Prayer Podcast · Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe

00:03 - Intro (Announcement)
You are listening to Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe of Torch in Houston, Texas. This is the Prayer Podcast.

00:07 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
All right, welcome back everybody to the prayer podcast. It is so wonderful to be here this morning together with all y'all. Today we are going to learn the final piece of the offerings. Next week, god willing, we're going to learn together the Breis of Rabbi Yishmael, which we're going to talk about. What's the Breis? What are the 13 principles of the Torah that the Torah studies is learned by? But today we're going to do the fifth chapter of Zvachem which, thanks to Howard, we know that today is the first day of the Dafyomi of Zavachim. So it's perfect timing for us to join together with the Jewish people around the world who are also studying this tractate in Zavachim. Now, what is going on here? We know that we spoke about previously in the prayer podcast. We read the verses from the torah that command us to bring offerings, and we are. We spoke about the, the uh.

01:15
Now we're going to be speaking about the mishnah and then next week we're going to be doing the brisa, which is a piece of talmud, a piece of Talmud about how we learn. And why is this important. All of the commentaries, all of the commentaries that I looked at collectively, all say the same thing Because there is a special mitzvah for a person to learn Torah, mishnah and Talmud every day. So, in reading the offerings, before we even start our prayer, what do we do? We read verses from the Torah, we read this Mishnah, and then we read the Bryce of Rabbi Yishmael, which is considered like a Talmud, and therefore we covered all bases even before we started. So if a person is busy they're a busy doctor, they're a busy lawyer, they're a busy lawyer, they're a busy professional in any craft, in any area just by saying their morning prayers of the offerings, they've already fulfilled this precept to study Torah, mishnah and Talmud.

02:23
Now there's something that needs to be addressed when we talk about this is what is the difference between Torah and Mishnah? We know that Torah is the written law, the written Torah. The Torah was given to us by Moshe at Mount Sinai. Who was it written by? It was written by Moshe, by the word of Hashem. So we've seen this many times before. We've seen this incredible chart, this diagram that is important for us to identify what is going on over here. We have the green section here, which is the written Torah.

03:02
The written Torah is the Tanakh, the Torah, the Nevi'im, the prophets, and Ketuvim, the writings. It's a total of 24 books. These are considered the written law and in it is all of the guidance that the Almighty gives us as part of the Torah, as part of the instruction of how to live life. But this is everything of what to do. It's not how to do. Then we need to understand how to do.

03:31
The Rambam explains an amazing thing. He says that Moses had a notebook and Aaron had a notebook, and Joshua had a notebook, and all of the elders and all of the prophets they all had notebooks. All of those notebooks were collected by Rabbeinu HaKadosh and Rabbeinu HaKadosh studied them all and put them into six categories of the Mishnah, the six orders of the Mishnah, and each one of them is written almost in code, to teach us, in code, in absolute perfection, exactly everything we need to know about how to live life. But how do you decode it that? You have the Talmud which explains it. So it would be a grave error for one to think that the oral Torah is just a bunch of rabbis making up things. No, it's the explanation to everything that's written, for example, we've given many of these examples before. But we have the. It's the explanation to everything that's written. For example, we've given many of these examples before, but we have the mitzvah of mezuzah. We know that we have to have a mezuzah on our doorposts, all around our house, all around our workplace.

04:36
What is a mezuzah? Doesn't say. It says to have a mezuzah. It says that before you eat from a kosher animal. It says that before you eat from a kosher animal, it needs to be slaughtered, but it forgot to mention how to slaughter it. And more and more of the mitzvahs, of the performative mitzvahs. It says that we are to fill in every day, but it doesn't tell us what to fill in are. Each one of the mitzvahs in the Torah are lacking in the details. It tells us what to do, it doesn't tell us how to do, and for this reason, it is critical for us to understand that the oral Torah is not a rabbinic book. It's not. Some rabbi is getting around plotting how we're going to make life miserable for the Jewish people. Ah, I got an idea right, and it's like the conspiring the elders of Zion. No, no, none of that. It's all of the explanations to everything that was given in the written Torah.

05:37
I had a friend of mine, a very good friend of mine, who was a very accomplished attorney and he was giving a course at U of H, university of Houston, on the parallels or the differences between American law and Jewish law, torah law and I told him, when he told me he was going to be giving this course for one semester at U of H, I said any questions you have about the Jewish law part, I'm happy to help you. I'm not as proficient. I'm not so proficient in Jewish law either, but I'm less proficient in American law. So I said if you have any question about the Jewish law part, let me know. I said 24-7,. I'm available. Okay, you just tell me when I'll be there. That was it. Forgot about it.

