Tazria-Metzora 5785: How to Grow and Achieve Greatness

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Shiurim given in 5772

The Order of the Korbonos Is Puzzling

Our subject today relates to the haschalas hazman and as it relates to the parshah. This week’s parshah tells us about certain korbanos that are brought by a woman who gave birth. It says: וְאִם לֹא תִמְצָא יָדָהּ דֵּי שֶׂה, if she can’t afford to buy sheep, וְלָקְחָה שְׁתֵּי תֹרִים אוֹ שְׁנֵי בְּנֵי יוֹנָה, she takes two pigeons, אֶחָד לְעֹלָה וְאֶחָד לְחַטָּאת, one is brought as a korban olah, whichis a burnt offering, kulah laHashem (Vayikra 12:8), and the other one is brought as chatas, a sin offering. Rashi says on אחד לעולה ואחד לחטאת, that from the order of the passuk it would seem that you first bring the olah and then you bring the korban chatas. However, he tells us it is not so. Rashi says: לא הקדימה הכתוב, the Torah does not write the olah before the chatas to describe a practice, אלא למקראה, but only for the kriya. That means when you read it in the Torah you read אחד לעולה first and then you read אחד לחטאת. However, אבל להקרבה, but in the actual procedure of the hakravas hakorban, חטאת קודם לעולה, the chatas comes before the olah. כך שנינו בזבחים בפרק כל התדיר. So what’s the obvious question?

The obvious question is, if you first have to bring the chatas and then you bring the olah, why do you have in the reading of the Torah אחד לעולה ואחד לחטאת? If the order of events is you first bring a korban chatas,it should say, אחד לחטאת ואחד לעולה. Doesn’t that make sense? Why doesn’t the Torah write it in the order of the hakravah?^[i]

Nurturing Great Goals

So perforce, there is some lesson. Even though in the halachah, in the seder hadevarim, you bring the korban chatas first, and only then you bring the korban olah, but the Torah wants you – when you’re reading this parshah – to mention and be aware about the fact that there is a korban olah, and mention it before the korban chatas. That’s what shtait.

Rav Eliyahu Dessler says that the Torah is teaching us the appropriate derech in avodas Hashem. The korban olah represents the shpitz in avodas Hashem. That represents us being kulo laHashem. That’s the end game. That’s the shleimus ha’amitis. It’s kulah laHashem! The chatas, the sin offering, represents the means of a person getting there. The way a person reaches his goals in avodas Hashem is step by step.

Step By Step

First you work on sur mei-ra, “turn away from evil” (Tehillim 34:15). There are many people who attempt to ignore the sur mei-ra. They just want to work on aseh tov. And then what happens is they feel that if they work on the aseh tov,automatically the ra will go away. But the Torah says סור מרע ועשה טוב, you have to accept upon yourself to distance from the ra. With that approach, that is how you’re aseh tov. So the chatas is brought first. That’s the sur mei-ra, the sin offering, the cleansing, the kapparah for one’s cheit. Practically, that’s where you start. And then afterwards you go for the olah kulah laHashem. However, a person has to know that it’s not enough just to be sur mei-ra. A person has to know that when he begins his sur mei-ra, it’s in order to come to the aseh tov in the best and highest form and fashion. So you have to read about the olah first before you mention the chatas,because you have to know that the goal is shleimus. The goal is for me to reach and be attached to Hashem as much as possible. That’s the goal. Let’s say somebody is involved in bad behavior. So he says, “Okay, I’ll stop the bad behavior.” He says he’s going to stop the bad behavior, but he doesn’t understand that the ultimate goal is kulah laHashem. If he only says he’s going to stop the bad habit, but he doesn’t understand that the ultimate goal is shleimus and attaching himself to Hashem as much as he can, he won’t end up getting there.

