Parsha Review Podcast · Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe

00:03 - Intro (Announcement)
You're listening to Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe of TORCH in Houston, Texas. This is the Parsha Review Podcast.

00:12 - Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe (Host)
All right, good morning everybody. Welcome back to the Parsha Podcast. It is so wonderful to be here. It is Tuesday morning and it's beautiful here in Houston and we have the privilege of learning the third parasha in the Torah. The third portion of the Torah, parashas lech lecha. And this is where God is telling Avraham Avinu. He's telling Abraham, our patriarch. He says go. Okay, we'll read the words inside, so you'll. I want you to understand that. I saw this this morning in shul and I jumped out of my seat. I was so excited, and the guy standing behind me I said to him I said you got to read this. This will change your life. This is unbelievable. I said okay, this is it.

00:55
And Hashem said to Abraham yourself, from your land, from your relatives, from the house of your father, to the land that I will show you. Okay, we're all familiar with these verses, right? God didn't tell Abraham where he says just go. This was a sign of Abraham's commitment to Hashem. This was a sign of Abraham's trust in Hashem. I have no idea he's like tell me to go. Where am I going to? I have to know how to pack. Should I pack cold? Should I pack hot? Is it going to be fall, winter, summer? What is it going to be? What's the climate going to be? No, no questions asked. God said go Boom. Abraham goes, okay, great, and I'm going to make you into a great nation and I'm going to bless you and I will make you great, I'll make your name great and you shall be a blessing. Okay, very interesting. These are the first two verses.

01:59
I open up this morning, the beautiful teachings of Reb Nachman. Reb Nachman of Breslov, and first is he goes into many of the basic ideas that we're very familiar with that God sent Abraham to the Holy Land because the Holy Land has tremendous blessings. Okay, abraham was barren, his wife was barren, sarah Sarai at the time, and this is a place that has tremendous blessing. The prayers in the land of Israel are extremely powerful and God wanted him to be there so that the blessings can have that power. Okay, that's very interesting. But listen to what he says here. He says God is telling Abraham go to yourself, lech, lecha, go to yourself, go to your soul. You know we talk many times in our classes. We brought the following idea.

03:02
We said this numerous times that the Torah is not a history book. The Torah is not a book of stories either. So what is the Torah? The Torah is a manual for living. If we look and we see the stories of our ancestors, we will learn the keys to life.

03:23
We say this so many times, but here we have a perfect example of how we can look at the story of Abraham. We can see it on one level. This is a story God told him. Leave your family, leave your father's home and go to the land. Oh, it's great trust. Abraham is so trusting in Hashem. It's a beautiful thing. Okay, that's the surface level.

03:46
What Reb Nachman is going to introduce us to here is the level beneath that, or level above that, and that is let yourself go to yourself, to your real self, to who you really are. Let all your travels and searching focus on discovering your soul and its source, meaning you're going to be in a world where you're going to have a lot of things call at you. You're going to have your job, you're going to have your family, you're going to have your career, you're going to have your hopes and dreams for the future. You're going to have all of these things calling at you and you know what you need to do. Look inside, discover your soul and its source. So how do we accomplish this? We need to go from our land. We need to remove ourselves from materialism.

04:47
You remember when we talked about Genesis, god in the beginning, god created the heaven and the earth. What did we say then? God created two forces in this world the forces of spirituality and the forces of materialism. This is the struggle of life. The struggle of life is am I going to be completely consumed by materialism, by getting a new car, by getting a new house, by getting new jewelry, by getting new clothes, or am I going to be invested in a world of shamayim, of spirituality, of soul? What God is telling Abraham here? Lech lacha me'artzocha, leave your land, leave the materialism, um molatocha, the things that you're comfortable with. We all have things that we're very, very comfortable with.

05:42
We talked about this last night in our class about repentance. One of the things we said about repentance was that we have to repent not only for ourselves, but for our ancestors. What do you mean? Our ancestors? What they, what did they do? Well, sometimes we inherit habits from our parents, from our grandparents. This is the way we do things. It may not be the best, and we need to sometimes change from those habits and see you know what. Maybe there's a new light, maybe you know a little bit more. Observance is where I should be, where God expects me to be. Maybe a life of more internal introspection is what I should be dealing with, maybe a life which is less focused on career. It's very possible. Every person needs to know themselves. Every person needs to know their soul.

