If G-d appeared to you and asked you how long you would like to live, what would you say? 100 years? 130 years? Would you make any conditions like: but they need to be healthy years? The Alter Rebbe, Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, chose to bless one of his greatest followers Rabbi Yekusiel Liepler, with long life. The Chassid qualified the blessing and said that he was only willing to accept it if it would be infused with spiritual vitality for without that the years were empty and meaningless to him In Genesis Adam died at age 930, Noah was almost 500 when he started building the ark (not bad!) and Methuselah lived a world record of 969 years! Are you jealous? Would you like to live 900 years? What would you do with that time? We study and marvel at centenarians. We ask them for their secrets and diets, lifestyles and habits. I find it very intriguing that some of the greatest in our history like Amadeus Mozart or Rabbi Isaac Luria, the greatest Kabbalist of all ...
The four species that we bless on Sukkot correspond to the four letters of G-d's Hebrew name. Waving them in all six directions signifies our faith that G-d is everywhere. Specifically, we are saying that on every level, at every stage of life, in all that happens to us, G-d is there. Right and left represent Chesed and Gevurah, the power of love and the power of discipline. G-d, like a parent, can be loving and can also be strict. Sometimes G-d's light shines on us and we feel close to Him, other times He seems distant, we feel left in the dark and have to find our own way through. Whether we receive G-d's closeness and love, or whether He gives us space to grow on our own, it is all coming from G-d. He knows exactly what we need, and that's what we get. Up and down symbolize the highs and lows of life. When we feel we are on top of the world, we need to remember that G-d enabled us to get there. When we feel down in the dumps, we need to have faith that G-d is w...
Here's a thought: have you ever felt very inspired and uplifted by a great spiritual experience only to have real life wipe out any memory of it rather quickly? A newborn baby, moments after birth, is taken by a midwife and wrapped up in a swaddling cloth. This serves to keep the newborn protected and warm. Having just emerged from the security and nurture of the womb, the baby is particularly vulnerable and sensitive. A good swaddling cloth gives him a sense of protection from the cold and harsh world out here. But swaddling doesn't last long. You rarely see teenagers wrapped up in a cloth with their arms behind their ears. (Though perhaps some should be.) Swaddling is a brief bridging stage between the safety of the womb and the hazards of real life. A well wrapped baby will eventually grow to face life unwrapped. The swaddle cloth just helps him get there. Your soul needs that bridge too. You have emerged from the womb of Yom Kippur a pure and renewed soul. The negativ...