Tragedy: Observant But Empty

I was just reading an article about a girl in Eretz Yisrael who grew up in a frum family. The father was a learning person. They were considered a Charedi family, not just stam frum. He was arein geton (absorbed)in learning. The mother was a regular housewife, and they had a nice frum family. The kids went to the best of schools. They did everything by the book. But over the years the girl noticed an interesting thing. Her mother would let them watch certain videos, but when the father came home, the mother would quickly put it all away and tell the kids, “Don’t mention anything.” It continued like that throughout the years, behind his back. She said her mother was a very nice lady, a very frum lady, but there was no sense that there was any goal and any purpose in their Yiddishkeit. Yiddishkeit was just their way of life, but there was no reason why you “do” Yiddishkeit. There was no mention of Hashem, not from her father, not from her mother. Her father was a busy person, and there was no connection. It was just trying to stay within the cocoon, within the box, not to step out. But there were no goals.

And then she grew up, and she met somebody, and discovered that the real story about Yiddishkeit is about Hashem! Yiddishkeit wasn’t just another religion that happens to be our religion, or happens to be the best religion, or that we basically do the same things as all the goyim as long as they don’t contradict our religion. We shop. We go on vacation. We go to the fanciest stores. We buy the nicest things. The same Nordstrom for them, is for us. The same Saks Fifth Avenue for them, is for us. It was a whole different hashkafah. She said she spoke to other people and she discovered this wasn’t such an uncommon thing. People just don’t understand the mehalech of avodas Hashem and this is what has to be emphasized.

Striving For Greatness Continuously

Now, the emphasis has to be, not that you can become anything you want. You must become the best person you can be. That’s what we have to tell ourselves. We have to tell this to our wives. We have to become the best we can be. And we have to tell this to our children, that they must be the best they can be. Today, there’s kind of a concept where a lot of children resent that. Why do I have to be the best I can be? I’m happy the way I am. As long as I’m not doing bad stuff, isn’t that enough? And the answer is, no. That’s not the goal. The real purpose here is the understanding אחד לעולה, that’s the goal. It’s not enough just not to do bad stuff. You have to be sho’eif. You have to yearn and strive for greatness.

Now, Rav Eliyahu Dessler writes that there are many people who already get onto the road of aseh tov and they ‘do.’ They shteig a little bit, and they do the right thing. He says, you have to know that the goal in life is to constantly shteig. Shteiging is not something you do when you get onto an ‘easy’ path. No. Constant growth isrequired. If you look at a person who’s a frum person, he learns every day, he davens every day. He doesn’t have modern media in his home. He’s a nice Jew. There are a lot of people like that, fine yungeleit. But the concept of ‘you want to shteig?’is gone.

I remember when I got married, I joined a chaburah in a kollel and they were learning mesechta Shabbos. So I learned it the way I learned any other mesechta. I remember I came to a Tosfos and I was bothered with this Tosfos. I had a kasha. I couldn’t understand it, back and forth. I was starting to handel it. I went over to an older yungerman, someone who is still learning today. And he told me an interesting thing. He said, “You know, those kinds of kashos you only ask when you’re a bachur, when you’re younger. When you get older those kinds of kashos don’t bother you anymore.” I said, “I hope that I never get older. I hope I will always stay young and these kashos will bother me.” I said, “If I don’t understand the Tosfos how can I leave it like that?” He told me, “Is the Tosfos that important? In your life, your life picture, does the Tosfos make a big deal?” I said, “If I go with that mehalech, nothing is going to be important. Every time that something bothers me and I push myself a little bit to understand it, that means I’m alive. I am still interested. If I learn a gemara and I come to the gemara and I don’t understand the gemara, if I say, ‘I don’t understand this gemara – vaiter,’ you know what that shows? It shows that I’ve lost interest already.” If there is a button on your radio or on your computer, would you say nu mei heicha teisa I need to know what it does? I don’t have to know what that button does. Does everybody know what every button does? No. You want to know what it could do. You want to be a mumcheh. You know why? Because that’s where your interest lies. You want to find out new chiddushim.

A mentch has to know, R’ Dessler says, that wherever a person is holding, he has to shteig.

