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What Jew-Hatred Really Says about the Jew-Hater

31/3/2019

Jew-hatred always reflects on the hater much more than it reflects on the Jewish people.

This is often true to at least some degree with hatred, but not always. Sometimes you dislike a person because they are behaving badly, and not because you are projecting your own bad middot onto them.

And yes, it’s true that the main root of overtly expressed Jew-hatred is our own sins.

Our sins sow din in Shamayim. Eventually, the measure fills up and we start to see the harvest of the negative consequences of our behavior. In His Great Mercy, Hashem usually brings the dinim about gradually in order to give us expansive opportunity to do teshuvah and sweeten dinim.

But the manifestation of Jew-hatred reflects on the Jew-hater.

For example, Nazis accused Jews of being bloodsuckers, vermin, swine-hounds, and trying to take over the world.

But who really shed & sucked out tremendous amounts of blood, including draining Jewish women of their blood for Nazi use (as described in Rav Avigdor Miller’s A Divine Madness)?

Who really behaved like disgusting predatory vile animals?

Who was really trying to take over the world?

The Nazis, of course.

Yet they accused us doing what we would never even dream of.

The Mirror of "Dual Loyalty"

Likewise, when you have a smirky gleeful Minnesota Congresswoman accusing Jews of dual loyalty and being led by money, you don’t have to scratch much beneath the surface to find evidence of her own dual loyalty and greed.

For example, there is some pretty convincing evidence (albeit not yet total proof) that she married her own brother on paper in order to help him immigrate.

In other words, she committed immigration fraud & broke the country’s law out of loyalty to her brother. (Not to save his life or anything, but just to give him a leg up.)

This also violates the 7 Laws of Noach, which include stealing, which includes ganeivat hadaat (i.e., fraud).

That’s also loyalty to the idea of tribalism, which is a most un-American quality.

Furthermore, she has demonstrated much allegiance to her religion, which is not compatible with the American values stated in the Constitution.

While her religion did borrow some precepts from the Torah and Mishna, it is not tacked on to the Tanach as Christianity is. Rather, it retells some of the authentic stories with pro-Yishmael distortions within a whole hodge-podge of its own primitive tribal value system.

But ideals like every human being made in Hashem’s Divine Image, the 10 Commandments (don’t steal from ANYONE regardless of their religion, love thy neighbor, don’t murder, etc.), and so on, are Torah values that found great popularity worldwide and formed the basis for American law.

But her religion promotes self-centered values and coerces a dhimmi status onto those who refuse to convert.

Sure, some of her co-religionists aren’t particularly religious. It’s not necessarily the religion but how people practice it. So those types pick and choose what makes them comfortable and ignore the uncomfortable parts. But this smarmy Congresswoman is very dedicated to her own religious principles and to the tribalism of her culture of origin—even though all this solidly contradicts American mores and even the Constitution itself.

For example, via CAIR, she is also fund-raising for the extremely bloodthirsty & very anti-American Hamas.

And if that’s not dual loyalty—and dangerously dual loyalty—then what is?

UPDATE: Thank you to the knowledgeable reader who wrote in to say that Rav Avigdor Miller delves into this idea at length in his book Awake My Glory, Chapter 10 "Reproach of the Vile."

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The Real World: Parshat Shemini with Rav Avigdor Miller

28/3/2019

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In Rav Avigdor Miller’s dvar Torah for Parshat Shemini, he speaks of both the purpose of sorrow AND the great consolation possible even within the sorrow.

He explains how to be truly happy in This World, despite enormous suffering.

(I’m embarrassed to tell you how much I need to hear this message. Again. And again. And Hashem in His Great Compassion and Kindness sends me this message through a mouthpiece as geshmak as Rav Miller. Yishtabach Shemo.)

Anyway, the main key is to detach from the material world as much as possible.

Now, this is a process.

And it doesn’t mean to lower your material standards to such a primitive level that you freeze or barely eat (unless you are genuinely content in that state—and some tzaddikim have been).

How to Detach from the Material?

Detaching from the material world means seeing things as they REALLY are, and not with the significance or urgency with which we imbue them.

Yes, some material things are necessities. Some are significant & urgent.

But many aren’t.

And a great way to detach is to imagine the great pleasure of the Next World, which Rav Miller has discussed that in many shiurim (including this dvar Torah, which is why you should read the original because this post leaves out TONS of very important stuff).

