A Soulful Journey

A tailor was having a terrible time making a living.  He went to his rabbi asking his advice.  After thoughtful consideration the rabbi said, “You need a partner.” "But I have had partners before and they have never worked out.” "Not that type of partner,” responded the rabbi. And so next year the tailor opened a new shop called HaShem and Shapiro. Business flourished.   Soon Shapiro decided to move the store from the Lower East Side to uptown. Along with the move, he changed the name to be more upscale as well, Lord and Taylor.    

 A grasshopper walks into a bar.  The bartender looks at him and says, "Hey, they named a drink after you!" "Really?" replies the grasshopper.  "There's a drink named Stan?" Clarity is always important.  Be precise.  Mean what you say.  Say what you mean.

"When Lenin's party was a fairly small splinter group in Russian socialism he named it the Bolshevik party, which in Russian means the majority power.  The opposition obligingly, and with awesome stupidity, accepted the designation of Mensheviks, the minority party.  In a decade and a half they were."  - Carl Sagan Be careful how/what you label, call, yourself as well as others.  You become what you say you are (as well as those others whom you label).

The Cunard Liner Queen Mary was originally to have been named Queen Victoria.  A Cunard official was dispatched to Buckingham Palace to inform King George V of the choice, and he nervously began to explain the matter to the king by saying that the company decided to name the imposing new vessel after the "the greatest of all the English Queens." The delighted king exclaimed, "Oh, my wife will be so pleased!"  The poor Cunard man did not have the courage to point out the king's mistake, so the ship was renamed. It is hard, when we are concerned about hurting the other fellow's feelings, to say what are meant to say.  Yet, softening the truth can sometimes lead to misleading statements.   We should always strive to be kind but never misleading.

  "As is his name, so is he."  -I Samuel 25:25 We live up, or down, to our names.  Choose well.

"If you are planting a tree, and someone comes and says, 'The Mashiach is coming!'— then plant!" No matter what reasonable people or foaming enthusiastic youths tell you: this messiah or that messiah is imminent— plant! The Mashiach is in no rush. When you have patted down the last clods of dirt, and watered your maple, your sycamore, your elm, he will still be wherever he is supposed to be, and more than happy to admire the sapling with you. Messiahs don't come to uproot things. If he wanted to, he could bundle Eretz Yisrael into a package and bring it to you, so you would not have to go wandering again through many lands. If he really is the Mashiach, this One everyone pesters you about, he can bring you Abraham, who will sit by your tree and dispense dates and the flat bread of hospitality, as in ancient days. So plant it now, firmly, water it well, whether or not there is a Messiah today or tomorrow.    - Avot deRabbi Natan B, Chapter 31, Danny Siegel

 Rava stated, "A bad spouse is like continual rain.  They both drip."  - yevamot 63b The Talmud, ever pithy and often humorous, skillfully declares appropriate behavior in any relationship.  Conversation should be up front, transparent and honest.

  "The way God punishes someone is to take away their faith."  -Baal Shem Tov

  Two Jews decided, for social reasons, to become converted to Christianity, and as they were important men in their town the ceremony was to be performed the bishop himself.  They waited at the Cathedral on the appointed afternoon, and the time passed but the bishop did not arrive. At last one of them grew impatient,  'Do you know,' he said, 'if this goy does't arrive soon, we shall late for mincha .' -Friday Nite Book Underlying the old joke is a truth: we never give up on one another.  Thee is always hope for change.

 It was the last day of my trip to Israel.  Prior to  final dinner with my brother in the drive to Ben Gurion airport we stopped at the Kotel. Prayer at the western wall is always significant, but it takes on added emotional meaning when it also serves as a goodbye to our beloved land. We found a minyan and prayed the Mincha service. Then we lingered for a few more minutes to recite to Tehillim (psalms).  I could not help but notice. the man on my left who approached the Wall.  He led a little boy of about four by the hand.  "Stand here," he told the child, pointing to the large stones of the Kotel.  "it is customary to recite prayers here at this wall, prayers to God. The boy looked up at his father, and the man continued: "Say a prayer yourself, my son, we believe that God listens especially well to all prayers recited at this Wall. The last time mommy and I came to Israel, five years ago, we also came to the Wall and prayed."  His voice trailed...

"Midrash is a hammer - it is a hammer that awakens into shining light the sparks slumbering within the rock of the text.  Midrash strikes the fire that hides inside the iron."  - Michael S. Katz Inhering in all things, especially Torah, lies invaluable treasures.  Our task to reveal them.

“That is the problem of Dante’s Divine Comedy too.  The crisis comes in the “middle of the way of our life,” when the body is beginning to fade, and another whole constellation of themes comes breaking into your dream world.  Dante says that, in the middle year of his life, he was lost in a dangerous wood.  And he was threatened there by three animals, symbolizing pride, desire and fear.  Then Virgil, the personification of poetic insight, appeared and conducted him through the labyrinth of hell, which is the place of those fixed to their desires and fears, who can’t pass through to eternity.” – Joseph Campbell If you hold onto the past you cannot access the  possibilities  of the future.   Be open. That is the  gateway  to heaven while the  other  is the  pathway  to hell.

Rav  Beroka, a Talmudic sage, was surveying the scene in a marketplace together with the prophet  Elijah . He asked the prophet, “Who in this marketplace is deserving of  olam haba ?” Elijah pointed out two individuals who seemed quite ordinary to Rav Beroka. Curious to hear what they did to earn this remarkable reward, he questioned them. “We are comedians,” they told him. They  entertained people with their jokes and juggling; they would cheer up people who had quarreled. - Taanit 22a

 The Talmud relates a story about the great luminary, Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi.  Arbata, the Parthian king sent to the Rabbi Yehudah a gift, a splendid pearl.  Rabbi Yehudah responded with a gift of his own, a mezzuza.  Outraged by the seeming mockery, the king angrily rebuked Rabbi Yehudah: "You have insulted me!  I sent you a priceless gift, and you reciprocate with a trifle of no value?!"   "The gift you sent to me is so valuable that it will have to be guarded.  The gift that I gave to you will guard you, even when you are asleep."

In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer. I know I am but summer to your heart, and not the full four seasons of the year. Spring passes and one remembers one's innocence. Summer passes and one remembers one's exuberance. Autumn passes and one remembers one's reverence. Winter passes and one remembers one's perseverance. Listen! The wind is rising, and the air is wild with leaves, We have had our summer evenings, now for October eves! Humbert Wolfe

“Itticha gotsa g’chin v’tilchosh la , Rav Pappa said to Abaye “if your wife is short bend down  and whisper to her.” Baba Metsia 59a