About six years ago, before the Gulf War, when people over in Eretz Yisrael especially were afraid of what's going to happen when Iraq threatened to attack Israel, and later they did with the missiles, Scuds, and people were afraid, not knowing what's going to happen, so there were some people in Eretz Yisrael that claimed that we have to fear that there, God forbid, might be another Holocaust. Who knows? Because so many Arabs against so few Yidden, and who knows what could be. And they said that we have to do teshuvah because who knows, it's very possible it could happen. And the reason why it could happen is because people are not doing the right thing, Yidden are not keeping the mitzvot, and as a punishment, God forbid, there could be a Holocaust. And they referred to the Holocaust that just like 50 years before, close to 50 years before, there was a Holocaust which came as a result of the Yidden not doing what they are supposed to do, the Yidden not learning enough Torah, doing mitzvot, Yidden were not keeping the the commandments of Hashem, and therefore there was a Holocaust. Finally, Hashem waited and waited, and finally when He saw when it came to the top, as the expression in Gemara is נתמלאה סאה, so and therefore there was this Holocaust. And that's why they said, therefore it's possible, God forbid, it should happen again, and we have to be very careful. At that time, the Rebbe spoke up very, very strongly against this. And the Rebbe said, first of all, that we should not, God forbid, scare Yidden, and not tell them that who knows that another Holocaust could come. And the Rebbe explained in detail that by saying that, this is against the kavod of Yidden, it's not respectful for Yidden, and it's against the kavod of Hashem to say that Hashem is as if waiting to see when another Holocaust, God forbid, will come. And it's against the truth, because Yidden are not bad, even though the majority of Yidden nowadays don't keep the mitzvot, but we can't consider them רשעים and that Hashem should be upset, because most of them are תינוקות שנשבו, most of them are children, similar to children who were captured by goyim and raised by goyim. When a child is raised by a goy and he doesn't know better, he will not be punished. He's definitely lacking the mitzvot, but he will not be punished. And most of the Yidden nowadays are like that, and it's impossible to say that, God forbid, that Hashem would bring another Holocaust, etc., etc., etc. I don't want to go into those details. But another thing that the Rebbe mentioned then was that certainly we cannot scare the Yidden by referring to the Holocaust, because we cannot say, the Rebbe said clearly, we cannot say that the Holocaust came as a result of the sins that the Yidden did. And the Rebbe expressed himself and he said that nobody, nobody, not even the Satan himself could come up with a cheshbon, with an account of so terrible sins, such terrible sins that should deserve such a terrible punishment as the Holocaust. It's impossible to say that. And therefore the Rebbe said, what was the reason, why did the Holocaust take place? So he said, nobody knows. He quoted the Gemara that even though in many places in Gemara we find, and you always could bring a דין, אבל אין דין בלא דיין, and everything has a reason, and Hashem does not, God forbid, without judgment. And therefore, in most cases, if a bad thing happens to a person, we say that it is because people deserve it. The Gemara says, אין יסורין בלא חטא. There is no suffering without sin. And therefore, when a person suffers, then it's probably because of a sin. Nevertheless, we do find certain times when the Gemara refers to it with a different expression. We find in the Gemara concerning Rabbi Akiva, when Rabbi Akiva was killed, and he was one of the עשרה הרוגי מלכות, one of the ten that were killed by the government, and he wasn't killed simply, he was killed in a very, very sadistic way, he was killed that they combed his skin with מסרקי של ברזל, with skins, with combs of metal. And the Gemara says that even Moshe Rabbeinu asked השם, וכי זו תורה וזו שכרה? Is this תורה and this is the reward you give to somebody like Rabbi Akiva? Rabbi Akiva was a person that the whole תורה is based on Rabbi Akiva, the Gemara says, דכולהו אליבא דרבי עקיבא. And this is what happened to Rabbi Akiva? And Hashem answered, שתוק, כך עלה במחשבה. Be quiet. That's what I want. That means Hashem said, this is something that's beyond your understanding. We know on Yom Kippur, in the Machzor, in the tefillot, one of the most important prayers are the tefillot concerning the עשרה הרוגי מלכות, the ten great chachamim, Tannaim that were killed by the government. And there, the expression is tells that one of the Tannaim, Rabbi Yishmael Kohen Gadol, went up to shamayim to find out why this is going to happen. And when they cried out, the מלאכים cried out, and they said: How could this happen? Hashem said: שתוק, be quiet, גזירה היא מלפני, it's a gezeirah. And it's a gezeirah that can't be explained. And it's not as a punishment for Rabbi Akiva or for the other Tannaim, the other great chachamim that were killed in the עשרה הרוגי מלכות. We find even earlier than that, we find by the ברית בין הבתרים when Hashem told Avraham Avinu that your children are going to be in גלות מצרים, they will be in מצרים בארץ לא להם, in a land that's not theirs, and they will suffer for 210 years, He actually said to him 400 years. And that wasn't as a punishment for what they did. But why was it? And as the mefarshim say, there is no reason, there are spiritual reasons, but it's not as a punishment for what they did. There's even a Midrash that when Moshe Rabbeinu came after he was sent by Hashem, and he came to Paro and it became worse, and he came back to Hashem and he said, למה הרעותה לעם הזה? Why did You do this to them? Why did You make it worse? So the Midrash says that Moshe Rabbeinu said to Hashem, I looked into Chumash, he said, I looked into the Chumash and I saw You killed the דור המבול, the generation of the flood, but they deserved it. I saw You killed the דור הפלגה, they deserved it. But אלו מה עשו? What did they do? And nevertheless, the Yidden were in galut and the Yidden suffered. Why did they suffer? This is one of those things that גזירה היא מלפני, it's a gezeirah by Me, Hashem said, it's a gezeirah, it's a decree, and there is no way to explain it, there's no way that we can understand it. It's beyond our understanding. And even though at the time of the Holocaust all the Gedolei Yisrael came out with kol korei's, with proclamations, people do teshuvah, do teshuvah, look what's happening, do teshuvah, as if saying that it's because of the sins that this is happening, it is not so. When you do teshuvah, when you return to Hashem and you do more mitzvot, it could become a protection, that when the gezeirah comes, it could be softened, it could be easier. The mashal gives the example of a helmet, that if a person doesn't wear a helmet and the bullet is shot, it could kill him, and when you put on a helmet, you'll be protected. Now, it doesn't mean that a person is killed by the bullet as a punishment for not wearing the helmet. The helmet could be a protection. And that's what, even the Frierdiker Rebbe himself, came out with many letters at that time, saying: Yidden, do teshuvah. We're going through חבלי משיח, do teshuvah, Hashem should help and protect us, because the the Torah, mitzvot, and teshuvah would protect and would help. But the reason it came is not because of the aveirot they did. Why did it come? גזירה היא מלפני, it's a gezeirah of Hashem.

