Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe Podcast Collection

You're listening to Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe of TORCH in Houston, Texas. This is the Thinking Talmudist podcast.

Good afternoon, everybody. Welcome back to the Thinking Talmudist. Today, we're going to continue the Talmud in Gittin, 57a, where we started a few weeks ago. And we are going to... the Gemara now continues with a third incident, how reckless action led to disaster. Now, in general, when we think of reckless action, you know, you think of road rage, you think of things that people do that can have worse...
worse results than you would anticipate it. You don't expect it to be that bad. It gets... and sometimes it can really get out of whack really, really fast. And here we'll see a terrible story that happened and it's important to see the story as a whole. We'll discuss it in general and why people may have reacted in the way they reacted is an important conversation to have. So, Ashakon derispak kharev beitar. As a result of this incident involving the side of a carriage,
Beitar, the city of Beitar, was destroyed. Dehavu nihige. In Beitar, there was a custom. Ki hava mesyaled yinuka, when a boy was born, a baby boy was born, shotle arza, they would plant a cedar tree. Yinukta shotle ternisa. When a baby girl was born, they would plant a pine tree. V'hi havi minasve. And when the boy and girl would get married, kaitse l'huva avdi ginana, the people would cut down their trees and make a wedding canopy out of the wood.
So, it was a very special custom that people would do. They would plant a tree, a certain tree for a boy, a cedar tree for a boy, a pine tree for the girl, and then they would cut them when they got married and then they would make the canopy out of their wood. And it was a very, very special custom that was in the city of Beitar. Yom achad hava kolfa barte dekesar. One day, the Caesar's daughter was passing by, itbar shako de rispak.
When the side of her carriage broke, kotsu arzava ayelula. Her attendants cut down a cedar tree that had been planted for one of the boys in the town and put it on the side of the broken panel. To hold together her carriage. Asu nafo alayhu mikhunhu. They, the Jewish people, attacked them and beat them. Asu amru leila kesar. The Romans went and reported to Kesar, to the Caesar, mardu bach yehudai. The Jews have rebelled against you.
Asu alayhu. The Caesar came upon the Jews of Beitar in battle and we know there was a terrible destruction. The Gemara is going to explain it in a minute, but it's a very interesting thing. Why did they, why did they care? So they knocked down a cedar tree. They took a cedar tree. What's the big deal? They needed to fix the carriage. So they took it down, they took it down. So the halacha says something very interesting.
We saw this on halacha at least twice already in our Everyday Judaism podcast, where people get very superstitious. You know, the halacha says a very interesting thing. People would bring a candle to the synagogue on the yahrzeit of someone who passed away. So a father, a mother who had passed away, a sibling who had passed away, a grandparent who had passed away. They would bring a candle to the synagogue, the grandchild or the child, and that candle would be a ner neshama, a candle for the soul of
the one who was deceased. It would be a memory for them, and they would light the candle. So the halacha says very interestingly that one should not light the candle themselves. Give it to the gabai, to the manager of the shul, and he'll put out all the candles and and light them. Why, the halacha says? Why? Because if you light your candle, what happens if one of the candles go out?
People get very superstitious. They're like, oh, oh, this must be something terrible. This must be something really not good happening with that soul, and people get very worried. Like this, you give it to the gabai. The gabai mixes up all the candles. You don't know which candle is which. You don't know which one is yours, which one's the other person. And if one of them get extinguished, okay, it's not a big deal. But we see the halacha goes out of its way to mention,
don't light it yourself, because we don't want you getting all hee-gee-bee-gee about your candle and all about, you know, you're gonna get all worried about, you know, why is this happening to me? I think it's a very important thing. Here, they would plant the tree. So sort of like, imagine this child goes now to the field, and his father says, you know, we planted this when you were born, and
the girl, we planted this for you when you were born. And now this is sort of, they become connected with this tree. The first tree huggers, maybe? No, but they would feel some type of connection with this, and then possibly they would feel superstitious powers, like, oh, when I get married, this tree is gonna be, and now they took this tree, like, what are you doing to her? This is my tree. You're killing me. Does that mean that my life will end early? Does this mean, right?
People get very, very worried about it, which is why they probably attacked, saying, what are you doing to my tree? This represents me. Now, there's a very interesting custom that used to be the custom of many people, that they would take, when someone passed away, they would take their table, which was made out of wood, and they would make their casket out of the wood from their table. Why? Because it would be sort of a testimony to all of the mitzvahs they did on that table.
