Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe Podcast Collection

00:13 - Intro (Announcement)
You're listening to Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe of Torch in Houston, Texas. This is the Ask Away series on the Everyday Judaism podcast. To have your questions answered on future episodes, please email askaway at torchweborg. Now ask away.

00:23 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Good afternoon everybody. Welcome back to Ask Away number 20 from the Everyday Judaism podcast. It is so awesome. We've gotten outstanding reviews for all of your questions, not my answers. It's your questions that everybody's loving and thank you so much for sharing them so that we can continue to learn and grow. I think one of the most important aspects of Jewish learning is not just listening, but asking, asking questions and not taking everything just. Oh, the rabbi said it has to be no, no, no, no, no. We want sources, we want to expand our knowledge and I welcome your questions Without any further ado, marilyn, please.

01:03 - Marylin R. (Caller)
Anti-Semitism is rampant. We are living in hostility and hatred. According to Central Synagogue, rabbis did a study. A study was done among college students 50% are denying their identity. What does it mean to be a public Jew?

01:27 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Okay, very, very important question. So the first thing I want to say about this is that I don't believe all studies, but this study, I happen to think, is underestimating the numbers of how many people are denying their Judaism. Why they're denying it? Because there's antisemitism. They don't want to be looked at in a negative light. It's the exact opposite of how we get rid of antisemitism. You see, the Torah tells us the nations of the world have no power over us. When we are close to Hashem, when we distance ourselves from Hashem, that's when the nations have power. When we are close to Hashem, the nations of the world have no power. So, yes, if we are able to muster up the strength, the fortitude, the passion for our Judaism, it's only going to distance the nations of the world from their hatred. The nations of the world are a tool of the Almighty. The nations of the world are a tool of the Almighty to bring the Jewish people back. The hatred creates isolation. That isolation will get the Jews to say one second, why am I running away from my Judaism? I should be embracing my Judaism, and that's what we need.

02:51
If we see, look through the words of our prophets, you look through Isaiah, the book of Isaiah, you'll see time and again the Jewish people. They got comfortable. They started saying you know what, let's just assimilate. You know what, let's just intermarry. You know what? Let's let's just be friends, and everything. And what happened? The nations beat us up. Worse, when the Jewish people followed the word of Hashem, the nations were at peace with us. As soon as we started to veer out, boom, they started slapping us, they started beating us. We had a holocaust, we had pogroms, we had expulsions, you name it. That only happened when we turned away from Hashem. And it's scary because if you look in the Torah, in the portion of Nitzavim and Vayelech, there's a very hidden secret that I'll share with you here, and that is that, according to the Gaon of Vilna, the verses of the Torah, if you count them from the beginning and you go all the way to the year that we're in today, year 5,786. Very good, we just started a new year because it's Rosh Hashanah. Rosh Hashanah was just last week. So we have, if you count, you'll be able to see what is the prophecy in the Torah with the 5,786th verse of the Torah.

04:18
But if you go back to the Holocaust, it's frightening to see the verses that discuss the Holocaust, the years of 1939, 1940, 1941, 42, it's. It's frightening. Anybody ever heard of the God syndrome where the Jewish people were walking around in the ghettos saying where's God? God doesn't see the suffering. Listen to this verse and tell me. This is the verse that equals up to that year that the Jewish people, my grandparents, were in Auschwitz. I'll give you even one verse behind. So if it's a year earlier or a year later, fleer will my anger bow against it on that day and I will abandon them and I will hide my face from them and they will become prey and beset them will be many evils and troubles. And they will say on that day, and they will say on that day, is it not for the reason that my God is not in my midst that beset me? Have these evils? You understand it's frightening. It's frightening. That was the year of the Holocaust, years of the Holocaust, all of those verses. But I will certainly hide my face on that day because of all the evil that it did, for it had turned to the gods of others. We turned away from god, turned away from god. God says you turn away from me, I turn away from you, you turn towards god, god turns us now. This is very harsh. It's not pleasant. We don't like to hear this, but the Torah only says the truth. And to the fact that the Vilna Gaon tells us that you can calculate exactly the verse and the year, verse number 5,700, and whatever year it was, 80 years ago to the exact year of the Holocaust, is that verse? It's frightening, it doesn't? It's chapter 31 in Deuteronomy, verse number 17, 16, 17, 18. It's really tragic, it's terrifying. And then it says so now, and that's when they were liberated.

