This past week has been a very different week for me. I am usually learning all day long but since we are on vacation for Passover I am helping people get ready for the holiday by cleaning their homes. This has made this week a very tiring and strenuous week, which consequently made this past Shabbat wonderful. I forgot what looking forward to Shabbot was like since every day here is usually like Shabbat.
This Shabbat I ate lunch at one of the Rabbis who walked with us back to the Yeshiva. On our walk back we spoke about the subtle beauty of Shabbat and Israel. Since our Yeshiva is opening a summer program for kids on trips from America and other countries, birthright trips have been talked about here lately. This is because the amazing success of birthright has had the unintended, but wonderful, effect of making kids on the trip rethink why they are Jewish and lead some of them on the path to frumkite. This was not the intended effect at all, but since people visiting Israel get drawn to the country they need to explain to themselves why. We spoke about how Israel does not have the most massive waterfall, or the highest mountain, or any other significant landmark that a person could rationalize to themselves saying, "The landscape is what drew me to Israel." Instead they have to say, "Judaism drew me to Israel," or better yet "Hashem drew me to Israel." Shabbat also has the same ability to subtly draw people closer to frumkite. Many people reading this will know what I am speaking about when I say, "Keeping Shabbat makes you feel like you are doing the right thing."
While we were walking back to Yeshiva we walked through a beautiful green area that you would see anywhere else in the world and it struck me for the first time that kids coming to Israel don't view the green living things in Israel as an open miracle. They come here and don't even notice that there are trees and plants because they expected to find them. Their picture of what Israel would look like is a picture with green in it. I could not believe it! It is amazing how Hashem can hide in plain sight! Israel only has green living plants because our Sages said, "The land will remain desolate until the Jews move back to the land of Israel." Mark Twain described his 1867 journey to the land of Israel in his book "The Innocents Abroad," "We traversed some miles of desolate country whose soil is rich enough but is given wholly to weeds - a silent, mournful expanse... A desolation is here that not even imagination can grace with the pomp of life and action. We reached Tabor safely... We never saw a human being on the whole route. We pressed on toward the goal of our crusade, renowned Jerusalem. The further we went the hotter the sun got and the more rocky and bare, repulsive and dreary the landscape became... There was hardly a tree or a shrub anywhere. Even the olive and the cactus, those fast friends of a worthless soil, had almost deserted the country. No landscape exists that is more tiresome to the eye than that which bounds the approaches to Jerusalem... Jerusalem is mournful, dreary and lifeless. I would not desire to live here. It is a hopeless, dreary, heartbroken land... Palestine sits in sackcloth and ashes." (pgs. 361-362). Before the Jews came back home this land was a desert with nothing alive. When we came back plants just started growing and now Israel is the ONLY country in the entire world with more greenery than the year before. As I have re-experienced this week, It is truly amazing what one can see and experience when they step out of their normal way of living and look at the world from a different perspective.
Sunday, March 25, 2007
Monday, March 19, 2007
Women
This Yeshiva tries to instill in every student that the secular misconception of Orthodox Jews being sexist is just that, a misconception. Just recently this point was illustrated very clearly and I thought some of you would be interested in hearing about it.
Me and another student here were learning about the laws of Shabbat and we came across something we did not understand. There is a law that if on Shabbat there is a fire you should tell a woman to deal with it. Since you are not allowed to put out a fire on Shabbat unless it will save a life, we did not understand why a woman should potentially break Shabbat as opposed to a man. We asked one of the Rabbis here what exactly was the reasoning for this law. He explained that a man has to learn Torah because he does not inherently understand it. If there is a fire in front of a man on Shabbat he will start thinking about how he could make sure that nobody would be harmed by the fire without putting it out and the end result could be that the fire harm someone. A woman on the other hand inherently understands what she is supposed to do. She will be more likely to make a quick decision, and it be the correct one, than a man.
Just this shabbat at lunch we were discussing this idea with the family that was hosting us. The father of the family made a comment that I thought was very interesting. He said that we see a hint to this idea that a woman is inherently smarter than a man in the account of Creation. The Torah describes how the plants came into existence before the water creatures, which came before birds, which came before land creatures. Each life-form is more intelligent than the last. We see that each new form that Hashem brings into the world is more intelligent. This pattern continues from mammals to the creation of Adam, and then the creation of Eve. Not only does the Torah say that Eve was created after Adam, but when describing the forming of Eve, the Torah uses the verb "to build" which, in hebrew, shares the same root as the word for "understanding."
