An Understanding Heart

  Our Chanukah Message, and for this year, and an announcement of new classes at Bnai Torah Boruch Hashem! “In those days at this time” So goes the Refrain of Al Hanisim – the additional prayer we add to the Amidah and the Grace after Meals During Chanukah and Purim. Chanukah is about the attempt to destroy Judaism and co-opt the Jews of the Land of Israel into the idolatrous, immoral, hedonistic and polytheistic Hellenist world. Our enemies, the Seleucids -with an empire centered in Syria, sought to use both the blandishments of societal acceptance and when that failed, force of arms and persecution to coerce us towards this goal. They desired that we bow to the prevailing values and beliefs held by the whole world -except for us Jews. In effect they said: “How can it be that you have the Chutzpah to believe the whole world is wrong and you are right?”. We responded that – “This is indeed the case, which is why empires, kingdoms, values and beliefs come and go, but our nation, ou...

 Hillel Fuld: I really don’t think you understand the absolute miracles that we witnessed last night here in Israel. In fact, I am sure you don’t. Let’s break this down. Israel has three air defense systems, each one of them a technological wonder and that’s not me saying it. That’s Dr. Gold who basically invented the Iron Dome who told me that. The level and sophistication of the Iron Dome is simply unparalleled. But the Iron Dome only knows how to detonate short range rockets or missiles within a 70 km range, give or take.  Then Israel has the David’s Sling system. That knows how to deal with mid range missiles up to approximately 300 km.  Then we have the Arrow system that literally detonates missiles that can fly outside of the earth’s atmosphere. That has a range of about 2,400 km!! 🤯 Last night, as Iran rained down ballistic missiles on Israel, all three defense systems were activated and implemented to perfection. The chances of all of these incredibly complex sys...

  This has been a very challenging year for Mishpachat Beit Yisrael – “The Family of the House of Israel” -the entire Jewish people. However, the reason it has been such a difficult period since Shemini Atzeret (10/7), is precisely because we are a family. We don’t always agree with each other, we don’t always stay connected, but we are always bound up in the reality of our relationship. One never stops being a parent, or a child, or a sister, or a brother. We rejoice in the joys of our fellow Jews and mourn with them in their sadness of loss. This then is a actually the dark lining of a beautiful reality. We care deeply about the tragedies befallen Jews we never met, whom we didn’t even know existed because we are part of a greater, indivisible whole. G-d says to us “Atem Edai” – “You (Israel) are my witnesses”. Our existence testifies to G-d’s existence, to G-d’s Providence and to G-d’s deep concern with what human beings do with their lives. G-d is One, Indivisible, yet the Sour...

  As we enter the fall, and prepare for Tishrei – The High Holidays, Sukkot and Simchat Torah, we are also poised at a key moment of the great American sport - the climactic crescendo of the Baseball season. True, in the grand scheme of things this may seem trivial, yet - all happens by Divine Providence. As a result of this reality, Rabbi Israel Ba’al Shem Tov taught “Everything we hear and see must teach us a means of enhancing our Divine work”. Since this sporting milestones are always close to this most intense period of the Judaic year, they must teach us something important. One of the special characteristics of baseball is the need for thorough preparation outside the games themselves. The perfect strike, the brilliant at-bat, the towering homer, the gravity-defying leaping catch at the wall, the perfectly choreographed double (or triple!) play all are the products of intense preparation and practice over many hours, days, months, and years. The necessary development of th...

  wing October 7, when the scope and horror of the Shemini Atzeret massacre became clear, I felt my mother’s experiences during the Holocaust come to life before my eyes. I felt overcome with grief and fear.  Yet, in the days that followed, something else became abundantly clear, and I was overwhelmed by its power.  I saw and heard how, on that terrible day, people put their lives on the line—and indeed many gave their lives—for fellow Jews they had never met before; how a divided Israel and a fragmented Diaspora Jewry came together in love and unity. I saw a new Jewish consciousness emerge, a realization that Jews share an essential bond with Israel and with each other that transcends all our differences. To quote the Tanya , “ It is on account of this common root, shared by all the Jewish people in the One G-d, that all of Israel are called siblings—in the full sense of the word.” Like siblings, we can disagree but the unbreakable bond is always there. But thi...

