One Person Saved an Entire Plane. What Can We Change? | Shabbos Bereishis in Light of Chassidus

00:00 In these days, wonderful days when we all feel G-d’s closeness and the great miracle that happened—in fact, the whole chain of great miracles that happened in recent days, during Sukkos, which the entire world saw and is talking about—we saw the hand of Hakadosh Boruch Hu and His closeness to the Jewish people. In a great miracle, in a matter of moments, Hakadosh Boruch Hu saved an entire group of nearly 180 Jews or more who were facing mortal danger. We also saw “a people rising like a lion”: the strength of the Jewish people, and how, with resourcefulness, inner strength, and extraordinary courage, they managed to defeat the enemy and save them, openly and visibly, through the most remarkable Divine Providence. I want to focus on a few points, especially at this moment, in the time we now find ourselves in: the days after Simchas Torah and the holidays of Tishrei, during the week of Parshas Bereishis, when we begin learning the Torah anew. There are several very important points we must take to heart. First is what the Gemara says in Sanhedrin: we must remember to give thanks, rejoice, and offer song, praise, and gratitude to Hakadosh Boruch Hu for the great miracles. The Gemara tells us that Hakadosh Boruch Hu wanted to make King Chizkiyahu Moshiach. In other words, King Chizkiyahu, who was from the House of David, was meant to be Moshiach. He is mentioned in several verses, including “This very day he will stand at Nov,” and the verses in Yeshayahu that speak of King Chizkiyahu: “A shoot shall emerge from the stem of Yishai, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit,” and so on. Yet why did he lose that opportunity? He lost that great merit because he did not sing in gratitude for the miracles. We all know the accounts from Tanach of Sancheriv, king of Assyria, and the great war, and how, through a great miracle

02:29 Hakadosh Boruch Hu saved the Jewish people in the most remarkable way in his time. Yet because he did not sing in gratitude for those miracles, because he took them for granted, he lost the great merit of being Moshiach. That is what the Gemara says in Sanhedrin. I remember the Rebbe speaking about this at the time, after the Gulf War in 5751: how grateful we need to be, how we must know to give thanks, praise, and sing for the miracles and wonders. This is part of the moral obligation of each and every one of us, every member of the Jewish people. We must simply offer praise and thanks, celebrate this miracle, and thank Hakadosh Boruch Hu. And of course, along with that, we must ask Hakadosh Boruch Hu—continue to ask—that just as He performed this miracle for us, when everyone saw with their own eyes the hand of Divine Providence, how He saved people in a situation where, by the laws of nature, there was no way out, so too may we merit to see more miracles, and the great, long-awaited miracle we are all waiting for: the miracle of the complete Geulah through our righteous Moshiach. Alongside the gratitude and praise, there is also what the Baal Shem Tov taught us. One of the things he taught is the famous saying that a Jew must take a lesson in serving Hashem from everything he sees or hears. That is, when we see or hear something, even the most seemingly minor thing, the Baal Shem Tov taught us that since Hakadosh Boruch Hu creates and sustains the world and everything in it at every moment—as we now read at the beginning of the Torah, “In the beginning, G-d created the heavens and the earth”—Hakadosh Boruch Hu creates the world. He did not create it only in the past; rather, as the Baal Shem

04:32 Tov explains, at every moment Hakadosh Boruch Hu creates the world anew from nothing. Therefore, the Baal Shem Tov also says that there is Divine Providence over everything, over every detail. There is remarkable Divine Providence even over the inanimate, over plants, and over animals, and all the more so over human beings. And all the more so over the Jewish people, His close nation: Hakadosh Boruch Hu watches over each and every person. We have now seen this in a tangible way, and a Jew needs to live with it and understand it. As we enter the new year and begin Shabbos Bereishis, the Baal Shem Tov says that we must take a lesson or an idea in serving Hashem from everything we hear or see, since everything is guided by Divine Providence. So if I have the opportunity to hear something interesting, something new, something remarkable on the news—or to see something—I must stop, pay attention, and think about what it teaches us. Of course, we can learn many things from what happened here on Sukkos, from this remarkable miracle. But let’s focus on one point that I imagine each of us has thought about. I think that if we connect it to this period, to this time, to the weekly parsha, Parshas Bereishis, there is an extraordinarily important message here for each of us. And it is this: the power of one person to turn a situation from the deepest darkness into the greatest light. The power that one single person has. And that one person need not be an expert; it can be an ordinary person. After all, that is what we saw here, and what everyone is talking about. The remarkable thing that happened here is that it was not people