Contemplate Old Age

Another good way to detach is to realize that you won’t be young forever.

People who get to the end of their lives without good deeds and mitzvot, without Torah and tefillah, find themselves in particularly miserable circumstances because they suffer mental, emotional, and spiritual misery in addition to difficult or demeaning physical circumstances.

The Benefit of Heavenly Hellfire

Parallel to this, it’s also good to mull over Gehinnom.

Frankly, there are sins I avoided ONLY because I understood that Hashem sees everything and knows my real motivation—and would whack me at some point, whether in This World or The Next.

So I refrained.

Fear of God works.

If it’s unhealthy, then it’s not real fear of God, but your own misguided imagination at work.

But real fear of God is a happy thing.

(For more on this topic, please see Why Fear of God is Still Important & Beneficial in Our Generation.)

A real idea of Gehinnom is a healthy part of robust ruchniut.

As Rav Miller explains:

The truth is that even in the shuls there’s nobody talking about it!

How long will we have to sit in the shul and listen to the rabbi’s speeches before we hear a dissertation on the great subject of Olam Haba?

I remember when the Slobodka Rosh Yeshiva once came to America and they invited him to a Young Israel convention – it used to be held here in a hotel in New York City.

He didn’t know what Young Israel means; he didn’t know, otherwise he would have surely not gone. So he went and they asked him to speak.

Speak?! What is the Slabodka Rosh Yeshiva going to say to them already? Which subject should he speak about?

He thought, “I should speak about what the Jews of America need to hear most.”

And so he spoke on the subject of Gehennim.

But you won’t always have the Slobodka Rosh Yeshiva to tell you those things. And there aren’t too many rabbis who are willing to tell you the truth.

First of all, many of them are themselves weak in the emunah of Olam Habah. And even if not, he can’t tell you the truth. You’ll run to the other shul down the block, and your rabbi will lose all of his congregants.

I told you once that in my shul we make a “membership drive” once in a while. I tell the shul members the truth, and I drive them out to all the other shuls in the neighborhood. That’s why the other rabbonim in my neighborhood love me.

The Root of Our Resistence

Why do we have such a resistance against listening to what can happen when people don’t behave properly? And for that matter, why don’t people also focus more on the sheer pleasure and perfection of the Next World?

Sure, we hear all the time about the weakness of our generation.

But WHY not? What’s the real reason behind our resistance?

Rav Miller shines a light on the root of the issue (emphasis mine):

And that’s why the Chovos Halevavos [Duties of the Heart] tells us that of all the principles the yetzer hara tries to weaken in a man, it is this one, the belief in the Next World, that he attacks first and foremost.

Because he knows that Olam Haba is the yesod of our lives.

It’s our purpose here.

So all the other things the yetzer hara can ignore – believe in Hashem, good; believe in Mattan Torah, good; believe in Yetzias Mitzrayim, good; believe in Torah she’bal peh, good; believe in the whole Gemara, believe in everything!

You can even believe in a Rebbeh, a tzadik!

But be weak in just one thing; just be weak when it comes to Olam Haba.

“Be weak in that,” says the yetzer hara. “Don’t talk about it; soft-peddle it. Be embarrassed to mention it.”

Because Olam Haba is everything! If the yetzer hara can weaken your awareness of Olam Haba then everything else falls away. If your Olam Haba is weak, then your Torah is weak, your mitzvos are weak.

Everything else is weakened if Olam Haba is not constantly at the forefront of your thoughts.

Sounds pretty serious. So what’s the solution?

The 30-Seconds-a-Day Solution

Rav Miller recommends thinking about Olam Haba (The World to Come) for just 30 seconds a day.

How?:

Whether you’re hanging on a strap on the subway, or driving to work; maybe you’re waiting to see the doctor, or even if you’re standing on the corner waiting for the light to change – whatever it is – look at your watch and let it tick off thirty seconds while you are now in the World to Come, thinking about the purpose of life.

And what will those 30 seconds do for you?

Rav Miller explains:

And then, when we come into the Next World so they’ll ask you, “What do you want here?”

And you’ll say, “I prepared; I thought about Olam Habah in the world where I’m coming from. I worked on it!”

“Oh!” they’ll say, “Shalom Aleichem! Welcome!”

Because you’re superior to everybody else.

