יום רביעי, א׳ אב תשפ״וWednesday, July 15, 2026
Follow Us
Even when they part ways because of the tiffs over grazing land, Avraham promises to always be there for Lot in time of need. He makes good on that promise when he takes on the world “superpowers” and rescues Lot from captivity.
While Moav & Midian championed a separation of 'religion' & state, Israel’s mission demands that spiritual ideals be materialized on a national level so that our Torah’s values be fully expressed on earth.
Just as an advocate is created for each mitzvah, so too a prosecuting angel is created with the performance of every aveirah.
It would seem that the problem was not in the stream but in the people. The Children of Israel disparaged the Land of Israel through the negative report of the spies and they had still not rectified this sin.
When we bentch, one of the people we should have in mind to bless and to thank, besides Hashem of course, is our wife. She is the one who prepares our repast, cleans up after us, and creates the aura that makes the meal pleasant.
Procrastination is opportunity's natural assassin. -Victor Kiam
Unfortunately, Yiftach would become a key participant in perhaps the bloodiest and most infamous civil war in Israel: that between Menashe and Ephraim.
Why did Hashem tell Moshe to take the staff if He wanted Moshe to speak to the rock? Why open a possibility for Moshe to sin?
In the Torah portions that we are currently reading, it is noted time and again that as soon as the people arrived at a new place, they immediately erected the Mishkan, the people's spiritual center and beating heart.
Communicating the Jewish people's deepest aspirations can often serve to raise morale & strengthen Israel’s position on the battlefield.
Any positive steps taken in matters of spirituality result in success – perhaps even in a different place or at a different time.
It is worth understanding why Korach’s argument against Moshe was found to be utterly without merit while Shmuel’s is held up as the apogee of righteousness.
The Rokei’ach teaches us that the author of Aleinu is none other than our great leader Yehoshua.
Korach cynically recruited the tribe of Reuven to join his “coup” against Moshe and Aharon, claiming that it was the right of the bechor, Reuven, to work in the Mishkan – not Aharon and the Kohanim.
We are acknowledging that Hashem is our Boss, not just when we’re in the synagogue but when we leave shul and go to our workplaces or to our homes.
Rust consumes iron and envy consumes itself. -Danish proverb
After all, summer vacation is not a vacation from values or from anything that is important to us. It's a vacation from school alone.
Our equality doesn't result from being created identical but rather from the fact that we each have equally crucial functions and important roles to play as part of Israel's greater historic mission.
The problem with the Meraglim was not having doubts, being concerned, or having insecurities.
Just as a slave would have a seal on his clothing identifying him as such, the tzitzis distinguish us as servants of Hashem (Tosfos).
The mitzvah of hafrashat challah is from the written Torah, and like all the mitzvot related to the Land of Israel, applies only in Eretz Yisrael and only when the majority of Am Yisrael resides there.
Power will intoxicate the best hearts, as wine the strongest heads. -Charles Caleb Colton
The spies that led Israel to national catastrophe mistakenly thought that the value of preserving life overrides the commandment to free Eretz Yisrael.
Anger, says Rashi, causes a person to err. It causes a person to forget their learning. It is extremely harmful to the body and it also causes the brain to be put on ‘pause.’
The most important question in life is how do we manage time, particularly the two months of vacation.
Some suggest “cholent” comes from the French chaud ("hot") and lent ("slow"). The opposite of cholent is “nonchalant,” which means cold and disinterested.
For the first time since making his decision to keep Shabbos, Uri became a little ambivalent. Yet, when it was time for him to close the shop for Shabbos, he resolutely requested all the shoppers to finish up and check out their purchases so he could go home.
Chazal say that the Menorah is a blessing of spirituality. It represents the light of the Torah.
Shimshon is a tragic, and ultimately tragically flawed, character.
Rav Avidgor Miller points out that the Hebrew word for anger, kaas, contains the same letters as the Hebrew word ‘eches,’ which means poison.
Through Israel's returns home and national rebirth, we have already seen sparks of prophecy return.
Old age has a great sense of calm and freedom. When the passions have relaxed their hold and have escaped, not from one master, but from many. -Plato
We need to pay attention to our bodies. We speak about values and Torah but ignore the fact that the body is the tool upon which values and Torah depend.
Rabbeinu Yonah (Gerondi), most famously known for his Sefer Shaarei Teshuvah, writes how worthy is the individual who observes the protective restraints that were instituted to guard the fulfillment of the mitzvos, over and above his actual performance of the mitzvah itself.
