This week we make an Eruv Tavshillin before Rosh
Hashanah. Outside of Israel
Also before Sukkos and Shemini Atzeres – Simchas Torah.
We
make the blessing “Blessed are you … who commanded us to make an Erev.” We do
this over bread or Matzo for a Shabbos Third Meal with a can of tuna/sardines
that we eat during the third meal on Shabbos. This enables us to cook. We
usually add the sentences in the Siddur/Machzor “for preparing from Yom Tov to
Shabbos to cook, light the candle for myself/family (and the Rabbi says for all
the people of this town)”.
In the direct mail
version: Why the Y before the period? From time to time, my typing speed or
glitch makes the capital letter disappear. The Y of Yoshua went missing. I only
caught it after the blogspot was published and Drasha was corrected.
Rosh Hashanah Torah and Parsha Hazinu
I don’t normally deal
with the Torah Reading for the Holidays. One day we read about the prediction
of the birth of Yitzchak and the Akedah of Yitzchak. Both are Judgements and
the birth of Samuel is also in the Haftorah. As for Hazinu, it is 58 lines verse.
Hazinu is a Torah Mussar Song from Moshe. I will deal with that and hopefully
Zos HaTorah next week before Yom Kippur.
32:1
Give ear, ye heavens, and I will speak; and let the earth hear the words of my
mouth. 2 My doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distil
as the dew; as the small rain upon the tender grass, and as the showers upon
the herb.
You have witness for Judgement but also mercy in the Judgement –
next week.
Elul ends Rosh Hashanah begins a new year
As I went to Mincha
Prayer and started Ashrei before the Minyan, a drama was playing out in Beirut.
The fulfillment of the last Rosh Hashanah Prayer: And the wicked shall vanish
like smoke for (you shall) remove the wicked government from the earth.
We start the Jewish
Calendar in Tishrei and usher in the year 5785. On the Solar calendar we shall
be ending week 52 of the hostages in Gaza. On Rosh Hashanah it is written who
will rise up and who will be put down. How will live and who will die and what
type of death an untimely one or very elderly.
Normally I would write
much more to whip up fear and perhaps love of heaven. But I see that the time
is approaching for the miracles of the redemption of the Bnei Yisrael. We are
seeing more and more Divine Protection. It is not a tremendous wind on the
Golan Heights uncovering the dust and exposing a mine field during the Six Day
War but the falling of 181 guided missiles with a half-ton of explosives and
not one Israeli killed but an Arab from Gaza in Yericho was killed. When we see
hope for salvation and G-D’s Mercy and Compassion, it is time to pray for that.
Other things like good health, family, reasonable income, perhaps a Shidduch
for us or pray for a child to carry on one’s family.
We are close to Moshiach
but must pray for salvation and life.
A near fatal Rosh
Hashanah faint by Yerachmiel Tilles
https://ascentofsafed.com/Stories/Stories/5785/1399-01.html
I [Dr. Les Rosenthal] am a dentist; I have a practice in
Encino, California. I also have a good singing voice and dabble in cantorial
music. In 1981, I was asked to sing at a synagogue north of Los Angeles. The
hall was full-probably 1,500 people were there-and I had a solo to sing, the
prayer Unesaneh Tokef. One bar before the solo, a massive headache
struck me and I fell to the floor-they had to carry me off the bimah (platform)
in the middle of Rosh Hashanah.
I was taken to a room where I could lie down and rest for a while. But two
hours later, the headache had not gone away, its intensity was unchanged, and
it was clear this was not a good thing.
At that point I was taken to the hospital, where they took x-rays of my skull
and neck, and came back with the diagnosis, "You have a tumor in the
pituitary gland. It's destroying the bone, and the pressure is causing the
headache."
A neurologist was called in, who ordered a tomograph in order to
get a better picture of the bone destruction. After he got the results, he
said, "There is no tumor. There is no destruction of the bone."
Relieved, I thought, "That's good-I'm going home!"
But he said, "Since we do not have a cause for your headache, we need to
do further tests." He ordered a CAT scan.
