Aspaqlaria

Keeping Torah and Values in Focus

Category: Ta`amei haMitzvos

Kehunah and Unity 0

4- Bamidbar / Forks / Holidays

Kehunah and Unity

Back on Chanukah I wrote: Chomos migdalei, the walls of my citadel [mentioned in the poem “Ma’oz Tzur“], were not the mighty walls around the Temple Mount or the walls of a fortress. They...

Small Jugs 0

1- Bereishis / Holidays

Small Jugs

In the beginning, or a few days later, Hashem created the sun and the moon. In Bereishis (1:16) the Torah says: “And G-d made the two large luminaries – the large luminary to rule...

Chanukah: Never Give Up 0

Holidays

Chanukah: Never Give Up

Chanukah tells us to never give up, no matter how formidable the challenge. When the Hasmonian family realized that they had no choice other than to confront the Greeks and attempt the impossible, they...

Mitzvos of Sukkos 0

Holidays

Mitzvos of Sukkos

(Copied from Sukkos 5766. -micha) There are many mitzvos that are specific to Succos. Aside from the mitzvos we can observe today, Succah, Hakafos, and the Four Species, there are also a number that...

Simchas Beis haSho’eivah 0

Holidays

Simchas Beis haSho’eivah

(Copied from Sukkos 5764. -micha) I There are many mitzvos that are specific to Succos. Aside from the mitzvos we can observe today, Succah, Hakafos, and the Four Species, there are also a number...

And with what? With a Shofar 0

Holidays / Yom Tov

And with what? With a Shofar

אמר רבי יהודה משום רבי עקיבא … אמר הקדוש ברוך הוא: … ואמרו לפני בראש השנה מלכיות זכרונות ושופרות. מלכיות: כדי שתמליכוני עליכם. זכרונות: כדי שיעלה זכרוניכם לפני לטובה. ובמה? בשופר. Rabbi Yehudah said...

Coronating G-d 0

Holidays / Yom Tov

Coronating G-d

(Significantly enlarged from the 2005 version. -micha) I Melukhah (kingship) is a major theme, if not the major theme of Rosh haShanah. Aside from the ubiquity of the word in our liturgy for Rosh...

Gender Differences: Oaths 0

4- Bamidbar / Gender

Gender Differences: Oaths

The Torah uses two different words for husband: ish, in particular when used with the feminine possessive “ishahh” (her man); and ba’al. Interestingly, in the beginning of parashas Matos, the section on annulling vows,...

Types of Thought: Gender Differences, part II 0

Fundamentals / Gender / Psyche

Types of Thought: Gender Differences, part II

In the previous post we spoke of gender difference in terms of extending society’s reach vs developing what we have – R’ Aharon Soloveitchik’s “kibush vs yishuv” (as discussed in this devar Torah for...

Gender Differences 0

Gender / Uncategorized

Gender Differences

(I had more to say on the each of yesterday’s post’s two topics, so it is being replaced with this and the next post.) In a post on parashas Chayei Sarah, I included R’...

0

Holidays

Mourning During the Omer, part II

As I wrote in the previous post, there are two events that we are commemorating by mourning during the omer, and they seem to have happened on different dates. Rabbi Aqiva’s students died in...

Mourning During the Omer 0

Holidays

Mourning During the Omer

א: אלו הימים שבין פסח לעצרת, מוחזק אצל כל ישראל זה שנות מאות רבות לימי דין וימי אבל, מפני שבזמן הקצר הזה מתו שנים עשר אלף זוגות תלמידי חכמים תלמידי רבי עקיבא, כדאיתא ביבמות...

Ge’ulah and Accepting Hashem as King 0

Eschatology / Holidays / Teshuvah

Ge’ulah and Accepting Hashem as King

(Significantly expanded May 6th.) When someone hears bad news, such as a death, the gemara (Pesachim 50a) tells them to say the berakhah of “Dayan haEmes“. This phrase is often translated “the True Judge”...

Defining Ge’ulah 0

Eschatology / Holidays / Pesach

Defining Ge’ulah

R. Shimon said: When the Holy One, blessed be He [– HQBH], came to create Adam, the ministering angels formed themselves into groups and parties. Some said, “Let him be created,” while others urged,...

Sipur 0

Pesach

Sipur

There are three words for counting that factor prominently in the Torah. Parashas Pequdei gets its name from Moshe Rabbeinu’s accounting of all the material collected for the mishkan. The root פקד has three...

Hagaddah 0

Pesach / Yom Tov

Hagaddah

A couple of years ago I collected some of my own thoughts and others from around the web into a commentary on the Haggadah shel Pesach. I took special care to give the seider...

Tam, what does he say? 0

Faith and Proof / Pesach

Tam, what does he say?

The text of our Haggadah for identifying the third son is somewhat ambiguous. The word “tam” means “simple”. It could refer to someone who is simple minded. And this is the interpretation assumed in...

Purim and Permanence 0

Anavah / Holidays

Purim and Permanence

One of the questions that have pried on my conscience is exactly how we managed to let life return to normal in the past 6 years. 9/11 was supposed to make everything different, but...

