Light from the Future: Parshas Vayishlach

1. Vayishlach – Being Alone and the Lone Jug of Oil When you are all alone in your struggle for good, you are not truly alone. There is a G-dly flame that burns in the heart of every Jew that…
2. Vayishlach – Don’t Lose Your Staff When we start to strengthen our trust, the forces of evil and negativity look for our vulnerable spaces hoping to drag us down even more. They find…
3. Vayishlach – Humility When a person is exposed to something so much greater than himself, it engenders a natural sense of insignificance and humility. When a relatively…
4. Vayishlach – In Transit During the brief “intermission” between levels and worlds, the souls of the righteous become disoriented. In the words of Kabbalah, they then are…
5. Vayishlach – In Unity There Is No Fear Instead of understanding the division of Jacob’s entourage into two camps as a consequence of fear, the Chassidic translation reverses it. Jacob’s…
6. Vayishlach – Is This How We Celebrate a Bar Mitzvah?! The lesson for a Bar and Bas Mitzvah, the day a Jewish boy or girl is initiated into the Jewish community, is that a Jew has to feel an intense sense…
7. Vayishlach – Moshiach for Dummies and Beyond It is axiomatic in Judaism that a Jew must not only believe in Moshiach’s coming but he or she must also yearn for and eagerly anticipate it. We must…
8. Vayishlach – Name Dropping The preference Jacob had for the name Benjamin-Son of the South (Israel) over Rachel's’ choice, Ben Oni-the Son of My Pain, for their last son,…
9. Vayishlach – Preparations for Moshiach We cannot allow the temptations and compromises of Galus to gain mastery over us. This is a continuing struggle and we cannot go into it with our eyes…
10. Vayishlach – Reprogramming Sometimes the threat to our existence comes from the right; sometimes from the left. Sometimes it comes from secularists and sometimes from religious…
11. Vayishlach – Returning with Light and Joy The ultimate goal of Teshuvah, of return to G-d is “good deeds.” The process of Teshuvah should not engender a desire to escape reality and…
12. Vayishlach – Self Respect We are witness to unprecedented, almost universal, opposition to our rights to the Land of Israel, coming not only from our most implacable enemies in…
13. Vayishlach – The Three Instruments of Perfection Contrary to the popular myth that Jews are pacifists and do not believe in self-defense, Jewish law, as stated in the Talmud, makes it clear, “One who…
14. Vayishlach – The World of Otherness Perhaps, Jacob’s fear of fighting with Esau was that if he acquired some negative traits as a consequence of his need to engage in violence it would…
15. Vayishlach – The Wrestlers We have instruments that G-d put at our disposal, such as the internet, fax machines, computers etc. Some view these technological marvels as the…
16. Vayishlach – Torah Power When a person is alive, even if it is a day old, it has the capacity to instill fear in the animal. When a person loses his or her appreciation for…
17. Vayishlach – Trust in Trust There is a famous adage stated by the third Chabad Rebbe; known as the Tzemach Tzedek that echoes this idea: “Think positive and it will be positive.”
18. Vayishlach – We Envy You! The Alter Rebbe referred to Moses’ vaunted praise as the most humble man on the face of the earth and asked: How could Moses be so humble when he knew…
19. Vayishlach – When Was the Last Time You Rode Your Donkey? Most material acquisitions are made by people who subordinate themselves to their material possessions; they crave them, they cherish them, they live…
20. Vayishlach – Wholly, Wholly, Wholly One might have reached the erroneous conclusion that there is some good in suffering because of the heroic responses that it elicits. The Torah, by…
21. Vayishlach – Wrestling There are times in our lives that we stand alone; we feel isolated and lonely. This is not all bad. When we do not have others to look at and interact…

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