The CAT scan revealed that behind my right eye, in the middle of the gray
matter, I had an aneurysm-a blood vessel that had blown up like a balloon-and
it was about ready to burst. If it burst, death would be instant.
When my wife heard that, she became hysterical. She was pregnant with our third
child, and the idea of being alone with three young kids without a husband
scared her witless.
She began to push me to go the next step-an aortic angiogram-which the
neurologist recommended. This involved putting a catheter into a major artery in
my leg and feeding it up to the aorta, then releasing a dye. This test allowed
the doctors to map where the blood vessels are, and see if it was possible to
stop blood flow to that particular blood vessel with the aneurysm.
If so, then they could make a hole in my head or else remove the eye to get to
the affected area, and then they could put metal clips there so that the
aneurysm wouldn't burst. While that might sound good, the problem with such a
procedure is that the particular blood vessel could be feeding some vital part
of the brain, and once it is clipped off, a stroke could result. That did not
sound like a risk I wanted to take.
There was another option, which unfortunately did not sound much
better. This called for surgically exposing the aneurysm and coating it with
glue to reinforce its walls. In this procedure the surgeons would have to
destroy a lot of tissue to expose the aneurysm, and that could also cause a
deficit in brain function.
Neither of these options sounded good to me, but my wife was very upset and
pushing the doctors to do something. Finally, I told them, "Okay, we'll do
this. But only on the condition that, if you're going to do the aortic
angiogram, you must have an operating room ready, so you can move me and do the
next procedure. If I ever wake up, I want it to be over."
Everyone agreed, and that's when Rabbi Joshua Gordon stepped in. He was the
director of Chabad of the Valley, and we had taken advantage of his Shabbat
hospitality a number of times. At his table, we heard about the Lubavitcher
Rebbe, and we attended classes where the Rebbe's teachings were discussed.
Rabbi Gordon said to me, "You have to write the Rebbe a detailed letter
about what's going on here. You have to ask him for a blessing."
While I was moving toward Torah observance, I was still skeptical
about the mystical aspects of Judaism, and I didn't know what good a blessing
could do. I said to him, "Listen, it's not my thing! I mean, what does an
old Jew, 3,500 miles away, know about what's going on in my head?"
I know that sounds pretty disrespectful, but that's where I was coming from at
the time.
Rabbi Gordon's comment was, "Why not write the letter? What harm could it
do for you to write it? You will be asking for a blessing from a very great
man, who has given blessings to many, many people who-as a result of his
blessings-have had wonderful things happen in their lives."
So I relented. I surprised myself by writing a three-page letter by hand and
sent it off.
Four days later, the answer came in the form of a phone call to Rabbi Gordon.
Essentially, the Rebbe's message to me was, "There is nothing wrong with
you. If you have to take this last test for your own peace of mind, I give you
a blessing that it should be successful. But there's nothing wrong with
you."
Since I had already decided to do the aortic angiogram, I went
through with it. When I woke up I saw, standing over me, the radiologist who
specializes in reading neurological films. His faced look very somber, almost
miserable.
But I was happy. The very fact that I woke up made me happy. I could think! I
could see! I could speak! I didn't care about anything else.
The radiologist stared at me for a few moments, and then he said, "I've
never seen anything like this before-that something so clear on a CAT scan
should turn out to be absolutely nonexistent in an aortic angiogram. You are
fine. You have absolutely nothing wrong with you at all. I have no clue why you
had that headache."
The bottom line is-I haven't had that headache since. Not since 1981, thirty
years ago.
Afterwards, we threw a big party catered by one of the kosher restaurants in
Los Angeles, since our house was not kosher enough as yet. My neighbors thought
I had died and it was a wake, because they saw all these black-hatted rabbis
coming over. But then they saw me dancing in the street, celebrating this
miracle.
It didn't take more than that to make me Torah-observant and a chassid of the
Rebbe and of Chabad, which I am to this day. My whole family was profoundly
affected as well. All our kids attended yeshivahs and
seminaries,[1] and today, everyone in the family keeps Shabbat, keeps
kosher. They all lead religious lives. And we are now expecting our fifteenth
grandchild.
