The number seven is so much part of the Great Plan. The entire creation came into existence in 6 days, but it didn’t come to an absolute standstill. Surprisingly the menuchah that Hashem created was active; Hashem allowed kedushah (transcendent holiness) to enter, so that later people like you and I have the ability to get out of a picture so that you can see the picture without distorting it by putting yourself in the center. The menuchah of the 7th day brought kedushah with it, so that you can see both the art and the Artist in ways that elude you during the 6 days when you are occupied with the business of living your life. 
Let’s look at the number six- the number that Hashem used in creating everything mundane. The number fits; every material object has 6 sides (the four sides plus up and down). However, something of the 7 touches 6. No matter how thin an object is, it also has an interior. This is where the number seven “lives” it is the pnimiyus, reality’s inner dimension. Today’s Haftorah is the 7th one of the “Shiva Dinechemta” the seven Haftorah’s of consolation. In many ways, its themes tell you the inner realities of Hashem’s evolving plan for the world, describing both the 6 (the external nature of redemption) and 7 (it’s inner meaning).

WHAT DOES IT SAY? 

“You will be happy, you will rejoice” you as a nation, and you as an individual are in for changes. Two words that mean happiness that used at the beginning (Soss and Tagel) were chosen carefully. The word “soss” means external and collective happiness, the kind that was felt on VE day, when news of a final victory in Europe hit the States. My mother told me how throngs of people spontaneously headed to the streets to celebrate together. The geulah is a time of far greater victory; the final defeat of evil will bring the people of the world together in ways that not only haven’t ever been equaled, but can’t even be imagined. “Tagel” is related to the word “gil” which (as Malbim explains) is used to describe inner joy. Only you know what finally being rid of all of your devils, your vulnerabilities, fears, and scars will feel like. It isn’t only the world that will be healed, you too will be healed. Malbim compares your personal geulah to a tailor-made garment that fits you uniquely. No one else can “wear” it or even fully understand it.

What if we aren’t ready?

Yishaya tells us that Hashem will never let you reach the point of no return, or allow Yerushalaim to disappear. He has” placed guardians at the gates”.  Who are these guardians? The meforshim take you in many directions. Perhaps, as Yalkut suggests, one may be Michael, the great angel who offers the souls of the Tzadikim before Hashem, drawing down their merits. Perhaps Gavriel who is empowered by Hashem to bring justice to our enemies is the other guardian. Perhaps, it is the merit of the Avos whose lives go beyond their lifetimes and are the ones who drew angelic intervention. Perhaps (Alsheich suggests) it is those who devote themselves to living like the Avos, in total devotion to Torah that brings them down to this world. Perhaps it is tefillah, maybe even your tefillah. The important thing, Yeshaya tells you, is don’t be silent; keep asking and longing.  And if there isn’t enough merit, the geulah will come anyway, and the day will arrive when the brilliance and clarity of what lies inside, under the surface will be recognized even by the non-Jewish world. 

The bills will be paid. Good and evil can’t coexist in uneasy harmony. Evil has to be destroyed and Yishaya tells you in no uncertain terms that everything that Edom represents will no longer have a place on the planet. They will be utterly defeated and destroyed. Hearing this isn’t just meant to leave you with a feeling of optimistic hope. It should awaken your ability to see that Hashem is with you in your suffering.
What does it mean?

One of the final psukim in today’s Haftarah is, “In all of your sorrow, He has (no) sorrow”. You didn’t see a typo. The word for “him” lo, is written with a vav. If written with an aleph, it means, “not”. Let’s look at how both meanings relate to you. Hashem when ‘lo’ is read as though it is written with a vav, the Shlah explains, it tells you that Hashem indeed is with you, and always has been. There are times when you make it hard for Him to maintain His deep connection because you can close the door against Him with such force that you end up drowning in a whirlpool of doubt/fear/innui/escapism. The more you try to get out the more the chaos  deafens you with its unceasing roar. It is when you feel you can’t try any longer, that you have taken yourself out of the center. .. At that point Hashem is with you, feels your pain, and waits for the moment when your eyes are open enough go to grab at a rope he tosses towards you. It can save you if you see it. Let’s say that you do. It seems too far for you to reach; you have exhausted yourself to the degree that you don’t know if you can make it. The next moment you are holding onto the rope, and can feel yourself being pulled to safety. This is the syatta di’Shmaya that can bring you back to being the seeker that you want to be, and know that you can be. Seeing you in pain and struggling is His pain, His sorrow.  This is Lo with a vav. 

Let us now understand the pasuk with ‘vov’ with an aleph.   Once you are safe, something changes. No more self-imposed chaos. You are clear about one thing; your place is dry land; stability, growth and dveikus. At that point the One who let you feel the pull of the water, and the awesome fear of death that you experienced is not sorry that this is what you went through. It was needed. It seed you life. ‘Lo tzar’, He has no sorrow for what happened. His “lo” is with an aleph . 

WHAT DOES IT SAY TO YOU?

Your personal geulah is a tailor-made garment. Hashem is with you in your struggles He is the hidden author of your book. This is true for us as a nation just as much as it is for individuals. Our national identity is our relationship with Hashem. Other nations “find themselves” through their interactions with the world through agriculture, technology, natural science in all of its forms, they live in the world of the 6. We don’t - we have a deep need to find the inner dimension, which is the part of us that is inherently connected to Hashem. There have been times when our sense of self as a nation has floundered.

​We struggle, come close to extinction but Hashem is always with us, saves us, and gives us the opportunity to rediscover the joy of return.
 
Love Tziporah

Dear friends,
I love Elul. The freshness, the hope, and most of all the sense of being able to negotiate the past and present are all so sweet.

The Ohr HaChaim lets you answer the doubts that tend to rise when you feel like you are treading water. You want to be more and do more, but sometimes you may feel defeated. 
Look at yourself hard enough to notice that there are three hurdles to deal with.  They are universal, and that tells you that you can deal with them, just as every other human can; we face the enemy, and find that he is us…and often times we win.

