[00:00:00] Hello, my friends, and welcome back to this week's episode of the Practical Parasha podcast. This is Rabbi Shlomo Cohen, and I hope you are well. I'm sorry about last week. It's busy before Pesach, and, you know, it's almost harder to miss a week than to push yourself and to do it every single week. You know, we get into routines where we do things once a week, once a day, and when you get out of it, it's hard to get back into it again.
[00:00:27] You know, I feel that way when it comes to the podcast. Every week, Wednesday night or Thursday night. Some weeks, if I'm running late, push myself, God willing, with the help of Hashem, to put out an episode.
[00:00:40] Last week, you know, I wasn't able to do it, thank God, for good reasons. Just Pesach, the rush, the busyness, and, you know, a lot of different weddings going on different happy occasions.
[00:00:52] So I wasn't able to sit down, to concentrate, to put out the episode. But in a way, it's harder now that I missed a week, even though I had a break to get back into the flow, into the routine.
[00:01:04] So I think the message is routine, and maybe we'll talk a little bit about that today in the podcast. But the thing is, is that this week is Parshas Tzav, and it's also Shabbos Haggado, which is the Shabbos before Pesach.
[00:01:20] Pesach Passover will begin Wednesday night.
[00:01:24] And next week there's not going to be a episode because next Shabbos, there's no Torah portion of the week. It's a special reading for Chalamoyd. So I know you might say, uh, oh, do something on the Torah reading of Chalamoyd or Pesach. We'll see. But I think I actually might take a break for next week and we'll pick it up during Pesach. Maybe I'll release an episode, meaning not during Pesach, but during the intermediate days of Passover of Pesach.
[00:01:51] I'll release an episode for the next Parsha, which will be the one day after Passover. We'll see. Hope that's the plan. But as you know, man plans and God laughs. That's the rule of thumb.
[00:02:05] So before we begin, as always, if you have any questions, comments, would like to reach out to say hello, or you want to wish me a happy Pesach, which I would like to wish you, send me email at Rabbi Shlomokon kohnmail.com I'd love to hear from you. So, as I mentioned before, I do this every year.
[00:02:26] If you would like to sell your Chametz to sell your unleavened products right now, you might think, sell my Chomets, does that mean I have to bring it to Rabbi Cohen?
[00:02:38] What do I have to do to sell my Chametz? Does it cost me money?
[00:02:42] And the answer is no and no. The custom is, is that there's a mitzvah on Pesach. We don't have any Chametz. We don't eat chometz. We don't own chametz. That means any leavened products, bread, crackers, pretzels, cereals, anything made of the five grains.
[00:02:59] Now, matzah is not leavened. It's just, uh, we cook it under 18 minutes. It doesn't rise. But the point is, things that we have in our house, some people get rid of all those Chametz products, the crackers and the pasta.
[00:03:13] But others, there's a very strong custom that's based in halacha and Jewish law that we sell our chomets, whatever chomets we have in our house, if you don't get rid of it, some people have the custom to sell it to a non Jew.
[00:03:26] So if you would like to sell your chametz to have it done for you, it's free of charge. You can reach out to me, Rabbi Shlomokon koh
[email protected], and I will send you an authorization form to fill out, and I'll forward that to the rabbi who takes care of it. I personally don't take care of the sale, but it's just, you fill out a document and the Chometz is legally sold to a non Jew for Pesach. Hence, it is not in your possession. And hence you are able to fulfill the requirements of not owning Chometz leavened products during Pesach. So you can reach out to me for that. But you got to do it sooner than later. Don't wait until the day before Pesach. You got to do it asap. Maybe as soon as you hear this episode before Shabbos or right after Shabbos, because once it comes past a certain point, I can't, you know, it's already taken care of already.
[00:04:22] This week's Parsha is Parshat Tzav, and it's also Shabbos Haggado, the great Shabbos, which is the Shabbos before Pesach. And just to give a quick overview of the Parsha, Parsha Tsav continues with the motto, I guess, of vayikra. It's really telling us about the different services that were done in the tabernacle, in the Mishkan, and also that would be done in the Beis Hamikdash. The first thing it talks about is this taking out of the ash which, uh, the altar. There were carbonos. There were sacrifices that were burned on it.
