects to the Torah of Chabad, to the kavanos of Chabad. The Toras Chacham, Rabbi Chaim de la Rosa — each one had... What? It all reaches Heaven. Tractate Eruvin, page 13: a Heavenly voice went forth and said, 'These and those are the words of the living G-d.'

1:04:37 Beis Shammai and Beis Hillel — all of them ascend to Heaven with favor. Whatever you want — everything is accepted. Everything is accepted, everything; the Holy One, blessed be He, accepts everything, everything, everything. All the streams, all the directions — everything comes before the King. No one can say, 'My stream is more, my stream is less' — all of them ascend with favor. What? What did you ask?

1:05:03 So, what I understood — what I understood of the question — with 'and place our portion with them,' where I said: how, as it were, 'and on Your great kindness we truly rely' — so truly, the one who already asks your question is the Amud HaEmes. Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Kotzk, in his sefer Amud HaEmes, asks exactly this question. He writes: how can one lie every day and say, 'and on Your great kindness we truly rely'? So he says that these wordings are not wordings that a person truly means; it is a person who wants to include himself in this statement, that it should truly come to be.

1:05:33 He wants to compel himself to be in this place. That is not called falsehood; It comes from the side that I want to be in that place. So he says it as an expression of hope, that "I want to be in that place" — that is how he resolves it, and this is the reason the Sages instituted this wording for us: not for you to say a falsehood, but in order to be in that place of emunah and trust in what you are saying. That is the intention, that is the plain meaning. — Sometimes there is a simple person who has merited to be attached to the tzaddik, and he is among people, great Torah scholars, and they have not yet merited this closeness.

1:06:08 The question is: from now on, does he, as it were, no longer receive from them, because they are not included in the tzaddik, or does one go on receiving from them, even though they did not come to the tzaddik — they are not connected to the tzaddik, as many are. — A complicated question; I didn't understand it. What is the question? Briefly, briefly — what is the question? — Sometimes there are Torah scholars. So if he is in a place where he has, around him, Torah scholars — he has rabbis that he learns a great deal from — but over time he has already merited to be close to the tzaddik, which they did not merit; his rabbis did not merit it as well.

1:06:47 They don't accept it, they — they go a different way. The question is whether he should go on receiving Torah from them, even though they are not connected to the tzaddik. — I'll explain a simple rule. I'll explain a simple rule. Look, to go into this subject with you now — one could talk about it now for another two hours or so, and I still would not have begun to explain to you the introductions, how important the receiving of the Torah is.

1:07:21 Yes? The Torah is likened to water. What happens when you drink water from the Ganges? Have you heard of the Ganges? They have water where they bury the dead there — they throw them into the water. It is the most polluted water in the world, the water from the Ganges. The laundry — it is the most polluted water, the most dangerous to drink. You know, many times we are careful about what we eat, what we drink — that it's healthy, that it's this and that — but Torah we receive from anyone.

1:07:52 We are not careful with the Torah that we accept to hear. The Torah — what you put into the body, into the soul — goes straight into the soul. If you receive from one who is not good, you become very distant from the Holy One, blessed be He. It is dangerous. There is a teaching of Rebbe Nachman, in Likutei Moharan, Part I, Torah 28; there he writes about what is called their Torah — "a parable and a figure" — about "shedin Yehuda'in," that they can distance a person from the Holy One, blessed be He.

1:08:21 And therefore one must be very, very careful in every way of receiving Torah. So the simple rule, always, in receiving Torah: be strengthened, and receive from what brings you closer to the Holy One, blessed be He. Go and rise to a place where you have elevation and closeness to the Holy One, blessed be He. Don't go looking now — one doesn't do, as it were, "from this one yes, from that one no." Receive: you are strengthened, you rise, you have joy, you have satisfaction — receive in a good way, rise and come close.

1:08:48 And that's it; that is the most important thing. And most important is that you receive only from rabbis who teach Torah and do not try to speak dispute and lashon hara and so on — because otherwise they are no longer rabbis. A rabbi who does not teach Torah — a rabbi must teach Torah, be occupied with Torah. The rabbi already starts talking politics and his opinions, and who is good and who isn't, and what is forbidden, and what we received and what we did not receive — let him occupy himself with teaching us the tradition of the Torah, and not "what we received and what we did not receive."

1:09:16 Do you understand? Talking nonsense. A rabbi must teach Torah, and not occupy himself with politics and with things of this kind and that, of... A rabbi must teach Torah — 100% Torah. Not tell you lashon hara, and not talk this way, and not with hints and not with winks. To teach Torah — 100% Torah. Do you understand? Not to talk with you about things around it, to try to influence you this way, to tell you this and tell you that and all sorts of things, things to win you over to what he wants, and how it seems to him — he wants to lead you.

1:09:48 The rabbi must teach you what is written — that is what he says. What is written, he says. He teaches Torah, what is written in the Torah. In the books — that is how the tradition is; this is what we teach. One must learn and teach. What is written in the books, what is written in the Torah — that is what you bring out to the people. Don't stray and change things. As you see, I stick to the line, to the book. What is written, I tell you: it is written here, this answer is written here, this is written here. Ask: "Bring a source."

