📋 Shiur Overview
Summary of Lecture: Desires, Technology, and Gratitude in Today’s World
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A. Opening and Organizational Remarks
[Incidental Introduction:] Technical matters – recording batteries, next week going away on vacation (Pennsylvania), Shabbos at Fleischman’s, possibly no shiur.
[Humorous Side Remark:] Someone said that too many shiurim are being given about taavos (desires) – people will think that’s the only thing we know. Jokingly compares with “Eli Roth.” The answer: people struggle with this, so it’s actually important. The “trick” – simply change the title of the shiur, but inside speak about the same thing.
The Plan for This Shiur:
1. Review a few points already discussed
2. Add new complications
3. Arrive at practical advice – “do something”
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B. The Central Foundation: “Nisgaber Al Atzmo” – Moshel B’Nafsho
In all Chassidic sefarim and by the Rambam, this is a central point: a person must be a ruler over himself. In the most basic sense, this means taavos (though it can also mean anger or other negative inclinations).
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C. Every Generation Has Its Own Test – The Context of Generations
The Principle
One must always understand the context – which generation, which reality people are living in.
– R’ Elimelech of Lizhensk says: every generation has a specific mitzvah that is “burning” (critically important). He said tzitzis.
– The Baal HaTanya said one must go with tzitzis outside.
– A Eitzerna’diger Yid said: the mitzvah of today’s generation is peri’as baal chov (paying debts).
The Main Point
One must be meshadech (match up) the old Torah teachings with today’s reality. We still say the old Torah teachings, but we must understand how they fit into our world.
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D. The Main Argument: Reality Has Radically Changed – “Abundance” and Taavos Today
1. Prishus Means Something Different Today
When we speak today about prishus (moderation, eating less, sleeping less) in New York 2026, it means something completely different than in Königsberg 1822 or Mezhbizh 1742 – because the most basic way of life has changed.
2. Concrete Proof: The Explosion of Products
– In the past: In a store there were 3-4 products – meat (had to go to the shochet), fish, 4 types of vegetables in winter, 3 in summer. That was “taavos.”
– Today: A normal supermarket has tens of thousands of items. A small grocery has over 10,000 products. There are 4-6 types of salt alone, an entire section just for snacks (hundreds of varieties), a few thousand types of kosher wine (previously 3 types).
– Ice machines in freezers, hot water machines with precise temperature control (100°, 200°, 212°) – a level of convenience that nobody had.
3. The Change in Food Culture
In the past: A meal was a special thing – a nice baal habayish meal with 7 items was a “huge meal.”
Today: People eat all day long. Nobody even asks if it’s a meal. Fruit that was once expensive and rare (like tangerines in winter) is now constantly available.
[Side Digression: Examples of the Trend in the Chassidic World]
– Eidah HaChareidis previously didn’t give hechsher on chocolate, until R’ Weiss (Shmuel) started it.
– R’ Nosson (a Chassidic Yid) said: “It has a hechsher from the Eidah, but no hechsher from the Bein Mayim Chaim yet” – he didn’t eat it. An example of an older approach where people refrained from new foods even with a hechsher.
– The R’ Chaim of Tzanz (Divrei Chaim) writes much mussar against gashmiyus. The Satmar Rebbe directed bochurim to learn that sefer.
– The Rosh Yeshiva in Yeshiva Ketana fought very strongly against gashmiyus – that people shouldn’t be megusham.
4. The Question Being Posed
Why is there so much that people seek? There are many reasons (capitalism, others), but the goal is not just to blame – rather to understand the essence of the change.
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E. Every Society Has Its Own Midos – Material Conditions Shape Content
The Principle
Every society – every Chassidus, every kollel, even non-Jewish societies – has its own virtues, mitzvos, and values that are discussed. Theoretically everyone believes in everything (tzedakah, chochmah, gevurah), but in practice every place speaks its midos – what’s discussed in the “cellar” (inside), that’s the true identity.
[Digression with Illustrative Function: Differences Between Chassiduses]
– Lubavitch vs. Breslov: Breslov – tefillah b’pshitus; Lubavitch – hisbonenus. Both agree that both are good, but the emphasis is different.
– Simcha: R’ Mottel Zilber explained that all Chassidim believe in simcha, but simcha means something different in every Chassidus – Karlin, Breslov, Amshinov, Gur, Slonim – each has a different “flavor” of simcha. It’s hard to express in words, but when you see how people live, how a farbrengen is conducted, you see the difference.
Material Conditions Shape Midos
Part of the differences between Chassiduses (and societies in general) stem from “material conditions” – how much money there is, how people live, how houses are built. Where there’s more money, simcha (or kavod Shabbos) gets an expression that costs more money.
[Digression: Gur’s “Simplicity”]
Gerer batei midrash looked simple, Gerer boots had “no taste or smell.” This has to do both with an ideology against externalities (they’re not Hungarian), and with the actual money situation. Hungarian Chassidim, who had both money and a hashkafa that beauty is a value, had beautiful batei midrash.
[Small Digression: “Waste of Money” vs. Honor]
The Gemara says that baalei batim in Bavel had money because they honored Shabbos – but perhaps it’s the reverse: because they had money, they honored Shabbos. “Dirah na’ah, ishah na’ah, keilim na’im.”
Kavod Shabbos Gets Different “Meaning” According to Reality
Kavod Shabbos means something very different in different contexts: for one person – buying “fancy” things; for others – sitting in shul longer (perhaps because one fights with the wife). The content of a middah depends both on external reality and on internal differences of opinion.
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F. When a Problem Doesn’t Exist, It’s Not Discussed – The Critical Example of Taavos
The Conclusion
In a place where something isn’t relevant – or so irrelevant that it’s completely impossible – the middah that addresses that problem isn’t discussed.
– In Auschwitz with two breads – taavos isn’t discussed.
– In Boro Park with 25,000 breads – taavos also isn’t discussed. “That’s a different problem.”
– Observation: All people in 2026 Boro Park don’t speak about taavos.
The Contrast: Old Roshei Yeshiva vs. Today’s Rabbis
The old Rosh Yeshiva (and the “Litvak Berel”) lived in a world where they didn’t understand gashmiyus, didn’t know which side to turn on a switch, and for them two slices of pizza is already “a gross baal taavah.” Their world consisted of two-three Roshei Yeshiva, three candies in the store – and from that reality they “pounded on taavos.”
But today: A person who already has two Mercedes – one for him, one for his wife – and many rabbis are already at that level – none of them have ever heard a talk against taavos. “Prove me wrong.” Even when the rabbis themselves don’t have cars, their gabbaim have cars – there’s a connection between the material reality and what is (or isn’t) discussed.
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G. The Problem of Hypocrisy Among Those Who Give Mussar Against Taavos
In certain Chassidic circles (for example Satmar) rabbis have an excuse – they say that they themselves don’t live in luxury (the Rebbe doesn’t have his own car, only the gabbai’s car). But this is a weak excuse: the Shabbos tisch alone has 10,000 calories, so to speak against taavos in such a context makes no sense. The mussar-giver is embarrassed, feels hypocritical, or speaks against taavos in a buried form.
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H. “Too Many Types of Cakes” – Is That Really Taavah?
The Question
Is the fact that a bakery has 25 types of cakes a sign of taavah? This is “a wrong category of analysis” – a false category of analysis. Because if three types of cakes is already more than nothing, why is 35 types worse than 3? The difference between 3 and 35 isn’t as simple as one thinks. We’re seeking a more nuanced understanding.
[Side Digression: The Badchan’s Joke – “Chassidic Foods” vs. “Gross Foods”]
Pizza with sushi is “buried,” but kugel with kishke is “refined.” This is a fact in certain communities – the rav doesn’t allow opening a pizza shop in the shtetl, but gross kugel is permitted. The badchan fantasized: if the Baal Shem Tov were in America, there would be “Ropshitzer pizza” and “Kretchnifer French fries,” with customs like the Rebbe cuts the pizza with kavanos of the sefiros.
Polish goyim ate the same foods (kishke, cholent) – just with pig meat. This shows that the “refinement” of these foods is only cultural, not inherent.
Cultural Relativism – A Good Question with a Bad Answer
The badchan has a good question (the “refinement” of foods is culturally relative), but his answer – that everything is just culture and therefore nothing – is false.
– Everyone knows there’s such a thing as a “gross boy” and a “refined boy” – this isn’t just cultural.
– Leitzonus (cynicism) isn’t an answer – one must ask the questions of leitzonus and find better answers.
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I. The Factor of Time and History – “New” vs. “Old” Pleasures
A food that’s been eaten for 200 years (like potato kugel) already has stories, thought, history attached to it. A new thing (like sushi) has less thought and history. This doesn’t mean new things are automatically bad, but there’s a qualitative difference between pleasures with depth and pleasures without.
[Side Remark:] A student brings a comparison to the internet – previously it was forbidden, today it’s more accepted, because with time “stories” are attached to it.
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J. We Need a **New Language** to Speak About Taavah Today
The Central Claim
– One can’t assume everything is the same. There’s a problem, a difference between types of pleasures.
– “Not being a baal taavah” doesn’t mean just not feeling physical pleasure – because then there would be no difference from nothing.
– Taavah isn’t just “bein adam l’atzmo” – what kind of taavah one has relates to which society one lives in.
– Our society has a level of pleasures that’s unimaginable – this doesn’t mean “hutrah haretzuah” (everything is permitted), but we need a new language to describe what’s “gross” and what’s “refined” today. The old sifrei hakodesh’s descriptions no longer fit directly.
Concrete Example: Eishishok 1920 vs. Lakewood 2026
– In Eishishok in 1920: A yeshiva bochur who goes out to buy an extra pretzel – that’s a baal taavah, a “wild animal.” Because in that world that was an extraordinary thing.
– In Lakewood/Boro Park in 2026: The same act is completely normal – the one who does it isn’t some strange creature.
– But also in Eishishok: The one who put salt on his food was not a baal taavah – that was normal. The one who didn’t put salt was perhaps a great ascetic, or perhaps something was wrong with him (like the Rambam’s “inui baal hargashah”).
– In Lakewood: The one who doesn’t buy that extra piece – he’s not a person, not a “gever b’guvrin.” People wouldn’t make shidduchim with him.
The Point: What’s “normal” and what’s “gross” is not absolute but also not just subjective – it’s connected to the society where one lives. The standard shifts, but it’s not that there’s nothing there.
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K. Two Ways to Define a Middah – Klal vs. Tziyur/Paradigm
The Methodological Difference
– Way A: A klal / definition / rule – abstract formulation (whoever thinks about food more than 10 minutes is a baal taavah, for example).
– Way B (better): A paradigm / example / picture – a concrete image of the person who has the middah. With midos (which are an “inyan ma’asi”), the second way is better – because a picture shows you what it means in practice.
The Key Point
When one gives a picture/example, one sees clearly that the same person in Ropshitz 5580 looks completely different than in Boro Park 5787. And if one tries to replicate the picture from Ropshitz in Boro Park – it won’t be at all the same as what that person was. “The idea is the same when it doesn’t look the same.”
A sharp remark: “Most people who behaved as if they don’t live in Tzanz in 5610, don’t know what to say about taavos. The only ones who know are those who pretend we can still live there.”
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L. Rejecting Both Answers – Context ≠ Relativism
Two Answers That Aren’t Good
– Answer A (everything relative): That everything depends on where and when one is born – this is “just nonsense,” because it makes everything arbitrary.
– Answer B (the “cynically-frum” answer): That it doesn’t depend on what one eats but on how much one is absorbed in it / how much time it takes from the mind – this may be true in principle, but halachah l’ma’aseh, when speaking of midos as actions (deeds), there is indeed a difference between contexts.
[Side Digression: The Shinover Rav – “Bread with Butter”]
The Shinover Rav said that “bread with butter may be eaten until the temples hurt” – because bread with butter is a basic, normal food, not a taavah. Can anyone in Boro Park say the same about rib-eye steak? No – that’s a contextual thing, not a relative one.
[Further Humorous Digression:] An attempt to find a modern equivalent – “cereal with milk,” “Cocoa Pebbles” – to show how different the context is.
The Key Difference
Contextual ≠ Relative. The midos themselves remain the same, but their expression is different in different contexts. One cannot speak of midos without accounting for the world one lives in. But one cannot dismiss that there exists a situation where an entire society is full of taavos and everything must be uprooted.
[Side Digression: “Go See What the Ehrliche Yidden Eat”]
A Rebbe who came to America asked what he should eat. He was told: “Go see what the frummest Yidden there eat – that’s what you should do too.” This shows that context is important – one adapts to the most ehrliche standard in that place, not importing a standard from another world.
[Side Digression: Walking with the Wife]
In Skver and Gur, walking with one’s wife is a “pruste” thing – the Skverer Rebbe made a takkanah against it. But in other circles (Litvish, modern) it’s completely normal. Again an example of contextual norms.
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M. Question from a Student – Where Is the Limit?
The Question
If everything is contextual, why isn’t every modern convenience a taavah? Someone who takes water from a sink instead of a spring, or drives a car instead of a horse-and-wagon – is he already a baal taavah? Where is the limit?
[Side Digression: Couch]
A humorous remark about people who hold that sitting on a couch is a “treife thing” – R’ Mottel sits on a couch but feels it’s not bad; others hold that a bench is enough.
The Answer (Not a Complete Answer)
There’s no complete approach, just a question. But the difference is clear: midos express themselves through actions, and actions exist in a world – one must account for the context. This isn’t relativism (everything is equal), but contextualism (the same middah expresses itself differently). The best way to understand a middah isn’t through abstract rules but through a picture/paradigm – and the picture must fit the context.
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N. Three Answers to the Question – And Rejection
First Answer
The entire approach is a gross mistake – one must change the whole approach.
Second Answer
The whole thing is subjective/fake – everyone calls frummer than himself “crazy” and freer than himself “wicked,” and there’s no true measure.
Both answers aren’t good – they don’t go with what’s being presented here.
Third Answer (Own Idea)
A certain idea based on a verse from Parshas Bereishis – “all the way back to Sinai.” (Elaborated later.)
