Tuesday, July 16, 2019

Dreams: Angelic or Demonic?


Source: Rabbi Shelomo Almoli - Dream Interpretation from Classical Jewish Sources

The essential characteristic of an angelic dream is that it is orderly, with no extraneous material mixed in.  Furthermore, the dreamer should not be panicked or frightened at the time of dreaming, and he must see himself as though truly awake in the dream.  If all these conditions are fulfilled, you may be certain that the dream is true, and that it comes through an angel and is a one-sixtieth part of prophecy. [Berakhot 57a]

However, a dream which comes by means of a demon is quite different.  The demon stands near the person as he dozes and whispers frightening words, a concoction of many things, into his ears.  This arouses frightening images in the dozer's mind; his heart beats wildly and he awakes in a panic.  [literally the great panic awakens him].  

The demons remain at his side, rejoicing and toying with his mind in order to frighten him, when he falls asleep they begin again.  After this happens several times [after he awakens from a doze and finally decides to go to sleep again for the night], he finally begins preparing for bed by reciting the Keri'at Shema prayer, or deals with them some other way.  He awakens and recites ''Unclean, unclean! Flee from here!'' three times.  At that, the demon will go on his way, and the sleeper will be able to rest, secure from such dreams.  

Below is a lecture on Dreams from Rabbi Alon Anava from 2018.


Monday, July 15, 2019

Does Eliyahu Precede Moshiach?


Following on from the comments on the Rabbi Kessin Moshiach video in the post below this one , this question was put forward.  Here is the response from the Lubavitcher Rebbe:  Source Sichos in English



There is a tradition that Eliyahu [Elijah the Prophet] will come before Moshiach, to inform the world of the advent of Moshiach. Is this showing of Eliyahu a mandatory pre-requisite for Moshiach?

The Talmud relates:1

Once, Rabbi Joshua met Moshiach and asked him: ‘When are you going to come?’ Moshiach replied: ‘Today!’

Rabbi Joshua then met Eliyahu, who asked him: ‘What did he [Moshiach] tell you?’ Said Rabbi Joshua: ‘He lied to me, for he told me that he is coming today, but he didn’t come!’

Said Eliyahu: ‘He didn’t lie, but this is what he really meant: He will come “Today, if you hearken to the voice of G‑d.”2

Maharsha explains that if Moshiach comes today, we assume that Eliyahu came yesterday to the Supreme Beth Din [in Tiberias].

Another explanation is that if we merit, and Moshiach comes sooner (before the appointed time), he may then come on his own before the revelation of Eliyahu. This is presented in Krayti U’playti [by Rabbi Yonason Eibschutz]:3

Rambam posits4 that it is not a certainty that Eliyahu must come before Moshiach. Although some Sages maintain that before the advent of Moshiach, Eliyahu will appear, yet, there is no definite basis for this.

This poses a difficulty, inasmuch as the Talmud states5 that Eliyahu will come first, and as is seen in Tanach,6 “Behold I send unto you Eliyahu the Prophet.” How do we reconcile these two statements re: the coming of Eliyahu?

The answer is seen in the timing of Moshiach, as the Talmud cites the verse:7 “In its time will I hasten it” — If Jews do not merit, Moshiach will come in his appointed time; but if they merit, then Moshiach will come sooner, in haste.

Rambam holds that there is an order to the coming of Moshiach, that Eliyahu comes first to foretell of his coming. This, however, is effective only when Moshiach comes in his appointed time. But when Jews merit and the redemption is hastened, as expressed in,8 “He is leaping over the mountains, skipping over the hills” — G‑d then changes the order, as a sign of His love for Jewish merits and good deeds. This is expressed in the Rambam’s concise words.