The truth is that there are many people that, because of what took place during the Holocaust, turned away from Yiddishkeit, and it weakened their emunah, their belief in Hashem. And their claim was: How could Hashem allow this to happen? And since Hashem allowed this to happen, then obviously there is no God. If God would control the world, then He wouldn't allow this to happen. And we can't just answer to these people: You should know that, well, you can't ask questions on Hashem, Hashem wanted to do it, and that's it. We're talking about people with sechel, people with logic, intellect, and we have to explain it intellectually. What I'm going to try to do is, based on what the רבי explained at different occasions, try to explain not what happened and why it happened, but to explain logically that it is impossible for us to understand what Hashem did. But this is not the pshat that we're saying, okay, don't ask questions. And people some people get turned away when you tell them, well, don't ask questions. We're talking about people, intellectual people, baalei seichel, so you have to explain it with seichel. But I'm not going to try to explain with logic what happened, because there is no explanation, but try to explain logically that it is impossible for us to understand why Hashem did it. Now, start off by saying that the question that they ask is in truth a contradiction in itself. The question is: How could God allow this to happen? And being that He did allow this to happen, obviously there is no God. Now let's analyze the question. The question is: How could God, who is so great and so good and so big, how Could he allow something like, something as terrible as this to happen? In other words, the whole question is based on the fact that we start off by saying that Hashem is so great. If he wouldn't be so great, then there wouldn't be a question. Well, he just couldn't control it. He couldn't control it. The government can't control crime in the world. The whole world couldn't control the Nazis. So he also can't control it. So what's the kushya? What's the question? The question is based on one thing: Hashem is greater than that. Hashem is able to control it. Hashem is beyond all these things that could stop him from changing it, from controlling it. Now why didn't he change it? Why didn't he stop it? And being that he didn't stop it, well, that proves that he doesn't exist. Now this is a contradiction in itself. The moment we start off by saying that he is so great and he is beyond all these limits and he's able to do anything, then obviously, it's impossible for my mind to understand what he does. If he would be somebody who is in my category, then I could ask, what you did doesn't make any sense. But if I'm starting off my question by saying, after all, he is so great, he is unlimited, he could do anything, so why didn't he do this? Well, if he could, he's unlimited, then obviously I can't understand what he does. In other words, the fact that I don't understand what somebody who is so far beyond me does, does that prove that that is wrong? It's like a child would come into a classroom, or hear from an adult something that he doesn't understand, and he'll say, well, since I don't understand this, then obviously it doesn't make any sense. That's stupid. If somebody would see a computer and the way the program works doesn't make sense to him, he'll say, well, obviously there is no program here. The contrary, being that he is so great, so it is impossible for us to understand, and certainly not to say that if I don't understand what happens, then definitely this cannot be true, it cannot be that he made it. I'll tell you in my mind, if the way I look at it, if everything that happens in the world would have a logical explanation how things go, it would weaken my emunah, because what it would mean to me is that the one that makes it all happen is somebody that's in my category, that I am able to understand. If it's takke from Hashem, if Hashem, God, who is so great, does it, then how do I even expect to be able to understand it? The fact that there are certain things that do make sense, that's a chidush, that's something that we have to take into consideration. Look, certain things that Hashem does we're able to understand, which is basically similar to the whole approach to Torah u'mitzvot. Torah u'mitzvot, there are certain people who say we don't do the mitzvot because there are many mitzvot we don't understand, they don't make sense, how could I do it? And therefore I don't want to do it. In truth, if all the mitzvot would make sense, every single mitzvah has a proper explanation and it makes sense 100%, I would start thinking, who made up these mitzvot? Obviously somebody who is in my category, that what he does I am able to understand. But if it's somebody that's completely beyond me, how is it possible that I should understand every little thing that he wants us to do? And the same thing is with what happens in the world. If everything that happens in the world would make sense 100% in our terms, then I would start thinking, so who's doing all this? Somebody that's in our category. It's similar to what the Shelah writes, in a different subject. We know that there's a rule in חומש, אין מוקדם ומאוחר בתורה, that means that in Chumash, it's not written in a chronological order. There is no מוקדם, before and after. Things could be written earlier and really they happened later. In other words, what it seems to be saying, that there is no real order in Torah. Comes the Shelah and he says, from this itself we could see that there is a real order to the Torah, because why would the Torah change the chronological order for no reason? Obviously there's another order which we don't understand, and because of that order the Torah was written in a certain way. And the same thing here. We are used to things making sense in our level. That's how we're used to, that's what we call nature. And in our level, if things go according to the way we want it to go, or we would like it to go, or the way we assume it should go, that's called for us seder, that's called proper order. When things go differently, then in our eyes that's not a proper order, that is wrong. But in truth, that is only wrong In our eyes, meaning it's only wrong according to our level. But a person who understands more, let's say, a person who is in a higher level, he could have a different order, which in our way, eyes, doesn't make sense. And the same thing is here. How is it possible for us, as human beings, to grasp everything that Hashem does? And the question itself says it. The question is, if He is so great, then why did He allow this to happen? If He is so great, then how do you have a question, or how do you want to prove that because it didn't happen the way we think, that's why it's wrong? And the truth is, Hashem is beyond any of the limitations that we are limited to, and therefore, what we think is right definitely doesn't have to be right in His eyes. He is completely beyond our category and our גבול, our הגבלות, our limitations. Now I want to get a little bit for a moment, get to the philosophy of it. The Rambam says, in the beginning of Rambam, he starts off by saying יסוד היסודות ועמוד החכמות לידע שיש שם מצוי ראשון. The