Yiddishe Mamme

What is the truth, the one who screams the loudest?  Israel is not only fighting a war on the battlefield. Today, the battle for truth is just as important. Public opinion is increasingly shaped by narratives rather than facts. Complex events in the Middle East are often reduced to simplistic black-and-white stories, while the historical context, security threats, and realities on the ground are left out. Social media plays a major role in this process. Posts that trigger strong emotions are shared far more widely than those that present a balanced and factual account. The more often people see the same message, the more likely they are to accept it as truth, even when key facts are missing or taken out of context. Artificial intelligence systems, such as ChatGPT, are also part of this new reality. AI does not have opinions or take sides. It generates responses based on patterns found in the information it has been trained on and the prompts it receives. When certain narratives or ...

  Are you honest, or not? About boycotting Israel  “And the truth is lacking; whoever turns away from evil is declared insane.” “And God saw it and was displeased, for there is no righteousness.” Isaiah 59:15   We live in an era unlike anything we have ever experienced before. Never before has information spread so rapidly. Never before have opinions spread so easily. Never before has it been possible for a lie to travel the world as fast as it does now with the internet.   Social media gives everyone an opinion, but it provides no wisdom.   Nowadays, a slogan is accepted as a fact. A viral message is called “proof.” A carefully edited video is considered the whole story. Thousands of people repeat the same story until repetition itself is considered truth.   But the Torah (Bible) teaches something different. Truth is not determined by popularity.   Truth is not established by the majority.   Truth does not become untrue be...

  “One must rely on the Creator…devote oneself to Him…speak to Him…Let your ego, which brings hatred toward others, fade away.”   These were the teachings of the tzaddik, Rav Asher  Fruend zt”l.   Rav Freund never believed in titles or acronyms.   He demanded truth in character and yet held infinite patience toward those who lacked it. “If I had ten people who were willing to venture out to a desolate field with me and who were willing to negate all worldly materialism and devote their entire being to G-D…we could bring Moshiach right away. This is how Rav Asher, as he was best known, expressed his desire and ambition to serve G-D and strive towards truth – without compromise, and without ego. Rav Asher was a wondrous man who is dearly missed by many around the world.  On the night after Yom Kippur,  on the 11th of Tishrei, we remember and mark the anniversary of his passing.  He was a unique servant of Hashem, a rabbi and f...

  Moshe finds himself assigned the most momentous task in Jewish history, to stand before Pharaoh and represent G-D by demanding that he “Let My People Go!” he meekly begs off.  He demurs.  He says, I can’t.  “Please, my L-rd, I am not a man of words, not since yesterday, nor since the day before yesterday, nor since You first spoke to Your servant, for I am heavy of mouth and heavy of speech.” ( Shemot  4:10)  Rashi teaches that G-D pleaded with Moshe for  seven days  to accept the role of leader. But he said, I can’t.  I am a  kevad peh.  I am kevad lashon . What exactly did these excuses mean?  In Vaeira ( Shemot  6:12) Moshe again proclaims his inadequacy in speech.  “B’nai Yisrael don’t listen to me; how then would Pharaoh listen to me, after all I am  aral sefatayim ?”  He is a man of “sealed lips.”   Daat Mikra  understands  aral sefatayim  to be an idiom wh...

  One of Rav Asher's students asked him: "How is it possible that I will not get angry if someone really annoys me?" "All kinds of desires (Ta’avot), when they come they come slowly, and we have time to be aware of them and to fight it beforehand. However, anger comes suddenly," said Rav Asher. "It is like a person balancing on a roof of tiles. How come this person does not fall off the roof while he is standing on a slope?" "Because he knows he’s in a danger. He does not forget for a second about his danger, he has to keep his balance". "The same thing when it comes to anger. If you live every second with the awareness of your anger that you can fall any moment in a burst of anger, and you are aware that you are in danger, this the way you can rescue yourself from getting angry" Said Rav Asher.

Selections from the Spinka Rebbe, Shlita, of Bnai Brak [A recent letter received by the Admor, Shlita, followed by his reply] The Question: I don’t understand what the  Yosher Divrei Emes  meant when he wrote that the worst thing,  the great evil is to fall  into depression and gloom. Then right after that, he continues and says that this state of mind comes about because of arrogance and a false, exaggerated sense of self. I cannot understand the connection between them. It seems that depression is the opposite of pride. Depressed people are broken people, not prideful people. The Spinka rebbe answers: Rav Asher Freund taught us that a person generally lives his 70 years with either excessive pride or despair.  Despair comes as a result of excessive pride. If things don’t bring me happiness, enabling me to be prideful, then I find myself settling into despair. For example, when a person walks into a room full of people and someone...