The Sages note that Eliyahu comes first, to convey the news of Moshiach; yet, this is not definite. For, perhaps G‑d will have mercy and bestow His holy spirit upon the Jews to serve Him with a full heart; then He will swiftly bring Moshiach without the need for Eliyahu’s message.9

FOOTNOTES

1. Sanhedrin 98a, Rashi

2. Psalms 95:7

3. Yoreh Deah 110, Bais Hasafek/end

4. Hilchos Melachim 12:2

5. Eiruvin 43b

Sunday, July 14, 2019

Rabbi Kessin talks about Moshiach

A 12 minute video
''The Jews will change the world''

''even Moshiach doesn't know who He is until He is revealed''

This is a must listen, and as it's very short you don't have an excuse not to.



Friday, July 12, 2019

Stalin vs Schneersohn

The [6th] Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneerson (1880-1950)



by Rabbi Y. Y. Jacobson




A Vain Battle


 If there was ever a battle fought in vain, this was it. Or at least, so it seemed at the time.

The year is 1924. Vladimir Lenin, the father of the communist revolution, is dead; over 900,000 people pass through the Hall of Columns during the four days and nights that Lenin's body lay exposed to the public.

Josef Stalin succeeds him as the new leader of the Soviet Union. During the following thirty years, he would murder 50 million of his own people. Jews and Judaism would be one of his primary targets. He sets up a special government organization, the Yevsektzye, to ensure that Russian Jewry in its millions embrace the new ethos of Communism, introducing a paradise constructed of bullets and gulags.

Stalin would rule with an iron fist till his death in March 1953, when four million people would gather in Red Square to bid farewell to the tyrant still revered and beloved by much of his nation and by many millions the world over.

At his home in Leningrad (today Petersburg), a 44-year-old rabbi, heir to some of the great Jewish thinkers and leaders of Russian Jewry, summons nine young disciples. He offers them an opportunity most would refuse: to take responsibility for the survival of Judaism in the communist Soviet Union; to ensure that Jewish life and faith would survive the hellish darkness of Stalin’s regime. He wants them to fight—in his words—“till the last drop of blood.”

They embrace the mission. He gives his hand to each of them as a sign that they are accepting an oath, one that would transform their destiny forever. "I will be the tenth, he says; together we have a minyan"...

An Underground Revolution

The nine men were dispatched throughout the country. With assistance from similar minded colleagues, they created an impressive underground network of Jewish activity, which included Jewish schools, synagogues, mikvaot (ritual baths used by Jewish woman for spiritual feminine reinvigoration), adult Torah education, Yeshivot (academies for Torah learning for students), Jewish text books, providing rabbis for communities, teachers for schools, etc. Over the 1920's and 1930's, these individuals built six hundred (!) Jewish underground schools throughout the U.S.S.R (1). Many of them last for only a few weeks or months. When the KGB (the secret Russian police) discovered a school, the children were expelled, the teacher arrested. A new one was opened elsewhere, usually in a cellar or on a roof.

One of the nine young men was sent to Georgia. There were dozens of mikvaot there, all shut down by the communists who buried them in sand and gravel. This young man decided to do something radical. He falsified a letter written supposedly by the KGB headquarters in Moscow, instructing the local offices in Georgia to open two mikvaot within 24 hours.

The local officials were deceived. Within a day, two mikvaot were open. Several months later, when they discovered the lie, they shut them down again.

And so it went. A mohel (the person performing the mitzvah of circumcision) was arrested, and another one was dispatched to serve the community; a yeshiva was closed, and another one opened elsewhere; a synagogue was destroyed and another one opened its portals in secrecy. It is a chapter in Jewish history unbeknownst to most.

But it sure seemed like a lost battle. Here was an individual rabbi, with a small group of pupils, staging an underground rebellion against a mighty empire that numbered in the hundreds of millions, and aspired to dominate the world. It was like an infant wrestling a giant, an ant attempting to defeat a military tank. The situation was hopeless.

Finally, in 1927—ninety two years ago—they lost their patience with this man. The rabbi behind the counter-revolutionary work was arrested and sentenced to death by a firing squad. Foreign pressure and nothing less than a miracle convinced the KGB to alter the sentence to ten years in exile. It was then converted to three years, and then—quite unbelievable in the Soviet Regime where clergy and laymen alike were murdered like flies—he was completely exonerated. The 12th and 13th of the Hebrew month of Tamuz (this year it is July 15-16), mark the 92nd anniversary since he was liberated from Stalin’s death sentence in 1927.

