We'll be discussing today, as we just heard, the concept of keeping kosher, which means the concept of eating kosher food, because in truth, just to make it clear, the word kosher has nothing to do with food. People think that the word kosher means specific type of food, that is not true. The word kosher is really the word kosher, or in the modern Hebrew we would say כשר, which means fit. It could you could apply it to anything. Anything that's fit, according to Jewish law, is called kosher, is called כשר. Anything that's not fit, is not kosher. It's just commonly used for food. So when we some when someone says, \"I keep kosher\", commonly what it means is, \"I keep a kosher kitchen\", which means \"I eat the kosher food only, food which is fit\". But the word kosher itself doesn't mean that, and that's why sometimes what we will find, whether it's in the שולחן ערוך or in the גמרא, concerning other areas of Judaism, of יידישקייט, and it will also use the word kosher. That this is kosher, this is not kosher, even though it doesn't deal with food. But the discussion today will not be concerning all types of being kosher, whether it's concerning marriages and concerning other things in Judaism, we'll stick just to kosher food, food and drink, which is included in one word, kosher food. Just to start off, when we talk about kosher food, there are different categories of what is kosher, which means what is fit, and what is not, different categories of כשרות. I'm not talking about standards, I'm saying different types of things which are fit to be eaten, and otherwise they are not kosher. And I'll just tell you the different categories. Number one, there are certain things which are not allowed to be eaten. According to Jewish law, according to the תורה, you're not allowed to eat it or drink it. And I'll give examples soon, but that's one category, things that, on their own, the way they are, you're not allowed to eat it. Then there are certain things that you're not allowed to eat a certain combination. If there are two things which each one in itself could be kosher, but if they're combined together, you can't eat it. It's another level of כשרות. Then there is another category of kosher, that there are certain things that a certain time of the year you can't eat it. Other times of the year it's kosher, but certain times of the year it is not kosher. And then there are certain types of things which you can't eat if certain things were done to it. In other words, the object itself is a kosher object, but because something was done in a certain way, that's why this is not fit to be eaten. And let me give you some examples in the different categories. Let's go to the first category. The first category is things which cannot be eaten. There are certain animals where the תורה forbid, you can't eat them. No matter what, these are non-kosher animals. Most of them are, many of them are the wild animals, but this is a category. Certain birds cannot be eaten, certain fish cannot be eaten, insects cannot be eaten. These are things that it's not because anything was done to it, not because of any mixture, the thing itself, השם, God, said in the תורה, this cannot be eaten. Even in a kosher animal, there are certain parts that cannot be eaten. It is forbidden to eat חלב. חלב is a certain fats that's in the animal. There are certain fats in the animal which are kosher, and certain fats in the animal which the תורה, God said, you're not allowed to eat it. Not because of anything that was done to it, you just can't eat it. Blood, blood of an animal cannot be eaten. Not because of any other reason, just because this is something that the תורה, השם, God forbid from eating. So these are examples of things that are forbidden, and another word for being forbidden besides not kosher is it's אסור. אסור means forbidden, are things that are forbidden on their own. I'll give another example, the example of גיד הנשה. There's a certain vein, a certain nerve in the thigh of the animal which is forbidden to be eaten. So these are things which fall to the first category of things which are forbidden on their own. Then we have the concept of things which are forbidden if there is a mixture. And that we all know what that is, that is בשר בחלב. If you meat, mix milk and meat, it cannot be eaten. Meat is kosher, milk is kosher. If you mix the two together, it's forbidden. That's a second category of things forbidden. Then as I said, there are things which are forbidden a certain time, and we know what that is also: חמץ on פסח. When it comes פסח, חמץ is אסור, is forbidden, is not kosher. What's חמץ? We all know what חמץ is. If you have any flour made of one of the five types of grain mixed with water and it rose rose, you can't eat it on פסח, it's forbidden. All year round, it's okay. פסח, it's forbidden. So here we have something that's not כשר, but it's only not כשר if it comes in a certain time, which is the holiday of פסח. And then we have certain things which are forbidden if it certain thing happened to it. Even a כשר animal, if it was killed not according to the way the תורה prescribed, it wasn't slaughtered in the proper way, that is forbidden. So the animal is a כשר animal, actually. The reason it's forbidden is because something was done to it in the wrong way which the תורה said you're not allowed to do. So this is an example of something that is essentially כשר, but because of something that happened to it, it is forbidden to be eaten. Or I'll give another example. If something was used, which is not so common nowadays, but if something was used for עבודה זרה, for idol worship, the simplest example is if wine was poured in front of an idol. Those days when they used to worship idols, and nowadays probably you have in the in in Africa wherever they still worship idols, if you pour wine they used to pour wine as a sacrifice to the idol, that wine is forbidden. Then we have things which are forbidden by the חכמים. And let me go into that idea for a moment. Certain things that you're not allowed to eat are called forbidden מדאורייתא, from the תורה, from the חומש, and there are certain things which are forbidden מדרבנן, from the rabbis. Certain things are forbidden from the תורה, whether it says outright, clearly in the תורה exactly what the תורה means, then there are certain things what