CY Family Mag #204 by Country Yossi

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

Message From the Publisher Hi Everybody, Yad L’Achim is a wonderful organization known worldwide for its daring pidyon shvuyim operations, professional deprogramming from missionaries and cults, fighting assimilation and intermarriage, among many other achievements. More recently however, they’ve also addressed the “shidduch crisis” by organizing a day of segulah for shidduchim on Tu B’Av, with tefillos in Amuka by a minyan of talmidei chachomim. This year, they are also offering a special tefillah on erev Yom Kippur and Hoshana Rabbah for shidduchim and all yeshuos, while at the same time you will merit the great mitzvah of pidyon shvuyim. The special tefillah will be recited in Amuka and Berditchev. Joining is FREE! See the article on pages 32-33 for more details. Our Rosh Hashanah/Yom Kippur/Sukkos issue is brimming with sweet articles that will tickle your palate, as well as your fancy. Three provocative Sound Offs serve as dessert after you’ve digested our Let’s Shmooze section. “All of a Sudden... Poof!” should stimulate your neurons

while “Achdus in the System” could not be better timed. Our Opinion department features an insightful piece by R’ Avi Shafran on poles! No, not polls or Poles but poles... as in “Subway Poles and Snakes on Poles.” Huh? Check it out and you’ll see what I mean. Our erev Yom Tov Inspiration section presents an astounding story I read in the Satmar beis medrash up in Monticello, while there to daven Mincha one evening. Read the amazing story of 26 older girls and the miracle that changed their lives forever. Who knows? If you do what they did, it might just work for you too! Of course, we honor Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis a’h and Elie Wiesel a’h, who left us recently. Also don’t miss “The Oldest Man Alive” (he’s Jewish), “The Wisdom of Louis Brandeis,” and our YWN Coffee Room controversy “Should I Marry a Smoker?” Wishing you all a kesiva v’chasima tova - a happy, healthy, sweet New Year. Your friend,

Country Yossi

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 13

SEPT./OCT. 2016

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 18

z"ga, hra,

ISSUE 204

“New York’s Premier Jewish Magazine”

s"xc

“You can tell a lot about a man by the company he avoids!” – CY Sept./Oct 2016 /z"ga, hra,

Table of Contents

Volume 29 Number 3

LET’S SHMOOZE ...................................................................................................................................................................................27 COVER STORY • Yad L’Achim: When It’s Dangerous Keeping Secrets from Your Husband . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33 SOUND OFF • All of a Sudden... Poof! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38 • Where’s the Achdus in the System? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 • What Would You Do If Your Child Had Cancer? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 OPINION • Ideology and Humaneness, by Rabbi Berel Wein . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46 • Subway Poles/Snakes on Poles, by Rabbi Avi Shafran . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

TIMELINE • The Wisdom and Wit of Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 FELDER FOCUS • Law and Order, or Chaos. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51 INSPIRATION • 26 Older Single Girls Get Engaged! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 • Making Others Happy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 TORAH • Let’s Make a Difference, by Rabbi Moshe Meir Weiss . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56 • Is a Good Year Enough, by Rabbi Pynchas Brener . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

SPECIAL REPORT • Elie Wiesel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 PEOPLE • The Oldest Living Man’s True Claim to Fame, by Yerachmiel Tilles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 • Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis, a’h, by Richard A. Stone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 ISRAEL • Har HaMoriah Rosh Hashanah, by Dov Shurin. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68 HEALTH AND ADVICE • Dear Bubby . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70 • Helping Our Kids Succeed This Year, by Sheri Toiv, LMHC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

CONTROVERSY • YWN Coffee Room: Frum Boys Who Smoke . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72 JEWISH BOOKS • Top 10 in Jewish Books . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 JEWISH MUSIC • Top 3 in Jewish Music . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76 • CY Songbook: Kiddush Man . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 HUMOR • The Boro Park Construction Zone, by Chaptzem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80 • Can’t You Just Plotz . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83 • Back to Civilization, by Kayla Kuchleffel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

COUNTRY YOSSI FAMILY MAGAZINE • 1310 48th Street, Suite 308 • Brooklyn, New York 11219 Telephone: (718) 851-2010 • Email Address: country@countryyossi.com COPYRIGHT © 2016 - Country Yossi Family Magazine, Inc. All rights reserved. Country Yossi Family Magazine is not responsible for unsolicited submissions. Unsolicited manuscripts, photographs, and other submitted materials must be accompanied by a stamped self-addressed envelope. We reserve the right to print all letters in part or in full unless specifically requested otherwise. No articles, photographs, artwork or other material in this magazine may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever, without prior written permission of the publisher. Country Yossi Family Magazine will not be responsible for typographical errors or advertisers’ claims.

Cover Design: R.A. Stone

website: www.countryyossi.com Follow countryyossi on Twitter

Interior Layout: H. Walfish

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 23

DOUBLE POSITIVE Dear Country Yossi, An MIT linguistics professor was lecturing his class the other day. “In English,” he said, “a double negative forms a positive. However, in some languages, such as Russian, a double negative remains a negative. But there isn’t a single language, not one, in which a double positive can express a negative.” A voice from the back of the room piped up, “Yeah, right.” Y.N. Flatbush

spot just after the first car passes by. The second car gets the spot. The other two are still looking. Did the second driver toil any harder than the other two? No. He would never have found the spot without looking for it, but the actual spot was a gift from Above.

TOILING OR FINDING Dear Country Yossi, I would like to comment on two items in the Tamuz/Av issue. You may print one or the other, or both. In a letter, TN discusses what we can learn from “looking for a parking spot.” To me, it is a Mashal (parable) to “Yagati Umatzasi Taamin.” Let me explain. The Rabbis tell us that if a person says he toiled (in Torah) and found the explanation, believe him. The question is, if he toiled for it, how can you describe it as “found?” If a person works at his job and his salary is deposited in his bank, would you call it “found money?” Imagine that three cars are circling around looking for parking spaces. A car pulls out of a

So, too, in learning Torah. Without the toil you can never acquire Torah, but the actual acquisition is a gift from Above. Regarding the outrage over the death of the gorilla, it is not surprising. Some years ago, a terrorist attached a bomb to a donkey, sent it into a crowd and exploded the bomb remotely. PETA

protested the cruelty to the poor donkey but expressed no concern at all for the people hurt or killed by the bomb. Zvi Freund Kew Gardens

THE BLESSING Dear Country Yossi, They walked in tandem, each of the ninety-two students filing into the already-crowded auditorium. With their rich maroon gowns flowing and the traditional caps, they looked almost as grown up as they felt. Dads swallowed hard behind broad smiles, and Moms freely brushed away tears. This class would NOT pray during the commencements - not by choice, but because of a recent court ruling prohibiting it. The principal and several students were careful to stay within the guidelines allowed by the ruling. They gave inspirational and challenging speeches, but no one mentioned divine guidance and no one asked for blessings on the graduates or their families. The speeches were nice, but they were routine until the final speech received a standing ovation. A solitary student walked proudly to the microphone. He stood still and silent for just a moment, and then, it happened! All 92 students, every single one of them, suddenly SNEEZED!!

SEPT./OCT. 2016

The student on stage simply looked at the audience and said, ‘G-D BLESS YOU.’ And he walked off the stage. The audience exploded into applause. This graduating class had found a unique way to invoke G-d’s blessing on their future with or without the court’s approval. This is a true story. It happened at Eastern Shore District High School in Musquodoboit Harbour, Nova Scotia. H.P. Boro Park

TAKE HEART Dear Country Yossi, The only survivor of a shipwreck was washed up on a small, uninhabited island. He prayed feverishly for Hashem to rescue him. Every day he scanned the horizon for help, but none seemed forthcoming. Exhausted, he eventually managed to build a little hut out of driftwood to protect himself from the elements, and to store his few possessions. One day, after scavenging for food, he arrived home to find his little

z"ga, hra,

hut in flames, with smoke rolling up to the sky. He felt the worst had happened, and everything was lost. He was stunned with disbelief, grief and anger. He cried out, “Hashem! How could You do this to me?” Early the next day, he was awakened by the sound of a ship approaching the island! It had come to rescue him! “How did you know I was here?” asked the weary man of his rescuers. “We saw your smoke signal,” they replied. The moral of this story: It’s easy to get discouraged when things are going bad, but we shouldn’t lose heart because Hashem is at work in our lives, even in the midst of our pain and suffering. Remember that the next time your little hut seems to be burning to the ground, it just may be a smoke signal that summons the shaliach of Hashem. P. S. You may want to consider passing this on, because you never know who feels as if their hut is on fire today. B.W. Flatbush

WHO ARE YOU VOTING FOR? Dear Country Yossi, What would it take for our people to understand what the Democratic Party has become? Many of the Jewish people voted for Giuliani after the Crown Heights riots. Do we actually have to wait for something similar in order to stop voting for the Democrats? Imagine if one mistake is ch’v made by someone from Shomrim; some looter who happens to be black is killed or hurt. “Black Lives Matter” would be immediately inspired to beat up and kill Jews. And Obama or Hillary would come out in support of the black criminal who was killed, no matter who he is. Or imagine if one mistake is made by the FBI and we have a Muslim terrorist blowing up a synagogue. Under the Democrats the whole concept of Muslim terror is removed from FBI handbooks. Many of the recent terror acts could have been prevented if not for political correctness. Why do the democrats scream that decreasing the number of immi-

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 28

SEPT./OCT. 2016

grants from Muslim countries is unconstitutional? In the last 30 years, more than a million people came here from China: a country that has a total population of more than a billion. But over 100,000 came to the USA from Lebanon and as many from Jordan, even though these countries have less than 10 million people each. An average Chinese person therefore had a 10-times worse chance to immigrate into the USA than an Arab. SO what’s unconstitutional about making the number of immigrants from Jordan 100 per year, while giving their extra slots to the Chinese? Of course, not every Muslim person supports terror, but there is a greater percent of Muslims backing terrorism than the percent of Germans who supported the Nazis. Imagine if, during WWII, many Germans wanted to immigrate to the USA and we knew some of them were Nazis, sent here to do terrorist acts. Would we let them in? Imagine if any candidate who would scream about “Naziphobia” would be considered a lunatic. And yet, many Jews are willing to vote for Hillary, who is about to increase the intake of Syrian immigrants by more than 500% while knowing that many of them are terrorists. After a while, we will ch’v have a war zone here, just like in France (which only has 5-10% of Muslims and still can’t deal with them). Our main priority should be fighting Islamic terror, just as at some point most U.S. resources were spent to fight Nazi ideology and later the Communist ideology. But Obama and Hillary believe that our main problem is Global Warming, and Islamic terror was not even mentioned at the Democratic convention. We need to minimize the number of immigrants from Muslim countries and re-institute spying on those mosques that promote terror. But only the Republicans will do this. In addition, only the Republicans are going to restore support for our police, and arrest and severely punish rioters. One last point: in case Hillary, whose health is failing, can’t do her job, our president will be Tim Kaine. But in case Trump is, for some reason, no longer our president (or even if he is impeached) we will have Mike Pence for president. For those who

don’t know anything about these two people, I suggest you do some research and then decide which one you would want to run this country. L.F. Flatbush

FOCUSING ON FISH Dear Country Yossi, At a job I have, there is a big fish tank with many fish swimming back and forth. When I sit nearby to eat a meal I watch those agile, colorful cre-

z"ga, hra,

ations of Hashem and wonder: What can I learn from them? At least a few things. Although their space is just a few feet, they seem happy to be there. It doesn’t seem to bother them that their lives consist of just going from this side to that side, up, down and around that cycle again. They know that this is their purpose, and that is enough of a reason to be satisfied and not bored with their lives. Another thing I noticed is their ability to get along. They even play a chasing game with each other, like tag, and that

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 29

SEPT./OCT. 2016

keeps them occupied and in-touch with each other. They seem to know that the humans who pass them enjoy their show of quick maneuvering and bright, shiny colors so they continue to perform day after day. We should take a lesson from this and adjust the way we view ourselves in our world. Hashem put us all here to perform and coexist with camaraderie. When we understand that our skills, talents and achievements are to benefit mankind, we view ourselves as the participants in a “sea of humanity,” where every-

thing is working towards the common goal of glorifying Hashem’s name. The fish tank becomes, for us, a reminder to do our thing, the best way we can, and everything will flow with the passion it was created for. J.P. Boro Park

FLATBUSH JEWISH STREETS Dear Country Yossi, I was one year old when we came to Flatbush and, except for a few years

z"ga, hra,

here and there, I’ve been here all my life. At that time, it was hard to get a minyan because there were too few Jews and today the problem is the same because there are B’H so many shuls. One thing Flatbush enjoys is the achdus. In the shuls, we see this from the fact that shul Rabbonim daven in other shuls and often two shuls merge when both are short of a minyan. Maybe what keeps us together are the many Jewish streets that place our roots fresh in our minds wherever we go! Take Avenue J, for example: J for Jewish, for Jerusalem, etc. Avenue K for kosher, for kumzitz, for kreplach, for kvetching, for kinderlach, for kolel… From there we get to Avenue L - for learning, for lulov, for latkes, for leil shishi, and leil Shavuos. Avenue M is for matzah, mikveh, minyan, mincha, maariv, etc. Not to forget the bordering avenues of H for horseradish and I for Israel; on the other side there’s N for nachas and O for oifruf. All of this unified Jewishness in Flatbush is certainly a reason to be proud. B.W. Flatbush

A LITTLE BIT YIDDISH? Dear Country Yossi, Four guys are standing on a street corner: An American, a Russian, a Chinaman and an Israeli. A news reporter comes up to the group and says to them: “Excuse me...What’s your opinion on the meat shortage?” The American says: What’s a shortage? The Russian says: What’s meat? The Chinese man says: What’s an opinion? The Israeli says: What’s excuse me? S.P. Boro Park

