Yomim Tovim

Shacharis. Shabbos morning. I'm not really feeling it. My mind wanders... before I know it, I'm holding by birchos krias sh'ma which speaks of the holy angels who praise Hashem..." It dawns on me, hey, does Hashem really need me? What am I, one small creature in a huge un...

Listen to a short message of Chizuk regarding Pesach Sheini (3.5 min).

During the hundreds of years that the Children of Israel lived in the land of Egypt, they gathered and elevated sparks of holiness that were hidden there. Our ancestors did what they had to do while enslaved in the lowest place on earth, they were ultimately successful in...

The Klausenberger Rebbe zy"a after the war was in the DP camps and it was Purim and he was at the seudah surrounded by many people, each one with a tragic story, this one lost a wife, this one his parents, this one his children and so on. the matzav ruach was very low. th...

Did Mordechai really suspect that Esther would do something so low? hamispalel ba'ad chavero vehoo tzarich leee'oso davar hu nenah techila. There is a power in a tefila that comes from a lev nishbar. A persn who needs something and his heart is broken because of it, and e...

I heard some tremendous Chizuk from Rabbi Efriam Wachsman in a shiur titled "Megilas Esther: Discovering the Depths of Our Neshomos":(Note: In general, Rabbi Wachsman's shiurim often give chizuk to those who struggle with the Yetzer Harrah.To hear his Shiurim, call the Ye...

PARSHAS MIKETZ SHABBOS CHANUKKA This week's Parsha has a terrific lesson that we can apply to our struggle and to our lives. Here Goes: We find that when Yosef Hatzaddik speaks to Pharo He speaks with tremendous humility Pharo tells him "I hear you can decipher dreams" Yo...

The Shiltei Giborim on Meseches Shabbos writes a famous remez to Chanuka found in parshas Mikeitz, וטבוח טבח והכן, the word ‹vehachen› and the ches from the word ‹tevach› spell Chanuka. Last year, my daughter found another remez, where Yehuda says ונלכה ונחיה, the last tw...

Reb Yeruchum explains the Torah's use of the word "mekeitz" as opposed to simply saying "And it was two years" based on the midrash, which quotes the possuk "keitz som l'chosech" - "an end he placed for darkness" - as referring to the two-year period during which Yosef sa...