If you have been settled in Eretz Yisrael already for four or more generations and your farm is producing steadily, blessed by Divine abundance, you begin to take it for granted.
Shabbat Shalom and Chag Sameach
It is unclear exactly where everything goes on the shulchan. When the two stacks of breads and two bowls of levonah are arranged on it, there is no place for anything else, let alone baking pans, bowls, pipes, etc.
Once they asked a wise man to talk about his greatest dream. He answered that he had many dreams and professional aspirations, but above all he wanted to be a better father, a better husband, a better son, and a better grandson. At the end of his life, a person can leave many achievements behind, […]
You must pay the price if you wish to secure the blessing. -Andrew Jackson
Abarbanel says that the Children of Israel are not compared to grains of sand simply because they are so many. Lots of things occur in great numbers but Israel isn’t compared to them.
Our Sages expound that granting merit to the many (zikui harabbim) is inherently infinitely beneficial.
When we think this Shavuos about the revelation at Sinai, let’s remember that the Torah was given surprisingly in the midst of billowing smoke and blackness.
That HaShem forgoes His Honor for the sake of making peace between man and wife comes to teach us the importance of humbling our own egos for the sake of making our relationships work.
Even within large groups, or even within an entire nation, each individual has a special place and a unique mission. Each person is important.
The multitude which is not brought to act as a unity, is confusion. That unity which has not its origin in the multitude is tyranny. -Blaise Pascal
Every mitzvah you perform heals some spiritual malaise that you might not even know you were suffering from.
It is every individual’s obligation to toil in Torah so that he can soar even higher than the angels.
We should train ourselves to look forward to doing our mitzvos. The premier example of this attitude is the mitzvah of sefira. That on a national level we demonstrate in unison an excited countdown towards Torah.
A people's army is necessary for Israel to fulfill the Divine commandment of sovereignty over our land.
Rabbi Greenblatt remembers that the rav stood in tallit and tefillin, looked him in the eyes, and gave him a blessing that he should become a talmid chacham and merit to live a long life. The second blessing materialized, he smiled, I hope the first did, too.
Statistics seemingly is the human species’ greatest defense mechanism. It allows us to live “normal” lives of stability and security.
Yirmiyahu knows that Hashem is all-powerful and that He is not limited by geopolitical and military realities. If Hashem wishes to reverse the process of conquest and cancel the exile, it is within His power to do so.
It is the first of all problems for a man to find out what kind of work he is to do in this universe. -Thomas Carlyle
The Doresh Tzion explains that Eretz Yisrael is acquired by the Jewish nation only in the merit of the Torah that was given at Har Sinai. If they abandon the ways of the Torah, then their entitlement to Eretz Yisrael is withdrawn as well.
You have two people who spent their Sunday night from 8 to 9 p.m. One administered the Heimlich maneuver and saved a person from choking and another person attended the Daf Yomi. In the scales of merit, it is the latter person who comes out on top.
If we had Har Sinai today, the contemporary form of the mitzvah of Shemittah would not apply to farmers, but to computer engineers, doctors, graphics artists, lawyers, stockbrokers and businessmen.
Man is a synthesis of his nefesh habahamis (the animal soul), which has physical needs, and his G-dly soul (nefesh haElokis). Man’s mission is to elevate his nefesh habahamis to function in the realm of his nefesh haElokis.
We are accustomed to transitioning from the sadness of Memorial Day to the joy of Independence Day, but how do we transition in the opposite direction, from independence to mourning?
The Arizal teaches that the firstborn ought to have had the priesthood by right, except that Kayin abused this privilege and it was revoked from him as a result of his grave transgression.
Parallel to the technical, scientific research I discovered many realities that are not intuitively apparent, but when you dig deeper, you begin to truly appreciate.
The pernicious difficulty of keeping self-love in check and not having it warp the way in which we see others is brought to our attention in the story of R. Elazar
Rabbi Weiss: The Hebrew word ‘leitz’ is made up of a lamed and a tzadik which means ‘learned’ and righteous’ for the scoffer thinks that he knows better and that he is really in the right.
During those years, many who came to America had no interest in continuing the sacred Torah traditions. R’ Yaakov Yosef dedicated his life to bringing back many who had fallen into a life of sin.
The fifth of Iyar marks not only Israel's victory against England but also the day we fulfilled the collective mitzvah of sovereignty over our homeland for the first time in nearly 2,000 years.
Again and again Yechezkel recounts all of the miracles Hashem has performed throughout history for His people and all of the ways in which they betrayed Him.
R’ Chaim chose to sit in the middle of the shul, off to the side. Anyone could have the honor of sitting next to him, something that was the dream of a lifetime for many.