  But the more they were oppressed, the more they increased and spread out, so that the [Egyptians] came to dread the Israelites. - Shemot /Exodus 1:12 All those, who throughout history sought power, wealth, and perceived security through the degradation, subjugation, and destruction of other humans have relied upon  two key sets of premises: 1.       Constant contempt and intrusive control over people’s lives and labor, causes them to lose a sense of agency. This then causes the oppressed to value their own selves less and internalize that contempt, so they no longer have the hopes, aspirations, and belief in their destiny flowing from a sense of self worth.  2.       The oppressed become invisible: Part of the background, without influence. In the case of the Children of Israel in Egypt neither was the case. They had as many children as possible and brought them up with a sense of pride and identity – rejecting the values of Egyptian soci...

We now enter the depths of this winter, with a long stretch between the afterglow of the lights of Chanukah and the dawning of the joy of Adar and Purim. Furthermore, there is an extra month between them with this year being a Jewish leap year. During this winter we might feel particularly down. I refer, of course, not just to the lack of holidays, but to the continuing pain of Israel’s war with terrorists in Gaza and on other fronts. We are still processing the cataclysmic loss and pain of the murderous attacks of 10/7 as more and more details come to light. Every day, alas, we hear of more hostages murdered, and more and more of our best and brightest killed in the IDF’s war against our implacable enemies. Those we have lost are: Wonderful people still in their teens who had whole, brilliant, lives before them. We have lost those who are parents and grandparents, brothers and sisters. We have lost great scholars of Torah, artists and scientists, doctors and nurses, craftspeople and t...

Dear All, We now enter the depths of this winter, with a long stretch between the afterglow of the lights of Chanukah and the dawning of the joy of Adar and Purim. Furthermore, there is an extra month between them with this year being a Jewish leap year. During this winter we might feel particularly down. I refer, of course, not just to the lack of holidays, but to the continuing pain of Israel’s war with terrorists in Gaza and on other fronts. We are still processing the cataclysmic loss and pain of the murderous attacks of 10/7 as more and more details come to light.  Every day, alas, we hear of more hostages murdered, and more and more of our best and brightest killed in the IDF’s war against our implacable enemies. Those we have lost are: Wonderful people still in their teens who had whole, brilliant, lives before them. We have lost those who are parents and grandparents, brothers and sisters. We have lost great scholars of Torah, artists and scientists, doctors and nurses, cra...

  We have all been consumed with the war forced upon our brothers and sisters in Israel, and the terrible suffering endured in the massacre of Shemini Atzeret (Simchat Torah in Israel) on 10/7, and all the subsequent troubles. Namely, the suffering of those murdered, tortured, and abused, the grief of the bereaved, the agony of the hostages and their families, the deaths of so many brave men and women fighting to defend G-d’s people on G-d’s land. I write these words with candor, driven – as we all are - by great pain and hope, so do not judge me too harshly for the jagged edges herein.   I write this on the cusp of Chanukah, I think the parallels to our present situation are remarkable. Yes – “our” because our lives and fates cannot be sundered from the lives of those in Zion.. Jewish history does not repeat itself, but it spirals through time constantly returning to the same axis -but in different circumstances.   To use a geometric metaphor - we keep coming back at d...