The individual behind the spiritual mutiny was the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn (1880-1950), who became the leader of Chabad in 1920, after the passing of his father. He selected nine of his young pupils to wage battle with him. The one sent to Georgia, falsifying the KGB document, was my grandfather, Simon Yakabashvili, my father’s father (1900-1953). He, together with hundreds of his colleagues, Chassidim throughout the Soviet Union, was arrested in 1938, tortured mercilessly and given a 25-year sentence in the Gulag. Most of his eight colleagues who accepted the oath never made it out of Stalin’s hell. They perished in the Soviet Union.

(My grandfather, Reb Simon, made it out of the USSR, but died several years later at the age of 53 in Toronto. He died on 2 Tamuz 5713, 1953, leaving behind there young sons, Gershon, Bezalel and Sholom. My father died in 2005, my uncle Bezalel died six years ago. Their mother, Freida, passed on in 1954, one year after her husband. She was 44. One child remains, may he enjoy many long and healthy years).

Investing in Eternity

More than nine decades have passed. This passage of time gives us the opportunity to answer the question: Who won? Stalin or Schneerson?

one century ago, Marx's socialism and Lenin’s communism heralded a new era for humanity. Its seemingly endless power and brutality seemed unbreakable.

Yet one individual stood up, a man who would not allow the awesome war machine of Mother Russia to blur his vision, to eclipse his clarity. In the depths of his soul he was aware that history had an undercurrent often invisible to most but discernible to students of the long and dramatic narrative of our people. He knew with full conviction that evil might thrive but it will die; yet goodness, holiness, G-dliness—embodied in Torah and Mitzvos—are eternal.

And he chose to invest in eternity.

He probably did not know how exactly it would work out in the end. I am not sure he believed he would survive. But he knew that his mission in life was to sow seeds, though the trees were being felled one by one.

Cynics scoffed at him; close friends told him he was making a tragic mistake. Even many of his religious colleagues were convinced that he was wasting his time and energy fighting an impossible war. They either fled the country or maintained a low profile. Some great rabbis at the time felt he was trying to do the impossible and it was futile.

But 90 years later, this giant and what he represented have emerged triumphant. Today, in 2019, in the republics of the former Soviet Union stand hundreds of synagogues, Jewish day schools, yeshivot, mikvaot, Jewish community centers. Since communism fell, the Lubavitcher Rebbe (the son in law of the sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe who was liberated in 1927) sent hundreds of ambassadors to create a Jewish renaissance. They span the entire length and breadth of the country, from Siberia to Tashkent; from Tbilisi till Krasnoyarsk. Over the last 30 years they have built more than one hundred (!) full-time Jewish day schools, in which more than 100,000 Jewish children received a Jewish Torah education. As this summer season began, dozens of Jewish day camps opened up throughout the former Soviet Union with tens of thousands of Jewish children who will enjoy a blissful summer coupled with the celebration of Jewish life.

I have a cousin, Rabbi Yerachmiel Garelick, who serves as the Chabad ambassador to Western Siberia. Jewish women had to travel for seven hours to visit a mikvah. He just completed building a magnificent mikvah in Tuman, Siberia!

And the Chabad couple in Birobidjhan, located on the Trans-Siberian Railway, near the China-Russia border, where Stalin wanted to exile millions of Russian Jews, opened a Glat kosher restaurant there.
Last Chanukah, a large menorah stood tall in the Kremlin, casting the glow of Chanukah on the grounds where Stalin walked with Berya and Yezhov. On Lag Baomer (a Jewish holiday), thousands of Jewish children with kippot on their heads marched the streets of Moscow with signs proclaiming, "Hear oh Israel... G-d is One." Jewish life is bustling in Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Lithuania, Uzbekistan, etc.

