Part III
This was originally published in the English edition of Yated Ne'eman in 1993, that is, 32 years ago.
For Part II of this series click here.
For Part IV of this series click here.
In the first part, HaRav Brevda discussed the efforts of the erev rav in taking charge of the affairs of our people in the golus. These are people who appear as Jews, but do not have a real Jewish soul. These people are trying to destroy Torah and mitzvos, and the chachomim find it necessary to add various restrictions to the basic laws in order to repair what the erev rav destroy.
The fact that the mourning in the Three Weeks and Nine Days is replete with restrictions added on since the beginning of the golus is thus indicative of the fact that the erev rav are working to destroy our aveilus over the churban. And they have been frighteningly successful.
Why have they worked so hard against the aveilus? Because it is a key to participating in the redemption. If we mourn the Destruction, we will participate in the celebration over the Redemption. The impact of this redemption will be that our soul will decisively triumph over our material selves. We will live a dominantly spiritual existence.
To participate in that simcha before Hashem, it must engage our heart. Only if we suffer and toil and mourn in advance will we be able to feel its depth when the geula comes.
No Pain, No Gain
Those who sow tears over Yerushalayim will rejoice at its rejuvenation. Those who didn't sow tears will not rejoice. They will, therefore, not be invited to partake, and they will literally not be present at the simcha of Yerushalayim.
Do you know why Klal Yisroel for about two thousand years had not ceased to mourn over the Beis Hamikdosh, but this generation has weakened?
There are a number of reasons. But the main reason is the following:
Until about two generations ago, believe it or not, most of our ancestors were more spiritual than material in their lives. In other words, they lived in small flats, a room or two and small kitchens. Three o'clock in the morning there would be a knock on the door in a frigid snowstorm. They'd get up, open the door. In would come, with a howling wind, two wretched individuals caught up in the storm. They would put the lights on for them. They would rejoice that they had orchim, guests, min haShomayim.
Their one wretched room would turn into a palace. They would give them hot water to bathe; they would start cooking soups and all types of warm foods for them; they would take out intensely white sheets—whiter than snow—and put them to bed.
And I want you to know that if this didn't happen once every few weeks, the wife would say to her husband, "We have sinned. Hashem Yisborach doesn't give us these mitzvos anymore."
However in our times of affluence and selfishness, things have changed.
More Room In A Hotel Than in A Split-Level Home
I once mistakenly gave someone, going to chutz la'aretz to a certain town out in the Midwest, the address of a person I knew who is somewhat close to Torah. The latter person had told me that he has a house of chesed—which meant nothing to me at the time—but I took his address and telephone number.
Someone from Israel who had to go with a very sick person to the Midwest, to a hospital in a neighboring town, asked me where he could stay over Shabbos.
I said, "I'm not Mr. USA. How do I know addresses out in the Midwest?"
Then I remembered that fifteen miles away from that hospital I knew someone who is a shomer Torah and mitzvos, and that he told me he is "Mr. Chesed." He has an open house. Fine. I gave him that address, and I hoped.
What happened?
He had gone to that address, and the person wanted very much to invite him, but he's married. He apologized that his wife says that they only have eight rooms in the house: one is for them, and one is for the little boy, and the other is for the big boy. Then there's a recreation room. Then there's a room that they don't say what goes into that. And this is this room and that room. And he said to him the following: "Do me a favor, I'll give you all the money in the world, just get out of here three hours before Shabbos. Don't hang around the house."
He wanted to invite him, but he just couldn't.
This is very interesting and I know it to be true. As many rooms as we have, we suddenly don't have room. Years ago, as few rooms as a person had, there was always room for more and more orchim.
And I want you to know that people also did not go around thinking day and night about business and how much they're going to make, and how much they've lost. No. They thought about the exact opposite: chesed and mitzvos. About business, they always had a minimal concern. It was not their goal and ambition in life. It was such a different world a few generations back.
How Much Did It Cost?
Countries like America and its influence on the rest of the world have certainly changed things very, very much. But that's not the whole story. America has brought such a materialism into everyone, that people don't even see what's wrong with it. I've lived in Eretz Yisroel in various places, in America in various places, and in Europe in various places. Living this way you get a broader picture, and you see what is truly different about the Americans, which they themselves don't realize. I will give you two simple examples.
