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The Yanuka’s own words in this shiur, translated into English by Lehallel · 7,343 words · 34:58. Press a time to hear it said.
0:01 Just... I'll tell you something — something important.
0:55 You know — as you know, "A broken and crushed heart, O G-d, You will not despise." It's been a bit of a week, not so easy, this week we've been through. There were many hard stories in these last two days. Very, very hard things. I heard very, very, very hard things — very hard stories that tear the heart.
1:25 This one — a child, crying; that one — a story. These stories, of course, one simply cannot take in. There is a revelation of G-dliness here, I wanted to say — in this story too, in this pain. When suddenly people in anguish sit before you, you hear the person telling you a story that takes you out of this world. You're not here at all. You say, "Where am I?" When you look at that story, you no longer know where you are — it so drives the mind out of you, what he is saying. You say: how can it be so hard for him, the poor man, and how — what is this Jew going through right now?
2:05 The tragedies, and the hardships that people went through — and these sirens, too. The sirens — right in the middle of a siren, people had to go to a funeral, to bury a little girl, with that sound in the background, and they walk on and escort her in the middle of the siren, and they don't... A horrifying story. Horrifying, horrifying.
2:31 You hear all this suffering — and what do you say? "Do not forsake me, Hashem; my G-d, do not be far from me." When you see this world here, you understand: there is One, and only One. "Avraham was one." We see: "Avraham was one." We see in the Torah that the Holy One, blessed be He, says so too — the holy Avos — and we see: "Shema Yisrael, Hashem is our G-d, Hashem is One."
2:59 There is a law, in siman 69 in the Beis Yosef — the law of "pores al Shema." We see — "Shema Yisrael" — they want to say Kaddish, and after that — there are more people who did not hear Barchu, so they say again: "Barchu es Hashem hamevorach." So they give the merit to the people who didn't — who didn't say it: one can say "Baruch Hashem hamevorach le'olam va'ed" again, and so give them the merit. And the Magen Avraham writes that this is called "zimun" — a summons. You know, when they say "Barchu" — he cannot then go on to pray other things, he cannot say...
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3:27 You have summoned the whole congregation — now you must pray. And here it is the very same thing: the Holy One, blessed be He, makes His might known in the world. He makes His might known in the world, and He wants people to begin serving Him. And when we hear these things, it is as if the Holy One, blessed be He, is announcing to the world: "Look — do you see what I am doing?" As if He is telling me things: "But you see what I am doing in the world.
3:53 I do not do what I do for nothing. Learn, and begin to return, begin!" He is inviting them to teshuvah, inviting them to tefillah — when we see all these things in the world. There was never anything like this in the generations: so many troubles that the Jewish people are going through, so many decrees. And in short: what protects the world is you, baruch Hashem. You are the chevrah, our movement, our strength; you are talmidei chachamim — each one here a walking Shas — and you are world-class geonim, truly. There are no words to praise you for the...
4:25 Each and every one — "his honor, his eminence," as we would say — truly, you are talmidei chachamim. But beyond your being talmidei chachamim, baruch Hashem, what makes me happy in you is the wonderful middos, which are the true comfort, so that the Torah will not be forgotten. How important it is to the Holy One, blessed be He! I once said a beautiful thing. What is the most important thing to the Holy One, blessed be He? In the end, we know that the Holy One, blessed be He, loves the blood, loves the foreskins — Givas HaAralos, the Hill of the Foreskins; Yehoshua bin Nun, they circumcise themselves — self-sacrifice, blood, the korbanos. The Holy One, blessed be He, loves the korban, loves the blood.
5:00 Avraham Avinu sets out, arrives — Yitzchak, to bind him — he goes to bind him on Moriah. With the Holy One, blessed be He, it is self-sacrifice. That is what we see in the Torah. When you learn the Torah, you try to understand what the Holy One, blessed be He, wants. You see a person talking about it: the person wants to build a big shul. He says: "You want a big shul, You want a mikveh, You want a place" — wants whatever it is He wants. But when you learn the Torah — the Holy One, blessed be He, repeats it several times, and you see that the entire Torah speaks of self-sacrifice. The Holy One, blessed be He, looks to see that a person gives up his very self.
