​Dear friends,

Baruch Hashem, it’s been an ultra-busy week. Bnos Avigail went to Bnei Brak for Shabbos. We stayed at Batei Avot, a dormitory that was originally donated to the Ponevitzh Yeshiva by an upper-class English woman who was willing to help the Ponevitzh Rav, Rav Yosef Kahaneman in his efforts on behalf of Israel’s kids. After the war, there were literally thousands of orphans who needed a roof over their heads, and arguably something more crucial for their genuine survival and their ability to build a future for themselves, a Torah education that would give their lives meaning. She was not observant, nor did she admire those who are. She made a condition, “I don’t want to donate a building that will house boys who wear yarmulkes, and have tzitsit. I don’t want to bring them back to the ghetto”. The Rav didn’t bat an eyelash. He agreed wholeheartedly with her stipulations and kept them. He built a home for girls.
​
When I was in school, the war was long over, and the orphans had gone on to marry and build their own homes. The building then became a dormitory for students who wanted to go to Bnei Brak’s esteemed seminary, and who didn’t live in Bnei Brak. It hasn’t changed much since my times. The curtains are new, and the portrait of the Lady is gone, but otherwise it is identical to the dorm I lived in. I wanted the girls to experience Bnei Brak the way I did, as a place where doing things right is not viewed as extreme, and where idealism is as normal as breathing air. 
 
We were fortunate enough to visit Rebbitzen Berman. She told us a story that was unbelievably moving. 
Her husband’s grandfather was the famous Steipler Gaon, and she was very much part of the Bnei Brak that I wanted to share. She began by asking if we think happiness comes from the inside or the outside. We all said (not surprisingly) that it comes from the inside. That set us up for her story.

The Steipler Gaon, Rav Yaakov Yisrael Kanievsky was the acknowledged Gadol of his time. He had three sons in law, one of whom was Rebbitzen Berman’s father in law. When her father in law moved his young family into the house where the young Rebbitzen Berman now lives, things were very different than they are today. No one had boxes or crates. When you moved, you spread a sheet on the floor, put all of your belongings onto the sheet, and then tied the corners together, and repeated the process until all of your earthly possessions are in makeshift bundles. You then hire movers (not that there were actual professional movers, they were usually itinerant Arabs looking for whatever work they could get). They carried your bundles into your new home, dropped them on to the floor received their wages and left you to unpack.

The day the Berman’s moved was exactly as described. Their kids were young and loved the almost indescribable chaos of moving day. One of them got bored, and began playing with his toys. He threw one of the pieces into the toilet, which immediately became blocked and began to overflow onto the floor where all of the sheets were spread. 

What would you do?
I would freak out.

To make things worse, Rabbi Berman looked at his watch, and realized that 60 young men were waiting for him in the Beit Midrash of Ponevitzh. “Should I go?” he asked his wife. “Go! I’ll manage” she said, not believing that this was really happening to her. Moments later the door opened. It was her father in law, the Steipler Gaon, a man who rarely looked further than his Talmud. He immediately grasped the situation without her saying a word. He took off his hat, laid it on the table, and then took off his coat and did the same. He went for a plunger, unstuffed the toilet and took the sponja stick and began sweeping the water out.  What made this a lesson for life, is that he did this this all with a smile.

She knew why.

He knew he was doing exactly what the situation demands, He was doing what Hashem’s will for him was at that moment.

A person like that is always happy, because nothing on the outside can change his sense of being on the path, and being beloved for it.

Love,
Tziporah  

Dear friends,

Some of you may have known Rabbi Yosef Azar. 

I didn’t. I saw him at Neve over the course of many years, but I never actually spoke to him. He was nonetheless someone who I admired from afar. He always looked like he just came back to work after the best vacation ever. He seemed rested, full of high spirits and an almost tangible level of optimism and love of life. When he disappeared from the scene, at first I didn’t think much about it. In fact, I assumed that he might be involved in some sort of fundraising because he would be an amazing ambassador for Neve.  When his name appeared on the Tehillim board, with those who need our prayers because of illness, his name became part of my daily tefillah. It felt discordant. He just wasn’t the type.

He came back, and he looked (not surprisingly) like a poster boy for cancer treatment. The same relaxed upbeat persona, and the same observable connection with people. Then he stopped coming.

It didn’t occur to me that he was relapsing until his name reappeared on the list. He recently wrote a letter to the school in which he thanked us for our tefillah and tehillim and then went on to candidly discuss his condition. He was on a new type of chemo, one that left him less wiped out. There was no hint of resentment in his being “less” wiped out, only gratitude.  Maybe it would shrink his tumor enough for a future surgery. He didn’t seem at all concerned with the possibility that maybe it wouldn’t, even though it was evident that the reality of his condition didn’t escape him.  It was clear that he felt that everything is as it should be, “According to plan”, and that there was no reason to complain.

I was unable to attend his funeral, since I was in Kiryat Sefer, which if anything makes the finality of his passing more elusive. There was something so full of light about him, that it’s difficult to just let go.
The first thing that the Torah tells us about the world is that it was chaotic, desolate, dark and had seemingly unfathomable depths. Hashem imposed spiritual light over that waters when He willed it to come into being. Rashi tells us that this light (which isn’t physical- the sun was created later) was concealed Where?