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 30

COVER STORY

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

SOUND OFF

ALL OF A SUDDEN POOF… BROUGHT TO YOU BY BO AND HIS DISCIPLES

efore Obama there was virtually no major presence of Islam in America. All of a sudden, Islam is taught in schools. Christianity and the bible are banned in schools. All of a sudden we must allow prayer rugs everywhere and allow for Islamic prayer in schools, airports and businesses. All of a sudden we must stop serving pork in prisons. All of a sudden we are inundated with lawsuits by Muslims who are offended by American culture. All of a sudden we must allow burkas to be worn everywhere even though you have no idea who or what is covered up under them. All of a sudden Muslims are suing employers and refusing to do their jobs if they personally deem it conflicts with Sharia Law. All of a sudden the Attorney General of the United States vows to prosecute anyone who engages in “antiMuslim speech.” All of a sudden, Jihadists who engage in terrorism and openly admit they acted in the name of Islam and ISIS, are emphatically declared they are NOT Islamic by our leaders and/or their actions are determined NOT to be terrorism, but other nebulous terms like ‘workplace violence.’ All of a sudden, it becomes Policy that Secular Middle East dictators who were benign or friendly to the West, must be replaced by Islamists and the Muslim Brotherhood. All of a sudden our troops are withdrawn from Iraq and the Middle East, giving rise to ISIS. All of a sudden, America has re-

duced its nuclear stockpiles to 1950 levels, as Obama’s stated goal of a nuke-free America by the time he leaves office continues uninterrupted. All of a sudden, a deal with Iran must be made at any cost, with a pathway to nuclear weapons and HUNDREDS of BILLIONS of dollars handed over to fund their programs. All of a sudden America APOLOGIZES to Muslim states and sponsors of terror worldwide for acts of aggression, war and sabotage THEY perpetrate against our soldiers. All of a sudden, the American Navy is diminished to 1917 Pre-World War I levels of only 300 ships. The Army is at pre-1940 levels. The Air Force scraps 500 planes and plans to retire the use of the A-10 Thunderbolt close air support fighter. A further draw down of another 40,000 military personnel is in progress. All of a sudden half of our aircraft carriers are recalled for maintenance by Obama, rendering the Atlantic unguarded. NONE are in the Middle East. All of a sudden Obama has to empty Guantanamo Bay of captured Jihadists and let them loose in Jihadfriendly Islamic states. He demands to close the facility. All of a sudden America will negotiate with terrorists and trade FIVE Taliban commanders for a deserter and Jihad sympathizer. All of a sudden there is no money for American poor, disabled veterans, jobless Americans, hungry Americans, or displaced Americans but there is endless money for Obama’s “Syrian refugee” resettlement programs. All of sudden there is an ammunition shortage in the USA.

All of a sudden, the most important thing for Obama to do after a mass shooting by two Jihadists, is disarm American Citizens. All of a sudden, the President of the United States cannot attend the Christian Funerals of a Supreme Court Justice and a former First Lady because of previous (seemingly unimportant) commitments. All of a sudden the President of the United States won’t attend the funeral of a flag-rank Officer (Gen. Greene) killed in action; he played golf. But he sends a big delegation to Michael Brown’s funeral. He sends a minor delegation to Margaret Thatcher’s funeral. He won’t acknowledge Chris Kyle’s murder but he’ll fly the Flag at half-mast for Whitney Houston. All of a sudden, I’m sick to my stomach. I’m not sure the majority of Americans recognize the seriousness of the situation and how much “progress” has been made by Islam these last 7 years, a very brief time compared to a 75-year lifetime! The above would have been unbelievable a few years ago. Think, all of this in less than 8 years? The above also shows how America is decaying and is becoming unrecognizable. We all better hope that the right people win in November, all the way down the ballot. And just guess who will continue this if she is elected president. If you’d like to “Sound Off” please send your submissions to: SOUND OFF c/o Country Yossi Family Magazine 1310 48th Street, 3rd Floor Brooklyn, New York 11219 Submisssions should preferably be type-written, double-spaced and should not exceed 850 words.

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 38

SEPT./OCT. 2016

SOUND OFF

Where’s the Achdus in the system?

e are cushioned from our formative years through young adulthood under the umbrella of the system: Yeshivos, Bais Yaakovs, seminaries… but what happens when our children come home? All of a sudden they’re allowed to be thrown to the wolves? The cord cut completely loose? Why doesn’t the “system” follow during this pivotal, sensitive parsha? There should be a hierarchy system that we can have access to when our children come home from seminary and yeshivah, rather than everyone navigating shidduchim separately. There should be a system where everyone is submitted into a database when doing Dor Yeshorim and our youngsters are matched up based on a profile that they fill out. Why waste time (inflicting easily avoidable pain) by pairing people who aren’t even matches? On-hand shadchanim/board members/mechanchos should match people up, hopefully initiating at least 2 to 3 matches per individual. The collective attitude is: “It’s just so hard to get shidduchim to come about, so why even put in so much energy for one fruitful, final yes from a boy - and then the girl says no.” So let’s use technology productively. You’re in the bungalow colony, then and there you think of a match. Send a text, email or wattsapp to the database and let them facilitate the rest. Simply initiating a shidduch off the ground makes someone a shadchan. This is the opposite of a “dating service.” It’s the ultimate form of Achdus. People feel so lost navigating the shidduch scene, especially newbie parents with their eldest child. There should be a general resource where you can turn for sheilos, hadracha, and

in general SHADCHANIM. The system should have graduates from all corresponding Yeshivos/Bais Yaakovs. It shouldn’t be that out-oftowners are completely obsolete from the in-town system. Quite the contrary; every graduate should be submitted into the database, making it so much easier to network. Many shidduch ideas are nixed simply because it’s complicated to redt it… you don’t want to be the one to redt it for fear of one side seeing it as an unfit shidduch… however, you know it’s worth a try. So go directly to the hierarchy database, tell them you think Raizy from Bais Yaakov of Boro

Park would be a great match for your nephew David, from Chofetz Chaim of Baltimore - and the onsite shadchanim will email the corresponding parties. Going out of town can seem like a great opportunity to meet new shadchanim and connections, but by the time someone has even looked into you, it’s already time to go home. No more is it the age when people do a little word of mouth research and quickly set up a meeting. There should be a system where you let them know “I will be in Los Angeles, this is what I’m looking for, is there anyone that you think would match my profile?” There’s no question that the harder something is to achieve, the greater the satisfaction is in its achievement. But does it have to be herculean to even have our children meet each other? The message of the three weeks was clear: Klal Yisroel needs Achdus. What could be a greater form of this than for everyone to be joined universally, under one umbrella shidduch system? Why should everyone have to work separately, inefficiently, alone?

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 40

z"ga, hra,

SEPT./OCT. 2016

SOUND OFF

What Would You do If Your ChIld had CanCer?

Dear Friends, In November 2001 my wife and I were told the words no parent would ever want to hear - YOUR SON HAS CANCER. Jonah, like other children confronting serious illnesses, faced a host of challenges on numerous fronts; challenges that immeasurably compound the difficulty of their arduous struggle to combat the disease itself. Seriously ill children need and deserve as happy and normal a childhood as possible. Jonah is now a healthy twentythree-year-old and was cured with the participation of our doctors, friends and most of all Hashem. Jonah had the cancer but unfortunately the illness affected each member of the family. Chai Lifeline was with us every step of the way. As a parent I will never be able to fully show my appreciation to Chai Lifeline and the support they gave us during this entire ordeal. Chai Lifeline is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to helping children who are suffering from serious illness, as well as their family members. Chai Lifeline stood by our side and helped Jonah and our entire family tremendously. From providing our children with big brothers and sisters, to giving us emotional support; from providing us with home cooked meals in the hospital, to sending Jonah to Camp Simcha in the mountains, where he always had a blast. As the father of a child who had cancer, I can never do enough to help the organization, and that is why I am asking for your help. Chai Lifeline reaches out not only to patients, but also to parents, siblings, classmates, school faculty and the community as well. Chai Lifeline found ways to bring joy to our lives and the lives of young patients and their families through creative, innovative and effective family-centered programs, activities and services. They engendered hope and optimism - especially during the bleakest of times. They provided unparalleled support throughout our sonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s illness, recovery and beyond. As a means of showing my

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 42

z"ga, hra,

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

gratitude, while running the Marathon on behalf of Chai Lifeline on Sunday, January 29, 2017, I hope to raise more than $30,000.00 by race day. I hope you will help me reach this goal by making a generous tax-deductible donation. Your support is a critical part of this effort, and I know that together we can make a difference to these children. All donations are 100% tax-deductible, and the Team Lifeline website https://goo.gl/4IrJg8 makes donations quick, easy and secure. Making a donation will only take a minute, so please donate today. If you wish to mail your donation, please mail your checks payable to: Chai Lifeline c/o Adelsberg, 309 Barr Avenue, Woodmere, New York 11598. Thank you for supporting me, and in doing so, helping children and their families cope with the diagnosis, treatment and aftermath of serious pediatric illness. Thank you, Howard M. Adelsberg

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 43

SEPT./OCT. 2016

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 44

z"ga, hra,

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 45

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

O P I N I O N

IDEOLOGY AND HUMANENESS BY RABBI BEREL WEIN

think that history, both ancient and recent, proves that ideologies by their nature are rigid, oftentimes cruel, even murderous and dangerous. Devotion to a cause, no matter how noble by its very nature, places human beings in a secondary and often expendable position. When the cause is so noble and the venture so necessary and the perceived good of the fulfillment of the ideology is so attractive and mighty, then the cost to human lives and society pales in comparison. How many millions of lives have been lost in the last century in the quest for the fulfillment of utopian ideologies that eventually collapsed of their own weight! The great murderers of the past century - the Kaiser of Germany, the Emperor of Austria, the Balkan nationalists, Lenin and Stalin, Hitler and Himmler, Chairman Mao and Pol Pot and the radical Islamic extremists of today - all have one thing in common - they were all ideologues. Their efforts at enforcing and realizing their ideology in the real world brought about the deaths of untold millions. But they never had any qualms about the cost of their attempt to create the ideal society. When ideology governs, all concepts of humaneness disappear. People and individuals are merely pawns that are expendable in the great game that ideologues believe themselves to be playing. Woe to the individual that somehow disagrees with the ideology and the ideologues currently in vogue or in power. The debris and destruction of much of the world that has occurred

over the past century and is still occurring in front of our eyes is a result of ideologies that triumphed over the concept of humaneness. One of the more startling insights into Judaism - not Jews - and Torah is an absence of ideology. There are rules and commandments, moral commitments and definitions, but there is no overriding ideology as to how society is to be formed and governed. To a certain extent, the Torah leaves that to human trial and error. Even though the great and holy prophets of Israel portray for us a world of future hope - a world of justice, equality and peace they do not quite outline for us a certain path to bring us to that goal. What form of government is to be instituted? Is it absolute monarchy, constitutional monarchy, a form of democracy - etc.? This problem troubled our great teacher Moshe at the onset of his career, when he asked G-d to tell him how he was to raise the Jewish people to a level of permanent greatness. Heaven demurred and did not so inform him. But when viewing that Torah in its totality, with all of its myriad commandments and instructions, the conclusion that humaneness is the overriding feature of Judaism is inescapable. The bookends of the Torah are kindness and goodness to others to the stranger, the servant, the widow and the orphan and the otherwise defenseless. There is no ideological cause that justifies the abandonment of those principles. In our current society, ideologies and politics have merged and sometimes form a witchesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; brew of contro-

versy, strife and even violence. The worst atrocities are justified by their perpetrators as being the fulfillment of great and true ideologies. Jewish society, as well, is not free of ideologues and differing ideologies. Because of this, it is not many times as humane as it should be and as what we would wish it to be. The rights of the workers are considered to be sacrosanct in Jewish law and life. But these rights were an expression of the humaneness of Torah and not as an instrument of class warfare and the fulfillment of dreamy economic theories. Humaneness itself is often distorted and ruined when it is converted to an overreaching ideology. Human kindness is often morphed into aggressive, coercive and even violent behavior. The question that should always be asked regarding a seemingly humane act that one is about to commit: Is it being done out of humaneness or rather is it only in furtherance of a preconceived ideology? And we should always remember that humane behavior always trumps ideology, no matter how noble and progressive we believe that ideology to be. The principle rule of the Torah is that human life is the most precious of all commodities and overrides all other considerations. Sending children to be suicide bombers based on a warped ideology is an affront to the idea of religion and faith in the Creator. The Torah warned us that these acts and beliefs would arise. It is our task to be humane in the face of such ideological cruelty.