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O. Aristotle’s Approach – Midos Are Contextual, But Limited
Aristotle would say: a “good person” (adam me’uleh/baal midos tovos) is defined according to the society, the region, the generation where he lives. The picture of a good person is contextual.
But – even Aristotle would agree that there’s a limit – everyone agrees there are things that are “too much.” The justification isn’t clear, but in practice everyone agrees there are things one may not do.
But – a Jew can’t just say like Aristotle, because that would be “goyish / social tents” – social norms without deeper grounding. And it remains very limited – one can’t ground strict ascetic rules with this alone.
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P. [Side Digression] Potato Chips, Nosh, and Chassidic Customs About Taavos
– In Skverer Yeshiva they held that “nosh is a goyish thing” for bochurim.
– Why may girls eat nosh but not bochurim? – Critique of the accepted rule that “girls may be a baal taavah” but men not.
– An approach that men should have taavos achilah so they won’t have other taavos – but for women they think both taavos aren’t a problem.
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Q. Pills (GLP-1 / Ozempic-Type Medications) and Avodas HaMidos
The Case
In America, where there are 35,000 items in a supermarket, there’s an epidemic of obesity (overeating). A solution was found – GLP-1 pills (like Ozempic) that suppress appetite.
Rav Mazesnek’s Approach (a Breslov Rav)
He wrote a teshuvah that it’s not proper to take pills because Hashem gave man free will, and pills nullify free choice.
The Response to Rav Mazesnek – **Disagree**
1. Taking pills is itself a choice – it’s part of choice, not against choice.
2. Avodas hamidos itself is also “against choice” in a certain sense – one habituates oneself until one no longer has the bad inclination. What’s the difference?
3. “A person isn’t just his body” – we don’t believe that man is only a “will” (ratzon); we believe one is also in the actions. A person who takes pills every day and has less taavos – that’s also a middah.
4. Practically: After enough time on pills, one often no longer needs them.
What People Actually Mean
Those who are against pills actually mean something else but have no language for it – they say “choice” because a frum Yid “may not say” that he wants to maintain mitzvos (i.e., that he wants people to suffer with taavos so they’ll have reward for overcoming).
The legitimate claim against pills is side effects (depression, inability to have children, etc.) – not the “choice” argument.
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R. [Side Digression] Story with a Chassidic Rebbe in a Litvish Yeshiva
A Chassidic Rebbe came to a Litvish yeshiva and said that certain things Litvaks do (late marriage, etc.) aren’t good. The Litvish Rosh Yeshiva answered: “My bochurim it doesn’t harm.” The Rebbe answered: “Yes, but do you want to do aveiros so it won’t harm?”
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S. The Sharp Argument: Everyone Agrees One Needs “Aveiros” for Normalcy
The Principle
– Even the Gerer Rebbe agrees that for a person to function normally, he needs a bit of taavos – even more than “for the sake of mitzvah.”
– There’s no person who can turn on his system exactly as much as needed – one needs a bit more.
– It comes out: the whole world agrees that to be a normal person, one needs “a few aveiros” – a few forbidden thoughts, etc.
– Therefore: the dispute is not whether one may do aveiros to become normal – everyone agrees one must. The question is how much and what kind.
– Example: If a very frum bochur can’t live at all with a woman in one house without issurei d’Oraisa, the Gerer Rebbe will tell him: “You’ll do the issur ten times, and afterwards you’ll learn to become a normal person.”
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T. The Shinover Rav’s Mashal: “Every Yid Has a Belly Full of Worms”
The Shinover Rav said: The five asin (positive commandments) don’t mean one should be completely pure – rather that it shouldn’t “overflow.” The Torah goes a bit extreme (as the Rambam says) to build balance – the Torah didn’t expect anyone to have no bad thoughts at all.
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U. The Gemara: “Ein Adam Nitzol Mimenu B’chol Yom”
One who thinks he’ll be in yeshiva without any tests – is an apikores, because he goes against the Gemara. This is a “techilah” – that’s how it’s made. The answer why one doesn’t take a “pill” for that: not because pills are “ruin,” but because the middah hatovah is to have a few aveiros, not too many. “Al tashbi’eini” means: not too much. One must try each time that it shouldn’t be too much – but this isn’t a heter.
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V. “Nach Liheineinu” – Today We Have Different Problems and Different Solutions
In America we have different problems than in the past. Everyone – Jews, non-Jews, frum, free – agrees there’s a problem of eating too much.
Three Answers (Recapitulation)
1. Indeed too much taavos – go live in Galicia (leave the modern environment).
2. Everything is fake (the taavos aren’t real needs).
3. The foundation remains the same – there’s a “middah b’mitzvos” – but it presents itself differently because the body/environment is different.
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W. The Mashal of Noach: Middah B’Mitzvos Doesn’t Mean Just “Middle”
Middah b’mitzvos doesn’t mean one should sit in the middle of foolishness. Noach was a tzaddik “in his generations” – he has a virtue that he goes against resha’im, but that’s not yet shleimus. There’s an ideal, but the ideal presents itself differently according to the body/environment. Mashal: A person with three hands would have different mitzvos – not because the ideal is different, but because the “presentation” is different.
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X. Application to Today’s Society
Food Is Cheap – The Old “Malastem Es HaBrios” Is No Longer Relevant
In the past, one of the reasons against taavos was “man shorrer u’mora” – one burdens other people with the costs. Today that’s exempt – a steak costs $17 kosher, $3 treif – it’s nothing. Nobody will steal for it.
[Small Digression: Addiction as New “Malastem”]
Today the problem of “malastem” is different – for example, drug addiction, where people steal from their parents. In the past “addiction” meant a drunkard; today it means drugs – different level, but the same halachah.
“Hayom” – The Torah Is Given Today
“Hayom hazeh… la’asosam” – the Torah is given today. If one speaks midos with the language of 5714 (1954), that’s like saying the Torah was given yesterday – that’s apikorsus. The ideal remains the same, but one must say it according to how it looks today.
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Y. Critique of “Old Version” Mussar Talks
Old Examples Don’t Speak to Today’s Bochur
A mashgiach who speaks against overeating in the old version – doesn’t speak at all to today’s bochur. His examples are “wrong” – there’s nothing bad about a bochur eating chocolate; in Galicia it was “bad,” today it has nothing to do with it.
[Small Digression: “Kavanos When Eating”]
Someone who loves pizza, you ask him what’s the “kavanah” when eating pizza – he says gematrios, names, everything nice. But that’s not the topic.
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Z. The Real Topic: Not Becoming Obese – It’s Something Deeper
The Problem Isn’t Just “Overeating”
The reason people are gross isn’t only because they overeat. There’s another, more acute problem – various theories exist (fast food, the air, the lifestyle), but meanwhile no solution has been found except Ozempic (after 60 years when all diets didn’t work).
[Digression: Kabbalah-Pshat on America]
In America there’s less “nitzotzos hakedushah” – everything is spread out (like the physical space – in Eretz Yisrael 30 people live in the place where in America one person lives). In Poland, in every glass of water there were “twenty mikvaos”; in America – everything diluted.
One Can’t Just Blame “Overeating”
One can’t say it’s just because people are overeaters. Many people who are “sholt b’yitzram” are gross – there are physical/lifestyle problems, not everything is in the head.
“Never Take a Guru That’s Fat” – Disagree
In India – perhaps. In America/Eretz Yisrael – no. Rabbis have a lifestyle that makes them grosser (sitting all day), and if a rav runs more, they say he’s a “grosser younger.” It’s a catch-22: there are physical problems, not everything is in the mind.
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AA. Conclusion of the First Approach: Physical Problems, Not Just Spiritual
Many of the problems with eating/taavos are physical problems – something is broken in the body (appetite mechanism doesn’t work properly), not just a matter of avodas hamidos or spiritual weakness. Therefore the answer is not to become “more parush” or love food less.
Practical Solutions:
– GLP-1 medications (that make one feel more satiated) – this fixes the physical mechanism, not the mussar.
– Meditations/mindfulness when eating (being more mindful).
– Situational changes (setting up the environment differently).
– This isn’t yet fully worked out, but this is the right direction.
[Small Digression: Customs with Sponge Cake and L’chaim]
By R’ Shaul came someone who made l’chaim everywhere with sponge cake – he became a “drunkard” from the custom. Why can’t one exploit the custom – instead of sponge cake, give celery with water? The point: often the problem is the custom itself (the situation that presents unnecessary temptations), not the person’s character.
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BB. Second Approach (New Chiddush): The Mashal of Gan Eden – “Kafar B’Tovaso Shel Makom”
1. The Mashal of Adam HaRishon in Gan Eden
Hashem placed Adam HaRishon in Gan Eden with all the pleasures of the world: every type of food, every type of enjoyment, even company (Chavah). “Kol eitz nechmad l’mareh v’tov l’ma’achal” – everything was provided, no bill, no payment. Only one thing was forbidden to eat – Eitz HaDa’as.
[Humorous Digression]
In Gan Eden there was Lieber’s potato chips, Waite’s chips, everything – only “Old Williamsburg” brandy (that’s shared at Bobover kiddush) nobody wanted.
2. The Nimshal: Our World Today Is Gan Eden
A direct parallel: Our time is literally like Gan Eden. Hashem placed us in a world where:
– One can order a helicopter
– Uber Eats brings all foods
– One doesn’t need to get up from the bench
– On the internet everything is available
– One presses a button and gets what one wants
But – just like in Gan Eden, there’s also a “nachash” (the internet’s bad side), and several things one may not do.
3. The Critical Point: “Kan Kafar B’Tovaso Shel Makom” (Rashi)
When Adam HaRishon sinned, he said: “Ha’ishah asher natata imadi” – You, Ribbono Shel Olam, are guilty! You made the internet! Rashi says: “Kan kafar b’tovaso shel Makom” – this is denial of HaKadosh Baruch Hu’s goodness. This was the first sin.
4. The Mussar Lesson – Against the “Terrible World” Narrative
Sharp critique of the prevalent rabbinic discourse that says: “Terrible! One can press a button and get what one wants! One can see what one wants! Terrible world!”
– It’s not denied that there’s a “nachash” (problems, tests).
– But – the first thing one must say is hakaras hatov! Hashem provided us a world with unbelievable goodness.
– When the only thing heard in the beis medrash is “terrible, terrible” – that itself is kefira b’tovaso shel Makom, just like Adam HaRishon’s chet.
– Rhetorical question: **”When is tovaso shel Makom mentioned in our
beis medrash?”** – Almost never.
[Historical Digression: How Hard It Was to Sin in the Past]
In the past, a Yid had to struggle very hard to sin – go barefoot to another city, search for a house of ill repute, with danger of punishment (in Spain they killed for it). Today everything is accessible with a button-press. But – the point is that this doesn’t mean one should only speak about the bad; one must first acknowledge the good.
5. The Rambam and Yemos HaMashiach
The Rambam says that when the Midrash says that in yemos hamashiach bread will grow on trees – it must be a mashal, because it’s “not possible in reality.” The ironic point: Baruch Hashem, we’ve already merited much more than that – our world already has more than “bread grows on trees.” We live in a kind of Gan Eden/yemos-hamashiach state, and one must acknowledge this.
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CC. Tovaso Shel Makom – Hakaras HaTov on Technology as Spiritual Repair
Critique: One Doesn’t Thank – One Only Complains
Never has one spoken to Hashem about the good. It’s mentioned only when one wants to be kofeh b’tovaso – like Adam HaRishon who said “ha’ishah asher natata imadi” – one uses Hashem’s goodness as a claim against Him, that it causes bad things.
One presses a button and a non-Jew brings a warm kugel to the door (delivery) – this is literally like malachei hashareis who served Avraham Avinu. The Gemara says that every Yid has 2,800 “CIA agents” (malachim) watching over him.
Practical Proposal (Half Humorous, But 100% Serious):
A New Yom Tov – **Yom Hoda’ah Al Gilui Ha’Internet/Technology**
– Chamisha Asar B’Av would be a fitting day
– One should make a Shulchan Aruch with a list of all technological brachos: cars, telephones, smartphones, computers, internet, AI
– All Yidden should dress in bekitches and say Hodu for the fact that we don’t have to live like our grandfathers – without washing machines, with the terrible toil of washing clothes, baking bread, etc. All this was Adam HaRishon’s sin with tircha – “b’itzavon tochalena.”
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DD. Biblical Foundation: Noach as First “Mashiach” – Shoresh HaNechamah
A New Derasha
– Question: Where is the first time that “nechamah” (in the sense of consolation, not regret) appears in the Torah?
– Answer: By Noach – “Zeh yenachameinu mi’ma’aseinu u’mei’itzavon yadeinu min ha’adamah asher eirar Hashem” (Bereishis 5:29)
– The Gemara says: Noach was a technologist – he invented ways to work more easily
– Shoresh hanechamah = technological progress: Adam HaRishon was cursed with “b’itzavon tochalena,” Noach made it a bit easier, and so on until today – there’s a combine that does almost all the melachos of bread at once
– Conclusion: This is literally the pasuk of nechamah – “zeh yenachameinu” – and never has anyone made a yom tov on the nechamah from Adam HaRishon’s sin!
Concrete Description of This Yom Tov (Humorous But with Serious Intent):
– One will dance with smartphones around the bimah (not burn them like erev Pesach!)