1-The yetzer hara (generally translated as the evil inclination) has to be understood. Everyone likes destruction. It’s empowering! It can be (ironically) so charged that you can confuse it with creativity. If you can get yourself back to your post toddler years you may remember how good it felt to knock down the leggo tower that you just built. It made you feel “in charge”, empowered, and strong. Here’s where things get complicated. You knew the good feeling of destruction even before you knew how good it is to give and to connect. The yetzer hara has been with you for years; he has a head start.

2-The problem of instant gratification can’t be overstated. Saying the wrong thing, but feeling the surge of “gotcha” happens in seconds. Impulsivity in every area of sensory pleasure is often the tool that the yetzer hara uses to get you to do what you would never do in a saner moment. 

3-Your sense of “normal” can change. The third time you make a bad choice and do something that you know very well is bad for you, t doesn’t overwhelm you with guilt the way it may have done the first time. 
After analyzing why things are so hard to change, Ohr HaChaim doesn’t leave you in the lurch. “It’s true”, he says, “If you and to fight this battle alone, with your strength as your only ally, you would recognize that you will lose. You just don’t have the strength to win this kind of war. However, the Torah tells you that even when actual soldiers went to war in earlier times, a specially appointed Kohein had to tell him, “Hashem’s is with you. His great strength will save you”

There are all sorts of ways in which you can do the equivalent of opening y our h and to receive Hashem’s help. Rav Meilech Biderman wrote,  Learn from a ship at sea.

It says in Yirmiyahu, “Who places a path in the sea”, Hashem makes it possible for you to navigate even when there are no signs to guide you. This the Arizal said, refers to Elul. Objectively there are no paths in the sea. There is no set route so you have to chart your own path. There are some basic rules you have to know, (such as how to use a compass), but for the most part he is on his own. 

Everyone has his own path, his own purpose in being here, and his own destination. Everyone has to discover their own path of tshuvah. You find your way based on examining your talents, your tests, and the role that Hashem gave you in life. Each one of these three things ultimately are gifts, presented to you so you can become the person you want to become. 
​
When you examine yourself honestly, it’s time to go on to the next step. You open your hand and to receive the help Hashem has ready to extend to you from the moment you were created.

Your path. Your destiny.
Your set of wings
That take you higher
Into a place that you
Never never never
Wanted to go
Until you were there.
Love, 
Tziporah    

Dear friends,
​
Can you really choose life? Isn’t being alive or not out of your hands?
The fact that the Torah tells you to choose life means that you can look and see that Hashem put before your life and death, blessing and curse, and then tells you:

Choose life!

The Torah would never tell you to do something that you can’t’ do no matter how you try. It’s the Torah of life! Not a collection of dry principles that are inapplicable to ordinary people and apply exclusively to the Very Righteous. 

What actually is involved in choosing life? Before going further, it’s important that you and I are on the same page when we talk about what the word life actually means. The dictionary begins its definition of life by offering two options. One is “The quality that distinguishes a vital and functional being from a dead body. The principle or force that is considered to underlie the distinctive quality of animate beings …The second it “the Sequence of physical and mental experiences that make up the existence of an individual.” On the surface of things neither definition lends itself to being available to you as a choice. The qualities that make you at least “not dead”, are not qualities that your efforts or money can acquire. You also can’t choose your experiences.   

That’s only when you decide to stay on the surface. There is more out there than surface experience. Where does the “principle or force” actually originate? Did it make itself?  Sfas Emmes would say that Hashem vivifies everything you will ever see or experience. There is what he calls “an internal point” of connection between any dimension of reality and Hashem Himself. It is He who generates innumerable forces to “make up the physical and mental experiences” that make up your existence. He is both the source of life, and the orchestra leader who composes its unending symphony. You can choose to uncover the concealed source of life as you live ordinary life, working, eating, interacting with others and making the daily choices that face you, or you can choose to live on the surface. One problem in choosing to live on the surface is that the physical world is death bound. Did you ever look around at all of your Stuff-you know the Stuff you buy, store, use, enjoy? Did you notice that it is headed towards oblivion? I don’t think in those terms very often, but every so often I let myself take it in. There is a choice I can make that changes the picture. If I choose to find the spark of eternity in all that Stuff, by letting it take me (and it!) to its root, then it never really dies.

My kids are good kids, Baruch Hashem (for sure it is His grace, not my somewhat shall we say, ‘A’ for effort parenting). Two of them decided (without being asked!) that it would be nice to offer my husband and I an escape from the covid generated isolation we have been in long enough to contract a bit of cabin fever. Sky, earth and variation becomes precious when you don’t have enough of it for a while.  Child number 1 decided that he could figure out a tiyul that have the magic word, OUTSIDE and at the same time bring us to places where we could maintain isolation. He took us on a trip to Maarat Hamachpeila late morning when there were no organized prayers going on, and from there to the tomb of Ruth and Yishai, and onwards to mountain spring in Bat Ayin, off again to a fenced off beach in Ashkelon and finally to the tomb of the prophet Samuel. Yes. All in one day. By the time we got home we were totaled, and didn’t want to go anywhere else for the next century or so. However, three days later we were once more Ready to Go, and another child did the organizing. This time we were off to Shiloh, the site of the ancient mishkan (sanctuary). We saw the place where it once was. I looked around me, and realized that the stones and the earth are still alive with the same force that was there when the Jews first laid eyes on its thousands of years ago. The same is true of all of the places we saw and all of the land that we tread upon, the spring at Bat Ayin and the waves hitting the sand on Ashkelon’s lonely shore. And here in Yerushalaim, and back where you are. In the States or anywhere on the globe. There is life force to discover. Always. You can reframe your life to learn to feel it.

 “There she goes. Who says I want to reframe my life?” Listen to the reframes, and take in that they may be what you need to choose life. There are seven in Orchot Tzadikim, but we will just  look at two of them this time around.’