5:33 Now, the main self-sacrifice — the Holy One, blessed be He, is revealed in the Torah through blood, or korbanos. Korbanos, and blood, that rise before the Holy One, blessed be He. A great and lofty nachas ruach. And from Givas HaAralos, too, the smell of the foreskins rose as a pleasing aroma to the Holy One, blessed be He. Of course, it was a bad smell, a harsh smell, of the foreskins. But the Holy One, blessed be He, had nachas ruach from it, as from a fine and choice fragrance — "a pleasing aroma, a fire-offering to Hashem." The Holy One, blessed be He, looks at the world through self-sacrifice. And the true self-sacrifice is for faithfulness to the Torah, faithfulness to the holy path, and the keeping of the Torah. Because faithfulness is the remembering of the Torah.
6:18 There is nothing greater than this. A person who has no faithfulness — he has no faithfulness to his wife, he has no faithfulness to his Rebbe, he has no faithfulness to the Creator, he has no faithfulness to the Torah, he has no faithfulness to anything. The steady thing that we must do: we must turn the world around, to reveal G-dliness; we must turn the world around and bring the geulah. What matters most to the Holy One, blessed be He, is memory — to remember the Torah.
6:46 "Lest you forget the things that your eyes saw, and lest they depart from your heart" — as the Holy One, blessed be He, says — "all the days of your life; and make them known to your children and your children's children: the day you stood before Hashem your G-d at Chorev." What matters to the Holy One, blessed be He — look, picture yourselves now, each one of you now, is now inside a vision, a very great sight: he sees the Splitting of the Sea. He sits, he sees the sea torn into twelve parts, the waters reaching the heavens; he rises, he is uplifted, he is full of joy.
7:14 And then, when the Splitting of the Sea is over, suddenly we see it — how can this be? They had everything — we see them facing the sin of the Golden Calf. We see — what?! How did you come to the sin of the Calf? What have you done? What — don't you remember everything that happened here? There were plagues here, there were the miracles of Egypt. You had the Splitting of the Sea! What business have you making the Calf? How did you get to a state where you even come to the test of the sin of the Calf, after all that? And the flaw of the sin of the Calf was forgetting: that you did not remember that great moment, what the Holy One, blessed be He, did for us.
7:50 The Holy One, blessed be He, took us out of Egypt, He split the sea for us — where is the memory? "Lest you forget the things that your eyes saw." The Holy One, blessed be He, was very strict about this: always remember where you came from, what you saw, what you heard, what you learned. Never, ever forget it. The real ingratitude is when a person forgets everything he received. That is how we receive the Torah every day, every day — we are forbidden to forget it. We are going to celebrate, in the world, Torah lishmah — to celebrate in the world Torah lishmah, for the sake of Heaven.
8:20 How to reveal G-dliness in the world, to reveal His G-dliness, blessed be He; not to be broken by anything, by any situation, by any reality, by any hardship a person has — it is forbidden to break. You know, people go through so many hardships. Each one has the burdens of making a living. Certainly when the Adversary tries to rattle you, and you recognize it — livelihood, this and that, and hardships. What Hashem, blessed be He, wants is to accept all that is decreed, and to say to the Holy One, blessed be He: "I always surrender before You."
8:46 You know — when two people are fighting, in the end there is a way out: either you defeat the one fighting you, or you surrender. That is the way of a fight. Now, when you come to fight against a big man, a mighty warrior with weapons of war and a sword — can you? He wins. What is the only way? What do you do? Surrender. Surrender to him. Surrender to him. That is the secret of a person surrendering to the Holy One, blessed be He.
9:13 When a person surrenders to the Holy One, blessed be He — the Master of all, the Infinite One, Who can do anything, Who is without end. It is the same as the Gemara in Berachos, page 28b: one must bow "until all the vertebrae of the spine stand out." We make the bow and prostrate ourselves to the Holy One, blessed be He, so that all the vertebrae bow. Why? He leaves nothing at all of himself; he bows with his entire being and nullifies himself to the Holy One, blessed be He. That is why this is the secret of the snake — the Maharsha writes about it too — it becomes a snake. What is it — seven years, or seventy years?
