“As a teacher for more than 20 years, I’d like to share with you why this job is incredibly different than any other”

Be My Guest [Guestlines / Issue 1034]

It was with great interest that I read about the “Last Succah Standing.” Thank you to Rabbi Motzen for bringing attention and awareness to those who practically stand alone without a spouse. On that note, there is a passion that I have to spread awareness in the same vein with regard to the great mitzvah of hachnassas orchim, which the Chofetz Chaim calls, “the crown jewel of chesed” (Loving Kindness, day 126, translated by ArtScroll.)

The organization “Be My Guest” was founded by a member of the White Shul in Far Rockaway, NY. Its goal is to bring awareness to the importance of reaching out to divorcées, widows and widowers, and singles by including them in a way of connectivity to the Shabbos/Yom Tov table. Ambassadors help by making introductions to ensure people who are alone are a valuable part of our community and not marginalized, that they shouldn’t feel like a good deed done.

Currently, Be my Guest is gearing up for their second annual event with Rabbi Paysach Krohn, with introductory remarks by Rabbi Eytan Feiner. B’ezras Hashem, this event will be held at the White Shul on Monday, January 6, for men and women. For more information please email bemyguest@whiteshul.com.

May Hashem reward our efforts of achdus and inclusiveness and bring us all home together, whole.

Chaya Feldstein

Far Rockaway, NY

In a Class of Their Own [Inbox / Issue 1033]

In response to the person who wrote in saying people of all professions need time to cook before Yom Tov, not just teachers, clearly you’ve never been a teacher! If you had been, you never would have composed that letter, nor would you have lumped teachers together with “accountants, babysitters, nurses, computer programmers, and graphic designers.”

As a teacher for more than 20 years, I’d like to share with you why this job is incredibly different than any other.

A teacher’s job doesn’t end when she comes home after giving it her all in school. She spends many hours in the evening, and often throughout the night, preparing the next day’s lesson so that it will touch each individual student’s heart.

Teaching is an all-encompassing job that never ends. Aside from grading papers, entering grades, conferences, and speaking to parents and administration on the phone, when school is in session, a teacher’s headspace is filled with her students and their educational, social, and emotional well-being. Planning menus and cooking for Yom Tov is the farthest thing from her mind.

To say, “The school administration and teachers seem to have a hard time figuring this one out” (how to cook for Yom Tov without taking off work), is simply disrespectful to the most dedicated people who give every waking and sleeping hour to the next generation.

Teachers can’t “put away a few items in their freezer whenever they have a free afternoon, evening, or hour.” Whatever free time they may have is dedicated to schoolwork.

Teachers can’t afford to “come to work pretty tired the next day.” A coffee isn’t enough to transform them into the patient, kind, and loving people that they need to be.

Dena Weinschneider 

Cincinnati, OH

Senator Johnson and the Liquor Store [Friends in High Places / Issue 1033]

Thank you for your article about presidents who were kind to the Jews. My family was a recipient of the kindness of then-Senator Lyndon B. Johnson. B’chasdei Hashem, my grandfather and three of his siblings survived the Holocaust and tried to rebuild their lives in Slovakia. Then the country was taken over by communists, and as people who believed in democracy, it wasn’t safe for them to stay. They had an uncle who had moved to Austin, Texas before the war, and they asked if he could help them. That uncle owned a liquor store, and Senator Johnson was a frequent customer.

Family lore is that the uncle offered to clear the senator’s tab if he could procure visas for his nephews and niece. The truth was, Senator Johnson was a mensch, and he helped get my family over to Texas because he wanted to help. My family came to Dallas in the early 50s and established the frum community there. I guess the entire Dallas Jewish community owes a debt of gratitude to LBJ, even if the Dallas highway named for him makes it impossible to extend our eruv....

An appreciative Dallasite

It’s More Than Described [The Brother I Never Knew / Issue 1033]

Riki Goldstein wrote about the volunteers of Beitar Illit who provide meals to the families of reservists in Tzur Hadassah.

Our son, daughter-in-law, and grandchildren live in this warm and loving community. It has a vibrant Orthodox community with two shuls, and the rabbi is Rabbi Levi Cooper. There’s a mikveh and a day school.

Our son has been serving in miluim since October 7, 2023 and is currently in his fourth round of duty. He wasn’t able to be home with his family for any of the chagim. Since Yom Kippur, the yeshivah he graduated from, Horev in Jerusalem, has lost 11 young men — all Torah-observant men.

Tzur Hadassah is so much more than an “upscale town of high-end homes and a predominantly secular/traditional populace.” It’s a unified community with mutual respect for one another no matter what their observance level is. This community is a hallmark of what bridging the gap is all about.