1 - Realize that Hashem has compassion for every human being. He has more compassion for you, than you will ever have for yourself   Compassion isn’t’ pity - it’s closer to love than to patronizing solicitousness (how’s that for a big word no one ever uses? Isn’t playing scrabble worth-while?)  You may think at times, that you are the only one who knows your feelings and what your heart tells you. You aren’t. Hashem sees what you and I see, the surface of reality. He also sees far more than that. He sees your inner life more clearly than you do, knows your fears and pain without the defenses that you put up. You may at this point say, “Where I am today has nothing to do with Hashem. I killed so many relationships dead, I let my ego trap me so many times.  This may be true.

That doesn’t mean that Hashem won’t re-open doors that you closed. As long as you are physically alive (which you usual can tell…) the message is that Hashem believes that you have a reason to be here, that your inner capacity for living a genuine, meaningful, contributive, joyous life are all still in the picture.
2 - All of the benefit that you have ever reaped from any other human comes through them (for which they deserve acknowledgment validation and thanks) but from Hashem. No one can give you what they don’t have; whatever you received from your parents, mentors, friends, spouses are real. They made the choice to care. Nonetheless, all they can give is what they have, and everything they have comes from Hashem, whose love for you is ultimately the source of their love. Knowing this and living this is what choosing life is about. 

So much for now!
​
Well, stay alive till next time…
Love,
Tziporah  

Dear friends,

I begin this letter with mixed feelings. On one hand, I am not sure how much to share with you, and on the other hand, I like you far too much to keep much back. 

I received a wedding gift today, one that put any other gift we received in the shade.
It is a check for $9. It was sent from a man who began corresponding with me years ago. He reads Hamodia, and likes the Torah articles. He had a question and a comment on an article I wrote, and we have been corresponding since. He is a prisoner in a federal facility. 

In the course of the time he has been incarcerated he has developed himself spiritually in ways that we can all envy (or at least admire). Keeping kosher, studying Torah and most of all not being destroyed by an environment that tells you hundreds of times a day that you are unworthy in every possible way, is a great feat. Many people have been reduced to emotional and spiritual pulp in situations that are far less overwhelmingly negative. On one of my trips to the States, I travelled out to his “home” a medium security jail, together with another woman. Our aim was to meet him, and give him something small. In order to arrange our visit, we registered, arrived at the right time, and then sat through an indeterminant amount of time while all of the prisoners were counted before they could enter the large public room where visitations take place. The vast majority of visitors were women whose faces told me that they are mothers and wives. In the short time we spent with him, we got a feel for what it means to never have warm food, because if it koshers it’s cold. Never turning your back on your”friends”. There were some rays of light in the darkness. One was having visits from an unbelievable group of frum men who come out on a regular basis to learn with and to bring chizuk to someone who was once just a stranger to them. I didn’t notice any others. 

The $9 is more than he earns in a week doing the kind of work available in the lock-up. It means real sacrifice of small things that help make life bearable. 

I made a decision on the outset not to ask questions about his pre-prison life. It would be intrusive, and in a certain sense voyeuristic. In the note he sent with the check, he expressed regret that he couldn’t attend my wedding personally. “I won’t be here forever” he wrote. I hope the day will come when my husband and I can have him over for a Shabbos in our home.

Why was I reluctant to write this? I like to write about either the parshah, or what is going on in your lives or in mine. His story is not one that will resonate to you, at least not on the surface. You don’t live his life, nor do you know what getting up in his cell feels like. When I thought about it more, I changed my mind. It occurred to me that in some regards we are all imprisoned. Some of us have addictive behaviors, others are locked into families that are so hard to navigate that your love for them and your belief in yourself can barely coexist. Almost all of us are locked into self imposed traps where the person you want to be and the person you are barely on speaking terms. The good news, is that you can be like my acquaintance, Mr. G., who is free in the deepest sense of the word. His trick (from the outside) is that he has realistic aspirations and knows what steps he can take to make them actually happen.

The reason that I decided to write it anyway isn’t just because of the message of dignity and hope that came with the $9. It’s because it is actually related to one of this week’s Parshah’s most moving questions; What does Hashem want of you? You may have tied yourself down to one of the answers that work for most people . He wants you to do all the mitzvos. But not only that . You have to get your kids into the best schools. Make a great shidduch. See that the couple can get by in the beginning at least. You want to marry (or stay married), raise perfect kids (have you met one lately?), have a rewarding career (In every sense of the word rewarding). The proof that these are popular goals is that this is where the majority of people invest not only their time, but their hearts and souls. The Torah tells you that all that Hashem wants of you is to fear Him. 

Fearing Hashem isn’t the same thing as dreading punishment. That has nothing to do with Hashem; it’s about fear of suffering.  Your first step in learning fear of Hashem means taking in some of the wonder and enormity of His creativity and power. The next step is to envision yourself working in the perfect job, one that you have dreamed of forever. Your employer is brilliant, generous, and has told you that your work is more than good-it’s great. If you were given an assignment you would relate to it seriously. If you see the deadline approaching, you might begin to feel some anxiety. Is it because you think that the boss will slap you? Hit you? Hold a staff meeting in order to humiliate you? Of course not. Your anxiety is born fear of losing his respect, admiration, and possibly your position. Along the same lines, realize that Hashem has given you an assignment that only you can do. You don’t want to lose the bone that you are building as you do this assignment. 

The sages play on the word mah, which means “What”? They point out that it is very similar to the word “meah” which means a hundred. “What does Hashem want of you? “ they ask enigmatically, “To say 100 blessings a day”, which plays out by your seeing everything that you eat, see, touch or experience has being a gift from Hashem, for which you can/should bless Him.  This means that you are on assignment, your job is to find Hashem in the world regardless of your situation, and to become His servant. Mr. G. is on assignment. 