06:30 who were trained experts in the field who saved the plane. It was specifically a Jew—as he himself said, without being ashamed to say it. And all of us, the whole world, are talking about it, and with pride. A Jew whose job had nothing to do with planes, who did not know how to fly them, showed resourcefulness because of simple things he had learned. Of course, this person is not ordinary at all: he is a person with a lofty soul, to whom Hakadosh Boruch Hu gave the merit and the ability to save a whole group of Jews in such a remarkable way. And not only to save a group, but to make a tremendous kiddush Hashem before the entire world, which sees it, hears about it, and talks about it. That is certainly an extraordinary merit. But what is the message here? It is that a person who was not an expert in the field nevertheless took the controls into his own hands, took the reins. He grasped what needed to be done and managed to put things right. He managed to stabilize the plane and, through that, save the entire group. There is something extraordinary here: the power of one single person. There has been an argument in recent days—not a very pleasant argument—but everyone has been talking about the fact that this was a miracle. Should we emphasize the miracle, the great miracle from Heaven that happened here? Or was it an act of human heroism—the strength of a person who showed resourcefulness, who displayed extraordinary, almost superhuman strength, and managed to do it? But the truth is that there is no argument here. When we read Parshas Bereishis, we understand that these two things not only do not contradict one

08:42 the other. Rather, these two things reinforce each other. We’re talking about a G-dly power, the power of siyata diShmaya—help from Heaven—the G-dly power of Hakadosh Boruch Hu. At the same time, this is the power Hakadosh Boruch Hu gave to a person. A person has this G-dly power: through his choices, he can do the right thing and elevate the entire world, change the entire world and make it a more G-dly, more illuminated place—or, G-d forbid, the opposite. That is really the essence of the whole of Parshas Bereishis. There’s a well-known saying among chassidim that the Rebbe would always repeat in the name of the Tzemach Tzedek: The way a person sets himself up on Shabbos Bereishis is how the whole year goes. And the obvious question is: What’s special about Shabbos Bereishis? True, we start reading the Torah again, and that’s wonderful. But what does it mean that the way a person sets himself up on Shabbos Bereishis is how the whole year goes? We’ve just come from Rosh Hashanah. Surely Rosh Hashanah is the day when the way a person sets himself up determines how the whole year will go. Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Sukkos, Simchas Torah—no. Specifically after all the holidays, on Shabbos Bereishis, the way we set ourselves up is how the whole year will go. The Rebbe spoke about this many times. The Rebbe said that the message of Parshas Bereishis, the first parsha we begin reading after all the holidays, comes precisely as we enter everyday life—the ordinary days of the year, when we return to our regular lives. That is where we find the greatest and most important message a Jew needs to take into life. What do we see in the weekly parsha? “In the beginning, G-d created the heavens and the earth.” That’s the first point: the creation of the world. Hakadosh Boruch Hu creates the world, and He creates every detail of creation. And as we said, the teaching of the Baal Shem