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 46

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

O P I N I O N

SUBWAY POLES/ SNAKES ON POLES BY RABBI AVI SHAFRAN

ubway riders in standingroom-only cars try not to think too much about what organisms might be happily residing on the poles they grasp during the lurching trip. To obtain some hard data, Harvard researchers conducted a study in which they swabbed seats, walls, poles, hand grips and ticket machines in the Boston transit system, and then did DNA analyses to find out what organisms they had collected. They recently released their study’s results. It’s still a good idea to wash your hands after a subway ride, but straphangers can feel somewhat relieved at the study’s finding that the surfaces were contaminated, but with generally innocuous bacteria. If one is relatively healthy, the germs picked up from a subway grasp shouldn’t present any problem. The reason for the inclusion of the word “generally,” though, in the previous paragraph is because even strains of common bacteria can cause terrible diseases under certain circumstances, like among the immunosuppressed. Which thought should serve as a reminder that all that stands between each of us and myriad invisible agents of harm is the unbelievably complex biological network of tissues, cells, enzymes and antibodies that science calls the immune system. Were the myriad mazikin that constantly surround us visible to us, says Abba Binyamin (Berachos 6a), we would be frozen in terror. Whether he had in mind the fungi, protozoa, bacteria and viruses that regularly seek to invade our bodies must remain speculation. But, regarding the countless organisms that would, were it not for

our immune systems, do us great harm, the statement would have been entirely true. In the parsha, we read about the nachash hanechoshes, the “copper snake” that Moshe Rabbeinu mounted on a staff during the plague of poisonous serpents that Hashem had brought after the people showed a lack of gratitude and complained about their sustenance. Those poisoned gazed at it and were cured. Chazal teach us that, of course, it wasn’t the replica that cured them but that the gazers’ hearts were aimed Heavenward (brought by Rashi,Bamidbar, 21:8). What, then, was the snake for? Why the middleman (or middle-reptile)? Why not tell the people to just gaze directly toward Heaven, where their hearts were to be? Rabbeinu Bachya notes that the snakes plaguing our ancestors are referred to with the definite article, “hei” - the snakes. And he sees in that seemingly superfluous Hebrew letter a reference to Devarim 8:15, where the midbar is characterized as a place of snakes and scorpions. The snakes, explains Rabbeinu Bachya, refers to the ones that regularly filled the desert. Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch expands on that thought, and sees the people’s gazing at the copper snake as focusing them on the fact that snakes in the desert were ubiquitous. Looking at the metal serpent would bring them to appreciate how, every day without a snake bite was a day during which Hashem had protected them from a clear and present danger. With that realization, born of meditation on the copper snake-replica, our ancestors’ hearts could truly, meaningfully aim Heavenward.

It’s more than interesting that the image of a serpent entwined around a staff has become a widely employed symbol of the medical profession. Although the symbol is believed to have been borrowed from Greek avodah zarah, the ultimate origin of the image seems clearly to be the nachash hanechoshes. More than interesting because a fundamental pillar of modern medicine is the understanding that much disease is caused not by “vapors” or internal imbalances, as was once assumed to be the sources of all illness, but rather by the failure of bodies to repel invaders - the bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites that surround us all the time. That might seem obvious to us, but germ theory, the idea that microorganisms lie at the root of many diseases, only became accepted in the nineteenth century, less than two hundred years ago. Now, though, it is a pillar of medical practice that sanitation is key to health. Surgery requires great antiseptic measures, medical personnel wear sterilized disposable gloves, we all recognize that diseases can spread through the transfer of germs of various types. So, however the medical world might conceive of the source of the “Rod of Asclepius,” if it is indeed a depiction of the nachash hanechoshes, it is an unintentionally apt symbol of the lesson of that copper snake. That is to say, the fairly recent realization that we are indeed surrounded by myriad mazikin, from which only miracles the immune systems Hashem has made part of our bodies - protect us. This article originall appeared in Hamodia

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 48

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 49

SEPT./OCT. 2016

T I M E L I N E

A N ECLECTIC C OLLECTION OF NEWS ITEMS, FEA TURES A ND H UMOR WE JUST COULDN’T FIT ANYWHERE ELSE!

THE WISDOM & WIT OF SUPREME COURT JUSTICE LOUIS BRANDEIS EDITED BY EUNICE G. POLLACK

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 50

z"ga, hra,

ouis Brandeis graduated from the Harvard Law School at age 20 with the highest grade point average in that school’s history and, after other academic triumphs, was appointed Supreme Court justice. When Brandeis was studying law at Harvard, an anti-Semitic professor by the name of Peters always displayed animosity towards him. One day Prof. Peters was having lunch at the University dining room when Brandeis came along with his tray and sat next to him. The professor said “Mr. Brandeis, you do not understand. A pig and a bird do not sit together to eat.” Brandeis looked at him and calmly replied, “Don’t worry, professor. I’ll fly away,” and he went and sat at another table. Peters decided to take revenge on the next test paper, but Brandeis responded brilliantly to all questions. Unhappy and frustrated, Peters asked him the following question: “Mr. Brandeis, if you were walking down the street and found a package; a bag of wisdom and another bag with a lot of money, which one would you take?” Without hesitating, Brandeis responded, “The one with the money, of course.” Peters, smiling sarcastically, said “Just like a Jew. Unlike you, I would have taken the wisdom.” Brandeis shrugged indifferently and responded, “Each one takes what he doesn’t have.” Prof. Peters’ hate for the Jewish student came to a finale when he scribbled on his student’s final exam the word “idiot” and handed it back to him. A few minutes later, Louis Brandeis got up, went to the professor and said to him in a dignified but sarcastically polite tone, “Prof. Peters, you autographed the exam sheet, but you did not give me a grade…”

SENATOR FELDER HIGHLIGHTS LAW AND ORDER, OR CHAOS

f a novice were to ask for my counsel about going into public service and running for higher office, I would start with this tidbit of advice: Pick a side. You are either for law and order, or you’re against it. And if you’re against law and order, find another career path. Elected officials owe it to their constituents to hold the law and those who defend it in the highest regard. As we saw with the events surrounding Occupy Wall Street, certain elected officials - to say nothing of some community leaders - are too quick to ride populist waves, sowing seeds of anger and tacitly encouraging lawlessness and violence. And now, as this summer of discontent unfolds and policemen are randomly assassinated in the streets, precisely because they are policemen, many are wondering how it ever got this far, while in fact we should be worrying about how much further it will go… and for how long. But it doesn’t have to be this way. In Pirke Avot 3:2, Rabbi Chanina the deputy high priest taught, “Pray for the welfare of the government, for were it not for the fear of it, men would swallow one another alive.” In 1964, pressured by a non-violent civil rights movement and under the leadership of President Lyndon Johnson, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibited segregation in public accommodations and made discrimination in education and employment illegal. In 1965 Congress passed the Voting Rights Act,

which suspended the use of any voter qualification devices that prevented blacks from voting. Other civil rights battles still lay ahead, but the civil rights movement had used a campaign of nonviolent actions to end centuries of open, legal racism in the United States.

A half-century later, we’ve allowed a quest for justice to devolve into absurd political correctness. Being pro-equal rights does not mean having to tolerate crime, regardless of the race of the perpetrators, or of the victims. Being anti-prejudice should not require blindness to facts or tolerance of abhorrent happenstances.

Those who are kind to the cruel will eventually be cruel to the kind. When we tie the hands of our police, we make it impossible for them to effectively protect our citizens. When we take away police-recommended (and highly effective) measures like stop and frisk from law enforcement, we make it harder (and sometimes impossible) for them to enforce the law. But this is what our elected officials did. And in so doing, they encouraged some people to hate the police. The president of the United States, above all other U.S. elected officials, should be an icon of law and order for all of us. But how many of our citizens - even his political supporters - regard him that way? His refusal to condemn groups that encourage violence against police amounts to a deafening silence. How much more so other elected officials closer to home? First they sow seeds of discontent, then we all reap the whirlwind. Clearly, as we define deviancy down (as Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan phrased it) and watch the disintegration of law and order in America - as public urination is decriminalized in our city and police are shot at all over our nation - the connection should be clear. One definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Perhaps it’s time to consider a new direction - respect for the police and law and order - and find more satisfying outcomes. K’siva V’chasima Tova, Simcha

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 52

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 53

SEPT./OCT. 2016

Inspiration 26 OLDER SINGLE GIRLS GET ENGAGED!

av Chaim Zaid shlita, the Rav of the Pardes Katz neighborhood in Bnei Brak, and a lecturer in high schools throughout the country, told over an unbelievable and inspirational story: “Last year, in the summer, a group

of older single girls wanted to get together for an inspirational Shabbos of chizuk in Yerushalayim. They were a group of 26 girls, of which the youngest was 30. I was asked to attend with my family to speak for the women and strengthen them. The Thursday before the Shabbos, I

went to seek advice from the mekubal, HaRav Dovid Abuchatzeira shlita, from Naharia. I told him about the Shabbaton and about my job to lecture and give over words of chizuk. My question was, “What message should I give over to the girls, in the name of the Rav, in order to lift their spirits from falling into despair over their plight?” Rav Dovid answered as follows: “Tell them that if they want to get engaged, they should disconnect themselves from their impure technological devices.” When I heard these words I was shocked and taken aback. How would I convey such a message, especially to non-observant women?! The Shabbos started uneventfully. At the first meal, I tried fitting in this topic to my speech, but failed. Similarly, by the second meal the opportunity did not present itself. After havdala on Motzei Shabbos, I asked the girls if I could say a few parting words. That is when I threw the bombshell. “My dear girls, I have something to tell you. Prior to this Shabbos, I visited the great mekubal, HaRav Dovid Abuchatzeira, and he requested that I pass on a specific message. He said that if you disconnect and let go of your impure devices, you will see great salvation in finding your bashert.” Silence filled the room. After some lengthy minutes, one girl came up to me and put her phone down on my table. It was not so easy for the others, however, after an hour and a half of discussion, 25 girls parted with their impure devices and gave them over to me. Only one girl remained unable to bring herself to part with her phone. I bade everyone farewell and was about to drive off when I heard knocking on my car window. The last girl too had overcome her temptations and gave over her phone! I decided to personally go to HaRav Dovid to tell him about the unbelievable success. I went before the Rav with a bag full of iPhones. HaRav Dovid was moved to tears. He gave all the girls a bracha that by Tu B’Av, they would each get engaged. The unthinkable happened! 25 of those girls got engaged by 10 Av and the final girl got engaged on the night of Tu B’Av! HaRav Dovid Abuchatzeira himself attended the last girl’s engagement! To hear this for yourself from HaRav Chaim Zaid, you may contact him at 052-765-5774.

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 54

z"ga, hra,

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

Inspiration Making Others Happy IN MEMORY OF THE SASSOON CHILDREN, MAY THEIR SOULS REST IN PEACE.

wo men, both seriously ill, occupied the same hospital room. One man was allowed to sit up in his bed for an hour each afternoon to help drain the fluid from his lungs. His bed was next to the room’s only window. The other man had to spend all his time flat on his back. The men talked for hours on end. They spoke of their wives and families, their homes, their jobs, their involvement in the military service, where they had been on vacation… Every afternoon, when the man in the bed by the window could sit up, he would pass the time by describing to his roommate all the things he could see outside the window. The man in the other bed began to live for those one hour periods where his world would be broadened and enlivened by all the activity and color of the world outside. The window overlooked a park with a lovely lake. Ducks and swans played on the water while children

sailed their model boats. Young girls walked arm in arm amidst flowers of every color and a fine view of the city skyline could be seen in the distance. As the man by the window described all this in exquisite detail, the man on the other side of the room would close his eyes and imagine this picturesque scene. One warm afternoon, the man by the window described a parade passing by. Although the other man could not hear the band - he could see it in his mind’s eye as the gentleman by the window portrayed it with descriptive words. Days, weeks and months passed. One morning, the day nurse arrived to bring water for their baths only to find the lifeless body of the man by the window, who had died peacefully in his sleep. She was saddened and called the hospital attendants to take the body away. As soon as it seemed appropriate, the other man asked if he could be

moved next to the window. The nurse was happy to make the switch, and after making sure he was comfortable, she left him alone. Slowly, painfully, he propped himself up on one elbow to take his first look at the real world outside. He strained to slowly turn to look out the window besides the bed. It faced a blank wall. The man asked the nurse what could have compelled his deceased roommate, who had described such wonderful things outside this window. The nurse responded that the man was blind and could not even see the wall. She said, ‘Perhaps he just wanted to encourage you.’ Epilogue: There is tremendous happiness in making others happy, despite our own situations. Shared grief is half the sorrow, but happiness, when shared, is doubled. If you want to feel rich, just count all the things you have that money can’t buy.

Six Tiny Stories with Great Meaning 1. Once all villagers decided to pray for rain. On the day of prayer all the people gathered, but only one boy came with an umbrella. That’s FAITH. 2. When you throw a baby in the air, she laughs, because she knows you will catch her. That’s TRUST. 3. Every night we go to bed, without any assurance of being alive the

next morning, but we still set the alarms to wake up. That’s HOPE. 4. We plan big things for tomorrow in spite of zero knowledge of the future. That’s CONFIDENCE. 5. We see the world suffering, but still we get married and have children. That’s LOVE.

6. On an old man’s shirt was written a sentence: “I am not 90 years old. I am sweet 16 with 74 years’ experience!” That’s ATTITUDE! Have a good week and live your life like the six tiny stories! May you always have love to share, health to spare, friends and relatives who care.

