"So Deep" - Thinking/Linking About Shlomo Carlebach

I'm considering going to a Yahrtzeit concert - but I kind of prefer listening to and thinking about the man himself (video, on Israeli TV). (Here's an audio of him figuring out a tune. There's a priceless moment at 8:57-8:58 when someone sneezes and Shlomo reacts. I recommend continuing on to Part Two, till the very end.) (Here's his early, smoothly produced, chazanishe Mimkomcha.) (Here's a video of him teaching and singing pre-Rosh HaShanah in his Shul. Over his head is a picture of his twin brother.)
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Here's an interesting article on Reb Shlomo by Professor Shaul Magid, cited by Menachem Butler. b
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In the early nineties Reb Shlomo greeted me with a hug at Simcha Hochbaum's wedding on Har Tzion. Right before he embraced me (we didn't know each other) he looked right at me and said warmly, "Brother, you look sharp." To me that's a wow, always will be.
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Magid's piece includes this first hand account and commentary:
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"In the autumn of 1994, just a few weeks before his death, Shlomo was strapping on his guitar and taking his seat, while I was kneeling next to him, taping our microphone to the microphone that was being used for amplification. As he was sitting down, characteristically tired yet uncharacteristically weak, he said to no one in particular, 'Okay, hevre, let’s pretend we’re happy.' I may have been the only one who heard it. It struck me as the quintessence of his life, the narrows between utter brokenness and the unwillingness to give in to despair."
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A friend of mine told me that years ago his prominent parents saw Reb Shlomo at a convention. They bumped into him in the lobby and shmoozed a bit. He was about to perform and said something like, "Excuse but I have to go and pretend to be happy now." My friend and his parents only saw the sadness in that, not the greatness, not the humanity. When I told the story to a wise friend of mine, he said that the story made him think more not less of Reb Shlomo. That story never made me think less of the man.
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I wonder - how many times in his life, maybe even in a day, did he feel/say that sentiment? Also, how many times a day did he cheer someone on with a words the way he did for me with, "Brother, you look sharp." No one else has ever said those words to me in my life.
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That same summer as Simcha's Chasanah, I was an advisor for a summer program for college kids. Reb Shlomo did a private concert just for our small group and he told the following story. He performed at a high security prison. All the young men he played for had committed heinous crimes and were in for life. He gave them each a hug and sang for them. Afterwards, as he was leaving, one of the boys approached him. "Rabbi," he asked, "can I have another hug?" Reb Shlomo was happy to oblige but asked, "Why?" And the boy said, "Because that I know that in my whole life I'll never get another hug." Reb Shlomo said with confidence,"If only I had met him and hugged him when he was younger - he never would have become a criminal."
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Mei inyan le'inyan be'oto inyan - On a related/unrelated note, a poem comes to mind. I don't remember the exact words of the poem, but I almost do. It was about twenty years ago way downtown at a reading. It was during the season that is quickly approaching. A woman got up and said something like this, "I'll never forget the first time I was hugged, I don't remember who gave it to me - but I remember the hug. And G-d - the only gift I want for Christmas this year is another hug.'
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I kind of wanted this piece to only be about Reb Shlomo, but I think the free association is within the spirit of his spirit. Back to him. My friend Simcha has smicha from Shlomo, he seems to be the last person to get it from him. I was there when he got it. Simcha has it on tape. There was a moment when the floor was opened for anyone who wished to speak and I spoke. Every now and then Simcha listens to the tape and thinks of me when he hears my voice.
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Reb Shlomo told a story of his memory of his receiving smicha. As he recalled it, Rav Yitzchak Hutner sat him down (he had lost a lot of sleep leading up to that moment) and looked at him. Then Rav Hutner said something like, "Pretend that you were me and I was you and you were me and you were testing me for smicha , what would you ask me?" He passed the test and got his smicha. And so did Simcha.

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At the bris of Simcha's first son, on the Lower East Side, Reb Shlomo walked in with a sefer under his arm. He spoke, and in his talk he asked why of all days was it on Pesach that Avraham and Sarah were told that they would have a son. His answer was that there's little sadder than not having any child to ask you the Mah Nishtanah.
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Mei inyan le'inyan be'oto inyan - On a related/unrelated note. I once heard Rav Aharon Lichtenstein give a long presentation on why Moshe broke the luchot. After presenting many viewpoints, he came to his grand finale. The last opinion he cited was the Kli Yakar, who says that Moshe broke the luchot out of his love for the Jewish People, so that he would be in the same boat as them. Rav Lichtenstein paused, then said, "Imagine how much ahavas yisrael the great rabbi, the Kli Yakar must have had, to think of that interpretation."
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Imagine the empathy and love that Reb Shlomo had for others to think of that thought about Avraham and Sarah and anyone without children.
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They say that more than loving klal yisrael we have to love Reb Yisrael, not a theoretical love of an amorphous group but true love for the guy next to you. Reb Shlomo strove and inspired in that regard.
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One of my students told me this week that he was thinking of spending Shabbos at The House of Love and Prayer. I asked him if he was going to California. He said, "No, the Upper West Side." He thought that's the name of the Carlebach Shul. He didn't seem to believe me when I told him that it wasn't.
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Here's a nice description of The Carlebach Shul from Among the Holy Schleppers, by Jennifer Bleyer:
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I had grown up in congregations where the aisles were used as catwalks during the High Holidays. Here, worshippers were freaks, geniuses, outcasts, and eccentrics—more like members of the tribe to which I imagined myself belonging. One was a former yeshiva student who now favored various Hindu gurus, but still kept Shabbat. One was a Kahanist alcoholic from Transylvania. One got arrested for aiding a runaway teenager and other congregants rallied to help bail him out of jail. Reb Shlomo referred to all of them as “holy schleppers."
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Here's a complex biographical essay of Reb Shlomo, by Zalman Alpert. He ends with a striking phrase, which some might consider an insult. What Michael Lerner called Reb Shlomo sounds like a high level to me.
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May the neshama of this great "wounded healer" experience an aliya.