the תורה says, but it's not clear, and the sages, the rabbis, were the ones that defined it, but that's still called forbidden from the תורה, it's not forbidden from the rabbis, because when the rabbis defined and interpreted what it says in the תורה, they did it because they were given by God, through משה רבינו and passed down throughout all generations, the tools, the instructions, the rules how to study a פסוק, a verse in the תורה, and how to interpret it. And after they used these rules and they actually interpreted what the תורה says, and they came out with a decision based on these rules and the tools that they were given by God that this and this is forbidden, it's not that it's forbidden because the sages made it forbidden, that's considered forbidden from the תורה, because what they did was they just explained what the תורה, what השם, what God when He said it in the תורה, what He meant. And God wanted them to do that. That's what we call תורה שבעל פה, the oral תורה, but this is forbidden from the חומש, because they explained based on the rules that God gave them what the חומש means. But then there are certain things that are forbidden because the rabbis themselves decided, and they said, \"We feel that you shouldn't eat this.\" And to us, it makes no difference, we still are forbidden, because the way they the reason they were able to do this, because they were given the authority by God Himself in the תורה for them to do this. In the תורה, it says that the rabbis of all all generations, when they see a certain thing has to be forbidden for whatever reason they feel, they have a right to do it. And not only does the תורה say they have a right to do it, they have an obligation to do it. It's an obligation on the sages to see that anything that they feel is needed to make it forbidden for whatever reason they feel, then they have to do it. And we, all Jews, were commanded to listen to what they tell us. So, therefore, even though certain things are what we call מדרבנן, they were only forbidden by the rabbis, but we have to keep it. Part of what the תורה says is that we have to keep this. So there are certain things which are forbidden from דרבנן. For instance, I mentioned wine that was poured for the עבודה זרה, something was done to it and that the תורה says is forbidden, was poured in front of an idol. Then came the rabbis and they said that any wine that was touched by a non-Jew is also you can't drink it, and that's from the rabbis. And the reason they did it was they said because if we'll allow it, then people will become very friendly with the non-Jews, and that might bring to intermarriage. The rabbis said that if food was cooked by a non-Jew, you can't eat it. There are a lot of details here, a lot of conditions, when it's forbidden, when it's not, whether it's the food, or the baking, or the wine. I'm just bringing in a general idea that there are certain things which are not כשר, but they're מדרבנן. But this all would be in the category in the last category of things are forbidden because something was done to it. Whether it's מדאורייתא, if you didn't שחט it, you didn't slaughter it properly, or if it's poured for עבודה זרה, or things which the רבנן said, if something was done to it was done in a certain way, it's forbidden. But it falls into the category it's forbidden. Then there are another category, which I don't know if it would fall into the category of כשרות, of being of eating כשר food, and that's that there are certain times that all food is forbidden. So it's not that the food is not כשר, and that is on a fast day. Comes יום כיפור, you're not allowed to eat, you're not allowed to drink. So that day nothing is כשר. Everything is forbidden. That's a separate category. Or even on תשעה באב, which we're coming up in a few days. That's not מדאורייתא, it's not from the תורה, but the רבנן, and they, as I said, whatever they say we must keep. The תורה told us to keep what they say. So on תשעה באב we can't eat, so all food is forbidden, or other fast days. So here we have these different categories, just to make it clear, different categories of types of food which are forbidden. Why is this all forbidden? Now, some people would like to say, because it's much healthier to keep כשר, to eat כשר food is much healthier, which between me and you, probably is true. But I don't care if it's not true. That's not the reason why we keep כשר. That is not the reason. In other words, if someone would come or they would invent a machine or do something that would clean all the food and make it better than before. They say if you eat pork, a pig, it's not a clean animal and therefore the תורה said you're not allowed to eat it, but what happens if nowadays they could clean it, and they could take out all the bacteria, and they could make it better than other foods? Would that mean that you're allowed to eat it? Because the reason is not because it's it's healthier. The reason we keep כשר, because השם said so. Because the תורה says so. If the תורה says that you have to keep כשר and these are the foods that you're not allowed to eat, then we're not allowed to eat it because we keep what השם told us. There are certain thing reasons written concerning certain types of not כשר food, but that's not the main reason. These are side benefits. If it's healthier to eat כשר, fine, so it's a side benefit that you get, but that's not the reason why we do it. And the same thing with other things. It says the many of the commentaries write that one of the reasons why we can't eat meat of a wild animal, because a person will get the characteristics of that animal, and it'll make you have a bad מדה, bad attribute, bad characteristics, which is true. Why can't you eat animal that was not slaughtered properly? So they give a reason, too, because slaughtering, the way the תורה says it, the way a שוחט does the שחיטה, is the most humane way of killing the animal with the least pain. And there is a concept of caring about the animal's pain. So if you kill the animal in a different way, it's cruel. Now, someone might say in that case, let's not eat meat at all! Why kill an animal? I'm not going to get into that subject now, the subject of vegetarian becoming a vegetarian, which it would sound that it would be a good idea according to the תורה, which is a תורת חסד, a תורה of kindness, not