07:03
They go out and what happens? Write a Torah, meaning start anew. Start anew, you'll teach Torah, and that's the mission of the Jewish people reestablish the Torah and listen what happens a few years later. They enter into the land of Israel. Let's look at the next verse Ki avi enu el ha'adamah. Oh, let's look at the next verse Ki avi enu el ha-adama, for I shall bring them to the land that I swore to their forefathers, following flowing with milk and honey, and see how the prophecy works here. This is the Torah, this is our Torah, it's our book. The Torah tells us exactly what's going to happen. You understand this is.

07:43
The nations of the world are messengers of the almighty that when the jewish people don't do, when we don't do what we're supposed to do, hashem takes the nations of the world to slap us upside our head and it's not pleasant. We don't enjoy it, we don't like it and we think it's like oh, it's the nations of the world. No, we have to look in, not look out. Don't look out and don't point fingers. Oh, it's the, it's the british, it's the nations of the world. No, we have to look in, not look out. Don't look out and don't point fingers. Oh, it's the British and it's the Germans. And you're going to go around the whole world and it's going to be everyone. It's going to be the Spanish and it was the Russians and it was the Ukrainians.

08:15
You ever heard of Babi Yar? I'm sure you all are 150, I was at Babi Yar. 150,000 people murdered in a single day. 150,000 people murdered in one big mass grave. And you go to Poland and you go to Czechoslovakia and you go to Hungary and you go everywhere. Jews were massacred everywhere. There's no innocent nation out there.

08:40
We don't look at them with hatred, we look inside and say we have to do better, we have to do better, we have to do better. We're representatives of God, and if we decide that we want to be like the nations of the world, what are we doing? We're saying we're relinquishing our responsibilities. Hashem says no, that you don't have a privilege to do. You don't have that luxury of saying I'm not holding up my part of the deal. My part of the deal is I'm a representative of the Almighty. That's what it means to be a Jewish people. To be the chosen nation means that we choose the Almighty and, as such, our responsibility is to stand up, yes, to be proud of our Judaism and not to shy away from it and to say you know what?

09:28
I may not be kosher yet, but I'm going to do something. You know what? When I look for the next time I buy a can of corn, I'll look for a kosher symbol. I can buy the same exact corn with a kosher symbol. I'm looking for meat. Let me see if I can find one with a kosher label. I'm looking for meat. Let me see if I can find one with a kosher label. I'm looking for a bread. Let me find one which is it doesn't have to mean that my whole kitchen is going to be kosher. I'm going to take one small step, one, something small. I'm looking for yogurt. Let me find one with a kosher symbol. So it's the idea of let's take one small step in showing Hashem. We're not relinquishing that responsibility of being the chosen people. On the contrary, we're undertaking that mantle of responsibility and we're stepping into it, getting one step closer.

10:13
I hope I answered your question, marilyn. I mean, that's the way we need to think, but what is going to be done about it? What changes can be made? Yes, the change. I think the number one change. And you see this my grandfather dedicated an entire book to the generation of the Six-Day War, the Yom Kippur War, where you had so many people who were secular, committed, devoted secularists in Israel who changed their whole life around.