1:10:13 What is this rabbi saying? Say to him: where is it written? Where did you learn it from? What is the source? Ask — me you bombard with questions. Ask! You went to a rabbi who told you something — say to him: where is it written? What is it learned from? Teach me. That is how one should receive. I want to receive Torah from a rabbi — I'll tell you something. What's that? Yes, but you know, if we want to receive Torah — you want to receive something — now, anyone can come and make things up for you out of his own head, or things that seem right to him. You want to tell me something, you want to teach me something — tell me, "we have such-and-such a tradition"; tell us everything there is.

1:10:55 We want to learn. The most important thing is to stick to the books, to stick to the commentaries, to the explanations, to the Torah, to what we have received. The moment you learn Torah in the right way, and you always learn and lean on the pillars, on the great ones of the world — you will not err. To walk in this world — it is easy to err, easy. Today you would not build a house without an architect, right? You would not deal with electricity without bringing an electrician.

1:11:21 So why walk in this world without a way of Torah, right? Everyone thinks he understands, and — hop. That is how our generation has become; that is our generation, to our sorrow. Someone comes who does not understand and thinks he understands; the one who thinks he understands the most presents himself as the absolute truth — and in short, it is all a mess. I can't hear you. Rav Eitan is here with us — a tzaddik.

1:11:47 How do you feel? May you have a complete recovery, robust health. Come to us, come closer to us here. Make room for him, for Rav Eitan. Our tzaddik, Rav Eitan. May He give you health, a good life, protection and shelter. May the Holy One, blessed be He, bless you. A great sage, a special one. May Hashem watch over you, give you a complete recovery, robust health, and quickly raise you up to a good life and to peace. May He give you good tidings, salvations, a good life.

1:12:17 What is this? What is this? — Books. — Ah, books? Ah, in Spanish... your honor. How are you, your honor, first of all? How do you feel? — I think that when I am here, I feel that I am in the hands of the Shechinah. — Beautiful. Thank you very much, your honor. — It is what King David said... all the encouragement, new books... that is what we feel here with the Rav. We need to thank the Rav all the time, and to ask the Rav's forgiveness. No one knows what the greatness of the Rav is — of all who are close to the Rav and those who are far from the Rav, and of course I am speaking about myself — one must ask the Rav's forgiveness.

1:12:51 The more people get to know the Rav, as they come close to the Rav, the Rav conceals himself to such a degree that, however much people know, the Rav's humility is such a concealment that people do not honor the Rav enough — and for that I ask forgiveness in the name of the whole public. That is not... I would be glad to... Right. Everywhere, they have made very bad public relations for Mashiach — people who talk about Mashiach, "Meshichistim," delusional people, and all sorts of things like that.

1:13:23 And today, it's as you say: they cry "Wolf, wolf!" — and in the end, when the wolf comes, no one believes it. In this generation everyone speaks of it — it is a conversation even among the Litvaks — that everyone understands that this is the last generation; even by the mathematics it is the last generation. Those who listen to the Rav's Torah understand that really, if there is no Torah lishmah, if there is no unity in the Jewish people, then there will be no Mashiach.

1:13:51 So what is the truth? The truth — are we close or not? Far? Let the Rav tell us. What is going on here? People pray, they say... about Mashiach. So is there a chance in the world that everyone will know the Rav's Torah? What chance is there that there will be unity? What chance is there that everyone will know Torah lishmah, and truly for the sake of Heaven? That is one. And two: a generation that is entirely guilty or entirely meritorious.

1:14:15 What chance is there that it will happen? It is neither entirely guilty nor entirely meritorious. Where do we stand? Let the Rav tell us the point of truth, at least in this matter of Mashiach. — I'll answer you what the interpretation is of "entirely meritorious or entirely guilty"; after that I'll come back to finish with you on the first question. That one I'll answer second, and the second I'll answer first. "A generation that is entirely meritorious or a generation that is entirely guilty" — we are at this moment in a generation where it truly is not clear where it stands.

1:14:49 On one side you see what you see, you already understand where it is heading; and on the other side you also see the other side — that there is much elevation, much awakening. You also see that it is going in a positive direction. Now, you remember that we learned that when we go to the cemetery, we bless: "Who formed you in judgment" — "Who formed you in judgment, and sustained you in judgment, and brought death upon you in judgment, and knows the number of you all, and will in the future revive you" — "and You are faithful to revive the dead" — "Blessed are You, Hashem."

1:15:19 I said that one does not say this blessing at the grave of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, or at a single grave. Why? Because you too know how many are buried there. So you do not say this blessing, "Who formed you in judgment." Why? Because you know that Rabbi Shimon is buried there — he and Rabbi Elazar. Now, you say "and knows the number of you all" — and you too know who is buried there. Right? It's not... or that you... You know — so you cannot say it.