He is on assignment. He has no complaints to The Boss. He does his job as best he can. 
So are you
And I
On assignment with the knowledge
Of the dazzling
Brilliant 
Beloved
Place that your heart becomes as you go on one step
At a time.
​
Love,
Tziporah    

​Dear friends,
​
When you study Western history, you may notice after you passed your last exam that you were really studying the history of warfare. When you study Jewish history, you find something else. It is the history of moral triumph (and at times defeat), and the accompanying history of scholarship. One of the major exceptions is in this week’s Parshah. You have the Jews being told to wage war against the Midianites, and it is part of our sacred history-part of the Torah. The question is why?

It's not because we ever saw war as a test of nationhood. War is by nature brutal and often tragic. It is, however a test of what you are willing to fight for, and possibly to sacrifice for. Most of the wars you read about when you learn history were fought for expansion and a subtle but toxic something called national pride. (Think of the Napoleonic wars, the endless battles for a “place in the sun” that led to the colonial wars in Africa, the underlying issues in the war in Viet Nam and more). The wars the Jewish nation fought were by Hashem’s command to claim our land (after offering peace terms to the non-Jewish inhabitants allowing them to continue living in Israel as law abiding citizens who keep the Noachide laws). 

The war against Midian was different. It was not for survival (such as the war with the Amalekites who attacked us in the desert right after the sea split). It was not because we were under physical threat in Eretz Yisrael. It was because we were under threat for our very existence - an existence which is defined by who we are as Jews. 

They tried to destroy us morally by instructing their daughters to attract and later seduce young Jewish men. How did they do this? They set up a bazaar, and when a young man would come in to look at the goods, the middle-aged saleswoman would suddenly “need a break” and send in an attractive young woman to “substitute”. She had a script. Looking him straight in the eye, she would begin a dialogue that sounded something like this:
He “How much is the rug?”
She, “40 dinar. May I just ask you one thing before you go? I’ve always been fascinated by the Jews”
He: (with tolerant smile, always happy to help…) “sure”
She, taking out a box of tissues or whatever they used in the desert 4000 years ago. “WHY Do you hate us?”
He “I don’t hate you! Why do you think I hate you?”
She, “You won’t celebrate with us. You always find excuses to avoid being with us. There’s a major festival tonight. I know your type. You won’t be there. You think you’re above us”. This is said between little sobs and shaking shoulders.
He. “You have it all wrong. I’ll be there”

And he was, and he found himself in a world he always avoided, with women he would never see again. 
What did they believe? We don't know much about their systems any more.  Whatever it was, it robbed the ordinary Joe's and Janes of the idea of having a real relationship with the Creator. They thought that they were too small, to low, and that any belief in human morality or potential was an enemy from whom they had to escape. You find this today, when people who live with sins, that are described as ‘abominations’ in the Torah, cover it up with a platina of pride. 

The name of their idol was Baal Pe’or.  The Master of the Gap. The gap in question is the anal cavity. They would defecate before their god. What were the adherents of this bizarre mode of worship thinking? The Chassam Sofer explains that they were making a statement. “G-d in heaven doesn’t want (or can’t have) anything to do with us. We are base and gross. Unworthy and unable to relate to G-d’s transcendence and compassion. They were as the French philosopher Camus (who would have felt right at home with the Midianites) would say, “We are like whales stretched out on a beach” almost dead, but in the sun. Certainly, closer to an animal than to a person.  Do what you want. The animals do! Would sum up their theology.
A rabbi was on a plane, and his seat mate took note of the kosher food that he had ordered. The other man had also made a special request and his vegan food came shortly after the kosher tray was passed over his head. “I don’t eat other animals” he said, making note of the tepid chicken served on the overcooked rice on the rabbi’s tray. “Why not? The “other animals” eat each other animals”, the rabbi replied. “Most are not vegan”.… 

We are not animals. Our ancestors had to fight against those who would redefine them as such. It was a hard fight. It is a battle that some of us have to fight fairly often.

Outsmarting an enemy is the best way to do battle against him.  Get in touch with your nature, and use it to serve Hashem. You are not an animal who eats because the food is there, and it looks good. If you take the laws of kashrut seriously it gives you the means of being truly human, not another animal. You can learn to feel the good “Gaavah d’kedushah” pride in being holy.  Communicate with Hashem. He loves your words and even if the words of the siddur don’t flow from your heart, He loves the person who opened the siddur in an effort to speak to Him on His terms. Every mitzvah you do is eternal. Every time you learn something new, you are validating the entire purpose of the world’s creation.

You are important
Human
Possessed of a soul
That lasts forever.

Love,
Tziporah             

Dear friends,
Today begins the period on the calendar called the three weeks. It’s a time of diminished joy, a time in which you try to deal with the realities of our lives as individuals who are no longer part of a nation that has claimed an indigenous culture, land or language. You are part of the Great World, but not consistently really at home.

Those of you who live in the States are aware of the rise of a new brand of Black anti-Semitism. I saw a clip in which one of the leaders of the Black Lives Matter movement stood in a large public area near a Jewish neighborhood. Pointing at the homes, he asked his adoring audience, “. Who owns these homes?” and the answer was “The Jews” “How did they get them?” “White Privilege”. The fact that the Jewish refugees struggling to keep alive, keep their kids in school, and maybe belong to a synagogue were not a privileged bunch by anyone’s definition when they hit the shores of the US is not relevant when you are selling hatred. Just don’t bother him with facts. Also, if he tells you that as a Jew you don’t belong, you are just a leech trying to suck his blood, don’t ask him where you do belong.  The answer won’t be Israel. From his perspective, Israel deserves vindictive financial and physical consequences for being racists who are addicted to committing daily genocide against our Partners for Peace.

How would you like it to be if you had your “druthers”?

Do you dream of peace (which means acceptance and validation, not just non hostility)? I have really terrible news, and some marvelous news as well.

The bad news is that it’s not going to change until we change. The same way the galus was predicted, the redemption is predicted. The good news is that it will definitely change, and so will we. The kind of rave I saw is typical for galus; the 2000-year exile we are so accustomed to. In fact, it feels unpleasant, but normal. The good news is that it is the same Torah that told us that we can open our hearts, redefine ourselves as a G-dly people and affect the entire world. 

