WHAT IS JUDAISM? Discover It's True Meaning - with Rabbi Yisroel C. Blumenthal

[music] As Jews, the Jewish faith has been around for 3,000 years. We've been around for a long time. Every generation comes with its own unique challenges, situations that we have to deal with. We live in a modern world, a world that our grandfathers never dreamed of, a world of internet, open communication across the globe instantly. And that brings its own set of challenges. There are people out there that challenge our faith, that argue against our faith, specifically from the angle of atheism. And you have the materialistic world which doesn't recognize and doesn't acknowledge the existence of abstract or concepts. And Judaism is all about abstract and concepts. And the internet amplifies these questions, these challenges. It's very hard when you're people research things on the internet. It's very hard to discern to to figure out what is true, what is false. And this is a challenge that we face, our children face, and our generation faces. What I would like to do over here is not provide answers to any particular challenge. What I would like to do is articulate Judaism in a language that I feel talks to our generation that if we understand what Judaism is doing in our life in the language of our generation, many of the challenges will fall away or at least be put into perspective. What is Judaism? Well, we know that Judaism is a in Hebrew we use the word bris, a covenantal relationship between the Jewish people and the creator of heaven and earth. The word covenantal relationship is not a word that we use in our day and age. It means a deal, a an alliance, a a pact between a set of human beings, a family of human beings, a tribe of human beings, the Jewish people, and the creator of heaven and earth. A pact, a deal would mean that there's a two-way relationship. We understand that God, the creator of heaven and earth, gives us protection, gives us blessing. What do we give to him? Obviously, we believe that God is above and beyond personal needs. It's not that we're giving him personally anything, but God has a plan here on earth. He wants to accomplish something here on earth. That's a a major component of what Judaism believes and teaches. And we contribute to that plan. The pact, the deal that God has with the Jewish people is that we will play a central role in his plan for humanity. What is the role that we play? There are different ways to word or to articulate what exactly that role is. But one of the ways that the Bible uses to articulate to describe the role that the Jewish people had is a witness nation. We're carrying a message. We are bearing a message. A message from the creator of heaven and earth to ourselves, to our children, to all of humanity. We are a witness nation. I'll just provide a few references, biblical references to establish this concept that we are a witness nation. First of all, the words you are my witnesses, God addressing the Jewish people appear in the book of Isaiah several times. Chapter 43:10 is one one such example. The Shama, the Shama is a declaration of faith. It's in Deuteronomy chapter 6, which Jewish people throughout history have considered it their declaration of faith. Has two Hebrew letters highlighted or enlarged. And those two Hebrew letters spell out the word witness. That's a testimony that the Jewish people testify to the world that there is but one God. And in Psalm 78, the psalmist describes the Jewish people as passing on a testimony. God established testimony in Jacob. Jacob is the name of the Jewish people which is passed on from generation to generation. So our role in God's plan is that we're supposed to be carrying this message. This message is something that's larger than ourselves. It's something that we never fully understand because it's God's message. It's not our message. But it's our job to carry this message. What is this message that we're carrying for the creator of heaven and earth? Primarily, our message is our perception of God. Our perception of the creator of heaven and earth. First of all, this perception includes the idea that there is a creator who is above and beyond nature. He's not subject to the laws of nature. He's not subject to the forces of nature. He is the source of the laws of nature. He's the one who created those laws of nature. He's the one that created all the forces of nature and all of nature. He's above and beyond nature and its laws. And nature is beholden and subject to him and to him alone. But our perception of God doesn't stop there. Our perception of God goes on. We believe that he is the source of justice, kindness, and morality. He desires a relationship with humanity on the basis of those three qualities. Justice, kindness, and morality. We call God the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Because we believe in our tradition, we have this idea that Abraham exemplified a life of striving towards God's kindness. He lived a life that if you looked at this man, you saw that this man loved God through the path of kindness. Isaac was someone who loved God through the path of justice. He lived his life in a way that it was clear to all that this is his ideal. Justice, fairness, what's right, and to avoid what's wrong. And Jacob lived a life that exemplified God's holiness, his morality, his truth. And that's what we call God, the God of Jacob, when we're talking about God who desires a relationship with humanity through the quality of truth, morality, and holiness. By recognizing that God is the source of justice, kindness, and morality, and that he desires a relationship with humanity through these three qualities, we're saying