1:15:44 You too know how many it is. "The number of you all" is only when one blesses over cemeteries where a multitude of the Jewish people are buried. And today, in our days, one can say this blessing — not over any single one of the Jewish people — in the cemetery several times, because new dead are added, and one can say the blessing once again. Now, each one of the Jewish people — "the number of you all" — there are people who are equal to a multitude.

1:16:09 A person who commits a sin, or acts brazenly against a great one of Israel — that — a person comes now and lights a cigarette in front of a great one of Israel: it is as if he desecrates Shabbos in public. It is enough that he does it — acts brazenly against a great one of Israel, gets angry in front of a great one of Israel; that is acting brazenly — he does it, and it is as if in public, as if before the many. It is enough that he stands only before his eyes, only before one — it is as if he does it before the many.

1:16:36 He does not need to stand now before the many and commit a sin. He stands before a great one. A person who, Heaven forbid, speaks lashon hara about a great one of Israel, or who heard lashon hara about a great one of Israel and did not protest — it is as if he spoke about all of Israel at once. It applies to all the Jewish people together. Why? Because a great one is equal to the Jewish people. Yes, tens of thousands. Now, the Holy One, blessed be He, knows what the number of the weight is — whether it is ten thousand, tens of thousands, five thousand, a thousand, five hundred, six hundred thousand, ten thousand, three thousand, a hundred people, fifty people, twenty people, five people.

1:17:18 The Holy One, blessed be He, knows how much each one is equal to. Now, if the son of David comes either in a generation that is entirely meritorious or in a generation that is entirely guilty, that means there will be many who will be equal to many of the Jewish people, and then they will tip the generation, so that the generation will be meritorious. — So it does not go by the generation, and not by what is publicly known. — Exactly. So, as it were, there will come those who are equal to the whole people, and they will tip the whole generation to the side of merit — and then it is as if he comes in a generation that is entirely meritorious.

1:17:48 And if they do not have one like that, then it will be "guilty" — one will come who makes the whole generation guilty. In Tractate Shabbos, page 139, the Gemara says: "If you see a generation upon which many troubles have come, go out and examine the judges of Israel" — because they do not conduct themselves properly, troubles are renewed and come into the world. So that is like "a generation that is entirely guilty." So from here you will understand the answer to your question. Now, regarding the first question that you asked: Baruch Hashem, people are being strengthened, accepting the things and learning, understanding the right path.

1:18:25 And I brought proof — from all the words of our Rabbis, the Rishonim; all of it — nothing is my own. That is: in Yoma, and what our Rabbi writes there, in Sefer Chassidim, Rashi and Tosafos in Berachos, page 17, Pesachim, page 50; Yoma, page 72. There are many. It is not something new that I brought. One must learn Torah lishmah, give the Holy One, blessed be He, nachas ruach, and beware of learning that is not lishmah.

1:18:54 We want to awaken the Jewish people and raise up the Jewish people. This is learning that must be clean. What you, Baruch Hashem, learn in the book, in the writings, in the pamphlets, in the writings — may you read, with Hashem's help, everything that comes out. There will be great benefit, with Hashem's help — to serve Hashem correctly, precisely, in the right way, in a clear way. Baruch Hashem, people are rising; people who, Baruch Hashem, walk in the path and learn the writings testify that within a few weeks, a few days, they have a change, they have elevation, they have memory in their learning, they have joy in their learning, they have elevation.

1:19:30 And I see students who reach... You see here the Torah scholars, on Shabbosos and so on — that they know Torah, Baruch Hashem, they know. They know a lot of Torah. Where does it come from? Learning Torah lishmah — a lot of Torah enters them; they absorb. Much more — when you learn Torah lishmah, a clean sponge. So it takes in much more water; you put it in — clean. That is to say, you come with dirt.

1:19:56 — That the Rav knows the entire Torah, and the Rav's genius — it is not for nothing "the Rav, the Gaon, the Yanuka." It is not only about genius in Torah, which is something phenomenal. It is that the Rav received the Torah as a gift — "from the wilderness, a gift" — a gift. As the verses say — it is all given to whom? To the one who is the giant of the generation. It is not only about the genius. The Rav's genius, truly — it connects exactly, it corresponds with what the Rav said just now. Whoever learns the Rav's Torah is really receiving, distilled, all the knowledge of the Torah — for the genius is to take and distill the things and write them — all that the Rav knows — into one chapter, into one paragraph.

1:20:35 It is really like learning all the Rav's Torah, the moment one learns the Rav's writings. So just as the Rav produced it with sweat, with toil and with tears, in Torah lishmah — so whoever connects to the tzaddik, as the Rav said before, connects to the Kohen — not only to the prayers, but to the Torah of the tzaddik; and through this, with Hashem's help, may we merit that our righteous Mashiach be revealed. — Amen. May it be His will that we merit it, amen. With Hashem's help, may we merit it. But until then, until Mashiach comes, and until the geulah comes, and until the Beis HaMikdash is built, we can meanwhile serve Hashem and think — with Hashem's help the geulah will come — how we will live. But let us think about our geulah today: how

1:21:12 to live in geulah now — not to wait for the geulah. Now we need to have our own geulah. We must learn with a correct da'as, to value the Torah, to rejoice in the Torah, to hold the Torah dear, to hold the souls of Israel dear, to lift up the souls of Israel, to shine the light. There is so much falsehood, and darkness and gloom, in the world. There is great darkness, and the cloud and the fog are very great — very, very, very much so in the world.

