The Library

What if the biggest problem with our relationship to our phones wasn’t that we rely on them constantly—the “lazy brain” argument—but that we have a genuinely unhealthy, addictive relationship to them? .... From the narrator, philosopher Alain de Botton: To say we are addi...

Avraham Avinu is instructed by Hakadosh Baruch Hu to go up to the mountain and to bring Yitzchok as a Korban. R' Moishe Rosenstein gives a very beautiful and powerful insight as to why this was such a difficult test. He says, that when someone has a test and it's in fron...

One Shabbat, there was a man who came to the synagogue of Rabbi Berel Wein, in the Rechavia section of Jerusalem, accompanied by his three young sons, whom it turned out were of the ages 9, 7 and 5. Even with their long peiyot, they didn’t look Jewish with their stunning ...

I had had an amazing episode I would like to share with you. I had a big fall (again), and I was feeling terrible about life. Basically, I just had a baby boy born on Erev Succos, with Down syndrome and a few other complications, so it's been stressful, to say the least, ...

I’m in college and there’s non-tzniyus dress everywhere! I take off my glasses, no matter what I don't rationalize “I’m probably not going to see anyone right now.” Why? Why do I 'torture' myself? Because my life is on the line!!! My kedusha is at stake, what in the whole...

INTRODUCTION - CURTAIN CLOSING The 21st century confronts the Jew with unique challenges as never before. The long years of exile are drawing to an end, and the Satan is in his death throes, fighting with all his might before he is to be vanquished forever. As the curta...

Enjoy the tremendous gift of sight By GYE Sometimes, when we find ourselves drawn, time and time again, to look at things we know we shouldn't, we ask ourselves, "wouldn't it be great if I just couldn't see"? But then, we start to think about how wonderful it is to be abl...

I saw an interesting drosho from the previous Klausenberger Rebbe, given approximately 40 years ago on parshas Kedoshim. He showed throughout history how all of our enemies who tried to destroy us physically rach"l, first tried to move us away from Hashem by causing us to...

Keeping my eyes and my thoughts away from even mildly pornographic or destructive things is something I believe is important and will make me a happier person. I want to be thinking about how to reach my dreams, how to be a better husband, how to do something awesome,...

A person wakes up in the morning, makes himself a cup of coffee. He puts the bitter coffee in a mug, adds to it the sweet sugar, pours in the boiling water and adds some cold milk. A cup full of contrasts: hot, cold, bitter, sweet. Then he says, “Ribono shel Olam, I...

Have you heard of Rav Motta Frank? Not so many people know his name. The truth is he doesn’t allow people to call him Rav Motta Frank, at least not in his presence. He makes everyone call him Motta. Rav Motta Frank is a rav and mashpia in the Breslov community in Meah She...

The need for strong passion and emotion in our yiddishkeit is a topic that has been heavily discussed in recent years, including at various forums at the Agudah convention. However, at the special “Sleepwalking Along the Derech” session, despite the alarm and awareness, a...

Someone wrote to GYE: I am a real sicko - a loser. I am so subconciously focused on lust and I am almost 50 yrs old. Why can't I just be normal? I agree everyone has nisyonos from time to time, but it feels like I'm always stuck in the mud! GYE replies with a parabl...

When people consider making improvements in Shmiras Haloshon, they sometimes drop the idea as unrealistic. “Can I really say that I’ll be able to avoid loshon hora forever? What’s the point of trying, only to fail?” But in the month of Kislev, we learn that this line of ...

The pasuk tells us that Esav was “tzayid befiv’. The common understanding of this is that Esav tricked Yitschok into thinking that he was really a righteous person and Chazal tell us that he would ask Yitschok halachic questions such as whether maser needs to be taken fro...

I heard the following Mashal/parable from a wise Tzaddik: A man is walking down the street. He has been walking for an hour and is very hungry. As he walks, he passes a McDonald's and he can smell the food cooking inside. Oh, is he hungry! But he knows the Halachos of k...

One thing I feel that really helps me when I'm about to fall is to stop for a second, and think logically about what the pros and cons of this fall would be. For example: Pros: 1) I get pleasure. 2) it relieves stress. (And that's all I'm able to come up with, besides for...

I never knew what the word meant - until I sat in the classroom with my student who'd just turned 12. She sat in her place, ready to bentsh bircas hamazon, and I sat in mine, just beside her desk at the side of the classroom. Usually she sung bircas hamazon with the clas...