Seeking Harmony in a Complicated World through Rabbi Stein's Teachings

0:01 It was 30 minutes that the world was perfect, peaceful, serene. It was this past era of Shabbos that I had the great fortune of bringing my father, avim Muiri, and my daughter to go visit my Rosh Yashiva. It was the era of Shabbos, we had 30 minutes with Rabbi Nussin Stein and we really bombarded him with questions facing society, contemporary issues, everything from A to Z. Should one move in town or move out of town? Should one set up his life in a way that's more working or more learning how to balance one's time How do you make sure that you're paying the bills but yet also learning how to face technology and the issues that it has and then also still take the benefits and the ease that it creates in a person's life?

0:51 Really, it was a priceless little stint of time. The Rosh Yashiva, in almost every single question that we posed to him, reminded us of Yissoy that he has told me so many times and always finds his way into almost every question that is posed to him. And it's a Rambam in Hilch's Deos at least it's based on this that Rambam is talking about Medos, deos and how it's A to Z. There's this large field and spectrum between cast anger and total being a pushover and not standing up for anything. There's a huge world in between those and the right way. What is the Hadarachayashara? between happiness and atavos and seriousness or sadness?

1:33 What is the straight path? Himeida Benodas, you go in the middle, the perfect balance, the Shavil HaZahav. You can find it in the first chapter in Law 4 of Hilch's Deos, in the Rambam Hadarachayashara. Himeida Benodas, shabekol Deyavedaya, mikol Adayashiyashvili, the Allam, you pick the straight path, the balanced one, the Rosh Yashiva told us. There's like a sickness in society that everything is all or nothing. You have to learn in depth and Daph Yomi is nothing. You have to learn Daph Yomi, or just going slowly. You don't know any of the Torah and that's terrible. And it might be a Gaiash approach, something that we don't necessarily stand for. It has to be like the Republicans and the Democrats are terrible, or we tax like this or like that.

2:14 But the truth is that there's a Dharachayashara and there's a middle path and there's a lot of good and a lot of different things. Never since other Mauritians did eat from the Ait-A-Dass Airbuvya happened a big salad. And it's not just a perfect world. We're all good here, all bad here, but things are mixed. I was thinking. When you talk about artificial intelligence, people have such serious opinions about it It's the worst thing in the world, and other people say it's such a helpful tool. And maybe there is a middle ground to all of this, a middle ground to technology, i don't know. There's a middle ground to how to learn. There's a middle ground when somebody, a rabbi, doesn't say something that people don't agree with. People will just parcel him, nullify him.

2:55 Oh, he's no good. Or a bacher, he did this, he's no good. There's such a big world inside of a person and there's such a meto-banalist that we must find in so many of the different things in our life. So, when so much in life is all about all or nothing, we should remember this wisdom from Nassin Stein that there's a Shvil Azov, that balance, equanimity, equilibrium is what we're looking for, because that is the Derich Yashara.