דמי חנוכה (תשפ״ג)

00:01 This is Igris, and you might notice that this is a Hanukkah letter, and you might notice this is not Hanukkah today. And I would love to tie it to some event and, uh, and tell you that, uh, that I organized this, that from the time of Hanukkah, I've been hanging onto this letter just to give it to you in Manahama to give you a bit of the, uh, winter chill in the middle of the blistering summer. But that's not the case. What we are doing right now is since we're near the end of the year , we're going back over letters we didn't get to cover that are particularly interesting, so we don't leave anything absolutely wonderful on the cutting floor. Either way, we're gonna leave wonderful things on the cutting floor, but you know what I mean. We can't miss this letter. This one is, uh-- And I've been keeping it in the, in the rails, and it's now getting to the point where if we don't do it, we never will. So we are going to do a Hanukkah letter today, and the main reason we're doing it is because this is one of the Rebbe's most, um, novel takes on the idea of Hanukkah gelt. You might be aware of the controversy surrounding Hanukkah gelt. If you're not, allow me to fill you in. If you ask your average snarky friend, especially your snarky frum friend, but you'll find it among your snarky non-frum friends as well, they will tell you that

00:59 Hanukkah gelt is a relatively new custom that was invented in order to make Jewish children feel good about the goyish holiday that happens around the same time. This is not the case at all. It is quite an old custom. It's probably a custom that is-- It's a custom almost certainly older than gift-giving on that other holiday. That other holiday only started giving gifts relatively recently in history, uh, whereas we've been giving gelt for quite a while. We have a Magen Avraham on it that suggests already that it's a pretty ancient custom, and we have Kabbalah's forum that talk about the reasons why we do it. Uh, there's a Magen Avraham. It's at the beginning of, uh, right at the introduction at Racham six seventy, which is the section that discusses what you can and cannot do on Hanukkah. And the Magen Avraham's reason for giving out Hanukkah gelt is a real simple one. People can't afford Hanukkah. It's a very expensive holiday. We know that all the way back from the Gemara. In Masecha Shabbos already says that some people might have a problem that they can't afford Kiddush wine, they can't afford to light Shabbos candles. Should they spend their money on Shabbos things, or should they spend their money on Hanukkah licht? And the answer is that when it comes to Kiddush versus Hanukkah, I believe the din is in Masecha Shabbos, that you're gonna spend it on your Hanukkah licht because lighting the Hanukkah candles is, uh, it publicizes the miracle of

02:00 Hanukkah. Masecha and Kiddush, I guess, doesn't publicize a miracle. Anyway, you don't have enough money, you're going to spend it on Hanukkah stuff, which means that people found this to be an expensive tradition, expensive mitzvah. Because this was an expensive mitzvah, we gave gelt to them. So that's a Magen Avraham that says we give people go door to door begging for money so that we could give out money to them so that they could light the Hanukkah Menorah. There are some more, uh, more sublime reasons. You have them look at the Levi Yitzchak. It's brought in his Igris there, but it's actually a source from other places as well. He's quoting other sources in this, is that, uh, there's a din that when you're in front of the Hanukkah candles, you're not allowed to do any activities in front of them. Activities that require focus in front of the Hanukkah candles would be benefiting from the light. As we sing in that niggun that goes on forever, We're not allowed to use them. So one of the things you're not allowed to do, the example given in Masecha Shabbos, is you're not allowed to count coins in front of the candles. So one of the reasons given in some Sefardim is that we give kids candles and tell them, "Don't count these by the menorah," which is a funny reason for the custom, but sure would put a spin on your Hanukkah gelt. Surely, when you give out Hanukkah gelt, is that what you tell

02:56 the kids? "Here's your, here's your money. Don't count them." "Here's the money. Don't count in front of the candles." There's a, uh, famous sipha from the Rebbe that a lot of us quote around Hanukkah time that you've heard before, and that's not the direction the Rebbe goes in this letter. But the sipha from the Rebbe is that the entire point of Hanukkah is to subvert things for K- for Yiddishkeit, that the, the, uh, the Yavanin, the Syrian Greeks, they didn't really want us not to have stuff. They were fine with us having money as long as we spent it on fancy vacations and nice cars and big houses. And they were fine with us having Torah as long as we used it for secular enlightenment, and they were fine with us doing mitzvahs as long they were-- as long as they were part of some sort of humanistic tradition. But the moment we're going to take our money and start giving it to charitable causes, giving it to poor people, or giving it to shuls, or giving it to battei midrash, or putting it to our Torah study, this was something that they couldn't handle anymore. So taking money and telling children, "Here is the, uh, here is the main prize of Greek culture, the dollar, and we're going to subvert it for holy purposes. We're gonna give it on a holiday, instruct you to use it in a holy way, either to give it as tzedakah or to buy Sefardim or to give it

