B"H
Until his death in 1983, Rabbi Mordechai Sharabi was one of the most famous Kabbalists in Jerusalem. In 1908, he was born in Yemen and then came to Jerusalem where he established his Yeshiva "Nahar Shalom" right behind our bakery at the Machane Yehudah Market. Rabbi Mordechai Sharabi received the Sephardi title "Chacham - a wise man"; a title, only extraordinary Sephardi Rabbis receive.
There actually is a very famous story about Rabbi Sharabi still being told in Jerusalem. The building where our bakery is located turned out to be higher than Rabbi Sharabi's Synagogue right in the back. Moreover, the new building kept away the sun from his yard where he liked to sit. The Rabbi was so upset that he cursed the building and until today it is known as the "Binyan HaMekulal - the Cursed Building". And since then, no business or shop really succeeded in the seven floor building. Today a social office of the municipality is located inside, several families live there (including Dov Shurin, a relative of Rabbi Kamenetzky), some shopkeepers from the market have their storage rooms inside and we have our bakery. And the bakery has been the only successful business ever. When we moved in, the father of the owner who was a famous Rabbi in the Kurdish community, canceled Rabbi Sharabi's curse.
The duty of a Jew on Chanukkah is to spread around the whole world that G - d alone is the Creator of everything.
The Chanukkiah should be placed outside the house. When a Jew leaves his house, the Chanukkiah should be standing to his right. When he comes in, the Chanukkiah should be placed to his left. Then the Mezuzah is on the right and in case the returning Jews is wearing a Tallit, everything will be a perfect Mitzwah. The Chanukkiah, the Mezuzah and the Tallit at the same time.
The same applies to women but usually without a Tallit.
The Chanukkah Miracle
1. The weak (the Jews) defeated the strong (the Greeks).
2. The flask of oil miraculously lasted for eight days.
3. The Jews were saved from assimilation and the loss of their Jewish identity.
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
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If you look at the Chanukah insert for Shemone Esrei and Birkas Hamazon you will notice one of the sections speaks of Tamme and Tahor. Only Jews can be Pure and Impure so the real miracle and battle was the Torah Observant Jews against the Assimilated Jews.
ReplyDeleteHappy Chanukah!
B"H
ReplyDeleteThere are so many opinions on the reasons.:-) Just like the explanations why the Flood took place in the times of Noach. There, the Talmud teaches that it took place because of theft. However, personally I think that creation was so messed up that G - d had to change some issues as the human DNA etc.
Anyway, Chanukkah Sameach !!!
Whoa, LBC!
ReplyDeleteA couple of months ago you complained about Miriam bashing chasidim, and now YOU call secular Jews impure? If ahavas yisrael were only for Jews like ourselves it wouldn't be much of a challenge, now would it?
Matt
B"H
ReplyDeleteHi Matt,
I suppose the Long Beach Chassid meant the Hellenists. Otherwise I don't think at all that secular Jews are impure !!!
Unfortunately, many religious cannot believe when I am telling them that there are actually great people in Tel Aviv. And Tel Aviv is considered the worst of the worst secular.:-)
Anonymous Im not even going to respond to such a childish and ignorant statement.
ReplyDeleteAs for there being really great people in Tel Aviv, its true. There are also really great people in Mea Sharim and Bnei Brak. There are also really bad people there that this blog focus's on.
Never seen an article on here criticizing Secular Jews outside of the government officials.
I dont think this blog would be as popular if there wasnt a heavy criticism of the Ultra Orthodox.
Oh and just a side note. We are all impure because we haven't had a red heifer in two thousand years.
ReplyDeleteB"H
ReplyDelete@ Long Beach Chassid
We are all humans in this world and G - d created us imperfect and with individual faults.
There is no perfect human being and there is no perfect society in this world.
Unfortunately I have to say.
And as everyone else, haredi society has its problems and there exists a right to critise it. If you consider haredi society as something absolutely holy and without any negative sides, well, this is your problem. However, you should never forget that also in this society violence, abuse, and anything negative you can imagine, does exist. And, as I said, nobody is perfect.
This, on the other hand, doesn't mean I am constantly attacking haredi society. I am not and everyone who knows me knows that this claim wouldn't be true at all. In fact, I do identify myself with the society but I also try to remain realistic and not getting carried too far away.
You say over and over again these same words. The question is where have I ever said that any society is perfect void of problems? If that was the case Moshiach would already be here.
ReplyDeleteMy point is there is plenty of good going on and people aren't entertained by positive stories. If you only had positive stories people wouldnt read your blog anymore.
Tel Aviv has many great people, and these also had a recently canceled Sex Orgy where almost 300 people were going to join together in a sex orgy to promote world peace.
These kinds of things happening on Hashem's Holy soil.
I understand you are giving people a window into a world that secular media cant deliver to them.
I guess there is just nothing positive anymore about Haredi society because if there was then you would be writing about it.
B"H
ReplyDeleteLBC
I am just not in the mood having the same discussion over and over again. You are always making the same accusations and let me tell you, I do write positive and negative things.
And if you don't like it, look for something only positive. I don't understand your problem. Don't you have anything else do to in your life ?
Im flattered that you think the 2 minutes it takes me to write a comment on your blog dominates my entire life. Its a miracle I find time to do anything else.
ReplyDeleteYour "positive" blogs usually consist of a couple sentences and a picture, where as your "negative" blogs are several paragraphs.
It must be depressing that negative is your only reality.
Good Luck with that.
Nothing more left to say.
B"H
ReplyDeleteObviously you haven't really read the blog and not discovered more positive things.
However, I am glad you found something else in your life which keeps you busy.
LBC writes, "Anonymous Im not even going to respond to such a childish and ignorant statement."
ReplyDeletePerhaps he doesn't respond because he has been caught? In any event, name-calling, either of people or of their arguments, usually signals a bankruptcy of rebuttals.
I will say to Miriam, though, perhaps your facility with English caused you to overlook this point, but if LBC meant "Hellenists" he would have used that term, which connotes the "hellenizing" of others, ie the victimizing of others. Rather, he chose the word "assimilated" to suggest that those Jews were victimized by the assimilators. Thus, he makes no distinction between the victor and the victim. Most poskim of whom I am familiar distinguish between the Reform rabbinate and their congregationists, distinguishing between those who lead others astray and those who are so led.
I apologize for the tardiness of my response, but I was going to give LBC the benefit of the doubt as you so graciously did until I read his invective directed towards me. Then I figured, while I will no longer attempt to engage in dialogue with the ironically named chasid, I will justify my position to the other readers of your blog.
Matt
B"H
ReplyDeleteMatt, To tell you the truth: I couldn't care less what the LBC has to say. For months, he has been criticizing around here; no matter what the subject was.
I agree that he is anything but a Chassid and I kicked him out of my link list some time ago. The same I should do with any further comments. In fact, I already did so a few times because I am not wasting my time with any psychos.
If I don't like a blog or a site, I don't read it. It is as easy as that. And provoking is anything but a religious behaviour.
Shabbat Shalom:-)