10:46
They said you know what we see? The miracles of Hashem. There must be a hand of Hashem. Let me see what Hashem is talking about. Let me learn His Torah. Let me and people started keeping Shabbos and people started keeping mitzvot and people started putting on tefillin every day and people started keeping kosher and people started growing in their relationship with Hashem. Hashem tells us everything in His Torah. Hashem lays it out for us. It's very, very clear, plain words, black on white. Hashem tells us exactly what we should do and what we shouldn't do, and that's what we really need to do is become more committed to the word of Hashem, and that's really the magic bullet that we have is the more we are devoted to Hashem and that's really the magic bullet that we have is the more we are devoted to Hashem, the less the nations of the world beat us up.

11:32 - Marylin R. (Caller)
Okay, it's 100% of the time I was going to say that we need the rabbis to inspire us.

11:41 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
That's what we're doing here at the Torch Center and that's why we dedicate so much effort to sharing all of our Torah classes on podcasts, on videos. We are on so many different platforms. I had someone reach out to me last night. He says I had no idea. You guys are on Blue Sky, you guys are on Parler, you guys are on Getter, you guys are on Facebook, you guys are on X Twitter, you guys are on YouTube, you guys are on Getter, you guys are on Facebook, you guys are on X Twitter, you guys are on YouTube, we're on Rumble. You name the platform liberal, conservative, it doesn't make a difference, I don't care. I'm on locals. Whatever platform allows us to share our Torah, we go there. I don't care if I don't get any views. I don't care if I get only one view. I want to be on every platform so that Almighty will never.

12:25
At the end of my life, after hopefully a long, beautiful life of 120 years, I come up to the heavenly tribunal. They're going to say Wolby, what did you do with your life? What did you do? You know what? What did you do? You know what? I'll say? I tried no-transcript. If one person watches a video and gets inspired. That's our responsibility is to reach out to as many people as possible. And if someone comes to me and says, whoa, why are you wasting your time? You only get one view there, I don't care, I really don't. I don't care. One view, it's one person, it's one world. Someone learns. I put them everywhere, everywhere. No, no, no, it's all done right here, from this desk, and that's why we have this. We invest in cameras and we invest in recording devices and microphones, and we do all of this so that we can share the world of Hashem, the Torah of Hashem, with the world. Thank you, thank you. I appreciate that so much. Our goal is for me to be inspired and, hopefully, every person that I'm in contact with to be inspired as well, and to share that and to use our agency to share it with whoever it is that we come in contact with. Let them be inspired, let them grow.

13:57
We're not here to you know, I don't try to sell a membership. I don't have a synagogue. I don't try to sell a membership. I don't have a synagogue. I don't try to sell a school. I don't have a school. I don't try to sell anything. I just want to share the word of Hashem. There's no agenda, there's no mission. There is a mission Connect Jews and Judaism. Connect Jews and Judaism. That's the mission of Torch, and I appreciate that all of you are here in person. On a beautiful Sunday morning, you can be out walking your dog, you can be rowboating and you can be watching the Texans right now, but you're here sitting and learning together and that's the most beautiful thing in the world. So I appreciate it and I'm deeply, deeply grateful that I have the privilege to learn with so many amazing people here. So thank you All right. Next question Very quickly.

14:45 - Jane A. (Caller)
I had an experience in Montclair, new Jersey, when I was living there, with some Italian painters in the building and they were complaining that there were some Jews there, but the Jews they knew were not proud to be weren't showing their Jewishness, were hiding, they were like trying to be like Waspy and it bothered them. We need you to be Jews, we need Jews to be Jews and we look up to you. You're supposed to. He didn't say it in those words, but basically they need us to be an example and we're not doing it. It throws them off.

15:21 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Right.

15:22
So I'll share with you an episode that I had. I was in Costco doing my regular shopping and this elderly man came over to me and he looks at me. He sees my yarmulke. It's obvious. I don't hide it. In fact, when I was younger, there were times that I was.

15:44
I wasn't sure whether I wanted people to see me with the yarmulkes. I said you know what? I'm going to get a bigger yarmulke now because I'm going to be proud of my Judaism. I'm not going to hide it, I'm not going to shy away. I got a bigger yarmulke. My wife is like you know, it's a little bit big. I'm like, yeah, that's the idea is that I don't want you to have any questions. Okay, I don't want you, and it's for myself to have that conviction and to have that pride. I'm not hiding from my Judaism, I'm not going to hide from my Judaism, okay.

