Jewish Holidays

Scholars of the Bible and Rabbinic writings know that the Scroll of Esther took place at roughly the same time as the beginning of the Book of Ezra...During that period, only a small minority of the Jewish People moved back to the Land: just over 43,000 people. The others did not heed the prophetic call, and preferred to remain with the fleshpots and other enjoyments of the exile... But this raises a well-known question: Why did Mordechai HaYehudi, the great righteous man, remain in Shushan, when he had a chance to return to our Holy Land and rebuild Jerusalem and the Holy Temple? Actually, we read in the Book of Ezra (2,2), that Mordechai was one of the leaders of those who did return to the Land of Israel – which means that he later returned to Shushan! Why did he do this?...

Scholars of the Bible and Rabbinic writings know that the Scroll of Esther took place at roughly the same time as the beginning of the Book of Ezra...During that period, only a small minority of the Jewish People moved back to the Land: just over 43,000 people. The others did not heed the prophetic call, and preferred to remain with the fleshpots and other enjoyments of the exile... But this raises a well-known question: Why did Mordechai HaYehudi, the great righteous man, remain in Shushan, when he had a chance to return to our Holy Land and rebuild Jerusalem and the Holy Temple? Actually, we read in the Book of Ezra (2,2), that Mordechai was one of the leaders of those who did return to the Land of Israel – which means that he later returned to Shushan! Why did he do this?...

The Day of Love for the Land of Israel

The initial letters of the weekly Torah portions that we read publicly over the course of the next few weeks, starting with Shmot, spell out the Hebrew word "Shovavim." Thus, the coming weeks are the "Days of Shovavim," widely regarded as days of fasting and atonement. The acronym Shovavim is also a Hebrew word meaning "troublemakers." In Yirmiyahu 3,22 appears the prophet's exhortation, "Return [repent], children who are shovavim" – and thus is revealed the connection between repentance and this Shovavim period...

For Chanuka: Rav Kook on: Adopting the Positive Without the Negative of Greek/Western Culture Chanuka is a good opportunity to study Rav Kook's detailed advise regarding how exactly to adopt the good from the Western and modern world without the problematic and negative aspects. The class gleans many sources on this central topic of Rav Kook's various books and summarizes the Who, What, Where and How of this basic issue for religious-Zionist and Modern-Orthodox Jews.

The Admor informed his good friend, Rav Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev, of his release [from prison] with this letter: "… and who am I, the lowest of people, that G-d brought me this far, that the Name of Heaven should be sanctified and magnified through me… But this was precisely from G-d, that this merit should come through me in the merit of the Holy Land and its inhabitants in this manner.