These 21 days are days of re-evaluation of who we are, much as the 21 days between Rosh Hashanah Hashanah Rabbah. You have to first figure out who you aren’t and who you don’t want to be before you can go onto becoming something more.

What don’t we want?

The bloodbath that spelled out the destruction of the Temple. The subsequent expulsions in countries where we lived lives in which we felt we were completely accepted until it became clear that we were never genuinely accepted. We don’t like being forced to move on from country to country until you can find Jews in every country on the planet. We don’t like learning hard lessons, such as the fact that as long as you define yourself as a citizen of the world rather than as yourself, the world will not accept you, nor has it ever done so for very long. 

There has never been world peace (without even considering the way Jews are dealt with) and there is a reason for this. Peace can only occur when there is recognition that each and every piece of the puzzle has a place to be. When you try to homogenize the nations you reap the raw hostility that erupts every year or so because no one wants to be destroyed or repressed or to be left with no identity. 
The function of the Jews as a people is to exemplify what the puzzle can look like through the example we set. In the Maharal’s vocabulary this kind of example is called “tzurah” or structure. The tzurah presented in the Torah is big enough for each nation to be itself (which is why in classical Judaism converting other people is not quite the thing to do; If a person was born a non-Jew, he has a piece of the puzzle that is real and important. Why trade it in for another one with a Jewish star on it? If he/she says, I never really belonged. I need the structure the Torah provides, then he or she is now an official member of the clan (after circumcision for men and immersion in the mikveh for both men and women). 
The Torah is the structure that Hashem gave us to know how to put the pieces together.  “structure”.

​You have 21 days to be less distracted and more focused on one thing.
Are the way things being now the way you want them to be?
Do you like hatred?
How’s about violence?
What about change?

During the 820 years the Bais HaMikdash existed, we had structure. Something of the Bais HaMikdash still remains. Get yourself to the the Kotel (okay, go to Aish and see the Kotel through their 24-hour camera). Let it speak to you. Let it inform you that you are part of something bigger than yourself, and that the structure you want to govern your life is the one that was created by the One who simultaneously re-creates the world over and over giving you chance after chance to bring meaning to your life and to enjoy His world. Just get the rules right.
 
Use the time well!
Love,
Tziporah

Dear friends,

Rosh Chodesh Tammuz is so different than other Roshei Chodashim.  I doubt that you know what Tammuz actually means. Of course it is possible that you have no particular desire to assimilate this particular bit of information, but then again, who am I to say?  I will tell you what it means at the end of the letter. That should keep you reading!

A hint, and some reflections on the nature of language.

The word Tammuz is actually not Hebrew. It is Aramaic, the language that was spoken in Babylon. We never really made a complete linguistic recovery from that period when we headed back to Israel (and the majority stayed put; after 70 years Babylon which had been conquered by Persia). It was a place where we found a niche, far from the horrors of the Roman occupation of Israel, and in a relatively tolerant environment. The language that we had learned to speak on foreign soil was our language. It didn’t take long for this to occur. It was only 70 years earlier that the exile had begun. 
Although Hebrew (or Lashon Kodesh, the Holy Tongue) was never forgotten, it also was never really alive again as the language that you woke up to in the morning and went to sleep with at night. It was the language of prayer, of holy books that were always part of our lives as a much beloved family member. There were always people who chose to speak Lashon Kodesh, but for the majority Aramaic was their native tongue. 

Maharal points out the reason this happened.  Lashon Kodesh no longer expressed us.
Although the language is holy, and the holiness of the Jewish People is real, the bond between what could have been the language that gives expression to this kind of holiness, and the lives we actually live is not always that steady. Lashon Kodesh is the language with which Hashem created the world, it is also unique in this that it has no word that isolates physical intimacy from its spiritual and emotional component. This is both its virtue and its liability.  If a language isn’t a “good fit” for you, you will find yourself adjusting the language to fit, or end up speaking another language. Modern Hebrew is the perfect example of this phenomena. Ben Yehuda, often referred to as the father of modern Hebrew, and he author of its most popular lexicon was a purist. He tried to find Heberw words that fit into contemporary experience. What happened was that even when he though of words that work, modern Israeli’s are comfortable using phrases like Veeken (week end), breksim (brakes) and totalreck. The words take you to the West, a place that many young secular Israeli’s feels at home in even more than in Yerushalaim.

One of the big questions that you may find yourself asking when you think about your Jewish identity, is why we have one.  It’s not land (at present the majority of Jews still don’t live in Israel), nor is it language (hmmmm. There must be a reason that I am writing this letter in English.  You speak it, and in honesty, for the most part, it is also the language of my self-talk. It isn’t culture. The culture of say a Jew living in LA is different enough from the culture of a Jew living in Addis Ababa force you recognize that history and culture aren’t the bond that made us a people. It also isn’t religion. In case you live in a cave and aren’t quite aware of what goes on outside cool doom, many Jews in both LA and Addis are not religious. We are still a single people, and the Jew in LA or Addis is no less Jewish than the one in Yerushalaim. No one knew the answer to what actually makes us a people than Bilaam and Balak, this week’s parsha’s anti-heroes.
What did they know, and why did they care, and what does any of this have to do with you?   

When Balak the king of Moav hired Bilaam to curse the Jews there was more going on there than a HR deal in which someone is hired for a job and collects a small fortune in compensation. Bilaam was a profound mystic, who had a deep grasp of the underlying unity of Hashem’s creative power. For him, this kind of knowledge was egocentric. I was more a search for ego fulfillment than it was a channel for devotion. Hashem opened doors for him that He had never opened for a non-Jew. 

Bilaam’s grasp of reality was so great that he could use his tongue the way an archer uses arrows. He could verbally make accusations that were not unfounded, and demand that justice be done. He was threatened by us. Our existence forced him into a secondary role in the world’s stage. Jew’s   Each of the blessings he was forced to give (as you can see in the Parshah, parshat Balak which is in BaMidbar) was an alternative glance at a piece of reality that could be easy seen as negative but true.

