In a foreign and unnerving setting, a hospital ward, there came an extraordinary moment, a shared whisper between two souls, wrapped in the sacred shroud of serenity. This heavenly ballet was enacted on the humble stage of a noisy, strange room. An angelic soul, nestled on the bed, stretched out his little hand towards me. His tiny fist secured around my pinky as we silently sang a melody of our profound connection.

His innocent eyes, shimmering pools of trust, held onto mine, forming an unspoken sonnet of pure adoration. In this intimate world of ours, time was suspended, reality blurred, and all that prevailed was this silent dialogue, a wordless tale of love and trust.

As this silent symphony unfolded between us, the spiritual notes of ‘Lekatchila Ariber’ began to resonate, becoming clearer and more meaningful. This Niggun, imbued with profound Chassidic philosophy and the spirit of overcoming all barriers, enveloped us in its harmony. This enchanting melody gently lulled my precious gift into the land of dreams, his gaze softly dimming, yet never leaving mine until sleep tenderly cloaked him.

In this moment, my heart fluttered with a sense of awe and overwhelming gratitude. What good deed had I done, what merit had I earned to be bestowed with such a precious blessing from Hashem? My heart swelled with joy, a joy not of earthly possession, but of a divine gift, a heavenly bond.

This angel, a gift from Hashem, was a testament to His divine love. As I watched him surrender to the rhythm of the Niggun and the pull of sleep, I was humbled by the breathtaking beauty of this moment. It wasn’t merely a sliver of time, but a sacred memory forever etched in my soul, a testament to a bond that dances on the strings of the divine.

This is my gift, my blessing from Hashem. A tidal wave of gratitude wells within me, as I am humbled and enchanted by this divine dance of life. Standing on the precipice of this magical encounter, my deepest thanksgiving rises to Hashem for His bountiful and infinite blessings.

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Life’s path is strewn with jagged stones of hate, a bitter reality the Jewish community has endured all too often. The stain of hatred has appeared in manifold forms, intensity, places, and historical epochs. The depth of these encounters has left an indelible mark on our collective memory, etching the pain of these experiences deep within our consciousness.

But in the darkest storm clouds, we find our silver lining: the Divine Providence – Hashgacha Pratis, and Divine assistance – Siyata d’Shmaya. More than mere religious concepts, they represent a comforting hand that steers us through life’s most tumultuous seas.

Over the millennia, hatred towards Jews has permeated nations, passed down generations like an ominous heirloom. Yet, amidst the irrational and disturbing accusations – deicide, blood libel, scapegoating for the Bubonic Plague – we find an underlying truth. We, the Jews, were chosen as the conduit through which the Creator endowed the world with morality, a beacon to guide humanity out of moral obscurity. It is this very light that incites some to harbor hatred against its bearers.

Ironically, these nations and individuals opposing us inadvertently serve a divine purpose. They act as mirrors, reflecting our identity back to us, challenging us to uphold our Jewishness in face of adversity. Every encounter with hate serves as a call to look inward, to reconnect with our essence – the ‘pintele yid’, the Jewish spark that forever burns within us.

Throughout history, this innate spark has ignited even in the hearts of those most assimilated. In moments of crisis, seemingly disconnected individuals have been transformed into luminous beacons of truth, choosing the path of faith and integrity which often meant death, over forced conversion or illicit acts.

Despite the cruelty inflicted on us, there have been those – individuals and groups – who have offered shelter and protection in our times of need. Their words and actions embody the goodness and kindness inherent in humanity, serving as a testament to the sacred mission we carry: the dissemination of divine morality in the world.

Thus, as we grapple with each hateful encounter, we are also offered opportunities for introspection and reaffirmation of our values. Amid the turmoil, we discover a sweetness – the sweetness of reconnecting with our core, of rekindling the unyielding Jewish spark, and of acknowledging our divinely ordained purpose.

