Michael el Chayil

The shmone esrei is divided into three distinct section: three paragraphs of praise (shevach), 13 of requests (bakashos), and a final three or thanks/acknowlegdement (ho'da'ah).  (The observant reader will note that adds up to 19, not 18.)  Each section has its unique character that expresses itself in halachic distinctions.  The shevach and ho'da'ah are inseparable units that must be said correctly from start to finish.  The bakashos need to be said in order, but to correct a mistake in the middle that requires a repetition requires only going back to the bakashah in which the mistake occurred.  One may make additions for personal needs in the bakashos, but no personal additions may be made in the shevach nor ho'da'ah. There is a very nice distinction that shows up in the change we make between winter and summer that spans both shevach and backashos.  In the winter: "mashiv ha'ru'ach u'morid ha'gashem" in shevach, "v'sein ta...

There are all sorts of jokes (mostly stemming from the non-religious yiddish literature, I think) that about the talmudic process.  They basically following the same format: Two talmidim are embroiled in a heated debate and finally decide to go to the rosh yeshiva for clarity.  "Rebbi," says the first talmid, "I say the gemara means X; and I can prove it because of Y!"  "Hmmm," says the rosh yeshiva, "You are right."  The second talmid balks, "But Rebbi!  I say the gemara means A; and I can prove it because of B!"  "Ahh," says the rosh yeshivah, "You are right."  They both look astonished and a third talmid who had overheard the whole things exclaims, "But Rebbi!  They can't both be right!"  "Exactly!" beams the rosh yeshivah, "You are also right!" That, I fear, is the outsiders view of "eilu v'eilu divrei elokim chayim."  The truth of the matter, however, is that co...

The havadala in the sh'mone esrei of motzei Shabbos has an interesting status.  Havdala is really meant to be a ceremony to mark the end of Shabbos/onset of the week.  Havdala is a rabbinic innovation that was decreed to correspond to the Torah obligation of making kiddush that marks the onset of Shabbos.  As such, it is, l'chatchila, a bracha said over wine; the wine being a common accompaniment to our religious ceremonies that adds a measure of distinction to the event. During one epoch in our history wine became prohibitively expensive and havdala became a burden on k'lal yisrael.  In response to that era, Chazal instituted an insertion into the bracha of "atah chonein l'adam da'as" in the ma'ariv of motzei shabbos as a substitute for the wine ceremony.  Once wine went down in price the wine ceremony with which we are all familiar was restored, but the insertion to t'fila was also retained.  As such, the insertion has an interesting status in ...

No one Jew can fulfill all 613 mitzvos. Some are specific to kohanim, some to women; one (geirus) can only be done be a non-Jew!  So how do we reach the perfection that only comes from fulfilling all 613 dimensions of perfection?  Chazal tell us that by learning about a mitzah that we cannot fulfill, we are credited as fulfilling it.  Moreover, some mitzvos, even though one could fulfill them, it is not desirable to fulfill them.  Returning a stolen object, for example.  Stealing something just to return it is at best a mitzvah ha'ba b'aveira and generally frowned upon.  So some mitzvos are best fulfilled even l'chatchila through study.  I am going to put tashlumin in that category.  I found the following case cool because it touches on a lot of issues. Suppose Moshe is unable to daven mincha one erev rosh chodesh.  So at ma'ariv he will daven a tashlumin right after his ma'ariv sh'mone esrei.  So far so good.  Ma'ariv on rosh cho...

Batei k'nessios (places designated specifically for prayer) used to be outside of town and in relatively deserted fields.  I have no idea why, but that's the facts, ma'am.  We have a few remnants of that historical fact in our ma'ariv davening.  The basic idea it that we don't want to leave someone alone there at night, so there are extra paragraphs that we say but that could be skipped by a latecomer to catch up and/or not be delayed.  One of these is known as "mei'ein sheva" -- the essence of the Friday night shmone esrei in shortened form.  If someone were late getting to shul Friday night (I know, unheard of, right?), then he could catch up while everyone else is saying that quasi chazaras ha'shatz.  (Maybe it would be more accurate to say they can catch up while he says the mei-ein sheva...)  Nowadays are shuls are in town and we don't worry so much about someone being alone, so now everyone says it. Mei-ein sheva has another function, h...

