Series: Be'erot, Love & Relationship with God.

Synopsis: The time-bound specific self vs. simple beingness.

Episode Transcript:

(After singing a niggun) It's a niggun about things that we are learning. It's set to the pasuk that David Halmelech says, Yamin Haromema…asaseh yah, which means: the right hand of G-d is raised up. It's the higher power in relationship to the power of din and of justice and judgment, and the right hand is the hand which enables Hashem to do chayil--He has the power to create hosts, and create many wondrous and myriad expressions of life… David Hamelech declares about himself, I will not die, but I will live. I will tell the story of the doings of yud key--an abbreviation of one of the names of G-d-- and it has a very powerful connection to what I want to explore today, regarding David and his expression of the love of G-d that we began to see last time.

Here is the context: We saw in Rashi's divinely inspired perush on the pasuk v'ahavta hashem elokecha… that you love G-d with all of your heart, and all of your force or soul, and with all of your meod, that Rashi told us about meod, that the highest level of this love of G-d is expressed through mamoncha-- through your creative investment in life, your possessions-- and then Rashi told us that the other person who is present at the end of this process is King David, who we've been following the emergence of (since we saw the dudaim with Leah, which is in reference to his name) and now David actually turns out to be the one who is the final expression of love of G-d. His name "dod" actually means the loved, and the lover, and therefore Shlomo Hamelech, when he begins Shir Hashirim asher l'shlomo yishakeini m'neshikot pihu, he said, Kiss me with the kisses of His mouth, ki tovim dodecha miyayin, that your dodim are more dear to me than wine is. So he is referring here to his father, dodecha, davidecha, your David, who the kisses of Your mouth, G-d, are expressed through David, and they are more worthy and valuable to me than any of the wine of Your direct and expressed revelation. That there is something that happens between us, Shlomo haMelech says, that happens in a kiss, that can't happen if all there is is just wine. And this we understood with the help of Chazal; it was a reference to the incredible power that G-d has given by virtue of coming into unity with Him through the kisses of the mouth, which are teachings of the Torah she b'al peh and the halachah, and we saw how that becomes realized in this world with the halachah also being hakalah, the bridemaid who is where all of G-d's teaching and revelation arrive in that act , that one act of love towards him in fulfilling His will, which is our way of kissing Him. And the other aspect is the kiss of the Torah she b'al peh, the creative involvement in the revelation of His word, and a new element which I want to also refer to today, is something else about these neshikim.

But the transpersonality, the power in the world which is embodied in David, is a kind of power of love which comes to realization in the bechol meodecha. And what was the bchol meodecha? That David becomes the one who expresses at the meeting of all of the various and sometimes trying meetings with life, is the one who achieves the level of bchol midah u midah she moded lecha, that with every measuring out that G-d sends to you, that He measures out to you, haveh modeh lo, so acquiesce to Him. And I believe that's the correct translation here, as opposed to hodaya, with giving thanks. Here it's--in a sense--surrender, it's an acceptance of, it's a being whole with that, David says. And Rashi goes on and says that David is the one who says: kos yeshuot esah, uv'shem adonai ekrah, that I raise up the cup of salvation and I call out the name of G-d. Tzara v'yagon emtza. I find difficulty and travail, uvshem adonai ekrah, and I call out the name of G-d. Whether it's kos yeshuot, whether it's tzarah v'yagon, whether it's salvation, or it's travail, bshem hashem ekrah. And I want to point out that bshem hashem ekrah, doesn't seem to be an expression of thanks. Hes not thanking G-d. He's not saying, uvashem odeh, that I will give thanks to G-d. He says that in many other places-- it's not that David is short on giving hodaya. But here, in meodecha, what he is doing is being modeh. How? By calling out G-d's name. And this is a very powerful and crucial element in all of the work that we have been doing in the love of G-d. And especially in the aspect of the creative force which we explored last week in the lev tov, which is the heart of creativity, the pounding life-giving force, which a person, in his right purity, becomes that. That lev tov is rooted in that maayan mitgaber, in a spring that is overcoming all kinds of obstacles, whether it be fear, whether it be self-denigration, or--but that the maayan comes to be expressed in the lev tov, and in attaching oneself to that, so one learns to be modeh.

How is one modeh? So we saw last time, in telling a tale of someone who had a tremendously liberating breakthrough in a certain context that we were together, that breakthrough for instance may even be the kind of plug that is in the neck of the bottle, that's the plug of his own self-hatred, or self-denigration, or calling into question his ability to be an expression of all of those but block the expression of the maayan mitgaber which flows out. And the incredible thing is then when a person becomes modeh--meaning accepts--and here I'm giving the explanation of what the modeh is, he accepts the reality as it's being given to him. He accepts that and he is modeh to it. That's the first stage. He is at one with the is-ness of things, just as they are. Without all of the lies and blockages. Just as they are, that's the first stage. Just with the is-ness of things just as they are which attaches them to, as we've explained in the past, to the Tree of Life, as opposed to the Tree of Judgment of Good and Evil. And now that he is attached to that place, there is a marvelous thing: and that is, that there is a life-force which in a sense protects from becoming complacent when you're modeh, a life-force that pushes ahead to evolve further and grow creatively into more.

