Monthly Archives: June 2014

Be Delighted. Keep Shabbos.

On Shabbat the tzaddik delivers lechem mishneh. (The term lechem mishneh refers to the “double bread,” the two loaves of challah on which the homotzi blessing is recited at each of the three Shabbat meals.) This lechem mishneh is Mishnah Torah which gives you the privilege of generating new Torah insights that are “two for one.”
The tzaddik uses the holiness of Shabbat to deliver Torah lessons that contain eye-opening and lofty teachings. In these teachings you can find a lot of ethical instruction, motivation to be awe-inspired and new levels of comprehension for understanding the truth. This is what is meant by the term chidushei Torah, new Torah insights. Because when you listen sincerely to these teachings you are infused with new awareness of Hashem and powerful inspiration to live by the Torah.
If you truly hear these Torah teachings, you become a new person—your perception and wisdom are brand new. This is why the teachings are new Torah insights.
The holiness of Shabbat has a number of positive effects. One, it generates fullness of blessing in all the spiritual worlds, including ours. Second, it permeates every single level of serving Hashem with enlightenment. That means that even ordinary people, even those who aren’t considered God-fearing, glow with increased wisdom and perception for understanding Torah and faith. This doesn’t happen by itself. The Jew has to keep Shabbat as prescribed by the Shulchan Arukh, sincerely, for the sake of Heaven.
Keeping Shabbat honestly and sincerely makes one worthy of both spiritual and physical healing.

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You can make Shabbat shine. How? By keeping Shabbat properly and feeling the spiritual delight it gives. This awakens in you a desire to return to Hashem out of love, teshuvah m’ahavah. Keeping Shabbat properly triggers within you a love for Hashem so deep that you just want to become closer and closer to Him.
Most of the time, it is as a result of suffering that people become more caring about their relationship with Hashem. But when Shabbat shines on you, your motivation is your intense love for Hashem. You don’t need to suffer, at all, to be reminded that Hashem is always present and that you are obligated to keep the Torah (as are all of us Jews).
The illumination of Shabbat heals every sincerely observant Jew of all the suffering s/he has borne till now. S/He becomes worthy of people’s esteem. Each of these kosher Jews—in proportion to his sincerity and his honest observance of the Torah—gains recognition and honor from everybody s/he meets.
To the degree that your Torah observance is sincere and the greater prestige and esteem with which others view you, you will understand the Shabbat chidushei Torah (Torah teachings) of the generation’s leading tzaddik.

 

© Copyright 2014 148west.com/O. Bergman

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Father-Kind

Kindness builds the world. It’s not me saying that. It’s King David (Psalms 89:2). People who do kindness, especially people who actively seek to do kindness, are building God’s world.

We usually don’t think of being a father as an opportunity to be kind or to do kindness, but it certainly is. Bringing a human being into the world to serve and connect with God, to teach that human being how to navigate through life—those are huge kindnesses.

So if there’s a little person who doesn’t have his built-in Dad to provide the “how to navigate through life” kindness, it’s a huge kindness to be step in and do what Dad can’t. It’s an ever greater kindness to get people to be that person.

When I was 16, my father a”h/o.b.m. died suddenly. He survived World War II, being sent to Siberia, but died in his home by falling down a flight of stairs. It took me over 25 years to realize what I had lost, to understand what my friends had had—what my children have had—that I did not. (My wife recently pointed out that she could count on one hand how many times I have talked about my father in our 35 years of marriage.)

So when I see The Mentoring Project providing mentors for boys without fathers, it resonates. They are doing something that is beyond noble. The Mishnah teaches, “Who is wise? One who learns from anyone” (Avot/Ethics of the FATHERS 4:1). We should learn from their example.

 

© Copyright 2014 148west.com/O. Bergman

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Eating on Shabbat—Such a Pleasure!

 

Through the mitzvah of taking an oath—to give charity or to do something good—and fulfilling it right away, you are privileged to experience oneg Shabbat. Oneg Shabbat means engaging in the bodily pleasures on Shabbat for the sake of Heaven, and not in order to satisfy your physical cravings, God forbid.

Immediately fulfilling your oath also graduates you to a more spiritual level of eating, even on weekdays. This enhanced level of eating is also a type of oneg Shabbat. Rebbe Nachman teaches that oneg Shabbat alludes to eating in a dignified and sanctified way (Likutey Moharan I, #57). If you can eat on this level, you don’t need to fast. {Rebbe Nachman doesn’t mean you don’t have to fast on Yom Kippur or the other obligatory fast days. He means you don’t have to undertake a voluntary fast day in order to achieve your spiritual goals.} When your eating is consistently on this high level, you gain mastery over your temper. You can achieve a high level of calmness that nothing angers you or even annoys you. Besides the obvious benefit of not becoming incensed when things don’t go your way, there is a tremendous by-product.