something about existence, not just about God. In other words, our perception of God is not just a perception of God. It's a perception about all existence. God is the only true existence and all the rest of existence is just his his will. It's he desired to create it. It's not intrinsically real. It's only because God wills it. So from all of existence, the most real aspects of existence are the qualities of justice, kindness, and morality. Those are eternal. And everything else is temporary. It's flimsy. This is not just a teaching about existence in general. It's a teaching about what goes on inside a person. Inside a person, there are many forces that pull a person in many different directions. We have many desires. We have anger, jealousy, a desire for power, a desire for pleasure, etc. But we also have a yearning for justice, for kindness, and for morality. And our perception of God tells us that those three aspects of our psyche of our inner being are the most important and the most real aspects of our inner being. Just to illustrate this idea that we possess these three yearnings and desires, I would want you to imagine the following scenario. Imagine if you find yourself in a subway station late at night, 1:00 in the morning. There is no one else in the subway station. It's deserted and there's a beautiful painting on the wall. Someone put a beautiful mural on the wall, a beautiful painting, and it's right there on the wall. There's a can of black paint without its lid. A can of black paint just sitting there on the floor in front of the painting. And suddenly you feel a childish urge to take that can of black paint and splatter it across the painting. Why won't you do that as a human being? Why will you not do that? Now, let me just tell you the security cameras are off. There are no policemen here. You will not get into any trouble. There'll be no consequences to your action in the realm of human society. So, put that aside. Don't think about consequences, punishment. Why won't you destroy that painting? There are various answers that people give to this question. Why will they not destroy the painting? And the answer fits the answers that people give to this question fit into three basic categories. One category is feeling for other people. They say I cannot destroy this painting because someone put work in this painting. I feel bad for him. Or people are enjoying this painting. Why should I take that enjoyment away from them? So that that is the desire for kindness. Kindness desire for connecting with other people, feeling other people's pain, enjoying other people's joy. That's a desire for kindness. Another person or another group of answers fit into the realm of justice. People say it's not my painting. It's wrong to destroy it. It doesn't belong to me. It's stealing. It's it's it's touching property that that I have no right to touch. That's all the desire for justice. And then people would say the painting is beautiful. How could I destroy something that's beautiful? That's a desire for truth. That's a yearning for holiness and morality. And that's just a little illustration of how these forces are present within ourselves. and our perception of God. Our message to humanity, our message to our children is that these three forces within yourself, you have a desire for justice inside yourself, you have a a desire for kindness, a desire for morality and holiness, those are the most important aspects of your psyche. When you satisfy those leanings, those yearnings within your being, that's how you connect to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. This is not just a teaching in general about okay now I understand the human psyche. It has a ramification in the way we live our lives and an obvious ramification the way we live our lives. Human beings have unbelievable need for self validation. We want to feel validated. We need to feel validated. And it's not a bad thing. It's that's how God created us. And that's we need it just like we need air to breathe. And if you look around, you'll realize that according to the needs that human beings have, that's how the creator provided for them. For example, when we talk about physical needs, air is the item that we need the most of, and it's all over the place. Follow by water. Water is another item that we need not as much as air, but we need a lot of it. And that's readily available. The basic staples of food that we need are also available not as read not as available as water but they're readily available as well. And you know luxuries are things that are not as available etc. It would follow that the same creator who provided for our physical needs he set up a world that will provide for our emotional needs. And if the emotional need for validation, for self validation, for the feeling of I am valuable and important and what what and and significant if that's such a basic human need, you would expect it to be all over the place. But people live their lives searching for this and and having a hard time finding it. The reason that is is because people consider success and failure or I am valid. They measure their value by external factors. They measure value by how much money they have, how much fame they they have. People want to feel unique. I did something that no one else did. So they do something that gets them into the Guinness Rule book of records. But how many people could do that? How many people could be famous? If everyone be famous, then no one would be famous because fame is something that's relative. It's You're only famous if you're more famous than the average person. You're only wealthy, you're only rich if you're talking about