Now I want to look at u'vshem hashem ekrah, that he's calling out G-d's name. So we saw profoundly last time that this is actually a reflection of the love of G-d which the Maharal taught us; it was a reflection of it's ahavah she aina t'luyah b'davar, it's a love which doesn't depend on anything, meaning it's not a matter of whether G-d's doing good things to me or things that I don't like. Because I'm so at one with Him, and so connected to Him, and all of life is experienced as the wellspring of G-d bubbling up through reality, so that actually pushes us ahead in our growth in the participation of that. That, the Maharal taught us is love, because love is the deepest communing of our soul with G-d. And already at this point, the love that we are describing is really in a sense vaguely connected to the lover and the beloved as two separate entities. It's devotion to expression, it's connectivity of all, and it's a process of birthing, which is what life then becomes about.

So something very powerful which the Rabbis tell us and actually has a lot to do with the day which is coming out, Tu B'shvat, Rosh Hashanah la ilan, and the way in which we're always called upon to live our lives of creativity and action in this world. And that is, I would say, the most important contemplation that we have in our literature, which is the shliuv of shem yud kay vav key and alef dalet nun yud, that those two names be ever intertwined. And there is a way of writing them which is intertwined, which you've seen in certain siddurim, and it is encouraged, when a person is praying, to have either in imagination, or on the print in front, the shiluv of these two names. And the reason for that is because, the shem Adny, is the most dear

--and dangerous--place. It's most dear, because it's the place of our realization and creativity, because shem Adny is a reference to the soul as it becomes expressed in the world as an Adan. An aden in Hebrew is a socket. Like the sockets that were holding the tabernacle in its place. Life is Adny, life is My aden, G-d expresses through that name. Your life is My adan, Your life is holding all of this divine influx. That it should have a place to stand. That's shem Adny.

But shem Adny has a profound danger, and is most present specifically in our creative moments, which are so endeared and we've given so much space to in our teachings. That is because the experience of creativity can become a profoundly separating one. We saw this in the trial of Yaakov, who remains lvado, alone, for the small shards and the image of him being alone (and the first time of his being talked about being alone.) It's very painful--it's painful, in a sense, to be a creative person. The artist's life is a trying one, and I think anyone who has any kind of creative realization that is personal and dear to them knows that there is a very curious path that seems to be followed in that there is--maybe it's not that way for everyone--but my sense of it is that there is a period of sorrow or trial, which then leads to a realization that I'm not about these trials and sorrows; they are what I am experiencing, but there is a depth to my selfhood and my being that is beyond the depth of my sorrows and my trials. There is something that actually the pain brings about by virtue of being a tzarah, which is the word that means a narrow straight, and somehow that narrow straight--like water that flows through that narrow straight--becomes energized, where there must be a great word like impetuized--empowered--by passing through that straight.

And then there is this opening that happens; this is a pathway of creative output which is a trying one, a very difficult and lonely one. But in that loneliness, there is a tremendous meeting that we saw that Yaakov has with, so to speak, the lonely one. The lonely one being Hashem Himself, Who, no thing, no one, is like. And it's very important to maintain a consciousness of the shiluv between the place of the outer expression and personal and specific and unique creator, and the one who is simply a mouthpiece for the G-d who is speaking through me. And I don't say that lightly, but that is indeed what we call upon G-d to do. Every time we pray, we say Hashem sfatati tiftach, You G-d open up my mouth. So that is a shiluv of Havayah and Adny. How so? Because the name Havayah is the name of simple being, as we've seen from the Grah and other places. It has no time frame, no future, no past, there is only present in shem Havayah. That's the meaning of that name. And even present is a misnomer, because there really is no present that's just simply being. That's shem Havayah. And Adny is, as we said, a place where there is a specific casing for the appearance of being in the form which is time-bound, time involved, specific, and seems to be putting out its own stuff. This is why, the name Adny--alef dalet nun yud-- is the word ani, alef nun yud, with a dalet in it. And this isn't just a word game, this is very important, because in the Kabbalah, shem Adny is actually called ani. It's me. The I, the place of the I, I am, and the place of the I is the deep experience of being able to stand up to, being able to assert, be an act, or in life. That's the place of ani. But it only connects to Adny when the letter dalet is there. Literally, the letter dalet, as we saw, is so important in the name Yehudah, for instance, which is also a connecting of the dalet from Adny into the yud key vav key. G-d's name is the yud key vav key with the dalet from Adny, so that the ani can appear, which will be David Hamelech, who comes out of Yehudah, so that the ani of David Hamelech can appear. The dalet remains bound to yud key vav key, so that the consciousness of being connected to simple being, and G-d in His own changing presence will not be lost

But then David comes down as the ani, the I who is the creative output, and this then becomes revealed in the world, through the specific and creative activities which were so dear and about which we say ki tovim dodecha mi yayin, that your dodim are so dear, they are deeper than all of the wine, which is the place of the place right now. There are higher worlds than this, but [this is] the place of statis, the secret place. Yayin is gematria sod, which is the secret place of being, which is always a secret because we're always in the world of doing. So, it can't be spoken--it's an essential secret, in the sense of as soon as you begin to speak it, so then it is no longer being. It's already doing language, letters, forms, etc. so it’s a perfect secret.

For us, the David has to become a right reflection, with the dalet --and the dalet, David-- right? The dalet and the dalet has to have the clear and powerful-- powerful is the wrong word, but the very clear and zach, clean, transculent awareness of him being an expression of being, a mouthpiece for being. Very hard to hold that together. You could see why every time you say G-d's name you have to create a shiluv, a merging of these two names together. Very hard to hold that because as soon as you become creative, a new creativity, wow! you're excited and there's energy and there you are, and unbelievable, and even if it's not egotistical and self-centered, but the experience of it--it's me, it's happening to me and then you have to pull back and oscillate back to it's G-d, it's pure being, and go back there. When you're there it's a statis and there's all kinds of creative movement, so then you begin again and it becomes this oscillation which is indeed the oscillation of the shir which we spoke of once. It's the oscillation also between Havayah and Adny, which creates by virtue of its movement back and forth the song, which is the song that Shlomo Hamelech sings, the Shir Hashirim asher l'Shlomo.

