We’ve been talking about the advantages of humility. The Gemara in Masechet Eruvin talks at length about the arguments between Bet Hillel and Bet Shammai. As we know, the Halacha follows Bet Hillel. The Gemara is bothered. Why did Hillel merit that the Halacha follows them? The Gemara gives a very interesting answer: because Hillel was more humble than Shammai, more easygoing. That's a very strange answer. It would seem that if you know the law, the law's follows you, and if you don't know the law, the law's not doesn’t follow you. What does your humility have anything to do with if the Halacha is goig to follow you or not? The Chida, in his sefer Petach Enayim, gives multiple reasons. -Reason number one is based on nature. Someone who is humble doubts himself. He's not sure, so therefore he's always looking in, reviewing and checking whether he's correct or not. It's interesting, I've noticed when dealing with doctors, that sometimes the greater the doctor, the more they say they don't know. I wonder if that's connected. If they're humble and curious, they're more likely to look into things more and end up with the correct diagnosis. A doctor that says, “ Oh, I've seen this a thousand times! I know the answer,” is not going to get to the right answer. -His second answer is that a humble person has a broken heart, and therefore his heart is a vessel to accept wisdom. Wisdom needs a vessel, and the vessel is a broken heart. -In a similar vein, he says that someone who's humble has the Shechina with him, and once the Shechina is with him, the Halacha follows him. He even points out that Anava has the same numerical value as Sinai , as in Har Sinai, to hint to us that the humble person's Torah is true like it was given at Har Sinai, which alludes to the famous explanation Moshe kibel Torah M’Sinai. Simply, this means he received the Torah at Har Sinai, but it says M’Sinai , which means ‘ from Sinai,’ meaning that he learned the lesson from Sinai, the humble mountain. -He adds another, somewhat kabbalistic reason- that all mistakes and all lack of understanding really come from the negative forces, but someone who is humble is not affected by those negative forces. We mentioned, at the beginning of the week, that Bilaam, who was an arrogant man, was the source for all negative forces. He was the source of kishuf and black magic. Those those negative forces impact our ability to understand. A person who's humble does not have those negative forces impacting him and therefore, he’s able to understand. This is similar to the concept that he is vessel for God to dwell in. It goes to back Har Sanai. God came down to Har Sinai, He didn't lift up Har Sina, which the Gemara uses as a proof that rather than God lifting up the humble to heights, God comes down to them. These are yet more wonderful benefits of humility. And again, this is very strongly related to Bitachon. As we’ve said previously, the Meshech Chochma tells us that the source of bitachon is Bo Tidbak/Cleave to God. B itachon is all about connecting to God, and you can't connect to God if you're an arrogant person. Thus humility is a necessary factor in our work on Bitachon. Have a wonderful day.