material abundance if you are more wealthy than the average person. If everyone has money, then no one has money. It's it's when we're talking about the search for validation, uniqueness, making a mark. But when it comes to justice, kindness and morality, if a person sees those as his success in life, the more justice I incorporate into my life, the more I grow in the path of justice, the more I grow in the path of kindness, the more I grow in the path of morality, that's open for everybody. No two people are the same. No pe no two people have the exact same perception of justice, kindness, and morality. Every person could be great not in wealth, not in sports achievements, and not in fame. Because if everyone's achieving the same thing in sports, then it's not an achievement anymore. But when it comes to being a good human being, a just human being, a kind human being, and a moral human being, everyone could be great because everyone has their own perception. Everyone has their unique way of approaching this. And if if people would consider this as their goal in life and this is what measures their success and this is what gives value to your life takes on a whole different meaning. It's not a rat race to try to get more money than the next person or more fame than the next person. Rather it's a inner search. It's a inner growth of incorporating justice, kindness and morality into your life. And every human being is unique. No two human beings will ever be the same when it comes to these qualities. Now the that this is the core of Judaism just as kindness and morality is expressed in the Talmud. It's expressed in the Bible in the book of Micah chapter 6. God addresses man and he says what does God demand of you but to do justice to love kindness and walk in humility before God. We understand walking in humility before God is morality holiness and truth. But where do the rest of the commandments of Judaism fit in? eating kosher, keeping the Sabbath, studying Torah. Where all those commandments fit in? We see Judaism is not that busy with justice, kindness, and morality. So yes, there are many commandments that are associated with justice, kindness, and morality. >> To love your neighbor as yourself, not to steal, not to kill, not to speak bad of other people, etc. So yes, a very large amount of the commandments are directly associated with justice, kindness, and morality. But many of them certainly at on the surface do not seem to have anything to do with justice, kindness, and morality. Keeping the Sabbath for example, what does that have to do with justice, kindness, morality? Not worshiping idols, what does that have to do with justice, kindness, and morality? So, where do those fit in? So, I I would like to give a few general statements about the commandments in general and then I will take three examples three examples of the commandments and see how they fit in with justice kind of simality. So first a general statement about the commandments. The fact of life is fact of history, human history is a sad fact of human history is some of the greatest cruelties, some of the greatest injustices and some of the greatest immoralities were perpetrated in the name of justice, kindness, and morality. Take Nazi Germany. Nazi Germany killed the Jews, killed the gypsies, killed whoever it was that they were trying to kill and fought the world because they felt an injustice [clears throat] was done to them and they are rectifying an injustice. It was for the cause of justice that they at least that's what they told themselves that's what they're doing etc. We just look through history and you see so many injustices were perpetrated in the name of justice. And the same thing with kindness and cruelty. People are cruel to some people in order to be kind to other people. That's not kindness. Kindness is not a destination. Justice is not a destination. And morality is not a destination. These are journeys. A person has to always remember that he never arrived at the destination of justice, kindness, and morality. If a person thinks I have, I am the master of justice, kindness, and morality. He didn't get there. He might be the furthest person away from justice, kindness, and morality. We understand that justice, kindness, and morality, these qualities are God's qualities. They're not our qualities. These are qualities that we're trying to embibe and incorporate into our lives. But we have to remember that we're never going to get there. It's life is not about getting there. Life is about the journey. The journey of striving towards these goals. So when we have commandments from a God who we see as the source of justice, kindness, and morality, and we're striving to obey them without fully understanding them, that is reinforcing in our psyche the idea that we are not the masters of justice, kindness, and morality. We are servants of a god who is a source of justice, kindness, and morality. It's always going to be above us. It's always going to be something that we have to learn more about. It's always going to be something that someone else could teach us something about. And therefore, it puts our journey towards justice, kindness, and morality in a certain perspective. So answer number one is the commandments in general without getting into the specifics of specific commandments but the fact that they we see them as coming from emanating from a god who is the source of justice, kindness and morality which is above us and we are striving to obey and come closer to this god reminds us of this concept is that justice, kindness and morality are goals that we will never ever be able to say I achieved. achieved it. I have it in my back pocket. It