to eat animals, not to eat meat at all because you're killing an animal, but it's not so. But that's a different subject altogether. There are many reasons why the תורה did not encourage. תורה doesn't say it's forbidden, you're allowed to be a vegetarian, there's no שאלה, there's no question. But the תורה doesn't encourage it for other reasons, and according to חסידות it's understood because you elevate the animal, whatever the reason, I'm not going into it. But when you do kill the animal, the תורה wants you to kill the animal in the way that is the least painful. And therefore, if you kill the animal in a way that it's painful, which is cruel, and then you're going to eat the meat, you know what's going to happen? That cruel thing that happened to the animal will enter into the person and you'll also get some kind of cruel feeling. You'll become cruel to a certain degree. Because this is true, that the food, the characteristics of the food has an effect on the person. I saw a few years ago somebody showed me an article someplace in a magazine where it said that they did an experiment, an interesting thing that caught my eyes then when the guy showed it to me, that there were worms that in a certain place where they were, they put some kind of electrical current there. And after a while the worms got used to it, so they already knew how to avoid that area. They automatically avoided the area where you had electrical current. And then they took these worms and they fed it to other animals. The other animals automatically on their own started avoiding any place where there was electrical current. And they didn't understand why, because they ate these worms, which had this characteristic, just got used to this, and that had an effect on the person who ate it, on the person, it wasn't a person, it was these animals who ate it. So we even see physically it's like that that you get the characteristics of the animal. Actually, it says in a מדרש, interesting מדרש, the מדרש says, first the גמרא says this and then the מדרש explains, the גמרא says that when השם offered the תורה to the יידן, and he said, \"Will you accept it?\" and they said, \"נעשה ונשמע,\" which means we will do and we will hear. First they said we will do and then said we will hear, which means we will understand. And what they said was, \"We are ready to accept it before we even understand the reason why.\" And the גמרא says that השם, when he heard that answer, when God heard the answer, he said, \"Wow, מי גילה לבני רז זה? Who revealed to my children this secret? It's an expression that only the angels use. How did they know this?\" And the גמרא quotes a פסוק that the angels use that expression of first we will do and then we will hear, we will understand. So השם said, \"Who revealed it to them? How did they know to say this?\" But the גמרא doesn't say how did they תאקע know, how did they really know? So the מדרש says an interesting thing, because a few weeks before, they started eating the מן. We all know in חומש it says that the מן came down from heaven, and it came down I think the 15th day of אייר, the 16th day of אייר, which was about a few weeks before the תורה was given. The מן is considered food of the מלאכים. So because the יידן ate the food of the מלאכים for a few weeks, they got the characteristics of the מלאכים. So since the מלאכים had this feeling of always saying נעשה before נשמע, we will do before we will understand, that put into the יידן that feeling. Why? Because they ate the food of the מלאכים. All this is to bring out that there is this idea that you get the characteristics of the food, and these are the reasons that some say for some of the reasons of כשרות, which like I said before is fine. Great holy books write these reasons, but I can tell you that it's not the real reason, that is not the reason. Even for בשר בחלב they have a reason. בשר בחלב, mixing milk and meat, which everyone knows makes no sense. What's the reason? What's wrong with it? If they're both כשר, why can't I mix them together? So they do give a reason because the original way the תורה puts this for this prohibition of milk and meat is לא תבשל גדי בחלב אמו, do not cook a goat in its mother's milk. Cooking a goat in its mother's milk is cruel. You can imagine, own mother's milk and you cook the goat in it, it's cruel. From that פסוק, the חכמים learned out, the sages learned out, that you can't not only not cook it, you can't also not eat it, you can't, you're not allowed to have any pleasure, any use from it. But the way the פסוק puts it is that this is something cruel. So if you're going to milk, mix milk and meat, it's based on cruelty, and therefore, you might become cruel also. So this is a reason given, but as I said, this is not the reason why we keep כשר. The reason we keep כשר, no reason. It's because השם said so, that's why we keep. We're not looking for reasons, and we don't care if we have no reason. Now, someone might say, you know, \"Well, I don't believe that God said so.\" Okay, that's a different story. If you don't believe God said so, then we have no business having this class today. Then we have to have a different class. Then first we have to have a class to explain that the תורה is true and God gave us the תורה, then we can continue with this. Obviously, when we're holding at this class, we're already past that stage, and we know that the תורה, the תורה is from God, and we know that it's true what it says in the תורה. So we know that it's true that God said you have to keep כשר, and there are certain foods you can't eat. If we know that God said it, we don't have to go any further. If God said it, that's it, that's what we got to do. The truth is I do want to explain, even though we're not going to go into the details of the reasons, like I said, we don't care and we don't know why this specific thing is forbidden and this specific thing is not forbidden, why this mixture is good, this mixture is not good, and these foods are and this is not, not to go into the details of why specific things are כשר or not כשר. But the general concept that there is such a thing as כשרות, that there is such a thing that certain foods have to be forbidden according to the תורה, that makes sense. The details make sense or doesn't make sense, makes no difference. But this makes sense, that there is such