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The Chelminsky Family
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A BIT OF WIT |
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President Bush calls in the Head of the CIA and asks, How come the Jews know everything before we do?"
The CIA chief says, "The Jews have this expression :'Vus titzuch?'
The President says, "Hell, what's that mean?"
Well, Mr. President", replies the CIA chief, "It's a Yiddish expression which roughly translates to "what's happening". They just ask each other and they know everything."
The President decides to personally go undercover to determine if this is true. He gets dressed up as an Orthodox Jew (black hat, beard, long black coat) and is secretly flown in an unmarked plane to New York, picked up in an unmarked car, and dropped off in Brooklyn 's most Jewish neighborhood.
Soon a little old man comes shuffling along. The President stops him and whispers, "Vus titzuch?"
The old guy whispers back: "Bush is in Brooklyn ." |
| JEWISH YOUTUBE |
In response to last week's tragic and fatal terrorist attack against 8 yeshiva students in Jerusalem, I think this short clip will give us an important perspective. What we do in their memory will bring all of Israel comfort - take a look |
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ASK THE RABBI |
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Dear Rabbi
How can I be sure that my children will share the Jewish values and beliefs that I hold dear. The world has changed so much since I was young, and I can only imagine how much more it will change by the time my children grow up. How can I pass on my convictions to my children?
Answer:
Ideologies are too abstract to pass on. For your beliefs to be conveyed to the next generation, they need to ride on the back of concrete rituals. You can't expect your children to share all of your sentiments and feelings, but you can teach them to continue your customs.
One of the geniuses of Judaism is its emphasis on doing. Pesach is a great example. It is a festival full of demonstrative rituals that convey a deeper message.
We may not all remember exactly how many Israelites left Egypt, or the order of the ten plagues, but we all remember eating Matzah at the Seder. And by power of association we remember the core messages of the Seder - that freedom is an ideal worth celebrating, and that from humble beginnings a nation can reach greatness. These abstract ideals have seeped into the Jewish psyche from generation to generation by being linked with ritual and custom.
But it could have been otherwise. Imagine the Seder was observed as a group meditation on the virtues of liberty. Instead of eating Matzah and horseradish we would read odes to freedom from such great writers as Tolstoy and Plato, Shakespeare and Rowling. Then we would end with some quotes from Nelson Mandela, and sing a few songs of peace and love from Woodstock .
What would be the result? Nothing. There would be no result because such a commemoration would be quite forgettable. The kids would be completely unengaged and the message totally lost on them. What makes the Seder memorable is the action: the crunch of the Matzah that reminds us of the freedom, the red faces from the horseradish that commemorates slavery, spilling the wine for each of the ten plagues, and the search for the Afikoman. By punctuating the exodus story with these hands-on experiences, we etch it into our children's memory forever.
There is no guarantee that your children will follow your ways. But three thousand years of evidence suggests that living your beliefs through ritual works. The Jewish people has survived with our message in tact because we are still eating Matzah. Lofty ideals are difficult to pass on, but crunchy Matzah stays fresh for millennia.
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Purim |
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Candle Lighting Time
7:11 pm
Kabbalat Shabbat
7:15 pm
Morning Services
9:30 am
Followed by a gourmet kiddush
Evening Services
7:00 pm
Shabbat Ends
8:04 pm
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Followed by a delicious breakfast
Weekday Morning Services
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Followed by a delicious breakfast
Tuesday Senior's Class
10:30 - 11:30 am
Israel: The Land & The Spirit
Thursday Evening
7:45 Evening Services followed by Megila Reading
Buffet Dinner and L'chaims
Friday Morning
8:00 am Morning Services
8:30 am Megila Reading
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PURIM POINTS |
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Haman was hanged on the third day of Passover? (Purim is the anniversary of the Jews' victory celebration after their war against their enemies 11 month later)
...Esther's Hebrew name was Hadasaah? ("Esther" is Persian)
...Mordechai was the first person in history to be called a "Jew"? (Before then, Jews were called "Hebrews" or "Israelites")
...Achashverosh searched four years for a queen, during which he considered more than 1400 contestants, before choosing Esther?
...Vashti (Achashverosh's first queen) was the great-granddaughter of Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonian emperor who destroyed the first Holy Temple?
...Haman was the one who advised Achashverosh to kill Vashti?