16:14
So this man looks at me. He says you're Jewish. I said yeah. He says are those tzitzit? Are they the four-cornered garment that you wear? Yeah, the fringes, the mitzvah and the Torah. I said yes, this guy is clearly not Jewish and clearly not American. And he says to me can I touch the tzitzit? I said sure.

16:32
So he comes over and he holds the tzitzit and while he's holding it he says to me. He says do you realize your responsibility? Responsibility, you're the chosen people. We, the nations of the world, we look up to the Jewish people. You need to show us what it means to be God's chosen people. I thought it was like wow, what? And it's an amazing thing because some one of our listeners online showed me, sent me the verse in but one of the prophets. He writes that people from the nations of the world will grab the garment, the corner of the tzitzit of 10 Jewish men and, in their own language, say that we need to be responsible for the word of God. And I felt like, wow, if that's referring to me, if that's referring to me, it's a huge, huge privilege. But definitely it was a very powerful message that we have a responsibility. Our job as Jewish people is to represent the Almighty and that's a task that we cannot shy away from David.

17:44 - David Z. (Caller)
I should know the answer to this, because growing up my grandmother would come from Israel and stay with us and we would keep kosher while she stayed with us. But I don't remember this part. So really more the dairy meat yeah, so obviously in the house, six hours separated between that. But when you go to a grocery store and you're shopping, can you put both in the same cart and when you get home and separate them for your kitchen? Or are you not even allowed to have dairy and meat in the same cart when you're shopping? Because I don't know, I don't remember.

18:23 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Beautiful question, okay. So let me explain something. In the laws of milk and meat, we don't mix them in any cooking form. Okay, we cannot eat them together. You can't take cold chicken and cold cheese. And you can't drink your coffee together with your steak, right, if you have milk in it. I got rid of my milk in my coffee so I can have coffee all day and it's amazing, best thing ever You're getting rid of the milk in the coffee. So, no creamers, nothing, it's just pure black heaven. So I love it, okay. So now milk and meat cannot be mixed in.

19:00
Okay, the way they get transferred generally between to have a mixture of them is with heat, right? So you cook a meat dish and you put cheese in there, that's an invalid mixture according to the Torah. And if you have your French onion soup and you have your cheese in there and you put a piece of meat in there, that's also a forbidden mixture. So any mixture of milk and meat. Now, when they are sealed and they are cold and they're in your wagon, no problem. When they're in your refrigerator, there's no problem. But we try to ensure that there doesn't become any type of mixture between them. That does not mean and many make this mistake that you need to have different refrigerators for meat and dairy. And it does not mean that you need to have separate rooms for meat and dairy. We don't mix between the two. Now there's another issue that, for example, for dishwashers which is a little bit more advanced, but dishwasher uses a lot of hot water, and if you put your dairy and you put your meat dishes in the same dishwasher, what's going to happen is the dairy is going to go on the meat, the meat is going to go on the dairy and now both of those dishes are going to become a mixture of milk and meat. And now you're going to take it out and use it for whatever food you're going to eat. There's going to be a mixture of milk and meat embedded into that plate. So you've got to be very careful about that. That's why we do have in my house we have separate dishwashers, we have separate sinks, we even have separate dishes, but we don't need to have separate refrigerators.

20:35
Leftovers, so you make sure you don't mix them. So you have them If you have leftovers no, you don't have separate, you don't need separate fridges. You no, you don't have separate, you don't need separate fridges. You don't need separate fridges. You just make sure that the food is not mixed together. So if you have a pan, a silver foil pan, with your leftovers or a Pyrex with your leftover chicken, and that's fine, you can have it in your refrigerator.