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 55

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

Let’s Make a Difference by Rabbi Moshe Meir Weiss

s we march closer to Rosh HaShanah, the Jewish Day of Judgement, the wise person prepares for this critical encounter with the Divine Judge. One of the best defenses that one can muster is to make oneself needed by as many people as possible. The Gemora teaches us “HaOlam nidon biskira achas - The world is judged with one sweeping, global overview.” This means that besides inspecting everyone individually, Hashem also takes a look at how all of the pieces of humanity interlock, one with another, and if someone is needed by many people and they don’t deserve to lose him, then he or she is granted another year even if he personally doesn’t deserve it because of sin or spiritual lethargy. The Gemora teaches us this allimportant concept when it discusses the tragic death of the great tzadikim, Nadav and Avihu, the children of Aharon HaKohein. The Gemora questions why these great people died at the Hands of Hashem. The Gemora answers that it was because they weren’t married and because they had no children. This is mystifying, since the Torah itself says that they were executed by laser-like beams which emanated from the Holy of Holies because they introduced a foreign fire on the mizbei’ach, the altar, during the week of the Tabernacle’s inauguration. So, how can the Gemora advance a different reason than that which Hashem tells us in the Gemora? The commentators almost unanimously explain that indeed the reason for Nadav

and Avihu’s death was because of their extracurricular fire-offering. However, if they had been married, the fact that their wives would have needed them would have saved them. Furthermore, even if they no longer had wives, the Gemora maintains, if they had had children, the children would have saved them. In a similar vein, the Chasam Sofer, zt”l, zy”a, interprets the verse, “V’hosircha Hashem bifri bitnicha - Hashem will give you extra because of the fruit of your womb,” to mean that if a person stays active in the tutelage of his grandchildren and great-grandchildren, this will add years to his life because he is needed to ensure the passing of the Torah legacy to his descendants. A great example of how one person can make herself needed by the masses is the wondrous life of the late Rebbetzin Jungreis, zt”l, zy”a. Readers of the Jewish Press, for the last halfcentury, are well aware of the impact the she made in their lives. In thousands of living rooms across the globe, Friday nights have been illuminated by her sage advice and inspiration for the five decades. Each of us, in our own way, needs to realize that we can make a difference. But, we must be conscious to make this effort. Once in a great while, the Jewish Press has to ‘bump’ an article because of lack of space. When my column is omitted, I complain through my wonderful agent, Shelley Zeitlin, to the trusted Senior Editor, Jason Maoz. He responds, “Tell Rav Weiss that now he’s ahead for next week.” But I respond, “By leaving out my column, tens of thousands of people will not

learn its Torah this Shabbos.” To me, that is a reality of how I can impact as many people as possible. I know my readers will be thinking, what does this have to do with me? I don’t have a column in a major newspaper. But the way we answer “amein” in shul encourages those around us to do the same. So too, when we are quiet by davening or when we come on time for davening, when we are courteous to everyone in the office, when we take the lead in demonstrating charitable pledges, when we exhibit respect to our spouses, when we are a role model on how we watch our children in shul, we are making a difference - and we are acquiring a strong cloaking mechanism of defense. I’ve mentioned many times the Orchos Chaim l’HaRav Luniel, zt”l, zy”a, who states,”Harotzeh l’harich yomim, hevei marbeh b’achim v’rei’im - If you want to live long, have many relatives and friends.” For, if we are needed by the lowly and the downtrodden, the impoverished and the vulnerable, or even if we are a staunch friend to another, that is a huge reason for Hashem to extend our lease on life. So, let’s start getting involved in our shuls, schools and with our relatives. Let’s make new friends and help them and in that merit may Hashem bless us all with a New Year of good health, happiness and everything wonderful. Sheldon Zeitlin takes dictation of, and edits, Rabbi Weiss’s articles.

Start the cycle of Mishna Yomis with Rabbi Weiss by dialing 718.906.6471. Or you can listen to his daily Shiur on Orchos Chaim

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 56

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

l’HaRosh by dialing 718.906.6400, then going to selection 4 for Mussar, and then to selection 4. Both are FREE services. Rabbi Weiss is currently stepping up his speaking engagements. To bring him to your community, call 718.916.3100 or email RMMWSI@aol.com. To receive a weekly cassette tape or CD directly from Rabbi Weiss, please send a check to Rabbi Moshe Meir Weiss, P.O. Box 140726, Staten Island, NY 10314 or contact him at RMMWSI@aol.com. Now back in print is a large size paperback edition of Power Bentching. To order call him at 718-916-3100 or email at above. Attend Rabbi Weiss’s weekly shiur at the Landau Shul, Avenue L and East 9th in Flatbush, Tuesday nights at 9:30 p.m. Rabbi Weiss’s Daf Yomi and Mishnah Yomis shiurim can be heard LIVE on KolHaloshon at (718) 906-6400.. Write to KolHaloshon@gmail.com for details. They can now also be seen on TorahAnyTime.com.

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 57

SEPT./OCT. 2016

T O R A H Pynchas Brener is the Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Caracas, Venezuela, since 1967. He received his Bachelor of Arts and Rabbinic Ordination from Yeshiva University and his Master’s degree from Columbia University, and is a PhD honoris causa of Bar Ilan University. He has an internet project and a website: www.pynchasbrener.com.

’

GOOD YEAR ENOUGH

is the time of year when many mail boxes begin to be inundated by good wishes from friends and relatives. As of late, it is more likely that the inbox of our email will be bombarded with creative designs to wish us a Shanah tovah. Personally, I have a slight aversion to the mass mailings, though I understand that limits of time make sending a personal greeting difficult, if not impossible for some people to do. Therefore, even though I feel that more effort should have been invested in sending a personalized message, since they are good wishes, why not be grateful? And I answer with a personal note. Why don’t we wish a great year, or a huge year, an adjective that has become politically correct? Why don’t we wish for a successful year, or just a ‘very good’ year? It takes the same effort when writing an email. Shall we start then a contest about who can invent the most cosmic good wish? Yet, I remember from my Caracas days, a survivor who was wont to say: “Ich vill nit besser, ich vill gutt - I don’t want better, I want good.” I remember it, because it made an impression on me: Be satisfied with the goodness you have received, because if you want better all the time, you will never be happy and content. After all, this is the language of the Torah in Bereshit: “Vayar Elokim ki tov - and Hashem saw it was good.” Could not Hashem have made a better world? Why only good? Then again, is G-d comparable to a human artist, who takes several steps back after finishing

a work of art, and says to himself: “It is pretty good.” Did G-d not know beforehand how His work would turn out? I particularly like a Chassidic interpretation, which explains that by a stretch of the imagination, “Vayar” can also mean “He showed, He made visible.” Some astronomers and physicists posit the possibility of other ‘universes’ that exist in different dimensions we cannot perceive. We know that our vision is limited in the spectrum; some animals have audition that surpasses human abilities. Why not a universe that we humans cannot perceive with our senses? The above means that Hashem decided to make the universe visible to us. Why “ki tov?” Not because the universe, His creation, is good. “Ki Tov” means because He, Hashem Himself, is good, and He made the universe visible as a manifestation of His goodness. That means that “tov,” “good,” means sharing. G-d made the universe visible because He wanted to share it with us. Maybe that is the reason why Hashem made a vertical section of the first man, Adam (and the Torah calls both man and woman ‘Adam’) so that a human should have the possibility of “sharing” with another human being. When the Torah affirms: “Lo tov heyot haadam levado, e’eseh lo ezer kenegdo,” the meaning may be: “If a human being does not have a partner, he will not have “tov,” because “good” means an opportunity for “sharing.” That is the basis of marriage and of human relations, in general. Now, you may argue that at the end of the sixth day of Creation Hashem ex-

claims: “Vayar Elokim et kol asher asa vehine ‘tov meod,’” it is “very good!” But bear in mind the comment of our Rabbis, who say “tov meod” comes to include the appearance of the yetser harah, the evil inclination: A very present feature in all men. Maybe, after all, “good” is still good enough. There are too many mitzvot in the Torah to enumerate, which require sharing. I am reminded of the question that the future Kotsker Rebbe asked his teacher, when he was yet a young boy: When our ancestors were in the desert, everyone had all their material needs satisfied in food and clothing. In such a scenario, how did they practice tzedakah? No one was in need! Don’t we teach our toddlers to share, to consider other people? I remember when our two older boys were 2 and 3 years respectively, my motherin-law, of blessed memory, offered to take care of the children for a week so we could enjoy a Miami vacation. When we told our older boy that we were going for a few days to Miami, his reply was: “It is ‘my ami,’ and insisted on it. He did not realize that Miami was the name of a city. He separated the word into 2 parts: ‘my and ami.’ Our Rabbis say that when we are born we usually have our fists clenched because we want to keep everything. But we leave this world with open hands, to show we cannot take anything physical with us, only “maasim tovim,” good deeds, accompany us in the hereafter. So our Rosh Hashanah wish of “Shanah tovah” has a dual meaning: ‘a good year,’ but also a “year of sharing,” of relating positively to other human beings, of caring for your neighbors. How “good” is the mitzvah “Veahavtah lereacha kamochah,” a mitzvah that Rabbi Akiva thought was the “klal gadol baTorah” - the great principle of the Torah, because in order to fulfill the mitzvah you need a recipient of your love. It is about the relationship between 2 human beings. Share with others the Torah you have learned, share your wealth with the needy, share your love with your dear ones. Then you will have a “good year,” a year of sharing, and merit to be inscribed in the Book of Life, so that you can continue to share in 5777 as well.

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 58

z"ga, hra,

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

SPECIAL REPORT

liezer “Elie” Wiesel was a Romanian-born American Jewish writer, professor, political activist, Nobel Laureate and Holocaust survivor. He was the author of 57 books, written mostly in French and English, including “Night,” a work based on his experiences as a prisoner in the Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps. Along with writing, he was a professor of the humanities at Boston University, which created the Elie Wiesel Center for Jewish Studies in his honor. He was involved with Jewish causes, and helped establish the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. In his political activities he also campaigned for victims of oppression in places like South Africa and Nicaragua and genocide in Sudan. He publicly condemned the 1915 Armenian genocide and remained a strong defender of human rights during his lifetime. He had been described as “the most important Jew in America” by the Los Angeles Times. Wiesel was awarded the Nobel

Peace Prize in 1986, at which time the Norwegian Nobel Committee called him a “messenger to mankind,” stating that through his struggle to come to terms with “his own personal experience of total humiliation and of the utter contempt for humanity shown in Hitler’s death camps,” as well as his “practical work in the cause of peace,” Wiesel had delivered a message “of peace, atonement and human dignity” to humanity. He was a founding board member of the New York Human Rights Foundation and remained active throughout his life. Elie Wiesel was born in Sighet (now Sighetu Marma’iei), Maramure’ in the Carpathian Mountains in Romania. His parents were Sarah Feig and Shlomo Wiesel. At home, Wiesel’s family spoke Yiddish most of the time, but also German, Hungarian, and Romanian. Wiesel’s mother, Sarah, was the daughter of Dodye Feig, a celebrated Vizhnitz Chasid and farmer from a nearby village. Dodye was active and trusted within the community. Wiesel’s father, Shlomo, instilled a strong sense of humanism in his son,

encouraging him to learn Hebrew and to read literature, whereas his mother encouraged him to study the Torah. Wiesel has said his father represented reason while his mother Sarah promoted faith. Wiesel had three siblings - older sisters Beatrice and Hilda, and younger sister Tzipora. Beatrice and Hilda survived the war and were reunited with Wiesel at a French orphanage. They eventually emigrated to North America, with Beatrice moving to Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Tzipora, Shlomo and Sarah did not survive the Holocaust. In March 1944, Germany occupied Hungary which extended the Holocaust into that country. Wiesel was 15, and he with his family, along with the rest of the town’s Jewish population, were placed in one of the two confinement ghettos set up in Má ramarossziget (Sighet), the town where he had been born and raised. In May 1944, the Hungarian authorities, under German pressure, began to deport the Jewish community to the Auschwitz concentration camp, where up to 90% of the people were exterminated on arrival.

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 60

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

After they were sent to Auschwitz, his mother and his younger sister were killed. Wiesel and his father were later deported to the concentration camp at Buchenwald. Until that transfer, he admitted to Oprah Winfrey, his primary motivation for trying to survive Auschwitz was knowing that his father was still alive: “I knew that if I died, he would die.” After they were taken to Buchenwald, however, his father only survived for eight months, dying just a few weeks before the camp was liberated. In “Night,” Wiesel recalled the shame he felt when he heard his father being beaten and was unable to help. Wiesel was tattooed with inmate number “A-7713” on his left arm. The camp was liberated by the U.S. Third Army on April 11, 1945. After World War II ended and Wiesel was freed, he went to Paris where he learned French and studied literature, philosophy and psychology at the Sorbonne. By the time he was 19, he had begun working as a journalist, writing in French, while also teaching Hebrew and working as a choirmaster. He wrote for Israeli and French newspapers, including “Tsien in Kamf” (in Yiddish). In 1946, after learning of Irgun’s bombing of the King David Hotel, Wiesel made an unsuccessful attempt to join the underground movement. In 1948, he translated articles from Hebrew to Yiddish for Irgun periodicals, but never became a member of the organization. In 1949 he travelled to Israel as a correspondent for the French newspaper L’arche. He then was hired as Paris correspondent for the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth, subsequently becoming its roaming international correspondent. “Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, which has turned my life into one long night, seven times cursed and seven times sealed. Never shall I forget that smoke. Never shall I forget the little faces of the children, whose bodies I saw turned into wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky. Never shall I forget those flames which consumed my faith forever. Never shall I forget that nocturnal silence which de-

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 61

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

prived me, for all eternity, of the desire to live. Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my soul and turned my dreams to dust. Never shall I forget these things. Never.” -Elie Wiesel, excerpt from Night. For ten years after the war, Wiesel refused to write about or discuss his experiences during the Holocaust. He began to reconsider after a meeting with the French author Francois Mauriac, the 1952 Nobel Laureate in Literature who eventually became Wiesel’s close friend. Mauriac was a devout Christian who had been with the French Resistance during the war. Seeing Wiesel’s tormented eyes, Mauriac persuaded him to begin writing about his harrowing experiences. Wiesel first wrote the 900-page memoir “Un di velt hut geshvign” (And the World Remained Silent) in Yiddish, which was published in abridged form in Buenos Aires. Wiesel rewrote a shortened version of the manuscript in French, La Nuit, in 1955. It was translated into English as “Night” in 1960. The book sold few copies after its publication, but still attracted interest from reviewers, leading to television interviews with Wiesel and meetings with literary figures such as Saul Bellow. After its increased popularity, Night was eventually translated into 30 languages with ten million copies sold in the United States. Film director Orson Welles at one point had wanted to make it into a feature film, but Wiesel refused, feeling that his memoir would lose its meaning if it were told without the silences in between his words. Oprah Winfrey made it a spotlight selection for her book club in 2006. In 1955, Wiesel moved to New York as foreign correspondent for the Israel daily, Yediot Ahronot. In 1969, he married Marion Erster Rose, who was from Austria, who also translated many of his books. They had one son, Shlomo Elisha Wiesel, named after Wiesel’s father. In the U.S., he went on to write over 40 books, most of them non-fiction Holocaust literature, and novels. As an author, he has been awarded a number of literary prizes and is con-

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 62

SEPT./OCT. 2016

sidered among the most important in describing the Holocaust from a highly personal level. As a result, some historians credited Wiesel with giving the term “Holocaust” its present meaning, although he did not feel that the word adequately described that historical event. Wiesel published two volumes of memoirs. The first, “All Rivers Run to the Sea,” was published in 1994 and covered his life up to the year 1969. The second, titled “And the Sea is Never Full” and published in 1999, covered the years from 1969 to 1999. Wiesel and his wife, Marion, started the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity in 1986. He served as chairman for the Presidential Commission on the Holocaust (later renamed US Holocaust Memorial Council) from 1978 to 1986, spearheading the building of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. The museum gives The Elie Wiesel Award to “internationally prominent individuals whose actions have advanced the

Museum’s vision of a world where people confront hatred, prevent genocide, and promote human dignity.“ The Foundation had invested its

endowment with money manager Bernard L. Madoff’s investment

z"ga, hra,

Ponzi scheme, costing the Foundation $15 million and Wiesel and his wife much of their own personal savings. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986 for speaking out against violence, repression, and racism. The Norwegian Nobel Committee described Wiesel as “one of the most important spiritual leaders and guides in an age when violence, repression and racism continue to characterize the world.” Wiesel explained his feelings during his acceptance speech: “Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Sometimes we must interfere. When human lives are endangered, when human dignity is in jeopardy, national borders and sensitivities become irrelevant.” He received many other prizes and honors for his work, including the Congressional Gold Medal in 1985, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and The International Center in New York’s Award of Excellence. He was also elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1996.