belongs to me. It's always a journey. It's always we can always learn more. There's always more to find out about these concepts and we always have to grow in these realms. A second idea about the commandments deals with the concept of motivation. And this is a very important point because people outside of organized religion or even if they're in organized religion but outside of Judaism and see even people on the peripheral on the outside of Judaism without understanding the inner heart of Judaism have a certain misconception about Judaism and they they associate it with other religions. They understand that the primary motivation for observing the commandments and avoiding the negative commandments is a fear of eternal punishment, a fear of going to hell forever and ever or a desire for a reward, an eternal reward. If that would be the primary motivation, then it would be the opposite of justice, kindness, and morality because it's basically self-centered. It's all about me. It's all about what could I gain? I'm going to do this because I'm going to earn some points over here. I'm going to avoid pain. I'm going to avoid eternal punishment. That's that's not the primary motivation. It's we are taught that we can use this motivation as a stepping stone to get to the true motivation, but the true motivation has to be justice, kindness, and morality. And let me explain. a person could follow the commandments and observe the commandments with the understanding that listen, it's not my world. If a person recognizes God who was the creator of heaven and earth put me here. He created me. He created all of the gifts and the blessings that are part of my life. Who am I to disobey his will? I'm going to obey his will simply because I understand that it belongs to him. It doesn't belong to me. every bit of energy that I possess is his. It doesn't belong to me. How could I spend the energy that belongs to him in a way that violates his will? If a person approaches the commandments from that angle with that understanding, then every time he obeys God's commandment, he is building in himself the sense of justice because this is the sense of justice of right and wrong. The the the bottom line of justice is you don't take something that doesn't belong to you. You give to you give an item to who it belongs to. So if it belongs to God, it has to go to God. Another approach another so this is a valid motivation for observing the commandments is the motivation of justice. This associated with Isaac. When we we speak about the God of Isaac, we're speaking about this motivation of observing God's law, obeying God's commandment, commandments, and following God. There's another way of understanding approaching God mo a motivation for the for obeying the commandments and that would be is when we see God as the God of kindness. We see all of God's blessing here on earth. All of God's wisdom in creation how it is for the benefit of his creations and we see the goodness of God. So there's certain love of goodness that that could that overtakes our heart and we want to be part of that goodness. We reciprocate towards that with a love for goodness and a desire for becoming part of that goodness. That's serving God out of kindness. Out of love and out of appreciation for kindness. That that's how we refer to God as the God of Abraham. In other words, serving God because we appreciate God's kindness. We see kindness as an ideal that we want to be part of. And if a person obeys the commandments with that motivation, then he's growing in kindness. He's growing in connecting with other people and feeling other people's pain. Feeling other people's joy, feeling creation's pain, feeling creation's joy. He's growing in kindness. He's journeying towards the goal and ideal of kindness. Then we could serve God from a third motivation which is to just we understand that doing certain things are beautiful. Beautiful. We're not talking about on a physical craft level. We're talking about on a spiritual level. There's certain spiritual beauty that comes when we obey the commandments. People see that there's a totality of beauty in the observance of the commandments. There's a certain beauty in the life that comes along with obeying the commandments. And we appreciate that beauty. you understand a certain ugliness, negativity associated with violating the commandments and you're obeying God out of that motivation, out of the motivation of what we call that holiness or beauty or truth. And we don't want to violate the truth that in that aspect and that angle we call God the God of Jacob. And if someone obeys God from that motivation, he's reinforcing and he's building within in himself a desire for truth, an appreciation for truth. He's making God's truth a greater part of his life. In short, we could say is that following God on the basis of on the motivation of justice would be thinking about the world in terms of right and wrong. When it comes to the motivation of kindness, we we think of the terms or that when we focus on that angle, that aspect, it's good and bad or kind than cruel. When we focus on the angle of beauty, on the angle of truth, on the angle of morality and holiness, it's beautiful and ugly. Those are the words that we think about and we strive for beauty and try to avoid ugliness. If a person's building those motivations inside himself, those yearnings inside himself, that is a growing person. That's a person who's building the most real parts of himself, the godly parts of himself. So when we observing any of the commandments for the proper motivations, it's always going to be related whether it's a commandment that's directly associated with