06:41
It says Reb Nachman, here, from your land, removing yourself from materialism, he says, from the physical attractions of this world. We're living in a world where everything is being advertised to us to give us a better life, to make us happy. You know, imagine they gave you an advertisement for Goodyear tires and it wasn't with a happy, smiling person, right? What they're trying to sell you is not just the tires. What they're trying to say you really want to be happy, you want to be happy, goodyear tires. What does one have to do with the other? It's like. But that's the way we're selling materialism, that's the way the world, that's what we're attracted to.

07:31
We're attracted to materialism. We're attracted to those things, no matter how deeply you think you have descended into a material existence and know that you can leave it behind right From your birthplace, from whether you were born and raised in a life of materialism. That's your journey. It's a beautiful thing. It's a beautiful thing. You have a journey. Every single one of us has a journey, a journey that we can grow and we can elevate ourselves to a level that no one ever imagined, that we didn't imagine. From your father's house. What does that mean? Your family, your friends, your neighbors, your family, your friends, your neighbors, even if yours were lowly beginnings, you can strive for greater heights. You need not carry around your background like excess baggage. You understand what's going on here.

08:43
Sometimes we think of our past as a drag. If anybody knew my history, they would never hire me. If God knew what I did right, he would never want me close to him. That's not true. God knows what you did and he wants you close, notwithstanding what you think about it. God wants you close, notwithstanding what you think about it. God wants you close.

09:11
You understand that what we're opening up here is that God is telling Abraham you as an individual, you are great, you have so much potential, you have so much power to accomplish greatness. You have so much power to accomplish greatness, but we have all of these excuses. Well, you know, I have a job. Well, you know I'm raising children. Well, you know my family tradition, you know my parents, you know my household, you know my background, you know my affiliation. You know we have all of these reasons and excuses that we can't be a lech lecha. Be there for yourself, for your own spiritual growth. We have all of these things that are limiting us and we're saying, ah, I can't do it. I can't do it for whatever reason. Go, lech lecha. Go to the land that I will show you. The main test of a person is in this world. The main test are you ready to go, are you ready to accomplish, are you ready to attain your greatness? It's l'cha, it's not only l'cha, it's l'cha. This is for you.

10:18
Our sages talk so much about the blessing that's in disguise here for Abraham. We need to notice that the next verse says that those who bless you will be blessed, those who curse you will be cursed, that there's a whole protective, you know defensive shield around Abraham, us, children of Abraham, isaac and Jacob. No matter where we were, no matter what we faced, god was always protecting us. And we have today a world of thriving Jewry, and we need more of it. We need more Jews to be learning Torah, to be connecting with the Almighty through His Torah.

11:08
Now there's something very, very amazing. He says that God holds back showing a person what he has accomplished, why, and the reward for it. God doesn't show us the reward Because if you knew the reward, if a person knew the reward for it, god doesn't show us the reward. Because if you knew the reward, if a person knew the reward for coming to learn Torah, for doing a mitzvah, you wouldn't have free will anymore, because it's like imagine this okay, I always say that you know, we brought this example of how I'm a mentalist. I'm not a mentalist, I'm just kidding, right, but you know, I can tell you what a child is going to choose. I know what they're going to choose. Right, I'm going to give them two options. On one hand, I'm going to give them a lollipop and, on the other hand, I'm going to give them a cockroach. Okay, which one are they gonna choose? I know which one they're gonna choose. I'm a genius, I'm brilliant. Look at that.

12:13
When a person sees good and bad in such an extreme, they have no free will anymore. It's obvious what they're going to choose. If someone knew the greatness of the reward that they're going to receive for a mitzvah. They're not going to have free will anymore. Therefore, god doesn't tell Abraham where he's going. That's God's hiding from him the reward for the good that he does. He would no longer have free will. Therefore, god holds back from showing a person direction, letting him seek it on his own. One who strengthens himself will eventually find the land. What's the land? The goal he is intended to reach and, especially, the ultimate goal of the world to come. This is really amazing.

13:08
What we're learning here from these words is a whole perspective on our lives, of living a spiritual life versus a materialistic life, a life which is based on our closeness, our focus on closeness with Hashem, versus a life that is self-indulgent. I want to fulfill my mission. This is my goal. Versus what does God have in mind for me?

13:35
God made each and every one of us unique. There will never, ever, in this entire world, ever be anyone like you, ever. You are the only you there will ever be. It's empowering, it's refreshing. It is exhilarating to know that I'm the only me. There will never be a combination Ever Like each one of us. Imagine that you hear that, elisa, there will never be anyone like you, ever, ever in the Elisa. There will never be anyone like you, ever, ever in the world. There will never be anyone like you. That means your parents, your upbringing, your talents, your skills, your capability, your potential. There's no one that will ever be able to. Oh well, twin siblings, even twins we all know Anybody who knows even the most identical twins. They don't like the same color, they don't like the same sports, they don't like the same activities, they don't. There's nothing, almost nothing. They look alike and they were in the same womb, perhaps, but they don't have any of the identical traits. They're so uniquely different.

