Parsha Review Podcast · Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe

00:01 - Intro (Announcement)
You are listening to Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe of TORCH in Houston, Texas. This is the Parsha Review Podcast.

00:10 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
All right, welcome back everybody to the Parsha Review Podcast. This week's Parsha is Parsha's Shoftim, shoftim v'shotim titen, lecho b'chol sha'arecho. Judges and executive officers shall you appoint for you? In all your city's gates, in all of your gates, means have judges, have a police force. You need to make sure that laws aren't just laws, that laws are to be enforced. Say, just, tell us something very, very interesting.

00:49
This Torah portion is always read in the first week of the month of El, always El. The first day of El is tomorrow. Like we mentioned previously, the month of El begins tomorrow. Today's already Rosh Chodesh, it's a two-day Rosh Chodesh. So today's Rosh Chodesh's already Rosh Chodesh, it's a two-day Rosh Chodesh. So today's Rosh Chodesh, tomorrow's Rosh Chodesh, and we're going to start blowing the shofar tomorrow. Shofar's goal is to wake us up, to awaken within us a trembling, an awakening of recognizing accountability. Shostim b'shotrim, judges and officers, beginning of the month of Elul.

01:37
We always read this, our sages tell us, because most people think that what's going to be Rosh Hashanah, yom Kippur? Oh, I'm going to have to tell God I'm sorry, I'm going to have to apologize, I'm going to have to do Teshuvah, I'm going to have to repent and have atonement for my sins. Which sins Me sin? Well, most people think what type of sins? The sins of the things I didn't do right. I may not have eaten perfect kosher, I may not have done appropriate things on Shabbos, I may not have done the right things here and there. Maybe I don't keep all God's laws. I don't know. Maybe yes, maybe no. I'm going to have to work through all of them. Our sages tell us no.

02:26
The most important part of our teshuva, of our repentance, is how we treated our fellow man, our neighbors, our friends, and then the ones who are much closer to us our family, our children, our siblings, our spouse. That's where we need to start being judges and officers, looking into ourselves and recognizing whether or not we acted the way we should have. Did I say the nice things that I should have said? Did I use words that perhaps were offensive? Was I always patient? Was I always calm? Was I always reassuring? Was I doing the things the way God wanted me to do them, the way God prescribes in his Torah?

03:24
Shoftim v'shotrim, there was a rabbi who was famous to be saying he says eating in other people's house. In my community he would say I can do, because everyone has a kosher symbol on their food. I know their food's kosher, but taking their money, I don't know if their money's kosher. I don't know if they may have cheated somebody. That's something that we need to take account for during the month of El, to prepare ourselves. We need to be the shoftim v'shotrim. We need to be the judges and the officers to look into our own ways and see whether or not we've gone astray, whether or not we've done the right things. Not between us and God, oh, between us and God. God, please forgive me, I won't do it again. No, it's between us and our fellow man.

04:17
Was I honest in business? Did I give a person intentional bad advice just so that they fail and I'll be happy that my competition is taken out? Was I doing the will of Hashem in the way I conduct myself with my neighbors and friends, with my family, with my siblings, with my children, with my spouse? Yes, did I want good for someone else or did I not want good for someone else? Did I pray for? When I heard that someone else was in pain, when someone else wasn't feeling well, did I go out of my way to pray for them? Did I really feel the pain of our hostages, our fellow brothers and sisters. Do I remember them? Do I understand what it means that mothers are burying their children? Do I understand the pain of another fellow Jew? This is the question. Are we really living with a responsibility for others and taking it all in being responsible for ourselves, or am I just worried about me, me, me. How does it make me feel? Am I just self-centered?

05:55
This is the Parsha that reminds us right in the onset of Elul. Guess what You're about to go into? A month of judgment. Are you ready to give judgment to yourself first, take accountability, look into yourself and see, judge yourself, be an, be an officer and say you could have been better, you should have acted better, you should have been thinking about others better, you should have been less selfish and more selfless. And that doesn't mean that we should be harsh, but we should be realistic. This month is a month of responsibility, accountability between us and ourselves in front of the Almighty.

06:42
When we come on Rosh Hashanah, we say Hashem, give me another year. It's not a given. You know, if you came to my grandfather of blessed memory right before Rosh Hashanah and you said to him you know, I'm making a wedding after the holidays. I want to invite you to the wedding. You know what my grandfather's response would be I don't know if God will give me life another year after the holidays. If God decides to give me life, I'll be happy to attend. But you understand the reality that he lived with. It's not a given that we'll be here tomorrow. It's not a given that we have another year.

