Lessons for the soul

Kabbalah, the ancient Jewish mystical tradition that has captivated Madonna and Britney Spears and spawned accoutrements such as red bracelets that ward off evil, is coming to St. Petersburg.

But don’t expect the faddish Kabbalah of the stars. This version of the ancient teaching is rooted in the Orthodox Chabad Lubavitch movement and is being brought to St. Petersburg by Australian author and lecturer Rabbi Laibl Wolf. Wolf, who lectures on the topic around the world and travels to about 80 cities a year, will speak at a St. Petersburg synagogue on Nov. 14.

Kahane Activist Linked to Bomb Plot Killed in Prison

A Jewish Defense League activist imprisoned for his role in a plot to bomb a California mosque and the office of a Lebanese-American congressman was killed at a federal prison in Phoenix, an FBI spokesman said Saturday.

Earl Krugel, 62, was killed in an assault Friday evening at the Federal Correctional Institution, said FBI agent Richard Murray.

Murray wouldn’t release further details but said federal authorities had opened a homicide investigation.

Krugel’s wife, Lola, said FBI investigators told her an inmate had struck her husband on the head from behind with a cement block.

Ushpizin

The current ‘hot favourite’ Israeli film is called ‘Ushpizin’. Ushpizin is an Aramaic word for ‘guest’ and the verb means ‘to host’. The film is made and acted by two formerly secular actors, now married and converted to religion in a very serious way.

The plot is about a childless couple of ‘returnees’ to religion who have adopted the Bratslav version of Chassidic Orthodoxy that was founded by the early nineteenth century Hassidic master Rebbi Nachman of Bratslav.

He is the known for his stories and aphorisms. Amongst them are, ‘It is obligatory to be in a state of spiritual joy all day long,’ and, ‘This world is like a very narrow bridge and the most important thing is not to be afraid.’ After he died in his late thirties, they never appointed another rebbe. As a result the Bratslaver Chassidim were known as the ‘Toiter Chassidim’ the ‘Dead Chassidim.’

Mayor Spends Final Days Of Campaign Courting Democratic Voters

Newscast of this story.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg may be a Republican, but he’s campaigning heavily in Democratic rich areas, and he’s finding it’s not so hostile territory.

The Republican incumbent didn’t spend Friday on Staten Island or other Republican rich areas like Middle Village, Queens – he went straight into Democratic territory. In order to win, he’ll need them to cross party lines come Tuesday.

At subway stops, he pressed the flesh in Crown Heights and Park Slope with Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz. Then he appeared at a senior center in Bushwick with his Latino supporters, salsa star Willie Colon and City Councilwoman Margarita Lopez.

New Uncertainty About Democrats Holding Seat in Assembly

In a typical local election in Crown Heights and Flatbush, Brooklyn, there is little for the Democratic candidate to worry about. But this year’s special election for a vacant Assembly seat is far from the typical election contest.

For one thing, the special election is to fill the remainder of the term of Clarence Norman Jr., who was found guilty in September of soliciting illegal campaign contributions. Because of his conviction on various felony counts, Mr. Norman, who also led the Brooklyn Democratic Party for 15 years, was required to vacate both his position as the borough’s Democratic leader and his Assembly seat.

‘The Shluchim’ Movie to be Translated to English

A generous donor, who wished to remain incognito, decided to fund the translation of the ‘Shluchim’ show that was broadcasted on channel 1 of the Israeli T.V. a half a year ago. The video is mostly in Hebrew and therefore many shluchim asked producers, the management of the Israeli T.V. , the division of heritage programs and producer Eitai Rappaport that English translation be made to benefit many non-Hebrew speakers.

At this time, independent producers in Israel are examining several possibilities to distribute the translated version which would be available, perhaps, by the next Kinus Hashluchim. Producer, Eitai Rappaport said he heard about this but cannot confirm it.

Psychiatrist’s Legacy Continues the Search for Meaning in Life

A century after the birth of Viktor E. Frankl – who spent three years in four Nazi deaths camps, and used his experiences to transform psychotherapy into a discipline that encouraged patients to resist despair and embrace life – proponents of his ideas are using his approach for everything from treating terminally-ill cancer patients to improving workplace dynamics.

This was the central theme running through an Oct. 30 conference held at the University of Pennsylvania that celebrated the life of Frankl, an Austrian-born Jew who died in 1997 at the age of 92. He would have turned 100 this past March.

Some Florida residents in the dark after the ravages of Hurricane Wilma

Thousands of elderly Florida residents, including many elderly Jews, were still without power this week as a result of Hurricane Wilma.

Last Friday, most Florida Power and Light customers were still without electricity, rendering hurricane cleanup and Shabbat preparations arduous.

The disruptions from Wilma, which swept through the region on Oct. 24, were just the latest from a storm that hindered Sukkot celebrations through South Florida, a region densely populated with Jews.

Chabad class to explore modern relevance of Holocaust

People all over the world are signing up for a six-week class that is defined more by what it is not than what it is. It’s not a history, not an explanation, not about the pain and suffering, organizers say. Rather, it’s a “journey into the intense realm of meaning.”

