Alcohol, Drugs, and Morality Among Orthodox Teens

I'd like to begin by trying to provide a little bit of a halachic context for tonight's Leil Iyun. I think what we all know it's something we review every year during this season of Yamim Noraim that the process of teshuva begins with hakaras hachait. That we have to begin by identifying and acknowledging bechait the shortcoming, the inadequacy, less euphemistically, the sin. Hakaras hachait in turn is only possible as a result of a cheshbon hanefesh. Certainly the magnitude and dimensions of a problem require cheshbon hanefesh. Only if there's an introspection, an honest, unrestrained introspection can we identify and appreciate the magnitude and dimension of problems which we have to confront. Generally we associate teshuva with a yachid, with the individual. But there is a concept in halacha of teshuvos hatzibbur as well, that the community also has to undertake to do teshuva. The Gemara in Taanis in daf yud bais tells us that when Beis Din would decree a taanis because of some dire set of circumstances, Beis Din and the Zekeinim would devote the first half of the day to be meayen bemilei demosa, to understand what went wrong and why. Thus the halachic context for tonight's Leil Iyun is that it's a communal cheshbon hanefesh. I for one was not aware of the timing when we were trying to find an appropriate night which fit everyone's schedule, but the fact that it's the night before Behab begins makes it a time when traditionally Jews fast the Monday, Thursday, Monday after Succos, after Pesach, makes it an appropriate time for such a communal cheshbon hanefesh. And though the second of this evening's two speakers lacks the credentials both of Beis Din and זקן זה שקנה חכמה, but nevertheless let's try to come to grips with the problem and see what efforts we can make to address the problem. If we harbored any illusions that maybe the problems of alcohol, drugs, and promiscuity don't exist within our communities, then surely these illusions were shattered by Rav Dr. Twerski's sobering presentation. And as he so eloquently presented, denial, even if it were possible, maybe a short-term palliative but in the long term is a formula for disaster. Perhaps to help us appreciate what we basically intuitively sense of just how serious the issues involved are, let's review some of the issurim involved. Again, I think we all intuitively sense that these are very serious issurim. Intuitively we sense that a Torah lifestyle is one of discipline, is one of self-restraint, and any behavior which encourages loss of all restraint, of all self-discipline is antithetical to a Torah lifestyle. But what specifically are some of the issurim involved with drugs and alcohol? HaRav Soloveitchik, zichrono livracha, in an article he wrote over 30 years ago, and apparently already then he wasn't theorizing, but he was responding and reacting to facts on the ground, discussed some of the issurim involved in drug use. He pointed first to the Ramban's exposition of Kedoshim Tihyu. Kedoshim Tihyu according to the Ramban demands of us prudent and moderate involvement with devarim gashmiyim, with physicality. Certainly partaking of alcohol and drugs for recreational, non-medicinal purposes is the antithesis of Kedoshim Tihyu. But you can't help but think if that was the best. That a gadol of Reb Aharon's stature could come up with, Kedoshim Tihiyu? Can't you be a good Jew without being a kadosh? That was the best that he could come up with, that drug use is a violation of Kedoshim Tihiyu? So the truth is he goes on to enumerate many other isurim. One or two of others we'll mention. But to understand this, we have to call to mind another remarkable passage in the Ramban. This is a passage to which my father, zichrono livracha, first called my attention. The Ramban discusses what isurim does the ben sorer umoreh violate? The ben sorer umoreh, right, the wayward son. He steals in order to support his habit of eating and drinking gluttonously. So the Ramban says, okay, but now let's let's talk in very concrete halachic terms. On what count are we indicting him? So this is a remarkable Ramban. The Ramban says: So you know what the ben sorer umoreh is guilty of? The ben sorer umoreh is guilty of Kedoshim Tihiyu. His gluttonous, unrestrained, addictive behavior, he violates Kedoshim Tihiyu. And we all know what what course of action the Torah prescribes for the ben sorer umoreh. So what do you see from the Ramban? That yeah, there are many, many levels of kedusha. And of course the higher levels of kedusha that we only dream about, we probably don't even understand them enough to dream about, yeah, of course we can be good good Jews without attaining those high, rarefied levels of kedusha. But there are very basic levels of kedusha which form the lifeblood of what it means to be a Jew, of what it means to be a mentsh. And the most basic definitions and the most basic components of kedusha, so that's not just to be an especially holy and pious individual, no, that's just to maintain the most basic moral fiber which a Jew has to have. And hence the Ramban says the ben sorer umoreh is guilty of Kedoshim Tihiyu. Now obviously the point is not rachmana litzlan to to insinuate that there's any kind of equation between someone who who abuses alcohol and drugs and the ben sorer umoreh. Obviously rachmana litzlan that's not the insinuation. But the point is that if Reb Aharon tells us that that using drugs, abusing drugs, using, abusing alcohol is a violation of Kedoshim Tihiyu, it's not something which we can cavalierly dismiss. There are other isurim which which he lists also. I'm not going to go through the whole list, but