Embrace Your Past

Helfin noch a Yiddish kind, vus der matzav rochni is eim blind / Veil music nor mit dem — fin mein neshumeh ich redt tzi eim (Helping another Yiddishe child, whose ruchniyus situation is blind… Because only with music, can I speak to him through my neshamah)

—from the song “The Language of Music,” 2010

L

ipa recently released a new album titled Eluzer Lipa’le, the name he was called as a young child growing up in New Square. When you hear the songs — ranging from poignant to haunting to exhilarating — you immediately know why he gave the album that name. It’s about their shared theme: Embrace your past, both your childhood struggles and those that took place in your adult life, and realize that those struggles were all orchestrated for your ultimate growth.

Walking up the steps to his home perched high up in Pomona, New York, I take in the stunning panoramic view from his front steps: You can see all of Haverstraw, the Hudson River, and the mountains beyond. Lipa is stylishly late, coming up the steps behind me.

“They’re amazing, the Borei Olam’s paintings, no?” he remarks.

In fact, the walls of Lipa’s house are covered with his colorful, creative artwork. There are paintings all over, with words of chizuk and emunah intermingled with bright shapes and splashes of color; there is a mural on the wall leading all the way up the staircase; and there are artistic sculptures hanging from the ceiling in the living room. There’s a grand piano in front of a large window facing the breathtaking view, with words of encouragement emblazoned across the music rack, inscribed by friends and family. I can easily picture Lipa sitting there, staring off into the distance and creating new tunes.

Lipa welcomes me into his personal studio, which is a jaw-dropping sight: There are colorful foam acoustic panels on the ceiling; wooden acoustic clouds are hanging on chains; the walls are covered with more extravagant artwork, accompanied by the words Hodu LaHashem.

And in the middle of the room, directly in front of the recording mic, is a large, ornate wooden amud. “I recently brough this amud into the studio,” Lipa explains. “This way, when I sing for Yidden, it feels like I’m leading them in prayer.”

Lipa says the home recording studio is “the best thing ever.” He says that when he was working on previous albums, he had to book sessions at recording studios, which often meant he couldn’t produce the sound that he was aiming for.

“A voice can be affected by many factors,” he explains. “If I was feeling tired, or if I just sang a lot at a wedding the night before, it was sometimes very hard to sing in the studio. So when I used to record my music at prearranged sessions, I wasn’t always up to it, and my voice didn’t always sound the way I had wanted it to. But now, whenever I feel like singing, I just hop into my at-home studio.”

And it’s not just the home studio. Regarding the new album, Lipa says that it’s “a new level in Jewish music. For the first time in the heimishe music industry, we now have an album that offers Dolby Atmos sound.”

Noticing the clueless expression on my face, Lipa explains what this means. Dolby Atmos is a new technology that makes music sound three-dimensional. It gives the listener the sense that he’s surrounded by the music, adding clarity and depth to the sound. It also allows the listener to hear hidden details and subtleties in the songs. Lipa adds that this feature is currently only available on Apple and Amazon Music, but he believes that even platforms like 24Six will eventually offer this technology.

“Producing the album with the Atmos option cost me an extra twenty thousand dollars,” Lipa says. “So why did I do it? Don’t I have something better to do with that kind of money? I’ll tell you why. Because ever since I entered this business, I’ve always tried to produce the best musical experience available. I don’t want any struggling teen out there to have an excuse to run to secular music, saying that what the Yidden offer isn’t as good. It may cost me extra, but I think it’s worth it for that reason alone.”

As our conversation continues, I learn just how much Lipa was willing to put on the line with his music in order to help others.

Take It Personal

Ich ti mich nor a toiveh, ven ich loz gein / fin alle shlechtz vus ich hub biz yetzt mit gemacht (I’m only doing myself a favor, when I let go of all the bad that I have endured until now)

—from the song “Lozen Gein,” 2025

AS we head out of the studio toward the cozy living room sofas, it’s clear that Lipa 2.0 is not only comfortable, but happy to bring his listeners along on his journey to healing.

“We’ve all suffered difficult failures or traumas at some point, either during our childhood or even when we were adults,” he says. “The idea is to stop being stuck in all the pain from the past. The best way to be b’simchah is to acknowledge what we went through and heal through acceptance.”