9:39 The snake — why a snake? He did not bow. ...but "snake" is a hint; it means something. It is something well known — but the snake, he too... The snake, which received its curse — it goes on its belly, and it does not lift its eyes to Heaven. The spine is what holds up the whole person, and it is not for nothing that it turns into a snake. It turns into a snake because the person cut himself off from the Holy One, blessed be He, did not surrender to the Holy One, blessed be He.
10:03 "Did not surrender to the Holy One, blessed be He" — that is not only about saying "I surrender." It is to know that everything is Hashem; to turn to Hashem about every single thing. Don't pray only about a big thing — every thing, small as well as big. Once, our holy Rebbe, Rabbi Nachman of Breslov — when Rabbi Nosson came to him, he told him that the nail had already gone into the wood. He said to him: "Before you put the nail into the sukkah, did you pray that it should go into the wood and not into your hand?" He said to him: "If you had prayed, it would not have happened."
10:29 And what did he teach him here? He could have told him something else — but he told him: one must pray about every thing; not to be cut off from the Holy One, blessed be He, in any personal matter at all; to be attached to the Holy One, blessed be He; not only to think "there is the problem" and get lost in it, but to cling to Hashem, to want what Hashem wants, to know what our purpose is here in the world, what our true purpose is; to have compassion on our true purpose, to truly have compassion on ourselves; to know Hashem, that He loves us; to know that we have immense, hidden powers to prevail against everything, to overcome everything and illuminate everything. We must reveal His G-dliness, blessed be He, in the world,
11:02 turn everything around into a revelation of G-dliness, illuminate the Torah of Hashem, rejoice, know that you love Hashem — there is nothing greater than this. Surrender to Hashem must be: "Whatever You, Hashem, do to me, whatever is hard, all the trials I go through" — to bow down to the Holy One, blessed be He, and say: "Hashem, it is all You." And to see how the Holy One, blessed be He, hints to you, tells you what He wants from you, and what He thinks you need to do: to surrender to Hashem. And what Hashem wants is that you always remember everything He gave you, and everything He set up for you — from that you will succeed.
11:34 That is the work of Sefiras HaOmer. Now the work is toward receiving the Torah. The forty-eight ways by which the Torah is acquired — how can a person take hold of them? This is the root of all the ways of acquiring the Torah. The root of all the ways of acquiring the Torah is to remember, and not to forget, everything we received at the Revelation at Mount Sinai. That is what it means for us, and that is the counting that you say. As you now go through another day of Sefiras HaOmer, and another day — the true preparation of the days of the Sefirah is to prepare ourselves to be worthy, and to remember the Revelation at Mount Sinai.
12:00 And so the Kav HaYashar, of Koidanov, writes that every day, when we say the blessings over the Torah, one must remember, and receive, the Revelation at Mount Sinai. That is the thing — chapter 2; in all the first chapters he writes about the purpose. Chapters 1, 2, 3 — and there is also the whole matter of the grave, and all that. But this is the purpose, and a person's first thought. You want to learn, and to cling to the Holy One, blessed be He? Remember. "Lest you forget the things that your eyes saw, and lest they depart from your heart."
12:26 A person must never, ever forget everything he received. That is the true purpose. We are going to prepare ourselves, and to be worthy of the geulah. You know what I explained — my chiddush, what I said: seemingly, the Holy One, blessed be He, is not redeeming us. The geulah still has not come; He is holding back from redeeming the Jewish people. So what is the reason? It is hachnasas orchim — welcoming guests.
12:51 Eh? Hachnasas orchim. Ah — He chooses. He chooses welcoming guests over receiving the face of the Shechinah. He actually ranks it higher. Why does the Holy One, blessed be He, say it is better that more souls come into the world than to build the Beis HaMikdash, the Holy Temple? Receiving the face of the Shechinah — that is in the Beis HaMikdash. Clearly: He prefers to bring more guests here to the world, that there be more guests here, more souls that come, over building the Temple and bringing the Resurrection of the Dead.