1:21:37 There is very great darkness. It is not a darkness, now, of which you say "where is it from" — it is a very, very, very great darkness. And you see it, in that today you don't know from where — what will you say to people today? What will you say today? It is like — it is exactly the same aspect that is brought in Tractate Tamid, page 31b, about Alexander of Macedon, who came to the Elders of the Negev. He asked them, right?

1:22:04 What did he ask them there? — About how... ...one lives. — Yes, there is that too, I know. No — those three questions he asked them; no, this is something else. Tamid, page 32 — on page 31b he asked them: why did He not put the darkness first? What was created first — the darkness or the light? And the Sages did not answer him. What was created first — the darkness first, or the light? Seemingly, what was created first?

1:22:31 — The darkness. — The darkness. "And darkness was upon the face of the deep, and the spirit of G-d hovered over the face of the waters" — that is, the darkness. Now, they did not want to tell him that the darkness was created first. Seemingly, what should it be by logic? That the light was created first. That is what logic says. Now, they did not want to give him an answer. Now — now I understand the secret of the question, of what was here. What is the secret of the question that was here? What was created first, the light or the darkness?

1:22:58 The darkness was created — that is, the darkness — the world was tohu vavohu, "darkness upon the face of the deep." That is to say, when you see darkness — there is darkness in the world today, there is a reality of darkness — it is a sign that we are at the beginning. So it is tohu vavohu; that is to say, there is darkness, there is a reality of darkness, there is no reality of light — to reach a reality of light, and as it is written in Zecharyah, "And it shall be that at evening time there will be light" — only at the end, "at evening time" — only after the evening will there be light.

1:23:29 First of all, we look at the darkness, at the reality — that we understand there is darkness. Only when you understand that you are in darkness, only then can you expect light. As long as you do not understand that you are in darkness, do not expect light. Do you understand what that means? That is, there are those who think they are in the light; they do not understand that they are in darkness — and they truly are in darkness. That is the dangerous breed of humankind. Yes, they think that they are in the light, and that they are enlightened, and that they are wise; they do not understand that they are in darkness. The very knowledge and understanding that you are in darkness — the very understanding that you are in darkness — that is already the greatest light.

1:24:07 Now, you can see this from here regarding the sukkah as well. Now, our sukkah — we are sitting now inside the sukkah, and you say: what is the virtue of the sukkah? Why is a sukkah that is higher than twenty amos invalid? Why, the moment the sukkah is higher than twenty amos, is it invalid? And you say: why is a sukkah higher than twenty amos invalid? What happened in a sukkah higher than twenty amos, that it is invalid? What happened?

1:24:37 The eye does not reach it, right? That is, what does "the eye does not reach it" mean? You cannot see the s'chach. That is, according to Rabbi Zeira, it is because, as it were, the walls that reach up — once it is twenty amos, the shade of the sukkah comes from the wall. The shade does not come from the s'chach above. We need — as Rabbah says — according to Rabbah, one must see the s'chach.

1:25:04 That is, if now the eye does not reach it, then I do not see the s'chach. And Rava — what does he say? That it is, as it were, not temporary — because a temporary dwelling has to be something that is... to build twenty amos now, you have to put up something big; that is putting up a building. It is no longer temporary; it does not have the law of temporary. That is, in all the explanations, if you look at the Sages — they are discussing — you say, what is going on here? There is something here in the sukkah that in fact comes to teach us about the light — where it enters from.

1:25:35 That is, if the light — it has to come from the s'chach; it has to be close to you, but it has to be regulated. Once its sun is greater than its shade, it is invalid. That is, you need to be, as it were, inside the light, but you must have a very, very great protection — and the light must come from the s'chach. Not from the wall — as Rabbi Zeira says, that it is invalid. If it is also high, according to Rabbah, then it is, as it were, also invalid — because the eye does not see it; the eye no longer reaches it.

1:26:03 It is like the beam of the alleyway in Eruvin — the same thing. You need to see with the eye, you need to look, to take in what you see; because if you do not understand it, then you do not sense it, and then you do not see. So from here one can also resolve what we said about Abaye and Rava, in Berachos, page 48a — as children, when they said the blessing. The dispute of Abaye and Rava: Abaye says: in the heavens.

1:26:31 What does Rava say? In the ceiling. In the ceiling. That is to say, on Sukkos we fulfill our obligation according to everyone, because it is both in the ceiling and also in the heavens. That is to say, on Sukkos one can fulfill the obligation, because one sees the revelation of G-dliness in all of it. And why? Because on Sukkos you are, in fact, sitting inside the greatest light — the sun is upon you, but you are in the shade. And that is exactly the understanding.