14:53
Every human being is unique and special, and God has something that he wants each and every one of us to bring to this world. That's why God is telling Abraham here Lech Lecha, don't be just another person, another number in the community, another member of the community. You have a calling, something that you can bring to this world, something that's unique, that's special, that only you can accomplish. And this is the message that God is telling us, each and every one of us, in this week's Torah portion Lech Lecha, you are unique, ed. You have something that you bring to the table that nobody else on planet Earth can bring. That's a big calling.

15:42
That's what God is telling Avraham, avinu, abraham, our patriarch, god is telling him you and your children are unique. I will make you a great nation. You will overcome your enemies. I will bless you. You will draw all the blessings to benefit mankind. I will make you a great name. I will make your name great. And what is that? You will merit an unprecedented knowledge of God. These are things, and we say that I will bless you because one who strives to serve God remains steadfast in his devotion despite all the obstacle he faces. Thus, he will always be blessed and feel blessed.

16:34
If we know that we are here on a mission we're not here to just enjoy life that's part of it. But if that's what we think life is about eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow you die, we're wasting our lives. But if we realize that being in this world means I need to accomplish, god, put me here so that I accomplish. God. Put me here so that I work hard to become bigger, to become better, to become, to perfect that uniqueness, to perfect that uniqueness. Every diamond in this world is unique. There are no two diamonds that will look alike. They can, yeah, somewhat, but they're not the same. Everyone is unique. We're all diamonds, every single one of us, and we have a uniqueness and we need to let it shine. The only way we shine is when we buff it.

17:40
We take our traits. You have a trait of kindness. You got to work on it to perfect it. You have a trait of anger. You want to remove it. You're going to have to work on it. It's not going to disappear. On it to perfect it. You have a trait of anger. You want to remove it. You're going to have to work on it. It's not going to disappear on its own. You have a trait of jealousy. You want to work on it. You're going to have to diligently work on it. It's not going to just one day fix itself. This is our task, our life.

18:09
Lech lecha, you are unique. You are special. You're going to have many distractions. You'll have many excuses. What are the excuses? Me'artza cha Me'oladata cha Me'beisavicha? You have a lot of excuses. Your background it's not my type. It's not my style. It's not my thing. It's not my type. It's not my style. It's not my thing. It's not my.

18:35
We have tons of excuses. I can tell you the excuses that I've heard. People don't owe me anything, but I've invited many people for shabbos over the years and the the reasons that people come up with of why they can't. I'm babysitting my neighbor's dog who's like come on, you know, give me a break. There's so many reasons. If we don't want to go, we can just say I don't want to go, but we make excuses because we want to justify why. Because we really do want to go. But we need to justify to ourselves why we're not going to focus on our own spiritual growth. And this is, by the way. You have a lecture where someone's talking about how to be a better husband, how to be a better wife, how to be a better parent, how to be a better child, how to be a better citizen of our community. Well, we have all these excuses. That's me'artzacha, me'oladdacha, me'beisavicha. We have all of these reasons of why we come up with, why we can't do, why we can't accomplish greatness. We sell ourselves cheap. We want the easy route. Lech, lecha, go for you. Go, become a great person, because you, your soul, is so great, you have so much you can attain, so much you can accomplish. It's going to necessitate sometimes going away.

19:59
I want to share with you a story. My parents are the most amazing people, most amazing people, but I remember one instance where I had to do my own Me'artzacha Moladacha and Be'e Savicha so I got involved in when I was about 17, 18 years old, I went to Ukraine and I was doing Jewish outreach there. I was part of a summer camp and then I went back for Sukkot and then they wanted me to go back for Pesach, for the holiday of Pesach, and it was the year after that. During that year, my brother got married and this was going to be the first Pesach that the whole family was going to be together, with our new sister, my new sister-in-law, the new daughter-in-law of my parents, and you know it was very, very special for my parents. I get a phone call that they wanted me to come for Pesach to Ukraine, to be in Kiev, and I got the phone call. I said fine, let me find out.

20:57
I called my father. He says absolutely not. The whole family is going to be together. The whole family is going to be together. Finally, we're going to be with our new daughter-in-law, my sister-in-law. They're coming from Israel. No, no, absolutely not.

