by Rabbi Eliezer Simcha Weisz Rav Chaim Shmulevitz zt”l asked powerful questions during the Yom Kippur War: Why don’t we see awakening in prayer and learning despite the crisis of war? He concludes it...
by Rabbi Shaya Karlinsky The coverage of the horrors of the Simchas Torah carnage in Mishpacha magazine generated many letters to the editor. Some complained that showing the images (and they were quite benign...
Sometimes an idea can only be possible after a certain point in history. One example might have to do with the imagery of Yaakov’s dream at the start of the parsha. The message delivered...
Dear Friends, We have each other and we must treasure each other. For the nation that dwells alone and has had good reason to feel alone, Monday and Tuesday were days of incredible strength...
May I still use the word “exhilarated,” or has a certain Cornell professor banished it from the use of decent people? Assuming it is allowed, it describes the way everyone I spoke to felt...
As the tale goes, a learned non-Jewish cleric challenges the town’s Jewish populace to have its greatest scholar meet him on a bridge over a raging river, each a heavy weight tied to his...
That a man’s gifting of something of worth to a woman can effect a marriage if both parties agree is derived through exegesis from, of all places, Avraham’s purchase of a burial site for...
So many of the events that punctuate our days here in Yerushalayim end the same way. Case in point. My son went to a levaya of a soldier on Har Herzl. As he walked...
Avraham experiences a communication from Hashem at the start of the parsha (Beraishis 18:1, 18:13). And it culminates with Hashem’s informing our forebear of the impending destruction of S’dom (18:20-21). Then, the Torah tells...
Stars aren’t visible during the day. Yosef Chaim Cara, a 17th century Polish rabbi, points out in his sefer Kol Omer Kra that after Hashem tells Avram, concerning his future progeny, to “Look heavenward...