13:16 So that more souls will come — those will be the last guests — therefore let them be fruitful and multiply in the world, let them bring as many souls as possible into the world. Let there be no holding back of births; let them bring more children and more holy souls, and may all the childless women be remembered, and may we all merit to turn every heart back to Hashem, blessed be He. You will begin to see "when Hashem returns to Zion" — the complete geulah will begin.
13:42 There is also endless assimilation. How so? On the other side, we see endless assimilation — the Jewish people is being lost. The Jewish people is being lost. True. In every respect... True. One has to begin bringing people back from there, too — to bring the Jews back from there. "Fortunate is the man whose strength is in You" — writes Rabbi Yaakov Yitzchak HaLevi of Lantzut, the Chozeh of Lublin — he taught this about himself.
14:11 And they say it was also said about the "Amud HaEmes," Rabbi Mendele of Kotzk. That is: a person can sit in his house, shut in, and make "pathways in their hearts" — for all the souls, in a moment. That is, it is possible to bring Jews to return in teshuvah. You know — that the nations will find the opposite of their own faith, they will return in teshuvah; one must draw down peace. That is, there are several teachings on this in Likutei Moharan, of Rabbeinu — or Torah 14. He said... and if the Rav agrees, it seems there is much to be received.
14:38 He knew — I think — through certain tzaddikim. Rav, it is written that Rabbeinu Nachman said that when his books are printed, when the presses are working, converts are made. It is hidden — something hidden and awesome. That will bring the geulah then; with Hashem's help, that will bring the geulah. Certainly. The geulah will come through our holy Rebbe, Rabbi Nachman. All of Sippurei Maasiyos is a road map to the coming of Mashiach.
15:06 Everything that is going to be — it is all hinted at inside the book Sippurei Maasiyos. Sippurei Maasiyos is the loftiest book in the world. Hidden in it are all the secrets that were and that will be, about the whole way of Mashiach's coming and the entire geulah. A Megillas Setarim, a hidden scroll, is concealed inside the book. Sippurei Maasiyos — it is a very hidden and awesome secret. All the tales — the first, the second, the third — all the tales. To recite various things by rote? I am completely against rote recitation.
15:32 In Tractate Avodah Zarah, page 19: "A person should always recite, even though he does not know what he is saying" — as a way to learn? Once, they spoke of this as a way of learning — but it is not good for everyone. Someone argued that in our generation, when minds are confused — like the story where he told his daughter, when he was setting up the Seder for Pesach: "Take things out" — and there was a clock, and his daughter put a kerchief over it.
15:56 That is, there are confused minds, and even that confuses them — that they would see, as it were, see a kerchief on that clock. He told her that. So it is the same thing: a person's mind — today there are minds so confused that rote recitation will bring into a person all the confusions there are in the Mishnah. He will take in all sorts of things that... he understood in his own way — "understood" — and then it springs up in him, and it can cause him confusion.
16:22 The best thing is to learn little by little, with understanding. Even just one chapter with understanding, and not twenty Mishnayos without understanding. Don't rush to finish anything fast. Learn slowly, slowly, slowly, slowly, slowly. The slowest is the finest learning. The finest. No, no. He means that you should not stop. A person should have a drive to learn.
16:46 That is, a person should begin to learn with great desire. That is, in that case, learn so as to move forward; afterwards you will go back over it. But that is in order to bring you into the learning, to bring you into the flow of the water — to jump into the water, to jump into the river. That is the aim. But not that a person who has peace of mind and the possibility of learning spends the whole day reciting books by rote. In the end he has to stand up. A person sits in the beis midrash from morning till evening; evening comes — between Minchah and Maariv — and they need some Rav to give a dvar Torah between Minchah and Maariv, and he won't know what to give them out of everything he learned today. So what did he learn?
17:16 What — he recited all day? He needs to come and give them some diamond, give them something sweet, give them some chiddush, give them some chizuk, something to draw them close. But all day long he recited. What came of it? A person will recite the entire Zohar — say he finishes reciting the entire Zohar. He did not learn Zohar; he lost a sea of treasures. There is a sea of treasures in the Zohar. You swam in the water. One who learns by rote — what is he like?