an idea that you should have to keep, that there are certain rules of which food is forbidden and which food is not, and nothing to do with health and nothing to do with nutrition, nothing to do with the physical reasons. There must be some spiritual reasons why they're forbidden. That's something that's logical. That's something that I can explain. And I'll explain it like this: what the food accomplishes is a food keeps a person alive, obviously. Keeping the person alive means it keeps the body and soul together. Now we know that a person has a body and a soul. The body is the physical body, then you have the soul, which is the נפש, which let's call it the life force of the person. And they're two separate entities. The best proof is a person, if he dies, the body is still intact, what's missing? What left? The life, the נפש, we call it, that left. So a person, a human being is made up of a גוף, which is the body, and the נפש, which is the soul, the life force. The body is physical, the life force is is spiritual, it's not physical. They're two things that are far apart. They're two extremes. Spiritual and physical are pretty far apart. We think far apart means right and left or things like that, black and white. This is more far apart. Spiritual and physical are much further away. And what we have to do, keep them together, combine them. That's what a person alive being alive means, that the two are together, they're united. And the truth is the way the soul and the body are united, they're united in such a way that they become one. They become one. It's not like you have a motor, the engine of a car. The car is a piece of metal, and then you have a force there which makes the car go. So it doesn't mean that the car became the metal became alive. There's two entities. One pushes the other since you have a motor and there's something that's pushing it and it makes it go, but it's not that the car is united with the motor. But in the body, the body and the soul, which is the גוף and the נפש, become one. The body becomes a live body. It's not that the body is always dead, it's just that there are certain there's a certain energy in it that makes it function. The body is a live body. The body itself became alive. And not only is the body one with the נפש, that the body became alive, but each individual limb, each individual organ became united with a certain aspect of the נפש. When we say the eyes could see, the eyes are physical things and the eye is not alive. You could have a person who's not alive and he still has the same eyes. What makes the eye see? The fact that the eye is alive, that there is the נפש there. Now that נפש has two things. The נפש has the general idea that it makes you alive, and then it has the details, that there's a certain aspect in the נפש that has the ability to see and goes into the eye and makes the eye see. There's a certain aspect in the נפש, in the life, because it all comes from the life, it doesn't come from anything else. The sight doesn't come from the thin air, and it doesn't come from the eye either, cuz the eye itself is a piece of flesh. It comes from the נפש. There's a certain part in the נפש that has the ability to make your hands move, and that part of the נפש comes into the hands. And that part of the נפש that comes into every aspect of the body becomes one with that part. The eye becomes a seeing eye. It's not that an eye is a piece of flesh and then there is something else that sees. The eye has this ability to see because it takes part of the נפש. So the נפש of the person, the soul of the person, becomes one, united with the body, not only in general that the body becomes a living thing, it itself is alive, it's itself we would call it a soul type of body, a body with life, but each individual part of the body becomes that. Afterwards, now when we have two opposites and we want to unite them, we have the soul, which is spiritual, we have the body, which is physical, and we want to make them into one and not just put them close together, make them to become one. How could you connect two opposites? To connect two opposites you have to have a link in between which is made up of both, because otherwise how do you connect them? But I want to go a little bit deeper in this before I continue. When I'm saying they're two opposites, that the soul, the נפש, the life is an opposite of the body, it's not really 100% true what I said, because why is physical the opposite of spiritual? That's how God created it. Everything is a creation of God, and any characteristic anything has, any quality anything has is because God made it that way. So God made that physical is one way, spiritual is another way. The same God made that the natural way it is that they come together and it makes a person alive. So what's the problem? I'm trying to make a problem here and saying that how could you combine the two when they're two opposites? Mean how can you combine, why are they opposites? Because God created that this has this characteristic, this has this characteristic, and they're two opposite characteristics. But the same God made part of nature is that human beings are alive! Part of nature is that the soul, the life force, and the body come together and they're able to be together. So that's part of nature, that's part of טבע, which is not a real problem. The real problem is when we're talking about the life force of a Jew. Because I'm sure you learned already in חסידות that besides the regular life force which we call the נפש that every human being has, which is a side of the body, there's the body and that's what we call the soul, the נפש, but that's called the נפש החיונית, is the נפש, the soul that gives the person simple life, to make him alive. But a Jew has what we call a נפש אלוקית, a Godly soul, and that is something that's not part of nature. Because as far as nature is concerned, the natural way of living in this world, you don't need that soul, that soul is something extra. God put into every Jew a special נשמה, a Godly soul, and that is something that's not part of the nature of the creation of the world. Actually, that didn't happen at the time of the creation, that happened later on by מתן תורה, when השם gave the Jews the תורה, He put into the Jews the Godly soul, which is a life force that He put into the Jews, which is not really originally needed for them to live as a normal human being, and He said, \"I'm putting into you something extra, something Godly, something that's beyond nature. And that becomes part of your life, and that connects to your regular, secular, let's call it, נפש, the נפש הבהמית, נפש החיונית is the one that gives your life. And that gives life to a Jew.