Visiting Russia last summer, Russia’s chief Rabbi, Berel Lazar, pointed to a massive Jewish school he built in Moscow stretching over a full block. “Right across from here were some of the main offices of the KGB, where the orders to decimate Judaism came from,” he said.

Across the street was a massive Jewish museum, one of the nicest I have ever seen, attracting thousands of weekly visitors, telling the story of the Jewish people and its heritage. “How did you get the money for this?” I asked Rabbi Lazar. He smiled and said that the first million came from the private charity of Vladimir Putin. "The rest was easy."

I then entered, two streets over, the Marina Rashtze synagogue in Moscow, a massive and beautiful 8-story structure. Hundreds of Jews were praying and studying Torah.

Comrade Stalin is dead; communism has faded away as hopelessly irrelevant and destructive. The sun of the nations is today a clod of darkness. The ideology of the Soviet Empire which declared "Lenin has not died and Stalin will not die. He is eternal," is now a mockery. Stalin and Lenin are as dead as one can be. But the Mikvaot built by the Lubavitcher Rebbe in 1927, they are still here, from Siberia to Moscow, to Tashkent.

If you will visit Russia this coming Shabbos, I am not sure you will find anybody celebrating the life and vision of Stalin, or even Khrushchev, Brezhnev and Andropov. But you will find tens of thousands of Jews celebrating the liberation of the Lubavitcher Rebbe in 1927 and the narrative of one holy man’s triumph over one of the greatest mass-murderers in human history, sharing his vision, committing themselves to continue saturating the world with the light of Torah and Mitzvos.

So on this Shabbos, two days before the 12th of Tamuz, lift up your glasses and say L’chayim! L’chayim to a Rebbe who inspired such heroism in so many disciples, many of them who paid the ultimate price. L’chayim to the incredible Jews of Russia who maintained the embers burning for seven decades, and then—when opportunity came—fanned them into glowing flames. L’chayim to my dear Zeide, Reb Simon, whom I never met but whose life-story is engraved in the core of my heart.

Today, we have many battles to fight, and plenty of darkness to conquer. It is easy to become cynical or depressed, leading to emotional paralysis. But our greatest leaders always knew better. They never allowed the mask of evil to define the narrative of history; they ensured that another story would dominate our imaginations and actions.

So can we.

1) This figure was given to me by Rabbi Sholom Ber Levin, chief librarian of the Central Lubavitch Library in Brooklyn, NY.

Thursday, July 11, 2019

Kapparah in the Death of a Tzaddik

by Rabbi Elchanan Lewis


Question: How can the death of a Tzaddik become a Kapparah [atonement]?

Answer: The Tzadik is not a personal individual that has an impact only on himself, he is a public figure who impacts on all those around him; the loss of a Tzadik is therefore a public loss, not an individual or family one. The Tzadikim are here not for themselves, rather for others - that is how they live their lives and that is how they also die; Just as the death serves as atonement to the deceased himself, so the departure of a Tzadik does to his community.

Death of a [Hidden] Tzaddik




Just last Friday, the day of the big earthquake in L.A., a young Chabad rabbi was suddenly taken from this world.  His name was Rabbi Tzemach Yehoshuah Cunin a''h.

The name Tzemach Yehoshuah literally means ''the Redeemer is flourishing''. 

When we look for hints for the coming of the Moshiach, these two events: the earthquake and the sudden unexpected passing of Tzemach Yehoshuah - can be taken as a huge sign.

Tzemach a''h was, by all accounts, a hidden Tzaddik.  His life was devoted to bringing Jews back to their roots, via his Chabad House in Century City Los Angeles.   He leaves behind a tzadekess wife and five children.

Tzemach's father, Rabbi  Baruch Shlomo  Cunin was appointed by the Lubavitcher Rebbe in 1965 , as a head shaliach to the west coast of America. Cunin built the very first of over 5000 Chabad houses, and is personally responsible for a network of over 200 Chabad Houses throughout California and Nevada.  If anyone can bring Moshiach, it is Rabbi Shlomo Cunin, as you can see for yourself in the videos below.