This whole level of nachas would not have been mine if it
wasn't for the Rebbe. He sent me-whom he had never met, and who knew nothing
about him-such a salvation blessing.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Source: Lightly edited and supplemented by Yerachmiel Tilles from a
weekly email of "Here's My Story," a part of JEM's extraordinary "My
Encounter with the Rebbe" project.
Dr. Les Rosenthal practices dentistry in Encino, California. He was
interviewed in his home in September 2011. The text of the video was published
online in 2015. A video of him telling the story can be found at
https://www.chabad.org/3507814.
Why this Week: The story
begins on Rosh Hashana (1981)
Biographical note:
Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the Lubavitcher Rebbe (11 Nissan 1902 -
3 Tammuz 1994), became the seventh Rebbe of the Chabad dynasty after his
father-in-law, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, passed away in Brooklyn on 10
Shvat 1950. He is widely acknowledged as the greatest Jewish leader of the
second half of the 20th century. Although a dominant scholar in both the
revealed and hidden aspects of Torah and fluent in many languages and
scientific subjects, the Rebbe is best known for his extraordinary love and
concern for every Jew on the planet. His emissaries around the globe dedicated
to strengthening Judaism number in the thousands. Many hundreds of volumes of
his teachings have been printed, and hundreds of English renditions too.
Footnote:
{1}And some became [excellent] dentists, so my business became a family
practice. https://www.patientconnect365.com/Dentists/California/Encino/91436/Rosenthal_Family_Dental_Group
Milestone: Pete Rose, 83,
https://www.foxnews.com/sports/pete-roses-death-sends-baseball-world-mourning-absolutely-heartbroken
Milestone: Dan Tichon, 87, Knesset
Speaker. https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/former-knesset-speaker-dan-tichon-dies-at-87/
Inyanay Diyoma
Sept. 28 and 29
Day 358 and 359 start of week 52 as
a solar year closes on the hostages.
This is how I start out my Shabbos
Teshuva Elul-Rosh Hashanah Drasha this week: As I
went to Mincha Prayer and started Ashrei before the Minyan, a drama was playing
out in Beirut. The fulfillment of the last Rosh Hashanah Prayer: And the wicked
shall vanish like smoke for (you shall) remove the wicked government from the
earth.
The IDF missed him in 2006 with not
enough explosives. Not taking a chance within 10 seconds, the IAF drops 83tons
of explosives on Nasrallah. So long to the Iranian General managing the war. https://www.timesofisrael.com/idf-says-hezbollah-terror-chief-nasrallah-other-top-commanders-killed-in-beirut-strike/
Biden – Justice Served. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396861
https://www.timesofisrael.com/who-is-hashem-safieddine-hezbollahs-next-projected-leader/
On Shabbos an interesting thing
happened. Rocket alerts and named towns were going off though most of the
morning prayers. In fact during the blessings for the Haftorah through half of
the reading there were so many towns that the rockets either were shot down or
landed.
Then in the late afternoon at 17:41
I heard a loud siren. I got up from the table but saw a confused wife so I
yelled “get up and into the shelter”. We got into the shelter and locked the
blast door. Then the alert app went off. The shelter had the TV open to
psychologically calm down the wife and possibly myself as I found during the
Gulf War that helped. As they announced that the missile from Yemen was
intercepted at a high altitude and stay in place for 10minutes just in case
pieces come down – then the App on the telephone went off. The siren was still
blasting and it was less than 1.5minutes. The telephone app went off again
after almost a minute of silence. Why the Houthi Missile? The Prime Minister
was returning to Ben Gurion on Shabbos.