06:26
A few months later I get a phone call at 1130 at night and he says to me all right, where are you? I said is everything okay? He sounds like this guy's about to have a heart attack. Is everything okay? He says I need you emergency Emergency. I said where are you? He says I'm at my house. I said I'll be there in 10 minutes. I quickly jump, get my clothes on and I run to his house. I was probably dressed already anyway. And I get to his house and he's there with a bunch of notebooks and binders and he looks so confused because the next day he's about to give his introductory class to this whole series and he says to me I don't know what to do. He says I sat with the three rabbis of my congregation and I interviewed them with the same list of questions and now I'm going through it and I see that I have three different answers.

07:22
I don't know who wrote the Torah. Who wrote the Torah? And each one of them gave an answer and each one of them happens to be gave the wrong answer. A little frightening. She says who wrote the Torah? So I said, my friend, I'm not gonna give you the answer, you're gonna give me the answer. I said now close your eyes and imagine that we lift up the Torah in your congregation, with Hagba right, and they show the Torah writing to everyone on all sides of the congregation.

07:57
I said now they sing a tune, what's that tune? And he starts humming it V'zot ha-Torah, asher sa-Moshe lifnei b'nei Yisrael al pi, adonai bi-yad Moshe etzcha yimhi Right, and they start singing. I said what are those words? What does that mean? What does that mean? I said let me read it to you. Okay, let me translate it to you from art scroll, so you don't think that I'm making up things. This is the torah. By the way, this is a verse in numbers. Okay, this is the torah that moses placed before the children of israel, upon the command of hashem, through moses's hand. So I asked him who wrote the Torah? He says wow, I didn't even know what I was singing.

08:46
It's Moses' hand who told Moshe what to write Upon the command of Hashem, hashem. It's like today. You do transcript right, you can do a voice to text. Hashem says the words and Moshe writes it. And Moshe could not change a single word.

09:05
If you look, for example, at the beginning of the book of Leviticus, it says Vayikra, and Hashem summoned Moshe. Moshe what do we know about Moshe? Moshe's a very humble man. Moshe felt that it would be inappropriate for the Torah that he's transcribing from Hashem's words for him to write about how he was summoned to Hashem. So what did he do? Can't change anything. Hashem says to write Vayikra. You put Vayikra, but he made the Aleph of Vayikra small so that if you read it without paying attention, it should be Vayikar, which means he happened to meet God, not that God summoned him. That's wow. That's a high profile individual. I was summoned by the king. I was summoned by the president. No, not the same thing. I happened to meet him. It happened to be that we met. That was Moshe's humility.

09:59
He can't change what God said, but he modified the letter so that it should look like it was just happenstance. It's there. If you look in the torah, the aleph is there. The olive is small. If you look in the hummus right here, I'll show you when you open up to the beginning, the first no, no, I want you to just see. I want you to see with your own eyes. Don Don't trust. Don't trust.

10:24
That rabbi says something that's true. Nah Say, I want proof. That's part of the principles of how we learn here, right? Is that? We don't? You know? We verify, verify, verify.

10:36
Come take a look here, chapter 1, verse number 1. Look, see, the aleph is smaller. Look the five letters. The fifth letter is smaller, right? So if you read just the first four letters, it means happenstance, it means that we happened by coincidence to meet, but that was because Moshe was humble. Moshe was humble, he didn't change what, god, you're not allowed to change, lobo de melebo. Moshe could not, I know, but he wanted it to at least present in front of the Jewish people, in a way of humility For Moshe himself. So we have the written law and we have the oral law. The oral law is all the explanations.

11:25
For example, I see some people here have pens and papers and they're taking notes. So you're going to write down from a 20 to a 60-minute class. You're going to write down notes, but how much information is really being transmitted in the 20 to 60 minutes, hours and hours and hours of preparation? And you're not going to be able to write as fast as I speak. So what's going to happen? You're going to go home after class. You're going to be able to write as fast as I speak. So what's gonna happen? You're gonna go home after class. You're gonna be talking to your friend, hopefully, and or to your family. You're gonna be saying, oh, it was a great class from Robbie. I'm just being arrogant. Okay, who's a great class? And and and I have to tell you what he said. He said uh, uh. You look at your notes. You can be like oh, yeah, he said this right. Then you just have the headline. You have just the little footnotes of the little little things of what was said, not the full class. It's not the full transcript. What happens is that you only have the footnotes. The Torah is just the footnotes.