\" And that's something that's beyond nature. Here we can't say that it's natural for the two to come together, just like השם made, God made the nature of this being physical, this being spiritual, He made the nature putting them together. Here God puts something beyond nature, and He said, \"I'm going to put into you something that's beyond nature.\" So what we're trying to do when we have a Jew alive, and alive means that he has the body, and in addition to the body, he has this regular soul, which we called the נפש החיונית, נפש הבהמית, the animalistic soul, but besides that, what's giving him life is also something beyond nature. So here we're trying to combine by a Jew the two sides: the body, which is nature, physical, and even the life of the body, which is also natural, which is also, I would call it, physical, part of this physical world, and trying to put that together and unite that with the נפש אלוקית, with the Godly soul that gives the Jew life. Now, again, I'm going to repeat what I said before. If someone says, \"Well, who says there is such a thing as a Godly soul and extra soul? We're all equal human beings, and etc., etc., etc.\" The truth is we're not trying to knock anybody, saying other people that everybody has his mission in this world, true. But someone would say, \"Who says this?\" So again, this is not the class here. For that, you have to have another class to convince you, or I'm sure everyone knows it, but anybody who would be seeing this, and we have another class to convince that there is a נשמה, that every Jew has a נפש אלוקית, as we learn in תניא, which is part of God, which is Godly, spiritual. But we're beyond that. Again, we're here already beyond. We know that there is a God, we know there is a תורה, we know he has a נשמה. So here we have a problem. We have to combine two sides: nature, the normal life of a person, the normal body of the person, and even his normal life, combine it with the נפש אלוקית, with the Godly one, which is not nature. And that's really far, far apart. And I said before that the physical body versus the נפש is two far things apart, it's not really true, I said, because both of them are part of nature. So in nature itself, they're a little bit different, different types of nature, but we do find that we find two types, one more abstract, to mix and get connected to something that's more physical. I'll give you an example. A person could take an idea, a סברא, an idea, and he has it in his physical brain. Now, the physical brain is a piece of meat or whatever it is, tissue, I don't know what you call it, and you have an idea, and an idea is not something that's tangible, and it puts together. This is part of nature. In nature, you have the idea of combining something tangible with something not, matter with something that's not tangible, like an idea, and it goes together because that's how God created it. But we're talking here about combining the נפש אלוקית, the Godly soul, which is beyond nature, with nature. Those are two opposites. Whenever we want to combine two opposites, there has to be a link in between, and that link, the only way it could combine both ends, if it's made up of both sides. It's made up of both sides. We find in חסידות the example in the time of the גמרא, the time of the תנאים and אמוראים, of these sages of the גמרא, of the משנה, When they used to give a lecture, a שיעור, they would have a מתורגמן. מתורגמן is somebody would the literal word means translat- translator, but he wasn't just a translator, he would give over the ideas that the rabbi said. And the reason they needed this מתורגמן was because the rabbi, his ideas were so lofty and so abstract that a regular person could not understand it. So when he spoke, no one understood. So you had to have somebody in between to combine the two, bring the thoughts of the rabbi to them, and that was a מתורגמן. And it says this מתורגמן was somebody was a little bit on the level of the rabbi, and a little bit on the level of the people. Had he been only on the level of the people, he wouldn't understand it himself. Would he be on the level of the rabbi completely, then he's just like the rabbi, he can't explain it. Here you have a person that's not like the rabbi completely, but he's within בערך, means in comparison to the rabbi, also to the people, so he has both ends, and he is one person has both, he is the one that's able to combine the deep thoughts of the rabbi to the people. And that is brought in חסידות as an example that every time we have two extremes which you want to connect together, you have to have something in between which is made up of both sides. Now here we're talking about keeping the נפש in the person, and by a Jew the life of the person is also the נפש אלקית, so we're looking how to keep this godly thing in this physical thing which is the body. So you have to have in between something. So what is it? The food! The food that you eat keeps your נפש in your body. But how does that work? Food is גשמי. Food is physical. We just said that you have to have both ends. You have to have something which is on the side of the physical, something with inside of the godly, and between them, and it's in one object, and and that that connects both sides together. But food is only physical. The truth is food is not only physical. There is the famous saying of the אריז״ל, famous אריז״ל, the biggest מקובל, the אריז״ל, which actually we celebrated his יארצייט just Friday, ה׳ מנחם אב is the יארצייט of the אריז״ל, and the אלטר רבי brings it in many places. And he says like this: there is a פסוק in חומש that says, כי לא על הלחם לבדו יחיה האדם, כי על כל מוצא פי ה׳ יחיה האדם. A person doesn't live just on bread, which means food, bread is an expression means food, you live on the words of God. So the אריז״ל says you know what that means? When a person eats food and that gives him life, it's not the food itself that gives him life. In the food, you have the words of God. Or