Note: A rocket to Haifa caught my
grandson and his Yeshiva in the middle of the Amidah Prayer. They went to the
Shelter and continued from where they left off. For a danger to life replaces
the not moving during the prayer. While my wife and I scuttled from our Table
to the Shelter, others on the beach ran to the nearest Shelter in Tel Aviv and
my grandson and family were at a Bar Mitzvah for his brother-in-law in Bnei
Brak by the third meal. This is life in Israel for both the religious and
non-religious. Less than 1000 demonstrated in total in Tel Aviv and
Yerushalayim about the hostages. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396857
Mark Levin starts off with the
horrible plague of antisemitism rising in America that he can’t wear a Yarmulke
or Star of David in the States. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xGxCu62noo
https://www.timesofisrael.com/idf-kills-another-senior-hezbollah-official-in-beirut-fresh-barrage-targets-tiberias/
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396858
Updates: https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396639
Netanyahu and Dutch PM met. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396839
3 more battalions called up. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396876
No need for a two state solution. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396903
2008 elimination was from Israel. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396888
Bennett: Jewish People do not
forget. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396910
Turkey wants to eliminate Israel. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396911
Rabbi Yair Bar Rav, who is serving alongside the
soldiers in the Northern Command, has issued an urgent call: "Our soldiers
have answered the call to defend our nation, but now they need us to support
them. We must provide tallitot, machzorim, and the essential supplies so they
can pray and celebrate the High Holidays, even in the field. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396902
Has a small ground operation
started? https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396896
Unprecedented military success. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396894
Sept. 30
Day 360
2nd port and power
plants.
Hamas leader of Lebanon gone. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396949
This also happened when I was on
border patrol as a rescue force. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396957
Updates: https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396639 note same link as yesterday but
upgraded.
Israel hacked Hezballah UAV. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396952
Two new polls. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396943
Arutz 12 poll. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396935
20 terrorists’ die with Nasrallah. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396920
Kamala Supporters: The institute, the Lemkin Institute, professes to be dedicated to the study of the grisly topic
of “genocide” and what so appalled the eminent lawyer was the bizarre manner in
which the Institute—that bears the name of the man, who originally conceived
the term “genocide”—had chosen to twist and distort its alleged focus of
inquiry. With evident dismay, he tweeted: “Quite incredible that @LemkinInstitute, named after Raphael Lemkin, who coined the term
'genocide', would now be shilling for jihadists of Hezbollah (and Hamas), who
would seek to carry out another genocide against the Jewish People – Shame on You! https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396931
Oct. 1st
Day 361
The IDF has plans for a small
incursion into Lebanon to clean up the area near the border. Shall we make a
demilitarized zone like between North and South Korea?
We took down three buildings in
Beirut and somebody did something to an apt in Damascus. 15 rockets on Metula
in the morning and almost every hour upon the hour since. The Tel-Aviv Dan area
through Kfar Saba and even Route 6 closed by the taking down of 3 rockets. https://www.jpost.com/israel-hamas-war/2024-10-01/live-updates-822657
Three civilians injured. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/397019
Injuries in Syria from an attack. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396997
Gaza: IDF soldier seriously injured.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396982
https://www.foxnews.com/live-news/israel-lebanon-invasion-hezbollah-sep-30
Four soldiers from the IDF's Duvdevan Unit were
injured Tuesday during a military operation in Shechem (Nablus). One of the
soldiers is in serious condition, and three others are in moderate condition. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/397021
IDF division that broke Hamas is now
in Lebanon. https://www.jpost.com/israel-hamas-war/article-821158
Some Major Headlines in the US
become lesser headlines in Israel. The war in the Ukraine is on the back burner
as no flights by foreign airlines to Israel is in effect. Hurricane Helene and
the horrific scenes do make the news.
https://www.foxnews.com/us/trump-launches-gofundme-help-hurricane-helene-victims-raises-more-1m
High Holidays take a back seat due
to the Hurricane. https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/article-822642
https://www.foxbusiness.com/economy/dockworkers-go-strike-east-gulf-coast-ports
With the lowering of Israel’s Rating
by Moody’s we can’t afford a strike and fortunately, the Treasury settled after
years with the High School Teachers after the Education Minister took their
side strongly.