17:40 A person who swims in the sea, above treasures. He only swam in the sea, and came out. And what is a person who learns slowly, with understanding, like? A person who dives — though he doesn't swim the whole sea. He dives — pearls and diamonds. Tell me — am I not right? Who said one has to be under pressure? Who is pushing anyone to finish? We learn slowly, with intention, calmly: another amud, another daf, another tractate, another Mishnah, more Kabbalah.
18:05 We learn slowly, slowly — everything slowly, slowly. There are those who, baruch Hashem, have already merited to finish the Shas many times themselves. They remember, and they learn Yerushalmi, they learn this and that, but — they move ahead, but that is not the main thing. The main thing is not to finish; the main thing is to begin. The main thing is to store it up, each one according to what he remembers and what Hashem has graced him with. Some have more ability, some have less ability, but the true purpose — the true one — is that a person take stock of himself, and try to see what he is drawing out of the Torah.
18:33 Not for nothing did the Ramban say: "When you rise from the book, search through what you learned for something in it that you can fulfill." Tell me how much depth there is in that: "when you rise from the book." "Rise from the book" means: you looked in, you stood up — what did you learn? Sum it up for yourself in your own words: what did you learn? What did you get out of it? What useful lesson is there? What do I gain? How can I take something from this? And then walk with it on the way.
18:57 Now, you want to remember what you learned? So come: you've finished learning, you're heading home, going to bring the child from the Talmud Torah; you're driving now to do the shopping, you're going home, to visit your parents, you're going to do something — on the way, think over what you learned today. Rise from the book, and search through what you learned. So it is exactly, as it were, "In all your ways know Him, and He will make your paths straight" — on the way, you are fulfilling it. A mitzvah. Say you're on your way somewhere now — on the way, you review; you learn, you recall what you learned, and you keep going over it, and you already see some G-dliness.
19:27 Now you step outside, under the heavens — and in every thing, as it is written in the sefer, in the siman: first of all, when you see a thing, you must see G-dliness in it — discover how you come closer through every thing you see, what Hashem wants from you, how you can come closer to Hashem. In the end, the end of the day will come, and those times were not used — times that would help the memory, times when you had just risen from what you learned. Not for nothing did the Ramban say, "When you rise from the book."
19:53 There is immense depth in this. Only when you remember the book and learn it... I say — it is brought explicitly by tzaddikim — first, there is a segulah... like a person who touches the king's garments... And it is a segulah to kiss the sefer before learning, and to kiss the sefer after learning — a segulah for memory. So say the tzaddikim. It is a segulah for learning. That is: we kiss it before learning, we kiss it after learning. Yes. "Remember the word to Your servant, by which You gave me hope" — as is brought... and to say seven times, "Remember the Torah of Moshe, My servant."
20:24 Fine — these are segulos for memory. But the best thing for memory is what I am telling you in the name of the Ramban: "When you rise from the book, search through what you learned." You have no segulah for memory better than this. None. None, none. I'm telling you, this is the best segulah there is. You closed the sefer? You explained it. Right away — what did you learn just now? Review it on the way. You need to clarify it, to explain it, to remember it, understand it, make use of it — so that the mind is busy with words of Torah all the time.
20:51 Many times I do this on the road — to a bris milah, on the road — to make use of it, reviewing during those times. It's a pity. One must use the time; whoever doesn't use the time won't get anything done. Nothing, nothing, nothing. You have to use the time, to dedicate the time. If the time isn't used... Once, Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin arrived in a certain town, and he came to a certain man and said to him — and that man said to him: "I need you for a few moments — for a few 'minut.'" Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin said to him: "Ach — a few minut!
21:19 Who would give me a few minut in this world, that I should give you a few minut?" "Minut," that is, means minutes. "Minus" doesn't sound good — it sounds like heresy. That is the "minus" of the world, the heresy. By them it's "the minutes" — in English, "the minutes": minute, minute, "minus." That is their "minus": they use the time they have for heresy. So he said to him — in the end he said to him: "I'll give you a few moments, I'll give you a few moments, but you will promise me that you will give a few moments too." He said to him, "All right" — as in, "I'm with him for a few moments."