12:22
You want to have the full, elaborated, explained, detailed understanding of the Torah. You have to learn the Oral Law. What is part of the Oral Law? The Midrash, the Kabbalah, the Mishnah, the Talmud. We have both Talmuds, the Jerusalem Talmud and the Babylonian Talmud, and then you have the conclusion of all of those and that is the Halacha, the law. What does that mean? How do we get to that? So, for an example, the Mishnah can tell us, the Torah tells us to keep kosher. The Torah tells us exactly what animals. The Mishnah will talk about some of the details of those animals, and the Talmud will start asking all of these questions to make to get it, you know, how do you? To have it clearly defined, to have it more crystallized. Now, how do you sharpen a knife? You take another knife, you take two knives, one against the other, and they both get sharpened. That's the way, by the way, very interesting we're talking about I'm just reminded, we're talking about Ezer HaMikoman, this Mishnah.

13:37
Why specifically this chapter? Why specifically chapter 5 of Tractate Zivachim is the one that's brought about the offerings there are so many different Mishnahs that talk about offerings, so many different chapters. The Sages tell us something very, very incredible. It's the only chapter in the entire Mishnah, in the entire Mishnah, it's the only chapter that has no second opinion. There's no dispute, because so many times in the Mishra you'll have well, rabbi Yochanan says this, rish Lakish says that, hillel says this and Shammai says that You'll have constantly different opinions. Rabbi Meir says like this, rabbi Huda said like that. Not here. In this entire chapter there's no dispute. Everybody agreed, which is an incredible thing the only chapter in the entire Mishnah that has no dispute whatsoever.

14:40
Now we think sometimes we can feel, oh, dispute, which means it's shaky, oh, there's some argument. No, our strength is dispute. There's right now a big conversation in the United States about freedom of speech, giving people a platform to talk. People are like I don't want to hear opposing views. Well, it'll only strengthen. It'll only strengthen when you hear an opposing view. It'll only strengthen if you're able to argue your case In Torah. What do we have? Constant dispute? Why? Because you're saying something. I got something to prove you wrong. Now you're going to prove that you're right and I'm going to bring you a different proof against you. What's going to happen. The two knives are both going to get sharpened, and this is the brilliance of the Mishnah.

15:31
So when we talk about the written Torah, we talk about the oral Torah. It's important for us to be connected to both of them and to heaven forbid. I've heard sometimes rabbis say oh well, that's just the oral Torah, that's just a bunch of rabbis who made up the rules. That's a total ignorance, it's a total misunderstanding. Or they brush it away saying ah, that's just Midrash, ah, that's nothing Like Midrash doesn't mean anything Like Midrash is not Torah. Midrash is Torah Because it ends up being those people who are mistaken, who end up saying, like someone has in our community from the pulpit, someone said that to their congregants close your ears, or close your children's ears. Because this is going to be very delicate information that I'm going to share and this is what the rabbi said. The rabbi said I don't know why you call them a rabbi, but the rabbi said we all know that Santa Claus is a fairy tale. He says well, guess what? So is Hanukkah. Well, if you're ignorant, then that's what happens. If you're ignorant, then you don't know the source for Hanukkah, then that's what you think. Well, the rabbi shouldn't indeed, but no, it's really terrible.

16:53
And then we dedicated three weeks of our Talmud studies in here, in our Thinking Talmudist, to talk about the Talmud from Tractate Gittin that talks about Hanukkah, my Hanukkah, what is Hanukkah? And we went through the entire discussion, the whole history, all of the proofs and the verification. It's okay, let's get back to Ezo McCormick. So it is a Mishnah that is recited after the verses of the Torah are recited and the Gemara is going to be the Brisa that we're going to do, god willing, next week. We're going to elaborate on that. Why? To fulfill that?

17:33
Learning is like the offerings. Learning is like the offerings. When you learn the offerings, when you learn about them, it's as if you brought the offerings. You bring it in its completion.