Parshas D'varim is always read the Shabbos before the fast of Tisha b'Av is observed.  Sefer D'varmim is Moshe Rabeinu's farewell address and summary of four decades of loving leadership of the Jewish people.  Parashas D'varim begins with a mussar shmuess to Klal Yisrael.  Of course the Shabbos before we as a nation mourn the loss of our Holy Temple and contemplate the thoughts and deeds that led to that horrific disaster is a perfect time for a mussar shmuess.  But perhaps as much as the message itself, the careful and precise manner of delivery can have just as much impact on us for good. First, Moshe Rabeinu gathered everyone together; no exceptions.  There was to be no possibility of anyone who wasn't there having a grievance that he could have said this or that in rebuttal.  One may infer from that, by they way, that when Moshe Rabeinu spoke, he also listened.  There must have been time for people to absorb the discourse, think about it, and con...

Look up "crowd control" in Wikipedia and you'll see phrases like "to prevent possible riots", "events such as soccer games", "stanchions and crowd barriers", "cooling fans and entertainment [to keep the crowd from getting unruly]".  And that's just the first paragraph.  Most of us probably imagine that crowds as small as several hundreds would probably start to need some crowd control; by the thousands and tens of thousands, you are definitely in crowd control territory.  Yet, with more then 90,000 Jews attended the Siyum haShas in NY MetLife stadium, there was no talk of crowd control.  The police and heightened security were in place for protection of the crowd, not control. That got me thinking about the paragraph in the "hadran" that compares our waking, laboring, and running to their waking, laboring, and running.  The structure is oddly poetic, "we get up early and they get up early; we get up early for th...

Somehow it doesn't matter whether Shabbos starts at 4:15PM or 9:15PM... we are always running to make Shabbos on time.  Just to make things more interesting for us (apparently), HaShem created for us, "tosafos Shabbos" -- a little additional Shabbos.  Now as far as I am concerned, the more Shabbos the better.  The only problem is that we are also exhorted to work for six full days.  "Sheishes yamim ta'avod v'asisa kol m'lachtecha" - for six day you shall work to do all of your labor; "v'yom ha'sh'vi'i shabbos LaShem Elokecha" -- and the seventh day is a time of cessation [from your labor in order to concentrate on] HeShem your G-d. So here we are working for six days, then we need to stop a little early and accept Shabbos a bit early. Great; more Shabbos! One question: what exactly is tosafos Shabbos?  Are we actually extending Shabbos into the week, or are we taking on the stringencies of Shabbos with the force of a neder...

There is a general principle when it comes to working on improving oneself: set attainable goals.  It is easy to give examples of what not to do.  Want to improve your davening?  If you are starting from losing concentration at "s'fasai", don't make a goal to say every word of sh'mone esrei with kavana.  Want to improve your kovei'a itim?  If you are barely able to stay on task when the rav says over a d'var halacha betwen mincha and ma'ariv, don't set a goal to sit down for an hour after davening to learn Choshem Mishpat.  That is all reasonably straightforward.  The correct approach, of course, is to choose small, attainable steps.  What those steps are depends and where you are starting and will change as you improve; just keep the steps small achievable.  Stretch goals may be what your supervisor wants at work, but they have no place in avodas HaShem.  In fact, the M'silas Y'sharim says that such a course is a recipe for disaster. ...

Generally speaking, women do not daven ma'ariv.  Many women do, however, regularly daven mincha.  Halichos Shlomo (chapter 13, halacha 8) says that such a woman who misses a mincha because of circumstances (ie, not simply because she decided to forego mincha for no good reason) is obligated to daven ma'ariv that night in order to daven a tashlumin (make up) t'fila afterwards.  Understanding this p'sak will bring more clarity to the concept of conditional exemptions . First, though, what's tashlumin?  The idea is that since t'fila is so very important, Chazal gave us a chance to make up for missed t'filos.  If a person misses a t'fila (ie, sh'mone esrei), he has an opportunity immediately after the next obligatory t'fila to daven a make up t'fila.  This can only be done at the next obligatory prayer service, not before and not later.  There are all sorts of cool halachos for tashlumin, but that is for another time.  For now, the important t...