[00:04:54] Some of them were totally burned. And there was understandably a lot of ashes. So there was a certain service that to be done with the ashes that were on the mizbeach on the altar. Some of it had to be taken and put onto the side, the Mizbeach. The altar had to be cleaned totally. There was also a constant fire on the Mizbeach that could never be put out. It always had to be on. The parsha also tells us of, uh, the different types of meal offerings. There wasn't just animal offerings that were brought in the tabernacle, in the Mishkan, but also meal offerings.
[00:05:23] And there's different types of offerings. There's a sin offering if someone committed an aveira, a sin. The parasha also tells us about a guilt offering. And when the requirements to give, that is.
[00:05:35] And when you have a requirement to bring one of those carbonos, one of those sacrifices. We also talk about a, uh, Thanksgiving offering. When a person has a situation where he wants to give thanks to Hashem for saving him or delivering him from salvation, he would bring a special sacrifice called a carbon toda, which would be totally burned on the altar, and no part of it would be eaten by the kohanim. The parsha continues with different requirements and prerequisites for carbonos. That there's such a concept of pigle, which is, a person could have improper thoughts, could invalidate a carbon. And also eating in a state of contamination. A person can't eat a carbon when they're contaminated.
[00:06:13] In this state of spiritual impurity. They. They have to be spiritually pure to eat the carbonus. Additionally, the parsha tells us about the fat and the blood of the animals that were given, what they had to be done and the different parts of the animal and what the processes of how a carbon was offered. Finally, the parsha concludes with Moshe Rabbeinu Moses consecrating the kohanim. You know, and what he did. He dressed them, he. He anointed them, and he brought them into the service that they were now the kohanim who do the service in the tabernacle and in the Beis Hamikdash. The first idea I want to share with you today takes us to the beginning of the parsha.
[00:06:58] Now, we just talked about routine in the beginning of this podcast, of doing the podcast every week. And I think it's just like, it's appropriate. There's a beautiful idea I saw from Rabbi Fran, who, who he brings it down from Rabbi Hirsch. The parsha tells us about this mitzvah that the kohanim would have to take from the ashes on the Mizbeach. They would have to take, uh, a small amount of it.
[00:07:22] And he would take it, you know, what was there every day, a small amount, and put it on this pile. There was this big. They called it the tapuach, which literally means apple. But there was this big round pile on the side of the mizbeach where the ashes would be built up. That's where the ashes would be dumped from the altar, and it would stay there. It would get bigger and bigger till a certain point it would get big enough. They would have to take the ashes, I guess, these. The ashes of these carbonos, these sanctified ashes, and bring them outside of the temple to be buried properly in a special place outside of the tabernacle or the beis hamikdash. And every day this process would be done. A little bit of the ashes was taken off, and it was put on the ashes from this big pile.
[00:08:12] Now, additionally, the parasha also tells us that aside from taking a small amount of the ashes from yesterday and removing them from the mizbeach, every so often, when the mizbeach would have too much ashes on it, the kohanim would have to totally clear off the mizbeach, the altar, to make sure no trace of the ashes were left, meaning when it became too much, it would have to be totally cleaned out. So on one hand, you have this service that was done every day where a small amount of the ashes were taken from, you know, from yesterday's carbonav, from yesterday's sacrifices, and were placed next to the altar. That's the truma sedeshin.
[00:08:57] And on the same time, we see when the mizbeyach, when the altar was full, I guess on the altar, it was too much ashes. It was, you know, it had to be cleaned. The haitzosadeshen, the altar would have to be totally cleaned out. Nothing left from the day before.
[00:09:16] Now, it's interesting over here, these two ideas that you have here. So on one hand, every day we're taking a small amount, putting it on the side of the altar, and at the same time, we also have a concept where we're totally clearing out the ashes, that there's nothing left from yesterday. So Rav Hirsch explains that the Truma Sadashen, this idea that this service that the Kohanim did with the ashes represent two ideas, you know, in our spiritual lives and really in our lives in general.