These are the messages that permeate the album. In “Lozen Gein (Letting Go),” he urges listeners to forgive those who have wronged them when they were young, suggesting that the anger keeps us shackled, preventing us from living in peace. In another song, “Mein Michkind (My Inner Child),” he talks about the grave mistake of running away from our youthful memories and attempting to become something that we aren’t. The best route, he sings emotionally, is to live in harmony with your inner self and recognize that although you’re flawed and have been rejected in the past, it doesn’t mean you’re not golden the way you are.

These themes aren’t just a collection of nice verses, they are extremely personal. In fact, Lipa sings many of the lyrics in first person. In “Gezint (Health),” this sentiment crescendos with a very personal admission: When I was a child, I wanted to be a policeman… when I was younger, I wanted to be a big singer… when I was a little older, I thought that everyone had to understand me… But today, but today… all I want is to be healthy.

I ask Lipa whether it makes him feel vulnerable to know that thousands of people are listening to his confessions of personal pain and healing. “Of course,” he admits. “But I felt like it was what the Ribbono shel Olam wanted from me.

“Look, I’ll be honest,” he continues. “In recent years, I’ve been blessed with a lot of success; my calendar is filled with events and simchahs. I didn’t really need to spend a hundred and twenty thousand dollars on a new album right now to keep myself relevant. I could just release new singles every now and then, or perhaps a shorter album. But if I’m already going all the way and producing an entire album with fifteen songs, it’s definitely not in my best interests to talk about touchy subjects.”

Indeed, I conducted my own little poll to see what the public’s reaction was to Eluzer Lipa’le. While some were raving about the meaningful messaging and great music, others were uncomfortable, even disappointed. One person told me, “When I listen to a new album, I want to hear fun music. All this personal stuff throws me off.”

Lipa was aware that this style wasn’t necessarily what all his fans wanted to hear.

“It was a very risky move,” he acknowledges. “Here I am, considered a fun and exciting performer, and I’m suddenly dropping these songs that are very heavy. I really can lose a lot of momentum with this, but I don’t mind the consequences — I did it because I know there are so many people out there who need the chizuk.

“Think about it for a second. There are a lot of people who need assistance with their mental or emotional health, people who are really broken, but they don’t seek the help they need because of the stigma. I thought to myself, if there’s a popular album out there that talks about the importance of overcoming life’s struggles in a healthy way, then maybe, just maybe, some of that stigma will go away.

“And that’s why I sing these songs in first person. If I say ‘you should let go of your pain,’ it sounds like I’m giving you mussar, but if I say, ‘I’m letting go of my pain,’ then it becomes personal, like your good friend encouraging you to do the same. And that’s the feeling I want to give over, even if it makes me vulnerable to other people’s judgments.”

Creating this style of music is a delicate balance, especially for audiences who might not be ready for it. But Israeli artists, singers such as Ishay Ribo, Shuli Rand, and Akiva Turgeman, have been able to adeptly elicit strong feelings of yearning and self-improvement without listeners flinching. And Lipa, who wants as broad a reach as possible, reveals that he is now taking the mostly Yiddish Eluzer Lipa’le and working on both English and Hebrew translations.

How are Lipa’s listeners taking to the new music? Lipa shares that after he finished singing at a recent wedding, a bochur approached him with a question: “I don’t struggle with any past traumas or pain. Is there any reason for me to listen to your new songs?”

“Let me ask you a question,” Lipa responded. “Did you stop saying the brachah of Refaeinu three times a day?”

The bochur chuckled. “Of course, I still say it. It’s in lashon rabbim. The tefillah is for all the cholim in Klal Yisrael, even if I myself am perfectly healthy.”

“Exactly,” Lipa replied. “So maybe it’s worthwhile to listen to these songs as well. That way, you might develop some empathy for the people around you who are struggling emotionally. Maybe you’ll learn to appreciate what they’re going through and be more supportive of them.”

Who Am I?

Kittah Daled… Kittah Daled. Kittah Daled? KITTAH DALED! KITTAH DALED! (Fourth grade… fourth grade. Fourth grade? FOURTH GRADE! FOURTH GRADE!)

