We're still working off of the letter of the Chofetz Chaim to the alumni of Chaim Berlin and in the course of discussing some of the ideas which are stimulated by the letter, so we mentioned the Rav's response to a question of how can it be that Volozhin was closed down because of the demands of the Czarist government to introduce secular studies and we have a Yeshiva where we take the initiative to incorporate them? And he answered, "Times are different." And we spoke a little bit about that. But the truth is, had he been interested in the question, I think he clearly would have—again, the question clearly didn't engage him. I think he apparently felt that it was something that people should have should have understood on their own. Had he been engaged by the question, undoubtedly he would have said something else in addition. There are two compelling responses to that question. The first compelling response is the one he gave, about "times are different," but the second one is that there is a crucial difference between the two scenarios. In the case of our Yeshiva, so there's an educational vision, there's a vision of chinuch which we internally craft and look to implement. Again, I don't mean in terms of the actual particulars and the actual implementation, I mean in terms of the principle, the ikaron of having secular education as well. That's one type of situation. It's entirely and altogether different when you have an antagonistic non-Jewish body looking to dictate how chinuch should be carried out and how chinuch should be implemented. And even if coincidentally there would be a certain overlap between the dictates of that antagonistic governmental authority with our own internal vision, just the allowing for the precedent of, again, an antagonistic and external governmental body looking to dictate what our chinuch should consist of is something which one understands had to be resisted. And you know once upon a time, when we learned a little bit about the history of the closing of Volozhin, so we associated that type of situation that the gedolim of yesteryear had to deal with with bygone times in Jewish history. No one lives, b'chasdei Hashem, under Czarist rule anymore. And yet, lema'aseh, the same issue arose within the past year when that commissioner, at the time she was commissioner, was trying to... who interfere and legislate to all the to many many of the the yeshivas and day schools and lehavdil, not only yeshivas and day schools, but all all parochial and and private schools how they should be allocating their time. And there, even if coincidentally there would have been any overlap, I don't think there was, there wasn't, but even if there would have been, but just the very issue, the very principle that chinuch has to be decided upon and and the driving force has to be internal. It has to be what what the chachmei Yisroel, what the mechanchim in consultation with chachmei Yisroel see as the the most effective way of of transmitting the mesorah, of of raising the next generation of bnei and bnos Torah. Obviously that has to be done bechochma. And again, that's what we, that's the first response that we spoke about, the Rav's response about times are different. That has to be done bechochma, but that chochma is to be found and that chochma is the is the prerogative and the discretion of of of the Torah community and it's not something which can be dictated or imposed upon mibachutz, which is why that that issue that arose so recently in in New York State was one of such vital importance. The last or the next to last paragraph in the letter. אין דער פרשת ויקהל איז דא א גאנצע פסוק אין וועלכער שטייט מער נישט ווי די ווערטער אז ויצאו עם לפני משה.
There's a pasuk in Parshat Vayakhel that the pasuk seemingly doesn't communicate anything. It just says that after having gathered before Moshe Rabbeinu, so then they left. עס איז נישט פארשטענדליך צו וואס עס איז נויטיג זיך צו דערציילן אז מען איז ארויס פון משה.
It's not at first glance, it's not understandable why it's important to tell us that they left from before Moshe. עס פארשטייט זיך דאך אז מען איז פריער אריין צו משה איז מען דאך שפעטער ארויס פון משה.
If if it's it's understood, it's self-evident that if you go somewhere, if you gather somewhere, so when the gathering is over, so you leave and and you go back home. It doesn't you don't really need that to be narrated. זאגט אויף דעם דע וועלט אז דער זין פונעם פסוק איז אז נישט נאר ווען מען שטייט פאר משה דארף זיין ניכר אז מען שטייט פאר משה נאר אפילו ווען מען גייט שוין ארויס פון משה דארף אויך זיין ניכר פון וואנען מען איז ארויסגעקומען.
So says the Welt is as follows, that what the pasuk is telling us, ויצאו עם לפני משה, it's it's not describing as it were something, it's not a a description of external motion and movement, but but it's telling us something qualitative. It's telling us that when they left Moshe Rabbeinu, they they left in a way that that you could see from their behavior, you could see from the level to which they had been uplifted that they were leaving from an audience with Moshe Rabbeinu. And that it should be discernible. It should be discernible not only when one is in the presence of a Moshe Rabbeinu should should that be discernible, should it be evident that that a person is is being raised and and elevated to a different madrega. No, but when the Vayetzu ha'am, it should also be nikar. At the point of Vayetzu, it should also be nikar, not that the person then when when a person leaves Moshe Rabbeinu, so then he's the same person that he was before. No, when the person leaves from Moshe Rabbeinu it should be nikar what experience he's leaving from, what encounter he's leaving from, he should be leaving a different person. I think the ספר הבעל שם טוב הקדוש that if a person davens properly, and this is an amazing challenge, it does set the bar in a place where we need to strive. But when a person davens properly, he should be a different person after the tefillah than he was before. And if a person is the same, says the Ba'al Shem Tov, that's an indication that something was missing in the tefillah. At the end of the parsha of Nazir in Parshas Naso, so when the Torah describes the korbanos that the nazir brings ביום מלאת ימי נזרו and the tiglachas etc., and how all this represents the culmination of his tenure as a nazir, so then the Torah writes: והניף אותם הכהן תנופה לפני ה' קודש הוא לכהן על חזה התנופה ועל שוק התרומה ואחר ישתה הנזיר יין.
So now at this point the nezirus has been terminated and now the nazir can drink wine because the issurei nezirus are no longer in force because the milos of the nezirus has been completed. So my brother Hashem yikom damo, his talmidim say in his name, used to every year Motzei Yom Kippur on our father's hilulla, he used to say this vort as follows. But the whole point is that the reason he's allowed to drink wine is that he's no longer a nazir. So what do you mean אחר ישתה הנזיר יין? No, it's achar yishteh yayin because he's ois nazir, because the nezirus ended. So no, the pshat is, ve'achar even when the issurei and dinei nezirus are no longer in effect, he, the way he drinks wine has to be different. He can't go back to the same level of life, the same way of life, the same madrega he was on before he was a nazir. No, the kedushas nezirus is something when even the nezirus is over, but that experience of having been a nazir is something which has to be evident and has to translate into his behavior moving forward. When he resumes drinking wine, he's not, it's not that now he's like everyone else. No, he resumes drinking wine as someone who had been a nazir, as someone who had been through this experience of kedushah of nezirus. Okay, so we'll stop here for the early morning component and בלי נדר אם ירצה השם we'll reconvene at 11:30 with פרקי אבות אם ירצה השם בלי נדר. Okay, rabosai, have a productive morning, be well, be safe.