Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: In the beginning, when my son just started learning Talmud in Yeshiva, that is something that he had a hard time with.
[00:00:08] Speaker B: We know the law.
[00:00:10] Speaker A: So what is the difference exactly how we learn it out and where do we learn it out from?
[00:00:15] Speaker B: We know that's what you're supposed to do.
[00:00:17] Speaker A: We know that you learn this law from this verse. Who really cares? Is it the first word in the
[00:00:23] Speaker B: verse that makes a difference, that makes us law the way it is, or
[00:00:26] Speaker A: the second word is in the verse that makes this law?
Who cares if this verse would be worded differently?
[00:00:33] Speaker B: Would the law be different or not?
We know the verse. We know the law.
[00:00:38] Speaker A: Next, he had a very hard time with it in the beginning. And I was explaining to him that actually most of Talmud is going to be doing exactly that. And it seems to be splitting hairs, and it seems to be picking on minute details which are not needed today.
We gonna see why these minute details are important, and also we're gonna see the spiritual ramifications of them. So as an example, we're gonna use a mitzvah, which you know very well. This is the mitzvah of Tefillin. The mitzvah of Tefillin is learned from the Etchanan. This Torah portion is telling us the chapter of Shema that specifically tells us about the Shema which you recite every day is. Is actually from Vaetchanan.
[00:01:22] Speaker B: And it says
[00:01:26] Speaker A: you should bind a sign on your arm,
[00:01:30] Speaker B: and there will
[00:01:31] Speaker A: be a sign between your eyes. These are the words that we are learning the Mitzvah of Tefillin from.
[00:01:38] Speaker B: Whenever you put on tefillin, you first put on your tefillin shell yad on
[00:01:42] Speaker A: your hand, and then you put your
[00:01:44] Speaker B: tefillin shilrosh on your head.
And then when you take them off, you take them off in the opposite order. When you take them off, you first take off your tefilling from your head, and then you take off your telephone from your arm.
[00:01:56] Speaker A: So now the question is, why do we do it this way?
[00:02:00] Speaker B: What is the reason for us following this aura?
[00:02:03] Speaker A: Believe it or not, there are three
[00:02:05] Speaker B: opinions of why we do it.
[00:02:07] Speaker A: Specifically, in this aura, there's one opinion of the Gemara.
[00:02:12] Speaker B: Gemorra says it's very simple.
[00:02:15] Speaker A: Look, it says,
[00:02:19] Speaker B: first it says you should put it on your arm, then it says they will be on your head just because of the sequence in which it's written. That's how Gemara breaks it down. Mihilta, which is another work of halachic discussions.
[00:02:37] Speaker A: There is another place in the Torah where it speaks about Tefillin. This is in the book of Shemot, Exodus, Parashat baal.
[00:02:46] Speaker B: And there it says, you should put your tefillin on your arm first. And then it says, put tefillin on your hand. And the order we learn from there, not from here. In other words, the mitzvah we learn from here, but the order we learn from there.
[00:03:01] Speaker A: Because here you have two different verbs. One says Thai, the other one says will be. You cannot learn sequence from here because it's two different verbs.
[00:03:12] Speaker B: Over there it's the same verb. And because it's the same verb, that's
[00:03:15] Speaker A: why you could learn sequence from that place.
So the mitzvah we learn from this
[00:03:21] Speaker B: part of Shema, but the order we learn from there.
[00:03:24] Speaker A: Then there's a third opinion of Sifri.
[00:03:27] Speaker B: And Sifri pretty much agrees with Mihilta. But he says that in a nuance, there's a difference, because Mihilta claims that these are two separate actions. One, you put tefillin on your arm, one, you put fillin on your head. According to Mihilta, these are two mitzvahs that have to be done in certain order. Sifree says, no, no, no, no, no. It's one mitzvah. And the way you fulfill this mitzvah is by first putting on tefillin on your arm and then putting on fill on your head. So the difference between mihilta and Sifi is whether you're feeling on your arm and you're feeling on your head to different mitzvahs, or whether it's one mitzvah which you fulfill.
[00:04:13] Speaker A: Now, why is this discussion important?
And I can see how some people listening to this discussion could look at me and say, come on, that's what
[00:04:25] Speaker B: you spend all your time in Yeshiva. You don't have anything better to do. This is what rabbis busy themselves with.
[00:04:33] Speaker A: So there is a technical difference, and then there is a spiritual difference. What is the technical difference? The technical difference is that the mitzvah of Tefillin Shaliat and mitzvah of Teflin Shalosh, first of all, like you said, can be viewed as two separate mitzvahs or as one mitzvah.
[00:04:54] Speaker B: And according to Sifri, it is one mitzvah. And you cannot do one without the other one. This is how you do this mitzvah. But according to Gemara and according to
[00:05:06] Speaker A: Mihilta, these are two separate mitzvahs.
[00:05:08] Speaker B: Now.
[00:05:08] Speaker A: But then there's a difference between Gemara and Mihilta.
[00:05:13] Speaker B: According to Gemara, this is one mitzvah and then there is another mitzvah, two separate mitzvahs. But it's proper to do it in this order.