You’re a dagul mei’rivavah, you’re one in ten thousand. You’re a head taller than everybody else because you understood the lessons of what happened on Yom Hashmini and you’re thinking every day about the World to Come.

Now, whether they’ll give you a front seat, or a middle seat or a back seat, that will depend on how much effort you put into the things we speak about here.

But they are going to welcome you; that's guaranteed.

That's a pretty nice promise for only 30 seconds a day, eh?

May we all succeed in meriting a glorious portion in Olam Haba.

With thanks to Toras Avigdor for their permission to quote from their incredible site.

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Surviving the Extreme Rollercoaster of the Feminine Journey: Knowing What's Normal Helps You Stay in Your Seat as You Zoom Around Upside-Down

26/3/2019

Like all the other harmful “isms” over the past century, feminism zeroed in on & embellished the negatives in order to foment their social upheaval.

This was easy to do because the traditional women’s sphere of domestic chores provides a mixed experience for women:

highs & lows
great satisfaction & profound dissatisfaction
pride & humiliation
respite & exhaustion

...and so on.

(And a lot was exacerbated by Hollywood, which encouraged the oppression, dumbing-down, and abuse of women. Please see How Hollywood Corrupted America for more.)

A lot about a woman’s traditional roles and even her very biology play out like one very long rollercoaster ride:

The heights of pride & satisfaction in a clean, tidy, tasteful home vs. a descent into humiliation (even when it’s not her fault) & dissatisfaction when the home is grimy, messy, and generally not to her liking (due to illness, weakness, finances, family members, etc).

Mothers can also experience either the heights of nachat or the depths of embarrassment, depending on their children's behavior.

The energetic mother enjoying her children vs. a descent into an exhausted mother who can’t stand crying, whining, and being pulled at for even one more second.

The pretty presentable wife vs. a descent into a wife with dark circles under puffy eyes and spit-up or peanut butter across her navy skirt.

The sturdy, graceful woman vs. the waddling woman heavy with pregnancy.

The calm, focused woman vs. a descent into a woman suffering from hormone-induced depression, irritability, and physical pain.

Sometimes, a woman feels free as a bird, yet other times she is limited or even confined due to her monthly cycle, pregnancy, birth, nursing, or menopause.

There are other heights and descents, but these are just a few examples.

The Sweet Trap of "Salvation"

And despite cheery well-meaning claims to the opposite, you can’t completely avoid the descents.

Yes, intelligent efforts suited to your personal situation plus copious tefillah can both lessen the amount of descents in life, and soften the ones that do occur.

But they aren’t completely avoidable.

What feminism did was target and embellish the low periods of womanhood.

For example, most mothers can experience a real low with housework and childcare, even back in the times when stay-at-home moms were the expected norm.

Lows are a part of any role in life.

Even the most successful professional can be plagued with profound dissatisfaction, boredom, frustration, and exasperation—all the more so, a mother with such a physical, spiritually, and emotionally intense duty that never ends.

So when one infamous feminist branded the average American suburban home of the Sixties a “comfortable concentration camp,” she was preying on the lowest lows of a woman’s rollercoaster ride.

In fact, feminists pathologized both the highs & lows of a normal woman's life.

Feeling content & fulfilled with your domestic life meant you were vapid & repressed while feeling miserable & trapped meant you were oppressed overall and in need of permanent escape and salvation.

Not respite. Not help. Not in need of a tweak to your situation.

But total escape and salvation.

And just like the yetzer hara offers suicide as escape and salvation, feminists offered feminism and women's "liberation."

Elated? Depressed? Normal!

In Laura Ingalls Wilder’s most autobiographical book of the Little House series, The First Four Years, 18-year-old Laura expresses great satisfaction with the little home built by her new husband, Almanzo Wilder.

Yet throughout the book, Laura also expresses negative feelings, even profoundly negative feelings about her domestic duties:

“But the windows must be washed…And how Laura did hate to wash windows!”
Regarding meal preparation: “But it was part of her job and she must do it, though she did hate the smell of hot lard, and the sight of so much fresh meat ruined her appetite for any of it.”
While pregnant: “…feel ill at the sight or smell of food…”
“One day…she was particularly blue and unhappy…”

Yet Almanzo surprised Laura by sending a hired girl to clean the windows instead and Laura enjoyed other kinds of food preparation, even stating that she’d gotten quite good at making light bread.

