Emunah for the Non-Jew
We Don't Live in a World of Matter, But in a World of Consciousness
1 hr 10 min
Chassidus: Siddur Shaar Chag Hamatzos #2
- March 11, 2021
- |
- 27 Adar 5781
Rabbi YY Jacobson
775 views- Comment Call-in
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Dedicated by Mendel Fishman in memory of his father R' Moshe Baruch ben Yaakov, who led by example to be a mentch and a "varemer Yid."
Class Summary:
This text-based class, the second of a series on the Maamar Sheishes Yamim, in the Siddur of the Baal HaTanya, the Alter Rebbe was presented by Rabbi YY Jacobson on Thursday, Parshas Vayakhel/Pekudei, 27 Adar, 5781, March 11, 2021, live from Rabbi Jacobson's home in Monsey, NY.
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Chassidus: Siddur Shaar Chag Hamatzos #2
Rabbi YY Jacobson
- March 11, 2021
- |
- 27 Adar 5781
- |
- 775 views
Dedicated by Mendel Fishman in memory of his father R' Moshe Baruch ben Yaakov, who led by example to be a mentch and a "varemer Yid."
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Anonymous -3 years ago
Dr. Yishayahu Rubinstein, a molecular biologist in Machon Veitzman, researched human DNA cells.
He tells of an amazing thing he found.
When looking at DNA in a microscope, they look like two springs spiral around and attached to each other. As long as the connection continues, the cell is alive.
He found that along the whole DNA there are "bridges" that keep the spirals from detaching, thereby keeping the cells alive. - Keeping US alive.
Looking closer he says, he saw a pattern in these bridges:
10 acids, and then a 'bridge', 5 acids, a 'bridge', 6 acids, a 'bridge', 5 acids, a 'bridge'. Then the pattern repeats itself.
He tried to figure out what this pattern meant, and was in awe. A light came through the microphone!
10 - י
5 - ה
6 - ו
5 - ה
Just as an artist signs his name on his creation, the great artist of all creation, Hashem, leaves his signature on each cell in our bodies!
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Anonymous -3 years ago
Dear Rabbi,Thank you for the honour of an invitation to your shiur, which I attended this morning.
It was a profound way to start the day. The dark, the quiet, the words…
If you asked me what was my favourite part, I would have to say the dancing child, but as for the teaching itself, I have picked three things that struck me and the reason why.
Here are my three responses:
1. Rabbi Yossi Jacobson: “The whole world is a divine word.”
Excerpt from the Author’s Preface to my last book, Felicity and Barbara Pym about the British novelist, Barbara Pym. (It’s more about the appreciation of Literature than about Pym)
"The idea for this book can be traced to an incident that took place in my undergraduate astronomy class at university many years ago. The lecturer began with the Big Bang, a theory to which, despite extensive examination, I have never quite warmed.
His opening statement to us was that ‘before there was anything, there were particles floating around in the universe. I raised my hand and when called upon, asked (logically, I thought then), ‘What universe? If there was nothing, then there was nothing. I don’t understand.’
Accordingly, he revised his statement to say that there were sub-atomic particles in existence, to which I again asked, politely, ‘Where did they come from?’
His answer was, ‘Miss Cooper, you are an English major—why are you in this class?’ I replied that I was in university to learn [I was very young] and therefore was truly interested to know where these particles came from.
Whereupon he walked to the door, opened it, pointed down the corridor and said frostily, ‘This is an Astronomy class. We begin with the Big Bang. If you want to know where the particles came from, the Theology Department is down the hall, and the Philosophy Department is upstairs.’
Until that moment, it had not been my understanding, nor my experience, meagre as it was, that astronomy, philosophy, theology and literature could be unrelated. And, as the performance of the Astronomy professor did not convince me otherwise, I have persisted in the belief that they are not. It still seems to me that none of the traditional components of the trivium or quadrivium is so far removed from another, or from the liberal arts, that the effort to understand one does not benefit all.
And I am still convinced that enquiry is the passport to genuine understanding."
______
2. Rabbi Yossi Jacobson: "Every Jew has Emunah. What is Emunah?”
Excerpt from an interview in Carpe Articulum Literary Review with Dr. Harrison Solow:
"Belief, true belief, has to incorporate huge black holes of uncertainty and absurdity - or rather acknowledgment of absurdity. Credo quia absurdum.That is real belief. Everything else is miscategorised.
If people think they are walking on solid ground insteadof leaping over a chasm, well, they can call it faith orjammie dodgers but it doesn’t make it either.