– The Rebbe will enter with a large Tesla
– A large iPad with a chuppah over it
– Like a hachnasas sefer Torah
– One will sing “Zeh yenachameinu mi’ma’aseinu u’mei’itzavon yadeinu”
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EE. Main Answer #2: Simcha Against Atzavus – The Key to Proper Use
The Principle (From Chassidic Sefarim)
– Beis Aharon: The yetzer hara only wants atzavus – sadness is the greatest problem
– Baal HaTanya: One sees clearly that when a person is too happy, he has no bad taavos; when he’s in atzavus, he falls into all aveiros
– Gur: When a person is “uplifted” (happy), he’s pure
Application to Technology
– Why do people fall into aveiros through the internet? Because they’re depressed/sad
– When a person is depressed, the nachash enters
– When a person is satisfied and grateful, he doesn’t eat too much, doesn’t go to bad things on the internet, does everything b’middah
– The answer: If one will thank Hashem for technology (simcha), one will not fall into tests (which come from atzavus)
Practical Halachic Point
– When one buys a new phone or computer, one must make Shehecheyanu – this is halachah
– When one makes birchas hanehenin with kavanah, one doesn’t become gashmiyus’dig from eating (Chassidic sefarim)
– Birchos hashachar as a place where one can thank: “Hanosen lasechvi binah” – playfully that “sechvi” means “silicon” (= smartphone), with a quote (humorously) from Kisvei HaAri that one should have kavanah on this
Back to the Main Claim: Kefira B’Tovaso Shel Makom
– It cannot be that Hashem changed the entire seder ha’olam, made the goodness a thousand times greater, and our main reaction should be protesting against it
– I’m not permitting any issur – but the main reaction cannot be only negative
– Mashal: When someone makes you a huge meal with 24 foods, your first reaction isn’t “you want me to become gross!” – the kavanas hanosen is to give you pleasure
– Yes, there’s a problem that one can “become gross” – but it’s certain that Hashem’s intention is good
– Never has an enemy wanted to harm his foe by making him a huge meal – a great benefit is a sign of love, not hatred
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FF. “Mah Ya’aseh HaBen Shelo Yecheta” – Chassidic Reading
[Side Digression with Chassidic Story]
The Midrash “mah ya’aseh haben shelo yecheta” – what should a person do so he won’t sin? A Chassidic story (from the Ruzhiner or another Rebbe) gives a novel reading. This is “b’derech Chassidus” and not “b’derech Aristo” – a Chassidic way, not a philosophical analytical way.
Main Point: This doesn’t mean “sadism” (masochism/suffering as a value). The simcha isn’t that one should suffer, but that one should understand the entire framework differently.
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GG. Returning to the Ramban – Eating Properly vs. Eating Too Much
The Ramban doesn’t say one shouldn’t eat, but that one should eat properly and well.
The Diagnosis of the Problem:
– Generally one doesn’t eat well – one eats too much, one doesn’t enjoy enough
– One isn’t b’simcha
– One tries the whole time to fill a “hole” inside oneself
– Eating itself isn’t enough as advice – one also needs simcha
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HH. Context Changes Everything – Seudas Shabbos vs. Supper
Key Argument: Eating a seudas Shabbos is fundamentally different from eating a regular supper, even when eating the same foods. Why? Because a person is a “medaber” – a person lives in stories (narratives), and how he understands himself determines the essence of the experience. It’s not “magic” – it’s the narrative-context that changes reality.
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II. The Practical Conclusion: Changing Our Relationship to Technology
This is the main practical point of the entire shiur:
“You need to change the relationship. You need to change our relationship to all technology.”
The Mashal: When a person opens his computer or phone in the morning, it should come with a “Modeh Ani” feeling:
– “Wow, this is an amazing tool! I can connect with the entire world!”
– Afterwards – “look at the mezuzah” (be careful not to stumble with bad things)
– But the first moment cannot be a protest: “Terrible, I’m the shegetz who has a smartphone, it’s a devil” – that’s the wrong approach.
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JJ. The Emunah Argument: It’s Not a “Beis Zonos”
According to emunah: Hashem gives you these things (technology, taavos, marriage). If you convince yourself that this is a “beis zonos” – then you have a problem.
The Truth: “This is your wife. It’s not a beis zonos. It’s ‘ishah asher nasati’ – that Hashem gave you. It’s a tremendous thing.”
The Difference: When people relate to something with simcha and gratitude – “they’re happy” – then it doesn’t become a beis zonos. It only becomes a beis zonos when one doesn’t have simcha, when one feels guilt and shame.
Conclusion: “And then it will be good. Shalom Yisrael.”
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KK. The Title of This Shiur
The title of this video should be: “Chamisha Asar B’Av Is a Yom Tov on Embracing Technology.”
There’s a derush how this fits with the Gemara on Tu B’Av, but that remains a “cliffhanger” for a future shiur.
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General Structure of the Entire Shiur:
“`
[A] Foundation: Moshel b’nafsho – every generation has its own task
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[B] Reality has radically changed – abundance of products/options
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[C] “Prishus” means something completely different today than in the past
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[D] Material conditions shape the content of midos
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[E] Nobody speaks about taavos today – because the old discourse doesn’t fit
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[F] “Too many types” isn’t the right category; cultural relativity
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[G] We need a new language – contextualism (not relativism)
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[H] Picture/paradigm better than abstract rules
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[I] Aristotle’s approach – limited for a Yid
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[J] Pills/Ozempic discussion – choice argument rejected
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[K] Everyone agrees one needs “aveiros” for normalcy
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[L] Approach #1: Problems with eating are often physical, not mussar
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[M] Approach #2 (chiddush): Gan Eden mashal → kefira b’tovaso shel Makom
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[N] Noach = first technologist → “zeh yenachameinu”
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[O] Answer: Simcha/gratitude = antidote to tests (atzavus = root of aveiros)
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[P] Practical: Change the relationship to technology – “Modeh Ani” when opening phone
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[Q] Conclusion: Hashem’s intention is benefit, not test – treat it as a gift
“`
📝 Full Transcript
Desires in Today’s World: How the Reality of Abundance Has Changed the Nature of Nisayon (Trial)
Opening and Organizational Remarks
Instructor: Also, I hope it helps. Do you have enough batteries?
Student: Yes.
Instructor: Seven hours, okay. Yes, I can speak for seven hours. Not that this is the thing for batteries, I already know. I have that it’s enough. It shows one hundred percent.
The thing is like this: Someone told me that I give so many shiurim (lectures) only about ta’avos (desires, appetites). People will think that this is the one thing that I know. I have to stop, as I said with this. So, trying to finish with this shiur. Maybe next week there will also be a shiur. I mean not, I’m going away next week, maybe there won’t be any shiur.
Student: Where are you going?
Instructor: On vacation. Somewhere in Pennsylvania I think. Who could have known this? It’s not just a place, some kind of house for a year or something, I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t make the arrangements, there’s a governor. Shabbos near Fleischmanns.
So anyway, in any case, so I don’t know, maybe really really one shouldn’t speak here too much. But one thing is very important to me. It’s really a very important topic. The Rambam (Maimonides) speaks about this a lot, and all the Chassidic sefarim (books) speak about this very much. And maybe one does need to speak about this a lot, I don’t know.
Ah, the trick is simply to have a different title each time. No one needs to know what to speak about inside. The title needs to be changed. About ta’avos. I’ve given too many shiurim about ta’avos, and people are saying that it’s starting to come out that I’m like Eli Roth (film director known for graphic content). Eli Roth has a lot of scenes. Maybe it’s actually good, on the contrary, maybe this is what people want to hear. Because people struggle with this.
So I want to say like this, I want… a few points that we’ve discussed, and to add a few more complications, and see that one can accomplish something also. So, I want to make a few introductions, lighter things, to get to something that’s complicated, which I wanted to speak about last time, it seems they messed up the story. I didn’t find it. I thought about how one could find for this that there’s a connection in the Rambam and the sources, I didn’t find it clearly, but it’s like this, I did find an important thing. I had a shiur today on a different topic, and it came out with this, I’ll say it again, that shiur wasn’t recorded, it’s like the Rebbe says one is a kohen (priest).
The Fundamental Point: Nisgaber Al Atzmo and Moshel B’nafsho
So like this, in all the Chassidic sefarim, and everyone spoke about this, there was a shiur this week, two nights ago about how ta’avos is like a very basic thing in chinuch (education), yes, we spoke about this point, two shiurim ago it was.
So the topic of nisgaber al atzmo (overcoming oneself) to be like the Gemara (Talmud) says, a sholeit b’yitzro (one who rules over his inclination), or a moshel b’nafsho (one who rules over his soul), moshel b’rucho (one who rules over his spirit). In a very significant sense it means ta’avos. One can speak about ruling against another thing, against ka’as (anger), against other netiyas ra’os (bad inclinations) that a person has. In a very basic sense it speaks about this, and one says that there’s a certain way, it can be about everything, etc.
Every Generation Has Its Own Mitzvah and Nisayon
Now, it’s very interesting, one always needs to know the… the contexts, what kind of generation, and what kind of reality people live in, and what kind, consequently which kind of mitzvos (commandments), which kind of aveiros (transgressions), which kind of midos (character traits), are relevant to be yes.
And certainly Rebbe Elimelech (of Lizhensk) says that every generation has a certain mitzvah that that generation was created to do, yes? It’s written in Rebbe Elimelech, he says tzitzis (ritual fringes). For some reason, Rebbe Elimelech said that it’s tzitzis. Something he meant with this? Yes, creating tzitzis, I don’t know.
The Ba’al HaTanya (Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi, founder of Chabad) said that one must wear tzitzis outside. That’s not what he meant. Today one must go with tzitzis outside. He meant that it’s a kind of concept.
He heard a certain Jew, he said, what is the mitzvah of today’s generation? Peri’as ba’al chov mitzvah (paying one’s debts is a mitzvah). Peri’as ba’al chov mitzvah. The mitzvah of today’s generation.
The Necessity to Match Torah with Reality
Anyway, so it’s important to grasp that… we are often not in sync, that’s the thing, and by us the custom is that we say Torah teachings that were once, but one must also be a bit meshadeich (match up) with reality, a great shidduch (match).
And what this means is, that one must be able to understand how all these important things fit in, all these values, all the virtues, the virtues that were once spoken about, and how they fit into the reality in which we live.
So for example, when I was in yeshiva ketana (high school yeshiva) the rosh yeshiva (yeshiva dean) there was very upset about how the world is filled with gashmiyus (materialism), as it’s called gashmiyus. And he worked very strongly against gashmiyus there, that people shouldn’t have gashmiyus, be gashmiyus, megushamim (materialistic).
So one must grasp that it’s true that there seems to be such a change. In other words, if I speak today about prishus (abstinence, moderation), right, or moderation, right, eating less, sleeping less, and so on, one must grasp that it means something very different when one says this in New York in 2026, than when it was said in Königsberg in 1822, or in Mezhbizh in 1742. It means something very different, because of the kind of life that we have, which is very different in the most basic sense in this.
And one must know… I mean to say such a simple thing, the reality has changed.
The Radical Change in the Reality of Abundance
What does it mean the reality has changed means like this: that when one went to the store thirty years ago even, or beyond the wall (i.e., long ago) three hundred years ago, there were about three products to buy. Okay, one can buy meat, one can buy chicken if it was that day, not even in the store, one has to go to the shochet (ritual slaughterer), slaughter, or butcher, whatever. One can buy fish, one can buy… in certain cities there were a few more things, a big city, but one can buy four kinds of vegetables in the winter, three vegetables in the summer now. That was the ta’avos. Right?
And the same thing is with other ta’avos which I’m not allowed to speak about so much anymore. In any case, there are also today many more options, even there are today many more ways. So that’s what it was, right?
Now, if I go today to the store here on 18th Avenue, I think that… I think that… I think they sell about thirty thousand items… something like that number? It’s in the tens of thousands.
Student: Supermarket?
Instructor: A normal market, here the big supermarket here, has tens of thousands of items. Tens of thousands. A tiny grocery has over ten thousand items. My big… a corner grocery store has over ten thousand items. That means ten thousand different types.
Again, there are four kinds of salt, from the plain salt, then there’s the coarse salt, another six kinds, each one tastes a bit different. There are those who understand the difference. The kugel means, it’s everything, it’s crazy, crazy amount, and it’s almost not the… the snacks section is a whole section. I don’t know the difference, my children know the difference of the different snacks, but there are five hundred different snacks.
In short, when we were children, what was the symbol of a non-kosher… one speaks like it’s the difficult thing. You know? You know? It was such a true…
Student: No, even… ah, one can even speak about the kosher, right?
Instructor: And certainly the… the Eidah HaChareidis (a strict kosher certification agency in Jerusalem) didn’t used to give any hechsher (kosher certification) on chocolate, until there came the Rav I think, was called with the name Shmuel. He said that it’s missing, he wanted to eat it himself, I don’t think so.
In any case, and then there was a Chassidic Jew, he said… Reb Nosson I think, Reb Nosson, he said when the Eidah Chareidis started giving a hechsher on chocolate, he said that it does have a hechsher from the Eidah, but no hechsher from the sefer yet. So he didn’t eat it.
Student: I don’t want the ice cream?
Instructor: The Rebbe Chaim speaks a lot of mussar (ethical teachings) against being a glutton which is there…
Student: Yes yes, it’s there that it doesn’t fit with a Chassidic sefer. It’s not hard, it’s not hard to read. It’s Divrei Chaim (sefer by Rabbi Chaim Halberstam of Sanz).
Instructor: Yes, he writes very nicely. He writes clearly, relatively. The Satmar Rebbe used to say for the bachurim (yeshiva students) what to learn, I think from this.
Student: Yes.
Instructor: Also others, Chassidim, it was in certain places that it was a very basic sefer that was learned.
What can I say with this? That one must grasp that even within the last fifty years, when one lives today grown up, there were three hundred kinds of kosher wine that one could buy. And how many kinds of wine are there in the store? Okay, how many kinds of wine are there today to buy in the store?
Student: Also, a few thousand.
Instructor: Kosher. I think a few thousand. I don’t have a few thousand, I’m afraid. Come, the world doesn’t always change, everything is still a bit more with us. It’s not like the non-Jewish store, but… in short, so, thank God, it’s a very great abundance.
I want, I want, I want, I want not that one must grasp this. I feel that we’ve also been speaking about ta’avos, I don’t know, maybe the mashgichim (spiritual supervisors) haven’t been speaking to me about speaking this way. I want to write, what are you doing? Ah now, this is a question, I want to put down. Okay, okay, one must speak about this. One must speak about this.
Student: Yes, why is there so much that people seek this?
Instructor: No, the world with people. There are all kinds of reasons. I don’t want capitalism. Ah, that can also be. It could be that one is not more materialistic, it could be that one is less materialistic.
What I want to get at is something that one used to sit down to eat and today one eats the whole day. No one even asks if there’s a seudah (meal). I mean once this was a huge seudah, a nice respectable Jew. A shalom says. The game for is not. Seven items?
Student: No, that’s frugal.
Instructor: I was frugal up there, people started to make fruit? Expensive things, memory, tangerines in the winter, there won’t be tangerines in the winter.