In the face of hatred, we find opportunities to reinforce our identity, deepen our understanding of our divine mission, and strengthen our bond with our Jewish essence. Amid adversity, we recognize the beauty of resilience, the reaffirmation of our purpose, and the relentless spark of the ‘Pintele Yid’. For this, we must be eternally grateful.

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Before that day, my understanding of a miracle was largely academic. I had read about miracles in the Torah, particularly the awe-inspiring miracles that HaShem performed for the Jewish people during Pesach, leading us out of Mitzrayim. However, these events belonged to another time, another place, and other people. It was challenging to personally connect with these ancient miracles, even though our teachings urged us to do so. It’s a work in progress, a lofty ideal worth striving for, but achieving that level of understanding often felt unlikely.

However, on that birthday of mine, I found myself at the center stage of a miracle. Part of me wanted to take credit for it, to bask in the glory that comes with being a protective, nurturing father who would safeguard his children under any circumstance. But in all honesty, I can’t claim it was all me.

We were at the waterfall when a few of my children decided to climb up to the water’s source. I was helping Shirah, who was the most cautious and reserved among the girls attempting the climb, clamber up the edge of the cliff. Above us, about 15 to 20 meters higher on the slippery, mildew-covered rocks, the other girls were being carefree, perhaps a little too much.

Suddenly, I heard a terrified scream. I turned my head and saw my daughter, Tiferes, clinging to a shrub as she teetered dangerously over a steep drop. In that moment, time seemed to warp. In less than a blink of an eye, I found myself at the top, just in time to catch her by her arm as she lost her grip on the shrub.

My heart pounded in my ears, adrenaline surging through me, leaving me shaking and breathless. The protective instincts that propelled me forward didn’t subside until she was back on solid ground, safe and sound. Once everyone was safely in the car, the adrenaline that had been my lifeline drained away, leaving me a spent hulk. For the first time, I noticed my legs and feet were bloodied from the scramble up the cliff. I felt like a tool of divine providence, showing signs of being well used.

Yes, I was the one who caught her, and yes, I somehow made it to her in an impossible amount of time. But in all honesty, I can’t claim any credit for it. To me, that was a miracle, one I am eternally grateful for.

Today, Tiferes, now almost eight years old, occasionally gives me a look that brings me back to that day. In her eyes, I see the same fear and relief that was there when I caught her hand. That look, that unspoken bond, has become a permanent fixture in our lives.

On that day, as a six-year-old, she said Tehilim in the aftermath of the event, cementing the moment as a miraculous reality that unfolded before my very eyes. That birthday shifted my understanding of miracles from the abstract to the tangible, from stories in the Torah to a personal experience that I will forever cherish.

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Facing this terrifying void, I found myself at the altar of Hashem, offering the only sacrifice I could muster – my prayers. My voice wavered, stumbling over the ancient words of psalms into the sterile air, a desperate plea wrapped in verses that had comforted and guided generations before me. In my mouth, they felt fraudulent. The echo of the words became my lifeline, a conduit to the divine, the only source of hope in the numbing stillness.

My tears, salt and sorrow, raced freely down my face, each drop a testament to the helplessness I felt. I offered my repentance, my atonement, my life, and I begged for mercy, pleading with a fervor that seemed to sear my soul. My ego crumbled, my pride shattered, leaving behind only the raw essence, a husk.

“I am nothing,” I cried in a voice not my own, my words swallowed by the stillness, “Your mercy, Hashem, is their only hope.” Broken, bent, and silent, I approached the door.

I paused, my hand on the door handle, my heart pounding a solitary beat. The air crackled with anticipation. Then, the door opened.

Her smile, my angel’s smile, radiated through the gloom, a beacon of hope that instantly pierced my despair. The steady drumbeat of life, the heartbeat of our unborn child, danced in the air. It was a lifeline thrown across the chasm of fear, a promise of survival.

With a gasp of surprise and delight, she exclaimed, “It’s a boy!”

It felt as if I were perched on the precipice of the highest cliff, my gaze lost in the unfathomable depth beneath me. Yet, there was no fear, only an overwhelming sense of exhilaration, an invisible force buoying me, allowing me to soar through the infinite expanse of the sky.