But this very crucial holding is actually what we are referring to every time we say amen, every time we say a bracha. So in the bracha, he's brought it down from the highest shefa into this piece of fruit, or this piece of bread, or whatever it is, and then it has created this yichud, and then the person answering amen is actually saying something that is completely faithful and integrous. That's what amen means: Be faithful and integrous. And I'm connected by asserting that this is faithful and integrous. This world is indeed nothing but Him in His expression. And that is why the word amen itself is the numerical value of these two names of G-d, yud key vav key and Adny, because that is what needs to be established by the person who has heard the bracha, Amen. It's Adny and Havayah together. This is the real ne'emanut, the faithfulness that one's creativity is not experienced which is ajar from or [inaud—revert/overt?] from.

I must say a little bit of a digression, but it is important, too, because I would really like to see this more clearly, but I have a sense that eating fruits on Tu B'shvat isn't really--excuse me for bringing up my penchants. I am not so convinced that it's such a good idea to be so focused on the fruits on Tu B'shvat. Because it's about the tree, it's Rosh Hashanah ilan, and the word ilan is the same gematria of these two names. It's the same numerical value. Because the ilan is the place which is the connector between the ground and the fruit, or as the Maharchu of Reb Chaim Vital explains it, that there's a soul root which is in the higher worlds. And it's rooted and comes down through the tree and then it blossoms and becomes a fruit in this world. But lo! to the one who decides it's only the fruit. Has v'shalom. On Sukkot, which is the only holiday on which we deal with fruit, it's very important to keep connected to the lulav. Because the lulav connects it back up to the tree-ness of it and we're never supposed to be separated when they're being held. Because the most powerful and significant downfall is when the fruit is pulled away from the tree, and in fact has a great deal, --as we've explained in other contexts--, a great deal to do with eating only the product and not of the one who is its source and so we'll put that aside, but I will point out that historically, it's fairly late that we Jews are eating fruits on Tu B'shvat. It's mentioned in the Magen Avraham, 1600s, and there's good reason to believe that the source of having a seder Tu B'shvat with all these fruits is not a particular holy one. I'll put that aside…

In terms of our lives, it's very much that way. It's very easy to become fruit-oriented, because you're very much oriented around the productivity and the produce and the output and just in terms of personal terms, forget about what am I becoming and how am I connecting to Source. Who is producing this fruit? I mean, it's all a bunch of great words, but what is your life? Who are you? We live in a society which is so divorced from Source. Just give me the stuff! Go into the store and pull it off the shelf. I don't want to deal with mechanism. I don’t want to deal with process. I just want to have the stuff at the end. And our personalities become that way, where it becomes like our personality culture or persona-culture, which is what you're projecting, which is far more important than who you've become.

So you get these things, you know, like learning ways to get people to like you, or to make a certain impression without the transformation itself. So that's on the level of our humanity. But on the level of our divinity, it's the same way. In a creative mode it becomes disconnected from that first origin of expression. You know that one of the great and most important contemplations that we have is the knowing that all of this is always in becoming; it's always being made by G-d, He's always speaking this. You can even imagine in a mediation, the emergence of a thought; just watch the emergence of a thought which comes from perfect at-oneness with that which that thought is emerging. Where did that thought come from? What was the nature of it, that thought, a moment before you thought it? Certainly it was there in thought, in mind, somewhere, it didn't come from nowhere. Well, that is the very beginnings of contemplation of unity coming into manifestation in a very mysterious, wondrous way in which that thought is not in your mind before you think it, it's not there. You can't find it, identify it, but it is there.

Now that is a low level example of, if we imagine it as far more supernal that (33:24) all is present within G-d before it becomes manifest and real, or is it, or in what sense is it there before it becomes manifest and real? It is there and it's not, and there's this wonderous transition. I'm teaching you this because it's very important for us as Jews to always be attentive to that transition point, that we become creative and expressed, but we know it was a thought that was thunk by G-d. And that's what it is and that's what our lives are. It's His thinking it. Even though we experience it, and we have to experience it, the Adanim which is the hard socket that holds it, and if we don't experience ourselves with substance, so then we're not going to do anything.

But the ani must always be connected or expressed through the dalet, which is a delet, which I began to explain twenty minutes ago, the letter dalet in Hebrew is a delet, [a door], a passageway, and so in the ani has a passageway that it's adni, and then when it connects up to yud key vav key, and its dalet becomes interpenetrated into the yud key vav key, then it becomes Yehudah, who is able to both acquiesce to and surrender to and give thanks for--and only from there can David our King emerge. And only from there can a true, redemptive consciousness emerge. And only from there can come true song and speaking of Torah and prayer, almost ironically, and prayer. And this David says about himself: v'ani tefilah. My selfhood is prayer. And the reason why he says that--it's so important-- is because--well, (hesitating) the prayers we say, in the Kabbalah, the Arizal, the prayers that we say, are kisses. This is the profound terminology of our teachings which must be taken with a right orientation of zakut, of non-materiality, but in the prayers we pray, so the first three brahcot are the chibuk, the hug, and the request we make of G-d are the kisses, so the Arizal teaches. What, the kisses? That yeshakeni m'neshikot pihu. Because when we pray, so there's a mixing of our breath with His breath, and this in the Kabbalah is a very high place of unification. The prayers are actually His voice speaking through us, and that's the only way to truly pray, which is with an awareness that it's Havayah who's speaking through my Adny, my Ani.