They invited people to their home. They hosted Shabbos dinners. They had people, right? That would be a testament to the person, and sort of, that's their wrapping, that's their casket, with which they're buried. It was a very special, powerful thing. Now, if you were to take someone's table and just run out of their house, they'll be like, yeah, you're taking like... It's okay, guys. It's a very important thing for a person to know that it's not worth losing your composure about certain things.
Even though, in some ways, we are superstitious, in some ways, we're not. We see that there's some areas where we say, this has meaning, this has certain powers, but it doesn't... Okay, we don't do the knock on wood, because that's for the cross. That's the wood of the cross. That's why Jews don't do the knock on wood. Yeah, even though today it's become a thing that everyone does the knock on wood, but we have a different thing. We just say, b'li ayin hara, without an evil eye,
which is essentially what it is that we're doing. We're saying without an evil eye. But even though, by the way, the Talmud says that it's not so simple that the evil eye even applies to Jews. The Talmud says that ayin mazal yisrol, they're not limited to the mazal, to the zodiac, you know, powers. But then we see that the Talmud does delineate a lot. So we have to understand it and get into it a little bit more in depth.
So now the Gemara describes the destruction of Beit Har. Goda bichori af kol keren yisrol. Scripture states that God cut down in fierce anger, all the dignity of Israel. Rabbi Zehra said in the name of Rabbi Vohu, who said in the name of Rabbi Yochanan, There were 80,000 division leaders who entered the city of Beit Har when it was captured. And they slaughtered men, women and children. Until their blood flowed all the way into the Great Sea, the Mediterranean Sea.
Shema toma krov ha-yesa, and lest you say that Beit Har was very close to the sea. Rechok ha-yesa mil, it was a mill. A mill is 2,000 amos, which is about 3,000 to 4,000 feet away from the sea. Tanya, it was toward Nabraisa, Rabbi Eliezer ha-gadol omer, Rabbi Eliezer the Great says, Shnei necholam yesh be-bikas yadayim. There are two rivers in the Valley of Yadayim. Echod moshech eiloch, ve-echod moshech eiloch. One river flows one way and the other flows the another way.
V'shi aruch ha-chomem, the sages estimated shnei chalok emayim ve-echod dam. That these rivers comprise two parts water and one part blood of the Jews. From Beit Har. It says that the streets were streaming with blood of the Jewish people. A third of the water in these rivers was the blood of the Jews of Beit Har. We know that in our Birkat HaMazon, in our grace after meals, we have four blessings. So we have the blessing of
Hazanet Hakol, which is the first blessing which was composed by Moses when the Jewish people received the manna. When they receive the money is like we have to give thanks, we have to give thanks for this. So that was composed by Moses. The second one was composed by Joshua. The third was composed by David and King Salmon. And the fourth blessing was composed after the destruction of Beit Har. The essence of this blessing is the phrase
Ha-tov Ha-hametiv, who is good and who does good. The court of Rebbeinam Leal, the elder in Yavne, composed it in gratitude to God for preserving the bodies of the victims of the Roman massacre at Beit Har and for eventually allowing them to be buried. So even though they were murdered and their blood was streaming down into the Mediterranean, their bodies stayed preserved years later and they were all able to get burial, proper Jewish burial. We say Ha-tov Ha-hametiv,
it says that just like the Talmud teaches us, that just like we thank God for the good, we have to thank God for the bad. Which is why when someone passes away, what do people say? They say Baruch Dayan Ha-emet. Right? Blessed is the true and just judge. It's a very sad time, but we have to remember God is in control and he knows what he's doing. The Talmud also says that if someone
makes a great fortune, they have to say a blessing thanking Hashem. Someone loses a great fortune, they also have to. That means you have to recite the blessing to God and thank God for the good and the bad. All right, it's an important, an important responsibility. B'masnis ha-tanah, le-tanah tot na-brai-so, she-va shonim batzru ov de-kochovim es-karmei-hem mi-domon shel Yisroel b'lo zevon. For seven years idolaters harvested their vineyards whose soil had been fertilized with Jewish blood without requiring any other fertilizer. It's jarring
to think that, you know, that's what their soil was composed of. Of Jewish blood. I remember when I went to Europe, and I don't like going to Europe for many reasons, not only because of the EU, but I was in Poland and I was in Germany. I was in many of these places and I felt like I was, wherever I was going, I was stepping on Jewish blood. Like every street corner is where Jews were murdered or massacred. Wherever you go, it's a
it's a little bit of a shocking experience to like think about how many Jews stood right where I'm standing at this square and were murdered. Right here. You know, you go in Poland, you have to go to Krakow, they have a whole square where 400,000 Jews were murdered on one day. One square. They made this nice memorial where you have a few benches, a few empty chairs in the middle of like this open, what does that do? It doesn't do anything. But just like the amount of
tragedy that we see and experience when we go to these places, I think it's important for every Jew to go to see where we come from, to see where our ancestors are from, to see and try to visualize what they experienced. You go into the one of the barracks in Auschwitz in Birkenau, just go in there and try to lie down in one of those planks that they had 20 people lying there without a blanket.