20:55
Just don't put your milk into it and don't mix the two. Seal it yourself, it's not a problem, it can be. Imagine it being in your wagon. You have your milk, that's fine. You buy fresh kosher meat, put it in your wagon, that's not a problem. For them to be in the same wagon, not a problem. What's the problem? The idea is they cannot be a mixture. They cannot be a mixture together, meaning that you take milk and take chicken or meat and put them together. Meaning that you take milk and take chicken or meat and put them together either in your cooking or in your eating or in any other way that they become a mixture. But being in the same world doesn't make the world treif right and being in the same refrigerator doesn't make your refrigerator or the food tray.

21:43
Now a person has to be careful that, for example, in Israel I don't know that they have this anymore, but at least when I was growing up in Israel, when I lived in Israel about 25, 30 years ago they had the milk was not in cartons, the milk was in plastic bags. Okay, remember those bags? Yeah, okay. So now it becomes complicated when you have those plastic bags and you put the bag in the little container in the fridge, because then when you take it out, milk can splatter because it's in a bag. The bag is open. So what are you going to do?

22:18
So it's funny because I had different opinions that I heard from rabbis. One it's funny because I had different opinions that I heard from rabbis. One said you should keep it in the door, that way it doesn't on the side. And one said do not keep it in the door because when you close the door, what's going to happen? It's going to splash.

22:33
So again, a person just has to be careful. I know people who. What they did was they take the corner of the bag. They would clip it closed so that way nothing would spill from it. But again, it's just taking common sense, making sure that there is no mixture. Now, if you had chicken, I don't want to confuse you, but if you have cold utensils that were not used within the last 24 hours, it wouldn't be considered a mixture. I'm not going to get into it, it's too much for now. But as a general concept to answer your question, it's not a problem having milk and meat in your wagon, in your basket, and just make sure not to cook them together, not to eat them together, and you're good to go. And it's still well.

23:15
Yes, Six hours Six hours between After six hours, after meat to milk, but between milk and meat, it's only, it's not to be six hours, it could be 30 minutes, right, right, milk, I mean. So if you have your cereal and then you want to have your steak, you can have. 30 minutes is fine, right, but from your steak to your, because the meat stays in your teeth for much longer than the milk. All right, that's an excellent question. Excellent question. I forgot, I don't remember what we did as a kid.

23:41 - Marc S. (Caller)
I love that question.

23:42 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Thank you, David. Thank you Next question.

23:45 - Marc S. (Caller)
So, rabbi, I was doing some research on Rabbi Shlomo Wolbe and he, from what I understand he, was an anti-Zionist.

24:00 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Where'd you get that from Wikipedia. It was from.

24:02 - Marc S. (Caller)
Wikipedia. Yeah, you know how much it was from Wikipedia.

24:03 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Yeah, you know how much you can trust Wikipedia, okay.

24:07 - Marc S. (Caller)
Exactly so. I was hoping that maybe you can clarify some of the viewpoints with regards to Zionism and anti-Zionism.

24:17 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Okay, so it's a great question and I'm glad that you asked that question. Okay, so here's the thing, my dear friends, is there anybody here who's a Zionist? Okay, for those of you who are not here, everybody's hand is raised. Okay, everybody in the entire room. My hand as well. Anybody here who's an anti-Zionist? By show of hands? Okay, let me explain to you what I'm talking about.