21:18
So I said to my father. I said, if I call Rabbi Shmuel Kamenetzky and ask him for his advice. Will you accept whatever he says? Absolutely, the leading Torah sage in the United States. Whatever he says, we'll do. I called him up. I called up Rabbi Shmuel Kamenetzky. I said listen, I'm in a dilemma here. I said they're asking me to go to Ukraine for Passover and my father really wants me to be home with the whole family. Everyone's coming back, you know, from Yeshiva. One older brother was in Yeshiva in Israel. My other brother was married now and he was coming with his wife. This was going to be the whole family together. My father wanted everyone to be together.

21:56
So Rabbi Shmuel Kamenetzky said you have to go to Ukraine, you have to go. He says the Jewish people need you. He says your family, you'll have other times to get together with your family. So I called my father and I this is what the rabbi kamenetsky said, this is what he said and of course I went and he was the most remarkable pesach I've ever had. I'll tell you why.

22:18
Because when I arrived in kiev, I get there and rabbi deshon, who's the head of the organization, he was there for a few more hours before he had. He was heading back to new york and he calls me into the office and he says to me welcome to ukraine, welcome to kiev, but you're on your way out. I said what are you talking about? He says you're not staying in kiev for, uh, for the seder. He says there are 350 jews that need you in chmelnitsky, which is very far away. It's like. It's like an eight-hour train ride from Kiev. He says you're getting on that train at 1 am this morning. He says you can pick any one of the guys that you brought here with you to go with you. You're not staying in Kiev.

23:03
Kiev was much more comfortable than going to Khmelnytsky. I guarantee you. Khmelnytsky was like and here I am 18 years old, 19 years old. I needed to run an entire Seder for 350 people in Russian. It was a life-changing event. It was such a special gift from Hashem. But imagine I could have been home with my family. It would have been very nice, it would have been very special.

23:27
But sometimes Hashem says I'm going to give you an opportunity. You're going to have every reason in the world to say no, but El Oretz, hashear Rechah, god didn't tell me where I was going. I thought I was going to Kiev. He says no, no, no, that's not what I have in mind for you, and this is going to be Lecha, this is going to be l'cha, this is going to be for you. This is going to be the most incredible experience in your life, transformative experience. I can't even tell you the impact that that Pesach had on me. I don't know if you know what it's like to eat only four things, the entire Pesach, four things, that's it. We had four foods. Okay, it was very limited. Okay, it was that's what we had, that's what we had and that was it. But it was so special, it was so special.

24:27
We all have things, we have callings where God says here's an opportunity, I'm going to send you another opportunity. I'm going to send you another opportunity, I'm going to send you another opportunity. God continues to send us opportunities and we have to very, very carefully internally consult with our soul. What is my calling here? Is God just sending me a random message or is he sending me a message here? This is l'cha. This is for your soul. This is for the development of who you will hopefully become Abraham. You're going to become a leader for the Jewish people. You're going to have to learn to leave your father's house, and my parents were very, very proud after. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't. You know, we have to understand that sometimes we're going to do things, that our parents are going to look at us and say what, what are you doing? What are you doing? What's wrong with you? You know that that's fine when you do what you know is right and you can consult with your rabbi, you can consult with your spiritual mentor to make sure that you're not just convincing yourself to do something because it's convenient for you. But when we have this opportunity and we take the opportunity, it becomes so much blessing.

25:49
So Abraham went and took Lot with him. He took Lot. Who is Lot? Our sages tell us that Lot represents the evil inclination. Lot was the evil inclination. Even if a person masters his evil inclination to fulfill the word of God, the forces of evil are always at the ready, ensuring the continued existence of free will. You're always going to have. Why did he take Lot? What does he need Lot with him for? Because you're never going to be in a situation where it's so clear as day the good versus the evil. You're always going to have the challenge of making that decision, that determination based on your soul, based on the l'cha. Who are you?

26:38
As soon as Abraham entered the land, a famine struck and he had to descend to Egypt. What's going on here? Now he's in the land of Israel, the land with so much greatness, with so much power, as we mentioned in the beginning, a place of incredible blessing. You know what the challenge is going to be now. You're going to have a famine. You're going to always have the counterbalance.

27:01
This, too, was a test forcing him to leave the realm of holiness he had so recently achieved. The same happens to every individual. But upon re-entering the realm of holiness, one brings back. What does he bring back with him? Cattle, silver, gold, the sparks of holiness that were entrapped in the realm of evil. It means sometimes you're going to have to face that challenge. You're going to go and you're going to overcome. You're going to overcome those challenges.