I was there in March. It was so cold. Oh my goodness. And I'm from Houston, so I'm extremely sensitive to cold. If it's like below 60 degrees, it's winter, right? You know, so it's like it was so frigid cold. Like you imagine they didn't have heat. They didn't have clothes. They didn't have anything to keep them warm. And they're being abused daily and they're being, if they were able to stay alive, don't forget millions. It's shocking. Anybody know how many concentration camps there were? Anybody know?
You can look it up. Look it up on Wikipedia. There were 44,000 concentration camps. Look it up on Wikipedia. Look it up on Wikipedia. 44,000 across Europe. But it's like it's unreal. I mean, everywhere we went when I was there, it was about six or seven years ago when I went to Poland. And it's like every time the bus stopped, it was another this. Oh, over here, 180 children were murdered in one day. Over here you have, you know, it's like 3000 people.
The whole community was wiped out in a day. Over here, 500 people in this community, done, out. It's like it's not to be believed, the tragedy that we've experienced. So between ghettos, concentration camps, murder camps, they were all not exactly. Look, my grandmother was in the Kovne ghetto. Was it considered a death camp? No. But they killed people. The ninth, fourth. I have the book. I brought the book here. I brought the book right over there on that shelf. You see? Here you go.
So for those of you online, this is the book my grandmother wrote. She wrote this book. You see Rivka Wolby? She wrote this book when she heard that there were people denying the Holocaust. She sat there and she never talked about it. My father grew up with a Holocaust survivor mother, and she never talked about it. She never talked about it. She never wanted to traumatize the kids. As soon as she heard that people were denying the Holocaust, she sat down and wrote the book.
And my grandfather, of blessed memory, wrote the foreword for it. So it's really, really an amazing. I decided to bring, I have two copies at home. I decided to bring one to the center so whoever wants to read it here can read it and enjoy it. Faith in the Night by Rivka Wolby, of blessed memory. All right, so let's continue the Talmud now. The Gemara describes the carnage that was wrought by Babylonian forces during the period of the destruction of the first temple.
Rabbi Chia Bar-Ovin said in the name of Rabbi Yishua Ben Korcho, One elderly resident of Jerusalem told me, In this valley, Nuvuz Radan, the chief Babylonian executioner, slaughtered 211 myriads, which is 2,110,000 people. Right over here. And in Jerusalem, he slaughtered 91 myriads, which is 940,000 people on one stone. Until their blood flowed and touched the blood of Zachariah that lay seething on the temple floor. This served to fulfill that which is stated, Blood touched blood.
The blood of Zachariah, the prophet, and the blood of the people of Jerusalem. The Gemara elaborates. When Nuvuz Radan found Zachariah's blood boiling and bubbling on the temple floor, he asked the priests, the Kohanim, what's going on here? Amar-ley, they said to him, It is blood of sacrifices that you spilled. Nuvuz Radan brought the bloods of various animals to compare them with the blood boiling on the ground, but they did not resemble it. They weren't similar. Amar-lehu, Nuvuz Radan said to them,
If you tell me whose blood this is, fine. If not, if you don't tell me. I will tear your flesh with iron combs. Amar-leh, the priest said to him, What can we tell you? Neviyo havabon dehavia kamo chachlon b'mili d'shmayah. There was a prophet that we had among us who would rebuke us in divine matters. We rose up against him and we murdered him. V'ho kamo sh'nin d'lo konayich dameh. And it is now many years and his blood still has not rested.