Hmmm

I have a set of Tehillim cards - each card has one pasuk or part of a pasuk. The idea is to take one idea and focus on it - sing it, meditate, chant, dance, etc. Right before Shabbos I picked one from the face down stack of about 100. It was Mizmor Shir Leyom HaShabbos, with a thought reading, "Of all I have accomplished this week, the highest is my singing the song of Shabbat, the day of appreciation of our very existence."

Tehilim Cards: Psalms for recharging and rejuvenating us to open our hearts

B.C. Poem, Animated

The Dead (rachmanah litzlan)

Shifchi

This song is so beautiful - hope it's not too sad for pre-Shabbos. I experience the song as more dveikusdic than sad, even though the words are from Eichah, from a sad context: Shifchi Kamayim Libeich (starts 2 minutes in).

Lech Lecha Tanka

I am an onion
and have to leave Ur Kasdim
to unpeel my self
We each cut through our layers
If we are to say we lived
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Four More

The have to be rights
always act like they are right
because they feel wrong.
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Written during Karduner conceert, while thinking of a recent Therapy Doc post about people who always have to be right.
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The candle burns on
I believe I can still fix
Yes, I need to fix
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Written during Karduner song about how we have to believe that we can fix, It brought to mind a story about Rabbi Yisrael Salanter and a shoemaker and a candle.
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Merciful king, Please
Bring us up to Israel
Our Own Holy Land
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I walked around Israel for 8 days this summer and must have listened to the song Ve'Ha'aleinu LeEretz Yisrael about a hundred times. It speaks to me in the deepest way, on many levels. I wrote this while Yosef Karduner played the song live at Mount Sinai Congregation in Washington Heights, New York.

Yosef Karduner
strums with his fingers, no pick;
plays with his raw soul
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Witten early on during the concert.

Achim Anachnu

A Lech Lecha Thought
By Rabbi Neil Fleischmann

"If you go to the left I will go the right, and if you go to the right I will go to the left” (Breishit 13:9). These famous words needed to be said regarding a separation that had to be made. That’s the way it’s normally understood by most of the commentaries and the way most of us have it in our heads since early childhood. As the Sforno puts it, “If you choose to request a pasture on the left side, I will request one on the right side.” Unklus says Avraham declared, “If you go north I’ll go south,” and vice versa.

Several years ago Rabbi Motti Elon spoke at my school and cited an explanation of this pasuk, which sounded novel to me, though it appears explicitly in Rashi. According to Rashi, Avraham actually said, “If you go to the left, I will be nearby to support you on the right. And if you go to the right, I’ll be there for you on your left side.” The Siftei Chachomim explains that it would be odd for Avraham to be saying that he wanted to run in the opposite direction from Lot, because he just finished saying “achim anachnu” - we are brothers that shouldn't fight. Why would he now be saying in harsh terms, “I’ll go to the other end from wherever you go?”

Support for Rashi’s position can be found in the fact that in the end Avraham does not travel at all. According to the conventional understanding of his affirmation it would seem that Avraham did not keep his word, as only Lot travels. Later on we’re told “Avraham heard that his brother was taken captive” and he snaps into action immediately and fights to protect Lot (14:14). This fits perfectly with Rashi’s approach here, as Avraham is clearly keeping his word to be at Lot’s side ready to help him in his hour of need.

The Netziv says that it would have been enough for Avraham to tell Lot, “Separate from me, either by going right or left.” Avraham’s phrasing reveals that he offered to split the burden of separation with Lot, rather than putting it all on him. Lot chose to travel far enough away that Avraham did not have to budge from where he was. This explanation supports the traditional understanding of this line, while taking the edge off of it, as well as answering the question of why Avraham does not move as he said he would.

As Rashi sees it, Avraham was saying that while on the one hand he needed to distance himself from Lot, on the other hand he would never abandon him. This short line has a profound message for us. There are individual people as well as groups that we need to distance ourselves from, but it doesn’t mean that we don’t care about them. Although those we care for may mistakenly feel abandoned, we separate with an attitude of concern and support. Dear brothers and sisters may reside in their own spaces to our immediate right and to our immediate left. We need to view these positions as angles from which to offer support.

May we be blessed to feel love and compassion for others and to offer genuine assistance, for this is the way of G-d, whom we yearn to emulate.

Shabbat Shalom

I know kindness works

So I risk it with the cruel

Then kindness fails me

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Written during live rendition of Yosef Karduner's adaptation about Rav Nachman MiBreslav's saying that one should judge even a totally wicked (rasha gamur) person favorably.

Extra! Extra!

The latest from the Jewish Week is online, including an essay by me on Lech Lechah called The Road Away From Here.

3 Pre Sleep Haiku

OZ VEHADAR
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Garbed in graceful strength
You laugh the day's final laugh
Beauty is a breath
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Written while listening to Yosef Karduner sing this song live. He said that the tune was composed by a poor Breslov Chasid who presented it to his daughter as a wedding gift.
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K'SEH OVEID
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Erred like a lost sheep -
did not forget your mitzvot,
So please seek me out
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Written while listening to Yosef Karduner sing Bakesh Avdechah, based on Tehillim 119:176-177)
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Dear Pillow, I think
Tired is as tired does
That may be the case
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Written during the Karduner concert while envisioning typing it and posting it now, right before sleep.

A Thought Before Mincha

They say mincha is the hardest prayer of the day. Starting early and ending late are both easier than pausing in the middle. This is true about every day and about life as a whole.

