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The Yanuka’s own words in this shiur, translated into English by Lehallel · 3,239 words · 19:15. Press a time to hear it said.
0:00 We want to say thank you to Rabbi Shlomo Yehuda Be'eri, the Yanuka, who was with us over a long period. And as you see, the child is here. The child was sedated and on a ventilator, and in the ambulance they pronounced the child dead. The doctors gave us no hope, not even a drop of comfort. We showed him to the Rav, sedated and on a ventilator, in a vegetative state. And baruch Hashem, as you see, the child is with the Rav, and the Rav gave him his chalakah, his first haircut, almost three or four months ago.
0:38 And we truly want to say thank you. We love you, we want to thank you, we appreciate it very much, and truly it is not to be taken for granted. And altogether, that you came to Ashkelon and made the effort, and we troubled the Rav, and the Rav gave us time, that is truly something not to be taken for granted. It really shows the connection and the love, really, like, our soul, which is bound up with the Rav's soul. We truly love the Rav and wish him all the good there is in the world.
1:05 Amen. Amen. Amen. Good, healthy and long days, and may he bring merit to the many, with a long life, and may He grant good salvation, with Hashem's help. Amen. May He keep him alive for a good and healthy life, and may he merit to raise his children with great joy. Amen. And we also wanted to wish the Rav mazal tov on the child born to him a few days ago. Mazal tov, everyone!
1:41 If possible, everyone please be seated. House of Israel, we must always strengthen ourselves and always awaken ourselves to the purpose, the true and eternal one, the holy purpose: coming close to Hashem, blessed be He. What we merit here in the world, to grab more kedushah, more mitzvos, more Torah, more fear of Heaven, to grab as much as possible in this world, that is the purpose, and the most important thing there is here in the world.
2:21 The more time passes, and a person takes the purpose to heart, what will come of everything that passes over him... Rabbeinu HaKadosh, our holy Rebbe: Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi is called the holy Rebbe, because of his kedushah, that he never looked downward, and his holy hands. And there was one more who is called Rabbeinu HaKadosh, and I say, one may say it is for the Tikkun HaKlali that he revealed to the world: that is Rabbeinu HaKadosh, Rebbe Nachman of Breslov, whose title, for the whole world, everyone calls him Rabbeinu HaKadosh, the holy Rebbe.
3:02 Rebbe we call Rabbeinu HaKadosh for his kedushah, and so on. We did not see him, but we know a tiny bit of his level. Rebbe Nachman: today, baruch Hashem, people today, everyone, sees and grasps a little bit of his Torah, of the strength he gave the Jewish people, of the hope he gave the Jewish people, when one sees broken families, people in despair of life, as many as there are here in this world.
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3:37 And as the Rebbe of Komarna said: in the generation when people do not take their own lives, they will be counted as tzaddikim. A person, from all the troubles they will go through in the generation, it was said, in the footsteps of Mashiach, if Jews do not take their own lives, it will be counted for them that they are tzaddikim, with all the trials and hardships they will go through in the last generation, the hardships, the suffering, and everything people go through. Even as it is, this world is not easy, and many people are weighed down with suffering, and ordeals, and difficulties with livelihood, and worries, and illnesses, and hardships.
4:11 Everyone has many, many confusions and hardships. But Rebbe Nachman said, and brought to the world, a strengthening, the greatest there is, for every one of us. He revealed to us that there is a way by which each and every one of us can be the greatest tzaddik in the world, if he merits to fulfill it, if he merits to come close to Hashem through it.
4:38 This, baruch Hashem, can suit every one of us, no matter how far he is, or that he does not merit to be, and to keep, everything. Even if he is very far, he finds this one small thing, and he comes close and connects, with love, to the Holy One, blessed be He, and brings himself to the purpose, and for this the world was created. That is the conversation between a person and his Maker. Rebbe Nachman explains in Likutei Moharan, Part I, Torah 15, that whoever wants to taste the taste of the Hidden Light, it is by judging and trying himself, by himself.
5:13 He should judge and try himself, understand, and tell Hashem everything he is going through. He should hold a trial for himself: 'Today I did not pray at sunrise, today I did not pray Minchah, today I did not pray enough, today I did not pray.' He should judge himself, by himself. This will bring him to closeness to the Holy One, blessed be He, for he will annul from upon himself all suffering, all of it. And you know that he spoke of many, many virtues and tikkunim, that he merited to be among the holy ones and tzaddikim who rectified our souls.
5:45 We, each one of our souls, a soul needs many rectifications. The soul... it is enough that a person blemished his thought one time; let him live a thousand years, perhaps he will rectify one blemish of thought. Perhaps. Let a person live a thousand years and fast a thousand years, perhaps he will rectify one blemish of thought, so far beyond measure is it to rectify the soul at all, to rectify a person's stature, to rectify his level. It is hard beyond measure.
6:11 But to rectify as much as possible at all, it is a very hard thing. But our connection to the holy ones, to the tzaddikim, that can bring us to the highest levels. And the only way is that a person can merit it through two things. One: that he speaks much between himself and his Maker, to the Holy One, blessed be He. And the second thing: that he always reminds himself of the day of death. They say that Reb Nosson, Rebbe Nachman's disciple, once expressed himself and said: 'I can imagine everything, but the first night that I will lie in the grave, that I cannot imagine,' he once said.