[00:09:52] When a kohen would take from the ash, from yesterday's ash, and he would remove it from the altar, there was a significance there that today is connected to yesterday, that what we did yesterday, we have to continue today, right?
[00:10:13] When the Kohanim, they brought, the sacrifices they brought, they did the service, lighting them in nowhere, all the different steps that they did yesterday, we're going to do the same thing again today.
[00:10:28] The message that the Truma sedeshin of clearing the ashen, of not just clearing the ashes, but taking a little bit from yesterday and putting on the side signified.
[00:10:37] In life, we have to have routine.
[00:10:42] And especially when it comes to our spiritual lives, the routine. What we did yesterday, we need to continue today, right? We daven yesterday, we learned yesterday.
[00:10:54] We continue that today and tomorrow we're going to do the same thing. And in a month from now, we're going to do the same thing. It's a continuation. And this is not just something which spans our lifetime. It spans our grandparents, uh, our great grandparents, to our grandchildren and our great grandchildren. This is something for the span of humanity and the span of the Jewish people that were part of this bigger process. You know, a lot of us, a lot of the time, we're thinking about doing new and exciting things. You know, think about a president, right? To make a little separation, Each president, he focuses on something different so that, you know, and when the next president comes around, the thing that the first president was focusing on becomes boring, and you focus on the next thing. But the thing is, if this president focuses on the economy and the next one focuses on foreign policy, one's gonna fall to the wayside.
[00:11:50] The Torah is telling us here that when it comes to service of Hashem, we have to have continuity is very important. Routine is good. It's funny, I think about in my own life, you know, we think about COVID right? In the beginning of COVID when the whole world shut down, there was nothing happening. You know, most people were not going to work.
[00:12:14] There was, uh, nowhere to go, though. There were no new TV shows, right? People had, ah, you know, there was no entertainment. There's nothing new. Uh, people just watching reruns of things, right? Imagine.
[00:12:26] And I felt like for majority of the world, the world just, you know, was standing still. You know, there was nothing to live for anymore. It was just like nothing to look forward to. A lot of uncertainty now for myself, of course I felt uncertainty and what's going to be. But I felt in a certain sense, my life had tremendous amount of structure.
[00:12:53] There was always davening. And in a certain sense I was doing the same thing that I always was doing. I was davening every day, three times a day. I was learning Torah. Maybe not in the same scenario of learning in a shul, in a synagogue. I was learning in my house. We had Shabbos every week. There was something to look forward to. There was the holiday, there was Pesach Passover, which came out right during that time. There was the cycle of Jewish life continued. Our spiritual lives didn't stop because the world stopped. Uh, it didn't make a difference.
[00:13:25] The thing that we did yesterday, we did today.
[00:13:28] And I think that's just a very powerful message. Especially when we're always looking for exciting things, new things.
[00:13:35] We have to realize it comes down to the grind of life, the day in and day, day out. And I think this concept is not just a spiritual, you know, idea that we can strive for, but I think even in our, in our mundane lives, our day to day lives that we live, we have to realize that we need, you know, what we did yesterday, we're going to do today as well, right? If a housewife is not going to make supper today because she did that yesterday, or she's not going to clean, uh, not even housewife, forget about it, anybody. If we're not going to do the things we did today because we did it already yesterday, we're going to have problems. If we're not going to go to work today because, uh, we did that yesterday, we're going to get fired. Right?
[00:14:18] The point is in life we have to, you know, we have to get into the routine of life, the continuity and the things that we did yesterday, we need to do today this continuation. There's no, and in a sense, there's no resting on our laurels. We can't just sit back and relax and just, yeah, we'll be good. I did it yesterday, I'm good. There's always a certain sense of we need to continue, we need to move forward, we need to. And it's not necessarily the exciting things, you know, it's what we did yesterday we do today. And it's continuity, routine. And I think that's how we get to, you know, a certain sense of Levels of serving hashem and reaching our true potential. When, you know, sure, there's going to be highs and lows, but we always want to go for that healthy medium to get into that, you know, routine. It's always that grind of life to push through not just with the spiritual, but even on the other things in our lives in general, to just to focus on the routine, to get into good habits. And that will help us be successful in all areas of our lives.