Time to take a breath
and share a moment with G-d
Holy Mincha time

2 Original Poems

Shabbos white

or Gap blue shirt

Judgement calls

always hurt

Thank you G-d

for a moment of prayer

an oasis of breath

any time, any where

Written tonight after Maariv, while in the moment as well as rethinking a part of yesterday when I was a lone tie-less blue shirt in a sea of black ties, black suits, and white shirts.

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Weddings are a time for reflection and going inside oneself - but that's how I feel about all times.

Each and every moment of life is an occasion - the "big" ones can overshadow the "small" ones, but we can also see the small moments more clearly from the vantage point of the big ones.

Don't let life slip away.

Don't become a person who says the above line to others based on experience.

Into mystery we all walk, perhaps never more so than on our wedding night.

Nothing serves as well as a cliche', sometimes, to sum things up: "Nothing is easy."

Greatness can be built upon ink and sliced wood.

Some truths are simple: "Fear G-d and keep his commandments"

Written last Thursday night while awaiting the Chuppah of Josh Podolsky, an unusually wise and kind young man.

Hearing the Baby's Cry

The story is told that one of the Lubavitcher Rebbes was sitting with his son who would follow him as leader. They were learning Torah and the younger of the two did not notice when his infant son, in the other room, began to cry. The baby continued to cry but the father didn't hear. The grandfather heard the child, went and got him and calmed him down. He told his son, "If you want to be a leader of the Jewish People you have to know when to pause from learning and hear and respond to the baby's cry."

I always understood this story to be about empathic listening, I still do. It means a lot to me. Someone recently told me that Rav Amital of Gush Etzyon has applied this story to the founding of his yeshivah. He said that Medinat Yisrael needed help and that yeshivah people couldn't ignore the cry. I trust that he also applies the story to empathic listening.

Knowing How Way Leads On To Way...

Years ago I heard Rabbi Nissan Alpert Z"TL tell of someone asking Rav Moshe for forgiveness and Rav Moshe saying that there was no need to ask before he says a prayer every night in which he forgives everyone that might need it for that day. I think of prayer sometimes when I write right before sleep.

I once had a teacher who, during a test, announced, "Eyes on your own paper," just to see who would look up. Once when I posted pre-sleep about forgiveness two people came forward and apologized - but I wasn't fishing for that. And I am not fishing now.

I have some poems and other posts stored up. This one is free flow, right before sleep.

When I was a little boy I was taught well by my parents to pray before sleep for all the people I love. It reminds me of that Robert Fulghum piece. It's true so much of what is essential to life is told to us as children.

A few years ago I walked into a bookstore and picked up an out of place book and bought it on the spot (half price at Strand). It was called Pobby and Dingan. I loved it and must have lent it out ten times. No-one that I've lent it to has been taken by it the way I was. It's one of my favorite books ever. It's about a little girl who has two friends, who happen to be imaginary, and one day they go missing. It probably helps to get into this book if you've had imaginary friends yourself.

Today I watched a short, powerful video called Opal Dream. It reminded me a bit of Phoebe In Wonderland. It's an adaptation of Pobby and Dingan. It was great, but as the old saying goes, I liked the book better. They Hollywood-ified the ending. Perhaps my friend who didn't like the book's ending will like this treatment better. I recommend this film, as well as Phoebe in Wonderland. (Opal Dream is squeaky clean, the other one a drop less so.)

On Shabbos I came up with a parsha Q - Noach entered the teivah at 600 years old, did he take in many great great grandchildren? It doesn't sound that way. Were they killed off?

Good night and G-d Bless

you with holy peaceful rest

whoever you are

;

PS - Over Shabbos the poem The Road Less Travelled came up, and I thought of this post.

POTD

To Be Quiet in Heart and In Eye Clear

Geese appear high over us,
pass, and the sky closes. Abandon,
as in love or sleep, holds
them to their way, clear,
in the ancient faith: what we need
is here. And we pray, not
for new earth or heaven, but to be
quiet in heart, and in eye
clear. What we need is here.

From The Wild Geese, By Wendell Berry

GRATITUDE

I wrote this last night in my hotel room at Freshman Retreat, was feeling good and didn't feel compelled to write. I decided to push myself and put down some words of gratefulness. This is what came out:

Games are played in all fields and in many ways; be diligently honest and fair
Right now I feel comfortable with my own skin - may I be blessed to hold on to this in the moments when I feel like I don't have skin
Always and never are good words to keep away from - like other extremes they are so disloyal to the opaque nature of reality as to become virtually meaningless
Timing is key in life
I am grateful to G-d for this moment, the moments that brought me to now and whatever moments that will flow out of this one moment
Truth and peace rest on two sides of a shaky old school scale; it's up to us to balance these values
Upon reflection answers are generally combination plates rather one straight up choice from column A or column B
Dust is part life, part of death - minuscule remaining fragments of people, places, and things
Even rabbis get the blues

Reb Noach

In looking over the Parshat Noach I noticed a leitmotif resting on forms of the word hashchatah - destructiveness. In Breishit 6:11, it says that "vatishachet ha'aretz - "the world had become corrupt/morally destroyed." Verse 12 adds that "G-d saw the land and beheld that it had been morally destroyed by its inhabitants who had all become corrupt/destructive - "Vayar Elokim et ha'aretz, vehinei nishchatah, ki hishchit kol basar et darko al ha'aretz." Therefore G-d decides (line 13), "I am about to destroy them from (Rashi) - or with (Kaplan) the earth" - "ve'hineni mashchitam et ha'aretz."