6:46 That is how he spoke about himself. So greatly did he fear the true and eternal end, he constantly instilled in himself what the purpose in this world is. What did we come to the world for? That another year should pass, and another two years, and a few more years, and again a person gathers gold and silver, wastes his time on emptiness, and in the end, where will they lead him? Where will they lead his end? In Tractate Sukkah, page 53, the Gemara says: 'A person's feet are his guarantors.' The feet are your guarantors, to take you to the last day, on which you will have to leave the world. Your feet will lead you exactly to that place.
7:20 It is written in the Yalkut Shimoni on Iyov, in section 922, that when a person's hour comes for judgment, the Holy One, blessed be He, comes Himself, reveals Himself to the person, has him sign, and says to him: 'So, these are your deeds, you are witness to them. Sign.' And he dies. That is what a person does: the Holy One, blessed be He, is revealed to him: 'Attest that these are your deeds.' He attests, signs, and the person departs.
7:44 In Pirkei d'Rabbi Eliezer, chapter 34, the Sages teach us that a person has three who love him: his children, his money, and his good deeds. These are the things that love a person. The person loves them and they love him. When a person's hour comes to go, at once his sons and daughters come. He says to them: 'Save me, I have to depart.' They tell him: 'Don't you know that there is no rule over the day of death?
8:13 There is no power over it. We have no way to help you. I cannot save you. It is a merit to depart. Go on, it is your merit now to go. Go, rest in peace upon your resting place.' When he says: 'No, nothing helps me now, not the children, the family does not help,' then he goes to his money and says: 'My money, my money, how I toiled for you! So many years I toiled and labored for you. Come, save me. I am standing before judgment, I am about to die.
8:39 Now my hour has come. Save me, my money. Where are you? How I toiled for you!' His money says to him: 'I have no way to help you. Your hour has come. No money in the world will help you.' Then the person's good deeds come and say to him: 'Your righteousness shall go before you, the glory of Hashem shall gather you in.' Go. We are already there, we are already going ahead of you. Your good deeds are with you.
9:04 That is your merit in this world. When we are here in the world and we think, all the time, of bringing merit all the time, the Sages teach in Tractate Avos, chapter 6, mishnah 9, about the merit and the greatness of a person who brings one mitzvah, one advocate, that a person does not know the great merit he is building for himself here in the world, with those who plead in his favor, with kedushah, with purity. They taught in Tractate Sotah, page 3b, they taught through the Sages the greatness and the merit, how much people sit and always think of the purpose, and set their thought far ahead, that they stretch their thought the farthest, to say: 'We think about the purpose. We live in the World to Come already. We do not live seeking this world. We already live here, in this world, in the World to Come.'
9:50 Then all the mitzvos, everything one fulfills, cleaves to the Holy One, blessed be He. When a person cleaves to the Holy One, blessed be He, he receives a great deal of fear of Heaven, he receives kedushah, he receives purity, he receives purpose, because he says: 'I do not live here for myself. I do not live here for this world, because nothing is worth anything.' What can speak to a person? Give a person all the gold, all the treasures, none of it will speak to him. Rather, he understands that his whole purpose is for the end, because time, in the end, passes.
10:17 And suddenly a person will find himself already in old age, at a ripe old age. The Sages, in Tractate Kinnim, at the end of Tractate Kinnim, in the name of Rabbi Shimon ben Akashya, who says: 'With the aged is wisdom, and in length of days, understanding.' The elders of the unlearned, the older they grow, the more their minds become confused. But the elders of Torah are not so; rather, the older they grow, the more settled their minds become. As it says: 'With the aged is wisdom, and in length of days, understanding.'
10:42 The whole time that old people increase their wisdom, they gain even more wisdom, and still more wisdom, and still more wisdom. And the opposite: the elders of the unlearned, their minds become confused. And the more a person merits to do, and says: 'How much I grabbed here in the world, that I was full of Torah here, and I devoted my time to Torah, to kedushah, to minyanim, to tefillah. Now the time has passed, the moment has come, and here I am, already seventy years old, eighty years, a hundred and twenty years old,' each one, may we all merit length of days and years.
11:11 And then he looks at himself and says: 'The purpose, what is the purpose? What did I do here in the world?' And then he looks back. He sees transgressions, sees sins, sees offenses, and he says: 'How will I answer? What will I answer on the day of reckoning? What will I do?' He is full of fear and panic. But if he looks back and sees Minchah and Maariv and Shacharis, and praying at sunrise, and Torah and kedushah, mitzvos and tefillin, kedushah and purity, then the Holy One, blessed be He, comes Himself and gathers him in. He merits such a revelation of the glory of Hashem, such a high level. So this is the greatest bond a person has: tefillah, and the merit for the last day. One can also learn this from the Mishnah Berurah, siman 95, se'if katan 5, who brings what is also written in the Zohar, Va'eschanan, page 260b: that when a person
11:57 comes to depart, then of course he is not allowed to see the face of the Shechinah if he used to look around and gaze during the Amidah prayer. When a person looks, during the Amidah, he opens his eyes onto the siddur; he does not look around. Either a person closes his eyes, or he looks in the siddur. The moment he opens his eyes, he is brazen, because the Shechinah is before him and he is looking at the Shechinah. So one must close the eyes. And the punishment of one who opens his eyes during the Amidah is that when he departs, he will not merit to see and behold the pleasantness of Hashem, and to see the face of the Shechinah. So one must be very careful, always, when praying, always to close the eyes.