Now Rav Eliyahu Dessler says: If you’re holding on the lowest level of shteiging, you have to know and be aware that higher levels do exist, more than you understand. And this is another mistake he says people make, that they think that I’m basically ois geshtigen – I’ve achieved all there is to achieve, and that’s all there is in life. I remember, I once had a discussion with a young lady and she said, “Don’t take this personally, but you know, I’m not a ba’alas teshuvah,” she said. “I went to frum schools. So basically, the difference between me and you is you maybe know more books and I know less books, but we’re the same.” I said, “Have you spent any years learning Torah, or being exposed to learning Torah or have a husband who learned Torah?” I said, “We live on different planets. We’re not living on the same planet.” She did not strive to be someone greater or appreciate someone else who did strive to become greater.

Beyond Your Dreams

Rav Dessler says a person has to know that when you’re shteiging, don’t think you are already there, and that it’s just a matter of more books, more lines of text left to read. When you shteig and then you shteig more and you shteig more, you look back and you discover that when you were first shteiging, you were totally and absolutely clueless, and what you thought you understood and grasped then, was mamash like a blind man in the darkness, even though you were doing the right thing. Because whatever you think at this point in time, he says, is only the beginning; your mind is not yet developed and the madreigah of your neshamah is not yet developed, so you don’t even begin to appreciate the endless growth that is still possible. That’s what you have to be aware of. It’s not just, “I’m there already so therefore it’s just a matter of okay, a little more.” When you start off, he says, you’re living in a world of teva and then you can’t begin to be masig (grasp) that it’s shayach for me to be oleh, to shteig,and to actually live in a world that’s beyond teva. That’s amazing.

You talk to the average person on the street who is frum,and tell him, “You know it’s shayach to have an existence in this world that’s shelo k’derech hateva.”They say, “Give me a break. That’s what you tell kids. You say make-believe stories.” Everybody has – l’havdil – their ‘Santa Clauses.’ You know, the wishful thinking of Eliyahu Hanavi coming and this guy coming, and he’s going to bring you this and bring you that. Oh, please – that’s all nonsense.” You know what that is? That’s exactly this problem! Because when you’re on some madreigah,but it’s the madreigah hatachtonah, your perspective from which you see things now doesn’t enable you to see beyond. If a fellow doesn’t open a sefer – so he understands he can’t see what’s in the sefer. But it’s a shame when a fellow opens the sefer, and he looks in the book, and thinks, “Nah, I’ve seen it all already.”

Gaining A Higher Perspective

Everyone here could testify to it. Anybody in his life who focused ever on this shteigarai knows that he crossed a line. He went from the world of teva, and he started to experience things that all of a sudden were beyond teva. At first, he said to himself, “This must be a joke. This must be a coincidence. It’s not real. It’s good luck. Luck happens. Things happen.” That’s how a person teitches it up. But as a person shteigs, he starts to see everything in that light, and every area of his life happens from a different perspective.

Rav Dessler says, you should know that whichever level you’re holding on, know there’s a higher level, and that higher level will create a discovery for you. It will open your mind up to realize that where you are now is gornisht.

He says the rule is a person has to work to grow, but you have to live within your madreigah. That’s why there are many people who, when they hear about this type of world – for example, when they hear about people in the gemara who were zocheh to see Eliyahu Hanavi – they think it was only possible back then. The Chafetz Chaim didn’t live that long ago, the Chafetz Chaim was zocheh to giluy Eliyahu. There are a number of stories like that. Rav Chatzkel Levenstein writes that he was present with the Chafetz Chaim and neshamos came and they were disturbing and trying to beg the Chafetz Chaim for tikun. Could you imagine when a person is on that level? I can’t. And I can’t imagine Rav Chatzkel was on that level that he was aware of that. I’m sure that a lot of people talked to the Chafetz Chaim and they may have thought the Chafetz Chaim was talking to himself. “Gei avek. Okay do this. Do that.” What? Is the man talking to himself? He’s talking to me? No, he’s talking to himself, you understand? Rav Chatzkel could see who he was really talking to and really understand what was going on, but a person who is on a very low madreigah would say the Chafetz Chaim is getting senile already. That’s what a person would say. Fashteit nisht. He doesn’t have a musag of such a thing, so he can’t imagine it. He’s talking to himself. Nebach. He’s not fully focused.