And I'll say it in simpler terminology. It's His will and desire which I seek to align myself with in my prayers, and to speak His word, so that I will be speaking what it is which He Himself desires and it will never be anything else other than that. Just like it should never be anything other than His Torah that I speak when I say something which is a chiddush, something new. What does that mean something that is new? Is it not what G-d Himself thought? Of course it is! If it's new and disaligned from He, then it is nothing. And when it is very ancient, only then is it something, but in its being ancient, and the more ancient it is, the newer it is when it is received in this world, and in this body. It's this profound paradox that we live. We only want to say the most ancient thing, the ones that are the deepest thoughts of His will.

The Zohar teaches that when a person says a chiddush, the angels raise it up and bring it to G-d, because He asks that a chiddush come to Him so that He might kiss it, and He kisses every chiddush. That's yeshakeni m'neshikot pihu, we're asking Him to kiss us with the kisses of His mouth. Pihu, which is the peh of yud key vav, with us providing the final heh, which is the soul's return up to Him to be kissed by Him and rejoined with Him, and then His breath becomes at one with our breath-- through a teaching which is a true teaching. This is what we really long for, and this is where love becomes so deeply at one with Him that in the end, David Hamelech himself says, it doesn't matter what you send my way, I am in full at-oneness with it. The Rabbis say that at the end of time, and I say this with trepidation and had it not been printed in the Talmud, then I wouldn't, but as you'll hear, because as the verse says in Zacharia, in chapter fourteen, v'hayah adny hamelech al kol ha'aretx, v'yom hahu….ushmo echad, that it will be that G-d will be King over all the earth, and on that day G-d will be one and His name one.

So the Rabbis say….(40:49) what , today he is not one?… Amar… so Rebbe acha bar chaninah, his name is like the fraternerous one, his name is the binding one who is the son of the one who has chen…. The World to Come is not like this one. In this world, when something good happens, we say, baruch hatov v' hamativ, blessed is the One Who is good and Who does good, but when bad news comes, so we say baruch dayan haemet, blessed is the True Judge…. In the World to Come, the only thing will be hatov v'hamativ, there only will be good and the good one. Shmo echad, so that was He will be one, and His name one. What? His name now is not one? ,…. Rebbe Nachman bar Yitzchak, not like this world, but in the World to Come. In this world, My name is written yud key but is read aleph dalet. In this world, it is written yud key vav key but we don't say that, we don’t pronounce that, we only pronounce the aleph dalet nun yud. But in olam habah, kulo echad, but in the World to Come, He will be called yud hey and he will be written yud heh. We will call Him by His real name. Because in the World to Come the simple being of all will be so present and apparent, that the experience will not be of things will are antithetical to or in favor of. It will only be Him. That's what David is calling to, when it says ubhem hashem ekrah, I call out His name, Havayah. B'shem havayah ekrah. Calling upon that His name should become One.

But we should experience life that way and indeed he is the one who is raising that cup at the end of the feast, at the end of time, at the end of G-d's sustenance for creation to give Him this blessing, which is this odecha of the final and most intimate love with Him which it's no longer a calling out of His name, it's a being to being with. This love, which is one which is-- there's glimmerings available to us in this world, glimmerings of it whenever we accept life, when we accept what G-d gives us, when we know it as good what He has sent us and what we have faced in our lives.

And I want to tell you something that is a great secret. And so much so that the Gemara goes on and says, Ravah, who was one of the greatest teachers of the Talmud, wanted to give over this teaching in a very public place, in the pirchah. The pirchah is when there would be very large masses of people that would gather for the teachings of the Rabbis. So amar le ha husaba (44:47) so there was an old man there, who said to him, l'olam ktiv, it says, ze shmi l'olam. This is My name to be hidden. This is to be hidden. So he didn't. (That's what I meant when I said I would give it over, it wasn't printed.) But the truth is, it's a secret whether you've heard it or not. It forever remains a secret, because it stands as an antithesis to our primary experience of life, which is of the ani, and the transition all the time from the ani back into Adny, through Havayah and Yehudah back up into the ayin, is one which is an ongoing oscillation and flux, which is truly the song of life, and the great love song, which is the Shir Hashirim asher l'Shlomo.

(46:12) There was once a man who lived something of this. He was the great teacher of Rebbe Akiva, who is of all the tanaim, is the most primary origin of Torah sheba'al peh. In fact, so much so that when Moshe saw Rebbe Akiva, he said, "You have Rebbe Akiva. What are You giving the Torah through me for?" I could go on and on about Rebbe Akiva…His name is actually the ending letters of a verse which is big important verse about our lines: Or zarua l'tzaddik uv'yisreh lev simchah. If you take the ending letters of each word, it spells out Rebbe Akiva. Or--resh, zarua--ayin, l'tzaddik--kuf, uv'yishrey--yud, lev--vet, simchah--hey. And Rebbe Akiva is the expression of the Torah she b'al peh, who lives his life in oneness, as we know that's how he indeed ended his life.