17:47
Now we know there's two different categories of communal, two different categories of offerings. There's communal offerings and there's private offerings. I'm not going to get too much into the details. I don't want to confuse everyone, but we have the communal offerings, which was the Tamid, which was brought in the morning and the evening. This was a daily offering that was brought every day of the year, every morning, every evening. You also had the public offering of the musaf, which is our musaf prayer. That we pray is to compensate for not having a temple. Today we bring that, we recite that prayer and in that prayer we recite the offering that would have been brought had we had a temple. And that is on shabbos, on rosh chodesh, the first day of the month, on Pesach, shavuot, sukkot, on Shemini Atzeret, on Rosh Hashanah, on Yom Kippur, on all of these days we have a Musaf offering that was brought.

18:37
That was a communal offering, and then there were private, individual offerings, and that was the Karbon Ola, the burnt offering. There was the shlomim, the peace offering. There was the paschal offering, there was the firstborn offering, the tithe offering, the thanksgiving offering, the pilgrimage offering. There was the chagigah offering, the shlomim. Each one of these represented a different characteristic and you know, one was a volunteer offering, okay, which was the oluz totally, it would be totally burnt, and our sages tell us that it represented a complete physical devotion, removing ourselves from the physical world.

19:21
Because, what happens? You take the physical offering and you burn it. Basically, you're saying I'm too committed to my physical stuff. I what happens? You take the physical offering and you burn it. Basically, you're saying I'm too committed to my physical stuff, I got to let go of it. I got to get away from my physicality and that's the great gift of Shabbos that we have. Is that removes us from the creative world. During the whole week we can be creative. You know it's a big mistake in semantics that people use that discourages people from Shabbos. It says you can't work on Shabbos. That's not what it says. It doesn't say you can't work on Shabbos. It says you can't do creative labor on Shabbos.

20:03
There's a big difference between work and creative labor. I'll give you an example my home we have. Sometimes we have many, many people over for Shabbos. Many of you have been by us for Shabbos. It's a lot of work. Serving people, cleaning up that's a lot of work. All the food is pre-cooked before Shabbos, all fresh, all delicious. My wife is a master chef, but that's a lot of work. So what's more work? Doing that and serving and cleaning up or flicking on a light switch? Which one is work? Serving the table is much more work, but that's permitted. Flicking on the light switch is prohibited why? Because there's nothing to do with work.

20:51
Work is the wrong definition. It's the wrong word for it. It's creative labor. Preparing a dish from what is already prepared is not creative labor, it's work. It's not creative labor. Turning on a light is creative labor. Turning on a light is prohibited.

21:10
Working is not prohibited and it's a little mistake that people make, which is, if you put it into that category of understanding, everything makes sense. All of the laws of Shabbat make sense. Now, when we're talking about a burnt offering, what does it really mean? It means I'm letting go of my physical attachments, my physical addictions, the sin offering someone who did an accidental sin against Hashem. That's the complete remorse that one has for a sin, the transgression against man, which is the guilt offering, the peace offering which was eaten in total holiness, which was elevating my physical dimension, meaning the way we eat can be an eating of just stuffing our face with food or making it an elevated experience.

22:04
My rabbi, very interestingly, the Talmud, says that a person it says someone who eats in the marketplace, is compared to a dog, means you go to a marketplace. Yeah, you've all seen that guy who's walking in the mall with a piece of pizza and he's, like you know, fitting it into his mouth, right? You've, we've all seen, we, we know what I'm talking. You know what I'm talking about, right, that's compared to a why. A dog doesn't have any dignity and it eats any place. You give it, you throw it a bone, you throw it some food. It'll eat any place, it doesn't care. He's at a black tie of event, a black tie of fear. And the dog, they just wanted him quiet, they just put and he's chewing on that food and he doesn't care that everyone's dressed in a tuxedo and everyone's. He doesn't care why. Because I'm hungry, I want to eat, but there's a proper dignity.

22:58
So one of my rabbi always talks about being dignified. He always talks about being dignified, carrying yourself with royalty. He says not to eat with your hands, not to eat with your hands, not to eat with your hands. You have a knife and a fork. You should eat. So one of the students asked how do you eat pizza without your hands, right? She says if you can't eat it without your hands, don't eat pizza. Right? Your royalty, if you're royalty, there's a proper way to eat. There's a proper way to be dignified. Okay, I'm out here talking against pizza. I love pizza. Yeah, there's a mission of there I'm gonna get, I'm gonna give you in a minute that has the full translation Thanksgiving offering. What was that? That was representing a complete closeness to to Hashem and giving full thanks, okay, so.