Absence diminishes little passions and increases great ones, as wind extinguishes candles and fans a fire. -Francois de la Rochefoucauld
The Gemara explains the discrepancy in the offerings in a beautiful way, to the effect that Israel will bring what they have available and Hashem will accept it.
Do not allow any bad thought to arise in our hearts, heaven forbid, neither when we are awake nor in a dream.
We can admire and learn from people who are able to find the extraordinary strength to see the oneg while understanding and empathizing with those who are having a hard time seeing past the negah
The mere existence of life is not sufficient. Life derives its true value and meaning as a tool to be used in the service of the Divine.
Wishing all a Happy New Year-but when?
Even more curious is the latter part of the Midrash – to prevent becoming afflicted with the nega’im, what should one do? Eat, drink and be happy! Have a continual party – that is the remedy!
On this Night of Heritage, when we have the opportunity to etch the fundamentals of our faith into our children and grandchildren’s memory banks, it behooves us to spend time in preparation for this monumental task.
His son, Rabbi Shlomo Kanievsky touched the crowd with stories of childhood games played with his father, the mastermind, and uncovered a little bit about the relationship with his deceased wife, Batsheva.
I count life just a stuff to try the soul's strength on. -Robert Browning
Israel is to participate in - and elevate - every sphere of national life in order to reveal the inner connection of all that exists to the Divine Ideal.
The rebbi felt terrible that there was a child sitting in his class who was not eating lunch…
HKB”H created most of the human body with redundancy. We have two eyes, ears, nostrils, arms, legs, hemispheres in the brain, chambers in the heart, lungs, kidneys, reproductive organs, etc., the logic being – “if one fails, we have a spare.”
Since Hashem despises the evil person as He is, so to speak, nauseated from the praise of the wicked, it is a good idea to preface our Seder with teshuvah.
Israel has dramatically returned to the world stage in what has so far been merely the introduction to a revolutionary process destined to free humankind from a global order that promotes injustice.
When our haftara was designated for a week such as this, thousands of years ago, the sages saw fit to add another couple of verses to the end, spoken by Yirmiyahu almost a thousand years before that.
The intent of the commandment to clean the ashes was to bring his thoughts down to the people on earth, for him to ‘see’ the hard-working people who were involved in everyday life.
I know very few who enjoy matzo year round. Most people can’t wait for Pesach to end, to get rid of all their leftover matzo.
How many times have any of us said to ourselves: “I felt so badly that I wanted to die.” And yet, G-d does not demand that of us. He wants us to live and do teshuvah.
On the stage of history, we have been taught that Hashem often uses the wicked to destroy the wicked. One evil nation will conquer another, only in due course to be conquered by the next to arise.
On Shabbat we finished reading the book of Exodus with its emotional description of the completion of the Mishkan, the spiritual center that accompanied us in the desert. This apparently was the first crowd-funding endeavor of our people.
Most people have the will to win, few have the will to prepare to win. -Bobby Knight (all-time great college basketball coach)
The offering of the korbanos in itself does not achieve atonement. It is when the person’s mind and heart are overcome with thoughts of teshuvah that there is atonement.
We are in the land of “What have you done for me lately?” where the standard is “What’s in it for me?”
If the sin originated with food, then its remedy and atonement must involve food. This is why Purim is so food oriented...
Alexander Kaganovsky, president of our cong. asked for silence and said: 'I want to thank all the emissaries who have stayed behind with us. For many years you have been saying that you are an inseparable part of us, but now you proved it in the moment of truth.'
When it came to the “Jewish question,” Achashverosh seemed to be completely neutral. So how could he be as bad as the man who destroyed the Temple?
It was Mordechai's pivotal decision not to bow or budge before Haman that catapulted the Jews into a situation of possible annihilation, and it was he who commanded Esther, his own wife, to risk her life to save her people.
It's important to recognize the internal development of the Hebrew tribes from the Exodus from Egypt to the Brit Sinai and consecration of the Mishkan.
One word of derision can offset a thousand words of mussar.
In our haftara, we find Shlomo HaMelech completing the construction and initiating the dedication of the First Beit HaMikdash. In Shlomo we find a unique synthesis of the attributes of Moshe and of Betzalel.
These last two years have demonstrated how vital it is to feel solidarity not only toward those who have passed away but toward those who have been sick but are not yet fully recovered, toward business owners, toward coping parents, and, in fact, toward everyone who has been affected,--which means every one of us.
Our Sages tell us that righteous men and women merit that their descendants continue in their ways.
July 10, 2026 
