Volume 2
Issue 24

The Connections people
 

With many thanks to our generous sponsors:

  Chinuch Yaldei Hashluchim:
 Rabbi & Mrs.
Kasriel & Chana E. Shemtov
 
Connections:
Mr. & Mrs.
Yochanan & Peri Brook
 Mr.  Mrs.
Zalman & Raizy Cousin

 

Chinuch Yaldei Hashluchim:

Rabbi M. Shemtov
Rivky Lokshin
Dabrushy Pink
Aydla Vechter

 

Va’ad Hashluchim:

Rabbi Y. Deren
Rabbi O. Goldman
Rabbi Y. Greenberg
Rabbi B. Levertov
Rabbi Y. Shemtov

 

A project of
CHINUCH YALDEI HASHLUCHIM
cyh@shluchim.org

a division of
THE SHLUCHIM OFFICE

PARSHAS ACHAREI MOS - KEDOSHIM

"Oh look, everyone," Blumie called out one Motzaey Shabbos, as she brought in the mail which had arrived on Shabbos. "Cousin Yankie's Bar Mitzvah invitation. It's in Baltimore. Are we going?"
"We're planning to," replied her mother. "Please, Blumie, would you jot down the date on the kitchen calendar?"
Later, Blumie asked her father: "Tatty, I noticed that on Yankie's invitation it said he would be called to the Torah on Parshas Acharei Mos. But on our calendar the name of the parshah that week is Acharei. Why is it different?"
"Not everyone calls this parshah by the same name," replied her father, "and there's a lesson in that. Acharei means 'After,' while Acharei Mos means 'After the death of.' Do you know who died?"
"Yes," Blumie answered. "We learned about it a few weeks ago. On the day the Mishkan was dedicated, Aharon's two sons, Nadav and Avihu, brought a korban to Hashem that they were not commanded to bring, and they died."
"Blumie," her father replied with a smile, "I'm happy to see that you keep up with the parshah. Why did Nadav and Avihu die? They felt a very deep love for Hashem and wanted to come very close to Him. Their neshamos had such a strong longing to be with Hashem that they did not want to continue living in their bodies. The Torah calls this eish zorah - 'a strange fire,' because it was different and new; no one had ever expressed such a fiery love for Hashem before. And about this, the Torah tells us asher lo tziva osam - 'Hashem had not commanded it.' For Hashem does not command us to give up our lives for love of Him.
"Nadav and Avihu's fiery love for Hashem was more than Hashem commanded. Yet even though they died, the love for Hashem which they showed had positive effects afterwards. It gave the Jewish people the power to have mesirus nefesh and give up their lives al kiddush Hashem - in order to sanctify Hashem's name.
"That was one thing that came Acharei, after the deaths of Nadav and Avihu. The other thing was that afterwards, as our parshah tells us, Aharon was commanded to carry out the Yom Kippur Avoda in the Mishkan. The mesirus nefesh of Nadav and Avihu as they came close to Hashem gave Aharon the power to enter the holiest place on earth, the Kodesh Kodashim. There he came very close to Hashem, and served Him on behalf of the entire Jewish people.
"By showing such powerful love for Hashem, Aharon's sons made it possible for there to be Jews who would come very close to Hashem, but whose neshamos would still be able to remain within their bodies.
"Now, if we would call the parshah Acharei Mos, we would be emphasizing the death of Nadav and Avihu. By saying only Acharei, we are stressing that this episode did not end with their passing away, but that its effects are felt afterwards."