03:54 to your melamdim." This is a way of us subverting the Hanukkah message. These are all things that are brought, various siphas, various places in the Chassidus. This letter does none of those, which is why it's so interesting. And, uh, I p- I looked around on the English side of the internet to see if any of the, uh, any of the go-to websites, you know, your chabad.org and the like, had, uh, had taken this letter and turned it into something for public consumption, and they have not. So, uh, this is a, this is a dvar Torah in a bag, but you're gonna have to save it all the way till Hanukkah. It is a completely novel take on gelt. So somebody wrote to the Rebbe who's the , of course. Ner Shamini, the eighth night of Hanukkah, Brooklyn, New York, Shalom Ubracha. The Rebbe writes, You have it on your screen. This is an answer to the question: What is going on with the minhag, minhag of Hanukkah? Minhag Yisrael Torah. He noticed that the Rebbe opens with an assumption here. He keeps this assumption. This is very, ve-very typical Rebbe, but I like to point it out every time I see it. But the Rebbe starts with the assumption that if something is a minhag and it's not assur, that minhag Yisrael Torah hi, and we're going to back justify it. There's not going to be a situation where we throw out a good minhag or say that a good minhag is, uh, somewhat baseless.

05:01 I, I-- And, and the reason why I'm pointing this out is because this is a hobby lately, as I'm sure you know if you hang out in, uh, in Frum circles. A hobby is to take a look at our old minhagim and say, "Ah, this one sounds a little bit Zaddish. This one's relatively new. I'm not sure what the makor of this one is." The Rebbe's opening assumption with the minhag is that if i don't see something assur about it, it's Torah, Melach HaMelech. It's meant to teach me something. So we give Hanukkah gelt, that is the custom, and we wanna know since Torah is Melach HaMelech and minhag Yisrael Torah hi, that means a minhag Yisrael is Torah, and minhag Yisrael is something i can learn from. So since i can learn from every minhag, the Rebbe is now going to darshan a minhag. I wanna answer, and I wanna first give an introduction, says the Rebbe. The Besht says the following. Everything you see and everything you hear, this has a specific lesson in your service of Hashem. The truth is, I didn't need the Baal Shem Tov for that. It is self-understood. Because it's based on our very faith itself. Since every pa-- since everybody knows that God is the creator of the world, and not just the creator of the world, but the one actively running the world at every single second and at every single hour. And he's-- and he only created me to serve Him. That would mean that

06:15 everything I see at all times is supposed to-- that I see it, that I notice in my surroundings, is connected to Avodas Hashem. This, uh, is something that's easy to skip over quickly, and we shouldn't. Because here what he's saying is that the idea from the Baal Shem Tov, that everything I see is Hashgacha Protis, is also logical once you take a couple things as a given. If we take it as a given that God's the creator of the world and is actively running it, and that His only interest in me existing is that I should serve Him, that means that I would blink out of existence if I wasn't-- if He wasn't trying to make me serve Him. 'Cause His only interest in me being here is that I'm going to be able to do Avodas Hashem. So why would He put anything in my path that wasn't for that purpose, given that He has no other purpose for me? If His only purpose for me is for me to serve Him, He wouldn't summon things into my path unless they were supposed to help me serve Him. And since He's running the show, He's the only one capable of making sure that everything I do and everything I see would be a Heran Avodas Hashem. So it's actually quite logical when you have a-- when you have basic understanding of, uh, or basic belief in a, uh, in a God who's everywhere and can do anything, and is also personally interested in me,