21:51 So he said to him: "Take it upon yourself to learn for a few moments." He told him so. In the end — a businessman, a few moments... Some years later, Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin came to him, and there he is: a talmid chacham, outstanding, learned. He went up to him and said: "What do you do? Who are you?" "A few years ago I met you, and you told me — 'use the time.' I wanted you to give me a few minut — I don't know exactly — and you told me: 'I will give them, if you set aside a few minut for me.' And this is what came of it: it is from those few minut that you gave."
22:17 Make use of things, every thing: set a small fixed session of five minutes in something. The holy Baal Shem Tov had a set session in the Zohar just before sleep. He would take it before sleep and learn the Zohar. Maybe one would need to learn Etz Chaim as well? He did not learn Etz Chaim and the writings of the Arizal — know that; just so you know. He didn't occupy himself with it. He knew it, but he didn't occupy himself with it. He knew it, he learned it, yes — but he learned the Zohar itself. There's a curiosity for it — but Rav, to do Daf Yomi, to get around the Shas a little, to know the Torah, to taste a little — it brings in everything; I did a daf, I grasped something, moved on — and with the curiosity satisfied, I think, it's more calming...
22:57 I suggest — I'll tell you what I do; this is how I learn, yes? I suggest you do this: when I learn, say, Gemara — there are, say, the aggados, or Tractate Taanis, which is light — or, say, many such tractates. Save it for certain times — learn it at the times when there is more tiredness and weakness. More tiredness, more weakness. That is — Yevamos, Niddah, Eruvin — tractates that demand more in-depth study. That is what's called "ANI" — Eruvin, Niddah, Yevamos.
23:25 Those are tractates to save for times of more peace of mind; at those times it is easier to learn. For example, say I come to learn mussar — to learn mussar, Chassidus, things like that — I put in a bookmark, skip on to another chapter again; I start halachah, Mishnah, and then I come back — whenever, say, in the evening or so — I come back to the maamarim — for example... all the maamarim of Rabbi Shimon, and so on — and I can do that: I have just been learning, so I put a marker there, skip — that is kept for those times. And that way you can move ahead.
24:03 But if you stop now, and suddenly learn the Chassidus, the tales, then you will spend a great, great deal of strength, and then when evening comes, or the next morning, and you get to the Mishnah or to working through a sugya — it's already hard, because just then you had to go, and you won't manage. Make use of this. In any case, that is how I learn. Those are my sedarim. As for the sedarim — I'll be able to give them to you later on, with Hashem's help. May you do great things with them. This is just a small piece of advice I can give you.
24:31 A small piece of advice that I recommend. And I also very much recommend going chapter by chapter. Just sharing. A chapter: from the start of the Mishnah to the end of the chapter. You can finish the first chapter, the second chapter, the third chapter, and review it. Each chapter — you finish it. It goes by the Mishnah: Mishnah to Gemara, and Mishnah to Gemara. From where the Mishnah begins, until its Gemara ends — until the start of the next Mishnah. Don't look at the pages. Mishnah and Gemara, Mishnah and Gemara — and then there is always a continuity of understanding.
24:58 The Yerushalmi is more divided up: Mishnah–Gemara, Mishnah–Gemara — that is easier to learn. You cover a lot in a day in the Yerushalmi. But there — it's as if there isn't much to hold in the mind. Mishnah–Gemara, Mishnah–Gemara — it's doable. But learning the Bavli demands more thought. And the way of learning today — why is it not so right? It goes by the page. Once, they would learn Mishnah and Gemara — the whole Mishnah with its Gemara.
25:25 That is more correct, because there is a continuity to it all. That is how I learn, and that is how I recommend learning. In halachah as well — in the Tur? What? — In halachah as well, in the Tur? How's that? In halachah too? In halachah as well, certainly. Halachah with the Beis Yosef. Without the Beis Yosef it is impossible to understand. No, but by what should one divide the... By se'ifim, or...? — No, by simanim. Learn a siman, that's it.
