|
|
|
|
As election day approaches, we are showered with promises from the various politicians. They will lower taxes, solve the health care crisis, cure the economy and help bring new jobs to your area.
Then comes the day after! The politicians are nowhere to be found, promises are forgotten and we, the constituents, are once again disappointed.
Just a moment- think about this: are we not the same? Take a look at the recent High Holiday season. On Yom Kippur, we stand before G‑d and make all kinds of promises. "Give us a good year, make sure our family is healthy and our business goes well, and in return we will..."
Let's not play politics with G‑d. Let's make sure that not only does G‑d hear our promises, but that we hear them too!
See you at shul on Shabbos.
Shabbat Shalom!
Rabbi Shalom M Paltiel
|
|
Oct 24
|
Upcoming JLI Course: Medicine and Morals Your Jewish guide through life's tough decisions
6 Sundays, Oct 24 - Nov 28 | 10 - 11:30 AM
At Chabad of Port Washington
Click here for more info and to register.
|
|
Oct 24
|
JLI Teens Course: Israel 3D
A journey through time, space, and beyond.
Sundays, Oct 24 - Dec 5 | 7 - 8:30 PM
High School students, Grades 9-12
At Chabad of Port Washington
Click here for more info and to register.
|
|
|
Should we chop fingers off?
By: Rabbi Aron Moss
Sydney, Australia
We had a baby boy and we are very excited. But we are still undecided about the Bris. I have issues with it. I am aware of the spiritual significance of the circumcision, but I have much more practical concerns:
1) Is it not barbaric to put my baby through the pain of a medically unnecessary operation?
2) He was born uncircumcised, why should I mess with his natural state?
3) My son has no say in this, and can never reverse it. Shouldn't I let him choose later on in life if he wants this done to him?
Do you have any rational answers?
Answer:
Imagine the following scenario. Your baby is born, healthy and well. But there's something unusual. He has six fingers on each hand. An extra little growth protrudes right next to each pinkie.
What would you do about it? Have the extra fingers surgically removed? Or leave them? After all, he was born that way. And he can live with twelve fingers. Maybe the child should be allowed to choose whether or not he wants his extra fingers later in life. Can you think of anything more barbaric than chopping someone's fingers off?
And yet I suspect you would do what most parents have done in such circumstances. Better remove the extra fingers now, when it is relatively painless and quick to heal, than subject the child to feeling like an anomaly in his future life. He has no use for them anyway, and would later resent the fact that his parents didn't remove them for him.
And so, kind and loving parents will unflinchingly put their babies under the surgeon's knife. The short term pain is worth it to avoid any long term discomfort. All other concerns would quickly dissolve. What is called barbaric in one context is quite humane in another.
If this logic works for removing extra fingers, a purely cosmetic operation, how much more should it work in favour of the infinitely more meaningful act of circumcision. I am not suggesting that being uncircumcised is the same as being twelve-fingered. But for a Jewish child there are several similarities.
An uncircumcised Jew often feels like an outsider among his own people. He will always be a Jew, but may come to feel ambivalent about it, knowing that to actively embrace his Jewishness entails undergoing an operation - one that is minor at eight days old, but quite a bit more daunting in adulthood. I have attended adult circumcisions, and it is inspiring when someone makes that choice. The actual operation is not such a big deal. But the decision to actually do it is. You are in fact limiting his choices by not circumcising him.
So putting all spiritual considerations aside, from a practical perspective, here's the equation. Leave your son uncircumcised, and you leave him with a psychological barrier to exploring his own identity. Give your son a Bris, and he loses nothing more than a bit of skin. But he gains immediate entry into the four thousand year old covenant of Abraham. That is a gift you will not regret giving.
|
|
|
|
| B"H |
 |
Board of Directors
|
 |
|
Adam Katz, Esq., President
Frank Arnold
Bert Brodsky
Martin H. Brownstein, M.D.
Howard Fensterman, Esq.