Furthermore, on the day she was "particularly blue and unhappy" during her second pregnancy, a neighbor stopped by to loan her a set of Sir Walter Scott’s Waverly novels:

“And now the four walls of the close, overheated house opened wide, and Laura wandered…through the enchanting pages of Sir Walter Scott’s novels…”

“When the books were all read and Laura came back to reality, she found herself feeling much better.”

(pgs. 107-108)

The thought of the stories also distracted her from the nausea induced by cooking-smells and she simply cooked faster to get it over with.

But going back to the first trimester of her first pregnancy, Laura felt so sick that initially, her hard-working farmer husband needed to get his own breakfast. (Not so simple when you need to first heat up coal for cooking and make some kind of bread from scratch.)

She fainted whenever she left her bed, yet she forced herself to do so anyway, describing herself as “creeping around the house” and going “so miserably about her work.”

Yet by the second trimester, Laura was feeling better and able to go out and enjoy the buggy rides she and her husband formerly enjoyed. In her third trimester, Almanzo built her a handsled and a harness for their large dog, with which Laura went sleighing up and down a snowy hill for the next month until the moment she went into labor.

At times, her home is “bright and cheerful,” yet at other times that same home grows “to look rather dingy for she couldn’t give it the care she always had” or the house feels "close and hot and she was miserable.”

And in contrast to her grim observation that her family “must be kept warm and fed. The work must go on, and she was the one who must do it,” she describes another phase of constant occupation with “cooking, baking, churning, sweeping, washing, ironing, and mending” as “a busy, happy time.”

Yes, she perceived that time as "happy" even though “The washing and ironing were hard for her to do.”

And also this:

“There was very little visiting for neighbors were far away…and the days were short. Still, Laura was never lonely. She loved her little house and the housework.”

(pg. 44)

This all occurred between the years 1888-1892 on the prairie of South Dakota—not exactly a bastion of feminist thought or women's "liberation."

Likewise, Laura had no manicured Hollywood housewives or magazines ads of smiling women wearing heels while mopping glossy floors forced upon her as the feminine ideal.

Laura felt whatever she felt simply by virtue of her innate nature and situation.

Therefore, sometimes Laura loved her little home and her housework...and sometimes she absolutely couldn't bear it.

And that's exactly how it goes on the rollercoaster of womanhood.

In other words, that's NORMAL.

Welcome to the Old Normal

Laura’s times of dissatisfaction and misery with her domestic responsibilities weren’t a sign of feminism (or a need for overall “liberation”—although sometimes a break or respite was necessary, as shown above).

Nor did those times mean that anything is wrong with wifehood or motherhood.

Likewise, Laura’s times of perfect contentment and pleasure with those exact same responsibilities don’t brand her as a Stepford wife or a submissive brainwashed twit.

This kind of rollercoaster journey throughout a female life is NORMAL.

And it’s really important to know this so that these movements of despair can’t ever get a chokehold on you.

No need for despair or to throw it all away - this is completely normal!

What's Underneath All that Muck?

25/3/2019

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It's so popular today to put ourselves down.

And as stated on this blog before, the Orthodox Jewish community is the most self-critical, self-condemning community you'll ever see.

Sure, there are those who act like their group is perfect. But if you open any frum newspaper or magazine (or blog!), you'll see what I mean.

We hold ourselves up to very high standards & we don't give ourselves a break.

Yet humility & honesty aren't synonymous with self-denigration & self-hatred.

Humility & honesty mean that you know that you could be so much more.

Yes, humility & honesty also means knowing that there's mud caked onto the neshamah, and actually seeing that mud too. (After all, you can't fix a problem if you can't even see it.)

But it's also knowing that the mud isn't part of the actual neshamah & that there is beautiful light & sparkling gems underneath all the mud, waiting for us to access it all.

And it's a matter of scraping through the muck to get in touch with our soul in order to access all that lies within it.

May we all succeed in enabling our inner light & gems to shine through.

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Looking Back on the Cracks in the Liberal Façade

24/3/2019

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It’s funny to look back and see how Hashem inserted events into your life to provide an opening for later opportunities & better ideologies.

For example, I grew up very liberal. My parents were dedicated Democrats and I was very influenced by the surrounding culture, which comprised a constant drip-infusion of secular Leftism.