[00:05:25] Speaker A: That's it.
[00:05:26] Speaker B: In other words, they're two separate mitzvahs. But that's how you do these two separate mitzvahs in this order. That's it. According to Mihilta, the way to do mitzvah of tefillin on your head, tefillin shlerosh is if you have tefillin shaliyad on your hand already.
In other words, you are not completing the mitzvah of putting on tefillin shlerosh if you don't have a mitzvah of Tefillin shaliyad on your hand already. So these are three positions and practically
[00:05:57] Speaker A: it would be a difference.
[00:05:59] Speaker B: If let's say you happen to put tefillin at the same time on both your arm and your head, you have your arm stuck out and two people come, one puts a twill on your arm, one puts on your head at one second, that would be a difference. Another example where it would be different,
[00:06:18] Speaker A: then it could be a difference in situation. If somebody doesn't have arms, if it
[00:06:24] Speaker B: is one mitzvah, then maybe he should not be putting trill on his head either. There are numerous differences in hypothetical scenarios.
[00:06:31] Speaker A: But then there is a spiritual difference as well. What is the spiritual difference?
[00:06:36] Speaker B: We know that film that we put
[00:06:37] Speaker A: in our head is given to us for Shibud hamoach, which means for us to gain control over our mind.
[00:06:45] Speaker B: It helps us to make our mind
[00:06:47] Speaker A: more in tuned with spirituality.
[00:06:50] Speaker B: And that's the idea of twill on your head.
[00:06:51] Speaker A: The tefillin on your arm is put right next to our heart. And this tefillin is made to make our hearts more in tune with spirituality.
[00:07:01] Speaker B: Now our mind should be preoccupied with
[00:07:03] Speaker A: the learning of the Torah.
[00:07:05] Speaker B: So mind corresponds to the learning of the Torah. Why did God make us Jews smart? Not so. We should study Greek philosophy or Latin language. God made us smart, so we should study Torah.
[00:07:19] Speaker A: Our mind is for Torah study. Our heart is in charge of our emotions. Our emotions are in charge of our actions.
We most of the time don't do things just because we decided this is the right thing to do. Our mind has to influence our emotions
[00:07:36] Speaker B: and we have to start wanting to do what needs to be done and then we can do it. This is why very often we know something should be done, but we still don't do it. But if we want to do something, we will do it automatically unless we control ourselves so our emotions compel actions unless they are stopped. Our mind never compels action unless it is helped.
So our head is for study, our
[00:08:07] Speaker A: heart, our emotions are for actions.
[00:08:09] Speaker B: The study in Jewish context that we
[00:08:12] Speaker A: are referring to is study of the Torah. The actions we are referring to in
[00:08:15] Speaker B: Jewish context are the mitzvahs that we do, the Torah commandments.
[00:08:20] Speaker A: So now if we look at tefillin shalyad that we put on our hand, in tefillin shal rosh that we put on our heads, in this context now we see that tefillin shalyad, which are Torah commandments, is put on first, and then tefillin shadrosh, which is the Torah study, is put on afterwards. Why is it? Because to fulfill commandments, one has to have fear of God, understanding that there is somebody who is ordering you to do that. If somebody does mitzvahs because he understands that this is a better way of
[00:09:03] Speaker B: living, like, for example, with health benefits. To kosher is actually one of these examples. If somebody keeps kosher because he thinks that this is a healthier diet, then he's not doing a mitzvah. Then he's just following his doctor's guidance. So if I understand something, I'm not doing a mitzvah. The only way I'm doing a mitzvah, if I accept that God is higher than me, smarter than me, and God tells me to do something, and that's why I do it, even though I don't understand why that's the only way, how you could do a mitzvah in the army, if there is a officer who is commanding a private to do something, if private is doing what he wants, that's not called an order, that's not called a command. If an officer is coming to private and say, here's a field, do as you think should be done to this field, whatever you want, then this private is not following any commandments, even though he might end up doing a lot of good things.
[00:09:58] Speaker A: So mitzvahs means accepting that there is a higher authority above you. That's what a command is. So in other words, the question of what do we put on first? Tefillen shel yad on our hands, tefillen
[00:10:14] Speaker B: shel rosh on our heads, is essentially
[00:10:16] Speaker A: the question is what should be coming first, A respect for authority, recognition that there is something higher than me, or Torah study, which means understanding things that I'm supposed to do, why I'm supposed to do that. So what should come first?
[00:10:34] Speaker B: The Torah is telling us to study the Torah has God's wisdom and Torah in it, has a commandment to study God's wisdom. So God wants us to understand what we are doing, but the question is, what should be coming first? My respect for authority or my understanding
[00:10:52] Speaker A: we are maintaining in the Torah. In Jewish tradition. In Judaism, we insist that respect for authority, recognition that there is somebody higher
[00:11:03] Speaker B: than you, must come before your own
[00:11:07] Speaker A: wisdom, before your Torah study.
Why?
