Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Berdichev once complained to G-d,

”Master of the Universe, the structure of this world is stacked against us! The pleasures and temptations of the world you placed for all to see, yet the pleasures and inspiration of the Torah, you put inside the books which people need to struggle to study! Why not put the temptations in the books, and the delights of the torah in the open?”

Indeed, this structural need for darkness feels stacked against us. Yes, we know the reason: Our sojourn here on earth, the very experience of the distraction —and destruction— of this world, gives us the power to reveal the greatest light… to make the most meaningful impact on the universe.

But the question can still gnaw at us.

The Rebbe once noted that as a child, his teacher told him that he found a hint in the Torah for the pogroms caused by the Ukrainian War of Independence then tearing through Eastern Ukraine — including the Rebbe’s own home town of Ekaterinoslav (today, Dniepro).

”What good is that,” the Rebbe asked him, “a pogrom is still a pogrom!”

”When a person experiences something difficult, and knows that it was foreseen in the Torah, it gives a sense of comfort,” the teacher answered.

That may be true, the Rebbe noted some fifty years later, but a pogrom remains a pogrom.

Wishing you an uplifting Shabbat,

Rabbi Mendy & Mussy

p.s. As always, we would love to chat with you over coffee or drinks, about Judaism, or just life - reply to this email.

/Of Interest/

We Are Not Alone Visitors to the Rebbe’s tomb ask Hashem for help, while those davening to the golden calf of D.C. politics get spurned

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25 Years Later, the World Honors the Pioneer of the Jewish Internet

Magic the Gathering's Creator Wants to Create an Even Better Game. Walking a fine line between collectability and obsolescence.

A Poem:

Upstairs the Eulogy, Downstairs the Rummage Sale

The beloved Yiddish professor

passed away on the same day

as the synagogue’s rummage sale,

and because they could not bear

the coffin up the many steps

that led to the sanctuary,

they left it in the hallway downstairs,

and because I was not one of his students,

and it didn’t matter if I heard the eulogy,

they told me to stay downstairs,

to watch over the body and recite Psalms.

And I thought,

this is how it is in the life and death of a righteous man:

upstairs, in the sanctuary, they speak of you in glowing terms,

while down below your body rests beside

old kitchen appliances.

And I recited the Psalms as intently

as I could over a man I had only met once,

and because I knew where he was headed,

and you and I were to wed in a few months,

I asked that he bring with him a prayer for a good marriage.

And this is how it is in the life and death of a righteous man:

strangers pray over the sum of your days,

and strangers ask you to haul their heavy requests

where you cannot even take your body.

From G‑d’s Optimism by Yehoshua November

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Light your candles at 5:13 pm

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