[00:15:19] Now, on the flip side, you have the haitzos hadeshin, right? So we just discussed one part of this one idea here.
[00:15:28] We're taking something from yesterday, and we do this every day. Now, at the same time, the Mizbeach also represented when this idea of renewal, this idea of not focusing so much on yesterday, right? This is the beauty, the dichotomy of the, uh, Mizbeyak of the altar. Because this idea of clearing out all the ashes totally from Mizbeyak reversh says nothing from yesterday could be left.
[00:15:53] When it got too full, the altar had to be totally cleaned out.
[00:15:56] This is, uh, a flip side reverse brings out. Because on the flip side, a person also has to learn, have to focus on that what happened yesterday happened yesterday. And today is a new day. That no matter if we didn't do as good as we wanted to yesterday, we could start fresh from this moment. And if you look in Judaism, there's so many ideas that represent renewal. You know, every. You know, think about Rosh Chodesh. Every month is a new moon. That's renewal. The moon waxes and wanes. It's renewal. Talk about the new year. Every week is a new week. Every day is a new day, even every hour, every minute, that's already on a higher level. But the point is that sometimes we have to be able to leave that day behind and move forward. So on both sides of the equation, we have two ideas over here. One side is that connecting to the past, connecting to yesterday. But on the other side, it's remembering that what happened yesterday is still, you know, it's not dependent on what happens till today. Meaning. And I think these ideas are not contradictory. They go together in a sense, even though they're different ideas. Because even though yesterday wasn't the way I would have wanted it to be, I still have the ability now to go forward and to create a new reality and to tap into something new, to have a renewal, to go forward and to be a better person.
[00:17:24] Second idea I want to share with you today is when the Torah says regarding the Fire on the altar.
[00:17:35] Uh, the fire on the altar shall remain burning on it. It shall not be extinguished, and the coin shall kindle wood upon it. Every morning he shall prepare the elevation offering upon it, and shall cause the fats of the peace offerings to go up in smoke upon it.
[00:17:54] Now, many commentaries explain on this pasach, on this verse, that it's talking here how the fire on the Mizbeach can never go out. The fire on the altar has to be continuous.
[00:18:05] And there's many ideas here that can be derived from this fact that it has to be constant.
[00:18:12] And, uh, we've talked a little bit, I think, in this episode, this idea of having continuity and having that fire within you, I guess, is an important idea as well, to never let it go out, that you should always be pushing yourself.
[00:18:27] But there's a beautiful idea that I saw brought down. Rabbi Twersky brings it down from Rab Schneer Zalman of Liadi, the Balatanya. He says that there's a very novel way of reading this verse, right? So we read it that very simply, that the fire in the Mizbeach, the fire on the altar has to be burning constantly. Can't go out. He reads it little homiletically.
[00:18:52] The fire on the altar has to be continuous burning, but the.
[00:18:59] No, don't put it out. The way he derives it, I guess, homiletically, is that the negatives put out, the loys, the do nots. Right.
[00:19:11] The negativity put out.
[00:19:14] Now, there's many books that have been written about the importance of positivity.
[00:19:20] I saw Rabbi Twersky brings down that this, uh, researcher, Norman Cousins, he put out many works and studies about the, you know, the benefits of having a positive outlook, how that can affect the person even medically. That if someone has a good outlook, he smiles, he's happy.
[00:19:39] That can affect a person who's ill and make better health outcomes.