The Chasam Sofer quotes a verse from Tehillim that says, “Light is planted in a tzadik, and those whose hearts are straight have joy.” A tzadik is someone whose good deeds outweigh their bad deeds. Not quantitatively. They outweigh the bad deeds qualitatively. The word “outweigh” tells you that some deeds have greater spiritual impact than others. Suppose, for a minute, that you have a chronic case of yentitis (the need to gossip, to stay “in the know” and to exercise daily by jumping to conclusions). You go to a class reunion and can’t’ wait to share your insights. Your High School chums used to be younger, thinner etc. You want to give an honest report about each of them, to anyone who shows even polite interest.  If you somehow manage to resist, you made a real dent in your character, and this can be a genuine brick in the you, you call “self”.  On a one to ten scale, what number would you use to describe your victory?  Try another scenario. Envision yourself in the midst of a bitter divorce, one in which your soon-to-be ex is relentlessly trying to prove himself “right” by presenting you as “borderline” (the favorite cliché in the world of current psycho-babble). No one will ask him for his professional credentials…You want to answer each accusation with “the truth” (which under the circumstances by the nature of things is the truth as you see it, which may or may not be the entire truth). Words like “abusive” and “controlling” can roll off your tongue freely. No one will ask for your credentials any more than they asked him for his credentials. 

And you remain silent.
Because,
You know the truth. 
No one is asking you for a recommendation as a future marriage partner. You are not even legally divorced. People want some drama and spice, and the thrill of being vicariously part of a drama. And you remain silent.

Your silence is enough to turn an ordinary person into a tzadik. It’s a 10.  A tzadik is described as being someone who has the brilliant light of the first day implanted in his heart. When a seed is put into the ground, its inherent life force causes it to sprout. This causes the original shell that encased it to burst. The forces of evil are called “shells” or “husks” in Kabbalah language. They hold your capacity for light, your life force and vitality prisoner unless you are strong enough to make it burst. Someone who can hear themselves humiliated and not respond, is considered as strong as the sun at its most powerful moments.
Where does the strength come from?

There is an even higher level. There are people who have a natural goodness about them. They are described as “yishrei lev” having straight hearts. How do you get there?  The answer that the Chasam Sofer gives is through having simchah. Joy in being. In learning. In doing mitzvos. 
We just lost one of the “baalei simcha”- one of the masters of joy.

I didn’t know him, speak to him or do anything but see him from afar. It’s enough to make me want to bring some of what he was into myself.
​
Love,
Tziporah

​Dear friends,

The season is over

But not really.

The holy days touch you, they can (and hopefully will!) stay with you forever. There is something that the Kabbalists call “rishimu” which means an impression. Even when the flash of light passes, it leaves something of itself behind, and that “something” is real enough to take with you as you travel through this newly born year.

Step back a minute and think about how you felt when you heard the shofar at Yom Kippur’s end. It tells you (whether or not you realize it) that you are ready. A feeling of the victory of good over Other took place, one that you may not feel is real or enduring because you (at least on the surface) are the same old you. 
You aren’t.

No one stays the same. The rishimu is here, and it can be accessed again. There are three major moves you can make to retain something of the light that is really there, but hard to find when you are (like all of us) so drawn into a world that grabs your feelings and your time.
​

1. NOTICE WHEN YOU HAVE A CHOICE IN FRONT OF YOU.

 Janice* went to a Shabbaton sponsored by a kiruv organization that she has been part of since she was a clueless student who wanted a free dinner.  It was something of a milestone for her. She was going to be giving a workshop, and that placed her squarely on the side of the people who are there to give, and who have something to give. Once she was there only to get. Those days are over. Her talk was far more successful than she had imagined it would be. She had been able to give more than ideas or words, she gave something of herself, and when you do that all of the walls fall down. Now it was time for the meal to begin. Everyone streamed into the hotel’s dining room. As she surveyed the tables, she intuitively felt someone right behind her coming closer than she liked. Turning around to see who was about to invade her personal space, she noticed Cathy. “Can we sit together”, the girl asked with undisguised enthusiasm. Janice’s first thought was, “Oh no”. She didn’t want to sit next to Cathy. Her initial revulsion was followed by a stream-of-consciousness effort to find some excuse, any excuse to avoid the young woman behind her. Cathy was socially awkward, loquacious, and highly opinionated and worst of all, extremely vulnerable. There was one problem that prevented Janice from latching on to one of the excuses she had already mind. The best of them being“I would love to, but I am supposed to mix so I can meet the new people” was. The topic of her workshop was, “Jewish Unity – Fact or Fiction”. It was too soon for her to delete the message she had presented so sincerely.

She knew she faced a choice; What she preached was, “You should genuinely like people who make you feel good (by entertaining, listening or whatever) or like everyone because they are part of the Tribe.” What was she going to practice? 

