Jewish Inspiration Podcast · Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe

You're listening to Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe of TORCH in Houston, Texas. This is the Jewish Inspiration Podcast.

Welcome back my dear friends to day number 154, page number 837 in the Treasure for Life edition of the Orcha Sadiqin. HaChamisha, or the 15th step in the process of tshuva, is Hatfila, prayer. Is to pray and to ask the Almighty to forgive you and He should have mercy on us and forgive us for our sins. And should ask for forgiveness and atonement for them.
And ask Hashem for help, ask Hashem for assistance to help you in your path of return, of repentance. And Hashem should open up the gates of purity. Hashishostah, so prayer. Prayer is essential. Obviously, you can't do tshuva without speaking it out. But also asking Hashem, that's why in our Amidah, we have a request, Hashem, please help us with our teshuvah. Help us, bring us closer to you in our teshuvah. Number 16, Tikkun HaMouvos, and that is correcting the misdeed. And do this, correct it, before you confess.
That means if you stole from someone, even if it's a penny, even from the store, you made a misdeed, you took something, I'll give you an example. I'm sure there's nobody, nobody who's watching or listening, or here in the room, who would ever steal. But imagine if, God forbid, you leave the store and you realize that there was an item in your wagon that wasn't scanned. By mistake. What do you do? Oh, it was a mistake. It's okay. I got a free, whatever it is, right?
No, you go back and you tell them, I'm sorry, there's a mistake here, and I want you to correct it. I owe you money. Actually, I recently had a story, my daughter's friend, she lives in a different state, and she said, my daughter came into my office, she said, my friend is on the phone, she has a halachic question, can you answer? So the friend said as follows, about a half a year earlier, about a half a year earlier, her friend,
okay, now the friend's friend, all right, we just need to mute the microphones. So the friend's friend gave her makeup, gave her makeup, really expensive brand makeup. I don't know anything about makeup, except that it's expensive. So she gave her this expensive, she gave her like six different bottles, or whatever it was, I don't know what you call those little things. Either way, so she was very, very excited about it, because this is her favorite one, and the friend was getting rid of them.
She's like, here, you can have them. Okay. So it turned out a half a year later, this, my daughter's friend found out that this girl did not get it by honest means. She did not get it by honest means. She, it most likely that it was stolen. And that friend who stole it gave it to my daughter's friend, and my daughter's friend now is on the phone with me asking me, what do I do with this stuff? What do I do with it?
I have stolen goods in my possession that I didn't steal, someone else stole and gave it to me. What do I do? And it was a while back already. She just had found out. So I said, you have to go back to the store. Go back to the store. She knew what store it was, the makeup store. And she went back, and she called me a few weeks later.
She said, I just want to tell you, I went and I spoke to the lady at the, the lady, you know, who was there, you know. And as you told me, they're not going to know what I'm talking about. They're going to call the manager. Because that's typically what happens. The people who are there at the cash register don't know, like, what do you mean? How did they get it? What, what? They get confused. I said, make sure you speak to the manager.
Explain to the manager. You got these things. They came through a friend who many months ago gave it to you. You just found out that they, they, they didn't attain it honestly. They didn't get it. Right? And so the store ended up saying, you can keep it. Thank you very much for your honesty. We appreciate it. But, you know, you can keep it. But what's the difference between whether or not she would have asked or not asked? What's the difference?
The difference is, is that now, first is, it was given to her now. Okay, it was given to her. The store gave it to her. Number two, it's a kiddush Hashem, you're sanctifying God's name. Because they see that's a Jew, this is a Jewish girl. She comes in and she says, I don't want to, I don't want to have something which is stolen. You know, they said, okay, you can keep it. But another thing is, like, imagine the, the feeling that she would live with
down the road, thinking that I'm busy beautifying myself with something that's stolen. What that, what beauty does that have? What beauty does that have? To, to, to enjoy something which didn't come to your hands, even though it wasn't, it wasn't her fault, it wasn't like she did something wrong. But like, now you have a clean, you have a clean, not only a clean conscience with humans, you have a clean conscience with Hashem. And I think that that's very, very important for us to ensure that we are
acting in such a way. You have to fix the mistake. You did something wrong. You can't confess your sin to somebody and say, you know, I, I spoke Lashon Hara and, and I accept upon myself to never do it again. What do you mean, you spoke Lashon Hara about somebody? You got to go ask them forgiveness. You got to, you got to go tell them. The Chavetz Chaim tells us in the, in the book of the Chavetz Chaim, he says,
so if you speak Lashon Hara about somebody, you have to go to them and you have to tell them what you said. That's embarrassing. Imagine that, you go, you say, hey, Scotty, let me tell you something. I need to ask you forgiveness because that's very embarrassing, right? That would be very, a person has to be very, very careful to make sure. I know somebody who sadly stole a lot of money. He sat in prison for it for a long time.