...There is an opinion in the Talmud that Esther was not beautiful at all, and had a greenish complexion?
...Haman was once Mordechai's slave?
...Mordechai, who refused to bow to Haman, was a descendant of Benjamin, the only one of Jacob's sons who didn't bow to Haman's ancestor Esau?
...Esther's plan was to make Achashverosh jealous of the attention she was giving to Haman so that he should kill them both?
...Haman's decree was never revoked? (Achashverosh only issued a second decree, giving the Jews the right to defend themselves)
...Mordechai was a very old man during the story of Purim? (He was already a member of the Sanhedrin, the highest court of Torah law in Jerusalem, 79 years before the miracle of Purim!)
...Every single Jew in the world lived in Achashverosh's kingdom, so that they were all included in Haman's decree?
...G-d's name is not mentioned even once in the entire Book of Esther?
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Got Matzoh |
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GOT MATZAH?
Pesach is just around the corner,
Have you got your Matzah?
Taste of Freedom-Regular hand made
Shmurah Matzah $15 per pound
limited quantities
email us
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the book of Leviticus - A Ten Part Journey
A New Course! |
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Your Choice of Days
Thursdays 8:00 PM
or
Fridays 1:00 PM
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PARSHA IN A NUTSHELL |
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| G-d calls to Moses from the Tent of Meeting, and communicates to him the laws of the korbanot, the animal and meal offerings brought in the Sanctuary. These include:
The "ascending offering" (olah) that is wholly raised to G-d by the fire atop the Altar;
Five varieties of "meal offering" (minchah) prepared with fine flour, olive oil and frankincense;
The "peace offering" (shelamim), whose meat was eaten by the one bringing the offering, after parts are burned on the Altar and parts are given to the Kohanim (priests);
The different types of "sin offering" (chatat) brought to atone for transgressions committed erroneously by the High Priest, the entire community, the king, or the ordinary Jew;
The "guilt offering" (asham) brought by one who has appropriated property of the Sanctuary, who is in doubt as to whether he transgressed a divine prohibition, or who has committed a "betrayal against G-d" by swearing falsely to defraud a fellow man.
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This being the Shabbat before Purim, on which we celebrate the foiling of Haman the Amalekite's plot to destroy the Jewish people, the weekly Parshah is supplemented with the Zachor reading (Deuteronomy 25:17-19) in which we are commanded to remember the evil of Amalek and to eradicate it from the face of the earth. |
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E-TORAH |
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In the hebrew text of the Torah scroll, thousands of years of tradition dictate how each letter is to be written. Certain words, such as the first word of this week's Parshah, are exceptional in some way.
The opening phrase is "And G-d called to Moses." This is the beginning of the third Book of the Torah, Vayikra (Leviticus). Unlike the preceding book which is mainly narrative, telling the story of the Exodus, this book mainly comprises direct instruction from G-d. So it begins "And G-d called to Moses." G-d called to Moses from the Sanctuary, to teach him the laws which he would transmit to the Jewish people.
The first word in this phrase ends with a letter Aleph. What is unusual is the fact that this Aleph is very small compared with the size of the other letters. The scribe has to write very carefully a tiny Aleph. This has been a feature of every Torah scroll since the first one, written by Moses. What does the small Aleph signify?
One explanation is that the small Aleph hints at an important aspect of the role of Moses as lawgiver: humility. Moses received the Torah from G-d and transmitted it to the Jewish people. However, in order for him to be able to receive Divine teachings, he had to achieve the quality of utter humility and selflessness. The Torah testifies that "Moses was very humble, more than any man on the face of the earth" (Numbers 12:3).
Because he had no interposing self he was able to act as a pure channel for the Divine. Thus the Sages tell us, "The presence of G-d spoke from the throat of Moses." The small Aleph in the first word of the Sedra expresses this humility and selflessness. The Aleph signifies the nature of Moses and of all great teachers since his time.
We too need something of this humility in order for us to hear the words of the Torah. We need the ability to stop and listen. We need a very similar quality in order to be able to bring the Torah teachings into effect in our lives: acceptance. The small Aleph is also required in the process of transmitting these teachings to those around us and to the next generation: the humility of the teacher. The small Aleph is the key... | |
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Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Yisrael and Toby Baron
Chabad of Sunny Isles Beach
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