The Material Conditions of Midos: How Material Abundance Forms Spiritual Values
The Modern World of Material Abundance
Instructor: One must speak about this. Why should one feel that people seek this? No, the world will come more. There are all kinds of reasons. Ah, that can also be. It could be that one is not more materialistic, it could be that one is less more materialistic. No, but even the eating, but what I feel to get at is something more… one eats the whole day. No one even has a story that there’s a seudah. I mean once this was a huge seudah for a respectable Jewish person, that first children twenty is such a… a kiddush. What was it? Seven items? No, no one. No, that’s frugal. I was frugal. Expensive things, nice things. Memory, tangerines in the winter. There will be tangerines in the winter. I’ll just remember I already think. I think your old dinner is. I say, it’s not… no way, it’s not… no way, no way. What is it? That’s what’s interesting. One minute, it’s agreed, people agree that the reality is very very different, okay?
Example: Ice Machines and Hot Water Machines
One said, I have in my house a machine that all day makes ice. I need a drink that’s a bit colder, I need… and I grew up, and one could buy it, but it didn’t come. Today almost every freezer comes with it already. And one doesn’t even need to remember to put in the trays and make ice. I press a button, and ice comes into the water. Just now it’s broken, I have to unfortunately drag it myself. It doesn’t come by itself, it’s really a trouble.
And if I want hot, I have a machine, it makes exactly hot. So you press a button, one hundred and two hundred degrees you need to be the tea, or two hundred and twelve degrees, or two hundred and three degrees. Because the experts say that the three hundred tea… hello, this is something… a level that no one had. I mean that no one, maybe some king, I don’t know.
Now, what does this mean? Ah, here there’s a real thing. What do I want to bring out here? One needs something, something must bring me out here. I don’t have a clear way to think. I think that something changes, and I think also, so one must understand that… let’s say another fact, okay? I’m trying, I’m trying, I’m trying to help myself think.
Every Society Has Its Own Midos
So here, as there is in every society, we’ve already spoken about this, every society, every Chassidic group, even by non-Jewish societies, there are certain virtues that are spoken about, certain virtues, certain mitzvos, which things one may yes, which things one may not. There’s no place that doesn’t have Torah in this sense, right? About which things does one speak?
Now, everyone, theoretically everyone holds of everything. Yes, he should be a tzaddik (righteous person), and a chacham (wise person), and a gibbor (mighty person), and everything. In practice, every place speaks its midos. In practice, as one says, what’s the difference between a Lubavitcher and a Breslover? A Breslover one is more engaged in tefillah (prayer) in a simple way, and a Lubavitcher one is more engaged in hisbonenus (contemplation/meditation). Both agree that they are both good things, they’re not arguing. But that’s the story, the middah (character trait) that’s spoken about in the circles, that’s the thing.
The Difference Between Different Chassidic Groups
A good Breslover Chassid is not the same thing as a good Lubavitcher Chassid is also not the same thing as a good Karlin Chassid. And each of these has a different meaning, right?
I went to… I was a little boy. I went to Reb Mottel Zilber and drove him crazy. What is… what? Boy. I mean to sit. What is the essence? I don’t fit into I don’t know. Why? I’ll say differently. Ger didn’t have everyone. Ger had from Coca-Cola with white potato chips. Ah, in short, so, so, so, I understood what is the essence of Chassidus, and what is the difference of other Chassidic groups, and why is it so?
Reb Mottel Zilber’s Explanation About Simcha
He explained to me that all Chassidim for example hold of simcha (joy). But it doesn’t mean that simcha has the same meaning. According to Karlin simcha means one thing, and according to Breslov it means a second thing. And in Amshinov it means a third thing, everyone holds simcha, generally all Chassidim almost. I mean everyone is under the topic of simcha. And how one describes it, is very difficult, he doesn’t have words.
But if you know, if you go to a tisch (Chassidic gathering) in Karlin, and a tisch in Amshinov, and a tisch in Breslov, and a tisch in I already know, you’ll see there that the simcha means something else, and Ger also means a bit different the simcha. And then Slonim shows how one thinks simcha. Something it means, which one doesn’t know exactly.
Now, if you see people, how they live, how does one make a farbrengen (Chassidic gathering) there? It looks very different, today maybe everything is the same. It’s slightly different, it’s a different taste, like the… it has a different taste. It’s difficult, it’s difficult to do this. Maybe if someone is very smart, he could find words, if he’s very creative and literary, and you understand, you can find words for the difference. But it’s different, it’s different midos, or it’s different takes on the same midos.
The Main Point: Midos Have Different Expressions in Different Places
What I want to bring out from this is just, ah… it makes more sense, one can even find more sense if one wants, such a thing, such a kind of thing to do in this place and in that place not to do in the name of the same middah. So something is the reality.
Material Conditions Form the Midos
Ta’avos and Culture: The Problem of “Coarseness” in a World of Abundance
The Hypocrisy Problem with Mussar Against Ta’avos
Prove me wrong. This is an observation.
In Satmar, the rabbis don’t have cars, they have a gabbai’s car. They would tell you, very good, they have an answer to the question. Many people have an answer to the question, right? He’ll tell you like you’re saying. I can talk about ta’avos, but in practice, come here, my Shabbos table already has ten thousand calories you can eat at my Shabbos table without taking doubles, I’m going to speak against ta’avos, it doesn’t make any sense.
So he looks at it that they are so far, they’re not relevant at all. What will we do? We’ll find other mitzvos. That’s how he looks at it, or he’s embarrassed, or he feels like a hypocrite.
Or if he does speak, he’ll speak against it like this. If that person will indeed grasp that he lives in a world that is 10,000 levels of pleasures of this world more than anyone who spoke against it ever even dreamed, he’ll speak against it!
The Question of “Too Many Varieties” – A False Category?
So look what a kind of buried world. He can say why does the grocery bakery need 25 types of cakes? What, three cakes is enough? One cake isn’t enough. You grasp that your mashal has no parallel to the nimshal. If one shouldn’t have pleasure, he’s angry that there are so many ta’avos. But it seems that it’s a wrong category of analysis.
And you say that the 35,000 types of cakes is too much ta’avah, it sounds modern. I mean that it’s something else. Why? Someone who only has two or three… let’s say three is more than nothing. Why is two or three? Yes, against cakes. If you say one shouldn’t, only bread. So it’s the same taste.
Let’s add another piece of evidence. If you don’t agree with me that there’s such a problem… No, no, I mean to say that there’s another kind between three and five and thirty.
The Badchan’s Joke: “Chassidic Foods” vs. “Coarse Foods”
There once was a badchan, or it’s the property of the badchan, who used to explain that there are such things as chassidic foods and coarse foods. Really, everyone knows, pizza with sushi, that’s coarse, but kugel with kishke, those are refined foods. Right? No.
That’s how they talk. By the same people… one minute. This is a fact, right? By the people who look at it this way and speak about it actively, literally the rav doesn’t let them open a pizza shop in his town, or sushi, or whatever the new thing is this week, I don’t know anymore, it’s already fifteen years ago, right, there’s something new. A Milford one may not bring to kiddush, but a coarse kugel one may, and even a yopchik, whatever it is, right?
The Badchan’s Fantasy: The Baal Shem Tov in America
And you remember there was a badchan who used to describe how, and it’s lucky that the Baal Shem Tov wasn’t in America, because there would have been such a thing as Ropshitzer pizza, and Kretchnifer French fries, and there would have been, Chassidus would have had such a food that the Rebbe distributes, and because the Rebbe cut the pizza this way, and there would have been a whole avodah of cutting the pizza. And the Skulener Rebbe used to cut the pizza with such beautiful triangles, and he had in mind all kinds of sefiros, and he used to put a lot of everything on his pizza, and so on. There would have been customs in everything.
Actually, the Baal Shem Tov was in Poland, and as you say, they loved kugel.
The Polish Goyim and the “Jewish” Foods
My father loved to tell that next to us in our house there used to be, maybe it’s still there, there were many Polish goyim who used to come work by the Jews, and they made a restaurant, and there they used to sell kishke, with cholent, everything with pig meat, with all the Jewish foods. In short, all these things that you thought were something of oneg Shabbos, the Polish goyim used to eat the same thing. And they still eat it.
The Sephardim don’t know about this, Uri. They have their own goyim, their goyim eat. Their goyim, yes.
Cultural Relativism – A Good Question Without a Good Answer
So in short, you grasp? So what I want to bring out from this, so the person uses it as a joke. Ah, so it’s just cultural, this is cultural relativism. What you call a refined food, it’s just because you’re used to it being that the goyim in your town used to eat that. But it’s nothing more coarse than pizza.
I mean that it has a good question, his answer isn’t a good answer. What’s the question? What’s the question? What’s the question? Yes. Why? There’s everyone, we all sense that there’s such a thing as being a coarse boy, there’s such a thing as a refined young man.
This is a bent answer. That’s what I’m trying to say. Cultural relativism in my opinion, I have a question without an answer. Therefore it must be it’s nothing. I’m making fun. Our whole approach is that one must ask all the joking questions, so better answers should be found.
The Factor of Time and History
If it’s a new food, let’s say the last fifty years, the last ten years. Everything that’s new, means to say, to come to it there’s less thought, less history to it. When I eat a piece of potato kugel, it’s already two hundred years that people eat potato kugel. The Baal Shem Tov was already in Baal Toch, I don’t know. I did it. But two hundred years people eat potato kugel. So somewhere there’s already more stories about it. There’s something of thought that’s in it.
I can tell you stories about sushi in a year. If you’re here in twenty years from now, it will actually be fine. Some story? Some story? Some story? Some story when he eats something?
Discussion About the Internet
Student: Yes, yes, they spoke… about this the internet was ten years ago, and today it’s permitted, because in the beginning internet there are no stories. Today there’s already what… something I think…
Instructor: Okay, let me know. I want to go back. I want… I wanted to call somewhere. I don’t know where anymore, but what you’re saying is very true, I am I am a shiur about this I meant here, I meant here.
The Main Argument: We Need a New Language for Ta’avah Today
What I want to bring out is that I don’t think that you could assume that everything is the same. There should be more against all the flavors of ice cream that exist. I assume, and I try to bring out from all these examples to show that there’s something of a problem here, there’s something of a difference. And you can’t, and why is this?
I mean that if you want all the things that we spoke about, and perhaps what I myself don’t know. We can understand why it’s so. To say not to be a baal ta’avah has to do with, just as one can’t make it stand on one thing, one can’t say everything, okay, ta’avah doesn’t mean not to feel the tickle that one feels in the nose, in the street, in the tongue when one eats something, too much. Then there wouldn’t be any difference at all.
And I show that there is indeed a difference, and I show that it’s a human being, “venafshoh sholetes beta’avoso,” there’s such a kind of person. And this kind of person, a person is such a kind of thing that lives in a city, he lives with other people, he lives in a society, right?
Ta’avah Is Not Just “Bein Adam Le’atzmo”
And when you live in the midos of a person also have to do with, even the middah of ta’avah, I spoke about this earlier, even the middah of ta’avah which looks completely like a middah bein adam le’atzmo as if, it’s not completely true, because what ta’avah means and what kind of ta’avah you have, comes with stories that you say, has to do with what kind of society you live in.
And since we live at this moment in a society that is something like a level of pleasures that is very hard to imagine, I mean that, I’m sure that there’s a good middah and a bad middah regarding this. I’m not saying that therefore the strap is loosened, I’m not saying that therefore it’s permitted, yes, the strap is loosened.
What I do want to say is, that whatever the holy sefarim and how they describe what is bad and how they describe what is good, one must rewrite, not rewrite, one must speak about something else, because the bad is different from what we’re talking about, and the good is different from what we’re talking about. It’s not the same issue.
I mean that we need a different language to describe what is a coarse person today and not a coarse person today, and what would be the proper person.
The Difficulty of This Work
And it’s not easy to do that, because as that person said, as you say, there were chassidic Jews who said that one can’t go to America because the students of the Baal Shem didn’t purify the air. Really, I don’t know at all how to do it. I mean that here there’s something of a… yes.
Student: America is impure.
Concrete Example: Eishishok 1920 vs. Lakewood 2026
Instructor: Okay, but remember that the last, I just want to understand. You’re doing a certain… I agree and a bit not, because I don’t completely agree that the definition is that everything has to do with the power, or something like that, because there were all enemies of Israel, because that’s also a certain, like they made it stand on one thing, a certain rule, and I don’t believe in rules, or not enough. One must look mainly at forms more than at rules, because that is, a rule is a word, a rule is something like a… let’s understand.
The Fact Is This
The fact is this, right? The fact is that my Rosh Yeshiva (head of yeshiva) who lived in 1870, okay? He’s still alive, but he lived in 1870, not in 19… okay, I don’t know, maybe I’ll make it seven… let’s say in 1920, it makes no difference.
Eishishok 1920: The Extra Pretzel is a Chaya Ra’ah (Wild Beast)
There, truly, yes, he’s already sold out, just like that it’s not… but there truly, a bachur (yeshiva student), a yeshiva bachur who goes and he puts, I don’t know what was his example of a ta’avah (desire), yes, that he buys for lunch an extra piece of pizza because the pizza in yeshiva wasn’t good, or the rice that they gave in yeshiva, is a coarse young man. And it’s true.
Truly, in Eishishok in 1920, the bachur who went out from yeshiva and bought another pretzel was a chaya ra’ah (wild beast). He was a ba’al ta’avah (one controlled by desires).
Lakewood 2026: The Same Act is Normal
In Lakewood or in Boro Park in 2026, when the one who does this is a normal person. The one who does this is not some kind of crazy creature. I want to say a kook. I’m not saying it’s an objective thing.
Why? I’ll tell you why. Because also in Eishishok, the one who put salt on his pretzel, there wasn’t any pretzel back then, whatever they ate, wasn’t a ba’al ta’avah, he was a normal person. The one who didn’t put any salt, perhaps he was a great oved (servant of God), a great sagfan (ascetic), perhaps he was already too much in a middah ra’ah (bad trait), already too much of a, as the Rambam calls it, inui ba’al hargashah (affliction with feeling), something was wrong with him. There was nothing wrong with putting salt, true?