And you could not detach yourself from the unending drip of:

newspapers with their exhortative editorials, their witty & (seemingly) sensible advice columns, and comics with a definite liberal slant (except for Family Circus);
TV & movies with their fine-tuned brainwashing in favor of secularism, paganism, degeneracy, & hedonism;
books written by enthusiasts of either secular liberalism or Westernized paganism;
university classes taught by only Leftist professors
the non-Orthodox Jewish community that embraced liberalism as their religion and tried to weave that into their Judaism (with disastrous results which they refuse to acknowledge to this day);

My situation should have been hopeless.

But like I said, Hashem inserted several cracks in the liberal façade along the way.

The "Crazy" Neighbor Down the Street

For example, an elderly but spry neighbor down the street sported an anti-UN bumper sticker on his car and voted Republican (gasp!). We laughed about him, calling him crazy—even though he clearly wasn’t crazy. He was a friendly & successful guy, both in his economic life & his personal life...something genuinely crazy people don’t usually achieve.

And even though I disdained him as a child, his bumpersticker at least introduced me to the idea that something might actually be wrong with the UN. It always seemed like an unquestionably good & necessary entity—sort of like the American Constitution.

If you grow up in an ideologically homogeneous society, it may never even occur to you that something could possibly be faulty or even wrong—even if it obviously is.

Now, of course, I think that neighbor was right on the money.

Too bad I never thought to ask him for his side of things. I think he would have been happy to explain things to me.

And I would've learned something.

The Boycott that Fizzled Out

Likewise, I passionately opposed racism and felt that all problems in the black community stemmed from white racism.

I even boycotted Coca-Cola for a while, writing them a letter of protest for their involvement in the then apartheid of South Africa. In reply, Coca-Cola sent me a copy of a letter from the obviously black Desmond Tutu, who praised Coca-Cola.

Included were also large shiny booklets featuring laughing black South Africans in Coca-Cola’s clean & brightly lit factory. They were even enjoying free cans of Coca-Cola on their break.

The accompanying text assured me that Coca-Cola provided employment for masses of black South Africans, enabling them to achieve a living standard they could never otherwise enjoy.

I realized that it might all be propaganda, but there was no way for me to know for sure.

It also taught me that these things aren’t so clear-cut as small yet zealous minds would have you think.

And thus ended my boycott.

Who's the Real Racist?

Then I met a sad Italian boy who attended a predominantly black school in the 1980s.

He was bullied there simply for the color of his skin and even drop-kicked in the back of the head walking down the hallway.

He told of a home life where he and his only brother were completely ignored by their parents.

“They only like each other, not us,” he said.

This extended as far as his mother making dinner for her and their father in the evening, and sitting down to eat—without the kids. He said that he and his brother tried to get their attention—including beating each other up to see if their parents would intervene or even look in their direction, but their parents never did.

Joe's words painted an image of him and his younger brother gazing at their parents as the parents sat eating at the dining room table in full view of their children.

So there he was, completely ignored at home and could not walk down a hallway or eat lunch without fearing a racist assault—with no one to stand up for him. Ever.

I very much wanted to believe that it was only that the black bullies needed more love and understanding, and that racism only worked one way.

But I couldn’t deny Joe’s side of the story or the sadness that never left his eyes.

Obviously, a white kid attending public school in the inner city is certainly not more “privileged” than the non-white kids attending the same school; the student population is drawn from the same neighborhoods. Furthermore, he was Italian. How many Italians owned black slaves in the South or enabled racism at the institutional level prior to the “Civil” Rights movement?

Finally, it's very likely that Joe ended up experiencing much more racism--and more aggressive racism--for being white than his aggressors ever experienced for being black.

In other words, all the liberal justifications for bullying & racist behavior against a non-minority (although he was a minority within his school) just didn’t hold water.

Irony of Ironies

Throughout high school, I had a teacher who’d escaped Germany at the age of 2 with her mother.

And no, they weren’t Jewish. Her Aryan father stood up to the Nazis and as a result, they dragged him off to Auschwitz, where he died.

Because of this, I felt an affinity with her.

At that time, however, I did not know that merely opposing Nazism did not automatically mean one opposed the Shoah. After all, Russian and Polish partisans vehemently fought the Nazis, even as they either ignored or actively participated in Jewish persecution.

