Last month, we took the liberty of offering post-election analysis a month after the election.

This month, the obliviousness goes further as we attempt to pay tribute to a person who left the world on Succos.

But it’s not a hesped, which is forbidden on these days. Once again, it’s an attempt at social commentary.

One of the great advantages of learning in yeshivah in Eretz Yisrael is that it offers young adults the chance to truly understand the differences between American and European bochurim.

There are several, but I focus on a particular one, brought home during Kabbalas Shabbos in one of the downstairs rooms of Beis Yisrael shtiblach. (This was the late ’90s. I have been there since and it’s not the same — well-intentioned gabbaim having slapped down marble slabs, expanded rooms, added sinks, and worst of all, replaced the single wilted, soiled, ragged towel that devotedly served hundreds of people each day.)

The weekly minyan was composed entirely of bochurim from Mir, who would then hurry off to seudos in Arzei, Maalot Dafna, and Sanhedria Murchevet, where they would be served apple crisp and chicken. (Different time. Even wealthy American couples didn’t serve meat on Shabbos, and chicken was on the bone. Remember, there were no magazines then, so how could anyone have any recipes?)

The baal tefillah chose a popular tune for Lecha Dodi, starting with gusto, members of the minyan eagerly joining in, but when he reached the high part, he paused. He seemed to freeze in place. I chapped what happened, because I’ve been there — he blanked, forgetting how the song continued.

Eventually, some baal chesed rescued him, continuing the song, but what I recall is the look of pure horror on the face of a slight British bochur next to me. His eyes opened wide and he blushed in empathy with the humiliation of the baal tefillah.

But the baal tefillah himself, an American, found it hilarious. He turned around after davening, beaming with pride, and for weeks after, he would recall the moment for anyone who asked and even those who did not.

The encounter confirmed my suspicion that in England, if someone goes off-key during a kumzitz, security immediately arrives and politely, but firmly, leads him out of the room while the other participants lower their eyes then resume singing in perfect harmony.

It’s the precision of good music meeting the precision of the British, and it can make for an intimidating mix.

Enter Yigal Calek.

What is it? What’s the secret of his music, the way it flows not past you, but through you?

It was on Chanukah of 2021 that London Boys Choir-love reached its international peak, no longer the first choice just for real snobs or people with many sisters. There was something mesmerizing in those much-publicized clips of gray-haired choir alumni farbrenging with their old director, the synergy and wordless flow between them, the way his withered hands functioned as a baton pulling forth intricate harmonies, a flick of his wrist able to speed or slow down the tempo as if he were turning a dial.

Those videos were magic. Every so often, my phone’s memory is full and I need to delete all videos — but those are the ones I keep re-saving out of an irrational fear that they will disappear and no one else on the planet will be able to access them.

And in those clips lies the answer.

A great salesman is necessary only when the product itself needs pushing; if the item being sold is desirable, then even a poor agent will succeed.

This was a man who clearly believed in his product, who felt that the poetry inherent in a pasuk or phrase of tefillah was enough for it to sell itself. It was musical purism — he shot high, confident that if the words were presented along with his interpretation of their tune, then people would connect.

He didn’t need lyrics that instantly, obviously suggest broken hearts and Jewish tears, because he believed that the poetry inherent in the scene of a mother bird sent away from her children is no less potent, that the drama of Devorah’s reproach to the people of Reuven, who appeared to choose the bleating of sheep over the honor of joining their people in war, would move us, if the resonance of her words could be reflected in cadence and tune.

What we have lost is not just the man and not just his compositions, but also that approach and its authenticity.

Today, music comes with built-in distractions, gimmicks to keep people engaged for more than one low part and one high part. If the words of a pasuk or tefillah are too complex or intricate, then it’s okay to surgically replace them with easier Hebrew or English ones, ’cause it’s all about inspiring people.

Okay, changing times, changing needs, fine, but we can at least appreciate the fact that Yigal Calek wrote songs that you will never see anyone singing at a kumzitz in a winery. (Yes, it’s a thing.)

I have a ra’ayah. If you can find those videos, look (if you can’t, I happen to have them saved on my phone), and you will notice something. There is a nice crowd, in a balabatishe home, with elegant furnishings, and ample refreshments, but there is little by way of decor: no party-planner forced lighting, no indication that anyone worked on creating a vibe, no oversized meat boards or uncorked bottles positioned at symmetrical intervals down the length of table, with waiters and bartenders hovering to ensure an endless supply of emotion.

(A friend was recently making a simchah, and the agent assembling the orchestra listed off various options and prices, then asked him if he davka wanted chassidishe musicians. My friend wondered why he would care if the trombone player wore a gartel during davening or not.

“Forget it,” the agent mumbled, “whatever… just some people like the flying peyos look, the optics of it, you know?”)

Actually, in those London clips, there are ornaments on display: a large menorah in the corner surrounded by smaller ones, because it is Chanukah.

From Heaven, it had been perfectly choreographed. Yavan got optics, a world where splendid music reflected visual elegance, external layers of glamour complementing one another. We also believe in beauty, but for us, it evokes and reflects the neshamah within.

If the oil is pure, you can strike a match, ignite the wick, stand back, and behold the simplest, most unadorned beauty. The externals have changed many times over the past 2,200 years — different language, clothing, architecture, and art — but the flickering flames that told a story then do so now, and if you believe that, you can lean in close and hear their song.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1042)

The post Hear His Song first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

IN the weeks following the presidential election, this magazine provided a more-than-adequate flow of analysis, exploration, and perspective on what happened, why it happened, and what it means.

A writer offering a few more election thoughts at this point is as welcome as the middle-aged guy who still finds himself hilarious and throws a pekeleh at the chassan after the shul has already quieted down and no one expects it.

So take this not as political commentary, but as social commentary — not about them, but about us.

Firstly, imagine Kamala had won the election. Many in our community would have been disappointed, or even worried. But then, a moment later, they would have shrugged and said what Jews say — i.e., some version of “The Ribbono shel Olam fihrt di velt, and He’s in charge.”

The fact that Trump won shouldn’t change that. It was always only Him, so we’re exactly in the same place regardless of who was elected.

Okay, but it still feels good. We were given a smile from Heaven at a time when we need it so badly; less a geopolitical transformation and more a morale-boost when we were feeling down. For this, #TYH.

My second post-election point: Can we please stop being choneif Chuck Schumer? I understand that those on the front lines of political shtadlanus sometimes have to swallow and shake hands with ideological opponents, but what’s the shiur? Our great rebbeim (both the Lubavitcher Rebbe and Rav Aharon Schechter, in different contexts) have taught us that we don’t ever say “yemach shemo” on a Jew, fine — but we don’t have to laugh enthusiastically when he calls himself a shomer Yisrael anymore, do we?