justice, kindness, or morality or indirectly associated with it or even not obviously associated with it at all. But still, if you're observing it from one of these three motivations, you're growing in justice, kindness, and morality. The third concept that is associated with all the commandments in general is that a person who lives with obedience to the commandments, he realizes that his actions are significant. Life is not insignificant. Life is meaningful. And actually, people don't realize this, but the commandments are not just limited to actions that we do or don't do. They're associated. The commandments cover the words we speak and not speak. And they even cover the thoughts that we have and not have. We're commanded to think in certain directions and certain thought patterns God wants us to have and certain thought patterns he doesn't want us to God doesn't want us to be angry at other people or to be lustful even in our hearts not just with our words or with our actions. So when a person lives with this with this idea of every thought is significant. It's part of God's plan whether I understand it or not. It's reinforcing in the person the idea that your actions are significant. They're meaningful. Let's take this a step further. Generally, we're used to thinking of of these concepts, justice, kindness, and morality, more as avoiding a negative. We don't want to do bad. We don't want to destroy that painting either because it's wrong or because it's cruel or because it's ugly to destroy a painting. These are avoiding a negative. We don't readily see these as positive products growing justice, growing kindness, developing and and and cultivating morality. But the truth is life is about cultivating these products because again every individual has own way his own unique sense of justice, kindness and morality. And when a person lives his life, living a life of justice, kindness, morality, and and a life is built up of minor actions, you are what you do. You are what you speak. You are what you think. The actions that you do build your life. And they build the picture that you're projecting of life. They build the impact that you have on the people around you. And just obeying the commandments and following the commandments reinforces the idea that every action is significant. Every action, every thought, every word contributes to your total impact on the world around you. if you're going to be a blessing to the world around you or the opposite of a blessing. The fourth thought about the commandments, again, a general thought about the commandments, perhaps the most foundational. We believe that God, the God of justice, the God of kindness, the God of morality, built those commandments. He created those commandments. He designed those commandments to sanctify us. In other words, to elevate us. Whether we understand it or not, these commandments, by observing these commandments, we are embibing and we are absorbing God's will into our psyche, into our being. And God is the God of justice, kindness, and morality. So, we're absorbing more justice, kindness, and morality. There's this concept that actions speak to ourselves louder than words can speak to ourselves. You can hear a lecture from today till tomorrow. It doesn't do the same thing to you like when you did something when you lived let's say an act of kindness you went and you helped somebody you absorb more kindness than listening to 20 lectures about kindness. When you overcome an urge or a situation where there's money that's questionable. You don't know if you it's right for you to keep it not keep it. You overcome the part of yourself that tells you keep it. It's okay. It's fine. And you give it back to the one who it belongs to. you're embodying more justice into yourself than hearing 20 speeches about justice. So the actions that we do have an impact on who we are. And we believe that the commandments that God designed were built to to to elevate people and to bring people higher on these three realms of justice, kindness, and morality. Let's speak about three commandments. I'll talk about idolatry, Torah study, and observance of the Sabbath. And we'll try to understand them on a practical level. See how they could impact our understanding of justice, kindness, and morality. Build those qualities within our beings in a practical way, in a way that we can understand in the modern world. Let's take idolatry. At first glance, you say, "What's the big deal?" You have this guy venerating a statue or venerating a human being, venerating a force of nature and allowing himself to be overwhelmed by the beauty of the river or by the magnificence, the majesty of the sun or the mystery and the holiness that he sees in a human being. He allows himself to be so overwhelmed by that emotion of the the majesty, the beauty, whatever it might be that he submits himself to that entity. That's what idolatry is. Idol is when a person submits himself to an any entity in the world other than God, other than the creator of heaven and earth who is above all of creation, all of existence, all of finite existence. What's the big deal? So many societies have been doing this. And in fact, the Jewish refusal to bend to whatever it is that the people around them are idolizing has been seen as a sort of Jewish arrogance. Why won't you do that? And the truth has nothing to do with arrogance. In fact, it has to do with respect for humanity. And let me explain. First of all, when a person submits himself to another entity besides his own creator, he's not just elevating something that doesn't deserve to be elevated. He's minimizing himself. You're a human being. You're the crown of God's