Ki Teitzei-Sep 13, 2019
This Shabbat:
Friday Candle Lighting: 6:45 pm
Shabbat Ends: 7:38 pm
Torah Message:
Solidly Spiritual
He cannot give the right of the firstborn to the son of the beloved one ahead of the son of the disliked one, the firstborn. (21:16)
One of the greatest men who came into this world was an unassuming rabbi who was born in Russia and lived most of his life in New York City. There are enough stories about Rabbi Moshe Feinstein to fill many books. Here is one small story which is enormously revealing.
When a Jew finishes speaking to his Creator in the amidah, the standing prayer, he takes his leave by walking backward three paces as a servant would take his leave of a great king. If someone is standing behind you and is still praying this prayer, the halacha forbids you to back up into a space four amot (approximately two meters) in front of the person still in prayer. One day, Rabbi Feinstein had just finished praying in his Yeshiva on Staten Island, New York. As it happened, someone was still praying behind him. As he was waiting patiently for this person to conclude so that he could take three paces backward and complete his service, someone told him that there was a call from Israel, a matter of urgency but not life-threatening that demanded his attention. Rabbi Feinstein continued to wait for the fellow behind him to take three steps backward. Nothing happened, so deeply was this fellow immersed in prayer. The person who had brought Rabbi Feinstein the news of the call started to become agitated:
Shoftim-Sep 6, 2019
This Shabbat:
Friday Candle Lighting: 6:54 pm
Shabbat Ends: 7:48 pm
Torah Message:
Pain and Gain
“Who is the man who has built a new house and has not yet inaugurated it? Let him go and return to his house, lest he die in the war and another man will inaugurate it.” (20:5)
Rashi: “And this thing will pain him.”
Rashi’s comment on the above verse cannot mean that the thought of someone else inaugurating his new home will be extremely painful to him. For in the painful-thoughts department nothing is more painful than the thought of death itself.
The Midrash teaches that when the Romans executed Rabbi Chananya for teaching Torah in public they wrapped him in his Sefer Torah and set it alight. To prolong his agony they packed water-soaked wool around his chest. Rabbi Chananya said, “The parchment is consumed, but the letters fly up in the air.” The Roman executioner was deeply moved by Rabbi Chananya’s holiness and asked, “If I remove the wool from around your heart, will I have a share in the World-to-Come?”
Re’eh-Aug 30, 2019
This Shabbat:
Friday Candle Lighting: 7:04 pm
Shabbat Ends: 7:59 pm
Torah Message:
In G-d We Trust
“You shall open your hand to your brother, to your poor, and to your destitute in your Land.” (15:11)
Sign seen hanging in a store:
“In G-d we trust, everyone else pays cash.”
A philosopher once asked Rabban Gamliel, “Your Torah commands you over and over again to give charity, and to not be afraid of its affecting your financial security. Isn’t such a fear natural? How can a person give away his money without worrying that perhaps he should have saved it for a “rainy day?”
Ekev-Aug 23, 2019
This Shabbat:
Friday Candle Lighting: 7:13 pm
Shabbat Ends: 8:08 pm
Torah Message:
Compulsories
“And it will be that if you harken…” (13:17)
Photographer Joe Lipka once observed in LensWork Magazine that all artists start out by imitating their role model. Why else would you want to pick up a brush or a camera or a guitar unless you already saw something that grabbed your imagination and made you feel, “I want to do that!”? The problem is that having achieved a level of competence and duplicating the work of the maestro — what he calls ‘compulsories’ — most people fail to take the next step by stepping outside their comfort zone and replacing necessary plagiarism with art. It’s frightening letting go of the virtuoso’s apron strings, throwing away the training wheels and striking out into the great unknown. But that’s the only way we can really escape the treadmill of reinventing the wheel.
Va’etchanan-Aug 16, 2019
This Shabbat:
Friday Candle Lighting: 7:21 pm
Shabbat Ends: 8:17 pm
Torah Message:
Loose Change
“For you shall not cross this Jordan” (3:27)
A dark night. A passenger jumps down from a bus. As he jumps, some small change falls from his pocket.
Too embarrassed to ask the driver to wait so he can use the headlights of the bus to collect his nickels and dimes from the sidewalk, the passenger quickly reaches into his pocket and places a twenty-dollar bill on the ground in the vicinity of his small change. He shouts to the driver, “Hold the bus! There’s a twenty-dollar bill of mine somewhere down here on the ground!”
Devarim-Aug 9, 2019
This Shabbat:
Friday Candle Lighting: 7:29 pm
Shabbat Ends: 8:26 pm
Torah Message:
Please!
“These are the words…” (1:1)
It’s always a refreshing experience to walk off the plane in London. I keep forgetting how polite the English really are. The wheels of English social intercourse are oiled through a millennium of homogeneous culture (the last invasion of the British Isles was in 1066), in which politeness is arguably the highest social virtue. Immigrants fast become more English than the English. When I grew up, someone who wore a turban, or a chador, or had different skin color, was guaranteed to carry along with that a heavily accented and foreign demeanor. Now when you speak to someone clearly ethnic, their accent could be as cockney as the sound of Bow Bells, or as a cut-glass as an ex-Etonian – but they are so polite. Yes, the English are so polite even when you can see they hate you.
