Ready To Change
Ahhhhhh - PLEASE OPEN YOU HEARTS to words of Rav Shlomo Ben Rav Naftali:
The Torah tells us that, after the Jews crossed through the Red Sea, "the Sea returned to its strength." The gemara says, (Rashi brings it on the verse) do not read it as "strength" but as "condition,". The Red Sea returned to its original condition. Hashem, when He created the Red Sea, made a condition with it that, on the seventh night of Pesach, when the Jews will be by the shores of the Red Sea, the Sea should split open and allow them to pass through.
So, everybody asks, wasn't it when the Sea split open that it went back to its original condition, when it fulfilled the condition Hashem made with it and not when it became water again?
Hashem makes conditions, not only with the Sea. Hashem makes a condition with every person in the world. Hashem tells each person, "There will be one moment in your life when you can save somebody else's life, there will be a moment when you can do the greatest thing, which I created you for, but - you have to be ready to be something else. To go out of your way. Water, to become dry land, to become anything in the world. The deepest secret of life is that, I always have to be what I am, but there are moments I have to be not what I am also.
But, forget about time schedules. People have soul-schedules also. What's going on today with our establishment? According to their schedule, the way the world is today doesn't fit in. So, they just ignore it. For instance, during the Holocaust, they didn't do anything, right? Because it was not in their schedule. Twenty years later, now, it's part of their schedule to talk about it... In the sixties we lost thousands of kids to drugs. They didn't talk about it because it was not on their agenda. What's going on in Eretz Yisrael now? They all talk about the Arabs. What about inside? We are losing our kids, thousands of kids, but it's not on their agenda.
How about changing? From ocean, become dry land! Be something else.
When you love somebody very much, what is the acid test? If you really love somebody - are you ready to change for that person, even for just a moment?
The gemara says that finding your soulmate is like crossing the Red Sea. Everybody asks, why does Hashem call out, forty days before a person is born, who his soulmate is? Because, for two people to find each other and live together, everybody living on their schedule all the time, they will never make it, right? I am I, and you are you. Unless they are like the Red Sea. When Hashem created the Red Sea, at that time, He put in the condition that there will come a moment that it will have to stop being a sea and become dry land. But this is a heavenly power. You cannot do it after you have been created. It must come from before. Because change is the hardest thing in the world. That kind of change is not from this world. It's as deep as when Hashem created the world. Therefore, when a person is born, a condition is already made that you will marry this Chanele, but, for this Chanele, I want you to change a thousand times.
Now I want to go one step deeper. Why does the Torah say that the Red Sea went back to its original condition? Here is the deepest Torah in the world. What happens to you if you refuse to change? You know what happens to you? You might say: "Okay, at least I am what I am." But, really, you are nothing. You know what the Torah says? When was the Red Sea really a sea? After it was ready to change. When are you really what you are? Only if you can be anything for somebody you love. And, when the Sea returned to its original condition, suddenly, it was really a sea, a real sea. Now its water was really water. When Mashiach is coming, "kamayim layam mechasim" (as water covers the sea) - the waters of the Red Sea, such deep waters, waters that are ready to change to save peoples lives.
The Torah tells us that, after the Jews crossed through the Red Sea, "the Sea returned to its strength." The gemara says, (Rashi brings it on the verse) do not read it as "strength" but as "condition,". The Red Sea returned to its original condition. Hashem, when He created the Red Sea, made a condition with it that, on the seventh night of Pesach, when the Jews will be by the shores of the Red Sea, the Sea should split open and allow them to pass through.
So, everybody asks, wasn't it when the Sea split open that it went back to its original condition, when it fulfilled the condition Hashem made with it and not when it became water again?
Hashem makes conditions, not only with the Sea. Hashem makes a condition with every person in the world. Hashem tells each person, "There will be one moment in your life when you can save somebody else's life, there will be a moment when you can do the greatest thing, which I created you for, but - you have to be ready to be something else. To go out of your way. Water, to become dry land, to become anything in the world. The deepest secret of life is that, I always have to be what I am, but there are moments I have to be not what I am also.
But, forget about time schedules. People have soul-schedules also. What's going on today with our establishment? According to their schedule, the way the world is today doesn't fit in. So, they just ignore it. For instance, during the Holocaust, they didn't do anything, right? Because it was not in their schedule. Twenty years later, now, it's part of their schedule to talk about it... In the sixties we lost thousands of kids to drugs. They didn't talk about it because it was not on their agenda. What's going on in Eretz Yisrael now? They all talk about the Arabs. What about inside? We are losing our kids, thousands of kids, but it's not on their agenda.
How about changing? From ocean, become dry land! Be something else.
When you love somebody very much, what is the acid test? If you really love somebody - are you ready to change for that person, even for just a moment?
The gemara says that finding your soulmate is like crossing the Red Sea. Everybody asks, why does Hashem call out, forty days before a person is born, who his soulmate is? Because, for two people to find each other and live together, everybody living on their schedule all the time, they will never make it, right? I am I, and you are you. Unless they are like the Red Sea. When Hashem created the Red Sea, at that time, He put in the condition that there will come a moment that it will have to stop being a sea and become dry land. But this is a heavenly power. You cannot do it after you have been created. It must come from before. Because change is the hardest thing in the world. That kind of change is not from this world. It's as deep as when Hashem created the world. Therefore, when a person is born, a condition is already made that you will marry this Chanele, but, for this Chanele, I want you to change a thousand times.
Now I want to go one step deeper. Why does the Torah say that the Red Sea went back to its original condition? Here is the deepest Torah in the world. What happens to you if you refuse to change? You know what happens to you? You might say: "Okay, at least I am what I am." But, really, you are nothing. You know what the Torah says? When was the Red Sea really a sea? After it was ready to change. When are you really what you are? Only if you can be anything for somebody you love. And, when the Sea returned to its original condition, suddenly, it was really a sea, a real sea. Now its water was really water. When Mashiach is coming, "kamayim layam mechasim" (as water covers the sea) - the waters of the Red Sea, such deep waters, waters that are ready to change to save peoples lives.
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