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Did you say the ‘Nasi’ Today? (Yom Beis)

From the Safer Haminhagim: [Every day from Rosh Chodesh Nissan until the twelfth of the month, usually after Shacharis,] one reads the passage [from Bamidbar 7-8:4] that describes the offering brought on that day by a particular Nasi, or tribal prince, for the dedication of the altar of the Mishkan. [In common parlance, each day’s passage itself is often referred to as “the Nasi.”] This daily reading is followed by the prayer which opens with the words yehi ratzon (and which appears in Siddur Torah Or [as well as in Siddur Tehillat HaShem, p. 371]). This prayer is recited even by a Kohen or a Levi [despite its seeming relevance only to tribes other than the Tribe of Levi]. [284]

Jews of Color Find Home at Chabad School

J Weekly

Left: Director Miriam Ferris, student LaTanya Hutchinson and teacher Rabbi Levi Welton. Right: Shalom Dovber Ferris offers assistance to Jeremiah Hutchinson and Daniel Nunoo.

Sunday morning at 10 a.m., six pre-teens in the Hebrew school class at Chabad of the East Bay in Berkeley, CA are taking their seats around a long table. As Rabbi Levi Welton asks for a volunteer to go fetch tallits for the morning prayers, an observer is struck by one thing: For an Orthodox Hebrew school, this is a remarkably multicultural bunch.

Lessons in Education: Why Parents Need to Be Honest

Rabbi Nochum Kaplan continues his discussion of effective praise. The litmus test of a compliment and successful praise is whether or not it encourages and stimulates the recipient in a positive way. It should spurn continued effort and dedication and lead to continued growth and development, he maintains. The best form of praise gets children to think about their behavior and determine what’s right and understand how to do it.

The Relationship School

by David Brooks – New York Times

Usually when you visit a school you walk down a quiet hallway and peer in the little windows in the classroom doors. You see one teacher talking to a bunch of students. Every 50 minutes or so a chime goes off and the students fill the hallway and march off to their next class, which is probably unrelated to the one they just left.

Living Torah: Hemshech Ayin Beis, The Series of 1912

The Chasidic discourses from the year 5672 to 5676 (1912–1915) are renowned to Chasidim as ‘Hemshech Ayin Beis — The 5672 Series.’ The Rebbe Rashab invested extraordinary effort into this series, and it contains amazing concepts even compared to those of his legendary ‘Hemshech Samech Vov — The 5666 Series.’

New Engagement!

Mendel Krasnjanski (Melbourne, Australia) and Musha (bas Zalman) Karp (Crown Heights)

L’Chaim Motzai Shabbos at Lubavitcher Yeshiva
570 Crown St [hall entrance on Albany Ave]

Parasha Thought: Raw Thoughts on the Toulouse Massacre

by Rabbi Yossy Gordon

Sholom Aleichem. Some raw thoughts on the Toulouse massacre…

I thought to not start this column with “Sholom Aleichem” because the Jewish People are in an international state of mourning and to mourners one doesn’t extend this greeting. Nazi-like cruelty has been visited upon our people. It is disturbing to read how the murderer perpetrated his evil in cold blood and with an extra effort to make sure his victim didn’t live. One wants to ignore this. It is just too much to bear. But is our discomfort reason enough to make the pain of our brothers and sisters into a mere statistic?