another very, very important isur in this context and in many other contexts in contemporary society, which the Shulchan Aruch in Hilchos Shabbos discusses, is that of girus yetzer hara. There's an isur to be megareh the yetzer hara, which literally means to incite or inflame the yetzer hara. The yetzer hara means is that sort of, in esoteric terms, is that aggregate of of drives and urges, many of which are very carnal, which a person has. Let's use that as a an inadequate but working definition of yetzer hara. We all have a yetzer hara. Without the yetzer hara, the world wouldn't continue, Chazal tell us. We all have the yetzer hara. The greatest, the greatest have yetzer haras. Certainly certainly the rest of us. We all have yetzer haras. Say Chazal, it's osur to be megareh the yetzer hara. To incite the yetzer hara is osur. Certainly anything which causes a person to be uninhibited is certainly a form of girus yetzer hara. The loss of inhibition which results from partaking of alcohol, partaking of drugs, is girus yetzer hara, is inciting and inflaming in one of its worst and crudest forms. In terms of other types of again what we're referring to euphemistically as immoral and dangerous behavior, the Chofetz Chaim paskens to sort of fast-forward to the 20th-century hachraa that the isur of nidah which carries with it the excision is also classified under the rubric of arayos, which are one of the cardinal aveiros in Yahadus. It's one of those aveiros for which the Torah prescribes yehareg ve'al ya'avor, for which a person is supposed to suffer martyrdom rather than succumb and violate the issur. So certainly issur niddah, any young woman over the age of 12 who is presumed to have already reached the stage of niddus, is certainly not an issur which we take lightly. Anything which is any type of chibuk v'nishuk, any type of contact which shows the slightest bit of chiba, of affection, is also prohibited under the lav לא תקרבו לגלות ערווה. So there's no need to belabor the point, what we're dealing with here are very serious issurim. Now the issue is a very complex one, and obviously there are many reasons and contributing factors. I have neither the time nor the competence to offer a Torah perspective on all the relevant factors. So I'd like to perhaps, as a Yehudah v'od likra, somewhat redundantly and in a superfluous fashion, echo some of the themes which Harav Doctor Twerski has already articulated. And I'd like to focus specifically on the role of parenting, of chinuch, and societal values. But please allow me to be very clear in this point. I'm not simplistically suggesting that parental neglect or improper chinuch is the sole cause of the current epidemic, and that hence improved parenting and upgraded chinuch would be a panacea. I don't even mean to suggest that parenting, chinuch, and societal values are even relevant in every case. Obviously every case is unique and every case has to be dealt with on an ad hominem personalized basis. And yet, all that notwithstanding, certainly parenting and societal values are highly significant factors. And most importantly, it's these factors that we can most directly impact and control. So maybe let's begin by trying to understand why, some perspectives on why our youth are so susceptible to the plagues of alcohol, drug abuse, and other forms of immoral behavior. The yetzer hara in adolescence, Chazal tell us, the Yerushalmi, Rashi in Chumash, in Parshas Noach on the pasuk of כי יצר לב האדם רע מנעוריו, so Rashi quotes a Midrash Rabbah and a Yerushalmi that from the time the fetus leaves the womb of the mother, from the time the child is born, so the yetzer hara enters the child. We enter this world with the yetzer hara. That notwithstanding, the force of the yetzer hara is not uniform throughout one's life. And the halacha is very cognizant of that. How do we know that? The Gemara in Yoma says, the Rambam quotes in Hilchos Teshuva, that eizohu teshuvah gemurah, what is teshuvah gemurah, when a person who has succumbed to a yetzer hara once overcomes that yetzer hara when the yetzer hara is just as strong. Not when you get older and the yetzer hara has weakened and it's easier to overcome, that's not a perfect teshuvah. It's a teshuvah, and one should certainly do it, one shouldn't forgo such a teshuvah. But the perfect teshuvah, the complete teshuvah is when one can cope with the yetzer hara when the yetzer hara is as strong. So Chazal, Chazal it should come as no surprise to us, we're very sophisticated, Chazal understood, yeah, the yetzer hara, we're born with the yetzer hara but the yetzer hara isn't uniform. The yetzer hara it waxes and wanes, and there's no question that during adolescence is a time when the yetzer hara is especially strong. And there are two elements among others that deserve to be highlighted. First of all, there is a yetzer hara, again which we all have, but is perhaps especially strong in adolescence, for independence. No one likes being told what to do, and especially teenagers don't like being told what to do. It's something which the nachash played on when he was trying to inv if you'll eat this fruit, so then the result is והייתם כאלהים ידעי טוב ורע. That you'll become independent, you'll become autonomous, vihyitem kelohim, you won't have to listen to anyone else, you'll be able to dictate for yourself what you want to do. So we all have this urge to be independent and certainly adolescents are interested in asserting and exerting their independence. That's one element of the yetzer hara. Another element of the yetzer hara is as the Rambam quotes from the Gemara that

אין לך דבר בכל התורה כולה שהוא קשה לרוב העם לפרוש אלא מן העריות והביאות האסורות.