23:55
So another thing to understand is that the Ezo Mikoman is an opportunity to expand our knowledge beyond the Mikra and Mishnah Right. Thank you so much. Beyond the, what the Torah tells us is our basic obligation. Now we elaborate on it, we advance our knowledge, like we mentioned previously, with the oral Torah, and this is part of our delving beyond the surface, and it's important to understand as well that we have an intellectual understanding, but we also have to have an emotional connection. It's not enough to just say prayers, say words, we have to understand, which is why our sages tell us that someone who recites particularly this Mishnah, and they don't understand what they're saying, they didn't do anything because they have no emotional connection to it.

24:51
If you're bringing an offering, you had to know what offering you were bringing. If you came to the temple and you said here, kohen, I want you to slaughter this animal for me because I sinned, and now you don't have proper intention for what's going on, it could be very problematic. The offering didn't apply because you weren't connected to it in an emotional way. The Mishnah is the only chapter that contains no disagreements, and this is to teach us that there is a certain power to peace and unity as a people. By the way, the Kohen, in order to serve in the temple, had to be in peace with everyone. No arguments with his next-door neighbor, no fights, no quarrels, no pettiness, because he was representing the entire people. Someone's bringing an offering and you're busy fighting with your wife, fighting with your neighbor, fighting with your friend, fighting in some court case. No, no, no, you can't. If you had such a, such a no, you can't fully be devoted to it.

26:01
So what is the words? Ezehom HaKomen? What is the place? What is the place of where the offerings were brought? And, as we'll see in a minute, most where the offerings were brought and, as we'll see in a minute, most of the offerings were brought. Each one had its own designated places, but some of the offerings were brought any place, any place in the temple, you can bring in, any place in the courtyard, you could bring it here, you can bring it there.

26:24
But our great sages would cry when they would read this, because if you look at the words azehu Mekomim, what is the proper place to bring the offering? They would start saying where is the location for the offering, meaning where is the temple, where is the temple that we need in order to bring those offerings? Now that we don't have a temple, we're lacking the ability to bring those offerings. So, perhaps, this being a reminder, ezehom HaKalman, where is the place that we need to bring our offerings? We don't have a temple and we should have a special prayer, which is why, if you look at the end of all of these prayers, there is a special prayer which is added After you finish this Mishnah. There's a special prayer that's added.

27:16
And what's that prayer? It says as follows Yehi Rotzon, may it be your will that the building of the Temple be restored. Here we go. Yehi Rotzonzel, mefanecha, may it be your will, hashem, our God and the God of our forefathers, that the holy temple be rebuilt speedily in our days and grant us our share in your Torah. And may we serve you with reverence. May we serve you there with reverence, as in days of old and in former years. So we see, we're always. We're saying Eizu Mikoman, yes, where's the place for the temple? We are looking for that place. We're asking for it in our prayers as well. So I want to read to you something from Abnachman, where he talks about this special thing. He says we can understand the reason for the Thanksgiving offering a peace offering and a sin or guilt offering but what purpose is the Ola offering, the elevation offering, what purpose does it serve?

28:22
The Midrash teaches that an Ola is brought on account of the heart's intention as it atones for forbidden thoughts. This is the Midrash. Conceptually, a burnt offering represents a person's broken spirit within himself and feeling ashamed before God for he secretly had forbidden thoughts. He thinks of himself how can I have fallen and been cast down from heaven to earth? I was in such an exalted place, but now I've turned my face away from God. The person's heart breaks and it causes Such an exalted place, but now I've turned my face away from God. The person's heart breaks and it causes him to take pity upon himself, for there is nothing more in want of compassion than this. This is the great value of the Ola that a person broken hearted says Hashem, I've turned away, hashem, I've strayed from your ways and this is such a painful thing for me. And the person would bring that offering. This is something which is so incredibly powerful.

29:29
If we look at the, at the at Rav Schwab on prayer, he brings an incredible thing here. He says that the Karban Ola, the elevation offering, required three things Hafsheit. If you look at the Mishnah, it says that the animal must be skinned, v'nituach it must be cut into sections, and then v'kolila yeshim, that it must be completely burned by the fire. So he says, since our prayer is a substitute for the Ola offering, for the Ola Sataamid, its fundamental part, the Shmon Esrei, the Amida also contains these requirements. What does it mean? First, similar to Hafshet, which is the skinning of the animal, and it must be skinned, we are mentally to practice hafshata sagashmias, stripping oneself of physicality while saying the Amidah.