—from the song “The Journey,” 2025

Soon Lipa leads me downstairs to his art gallery. The walls are lined with complex modern paintings and other eye-catching pieces of art. Art became Lipa’s passion during the “interim” years, when, from 2014-2018, he studied Psychology, Creative Writing, and Visual Art at Columbia University. One interesting item catches my attention right away: it appears to be a blue beketshe hanging on the wall, but glued to the lining are an assortment of toys — I can make out a little airplane and some matchbox cars.

Lipa explains the inspiration behind the art: “Little kids often daydream about being a big Rebbe when they grow up. When they get older, they sometimes crave that gorgeous, colorful beketshe that the Rebbe wears to tish. The idea I’m trying to impart in this artwork is: If all you want is the fancy beketshe, then it’s just like craving another toy. What you should really be aspiring for is the tochen, the lofty levels of the big tzaddik, not the levush.”

One of the most innovative songs on Lipa’s new album, titled “The Journey,” is essentially a musical interpretation of the various stages of life. Starting with birth and making his way through grade school all the way to adulthood, there are no verbal descriptions of the experiences. Rather, the music tells the story: the rise and fall of the tempo, the dramatic sounds and the more mellow segments. While everyone seems to be getting a different impression of what the song is conveying, that’s exactly what Lipa was hoping for.

“I didn’t want to tell my own story,” Lipa explains. “I wanted everybody to interpret it in their own way. Everyone goes through their own journey to reach their tafkid, and I wanted to give them a song to apply their feelings to. The main point is to get to the end of the song, where the person suddenly reflects on his life and asks himself those words I say at the end: Who am I? Why was I born in this period? And what do I have to accomplish before I go home?”

Lipa is now more than two decades into his professional musical journey. It began in the late 90s and early 2000s, as a young chassidishe fellow from New Square named Lipa Schmeltzer began to make waves in the industry.

Yet when Lipa asks, “Who am I?” at least a part of the answer comes from his personal family history. He grew up in New Square, the second-youngest of Reuven and Shifra Schmeltzer’s 12 children. Reb Reuven a”h, who was niftar in 2018, was born in Budapest, Hungary, and was orphaned as a teenager after his father was murdered in a slave labor camp. His extremely resourceful mother, left alone with two boys (Reb Reuven’s brother Rav Chaim Schmeltzer became rosh yeshivah of Telshe-Chicago), managed to get her small family onto the Kastner transport, which, after months in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, eventually arrived in Switzerland, from where they made their way to the US.

The three Schmeltzers moved to New York and began life anew. Mrs. Schmeltzer founded what was the precursor of Satmar Bikur Cholim, and Reuven learned in the yeshivah of Rav Moshe Neuschloss in White Plains, where he became extremely close to the previous Skverer Rebbe and was part of the Rebbe’s core group of founders of the shtetl of New Square.

Reuven was still single in 1954 when the Skverer Rebbe purchased a lot in Rockland County and founded the nascent village, but not wanting to miss out, he purchased a small house, which was used as the cheder building until his marriage three years later.

The large Schmeltzer clan grew up in that tiny house. By day, Reb Reuven worked for the next 42 years in the post office, but his focus was always on the chinuch of his children. While the family didn’t have much materially, the children discovered their gifts and talents. Lipa credits his older brother Zishe, a master mechanech who produced dozens of children’s tapes, for introducing him to the world of professional music. While their father wanted his children to become talmidei chachamim, he did permit Lipa — whose talents didn’t lie in academic excellence back in those days — to help out Zishe in the studio.

“My first experience singing publicly was when I joined the Skverer choir as a child. Later on, when I was nineteen and learning in Eretz Yisrael by the Makova Rav, the mechuten of the Belzer Rebbe, the Rav would regularly ask me to sing at the Friday night botteh. When I returned to New Square, I started out doing grammen at weddings. I realized then that I was blessed with talents in both singing and ad-lib rhyming, and I decided that I wanted to become a wedding singer. I soon got married, and shortly after that, I started handing out my simple business card that read: Lipa Schmeltzer, badchan and singer. People told me I had to choose whether I wanted to be a badchan or a singer — but I felt like I was made for both, so I kept to it.”

Lipa eventually decided it was time for a solo album. He borrowed $15,000 from a gemach to get started with the recordings, and in 1999, he released his debut album, Nor B’simcha.

Yet the sales of the tape fell pretty flat. Lipa sold a few hundred copies, and was unable to recoup his initial investment. In those days, singers made a large portion of their income through sales, and if their first attempt at an album didn’t sell well, they would usually throw in the towel and try a different profession.