Also, the first people dragged off to and murdered at the death camps were mostly non-Jewish political opponents of the Nationalsozialisten (AKA the Nazis). The Jewish annihilation came later.

So it could be that her father just didn’t like socialism. Or totalitarianism.

Or maybe he preferred Communism to Nazi Socialism.

On the other hand, the underground White Rose society of Germany definitely opposed the Nazi persecution of the Jews.

So who knows?

But based on my limited knowledge at that time, her father’s fate caused me to feel an affinity for her. And aside from that, she was an excellent teacher and one of my favorites in high school.

She was intelligent, straight-forward, and used her dry wit with a lot of skill.

And one story she told never left me.

When she first graduated with her degree in teaching, good jobs weren’t available for young & inexperienced teachers.

The only openings were in inner-city schools where no one wanted to teach. From there, you could work your way up to more desirable locations.

She related how her first teaching job was so dangerous that police patrolled the hallways and teachers taught from within a locked glass booth at the front of the classroom. If a student acted up, the teacher simply pressed a button in the booth and a policeman (what, not a policewoman??!!) came in and removed the problematic student.

Yet 100% protection was impossible. Getting to and from the classroom, plus lunch breaks, required teachers to leave the booths.

“I was thrown down a flight of stairs,” she once stated, “simply because I was white.”

And again, it was hard for me to blame white racism on such behavior.

It also offended my sense of fairness to hear that the once-little girl forced to escape Nazi Germany, the daughter whose father was murdered in Auschwitz for opposing genocidal proponents of a "master race," was assaulted for her race.

And it was also hard to ignore the question of who’d really suffered more discrimination in life.

And like Joe's tormentors, the student who attacked her likely grew up and interacted with only other people of his race. Where would he have had the opportunity to experience any racism?

Had a white person ever sent him flying down a flight of stairs?

In fact, had a white person ever aggressed him in anyway? (Hard to imagine, given the circumstances.)

Even if he’d experienced wary non-black storekeepers or non-black women who moved their purses out of reach as he passed them, it likely happened because of his gang-dress & mannerisms rather than the color of his skin. (And that’s if he experienced such things. He may not have, unless he'd left his neighborhood.)

But what about her, growing up in America with a mother who spoke in the enemy’s accent during WWII and after?

And what was it like growing up as a half-orphan, knowing what had happened to her father?

Her father died fighting an overwhelming force of some of the most brutal and bloodthirsty racists of the 20th Century—yet she was assaulted because of her own race?

I’m sure the irony wasn’t lost on her.

It wasn’t lost on me either.

The Torah is Right Yet Again!

Judaism is all about compassion.

But the Torah also states “Tzedek, tzedek tirdof—Justice, justice you shall pursue.”

And abusing or discriminating against people simply for the amount of melanin in their skin is never just—no matter what their race or the race of their abuser.

It's not compassionate either.

Try explaining that to today’s liberals & social “justice” warriors.

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How to Know If the Stress is Major or Minor - And Then Respond Accordingly

22/3/2019

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Stress is either an atonement or a wake-up call from Hashem.

As far as atonement goes, it's definitely ideal to suffer from very temporary forgettable worries rather than long-term memorable worries, and to be grateful if temporary & forgettable stress is ever the kind of atonement Hashem sends your way.

I find the following idea very helpful in gaining perspective & not losing da'at when feeling stressed out or overwhelmed.

"One year ago today, you were worried about lots of stuff that you now can't remember."

So true.

Yes, some of our worries in life are (unfortunately) genuinely big & memorable.

But how much of what you are stressing about right now will matter in another year?

What about another month?

Or another week?

Will it matter tomorrow?

Will you even remember it tomorrow?

What about another 3 hours?

As already mentioned, some things are unfortunately so strenuous that they do matter and are remembered long after they happen.

But many things are not.

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UPDATED: A Special Segulah for the Fast of Esther!

19/3/2019

NOTE: For anyone who misses waking up at the crack of dawn on Taanit Esther, please know that the article below states that the entire fast day is an auspicious time for prayer and requests.

After all, this is the fast that saved the Jews from Haman back then.

(Also, a summary of the linked article is in the comment section below.)

Giving any kind of tzedakah and reciting Psalm 22 (whether once or 7 times, as recommended by the Kav Hayashar) is an excellent thing to do throughout the fast day.

