Guarding Your Seed of Eternity

1. Class Description:

There is a fascinating conversation recorded in the Talmud. Two Talmudic sages are dining together, when one asks the other to share an idea. The response? “Never talk while you eat, lest you choke on the food!” After the meal, he obliges to his colleague’s request, and makes a radical statement: “Jacob, our father, never died!”

But wait. The conversation grows stranger. The sage continues: “Whoever mentions the name of the famous Biblical harlot Rachav, experiences an immediate seminal emission.”

And then, before they depart, he asks his colleague to bless him. The sage engages in a long metaphor as an introduction to the final blessing: May your children be like you.

What are we to make of this conversation? What is the logic behind the sequence of their dialogue? This class will show how this Talmudic episode reveals the Jewish perspective on the seed of life, the essence of life, and how Judaism looks at man’s drive to reproduce. Is it merely, as Darwin wants us to believe, a drive fueled by self-propagation, or is there something holier and infinitely more powerful in the act of reproduction?

Heavy ideas. I need to think about this!

Wow!!! Thanks so much for this fantastic shiur!!!! I'll applye it to my own life if I can!!!!

Thank you for your weekly dose of Chassidic analysis on the weekly Torah portion! It is intellectually stimulating and spiritually nourishing for the mind and soul. Yasher Koach!

I did not view the shiur yet. However, the Rebbes father, in Likkutei Levi Yitzchak, has at least a thirty page exposition on the Gemara quoted above

The song at the end of the class on the words of the Talmud you exponded on was a really nice treat.

how can we send it to freinds can you add this fiture??

In the meantime, you can email them a link.

I am always so very inspired by the Rabbi's lectures!
Ilan, Ilan( the song) made me think again about my beloved cousin's son, Ilan Ramon, who's memory will be etched in my soul forever.
He lives on as well....

So strong.
so many boys need to hear this.

Percise words, thats make us understand and feel the importance of how to conduct our precious life!
thank you!

Accroding to Rav Nachmans answer to Rav Yitzchak it is shver why the Gemara wrote "Kol' Ha'omer" Lechoirah if it is referring to yoda'ah umakirah it should have said so from the outset?

That's a question not on the class. Obviously Reb Yitzchak meant: Anyone who knew her who says Rochan Rochav. This happens often that the Gemarah qualifies a statement. the wording "kal" is telling us the novel idea that by just saying her name one expereinces a seminal discharge.

in the pdf to the class.
on th eenglish side.
it says sourse one comes from the talmud sotah
it probebly is ment to be talmud tanis.

thanks.

the custem in Yerushlayim is reserved only during the funerel of a father not of a mother, and the reason is understood as explained in the lesson
kol tuv

B"H
3. Questions and Exercises
1. What is the logic behind the sequence of the four statements made by Rabbi Yitzchak to Rabbi Nachman?
The logic can be easily summed up in French “Shershe la fam”. (It’s not always about a woman presented in a process but lack of a right one as well.)
It might be true both on personal level and Divine. That’s why G-d chose us to be his spouse.
Just recall historical sequence: polygamic people, their elimination in Flood and oil as the result of G-d’s first experience… And now we wonder why oil brings so many destructions... (Do I sound heretical?)
2. What is the meaning of the statement, “Jacob our father did not die.”
I am not sure that Rabbi Yitzchak meant exactly the same but as we can read between the lines... Jacob was blessed with a lot of things but his wives were best of his blessings.
Who made him so productive?
Standing in line for having him for a night they never left him a chance to “escape with fantasies”... As a result he gave birth to a very healthy generation of Jews, who perpetuate his life both in physical and spiritual dimension.
3. Who was Rachav?
She was a great grandma of many prophets and prophetesses.
Why does mentioning her name twice have such a powerful impact?
She had a great power to transform reality for those who knew her to the point that transformation had been revealed not only spiritually but physically as well ( Two times, different dimensions). Rabbi Yitzchak gave her as an example of transformation spiritual into physical and visa verso.
My opinion is that it has nothing to do with those cases of “wasteful emission of seeds intentionally”. It comes to a category of Divine mystery. Difference between these two cases is similar to difference between killing intentionally and unintentionally…
4. Why does Judaism strongly oppose the wasteful emission of seed?
Because it equates of killing a life intentionally on a physical level. On spiritual level, as the most sacred element of the universe, it draws most destructive forces into micro and macro cosmos…
5. Why were Jacob’s children permitted to follow his coffin, notwithstanding the Kabbalistic caution against this?
Because there was no “feculence” or “slime” arousing from his past. He managed to channel all his passion productively.

6. What was the deeper meaning of the blessing of Rabbi Yitzchak to Rabbi Nachman that “Your children should be like you” ?
He gave his teacher the most powerful blessing for all his life or he might just flatter his habits.

It took me close to a week to ponder just what I wanted to write and how to write it. Now I want to post it before the next shiur.
Rabbi Jacobson, as only he can, took a very sensitive subject, spoke about it with dignity, based all his words on Talmudic sources, without any tinge of the topic being "difficult" to transmit. That's no easy feat.
I am a woman, and the "take-home pay" was for me and not just men. Rabbi Jacobson, Yasher Kochacha once again.
I am eternally grateful to David and Eda Schottenstein for their unbelievable generosity and commitment to these one-of-a-kind shiurim.

cool art-oh and great class too- especially as I work on a collage campus and this issue comes up from time to time

so what are to say about Avrohom Yizchok Moshe etc...?

Thanks for your Shiruim. how do we understand Avrahom Yitzchok Moshe ...........? only Yaakov every seed of life is "Bachayim" ?

Thanks
Eli

As said in class, Avraham and yitzhcak were not mitasei shlaymah, so one part of them went to eisav and yishmael, and got lost. But with yaakov all of him is bachayim.
He is the father of kelal Yisroel, every Jew comes from him. And every jew will do teshuvah. So all of him is bachayim.

Clearly, you have had the spiritual strength to tackle this issue for our time, deal with it in the forum of spiritual struggle and conveyed the essence of the issue ---> our ability to win over our own evil inclination. Kol HaKavod! May you continue to provide elevation and inspiration on the most intimate subjects to many souls around the world.

BH

Very nice Shiur. Thank you Rabbi Jacobson.