using the terms of קבלה and חסידות, the food has ניצוצות הקדושה, has godly sparks in it. When a person eats the food, you know what gives him life? The אריז״ל says, based on this פסוק, it's the godly sparks, the godliness that's in the food that gives him life. Now everything has godly sparks, but when you eat the food, what happens is you take these sparks and you elevate them, you take them out, and you separate them, you make them into an separate an entity of godliness, and that gives the person life. Otherwise, there's a big problem. We know that food, which is made up or of things that grow or of an animal, is a lower level than a human being. How could something that's lower than you give you something that you don't have? If a person who is higher doesn't have this life, this health, how does the food do it? The answer is it's not the food, it's the godly sparks that's in the food. And when you eat it, what you're doing is you're taking out this godly sparks, the godliness of it, and that gives you the life. In other words, it comes out like this: that when you eat food, it has two parts to it. We were looking for two parts. We said in order to combine the nature with beyond nature, something in between has to be made up of both. Yes, that's what food is. Food has both: the physical part of the food, that's the physical part of this thing which of this link, and the ניצוצות הקדושה, the godly part of it, that's the spiritual part of the food. So here you have one object which is made up of both, made up of physical and spiritual. And that's able to combine the two sides, able to combine the body, which is physical, with the נפש אלקית, the godliness, which is spiritual and godly, and it's one thing that is in one, and that keeps them together. And that's how the food is able to work, because in order to make a person live, which means to keep, by a Jew, to keep his נפש אלקית together with the גוף, you have to have something in between that will have both ends to it, and that will keep it together. Now just like from the physical end, everyone knows that there are certain rules in food, which food is healthy and which food is not, which food is poison and you shouldn't eat it, it's harmful, which food is beneficial, which food is harmful. And there are so many things. And in the physical part, we know that certain foods, the food itself is no good, don't eat it, it's going to be poison to you, it's going to harm your body. Certain times we say, \"Oh, this is going to harm your body. On itself not, but if you combine it with another thing, oh these two together, oh they won't work, they'll be harmful.\" And many other rules that we find concerning the physical part of the food. Since the food has in it also the spiritual part, there are the same rules for the spiritual part, that certain things are beneficial for the נשמה, and certain things are not. Certain things if you mix them together, they're not beneficial, certain things are you could mix together, certain things if you do to it, just like physically, certain things if you do to the food, it makes it harmful, so too spiritually, from the spiritual aspect of the food, which has a spiritual aspect, also it's harmful. The difference is only when it comes to the physical part, we see it, we understand it, we see how this the doctor would tell you, the nutritionist will tell you that this and this was harmful for you. This mixture is harmful. He sees it because the body is something that we see. The physicality of the of the world is something that we see with our eyes. So we could see which things are good, which things are not. But when it comes to the נשמה part of the food, just like we do not see the נשמה, we do not see and we cannot decide which things are harmful, which things are not, which things is good for the נשמה, which is not, because it's a spiritual thing. We have no way of giving an opinion in what's harmful for the נשמה, what's not. Being the נשמה is godly, and it's a godly thing which we as human beings don't know that, so how could we give an opinion? It's like a mechanic is going to come to a doctor and give an opinion which food you should tell the patient to eat or not. The mechanic is good in his business, he could give you opinions in in how to be a mechanic or what to do to a car, but he can't give you in an opinion in in how to the doctor. So how could we as human beings give an opinion of what's good or what's not? That's why if someone will come and say, \"Well, used to be that כשר was like this, nowadays things changed.\" Who in the world could say that? How do you know? You have to be up there, you have to be spiritual in order to give an opinion in the spiritual. Like you have to be a doctor to give an opinion in medicine, you have to be a spiritual human being. Who can give an opinion? Nobody can give an opinion. The תורה, God, who is the spiritual and he's he could tell us. So therefore, whatever he said we have to keep. But what I'm trying to say is we could understand why there is such a thing. We could understand why there is such a thing as certain food is כשר and certain foods are not. Why? Because the food has the two aspects to it. It has the aspect of the physical and there you have to follow the physical rules, and it has an aspect of spirituality to it and you have to follow the spiritual rules, what's good for the נשמה. Which things are fit, כשר, fit for the נשמה, which are not fit for the נשמה. And that we just have to follow the rules that were given by God, given in the תורה. Actually, there is another word that I mentioned before for things which are forbidden, it's called אסור. Things which are permitted are called מותר. Now the word אסור and מותר has another meaning also. אסור means tied, מותר means untied. It's another translation to the word אסור and מותר. Things which are forbidden means it's tied in such a way that you cannot release the godly sparks that's there that should have an effect on you, so you can't release it. If you can't release it, you can't eat it because the whole purpose of the food is that when you eat it, it gives nourishment to your נשמה. It gives nourishment to the body, gives nourishment to the נשמה too, because it has supposed to connect the two. But אסור means it's tied. It's tied down, it's connected to something else and