Recognizing Your Friend in the Dark 0

Holidays / Machashavah

Recognizing Your Friend in the Dark

Rav Hutner, in the Pachad Yitzchaq for Purim, addresses the famous medrash (on Mishlei 9) which says that after moshiach comes, all the holidays will cease except Purim. This is derived from the verse...

Simchah and Oneg 0

Holidays / Shabbos / Simchah / Yom Tov

Simchah and Oneg

Simchah is related to wanting and having, because Ben Zoma defines the wealthy person as “sameiach bechelqo — happy with his lot”. The Tanya speaks about how each aspect of the soul lives in...

Shemittah 3

1- Bereishis / Ta`amei haMitzvos

Shemittah

( You will notice that this entry is pretty much straight lomdus rather than my usual fare. When I wrote Rafi’s bar mitzvah speech, I ran overly long. Here is an even longer earlier...

The Last Tish’ah be’Av 0

Holidays

The Last Tish’ah be’Av

I recall one year I had just started a new camp. I was davening in the evening, at the very beginning of Tish’ah be’Av, and I heard a shofar blow. After a moment, I...

Hilkhos Mashiach 0

Holidays

Hilkhos Mashiach

On Avodah, Saul Newman gave the following summary of halakhos related to bi’as hamashiach from an article in the Yated. I found that the pragmatic halachic discussion gave some mamashus (tangibility) to the idea....

Hashem is Righteous 0

Holidays

Hashem is Righteous

Eli Turkel summarized some thoughts from the 100 pages introduction to the sefer “The Lord is Righteous in All His Ways”, from the notes of R’ JB Soloveitchikzt”l. The format isn’t the usual for...

Tzitzis: Advance and Retreat, part II 0

4- Bamidbar / Clothing

Tzitzis: Advance and Retreat, part II

I discussed the role of tzitzis and the various roles we have for clothing in a number of earlier posts in this topic. The following is a different take on the idea from Rabbi...

… The rest is commentary 0

Absolutism / Ta`amei haMitzvos

… The rest is commentary

(More material added on May 30th.) There is a famous story in the gemara (Shabbos 31a) about three prospective converts who each came to Shammai saying that they want to convert but only if...

Universalism 0

Ahavah / Ta`amei haMitzvos

Universalism

(Updated 12-Oct-2007: Added kaf zechus.) In today’s world, with the Orthodox community as tiny as it is, dealing with high costs of education and our own needs, our chessed tends to be focused on...

Like the Laws of Pesach 0

Faith and Proof / Pesach

Like the Laws of Pesach

חָכָם מָה הוּא אוֹמֵר? מַה הָעֵדוֹת וְהַחֻקִּים וְהַמִשְׁפָּטִים אֲשֶׁר צִוָּה ה’ אֱ-לֹקֵינוּ אֶתְכֶם? וְאַף אַתָּה אֱמָר לוֹ כְּהִלְכוֹת הַפֶּסַח: אֵין מַפְטִירִין אַחַר הַפֶּסַח אֲפִיקוֹמָן. The wise son of the Hagaddah asks, “What are the...

A Seder Thought 0

Pesach

A Seder Thought

From this month’s Yashar (The Mussar Institute‘s newsletter), “How Mussar Affected My Life — Student Profile” by By Dorit Golan Cullen. (I wrote the majority of this entry in an email to The Mussar...

This Year in Jerusalem 0

Pesach / Yom Tov

This Year in Jerusalem

The first Satmerer Rebbe, R’ Yoel Teitelbaum, writes the following thought in Vayo’el Moshe. When Yaakov first meets Rachel, he is at a well with some shepherds, waiting for enough to come by to...

Pesach: Freedom from Preconceived Limitations 0

Pesach

Pesach: Freedom from Preconceived Limitations

I appreciated this video from YU‘s Center for the Jewish Future. Something to think about: What does this notion of cheirus (freedom) say about the appropriate thoughts to have while cleaning the kitchen this...

Why do we light the new candle first? 0

Holidays

Why do we light the new candle first?

My son (4th grade) had a class Chanukah party, for which he was aked to prepare a devar Torah. A short vertl, a question and answer to fit in less than a minute. My...

Shiluach haQen 0

Psyche / Ta`amei haMitzvos

Shiluach haQen

This entry is a continuation of the previous one. I – Shilu’ach haQein האומר על קן צפור יגיעו רחמיך ועל טוב יזכר שמך מודים מודים משתקין אותו: One who prays, “Upon the birds nest...

Chayei Sarah – Kibbush and Chizuq 0

1- Bereishis / Fundamentals / Gender / Holidays

Chayei Sarah – Kibbush and Chizuq

1. Buying Ma’aras haMachpeilah It is interesting to note that Judaism’s holiest sites were not conquered but bought. Parashas Chayei Sarah opens with Avraham purchasing the Ma’aras haMakhpeilah and the fields around it. Later,...

Changing Name 0

Ta`amei haMitzvos

Changing Name

There are two places in halakhah where the criterion for whether something is significantly changed is whether there was a shinui sheim, a change in name. The first is in the laws of Shabbos,...