Saying a lot of Tehillim on Taanit Esther & Purim is very auspicious, if you can manage it.

The main thing on Taanit Esther is pouring out your heart and asking Hashem that He help you in the zechut of Esther Hamalkah & Mordechai Hatzaddik.

Please see A Spiritual Remedy Guaranteed to Work on the Fast of Esther to see how you can effect your own salvation (or the salvation of others).

The fast starts at the crack of dawn, and the full segulah starts from that moment.

How to Respond When Things Just aren't as They Seem

19/3/2019

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Throughout Jewish history, Hashem has put our greatest Jews in highly suspicious circumstances:

Avraham Avinu, the preeminent opposer of human sacrifice, appeared to be about to sacrifice his own son.

The birth of Yitzchak Avinu after Sara Imeinu’s imprisonment in Avimelech’s palace cast false aspersions on the status of both Sara Imeinu and Yitzchak Avinu.

Moshe Rabbeinu was suspected of impropriety with women (despite a total lack of evidence), among other things.

The Jewish children of Megillat Esther were unjustly imprisoned.

The Talmud presents several instances of very holy Sages going to jail or even execution for either false charges or unjust charges (like keeping Torah & mitzvot).

Likewise, great tzaddikim such as the Ohr Hachaim, the Ben Ish Chai, Malbim, Rav Levi Yitchak Bender, Rav Eliyahu Chaim Rosen went to prison on either false or unjust charges.

Others, such as Rebbe Nachman & Rebbe Nosson of Breslev, struggled against the onslaught completely baseless slander.

And so it goes in the story of Purim.

Queen Esther's 180-Degree Turn (or so it seemed...)

Queen Esther’s presence in the Persian palace gave hope and comfort to the Jews of her time.

Yet in inviting Haman to a private party with the king, Esther Hamalkah extinguished even that straggling glimmer of hope.

But it was exactly that lost hope which propelled the Jews to pray from the depths of the heart, effecting their own salvation.

Esther Hamalkah was not a traitor after all. She was even wiser, more perceptive, more faithful, and more courageous than they’d ever realized.

And so it goes throughout Jewish history.

When a Commitment to Non-Commitment Leads to Salvation

For some reason, it seems that many truly great Jews must go through the nisayon of denouncement, baseless slander, false accusations, and unjust imprisonment.

And while the Torah’s obligations regarding justice & self-protection preclude us from assuming the best about non-tzaddikim when the evidence is clearly against them, we can still give the benefit of the doubt to the real greats.

The Yismach Moshe, Rebbe Moshe Teitelbaum (1759 – 17 July 1841), remembered himself in a previous incarnation as a member of Sanhedrin in the time of the Moshe Rabbeinu-Korach controversy.

While all his fellow Sages joined the camp of Korach (the masses followed Moshe Rabbeinu), the Yismach Moshe-as-Sanhedrin-Member retained a certain doubt as to whether Korach was really in the right.

When his grandson expressed astonishment as to how the Yismach Moshe could have indulged in any speculation against the righteousness of Moshe Rabbeinu, the Rebbe explained that Korach's position was so persuasive, his doubt was actually very precious in Shamayim.

Ultimately, the Yismach Moshe said, "Not wanting to be part of the machlokes [controversy], I ran into my tent and closed the entrance tightly. I refused to come out until it was all over."

Astonishingly, his thoughtful doubt & refusal to pick sides became his salvation.

(For the original story, please see Not Everything is Black & White & Parshat Korah: The Jewish Eye.)

The Virtue of Sincere & Thoughtful Doubt

In American culture, you’re supposed to be bold, confident, proactive, and determined. In British culture, you’re expected to be decisive and consistent. (And I don’t know enough about the others to generalize.)

But really (IF it's honest & not escapist), it’s okay to look at the all the facts you have & conclude:

"I’m not completely sure.”

"I don't really know how to precede."

"Something's missing, but I'm not certain what."

"I just can't decide — yet."

"I honestly don't know."

"I think I'll sit this one out until I get more clarity."

Many times, boldness and confidence in one’s position derive from insecurity (“Indecision feels uncomfortable or threatening to me”) or narcissism and immaturity.

(Unless, of course, the position is 100% correct. For example, I’m completely convinced of Hashem’s Existence and the Torah’s Correctness. That's not insecurity, narcissism, or immaturity — no matter what any detractors say.)