That’s what a mentch has to understand. So he says a person is chayav to learn about the higher levels, to become aware of such things. I remember thinking about it when I read this from Rav Chatzkel, and I was thinking it is a very high level. I remember it shook me up and it boggled my mind.

Recalibrating Reality

I remember reading another story about a fellow who was in a car accident, a major car accident in a foreign country, and he writes how he died and he was brought lefnei beis din shel ma’alah, and his amazementwas that on the beis din, there were two Yidden who were still living in this world. He writes that they asked him not to mention their names. He went to them afterwards. They were pashut on the beis din shel ma’alah! Could you imagine that?! A person could live in this world and be used as a dayan in the next world? I can’t imagine that. I would call that person a nut case; the guy needs serious psychiatry and medications. But that’s because you don’t understand. You live in a tiny, little world and your awareness of things is extremely limited. But if you study such ideas you could learn a little about it.

I remember when there was a tekufah when we were very involved with the autistic kids. What was that all about? That was just to give me an awareness of the world that I can’t see. It opened my mind, expanded my thinking in ways I had never dreamt of. I thought sometimes my head was going to explode. I thought the head gaskets were going to blow because you realize that you have no idea about anything. You realize you’re walking around with a plastic or a paper bag over your face and you can barely see and you think you’re seeing and you don’t see gornisht. עיינים להם ולא יראו. And then when you tell someone else about it, you know what the guy says? You’re starting to lose it.

Somebody just called me up who is nebach very sick. The person became extremely close to Hashem and started to become aware of things in their life they were never aware of, to such a madreigah that it’s unbelievable. The person called me up and said, “My friends are telling me that I’m starting to lose it. I’m a different person. My personality is changing now. And you know you’re starting to hallucinate and starting to imagine things. Everything you talk about is about spirituality. Come back to be a normal person.” I said, “Your friends are on very low madreigah so they have not had the opportunity to become aware of what you’re aware of. But baruch Hashem, you have become aware. Yes, you’re not normal. The normal of yesteryear you’re not anymore, because you shteiged and you grew.” That’s what you want – to grow. And every one of us wants to see that. Through the Torah and through shteiging and only through shteiging.

The End Goal Is To Aim High

So if you’re not koreh אחד לעולה first, you’d not know there is so much more to shteig for, and that it should be your goal. Now, people make a mistake. You can’t jump to אחד לעולה. Someone who’s on a low madreigah reads about the Chafetz Chaim, and all of a sudden he goes into a room, he closes the lights, rubs his eyes very shtark, and he starts to see stars and then imagines he’s talking to neshamos. Somebody comes into the room and says, “What are you doing?” He says, “I don’t know, ich ken nisht zoggen.” “What are you doing?” “I’m talking to neshamos. I’m connecting to neshamos.” You know what you say to the guy? “You’re an absolute nutcase.” You try to wake him up. You’re trying to get him out of his reverie. “Go back into the beis medrash and be a mentch. Because you’re not holding there.” But if you want to know if what you see is the end – it’s not the end. You have to be aware of the big world beyond the person and how little the world we live in is. And if we shteig – and for all of us, as you shteig -Hashem will make you aware of things that are unbelievable.

I’ll never forget the passuk that spurred me on. The passuk says in the chumash (Devarim 4:29)that when you will be in galus, you’ll be old, you’ll be tired, you’ll be far away and you will seek Me out with all your heart and soul. Hashem says, “I will reveal Myself to you.” I remember reading that passuk over many, many times, and I decided, you know what? That means I could find Hashem. It’s possible for me to discover Hashem.^[ii]

So I asked people. They said, “It’s not shayach. It’s not shayach.” I said, “But in the Torah, it says you can.” They told me, “In the Torah, it says a lot of things.” I said, “What do you mean?” They said, “Well, you have to know. You have to understand.” I said, “I understand I’m not going to be zocheh to giluy Eliyahu.” I remember reading about how if you fast for forty days you’re guaranteed to see Eliyahu. I was contemplating if I could do that. I didn’t think so. And I think even if I got to 40 days, I’d probably be very shvach, and I wouldn’t see giluy Eliyahu. I would need a hospital. But al kol panim,there is such a thing out there. Because there is such a thing out there, even if it is unlikely you will achieve it, it doesn’t mean it’s not real. But I have to recognize the madreigah on which I’m holding right now. So practically, you take care of the chatas first, and then you advance to the olah. But when you start, you have to know the end goal is the olah.