He had a teacher, whose name was--we only know his first name--and apparently, both the place he came from, and the way he lived life. And the name of his teacher was Nachman Ish Gamzu, the consoled one who was of Gam Zu. What is Gamzu? This, too. Why was he called Nachman of Gamzu? (48:28) Because kol milte de hava salka le, On everything that would happen to him, he would say of it, gam zu l'tovah. This is also good. This is also for the good. Gamzu l'tovah. Fantastic.

So, there was actually something here that could be put to use, a guy like this. You could send him to all kinds of situations, and he would say, gamzu l'tovah. Nice, but will it always work out? I guess, he'll always see it as working out, so I guess it's okay. I guess it's kind of like a no-risk thing. So the Rabbis needed someone to go speak to the Caeser, who was going to or had made a bad declaration against the Jews. So they wanted to send him a package of a bribe, of extravagant and precious stones. So they said, who can we send this with? So they said, well, let's send it with Nachum Ish Ganzu-- d'iluma b'nisim, miracles are always happening with him. He's learned of miracles. Actually an interesting phrase, because it doesn't acutally mean always happening with him, it means he's learned of them. Already you have a sense that miracles that happen to him don't just happen to him, they're related to somethng about his consciousness about life and the world. He's learning. His learning is a miraculous learning. So, what do they do? They sent him a suitcase of precious stones. On his way to Rome, or wherever he was going, he had to sleep over somewhere. So he put it wherever he put it, he went to sleep, and in the nighttime, the owners of this little rest spot came in his room, took the suitcase, emptied all of the stones out of it, put them in their bag, and filled it with dirt.

Now there are two versions of this story. In the one version, in the morning he saw it, and said, gamzu l'tovah. Another version has this in parenthesis, that dar , I don't know. In any case, (51:12) kimatva hatam, when he arrived in Rome or wherever he was going, sharinu l'sifta, so he presented the suitcase to the Caesar, they opened it up, and they saw it was full of dirt. The King wanted to kill him and all the Jews. They're making fun of me, those Jews. Nachum Ish Gamzu said, gamzu l'tovah. Eliyahu appeared, he looked like he was one of the king's advisors, and he said, maybe this is the dirt of Avraham, their father. You know, when he took dirt, he would throw it and it would turn into arrows, knives and swords, there's even a verse in their prophets that their swords are turned into dust. And the archer's bow is turned into chaff, actually the direction in the prophet, of course. There was this one that they couldn't overcome --lo matmu lmichtma she (52:41)-- So they checked it out, and they threw this dirt at the capital city, or at the country, and they were able to capture the country! Whoa!

So they came back and they went into the King's treasury and they brought out all kinds of precious stones and they give them to Nachum Ish Gamzu, and they said, Here, take this back and give this to your people. They were thrilled. Okay, so on his way back, so he goes and he sleeps in this place. I don't know, good things seem to happen in this place, so he goes and sleeps there again. So they asked him, What happened with your mission? How did things work out? So he told them what happened. They said, Well, what did you bring? He said, What I took from here I brought to there.

Okay, as soon as he left, they pulled down their house, dug up all the dirt, put it into big boxes, and they brought it to the Caesar. And they said, this is it! This is the stuff! We are the owners, we're the ones he brought it from. So, they said, okay, let's check it out. Of course they checked it out and it didn't do anything. And so these scoundrals had an unhappy end. And that's was the story of Nachu, Ish Gamzu, teacher of Rabbi Avika. What's this Nachum Ish Gamzu? Gamzu l'tovah.

So the Maharal says a deep thing, "What did Nachum Ish Gamzu always say "gamzu l'tovah"? He was always saying "Gamzu l'tovah." As if it needs to be enunciated. It couldn't be, so to speak, just an attitude. So he says the following crucial teaching: It says that everything that comes from G-d is coming from His good, and when something comes upon a person which seems to be bad, listen carefully, (55:41) hu boteach bo… yitbarach. That he completely relies on G-d. Hashem Yitbarach…tovah. G-d turns it to good… by virtue of his reliance on Him. Vey interesting--listen carefully. Everything which comes from G-d is good. When it comes, trust Him. And if You trust Him, he turns it to good. Huh? Wait a minute. Is it good, or isn't it good? What are you telling me? Is it good, or isn't it good? Why are you telling me that my trust will determine whether it's good or not good? You just told me that everything that comes from G-d is good. Yeah. But its goodness depends on your reliance, bitachon, betach, is your ability to cling. In Hebrew, tiach is what clings to, rest in Him. Boteach bo. It's like sitting on the floor now. Let your weight be in it. Cling to Him, be davek in Him. And then He turns it to good. That's not to say that if I didn't, then it wouldn't be good? Well, you know what? Yeah. Because then you'd be living a lie, you'd be living the lie of your interpretive and judgmental mind which is pushing it off and not willing to be modeh to. But when you are boteach and modeh to, then the good comes.

Now I want to warn you. Don't try to make sense of this, because it's a tautology. It's not like I'm proving to you that what G-d is sending you is good, the proof being when you accept it, it's good. It's not a proof of anything. It's an experience of life. We could never prove such a thing, because we can't stand outside saying, it should be this way, or it should be that way, if you remember the young man from last week. You can't say it should be this way or it should be that way. You should be standing outside the whole system to determine such a thing, so shut up. Just shut up. Shtok. Ki kachah lah b'machshavah. You can't say what it should be, shouldn't be.