That the strongest urge and drive that people have is to avoid the prohibitions associated with illicit relations. This Chazal identify as the strongest yetzer hara. It's a yetzer hara which is new to adolescents and what's more Chazal were also acutely aware of what they refer to as pas besalo. Pas besalo, the imagery of pas besalo literally means when a person has bread at hand. Which means that it's easier to fast if you know that whenever you want you can break the fast. So in performing the avodah on Yom Hakippurim, the service on Yom Hakippurim, so the one who used to take the sa'ir la'azazel, the original scapegoat, to the midbar, so he was allowed, he was allowed to eat. If the task of bringing the sa'ir out to the midbar was too onerous, so then he was allowed to break his fast and eat and drink. And there were way stations along the way. And at each way station they used to ask him do you want to eat, do you want to drink. And Chazal tell us, the Mishna tells us that it never ever happened that he needed to break his fast. He always was able to muster the strength despite the fact that he was fasting, that it was Yom Kippur, he was able to complete the task of bringing the goat out to the midbar where it was pushed off the cliff. So then Chazal ask the obvious question, so what did we go through this whole chad gadya every year of having all these way stations and asking him do you need something to eat, do you need something to drink? So Chazal answer because

אינו דומה מי שיש לו פת בסלו למי שאין לו פת בסלו.

The fact that a person can avail himself of the food and drink, that makes it easier for him to abstain. The fact that psychologically he knows he has that option. So when a person is older and a person is married, so it's pas besalo. It's easier to comply with the restrictions. When you have an adolescent for whom marriage is not imminent, is not pending, so there is no pas besalo. So the yetzer hara on the one hand is new. On the other hand, and it's a strong yetzer hara, Chazal say it's the strongest yetzer hara we have. It's new, it's the strongest one we have, and on the other hand, it's not offset at all by the fact of pas besalo when one is still single with marital prospects not imminent. So that's some of what our teens are dealing with. Now that's compounded by the fact that there is a vacuum, a vacuum in their lives. Now what do I mean by a vacuum? After all, we're talking about Orthodox teens. They go to yeshivas, yeshiva high schools, they put in long days carrying double programs. We're not talking about keeping them any busier than they already are. It's neither advisable nor practical, probably not even possible, to keep them so busy that they don't have time to abuse drugs, to abuse alcohol. It doesn't take much time to do that. That's not the issue. So the vacuum we're talking about is a religious, spiritual vacuum. The Rambam writes at the end of Hilchos Issurei Biah, the Rambam says that for a person to be taken and preoccupied with desires and passions and lust is only when there's a vacuum. When there's no vacuum, so then there's no room for this to strike root. But when there's a religious, spiritual vacuum, that's when there's an opening for other things to come and fill the vacuum. That's something we'll talk about. more in a moment. And then the fourth element of what our children are dealing with is the constant bombardment from the society around us again, as Rav Tworsky mentions, whether it's standing in the checkout line at the supermarket or whatever it is, but this constant giruy yetzer hara, constant incitement, constant inflammation. It brings to mind what Chazal say, they give a mashal that a father dresses his son in the finest of clothing and he makes the son as handsome as possible, gives the son a lot of spending money and then sends the son to walk by a brothel. And Chazal say מה יעשה הבן שלא יחטא. Chazal say that what is the son supposed to do that he shouldn't succumb? So this combination of the different elements of the yetzer hara with which our teens, with which our children struggle, with the religious spiritual vacuum, with the constant giruy yetzer hara, the bombardment, the incitement, the inflammation, the combination is highly combustible. Now let's pose a different question for a moment, and the question is a painful one, it's a very painful one. Rabbi Teitelbaum in his introduction alluded to some of the more public manifestations, those tips of the iceberg which broke through and, much to our dismay, became headline news of the partying, of arrests at parties. So the question is: when our children are at such parties, so where are we? What do we know about what's going on and what don't we know? And logically