Stay updated with breaking news from ராவ் மோஷ் ஷாபிரா. Get real-time updates on events, politics, business, and more. Visit us for reliable news and exclusive interviews.
Soundtrack of Our Lives mishpacha.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from mishpacha.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Finally, we are united, if briefly. United, if only in anguish I have never felt such a pall fall over the Torah community in Israel as that in the wake of the Meron nightmare. The scene of the tragedy is a familiar one to all of us. Each of us has been to Meron many times to pour out our hearts at the kever of Rabi Shimon bar Yochai. And hundreds of thousands have joined the Lag B’omer festivities at one time or another. Even those of us with a fear of crowds, such as myself, have had arguments with yeshivah-age children eager to go to Meron on Lag B’omer, and when we lost those arguments, spent nights filled with apprehension of a disaster like that which occurred last Thursday night. At least two close family members told me after being in Meron on Lag B’omer that they would never go back; the feeling of being crushed was too frightening. ....
The Shalva story: an example of how Hashem assigns missions to people
One of my great joys in writing a regular column is the ability to share things that move or excite me people, ideas, books. I’m an enthusiast by nature, and one’s enthusiasms are enhanced by being experienced with others. I won’t guarantee that Rabbi Kalman Samuels’s Dreams Never Dreamed will be every person’s favorite book ever. But I would be genuinely surprised to hear from anyone who was not inspired and uplifted by it. The story begins with a tragedy. Yossi, the second child of Kalman and his wife Malki, was left blind, as well as extremely hyperactive, by a contaminated whooping cough vaccine when he was just short of a year old. He would subsequently lose his hearing as well. ....
The drinking on Purim that renders bochurim both a danger to themselves and to those around them has too many enablers
My wife and I will once again flee our Jerusalem neighborhood this Purim for the calmer haven of Ramat Beit Shemesh. At some point, I realized that I have no wish to spend Purim where one cannot drive without fear of drunken young men jumping on the hood of one’s car. But I would not mention my holiday itinerary were it not for something that happened last year. We returned to Jerusalem late afternoon of Shushan Purim to join my son for his seudah. On Motzaei Purim, as I was driving my mother home, I heard no fewer than four ambulances leaving the neighborhood. ....
The greatest success is the ability to own up to failure
In the Torah view, the single most essential ingredient of a person’s fitness to hold a position of responsibility is his ability to accept responsibility. There is no greater disqualification for leadership than one’s unwillingness to say the three words, “I was wrong.” It works the other way, too: Someone with a conscience that impels him to accept blame when justified is also likely to feel unable to stand idly by when wrongs need righting, and will more readily volunteer to step up to act and take responsibility. ....