Rabbi Zelig Pliskin

Time to Feel Bad

“Im eshkacheich Yerushalayim… — If I forget you, Yerushalayim, may my right hand be forgotten. Let my tongue adhere to my palate if I fail to recall you, if I fail to elevate Yerushalayim to the head of my joy” (Tehillim 137:5–6).

These two verses are an essential part of keeping the remembrance of our homeland, and particularly Yerushalayim, at the forefront of our consciousness. Regardless of where we have been sent in our long exile, we keep our pledge never to forget Yerushalayim. In fact, our very right to speak is connected to our remembering the Divine presence that was in Yerushalayim.

This verse is declared publicly at the pinnacle of the wedding ceremony, at the height of the new couple’s joy. A glass is broken to serve as a reminder that as long as Yerushalayim is still missing its former glory, there is an aspect of sadness during even the most joyful moments.

One of the great miracles of Jewish history is our People’s maintaining our Jewish identity and holding onto our eternal pledge never to give up, no matter where we’ve been, how others have tried to influence us to forget our roots, or how evil people are even willing to blow themselves up in an attempt to destroy us. Regardless of how often and how harshly we’ve been persecuted, we continue to maintain our love for Yerushalayim and for Hashem Who has chosen it as the most special place in the world.

We remember Yerushalayim at weddings. We remember Yerushalayim in our daily prayers. We remember Yerushalayim when we thank Hashem for the meals we have eaten. We constantly keep the memory of Yerushalayim alive.

Over the years I’ve spoken to many people who are distressed over not feeling bad enough about the loss of the Beis Hamikdash in Yerushalayim. I share with them what I once heard from an elderly Torah scholar: “If you cannot truly feel bad about the loss of the Beis Hamikdash, at least you should feel bad that you don’t feel bad. That itself is a positive step in the right direction.”

Rabbi Zelig Pliskin is a rabbi, lecturer, and author of more than 25 books, including Gateway to Happiness, Conversations With Yourself, Building Your Self-Image and the Self-Image of Others, and Life Is Now.

Rabbi Avi Shafran

On Every Plate

“Posei’ach es yadecha… — You open Your Hand and satiate the needs of all living creatures” (Tehillim 145:16).

Though all of Tehillim’s pesukim are, of course, equally holy, Chazal assign a special importance to this pasuk. It describes something amazing.

I once personally learned the truth of this pasuk well when, on a mosquito-plagued summer hike with my wife, we came across a strange plant. It was only two or three inches tall, and both its stem and the tulip-like flower at its head were entirely, strikingly white. How, without chlorophyll, did it get the energy to fuel its little life?

Later, I discovered that we had come across the rare monotropa uniflora, known as the Ghost Plant. It hosts certain fungi that are symbiotic with trees — meaning that the little white plant gets its fuel second hand and “refined” from the fungi, which in turn received it from photosynthetic trees. “Posei’ach es yadecha…” I reflected. And then it struck me that, when we were examining the plant, the mosquitos we were slapping at were availing themselves of the food source Hashem had provided them as well.

The Shulchan Aruch directs us to recite this pasuk with great concentration, and the Mishnah Berurah asserts that if one didn’t have such concentration at first, he should return to the pasuk again. Because what the pasuk describes is beyond remarkable: Every life on earth — millions of species and quintillions of individuals — has been provided a source of sustenance.

Yet the grammar of the pasuk is odd. Literally translated, it reads: “You open your hand and satiate for all living things [with] ratzon (will).”

I’ve often wondered if ratzon might be the object of the verb masbia, “satiate.” In other words, could the pasuk be teaching us not only that Hashem provides every living thing with the physical means of sustaining its life but also will — the determination to live, to persevere, no matter what challenges present themselves?

We tend to take that fortitude for granted, but perhaps shouldn’t. Because determination to persevere when times are tough is also a Divine gift. Hashem provides us not only our physical sustenance but our emotional sustenance no less.

Rabbi Avi Shafran serves as public affairs director for Agudath Israel of America.

Dr. Yossi Adler

Lift Us Up

“Malchuscha malchus kol olamim umemshaltecha bechol dor vador. Somech Hashem lechol hanoflim vezokef lechol hakefufim — Your kingdom is a kingdom of all times, and Your ruling is in every generation. Hashem supports all those who fall and straightens all who are bent down” (Tehillim 145:13–14).