Nothing Less Than The Whole Torah

There is a gevaldige Rav Baruch Ber in the Birkas Shmuel in Kedushin, where he brings down something from Rav Chaim of Brisk in siman chaf zayin os beis. Rav Chaim talks about darkah shel Torah and how important it is for a father to yearn, strive and teach his children as much Torah as possible. And he says there are those people that have the new-fangled ideas and they decide that they’re going to limit the limud haTorah of their son. And they say, “You know what? It’s enough. It’s enough.” And he decides what is enough, what the rabbis teach him in school, “That’s enough.” He says, and what this person is doing, he says, is removing his descendants from Hashem Yisbarach. That’s what he’s doing. He says, do you know what the end is going to be? שבני ביתו, his immediate family, או הדור שאחר כך יהיה ריפורמה, or the next generation, they’re going to be Reform Jews. That’s what he says! And a person has to bring his kids up al pi Torah because the only way the father has to transmit Torah to his son, is to transmit the entire Torah that we learned at Sinai. כל המלמד לבנו ולבן בנו תורה כאילו קבלה מהר סיני – so can you imagine what would happen if a person transmits half the Torah that we learned at Sinai, but not the whole thing?! A father has to transmit the whole thing. Kol haTorah kulah! And that’s the ikar. תלמוד תורה כנגד כולם. The father comes and says to his son, “You know what? For you, I’m happy if you have part of the Torah.” Rav Chaim says, that kid doesn’t have a chance, and he’s going to become a סריס הדורות מן התורה, he’s going to cut off his generations from the Torah and the emunah hatehorah v’hakedoshah. He says, אוי לו, woe unto that father who removes his doros from Torah.

Rav Baruch Ber quotes Rav Chaim’s kasha. Rav Chaim asks, אם תשאל, if you’re going to ask a kasha. We find a number of people who are working people, ba’alei umnus, that they’re not such gedolim beTorah, and in spite of that, they’re tiere Yidden and they’re ma’amin in Hashem Yisbarach. How could it be? Rav Chaim just told me that if a guy is not taught the gantze Torah and the guy is not given Sinai, only partial Sinai, he’s finished! So how is it shayach to find erliche Yidden who are simple Jews? I guess there was once upon a time such a thing. They had emunah in Hashem and were tiere mentchen.

Rav Chaim says: והדבר הוא, you want to know what the secret is? Such a person prepared himself to be a gadol baTorah because he learned in the chadarim b’temimus. This fellow went to a cheder as a child and he really set himself on the path to be mekabel kol haTorah kulah. But you don’t learn kol haTorah kulah in cheder. That’s the beginning. And then something happened to stop it. Not a shitah. You know what it was? What made him stop was either parnasah or kishronos. He didn’t have the kishron to go on with Torah. But he was a person who was prepared. He was muchan. He had the chinuch and the preparation of Torah. That’s why, says Rav Chaim, he remains a tzaddik and a ma’amin. But the person whose hachanah initially was to have part of Sinai, he won’t make it. Maybe the father said, “You don’t have to learn gemara.” I know a school where a fellow told me they learn gemara. It was a Mizrachi school. I said, “What do they learn there?” So he brought me the gemara they’re learning. You know what he brought me? He brought me papers. I said, “What is this? A joke? More sheimus?” He said, no, they gave papers out and they learned selections from the Talmud. It’s called “selections of the Talmud.”

