Parshas Ha'azinu 5787

Automatic transcript of the voice note (unedited) — Hebrew and Yiddish terms may be spelled phonetically.

G-d says, parash, parash, hazino, hazino, ha-shemayim, v'debev, sishma, arez, merfi Chazal points out that Maish Rabbeinu when he's talking to Shemaim uses the Lashon ha-Zinu Listen with your ear, hazino, like Lashon oizen, we say in English also, let me hear your ear When someone's in close proximity, you have to scream to say Lashon of ha-Zinu When it's further distance you say v'sishma, Lashon listen, Shema So when Maish Rabbeinu was talking to the harez, to the land, he had to use a Lashon of someone in the distance And Chazal explained to us, because Maish Rabbeinu was a man of Shemaim, he was always by the Kisai Kovod

He was in the Midrash Shemaim, Matan Torah, he's running away from Olam HaChem, he's grabbing at the Kisai Kovod He spent 120 days in Shemaim, and this week's parasha, and then the parasha, the Medrash Rabbah, parash Ha-Zinu says That the Nesham of Maish Rabbeinu goes back under Kisai Kovod Maish Rabbeinu was a person who lived his life by Kisai Kovod It's supposed to say Yo Ha-Navi, so by him it says Shemo Shemaim, V'Zinu Ha-Arez Because he, I guess like all of us, was more closer to the ground When he's talking to Shemaim, it's a call from a distance When he's talking to the Ha-Arez, so then he says Lashon Ha-Zinu, because he's in close proximity to the Ha-Arez

You all know Maish Rabbeinu is on the highest level possible He's called Av Nevi'im, he's the giver, the transmitter of the whole Torah It says in the Zohar Kaddish, it says Maish Rabbeinu is named twice without a Pesik Without a line in between, because he totally, fully reached the full potential of what Maish Rabbeinu can be Every person is given Kalim to be able to carry out greatness And we're avoided to try our best to see how much we can actualize the potential that we're given Maish Rabbeinu is the one and only who actualized it completely, 100% So it's Maish Rabbeinu without a Pesik And the greatest tzaddik of all time, like Yaakov Avinu, whose face was on the Kisai Kovod

The Zohar Kaddish says about him that it says Yaakov, seek Yaakov Because he wasn't actually able to fully get to the 100% potential Now it could be because that was impossible Because keep in mind, like we just said, his face was on Kisai Kovod It could be to actually have Kisai Kovod in this world is something that's really beyond human capability Maish Rabbeinu reached it, Maish Rabbeinu reached it A full, full actualization of his potential How? That is the question, how did he do it? So we spoke about this many times, but the real Yisaiyit of Maish Rabbeinu, the Yisaiyit is that he never made it about himself

There's so many different ryes for this concept, but for those of you doing B'af Yagme, we just had it yesterday Where it says, Maish Minat Teri Minayim, where's Maish Minat Teri? That's a funny question, where's Maish Minat Teri? He's all over the Teriyah Anyways, the answer is even funnier, the answer says B'Shigamu B'aseh Which basically means that the Kaddish Baruch Hu is saying, he knows, yeah I know after all they're only flesh, that's the B'Shigamu Like I know at the end of the day that's what they are And therefore they're not going to be perfect and they're going to have issues

But it still says the Kaddish Baruch Hu, in 120 years that's it, that's the end of the line, this is by the Mabu It actually points out that B'Shigamu in Gemara is Maisha It also points out that the 120 years left to live is K'meged, the 120 years that Maish Rabbeinu lived But come on, really that's what it's about That is Maish Rabbeinu, what in the world is the Gemara saying? We spoke about this many times, we're going to be at bridge, bridge version over here But we pointed out that Noach and Maisha Rabbeinu both gave him the same deal And Noach accepted the deal and Maisha Rabbeinu turned it down Kosh Baruch Hu came to Noach and he told him, what's the world, are you?

And Noach said, deal, no problem, take me And the world got destroyed That's actually why Noach is accredited with the Mabu, it's called Me Noach Thanks to Noach, thank you Noach, you did great, because of you the world was destroyed That's the way Chazal actually touched the concept of the Gemara And that's the way of what happened with the Mabu Hashem came, Maish Rabbeinu was offered a very very similar thing When HaKadosh Baruch Hu said, I'm going to destroy everyone Really, Kalei Yisroel, because Kalei Yisroel took over the concept of the Bnei Adam at that point Anyways, I'm going to destroy all of them, it's all going to come from you

It's not going to be Bnei Yisroel, it's going to be Bnei Maisha Maisha Rabbeinu said, no thank you, Bnei Yisroel said, no thank you He said, mechei me, which means erase me He did the exact opposite Noach said, take me, he said erase me, I don't want a part of it They also point out that mechei me is exactly the same as his Meina That's a nice cute addition That's why Maisha's name in Gemach is represented by B'shagam Because Maisha Rabbeinu happed the frailty, the fragility, the fact that people, they're broken They're not perfect, they're flesh And that's why he spent 120 years of his life advocating Now it's connected to 120 years that Noach did not

Noach did not do a good job being Mekai of the world In fact, the Medrash says that he called them Shaitim He says, you're crazy people That didn't work That didn't help anyone correct their ways They want to get closer Misha Rabbeinu was the first one to realize how much Chai Yisroel was doing wrong And they were doing Chaton A lot of them were against him himself Yet over and over and over again He advocated for them and they told him, G-d bless you If it's about me or them, so then destroy me When we live our life realizing that it's not about ourselves And it's not about trying to add greatness to ourselves But rather actually realizing that we are great by nature

Because the Kodesh Baruch Hu created us great Just sometimes we mess up Because that's what humans do B'shaga mu'bosser That's the key to realizing our potential That's the key to being in Shemaim Or Dekel HaHemot Dekel Yir It definitely does not mean that Misha Rabbeinu was so far and disconnected That's not what it means He just perfected the concept that a God-given greatness Was given to us, not to serve ourselves But rather to serve the Kodesh Baruch Hu To help others I just want to end off with a last point That hits this whole idea home Which I heard many times from Raymond Goldwater The Allava Shalom For those who knew him, he was Nana's late husband

It's like the quote, the one of the big maskilim The one known as Achad Ha'am He really wasn't such a believer in Yiddishkeit I think the way he says it over is that he wasn't even a Maimon We talk about the fact That even though he doesn't really believe at all In the Torah being from Shemaim This person will stop and contemplate The fact that the Torah describes Misha Rabbeinu Our greatest leader As the person who he is It's an amazing thing This is a quote that I'm going to read off Sorry about that, I was just pulling it up So it says like this Judaism is unique and impressive Because the crown it places on its head is a Supreme leader It's not worldly conquest But absolute humility