What’s Wrong With Us?

The first Bilaam did was to focus on only one part of the Jewish Nation’s encampment. He didn’t want to see the whole. The picture of Klal Yisrael, the Jews as a united group is so awesomely great that there is no weak spot to attack. Wherever you look for the rise of moral values, sensitivity towards others, add acts of kindness, we are there. When you look for seeing Hashem’s unity so that you recognize that each person comes from one original source, as does every microbe and every galaxy, you will find Jewish people there ceaselessly looking for meaning (sometimes more successfully sometimes less so).  When you look at us as we sometimes are; hopelessly fragmented, embattled against ourselves, unable to find the magic ingredient that unites us, you see us as Bilam did.

He began his blessing by saying, “Who can count Yaakov’s earth”. We do mitzvos without abandoning the physical world. The comparison with the earth also has a deeper side. Maharal’s Earth is the “mother” of everything that grows. So are we. Every meaningful spiritual road starts at Sinai. It is the source of all of the great world religions. They base their principles and teachings on the revelation that Hashem gave to us, giving us the empowerment that we have to touch every seeker. If you were to ask everyone who lives in Yerushalaim, for instance, “Is your life touched by the Jews and the Torah”? The answer would be be that if they are Muslim, Christian or Jewish the answer is yes. Spiritual ambition is engraved on the soul of even the least observant Jew.

The earth also consumes. It reduces even the strongest metals to rust and nothingness. We have faced the greatest civilizations, watch their decline, and outlive the challenges that they presented.
What’s right with us, and what does this have to do with today’s reality?

One of the problems that we face, is that we don’t  know ourselves well enough. We have lost our language as a result of assimilating the way the people who surround us express their version of the search for meaning.  You may not know yourself well enough to find the moral stamina to face the current reality of watching the disintegration of society. We have been down this road before.
It’s time to see yourself through Bilam’s eyes. Recognize that you have the potential to live a life that nurtures and that at the same time confronts everything that is false in the world surrounding you.

WHAT DOES TAMMUZ MEAN?
AHA! I didn’t lie!

Tammuz is the name of the ancient Babylonian sun god. It tells you that you have lived in this kind of distorted culture and survived. You come from people who lived with every sort of depravity and stayed “awake” enough to have Torah flourish the way it does today in Jewish enclaves that are surrounded by today’s version of depravity. The words of Kaddish, probably one of the prayers that have survived exile the best, are in Aramaic!

I don’t know what kind of challenges you face. Ironically, from the parshah, I do know one solution.
Be yourself
Your deepest holiest
Self.
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Love, 
Tziporah Gottlieb (yes I know that you know who I am, but I love my new name) 

Dear friends,

It feels so good to look at mistakes that other people made, take a deep breath, and say, 
“What an idiot”. Be honest. Could you see yourself standing in Korach’s shoes? He lived through the plagues, the splitting of the sea, receiving the Torah. He ate mann every day. Did he really think that Moshe, the man who Hashem selected to bring these earthshattering events into being was a bad choice? Wouldn’t taking over Moshe’s role be that be like me taking over the control tower in a huge airport? If you were there at the time that Moshe announced that Hashem had told him to install Elitzafon (yes, I know you never heard of him) as the leader of the Levites, would you call for new elections?
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Korach was far from a fool. He was blessed with intellectual capacity far greater than anyone you are likely to have encountered. He was fabulously wealthy. He had presence.
His flaw was that he believed in democracy.
Huh?
He argued that no one is inherently “better”. Everyone deserves an equal chance at being whatever they choose to be. It’s a convincing argument. After all, in some ways we are all the same. We all fear loss rejection, pain, failure, poverty and death. We all want acceptance, comfort, success, financial security, and life?  Doesn’t that mean that we are all basically the same?
Not really. From the perspective of the Torah the truth about your identity is far more complex. While you and I have many areas of life that are almost indistinguishable, there are many areas that are non-negotiably different. One is the genetic heritage you carry with you that was determined by Hashem before you were born. This includes specific intellectual and emotional tendencies (some of which have observable genetic markers!). Another individuating factor is the family that Hashem selected for you; your position in the family; the factors that made your mother into the person she was when she saw you the first time; their health, their financial success or lack of financial stability and endless other factors that you didn’t choose. Each of them is part of the environment that was the backdrop for your choices. You also live in your times which are very different than my times. I never faced the horrors of overt anti-Semitism-my older relatives can’t imagine life without its tedious repetitive mind-numbing background music of cliché-ridden hate. You may have grown up in an environment where anti-Semitism is somewhat fashionable. You have your body, your life experiences, the neural channels your choices have engraved on your mind. There never was or will be someone who is your clone. The Talmud put it this way; “How great is the King who mints countless coins, and each one is different”. None of this means that the similarities between you and every human are illusory. They are just as real as the differences, and demand just as much acceptance, direction, and care.

Korach didn’t accept that the differences are real, and that they are purposeful. He wanted leadership. Hashem gave it to Elitzafon.

What are you supposed to think when you feel like a size 9 foot being forced into a size 6 shoe? Why should you be denied a role that feels right, and by your definition of fair, you should have it!
Korach’s father. Yitzhar was the second of Kehat’s sons. Kehat was the most distinguished of Levi’s sons. His first son, Amram, was Moshe, Miriam and Aaron’s father. Amram had two more brothers, Chevron and Uziel. Korach’s expectation was that since Moshe had “taken” the glory for his own nuclear family, (Amram’s children) when the leadership of the tribe of Levi was up for grabs, the fact that his father Yitzhar was the next brother made his choice the most likely one. But it wasn’t’.  Moshe skipped over Yitzhar, and Chevron, and chose Elitzafon, Uziel’s son for the leadership. The way Korach saw this was that Moshe doesn’t want to share power. That’s a good reason for choosing a young leader who was not groomed for the job. Korach maintained that Moshe didn’t want Korach’s great mind, immense wealth and charismatic personality too close to the power base.