Now, that’s the type of limited chinuch I am talking about. I want you to know, even though we don’t learn gantze mesechtos, but we have gantze mesechtos. Some chacham may come up one day and say, “You know, since you only learn a few blatt in the seder,I have a good idea. Forget about buying expensive gemaros so someone can make a few pennies. I have a better idea! Make copies of just the first few pages. Sit and learn a few pages. This will be enough.” You know what the chiluk is? That’s the chiluk. The person who holds the gantze mesechta says, “I’m starting with the first page, but I understand that I am being meichen myself for the whole mesechta. I want to know everything in the Rosh and in the Tosfos andin the Rashi and in this and in that.” The guy who buys a gemara and the gemara doesn’t have Rashi, doesn’t have Tosfos, and it leaves out gemaros, has a different Torah. It’s an andere mesechta Kiddushin. That person has no hachanah to be a tzaddik, and he can’t be a tzaddik. So the proper kuk, the proper approach, is this approach.

Genuine Growth vs. Foreign Agendas & Shittos

Now, the Ponovezher Rav related a very interesting story. He said he had a bachur in his yeshivah that was a ba’al kishron but he got fachapped by the olam hata’avos and he wasn’t going b’derech HaTorah anymore. The Ponovezher Rav decided he’s got to let this guy go from the yeshivah. But he was afraid if he sent him away, he’d become frei. But on the other hand, if he left him in the yeshivah, he’s going to cause damage to the rest of yeshivah, to other bnei yeshivah. He didn’t know what to do. He decided to bring the shaylah to the Chazon Ish. The Chazon Ish said, “Send me the bachur. I want to see the bachur.” And that’s what happened. The Chazon Ish saw the bachur and spent an inordinate amount of time with this bachur; he worked on him, he was mekarev him, and he turned him into a talmid chacham and an emese yarei shamayim. The Ponovezher Rav said that this happened not one time. It happened with many bachurim. So they asked the Chazon Ish, “What’s the pshat? Why do you waste your time with these bachurim?” The Chazon Ish was a Torah machine. He wasn’t a kiruv machine. He wasn’t a kiruv man. A fellow said to the Chazon Ish, “If a guy would come to you from the modern world who’s frum, and he would come and he’d want to get close to you, you wouldn’t talk to him. You wouldn’t have any shaychus to him. You wouldn’t even let him cross the threshold of your house. And here you’re mamash being moser nefesh, you’re being metapel,yourself, with a bachur who is a mashchis.”

The Chazon Ish answered, “I’ll tell you a teretz. A bachur that comes to a yeshivah, bederech klal, is a different case. Why does a bachur go to yeshivah?” Especially in those days, today maybe it’s different. But in those days, you didn’t go to yeshivah unless you wanted to focus on learning Torah. You didn’t go there to sleep, and you didn’t go there to eat. I’m not saying you didn’t eat and sleep in yeshivos but that’s not why you went. If a person decided to go to yeshivah, he was committed to becoming a gadol baTorah and a yarei shamayim. So he had the she’eifah. He had an awareness of what the goal is. But what happened? The yetzer hara saw the guy is capable, so he came, and he wanted to disturb him, and pull him down into the beis hakisei and make him into a mushchas. But the modern mentch, the Chazon Ish said, this is his she’ifah in life. He could be a shomer Torah umitzvos – but he has this new Torah. That’s what it is. So that fellow, the Chazon Ish said, is not looking for more. He has his limit. He has his Torah that he created. He said: “With aza mentch I don’t want to have any shaychus because he has no goal of אחד לעולה.” That’s why a person has to understand that this (shteiging) is the avodah that we have to do in our life.

Shteiging Like…A Kid

What I heard from my Zeida all my life was, you have to be engaged in constant shteiging. If you’re 50 you want to shteig. You’re not shteiging in davening? Did you shteig in davening in the last month? If you did not shteig in davening, that means you didn’t go anywhere. That means you were lacking. Are you planning on shteiging in davening this zman? Are you planning on shteiging in learning or just continuing to learn? Is it ‘continuous education’? You know, lawyers and doctors have to take what’s called classes in continuous education (CEs). Every year, they have to take a certain amount of hours of chazarah to make sure they’re still on top of the matzav – but that’s not called shteiging. It’s continuous education to keep yourself refreshed and up to date.

