Shalom aleichem rabosai, just to share a few simple thoughts, no chiddushim on the suggested topic of balancing one’s Talmud Torah with classes. The Gemara in Kiddushin has a Halacha that לעולם ישלש אדם שנותיו שליש במקרא שליש במשנה שליש בתלמוד.
The Gemara is talking just about one’s learning time, that one’s learning time, the way one should allocate the learning time one has available, is into three parts. There should be a part for Tanach, there should be a part for Halacha, there should be a part for Iyun. So when the Rambam is illustrating, the Rambam quotes that din in Perek Aleph Hilchos Talmud Torah, and then he gives us a for instance, and he illustrates it as follows. And we’re not so much in terms of our topic, our focus, it’s not the Halacha per se which is our focus at the moment, but rather that’s the context in which the Rambam writes the following. So the Rambam says Keitzad: כיצד היה בעל אומנות והיה עוסק במלאכה שלוש שעות ביום ובתורה תשע.
I wrote down the lashon here: Haya ba'al umnus, a person he’s a professional, והיה עוסק במלאכה שלוש שעות ביום ובתורה תשע. So the impression you get from the lashon ha-Rambam is that the quantities notwithstanding, is that what’s driving things here, sort of what determines the schedule of the ba'al umnus is how many hours he needs to devote to his umnus. For other reasons, the Rambam’s assuming you have twelve working hours. In Hilchos De’os, the Rambam says that the yitachen that a person might need as much as eight hours of sleep a night. And that a person has to daven, a person has to eat, v’chulu. So the Rambam says that the pie that we’re dividing up here consists of twelve hours. If a person needs less sleep, okay, so then the pie’s going to get a little bit bigger. But the point is, is the way the Rambam writes that Keitzad: כיצד היה בעל אומנות והיה עוסק במלאכה שלוש שעות ביום ובתורה תשע.
It’s that first the ba'al umnus has to devote as much time as is needed to the umnus, to his hishtadlus to make parnassah, and then the remaining time he devotes to Talmud Torah. So when we transpose that to our topic, again, we’re not talking about hishtadlus for a parnassah at that stage already, we’re not talking about actually being involved in the umnus. We’re talking about a preparatory preliminary stage. But l'chora the formula and how the formula operates and how it’s to be applied would be the same. A person has to allow and allot a realistic amount of time for his classes. A person has to have defined what the tachlis is that he’s looking to achieve from getting out from going to college. Is he looking to go to the law school? So what do I need in order to when I graduate to be positioned to do that? Is he looking to enter one of countless other professions? A person has to define what the tachlis is, take classes towards that end, and then a person has to give a realistic amount of time to the classes. Let’s move on to another perspective that needs to be blended. There is a very startling peshat that the Ba’alei HaTosafos quote from Rabbeinu Tam. Rabbeinu Tam, the Tosafos Yeshanim quotes it in Yoma, that Rabbeinu Tam says. So Rabbeinu Tam says when you have that structure יפה א עם ב, right, יפה תלמוד תורה עם דרך ארץ. So Rabbeinu Tam says brace yourself, the second one is the ikar. Right? So when you have יפה א עם ב, when you have that construct, so Rabbeinu Tam says in loshon hakodesh, that construct reflects, places the ikar in the beis position. So יפה תלמוד תורה עם דרך ארץ, Rabbeinu Tam says derech eretz is ikar. So that's staggering. Besides just being sort of internally minei ubei staggering, but עשה תורתך קבע ומלאכתך עראי. So what does Rabbeinu Tam do with that? He makes it into a machlokes? It doesn't sound that way. Doesn't sound that way at all. So the answer is as follows. My father zichrono livracha he used to talk about how whatever demands there are on a person's time, but axiological supremacy, that was the phrase he used. Axiological, axiological means having to do with values, that axiological supremacy always has to be assigned to Torah. And it's clear, again, he wasn't talking about this Rabbeinu Tam. He said it in a different Talmud Torah context, but it's clear that that's the answer to the stira. When Rabbeinu Tam says יפה תלמוד תורה עם דרך ארץ, derech eretz is ikar. What Rabbeinu Tam means is that it may turn out to be the case that a person may end up spending more hours of the day in derech eretz than he does in Talmud Torah. That doesn't contradict the mishna of עשה תורתך קבע ומלאכתך עראי because what the mishna of עשה תורתך קבע ומלאכתך עראי is talking about is what, what is life about? What's most important in life? What, what is sort of obligations that need to be balanced and attended to? And ultimately, what's the supreme value in life? What's life all about? So in that sense, avada, everyone agrees that the Talmud Torah is ikar. עשה תורתך קבע ומלאכתך עראי, melacha is arai is something transient. It's something that it's part of the balance that we have to achieve and strike in