30:31
When we stand for the Amidah, what do we do? Excuse me, what do we do when we're reciting the Amidah? We're removing ourselves from the entire world. We're getting to what the world today calls mindfulness. The world calls it mindfulness. We're removing ourselves from the entire world.

30:50
The Halacha says that during the Amidah, a person's eyes should either be closed or glued to the prayer book. We shouldn't be looking around, we shouldn't be motioning to people. While we're praying, we're completely removing ourselves. We're praying, we're completely removing ourselves. We're stripping ourselves from our physicality. This means withdrawing into our own self. We are to disregard our outer physical frame, while our inner, spiritual, true self is communicating with God. The transient physical aspect of the human being, as soon as seen in a mirror, is not that which is communicating with the Almighty. This aspect is to be removed during prayer. It's only the inner part of us that is praying. Rather, it is our spiritual side, our neshama, which is praying to Hashem. So that's the first part of the offering.

31:45
The second part, just as the ola, is nituach. Nituach, we said, is cut into sections. We too are to appear before God with a lev nishbar, with a broken heart, as in a humble persona. Lev nishbar, v'nitka, elohim lo sivzeh, a heart broken and crushed. Oh God, you will not despise. We are to imagine that this little me, this little nothing that I am, with all my shortcomings, is approaching the Ribboner Sheol, olam, the Master of the Universe. What audacity, what chutzpah. This feeling of complete inadequacy is what is meant by Lev Nishbar, by a broken heart. This corresponds to Nituach, the cutting up of the different parts of the animal, the different sections of the animal. And finally, says Rav Schwab, the third part of the Ola offering, which is the kolil l'ishim, the completely burned by fire, and he says this is his slavos, a fiery enthusiasm which corresponds to this kolil l'ishim. One should feel exhilarated to be fortunate enough to be chosen by the Almighty, that he's part of the Jewish people and to say the words of our prophets and our sages together with the rest of the Jewish people. That's what our prayers are.

33:16
My son was just talking to me this week and he was saying how he was going to yeshiva. He's in ninth grade and he was feeling a little bit upset that he has to go to school. I said do you realize what a privilege it is? Do you realize what a privilege it is that you, of all the people on planet Earth, you get to go to yeshiva? You have that tremendous opportunity. See, he looks at me a little confused.

33:48
I said one second, how many 15 year olds are there in the world? This is probably I don't know 100 million, 200 million, I don't know if. 100 million, 200 million, I don't know. If you have to figure out If there's 8 billion people in the world, divide it up to every age, from 1 to 85, 1 to 90, and you divide it up. There's a little bit more in the lower age group. Okay, so 100 million.

34:16
He said how many of those 100 million are Jewish? He says Jewish boys. He says how many of those 100 million are Jewish? He says Jewish boys. He says 10,000, maybe 10,000 Jewish boys. He said from 100 million, you're one of 10,000. How many of those 10,000 Jewish boys have the privilege to go to yeshiva? Not in public school, not living in a secular world? How many of them have a privilege to be in a yeshiva? A few thousand, a few few. I said of a hundred million, you're of the few thousand that have the privilege to go and learn the word of Hashem and to study that. Do you know how fortunate you are?

35:04
Sometimes we don't realize that. Sometimes we're like, oh, the antisemitism. Oh, we're so afraid. Do you see what they're saying? Tucker Carlson, candace Owens, we're all worried about what people are saying about the Jewish people. This is not new. We've had this since day one, since the first day of the Jewish people.

35:24
It says that the Jewish people received the Torah at Mount Sinai. Why specifically Mount Sinai? Because when Sinai received the Torah, you know what else descended with the Torah? Sinai, which rhymes with Sinai, sinai hatred descended at Sinai as well. Ah, when we see that article, we're like yes, I'm part of the Jewish people, that hatred, that they hated Moses. For they hate me, they hate you.

35:53
Gary, how can anybody hate you? You're the most lovable, you know, huggable fuzzball in the world. You're the most. You're so incredible. How can someone hate you? But guess what? But guess what? But guess what? We get to be like Moshe. Moshe was hated by the nations of the world and we get to be hated like he was and like Joshua. And you think about all of the great people throughout our history, our ancestors, who were murdered because they were Jewish. We have the great privilege to be connected with them. We have a great privilege to be part of the Jewish people, to be part of the chosen nation. Chosen doesn't give us the ability to be arrogant. It doesn't give us the great fortune of being nothing but humble. When we are the chosen people, that means that we have a greater obligation to be a shining light for the world, and when we don't live up to that, that's when we have these people hating on us.