27:34
Now you come back into the realm of holiness, into the land that is the promised land. You're going to come back with incredible riches. You hear this, mark, mark. This is an amazing thing. Listen to this. You know. You say I'm not going to hang out with those people anymore, but then the Yetzirah is always going to send you a challenge. So he's going to say this is a business meeting, it's mandatory, it's a business meeting you have to Everyone's going and you stay firm with doing the right thing. Why do they make these conferences in Vegas? Why do they make conferences in Vegas? Right, that's the challenge. You're going to have to do it because this is your job. This is where they have the show, this is where they have the expo. But are you going to stay strong to your convictions? Are you going to stay strong to do the right thing? Then, when you come back, you're so much greater. You come back with riches, with gold and silver and cattle, which is the rewards, the spiritual rewards, for doing the right thing.

28:43
This is the story of our lives. This is the window into our soul. When one raises himself back into holiness, he merits to raise the fallen sparks as well. We all have these sparks all around us of holiness that we can elevate. And when we're in a challenge and we do the right thing, we're taking those sparks and we're elevating them. My dear friends, this is the story of our lives. This is the lesson we learned from Abraham. The story of Abraham is not just the story of Abraham dealing with a disgruntled family situation. Oh, his dad was an idolater, and his nephew and his cousin, and his this and his that, and Nimrod is running after him and he throws him into a burning furnace. These are all things that are teaching us about our lives. We have to dig deeper and see. What is this telling me? It's telling us, lech Lecha, this is a message for you, to your soul. You're going to have a lot of arzacha, maladatacha, mibesavicha things that this is just the way we do it.

30:00
I'll give you another example. You know someone who you know in the world of politics. You know, sometimes people vote what their family did. In sports, people follow the team. This is our family tradition Ole Miss or Texas, or A&M, right, or everyone is so loyal. But what's if your calling is something else? Not that the calling is following sports, but you understand that loyalty concept. This is what our family does. We don't go to Oklahoma, right, because we're from Texas. But you know what? What's if? That's better for you?

30:40
A person needs to know. A person needs to know. How do we know? We connect with our soul, lech lecha. Connect with your inner self, connect with your source. Who's your source? Your creator? Talk to Hashem. You can ask Hashem? Hashem, give me guidance. Hashem, tell me what is the proper thing, what is the best thing for me to do. Hashem, guide me. Hashem, show me a sign, tell me when we're stuck. This is what prayer is about. Prayer is about communicating with Hashem and allowing for Hashem to communicate with us.

31:21
A friend of mine told me this week. He said he was really down in a real dump, he was in a real challenge. He said he closed his eyes and he prayed. He said, hashem, I need you to send me a message. He said the message was black on white, the clearest message you can possibly. It was like Hashem was like boom, shaking him up. I'm right here. I'm right with you, lech lecha Know what's deep within you.

31:51
We all have this spark of godliness within us. We need to wake it up, awaken it, and we need to rise up to the greatness that Hashem expects of us. They say today that people use only 5% of their brain. And how much of our potential do we maximize? I bet you it's less than 5%, because we're focused on such a world of everything. It's such a facade out there, such the matrix showing us an image of the world that is so fake. It's really not there. It's there just to distract us, just to allure us away from our essence.

32:37
My dear friends, I am so excited about this. This was such a tremendous treasure that Hashem sent my way, and I'm so happy that I was able to learn it again together with everyone here, because I think this is such a powerful message for us to know and understand that having challenges is part of our growth. Having challenges is embedded into the nature of this world. Yes, you're going to have challenges from your parents, who are going to tell you one thing, from your neighbors, from your friends, from your spouse, from your children. You started going, oh, dad, you suddenly became so religious, you started going to learn a torch. Really Right, you're going to have all of these distractions. That's the etzahara being, you know, masquerading as your daughter or as your son or as your spouse, or as your daughter or as your son or as your spouse, or as your parent, telling you things, trying to persuade you to not do that.

33:43
Because if we knew the reward for the mitzvahs that we do, if we knew the reward, there would not be free. Will Imagine, if you knew the reward. You know they have all of these things on these videos. They show you to waste your time. The guy says here and he throws a football. He says catch the ball. And people walk away from it. He says well, sorry, I would have given you $5,000. Hey, if you would have known, you would have caught it. Right, if we understand the value, if you understand the value of a mitzvah, we would never let go of a mitzvah. We would never let a mitzvah pass us by and that's why the reward is not written. The Torah doesn't tell us a lot about reward for the mitzvahs. We see the reward with honoring your father and mother. You have a long life when you honor your father and mother. The reward is written in the Torah You're going to have a long life. Such an incredible treasure. My dear friends, thank you so much. Have an amazing, amazing Shabbos.

34:57 - Intro (Announcement)
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