24:36
It's all definitions, okay, and it's important for us to know what this is. I'm not an anti-Zionist. I was born in Israel. My blood vessels pump blue and white. Those of you from New York, oh, I bleed pinstripes, right? No, no, so let me explain. Let me explain, okay, let's define what it means to be a Zionist Zionist to all of us here in the room and all of those watching online, that means to be a Zionist Zionist to all of us here in the room and all of those watching online, that means to be pro-our land, being the land, the land of Israel, being the homeland for the Jewish people, the land that was gifted to us by God, creator of heaven and earth, promise that was given to Abraham, to Isaac, to Jacob, to the tribes, to Moses, to Aaron, to David, to Solomon, our ancestors. He was given to us is our land right. So that's Zionism. That's what we believe. Zion is Jerusalem and we are Zionists in that we believe that this is our land. Now, what is modern day Zionism? I'm talking of the form of Herzl and Ben-Gurion, and it's a very different type of Zionism and that's the Zionism we are. Zionism, according to them, was that the Jewish people should have a homeland for Jewish culture, not for Torah, not for mitzvahs, not for observance, not for Jewish life Culture. Because there were Jews that were massacred in Spain and Jews that were massacred all around the world, like we've mentioned numerous times, whether it be expulsions, whether it be Holocaust and so on and so forth. And in the late 1800s, early 1900s, a few good men said you know what we have to create a land, and they didn't care if it was going to be, by the way, in Jerusalem, in the land of Israel, or if it was Uganda. Uganda was on the table, by the way, in Jerusalem, in the land of Israel, or if it was Uganda, uganda was on the table. Remember the Uganda plan, where they said we don't care where, as long as the Jewish people have a land, and that's great, but to have a land that is separated from Jewish values in the land of Israel is not our value Meaning.

26:51
When they brought the Jews from Yemen into Israel on a secret mission, they told everybody you can take off your kippahs. Two thousand years they were in exile there. Two thousand years they kept the Torah, they kept the mitzvahs, they were so adherent to every word, every word. They were very, very religious. When they were on their way to Israel, they told them you can take off your yarmulkes. They're like what are you talking about? They showed them a picture of Herzl. They're like who's that? He's not who's he. He doesn't have a kippah. They said well, he's our Moses, he's a modern day Moses, you don't need a kippah. And they took them, the Yemenite community and they put them into the kibbutz system. They separated the adults and the children and they fed them pork and they fed them food that's not kosher, to secularize them.

27:47
You're Jewish in culture.

27:49
You're not Jewish by any laws.

27:50
You're not Jewish by relationship with Hashem.

27:53
You're Jewish by culture.

27:54
Is that something you're comfortable with? I don't think so. I can see everybody's face like what, what? Yes, that's what the kibbutz movement did. That's what the Zionist movement did. They did not want religious life in Israel. They did not want Torah study in Israel. They did not want observance in Israel. So I ask you, are you a Zionist or not?

28:15
We're all Zionists and yes, in the terminology that we're familiar with, yeah, we're anti-BDS, we're anti all of the free Palestine, from the river to the sea. Our homeland, that's what it is. From the river to the sea. Our homeland, that's what it is. Homeland, that's what it is, from the river to the sea. Our homeland, that's what it is. It's not living a secular life.

28:36
Now, if someone chooses not to observe the Torah, that's their choice, and every person has free will and every person. But to create a land that is anti-Jewish in the name of Judaism, is that's that. We're all anti. So we, we're not. We're not.

28:52
You look it up. Look it up. You don't believe me. You look it up. You look at what their doctrine was. Their doctrine was not for it to be an observant land of Torah and mitzvahs. Look, it's sad that there are people who still make that choice, but that's their choice. But someone who wants to be observant in the land, they have the ability to do that, and that's the Zionism we're craving, that's the Zionism we love, and to have a picture of the prime minister of Israel wearing tefillin is the greatest glorification of God's name, because that's not the Zionism they wanted. That's the Zionism that we all believe in, that someone who wants to observe the Torah can observe the Torah in our homeland, and someone who wants to serve in the army should serve in the army. And someone who's sitting and studying Torah and protecting the land from spiritual dimensions, in the spiritual dimensions, that's also something that we want right. The idea, the cultural war that's being fought in Israel is the Zionism of Herzl versus the Zionism of what we believe in, and that's, I think, a very important distinction for us to make to ensure that, yes, we believe in Zionism, but what form of Zionism? The one that allows the observance of Judaism and the Torah in the land, not the Zionism.

