Understanding the Shema Prayer -- להבין על תפילת שמע

If you want to understand more about Krias Shema, open your heart to listening to this shiur by Rav Yedid Meyer.  The mention of לב (heart) is repetitious to teach us many things.  The heart is the conduit to knowing and loving Hashem. How do we get our heart to do so? For the men, that would be learning Torah.  For the women, that would be modesty.  How do the men protect themselves from straying?  By the mitzvah of tzitzis, as a reminder of their obligations to Hashem.  What if men encounter pritzus (vice) on the streets?  He wouldn't have to worry if he encounters them without the intention to seek them.  The only problem comes when he has a desire to seek, i.e to stray after his heart to go after "other gods."  If he develops a desire to explore the "other side" then he is responsible for his actions.  If by walking on the streets of Manhattan, and vice appears all over the place, then he's not responsible if he guards his eyes and not look.  

The phrase "other gods" is no longer limited to rocks and stones.  They are anything that would win you to the side of the Yetzer Hara, for e.g. pursuing the latest fashions, getting lost in social media networking (Facebook, Twitter, FaceGlatt, including reading too much news and blogs that are empty of Torah content), following the wimps of society, buying the latest gadgets and electronics (iPhone, Kindle, etc.) etc. 

To learn from the shiur, go here.

4/5 of the Jews will not be redeemed, 4 / 5 לא ייפרעו

According to the shiur delivered by Rav Eli Mansour on Yosef and Shoes, the latest intermarriage statistics is like 80% among Jews in USA.  Which means 4 out of every 5 Jews marry out.  It is not clear if they mean Jewish men marry out or Jewish women marry out.  Le't say it's the worst case scenario -- Jewish men marrying shiksas.

The following is from an old statistic:

Currently 72% of the Jewish people today are intermarrying We lose approximately 100 Jews everyday to intermarriage and assimilation. *amongst non-orthodox American Jews 50% of all Jewish college students have one Jewish parent Source: SimpleToRemember.com

The startling rate of growth of intermarriage to 80% today is not surprising. I started to think about the Rashi which talks about only 4/5th of the Jews were redeemed from Egypt and many Rabbis say that the final redemption will repeat itself with the same statistics. If 80% of Jews (4/5th) are voluntarily marrying out so that they want to separate from the nation of G-d and be cut off, then it would not surprise me that this Rashi is playing out to fulfill this prophecy.

The following is an old advertisement from the Jewish Agency regarding warning Israelis against intermarriage:



This is from my favorite Reb Gutman Lock's outreach to Jews visiting the Kotel to remind them to marry Jewish.  Well, Reb Lock, you don't need a thank you from Jews, Hashem thanks you for doing your job!



And this problem is not limited to the Americans.  Jewish intermarriage is all across the world.  Here is news from Australia.




And now, why not intermarry?

Yosef and Shoes, יוסף ונעליים

The question arises "How did the Jewish nation in Egypt survived assimilation for 210 years, and we the Jews living in America are slowly dying from assimilation within 230 years?"  What is the merit of the Jews in Egypt?

What is the connection between Yosef HaTzadik and shoes? In the midrash, we learn that the brothers spent the money earned from the sale of Yosef on shoes.  Rav Eli Mansour explains that the brothers did not wear shoes before that event.  What's the significance of wearing shoes?  Shoes are supposed to separate us from the tumah of the soil. When Adam HaRishon sinned, he brought tumah into the world. The brothers were all born in tahara (purity),  just like Yaakov and Yitzchak.  However, the brothers suspected Yosef as being a klipah like Esav and Yishmael before them, and hence, purchased shoes to convince themselves that it was Yosef who brought tumah into the land. They were of course wrong.

The Rav brings out connections of the shoes between the Torah portion and the Haftarah, and a little bit of history about the Haftarah.  During the reign of the Greeks, one of their evil kings banned public Torah readings, and the Haftarah was born.  He then brings out the connection between Yosef and Chanoch as gilgulim.  Chanoch, according to the Midrash, was a cobbler (shoe maker) -- another connection to shoes.  Chanoch intended to protect his generation from the tumah of the day with "shoes", however, he didn't succeed. Hashem, I believe, took him before his time. (Bereishis 5:23-24)  However, his gilgul, Yosef succeeded in saving his descendants, thanks to the shoes that his brothers purchased and wore after his sale.

A very fascinating shiur as usual from HaRav Mansour.  To learn for yourself, go here.

Chanukah in the Safari, חנוכה בספרי

This is a Jewish Zebra

Chodesh Tov!

Yavan and Yonah, יון ויונה

I heard this short Divrei Torah which I find fascinating and thought I'd pass it along.  The source is from Rabbi Laris of Eretz Yisrael.

The Greeks are called Yavan, spelled in Hebrew יון.  The message of this name is that when a Jew starts to sin, he is like the י of Yavan, and then he sins some more, he is like the ו of Yavan, and if he continues to sin until he falls, he is like the ן of Yavan.  The three letters show the descent from י to ו to ן, each letter getting longer and longer to the point of no return.  The message of Chanukah is to not stumble like a Hellenist (Greek) Jew.

However, if the Jew catches himself before he sins any further, by attaching himself to Hashem, let's say he's at the יו stage, and he attaches himself to Hashem by doing teshuva, then the ן of Yavan becomes a regular נ, and by attaching to Hashem, he adds the letter ה to his name, thus becoming a יונה, or YONAH.  In English, Yonah spells DOVE, the symbol of the Jewish people.  Isn't that nice?