you can't release it. מותר means you're allowed to eat it because you could release it, it's untied. You could release those godly sparks, the godliness in it, and bring it into your נשמה. Now one might ask a very simple question. If I'm saying that we're trying to combine the נשמה, the life of a ייד together with the body, and that only happens if you eat כשר food, because otherwise it's like eating poison, just like you could eat poison, it'll harm the body, you could eat poison, harm the נשמה, but if so, if a person eats non-כשר, the his life should be different. It should have an effect on his life, just like when a person eats food which is not healthy, it has an effects on his life. Why doesn't this? The truth is it does, but we just don't see it, and God made that we shouldn't feel it, because imagine if a person would see that by eating not כשר food you get a stomach ache, or not eating כשר food, if you eat non-כשר food you get sick, everyone is going to keep כשר without having a free choice. God wants us to have free choice, so he says, \"I'm going to make it so that you shouldn't be able to see it, and therefore you could keep, not keep כשר, and still eat and still be\" healthy, no one sees. But because He doesn't want it forced upon us, because He wants us to have free choice. But otherwise, but the explanation what really happens here is that if you eat food which is not כשר, it's detrimental for your נשמה. And that makes sense. So, like I said before, reason for each individual thing why, we don't know, we don't care. But it's not up for us to know anyway because we can't know. We are not in that level to know the spiritual things, and therefore why this is spiritually good, this is spiritually, because we're not in that level. But the general idea that there are rules of כשרות, which have nothing to do with the physical aspect of the food, that makes sense. Because it has to be, if it's going to have a connection to the נשמה, to the נפש, then certainly there has to be some spiritual rules, just like we understand, everyone understands why there are rules in food which are good and which are not. So, obviously, the second half has to be the same, so that's what כשרות is. Certain things are good, certain things are not, certain combinations are good, certain things not, certain time of the year. Just like in food itself, certain time of the year, certain foods you shouldn't eat. You shouldn't eat certain things certain time of the year because it's no good for your נשמה. It's harmful for the נשמה. And same thing if you did something to it, just like physically. And certain times they tell you not to eat at all because the body has to rest, whatever it is. Spiritually, there are times you have to fast, and you shouldn't eat at all. Why? Because, well, certain like יום כיפור we know the reason, whatever. But that's, makes sense that there should be these rules. But the truth is, I want to say, as much as I said we do not see the effects of non-כשר food, but it's not really 100% true. There are effects that we do see by not eating, by eating non-כשר food. Now, I'm not going to try to convince you, or convince anybody, or try to prove it, I'm just saying the way we see it. If a person eats non-כשר food, it definitely has an effect on the person's outlook on spirituality. A person's outlook on proper behavior, the way God wants us to behave. And I remember the רבי once explained this, and it's written in ספרים even years ago, that if people do not eat כשר food, eat, don't care, are not careful with כשר, has an effect that they lose the איידלקייט, the the refinement of having some kind of feeling towards spirituality. And that is the reason the רבי said why you find so many people, so many Jewish people that do not have any feeling towards אידישקייט, toward Judaism, towards Godliness, to anything like that. And one of the reasons is because of the food that they eat. The expression in חסידות is that non-כשר food is מטמטם הלב והמוח, it stuffs up your brain and your heart. That means it makes the person harder to have any feeling, being a vessel to receive anything that's spiritual. Sometimes you see, and I've seen it, you have certain children in school that have pretty good intellect and head, they have pretty good heads, and when it comes to the secular studies, they do fine, they're A students. When it comes to learning a piece of גמרא and learning a מאמר חסידות, learning something תורה, it doesn't go into their head. And not because they're lazy, they don't want to learn, there's just some blockage there. It's strange. I can understand some people have better heads and they learn better, some not, but it should be all the same. Why is it that when it comes to learn a פסוק חומש, that's hard for them to grasp? When it comes to learn math, they grasp it very easily, so obviously they have a good head and they could understand. It's all connected, I wouldn't say all, but it has a connection to the food that you eat. We know, like I said before, that it gives the characteristics of the thing gives to the food. We know, especially by food, food is the only thing that goes inside you and becomes part of you. Everything else, when you get dressed, clothes is something that enhances the person, makes you get respect if you're dressed nicely, it has an effect on the person, but it's still on the outside. Food goes inside. What's the expression? You are what you eat. Yes, you are what you eat. And therefore, when you eat non-כשר food, you know, your body is made up of things which are spiritually harmful. And therefore, it makes it harder for you to be connected to the spirituality. Like I said, I'm not trying to convince, people will say, \"Well, I know other reasons, I know other people have this and this.