And I don’t mean being wishy-washy or skipping along in rose-colored blinders due to an addiction to blissful ignorance — both of which allow evil to flourish.

I mean investing thought and research into a subject and still unable to come to a clear conclusion.

Personally, the ability to hold off and say, “I’m not 100% convinced about this” is one of the major factors that led to some of my most profound spiritual growth. Not that I’m on a high level now, but you should have seen me before… ;)

It’s neither politically correct nor socially acceptable to retain a thoughtful & educated doubt.

But sometimes, it’s the only honest choice.

And that can actually hold weight in Shamayim.

(Plus, you’re more likely to earn Heavenly Assistance toward resolving your doubts when you’re in a state of honesty and humility. After all, Hashem cannot stand to be anywhere near 3 types: a liar, a flatterer/hypocrite, and an arrogant person.)

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Links to Stuff Everyone Needs to Know about Purim

17/3/2019

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The more I learn about Purim, the more fascinated I become.

At superficial glance, it seems like a fun, light-hearted holiday accompanied by feel-good mitzvot (donations to the poor and to anyone who requests charity, mishlochai manot, and being happy).

But a deeper look reveals a very strong connection to Yom Kippur.

It's actually a day in which the more correctly you can carry out its mitzvot, the more benefit you reap on your deepest soul-level.

Purim is a powerful & empowering day rich with many hidden layers of meaning & influence.

The transformative joy of Purim comes from profound gratitude to Hashem, not mere levity or light-headedness.

You can find posts on Purim by clicking "Purim" in the sidebar of Categories.

(Or you can just click here: Myrtle Rising Purim posts.)

And as always Rav Avigdor Miller offers good solid guidance for Purim, both in halacha and our attitude & understanding of Purim:
Purim with Toras Avigdor (includes dvrei Torah, plus several Q&As -- everything you wanted to know about Purim, but didn't know who to ask!)

And just so you don't miss it, here is an interesting, all-important question answered by Rav Miller:
Rav Avigdor Miller on Post-Purim Blues:
Now that Purim is over, what are we supposed to think?

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How to Overcome the Terrorist-Klippah of Zeresh

17/3/2019

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Most of us are familiar with the famous liturgical poem, Shoshanat Yaakov—Rose of Jacob, which is recited after the reading of Megillat Esther on Purim.

Here are some links for lyrics & more information:
Shoshanat Yaakov with Chabad (includes an audio track)
Know the Words!: Shoshanas Yaakov (with inspiration regarding Charvona)

While we love singing “Baruch Mordechai Hayehudi!--Blessed is Mordechai the Jew!”, there is another stanza which reads: “Arur Zeresh eishet mafchidi—Cursed is Zeresh, the wife of my terrorist.” (That is how the book of Rav Levi Yitzchak Bender’s lectures, Words of Faith, translates mafchid: terrorist.)

The word mafchid is literally “a frightener” (as in “one who frightens”) or “scary one” (as in “one who scares”). So mafchidi is like my own personal frightener, one who scares & terrorizes me — my own personal “terrorist.”

In the name of the Arizal (Netiv Yitzchak 128), Rav Bender explains that there is a klippah (a spiritual "shell" of spiritual blockage) called “Zeresh” that injects fear into the heart of a person...and even makes him paranoid.

And this stanza in Shoshanat Yaakov remedies fear, as Rav Bender explains:

“About this we say, ‘Cursed is Zeresh, Arur Zeresh’ — to subjugate that klippah which terrorizes a person.”

(Words of Faith, Vol. I, page 364)

A great many people today understandably suffer from anxiety, fear, or even paranoia.

But all that anxiety and fear are really the klippah called Zeresh, the evil conniving wife of Haman.

B’ezrat Hashem, if we say "Arur Zeresh! — Cursed is Zeresh!" with enough heartfelt gusto, we can nullify & overcome that awful klippah.

(Don’t give in to terror!)

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UPDATED: A Special Segulah for the Fast of Esther!

How to Respond When Things Just aren't as They Seem

Queen Esther's 180-Degree Turn (or so it seemed...)

When a Commitment to Non-Commitment Leads to Salvation

The Virtue of Sincere & Thoughtful Doubt

Links to Stuff Everyone Needs to Know about Purim

How to Overcome the Terrorist-Klippah of Zeresh

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