Moshiach's Rainbow and Lag B'Omer

Lag B'Omer occurs on the 18th day of Iyar: this year Sunday 14 May.

Why is Lag b’Omer celebrated with bonfires and bows and arrows?

by Rabbi Yossi Marcus

The bonfires celebrate the immense light that was brought into the world by Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai [who passed away on Lag b’Omer], especially on the day of his passing.

The bow commemorates the fact that during Rabbi Shimon’s lifetime no rainbow was ever seen. [Bereishit Rabbah 35:2] Note: This was a good thing because the rainbow appears when the earth deserves punishment. The first time a rainbow appeared was after Noah’s flood, when G-d said that He will no longer destroy the world, rather He would send a sign: the rainbow. During Rabbi Shimon’s lifetime, the world was filled with merit because of him and therefore never saw a rainbow. [Genesis 9:8-17 and Rashi there]

There is a Kabbalistic tradition that on Lag b’Omer a rainbow will appear in a different color, which will symbolize the arrival of the Messianic age [Bnei Yissaschar]

How to See the Geula

The Anguish of the Soul and its Solution

Rabbi Mendel Kessin - the latest in his ''Derech Hashem'' series

Judaism and Abusive Marriages - Reality Check

What do you do if you're an orthodox Jewish woman and you're in an abusive marriage?  You go to your rabbi and he tells you that you must do everything you can to save your marriage, and Hashem ''never gives you more than you can handle'' etc etc - so do you stay in the marriage and continue to be abused, thinking that this is Hashem's Will ?

Rabbi Yossi Jacobson has all the answers in this audio.

Adults vs Children

Re-blogging because it's been this kind of a week.
Send this to someone who needs to hear it.

 

Want to see more?  Click here

Judging Others Favorably

It is written, “With righteousness shall you judge your fellow” [Acharei/ Kedoshim 19:15]

The Sages interpret this to mean, “Judge your fellow favorably” [Shevuot 30b]. How can we apparently lie to ourselves by judging people favorably in every case, when in certain cases we can see them doing the very opposite of something favorable? What is the meaning of this mitzvah in that case? The Sages have said, “Any man who is insolent will in the end stumble into sin” [Taanith 7b]. This means that shame serves as a barrier and an obstacle to sin. Once a person had breached the barriers of modesty and shame, there is nothing to prevent him from sinning, as it is written: “It is a good sign if a man is shamefaced. … No man who experiences shame will easily sin” [Nedarim 20a]. 

The same applies to a person’s influence on others. The first one who sins completely breaches the barriers of shame. The one who follows him does not require as much insolence to sin, and the third person needs even less, once these barriers have been broken down. This is why the sin of desecrating Hashem’s Name is so grave. A person who openly sins diminishes the intensity of the fear and shame that are engraved in man with regards to committing a sin, thereby prompting others to sin as well.

We can now understand how the advice given to us by the Sages, to judge others favorably, is designed to help us. It is meant to ensure that the barriers of shame are not breached within our own hearts, for once we are certain that everyone is righteous, how could we dare to be the first ones to sin? However if a person tries to find fault with everyone, he will be more likely to sin at a time of weakness.

Source – Rabbi Yehoshua Leib Diskin via Rabbi David Pinto

The Second Error of President Donald Trump: Rabbi Mendel Kessin

Finally Rabbi Kessin returns to our screens.  Can't wait to hear this one.





If you haven't seen the previous lecture ''The First Error of Donald Trump'' - click here to view

Worlds, Souls, and Divinity

Every interaction we have with another person can be experienced on four different levels.  Rav DovBer Pinson explains.

Iyar: The Month of Healing

The Sefer Ta’amei HaMinhagim writes that our new month of Iyar is tried and tested as a time for refuah, healing, from the ailments and pains that may affect a person. Why is this so? He brings the B’nai Yisaschar, who teaches that most weakness and illness come from foods which do not comport with the person’s nature or composition.  Read full article at: Days of Mashiach

There are a couple of ways to assist in your own healing, and that is by saying the Unique Healing Prayer [but you have to do it properly and say every chapter relating to your [Hebrew] name, instructions are at the site].... and the other thing to do is to change your eating habits for the following reason:

"The reason a person's health returns through taking medicines is that his soul sees that he is able to control himself and to act contrary to his physical desires and habits. Perhaps he is accustomed to eating bread and other foods, but now he curbs his desires and submits to a medical regime, taking bitter medicines for the sake of his health. His soul sees that he has the power to control his impulses in order to achieve a certain goal, and she therefore comes back to him in the hope that he will curb his desires for the sake of the true purpose - which is to carry out the will of the Creator" [Likutey Moharan I, 268].  

Do we recite a Blessing on Medication?  Rabbi Eliezer Posner says:

If the medicine has a good taste, such as flavored chewable pills, recite the Shehakol blessing. [Seder Birchat Hanehnin 7:8] Flavorless medicine, such as pills that you swallow, do not require a blessing—but we do say a prayer that the medicine should take effect:

"May it be Your will that this medicine shall bring healing."