foundation of all foundations and the pillar of all wisdom is to know, לידע, to know שיש שם מצוי ראשון, that there is this first being. He says to know, doesn't say to believe, להאמין, to know. We are able to know that there is this first being. In other words, it's not blind faith that there is this first being, Hashem. It's something that we could come with a logical conclusion. What is a logical conclusion? The fact that He is מצוי ראשון, there must be this first being. In other words, let me explain it. We have a rule, a logical rule, that אין דבר עושה את עצמו, nothing makes itself. Everything must have a source. That's the laws of nature. That's how things are. Everything must have a source. So when we start thinking this came from that and that from this, we come up to a point, where did the first being come from? The reason that some people don't believe in בריאת העולם, in creation, they'd rather believe in evolution, for that reason, because they don't want to accept anything in blind faith. Everything has to make sense. Everything has to fit to the laws of nature. And the laws of nature, there has to be an evolvement. But you come into an end and you ask the question, where did the first thing come from? And for that, there is no answer. So logically, we must come to a conclusion that there is this first being who is not limited to these laws of nature. The laws of nature are the laws of being, of normal being is, that everything has to have a source. There must be a being who is the first being, meaning that He is always there, and He doesn't have a source because He is essentially there. We don't know what it is and how He is and what it is, but logically, you must come to a logical conclusion that there must be a being, a first being, who is not limited to all the laws of nature and all the laws of the way things are in our eyes. And therefore, this first being definitely is not limited to our understanding, that because we don't understand, therefore what He does is not right. That can't be. If we understand that this first being must be a being that is not limited to any laws of nature, not even to this law of nature that you have to have a source, certainly is not limited to understanding the way we understand. And therefore, the fact that we don't understand what He did in no way proves that He doesn't exist, God forbid, because it's just the opposite: since He is beyond anything that we can understand, so we can't understand what He did. There's an expression in the Gemara that you can't put in a פילא בקופא דמחטא, you can't put in an elephant to the hole of a needle. Why? Because something that's big can't go through something that's small. The hole is limited and the elephant is limited, just that one is bigger and one is smaller, so you can't push one through. Imagine to push an unlimited thing through a limited space: impossible. To take the unlimited wisdom of Hashem and put it into our limited, finite minds, it's impossible. How do we expect, with our limited minds, to grasp His understanding and to understand what He does? And therefore, the question in itself, or the proof, as they call it in themselves, that He, He, capital H, allowed it to happen, proves proved that He doesn't exist, is a contradiction. If it really is a He who is so great and so beyond, and the fact that He allowed it to happen just shows that we don't understand, but that should be a proof that He doesn't exist because I don't understand? That's an imposs- That's not That makes no sense. And therefore, we look at it like this: We don't know why it happened, but we know for sure that if He made it happen, He knows what He's doing, and that in no way proves that He is not there. This is very general, but let's get to this a little bit in detail, to the specific question that is asked. Try to get a little bit more in detail of trying to explain along these lines that we can't understand, but at least try to explain it more in detail.

One of the times when the Frierdiker Rebbe was arrested in Russia, so one of the interrogators took out a gun, he asked him questions and he didn't want to answer, took out a gun and he pointed it at his head, and he said, \"This toy made many people talk.\" And the Frierdiker Rebbe answered him like this: \"It only makes talk people who have one world and many gods. I have one God and two worlds. To have No, who have many gods and one world. It made It makes people talk people who have many gods and one world. I have one God and two worlds, and therefore I'm not afraid of it.\" What did he mean with that? Why are people afraid of a gun? People are afraid to die because that's the end of them. We know that everybody cares about himself, that's human nature. People want themselves. כל דבר, there's a rule, a statement, כל דבר רוצה בקיומו. Everyone wants his own existence. And when you're going to get shot, you'll be finished. That's against the human nature, therefore people are afraid of it. So the Frierdiker Rebbe said to him, which people are afraid of it? People who feel that if they'll be shot, that'll be the end. So they're afraid to come to an end. But people who know that there are two worlds, there is עולם הזה and עולם הבא, this world and the world to come, then they have nothing to be afraid of, because even if you shoot me, that's not the end of me. I will continue. I will continue in a different world. Which means like this: We know that we are all made up of two parts: a guf and a neshamah, the body and the soul. The body is physical, and the neshamah is spiritual. It's self-understood that things that affect the physical don't affect the spiritual. Things that affect the spiritual don't affect the physical. Now, I don't mean it doesn't affect it, it affects it, but it that doesn't apply to it, doesn't do anything to it. For instance, if someone will cut someone's hand, God forbid, he's cutting the body. Will it mean that he is cutting the neshamah, cutting the soul? What happens to the body has a certain effect, to a certain degree, on the neshamah, that if a person's body is sick, then his neshamah can't do what it's supposed to, can't learn Torah. A person doesn't have is is sick, can't do mitzvot. That is true. So it's an effect that the body has on the neshamah. But we can't say that if something happens to the body, it happened to the neshamah. That if someone cuts the body, automatically he's cutting the neshamah. If someone shoots a bullet on the body, he didn't shoot the neshamah. If so someone is sick, God forbid, that sickness doesn't mean that the neshamah is sick. It has an effect, like I said. If the person is sick, he can't learn as well. Famous expression of the Maggid of Mezeritch wrote to his son, his son used to fast a lot, and he became very weak, so his father wrote to him, the Maggid of Mezeritch wrote to him: Gedenk, a kleine lechele in guf vet a groyse loch in neshome. \"A small hole in your body will cause a big hole in your neshamah.