1:26:57 You need to understand that outside there is darkness, and you are inside the light. But this light must reach you by way of the s'chach. Precisely when a person understands that the light of the Torah has to be regulated, and that one must receive the light correctly, gradually, and in vessels, then his sukkah is not invalid. It can be kosher. But if he wants to receive the light with its sun greater than its shade, or he wants to receive it from the walls, or he wants his sukkah to be higher than twenty amos — it is invalid.

1:27:30 Because the eye does not reach it. He cannot see the revelation of G-dliness — that it comes from the Holy One, blessed be He. And so, when you look at everything you go through in this world — one sees many ordeals in this world. We go through many ordeals in the world. All kinds of troubles and ordeals, and people, and opinions, and mistaken people; over the course of life in this world one meets a great, great many creatures and people. And there are the people who say: "I am right, I am the correct one, I am the one who knows, I am the truth, I am the..."

1:28:00 How's that? "I, I, I." Whoever does not have it in him — whoever has not toiled in Torah and does not have correct da'as — can never in his life say the word "I." His intellect is always distorted. He is always corrupted; he thinks that he knows. His imagination thinks that it knows. Only when a person crushes himself, and brings into his mind — into his intellect, his inner self and his soul — the light of the Torah, only his sukkah is kosher.

1:28:26 Anyone who does not have this in him — his sukkah is flying in the air: with one it is the walls, another has no s'chach — you see just one palm branch, that's all. With him it is all sun. That is exactly how it is with the light of the intellect. The sun is the light of the intellect, and the person is in the sukkah. Everyone has the light of the intellect. There is one who has long walls, there is one who has more than twenty amos, there is one whose sun is greater than its shade, and one whose sukkah does not stand up to an ordinary wind. To each one comes a spirit of folly — in Sotah, page 3: "A person does not commit a sin unless a spirit of folly has entered him."

1:28:57 A spirit of folly enters him and knocks his sukkah down. Right away he kicks the sukkah. As in Avodah Zarah, page 3, where the Gemara says that in the time to come all the nations of the world come; they all run — come on, let's go. "We want — we too want to fulfill the mitzvah of sukkah." "Come, come, I am giving you one mitzvah; let us see how you fulfill it." He brings the sun out of its sheath upon them, and they immediately kick at the mitzvos. We fulfill the mitzvos with devotion. We sit and toil in Torah. We serve the Holy One, blessed be He — right? We are the Jewish people.

1:29:24 The nations of the world do not have this; they do not have our devotion, they do not have our way, they do not have this. But what do we do? Where does the evil inclination come in? It brings disputes into us, and lashon hara, and such things, and then there is something invalid in our service. Our service, our Torah, our offerings are not as they should be, and then we lose. Therefore, when we learn Torah and listen, and we become truthful and faithful and holy and loving, and helping, and doing good — you will see: suddenly, such a revelation of G-dliness that everyone will serve the Holy One, blessed be He, and suddenly the geulah will come — "suddenly the Master will come..."

1:30:02 — That explains the sukkah in the sun. What is the sukkah at night, when the sun is not there over the world? — Now, look: everything you see, the stars — it is the same thing. The stars too. The stars are — the night is really the fear and the darkness and the concealment that there is in the world. Generally, in the world, what is a person afraid of? The night, the dark, the hardest moments. Precisely at those times — "and Your faithfulness in the nights" — precisely at the time of darkness and gloom and all that, when a person's intellect does not shine for him, as I said before — "And it shall be, at evening time there will be light."

1:30:38 — One should be able to see the stars from the sukkah. — Right. But the whole purpose is: "And it shall be, at evening time there will be light." If you know that you are in darkness, there is already no darkness. You can already look forward to the light. But if you think you are in the light, you are in darkness. Do you understand? The outlook must always be: I always need to change. The moment you already think you are perfect — when is a person's mistake? When he is already the critic, already the examiner, already the one who rebukes.

1:31:08 That is the mistake. Who are you, that you know the truth? Who authorized you to know the truth? The moment you understand that you are in darkness, all that is left for you is to look forward to the light. Because you immediately turn from "at evening time" to "there will be light." But the moment you do not bring yourself into this, and you think you are in the light, then you never even get as far as the darkness, and you always remain truly in darkness. Do not be someone who thinks he is already there. No. One always needs work, toil, tefillah, pleading, truth, Torah learning. Learn a lot of Torah — learn a lot of Torah and you will reach the right path. Those who learn Torah correctly reach the most correct place.

1:31:46 All right, tzaddikim, look, I could sit here with you until morning. Perhaps we will merit something short for the conclusion — one moment. Yes, one moment, let us hear the gentleman. Yes. Yes, please, go ahead. — The twenty-four thousand students of Rabbi Akiva — what did they do? They were giant Tannaim; the least among them, like Rabbi Shimon, [unclear] for all the Jewish people.

1:32:13 Always. Giants, tremendous giants. The least among them — twenty-four thousand giant students — ...one toward another — what was it with them? What was wrong? "They did not treat one another with respect" — they did not honor this one and that one, they did not say it — every day, eight hundred funerals.

