Yeshiva
Beit Midrash
- Torah Portion and Tanach
- Shmot
- Terumah
- Jewish Laws and Thoughts
- Serving Hashem, Mitzvot and Repentance
The Mishkan was built by very young architects. Midrash teaches us that Bezalel himself was barely bar-mitzva when he undertook this enormously task. Perhaps the Torah wants us to realize that only the young, those still pure and uncontaminated, are worthy of such a task. They still have ideals that have not been allowed to deteriorate in the face of life’s practicalities and difficulties. Thus their approach to building a Mishkan will of necessity be less tainted and conflicted than that of the older, wiser but more battered adults. One of the most refreshing things that I have experienced in my decades of teaching young men Talmud is their freshness and lack of cynicism and conflicts of interest. Teaching adults, no matter how fine and pious they are, nevertheless always involves an entirely different approach. It is a measure of self analysis that determines how one views the building of a Mishkan - a personal Mishkan and a national one. Those who are able to recognize their personal faults and intend to improve them, who can recognize their true motives and conflicts will undoubtedly be able to such a Mishkan that God Himself, so to speak, will dwell amongst them. But without such a self analytic effort any Mishkan that will be built will be temporary and faulty. The effort and materials that have to be taken to build a Mishkan have to be as honest and pure as possible - they have to be taken for "Me" - for God Himself.
Rabbis in Midrash
Lessons
fast navigation
Various Events FOR WHOM NOT TO VOTE
Rav Zvi Yehuda Kook stressed that Israeli politics is G-dly, so I have no problem answering this common question on a Torani blog. Also, Free-Will is a G-d-given right and obligation, to "destine one's fate" (R. Soloveichik, Kol Dodi Dofek, 67), so I obviously don't tell others how to vote. But once not a few (especially young) have already asked, a couple of personal words from experience and thoughts from chazal & Rav Kook which may be of help to others, mainly for whom NOT to vote.
P'ninat Mishpat Fallout from Failure to Install Elevator – part II
based on ruling 85007 of the Eretz Hemdah-Gazit Rabbinical Courts