M. Allan Hyman, Esq.
Sara E. Paltiel
Rabbi Shalom M. Paltiel
Alan Rosenzweig
Alan Salzbank
Michael Samuel
Felix Sater
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 |
Candle Lighting Times for
Port Washington, NY
[Based on Zip Code 11050] |
 |
Shabbat Candle Lighting:
Friday, Oct. 22 |
5:47 pm |
Shabbat Ends:
Shabbat, Oct. 23 |
6:45 pm |
|
|
|
|
 |
|
Kiddush Calendar |
|
This week's Kiddush is sponsored by Larry and Phyllis Hollander in honor of the Yahrtzeits of Larry's father, Stanley Hollander (Shmeril ben Yisroel), on Cheshvan 25 10/22/02 and the 20th Yartzeit of Rabbi Meir Kahane (Meir Dovid ben Yechezkal), who was assasinated on the 18th of cheshvan 5751.
Larry and Phyliss Hollander
Click here to let us know if you'd like to sponsor a kiddush.
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 |
BIRTHDAYS
Matthew Joseph Farhadian 10/23
David Weiner 10/24
Davida Harris 10/25
Ellen Savran 10/28
ANNIVERSARIES
George Kalinsky & June Azoulay 10/25
Dr. & Mrs. Robert Spatz 10/26
Mr. & Mrs. V. Hovanec 10/28
YARTZEITS
Evelyn Klat, observed by Alan and Peggy Klat, Cheshvan 19 - 10/27
Rahmatollah Kohannim (Rachamim ben Yehuda), observed by Mr. & Mrs Mehrdad Kohanim and Manny & Mojdeh Malekan, Cheshvan 19 - 10/27
Victor Gotbaum, observed by Mr. & Mrs. Russell Burman, Cheshvan 21 - 10/29
We honor the first Yartzeit of a dear friend of Chabad, Stanley Ross (Sender ben Fishel), on the 20th of Chesvan.
As we remember Stanley on his first Yartzeit, we dedicate a memorial plaque to him on the new Salzbank Family memorial board.
We mark the Yartzeit of Mark Lancberg (Meir Zev ben Yehuda Aryeh), Father of Karen Salzbank on the 16th of Cheshvan.
Alan and Karen Salzbank
|
|
|
|
 |
 |
* PATRONIZE OUR SPONSORS *
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
 |
This Week @ www.ChabadPW.org |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
Chabad-Lubavitch News from Around the World |
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
the parshah in a nutshell |
 |
|
|
ParshatVayeira
G‑d reveals Himself to Abraham three days after the first Jew's circumcision at age 99; but Abraham rushes off to prepare a meal for three guests who appear in the desert heat. One of the three — who are angels disguised as men — announces that, in exactly one year, the barren Sarah will give birth to a son. Sarah laughs.
Abraham pleads with G‑d to spare the wicked city of Sodom. Two of the three disguised angels arrive in the doomed city, where Abraham's nephew, Lot, extends his hospitality to them and protects them from the evil intentions of a Sodomite mob. The two guests reveal that they have come to overturn the place, and to save Lot and his family. Lot's wife turns into a pillar of salt when she disobeys the command not to look back at the burning city as they flee.
While taking shelter in a cave, Lot's two daughters (believing that they and their father are the only ones left alive in the world) get their father drunk, lie with him, and become pregnant. The two sons born from this incident father the nations of Moab and Amon.
Abraham moves to Gerar, where the Philistine king Avimelech takes Sarah — who is presented as Abraham's sister — to his palace. In a dream, G‑d warns Avimelech that he will die unless he returns the woman to her husband. Abraham explains that he feared he would be killed over the beautiful Sarah.
G‑d remembers His promise to Sarah and gives her and Abraham a son, who is named Isaac (Yitzchak, meaning "will laugh"). Isaac is circumcised at the age of eight days; Abraham is 100 years old, and Sarah 90, at their child's birth.
Hagar and Ishmael are banished from Abraham's home and wander in the desert; G‑d hears the cry of the dying lad and saves his life by showing his mother a well. Avimelech makes a treaty with Abraham at Be'er Sheva, where Abraham gives him seven sheep as a sign of their truce.
G‑d tests Abraham's devotion by commanding him to sacrifice Isaac on Mount Moriah (the Temple Mount) in Jerusalem. Isaac is bound and placed on the altar, and Abraham raises the knife to slaughter his son. A voice from heaven calls to stop him; a ram, caught in the undergrowth by its horns, is offered in Isaac's place. Abraham receives the news of the birth of a daughter, Rebecca, to his nephew Bethuel.
|
|
|
 This email is sent from Chabad of Port Washington. If you do not wish to receive such emails in the future, please let us know.
Select content and graphics copyright Chabad-Lubavitch Media Center (www.chabad.org). |
|
|