\" What does it mean? Because you won't be able to learn. But not that a hole in the body makes a hole in the neshamah. There are certain things which are good for the body and not good for the neshamah. There are certain things which are good for the neshamah and not good for the body. Could be even more, certain things are good for the neshamah and it might even cause suffering to the body. Because the neshamah and the body are two different worlds, and not what happens to one automatically happens to the other, like I said, sometimes it's the opposite. What what the neshamah is happy about, not necessarily what's good for the body. What body feels good doesn't mean that the neshamah feels feels good about it. Out of the two things, what's the more important one, the neshamah or the guf? The body or the soul? Well, obviously it's not the body. The body, the piece of flesh, why is that different than the piece of meat that's in the pot? That's a piece of flesh. What is the most important part of the person? The most important part of the person is the neshamah. A person has a life force, and as I explained last week, by a Yid, the life force is a נפש אלוקית, a Godly soul. And what happens to the body doesn't doesn't mean that the same thing happens to the neshamah. Like I said, you could cut the body, and the neshamah is not cut. And therefore, when we look at things that happen from the physical point of view, it doesn't mean that this is actually bad for the person as a whole. Could be that for the person as a whole, because of his neshamah, this could be good, even though for the body it means suffering. But this, who could say whether it is or it isn't? Only somebody who knows spiritual matters. Somebody who is not a מבין in spiritual matters can't come and say, \"Well, because something physical, something bad happened physically, automatically it's no good for the spirit.\" How do you know? The best example is, if people would walk into an operating room, and they would see 10 people standing with white aprons, holding big knives, and there's a guy laying tied to the table and they're going, God forbid, to cut off his foot, he would say, \"Stinking רוצחים! Look what the guys are doing! They tied up a person, they're going to cut off his foot.\" So, a person that doesn't know anything about medicine would say that. But the the doctors know that even though what they're going to do is going to hurt the body, but nevertheless, it's going to be good for the person because it'll save his life. And therefore, a person from the side can't come and give an opinion and say, \"Well, this is terrible.\" How do you know? You're not a doctor. You don't know if this is good or not. And the same thing is here also. All the physical pain and suffering and torture that took place are all for the body. We don't know what this did for the neshamah. These people, for their neshamah, you don't know we don't know what this did. And again I'm saying we don't know, I'm going along the line that it's something we don't know. But we could understand that even though for the physical body this meant suffering, but that little bit of suffering, little bit, it's a lot, but compared to what's going to happen later, this was a means of being good and beneficial for the neshamah. So how could we come and give an opinion and say, \"Well, this was terrible\"? For their neshamah it was good. Now, how was it good for them, it's hard to say. One thing we know for sure it was good: they reached the highest level a human being could reach. They reached the level of Kiddush Hashem. Kiddush Hashem, sanctifying Hashem's name, is the greatest level a human being could reach. The Gemara says that as holy as the great Tannaim and Amoraim are, and the great tzadikim, but those people that went on מסירות נפש, אין בריה יכולה לעמוד במחיצתן. No creature could stand in their area. That's how great of a level it is. They become one with Hashem. People who give up their life for the sake of Hashem reach the highest madrega, the highest spiritual madrega possible. They get closest to Hashem possible. Not only if a person gives up his life for Hashem, meaning when he's asked to bow down to an idol and he gives up his life. If a person is killed just because he is a Jew, he is termed, he has the title kadosh, holy one. The Chasam Sofer paskent a person who's killed just because he a Jew he's a Jew is called a kadosh. We say in davenen, I just happened to open the siddur as you saw and it just opened to that page, in Av Harachamim on Shabbos we say, we say to say to Hashem that he should take revenge and we say for all these great tzadikim who passed away, and he says, קהלות הקודש שמסרו נפשם על קדושת השם, those holy communities that gave up their life to sanctify Hashem's name. And we go on and on to say how great they are, ככתוב בתורת משה, and we bring all kinds of pesukim. This is the highest level. So one thing is clear, that these people reached the highest spiritual level possible. When Mashiach will come We're all gonna be very, very close to Hashem. They reached that level now. So even though physically it was suffering, but that physical suffering brought them to the highest spiritual level that could exist in the whole teva, in the whole universe, in the כל, in the whole, as we use the terms of Kabbalah, סדר השתלשלות. Now this is one of the things that definitely was good for them. And therefore we cannot sit and judge and say, well how could Hashem allow this to happen? He allowed it to happen because he wanted them to reach the highest level possible. Now

does that mean that to live down here in this world a healthy life without suffering is bad? Does that mean according to what I'm saying, so let's all, God forbid, try and go on Kiddush Hashem because that's the best thing possible, as we're saying? No. It's not so. We know that according to the Torah, human life, physical life on this world is very, very important. We know פיקוח נפש דוחה כל התורה כולה. When it comes to saving a life, it pushes away the whole Torah. The most important thing. Not only that, the whole mitzvah of tefillah, of davening is, that when a person is in need of something physical, he must daven to Hashem that Hashem should give it to him. So obviously it is important not to suffer. It is important to be alive. In some of the tefillot that we say when we ask Hashem to forgive us for our sins, for instance, just to use an example here in the beginning of קריאת שמע שעל המטה in Nusach Chabad, many people say it, we say ומה שחטאתי מחוק ברחמיך הרבים, what I sinned please wipe out with your great mercy, ולא על ידי יסורים וחלאים רעים. We ask Hashem, but not through suffering and not through bad sicknesses. So this is part of our tefillah, that we ask Hashem not to be sick and we ask Hashem to have אריכות ימים, to be alive in this world. And the reason for that is because what a Yid could accomplish in this world can't be accomplished when the neshamah leaves the body. The neshamah, when it goes in shamayim, doesn't have mitzvot, can't do mitzvot. When a Yid does a mitzvah down here, gets close to Hashem, very close. And that you can't accomplish when you don't have a body. Malachim don't have it. There's an expression from the Baal Shem Tov, he said that Malach Michael is jealous of a mitzvah that a Yid may have, any mitzvah. And he picked out an example, he wishes he would have at least one tzitzit. He doesn't even He's not that doesn't even want four, doesn't he can't even expect to have four tzitzit like we have. One corner! Why? The mitzvah, and he doesn't have it. Down