The Opposite: Who Doesn’t Eat the Extra in Lakewood
And in Lakewood, the one who doesn’t buy the extra piece of pretzel, whatever they sell today in the canteen, he’s not a person. I don’t think, I don’t make shidduchim (marriage matches) with him. I told him, I’m only a shadchan (matchmaker) for people who laugh at my nivul peh (crude language) like me. I already don’t have any nivul peh here. I already said, very good is… what am I saying? Well, whatever. My thing is lashon hara (forbidden speech). I’m his chiluk (distinction).
Do you understand me? He’s not a person, he’s not a gever bigvarin (a man among men), he’s not a person among people. There’s such a… now, one can talk, this is a different conversation.
Ta’avat Achilah (Desire for Food): Context and Middot (Character Traits) (Continued)
Example from Lakewood – The Pretzel Buyer
And in Lakewood, the one who doesn’t buy the extra piece of pretzels, whatever they sell today in the canteen in the camp, he’s not a person. I don’t trust, I don’t make shidduchim with him.
I didn’t say, I’m still a shadchan for people who laugh at my nivul peh like me. I already don’t have any speech, very good is what I say, what I say, one speaks, it’s lashon hara, until a chiluv (mixing, confusion).
Do you understand me? Because he’s not a gever bigvarin, he’s not a person among people.
There’s such a… now, one can talk about this, it’s a different conversation, about being too much in reshut (domain), the Rambam… yes, this is one of the sugyot (topics) that stands here in the Pri Megadim in the nosa (topic).
Rejecting Both Answers
But I just want to bring out, there, one can’t say, when I say this that the teirutz (answer) that people say, two teirutzim are not correct:
Not the teirutz that everything is relative, and it supports what we say that overeating, when last week it was a ta’avah, but kugel wasn’t, it’s just nonsense, it comes out that everything depends on where one was born and when one was born, that’s not true.
And also this is the free answer, as if the cynical answer, which says, it’s not true, but as you say, it’s not dependent on what one eats, it’s dependent on how much one is preoccupied with it, how much time it takes from his mind. It could be that now is true in the end.
Halacha L’ma’aseh (In Practical Terms) – There is a Chiluk
But halacha l’ma’aseh, when we speak of middot we speak like the halachot (laws), how it looks, yes there is a chiluk, one agrees that there is such a situation where the one who eats, goes out from yeshiva to buy a pretzel there at the stand outside where he sells pretzels is a chaya (beast), a piece of a chaya, not in the Mishnah, not in the proper middat ha’aretz v’aretz (proper character trait).
But in a different tekufah (period) and in a different city he’s not, he’s normal, he’s not a ba’al ta’avah at all.
Both, now what to bring how to think about both of them? I don’t know, I don’t know if one can reckon this way. And from this I mean that… and I truly mean this. It’s very difficult, one must understand this.
Example from the Shinover Rebbe – Bread with Butter
If you will read, as that one said, I spoke here about that Reb Pinchas’l Koritzer with the Maggid Mesharim, if you will read such numbers, as that one said that he was a tzaddik (righteous person), he ate…
Yes, the Shinover Rebbe knew, the Shinover Rebbe said that bread with butter one may eat until the temples hurt. Have you heard such a maimra (saying) once? It’s written in Reb Yankele.
This, one eats so much in working and pulling here. Because somewhere it says bread with butter is a normal food, you want to eat, eat as much as you want. This is his basic things. With butter, not without butter. So I saw in the Shinover rule.
This is a Contextual Thing
This is a contextual thing, right? One can say that here in Boro Park rib-eye steak one can eat as much as one wants, it’s no different than by him bread with butter.
No, why are you making such a… who was the last time who ate bread with butter? Who eats bread with butter? I don’t understand what you’re talking about.
Okay, not every day. Okay, so let’s find something else. What does one eat every day? Cereal with milk, okay? I don’t know what this is with the children.
But imagine that the holy Shinover said that cereal with milk one can eat as much as one wants. Well, even the sweet cereal. Pebbles, pebbles, cocoa pebbles.
Understand? This is just… no, what do I want to bring out? I just want to bring from the dugma’ot (examples), that…
Two Ways to Define a Middah
This is how the Rambam learns and all the mefarshim (commentators) agree only this way. You can’t say that everything is like a kamut (quantity) or everything is like a tenu’ah pnimit (inner movement).
There are yes external things when we speak of middot in terms of pe’ulot (actions), and say that the middah is the thing that is gorem (causes) the pe’ulot, and therefore these things are contextual, and therefore, that he lives in a certain world, and therefore, today what is living in a world where there are 37,000 other items in the supermarket.
Klal (General Rule) vs. Dugma (Example)
It can’t be that the description, if you want to describe yourself, as one says, there are two ways that you describe a middah, or every thing, also a hagdarah (definition) in lomdut (Talmudic analysis), there is one way to say a klal, or a definition.
A middah is like you say, whoever loves this too much, it’s to think about this more than ten minutes later, I have many torot (teachings), one can say dugma’ot, definitions, or another sort of thing. This is one way of giving a gederah (definition).
There is another way of giving a gederah, which is in the nosa of ma’asim (actions), that middot tovot (good character traits) is an inyan ma’asi (practical matter). Learn that this is the better way.
What is the better way? To give a… I say it in English this is called a rule or a paradigm? Two different things. Right? Yes.
I give you an example, a picture, the person or the ma’aseh (action), this is the best picture, this is a pure picture of… understand this way? Do you know what I mean, God forbid I already said the klalim (rules) in epistemology?
This is the best example of the one who has the middah. I tell you a ma’aseh, I give you a picture, I give you a specific image, a certain mashal (parable), it could be there are in this to mix other things, I give you a pure mashal, the best mashal for this, the best picture for this. Understand what I’m saying?
The Better Way – A Picture
If I seek a picture of what is the middah, one who has, or one who conducts himself in the middot ra’ot (bad character traits), the middah ra’uyah (proper) regarding ta’avot (desires). The rules are not so useful, in general by me the rules are less useful.
I’ll tell you, I’ll tell you a mashal, what brings out the best the person? Who is the person? True?
And when I will tell you this way, you will understand that the person when he lives in I don’t know where, in Ropshitz in the year 1810, he looks very different than the same person who lives in Boro Park in the year 2027.
The Idea is the Same When It Doesn’t Look the Same
And if he will try to imitate, no, it’s not the same. The idea, I tell you, we’re not speaking now about the idea, I want to speak on more a practical level, that I’m not sure that this is the same, I reckon that halacha l’ma’aseh is different.
And if he will try to imitate, it won’t be what that one was at all. It’s very opposite, the idea is not the same, and the idea is the same when it doesn’t look the same. I don’t know, I don’t know what I’m trying to say.
A Sharp Observation
I see that the fact is that most people who conducted themselves that they don’t live in I don’t know there in Tzanz in 1850, don’t know what to speak about ta’avot. They don’t know. The only people who know are those who pretend that one can still live there.
Questions and Discussion
Student: I have a question. The question is this, I think the whole time, why not actually? Perhaps all these people who don’t live two thousand years ago, one who instead of going to the well to take out water, he goes and he goes to the sink and takes a cup. What can one do? It’s very convenient, but we are already ba’alei ta’avot. We have already gotten so used to it.
But it doesn’t make any sense. I understand that actually not with a cup of water, but perhaps if one travels with a car instead of traveling with a horse and wagon, it could already be that he’s a ba’al ta’avah. The world has moved something. I don’t actually know to what, but I still hear the kashya (question), I still don’t hear the teirutz. Convenience? That means… something I don’t understand. No life, no shi’ur (measure)?
Maggid Shiur (Lecturer): No, I think still… on one hand I think, on the contrary, perhaps actually they are all ba’alei… perhaps actually, the ta’avah is still the same. What can one do? We’re already very far, but it doesn’t make any sense. I’m not allowed to travel with any horse and wagon because it’s slower than a car. Something there is a shi’ur.
Digression – Couch and Bench
I think that when he sits on a bench, a man sees that a couch is a treif (non-kosher) thing, and who knows who. There are such people? There are such people? I mean that Reb Mottel sits on a couch, he doesn’t hold this way, but when he sits he feels that it’s not bad.
No, but he’s already a rebbe, he doesn’t learn. He doesn’t learn. I don’t know, it’s like this, yes, a ba’al habaytish (householder-like). It’s not a couch. A bench, it’s not bad a bench. A bank, a bench is not too much. No. But one can go out. Well, a normal person who does this, would be very crazy to say…
I hear the kashya, I don’t have a mahalach (approach), I’m saying a kashya. This is not a kashya. I asked the same kashya earlier. It’s worth more than a week to say.
Back to the Main Kashya
It would be very crazy to say, as I say, it would be very crazy to say one of the two teirutzim. Either the whole thing is fake. Everyone says part of what the modern shachen (neighbor) does, but…
And the second would be very crazy to say that… he’s not right with this. That what? That essentially one should have been?
No, that the modern shachen is the other extreme. It could be, I’m not saying that the modern shachen is a tzaddik. I’m just saying that… what he is, with this means just sach hakol (in sum), the chiluk that we call with this, this means just sach hakol, he lives in a different style, in a different world, he should actually live on the same block, but he lives in a different…
Context vs. Relativism
It could be this is a bad society, it’s just a thing a bad society, I’m not saying there’s no such thing. But one can’t say that it would have been, it’s very weird. It could be one must say this, I’m not saying, I just want to be mechadesh (innovate) the prompt.
It could be, I don’t know, I don’t have a ra’ayah (proof) that there’s no such thing that the society is full of ta’avot, and actually the whole thing is to uproot the whole thing. One must go live in the midbar (desert) for forty years, perhaps as if and if.
I’m not saying it has a different middat hamitzvah (measure of the commandment), yes? This is what you’re saying. I’m not saying it has a different, I’m saying one can’t speak at all about the middah without speaking after what there is a certain world. Perhaps the same middat hamitzvot, he doesn’t speak, but they will express themselves differently.
I don’t want to say it’s relative, it’s contextual and not relative. But you’re saying that the context is important, it’s not a neged (contrary) thing.
Example from Kashrut – “Go See What the Ehrliche Yidden Eat”
I say it in kashrut there is, I know, the holy rebbe used to, when he was in Jerusalem, he knew that only the ehrliche charedim (upright ultra-Orthodox) in the land is the only thing that one is not allowed to eat, everything is treif. He sent to America for money.
The first time he asked him, what should I do from America? What should I do from America? What should I do no question eat? He told him, go see what the ehrliche Yidden (upright Jews) there. Ehrliche Yidden ask them, what do the frumste (most religious) eat? What you should also do.
Even the edah (community) in the land are the only good thing, but the edah in the land are the frumste. No, I say so the context…
No, I didn’t say it’s so kashur (proper). You know that it’s American certainly treif. A lot can’t be as good as the edah. But this means that the edah is not truly.
No, this means to say that one can’t… it could be that there’s such a thing that one encounters a context. And you want to be a certain counter, he will hold that this is a previous thing, a Sephardic thing.
I Can’t Answer It
And kodem kol (first of all), I tell you, I shouldn’t answer, I can’t answer that one should say that yes, he has a different normal, what is normal in that area is not at all normal according to the truth, all people, there’s not one person who is a normal person, always they walk with their wives, and good day. Is this truly terrible, and true, yes, this is how the Chassidic Jews hold, and certain of them, yes?
Example of Walking with One’s Wife
In Ger? It’s not only in Ger. And this is truly coarse. Walk with the wife? Oh, the greatest tzaddik, the greatest… in Skver and in Ger, I don’t know what are the others… the others also.
The Skver Rebbe made a special takkanah (enactment) for his towns that he cared about. He made two sides. Yes, but kitzur (in short), there was a takkanah, one is not allowed to walk with the wife. It looks too coarse. Not the current one.
Desires, Character Traits, and the Problem of Pills: A Discussion About Normality and Character Development Work
Continuation: Back to the Main Question and Answers
Rejection of the Two Answers
Instructor:
When he lived in Mir, he didn’t know about it. But there are quite modern people who came to Boro Park in the last twenty years.
No, not modern people, quite ehrliche [honest/upright] ones. I didn’t say, I don’t know. No, it used to be there, the Lithuanians used to conduct themselves that way. Perhaps not today, because it came to Boro Park.
But l’inyaneinu [to our matter], what I want to bring out is, I’m saying there’s a question. One answer is to give the answer that people say, that indeed one must change the whole thing, this is all a gross mistake. That’s one answer. I had a certain answer to give, which is not an answer to the question. I had a certain answer. The second answer is to say that indeed the whole thing is fake, everyone says that frummer [more religious] than me is crazy, and freer than me is a rasha [wicked person], and there’s nothing. Both these answers I don’t like. Although the first answer I can’t disprove either of the answers, but I don’t like them. My points don’t go with either of the answers.
A New Idea: A Verse from Parshas Bereishis
I have a certain idea. I’ll say what my idea is. I have a verse. I have a verse. I have a certain idea, I have a verse. It goes back to Sinai. All the way back to Parshas Bereishis [the portion of Genesis]. No, no, no, a verse from Parshas Bereishis.
Aristotle’s Approach: Character Traits Are Contextual
The Basic Approach of Aristotle
Instructor:
I don’t hold of Aristotle. I mean that Aristotle would certainly say that there are indeed different middos [character traits]. He goes very strongly with the idea that middos are contextual. He would certainly say that there are different middos in such a society. And he would also say, he would certainly say that it’s indeed not wrong. Because the problem is, but a Jew can’t come and say…
He would say, exactly, he would say that a middah [character trait], an adam ba’al middos tovos [a person of good character], an adam m’uleh [an excellent person], a good person, the image of a good person that exists in the world, in the region where he lives, in the society where he lives, that’s how one views a good person. And indeed, it’s indeed different in every region, in every generation, and so on.
But There Is a Limit
And you understand also, even there where there’s a store of thirty thousand items, there’s also an agreement even among the non-Jews that there is someone who is too much of a ba’al ta’avah [one with excessive desires/appetites]. When one needs more proof, I can bring you proof, I’ll bring you the proof. Everyone agrees that there are things that are too much. It’s not clear what the justification for it is, but everyone admits that there are things that are too much. It could be that it has a different definition. It’s not clear what the justification for it is.