Amar-leh, Nuvuz Radan said to them, I will appease him. He brought the judges of the great Sanhedrin and the minor Sanhedrin. And he slew them over Zacharias' blood. And it still did not rest. It was still bubbling. He brought the youths, the young boys and girls, and he slew them over Zacharias' blood. And it still did not rest. He took the schoolchildren, the little babies, and he murdered them over Zacharias' blood. And still it did not rest. Amar-leh, Nuvuz Radan exclaimed to the blood,
Do you want me to exterminate them all? When Nuvuz Radan said this, the blood rested and it stopped. It stopped bubbling. At that moment, thoughts of repentance entered his mind. Amar-leh, he reasoned. If the punishment for killing one soul, Zacharias, is so severe, then the man, he himself, Nuvuz Radan, who killed all of these people, how much more so is he deserving of severe punishments? He ran away. He went and sent a document of instruction to his household detailing what was to be done
with his property, V'yigayer, and he converted to Judaism. So, having mentioned that Nuvuz Radan converted to Judaism, the Gemara cites a bracer that enumerates other enemies of Israel who became associated with Judaism. Netanah taught in a bracer, Naaman was a resident convert. Nuvuz Radan was a righteous convert. What's the difference between the two? Naaman, a chief general of Aram, was cured of Tsaras by the prophet Elisha. He thereupon vowed to refrain from idolatry, but he did not accept upon himself any of the other mitzvahs.
The Gemara of Odeh Zarah cites three different Tanaic views on the definition of ger toshav, resident convert. Number one, a Gentile who accepted upon himself to refrain from idolatry, a Gentile who accepted upon himself to observe the seven Noahide laws, and a Gentile who has accepted upon himself to observe all of the Torah's commands except for the prohibitions against eating meat of an animal that was slaughtered in a manner prescribed by halacha. They're willing to accept everything, but not everything.
But not that one law or not that one area of halacha. That's considered a ger toshav. Such an individual is called a resident convert because he is permitted to dwell together with the Jews in the land of Israel. A full convert, which is a ger tzedek, is someone who accepts everything, accepts. And we've had, interesting, so most of the converts that we are familiar with are converts that are ger tzedek. A ger tzedek is someone who accepts everything, lock, stock and barrel.
Now, I know people, we've had, we spoke about this actually recently in one of our classes. I think this was also on the Everyday Judaism podcast in the Ask Away segment last week. There are many people here in Houston who have, following the teachings of Rambam, Maimonides, have non-Jews who have said, we are disavowing idolatry and we're accepting the seven Noachide laws. And according to the Rambam, it needs to be done in front of a bezdin, of which I was a
member of. And they have to stand and in public announce their commitment to the seven Noachide laws and have to publicly denounce all idolatry. And they did that. It was a group of about 20 people and they did that. It was really, really, really special. And many of those people come to the Torch Center to learn Torah. And that's a very beautiful thing that there are people today who say, you know what? We weren't born Jewish. We're not going to be Jewish, perhaps.
But we're taking a step in becoming part of God's people, so to speak, by observing the seven Noachide laws. Yes. Right, very good. What was he saying? He says the idea, what he's saying is that I've killed these people, destroying. What does it mean to kill a soul? You're killing the potential of their further growth, their further connection. That means you're cutting it off and it can't be advanced any further. Death. What are we afraid of death about? What's really going on?
Why is one afraid of death? Really, it's because all opportunity is over. We have no more opportunity. We can't do anything once we're dead. So this it's like if if I give charity, I can't do it anymore once I'm dead. If I can learn Torah, I can't do it once I'm dead. If I if I want to do an act of kindness, I can't do it once I'm dead. So that's the idea of the terminology that's used here in the Talmud, that he murdered their soul.
The idea is that he ended their ability in their service in an advancement of God's commands. It's a later point where we'll have and we will experience the resurrection. And yeah, we're going to talk about this. I want to dedicate a few weeks, God willing. We're going to talk about cremation and burial. If anyone has plans to get cremated, don't don't do it to your soul. Don't do it. It's not good. It's a terrible thing. The Torah talks about it. We're not to cremate only burial.
