Rabbi Levin's Blog

We are not defined by our suffering.  We are a people with a mission and a purpose that defines us, despite our suffering.  We are still in the Shiva period for the beautiful Jewish souls who were wiped out, along with all their future generations, by people who don’t deserve to be described as such.  The world witnessed it.  We all witnessed it and we grieve.  We grieve for the holy martyrs who sanctified Hashem’s name, we grieve with their families who are suddenly left without their loved ones in such a cruel and horrific way. May Hashem avenge their blood.  And we pray for the wounded and the traumatized, and all good people around the world. But we are not defined by our suffering.  Our mission is to bring light, and that is what we continue to do, proudly and without fear.  That is the spirit that has kept us going through the ages facing monsters of all types.  It is gratifying and quite remarkable, though not surprising, that public M...

  It’s almost Chanukah!  What a beautiful, inspiring and enlightening holiday this is!  And no, it’s not just an alternative winter holiday.  Chanukah is a uniquely Jewish celebration with a global message, marking the victory of the faithful to Torah against those who tried to secularize Jewish life, and sending a powerful message of religious freedom. The threat against the Jews from the Greeks was not a physical one, at least that was not the original intent.  They had taken control of Israel and occupied the Temple, but their goal was not to commit physical genocide like Hamas and their supporters around the world.  They wanted to show the superiority of their culture, their “moral path” and their “superior” intellectual teachings.  And like all good people who can’t win an argument, they would make the Jews accept the truth of their views by force. The Greeks did not care if the Jews studied their books along with the Greek books, or if they follo...

What happens to us in this world is a reflection of the spiritual worlds above.  This is a fundamental belief of Judaism.  Nothing is random.  Hashem is constantly creating the world, and Hashem’s energy is the life-force of everything.  It follows that whatever is happening around us is happening for a purpose.  Just as our purpose in life is to make a home for Hashem in this world by doing Mitzvot and acts of goodness and kindness, the purpose of all events that happen around us are in order for us to fulfill this purpose. This belief was evident in Rabbi Schneur Zalman’s attitude when he was arrested on suspicion of treason in Russia in the year 1798.  Here was the most revered, saintly and scholarly Jewish leader in his generation, and one of the foremost influencers of Judaism of all time, being carried away in a black wagon reserved for capital criminals. He had been slandered to the Czarist government by a fellow Jew who didn’t agree with his philoso...