here, we could do mitzvot. And doing mitzvot down here is the most important thing. That's why it says in פרקי אבות, יפה שעה אחת בתשובה ומעשים טובים בעולם הזה מכל חיי העולם הבא. One moment of teshuvah and good deeds in this world is more than the whole life of the world to come. Even though the same Pirkei Avot says, יפה קורת רוח בעולם הבא, שעה אחת של קורת רוח בעולם הבא מכל חיי העולם הזה. One moment of pleasure in the world to come is more than all the pleasures we could have in this world. Pleasure, yes. But as far as accomplishing, reaching a level, we could reach a level only down here by doing mitzvot. And therefore, Jewish life is very important. To be healthy is important. Hashem wants There is a mitzvah of ונשמרתם מאוד לנפשותיכם, we have to watch our health. Now the Rebbe told somebody that that's a mitzvah that we have to be מהדר. Just like you have to be extra careful in every mitzvah, you have to be extra careful in that mitzvah, too. And that's why sometimes the yetzer hara comes to a person and says, well, don't watch your health so much. It's the yetzer hara saying it. And sometimes he puts himself into a garment of kedushah. And it comes to a person that the doctor says you shouldn't do something, shouldn't do a mitzvah, because it'll be bad for your health and you have to listen to the doctor. And sometimes a person says, well, no, I'm gonna do it anyway. Fine, לכאורה, it sounds like a tzadik. So the Rebbe told somebody, this is the yetzer hara speaking, because you have a mitzvah of ונשמרתם לנפשותיכם. So there's definite Hashem wants us to be And therefore we ask Hashem it should not be through yisurim, we should be healthy, we should we have to be that way. But the reason for that is because we're able to serve Hashem then. And therefore, we on our own can't, God forbid, do something that we should have kiddush Hashem. But when Hashem himself makes it happen, that's a different story. So if Hashem makes the kiddush Hashem happen, then it is Hashem's will that this should be. So then they have a higher level through kiddush Hashem than we would have they would have being in this world, because Hashem wanted it to happen. And the whole reason of wanting, having to be in this world is because then you're able to serve Hashem, so it's all based on Hashem. And here Hashem wanted that they should be that highest level of kiddush Hashem. And that's a very high level, if Hashem wants it. The Beit Yosef writes, the Beit Yosef who wrote the Shulchan Aruch, writes in the ספר Magid Mesharim, he writes like this: he was promised by a malach He used to learn with a malach, with an angel, and he was promised by him that he would be zocheh eventually to die al kiddush Hashem. And something happened that he didn't merit, and because of that he lived a little bit longer, and he managed to write the Shulchan Aruch. And that's considered a punishment that he lived longer, because he didn't reach the level of kiddush Hashem. But that's only if it would come from Hashem. And therefore we have to have both sides. On one hand, every Jewish life is important and the most important, more important than anything in the world, than Torah, mitzvot, and anything, except the famous three עבירות that you have to give up your life for. But otherwise, a Jewish life is more important, it's because Hashem wants it. But if Hashem makes a person come and go al kiddush Hashem, then that person reached the highest madregah. And therefore, getting back to the point, what it comes out here is we don't know why Hashem did it. But on the other hand, to come and say this was bad for them, why has Hashem allowed this bad thing to happen, we are not מבינים. We didn't study ruchniyut. Just like the person didn't study medicine can't come and give an opinion, \"You're cutting this pupil, how could that be?\" We, too, can't come and say this is bad or this is good. But at the same time, we can't sit back and say, \"Well, in that case, I'm inclined to explain that it was good. And as we always say for everything, gam zu l'tovah, it's good, then that's it. So if it's good, then there's nothing to speak about. Then why should we complain about it?\" The Frierdiker Rebbe once said that we shouldn't leave Hashem alone. We should nudzh him, and we should say to him, m'zol manen, we should demand, \"Why did you do it? And don't let it happen again.\" And that's not, God forbid, against emunah. Avraham Avinu said that. Avraham Avinu was the greatest מאמין, the greatest believer. He's called ריש כל מאמיני, the first believer, the head, the top of all believers. When Hashem said to him, \"Take your son and שחט him,\" he didn't ask questions. And at the same time, when it came to Sedom and Amorah, he got up and said to Hashem, \"השופט כל הארץ לא יעשה משפט? You who judge the world, will you not do judgment, you'll not do righteousness?\" So to demand is not a contradiction to emunah. Moshe Rabbeinu, the Gemara says, asked Hashem, \"Why do we find צדיק ורע לו?\" Sometimes a tzaddik and it's בגשמיות, physically, it's not good for him, and he demanded it. The whole of Iyov is based on this. So on one hand, it is not wrong to say to Hashem, \"We would want, and we ask, why did you do? We want you should do it differently.\" And the reason is because Hashem, being that big professor who made the operation, is not like a doctor who has no other way to make the operation but by hurting the person. Hashem could have done it, because Hashem is בלי גבול, unlimited, he could have made them reach this high level and made this operation even in a way that they wouldn't suffer. And we ask Hashem, \"Why didn't you do it?\" At the same time, we believe that what Hashem did was right. It seems like a contradiction. True, it sounds like a contradiction, but we Jews live with contradictions. Hashem is beyond contradictions, and we are beyond in this emunah contradictions. In truth, this is not only in here, in this case. Every emunah and bitachon is a contradiction. On one hand, we have to have emunah, believe that everything that Hashem does is for the good, and at the same time, if someone is sick, there's a mitzvah to ask Hashem to cure him. If you believe that Hashem did it and it's good, then why ask Hashem to cure him? The answer is this is what Hashem wants. Hashem says, \"What I do I want you to believe is good, גם זו לטובה, and at the same time I gave you a mitzvah that you should ask me. It's a mitzvah from Hashem, mitzvah of davenen, to ask me that everything should be good in a form that you could see it's good.\" And that's what's happening here. We know that Hashem did it, and we can't understand why. גזירה היא מלפני, it's a gezeirah, a decree of Hashem. We can't understand why. It's definitely for the good. The fact that we didn't see how good it is doesn't mean that it's not good. For the neshamah it's good, definitely good for the neshamah, and we're not mevinim on a neshamah. A physical pain doesn't affect the neshamah. And at the same time, we have to know that we have to ask Hashem that he shouldn't do it again, and we have to beg him, and say to Hashem, \"Look what you did. You owe us one.\" We tell Hashem, \"You owe us one.\" The main thing he owes us is Mashiach. But he owes us because of what he did. And at the same time, we know it's good.