creation. You are the the focus of God's creation. God, this is the garden that God wants to cultivate. He wants to cultivate your justice, your kindness, your morality. You are significant. You have a unique role to play in God's plan that no other human being in the world has. You are directly a servant of God. Why are you subjecting yourself? Why are you submitting yourself and seeing yourself as less than another servant of God? So it's it's diminishing the human being. An act of submitting to any entity other than God is diminishing the human being. And it's diminishing if it's diminishing the human being, it's telling the human being the opposite message of the message that God gave to the Jewish people, which is that your justice, your kindness, and your morality are significant before God and supremely significant before God because this is the purpose of God's creation. Your kindness, your justice, your morality. So that's number one, that idolatry diminishes the human being. But there's another aspect of idolatry that we have to consider. I worship. When a person is worshiping whatever it is that he's worshiping, whether it's God, whether it's an idol, whether it's any entity other than God, which we call idolatry, the fact is he's giving something to that entity. He's giving his his soul. He's giving himself. He's giving he's that's what worship is. Worship is submitting yourself, giving yourself over to the entity that you're worshiping. Now, we have to ask ourselves on what basis are you doing that? Why are you giving yourself to that entity? Why does that entity deserve your worship? We have to ask that question. Why does that entity deserve your worship? And whatever it is that is behind that entity's motivation or desire for your worship, you're elevating that. So let me explain what I mean. When someone worships God, so he submits himself to God. I'm going to ask why are you doing that? So the simple answer will be my I'm not giving to God what doesn't belong to him. I'm acknowledging something that is God created me. He created my ability to worship. He created my heart. He created my emotions. And by submitting to God, I'm just giving to God what belongs to him. Justice. It's right. This is I'm just giving what belongs to God. Just the opposite. If I won't worship God, I'm withholding from God. I'm withholding from God what belongs to him. As opposed to someone worships any other entity. Why worshiping that entity? Why does that entity deserve your worship? If that entity is not your creator, if that entity is not the one who's above and beyond all of finite existence that created all of existence, then it's greed. Why does he want your worship? You're you're imagining that that entity wants your worship just like you want things that don't belong to you. If it doesn't intrinsically belong to that entity, why are you giving it to him? So idolatry would be an elevation of greed. It will be an elevation of of injustice of grabbing be and and wanting and desiring that which doesn't belong to you. So the act of idolatry again this is a subconscious message but when someone does an act of idolatry it's uh it's he's giving himself a subconscious message of injustice he's elevating the the the motive the emotion and the motive of greed. Let's talk about another commandment. The commandment of study of Torah. It's it's it's a commandment which for Judaism has been something that occupies a lot a big number of people's time. Many people study Torah for many hours a day. So first of all, it's it's it's not so much an individual endeavor because you have people that work a big part of their day. Yes. Every individual is commanded and encouraged to study Torah to the best and of their ability, but it's primarily a societal commandment. Society as a whole wants to embibe and wants to absorb Torah knowledge. And on a simple level, without getting too far, the idea over here is is that we understand that there's knowledge beyond what we know and primarily in the realm of justice, kindness, and morality. So yes, many of the commandments that we're studying about do not directly have to do with justice, kindness, and morality. But we we understand they're emanating from a god that is the master, that is the source of justice, kindness, and morality. And by studying this, we are acknowledging that justice, kindness, and morality are beyond us. It's not something that we could say we have. It's something we have to grow towards. And studying Torah is an endeavor to embibe that, you know, the the will of that god. There's another aspect to the study of Torah which we which I mentioned before is that we understand that God imbued and he put into the commandments the ability to elevate man. And from all of the commandments, Torres has the greatest ability to elevate man. Let me just illustrate this with a little conversation that I had with someone who presented a challenge to Judaism. This fellow was a person who doesn't belong to he's to the Jewish community. He he sees himself as someone who stands outside of the Jewish community and he he knows what's going on. He has a certain working knowledge of what's going on in the Jewish community. He he has an understanding of what's going on today in the Jewish community and he has an understanding of the history of the Jewish community. So he asked me the following question. He asked me about the Rashba. The Rashba Rash Benaderat. He was the rabbi of Barcelona in the late 1200s early 1300s. And he is his works are very popular amongst people study amongst orthodox Jews. He's very respected. He's from the rabbis who lived in that time period in those several centuries from