How Special The Land

"והלואי שנזכה אחרי כל ההפלגות כולן מצדנו, להביע אך חלק אחד מרבבה מחמדת ארץ חמדה, ומהדרת אור תורתה, ועילוי אור חכמתה ורוח הקודש המתנוסס בקרבה וכו' זה המין של האור  והעדן של הקדושה הנמצא בא"י לתלמידי חכמים מבקשי ה', איננו נמצא כלל בחוץ לארץ. ואנכי בזה היודע ועד, כפי קטני" (אגרות הראי"ה, ח"א עמ' קיב-קיג).

 

I wish that after all of the superlatives we say about Eretz Yisrael, that we can express a tiny percent of how beloved the land is, the glory of the light of its Torah, the elevated light of its wisdom and the Divine spirit which exists within it etc. This type of light and pleasure that exists in Eretz Yisrael for those Torah scholars who seek out Hashem, cannot be found in chutz la-aretz. I know and can testify about this, even on my low level. [Maran ztz"l]

A Tzushtel Tzu De Avos!!!

The holiest!!

אין זכייה כתורה

As part of the celebration of the finishing of the Torah we sing [and jump] to the words אין זכייה כתורה - There is no prize like the Torah.

The Rebbe Shlita interrupted the festivities for a minute as everybody was screaming אין זכייה כתורה and said [approximately] the following:

Let us say you received a phone call telling you that you won a HUUUUGE prize. You were very excited and asked what the prize was and were told that you would have to wait until the next day to find out. You waited anxiously until you were informed. What is it? 10 million dollars? A new house in your dream neighborhood [Ir Hakodesh Woodmere?]? An all expenses paid vacation to an exotic resort?

You have to wait and see.

The next day you received a call and were told what the prize is: A chavrusa with a talmid chochom.

What a LET-DOWN!!

BUM-MER!!!!

You wanted something fun and exciting and instead got this....

אין זכייה כתורה!!!

To learn with a good chavrusa is MUCH BETTER than 10 million dollars or a house in Back Lawrence with a swimming pool and tennis court. טוב לי תורת פיך מאלפי זהב וכסף. Are we there? Do we believe it? I know almost NOBODY who does.

But lets work towards believing it. It is a foundation of our faith.

אין זכייה כתורה. All else?

הבל הבלים אמר קהלת - הבל הבלים!!!

We Were Happy

שיר המעלות בשוב ה' את שיבת ציון ..... הגדיל ה' לעשות עמנו היינו שמחים

Why did Hashem redeem us from the galus and do great things for us [הגדיל ה' לעשות עמנו]?

Because we were happy.

היינו שמחים.....

BI-SIMCHA SWEEETEST FRIENDS!!!:-)

אבני זכרון עמ' רס"ד

Big Loss

Rabbi Eitam Henkin H"yd who was killed recently by an Arab, was not only a quiet, unassuming, modest and humble individual, but was also a serious talmid chochom, a rising star who had a great future ahead of him. He was already a prolific author and had so much more to contribute.

Here is a link to his blog.

יהי זכרו ברוך, ולא נדע עוד שוד ושבר בארצנו, ומחה ה' אלקים דמעה מעל כל פנים, ויקיצו וירננו שוכני עפר בתחיית המתים אמן ואמן

Tefillin On Chol Ha-moed

לזכות ידידי אהובי ר' הירש יונתן בן ר' מרדכי אפרים הוא וביתו וכל אשר לו לברכה והצלחה בכל מעשי ידיו

There is a fascinating discussion in the poskim about wearing tefillin on Chol Ha-moed. There is a vast corpus of literature and I am not going to give an overview here. Suffice it to say that it is a machlokes. The Rema [along with many others] says that one should wear tefillin on Chol Ha-moed while the Gra [whose yahrtzeit is today] says that one should not. The Zohar Ha-kadosh says that one who lays tefillin on Chol Ha-moed is ... חייב מיתה.

Whoa!

The minhag in Eretz Yisrael is to NOT put on tefillin. The Mishna Brura [and many others] say that even a ben chutz la-aretz should not wear tefillin in shul in a place where the minhag is not to wear tefillin because of לא תתגודדו - not to have different halachic practices, making the Torah appear as two Torahs [there are oceans of material discussing the paramaters of this law]. Others [such as Rav Ovadiah Yosef] disagree and allow everybody to follow their own minhag [either because when it is known that it is a machlokes there is no לא תתגודדו or because regarding minhagim there is no לא תתגודדו or because when one is dealing with a bitul mitzva di-oraisa you don't pay attention to what others are doing]. I have seen a lot of tefillin this Chol Ha-moed and it bothers me. But who asked me anyway...:-).

Rav Chaim Soloveitchik didn't wear tefillin on Chol Ha-moed. He was asked by his son Rav Moshe why he is not חושש for ספק דאורייתא לחומרא and maybe he must wear tefillin. Rav Chaim replied that there is no safek at all because the gemara in Erchin [10] says that Chol Ha-moed has kedushas Yom Tov and a person would thus be absolved from the obligation to wear tefillin.

Against

Regarding the post about the sefer לנבוכי הדור: Here is a very strong expression of opposition to the publication of the sefer.