Dixie Yid

Below is an excerpt from the English translation of the drasha given by Rav Itchie Mayer Morgenstern on Parshas Vayeitzei. Below that are links to download the full Hebrew and/or English translation texts in pdf format...

“And Yaakov went out from Be’er Sheva and went toward Charan. And he touched upon the place, and he tarried overnight, for the sun set suddenly. And he took from stones of that place and placed them beneath his head, and he lay down to sleep in that place.”[1]

Uniting the Stones

Rashi explains that Yaakov placed the stones beneath his head to form a protective barrier since he was afraid of wild animals. The stones began to bicker among themselves, since each stone wanted the exclusive honor of supporting the head of the tzaddik. Hashem immediately joined them together as one stone, as we see from the verse that follows: "וַיִּקַּח אֶת-הָאֶבֶן אֲשֶׁר-שָׂם מְרַאֲשֹׁתָיו"—“And he took the stone that he had placed beneath his head...”[2]

Rashi explains that the words, “And he lay down to sleep in that place,” are meant as a qualifier—Yaakov lay down to sleep in that place, but during the entire duration of his fourteen-year hiatus in the yeshiva of Shem and Ever, he did not lay down to sleep. [This means that during his time with Shem and Ever, he did not sleep in a designated place, but rather would fall asleep briefly over his studies when he had no more strength to learn, and only in order to renew himself for further study.]

The second statement of Rashi seems very difficult. How can we say that Yaakov, the vehicle for the Tiferes of Atzilus,[3] [which is the spiritual source of Torah[4]] stopped learning and went to sleep? Surely, just as he never forgot Torah for an instant for the fourteen years he was in yeshiva, he would never knowingly disrupt his thoughts from their involvement in Torah? The answer to this question is that even Yaakov’s sleep was an aspect of Torah. The Tikkunei Zohar teaches that this is the deeper meaning of the words of the verse, "וַיִּשְׁכַּב בַּמָּקוֹם הַהוּא"—“And he lay down in the place.”[5] The word ישכב—“lay down”—spells יש כ"ב—“there are twenty-two.” This refers to the twenty-two letters of the Alef Beis that form the Torah through which Hashem created the world. [In the Sefer Yetzirah, these are called “twenty-two stones”—the essential building blocks of creation.] Yaakov went to sleep in the place of these twenty-two letters.

This is similar to the statement of Rav Michel Zlotchover regarding his slumber. “I have never been in the state of oblivion that most people call sleep. Whenever I go to sleep I have an aliyas neshamah, my soul ascends to the upper realms on high.”

The deeper works explain that the verse, "אָכֵן יֵשׁ ה' בַּמָּקוֹם הַזֶּה וְאָנֹכִי לֹא יָדָעְתִּי"—“Surely Hashem is in this place, and I knew it not”— indicates that until that time Yaakov had not understood just how much a person can grasp of Hashem while he sleeps.[6]

[1] Bereishis 28:10-11
[2] Ibid., 28:18
[3] Zohar I:157b
[4] Ramak in Tomer Devorah
[5] Ibid., 28:11
[6] See the Baal Shem Tov Al HaTorah and the Ohev Yisrael on this verse.

CLICK HERE for Toras Chochom on Vayeitzei
shirat devorah. Click here to get Dixie Yid in your e-mail Inbox or here to subscribe in Google Reader.

Rav Shmuel Brazil has written an amazing Drasha on Parshas Toldos called The Zoo Keeper and Latkes. Definitely worth reading!

As you may know, this is is from Rabbi Brazil's new Yeshiva, Ziv HaTorah. You can hear many of Rabbi Brazil's drashos HERE.

HT to Tuvia Heller.

Picture courtesy of Zeev HaTorah. Click here to get Dixie Yid in your e-mail Inbox or here to subscribe in Google Reader.

Here are several shiurim given, for women only, by Rebbetzin Yehudis Golshevsky. To listen to them right away, left click on the links. To download them, right click on the links and select "Save Target As."

Rebbetzin Golshevsky gave the following shiur during her recent trip to Uman on the topics of Tikkun Haklali, shemos hatzaddikim, and a vort from Kedushas Levi on Noach, told over in Berditchev.

LINK

"making Torah into tefillah"--the relationship between Yaakov, Rochel, and Leah.

LINK to get the shiur.

Making a tzimtzum in the heart so that we can build the vessels to reveals Hashem's Kingship:

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

Picture of Rabbi Nachman's "kibbutz" and the original Breslov Synagogue (on right horizon), circa 1922, courtesy of Breslov.com. Click here to get Dixie Yid in your e-mail Inbox or here to subscribe in Google Reader.