You come to America and you meet Uncle So and So, or Mr. So and So. "Hello, hello."
And this Mr. So and So can have the audacity to say to you, "What a nice tie you are wearing. Where did you get it? How much did it cost? I have a brother-in-law who could get it cheaper for you."
In Europe a person would not dream of saying something of that sort. It is not only unacceptable. It is considered disgraceful and uncivilized.
"How much did it cost?" That American phrase—"How much did it cost? I can get it cheaper." That is lower than low. But if you're born and bred there it is higher than high. And if you can get it cheaper, you may be the President one day!
It is unbelievable. They've transformed people into little banks. There is a certain kind of little bank that they give to children. It is named after an animal. I don't want to say the word. We don't eat its meat. And this is what they've turned people into, mamesh.
It is unbelievable what they've done to the whole world. They've made us more material than spiritual. That spirit is today all over the world. Who wouldn't go ten miles for a bargain, even though it costs you a lot of money to get there? It's the coming back with that wretched dress in your hands, which you got for eighty-nine cents cheaper.
The American way of quoting a price—7.99 instead of saying "eight." It's all over the world today. They never knew this in the world. "Eight" was eight. The Americans created big seven and a little ninety-nine. Actually it means putting all the genius of the person into business.
I can go on and on when I get onto this topic. It is so true. It is so sad.
At the beginning of this article I related a story of a certain person's spiritual experience. I don't know if you realized why. The yungerleit who tell me such stories, in all honesty, what they are saying is just that they had moments in their lives when they were so attached to their souls, that they felt like different human beings. Once you have that attachment and you lose it, you mourn over it for the rest to your life.
But if you are attached to material things in life, you do not mourn over spiritual losses. This is the reason why we are not up to par, spiritually, in this generation. We are more material than spiritual.
I'm going to give you a very simple example. If go to eat a breakfast, a lunch, or a supper, and the food does not taste as you would like it to taste. You complain!
How can an adult complain over the taste of one meal, like a baby? What does that prove? We are materialistic.
Which Side Are You On?
You know the Mashgiach in Ponovezh, Reb Chatzkel Levenstein,zt'l, used to say something like this every few weeks. There's a Polish word to describe a freshly baked roll. It's called a bulka. The Mashgiach used to say that we should always test ourselves spiritually. Are we attached to the Torah or are we attached to the bulka? This was one of his favorite phrases. Figure out what you are closer to.
I speak to yungerleit, great Talmudic scholars, and I say, "You come home from lunch and your wife hasn't cooked the meal as you wish. Do you complain—or do you keep quiet? And how do you feel in your heart? If it really hurts you, then you're a baby, then you have to grow up yet. Who's going to mourn over a spiritual loss if you're worried about the taste of one meal in your life?"
It's disgraceful. There are no words for it. But people are afraid to speak about it in shiurim today. They are afraid that the audience may walk out on them. Perhaps they will. You have to choose your audience, I say.
Tisha B'Av and the Nine Days are a time for soul-searching. A time when we can make a decision to begin moving away from material aspirations, and coming closer to spiritual values...
A modern model of Second Temple Jerusalem
A Trip Up To Yerushalayim
I want to describe one thing to you to show you why we should be mourning over the loss of the Mikdosh. At the time of the Beis Hamikdosh a melamed, a teacher in a cheder, says to the children in his class: "You've been very, very diligent pupils this year. I'm going to give you a reward. I'm taking you in two weeks' time, on a trip to Yerushalayim. I'm going to take you into the Beis Hamikdosh. I want you all to be tahor. You should be very careful not to be unclean in these two weeks. Your parents should watch over you. And I promise to show you all a miracle—not a nes nistar, a concealed miracle—a nes niglah, an unconcealed, open miracle!"
Now I imagine many of us in various stages of life, have said, "Show me a miracle of Hashem. I will become a more fervent believer."
It would have been very good if someone could show it to us today. And if we could see that miracle at any hour of the day, and as many times as we want. That would have been a big boost to us in life, and even more so for children, to show them something like that today.