But not Lipa Schmeltzer. “From the get-go, I felt that I wasn’t a run-of-the-mill singer. I felt like I had something fresh to offer. So I attributed the poor sales to the album’s lack of creativity — the tracks were very basic and predictable. I decided to try creating fresher sounds, hoping that it would boost my sales and give people new kinds of music to really love.”

Around that time, producer JJ Fried heard Lipa’s original album and realized that he was dealing with a super talent. The two of them got to work on Lipa’s next CD, titled Shema. At that point, Lipa started experimenting with his vocals.

“I was just trying to get more creative with my music. At that time, producer Yochi Briskman had just discovered Yaakov Shwekey, and they were trying out new sounds as well. JJ and I were trying to be creative in a way that worked for me.”

Shema’s fresh style might be considered outdated by most people in today’s wide-ranging Jewish music industry, but in those days, it was revolutionary. In 2001, he released Letova, and his album sales grew exponentially. People were drawn to Lipa’s novel, upbeat songs and clever Yiddish lyrics; he was finally able to pay back his debts and start making parnassah.

A friend of mine who is a self-proclaimed longtime Lipa fan shares his feelings from that period. “I was a recent baal teshuvah, and although I developed an affinity for traditional chassidishe zemiros, I missed being able to hear original and artistic musical creations. With Lipa’s new music, I got to really enjoy new songs that had a meaningful message and were fun to listen to. It was very refreshing, and it helped keep me away from the secular stuff.”

The young star’s fan base began to mushroom in both scope and size, and he soon began performing at large events to animated crowds. The energy coming from the audiences were very different than by weddings; hearing people sing his lyrics along with him and relish in his performances made his music feel more than just great art — it became personal, almost as though he was communicating with his fans and providing them encouragement.

“I felt like I was moving people, and it made me feel like I had a real purpose,” he says. “I was making people happy, and I was bringing important ideas to light. It was humbling, but it also gave me the desire to give them more.”

A few years later, with the release of Baderech, hit songs like “Gelt” and “Dimyonos” brought a whole new flavor to Jewish music: Humbling truths coupled with great humor and catchy, satirical lyrics. At one point, Lipa came up with the idea of producing a music video for the HASC 17 concert. His hit video for the song “Gelt” got a lot of attention, and he followed it up the next year with his popular Abi Melebt clip.

“Nobody did music videos at that time, so it made a lot of waves,” he relates. “I wasn’t doing any of this to antagonize — just to make people smile.”

In 2006, Lipa released the smash hit album Keinehora, including timeless favorites such as “Rabboisai Mir Vellen Bentschen” and “Der Saba Kadisha/Hashiveini.” The hits kept coming with the release of A Poshiter Yid in 2008, and the trend continued for years.

However, along with the skyrocketing fame and newfound sense of purpose, Lipa was torn inside. On the one hand, he was gaining traction, and people were finding his work both entertaining and inspiring. On the other hand, he didn’t want to upset his community, yet he began facing significant backlash. On a few occasions, rabbanim in his hometown asked him to stop releasing albums with contemporary-sounding songs. There were also times that he was told to cancel musical events.

Eventually, Lipa realized that many of his neighbors were openly opposed to the path he was taking, so he left New Square and relocated to Airmont.

“But the feelings were left bubbling inside,” he says. “Right or wrong, I felt very rejected. I understand now that I wasn’t in the right environment for what I was doing, but deep down, I had lots of unresolved feelings from my youth, and together it really caused pain that lasted for years.”

A Better Place

Der Rebbe Reb Zishe fleg altz zoogen freilich, M’vet mir nisht shmassen far nisht zein vi Meilech. Dus besteh vus ich ken zein, dus vill men fin mich (The Rebbe Reb Zishe used to always say happily, I won’t get lashes for not being more like [my brother] Meilech. The best that I can be, that’s what’s expected of me)

—from the song “A Poshiter Yid,” 2008

A

bout a decade ago, the internal strife came to a head, and the mood in some of Lipa’s songs began to shift. He soon dropped out of the public eye, and began going through some significant changes.