But what you can become is an experiencer of life as it is. And you can know, thanks to G-d having revealed Himself to us, that He made this world and held it because He saw that it was good. And when he saw the suffering and travail, the midrash says, that came about on yom sheni, on the second day, which is the introduction of duality. He didn't say tov about that. That if you look on the second day of Creation, He doesn't say tov, because it's the day when duality is created. But on the day of tov meod, He interincluded all the elements into one. And then even yisurim--which are the experiences of life which are antagonistic to what it is that we enjoy or like--becomes included, the midrash says, in the tov meod. And so it is that as long as we stay in the place of claiming omniscience, so forget it. What are you proving to me? That G-d is good because when I accepted what happened to me, that it turned out for the good? What, are you trying to trick me into believing in G-d? No, I'm not trying to trick anyone. I'm just trying to describe an experience and that's what the Maharal is doing for us; he describes the experience when you're boteach, he's m'hapech it l'tovah. But I'm telling you it's good. So if you're telling me it's good, it's good, even if I don't accept it--No, it doesn't work that way, sorry!

Here, give Me a kiss. Can you give Me a kiss, G-d says, can you become at one with Me? Ki tovim dodecha m'yayin, it's better than all of the joys which you could have thought to experience had you not come into being and stayed the simple wine in the place of the secret. If you can, then you've entered the moed . Meod? Like more than? More than. More than what? How could there be more than? You're right, there isn't. It's all Me. But know that meod is the same letters as Adam. Because you are the meod, if you live your life right. And the way to live your life right is when the meod becomes mah, which is the same numeric value, the question of what. The statement of we are what, which was Moshe, who said about himself, and Aharon, anachu mah. We are meod realized as mah. And that's when the ani becomes ayin , and the Talmud says that you should know the whole world stands on that, the mah of Moshe, as it says: toleh eretz al limah, that he hangs the whole of reality on li mah. On the ones who say the li mah, for me, it's what. And I'm complete bitul to Him, I'm complete abnegation to Him, it's only Him. (1:02:39)

The beautiful thing is, when that mah has the beginnings of ani added to it, the aleph, so it becomes meah, the one hundred brachot that a person is meant to say every day. But it's Moshe and the power of his humility which allows this to be, it's his power of humility which allows for the yichud for the connection of shem Adny and shem havayah as one, that the ani never lose its awareness of where it is always, and who is always thinking it and who is always speaking it, and who is always expressing it, and that is ultimate love and ultimate communion in a way that, in the end of time, will be expressed by the meodecha of acceptance.

(1:04:30) You're welcome to ask questions…

We discussed creativity in the beginning, and you talked about creativity in the sense of aloneness. How do you define creativity? Because you're not really defining it in a purely artistic sense, obviously.

I really appreciate your asking that. Because it's not always that way, and the truth is, when it's a true creation, there's always people together in it. Nevertheless, I don't know exactly how to explain what's lonely about it. In the end nobody can know your heart. They bring five things--I need to find this Gemara again--five things that no one can ever really know, and one of them is the heart of another person.

So that's creativity? The heart?

Creativity is-- the lev tov is the creative origin of the life-giving force which is creative power.

But creative power means what? That you're bringing something new to the world? It's something from you?

Life-giving. I mean, one one level, it's life-giving. When it's new life-giving, so it's even more joyuous?

So life-giving is a lonesome process?

No, that I don't think. The amazing thing is the way that G-d made it is that the only way to give life is with another person. Until technologically came along and tried to rake that up too. But the incredible thing is, the creation of a child, the creation of anything, really, always involves another person. If you remember, we saw (1:06:34) ashrei yulad'to, it says, happy is the one who gives birth to him, is the one who teaches be a chaver tov, know how to connect. So I'm contradicting myself, because I'm exploring different aspects of it. I'll try to say it as succinctly as possible. On the one hand, creation is always a co-opting activity, really, deeply. Creation is always cooperative. But there are moments in Creation that are experienced as just me doing it. Just me. And not only that: how could I possibly share this? Who would understand me? --on the one hand. On the other hand, of course it's with others and with all of reality and the whole world and G-d who is speaking it through me. And that is experienced very intimately. But I may be wrong, and I'm not the cleanest in the world. But I have the sense, at least this is where my madrega is, I have the sense that it shifts back and forth. And then you just want to share it, and then you realize: This isn't my doing, it's like everything and every person I've come into contact with and all life experience, this is reality. And then you're not alone at all.

So does the loneliness—is the loneliness not knowing if the-whatever the creative item is--is going to be received? Is that what the loneliness is?

Never able to fully share. One. And on the other, it's an expression of my utter and complete uniqueness.

Right. So that's not knowing if it will be received or not.

Not only the question of knowing if it will be received . It's unreceivable, because it's utterly unique. It didn't come from anyone else, it came from me. On the one hand. On the other hand, it's a very tameh place that I'm describing. Meaning, it's a very impure and incorrect. It's not right. The truth is, the whole of reality is participating in this and taking pleasure in it and contributing to it. And being part of it. That's the truth. Halevai that we hold that in the creative. But, nevertheless, it is still l'vado. Because this particular expression is so unique and different that it's really alone. I'm kind of like trying to draw for you the shiluv for you of shem yud key vav key, and Adny. You can hold it in a picture, with a yud and an aleph and a hey and a dalet and a vav, etc.

What I also want to say, it's the deepest love when it's experienced as something which is what I just described. We're all together in this. But who could you love more than someone who's participating in that with you?

Also you said that it doesn't really come from you. So if you're not really alone, then what you're doing is tapping into Hashem.

Right.

So then is it an illusion, then, the (inaud) (1:10:51) ?

Yeah, on a certain level, yeah. The class is over..and I'll continue to take questions.