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 63

SEPT./OCT. 2016

Wiesel co-founded Moment Magazine with Leonard Fein in 1975. They founded the magazine to provide a voice for American Jews. He was also a member of the International Advisory Board of NGO Monitor. Wiesel became a popular speaker on the subject of the Holocaust. As a political activist, he also advocated for many causes, including Israel, the plight of Soviet and Ethiopian Jews, the victims of apartheid in South Africa, Argentina’s Desaparecidos, Bosnian victims of genocide in the former Yugoslavia, Nicaragua’s Miskito Indians, and the Kurds. In 2003 he discovered and publicized the fact that at least 280,000 Romanian and Ukrainian Jews, along with other groups, were massacred in Romanian-run death camps. In early 2006 Wiesel accompanied Oprah Winfrey as she visited Auschwitz, a visit which was broadcast as part of The Oprah Winfrey Show. On November 30, 2006, Wiesel received a knighthood in London in recognition of his work toward raising Holocaust education in the United Kingdom. In September 2006 he appeared before the UN Security Council with actor George Clooney to call attention to the humanitarian crisis in Darfur. When Wiesel died, Clooney wrote, “We had a champion who carried our pain, our guilt and our responsibility on his shoulders for generations.” In 2007, Wiesel was awarded the Dayton Literary Peace Prize’s Lifetime Achievement Award. That same year, the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity issued a letter condemning Armenian genocide denial, a letter that was signed by 53 Nobel laureates including Wiesel. Wiesel has repeatedly called Turkey’s 90-year-old campaign to downplay its actions during the Armenian genocide a double killing. President George W. Bush, joined by the Dalai Lama and Wiesel, October 17, 2007, went to the ceremony at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., for the presentation of the Congressional Gold Medal to the Dalai Lama.

In 2009, Wiesel criticized the Vatican for lifting the excommunication of controversial bishop Richard Williamson, a member of the Society of Saint Pius X. In June 2009, Wiesel accompanied US President Barack Obama and German Chancellor Angela Merkel as they toured Buchenwald. Wiesel was an adviser at the Gatestone Institute. In 2010, Wiesel accepted a five-year appointment as a Distinguished Presidential Fellow at Chapman University. In that role, he made a one-week visit to Chapman annually to meet with students and offer his perspective on subjects ranging from Holocaust history to religion, languages, literature, law and music. In July 2009, Wiesel announced his support to the minority Tamils in Sri Lanka. He said that “Wherever minorities are being persecuted we must raise our voices to protest... the Tamil people are being disenfranchised and victimized by the Srilankan authorities. This injustice must stop. The Tamil people must be allowed to live in peace and flourish in their homeland.” In 2009, Wiesel returned to Hungary for the first visit since the Holocaust. During his visit, Wiesel participated in a conference at the Upper House Chamber of the Hungarian Parliament, met Prime Minister Gordon Bajnai and President Lá szló Só lyom, and made a speech to the approximately 10,000 participants of an anti-racist gathering held in Faith Hall. However, in 2012, he protested against “the whitewashing” of Hungary’s involvement in the Holocaust, and he gave up the Great Cross award

he had received from the Hungarian government. Wiesel was attacked in a San Francisco hotel by 22-year-old Holocaust denier Eric Hunt in February 2007, but was not injured. Hunt was arrested the following month and charged with multiple offences. Wiesel was active in trying to prevent Iran from making nuclear weapons, stating that “the words and actions of the leadership of Iran leave no doubt as to their intentions.” He also condemned Hamas for the “use of children as human shields” during the 2014 Israel-Gaza Conflict. The Times refused to run the advertisement, saying “the opinion being expressed is too strong and too forcefully made and will cause concern amongst a significant number of Times readers.” Wiesel often emphasized the Jewish connection to Jerusalem, and has criticized the Obama administration for pressuring Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to halt East Jerusalem Israeli settlement construction. He stated that “Jerusalem is above politics. It is mentioned more than six hundred times in Scripture and not a single time in the Koran. It belongs to the Jewish people and is much more than a city.” Wiesel died on the morning of July 2, 2016 at his home in Manhattan, aged 87. Utah senator Orrin Hatch paid tribute to Wiesel in a speech on the Senate floor the following week, where he said that “With Elie’s passing we have lost a beacon of humanity and hope. We have lost a hero of human rights and a luminary of Holocaust literature.”

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 64

z"ga, hra,

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

P E O P L E

Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis, a”h By Richard A. Stone

aruch Dayan Emes. Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis was nifter. Who was not affected by this holocaust survivor who changed the lives of so many with her HINENI organization that attracted so many Jews to return? My family went to a getaway at the Pineview Hotel in 1978 encouraged by my mother’s friend, Barbara, the Rebbetzin’s right-hand woman, and Roy Neuberger. We were baalei Teshuva for 8 years at that point, but that was filled with studying the basics from alef beis to fighting off the urge to watch tv when our parents left the house Shabbos afternoon. HINENI was my first introduction to the purely inspirational side of frumkeit. Rebbetzin Jungreis was this larger-thanlife woman with a voice that rolled hypnotically, like gentle waves, as though she was living the stories she was telling. Her father was at the event, as was he at most events that we would go to. She always sat him down first, before she would speak. She told the story of singing songs to get through the death marches. Others would recount the first HINENI event at Madison Square Garden, where money was a miracle and no one knew how many people would show up. Then, from everywhere, people were entering the Garden and that was the beginning of HINENI! That

story was what inspired me most. The belief that if you “build it they will come” (okay, what came first, HINENI or Field of Dreams?). We all need to believe in something.

My family was very close to moving to the area where the Rebbetzin’s husband had his round shul, Barbara’s family and Roy Neuberger’s family were in the same area. It would have been scary to leave our friends in Staten Island after leaving our friends in Trump Village. But we really enjoyed

staying at the Neubergers. That was a long time ago. Special memories have to include the HINENI van, which had a stage that dropped from the side, and swivel seats. And a really cool painting on the side. That’s what I wanted... an organization that made a difference. And a cool van with a stage for a band! The Rebbetzin was all cued up to fight the missionaries on college campuses and the Moonies by the New York public library, where my brother Baruch a”h and I gave out HINENI literature on a Sunday afternoon to the Moonies that were giving out flowers. Roy even identified a Moonie as being Jewish and started a conversation. It was amazing! Rebbetzin Jungreis began a movement of great work that spans the decades. (Philys Levitan, where are you? You were there at the Pineview and a group of us [I was 14 but so what?] stayed up half the night talking about Moshiach and miracles and Simon and Garfunkle’s “Bridge Over Troubled Waters.”) HINENI - Here I Am, Rebbetzin. You have no idea how many times my mind wanders back to that event at the Pineview and other events we went to. When I need to anchor myself, that is one of the places I go to find my true self and recharge. Thank you so much Rebbetzin Jungreis, a”h.

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 65

SEPT./OCT. 2016

P E O P L E

The OldesT living Man’s

True ClaiM TO FaMe By yeraChMiel Tilles

hen the oldest living man in the world at the time, Yasutaro Koide of Japan, died in January at the age of 112 years and 312 days, who would have thought this would be a prelude to a significant event for the Jewish people, and also for the world at large? That is, on March 11, 2016, Guinness World Records publicly proclaimed that Israel Kristal of Haifa, Israel, who on that day became 112 years and 178 days old, is now the world’s oldest living man. Why do I claim this has such significance? Because when I researched the above “crowning” of Mr. Kristal, which I found fascinating, I discovered there were articles and website postings in, among others, the NY Times, USA Today, People Magazine, Wikipedia, Jerusalem Post and Ha’Aretz (Israeli dailies), major network TV coverage, and even a few Orthodox Jewish sources. Yet, while all reported interesting remarks of Kristal and of his son and of his daughter about him during the ceremony that the Guinness representatives organized at his house, not one of them picked up on what I believe is the most extraordinary

quote of all. I saw it only in ‘Sichat HaShavua,’ an Israeli 4-page Hebrew weekly, my first source. So perhaps this is an English language exclusive. Yisrael Kristal was born in Poland on 22 Elul 5663 (September 15, 1903). When he was seven years old his mother passed away. He lived through both World Wars. In WWI his father was drafted into the Russian army and subsequently killed, so from the young age of 11 Yisrael was on his own. His father had provided him a solid traditional Jewish education, and that helped him to remain a man of deep faith and religious commitment his whole life. In WWII he lost his wife and two children, as well as all his other relatives. He himself survived the Auschwitz, Wustegiersdorf, Dornau, and Schotterwerk Nazi death camps. When he was rescued by Allied forces in May 1945, he weighed only 37 kilos (81.4 lbs) and was on the brink of death. In 1920 Kristal had moved to Lodz, Poland, to join the family confectionary business where they made and sold candy and other sweets, in which he worked for twenty years and became a master of the craft. So, after emigrating to Israel in 1950 with his second wife, also a survivor, and their baby son, and settling in Haifa, in addition to having another child, a daughter, he opened his own Kristal

Candy Factory in 1952 on Shivat Zion Street, which became increasingly successful over the years until his retirement in 1970. (Among the sweets he produced were tiny liquor bottles made of chocolate wrapped in colored foil, jam made from carob, and chocolate-covered orange peels. -Wikipedia) His two children, Hayim and Shula, were “fruitful and multiplied,” and so were their combined nine children after they married. In an interview with The Jerusalem Post [in 2012, when at age 109 Kristal was recognized as the world’s oldest Holocaust survivor], his daughter said of her father, “The Holocaust did not affect his beliefs. He is not an angry person, he is not someone who seeks an accounting, he believes everything has a reason in the world. He believes he was saved because that’s what G-d wanted.” This year, when interviewed on the occasion of the Guinness ceremony at their Haifa home, she reported that her father’s calm response to the fuss over his being the world’s oldest living man encapsulated his basic outlook on life: “I didn’t create anything. I didn’t discover anything or reveal anything new in the world. Everything is from Heaven. The Al-mighty gives me life and I simply live. It is not through my own strength or cleverness or any particular lifestyle. Everything is through the Creator of All. He has granted me long life and I am grateful to Him for it.” There is, however, one accomplishment the humble Yisrael Kristal is prepared to take credit for. Except for extreme circumstances during the two great wars, since his thirteenth birthday he never failed to wrap tefillin daily. In his words: “Instead of being acclaimed as the world’s oldest man, I’d rather be known as the oldest and longest daily wearer of tefillin in the world.” On September 15, 2016, the world will acknowledge with admiration the 113th birthday of Israel Kristal according to the Gregorian calendar. Seven

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 66

z"ga, hra,

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

days later, on Elul 22, his birth date on the Hebrew calendar, the Jewish world will celebrate his 113 years of life, a full century since his bar mitzvah, the modern record of 100 years of wrapping tefillin (!), and his message to the world that it is not how many years and days you spend eating and sleeping that does you credit, but whether you spent those years and days fulfilling your purpose in life. Yisrael Kristal never had a formal bar-mitzvah celebration, due to the pressures of WWI. So the family is planning one for his 113th birthday instead. It will be a private family affair with many but not all of the family members in Israel attending, only about 100! * The currently oldest living person is an American woman, Susannah Mushatt Jones, who on July 6, 2016 celebrated her 117th birthday. (Guinness)

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 67

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

Har HaMoriah Rosh Hashanah By Dov Shurin

efore I begin my article, I’d like to thank Country Yossi for the 26 years of writing for his magazine, which inspires me to get interesting chiddushim from the Ribono shel Olam, Who, according to R’ Yisroel of Rishin z’l, is a ‘GREAT Rebbe,’ but, sadly, He has very few chassidim. My Rebbe’s chatzer (courtyard) is on Har HaMoriah, which today is called Har Habayis (the Temple Mount) but, as long as the Golus lasts, we can not approach it because of the ‘HAND’ which You sent to Your Sanctuary (the children of Yishmael, of whom it is foretold, “Yodoh bakol v’yad kol bo.” Meaning: “His HAND will be all over the place!” as we see clearly today.} The point being that ‘Hand’ is associated with the children of Yishmael. According to most commentaries, the Akedas Yitzchok happened on Rosh Hashanah, on Mount Moriah, and the shofor, the ram’s horn, is blown on Rosh Hashanah to remember the Akedah as a merit for Yisrael for all time. My chiddush is as follows: Avraham and Yitzchok, and the 2 accompanying young men - Yishmael and Eliezer - arrived at their destination just below Mount Moriah, where the Akedah was soon to take place. Surprisingly, Avraham said to his 2 guards, “Stay here with the donkey, and Yitzchok and I will go to do the sacrifice alone.” This was strange regarding Yishmael, because he was Avraham’s biological son, and the Torah states, (Divorim 6V.6) “And you shall teach these words (the Torah) to your CHILDREN!”