We have a couple of books about it here as well. Dealing with it. It's reconsider it. Change your plans. Oh, so there's another thing here that he says over here that he had a moment of repentance. A hearer true of our sages tell us that God, anyone ever having a you go to an inspiring lecture. You go, you hear a you watch one of these videos and you're like, I really I feel so terrible. I have to change that bad habit.
Or I regret that I did this or that with my child, or I regret that I acted in such a way. You have that moment of inspiration, even if nothing really changes. Our sages say that moment of chuva, that moment, the thought of chuva already counts like chuva. The Almighty loves that closeness, that connection, that inspiration, that epiphany that we have so much that it's considered a chuva. And there was a great rabbi who was in Israel. Very, very powerful lectures that he would give.
And I would listen to many, many of them. And he would every time he would get into fights with the Israeli government because they didn't like that he was giving over Torah ideas publicly and very, very powerfully. And people were becoming inspired all over the country. And every time they would put out some type of negative article, you'd say, OK, I'm giving out another 100,000 cassettes. And at street corners all around Israel, they would give out these cassettes. I've said some of the stories.
One time he gets one of his assistants come up to his office and they're like, someone's downstairs needs to speak to you. He's like, what's going on? This guy was a car thief and he stole a car the night before. And in the car cassette deck was a lecture from this rabbi. And he was so taken by it. He said, I have to do to chuva, I have to repent. But he didn't know where he stole the car from.
So he went, he took out the cassette and saw the address of the organization. He brought it. He brought the car keys to the rabbi. He says, rabbi, just figure out how to get this back to the owner. But I don't want to I don't want to steal anymore. And I'm returning what I stole. So but very, very, very powerful lectures. And so someone once asked him, he said, why are you doing all this? Like how many what's the percentage of people that are actually transforming their
lives? What's the number of people like you're putting so much investment, so much time, so much money, so much effort? He says, my goal is not to get people to convert to my way of living or to completely transform their lives. So I want every Jew to have an opportunity for a moment of chuva, a moment of repentance, that transformation of that one moment gives them all of my bow, gives them the world to come. It's such a powerful thing to have that one moment of inspiration.
OK, so so now Amman was a chief general and he was a resident convert. OK, Nivuz Radan was a righteous convert, right, a full convert as opposed to a resident convert. Mibnei Banav Shel Haman Limdo Toreb Ibn Ebrak. He was one of the descendants of Haman. And he ended up teaching Torah in Bnei Ebrak. Mibnei Banav Shel Sisra Limdo Tinokos B'Yerushalayim. One of the descendants of Sisra taught children in Jerusalem. Mibnei Banav Shel San'harev Limdo Toreb Ibn Ebrabim.
And one of the descendants of San'harev, he was the king of Assyria. He attacked Judah and attempted to conquer Jerusalem. He ended up becoming a teacher, a public teacher of Torah in Jerusalem. The Gemara identifies these descendants of San'harev, man inun, who are they? Shmai of Avtalyan. Shmai and Avtalyan were the descendants of San'harev. And the Gemara now concludes its discussion about Zechariah's blood, Haynu Dechsev. And this is what was referred to when it was written, Nosati ezdomo al tzachich, tzachiyach, selah li'biltihi kasos.
And God placed her blood on a smooth surface of rock so that it will not be covered. It will not be absorbed into the ground. And that was referring to the blood of Zechariah. All right. OK, so now we're going to do one more little piece here on 57B in Tractate Gittin. The scripture relates that when Jacob, the progenitor of Israel, he was later called Israel as well, disguised himself as Esau, the progenitor of Rome. His father, Isaac, exclaimed, the voice is the voice of Jacob.
But the hands are the hands of Esau, of Esau. The Gemara interprets this verse phrase by phrase as a prophecy of Israel's fall at the hand of Rome. So we see all of these terrible things that happened. Why? The Gemara says, the scripture states, the voice is the voice of Jacob. But the hands are the hands of Esau, the voice. This is referring to the crying of the Jews at the massacre inflicted by Hadrian Caesar. Shaharag b'Aleksandria shel Mitzrayim, shishim ribo al shishim ribo,
who slaughtered in Alexandria of Egypt 60 myriads, which is 600,000 people, plus another 60 myriad, another 600,000 people. Kiflayim kiotzim Mitzrayim, which is together twice the number of those who departed, who left from Egypt, kol Yaakov ze aspasyonus Kesar. The voice of Jacob, this is a reference to the crying of the Jews of the massacre inflicted by Vespasian Caesar, shaharag b'krach betar arba meos ribo, who slaughtered in the city of Betar 4 million people. Ve'amru la arbas alofim ribo.