[00:19:45] But I think the idea here that the Balatanya or Bneer Zalman is learning from this puzzuk, how he's interpreting it homiletically, is that you always have to have that fire. You always have to have that positivity. But the loyz, the negativity, Sikhbe, you put it out, right? We have to have a constant action attitude of positivity, you know, attitude of gratitude. I think that ties into this idea of having a good outlook. It's not always easy, but, you know, you always want to be an eternal optimist to look at the good in every situation, because really, There's. There's no other option.
[00:20:26] If we start focusing on the bad, we start focusing on what we're missing, we'll never be happy.
[00:20:33] Happiness is appreciating what we have.
[00:20:36] And having, you know, that's the beginning of having a positive outlook is appreciating what you have to be grateful.
[00:20:43] That's how we develop it. And to always have that positive outlook in the future, just to exude positivity, because the way we act, the way we hold ourselves, that's how the others are going to react to us. You know, Kamayim, Panama, panem, it says, just like, you know, reflection in water, so too, you know, that's the way we are. That's how people act back to us. And actually, if you smile at another person, they're gonna smile back to you. And if you greet people positively, they're gonna greet you back in the same way. Now, uh, you know, it's not like magic. It's a process. But the point is, if a person adopts this attitude, you'll see slowly a change with the people around you, and maybe not even the people around you, but for sure yourself, you'll see a change.
[00:21:35] Having an attitude of positivity is the way to go. And that's something we see from this week's parasha.
[00:21:41] Another thought I wanted just to talk about quickly before maybe I shift to one message about Pesach is that in this week's parasha, the Torah tells us about the prohibition of piggle, which literally means rejection.
[00:21:56] Now, pigle is when a person has improper thoughts about a carbon, meaning he has thoughts that he's going to eat it in the wrong place or the wrong time, because sacrifices, depending on the sacrifice, had to be eaten within a certain time limit or had to be eaten in a certain place. Those are some examples of a piggle. Piggle literally means rejection that a person just thinking about the sacrifice, that he's going to do it in an improper way, can invalidate the sacrifice. And a person can be liable for punishment if he had this improper thought. The kohanim, um, who would do the service.
[00:22:35] The kohanim, who would perform the service of the Beis hamikdash of the temple or of the Mishkan of the tabernacle, when they are performing the service of. Of these carbonos of these sacrifices, if they thought the wrong thoughts. You know, obviously there's certain, uh, requirements in order to do that. It's not like a person just has any thought, but if they think they're going to do it in the wrong way, they're going to eat it in the wrong time, or they're going to take it to the wrong place, the carbon is disqualified, and the kohen would be held liable.
[00:23:06] Now, just think for a moment, you know, we think of our thoughts.
[00:23:11] That it's, you know, what I think in my mind, it's totally, you know, it's me, myself, and I. There's nobody else that, you know, doesn't bother anybody else. And I think one small point to bring out over here is that in the Torah, Torah, lifestyle, the Torah legislates how we're supposed to live what we're supposed to do. And it's not just actions of do this mitzvah, you know, eat matzah, don't speak, you know, don't commit murder, uh, don't eat meat and milk together, right? It's not just the do's and the don'ts about things we do that are in the outside, but even within ourselves, there's commandments on how we're supposed to think, right? One example is piggle. This is piggle, this disqualification of thinking improper thoughts on a carbon that, uh, Hashem requires of us, even how we think, to be in the proper way. And it's not just that, you know, you think about it. You know, nowadays we don't have a temple, but we have a prohibition, the Torah, to not look at improper images. That means if a person has a desire to think thoughts in his mind about improper things, you're not allowed to do that, as hard as it may be at times, or to look at, you know, at the world around us, that things that are not appropriate for us, that's something which is in the Torah we should not follow after the desires of your heart and the desires of your eyes. But the point is, I think it's just showing to us. I think Piggle shows us this concept that it's not just the acts on the outside that we have to.
[00:24:53] The Torah doesn't just give us instruction on the things that we do on the outside, but even within ourselves, in our heart, in our mind, in our thoughts. And what we look at and we think about is something which the Torah requires of us to help get us to the highest place we're supposed to be.