I feel like the next organization that makes it clear exactly how we view his duplicity, greeting him not with applause but with a cold, hurt silence, will make up whatever they lose in federal funding on a Charidy/Rayzeit/Whatever page within the hour, donors happy to invest in gaavasan shel Yisrael and basic self-respect. Oiss shoimer.

And the third point, the one I really wanted to get to — the previous paragraphs were just pleasantries. In an article analyzing the failure of the Democratic Party, one pundit astutely wrote, “When you have wealthy consultants talking to wealthy donors who are all living in an elite bubble, it can become detached from what messages will resonate with people who aren’t in the elite bubble… When you are surrounded by monied interests, you have to figure out how you don’t become bubble-ized.”

In their shower of funding, star-studded rallies, and virtuous-sounding taglines, they stopped seeing people. This one is so relevant to us.

Our communal structure is built on the generosity of the wealthy, and it is tzedakah that drives our mosdos, which do not turn a profit or benefit from ample government funding, for the most part.

It is natural that donors will take an interest in the causes they support, and thus it is natural that they will end up on the boards or advisory committees of these organizations. It’s also practical, because aside from helping make payroll, these are generally people who have worked hard and found success, and their own experiences can also help mosdos flourish. Along with this, a successful businessman has the luxury of being able to take time off, as necessary — a nine-to-five employee doesn’t get to take up mountain biking or work on his golf swing, so these lay leaders are giving that leisure time away to the klal, which is amazing.

So far, so good.

The issue is, When you are surrounded by monied interests, you have to figure out how you don’t become bubble-ized.

The few cannot make decisions for the many. You can’t have a group of high-net-worth individuals sitting around a table deciding if Shabbos food package recipients would rather get chicken tops or bottoms.

A friend once described sitting with a tuition committee, negotiating the terms for a new school year. They were suggesting a ten percent increase over the year before, while he felt it should not be ten percent, but twenty, and not an increase, but a decrease.

He explained the reasons: He had not changed jobs, but a child who needed a particular kind of therapy had drained his income, and a badly needed basement remodeling had forced him into debt. He shared this personal information uneasily and looked around at the faces of the men across from him. One was a successful real estate syndicator who had built himself up from nothing and had no sympathy for anyone who didn’t match his ambition and drive. One was a professional yoreish, who had never filled out a form in his life because his father still paid tuition for all the eineklach. And one was clearly somewhere else, still tanned from a quick visit to Turks and Caicos and deeply immersed in planning a getaway to Panama, because “it’s so important to make time for a marriage.”

My friend, to whom making time for his marriage means an occasional walk around the block with his wife, made a respectful point.

“You would not sit on a beis din and pasken sh’eilos about hilchos yuchsin, because you don’t know it, right?” he challenged them. “So why do you think it’s okay for you to sit here and pasken sh’eilos in hilchos ‘making ends meet,’ casting judgment on whether or not sending my son to camp for one month is appropriate or my wife should be driving a Kia instead of an Odyssey? The struggles of the middle class is not your sugya.”

The word bubble-ized in the quoted article resonated, because the danger exists in our camp too, this party called the Torah community. Our wealthy class is doing so much, but if we want our every organization and institution to be relevant, then we have to make sure that regular guys are getting air time at board meetings, too.

Some words change their meaning over time. Askan used to mean a person who was oseik, involved and devoted to the needs of the community. Then it started to be seen as another word for a person of prominence, and then it became stale, so naggid came back into use, a code word for rich respectable. You need neggidim to get things done, because money is important, and you need askanim, because so is dynamism and efficiency. But make sure your board has one regular guy (loosely defined as someone who still relies on credit cards, somewhat, has never flown private or sat in a stadium box, and knows when the Charles Tyrwhitt sale is).

Ayyy, you’ll ask me, the regular guys have to do that work thing, like with bosses and schedules, so when will they have time to askan-ize? It’s a fair question, so how about this: At least bring in board members who were once regular and can remember it, or at the very least, who associate with regular people.

The askan/nadvan/lay leader class is doing so much, giving heart and soul, resources and energy. If you’re around that table, make one more investment and try to make time to listen to the people you aim to serve.

It’s how you win.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1039)

The post Burst Your Bubble first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

I had the piece written, ready on schedule. It’s never nice to mess with the magazine’s production schedule, but especially at this time of year, when the calendar is a bunch of half-days and much of the production staff is fasting.

Then, on Motzaei Rosh Hashanah I heard news that shook me; that piece was shelved and I’m trying, just trying, to take the heaviness in my heart and turn it into words.

Perhaps the most moving part of the Mussaf of the Yamim Noraim starts with Unesaneh Tokef: We speak of the power of the day, and the gravity of judgment. But there is hope — a person can deflect a harsh decree, for Hashem knows of our frail nature. Man is like a broken shard… like a breeze that blows away and dust that scatters, like a dream that flies away. It appears to be a reflective rumination on the transient nature of man’s existence: Now he is here, and now he is gone.

But suddenly, inexplicably, voices rise and the joy is back: V’Atah Hu Melech — But You are King, G-d Who lives for all eternity!

How does this statement counter the earlier disheartening thought?

Since He is eternal, if we have an opportunity to use our brief sojourn in This World to encounter Him, to reinforce His glory, to elevate Him, then we, too, become part of that chai v’kayam and we, too, can live.

My friend Chaim Tzvi Katz was suddenly niftar on Rosh Hashanah, at just 28 years old, and this is what he taught me: Celebrate each moment of this fleeting, ephemeral existence and sing its song.

Chatzi, as he was known, lost his mother when he was 15 years old. In a piece he wrote for this magazine at the close of the year of aveilus, he showed a bit of the depth and sophistication hidden under the untucked white shirt.

He reflected on the year of having to daven from the amud — the inconvenience, humiliation, and awkwardness of it.

Now that the year is coming to an end, my first thoughts were… freedom at last. I could finally be a normal teenager.

But now I have mixed feelings…. You see, this whole ordeal gave me a special connection, a relationship to you, and you are looking down and smiling at me. I feel like you are going to Hashem and saying, “Look at my son and what he does for me. Please do for him.”

The physical and emotional struggles kept me thinking about what you did for me each day…. When I fought myself to get out of bed early, I remembered how you would drag yourself out of bed to wake me and lovingly send me off to yeshivah, despite your condition.

The year is coming to an end, but I don’t want to lose you. I will try to do good things for you….

Love,

Your ben yachid,

Chaim Tzvi

The imagery — a 16-year-old bochur pulling himself out of bed to make it to davening on time for the first Kaddish d’Rabbanan every day for a full year — would become his story, and it was this that made his music so meaningful.

In Lakewood, at Yeshiva Ateres Yisroel, he found a rebbi and with his rebbi’s encouragement, he eventually started to sing professionally — but he never became a professional singer.

