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Rabbi Yehuda {Leonard} Blank MS, BCC
Vice President of Professional Development and External Affairs
Chair of the Chaplaincy Commission
Rabbinical Alliance of America/Igud HaRabbonim
917-446-2126  rablenblank@gmail.com
**August 22, 2024, Av 18, 5784**
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“To Be a Jew –   Faith and hope in challenging times.”

“We are one family.”

“The Torah Unites Us”

“Agents of Hope.”

Being a proud Zhid.

How to greet our fellow human beings as a chaplain
or in our neighborhood.

We must not give up having hope.

Nafshi Sidrom
K’afar
Pesach Libi Besorasecha

“ Yehi Leratzon Imrei Fi Vehegyon Libi Lefanecha H Tzuri Vegoali.”

The doctor who gave his patient an extra 6 months.

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PLEASE CLICK ON THE BOTTOM LINKS FOR A CHAPLAINCY POSITION,
AND THE JEWISH BIOETHICS CERTIFICATE PROGRAM FROM YU RIETS

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Rabbi Jonathan Sacks
To Be a Jew
Faith and hope in challenging times.
“We Are One Family”

Page 25

By Sivan Rahav-Meir. “The Rabbi Sacks Legacy booklet. Distributed in the Hamodia newspaper Friday August 15, 2024. Explore the digital archive, containing much of Rabbi Sack’s writings, broadcasts and speeches, at www.rabbisacks.org” Page 25 “It was the sense of family that kept Jews linked in a web of mutual obligation despite the fact that they were scattered across the world. Does it still exist? Sometimes the division in the Jewish world go so deep, and the insults hurled by one group against another are so brutal that one could almost be persuaded that it does not.
In the 1950’s Martin Buber expressed the belief that the Jewish people in the traditional sense no longer existed. Knesset Yisrael, the covenantal people as a single entity before G, was no more. The divisions between Jews, religious and secular, Orthodox and non-Orthodox, Zionist and non-Zionist, had he thought, fragmented the people beyond hope and repair.
Yet that conclusion is premature for precisely the reason that makes family so elemental a bond. Argue with your friend and tomorrow he may no longer be your friend, but argue with your brother and tomorrow he is still your brother.” (Rabbi Sacks, Studies in Spirituality, p164).

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Rabbi Jonathan Sacks
To Be a Jew
Faith and hope in challenging times.
“The Torah Unites Us”

Page 30

“Jews were dispersed throughout the world, they were not part of the same political jurisdiction, but they continued to see themselves as a single nation, a distintive group, often more closely linked to other Jews throughout the world than to the peoples among whom they lived.
They did not share the same culture. While Rashi and the Tosafists were living in Christian France, Maimonides inhabited an Islamic culture, first in Spain, then in Egypt. Nor were their fates the same at any given time. While North European Jewry was suffering massacres during the First Crusade, Spanish Jewry was enjoying the golden age. While the Jews of Spain were experiencing the trauma of expulsion, the Jews of Poland were thriving in a rare moment of tolerance.
They did not use the same language of everyday speech. Ashkenazi Jews spoke Yiddish, Spanish and Portuguese Jews spoke Ladino, and there were as many as twenty-five other vernaculars, among them Judeo-Arabic, Judeo-Slavic, Judeo-Yazdi, Judeo-Shirazi, Judeo-Esfahani and Judeo-Marathi, as well as Yevanic, a form of Judeo-Greek. Nothing united them at all- nothing, that is, that would normally constitute nationhood.
What united them? Rav Sadia Gaon in the tenth century gave the answer. ‘Our nation is only a nation in virtue of its religious laws.’ Wherever Jews were, they kept the same commandments, studied the same sacred texts, observed the same Sabbaths and fast days, and said essentially the same prayers in the same holy language.
They even faced the same spot while doing so. Jerusalem where the Temple once stood and where the Divine presence was still held to have it s earthly habitation. These invisible strands of connection sustained them in a bond of collective belonging that had no parallel among any other national grouping. Some feared this, others respected it, but no one doubted that Jews were different. Haman said so in the book of Esther. There is one people, scattered and divided among the peoples, whose laws are different from all others’ (Esther 3.8)
That is the paradox. In their own land, the place where every other nation is to some degree united, Jews were split beyond repair. In dispersion, where every other nation has assimilated and disappeared, they remained distinctive and, in essentials at least united.”

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks
To Be a Jew
Faith and hope in challenging times.
“Jewish Continuity”

Pages 31, 32

 There are [problems] from within. There is the crisis of Jewish continuity. Throughout the Diaspora on average one in two young Jews is, throughout marriage, assimilation or disaffiliation, choosing not to continue the Jewish story, to be the last leaf on a tree that has lasted for four thousand years.
One episode, told by a rabbinical colleague, has lingered in my mind. It took place in Russia in the early 1990’s, following the collapse of communism. For the first time in seventy years, Jews were free to live openly as Jews, but at the same time antisemitic attitudes, long suppressed, also came to the surface.
A British rabbi had gone there to help with the reconstruction of Jewish life and was one day visited by a young lady in distress. “All my life,” she said, “I hid the fact that I was a Jew and no one ever commented on my Jewishness. Now, though, when I walk past, my neighbors mutter Zhid [Jew}. What shall I do?” The rabbi replied, “If you had not told me you were Jewish, I would never have known. But with my hat and beard, no one could miss the fact that I am a Jew. Yet, in all the months I have been here, no one has shouted Zhid at me. Why do you think that is?” The girl was silent for a moment and then said, “Because they know that if they shout Zhid at me, I will take it as an insult, but if they shout Zhid at you, you will take it as a compliment.”
That is a deep insight. Beyond eternal vigilance, the best way for Jews to combat antisemitism is to wear their identity with pride.” (ibid p108).