This is a problem, this is perhaps another problem, but in practice everyone admits that there are things that one may not do. Say, but that would be the non-Jewish tenets, the social tenets, to say that there are things that are indeed not good, and it could even be that there are things about which one is mistaken. I don’t know if it’s entirely, it could be that it’s accepted that it is indeed good, but it’s not good.
The Limitations of the Social Approach
But nevertheless, it will all be very limited by what the world is. It will all be very limited. You won’t be able to say that you may not eat potato chips at all.
Digression: Snacks, Desires, and Hasidic Customs
The Skver Yeshiva and Snacks
Instructor:
In Skver yeshiva it was forbidden for the bachurim [young men] that snacks are a non-Jewish thing. Why not eat any snacks? The girls they let eat snacks? I don’t know why. Just the reality in the Hasidic world is accepted that girls may be a ba’al ta’avah [one who indulges desires]. I have no idea why. Midas Torah [the character trait of Torah] is only for men? Learning Torah I heard, is only for men.
The Opposite Approach
I know places say exactly the opposite, that the men should have ta’avos achilah [desires for food] so they won’t have other desires. But the wives don’t have any problems. The wives have neither ta’avos achilah [food desires], nor those desires. What’s going on? Okay, that’s certainly a desire. That’s certainly a desire.
The Main Discussion: Pills and Character Development Work
The Problem of Obesity and the Solution of Pills
Instructor:
So, by the way, that’s a good example. I wanted to talk about this. I just have a whole shiur [lecture] about that topic. No, not about the girls should be there, about the topic of us having such a problem. I want to show, I can say this is the word. Yes?
In America, after there are thirty-five thousand items, there is a plague, thank God, called obesity. Okay, eating. It comes from eating. Today we’ve found a solution called… GLP-1. GLP, which basically means not eating, right? It’s a drug that makes you not eat. There’s no direct tone, like basically. It’s suppressing. It’s a great character development work. It’s pills, nu? Nu, what’s bad? People talk about it. Exactly. And that itself is bad. A lot.
Rav Moseneck’s Answer: Pills Are Against Free Will
Instructor:
If it’s us no, I don’t agree with anyone. The Rav, those who are against it, they say, they make such a rule, I’m not saying any matter of actually being middos [character traits] through pills. Not the truth.
Student:
Questions, what is a good middah [character trait]? I’m not… by the way. Yes, Rebbe, Rebbe, what’s his name, the Breslover? The Gerer who was a Breslover. He’s too much not only today. Gerer? Was a Breslover?
Instructor:
Moser, he just wrote a responsum in his sefer [book]. Rav Moser, he’s also my Breslover. Okay. Rav Moseneck says, he’s already the Rav in Breslov in Tzfat. Rav Moseneck wrote a responsum there… Rosh Hashanah, that’s him Tzfat. No, the Rav there in… in Ramat Beit Shemesh. In short, Rav Moseneck wrote a responsum in his sefer, that the Ribbono Shel Olam [Master of the Universe] gave a person ko’ach habechirah [free will], and therefore it’s not appropriate to nullify the bechirah [choice] through taking pills. So he writes in the responsum.
The Answer: Pills Are Part of Free Will
Instructor:
With all due respect, he’s not right, because that’s part of the bechirah [choice]. What’s wrong with taking pills?
I mean that all these people who are against the Gerer Rebbe pills, they mean something else and they don’t have language. They say this. Why is it bad to say? Very good, why is it bad to say that the Gerer Rebbe gives pills for things that are a mitzvah? Why must one say that it’s an aveirah [sin] to give pills?
The Legitimate Arguments Against Pills
Say it, and indeed, everyone admits that if someone is something a… yes, we’re talking about that topic, if someone does certain things that are relevant for others and the like, everyone admits that one can give pills. Why? Eh, bechirah [free will]? No, it’s strong enough, it’s bad enough.
Let’s talk for ourselves. It’s crazy, one admits on the level that… technology. I ask you a question, if there’s someone who is really… someone who is suicidal, he’s really… he has too much ta’avos [desires], he has so much ta’avos, he can’t… I don’t know what there is.
Character Development Work Is Also Against Free Will
Instructor:
Honestly, I don’t have any… in general, avodas hamiddos [character development work] went against bechirah [free will], right? In a certain sense. One gets used to it until one doesn’t have the middah [trait].
The Philosophical Point: We Are Not Just a Will
And a person is not his body, which is a new belief. What I eat is also what I am. Such a person who takes pills every day not to have so much ta’avos [desires]. Still indeed a certain middah [trait]. Who is this you? Who is this you? This! I don’t believe in this. We don’t believe in this. We don’t believe that we are only a will. We believe that in the actions.
The Practical Problems with Pills
By the way, when one takes the pills long enough, one doesn’t need it afterwards. All, almost, almost, not exactly all, almost most of the pills work also when one stops taking them a bit. It ruins it even, one can’t go back.
Student:
On the contrary, and they become fat again.
Instructor:
Not all, not necessarily. It’s not so simple. They say today they say this, and tomorrow they say that. It’s not every pill. There are such, there are such, there are pills that help. Not a joke, but this is…
The Real Argument Against Pills: Side Effects
Again, the argument of bechirah [free will] is a funny argument, and I mean that people say it… The learned argument about the pills that I’ll say is the side effects. A lot of people take these pills, they become depressed, or these types of pills, they can’t have any children because of it. Okay, very good.
Discussion: What Is the Real Problem?
Student:
So they, in short you’re saying, what are the pills?
Instructor:
One minute, one minute, one minute. Because we’re playing, we’re going to shout deeper. What I just wanted…
Student:
Do you want to take away the tape?
Instructor:
We’re getting somewhere. No, no, no, I don’t agree. There are many thoughts about this. You have very little time tonight.
What People Actually Mean
What I mean to say is, people… I’ll finish with this, I’ll continue further. People say that the problem with pills is that they take pills. No, the problem is… very good, it’s an aveirah [sin]. In short, you’re saying that it’s an aveirah, what he calls an aveirah. Very good. You’re saying… no, you’re saying a simple thing: that he gives pills, you have mitzvos [commandments]. In other words, and the problem is that a frum [religious] Jew may not say this, therefore they say funny tales about bechirah [free will]. True?
Story: The Hasidic Rebbe in the Lithuanian Yeshiva
The Story and the Point
Instructor:
Let me ask you a question. Everyone understands… no, no, exactly. Let me ask you a question. Everyone agrees, however, everyone admits. I’ll also talk about the topic, Master of the Universe, I need to find more kosher examples.
You know the story, once there came to a Lithuanian yeshiva a Hasidic rebbe, I don’t know, and he told him that something that the Lithuanians do, Hasidim don’t do, they have weddings late, or something else, going in the street, I don’t remember which Hasidic piety that one does. And he said to the rebbe that my bachurim [students] it doesn’t harm. It doesn’t harm, I’ll do. Says the rebbe, yes, but do you want to do aveiros [sins] so that it won’t harm? Yes?
The Main Argument: Everyone Admits That One Must Do “Sins” to Be Normal
Even the Gerer Rebbe Admits
Instructor:
The answer is, the problem is, that even the Gerer Rebbe holds that there are certain aveiros [sins] that one must do so that certain things won’t harm. True? I have proofs, I don’t have the strength now to go into each thing. What does it mean one must explain? Because he also admits…
To Be a Normal Person
I want to say, what is this? To be a normal person, to be a person among people, certain things, if he says, if one goes in the middle path, if someone will say, if one is not a Rambam [Maimonides], or he says that the whole topic of having a body at all is suboptimal, it requires investigation why the Ribbono Shel Olam [Master of the Universe] had to make a person with a body. One must at all, when one is born one should only make a funeral. One indeed makes a consolation of mourners for the birth.
In short, after an introduction, that the whole thing is a mistake, essentially one must at all, so then, that person can hold that one must give pills, and in general everyone should have weddings like by the queen bee, true? No single queen has children naturally anymore, everything is inserted with this, which is more organized so one should do, and people, God willing, one will introduce the custom, and it will be that people won’t need to have any joy at all.
One Must Have a Little Desire
If someone doesn’t hold that way, in other words he holds that a little a person must indeed have ta’avos [desires], yes? A little, for the sake of a mitzvah. Now, the interesting thing about people is, that in order to have that bit, one must do a little more than for the sake of a mitzvah. There’s no one who can properly ignite his system exactly only on how much is needed.
Everyone Agrees: One Must Do Sins to Be Normal
It comes out that the whole world admits that in order to be, one must reach a certain level and it should be normal, and one must do however some aveiros [sins] for this. However some forbidden thoughts one must have, and however whatever you want to call it one must have, true? Everyone agrees, true?
The Disagreement Is Not Whether One May Do Sins
So the so-called victorious answer is this answer. The disagreement is not whether one may do aveiros [sins] in order to become a normal person. True, one must. Everyone admits that one must.
The Gerer Rebbe’s Approach in Practice
If there’s a very frum [religious] bachur [young man] who can’t live at all with a woman in the same house, the moment she enters the same house there come out Torah prohibitions, let’s say, he goes to the Gerer Rebbe, the Gerer Rebbe tells him, I have news for you, you’re going to do the prohibition ten times, and afterwards you’ll learn to become a normal person, true?
Measure in Mitzvos: Today’s Reality of Eating and Character Traits
The Basic Principle: One May Do Sins to Become a Normal Person
The disagreement is not whether one may do aveiros [sins] to become a normal person. True, one must, everyone admits that one must. If there’s a very frum bachur who can’t live at all with a woman in the same house, and she enters the house, there come out Torah prohibitions, let’s say, he goes to the Gerer Rebbe, the Gerer Rebbe tells him, I have news for you, you’re going to do the prohibition ten times, and afterwards you’ll learn to become a normal person. True? I saw an explicit story. Everyone understands that one does this, true? Why? Because here he also holds that here the person is already too crazy.
In short, what am I saying? Because now we’ll have a problem that the righteous Rav, the Rav… what’s his name? May he say this? He can’t say clearly come here yes. The Torah says that one doesn’t do aveiros [sins], as the Shinover Rav said.
The Shinover Rav’s Parable: Every Jew Has a Belly Full of Worms
It means that it shouldn’t overflow, yes? By the worms. Nu? You’re not crying? Nu. The Shinover said that every Jew has a belly full of worms. Eh, it says in the Torah five positive commandments, this means that it shouldn’t overflow. So many mitzvos. The Torah gave barriers. As the Rambam [Maimonides] says, the Torah goes extreme a bit, so that to build, the Torah didn’t expect that no one should reach any evil thoughts. That means so says the Torah.
And the Gemara [Talmud] says… no, I remember… no, I remember… the Gemara says that… an evil thought, no person is saved from it every day, the one who holds that he’s going to be in yeshiva without this is an apikores [heretic], he goes against the Gemara. Okay?
The Measure in Mitzvos: Not Too Much, Not Too Little
So, I Can’t, What Does That Mean? That’s How It’s Made, That’s a Beginning [natural state]
So, I can’t, what does that mean? That’s how it’s made, that’s a techila [beginning, natural state]. Why shouldn’t I take a pill for that? Because the answer isn’t that pills are something bad. The answer is, because the midah hatovah [the good measure] is to have a few aveiros [transgressions], not too many. That’s all. The pasuk, “al tasbi’eini” [do not satiate me] means not too much. Therefore one must try each time that it shouldn’t be too much. I’m not saying a heter [permission] now, right? I’m just saying that since people don’t have English, so to speak, they say a funny thing.
Noach Lenachameinu: We Have Today Different Problems and Different Solutions
Now, “Noach lenachameinu” [Noah to comfort us]. Shh, you’ll understand in my piece of Torah. Noach lenachameinu, what I wanted to bring out with this whole thing, is that we have today different problems and different solutions. And I mean truly, therefore I say GPS. How do you say GPS? GPS-one. From that I mean, that there is in America, yes, make yourself that.
In America there really is a problem, everyone, we have too much to eat. Kulei alma modu [everyone agrees], not only the Jews agree. How is the… I can make it, but how is the group? What’s it called? Lan shishi. I’ll make it for you. Good. Kulei alma modu, both the Jews, both the gentiles, both the frum, both the free, everyone agrees that there is a problem.
Returning to the Question: Three Answers
Let’s go back. I started with a kushya, I have a tremendous answer to the kushya. I started with a kushya here, I don’t know if it’s the complete answer, I’m just saying a certain approach. I started with a kushya, I had a different approach, I have to say it today too, I can’t, one thing I must say that thing.
I started with a kushya that there is a topic of taavos, of not having taavos forever, and it doesn’t work in America, because there are too many taavos.
One answer is, there really is too much, one must go live in Galicia.
The second answer is, everything is fake.
The third answer is, no, there is in every, one can’t speak, the same, it really is the same, the foundation remains the same, there is a measure in mitzvos.
Measure in Mitzvos Doesn’t Mean Being in the Middle of Foolishness
And it’s not simple, measure in mitzvos doesn’t mean that one should be in the middle of every foolishness, right? It doesn’t mean that it should be a state of Sodom, so the tzaddik will be like Noach [Noah], yes? Bedor shel resha’im [in a generation of wicked people]. From a certain perspective he has a virtue, he goes against the place of wicked people which requires ma’asav hara’im [his evil deeds], but it’s still not the shleimus [perfection].
We say that there is indeed a certain ideal which is shleimus. But as everyone understands, if he had a different kind of body, he would have different midos tovos [good character traits], although perhaps the ideal of midos tovos should be the same, but you have a different kind of body. A person who would be born with three hands, would have different mitzvos and different avonos [sins]. Not because the idea of mitzvos would be different, but because the expression would be different.
The Same Thing in a Different Society
The same thing if one lives in a different society, where here the topic isn’t to go buy an extra steak outside, because that’s already here, it doesn’t even cost money. Okay, it’s actually one of the things that’s still a bit expensive, and it makes some nafka minah [practical difference] for a person. But be’ofan klali [in general], it means nothing, right?