In the old days, when newspapers were on paper and not feeds from web sites, they had a thing called "pictures".  Not images, jpegs, or gifs; pictures.  In the real old days (like 40 years ago or so), those pictures were black and white.  Even though one could see shades of gray, they were called "black and white".  That wasn't a mistake.  The pictures were actually composed of little black dots on a white background.  You could have every shade of gray from pure white to jet black just by making the dots denser (more per sq. in.) or less dense. I have, on occasion (lots and lots of occasions) been accused of being "black and white"; and I don't mean when commenting on my taste in fashion.  My response is, "The Torah is black and white."; which is an explicit Chovos haL'vavos.  The Chovos haL'vavos notes that people misunderstand the term "divrei r'shus".  They think it means "optional" or "do what y...

One of the things I truly appreciated about physics is that it knew its boundaries.  "Physics answers how, not why", is a fundamental part of the catechism.  On the other hand, physics certainly does answer questions such as, "Why is the sky blue?"  That's because the question is not really a "why" question, it is a "how" question.  That is, one is really asking how it happens that the sky appears blue even though it is being bathed in (white) sunlight.  A "why" question would be, "Why do you want to know how the sky gets its blue color?" Learning gemara is like that also.  There are questions  that one needs to ask just to get p'shat.  There are other questions that may be interesting, but they are tangential to the discussion at hand.  There are other questions that really have no place at all in learning.  Consider the following gemara: R' Chanina bar Egil asked R' Chiya bar Abba why it doesn't say ...

Making a watch, from inception to production, is essentially four steps: The thought to make the watch. Gathering the necessary raw material. Constructing the watch. Starting the watch running. Chazal describe a similar process for creation of the world, and each step is named according to its main activity.  We live in the "olam ha'asi'a"; the world of action/doing.  The step before that is "y'tzira"; formation of the world out of parts, ie, yeish mi'yeish (something from something).  Before that is creating the raw material itself; "b'ri'a", the world of yeish mi'ayin (something from nothing). That is where our Torah haK'dosha begins; b'reishis bara elokim....  The step before that, a step that has no word nor concepts for us to use is "atzilus" (noble/refined).  We refer to all four steps in kaddish "y'hei sh'mei... l'alam u'l'olmei almaiya" -- HaShem should be sanctified...

One of the coolest things about the Chicago vasikin minyan is getting to hear two halachos from the Mishna Brura before or after (depending on time of year) davening from R' Dovid Cohen.  You may be thinking, "What's so cool about that?  I can read the Mishna Brura myself."  That, dear friend, is like saying, "Why should I go to a Yitchak Perlman concert?  I can get the same sheet music and hum it to myself."  More than that, you will get extras, such as quotes from Rebitzin Isserles, which are available exclusively at our vasikin minyan. What prompted this particular exposition was finally hearing an accurate statement about learning on Tisha b'Av.  The oft quoted misstatement is that one is not allowed to learn on Tisha b'Av.  That is more than misleading; it is patently false.  One is always obligated to learn, just as one is always obligated to breath -- the Torah says "v'chai bahem", you shall live by them [divrei Torah].  So wha...

R' Dovid Siegel, shlita, once asked me if I really understood what the experience of olam haba is.  Not what it will feel like, just what it is .  (We always have light conversations like that.)  Having been learning for years by that point and feeling confident, I replied, "A person experiences himself, the being he built during his life in this world."  At that point R' Seigel started talking to himself, "I see where he got that idea, M'silas Y'sharim, Derech HaShem.  Maybe it's just the way he's expressing himself?  No; we are in beis medrash, that is certainly what he thinks."  I was wondering what mistake I had made and waiting for the rebbi to enlighten me.  He did.  "Not yourself; that would be intensely and profoundly lonely.  The experience of olam haba is feeling and enjoying the presence of HaKadosh Baruch Hu!"  I could have argued and said that's what I really meant, but what would be the point.  He was right; I had...