I’ve always been struck by the proximity of these two pesukim. On the one hand we extol HaKadosh Baruch Hu as the King who transcends all concepts of space and time, as the Ruler of the world. On the other, He supports every individual, particularly those who have fallen into distress and are bent under the strain of their troubles.

Sometime we sense Hashem’s Malchus, either spiritually, at tekias shofar or Ne’ilah in a packed shul, or physically, after glimpsing the majesty of His creation. I particularly remember feeling the overwhelming grandeur of His handiwork when we visited the Grand Canyon some years ago, but I can also sense it when looking at a sky full of stars on a clear night.

And then being back at my office the next day, dealing with the health challenges and unfortunate difficulties of so many of His beloved people highlights the contrast between these two pesukim, and it is a relief to try to remind myself that He is indeed in control of the destiny of each and every one of us.

Never has the contrast been so stark as in the last few months. In the winter we had the incredible inspiration of tens of thousands of Yidden at siyumei haShas around the world joining to be mekabel ol malchus Shamayim. Just a couple of months later we moved into lockdown where we could not even join together for a minyan. We shared the suffering of so many of our fellow Yidden and mourned the loss of so many of the greatest people in our communities.

The Gemara in Berachos tells us that there should really be a verse beginning with the letter nun separating these two pesukim, but Dovid Hamelech did not want to refer to the fall of Klal Yisrael (“nefilah”), and instead moved straight to a pasuk beginning with samech, to signify that however difficult the situation seems to be, Hakodosh Boruch Hu is always supporting us (“someich”). The commentaries explain that a nun is only half a circle and therefore epitomizes the nefilah, falling, where we are only able to experience half the story and it seems as if we’ve been abandoned. The letter samech is a full circle, because eventually we will experience the completion of the circle — when we will all see that the purpose of the suffering is to bring the yeshuah that follows. We so desperately need that completion, and the coming of Mashiach, may it happen speedily.

Dr. Yossi Adler is a third-generation Orthodox physician, serving Northwest London in family medicine for over three decades.

Mrs. Shaindy Kleinman

He Didn’t Let Me Drown

“Vehaboteiach baHashem chesed yesovevenu — He who trusts in Hashem, kindness will encompass him” (Tehillim 32:10).

Nineteen years ago, as a mother of a young family, I endured open heart surgery. It was two weeks before Pesach, when I suffered heart failure on a Friday night. The following Tuesday my son was bar mitzvah, and the next Friday I underwent life-saving surgery.

On Motzaei Shabbos, my mother came to visit me. Having been moved from the operating theater to the ICU, I couldn’t find my siddur, and I asked my mother for the siddur she always carried in her pocket book. I opened the siddur, looking for a tefillah to say out of gratitude, and on the first try, the page opened to Tehillim 32 — the gematria of lev, heart.

I decided to say this perek every day, to maintain that gratitude to Hashem for saving my life.

Two pesukim in particular became very meaningful to me. One was “Al zos yispallel eilecha kol chassid… le’shetef mayim rabbim eilav lo yagi’u — a flood of water will not reach him.” I was drowning in fluid but Hashem did not let it consume me. The other is “Vehaboteiach baHashem chesed yesovevenu.” During that week, waiting for surgery, I kept thinking about trust in Hashem and living with bitachon. When you really tap into that, you feel calm, surrounded by His chesed. I still say these words every day, always feeling anew the gratitude for a full recovery and good health.

Mrs. Sheindy Kleinman is a popular teacher and lecturer on Jewish women’s issues and is a counselor for teens at risk and families in crisis.

Reb Abish Brodt

A Song for Healing

“Ve’al tasteir panecha me’avdecha ki tzar li — And do not hide Your face from Your servant, because I am in pain” (Tehillim 69:18).

In the late seventies I heard a niggun for this pasuk, written in response to the tragic petirah of a bochur in Far Rockaway, and when I heard the emotion in the song, the plea of the pasuk reflected in stirring music, I felt that I had to meet the person who composed it.