2-RECOGNIZE THAT YOU HAVE TO DO SOMETHING TO ACTUALIZE THE POTENTIAL THAT MAKING A MEANINGFUL CHOICE OFFERS.
Janice knew that she could have just smiled, and continued walking. No bad feelings, no overt rejection. She could have said “sure” and headed off to the rest room hoping that there would be no more places left for two people. Passivity can be very inviting. Instead, because she wanted to be a person with enough integrity to walk her talk, Janice did something she had never done before. She asked herself whether Cathy is any less valuable than she is. She had liked the question well enough to make it the core of her next presentation. Cathy is part of her, part of the whole, part of the great and unique Unity of Hashem. She won. She found herself saying, “Sure. Let’s go further in. I think that someone there is leaving”.

3-AFTER YOU DO WHATEVER YOU CAN, LET GO AND LET HASHEM DETERMINE WHAT THE RESULTS OF YOUR CHOICES WILL BE, HE WILL HELP YOU MOVE FORWARD
“I see that there are two places right in the front, near Rabbi Cohen’s table” Janice said when it seemed that no one was leaving after all “Great!”. Rabbi Cohen’s wife came into the ballroom, found the table in seconds, and went back to the entrance to escort her aged mother to the table. The two places were clearly taken. After looking around, it was equally clear that there were not two places together available at the same table.  Cathy turned around, and said, “You know what, Janice? I hope it isn’t going to make you feel bad, but I see a seat next to Leora, and I really would like to catch up with her. We both originally come from Cape Town, and I’m sure you’ll understand.” Janice understood. 

Hashem let her stretch beyond her comfort level, but then took over once again. The next time a situation like this one arises, Janice will respond in a way that is spontaneous, smooth, and most significantly, real. She is like a runner, whose coach got him to the finish line.

Keep the story (or one like it) with you. It has what is arguably the most important message of all; You are strong enough to do it! You can make changes that are genuine enough and subtle enough to make you much closer to doing the job for which you were created.

Love,
Tziporah

Dear friends,

One of the more interesting things about having a large family, is the huge age difference between the children. The way things work, is that you are actually raising several different generations simultaneously.  When the older ones marry, things get more complicated. The children of the older ”generation” are more or less the same age as the children of your younger” generation…”.

Envision this happening on an ordinary Shabbos afternoon. The girls are schmoozing in the kitchen. Four boys who are brothers, but of different “generations”, are hanging out in the living room. The four- year old built a really huge tower using magnablox. It’s far bigger than he is, and he is standing on the couch to add what presumably will be the penthouse, since there are no more pieces for another story. Suddenly the entire structure meets the fate of all kid-built towers; it crashes to the floor. The little boy begins to cry inconsolably. His older brother who just entered yeshiva ketana (high school age yeshiva) says, in the manner of unsympathetic teenage boys “you don’t even know what’s worth crying over. I’m in trouble with the mashgiach. That’s real.”. The twenty-two-year-old says, “That’s nothing. Apologize and grow up. You don’t know what real life is about. The last date I had was a disaster.  I really wanted it to work, but she doesn’t want to see me again. That’s the real stuff”. The 35-year-old interjects, “Forget it. You’ll find the right one when Hashem wants you to. You can’t imagine the stress of meeting mortgage payments and paying tuition at the same time. You don’t know how demanding raising a family is”. They are all right. They have all forgotten some things, and are not as yet willing or able to see other things. Enter their worlds, so you can see something of yourself in them.

Be the four-year-old. Did you forget how much fun it was to build your fantasy with the brightly colored tiles? How important it is for you to see them crash so you can move on to things that are more real.

Be the fifteen- year old. Did you forget how much you love the moment your mom took you to buy your clothes, as you saw yourself moving into another phase, one that has more truth and more power. How much you want to shine, and how the mashgiach is there to help you not fall back.

Be the twenty-two-year old. Did you forget how much you want to see yourself move beyond being a piece in what is ultimately someone else’s puzzle. How each date gave you hope that your time has finally come. How much you want it to be the right one, and how honest you have to be about how both of you have to be on the same page, and what an important lesson this will be later.

Be the thirty-five-year-old. Did you forget how struggling and sacrifice turns you into the kind of hero you want more than anything to be, and how your kids and your responsibilities build you more than they take from you.

Why am I telling you all this? With Rosh Hashanah rapidly approaching, it’s important for you to have a deeper and broader vision of who you are, and what it is you really want in the coming year. You want to live a meaningful life, which ultimately means having a real connection to Hashem. You don’t want to spend the next 50 years doing the equivalent of weeping over fallen pieces of plastic. 
​
One of the customs for Elul is reciting Tehillim 27. Arguably the most meaningful line is “I ask for one thing; it’s that that I seek; to live in Hashem’s House all the days of my life….” Being in Hashem’s house in the simplest sense means living to see the Bais HaMikdash. King David, the author of this psalm lived before the Temple was built. He wanted to be close to Hashem, surrounded by His presence. Aware of being a member of His community and living a life in which every day and every activity has meaning.
David was a king. His function was to act as a living example of what it means to let the ultimate king, Hashem rule. He had to relate to Hashem with absolute selflessness. He was forbidden to have the horses, women, and money that gave other rulers their sense of importance. His role was to be part of the greater picture continually.

On Rosh Hashanah, your main task is to commit yourself to being conscious of how much you want Hashem to be your ruler. Not your ego. No other people’s voices from your past or your present. Not your bank account (or lack thereof…) and certainly not your body’s endless demands.