07:13 and also personally interested in nothing but my Avodas Hashem, the natural conclusion is that everything I see is Hashgacha Protis. And it's cool that you don't need the Baal Shem Tov for that. Not that we don't need the Baal Shem Tov, God forbid, I just think it's cool. Now, the Rebbe says let's get back to Hanukkah. There's two things when it comes to Hanukkah. One thing about Hanukkah is it's called Hanukkah 'cause we rededicated the temple and the altar. That Hanukkah is from the lesson of teaching. Teaching a small child or teaching a teenager, teaching a na'ar, kids. But this includes every single Jew because Na'ar Yisroel, the Jewish people are called Na'ar. So this is about educating all of us. So Hanukkah has two themes. Theme number one is rededicating the Beis Hamikdash, and theme number two is my own Torah education. That is to say, excuse me, the same way that there was a turning over of and a purification and a rededication of the Beis Hamikdash. That is, we fixed up the Beis Hamikdash, and everybody on Hanukkah needs to think about fixing up themselves. I, I'm sorry it's not Hanukkah. You also today need to think about fixing up yourselves. All the things, right? I have to clean myself out, I have to purify myself and rededicate myself. If that's not an Elul message, nothing is, and we're going into Elul. In addition to the fact that I need to be fixing myself, I need to take my Beis Hamikdash and

08:39 clean it out and purify it and rededicate it. Even if we were all very wise, we would all need to do this. This is from the Haggadah, of course. Since every person is obligated to increase in their Torah and mitzvahs every single day, the light of mitzvah and the light of Torah, the candle of mitzvah, the light of Torah every single day. So this also applies to educating our children, the boys and the girls. And with, uh, with, with e- with extra emphasis. And this is a specific obligation that is placed on the parents. The chinuch of a child, when we're educating our children, needs to be after their manner. That is, in a way that children understand, in a way that makes sense to them. That's what the Rebbe says . So in a way that is understood and accepted by the children. So the second paragraph here is saying that every single person needs to educate themselves and do a chinuch of themselves, which is a rededication and a re-education of their themselves, and also rededication and re-education of their children in honor of Hanukkah. Now, this is what Hanukkah gelt is all about. Why do we give Hanukkah gelt? Remember, the Rebbe's given-- we have, we have, we have a bunch of reasons in the books. I found this nowhere except for here. That is that there should be a hirah from even thinking a little bit about what money is. I'm gonna give my kids money, and through money, I'll be

10:00 able to teach them the following lesson, which is pretty easy to grasp. To it. Money has a lot of power. Money's power. Somebody who has a lot of money, they become an asher, they become rich. They didn't have to do anything, all they had to do was get it, right? Sometimes they have to work hard to get their money, but the point is, what is the definition of a rich person? Someone who has money. They can even become a big asher, very wealthy. And someone who doesn't have that money, that person is an ani ve'rash. They're poor and they are indigent. Let's do indigent today. Ani ve'rash, they're very poor. So on one hand, money is a king maker and a poor maker, pauper maker. On the other hand. Money, the way it is all by itself. Money is not one of the three needs of a person. I can take care of, uh, none of my needs using money. I can't eat money, I can't wear money, and I can't take shelter under money. I guess if you string a lot of dollars together, maybe you could put together l'vush or a bayis, but you still can't eat it. The three needs of a person are not met by money. What is money? Money is an intermediary. It is how I acquire the things that I need, but it's not a need in and of itself. It's just a really good way to get my needs. Furthermore, money is not a mitzvah, but money

11:19 is a great way to do mitzvahs. I can do a whole bunch of mitzvahs with money. I can do tzedakah, gemilus chasadim, all sorts of mitzvahs. Mitzvahs are expensive. We know it's, uh, it's expensive to be a Jew. But if I keep money in a box, it doesn't-- if I don't keep money in a box and don't use it, it has no value. That is, if I collect a whole bunch of money and lock it all away, that might make me an asher, but it doesn't actually do anything. I can't eat it, I can't-- a, a person could-- a very rich person could starve if they never spend any of their money. Such a thing is possible So what he's saying here is, is that money has a weird quality to it in that it is the ultimate way to get everything we need. It can get us all sorts of wonderful things, and yet it is in and of itself not a necessarily wonderful thing and is not one of our needs. So it is perfectly useless unless it is being used, which is, uh, there's almost nothing like that in the entire world. It's a very interesting tool for a mashal. So let's hear the nimshal. What is one of the fundamental things we have to teach small children, and I guess ourselves too? We have to explain to a child . We have to explain to kids that God gave them incredible powers. They're very powerful. They have all sorts of talents.