10:56 Tov is that not only did He create the world once; He creates it at every single moment. That is the power of faith. But alongside that, in the weekly parsha we read about the creation of man. The sixth day arrives, after Hakadosh Boruch Hu has created every part of creation—the inanimate, plant, animal and human realms, the heavens and the earth and all their hosts. On the sixth day, at the end of creation, Hakadosh Boruch Hu says, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” He creates man, the crown of creation. And when man is created, we see something remarkable: he is created differently from every other creature. One way we see this is in what the Gemara says in Tractate Sanhedrin: Why was man created alone? It’s interesting. When you look through Chumash at the creation of the world, you see that all the other creatures were created in groups. “Let the earth sprout vegetation, seed-bearing plants, fruit trees bearing fruit according to their kind.” So many trees, flowers, plants and grasses. The hosts of heaven, the stars—the sun and moon and all the stars—everything was created in great abundance, in enormous numbers. The domestic animals, wild animals, birds and fish. Then suddenly we come to the creation of man, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu doesn’t create a group of people. Just as He created millions of stars, just as He created millions of fish and birds, He could also, with His infinite G-dly power—“How manifold are Your works, Hashem”—have created many people. But no: He created one person, alone. The Mishnah in Tractate Sanhedrin asks: Why was man created alone? The Mishnah says it was so that a person would know that each and every individual is an entire world. That is why the Mishnah says, “A person is obligated to say: For my sake the world was created.” A person must understand that when Hakadosh Boruch Hu created man on the sixth day, He created one person, alone. Why? So that every person would know and remember, in every

13:24 generation—even now, when there are millions of people—that a whole world was created for one individual. What does that mean? It’s something truly wonderful. I had the privilege of hearing this explanation exactly forty years ago, in Tishrei 5747, from the Rebbe himself at the farbrengens during Tishrei. The Rebbe spoke about it at great length. There is a wonderful message here. Adam was a person... when he was created, he was alone; even Chava did not yet exist. The Torah tells us today how the whole sequence of creation unfolded. When Adam was created, he was alone. Then comes the rest of the story, right? “And He fashioned the side,” and so on, until Chava was created, and then came Kayin and Hevel and all the rest—all of history. But how did it all begin? With one person, alone. When Adam was created as a single individual, Hakadosh Boruch Hu said to him, as we read in the weekly parsha, “He placed him in the Garden of Eden to work it and guard it.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu creates man and tells him: You have a role. You need to work it and guard it. The whole world is in your hands. It is in your hands to elevate the world, to build the world. None of the other creatures has free choice. From 25 Elul to 1 Tishrei, during the six days of creation, Hakadosh Boruch Hu created many creatures, but they remain as they were created. They cannot rise or fall; they are what they are. They have their lives, their nature, their way of life, their way of existing, and they have no ability to change that. The only one to whom Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives the power of choice is Adam. Hakadosh Boruch Hu comes and tells him: Here are the fruits of the trees of the garden. You may eat from this one; from that one you may

15:32 not eat. It is in your hands, “for on the day you eat from it...” In other words, you have a choice in your hands. That is Adam. And Hakadosh Boruch Hu tells Adam: If you choose good, you can elevate the entire world—not just yourself. All of creation is in your hands, “to work it and guard it.” You can make the world an illuminated, G-dly world. And if, G-d forbid, you choose evil, you will bring destruction upon the entire world. And that is, in fact, what happened. The Midrash says that as soon as Adam was created, all of creation came to bow down to him. They thought he was G-d. That is what Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer says. What did Adam do? He told them, “Come, let us sing joyously.” He told them, “Hashem reigns, clothed in majesty.” “Come, let us bow down and bend the knee; let us kneel before Hashem, our Maker.” Come, let us bow down to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. With that simple act of saying, “Come, let us bow down and kneel,” Adam elevated the entire world. He crowned Hakadosh Boruch Hu King over the world; he recognized Hakadosh Boruch Hu and revealed His kingship. That is Rosh Hashanah. In fact, we know from the Midrash that the whole essence of Rosh Hashanah began with Adam. He was the one for whom it was “This day is the beginning of Your works.” He was the first to crown Hakadosh Boruch Hu King. Because of him, every Friday and Shabbos eve we go to shul and say, “Come, let us sing joyously.” We say, “Hashem reigns, clothed in majesty.” Adam did this for the first time, and we, the Jewish people, have the privilege of doing it every year on Rosh Hashanah—and, in fact, every week on Friday and Shabbos eve. That is the power one individual has to save the entire world. And when Adam chose the opposite, when he faced the test of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, and Adam chose to listen to the impulse prompted by the primordial serpent, because it was