Parshas Toldos

The first step is to follow the way of Yaakov. We all must “sit in the tents of Shem,” study Torah and pray with intense dveikus with our Creator. But this is not enough to imbue a person with a spirit of prophecy. One can only really become holy by drawing down the illumination that he grasps with his mind and using that light to sanctify the material reality, which is Eisav’s realm. This entails binding our hearts with Hashem even while we are occupied with physical activities, and it is one of the hardest avodos. We must sanctify our thoughts while we are involved in the pleasures of this world, and this can only be attained through continuous effort by knocking on the gates of holiness with real obstinacy. We must be willing to wait until the gates open and we are afforded truly deep dveikus, since it is not enough to be satisfied with a lower level of dveikus which is easily attained. We all must toil to grasp a very deep and meaningful dveikus with Hashem in our innermost being.

The first step towards attaining this dveikus is to focus on it during prayer, since one is closest to entering the gates of connection with Hashem at that time. Once the spirit of Hashem rests on a person during prayer it is much easier to learn Torah with fiery enthusiasm and dveikus too. This is in keeping with Rav Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev’s statement that if one recites Shacharis with abundant vitality and dveikus, the Torah he subsequently learns will also be imbued with fervor and freshness.

But what is one to do if his prayers were not filled with dveikus? In that case he must make an even greater effort to at least learn Torah with passionate attachment to Hashem. When a person consistently learns and prayes with dveikus and focuses on the Divine Names formed by every word of Torah and prayer, he will be filled with the light of ruach hakodesh, of Divine inspiration. However, even this is still not enough to merit redemption. The redemption will only come when true prophecy is restored to us. Prophecy means that the light of Hashem rests on a person’s physical body so that he purifies the entire material reality, since his every act is for the sake of heaven.

This is why the soul of Dovid HaMelech was originally hidden in Edom, as indicated by the name Admoni which signifies Edom. But the Shelah HaKadosh teaches that he is the positive manifestation of Edom, unlike Eisav.[1]

[This is the meaning behind Yaakov’s donning Eisav’s “desirable garments” that he had stolen from Nimrod so that he could receive the blessing from Yitzchak.] We all must elevate the aspect of Edom which is represented by the physical body, since it is only through the physical that we build vessels to receive the light of prophecy. We must purify even the lowest aspects of physicality through an intensely powerful dveikus from the innermost depths of our being. This is because the more corporeal something is, the higher the light that is necessary to sanctify it.

[1] See Shelah Hakadosh, Bereishis, Parshas Vayeishev, #9

[埋込みオブジェクト:http://www.youtube.com/v/lC92U2j4dMo&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&feature=player_embedded&fs=1]

The video above shows how Crembos are made. And although the Crembo song below is not the same as the "Crembo Niggun" we sang at Mishmar in yeshiva, it's very funny!

[埋込みオブジェクト:http://www.youtube.com/v/3NsdBrKMeKo&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&feature=player_embedded&fs=1]

Click here to get Dixie Yid in your e-mail Inbox or here to subscribe in Google Reader.

You know how you sometimes feel that certain things in Olam Hazeh, this world, are so permanent, so real, that they will always be there? Well, some things disappear and remind us that nothing in this world is permanent.

[埋込みオブジェクト:http://www.facebook.com/v/210438244545]
[埋込みオブジェクト:http://www.facebook.com/v/210458874545]
[埋込みオブジェクト:http://www.facebook.com/v/210460504545]

I couldn't resist sharing this. It's his own composition this morning using the guitar he'd just gotten and probably inspired by this song by Adi Ran that we often listen to during carpool. :-)

Click here to get Dixie Yid in your e-mail Inbox or here to subscribe in Google Reader.

Check out my guest posting at Beyond BT where I posit that, in general, when it comes to who is more likely to become a Baal Teshuva later on, it's better to have a reform sunday school background than no Jewish background at all.

I read Beyond BT’s recent article by Azriela Jaffe, Vaccinating Our Children Against Prayer, with great interest. Based on my own reform sunday school and temple experiences, I also felt that those experiences not only vaccinate Jewish children against prayer, but also against any interest in Judaism in general. My theory was that having no Jewish background, rather than a negative background, gives people more of a blank slate when it comes to approaching Judaism for the first time. I theorized that when these “blank slate Jews” do come into contact with frumkeit for the first time, it will be with a more open mind because they had no preconceived notions based on negative Jewish experiences.

But based on later experiences working with a number of Jewish, not-yet-religious college students, I have come to a different, though not mutually exclusive, conclusion...

To Read the full guest post, CLICK HERE.

Picture courtesy of commercialappeal.com. Click here to get Dixie Yid in your e-mail Inbox or here to subscribe in Google Reader.

