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The Yanuka’s own words in this shiur, translated into English by Lehallel · 1,462 words · 6:44. Press a time to hear it said.
0:00 There are many children who think hisbodedus, secluded prayer, is something abstract, that it has nothing to do with them. They say to me, "How will I talk to Hashem? What, does He hear? Does He answer me? Can I ask of Him? Can I..." If the Rav could give a few words, so that anyone at all, a child, religious, not religious, an adult, a man, a woman, anyone, how does one connect to the Creator of the world? How is it possible to talk to Him? - It is written, "And Yitzchak went out to converse in the field toward evening." "To converse" - that is conversation before the Holy One, blessed be He. The great virtue of hisbodedus is that for hisbodedus there is no rule, there is no set time, there is no halachah, there is nothing that explains to you how to be, because you need to be you, from the point of
0:43 your inwardness, your simplicity, And that is how all the tzaddikim were. Why is it not written, "And Yitzchak went out to pray," "And Yitzchak went out to arrange his prayer"? With Yaakov Avinu it is written, "And he came upon the place and spent the night there." But with Avraham Avinu, with all the great ones, all the great ones that you find, with Yitzchak you find the language of "siach", the language of conversation. It was toward evening, it was the time of the sun's twilight, at the time when he went out to pour out his heart.
1:12 Hisbodedus is that a person needs to come to the Holy One, blessed be He, from the point of the heart, without using the intellect, without coming to think how and what, simply to be himself, simply to be simplicity, to lift the eyes to heaven, and even not to speak at all. It is written about Aharon, "And Aharon was silent," that Aharon, after everything he went through, "vayidom" - he kept silent. He could have spoken a great deal after his children passed away.
1:36 He could have spoken and cried and screamed and asked why, and said to Hashem, "Maybe it is for such and such," and poured out words to the Holy One, blessed be He - and he chose to be silent. "Vayidom" - silence too is a kind of hisbodedus. the conversation in which you lift your eyes to heaven, the main thing, the most important, is that there be a look toward heaven. That is the most important thing in all the conversation with the Holy One, blessed be He. All our holy forefathers, Avraham, Yitzchak, Yaakov, all the tzaddikim, all the holy ones, the Rambam, the Ramban - there is the Rambam in the introduction to his Commentary on the Mishnah, in Zeraim, in Rabbi Avraham the son of the Rambam, the book HaMaspik LaAvodas Hashem.
2:14 It is found in all the words of our masters, the Rishonim. And the Maharal of Prague - it is the way of all the holy ones. It is simply that it is called by this name. What it means is simply that a person should go to a place where he is alone, where he will be himself, and simply be a few moments with the Creator, where he pours out his whole heart before Hashem, he should tell Him his distress, his difficulties, his problems, his troubles, and also ask Him to come close to Him: "Heal me, save me, help me, have mercy on me."
2:47 And also, sometimes, when there is nothing to say, also not to speak - simply to be what you are. The whole essence is the verse, "And from there you will seek Hashem your G-d, and you will find Him, when you search for Him with all your heart and with all your soul." "You will seek from there" - from there, the place where you are, from the level you are at, from the understanding you are at, that is the place, that is the time to seek, from there, the Holy One, blessed be He. And when you seek, from there, Hashem, blessed be He, that is all the created beings, and the whole purpose of creation came only for this moment.
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3:20 And you seek, from this point of yourself, from your own point, the turning toward heaven. And one who does not do this, it is very hard for him to be upright and true and pure. He does not lift his eyes to heaven. When a person does not lift his eyes to heaven— - In other words, the main thing in hisbodedus is to look at the heavens, even if he has no words. - He has no words. Even if there are no words, sometimes that is hisbodedus. One can call it all kinds of things, one can call it prayer, one can call it conversation, one can call it hisbodedus, one can call it closeness to Hashem, one can call it a request for salvation.
3:53 What does a Jew do who comes to pray at the grave of a tzaddik? He does hisbodedus. The word "hisboded" means that a person isolates himself from all the thoughts of the day, from all the problems, from all the troubles, from all the worries, from all the anxieties - to disconnect, to be alone. Be one moment with the One who created the world, be an upright man, ask yourself: where are you in the world, what is your purpose? Today has passed - what is tomorrow for?
4:19 Tomorrow for yesterday, or yesterday for the day before? What do the days say? That a person be true, true, true, and this truest truth can come to expression only when a person speaks between himself and Hashem, blessed be He. When you speak like our fathers, like our mothers, your grandmother, the grandmother of every one of us, who came from every place in the world. When Jews arrived - every Jew has some grandmother and grandfather who were heard speaking in their own language, who did not even know how to read and did not know how to write.
4:51 They spoke to Hashem, in simplicity, and also prayed to the Holy One, blessed be He - that is prayer, until the Men of the Great Assembly came and established the order of prayer for us. But the problem is that today, even in the Amidah prayer, you cannot pray - as the Tur, in siman 90, writes that when a foreign thought comes to a person, he should be silent during the prayer. During prayer a person prays, but sometimes there are also foreign thoughts, that trouble him; he does not manage to reach real closeness.
5:16 But in hisbodedus he, as it were, can also do hisbodedus about the prayer. One can say to Hashem, "Master of the world, see: when I come to pray Shacharis, Minchah and Maariv, give me a settled mind, help me to concentrate, help me to truly pour out my heart before You." He can look from the side at the whole of his service: "How do I pray at all before Hashem? How do I even come to a state where I have foreign thoughts during prayer?"
5:44 And then even the Jew who is furthest away says to himself, "I do not even merit to pray." It brings everyone close - even to do five minutes, ten minutes. It is a moment of a person, between himself and Hashem, blessed be He. It is the way of all the tzaddikim, of all the holy ones. - In other words, the Rav is saying that every man should take upon himself, every woman, a few minutes every day to talk with Hashem in their own language. - To lift the eyes to heaven and to speak with the mouth, in his own language, to try to love the Creator.
6:09 Not only to come and say to Him, "Give me, and get for me." In Tikkun 6, on page 22, in the Tikkunei Zohar, it is written, "Give [unclear] sustenance," like "hav, hav" - like dogs crying out, that ask only for a livelihood. Ask of Hashem, "Bring me close to You, I love You. You are the source of all good things, all blessings, You made everything; have mercy on me, bring me close, save me, help me, Creator." That is the thing; this whole array is simply so that a person reaches this point. - Thank you very much, Rav. - I bless you that you should succeed - Amen. - in everything that you do; all your affairs, they are good. In the merit of the holy Torah, may it protect you.
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