Our Sages tell us (Pesachim 66b) that when a person becomes angry, he is stripped of some of his Torah-wisdom. The reverse is also true. When are you careful to control your temper, your lost Torah-wisdom is given back to you. As your Torah-wisdom is restored, your Divine image shines more brightly. This beaming sacred light weakens your spiritual opponents and eventually gets rid of them. They are no longer be able to harm you or anything else in Creation. This is alluded to in the Torah when it says, “All the beasts of the field will fear and dread you” (Genesis 9:2).

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The food you eat on Shabbat is very precious and very holy. Why? Because that food is transformed into pure, unadulterated holiness and Godliness. The Sitra Achra (the Side of Evil, aka “the bad guys”) has no portion whatsoever in the food you eat on Shabbat. This doesn’t happen automatically. You have to eat in the dignified and sanctified manner, as we mentioned above, and you have to eat genuinely for the sake of Heaven.

As your Shabbat-eating becomes more like this—the more it is authentic oneg Shabbat—the less often you will get angry and the less your anger will be. Not only that, but people and influences that prevent you from being a better Jew will fade out of your life. Perhaps best of all, you’ll merit to love your fellow Jews and live peacefully with all of them.

© Copyright 2014 148west.com/O. Bergman

 

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Please tell me quick—What is hitbodedut?

What is hitbodedut? It starts by your going to a place where you’ll be alone, with no one around. When you’re settled you tell Hashem/God everything—everything that’s going on in your spiritual life and everything that’s going on in your material life. You tell Him about the good things and the kindnesses, and you tell Him about your troubles, God forbid. You thank Hashem for being kind and nice to you; you plead with Him to take away all your suffering. You also take an honest look at yourself. Ask yourself questions like: Are you as patient and sincere as you should be? Are your faith and trust in Hashem as firm as they should be? Are you still more jealous and timid than you should be? Are you cutting corners in your prayers? Are you being honest in your financial dealings? Still telling white lies?

And answer these questions as if you were answering them to God. Because you are. You have to determine whether or not you are really meeting up to Hashem’s expectations from you.

© Copyright 2014 148west.com/O. Bergman

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Don’t Be Inferior

One of the biggest challenges we face in our quest to live Jewishly, is the feeling that we can’t measure up, that certain “levels” or accomplishments are just beyond us.

This is not a feeling that only a baal teshuvah might have. Many who are born and educated in even the most “religious” and/or spiritually dedicated homes feel inferior to someone who seems more gifted, privileged or just plain lucky. (”Mazeldik” is the technical term.) The feeling is real and too often is an impediment to becoming all the Jew you can be. What should you do to so that this feeling lifts you and doesn’t bury you?

First, ask a question that you should always ask any time you feel stuck in our Jewishness: Who says? Who says that just because I’ve bumped my head on the ceiling of my Jewishness that I can’t break through it? Asking this question requires two ingredients: chutzpah and ambition.

If you’re Jewish, you automatically have chutzpah. Ambition you may also have, but maybe not. And even if you do, you may not have exerted any of your ambition on growing as a Jew. If so, start now.

This question and this ambition show up in this week’s parsha. When everyone else was busy coming closer to Hashem by bringing the korban Pesach, a small group of Jews felt excluded. Heck! They were excluded. So they (respectfully) challenged Moshe Rabbeinu (Numbers 9:7). “OK, so there’s something seriously wrong with us. Does that mean we can’t move forward with the rest of our fellow Jews? Help us out!”

Their quest and question echoes that of Rachel Imeinu (our Matriarch). Hundreds of years earlier she was confronted by a very stark truth: her sister, Leah Imeinu, was privileged to build the Jewish people by bearing children to Yaakov Avinu (our Patriarch), but she, Rachel, was not. She was not to be denied though. It was her goal to be a builder of the Jewish people. What did she do? She prayed. And prayed. And she prayed some more and she prayed again and she continued to pray.

In order to equal her sister, to match her accomplishments, Rachel Imeinu was not only ambitious, but STUBBORN. She cried, she pleaded, she begged and screamed. And she remained barren, for years. Nothing. After trying for years and seeing no results whatsoever, normal human beings give up. But to build Judaism or Jewishness from the ground floor, you can’t be “normal,” you can’t accept spiritual defeat. (And you must realize, that your current level of Jewishness is the ground floor for your Jewishness yet to come.)

In what activity do we have to be the most stubborn? In tefilah, prayer. How stubborn? Reb Noson writes: “Even if you imagine that your words don’t help at all; even if you feel that you are a million light-years distant from your Jewish goal—after all, it’s years that you’ve been pleading with Hashem to achieve Jewish growth and nothing has happened—you must continue with ‘just because’ stubbornness.”

That’s right. You have to tell your inner-skeptic, “Yes, there is no good reason to continue praying for my goal, but I’m going to do it anyway.” Your success may be too small for you to measure, or may not satisfy you as much as you like. But keep at it, writes Reb Noson; you will ultimately be equal with your fellow Jews who are already tzaddikim.

© Copyright 2014 148west.com

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