Meaning — he was never an “other” to his audience, but part of the crowd, enjoying the music along with them. He was laughing uproariously along with the over-excited friends of the bar mitzvah boy; bursting with pride along with the 17-year-old mesayemim. Those were his favorite settings: bochurim, toil, and a room filled with dreams. And he was happy — so genuinely happy — for a chassan a year or two younger than him.

Sometimes a gig doesn’t go — people are speaking loudly, the sound system is having a bad night, or the host has placed him behind a potted plant, but Chatzi was able to remove himself from the equation and tease the hapless singer — himself — to roll his eyes good-naturedly and say “oh well.” I suspect he even enjoyed it, because this was human stuff. He never wanted to be shiny and he had no brand. He was just us, the people he was reaching.

He would talk about the struggle to connect, to feel, to really daven, but when he sang, you realized that he was way ahead of you. He didn’t announce that he was about to start davening or say “Ribbono shel Olam” or “Tatte,” but you could hear the slight shift in his voice and you knew that he was reaching deep: He knew that the Ribbono shel Olam is the Avi yesomim, and that he had a privileged relationship. Hashem malei rachamim, racheim alai.

We live in a golden age of Jewish music, with so many gifted singers, but I don’t know if there is another who can compare to Chatzi when it came not to showing his neshamah on stage, and instead using that stage to show you your neshamah.

At his very first gig, at this time of year, he sang the tune of “Chamol al Maasecha.” As he reached the high part, the Lakewood Rosh Yeshivah, Rav Yisroel Neuman, was leaving the hall.

Tukdash Adon, sang Chatzi, and the Rosh Yeshivah turned around and came back in, closing his eyes. Rav Yisroel is this generation’s example of the masmid to whom every second is cherished, so if he made the decision to reenter the hall, it is because he heard something.

This column is not meant to be an obituary, but an opinion: My untucked, uninhibited friend wasn’t super opinionated, but he had a unique ability to make you rethink a topic.

I once spoke publicly about Kabbalas Shabbos and the joy a Yid feels with the onset of the holy day. Chatzi took issue with the premise. “Maybe the books that speak of the anticipation that fills a Yid on Erev Shabbos aren’t doing us a favor,” he challenged me, as always, the lamdan cutting through the haze. “Maybe, it’s just that you work hard all week, you don’t really see your family much, and when you come home from shul Friday night, you’re anticipating the chance to just sit with people you love, enjoying a delicious seudah and singing.”

Being single, he told me, he experienced it differently. “I am usually a guest somewhere else for Shabbos, and I don’t have the experience of going into my own house, surrounded by my loved ones. I would also want to feel that joy, though. Shabbos isn’t just for married guys with their perfectly set table and kinderlach in matching Shabbos pajamas.”

Having shaken me out of my presumptuous delusions about my own appreciation for Shabbos, he became my chavrusa. On Fridays, we started learning a sefer called Sidduro shel Shabbos. The words of the sefer are esoteric, at times, and lofty. I would read them without completely understanding them sometimes, but Chatzi got them. Even if he wasn’t sure what each word meant, he perceived the depth of their message, sometimes humming them.

You see, the sefer speaks about how Shabbos is the stuff of humans, about the power of our little actions and feelings to prepare ourselves and create keilim to receive the light, and this was Chatzi’s turf: He had tasted pain at a young age, and he had learned to smile through it.

That was his music. That was his chein.

He was single, and Shabbos involved planning — he never did get to make Kiddush at his own table, but he learned to make Kiddush of a different sort, working to find the spark of Shabbos within himself and to make himself a vessel to receive it.

He taught me not to confuse love of family-time, good food, and a relaxed pace for a love of Shabbos, but to make sure its the real thing. And he showed me that a bochur still dreaming of a home of his own could aspire to grow in their love of Shabbos.

Chatzi’s music was not the song of angels, but of humans, and that is why it resonated.

Chaim Tzvi ben Rav Elya Nota. He lived a short life — like a fleeting dream — but, as if he sensed this, he used it to create a song that will play on. Notes of submission, notes of pain, notes of hope, and notes of glory to the One Who endures.

Ashirah laHashem b’chayai. We are here to sing. With his every breath, Chatzi sang.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1033)

The post Song of Humans first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

Mai Har Sinai? Har she- yardah sinah l’umos ha’olam alav. (Shabbos 89a)

It would seem that the hate is connected with our having received the Torah. Why is that? Do you feel this fierce, illogical hate toward someone who earns a PhD in molecular physics?

The hate, perhaps, is not about what we got, but more about what it means.

In every class, there is a kid who asks the rebbi a question just as the recess bell rings. (Later, as a rebbi, I discovered that the annoyance the kids feel toward their fellow student is not even close to… whatever.)

It is never appreciated. Leave us alone and let us go play ball.

If the neighbor on the rigorous diet who never cheats and goes running in the rain were miserable about it, you could live with him. But his pride and exuberance is what gets you. He loves his diet, and you can barely get up off the couch to glare at him as he tears past your window. (For sure listening to a shiur and no doubt ahead of the daf, guaranteed. It’s the same type.)

For the world, it’s been 3,300 years’ worth of ideas, each one capturing the attention of society, dictating behavior and convention for a while, then fading away as something shinier and newer comes along.

For us, we never really let go of the original idea, sticking with that program. The whole neighborhood is still trying diets that allow them to eat what they want — but don’t make them happy.

I write this because of what happened to America. Or better, what is happening to America. Another glorious empire that promised so much, founded on such noble, admirable principles, fallen victim to hate and insecurity — a symptom of not having a clear identity and mission.

I don’t know much about business, or how the markets work, but I do know, for example, that crypto was a weird concept that no one could really explain. Then, some people (and there’s one in every shul) were suddenly very rich cause they chapped it, and jumped in. We were happy for them.

Then, suddenly, they were wiped out because crypto was a sham, and we were sad for them. (The words “happy” and “sad” are being used loosely here — the emotions may or may not have been reversed.)

I think it’s back up now, but you get the point. No one can say that crypto is the best investment ever, because it’s been up and down.

TO be the best investment ever, value has to hold steady, or increase. It has to be the asset that you can still count on when every other asset in the portfolio has dipped.

At the Mir dinner a few months ago, one of the most powerful moments of the night came in a speech from a balabos who conveyed the most profound, simple truth.

Over the last few weeks, there was a phrase running through my mind, a lullaby that a generation of Yiddishe mothers sang to their children.

Toirah, these women hummed, iz di beste sechoirah.

Five words.

Five words that have played in the ears of Yiddishe kinderlach, but sometimes, it can take decades — the child all grown up, with children and grandchildren of his own — until he fully grasps the depth of the song.

I have spent many years in business. I have learned to recognize value in commodities, properties, and stocks, and some of them developed value, but about none of them can I say with conviction that they are the beste sechoirah.