A couple of years later, I heard that the composer, Rav Shmuel Brazil, was in the mountains near us for the summer. He was there with Yeshivas Sh’or Yoshuv, and I went over to hear him play guitar on Motzaei Shabbos. We became friendly, and I invited him over to Melaveh Malkah in our colony, where the Bobover Rebbe ztz”l was spending some time. The first song Rav Shmuel played there was his famous “Modeh Ani.”

The Regesh partnership was born from that friendship. We began to record his compositions, originally with no intent to release them for the public. Rav Shmuel was a maggid shiur, and I had a family, so neither of us wanted to go public as performers. But the Ribbono shel Olam wanted otherwise, and the Regesh cassettes were an important part of maintaining a real Yiddishe musical sound throughout the 1980s and 1990s.

Many musical years later, I realized I still had not recorded “Al Tasteir Panecha” the song that had so moved me so many years before. I finally did so on a much later album, Shirei Halev — Machnisei Dimah [the album featuring Machnisei Rachamim in Yiddish]. After all those years, it’s still a special song of healing.

Reb Abish Brodt, beloved chazzan and the cantorial voice behind the Siyum HaShas since 1990, has released dozens of albums and is best known for his collaboration with Rav Shmuel Brazil on the Regesh album series.

Sivan Rahav-Meir

Relax: Hashem Is in Charge

“Harpu ude’u ki anochi Elokim — Desist, and know that I am G-d” (Tehillim 46:11).

This pasuk always spoke to me, and now, during coronavirus, it’s been a font of strength. My husband, Yedidya Meir, and I were spending this past year with our five children in the States, on shlichut for the World Mizrachi Movement. We had a diary packed with upcoming speaking engagements in communities all over the continent, from Montreal to Texas and Memphis to California. Of course, COVID-19 changed everything. All the schools closed, all the lectures were canceled. We found ourselves on lockdown, and decided to return home to Israel. We flew back, arriving a few days before Pesach, and during our 14-day quarantine we cleaned and celebrated Pesach in an apartment we’ve rented for the interim — until our own home, which we rented out, becomes available at our scheduled return date.

Today our scheduled lectures to American audiences are held on Zoom, and our children’s dreams of camp in the US have dissipated. Instead, they’re trying to settle back into life in Jerusalem while everyone is trying to navigate their “new normal.” I know that everyone is going through upheaval, and I am certainly not complaining. I’m thankful to Hashem that we’re all healthy and well, and we’re happy to be back in Eretz Yisrael again. When everything keeps changing all around us, I just repeat to myself “Harpu u’deu ki anochi Elokim — Let go, and know that I am G-d.” We have to know how to let go of our plans, and let Hashem run things. After all, He’s really been doing it all along.

Sivan Rahav-Meir is an anchor on Israel TV news, writes for Yediot Aharonot, and hosts a weekly radio show. Her Torah lectures, to a mostly secular audience, are attended by hundreds in person and thousands more by live hookup. Her wig notwithstanding, she was voted the most popular female media personality in Israel.

Rabbi Warren Goldstein

Slipped through Our Fingers

“Baboker yatzitz vechalaf, la’erev yemolel veyavesh — In the morning, it blossoms and passes away; in the evening, it is cut off and withers” (Tehillim 90:6).

“For even a thousand years are in your eyes like yesterday that has already passed,” says Dovid Hamelech, “In the morning it blossoms, and by evening it is cut down and withers.” Elsewhere in Tehillim, it says, “Man is like a breath, his days like a passing shadow” (Tehillim 144:4). The Midrash teaches that this passing shadow is not like the shadow on a wall, but like the fleeting shadow of a bird as it flies.

Life seems to slip through our fingers. Days come and go. Weeks, months, even years, disappear as if they never happened. During our limited stay on this earth, how can we stop life from slipping by so quickly? How do we hold onto time as it flies away?

The Dubno Maggid (Ohel Yaakov, Emor) explains that it all comes down to how we view life. If we live life in purely materialistic terms — pursuing physical pleasure and self-gratification — then we are indeed locked in a losing battle with time, because all the pleasures we’ve experienced in the past are gone and irretrievable, and our only hope is for the pleasures that lie in the future — and one day, those too will be behind us.