approximately the year 1,100 till about the late 1400s that you know that group of scholars. He's the scholar that actually produced the most written response. So he's a great Torah scholar. And this outsider, this challenger asked me why does the orthodox community respect the rashba so much? What did he contribute to society? What kindness, what justice, what morality did did he contribute to society? So he wrote so many response. He wrote thousands of of responses to people who asked questions about minutiae of the law. Where is the contribution? Where is the growth in the realm of justice? If God is the God of justice, kindness, and morality, how does the Rashba fit in? That was his question to me. So I asked him a question. You know, Jew always has to respond to a question with a question. Are you familiar with the organization called Hatsalah? And he said, sure, of course, I know. And that's actually something that I respect about the Jewish community. Now, in case you don't know, let me tell you what Hatsala is. Hatsella is a volunteer ambulance association that every Orthodox Jewish community of, you know, significant size that's able to fund such a such an ambulance organization has one. What do they do? If a person takes sick, a person needs medical help, instead of calling the 911, the typical ambulance that you would call, they call atala. And the response time of atala is so much faster than the regular ambulance system in every community. Where did start from? It started back in the 70s in New York City. New York City is a large, you know, a large population, big city. And the people realized, the Orthodox Jews in the in the in in New York City realized someone has a heart attack. They call the I don't think 911 was around in those days in the early 70s, but they would call the local ambulance until the guy the ambulance came. The guy died. They realized that the response time of local ambulance is unsatisfactory. So what did they do? They made their own ambulance corps. They made their own ambulance organization. Jewish communities all over all over the United States, Canada, Israel has this this organization. What does that show you? It's it shows you respect for human life. They they they human life is so valuable to them that they're willing to have you have people that take time off in the middle of the day, middle of their work. Suddenly they jump off. They have to have a call. They have to run to the they're volunteers. People donate money to it. Now one second. Let's think for a second. You know how many ethnic groups there are in the United States? Basically every ethnic group around the globe, maybe barring one or two, are represented in the United States of America. And out of all of them, the only one that made this ambulance core was the Jewish people. But it's not really the Jewish people because there are so many secular Jewish communities or Jewish communities that are not as Orthodox that don't have this ambulance corps. It's just interesting is that the only communities that have this ambulance corps are the ones that respect the rashba. The ones that have a respect for the rashba and his learning and his Torah scholarship, those are the ones that have this ambulance core. So I don't I can't tell you exactly how it connects, but you see statistically that it connects. If you have a respect for Torah scholarship, for some reason that brings you respect for human life, it brings you closer and higher in justice, kindness, and morality. Let's move on to the Sabbath. The Sabbath is something that comes every week, once every seven days, we have the Sabbath. How does that connect to justice, kindness, and morality? So, first let me describe the Sabbath, in case you're not familiar with the Sabbath. The Sabbath is a day of we're prohibited from doing any creative work. We don't write on the Sabbath. We don't talk on telephone on the Sabbath. We don't use electricity on the Sabbath. Again, lights that have been turned on or electricity that has been set up from before the Sabbath. Yes, we use that, but we don't interact with electricity on the Sabbath. We don't turn on the lights. We don't turn off the lights. We don't use electrical implements. We don't light fires. We don't go to work on the Sabbath. It's a day of rest. It's a day of stepping aside from our creative activity in this world. People from the outside, it sounds like this must be very restrictive. It must be very, you know, painful to go through 24 hours or 25 hours of refraining from such type of interaction with the world around you. But anyone who experienced it could tell you the opposite is true. It's the most pleasurable of days. But again, how does this bring you to justice, kindness, and morality? So, the truth is there's so much what to talk about, but I'll just bring out a few points. The first step is as follows. You don't work on the Sabbath, which which reinforces into your mind the idea that you are not subject to the forces of nature. When when we're working, that means a person is going to do whatever job it is that he's working. whatever profession he has, he's telling himself that in order for me to eat, I need to do something and if I don't do this thing, I'll die. Yeah. So, the truth is a fact is that is the literal truth. But there's a message over here which is we don't want to we that message is not good. The message is that you are less than the forces that you need to work for your boss. So your boss of the company that you're working for is in charge of you. He's bigger than you. He's higher than you. or even if you're not working for you are the boss of the company but if I'm not going to do these activities I'll