37:00
Rabbi Schwab says this will explain the reason for saying Hashem sefasai, tiftach ufi agiti losech. In the beginning of our Amidah, we say my Lord, open my lips, that my mouth may declare your praise, he says before beginning the Amidah. At this point we are mentally discarding our physical outer shell and standing before the Almighty in a state of nituach, with our humble and broken hearts, which would make it impossible even to speak. So we ask Hashem to help us with the thoughts of our prayer, with our lips and mouths, because right now we're just a soul. When we come to the Am, because right now we're just a soul, when we come to the Amidah, I'm just a soul. I don't have anything left in me, no physical component. So we ask Hashem, open our lips so that we can speak, so we can say your praise. And finally, when we are ready to begin, we throw ourselves at the mercy of the Almighty and say Baruch Atah Hashem, directly talking to God blessed are you, hashem, elokeinu V'lekei V'senu, our God and the God of our forefathers, with fiery enthusiasm, as if we are offering ourselves on the altar much as the Olas Tamid is put on the altar.

38:24
This is an amazing parallel. I love this, this part I said when I saw it I don't want to quote it because I'm going to misquote it. I want to read it inside there's a special location for important offerings, and lesser important can be any place similar to prayer. We can pray any place, but there's a special place that one should set aside. When you're in synagogue, when you're even praying at home, have a special place, the halacha tells us, because God loves our prayer so much. He wants to hear our prayer and he's waiting for us. Where is he waiting for us? In our set place for prayer. Where is he waiting for us In our set place for prayer? It can be in your kitchen. It can be in your living room, your dining room, your study. When you're home and in synagogue, to have a set place as well. And, by the way, if someone's standing in your place, don't embarrass them and kick them out. See, you'll sit a seat over, you'll sit two seats over, you'll sit a row away. It's still considered in the area of your regular prayer.

39:26
Stand still as we connect with the makom. It says Ezehu mekoman. What's the place, what is the makom? When someone is sitting, shivo, what do we say? We say a special phrase Hamakom yinachim Eschem. We refer to God as Hamakom, the place we need to connect with our place. What's the place? That's our God. Wherever you are, whatever your makom is, whatever your place is connect to the makom, connect to the place, because God is everywhere. Wherever a person may be, god is always there to be there with us. We are reminded that we can connect from wherever our makom is.

40:13
When bringing an offering, we must reflect the contrast between human spirit and animal spirit, our human spirit. This is why we bring the offering and we give it to the Kohen, we move it aside to the Kohen, and what do we do? That's getting rid of our animal spirit. Now we recite the special prayers, we recite the Mishnah. That's the human spirit that must rise above everything else.

40:44
And finally, this is the last part of the offerings before we go into our prayers, Because we always know that it's the best time to ask the king for a favor when he is being fed, when he's in the middle of a feast. We see this with Esther. Esther says to the king oh, the king says, Esther, what do you want? Up to half the kingdom. So she says, come tomorrow with Haman and we're going to have a feast, and then I'll tell you what I want. Why a feast? Because when they're satiated, when they're full, then it's much easier. What did we do now? We brought the offerings to the Almighty, so to speak. The Almighty is having His feast.

41:30
Now we can go right into our prayers and make the request, ask Hashem for success, ask Hashem for guidance, ask Hashem for all the things that we want and so deeply desire in the rebuilding of the Temple. Hashem should bless us that we should merit to the restoration of our Temple. It should be built speedily in our days, and all of our prayers, all of our offerings which the prayers are a replacement for those offerings should hopefully go back to be actual offerings so that we can connect with them in a more real way. Hashem should bless each and every one of us that our prayers should always be fulfilled. Don't be afraid to ask God. Next week at this time we'll all be in synagogue, hopefully at this time, hearing the blowing of the shofar. The shofar is a very, very powerful time to blast through all of the barriers that block our prayers potentially from reaching God's throne. It's a time to just break through all the barriers. Hashem should bless each and every one of us that our prayers always be accepted lovingly in front of Hashem.

42:34 - Intro (Announcement)
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