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks
To Be a Jew
Faith and hope in challenging times.
“Agents of Hope”

Page 34

To be a Jew is to be an agent of hope. Every ritual, every command, every syllable of the Jewish story is a protest against escapism, resignation and the blind acceptance of fate. Judaism, the religion of the free G, is a religion of freedom. Jewish faith is written in the future tense. It is belief in a future that is not yet but could be, if we heed G’s call, obey His will, and act together as a covenantal community. The name of the Jewish future is hope. Somehow, in a way I find mysterious and moving, the Jewish people wrote a story of hope that has the power to inspire all who dare to believe that injustice and brutality are not the final word about the human condition, that faith can be more powerful than empires, that love given is not in vain, that ideals are not illusions to give us comfort, but candles to light our way along  winding road in the dark night without giving way to fear or losing a sense of direction.” (ibid p 250).
Why has antisemitism shown its ugly head in so many ways and in so many places on this planet of ours including our very own backyard? That topic would take many pages to fill of which I am not going to discuss here and now. However more of our fellow Jews are uniting as one family and proudly displaying their Jewish stars/ Magen Dovids, their yarmulkas/kippas, and many their tzitzis. Though there are many who do not outwardly display that they are Jewish they sure are not keeping their Jewish identity a secret. This has been a challenging and difficult situation at colleges and universities in many parts of our country with persecution of Jewish students. Yet more and more Jews are standing strong and steadfast. Nevertheless, we must not forget our heritage and our Torah. However, as I have mentioned in previous times, there are many who are not of the Jewish faith who are caring, sympathetic and very respectful and do not agree with being hurtful of those who are Jewish. In my own neighborhood I have met so many who greet me or reciprocate my greetings. When I would go for a walk with my wife a”h and be greeted and greet others, she would jokingly ask me, “Yehuda, are you running for office?  Of course, I would reciprocate when she also greeted and was greeted by others.  In all of my professional positions, there were constant opportunities of making a kiddush H which continues to this day. The same enthusiasm in finding good in every person continues. There are Jewish chaplains, or I should also say, chaplains who are Jewish from diverse backgrounds helping Jews of all backgrounds wherever they may be. Today these wonderful and caring men and women chaplains offer care to everyone with sincere enthusiasm.  A question is often asked what chaplains who are Jewish do when a person is of another religion. In such cases a clergy of that person’s religion is requested. All professional chaplains are trained and educated on how to care for all men, women and children.
Our Torah and our sages throughout the centuries have helped keep Klal Yisrael together in difficult and trying times. Rabbi Sacks zt”l has clearly shared the important views of our Jewish nation in his many speeches and writings.
We must not give up hope. Our mission is sharing encouragement, support, kindness, and being sincere to all who we minister to. There are all kinds of hope even for those at the end stages of life.  There all types of hope and inspirations chaplains give even to those who are incarcerated in prison. 

NO KNOWN AUTHOR

(Given to me in my earlier years of chaplaincy)

HOPE

“Hope looks for the good in people
instead of harping on the worst.

Hope opens doors where despair
closes them.

Hope discovers what can be done instead of
grumbling about what cannot.

Hope draws its power from a deep trust
In G and the basic goodness
of human nature.

Hope “lights a candle” instead of
“cursing the darkness.”

Hope regards problems, small or large,
as opportunities.

Hope cherishes no illusions, nor does it yield
to cynicism.

Hope sets big goals and is not frustrated
by repeated difficulties or setbacks.

Hope pushes ahead when it would be
easy to quit.

Hope puts up with modest gains,
realizing that “the longest journey
starts with one step.

Hope accepts misunderstandings
as the price for serving
the greater good of others.

Hope is a good loser because
it has the divine assurance
of final victory.”

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From: Artscroll Siddur
The Schottenstein Edition
Mesorah Publication Limited Edition Ltd.

Nafshi Sidrom K’afar : “Let my soul be silent like dust. We should ignore barbs and insults, because the less a person cares about his prestige, the less he will let selfishness interfere with his service of G and his efforts at self-improvement (Ruach Chaim).

Pesach Libi Besorasecha: Open my heart to Your Torah. Our goal is to serve G in a positive manner by studying Torah and fulfilling its commandments (Abudraham).”

“Yehi Leratzon Imrei Fi Vehegyon Libi Lefanecha H Tzuri Vegoali.”                 

May they find favor the expressions of my mouth and the thoughts of my heart before You, H, my rock and my Redeemer.”           

May we continue to be mezake Klal Yisrael. May we all be a beacon of light and a source of hope for those in their time of need. 

Sincerely, Rabbi Yehuda Blank           

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A doctor recently gave one of his patients only six months to live.
When the patient didn’t pay his bill on time, the doctor gave him another six months to live.