House of Love and Prayer
San Francisco, 5733.

THE FOUR CUPS

Why do we drink four cups of wine? G-d said to Moshe the four words
of redemption: Vehozaisi, I shall take you out; Veyitzalti, I shall save you;
VeGoalti, I shall redeem you; velakakhti, I shall take you. According to
my holy ancestor, the Maharal (Rabbi Judah Loeb of Prague), and other
mekubalim, holy mystics, there is a fifth cup, viheveisi, I shall bring you
to the Holy Land. The first four cups are for the Exodus and Redemption
from Egypt, Babylon, Persia and Edom (Rome). The fifth cup is for a
redemption which has yet to come. But most people, simple folks like us,
only drink four cups.

In this world wine makes us drunk, and us forget. When Messiah comes
there will also be wine, but le that will it us up to the highest levels, because
wine really could lift us up. It is only because the world is so low that wine
drags us down more. If the world would be as it should be then every drop
of wine would lift us to the highest levels. Pesach night is alittle bit like the
world to come, so the four cups of wine lift us to the highest  joy in the world.
Suddenly we really understand that everything is right. When Mossiach is
coming there will be a new song, but in order to hear this song you have to
be drunk on a high level. Therefore, we really only start singing after the
third cup of wine, which is when we say Hallel. By the third cup we are
already drunk enough to hear the song of the world to come. As much as
all the gates of Heaven are open  th first part of the night, they are not
completely open. After the third cup door we open the door for Elijah the
prophet, because everything is open then. Nothing is in the way anymore!


THE FOUR SONS

                    Reb Zvi Elimelekh of Dinov (a grand nephew of Reb Elimelech
of Liszensk)'s  custom was to visit someone's house on the first night of
Passover in order to see how he was making the seder. So he stopped
in front of one Yiddele's house and Iistened to the Yiddele read from the
Haggadah. He was chanting, "In regards to four sons the Torah speaks:
One who is wise, one who is wicked,. ." and every time he would read
the word "one" he would shout out in a loud voice "O-N-E" as if he were
saying the Sherna.

          Afterward, Reb Zvi Elimelech recounted his experience, saying that
this little Yiddele was making such a holy prayer from the "four sons" -
by the way he was saying "O- N - E-"  that Reb Zvi realized
that even the wicked son knew the Oneness of haShem.

MOROR AND HAROSES

          To make haroses you have to grind together a lot of apples, figs, and
nuts and put in a little bit of wine, and cinnamon. This is to remind us of the
mortar we put between the bricks when we were slaves in Egypt. At the seder
we take the moror, the bitter herb, and dip it into the sweet haroses. Even in
your greatest pain G-d makes the pain wide enough for you to go through.
Meaning to say, even when G-d gave us all the maror in the world, all the
bitterness, there was always just one little sweet spot.

  MATZA

               Reb Nachman talks about some thing called Noam Elyon, a kind
of holy sweetness which flows down from Heaven. This sweetness is so
whole, that if your mind isn't whole, and if your emotions aren't whole then
you can't taste it. You don't have the plate in whch G-d can give you the taste
of holy sweetness. Matza is the simplest bread in the world, just flour and
water. No salt, no pepper. Reb Nachman says that on Yom Tov the Noam
Elyon flows from Heaven in simplicity. If you are not whole you cannot receive
it. The matza we eat gives over to us its simplicity, wholeness. Matza tastes so
good because it is a piece of the sweetness of Noam Elyon.

            What makes us so perverted? We put so much work into our little piece of bread. What do people do for the few rubles they make? They put their
whole heart and soul into it, and each time they do, they become more and
more slaves. The matza we eat on Pesach doesn't take much time to make.
We put the least amount of time into our food, and the rest of the time we
have is for doing great things, to be free.

When you eat the matza you really have to be with it, you can't talk or
joke. The piece has to be really big, and you sit and mamash eat matza.
Once a year there is a mitzvah to eat, we are commanded to eat matza.
Okay. It is also a mitzvah to eat on Shabbos, but it is not on the same level.
On Shabbos we have to be happy, oneg Shabbos, so we make ourselves
happy by eating. On Seder night we  fulfill the biggest mitzvah in the world
when we are eating matza. The holy Sanzer would sit after the seder, and
put his hands on his stomach, and say "Ay! Tonight my stomach did so many
mitzvos!"

The afikomen, the last piece of matza is realty not from this world. We put it
away, we hide it, and then we eat it. It is coming from a completely hidden
world. When we eat the aftkomen all our prayers are answered in that moment.

On Pesach we celebrate freedom, which means that G-d in Heaven opens
the gates of freedom. This world is just a vessel for higher worlds, so
something is happening in Heaven on Pesach night, and actually the
whole month of Nisan, the month of freedom. We see all of nature becoming
free. All the little seeds who were sitting under the earth and crying are now
coming out, becoming free. Everything begins to grow.

There is a voice in the universe which says, "Let there be man", and there
 is another voice which says, "Let there not be man". These two voices struggle
inside every person. The voice which says, "Let there not be man" wants to
destroy man, says that he is worthless, he's no good. What we don't know is
that we don't really hate man - we try to hold back life itself when we say "He's
no good". It is the voice inside us which doesn't want man to be.

               The Ishbitzer says this is why winter comes to the world. The voice which wants to stop life becomes too strong for a time. Then the voice which says "Let there be man" becomes strong again, and we have springtime, Pesach.

               Why do we have to eat every day, over and over agan? Nature
doesn't really trust , because she knows that we have something inside
ourselves which wants to destroy life. So nature gives its life - an apple,
or some grain we can make into bread, but only enough for a few hours
or a few days, because the earth doesn't completely trust man to listen
to the voice which does say "Let there be man".

               On Pesach we celebrate the power of giving life. The Zohar calls
matza "nahama dmehemenusa", bread of faith. It is the fruit of the Tree of
Life, before Adam sinned. One fruit is enough to give you life completely
so you don't have to eat over and over again. If man would only really
have faith, one piece of rnatza would be enough to last him for his whole life.

              This is also why the last meal on the last day of Pesach is called
Messiach 's seuda, the feast of the Messiach. When the Mossiach comes
one piece of matza will again be enough to give life to a person, because
the earth will be able to trust man agan.

                         ELIJAH'S CUP
    SHAFOKH HAMOSKHA -- POUR OUT THY WRATH


     The Baal Shem Tov says that before Moshiach comes everythng will
become more clean.

     The word for "man" in Hebrew is "adam" -- alef, dalet, mem. Now "mo'od"
in Hebrew -- mem, alef, dalet means "very". Everything that comes from
the same letters comes from the same root. So before Moshiach comes, a
good man will be very good and an evil man will become very evil.

     When we open the door for Elijah the Prophet during the second part of
 the seder we say words which sound horrible. First we say holy words of
love and peace, and then we say, "Pour out your anger at the world."
The world needs a little cleaning out. We are begging G-d, "Would you
please do the cleaning?" 

  When we open the door for Elijah, who will come to announce the Meshiah,
we are on the level of saying we don't want to do the cleaning. There
are a lot of people who are so eager in fighting evil, it's the greatest thing in 
their lives. At the seder we say to "If there has to be some wiping of
evil, please, You do it."


New York
Seder Night, 5742.

(All the earth around us outside was completely covered with snow from a rare April blizzard)

 Okay, the world translates the word "hamaskha" to mean your anger. But
the word comes from "ham", warmth. Now by Amalek the Torah says "asher karkha".
Evil wants to turn us into cold people. Seder night we are begging G-d, "Please
purge the world of all the coldness. Please make the world a warm place for everyone."