life. But a person's neshama didn't come down to this world to have a career. A person's neshama came down to this world to learn Torah, to be oved Hashem. עשה תורתך קבע ומלאכתך עראי. What has axiological supremacy, what's most important is Torah. Yitachen however, whatever happens on a practical level, but עשה תורתך קבע ומלאכתך עראי. It could be that on a practical level it may be that יפה תלמוד תורה עם דרך ארץ. Obviously for this to be honest, so if Torah is axiologically ikar, which it is, כי הם חיינו ואורך ימינו, so then a person is looking also to translate that into maximizing the time as much as possible. But the point is that even if a person is at a stage of life where there are lots of legitimate demands on his time and legitimate al pi Torah, al pi halacha that a person is supposed to be attending to them. In terms of his hierarchy of values, in terms of what life is about, it's עשה תורתך קבע ומלאכתך עראי regardless of whether and how that is able to translate on a practical level. Bekitzur so far, a person has to, a person is looking to maximize the amount of time he can devote to Talmud Torah, but that has to be done realistically. And you see that from the Rambam in perek aleph of Talmud Torah of כיצד היה בעל אומנות. Again, notice how the Rambam's proportions, right? He sees being osek be'melacha three hours and he's learning nine hours. So again, obviously a person can't literally transpose that, a person has to figure out what the equivalent numbers are within the context of his life. But if Torah is axiologically... A person is looking to maximize the amount of learning but not at the expense of being unrealistic about his class obligations. A person has made a cheshbon, he's made a cheshbon and has a definite tachlis in mind and a person is supposed to allot realistic amount of time in order to be able to achieve that tachlis and then use the rest of his time as best as he can for learning. The ba'alei mussar quote from Rav Yisrael Salanter corresponding to the yud gimmel, the yud gimmel middos that we have in other contexts of מידות שהתורה נדרשת בהן of HaKadosh Baruch Hu. So Rav Yisrael Salanter also talks about yud gimmel middos in terms of character traits. And you look at them and it's very surprising because the middos all seem to be very mundane. He talks about orderliness and efficiency and neatness. That seems, I don't know, seems more like your counselor in camp telling you to make your bed than Rav Yisrael Salanter. So what's going on here? There are two things, there are two things that are going on. The second of the two is more relevant in our context. The first is that in terms of a person's middos, a person can't compartmentalize. If a person is not going to be organized and neat and efficient in milei de-alma, he won't be that way in his avodas Hashem either. If a person is again disorganized, inefficient in milei de-alma, so then when it comes to keeping his sefarim, when it comes to davening, those middos are going to carry over because a person can't compartmentalize. A person can't say, well, I'll be disorganized only when it comes to this, but I'm going to be very organized when it comes to that. There's no palginan that a person can make because a person has habits, a person has character traits. So that for one reason, that's what Rav Yisrael Salanter is telling us that in general a person has to be neat. If a person is neat, so then it's going to carry over and he's going to be makpid about he's not going to be sloppy about where he puts his tefillin. He's not going to be oblivious to what time it is, he's going to get to shul on time, he's going to get to seder on time. But there is another level in which again the efficiency, the orderliness, the neatness in milei de-alma also affects one's avodas Hashem which is that the more time one loses due to inefficiency in milei de-alma, so ultimately there are only twenty four hours in the day. Ultimately, that's going to be on the cheshbon of learning, it's going to be on the cheshbon of things which are intrinsically kadosh. If I'm not efficient and organized in how I go about my college schedule in terms of how I to the degree that I have discretion how I'm able to schedule the classes and can I schedule my classes in such a way that I leave bigger blocks of time open again whether that's to chapper arein an extra seder or whether it's to be able to get momentum lehavdil in doing my college work. Either way, it's easier to do things with big big blocks of time than little blocks of time. So to try to go about one's college work in as organized and as efficient a way as possible because whatever lack of efficiency, whatever lack of organization there is ultimately is going to drain time from the beit midrash from devarim she-bekedusha. One last perspective I just wanted to share. In the beginning of Parshas Vayeitzei, so after Yaakov Avinu wakes up from his dream of seeing the מלאכי אלקים עולים ויורדים בו so the Torah says ויקץ יעקב משנתו ויאמר אכן יש ה' במקום הזה ואנכי לא ידעתי.