25:50 To review it four times? It's not possible — a long siman, too? You learn and review. Four times. One must review four times. Four times. Just as the Holy One, blessed be He, expounded every thing in Heaven four times, so we too must learn four times — review the learning, and make it into rules, rules. What does "iyun," in-depth study, mean? Iyun is what you begin afterwards — after you have learned the Mishnah well, and the Gemara well, and you have command of the Mishnah, and you understand the Mishnah.
26:17 "His Mishnah is not in order for him" — to learn and understand the Gemara properly, one has to learn the Mishnah well and remember it well, and then learn the Gemara. After one has learned the Gemara and the Mishnah really well — then comes iyun: to look into what it is the Gemara wants at all. Before you begin to study the Rashba, the Ritva and the Rosh, and all the Acharonim, and to know what was ruled as halachah in the responsa — without first understanding this, it is not called iyun.
26:43 Then we don't understand at all what stands in the sugya itself. So that's not it. Today they teach as if you start at the top, and then come down. It is not such a correct way to learn. There is Rabbi Yonah in the Shas, the student of Rabbi Zeira. In the Talmud Bavli he is mentioned perhaps a few dozen times — thirty times in the Talmud Bavli. And in the Talmud Yerushalmi he is mentioned close to 400 times, 500 times. It is very interesting, how he is mentioned.
27:07 He was great — the great student of Rabbi Zeira and Rabbi Yirmiyah. There are sages with many forms of learning, discussions and disputes that are mentioned in the Talmud Bavli — and he is mentioned there far more. That is not in order to come now and tell you what... You know, one has to understand the form in which the Talmud is built. The structure of the Talmud — because it was forbidden to forget the Torah, it was built in a form that is not hard.
27:35 It is a form for memory. It is a study of rules, of points that had to be remembered — like the Mishnayos themselves. That is the way of memory, that is the way of their method, of the tradition. On Eduyos — the Mishnah, really — in the introduction of the Tosfos Yom Tov, the Tosfos Yom Tov writes it, and also the Tiferes Yisrael, Lipschitz, in the introduction to the Mishnah in Eduyos — something of that whole introduction there.
28:02 So the whole Torah and the whole way — for certain details too — that is, it is not for nothing that Rabbi Yishmael says: "By thirteen principles the Torah is expounded." When one understands this essence — the rules, the foundations, how to expound it — to learn it by way of memory... Fine: today one cannot learn from Mishnah to Gemara — it's long, it's a bit hard. It depends where you are, depends on what, depends how much.
28:26 But the right way is to always strive not to cut off the quality of the thought. The Gemara is a quality of thought; if you cut it off in the middle, you stop in the middle, you can't. Why do I have a difficulty with Daf Yomi? Because to go back to the daf — we learned the daf yesterday — you don't know where to stop it so as to tie it to the next day's daf. And that makes it hard for people to ever remember the dapim. I don't learn that way — I'm telling you the truth. I don't learn by the daf.
28:51 You understand — the Mishnah, to the end, and then the whole chapter. That is, I try, myself, to get through a chapter, as much as possible. Mishnah to Gemara, Mishnah to Gemara — and that is how you divide it up. And likewise the dapim left in the middle — they need to be completed. Without Rashi? Without Rashi. Only bookmarks. I learn with bookmarks — I'm telling you the truth — only with bookmarks. Only bookmarks. All bookmarks. — Rashi the first time?
29:19 What's that? — With Rashi the first time? — Yes, yes. With Rashi, yes. Rav, there was also the chanting — of the Mishnayos, yes. It is written that... the Tiferes Yisrael too writes, in Eduyos, that there was a melody, that it was for memory. So it surely is for memory. And besides, look: the niggun — when you learn the Torah with a niggun, every thing you say with a niggun already rises through the worlds. We have Asiyah, Yetzirah, Beriah and Atzilus. "TaNTA": the cantillation notes, the vowels — cantillation notes and vowels, crowns and letters, lower down.
29:49 The cantillation notes come from the highest place. The cantillation notes are melody — the root of melody. When you learn the Mishnah with a niggun, when you learn the Gemara with a niggun, when you learn Rashi and you sing it — learning with a niggun calls back many forgotten things. The niggun can open up for you many things hidden and concealed within the Torah, and give you the sweetness of the Torah. That is niggun. Make up a niggun, yes — make up a niggun.