07:26
What are we asking for? We're asking to have the reality of our own judgment within ourselves, to stop and to think no one else is going to judge us now. Hashem is not judging us yet. We have Rosh Hashanah coming up in 30 days. We have Yom Kippur in 40 days. It's for me to be the judge of me. It's for me to take the judge of me. It's for me to take the accountability of my own actions and or inactions, and don't rush to be so holy and righteous and say, god, I may have sinned before you. No, no, no, no, my fellow man, I may have sinned before you. My fellow man, I could have done better with my friends and with my neighbors. I could have done better with my brothers and sisters in the Holy Land. You hear a story.

08:24
It's an amazing thing today that we're able to touch our phone and see news around the world. But it also has its drawbacks, and that is we become insensitive, we become completely desensitized when we see all these stories. Oh, another story, another story, another hostage, another hostage. What's if that was our child? What's if that was our brother, sister, our nephew, our niece, our relative? How would we feel then? Would we just say, oh, that's terrible, and just move on with our day? Would we shed a tear? Would we say a prayer? Would we ask Hashem, hashem, please wake us up. Hashem, give us the ability. This is part of what we pray. We don't just have these emotions. We ask Hashem, hashem, wake me up so that I not be numb. Wake me up so when I see a story like this, it affects me. Wake me up. That's part of our waking up and that's what we need. To ask Hashem, this journey of the next 30 and 40 days 30 days to Rosh Hashanah and 40 days to Yom Kippur it's a journey. Let's not be sleeping. Uru y'sheini mishinaschem, wake up my sleeping fellows Right From your slumber. This is what Moshe says.

09:59
Moshe, interesting story. We've talked about this in the past. Moshe is standing at Mount Sinai with the entire Jewish people on the sixth day of the month of Sivan and they receive the Torah, the revelation, at Mount Sinai. Moshe goes up the mountain, he ascends up to the heavens and he receives the physical tablets from heaven. 40 days. We know he's in heaven 40 days, comes back down and what are the Jewish people doing? They're dancing around the golden calf. Moshe takes the tablets and breaks them, wakes them up again. What's wrong with you? Has to clean house a little bit. Has to wake them up again, inspire them again.

10:45
40 days later, rosh Chodesh El, which is tomorrow, moshe again ascended to the heavens for 40 more days. Yom Kippur he comes down After receiving atonement on Yom Kippur days. Yom Kippur, he comes down after receiving atonement on Yom Kippur. Hashem said to him on Yom Kippur, today will forever be a day of atonement, a day of forgiveness. That's why we have Yom Kippur on that day. Hashem says this is a day that I will forever use for mercy for the Jewish people.

11:16
But before Moshe went up on that day tomorrow, rosh Chodesh Elul, before Moshe ascended, he said every day, throughout the camps where the Jewish people were camping in the middle of the desert, he says you've got to go out and blow the shofar. We don't just randomly do it in our synagogues. We do it because this was done 3,333 years ago when the Jewish people were still camped around Mount Sinai. And Moshe is ascending up the mountain. He says before I go up, I want to make sure that every single day, you blow the shofar so that you guys don't go to sleep again and cause another golden calf, so that you guys don't go to sleep again and cause another golden calf.

12:01
We need to pray every day that we wake up, that we don't fall asleep, that we don't become numb, that we don't just live another day like, oh it's terrible, that's the way it is.

12:17
No, let's wake up, let's do something about it. Let's pray that Hashem give us the ability to do proper teshuva, to do proper repentance, to connect with ourselves in a real way, in a way of accountability, where we look into ourselves and again, not be harsh, be realistic and say you know what I could do better. I'm going to change. And you know what? I hurt someone's feelings. I'm going to apologize to them. I did something that I shouldn't have done to somebody else. I'm going to apologize to them. I'm going to use these 30 days before Shoshanna and the following 10 days before Yom Kippur, to change who I am. So I transform my essence, I transform my being and I become a new person. Hashem should bless us all to merit, to take this Shof Din V'shotrim message Be the judges, be the officers of our own lives, take control, take accountability and hopefully live a magnificent life of closeness, not only with our fellow man, but also with our creator of heaven and earth. Hashem should always protect us and keep us close. Amen.

13:44 - Intro (Announcement)
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