Was he wrong?  

Of course, he was wrong. The reason isn’t that nepotism is a great value and must be maintained at all costs. The reason is that only Hashem who authors each individual’s abilities and environment knows the plan he has for each person. Fulfillment comes from living the life that offers you the maximum potential to be yourself. The problem that Korach had, is that he didn’t really know the self he could be. He only knew the self that he was at the time that he decided that he had had enough. Had he waited, there would have been a place for him; a position called Levi Gadol, the High Levite, a position much like that of the Kohein Gadol High priest) would have emerged. Hashem had a pair of size 9 shoes waiting for the day that Korach could step into them.

You can choose to be Korach, or you could choose to be Moshe. 

Interestingly, Korach, who was fighting for the fulfillment of his own ambition destroyed himself and everything that he touched. Moshe was very much his opposite. To him, the only question worth thinking about when he was faced with choices, was what does Hashem want NOW.

Korach was convinced that he was acting “leshem Shamayim” for the sake of heaven. He wanted spiritual self-expression on the highest level, and encouraged others to do the same. The result was disaster.
The earth swallowed up Korach and his followers. Th reason is that fomenting this brand of discontent is a crime against the earth itself. The earth was given to us humans to turn it into a place of profound spiritual beauty. The way this happens is by negation of ego, and focusing on what Hashem gives us. Moshe was the humblest of men. He could know what Hashem wants of him through seeing reality through a clear lense, devoid of ego or any prism of self. He was a living GPS heading towards where we were meant to be.
In Pirkei avot we are asked to refrain from disagreement. Sometimes a disagreement that has a core of being leshem Shamayim is ‘captured’ by ego, desire and the rest of the choir.  Disagreement where there is no emotional agenda is an entirely different matter. It is called ‘search for truth” and is the key to all serious learning.

Where does your search for truth lead? You are all different and simultaneously you are all similar. If you are sincere, you won’t all get the same answers., but you will look to the Torah for your truth. The vast majority of fragmentation within the Jewish people comes not from hearing different answers, but from looking for answers in the wrong places. 

Recently, we have been living in a world in which humans are no longer in control and have been forced into seeing this with overwhelming clarity. Maybe we can learn not only to ask the right questions, but to look in the right places, and surprise ourselves when Moshiach arrives – may it be soon! 

Love,
Tziporah

Dear friends,

One of the most annoying things about Covid19 is that it just hasn’t taken its leave of us as yet. Did you realize that months, not weeks, would pass, without life returning to normal?  Just two weeks ago, when my husband and I went out (YES OUT!! WHAT A DELIGHT!) to Machaneh Yehudah Market (which was permitted according to the instructions given by the Ministry of Health), we were duly masked and gloved. When we entered the shuk on Thursday one of the locals looked at the half empty lanes of the marketplace that usually can be navigated only by native Israel’s and folks from Brooklyn. It had taken on an almost Mid-Western patina of civility. He looked at us  and said, “That’s it, Corona is finished”.  Within a few days, it was permitted to go to shul (with restrictions), to send you kids to school, and to eat out if that’s your thing. 

Then we heard that numbers of people infected are rising. Whether it’s because you really need more isolation to get rid of it once and for all, or whether there are other factors involved with we are not yet familiar, one question still needs to be answered; where is the demarcation line separating your trust in the One who created you (and every microbe that will ever exist), and your responsibility in taking care of yourself, not just in this situation but in all situations. 

Is taking an attitude of “what will be will be for the best” the right way to go, or should you perhaps not be so dismissive of the voice that demands your taking the steering wheel into your own hands?
 
POSSIBLITY ONE: LET GO
YOU ARE NOT IN CHARGE.

Ramban maintains that in the case of one of Avraham’s tests, his failure (Ramban’s words, not mine) to let go and surrender to Hashem affects us still today. The imprint on the future that most of us would see as negative is indelible.

Just stand in Avraham’s shoes for a moment. Avraham and Sarah left Ur Kasim (which is in today’s Iraq) after he had faced being burned to death and rescued from that fate miraculously.  They then headed out to Haran, where he and Sara succeeded beyond anything they could have dreamed of. Thousands of people came under their influence, and began to believe in one God. At that point, almost inexplicably, Hashem told him to leave everything behind; He also told him that the result of making the choice would be children, money, fame, and the key to giving blessings to others. He left with Sara, Lot, and their followers, and when they arrived in Israel, not only didn’t they experience the blessings that they had every reason to anticipate, they actually found themselves starving. They ultimately only had two choices; go or stay. 

Avraham chose to leave. Ramban tells you that this was a terrible mistake. He should have trusted that Hashem can cover His checks… This is important for us, because the patriarchs and matriarchs related to their future generations the way a foundation relates to a building. A flaw in the foundation that is barely visible at floor level, can result in the Leaning Tower of Pisa! You can only give what you have, and Avraham and Sara didn’t have the absolute faith in Hashem that could have changed things for their descendants. “The deeds of the patriarchs are a sign for their children” Ramban famously quotes. They left Egypt in the face of a famine, and so did their children two generations later when Yaakov and his family had to leave Israel because they were starving. Avraham and Sara found themselves under the Egyptian oppression when Sara was taken by force, and their descendants experience oppression of slavery in the same country, but much much more severely. Had he had the faith to remain in Israel, Ramban concludes, none of this would be necessary. 

That means, in plain language, that Avraham should have stayed in Eretz Yisrael and trusted that the One who told him to go there, would save him from the famine.