Fortitude for the farmers. https://www.timesofisrael.com/fortitude-under-fire-farmers-along-the-northern-border-stay-planted-despite-the-war/
This is America today. How many
Americans died by the hands of Hezballah from the Marine Barracks forward? https://www.algemeiner.com/2024/09/30/anti-israel-groups-activists-mourn-nasrallahs-death-condemn-jewish-state-killing-terrorist-leader/
Germany 31 wounded by a man with a
PLO Flag. https://www.jpost.com/international/article-822321
Our war is with Hezballah not the
Lebanese People. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/397018
Breaking in the center of the
country, the people are requested to meet in buildings with a secure area. FOR THE FIRST TIME IN ALMOST FIVE YEARS, our outdoor Minyan
will be inside for Rosh Hashanah – Yom Kippur both with air conditioning,
toilets and a shelter.
The IDF Aerial Defense Array intercepted a UAV
over the Mediterranean Sea, dozens of kilometers off the coast of central
Israel, early Tuesday morning, according to the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396996
Israeli President Isaac Herzog on Tuesday
received the diplomatic credentials of several new ambassadors to Israel: Mr.
Stefaan Thijs, Ambassador of the Kingdom of Belgium; Ms. Barbara Mestanova,
Ambassador of the Slovak Republic; Mr. Simon Geissbuhler, Ambassador of
Switzerland; Ms. Alexandra Rydmark, Ambassador of Sweden; and Mr. Henry Mokono,
Ambassador of Papua New Guinea, who was taking office as his nation’s first
permanent ambassador to Israel with their embassy in Jerusalem. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/397023
Political commentator Amit Segal on Sunday
evening published a hate message with a threat he received via email, which he
claims came from a professor. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396962
Oct. 2nd
Day 362 end of week 52
Yesterday afternoon, the US informed
Israel about an impending Iranian Attack. Home front command changed the
guidelines for the third time in a day for all people in many areas to be near
the secure area. That did not stop me from praying outside in our Minyan. Two
of my granddaughters did last minute pre-holiday shopping. I was on the phone
learning with Rabbi Mimran Shlita “Who is exempt from the Sukkah?” – women,
male children under 5 or 6, slaves, a Jew who is half slave and half free, etc.
Suddenly, all the phones went off with like Morse Code even the Kosher Phones.
I thought I heard a siren I told him, I am heading to the shelter. In the
shelter, my wife put up the volume on the news and I could not hear any other
sirens. After the first round, we relaxed and then another telephone round
started. My granddaughters waited over ten minutes after the first round and
started heading to their home without a shelter. They ducked into a building
with a shelter and waited for the second round to end. In total we were about
40minutes in the shelter. Great grandchildren were close to bed-time and they
sleep in the saferoom. This through off my learning Selichos Forgiveness
Prayers at night put off until the morning. 181 missiles in total. Perhaps one
hit in an open area in mid country and one in the Negev. Pieces of destroyed
rockets landed in the Sharon area in an abandoned home was hit badly. A number
of widows alone at home were scared. https://www.algemeiner.com/2024/10/01/iran-launches-barrage-ballistic-missiles-israel/ https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-warns-of-consequences-after-iran-launches-181-missiles-in-major-attack/
7 dead and the names of the victims
released so far. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/397053
Watch the 98th operating
in Lebanon. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/397085
Damaged homes: https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/396639
Explosions near Israeli Embassy in
Denmark. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/397068
Shabbat times: https://www.israelnationalnews.com/en/shabat
Austin to Iran – call off your proxies.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/397064
5785 estimated population of Jews in
the World. According to the data, 7.3 million Jews live in Israel,
compared to 7.2 million at the beginning of 5784, while 8.5 million Jews live
outside of Israel — including 6.3 million in the United States and 2.2 million
in other countries. The figure for Israel is calculated after a technical
correction made by Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics regarding the
definitions of residency in Israel. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/397080
A healthy, happy,
joyous, wonderful, beautiful, bountiful, fruitful, peaceful, restful, successful,
prosperous and Torah Filled New Year,
Rachamim and the Pauli Family
