Tasting Purity Parshas Vayikra In Parshas Vayikra we find that the first word of Vayikra is written with a small aleph. What is the reason for this small letter to start out the new chumash? The small details in life often can make the biggest differences. So what important thing is this small alep coming to teach? The Midrash teaches us that the little aleph teaches us that little children should start learning Chumash with Parshas Vayikra. This is pretty weird. Why would li

Mic Drop: Purim Edition Parshas Vayakhel When Moshe Rabbeinu came down with the second luchos, we find the Jews standing in an interesting place. From the beginning there was never supposed to be a second time. However, we sinned with Chet Ha'Egel and needed a second chance. Rashi tells us in the first posuk in this week's Parsha that the day that Moshe came down on was Yom Kippur, which is the day of teshuva. This is when Hashem forgave us for the Chet Ha'Egel. In the Megi

Maximizing our Relationships Parshas Mishpatim We ended off last week's parsha discussing the unbelievable experience of the Jewish people at Har Sinai, receiving the Torah. Miracles were going on all over and the whole world heard about it. It was an unforgettable experience. However, when we open up this week's parsha we get a very different picture. There are tons and tons of laws and technical details given for the mitzvos. Even the name of the parsha, Mishpatim, means st

Symbols of Greatness Parshas Va'eirah - Short vort When Moshe went to Paroah to ask him to free the Jews for the first time, HaShem told him to show them a sign that would prove that G-d was on his side. HaShem said that Moshe should throw down his staff, and it would then turn into a snake. Why did HaShem choose the sign specifically to be Moshe’s staff turning into a snake? What is the significance of this? The reason why HaShem specifically chose this miracle was to illust

It's Not Easy Being Right All the Time Pashas Vayechi There was once a wealthy businessman flying on his way to Israel. He takes a seat next to this elderly man, and they set out for a ten hour flight together. Right after taking off, the elderly man shuts his eyes to go to sleep. The young businessman frantically wakes him up. The young man says "We have a long 10 hour flight ahead of us and I need someone to talk to! You can't just go to sleep!" The elderly man smiles and s

The Chanukah 'Present' Parshas Mikeitz & Chanukah There is a famous question that is posed about Chanukah. Why do we celebrate 8 days when the miracle was really only 7 days? There are hundreds of answers as to why we are celebrating the first day. One of the basic ones is the miracle of actually finding the oil and that there was enough oil for the first day. I would like to share another answer, that may not seem so miraculous at first. We see in this week's Parsha that Yos

More Than a Couple Jars The Parsha relates that Yaakov was traveling with his family. After crossing a river, he returend to retrieve some small jars that were left behind. This ultimately became a confrontation with Eisav's angel, who fought against Yaakov until sunrise. Finally, the angel submitted to Yaakov, who able to get his jugs back. He spent the whole night fighting just so he can get his jars. This seems like someone who really values his belongings, and cherishes e

Mic Drop In this week's Parsha, we find Yaakov is cooking a red lentil soup when Eisav walks into the house. He was so exhausted from the field, that he told Yaakov to pour the soup straight into his mouth. Yaakov made a business deal with him for the sale of the bechor. Eisav agreed. It was for this reason that he was called Edom (meaning, red). The Gemara in Shabbos explains to us that Eisav was born under the red star, which is why he was red-headed, and so blood thirsty

The Bystander's Dilemna We learn in this week's Parsha, right off the bat, we are introduced to how bad the generation was. But, at the same time, we also see that Noach didn't fall prey to the ways of corruption in his generation. Noach had every excuse to do so. There is a famous pyschological phenomena known as the Bystander Effect, whereby a person will not react, for example calling the ambulance or police when they see an incident - merely because they assume everyone e

Every morning the first thing we do when we wake up is say the special prayer of Modeh Ani. Before we start the craziness of our schedule, before we even eat our morning pudding, we are supposed to pause and say Modeh Ani Lefanecha. If you think about it, it's a bit funny how we say it. You would think that the normal way to say it should be "Ani Modeh" as in "I am thankful". For some strange reason it is flipped the other way around to say "Modeh Ani". Why are we changing th