“Beyond Never Again: The Holocaust —- A View From the Soul” explores the ways in which the Nazis’ concerted effort to obliterate European Jewry during World War II affects this generation.

“We know what happened,” said Rabbi Yossi Bryski, who will conduct the series of classes at the Chabad Educational Center in Scripps Ranch, “We know how it happened. We know the numbers. We know about the bad guys. We know about the good guys. What we don’t know is —- where was God?”

Chabad Lubavitch to Thank Pair for Their Helping Hands

Chabad Lubavitch of Northwest Connecticut gets plenty of help in its mission of spreading the word about the richness of the Jewish faith and culture, and two of its most valuable advocates will reap the dividends of doing good deeds in the form of being honored at the organization’s third-annual Community Awards Dinner Sunday.

Attorney Norman Drubner of Washington is to be recognized as Man of the Year for his continuous contributions to the organization, and Charles “Chic” Frosch of Brookfield, president of Union Savings Bank in Danbury, is to be honored with a Community Service Award for the bank’s ongoing support of the Jewish Fest, the organization’s largest annual event.

Chabad on campus: A haven for students
…a question mark for Hillel

It was 11 p.m. on a Friday night in mid-September and Pam Newman had just finished enjoying the weekly Shabbat meal with 80 or so students at the Hillel House on the campus of UConn at Storrs. Then Newman, the organization’s director, gathered up a bunch of students and headed over to the school’s new Chabad@UCONN outpost just, as she put it, “to hang out and say hello.” As Newman was leaving Chabad at 12:30 a.m., another group of students was arriving. The next morning Rabbi Shlomo Hecht, the new executive director of Chabad@UCONN, joined the Hillel House minyan, then returned again in the evening for the community Havdalah service.

And that’s the way it’s been ever since Hecht, his wife and two young sons, arrived in Storrs this past summer, and Hillel students helped them move in: Hillel students bake challahs on Thursday night and send a couple over to Chabad for Shabbat. Hecht goes food shopping in Brooklyn’s Crown Heights, and picks up a few things for Hillel, too. The two Jewish groups ran separate programs for the holidays…but came together for a blow-out Simchat Torah celebration n as they did last year for Purim when Rabbi Yosef Wolvovsky of Chabad East of the River ran the program.

Bloomberg’s Comfort Level

Jews poised to become the mayor’s biggest ethnic bloc, while Ferrer faces uphill battle.

It should have been no surprise that Mayor Michael Bloomberg chose to make his first campaign appearance with his predecessor, Rudolph Giuliani, at a breakfast to which more than 1,000 Jews had been invited at the Hyatt last Friday.

By packing the room with Jews, a great number of them Orthodox, Bloomberg was assured a hearty and enthusiastic response from a crowd that was enamored of him and his fellow Republican and erstwhile chief executive.

UN establishes annual Holocaust Day

The 191-member U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday established January 27 as an annual commemoration day for the 6 million Jews and countless other victims murdered in the Nazi Holocaust during World War Two.

The watershed resolution, agreed to by acclamation after two days of speeches, is aimed at making the new “International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust” a symbol against genocide for future generations.

“I feel moved and privileged to present this historic resolution today, as an Israeli, a Jew, a human being and the child of Holocaust victims,” Israel’s U.N. ambassador, Dan Gillerman, said in introducing the measure.

Now that there’s a Sanhedrin, who needs the Supreme Court?

When the “new Sanhedrin” was established in Tiberias a year ago, hardly anyone took it seriously. The 71 rabbis who came to the northern city 1,660 years after the original Sanhedrin (the assembly of 71 ordained scholars that was both supreme court and legislature in Talmudic times) held its last meeting there, were welcomed by many in the Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox sectors with smiles tinged with derision.

The declaration of the Sanhedrin’s reestablishment was perceived as both a curiosity on the margins of the right and as a rebellion against halakhic conventions; as a perhaps daring step, but one that was also a warning; far-reaching, but to a large extent provocative.

Info To Be Menachem Avel Meyer Eichler, Bella Levin & Dvorah Lifshitz

R. Meyer Eichler – CH, Bella Levin – CH and Dvorah Lifshitz – CH are sitting Shiva after the passing of their father R. Tzvi Eichler OBM.

They will be sitting in Meyer Eichlers house at 702 Eastern Pkwy. on the corner of Brooklyn Ave. and the phone number there is (718) 756-6060

Shachris on Friday will be at 8:00am and Mincha at 1:00pm.

Shachris on Sunday-Tuesday is at 7:15am and Mincha at 4:15pm and Maariv 7:30pm

Wednesday they are getting up from Shiva and Shacharis will be Davend at 7:15am.

Mrs. Clinton Plans a Trip to Israel to Discuss Security With Sharon and His Aides

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s aides said on Wednesday that she was planning to go to Israel next week to discuss American-Israeli relations, in a trip that may help her strengthen her support among Jews in New York as she faces re-election next year.

The visit by Mrs. Clinton, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, will include meetings on security issues with top Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Shimon Peres, the deputy prime minister. In her meeting with Mr. Sharon, Mrs. Clinton plans to discuss developments stemming from Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza and to reiterate her condemnation of remarks made by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran calling for the destruction of Israel.