I ask Lipa about that trying episode. “There’s nothing to hide. Like I said, I had my journey. There was a point when I was really struggling to figure myself out — I was just trying to survive. Here I was, adored by thousands, who would scramble to hire me for big events, and regularly stop me in the street to tell me that my songs changed their lives. But then, the more conservative communities were constantly banning my events and blacklisting my albums, which made me very conflicted. I had still not healed from some serious past traumas at that point, and all the negative publicity doubled down on that.”

During that decade, many other mainstream Jewish singers were experimenting with new ideas and sounds, but Lipa’s music and public persona had a knack for rubbing some people back home the wrong way.

“They often interpreted my work as cynical and antiestablishment — and in some instances, they may have been right,” Lipa admits. “Honestly, it’s hard to know what caused me to get more edgy than others in the field — my own inner conflicts or the criticisms themselves. Whatever it was, I eventually made a sharp turn.”

But Lipa was always searching with sincerity, and he soon found his footing.

“It took me a while to dig deep inside. But then, baruch Hashem, I started to heal, and things started falling into place. It was only on the other side of that parshah that I began to appreciate what true joy really feels like — the kind that comes from a place of inner calm. There was a lot of therapy, a lot of healing — but I managed to find the real me, and I embraced him.

“Today, I understand that it was all meant to be. Everything that happened along the way was orchestrated by Hashem for the ultimate good.”

Lipa’s music made its highly anticipated return with the release of Gevaldig in 2020. The songs were full of emotion, faith and creativity — the ultimate return of pure, riveting Lipa music. At the time, singer Shmueli Ungar commented on a popular podcast, “Heimishe music finally got back what it needed so badly — the originality and depth of Lipa Schmeltzer. I really missed hearing his fresh material, and these songs are some of the best yet.”

Today, Lipa’s fan base is as broad as ever, and he gets requests from Yidden of all denominations.

“Next week,” he says, “I’m performing in Manhattan in front of a crowd of 17,000 people — kids who went to public school and are looking for inspiration. At the same time, I recently performed at a siyum in New Square, and the Rebbe’s son introduced me, talking about our longstanding friendship.”

Lipa shares that this was very moving for him, as he had gone through a lot of strife with the community he came from, and he had now come full circle. “They say in the name of the Satmar Rav’s wife that one doesn’t have to daven that all his foes will make peace with him. He just has to daven that he’ll live long enough to see the day that all the dust settles, and they naturally come to terms with each other.”

Just a Warm Drink

A coffee vill ich, nisht du kein milich / Gefinen kom a trop (I want a coffee, but there’s no milk. I found barely a drop)

—from the song “Abi Melebt,” 2005

L

ipa shares that a few months back, he was performing at a function for a prominent yeshivah. At one point, he went over to shake hands with the rosh yeshivah and they began conversing. The photographer saw a chance for a great photo, and asked Lipa and the Rosh Yeshivah to smile to the camera. But just then, the Rosh Yeshivah’s gabbai intervened, shooing the photographer away.

Later on, the gabbai approached Lipa to explain himself. “You have to understand… I’m very involved in the fundraising. I need to protect our brand.”

“You know what?” Lipa says proudly. “It didn’t bother me at all. A couple of years ago, it would have really hurt me, but now I’m past that. If I’m the kind of person that makes bad imagery in some people’s eyes, that’s okay. I’m comfortable being exactly what Hashem wants me to be, and that’s all I need.”

I ask him if the songs from his more recent albums are garnering the same appeal at his performances as the songs of a decade ago.

“Sure they do. A lot of them, like the ones from the albums BavLipa and Yom Tov Lipa, are long compositions in Yiddish that I mostly get asked to sing at dinners and the like. But the upbeat songs are very popular by weddings and events as well.”

Indeed, at my cousin’s chasunah, the crowd was dancing up a storm to some of Lipa’s recent hits, including Yeridah L’tzorech Aliyah (2020) and Lishma (2022). And Lipa says that the dance-style songs on his new album are already hitting the weddings. “ ‘Po’el Gevuros’ and ‘Hishkif’ are already k’noking by chasunahs,” he says, “and they’ve only been around for a few days.”

Lipa graciously offers me a cup of coffee, and whips up a brew that smells absolutely delicious, but then has to search the fridge for some milk. I feel like I’m reliving his song. And then — “Ah! baruch Hashem, there’s a little over here.” The coffee was great — and the milk did not turn out to be sour as the song suggested it might.