17:43 Pleasant to look at, he chose something negative and destructive, because he knew what it would cause: it would bring evil and death into the world. He did not hold back. He truly brought destruction upon the whole world. Not only Adam received the punishment for it, but all of creation did. As Chassidus explains, based on the Zohar, the whole world became a mixture of good and evil, and everything was overturned. The entire world was affected by the flaw of the sin of the Tree of Knowledge, which we are still working to correct today, and will continue to correct until the coming of Moshiach Tzidkeinu. Such extraordinary power lies in the hands of one single person. The Rebbe expressed it this way—I’m telling you what I heard from the Rebbe then, during Tishrei 5747, forty years ago: Listen to what our Sages tell us. Why was man created alone? When Hakadosh Boruch Hu created Adam 5,787 years ago, He created him alone. Why did He do that? So that I, living today more than 5,700 years later—whoever I may be, wherever in the world I may be, even the simplest of the simple—would remember, know, and learn that “the world was created for me.” What does “the world was created for me” mean? Not that I am the center of the world and everything exists for me, out of pride and selfishness. Just the opposite: it is my responsibility. It is my power. “The world was created for me,” says the Frierdiker Rebbe in his well-known, wonderful maamar beginning “Basi Legani Achosi Kallah,” the last maamar the Frierdiker Rebbe published before his passing on Yud Shvat 5710. He interprets “the world was created for me” to mean “the concealment was created for me.” The word olam, “world,” is related to he’elem, “concealment.” He’elem means hiding, obscuring. The world was created for me. The fact that the world obscures, conceals, darkens, and does not let us see the Divine light in creation—that is for me. So that I can correct

19:59 it. So that through an action, a word, or a thought—a positive act, an act of light—I can do something about it. I have the ability not only to lift myself up, not only to elevate myself and make myself more refined, closer to Hakadosh Boruch Hu, but to affect all of creation. That is the extraordinary power Hakadosh Boruch Hu gave man, and that is what Parshas Bereishis comes to tell us. “Behold, man has become like one of us.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu says to man: Know that you have received this extraordinary gift, “like one of us.” “Like one of us” means like the One and Only of the world, as the Midrash says. The Rambam explains this at length in his writings: Hakadosh Boruch Hu created man “like one of us,” like the One and Only of the world. Just as Hakadosh Boruch Hu—every Jew has a part of G-d Above, and therefore you have tremendous powers. So even the simplest Jew is connected to the greatest of all, to Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself. There is a saying of the Baal Shem Tov. It is hard to translate into Hebrew, because the Baal Shem Tov used an expression that comes up in many, many sichos. The Baal Shem Tov said, “The simplicity of a simple Jew is connected to and rooted in the simplicity of the simple essence of Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself.” It is a little hard to translate, but let’s put it this way: we use the word “simple” to mean something basic. We call it simple because it is not made up of parts. But the truth is that the One who is truly simple is Hakadosh Boruch Hu. On the contrary, He is simple because He is not made up of parts, because He precedes all composition and is beyond it. Composition does not apply to Him. He is the One and Only, unique and singular. He is essentially simple because He transcends every definition, every description, every form. And that, in essence, is what

22:04 the Baal Shem Tov is saying: the simplest of Jews is connected to the deepest simplicity of the very essence and being of Hakadosh Boruch Hu Himself. That is the extraordinary power of a Jew. What we saw this week, what we saw in recent days, was how Jews—each of whom, on ordinary days, says to himself, “I’m the simplest of the simple”—showed their power. “He rises like a lion.” This is what we need to take with us into the year: to know the power of a Jew. We are now living in days, in moments, in a period when the world is at a turning point. We see what is happening everywhere, in every corner. Whether we are talking about families, communities, countries, or nations, wherever we find ourselves and whatever situation we move through, at every moment we have the opportunity to choose. You can choose to do nothing. You look at the state of the world and feel despair: “I don’t have the strength. Look what’s going on.” Wars, evil, hatred, corruption—in all kinds of sectors and groups, and within them too, wherever we look. So someone may make the choice that Yonah the prophet made in the Yom Kippur haftarah we read. When he saw the turmoil, the storm at sea, what did Yonah do? He went down into the hold of the ship, lay down, and fell asleep. He went to sleep. “I can’t do anything. It’s not in my hands.” Until the ship’s captain came and said to him, “Why are you sleeping?” That is the message of Yom Kippur. And that, in essence, is what happened here this week as well. A Jew, instead of going to sleep, got up. “Why are you sleeping? Get up, call out to your G-d.” When you have an opportunity to act, you must act. And this comes up for us in all kinds of situations. Take an example from a plane: sometimes you are on a plane with many other Jews.