‘Please Tell Me What the Rebbe Said’
(Adapted from Sichos Acharei-Kedoshim, 5750)

Hi Kids,
Being an inventor is hard work. Would you think that in order to invent something, you would need to be strong and sing and dance? I didn’t think so either until I tried it myself. I’m Dr. Getzel, eye doctor and inventor. Yesterday I finally had time to sit down and work on perfecting my newest invention since Yom Tov was over. I still needed to find some missing ingredients in order to complete my lightweight, automatic, digital, multi-featured future-vision COL lens. There I was, sitting on my worn-out, polka-dotted swivel chair in my green-roofed office, looking at my invention and thinking about what I could do to improve it. I sat. And I looked. I looked. And I sat. But, unfortunately, none of the sitting or looking helped me come up with any ideas to improve the lens. I decided that I needed a change in tactic so I stood up and closed my eyes. Then I stood on my head and looked at the lens with one eye open and one eye closed. I still had no luck so I decided to leave my office and take a break.
I jogged down the street with my eyes, nose, ears, and mouth wide open (I had to close my mouth after a bird almost flew in!) looking for something to help me with my problem.  Suddenly, I spotted an old lady wearing a big pink bow-tie and carrying two heavy looking shopping bags. A thought popped into my mind: “Everything a person hears and sees is Hashgacha Protis and happens for a reason.”  I concluded that Hashem made me see this lady because she would help me solve my problem and give me an idea to improve my COL lens.
I ran over to the lady and offered to carry her bags for her. As soon as I picked them up - Umph! I almost fell flat on my face! The bags felt like they were filled with rocks. They were so heavy that they made me loose my balance. Luckily, I activated my anti-trip, slip and fall device and managed to catch myself from falling just in time to hear the old lady’s squeaky voice begin to speak. “Thank you so much for carrying my rocks, Zeeskeit,” she said smiling. “But be careful with them, my rock collection is very special to me.”
By the time we got to her house, my arms were sore, my back was stiff and I saw stars twinkling in front of my eyes (even though it was in middle of the day).  I was so excited to put down the bags that I let go of them right where I was... and dropped them directly onto my big toe (which made my big toe bigger). I started yelling and hopping up and down. “Oy, Sheifalle!” cried the old lady. “That’s just what I need after a long day. How did you know that I love watching performances?
How could I say no to the little old lady? For the next half hour I danced around her living room (which is not an easy thing to do while holding one foot!) and pretended to be Avraham Fried while the little old lady sat on her couch, smiling and clapping.
When I finally got home that night with a hoarse voice and aching bones I had something to add to my lens. The old lady did help me with an idea in the end! I quickly turned on my machines, mixed some chemicals together and – Poof- I created the 70/80 feature. Most glasses help people see perfectly with 20/20 vision.  My lens would help people see differently with 70/80 vision. 70/80 vision reminds you that a person could be alive for 70 or 80 years just to be able to do a favor for someone else. With that in mind, you’ll always run to help another Yid anytime with anything. So if you ever meet a lady who wants you to carry her rock collection or put on a show for her, use the 70/80 vision and run to help!

Bye ‘till next week!
Dr. Getzel

Miriam Polter, Age 7
Acton, MA

Hi, my name is Miriam.
My Chabad House is in Acton, MA. On Shabbos people come and daven and the kids that come have a class while the adults daven. We have a lot of fun! When davening ends we have a Kiddush with a lot of food. After eating, the kids go play. Meanwhile the parents go to a class for adults and learn a lot. Sometimes we have a Friday night dinner with a lot of people.
Every Sunday and Wednesday we have Hebrew School.     
For this Chanukah we had a Carnival. Everyone had a lot of fun.
 Before Sukkos this year my father bought a trailer for a sukkah mobile and drove it around on Sukkos to show everyone it is Sukkos today. Sometimes people came out and shook the lulav and esrog and had a piece of cake. One Sunday men came over to help build a sukkah and the middle division in Hebrew school participated in putting up the s’chach on the top. The older division visited a sick man in the nursing home. The youngest division made a cardboard sukkah and painted it. That’s my Chabad House.

י"ג אייר

יארצייט של ר' ישרא-ל ארי'ה לייב

ר‘ ישראל ארי‘ לייב was the Rebbe's youngest brother. He was born in the month of Sivan in the year תרס“ט (1909) in the city of Nikolayev, Russia. His parents, ר‘ לוי יצחק and רביצין חנה had two children at the time - the Rebbe who was then seven and דובער .