[00:11:12] Speaker B: The Torah tells us that if there
[00:11:15] Speaker A: is fear of God that precedes the
[00:11:19] Speaker B: wisdom, then this wisdom is going to
[00:11:20] Speaker A: be directed in the right way.
[00:11:21] Speaker B: If there's no fear of God that is preceding wisdom, then this wisdom is very dangerous. And we have seen in our history exactly that playing out many different scenarios. Very smart people were achieving extremely evil goals. Very smart people were doing a lot of. A lot of terrible things.
[00:11:44] Speaker A: Why? Because they didn't recognize that there is a higher authority, higher entity that I need to obey, and I'll just do whatever I understand.
As my math teacher in school used to say, a person is obviously supposed to use his brain, but person also supposed to use his brain to understand
[00:12:05] Speaker B: when he's supposed to use his brain and when not. Your brain should be smart enough to understand when it should be used and when it should not be used. If my daughter tells me, I want an ice cream, and I will tell if you logically explain to me why you want ice cream, then I'll give you ice cream. But unless you logically prove you your need for ice cream, I'm not buying you any ice cream. So guess what then? My children will never have any ice
[00:12:25] Speaker A: cream in their life.
[00:12:26] Speaker B: So now we understand what is the
[00:12:29] Speaker A: spiritual meaning of the fact that we put tefillin on our hand before we put our tefillin on our head? Because we believe that recognition of an authority has to come prior to your own wisdom. But the question is why? And there are three ways of looking at it. One, the way of Gemara, one, the way of Mihilta, one, the way of Sefi. The Gemorah is saying that there are two separate mitzvahs. Just one has to come before the other. In other words, there is a separate concept of recognition of a higher authority. And then there's separate concepts of using your own head, using your own wisdom,
[00:13:07] Speaker B: learning the Torah, that's separate from each other. But one has to come before the other one. Just in order of life.
You have to teach your child to respect your teacher, to respect your parents before you teach him anything. That's just how it is. You will never be able to teach the brightest child, if he is not listening to his teachers, that's number one.
[00:13:28] Speaker A: Then comes Mihilta. Mihilta says the ultimate way of fulfilling the mitzvah of tefilling on your head is when you have already a tefilling on your hand. The ultimate way to fulfill the mitzvah
[00:13:47] Speaker B: of Torah study is while you are experiencing this respect for authority, which means not only chronologically, you have to have your recognition of a higher authority before the Torah study. Also, while you are preoccupied with the Torah study, the only proper way to do it is if you are recognizing this is the Torah which is given
[00:14:11] Speaker A: to you by God, and you are
[00:14:14] Speaker B: studying something which is given to you
[00:14:16] Speaker A: from a higher source.
[00:14:18] Speaker B: This is how Mechilt is looking at it.
[00:14:20] Speaker A: Sifri comes as, no, no, no, no. This is even a deeper level. What's a deeper level?
[00:14:25] Speaker B: According to Shifrit, feeling on your hand
[00:14:28] Speaker A: and feeling on your head is one mitra. The Shifi is saying, no, no one
[00:14:32] Speaker B: without the other is impossible. It's all one mitzvah. If you have a respect for higher authority, and you are not trying to understand why this higher authority is telling you what they are telling you, you are not really respecting this higher authority. On the other hand, if you are studying it and you are losing sight of the fact that this is a higher authority, you're also losing the whole point. So this is really one thing. They're inseparable.
[00:14:59] Speaker A: The Torah is telling us that whenever there are three opinions about something, even
[00:15:05] Speaker B: though practically we follow only one of
[00:15:07] Speaker A: them, but really on spiritual level, every
[00:15:10] Speaker B: one of these opinions has a place. So in other words, even though there are three separate opinions of how this law is derived, I mean, the law is the same. Everybody agrees what the law is. There's no argument about the law. The argument is only how do we derive it from the Torah.
[00:15:27] Speaker A: So the law is only one way.
[00:15:29] Speaker B: But all three of these levels are there.
[00:15:32] Speaker A: And we see that Gemara, Mihiltah, and Sifri, they are telling us a deeper,
[00:15:39] Speaker B: a higher level of being a proper Jew. The Gamora is telling you, just listen. You have to understand there is God in the world. After there is God, just go learn. That's it. After you're following the rules, you're studying the Torah, two separate things. You first accept the yoke of heaven, you first resolve that there is a God who is higher than you, then you study his Torah. Very simple. Mihilt is telling you that it's true. But then after that, you could get carried away by your Torah study and forget about his higher authority, which happens, unfortunately, we get carried away.
[00:16:13] Speaker A: They say that there is this Jew who comes to his rabbi and says, rabbi, I had a terrible dream. How's your dream? Terrible, Terrible. He says, in my dream, I saw that God died. The rabbi says, listen, it says that whatever we think about during the day, we end up seeing in our dreams at night.
So that's what you maybe thought about, and that's why you saw it in your dreams. No, Rabbi, it's not true.
[00:16:36] Speaker B: I did not think about God for at least a year. So sometimes we just forget about God. And then there is a deeper level. The deeper level is the one that is arguing, how could you even have one without other. They are inseparable.