Investments, deals, and portfolios have failed the test of time, but Torah endures — the time, the heart, the energy, and the resources we invested in it making us proud and grateful.

What made the message resonate was how frank and honest it was, the fact that Mr. Ralph Herzka works in the mortgage industry, and it hasn’t been the easiest few years in that space.

He, a child all grown up, with children and grandchildren of his own, had fully grasped the depth of the song.

Sometimes, in a foundering world, it’s good to take a step back and remind ourselves of what we have.

Mothers, teach your children to sing that song.

I want to share my own, original vort here. Granted, it’s not very good, not the sort with which you will impress your shver, but still.

The question is a legitimate one: Why did Klal Yisrael sleep soundly through the night before Matan Torah, so much so that the Ribbono shel Olam came and found them asleep in the morning? (Shir Hashirim Rabbah 1:12.)

Chazal say that they had been counting down the days until they received the Torah, filled with excitement and energy, so how could they oversleep on the day itself?

Here’s the somewhat cringy vort.

To sleep is to remain the same, comfortable and content. One who is restless and looking for change cannot sleep.

Hence, the term “woke,” which is very different from awake. Awake means alert and attuned, open to change — and open to forgiveness and self-reflection as well. Woke means furious and anguished and censorious of whatever was.

The Torah will never change. Before receiving it, the people went to sleep, proclaiming that they were just fine. The sleep was a message that this was not a seething, frenzied movement occupying highways, but a calm, contented, grateful people: not restless, but restful.

I may be dreaming, said the Ponevezher Rav, but I am not sleeping. Here, they may have been sleeping, but they were not tired.

Shavuos is our anniversary, always a special time for a couple — but there is something especially meaningful about the anniversary after the couple has endured a challenge together.

It’s been a year. The Torah carried us — those on benches gave their all for those on the front, faces radiant as they learned through bein hazmanims and afternoon breaks. Those on the front, faces worn and streaked, glowed when showing pictures of their newly printed Daf Yomi Gemaras. The world came crashing down, and the beste sechoirah did not go down in value, but up.

And we carried it too. We accepted it, right? We slept soundly, purposefully, indicating that we were truly comfortable with the decision.

May this be the happiest anniversary yet.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1015)

The post The Best Merchandise first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

At what point do we press the panic button?

No one wants to be the “it feels like Germany in 1938” guy, a prophet of doom thundering about the end of American Jewish life when people are trying to enjoy a new type of tequila at the kiddush. But at the same time, it feels tone-deaf to haul an extra-large meat board into your home as you pass through the Free Palestine protesters in the front yard.

I had been wondering about the balance between carrying on as normal (for the children) and waking up to a new reality (for yourself) when I ended up in Toronto, a guest at an especially innovative gathering.

It was, to borrow a popular cliché, “not a fundraiser,” though there was a carving station and mixologist and the room was filled with philanthropists and executive directors.

The goal was not to raise money. For real. Called Impact 2024, it was hosted by a cross-section of Toronto mosdos and organizations, the most generous donors and most dedicated executive directors gathered around a figurative table just to talk.

The relationship between the donor base and those who willingly choose to make out a career out of balancing budgets, soliciting, arranging events, and borrowing to heroically make payroll, and then doing the whole thing again the next month, is not unlike a marriage, two forces pulling the communal wagon together.

Those who carry the back-end of our mosdos (whatever their title might be — just like one day, stewardesses became flight attendants, fundraisers became executive directors, who then became directors of development, and — oh, even gvirim got a new name this week, Rabbi Motti Rapaport of Relief Canada referring to them with the elegant title of “stakeholders”) give their neshamos to the job. The donors give their money, called damim by Chazal, since one who gives money is giving his essence. Both sides are investing their lifeblood.

The goal of this event was to take a relationship that was becoming impersonal — everyone is busy, overwhelmed, and distracted — and make it personal again. I know that you don’t mind giving what you gave last year, but can we do it better? Can we do it smarter? Needs have changed, so shouldn’t those who are providing those needs also consider adapting?

The conversations, conducted through a series of short, honest panel discussions, revolved around these topics, and one comment has been replaying in my mind since that night.

Rabbi Elliot Diamond, CEO of Aish Toronto, said, “Throughout Jewish history, there have been periods in which we had to press reset, to take a step back and not just continue to do things because we always did them that way. Everyone understands that this is one of those reset moments.”

He answered my question. For those who don’t want to press the panic button, there’s the reset button.

We have to let go of the false sense that everything is okay; the images, sounds, and messages coming forth from the campuses, shopping malls, and highways of America and Europe are telling us differently.

Now, where that reset should be and what areas need overhaul are not my department. There are gedolei Yisrael who make those decisions. (Random data compiled by reading the comments on a frum website shows that there are, in fact, enough crises and issues facing us, and a sincere reader shouldn’t have too much trouble finding an appropriate disaster area.)

For a reset to work, there are two steps.

First, people have to talk — with their rabbanim, friends, spouses, neighbors (and with themselves!) — but the honest conversation has to happen. What are we doing, and how can we do it better? What was good enough eight months ago isn’t good enough today, because being engaged in a war means that we are all in.

And second, they have to believe in their own ability to be great, to tap into the koach revealed by the Rebbe who saw inside every Yid: Rabi Shimon bar Yochai.

The one who revealed penimiyus haTorah, the inner dimension of Torah, also revealed the penimiyus of a Yid. He saw the depth, the passion and the yearning.

In Toronto, there was a sense that it’s not enough to have a secretary issue a generous check anymore; as the world rumbles with Chevlei Mashiach, the chance to give tzedakah is a means of survival, and being connected this way is the most important thing in the world. We’re doing it anyhow, so let’s take a moment to appreciate what it is we’re doing and why we do it.

Find the wise, honest people in your life and sit down with them. Is it your Shabbos table that needs an upgrade? How you act in shul? Could you be working harder to help others find shidduchim?

The other side is feeling the virtue of their cause. If we shake ourselves up, maybe that will be viewed favorably enough in Heaven to open the floodgates of rachamim. At the very least, we will have told Him that we get it — we’re not panicking, but we are resetting.

Halachah hi, b’yadua, she’Eisav sonei l’Yaakov. It is a law: it is known that Eisav hates Yaakov, Rabi Shimon bar Yochai taught.

Kol Yisrael bnei melachim heim. Every Jew has the status of a prince, Rabi Shimon bar Yochai taught, an opinion with relevant halachic implications.

The world has come together to bring a ra’ayah to his first teaching.

Now, it’s our turn to come together to bring a ra’ayah to the second one.

Let’s become a little greater, a little more real, a little more alive in our Yiddishkeit, pressing reset on the old way.

Look inside yourself and see what he saw.

Ashreichem Yisrael.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1012)

The post Pressing the Button first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

Writing an opinion column for a popular magazine has several perks.

