יום שני, י״ד תמוז תשפ״וMonday, June 29, 2026
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Michal can be reached at michal@jewishpress.com
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This week Jews all over the world celebrate the 33rd day of the Omer. This day designates two very important milestones. One is that on this day the students of Rabbi Akiva stopped dying. Secondly, this is when Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai shared the holy Zohar, a Kabbalistic work revealing the greatest secrets of the […]
However, being friendly and or having lots of friends doesn’t necessarily mean that these friends are true ones.
This week Jews in Israel and all over the world celebrated the founding of the Jewish state. Unfortunately, positive recognition of the State of Israel is controversial. The fact that this is the land that Hashem bequeathed to the children of Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov is agreed by all who believe in the Bible; it […]
We as Jews have a special power and energy to never be defeated. This was passed down to us by our father Avraham, the first Jew in the world.
This time I felt that G-d had sent that message especially for me. I was suddenly able to look at what I have and not at what I was still missing.
Often the only thing preventing one from doing something is a bit of encouragement from another.
No matter what was left physically, Zechariah’s soul was soaring high above the crowd even after 37 years.
A person can get hurt, insulted, or offended by anyone. And when a person gets hurt by someone they care for and love, the pain is even greater.
The more natural something is, the less attention we pay to it. Every morning we get up and take care of the morning routine almost by rote.
Mordechai was all she had – he was her family. And now she must live apart from him forever. Why?
Every heart was filled with gratitude to the Almighty for granting this special soul a chance to live.
To build the Mishkan, one must have the ability to hear G-d every step of the way, so that it will come out exactly the way G-d wanted it.
Worries have been around since the beginning of time. How we react is the only thing that really changes.
The Torah specifies that the home is the first place that one should do chesed, and only after that should we look to help others.
We must all feel as though the traumatic event is part of us; we must cry and pray to Hashem to have mercy on all of us as individuals and as one big family as well.
Leah couldn’t wait to hear what the Rabbi had said. Deep down in her heart she wanted so much to hear and believe that everything was going to be all right...
Who looked for wisdom? Who sat so quietly in class taking in every word that the rabbi was trying to teach us?
Thinking about all of our troubles or tests will not help us. Gloom and depression don’t solve anything.
It is very important to know who and where your family came from since history has a way of repeating itself.
I felt that as a psychology teacher, who knows and teaches so much about human nature and emotions, to explode and get so angry was not the right thing to do.
By noticing others, you are simply acknowledging that there are other people around you who have desires, lives, families, joys, aches, and hardships.
Is G-d our best friend? Do we think of Him first before anyone else?
Sometimes you are having a bad day. Nothing seems to be going as you expected. And then you see someone at work or school who needs help with something and you help them out.
A person can be anywhere in the world and he or she can feel the holiness of the holiday or of the Shabbat, no matter what.
We can take our hard moments and turn them into a deep connection to the one above. We can take each opportunity of hardship and turn it into our special prayer to G-d.
In our relationships, when do you forgive and forget, and when do you demand redress from those who hurt you? When do you say “No”? When do you say “Yes”?
Sometimes a person who rises to heroic heights for the sake of ideals is routed by the day-to-day hardships of living.
Ask any counselor or therapist and you will hear of the great damage caused to children who were insulted by their parents or teachers, siblings or peers.
Cold-blooded, fanatical, baseless, relentless hatred can be uprooted from its core only by saturating our world with pure, undiscriminating, unyielding love and acts of kindness.
Rachel, our loving mother, still lays buried near Bethlehem. Though she was buried along the road, today her grave is included in the city proper, yet it is still far from the grave of her husband Yaakov Avinu.
When a child is born and we give them a name, we really have no idea how this child will develop and in which way this little neshama will grow.
Does G-d answer our prayers? Definitely! Sometimes the answer is "Yes" and sometimes it's "No." And whatever God's answer, it's always what's best for us.
When should we be tough, soft, when are we truly honest with ourselves and our surroundings? And when are we just putting on a show.
We will never find happiness when all we see is the surface of life, without examining its core.
There are so many examples of something that looks harsh or not pleasant when in fact it is for the benefit of the individual suffering.
Life in this special land can be difficult. Sometimes what makes it so hard is not so much the physical work but the mental and spiritual work.
Bitachon is not measured by your success in climbing over the gate. Bitachon is measured by your response upon seeing the gate – whether you grimace and give up, or whether you appreciate that God has put the gate there for your ultimate benefit.
If one were to make a vow or promise to Hashem, it is something that must be fulfilled.
And yet G-d himself presents himself, so to speak, on a very simple level so that anyone can just go up to him and talk.
Love is a contagious mitzvah: When others see someone whose life is motivated by the love of G‑d, they unfold their wings to fly along with him or her.
I try to open up the eyes of the people around me to have more sensitivity and awareness regarding all people who were not blessed with optimal health.
In earlier times, it was the custom already from Tu B'Av to use as one's greeting "Ketiva vachatima tova,” the same blessing that we use today during the month of Elul and on Rosh Hashana.
Till this day, many Jewish homes continue to observe the tradition of maintaining a half-meter square patch of wall scraped clean of plaster as one enters the house. For how can we complete our houses when G-d's house lays in ruins?
We all try to go on the right path, we all try to set goals and go ahead and achieve them.
As Jews, we try to connect all of our daily events to the guiding hands of The Almighty. And yet, how often do we look at G-d’s connection to the world and His intervention in the public realm?
