יום שלישי, כ״ט תמוז תשפ״וTuesday, July 14, 2026
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There were many hespedim written about him, and a book published. But they just don’t do him justice. How could words capture his empathy? Wisdom? The way he made you feel like you were oh-so-important and valued?
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.
By Anat Coleman
Before giving someone mussar, ask yourself if you're helping them improve, or easing your own irritation? Are you seeking their growth, or your need to feel right?
By Avi Ganz
Rav Chaim, zt"l, like other Mussar Greats, teaches that mussar isn't a negative thing at all!
By Ruchi Koval
Frum friends word association: mussar = scary, my principal, I did something wrong, I’m in trouble. Non-frum friends word association: character development, kindness, patience, forgiveness, giving the benefit of the doubt.
While halacha sets mandatory, objective boundaries of behavior, mussar goes beyond the letter of the law and addresses internal, subjective and personal refinement.
I used to dismiss a vort as a shallow thought meant for light conversation or sharing a cute idea. However, looking back, it represents a way of bringing Torah into every conversation...
I’ve realized that if I only associate a vort with a sequined dress and a party, I’m missing the actual power of the concept. The traditional definition, a meaningful connection to the words of Torah, has evolved from an event into a daily mission.
By Hillel Fuld
The first one is a small short thought about the Torah. A longer thought might be called a d’var Torah, but a short idea is often referred to as a vort.
The basic meaning is as follows. There is a simcha! One of your children is engaged to someone and a simcha is to be had for all. Everyone is invited for a vort. That means come over and have a schnapps with a piece of cake.
By Keshet Starr
Words can allow us to connect with others, to compliment them when they need a boost, and to help them feel less alone when they are struggling. Words can be a bridge, or a buoy to those lost in suffering.
By Nachum Segal
When one is sitting in a lecture or Torah class and tries to offer an out of the ordinary approach to one of the presenter's points, very often that can be classified as a kvetch.
The truth is no one likes a complainer. To hear constant complaints drains emotional energy and makes the listener feel bad.
By Akiva Kra
Complaints create instant connection. Someone mentions the weather, the food, or how the kugel managed to be both dry and somehow soggy, and suddenly everyone is involved.
By Ariela Davis
Why notice the things that don’t go right and instead focus on the good, we wonder?
We are admonished to live our lives, b'simcha – in joy. But kvetches wallow in misery, because they have no hakarat hatov, no recognition of the chesed Hashem has bestowed on them.
Because Mitzrayim (Egypt) comes from the word meitzar – constraint, limitation. Egypt represents the boundaries that hold us back, exactly what the yetzer hara wants: for us to be satisfied with sababa.
It seems that we need cool new words every couple of years or so to denote cool.
By Martin Bodek
If I was to translate it into modern slang, it would be no worries, which is an overused phrase, because "no problem" is now underused because it is not allowed to be used anymore. Someone declared it evil, and I'm not sure why.
By Rabbanit Dr. Adena Berkowitz
When someone will ask you how your day is going, let’s give it a twist: Baruch Hashem, sababa!
No matter where I am in Israel – whether it’s the calm of Yehuda and Shomron, the soul of Jerusalem, or the vibrant pulse of Tel Aviv – it’s always sababa.
Many of us picture piety as passively throwing up our hands and allowing G-d to do the fighting on our behalf. The truth is that we are experiencing a deficiency of the chutzpah required to proudly advocate authentic Jewish values to the world (Kovetz Ma’amarim, vol. 1, p. 262).
There’s a classic definition, often attributed to Leo Rosten: chutzpah is the man who kills his parents and then pleads for mercy because he’s an orphan. Extreme, yes – but the structure holds.
As the world seems to fill more each day with truly heinous chutzpah (a “Globalize the Intifada” march right down the road from where Jews were just massacred!), we can take heart from the Gemara’s teaching in Sota 49b: In the lead-up to Moshiach, chutzpah will multiply.
Chutzpah, by definition, is boldness bordering on nerve. So really, expecting this article now is not ironic; it’s a live demonstration. It’s the literary equivalent of asking someone to deliver a shiur while waiting on a Disney line.
Diminishing your former spouse’s character in your children’s eyes will only diminish you in your children’s eyes. As hard as that reality may be, it’s the truth.