Here is something that is not one of them. I sometimes feel like a sheimos box for people’s ideas, the community-saving solutions developed over kiddush or a Shabbos meal.

The idea-developers carry these grand ideas around, and then, when they find somewhere safe to deposit them, they do so, feeling like they discharged their duty to society.

I already know the look, the glee in the eyes of the guy about to finally take the weight of the idea off his shoulders and shift responsibility to someone else — now, he can go back to reassure his shvogger/kiddush buddies/fellow think tank members that it’s being worked on.

I try not to get cornered, but it’s hard to move faster than walking inspiration.

I have already been accosted and informed that the delay between the chuppah and the first dance is destroying the schedules of Klal Yisrael and we’re giving too much power to the photographers (not a crazy thought, but no one is changing the wedding schedule because of a magazine column).

In a few weeks it will be, “Why can’t the schools and camps align their schedules?” (Also a fair observation, but also, assuredly, one that none of the administrators or camp directors need me to point out to them.)

This time, the eitzah is my own. I’m the activist here, and you get to listen.

Earlier this year, at the Agudah convention, I had the opportunity to discuss a favorite topic: shuls, rabbanim, balabatim, and the relationship between them.

Over the past half year, I have become more educated, hearing feedback from both sides along with some real catch-22 questions that need to be addressed.

For example: Balabatim would ideally like rabbanim who don’t just know their names and faces, but know them, their realities and situations. Several balabatim expressed the same desire — that the rav visit their home, if only once or twice a year, and sit with their wives and children as well. Nice, said a rav, but if the rav is paid like a part-time secretary, forced to work one or two other jobs to make ends meet, how is he supposed to find time to visit 40 or 50 homes a year and chat?

In many cases he works as a rebbi, dayan, mechaber seforim, paid chavrusa, etc. by day, and at night, he’d better show up at simchahs and stay till after the first dance (hijacked by the photographer, I know), and he’d better hope that no other shul member is making a siyum or a shloshim seudah, or being honored at a dinner at that same time. Balabatim are very sensitive.

The rav is expected to “be there” at times of challenge, and listen, empathize, advise, and guide. To help navigate shidduchim for your children and take phone calls from those asking about those children.

Balabatim would want their rabbanim to know them better — to be able stop a shul member passing by on Friday night to say Gut Shabbos and tell him he looks a bit stressed and is everything okay? (As an aside, for that to happen, people have to make it a point to walk by and say Gut Shabbos after davening.)

The topic is always relevant, but especially now, when life is especially complicated, a good rav is not a luxury, but a necessity.

Decades ago, Rav Shlomo Freifeld would caution American couples planning to move to Eretz Yisrael that they faced a real risk of “getting lost.” A family has to belong somewhere, he would say, and in America, the shul provides that spiritual, ideological, and social home, but at the time, there were not yet such shuls in Yerushalayim.

Eventually, American families living in Eretz Yisrael formed their own kehillos, and this winter, I discovered something even more heartening. I spent Shabbos in Ramat Eshkol, and went to daven with my son-in-law — at a minyan formed by young American couples who are not making aliyah, and might only be there for a year or two; it makes no difference.

They have a minyan of their own, in a rented apartment, with a real rav to whom they pay a salary — a rav who meets each couple separately so they have a voice of stability when they are far from home.

Fittingly, the minyan is named for Shlomie Gross — who (as recounted in Rabbi Shimon Finkelman’s fantastic ArtScroll biography) was the sort of balabos who made his shul a success and was a soldier to his rav.

Anyhow, in that same conversation, Rabbi Freifeld spoke of families in America who daven in three different shuls over a Shabbos, based on weather, schedule, kiddush menu, and mood, saying, “That’s not a shul — that’s a shopping spree.”

To have a shul means, ideally, to have a kevius, a set place.

I used to look warily at the “makom kavua” people, thinking that anyone who says, “Excuse me, you’re in my place,” has unresolved issues — Big deal, take a siddur and sit somewhere else, do you need your seat to feel like you belong somewhere? — but now I see it differently. (Or maybe I also have… whatever. Forget it.)

Now, I see it differently — beyond the halachic implications of a makom kavua and what being a real member of a shul does for the rav-member relationship.

And this is my personal save-the-Jews epiphany, so consider yourself cornered (just, for accuracy’s sake, try to imagine it happening at the kabbalas panim of a wedding, when you just filled up a plate with sesame chicken and rice, let’s say, and you’re hungry after driving a few hours, and you know that soon they will clear away the food, and then you’re not eating anything nogeia until the main course, if you’re still there bichlal — talk about Klal Yisrael issues! — and the solution-sharer detains you before you managed to get a fork, and now you’re stuck with a heaping plate and no way to eat it).

Having your seat in shul provides something else: sheer comfort.

It’s been a long, difficult winter. As a great man remarked: The war in Eretz Yisrael is not the expression of Middas Hadin, but a symptom of it. The war is the most tangible and obvious effect of a period of hester panim, and it is felt in different ways throughout the Jewish world.

The only out that we know of is through tefillah — Yisrael, they have no strength other than with their mouths!

Having your seat — your shtender, your siddur, your stuff — gives a sense that this tiny spot belongs to you and you can freely share what’s on your heart.

The world has become scary, and it’s nice to have somewhere to run. Somewhere to speak, or to cry, or to feel.

And hopefully, somewhere to give thanks.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1008)

The post Consider Yourself Cornered first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

They say a writer has to know his audience. I am fairly confident, writing for adults in the Orthodox world, that there are some things I can take for granted about the majority of the readership.

For instance, it’s a safe bet that if you are a frum male, you derive extraordinary satisfaction and pleasure in beating whatever time Waze predicted it would take you to get to your destination, and you will tell everyone at the vort you just drove in for how you achieved this Olympian feat.

If you are a frum male, you get a strange sense of fulfillment in boarding the airplane when they announce boarding for Zone 3, even though your ticket is Zone 4. It makes no difference — your seat isn’t changing, and your carry-on won’t fit in the overhead bin, regardless — but for some odd reason, it gives you a geshmak.

I think I can comfortably assert that you do not know the words to the low part of “Shaarei Shamayim Psach.” (Someone at your Purim seudah will sing it, and then everyone will falter and you will keep going, gaining instant respect when you keep singing: tzekon lachasham keshov, Kah shochen meulim. You’re welcome.)

I can even make an accusation — and forgive me for exposing this — you once checked the house of someone suggested as a shidduch for your child on Google maps. (Not because you care how big it is, more just to make sure it’s neat and well-kept, I know, I know.)

Okay, here’s one more, and it’s even more personal.

Right now, coming into this Purim, you are scared. It doesn’t feel like Purim usually does. You aren’t sure if it’s appropriate to rejoice, or how you could be busy discussing if it’s better to go with dry or semi-dry when so many brothers and sisters are mourning or in danger.

