What a Thief Can Teach You About Wisdom

Welcome to Ethics of Our Fathers: Pirkei Avot, Chapter 4, Mishnah 1 Who is truly wise? According to Ben Zoma, it isn’t the smartest person in the room. It’s the one willing to learn from everyone in it. Chapter 4 of Pirkei Avot opens with four questions from Ben Zoma: Who is wise? Who is strong? Who is rich? Who is honored? Each one overturns the usual answer. The wise person learns from every person. The strong person conquers his own inclination. The rich person is happy with his lot. The honored person honors others. Rabbi Greenberg begins with Ben Zoma himself: a brilliant sage who died young, whose teaching about remembering the Exodus “even at night” we recite at every Seder, and one of the four who entered the Pardes. He then focuses on the first question, showing why learning from everyone, including the simple, the critical, a thief, and even those far greater than us, is a sign of security rather than weakness, a key to our relationship with God, and the greatest gift we can give another person. 🔎 In this video we explore:

• Who was Ben Zoma, and why the Pardes left him changed
• The two movements of a spiritual life: rising up, then coming back down
• Ben Zoma’s four redefinitions, and why they map onto four stages of life
• Why the Talmud honors every elder, even one who seems to know nothing
• Learning from your critics: how the Rebbe responded to being called “inactive”
• Seven things Reb Zusha learned from a thief
• The cards hidden in the guard’s pocket: a lesson from the Soviet gulag
• “Let us make man”: why even God consults
• Why the Rebbe taught to learn even from those far greater than you ⏱️ TIMESTAMPS 🙏 If this shiur gave you a new way to think about wisdom, hit like, subscribe, and tell us in the comments: who is someone unexpected you’ve learned something important from? 📚 Sources discussed: Pirkei Avot 4:1 (Ben Zoma); Mishnah Berachot 1:5 and the Haggadah (mentioning the Exodus at night); Talmud, Chagigah 14b (the four who entered the Pardes); Vayikra 10 (Nadav and Avihu); Tehillim 119:99; Mishlei 16:32; Tehillim 128:2; Shmuel I 2:30; Talmud, Kiddushin 33a (honoring the elderly); Talmud, Sotah 5a (“I and he cannot dwell together”); Pirkei Avot 1:6 (acquire a friend); Bereishit 1:26 with Rashi (“Let us make man”); Talmud, Tamid 32a (Alexander the Great and the sages); the Maharal on Torah, Avodah and Gemilut Chasadim; the Baal Shem Tov; Reb Zusha of Anipoli; the Alter Rebbe and the Malach; Reb Mendel Futerfas; the Lubavitcher Rebbe; Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis; the book Paradigm Shift to the Fourth Power