It dawned on me that what seems to be conveyed here that the flood was more a consequence than a punishment. And it was only the final part of a consequence that the people had already set into motion. They had already destroyed the moral center of the world, there was no civilized world left, just a pathetic distraction of an imitation. G-d had to recreate the world that the people had destroyed and at this point a tragic housecleaning was sadly in order. Even the final form of the word that G-d uses when He says that he will destroy the earth's inhabitants, seems to connote that they had destroyed themselves.

For more, longer, Noach pieces of mine search in Noach in this blog and at parshapost.blogspot.com.

Shabbat Shalom

GNAGB

I am not a baseball fan, but the news station I keep the radio on is broadcasting the Yankee game, and the FM station is playing a weak James Taylor song. They just announced that the game belongs to the Yankees and you're not allowed to record it or reproduce it any way without express consent. That reminded me of when I was a kid and taped M*A*S*H and was excited about it. When I shared it with a friend he told me that I did something illegal and burst my bubble. He said that it was like that announcement they made during baseball broadcasts.

"Such little things make such a big difference," that's what the announcer just said. And yet he's managed to say myriad things since. There seems to be a rule that sportscasters have to fill every second of air with their voices. What's that about? Do people enjoy the nonstop chatter? (I wrote these words at the start of the game and then turned off the radio, turned toward other things. I just turned it back on. The Yankees were up 5-0 and then the Angels got a one run home run. Apparently the Angels tend to have fifth inning rallies. This must be exciting if it means something to you. It helps me imagine how people who aren't into things I'm into can be oblivious to the excitement that something like a poem can bring on for me.)

It is the end of another day. I feel badly that I was tied up with work and didn't visit a student during her math test. I didn't understand when she asked if I could come by - then she told me that last year (or was it two years ago?) I proctored a math test she took and it was the only one she did well on all year, and she felt that I somehow brought her success. I was doing Torah Guidance during that time, then a colleague came in and asked me to write a recommendation ASAP for a student. So I did.

I am teaching about Shmah.

We say Shmah in the day and night, in the bright times and in the dark times. The phrasing used for when we are to say these words is "when you're lying down and when you're rising up" - in the highs and lows of life. Similarly, we praise the chesed - kindness of G-d that we see in the morning of redemption and we affirm the belief which we have in Him (and He has in us) during the night of exile.

Time to head toward sleep. GNAGB.

A Dear Colleague

Out The Door Poem

Judgements are a judgement call

Kindness, kind of hard

Falliing down comes up in Fall

Calling, my calling card

Going Twice

As a kid I'd never heard of Where The Wild Things Are. I did know who Maurice Sendak was because of Chicken Soup With Rice (words available here) (Carol King's adapted song and cartoon video, here).

From My Classroom - Devarim Perek Alef

In the beginning of Devarim(1:6-8), Moshe recounts Bne Yisrael being told to go from Chorev and to begin conquering Israel. Then we are told that they actually went and did this (1:19). We need to understand the meaning of the 10 seemingly anomalous psukim in between these two statements, which seem to interrupt the narrative flow. I presented this question to students. Number one below, based on Rabbi Yitzchak Twersky, is the answer I brought to the table. Students came up with other cogent answers, which I will include below. I love it when students teach me.

1. Sefer Dvarim is all about the challenge of living up to Avraham’s model and being worthy of receiving the land promised to Avraham. In Breishit (18:19) God says he knows Avraham will pass on the way of God to his children and that they will do tzedaka and mishpat so that God can keep all that he promised Avraham. (The context of this pasuk is a contrast between Avraham and Sodom which rests at the crux of this sefer). This explains why following God’s command to Moshe to begin working towards the conquest of Eretz Yisrael, Moshe immediately turns his attention to establishing tzedaka and mishpat. It states (1:17) “ki hamishpat lElokim”, with these words Moshe is working to fulfill God’s expectation that Avraham’s children will follow the derech Hashem.

2. In order to go from living the divine desert life to autonomy in the land of Israel they needed to be told about setting up a society. Thus, in between being told to head to Israel and actually beginning the trip they were told to set up a judicial system.

3. Israel can only tolerate inhabitants that are just. Like a digestive system that can't absorb poison, the land of Israel vomits out inhabitants that behave in crooked ways. Thus, before actually heading to the land the people are reminded to set up a system and live a life righteous justice.

4. The last time the Jews tried to go to Israel they did not approach things in an upright manner and that opportunity to enter the the land was lost. The incident of the meraglim was a case of behavior that will not work if the Jews are to live in the holy land. In contrast to that incident they are now reminded to live straight, truthful, just lives. This approach explains how this flows into the lines which immediately follow in which Moshe recounts the story of the spies. This fits with the fact the story starts off on a darker note than the way it's told in Bamidbar. Here, it is clear from the start that the people's intent was less than pure and that Moshe blamed them for implicating him and making it impossible for him to enter the land.

Recalling Shabbat While "Painting"

I love meals where Torah flows comfortably. I never heard before today that Adam and Chavah seem childlike in The Garden, adolescent like when they eat the forbidden fruit and get called on it, and adult like after their expulsion. That type of talk tends to (as it did at lunch) open up the topic of what G-d's plan for humans really was. There was great back and forth at lunch. One bright person noted that Adam and Chavah's response after sinning seems primitive; they try to hide from G-d. This was posed as a challenge to another wise person's case for Adam and Eve as being on a sophisticated, high spiritual level. Another member of the assembly asked, "Haven't you ever seen a sophisticated person revert to a primitive reaction in an extreme, traumatic situation?" Touche!

I had never heard before last night that the Ramban says that Kayin's sign was a watch dog to protect him. The person who shared this piece of information gained it by being in an online group in which everyone shares a different commentary on one verse. I think that's a great idea.

I davened on the other side of the neighborhood and was later told that I was missed at a simcha kiddush on this side. Oops.

