Reb Nachman z"ya on traveling.

Being that I'm traveling to the USofA tomorrow morning I figured I would share something I saw recently in Sichos Haran.
A man once asked the Rebbe whether he should make a particular journey. The Rebbe answered that if you have occasion to travel, you should not remain at home and stubbornly refuse to go. Wherever you travel, there are things you must correct. You must only be careful not to sin there. If you do not sin, you can correct things wherever you travel. Even if you are an average person, you will do holy things in each place. You will pray, say a blessing over food, and many similar things. For even the lowliest Jew does holy things wherever he goes.

Each man is destined from on high to be in a particular place at a given time. At that time and place there is something that he must correct. When you have occasion to travel, it is for your own good. If you would not make the journey voluntarily, you would be forced to go in chains, as we learn in the gemara (Shabbos 89:)"Yackov would have had to come to Egypt in chains, but was saved by his merit."

This is true of every man. If you find it necessary to travel, it is a favor from on high. Otherwise you might have had to make the journey in chains.

This is true even of the average person; for as long as he does not sin in any way, he accomplishes great things wherever he may be. (Sichos Haran 85)

I hope and pray that I do not sin on my coming trip and that I accomplish that which I was meant to from on high. I look forward to seeing everyone soon.
peace and joy,
Etan

Debt continued in the words of Rabeinu z"ya!

Free (or at least mad cheap!) tickets to Uman if you never went. This is from America. I will bli neder post the # from Israel as soon as I get it. Hope everyone has a good and productive week.
peace & joy,
Etan

Debts and repentance

If the Torah were written in order, we would know the reward and punishment for every positive and negative commandment.

There are sins for which the punishment is to be perpetually in debt. The sinner may try every possible ploy, but he still remains in debt. He can even cause others to fall into debt too . When these sins are rampant, there are many debtors in the world.

The remedy for this is to repent in general for all your sins and to beg God to save you from this particular sin. The time for such repentance is when you are in a state of expanded consciousness. This is the time to regret such sins, praying to God with complete repentance.

For the debtor's mentality is one of constricted consciousness, as the Talmud teaches: “Ten measures of sleep came down into the world and nine were taken by slaves” ( Kiddushin 49b) . “Sleep” is constricted consciousness, while the “slave” is the debtor, because “The borrower is slave to the lender” (Proverbs 22:7) . The “nine measures of sleep” taken by slaves are the constricted consciousness of the debtor.

This is why the time to repent these sins is when you are in a state of expanded consciousness, because this counteracts the debtor's state of constricted consciousness.

Sichot Haran #112

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Don't lose out because of anger

It would be proper for all Israel to have wealth, but there is one trait that interferes and causes them to lose it. The trait in question is a very bad and lowly trait from which it is very difficult to escape. Sometimes a person wants to escape this trait out of a desire for wealth itself, so as not to lose money, but even so this evil trait attacks him from childhood, causing him to lose the money he should have had.

The evil trait that causes a person to lose the money he should have had is anger. The reason for this is that at its very root and spiritual source , wealth is in the same category as anger. Thus when the evil one sees a flow of influence descending to bring wealth to a person, he turns it into anger, because , at their root , anger and wealth are in the same category: they both descend from God's mighty powers, deriving from the same place. “From the north comes forth gold” (Job 37:22) and “The evil will start from the north ” (Jeremiah 1:14 ) .

Wealth is a “wall” ( ch O mah ), while anger ( ch EY mah ) ruins the wall. Thus when the evil one sees that a flow of wealth – chomah , a “wall” – is being sent to a person – he turns this flow into anger, sending something to make the person angry. Thus the “wall”, chomah , is ruined because of the anger, cheymah . Since anger and wealth are at root one category, the evil one can easily turn the flow of wealth into anger.