12:29 And the opposite: when we say Kedushah, the Shibolei HaLeket writes, in siman 20, that this gives the Holy One, blessed be He, satisfaction, the greatest in the upper worlds, when the Jewish people lift their eyes on high and say 'Kadosh, kadosh, kadosh', and raise their eyes to heaven. This gives the Holy One, blessed be He, the greatest satisfaction there is. It is exactly the opposite: in the Amidah prayer we do this, and precisely at Nakdishach, we say it, such satisfaction for the Holy One, blessed be He, so great, when we say 'Kadosh, kadosh, kadosh'. How much this does for the Holy One, blessed be He! So always say the Kedushah and raise your eyes to heaven, because this gives the Holy One, blessed be He, such satisfaction that at that moment He wants to say to His children: 'I want to redeem you already. I want to take you out and redeem you, My dear, beloved children. How great is My love
13:16 and My affection for you, great and precious and so beloved.' That is how much the Holy One, blessed be He, loves us. And this is the merit, to tell us how great our merit is, we, the Jewish people, how much the Holy One, blessed be He, loves us, and how much we need to know that everything is by individual Hashgachah, meticulous and exact; and to respect one another and to love one another, to respect the rabbis, the sages. Baruch Hashem that you have here, in this holy city, a city of kedushah.
13:42 One sees that the people here are holy, pure, settled. You have here kedushah and the resting of the Shechinah. Every city has the merit and the virtue of the people of the city, who have a very great influence. Baruch Hashem, one sees that in this city you have such pleasantness and grace and goodness and sincerity and kedushah. Truly a holy city. One feels a special pleasantness in this city. I am happy to come to your city, to feel the kedushah and to meet you here. I want to bless you that many, many joyous occasions should multiply in your homes, and that you accustom yourselves to go into seclusion and come close to Hashem, blessed be He, to speak to Hashem, blessed be He, always. This everyone can do, from any place. King David would seclude himself in his bed,
14:27 under the blanket he would speak to Hashem. Always speak to Hashem, blessed be He. This is advice that each of you can carry out, no matter in what place; in every place, carry out this advice: speak to Hashem, blessed be He. And continue to hear the Torah of the honored rabbis, and come to the shiurim and grow stronger, and continue to make the Torah great. And may the Holy One, blessed be He, watch over you, and may you have help from Heaven, and may you have kedushah and purity. We are also giving out here a tzitzis undershirt for everyone, with Hashem's help, so that you have strengthening and kedushah. Know that this is a very great virtue.
15:02 There is nothing greater that protects a person from the evil eye, from all evil afflictions, than the mitzvah of tzitzis. So keep growing stronger, and becoming holy, and being joyful. May everyone have blessings, salvations, miracles and wonders. I love you, I pray for you, and I am very, very happy to see you. May the Holy One, blessed be He, bless you, and may all the blessings rest upon the congregation. Hear, O Israel: Hashem is our G-d, Hashem is One.
15:31 Hashem, He is G-d! Hashem, He is G-d! Hashem, He is G-d! Hashem, He is G-d! Hashem is King, Hashem was King, Hashem will be King forever and ever. Hashem is King, Hashem was King, Hashem will be King forever and ever. Halleluyah! Praise G-d in His sanctuary; praise Him in the firmament of His might. Praise Him for His mighty acts; praise Him according to His abundant greatness. Praise Him with the blast of the shofar; praise Him with harp and lyre. Praise Him with drum Rabbi Chananya ben Akashya says: The Holy One, blessed be He, wished to give merit to Israel; therefore He gave them Torah and mitzvos in abundance, as it says: 'Hashem desired, for the sake of His righteousness, to make the Torah great and glorious.'
17:49 May His great Name be exalted and sanctified in the world that He created... The Rav will make a general Mi Shebeirach, and then let the Rav leave. He Who blessed our holy forefathers, Avraham, Yitzchak and Yaakov, Moshe and Aharon, and Shlomo, may He bless this entire holy congregation. May He give everyone salvations, good tidings, a good life of kedushah, purity, deveikus, the Tikkun HaKlali, the eternal Tikkun, the complete Tikkun of nefesh, ruach, neshamah, chayah, yechidah; to merit to complete and rectify everything we came to the world for, and to shine the light in the world, so that the glory of the kingship of the Holy One, blessed be He, be revealed in all the worlds.
18:24 May joyous occasions multiply in your homes, salvations and miracles and wonders. So may it be His will, and let us say Amen. Move back!
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