Divrei Chaim

This has nothing to do with this week’s parsha, but I saw it recently and it’s a great hesber, so I’ll write it down now and label it and ...

Ramban writes that the Torah uses the term “kohanim,” as opposed to just saying “bnei Aharo,” when discussing the prohibition of tumas koh...

The Chidushei HaRI”M teaches that every single person has a special chein , some special quality that makes him/her beloved, in the eyes o...

The Netziv points out that the punishment of the mekalel was carried out with the participation of the witnesses as well as Beis Din (24:...

You know world has forgotten you when you don’t even get your own Wikipedia entry.   R’ Moshe Avigdor Amiel, who I mentioned yesterday, wa...

Rav Moshe Avigdor Amiel in his sefer " L’Nevochei HaTekufa " writes that there are two different ways that one can come to recog...

One of the explanations of the name “Adam” is that it is a combination of “ aleph ,” representing the “ Alufo shel olam ,” the singular pr...

1) Rashi interprets “kedoshim te’hiyu” to mean “perushim min ha’arayos u’min ha’aveira.”   Ramban argues that Rashi cannot be right, as his ...

According to Midrash the pasuk uses the singular tense, “V aYikchu ish machtaso… ” in describing the actions of Nadav and Avihu because “ lo...

Someone pointed out to me a post on a  shul website in which the rabbi  addressed the same Ramban I mentioned in Sunday’s post about the i...

Ramban (Tazri'a 13:47) writes that the punishment of tzara'as described in Parshas Tazri'a was a miraculous manifestation of Has...

My daughter asked why is it that the tumas hayoledes for a girl baby is twice the length of that for a boy baby (2 weeks of tumah followed b...

The punishment of tzara’as is the result of the sin of slander and gossip.  We all know the famous pasuk in Tehillim, “ Mi ha’ish hachofte...

A few nights ago our community had the privilege of hosting R’ Warren Goldstein, the Chief Rabbi of South Africa.  One of the points he ma...

“Rosheich alay k’Karmel v’dalas roseich k‘argaman… ” (Shir haShirim 7:6) taken literally is a description of the beauty of someone's h...

The gemara (Sota 39) writes that R’ Elazar ben Shamu’a attributed his longevity to the fact that he never duchened without first saying a ...

M’inyan l’inyan from Yom Tov to the parsha: The Sha’arei Teshuva at the end of O.C. 495 quotes a machlokes achronim whether a kohen who c...

The Sefas Emes explains that we hide part of the afikoman, tzafun=hidden, because not all of the geulah was revealed during yetzi’as Mitzr...

On Shabbos Chol haMoed, both of Pesach and Sukkos, we lein from Parshas Ki Tisa beginning from Moshe's statement/complaint (33:12):  ר...

  I have not really started to look at the haggadah, but a thought occurred to me regarding the response to the ben rasha.  First of all, ...