No blessing is recited on water that you drink to swallow down the pill. If you are swallowing it down with a beverage other than water, then you do recite the appropriate blessing on that beverage. [Tip: recite the blessing, take a sip, swallow the pill and then drink it down with the rest of the beverage.]

Recognition

''A person who seeks recognition is much like a goat that wears a bell around its neck to announce its whereabouts."

Source: Rav Mendel of Kotzk zt'l

Do Jewish Sources Predict a North Korean Threat in the End of Days?

Fake weapons 

Listen to Tamar Yonah interviewing  R' Dov Bar Leib from the Years of Awe blog

Do Jewish sources predict a North Korean threat in the End of Days?  Tamar takes a spiritual look and then a more factual geo-political look at the North Korean threat.

Tamar also speaks to Dr. Mordechai ben-Menachem, author of the book Muslim Winter.  Click here to listen: The Tamar Yonah Show

The Power of Words

Pharris Art

These parshiyot – Tazria and Metzora tell about the metzora. Chazal say that the word “Metzora” is a combination of the word “motzi ra – one who emits slander” [lit. spreading negative information], implying that tzara’at is retribution for one who slanders, since he spread derogatory information. But there is another meaning to tzara’at that a metzora suffers, as it is stated in Gemara about tzara’at [Berachot 5b]: It is nothing else but an altar of atonement. Suffering purifies a person from all evilness, since through suffering he is cleansed from all sin. This is the reason for the juxtaposition: “If a woman conceives … and on the eighth day, the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised” and following this is parashat Metzora, which signifies that just as through the mizvah of Brit Mila [circumcision] the child connects to the Covenant of Avraham Avinu, so too the suffering and pain that a person experiences because of his tzara’at removes all evilness from him and connects him to Hashem, since suffering is for the benefit of man and he should not despair when it comes upon him.

Source: Rabbi David Hanania Pinto

This shall be the law of the person afflicted with tzara'ath, on the day of his cleansing: he shall be brought to the kohen. [Metzora 14:2]

People have a tendency to make light of the sin of loshon hara, said the Dubno Maggid.  They say to themselves:  ''What are mere words? I am not harming my friend in any way by simply speaking about him.''

The Torah therefore requires that the metzora be brought to the Kohen, in order for him to witness what man's speech is capable of doing.  With one word, the Kohen defines the status of the metzora, making him either pure or impure - such is the power of man's words!

Source: Rabbi Yisrael Bronstein

Dreams are Always Revealing

HaRav DovBer Pinson on dreams and how they always contain either prophetic or subconscious revelations. You'll need to have a very quiet space and turn up the volume to hear him, he's talking very quickly.

Nibiru is Right Here, in Queensland Australia

Holding On

Today is Holocaust Remembrance Day [Yom HaShoah] 2017 in Israel


Story by Yaffa Eliach from "Hasidic Tales of the Holocaust", based on a conversation between the Grand Rabbi of Bluzhov, Rabbi Israel Spira and Baruch Singer: January 3, 1975.

It was a dark, cold night in the Janowska Road Camp. [The Janowska Road Camp was situated near the cemetaries and sand mountains outside the city of Lvov, in the Ukraine]

Suddenly, a stentorian shout pierced the air: "You are all to evacuate the barracks immediately and report to the vacant lot. Anyone remaining inside will be shot on the spot!"

Pandemonium broke out in the barracks. People pushed their way to the doors while screaming the names of friends and relatives. In a panic-stricken stampede, the prisoners ran in the direction of the big open field. Exhausted, trying to catch their breath, they reached the field. In the middle were two huge pits. [The vicinity of the Camp was scarred with bomb craters from WW1. The huge pits were used as torture sites and mass graves.]

Suddenly, with their last drop of energy, the inmates realized where they were rushing, on that cursed dark night in Janowska. Once more, the cold healthy voice roared in the night: "Each of you dogs who values his miserable life and wants to cling to it must jump over one of the pits and land on the other side. Those who miss will get what they rightfully deserve - ra-ta-ta-ta-ta." Imitating the sound of a machine gun, the voice trailed off into the night followed by a wild, coarse laughter. It was clear to the inmates that they would all end up in the pits.

Even at the best of times it would have been impossible to jump over them, all the more so on that cold dark night in Janowska. The prisoners standing at the edge of the pits were skeletons, feverish from disease and starvation, exhausted from slave labor and sleepless nights. Though the challenge that had been given them was a matter of life and death, they knew that for the S.S. and the Ukranian guards it was merely another devilish game.

Among the thousands of Jews on that field in Janowska was the Rabbi of Bluzhov, Rabbi Israel Spira. He was standing with a friend, a freethinker from a large Polish town whom the rabbi had met in the camp. A deep friendship had developed between the two.

"Spira, all of our efforts to jump over the pits are in vain. We only entertain the Germans and their collaborators, the Askaris. Let's sit down in the pits and wait for the bullets to end our wretched existence." said the friend to the rabbi.