But here’s the thing about Purim and its story — perhaps the best-known of all the stories that are part of our legacy, inheritance, and birthright.

Purim itself tells us what to feel this year, 2024.

Chazal tell us that when the letters against Klal Yisrael were sealed, Haman and his team went out to celebrate. They had gotten exactly what they wanted.

No doubt, the diplomats and politicians from across the spectrum also saw which way the wind was blowing, telling askanim with whom they had always been so close that they were powerless to help. (Yes, I know there are exceptions. Speaking of which, another fearless prediction: In certain neighborhoods, Senator Fetterman will be a big costume this year. Pretty easy if you ever went to any mesivta summer camp, since you walked around in a hoodie and shorts all day anyhow.)

In Yiddishe homes, unease turned to panic turned to full-blown fear. There was no turning back.

Mordechai Hatzaddik saw three little boys on their way home from school, and he asked them what they had learned that day. “Pesok li pesukecha,” he asked, recite to me your pasuk. This too is a form of nevuah.

The first boy didn’t hesitate. “Al tira mipachad pis’om — Do not fear terror that comes suddenly, nor the destruction of the wicked when it comes,” he said.

Then the next boy said the pasuk he had learned. “Utzu eitzah v’sufar — Plan a conspiracy and it will be annulled, for Hashem is with us.”

The third boy took his turn. “V’ad ziknah ani hu — Until your old age I am the One… I created you and I shall carry you and rescue you.”

Mordechai heard this and rejoiced.

We say these three pesukim together after Aleinu several times each day, even though they are not listed in order and are not all from the same sefer. Their connection comes from this midrash, from the Purim story.

If throughout the year we are meant to finish davening and head out into the streets with the reassurance that there is no reason to fear, then on Purim we certainly have to contemplate the words.

Al tira.

Okay, but you are scared, right? You hear the cries of the protestors standing on streets where you are used to walking around like the balabos, and you see what it says on their signs. Their confidence is growing, and worse, they are seeing that they can get away with it.

Al tira.

But what about the fact that nations who despise each other are suddenly allies, joining forces to condemn, denounce, and lecture, 70 wolves moving into attack formation around the single trembling sheep?

Don’t worry. Ki imanu Keil.

What Mordechai heard in the answers of these children was that his tefillos were being heard, his sackcloth and ashes bringing his people to a place of imanu Keil.

Fine, but what about the blood that has already been spilled, the families already shattered by loss?

I created you and I shall carry you.

That’s the answer. He is older and He is eternal and the story He is writing isn’t just a few months long. These are chapters in an unfolding saga, and faith means that we trust the Author to come full circle, answering every question at the happy ending.

We trust the Author, because we have read His beloved Megillah, in which He taught us that even when He is in disguise — His face concealed — He is controlling every move.

Those living in Shushan went on with their lives during the nine-year period recounted in the Megillah, not even noticing the miracle at first; we don’t say Hallel, because they remained subservient to Achashveirosh (Megillah 14a).

Esther persevered, insisting that this story, this Yom Tov needed to be celebrated, because to the generations who would not understand, it would be encouragement. To people (us!) who wake up every morning desperate to hear the good news — did anything even change? — this story reminds us that change is not always visible, and in fact, sometimes it is the opposite.

This day is our day, the Yidden of 2024, deep in the middle of a suspenseful chapter of galus.

Al tira. Don’t be afraid.

How the celebration expresses itself this year — is the oversized meat-board (I’m not following board trends anymore, it went from meat to cured fish to kugel too fast for a guy from Montreal, where we’re still impressed with sushi at a parlor meeting) necessary or not — is a question for whomever you ask questions to. If the band plus singer plus deejay plus sound-guy plus lighting-guy for your party is essential to the Yom Tov or not is something to ask the wise person in your life.

But the joy?

The joy must be greater than ever before, because it's specifically at times like this, when it’s not so clear to the world that this is the winning team, that we get to revel in these words: “L’hodia…To make known that all those who put their hope in You, will not be shamed and those who take refuge in You will never be humiliated.”

We have never been more dependent on Him, and our tefillah has never been more crucial — but on Purim, we are meant to dance as we plead and to sing as we ask.

Al tira. Hold on, and it’s going to be freilech.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1004)

The post Dancing and Pleading first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

It’s almost a cliché: A mashgiach stands in front of the room with a somber expression on his face, insisting that the message about whatever wrongdoing he is addressing is not really intended for his audience. Rather, “Ich mein zich — I am speaking to myself,” and if others happen to overhear and draw conclusions relevant to their own lives, then so be it.

It can be hard to imagine that an elderly tzaddik really needs to hear admonitions about breaking into the kitchen or waking up after zeman Krias Shema, but the “speaking to myself” disclaimer is basic baal mussar etiquette.

What I am about to write, though, is really and truly intended for myself. It’s a personal feeling, and nothing more, but one I hope to honor now and always.

Over the past few months, the individuals within the wider community have all tried to increase zechuyos for our brothers and sisters in danger, but people differ as to how those merits are created.

The sugya of personal kabbalos is tricky, and when people judge the commitments undertaken by others — “This is not enough,” or “How can you do this when I stopped doing that?” or, silliest of all, “You must not care about the situation in Eretz Yisrael, because you are not expressing it in the way I think it should be expressed” — that creates pirud, which does nothing to create zechuyos for Eretz Yisrael.

All this is part of my elaborate introduction: Any reader who doesn’t agree with what I write here might well be correct. I am sharing a sentiment and nothing more.

One of the things this magazine has done so nicely over the years is to reveal lesser-known giants, the ones doing their holy work quietly, gallantly, loyally. In 2017, Mishpacha published a feature about one of those rabbanim, a simple, touching celebration of the relationship between Rabbi Mordechai Berg and his kehillah. After Rabbi Berg passed away, the broken members of his Monsey kehillah reflected on the lessons of their beloved Rav.

One of them spoke of the Rav’s loving authenticity, recalling, “Someone in shul hosted a Super Bowl party, renting a huge screen and offering a lavish spread. During the intermission and halftime show, the screen was closed, and there was a shiur. Many considered it a unique kiddush Hashem, but Rabbi Berg had his own opinion.

“ ‘Listen, rabboisai,’ he said from the podium, ‘I understand why someone would want to watch professional sports, and why it’s engaging. But please, recognize it for what it is. It isn’t Torah and doesn’t come from the same world as Torah. Torah is Torah, and this isn’t it. I urge you to be honest about what you’re doing and don’t fool yourselves.’” (With Loyalty and Love, January 2017)

It took me a minute to chap the gadlus in that story, but when I did, I realized how obvious it was.