Now, there were some people who stopped, who turned away from Yiddishkeit, claiming that it's because of what took place, the Holocaust. Now, like I explained, it makes no sense. Hashem doesn't have to run his world the way I would like him to run it, and therefore because he doesn't do what I want, therefore I don't accept him anymore. But besides that, the truth is, the truth 100% is that those people who turned away from Yiddishkeit because of the Holocaust, it's only an excuse. These people were weak to begin with, and they were looking for an excuse to turn away, and they found an excuse, a tirutz. They found an excuse. Many of them were not even frum before, and even some of them who were This was an excuse that they found. The real reason why they turned away, because they're lazy, they don't want to do it, but not because the philosophical concept of it bothers them. Once someone came to the Frierdiker Rebbe, and the Frierdiker Rebbe asked him, \"Why don't you put on tefillin?\" Asked him to put on tefillin, so he said, \"Because I'm an apikorus. I'm an atheist.\" So he says to him, \"You think it's so easy to be an apikorus? You think you're an apikorus? You're an am ha'aretz, you're not an apikorus. You're ignorant, that's what you are, not an apikorus. You're lazy, that's all you are. Apikorus means someone who understands and thinks and this, and comes out with a question. You're just simple lazy, that's what most of these people are.\" It's not that the logical problem that they have with this is what caused them to turn away. I'll tell you a simple reason. What, why is it only the Holocaust that turned them away? You study history, unfortunately, these things happened before, not in such a big form. You had חורבן בית המקדש, when hundreds of thousands of Yidden were killed. You had the Inquisition, you had the מסעי הצלב, the Crusaders, you had. And the same person, when he learns about the Inquisition, that didn't make him turn away. It's the same question, and it's not because he didn't believe it happened. He believes it. History, no one doubts history. So why didn't he ask the question, השופט כל הארץ לא יעשה משפט? How could Hashem allow the Inquisition to happen? And he should turn away, he didn't. So obviously it's not the question of sechel, of logic. It's emotion, it's feeling. Even those that we say will give them the benefit of the doubt that it's serious, it's the feeling. Well, for that you have to have moach shalit al halev. The mind has to control the heart, and if in mind we understand that these questions are not questions, it is not something that could prove, God forbid, that there is no Hashem, then we just have to overcome the emotion. But the basic thing is that these people, it's not the logic philosophical problem that they have why they turned away. I want to touch on one more small point concerning the Holocaust, one little point. And it's a question that many people ask: Why is it that the religious Jews don't really participate so much in all these memorials and all these monuments that other people make to remember the six million? And it's something that's very important, we have to remember. To remember their Kiddush Hashem, and we have to remember this, it's part of our, it's us. So why is it that many frume Yidden don't really participate? So I just want to mention that the reason is not because we have anything against, chas v'shalom, of remembering them. We have to try to do whatever we can to keep their memory going. It's just the way it's done. Like getting together and lighting six candles and making a moment of silence, which I have no idea where that comes from. What's the big idea of a moment of silence? So you stand quiet? Stand quiet. I want to talk, why should I, I mean what's the idea? Where do we find in the Torah a source for a moment of silence, that that should be eppes good for the neshamah? For the neshamah you have to have learn Torah for the sake of the neshamah, we find in Torah. You learn תורה לעילוי נשמת, it's a aliyah for the neshamah. You learn Mishnayot, it's a aliyah for the neshamah. Give tzedakah for the neshamah, it's good for the neshamah. The Rabbi spoke many times about doing things to remember the six million. One of the things he said: Six million of us perished, we have to bring six million back, so everyone should have large families to bring the more neshamot down. The Rabbi said, \"Let's learn more Torah. Let's establish more yeshivot. Let's show the Nazis, yimach shemam vezichram, that what they tried to do, they did not accomplish.\" This is the best memory that we could continue for these six million. But lighting a candle here and saying a speech here, that is not what is going to do. Having a day, a day of memory, fine, there's nothing wrong with it. But some people are yotzei, one day a year you remember them, and the whole year you forget, not only you forget, you do things which they would see it, they would turn over, as they say, in their grave for what you're doing. So therefore, by us that's not the way to remember the kedoshim that went al kiddush Hashem. Some people did make certain תפילות, קינות that some people say on Tisha B'Av, that's very fine, that's good. That's part of of of מנהג ישראל, that's part of tradition. But the main thing is that we have to learn for their sake, daven for their sake, and give nachat to their neshama, and that would be a עליה לנשמה. But after everything is said and done, whatever whatever we'll explain and whatever we'll say, I just want to say that we could turn to Hashem and we could say to Hashem, we have all kinds kinds of things that we say, but it all doesn't answer the question. And we ask Hashem that you, like I said before, you owe us one, and the main thing that Hashem owes us, and I think in Yiddish there's an expression, ס'קען מען נישט אויסצאלן, it'll never be paid up until the Eibershter brings Mashiach. And when Mashiach will come, then we will look back and we will see that what happened was really for the benefit of these neshamot. And then we will see it with our eyes, and we will see how all the suffering of the Yidden of the Holocaust and the Yidden from the Inquisition and the Yidden from the massacres from the Crusaders and the churban, they all, it was all for their benefit, and we will see how all that was worth it because through all that, Klal Yisrael will reach its goal, and that is ביאת המשיח, which will happen במהרה בימינו ממש. Yes. The guf will be on a higher level. I could explain it, but I don't think it has much to do with the subject. I just meant yeah, I can mention neshama and guf, doesn't mean I have to. I will explain as it says in ספרים that when Mashiach will come and then there will be תחיית המתים, so then we will