Me and another student here were learning about the laws of Shabbat and we came across something we did not understand. There is a law that if on Shabbat there is a fire you should tell a woman to deal with it. Since you are not allowed to put out a fire on Shabbat unless it will save a life, we did not understand why a woman should potentially break Shabbat as opposed to a man. We asked one of the Rabbis here what exactly was the reasoning for this law. He explained that a man has to learn Torah because he does not inherently understand it. If there is a fire in front of a man on Shabbat he will start thinking about how he could make sure that nobody would be harmed by the fire without putting it out and the end result could be that the fire harm someone. A woman on the other hand inherently understands what she is supposed to do. She will be more likely to make a quick decision, and it be the correct one, than a man.
Just this shabbat at lunch we were discussing this idea with the family that was hosting us. The father of the family made a comment that I thought was very interesting. He said that we see a hint to this idea that a woman is inherently smarter than a man in the account of Creation. The Torah describes how the plants came into existence before the water creatures, which came before birds, which came before land creatures. Each life-form is more intelligent than the last. We see that each new form that Hashem brings into the world is more intelligent. This pattern continues from mammals to the creation of Adam, and then the creation of Eve. Not only does the Torah say that Eve was created after Adam, but when describing the forming of Eve, the Torah uses the verb "to build" which, in hebrew, shares the same root as the word for "understanding."
Sunday, March 11, 2007
Today
Today was the best day of my life.
This past weekend I realized that I was singing out loud for no particular reason other than that I was happy. I do not remember the last time I was singing out loud in public, which is a good thing since I cannot sing. It hit me that I was so happy to be learning Torah that I didn’t care how bad I sounded because I was too happy to hold it in.
Over the past 3 months we have been learning Gemara and there was one part that just did not make any sense. We asked the Rabbi’s here and the question was such a good question that we tabled it in order to answer other questions. Three other Yeshiva guys and me were struggling all morning with this question and right before lunch we figured out pashot (the simple understanding) in the Gemara. If anyone wants to look inside the question is in Bava Kama, daf 20, amud 1. Basically the Gemara explains that a Rabbi was asked a good question, which was, “If someone lives in an apartment without the owner knowing, should he have to pay rent.” Obviously this question needs clarification, so the Gemara offers some suggestions for what the scenario is.
1 – The owner of the apartment normally does not rent his apartment and the person squatting normally does not rent. This scenario is shot down because the answer is too obviously that since the owner of the apartment does not lose anything and the squatter does not benefit he does not have to pay.
2 - The owner of the apartment normally does rent his apartment and the person squatting normally does rent. This scenario is shot down because the answer is too obviously that since the owner of the apartment is losing potential rent and the squatter benefits from living in the apartment he has to pay.
3 - The owner of the apartment normally does not rent his apartment and the person squatting normally rents. This scenario is accepted as a good question because the owner of the apartment does not lose anything, but the squatter benefits from living in the apartment. The Gemara continues with trying to figure out what the answer is to this question.
The Gemara never gives answers that will be obviously shot down so there must be some reason that both the first and second scenario was not obvious. There is also a concept in Jewish law that when a person doesn’t lack anything from someone else’s benefit they cannot charge for the benefit because that is what the inhabitants of Sodom did, and their city was destroyed by Hashem.
The question is two-fold. What is the reason that both the first and second scenario is not obvious, and also why is the scenario of the owner lacking but the squatter not benefiting not mentioned?
I would love to tell you the answer but you get credit from Hashem for learning Torah not for knowing answers, but rather for struggling to understand the answer for yourself.
When something is in the back of your head for three months and you just do not understand what is going on and then you finally figure it out, and you did it yourself, it is an amazing feeling.
These are some pictures from two of the simchas we have had recently. I could not find any pictures with me in them and I know people, well at least my family, want to see me. I asked the camera guy to take a picture of me last night so I could post a recent picture of me but that one is not off his camera yet. As soon as I get it on my computer I will post it.
This is a picture of one of the students signing his ketuva.
This is a picture of the newly married couples escort from the bimah.
This is another picture of us dancing around the couple.