If, however, we live life less concerned with our immediate desires and physical wants, and more attuned to doing mitzvos, living in accordance with our Divine purpose — the life formulated by the Torah — then we are building something enduring, something that transcends time.

We know that every mitzvah we perform is counted as an eternal merit that we not only carry with us in This World, but take with us to the Next World as well. These experiences aren’t lost with the passage of time. On the contrary, they build and accumulate, becoming greater by the day. They become eternal. We become eternal.

Counting the Omer embodies this idea of cumulative growth. Each day brings a new mitzvah-action. We say a separate blessing. And each day builds on the days that preceded it. The verse describes the count as “seven complete weeks” (Vayikra 23:15) — which is why, according to some opinions, if you miss a day, the mitzvah is lost (BeHag, Positive Mitzvah 200). All the pieces are important. And they build into something greater than the sum of their parts.

Physical life is fleeting. It can be experienced in the moment, but only in that moment. Like the shadow of the bird flying overhead, it’s glimpsed — then it’s gone. The past doesn’t exist, the future has not yet been born, and we only have that tiny window in the present to hang onto.

But the Torah is our gateway to something more, something that we can hold on to, and — step by step, mitzvah by mitzvah, day by day — it transforms our actions into something transcendent and eternal.

Rabbi Dr. Warren Goldstein has been chief rabbi of South Africa since 2005, and is founder of the worldwide Shabbos Project.

Dean Dr. Robert Goldschmidt

Scaling the Mountain

“Esa einai el heharim me’ayin yavo ezri. Ezri me’im Hashem — I shall raise my eyes to the mountains, from where will my help come? My help is from Hashem” (Tehillim 121:1–2).

This pasuk resonates very loudly amid this global COVID-19 pandemic. We stand totally helpless — “From where will my help come?” Only Hashem Yisbarach can bring us the yeshuah, the salvation, from this terrible plague.

The Gemara in Sotah explains that “harim,” mountains, refers to the yetzer hara, who looks like a tall mountain, difficult to climb, a formidable foe, whom we confront and battle daily. The Midrash, though, offers an entirely different perspective, telling us that the words “el heharim,” to the mountains, can also be read as “el hehorim”, to the parents, whose guidance and teachings loom like tall mountain peaks to their children. As they forge their path in life, both youngsters and grown-ups look up to their parents and to the example they set.

On a personal level, this pasuk, and the entire kapitel, has a special meaning for me, reminding me of my parents, zichronam livrachah. It throws me back to the emunah and bitachon my parents derived from these words, enabling them to display exceptional mesirus nefesh in raising their children in the mesorah of our Avos. They raised their two children for over a decade in Communist Romania, then in France, which at the time was a society inimical to supporting a Torah life, and finally, in the United States — where they sacrificed all comforts in order to ensure a proper Torah chinuch for their two teenage boys.

I look up to my parents, who appear like looming mountain peaks, and wonder, How will I live up to their actions, and to the standards they set? And I know that I, like they before me, can only succeed with the help of Hashem.

Dr. Robert Goldschmidt is the Vice President and Dean of Students, Touro College

Rabbi Shlomo Bochner

Help Them, Help Yourself

“Ashrei maskil el dal — Praiseworthy is one who looks after the poor” (Tehillim 41:2).

This pasuk has spoken to me in a very personal way for the last 21 years, since we opened Bonei Olam. The word “maskil” means “uses seichel, wisdom,” but at first glance this seems strange. Since when do you need smarts to help a poor person?

In one of Rav Yechezkel Sarna’s fiery pre-Yom Kippur shmuessen in the Chevron yeshivah, he asked the boys how in the world they could come before the Ribbono shel Olam asking for forgiveness, when it is almost impossible for a human being to fulfill his obligations to Hashem perfectly. The solution he offered was that they offer their services to others in any way they could. Then, the judgment would no longer be on the individual but on how many people benefit from him.

We have just lived through coronavirus. My wife and I were both very sick, for a long time, and experienced great rachamei Shamayim in our recoveries. As I lay there ill, it seemed like every hour another person passed away — a classmate, a neighbor, a friend — and it was frightening. I had to do a cheshbon hanefesh. All I could say was, “Ribbono shel Olam, if you give me back life and koach, I will stay on my job, I’ll continue — although our work is like climbing a mountain now.” Hashem saved me.

