Chodesh Iyar – Insights from the Arizal about how the month of Iyar is a time of preparation to receive the Torah. Speaker: Rabbi Nasan Maimon.
The first day of Rosh Chodesh Iyar (the 30th of Nisan) is the yahrzeit of Rabbi Chaim b’R’ Yosef Vital ז”ל. At first, he was a close student of Rabbi Moshe Cordovero – the Ramak. After his teacher’s passing, Rabbi Chaim began studying with Rabbi Yitzchak Luria – the Arizal – who had arrived in Tzefas in the year 5330 (1570 CE).
Rabbi Chaim described an incident that marked his initiation into the Arizal’s teachings: “When I [first] came to the sainted master [the Ari] to study, he took me with him aboard a boat on the Kineret. Then, at a location opposite the Old Synagogue of Tiberius, he dipped a cup into the water and gave it to me to drink. He told me that now I would be able to understand his teachings, for I had tasted water from the well of Miriam [which is hidden in the Kineret]. From that moment on I was able to enter the depth of this wisdom.” (Source: Nagid U’Mtzaveh by Rabbi Yaakov Tzemach ז”ל, written about 60 years after the Arizal’s passing.)
The entire Shiur is HERE.
Podcast (shiurim): Download (Duration: 3:20 — 4.7MB)
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