By Maayan Zik
The Maggid explained of his technique for creating lessons, First I decide what point I want to make, then I craft the story around it.
Spend money to enjoy life: After covering essentials and saving responsibly, use your resources to enhance your life.
I have deep gratitude for my professional teachers. But the lessons that shaped me most are the ones I learned from my students, especially those who challenged me the most.
By Eli Lebowicz
But there are informal lessons we can glean from different life experiences. Some lessons are small but still important, like make your kids’ lunches the night before so your morning self doesn’t hate your evening self.
We must learn a lesson from King David and focus on overcoming our enemies once and for all.
When we talk about doing something “for the klal,” we are speaking about Klal Yisrael, the Jewish people as a collective, not an abstract category but the very human, physical people that make up our religious nation.
Often, people feel that this kind of volunteerism exempts them from the need to tend to their personal development, their spiritual lives and their interior world.
It is well known that, by working together, people can accomplish far more than if they work apart. This is also true in the spiritual world and is presumably part of the reason a minyan is required for public Torah reading, priestly blessings, repeating the amidah, etc.
When ego or a sense of being worthier or more expert and thus the belief that my way is the only way infiltrates members of the community, it can lead to friction, discord, antipathy, antagonism, hostility and baseless hatred.
By David Curwin
Klal means a general rule or principle, set against prat, the specific case... A klal here isn’t just any rule. It is meant to organize and govern many cases at once, acting as an overall framework rather than a narrow instruction.
In sleep-away camp, I began to think of the mistakes I had made and the sins I felt I had accumulated over the years. The weight of that realization sat heavily on my heart. I confided in my sister, unsure of what to do with these feelings. She suggested that I speak to my father.
Being a father has also given me a greater understanding of my relationship with my Father in heaven.
Some communities have renamed their motzei Shabbat learning programs from Avos U’Banim to Dor L’Dor, acknowledging that not every boy has a father or has a father who can accompany him to a learning program.
In today's world, where many suffer from emotional wounds rooted in broken trust, abandonment, or confusion around fatherhood, the Torah reintroduces us to the ultimate, unchanging Father – One who sees, hears, understands, and never withdraws His love.
He was a Torah Scholar who spent his day, every day, learning Gemara until 3 p.m. in his home study. Only after that did he set out for his office at The Jewish Press.
By Anat Coleman
Time fills quickly; we find ourselves running through days packed tightly with obligations and expectations.
By Solly Hess
Growth requires three things: Vision. Planning. Running. Without the third, we’re left in that frustrating dream state of striving, struggling, and going nowhere.
By Martin Bodek
I’ve come a long way since then, and I’m proud to say that I’m the second youngest person ever to complete 25 New York City Marathons, which is completely insanely cool.
The Jewish people weren’t particularly mindful when they left Mitzrayim. They rushed so quickly that their bread had no time to rise. It was a mad dash – they ran! Today, we too have to run when we make our matzahs, like they did. You’ve got 18 minutes: Go!
We know that our yetzer hara (evil inclination) is constantly trying to bring us down, making us feel sluggish, lazy, or insecure. Our daily task is to identify where our thoughts and feelings are coming from.
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Chazal and behavioral science converge on the same principle: inner strength is built up through repeated, values-aligned action – choosing structure over impulse and obligation over comfort.
If one is strong, why does he need strengthening; and if not, how will it help?
We often treat strength like a solo sport, as if needing help means we’re failing somehow. Chizuk reminds us that real strength is often built through connection.
If you want to give chizuk but feeling uncomfortable, that’s good. That discomfort means you’re resonating. The key is holding that feeling – letting it move you to reach out and care, while not letting your chizuk become about soothing your own distress.
No matter who you are, no matter where you come from, it is a gift you can give to others. It's generosity, where one person sees what the other needs, and strives to provide it, and what is more G-dly than that?
Given that most interpreters take the first usage to be related to the practical purpose it served rather than to the divine standard that it met, the original reference to the term also implies that good is discoverable by human reason. G
By Keshet Starr
We want what’s good – for ourselves, for our families, for our communities. But what actually is good?
Now tov was taken as good, satisfactory, a little better than average. But the truth is – tov is a fantastic grade. It tells you that you are at a certain level but there is still room to grow.