This was the divine dance of joy. This was gratitude, radiating from every pore, every breath. This was a second chance, a divine decree encased in the strong newborn cries of my son mixed with the joyous laughter of my wife. My heart swelled with a silent vow, a promise to Hashem, to be worthy of this mercy, to honor this gift with a life lived in gratitude and love.

From the depths of despair, I had been lifted to the pinnacle of joy. The miracle of life, the miracle of mercy, unfolded before my eyes. In the echoes of my psalms, in the rhythm of the heartbeats, I found my gratitude, my resolve, my promise. To cherish each miracle, each moment, with the love and gratitude they deserved.

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Generosity of spirit – When a human reaches out, without a quantifiable reason to help another and gives of him/herself to comfort or sustain another.

This is a Devine attribute and therefore completely foreign to most.

But there are some truly inspiring and breathtakingly generous people, who learn from on high and act divinely.

They are the 36 pillars holding this world up, inspiring others to look up and become aware.

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So now I know what needs to be done, great! Where to from here?
Wait, I need to finish off something or other, I need more time in the world of make-belief, I need time, don’t pressure me, what’s wrong with the way I live? What right do you have to go against the grain? Enough of this fantasy, let’s get back to life.

The cycle continues for several rotations, and within a blink of an eye, we’re in our twilight years thinking about all the things we did not do nor achieve nor resolve, this thought being utterly depressing for me now.

We need to stop going through the cycles and get off this ferris wheel of meaningless?
I know let’s build a meaningful life, based on core values, based on love and nurture of the unit and not just ourselves, creating space and love for others who come into our sphere of influence and treat people with respect.
This life sounds grand, almost ideal, but it’s missing something, it’s missing… meaning.

So for meaning, we can strive to build this life so it has a residual value, when our number of days is up, therefore, it must be something; tangible, valuable and devoid of corruptible elements… I got it!!!! We need to raise children, then we can instill these values in them, together with meaningfulness they can internalize them and have something to pass on to their children. We are almost there, and yet it feels contrived, like a well-designed illusion lacking a fundamental truth…

We have now reached an impasse and on the verge of throwing in the towel, proceeding back to our next cycle, when… I remember a lullaby which my grandmother taught me, some meaningless ditty that I could not understand, sung in a foreign language that I only learned because it put a smile on her face as I stumbled through the difficult words whilst trying to remain in tune.

What was it again… how did it go… Now I remember and from now on will never forget,

Shema Yisroel – HaShem Alokainu – HaShem Echad

I have come full circle, back to my core, back to who I am and now I understand that without HIM, I have nothing, I don’t even have a notion of what I am.
By placing HaShem in the center of our life/world, we allow ourselves to live, function with meaning, and be able to be the type of people we actually like.

Once we get to this point, then we can begin to craft the life we conceived earlier, but this time without any missing ingredients, with a central core, a fundamental truth for meaning, and a full heart.

From this point onwards we can start the journey of finding that special person who will join us on this journey, which is sometimes turbulent and scary, at times magical and sublime but always meaningful and rewarding.

My biggest blessing was to have found my special one, my zivug, my Chaya Batya, to share in our mutual journey of building a small dira b’tachtonim, where we try our best to welcome our special guest daily.

May Hashem continue to bless our union, may his radiance shine upon us, and may he shower us with his love and blessings until 120, with our hands firmly clasped together, through all stages of our lives.

From the depth of my heart, for now, and forever more, I love you and thank you for being you,

Happy 10th anniversary my love.

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Submission as a word has been perverted, to mean a form of humiliation. Depicting one as being at the mercy of another and conjuring images of wrestlers or people garbed in shiny leather.

To submit is to acknowledge that;

• You lack the superiority and power and are beholden.
• You have no independent will and that your destiny is not in your own hands.
• Your life’s work is to strive, believing in its success with no guarantee of it.

All these realizations sound depressing at first, however, when you dive in and understand what is at stake you come to realize that a genuine submission is euphoric and liberating.