I'm always very wary of the word "illusion".

False understanding.

It's called, like I like it better, in the non-judgemental that's called da'at tachton. It's lower consciousness. The reason why I prefer that is because lower consciousness is crucial. The Rabbis said, when they tried to get rid of the yetzer harah, they looked around the kingdom and they locked it up. For three days, the yetzer harah, and they looked around the kingdom and they didn't find one egg that had been laid by a hen. Not one egg. You know, no fruit. Sad to say, but you need a lower consciousness. Then you catch yourself, and then like-- I know, high souls, maybe, I don't know, but it doesn't oscillate that way. But it's good to always have someone who reminds you. I have a dear I guess former talmid and friend. He reminds me, It's good to have someone who reminds you, when you're in your LOW! G-d. Because you can really only sort of hold it pictorially with a shiluv of Havayah and Adni and to be in the ilan. Was that helpful?

It is, but I don't want to continue, because I could do it for two hours.

(Continuing) Amanut, omanut in Hebrew, craftmanship and artistry, has its root as amen; aman has its root as shiluv. Because real craftsmanship, which is the creative output, is always with this kind of consciousness. When you're purely in it, when the creative inflow happens, so then it's from G-d. Then you start working it out, thinking about it, presenting it, getting it into how it's going to look, packaging it, etc. But the real moment of omanut, is very much like that.

I'm just going to say one other thing. We're just referring back to our learning in the Rambam. (1:14:28) about Simcha bmitzvotav ahavat hakel shetzivah bahem. And David and his dancing and letting go, and it's all flowing through him, and Michal trying to stop that and etc. So the Rambam learned his teachings about simcha shel mitzvah from a sugiah that in a sense doesn't make any sense at all. Listen to this piece of Talmud. It says, Kohelet said two things. One thing he said was simchah--ech! It's a bunch of trash! As Ecclesiastes talks. And the other one says, Eshabeach ani et hasimchah. I praise nothing other than simchah. So the Rabbis say, What are you going to do with this contridiction? So they say, one is simchah, and the other is simchah shel mitzvah. And where do we learn simchah shel mitzvah, the joy of a mitzvah? So here's their proof. They say, well, you know, it says, that when Shaul was troubled and crazy, so his advisor said, We need to bring someone who can play you music. And, of course, they bring him no other than David Hamelech.(1:15:46) Vayehi knagen hamenagen, And then, when he played him the music, so his spirit was calmed. It's the same language which is used when the prophets would play and prophecy would begin. Huh? That's the proof that simchah she b'mitzvah, that's something. Now you look at that piece of the Talmud and you say, What? I mean if you had said, He brought him a lulav and he shook the lulav in joy, or if he had brought his tefillin and it said, He put on his tefillin in joy, then it would have been a mitzvah, right? Then it would have been the joy of doing a mitzvah, right? No. That's not simchah shel mitzvah. Simchah shel mitzvah is the joy in the joining. That's mamash, it's the only way to explain the Gemara. When he played the music, so he joined Him, G-d's spirit was resting upon him. That's simchah she b'mitzvah. The joy is in the joining. And Rashi says, well, it's a mitzvah to have G-d's spirit rest upon you, that's how Rashi, what they say in yeshivish, "tyches it up." But that's the point. That's simchah she b'mitzvah. The joy is in the joining. And that's music. The music is there. And that's David who plays the music for Shaul.

Can you tell me more about the day of tov meod?

It says that at the end of Creation on the sixth day, that G-d looked at everything, V'hiney, tov meod. Up until that day he looked at the particular creation of that day and He saw that it was good. He looked at the light, He saw that it was good. He looked at the plants, He saw that they were good. He looked at the orbs, He looked at the animals, etc. And then at the end, He looks at it all and says, it's tov meod, the allness of it that's malchut, the entirety of it. So the Rabbis said, You know what He saw when He said tov meod? He saw death. He saw suffering, pain, hell. Gehenom. And He said, tov meod. Gey shteis. Go understand that. That was the tov meod. I'm kind of loath to explain these kinds of things, but they have everything to do with what we've been talking about. Because that's the root for that pain and travail, as painful as that is, if you ask me, I don't know if I'd ever make the world like this, don't ask me, but that's the pathway that takes us to the meod. It's just that way, and when you're modeh to that, then it is that. Is that helpful for you? There's a number of midrashim on that, quite astounding.

(1:19:55) You're describing the oscillation. You see, it's very much like whiplash, like I'm hearing you say oscillation, and I'm thinking halivay, to be in some kind of like sweet oscillation..

Thank you, I'm being, I'm sweetening it.

And that in that, I guess, I'm not sure what the question is, I think maybe that sitting in the reality in the Adny of it, say, how to sit in that and feel it and accept it, without feeling the need to push it off and say, no,but I'm really bitul and I'm really gamzu l'tovah, even if there's a deep emunah in the gamzu l'tovah, in the moment, how do you experience it and feel it and love it?

How do you have both the gam, which reflects an awareness of my needing to see it, experience it, with all of its difficulty, how do you hold the gam, this too, is good.