24:06 And not necessarily Jews; there may also be non-Jews. You can keep to yourself, go to sleep, and do your own thing. But you can also reach out to the person sitting next to you, say a kind word, ask how he is, and perhaps start a conversation. You may be able to help him perform a mitzvah: if he is Jewish, perhaps putting on tefillin or sharing words of Torah. And if he is not Jewish, speak with him about the Seven Noahide Laws. Speak with him about justice and integrity. Speak with him about Hakadosh Boruch Hu, about the fact that creation has a Guide. In every situation, in all kinds of places, we have so many opportunities to act. And that is precisely the message and the lesson in serving Hashem that we saw this week: the power of one person who decides to act. He has the ability to save an entire world. And this brings us to the words of the Rambam—those wonderful words of the Rambam that the Rebbe repeated so many times. I remember, forty years ago, hearing the Rebbe call out about this at farbrengen after farbrengen, urging that it be publicized throughout the world. The Rambam’s words in Hilchos Teshuvah: “A person should always see himself as equally balanced, and the entire world as equally balanced.” A person must always look at himself and at creation as though everything is balanced evenly: evil against good, darkness against light, holiness against kelipah. It is always at the midpoint. If he performs one positive act, one mitzvah, speaks one word or thinks one thought in the direction of holiness, Torah, mitzvos, goodness, justice, and integrity, he tips the balance for himself and for the entire world toward merit, bringing salvation and deliverance to himself and to them. Those are the Rambam’s words. I remember the Rebbe sitting at a farbrengen and speaking about this from the depths of his heart. Simply

26:09 You don’t need to give grand speeches. You don’t need to be someone with a great deal of knowledge, depth, or expertise in anything. You just need to be simple, to believe in the power of the simple Jew, and to know that “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness” was said about you—about each and every one of us. It speaks to the wondrous power of a human being, “like one of Us”: the ability of one person to transform the world and bring about a positive revolution, a revolution of light and holiness in the world. And that is what we take with us into Shabbos Bereishis. This is its wondrous strength: how a Jew sets himself up this week, on Shabbos Bereishis, by taking the message that, on the one hand, “In the beginning, Elokim created the heavens and the earth.” You are not alone. Hakadosh Boruch Hu guides the world. There are great miracles here when miracles are needed, and even when they aren’t. Even nature—the numerical value of Elokim is the same as that of hateva, “nature”—is explained in the books of Kabbalah to be a G-dly force. Hakadosh Boruch Hu is present in every detail and watches over everything with individual Divine Providence. But at the same time, remember your own power. Hakadosh Boruch Hu waits and expects man “to work it and guard it.” So it is in our hands to transform the world, to reveal the kingship of Hakadosh Boruch Hu in the world, to sanctify the name of Heaven. And when you have an opportunity to act, don’t stand on the outside looking in. Do what you can. Your action, your deed, your speech, your thought—a single, specific act—has the power to transform the entire world and bring salvation and deliverance. May we indeed merit to see it in our days, in these very days, in the month of Tishrei: may we merit the complete Geulah, the full and final salvation and deliverance. May it be a good year, a blessed year, a year of health and success, a year of Geulah, a year of abundance in everything each of us needs. And above all, may we all merit to reach the holy city of Jerusalem and the Beis Hamikdash

28:18 which will be rebuilt speedily in our days, amen.