30:23
Now you ask me about Neturei Karta. Neturei Karta is a group of Hasidic-looking people who go wearing the Palestinian flags. You see them with the hats, with the long payas. You see them hugging the Ayatollah, and you see them hugging the people in Iran. You've seen them. They look religious like that. So those are mistaken people. They're people who are quote anti-Zionism of the old Zionism, like we are. But they haven't realized that there's a new world here. They haven't realized that there is an ability for us to observe Torah in Israel. They haven't realized that there is a way for us to perform mitzvahs in the land of Israel.

31:04
The Satmar Rebbe was against the old Zionists. You know. By the way, satmar Hasidim took in Yemenites because they knew what they were doing to them and secularizing them. So they said send them to Monroe, send them to where we live in New York, because we don't want them going to Israel and being secularized and removed from. By the way, I met Yemenite Jews who came back to their Judaism 20, 30 years later after they were taken and force-fed pork, force-fed things. I met Jews like that myself and they said how they weren't given.

31:42
It was like a communist regime which those of you who study some of the kibbutz movement. There was a little communism, right, that's the way it was. You didn't have any free will there. This is the way it is and that's the way it's going to be. That's not the Zionism we believe in.

32:00
We believe in a Zionism of a free land where people can choose to observe if they want to and choose not to observe if they don't want to.

32:09
That is the beauty of free will in Judaism. But to have a land that is dedicated against the observance of Judaism, that's not something any of us believe in, it's not something that any of us are comfortable with. So yes, to answer your question, mark, we are all Zionists. While we still hold a little anti-Zionism within us to the Zionism of being against the observance of Torah, while we still hold a little anti-Zionism within us to the Zionism of being against the observance of Torah life in the land of Israel, that's something that none of us are comfortable with. So, yes, yes indeed, israel should be the home. Israel is the home of the world of Torah and it's beautiful to see.

32:52
I love when I come to Israel and I see how the world of Torah and it's beautiful to see. I love when I come to Israel and I see how the expansion of Torah life and the availability of kosher food and the availability of study halls and synagogues being in every corner of the land of Israel, that is the most incredible thing. And when you see that the vast majority, that the vast majority, that the vast majority of farmers, that the vast majority of farmers in the land of Israel keep the sabbatical year and don't work their crops on the seventh year, the Shemitah sabbatical year. That's the glorification of God's name, that's the greatest Zionism we all believe in. That's what we want. My dear friends, it is getting late. One more question, okay, one more question for Marilyn. Let's go.

33:40 - Marylin R. (Caller)
From what we were talking about Israel. We are the people of Israel. What does Israel mean?

33:48 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
Oh, okay.

33:49 - Marylin R. (Caller)
So this is going to take a while.

33:50 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
We'll have to save it for next time, but let's just touch on it a little bit. There is. First is the name Yisrael was given to Jacob, our patriarch. His name was Yaakov and then later it was called Yisrael.

34:02
And the idea of Yisrael is that we have a relationship with God, which is in the name Yisrael, which is Yashar El, directly with Hashem, straight to Hashem. We don't have intermediaries. We always need to remember as a people of Israel, as a nation of Israel, we have a direct relationship with God. There's no intermediary, there's no conduit. There is no, we don't go through, we don't confess in a confessional right. You know how you confess. You talk to God directly, privately, On Yom Kippur. None of us confess to our rabbi, None of us confess through any intermediary. We don't have anyone who died for our sins. You are responsible as an individual to handle your own affairs with the Almighty and we talk directly to God. And that's the beauty of the Jewish people, the beauty of the Torah is that we don't have intermediaries. We don't have anybody through which we deal with our problems. We take personal responsibility. We talk directly to Hashem.

35:02
So we're going to talk more about Israel, If you can remember, next week. Hopefully we'll address this a little bit more. My dear friends, have an amazing holiday of Sukkot. Have a beautiful. This should be an amazing year for all of us. My dear friends, I love you all. Thank you and have an amazing week. Chag Sameach.

35:21 - Intro (Announcement)
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