POSSIBLITY TWO: BE RESPONSIBLE
YOU MAY NOT TAKE THE GIFT OF HAVING CHOICES LIGHTLY

The Torah tells you to guard your life, “Very much”. Don’t endanger yourself or take your life lightly. It is a precious and irreplaceable gift. Shmuel, the second greatest prophet of all times, was told by Hashem to anoint David (later to be King David) as king. There was only one problem. The reigning king, Shaul, had no intent of surrendering his crown, and was doing everything human (and some would argue inhumanely) possible to prevent David from usurping the throne. As far as he was concerned, Israel already had a king, namely himself, (Shaul) and the job of reigning monarch was not one with openings. Shmuel didn’t do what would have been most simple. He didn’t just go and hope for the best. He told Hashem. “What will be? If Shaul finds out he’ll kill me’ The response was for him to take a wagon and tell whatever troops he comes into contact with that he is headed towards David’s fathers’ home and was coming to offer sacrifices. He was not rebuked by Hashem, for not having sufficient trust in Him to just tell the truth and risk Shaul’s uncontrollable anger., nor is there any talk of this having brought about anything dire in future generations. He was acting responsibly; he said whatever he had to say to avoid endangering himself. He was pro-active.
It seems that the two stories are two opposing ways of seeing the unrelenting war between the voice that tells you that the way you want to go is in trusting  completely and sincerely, and the answering voice says that you are obligated to be responsible enough to treat your life as the precious gift that is.

THE BOTTOM LINE
The spies that Moshe sent, were our example of making the wrong kind of choice. They were not just doing what they had to do in order to figure the best way to move forward. That would have been good. Instead they editorialized the entire 40 days of their journey to death. It stopped being a practical approach to entering Israel, and became an anxiety ridden journey away from Hashem.  If they had just been less reluctant to trust Hashem’s explicit promise to be on their side, things would have been very very different.     

NOW FOR YOU
Your soul was sent down to this world for the sake of doing a mission. If you are doing whatever you have to do (find a shidduch, earn a living, deal with difficult people etc), with integrity, and then ONCE YOU HAVE DONE YOUR PART step quietly back. Move away from obsessive flashbacks to trust.
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HAVE only simchah, faith, and nachas.

Love,
Tziporah

Dear friends,

Shavuos has passed, and we will be having quite a dry spell before there are any new times of renewal. Does that mean that you are doomed to a several month spell of FOMO?

Sort of…

The best time of all is real life. That's where you give birth to yourself, and let the true you emerge. One of the ways in which your choices happen is by stepping back and figuring out what your priorities really are. There is a bit of Gemarah that says, “Rabba bar Machsya says that Rav Chamma bar Guria says that any city that has the roofs higher than the roofs of the synagogues will eventually be destroyed as it says, “To trample Hashem’s house and to establish its destroyed places”

The reason that I gave you an exact quote is that there are quite a few things that you can see in it that may change your focus. One is that everything here is attributed. I don’t much about Rav Machsya and even less about Rav Chamma, but there is one thing that I do know; Rav Machsya was an amorah, a teacher in the Talmudic era, someone who was close to the Oral Law in ways that I will never know. He had the opportunity to meet with and observe people who were one step closer to Sinai, and who had direct linkage with those before them. It doesn’t just take you back to Moshe, it takes you all the way back to the One who gave the Torah, who is the same One who created the world. 

When  you look around you or (for those of you who like this sort of thing) when you learn about the incredible intricacy of literally everything physical, you see the Hand of a giver, the One who wants you to live and interpret His world in ways that give you meaning, you know this because he chose to make you a human being.

Humans are the top of the pyramid, but we are simultaneously the only ones who could choose not to find their place. Everything in the world is still connected to its source just as much as it was on the day it was created. You are no exception. Your body, soul and evolving history are connected to Hashem. Every choice can get you closer to the One who creates life every second, or distance you. The scholars of the Talmud chose to learn, to explore, and to ultimately share what a human can know of the pattern that governs every choice you can possibly make.  

Here they talk about living in a city; a topic which is not an easy one just now.

I am aware, that as I write this, the incredibly painful destruction takes place every night in many of Americas metropolises. Wanton, heartless destruction, surrounds you if you go out to see the scene. It didn’t come out of nowhere - there is history that has to be confronted. From the perspective of the Talmud, one thing must be said.

The fact that there is rage doesn’t mean that its offshoot is justice. There is nothing remotely resembling justice in looting a Gucci bag or a large-TV screen.

The voice of anger is always the same. This can be true of genuinely justified anger (Imagine the anger a parent would feel if their child was murdered), or trivial anger (the kind that you feel when you find yourself asking, “how dare he park where I wanted to park”). The voice says, “This isn’t how it should be; it should be the way I want it to be”. The underlying assumption is, of course, that the way you want “it” to be must be right.

How can you know?

The Talmud says that the beginning of the destruction of a city is when the roofs of the local buildings are higher than the roofs of the synagogues. Maharal explains this by saying that spiritual reality is inherently more exalted than material reality. That would mean that values that are eternal (and you can only know what they are from the Torah) have to be seen as transcending material reality. What happens when this is reversed? When questions of what morality really means are not asked? You have a situation evolve in which the purpose of life, its Source and its meaning are forgotten. What is remembered is how good material pleasure feels, how loud the desire for status talks, and how marvelous it feels to experience a little righteous indignation. This mixture is what you see every night. To use Maharal’s words; “lowliness is a part of the physical world (it was created to follow, not to lead);  exaltation belongs to the non-physical world. When you reverse this, the inherent plan Hashem had for the world and order for the world that the Torah reveals, is destroyed”.

What does this mean in plain language? It means that the indignation about a murder (which, needless to say is part of the Torah’s system, and reflective of valuing the true worth of human life) is just. Looting, violence towards the law officers (whose lives are not less valuable than that of Floyd), are not part of this system. It is part of another system, one in which whoever is most vicious wins. It’s a perversion of what being human is all about.

What does this have to do with you?

Do you always put the right things first? I try to, but I don’t always succeed. The immediacy and the here and now nature of living in a way in which grabbing for what you want gives you instant pleasure is sometimes overwhelming. It can be the pleasure of saying what shouldn’t be said because it feels so good, or doing something that shouldn’t be done for the same reason. 

Here’s the good news. Once you know who you don’t want to be, you are much closer to being who you do want to be. We have all summer to practice!
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Love,
Tziporah Gottlieb (can’ya believe it? I am still floating