Rabbi Meir Goldvicht spoke this morning in the Shul I davened in and said:

Shabbat Breishit is one of that Shabboses with a special name, like Shabbat HaGadol. People think that its name is on account of us reading from Parshat Bereishit. If that was what gave it its name then perhaps every Shabbos should be called by the name of its parshah, but we don't have a Shabbat Noach or a Shabbat Lech Lechah. Rather what makes it special is that it's the first Shabbat following the chagim, and is the Shabbat that is truly the start of the normal cycle of our year, into which we take the influence of the holidays. Chazal say that Shabbat Breishit sets the stage for every Shabbat of the year.

The Week Ebbs Away

Shabbos is coming. A new month is coming. The Shabbos blessing for the new month is coming. I read that such a prayer for the new month is unique to Judaism. I don't know other cultures and religions well enough to say if anyone has such a ceremony. I can say that ours is a beautiful prayer. We look for every month to be one of renewal. We pray that like the moon that almost disappears and is then reborn that we should be blessed with revitalization this month.

May we be blessed this month, and also this Shabbos, not to mention every day (oops).

I'd like to come out of this Shabbos more focused and energized. Please G-d, as we read in the Torah about the first Shabbos ever - let it be special for us. Some say on the seventh day nothing was created. Another way to view it is that the greatest creation was saved for the seventh day - Shabbos.

I sway as she approaches,

as darkness encroaches,

lightened by her light

I forfeit the fight

I hurry slowly

toward being more free.

take in the strong day

let the week end her stay.

G-d help me

to make one of many

and this day to sanctify,

despite my poverty inside.

Soon Shabbos

Sometimes you just have to get on the bus. That time is going to come for me soon. There's endless work to do, but I have to sign out and move on toward home. As I write this a bouncy song called Horchata is playing. It's by Vampire Weekend and available as a simple and free download on their website.

I just mentioned to my brother that I have a gift for him from my Israel trip this summer. I told him that it's a framed piece of klaf with the words "Hinei mah tov umanayim shevet achim gam yachad" ("How good and nice it is when brothers dwell together in unity") " wrtten on it in large, beautiful Torah print. He asked why I chose that pasuk so I asked if he'd prefer the one I got for myself: "Mah ahavti torahtechah kol hayom hee sichati" (How much I love Your Torah, it is my topic of convesation all day/every day.") He then asked if I was kidding and I said I wasn't. It turns out that that's his pasuk, the pasuk for the name Mordechai, which he recites after Shmoneh Esrei!

Apparently, a person's pasuk starts with the first letter and ends with the last letter of their name. I never paid much attention to how that worked because my name is not on the list in any siddur I've ever seen. I once looked up my name in a concordance and found that in one place in Tanach it appears as a noun and not a verb. That's the pasuk I consider mine. But maybe I should find one that starts with a nun and end with an ayin.

I've posted a totally new essay on the parsha. It's about time.

Rabbi Pesach Oratz, ZT"L, told me about when he had a heart attack. As they wheeled him in to the hospital the doctors were most concerned about his medical information. He said that he wanted them to attend to his life first and that they'd get the information later. They listened.

He was advised to have bypass surgery immediately. He didn't know what to do. It entered his mind that there's a tradition that considering the name of Rav Levi Yitzchak of Berdichov is known to be a segulah for health, and so he thought about that name. Then he decided to have the operation and met with the doctor. The surgeon told him that he was Jewish but it was not meaningful to him. He added that another doctor told him that it might be of interest to Rabbi Oratz if he shared his lineage with him. So he told him, "I am a descendant of a man I'm told was a great rabbi. His name was Levi Yitzchak ben Sarah Sascha." This helped Rabbi Oratz relax.

Last Thursday I had an extraction of a shard of a tooth that was embedded in my palate. My insurance and signing of releases was of great interest to the doctor and staff. The assistant (and the doctor) were also quite interested in her retrieving her glasses which she had forgotten to wear that day and couldn't see without. If you ever want to know where not to go for oral surgery ask me.

Soon the bus. Soon Shabbos. A date once told me that the Shulchan Aruch says that it's assur to travel on Friday. Okaaay. One has to be careful. I don't know anyone who holds practically today that you may not travel on Erev Shabbos.

Soon Shabbos.

Happy Global HandWashing Day (Click For Link)

Consider The Yetzer Harah

There is a Gemera where Antoninus asks Rebbe, "When does the Yetzer Hara enter, at conception or birth?" Rebbe says at conception. Antininounus says, "Impossible, if so it would break out of the womb." Rebbe conceded that Antoninus is right. Rav Avhraham Grozentsky says this doesn’t seem to make sense because the main thing the yetzer hara wants is pleasure/comfort, so why would it break out of its comfortable womb?

He answers that it is a mistake to think what the yetzer hara wants is pleasure. Its main drive is to be free and unfettered, to oppose any control, to defy. One of the ways the yetzer hara remains unrestricted is by always choosing pleasure, but that is only one example. Even in the absence of pleasure the yetzer hara's number one priority is to be its own master. We see from this example the yetzer hara is more bothered by being confined than it is excited by an idyllic setting like the womb.

This explains why people are so often self destructive, because there is a natural human drive to not feel controlled even when this rebellion is not in one's best interest. This explains why O.D.D. (oppositional defiant disorder) is the most frequent diagnosis within adolescence. This also explains why in today’s climate, with such few social restraints, the yetzer hara is having a field day. (adapted from Rabbi Abraham J Twersky, Prayerfully Yours.)

