Monthly Archives: March 2012

Where MO might need to be headed

3 Replies
Find this here

Dr. Rabbi Alan Brill has a great post about a recent discussion with Rabbi Shlomo Einhorn here.  The observations by both Dr. Brill and Rabbi Einhorn are revealing and seem to be very on target towards my generation.  Here are a few great quotes:

Einhorn describes the need for his age group, the younger gen x and older gen y rabbis to seek the experiential. They grew up with a strict halakhic diet and a rationalist worldview which did not sustain their cravings for religious experience that they were taught to value in Israel.

Rabbi Einhorn is absolutely sold on Tony Robbins’s program for fire-walking to be transformed and to release the potential within.

I commented on the actual blog post and recommend you check it out what Dr. Brill posted and some of the comments.

Halevai…

1 Reply

Rav Moshe Weinberger says that the word הלוואי  contains almost the same letters as אֱלִיָּהוּ because, when we say, “Halevai such-and-such should happen”, we really have to have the same level of emunah that we do regarding our belief that Eliyahu HaNavi will be coming soon to announce Moshiach!

Sunday’s mussar morsel

Leave a reply

Rav Yosef Yoizel Horowitz, the Alter of Novardok

“A man cannot dance at two chassunas (weddings).”

Meaning, you simple cannot be at two places at once. If you are at home with your family, then that you be your focus. If you are at work, then concentrate on work. If you are in shul for davening, then that is where your focus should be.

Link to a hesped for Revuen Kirshner a’h

Leave a reply

Yesterday, Reuven ben Menachem Mordechai, the grandson of Rabbi Harry Maryles was niftar.  His body had been fighting cancer for 6.5 years and it was time for his neshama to return to the creator.  Like many others, I davened, learned, and did mitzvos in his zechus.  The levaya was very emotional, as you can imagine.  Rabbi Maryles delivered a hesped and it’s posted on his blog, here.

Are you living a religious routine or a religious life?

2 Replies
Poster from here

I was listening to this discussion panel, titled “Igniting a Spiritual Passion” (black hat tip to R Mordechai Torczyner) today on my drive to work and I was struck by the following question:

Are you living a religious routine or a religious life?

Keep in mind that in the sefer זריעה ובניין בחינוך by Rav Shlomo Wolbe zt’l (translated and published as Planting & Building), the Mashgiach mentions that those children who don’t, “possess any internal vitality” or “individual initiative” will become “human robots”.  I ask you to think about the question above and how it relates to your own avodah.

The commuter’s dream come true

8 Replies

I recently switched jobs and my former 18 minute (each way) is now a drive of, no less, than 40 minutes each way daily.  It’s taken some getting use to, but I happen to enjoy listening to shiurim and also music (90% Jewish music and 10% non-Jewish).

Just last week, on RavMosheWeinberger.com, they reduced the price of shiurim credit to 99 cepts per credit and also started offering 50 downloads per month for only $6.99.  That’s right, you can download 50 shiurim a month for the low price of about 14 cents a shiur.  You can even roll-over unused credit to the next month.  This is incredible and for me, means I can actually learn more Torah from Rav Weinberger and also catch up on a bunch of shiurim series that I’ve been hold off on purchasing.

I even figured out that if I drive on the non-toll roads about 10 days out of the month, I will have actually saved the same money as I’m spending on the the monthly download fees.  Of course, this means that it will take a little longer to get to work those days, but that’s more time to listen to shiurim!!

Please spread the word about this great offer and go check out RavMosheWeinberger.com.

Shout-out to Mordechai HaYehudi

1 Reply

I was recently visiting a friend whose mother was sitting shiva and we were talking about the fact that we didn’t have each other’s cell numbers in our phones. Now, our family has been to him for Shabbos lunch and we have davened together every Shabbos Kodesh for the past six years. So, the question comes up why didn’t I have his cell number? Because, we daven together ever Shabbos Kodesh, so why would I need to call him. I do have his email address and we’re friends on Facebook, so if I needed to I could get ahold of him. However, despite the term “social”, Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter are really not so social.

Being social means that when you see a guy in shul and don’t know his name, you find it out and say, “Hi”. Being social doesn’t mean (and I admit, I am a shtickel guilty of this) that because we have 223 friends in common that we should become friends or linked into a professional network.
On Purim I got up to daven at 5:30am with my son, heard megillah at 6 and then worked 4 hours, so I could rush home. I gathered my kids and our shaloch manos and drove around two different neighborhoods double parking and finding creative parking spots to be social. My kids went up to people that they don’t exactly know and gave out our very creative (thanks to my wife) parcels. We gave to friends, teachers, acquaintances, and some classmates of our uber-kinderlach. Since giving is the precuror to love, as taught by Rav Dessler zt’l, I have to give a shout-out to Mordechai HaYehudi for having the chachmah to creat a real social network for Klal Yisrael.