 How should a person feel when he does good things for other people? Says Rav Asher Freund zt''l, G'd gave a lot of examples in our world.  Just like an electric iron, that straightens out all of the clothes, nobody thinks he has to get up an stand and thank the iron. Because without any electricity, the iron would not be able to do anything.  The same applies to  a person, he himself does nothing. It is only G'd who gives him the electricity, the life, that he should be able to help other people.   The Holy language The Ahavas Yisroel from Vizhnitz said: "I was looking for a language that is clean from slander, gossip, anger and conflict . I, G'd, found a language, a holy language. When a person talks clean, without lashon harah, slander and conflict even if it's English, Danish or Dutch, it is a holy language.  Source: Spinkah Rebbe Bnei Berak

As is well known, Israel receives far more criticism in the UN than any other country. You would almost think that hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are killed by Israeli massacres and that Israel should therefore be condemned. Nothing is less true. But in the UN, different countries work together to advance their own interests at the expense of Israel. Facts The true facts don't matter that much. The geo-economic and social interests are valued many times over the existence of that small country of Israel. Israel seems to be a thorn in the side of many countries and the destruction of the Jewish state is not considered an impossibility by those countries. Israel's opponents confuse the true facts of history with lies and distortions. This is currently not only the case with Israel. If countries have an interest in distorting the facts, many will not resist. Doesn't this also happen in the media? Disaster As decided at the beginning of this month the United Nations thin...

 Jerusalem has 80 urban gazelles and they are preparing for winter. Warm up As Jerusalem's weather cools, the endangered wild Israeli gazelles are changing their diet and eating habits. They also do a warm-up run to keep warm during the coming cold Jerusalem winter. Winter is approaching and the 80 animals prepare to survive the cold, rainy weather in Jerusalem. The gazelles are  switching from eating dry grass to fallen leaves, almonds and olives that are rich in nutrients and oils that provide a lot of energy. In addition, the animals do instinctive physical training to keep warm. In the evening the gazelles go for a run to warm up before the temperature drops. All the animals in the herd participate in the running and this 'training' can take a very long time. Endangered species This is very special, because the mountain gazelle of Israel is an endangered species worldwide. About 5000 still live in the wild. The greatest danger to gazelles in the wild is the destruction ...

Rabbi Meir Baal Haness (139-163) lived in the times of the Mishna and was a highly respected fourth generation Tanna (Talmudic scholar) and a leading student of Rabbi Akiva. Interestingly, he was not a scion of Jewish aristocracy, as you might expect. He was actually descended from the Roman General Nero, who reportedly converted after a battle with the Jews. His brilliant wife, Bruriah, was the daughter of Rabbi Chanina ben Tradyon, and is one of the few women cited in the Mishna. Rabbi Meir received his smicha (rabbinical ordination) secretly from Rabbi Yehuda ben Bava, during the peak of Roman persecution. He, together with four others, were entrusted with the vital mission to keep Torah study alive despite the Roman prohibition against it. Rabbi Meir’s name features prominently in the Mishna; he is the third most oft-quoted Tanna. Additionally, any reference in the Mishna where the name of the speaker isn’t noted is attributed to Rabbi Meir by default. Possessed with a pow...

Maybe we can start to have a clue:

From Blogger  Yeranen Yaacov The  last verse in Parshat Shemot is :  וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוָה, אֶל-מֹשֶׁה, עַתָּה תִרְאֶה, אֲשֶׁר אֶעֱשֶׂה לְפַרְעֹה:  כִּי בְיָד חֲזָקָה, יְשַׁלְּחֵם, וּבְיָד חֲזָקָה, יְגָרְשֵׁם מֵאַרְצוֹ . And the LORD said unto Moses: 'Now shalt thou see what I will do to Pharaoh; for by a strong hand shall he let them go, and by a strong hand shall he drive them out of his land.' Notice that this verse speaks about the first redemption of the Jewish people. When taking the gematria of this entire verse including the numerical value of the 2 Mem-sofit letters as 600 each, one gets to 5708, the year the State of Israel was established, a major stage in the Redemption process. The verse has 17 words.  If we combine אֶל-מֹשֶׁה because a Makaf connects them, we have 16 words.  If we then add the 3 Samechs that is often used to denote the end of the Perasha (like  here ), we get 19 words.  If we add those 19 words to our 5708 ...

Cecil (Shimon) Emanuels 3 1 december 2014 / 10 Tevet 5775 Today is not just the end of 2014 but also Asarah beTevet, a fastday. The fasting commemorates the  siege of Jerusalem  by  Nebuchadnezzar II  of  Babylonia —an event that began on that date and ultimately culminated in the destruction of  Solomon's Temple  (the First Temple) and the conquest of the Kingdom of  Judah  (today southern Israel). Today is also Opa Cecil’s (Shim’on ben Awraham’s) Jahrzeit. It is already 15 years ago that he passed away, in 1999. We remember him as a very special man,  an honest man, a loving father, a proud grandfather, a man with Chessed and Humor and above all a man with full belief in Hasheem. With the absolute knowledge that Hasheem was revealing himself to him, even during his lifetime. But Opa Cecil had to discover that all by himself. This past Shabbath we read the Torah portion Wayigash 45.3 The 11 brothers of Joseph ar...