The task is to love, to commit, to act, despite uncertainty - despite an inability fo fully apprehend a Mystery to which we belong, but cannot see.”
[Chabad puts it this way: “Emunah is...a perception of truth that transcends, rather than evades, reason.”]
3. Rabbi Yossi Jacobson: "The things that are invisible are far more consequential.”
“My task is to make the invisible, visible. For four years, I watched people walk by doors they could have opened, songs they could have heard, beauty they could have seen, credos they could have admired and people they could have loved – people who worked with them, for them, on behalf of them – people whose world they were inhabiting without so much as an invitation, and whose culture they were eroding, often without even realizing that it was there.
It seemed imperative, then, to shed some light on what danced unseen before their eyes. And if illuminating this ephemeral and largely invisible panorama seems like an inconsequential or ignoble task, it might be well to consider this: millions of people dedicate their lives to making the invisible visible: archaeologists, astronomers, quantum/particle physicists, artists, nano-technologists, physicians, microbiologists, filmmakers, rabbis, oceanographers, astronauts, psychiatrists and writers, all in pursuit of truth, all on a pilgrimage to somewhere they haven’t been before.
I just happen to be on the same pilgrimage.”
- Harrison Solow - The Bendithion Chronicles (PhD Thesis)
_________
Rabbi - I signed up for updates, so I look forward to a beautiful richness. Between you and your brother, I seem to be living in a transformed universe. May you both know nothing but good in your lives.
Benyamina Solovietchik (Dr Harrison Solow)
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Sarah Goldberg -3 years ago
The inner world of the seemingly inactive inanimate world is extremely active
If so then, even the dried-up bones of those buried in the ground, have atoms racing around each other (otherwise even those seemingly inanimate bones wouldn't exist) and are as "alive" as a rock.
Thus, even the deceased whose bones remain in the ground are "alive" to a limited extent and going to a kever can attach us to the person buried there.
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Sarah Goldberg -3 years ago
If emunah/faith is that realm beyond our logic and rationality
And each person possesses varying levels and amounts of logic and rationality, that which is emunah for one person because it's because his rational logical mind, is within the realm of logic for another. The child has pure emunah because his rationality is not yet developed.
If so, it behooves each and every person to "exercise" his logic and rationality to expand it. Not to "body build" in a gym and develop huge muscles, but to "mind build" in the yeshiva and develop a huge mind. The more the mind is thus built up, the less reason there is to rely on anything being believed because it's in the realm of emunah.
If so, part of our avodah is to build up our logical minds, lessen the turf for emunah until the point when "the knowledge (not faith!) will cover the earth like the oceans cover the world".
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Sarah Goldberg -3 years ago
Is Creation the biggest miracle?
If the only difference between nature and a miracle is frequency (if mann came down every day until now and wheat grew only infrequently, the former would be called natural and the latter miraculous); and Hashem perhaps created Creation once (though, the medresh Je created and destroyed many worlds, e.g. al pi gevurah, etc.,) then indeed Creation is a miracle because it was not only infrequent from our perspective, but occurred just once.
But, perhaps from a perspective above and beyond Creation, the tzimtzum to enable a space, a void, in order to allow for Creation, is a greater miracle than Creation. I.e. For Hashem to create Creation is huge, a one time occurrence and therefore miraculous from our point of view, but for Hashem to create anything is "no big deal" for the Omnipotent. Perhaps a bigger miracle is His withdrawal by way of Tzimtzum over Creation.
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Sarah Goldberg -3 years ago
Is emunah/faith Rational?
Some would say that emunah or faith is beyond rationality. We must take a giant blind "leap of faith".
On the contrary, it is the epitome of rationality to know, not believe, that our logical rational brains can only go so far, each according to his ability. And moreover, that there are matters, concepts and realities that are beyond the limits of our logic and rationality.
Thus, it is quite rational and logical to know, to realize, as a matter of fact, that the realms beyond our logical capabilities contain truths such as the existence of Australia, lehavdil, the existence of Hashem, etc.
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Anonymous -3 years ago
לא ללמד על עצמו יצא, אלא ללמד על הכלל כולו יצא
I had a thought - Those precious souls that go off the derech, were taken out of the klal not only for themselves ( what they could learn from their struggles etc. ) rather to teach the whole klal- their unique souls have the ability to transform and lift up the rest of the klal. If they were left in the klal we may never have gained from their unique light, but now that they were separated we have the opportunity to access their gifts that they have to offer to the klal. We have to look at everyone who is struggling as a lesson for us as well that there is something that we need from them. Instead of looking at them as nebach cases etc. it is a reminder to us to realize how important they really are.
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