Already as a child it was seen that he was a very talented boy. A חסיד by the name of R' Simchah Gorodetsky once visited the Schneerson home in Yekatrinoslav and רביצין חנה invited him to come watch her son ר‘ ישראל ארי‘ לייב learning in his room. They both entered the room and רביצין חנה called out to her son, "Leible!" - but he did not react, he was deeply involved in his learning.

Not long before the start of the second-world-war, he moved to Tel-Aviv, in ארץ ישראל . In Tel-Aviv  ר‘ ישראל ארי‘ לייב lived near the Chassidishe neighborhood and often participated in the חסידים ’s simchas and farbrengens. He loved to learn חסידישע מאמרים . Often he would spend entire nights learning with his friends, helping them understand deep ideas in חסידות .

In the year תש“א (1941), when the Rebbe came to New York, the Rebbe and his brother continued their relationship through sending letters to each other. Many times ר‘ ישראל was the first person in ארץ ישראל to receive the ספרים published by the Rebbe and he would show them to the חסידים there.

In the year תש“ח (1948), due to business and study, ר‘ ישראל moved to Liverpool, England.

Four years later, י“ג אייר תשי“ב (1952) he passed away at the young age of 42.  The Rebbe requested that he should be brought from England to ארץ ישראל where he was accompanied by many חסידים and buried in צפת .

אחרי מות

In פרשת אחרי מות , the אידן are told to take two goats, one would be ‘לה‘ ’ - offered as a קרבן to ה‘ in the בית המקדש and the other would be ‘לעזאזל ’, thrown over a cliff.  The גמרא tells us that these two goats should be the same color, size and value. 

Why should the אידן have to spend extra money on the goat that would be thrown over a cliff?  Why did it have to be the same value as the special goat that would be a קרבן ?
The money we spend during our lifetime can be divided into two parts: One goes to רוחניות things such as צדקה , מצוות , and paying for teachers to teach us תורה , and the other part goes to גשמיות necessities and personal pleasures. If we think about it, money spent on pleasures has been wasted. However, money spent on רוחניות has an effect that lasts forever.

The two goats can be a משל for this. And the instruction in the גמרא that the goats should have the same value, shows us an important lesson.

ה‘ is so kind to us and He does not mind how much money we spend or waste on our גשמיות pleasures. He requests however, that at least an equal amount of money (and perhaps more) be spent on רוחניות matters. If we have money for "עזאזל " — to throw over the cliff — we should not pretend that we don’t have enough when it comes to spending for ה‘ .

קדושים

At the beginning of פרשת קדושים , ה‘ tells משה to tell the אידן , “קדושים תהיו ” - “You shall be holy”.  What does it mean that we should be ‘holy’?

The שורש of the word "קדושים " is "קדש ," which means holy and "separated." When we give something to the בית המקדש it becomes "הקדש ," meaning that it is no longer available for general use; it is separated and put aside for ה‘ .

The same thing is when a חתן puts the ring on his כלה ’s finger under the חופה , he says, "הרי את מקודשת לי " — "With this ring you have become holy to me — separated from the entire world and designated only for me."

When ה‘ demands that the אידן be holy, He means that we must elevate ourselves above the ordinary, גשמיות‘דיקע world and behave in a holy way. ה‘ told משה to speak to the entire בני ישראל and to tell them that they are separated and special for ה‘ , who says "I separated you from the entire world to be specifically My people and, so, I request of you that you keep yourselves holy — separated and different from all the other nations."

(Adapted from ‘Vedibarta Bam)

See the printable version of Connections for incredible fun pages!

 

Last Week's Winners:

Rochie Krinsky, age 11 from Manchester, New Hampshire &
Mushky Harlig, age 8 from Henderson, Nevada