יום שלישי, ה׳ אלול תשפ״וTuesday, August 18, 2026
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During the years that I was a division head, 98% of the campers in my division who were homesick were completely fine and enjoying camp within a week. But that first week can be gut wrenching.
The Torah doesn’t just caution against anger; it offers a vision of leadership that channels conflict into purpose. That’s the kind of leadership we need now: sober, disciplined, and deeply strategic. After all, our community’s safety is at stake.
In principle, certain sins indeed leave a mark and are absorbed so deeply that the body must be destroyed. Yet, if the internal actions and repentance reach a level that rationalizations peel away – or at least significantly weaken – the vessel is reformed without actual destruction.
There is no issue that raises the temperature and polarizes Israelis more than exemptions for yeshiva bochurim serving in the army.
It seemed totally impossible for him to come out unscathed. And yet he did. He then revealed a very narrow space, just big enough to curl into, safely out of reach of the nails.
A manicure is still not all that important to me. But I understand more about the women for whom it is – both in its presence as a basic element of personal grooming, and in its absence as an announcement to the world that you've just gone to mikvah.
Suddenly, during the meal, my face started itching and burning. My ears were tingling. I looked in the mirror and saw a swollen face staring back. My husband gave me Benadryl, but by the next day, I looked like a horror show.
By Eli Lebowicz
The one Kabbalistic custom we all know is cutting nails over a garbage can or toilet. People on public transit should adopt this custom!
By Anat Coleman
In the end, the corkboards went up, I was relieved that the piles of paper had finally found a home, and the kids now have a new appreciation for the difference between a screw and a nail – and perhaps a bit too much confidence with a hammer in hand.
Aliyah is not about taking. It’s about giving. It’s about building.
How Judge Torresen’s ruling can be reconciled with the Supreme Court’s admonition about judges staying in their lane eludes us.
I smile when I think of him now. I look at the pictures of our past with no regrets, knowing just how fortunate I was to have met this man who adored me and who opened up my world to heights and new experiences, I had never imagined.
Even investments, which do belong to the person in his lifetime, should ideally be divided according to the beneficiaries. Although these investments are part of his estate, since the person designated beneficiaries, the principle of mitzvah lekayem divrei hames applies.
While it might appear that unmarried men and women have less complicated lives by virtue of being on their own, and hence have fewer responsibilities and obligations to take up their time and energy, life for them is nonetheless more difficult.
Like social skills, street smarts can be picked up naturally or they can be learned through explicit instruction.
An Essential Agent ‘Set In The Skin Of The Rennet Of Nevela’ (Avodah Zarah 35a)
Engaging in aimless activity creates the illusion of progress, allowing us to sidestep decisive action that could expose us to failure.
By Irwin Cohen
I root for all of the Detroit teams and Detroit has been energized by the recent success of the Tigers baseball team and the football Lions. But now basketball has become my third favorite and the Brooklyn Nets have replaced the Detroit Pistons as my favorite hoopsters.
Question: I recently returned from a trip abroad. When I entered my synagogue early one weekday morning, I asked the officers for an aliyah so that I could bless Gomel. I was informed that I could receive an aliyah; however, as per the rabbi’s instruction, I would have to wait until the Sabbath to bless Gomel. I was not given any reason for this and did not wish to display my ignorance, so I quietly acquiesced. Can you please explain what was meant? Name Withheld Via E-mail
Of all the things that we can give our children, self-esteem is the most important.
Despite the challenges of war, Israel’s economy is widely viewed as resilient and fundamentally strong, giving both local and international buyers confidence in the market’s long-term prospects.
We daven together in synagogues that feel familiar whether we’re in Toronto or Tel Aviv. We mourn together when tragedy strikes and we celebrate together when a lost hostage comes home or an aliyah flight lands in Ben-Gurion Airport.
The title page itself announces the work’s ambitions: a composition… measured and delved to uncover allegory and parable in the words of Chazal, standing on the shoulders of giants like the Ibn Ezra and the Rambam.
Going out before the people and going in before them is one type of leadership. It is the leadership of the humble public servant who bends before the needs of his people.
We must not be discouraged or lose heart in the face of the long arc of life in Israel.
By Adina Broder
When confronted by Leah’s harsh words, Rachel certainly could have argued back, showing how she, not Leah, was the victim in this situation. She now had to share her husband, when she could have had him all to herself.
You don’t need a girl who see you and sees short. You need a girl who sees you and understands that you are everything she ever hoped for.
Not every gut impulse is a moral directive. When we confuse conscience with certainty, we risk mistaking personal anger for sacred missions.
By Marc Gronich
The message is about tolerance, anti-hate, anti-bias, anti-discrimination. It’s not just that we need to be more tolerant, because students understand that but we really get to focus on how I can be more tolerant. What actions can I take?
