A Lesson for the Young Men of Yeshivas Metchabrim in the Home of the Holy

The young men of Yeshivas Metchabrim merited to enter into the inner sanctum last night, the night of the 17th of Sivan, for a lesson from The Rav, Rabbi Eliezer Berland shlit"a. Presented here is a review of The Rav shlit"a’s words as they were said during the lesson.

The Rav shlit"a opened the lesson with the verse, “And among these there was not a man,” and with Rashi on this verse in Parshas Pinchas: there was not a man—but women were there, because they did not sin with any sin in the wilderness. He expanded at length on this point: that a woman, by her very nature, does not sin, and he spoke about the greatness and spiritual stature of women. From there he moved on to speak about the mothers in Egypt who would succeed in escaping out to the fields, and there give birth to their babies. He elaborated on all the miracles that took place in Egypt: the Egyptians would come to seize the babies from the field, and the babies would be swallowed into the earth. But the Egyptians did not give up; they would bring plows to dig deep into the ground—and the more they dug to find them, the deeper the babies were swallowed.

Later in the lesson he spoke from the secret of “a silver basin, its weight one hundred and thirty.” After that, he spoke about the miracles that have taken place in the recent period, when a large number of terror attacks were prevented.

The Rav also spoke in the lesson about Eliezer: that even before he asked Rivkah who she was, he placed the bracelets on her arm, because he saw that the water rose up to meet her. He expanded on this at length.

Toward the end of the lesson he spoke from Parshas Shelach Lecha and from the Midrashim about Calev and Yehoshua. He also spoke from the Gemara in Maseches Sotah that Miriam was the ugliest in the world—and that this was only in order to preserve her for Calev. He told a story about the wife of Rabbi Shmuel Shapira, who said, “I want a match like what is written in Chayei Moharan,” and indeed she merited it. There too it was the same kind of story as with Miriam and Calev: she had a blemish, and the day after the wedding the blemish disappeared in a wondrous way.

After that he spoke about the humility of Yehoshua: although he knew the spies would want to kill him because of the prophecy, “Moshe will die and Yehoshua will bring [the people] in,” he nullified himself to the Tzaddik and nothing mattered to him. And in that merit, Moshe gave him the yud of Sarah—meaning the ten kinds of melody, through which it is possible to bring the entire world back in teshuvah.

At the end of the lesson he spoke from the secret of “I am Yosef,” and from the entire story of Yosef’s sale: that Yosef never met with his father, because he knew that the moment Yaakov would learn the truth—that the brothers sold him, and not as he thought, “a wild beast has devoured him”—all the brothers would immediately die from Yaakov’s strict judgment. With this, The Rav shlit"a concluded the lesson after forty-five minutes of fiery, flame-like words that the young men merited to hear.

After the lesson ended, as mentioned, The Rav shlit"a recited Kaddish and went out to Maariv, as every evening, with a great crowd—from the balcony of his home, with singing and niggunim.