[00:25:12] Now, just to end with one thought about, uh, Pesach, this Shabbos is called Shabbos Haggadal. It's the great Shabbos.
[00:25:21] And I saw it brought down. There's different reasons why this Shabbos has a connection to Pesach what is the connection exactly? Why is it called Shabbos, Haggadah, the Great Shabbos? You know, it's customary that the rabbis in, uh, synagogues, they'll give a speech about the Halachos, the laws of Pesach. Some people have the custom to say parts of the Haggadah on this Shabbos. Rabbi, uh, Twersky brings down from the Midrash that on this Shabbos, before Pesach, the Jewish people in Egypt they acquired, they got the sheep that would be used for the carbon Pesach, meaning during the times of the temple and the Mishkan, there was an obligation to bring a carbon Pesach. And nowadays on our seder plate, the Zroa, the shank bone, is in commemoration of the Karbon Pesach which was eaten on the Seder night.
[00:26:15] And really the significance of the carbon Pesach has many, many meanings. But central to it is that the sheep was one of the gods of the Egyptian.
[00:26:28] And when the Jews slaughtered the sheep for the Karan Pesach, it sort of, it signified that they were slaughtering the God of the Egyptians, of Mitsrayim. And in essence they were repudiating this, you know, this paganism and this idol worship which really was, you know, embodied the Egyptian and this was a total defiance of the Egyptians, you know, rule over them. The Talmud tells us that the Jewish people, when they're in Mitzrayim, they had been influenced to a certain degree by these rituals and the idol worship of the Egyptians.
[00:27:04] And now when they, you know, when they went out, they were, with this carbon Pesach, they were separating themselves from this idol worship that they had been doing previously.
[00:27:15] And really even more than that, the Talmud tells us that the Jewish people didn't necessarily believe in this idol worship, but rather it was a excuse to be able to do what they wanted to do, right? They weren't so foolish to think that a sheep is a God, they didn't realize that. But rather, you know, sometimes religion can be viewed as restrictive and not able to be doing what you want to do. And people could feel guilt if they do something. So therefore, in order to fulfill their desires without the guilt or without transgressing, they created a certain substitute in their mind. Human beings in general are driven by cravings, by emotions, and we all at times rationalize the things we do to justify our behavior. And that's really what the source of idol worship of Odazara is. It's this self deceiving rationalization.
[00:28:17] So now when Jewish people were going out of Mitsrayim, now they were slaughtering this, you know, the quote, unquote, the God of the Egyptians to sort of signify to themselves and to the Egyptians as well that their God was useless. And they are separating themselves from this rationalizations. They're freeing themselves from the enslavement of their desires and their rationalizations and their emotions. And really, that's really one of the ideas, essential components of Pesach, a Passover, that just like our forefathers went out from Egypt, we view ourselves that we also went out of Egypt. We say in the Haggadah, we look at it that we also went out because number one is if they wouldn't have gone free, we wouldn't have been free.
[00:29:05] But even on a deeper level, we're reliving the Exodus every year. That means to say is that we all have things that are holding us back. We all have things that we're enslaved to.
[00:29:17] You know, some people are enslaved to money. Some people are enslaved to, you know, lustful desires. Some people have, uh, you know, other type of addictions.
[00:29:27] It's not necessarily idol worship anymore.
[00:29:29] But the point is, is that Shabbos hagadal is the beginning of that process. The Jewish people, they got that Paschal lamb, and on Pesach, we're going to, you know, before Pesach was slaughtered, it's eaten on Pesach. And this is really the essence of the Pesach experience.
[00:29:46] We're going out of Mitzrayim. We're becoming a people realizing that Hashem, uh, is in charge. And one part of it is breaking free of the things that hold us back in our lives, to be able to serve Hashem in the best way possible.
[00:29:58] So with that, I'm going to finish. For today's podcast, I wish everyone a chag kashava sameach, a happy Pesach, an enjoyable Pesach, and a good Shabbos. And again, if you have any questions, comments, or would like to reach out, feel free to send me email at Rabbi shlomakon
[email protected]. all the best.