By Hillel Fuld
Like many phrases or words in modern Hebrew, the word tov, depending on the context, can mean different things.
Legacy is powerful because it connects us to something larger than ourselves. It makes us feel proud, responsible, and committed.
What I love about this genre is when you realize that the decisions you make early on have significant consequences for sessions that take place weeks or months down the line.
By Adina Broder
The word legacy often carries a sense of weight, as though it belongs to those who have accomplished something historic or have reshaped the world in some monumental way.
Chazal say banav hem ma’asav – our children are our deeds. Maybe that’s the only balance sheet that matters.
I am proud of my family’s legacy which has prompted me to dedicate my time to serving my community.
The dreidel should be celebrated as the healthiest and financially friendly Chanukah item. The dreidel is not fattening – it is 100 percent fat-free, sugar-free and salt-free.
Regardless of our hard work, experience, and effort, we all still need a bit of mazal to be successful. You can make all the right decisions, but if your timing is off, nothing else matters.
Is the dreidel just a toy? To some, possibly. But to those who know it’s supposed history, it’s a device that allowed the safe study of Torah in a time of persecution.
By Avi Ganz
Chanukah tells us that sometimes, especially in the dark and cold of winter/Galus, we need to let go of our supposed control and let the Divine run the show.
Explanations for the dreidel's significance range from the practical to the mystical.
By Eli Lebowicz
Whenever a company or non-Jewish institution must issue a statement of solidarity or seasonal greetings to the broader Jewish community, they always show a menorah for some reason, no matter what the message is about or no matter what holiday it is; it’s not a meaningful message from the goyish world without some candles.
Candles shouldn’t matter anymore. They belong to another age – like quills and clay stoves, things replaced by convenience. And yet, candles endure. They wait on shelves and windowsills, marking moments no lightbulb can reach. We light them to remember, celebrate, begin, end, and to sanctify.
Shortly after my daughter got married, both she and my mother came for the weekend. As we lit candles, I realized that this was the first time that three generations were simultaneously ushering in Shabbos.
One thing they all have in common is the unique character of the candle which shares its light without diminishing its own ability to shine.
By David Curwin
With the arrival of electricity, meanings evolved. Menorah came to mean any lamp or light fixture, while nurah, a modern coinage, was adopted for “light bulb.” That shift left ner to take on its modern meaning: candle.
For such a complex word, it has a real simple etymology – it comes from the word pack, which means… pack! Add a diminutive, pluralize it, and you get pekalach!
When a loved one passes, we don’t wish we could trade them for someone else, even if an illness took them from us in a horrible way or much too soon. Only because we cannot isolate pain from pleasure, love, and meaning is it true that we would not trade away our suffering.
The same word morphed from childish sweetness to an adult weight. And for a while, I thought that was the whole story: that growing up meant swapping candy bags for burdens.
Perhaps we should not sweat the small stuff – the pekalach – but be grateful and feel blessed that we do not have to deal with a life-draining pekel.
We must learn to be grateful for our pekelach in life – our personal lot – because, as the saying goes, if everyone were to place their own bundle of challenges in the middle of the room, each person would ultimately choose their own back again.
I took one bite, said, Blech! and washed it down with the only drink I had, extremely sweet Manischewitz.
I remember growing up, gefilte fish looked different. The traditional old school look of it was football shaped and the size of your hand, not logs.
At 17, I had previously encountered gefilte fish, but I didn't understand that it was a common first course for Shabbos lunch.
Gefilte fish, dips, chopped liver, sweet and sour meatballs – no. Serve the meatballs and the liver as part of the main meal. You can even put out some dips. But skip that first course.
Children are not nachas machines. Children are human beings, messy combinations of nature and nurture, who are put on this earth to navigate their own journeys.
By Avi Ganz
According to AI, nachas is a Yiddish word that translates to deep pride and joy, especially the kind felt from the accomplishments or meaningful actions of a loved one, particularly one's children.
By Ariela Davis
It’s one thing to have nachat from kids because they get a good grade or follow the path we hope they will follow.
Often, parents view nachas as the payoff for cleaning up diapers and vomit, helping with countless hours of homework and hanging on during the roller coaster that is the teenage years. Even if that payment is not made immediately, it is still viewed as deserved when it comes to fruition in adulthood.
July 10, 2026 