And some say that it was 40 million Jews. Ve'ayodayim yidei Esav, zo malchus arisha. And when it says the hands are the hands of Esau, this is referring to the evil government of Rome. She'eheriva esb'osenu, ve'sorfa se'cholenu, ve'higlisanu me'artzenu, which destroyed our temple, burned down our sanctuary and exiled us from the land. The Gemara presents a different interpretation of this verse. Dover acher, hakol kol Yaakov. The voice is the voice of Jacob that teaches us. Ein lechotvilo shemo'elas she'ein ba mizara shol Yaakov.
There is no successful prayer in which a descent of Jacob is not a participant. Ve'ayodayim yidei Esav. But the hands are the hands of Esav. Ein lechotvilo shemo'elas she'ein ba mizara shol Esav. There is no victorious military campaign in which a descendant of Esav is not a participant. Meaning there are certain powers that were given down to the world. And if you want the power of prayer, you need to have a descendant of Jacob. And if you want to have the power of war,
you need to have part of it, a descendant of Esav. And we know we've had many converts who came from Rome, who became part of the Jewish people. And he had, sadly, many Jews who've gone to other religions. Right. We know some Jewish guy who talked about the knock on wood before, right? So that's a that's a nice Jewish fellow. So the power, the power of prayer goes through the channel of Jacob and the power of war goes through the power of Esav.
OK, so now we are just finishing up the piece of Talmud that we started early about Bar Kamtza. As related above, the slanderous talk of Bar Kamtza led to the destruction of the temple. The Gemara notes that this tragic episode exemplifies the following teaching. Ve'hayinu da'amir evelazer. And this episode is that which Evelazer taught. Be'shot l'shon te'chabe. The verse says when the tongue is shot, you should hide, which means be'charchurei lo'shon te'chabe. From the contentions of the tongue, meaning slander, you should hide.
A person should be very, very careful. We all must be very, very careful to utilize every measure of caution. When it comes to the words that we speak. In our Jewish inspiration podcast, we're right now in the middle of talking about silence and silence. Part of silence is not speaking lashon hara, not speaking negative talk about another person. You know what? You have an opportunity to say a jab about somebody. Stay silent. Soft words have a much greater impact.
Pleasant words have a much greater impact. And this, by the way, is also for our children, for raising our children. There are parents who don't let their kids breathe because they're pounding them with criticism and they're pounding them with insults. They're pounding them. I've seen it. They're pounding them with lack of trust. A little bit of a gentle word goes a lot further. A loving embrace, a loving gesture that a parent gives to a child goes so much
further than the difficult, harsh words that could potentially be used. And by the way, this is in every relationship, in a marriage as well. It goes with friends and community. It goes so much further, it's so much more impactful when we use kind and gentle words, definitely to stay away from lashon hara. Either way, this all comes down from the Talmud that we originally started about the destruction of the temple, that if we are careful and we ensure
that we don't let someone be embarrassed in public and we don't let someone speak lashon hara, speak slanderously about another person, we have to take that responsibility. Someone comes over to you and says, hey, I want to tell you something about someone. So you know that guy? I don't want to hear. God should bless us all that we should merit to the rebuilding of our temple speedily in our days. Amen. Have a great Shabbos, everybody. OK, the Torah says that the Jewish people
were punished because they spoke slanderously. We spoke about slander today, right? They spoke slanderously about the land of Israel. When they sent in the spies, the 12 spies, to go see what's going on in the land of Israel, 10 of them came back with a negative report. The Torah tells us you're not allowed to speak negatively about the land of Israel. It's so holy, it's so special. It's God's favorite place on planet Earth. You can't speak even to complain about the weather.