[埋込みオブジェクト:http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=7439757&server=vimeo.com&show_title=0&show_byline=0&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1]

Untitled from bhol on Vimeo.

Courtesy of Circus Tent. Click here to get Dixie Yid in your e-mail Inbox or here to subscribe in Google Reader.

Conversation this morning between my seven year old daughter and four year old son:

Seven: Why is it sunny outside if it's so cold?

Four: Because it's the morning.

Seven: But then is it sunny on rainy mornings?

Four: No, Hashem doesn't put out the sun when it's raining because He doesn't want it to get wet!

Picture courtesy of dailyclipart. P.S. Notice that a small portion of the "sun" is covered up by the umbrella. Click here to get Dixie Yid in your e-mail Inbox or here to subscribe in Google Reader.

Lunch and Shiur information for Rabbi Brody in Forest Hills on Sunday AVAILABLE HERE.

Men only event Monday morning in Forest Hills information AVAILABLE HERE.

And Kew Gardens Hills on Monday, as per commenter, information HERE.

Picture courtesy of Chazaq. Click here to get Dixie Yid in your e-mail Inbox or here to subscribe in Google Reader.

People tend to stumble through the physical world like blind men who walk in darkness. As a result of the great impurity that pervades the physical world, we are like a חולה—a sick person—which itself has a numerical value of forty-nine, the forty-nine gates of impurity that affect us all in one way or another. When a person who is bound to impurity learns Torah and prays, he does this in a very dry manner, with no vitality or light. It is for this reason that Avraham Avinu commanded us to be like angels in the way we have already described until Hashem “appears to us,” “visits the sick,” and delivers us by lifting us up from the forty-nine gates of Binah to the fiftieth gate. This is the only way to be truly freed from the deep darkness of the physical world—by powerful contemplation of Hashem’s Name in the manner of the fiftieth gate of Binah.

Rav Tzaddok HaKohen of Lublin teaches that after Hashem appeared to Avraham in the beginning of our parshah he was never again alone, since Hashem’s Presence accompanied him everywhere afterward. Hashem blessed Avraham with the ability to draw the revelation of Elokus into the oral Torah.[1] It is about this blessing that our sages commented on the verse, "הוֹשִׁבַנִי בְמַחֲשַׁכִּים"—“He has set me in dark places...”[2] Every Jew can follow Avraham’s legacy and perceive Hashem at all times, and especially when he is learning or praying, since Yitzchak inherited this from his father and passed it on to his son Yaakov. This is the meaning of the Midrash on the verse, "וְיִתֶּן-לְךָ הָאֱלֹקִים"—“‘And G-d will give you...’—He will give you Elokus.”[3] This indicates that Hashem enabled Yaakov and his descendants to cleave to Hashem at all times.

But this level cannot be attained all at once. Instead, one must slowly eject the darkness that is within him until he escapes the upheaval of the spiritual state of Sodom. As we find in the verse, "וּמְשַׁחֲרַי יִמְצָאֻנְנִי"—“Those who rise early diligently to seek Me will find Me.”[1] If we truly seek the Shechinah we will eventually merit to find Hashem.

[1] Mishlei 8:17

[1] Pri Tzaddik, Vayeira, #7
[2] Tehillim 143:3
[3] Bereishis 27:28; Bereishis Rabbah loc cit

Rabbi Lazer Brody's drasha in the Five Towns last night was a big success. We planned for about 30 people maximum. But there were almost 60 people there. Thanks to Rabbi Brody, several people who helped solicit sponsorships, and well over 20 people who came forward to help sponsor the shiur, and to all the attendees, it was a big success.

It was an eclectic crowd and many people got to speak with Rabbi Brody after the shiur. I received a number of requests to have the shiur recorded from people who knew that they would not be able to make it. Therefore, thanks to Reb Chaim, who recorded the shiur, I would like to present a wav recording of the shiur.

The very beginning of the shiur is not in the recording because there were some slight tecnical difficulties with the recorder, but the following is the beginning of the story Rabbi Brody opened up the shiur with... Poking fun at people like himself who come to America to raise money for worthy institutions in Eretz Yisroel, he told the following story:

A galach (priest) back in Feudal Europe noticed that while plagues and sickness were afflicting the gentiles in the town, the Jews did not seem to be afflicted by these things. The priest went to the rabbi to ask what the secret was to their immunity from these diseases. The rabbi told him that all Jews keep a mezuzah on their door, and that they are therefore procted from many forms of danger in their homes.

The priest asked if he could buy a mezuzah to put on his door as well. The rabbi responded that it was not one of the mitzvos that a gentile may not perform, so he saw no problem with it and assited the priest in obtaining a mezuzah, which the priest installed on his door.