Min Shorar Umora Is Not Relevant Today
Derech agav [by the way], yes, one of the things about taavos is because it costs too much money, right? Min shorar umora [mal’astim es habrios: burdening others]. True, we spoke about this. One of the reasons that one may not be a great ba’al taavah [one who indulges desires] is because one is mal’astim es habrios [burdening other people]. This thing is not nogei’a [relevant] today. In today’s times, min shorar umora is patur [exempt].
Even a ta’avah basar [desire for meat]. Imagine, you know a ta’avah basar? Nothing. It costs seventeen dollars. Most kosher. The treif costs only three dollars. What is that? A lie? It’s nothing. It costs twenty dollars. It’s normal. About this one will go steal? He can go with money after shul, one shacharis he makes more money than that.
You understand that we don’t live in the reality, and the two natural taavos [natural desires] is destructive because he is in lasten mesvir [burdening the environment].
The New “Mal’astim”: Addiction
It will be that someone will say today is nogei’a from someone who becomes addicted to drugs. For example, that’s really a thing that people only in their life have stolen from their father, because he is… ah, it was once counted, addiction meant a shikor [drunkard]. Today it means he’s a drug addict. It’s a whole different level, but it’s the same halacha, just different… it presents itself differently, because the problem is different.
The one who eats even if he steals from his father, and in general, his father doesn’t care. When my bachur comes in the fridge and takes out all the meat that was prepared for Shabbos, is empty, let’s buy another one. Hello? What are you making yourself crazy? One doesn’t drag to beis din [rabbinical court], once one dragged to beis din. It’s a point, right?
What do I mean to bring out? So back to things. But there are indeed, so there are problems.
“Hayom” – The Torah Was Given Today
Long the words, everyone is moder [agrees] in today’s language that there is a real problem, it’s a health problem, it’s also a midos problem, right? It’s both, it’s not so separate, the two things are not truly different. There is a problem of overeating, a big problem. Most people in America and in the West eat too much, a real problem. It’s especially in America. Particularly in America, true, I have an explanation in the Oifistan. But particularly in America, most people eat too much. In America, most people eat too much. Okay? That is truly a problem. There is a problem, there is that people eat too much.
Okay, there is a level where he starves himself because he has to go to the hospital. He wants to be very tired, some craziness that his din is beautiful, or something like that. It’s also something too little which is a sickness, some crazy thing.
One minute, I’ll say the nesi for my second approach. I first need to say the first approach which comes from the first thing from the newspaper.
The Torah Was Given Today, Not Yesterday
So I want to say a vort, that in America, I want to say like this, let’s say, the beginning of the shiur was that the Torah was given today, true? Hayom bechoros ushmua, hayom la’asosa [this day… today to do them]. The Torah was given today. Today means that if one speaks the midos of yesterday and says it about 1954 yesterday, it’s apikorsus, one says that the Torah was given yesterday. And the idea is the same, but one must say it according to how it looks today, and not twist everything, and soon we will speak what the pasuk says against this.
The Problem with Old Mussar Talks
So therefore, if a mashgiach, someone wants to say, I want to be, yes, I say, there are two kinds of people, there are people who speak against overeating in the old style, but it doesn’t speak at all to today’s bachur, he speaks to someone else, he should forgive me, he doesn’t speak to him. True? Because his examples are wrong, and it’s already not true, there’s nothing wrong that a bachur should eat chocolate, I don’t know, he thinks it’s something wrong, because in Galicia it was wrong, you understand? It has nothing to do with it.
The Parable of Kavanos When Eating
Or someone says that he doesn’t have the kavanah, there was some fine vort that he didn’t eat any seltzer, he said that he’s not mekayem that his father had the kavanah, he knew about this. It’s very good, today there are no more people, the Beis Shmuel [a halachic commentary] said the kavanos, the kavanah of Coca-Cola. I was once by him, I asked him, he loves to eat pizza very much, he said what is the kavanah of the mechaber [author] that he eats pizza. Everything is very good. Pizza is good and yashar, it’s tremendous. Pizza is gematria [numerical value], I can still say the names, it’s already there, not that’s the topic.
The Real Topic: Not Becoming Obese
But what is indeed the topic? In other words, what we speak about midos, according to how it presents itself by us, al kol panim one of the topics, I mean that there are more topics, but al kol panim one of the topics is not to become obese. Okay?
There Is a Different Problem, Not Just Overeating
Now, what must one do not to become? There are other things that we learned, every thing has pe’ulos [effects], there are certain things, and I mean this is another whole shiur about this, so say the meforshim [commentators], that the reason why people are fat is not because they overeat. There is something a different problem, something a more acute problem, something there are various theories, why? But there is something a different problem. A different problem.
And it can be truly that meanwhile one has not yet found any solution except for the injection. One works already sixty years, all diets don’t work, only Ozempic works. It comes out that this is the solution. What will I do? Looks like in other words. Could be, not only.
Various Theories: Fast Food, Air, and More
There is fast food, how do you fast? Fast I mean kugel. What one sells in the store, I want to do he should go. He tells me that the one is to live in another land where one sells other food. That’s not prishus [abstinence], that’s already like the other food, that’s already gone to the midbar [desert]. Perhaps that’s a mitzvah, but one doesn’t speak now from this level.
In America, the food that one sells is such, could be there’s something wrong with the food, could be there’s something wrong with the air, could be…
A Kabbalah-Explanation: America Has Fewer Nitzotzos Hakedusha
I said, I have an explanation al pi Kabbalah [according to Kabbalah], that in America there must be less in the nitzotzos hakedusha [sparks of holiness], therefore one must eat more. There are many explanations. No, there is very little, and it’s very less dense, yes? In Poland there was in every glass of water there were twenty mikvahs [ritual baths]. In America, in twenty glasses of water there was… It’s very spread out in America everything.
One sees that in America everything is very spread out. A house that in Eretz Yisrael [the Land of Israel], in the area live thirty people, here lives one. Everything is spread out. Okay, I tell you that I have just torahs, and I don’t have an explanation in explanation in explanation. Already, there are other explanations.
One Can’t Just Blame “Overeating”
But the reality is, that you can’t say that it’s just because we are overeaters and one can’t control one’s yetzer [inclination]. Because there are people, I already spoke with a friend at length, I know many people who are very in control of their yetzer, but they are fat. It’s very hard to say that specifically here in this topic he didn’t find any advice.
I don’t agree. I once said, “Never take a guru that’s fat.” Very good, I don’t agree. If he lives in India, perhaps, not if he lives in America. I don’t agree. Or in Eretz Yisrael, in today’s world. Because it has to do with certain lifestyle things, it doesn’t have to do with…
Rabbis and Lifestyle Problems
Particularly most rabbis are fatter in lifestyle. And conversely, if he will run more, one will say that he’s a crazy youngster. It’s not allowed. One must eat very little. In short, there are problems, there are physical, it’s not all in the mind, in the head. I mean that very much has to do with this.
You can say, he’s not here, one must really live in a different city where one travels, one doesn’t drive, one walks. What isn’t there? I don’t live in the next world, okay? Many rabbis sit at home all day, sit in the chair, and the back doesn’t. Very good, and that’s not. The rabbis until me the heavy top on this, what goes up on this. For example, I hope indeed up up up…
Tovaso Shel Makom: Hakaras Hatov in Our Time
Conclusion: Physical Problems and Practical Solutions
In short, there are physical problems, it’s not all in the mind and in the head. I mean that very much has to do with this.
One can say that he must really live in a different city where one travels with a gartel and one doesn’t go with a car, and walks. I don’t want to now live in the next world, okay? Rebbis and rabbis sit at home all day, sit and don’t move. Very good. And the rabbis are not… Okay, I don’t want to go into it.
I just want to say, finally in a matter, one can perhaps introduce to give celery under the sponge cake, that the rebbe should be taken out. But that’s a… Very good.
The Story with Sponge Cake and L’chaim
Now, why do you eat sponge cake? Because it’s a minhag, not because he’s an overeater. Why do you eat sponge cake?
I saw by Rav Shaul, someone came and he says, “I’m a complete drunk, everywhere I went I made a l’chaim.” I’m not a wine-maker. Why must he make a l’chaim where he goes with a sponge cake? Why can’t one give a glass of water with a celery?
He used to drink the chocolate, nu? He used to everything. Stop it. He was ashamed already. One told him that it’s not so. One drinks it only at home. In short, a story.
You understand the problem? It’s a problem. I say that it’s not a problem, it’s the problem of the minhag. He says make a different minhag. So it’s not that, so it’s therefore, it could be the solution is different, the problem is different.
The Virtue: One Must Speak About the Reality
The virtue is, one must speak about the reality. It’s certain that one must speak about this, it’s a big problem, and not only overeating is also the physicality. But I don’t believe that the answer is to be more abstinent, less loving the food or something like that. That I don’t mean.
Now, I want, I can’t think, I have another whole story to explain why a level al pi pshat, a torah about this would… I’ll stop, I just want to say one more important virtue that I was mechadesh. There was a story like this, okay?
Different Kinds of Problems, Different Kinds of Solutions
The first approach is that there are different kinds of problems and different kinds of solutions. Could be that the problem of America is that the food doesn’t make enough things, okay? Something makes one need to eat. And the GLP makes that one should feel more things. Could be that there are other advices, it could be that there are other things that make more things.
Could be I can give certain meditations of more eating, one should have more kavanah… Situational things, and situational things, and instead of working on the door of the situational things, and the copy dartist injects, so that’s a solution. I haven’t done it yet, because no other people have done it, it works very well, I don’t know what to say. Could be that this is the solution. And it could be that it’s not asked, you understand?
Because the Problem Is a Physical Problem
Because the problem is a physical problem. If you want the problem was in ruchnius, in avodas hamidos, you’ll say that one’s taavah, on avodas hamidos you make a pill? No, the problem is not avodas hamidos.
My problem is that something is broken with my body, something goes wrong with the desire, how is it that the appetite works is not good. The pill fixes it, it makes it back like it should be normal. It doesn’t overeat it to not overeat. It doesn’t stand before younger, true, it’s the problem only that no one has yet done from anchor from this. Perhaps one spoke a huge that, I don’t know.
So, that’s one virtue.
Another Virtue: The Parable of Gan Eden
But I have another virtue, I don’t know if it’s the problem, but it’s another point. A point is a pasuk.
Adam Harishon in Gan Eden
In the Torah it says such a story, okay? There was a Jew, a person. What was his name? Adam. Adam. Adam. Okay, and the Ribbono Shel Olam took him and gave him all the taavos that he only wanted. He had to ask for everything, and he was Gan Eden, and he didn’t have to be allowed everything.
Gratitude for Divine Beneficence: Technology as Blessing and the Necessity of Hakarat HaTov
Opening: The Midrash About Trees That Grow Bread – It Has Actually Come True
No, I’m saying, I mean, there is a tovato shel makom [the goodness/beneficence of the Omnipresent], yes? Baruch Hashem [thank God], we live in a… literally, I’m not joking, I mean, the Rambam [Maimonides] says that when it says in the Midrash [homiletical rabbinic literature] that trees will grow bread on the trees, it cannot be taken literally, it must be a parable [mashal], because it’s simply not possible in reality [b’metzius].
Baruch Hashem, we have already merited that not only is it possible in reality, it’s much more than what is possible in reality. Okay, it doesn’t grow, what I mean to say, in any case [mikol v’chol], it’s certain that… it’s Enkel, who grows bagels from Halberstam, it’s certain that pressing a button and a non-Jew comes here to the door with a warm kugel, it’s certain that this is much more than what the Midrash could have imagined would grow on a tree. True? Like the malachei hashareit [ministering angels] to Avraham Avinu [Abraham our forefather] say. It’s literally, literally.
That every Jew has two… it says in the Gemara [Talmud] an expression [lashon], every Jew has two thousand eight hundred CIA agents who can watch him. True?
Critique: We Don’t Give Thanks – We Only Complain
It’s truly amazing. And you’ve never yet spoken to the Almighty about this. You’ve never yet said this word in the beit midrash [study hall]. And when do you say it? Only to be ungrateful [kofer b’tovato]. To say like “the woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me from the tree and I ate” [ha’isha asher natata imadi hi natnah li min ha’etz va’ochal – Adam’s response to God in Genesis 3:12]. You still have complaints [te’anot] that it actually causes bad things.
I have a solution [eitzah]. No, I’m just saying, a person needs to pay attention to his wife. That’s an answer [teiretz] to the topic [nosa]. I think that will be the solution.
Proposal: A New Holiday – A Day of Thanksgiving for the Revelation of the Internet
I’ve already said once, I’ve already told others, I’m going to call all these people who run campaigns [maarachot] in the coming days, they should make something new. It’s a shame they should make more campaigns, they should make a new holiday [yom tov]. The fifteenth of Av [chamisha asar b’Av] would be a good day for this. Why? The internet was revealed [nitgaleh]. Yes.
We’ll make a holiday, a day of thanksgiving [yom hoda’ah], for the revelation of the internet [al gilui ha’internet]. Not just the internet by the way. Cars, telephones, smartphones, computers, the internet is just one thing, connected, AI. We’ll make a list, okay? A whole Shulchan Aruch [Code of Jewish Law] we’ll make, all the innovations [bitul].
We’ll make a special day of thanksgiving, and all Jews will gather together dressed in a bekishe [long black coat worn by Chasidim], and say hodu [give thanks] for the fact that baruch Hashem we don’t have to live like our grandfathers who didn’t have washing machines. They never… we don’t even know what the simple meaning [pshat] is of all those terrible toils [terachot] that existed. Washing the clothes [begadim] and making the bread, everything was diligence [zerizut] with toil [tircha], literally the sin of Adam the first man [cheit Adam HaRishon] with toil. That is the meaning of consolation [nechamah].
Biblical Foundation: Noah as the First Messiah – The Root of Consolation
Noah the Technologist
And the grasshopper, I have another verse [pasuk], it’s my best context, from this I say I need the verse on the fifteenth of Av. Another homiletical discourse [drashah] that I still need to say this week.
Yes, who was the first consolation in the world? Where is the first time that the root [shoresh] of consolation appears in the Torah? The Almighty. Not in the sense of regret [mi’lashon charatah], in the sense of consolation [mi’lashon traist]. Perhaps the same root, but in the sense of consolation.