Davening for all of our chayalim, for peace, and for the return of all of the hostages,

Debra Weiner, MSW

Jerusalem, Israel

Unique Delivery [Screenshot / Issue 1033]

I want to thank Shoshana Friedman for the amazing article, “The Succos Fable,” in which she wrote the tale of a family whose property was attacked from all sides and who tried to protect themselves by installing high-tech fences and making friends with influential people, but only when sitting in their flimsy succah did they realize it was only the One Above who could save them.

I actually cried when I got to the ending. The idea was brilliant and brought out an important and beautiful lesson in a very special way. I’ve read it over and over, and each time I was blown away.

R.L.

Advocate for Its Introduction [Ambassadors of Love / Issue 1032]

I want to thank you for publishing Yoni Klajn’s article in the Yom Kippur edition of your magazine about my husband, David Geffen z”l, and his effective programs of Positive Relationship Education (PRE), and in particular, Loving Classroom.

Anyone who is concerned about chutzpah, bullying, violence, racism, abuse, substance dependency, depression, and other behaviors that are harmful to individuals, families, and society at large, should advocate to have Loving Classroom integrated into their child’s standard school curriculum. It has become clear that academic achievement alone doesn’t promote a happy, stable life. Countless people still in the school system, and in adulthood, suffer from the fallout of domestic breakdown, coercive control, online bullying, acts of terror — and a long slew of harms caused by man toward man. Sadly, even within the frum Jewish community, we’re not immune to the heartbreaking repercussions of man-inflicted suffering.

Learning the skills of how to get along with one another has been proven to be successful. Our programs have been given awards (e.g., Luxembourg Peace Price for Education 2024), accreditation, and approbation and haskamos. I urge your readers who advocate for achdus to recognize that Loving Classroom is the educational content that promotes and delivers long-term unity, built on solid-based Torah sources for maintaining healthy relationships (and less on ephemeral reasons such as existential threat).

Introduce this program into your children’s schools. Please join the endeavor to build a loving world, as this is the hope that can bring Mashiach.

I lost the magnificent engine who masterminded this program, so I need the help of mankind to follow through. Please contact Naomi@LovingWorld.com for more information.

Naomi Geffen,

Ramat Beit Shemesh

In Search of a Matzeivah [Graveyard Shift / Issue 1032]

Your article about the wonderful work of Motty Hammer, head of Vienna’s chevra kaddisha, was much appreciated. I’d like to add a tidbit on how he is always available to help, even in small ways.

I’ve been working on our family history for several years. In October 2022, I heard that one of my wife’s cousins was en route to yeshivah in Israel via Vienna. He wanted to visit the kever of the Tchortkover Rebbe.

I had several burial receipts from the 1920s for family members who had arrived in Vienna from Galicia after World War I. They were also close to the Tchortkover Rebbe.

Motty Hammer took the time to guide this young bochur to all the kevarim. Unfortunately, my great-grandmother’s kever had fallen into disrepair. That was unfortunate, since I’d hoped to see the inscription in order to solve a mystery. She’d been married to Mordechai Eliyahu Kuppermann, the grandson of Dayan Chaim Tzvi Kupperman from Oshpitzin.

In February 2023, Motty arranged to have the matzeivah propped up to read the inscriptions. I am so grateful to him.

I am wondering if any of the readers of Mishpacha have a picture of the kever of Dayan Chaim Tzvi Kuppermann in Oshpitzin? Did it survive the Nazis? Any information about his descendants would be appreciated.

David Stein

Montreal

In Our Uncle’s Footsteps [Still Singing His Song / Issue 1031]

Thank you for publishing the beautiful article about my dear uncle, Rabbi Gershon Fordsham shlita. Our family all enjoyed reading it.

After reading the inbox letter from H. R., who fondly recalled enjoying Reb Gershon’s davening from the amud when she was in seminary in Gateshead 50 years ago, it reminded me that I wanted to write in as well.

I, too, was a seminary girl, but in Manchester, over 30 years ago.

I wanted so much to be in Gateshead to hear my uncle daven on Yom Kippur. Having come from Toronto, I never had that opportunity before.

After some pleading I received the principal’s permission to travel to Gateshead.

When I arrived in Gateshead, my aunt found it difficult to find the words with which to tell me that Uncle Gershon went to Manchester to daven with his Rosh Hayeshivah, Harav Yehuda Zev Segal ztz”l. What a disappointment!

The hardest part of the incident was the discomfort I felt upon my return  and hearing that my friends who davened in the yeshivah were all zocheh to hear the most beautiful, miraculous Mussaf.

Nowadays, in Toronto, we have a baal tefillah who is originally from Gateshead, and who uses Rabbi Fordsham’s nusach. Baruch Hashem, the next generation of Fordshams worldwide are following in his footsteps by hearing Rabbi Fordsham-style davening.

Wishing Rabbi Fordsham gezunt and many more years of inspiring Yidden through the gift of his beautiful tefillos.

Hadassa Seliger (née Fordsham)

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1035)