יום שלישי, ז׳ אב תשפ״וTuesday, July 21, 2026
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Dr. Chaya Sima Koenigsberg is an assistant professor of Judaic studies at Lander College for Women/The Anna Ruth and Mark Hasten School.
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The word mussar takes me back to the uncomfortable moments from childhood when I was on the receiving end of rebuke, and the equally difficult moments when now as an adult, as the teacher or the parent, it is my responsibility to be on the giving end.
As a student in high school, I remember looking forward to the initial “Fall back” where we roll back the clock by an hour and for one or two mornings you felt like you gained an hour of sleep!
Everywhere I go throughout Israel, every hostage poster, every sticker or magnet memorializing a fallen soldier hits hard. Despite being an outsider, they are all so familiar, their names and faces, because we have all been following so closely.
Does faith emerge from recitation of Shema in shul, daily, on Shabbat, or when belted out as Yom Kippur wanes? These are powerful moments, but I think it’s the quieter, private moments of a child’s bedtime recitation of Shema that leaves the most lasting imprint on the developing mind.
For those of us outside of Israel, there is the added discomfort of feeling separated from the epicenter of our people. We feel the longing for our other half and the guilt of feeling absent as the next chapter of our history is being written by those on the ground.
They say Hashem provides the cure before the disease; sometimes, like Avraham Avinu, we need only open our eyes and acknowledge how Hashem has placed those who can help us within our midst.
What she produced is a singular work describing the life of a Jewish woman, filled with faith, mussar, and stories that impart lessons to her descendants. At the outset of the project Glikl states that she plans to write seven little books. Why seven?
Speech itself is referred to as ruach... This G-dly spirit gives us the power of intelligent speech that elevates and separates humans from other living creatures.
If next year’s tuition contract has given you sticker shock, remember that the challenge to afford tuition is nothing new.
July 17, 2026 