If rabbis begin to offer public endorsements, especially from the pulpit, will those who disagree with his conclusion still feel comfortable being part of that shul?
If Parshat Bamidbar showed why the Book of Bamidbar is called the Book of Numbers, then Parshat Pinchas confirms that name.
Rabbbeinu Bachye finds it problematic to accept the literal interpretation that Hashem somehow erred, requiring our intercession on His behalf. He explains that the real purpose of this mitzvah of the Chatat on Rosh Chodesh is to give hope to those who have gone astray but wish to return to the faithful service of Hashem.
By Fayge Young
The stories are compact, yet feature writing that is solid, lively, and packed with emotional depth.
Striking the right balance between Torah and one’s livelihood is a tricky business. Especially since making a living is a mitzvah in itself.
Five decades before Herzl’s Der Jundenstaat, Montefiore was arguably the first contemporary Zionist.
We might think ancient society was cruel to women – and in many ways, the ancient world did not sufficiently protect individual rights – but I can’t think of anything more cruel than the modern conception that a woman should feel obligated to compete in the employment marketplace and jump back into work six weeks or three months after the most profound experience of childbirth.
In truth, though, as recent events in the Middle East demonstrate, the relationship between President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu was a function not of them complimenting each other but rather of their respective militaries complementing each other in meeting a shared challenge.
So where do we go from here? Don’t ask me. I have difficulty making decisions that affect my own life, let alone those of millions.
It’s no accident that the universities with the most radical anti-Israel protests – in which bloodthirsty slogans in support of Hamas are commonplace – are also among those with the largest foreign student enrollments.
Working six days and resting on the seventh reminds us that Hashem did the same when He created the world. Shabbat is a weekly reminder of how the world came to be. It was created by Hashem, and is not just here on its own.
By Maayan Zik
Catastrophes can strengthen communal ties and can paradoxically be a catalyst for profound positive change.
We do not respond to catastrophe with questions of why and we do not think of calamities gone by in order to be sad. We respond as best as we can.
Catastrophe disrupts our sense of coherence simultaneously – spiritually, psychologically, neurologically. It fractures how we understand ourselves and the world, overwhelming the nervous system’s need for safety and control.
I had planned a different response to the word catastrophe, but living in Israel now, during the ballistic missile barrages from Iran, that word has taken on a new meaning.
Like the word, our personal understanding of these events can change. What once felt like a meaningless, destructive force can, with time and support, reveal its place in our life's narrative.
By Our Readers
Just as Donald Trump’s leadership in the fight against antisemitism drove them wild and in the opposite direction, so too has President Trump’s astonishing support for Israel, beginning in his first term and continuing in his second, likely reinforced their anti-Israel/pro-Palestinian obsessions to insane levels. Again, think Trump Derangement Syndrome.
Speak up and pay the price or stay silent and enable failure. In such moments what organizations need isn’t just better ideas, they need better messengers. Outsiders with no agenda. Someone who can say what others can’t.
Despite the beautiful blue summer skies above and the warm sun that shines down on our earth, our army is still fighting in Gaza.
It’s that sense of altruism and unity that gives us hope that we will merit to witness Mashiach.
The eight justices noted, however, that they expressed no view on any particular plan because none was presented to them.
It has been a delight to receive letters throughout these three years from many of you sharing your journey or that of someone you care about.
I understand that halacha frowns on engaging in personal needs before Shacharis, including travel, Eliyahu said. But I have a choice between davening at home and then fighting traffic, often getting late to work, or joining a minyan near work and avoiding traffic. Rabbi Dayan listened attentively. Eliyahu asked, Can I drive to work and daven Shacharis there?
Stubbornness brings lots of benefits, but what about the negative consequences when raising a child? Is there a way to alleviate them?
A Matter Of Time ‘One Who Is Recognized As An Expert...’ (Avoda Zarah 26b)
Perfection—the henchman of procrastination—is deeply demoralizing. Neither intelligence nor talent grants immunity from its grip.
We live such public and exposed lives today, yet in this week’s parsha we are reminded to seek the blessing of privacy.
By Mendi Glik
The reason, by the way, that I didn’t really pay attention to the words all those years is because the melody is just so beautiful that I didn’t really care that I didn’t understand the words.
While it’s important to have articulate advocates representing Israel and the Jewish people, what is the average person’s role in improving the plight of Jews around the world?
Chani was the first in the family to acknowledge the wisdom of renting out their home, and was more willing than the others to bite the bullet and do whatever was necessary to keep them afloat.