It’s the realization that a fence is not built to cage you in but rather to give you the confidence to strive, knowing that you have a safety net in place.

We should never be afraid to submit to the ONE who gives us everything and asks for a pittance in return.

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A promise to love is on the surface a fallacy, a pun, an impossible claim and its utterance is only dwarfed by the simplicity of the individual believing it.

It makes no rational sense to say it or believe the person who is saying it. After all, it is based on the known of today and not the unknown of tomorrow.

Yet we make this promise and our intended believe us readily, where is the sobriety here.

The objective truth is, thank GOD, there is no sobriety present at this exchange.

GOD provides each party with the required, lack of reason, to facilitate marriage. Without which, far fewer people would find themselves married to people whom they can’t recognise and whom rationally they would have never selected.

To the unsuspecting, one could say that a cosmic joke is being played out and we are pawns, marching to a drum roll purpose-built, for our subjugation.

This same unsuspecting person is one who has not had the good fortune to meet his Woman of Valour and this revelling in his own deductive brilliance is simply an admission of not being whole, there is a piece missing, an emptiness that no intellectual observation can fill.

This Woman of Valour who turns conventional wisdom on its head, who smashes through the moral decay of this world and nurtures a pure soul, not just hidden deep within, but worn on the outside for the world to bask in its radiance.

A partner in building a home filled with joy, whilst raising children who never need to crave attention. With a dedication to becoming better people in many ways and to nurture the family to have a more meaningful relationship with GOD.

Perhaps its time to stop hiding behind your plate armour of logic and become whole, experience joy and build your legacy by finding your Woman of Valour.

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A feeling of guilt that’s felt (in varying degrees) is a constant companion, a calling inside you. It whispers that you ought to be doing something noble with the failure to achieve some mysterious goal leaving you feeling sad and depressed.

Depending on the volume of this voice inside, you can resort to various activities to sideline and mute its insistence. Get busy with work, family or dive into some project and if all else fails, then indulge in gratuitous behaviour. This generally works for a time, with only the nagging feeling remaining, but remain it does. Ready to pull you into depression if you indulge it.

The latter of these remedies, presents as a potent solution, addressing the self, which is under attack.

We justify with, “if I don’t indulge now, then when?”. A powerful stimulant for more and more hedonistic pursuits.

So how did we get here?

From a nagging voice calling us to some unknown noble cause to debauchery? Is guilt really just a clever guise for our evil inclination.

So, the conclusion you could make is, guilt is evil.

I would like to offer some nuance. Guilt is an unidentifiable desire which, if not satiated can lead to evil.

But what if you could define this noble desire, express it and achieve it, would it still be evil. The answer would have to be, no. In fact, you would have to argue that it’s a polar opposite, guilt is inherently holy.

Just this morning, I had a personal revelation, upon finishing my morning routine of prayers and meditations, I felt a sense of completeness. Like I reached an oasis and found myself at peace.

I reflected for a long time on this. The only word that I could use to describe my feeling was satisfaction, with certainly no iota of that voice. It was entirely muted, in fact, I would go further and say it vanished.

With further reflection, I came up with a formula. 

Guilt is an Angel, coaxing you into performing the only thing that you are obligated to do. To be grateful.

• To say thank you for this world and your role in it.

• To say thank you for everything which you receive without needing to ask. 

• To say thank you for having the confidence in us by continually giving us chances to be better.

If we are truly grateful, then our reward is an oasis from the clutches of the same Angel who instead of disappearing, changes into a completely different outfit.

I pray that our future prayers will manifest the abundant gratefulness, which is our debt to GOD and fill us with the feeling I experienced this morning.

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It’s been a path of many twists, of seeming triumphs and defeats.

It’s been a journey of many tales, of countless memories and lofty trails.

It’s been a wondrous adventure, with superhuman feats abound.

But mostly it’s been sublimely perfect, to share it all with you my love.

You are the very best of people, a true inspiration of our nation. You are my precious Eshes Chayil and I, your evermore beloved.

22 Sivan 5779

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