A mentch has to understand this is the goal in the passuk. The Navi Hoshea (11:1) says: כי נער ישראל ואוהבו, “Yisrael is a child whom I loved.” The Navi gives us a message from Hashem that when Klal Yisrael is a na’ar, v’ohaveihu, I love him. So Rav Yisrael Salanter explained that Hakadosh Baruch Hu loves Klal Yisrael on condition that they’re b’bechinas na’ar. What is a na’ar? A na’ar is youth. A youth is an unfinished product. When you see a kid, you know he’s going to grow up. That you know. The definition of a kid is he’s growing. A kid is inquisitive. A kid is interested. He’s learning new things about his life. That’s what Hakadosh Baruch Hu loves. But a person who’s already reached a certain place, he’s not growing anymore. He’s finished. You’re not expecting him to be a few inches taller when you meet him in three years. Na’ar means he’s in the matzav of growth. And if a person strives to keep shteiging, he will continue to grow.

This is one middah that gedolim always had. Gedolim had these type of hanhagos that they were always focused on growing and shteiging. Rav Mordechai Gifter used to always say over from the Telzer Rosh Yeshivos, that the greatest ma’alah, more than all other ma’alos that a person could attain is az er halt by dem shteigen, if he is holding by shteiging. You know how sad it is when you meet frum Yidden and they don’t hold by shteiging anymore? Rav Chaim Ozer said that every time he meets the Chafetz Chaim it’s not the same Chafetz Chaim he met last time! He was nespael. He said, “It’s pashut,” he says. “Every time I meet the Chafetz Chaim, it’s not the same Chafetz Chaim.” And the Chafetz Chaim was an older Yid. The Chafetz Chaim was always shteiging.

We have to always shteig. Don’t think, “We got there. Okay, so now I know a little about how to learn. I know how to look at a gemara.”That’s it? Go vaiter. “I want to grow in yiras shamayim. I want to become frummer. I want to become closer to Hashem. I want to know my goals.” Don’t say that even though right now you’re holding on a low level, which we are, therefore you give up. There are many people like that. The yetzer hara sort of pulls them down and says, “You’re not going anywhere. You’re mine. You’re in a sewer with me.” A lot of people say, “Ok. You’re right.”

Jump Over Hurdles and Grow

Just recently, I saw somebody undertake to shteig. A person had stopped shteiging for a while, and the person now decided to undertake shteiging. I told the person, “I want to give you a warning that you’re going to get unbelievable nisyonos from the yetzer hara because he doesn’t want you to shteig. He wants to see if you understand what shteiging means.” And the night before the person was supposed to undertake the shteiging, he contacted me and said, “Bad stuff is starting to happen.” I said, “Say the words that Avraham Avinu used. Say, אף על פי כן! Just say, I don’t care what. I don’t care when. I don’t care how.” The person made a lot of hachanos that his big day should be perfect. And then, early in the morning, I get a text. What should I do? My employees called off from work today and my business can’t open up without me. I said, “Kiss it goodbye.” I said, “Forget it!” I said, “I’m telling you, the yetzer hara is not letting you go. Say אף על פי כן. Take it out of your mind. Say, forget about it. I’m telling you, it’s going to work out. It’s all the yetzer hara’s imagination to show you that you can’t shteig.” Baruch Hashem, the person passed the test and the person said, “Wow, that felt good!” Afterwards, Baruch Hashem,the world didn’t collapse. He didn’t go bankrupt and he didn’t lose any money. הרבה דרכים למקום.

That’s what we have to know in our life, Rabbosai. We’re starting a new zman. We have to say: By the end of this zman, none of us want to be the same as we are now. You want to grow, step by step. You want to grow. You want to grow in many ways. In hasmadah, in other areas. We want to be able to be in the beis medrash for longer after ma’ariv. We’re going to be ligen in learning more. We’re not going to get sidetracked. On Shabbosos, on Erev Shabbos, we’re going to be arein geton in learning. We want to make this zman a great one. At the end of this zman, you should be davening better than you davened until now. That means you feel you took a step up in having a shaychus andtalking to Hashem sometime during the day. You want to feel not that you know the words. You want to feel connected with Hashem. You want to feel your sense of chashivus for Torah is going up. You want to feel I’ve been working on my middos more than I did. Let me work on my middos now. I’m going to be machnia myself. I’m going to go vaiter.