The first is like this, this one, it says two tropes on this word, “he will console us from our work and from the toil of our hands, from the ground which Hashem has cursed” [yenachameinu mi’ma’aseinu u’mei’itzavon yadeinu min ha’adamah asher eirar Hashem – Genesis 5:29]. Yes, the Gemara says, Noah was a technologist, he invented solutions for how to work more easily. True, that is the root of consolation [shoresh hanechamah]. The root of all consolations is that solutions were invented.
Indeed Adam the first man was cursed [nitkallel], “cursed is the ground because of you, in toil shall you eat of it” [arurah ha’adamah ba’avurecha b’itzavon tochalenah – Genesis 3:17], there will be sadness [b’atzavut], one must toil with very hard work [avodah]. Noah comes and he makes it a bit easier. And so on until this very day [ad hayom hazeh] it has become so much easier.
The Modern Fulfillment of Noah’s Consolation
Today even being, there is a combine that does all the labors of bread-making [melachot hapat] at once, yes? An almost ready bread comes out from the other side. Almost, yes? There is such a machine today, it costs a billion dollars, I don’t know what. You drive in it, almost more or less you drive in the fields, a baked bread comes out from the other side. Almost, yes? One more machine in between, okay? Whatever, it doesn’t come out flour [kemach], it comes out thoroughly ground wheat, but it’s good enough that the Midrash could say it that way, true?
Very good, I’m saying, I’m joking a bit, I need to make a Midrash, but I just want to bring out, this is indeed the consolation [nechamah], yes?
Why Has No One Ever Made a Holiday for This?
And how can it be that Saturday night we all dance, we don’t make any… for the consolation that consoles [menachem] the sin of Adam the first man, no one has ever made a holiday. So we need to make a holiday, rejoice, and everyone will bring and we’ll dance with the smartphones then around the bimah [platform in synagogue]. Not like you’re about to throw the smartphones into the fire on the eve of Passover [erev Pesach].
We’ll dance with them around the bimah, and the Rebbe will come in with a big Tesla to the… the big iPad, and we’ll make a chuppah [wedding canopy] over it like this. And a joy, like there’s a hachnasas sefer Torah [celebration of bringing a Torah scroll], and we’ll dance “zeh yenachameinu” [this one will console us].
What’s wrong? A verse. That was Noah, the first Messiah [mashiach] was Noah. “Zeh yenachameinu mi’ma’aseinu u’mei’itzavon yadeinu” [this one will console us from our work and from the toil of our hands]. Why do we laugh when it’s said? I’m not laughing, I mean one hundred percent seriously. Most people [rov olam] laugh when it’s said. I didn’t want to be laughed at. Why? It’s funny, but you should think differently than I’ve thought until now.
Solution #2: Joy versus Sadness – The True Solution to Trials
The Foundation: Sadness is the Root of All Sins
No, no, no, it’s like the sushi. It’s like the sushi. No, no, I mean, one must thank the Almighty for this. And afterwards, and certainly, then one will not be transgressing.
What you’re asking, what would have been if not buying and not buying and not buying and not eating from the Tree of Knowledge? You know why? All the Chasidic rebbes said this. I mean that both ways, I mean this truly. It says in all the Chasidic books that, yes, in Beis Aharon [a Chasidic work], that the evil inclination only wants sadness, right? Sadness is the greatest problem. The moment a person is in sadness, then he falls into all sins. Just as when a person is in joy, he has no sins.
So while I say this, why? Do people get internet to do this sin, because they are in sadness about it. One should thank the Almighty afterwards. One should not make any blessing. It is forbidden to answer a blessing in vain.
Halachic Point: Shehecheyanu on New Technology
If a person buys a new computer, does one make a Shehecheyanu [the blessing thanking God for bringing us to this time] on it? By the way, it’s a law from the Torah, not from the Torah, but from the Rabbis. Just as when one buys a new phone or a computer, one must make Shehecheyanu. Uri Holtzman says about people, this is also the law, but on a phone he must make it. On a car, this is indeed the law, Shulchan Aruch [Code of Jewish Law].
And the Piskei Teshuvos [a halachic commentary] says that one doesn’t conduct oneself not, and one conducts oneself yes, there’s no Piskei Teshuvos. What Piskei Teshuvos? Whatever, he’s probably Piskei Teshuvos. No, no, whatever, I say that this is the root of the matter.
The Practical Application: Gratitude Leads to Contentment
If one will bring close with what, one will be content. Why does he go on the computer at the table for bad things? Because he is in sadness, he is already depressed. He thinks, poor thing, that he is simply a disgusting thing. When a person is depressed, the serpent comes in. This is the way things are, as it says in the holy books, all the books say this.
Sources from Chasidic Books
It says in the Baal HaTanya [the Tanya, foundational work of Chabad Chasidism] that one sees empirically that when a person is too happy he has no evil desires. He can control himself. No, on the contrary, he has no evil desires. When a person is in sadness he can control himself, he is happy. Yes, and the Gerer [Rebbe] says that he is uplifted, because then he is pure. This is the answer.
The Conclusion: Gratitude is the Antidote
Therefore, the answer is, that since the whole thing of desires is… It becomes like a homiletical interpretation, but this is the second answer, it’s a true answer, it’s a true answer. That why can’t one speak today of desires, one should be in sadness.
Master of the Universe, the sermon begins with sadness, and otherwise it doesn’t become sadness, it’s denial of God’s goodness, right? Rabbi, you’re a normal person, you get up in the morning, I tell you, you get up in the morning, and you still have a machine that you press a button and put in such a thing, out comes a hot coffee. If I want a cold coffee, there’s another button, it does the same. I didn’t have that machine, but one can buy for another fifty dollars a machine that makes cold coffee when one wants it strong, right?
The World We Live In: A Tremendous Blessing
And you get up in the world, yes, and then even more, you have a machine, a button, you have a button that you press next to your bed, it’s still there. And if you want it to be 71 degrees, you make it 71. If you’re already too warm for you, you make it 79. If you’re already cold, you make it 73. And you live in the world, yes? He said, the ministering angels roast meat and strain wine [referring to the angels who served Abraham].
The Heresy of Not Giving Thanks
And you get up, and you go for nothing, you say, gentlemen, it’s terrible, I will live in such a world, so much technology, spiritual decline, it’s disgusting, my evil beast that you are. You haven’t been such a denier of God’s goodness since the time from here, there hasn’t been such a denier of God’s goodness. First give thanks, but it’s tremendous.
It’s not just tremendous, we can’t even… You know why we laugh? Because we can’t hold so much joy. So it says laid out on the oath. One doesn’t become a troubled person.
Practical Advice: Blessings and Intention
I say that one makes a blessing on it. It says in Chasidic books that whoever makes a blessing with proper intention, doesn’t become materialistic from the eating. Everyone would if one doesn’t make a blessing with proper intention, one also won’t eat too much. Because he should be happy.
Why does a person eat too much? Because he is depressed, and he thinks that he has eaten and made himself. He is already content, he eats because it’s tremendous, he won’t eat too much, he doesn’t have too much on the internet, he does everything in moderation, because he will be content. This is a very basic thing, therefore one will establish a new holiday in honor of this, and this will be the advice. And then, and no one will have any trials, and no trials, and no trials.
The Necessity of Community
And he will do it together with other people, it’s not hidden, that’s what a person is always alone, he won’t make progress. One must make a WhatsApp group. No, no. One must make a top. One must at least, since you won’t do an actual deed afterwards, meanwhile, until next year you’ll remember, I didn’t want perhaps actually to do it.
Birchos HaShachar as a Place for Gratitude
Go do this, at least when one says the morning blessings, blessings of enjoyment, morning blessings, let’s think about this. But one can do it again. Who provides for all my needs, Who opens the eyes of the blind, Who releases the bound, this is what was released, and Who straightens the bent, and gives understanding to the rooster, no one knows what a rooster is, do you know? Rooster means intellect.
No, not a verse that appears once in it, no one knows what it is, it means a smartphone. “Who gives to the rooster” means “silicon.” “Who gives to the rooster” is the numerical value of “silicon.” No, one can see in the writings of the Arizal [Rabbi Yitzchak Luria], writings of Likutei Maharil, Rabbi Yitzchak Luria says that one should have in mind “Who gives to the rooster,” “rooster” is the numerical value of “silicon.” It’s not the numerical value, it’s approximately the numerical value, one makes it so it should fit. It’s not a problem. By the way, this is the intention of the Arizal, he puts in things that he makes and one must have for the smartphone, for the pocket watch, and so on. And this will be the solution.
Conclusion: The Almighty’s Intention is Good, Not a Trial
It’s certain that it can’t be, I don’t know if this is a Chasidic discourse, but one must react to the way that God’s conduct is, how the conduct of the Divine Presence is, right?
It can’t be that the Almighty has given so much goodness, I simply repeated what the Rebbe may he live long said that the intention of eating is to connect with the Almighty the goodness that bestows good for everyone that He gives them to eat.
It can’t be that the Almighty has changed the entire order of the world and made that the goodness should be a thousand times more, that the reaction that we have should be to protest against this. And one must protest against the next, I said not that one should do any sins, I’m not permitting any prohibition. It can’t be that the main reaction will be this.
Parable: The Feast That is Meant to Give Pleasure
But I’m speaking to you, yes? Someone comes to me and I give him a wonderful feast, a huge feast. I serve him twenty-four different dishes. What does he want to say? I know what you want, you want it to become coarse. Wise one, he’s not a bad guest in the world.
Certainly I want, on a trouble you’ll be able to become close, you’ll have to take care of it yourself. It is indeed a problem. But it’s certain that the intention of the giver, he wants to give you pleasure.
Never has there been someone who had an enemy, he wanted to do him in, he made a huge feast, he bought everything, he made the food and drink. Never, perhaps not except some Chasidic story says this.
Changing Our Relationship to Technology: A Joy-Based Approach
Digression: “What Should a Person Do So He Will Not Sin” and the Chasidic Way
Teacher:
What do you want to say? I know what you want, you want me to become coarse. I have no bad guest, he was already such a bad guest in the world. You shouldn’t become, on a trouble you’ll be able to become coarse, you’ll have to take care of yourself. It’s your problem.
But it’s certain that the generosity of the Giver, he wants to give you pleasure. Never has there been someone who had an enemy, he wanted to do him in, he made a huge feast, he bought everything, he made the food and drink. Perhaps not but perhaps a Chasidic story that says this, but seriously, it works already.
What should a person do so that he will not sin? What?
Student:
Okay, okay, okay. There’s a political principal, I hear.
Teacher:
No, but the truth can indeed say that this is what should a person do so he will not sin. This is the true strong in the Midrash. I know the Chasidic rebbe said, what should a person do so he will not sin, something.
Student:
Aha.
Teacher:
Fear, really Purim now. So said your Ruzhiner [Rebbe] or some Chasidic one.
Student:
No, I mean it’s a good, it’s a true point.
Teacher:
I tell you that if one thanks the Almighty for this, it will be thanksgiving. I tell you that one won’t thanksgiving.
Student:
No, this is already not the way of the commandment.
Teacher:
I mean that it will lead them the way of the commandment, because this is another topic that the sadness…
Student:
No, it has to do with this. The connection…
Teacher:
First the piece wasn’t in the way of Aristotle, it was in the way of Chasidus. But…
Student:
In the way of Chasidus. It’s the way of Chasidus. Out, people thought to just be so.
Teacher:
But the answer is, not… I don’t want sadism. I don’t want sadism.
Back to the Ramban: Eating Properly, Not Eating Too Much
Teacher:
What I’m saying is, the connection is, with what we spoke earlier, as you said. The Ramban [Nachmanides] doesn’t say that one shouldn’t eat, the Ramban says that one should eat properly, or eat well.
And my argument is, what in general does one not eat well, the problem is that one eats too much. One doesn’t enjoy enough, but one is not with joy, and one tries the whole time to fill some hole inside oneself. One advice, but it’s not enough. One is not enough must be with joy also.
The Context Changes Everything: Shabbos Meal versus Supper
Teacher:
Therefore, when one gives, like a set, giving context, as I said that to eat a Shabbos meal is very different than eating a supper, right? It’s not the same thing. Ah, one eats the same foods? Let’s already say one eats the same, actually one doesn’t eat the same.
It’s not magic. Because a person is a speaking being, a person lives in stories, and how he understands himself.
The Practical Conclusion: Changing Our Relationship to Technology
Teacher:
So about this, the joy that I’m saying, I change what a smartphone is. I mean truly, you must change the relationship. You must change our relationship. I mean this seriously. Everything I say I mean seriously, all the parts are Midrashim.
But one must change our relationship to all the technology. When a person turns on his computer in the morning, a person who works, when he turns on his computer or his phone, it must come with an “I give thanks before You” [the morning prayer].
Wow, it’s an amazing tool, I can connect with the whole world. Afterwards with looking at the mezuzah, and not stumble with the bad things.
But it can’t be that the first moment is that it’s a protest. Ah, terrible, I’m the non-Jewish boy who has a smartphone, and it’s a devil.
The Faith Argument: It’s Not a “House of Prostitution”
Teacher:
And this… First of all he says according to faith, because the Almighty gives it to you. If you want to speak of practical difference regarding desires, he says, then, your whole story, because it’s bad.
You went criminally to a house of prostitution. Who convinced you that this is a house of prostitution? Hello, you’re a normal person. This is your wife. It’s not a house of prostitution. If it’s a house of prostitution, go he could go there. Don’t make a house of prostitution. Not a house of prostitution.
You convinced yourself that it’s a house of prostitution, you have a problem. It’s the goodness of the Omnipresent. It’s “the woman whom I gave” [referring to Genesis 3:12], that the Almighty gave you. It’s not a house of prostitution at all. It’s a tremendous thing.
They are happy. They are happy. They just don’t become a house of prostitution. The house of prostitution you become, we don’t have happy. You understand? And then it will be good. Peace, Israel.
Conclusion: The Title of This Lecture
Student:
What can be the title on the video?
Teacher:
Write the fifteenth. The title is that the idea is that the fifteenth of Av is a holiday on embracing technology. I want the explanation how it fits with the Gemara [Talmud] on the fifteenth of Av, I’ll say it another time.