One week of Elul is behind us. It’s a good time to think about how free you can be if you let Hashem be your own ruler. How much more fun life is when you see the whole process, and not just the incomplete episodes.

Now be yourself
Forgetful
Stuck in the visions of fragmentation
Longing for the Whole
And
Make room for it
 
Love,
Tziporah

Dear friends,

I went to shul this morning (yes, Sunday, not Shabbos, such things happen…) and heard the shofar. (no, not Rosh Hashanah, just the first day of Elul)

Elul is the last month of the Hebrew calendar. It’s a time of taking all of the lose pieces of your life, and trying to tie them together. Very appropriately, Rabbi Edelstein of Neve is introducing an alumni shiur, so that girls who “finish” Neve (no, you never really finish Neve (no comparisons to summer colds p lease). For a long time after I finished seminary in Bnei Brak, I received a monthly letter from the principal together will all of the other graduates. At the time they were meaningful-they brought me back to the heady idealism of seminary. When we moved away from my first apartment, I didn’t bother giving the office my new address. It was so clear to me that everything I read is so completely integrated that it wasn’t worth the effort. If I were to have them today (yes, I threw them out.), they would mean more. They would give me insight into what Elul is, which is really examining who you are, why you emerged as you did, and who you want to be in the future. 

Rambam delineates various things that make you yourself. 

Your biological heredity is a factor. I often suspected that intellectual ability has a hereditary side when I looked at some of the great rabbinical families such as the Soloveitchiks. More recently I discovered that all sorts of other stuff, like dyslexia and ODD are part of the package.

 The next factor is what you chose to integrate from your environment and make your own. My parents were both scrupulously honest with money. I still remember how my mother went to Bais Yaakov to enroll me. I was about to enter the 7thgrade, had only after- school Hebrew School background. My mother came as is; no hair covering and no pretentions of being more religious than she was.  I doubt if I would be accepted into Bais Yaakov today. The rabbi asked me briefly if I am sure that this is what I want, looked at both of us, and took out the forms. When my mother asked him how much the tuition was, he told her $9.00 a month ($100 then, was like $802.70 today. Even factoring in inflation, tuition then was very low. The parents were mostly immigrants, and the little they paid was food off the table.) There was a split-second pause. He expected her to bargain. She didn’t. Nor did she ever miss a payment, or send it late. This was far from normal in an era when no one paid retail….

My father similarly was a straight arrow. His furniture business turned sour when the neighborhood his store was located in changed. His customers had to be chased into a corner to get the money they had committed to pay out of their wallets. That never was an excuse to add on charges (or to defraud the government by not reporting income).  There is no way to delete these images. They are as much part of me as my eye color or my hair.You are more than your heredity and your environment. 

You have also made choices that narrow your future choices. One of my neighbors and English teacher whose has made computer graphics her hobby. Whenever there is an “occasion” in the building-a bris or a wedding, or someone moves away, there is always a witty sign with an appropriate message. The effect on her, is that she has become, over the years, an extremely sensitive person, aware of the ebbs and flows of other people’s lives and has developed into a person who is always there for them. I doubt that she realized that her first Mazal Tov sign would be the first step into becoming a person positively involved in other people’s lives, but it did. When tragedy strikes, she is there. When one of the neighbors developed memory issues, she was there, subtly helping the family. The big choices are often pre-made by the small ones.
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You also have gifts, potentials that not everyone else has. You may be the kind of person who intuitively knows how to make other people relate to you and to each other. You may have musical talent, or the ability to be silent and content. You may have used your gifts well, not at all, or (in the worst case) as a tool to manipulate others. My daughter’s father in law Elya Succot is a very well- known Israeli artist. His paintings and murals can be seen all over the world. The themes are inevitably of the joy of seeking and finding Hashem. His style is impressionistic, and full of intricate sub-designs well hidden in the main focus of the painting. Really looking at his paintings are like a walk through the fields and forests of your inner life. He made choices. When he was young, and studied art  in Italy, he could have let things take an entirely different direction.

You have also developed habits that you may or may not realize have become part of you. How do you respond when you are afraid, or feel trapped? Do you know how to keep your mind and heart on the same page? The way you respond today, may be the product of years of responses that you may or may not have noticed. 

These fives things are open books that you can read to learn who you are. You will notice some things you like, and some things that you don’t. The good news is that Elul is the time of year that Hashem imbued with the power to open doors that you may have closed. You aren’t stuck.

It’s a time of joy,
 renewal,
 love
 and most of all possibility.