Right at that moment, an important story of the Torah was truly happening. Daily, the world over, Jews read this portion referred to as ‘Akedas Yitzchok.’ So why would Avraham tell his son (while forfeiting the great mitzvah of educating him) to remain with the donkey? You can’t answer that Yishmael was ‘off the derech,’ as he was when Sara ordered Avraham to “throw your son and his mother out of the house.” And remember that Avraham didn’t want to send him away, until Hashem ordered him to listen to Sara. Now Avraham knew, at that time, the Yishmael was ‘off the derech,’ and that, according to some, Yishmael was committing the 3 worst transgressions. But, Father Avraham, according to Mishleh,(22, V.6) preferred to “Train a child (al pi darko) according to his way (level),” not wanting to give up on this mitzvah of “teach it to your children.” But since one can’t sacrifice the other children, who might G-d forbid go ‘off the derech’ because of a brother who is a ‘rotten apple,’ the situation had to be addressed. And, in fact, Avraham cast out his rotten son, whom he actually hated! We see this by how the millionaire, Avraham, gave his son and maid-wife only bread and water and sent them to the desert. He obviously despised the child. But now, Yishmael was over 53 years old, and he obviously was a baal teshuva because he was back with his dad. And now Avraham was obligated to preform the mitzvah of “Teach your children.” So why was Yishmael ordered to stay with the donkey? For the answer, I employ the amazing teachings of my illustrious grandfather, HaGaon Rav

Yaakov Kamenetsky z’l. When my Zeideh taught Pirkei Avos (Ethics of the Fathers) on my radio program in 1982, (available on disc at my web site: dovshurin.com), he explained Mishna 1 of Chapter 2, in the following way: “Rebbe (Rav Yehudah HaNasi) said: ‘Which is the righteous path a person should take in his life? That which is glorious to his Creator, and is seen as glorious by his fellow man.’” My grandfather explained that, after consultations, it was clear that the circumcision process of his household could be done publicly and festively, for it was glorious to BOTH his Creator and to mankind. But then he brought the Akedah as an example of an act glorious to his Maker, but dispicable to any average person! And so he said to his attendants, “stay here with the donkey, and Yitzchok and I will go alone.” But here I repeat my question, which my Grandfather DID NOT address. Yishmael was his own son, he was commanded to TEACH him, so why didn’t he take him? Wouldn’t it have been seen as GLORIOUS to Yishmael? For part one of the answer, I take you to my Zeideh’s sefer on the Torah, “Iyuneh B’Mikrah.” My grandfather states, on the verse in Divorim (12,V.30) where Moshe warns us, “Watch yourselves in the land you are conquering, for the people do what Hashem HATES! for also their sons and their daughters do they burn for their gods (today we see it in suicide bombings).” Then, suddenly, the Akedah is addressed by the Iyunei B’Mikrah(see Continued on Page 73

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 68

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

HEALTH & ADVICE

Dear Bubby If you would like advice from Bubby send your letters to: Bubby, c/o Country Yossi Family Magazine, 1310 48th Street, Suite 308, Brooklyn, New York 11219 or Fax to (718) 851-2510

Dear Bubby, Every summer my sister-in-law goes upstate for the summer to a bungalow colony. She and her four children enjoy the beautiful swimming pool, spacious grounds and phenomenal day camp. I, on the other hand, am stuck in the city with my two little ones. Unfortunately, my husband and I can’t afford to rent or purchase a bungalow, and even day camp is out of our budget. I try my best to entertain my kids; we go to the park, play indoors, etc. I do the best I can, but of course their summer is not what it should be. My brother and sister-in-law have a two-bedroom bungalow and a couch in the kitchen. I completely realize that with their kids, the bungalow is pretty packed - but I still feel that it wouldn’t kill them to have us up for a week once or twice. Even a couple of weekends would be nice. After all, we are family. We really wouldn’t mind squishing. Since when do kids mind bunking together? Not to mention that all week my brother is in the city, so that leaves an empty bed too. Whenever I hint to them that we’d love to come, they either change the subject or invite us for a Sunday barbeque. Bubby, imag-

ine driving all the way to the country just to have a barbeque, then driving home a few hours later. What I’m wondering is, whatever happened to hachnasat orchim? Am I expecting too much, or am I receiving too little? Yours Truly, Summer Blues Dearest Summer Blues, I will begin this letter by addressing the last line of yours. I tend to think that to some degree we all expect too much and receive too little. We all believe that our needs deserve to be met, and that people should accommodate us. At the same time we are somehow never completely satisfied, and are always feeling we deserve more. Having said that, your frustrations are neither here nor there but rather somewhere in between. You have every right to want your children to have a fun-filled summer, and I credit you for all your efforts at achieving this. However, you can not expect people to go above and beyond simply because you want them to. Perhaps what you view as no big deal is a big deal for someone else. What’s easy for one is challenging for another. So while you think squeezing

six kids into one bedroom would be easy and even fun, your sister-in-law probably views it as a tremendous inconvenience. She has every right to feel this way and to be honest with herself as to how much she can handle. Hachnasat orchim is certainly about inviting guests, but it’s also way more than that. It’s about making those guests feel welcome and comfortable. If a host feels that she is unable to do the mitzvah properly, then she is probably better off not doing it at all. After all, who would want to be a guest in a home where they are unwanted? Often in life we see things only from our own perspective. Try taking a step back and seeing things through your sister-inlaw’s eyes. Give her the credit she deserves for inviting you to spend Sundays with her family. True - it may not be what you had in mind, but certainly it should be appreciated. It is very easy to blame others and point our fingers when things don’t quite go the way we planned. This is obviously unfair and counterproductive. Rather than making the best of our various situations, we simply resent and begrudge those around us. Family is everything, and it would be a pity for you to allow these ill feelings to get in the way of a beautiful relationship. In closing, I would like you to keep in mind that children have a precious ability that we seem to lose as adults; and that is to appreciate the little things. Jumping rope, blowing bubbles, coloring, are just a few of the simplest things that children enjoy. Your kids can have a wonderful, funfilled summer. Your disposition, and the time that you spend with them, is far more meaningful than where they spend their summer. Behatzlacha! Love, Bubby

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 70

SEPT./OCT. 2016

HEALTH & ADVICE

Helping Our Kids succeed THis Year

t’s that time of year again. After weeks of frantic preparations, we walk our little ones to the bus stop for the first day of school in new outfits, crisp uniforms and fresh haircuts. They march forward (or lag behind) in their shiny new shoes, backpacks exploding with supplies, all in an effort to get this new year off on the right foot. We usher them onto the school bus and, frantically waving (or running) as they pull away, we are filled with hope and expectation that the year ahead will be a happy and successful one for our little ones. We whisper an extra prayer that day for Hashem to grant them blessings of kind teachers, good friends and success in their studies. If there were anything we could do to help them, we would do it. So what can we as parents do to help insure our children’s success this year? Recent comprehensive studies on the factors that influence success in school have found that emotional intelligence is not only a high predictor of academic success but of life success as well, improving health, happiness and decreasing risk behaviors. Emotional intelligence is a category that includes selfawareness, self-management, social

awareness and relationship management. Luckily there are easy but important ways that we can all help our children to develop their EQ. Talk to your kids about their day at school. Seems obvious, but it isn’t always easy. Me: Hi Sweety, how was your day? My kid: Hi Ma, fine. (Heading to bedroom to chill, for his tablet, or to a neighbor…) Should I think, “It must have been a good day or else he’d have something to get off his chest.” Or “It must have been a bad day if he’s running away from talking about it.” Or “I guess nothing noteworthy must have happened today.” Which is it? It can be hard to know, unless we develop the ability to engage with them on their level. To do this, it helps to have specific questions at the ready to help draw out the details of their day. This will help them learn how to share their personal experience, as much as it will help you gain a window into the life they are living 8 hours of each day away from you. Questions can include things like, what was the best part of your day? How about the worst? What made you laugh today? Who did you sit with at

z"ga, hra,

lunch? What did you do at recess? Gym? Tell me something interesting you learned… Something boring… What was the most challenging part of the day? Any of your friends/classmates seem to have a hard day today? Asking more pointed questions helps your child answer the question more easily and begin to process his own thoughts and feelings about his day as well as foster self-awareness. By giving him your time and attention you are showing him the importance of his feelings and experiences, which is a fundamental precondition for understanding the experience of others. Use the opportunity to reflect back the things he tells you. No, not in a weird Freudian way; reflective speech is actually important. It allows us to relate to the other person without focusing solely on the right response. It also conveys to the speaker that we are ‘getting it’ and that feels good and encourages more sharing. Once you get a good conversational groove going and your child is sharing regularly, you will undoubtedly hear things that make you want to dive right in to fixing, solving mode. Hold off and aim instead to guide your child to fix and solve on his own. When he needs help, show him how to brainstorm his options and weigh the pros and cons of each. If there isn’t a perfect solution, let him learn to adapt to changing conditions and grow his resilience through the challenges he overcomes. In adult life there are rarely perfect options. It’s ok for our kids to start learning how to cope with that now. It can be hard, but the experiential learning of managing your feelings and relationships both with teachers and peers in healthy and constructive ways is a big part of childhood. Much in the same way children skin their knees, run back to mama for comfort and run back out again, they need to be able to make social or academic mistakes, run back for comfort and then head out to try again with confidence. Use the word “yet” to help your kids understand that learning is an active process. It is easier to forgive ourselves for the mistakes we make without feeling ashamed when we tell ourselves that we didn’t know that yet. When he tells you he doesn’t know what to do, or how to do it, the answer is simply “yet.” Often we think we’re helping when we provide our kids with sophistiContinued on Page 87

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 71

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

CONTROVERSY

TODAY’S TOPIC: Frum Boys Who Smoke Sparkly: I think “frum” boys who smoke should be considered OTD even if they go to yeshiva and learn all day, etc. I think that girls should be more careful when it comes to dating these kinds of boys. Joseph: Girls have no choice but to marry smoking boys because, as is well known, there is a shortage of available boys for every girl and as it is some girls will be left with no one to marry. So without marrying smoking boys, even more girls will be left at the altar unable to marry anyone. Yeshivishyenta101: just because someone smokes doesn’t mean they are OTD! Abba_S: I don’t understand. Why are boys who smoke going OTD? Just because they don’t believe that smoking causes cancer they are OTD? You are bringing proof from a magazine? Would you say the same for parents who refuse to get their children vaccinated? I don’t smoke, nor does anyone in my family, but my son-in-law does. He is a good husband and only smokes outside the house or car and never in front of the children. Girls who limit themselves to those who don’t smoke may miss marrying their bashert. Lesschumras: I’ve often wondered where they get the money. Cigarettes are expensive. A girl who marries a smoker is also going to be bringing the stench and filth into her house, as well as the secondhand smoke that will endanger the health of her children as well as her own. Health: You think that just because someone smokes it doesn’t mean they are OTD? Sure they are! As a matter of fact, some yeshivas will throw out a smoker!

Mynameismysecret: The Torah says you should be healthy, and smoking is not healthy. But just because you smoke you are not “OTD.” If so, all the fat people of the world are OTD too. I want a healthy husband for my kids, so no smoking is accepted. But I understand if someone smokes from time to time. Joseph: Once there are only smokers left to marry in their age category, 25-year-old girls will have to choose between a young smoker or a 50+ year-old. Syag Lchochma: Girls don’t have a choice? Who are you trying to bait on this one? I wouldn’t allow a smoker into my family any more than I would allow anyone with any other self-serving, self-absorbed, inconsiderate, hypocritical midda. Just saying… Joseph: What if the choice is a nice boy in all regards, except that he smokes, or being a spinster? Syag Lchochma: When you do things l’shma - like choosing the right Torah values for your future home - you aren’t choosing between a smoker and a spinster. I think that statement is disgusting and lacks bitachon on all levels. WolfishMusings: I know you didn’t mean this when you wrote it, but I have to tell you, I find your definition of OTD to be personally offensive. My mother was raised in a non-observant home and began smoking as a teenager. After her marriage broke up (at age thirty) she became Orthodox as a single mother, encouraging my sister and me to become shomrei Torah u’mitzvos. She sacrificed personally and professionally to remain a shomeres Torah u’mitzvos and if you were to ask her if she could have any one thing