And I hope that his prayer is Hashem, I need success so that I can pay back my debts. Yeah, it's true. I sat for it. Okay, fine. He paid his, he paid his time to society. That's not enough. You have to actually return the money. The money that was stolen has to be returned. And it's a very important thing for a person to realize that it's not enough to just apologize. You have to actually correct it. Okay, so this is a very important question.
What happens if the person that you stole from isn't alive anymore? If the person you stole from isn't around anymore, you can't find them. So first is if they have ears, then you have to give it to their inheritors because they get all of his possessions and it was his possession. So this should go to them. But if he didn't have, if it's a single person, not married, didn't have any children, doesn't have any relatives, so there's no next of kin.
There's no one else to bring it to. So then there's a process for it. But yes, it would be part of giving it to the community. And that being a, hopefully, a proper return of that which was, it's an undoing of what was done. The 17th step in repentance. To run after opportunities of kindness and truth. The verse states in Proverbs, King Solomon tells us, with kindness and truth, transgression is atoned.
And if a person doesn't return to Hashem, doing acts of kindness and truth is not going to help. The first step is returning to Hashem. There's no shortcut. Who does not show favor and does not take graft. Our sages interpret this as follows. He does not take mitzvahs as a bribe for overlooking transgressions. It means you can't say, Hashem, look, I gave you a lot of charity, but really I wasn't, I wasn't honest. Like, you know why I stole the money?
I'll tell you why I stole the money. So I can support a lot of institutions. That's why I'm going to do a mitzvah with this. That's not the way it works. In the eyes of Hashem, you can't do good to cover for your bad. Each one has to be dealt with in its own way. And that's the understanding of the Passover. By kindness and truth, transgression is atoned. It applies to only the bar teshuvah, the penitent. That's the person who's it's referring to.
There are sins which repentance and Yom Kippur suspend and afflictions erase. He says when someone does acts of kindness, it shields the sinner, guarding him from affliction as it shields him from death. As the verse states, as well in Proverbs, that charity saves one from death. And there's another sin. We have to understand that there's a transgression of desecrating God's name. So, the desecration of Hashem's name, repentance, Yom Kippur, afflictions suspend it, and death erases it. But we can clear it up without affliction.
We can clear it up without death. We can clear it up with repentance. We can clear it up with Yom Kippur. And when a person exerts himself to uphold the truth, and he strengthens men of truth and elevates them, and he lowers men of falsehood unto the very dust, this is the path of sanctifying God's name. When a person is expanding and elevating himself with the trait of truth, truth, emes, real truth,
then the sin of Chilul Hashem and any desecration of God's name will be forgiven with the tshuva. So, this is an important thing to just clarify. What is a Chilul Hashem? A Chilul Hashem means a desecration of God's name. That can happen in many, many ways. You know, I tell my children, I grew up, I heard this from my rabbis, I heard this from my teachers, they always warned us when we were going out in public, you have to remember that you are a chosen people.
You're a chosen people. What do people expect from the chosen people? To act in a way that is becoming of a chosen people, right? You don't cut the line at the amusement park because you're the chosen people, I'm going to cut the line. No, that's not the way it works. You don't not stand up for the elder, for the elderly, because you're the chosen people. You don't, there are things that we have to be very, very careful and conscientious about.
When we are a chosen people, we're expected to act in an exemplary way with the nations of the world and say, ah, this is Hashem's people. This is greatness. This is why the Torah was given to them, so that they can act in such a special way. If a person doesn't do that, what does it say? Forget about what it says about us. Anti-Semitism, everything. No, no. What does it say about us? Who's your God?
You're a chosen people and this is the way you act? That's your people, God. That's your people. That's a desecration and it's very, it's very shaming to God when we act in a way that's not, that's unbecoming. But when a person institutes emes into their life, what is emes? Emes is truth. Hashem elokechem emes. The word emes is the name of Hashem. Hashem is emes. So when we instill more emes into our lives, then what we're doing is we're bringing kiddush Hashem.
We're bringing the sanctification of God's name. Okay, step number 18 in the process of tshuva. A person should always remember his sins. Ah, I can't believe I did that. Oh, right? And a person should feel, don't forget that. I know my offenses and my sin is always before me, said King David. Right? It always stands in front of me to remind me, to warn me. So a person has to not forget.
