Almost Eden

BS"D Parashat Va’yakhel-Pekudai 5770

A. Preface

Yesterday, I met a close friend who is a well-know rabbi presently living in the States. He was in a hurry, but stopped just enough to call out, "Continue your writing and don’t be intimidated by your critics." He ran on without my being able to reply.

So the following is my answer to my friend, to myself and to any other interested parties.

If the box seats in Yankee Stadium were filled with all the rabbis, Chassidic rebbes and roshei yeshiva in all the lands of our present-day galut [exile], and the grandstands and bleachers were filled with 100,000 of their disciples, I would not hesitate to stand at "home plate" and announce the following:

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DVAR TORAH: PESACH'S "OPEN-DOOR" POLICY
RABBI STEWART WEISS

We all know about the Jewish prisoner who petitioned the warden to allow him to hold a Pesach Seder in jail. When asked by a fellow inmate why he was so adamant about davka celebrating Pesach, more than any other Jewish holiday, the prisoner whispered in his ear, “You’ll find out when I go open the door for Eliyahu!”

We close out the amazing Book of Shmot this Shabbat, and also add the Maftir of Parshat HaChodesh. Always read before the month of Nisan, this last of the four special Parshiyot commands us to honor Nisan as month #1. In essence, our calendar - & our history - begins again.

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I apologize in advance to my writing coach who has told me on more than one occasion "Jews don't confess, Catholics do – it's not part of our psyche to confess!" I guess that means there's something wrong with me because I feel the need to share this with you because #1 it's therapeutic for me, and #2 one of the goals of this blog is to help olim (and prospective olim) NOT make the same mistakes I did.

During our pilot trip we received from an acquaintance who later became a friend (thanks Ron!) what I now know was the best piece of Aliyah advice:

Don't expect Israel to be like the USA. Like most things in life, your experience here will be largely determined by how adaptable and realistic you are.

I was psyched to embrace this philosophy; prepared to live without my favorite American products, "rough it" using public transportation, cope with a different medical system and major climate change, send my kid to an Israeli school and even learn a new language! Yes! I could do it!

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BS"D
Parashat Ki Tisa 5770

Part A:

The roots of this message are imbedded in the Megila and Tractate Megila, and therefore it would seemingly have been more appropriate to send it before Purim. But since its massive trunk, intertwined boughs and thick foliage stretch far into the future, spanning 2500 years to our days, its relevance goes far and beyond the miracles of Purim.

I believe that the Purim episode holds within it the secrets of the final chapters in human history, and even their time frame.

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DVAR TORAH: PICKING UP THE PIECES
RABBI STEWART WEISS

Life, as we know, is often inscrutable. While we certainly experience life and know a lot about it - and even try to master it – its intricacies and its deeper meaning are often beyond us, and defy our intellect and understanding.

So, too, the Torah. We marvel at its wisdom, its logic, its timeless ability to inspire and invigorate us. But it, too, has an inscrutable side, a point beyond which even the most brilliant among us cannot journey. The section chosen by the Rabbis to represent this principle is the Para Aduma, the red heifer whose essence is beyond mortal reason.

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BS"D Parashat Tetzaveh - Shabbat Zechor 5770

Shemot 27:20

And you shall command the Children of israel, that they take to (for) you clear oil of pressed olives for the light, to keep the eternal flame ablaze

The Midrash Raba on this week’s parasha compares the Jewish nation with olive oil, in two respects: olive oil does not combine with any other liquid, and when added to any other liquid olive oil always rises to the top. So too the Jewish people maintain a hard core that has never inter married with gentiles and never will, and in the most difficult of social and economic circumstances they always rose to the top of society.

But there is a third comparison made between us and olive oil stated in various books, that just as the olive delivers its pure oil through pressure, so too do the Jewish people express their unique genius only under pressure and duress.

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BS"D Parashat Teruma 5770

A: SEDER AND HESDER

Book of Daniel (10:4-7):
⁴ On the twenty-fourth day of the first month, as I was standing on the bank of the great river, the Tigris,
⁵ I looked up and there before me was a man (angel) dressed in linen, with a belt of the finest gold around his waist.
⁶ His body was like chrysolite, his face like lightning, his eyes like flaming torches, his arms and legs like the gleam of burnished bronze, and his voice like the sound of a multitude.
⁷ I, Daniel, was the only one who saw the vision; the men with me did not see it, but such terror overwhelmed them that they fled and hid themselves

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DVAR TORAH: YIDS AND YUDS
RABBI STEWART WEISS

This is something out of the “When Moshiach Comes!” file: Moshe appeals to the nation for donations, and after just a few days, he must beg them to stop giving – we have more than we need!

Our response to the building of the Mishkan was so strong that in no time at all, we had reached full-funding! But – there was one flaw in the ointment: the Princes of the nation never got their chance to donate.

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BS"D Parashat Mishpatim 5770

Two statements came out this week from the Ayotullas in Teheran, that they will begin enriching uranium to the level of 20%, and their oft repeated threat to destroy every man woman and child in Medinat Yisrael as the initial step in doing the same to all Jews, wherever they might be. Sounds familiar as the holiday of Purim draws closer.

This Shabbat, we will bless the new month of Adar which will begin on the following Sunday night. Adar is the month that plays host to the miraculous holiday of Purim, when HaShem intervened to save the Jewish people from Haman and Achashverush, whose turns had come to be the ranking arch anti-Semites of that time.

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DVAR TORAH: THE ANGELS AMONG US
RABBI S. WEISS

Our Sedra of Mishpatim shows Judaism’s “sensitive” side. How we must respond to the needs of the poor, the widow, the orphan, the disenfranchised, even the slave and members of the animal kingdom.

But the Sedra’s closing section seems, at first, to be of a completely different flavor. It contains several mysterious episodes: First, Hashem says, “I am sending an Angel to protect you; respect him, for My name is in him.”

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