1:32:46 Those Tannaim. How can that be? It troubles me. If one cannot learn from them, from whom can one learn? Why not honor my brother? Why not love him from the heart? Not one thing in the mouth and another in the heart. With the mouth I say: "I love him, I'm crazy about them, I'd do anything for them," and in the heart — well, if right now I could tear him to pieces, I would do it gladly. Look, there are such people, to my sorrow — I know them personally, Rav — in the heart they are completely different, and the heart is galaxies away from the mouth.

1:33:26 How far it is from the mouth... — Right, that is right. — That is that. And the Rav spoke earlier about the birds. I wanted to say: not only that — they pass a message from one to the other. — Right. — And we — we don't, nothing at all. Heaven forbid, when there is some danger — an earthquake or something like that, Heaven forbid — and something is about to come, they jump up and go wild and cry out and run about and... [unclear] — not in the way of King Shlomo; King Shlomo, the wisest of all men, knew all the speech of the animals, all the speech of the trees, all the speech of...

1:34:14 If one does not understand, at least let us ask: what — what is going on? Why do they suddenly change their... like that? There is speech among them — among the birds, between themselves. Now we want to try to understand more than usual. Have we gotten there? Why do people ask questions all day long about the One Who spoke and the world came into being?

1:34:44 What is there to ask? Be — "You shall be wholehearted with Hashem your G-d," and serve Him with wholeheartedness, and uprightness of heart, and love that asks for nothing. Oy — "give me, and give me, and give me, and give me, and give me" — and I do nothing for You. Why? Why is it like this? ...Heaven forbid — oy va'avoy — we have nothing at all.

1:35:15 I will give Him everything, only when He truly sets me free. — Shall I answer? First of all, yasher koach to you, tzaddik. Very nice. May the Holy One, blessed be He, watch over you; may you have health and joy. You moved us very much; you truly said correct things. You are right, my brother — truly.

1:35:40 It is right, it is very right, right. — The palace has a Master: He decides, He understands, He gives life. Except for who will be wicked and who will not — that is in the person himself, in which direction he steers himself. It is only potential: whether he will be tall or short — that is only potential... — All right, so I will say — I will answer.

1:36:11 No, no, it is perfectly fine. Your question was important, and I will answer. I will answer with a question on your question. I already asked this, back then, at Sefiras HaOmer. What you asked about appears in the Gemara, in Yevamos, page 62: "They said: Rabbi Akiva had twelve thousand pairs, from Gevas to Antipras, and all of them died in one period, because they did not treat one another with respect; and the world was desolate, and the Torah was forgotten, until he came to our Rabbis in the south" — Rabbi Elazar, Rabbi Yehudah, and so on.

1:36:45 Now, I want to explain something to you that is very important for you to understand. I asked this. Every one of us asks and says: after all, we see many sages, many tzaddikim. What did Rabbi Akiva say? Rabbi Akiva says: "You shall love your fellow as yourself" — this is a great principle in the Torah. It is the most important thing. And I asked: if Rabbi Akiva said that this is the great principle in the Torah, how is it that precisely his students died over the very thing that was his own saying?

1:37:19 After all, when Rabbi Akiva says "You shall love your fellow as yourself," it is something that comes from his very life-force. It was Rabbi Akiva's banner; it was Rabbi Akiva's message. It is like when we speak of the Chofetz Chaim, whose whole banner was — what? To guard the tongue from evil. Imagine: the students of the Chofetz Chaim — all of them go because they spoke lashon hara. How would that look to you? Rabbi Aharon Roth — the students of Rabbi Aharon Roth, the one holy in the bris — all of them died because they blemished it.

1:37:48 It does not add up. That is the question I asked: how can this be? And it makes no difference when he said it, or how he said it, in which period — after, before. That is not the answer. The answer is: the very fact that it came from him — it is his banner. It is the essence of Rabbi Akiva. You see it at the beginning too, that he received Torah with self-sacrifice, and he learned with self-sacrifice. So where did it come from? From where...

1:38:14 What do you see? — He said it. — Right. — What does his wife say to him? "Go, put flowerpots on the donkey." The first day he went out, the second day he went out, the third day — and in the end it already looked normal; that was it, the laughter was over.

1:38:42 — Where do we hear that from here? So what is your answer to this? What do you say? How can this be? — It is because this was his banner. But just as the Holy One, blessed be He, is exacting to a hair's breadth, so with the students of Rabbi Akiva it was exacted in this, between one and another. — Very nice.

1:39:07 Very nice, but still, that is not what I explained. No, it has nothing to do with gilgulim. How can it be that the one who says this saying — whose whole root and life-force is "You shall love your fellow as yourself" — that in the end, the ones who go are his students — and it is his saying? But I already told you earlier that this is not the answer.

1:39:34 Even if so, it is not... Let us put it this way: suppose it were written in the Gemara — say the Gemara had said, "After such and such and such happened, Rabbi Akiva came, stood up, put his head between his knees, and said: 'You shall love your fellow as yourself' — woe to me over this." Say it said so — still, even if I were to say that: the moment Rabbi Akiva said that this is the great principle in the Torah, it was already rooted in him from his beginning.

