Preventing Spiritual Erosion: Lessons from the Three Weeks of Mourning and Jewish History (Rebroadcast)

0:02 Today begins the three weeks. It is Shiva Asar Betamos, the beginning of the Ben Hamitzarim, the time between streets, a stint of time on the Jewish calendar marked for remembrance and mourning, bookended by Shiva Asar Betamos and the eventual Tisha of the 9th of Av. And perhaps, the same way that a doctor is less concerned about his patient's runny nose because he's more focused about the cause of it, the root illness and bacteria, the infection in his patient's body, perhaps it would follow that while we are mourning what we have lost, we should also focus on the seba, the sins that caused this destruction, so that we can seek to rectify it.

0:52 Because, after all, it is our job to rebuild the base hamigdash through tiket abidus, halacha toira and avayt as Hashem. So we begin in unraveling this puzzle for the cause of the destruction from a Mishnah in Mesech de Tainis that tells us that on Sheva Oser Betamah, five calamities and tragedies befell the Jewish people. Number one Moshe broke the luchos. Number two the karban hatomib ceased to be brought. Number three the walls of Yerushalayim were breached. Number four a posthumous burned Ezra's famous Sefer Torah.

1:33 Number five an idol was placed inside the base Hamikdash. And I found in Rabbi Gladstein's great work on the three weeks, an unbelievable anointing of the'oyim dikivart from the great orichlaner Rabbi Yaakov Etlinger, the Baal Minchashai, the Baal Bikurei. Yaakov the Baal Orichlaner and interestingly enough, this 19th century ge'oin was one of the rabbeim of Rav Shams and Rav Folh Hirsch. Now he tells us that the five events here are not in a random order, but they are actually documentation of the sequence of the descent of a Jewish person, of a Jewish community and of Klau Yisrael. God forbid that.

2:14 It starts where a person will break his luchos. It begins with a slacking off in one's steadfast devotion to Torah study breaking the luchos. Luchos represent Torah. Eh, I can miss today's dafiyomi. I don't need to learn be'ion. Eventually that leads to a batol hatomid. And now there is no more davening. I don't need to go for a minyan, I can daven in the office. I'll put tefillin on at home. I don't like their nusach, I'll go here. There's. There's no more tefillah. Then it turns into breaching the walls. You are now without any sort of guardians on your walls and things enter just pouring into your house, into your body, into the community. It's not a wonder why you select other sort of gross, putrid foods, because ultimately one is bereft of spirituality.

3:03 His walls have been broken. Forth, a posthumous. He then burns the Torah, because ultimately, one is bereft of spirituality. His walls have been broken. Fourth, a posthumous. He then burns the Torah openly, where now there's nothing left of this Jewish person. The community, even Lulav, even Hanukkah, even the Pesach Seder are now gone. It's been burned. And now, lastly, god forbid, there is nothing, because there is a tzelem, there is an idol inside of the Beis Hamikdash. Your Judaism, your Yahadus, has been replaced by an idol. Your children marry non-Jews. There's nothing to be shown for your Yiddish Tragedy. And it all could have been prevented if a person would have stayed strong in his Torah learning, if he would have stayed in that tafiyomi, he would have stayed in his iyon, if he would have stuck to his kovata item.

3:53 La toira Rapsadjagon tells us that the nation of the Jewish people are not a nation that is bound together by the same ideals and the same logic and the same morals. But no, ein hauma elapopet Torah. We're only a nation because of the Torah. Commit to your sidarim, set yourself up chavrusas, stay true to Torah study, because after that things unravel rather quickly and eventually, god forbid, it ends in an idol being placed in the base of Hamikdash.