Rabbi Peretz Chen | - Iron Swords - You can't lie to children!

00:00 Hello to you all. Just a day before we were about to return to our routine, that routine was turned upside down. We find ourselves at home with the children for hours—and not just at home with them, but in a state of war, in a tense atmosphere, with uncertainty all around us. So in today’s class, with Hashem’s help, we’ll talk about the things children learn from us even when we don’t notice. During this period, though, we need to pay special attention to them. Children learn many things not from what we say, but from how we respond to situations. They watch how we behave in all kinds of situations, and when they encounter those situations themselves, what they saw in us will suddenly come back to them. That’s why how we behave in front of our children is so very important. This is what’s called an association. When a particular situation has brought out a particular response, then when the same situation comes up again, that response may well come out again; the same feeling may be stirred again. To illustrate this, I want to share two experiences from recently. Last Friday I went to Ashkelon. That was the day when heavy rocket fire on Ashkelon began in the afternoon, and I was there at exactly that time, making the rounds to distribute supplies to the community for Shabbos. I stopped by the Magen David Adom station, the fire station, and the police station to put on tefillin with them. We had also set up a tefillin stand in our neighborhood. I was standing at the stand when suddenly the siren went off. As soon as it sounded, everyone went into the reinforced safe room in the nearby supermarket, and I went in too. I looked around and saw many Jews of all kinds—more religious, less religious, all sorts of people. Standing together in that safe room, with the sounds of explosions outside, a large group of all kinds

02:16 of Jews, suddenly brought back a story I had read several times, almost like a flashback. The Frierdiker Rebbe, the previous Chabad Rebbe, relates that he was in Warsaw when the Germans were shelling it. He describes being in a shelter with a large group of Jews of all kinds: Jews who observed Torah and mitzvos and Jews who did not yet observe Torah and mitzvos. Then, he says, a shell landed very close to their shelter, and they heard a tremendous explosion. It was remarkable and moving to see how, in an instant, the eternal cry of a Jew came from everyone’s lips: “Hear, O Israel, Hashem is our G-d, Hashem is One.” The Frierdiker Rebbe describes how, at moments like that, the Jewish heart suddenly awakens. So as I stood in the safe room last Friday with all those people, that story the Frierdiker Rebbe tells suddenly came back to me: a large, diverse group standing together in a tense situation. What he described about the heart opening up prompted me to call out in the safe room, “Who hasn’t put on tefillin yet?” And because of that, people put on tefillin there. Hearts really did open at that moment, and a Jew wanted to put on tefillin. In other words, someone who had a traumatic experience while in a safe room or shelter might find that the same situation brings up stress and anxiety. Boruch Hashem, I didn’t feel anxiety from being in a place like that. The only thing it brought to mind for me was that story by the Frierdiker Rebbe that I had read several times. In other words, something that had happened before in a particular setting—when I found myself in that setting, it brought out that exact point for me. That’s the

04:26 association it stirred in me. Or here’s another story to illustrate it. A few weeks ago, I went to the Rebbe with my two children. I mentioned this in recent classes too. We were flying from Munich to New York, a flight of almost nine hours. My ten-year-old son wasn’t having such an easy time with the flight; it felt too long to him, and he was a bit bored. So he asked me, “Abba, how much longer?” I looked at the screen showing the time remaining and told him, “Another seven hours and we’ll arrive, with Hashem’s help.” He said, “Oh, that’s like someone eating meat, waiting six hours until he can have dairy, then eating something dairy and waiting an hour until he can eat meat again.” Because according to our custom, we wait a full hour between dairy and meat. So what did those seven hours bring up for him? What did they immediately remind him of? Six hours between meat and dairy, plus one hour between dairy and meat. Those are things he experiences in daily life: he eats meat and waits before having dairy, or the other way around. In other words, he heard the number seven, and it brought up six plus one in that context. Someone else might once have waited seven hours for a particular trip, or taken a trip that lasted seven hours. As soon as he hears the number seven, he might say, “Oh, seven—that’s how many hours it took me to travel from this city to that city in Europe,” for example. In other words, whenever anyone hears something, it immediately brings to mind connections of one kind or another, based on what