So Rashi says had I known I wouldn't have slept bemakom kadosh kazei. The intimation in Rashi seems to be that it's Because in a makom kadosh, you're not even supposed to sit down, kal vachomer, you don't lie down and you don't camp out in the Beis HaMikdash. My father zichrono livracha called attention to a remarkable comment of the Netziv on that pasuk. The Netziv says as follows: when he says ואנכי לא ידעתי כמתחרט על שישן באותו מקום, that Yaakov Avinu has charata. He's upset, he's distressed that he slept there. Why? Not focusing on there having been any issur in so doing, but listen to this rabosai: באותו מקום שהיה שם גילוי שכינה. Yaakov Avinu now realizes that what he spent the night is a place that was muchan legiluy Shechina. Ve-tov haya yoter, he could have taken better advantage of the opportunity. Listen to this rabosai: וטוב היה יותר להרבות באותה שעה שם בתפילה ובבקשה ובהקיץ.
He could have made so much more of the opportunity of having been in that makom kadosh had he been awake, had he not been sleeping. And that what Yaakov Avinu is bemoaning is the lost opportunity. There's a tremendous yesod reflected in this Netziv, which is that in general in life, in order for a person to take advantage and make the most of opportunities, a person has to recognize them and appreciate the opportunities for what they are. Too often in life, and we're all susceptible to this, we're all prone to this. You have most of your life in front of you. Try to ensure that this either doesn't happen or happens as little as possible. So we only recognize the true dimensions of opportunities in retrospect. We think back and we think back of, oh, what an amazing time that was, what an amazing period that was, what amazing opportunities there were. With the exception of those whose plans, and if you can work it out, it should include as many of you as possible, with the exception of those whose plans call for returning to full-time learning after you finish college, it's crucial, crucial to appreciate that the opportunity which you have now, the opportunity which you have now while you're in yeshiva to be learning so many hours a day is not an opportunity that you'll ever, ever have again. Part of in balancing classes and learning, so one of the questions is, am I looking to finish college in three years? Am I looking to finish college in less than three years? Should I spread college out over four years? And obviously that's a complex question, and obviously there are many factors that everyone needs to weigh together with their parents in their own personal context. Financial factors obviously play a role. But the point is that when you have, when you make that deliberation and that decision, it should be made with the recognition and appreciation that you're not looking to get out of here as fast as possible. You're looking to maximize the opportunity. You'll never, ever have it again. You'll never, ever, when you're in the workforce, the boss is not going to tell you, okay, you'll learn from nine to three, and at 3:00, you'll open up your laptop or we'll have our first meeting of the day. No, he's going to be looking at his watch to make sure that you're at your desk at I don't know what time, 8:00, 8:30, 9:00, whatever time it is. The yesod of ve-anochi lo yadati is, and the Netziv is telling us this, that to make the most of an opportunity, the first thing is a person has to recognize the opportunity for what it is. You're not looking that it should be a revolving door. You're looking to... to make the most of an incredible, incredible opportunity Rabosai. Again, obviously that there are many factors that have to be weighed, but when the factors are weighed, at least recognize that this is what you're deliberating about. This is what you're making the decision about when you're looking to see do I, do I look to pack all the classes in that I can get out as quickly as possible? But if you're just going straight to graduate school or straight to the workforce, recognize this is an opportunity that you'll never ever have again in your life. And I'll tell you something else Rabosai. Even if you're headed to Chinuch or to Rabbanus, even those who are headed there, even for you, the demands in Chinuch, a person is meshubad to preparation for his classes, his shiurim. In Rabbanus there's a pastoral side, there's attending simchos baruch Hashem. The luxury of having so many hours where one can diversify one's learning without those shibudim, even for those who are headed to Chinuch and for Rabbanus, what you have now is a unique, unique opportunity. So when you're balancing the classes and the learning, especially, again, there are different depending upon where you want to get after college. So it could be that your college schedule's going to be more demanding and maybe the courses are going to require more work. You want to make the most of the opportunity of learning. No matter what your schedule is, Torascha keva. Life is about Torah, life is not about, yes, גדול הנהנה מיגיע כפיו. Yes, we're supposed to make hishtadlus for parnassah, but that's something we're supposed to do. That's not what life is about. עשה תורתך קבע ומלאכתך עראי. That then means that, yes, you do a lot of realistic time. You have to give realistic time. It's just counter-productive and you just undermine yourself by not giving it realistic time. On the other hand, you also want to look to make as much time available as possible. And throughout, a person should realize just what the incredible opportunity that you have in these years in front of you is. I conclude with a birchas hedyot that you should all be very, very matzliach in all your endeavors and you should be עולה מעלה מעלה במעלות התורה ויראה. Amen.