Love,
Tziporah

Dear Friends,

Baruch Hashem, there is so much good news to share, but I sometimes feel a bit awkward  because some of you don’t know the people , It won’t stop me this time. Two girls from Bnos Avigail got engaged in such a short time span, that I can’t help but wish them both a real mazal tov! They are Goldie Stein and Sarit Poliaff. If you don’t know them, wish them well any way. Why not! Let yourself feel the goodness role… 

I can’t resist telling you a true story, but in honesty it works much better when you can understand the cultural/ethnic background. There was a bakery in Meah Shearim called Brizel’s. The proprietor was an eternally older Karlin chossid named Zalman. I shopped there for decades, but he always seemed to be in his mid-sixties, grey payos flying, and full of a rare blend of optimism and humor blended with Meah Shearim in every cell of his blood. His friend recounted that one day he entered the bakery and asked “What’s new?” Brizel replied “terrible” which was the last thing his friend expected to hear. “What happened?” “Nothing big. I got up really early to put in a good few hours of study before I get to the ovens (that means it was about 2 a.m.). I couldn’t find my shoes. My grandchildren were over, and they must have been playing around in my room. I finally found them, but they took the laces out. Finding the first one was easy, but then I wasted almost a half hour until I finally discovered where the kid stashed the second one. Then I headed out to the mikveh. It was too late to study, but I got there in time to immerse before going to the synagogue. I went in, and when I went out, you won’t believe what happened! Someone stole my clothes. He left me with nothing. I had to wait until someone came to tovel, and plead with him to go to my house and get me something to wear. The fellow agreed, but I knew that when I come home, my wife will have what to say about being woken up so early because her schlimazel (no one can translate that one) of a husband had his clothes stolen.” His friend commiserated, and then said, “How do you feel now? Want me to make you a coffee?” “No replied the chossid. “ I feel great. Full of simchah. You want to know why?” 

“None of this happened. “

“I had no trouble finding my shoes, no one stole my clothes, and my wife thinks that I’m the best thing that happened since they began slicing bread. Isn’t that a reason to be happy? “His grin was real, and his friend left him to finish arranging the cookies while looking like he won the lottery.

Do you think about what’s right in your life? 

It’s hard to not just write off all of the good and put them in the soul-destroying file called “regular”. All of Hashem’s constant compassion, providence, and love get lost once you put them in the complacency file.
I went to a funeral last night. Rebbetzin Zehava Kass lost her father. Her brother spoke, as did Rabbi Kass and a grandchild. None of them spoke about the kind of deeds that make the front page of a newspaper, or a Feldheim biography. They spoke of a man of few words, but kind deeds, who had left his native Syria as a young man, and succeeded in building a family in a different culture, facing challenge after challenge with the rarest of all virtues, modesty.  I didn’t know him, and only came to the funeral in respect to the Kass’s, but I am not sorry to have been there to be part of a group of people giving honor to someone who may have easily been overlooked in other circumstances.

Like everything...
That matters
That we see and don’t see.

This reminds me of the beginning of this past week’s Haftorah. “Be comforted, be comforted my People, says your G-d”. In classical Hebrew the word for comfort is also sometimes used to mean regret. In context, it means that once you see the end of the story, you may come to regret the way you responded when the story was still happening.

You have all heard the kind of story where someone is headed to the airport, but is delayed because they had to help out someone who was lost, or spend longer than he had planned on the phone with a lonely person, or any one of the endless repertoire of “things that happen at the wrong time”. Our hero gets to the airport late, misses the plane. If you were in his shoes, what would you be thinking? “I can’t believe this is happening. I’m going to miss half of the meeting’, or, “the ticket isn’t even exchangeable. There goes $250” or “This will finally teach me a lesson. I have to learn to think more about my real needs and priorities”. Obviously I can’t know your thoughts, but I can easily imagine any of the above occupying space in my brain…Then you hear your phone and your friend (or spouse, or parent) is in tears telling you incoherently that the plane you were booked for crashed. At that moment, all of the regrets you had for coming late disintegrate. 

But what if the plane didn’t crash. And you still had to face the mental debris that fills your mind?
The second invocation of the words “be comforted” is mean to tell you that in the ultimate sense, you will one day see the underlying chessed of the interactions that are not presently  clear. It says that the world will be covered by knowledge of Hashem the way the sea-floor is covered with water. 
​
That means that you too will one day reach the level where it doesn’t matter if you found your shoes or not. The message of every moment being a gift, full of possibilities, will be part of your knowledge base.
In the meantime, 

ENJOY!
Love,
Tziporah

P.S. Please continue davening for Ester Yocheved bat Braizel Brachah Pollard . May we hear good news from the Pollards who have both suffered so much for being caring Jews…

Dear friends,

What a wonderful day today was! Tisha B’Av at the kotel was deeply moving. Thousands of people were standing in the plaza. Not doing anything specific; just about everyone did maariv as soon as possible in order to make Havdalah and drink something. After maariv, there were about 15 minutes of just being.
Am Yisrael, just being

Men and women, children, old people

Traditional Sefardim, American yeshiva boys, old Yeushalmis. Jewish tourists who had little idea of why so many people were there (Last year, the entire area was so empty, Ethel). They all felt very much part of something bigger than they are. 

And then it was over.

Getting on the bus was the same surreal experience of Last Chopper Out of Hanoi again and again. Even the driver was surprised by the instantaneous descent into real life. The general feeling was still one of being part of one basically big, happy, dysfunctional family. 