reach a level that the guf, the body, will be higher than the neshama. Now it says הגוף ניזון מן הנשמה, מן הנפש, the body gets nourishment from the nefesh, from the soul. Then it says הנפש ניזונת מן הגוף, will get nourishment from the body. And the question is why? Like I said, it doesn't have much to do with the subject, but I did mention before the body and the soul, and the body is gashmiyut and the soul is ruchniyut, spiritual, and therefore the neshama is holier and greater, and therefore what happens to the neshama is more important than what happens to the body. So why is it? It says because then, and I'll say it just in short and I doubt I'll have a chance to explain it, but it says because then will be revealed the true essence of Hashem, that gashmiyut and ruchniyut, physical and spiritual, are equal to Him. And that will be expressed in the fact that to show that it's not like we think that He is closer to ruchniyut, He is beyond ruchniyut and gashmiyut, and therefore the guf, which is gashmiyus, is not lower than the neshamah. And because till now it seemed like the guf is lower, and He is closer to the nefesh, therefore the guf will be higher then. It says here we say that in, I mentioned it once before, that we say it in Hallel, that the difference between what the Yidden say and what the goyim say, the goyim claim, it's a pasuk in Tehillim, that we say it in Hallel, the goyim say רם על כל גוים השם, השם is very high up, על השמים כבודו, His honor is up there in heaven. And we say המשפילי לראות בשמים ובארץ. Shamayim and aretz, heaven and earth, are both a hashpa'ah, both a descent for Him, because He is beyond everything. They think that Hashem, being so great, He's closer to ruchniyus, closer to spirituality. Spirituality itself is also from Hashem, and gashmiyus is also from Hashem. And therefore, then we will see how gashmiyus is not lower than ruchniyus because we will see the essence of Hashem, and therefore the neshamah, the guf will be higher. Yes? Well, first of all, it happened to many, many people who did not deserve it. We know that the expression is from the סולת משמנה of Yiddishkeit, from the best of ours perished in the Holocaust. Now, these people definitely did not deserve it. And therefore, it's definitely hard to say that they were in that category. Second of all, as terrible as the Torah explains of what's going to happen, nothing comes to what took place during the Holocaust. And therefore, to say that this was something that is because of the aveirot, no aveirot that the Yidden did could be could deserve this. Just like by Rabbi Akiva, the reason why by Rabbi Akiva Hashem didn't answer, \"Well, he deserved it,\" because he did not deserve it. It's something that makes no sense, and therefore the answer is גזירה היא מלפני, כך עלתה במחשבה, this is what Hashem wants. And in this case it was the same. Well, even for a collective punishment, the individual has to be part of it. We find by the churban Beit Hamikdash, by the churban Beit Hamikdash, it says that the reason that the tzadikim, some tzadikim also perished, was because they didn't stop them, they didn't do certain things, so they had to also do something. And so here, those are hundreds, thousands of individuals who didn't have any share in anything that happened. Some people claim it's because of the this movement, that movement, the Enlightenment movement, but there are so many who fought it, tzadikim, hundreds, thousands of Yidden! And they fought it, they had no part in it at all, so they wouldn't have shared it. So it must be because this is what Hashem wanted. Yes. I tried to claim that it's logical not to be logical. All right. The truth, I don't know exactly what you mean, but definitely, the yetzer hara is the problem and everything that's, anything that's not right that a person does comes from the yetzer hara. But what I was trying to say that, in this case, it's such a terrible thing that the yetzer hara himself, and I'll quote what the Rebbe said, the Rebbe used the word a Satan, who is actually the same as the yetzer hara. The Gemara says, הוא היצר הרע, הוא השטן, הוא המלאך המות, it's all the same, the Satan and the מלאך המות, the yetzer hara. That even the Satan, he says, couldn't have thought of making a cheshbon, an account, of the aveirot of the Yidden to bring such a terrible, terrible punishment. So the yetzer hara, takeh, and any aveirah that a Yid does comes from the yetzer hara. But, in this case, there is something deeper than that. It's something that Hashem had in mind for Klal Yisrael, which we can't understand. He wanted them to become kedoshim, but basically it's something we can't understand. And we just know that Hashem did it. But the main point I tried to make was, the fact that we can't understand doesn't prove, chas veshalom, that it's not there. It's the opposite: we can't understand because He is beyond understanding. Yes. No, these people who died al kiddush Hashem, means they died because they're Jews, right? So that itself is called for their level dying al kiddush Hashem, mesirat nefesh al kiddush Hashem. Right. Right. Even if they had part? Well, very possible that by feeling somebody else's pain al kiddush Hashem, you share a chelek in that person's kiddush Hashem and your neshamah also gets elevated to a higher level. So again, it's good it's good for our neshamah also. That a person suffers, we know Hashem does it for the good and it elevates the person's neshamah also. And therefore, even though it's a suffering, but all suffering is to elevate the neshamah. I remember reading a story of the Baal Shem Tov that something terrible happened in Eretz Yisrael, and he showed him one level, another level, and he came to the third level which would be very bad until it came to the highest level. What actually had happened was that an evil person died. A punishment, and an evil person means rasha, and the curse went away. Is it the case by the Holocaust also that we're just missing information and if we would know what's going on behind the scenes, we'd come to the same conclusion, or is this something that's beyond logic? Well, the truth is We don't know, when we say beyond logic, how much beyond our logic. It's definitely beyond the level of logic as we have down here. Possibly, if we would have a higher level of understanding, we'd also understand and we'd also do the same thing. But it could be that it's so high, it's beyond the whole concept of logic. And I just want to say, when the Gemara says the expression שתיק כך עלה במחשבה, \"Be quiet, that's what Hashem wanted,\" in Chassidut it says that that level is not just a very high level of logic that our mind can't understand, it's beyond the whole level of logic. It says that in sefirot, if you want to go through Kabbalah, it's ספירת הכתר it says, which is beyond chochmah. Chochmah of Atzilut, this is beyond chochmah. So even if we would say that it's a level of chochmah from a higher world, from Chochmah of בריאה, it's also beyond our understanding, but it's still within the category of understanding, just not our understanding. But this in this case, if we would apply the expression that the Torah Gemara says by Rabbi Akiva, it would mean it's beyond the whole level of what understanding means, even in the spiritual sense of understanding, it's something beyond that. Just want to mention once the Alter Rebbe was sitting with other students of the Mezeritcher Maggid and they were talking, so one of the talmidim says, \"If I would be Hashem, I would do this, I would do that, I would give this, this poor man, I would give him a lot of money. You see this guy who's sick, I would make him healthy, I would...