Part III. The Miracle of Emunah
Flame of Emunah
And so we understand now what the menorah’s light is telling us. When you
light the flame of Chanukah what is it saying? It's saying one word that is the
secret of our success: It’s emunah. The Chanukah light is the light of emunah.
Now, emunah is understood by the world as ‘believing’, but that's not the real
meaning of the word. To believe, you have to know, is a secondary meaning of the
word. The original and primary meaning of emunah means ‘steadfast’; to continue
without any change.
When it states that Moshe Rabbeinu had to raise his hands up – during the
war against Amalek his hands were weary so they put two stones under his arms
to keep them up. וַיְהִי†יָדָיו†אֱמוּנָה†עַד†בֹּא†הַשָּֽׁמֶשׁ†– And his hands were emunah until
sundown (Shmos 17:12).
His hands were believing? Hands can’t believe. וַיְהִי†יָדָיו†אֱמונָּה†means his hands
were steadfast. He didn’t take down his hands. They didn't move from their place.
That's the meaning. It has nothing to do with believing. His hands didn’t weaken;
they didn’t falter.
Stubborn Loyalty
That’s a whole new understanding of what emunah means. A person who
once heard and he understood why you have to be a good Jew, it's not enough
Yes, he believes. He's convinced. But a person can yield his loyalty. All kinds of
things turn up in life that might make him hesitate or weaken.
Emunah means that once you know the truth then you have to be stubborn
in your loyalty to hold onto that truth. Not to be frightened off or to be tempted,
to be bribed. New fads, new ideas and ideals, new ways, ‘better’ ways, mean
nothing to the man of emunah. He’s going to remain loyal to the principles of the
Torah no matter what.
Even if you don’t know much, but the middah of loyalty says you won’t budge.
Let’s say you’re an ‘ignoramus’. You never went to college. You never read a book.
All you know is nothing but Shas. You know no science at all. You never studied
geology, you never studied biology, you don’t know anything. And here somebody
comes and tells you, “Look, there are fossils and the fossils are so many millions of
years old and they’re arranged one on top of the other in such a sequence that it
proves conclusively that one animal developed into another animal and evolution
is a proven fact and you people are going against the most open evidence. Even
the Department of Education of New York State says so!”
Ignorant Loyalists
Now, you’re not schooled in these things. You don’t know how to answer.
What are you expected to do? You’re expected to say, “They can bring all the
evidence in the world. When I was at Har Sinai, I gave my promise to my beloved
One. I said ‘na’aseh v’nishma’ and nothing in the world will ever cause me to budge
from my promise. I gave my word. I promised with all the fire of which I am capable
and I’m going to stick to that through thick and thin. If you’ll skin me alive, that’s
what I’m going to hold onto till the end of my life.”
That’s what it means to be a Jew. To be a Jew doesn’t mean that you’re a
scientist and you can answer. We can answer by the way. We can make monkeys
out of the people who think they came from monkeys. We can expose it as one of
the most vicious hoaxes that ever appeared in history. There is material without
end to show how false, how malicious, how schemingly planned the hoax of
evolution and geology is arranged. The whole thing!
I’d love to speak about this – not tonight – to ridicule them, to show what
fakers they are, what criminal frauds they are. I’ll quote from their own books that
the admission of their weakness is so widespread in every field of biology, in every
field of geology, one contradicts the other and they admit their weaknesses and
it’s nothing but wishful thinking. Ridiculous lies!
But suppose you don’t know anything. Suppose you don’t know what to say.
It makes no difference! You have to say, “Emunah.” Emunah means not ‘belief’.
Emunah means loyalty. That’s the meaning of the word.
Standing Strong
We are always ne’eman no matter what. Come against us with your culture.
Come against us with new attitudes. Come with all of your blandishments. We’re
not interested. We already gave our word and we are loyal to Him forever.
And even if you come with your armies, no matter; we already gave our word.
That’s what the Chashmonaim said. When they saw that the Syrians-Greeks with
their powerful army and their wealthy government were undertaking a gezeiras
hashmad against us, Matisyahu told the people, “Forget about that! There is no
such thing as extinguishing the fire that burns in our hearts.”
And he rekindled in the hearts of the people that light of steadfastness,
ne’emanus, not to yield. We are always ne’eman no matter what! You’ll chase us
into caves? So be it. You’ll light fires at the cave entrances and smoke us out? We
still won’t yield. And therefore when Mattisyahu raised his sword it was a sword of
emunah. That's the foundation of the entire story of Chanukah, the middah of
loyalty.