06:15 they’ve experienced before. So our job as parents is to make sure the connections formed in our children’s minds are good, positive ones. As parents, we encounter this at many, many points. Of course, today’s class is about something specific to what’s happening right now. But let’s give a few examples from everyday family life. Let’s say parents often teach their child not to steal: stealing is a disgraceful, low thing to do. You must know not to steal and not to lie. One day the family goes together to some park, perhaps a zoo or somewhere else, and there’s an adult admission price and a child admission price. Let’s say, for the sake of the example, that the adult price is lower than the child price, and the child price applies from age two through age twelve. Okay? Again, an adult pays less than a child. One of the children is eleven and a half. He should pay the higher price because he’s under twelve. They’re standing at the ticket counter, and the cashier asks the mother how many adults and how many children there are. The mother thinks to herself, “If I say he’s twelve—he’s already eleven and a half—let’s say he’s twelve and save twenty shekels or so on admission.” So the mother says he’s twelve, and he hears her. He thinks, “Wait, but I’m not twelve. I’m eleven and a half.” He understands that his mother said it because she wanted to save a few shekels on the price. The mother didn’t tell him that it’s sometimes okay to steal, but he learned in the clearest, most powerful way that it’s sometimes okay to steal. And when he encounters a similar situation of one kind or another, where there’s something he, too

08:15 to stealing, it’s very possible that he’ll remember what happened and do the same thing, because that’s what he saw. He saw that in certain situations, when you can save a few shekels by saying something that isn’t quite true, you don’t tell the truth. That’s what his mother did. It’s very possible that he’ll do the same. Or take parents who teach their children, “Keep far from falsehood.” How important it is to tell the truth, how valuable truthfulness is. Then one day the neighbor knocks on the door and asks, “Can I speak to your mother?” The girl runs to her mother: “Mom, Mom, the neighbor wants you.” But her mother just doesn’t have the energy right now, poor thing; she’s tired. So she tells her daughter, “Tell the neighbor Mom isn’t home.” The girl runs to tell the neighbor that her mother isn’t home. Everything’s fine: Mom wasn’t bothered again that evening. But the girl received a message, a lesson, that in certain situations it’s permissible to lie. When she finds herself under pressure and it seems it might be worth lying, she’ll remember that when Mom didn’t have the energy, Mom lied. So when she’s in that situation herself, what she saw then may come out: maybe it’s okay to lie now? Or take something my brother-in-law once told me. He said he saw a man in shul talking to his friend throughout the davening, talking and talking, and suddenly the man turned to his son and said, “Would you please start looking in your siddur? How much can you talk through the davening?” Someone even handed him a little note, and he went right on talking to his friend. He didn’t even notice that what he was telling his son was the exact opposite of what he himself was doing. How will that son grow up? With what message? With what, with what

10:00 feeling? Knowing what? That it’s okay to talk during davening, but you can tell everyone else off? That it’s definitely okay to talk during davening, because that’s what his father does. His father talks throughout davening; he only tells his son not to. In other words, the way we behave, the way we react in certain situations, is passed on to our children very, very powerfully. It’s quite possible that they’ll react the same way in similar situations. For example, I know someone who simply doesn’t help at home. He has a home with young children, but he doesn’t help. He expects everything to be done for him, everything to be brought to him, and he gets angry when that doesn’t happen. Once we were talking, and I just wanted to understand why. He told me that this was what he saw at home growing up. His father didn’t do anything. His mother did the laundry, his mother ironed, his mother washed the dishes, his mother cooked, his mother mopped the floors. His mother kept doing and doing, while his father sat there and was served his meals. That’s what he saw in his father’s home, and that’s what he expects in his own home. But perhaps that arrangement suited his mother; for his wife, it’s very, very hard. It isn’t easy for her. Yet that’s what he saw, and that’s the connection formed in his mind: when I get married and have a family, I’m supposed to be served. His father never told him, “When you get married, you’re supposed to be served.” His father didn’t say it; nobody did. It’s simply what he saw. So when he reached that stage and got married, he expected exactly