\" I'm not trying to, I'm just telling you my feeling and what other people feel and what it says in ספרים and and a lot of times I've seen it. And then later when you start to change your diet and you start eating כשר food, you could see a change, and it happened many times. I wouldn't say always, I know there are cases not like that, but I'm just saying there is something to it that it has an effect on the person. So, this is the important importance of why we have to keep כשר, because this has to do with the נשמה, because the food affects the נשמה, not only the body, because it makes you alive, and a Jew's life is also the נשמה, נפש אלוקית, this is what you have the food. Now, there are a lot of people who unfortunately think they're keeping כשר and they're really not. There are some people, let's just give an example, they eat keep כשר at home and outside they don't. Now, I'm not saying the part that they keep is bad. On the contrary, what they keep at home, as we would say in Hebrew, תבוא עליהם ברכה, very good. We can't say, \"Because you don't keep כשר on the outside, that's why you shouldn't keep כשר at home either,\" God forbid. Any little thing that you do, any good thing that you do is good. We can't mix the two. Some people say, \"Well, I think makes no sense. Why? Because I'm a hypocrite. If I eat non-כשר food outside, I could eat it in the house.\" It's not true. You're not a hypocrite. Whatever good that you do is do and whatever you don't is you don't. It's not like the same thing that you're contradicting each other. Each one is a separate entity. You're keeping כשר now. You ate You didn't eat something that's forbidden, that's fine. When you did something, you ate something forbidden, that's no good. But don't mix. And the truth is it's not only by כשרות, and it's a mistake that a lot of people make in Judaism בכלל. Tell a guy, \"Please put on תפילין.\" He says, \"How could I put on תפילין if I don't keep כשר?\" It's not true. Each מצוה is a מצוה. You have to keep כשר, you have to put on תפילין. The fact that you don't keep כשר doesn't mean you shouldn't put on תפילין. Each מצוה is a separate and each מצוה is a gain, each מצוה is a connection to God, and you got to do it. That doesn't mean that it's enough, you got to do the other thing also. And the same thing with כשר. But the bottom line is this person who's doing is not really keeping 100% כשר, because the time when he doesn't eat כשר, he's not eating כשר. But some people make a mistake. Some people think that they'll buy כשר meat, but they'll use one set of dishes, one set of pots, so they mix it together. That's a problem. That's not כשר. So, there are certain things that people don't know, are not aware, but to really, the part that they do is done and the part that they don't is not. And then there are so many other details in כשרות that some people are not aware, and it's important to know, which I'm sure that you learned here, but just to mention just a few, just like I mentioned now, the concept of having two sets of dishes, what I just want to explain that maybe for a moment since we get into a little bit of the the הלכה of it, because we know that not only can't you mix milk and meat, let's say milk and meat, but you can't even have a taste of milk come into the meat or a taste of meat come into the milk. When you cook something in a pot, the pot, the walls of the pot absorb the taste of the food that you cooked in it. So, if you cook milk in a pot, that pot absorbed the taste of the milk. Now if you're going to cook meat in it, the meat, when you cook, two things happen: it absorbs and it also gives out. The meat that you'll be cooking in this pot will also take out from the pot, from the walls of the pot, the taste of the milk. So now you'll have a little bit of milk coming into the meat, that makes it טרף. And it's not only by milk and meat. If you have, if you cook כשר food in a non-כשר dish, you got a problem, because if you cooked non-כשר food in a pot, the pot absorbed the taste of the non-כשר food. Now when you're going to cook כשר food in it, it's going to absorb some of the taste that's in the walls of the pot into the כשר food. So now you'll have in the כשר food, you will have the taste of non-כשר food, which is forbidden. There are a lot of details to this. Depends how much and how big and there are all kinds of measurements and things, I'm just giving the general idea. From here comes the idea of כשר'ינג כלים. When you have a vessel that became non-כשר, became טרף, by mistake, or originally it was used by somebody who didn't keep כשר, by a גוי or somebody who didn't keep כשר, in order to use that vessel, you have to כשר it. What you have to do is go through a process that what it'll do, it'll take the taste that's in the walls of this pot, the טריפה taste, and it will take it out that it won't be there anymore. And there are so many rules how to כשר. The general rule of כשר'ינג is או הגעלה או ליבון. Some things you could כשר by putting it, dipping into hot water, and the hot water will take out that taste and now it becomes כשר. Certain things you could כשר only by fire, with a torch or putting it into a fire. Certain things you cannot כשר at all, because whatever you'll do, the תורה tells us that the taste will never come out, like earthenware you cannot כשר. Things that absorbed non-כשר food through water, through liquid, you could כשר it by hot water, like Like I said, things which absorb not through liquid, through heat, let's say you baked cookies on a non-כשר cookies on a cookie sheet, so the cookie sheet absorbed the taste of the non-כשר cookies not by liquid, through heat. To כשר that, you have to have it through fire, that's the only way. These are the rules. And then there are in the water itself there's כלי ראשון, כלי שני, there are all kinds of things. And then there is the idea of who cooked the food, how it was cooked, so that's another level as I mentioned before that you have to make sure that it was cooked by a ייד, not by a non-Jew, and also the wine, and so many other details. But the main thing is we have to know that when we eat, when we keep כשר, we're benefiting for the body and benefiting for the soul, and that makes us more vessels to be able to connect to Godliness, and we're able to study תורה more, and we're able to be close to השם much more. It makes us much more refined, and that's why we have to keep כשר. But I don't know about that's why, we have to keep כשר because השם said so, and that's it, that's the bottom line. And if we do what השם says, He will do what He said to us, that He said, \"If you keep My מצוות, I will do My part, I will give you everything that you need.\" And the main thing is to bring משיח, especially now that we're in the Nine Days, right before תשעה באב, certainly this is what we're asking for, השם should bring משיח and take us out of גלות and build the בית המקדש.