People Would Say That I Was Just Good Fun

Another Harry's Bar is a song that I find to be very pretty. It's one of many acoustic Jethro Tull songs, which always seemed to me to be his strong suit. He recently said that he's an acoustic guy with a lot of noisy friends. He didn't bring those friends to the show I saw tonight. He didn't do Harry's Bar, but this was the general style of this unplugged set. He did do this one, which he said has come back to bite him. Though he admits that his he's not that heavy he said tonight that his waste has grown enough to cause him to lie in bed and experience abject self loathing.

He played Serenade To A Cuckoo and it looked and sounded very much like this video (except that he was dressed more conservatively). He did Rocks On The Road, which I was unfamiliar with, and it looked and sounded very much like this. The second set opened with this blues number, Some Day The Sun Won't Shine For You. They also did Jeffrey Goes To Leicester Square. March The Mad Scientist was another nice acoustic song they did which is on the other end of the spectrum of the stereotype of the Tull sound.

He didn't have an orchestra for Griminelli's Lament but did have another flautist to play off of and it was a beautiful. He played 19 great songs, I'll just mention one more - and I'm purposely singling out the more obscure and less stereotypical ones. Here's Mother Goose sounding in a very similar setting (though a smaller group of players).

There's much to say about why I went and what it meant. It's here, in the white spaces.

GNAGB

Consider The EASY-BAKE

I hope that my blog and its readers don't take offense to my refrain of,"Why am I writing this, here? A reader asked me how I decide what to post, and the sub-question I heard was, "Why do you post the things you post?" If you find The Answer let me know.

I started reading Quinn Cummings' book in earnest on the bus ride home today, I think I got into it, as that's the only explanation I can think of for being awake and missing my stop, which has never happened before. She writes in a funny/real way that speaks to my insides:

"I can not say that being a child actor was detrimental to me, but I could do without being a former child actor. To be a child is a temporary condition. To be a former child actor is a permanent state. Former child actors aren't people. They're memories from your childhood, little people who lived in the television in the den. It would be as if I asked you to consider the feelings of an EASY-BAKE oven."

Just got home and am heading out soon for the evening.

To Home, To Home

What a day! Teaching six periods and and and. The aftershock is still strong.

A student showed me that he was owed points and I gave it to him, then he later showed me that he realized he was mistaken and now saw why I took off the points. What a mentsch!

I came across Rabbi Shalom Carmy's Tradition essay on cynicism. His thought is that there's a warped sense of what mussar is which makes people derisive and cynical about everything, including the scared people and things that mussar is supposed to uphold and protect.

Time to catch a bus

Hope it doesn't pass me by

after this long day

Time to cross a bridge again

Time to travel home, to home

Post Shmini Atzeret Post

I did some research over the holiday on the meaning of the word atzeret, as it appears in Vayikrah 23:36:i

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Rashi - cites a medrash and uses a phrase that is his own wording and has caught on. He tells a story of a host that has many people over and then asks his dearest friends to stay a little bit longer, saying, "Kashah alai preidatchem," - "Your separation is difficult for me."
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Ibn Ezra - cites those who say that it means kehilah - gathering together (based on Yirmiyahu 9:1). Ibn Ezra points out, as others do, that this word appears in the context of the last day of Pesach (Devarim 16:8) which features a command to retreat to privacy (Devarim 16:7). He says that the word atzeret connotes stopping to make G-d primary and all else secondary (based on Shmuel 1 21:8). He backs up his explanation by noting that both here and in regard to Pesach the announcement of a day of atzeret is followed by the exhortation to refrain from melachah - work. Not doing other work allows this to be a true atzeret, a G-d centered day.

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Sforno - says that "Atzeret is not simply the concept of holding back from regular melachah. He says that atzeret connotes, along with refraining from work, placing oneself in a holy place and praying and serving G-d there, basing himself on Shmuel 1 21:8, in addition to Yoel 1:14, and Melachim 2 10:20. He says that the day after the last day of all the holiday cycle is an appropriate day to set aside to go to holy spots and engage in happiness of Torah and kindness. He points out that on the seventh day of Pesach the Jewish People, together with Moshe, sang to G-d (Shmot 15:1) and that's why that day is called atzeret laHashem (Devarim 16:8). This, he explains, is why Shavuot is referred to as Atzeret - because on this fiftieth day after Yetziat Mitzrayim the Jews stopped together to serve G-d. (He suggests that the Torah doesn't call this day Atzeret because the Jewish People later denounced this day when they listened to the negative reports of most of the meraglim (Shmot 33:6).

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Ramban - offers a kabbalistic idea about the six days all being a pair and the seventh and the Jewish People being a pair. He says this is the idea of atzeret, the eight being us. He develops this concept and says that what we call the Omer period is really like Chol HaMoed and Shavuot is the atzeret, topping it off. So too, Sukkos has an atzeret at its completion.

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Da'aet Mikrah - Breaks it down into several major approaches, either stopping or closing or gathering.

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Chizkuni - Tells a story of a group that gathers with a friend. Knowing that they'll be back in 50 days they don't make a big deal over parting. The next time, they know they will meet again in a few months, so there's no major to do over parting. But the next time, as they part, they realize this is it for six months so they add on a day to deal with the long break up ahead.
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Rav Hirsch - says that atzeret is a special kind of stopping, stopping and trying to hold on to something before it slips through your hands. He says, as others before him, that Sukkos marks the end of the cycle of the Shalosh Regalim. We have a special day to try to focus before returning to the "real world."

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Today, we experience Sukkos not so much as the end of the Shalosh Regalim, but as the end of a month of holy days. We take one day to try to figure out how to bring this holiness into our regular lives.

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"Kashah alai preidatchem/Your separation is difficult for Me." This is understood to refer to separating from G-d, kaviyachol. Some say the preidah is our separation from each other. It dawned on me on Yom Tov that preidah may refer to fragmentation within our selves. A dear friend of mine heard my thoughts and commented that the three are connected - it's the three relationships we have in life.

