Day 8 - Youthful Actions as a Window to our Inner Virtues [Introduction 8]

"Omer od amar Shlomo." Shlomo HaMelech says further, "Gam me'alav yisnaker nar im zach v'im yosher poalo." "Ze hapasuk ne'emar." What does King Solomon says? An amazing thing.

That even in his actions, may the youth be recognized whether his acts are pure and upright.

So what is this pasuk referring to? Says Shlomo, uh, says, says the, the author here, "Ze hapasuk ne'emar al hafchanas ha'na'arim," that we can evaluate the traits of the youngsters from when they were young.

"Ki minnuurehem nikaru midosayhem." From when they were young, you're able to discern their traits.

"Kemosh tir'u miktsas hana'arim nireis bahem midas busha." You're able to see that some of the younger children, they have the middah of busha, of shame.

"U'miktsas han'ar azus," some people have chutzpah.

"U'miktsas hanot'rin al hatav," some people have incontrollable urges.

"U'miktsas hanot'rin al ma'alos tovos," and others, other children from their young years, you're able to see their tendencies.

Some have great traits, great middos.

"Veda ki kol middos she'adam hashatir bo bimei bah abachrus v'haziknu hein hoyu bimei hayaldus v'hashacharut." He says the traits that you see in elders, you could have seen those exact same traits in them when they were children.

"Ach bizmanahu lo hoyu bo koach leharoson ulehavien ledei ma'aseh." But sadly, when they were young, they didn't understand, they didn't discern in these traits, and they weren't able to bring them to, to their perfection, to bring it to maximize the traits.

"V'hana'arim asher g'va aliem hanavlus." And those young children who grew up with great traits, but then they went, they left their home, they went to school, they went out into the world, and those positive traits got covered up by a bunch of nonsense.

"Efshar sheyochal ha'adam leha'atikam el haderech hatova." It's possible that a person can make believe that those traits, "ki heim nochim lekabol mussar" because they're willing to accept, uh, "ve'ein bahem koach vechochma lotzes ulevroch mitachas yadam yasar osom ve'im tzrichim lizbol." Says, but they get cov- sometimes it gets covered by all that dirt and by that nonsense of the world, and they get confused, and they don't even realize that they ever had such good traits.

They don't realize that really they were a baal chessed.

They were really, really kind to others, and they were giving, and they were committed to serving the community or whatever, any good trait you can imagine.

And suddenly they became self-serving, and now all, all it is, is how can I make the next buck, and how can I make, make more money? And it all becomes about, about perhaps not using their positive traits anymore.

And it is very, very hard to unravel and remove those negative, uh, piles of negative traits or negative influences that are now causing them tremendous pain.

"Avi bimei hazikna einam ne'atokin bekal mimishu shehayu bo bimei abachrus." But now when you're older and you're a little bit more mature, you're able to see things with a different perspective perhaps, and you're able to clear away some of the, the, um, some of the blockades that were standing before a person making those corrections to their traits.

"Veheym domim letas kesef shehaya tomun bekarka vehale chaluda ova be'orech hatmanaso.

Tzorich oso ha'kesef merika achar merika." So imagine someone hid a silver tray buried underground, and it became very, very tarnished.

Such silver requires polishing after polishing before it can regain its original luster.

"Ach sheyoshuv ha'kesef le'merei hono." Until it's able...

"Ad sheyoshuv ha'kesef le'merei hono." Until it's able to be restored to its original beauty.

"Kach ha'adam asher holech lefey darko u'minhago venishka be'imkei ha'midot hagru'ot." So a person who had nice traits and then sadly got stuck, got trapped in the negative traits.

"Tzorich liltosh sichlo lahavdil bein hatov u'bein hara." He needs to really work hard to identify the positive and the negative and to separate between the two.