die of starvation which would make these activities or force of nature higher than myself and that's not the truth because the truth is all of nature is here is an arena for your justice kindness and morality yes you need to breathe in order to live so you're dependent to a certain degree on that only your physical body that's dependent your true self is not dependent on that your true self which is a garden to produce justice kindness reality is not less than your boss. It's not less than the forces of nature that you need to give you sustenance, to give you food, to to to supply you with your daily needs. So, it's a message of you are not subject to the forces of nature. Another message that that that we tell ourselves when we refrain from creative activity, the way God made man is he's the only being in the universe that could utilize every force in nature. An animal can't light a fire. An animal can't utilize the internet, electricity, or whatever it might be. The the the ability to create and manufacture, that's man's unique ability. And it's very easy for man to fall into the trap of thinking that he is the master of nature. By stepping back and withholding one day a week from creative activity, you're reinforcing into your mind that I am not the boss. So two major messages that we have the Sabbath are that nature is not my boss and I am not the boss of nature. There's a God that's above and beyond. There's there's there's an ideal. There's a goal that's bigger than me, that's bigger than nature, and that will be will be found when I live out these goals of justice, kindness, and morality. So, these are two subconscious messages that the Sabbath gives over to the to the those who observe the Sabbath, which lead us directly to justice, kindness, and morality. Sabbath is also a day of appreciation. It's a day when we step back instead of interacting and doing and working. It's a day of relaxing. What do we do? What do we do when we relax? We step back and appreciate the blessings of nature. It's a day of realizing the good in life. Realizing the blessings that God gave us, realizing the goodness of nature. We need a day to just look at nature and embibe the goodness in nature. Appreciate the justice in nature. Appreciate the holiness of God's creation. And that's another way that Sabbath brings us closer to justice, kindness, and morality. Sabbath is a day when we testify, so to speak, that God created the world. He created the world in six days. He rested on the seventh day. And again, we it reminds us there's a purpose to the world. There's a goal to the world. It's not just avoiding negatives like we mentioned before when we're trying to be just, kind, and moral. It's not just we're trying to avoid injustice, cruelty, and immorality. Rather, it's a a garden to produce these products of justice, kindness, and morality to allow them to be cultivated and to flourish. Each human being according to his unique way. Let's look at history. Let's let's look at history. Look at Judaism's accomplishment. I mentioned Judaism been around for a long time, 3,000 years. And were we perfect? No, we're far from perfect. In fact, we never claimed to be perfect. That's not our goal. As I mentioned, it's not about being there. It's not a destination. It's a journey. It's traveling towards it. But we maintained loyalty to these ideals of justice, kindness, and morality in a world that at times celebrated cruelty or brute strength. So many societies value or attach significance to just physical animal strength that they find in human beings. The ability to destroy and the ability the ability to kill, the ability to to break is something that is seen as valuable and significant. In the certain societies, they would celebrate cruelty. The Catholic Church itself, they would entertain the masses by burning heretics at the stake, the Inquisition. That was celebrated. That was a world that saw cruelty as again maybe that wasn't what they were consciously trying to do but that that is what they were doing. They were celebrating cruelty. They were celebrating where you had stadiums, the Roman gladiators where they fought to the death. And that was something that people looked up to and looked at and saw as as an ideal and beautiful. And the Jewish people maintained an island of sanity in that crazy world, if you will, in that world of of which celebrated cruelty, brute strength. And until today, the Jewish people stand for the human side of man, education, family, bringing out justice, kindness, and morality. Bring out the value of every individual, the value of of of human life. Belief in the essential goodness of man. Judaism teaches that man is essentially good because the purpose of life is that every human being has that core of justice, kindness and morality, yearning for those things and everyone could cultivate that unique garden that's unique to him and that underlying message of Judaism and we've maintained a loyalty to this message. So what is Judaism in short? In short, we can say Judaism the covenant between the creator of heaven and earth, who is the source of justice, kindness, and morality and the Jewish people. And the Jewish people are carrying that message that there is one creator who desires a relationship with humanity through justice, kindness, and morality. And that is the core and the essence and the heart of Judaism. To the degree that we understand that message and to the degree that we embibe and live up to that message and appreciate that message and make that message part of our life to that same degree will be a blessing to the to the people around us. [music] Heat. Heat. [music] Heat. [music] Heat. [music] >> [music]