Guarding the Loyal
And that’s why they eventually won their battles. They won battles on the
battlefield not because of special fighting tactics. No; they won battles because of
the fires they lit in their hearts. אֱמוּנִים†נֹצֵר†ה†' – Hashem guards the loyal ones
(Tehillim 31:24). Because they have the middah of ne’emanus, Hashem has a special
protection for them.
Loyalty is a middah that Hakadosh Baruch Hu prizes. עֵינַי†בְּנֶאֶמְנֵי†אֶרֶץ†– His eyes
are watching over His loyal ones (ibid. 101:6). And when it's done by the entire
nation – by a majority at least – when everybody is loyal to Hakadosh Baruch Hu,
so you can have a nes Chanukah.
Now this is a very important lesson for us. We baruch Hashem don’t have that
today – we’re not running away into the mountains to do mitzvos – but we need
that same emunah. We have to be very careful. On all sides we have ideas and
minhagim of the people around us. Modern Orthodox are changing. They're
dropping some frum practices, adopting some gentile ideas. Little by little the
modern Orthodox are changing. I say modern Orthodox – today even the good
ones, the best, the frummest, are weakening before Western culture, before the
attitudes and ideals of the outside world.
So Chanukah comes and tells us that we have to be ultra-frum; ultra-frum
means we won't change. We refuse to change because our stubborn loyalty won’t
allow us to yield at all.
Tradition, Tradition!
Not only minhagim; that’s easier already. You have to set yourself free from
the darkness of the world around you. You have to let loose from the media.
There’s no in-between. You have to do whatever you can to be loyal, to not yield
at all to the ideas outside. Only Torah ideas. Only Torah ideals. Otherwise, you
have the goy living in your head. And you can’t be a successful person if you have
a goy in your head – it doesn’t matter, a Greek goy, an American goy, an Israeli goy;
whatever it is, it’s not a loyal head.
In dress too. Why should you yield? I saw a Jew, a Williamsburger Jew on
Kings Highway. He has to do business here. He has a kapote. He has peyos. He's
walking like he's in his shtetl at home. He's doing business with all kinds of people.
He goes in stores and he’s trying to sell them merchandise. He's not embarrassed.
The world belongs to him. You see this man doesn't have any chashash, any fear at
all of inferiority. That's a ne’eman. That man is loyal.
Loyal Forever
That’s what the Chanukah light says: Be loyal! Love your G-d. You promised
once. We promised and therefore we’re going to keep our promise through thick
and thin. That’s what it says at the end of Shir HaShirim, מַיִם†רַבִּים†לאֹ†יוּכְלוּ†לְכַבּוֹת†אֶת
האַָהֲבהָ†– many waters will never be able to quench that love, ונּהְָרותֹ†לאֹ†ישְִׁטְפוהָּ†– and
rivers will not sweep it away (Shir Hashirim 8:7). That’s what we say to the outside
world: “Try all you want but you won’t be able to put out that fire that we kindled
on Chanukah.”
Some will drop off, yes. Many have fallen by the wayside. They yielded to
various kinds of temptation. It’s the truth; some have weakened in their loyalty. A
tragedy, a tragedy. There always will be some stragglers, but through thick and
thin the Jewish nation will cling to the promise they made at Sinai until the end of
time.
And that's going to be the clarion call of the geulah. Like it says in Yeshaya,
פתִּחְ†ו†שְׁערָ†יִם†– Open up the gates. Who will come in? וְיָבֹא†גוֹי†צַדִּיק†שֹׁמֵר†אֱמֻנִים†– The
righteous nation who guarded their loyalty (26:2). The time will come when the
gates of Eretz Yisroel will open up and the Jewish nation will come again back to
their homeland. Why? Because they're שׁמֵֹר†אמֱֻניִם†, they guarded their loyalty.
Those Jews who yielded, who fell by the wayside, no. They fell in love with
American civilization or with British civilization and they gave their children to
the colleges instead of the yeshivos, no that’s not loyalty. And even the frummeh
who weaken and yield and vacillate, no, that’s not emunim. But those Jews who
learned the lesson of the Chanukah flame, the flame of loyalty, and remained
faithful to their principles, to Hashem; they're the ones who will come back again
and be with Him forever.
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