11:51 the same thing to happen in his home. He can’t even understand another way of behaving. In other words, what our children see at home is what they’ll do themselves. What does all this mean for us today? We’re going through a stressful time, a time of war, and we can’t fool children. What we say to them, what we convey to them—that’s what will be reflected in them. So what does all this mean for us today? Naturally, there’s much more stress at home now. Certainly for those living in areas under heavier bombardment, the pressure and tension are there every moment. Last Friday, when I was driving in Ashkelon, I was simply on alert every second, every moment. Especially when I’m outside the house, that state of alert never ends. All the time, all the time, all the time, you’re listening for a siren, for something to happen. It’s an extraordinary level of alertness. So there’s stress at home, and even people who don’t live in the areas most heavily bombarded feel it. Throughout the country there’s a certain amount of pressure. Missiles have reached distant places. And some families aren’t at home; they’re staying as guests elsewhere. Staying away from home, particularly for a long time, isn’t easy. It brings many, many challenges and stressful situations. The children see and absorb how we react and behave, and that is the strongest and most significant lesson. So as parents, we need to pay much closer attention now to how we conduct ourselves, how we behave, how we react to situations. Now classes have resumed over Zoom, and that’s challenging: several children at home need Zoom, and if the parents are teachers, they need Zoom too. Then a teacher comes along

13:54 and holds a long Zoom class, as if no one else exists. He doesn’t understand that there are other children at home who also need to be on Zoom. Or there’s a teacher who holds a very short Zoom class, and you feel he’s just going through the motions. So parents might react: “What’s with this teacher? What does he think he’s doing with such a long Zoom class? Does he think nobody else is here? What’s he thinking? Doesn’t he understand what’s going on?” Or, “What’s with this teacher who doesn’t care? Why is the Zoom class so short? Doesn’t he take it seriously?” That’s how the parents talk and react, and the child hears it and absorbs the message: if a teacher makes a mistake, you can disparage him; you can speak about him inappropriately. You can’t fool children. Children hear exactly how we react, and there’s a very good chance they’ll react the same way. There are always exceptions—the Gemara says every rule has an exception—but as a rule, they often learn from our behavior that when a teacher does something that isn’t right, or isn’t what we think it should be, we can speak about him disrespectfully or even belittle him. That’s what they learn. So in this more stressful, more challenging period, we need to pay much closer attention to what comes out of our mouths and how we speak. If it always matters, now it matters much more than ever. To sum up: our children learn from how we behave and how we react to situations. When they encounter similar situations, it’s quite possible that they’ll react in a similar way. That’s the connection they’ll make; that’s the association that will immediately come to mind. And that’s why it’s important for us

15:44 as parents to always behave properly in these situations, so that our children will behave properly when they face them too. Especially now, with the pressure we’re under, more frustration, more stress, and reactions that aren’t always appropriate can come out of us. This is the time to pay attention, to place special emphasis on these things. We need to notice how we react, because children see everything, and there is absolutely no way to fool our children. May it be Hashem’s will that, with His help, we get through this period well and as comfortably as possible; that the Jewish people have a great victory; that, with Hashem’s help, all those who are ill recover; that no Jew be harmed again, not even a hair on the head of a Jewish man or woman. May all the soldiers come home safe and sound, healthy in body and soul, and may all the hostages return healthy in body and soul. And above all—the most important thing of all—may Hakadosh Boruch Hu have mercy on us and bring us the righteous Redeemer. When Moshiach comes, not only will those who are ill recover, not only will the soldiers be safe, and not only will the hostages and missing people return: those holy Jews who were murdered—may Hashem avenge their blood—will also return to us, with Hashem’s help, at the Resurrection of the Dead. May all this happen very soon. I think the message of this class is so significant, so important, especially at this time. Share it with others. Share it with a friend, and let them pay attention to this point too. Perhaps there’s no great novelty here, just something we need to notice and think about. So share it with others. Help them notice this point too, because it’s so significant and so crucial, especially, especially at this time

17:51 That. So, once again, may we hear good news and merit the complete Geulah soon. Amen, may it be so. Thank you very much.