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 72

SEPT./OCT. 2016

in the world (and only that thing), it would have been that her children become/remain fine, upstanding frum Jews. She fought to get my sister and me into yeshivos, recognizing that public school was not the option that would serve our spiritual growth. She faced opposition from yeshivos that did not want us but, with the help of HKBH and some friends, she was able to prevail. I was not the best of teens and certainly gave my mother a fair amount of grief. While I did not appreciate it as a child, I know that she shed plenty of tears in prayer that her children grow up to establish Torah-observant homes. As her health failed (she had lots of health issues unrelated to her smoking, although the smoking certainly didn’t help them), she would still do whatever she possibly could to observe the mitzvos to the best of her physical ability. Anyone who knew her would characterize her as an example of a pillar of faith. Anyone who had her extensive health problems after becoming observant could almost be excused for questioning their faith, but my mother, despite being in physical pain for the last twenty five years of her life, never questioned her faith. I never once heard the words “Why me?” (or the equivalent) escape her lips. Over the years, she tried several times to stop smoking but was never successful. Despite all sorts of encouragement, cajoling and support from my sister and me and our children, she was just never able to kick the habit. So, yeah, she should not have smoked. Granted. Bad on her for that. But to hear you cavalierly toss off this woman as “off the derech” and equate her with people who are mechallel Shabbos, eat pork and don’t observe the mitzvos in general is deeply offensive. Of course, you didn’t know my mother and you were thinking of yeshiva bochrim rather than a woman who completely changed her life and made a major commitment to Yiddishkeit, sacrificed for it, cried for it and made it (and her children’s commitment to it) the central focus of her life. But that doesn’t change the fact that you still want to lump her in with the completely non-observant. Please be careful when you throw out the term OTD and who you decide to include in that category. I think that, given how much she demonstrated her commitment to Torah and mitzvos over the course of her life, it is deeply unfair and (admittedly unintentionally) offensive to categorize her as “off the derech” for the habit she could not kick. It’s as if you’re saying “all that you did is meaningless, because you were still off the derech.” Yehudayona: My daughter married a smoker. He went to a yeshiva in Israel where everyone smoked including the Rosh Yeshiva. She (and we) saw that despite his smoking, he was a good person and would be a good husband and father. Within the first year of marriage, he quit smoking. Miamilawyer: Can we all agree that comparing smoking to being OTD was probably not meant literally and probably was a poor choice of words? The larger point, however, is valid. Obviously, smoking is not a good habit and it is certainly reasonable to say it is a strike against a person, and for some people, it may be a deal breaker. But everyone has their own deal breakers. I also note that, as with many things, times have changed, so any reference to people who grew up in the past and struggled with smoking when it was more common is not relevant (except to the point about it being like OTD, which I don’t think the poster really meant). I went to Hebrew Academy and the Rabbi who served us the kosher food and his wife smoked (not while serving, but there was a stench). It bothered some then, it would be unheard of now. And today, I think an inference can be drawn that someone who smokes is more of a rebel than in the past, when it was quite common. Of course, like anything else, there are exceptions, but it is a fair generalization if not an absolute rule.

z"ga, hra,

Mik5: There are opinions that smoking [at least on a regular basis] is an issur d’oraysa. We are dealing with a safek issur d’oraysa, people. Certainly to start smoking is forbidden. If one is already addicted, maybe he doesn’t have to quit cold-turkey, but on the other hand, there are ways to quit. In Hagaon Harav Elazar Shach’s younger years, he was a heavy smoker. He even used to say that he cannot stand being without a cigarette, and that he doesn’t understand how a person can create chiddushim in Torah without a cigarette, for the smoking helps one concentrate and focus on the depths of Talmudic discussions. This is how he conducted himself for many years, until he once had to undergo a serious operation, and his doctor instructed him to stop smoking during his recuperation period. After recuperating, he asked the doctor if he could start smoking again, and the doctor answered, “If you have already stopped smoking, it would be better for you not to begin again.” (This was before it was known how injurious smoking was to one’s health). Rav Shach’s reaction was, “If smoking is dangerous for my health, even slightly, I will stop completely.” He took the pack of cigarettes that had been waiting for months on top of his dresser, and threw it away immediately and forcefully. Long afterwards, he recalled that from the moment he made the decision to stop smoking, he instantly ceased to feel any need to smoke, and he did not miss it at all. He often recounted this incident to members of his family and talmidim as a demonstration of the fact that “nothing can stand in the way of a man’s will. Making a decision itself may be difficult, but when one decides with full conviction to change a habit, it is possible to stick to a decision.”

Dov Shurin… Continued from Page 68 the full text in the Sefer). He writes that the Gemorah brings (Sanhedrin 89) that Satan was walking with Avraham Avinu, trying to convince him NOT to do such a disgusting thing! And Avraham wisely didn’t get into an argument with him. Now can you imagine if Yishmael would have come with his father? He would have said, “Dad, do it. It’s what Hashem wants! Do it, YES, do it. You MUST SACRIFICE YITZCHOK!!! Yishmael’s mother was from the children of Chom, the cursed son of Noach, who didn’t want Noach to have any more children to share the inheritance of the world with. He sinned to keep his father from procreating. So now Yishmael would be the only child that would inherit from Avraham! And now part two of my answer: Avraham Avinu left both his attendants with the donkey, while Yishmael, we presume, knew what his father was asked to do. There was wood, a fire and a knife, and Yitzchok was the Korben. But Avraham was teaching for all time what Rebbe is telling us in Mishna 1, Chapter 2. Right there, Avraham was coining the teaching of “that which is glorious to G-d and Man.” Avraham Avinu was in fact being mikayem the mitzva of “V’Shinantom Livanecha” by having Yishmael stay with the donkey,(where he still remains to this very day!). Shana Tova. dovshurin@yahoo.com

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 73

Country Yossi Family Magazine

SEPT./OCT. 2016

INCREDIBLE ACHMAN SELTZER - ARTSCROLL RABBI N MANDEL RABBI MANIS IMON FINKELMAN - ARTSCROLL RABBI SH KAPLAN KSMAN REB. VICHNA N D. S. LEIBOWITZ AND D. GLI REBBETZI F EMUNAH OKSHOP THE HEART OUVEN SCHMELCZER - ISRAEL BO RABBI R AH VOL. 2 LIVING EMUNAVID ASHEAR - ARTSCROLL RABBI D O GIVE IN THE POWER TOSHE ROCKOVE - FELDHEIM RABBI M OUR TABLE ULLER - ARTSCROLL RENEE M OOKSHOP NEZIRAH G - ISRAEL B ER B N EE R G TZIREL NOT DARK THE NIGHT IS GOLAN - ARTSCROLL YEHUDIT ROLL .3 OW - ARTSC WHAT IF VOL ZILBERSTEIN, RABBI M. SHERR RABBI Y.

1. Neimas Hachaim - Aderet 2. Bring the House Down - Avraham Fried - Aderet 3. Ani Kan - Shlomo Simcha - Aderet

1. Bring the House Down - Avraham Fried - Aderet 2. Neimas Hachaim - Aderet 3. Dance 2 - Shloime Daskal

1. Bring the House Down - Avraham Fried - Aderet 2. We Are a Miracle - Yakov Shwekey - Nigun 3. Rak Lekayeim Mitzvos - Yehuda

SEPT./OCT. 2016 1. Shmueli 2 - Shmueli Ungar - Nigun 2. Bring the House Down - Avraham Fried - Aderet 3. L'chaim Kindergarten: Elul/Tishrei - L'Chaim

IMPORTANT NOTE These ratings are supplied by the 7 major Jewish music outlets listed here, based on their actual sales over the last thirty days in the Greater New York area. The list does not reflect total sales of any CD. It does not include sales in other stores, cities or countries (Israel!). The list is designed to be an indication of whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s currently popular in New York. Although every effort has been made to ensure fairness and accuracy, this list is published for entertainment purposes only and Country Yossi Family Magazine is not responsible for any inaccuracies or misrepresentations. 76

1. Bring the House Down - Avraham Fried - Aderet 2. We Are a Miracle - Yakov Shwekey - Nigun 3. Energy - Eli Marcus - Aderet

1. Bring the House Down - Avraham Fried - Aderet 2. We Are a Miracle - Yakov Shwekey - Nigun 3. Hakhel - 8th day - Aderet

1. Bring the House Down - Avraham Fried - Aderet 2. Ani Kan - Shlomo Simcha - Aderet 3. We Are a Miracle - Yakov Shwekey - Nigun

1. Twins from France Cholent - Aderet 2. Shtetl - Rachel's Place - Aderet 3. The Rebbe's Niggunim - Torah Treasures

1. Shtetl - Rachel's Place - Aderet 2. Twins from France Cholent - Aderet 3. Bella Bracha Goes to a Wedding - Aderet

1. Shtetl - Rachel's Place - Aderet 2. The Chol Hamoed Circus 2 - Nigun 3. Mali - Malky Weingarten - Nigun

SEPT./OCT. 2016 1. Der Kroin Brent - Nigun 2. Shape Fitness - Aderet 3. The Chol Hamoed Circus 2 - Nigun

IMPORTANT NOTE 1. The Rebbe's Niggunim - Torah Treasures 2. The Chol Hamoed Circus 2 - Nigun 3. Bella Bracha Goes to a Wedding - Aderet

1. Wishes - Nigun 2. The Chol Hamoed Circus 2 - Nigun 3. Shtetl - Rachel's Place - Aderet

1. The Chol Hamoed Circus 2 - Nigun 2. The Rebbe's Niggunim - Torah Treasures 3. Shtetl - Rachel's Place - Aderet

These ratings are supplied by the 7 major Jewish music outlets listed here, based on their actual sales over the last thirty days in the Greater New York area. The list does not reflect total sales of any DVD. It does not include sales in other stores, cities or countries (Israel!). The list is designed to be an indication of whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s currently popular in New York. Although every effort has been made to ensure fairness and accuracy, this list is published for entertainment purposes only and Country Yossi Family Magazine is not responsible for any inaccuracies or misrepresentations. 77

SEPT./OCT. 2016

H U M O R

The Boro Park ConsTruCTion Zone

ave you ever noticed that no matter which block you walk down in Boro Park there is some type of construction going on? This is no joke. Any year, any month, any week, any day, any hour, there is bound to be some major building happening on every single street in the neighborhood. This is just a simple fact of life when living in a neighborhood like Boro Park. As soon as you walk out of your home you’re confronted by backhoes, front-loaders, jackhammers and cement-mixers all clunking, grinding and completely chewing up the terrain all around you. Leaving your home now requires wearing a hardhat and a reflective vest. Some people are actually so close to the work that is constantly going on that according to New York City regulation they need to walk out of their homes holding a ‘Men at Work’ sign. Even while you’re in your own home in Boro Park you’re no longer safe, and definitely not sound. With all the construction going on it takes triple-pane windows, extra-heavy-duty wall insulation and two sets of earplugs to keep the raucous construction sounds from outside just to a minimum. Once the clock hits six in the morning there’s not even a remote chance of getting any sleep at all. The sounds from digging, banging, clopping and scraping are just so loud and intrusive that instead of trying to get any sleep you may as well throw in the towel and just get up and spend your morning organizing your minischnapps bottles in your curio. When it comes to all the construction that goes on in Boro Park you

don’t even have to count the little projects like knocking down old houses to put up six-story buildings. Those tiny construction projects hardly even register on the scale at all. The construction work that regularly goes on in the neighborhood mostly consists of ripping down complete square city blocks, digging craters the size of Mars and then building up skyscrapers that almost reach the moon. All this construction in such a small area can be the cause of many problems. Take driving, for instance. Any time you leave your home to drive somewhere it ends up being a complete pain in the neck. As if driving in Boro Park wasn’t tough enough, the added stress and craziness from all the construction can drive anyone batty. Even drivers with many years of experience driving in other cities have been known to donate their cars to charity after moving to Boro Park. The challenges of driving a vehicle in Boro Park are extraordinary. In order to travel by car around Boro Park you need many hours of practice driving on a slalom just in order to be able to safely avoid all the obstacles in the road created by the construction. As a driver, you have to be able to weave around all the work trucks, be able to bob to avoid the gaping holes that have been dug, and be able to fly to make sure not to mistakenly drive into a fresh road being laid or a new building foundation being poured. Due to all the construction going on in the neighborhood, parking becomes an even more intense struggle than usual. With construction happening in the area, the few remaining legal parking spaces are either gated off as part of the work zone or are used to

store the hundreds of mammoth construction machines and vehicles. Parking has actually become so bad that on most weeks on Erev Shabbos you can observe dozens of people still circling their blocks for parking long after their wives have lit Shabbos candles. Aside from all the topographic hindrances associated with construction in Boro Park, there are some seismic issues as well. As it turns out, all the construction of these massive buildings in this small area have been creating major tremors in the neighborhood. What people thought to be a mini-earthquake was in actuality the effect of a one-hundred-foot, fiftyton steel beam being pounded into the ground as part of the foundation of a new housing complex being built. What’s most bothersome about all the construction in the Boro Park neighborhood is the utter lack of planning and cooperation. Have you ever noticed that as soon as any road has been replaced with beautiful, smooth new asphalt, the next day a construction crew arrives to rip it all up to move a pipe or a wire? You would think that they could have done the pipe or wire work the day before, when the road was all nice and ripped up already. It makes you wonder what qualifications you need to become a city planner that is aside from not being able to plan at all. The situation in Boro Park has become so hopeless that most people in the area have had to become extremely creative with how they deal with the major inconveniences of all this construction. Some people have tried contacting their local politicians and their local Rabbanim, only to find out that they are also having major construction work done on their homes. The most effective approach that people have been taking at this time has been to just join the enemy and become construction workers themselves. Chaptzem is a heimishe blogger that authors the Chaptzem Blog, the most popular heimishe website. The Chaptzem Blog has been quoted many times in the mainstream media and is viewed by thousands daily. www.chaptzem.blogspot.com

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 80

z"ga, hra,

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

H U M O R Mommy’ s Money

ones’ spaghetti. Just then the phone rang. I didn’t want to give up my ketchup battle just yet, so I asked my 4-year-old daughter to answer it. “Mommy, it’s the Rabbi,” my daughter called a second later. But before I had a chance to reach the phone, I heard her saying, “Sorry. Mommy can’t come to the phone right now. She’s hitting the bottle.” R.I., Crown Heights

My preparations for a Pesach-time visit from my children included a trip to the bank. While waiting in line for the teller, I lamented to the middle-aged man behind me, “My children are in their 20s, and I’m still giving them money. When does it end?” “I’m not sure I’m the one to ask,” the man said, glancing uncomfortably at the paper in his hand. “I’m here to deposit a check from my mother.” Y.T. Monsey

Get Rich Quicker

Tacklin’ the Laundry One day, while I was busy cleaning for Pesach, my housework-challenged husband decided to wash his own sweatshirt. Seconds after he stepped into the laundry room, he shouted to me, “Hey, what setting do I use on the washing machine?” I replied, “It depends. What does it say on your shirt?” He yelled back, “Green Bay Packers!” B.N. Highland Park

Laughing Over Spilled Milk

SINGING HIS OWN PRAISES

n a fancy shul in the ritziest section of London, a chazzan stood before the congregation one Shabbos morning. He looked around with a smug grin on his face and, in a booming voice, proclaimed, “Two years ago I insured my voice with Lloyds of London for $500,000.” An awed silence fell over the crowd. The chazzan puffed out his chest and was about to begin singing when an elderly woman in the back of the room suddenly broke the silence. “Well?” she called to the chazzan. “What did you do with the money?”