1:40:03 That is to say, he was born with it. It is the essence of Rabbi Akiva. Because if Rabbi Akiva had not been "You shall love your fellow as yourself," he would not have raised twenty-four thousand students. The very fact that he raised so many students is itself something of "You shall love your fellow as yourself": because he loved his fellow Jews, he raised many students. That is to say, without love for his fellow Jews he could not raise up twenty-four thousand students. And more than that: the wording of the Gemara in Yevamos, page 62, is "twelve thousand pairs." It does not say twenty-four thousand. What is "twelve thousand pairs"?

1:40:29 That he had already set a great one beside a small one, and said: perhaps they will learn from one another. And they did not learn. He said: let a small one come beside a great one. He said: let us take this one and that one — you and you, you and you. He said: through this, he will teach him; through this, he will honor him. That is the twelve thousand pairs. Why did he put a great one beside a small one? He said: they will learn. He saw that even this they did not do — even so, they did not show honor. All right. Let there be one more question, friends.

1:41:16 — So you see... They know that... let us say — There are people who think that, with the level they are on, no — they do not show respect. We show respect. — Nice. "They did not treat one another with respect."

1:41:41 "They did not treat one another with respect." Look. All right, I will answer you, so that we do not just get dragged along. I will tell you my answer — how I resolved it. So, it is like this. There is a great principle when one comes to receive Torah from the Sages, as it is written: "Moshe received the Torah from Sinai and handed it on to Yehoshua." When you come to receive Torah — when one comes to receive Torah from the Sages — each one receives what he wants to receive.

1:42:07 And there is the student who comes to receive "what the Rav wants to give me." There is a difference. The students of Rabbi Akiva came to receive from him what they wanted to receive. But with Rabbi Akiva, few were the ones who came to receive from him what he wanted to give them. That is why the choicest students — Rabbi Meir, Rabbi Shimon, those famous ones, the great ones — about whom people ask precisely this: why is it them that we have heard of?

1:42:32 Why have we not heard of more great students of Rabbi Akiva? Why specifically that pair? Because Rabbi Shimon, because Rabbi Meir — they came to Rabbi Akiva with self-nullification and said to him: "Teach us what you want to teach us. You guide me in what the Rav wants to teach me. I do not come to do as I please with the Rav." That is the self-nullification, and the awe of their Rav upon them; and therefore they drew nourishment from him, and they were saved. Why were precisely they saved? Have you not asked yourselves?

1:42:57 They too would have gone; they too were students. What happened, that they were saved? There is a difference. They were saved because they took from him what he wanted to give them. What did he want to give them? "You shall love your fellow as yourself." That is why they were saved. This is how I resolved it; that is my view. I think it is a correct explanation. And from here one must always know: when we come to take Torah, we should receive what we want — that is fine. Receive what you want, take what you want from the Rav, but also try to incline your ear, to see as well what the right thing is that he would give you, and what you truly need to receive from him — what he wants to say to you.

1:43:33 Because when you come to take from a sage only what you want to hear, you can remain with mistaken views for many years, and even disagree, and even think that your view is the correct one and perhaps the Rav is mistaken and does not know what he is saying. Yes, I think that you... And so, this means that one must always receive from the Sages their da'as, and not just look at how... So that is the answer about Rabbi Akiva. That is all for now, tzaddikim. We bless everyone: a good year and good tidings.

1:44:01 And I owe you this, bli neder — we did not even begin to explain the Name of Forty-Two. At another opportunity we will explain the Name of Forty-Two. In the end we did not get to it. Look where we drifted to, to what places. May there be good tidings, a good life, a good year. May we merit the complete geulah. And besides, we will mention now that we are partners, all of us, in the siyum that he is completing. We merit now to complete the entire Zohar together. — It is all in the Rav's merit. The Rav is the one who spurred me on, the one who gave me all the strength and power for this.

1:44:29 With Hashem's help, to know all the... We will finish — we will finish the entire holy Zohar. [unclear] of the holy Zohar; with Hashem's help he will say the "Hadran alach" and all of it. "And from those words of Bilaam I took, and I saw that there was none in the world as wise in sorcery as he. I said: Blessed is the Merciful One, Who removed sorcery from the world, so that people not stray from the fear of the Holy One, blessed be He — may His Name be blessed and exalted, amen." Until here.

1:44:56 "Blessed is Hashem forever, amen and amen. May Hashem reign forever, amen and amen." "Hadran alach" — we will return to you, the entire book of the holy Zohar. We will return to you, holy book of the Zohar, and you will return to us. Our mind is on you, holy book of the Zohar, and your mind is on us. We will not forget you, holy book of the Zohar, and you will not forget us — not in this world and not in the World to Come. We will return to you, holy book of the Zohar, and you will return to us. Our mind is on you, holy book of the Zohar, and your mind is on us. We will not forget you, holy book of the Zohar, and you will not forget us — not in this world and not in the World to Come.