These next two pictures are of a vort. One of the former students here is getting married in June and he had a party here before he left. It is a mitzvah to make the groom and bride happy so these pictures are of Rabbis and students trying to make the groom happy. The first is our holy Rabbi Farber dancing and the second is a bunch of crazy students making a human pyramid.
This past weekend I realized that I was singing out loud for no particular reason other than that I was happy. I do not remember the last time I was singing out loud in public, which is a good thing since I cannot sing. It hit me that I was so happy to be learning Torah that I didn’t care how bad I sounded because I was too happy to hold it in.
Over the past 3 months we have been learning Gemara and there was one part that just did not make any sense. We asked the Rabbi’s here and the question was such a good question that we tabled it in order to answer other questions. Three other Yeshiva guys and me were struggling all morning with this question and right before lunch we figured out pashot (the simple understanding) in the Gemara. If anyone wants to look inside the question is in Bava Kama, daf 20, amud 1. Basically the Gemara explains that a Rabbi was asked a good question, which was, “If someone lives in an apartment without the owner knowing, should he have to pay rent.” Obviously this question needs clarification, so the Gemara offers some suggestions for what the scenario is.
1 – The owner of the apartment normally does not rent his apartment and the person squatting normally does not rent. This scenario is shot down because the answer is too obviously that since the owner of the apartment does not lose anything and the squatter does not benefit he does not have to pay.
2 - The owner of the apartment normally does rent his apartment and the person squatting normally does rent. This scenario is shot down because the answer is too obviously that since the owner of the apartment is losing potential rent and the squatter benefits from living in the apartment he has to pay.
3 - The owner of the apartment normally does not rent his apartment and the person squatting normally rents. This scenario is accepted as a good question because the owner of the apartment does not lose anything, but the squatter benefits from living in the apartment. The Gemara continues with trying to figure out what the answer is to this question.
The Gemara never gives answers that will be obviously shot down so there must be some reason that both the first and second scenario was not obvious. There is also a concept in Jewish law that when a person doesn’t lack anything from someone else’s benefit they cannot charge for the benefit because that is what the inhabitants of Sodom did, and their city was destroyed by Hashem.
The question is two-fold. What is the reason that both the first and second scenario is not obvious, and also why is the scenario of the owner lacking but the squatter not benefiting not mentioned?
I would love to tell you the answer but you get credit from Hashem for learning Torah not for knowing answers, but rather for struggling to understand the answer for yourself.
When something is in the back of your head for three months and you just do not understand what is going on and then you finally figure it out, and you did it yourself, it is an amazing feeling.
These are some pictures from two of the simchas we have had recently. I could not find any pictures with me in them and I know people, well at least my family, want to see me. I asked the camera guy to take a picture of me last night so I could post a recent picture of me but that one is not off his camera yet. As soon as I get it on my computer I will post it.
This is a picture of one of the students signing his ketuva.
This is a picture of the newly married couples escort from the bimah.
This is another picture of us dancing around the couple.
These next two pictures are of a vort. One of the former students here is getting married in June and he had a party here before he left. It is a mitzvah to make the groom and bride happy so these pictures are of Rabbis and students trying to make the groom happy. The first is our holy Rabbi Farber dancing and the second is a bunch of crazy students making a human pyramid.
Sunday, March 4, 2007
I do not know what to title this...
The weeks are flying by here in Israel. I feel like I just arrived and it is already March! Today and tomorrow we have off because of Purim so I am getting some random chores done like laundry and attempting to reattach 2 buttons from my suit jacket. Tonight is the annual Purim schpiel where some of the students here put on a performance where they do random skits or do different Rabbi impersonations. We are also having sheva brachot for Yaakov Moshe Klarin. The wedding on thursday night was a blast and I even got to see two of Rabbi J's kids who are learning/living in Israel.
There are so many people coming to Israel soon! My family is coming to visit in April and some friends from school are also coming later in April to learn for a year. Then I will get to see more people I know on the JAAM trips in May and June and then some more friends are coming to visit in July.
I hope everyone has a great Purim!
I plan to post some more pictures next week, most likely of the wedding.
There are so many people coming to Israel soon! My family is coming to visit in April and some friends from school are also coming later in April to learn for a year. Then I will get to see more people I know on the JAAM trips in May and June and then some more friends are coming to visit in July.
I hope everyone has a great Purim!
I plan to post some more pictures next week, most likely of the wedding.
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