"My friend," said the rabbi, as they were walking in the direction of the pits, "man must obey the will of G-d. If it was decreed from heaven that pits be dug and we be commanded to jump, pits will be dug and jump we must. And if, G-d forbid, we fail and fall into the pits, we will reach the World of Truth a second later, after our attempt. So, my friend, we must jump."

The rabbi and his friend were nearing the edge of the pits; the pits were rapidly filling up with bodies. The rabbi glanced down at his feet, the swollen feet of a 53 year old Jew ridden with starvation and disease. He looked at his young friend, a skeleton with burning eyes. As they reached the pit, the rabbi closed his eyes and commanded in a powerful whisper, "We are jumping!"

When they opened their eyes, they found themselves standing on the other side of the pit. "Spira, we are here, we are here, we are alive!" the friend repeated over and over again, while warm tears steamed from his eyes. "Spira, for your sake, I am alive; indeed, there must be a G-d in heaven. Tell me Rabbi, how did you do it?"

"I was holding on to my ancestral merit. I was holding on to the coat-tails of my father, and my grandfather and my great-grandfather, of blessed memory," said the rabbi and his eyes searched the black skies above. "Tell me, my friend, how did you reach the other side of the pit?"

"I was holding on to you" replied the rabbi's friend.

Memorial Sign for Jews killed in Lviv Janowska Concentration Camp

Letting G-d Handle Your Problems - Emunah and Bitachon

Rabbi Alon Anava

The Chasidah Bird

The Chasidah [white stork]

 וְאֵת הַחֲסִידָה  "The chasidah" [Shemini 11:19]

Why is its name chasidah (literally meaning "kind one") asks Rashi. "Because it does kindness with its companions with food."

According to the Ramban, said the Chiddushei HaRim (R' Yitzchak Meir Alter of Gur), the reason why the nonkosher birds are not kosher is because of their cruel nature.  If so, the chasidah should have been a kosher-type bird; after all, it bestows kindness upon its companions!

The chasidah acts kindly towards its companions, answered the rebbe, but it does not act kindly toward anyone else. This is why it is considered not kosher.

How to Receive Ruach haKodesh

Ruach HaKodesh literally means ''breath of the Holy'' or more simply Divine Inspiration - it is what we call intuition, knowing something that you could generally have no way of knowing.  Although similar, it's not the same thing as Prophecy, as explained here.

Rabbi Pinson explains why most of us do not have this ability now, and how we can try and get it back.

A Month of Open Miracles

The first mention of the name Nissan is in Megilat Esther when Haman draws lots to decide which day of the year he will kill the Jews. This event, says the Megila, took place in the month of Nissan. The Bnei Yisaschar says the name Nissan is for “Nissim” miracles. It is a month of open miracles where Hashem turned the natural world on its head to rescue His beloved nation. The Torah tells us this special time was planned from the creation of the world and will always be a time of miracles and redemption for Am Yisroel for all generations.

The following is written by Rabbi Chaim Avihau Schwartz

Rabbi Yehoshua contends that in Nissan the universe was created... in Nissan the Jewish People were redeemed, and in Nissan they will be redeemed once again. [Talmud, Rosh HaShannah 10b]

Rabbi Yehoshua believed that the universe must have been created in Nissan, for Nissan is the first of the months of the year. Being the first month it is closer to the ultimate cause, closer to that heavenly source that lies above and beyond time. This is the nature of Nissan's unique holiness - a holiness by virtue of which it is closely bound to the Almighty. Nissan is separate and distinct from the rest of the months of the year. Compared to Nissan the rest of the months represent ordinary mundane existence. True, we count the years since creation from Tishrei, but from the deeper perspective of the Nation of Israel the year begins in Nissan. That is, the true point of connection, the true bond between the new year and its Divine source is in Nissan. From the human perspective, a Jew is capable of sanctifying himself at any time through the study of Torah, self sacrifice, etc. But from the loftier perspective of Divine affinity and willingness, Nissan is the choicest time of year for approaching and cleaving to God. That is, the possibility of our clinging to God is greater in Nissan than in any other month of the year.

The word "Nissan" can be understood in Hebrew to mean "our miracles." Because of its unique holiness Nissan is a perfect time for overt miracles. This is because Nissan constitutes a bond, as it were, between time-bound existence and the realm that transcends time. Throughout history many miracles have taken place in this month. Even the bread that we eat in Nissan - Matzah - is Holy. Matzah contains none of the leaven that represents the evil inclination. It is bread that possesses Divine holiness. It is impossible to subsist without bread, but in Nissan the bread is Divine. The difference between ordinary leavened bread and Matzah is the amount of time involved in its preparation. Once again we see that the month of Nissan constitutes the height of attachment between natural existence and the Divine source. Therefore it is singled out as a time of redemption - "In Nissan the Jewish People were redeemed, and in Nissan they will be redeemed once again" - speedily in our days, Amen.

This is an extract only, read the entire article at: Yeshiva

The Mystical Secrets of Seder Night

Rabbi Alon Anava