Category: September 2020

Forgiveness and forgetfulness By: Rabb Dr David Fox The elderly stranger sat at the far end of the table after my Talmud class. I welcomed him. “It’s too far,” he replied, sneering at me with a disdainful look in his eyes. “Too far?” I echoed, waiting for him to elaborate. “It’s too far. It’s too far for me,” he said in a mocking voice, imitating someone. I remained quiet, meeting his glare with as much warmth as I could, caught off guard by this older man’s harshness. I had no…

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More thoughts on the shidduch crisis By Ilan Preskovsky Alex Cohen’s article in the previous issue of this magazine, entitled “The Shidduch Project?” no doubt struck a chord with many single people in our community. It certainly did with me. While rightly crediting the various shadchanim for all their hard work, Alex accurately identified a number of different problem points that have made finding the right person such an unending, uphill trudge for so many of us, while also offering a possible solution or two to our community’s version of…

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Opportunities abound in the changing and turbulent economy By Chandrea Serebro Pivot (v): rotating, as if on an axis – and the buzz word of 2020, a year that will go down in the annals of history as a time of sickness and fear, but also of hope and change. The whole world is reeling from the Coronavirus and the economic crisis that inevitably followed. The world looks in no way similar to the way it ever did. People have lost loved ones, businesses, and sometimes all hope. But out…

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Out of the COVID-19 gloom, there have been lessons to learn and gratitude for the things we have always taken for granted. Here is just a peek at what some people have learned about life in the time of Corona. By Chandrea Serebro Lindi Markowitz Katzoff  That my ex-husband and I can work as a team and still live under the same roof. And that we must wash our hands a lot! Sara Spiro Don’t procrastinate. If you can do it now, do it now. Michael Black How much I…

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Why is the concluding and restarting of the Torah reading cycle celebrated on Shemini Atzeres? By: Aron Ziegler Reading through the Torah in our weekly parsha cycle is a very old custom. The Rambam codifies[1]: “The prevailing custom throughout the Jewish nation is to complete a cycle of reading through the Torah over the course of each year. Beginning on the Shabbos after Sukkos…and (ultimately) concluding on the following Sukkos.” Shemini Atzeres is the day that has become set for the celebration of our siyum (completion) of the parsha cycle.…

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A unique opportunity to reassess our lives and the structures we hold dear By David Levin The period of the Yamim Nora’im (Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur), far from being stand-alone times for teshuva, come at the end of an extended period of teshuva starting all the way back in Tammuz with the fast that commenced the “Three Weeks”. The seven weeks immediately preceding Rosh Hashanah are known as “shiva d’nechamusa” – the seven weeks of nechama. For each of these seven weeks, the Haftara of the week does not…

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A spiritual tool to achieve lasting change, even after Yom Kippur is over By: Rabbi Dovid Samuels So Close It says in the Torah[1]: For the mitzvah that I command you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it far from you. It is not in the Heavens, that you say, “Who will ascend for us to Heaven and get it for us, and teach us and we will do it?” Nor is it on the other side of the sea, that you say, “Who will cross the…

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