Both the trial and the l'tovah. Right now, I think I've described as best I can in a different plane. If you try to step over that experience of trial and tribulation, than the zu l'tovah won't happen either. You can't walk out on it, it's a perversion. It's a disgusting perversion--is the word that comes to mind-- it's a disgusting perversion of life, to G-d's gift of life, to try to not be in that. If it's just your thoughts, drop them. I have this, I'll think all kinds of bad things, or regrets about, or judgments of, etc. You don't have to walk through those. You can just lay those aside, you don't have to think about those, because it's not more real than the reality you're investing it with now. So drop that. That's not G-d sending that to you. Put that aside, think of Him, think of something good, etc. But when it's in life, person got his leg chopped off, or a child hurt, or whatever, things that we share, just like, oh, it's okay, it's G-d and it's good, that's a bunch of crap--that's a bunch of crap, and I specifically call it that, because I have something in mind, but I have like someone shared with me a lecture that he heard from a professor of philosophy from Berkley. And among the garbage in the lecture there was a good scene he described. When he was in the 1960s in an ashram, a a Buddhist teacher was telling the people there: So what would it be for you to have this rose without the thorns? That's enlightment. And they went around the circle and everyone said, Yes! And they got to this professor, who said, "What are you talking about? That's not life!" Jewish guy. "Where would love be? Where would growth be? Where would trials be? What are you talking about?"

And it's not that we don't know this, and in the end the Gemara says, ubayom hahuh yiyeh Hashem echad u'shmo echad. That, by the way, is what we started with, with the niggun (1:24:17) Yemim Hashem romema…ma'aseh ya. I am telling the story of yed keh Because in the end, yud key will be G-d's name: yihyah. Yud key yud key, which is just the mochin, just the higher consciousenss, not the lower consciousnes, that will be in the end of time, but that's not now. But when you try to pretend that it's now, then sort of like jump the gun, then it's a short circuit. That's what the Rabbis say to people who try to go the long path through a short cut. Like in the famous mashal that the Tanya brings, that there's a longer shorter path and a short longer path. When you try to take the long path as if it's a shorter path, then you don't end up at the palace, you're just pretending. This has everything to do with what you were saying before about illusion. G-d created it, see that's where we're different from the Buddhists. G-d made this, that we should see things this way. What are you going to do with that? So if you live in a will-less reality, so then all you're going to focus on is, this is all illusion, maya, higher consciousness. But if you live in a reality which is willed by a loving G-d Who is good, and Who has made this in His goodness, well, then, don't skip it over, it's the meod and the tov. Love me. If you experience G-d as a loving G-d, so He made this not as some perverse and false image, illusion, but He made it as a reality that's meant to be lived. And then when you pass through it, and you do pass through it, what comes out at the other end, is the chelah yeterah, that the Zohar says, is the chelah yeterah of tshuvah and other things that what life is here on this planet for, you passed through the narrow path of mitzraim. You had to go there, the metzar hagaron, the narrow path, between your heart and your mind. Was that helpful, was I relating to you, Debbie?

Yeah.

Chaya, what's…?

Still breathing.

Okay.

Gam zu l'tovah does that mean, this is wonderful?

Pleasant and good are two different things.

Yeah, Gam zu l'tovah. I don't know that it always means, to enjoy, it's to have a consciousness and awareness that it's not happening without reason, that there's a higher course

It's going for the good.

and you're a part of that, and that's way it's good. But it doesn't mean that--

It's is l'tovah "l" tovah.

Yeah, it's for the good, it doesn't mean that it's good for you

Correct. Gam zu l'tovah. I think Rebbe Akiva has a higher consciousness, and more geuladic consciousness, and ultimately there's even more, but he's the beginning --Nachum ish Gamzu, of this kind of consciousness, that's expressed in Rebbe Akiva in the great love of G-d that he lives. But you're right, and there's another story, which is a counterpart story of Nachum Ish Gamzu, if you remember where he meets a poor person, and the poor person asks him to --are you familiar with this story?

There's a story about Nachum ish Gamzu, I don't know if I really want to tell the story, it's painful but it's important to see the other side, the Rabbis came to him once, he was ill, he was lying on the bed, he had no arms, no legs, and he was blind, the house was falling down. So they came to visit him, and the legs of the bed were sitting in pools of water so that the ants wouldn't climb up on the bed and gnaw at him. So he said to the Rabbis, First take all of the stuff out of the house, and then take me out, so they took all the stuff out and they took him out, and of course, as soon as they took him out, the house fell down. Because it was only in his merit that the house was still standing. So they said to him, How did this happen to you? So he said, Once I was walking on the way, and I had a load on my donkey, and a poor man came up to me and said, Could you give me some food, and he said, I will give it to you as soon as I unload. It's like the equivalent of I guess, like you're taking a hitchhiker. You'd like to stop here and the other one would like to stop ahead, I'll stop over there, and you'll get out and walk back. Something like that, I guess, so he said, I'll unload, and then I'll give you. In the meantime, the poor man died. So then, Nachum Ish Gamzu said: these hands that did not move quickly for him should no longer be, these legs that didn't run or him should no longer be. These eyes that didn't see his suffering and compassion should no longer see. Wait a minute, why didn't he say Gamzu l'tovah? Well, apparently, it's not so simple. I don't have an answer, just leave that as paradox. But it's not so simple.

Is that in the Gemara?

That story appears right before the one I told. Because then the Gemara says, so why did they call him Nachum Ish Gamzu? Well, because he always said Gamzu l'tovah. What? And there he is, with the earth of Avraham, the man of love of G-d. It was his love of G-d, the earth of Avraham. It's not simple to be Jewish, you don't have the thorns, you want to go on a different path. Yeah, we have thorns and roses together. Because it's not an illusion, and your choices matter, and your response before them. And they have consequences. That's the next series. About fear of G-d.

Oh yeah?

No! Have a good day, bye!