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A man had trouble finding things in the morning. So he made a list before he went to sleep. It read, in part: My tie is on the doorknob, my shirt is on the chair, my socks are under the bed, and I am in bed. He woke up in the morning and went through the list and found gathered everything together. But when he did not see himself in bed he panicked. The idea is that everything can be in place in life, but if we are fragmented, if we don't know where we are, then nothing is in place.

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May we be blessed, in the merit of the one more day we took to wrap it all up, to find ourselves this year. May we connect with each other and with G-d. May this be a year of unity in all directions.

Ma'ariv

Many moments and thoughts pass away

As I let go while holding tight

A new familiar feeling comes over to me as Kaddish Shalem is recited

Riding my emotions I travel closer to the far away morning

I sigh while we say it is upon us to praise the Master of All

Very soon it will be time for Shacharit

On Isru Chag

I just heard a story on 1010 WINS about China cracking down on drunk driving. They ended the story saying that one man was even sentenced to death, and that that was later decreased to life. I think the piece could have been written more carefully, unless they were going for some kind of irony.

I just finished reading the wonderful All Other Nights. When I get close to the end of a book I enjoyed I start to dilly dally with my reading. I usually attribute this to not wanting to be done with that world and those characters. I wonder if there's also some control issue as the reading relationship between me and the book comes to a close. Am I saying, "Even at the exciting ending here, you don't rule over me?"

I am in the middle of a post about the meaning of Shmini Atzeret - one of those posts that a lot goes into and then I push blogger's publish button and then I wonder. So many things happened over the holiday that ignited my "I should blog about that" fuse, but now I don't remember.

I heard a nice offbeat talk by Rabbi Dani Rapp about the idea of living to one hundred and twenty. It was a Simchat Torah topic because the sources for the concept come from the start and end of the Torah. G-d decrees at the end of Breishi that man will live only one hundred and twenty years. Moshe dies at one hundred and twenty. There are hole in these pesukim being paradigms for this being the magic number that we all hope to live. It's possible that after the flood there was a specific decree for that generation. Also, Aharon lived longer than Moshe, and we need not assume that Moshe's age is the limit for all of us.

Rabbi Rapp cited a recent news story about two scientists who bet about whether or not any of their progeny will live to one hundred and fifty. They put money in an account and one day with interest accrued one of these scientists' descendants will inherit a significant sum of money. (Rabbi Rapp noted to me afterwards that he noticed as he spoke that this story elicited a smile from Rabbi Herschel Schachter.)

Among the many interesting ideas he cited (including a theory of Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan that there were many beings living before man for many years that were not named man. This theory affects a discussion of man's lifespan because, as described in sefer Breishit, these beings started to intermingle with and marry man) was the parallel between the age of the world and the age of man. The Ramban marshals the kabalistic idea that mashiach will come by the year two thousand. He explains that there are six thousand years correspond to the six days of the week which are followed by Shabbos. Similarly six thousand years will be topped off by the era of Mashiach. (The first two thousand years are the time of tohu vavohu, the next two thousand are the era of Torah - starting with Avraham, and the final era is the period of redemption). Rabbi Rapp explained that six thousand years is one hundred and twenty yovel cycles and that some suggest that this is based on the idea that the world as we know it, like man, has an expiration date of one hundred and twenty. When he completed his presentation right before hakafot on the night of Simchat Torah Rabbi Yosef Blau wished aloud for Rabbi Rapp to live ad me'ah ve'esrim.

"Kashah Alai Preidatchem"

May we each be blessed in these closing days of the Chag season.

There's a beautiful song by Moshe Yess about Sukkas. It ends with, "Don't we all live in temporary dwellings? Aren't we all visitors - you and me?" I searched for them and couldn't find 'em, but this post, in which I mention the song, came up instead.

Who Maketh My Spirit To Shine

This Warren Zevon song, Don't Let Us Get Sick was described by Mitch Albom as a plaintive prayer. Yes. Here's Jill Sobule praying the words.

This Holiday Season

I was about five (because I was still living in an apartment when I wrote it) when I wrote and set to a tune the words, "There's a fish on a dish on a table on a floor on a ceiling of the people next door, next door." At 12 I scribbled on my notebook during Mrs. Levine's class, "What are you doing tomorrow? Do you have some time I can borrow?" Soon after that I started saving poetry scraps in a red box that originally held a bar mitzvah present sweater.

It's always funny to me (not ha-ha) when people say they can't keep up a blog because they don't know what to write about, that it doesn't flow. I need to keep my urge wrapped in gauze in order not to spend every waking hour writing.

It's going on five years now for this blog and things have changed and stayed the same. There was a pocket when there were no comments, and to the best of my knowledge no one was reading. Then the blogger formerly known as Mirty installed two stat counters and I saw that people were reading. Sometimes I'm secure enough to feel that the writing is enough for me, and just in case I need to know it the fact is that people read too, and if that's not enough I do I have a nice treasure trove of comments. Those moments of confidence are good times.

I'm going to try to free blog (did I just coin that?). Hello, yeah - it's been a while, not much how about you? I am almost done with All Other Nights. It's remarkable. I'm getting close to the denouement. I love that word and have started using it it in writing ever since I learned how to pronounce it (it has joined ranks with Albert Camus and other people, places, and things that it took me ages to learn how to pronounce).

Sukkos is coming to the end. Those of us that follow the Shulchan Aruch will be eating in a Sukkah tonight and tomorrow unless it rains. I don't get how minhagim developed that go against the black on white halachah on this that traces back to the Gemorah.