It's not, yes, a person who returns, we call it in our generation, a baal teshuvah. The Talmud says, in a place where a baal teshuvah stands, even a complete tzaddik cannot stand. Unbelievable. It's an unbelievable thing. Someone who's, and by the way, we all hope to be a baal teshuvah. We all hope every single day that we are a baal teshuvah. Because what's a baal teshuvah? Someone will realize, you know what? Even if it's in the smallest thing or the biggest thing.
I was off the path. I'm coming back on that path. I'm coming back. Every person comes back on the path. Remember what happened when you took the wrong right turn. It wasn't so easy to get back on. It wasn't so pleasant to get back on. So don't make that error. That's the idea. We know, like, okay, follow the Google Maps, right? Don't miss the exit. Because I remember what happened last time. It cost me an extra 50 minutes on my drive, right?
So I'm very cautious about it, right? When you have that memory of the challenge that sin brought into your life, right? And I'm speaking to myself, to each one of us into our lives. Then we'll be more cautious not to fall into that trap again. Part number 19 in our teshuvah process, Leaving the sin. Completely leaving the sin. When a person is now tempted with the same thing as he was in the past. So a person sinned. He went to the Burger King.
He ate the non-kosher. Oy vey, what did I do? What did I do? I feel so bad, Hashem. I created a barrier between me and you. How can I have done this? I ate something which wasn't kosher. This is terrible. Okay, so now he's cleansed it, right? So now comes three, six months, a year, 10 years later. And he's passing by the Burger King. He's like, oh my goodness. I think I should just go in and get another one, right?
Maybe I'll just go in and get one. By not, by not doing that again, it's complete. That is the highest level of teshuvah is where he's now, I'm removed from it completely. He says, imagine, he says, if you want to know someone who's really, really repentful, I don't know if there's such a word, repentful, and that his repentance ascends to the throne of glory, you know who that is? Someone who's tested and emerges guiltless within the same period, within the same place, within the same woman.
The same thing, the same sin came to him. And this time he went the right way. This time he didn't go there. He didn't go to that party that he shouldn't have gone. He didn't eat that food that he shouldn't have. He didn't look where he was tempted in the past. He now did teshuvah, he says, no, I'm doing the right thing. I'm not going to do that because I'm not that anymore. I'm better than that. That's the highest level of teshuvah.
That teshuvah gets delivered, hand delivered to the throne of glory, to Hashem's holy throne. The parish, because of his fear of Hashem, now he didn't do it. He says, this is the highest level of teshuvah, if the same temptation comes to you, and now you just, you took a different path. You know, I've spoken to many people who've changed the course of their life. And they said at the beginning it was very difficult, but at some point it wasn't even a temptation anymore.
To eat those foods wasn't a temptation. To go to those places wasn't a temptation. To look at those things, it wasn't a temptation. To hang around those people wasn't a temptation anymore. At some point, a person elevates themselves to a point where, this is not my challenge anymore. And that's a very, very great place for a person to be, considering that he is now closer to the Almighty in his day-to-day life. The 20th step in the process of teshuvah,
to help others remove themselves from the trap of their sins. Return and turn others from all your offenses. Meaning, if you have the opportunity to persuade others, which hopefully this video will do, these recordings will do, if someone is inspired by it, so then hopefully I fulfill this process of not only a person changing and doing teshuvah, but helping others, inspiring others. And it doesn't mean by saying to other people, you know, you better do teshuvah because you're going to burn. No, that's not our religion.
That's not the way we do it. We, the way we share our closeness to Hashem, the way we share the opportunity to have clarity in our lives, the opportunity to feel a closeness with God, that's what we're selling. We're not selling fear. We're not, this is the essence of teshuvah, is when you're able to start inspiring others. As the verse states in Leviticus, you shall surely rebuke your fellow man and not bear sin because of him.
If now they're going to sin and I did nothing about it, I didn't care. I turned a blind eye to it. It's not my business. It's not my problem. I don't have to worry about it. So then perhaps I could be held accountable for their sins because I didn't care about it. If a person does not encourage their fellow to change their way, then potentially we could be punished for their sins. As the verse states in Psalms, and sinners will return to you.
This is what King David says, right? I'm going to go. I'm going to start a torch center and we're going to inspire people to learn and to grow and to connect and to perhaps go in a better path. That is what we're all aspiring to do here. That concludes day number 154.

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