Today we began learning again. The Ten Commandments seemed so much more part of our reality, they have been with us since we became a people who have no basic identity outside of the Torah. The fourth commandment, Shabbos, is one in which the unique nature of our identity is most physically observable. It’s only Tuesday night, but Shabbos is on my mind. The Neve girls who are leaving want to get in their last Shabbos. My son and his family who live in Bnei Brak want to escape its brilliantly sunny days and torrid airless summer days. The center of Shabbos, as you all know, are the meals. It doesn’t matter who is coming (or where you are going). There is always the unseen guest, Hashem, who provides us with everything we see, taste, and experience. Before you can relate to your weekly Guest, you have gotten to know Him. The first commandment opens your heart. “I am Hashem, your G-d who took you out of Egypt. That means that He is aware of you (the way He was able to differentiate between the Jews and the Egyptians during the plagues). He is not “distracted” by the limitless expanse of the cosmos, or the innumerable microbes on the head of a pin.  You are central, and in ways that your mind will never fully grasp, so is everyone else. He creates nature minute by minute, and at the same time hides behind its mask. He made the rules that govern reality, and can break them if that’s what He finds best for us, His dear children. When you keep Shabbos, you are entering a space where you too aren’t distracted by life itself, and as you sit down to eat, hear the words, Vaishali, And He completed the heavens and the earth.

For you
For all of us
For the people pushing their way onto the bus
And the ones who aren’t
For their ancestors
And their unborn generations
The heroes
And the ones who wish they were
The sweet humble amcha
Who know Him even when they don’t know
That they know Him 
​
Love,
Tziporah 

​Dear friends,

Every so often when you write (and yes, like your elderly mother in law, the next step is for me to complain about the infrequency of your letters), you share your negative, painful, sometimes tragic moments and/or days. Not that I have anything against negativity. It’s the stuff that makes the world go round, keeps us real, and challenges your moral fiber and trust in Hashem. 

No. 

It’s the tone of impatience that often accompanies the narrative that worries me. It seems that on one hand you acknowledge that it’s no fun to live a life that’s like paint by number art that you outgrew. The problem is that the joy of achieving a meaningful life is only experienced when you get to the end of, what is often, a long trek on a dry hill. Yes, when you get to the top, you have no doubt that the climb was worth it, but it’s a really hard perspective to hold on to when you are barely half way up and feel like you can’t take another step. What you really need to know is why things take so long.

Welcome to the world of Tisha B’Av.  Maharal talks about the nature of time (all the way from Yerushalaim I can hear those of you who dread Heavy Stuff repressing a sigh). Time is the measured sequence of change. Hashem created the world in a way in which light and dark alternate regularly enough to get us to sit up and take notice. You use an entire vocabulary, seconds, minutes, hours, days etc. to make life more definable. The first narrative in the Torah uses that vocabulary by telling you that the world was created in 6 days, and Hashem sanctified and blessed Shabbos by making it a day of rest. Obviously, the world doesn’t regress on Shabbos (see! I trust you! You noticed!). The world continues but the flow of energy that led to More and More ceased, which allows the day to reveal not only what Hashem does, but something of who He is. 
​
There’s another narrative hidden within the same story. You may have noticed it, or you may have not focused on the wording enough to see it. There are 10 statements of creation, meaning 10 times where the Torah narrates that Hashem brought something about. “Let there be light” is the first directive, and “Let us make man in our image and our form” is the last. Nothing new was added after this statement. No new creatures or things. Humans are to reality what Shabbos is to time. You can relate to the Creator, not just the creation. We too can stop the flow of doing more and more things, and entwine doing with being.
The number 10 is an important number in Judaism. Besides the 10 statements of creation, we have 10 ways in which Avraham was challenged. He was the first person to be what I would call and experiential seeker of G-d. He brought Hashem into the real world. He didn’t just refrain from ruining the world, or retreat into meditation. He took Hashem with him when he invited guests, taught, and lived the way a human in Hashem’s image can live. Each test got him closer to the mountain top, but it was a hard hike. There are 10 commandments, each one of which tells you how to reach the top. 

And now the obvious.

Nine comes before ten. It is the number that symbolizes how hard your struggle is. How many times you felt you couldn’t go on? It’s what a woman feels in the last moments of labor before the child emerges showing her that all of the struggle led to something.

Tisha B’Av is literally the 9thof Av. While the names of the months that we use are of Babylonian origin, their Hebrew meanings are relevant. Av means father. The month of Av is the month in which a in a certain sense we give birth to ourselves through struggle. It was on the 9th day, that in the desert the spies that Moshe sent said that they just don’t want to go on. The Land can’t be conquered. We’ll all die in the desert. Years later the first Bais HaMikdash was destroyed because we were distracted, weary of the search, self-indulgent, and very stuck in the world of 9. The Jews of the time were distracted by the world enough to worship idols, distracted by their egos enough to shed blood, and distracted enough by their bodies to live promiscuously.

There were 10 constant miracles in the Bais HaMikdash (look in 5thperek of Pirkei Avos if you either don’t believe me, or want to see what they were). Having the Bais HaMikdash to continue its existence in their midst would have been the wrong message. It would tell them that All Is Well, which was the most destructive message that they could have heard. The second Bais HaMikdash was built even though we didn’t really heal. What we did have going for us was that when you look at the entire people, you could see wholeness. One person may have ego issues, but others didn’t. They didn’t live in tiny little worlds with a population of one. They lived with and for each other. The Bais HaMikdash was destroyed only when that too had faded, and we descended into the bottomless pit of in-fighting, senseless hatred, fragmentation that we still suffer from now.