I think I want to embrace my Hebrew Birthday, smack in the middle between Yom Kippur and Sukkot. I like it. My English Birthday on the other has always disappeared into the ether of this holiday season and I think it's time to let it go.

I looked over an old (pre computers) poetry notebook and found it interesting that I write often about being hungry. I wonder what that means. maybe that I am often hungry?

Rav S.R. Hirsch says that atzeret doesn't simply mean to stop but to stop and try to grab onto something before it slips away. Shmini Atzeret is a last chance to stop and take something with us to hold onto for the next six months.

I'm happy for the people I know that really do Sukkos right - both of them. Some people actually make the Sukkot their home for seven days and there's no competing with that kind of holiness. If you live in Israel it's like spending your life in a Sukkah. And if you go to mikvah regularly then you get that unique experience of being surrounded by holiness. I suppose that if you truly live a life in which you are constantly trying to fulfill every shamor and zachor of every dibbur of G-d then you too are surrounded by holiness all the time.

G-d, please place in my heart the ability to be like our father Jacob, a believer the son of a believer, to learn how to deal with difficult people in the world while inside remaining a pure man, a dweller of tents (translated from the Hebrew, which I wrote on Erev Yom Kippur).

It seems to be that Sukkos has a universal aspect to it as evidenced by the 70 offerings, the story of why we keep this holiday in this month, the story of how the nations of the world will one day be offered this one mitzvah, and more. On the other hand Pesach is a private Jewish holiday. The most personal day of this holiday for us as A People is Shmini Atzeret.

Dear Sukkot I'm sorry that I didn't embrace you more properly, and soon you will be gone.

I wish everyone a happy end of Sukkot. I ask your forgiveness as a human being and as a blogger. May this be The Year.

Hoshiah Nah

Hoshanah Rabbah;

Dear G-d, please, please, save us now

For G-d's sake save us

Chol HaMoed - Day Four

The medrash explains that by the time Yom Kippur arrives we've been forgiven. Between Yom Kippur and Sukkot people prepare for Sukkot and don't sin. Sukkot is thus the opening day for sins. The question on this is that it sounds like erev Sukkot is holier than Sukkot because on the days before it we don't sin but on Sukkot we sin. The Sfat Emet explains that we see from here the power of preparation! This is similar to the pasuk which says that the Mishkan was dedicated on the eighth day. It was opening day, so it should say be called Day One, not Day Eight. Rav Yaakov Kaminetzki explains that we see from here how important preparation is.

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Melech Rachaman

King and Compassionate One

Racheim Aleinu

Please, please have mercy on us

Please, please show mercy to me

Zman Simchateinu

Reconnecting to G-d from a place of love (teshuva mei'ahava) accomplishes what can not be done through a fear based repentance (teshuva miyirah).When you do teshuva mei'ahava your aveirot - negative actions become zechuyot - merits. Up to and including Yom Kippur is a time when most people focus on fear of G-d. Sukkot is referred to as yom rishon lecheshbon avonot - usually translated as - the opening day for the reckoning of sins.

Sukkot is zman simchateinu. Rav Nachman MiBreslov explains that on Sukkot we re-focus our teshuva and do it mei'ahava. The true meaning of yom rishon lecheshbon avonot, is that in the post Yom Kippur days we want to re-count our avonot and work -through continued teshuva mei'ahava - on recycling the avonot as zechuyot - to switch things around and turn things up.

On Rosh HaShana, at Tashlich, we throw our sins into the water. On Sukkot what do we do? We gather in the water in joy - u'she'avtem mayim besason - we collect back those aveirot with great joy!

On Sukkot

About six years ago a wonderful student of mine said to me, "I saw this movie. It's being passed around from one Israeli family to another. I really liked it and thought of you - thought you'd like it." She lent me a bootleg copy of a Hebrew - no subtitles - movie. I watched this small Israeli film that no-one heard of and found it sweet and strong. About a year later this movie, Ushpizin, became all the rage.

If you haven't seen this movie you're in for a treat. If you've seen it, it's a good time to re-watch Ushpizin. It's a beautiful movie about living faith. Early on in the story the main character tells his wife that Rabbi Natan, the protege of Rabbi Nachman of Breslov said that if you see a lacking it's because of either a total or partial lack of prayer. His wife tells him to listen to his words and go pray. Then they each pray wholeheartedly. At the start of the film the protagonist is studying about the importance of not getting angry. It's theoretical until the film's denouement.

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The medrash (cited by the Tur Shulachan Aruch) explains that by the time Yom Kippur arrives we've been forgiven. Between Yom Kippur and Sukkot people prepare for Sukkot and don't sin. Sukkot is thus the opening day for sins. The Taz asks a strong question; from this it sounds like erev Sukkot is holier than Sukkot because on the days before it we don't sin but on Sukkot we sin. The Sfat Emet explains that we see from here the power of preparation!.

The Sfat Emet says that we see that there’s more power to the preparation for a mitzvah than in the performance of the mitzvah itself. This fits with the idea of saying a mitzvah oveir le’asiatan. Thus we hold an esrog upside down because the mitzvah happens so quickly. But preparing for the lifting of the lulav and esrog, as for any mitzvah is a long hard process made up of experiences that combine to make us who we are. Hachanah takes and is a lifetime. Sfat Emet adds that we may do a mitzvah incorrectly. But preparation, in feeling and thought - it’s all good. In preparation the effort is the key. (I heard the above cited ideas in a recent talk from Rabbi J.J. Schachter.)

This is similar to the pasuk which says that the Mishkan was dedicated on the eighth day. It was opening day, so it should say be called Day One, not Day Eight. Rav Yaakov Kaminetzki explains that we see from here how importance preparation is. (I heard this from my friend Jeff Korbman, who - if my memory serves me correctly heard it from Rabbi Frand.)