And know that even if the descending influence has already reached a person and turned into actual wealth, a “wall”, the evil one can still sometimes tempt the person to become so enraged that he loses even his existing money and wealth. One might have thought that after the blessing has already reached him and turned into wealth, it would be impossible for the evil one to turn it back into anger. The wealth should have been a “wall” protecting him from the evil one and preventing him from succumbing to anger, which is the opposite of a “wall”. Yet the evil one has the power to attack a person with such great anger that he loses even the money he already has.

May God guard and save us from this despicable trait! Amen.

Likutey Moharan I, 68

Parashas Chukas! This is what it's all about!

In this weeks parasha we find the purification process of the "parah adumah/red heifer". A person who became spiritually impure through contact with a corpse becomes pure through this process. While this process purified the person who underwent it, it also caused people who were previously pure to become impure.

"V'tameh hacohen ad haerev/and the cohen is impure until the evening."(Bamidbar 19:7)

Rav Yitzchak of Vorki z"ya says that the essence of the parah adumah is the concept of "v'ahavta lreiacha camocha/love your neighbor like yourself". His grandson Reb Mendel of Vorki z"ya explained that this is because the cohen who was involved in this purification process became impure himself by the same process that purified the person who came to him. When someone loses out himself in order to help someone else, that is the ultimate in love for one's fellow man. (Bais Yitzchak Chukas)

"Zos chukas ha'Torah..../This is the decree of the Torah…a completely red heifer" (Bamidbar 19:2)

A Torah law, or mishpat, is a logical commandment designed to insure the harmony and welfare of a society. Such laws include the prohibitions against murder, adultery, and dishonesty.

In contrast, a chok, or decree of the Torah, is a Torah commandment that defies rationale or human understanding. There are many decrees in the Torah, such as the prohibition of wearing fabrics made from a combination of wool and linen, the prohibition of eating milk and meat, and the prohibition against crossbreeding, just to name a few. Yet, the decree that requires us to use the ashes of a burnt red heifer in the ritual purification process is the only decree that is introduced by the preface of "This is the decree of Torah." Why?

The preparation and implementation of the holy purification water made with the ashes of the Red Heifer have a strange characteristic. All the priests that participate in the slaughter of the Red Heifer and the burning of its flesh become ritually contaminated, or impure. Yet, when the Red Heifer ashes are mixed with the holy water, they purify the ritually impure. So, we have a situation where the fulfillment of this same Torah decree makes the pure become impure and the impure become pure. Confusing?

The decree of the Red Heifer is essentially symbolic of the material world. Things that look real, such as wealth and physical pleasures are nothing but illusions, here today and gone tomorrow. Yet, absolute truth – the existence of Hashem as Creator and sole Ruler of the world, who personally controls everything that ever occurred, occurs, or will occur in the universe – isn't visible at all to the physical eye. So, like the Red Heifer, what you see in this world is not really there, and what you don't see is alive and real.

Rebbe Nachman of Breslov warns us (see Sichot HaRan, discourse 51), "Take my advice and do not let the world fool you."

This world is similar to the decree of the Red Heifer – just as the red heifer is deceiving, for the impure becomes pure and the pure becomes impure – this material world of ours is an optical illusion where fantasy is reality and reality is fantasy. A simpleton that lacks faith often sees Hashem's way of doing things as apparent cruelty. Yet, one of the foundations of emuna, faith, is that Hashem does everything for the very best.

So, don't let the world fool you, as Rebbe Nachman of Breslov warns; when a person trusts in Hashem, ultimately – by virtue of emuna – he or she merits to understand how everything Hashem ever does in their lives was for the absolute best. May Hashem grant all of us unshakeable faith in His holy name, amen.

A wonderfull Shabbos to one and all!!!
peace and joy,

Etan

Ah!!!Boruch Hashem Yiddeshe Nachas!! My first Siddur party as a daddy!

That's my big boy Avraham Elisha! Bli ayin harah! We should only know yiddeshe nachas from our kids!!
peace and joy,
Etan