I think most people know the famous physics equation, E = mc 2 . Whether or not you know (or even care) what it means, it would not occur to any sane person to suggest meanings for the symbols.  You are never going to hear the following: I am a fundamentalist scientist.  I believe only the literal writings of Newton and Einstein, the Written Physics.  I know those old orthodox physicists have their own Oral Physics that interprets the symbols a certain way,  and according to their interpretation that is an equation that relates energy, mass, and the speed of light.  But we are not tied to old, dogmatic beliefs; especially claimed "oral traditions".  We are modern and have our own interpretation: 'E' means enlightenment, the double lines means, of course, stay between the lines, and mc 2 means riding motorcycles in tandem. That's obviously hogwash.  The same physicists who told you "E = mc 2 ", also told you what it meant (or tried to; sigh...)...

People think my wife is such a tzadeikes.  Their proof?  She has lived with me, a known difficult person, for going on 35 years (yes; she was a child bride).  I would just like to point out a couple of things.  First, she is naturally nice.  Yes, being nice to me is a stretch even for her, so that is amazing; but still, she has a natural inclination to be nice.  I, on the other hand, obviously have no such natural inclination, but I do an amazing thing for my wife every morning (during the summer, at least).  I go home for breakfast after davening and before leaving for work.  That means that I am giving her the opportunity to be nice to a difficult person.  Without me she wouldn't be able to exercise all that niceness in difficult circumstances.  Who's the tzadik now, eh?  I am glad we cleared that up. So my wife was having a nice hearty breakfast of cereal, nuts, and yogurt.  Then she washed some blueberries.  Problem ...

Let's think about this.  There are over two million people -- men, women, children, and babies -- who are in the wilderness and there only source of water has suddenly dried up.  No water.  Lots of dust.  No water.  Babies crying for lack of milk, mothers crying because they can't produce milk.  Is it a shock when the people cry out, "Why did you bring us out of Egypt?  Just to bring us to this evil and uninhabitable place without even water to drink?!" So Moshe is told to take the staff, assemble the people, go with his brother Aaron to speak to the rock in front of the entire assembly.  The rock will produce water, everyone will get what they need.  Shalom al yisrael.  Why all the fanfare and flourish?  Well... there is no spring here in the wilderness, so you obviously need a miracle to produce a fountain that can produce enough water for this mass of people.  You may as well get some bang for your buck and bring the folks...

When of the best things about going to a chasuna (the only good thing?) is the opportunity to discuss sh'eilos with a talmid chacham.  One of the best things about discussing a sh'eila with a talmid chachim  is getting additional insights into how to even pose the question.  I asked R' Plotnik my question about a 12 year old boy finishing a meal right before sundown on his 13th birthday; would it be better to wait till he is 13 to bentch d'oraisa, or rather fulfill "z'rizim makdimim l'mitzvos" and bentch immediately?  First he told me, "Old, well known sh'eila."  Good, I thought, that means I am asking a reasonable question.  (The nice thing about being ignorant is getting to learn new stuff all the time!)  In the midst of the discussion he told me, "Of course, z'rizim has nothing to do with being fast; it means to do things best."  I would love to say that I immediately stopped to clarify, but I really just plowed on to say...

There are three entities for which we are are required to stand: a talmid chacham, a sefer torah, and a elderly person (even a goy).  An elderly person in this context means over 70.  (I know, I know... for a lot of us that doesn't sound so all fired elderly any more.)  The reasons are similar, but the differences come out in halacha. There are basically two reasons to stand up when a person comes into one's presence: either to the honor the person or honor what he represents.  Obviously with an icon, one could only be honoring what that icon represents.  I say "obviously", but making a mistake in that area is the foundation of avoda zara.  I once heard a nice modern way to understand how that works.  If an ambassador from a powerful country comes for a visit by himself, then it is appropriate to show him all the honor befitting  the leader of a powerful nation.  If, on the other hand, the king comes with the ambassador, then that same hono...