You want to know something? It’s a very short zman. The summer zman is only two months and 20 days, a very short zman. But it’s a loaded zman, because in the middle you have Shavuos, kabalas haTorah. They even give you a vacation this zman. I can’t figure out why. They give you a Shabbos vacation. But Rabbosai, let’s make a plan that at the end of this zman, we don’t want to be the same. I want to be – if not kulo laHashem – I want to be more laHashem. And I want to know, it’s only the beginning of my shteiging. And if we do that, we will grow im yirtzeh Hashem. Yes – I can’t fool myself. I have to know where I’m holding right now. But there’s no one here who can’t learn with more ratzon, who can’t be more arein geton in learning, who can’t be more arein geton in avodas Hashem and yiras Hashem. Pick some area, and let’s do it and let’s grow, and let’s prepare ourselves for the future.

^[i] מובא בספר הזכרון לבעל המכתב מאליהו (קובץ מאגרותיו ומכתביו אחד מתלמידיו, ר’ אהרן וסטהיים) ששאל רבינו, וז”ל: זבחים (צ, א) חטאת קודמת לעולה אפי’ להקדישה, ומ”ט בפ’ תזריע עולה ואח”כ חטאת אמר רבא ההיא למקראה, עי’ רש”י, ותוס’ הקשו עליו, וברש”י בחומש תזריע שם (פי”ב פ”ח) פירש כשיטתיה. והדברים תמוהים וכי מה הענין בזה לקרוא לעולה קודם בס”ת. [ור’ אהרן הציע התשובה שם, וז”ל] והנה מה שהעיר מעכ”ת בשאלה ב’ דעולה קודמת לחטאת למקראה (זבחים צ, א), אפשר לומר שאין אדם מסתפק במטרה שלילית בלבד וצריך תמיד גם מטרה חיובית, ואם לא יהי’ לו מטרה חיובית לשאוף אליה לא יתחזק להתחיל אפי’ בתשובה, משו”ה צריך להקדים קבלת העשה טוב לסור מרע, והיינו עולה קודמת לחטאת למקראה כתוס’ דהקדש היינו נדר־קבלה. [וכן כתב הרש”ר הירש חמשה חומשי תורה [על ויקרא י״ב:ו׳] וז”ל: וכן יונה או תר לחטאת. לנדר הבא לידי ביטוי בעולה, קדמה חטאת העוף; שכן כל אימת שקרבות גם עולה וגם חטאת, החטאת קרבה ראשונה. לפני שאדם מקדיש את מעשיו לה’, עליו לטהר עצמו תחילה מרשלנות ומחולשה מוסרית. עליו לרחוץ בניקיון כפיו, ורק לאחר מכן יהיו מעשיו רצויים. קודם “סור מרע” – ואחר כך “עשה טוב”. אך “עשה טוב” הוא המטרה, ומשום כך מזכיר כאן הכתוב את העולה תחילה, כלשון הגמרא: “למקראה הקדימה הכתוב” (זבחים צ.). ובייחוד כאן, צריך להזכיר את העולה תחילה (לדעת ה”ר חיים בתוספות שם, יש אף להקדיש את העולה תחילה); שכן התקדמות ועלייה אל רום תפקידו של אדם בחיים בהכרה ובמעשה – היא הניגוד הגמור, על צד החיוב, לכניעה פאסיבית לכוחות הכפייה הפיזיים של הטבע]

^[ii] וּבִקַּשְׁתֶּם מִשָּׁם אֶת ה’ אֱלֹהֶיךָ וּמָצָאתָ כִּי תִדְרְשֶׁנּוּ בְּכׇל לְבָבְךָ וּבְכׇל נַפְשֶׁךָ