Seeing Lessons We have all heard of music lessons and driving lessons. But seeing lessons? Seeing is something that a healthy person is born with the capacity to do automatically, why would one need lessons?  It is just that - learning to see- that one of the primary observances of Chanukah asks us to do. In the Neirot Halalu –the piece of liturgy said immediately after the lighting of the Chanukah lights we say “And we have no right to make practical use of them (the lights), they are only to be looked at”  This is actually quite curious, in as much as the other types of lights we are asked to kindle as a Judaic precept- The Shabbat and Holiday lights are specifically designed to be used for illumination. With Chanukah, we are asked to do nothing with the lights except to look at them.   Every Jewish holiday carries a lesson that has the capacity –if absorbed- to enhance our lives throughout the entire year. A key component of Chanukah is to use the lights of the Ch...

  Torah Study for this Week All times EST and then EDT (GMT+5/6) This week as Shabbat ends we begin the intense period of national reflection we know as the "Nine Days". For more information please  click here.   Shabbat Shalom and Chodesh Tov!   NEW ! Zoom link for all services and classes:  https://us02web.zoom.us/j/ 81775656038?pwd= K01hUUVHQkt0aldwV2R6YlpHTUVVUT 09 By Phone: 646 558 8656 Meeting ID: 817 7565 6038 Passcode: 248365   Schedule for Sunday 7/11 Class in Halachic Man via  Zoom : 9:30AM Schedule for Monday 7/12 All Classes are on our Zoom link listed above, or  click here  The Other Side of the Talmud : Aggadah 8:30-9AM Quick Lunch n' Learn  -1230-1245 PM New Day and Time:  Parsha- in-Depth Text Study  7:50 -8:45 PM on Zoom   Schedule for Tuesday 7/13 All Classes are on our Zoom link listed above, or  click here  The Other Side of the Talmud : Aggadah 8:30-9AM Rebbitzen Chanie Yaffe's Yid...

  Eruv is DOWN this week. Rest of Schedule will be sent out Motzei Shabbat / Saturday night Friday Mincha 4:30 PM Candlelighting 4:34 PM Morning Services 9AM Shabbat Mincha 4:20 PM Havdalah 539PM Extended Sermon and Havdalah on Zoom 6:05 PM https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89223490498?pwd=L3p5ZFErcldCRVhGVzBOQUZnQU5Kdz09   Follow our website and blog at:  https://www.bnaitorahma.org/ Our Calendar is Here: https://www.bnaitorahma.org/daily-minyan--shabbat.html

 https://youtu.be/jW3w_xse6QM

  Today: a timely message from 1800 years ago https://youtu.be/okgyIeNm17g You can subscribe to the YouTube channel to see all our classes as they happen

  Science is a matter of knowledge rather than belief. Belief can be countered by the suggestion that "I believe differently" whereas knowledge is subject to empirical investigation. This is exactly why there is so much rejection of medical expertise at the moment: Many people have confused knowledge with belief. One believes in a given political system -it is very hard except in extreme cases to demonstrate that one system or approach is absolutely better than another. It takes centuries to decide a debate of this sort. Therefore politics and philosophy remain in the realm of belief. Science either stands up to scrutiny or doesn't. Since our knowledge is always changing and growing, what we know today is incomplete compared to what we will know tomorrow. As Jews, Jewish law and ethics require us to make our decisions on the basis of the best knowledge held by the mainstream of each profession in any given moment in history. Does that mean that medicine found in t...

Shimon and Levi were punishing the perpertrators and enablers of Dinah's abuse for her sake as an individual person, not because she "belonged" to the family - as is sometimes suggested. I would point to a subtle point in the syntax of the text. But throughout all of the Torah many things are taught to us with that subtlety of the classic exegesis. Often, when a sibling is described it says the "sister of X was Y" making the "sister(Y)" subordinate to the "X" as in our Parsha, later, "ואחות לוטן תמנע" But here, we it is written "אשר טמא דינה אחותם" that Shimon and Levi used deception and violence because Shechem defiled "Dinah their sister" the name first. Dinah as a person first then the relationship. It was the harm and abuse to Dinah that primarily drove them. Nachmanides explained that they slew the men of Shechem because they stood by and did not stop the attack on Dinah. Those who do not stop an evil...