COVID-19 brought out so much chesed, as if Hashem was squeezing us to get the most chesed possible out of us Yidden. And how Yidden rose to the challenge! We are in awe of Hatzolah and so many other heroes throughout the world, who excelled in their missions to help others.

To go back to “maskil el dal”: When a person has seichel to take care of those in need, he doesn’t just have seichel regarding the poor person. He has seichel regarding himself. When a person makes himself available to give to others in Klal Yisrael, Dovid Hamelech continues the pasuk, “beyom ra’ah yemalteihu Hashem — on a day of calamity Hashem will rescue him.”

Rabbi Shlomo Bochner is founder and director of Bonei Olam, an organization that assists couples experiencing infertility.

Rebbetzin Sora Bulka

On Guard

“Im Hashem lo yivneh bayis shav amlu bonav bo, im Hashem lo yishmar ir… If Hashem will not build a house, its builders have toiled at it in vain; if Hashem will not guard a city, the watchman keeps his vigil in vain” (Tehillim 127:1).

I’m not one to advocate sitting back and doing nothing. On the contrary, we must do. We must make the efforts which are normal hishtadlus in every situation. But we must also not get lost in our efforts, and constantly remember that we are not in control — tzis du an Eibishter, there’s a G-d in the world. He is building our homes and institutions and guarding our gates.

Now too, as we take the precautions which coronavirus demands, we can stay calm and remember that we’re in good hands. Very good hands.

Two weeks ago someone called me to ask if we had a nurse working in a certain hospital. An elderly man from Boro Park, originally from Yerushalayim, was hospitalized, and his relatives could not visit or get any information on his wellbeing. Our seminary has the only frum nursing program in the US, and we have over 300 nurses, so someone thought of us. I immediately sent out a message to our graduates. Within 20 minutes from the original call, a frum nurse was in his room — and she was Hebrew speaking. HaKadosh Baruch Hu arranges these things, and in these times as always, His hands are the safest shelter.

Rebbetzin Sora Bulka is founder and dean of The New Seminary.

Mrs. Dina Storch

The Race is On

“Vehu kechasan yotzei mechupaso yasis kegibor larutz orach — It is like a groom leaving his chuppah, it rejoices like a warrior running a racecourse” (Tehillim 19:6). 

Recently this pasuk took on a new meaning when I was teaching songs from this perek to my students in Bnos Yaakov in Lakewood. Having always been taught that we are in a marriage relationship with Hashem, I had thought ‘vehu’ referred to Hashem. Teaching demands authenticating every assumption, and so I checked my favorite ArtScroll, and my understanding changed. This is the way I then described this pasuk to my students:

“Last night I was seated at the chuppah, waiting for the music to start, announcing the beginning of the ceremony. As the music started playing, all heads turned to the back of the room as the doors opened to reveal the chassan, led by his parents, who guided him down a decorated aisle to his chuppah. A little while later, the kallah emerged from those same doors and the chassan came toward her. It is with the same eagerness and anticipation of a chassan and kallah ready to walk down the aisle, that the sun eagerly awaits its call to emerge into a new day — every single day! It is full of excitement and eagerness to do Hashem’s will — to warm up our atmosphere, to nurture our plants, to bring energy where needed.

“We check the zemanim and calculate exactly when we can daven in the morning, while the sun waits for its cue.”

At the same time, my daughters were preparing for their 13-mile half-marathon in Miami with Team Lifeline, running in memory of my daughter Hudis a”h, so I really connected to the next part of this pasuk as well: The sun is excitedly waiting, so to speak, for the ribbon cutting, as the runners are off the path to their final destination.

I found this analogy exciting. Now, whenever I say or sing this pasuk, I gather renewed energy and excitement — just like the sun — to execute the will of HaKadosh Baruch Hu.

Dina Storch is a singer, songwriter, camp music director, and music teacher who has been a behind-the scenes linchpin of the Jewish music scene for over four decades. She’s written over 450 songs, including such classics as “Someday,” “Bird of Hope,” and “Crack of Dawn.”

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 812)