And just like we all want a good cup of coffee, we want songs that make us feel warm inside. And so, what does Lipa do when he confronts such challenges as, “What makes singers think that they should be expressing their opinions or feelings in their songs? It’s not like they’re claiming to be offering daas Torah.”

“That’s a great question,” Lipa says. He answers with an anecdote: Lipa was sitting at a mitzvah tantz, listening to his friend performing the badchanus. At one point during the grammen, the badchan took a friendly jab at Lipa: “Lately, singers started offering their opinions in their songs. Just wait — soon people will be turning to plumbers and electricians for advice as well!”

“It was meant as a joke, but it got me thinking. I felt like I needed the right words to explain what I was doing,” Lipa says. He later approached his friend and clarified his thoughts. “I told him that when I share my feelings and observations in my songs, I’m not trying to tell anyone what to do — I’m just sharing. True, I’m no more elevated than the plumber — I’m a poshiter Yid like him. The only difference is that Hashem gave me a mic — so I use it, and hopefully some good will come from what I say. And if someone doesn’t like what I’m saying, they’re free to turn off the music. Don’t worry, I can handle it.”

No More Running

Der besteh meditzin vus ich hub, is in mein hartz, in mein hartz / Ich zing ois mein hartz tzi dir (The best medicine that I have, is in my heart, in my heart / I sing out my heart to you)

—from the song, “The Best Medicine,” 2025

One of Lipa’s signature talents is his ability to ad-lib emotion-packed grammen. I remember watching him perform over a decade ago at the mitzvah tantz of a chassan who was an orphan from a very young age; a few minutes in, there wasn’t a dry eye in the room.

“I was really gebentched with this ability from a young age,” Lipa says. “I do some research on the parties involved before the event, but the actual lyrics are all sung spontaneously. It’s amazing — the Eibishter just puts the right words into my mouth. It also involves reading the crowd and recognizing what style they’re looking for.”

When it comes to Purim, Lipa is totally in his element.

“Purim is all about simchah,” he says, “but real happiness can’t be external — it has to come from within. Chazal say: Nichnas yayin, yatza sod (When the wine enters, the secrets come out). There’s a mitzvah to drink on Purim, and that’s because we’re supposed to reveal what’s hidden. We’re supposed to get in sync with what’s really going on inside. Tell me, if your inside is filled with pain, anger, and unresolved feelings — what kind of sodos will come out? One thing’s for sure: It won’t be simchah.”

Indeed, we often see people on Purim who experience an initial joviality after imbibing copious amounts of wine — but soon thereafter, the tears start flowing, and the anger bubbles over. You can find them in a corner, crying about the suffering they endured, yearning to finally be freed from their inhibitions. The emotions can reach fever pitch before they start smiling again.

It’s always special when people get comfortable enough to release all that pent-up tension on Purim. Those moments of pure honesty can form long-lasting relationships and initiate real changes. But Lipa says he wants to accomplish something else on Purim: To experience an inner self that is totally at peace.

“I’m looking forward to experiencing authentic — the kind that lasts, instead of disappearing the morning after Purim. And it starts with embracing who we really are inside, and finally stopping to run away from that person.”

*

I make a short stop at a gas station off the Palisades, and I’m suddenly hit with a flashback. In this very parking lot almost 20 years ago, I was a little kid sitting in the car with my father, listening to Lipa Schmeltzer’s newest CD, Likro es HaHalel. As we were about to pull out of the lot, we saw a chassidishe fellow walking past our car — and we immediately recognized him as the man whose voice was soothingly playing from our car’s stereo.

My father opened the car door and called Lipa over. “You hear what we’re listening to, Reb Lipa?” he said, turning up the volume. Lipa smiled, and then pointed out: “This album isn’t just music — it has many layers. Listen closely and I’m sure you’ll find it very uplifting.” Even then, chasing his career, Lipa wanted these total strangers to not only hear the songs, but the inspiring messages behind them as well.

And here I am again, this time reflecting on Lipa’s personal journey. It was the tale of a man who dared to dream and sought to inspire others with the unique talents that he was given. Along the way, he met great success and warmed many hearts — but also adversity that threatened to sink his ship. And yet, Lipa chose to heal and grow from his past. Today, he’s willing to share his journey, and inspire others to discover and embrace their true selves.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1053)