Bad news, no?

Here’s the good news.

We are close to the top. We have the merits of all of the generations that preceded us. We are living in the worst time (just think of the assimilation rates) and the best of times, times in which even one step forward can get you to the top. You know yourselves well enough to figure out what step you have to take next. For some of you its finally letting go of the need to be the Winner and All Time Champion in your relationships. For others it’s letting go of gossip, and for others its re-establishing a meaningful relationship with Hashem, the source of all wholeness.

Have a meaningful and maybe even transformational Tisha B’Av. Keep going and remember Hashem gives you all the strength you need to get to the top.

Love,
Tziporah

Dear friends,
The fast is half over, and I can’t help thinking about the difference between my version of the diaspora experience, and the version that the people who came before me had.

What could it have been like to be forced out of Israel when as far as you know, expulsion means doom? It means disappearance. After all, isn’t that what your eyes tell has happened to every other nation that ended up divorced from its land?

 I can’t go there. I was born to a cosmopolitan society in which almost no one I know lives where their ancestors lived. When I ask girls in Neve, where is your family from, I get answers like, Eastern Europe, England, South Africa, Bukhara, Israel, Russia, Morocco, Syria, Persia, Mexico, and more (we are a rather international bunch at Neve!). Once n a very long time, “my family was in the States 7 generations”. My reality is just too far to find geographical exile to the horror it actually is. The fact is that none of our ancestors left their homes for adventure; they left because they had no real choices left.

I didn’t stand in their shoes. 

Growing up in the States never felt like exile. It’s the culture that feels like home, the language that I speak best, and the place that nurtured my Jewish self. My aliya was far more a matter of “going to” what turned out to be a far more intense and vivid version of being alive, than “escaping from” fear of death or the kind of poverty that no one in the 21stcentury can relate to. Every so often the holocaust sneaks in and breaks through my wall of indifference. I will share some of my more recent vicarious exile experiences.
​
My son lives on Chai Taib (for those of you who for whatever reason are coming out of a cave, that is in Har Nof). There is a small synagogue near his house. One of the regulars is a man in his nineties, with the strength of a man far younger. He appointed himself the shul’s caretaker. He straightens up, puts the siddurs and chumashes back on the shelves, and sees that the shul’s general appearance is inviting. Every so often the shul has a shalosh seudos, or a bris, and food is served. Once, after a meal, someone wrapped up the plastic table cloth and threw it in the trash can along with everything that was on it. The old man turned to my son, and said, “Look! There’s a lot of rolls in there. They’re still good. Take them home, you have kids”. To tell you the truth, my son had absolutely no desire to salvage the rolls, and told the man that Baruch Hashem, he has bread in the house. That wasn’t good enough. “You’re just too arrogant to use them. You don’t know what bread is worth”. And then, this man, who made a principle of never discussing the holocaust, opened up. “I ended up deported with three friends. Once a crust fell from of one of the guard’s sandwiches, and he just walked away.  All three fell over themselves trying to get a piece of the crust: I was too far”, There was nothing more to say. My son took the whole rolls out of the plastic wrap and brought them home. Did they eat them? I don’t know, but it opened his heart enough to want to, just to share something of the old man’s pain.

The other story is about one of the great lights of the pre-war world, Rebbe Avraham Elimelech of Karlin. He saw the clouds beginning to gather far before anyone could anticipate that they would inundate the world with the kind of horror it had never known. He travelled to Eretz Yisrael in the late 30’s to pray at the kivrei tzadikim and entreat Hashem to change the decree. The old Karlin chassidim still know how shaken they felt when they saw him daven with tears running down his cheeks. He made it clear that he would not remain in Israel, he would not abandon his people back in Karlin when they needed him the most. He sailed on what turned out to be the last boat heading out to Europe before the war broke out. He spent the next 2 years in the Pinsk-Karlin ghetto suffering hunger and the constant threat of death. In the last days of the ghetto’s existence the great majority of inhabitants had already been sent to Auschwitz, where many of them had already turned into ashes. The remaining Jews were ordered out, they were told to search their “homes” and give over anything of value. They were then gathered together, and told to strip off their clothing. It was clear that these were their final moments. The Rebbe, and his son said no. This was not the way the plan was supposed to go, from the perspective of the SS men. No one says no. They were the first ones to be shot. They would not let themselves be killed more than once; their bodies are vulnerable but they would not willing give up their human dignity.

When I heard the story the first time, I wondered whether they were right. Even a moment of life has infinite value, and the Talmud tells you to never give up hope even if the hangman’s noose is around your neck. It does however say (Maggid Mishneh one of the commentaries on the Rambam in perek 5 of Yesodei HaTorah) that a person who is known in his generation for piety, is permitted to give up his life for love of Hashem to avoid any transgression, not just the 3 cardinal sins.