30:17 It is a very great power, of great importance. The Rogatchover had a special niggun for his learning; he learned the Torah only with a niggun. People would hear that niggun; he learned only with a niggun. There was nothing like it. He was singing all the time he learned. He had a niggun for the Mishnah, a niggun for the Gemara, a niggun for the question, and a niggun for the answer. How did he do it? He had a niggun for the Mishnah, a niggun for the Gemara. He would learn the Gemara, learning it with a niggun; he'd come to a question, and he would sing differently; he'd come to the answer, and sing that differently. And that is how he would remember. So I — I truly don't learn with a niggun — I play the piano — but that was his method, the Rogatchover's, and it truly is a good method, very good. Sometimes I, a little — I'm not a singer; I would like to be a singer — but sometimes,
31:04 when I'm by myself, I sing a little, a little of the... I sing my learning. But the main way is to remember the right order — especially in these days, as now... approaching the receiving of the Torah. It is important to know this. Approaching the receiving of the Torah now — out of the Shas, what is called "Shas" — the most important thing is the 613 mitzvos.
31:29 The 613 mitzvos — it is very important to learn them and say them every day. To divide them up and finish the 613 mitzvos every week — that is very, very worthwhile. It is also a segulah for wealth. It is very important. The 613 mitzvos is an important study. As we read in the Minchas Chinuch, in the introduction — there is nothing more important than this. The 613 mitzvos and the rules — that is the whole body of the Torah, it is all the flesh of the Torah, it is everything Hashem commanded us, what He wants from us. It is very important.
31:55 It also opens up for a person the whole way of learning. Because in the end, in all of the Shas, in all of the Torah, wherever a person goes, he will run into the 613 mitzvos. And the study of the 613 mitzvos will give you the rules and the details; everything will settle into its place, and a person will be able to rise and know a great deal; it will give him a right path. I hope that, with Hashem's help, these words will be of benefit. Rise and be uplifted in kedushah and in purity, and a good life.
32:22 Pray for us, pray for us too; we too need the prayers and the strength. Yes, Rav. We've hardly begun. We haven't begun to pray for the Rav. The Rav does so much for us... How can we find ways to honor the Rav's movement, which has entered... First of all, baruch Hashem, you have many, many of our treasures that we have brought until today, for us to learn them, review them, study them in depth, with Hashem's help. We have several more plans that, with Hashem's help, we will talk about.
33:00 I went over this with Amichai too — where is he? Amichai? He doesn't know what I mean. With Hashem's help, we'll talk with him about it. We will bring in one more particular study that I want us to take up, and awaken it. It is very important — we have already spoken about it on several Shabbosos — but with Hashem's help we will talk about it. It will be of benefit, with Hashem's help, and this is the introduction to what we spoke about, which with Hashem's help we will begin; and it will be of benefit, and a very great nachas ruach will come of it for the Holy One, blessed be He.
33:34 With Hashem's help, may the Holy One, blessed be He, grant you success, bless you; may you succeed, with all the blessings. This is your place, this is your dwelling. Do great things; be in the Torah of Hashem. I love each and every one of you, and know that I pray for you every day — every single day in my prayers, each and every one of you. May the Holy One, blessed be He, bless you, watch over you, spread a shelter of peace over you, give you a good life. May the Holy One, blessed be He, pour out on this place abundance, wealth and kedushah.
34:01 May there be none of — "no man shall say: the place is too tight for me to lodge in Jerusalem." And not "to lodge in Bnei Brak," either. May it be comfortable for everyone — for those from Kadima and for those from Jerusalem, and for those from Beit Shemesh and from Tzfas too — for everyone, with Hashem's help, salvations, safekeeping and protection, blessing and success, and all good, all good. — Yes, I must say one thing. When I was with the Rav, before we set out for here, they told the Rav that there were people outside, so the Rav said: "Know this — these are the apple of my eye. Every one you see out there — these are the apple of my eye. And everything I go through is so that they learn like this, and are bound together like this, and have an open path to me like this. My heart is with them."
34:39 That is all I wanted to say, to carry on. Chazak, chazak, chazak...
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