Question: I recently returned from a trip abroad. When I entered my synagogue early one weekday morning, I asked the officers for an aliyah so that I could bless HaGomel. I was informed that I could receive an aliyah, however – as per the Rabbi’s instruction – I would have to wait until the Sabbath to bless HaGomel. I was not given any reason for this and did not wish to display my ignorance, so I quietly acquiesced. Can you please explain what was meant? Name Withheld Via Email
Being a people-pleaser is not necessarily a bad thing, but it becomes difficult when you feel you have to avoid conflict at all costs.
In Parshat Balak, Bilaam never saw the people he was meant to curse. He viewed them from a distance; abstractly, impersonally. His words came not from relationship, but rather from obligation, from politics, from agenda. And yet they could have reshaped a people’s destiny.
Balak realized that Midyan and Moav, the erstwhile enemies, would have to make a truce and gang up as allies against Israel. But since G-d was on Israel’s side, there was no way he could prevent the Jews from ultimately taking over the land.
Balak precedes the Fast of the Fourth Month (that’s what the navi calls Shiv’a Asar b’Tammuz) almost 80% of the time. That includes, in Chutz LaAretz, the years when Shavuot is Friday-Shabbat and the sedra right before the fast is Chukat-Balak.
That this newly acquired manuscript – hidden away for centuries – should resurface now is a quiet miracle.
By Irwin Cohen
After Mr. Ploni finished telling his story, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef said, Now I know why I smell Gan Eden on you. The neshamos you buried are clinging to you.
One may not sell lions to Gentiles, according to the Talmud, because lions can cause injury to the public (Avodah Zarah 16), to put it mildly.
By Adina Broder
The respect component of the relationship comes from appreciating the other person’s differences – when you admire, or at least accept, the qualities your spouse has that you don’t.
His father told him: You decide which yeshiva you want to go to. Don’t tell me your decision. When the day comes to leave to yeshiva, take your suitcase, go to the yeshiva, and I don’t want to know where you are going.
If we make people believe they are infallible, they eventually believe they can do no wrong – especially when they do.
By Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks z"l
According to he Netziv, If Jews live distinctive and apart from others they will dwell safely, but if they seek to emulate ‘the nations’ they ‘will not be reckoned’ as anything special at all.
Basketball, Goodman asserts, is a vehicle that facilitates empowerment, and he’s confident that basketball will help these children emerge from a pervasive “down” state of mind and life in limbo – disrupted schedules, disrupted sleep, schools closed, extensive time in shelters, explosions and more.
Upon his return to London, Sir Moses was given a hero’s welcome, including a big ceremony and special synagogue services, and, when he met with Queen Victoria to present her with the firman, she honored him by permitting him to add the Lion of Judah holding a banner bearing the word 'Jerusalem' to his coat of arms.
Though the Shulchan Aruch agrees with the Rambam’s broad prohibition, his final clause might offer some room for an answer. It is permitted to note the beauty of an idolator if the focus of the comment is to praise G-d and not the person.
Although we believe President Trump has the healthiest respect for Israel’s contributions to the joint effort, we also believe that in his view, the U.S. was the indispensable party, making it all possible.
Every Jew should view themselves as a messianist.
Idolatry is insidious and it sneaks into the hearts of the unwary by way of small compromises and prohibited acts that appear insignificant at first.
The Torah singled out igniting fire as the paradigm for Shabbos observance, because our attitude toward one another on Shabbos is what will ensure its observance in future generations.
Acknowledge the fire, respond to the flame. If you don’t, well, you may as well be sloshing through life in a waterlogged rowboat. And who wants to live like that?
In our generation, we are witnessing the revealed yad Hashem – victories against all odds, survival amidst growing hate, and moral clarity in chaos. We are witnessing aish min haShamayim.
We must remember that an uncontrolled fire is destructive and terrifying, but a controlled one is a tremendous object of beauty.
There are many parallels between fire and water, most notably their coequal destructive potential and indispensability to human life.
Rabbi Sauber told his class, We are about to learn about the greatest act of self-sacrifice that ever occurred.
In a safe and secure future, Israel will not be dependent for its protection on the goodwill of foreign peoples, and its fate will not hinge on their empty and aimless predictions and theories about us.
It is also unfortunate that, generally, the program is not closer to the voucher models used in some red states whereby parents are provided with education vouchers that can be redeemed at either public or private schools.
This deliberate targeting of civilians – the very definition of terrorism – is why Israeli officials, human rights experts and many international observers have categorized the October 7 attack as a mass atrocity constituting crimes against humanity.
The most obvious form of chesed is giving money, but this is far from ideal. Short-term monetary gifts do not usually solve a long-term struggle with poverty; the person will therefore remain dependent and poor.
Of course, the piece de resistance was the decision at the end of the Court’s term in June, largely disallowing the imposition of temporary universal injunctions by district court judges.
August 14, 2026 