there seem to be two answers. One answer is that we don't know where they are. We think that they're at some innocent get-together with one friend, maybe reviewing for a gemara bechina, maybe relaxing and spending some time with a friend. That's one possibility. That's not a very attractive possibility, but the second one's even worse. The second possibility is that on some level we know where they are. On some level we know that they're partying and we're not doing anything about it. So either we're ignorant about what our children are doing or, even worse, we're apathetic, at least on a practical level, rachmana litzlan, we're apathetic about what our children are doing. Beruriah, when she has to tell Rabbi Meir about the tragic loss of their sons, uses the imagery about how when Hakadosh Baruch Hu blesses us with children, it's like a pikadon. It's like Hakadosh Baruch Hu asks us to guard what's His. Hakadosh Baruch Hu entrusts us with the most precious, precious thing that He has in His world: בנים אתם לה' אלהיכם. Hakadosh Baruch Hu, כי נער ישראל ואהבהו. Hakadosh Baruch Hu loves every Jew and Hakadosh Baruch Hu entrusts our children to our care. It's a pikadon, something that we're supposed to guard, we're supposed to watch over, we're supposed to nourish, we're supposed to nurture. Children are they're put in our charge. The mitzvah of peru u'revu, the mitzvah of procreation is a mitzvah to bring children into the world and to raise the children. The Gemara in Bava Batra says at the end of the third perek, the Gemara refers to the times of Roman persecution and the Gemara says משפשטה מלכות הרשעה from the time that the Roman government has spread its tentacles and is gozer. of these harsh decrees, דין הוא שנגזר על עצמנו, really we should have responded with a decree of our own not to have children because we can't raise them properly. So Tosafos has a question, Tosafos asks: what do you mean that we should have decreed not to have children? It's a mitzvah to have children. So Tosafos says: I don't know, maybe it means not to have more than the requisite minimum of a son and a daughter. But Tosafos says that's maybe. What's the alternative? The alternative Tosafos is implying is, the alternative is, well if we can't raise the children properly, we're not fulfilling the mitzvah anyway. The mitzvah of pru u'revu is not just to bring the children into the world, but it's to raise the children. To raise the children so we have to know where our children are at, we have to be involved with our children. It can't be that on Motzei Shabbos we either don't know where our children are or that we don't care where our children are. It can't. We're neglecting the shmirah. We're neglecting, we're neglecting that charge which Hakadosh Baruch Hu gave us in so doing. Of course any good relationship has to be built on a foundation of trust. And I'm obviously not suggesting that anyone should distrust their children. But on the other hand, if a parent knows, as we ought to know, that these pernicious problems exist in our community and in the yeshivos which our children attend, so then it's not a question of trust, but it's just a question of naivete or denial not to be aware and not to confront these issues. Parents need to know who their children's friends are, parents need to know where their children are going on Motzei Shabbos, what the children are doing on Motzei Shabbos. Parents need to know why is it that the children need to go out to find fulfillment on Motzei Shabbos, what can we do at home to provide the fulfillment? Why is it that the fulfillment is only possible by going away from home? How come? What can we do at home within our own dalet amos, within our own four cubits of our home that they should find the fulfillment, the happiness that they're looking for, that they don't have to search for parties? But the truth is that once we have to monitor our children, so that means that we already have a very big problem. And really we need to take preventive measures that we shouldn't even have to monitor our children. What's the Torah's counsel here? At least, again, it's not going to address all cases, every case has its own dynamic, it has its own unique set of facts, but what's the Torah's counsel here? There's a pasuk in Sefer Shmuel where the Torah says ובעבור תהיה יראתו על פניכם לבלתי תחטאו. There's one common denominator to all chet. All chet, there is a single common denominator. And that common denominator is that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is absent from our thoughts. He's absent from our lives. No one, no one acts, virtually no one, virtually no one if he's aware, if he or she is aware of being in Hakadosh Baruch Hu's presence. If a person is uplifted