\" Another one said, \"I would do this, I would do that.\" The Alter Rebbe turns around and he says, \"If I would be Hashem, I would do exactly as he did.\" In other words, this, whether we understand it or not, makes no difference. There are many people who question the Holocaust, where was God, and so forth. We understand they are... However, many people also ask, why did the people who were being rounded up by the Nazis, why didn't they rebel? Why didn't they do that? But when we see that the thousands of people went to their death singing אני מאמין באמונה שלימה בביאת המשיח, who didn't rebel, that they had this calmness, and they realized Hashem had a plan beyond their own physical existence. True. See, this question why they went, like you said, that itself stresses the point even more. Here there are so many questions asked the opposite way. There are so many things that don't make sense how it happened, not what happened, so many things that we can't understand. Why did the world Why was the world quiet? Why did the people go? Why Things which, under normal circumstances, wouldn't have allowed it to happen. This proves even more that it's Hashem's hand that made it all happen. Because otherwise, other things don't make sense. And these people that went, taka understood this, what I'm explaining now, that the people we know we can't understand Hashem and we know there is, like you said, a special plan Hashem said had, these people understood this. Because these people said אני מאמין going to the gas chambers. Yes, lady's side. You're talking about the Kinot of previous cases. Well, this that I'm saying doesn't mean it applies to every time it happened. In most cases, when a tragedy happens, it is as the Gemara says, because of a din. Because of a din, because Hashem judged and a person sinned, אין יסורין בלא חטא. It's specifically concerning the kedoshim of this Holocaust that we're talking about, that this was in such a great scale, in such a terrible way, that it's beyond any explanation of punishment. So in the Kinot, if someone would write Kinot now, somebody as great as the people who wrote then, would write it differently. Because this case is special, different. Yes, here. No, no, no. Like I said before, we have to try our best to be healthy and and to not to not to be killed and do everything. But when it happened in a way that they couldn't do anything, then they understood that even though it's happening to them, it's all from the hand of Hashem. But if they were able to resist, sure they have to resist. But like I said before, the fact that they didn't resist, which makes no sense, shows that there's some kind of plan here. Hashem made it happen in such a way which there is no explanation. Yes. You mentioned earlier in your lecture that the 400 years of גלות מצרים, according to Avraham, yeah, to Avraham Avinu, that the גלות had to be 400 years, and it was cut, in case, to 210 years, and the Midrash that said because of the suffering, the cries of the of the Bnei Yisrael. So the question occurred: Hashem didn't didn't hear didn't hear the suffering, the cries of the of the Jews in the Holocaust? Did that... Therefore, what does that show? That in this case, this was the best for them. The best for them, which we don't understand how, we just know that the neshamah matters we can't understand, and therefore this was the best for them. And when Hashem heard their cries, even though they themselves didn't understand, and they had to cry, it's part of the mitzvah to cry, the mitzvah to ask Hashem, and Hashem nevertheless did it for the best for them. We say in in Selichot we say מרובים צרכי עמך ודעתם קצרה, which means your your people their needs are many and their mind is short. That means that we don't even know what's good for us, we don't even know what we need. So we have to ask Hashem to give us whatever we need, but Hashem knows better. And it doesn't take away from the fact that we have to ask. Like I said before, a person chas veshalom is sick, he has to know that this is gam zu letovah, it's good, and at the same time he is obligated to daven to Hashem to make him healthy. There is a famous book written by a psychologist, a Jewish psychologist, who was an inmate in the concentration, I forget the concentration camp. Viktor Frankl, right. So Viktor Frankl said, based on his own experience, and he's a witness to this, that there were types of Jews that emerged from the concentration camp. One was completely religious, completely really proved, and one was completely fray. No no in between. So something to think about that that really So like I said, those that became fray is not for not because of the sechel they can't understand, they have a philosophical question, it's emotion. And I can understand them, we're not blaming them. It's wrong, not not justifying it, but we understand how it happened. What do you mean the same? It doesn't mean that what's good for the guf is good for the neshamah or opposite. That's not what it means. It means there is something that's parallel, in its way. But it doesn't mean that where this is good means it's good there too. Then that doesn't mean it's suffering for the neshamah. Doesn't mean, contrary, usually when it says a person, even in simple terms, the Gemara says יסורים ממרקים. A person suffers, it cleanses his neshamah. Here it's opposite, it's good for the neshamah and it's bad for the guf. So it means that there are parallel things always, when things happen begashmiyut there are parallel beruchniyut, but not necessarily if it's good here it's good there. There is a parallel thing there too. Some do also ask to, yeah, yeah, yeah. But that's for the sake of cleansing the neshamah, fasting and things like that. Okay, thank you very much. Everybody, we want to thank everybody for coming again. We also want to thank