Soon aftwardward, the town was overrun by cossaks who raided Jewish homes.

But to hear the rest of the story and the punchline, you will have to listen to the shiur. Enjoy!

CLICK HERE to get the shiur by either left clicking to listen to streaming audio or right clicking and selecting "Save Target As" to download the shiur. If it were up to me to title the shiur, I would call it, "Achieving Peace of Mind By Making Peace With Hashem."

Picture courtesy of R. Lazer Brody. Click here to get Dixie Yid in your e-mail Inbox or here to subscribe in Google Reader.

[埋込みオブジェクト:http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=-4435700763637040609&hl=en&fs=true]
Video of Rabbi Brody on my cousin Ari's "Tuesday Night Live" in Yerushalayim show. TheLandofIsrael.com

I wanted to let everyone know that Rabbi Lazer Brody will be speaking in Cedarhurst this Wednesday night (Nov. 4th) at 7:00 PM at Rabbi Spiegel's "Shteibel," located at 504 W. Broadway in Cedarhurst, near the corner of Cedarhurst Ave. Men and women are invited.

Also, although the majority of the sponsorship has been raised, more help is still needed. So if you can give anything, whether it's 36,ドル 50,ドル 100,ドル or whatever, it would be a mitzvah! Please call Benyomin Wolf at 516-668-6397 or e-mail him at benbenabe@aol.com to help out or for more information.

Click on the following link for more information on Rabbi Brody, a video of him speaking, and a full schedule of his speaking engagements while he's in the New York area from Israel: http://dixieyid.blogspot.com/2009/11/rabbi-lazer-brody-speaking-in-five.html.

Also, if you happen to be an e-mailer, a tweeter, a blogger, or any other "er," please forward/post/tweet/pass on this e-mail so that others can find out about this opportunity.

Picture courtesy of Dixie Dad. Click here to get Dixie Yid in your e-mail Inbox or here to subscribe in Google Reader.

[埋込みオブジェクト:http://www.youtube.com/v/GIbO6zEeDqA&hl=en&fs=1&]

Rabbi Lazer Brody will be speaking in the Five Towns/Far Rockaway area this week on Wednesday night, November 4th at 7 PM. Here are the details:

When: Wed. night Nov. 4th at 7:00 PM

Where: The Shtiebel,

504 W. Broadway, Cedarhurst

(near corner of Cedarhurst Ave.)

This event is open to both men and women

Rabbi Lazer Brody was born in Washington, D.C. in 1949. After receiving his bachelor's degree in agriculture from the University of Maryland in 1970, he moved to Israel and joined the Israel Defense Forces regular army, and served in one of the elite special-forces units. He is a decorated combat veteran of two wars and dozens of counter-insurgence and anti-terrorist missions on both sides of Israel's borders.

After surviving a near-suicidal mission to Beirut during the Israel-Lebanon conflict of 1982, Brody could no longer ignore the hand of G-d in his life. He became a baal-tshuva and left his mountaintop farm to study Torah in Jerusalem.

Nine years of intensive Talmudic, ethics, and legal studies, led to his rabbinical ordination in 1992. He devoted another two years of postgraduate study to personal and family counseling, and subsequently spent two years as rabbi and spiritual rehabilitation director of a major Israeli prison. There, he created a highly successful program of spiritual rehabilitation for prisoners based on Tshuva.

In 1996, Brody moved to Ashdod and became the understudy of the famed Melitzer Rebbe, a contemporary giant in rabbinical law and personal counseling. Two years later, Rav Shalom Arush opened a branch of his renowned of the "Chut Shel Chessed - Breslev" Yeshiva in the port city of Ashdod, and appointed Brody as the "Rosh Kollel", or Dean of the rabbinical program.

Today, Lazer Brody dedicates his time to Jewish Outreach, and particularly to spreading the teachings of Rebbe Nachman of Breslev around the globe.

Brody's first book, "Pi Habe'er", is a contemporary commentary of Torah based largely on the teachings of Rebbe Nachman of Breslev. The book has been widely acclaimed, and has received the approbations of Rishon Le'Tzion Rabbi Ovadiah Yossef, the Bes Din of the Eda Haredis in Jerusalem, Rabbi Eliezer Berland, and others. His second book, "Nafshi Tidom", is a unique guide to coping with verbal abuse, embarrassment and insult.

Brody's third book - his first in English - is "The Trail to Tranquility". Biographical info courtesy of R. Lazer Brody.

Check out the image below for Rabbi Brody's full U.S. schedule:

Click here to get Dixie Yid in your e-mail Inbox or here to subscribe in Google Reader.