It's considered speaking slander about the land, so imagine this, you have the privilege and also it only rains in Israel. OK, so if we look back in Deuteronomy, the Torah says it's an amazing thing. The Jewish people, Moshe is recapping everything that the Jewish people experienced and you left the land of Egypt and you went to the land of Israel. In the description of the land of Egypt, it talks about the overflowing Nile,
which was a steady thing that happened every single year, I believe twice a year. So imagine you had a guaranteed income living in Egypt because you'd plant your vineyard and every year you got enough water for it. Guaranteed. What's the land of Israel? The land of Israel is mountainous, it has valleys, it has ups and downs. That's the description of the land of Israel. What does that mean? That means there's no guarantee of water.
There's no guarantee of rain because on this mountain it could rain and it serves that little area, it's not the next mountain, it's not getting the same rain unless it has the blessing of God. That means that in order to live in the land of Israel, you have to be willing to live by the hand of Hashem. You have to be willing to say I'm not ready for a guarantee. It's like the people who work and have their own business versus the people who work for someone else.
When I work for someone else, I don't have to think about it. I just do my job and I know I get paid every month. Guaranteed income. But when you work for yourself, you have unbelievable potential to grow. And you're relying on Hashem 100 percent because I have no idea where my next customer is coming from. I have no idea where my next client is coming from. I have so many people who run their own businesses and I ask them,
this is my favorite question to ask them. Do you know where your next customer is coming from? No, I have no idea. So you come in every day, I have no idea. I come into the office and on my computer is waiting for the next day's orders. How? No idea. No idea. That's living in the hand of Hashem. That's the land of Israel. If you look at all of the land of Israel, that's exactly the way it operates. It doesn't make any sense.
I just watched yesterday, I watched only part of it. But this guy, this Chinese guy is standing up and he says over there, he says in the next 50 years, the only country that will dominate is Israel. Dominating the entire world. And he gives reasons. He says they're the most advanced in agriculture. They're the most advanced in technology. They're the most advanced in A.I. They're the most advanced militarily and they're producing babies, meaning they have more than two child, two children being born per mother.
Which in the United States, we're not even replenishing our own selves. He says, you look at all of the rest of the world, they're not, no one is where they're where they're holding. Israel is a very wealthy country, contrary to public belief. Right. So this is to me a very shocking thing. I don't understand why Israel has so much. Internally, there's a lot of challenges and I don't understand why. I mean, they have this Leviathan oil find,
which was a company here in Houston that found it right off of the coast of Haifa. A lot of what are leaving? Secular Israelis are leaving. A lot of secular Israelis, but they're right. But they're coming back after being in the United States. Most of them are coming back religious because it's very easy when you have a when you're living inside that bubble. So you say, OK, I'm not I'm not engaged in my Judaism. As soon as they leave.
And now they're like, I'm just among the nations. I have to connect with my Jewish heritage to have something. And then they find the nice Jewish Israeli girl to get married to. And then they're like, we have to. I had a student in my class with the earrings, with the ponytail, the whole Israeli look, you know, the whole thing. This guy was part of one of the elite units in the IDF. He says to me, I started keeping Shabbos on the 8th of October.
On the 8th of October, his wife turned to him and said, we're starting to keep Shabbos. So what do you mean? We're not religious. He said, well, now we are. That was it. It flipped the switch with the difference. And this is an amazing thing. The difference of Israeli culture versus American culture is that even let's say that guy with the ponytail and the earrings, OK, even though he may not observe Shabbos, he knows what Shabbos is. He knows what Kiddush is.
He knows what Havdalah is. He knows what prayer and synagogue is. He may not choose to do it, but he knows what it is. Versus the secular American Jews, they don't even know what that is. And that's that's something that we have to change. Hopefully make headway with that. All right. Oh, so just about the wine. So I was thinking if I drink Israeli wine that has the soil of Eretz Yisrael, of the land of Israel,
it has the rain that's the blessing that Hashem gave on that specific location. And that's the grapes that I'm drinking. Those that wine I said, this is holy from from up and down, from top and bottom, it's holy. I want I want to have part in that. That's so I to me, that's it's a big, a big, a very important thing for me is like wine, I tell my wife, don't buy any of the other wines. I'm sure they're terrific.
And I like you can find some really great kosher wines from Napa Valley. They're really incredible and really expensive wines. You have this Chalk Hill, which is like unbelievable. One of the best wines I've ever. But you know what doesn't match Israel. I'm such a Zionist, it's crazy, right? No obligation. No, no, no. I don't want to. That's my own Mishagas. It's my own Mishagas. Have a great Shabbos, everybody.

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