A book doesn’t have to be long for it to have a lifelong impact. A single spark of insight is all it takes. Experience a Sinai Live moment:
by Rabbi Joseph Telushkin
by Rabbi Benjamin Blech
The rabbis of the Talmud expressed a very daring concept: human beings are greater than Angels.
How can that possibly be? Angels are perfect while human beings often fall short of their spiritual obligations?
The answer is simple: Angels are perfect because they have no choice. They are basically robots, fulfilling their divine missions as automatons. They deserve no credit for doing what they are pre-programmed to do.
Human beings are different. We have been given free will. That makes our sins possible but also turns our good deeds into noble achievements, the results of our free-willed choice to overcome the seductive call of our baser instincts. Free choice is why God in the Bible says to every one of us, “Behold, I give before you life or death, good and evil. Choose life.”
You have the ability to choose – and that’s what makes you greater than Angels.
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by Rabbi DovBer Pinson
The dynamics of prayer has multiple levels. Prayer can be a petition, where you are asking for something. Prayer can be a connection, where you are trying to connect with something larger than yourself. Prayer can be praise, where you are swept away by a sense of awe and gratitude, and you just want to sing praises to the Creator.
An interesting thing about prayer is that if you want to make your prayers more meaningful, you have to surrender all ‘understandings’ about prayer. This means that when you pray, you should pray like a child. You can be very complex and interesting when you are trying to understand things, but that should all be prior to the actual act of prayer. Once you pray, there should simplicity in your prayer. Think to yourself that you are just connecting, even if you don’t understand why or how.
There is an image that I have one of my children. He walks into a room and just says, “Tati.” I turn to him and say, “What do you want?” And he does not say anything. He just turns around and walks out of the room. I realize that this is prayer. My child did not want anything from me. He just wanted to know that I was there. This is prayer.
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