1:45:24 We will return to you, holy book of the Zohar, and you will return to us. Our mind is on you, holy book of the Zohar, and your mind is on us. We will not forget you, holy book of the Zohar, and you will not forget us — not in this world and not in the World to Come. Please, Hashem our G-d, make the words of Your Torah sweet in our mouths and in the mouths of Your people, the House of Israel, and may we and our offspring, and the offspring of our offspring, and the offspring of Your people, the House of Israel — all of us — know Your Name and learn Your Torah for its own sake. "More than my enemies Your mitzvos make me wise, for they are mine forever. May my heart be whole in Your statutes, so that I not be shamed. I will never forget Your precepts, for through them You have given me life. Blessed are You, Hashem —

1:45:46 teach me Your statutes." Amen, amen, amen, selah, forever. We give thanks before You, Hashem our G-d and G-d of our fathers, that You have set our portion among those who sit in the beis midrash, and have not set our portion among those who sit at the street corners. For we rise early and they rise early: we rise early for words of Torah, and they rise early for idle things. We toil and they toil: we toil and receive reward, and they toil and receive no reward. We run and they run: we run to the life of the World to Come, and they run to the pit of destruction, as it is said: "And You, G-d, will bring them down to the pit of destruction; men of blood and deceit shall not live out half their days; but I will trust in You."

1:46:11 May it be Your will, Hashem our G-d and G-d of our fathers, that just as You have helped us complete the entire book of the holy Zohar, so may You help me to begin other books and to complete them, to learn and to teach in comfort, to keep and to do and to fulfill all the words of the teaching of Your Torah with love. And may the merit of all the Tannaim, the Amoraim and the Torah scholars mentioned in the holy book of the Zohar stand by me and my offspring and my offspring's offspring, that the Torah and holiness not depart from my mouth, nor from the mouth of my offspring and my offspring's offspring, from now and forever. And may the verse be fulfilled in me: "When you walk it will guide you; when you lie down it will watch over you; and when you awake it will speak with you." "For through me your days will be many, and years of life will be added to you."

1:46:40 "Length of days is in her right hand; in her left, riches and honor." "Hashem will give strength to His people; Hashem will bless His people with peace." We have one more siyum, of Tractate Kesubos — Gemara Kesubos. We will finish that too, in one minute. "Rav Chiya bar Ashi said in the name of Rav: In the future, all the barren trees in the Land of Israel will bear fruit, as it is said: 'For the tree has borne its fruit, the fig tree and the vine have given their strength.'" "Hadran alach, Shnei Dayanei Gezeiros" — and Tractate Kesubos is completed.

1:47:12 We will return to you, Tractate Kesubos, and you will return to us. Our mind is on you, Tractate Kesubos, and your mind is on us. We will not forget you, Tractate Kesubos, and you will not forget us — not in this world and not in the World to Come. ...Ada bar Papa, Daru bar Papa. Please, Hashem our G-d, make the words of Your Torah sweet in our mouths and in the mouths of Your people, the House of Israel, and may we and our offspring, and the offspring of Your people, the House of Israel — all of us — know Your Name and learn Your Torah. "Your mitzvos make me wiser than my enemies, for they are mine forever.

1:47:41 May my heart be whole in Your statutes, so that I not be shamed. I will never forget Your precepts, for through them You have given me life. Blessed are You, Hashem; teach me Your statutes." Amen, amen, amen, for eternity, selah, forever. "We give thanks before You, Hashem our G-d..." [the Hadran prayer continues] And may the merit of all the Tannaim, the Amoraim and the Torah scholars stand by me and my offspring, that the Torah not depart from my mouth, nor from the mouth of my offspring and my offspring's offspring, forever. And may it be fulfilled in me: "When you walk it will guide you; when you lie down it will watch over you; and when you awake it will speak with you." "For through me your days will be many, and years of life will be added to you."

1:48:31 "Length of days is in her right hand; in her left, riches and honor." "Hashem will give strength to His people; Hashem will bless His people with peace." Say "Rabbi Chananya" — we say the Kaddish "Al Yisrael," and whoever wants to join in the Kaddish — ...and say: Amen.

1:49:12 May His great Name be blessed forever and for all eternity. Blessed and praised, glorified and exalted, extolled and honored, elevated and lauded be the Name of the Holy One, blessed be He, above every blessing and song, praise and consolation that are uttered in the world; and say: Amen. Upon Israel and upon the Rabbis, and upon their students, and upon all the students of their students, who occupy themselves with the holy Torah, in this place and in every place: may there be for us, for them and for you, grace, kindness and compassion from before the Master of heaven and earth; and say: Amen.

1:49:46 May there be abundant peace from Heaven, life and plenty, salvation and consolation, deliverance and healing, redemption, forgiveness and atonement, relief and rescue, for us and for all His people Israel; and say: Amen. He Who makes peace in His heights, may He in His mercy make peace upon us and upon all His people Israel; and say: Amen. — Well done to all of you, well done to all of you. My brothers... [unclear]