There’s a tendency, sometimes, to take a gray area in communal life and, to borrow a term from the early days of the Oorah’s Smorg (the first frum cultural influencer), to “kosherize” it. Yeah, it’s weird for frum people to do a cigar-rolling or wine-tasting or public weight-loss competition, but look, just look at the cause. We feel like we are elevating, transforming, tricking the yetzer hara into serving our holy agenda.

And (ducking): Maybe it’s not true.

Rabbi Berg had the guts to stand up in a middle-class balabatish American shul and say, Sorry, guys, it ain’t so: You want to watch football, enjoy, I get it — but don’t pretend it’s holy because you had a half-time shiur, and then pat yourself on the back.

Be honest, and if you are honest, then perhaps you can grow.

So here we go (yes, the introduction is still going, like a rich guy with a kid in shidduchim doing his first Agudah convention gig and taking it a bit too seriously).

Ich mein zich.

Something has shifted in the last few months, and you can’t hide from it.

We’re starting to comprehend what our grandparents knew in their bones, to viscerally understand that we are alone in this world and that the excitement and allure and dazzle of secular culture is not meant for us. We always knew this intellectually, but now the knowledge is in our kishkes.

We are not very well-liked. The ones who shook our hands and slapped our backs and told us how impressed they were with our community? They didn’t really mean it.

American culture pulled us in, and at times, we confused the recognition it might bestow upon us — celebrate Judaism night, a frum Yid singing the national anthem, a yarmulke in the box seats — with kevod Shamayim.

(Introduction over. Here’s the actual piece, and admittedly, it’s the sort of take that, if someone I did not know shared at a simchah, would impel me to switch tables.)

If someone is a rabid sports fan and they really get excited about the fine points of the big game, then I am not addressing them — the time invested, the shemiras einayim stuff and all that, is their cheshbon to make.

But this is to anyone else who is not really a sports fan but feels like he is missing out if he is not at least somehow aware of or clued into the hype and glitter surrounding the game.

Enough!

It’s not our song. It’s not our team. It’s not our world.

Eateries in frum neighborhoods have found sly ways of advertising their “Super Sunday” fare — ask about our “Super Wings Platter,” or “Football-Shaped Subs,” anything short of saying the word “Super Bowl,” because after all, it’s a frum publication.

(The speech is over. We’re doing closing remarks now.)

A half-time shiur is wonderful, but it doesn’t retroactively transform the whole experience into holy.

Jews saying, “Yeah, I do enjoy a good game, but these are just not my people,” who understand that the ones cheering from the stands are more similar to the fans we’ve seen in Morocco and Turkey singing Gaza battle songs — that is holy.

Because it’s a major first step to getting out of here.

“Turn away, turn away, get out of there… get out of its midst, purify yourselves, you who bear the klei Hashem” (Yeshayahu 52:11).

Let me close with this. (Major speaker hack to recapture waning interest of the audience. Alternative phrasing, “To be mesayem.” The data show no correlation between use of the expression and actually being mesayem.)

This is not an initiative, and it’s not branded; not a single rabbi or organization or VIP or askan signed off on it. It’s just a suggestion from a guy who works in a hoodie in his basement: This Sunday, maybe this would be a nice gesture for Eretz Yisrael — for Klal Yisrael, for every beleaguered Yid who feels the simmering dislike on the subway, at the DMV, in the park with his kids.

Find the shtoltz to turn your back on a society that is in the middle of spitting you out anyhow, and use that time and focus instead to say a kapitel for all of us. This Sunday, take a moment to reflect on what it means to be distinct, and let that be a zechus.

Ich mein zich.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 998)

The post Speaking to Myself first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

Q: What’s the perfect month for an online tzedakah campaign?

A: Every month of the year, it turns out. All of them. Every day of every month except for maybe Tishah B’Av.

Back when we had actual dinners to raise funds for mosdos, there was conventional wisdom about timing. Sefirah seemed like an obvious choice, because there are no weddings then — but there is also no music, and then how can you generate emotion without a choir, without children singing school alma maters, and without “V’ezkeh liros banim u’vnei banim” playing as a soundtrack to the video?

Not only was Sefirah a problem, the Yom Tov seasons were off limits, too, due to the assumption that people are stretched thin then. Summer wasn’t nogeia either. So many mosdos chose to hold their events during this point in the calendar — the second half of winter, but not too close to Purim, because we don’t want the dinner to overlap with the Purim campaign, right?

But online, it’s different. There it can be dinner season all year long.

With the transition from sit-down dinners to digital campaigns, there is never a bad time, because no one has to leave their house to donate. Elul is heavy; mosdos capitalize on the fact that tzedakah is one of the big three, the stuff that can transform a harsh decree — and maybe this tzedakah is the one that can make the difference.

But I don’t think I have ever seen a month like December 2023 (donate before the end of the year to reap tax benefits, or whatever). The links came fast and furious, major organizations and minor organizations and local start-ups overlapping in the rush to raise more funds.

It makes sense. We are all a bit more conscious these days about the need to channel Divine rachamim, eager to dig deep and generate zechusim for our nation, so there is that.

Some of these campaigns struggled to connect themselves with the war effort in Eretz Yisrael, and maybe that was a bit of a copy-writing stretch — yes, your book-lending library is wonderful, and it’s nice that our little tzaddikim have kosher reading material on Shabbos afternoons, but you’re not really on the front lines of anything.

Jews are good and Jews are generous and after some good-natured kvetching, we agree to post and share the link, and we try to respond to the links sent our way. (Anything helps, no amount is too small, they assure us, knowing that once our name is there, basic self-respect and the need to make shidduchim for our children will remind us that there certainly are amounts too small.)

Secretly, I think there are some people who enjoy watching these campaigns evolve. I don’t think it’s the sort of addiction that will ever garner prime-time space at an Agudah convention session or a Mishpacha special feature, but let’s be honest: There’s a kav guy who can sit in his office and spend an entire afternoon watching a Charidy campaign progress.

There is suspense — will they reach their goal? There is intrigue — who is the secret matcher?

There are people so obsessed that they will follow a campaign for an organization that they never heard of, featuring raisers and donors they don’t know. (Every frum person, when given the choice between seeing the list of donors by latest donation, highest donation, or alphabetical order, will always choose “highest.” That is because the neshamah of a Yid instinctively seeks… nah, it’s because we want to know who can give a hundred-thousand-dollar donation, that’s the truth.)

A friend once confided in having a perverse joy in donating to the page of someone he does not know, then posting a breathless tribute to “an amazing person who drops everything to help.”

“I imagine them scratching their heads, bewildered about who wrote that about them, and why — and believe me, it’s worth the thirty-six bucks.”