12:29 They have, uh, incredible capabilities in their mind and in their, uh, in their attributes, in their heart, in their actions, what they can do. There's a lot of potential in a person. But you gotta use them. Uh, our potential is like money. Potential is like money. You can't do anything with it. You can't eat potential. You can't, uh, you can't make a life out of potential. And as a matter of fact, a lot of people have a whole bunch of potential that they waste, and they don't end up meeting any of their spiritual or physical needs or the spiritual or physical needs of the world. But like money, if spent properly, the more you have of it, the more you can do with it, and everybody is given an incredible amount of wealth in this regard. You gotta use them. God gave you a brain, so you should use it to learn Torah. Until you work very hard. Therefore, you'll certainly succeed. You were given the capacity to love, so you should use it to love God. And also to love Torah. And also to love all Jews. And all things that are appropriate to love. You were given capacity to love, but you have to apply it to actually loving things that are appropriate for loving. And you were given the capacity to fear, but you gotta put that into action, which is to, uh, fear and to flee from all things that are appropriate to fear and flee from. Therefore, a person needs

13:44 to learn very well, very carefully, with a lot of, uh, dedication and hard work so that they'll know what is, what is good and what they're supposed to do. And in that case, he has an advantage over somebody o-- there's an advantage of our talents over normal kesef, sh-- normal money. Someone who doesn't have any money is a poor person. Anybody can be rich. As long as he uses that which is given to him. What the rebbe's saying in that line is that money, th- it's true, you can't-- you can do anything with money, but you do need to have some. There's such a thing as a person who would do great things if they had money, but doesn't have it. However, we were all given the capabilities of doing great things, each at our own levels or in each in our own talent areas. But all of us were given the abilities. We all have an incredible wealth when it comes to what we could do. So we all have a, a large capacity that could be applied toward buying things spiritually. But it can be very wealthy. As long as he uses the that were given to him. And then he's promised that if he works very hard, he will succeed. But in this regard, he was given free choice. The thing is only dependent on and on free will. Nothing can stand before your will. So what is the message that we want to explain to our children? He's gonna drive it

15:02 home in these last three lines, then I'll say it outside. When you explain this in appropriate words and in sincere words that come from the heart to a child, and you show them an example of this, you act that way yourself, God will then open the eyes of both of them, light up the eyes of both of them. Both the giver of the Hanukkah gelt and the receiver of it. They will go and increase in from strength to strength. Until they become a sign, a miracle to the masses . So the rebbe is saying here that a fourth or fifth kavana for Hanukkah gelt, and really one of the most profound, is that we hand a child some money, and we say to the child, "Can you eat this money?" "No." "Can you wear this money?" "No." "Can you take shelter under this money?" "No." "So what good is it?" "It's good if I use it." "Aha. You have a whole bunch of very powerful skills. You're a special person that God gave special to, and if you use those, you can get a lot out of them. But otherwise, they're useless in and of themselves." A talent is worth nothing, a gift is worth nothing, and the are worth very little when they're given to a person unless they're ready to unless they're ready to implement them in order to become stronger and better. And the only really good mashal for that, something super powerful that isn't-- that is worthless unless used, there's almost

16:18 no mashal for something very powerful that is worthless unless used besides money. So if we wanna spread that message on Hanukkah, which is a time of chinuch and rededication to a child, the best time to spread that message would be on Hanukkah, and the best vehicle for that message would be a object lesson, as they say in education. The object lesson is Hanukkah gelt. The rebbe says here that we have to be a for that. Part of that is not just saying the words, but acting like it. I think as a kavana, even for people who aren't standing in Hanukkah right now, we are at work, and we encounter money. If every time we look at money, this is our kavana, we can totally tap into what the Baal Shem Tov is saying up at top here. The Baal Shem Tov up top is saying that every single time I see something, it's a . Every time I encounter money, to take a moment and remind myself that my are worthless if not used, and that they're just waiting for me to cash in, I think is a very powerful lesson we can draw from money throughout the year and not just on Hanukkah. That's it for today.