A Soulful Journey

t seems fashionable these days to bring something new to the Passover Seder table and Seder plate. Well, I would like to weigh in on this with the suggestion for the  newest addition to the Seder plate, the Bay Leaf.” This would be a non-edible spice that would represent  freedom from ridicule ,  especially rabbinic ridicule. Let me explain, this was a story told to me by a friend who has been a very active participant in his synagogue (these days that seems so very hard to find). He attends the weekday minyanim and has been a volunteer cook for all the events throughout the year with those occasions being breakfasts for the  Sunday  and  Friday  minyanim, for Tu B’shevat Sedarim, monthly Shabbat dinners and the annual Chanukah gathering. This past December as this gentleman was preparing for the Chanukah event, he brought in from his home a food processor, which he kept at home, using only for synagogue events, respecting the kashrut of the synag...

Reb Levi Yitzchak of Bereditchiv was walking with one of his Chassidim and they saw another of his followers greasing the axle on his wagon when he suddenly stopped to daven Mincha.    The Chassid said to Reb Levi, “Look at his despicable behavior … while he davens Mincha he fixes his axle.”    Reb Levi said, “No, no … look at what a beautiful Chassid he is.    While fixing his axle he davens Mincha.”    Reb Levi was able to see the best in everyone.   -Rabbi Mitchell Wohlberg Look for the best and you will find it.

As a young man he would stay up late into the night studying.   His father suspected him of wasting time playing and wandering through the streets.   He would punish him for being idle.   Israel suffered the blows in silence. Later, when he was famous, he was asked why he did not protest his innocence to his father, “It is not given to everyone to suffer for the sake of Torah,” he explained.   – Maggid of Mezritch This story of the Baal Shem Tov points t a powerful moral: How dedicated are we to Torah?  If we suffered for it would we remain true?

"A Jew who does not believe in miracles is not a realist"                         --David Ben-Gurion

Rabbi Nachman Teaches us as follows: "Good thoughts come from the Good inclination, negative thoughts come from the evil inclination"   Dough will become 'Chametz' when you don't touch it for 18 minutes. Within this period of time, you can bake Matza out of it. If 18 minutes pass, it is considered as Chametz and you can't bake Matza out of it.   Same thing with our thoughts.   A negative thought should never stay too long in our heads. Push it out, kick it out, replace it with any kind of other good thought. Rebbe Nachman teaches us that we can only have one thought in our heads at a time. A bad thought comes quickly replace it with a different thought, a beautiful nature scene, the gravesite of a Tzaddik or the face of a loved one or Tzaddik.   Don't let it ''chametz'' your brain, and it doesn't have to take more than a millisecond to reject it.   If you'd feel a little drop of cyanide on your tongue, how fast would you try to ge...

"What is profane has no share in the side of holiness but belongs entirely to the other side, to that of impurity.  Thereon is based the separation which we have to make between the holy and the profane.  Yet, for all that and despite their separateness, the holy contains a particle of the left side."  -Chaim Potok, The Book of Lights Everything is connected.  What we must never forget is how to tell the difference between good and evil.

The Kelmer Maggid, Rabbi Moshe Isaac, spent a weekend at a summer resort near Riga.   On Shabbat he noticed that there were numerous Jews in the synagogue without a Tallit because they were too lazy to bring them to the synagogue. “My friends, I will tell you a story,” began the Maggid.  “Recently, while I was spending a Shabbat in Riga I visited a wealthy merchant and was informed that he was not in.   ‘Where is he?’ I asked.   ‘He left on a pleasure trip,’ was the reply.   Suddenly I heard sobbing from a nearby chamber.   When I entered the room there was no one in sight.   Then I saw a tallit bag on the wall.   I realized that the tallit was crying.   “Tallit, dear tallit, why do you weep?’   I asked.   ‘Why shouldn’t I cry?’ the tallit replied.   ‘My master left and took all his gold and silver but left me behind all alone.’   So I spoke consolingly.   ‘Dry your tears, little tallit.   The...

“Jacob and Sarah Birnbaum are proud to announce the birth of their son, Dr. David Birnbaum.” ⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐⍐ Maybe one day we will see a birth announcement that reads: "Jacob and Sarah Birnbaum announce the birth of their child whom they pray will grow to be righteous."

In 1951 novelist Patrick White was carrying bowls of slop to feed his schnauzer pups in the Blue Mountains, west of Sydney, Australia.   David Marr, his biographer, wrote, “Somewhere between the jacaranda and the old piggery he slipped in the mud.   Swearing and laughing he dragged himself to his feet.   “I stood in the rain, the water up to my ankles, and pouring off me, as I proceeded to curse God.”   But how could be curse what did not exist?   As he puzzled at this, he had an inkling of the presence of God.   “Faith began to come to me.”   -NY Times March 1992 Wisdom, real wisdom, is being able to learn something are predisposed not to be believe.