We are six months to a year away from either a Shavuos night shiur or a full kuntres on the halachos of Charidy/Rayzeit campaigns. What happens if I plan to give, but then they reach their goal — am I still obligated? Is it fair to pay off an old donation today of all days, on the cheshbon of the matcher? (Spoiler alert. I don’t know, and I don’t know. Someone will do a shiur, though, so keep checking TorahAnytime.)

December 2023 cost Klal Yisrael several million dollars, it’s true.

You felt like you had to contribute to your neighbor — the one who is “really not the type to do this, and isn’t comfortable asking, but how can I say no to people who never say no” — and to your cousin from Chicago. (You also have a campaign coming and you’ll need a network.) With mechutanim, one doesn’t play games, and any organization based in Eretz Yisrael needs more friends now, not less.

The high school kids calling from the local yeshivah call center, given time off from math and science class and provided with pizza or poppers, are special: How can you disappoint a teenager whose self-confidence rides on your response? How can you ignore a voice in middle of changing when it asks if you can do a bit more, since the yeshivah is, like, really amazing? (And also, he’ll win a drone if he raises the most money.)

It might seem like, for the donor class, this new digital fundraising world is inconvenient: With live dinners, you could beg off because of geographical distance or prior commitments, but when all it takes is a click or a swipe, there are no more excuses.

But it is, in fact, very convenient. Aside from bringing extended families together and reuniting old friends and roommates, it’s the smartest way to show respect or appreciation. Forget the meat board or the expensive bottle; give $180 on someone’s page with a heartfelt message and they will appreciate it a lot more.

And now more than ever, we should embrace each link.

V’shaveha b’tzedakah. Our return home will be in the merit of tzedakah: The links and matchers, the messages and scrolling names and balloons on the screen when the goal is met — they are all opening doors, bringing us closer.

Now that we’ve established that, give me 30 seconds to tell you about a mosad close to my heart.

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 994)

The post Give It All You’ve Got first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.

Once, on Erev Yom Kippur, someone I did not know called to ask me for mechilah, explaining that, in a letter criticizing an article, he had referred to me as painfully ignorant.

I told him — and I meant it, a Yid doesn’t lie on Erev Yom Kippur — that those kinds of barbs come with the territory. You hope that your writing moves people enough to feel, and while you’d like the feeling to be happiness or pride, sometimes it might be displeasure or frustration.

For that reason, I have never objected to any letter being printed about me, no matter how harsh or critical.

I don’t write about halachah, or, l’havdil, offer recipes or home-renovation advice. In those cases, the writer could be wrong, because the details are absolute, black and white. When it comes to opinion pieces, though, it’s different — it could be a good take or bad take, you can agree or disagree, but it’s hard to say the writer is wrong.

I do, of course, read the letters, and often, they make me wish I had worded something differently, expressed an idea in a clearer way, or chosen a different example to make a point. Still, I have never responded in print. Since it was always a matter of opinion, all I would do by responding is prolong the argument and invite more letters that wouldn’t convince anyone or change any minds.

The strong response to my most recent column — about appreciating yeshivah bochurim especially at a time when we are showing such appreciation to the soldiers — left me with a weird feeling.

I’d like to quote the lines in the piece that drew the most ire.

Dovid Hamelech dispatched soldiers to war, and no doubt, those soldiers were appreciated and acknowledged. He did not just wish them well and make sure they had food — he also ensured that they would be victorious by filling the gates of Yerushalayim with those who toil in Torah, creating a source of merit and protection.

If the soldiers, with their valor and dedication, have captured your heart and you are baking, folding, arranging, or swiping, then take one moment to contemplate the source of their strength and go all the way.

On Isru Chag, thousands of bochurim and yungeleit were back at their posts, understanding just how vital their mission is now. American and European bochurim who’d traveled home for Yom Tov were suddenly stranded, uncertain how to proceed. Then, these young men squared their shoulders, hugged their parents goodbye, and boarded flights back to the place they feel is best for their learning.

If you have acknowledged the soldiers — and who hasn’t? — make sure that you are at least as appreciative of the ones giving them the energy and strength, bringing blessing, protection, goodness, and light to the world (See Nefesh HaChaim 4).

I don’t think that there is anything here that qualifies as opinion. I would think that every reader of Mishpacha agrees that Torah protects and shelters, and that the zechuyos created by those who toil in Torah and tefillah are vital to the warriors in the field.

Still, I wasn’t going to go back there.

But then I got a call from a choshuve rav, a distinguished posek and mechaber seforim. He told me that his wife had read him the letters about the piece, and he felt that I had a responsibility to defend its premise. I did not have much cheishek to do this again, but he made it clear that he felt it important to clarify the idea.

He compared it to a general who comments that wars are won by artillery.

“How can you say that?” someone asks. “Being in the infantry involves more sacrifice, since the foot soldiers actually face the enemy.”

“Who is talking about sacrifice?” asks the general. “I am discussing impact. The artillery is what allows the infantry to do their part.”

Against my usual practice, I want to share my personal reaction and feelings after reading those letters attacking my piece.

First of all, I don’t need anyone to preach to me about ahavas Yisrael or feeling pain of other Jews. I am one small person in a small town, but, like most Jews these days, my schedule and life has been altered over the last few months to allow for as much tefillah and other zechus-generating activity as possible.

I am sure the letter writers have their way of showing distress, but it doesn’t have to be mine. Suggesting that “maybe I visit a shivah house or watch a levayah” is offensive not to me, but to the idea that ours is a nation of rachmanim. Have we become a society where emotion at what is a very, very rough situation has made it okay to label as “insensitive” those who express their concern differently than you do?

Dovid Hamelech, as I referenced, created a holy partnership between those in the beis medrash and those on the front: The ensuing victories were powered by those learning and executed by those on the battlefield. His chiddush, perhaps, was not that Torah is magna u’matzla, but that these are not two divisions, but one — two elements of the same dynamic. It’s one team, as I wrote.

Soldiers fighting for us at a time of war generate an instinctive sense of gratitude; that we should feel that same love and appreciation for the ones fueling them isn’t an idea I will ever apologize for.

Of course I understand that a soldier leaving his pregnant wife without either of them knowing what the future holds is sacrificing more than a bochur in the comfort of yeshivah, with a warm bed and three meals a day. I was never writing about sacrifice, but about impact.

The imagery of the bochur “squaring his shoulders and boarding the plane” was meant to emphasize that since right now the job of our bochurim is to learn like never before, they all went back to the places in which they learn best. It was not a comparison to the soldiers’ sacrifice, but to their sense of mission. I understand that for people who did not read the whole piece, that line alone might have led them to draw a conclusion that hurt.

Dovid Hamelech showed us that, with respect and real acknowledgment, there is one unit. This miraculous entity is called Klal Yisrael, His nation.

Our nation. Our family. The greatest nation the world has ever known.

That’s my letter. Thank you for printing it.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 990)

The post Impact Accelerator first appeared on Mishpacha Magazine.