by that awareness of being in Hakadosh Baruch Hu's presence, ובעבור תהיה יראתו על פניכם. Hakadosh Baruch Hu comes to you, כי לבעבור זה בא אלקים, that's a paraphrase, I forget how the exact wording goes. Why is Hakadosh Baruch Hu coming? ובעבור תהיה יראתו על פניכם לבלתי תחטאו. Hakadosh Baruch Hu wants that you should feel Him as a presence in your life, and that's the greatest inhibitor of all chet. The greatest inhibitor of all chet is ובעבור תהיה יראתו על פניכם. The Rambam and the Sefer HaChinuch when when they enumerate The mitzvah of yiras Hashem in the minyan hamitzvos, so they say that the mitzvah of yiras Hashem, the phraseology of the Sefer HaChinuch is mitzvas yiras Hashem להיות יראת השם על פנינו לבלתי נחטא, reflecting this pasuk that we should feel a sense of awe, of fear of Hakadosh Baruch Hu because that inhibits all chet. We need to make sure that in our homes Hakadosh Baruch Hu is the central and defining presence. Even in a home, even in a home where one can be busy and formulaically, externally comply with everything, all the strictures of Torah u'mitzvos formulaically, but that Hakadosh Baruch Hu's presence is not felt. There's no talk about Hakadosh Baruch Hu. There's no im yirtzeh Hashem. What am I going to do today? im yirtzeh Hashem. If Hakadosh Baruch Hu allows me, this is what I hope to do today. How are you? Baruch Hashem. Hakadosh Baruch Hu has to be a presence in our lives. If Hakadosh Baruch Hu is a presence in our lives, in our homes, if we bring the Ribbono Shel Olam into our homes, so then he'll be the central presence in our children's lives as well. The very first Rema in Shulchan Aruch, it's a more or less verbatim quote from the Rambam in Moreh Nevuchim. He talks about the principle of שיויתי השם לנגדי תמיד, about being aware of Hakadosh Baruch Hu. And the Rema, quoting the Rambam, says that the immediate corollary from an awareness of Hakadosh Baruch Hu is שמיד יגיע אליו היראה, that a person acts differently. Everything is transformed if a person has a relationship with Hakadosh Baruch Hu. What all in Torah u'mitzvos is about at the end of the day, it's not just the dos and the don'ts, but the dos and the don'ts are the way Hakadosh Baruch Hu tells us, guides us, prescribes to us that we have a relationship with him. And that's what the idea is when the Torah tells us that we're avdei Hashem. Hallalu avdei Hashem. What does it mean to be an eved? So to be an eved doesn't only mean to be subservient, but to be an eved also means to be an intimate. When Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai asks his disciple Rabbi Chanina ben Dosa to daven on behalf of his sick child. So his wife asks him, why are you asking Chanina? Aren't you greater than Chanina? Why don't you daven for our sick son? Why are you asking Chanina? So Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai answers her and says I'm like a sar lifnei hamelech, I'm like an officer before the king. Chanina, he's like an eved lifnei hamelech. So what's the sense of avdus in that Gemara? An eved is the intimate. The eved doesn't need an appointment. The eved is with his master day and night. He's waiting on him hand and foot, but he's an intimate, he's with him day and night. When Hakadosh Baruch Hu says avdai heim, it means that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is, we're supposed to have an intimate relationship with him. We had, if we would have such an intimate relationship with him, think about Hakadosh Baruch Hu, think about the Ribbono Shel Olam, talk to our children about the Ribbono Shel Olam, talk to them about yiras Hashem, talk to them about bitachon, talk to them about how when we have problems, yes, we're supposed to take every initiative we can, we're not supposed to be quiescent, but Gott zul helfen, but we have bitachon that השלך על השם יהבך, that Hakadosh Baruch Hu will help us. The vacuum that exists in our children's lives, you know, it's well-known if you see a little toddler, you see him in the supermarket, and you listen to the words which come out of his mouth, you listen to his vocabulary, so you get an idea for his parents' vocabulary. Because the child, he's not reading, he's not going to school, his exposure is to his parents. So you hear the child speaks in a refined way, you know the parents speak in a refined way. You hear the child speaks not so delicately, so then you know where he hears such language used. So the same is often true in other venues as well, that sometimes the problems that we see in our youth, perhaps they manifest themselves differently, but the problems are often a reflection of the problems that exist within us. They manifest themselves differently, maybe. Maybe they play out differently in our youth, but