The older we get, the wiser we get, and the more mistakes we have made over time, the more experience we have gained.
All the suffering that has been our lot since the day the Temple was destroyed is a result of our exiled state. This is why we mourn the destruction of the Temples.
All of these children, including my son, take an enormous amount of physical care. It is not a simple matter. And yet, taking care of such special children is an honor.
How do misunderstandings arise? Often the cause is a kind of egocentrism – the belief that other people think the same way we do, especially if these people belong to “us.”
Royalty is a concept that brings respect and awe to whoever thinks about the true essence of the word.
Sometimes we are so busy looking for the next great thing to plan and prepare for that we seem to forget that the simplest things in life, and finding happiness in those tremendous simplicities.
Jews everywhere are proud of their unhesitating acceptance of the Torah and of its wonderful teachings.
I value solidarity and community, but I also think it is healthy and desirable to be able and willing to think and act independently with a strong sense of self.
The entire mountainside is transformed into a promenade where superstars of the Israeli religious music scene participate in impromptu jams with tourists.
On Memorial Day, as I remembered all the soldiers and great people who died protecting this little but so important and significant piece of land, I felt so proud to be part of the Jewish nation in its homeland.
Think what the world would be like it we gave more respect to even one person. The more similar people seem to be, the more they find to argue about. The less we have in common, the less we care!
Today, counting the Omer can be a time of meditation where we renew our spirits as we prepare for Shavuot.
We perceive these moments to be filled with grace, and we might feel that our lives are worth even one such experience.
Did all those broken and hurt people expect the last words of Yosef – “And G-d will surely redeem you from here,” which he uttered on his deathbed – to come true?
We all know that cleaning the house for Pesach is a mitzvah, but what are our thoughts as we fulfill it?
What do hamentaschen and matzahs have in common? What connection could there be between Pharaoh and Haman, Moses and Mordecai, Miriam and Esther?
It’s doing the right thing even when it might seem like it’s the opposite of what everyone else is doing, even though you know, that it’s the right thing.
The entire world is like a body or a vessel, and Israel is the soul that makes the body run.
All of us go through challenges in our lives. One can just let one’s imagination run wild wondering how many tests and challenges a person might experience in the course of 20 years.
My special needs child was in the car and it was a very cold and rainy morning. These two officers didn’t leave my side for more than 2 hours.
Throughout the years of taking care of such a special needs child I believe that he understands all that is going on, he just doesn’t have the ability to express himself. And I was determined to make him as happy as I could.
Among Chasidim, this period is one of teshuvah, fasting, and selichot. And the Jewish Kabbalistic-ethical works talk about this period being one of teshuvah and introspection.
The Tenth of Teves commemorates the beginning of Nebuchadnezzar’s siege of Jerusalem, the first stage in the sequence of events which led to the destruction of the city.
In our fast moving world, it might seem odd how a leader of such great stature, like Rabbi Shteinman, lived in such great simplicity, without looking for any fame or fortune, and yet had so many followers.
Although this bringing in of light begins at home, it does not stop there. Such is the nature of light that when one lights a light for one’s own benefit, it benefits also all who are in the vicinity.
How many of us think of the heroin Yehudit and the heroic act she did to save all the Jewish people, especially the women? This is the story of Yehudit.
As a Jew living in Israel I can express my burning desire that this whole country be united and focused on the same Jewish morals and values.
We as Jewish people must remember daily who we are, and who we come from and who our forefathers were.
True there is a lot of wealth within the world of technology that enables us to do so much more than in generations past. However, it has also created a very cold and isolated generation.
Everyone wants to feel loved and accepted. Everyone wants to feel respected and honored. But what about the people who are never noticed?
Each tear of our mother Rachel nurtures in our, her children’s, consciousness the sense of “smallness.” She “nurses” us with her tears.
With no special additions in any of the prayers, after such celebrations one can fall into sadness thinking the next holiday is Chanukah and it’s so far away.
G-d is merciful and loves his children more than we can understand. He isn’t interested in punishing just because we did wrong.
Each one of us no matter where we live, our gender, our nationality or the social circles we live in, have worries.
We prepared and learned and repented in order to make Hashem very proud of us.
This is the time to stop and see in which direction we are heading in our lives. What type of investments are we making?
Now other than it being very frustrating we must learn to contemplate on those times and see beyond the moment of distress to a higher force.
Living in a carefree mode during bein hazmanim is dangerous and counterproductive to human accomplishment.
Then there's the theory that Tu B’Av marks the day on which the generation sentenced to die in the desert for the sin of the Golden Calf stopped dying.
Many books and commentaries have been written on the reasons we have not merited redemption. All agree that the main reason is the lack of love between us.
No one knows how many years he is given on this earth. If a person were to know when their time is up they would live differently.
The older and wiser that we get the more we realize that those prehistoric parents and grandparents are not as out of date as we thought.
Throughout the years that I lived in America I would meet lots of Jews with the same love and burning desire to live in Israel. I was not alone.
The generation of Jews who left Egypt and received the Torah on Mount Sinai, dreamed of entering the promised land and settling in it.
Aside from the inconsiderate people there are the people who stare at those who look different, or even strange, depending on the disability.
Often we feel that the days just pass by and we are missing our purpose in life.
Living In Jerusalem isn’t so easy. People with different religions and different views want this city to belong only to them.
As we grow up and become more independent, we tend to think that we are in charge and that everything is in our hands.
June 26, 2026 
