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A collection I acquired recently contained an unusual surviving document, an envelope sent by Leo Baeck from the Theresienstadt concentration camp, to Saly Mayer (1882-1950), leader of Switzerland's Jewry and the head of the Joint Distribution Committee in Switzerland.

As the sun set over Jerusalem the Golden, reunited at last, Jews of all backgrounds and ethnicities gathered at the Wall on Tisha B’Av for the first time in two millennia.

Is it defending democracy to bring criminal charges against people who never entered the Capitol on January 6 and to invoke farfetched extensions to charge conspiracy and justify multi-year jail sentences to the point where one defendant committed suicide?

Jewish tradition recognizes that there are appropriate times to cry and intentionally carves out times for emotional reflection and preparation, emphasizing that life isn't solely about constant happiness but involves growth through allowing and experiencing a full range of emotions.

If we measure strength in holding back tears, we’ve got it wrong.

Maybe you just have to realize that whatever pain you’re going through in your life right now is existentially rooted to an original pain: the removal of Hashem’s direct presence in the world through the destruction of the Temples.

Crying is a powerful tool. It is an emotion that Hashem gave us to elevate pain, happiness, sadness, tefillos. May we all be zoche to have our tefillos answered.

After our meeting, a searing pain gripped me, cutting deep into my soul. The reality of his absence and the passage of time hit me with a force that left me struggling to breathe.

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Discussing the conundrum with close friends has helped me to focus on what I do not want. I do not want an evening talking about our marriage and forcing our friends to sit through our stories, no matter how wonderful I may think that they are.

These rings appear from time to time in small auction houses that specialize in selling the entire contents of estates, and typically sell in the range of between $150 and $350.

Two Western Union Telegrams I acquired recently tell the story of one Jew that managed to escape from Poland and some of the challenges he encountered.

Having the opportunity to look people in the eye and make them laugh when they have gone through so much is powerful, she said.

While it is now known that Yad Avshalom was built about 1,000 years after the death of the Biblical Avshalom, it is not known who commissioned the monument – although the Biblical account in Shmuel Bet (2 Samuel) suggests that it was built by Avshalom himself, as discussed below.

The destructions and subsequent exiles are part of G-d’s divine scheme. His plans are positive and purposeful though we may not understand them now.

During the Three Weeks, we need to look at our division which led to the destruction of the second Beit HaMikdash, and for which the third Beit HaMikdash is not yet rebuilt.

It's always tempting to play the victim card when something we've worked hard on is ruined. However, throwing a pity party or dwelling on the offender’s punishment is not the Jewish way.

Ceaseless, persistent negative speech, lashon hara, can cripple, devastate, and destroy a person’s future and is the verbal equivalent of a barrage of missiles that demolishes a building.

It is a day when being part of the klal will supersede being an individual; it is a day of contradictions, an awkward fusion of happy birthday wishes and the start of the saddest time period of the year.

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There is a distinct pattern of behavior for each individual, but even more fascinating is that others with whom we have no contact, who live elsewhere on the globe, eat different foods, have different lifestyles, experience many of these same behaviors.

A series of documents I acquired recently tells one such situation, where a woman who survived the war, but whose husband did not, spent several years dealing with the halachic ramifications that resulted.

Over a century before the Holocaust, Rav Alkalai predicted that 1940 would be a year of great hardship with an outpouring of wrath that will lead to the gathering of our dispersed in Eretz Yisrael and urged Jews to make aliyah voluntarily before this catastrophic event forced them to settle in Eretz Yisrael.

Granted, the U.N. mainly represents governments – the great majority of which are dictatorships – rather than people. Nevertheless, to the extent that the U.N. speaks for the world, its overwhelming hostility toward Israel, and increasingly, the desire to extinguish the Jewish state, are undeniable.

I often tell my kids when they choose to take a gray path that they were born to stand out and to be unique.

A person is always complicated, layered, and ultimately unknowable – we never know exactly what someone has been through, and what has led them to the choices they have made.

One of my fondest memories in sleepaway camp was when it became dark and cloudy out. While some were bummed that the gray sky cancelled their swimming or sports play plans, I looked forward to the downpour and what came after.

Most things in this world are indeed gray. And then there are indeed things that are black and white, like a war between good and evil.

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Because our aide needs time off to be with her husband and to recuperate from Hubby’s constant requirements, she replaces herself with female friends from her social circle. Hubby doesn’t really mind, as they are young and usually lovely.