they're a reflection of the problems that we have. And when we talk about the combustibility of the yetzer hara which adolescents have to deal with because of a vacuum, of a religious spiritual vacuum, so the question is that we need to ask ourselves, so to what extent is that vacuum present within our own lives? And it's only a reflection or a projection into into our children's lives. And to what extent, as was mentioned, is our preoccupation with pleasure. So we're thinking about pleasure. Yeah, we we keep Shabbos and we keep kashrus, but we're not thinking about the Ribbono shel Olam. That's not how our life is oriented. That's not how our life is oriented, so our children are left with a vacuum. It's not fulfilling, they're not happy. They're left with this religious spiritual vacuum. Let's talk talk to our children about about the the wonders of אשר בחר בנו מכל העמים. Let's talk to our children about that and give them, let them have a sense of what it means to have that personal relationship with Hakadosh Baruch Hu. Another area in which the problems that we encounter, a child who tastes the sweetness of Shabbos, who tastes the sweetness of Talmud Torah, who tastes the sweetness of a beautiful davening, it's the closest we can come to an inoculation against the problems of drug abuse, alcohol abuse, and other forms of sundry immoral behavior. One other area in which the problems, one other area in which the problems which we see within our children are a reflection of problems that we have within our own community, and here too Rabbi Teitelbaum referred to it, is the problem of Kiddush clubs. It's very difficult to be mechanech our children not to abuse alcohol if we abuse alcohol. Do as I say, not as I do, is never a very convincing argument. And it's only to the extent again that we can provide a a proper example for our children, it's only to that extent that we can hope to be mechanech them. So to recap and and to conclude, a yetzer hara can be inflamed or a yetzer hara can be sublimated. To the extent that we're able to fill our children's lives with the joy and the meaning of Torah, of Yiddishkeit, of feeling that personal connection to Hakadosh Baruch Hu, so then when there's no vacuum, so then the yetzer hara is sublimated. But when there is a vacuum because they don't feel that, there's an emptiness, they just feel that they're being dictated to. They feel that Shabbos is a series of restrictions, it's stifling, stultifying restrictions. They don't feel the beauty of Shabbos. They're not they're not enriched by by beautiful davening, by serious davening, or by divrei Torah, or by family time together at the table. So then if Shabbos is only is if Shabbos is just a series of restrictions, there's a vacuum, there's a vacuum. If there are do's and don'ts, but the do's and don'ts are not the discipline which make possible a relationship with Hakadosh Baruch Hu, but they're just do's and don'ts, so then they feel oppressive. But if the do's and don'ts of Torah and Yiddishkeit are understood that they're guiding us like a like a flight plan along along a path to reach a destination, to have and develop a relationship with Hakadosh Baruch Hu. They feel it, they see from the parents' behavior that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is a presence in their lives. So then there's no vacuum. Where there's no vacuum, so then the vacuum doesn't need to be filled artificially. The obligation that we have as parents is a very great one. I was going to read, but maybe it's too much, many passages from the Vilna Gaon, from the Menoras Hamaor, where they quote a Midrash with Rabbi Akiva about the obligation of parents and of how the destiny of parents and children are linked. But I'm not sure we even need that. We all love our children more than life itself. More than life itself. We want to give them the best. The best that we can give them again is to fill that vacuum. Fill that vacuum as best we can. Let them feel the sweetness of Shabbos, of Torah, of a relationship with Hakadosh Baruch Hu. When they say Lecha Dodi Friday night, let them feel like they're talking to Hakadosh Baruch Hu, which they are, come Hakadosh Baruch Hu, Lecha Dodi. Let them feel that, let that vacuum be filled and then we give our children an eternal gift, more precious and more enduring than any other gift we can give, and we don't leave that void, that vacuum which can otherwise be filled artificially and perniciously. I hope that we should all be mischazek, we should all do our best, be mechazek each other, strengthen each other to try again to fill the void, the vacuum in our own lives, the void and vacuum in our children's lives, and we should all see בנים ובני בנים עוסקים בתורה ובמצוות.