Running a Chabad House is no easy feat.  It requires constant input financially, and the Rabbis and their wives spend their lives raising money to support not just their own families, but those of all around them, helping whenever needed for whatever cause, being non-judgemental and available to others at all times of the day and night.

There are so many tragedies in the world today... we cannot help everyone.... but if you have a look at the thousands of people who have donated to help the wife and children of Rabbi Tzemach a''h, you will see just how big an impact one person can make in a short life on earth.

The fact that his name means ''the Redeemer is flourishing'' is a sign that we should ALL join and make a donation and rock the Heavens with an outpouring of Tzedaka, the greatest mitzvah of all.  Of course it is also a great mitzvah to support widows and children.

I am asking everyone to make a small donation, even if it is just one dollar, because one dollar multiplied by thousands of people makes a lot of dollars.  Let's all be a part of this and let's help the Redeemer to Flourish.  Click to here to see the Fundraising Page, with a link to donate at the bottom of that page.  Whatever kind of Jew, or nonJew you are, Breslover, Satmar, Ashkenazi, Sefardi... it makes no difference, we are all the same big family.  Non-Jews who align themselves with the Jewish people are Righteous Gentiles and will be part of the world of Moshiach.

Below are a couple of videos from the Levaya [funeral] of Rabbi Tzemach a''h.







Wednesday, July 10, 2019

Two Paths of Redemption - A shooting star of Jacob and a Scepter Rise from Israel

Rabbi Yitzchak Breitowitz

Parshat Chukat: The Mysterious Friday Fast


The Magen Avraham cites a 'practice of individuals' to fast on the Friday prior to the reading of Parshas Chukas (OC 580). In general, it is an anomaly to have a fast day scheduled for a Friday. Of even greater significance is the fact that most fast days are established on a specific calendar date, while this one is not. The Magen Avraham writes that no matter what day of the month the Friday prior to Parshas Chukas falls, that is the day when 'individuals' fast.

What is the significance of this fast day? It commemorates the burning of 20 - 24 wagonloads of the Talmud and other Sefarim in France. When the event happened, it occurred on the 9th day of Tammuz. However, various Rabbinic authorities of that day learned through dreams that the 'cause' of the incident was not related to the day on the calendar, but to the fact that it was the day before the Torah reading of Parshas Chukas.

The Magen Avraham explains that the Aramaic Targum of the opening words of the parsha [Bamidbar 19:2] "Zos Chukas HaTorah" [This is the law of the Torah] is "da Gezeiras Oraiysa" [this is the Torah's decree]. This was understood to be a Torah decree that such a tragic event would occur on the Friday before this Torah reading.

The Imrei Shammai supplies additional historical background to this incident. He says that in the exact place where the Talmud and other Sefarim were burnt, the Jews of that town had in previous years publicly burnt the Rambam's Sefer - Moreh Nevuchim.

The Moreh Nevuchim was a controversial work. In those days, the Rambam did not yet have the unquestioning allegiance that he gained in later generations. As surprising as it may seem to us, he had his detractors and there were authorities that were highly critical of the Moreh Nevuchim. In fact, there were even some places where his Sefer HaMadah - the first volume of his Major Work "The Yad HaChazakah" was not accepted.

As a Heavenly punishment for this earlier burning of the Rambam's works, 20 cartloads of Torah books were now publicly burnt. When the Jewish community saw this, they recognized their earlier misdeed and repented by establishing a fast day. They prayed for forgiveness and subsequently there was no more controversy about the Moreh Nevuchim.

In this way they were very fortunate. They had a clear Sign from Shomayim in terms of what they had done wrong. It did not take a genius to put two and two together and draw the appropriate conclusion. The connection was obvious. This is the historical background of the custom of 'individuals' to fast on the Erev Shabbos preceding Parshas Chukas.

Source: Revach.net