You may be reasonably wondering why this story touched me so deeply. It’s because in our current exile, no one has to force you or me to lose our basic sense of dignity. It’s gone. We have absorbed the degradation of the society that we live in. The appalling rate of assimilation tells the whole story. Most of the unaffiliated Jews I know are beautiful people. They could understand the way the old man in the synagogue values bread, and would respond to him with understanding and sensitivity (as I am proud to say my son did). Most of them would not really understand the second story. They grew up in a society in which (as Rabbi Mannis Friedman says famously) No One Blushes Anymore. 

We are in deep galus, perhaps deeper than the physical oppression that was the norm just a few generations ago.

We are redeemable. Every last one of us. We have to pray, be personal examples, and hope for the times that Yechezkel prophesized as being ones in which even Jews who don’t know they are Jews, return.

Love,
Tziporah

​Dear friends,
Every season the Jewish calendar has its own soul. We adjust the calendar by making
sure that Pesach comes out in the spring, a time of renewal and growth, by having leap
years. The two hottest months of the Jewish year, Tammuz and Av, are months that
have historically spouted tragedy. The “season” of the chaos that defines exile and living
without answers begins with the 17th of Tammuz and reach its climax on the 9 th of Av. In
the classical Jewish calendar, there are 6 seasons (some of you may remember this
from Rashi in Parshat Noach. Just joking…). The season’s name is kayitz, which means
the end, the time that is as far from blossoming and growth as you can get.
Nonetheless, it’s a time in which you can learn how to come back to yourself. You have
all had times in your life when you felt that your back was to the wall, times in which
there was no place to escape the reality that surrounds you except turning to Hashem.
Feeling trapped and choked seems like the end. In many people’s life, it is the
beginning.

Last night I was in Kafir Charrith. What? You never heard of it? It’s a medium size Arab
village not far from Ariel and is the place where Yehoshua and Kalev ben Yefuneh are
buried. Periodically one of the groups that arrange trips to the less accessible tombs of
tzadikim organize trips to Kafir Charrith (with the security provided by the army). When
you go a few times, you end up on their list. When I received their call, something in me
said, “yes”. It isn’t a dream trip. You leave at about 9 pm and return at about 2am. It
involves about walking 20 minutes through the kfar, there is something about the three
weeks that made me recall Yehoshua and Kalev, and when I heard that there was a trip,
I said, “count me in”. Much to my surprise, there were hundreds of people on the buses.
What made me think of them now?

It was because their lives told me how to be when you are trapped. When they were
sent to spy out Eretz Yisrael immediately before the Jews were anticipating entering the
Land, along with 10 others. The others felt trapped by the horror that they anticipated
that the conquest and settling the land would bring upon them. They saw that the people
were strong, the cities fortified, and there was no chance of surviving battle after battle
against them. They were right excluding Hashem’s promises.
They should have known better - they had seen the sea split, and the miraculous
intervention that took place in their battle against the Amalekites. One of the women, in
the very Land that they were afraid to conquer saw the same things. She recognized that
life would never be the same. The waters split all over the world; the sun stood still for
everyone. Trying to “escape” into “normal” was not an option. She waited until the
moment was right, and when Yehoshua sent spies she helped them in every way
possible. When the time of conquest came, as was arranged she had a red string
hanging from her window, so that the Jews would recognize her house as belonging to
someone who was very much on the same page that they were. Eventually she
converted, married Yehoshua and ended up with 9 descendants who were prophets.
One of them was Yishayahu, who prophesized both the destruction and the beauty of
the ultimate redemption.

Visiting the tombs of the Tzadikim can be both inspiring and a source of connection to
visions of life that are bigger than you are. You are not them; you have your choices,
your potentials, your background. You still can be very much on the same path. Who
could be more different than Yehoshua and Rachav if you are looking at ethnic
background, life experience or any of the other factors that can be so definitive? What
made it possible was what I call “spiritual flexibility” which means seeking Hashem when
He is concealed, and seeking Him with just as much love when you instinctively think
you “don’t need Him”, because everything is going well. Your particular way of finding
Him is not like anyone else’s.
One of the great sources of nachas that I have, is that my daughter loves the kivrei
tzadikim as much as I do. We both pore over Rav Gamliel’s books on the topic (and by
doing so, also discover that some of them are not necessarily real - of course we choose
the ones that have solid basis for their authenticity.) I am including her add for those of
you in Israel, and for those of you abroad, it offers you the chance to experience some
good old envy.
For those of you who come, explanations of who these greats were are a part of the
trip…
Love,
Tziporah

A TIME FOR YIDISHKEIT
with

Rebbitzen Tziporah Heller
Day of Davening for Women
at the Kivrei Tzadikim in Eretz Yisrael
Monday 26th Tamuz / 29TH July 2019

550 nis

ITINERARY
Kever Rabbi Abdami De Man Haifa
Mearat Eliyahu
Kever Rabbi Yishmael Kohen Gadol
Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai
Rabbi Yehuda Bar Ilai
Rabbi Benayahu Ben Yehoyada
Choni Hameagel
Amuka (with time)
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DINNER at Bar Yochai!

Thanks for joining us on this exciting and inspiring Davening Day!
With a prayer that all our tefillos will be answered for the best and that we will be

zocheh to see the Geula Bimhera veyameinua.

Devorah
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