Modern Jerusalem
"Jerusalem" Today
In our generation you bring a child to "Jerusalem," (we'll call it) with that little inconspicuous sign welcoming you on the road in Hebrew, English and Arabic. What does a person see the moment he comes into here? Is it a chizuk for a child or a Yid?
You see a building with a crazy design. Then you see the modern youth of our time, dressed in a disgraceful fashion, looking and acting like the scum of the earth. This is what you see. And then you see something else and something else and something else, which I'd rather not describe here. Is there a spiritual chizuk today? Can we let children out of the house today? Can we ourselves go out of the house, without getting corrupted? This is an awful world. This is not Yerushalayim Ir Hakodesh.
Ir Hakodesh
But what were we able to do bizman Beis Hamikdosh? On a certain day the class travels to Yerushalayim. As they come into Yerushalayim, something strikes each child about the faces of every single Yid that he sees in the street there. It is an unknown fact. What is the fact? They are all very, very happy. All of them contented and happy. There's not one person with sorrow on his face.
Why is this? There's a posuk which says, "Mesos kol ho'oretz." Yerushalayim was the center of true simcha of the entire world. Is it only a figure of speech? Chas vesholom!
Chazal tell us in the last Midrash in Parshas Pekudei that a merchant once brought his wares to sell in Yerushalayim. A lot of tourists came for korbonos, to Yerushalayim and the merchant hoped that amongst them he would have good customers.
For five minutes he stood in the street trying to sell his goods and was not successful. So he shouted to Hashem Yisborach, "You wrote in the posuk, `Klilas yofi, mesos kol ho'oretz'— the center of rejoicing. I am not happy."
The moment he said it, Chazal say, hordes of customers appeared and everything was sold. He opened his mouth, "Mesos kol ho'oretz!"
Chazal add an astounding fact. A person has to make a balance sheet in business to know if he has made a profit or loss. If he gained, he is happy. If he lost, it's a sorrow for him. Yerushalayim is called "Mesos kol ho'oretz," and therefore one is not permitted to be in sorrow there. So what did Chazal do?
It says in the Midrash they built on the outskirts of Yerushalayim a building, which was named kuppah shel cheshbonos. This is the building where people made their balance sheets.
No one was permitted to make a cheshbon in Yerushalayim. You had to leave Yerushalayim and go out there. If you want to cry, you'll cry out there, not in Yerushalayim. Ad kdei kach, it was a law that you had to go out.
So as a child comes into Yerushalayim and sees the faces of people who are constantly besimchah, can you imagine the impression that it makes instantly?
Clearing The Atmosphere
Besides that, there's something else. The korbon Tomid, was brought by Klal Yisroel. The whole nation brought daily two korbonos, one in the morning and one in the evening.
The one in the morning was mechaper all the avonos of the night, and the one in the late afternoon, was mechaper on all that was done wrong during the day. So in Yerushalayim the whole atmosphere was completely clear of evil, of chataim, because they were whitewashed completely by these korbonos.
And I want you to know that Chazal say, "Meiolam lo amar adam tzar li hamakom she'alin beYerushalayim," which means no one ever said when he had to go to sleep at night that he doesn't have any elbow room here, that he was cramped. So the Vilna Gaon asks why?
He answers that in this world what causes cramped quarters is the tumah of chataim. Where there is no sin, there's always a lot of room. Spirituality does not take up room.
There is a limit to how many people could be sitting in a room. But there is no limit as to how many angels could be there, because spiritual beings do not take up any space.
In the Mikdosh there was a constant miracle that when all of the Yidden would come on a Yom Tov: "Omdim tzfufim"— as they stood they were very close to each other. But when they bowed down (and that should take up much more space), there was plenty of room for everyone.
Rav Chaim Volozhiner says, when people stand erect with some feeling of ga'avah, that's a sin. That cramps their quarters. However, when they were mishtachaveh, bowing down to Hashem Yisborach and losing their feeling of conceit, there was room for everyone.
So, the Gaon says, since Yerushalayim was constantly purified by the Mizbeiach, by the korbonos, the atmosphere was free of sin. If it was pure of sin, no one ever felt cramped overnight in Yerushalayim.
So once again, what did those children see? They saw a whole city of people in constant happiness, free of sin. Physically and spiritually the child was going into a new world.
End of Part 3