Matot/Massei-Aug 2, 2019
This Shabbat:
Friday Candle Lighting: 7:35 pm
Shabbat Ends: 8:33 pm
Torah Message:
Another Hundred Dollar Bill
“If a man takes a vow to G-d…” (30:3)
A tramp is standing by the side of the road. A big Rolls-Royce pulls up right next to him. One of the tinted windows in the back rolls down with a soft electronic purr, coming to rest at the end of its travel with a reassuring clunk. A hand in a white cotton glove emerges from the car holding a crisp new $100 bill. A voice emanates from the car. “It’s for you,” says the voice. The tramp gazes at the gloved hand in disbelief. “What?” The tramp looks around to make sure no one is standing behind him. “Are you speaking to me?” says the tramp. “Here, take the money!” Gingerly, he approaches the car, half-expecting that this is some kind of practical joke, and the money and the car will vanish in a second. He extends his hand and ever so slowly grasps the note. As soon as his fingers clutch the bill securely, the hand retracts into the car. The window rises with a soft purr and the Rolls-Royce speeds into the distance. The tramp stands transfixed to the spot, beaming from ear to ear with equal amounts of incredulity and joy.
Pinchas-July 26, 2019
This Shabbat:
Friday Candle Lighting: 7:41 pm
Shabbat Ends: 8:39 pm
Torah Message:
“And G-d said to Moshe, ‘Take to yourself Yehoshua ben Nun, a man in whom there is spirit.” (27:18)
George Bernard Shaw said, “Those who can, do; those who can’t, teach.” (“And those who can’t teach, teach teachers,” say others.)
Of course this is, as are most funny lines, a gross oversimplification. But like all gross oversimplifications, they contain a kernel of truth. I seem to remember hearing at school that the proof of understanding something was the ability to teach it to someone else. I’m not sure that’s always true. Arguably, Irving Berlin was one of the greatest songsmiths of the last century, but he composed his songs on a one-key piano (F sharp) with a lever under the keyboard to manipulate a fuller range. Asked what effect a more sophisticated musical education would have had on his talent, Berlin replied: “Ruin it.”
Chukat-July 12, 2019
This Shabbat:
Friday Candle Lighting: 7:49 pm
Shabbat Ends: 8:50 pm
Torah Message:
A Gift from the Wilderness
“…a gift from the Wilderness – the gift went to the valley and from the valley to the heights and from the heights to the valley in the field of Moav, at the top of the peak, overlooking the surface of the wilderness” (21:19-20)
Most ba’alei teshuva (returnees to Torah living) will tell you how at one point they sprang out of bed with “Modeh Ani” barely having left their lips, and rushed off to daven, unbelievably charged with the thought of putting on tefillin and davening — however slowly — with a minyan. How the expectation of Shabbat was visceral and the vistas of Torah were breathtaking.
And then, somewhere along the line, habit begins to dull the gloss. It’s not that the secular world has such a strong pull. Mostly you feel: been there, done that. Worn the T-shirt. Sometimes even knitted the T-shirt. It’s just that at some point you realize that you are different, and however religious you become you’re always going to be an “outsider.” It’s ironic that to be a ba’al teshuva you have to be somewhat rebellious. If not, you’d never have given up your nine-to-five existence to become a 24-hour a day “Yid.” And then you find yourself in one of the most conformist systems known to man. You could become bitter. Or you could pin your hopes on your children. After all, they’re “religiousfrom birth” and instinctively know how to walk the walk and talk the talk. But that’s also a challenge. The majority of noshrim (“dropouts” from the observant world) seem to have either chutznik (non-Israeli) parents or ba’al teshuva parents. And if you have both — that’s a double-whammy. Despite this, with a lot of prayer and common sense it is possible to bring up normal and well-adjusted Orthodox children.
But what about their parents? Are they just a stepping stone that’s been stepped over?
Never give up on your dreams.
The “gift of the wilderness” — the gift of water, the gift of Torah — comes miraculously out of the desert of a secular life. You have to follow that water. Sometimes it goes down to the valley, and sometimes it rises miraculously, and against its nature — to heights. But it can also return seeking the fields of Moav, the tremendous pull of the 49 gates of impurity.
Yet, if you keep going and you’re not prepared to stop and say. “Well, I got this far. Not bad for a ba’al teshuva!” If you keep following the water it will lift you to the top of the peak overlooking the surface of the wilderness, and you will know how far you have come.
Beshalach-January 18, 2019
This Shabbat:
Friday Candle Lighting: 4:52 pm
Shabbat Ends: 5:41 pm
Torah Message:
A Bribe of Kindness
“Stand fast and see” (14:13)
There was a friend of mine who suffered a terrible tragedy.
His sister was involved in a horrific car accident which left her brain seriously starved of oxygen for critical minutes. The doctors said she would probably never regain consciousness.
This terrible shock hit the teenage children worst. Who is more important in your teenage years than your mother? The hospital moved quickly to bring in psychological support for the family.