My 2-year-old son was eating a bowl of Cheerios for breakfast when some milk spilled on the table. I went to get a napkin, and when I came back I saw him dipping his fingers into the milk and dabbing it onto his cheeks. I was about to holler when I heard him saying, “A guta voch ...” S.R. Flatbush

The Battle of the Bottle One evening, while giving my kids a quick pre-Pesach supper, I was trying desperately to get some ketchup out of the bottle and onto my little

Mother had decided to trim her household budget wherever possible, so instead of having her dress dry-cleaned before Pesach, she washed it by hand. Proud of her savings, she boasted to my father, “Just think, Yankel. We are 10 dollars richer because I washed this dress by hand.” “Good,” he retorted. “Wash it again!” W.E., Flatbush

North-Bound Creepy Crawly My 2-year-old niece, who lives in Lakewood, has done a lot of traveling to Boro Park to visit her grandparents. One Shabbos when she was at my house, I overheard her singing, “The itsy-bitsy spider went up the Garden State ...” B.T., Boro Park

Send your true anecdotes, embarrassing moments, bright sayings, real life experiences, or any interesting incident relating to Jewish life in America to: COUNTRY YOSSI MAGAZINE, 1310 48th Street, Brooklyn, New York 11219. All printed submissions will receive free tapes or another valuable prize. Winners should bring legal I.D. PRIZES WILL NOT BE MAILED

e-mail: country@countryyossi.com

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 83

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

H U M O R

oy, it’s good to be home. I had some summer. The first week two of my kids came down with chicken pox. Just as they got better my other one came down with it. The next week the whole colony came down with NITS. I spent a day ‘NIXING’ everyone, two days in the laundry room and spent $17.00 worth of quarters. Then my husband and I ate out and that evening came down with a mild case of food poisoning. The next week my husband never made it up for Shabbos due to flooding on the FDR Drive and spent Shabbos in Monsey. One child fell off the bunk bed and needed stitches on the chin. Do you know what they charge for a stitch? $100! What do they use - 24K gold thread? My kid needed 25 stitches. I told the doctor to do the first one and I’ll do the rest myself. I could’ve bought a custom human hair shaitel for what I gave out for stitches this past summer. And then to top it all off my neighbor came down with hepatitis and we all had to get shots. Ah yes, its been quite a summer. And then for some strange reason, every time it rained, where do all the kids go to play? Not their bungalows, that put my house in the city to shame. With their front decks, back decks, side decks, Pella windows, sky-lights, cathedral ceilings, central air conditioning, 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, wall-to-wall carpeting, a family room and some even have finished basements. But vee kimin zay tzu krichin to my measly one bedroom bungalow where you have to climb over a bed to get to the refrigerator and a bedroom with 4 bunk beds and a crib packed in and you have to be a contortionist to change the linen. It’s so hot I have fans going on every flat surface available.

Some intake, some exhaust, some blowing up, some blowing down, some oscillating, some not and you could still pass out. People stop me and tell me what a beautiful sunburn I have. I tell them it’s not sunburn - it’s WINDBURN!

ANOTHER KAYL A CL ASSIC

you thing the resource room was? The one measly bedroom where I was resting! When another child arrived they made her the lady that checks for nits! Later, when they switched to playing house - one was the mother, one was the child, one was the cleaning lady and the other was the live-in maid! How’s that for Chinuch? Another thing that amazed me is the way no one claims anything from the laundry room at the end of the summer. I mean there are tons of things lying around! So the last few years I’ve begun collecting all the unclaimed socks and taking them home with me. Inevitably, some out of the one hundred or so socks match some of those that I have floating around the house. Especially the men’s black nylon ones with the black cable or block design running down the side. I think every male in America age 13 and up owns these socks and nebach we women have to stand for hours under a fluorescent light at just the right angle to see if we have a match. Then one day it hit me - who cares if they match! No one sees the design anyway. The pants cover it! And even if the pants didn’t cover it, I have yet to see someone bend down to the ground to look and see if the designs match! So ladies stop making yourselves crazy and as long as both socks are black, pair them up and “veiter gegongin!” Anyway, to get back to what I was saying - it’s great to be home. The first thing I did was kiss my washer and dryer. Then I sat my kids down and explained to them that we are now back to civilization and a diet of pizza, bagels and macaroni is simply unacceptable. What should I tell you - they all turned white. You see my kids love milchig. They wait all year for the nine Continued on Page 87

K ay l a Kuchle f fe l BACK TO CIVILIZATION When I ask them why they don’t take everyone to their house to play, being that they have so much more room, you know what they answered? Their mother doesn’t let them play in their bungalow because they make a mess so she locks the door. Nu? Ich freg deer? And what was it that they always played? What they hate all year School!! I don’t know - in my day when you played ‘school’ there were two roles. One girl was the teacher and the other was the student. If more kids came by you just made more students in the class. After a half an hour you switched roles. Not any more! In the beginning they had one student and one teacher. When another child arrived I assumed she would be another student WRONG! They made her the “Resource Room Teacher.” I never knew that word until I was 30! And where do

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 85

SEPT./OCT. 2016

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 86

z"ga, hra,

SEPT./OCT. 2016

Sherri Toiv… Cont. from Page 71 cated solutions to social problems. What we succeed in doing instead, is polarizing kids from each other by helping to create scenarios none of them are mature enough to handle yet. The environment only becomes more hostile and more difficult for everyone to learn in. Instead, teach your kids to lead with kindness. Teach them to use the empathy you have modeled in your own relationship with them, and tell them over and over to stand up for others, the same way you hope they stand up for themselves, with confidence and self-assurance. If they tell you someone was sad, mistreated, alone, or rejected, ask them what they did to help. “If you see something, say something” applies to our kids’ classrooms. None of us will ever regret raising a socially responsible, emotionally intelligent child. May all our efforts be rewarded! Sheri Toiv-Ellenberg, LMHC maintains a private practice in Brooklyn specializing in relationships, anxiety and depression. She can be reached at 917-332-7508 or on the web @ sheritoivlmhc.com

Kayla… Continued from Page 85 days to come. That’s the best part of their summer. Actually, I think it would be more of a mitzvah for them to eat fleishigs during that time and then they would takeh be in mourning every day. I would have milchigs only once a week. I then began unpacking the boxes in a frenzy because I had 6 weddings and 8 bar mitzvahs to attend Labor Day weekend, not to mention all the shopping that had to get done for Yom Tov. Then what really put the pressure on was when I noticed out of the corner of my eye my neighbor had their succah up already! In the midst of all the chaos my husband comes in from shul and informs me that they’re making the seating arrangements for Yom Tov and where would I like to sit? Where indeed! One year he bought me a seat under the air conditioner vent and I got frostbitten. Not only that, but it kept dripping on my head and machzor and people thought I was crying the whole davening. I used up a whose box of

z"ga, hra,

tissues and I heard a lady in back of me whisper, “nebach, zee miz hubin groiseh tzouris!” One year I sat near a window so I would get a “BREEZE’” but the older woman next to me complained she was getting a “DRAFT,” so I shut the window and nearly passed out from the heat. One year I sat on a wooden bench that kept snagging my $10 pantyhose. By the time davening was over they were kneehi’s. Another Yom Kippur I sat next to a woman whose kids came to her every two minutes for nosh. I wouldn’t have minded so much if she had an aisle seat, but she was the 6th seat and my toes were swollen from being stepped on so many times. Not to mention I was getting nauseous from the smell of pizza wheels and shoe leather. And one year I sat next to someone who reeked of perfume. I was coughing and gagging the entire davening. So where will I sit? I’m afraid to find out! Maybe this year I’ll sit next to you and write about you next year. Wherever you sit - have a wonderful Yom Tov and a gut gebencht yur!

For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 87

SEPT./OCT. 2016

z"ga, hra,

ALPHABETICAL ADVERTISER DIRECTORY 613 TORAH AVENUE......................................(718) 854-3482 ................................30

JN STORM WINDOWS & DOORS CO...........(347) 581-6238 ................................49

A THRU Z/MOTOR VEHICLE SERVICES ......(718) 686-1405 ..................................3

KATZ TRIMMING/C/O MR. KAT .....................(718) 436-5198 ................................34

A&V PRIME EXTERMINATOR........................(347) 768-4626 ................................45

KOBY’S TRANSPOTOURS INC.....................(800) 872-5629 ................................86

AD ART PRESS ..............................................(718) 438-7200 ................................45

KOLLEL CHIBAS YERUSHALAYIM...............(718) 633-7112 ................................25

ALEXANDRA’S SALON AND SPA.................(718) 438-5114 ................................44

KUPAT HA’IR...................................................(866) 221-9352 ..................................7

ALLSTATE INSURANCE ................................(718) 859-7900 ................................14

MANHATTAN BEACH JEWISH CENTER ......(718) 975-4880 ......Inside Back Cover

ALL-STATE MOTOR VEHICLES ....................(718) 436-5956 ................................41

MATERNICHIC MATERNITY ..........................(718) 258-6193 ................................40

APOTHECARIE ...............................................(718) 697-7570 ................................24

MEAL MART OF AVE M .................................(718) 998-0800 ................................57

ARI RENT A CAR............................................(718) 513-3838 ................................16

MALCHUT JUDAICA ......................................(718) 436-0707 ................................11

BETH TORAH..................................................(718) 975-4880 ......Inside Front Cover

MEIR KESSLER,RPA-C ..................................(718) 252-9066 ................................13

BORO PARK AUTO BODY.............................(718) 435-5556 ................................87

MILLER’LOCKSMITH .....................................(347) 613-0546 ................................86

BORO RUG AND CARPET.............................(718) 853-3600 ................................39

MORAH RIVKY PLAY-GROUP .......................(718) 926-9318 ................................86

CHINA GLATT .................................................(718) 438-2576 ................................26

MR. CLEAN .....................................................(347) 369-3051 ................................36

COUNTRY YOSSI............................................(718) 851-2010 ................................78

PEANUTS ........................................................(718) 686-0111.................................15

D’ROSE LINENS .............................................(718) 854-7269 ................................62

PLAZA AUTO ..................................................(718) 975-9000 ................................22

DAVID HOORY ................................................(631) 391-5816 ................................74

QUALITY CARPET..........................................(718) 941-4200 ................................69

DELUXE PASSPORT EXPRESS....................(718) 387-5441 ................................18

REB MEIR BAAL HANESS ............................(718) 243-2495 ................................10

DEVOIRY ZUTLER..........................................(718) 421-0790 ..........................20, 59

RENAH APPLIANCE REPAIR ........................(718) 694-0900 ................................61

DO-ALL TRAVEL ............................................(718) 972-6000 ..................................1

SANDEL’S LEGACY .......................................(845) 662-4151 ................................31

DR. MELINDA KELLER ..................................(718) 854-9292 ................................29

SHAKLEE ........................................................(718) 851-9478 ................................86

DREAMSCAPE REALTY ................................(718) 871-2250 ................................23

SKINNY HABITS .............................................WWW.LTDIET.COM.........................54

EURO HOUSE TILE AND MARBLE...............(718) 339-9469 ..................................4

SLEEPTIGHT BEDDING.................................(718) 438-3933 ................................82

EUROPEAN CLOSET & CABINET ................(800) 640-2567 ................................42

STRETTINER SIMCHA HALL.........................(718) 258-9685 ................................43

EXCLUSIVE HOME FASHIONS .....................(718) 854-4890 ................................47

TABLE PADS...................................................(917) 776-7371 ................................28

EXPEDITE PASSPORT...................................(718) 782-4700 ..................................9

THE WINE BARREL .......................................(718) 436-1031 ..................................8

EZRAS YISROEL ............................................(718) 877-4644 ................................17

TIP TOP ...........................................................(718) 853-5100 ..................................2

FASTPORT PASSPORT .................................(877) 910-7277 ................................63

TRADITIONS EATERY....................................(718) 376-3354 ..................................6

FIT ME .............................................................(718) 375-6666 ................................67

TRAFFIC VIOLATIONS ...................................(917) 988-5800 ................................61

FOCUS CAMERA............................................(718) 437-8800 ................................19

UNIQUE SHOFARS.........................................(718) 619-4271 ................................43

GEMACH ROFEH............................................(888) 623-8854 ................................64

VAAD TARCHEI L’REFUAH ...........................(877) 973-9824 ................................81

GOLDSTEIN PRESS.......................................(718) 252-5685 ................................67

WILLIAMSBURG SEWING & VACUUM.........(718) 384-0851 ................................84

GREATER WINDOW AND DOOR ..................(718) 972-2626....Outside Back Cover

YAD L’ACHIM ..................................................(866) 923-5224 ................................32

HAIR DESIGN ACADEMY ..............................(800) 944-4966 ................................57

YEHUDA TOIV.................................................(800) 443-9868 ................................62

HATS PLUS .....................................................(718) 377-5050 ................................23

YITZCHAK WEISSMAN ..................................(347) 522-3272 ................................12

HOME SWEET HOME.....................................(718) 799-5912 ................................37

YOSSI NEUMAN ONE MAN BAND................(718) 483-5092 ................................86

IMAGINE THAT ...............................................(973) 966-8000 ................................44

YOUR TOP PRIORITY ....................................(718) 853-1576 ................................13

J DRUGS .........................................................(718) 258-6686 ..................................5

ZELDA’S ART WORLD ...................................(718) 377-7779 ................................35

Thank you for mentioning Country Yossi when patronizing our advertisers For Magazine Advertising Call: (718) 851-2010 88